Chapter Text
“It’s a pity he’s being retired, sure, but I doubt he’d ever see a battlefield again with wounds like those. Honestly, what did the elders expect from him?”
Obito tries very hard not to shatter the glass in the palm of his prosthetic. It’s a near thing. Learning control over his new limbs is slow and time-consuming, and he’s struggled every step of the way.
Across the table, Rin stares over his shoulder at the group behind his back. “Your cousins,” she mouths. He knows. For all that the Uchiha are outsiders in Konoha, they’ll still wilfully feed each other to the sharks.
He sucks his sugary drink through his straw and tries to put it out of mind. His clansmen have been barking like this ever since the first days of the treaty, and already, he tires of it. They once lauded him as a warrior, celebrating his victories on the battlefront with drink and music. But now that the Uchiha have settled in Konoha, he’s not a warrior, but an omega.
They can piss off, for all he cares. It’s the clan that has changed, not him.
“They’re leaving,” Rin says after they’ve halfway drained their glasses.
“Good riddance. I hope they fall into the stream.”
“Want me to push them? ‘Cause I’ll do it. I’ll push them so hard for you.”
Obito laughs, and his bitterness flies away. Rin is the best company to keep when his mood is sour. People assume they’ve known one another for a lifetime and more, but it’s only been four months. “Nah. They’re not worth it.”
Five months ago, the Uchiha surrendered the war. A decades old conflict ended with a peace treaty and a promise to work together. One month later, they were absorbed into Konoha and became residents, fitting themselves amongst Konoha’s more prominent clans.
While the Uchiha adjusted to their new home, Obito watched the world through a hospital window. He was a casualty of the war’s final conflict, losing the limbs of his right side and riddled with burns and scars from the enemy’s lightning. He would never walk again on his own power, would never write with his dominant hand, and had nothing to show for it. Maybe it was bitterness that took him then, making food taste like ash on his tongue.
Rin was called in as his medic when he proved too troublesome for her coworkers, refusing to cooperate when they ran tests or brought his meals in. She sat on the side of the bed, her medical ninjutsu warm against his skin as she surveyed the healing tissue of his residual limbs, and for just one moment, Obito was reminded of his father. Dad acted as the clan’s healer when Obito was a pup, putting them back together as they warred with the Senju, and in later years, the newly-formed Konoha. His ninjutsu felt so much like hers.
It took Rin two days of trial and error to suss out that he has a sweet tooth, which even Obito, himself, hadn’t known. Sweets were a rarity among the clan, but Konoha had many things, great and strange, and when she brought him daifuku, he broke. Rin grinned, something evil in her eye. From there, she taught him the concept of dessert—that if he wanted the sweets she would bring him, he had to eat his meals first. If he cooperated with the nurses and medics, he would be rewarded. It was a small gesture, and the village was strange; the customs he was used to were foreign there, and he no longer knew what was needed of him. Rin made it easier. The Nohara clan met the same fate years before, so she empathised with what it felt like to be ripped away from his way of life.
Rin finishes her drink and sets the glass aside. They’re at a cafe in the civilian zone, resting in the shade of a parasol on the patio. It’s for Obito’s sake, so that he can people-watch. He’s only been out of the hospital for not yet five weeks, and the village is still strange to him. Where his clansmen have adjusted, he’s still finding his footing. The Uchiha settlement was small, war-torn. They had to relocate time and again after the devastation encroached on their homes, and the structures they lived in were simple and flimsy because of that. Konoha is a separate beast. It’s big and loud, crawling with people from a great many clans, all of which joined the settlement long before the Uchiha did. Seeing it from the inside, it feels like all his life, he’s fought a losing battle. In the end, his body is ruined, his people were decimated, and the enemy is still living here behind its big, gated walls as though never under threat.
One look at his prosthetic, and the fight leaves him. “They’re right, though. I’m not gonna recover from this.”
The arm he wears and the leg beneath the table are clunky and unfinished. These prosthetics are trial designs. To assist the veterans from their long-standing war, Konoha has been developing artificial limbs, and it’s true that they’re a great help. With them, he can stand on his own and hold things in his hand. But Obito worries he’ll never be the way he was, and that even if he could be, his clan wouldn’t let him. He’s an omega, and these are not war times.
After he stabilized, a stranger visited Obito in the hospital, one perfumed by the thick scent of a dominant alpha. He sat in the visitor’s chair with his fingers interlocked, an easy smile on his face and a sharp eye as he observed Obito’s ruined body. A warrior was always a canvas of battle, but Obito was an omega now, not a soldier. That title was stolen from him the moment the elders signed the treaty.
The Hatake patriarch heard word of an unsightly omega from the newly-absorbed Uchiha clan and got curious. It was he who funded the development of Obito’s prosthetics. The council’s charity was meant only to cover basic mobility aids, but thanks to him, Obito would walk again. There was, however, a condition.
