I look the same, you think.

Your reflection on your bedroom's body mirror tells you so.

Same hair, same eyes, same coloring. Once your childish characteristics mature, you've no doubt that you'll grow similar to yourself.

(Yourself, before you died.)

You barely look like this life's current parents. Undoubtedly Mikoto's and Fugaku's son, only because you're born with a twin that looks like them. How fortunate, as it wouldn't bode well for Mikoto to be accused of being unfaithful.

Unprompted, you wryly smile at your own predicament-- eyes crinkling but no teeth showing.

No matter your attempts, your smile never looks sincere; fake, and you think it's fitting for this world that shouldn't exist.

(It's all fucking hilarious, because you just had to be born in a doomed clan from Naruto.)

And you ask yourself,

What is the point of all this?

~*~*~

Mikoto tries to get close to you, to rekindle the bond you once had before your Awakening. You don't let her, and she doesn't force herself.

She tries the same with Itachi, but unfortunately, the boy is just naturally aloof and awkward, and you internally laugh at Mikoto's luck on birthing children with socializing problems.

Eventually, she gives up, and you wonder if this is the reason why Sasuke would be born-- for Mikoto's desire to be a mother.

Hah... This family is just cursed in more ways than one.

At least it's all temporary.

~*~*~

Your only interaction with Fugaku is through training, but you don't really mind. It's similar to business formality, and you know how to respond to it better than Mikoto's half-hearted attempts to form a relationship with you.

You don't underperform, but you don't overperform either. Being average is easier and a lot less stressful in the Uchiha clan.

Itachi is better, Fugaku tells you when he compared your performances.

Fugaku is... a very soft and tragic man, you will later learn. Unfamiliar with gentle gestures, but is still thoughtful and wanting the best for his sons, and shows it through callous ways that he identifies with his own brand of affection. No doubt, a side-effect of being born as heir; raised in a pressured environment of expectations that doesn't go away even when he's Head.

(Despite it all, he still loves, and that's what made his end so tragic.)

Itachi is better, Fugaku tells you because he wants you to take it as a challenge to improve. Competition is a good motivator within such a prideful clan, and the clan is what he knows best.

(Even at his death's door, instead of telling Itachi "I love you", Fugaku tells him "I am still proud of you".)

He doesn't know when to be Head or Father, so he defaults to the former.

(Being emotionally absent is easier; you would know.)

Nevertheless, you unsettle him with a smile he's starting to see more often lately.

You don't care what he thinks, and you think he understands.

~*~*~

"I... I like sweets... do you?" Itachi attempts to converse with you for the nth time. It happens every after your daily training sessions.

As usual, you shrug and don't answer, and he ends up disappointed.

It's a long time before he tries again.

~*~*~

You are four when Fugaku takes you and your younger brother to a battlefield.

The bloodshed surprisingly doesn't faze you, but you think that's because you're intimately familiar with death and it's bigger than this pointless violence.

Obviously, Itachi thinks differently.

(Poor, pitiful, foolish younger brother.)

You think you remember this part; when Itachi tries to show mercy to a fallen Iwa nin, only for the snake to bite the hand it drank from. Itachi outwardly didn't show any trouble in executing the Iwa nin, but you know this will haunt him for the rest of his life.

Eyes roaming around the inactive combat zone, you then palm a kunai from your weapon pouch and throw it with precision at a lying enemy's jugular, not too far from you. This startles both Fugaku and Itachi, and you find it amusing that you accomplished a feat not many people can do to the stoic father and son.

"Why did you do that?" Itachi asks, voice steady but underlying with accusation. "He was already dead,"

You smile (crinkling eyes, no teeth), and your brother is understandably confused and wary.

"No, he wasn't." You simply say, and whether they believe you or not, you don't particularly care. You granted that stranger quick mercy; that's all that matters.

Though, you're briefly curious of where all these dead soldiers will be reincarnated to.

~*~*~

Taking a midnight stroll around the Uchiha's forest grounds, you chuckle to yourself when you realize that you're going through the same existential crisis as your brother at this age.

What is the meaning of life?

What's your purpose here? Just by appearance, alone, you know that you don't belong-- not with your clan and not in this universe. So, why are you here, in a world that's supposed to be fictional?

Maybe this is all just a dream.

Death is eternal sleep, and sleep comes with dreams. You think it's a sound logic.

(Because it's a whole lot easier when you think they're not real, especially with your knowledge of their fates.)

So what do you plan to do in this life?

Hoot!

With a silent glide, an owl rested itself on your shoulder uninvited, but you don't shrug it away.

Hoot! Hoot! Hoot!

