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Chapter Text

“Take your gift and get out of my sight before I shove it up your arse.” As usual, Tobirama’s quiet snarl and the accompanying sharpening of his chakra was a frightening thing, driving yet another offending alpha out of their office with the distinct hint of ammonia clinging to his pants. And just as usual, Madara could barely suppress the burst of arousal licking at his spine whenever he witnessed the other omega’s fierceness.

“Another one?” At the beginning of sharing working space, Madara had opted to ignore the elephant in the room that came with the never-ending stream of courteous alphas trying to score the Hokage’s omega brother for themselves, but he’d since learned that their day would go much smoother if he gave Tobirama the opportunity to vent first. “He’s been what- the fourth this week?”

“The sixth,” Tobirama spat, frame shaking in barely suppressed fury as his burning red eyes focused on the pink package left on his desk. Neither of them needed to open it to guess what it was. The emblem stamped on the box belonged to a store at the capitol renowned for selling wares only nominally meant for omegas rather than their mates. What a classy choice for an initial courting offer.

The more time Madara spent around Tobirama, the more he realised that the younger man’s all but legendary intolerance to alphas in general and courteous knotheads in particular—the sexism he was being accused of behind closed doors—was far from baseless as the gossip spread by hurt pride indicated. In Madadra’s humble opinion, rather than the thorough knotting some speculated Tobirama might need, a lick of common courtesy and respect might be all that was required to heal his prejudice. Or it would be, if the unique brand of alphas Tobirama seemed to attract didn’t prove themselves so entirely incapable of viewing an omega as an actual person in the first place.

Madara himself hadn’t ever bothered to advertise his own presentation. It just wasn’t a relevant factor among the Uchiha, and, frankly, after everything he witnessed Tobirama being put through by amorous advances based on his biology alone rather than his person, he didn’t mind keeping it that way. Life in Konoha—with all the major clans and their various cultures and traditions cramped together in a single village—was much more comfortable, Madara imagined, while everyone assumed him to be an alpha due to his strength. As if omega were weak by definition. Idiots. As it was, Madara had too many duties to attend to add alphas in a one-sided pissing contest to the list.

The only reason Madara would ever consider valid in owning up publicly to his presentation despite it being no one’s business was… well. If he wanted to make it someone’s personal business. A certain someone, that is, who was eying him with blatant distrust that was entirely unwarranted, waiting for a condescending remark or a demeaning gesture that Tobirama had learned to expect from most known alphas within the village meant to be a safe haven for him in particular. It was a shame what Hashirama and Madara’s dream had been reduced to in certain aspects, truly.

“Nothing to say, Uchiha?” Tobirama sneered defensively, and Madara realised he had yet again spaced out while watching the hard lines of Tobirama’s lean body coil tight to spring into swift action, the sharp angles of his face thrown into a regal relief by the light of the early morning sun. It was a bad habit, and one of these days, it would bring him to an early grave—either due to his own mindless actions or due to Tobirama’s thin patience finally snapping.

“Madara,” he said instead, hoping to distract Tobirama from whatever it was he thought about the Uchiha while his mind was still expecting an alpha’s offending behaviour. “My name is Madara, you know you are free to use it.”

They stared at each other for a moment before Tobirama visibly deflated. ‘Visibly’ only to Madara’s keen eyes and his deep understanding of Tobirama’s expressions, that is. “Apologies, I was out of line.”

“It’s fine, I get it.” As a gesture of goodwill, Madara looked at the offending package and twisted his chakra to carefully cremate it without touching Tobirama’s desk, before he turned back to the other omega with a distracting remark about today’s schedule ready on his lips.

It died a swift death when he caught Tobirama’s suspicious scowl and realised he had fucked up.

“How would you get it?” Tobirama spat, his infamous temper finally snapping with a biting scent of peppermint billowing out, carried by his agitatedly swirling chakra that never registered as anything worse than pleasant against Madara’s own. Which was problematic for its own reasons, as Madara struggled to keep his own chakra response in check, lest he smothered the temperamental omega with more affection than he was willing to suffer on a good day, never mind in the midst of a tantrum of cold fury.

When they had been placed in a shared office, it had taken weeks for Tobirama to see Madara as something other than a threat to his autonomy, even longer until Madara managed to coax the man into cordial conversations as co-workers despite the younger man still thinking of him as an alpha. Madara loathed to imagine what a setback with the man he dearly hoped he might one day call his mate at this precious point in time would cost him in the long run. There really was only one way to handle this situation now, but-

Madara was a brave man, and not once in his life had he been called a coward, but if anyone knew how cautiously he’d shield his heart, they might change their view on him. With Konoha built and peace made among the major shinobi clans of Fire, there shouldn’t be any reason to hold back the pursuit of a mate—and, indeed, the current birth rate within the village was certainly one way to put the success of their dream into numbers—but Madara had never settled for anything. He knew what he wanted and usually, he seized opportunities to bend the world to his will, to see his dreams and desires come true without any thought to the consequences.

But in matters of the heart, Madara found himself to be more vulnerable than he would have liked.

Then again, prefacing his long overdue confession with coming clean as an omega was sheer self-preservation at this point, and it might even improve his chances to allow Madara to properly court Tobirama. Eventually. Maybe.

“I might not suffer unwanted advances as you do, but as a fellow omega, I can still feel sympathy,” Madara settled on, carefully not looking at Tobirama as he shuffled through a stack of paper on his own desk, scanning the new files for anything noteworthy. His resolve to give Tobirama space to process broke under the pronounced silence, though.

