Chapter 2
“Aniki, you really need to stop with the pining thing.”
From where Madara was sat at the window - forearms resting on the sill and head propped on them - staring wistfully outside, he replied, “I am not pining.”
Izuna cocked his hip, “Uh-huh?”
Madara sighed softly, eyes still fixed firmly on the snowed-in world outside. A dreamy smile formed on his lips.
“Yeah,” he said airly.
Izuna scoffed, “Aniki?”
“Mm?”
“Could you tear your eyes away from that window for a second-?”
Madara interrupted him, “When do you think the winter will be over?”
Izuna scowled, “and why do you care?”
“Clans will reenter communications once the snow melts,” he turned to Izuna, “which means I can begin my search for him.”
Izuna rolled his eyes, “of course.”
“He must be a shinobi, and a skilled one, so it shouldn’t be too hard to find him from among the crowd. Izuna, do you think he’ll appreciate a traditional courting more, or something a little faster? I mean, we are soulmates.”
“See, this is what I’m talking about, all you can ever think about is your soulmate.”
Madara blinked, “that’s not true.”
Izuna smiled sharply, “How long have you been at the window?”
Madara blinked again. It occurred to him that he couldn’t remember. A long time.
“The snow is pretty,” he tried to defend.
“You used to spend all winter cursing it out.”
Well, Madara supposed that was true. The snow was awful to deal with, and no Uchiha really appreciated the cold. They liked the warm, summer months. They liked fire and heat, not dreary cold. Madara hadn’t either.
But now when the cold winter air drafted in through his window, he was reminded of a deep voice and a freezing chakra. He was reminded of the red marks around his eyes.
Now, suddenly the snow was not a nuisance anymore. It was beautiful, and Madara cannot remember why he had ever loathed the first fall of it. Sure, winter was hard on his clan, that had not changed. But snow was fierce, and beautiful, and Madara could not begrudge it for it’s nature. It was snow, it did not fall to spite them.
Now he could get lost in the dazzling slopes of it for hours on end.
And it appeared he had.
Madara scowled, “I hate you.”
Izuna grinned, “Thank you, I try!”
“No, like I really really do. You’re the worst.”
“At least I don’t spend all day mooning about some man at a window,” Izuna stuck his tongue out.
Without so much as a word, Madara rose and walked towards Izuna. The bastard, still laughing at him, didn’t notice the danger until Madara picked him up and threw him over his shoulder.
“Aniki!” he shouted, but Madara was already walking with determined strides.
“Aniki, wait! Wait, I said! I didn’t mean it!”
They had to break the ice on the pond before Madara threw Izuna into it, but seeing his brother resurface from the shattered ice, chattering his teeth and cursing at Madara made it all the more worth it.
“Aniki!” Izuna whined.
Madara laughed.
—
Ink gathered in the brush.
Seals lay scattered around the room, in a semblance of something that had once been organized, but was now devoured by a mania.
Tobirama’s lab was usually pristine, but the recent weeks had lended to turning up every corner of it. He had no time for organized, not with what he was planning. Tobirama was, above most else, a scientist; an inventor. He created things, for a variety of purposes. Practical things, sometimes, tools, medicine, sealing scrolls. Weapons too, new jutsu, more powerful explosive tags, things that haunted the Uchiha lines. The kind of things that every conflict just almost-barely missed taking Izuna’s life.
Izuna could adapt faster than any Uchiha, his eyes working overtime to memorize every shift of Tobirama’s muscles as he moved. So in turn, Tobirama could change faster than any Senju. He made sure to reinvent himself each battle, new jutsu, new tricks, new patterns, new skill. He made sure that the man Izuna faced each battle was different, and therefore Tobirama stayed alive, and Izuna stayed teetering on the edge of death.
And now Tobirama reinvented himself again.
Two seals laid before him, and they were perhaps the deadliest thing Tobirama had ever succeeded in creating.
His most dangerous weapons, and he would use them for peace.
Tobirama almost had to laugh.
He picked up his brush, wiping off the excess ink, and painted the last mark on the seal that even the Uzumaki had told him would be impossible.
On the table, the Hiraishin thrummed with power.
—
Tobirama sat leaned up against the grass where his father was buried. Next to him, covered by untended overgrowth, there was a stone bearing the name of Senju Butsuma. It was all together an unfitting grave for a Clan Head, but given the fact that both he and Hashirama had wanted to burn his body - a burial that bordered on sacrilege for the Senju - Butsuma’s lackluster burial seemed all too glamorous for him.
Tobirama felt the spring breeze sweep his hair. The ground beneath him was damp, and the grass had just barely begun to sprout. The final snow had passed, and so winter was over. War season would soon begin. Spring brought both life and death.
Fitting, that Tobirama should be where he was now.
“I’ll never understand you, you know,” he said to the empty air. Somewhere beneath the ground, Bustuma’s bones could not hear him. Tobirama pretended they could anyway.
“You never loved anyone, or at least I can’t remember that you did,” he continued, “you did not love mother, even when you did not despise her, you did not love me either, and you never even loved Hashirama. He was everything she could have given you: a male heir, a strong son, a shinobi with the Mokuton. You were given everything, and you still didn’t love him.”
“And yet, you threw everything away for love ,” Tobirama said the word with an airy amazement, turning his hands over in a half shrug.
“Not even your own love…” he trailed off into silence. He could hear birdsong in the forest echoing quietly, and the rustle of leaves in the trees. Life had come back to the earth. Tobirama could have smiled at the sunshine warming his cheeks. He fell back onto the grass, feeling it tickle his neck. Above him, the sky stretched on and on, infinitely blue. It almost felt peaceful.
“I am about to do something you would like very much,” he said to his dead father, “and something you would have hated very much. But I think, in the end, you’ll forgive me. I will not be happy, and that is all you’ve ever wanted for me and mother.”
The bones below the earth did not answer him.
Tobirama could only hope he would not find himself in the pure lands, or wherever it was his father ended up, soon enough to hear his answer.
—
He found Hashirama in the armory.
The older man was looking up at the blades that hung on the wall. There were many of them, sheathed and racked in rows that rose up to the ceiling, and disappeared far back into the dark of the armory. But more than the number of blades, was the number of empty racks. Of weapons not left to rust, only polished on schedule by the armory manager, but rather sharpened and used and brought to battle.
The forges, Tobirama would predict, would be busy in the coming days. Fixing shattered and chipped edges, straightening armor, and melting down irreparable metal, the furnaces burning off the Senju and Uchiha blood that dyed it.
