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Published:
2021-02-16
Updated:
2021-04-15
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4/?
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Discordance of New Growth

Summary:

Every Senju has Mokuton. Due to circumstances very few ever have the ability to use it. However, it does show up in the lungs, feeding off of chakra, when one harbors feelings of unrequited love. Contrary to popular belief, this does not need to be romantic to form. Tobirama, to his detriment, finds this out first-hand.

Notes:

(See the end of the work for notes.)

Chapter 1: Prologue

Chapter Text

It's a shameful secret, that everyone in the Senju clan is born with the Mokuton, but rendered almost completely useless unless three criteria are filled. First, one has to have a completely balanced dual elemental chakra consisting of water and earth. Second, they need to have the chakra reserves to back it up. Third, is incredibly good chakra control; it doesn't have to be perfect, but it does need to be fine tuned. The last two are simple enough to train with chakra exercises, but the first condition is rarely filled.

This is not to say that the Mokuton doesn't show up in Senju shinobi (and very rarely it's civilians) but it's not as overt as Hashirama. It is known as hanahaki. When a Senju is feeling unrequited love (to their own knowledge) a seed formed of their chakra forms inside their lungs. The longer they feel this way, the more chakra the seed and later, flowers and roots eat. It's easy enough to tell, even before the Senju starts coughing up petals and flowers. Their very breath smells floral. There is an ultimatum with hanahaki. The love could be returned or it will end in death. Either the seed will eat all of their chakra or they will eventually suffocate.

To have hanahaki is humiliating to the affected and haunting to the rest of the clan.

In recent memory, when someone had hanahaki, it was for romantic love. Everyone forgot that familial love could sprout flowers as well.

Chapter 2: Growing up

Notes:

Sorry this took so long! I'm still very much invested in this idea, so I'll keep trying to get the words to match the picture my brain is writing.

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

Tobirama was not liked by his clan. From the day of his birth, the elders saw him as a blight on their clan. A foreboding harbinger of things to come.

The Senju discovered that Tobirama was a sensor when he was three. He'd gone up to his mother, gave her a hug, then looked at her stomach and said hello. She laughed and asked what he was doing. He told her that he was talking to the bright ball, like when 'Kawa' was in her tummy. She was dumbfounded and called for a healer to see if she was with child.

Less than a year later, Tobirama found the downside to this gift. He was playing with his brothers under the supervision of their cousin, when he felt the bright ball clearer than ever, but his mother's own go flat. It felt wrong and took two hours to completely dissipate. According to Hashirama, he froze in the middle of their game and went completely catatonic for the next half hour. Itama's appearance was declared a minor ill omen that caused her death by the clan elders.

Senju Butsuma would never love his second son. The albino had given up on that when Kawarama was born. The clan head did not have time to deal with all four of his children, especially the toddler and the newborn. He was training his two oldest sons and was leading the clan. Hashirama, as the heir, got the brunt of the lessons. Tobirama, when he wasn't in his own lessons, took over childcare for his baby brothers. At four, he became their parental figure. He gave them all the love that was denied them from their father. The albino did everything he could to keep his father’s negative attention on him and away from his brothers. Visible emotions were slowly beat out of him by his father. He took everything his father gave him in an effort to protect all of his siblings. When Kawarama, and later Itama, turned four Tobirama began teaching them less brutal lessons than Butsuma taught him. Their father had every one of his sons join him on the battlefield when they turned five.

At the age of nine, everything fell apart. Seven-year-old Kawarama was sent on a courier mission to the diaymo's court. He had just entered back into Tobirama's range when, like his mother five years prior, his chakra went dull. This time Tobirama didn't blank out. He left to discover that Kawarama had been an accidental casualty in a skirmish between the Hagomoro and the Uchiha. Hashirama, who had left as soon as someone mentioned his little brother leaving, swooped in and grabbed the body before Tobirama could get to the battlefield. When they brought their brother home for the last time, they were met with Butsuma's anger and disappointment. During the funeral, Hashirama had his first real and public disagreement with his father, but Tobirama took his brother's punishment and calmed the clan head.

