Chapter Text
The clang of steel, the smoke, the screams. A steady fug rose over the battlefield.
It was familiar. Tobirama breathed it in. The air stung of metal.
The enormous valley lying in the junction between the Uchiha and Senju territories was their second home. This vast chunk of space, dead and barren, with only the stubborn weeds pushing through the soil and refusing to develop any sense of self-preservation, was the place that served as a meeting spot for their skirmishes time and time again for generations now, presumably since both their clans’ histories began.
The battlefield was the place they’ve spent at least the third of their lives’ worth, the other two being missions and compound’s usual affairs, an irregular wink of sleep caught here and there. The war was something habitual to them at that point, and the smell of fresh blood was so ordinary that Tobirama at times couldn’t start on his morning routine until somebody got a kunai stuck in their throat. Point being, they didn’t know peaceful life at all.
The Uchiha didn’t know either. But, unlike the Senju, with this generations-long inconvenience, they seemed to get enough sleep, which annoyed Tobirama immensely. He thought it to be rather unfair that their opponents had an ability to just memorise every technique with a single glance, instead of having to train day and night while the full three thirds of their lives were already preoccupied. To keep up with those lucky layabouts an average Senju had to have at least thirty-six hours of work in a day. They’ve usually managed to fit in sixty-four and a half.
They’ve had an advantage. They knew how to survive.
Before they’ve departed, as always, Hashirama took a moment to check in on him as he was tying the knots of his armour back in his room.
“You ready?” he asked from the doorway, a subtle undertone of worry over his features. Hashirama always worried for some reason, as if he were still a child. Really, they were on it for so long and from such a young age that by this point the war was more of… discommoding, if anything. Hardly there was any ground in being so overly fretful when they’ve been forced to move out almost on schedule by now, the encounters not just predictable, but also sometimes called in in advance. This time around they got a letter announcing the exact time and place of a meetup.
“Like never before,” Tobirama answered. Because he was.
The day that the meeting was set up for was supposed to be a special one that would mark their existence for generations to come, at least in Tobirama’s opinion. He never told that to his brother, reason being his suspected reaction to the news, presumably resulting in Tobirama’s being forced to cease all operations under threat of confiscation of his lab equipment and house arrest, but by that date he developed a new, very impressive, seal, that should have won them this war once and for all. He was serious about that, as he always was regarding his experiments, however they were somewhat tight on time, and so the seal in question was left untested. Usually, untested meant some nasty side-effects, but Tobirama wasn’t much concerned about that since he made calculations again and again, coming to the same results every single time. Worst case scenario – the only potential risk that has less than two percent manifestation rate makes his body suddenly get atomised. But that wasn’t much of a threat in his own assessment. Body restructuring was a mandatory aspect of teleportation, so it would have been present either way, tested or not. Nonetheless, in theory it was a nice practice to pray none of his limbs would switch places to grow out of his ass.
Though he was confident in his capabilities, so any mishaps didn’t count. Only about a thousand things or so could go wrong in the process of utilisation, unlike usually, when it was hundreds of thousands. See? Progress.
“You look… a little bit too smug, Tobi,” Hashirama squinted at him, placing his hand on the doorframe. “Should I search you before we depart?”
Tobirama scoffed at the blatant suspicion in his brother’s words. “Have I let you down once before?”
“Last time you made explosive shields,” Hashirama quirked his brow, his own ragged armour clanking, “we’ve had a lot of people injured.”
“That was one time,” Tobirama huffed. Those shields were very useful actually. He just accidentally made them explode from the wrong side.
“And before that you tested chakra-sapping seals?” Hashirama grimaced, “Which only worked on me for some reason?”
“They sapped natural chakra,” Tobirama bit out, “and it is irrelevant to the situation. I’m not testing anything similar this time around.” It was a lie.
“Alright,” Hashirama squinted at him again, even more mistrust present in his eye. “But if you do, Tobi… gods help me.”
“Right,” Tobirama grumbled. His brother understood nothing at all. They needed to win this war, it trudged on for far too long. What were a few casualties in the grand scheme of things? Nobody even died!
Truth be told, Tobirama had his own grievances to console. The war… was a routine. Endless. All-consuming. Tiring. Nobody wanted it to go on, neither the Uchiha, nor the Senju. It was tolling on them far too heavily, and, since they were on the same page, the common consensus was one of the sides must have eventually conceded and ended its existence. Tobirama just decided it was him who was burdened with the task of convincing the Uchiha it was their best call to become a sacrifice.
Barely an hour past they moved out to the battlefield, and even his Anija’s constant dubious squint didn’t dissuade Tobirama from his conviction. He would do what was needed, he decided, and so his grandest plan started.
