Chapter Text
Tobirama would admit, later, kicking himself in his head, that he'd overreacted.
He could also admit to himself that he wouldn't have done anything different even if he'd stopped to think.
It was human instinct to protect children. Crying children triggered a reflex in people to protect and defend. Hatake were known for being even more outrageously protective of children. Tobirama was only a quarter Hatake, but it had come out in the off-color tints to his albinism and much of his behavior.
He also, personally, considered children to be precious things. Protecting and teaching the next generation was one of the few things that brought him joy back home in the midst of war.
When a young spark of chakra walked through the door, radiating distress and pain, Tobirama had whipped his head to see them. Small, big eyes, dark blue skin, little tusks out the side of his mouth. But not too far to be considered inhuman- kekkei genkai really stretched the definition of human.
He'd acted before thinking. The child's chakra was spread out and seeking assurance, seeking someone to help. Tobirama wrapped himself around it and grabbed the child, pulled them into his arms, and bolted into his room before anyone could react. He'd activated the manual inside lock and leapt onto the bed, careful to not jostle the child.
The aliens were fast. It was less than two minutes before they broke the door open.
In that time, two born sensors could talk a lot.
Burningcoals settled within his chakra with surprise. But Tobirama radiated his lack of intent to harm, checking him over with diagnostic jutsu. They worked strangely on the alien boy but he could detect the spot of pain and bones. A fracture.
Tobirama pushed a question, worried. Had someone hurt him? Was the boy in danger? Were the aliens on this ship safe? Tobirama would break them both out, if they weren't.
The boy assured him immediately that it was no one's fault. Clumsiness, a trip, a fall, a sharp landing.
When the door slammed open with a flare of active chakra Tobirama prepared for a fight. That did not happen. The boy spoke to them and assured them he was alright, then asked with both words and chakra if he could go to his family.
Tobirama reluctantly let go. Mostly because he found himself missing the feeling of warm skin against his almost so much it hurt. But also because he knew this would not go unpunished. Izuna - the lean oni from his ‘rescue’ - was boiling with fury and protectiveness. He would not forgive this. None of them would. Even the healer Kochiko radiated discomfort and a protective feeling.
Tobirama let them remove the child from his presence and lock the door behind them.
He followed through the buffering walls, this time, reluctant to let the boy go. He clung back with his own chakra, so Tobirama knew it was simply because the child was like him. A born sensor. Different to any trained sensor by magnitudes. The company of another born sensor was comforting.
Tobirama drank some water, ate some of the food he'd set aside, and sat cross-legged to meditate. He needed to prepare for the inevitable punishment.
It didn't come. Food and water was dispensed to his room at the regular time through a socket in the wall, but no one showed. The chakra signatures outside his room marinated in surprise and fear and then drew further away out of his reach. The boy at least gave him a little wave of chakra before disappearing.
Tobirama waited. Patient.
When something happened, it was nothing he could have ever expected.
The door cracked open. Just a bit, broken from the rough handling. Then it was shoved open.
There was yelling outside in the medical room.
Tobirama was too shocked by the appearance of multiple children in the door to say anything.
The child he'd met was leading the pack, yelling when he saw Tobirama and gesturing proudly. Two more of his own species followed- one looked disturbingly like Izuna in miniature, but looked barely old enough to be toddling around on his own. The second was purple and orange in streaks of color and clung to a purple alien that looked rather like a rabbit. At least that one appeared older than two.
Another rabbit but violently pink had been the one to break open the door. They stood with a proud stance as the Izuna-lookalike moved to cling to them. What looked like an honest to gods kitsune followed, hair bright as the sun.
A weird, insectoid rumbling came from outside followed by a clunk. The yelling was Izuna, it seemed, and he sounded winded. And was yelling at the children to get back.
The boy that Tobirama knew introduced himself with a hand to his chest. Kagami. Then pointed to everyone and gave names. The other two of his species were Sasuke and Obito. The two rabbits were Rin and Sakura. The fox was Naruto. He pointed outside and said another- Sai.
Izuna appeared in the doorway, hair flying everywhere, and chakra frazzled. He grabbed Sasuke and the pink rabbit he was clinging to.
The rest of the children scattered into Tobirama’s room with a variety of squeals, barks, and yips.
He froze as Kagami tossed himself right back into Tobirama’s lap, chakra radiating happiness.
Kagami pushed a feeling of lonely lonely lonely and then fixing it.
…silly boy. Tobirama had been alone for a very long time. He didn't need to worry about him.
Kagami bared all of his fangs at him, little needles. Given the eagerness to his chakra Tobirama couldn't take it as a threat.
