Author's Note: I AM BACK MWAHAHA!... Okay, I am SO sorry for making you guys wait this long again. I honestly didn't intend to take this long, but then exams got in the way and I didn't have the right mind set at the time to balance work and stuff to fit my lifestyle and etc. So yeah, I had to take a long break until voila! I am back to the internet! Rest assured, this story, and apparently I have to repeat this, IS NOT on HIATUS! I really don't wanna do that to this story considering I really hate it when other authors just suddenly ditch most of my favorite stories without even warning their fans, not even MENTIONING that their story would be on Hiatus.

Btw guys, yes, next chapter should be the FINAL chapter on Ice Age 2 before... ICE AGE 3~! FINALLY!

Are you guys also excited? Haha,

Anywhoots!

Let's get on with review replies (ohmigerd, I can't believe you guys still bother to review a stupid author like me! U guys are just the best!):

TimberPaw: Mwahaha! Yes I just did! I am sorry, I'll try to be less mean in the next ones! X3 Aw, it's nice to know that I was missed! Hope u like this chapter!

Yeeeaaah: It was definitely intense, you are right. Aw, thank you so much! Hope u continue to like the story and hope u like this chapter!

JubJub 0250: Good to be back! And thank you, hope u like this chapter!

Shiego627: Hope this was soon enough!

Villains' Bad Girl: ... yeah, about that...

Mfigueiredo334: Haha, boy I can name a couple of stories that are WAY better than mine in the Ice Age fandom, but thanks so much! I really appreciate it! Even if your first language isn't English. ;)

Meangirl8: Here ya go! Haha

Guest: Thank you! Here ya go, another update!

Fallfox46: Aw, thank you so much! Haha, I am pretty sure my story isn't REALLY the best, and I really think I can improve the grammer still, but thank you anyways! Really appreciate it!

By the way! There is another thing I would like to address: although yes, Taura it turns out can say... a word or two, it does not necessarily mean that she can talk now. ... *quickly hide behind a bunker* Don't hate me for this! But I just thought that by removing Taura's silence would be removing a part of what makes Taura...Taura I guess. So, I'll explain how Taura's voice works later on, but keep in mind that her throat (along with her vocal chords) were permanently damaged during the fight against the humans, so it wouldn't really make sense for her to suddenly be able to talk!

'This is it...this...is ACTUALLY happening...'

Taura looked up towards the light streaming through the surface, her mind now fuzzy from the lack of air reaching her systems. Taura barely recognized Kraz as he still floated above her, his head just barely nudging her chin. She barely realized the waves starting to hit her against the cliff walls as she started to drift further and further away from where she last saw Diego. She wondered if she barely even cared that in this very moment...she would die...along with her only living family. Taura as a child grew up with tales told from her den nanny about noble warriors and bloody battles between two dominating packs; in each of the violent stories, there would be that one moment where a saber is just moments away from death and there would be an overzealous description of how he could see his life flashing before his eyes, or he could see a harsh light heading towards him before it finally happened. None of these things ever happened to Taura. All she could do was feel the stinging pain rioting against her nervous system, how her lungs felt like they were collapsing within themselves and how her throat convulsed and choked out dollops of blood into her mouth from the stinging effort of trying to capture Diego's attention. But all the physical trauma was nothing compared to the emotional agony she felt coursing through her chest.

There was guilt. Insufferable measures of it compressing her very torso. Guilt for the pain Diego might feel. Guilt for letting Kraz down and just when they finally reunited. Guilt for not being able to save her own brother. Guilt for leaving the herd like this. Guilt for not being able to help Diego save whomever could be in danger right now. Just ... immeasurable culpability bearing down on her and Taura was sure that if she was above the surface, she would be balling her eyes out like a blubbering baby leopard seal.

