Hashirama had believed in Konoha since he and Madara had thought up the place at age ten. He had found the determination and the will of fire and kept finding it within himself to work towards it and believe even when Madara didn't. Or at least, when Madara wasn't openly working with him. Hashirama had seen the moment Konoha had become real to Madara. He had seen the light in his eyes and how Hashiramas enthusiasm seemed to deep under his skin and take root just as deeply in Madara as it had for him.
A village where no one had to lose any brothers.
Hashirama had always believed in Konoha, because he wouldn't stand for the alternative. He wouldn't continue to live in a world where he lost his loved ones and his friends, one after another for a pointless war that had long lost all purpose or meaning. If it ever had either of those things in the first place.
He had wanted better for himself and his family long before he'd ever managed to put the longing into words. Meeting Madara, someone else who wanted better, someone willing to not just want a solution, but to find one, had cemented the goal for him, made the proposed village real in a way his own secret daydreams or bumbling plans never could.
As far as Hashirama was concerned, Konoha had existed since he was ten years old. At first as a hope, a prayer, more than an idea or a dream shared by children. It had been the future-laid out for the rest of the world to see. It was a way forward.
And he could have never done it alone.
It felt so obvious watching it come together. Watching the village grow, beautifully and rapidly-like any of his Mokuton trees. First with their once enemies, the Uchiha, then their closest allies, the Sarutobi. Then the Uchiha's closest allie's the Inuzuka, and three clans that already shared one of the strongest alliances in fire country-the Akimichi, Yamanaka and Nara. The Shimura had been a surprise-they had showed up with enough information about their plans and a group of alliances of their own to contact in the future for the growth of the village. It had been hard to think of a reason to turn them down when they clearly made having their fingers in every pie a practice and believed enough in Konoha to throw their lot in with the rest of them.
Hashirama wasn't sure the feeling could even be put into words. There was satisfaction and joy and a jumble of other things so powerful all he could really do was cry.
Mito poked gentle loving fun at him and that just made him sob harder because he got to share living his dream with his lovely wife. Even his gloomy little brother couldn't put too much of a damper on things.
Hashirama would never dream of being grateful to whatever hidden clan that had been manipulating the Senju and Uchiha to continue their war in the shadows. Especially not when he knew Madara had lost his own future wife, and he'd lost his Uncle, who was the last of his fathers brothers when they'd made the discovery. But he could be grateful to the Uchiha who had brought their existence to light because Hashirama was fairly certain that knowing he'd been influenced by an enemy was the entire reason Tobirama was working so hard to help build the village.
He hadn't even thrown a fit when the members from all the founding clans got together and built his bridge without him. His little brother was trying, in his own way-he would never go as far as to actually say that Hashirama had ever been right about anything, but he'd watched the rain loud Tobirama carried over his head shrinking over the months as the village came together and they worked hard to integrate all of the different clans that wanted to be a part of the new peaceful future.
Akane was especially good at it.
Hashirama liked Akane. He understood her in a way that was different from the way he'd ever understood anyone else. He'd given Akane a bonsai for the first anniversary of Konoha, knowing that she'd take good care of them the way Hashirama did. That she could read the way they would need to be guided and trim away at them patiently for their own good. Akane was good at that, at being patient and leading people gently into the best path forward.
He had been ready to step into a brighter future with Madara, but Akane had been a pleasant surprise. As had been Touka's willingness to marry Izuna.
The ties between the clans weren't something that sprung up overnight like grass shoots in the spring. But they could be encouraged, and encourage them they did. Squad intervention had been hell, but completely worth it for the first time that a squad of Shimura and Yamanaka had struck the mother load of intel on the fire court. They had all the blackmail they would ever need to convince the court they should support their new village and whisper nothing but good things into the fire Damiyos ear.
Not that Hashirama necessarily thought blackmail was a great way to motivate the fire nobility to support them, but both Tobirama and Madara insisted it was a much more peaceful way than trying to line up their interest with so many different factions in the court.
He'd decided not to look at Konoha's relationship with the fire country court too closely and instead focused on developing the village.
As much as he didn't enjoy the bureaucratic aspect of being Hokage, Hashirama was dutiful enough to attend to the paperwork that seemed to magically multiply on his desk everytime he so much as glanced away. There were also endless streams of meetings. There were meetings with new clans which Hashirama looked forward to, always happy to make new friends, and meetings that made him want to tear his hair out, like dealing with the budget.
Then there were the unofficial meetings with various clan elders which weren't technically meetings so much as some elderly shinobi 'coincidentally' coming across him -but Hashirama was shinobi enough to know that if he took off like he wanted to when he 'happened' across the concerned elders, he would be setting the clan ties back instead of encouraging stronger bonds. The clans liked knowing they could have the Hokages ear on occasion, that their concerns were being heard and attended to even if not in an official capacity.
It was mostly stuff that would make a great incident report anyway. Which clan elders weren't getting along. Which resources were beginning to seem scarce, which clans were adjusting too slowly and which ones were making themselves at home too quickly. All things that could easily turn clans into enemies if the complaints were ever written down.
Hashirama knew he played an important role as Hokage, and clan relations were actually something he could usually dump on Madara, as head of the council of clans-but it was a little awkward to go to his friend about issues his own clan elders brought to Hashirama instead of their own clan head.
Issues like Madaras marriage.
