Chapter Text
Without taking his eyes off the guards making their rounds Tobirama lifted a hand to gently touch the puffy skin around his right eye, still dark and bruised from the solid hit Touka landed on him a few days earlier. He couldn’t exactly begrudge his cousin her reaction to seeing him again for the first time in five years. Actually he felt like he might have gotten off rather easily, all things considered. Touka had gained quite a fair bit of muscle since the last time he saw her but a single punch in the eye was still pretty far down the list of punishments he knew she was capable of dishing out even if she was one of the few in their ragtag group who never developed powers.
Izuna’s two hour screaming match with his brother over whether or not they could trust him now had also been expected, less violent but no less painful. Not that he and Izuna had ever been great friends, rivals would be more accurate, but the way Madara seemed to hesitate and consider some of his brother’s words had sent lances of deep pain straight through Tobirama’s heart – even despite the fact that he sort of agreed with them too.
He still wasn’t sure how Hashirama convinced the rest of them to let him come along on today’s raid of yet another government facility. Sure, he had a lot of insider information but it was pretty much all vague big picture stuff, nothing about the layout of the place or anything they could use on their rescue mission. Whatever the reason for it he was here now and Tobirama was determined that he would give no one any cause to doubt him from here on out. He’d been partnered with Madara to watch this entrance and like a dutiful soldier he hadn’t once taken his eyes off the guards since they arrived, patiently observing. It had only taken him ten minutes to memorize their stupidly lax patrol patterns but that wasn’t the point.
“Still hurts?” a warm voice asked from just behind his shoulder. Tobirama dropped the hand away from where he was still poking at his face and shrugged.
“Touka’s punches always hurt,” he replied noncommittally.
“Did you want to put some ice on it?”
Breathing deeply to keep a lid on his temper, Tobirama took his eyes off the guards for the first time in favor of turning to glare at Madara’s dumb smug face. “This is absolutely not the time for your terrible jokes.”
Madara snickered behind one hand but thankfully let it slide without any more bad attempts at humor. Or maybe it was just that he had no chance to as they both snapped to attention when a quiet voice spoke through the coms they were wearing in their ears.
We move in thirty, on my mark.
Tobirama spun his head back around to watch the guards again, mentally berating himself for looking away as he waited for Mito to speak to them again. His brother’s fiancé had perhaps had the most terrifying reaction of them all to seeing him again – in that she’d had no reaction at all. After staring at him wordlessly for somewhat more than a minute she had asked him to take his shoes off before coming in and then proceeded to ignore him for the rest of the week. If she was required to speak to him she would but her voice carried no inflection and it left Tobirama fearful of what would happen when the other shoe finally dropped.
Unclenching the fists he hadn’t even realized he’d made, Tobirama reached for the holster on his right hip and pulled out the tranquilizer gun he’d been given, sighting down the barrel to track one of the guards along his repetitive path.
In three, two, one – now!
His finger compressed the trigger at the same time as Madara’s did just beside him. Both of the guards before them fell in perfect sync, crumpling to the pavement for what should be a several hours long nap.
“Now comes the fun part,” Madara said under his breath, something feral and dark in his words.
“You think hurting people is fun?”
“I think getting revenge is fun. These people are trying to kill us.”
“Hashirama seems to think some kind of peace can be made, that we shouldn’t be killing them.”
Both of them rose from behind the cover they’d been crouched in for the last half hour and carefully stepped across the open space, eyes darting in every direction just in case someone else had miraculously escaped their notice.
“What do you think, then?” Madara asked. There was no challenge in his tone but he had to know what those words would sound like.
“I think no one should ever kill another human being easily.”
“That wasn’t an opinion.”
“No. It wasn’t. My opinions don’t really matter right now, do they?” Tobirama hefted his tranquilizer gun and held it at the ready in front of him as he stepped through the door of the research facility they were infiltrating. If he wanted to he could use his ice to snuff out lives in a hundred different ways but the fact of the matter was that he truly did not want to. These people believed in the wrong cause and spent their lives doing horrible things but he wasn’t convinced that death was the correct answer to those crimes.
You can’t un-kill someone, after all.
Madara followed behind him and said nothing more on the subject.