There was also longing. Longing to have at least seen her pack again; a longing to at least endeavor into these new found feelings that she's recently been feeling around Diego; a longing to at least live long enough to see how matured her brother has grown, a longing... to remain with her herd once again. It was like as she was sinking further into the water, the dreams she was longing for at the surface were slowly floating away into an unrealistic daydream; and it made her heart feel like it already sank into the deep, pressurizing bottom of the flood way ahead of her. Taura vaguely realized that Kraz was no longer floating above her...in fact, she couldn't see his hulking form anywhere within her vicinity. 'Oh...he must've been dragged off by the current by now...' Taura felt another piece of herself harshly dragged out of her body in one depressing mess. It wasn't that Taura just... gave up. She just couldn't see a way out of this situation now; it was always her and Diego, in one of their ridiculous escapades, finding some obscure way to finally escape at the last minute! ... But Diego wasn't here. And really, she couldn't really see herself doing anything right except by his side. She figured she might as well... just... accept her fate by now...

As she sank lower, she felt another dollop of blood just bubble at the back of her mouth and she instinctively chocked it out, unintentionally letting in another stream of water trickle into her lungs. Taura thought that if the tornado of dark and inconsolable emotions swirling weren't going to kill her first, the collapsing pressure she was feeling in her lungs certainly would. Taura was screeching on the inside for her eyes to stay open, but eventually exhaustion overtook her and her eyelids fluttered shut.

Taura vaguely felt something make a large splashing sound right above her, but by then, her entire reality was already succumbing to darkness.

If Diego wasn't hyperventilating before, he probably was now.

He managed to quickly dive into the water and he stalked his prey, just like Sid told him to (God knows he would never admit it to the sloth though)! The flood waters were rushing up and they were rushing up fast; the tree wasn't able to stay above the surface for long and by the time Diego got one of the possums, Sid and Crash were already sinking below the surface. Diego forced his shivering and aching muscles to claw and kick at the water again and soon enough, he managed to get everyone back up to the surface.

He... He actually did it. Diego stood panting on the rock for a moment. With Sid just barely coming to consciousness next to him and the possums gasping for air while hanging onto each other. Diego didn't know whether he stood there in shock or in the pure disbelief of the fact that he finally went over his fear... just like that! But the panic didn't stop there. Like a feral animal he suddenly snapped his head up and his eyes rapidly shifted to where Taura should've been still clinging on to the cliff side... but she wasn't there. And that could have only meant one...dreadful thing. Oh god, Diego felt like he could have hurled at that very minute.

Suddenly, everything hurt. His heart knifed itself sideways within his chest and caused a harsh, throbbing ache there; it made him feel and intense and excruciating panic within him for reasons he couldn't fully explain. His knees started to shake with a new shot of adrenaline, but from a different source of emotion from which he couldn't describe at the time. Diego let out a primitive roar with eyes set ablaze with fury and determination and before her knew it; the saber lurched towards the cliff side where he last saw Taura and dived into the icy, whirling waters. Within that moment, it was like Diego's mind went into a full shut down. Nothing reached into his head; not the stinging pain of his already aching bones; not the icy piercings of the waves tugging painfully at his fur and legs; there was only the need for air and the need to get to Taura as fast as he could.

As fast as he could, Diego rose to the surface again and fought against the hurling waves like a rabid animal; often letting out a deep and aggressive growl accompanying his heavy pants. Utter desperation and hysteria battled inside of him with such ferocity that he was physically shaking; Diego knew that every second he spent fighting against the current, was a second Taura was kept in danger of hitting another cliff side, or a second where she might drown and end up... Oh God Diego didn't know what he would do if she... And it would be all of his fault! All because of his foolishness, all because he couldn't even pay attention to where Taura and him were going in the geyser fields!

