Lost

17

Well after shouting that at the siblings, Madara seemed to all but deflate then; once he got his outburst out of his system, his shoulders sagged, he heaved a sigh and put his hands on his hips and stared at the two of them. It wasn't like they'd actually startled him; he was just playing up to it really, but he did feel a little bad when Hashirama was brushing his sister down and checking her over. Madara inwardly grimaced, did he push her away that hard to warrant Hashirama looking that concerned?

Something turned in his stomach, it wasn't like he was repulsed by the information that had come to light, if only to him, naturally. Was it just instinct and muscle memory? It wasn't like these two were the first of their clan he had encountered, albeit peacefully, usually most times Madara was pushing and shoving and fighting them off...he didn't mean for muscle memory or instinct to be the possible reason Saruyama got shuttled off and into her brother and had her brother looking like that.

Madara opened his mouth, a weird noise escaped his lips that even he didn't know what it was. He sounded confused, concerned too, but it was meant to be the start of a sentence; it wasn't, the noise just quietened off and didn't go anywhere. It did have the siblings glancing his way weirdly though, Hashirama was looking him up and down confusedly and Saruyama just raised an eyebrow when that sound left him.

"This is where you apologise, Madara." Saruyama stated while crossing her arms, she shifted her weight from one foot to the other and looked up at him defiantly. Her two toned hair blew in the gentle breeze of the day and her eyes slowly narrowed when he just stood there silently.

With a huffed sigh, Madara turned his head away and crossed his arms too. "You're the idiots that jumped me. What did you think was going to happen?"

"A catch and a cuddle?" Saruyama said, sounding reasonably serious while behind her Hashirama clapped a hand over his mouth, purely because of the look which appeared on his friend's face. Hashirama felt somewhat bad, but not by much seems joking at Madara's expense was the least Saruyama deserved after that push.

It was like something had just struck Madara in the head, with the way he flinched hearing her words. His fingers gripped onto the blue material of his kimono top, how his fingernails didn't rip into the soft fabric was beyond them. But the slow turn of his head, the blank expression on his face and the fact he stood ramrod straight just had Hashirama eventually bursting out laughing. He couldn't help it! He could see as Madara registered her words that Saruyama's shoulders were shaking, she was trying so hard not to laugh too, once she heard her brother, she all but joined in.

Madara hung his head with a groan, they truly could be unbearable at times. Though flicking his eyes up and looking through his hair he just inhaled slowly, Hashirama put an arm around her shoulders and the pair were still chuckling away, none the wiser to Madara's inner conflict. So, on the offset it seemed like it was easy to just carry on, but something in him just felt like it was constantly churning.

Hashirama caught the distant look on Madara's face and tilted his head, "What is the matter?" Hashirama was rather well in tune with moods at the best of times, and usually he could sense when his friend's mood was likely to shift; but this happened so quickly he just bypassed it. Something was clearly wrong, Madara was more silent than usual and was looking at them with this weird expression, almost longingly, imprinting them to memory, Hashirama didn't like it, it unsettled him.

Saruyama blinked quickly, "I was just joking," she said softly while holding a hand up, Madara found himself frowning and looking at her surely, he wasn't entirely buying that seems she appeared more than comfortable to be close to him. Saruyama just pouted and lowered her hand and glanced up at her brother as he circled around her and moved towards Madara.