“Anija,” Tobirama called softly, “we must go soon.”
Hashirama hummed, eyes still gently tracing the swords.
“Did Mito send you off yet?” he asked. Mito would surely be upset had her husband left without a goodbye. Hashirama would come back, that was a guaranteed fact that could only apply to one hailed as the God of Shinobi, but even then. Fear is not a friend of the rational, and hearts will fear danger that doesn’t exist, simply to remind itself that it can love. Goodbye’s were important before a battle, even if you got a ‘hello again’ after.
Greetings were never guaranteed, after all.
“Yes,” Hashirama finally said. His mouth had curved into a frown. Finally, he turned away from the wall, and looked to Tobirama.
“Good luck out there Tobi,” Hashirama said softly, and Tobirama could see the fear in his eyes.
Tobirama smiled fondly, “Good luck, Anija.”
“Don’t let Izuna get the best of you.”
“Don’t let Madara blow your eardrums out with his screaming.”
Hashirama laughed throatily, but even his humor could not tame his fear, or his disgust. Hashirama hated war. He hated the senseless killing. He had hated it since he was born, and then even more after the deaths of Kawarama and Itama.
Hashirama, Tobirama knew, was secretly very grateful that Madara and Izuna were strong, that way neither he nor Tobirama would participate in senseless, endless slaughter.
It was, perhaps, another reason he let Madara go.
“Hashi, I need you to trust me today.” Tobirama said.
“I always trust you.”
Tobirama shook his head, “You won’t today.”
Hashirama’s face twisted in worry, “You’re not making any sense. What are you going to do?”
“I can’t tell you, you’ll try and stop me."
“That is not particularly comforting, Tobi.”
“I know, Anija,” Tobirama smiled softly, “and if this doesn’t go well, I’m sorry. But when the moment comes, and you’ll know when it comes, I need you to trust me. I need you to use me.”
Hashirama looked confused, and concerned
“I don’t suppose there is any chance you could just tell me the plan ahead of time?” he joked.
“No.”
Hashirama sighed, let his eyes slide closed, and laid a hand on Tobirama’s shoulder.
“Okay, you little mad-man,” he said fondly, trying to hide his fear. He smiled at Tobirama, “I’ll trust you. But do me a favor, yeah? When you’re done with whatever plan you’ve concocted this time, please return my little brother to me.”
Suddenly, Tobirama felt himself be pulled forward, and wrapped in strong, comforting arms.
Hashirama had not hugged him in a long time. It was to be expected, they were grown men now, leading an entire clan together, leading a war together. They did not have the time for the brotherly tenderness of their youth.
And more, Hashirama hated war. And Tobirama represented that very war. He knew, deep down, that Tobirama was only doing what he had to - he tried to remind himself of that everyday. But even then, he could not help but look at his brother, and see the cruel eyes of their father - Tobirama was used to it. He was often seen as the phantom shadows left behind from lives he had not lived: a dead Hatake, a helpless mother, and a man who only spoke in violence.
But Hashirama still loved Tobirama, even clouded as that love sometimes grew.
“Anija?” Tobirama asked, hands hovering uselessly in the air.
“Promise me,” Hashirama insisted. His arms tightened around Tobirama, almost desperately.
Tobirama, at last, relented. He closed his eyes and leaned in to the touch, his own arms wrapping around his brother and completing the embrace. For a single second in their war, it was peaceful, and quiet, and warm.
“Okay,” he whispered, “I promise.”
—
The sounds of explosions and screams rattled in Tobirama’s ear. Few things could compare to a shinobi battle. Shinobi moved faster than the whistling point of a samurai’s blade, and their mere hand strikes carried the power of a cannon shot. An all out fight between shinobi made the very earth tremble.
A shinobi battle between the Uchiha and Senju?
It was hell on earth.
The ash in the air struck bitterly on Tobirama’s tongue, his eyes stung from the smoke in the air. He felt his teeth clatter harshly against one another as the earth shook again.
Metal screeched loudly in his ear as he deflected another strike of Izuna’s sword. The Uchiha heir narrowed his sharingan red eyes and danced back away from Tobirama - just in time too, as Tobirama’s sword came cutting down where he had just been.
Tobirama’s attacks followed him quickly, however, a fresh array of kunai chasing his form. They embedded in the ground, some lined with streaks of blood, but none managed to strike true on Izuna.
“Senju bastard!” he heard Izuna curse.
Izuna spat a swath of blistering fire at him, and with a couple of hand signs Tobirama summoned a wall of water to block it. With a screaming hiss, the battlefield grew cloudy with mist. The white clouds blocked Izuna’s view, Tobirama had learned over the years. But mist could do nothing to stop Tobirama’s sensing abilities.
Water senbon streaked through the mist, and Tobirama felt with satisfaction as they struck true. A cry of pain echoed through the settling mist. A swift wind blew, clearing away whatever was left of it, and revealing Tobirama and a bleeding Izuna.
Izuna, never one to be slowed by something as mere as pain, was immediately on him again. His blade edge caught against Tobirama’s own, and sparks scattered across charred grass.
They moved in a fast blur, swords screaming off one another, cutting where they may in shallow strokes, but never landing solidly in the flesh of the opponent.
Their swords caught, only for a second, but it was all Tobirama needed. His free hand flashed through signs that only the Sharingan could ever hope to catch. Water gathered in his mouth, and he spat a raging dragon of water at Izuna.
He heard the Uchiha curse, rapidly fleeing. The dragon wouldn’t hold him long. Tobirama took the time to take inventory of the field. His sensing spread out and caught on the various marked kunai about the ground. Quickly, he adjusted the dragon to chase Izuna back…back…back-
There!
Just as Izuna finally managed to slash through the dragon, he stepped back one final time. A marked kunai just behind his heel.
Izuna, for his part saw - in the molasses slow world the Sharingan provided - the water dragon shower to the ground, destroyed. And beyond the fall of thousands of glittering raindrops, he saw Tobirama grimace. In less than all the infinite divisions a second could be split into, Tobirama disappeared.
And then there were hands shooting out from behind him, the rustle of paper, and suddenly Izuna’s connection to his chakra, too, disappeared.
The world returned to full speed as his sharingan shut down, and all Izuna could hear was the rushing of blood in his ear, and the sharp edge of a sword at his throat.
“Don’t move,” Izuna heard in his ear. His eyes snapped to Tobirama, heart beating rabbit fast, but the Senju bastard wasn’t even looking at him. Rather, his gaze fixed far out onto the battlefield.