“A strong warrior will birth strong pups,” Sakumo Hatake said, and the threads of a smile tugged at his face. Obito’s grandmother was delighted. She bowed to him, and thanked him with tears in her eyes.
Obito had never felt more violated.
Rin kicks him under the table. He yelps.
“Stop that.” She sighs, slouching in her seat, crossing her arms over her chest as she sinks deeper. “These things take time. You can’t expect to master your prosthetics after a month, especially when they’re still being worked on. That doesn’t mean you never will.”
She’s right. Even this week compared to last, he’s doing better. Things aren’t slipping from his grasp quite as often, and his grip is steadier. But progress is painfully slow, and to a man who once thought himself a skilled combatant, struggling with something as simple as holding a cup is defeating.
It’s more than that, though. Obito is not a warrior, and even if he could fight again, no one would let him. Now that their clan is at peace, at least on the surface, the elders no longer allow him the tonic that suppresses his heat. He’s taken that tonic ever since he presented at fourteen, and now that he’s without, it’s a matter of time before its absence triggers his first mating cycle.
What’s expected of an omega isn’t blood-lust, but submission. That, he doesn’t know how to give. Perhaps he can learn.
They pity him. Because he’s ruined, and no one would ever want him. Obito is not the delicate flower omegas are taught to be, and he would never find a mate. He’s accepted this reality, and even if he will always be the Uchiha’s failure, he’d be fine with that.
He would be, had he not been promised to some pompous clan heir.
Nobody would have such an unsightly omega, and yet somehow, Obito finds himself the bride of the Hatake patriarch’s only son. After infrequent visits to Obito’s hospital bed, Sakumo proposed a union between Obito and the next head of the clan, who has refused every bride offered to him in the past. The elders celebrated. The treaty calls for equality between the clans, but it’s clear as day that the Uchiha have little standing in Konoha. They’re secondary citizens looked down upon by the bulk of the village, and though opinions may change over time, they have no power. But if one of their omegas gives another clan an heir, it might be the footing they need to carve out a space for themselves.
When he says nothing, Rin asks, “Do you know who it is yet?” She knows that he’s marrying into the Hatake clan, but none of the details. Obito didn’t know, either, until a fortnight ago.
Outside the cafe, academy kids are walking home from class. One of his younger cousins is there, dragging her feet behind a pair of Konohan pups. It’s bizarre. The Uchiha didn’t have an education system styled in the image of Konoha’s; pups were mentored by their elders in all aspects of life, from hunting to cultivating to war. Obito hasn’t been to school or walked home with his peers. Before the treaty, all his homes were temporary.
“Kakashi,” he says, pulling his eyes back to Rin. “He’s next in line for the clan head, I guess. I dunno. Never met the guy, personally.”
She clears her throat.
“What? Do you know him, or something?”
“He was in my class for a bit when I was a kid, but graduated ahead of everyone else.” This doesn’t explain her red face. “He’s intimidating, I guess? Unapproachable.”
Dominant alphas usually are. They’re difficult to work with and think they can lord over everyone. Obito saw a lot of it during the war. Factions would fracture beneath the big-headed alphas who thought they were better than their generals, and people died. Apart from that, he’s never spent any real time around alphas. The clan put his identity as a warrior above the biology of his sex because of the war, so he had a lot of freedom growing up. But it was a universal rule that an unmated omega should not mingle with alphas outside their duties. Living with one—two, maybe, since his fiancé’s father might share their abode—is a daunting, miserable thought.
“Great,” he mutters, propping up his chin on his hand. “Sounds like a real winner. Can’t wait to meet him.”
A weak smile tugs at the corner of Rin’s lips. “He's not all bad. I had a big crush on him when I was a pup, you know.”
“Even worse. Your taste is terrible.”
Rin shoves him. He barely manages to catch himself with his prosthetic. They glare at each other for all of ten seconds before peals of laughter fill the patio.
Regardless of where he ends up, he hopes they can continue laughing together like this.
The night before his clan gives him away, Obito sits on a floor cushion in his grandmother’s newly-constructed abode as she runs her fingers through his hair. Construction on the Uchiha district is well underway, and because the homes are small, most of their people now have roofs over their heads. It’ll be some time before they have a market of their own, though, and shared spaces that the rest of Konoha benefits from.
Granny Kaede unties the braid of his hair and de-tangles it with the teeth of the ornate comb Mom gifted her years ago. He closes his eyes, thinking of the park he passed with Rin and all the people enjoying it. It’s rare to see his clansmen partaking in the benefits of the village beyond its restaurants and cafes, like there’s an unwritten rule that they stay in their lane. If it’s going to be this way, he wonders why they ever stopped fighting. This isn’t an alliance; it’s defeat. The Uchiha are mere numbers to add to Konoha’s army and bodies to warm their beds.
