☆HashiMada OneShots☆

Mokuton

Madara knew the Mokuton - he knew it better, he was certain, than anyone save Hashirama himself. He had fought Hashirama's monstrous jutsu more times than he could even remember; he alone had seen the Mokuton pushed to the limits of its potential, in the battle that had somehow ended in the founding of a village. He knew the Mokuton, and he knew it as a wild, furious force of destruction, gigantic golems made of wood and branches rending flesh and bone, entire forests growing in seconds with the power of Hashirama's chakra.

And that was why Madara couldn't have heard right. "You want to build what?"

"A house," Hashirama repeated, so earnestly that Madara actually believed he was serious. "I think it'll be a nice gesture, you know? From the head of the Senju clan to the head of the Uchiha clan: the first official residence in our new village!"

"You want to build me a house using your Mokuton," Madara summarized, just to be sure he really understood.

"Right! I can make it exactly to your standards, as long as it's made out of wood."

What would a Mokuton-made house look like? Try as he might, Madara could only imagine a house-shaped thicket of tangled branches - or maybe a hollow wooden monster like the kind Hashirama had used against the Susano'o. Not exactly a particularly appealing style. "Have you ever done this before?" Madara asked.

"Well, not really. But how hard can it be?" Hashirama was wearing an expression that had become very familiar to Madara over the past month: hope mixed with determination. If Hashirama hadn't already demonstrated his convictions convincingly enough by nearly slitting his own stomach open, he'd proven his true feelings another hundred times over by the work he'd done at building this village. He was endlessly patient at negotiating; he addressed the pettiest complaints from members of either clan; he personally attended to the injuries of his former enemies and wept over the graves of the ones he couldn't save. If it was possible for a village to be founded on willpower alone, Hashirama was going to do it.

He was also incredibly persistent in his attempts to win back the friendship he'd once shared with Madara. Even after a month of trying, Hashirama didn't seem to realize that in the wake of Izuna's death, Madara was less of a person and more of a gaping wound. Hashirama's company made the raw edges of that wound ache; and yet, as time went on, Madara found himself paradoxically craving his company more and more. It put Madara in a state of perpetual frustration with himself.

Hashirama was looking at him expectantly. Madara shook himself out of his thoughts. "Well...I don't see the harm in letting you try," he said, and Hashirama's face lit with delight.

"You won't be disappointed!" he promised, and Madara felt the warm flutter of something that should have been long dead inside his chest. Hashirama always did this - always acted so happy at the slightest friendly word. Madara needed to stop thinking about it before he came completely undone.

Fortunately, Hashirama was ready with the next step. "I brought paper and ink," he said, holding said items up to prove it. "I was thinking we could work on a design together. That way I'll be able to make exactly the house you want!"

"I don't really care what it looks like, Hashirama. Just do whatever you want."

Taking no heed of this, Hashirama unrolled his paper onto his makeshift desk. Like all the buildings in the fledgling village, the structure they were currently using as village headquarters was a temporary building, more of a camping pavilion than a government office; no wonder Hashirama was so keen to start building something permanent. "You say that now," he told Madara, "But once you're actually living there, I bet you'll have lots of opinions on how you want the house to be laid out. Do yourself a favour and just plan it with me!" He countered Madara's skeptical look with his own pleading one, lower lip jutting out just a little - ugh, Madara should not have found that pout endearing. "Please?"