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As soon as the utterance escaped her mouth, she wanted to slap herself silly, what a stupid question. They were here to help. Despite her blunder, she kept up the smile and decided to feign ignorance instead, this way she could save face.
"I'm here to carry out the duty that Tsunade gave to me." His reply was short, and straight to the point, but what else was she expecting? He was the complete opposite of his brother in so many ways. It was quite freaky, really.
Standing the same room as The God of Shinobi and the Nidaime Hokage...her knees were doing everything in their power not to quiver. If she were to speak, she was certain her voice would break, so to escape mortification she nodded and went back to work. Oh yeah, it seemed bad mannered but she could not stand around all day…that is what she told herself.
The so-called God of Shinobi watched the lady walk away, "Hey, I think she's one of the few who isn't scared of us. If she is, she certainly doesn't show it." His brother barely glanced his way before walking further into the hospital. Tobirama wasn't a chatty person by nature and he had heard many times by his brother that he could be daunting.
The walls of the institution were painted in a pastel blue colour with white laminated floors, this made it easy to clean spillages however, it left the smell of bleach, and this was probably why Hashirama hated the hospital. In his time, they had buildings that you could be healed in, but nothing on this scale and as efficient. During his reminisce, Hashirama's thoughts glazed over the memory of his late wife, Mito. Being revived was blessing as much as it was a curse. She plagued his thoughts at the most impromptu times and made him desire to be with her once more.
Civilians walked past him completely unaware of his thoughts and the agony that the village founder was going through. Perhaps they would always be blissfully ignorant of the psychological effects of war, death and pain. Pain that every shinobi knew. Death that could be seen on the memorial stone. War that etched itself into the very fibre of their being until they became one with it.
Snapping out of the morbid train of thought, he strolled into the room he saw Sakura enter and looked around with an inquisitive glint in his eyes. Sakura twisted her head slightly at the intruder and felt her insides turn into a type of jelly and mush. "How, can I help you Hashirama-sama." Praising herself for not stuttering, she faced him fully with false confidence.
"Is there anything I can do to help? I've been told that my chakra is 'medicinal'" his laugh was warm and reverberated off the walls. It was the type of laugh that made you want to laugh along, and smile for no reason, hence why the edges of Sakura's lips were tilted upwards despite her reservations. She had come to realize that there was truly no reason so be so guarded around him.
"Our medics have it under control, but it would help us save time if you could create some wooden clones and help file all of the documents away." If he was willing to help, she might as well put him to work on the most audacious tasks.
Hashirama sweat dropped internally, this was not what he had in mind when he offered his services, but he couldn't go back on his word, that wasn't in his nature. Mustering up a large smile he responded enthusiastically, "Whatever you need, Sakura-san." She escorted him to the room where they kept all of the paperwork that had to be processed; the room large but was cluttered with files stacked upon each other and there was scarcely any room to move. Before he could ask any questions she retreated, probably thinking he wanted to change his mind. Six of is wooden clones poofed into existence and did all of the work for him, said man then sat on a nearby chair and relaxed in comfort. This wasn't so bad.
Several hours passed and the chaos in the hospital had begun to wind down, all of the staff were getting hang of things and followed their schedule better than they had previously.
Sakura realized that she had not seen or heard from Tobirama since she last saw him, with this in mind she got up and decided to search for him in the hospital. He could be anywhere. The corridors were bursting with activity so she acknowledged that spotting him would be harder that she initially thought. Pushing chakra around her, she could sense that we was two flights of stair up with someone else.
Walking up so many stairs was tedious but the elevator would take longer… stairs it is then. Once in the corridor she could her him talking with another person, it sounded like Konohamaru. "You don't look that strong. I bet I could beat you, let's spar!"
Tobirama wanted to roll his eyes at the boy. Such bravery, such foolishness. Idly he wondered why the boy wasn't spending time with his grandfather. Hiruzen had decided not to die very late last night. He had only just found out his son's child. How could he leave then? Tobirama thought he made the right decision; to die again would leave too much pain and sorrow behind. Not to mention the young boy in front of him obviously revered his grandfather and saw him as an inspiration. However, the news of Asuma's death had hit Hiruzen like a ton of bricks, no doubt the many was weighed down heavily with regret.
Sakura came out from the shadows and approached Konohamaru with killing intent. His ears turned red due to the force of which she grabbed it with, "Have some respect for your elders, you brat!" the boy just moaned and tried to escape her grasp. This only made her hold on tighter until he apologised profusely.
"I'm sorry! I'm sorry, okay! Ita, ita, let go Sakura-chan!"
When satisfied with the sincerity of his regret, she let go and warned him to go home straight, or next time would be worse. Konohamaru, thoroughly scared for his life, skittered off without another word. This left her alone with Tobirama. He was watching her intently, trying to decipher how quickly her emotions could change. "I came to look for you and see how you were progressing."
"I can sense everyone in the village." Sakura gave him a funny look, how was this possible? Not everyone had been check yet. She voiced her thoughts and waited for his feedback.