Chancing a glance under his fringe, Madara saw Tobirama standing frozen in apparent shock—holding his body as if struck, with one foot back and a hand defensively raised as he gaped at Madara with a slack mouth and wide eyes. Nobody would call the unflappable Senju ‘ice princess’ now, that much was for sure. It didn’t stem the fast rising embarrassment Madara felt, though. This had been a bad idea, the worst. He needed to go home—barricade himself into his nest until his chest didn’t feel as constraining anymore—and assault Izuna’s dignity the next chance he got. Idiot brat with his idiot advice.

“I’ll, uh,” Madara broke off with a stutter, entirely done already despite only having managed the first half of his half-baked confession. He shouldn’t have listened to his brother, the romantic brat. As if Madara ever had a chance with Tobirama in the first place. “I have to go. Water my papers and sign my plants, important stuff, you know how it is.”

“Wait!” Despite his better knowledge, Madara stopped at the threshold of their office, carefully not looking at Tobirama. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean anything by my reaction, I’m just surprised. I never would have thought that you’re- Oh, fuck. I’m so sorry. I sound like a knothead, don’t I?”

It was the least thought-out ramble Madara had ever heard falling from Tobirama’s lips, and that included the memorable dressing-down Tobirama had delivered to Konoha’s whole administration—including the Hokage himself—when he saw Hashirama’s face chiselled into the mountain side their village was nestled into upon his return from a gruelling mission.

Madara had been enchanted by Tobirama’s face distorting in rage, the aloof mask falling away in favour of a vicious snarl, and his usual relaxed body in constant motion as he cussed Hashirama so deep into the ground even his Mokuton roots would have had trouble digging him up again. After that, Madara had been a goner. Who could expect any Uchiha to withstand such a display of emotion? With their rocky acquaintance, it was only Madara’s luck that the rest of his clan seemed more terrified by Tobirama’s waspish temper rather than enchanted by his passion. A disgrace, the lot of them. But since it played in Madara’s favour, he was willing to give them a pass.

And with the memory of Tobirama at his most emotional at the forefront of his mind, the promise of what Madara might be able to discover if he got a grip on his nerves and managed to stay… Madara was willing to give Tobirama a pass, too, on his initial reaction to Madara’s faux-casual admission. Unpromising as it seemed.

“Look,” Tobirama sighed and strengthened by his newfound resolve, Madara turned around to face him, surprised to see the aloof man relax at his willingness to listen. “That came off wrong. It’s just-” Tobirama bit his lip, and Madara’s hand flexed on his upper arms, where he had them protectively crossed in front of his chest. Senju Tobirama would be the dead of him, of that he had little doubt.

“I know you are my brother’s friend most and foremost, but- I mean, we get along rather well, even if I’m an ass, sometimes, and- I- You- I mean,” Tobirama stuttered with his eyes everywhere but on Madara, red coming to his face in uneven blotches that held Madara’s entire attention as he tried to keep down the Sharingan at this unexpected treat of a sight.

“Ok. Look. I’ll just say it as it is: I might have been told I could use a friend, too. I’ve been wary of you because I have been fooled by alphas pretending to be cordial before, but I can admit that was unfair to you as a person. Who I might or might not don’t mind having in my space all that much.”

That- what? How was Madara—anyone, really—supposed to respond to something like that? There really was nothing to say but-

“Sure. Friends.”

That… was most certainly not what Madara did have in mind, but, oh Amaterasu, Tobirama’s smile—genuine and sweet and brittle—was the most beautiful thing Madara had ever seen, and he couldn’t rue the outcome of his failed confession if it led to this: to Tobirama opening up to him at long last, even if it wasn’t in a way Madara had envisioned.

How did they even land here when he had intended to confess his feelings for the younger man and ask for permission to court him as he deserved? This, right now, was so not in the script he had been hashing out over the past week or two. It was-

Fine.

It was fine. If what Tobirama needed was a friend, nothing but a friend was what Madara would be.

Chapter Text

Tobirama might need a friend—and Madara was willing to deliver on that, no questions asked—but what Madara needed was a drink or two. Seemingly overnight, Madara had gone from a barely tolerated nuisance to Tobirama’s bosom buddy, and he came to realise that he was ill-prepared to deal with the change in pace.

When he used to imagine himself confessing his feelings, Madara had hoped it would set him on a path that might lead to being welcomed within Tobirama’s space rather than just endured at his periphery. And even in his more daring dreams, Madara rarely envisioned anything bolder than to be allowed to hold Tobirama’s hand or for him to be gifted a chaste kiss. Anything to keep his sanity, really.

The reality of being Tobirama’s friend turned out quite differently, to say the least.

“There you are!” Thanks to the muscle memory trained up over the past weeks, Madara didn’t stumble on his way to the office as a heavy weight landed on his back—merely lifting his arms to make room for long legs wrapping around his waist and strong arms looping around his shoulders—and continued to read the file in his hands as he walked them to their destination.

Before the half-baked confession that got interrupted by his outing as an omega, Madara had rarely seen Tobirama engage in anything even remotely classifiable as a physical display of affection and had shaped his expectations for a potentially shared future accordingly. There had been nothing betraying Tobirama’s casual physicalness among friends—nothing that might have Madara prepared for having the younger omega plastered to his side or draped over his back at any given time—and while Madara had mostly adjusted by now, his heart still skipped a beat or two whenever it happened.

