I had never thought about how ominous the building where his lab lay was.

Large and dark, with several windows that were always gaping and unlit, it stood threatening above me like a hungry animal trying to decide whether I was tasty enough to devour or not.

It was funny how I hadn't been affected by the building knowing it housed a freezer with a dead body, or an AI capable of mass destruction (because at this point, there was no doubt in my mind Tobirama was capable of mass destruction and it wasn't Hashirama's codes that protected the world from it but Tobirama's own good, unbeating heart). But knowing it contained a man that had broken my heart not once but twice made the building seem incredibly eerie.

I blipped my card; it worked. It suddenly struck me that Hashirama seemed to be the only person who used this building as his lab. I'd never seen anyone else in the lunch room or in the corridors. I'd honestly never seen Hashirama interact with anyone.

Did people shun him?

I opened the door to his lab, expecting to see him stand there working, but to my surprise, it wasn't Hashirama who stood there.

It was Tobirama.

He had baggy, light blue jeans and a black long-sleeved top. He had bags under his eyes which I didn't even know was a thing when you didn't have a proper circulation. When I came in, he gaped, as if unable to believe I was there.

I suddenly became very aware of how rude I had been last time I saw him.

The sensation of relief when I saw him took me completely by surprise. All fear of the building, all heartache caused by Hashi, all nerves of seeing him again were washed away as I saw the incredibly kind machine in front of me.

I dropped my backpack, ran to him, threw myself into his arms, and burst into tears.

"I'm sorry!" I wailed. "I'm so sorry!"

But Tobirama didn't catch on. He didn't comfort me, or said say it was okay, or that it was not okay. Instead, he grabbed my face, bent down so he was face-to-face with me and shook me.

In his face was pure panic.

"Why did you come?! Why, Izuna, why?! You're so stupid!! You're so stupid, Izuna!! You should have stayed out!!"

I frowned, my tears drying in pure confusion. In his face was raw worry. 

And all of that love.

"What..."

He put his lips to mine then, kissed me forcefully as if his life depended on it.

As if it was our last kiss.

He pulled away from me, went back to staring at me as if wanting to imprint me into his mind forever.

"Hello, Izuna."

I turned round. Tobirama didn't; he closed his eyes, bent his head down a little as if he was tired of this, tired of the world, tired of him.

He stood in the door, clad in simple trousers and a shirt, his long, chestnut hair in a low bun, arms crossed, a smirk on his face.

And I didn't feel anything.

"What do you want?" I asked.

"Izuna..." Tobirama said.

"Isn't it marvellous?" Hashirama asked, leaving no doubt he was talking about his AI. I felt disgusted by this, by the fact that he saw Tobirama as a thing he had created, belonging to Hashi and not to himself.

Hashi walked to us, started encircling us. I suddenly started to feel something in the pit of my stomach. Fear. I had never been afraid of Hashirama before.

"Leave him", Tobirama said.

"Oh, you know it's fruitless", Hashirama said.

"What is fruitless?" I whispered.

But Hashirama ignored me, kept talking to Tobirama over my head.

"You've seen the code. You know it would be fruitless."

"What code?" I asked, my voice hardly existing.

"Izuna..." Tobirama began.

"No..." I whispered.

"I'm disappointed", Hashirama said. "No cancer cure. Nothing useful from you." Hashirama stopped behind Tobirama, who had stood up to his full length but had his arms around me now, pressing the side of my head lightly to his chest.

He was making his heart beat.

Hashirama kept talking.

"My brother was okay. But not too bright. I need more brain capacity. A brain with more neuronal connections than my brother had. The synergistic effect of that will be indescribable." Hashirama walked to the computer where Tobirama was stored. "I guess you know already." He was speaking to me now. "I knew he would tell you and that you wouldn't believe him. I've coded so that he will kill you. And he won't be able to code over it. I will make it look like he went... Wrong."

"The ethics board won't let you keep him inside my body", I said darkly, but my voice wobbled.

"Oh, I will show them the program is completely out of its own control but only in my hands. And it will be true. I will use the same code to start controlling him, make him do exactly as I want, and nothing out of his own will. I've already started. For example, I'm already forcing him to store everything he sees and hears. He coded over that before. Not anymore."

Hashirama typed something on his keyboard; he was activating the code.

"Sorry, Izuna", he said. "You were a true slut in bed." I could hear Tobirama's teeth crack in that way they did when he was upset. Hashirama heard, and turned to his creation. "Wasn't he? You saw. You saw how fuckable he was both times."

Tobirama pressed his lips to my head. Both of us knew me running was fruitless, that I stood no chance, so instead he held me close.

"I'm sorry I didn't do better", he murmured.

I felt he wanted to say he loved me, but that he didn't think Hashirama deserved hearing it. How sad Tobirama must be, being forced to make me leave this world while being unable to say what he truly wanted.

Hashirama looked at us one last time.

Then, he pressed enter, enabling the code that would make Tobirama kill me.








One second passed.

Two.

Five.

Ten,

Thirty.

Nothing happened.

Tobirama hugged me close, burying his face in my hair.

Still, nothing happened.

"Umm, Tobirama, my love. I can't breathe."

Tobirama pulled away and looked at me, hands on my shoulders, a confused look on his face.

I heard Hashirama starting to type again.

"I don't understand..." he said.

"I do", I said.

I was speaking to Hashirama, but my eyes never left the man in front of me. Hashirama wasn't worth my attention.

"You whore... What have you done?!" Hashirama's tone was angry, but I wasn't scared of him anymore.

"First of all, I'm not a whore. I fuck for free. Although not you, anymore." I heard Hashirama lose his breath. "Second. You might not be clever enough to figure out a code overriding your program. Even Tobirama might not succeed." Finally, I turned to Hashirama. "But you underestimate me."

Hashirama frowned.

"What?" he asked stupidly.

"Tobirama sent me the code by email. What the fuck do you think I did when you ignored me, sat in my couch eating Ben & Jerry's? Well, I did. But what do you think I did while I was eating Ben & Jerry's? I figured out how to break your Goddamn code." I looked back at Tobirama, and I suddenly saw that it started to go up to him.

"You succeeded", Tobirama whispered.

"Yep!" I said happily. "His code is useless. But!" I turned to Hashirama. "I thought the code making Tobirama record everything he saw and heard into his chip was useful. So I kept that. It's transferring it to my laptop as we go. Everything you said in this room..." I turned to Tobirama to speak to him instead. "I'm tired of professor Senju's bullshit. What do you say, should we take the recordings to the ethics board?"

Tobirama sunk to his knees and cried when he realised he wouldn't be forced to kill me.