Summary: Tobirama is a hard man, so what would make him speak up in chapter 619? (He just looks so regretful there…)
Notes: Continued thanks to everyone who has reviewed or added this little drabble collection to their favourites! Believe me, you make all the difference when I'm writing! There will be one more drabble after this one for sure. After that... I'll let you know then. ;)
Debt.
"Itachi killed his entire clan to prevent the coup and in doing so stopped the even greater bloodshed that would have followed," a Saru who was now older than Tobirama was saying. He went on to explain other things to the Uchiha child before them, but that was as far as the Second Hokage could make sense of his words. He had no idea who or what the Akatsuki was.
Tobirama was a practical man and, most importantly, a private one. He did not cry over spilled milk and, if lament he must, he did so to himself, alone. Yet, this once, something compelled him to speak:
"It is the destiny of the ill-fated Uchiha," he told the boy. "To think that they were annihilated…"
The thing that had to be understood here was that Tobirama hated being in someone's debt. The resulting obligation gnawed at his bones, begging to be let loose, and plucked at his tendons, reminding him of its presence until he did something to even the score.
He hated it because it reminded him that at some point he had failed, that he had not been enough to rise to a challenge. Both of these were unforgivable sins, in his opinion – weaknesses.
On the other hand, he hated it because his sense of justice never let him forget about such things. Regardless of who was on the other end of that debt, he was never able to forget and never able to let it go.
And Madara Uchiha had saved Hashirama when Tobirama could not.
It was true that Madara had been the one to put Hashirama in harm's way in the first place – "either kill your brother or kill yourself" – but, again, Tobirama was a practical man and fully aware that there had been other alternatives. No one had forced his brother to make the choice that he did. And when the kunai had been rushing towards his brother's gut, Madara's hand had been the one to stop it. Tobirama had been in too much shock to even move.
He had never expressed anything about this feeling to anyone, least of all Madara, of course. His pride would not allow it and he knew that the Uchiha clan head would never accept his thanks anyway. Still, his gratitude and the debt he owed shone through in small gestures: a shy, new openness to listen to what the Uchiha proposed – even though he often ended up disagreeing – and a willingness to let his old, irredeemable opinions about that clan be changed. Small stones that eventually started an avalanche and allowed the Senju to make peace with the Uchiha.
But Tobirama had never actually paid off the debt that he felt he owed, and now it seemed that he never would. All the Uchiha were dead and gone, except for Sasuke.
So he would offer his sympathies to this boy, hoping that somehow his obligation would lessen. He felt… no. He wanted the boy to know that his loss was acknowledged.