Instead of a greeting, Izuna spat out a fireball at him, and Tobirama immediately countered it with his suiton dragon, Hashirama flying past him to clash with his own opponent as the current’s maw swallowed the lump of heat, its form blazing through before turning into vapour with a puff, the heavy steam roaring in compressed creamy fountains as it would out a teakettle, covering the plain almost entirely. It stung and prickled, sweat beading on his brow, the water hastily condensing into sparse spraying raindrops.
The next moment Izuna’s sword collided with his own with the loudest screech and clang. Tobirama breathed out.
“What are you stuck in the clouds about?” Izuna hummed cheerily. “You don’t seem to have missed me much, if you let yourself get distracted. It hurt my feelings enough to actually kill you this time.”
“Bold of you to suggest before you weren’t trying,” Tobirama scoffed, deflecting another lunge, the heated steam over the battlefield slowly dissipating. “That trade deal you’ve struck last week includes quite an obvious trading route. Which also has some weak security measures implemented. Don’t you think that it’s rather risky to leave it like that?” That taunt was meant to serve two purposes at once. First, of course, to intimidate, as they've had the information and possible informants, and second, to fish for more intelligence. Because something with this deal wasn’t right.
“You saw it?!” Izuna sounded elated, dancing through blow after blow, the steel clanging in Tobirama’s ears far too loudly, the force of collision vibrating through his forearms. “You noticed, didn’t you! Say it is smart, so well done that even you couldn’t catch it! That was my brother’s work, isn’t that impressive? Oh, he is so good!”
So there was something else. And he really didn’t catch it. Then that route was just a ploy, and they didn’t find out what the point of the deal was at all, even though by now they should have. “What’s so good about that?” Tobirama sneered, slightly irritated with the fact that he couldn’t decide if the Uchiha wanted them to attack that route or if they expected that it was so obvious that they wouldn’t. Goddammit. That was always the most annoying puzzle. “He’s utilising the most basic tactics.”
“The simpler it is, the more effective. Basics work best against those who tend to overthink, or something like that,” Izuna snickered, definitely citing someone else while continuing the onslaught without stumbling once. “And it’s not that simple if you’ve gotten past that. We’ve played you this time around.”
Izuna’s glee got on Tobirama’s nerves. “Thank you for helping me figure it out,” he sneered with another screeching swing of the blade, this time extremely irritated. He couldn’t just abandon the case, so instead he tried a different tactic. “You are so destructive to your own clan’s affairs it can’t be fixed even by your somewhat competent brother.”
“Lying isn’t your strongest suit,” Izuna grinned, his voice seeping with malice. “That little trick is foolproof. And my brother is the greatest man in the entire world, just so you know.”
“Maybe you should go and marry him if he is so great,” Tobirama scoffed to the side, disgruntled with how his attempt at provocation didn’t work out.
“Maybe you should,” Izuna huffed mockingly, “so you wouldn’t doubt me so much.”
Tobirama felt his vein pop.
“Over my dead body,” he gritted out, going for an especially hard strike and making Izuna leap away to get out of his range. “There is no fate worse than becoming your relation.”
“I know at least one,” Izuna laughed. “Being a Senju surely counts!”
At that Tobirama spat some water needles at him, Izuna countering with another katon ball immediately. Tobirama scoffed bitterly.
It happened so that Izuna pestered him since childhood, being his unwilling self’s ever-present companion. And maybe Tobirama wouldn’t have minded, but Izuna’s main stand-out quality was total aversion to quietness. Tobirama believed taking him out would have been a service to society.
“You are repeating yourself,” he scowled, some shuriken flying past him. At least dodging those was easy, unlike Izuna’s quips, for which he contemplated not for the first time childishly stuffing his ears. Any solution was a good one, really. He was this close to sacrificing his dignity.
“So?” Izuna snickered, “It’s working, and that’s all that matters.”
Hashirama’s mokuton roared through the clearing, the roots cracking the earth apart and separating them further, the chunks of soil moving asunder and breaking down. What a mess. Tobirama wondered briefly who would be sent to clean up after the battle ended this time.
They’ve clashed again and again, the roots crawling further, turning the earth inside out, and with one unlucky landing Tobirama noticed from the corner of his eye that Izuna stumbled. That was the perfect time to say his farewells then, what a shame. He thought he wouldn’t miss Izuna one bit though, with his useless babbling. Finally the war was coming to an end. Who’s played who now?
Tobirama threw a bundle of kunai at his opponent, and he deflected with his katana, the muscles in his calves already straining before a leap until his eye caught on something different, a reflex from the steel’s honed edge capturing on his blood-red iris. Izuna’s eyes widened sharply. And then Tobirama pulled on the marker.
The thunderous crack of Hiraishin’s power roared through the clearing, and Tobirama felt the draw of its force ripping through his skin and muscle. The surroundings blurred, the rock and dirt dispersing into thin lines, the world blackening in a flash, the pull hurling him out.
