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Jul 23, 2019

Tear Into Your Soul - Early Years - ao3 link

Fandom: Naruto Pairing: Hashirama/Tobirama

Hashirama is a miracle.

Tobirama knows that to be true, because everyone says so. The first member of their clan in living memory to inherit that terrifying ancestral power, the Mokuton, the promise inherent within Senju blood fulfilled at long last - and just in time. Hashirama is a blessing sent from their ancestors, here to save them from the scourge of their enemies: the dreadful Uchiha, of course, among many other rival clans, but also, just as importantly, the ever-present threat of famine as the farms around them burn from the ever-present war and the darkened sky dooms their prayers that rice and wheat be abundant.

(The wind smells of ash, and people blame the fire-souled Uchiha for their losses. Children lost is one thing, but land is a Senju's soul, as sacred and untouchable as an Uchiha's eyes, and people go mad when nothing comes from the earth. Tobirama, as alone among his clan in his preference for water as he is in all other things, thinks of distant volcanos that erupt far more often beneath the sea than above the land, and looks to the cloudy sky with the thought that the land is not the only thing that plants need to grow.)

But those sorrows can no longer touch the Senju.

All of these evils are defeated, victory anticipated, and all because they have Hashirama now. Hashirama, who can fix it all for them, or at least let them look forward to a future filled with lush crops drenched in the blood of their enemies.

That's why they so revere him. Hashirama brings them hope where before they had none.

So it's okay, really, if he's sometimes a little – odd.

Who cares if sometimes he skips training in favor of wandering the forest, speaking to the trees as if he thinks they're speaking back?

Who cares if he laughs like a child, the wonderful seductive warmth of his smile never fading even when looking at a battlefield filled with death and despair?

Who cares if each spring drives him mad with unspoken rage, rendering him black-eyed and vicious, snarling and inarticulate and dangerous?

It doesn't matter.

Hashirama is their sign of victory ascendant, the one who will save them, and they love him without reservation.

Tobirama is no different from the rest of them in loving Hashirama.

Even if sometimes, he wonders -

But no.

He's read all the ancient scrolls his clan keeps safe, the ones describing their clan's extremely rare kekkai genkai, and they all hint that the Mokuton is a dangerous blessing to have: that those who wield it eventually become consumed by it, that they will find a way - any way - to achieve their victory. Tobirama doesn't entirely understand why the scrolls all act as though it's a bad thing that great victory is always within the reach of the Mokuton, why they warn so many times that only the master of the Mokuton alone decides what constitutes such victory - why they repeatedly point out that the master of the forest will be a little too closely connected to their domain to be entirely understood even by their closest kin.

The morality of plants is not that of human beings.

So Hashirama being a bit odd makes sense, really, if you look at it that way. If he cites the Mokuton’s influence as the reason for his strange behaviors, it's only reasonable to believe him.

Besides, if Tobirama were to admit the truth, if only to himself, he would have to admit that he doesn't mind Hashirama's behavior as much as he probably should, for the sake of his clan.

Hashirama might be odd, yes, but in his oddness he loves Tobirama, and in that respect he's practically unique.

If Hashirama is his clan's miracle, Tobirama knows that he himself is its curse. What else could explain his clan's disdain? They turn away from him, ignoring him even though he is their leader's son. They play tricks on him, taking advantage of his serious nature and difficulty understanding nuance to mock him. They whisper about his eyes even when he's not looking at them - he never liked looking people in the eye, so it was easy enough to obey his father's order not to, but that just started more whispers about how easily it came to him, whispers offered up as just more evidence of how unnatural he is. They laugh at him when he moves his arms in the strange way that made him feel better, and with his father's permission made a game of dislocating his arms whenever they saw him do it - though at least Hashirama put a violent stop to that as soon as he figured out what they were doing.

Hashirama loves Tobirama when no one else does; surely, that must be something drawn from the Mokuton, too, and so Tobirama is very careful not to question any of his brother's strangeness.

(One of Tobirama’s great sorrows is that he can’t ever bring himself to wish that Hashirama did not love him: it is all he has, all he clings to, and for all that it hurts him in his soul when their father punishes him as a means to hurt the otherwise untouchable Hashirama, causing Hashirama to grind his teeth and bite his tongue to bleeding with rage, he can’t help but be secretly relieved by it, too, though he knows that if he was truly righteous he would have wished that Hashirama remained untouched by his brother's troubles. This is how Tobirama knows he must be a curse: his own father treats his very existence as little more than a goad used to control Hashirama, and Tobirama guiltily lets him do it because Hashirama’s love is the only thing he has that he can’t bear to lose. He’s a bad brother, Tobirama is, and he knows it, and if he spends the rest of his life trying to make up for the pain he has caused his brother just by suffering in front of him then it will still not be enough to assuage his guilt.)

Besides, it's not like Hashirama’s strangeness is all that bad, really.

It's not really that bad to be ordered to share his brother's bed following that disaster on the river with the Uchiha and Hashirama's secret friend (you should have caught them earlier, his father bellows at Tobirama, and the rest of his clan agree; what use is it being a sensor if you let such things happen? he demands, and Tobirama doesn't know how to tell him that he knew all along but disregarded it because it made his brother happy so in the end he just doesn't say anything at all). The lack of privacy is a little irritating, yes, especially just as he was getting used to having his own space, but knowing that Hashirama loves him so much, fears losing him so much, that he wants him within arms' reach in the dark hours of the night has its own sort of joy.

