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Today was really not his day, or so Tobirama told himself as he stared at his worst enemy… who just so happened to be wearing a blanket. Just a blanket – not that Tobirama had been looking. He was a Senju, and he had his pride. Besides, it wasn’t like Madara was trying to hide the fact that all his clothes had suffered a similar fate to his own and were currently hanging near the little fire he’d set up.
Black eyes stared into red ones, both blinking a few times before they registered the situation at hand.
“Senju,” Madara snarled, his grip shifting, one hand keeping his dignity intact, the other clutching at the pouch holding his weapons. He hadn’t been expecting company, but then neither had Tobirama. Who would be idiotic enough to be on a mountainous path when the locals had been warning them about a major storm for weeks? A wry smile curved at his lips for a few seconds. He’d been planning on making it back a few days ago, but the troublesome water-user had given him more problems than anticipated, so there he was – in an oddly spacious cave with an Uchiha.
If he was completely honest, it sounded like the start of a bad joke… An Uchiha and a Senju walk into a cave… The odds of that actually happening were astronomical, especially since both clans went out of their way to avoid each other outside of battle. It’d been a decree from both Hashirama and Madara, along with removing those younger than fourteen from the battlefront. A good move, especially for that idyllic dream his airhead of a brother had with the spiky-haired monster. Speaking of spiky-haired monsters though… A light cough brought him out of his thoughts, bringing his gaze back onto the man sitting across from him.
“Uchiha.” He returned the greeting, scowling at the spiky-haired figure in front of him.
He bristled, the spikes of his inky black hair seeming to stand on end as he scowled at his mortal enemy. “Get out!” he hissed, pulling the blanket further around himself as best he could. “I swear to god, Senju, if I don’t see—”
Tobirama held up a hand, grimacing internally as he tried to take the diplomatic route, doing his best to look unaffected as he stood there dripping water. It was already forming a small puddle under his feet, and it was safe to say he was very uncomfortable between the clothes and the presence of one Uchiha Madara. “Look, Uchiha, I’m not here for a fight.”
Not that he could win one if it came down to it… but he’d at least inflict as much damage as possible before sprinting like his life depended on it – because it would.
“I don’t care if you’re not looking—”
He growled, stomping a foot down as he tried (and ultimately failed) to get back some semblance of control. “For crying out loud, let me finish!”
“NEVER!”
“Ugh, you’re impossible,” Tobirama muttered, covering his face with his hand as he tried to calm himself. Deep breaths. Deep breaths. He could deal with the bull-headed Uchiha, he just had to keep his temper in check. “I just came from a fight, idiot,” he grumbled. “I’m soaking wet, it’s nearly nightfall, the temperature is dropping, and I’m here because this is the only godforsaken shelter in sight.”
Madara stared at him blankly, one eye just about visible, and Tobirama was glad that the Uchiha hadn’t bothered to activate his sharingan so he could actually look at one of the many banes of his existence for once. He was usually busy avoiding looking at those eyes. “Do I look like I care?”
Tobirama rolled his eyes. “Not particularly, no.”
“So why are you still here?”
“I just explained, you imbecile!” he hissed, one hand clenching into a fist as he glared at the most obnoxious, idiotic man he’d ever had the pleasure of encountering. He had half a mind to throw the man through a wall, or maybe dunk him in the koi pond, as he often did to his own brother. It was no wonder they were friends. Their levels of idiocy were almost on par. “I’m not here for a fight, so just shut up and sit there, and tomorrow morning we can both go our separate ways and hopefully never see each other again.”
“Or I could just kick you out right now,” Madara said, grinning viciously – at least until a gentle gust of icy wind pulled at the blanket shielding him.
Tobirama smirked, letting his armour fall to the ground with a clank, noting the way Madara’s grip had loosened on his collection of shuriken and kunai. “We’ll be out of each other’s hair tomorrow… besides if the worst comes to the worst, and the fire goes out in the middle of the night, then at least we’ll have another option.”
Madara gaped at him, still clutching his blanket. “What?”
“Body heat,” he said, promptly ducking under the volley of shuriken flung his way.
“Get away from me, Senju!”
“What?” Tobirama hissed. Why couldn’t the Uchiha listen for once? Besides, what was so wrong about sharing body heat to survive? It was perfectly natural. They were two fully grown men… They could be mature about things. “It’s a logical option.”
Madara threw himself to his feet without an inch of shame, ramming a kunai into the dirt, carving a line midway through the cave. It was then that Tobirama remembered that they weren’t both adults. He was an adult, and Madara evidently wasn’t. He really should’ve known… Hashirama was proof enough by himself, so of course his best friend would be no different. “That’s your side. So stay on it,” Madara said, glaring daggers at him, as though he wasn’t standing there buck naked.
Tobirama blinked, staring at the discarded blanket, pointedly looking back towards the cave entrance and where it was partially blocked by an earthen wall. Coughing without a hint of subtlety, he kept his head turned, trying to scrub the image from his mind. Urgently. They were likely going to meet in battle again at some point in the near future, and he didn’t need to be distracted by the image of the head of the Uchiha Clan naked… not that it wasn’t a nice sight, dare he say so himself.
“You saw nothing.” Madara’s voice wobbled. Embarrassment or rage, Tobirama didn’t know, though he’d safely bet on the latter. “Absolutely nothing.”
“Sure.”
Madara glared at him. “You don’t sound convinced about that.” He puffed up his chest, and Tobirama was struck by the resemblance to a cat. Truly, the Uchiha did represent the felines they had contracted with.
“Well,” he began, shrugging off his sodden shirt, swiftly pulling out a blanket from one of his own sealing scrolls. If Madara was going to put up that much of a fuss, then it’d only be right to make things even… “You’ve showed me yours… so I could show you mine?”
“ABSOLUTELY NOT!”
Tobirama paused in his undressing, noting the way Madara had turned his back completely, and… were the tips of his ears turning red? Huh… “You know… you never struck me as a prude… though I suppose it makes sense seeing as how you can’t pee with someone standing behind—”
A sound like the screech of a cat being trodden on made him blink.
“HE TOLD YOU?!”
He nodded. “Of course. I was asking him about whether you had any weaknesses we could exploit,” Tobirama said plainly, shrugging as he pulled his blanket around himself. “Unfortunately it doesn’t really mean anything in the middle of a battle, so I can’t use it… um… Uchiha? Are you alright?”
Madara grinned. “I’m going to kill Hashirama. Slowly.”
“Hashirama is my brother, in case you forgot.”
“Be silent, Senju,” he muttered, curling up on his bedroll. “I’m plotting his demise.”
“How lame…”
“Screw you, Senju!”
“I’ll have to pass on that. I don’t sleep with my enemies.”
Madara screeched, face turning that cherry red colour that Tobirama was quite enjoying making appear on his face. Silently, he wondered how many more times he could make Madara blush before the night was out, but then he thought better.
Nah. It’d be better if he kept the ammunition.
It’d probably work wonders on the battlefield.