“You’re late,” Tobirama murmured in deference to the closeness of his lips’ to Madara’s ears, and Madara didn’t need to turn his head to know clever red eyes were fitting over the crammed pages in an astonishing speed before he lost interest at the inventory list of their armoury when he realised Madara had already signed off on the numbers.

It was humbling to have Tobirama’s trust in such a way. The man was infamous for micromanaging and cross-checking any administrative matter he could get his hands on—which was just about all of it, considering how creatively vicious the Senju got whenever someone tried to keep any scroll out of his grasp—so have him simply accept Madara’s work without question, made him all warm and tingly in a way that no number pushing had any business making him feel.

He was so gone it wasn’t even funny anymore. No matter how much Izuna disagreed with that particular sentiment.

“Izuna was a brat.”

Before Tobirama asked him to be friends, Madara hadn’t realised that Tobirama’s amusement was a private thing, a soft laugh rumbling within his chest too deep to be heard but easily felt when the omega was blanketing Madara’s back. It vibrated through his body like the purr of a great cat, and Madara dearly hoped he’d never have to go without it again.

“Isn’t he always?” Tobirama huffed as he slinked off Madara’s back and over to his desk, seamlessly returning to the paperwork he most likely abandoned when he sensed Madara entering the tower.

“He is. You would get along great, birds of a feather and all that,” Madara nodded sagely, secure in the knowledge that the moon would fall from the sky before Tobirama and Izuna had a single civil conversation—their personalities clashing just as much as Izuna’s presentation with Tobirama’s bias against alphas.

Just as Madara imagined he would, Tobirama scrunched his nose in blatant distaste before they fell into an easy banter as they got to work. Madara had enjoyed their verbal quarrels from before—the heated clash of sharp minds—but when Tobirama didn’t try to actively talk him in circles just for the principle of it, Madara found it reviving to debate with the brilliant man. And when he found himself running out of arguments, the comfortable atmosphere between them made it effortless to get Tobirama started on a tangent about any given topic under the sun and let the words wash over him as he got lost in sparkling red eyes and the liquid flow of hard lines as Tobirama passionately talked with his whole body in motion whenever they lacked an audience.

It was a shame that barely anyone got to see Tobirama like this, but Madara was a greedy, selfish man, and for as long as Tobirama was content with having only one friend, he wouldn’t push the infamous ‘Ice Prince’ to put himself out there at the mercy of faithless gossips. Tobirama deserved better than that, he deserved-

“Madara?”

Madra blinked, and would have reared back in surprise if he weren’t already used to Tobirama’s face hovering right in front of his own, their noses almost touching and an insistent finger poking into Madara’s cheek, calling his attention back to the present.

As usual, when Tobirama recognised that he had regained Madara’s attention after having spaced out, he tilted his head in apparent confusion but without judgement, and Madara never failed to notice how it made them share breath in the narrow space between their lips. It was maddening to withstand the pull he felt towards the other omega, the way his body ached to fall into Tobirama as easily as the younger man allowed Madara to carry his weight when given half the chance.

But Tobirama had asked for a friend, and a friend was what Madara would be. His feelings were his own, and he could handle them. But even so, Madara had fallen for Tobirama’s fierceness, the way he cared without ever pulling attention to it. He hadn’t expected his new friend to be this damn cute, and he barely knew how to handle that.

Chapter Text

Never mind that drink, what Madara needed to cope was a lobotomy. If the consequences weren’t as dire, he might have given it a real shot, too.

As much as Tobirama’s general behaviour kept reminding Madara of a great cat, there had been surprising divergences, too. Like, for example, when Madara learned that Tobirama seemingly couldn’t pass by any body of water deeper than a puddle without shedding his clothes and taking a dip. Madara’s spot of peace, his beloved koi pond in the back garden of his home, had lost quite a bit of its relaxing air since Tobirama learned of its existence.

It was one of Tobirama’s more damning habits, but if he might say so himself, Madara made for a remarkable rack. He dutifully held Tobirama’s clothes, keeping them dry and clean, ready to be slipped back into as soon as his water nymph deemed himself ready to part from the element that called to his soul. Madara had learned quickly to keep his eyes averted, to not let himself be tempted by the translucent drops rolling over smooth skin until they were caught by faint scars, glittering mesmerising in the sun.

There was only so much Madara could handle with his dignity and sanity mostly intact, and knowing that Tobirama was naked next to him while making these little happy noises of his was difficult enough without having the visual of water pooling where Madara wished he could trace with his tongue. The vague thought of leaving a mark of himself, the impression of his teeth, for the water to settle into.

Thankfully, there was an easy way to calm his continuously tested libido. Nothing to get a grip on himself like taking a relaxing bath with his other friend, Hashirama’s usually sunny deposition reliably falling away as he rants about all the people trying to get into his precious little brother’s pants.

There was no preserving his sanity, though, when Tobirama eventually caught on to the fact that his two most-liked people were regularly taking off to spend some time at the onsen. The pout had been as endearing as it had been deadly, and it had to be Madara’s divine punishment for keeping his feelings to himself.

But what was he to do? Overprotective behemoth of an older brother aside, above everything else, Tobirama had wanted a friend, someone to be affectionate with without having it tainted by other motives, and Madara was loath to ruin their relationship for the other omega. Despite his feelings, he could be Tobirama’s friend—he was Tobirama’s friend. His feelings were his own problem, and they would either pass at some point (debatable) or Madara would eventually learn to live with them (just as debatable, but Madara was determined to make it work).