Some deep deep part of his mind must've been confused of his sudden hurl of emotions at the time, Diego was sure of it. After all, it wasn't like Diego didn't feel strongly for Taura as one of his Pack companions and so naturally, he would do anything for no harm to fall upon her. But this... new tsunami of emotions, all hurling within his chest and clutching at his heart almost painfully... this wasn't what one pack member felt for another! At least... not to this extent... It was almost like something within him broke when he saw Taura clutching to that cliff side with both her paws bleeding from the amount of time she had to clutch onto the sharp needles of rock; something snapped and it was almost like nothing mattered anymore. His heart seemed to race so fast it would put a panicked rabbit's to shame; and his mind just shouted and demanded him to get to her, in an annoying and frantic mantra: "save Taura, save Taura, SAVE TAURA, SAVE TAURA SAVE TAURA SAVE TAURASAVETAURASAVETAURA!"

Diego growled to himself and pushed himself a little farther before finally taking a deep breath and plunging into the waters. Just listening to himself whimper made him sick; he was a male saber-tooth! Not some simpering cub sniffling about his dead grandmother and he'll be damned if he let the only female he has ever trusted die on his watch! The outrage that seeped from his very soul seemed to fuel some fire within him and Diego found himself shoveling deeper and deeper into the water; to the point where he could feel his sensitive feline ears starting to collapse!

Just as he was swimming deeper and deeper, Diego suddenly caught sight of a pair of luminous amber orbs staring right into his own. Diego felt a rush of relief flood into him and lifting the entire moon off of his chest! It didn't decrease his speed though; if anything he was now desperately flaying towards Taura now that she was so close! However, a sense of dread started to seep into him as Diego alarmingly shook his head as her eyes started to shut. 'Oh no, no no no NO!" Diego almost yelled at her to not give up, but after accidentally letting out some bubbles, Diego quickly shut his mouth as his eyes started to widen in panic.

Knowing that time was not on his side, Diego quickly took the scruff of what he assumed was Taura's neck (the dark waters not allowing him a wide array of vision this deep) and kicked his legs at one last attempt to the surface, trying to ignore Taura's already shut eyes.

If Taura had been awake, she would have heard Diego's final plea through their mental link; although it sounded like Diego's voice was hoarse with despair and withheld tears, "Come on Taura, wake up! Don't give up on me now... please...don't... d-don't leave me...wake up...please..."

"But what about Manny and Ellie?!"

If Diego thought that finally getting him and Taura out of the flood waters was the extent of their danger, then boy was he wrong. Sid and the possums managed to regain some stability and strength to stand, however Diego could barely lift a paw from how exhausted her was fighting the current. Taura's unshifting brown body was currently lying on her back, her paws flayed around her as if she was frozen mid-swim; as soon as Diego came out of the water, he just flopped himself onto Taura, lying his face directly onto her chest. At any other moment, he would have felt extremely uncomfortable from the weird, intimate position, but Diego was too worried about remembering the procedures to get the water out of her lungs! It wasn't until Crash pointed out that Manny and Ellie were still stuck out that that Diego found himself stuck again in another drastic situation.

Diego looked around where they all stood; from the looks of it, they were on another rocky platform that was a few feet above the raging waves, which meant they were safe for now. But there was no sign of the familiar cave where Ellie was on the horizon; just the entire ice walls leering over them and encasing them with its flood waters, which were steadily rising and reminding Diego that time was yet again not on their side! He was sure though that if they were to move around to other platforms, they should be able to find the cave soon enough!

Diego eventually got off of Taura and shook the water off of his fur, ignoring Sid's whines of discomfort. He looked around his surroundings and assumed his commanding voice, "You guys head towards the last area you saw Manny, just try and scour the place until you find the cave."

Sid and the possums looked nervously between each other, anxiously taking notice of the way Diego said 'you guys' and not 'we'. It was Sid who spoke up first with worry glistening his eyes. "What about you and Taura? You guys can't just stay here!"