He'd never in his life think the Uchiha elders would track him down to convince Madara to get married, but at least they had a candidate in mind. Even one Hashirama approved of-Akane would make a great Uchiha Matriarch, after all. If she managed the clan the way she managed the village, the Uchiha would be lucky to have her.
Of course then he'd tried sounding out his best friend about their union and watched Madara's face close off completely. Hashirama couldn't pretend he knew what losing a fiancé would do to a man, but he did know that Madara was as dutiful a man as they came and he would never shrink from finding a partner to lead his clan with.
"It's never going to happen," Madara had said firmly-face carefully blank. Too blank in Hashiramas opinion, he was beginning to think their might be more than a dead fiancé to the story. "I'm never going to marry Akane."
It seemed very silly to Hashirama to turn down what seemed to be the perfect bride. The more he thought about it, the more he liked them together. Then he'd spent half an afternoon trying to convince Madara to woo Akane only for the woman in question to walk into Madaras office without so much as knocking.
It had been painfully awkward for a long moment as Akane looked at them both.
Then she arched an eyebrow, "This again?"
"Again?" Hashirama echoed, intrigued.
He watched, fascinated, as the friendliest Uchiha he'd ever met laughed.
"I can't believe they put us through so much bullshit about making the village and allying with the Senju in the first place just to turn around and ask their clan head to make sure you popped out some babies."
Hashirama burst out laughing. Akane didn't often deadpan her delivery-but the artful wrinkle of disdain on her nose made her words significantly funnier than they should have been.
Hashirama couldn't hold his own snort when she put it like that. It sounded incredibly silly.
"They don't want me to marry just anyone," Madara said, glibly. "They want me to marry you, Akane."
"They would give up on trying to get us together if you found someone else to make matriarch," Akane said reasonably.
"It would be cruel to expect anyone to fill the role when the clan would only truly accept one person in the position." Madara pointed out, and he sounded tired of all things.
There was also a way he was looking at the young woman. Wistful, Hashirama thought. Did Madara want to marry Akane when she had already made it clear she wasn't interested.
"I'm hardly going to disappear from the clan when you get married, Madara." Akane assured. "Sure I won't be filling the role the clan wants from me, but I'm hardly going to stop my efforts to raise everyone's standard of living just because of a stupid title, no offense."
"None taken," Madara replied, shoulders slumping ever so slightly with something like defeat.
"I'll make sure to think up something to keep them busy and out of your hair," Akane proposed, "You should keep an eye out for a future bride."
Hashirama had to get Madara incredibly drunk to get the entire story out of him. How Akane had rescued his younger brother when she was a child herself and the engagement and warrior status Madara's father had saddled her with as a supposed gift to repay that life saving grace. How Izuna was so in love with her that Madara couldn't hurt his younger brother by going through the engagement, and the subsequent realization that Akane had never wanted to marry him in the first place.
Not for the first time Hashirama was incredibly grateful that he had Mito. Then, for the very first time-it occurred to him to appreciate that his little brother was such a complete icicle when it came to love and had never had any romantic thoughts about his wife.
Madara was having a much tougher time figuring out how to handle his own engagement and future wife.
Then Hashirama found himself 'coincidentally' running into one of his wife's guards on one of the strolls he'd learned to take routinely to deal with the various clans of Konoha more unofficial concerns.
"Is there something wrong with the Uzumaki?" Hashirama blurted in panic. His cousin clan had deemed his marriage to Mito a strong enough tie to their new village. It was hard to get Uzumaki to leave their home by the golden shores of Uzhio. He couldn't think of a good reason for Kotaro to want to have an unofficial conversation with Konoha Hokage.
His redhead cousin was quick to take mercy on him.
"This is a personal cousin to cousin chat," Kotaro assured him, "Mito would be the one talking to you about anything to do with the clan."
Hashirama slumped with sheer relief. The Uzumaki were both their biggest allies and backing in the shinobi world. Just the regular access to seal work had made their multitude of squads significantly safer on missions, of course they had to pay for the tags, but being willing to sell to the the entire village at a discount was already a kindness no other clans in the elemental nation benefited from. Uzumaki usually charged through the nose for their seal work, even most nobles could barely afford their standard prices.
"So what do you want to talk about?" Hashirama asked.
Kotaro gave him a smile that was not quite a smile. An expression Mito only used when Hashirama had messed up badly.
"I heard you've been trying to help Madara find a marriage partner?"
Hashirama nodded, wondering where his cousin was going. "He needs to find the Uchiha a good matriarch."
Kotaro's not quite a smile widened, "I have some suggestions that could result in strong political benefits for the village."
Well, Hashirama certainly hadn't seen that coming. Kotaro had never so much as hinted at any interest in village politics before. He took a moment to mourn for his wallet-Uzumaki were notoriously difficult to get drunk, but he didn't really have a better strategy for getting the reason for his new found interest in politics from his cousin.
X
So Hashirama totally shipped his bestie and our girl Akane, sadly it's not canon-but also Kotaro was not about to let that happen lol.
In bleaker news with this chapter I have run out of padding and have zero scenes written for the future which does not feel great-the thing that gave me the most confidence about updating this fic weekly was that when I started I was like thirty thousand words ahead-and now I am not and that makes me sad and kind of paranoid about my ability to keep to the update schedule. Wish me luck-I'm in desperate need of it.
Edit 1/20/2023- I've decided to take the rest of the month off the updating schedule to see how much padding I can build up and will tentatively start updating again come February.