The inside of the building was poorly lit but there was enough light to see the letters on the wall and take their bearings, comparing the room numbers around them to the blueprints they had all memorized over the last couple of days. From the door they had just come through there were three directions they could choose to take. Madara pointed down the left hallway and Tobirama nodded, following him two steps behind with his tranquilizer at the ready, muffling his footfalls as best as he could. The new boots they had given him with soft soles were amazing for these infiltration missions when it would be dangerous to their objective to make a big ruckus.
At the end of the hallway they were forced to duck in to a nearby alcove when they noticed a shadow approaching from around the corner. Without any time to find separate places to hide Tobirama pressed himself up against the wall and tried to make himself as small as possible, straining to keep any part of his body from brushing up against Madara’s. Despite his efforts he could tell the chilled air around him was making his partner uncomfortable and he dropped his eyes, ashamed, unable to watch the small tendrils of steam beginning to rise from the backs of Madara's arms.
It was a relief when the shadow passed by without turning down their way and Madara was able to spill out of the alcove, away from the cold dampening his powers. Tobirama gave the flames that began to dance up and down his sleeves a single rueful glance before leading the way forward. Right now was now the time to focus on his own continuing inadequacies.
Fifteen minutes of quietly sneaking around and three more close calls that almost led to being discovered brought them to the small boardroom where they had agreed to meet up with some of the others. There were two meeting points for the two different teams, set as far apart from each other as was necessary for the dual goal of today’s mission. Tobirama was a part of the team whose purpose was to rescue two young supers captured by the government somewhat more than three months ago. He was grateful to have both Madara and his brother in this cell with him, although his stress levels certainly could have done without the presence of Izuna.
His old and unwanted rival glared at him the moment he and Madara slipped in to the room, obviously still unhappy that his brother was left alone with ‘the traitor’, but Tobirama ignored him as best as he could. There just wasn’t time right now for rehashing the argument he’d overheard four separate times in the days they had been planning this raid and honestly he was getting tired of hearing it anyway. Whatever their personal feelings for each other they both had roles to play to ensure the success of this mission. All they needed to do for now was suck it up and stay quiet. They could get in to all the fights they wanted to once they made it back to the base.
“Everyone asleep?” Hashirama asked with a tight grin. Madara whacked him around the head then returned the expression anyway.
“Yeah, no problems on our end. Neither of them had the time to radio for help and the next check in won’t be for at least half an hour.” They shared a fist bump, to which Tobirama rolled his eyes.
“I’m not complaining but the laxness of the security here is worrisome. What if it’s a trap?”
“Relax, frosty boy, they’ve got no idea we’re coming.” Izuna sneered.
Tobirama narrowed his eyes, temper rising even though he‘d only just been lecturing himself about time and place. “It’s Freezeout, lightning boy.”
“Electrode,” Izuna snarled back. “I use electricity, not lightning, there’s a difference!” There really wasn’t. And Tobirama really wanted to tell him so since obviously he never passed middle school science class but he was interrupted before he ever had a chance.
“Can we put a pin in that argument? Pick it up when we get back home. Hashirama, what time do we have?” Madara’s tone was reprimanding but Tobirama knew he would be all too happy to sit back and watch the sparks fly between them once they were out of this place. He always had enjoyed a good argument, no matter whether he was participating or egging on both sides.
“The other team should have all met up by now as well and no one has reported any difficulties with keeping their entrance quiet. We’re good to head out.”
Hashirama waited for all of them to nod in understanding before he opened the door and checked the hallway outside. They each followed closely on his heels, Izuna taking up the rear guard with sparks jumping back and forth between his fingers in anticipation. Tobirama would have called him out for being too eager if not for the ice he couldn’t control slowly creeping up his own wrists and making it look as though he were doing the same. He knew very well that Izuna wouldn’t believe any of his protests to the contrary.
After spending so many hours between them studying the blueprints of this compound it was no surprise how little time it took them to navigate their way down in to the bowels of the devil’s domain where their ultimate purpose was being held. Mito whispered an update in their ears as soon as the other team had made in to their second checkpoint, waiting for the right moment for them to launch their part in this operation. It only took another couple of minutes before Tobirama and his team arrived at their secondary location as well: the holdings cells. The guards here were easily brought down while Izuna quietly disabled the surveillance systems as he has been doing periodically, jolting them with just enough electricity to interrupt the signals but not enough to blow them out.