He sighs.
Granny lectures him to be still.
There are conflicting traditions between the Hatake and the Uchiha. An omega’s hair is cut when their family gives them away, symbolic of their new beginning as a member of a new household. This happens on their wedding day. But Hatake tradition states that a pair is to be mated before they are married. The Hatake view marriage as transactional and dishonest if done without the presence of a bond, because nothing meaningful is tying them together. Obito will not wed the alpha until the alpha decides to take him. As a compromise, Granny has decided to cut his hair before he goes to live on the Hatake grounds.
The first strands fall to the floor, and outside, rain begins to fall. Granny keeps the sitting room door open just like she did at their old family home, back when they still had a place that was theirs. He hasn’t cut his hair since he presented, and he’s twenty-three now. Already, his head feels lighter.
“Poor pup,” Granny coos, brushing loose strands off his shoulders. “You’ve fought so hard for so long. I wish it didn’t have to be this way.”
To keep from fidgeting, Obito plays with the hem of his sleeve. “You’re the one who decided to give me away,” he mutters. Maybe he’s being petulant. But if any of the elders had his back, he thought it would be her, and she proved him wrong.
His grandmother lets out a heavy breath, shaking her head. She’s speaking in the old tongue, as she so often does when they’re alone, and though it’s his mother tongue, as well, he hasn’t had use for it lately. Their language isn’t common, and young pups have been adopting the language most prominent in northern Fire Country. “I know you’re hurting, pup. This change is painful for us all.”
Obito watches the rain as more of his hair falls. Outside, two men race home with their haori tented over their heads. They hurry beneath an awning, and he can hear their curses from across the dirt road. Though he’s bitter, he knows that the rest of the clan is still adjusting, too. Life will find a new normal one day, and in the future, they might even feel welcome here. But change doesn’t come overnight, and it’s so hard to make a home while surrounded by the people they fought and killed. There are too many grudges between their clans.
“The way you were brought up was cruel,” Granny says. “No boy that age should be sent off to war. Your parents never wanted that for you.”
They didn’t. Dad pushed for him to be exempt from their clan’s military, going so far as to use his presentation as an excuse. Mom insisted he should be a craftsman. For a while, she talked about leaving the Uchiha for somewhere down south to start fresh in a place free of this conflict. But their community was close, and she couldn’t bring herself to do it.
“It’s not ideal, but the Hatake are an old clan with roots in this village, and Lord Sakumo is a good man. He’ll take care of you.”
That says nothing of Obito’s husband-to-be, though, does it?
“I’m glad you won’t be fighting anymore,” Granny admits. “Every time you left, I wondered if I would have to send you off like I did your parents.”
Obito picks absently at his nail, his body a lead weight. In the Uchiha clan, the greatest sin one can commit is dying before their guardian. “It was an honour,” he mutters. “I wanted to fight. It meant that I could do something.”
Granny sighs, settling in front of him to cut his bangs. “I know how you think. You’re as easy to read as your father,” she says. “Retirement doesn’t make you useless, pup. You’re still a proud member of our clan, no matter where you are.”
Obito knows that, even retired, he has a use, but that’s what worries him. He doesn’t know how to be a bride, a wife, or a mother. He’s not soft and delicate like flower petals, and has never once served an alpha. The thought of carrying pups is alien to him, because for so long, that world was far away.
Tangles of black hair form a circle around him. When he looks at it, he feels like he’s lost something.
Warriors don’t cut their hair. Brides do.
Obito runs his flesh hand over his short crop of hair, scowling at the front gates of the Hatake district. Granny’s hand slipped when she shaped it last night, and what was supposed to be a cut long enough for him to still tie it back is now prickly and short. His strands spring up in every direction, no longer bound to the laws of gravity, and he finds himself touching them without meaning to. It’s strange and different, but lately, everything is.
The Hatake have land at the edge of the village opposite the Uchiha district. It’s sprawling and vast, but largely empty, filled with farmland tended to by the clan. This section of Fire Country has always belonged to the Hatake, who have been here longer than anyone else, and they’ve continued to keep a large portion of it for their own use even as their numbers dwindle and their bloodline thins. Many branch families still exist, but the main family consisting of Sakumo and his heir is dying. Usually, in this case, the heads of the clan would take concubines, or even casual bed-mates, and would go to whatever means to sire pups and keep the line going. But the Hatake have different traditions, apparently, and their alphas are a lot more loyal to their partners. Obito doesn’t know if he should be grateful or upset.
When he steps beyond the gate, he draws the eyes of all the pale-haired men and women working the fields. This section of the village is rural, and it doesn’t look like the Konoha he’s familiar with. He isn’t sure where to go, and there are too many scents around to follow Sakumo’s. It would have been nice if he was given a guide, at least. Or a map.