Izuna followed it, and saw Madara.
Fear struck him; cold as any of the ice that Tobirama had ever cut him with.
Tobirama, now, let out an imperceptible sigh, a breath he had been holding in tense suspense. He was worried that he wouldn’t have made it time, even with the Hiraishin, to slap a chakra suppressant seal on Izuna. He had developed the new seal in conjunction with the Hiraishin. The Hiraishin would have allowed him to kill Izuna by itself, faster than the sharingan as it was, but it wasn’t enough to beat him and keep him alive.
The chakra blocking seal allowed him that dearly needed grace. He had developed it from his medical seal that he used to limit the flow of his chakra. The seal, during it’s development, had posed a very serious threat, which was that those who didn’t know how to elicit a steady, thread-thin stream of chakra into it would find themselves cut off from all chakra in its entirety. You’d have to override the seal with enough chakra to burn it out.
It took him considerable effort, but he finally managed to strengthen the resistance of the seal itself, and cut the opportunity for any flow whatsoever, like the original seal had been built for.
And now, with the birth of his two new creations, he had Izuna retrained and cut off from his chakra systems. Now, Izuna was helpless as a civilian child, and the adults could get down to talking.
Tobirama watched, in an almost detached sort of focus, as Madara paused his fighting with Hashirama for just long enough to glance at Izuna, as he did every fight. He would never admit it, but he felt a pit form in his stomach as he saw the red marks across Madara’s face. Like blood that Tobirama had spattered - tainted - him with. Tobirama quickly dispelled the feeling, and reminded himself sternly of what he had told Touka all those nights ago. His happiness didn’t need to be on the treaty.
Finally, Madara was looking at them, at Izuna. He saw, then, Madara’s eyes lace through with fear, and his face crumpled in something Tobirama could not name.
He didn’t have enough time to ponder it either, as whatever the emotion was was quickly burnt away under an anger that darkened Madara’s features.
“Izuna!” he screamed.
Hashirama turned then, and just in time, as Madara came flying at Tobirama with a fist that would surely leave his brain matter splattered across the scorched earth.
Tobirama did not even blink as a fist stopped just short of his face, and a maelstrom whistled past him, his hair blown with the wind the blow carried with it.
A bead of blood rolled down Izuna’s neck, and Madara’s eyes were fixed on it. Tobirama, as Madara had drawn close, had shifted his blade almost imperceptibly inward; it was this that stopped Madara. The message Tobirama had sent was clear:
You may be fast, but I am faster.
Tobirama felt a grim satisfaction, and again moved the blade just a little more in, beading with it another drop of blood.
“Try it, and he dies.”
Madara’s gaze snapped up to him, and his face flashed with anger. Tobirama knew he had won.
Hashirama was suddenly there, panicked in a way Tobirama had very rarely seen him.
“Tobirama what-?”
“Hashirama-” he tried.
Madara flared, “if you so much as think of hurting him-!”
Tobirama brought the sword closer. The words died in Madara’s throat, and Tobirama watched terror eclipse anger in that moment.
“Izuna!”
“Tobirama!”
Tobirama registered the cries of the two men with disinterested attention.
“Hashirama.” he reminded firmly, but he saw it fail to register. Hashirama’s eyes flicked between the three of them rapidly, sweat building on his brow.
“Aniki, don’t worry about me, just kill him!” Izuna shouted, but his words fell on three pairs of deaf ears.
“Release him now, Senju!”
“Tobirama what do you think you’re doing-”
Now it was turn for Tobirama to shout, “Hashirama!”
Finally, Hashirama’s eyes snapped up to meet his own, and he watched as the panic in his brother’s eyes gravely turned to understanding.
“Tobirama no…” Hashirama pleaded.
“Propose your peace, Anija,” Tobirama commanded.
“Tobirama this isn’t how it’s supposed to happen!”
“Peace or death,” he reminded him, and now he looked at Madara. He used his sword arm to push Izuna’s head back, bearing his neck. Blood ran in rivulettes down it.
Hashirama’s eyes looked at him pleading once more before screwing themselves shut. Hashirama’s expression set into grim-faced determination and he finally turned to Madara.
“Madara, please, I beg you, accept peace with the Senju.”
Madara spat vitriol at him, “He has a blade to Izuna’s neck!”
“And he’ll slit it if he has to!” Hashirama cried, “You know he will! Peace or Izuna’s death, Madara chose!”
“Aniki!” Izuna lurched forward, but Tobirama pulled him back easily.
“Quickly!” Hashirama shouted.
“You’re insane Hashirama!”
“Please Madara, just accept the peace. I am begging you. Accept the peace, and Izuna lives!”
“Hashirama I will kill you, I swear, you and that fucking demon-”
“Choose.”
Tobirama’s voice echoed coldly across the clearing.
Madara finally looked back at the demon, and what he saw sent a shiver down his spine, along with another molten flash of fury.
The white demon’s gaze stayed trained on him, and those crimson eyes betrayed nothing in them from where they cut, peeking out just behind Izuna's shoulder. There was nothing of fear, nothing of admiration.
Tobirama looked at him calculating, and steeled with a hard resolve.
“Choose,” he repeated, “Peace, or Izuna’s life.”
“Kill him Madara!” Izuna pleaded, “Let me die, just kill him!”
“Izuna-”
“-Choose, Madara-”
“-Please Madara, please-”
“-let me die-”
“ -Madara!”
“ -Madara!”
“ -Madara.”
Red eyes watched him from over Izuna’s shoulder, and a voice in its singularity drowned out all the noise around it.
“Choose Madara.”
Tobirama looked at him, and Madara could think of nothing else. The world rang silent in his ears, all except for that horrible voice, and all he could see faded into oblivion except for those cruel, lifeless eyes.
“Peace!” he chose.
The word tore itself from his throat, so desperate and raw that he wasn’t even sure he was the one screaming it until pain stuck through his vocal cords.
The world came back to him in a flash, and he saw with Sharingan clarity as Izuna’s face fell, as Hashirama let out a breath, and as, almost imperceptibly, Tobirama smiled. The battlefield fell silent, and all Senju and Uchiha were slowly lowering their weapons, looking with cautious confusion to their leaders.
“Peace,” he said again, more steadily, “peace, Senju. I’ll give you your peace -I vow it before Amaterisu herself!- just let him go,” his voice turned into a terrified plea, “Just please let Izuna go. Let him go.”