Izuna had Sasuke and Sakura in each arm. He looked helplessly into the room at various children. Obito had scattered behind the shelf Tobirama’s bed sat on, somehow. Rin was cautiously sniffing his bed and easing herself onto it. Naruto had taken to chewing on Izuna's ankle, growling aggressively.
Curiously, the little kitsune's eyes started to glow red until Izuna gave a wounded sound and set the children down. They promptly all scattered into Tobirama’s room and peered over the edge of his bed.
A clicking of insectile feet preempted a large insectoid alien showing up behind Izuna. It shoved its way past him to strut until the room. Antennae waved curiously. Kagami welcomed Sai and told him to come up onto the bed.
Tobirama could not deny the Hatake part of him screaming as multiple alien children gathered around him. He hadn't had consistent physical contact in a long time. And now he was surrounded on all sides by children.
Tobirama couldn't stop himself from tossing his arms around the nearest few and burying his face in Kagami's curly little mane. Kagami soothed him with a soft little croon.
Staging a mutiny was always easy, if you were cute. Kagami had done this more than once! One time it was to make Madara keep him on board instead of taking him somewhere else. Another time was when Sasuke came on board and needed Izuna, but they thought he was too little and tried to bring him somewhere ‘safe’.
Kagami reserved mutiny for important occasions. Important occasions like the pale alien who was so, so, so lonely that his everything ached when Kagami spoke to him. He was wary and afraid and that didn't make sense.
He wasn't a bad guy or he'd be in the brig, where Kagami couldn't go. The brig even had a med bay for when bad guys got hurt.
So Tobirama - Kagami had to ask four times before anyone told him his name - was not a bad guy. But he felt trapped and worried about anyone coming near him.
And oh he felt good when Kagami was in his lap. Like how good Kagami felt holding onto Madara for the first time, years ago when Madara saved him.
Tobirama hadn't had someone to hold him in a long time. With chakra or without. Kagami knew, he'd asked. He'd asked when the last time he'd had someone close to him and he'd said years. So long he didn't know exactly, just that it felt like forever.
Kagami asked the adults if he could see his new friend. They'd said no because they needed to talk about what he'd done.
Kagami didn't understand. You didn't get in trouble for things unless you meant to do them and meant to hurt people. Sakura and Rin didn't get in trouble for breaking things when upset because they didn't have full control of their strength. Naruto didn't get in trouble when he did bad things, because it was his berserker state and he couldn't control that either when he was scared. No one got in trouble for saying mean things or doing bad things they didn't know were bad, because they didn't know.
Tobirama didn't mean to scare anyone. He was scared for Kagami, wanted to make sure he was safe. Kagami told them that! But they still had to ‘talk about it’.
Which wasn't fair. Because they took Kagami further away from Tobirama’s chakra and he clung on tight because he missed people and Kagami clung as tight as he could until they had to let go.
Kagami asked. He asked very politely. Then he demanded. And when they still wouldn't let him see his new friend, Kagami gathered in the daycare room and got everyone together to stage another mutiny while the adults were having their stupid discussions on the bridge.
Sasuke and Naruto were too little to really get what was going on, but Sakura was on board because the rest of them were all on board, so the two babies were too. Sai just liked to be included.
Kamasaru saw them gather together in a huddle. He leaned down near them just once to ask that they were sure. He knew Sai could just sit on him until they were gone if they had to. So he accepted Kagami's loud yell that of course they were sure!
Then he at least went with them to medical, because he was a worrywart like that.
They planned everything out before. Sai was very helpful when they had things to do like this. Kagami used to have to do everything by himself, but it was nice to have other kids around.
Kamasaru opened the door and Sai immediately clicked his way over to Izuna. Who was guarding medical for some reason.
“Sai? What's-”
Sai grabbed Izuna in his arms, then used his ink webs to spit at Kochiko.
Kagami led the others over to Tobirama’s room. He put in the code to open it, but the door was jammed.
Sakura chirruped happily and gave it a good kick to force it open.
Kagami happily threw himself at his new friend, who was sad and confused and cautiously very very happy. And got even happier when everyone came to cuddle around him. And even cried a little into Kagami's hair, because he was happy and sad and didn't want to be alone.
Kagami just started to purr as loudly as he could until Obito and Sasuke joined in.
Madara was going to kill him.
“A heads up would have been nice, Kamasaru.” Izuna rubbed his forehead.
Kochiko had managed to find the solvent to dissolve Sai's ink webs, but her skin was going to have black stripes stained on it for a while. He didn't envy her. That ink did not like to come out.
“If I'd warned you, they'd never trust me again, and I wouldn't have been able to at least supervise.” Kamasaru said blithely, inching to peer forwards into the room. “...is he crying?” He asked quietly.
“Mhm.” Izuna took a deep breath. It seemed their caution was unwarranted. Humans, unlike some species, seemed to be just as child oriented as uchiha were.