"Every citizen of Konoha has been in since this hospital at one point in their life. Whether they were born here, injured on a mission or came for a check-up, they have all been here at least once. Chakra leaves traces that fades over time but never truly leaves; therefore I can sense it, even in minuscule amounts."
That made sense, he had probably walked into every room, past every corridor and anywhere else to detect all the chakra, he could. It truly was amazing, but made Sakura feel safe and intruded at the same time. Safe because if she ever went missing she could always be found, and intruded because there was nowhere to hide.
"That's amazing, when will you tell Tsunade-sama?"
"First thing tomorrow morning." Standing this close to him, Sakura now had to proper chance to look him over. He was no longer wearing his heavy traditional armour, but a standard Jōnin vest and black pants to match. He almost looked casual. Almost. Upon close analysis, she could see that although his hair was indeed white, there were hues of pale blue depending on the angle. Not wanted to seem like some type of stalker she cleared her throat and suggested that they go and find his brother. Tobirama accepted this suggestion and walked with her to where she had last seen him.
They room the entered was filled with clones of his brother moving around paper and storing it, while the real one appeared to be taking a nap. Tobirama tusked inwardly and moved to wake him up with a flick to his ears. The older brother opened his eyes reluctantly and stood with a yawn.
The place was in much better condition and Sakura could not deny that she was impressed. Everything was allocated to the correct place and he had even managed to order them in last name and separate the shinobi from citizens. He wasn't hailed as a legend for no reason. "I'm leaving now, my clones will stay behind to finish the work, goodbye Sakura-san." He was gone in the blink of an eye, leaving the room as though he had never entered it.
Sakura glanced at her watch to inspect the time, and decided that it was time to go home. She would back again tomorrow to check up on more patients. "I'm leaving too, Tobirama-sama." What kind of man would he be if he let a woman walk home, unaccompanied alone at night?
"I shall walk you home."
"Oh, that's not necessary; I can take care of myself." The look he gave her showed that there was no point arguing with him. Sometimes Sakura forgot that things had changed since he was alive. He probably still had a chauvinistic mind-set and felt as though it was his duty to protect every fair maiden in need. The desire to point this out to him took over, as he needed to understand that things were not the same as before.
"You know a lot has changed. Women and men are seen as equals."
"I am aware of that, if things were still the same the current Hokage would be a man."
"It's not as obvious as that. The equality runs much, much deeper than that. Previously, there were 'seduction' missions correct? Where it was thought that the only way a woman could get information out of a guy, was to sleep with him. However, they don't exist any more. Tsunade scrapped them. In fact, if you have to sleep with the target it shows that you are not in control."
If he was surprised, he certainly didn't show it, his face was stoic as usual and the only sign of acknowledgement was the slight tilt of his head. "That may be the case, but you'd do well to remember that I'm not from this time."
She wasn't sure if was a just a statement or actually a threat…it definitely sounded like one. Feeling as though she had given him the wrong impression she tried to backtrack and express herself more accurately, "what I'm trying to say is that it's thoughtful that you want to walk me home, but if you're doing it because you think I need protecting then you wrong, as that isn't the case. But if you insist, let's go."
Outside the hospital, the air was brisk and people were retreating into their homes. They walked down the path to Sakura's home in silence for most of the journey, until she was fed up of the lack of conversation. "So, how are you getting used to being alive again."
"I have no objection towards it. It's not ideal, tying to re-adjust but it shows how much development has been done. Which is good."
"Why are you always so… stoic? If you don't mind me asking, it's just that you and brother a complete opposites."
"We grew up in the warring states era, where children died needlessly. Originally, there was four of us, Hashirama, Itama, Kawarama and I. The other two died before they were ten. During my time children, even as young as four were sent out into the battlefield. If you could fight, you were not a child, but a full-fledged shinobi. That was how things were. Hashirama wears his heart on sleeve because he believes that by showing our guts to each other there can be peace. I do not do this because I have seen war. Real war. It's nothing like the one we just had. Real war is vicious. People only think for themselves and a comrade's life means nothing. The fight with Madara lasted for about a fortnight. The one I lived through lasted over twenty years."
Sakura's eyes were wide, with disbelief and a part of her felt sorry for him. It made her feel like less of a ninja because she didn't even know half of what tragedy was.
Sasuke watched his entire clan be massacred, vowed to kill his brother, achieved this only to find out that he was good all along.
Naruto lost his parents the day he was born and grew up in a village that despised his existence, even though we was the one who saved them.
Kakashi lost every single one of his team-mates, only to find out that one was still alive, but was actually evil and tried to kill him, and enslave the world.
Guilt resided in her because she had totally misjudged him. At first she thought Tobirama was merely indifferent to the world around him and didn't really care. Only now did she realize that he always had his guard up and was constantly cautious of the world around him.
They reached her house and stood outside, while she fiddled with her fingers a little bit. Tobirama was about to turn away when her voice called out to him.
"Would you like to come in, and have some tea?"
Things are starting to happen between them. :)
If you see any spelling mistakes or something doesn't make sense, let me know, thanks.