And then suddenly Izuna was in his arms, and the two brothers fell down to the ground in an ungainly heap. Madara grabbed onto Izuna like he would vanish any second, and held him close with shaking hands.
He looked up with a burning gaze at Tobirama, standing over them from where he had pushed Izuna. His face was still carefully blank, and a drop of blood fell from his sword.
“We will send a treaty for signature,” was all he said, and then he was walking away. He even dared to turn his back to Madara like they were-
Like they were at peace…
They were at peace...
Shaking, with Izuna in his arms, he did not think it felt like it.
Hashirama was saying something to him, some form of apology that Madara could not quite hear. Izuna was screaming something at him, something about just letting him die, but Madara could hear none of it. All he could manage to focus on was the retreating back of the Senju demon as he slowly stalked away from the battle.
—
“Tobirama what have you done!”
The empty halls of the armory echoed with Hashirama’s shout, amplifying it and sending it back to Tobirama again and again. Like thousands of accusations at once.
He closed his eyes, and forced composure onto himself.
“I got you your peace, Hashirama,” he whispered.
Hands grabbed at his arms, and Hashirama drew so close Tobirama could feel the air move with the strength of his voice. Nevertheless, he could not bring himself to look at his brother.
“You threatened Izuna's life! Madara will never forgive the Senju, he will never forgive me!”
“He will forgive you.” Tobirama denied.
Hashirama could not be consoled. “Even then, Tobirama, you could have killed Izuna!”
“It was peace either way,” the words slipped insidiously from his tongue, for they were true. It would have been surrender, or signature - peace either way. Had Izuna fallen, or had Madara agreed.
He wanted it bloodless, but Tobirama always had a backup plan.
He heard a sharp intake of breath, and now his eyes finally drew up to meet Hashirama’s. There were tears in his brother’s eyes, and his face was flushed with emotion. He looked at Tobirama like he didn’t know who he was.
“You can be heartless, Tobirama.”
Tobirama did not let the words hurt him. He didn’t.
“I know.”
“It is no wonder they call you a demon.”
Breathe in, breathe out. Words could not cut him, he had long attempted his armament against him.
“We have peace now.”
Hashirama was distraught, and he was angry. His face twisted darkly, “It wasn’t meant to be like this!”
Tobirama could not help the way his voice rose, “How else was it supposed to be, Hashirama? I gave you bloodless peace! I left Izuna alive when I could have killed him! I have your peace, your village, your dreams - all a breath away!”
Hashirama hissed, “You held Izuna hostage!”
“He was the only advantage we could push!”
“Madara is furious!”
He snapped, “So what? He is furious at me! Hashirama, just let me take the fall! That is what I am here for!”
That, it seemed, finally quieted Hashirama. Now a different expression crossed his face. Fury gave way to an almost sort of heartbreak, and he did not shout at Tobirama - he did not match his tone. Deep sadness filled his eyes, and he looked at Tobirama distraught.
There was a wall between them - as there always was - but now it seemed so thin. Neither dared cross it, or rather, neither knew how.
“Tobirama…”
Tobirama turned his face away, “do not look at me with pity, Anija.”
Hashirama’s hand came up to his cheek, and brought his gaze back to him. The tears brimming in his brother's dark eyes had fallen. Tobirama could not lean away from the touch. The wall between them remained, but at times like these, they could pretend it did not exist. Soon, they would go back to their roles, but for now, they looked at each other and saw behind the persona. They admitted to the ruse.
“Be a hero, Hashirama,” Tobirama whispered, voice gentle in a way that was barely audible, “Leave the dirty work to me, and go bask in the light.”
“Tobi, please.”
Tobirama forced a watery smile, “If you ever need me, I’ll be just a step behind in your shadow.”
Hashirama hiccoughed out a sob, and his other hand came up to Tobirama’s cheek too. Then, Tobirama was in his brother’s arms, and Hashirama was crying into his shoulder.
“My foolish little brother,” he said into Tobirama’s neck, “they will tear you to shreds.”
“I will not let them.”
“Yes, you will.” Hashirama hugged him tighter, “You always do.”
Tobirama brought his hands up to settle on Hashirama’s back, “Be happy, Hashirama. Peace is finally upon us. Only I will continue at war, and the rest shall be free. Do not cry for me, brother. I have a soldier’s soul, war will be with me always. It is my rite to carry.”
Hashirama’s tears - the tears Tobirama would not shed - wet his shoulder.
Tobirama smiled, looking forward to a future he could almost see - a future he would secure. It was bright there, and Hashirama was happy. Children laughed there. The Uchiha and the Senju were finally free. That was all that mattered.
Only one soldier was left behind. Statistically, it was a magnificent exodus.
“Be happy, Hashirama,” he repeated, smiling, “be happy.”
—
The coming days were spent waiting with a breath held.
Madara sat all the could by the window to his bedroom, looking over the budding leaves in the courtyard, and waiting with a pit in his stomach for a messenger hawk to arrive. But even time for that was few. More often than not, Madara found himself in contention with his own clan.
And with his own brother.
“You should have let him kill me,” Izuna kept saying. Like it didn’t leave Madara terrified at the mere thought there could be a possible world where he had done just that. Like Madara wouldn’t have been shattered by that.
“You should have let him kill Izuna,” The clan elders kept saying. Like he would take his eyes after death, like there wasn’t already a viable solution. Like how in any way letting Izuna die, and killing Senju Tobirama off in return wasn’t a loss to Madara. Like his revenge would break even with his grief.
Like that was how a heart worked.
The rest of the clan, too, beyond the ones who openly rallied against him, were suspicious of peace at best. Rightfully fearful, they did not think of this as the end of the war. Worst case, it was somehow a Senju plot to attack them with their backs turned, best case, it would be a peace with unfair, subservient terms for the Uchiha.
Now, more than ever, Madara longed for his soulmate. Izuna was furious with him, Hikaku was busy just trying to keep everything together, and Madara found himself alone with his vow. He had promised peace before Ameterisu: he could not back down now without being stripped of his name as Uchiha and having his existence erased from clan records.
As he stared at the red marks around his eyes, he wished so desperately that the man who left him was here. He didn’t need someone to look up to him right now, he didn’t need another to scorn him - he just wanted someone to sit steadily by his side, and let him know that he was there.
It had occurred to Madara that his soulmate hadn’t knowingly left him that night. The blood was thick on his face, he remembered the feeling of it slicking down his skin, so it would have made it hard to see the new appearance of marks beneath the already existing red. It was not impossible that his soulmate simply had not noticed at first.