And yet… something wasn’t… right?
He found himself feeling the slightest bit nauseous, suspicious the problem number nine hundred seventy-three might have actually arisen, causing his stomach to switch places with his bladder in the process of body restructuring. Tobirama stubbornly proceeded to ignore it, preferring to focus on the bigger issue, which was the fact that he flashed past someone, narrowly missing them by the virtue of catching his foot on a stray root, his katana outstretched, and tripped, which resulted in him hopping half of the remaining course rather awkwardly on one leg. He came to a halt with half-a-flail and blinked rapidly, trying to assess if he messed up more than he initially expected. The world spun with unreserved aggression.
The loud buzz and clank instantaneously drew to a standstill. Tobirama glanced up. There were people staring at him.
He squinted, looking them over as well. Uchiha garbs. And Senju. He was still where he initially was. Then at least the distance was calculated more or less precisely.
He stared for a second more and then turned around. Izuna gaped at him, indignantly, stabbing his finger in Tobirama’s direction while his mouth worked in silence like that of a goldfish. Ah.
He really did mess it up.
Izuna was still suspiciously alive.
The world finally stopped spinning, resuming on its normal trajectory. Seeing that Izuna was in no rush to be done with his awkward stupor, Tobirama took a moment to muse on where exactly he miscalculated. His hand only just came up to absentmindedly, in a very performative thoughtful manner, scratch at his chin when suddenly there sounded a deep, low growl, its echo rolling through the valley, filling every crack and every alcove.
And what… was that?
Tobirama made a slow turn, attempting to keep from any abrupt motions. The sound was guttural, as if made by an animal, except it couldn’t have been, because they were in the middle of, very familiar by that point, nowhere. And he was pretty sure it was directed at him.
He glanced up. On the other side of the valley stood both his brother and Uchiha Madara, the scene customary if not for the utter tense rigidness of everything around. Madara’s face was twisted in a sneer, and Hashirama… stood with the same expression Izuna did, gaping at him and flailing his limbs around rather wildly.
Tobirama blinked, incredulity forcing out most of his thoughts instantly. How come they were that surprised? Hiraishin was just another new technique. Which he almost didn’t mess up.
He was hoping… Hashirama won’t even notice. Much.
Before he could make up any more ridiculous questions in his head however, Hashirama let out an unfathomable screech. “RETREAT!! RETREAT!!” He threw himself in Tobirama’s direction, swiftly shortening the distance and knocking him off his feet.
“What-what-WHAT–” Tobirama shrieked as he was hauled back into the woods by his middle, his heels dragging along the soil and his nails scraping at whatever he could reach of Hashirama. So, his face, mainly.
“This is the worst day of my life!” Hashirama yowled, desperately trying to dodge Tobirama’s hands as he leapt for the branches, dragging Tobirama along. “You and your wicked experiments again!”
“It almost worked!” Tobirama gritted out amid useless struggling against the grip, the trunks and leaves flying past. The surroundings blurred rapidly, the battlefield left behind.
“Oh, it did work alright!” Hashirama hissed, evading the fingers threatening to poke his eyes out. “I told you not to test anything weird!”
“Anija!” Tobirama spat, “You’re making it out to be worse than it actually is!”
“How?!” Hashirama howled, hastening his step. “You’ve just ruined our lives!”
“So theatrical,” Tobirama squeezed out, the grip on him tightening. “Release me this instance or you won’t like what is about to come.”
“What?!” Hashirama bit out bitterly, “Any more dooming new techniques of yours?!”
“No,” Tobirama sneered, “just an old-fashioned lesson in manners.” And then he caught a handful of Hashirama’s hair and yanked at them as forcefully as he could manage. Hashirama shrieked, instantly losing his balance and slipping off the tree.
They tumbled down, the freefall painfully short and abrupt, Tobirama smashing the back of his head upon slamming into the earth so hard sparks flew before his eyes. Hashirama floundered through the foliage, yelping repeatedly as it came down with his weight, his form crashing into the forest floor face-first almost simultaneously with Tobirama. He moaned.
“Told you you won’t like it,” Tobirama breathed out, contemplating if he should just stay down on the ground forever. The thought was tempting. That was one hell of a fall, his bones screaming horribly.
“You,” Hashirama wheezed, his head snapping up. His eyes narrowed in that ominous manner they did sometimes after Tobirama’s previous mostly unsuccessful attempts at giving their clan a reasonable advantage even though the sudden motion made him wince quite awfully, the two expressions briefly conflicting on his face. “Do you even realise what you’ve done? This, this will destroy our clan. I can’t just say two whole distinguished shinobi clans smelled wrong.”
Smelled wrong? Smelled what?