Tobirama had curled around them unmistakably in a protective hold, then proceeded to start crying. If it meant what it did for uchiha, it meant he was very, very emotional right now.
They couldn't make assumptions of course. That was how cultural miscommunication happened. But his chakra was radiating a weird slog of joy and melancholy across the whole med bay through the stuck open door.
“Izuna here.” He opened his comms to his brother directly.
“In the middle of something.”
“The big important meeting about how to handle the human? Yeah, the kids staged another mutiny about it.”
“What?!”
The last time a mutiny was staged, it involved a huge fight about allowing Sai to count as ‘adult supervision’ because he was technically an adult by his species’ physiology. It included Sai wreaking havoc, the children all basically waging war on adults throughout the whole ship, and Kagami as a fearless warleader.
Like every mutiny that had occurred on the Tsukoyomi they'd been forced to negotiate with the damn kids. Sai had won adolescent status, enough to supervise the other children in ship and on short trips port side. Long trips still required adults. No, it didn't count that he could defend them all from harm easily. His growth was still psychologically hampered due to lack of a proper hive and thus he was not mentally an adult.
Madara pinged in the rest of the bridge crew.
“What's the damage?” Hikaku asked.
“Well it's not too bad this time. Kochiko's got ink stripes and the door to the human's room is broken.” Izuna drawled, enjoying the loud silence of shock. “Oh, and the human's cuddling them all. Very happily.”
There was more than one cry of shock.
“He's not hurting any of them?”
“Nope. His chakra seems to be really, really attached. Very suddenly actually. Weirdly suddenly.” If the pulsing of fondness and protectiveness and the will to die for a child wasn't saying Tobirama was safe for children to be around, Izuna would eat his tusks.
“Humans might be pack oriented.” Kochiko muttered, looking at the ink spreading in blotches across her clothes. “Or the adults are prone to imprinting on children. Or maybe he's just weird. I don't know. I need a shower.”
“Bets on pack imprinting humans, go?” Izuna tried to joke.
“I'm coming down.” Madara growled.
Izuna sighed.
Madara showed up with his hair bristling and his fangs bared. He calmed down near instantly at the heavy chakra everywhere.
“...damn.” Madara said. He ran a hand over his face. Then he stomped over to the open door. “Kagami.” He said warningly.
Izuna peered around his brother's stupidly wide shoulders.
Kagami waved a hand cheekily, completely uncaring that a human was crying into the top of his head.
“This mutiny shit has got to stop.” Madara pinched the bridge of his nose. “You could have been severely hurt. Your friends could've been hurt.”
“Tobirama wouldn't hurt me.” Kagami declared. “He's lonely. And he wouldn't hurt any kids.”
The human shifted to blink up at them. For once the blank emotionless facade was something Izuna could read. He'd thought maybe humans just emoted differently. But no, they looked an awful lot like uchiha did. And this one looked like an uchiha who had been crying and was embarrassed about it. But was also very stubborn, because he only pulled the children tighter around him.
Rin wriggled her way out of his arms, which was a good sign. He let her. She then promptly climbed up onto his shoulders and stretched across them like a ruff. Sai had set himself up in front of the bed and was clicking his mandibles together. The rest of the children, scattered around the bed and in Tobirama's hold, just got more comfortable.
Sasuke was eyeballing Izuna hard though. He might be willing to ditch the alien.
“You don't know that.”
“I do!” Kagami scowled. “He's lonely and he thinks you're just going to study him like the rest and he hasn't had someone to hold in a long long time!” Kagami stilled and looked up. “Sorry. But they had to know! Otherwise they were gonna be mean and stupid!”
“Kagami.” Madara said with a groan.
“You were!”
They knew better than to try demanding Kagami leave the room. He had laid down the line. They couldn't even feel his chakra past the human's presence.
When the kids staged a mutiny, it was never over simple stuff they could just be convinced of. And of all the traits for the whole gaggle of kids to copy it was uchiha stubbornness that they all emulated.
Madara sighed long and hard.
“Fine. What are your terms?”
“Give Tobirama his own room!” Kagami said. “And not in medical! He's not hurt so he doesn't need to be here. And he's not a bad guy, he's not in the brig, so he gets his own room. You said.”
They had said, numerous times with skittish children used to being locked up. Or other people they had rescued.
“We don't know what humans are capable of, and we don't know that he's healthy-”
“He can tell you.” Kagami said confidently.
“We can't understand him, Kagami.” Madara’s rare patience was getting plenty of exercise today.
“I can! And he understands you! Mostly.”
“I- what?”
“What do you mean?” Izuna piped in, looking the human over. He twitched but had gone back to the emotionless facade. Not tricking him again. Izuna knew now that he could show similar emotions.