But it had been months since then.
There was no way, bar their own blindness, that his soulmate would not have noticed the marks on his fingers. He must know.
It was possible that they didn’t know who he was, but that was unlikely. Madara was the Calamity of Fire Country. He was the leader of one of the most powerful clans. It was unlikely that his soulmate didn’t know him, and even if they didn’t, they knew he was Uchiha. He had held Madara’s eyes in his hands and fixed them back into his skull.
So why did he never come find Madara?
Why had there been no one at the gates, holding up red-stained fingers and calling for his name?
Madara was not dense - a love stricken fool, maybe, but not stupid. It was possible that his soulmate was from an enemy clan, aligned to the Senju. Maybe Senju himself.
He might even be afraid of Madara.
That hurt, he would admit.
Now, he waited for the treaty to arrive for another reason. For the hope that maybe, just maybe, Madara would be able to meet him. That maybe there was a point to this peace beyond what only seemed to be insidious lies and blatant threats.
Madara was a fool for dreams, but even he felt the bitter reality of that absence. There was no one at his side now. He was alone.
That only made him crave it more.
That someone might look at him and understand him. That someone might say to him, “You couldn’t have let Izuna die, you shouldn’t.” That someone would look at him without the weighty expectations levied upon him. That he might have someone in his corner.
“I feel your absence sharply, love,” he whispered to the quiet of his room. Foolishly, with the hope that maybe someone, somewhere, out in the vastness of the world had somehow heard his words, would turn around, and come back to him.
A tapping at the window snapped him out of his thoughts.
He raised his head to look over, and felt his heart stop in his chest. A hawk sat at the sill, preening itself cleanly. Between its sharp talons, it held a sealed scroll, and across its neck, inscribed on a silver tag, was the Senju crest.
With slightly shaking hands, Madara reached out to grab the scroll. The hawk watched him carefully, golden eyes tracing him with a predator precision. The scroll was heavier than he had expected, or maybe Madara was just imagining it, but the paper felt like lead in his hands.
Slowly, he unsealed it, and unrolled it. Sharingan activated, his eyes flashed across the paper, widening as he did so.
Twenty minutes later and he was sitting in the clan meeting room with every Uchiha elder. They too, now read over the scroll with the same disbelieving expression. Chatter was spoken slowly between them, but nothing substantial was said. They did not have the words to say it.
Eventually, the scroll had fully made its rounds, and made it back to Madara’s hand. He stared down at the Senju seal placed below the treaty, and at the blank space left for the Uchiha’s.
Silence reigned heavy over the room.
Suddenly, Nozomi spoke up.
“It is not unreasonable.”
Her declaration sent a shockwave through the room, and hushed whispers once again rose. Eventually, another elder, Uchiha Manabu scowled and hissed.
“It’s Senju!”
The dam truly seemed to break then, and the rest of the elders, emboldened by Manabue, began to shout their own discontent.
“It must be a ploy somehow!”
“Lord Madara, I implore you to reconsider!”
“The Senju scum mock us!”
“We should eliminate them while we have the chance!”
“Yes, before they do to us!”
Madara felt a headache building.
Amidst the chaos, he watched as Nozomi’s frown - a delicate, courtly thing at first - grew darker and darker, until she seemed fully irate and beside herself with fury for the council of old fools.
Angered enough, she finally shouted, “We will uphold peace!”
And the room fell silent.
Nozomi’s voice was old, and cracking, but strong. She may have been relegated to the backlines of the war for years due to her age, but she had in no way retired. She ran the Uchiha medical unit with precision and skill, and unlike many Uchiha elders, she still possessed Shinobi steel.
Another elder, Uchiha Ako this time, fanned herself delicately and narrowed her drooping eyes at Nozomi.
“That is surely dangerous, is it not?”
Nozomi snorted, “We are shinobi.”
Ako’s mouth thinned, and she covered it behind her fan.
“The Senju are too, and we know what sloppiness gets us.”
Nozomi smiled meanly, “Of course, for some of us. What was it for you, Ako, taken off the field for a simple break, and retired at seventeen? As far as I’m concerned, you have no voice in the matter of war, still wet behind the ears as you are.”
Ako glowered, “How dare you-!”
“Ako.” Madara’s voice cut harshly over the room, and silenced the growing argument. Now, with all eyes on him, he scanned his vision across the room of waiting elders. Anger was within him as well, so he would not scorn their wariness of plight, but though it was like dragging his flesh across razorblades to admit, his hands were tied.
“I swore an oath before Amaterisu herself,” he reminded them, “the condition of Izuna’s life for peace. Now, I am bound to that peace. This meeting is not of war, but of the terms on which we end it. As long as I am Uchiha clan head, that is how it will be.”
He narrowed his eyes dangerously, “and unless anyone is willing to try and remove me from that position, then we will proceed with peace.”
The room was left in tense awe, they stared at him with widened eyes.
“Then?” he asked, raising a brow, “Are the terms unreasonable?”
“No, Lord Madara,” Nozomi replied.
And it was the truth.
Madara was fully expecting a document outlining the borderline enslavement of the Uchiha to the Senju. It was reasonable, they were blood enemies, and if the White Demon had manufactured this peace, he expected it to be nothing less hellish then the battlefields he too created.
After all, Madara had sworn a sacred oath. He had to agree to peace, and he expected his hand to be forced into something devastating. He didn’t know how he would protect his clan from that kind of retribution, he was terrified of even having to attempt it.
But in the end, he didn’t have to.
Madara would have been forced to sign off on anything. That was what a deal before the gods meant. And instead of what would have made sense, an unfair treaty benefitting the rightful winner, they were presented, with of all things, a document that stipulated nothing less than even terms for the two parties.
The Senju had won the war, and left the spoils.
Deep down, Madara still felt great fear and suspicion, as he could not for the life of him gather why they would do that.
But the terms of the treaty were fair, for Gods sake, they had even included an inquiry for any possible alterations to the document.
Part of Madara was furied by that - it was surely a mockery of the fact that Madara truly had no choice. Hanging a carrot in front of his face and laughing that he could not bite. Putting up a facsimile of fairness for a deal that was ultimately signed in blood.
It made him rile with anger.
But he held his tongue, and did what he had sworn to do.
“Then we are decided,” he said, voice almost solemn, “we will send back our consent, and will meet for signature in two days.”
—
Tobirama stared down at the marks on his fingers. He detested them now more than he had ever.