Eventually, one of the middle-aged farmhands takes pity on him. “Uchiha,” he calls, “you lost? Need help?”
Obito bristles. Though the Hatake dominate Konoha’s agriculture, they’re also traditionally a warrior clan, like the Uchiha. He’s fought many people with this colouring before. “I’m looking for the clan head’s estate,” he hollers back, his feet refusing to close the distance between them.
The farmhand nods, scratching the stubble on his chin. He’s covered in sweat and must have been out here since before sun-up tending to the fields. It looks like his kids are helping, several small bodies with white and grey hair carrying things from the shed to the field. Even if the clan as a whole is small, the Hatake keep big families.
“Straight down this road and left,” the man says. “Big building surrounded by trees. Can’t miss it.”
Obito bows low at the waist and holds himself there long enough to shout a word of thanks. When he rises, he sees even more clansmen watching him and hurries down the road. Gossip follows; they know why he’s here.
The estate is big and old, tucked behind overgrown trees and a large front garden. While waiting at the front door, Obito thinks back to the war and the many times he clashed with the clan. He saw the patriarch on the battlefield, but never crossed blades with him directly. If Sakumo remembers, he’s never said. Konoha’s White Fang spelled disaster. He was a thing of nightmares, like a yōkai in human form.
A pale-haired man opens the door, middle-aged with crows feet at the corners of his eyes, looking so much softer than the stories make him out to be. Sakumo, his benefactor, is a strange man. “Obito,” he greets as he steps aside, “welcome, come in. It’s good to see you.”
Obito keeps his mouth shut. He doesn’t know how to take that greeting, and fears what it means for an alpha to eagerly bring an omega into their abode. Inside, the house smells of old wood. It’s immaculate, the floors polished to a shine and not a speck of dust in sight, lacking the stink of an alpha den. Rin warned him that the estate might be hard on the nose, but he doesn’t notice anything beyond the smell of old pine and cedar.
“Are you hungry?” Sakumo asks, guiding him through the main sitting room and straight out onto the engawa lining the courtyard. “I can make something while you unpack, how does that sound?”
Uncomfortable, he doesn’t say. Alphas only cook for omegas when their omega is lacking, but it’s true that Obito doesn’t know many recipes. Instead, he asks, “Where will I stay?”
Sakumo continues down the engawa to one of the smaller connected buildings at the edge of the courtyard. “It’s too much to expect you to lay with my son as soon as you meet, so I prepared the guest house for you. I hope that’s okay.”
Obito stills, falling behind as the Hatake continues to lead. “Yeah?”
Sakumo looks back at him. “Well, of course. I would hate for you to be uncomfortable.”
Oh. He didn’t know that. He just assumed…
In this scenario, Obito is the asshole, isn’t he? He assumed that because they were alphas wanting him for their clan, they would disregard his comfort. Does this make him just as bad? The Hatake want an omega to carry on their line, sure, and Obito will be expected to do so. But does that mean they’re bad people?
“Thank you,” he says, and means it. He bows his head to push his gratitude, holding tight to the luggage slung over his shoulder. “That means a lot to me, Lord Sakumo.”
When he looks up, the old man is smiling. “Just Sakumo is fine, pup. No need for formality here.”
Obito rubs the back of his neck and looks anywhere but at the alpha. “Sakumo, then.”
Before Obito can be shown inside his new residence, movement catches the corner of his eye. A pale man walks across the courtyard with training gear in his hands, hauling a practice dummy over his shoulder as though it weighs no more than a feather. Sakumo is rambling off words, but Obito doesn’t hear them.
He knows this one.
“Ah, there he is. Kakashi!” Sakumo calls. Grey eyes find him, then settle on Obito and linger there. “Your mate has arrived. Come introduce yourself.”
It’s the scar over his eye that makes Obito’s blood turn to ice, because it was Obito who carved it through the soft flesh of his cheek.
It’s hard to think back to that day. Even when he does, his memory is hazy, filled with blood and pain and I’m dying, he killed me, I’m going to die. But that scar is something he remembers, the way it bisected the eye beneath it, the way it bled. It was deep, too, and it’s likely that the eye is blind. Even now, it hasn’t healed well despite Konoha’s advanced medical ninjutsu.
His body trembles, the arm and leg he no longer has aching like ghosts on his right side.
The young man bows his head slightly, then continues into the shed to store the equipment as though he doesn’t recognize or care who it is that stands before him. Old scars ache, the fractal spider-webbing across his chest and side itching. His limbs were not removed by this man, but by the healer who found him after the horn brought an end to their war, too ruined to be saved.
Sakumo sighs, scratching his head. “I apologize. He’s always been a little introverted, but he’s a good kid once you get used to him.”
Obito can still taste the lightning on his tongue, the way it felt as it cut through him like a blade. But they’re supposed to be mates?
I can’t do this, he thinks and doesn’t say. It’s not his choice to make.