It's not really that bad when Hashirama decides to take over the role of disciplining Tobirama, either. Oh, he doesn't like being bound and forced to sit helpless at his brother's side, but it's better than the discipline he sees lurking in his father's glare, the way he still sometimes hurts Tobirama as a way to punish Hashirama, and anyway Hashirama's punishments are so much less severe as to be practically laughable. Besides, Hashirama only does it because he loves him so much and worries about him, he says so, and it makes Tobirama so warm to know he is loved that he can almost forget the embarrassment of having his hands and legs tied together with rope, kneeling by his brother's side and being fed like a dog begging for scraps by the side of the dinner table.

It's not even really that bad in the spring, the terrible spring, where all of nature roars to life with a vengeance and Hashirama with it. The thick smell of pollen that fills the air of their compound is inescapable; where it makes some people sneeze and others look to their wives and husbands with anticipatory smiles, it drives Hashirama mad with the urge to possess and destroy and claim things for his own.

Really, Tobirama is proud that Hashirama picks him to accompany him to his solitude each spring, even if he sometimes wishes he could have some warning before it happens rather than Hashirama simply appearing beside him and grabbing him, eyes wild and face twisted into a grimace, and carts him off over his shoulder as he heads into the forest in his yearly isolation meant to save his clan from himself.

Yes, maybe it's a little bit boring, sitting trapped inside that little well-warded shack, alone for days on end, unable to leave and with no food or water but what Hashirama lets him have from his hand, locked away with no access to anyone but his brother who spends most days out in the forest that grows in frightening new ways. But Tobirama can adapt to that, too; he's been teaching himself sealing and how new jutsus are made. It's a good skill to be able to entertain oneself, after all, a valuable thing to learn before he starts heading out regularly on solo missions – and if maybe he clings a bit more to Hashirama those nights than on others, pressing his body into his brother’s just to feel someone’s touch against his skin and greedily drinking up his brother’s words because it’s better than the dreadful silence...well, it’s just that there’s a difference between solitude and loneliness and sometimes those long days spent alone feel like the latter.

Besides, it's not like anyone in their clan would pick him to spend their springtime festival with, anyway, so it's not like he's really missing anything.

Nobody would want him.

(It’s not that Tobirama doesn’t know that Hashirama chases away anyone who lingers too long, his brother's mind still full of the nightmares of Tobirama's unhappy childhood filled with pranks, but it’s fine, it’s really fine. Nobody wants him anyway, not really, and besides Tobirama doesn’t even really want a lover, not someone who just wants to use him and hurt him and count him as a victory to be won, the way Hashirama murmurs warnings about sometimes in the dark. He’s alone and he’s a curse and his brother’s love is the only thing he has and the one thing he cannot bear to lose, not for anything, and that means he appreciates his brother's protective love, he does, he really does, even if he does sometimes find himself longing for the touch of a friendly hand on his skin, however brief. But even there he can't really complain, because when he shyly told Hashirama about those strange longings – dreams of arms around him and kisses pressed against his lips – his brother only laughed and began to hug him more often, long lingering hugs that were only strange at first and quickly became like a soothing balm after a burn. Which just goes to show that Hashirama is right, of course; anything Tobirama wants, his loving brother can provide, and Tobirama shouldn't question that fact.)

So, really, it’s – fine.

If it got a little less fine and more embarrassing when Hashirama seemed to rather belatedly discover the joys his hands could bring him, well, whatever, Tobirama’s gotten very good at politely ignoring it, even if as time goes by he can’t help but sneak a few sidelong peeks out of curiosity. Hashirama likes to loll onto back when he touches himself, spread himself out without the blanket covering him, body relaxed and open and his cock hard in his hand as he strokes himself, and Tobirama just tries to keep very still and very quiet so Hashirama won’t be embarrassed to remember that he’s there.

(Hashirama’s not a virgin, not the way Tobirama is. On the elders’ advice, their father took Hashirama to a whorehouse for his first time, a seal painted on his back to prevent pregnancy, and took Tobirama along as well to guard his door from any shinobi that might try to take advantage of a vulnerable moment. It’d been spring, and Butsuma had presumably thought that Hashirama might get the rage out of his system through sex, but all that ended up happening was that the whores eventually gave up out of sheer exhaustion – yes, all of them – and Hashirama’d come back out, barely even winded, to grab a horribly blushing Tobirama and head to the outpost as usual. The elders hadn’t bothered to try it again next year.)

That much, at least, is normal, or at least so he thinks. His sensei hadn’t exactly been very clear about it all – it’s the father’s job to explain sex, really, but Tobirama’s father is far too busy for such things and so his sensei had stuttered his way through a short explanation of the mechanics of sexual interaction once he’d realized Tobirama was old enough to understand it. Regardless of the lack of clarity, he’d definitely explained that masturbation is normal and healthy, as long as it’s done in private.

And, well, Hashirama’s insistence that Tobirama share his bed means that they share a private space, so where else would Hashirama do it? It makes perfect sense.

Hashirama’s always been less shy than Tobirama in that respect. In every respect, really.