He was, at his core, a tactician. Peace was yet another operation, a movement of people and weaponry, all in a delicate balance. He had it all measured out and weighed, knew each moving part as well as he could know it. The only variable left was the supposed bond between him and Madara.
He did not know what would happen if he were discovered, he did not care to find out. Tobirama was a tactician. He eliminated unknown variables.
And so, the marks needed to be unseen.
The gloves would only last him so long, and especially with the Uchiha he had to be careful. His excuse of the winter cold would quickly expire, and Izuna had years upon years of perfect memory of Tobirama. He would notice the gloves.
He would be fine with just the one instance, but he needed to be rid of them.
He could not put his hands under a henge, a quick glance at it with the sharingan would see quickly beneath it. Cosmetics, too, would fail under an Uchiha eye. It would look lik ehe was hiding something. Nothing he could cover it with would adequately avoid suspicion.
Tobirama picked up the brush at his side, and dipped it into a dish of red ink.
He would cover them up with something that was visible, then, rather than being intended to go unseen. Any genjutsu or henge would look like a disguise, and Uchiha could look beyond such things easily.
But seals did not disguise, they covered. Izuna could not see beneath the red markings on Tobirama’s face, because they were sealed into his skin itself - inseparable, sans Tobirama’s release of the seal.
Now he repeated the seals on his hands. The brush touched down on the inside of his wrist, and in a dense scrawl of characters, he painted in his new gloves. Chakra storage, the same as on his cheeks.
The brush crossed over his fingers, he carefully felt nothing as his soulmark disappeared under the red ink.
It was all a calculated move, it was all for peace.
And if, when he had looked down at the marks, he could not help but remember their counterpart’s twisting on Madara’s murderous face - looking at Tobirama like he were a monster - then it was only another reason to bury them where they would never again be seen.
Tobirama had no room for an irrational pain, and he had less room for a longing he couldn’t explain.
—
The Senju and Uchiha convoys met on a soft spring day - the beauty of such a day ruined by the tenseness of two parties of delegates meeting in full armor, poisonous distrust filling the air like a miasma.
They set up a collection of tents and settled their parties down for a multiple day negotiation and signage. Or the act of it. For there was little to be discussed, and even less to sign. But, often forgotten, with the exception of moments like these, both the Uchiha and Senju were noble clans. There were certain ceremony and etiquette that they went through, even if both sides were a razor’s width from homicide.
For Madara, in particular, it was agonizing. The farce of it all only served to heighten his anger. He was forced to sit and drink tea across the table from Senju Tobirama. He was meant to exchange pleasantries with the monster who had almost killed his brother, who would have, had Madara not agreed to bow his head.
It was a certain kind of agony to sit mere feet from the White Demon. To feel those emotionless eyes stare at him as that stone face dipped to delicately sip from a luxurious cup. He was forced to shake the hand that had held a sword to Izuna’s throat. He was forced to sign peace with a man who had held his brother’s life in his hands, fully intent to end it if Madara did not listen to him.
He was forced to be cordial with a monster.
Tobirama’s hands bore fresh tattoos, red seal ink stretching from his fingers to the midway of his forearm, as if his hands had been dipped into a basin of blood. It seemed that Tobirama did not even pretend to be anything more than he was, he wore his armor to the meeting, he bore seal-weapons openly on his hands, he did not mince words.
Madara could not really see much beyond him - could not focus onto the tea ceremony or the pleasantries, or any of this entire farce - he could only see Tobirama. He could only watch and seethe, boiling just below the surface of his skin with barely reigned in anger.
Tobirama watched him now, as he placed the Uchiha seal on the treaty. Three days of meetings and ceremony and pure uselessness for a fucking signature - even that a formality.
“I never thought this moment would come,” Hashirama breathed as Madara pulled the seal away, leaving fresh ink drying on the paper.
Madara could not quite share his enthusiasm. He stayed quiet.
“Madara, we did it.”
Madara raised his eyes to meet Hashirama’s. The look in his eye was reply enough.
Hashirama’s face fell, and he hesitated. He, too, fell silent.
“The Uchiha party will depart,” Madara then announced, rising from his spot.
“Ah,” Hashirama scrambled to rise as well, “Then the Senju will return also.”
Hashirama stuck his hand out, and it took Madara a second to realize his old friend wanted him to shake it. His very being roiled against it, but he bit back the sickness rising in his gut and took Hashirama’s hand in his own.
“I know it didn’t happen how we planned, but I believe we’ll be able to do great things,” Hashirama confessed.
“Mmn.” Madara replied, detached.
The Uchiha Parties and Senju rose to follow their leaders. Madara was halfway at the door, when a voice called from behind him.
“Lord Madara, I must ask for a moment of your time.”
Madara froze, and then turned around stiffly. Tobirama stood tall from where he had spoken, eyes calculating and posture inhumanely poised.
Madara wanted to kill him - just the sound of his voice lit a fire of anger in the pit of his stomach.
“Say what you must,” he grit out.
Tobirama's gaze did not falter, “I am afraid it is a matter better discussed in private.”
He held back the profanities on his tongue.
“Everybody out,” he commanded instead.
“But-“ Izuna tried.
“Now.”
The Uchiha party cleared out, and so did the Senju. Madara noticed they left with little resistance, but was keen enough to catch the glance between Hashirama and his brother.
But then they were gone, and Madara was alone with the man who had almost killed his brother.
“What is it you want, Senju?”
Tobirama did not answer immediately. He shifted to the back of the tent, eyes no longer watching Madara but off to the side. He seemed to think, then opened his mouth.
“Give me a year,” Tobirama’s fingers trailed over the edge of the desk.
There was something very sharp about Tobirama, nothing about him penetrable, his very skin an armor. Even now, Madara had no idea what the man was thinking - Tobirama had not allowed him to, so he would not.
For whatever Madara felt about Tobirama, he would give the demon this: he was smart. The razor-sharp kind of intelligent that cut and carved and sacrificed until it got exactly what it wanted - the dangerous kind. Madara knew this very well, Tobirama was dangerous. And more than that, he used it to get what he wanted.
Even this, the simple action of trailing his fingers over the edge of his desk was done with sharp, precise purpose. Whatever that purpose was, Madara didn’t know, but Madara knew it was purposeful, so he watched tattoo-red fingers move across the polished wood, swiping up dust with them.
Tobirama lifted his hand up and rubbed the dust off. His eyes then locked on to Madara, red and fierce.
“I know this is not how you wanted peace to come, but this is the way it has,” Tobirama stated plainly.