Less than a year later, six-year-old Itama was the victim of Uchiha child hunters. Tobirama felt the adults who had left with his last baby brother go flat. He sprinted away from the compound, determined to save Itama. The ten-year-old could feel pieces of his brother’s chakra flatten and move away from the group. Tobirama landed in the middle of the cluster of shinobi, and absolutely decimated the Uchiha who had so hurt Itama. Once they were all downed, Tobirama turned to tend to his brother. They had cut off his limbs and cauterized the stumps badly. His chakra was dulling. Fading away to nothingness in his arms. Butsuma and Hashirama entered the clearing too late. Itama was gone. Flat chakra releasing itself into the wild slowly from his cooling battered body. The albino gently handed him to Hashirama, so he could find the missing pieces of his brother for burial.

Hashirama started vanishing soon after. Tobirama knew the chakra with his brother’s was Uchiha. He also was aware that his final brother had no idea. The albino did his absolute best to distract his father so his brother could keep his friend. After all, if Tobirama wasn’t enough to help, who was he to keep his brother from finding any small bit of happiness he could?

It was all for nothing. Butsuma asked days ago to find out what Hashirama was doing. Tobirama procrastinated as much as he could, but when he felt another Uchiha spying on his brother and his secret friend, he had to tell his father.

After the confrontation at the river, Hashirama, in tears, tore into his brother about the betrayal. He refused Tobirama the right to explain and began ignoring his brother’s existence. That was the first time Tobirama felt a sharp pain in his chest. It would not be the last.

Nii-chan slowly became Anija as the gulf between brothers grew. Hashirama never seemed to notice nor care about the change. Tobirama quickly took up the mantle of Senju Butsuma’s perfect little soldier. Every cold shoulder, every sideways glance, every casually cruel comment added yet another chest pain, but the albino never showed anything to his brother.

He was desperate to find out if there was something physically wrong with himself, so Tobirama added teaching himself iro-ninjutsu onto his ever growing schedule. It wasn’t until Butsuma’s death that he found out what was happening. Hashirama had just left him in the room with his father’s corpse after making a comment about Tobirama caring more about his father’s death than his little brothers’. Alone, with only the previous clan head’s body for company, he began to cough. Gagging on whatever was coming up his throat, he spit it into his hands. Colorful petals littered his palms.

From training his brother’s Mokuton, he knew what the petals were. Anemone, Yellow Carnations, and Larkspur. Fading hope, rejection, and fickleness. Tobirama sighed. He didn’t realize that things had gotten so bad with his older brother that he had lost his love as well. But if he had had it once, there was always a chance of regaining it. So he went to work.

Notes:

I didn't like the idea of chakra just disappearing once the shinobi died... it made more sense to me that it stayed with the body for a little while before going back to nature.

I typed this out and then rewrote this about five times. And I'm still not entirely happy with it. It still kind of reads like one of my college essays to me. Should I have written this in flash backs? Probably...

If I made any mistakes, please feel free to point them out so that I may correct them!

Thank you for reading!

Chapter 3: On the other side of the canyon

Notes:

I had half of a chapter in Tobirama's point of view written, before Hashi decided that his side needed to be heard.

Chapter Text

Hashirama was not the best older brother and he knew it. Months after he lost Madara’s friendship, he admitted to himself how much he’d overreacted in regards to Tobirama’s role in the fiasco. Unfortunately, he had no idea how to repair the relationship with his reserved little brother. It seemed that his father and the clan elders had conspired to keep them as separated as possible.

He watched his brother grow thinner and somehow even more pale. Quietly and mournfully heard himself addressed as Anija, rather than his name or even the nii-chan it had been. It was horrifying to watch, but he was unable to stop, as his baby brother withdrew more and more into himself.

Heading into lessons early one day, as he hoped to leave sooner and make his way into Tobirama’s room to actually talk to him, Hashirama paused at the door. Elder Takashi and his father were talking quietly. Apparently, Tobirama was always punished for any wrong word or deed from Hashirama. It had just been noticed that the albino was always taking negative attention away from the clan heir and on to himself. They were discussing methods of fixing the situations that sounded suspiciously like torture.