He could handle the clinging and the skinny dipping without making it weird. Even Tobirama joining his baths with Hashirama was something Madara was convinced he could handle—technically. If Tobirama weren’t plastering himself to his side like he was prone to do when they were fully clothed, whispering whatever came to his brilliant mind close to Madara’s ear to not interrupt Hashirama’s animated babbling.

The naked skin pressing against his own was- was- Madara couldn’t allow himself to dwell on it—or the absentminded caress of his chest—or he would combust. Poof and gone, just like that. The shivers running down his back from Tobirama’s breath against his wet and exposed neck didn’t help either.

Madara would die from a heart attack if Hashirama didn’t kill him first. His friend had fallen suspiciously silent during Madara’s inner meltdown, and when he dared to look over, he was met by narrowed eyes. Thankfully, Hashirama had never been able to stand a truly hot bath, or the man would have come over by now to yank Madara away from his precious baby brother, if nothing else.

As if Madara—or Hashirama, for that matter—was in any position to make Tobirama do anything he didn’t want to do. As if it wasn’t Tobirama himself who had bodily bullied a flailing Madara into the narrow side of the pool to plaster himself over Madara’s broad chest, soaking up the heat caused by Madara’s ambient katon rolling in tune with his emotions, raising the temperature of the water around him until it was steaming and sweat beads clung to their exposed skin.

And it certainly wasn’t Madara’s fault that Tobirama only got more courtship offers since he’d decided to grow out his hair by means of a nifty jutsu that he allegedly created when he couldn’t stand Hashirama’s pouting over Madara’s bowl-cut mockery anymore.

It wasn’t Madara’s fault that Tobirama had taken personal offence to his split ends, all the while complaining about how they felt against his lips—by the sun, Madara had been ill-equipped to realise what the relaxing little tugs on his hair had been caused by when Tobirama had been wrapped around him on a late night or early morning in the office—and then promptly took over their care, brandishing a brush and a little oil at least once a day to wrangle Madara’s wild locks into submission. Which Madara was perfectly capable of, mind you, just too lazy to bother with it on a normal day.

If Madara hadn’t been in love before, he would have fallen hard right then and there, as Tobirama grew out his own hair to give Madara something to practise his braiding skills on. The easy trust Tobirama readily showed by giving Madara his back, allowing him to sink his war-hardened fingers into these silken locks… Tobirama was a gift from the divine. And if Izuna would crack up about them sitting around and braiding each other’s hair a single more time, Madara would hide rotten fish in his brother’s den, rubbing it in so the smell wouldn’t simply air out. That insufferable brat.

If Madara continued to live, that is.

The redness in Hashirama’s face could be argued away by the near-boiling heat of their pool, but Madara thought it much more likely that it was due to the anger the beta felt as he observed his brother melted into Madara’s sprawled form, seemingly dozing if it weren’t for nimble fingers twisting black and white strands into joined braids.

Admittedly, even in Madara’s friendly experience, this was something widely out of character for Tobirama, but by the sun, it also was so disgustingly sweet, Madara wanted to cry when the water eventually dissolved the loose braids again, separating black from white.

Chapter Text

Madara was tired to the bone and ready to keel over any second now. This day—the whole week—had been a nightmare to deal with, and he wanted nothing more than to settle down and sleep without interruption for the next three days.

For all that they had split their workload as the Hokage’s main advisors somewhat evenly by Madara taking over external matters while Tobirama focused inwards, Madara was the first to admit that he was not the right choice to entertain anyone from the capitol. The sexism cultivated at court was hard to ignore even if it wasn’t aimed at him personally—no omega could ever be more than an ornamental gem meant to be bred, so someone as strong and trusted by Konoha’s leader as Madara had to be an alpha, right?—and they had Mito for any political dance, ready to make them dance to Konoha’s tune.

It was bad luck that Madara was the second one to greet the daimyo’s delegation. Right after Tobirama, who was widely known as an omega.

Smoothing over their relationship with the capitol after the Hokage’s brother decked one of the daimyo’s ambassadors for demanding the right to court him before Konoha’s Co-Founder consequently set the offending ass on fire hadn’t been that difficult to achieve for Mito—the alpha woman was a demon and no one could convince Madara otherwise—but never let it be said the sea witch did anything for free. He adored the mean spirit hidden underneath her demure smile, but earning Mito’s forgiveness had been gruelling work and Madara was finally done. Done, and so ready to fall into a deep sleep, Konoha could be on fire and he would not care to move a single finger. Not his responsibility.

In the absolute darkness of his room, Madara switched the damp towel around his waist for a worn but comfortable yukata before he crawled blindly under the heavy blankets with little fanfare. He would have burrowed into his nest, but chances were high he actually ended up over-sleeping and with his current mood, he wouldn’t take well to any invading presences at the heart of his territory. No need to decimate their forces by taking someone’s head off who didn’t have any chance but follow orders if he could just take simple precautions instead.

With how little sleep he had gotten over the past few days, Madara’s temper had been particularly short, which caused a closeness to his instincts that with a sensitivity of his nose that made it almost impossible to stand anyone not of his pack within his vicinity. Tobirama would have been the rare exception, of course, if Mito hadn’t made sure her punishment involved keeping them apart lest they dared to have any resemblance of fun while they worked themselves back into her good graces.

