Madara was worried. One of their young had gone missing. Of course, it was not uncommon that his clan's children occasionally snuck out, but they never dared to venture farther than a few steps away from the settlement.

He tolerated these small excursions. It made the children feel less stifled and gave them the sense of adventure they craved, while still remaining under the tight, but hidden protection of their adult kin.

It was one of the key aspects that differentiated his reign from his father's. Madara firmly believed children should at least have a small semblance of freedom, while Tajima's watch over them had been so iron-tight it had bordered on imprisonment.

Madara's attempt at handling the children was a balancing act. He did not want their young ones to see them as their jailers, nor could he allow them to run around as they pleased. So, he struck a compromise. A child sneaking out would not be stopped, but secretly followed and left alone, as long as they did not stray too far. But they would be caught and reprimanded upon their return. A punishment would be given. Not too harsh, but hard enough to discourage future ventures, and they would be put under a tight watch for a period of time.

Up until now it had worked very well, but now one of their young was gone. Madara knew every single of his clan's children, and that was the reason he worried about this child in particular.

Ryo was one of the gentlest children he had ever met. She was intelligent and perceptive, but she lacked any kind of aggressive disposition and gave her affections freely.

Even after her parent's cruel deaths, her kind demeanor had never changed, but it had activated her bloodline limit, and with that another problem had arisen. Ryo felt too much and too intensive to control it. It was a very rare condition that occurred only once every few generations.

The unpredictability of her Sharingan combined with her nature made her unsuitable as a kunoichi. A fatal flaw that did not speak well of her prolonged survival, especially since quite a few clan members were already looking down at her for being too soft.

Now she had vanished, and a lot of them were less than pleased with having to search for someone who held to no value to their forces. When she returned, Madara steadfastly refused to believe she was dead yet, life would become even harder for the child, and he would be forced to punish her appropriately.

The idea of having to lay his hands on someone so vulnerable made him angry, and it was not the first time he cursed the injustice of this world.

He slammed his fist against his desk. "I am Uchiha Madara. And at least in this clan, my word is law." He stood up, and his gaze fell to the window.

A small winged shadow appeared in the distance, and Madara recognized Hashirama's messenger bird. His mood soured even more. He had no patience to deal with Hashirama's ramblings now.

But he still opened the window to let it in. The bird flew in and perched itself proudly on top of his desk.

Madara crossed his arms and glared at the bird.

The animal remained unimpressed and presented the tied message with a demanding chirp.

For several seconds, man and bird stared at each other before Madara huffed loudly and untied the message.

Madara,

please read this before you ignore me again:

One of your children saved my brother. She is now with us - alive and unharmed, so there is no need to storm our gates.

But we need to talk.

We captured a man who claimed you hired him to kill my brother. Your child says, he lies. I am inclined to believe her, but we really need to talk.

Yours,

Hashirama - who really needs to talk with you.

P.s. If you still have the body of the man who said we sent him, please bring it along.

Madara stared at the letter. They had found her. The Senju had found her. Madara was torn between relief at her being alive and worry about the child being in the enemy's hand.

Still, what was that about an assassination attempt and Ryo saving Tobirama? And why the hell was he supposed to lug dead bodies around?!

Could this blasted Senju not be a bit clearer about his words?!

Madara crumbled his letter.

Hashirama wanted to talk?

Fine. They would talk.

As if sensing that Madara actually wanted to reply this time, the bird eagerly hopped out of his way and helpfully nudged the pen in his direction.

Madara snorted loudly and penned a short answer.

Hashirama,

Two hours, where we met as children. Bring your annoying brother and that foolish child.

Madara

P.s. I am not lugging dead bodies around without a good reason!

This had to do. He put his pen down. But before he could roll up the message, the bird swooped down and eagerly snatched it up.

Madara raised an eyebrow when it immediately fled through the window, as if afraid he would change his mind about responding.

What a strange bird.

But it certainly fit Hashirama.

A/N

Well, this was unplanned...and a rather spontaneous thing because I just felt like re-reading this story and remembered I actually had Hashirama's letter lying around. So I thought it'd be a nice extra to add and quickly whipped up some text to go with the letter. =)

I hope you enjoyed it. ;)

P.s. I have nothing to do with the bold, italics and underlines in Hashirama's letter. That's all on him. I guess he really wanted to get his message across.