Looking around the surrounding trees, you find six more owls perched on branches-- a parliament of owls. They all look at you with seemingly glowing yellow eyes, and you just somehow know what they silently ask of you.

Eyeing the horned owl on your shoulder, you pet its feathered breast as your wordless acceptance of their offer.

Owl summons, you amusingly thought to yourself. Of all animals that could've offered themselves to you, it just had to be the natural enemy of crows.

That doesn't bode well for your younger brother.

~*~*~

At five years old, you and Itachi were taught the hand-signs for the Grand Fireball Jutsu by Fugaku.

Predictably, Itachi got it on his first try.

You don't.

"Is it possible that my natural affinity is not Fire?" You ask, and Fugaku considers your theory.

He presents you with a sheet of Chakra Paper, and even you were surprised when it tears itself in half.

"Wind affinity is rare in the Land of Fire," Fugaku tells you. "Weak against Fire, but strong against Lightning."

Oh, you realize with an understanding smile.

If that wasn't enough of a hint of what you should do, you don't know what is.

(You still don't successfully perform the Grand Fireball Jutsu for Fugaku.)

~*~*~

"I don't like fighting," your younger brother confides to you one day, as you stay lying down after your most recent spar; your loss, as usual.

Itachi didn't even break a sweat. You don't mind, as you didn't either.

"So you're a pacifist," you say out loud, and Itachi perks up at your verbal response.

"Yes," he eyes your reaction carefully, because at long last, you finally reply, and Itachi is curious of his elusive brother.

Hah, adorable.

"Then you'll end up as a foolish hypocrite," you tell him, and he frowns.

"I know." Itachi-- still young, no longer innocent, but still naive-- accepts this.

~*~*~

It is summer when you meet a curious Uchiha Shisui, and he offers to train you like he does with Itachi. Sitting by the Uchiha lake's pier, you tune him out as he tells you of your younger brother's progress to further entice you in accepting his invitation.

"No, thank you. I like training on my own." You dismiss him politely at first.

When he insists, you give him your infamous smile, before flipping him off to shoo him away.

Unfortunately, he doesn't react like you expect him to, because he only laughs. He gets your message, but he doesn't easily relent.

You don't easily relent either.

However, he is very persistent and stubborn and pushy, you later learn.

You also later learn that giving him the chance to befriend you was simultaneously the worst and best decision you've ever made in both lives.

~*~*~

OMAKE: Silver Legacy

Hatake Kakashi stared at the Obito's grave, the familiar feelings of self-loathing and regret draping themselves over his shoulders like old friends. Rin was with him earlier when they visited together, but as of his developing habit, he opted to stay behind and continued to silently lament, until a young, high-pitched voice interrupted him from his grieving trance.

"What is the meaning of life?" Kakashi heard the voice ask, and he turned to see a boy-- no older than four-- standing next to him, eyeing Obito's grave with an emotion he couldn't identify.

For whatever reason, Kakashi was surprised to see the Uchiha emblem on the back of the child's shirt.

"Why are you asking me?" Kakashi asked back, his tone carefully neutral, and the Uchiha only shrugged his shoulders uncaringly.

"Because you're Yondaime-sama's student," the unnamed boy said. "Hatake Kakashi, right?"

"Hn," was Kakashi's sophisticated response, and the boy's lips quirked up as if amused with a joke Kakashi was unaware about. "And you are?"

"Call me Kama," the boy--Kama-- said, smiling with crinkling eyes, showing no teeth, and for some reason, that unnerved Kakashi.

"Okay..." The jounin lamely replied.

"So, what is the meaning of life?" Kama persisted, and Kakashi wants to tell him that it's rude to discuss about such a thing on the property of the dead just so he would leave him alone.

Oh, something clicked in Kakashi's memories. He remembered the name Uchiha Kama-- the rude and 'creepy' heir Obito once ranted about. Kakashi vaguely recalled Obito bad-mouthing a three-year-old for disliking the color orange on his face or something like that.

Kama was still waiting for his answer.

"The meaning of life," Kakashi started, licking his dry lips underneath his mask, "is..."

He trailed off and took a moment to think.

(Of Sakumo and Obito.)

"To protect the people you value while they're still around," he finally answered, and was surprised of his own surety of his response. "That's... That's my meaning in life."

"I see... I think I know what to do now," Kama thought aloud, and it sounded ominous to Kakashi's ears. "Thank you, Kakashi-senpai."

At last, the Uchiha turned to leave, but not before giving off parting words that would haunt Kakashi in the near future.

"If I were you, I'd take your own advice."

Kakashi didn't know what he meant by that-- on whether that was a cruel jibe or a genuine suggestion. Nevertheless, he tried to steer clear of the older Uchiha twin after that, but fate had always been an uncooperative asshole.