“He understands you some. He just doesn't want to be studied again. At least, not the kind that hurts and has pokey things and medicine that makes him sick.” Kagami looked at the human as if to check.
“...can he speak?”
The human opened his mouth and out came a butchered string of Common.
“Not good.” Kagami said with a wrinkled nose. “He learned by watching people studying him.”
That was an awful way to learn a language, true.
“Well at least the translator problem is partway there.” Izuna rubbed the base of his horns.
“Does he know about human health? If he doesn't, we can't assume he's healthy.” Kochiko chimed in, forcing Madara to stand aside and give her some room to look.
Kagami paused, head tilting as they had some indepth conversation with chakra.
“Yeah, a lot.” Kagami nodded with wide eyes. “Like a lot a lot. Like a doctor.”
Kochiko sighed in relief. “And he's healthy? No signs of malnutrition or dehydration?”
Kagami's nose wrinkled. “Um- he's not very hungry or thirsty, no. You were worried about old hurts? But they're very old and don't hurt anymore.” Kagami swiveled. “You were hurt?” He asked quietly.
Tobirama knew enough Common to know when Kochiko had been worried about his scars and the tattoos under his skin.
Kagami started to look very, very sad. “But… but…” He sniffled.
Tobirama ran a hand over his hair, just like a parent might, and murmured something in a staccato tongue that sounded just a step sideways. Like Izuna ought to understand it but couldn't.
“Kagami?” Madara worried, stepping into the room.
Sai clicked warningly.
“I'm sorry. He's- he got hurt a lot. A long time ago. And sometimes a little when people studied him. But he got hurt a lot.” Kagami wiped at his eyes. “Um- I'm okay. He's fine now. He doesn't need to be in medical.”
“I can do his own room and no studying him.” Madara agreed. “But he needs a guard. Especially since he's now involved in your little mutinies.”
Kagami pouted. Then the human made a motion with his head.
“Wh- okay…” Kagami groaned. “He says okay to the guard. He doesn't mind. But I have to be able to visit him!” Kagami clutched the shirt over him with little claws.
“You mean after your grounding for this stunt?” Madara crossed his arms.
“He's lonely.” Kagami emphasized. “He's like me. He needs people close.”
“Then you can have supervised playtime. After your grounding.” Madara said. “This was reckless and foolish and could have gotten people hurt.”
It took an hour of arguing before Kagami and all the children agreed to the terms.
Madara waved to the human to follow him, and the strange procession of a human with a bunch of children clinging to him or following in his trails was led through the halls until they reached the crew quarters.
Madara looked the human in the eyes.
“You understand me well enough, so I'll say this once. You're not a prisoner. You're not an experiment. If you need anything specific to humans, Kagami has volunteered to be your translator until we figure out communication. But if you hurt my ship, my crew, or my children, I will destroy you. Are we clear?”
The human carefully set the children down from his arms, ignoring their whines. He bowed deeply and didn't attempt his mangled Common.
The human still didn't leave his new room. But the children visited frequently and seemed to adore him.
It was, predictably, Kagami who managed to drag the human out of his room one day. Clinging to his hand, he pulled him chattering a mile a minute towards the daycare. Izuna observed, idling behind casually, as the human was happily climbed on top of and the children showed him how to play various games.
A trip to the daycare became a regular occurrence. Tobirama still stayed in his room for the most part. But he began to actually be the one to initiate his visits, now, and Izuna was glad to see more of the ship than the one damn hallway.
It was pretty funny seeing people's responses to a human walking around, even if they only caught glimpses.
The children were teaching him Galactic Universal. Most planets had their own translation equipment with their languages and universal already made. Everyone on board the ship had a translator earpiece that doubled as comms. There was no way to make a true universal language, as different species couldn't use the same sounds, but a general consensus was met with universal common. There were still countless pidgin languages but that's what translators were for.
The kids had lessons from Kamasaru on written universal. With Tobirama’s scattered knowledge of the language spoken out loud, he'd picked up the language terrifyingly fast for someone without an evolutionary feature like the sharingan. Izuna wouldn't admit this but he was a little intimidated how quickly the human began to understand it.
He mostly stuck to writing back and forth with the children. It was a good way to get them to sit still for lessons at least. And practice their reading and writing.
He didn't like the earpiece he eventually received. Translating was still difficult when they didn't have the knowledge of human language, but it could work. Clumsily. But it could work.
He hated it though. Kept fidgeting with it. Izuna knew it was uncomfortable but come on.
At least the human stayed out of everyone's way. And ended up a better caretaker than Kamasaru, who was never meant to fill that role in the first place. They'd just needed someone when the ship started to have too many kids on board.
Honestly that was probably the main reason Madara never asked Tobirama what he wanted to do. Izuna wanted the free childcare as much as anyone else.