Madara balked at the bluntness of it. Three days of niceties veiling distrust and anger had not left him expecting the puppetmaster of all of it to simply throw all of it away. Quickly, Madara sharpened himself, and quickly discarded his own attempts at playing nice.
“You held my brother hostage,” Madara bit back, hands clenching tightly at his side. It was all he could do to not launch himself at Tobirama and rip his throat out. He hated him. He hated him like he had never hated anyone before.
“I did,” Tobirama replied, no emotion betrayed in his voice.
“This is not peace,” Madara snarled, “this is a bargain. And you used Izuna’s life as the price.”
Tobirama gave him a half smile, with pitying eyes. Madara’s anger flared even hotter at it.
“Peace, bargain: what is the difference?” Tobirama held, “Lord Madara, this is indeed an exchange. My business is that of ending a war, and I intend to deliver on a product.”
Madara was not inclined to listen. He only wanted to hurt Tobirama. How to hurt someone you couldn’t touch… how to hurt a demon.
“Hashirama would disapprove,” Madara said.
Tobirama waved a hand, dismissing it quickly and without reaction, “He already does. Where has that gotten us? We’re both doing this for our brothers, Lord Madara. You know that.”
Madara glowered, “this kind of peace will not last. The only reason I even agreed to it was to save Izuna’s life, but you know as well as I do that the will of one person is not the will of a clan. The Uchiha, be it now or later, will rebel. Or the Senju will.”
Tobirama walked closer to Madara now, and even Madara would admit, Tobirama made a terrifying figure. He walked like he was human, he breathed like he was human, but there was no way he could be. Tobirama was an extra-ordinary sort of presence that seemed to sit apart from the rest of the world it supposedly inhabited. Something about him just wrong.
“That’s why I need you to give me a year,” Tobirama reiterated, “All I need you to do is to rein the Uchiha in for a year, and I’ll do the same for the Senju. One year of civility, and I will work to ensure that by the end of it no one will want to rebel. To prove that peace is possible, and that we are stronger for it.”
Madara blanched.
What Tobirama was proposing was impossible. To try and tame two rabid clans in a years span was an insane task. Only a madman would think it possible. Right now the Uchiha were seething, just barely holding back from what Madara wanted to do right now: kill Tobirama and resume to war. The Senju surely wanted the same, but for Izuna and the Uchiha. Maybe they even added Tobirama to the list.
Afterall, Tobirama had had Izuna in his grasp - a death which would have ended the war, which would have almost assuredly granted a Senju victory - and Tobirama had let him go.
Now all they had was a facade of peace between the two clans for it.
Tobirama was so disliked now that Madara bet he wouldn’t even be able to charm a whore.
“You’re insane.” he said.
Tobirama scoffed, “Of course I’m insane. I am ending a war here. Nobody who has been sane in the history of our two clans has even dared try.”
“This will not work.”
“I am not asking you to believe in me,” Tobirama shrugged, “I am only asking that you give me enough time to prove you wrong.”
“And if you fail?”
Tobirama paused for a second. It was not hesitation, but rather just a moment's span to draw in a breath. Then, he spoke.
“If I fail, Madara, then you may kill me.”
Madara’s blood froze in his veins.
“What?”
“You may kill me,” Tobirama was not looking at him now. He was looking somewhere in the distance, to a particular nowhere. Who knew what he saw there.
Tobirama continued, “I am not Izuna, and you are not Hashirama. If peace is truly impossible, which a year should be enough to prove, then our war will resume. But if I die, the Senju will not fall like they would in Izuna’s absence. Hashirama will not let them.”
“Senju what are you even saying-”
“It’s a zero sum game Madara,” Tobirama explained, his voice hard and cold, “Things will go back to the way they were before, almost as if it hadn’t happened at all. In fact, you gain something.”
He smiled down at Madara, once again returning his focus to him. Unlike all the times before, Tobirama actually, genuinely looked into Madara’s eyes. It was the equivalent of suicide for a Senju to try that with an Uchiha, and though Tobirama was an expert at breaking genjutsu, the man he had dared to look in the eyes was Uchiha fucking Madara.
He all but put his life in his hands.
It took much restraint to not end it.
“I know you want to kill me, Madara,” Tobirama said. His eyes were unreadable, defined almost by their lack of anything: nothing of fear, nothing of admiration.
“Then you should know you are playing with a fire.”
Tobirama huffed a dry laugh, and his voice was thick with sarcasm when he spoke, “I am a Senju shinobi. I have spent my entire life fighting the Uchiha. Playing with fire is all I do.”
“You’d really let me kill you?”
Tobirama did not waver, “yes.”
It took Madara a moment to respond, as he sat in the lingering silence of Tobirama’s declaration. Tobirama was a demon - that could not be denied. What human would offer their life so readily, with so little regard? Madara remembered stories of how demons corrupted humans, and how they traded in souls. It occurred to him that Tobirama had been doing that all along, and was doing it now.
He was a warmonger who dealt in blood, and he was a negotiator whose currency was death.
Izuna’s life, Tobirama’s life, what did it matter to a demon?
“Why do you care so much for peace?” he finally dared to ask. Why was it worth enough to risk his life for?
And for a single, almost imperceptible moment, he finally saw something real in Tobirama’s eyes. A certain gentleness. But it was gone as quick as it came, and listlessness replaced it once again.
Tobirama turned his eyes away from Madara, and moved to walk out of the tent.
“I don’t like war,” was all he said before he left.
And Madara was once again alone.
—
They barely managed to get back to the Uchiha compound before somebody snapped. Madara was fairly sure it would be him, with how dark the anger in his stomach had become - leaded and heavy. To his almost surprise, it wasn’t.
The second the gates of the compound creaked close, Izuna flared.
“God fucking damn it!” he screamed, and slammed his fist into the nearest wall. The stone shattered in a deafening boom - cracking and splintering in a spiderweb up the wall - releasing a cloud of dust.
“Izuna!” Madara shouted.
Izuna was not listening, he rounded on Madara now, eyes sharingan red, “Do not even try to calm me down right now, Aniki! I cannot believe you signed off on that!”
“You know that I had no choice.”
Izuna laughed, “Oh you fucking had a choice! You were just too much of a pussy to make it!”
Madara felt hurt flash through him, “I couldn’t let you die-”
“Yes you could have!” Izuna screamed, “We all know you could have!”
His declaration sent ripples of shock through the Uchiha party, and through the clan members who had gathered at their arrival. And shock gave way to a sheepish agreement. Nobody wanted to admit it, but Madara could have let Izuna die. And they would not be in the situation they were now.