“I need answers… no, we’ll return to the compound and then you’ll explain to me how you came up with this technique and why,” Hashirama pushed up off the ground, groaning and seeming to be torn at what wounded place to clutch. In the end he decided his head was the best choice after all.
“Must you be so dramatic?” Tobirama scoffed, sitting up slowly and carefully and then immediately crossing his arms. He could be dramatic too if he so desired.
“I just saw my best friend ogle you up,” Hashirama sighed sourly, “I’m traumatised.”
Tobirama blinked at him in offence. The things were… making less and less sense for some reason.
He thought the choice of words to be bizarre, and the reaction was odd as well. His new, perfectly attuned, as he mistakenly presumed before, technique was a novelty, but it wasn’t anything life-ruining. Tobirama was ready to get an earful for murdering Izuna in cold blood, but for inventing something that for once didn’t blow up? How unfair that was.
And so he took a deep breath, full of resolve to clear the air up. “Anija–”
“No, no. Do not talk,” Hashirama cut him off, raising his hand in the air. “I’m still trying to come to terms with the thing that you’ve done.” He let out a heavy sigh. Tobirama sneered at that. He didn’t do anything much to warrant such a reaction. “Was that deliberate?”
“Of course it was,” Tobirama scoffed. It was, every time. Yes, his technique malfunctioned. Not the usual way though.
“Why?” Hashirama’s face contorted into a grimace. “Was that some elaborate tactic to… help me out? Were you trying to distract Madara in this way?”
“I was trying to resolve a disadvantage,” Tobirama scoffed bitterly, thinking of how much of a distraction Izuna’s demise would have been. He decided it would have surely been a good one. Probably the war-ending kind.
“Disadvantage,” Hashirama sighed, his face sagging into something weary. “Otouto, we’ve talked about it before. It wouldn’t help you meaningfully on the battlefield. You can’t just do things like this out of the blue without any consideration of how it would affect your standing.” Tears burst out of his eyes in a fountain so suddenly it made Tobirama startle. “And if you’ve decided to proceed with it regardless, couldn’t you at least pick an Alpha?!”
All of Tobirama’s remaining confidence flung itself out of the window with a loud whistle. He never heard his Anija use that word once before. Then… what changed couldn’t have been the trajectory. How wrong were his calculations exactly?
“Really, I don’t get how you think this could resolve anything!” Hashirama sobbed, “There has to be limit to practicality! You think you have a reason, but all you’ve done is went too far in your pursuit of advancement! You’ve convoluted the thing that was always meant to be simple! Invented a wheel! Ever heard of a phrase ‘if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it’?!”
A giant metaphorical wave crashed over Tobirama among Hashirama’s hastened babbling. A lecture. His older brother was giving him a lecture. Over something he didn’t understand in the slightest. What was he even talking about?
“And because of this now I’m–”
“What’s an Alpha,” Tobirama stated dumbly. His mind was buzzing way too loudly with a hundred thoughts at once. He carded through a whole cluster of theories bundled up nicely inside his brain for an occasion that something with this precise jutsu actually does go wrong. Couldn’t have been the time. Couldn’t have been the space. If he didn’t mishear, then there was only one explanation left.
Hashirama stared at him for a long moment. “You’ve also hit your head, haven’t you?” He looked to the side. “Or is it a side effect of some kind?”
“The technique I have utilised was a time-space traversal type,” Tobirama breathed out. “What is an Alpha?”
“Really?” Hashirama squinted at him dubiously, ignoring Tobirama’s question again. “Then what about your body?”
“It has a side effect of spontaneous cell restructuring,” Tobirama trailed, uneasy about the fact that his brother might have had an idea about his stomach-bladder suspected issues. Or about the fact that he could have meant something entirely else. “Can’t teleport objects without first breaking them down.” He took a deep breath, his eyes narrowing. “Anija, what is an Alpha?”
Hashirama stared at him again, his mouth opening and closing a couple of times as if he couldn’t decide what to say. “A different gender?” he managed, unsure.
Tobirama’s thoughts finally snapped to a point. This place was not his place.
Where exactly he hurled himself out?
And Hashirama thought he did something to his gender. For a reason.
“And what was I before?” he swallowed.
“A Beta?..” Hashirama looked absolutely lost. “That thing did something to your brain as well,” he whispered under his breath. “How do I explain to the clan you are now an amnesiac?..”
Tobirama made a sharp inhale. This place was not his place. He did mess up in his calculations. Big time.
It was worse than the exploding shields. It was harder to rectify. He had a theory once about every decision you haven’t made leading to a different reflection of reality, but what decision and at what point could have been made for such reflection to have different biological and societal structure? Hashirama named two genders, the one that he wasn’t and the one that he was before.
Which meant that there had to be a third one.