Diego set his mouth into a firm line and his brows knitted in frustration, because he knew the sloth was right. If the platform beneath them wasn't eventually going to break down, the flood waters certainly would reach them if they just stayed here. Diego looked down at Taura's unconscious form; her chest barely fluttered into the regular pattern of breathing, reminding Diego of the imminent danger of her water soaked lungs. The absolute fear and dread he felt every time he saw her open mouth take another shuddering breath was so painful it almost made him roar from how hopeless he felt. Diego started to pace around Taura's body, with Sid and the possums watching him with frightened eyes; often glancing nervously at the rising tides as they bit their claws. Maybe Diego could try moving her to another platform temporarily and carry her on his back, but he didn't know if there were any vital parts of her body that was injured and he didn't want to risk further damage! The only way out of it would be to have to try and get the water out of her lungs, get her conscious and just... wing it from there. Diego could have growled from the sheer frustration, but right now, it was the best plan they had.

"Alright, here's the plan," Diego huffed, his eyes snapping to the others, keeping his description brief in order to stay ahead of time. He addressed the possums first with determined and narrowed eyes, who stood to attention as soon as his eyes befell on them, "Crash, Eddie, you two know the location of where the cave would approximately be, so you'll just have to go and try to find Manny somewhere near that area."

Sid's eyes widened from Diego's simple yet dangerous plan, and his mouth stuttered open to try and oppose, but Diego cut him through with a growl. "Sid, you go and follow them and don't even thing about staying behind, 'cause if you don't, then I WILL be chewing on your back this time at the end of all of this." Diego glared at him with bared teeth; Sid's eyes widened even further with panic from the terrifying idea of his friend eating his eyes and quickly shut his mouth.

"And what's gonna happen to you and Taura? What if-YAH!" Crash was about to ask until a giant roaring wave crashed threateningly near their platform, soaking all of the mammals on it and drowning out Crash's question with it's roar. Diego frantically looked around from corner to corner of the platform to find the water rising even quicker than before, making him let out another roaring curse. He quickly turned his head towards the other whimpering and already panicking mammals.

"Look! There's no time to argue, just go find Manny and Ellie! Me and Taura will catch up with you guys!" Diego growled at them and threateningly placed an unsheathed paw towards them and unconsciously placed it protectively in front of Taura's body. The possums looked like they were going to protest, but quickly shook their heads and nodded in determination. Sid still wasn't fully ready to leave them and Diego didn't blame him; after all, he was basically asking him to leave behind his two herd members with little to no chance of survival in order to find the final member, who is probably on a long distance platform far away from the cave by now. And from Sid's tearful gaze towards Taura, it wasn't that hard to guess. The possums however ushered him away and each grabbed a paw on either side before they quickly dragged him away, both brothers giving him a sympathetic gaze.

"C'mon Sid!" Crash yelled over the crashing waves,

"We gotta hurry!" Eddie shouted, before all three of them eventually broke into a sprint. Diego's eyes didn't leave their forms until they turned around the corner of another huge cliff before he finally diverted his attention to Taura. Like a frightened deer, he hurriedly placed both paws on either side of her head so that his body was right on top of hers and gently placed his head on her soft chest. It wasn't much, but Diego definitely heard a small heartbeat.

"Good..." He mentally sighed in relief, "I'm not too late then..." But Diego knew that the danger was still there and so didn't waste time taking action: he removed his paws from the sides of Taura's head and placed them on the center of her chest, careful not to apply too much pressure as his gargantuan paws almost took up her entire chest.

Then, with a steadying, shuddering breath, Diego quickly shoved his paws in an upwards motion into her chest. He suddenly heard a quiet, choking sound so soft that he almost thought he was imagining, but when Diego looked up, he noticed with pure relief that water was steadily dripping out of her mouth. Diego felt his mouth quirk up at the sides from the sight of hope, before he quickly set about placing his paws back in the same position they previously were; he then repeated the motion, but this time with much sharper precision. Diego almost laughed out in relief when he saw Taura suddenly start to blubber and cough out as her eyes suddenly flashed open in panic, water, saliva and... possibly vomit started to cascade out of her mouth and Diego couldn't have felt more relieved... that is until he felt Taura cough another glob of vomit... into his face.

