The thing about waking up was that he knew he had died, felt it in his bones and the way they held his flesh like clothes that didn’t fit quite right. His body no longer felt like his own but that was fine. Anything was fine to see the way Hashirama's tears coursed down his cheeks with a joy that looked like it broke his heart, Touka kneeling by his feet with her hands fisted on the tops of her thighs where she sat in seiza and bowed her head, praying as he knew very well she had never prayed before. The thing about waking up was that it was a blessing to all around him.
It was a curse to feel it inside him.
Every minute, every hour, Tobirama moved as though everything were fine and did his best to ignore the darkness that came back with him from wherever he had gone. Shadows danced under his footsteps and curled in the spaces at the edges of his vision. Hashirama led him home and Tobirama went knowing that he carried with him something that should never have belonged.
That he himself no longer belonged.