“Tell me about the twins,” Hashirama asks one day, lounging in their room, his head on Tobirama’s lap the way he likes to when they’re alone. Tobirama’s practicing his iryo jutsu, his fingers glowing green by Hashirama’s temples, but no matter how much he tries he can’t seem to fix or even find the damage his diagnostic jutsu always insists is there.

“The twins?”

“Mm. Masako and Mariko. Have they settled on anyone yet? You know what I mean.”

“Oh. Uh, Masako’s chakra spikes whenever Nara Youta comes to visit, and he always visits the twins’ shop every time he does, so I think it might be mutual. That’s good, right? It’d be a good alliance.”

“Hmm. Only if we actually establish an alliance, though – the Nara are fairly firm in their neutrality at the moment. What would be the point if Masako just goes off to the Nara compound? Mariko would be heartbroken, assuming she doesn’t also marry a Nara.”

“No, she likes Itsuki.”

“Hm. No, that won’t do.”

“What’s wrong with Itsuki? He’s a Senju.”

“Yes, exactly; there’s no benefit in it. He’s stable, dependable, loyal...excellent alliance material. Wasted on Mariko.”

“But she likes him.”

“So? Easy enough to fix, once we figure out whether an argument or isolation would work better to kill the affection. Very easy to kill such things, as long as you catch them early enough. Hmm. Can you think of any other Nara that might work for her? We could keep one twin with us, send one to the Nara – that way we keep a Nara here, for security, and bind the one there to us as well. The twins will remain devoted to each other no matter what the distance.”

“I suppose so,” Tobirama says doubtfully. He doesn’t know anything about romance, though he supposes he does know something about being devoted to family. “You won’t ever send me away, will you?”

“Of course not. You’re the heir; obviously you can’t leave home.”

Hashirama talked like that sometimes, as if their father was dead and gone and he was already clan head. It makes Tobirama worry, sometimes, but Hashirama made it very clear after that day on the riverbank that Tobirama had to choose between his father and his brother and stick to whatever choice he made, no going back, and of course Tobirama had picked Hashirama and that, he supposes, is that.

He’s pretty sure Hashirama’s only waiting until he comes of age to make certain the elders won’t be able to try to install some sort of interim head on a technicality.

(If that makes a frisson of fear run up Tobirama's back and turns his stomach, then it’s just because he’s being foolish: he picked Hashirama, has to stick with it, and if it makes him queasy to be silently complicit in his father’s premediated death, well, that’s just the price you pay for the choices you make.)

“What about after that, though?” Tobirama presses. He doesn’t let Hashirama get away with everything – okay, he lets him get away with just about everything, but not clan business, administration and that sort of thing; Hashirama hates paperwork, so he leaves it in Tobirama’s hands – and this is important to him. “I don’t mind you marrying me off, if you have to, but I don’t want to go, even once you have – once you have another heir.”

To be perfectly honest, Tobirama’s a little terrified of that day, when it comes. Hashirama’s marriage to an Uzumaki is already a signed deal, though he’s yet to meet his bride – she, of course, will come to live with them, as is only right for the Senju's future clan head – and Tobirama is secretly convinced that either she or the nameless children she will bear for his brother will be the thing that finally steals his brother’s attention and love away from him, leaving him all alone in the world.

“‘Don’t mind’? ‘If I have to’?” Hashirama asks, tilting his head back to look up at him. “Don’t you want to get married, Tobirama?”

Tobirama shakes his head. “I don’t want to leave you, not ever,” he says honestly, and wonders a little at the flash of triumph in Hashirama’s eyes, as though that’s the response his brother had wanted to hear from him, even though Tobirama knows perfectly well that as the spare he’s meant to be used to form alliances.

Just another piece for his brother to play for the advantage of their clan.

“There are all sorts of advantages to being married, though,” Hashirama says, almost managing to be casual with it. “Someone nice to cuddle up with...don’t you want those?”

“They’re not important,” Tobirama says firmly. He can’t even really imagine being curled up in bed with some nameless figure, a woman he does not yet know and might not even have yet met: he’s been sleeping in Hashirama’s bed for so long that any time he thinks of the future he can’t really imagine anything different. “Anything I really need, I can get from you, anija.”

That’s what Hashirama’s always telling him, after all.

Hashirama smiles, relaxing, and there’s something of the terrible spring lurking in the depths of that smile. “That’s right, Tobirama. Absolutely right. So don’t you worry, little brother; I won’t send you away, I promise. You’ll stay with me and I’ll take good care of you, just the way I always have.”

Tobirama smiles and nods, and thinks it’s settled.

And it is, he supposes, except that later that day, in the late lazy afternoon that they have all free to themselves for once, he wakes up from a pleasant doze to find Hashirama touching himself again and looking unusually thoughtful about it.

Tobirama closes his eyes again, intending to go back to sleep, except then Hashirama’s shaking his shoulder.

“What is it, anija?” he asks, keeping his eyes shut. He’s comfortable; whatever stupid idea his brother has – probably involving running errands for him, maybe for some more for the oil he likes to use on himself – can wait until he’s woken up all the way. Or, maybe, Hashirama could even go get the damn thing for himself for once.

“I’m worried, Tobirama.”