That much Tobirama had been able to help with, at least. It was one of his bigger sources of annoyance over the five years he had worked for the government, how lazy the security officers tended to be, offended more on principal than for any actual care about what happened to the people he worked with. He happened to know the men who watched the cameras in this place and had passed on their habit of ignoring their duty to waste time playing cards or even taking naps.
Izuna used his power to overload the electronic lock system leading to the holding cells and then they were in, creeping along silently and watching the names on every door. Each of these names was another life who had been taken from the happiness and freedoms that should have been theirs and instead brought here to have their soul torn apart piece by piece in the name of ‘genetic purity’. Walking passed so many people in need was hard, of course, but their consciences were eased by the knowledge that they would not be leaving them all here for much longer. Every person in every cell would have an equal chance for freedom by the time their group left. For now, however, their highest priorities were two names in particular whom they had come here looking for.
“How did they even manage to contain a kid who can walk through walls?” Madara wondered aloud, making Tobirama twist his features as memories shot through him like a physical pain.
“Sedatives,” he said shortly. “They would have kept him dosed enough that he can’t concentrate on using his power. If he’s too volatile for injection they put it in the water and food. He has to drink sometime.”
“That’s…man, fuck these assholes.”
“We’re trying to. Although perhaps not in the literal sense.”
Madara covered his nose to muffle his snort of laughter and Tobirama felt a thrill of triumph which he smothered an instant later. This was certainly not an appropriate time for him to be gloating over his slowly growing skills in flirtation. Hashirama’s insistent whisper-yelling caught both of their attention then and when they hurried over it was to see one of the names they were looking for on the clipboard hanging beside an otherwise unmarked door.
Name: Hatake Kakashi
Age: 14
Height: 145 cm
Weight: 33.2 kg
By-name: The Prophet
“Izu, come on!” Madara waved his brother over. Izuna barely had time to overload the door before Hashirama was wrenching it open and dashing inside without a single thought for caution.
“He’s here! Kakashi, wake up! Kaka– whoa! Calm down, it’s just me! It’s me!”
The young boy inside the cell stopped his instinctive feral attacks when the familiar voice registered finally and blinked owlishly at the people crowded in his doorway, tears gathering in his single unbandaged eye, before he flung himself in to Hashirama’s arms with a strangled sob. Clad in nothing but a white medical gown, body dangerously thin underneath, he looked as though he had been locked in here for quite some time. Long enough to grow panicked and attack whoever approached him, at least.
“H-Hashirama? What are you…doing here?” His voice had the scratchy, guttural quality of someone whose throat must be sore after hours of screaming.
“We came to rescue you two, of course! You didn’t think we’d just leave you guys in here?”
Kakashi hesitated, the words filtering in to his mind slowly. It was clear that he was having trouble believing the reality right there in front of his eyes, likely thinking it too good to be true, but eventually his body gave a violent shudder and he slumped further in to the arms holding him. Hashirama held him tighter with soft, sad eyes and soothing strokes down his too-thin back.
The moment was not to last, however. Long reunions would have to wait for a time and place where they knew they could be safe. Madara skimmed over the information on the clipboard before tossing it aside with an irritated noise and Tobirama knew it was because the charts provided would not say anything actually useful. All confidential information about powers and the experiments each patient might be subject to were kept locked away with limited access.
“Come on, we’ve got one more stop,” he said. “We can’t afford to dawdle.”
“Right.” Hashirama brushed Kakashi’s hair back a couple of times and then gently disentangled their embrace, passing his hand over the boy’s clothing and encouraging the cotton to grow in to something more modest than a medical gown. Once the garment had sprouted legs and short sleeves he stepped back and led Kakashi out of the cell with a firm grip on the boy’s hand.
Izuna smiled and gripped Kakashi tightly by one shoulder, giving it a friendly shake and then letting go without saying anything. No words could say what they all were feeling. Madara nodded to the boy but he seemed much too anxious to find his younger cousin to waste time on a more emotional display at the moment.
When Kakashi caught sight of Tobirama he recoiled, horrified, and only Hashirama’s grip on his hand stopped the boy from running in to the door jam. Tobirama sighed and glared around at the rest of them until they all looked away without commenting. He made sure to linger behind the rest of them, pointedly ignoring Madara’s lingering gaze as they moved up the hall to another door with another familiar name printed on its own stupid clipboard.