Ah, well. Madara would catch up with his sleep until the heat of his temper had somewhat cooled, and then he would hunt down Tobirama, maybe forcing the man to get some breakfast together at the new restaurant with the tiny little tables two streets down from the tower. That sounded like a perfectly friendly-

“Took you long enough, I’ve been waiting forever.”

Madara laid in muted shock as Tobirama scuffled closer under the shared blanket until a heavy body settled firmly into his side and he was caged by familiar limbs, a thigh hitched up on Madara’s midsection and long fingers lazily kneading his chest like a content cat softened her bed.

Alright then. Tobirama tended to get easily cold, so it shouldn’t be a surprise that the cups of winter made him come looking for a heater during the night. Distracted by the weight pressed into his body and the puffs of breath against his neck, Madara would not find any sleep tonight. But that was fine. He might need to work from home the next day rather than going into the tower and burning the whole thing down in a fit of temper, but that was fine, too. Sleep was overrated anyway. Madara would just lay here and watch the night pass through the window, friendly cuddled within an inch of his life by the man he loved. It would be absolutely, perfectly fine.

“Your scent is so sweet tonight. Are you going into heat?”

It would not be fine.

Wth the cold nose pressing close to his gland at the juncture of his neck—the hint of lips accompanying it—Madara knew his death was imminent. He would die tonight. At least it opened the opportunity of eternal sleep. Or, well, to sleep for as long as Tobirama took to create something insane to bring back the dead—Madara didn’t put it past the possessive man to feel slighted by the Shinigami themselves for doing their job.

“Might be,” Madara’s voice was strangled where he tried to keep it unaffected as the other omega kept nosing around his neck in deliberation of Madara’s scent. While he thankfully did not touch the gland as such, any exhale teased it all the same and strengthened Madara’s scent until he could smell himself, the sweet odour wafting up from the narrow space between them. And, oh. That- It might explain some of his irritation during the past few days.

For all that insight was rumoured to be the first step on the road to recovery, it didn’t help Madara any with keeping a grip on his body’s reactions to having Tobirama close, quite the opposite, truly. Trapped underneath Tobirama’s strong thigh—that Madara had at some point witnessed crushing a man’s skull, and, oh fucking no, that was not a image he needed on his mind right now—Madara felt himself harden. As did Tobirama, if the surprised sound and involuntary little jerk of pressure was anything to go by. The sudden dampness between his legs caused by the tiny movement didn’t improve Madara’s mood at all.

This had to be the most embarrassing pre-heat experience ever, and Madara didn’t see how this could get any worse. As long as he stayed awake during the night, that is, and avoided sleep-rutting against the warm body carrying the minty scent that he had all but imprinted on at this point.

“Heats are annoying to deal with,” Tobirama murmured against his neck, the vibration of his voice sending an excited shiver through Madara.

Madara opted for a non-commenting hum, mind focused on keeping a grip on his hormones as he desperately tried to neither cry nor moan when Tobirama stayed pressed into his side, large hands absentmindedly caressing the skin where Madara’s Yukata had gaped as he kept his face pressed into Madara’s neck, breathing deeply. As long as Tobirama didn’t move, Madara could at least somewhat ignore the firm pressure of Tobirama’s leg against his unfriendly interested dick. Small mercies.

“I could help you with it?”

Pause.

“What?!” Madara’s strangled yell was something between a screech and a cough, and thankfully, it made Toibrama draw back a bit, giving Madara some room to breathe fresh air untainted by their intermingled scents.

Tobirama blinked down at him in apparent confusion at the sudden outburst, white hair falling around their faces, blocking out the world and creating a small, intimate space just for them to exist in. He was the most beautiful man Madara had ever seen and there was no way he could ever grow bored of the sight.

“I could help you with your heat, so you would not need to suffer it alone. I wouldn’t mind helping a friend.”

And just like that, all arousal was forgotten and ice settled into Madara’s burning veins. He really wanted to cry now. Tobirama was willing to lend his friend a helping hand, as Madara knew some people were prone to do, although he himself had rarely indulged the same. And he never would with Tobirama, not when they had such vastly different views about each other and it felt like taking advantage of the younger omega.

“I’ll keep it in mind,” Madara whispered in the shared space between them, his gaze everywhere but on the earnest red of Tobirama’s lovely eyes. It was the clearest way Madara could think of to turn the offer down without spelling it out, but Tobirama only searched his face for a moment before apparently shrugging the whole encounter off.

With a nonchalant “Suit yourself.” Tobirama settled back onto the futon, cuddling into Madara’s side as if he belonged there—and by the sun, did Madara wish he did—his head now pillowed on Madara’s chest, hand laid still on his clothed stomach and thigh a bit lower than before, not touching any sensitive places anymore.

Tobirama was never one to overstep set boundaries, it was Madara’s own fault he didn’t set them in the first place, greedy to embrace whatever Tobirama was willing to give.

That lobotomy sounded better and better by the day.

Chapter Text

He woke up alone—the sun already high in the sky—with no sign of Tobirama but the neat little tray waiting next to the futon where Madara was sprawled out with his blankets kicked aside and his yukata in such disarray that his modesty could only be considered preserved if flower house standards were applied.

It was rare for Madara to sleep in, rarer still not to be called in for some urgency or another before he had drunk his first cup of tea in the morning, so it was obvious Tobirama had done more than merely preparing a light breakfast that Madara would actually be able to eat despite the heat making him feel nauseous from the thought of food alone. Ever since Tobirama declared them friends, Madara was astonished time and time again by how caring the man was under his aloof demeanour, even if he rarely showed it in a traditional way, opting for much more practical acts of love. Friendly acts of love, that is.