Hashirama had to keep up a charade of normalcy. He had to. He was also on his best behavior. He lasted a week before slipping an herb into his Butsuma’s favorite tea that would slow down his reaction time. It was poor timing that it happened just before a skirmish with the Uchiha. The Uchiha clan head struck down Butsuma, and Butsuma planted a kunai into his enemy’s chest. Both were dead before leaving the field.

And Hashirama had to live with the knowledge that he was the cause of death for his own father. He was a kin slayer and no one other than him would ever know.

The new clan head and heir sat in silent vigil by their father’s body. All night terror, guilt, and shame battered at Hashirama. He opened his mouth and uttered unspeakable things to his grieving baby brother before leaving. Once he returned to his room, he destroyed it in his rage. Not with the Mokuton, that would be too easy as it boiled under his skin in response to his emotion, but with his hands and feet.

It took another few months to get used to his new responsibilities as clan head, months of barely seeing Tobirama. He was buried in paperwork, and his elders would not let him slack off. He was lucky everyday he didn’t accidently grow a tree out of the papers.
Once he had built up his daily schedule more reasonably, he stopped by Tobirama’s rooms. They were empty. He’d forgotten that his brother was sent on a mission two days before. But he had a chance to look around the room. Maybe he’d find something in here that would help him bridge the gap between brothers.

There were the usual weaponry neatly placed throughout the room. There was a massive pile of scrolls on the desk that Hashirama automatically edged away from. He saw medical books on the shelves. Tobirama must be learning that to honor Itama, who had been interested in that before his death. Hashirama brightened up. He could do that too!

He was leaving the room when he noticed the wastebin next to the desk. The bottom was covered in destroyed dried flowers. Hashirama’s posture wilted. He didn’t think his brother disliked him so much. He knew he’d hurt him, but it was no reason to take it out on innocent flowers that Hashirama was sure he didn’t grow. He had to think of a way to fix this.

Tobirama was always so serious and proper and seemed to dislike it when Hashirama wasn’t. So that’s what he would do when around his brother. No more nicknames, or cutsy suffixes. He’d just call him Tobirama from now on. He could be serious. He’d do it and make things right.

Chapter 4: For his brother

Summary:

Pink, yellow, and purple petals litter his room before he can clean them up. Cyclamen, Marigold, and Violet. Resignation, jealousy, and devotion.

Chapter Text

His feelings towards the Uchiha are bitter. They stole all of his brothers away from Tobirama. Sure, one is still among the living, but how can he be Tobirama’s when the new clan head can barely look or speak to his only surviving brother? How can he when his face lights up and he smiles and laughs and says Madara in a tone that used to call Tobirama brother?

He doesn’t hate them. He holds himself back from that. He doesn’t ever want to get to the point where he will gleefully slaughter and torture children just because they came from a different clan. But he can’t sway himself away from bitterness.

Pink, yellow, and purple petals litter his room before he can clean them up. Cyclamen, Marigold, and Violet. Resignation, jealousy, and devotion.

The clan elders are sending him on more and more missions. Tobirama finishes the majority of them with enviable ease. Secretly he also takes the time, when in different villages or capital cities, to learn about how they are constructed. Infrastructure, how a large city is laid out compared to a smaller village, water and irrigation. No part too small for him to discover. He also looks at historical treaties. He needs to know. His Anija will love him again if he’s useful. Especially for his dream.

Won’t he?

One part that he keeps all for himself is creating a place of learning for children. Over everything else he is doing, Tobirama adores this project the most. But it’s the last thing he does in comparison to everything else.

He still researches medicine, though Hashirama has started learning and is already better at it. He invents jutsu for his clan and himself. He studies the Uzumaki seals and tries to make his own. He trains, and trains, and trains, and trains.

Still it’s not enough for Hashirama. Tobirama is the only one in the clan that his brother is stilted and formal for. There has to be something he’s missing. Something that will get Tobirama at least a smile.

Drops of blood are coming up with the petals. He wonders how long it will take somebody, anybody, to notice.

Notes:

So... This has been bouncing around my head for the past few months. Any ideas for tags? I'm slightly confused on that point.

I have decided that because for my premise, chakra forms hanahaki that there is no surgical option.

What do you guys think? Constructive criticism and ideas are always welcome!