Name: Uchiha Obito
Age: 15
Height: 139.1 cm
Weight: 31.7 kg
By-name: Fade
Still attached to Hashirama by one hand, Kakashi dashed in first to flutter worriedly around Obito’s prone form. Clearly at least somewhat conscious, the young boy was either high as a kite or no longer in possession of all his faculties. Tobirama clenched his fists until the ice building up around his fingers cracked and scattered around feet. He had glanced at the reports for these facilities once but he hadn’t been able to make himself look at the personnel information, skipping over it in favor of devouring the science behind the research their experiments were aimed at, selfish as he had ever been. If he had seen Obito and Kakashi’s names here would he have done something about it? Could he have?
“Is he going to be okay?” Kakashi demanded, clutching Obito’s arm with his free hand. “They never let me see him, not even when they brought us both in for this stupid surgery.” He gave a temperamental toss of his head as though that explained what surgery he was referring to. Then he winced and they realized all at the same time what he meant: their eyes, that both of them had only their left eyes bandaged.
“Kakashi, what did they do to you?” Izuna asked softly.
“Switched us,” he answered with a shudder. “They gave me his eye and put mine in him. And they’ve been putting less drugs in my food so I think maybe they thought…it would change something?”
“Ability transfer,” Tobirama cut in, choking on the words and unable to speak louder than a whisper.
He winced when the whole group of them turned to stare with wide eyes. Only Madara had the courage to clear his throat and ask, “What’s that?”
“It was an experiment with the intention of transferring one person’s super abilities in to the body of another by merging their DNA. I never thought they would attempt such a crude method…” Seeing the way his brother was now staring at him in horror and Kakashi was squirming with discomfort, Tobirama let his words trail off and turned his head away. “You get the idea. We should leave.”
“Yeah. Right!” Hashirama snapped to attention. “Alright, I’ve got Kakashi. Izuna you grab Obito. Madara, take point if you would?”
Letting his brother’s voice wash over them all and fill the dark silence his words had left behind, Tobirama clenched his jaw as he fell back to the rear of the group once more with one hand hovering over his tranquilizer gun. Guarding the fringes was to be his role for the foreseeable future so he may as well get used to it until he had earned himself a place with these people again.
In his ear Mito’s voice responded to her fiancé’s heads up that both of their targets were in custody, murmuring back to them that they had exactly sixty seconds until extraction began. He hurried along on Hashirama’s heels as their little group traveled back the way they had come in, listening for the sounds of approaching feet or opening doors. Surely by now security would know that the facility had been infiltrated but it wasn’t that suspicious for the alarms to have not gone off. If his home were being invaded he wouldn’t want to tip off the intruders that he knew they were there, after all. Right now the six of them were like little rats in a maze trying to run away with the cheese they had stolen.
He very nearly lost his footing when the ground rocked beneath them, muffled thunder booming in the distance.
“Looks like they went with Touka’s idea after all,” Izuna mumbled with a smug note of approval.
“You know how Asuma likes any excuse to blow things up,” Madara shot back quietly over one shoulder. They shared a quick grin.
“He’s so quiet and unassuming until he fights and then bam. Suddenly he’s Smog, blower upper of everything in sight!” Izuna’s words were cut off by a second explosion rocking the ground, though he continued to snicker. Again his shoulder Obito groaned and twitched before falling quiet again.
For the most part the way back outside was quiet, though they did encounter a few pockets of trouble along the way. Now, however, there was no need to conceal their presence and stay quiet like they did on the way in. They had what they’d come for. Madara let off a little steam by engulfing the first guard to dash frantically around a corner almost before anyone else even saw him. His screams drew two women out of a nearby room but a wave of Tobirama’s hand lifted a sheet of ice up from the floor, blocking off the hallway entirely and leaving them free to hurry onwards.
Transports ready at pickup location.
This time it was Touka speaking to them. Mito couldn’t speak when using her powers, shifting her body in to the form of various wild animals. Hashirama nodded even if his cousin couldn’t see them.
“On our way,” he replied. “ETA five minutes.”
So, of course, that was when the wall right next to them exploded.