Picking on his breakfast with little interest but determined to make Tobirama’s care count, Madara realised that his temper was much more even now that he had gotten some sleep. He might as well go into the tower to get a headstart on the paperwork that was left unattended while he was in Mito’s clutches. Maybe it would even help with not thinking about the offer he had to turn down last night.

Not that Madara truly believed it would, but he held onto the hope with shaking hands and bared teeth, and it’d help his composure immensely if his hindbrain stopped tempting him to roll back under the blanket they shared, inhaling the sharp mint scent Tobirama left behind, and enjoying how well it blended in with the scent of Madara’s faint arousal stubbornly clinging to the sheets.

Madara knew he shouldn’t venture out at the brisk of heat—that he should barricade himself in his nest and ride out his hormones rather than flaunt them to the village and its unsuspecting residents—but when he caught himself sniffing the air for yet another whiff of Tobirama, he knew he wouldn’t find peace left alone within his home. He had to admit he wasn’t fit to go into office either, not with it being the place Tobirama would most likely be, tempting Madara with their intermingled scents and his care and-

Grumbling to himself, Madara changed his yukata to something fresh, piled his hair onto his head with a lazy knot and left his home with a change of proper clothes. If he wouldn’t find peace at home, and his presentation as Konoha’s worst kept secret—Tobirama’s continued physical closeness without a mating bite marking him claimed should be an easy enough sign for even the biggest idiot to read—Madara might as well try out the onsen’s omega wing.

He had not expected to be intercepted before he even properly left the Uchiha district, though.

“Looking for a knot to sit on, Uchiha-sama?”

Madara stopped in his tracks, vision bleeding red in a way he couldn’t quite tell if it was the Sharingan or merely his blinding rage at the vile proposition and the mocking tone he had been addressed. The Shimura as a whole were everything Tobirama detested in alphas put into clan mentally—they were condescending to omega, denying them their own agency even if they could kick their ass or talk them in circles. Even when they actively did.

With all the people Madara had met over his life, he hadn’t ever come across anyone with a sense of self so overblown as Shimura Kosuke. Madara wouldn’t have shed a single tear if the Shimura clan had denied Hashirama’s open invitation to join the village, but sadly, they were opportunistic fuckers above all else, and their heir more than most.

“You’re certainly not up to my standards, but if you neaten up your hair some and get rid of those rags, you should be pretty enough to allow you a ride, doll.”

Madara was momentarily stuck speechless by the sheer audacity, the vile words and disgusting way the Shimura flared his weak chakra and off-putting scent in an attempt to entice Madara—or overwhelm him? It was hard to tell, but either way, Madara was not impressed. Before he could open his mouth in a blazing rebuttal, though, a freezing wave of familiar chakra billowed out from behind Madara, soothing the irritating heat in his blood to a manageable level as it engulfed him and scorched the earth at his feet with glistering frostbite.

It was as easy as taking a breath for Madara to relax against the sturdy body behind him when a muscular arm snuck around his middle to draw him in, Tobirama intimately rubbing their cheeks together in a comforting gesture before he hooked his chin over Madara’s shoulder, surrounding him with his entire presence as much as humanly possible. There was no need for Madara to put on a strong front by himself when Tobirama was readily having his back.

“Scam, scum.”

It said a lot about Tobirama’s reputation—and the expression he must be wearing—that the mouthy Shimura alpha turned on his heel without another word and left the scene with a speed that Madara suspected even Tobirama would have had trouble meeting. What a disgrace for Konoha this particular clan was, the least their heir could have done was to defend the biological superiority the Shimura were assured of, or die trying. Preferably the latter.

“You good?” Tobirama’s low croon cut through Madara’s fogged mind, easily distracted by the haze of an early heat. Was he good? It was rather disheartening to have his first public encounter as an omega within the village to be tainted by sexism and unwanted advances, but-

“I’m better now,” Madara sighed and settled more firmly against his friend. With Tobirama there, having his back and banking the heat in Madara’s blood with the chill of his chakra, Madara felt a whole lot better than he did waking up alone with his brain swamped by hormones urging him to seek a connection that would never be.

At Madara’s obvious contentment with his current place in the world, Tobirama huffed an amused laugh that vibrated through Madara’s body and tickled his collarbones, embarrassingly triggering another rush of slickness that Madara had no way to hide in such close proximity. Tobirama audibly inhaled, his body around Madara falling so lax it couldn’t be anything but a deliberate ploy to hide the readiness to pounce on any threat that might present itself to Madara in his precarious state.

“Come on, my home is closer,” Tobirama lied straight to his teeth and straightened up, tucking Madara into his side as he escorted him away from the Uchiha gates and towards the Senju district. “ You can crash in my nest while I keep watch so that no one will bother you.”

Madara had known that Tobirama had a protective streak a mile wide—they were alike in this—but it was soothing to Madara’s agitated hindbrain that he was included in the other omega’s possessive care. No matter the usual implications of being invited into someone’s nest, after last night it was clear to him that there wouldn’t ever be anything more to their relationship than being friends. But even so, suddenly Madara realised he could content himself with the secure knowledge that he was treasured by Tobirama nonetheless.

Before last night he would have baulked at Tobirama inviting him to his nest to spend his heat by himself surrounded by Tobirama’s scent—sullying the sacred space with his own arousal, feeling like it would be an intrusion of privacy when, deep down, Madara had still dreamed of maybe having something more than friendship one day. But today… somehow, Madara had made peace with himself and his feelings for his friend.