That gets Tobirama’s attention. “Worried?” he asks, opening his eyes and twisting to look at Hashirama. “About what?”

Hashirama looks at him with big soulful eyes. “I don’t want you to leave me, either,” he says. “But I’m worried that one day you will.”

“Well, that’s up to you, isn’t it?” Tobirama asks, puzzled. “You’re the clan head; you decide all the marriages.”

“Not all of them,” Hashirama says. “Not the love matches.”

Tobirama snorts. For one thing, he had just been helping Hashirama earlier that day to make sure the supposed ‘love matches’ tended in the right direction for the clan’s interests; for another, he highly doubted anyone would ever fall in love with him, rendering the problem moot. Tobirama doesn’t love where he’s not loved, not unconditionally; how else could he agree to let his father die? “I don’t think that’s going to be an issue, anija.”

“No, no,” Hashirama says. “But still...do you touch yourself, Tobirama?”

Tobirama flushes bright red.

“You don’t, do you,” Hashirama concludes, sighing and shaking his head. “Tobirama, that’s not good; you should. It’s normal for boys your age.”

“I have,” Tobirama protests weakly. “I – once in a while – when I’m on mission, I guess…”

“Wet dreams don’t count.”

Tobirama winces. Most of his experiences do probably fall into that category: restless feverish sleep, dreams of sensations of all sorts, followed by waking up rubbing off into the bedroll or a pillow or (a few hideously embarrassing and never-mentioned times) his brother’s leg. And that’s just when he doesn’t wake up having already come while asleep.

He knows he should do it more often, yes, but Hashirama’s always there, sharing a bed and a bath, and Tobirama just gets so flustered and embarrassed – and besides, he hates the idea of somehow doing it wrong, especially where Hashirama might see.

(He does sometimes mimic what Hashirama does, but with Hashirama around every corner and all the work he has to do, it’s easier to just – not. And then, of course, the dreams come…)

“You just don’t know how to do it properly,” Hashirama decides, because he knows Tobirama better than anyone else. “I’ll show you.”

Tobirama somehow hadn’t been expecting that. “Anija, don’t be ridiculous. We’re brothers.”

“So what? Doesn’t that just mean that it’s my job to show you things you need to know?”

Tobirama hesitates. Usually, yes, that’s the case, but…

“Isn’t sex – different?” he asks. He swears he’s read or seen something somewhere that said that siblings don’t want to know about each other’s sex lives – though he supposes those must be ones that don’t share a bed.

Hashirama shrugs. “Maybe for some people,” he says airily. “I certainly don’t mind – plants, you know, are all related anyway.”

Huh. That’s a good point. Still, surely...

“Besides, Tobirama, this is important! I won’t have you running off into some stupid ill-thought-out marriage just because you don’t know how to take care of your own sexual urges.”

Tobirama worries at his lower lip, distracted from his former thoughts by his horror at the concept. “Anija! I wouldn’t.”

“You might,” Hashirama says. “You’re a teenager, Tobirama, and I know you’ve been having those dreams nearly every night –”

That’s an exaggeration, surely? Tobirama usually only manages to furtively sneak away for some time to himself once every few weeks, but on the other hand he’s not always aware of the dreams...

“ – and eventually the frustration might get to you, and then where would I be? All alone, and you with someone else that doesn’t deserve you.”

Someone else who would abandon him at the first instance, no doubt, and Hashirama would never forgive him for such a betrayal, and then Tobirama would have nothing.

“Besides, you said yourself that I can provide you with everything you need,” Hashirama says, practical as always. “This is just more of that: a lesson on being independent.”

That’s how Hashirama had phrased teaching Tobirama to cook and clean, too, but Tobirama’s pretty sure that was only because Hashirama didn’t want to be bothered doing those chores himself.

Still, knowing how to cook and clean is pretty useful. And Tobirama really doesn’t want to be married off, not to a stranger, and there’s always the chance that if he says no Hashirama will decide to arrange a marriage for him just because he’d decided that Tobirama needed to be taken care of sexually. That would be just awful, but it’d be just like Hashirama – always trying to take care of him.

If Tobirama could prove to Hashirama that he didn’t need anyone taking care of him, that he could take care of it for himself...yes, that would be a good argument against any future marriage plans, wouldn’t it? If Hashirama worried about him not being happy, he’d be able to turn the tables on him, say that he’s doing just as he was taught and that he’s content that way.

And that way, he could stay by Hashirama’s side and continue to take care of him and be loved by him, forever.

“Okay,” he says. “But I really do think I know how to do – that. I mean, I’ve seen...pictures.”

Mostly he’s seen Hashirama, half-caught glimpses, but there definitely was one picture book that was being passed around the other boys his age that one time, where he saw a few pages before someone stole it away.

“Do you really? Show me.”

Tobirama turns red. Somehow he hadn’t thought about that part of – lessons. Hashirama would see.

(Hashirama might tease.)

“I promise to be nice,” Hashirama says.

“You’re never nice,” Tobirama grumbles. He’s pouting and he knows it, but he’s not sure how else to react.

“I could be nice,” Hashirama says virtuously. “I mean, if I really wanted to?”

“To me?”

Hashirama cracks a grin. “You’re my brother! It’s my right and solemn duty to tease you till you blush.”

“It is not.”

