He’s tired. He’s so fucking tired. He’s just shy of twenty years old and has already experienced enough blood shell to fill a lifetime, has killed enough people –enemies, but still, people- to make himself sick every time he looks his haggard and haunted expression in the mirror after a particular gruesome nightmare, or rather, memories twisted in the only way dreams can turn them into, and has buried more brothers than some families even have.
So yes, Senju Tobirama is exhausted of it all and he thinks, perhaps, just as much as everyone else. However, the simple but abysmal difference between the rest of the people and himself, it’s that he is clan head Senju Butsuma’s second son and Senju Hashirama’s younger brother, so it became his duty, by default, to be the support of his clan and of the present and future clan head.
While his -last remaining- brother’s personality is like the sun -always shining despite the changing seasons and gruesome storms- and his presence like a kiri tree -strong, dependable and unshakable-, his own character has always been more on the quieter and analytical side, prone to reasoning and concealment as his coping mechanism and defense. After a ruthless upbringing and so many heartaches and losses, it became like the expectant moment just before a lightning strikes, a particular kind of strength that is silent and unobtrusive but unstoppable and deadly in its efficiency and cunningness when set in motion. Sadly, he mastered it so perfectly, like the rest of the things the white haired man puts his mind on, that he turned into a symbol of fear to their enemies, but particularly to the Uchihas’ and, regretfully but probably unavoidable, to his own clan as well. At the age of eleven, hushed whispers of demon child, sometimes accompanied by pointed fingers, followed him as he walked the streets and were then roared with disgust and hatred in the battlefield until whenever someone saw him, they only thought white demon.
He knew well of this, intimately so, since sometimes even he got frightened of himself and of the things he knows he could and would do to protect his loved ones, even if the feeling was not reciprocated. After his failed attempt to save his brother’s horrid death from an Uchiha child killing squad all those years ago, he swore to himself to do everything in his power to never be weak enough to cost someone’s life. And that is why, despite being aware of the dehumanizing moniker, the fear in the people’s eyes, of having been turned into a horror story for Uchiha children, and the disappointment and sorrow in his brother’s incomprehensive gaze, he took the cold and heavy mask called the white demon and wore it in memory and honor for his lost ones, as a reminder of his own failures and sins, and as a promise to the living.
However, it’s not like everyone is oblivious to this. For one part, his father is perfectly aware that his red-eyed child is a warrior –he made sure of that- and that this is what became of him. The reasons behind it or how much of it is Tobirama and how much the white demon, he doesn’t care, not as long as it fulfills its role to the clan. For the other part, oddly enough, it’s his cousin Touka, a graceful, hardened fighter, and isolated and scorned since childhood for choosing what was considered a man’s duty, having proudly and unashamedly rejected what was expected of her from birth. Despite being older than him for a few years, the loneliness and determination that they found in each other’s eyes one autumn afternoon training by chance in the same hidden spot in the forest brought them together. Since then, they considered themselves each other’s closest person in a way only misunderstood souls could. They usually never openly discuss it, preferring the silent support over a cup of sake to forget recent battles, by training to distract themselves from haunting dreams or by sitting next to the other to not be alone in moments of vulnerability. So yes, Touka is not a fool and her cousin’s impassive face doesn’t delude her for a second, her eyes always seeing Tobirama and never the demon, for which he’ll always be deeply and secretly grateful and moved by it.