...

"GAH! What the heck Taura?!" Diego exclaimed in disgust, hurriedly rubbing his paw over his face while trying to flick the puke away. Taura however was too busy trying to get back onto her shaking legs steadily, still coughing and heaving uncontrollably. Taura tried to open her eyes from their currently shut tight state, but when she did, all she saw was a blurry image of something beige... Diego? She shook her head and tried to slowly blink open her eyes whilst squinting towards the said male. The world eventually stopped whirling and blending together until finally she managed to see her good old friend Diego, looking down at her with eyes filled with relief, barely contained joy and... something else... that she couldn't really label; possibly concern?

Taura tried to set herself up on two paws and looked around dizzily, "D-Diego? W... what happened? I ... I was drowning, a-and... Kraz almost drowned too and... oh god Kraz..!"

Taura suddenly shot up from her whimpering position, causing Diego to jump back a bit to get out of her way. Taura looked around frantically, remembering how Kraz was suddenly snatched from her by the current when she couldn't hold on any longer. She felt a slow creeping sense of dread creep into her, her eyes already watering from the inevitable. Diego however looked at her in concern and confusion, while trying to steady her by placing his paw on his shoulder.

"Kraz? Taura, what're you talking about?" Diego asked her, trying to catch her frantically moving eyes, until he felt a cold sensation creep into his toes. Diego looked down and realized... their platform was already flooding. Taura started when she felt Diego grab her a bit harder with his claws and she whirled her head towards him with wide panicked eyes... until she caught his calming, hazel ones and she felt her anxiety levels decrease a bit more.

Diego started to leading her away, his eyes staring into hers with a calming yet assertive gaze. "Look Taura, we haven't got much time! The valley's almost flooded and the only chance we've got is to reach Manny and Ellie before the flood waters do!"

Taura shook her head silently, her eyes started to widen again as she glanced down and saw the water levels already reaching her ankle. Diego thought that she was about to panic again, until he saw her shake her head again, only this time as if she was shaking herself out of a stupor. She looked up at him, her amber eyes set in a determined glare and nodded silently towards her friend. Usually Taura would mentally confirm with Diego about his plans, but in these situations, time was short and both sabers knew enough about the other to know which they were going to follow. Both sabers eventually took off at a steady jogging pace along the rocky pathway, before eventually breaking into a sprint. Taura nervously looked down and saw both sides of the path already gushing with flood waters threateningly splashing near her sprinting paws. However, she immediately shot her head up when she heard a familiar voice shout out above the storming winds:

"Manny! Manny look behind you!"

"We're gonna DIIIEEE!"

Our favorite herd were now stuck on one single flat boulder that was already covered in an inch of water, the entire area surrounding them was a giant vast horizon of nothing but deep dark raging blue waters. A sudden crash broke the mammals out of their stupor when they all looked up to find the boat upon the giant cliff side crashing down onto the flood waters, barely staying afloat from all the animals inside it screaming their lungs out with terror and fear. The boat eventually settled as evenly as possibly on the raging waves, resembling more like a giant floating piece of tree bark. However, the same cannot be said for the poor mammals that barely clung onto the boulder, already a few feet under the waters surface. Ellie and Manny were the only two big enough to stay standing on top of the boulder, while everybody else was on top of their backs or trying to climb onto it, like Taura on Diego; who were now both trying to cling on either side of Manny's sides. All of them looked at each other in despair of desperation, praying and silently pleading to each other if this was the end? If this was truly how they would all go?

That is... until a giant CRRRAACKKK! sound echoed around the valley and all the mammals looked up to find a sudden...giant crack on the ice walls... and all of the flood waters steadily sinking away.

Taura and Diego looked at each other with equal amount of shock in both their faces.

"...Da HECK?!"