It probably is.

“You’re stalling,” Hashirama observes. “Does that mean you’re scared?”

Tobirama can feel his ears turning red, because, well, he is stalling, and good shinobi don’t put off things just because they’re scared (or embarrassed, which is more accurate). So he ducks his head down and pushes down his pants.

“Awww, you’re so cute,” Hashirama coos.

Now Tobirama’s whole face turns bright red. They bathe together on a regular basis; Hashirama is just being obnoxious. “Anija, do you want me to do this or not?”

“You’ll learn to like the teasing,” his brother says dismissively, with the air of someone who knows things for certain. “Now, show me what you do. Or would you like me to show you?”

If it’s a choice between being laughed at for doing it wrong or being thought overly cautious by asking for the demonstration, it’s an easy decision. “You show me.”

Hashirama’s eyes sparkle and he beams, and Tobirama is pleased by the signs that he’s made the right decision. “Okay. Come over here, then, and sit in my lap, facing away; I’ll do for you what I do for me.”

Tobirama obeys, settling between Hashirama’s legs.

Then he just barely manages to stifle a gasp, because the feeling of Hashirama’s hand on his cock is nothing like his own.

Clearly he has, in fact, been doing this wrong.

And then Hashirama has to ruin it by talking. “Let me walk you through this,” he says brightly, using his teacher voice, and oh, Tobirama’s never going to be able to let his brother teach him anything ever again without thinking about this moment in the sun, warm and hot and filled with unexpected pleasure. “Now, generally I like to start with a nice long stroke –”

He demonstrates a few times.

Tobirama spills in under ten seconds.

“Tobirama, really,” Hashirama scolds, though he mostly sounds amused. He was probably expecting this. “How am I supposed to teach you if you can’t control yourself a little better?”

“Sorry, anija,” Tobirama says, mortified. “I didn’t mean to.”

“Well, it’s all right, I suppose. We’ll just have to keep going.”

“Keep going?” Tobirama asks, frowning. “But...”

“It’s okay,” Hashirama says, and there’s a smirk in his voice. “You’re young. I’m sure you can keep up.”

Tobirama cannot, in fact, keep up. The initial lesson takes thirty minutes, just going slowly through different types of strokes and speeds and interesting things you can do with your thumb or your fingers, and Tobirama has already come more times than he’s thought possible.

It’s amazing.

It’s also starting to get painful.

“Anija,” he whimpers. “Anija, please, I can’t, no more, please –”

“You’re getting hard again,” Hashirama observes gleefully. “I don’t think your body agrees with you.”

“Anija, it hurts.”

“Yes, but it feels good, too, doesn’t it?”

“Anija!”

“Oh, all right. One more time and we can move on to part two.”

Tobirama is about to start shouting – part two? Part two?! How many parts are there?! – but then Hashirama does that thing with his hand that they’ve discovered will get Tobirama to come even if he’s trying not to (Hashirama tried it a few times just to check) and he’s biting his hand to try to keep from screaming as his vision goes temporarily white and his body shudders into yet another orgasm.

“A break,” he begs once he comes down. “Just a break, anija, please!”

“Never thought you’d be begging to get out of training,” Hashirama laughs. “But that’s all right; you can have a break. Time for a test.”

Tobirama blinks owlishly at him.

“I want to see if you’ve learned what I’ve taught you,” Hashirama clarifies.

“But you said I could have a break!”

Hashirama snorts. “Oh, yes, well, fine. You can show me on me, then.”

It’s not as if Tobirama wasn’t aware that Hashirama was hard behind him, and had been since the minute he’d sat there – probably before, since Hashirama’s own masturbation session had been interrupted for this lesson – but it hadn’t occurred to him that he’d be asked to touch him.

“If you’d prefer not to, we could always test it on you –”

“No, no, you’ll do just fine!” Tobirama says quickly, his voice nearly squeaking in a manner very unlike himself. He doesn’t want to touch himself for as long as Hashirama will let him – not everyone has super-quick healing the way Hashirama does, which sometimes he thinks his brother forgets. He’s so sore. “I’ll practice on you!”

Hashirama leans back as Tobirama scrambles to turn himself around. “If you do well, I’ll heal you up after,” he offers.

Tobirama nods – it’s good to have a reward to work towards, a fundamental precept of education – and sets about replicating what he’s learned.

Irritatingly enough, it turns out that Hashirama likes an entirely different set of moves than the ones Tobirama had liked best, and while Hashirama assures him that just demonstrating that he knows how to do something is sufficient, Tobirama’s competitive streak is now up and running. Maybe he won’t be able to get Hashirama to come quite as many times as he did, but he can’t really call himself accomplished if he can’t get Hashirama to come at least a few times.

He explains as much to Hashirama, who nods solemnly. “I understand your motives, and I promise you’ll be able to do it again another time, but right now you only get a few rounds before we’re moving on to part two, you understand?”

Tobirama sighs. There’s no stopping Hashirama when he’s got something fixed in his head – see: peace with the Uchiha – so he might as well just give in now.

Besides, this is kind of fun. He tries to keep the fact that it makes him hard hidden, leaning further forward and ducking his head down, but he’s pretty sure Hashirama can still tell.