Izuna continued, jamming an accusing finger into Madara’s chest, “Because of you the Uchiha are signing a treaty that none of them wanted. For all we know, this could be a trap. Have you even thought about that?”
Madara tried to speak, but Izuna did not let up.
“Because you couldn’t let me die, now all Uchiha could be facing extinction! It was my cross to bear! I should have died! When the Uchiha face the consequences of your selfish decision, the blood will be on your hands Madara! Soley on yours!”
Izuna stormed off, ripping off his armor and chucking it to the floor as he went - the armor Madara had gifted him on his 17th birthday - like he was disgusted with the fact he was still wearing it.
“Izuna!” Madara tried to go after him, but Hikaku reached out and stopped him, shaking his head solemnly.
“Let him go, Madara. He is inconsolable right now.”
Hikaku looked left, right, and then commanded strongly, “everyone go back home. Stop gawking, you all have things to do.”
And so hesitantly, with looks cast back, the rest of the Uchiha watching left also. And then Madara and Hikaku stood next to a shattered wall, in a silent courtyard, with their backs facing generations upon generations of battlefields from a once immutable war, and the place where they had ended it.
The world felt all at once too big and too small for Madara.
“I couldn’t have let him die…” he said helplessly.
Hikaku gave him a sad smile, “I know.”
Madara buried his face in his hands, “what did I do wrong?”
“Is this not what you wanted?” Hikaku asked him, “you have your peace. You’ll have your village. Everything you dreamed of will come true.”
Madara scowled at his cousin, “Izuna’s life was ransomed for it.”
Hikaku smiled gently, and it did not reach his eyes, “Don’t let his poisonous words get to you.”
Madara startled, “Hikaku what-”
“Madara, Izuna should be dead. By all rights, he should be dead. We are shinobi, when our opponent is better than us, we die. That is the way it has always worked. Mercy is not in the playbook.”
“Mercy?” he spat, in disbelief. But Hikaku did not flinch away, and continued with brutal honesty.
“If Senju Tobirama wanted Izuna dead, then he would be dead. And with that, the rest of the Uchiha clan would have suffered greatly for it. He has been the only one fending off the white demon for years. But for some reason, Tobirama ransomed him instead - yes, ransomed. That is what happened. I’m not going back on what I said Madara, so stop looking at me like that - Izuna’s life was used as a bargaining chip. But he is better left alive as a chip than dead in a ditch.”
Hikaku scowled, “and he needs to realize that. He is embarrassed right now. And he’s suspicious, as we all should be, given the the Senju’s cunning, but you both need to wake up and understand that if the demon wanted us dead right now, we would be fighting for our lives on a retreating front, Izuna’s body rotting in the fields somewhere. Instead, we have peace.”
“You’re not seriously implying that we trust Senju Tobirama.”
“Of course I’m not,” Hikaku rolled his eyes, “Who knows what he will plan from here on out. What I’m saying is to trust this peace, and to try and make the most of it for however long it lasts. I do not trust the Senju, Madara, but we are all tired of war.”
Madara considered it, and even he, clouded with anger, had to agree to the points Hikaku made. Senju Tobirama was cunning and sly, but he did seem, under the scrutinizing eye of the sharingan, truthful and sincere about peace.
He had asked him for a year.
He had bet his life on it.
“I will never forgive him,” Madara whispered, but he did not deny what Hikaku had said. He couldn’t. He was right, this peace was dangerous, it was forced, and it was entirely engineered by their most fearsome enemy, but it was sincere.
And still, Madara loathed Senju Tobirama. He had delivered everything Madara had ever wanted to him on a silver platter, but he had done so in a way that left both the Senju and Uchiha bound and gagged, helpless to it.
Senju Tobirama had planned everything out to achieve this: each and every drop of blood that tipped into his scale.
He was a monster.
Hikaku looked at him, and set his jaw, “no one ever will, Madara. Nobody will ever forgive Senju Tobirama.”
And no one will ever thank him, went unsaid.
Madara could not help but think of Tobirama’s carefully blank eyes on the battlefield that day, or during the treaties, or even during his plea for ‘just one year.’ It seemed in that moment that Senju Tobirama knew that as well. He would not ever be thanked for peace.
Madara was okay with that. He did not want anything else for the man. He wanted him to suffer in that loneliness for all eternity. But Tobirama was okay with that as well…?
What was a soul, what was a life, what was pride, to a demon Madara supposed.
“Hikaku,” Madara suddenly said.
“Yes?”
“Keep your eyes out for any sparks of dissent within the Uchiha, have members loyal to the main branch do the same. I don’t want a single plan against the Senju or this peace to arise without my knowledge, and I expect it to be snuffed out summarily. Also….”
Madara swallowed thickly,
“If Izuna begins any mobilizing of his own against the Senju, you’ll tell me immediately. Am I understood?”
Hikaku inclined his head, “Yes, lord Madara.”
—
Two months later, Madara stood on a cliff above a neonatal village. The wind carded through his hair, and he looked down at the freshly built and occupied homes, their lights glowing in the fading rays of sunset. His eyes were narrowed down at it, and his mouth was pinched in a tight scowl.
The village took less time than any of them could have expected, but the Mokuton in combination with expert plans, it had been up and running before any of them could blink, and the clans rose for the first time in generations from their ancestral lands and moved.
If asked, nobody really knew who exactly planned all of it, or who orchestrated the quick assembly off all the needed moving parts. It was an amorphous ‘someone’, probably Hashirama if anyone had to guess. Madara knew different.
“You did all this within two months,” Madara said, still squinting down at the village.
From behind him, a cold voice spoke, “With help, of course.”
“Two months…” Madara repeated, and set his mouth into a frown. He turned around, and saw Tobirama standing in the vanishing light of dusk. Red eyes watched him carefully even now, face guarded behind a gleaming happuri - the Senju emblem now replaced by the symbol of their temporary peace: of Konoha.
“A year. You asked that day to give me a year…” Madara said then, looking at him. He folded his hands behind his back, and tilted his head, then continued past the tense silence he had let fill the air, “…You have ten months left. Let’s see if you can keep your head when the day comes for me to sever it.”
Tobirama dipped into a small bow, and a blood red hand placed across his heart.
He looked up at Madara through those ever so sharp eyes and looked at him with a careful blankness - nothing of fear, nothing of admiration.
“Thank you, Lord Madara,” he said.