Chapter Text

It never bode well when Hashirama tried to act like the adult he—in Tobirama’s unbiased opinion—only nominally was, but when his brother obviously didn’t hear a single word of Tobirama’s report while still observing him with rare focus and a pinched frown, it wasn’t something that Tobirama could ignore with good conscience.

“Spit it out. I have neither the time nor the nerve for your nonsense today.”

Contrary to his usual behaviour—always ready to spill his guts and weave a tale—Hashirama did not simply say what had crawled up his ass to have him in such a mood. Even under the pain of torture, Tobirama would never admit to it, but having Hashirama’s undivided quiet attention was unnerving, and he’d love for his goofy oaf of a brother to snap back into his natural overbearing behaviour. Then, at least, he’d have a valid reason to kick Hashirama’s ass for some much-needed mental recalibration.

“You’re reeking of Madara and heat hormones. Did you share his nest?”

Well. As they blinked at each other with equally wide eyes—Hashirama apparently just as surprised by his blurted words as Tobirama—Tobirama could safely say he had not expected the cause of his brother’s concerning behaviour. How silly of him to assume their Hokage’s grave demeanour might actually indicate a serious matter. Tobirama really should know better than that by now.

“Technically, he shared mine. I invited him to. Is that all?”

At Tobirama’s easy admission, Hashirama’s seriousness fell away in an instant and was replaced by the flailing the world was much more accustomed to. As much as it never failed to irritate Tobirama into bursts of fraternal violence, he gave Hashirama a pass today. The wide flailing and teary eyes were much preferable to the alienness of having him acting all mature.

Or so Tobirama thought, right up until Hashirama picked up his jaw and broke their peaceful silence with a screech of the kinds he usually reserved for discoveries of Tobirama’s more experimental studies.

“Brother! You can’t just-” Tobirama watched with mounting confusion as his brother strangled another yell with his hands before he gripped into his own hair and pulled harshly. “I wanted to give you time and space, but enough is enough. When were you going to tell me you’re courting? You are just courting, right? My sweet otouto hasn’t eloped without telling me?” There was a moment of stunned silence before Hashirama suddenly screeched. “Did my friend elope with my baby brother without asking for my permission first?!”

That was-

“What is wrong with you?” Tobirama yelled back, temper snapping as Hashirama lounged over his desk, his grabby hands aiming for the neckline of Tobirama’s habitually high collar. It had been years since Hashirama last managed to catch Tobirama in a spar, and it was just as easy to evade the poor attempt on his privacy and end their scuffle by kicking Hashirama back into his chair, where he thankfully stayed put with a pout and thick crocodile tears making a mess of his face. The overbearing madman was a disgrace, and sometimes Tobirama could hardly believe they were related at all.

“First off: If you think I need your permission to do literally anything, you’re going to suffer the consequences,” Tobirama snarled, entirely fed-up with this nonsense and relishing in the minute wince to Hashirama’s shoulders when the beta was reminded of the times he had tried to protect his newly presented omega sibling from making ‘bad choices’. “Also: Madara and I are friends. You wanted me to make friends since I was a child, don’t get weird about it now that I finally found someone suitable.”

As much as Tobirama enjoyed any cease of his brother’s dramatics, the heavy silence was unsettling enough for him to pin his brother under his judging stare as the older Senju buried his face in his hands with a groan so deep, it was a wonder the ground didn’t shake from it.

“Tobirama. Tobi. Otouto,” Hashirama began, dragging his hands slowly off his face and turning it into a grimace. It made Tobirama twitch with the violent need to kick him out of the window almost as much as the butchering of his name. “Know that I say this with all the love in my heart: You don’t do friends.”

Tobirama narrowed his eyes, offended by his brother’s poor attempt at discounting his friendship with Madara, but he didn’t get a word in as Hashirama barreled on with a longsuffering tone that Tobirama felt was entirely unwarranted. He was not the unreasonable one here.

“You hate people. You barely tolerate me in your personal space despite loving me—shut up, I know you love me—and still, you’re crawling over Madara, have been stuck to his side like ivy for weeks on end. And after that scene at the onsen, I’m pretty sure you also want to get into his bed if you haven’t already made a home there. Believe it or not: You are in a relationship, no matter what you want to call it.”

“We’re not-”

At his brother’s unimpressed stare, Tobirama’s mouth snapped shut with a huff and a flush crawling over his face. Denying Hashirama’s claims like an imbecile would do nothing but make him look like the child his older brother occasionally tried to treat him as. Stupid tree with his rose-tinted view on everything—spring season must be fast approaching if his brother got Tobirama and Madara’s friendship wrong like that. And all that just because Tobirama was comfortable around someone for once.

Admittedly, he might be a bit more touchy with Madara than strictly necessary, but how to explain to his brother that the older omega felt safe in a way Tobirama hadn’t ever experienced? Madara was so warm and pliant, easily making room for Tobirama’s presence without a thought—allowing Tobirama at his back despite not tolerating anyone else there—and it was addicting to be felt welcomed like that by someone who wasn’t bound by blood to-

To love him.

Oh.

Tobirama was still a bit dazed from his epiphany when his feet led him to Madara’s house without any input from his brain. Standing in front of the heavy door, he had the sudden realisation that it had become the new normal to flee into the safety of his friend’s presence whenever he needed a place to sort his thoughts—be it inspiration or distress.