“Okay, anija. I’ll do whatever you say,” he says, and then yelps when Hashirama unexpectedly jerks in his hands, and, oh, no wonder Hashirama had him sit facing away from him – given the way Tobirama had been kneeling and leaning over Hashirama, it’s gotten all over Tobirama’s hands and shirt. A little even got on his chin, which is pretty impressive.

“Take off your shirt,” Hashirama suggests. He’s panting a little. “That way you won’t get it any more dirty.”

Tobirama obeys, and goes back to work. He thinks about asking for a different position, but he can’t imagine his big brother sitting in his lap – and anyway, it wouldn’t work, given that Hashirama is taller. He wouldn’t be able to see what he was doing.

Anyway, Hashirama promises to warn him next time, which he does, even though he does end up splattering all over Tobirama’s chest anyway.

“That’s good,” he says, looking very pleased. “Well done, Tobirama.”

Tobirama flushes again, this time with pleasure. He loves making his brother happy.

(Hearing it makes his cock twitch, a little, but that’s only reasonable, given what they’re doing.)

“Now, part two.”

It would disappoint Hashirama if Tobirama tried to refuse, so he doesn’t, crawling back into Hashirama’s arms and sighing with relief when the glowing green light makes the soreness disappear as if it’s never been.

It appears that part two is a more elaborate version of part one, involving other body parts.

Hashirama spends what must be a near quarter-hour just on his chest and nipples alone, showing him how they can be stroked gently or pinched harshly, until Tobirama is thrashing and begging for a touch to his cock, too, because it’s feeling very left out right now.

“You do it,” Hashirama says mercilessly, and Tobirama does, though he does think grumpily to himself that it’s not quite as good as when Hashirama does it.

It also turns out that he likes having nails lightly raked down his inner thighs, though it doesn’t do as much for him when he does it himself, and Hashirama amuses himself for a good long while sucking bruises into Tobirama’s neck and collarbone even though Tobirama protests that he wouldn’t be able to do it to himself.

“That’s what clones are for,” Hashirama says, and Tobirama does not want to think about that. He’s already overwhelmed: the thought of even more – no way.

Hashirama’s also just as demanding in round two as he was in round one, and Tobirama’s left begging for mercy even as he obediently keeps tugging at his cock because he’s come too much already: even naked, he’s positively filthy, his own come dripping on his belly and chest and thighs.

“Just a little more,” Hashirama says coaxingly, and Tobirama entirely loses track of time after that – he remembers that Hashirama spent a lot of time putting fingers inside of him and letting him pleasure himself on them, moving up and down in a way that worked really well and felt great, and then made him do the same thing for himself (not as good as Hashirama, which is starting to become a trend), and that there were other things he couldn’t even remember because it was just so, so much.

Every time he thinks he’s flagging, that he can’t go any further, Hashirama heals him again and put him back to work.

(Why had he thought learning things from his brother was a good idea? Natural prodigies never understand how much more difficult things can be for everyone else!)

At least Hashirama will sometimes agree to let Tobirama pleasure him instead, if Tobirama begs very nicely for the privilege. It’s entirely worth it to beg if it gets him some relief.

By the time they get to part four (five? six? he’s lost count), which involves the application of toys, Tobirama has already decided that he regrets all of his life choices and this one especially.

It’s been hours.

He’s going to die.

He can’t even talk anymore, trying to convey his pleas for mercy in his eyes.

“You’ve been doing so good,” Hashirama says, putting his hand on the back of Tobirama’s neck the way he does sometimes when he’s feeling particularly proud. “You’re such a good boy, Tobirama, doing what I’m asking of you even when it hurts; I love you so much.”

Tobirama can’t help but preen a little at that. His brother loves him.

So what if the way he choose to express that love is different from other brothers?

“I bet you’re getting a little tired now, aren’t you?”

Tobirama nods furiously.

“Well, all right. But I don’t want to leave you with any gaps in your education –”

Tobirama’s a completionist at heart, so he doesn’t like the idea either; the gaps will gnaw on his mind and disturb his sleep in the future as he gets curious as to what was left out.

But right now, he’ll take it.

“– so how about we do this: you agree to use some of these toys every time you practice touching yourself for the next few months or so, until you’ve trained yourself to like having something inside of you when you come, and in return we can stop the lesson now. How about that?”

Hashirama is the best brother, taking pity on him like that, and Tobirama expresses his relief by throwing his arms around him for a (rather uncharacteristic) hug.

Hashirama laughs and hugs him back. “It’s gotten late,” he observes, nodding out the window. “Come, let’s wash up and go to sleep.”

Tobirama can’t really walk right now, so Hashirama ends up lifting him up, arm under his neck and another under his legs like he’s an infant, to take him into the bath, and then gently washing him clean before quickly bathing himself.

The water, Tobirama’s element, is wonderfully soothing, and Hashirama’s iryo jutsu is, too. By the time they make it back to bed, Hashirama curling himself up around Tobirama like a many-armed monkey clutching onto a beloved tree the way he always does, Tobirama’s already more than halfway asleep, and he drifts off quite happily, already planning on sleeping in as late as he can allow himself the next morning.

But water is his element.

It’s almost entirely dark when he wakes up, the light of the moon barely enough to let him make out dull, rough shapes in the dark, and he can taste something wrong with the water.