As usual, Madara did not show any indication of having noticed Tobirama’s intrusion into his home, merely shifting his weight to allow Tobirama to pillow his head on his thigh more comfortably after he silently slinked around the sitting man and crawled under the kotatsu like a child.

Time passed in silence as Madara kept going through the work that had piled up during his absence, and Tobirama soaked up the peace and warmth in an attempt to realign himself with the truth of their situation, chest vibrating in contentment when Madara’s hand sunk into his unbound hair and scratched his scalp. Tobirama couldn’t even put on a token offence at being threatened like a cat—he had all but incited the man to act like it, after all.

While it never sat well with him when Hashirama turned out to be right about something, engulfed by the warmth of Madara’s home and all but drunk on their intermingled scents trapped within his enclosed resting place, it was impossible for Tobirama to keep ignoring the ache in his teeth, the need to bite down and never let go.

He had always been close to his instincts—the wild Hatake blood of his mother running strong in his veins—but it had been easy to dismiss the growing urge as a sign of his irritation with the numerous alpha trying to carry favour with the Hokage by courting his omega brother. The irritation that had reached impossible heights when Tobirama realised it wasn’t only him they were eyeing with calculation anymore, but also Madara, who seemed entirely oblivious to it.

Tobirama hadn’t questioned his urge to bite, to claim, when it was hidden underneath the need to protect his guileless friend—the older man having lived so long without being seen as the invaluable omega he was that he was entirely blind to the eyes following him, the ill intent wafting around those mutts sniffing out their chances. Tobirama staking his claim on Madara by insistent scenting had been nothing but an act of protection, a favour for his dear friend. Really, anyone would have done it—if Tobirama hadn’t possessively scared them away with murder in his eyes.

In hindsight, it was difficult to explain away the pleased satisfaction Tobirama had felt growing ever since his sensible nose caught the first whiff of his own scent stubbornly clinging to Madara even before the man had stepped into their shared office for that day. He didn’t allow anyone else’s claim to stay after that, his possessive instincts too strong to have Madara’s scent besmirched by them—only barely tolerating Madara’s pack consisting of Hashirama and a few Uchiha as a necessary evil.

And- ah, well. Even Tobirama could admit that there had been nothing innocent about his thoughts anymore when Madara left after his heat and Tobirama found his nest drenched in the other omega’s scent—sheets still damp with slick and sweat, and the smell of sex heavy in the air. For a moment, Tobirama had felt tempted to drag Madara back into his nest, to bury his face at the source of the mouthwatering ambrosia, eating it up and rubbing it into his skin until no one would be able to keep them apart by their scents alone.

Social rules might not be Tobirama’s strong suit, but looking back, he had to wonder how he’d managed to convince himself that particular urge had been friendly in nature. Huh.

“Are we in a relationship?”

The thought fell from his lips without conscious thought, slipping past his defences as he wondered where they stood with each other. It wasn’t uncommon for Tobirama to misinterpret or straight-up ignore social cues, but surely Madara would know what was going on between them?

The sudden yelp and crash of an inkpot didn’t sound too promising, though. The muscle under Tobirama’s cheek tightening was the only warning he got before Madara one-handedly shoved away the heavy table in a feat of strength that did unspeakable things to Tobirama’s imagination.

“What?!” What do you mean ’are we in a relationship’?” Madara was a bit wild around the eyes, his hair frizzling around his flushed face as he looked down at Tobirama, still comfortably placed in his lap. “I just came to terms with only ever being your friend?”

And, oh. That whined afterthought seemed much more promising than the initial reaction to Tobirama’s question, didn’t it?

“So you mean you…” Tobirama murmured leadingly, eyes intent on Madara’s face as he let his sentence trail out, waiting for Madara to finish it.

“I love you!” Madara blurted and looked as surprised by his words as Tobirama felt by the easy admission of something that had just occurred as a possibility to him. “I mean: I’d love to,” Madara backtracked. Flailing so hard, it reminded Tobirama of his brother at his worst. But other than Hashirama, the sight awakened nothing but fondness in Tobirama. And if that wasn’t proof that Hashirama had been right with his baseless assumption, Tobirama wouldn’t know what was. He would never live this down, would he?

“I-uh,” Madara stammered after he got back a resemblance of composure, a flush still high on his cheeks. “I’d love to court you properly if you’d be amenable to it.”

“Alright then,” Tobirama agreed with a smile before he closed his eyes and buried his face into the warmth of Madara’s stomach, content that the matter was solved and he could take a nap after all the stress his brother had caused him.

“That’s- That’s it? Just ‘alright then’? Nothing else?”

“I’ve been informed I don’t have the patience for friends, but I want to have you at my side all the time, forever,” Tobirama shrugged, nuzzling his face into the soft line of Madara’s relaxed muscles a bit more firmly, inhaling through parted lips when the proximity made him catch the last trace of heat in the other’s sweetened scent. Well, if Madara needed some more words: “Your scent is burned into my nose and mind. I don’t like sweets, but you’re so enticing I want to taste you, lick your skin and eat up your slick. Heat or no heat, I find myself starving for you.”

Tobirama was startled from his scent-drunken ramblings by the wheezing sound coming from Madara’s throat as if he’d been punched. The moment of clarity gave Tobirama some awareness of what he’d just casually admitted to, but he didn’t care to take back his words. They were as much wishful thinking as they were a promise. He’d only need to wait for Madara to catch up.