Salt.

Tobirama visited the ocean once, as a child. It’s far too long a journey to make without good reason, particularly with the Uchiha lands sitting firmly in between them and the closer of the coasts, but Hashirama had insisted on it for Tobirama’s fifth birthday – it’d been right after he’d crawled back home after a courier mission gone horribly wrong, the Uchiha child-killing bands out to avenge the death of their clan head’s eldest son, and they’d carved a mark of shame into his shoulder that to this day served as a constant, terrible reminder of the dishonorable means he’d used to escape, targeting their eyes like a bandit, and no matter that it was an accident.

(He remembers that time all too well.

He’d been so desperate: they’d been having fun with him, kicking him back and forth, stepping on his hands, forcing his face into the dirt. It’d been funny to them, that the Senju had whelped such a runt as he, all pale-faced and red-eyed – like a rat, they’d laughed, like a corpse, diseased and hideous, and they’d made jokes about who his true parentage must have been for him to turn out like that.

He’d remembered the only suiton lesson he’d ever had: water-summoning, the most basic of the basic, and he knew it wouldn’t do any good against a whole band of adult Uchiha child-killers, but he couldn’t let himself die. Not at age four, not on a stupid courier mission that was supposed to be a nice and easy run to get him used to going out all on his own.

There wasn’t any water around to summon, though, but he’d remembered what his teacher, a passing Uzumaki come for a brief visit, had told him – there’s an ocean in every one of us, he’d said, no matter where we go, no matter what, we carry the salt of the ocean in our blood – and there was plenty of blood, all over Tobirama’s chest and from his nose, and he’d gotten it smeared on the Uchiha’s clothing so he’d thought that maybe it would be enough.

But when he called the water to come to him, not focusing just calling for any water, any water at all, it hadn’t come from the blood on their clothing: it had burst out of their eyes in a shower of viscera so vile that the memory still sometimes wakes him up in the middle of the night and sends him to scrub off his skin as if the stain of it had never left him. They’d been moaning, blinded, in pain, and he’d crawled away, one of his legs twisted the wrong way round from one of their kicks and his ribs feeling like they’d splintered in his chest. They tried to give chase, of course, even unseeing as they now were, but they couldn’t track him without their eyes and he’d gotten away. That’d been what he’d wanted, yes, but the shame of it still burned.

It’d been the middle of winter, he remembers, and Hashirama had been the one to find him: he’d made it most of the way home before the pain and the terror and the exhaustion had overcome him, so he’d ended up crawling into a hollow at the base of a birch tree in a vain attempt to hide his too-pale hair against the ghostly white bark.

His lips had been nearly blue when he’d been found, the trees sleepily calling out Hashirama’s name until he responded despite all the warnings he’d been given not to listen to them too much; Tobirama’s armor had been stolen and his clothing ripped all to shreds, first by the Uchiha’s knives as they laughingly cut stripes into his flesh to watch him thrash as he tried to escape and then by their reaching grasping fingers as they lashed out blindly in agony with what was left of their prized dojutsu streaming down their cheeks in a stream of gore, so he’d had no defense as the cold earth leeched away his warmth.

Hashirama had scooped him into his arms and run home, his face gone nearly as pale as Tobirama’s skin; he’d been struck mute by his horror at the incident, reduced to furiously shaking his head as he refused to leave Tobirama’s side while the medics stitched up his wounds and settled him into a bath of lukewarm water that felt like it was burning, with Hashirama sitting behind him to keep him from slipping into the water to drown.

When Bustuma recounts the incident, as he sometimes did to guests who needed to be convinced to join the Senju side against the vicious Uchiha threat, he says that Hashirama didn’t say a single word the entire day, but Tobirama remembers otherwise, in that half-hazy dreamlike way of both exhaustion and childhood.

He remembers Hashirama, sitting with him in the bath, his white-knuckled fingers wrapped around Tobirama’s arms so tightly that they left bruises. He remembers Hashirama looking out the window at the forest that surrounded the Senju compound.

He remembers Hashirama saying, in a strange low whisper, “The trees were right.”

He still doesn’t know what Hashirama had meant by that.)

And after that, Hashirama had demanded they visit the ocean, so that Tobirama could learn his suiton from the mother of all rivers and become stronger, and Tobirama remembers very well his confusion when they’d first arrived and he’d first tasted the salt in the water in the air.

He tastes the same thing now, but there’s no ocean to blame.

He opens his eyes, but he can’t clearly make out Hashirama’s face, not even as close as it is.

“Anija?” he says hesitantly, his voice still rough from the exertions of the day before. “Are you – are you crying?”

He’d hoped that Hashirama was asleep, maybe having some sort of bad dream, but Hashirama’s hand comes up to settle in Tobirama’s hair, and he begins to run his hand through it.

“My brother,” he whispers, and his voice is choked up as if he has swallowed too many of his tears. “My little brother.”

“What’s wrong, anija?” Tobirama asks, alarmed. “What’s the matter?”

“I love you so much, Tobirama,” Hashirama says. “I love you so much. I can’t imagine life without you by my side. The thought of you growing away from me as you get older – I hate it.”

“I won’t go away,” Tobirama assures him. “I won’t, not ever.”

Hashirama laughs a little, but it’s not as happy as it normally is. “I know,” he says. “I know, because I’ll make sure of it.”

“Well, that’s good, then, isn’t it?”

“I’ll make sure of it,” Hashirama says again. He’s not really listening to Tobirama. “I’ll do terrible things, Tobirama; to you and to the world, whatever I have to. I want you to be happy, I do, I swear I do, but I want you with me more. And for that I’ll break every rule, violate every principle...”

“Anija, you’re being ridiculous,” Tobirama says, a little sharply. He doesn’t like this strange and twisted tone in his brother’s normally happy voice. “Being with you is what makes me happy. Stop fretting over nothing.”

Hashirama laughs again, a strange creaky thing, and pulls him in even closer, until Tobirama’s head is resting on Hashirama’s chest. “Do you know, Tobirama, that you can shape trees?”

Tobirama blinks, surprised by the sudden change in subject. “Shape trees? You mean wood-cutting?”

“No, no. Living trees. See, if you get to them while they’re still young and tender, and you bind their branches in the way that you most like, their growth will be twisted into just that shape.”

“Oh. You mean like what cousin Taichiro did to make sure that tree by his house would grow over the wall instead of over his house?”

“Just like that. The trees don’t even realize they weren’t originally designed to grow that way; they settle into the new shape as if it was natural to them.”

Tobirama wonders if this is a Mokuton thing, like Hashirama’s bizarre hatred for lawns. Why in the world would he care if trees didn’t grow naturally the way they would out in the forest? And even if he did, surely it wasn’t something so distressing as to keep him up at night?

“Does it matter?” he finally asks, utterly baffled by this entire conversation. “If they don’t notice their new shape, and it works better for everyone if they grow that way, then surely it’s for the best all around?”

After all, cousin Taichiro was entirely reasonable in not wanting a branch to fall onto his roof the next time there was a particularly violent thunderstorm, whereas his garden wall could handle such a thing just fine.

“Mmm. An excellent point, I suppose. A tree doesn’t grow just for itself, after all, but is itself just a part of the growing forest – even if the other individual trees in the forest don’t always appreciate the way the forest is growing the new trees. But after all, any gardener will tell you that you need to clear out the weeds to let the trees grow unimpeded...”

Right. Hashirama is clearly talking in his sleep. Forests aren’t gardeners: they’re just collections of trees. Not to mention the only person who thinks trees have any sort of thoughts is Hashirama, ever since he started ignoring all the elders’ advice and started listening to them ever more deeply...and how did he suddenly jump from trees to weeds, anyhow?

“Anija, you’re speaking nonsense,” Tobirama tells him, taking a firm tone designed to quiet dissent. “Just go to sleep and you’ll feel better in the morning. You must have stepped on a shadow to have such bad dreams for no reason.”

Hashirama chuckles, but it’s a good sound this time: he sounds amused and happy once again.

“All right, Tobirama. I’ll do as you say.” He leans forward and presses his lips against Tobirama’s forehead. “I hope you liked your lesson today.”

Tobirama considers for a moment. It’d been pleasurable and painful and wonderful and terrible; he’s not sure ‘liked’ is really the appropriate word to describe it. But he’s also learned so much about himself and his body, things he’ll be able to use in the future – he has no doubt that Hashirama’s going to start nagging him to practice these new skills more often, just the way he’s always nagging about practicing non-training activities so that Tobirama doesn’t forget how to have fun – and that’s not bad, too, since out of all the ways to make Hashirama pleased with him, this one seems particularly easy, even pleasurable.

No, all around, while Tobirama might not say that he liked it, he can’t say that he didn’t benefit from it. Although...

“Anija,” he finally says. “One request.”

“Hmm?”

“If you ever start thinking that I need to learn about sex...”

“Yes?”

“Get somebody else to teach me.”

Hashirama burst out laughing: real, proper happy laughter, giggles escalating to deep belly laughs. “Okay,” he says, using the front of Tobirama’s yukata to wipe the tears of laughter from his eyes. “Okay, Tobirama, I’ll keep that in mind. I’ll find the perfect person for you, just you wait...did I overdo it today?”

“Yes. I’m going to have nightmares, anija.” But Tobirama is smiling. “Now go to sleep, and we’ll both forget this conversation ever happened by morning.”

“Yes, Tobirama. Whatever you say. Good night.”

Tobirama has no intention of actually putting this bizarre conversation out of his mind, of course, planning to analyze it in the morning when he is less tired. But as it happens, the very next day Hashirama ends up killing an elder for what appears to be no reason at all, right in the middle of the man’s punishment of Tobirama for some unspecified act of vile seductive licentiousness which Tobirama didn’t really understand and still doesn’t because he’s never successfully seduced anyone ever, not even for a mission, but of course submitted obediently to anyway, and everything gets very busy for a while as Tobirama has to run all levels of interference while Hashirama buries the body to hide what he’d done, so ultimately he really does forget all about it.

Hashirama ends up growing a surprisingly hearty and unusually beautiful rose garden on top of the hidden grave, and wins three awards in that year’s regional competition for most beautiful flowers.

Tobirama would try to make some sort of meaning out of that, but he’s never been good at metaphors.

#hashitobi #senju hashirama #senju tobirama #senjucest #tear into your soul #my fic

robininthelabyrinth