Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto or any characters in said series.
A/N: Because I misread a sentence involving Fugaku and his sons. Got me thinking about all the 'brother' pairs in the Uchiha clan, both figuratively speaking and literally.
Regardless
-'-
Uchiha Fugaku is seven years old. He has two brothers.
Teyaki is his elder by almost six years, gruff and no-nonsense and rather intimidating to a small boy always hopeful for his brother's attention. Attention which isn't earned easily; which is in fact often only gained by Fugaku attempting some stunt that lands him in the hospital.
Mekka, on the other hand, is younger than Fugaku by four years. This gives Fugaku the chance to be big brother, a task which he finds somewhat enjoyable. At first he tries to act stern and stiff to the small boy, because this is what Teyaki does and therefore it must be the proper way to act, but after a time he finds the whole charade exhausting.
In truth he finds his little brother interesting at the worst of times, and impossible not to love at the best.
-'-
Uchiha Fugaku is fourteen years old. He has just graduated the Academy.
It's official now; he is an honorary Genin of Konoha. But his graduation isn't a source of pride, for him or his father; because he finished his schooling a year late. All of his classmates became Genin at the expected age of thirteen, but Fugaku failed his Ninjutsu exam by one point.
Now he can wear his hitayate and pray his father forgives him for the embarrassment someday. On top of that, Teyaki won't leave him alone; he keeps teasing him about his late graduation. It makes Fugaku so angry he sometimes sees red, but Teyaki is his elder brother and so he does what is expected and takes it.
Ten-year-old Mekka is another story entirely. Apparently the boy's lacking a bit in the common sense area, because he doesn't seem to notice that his nii-san earned his forehead protector a year after all of his friends. He just follows Fugaku around as always, like a persistent puppy, and admires the shining hitayate with slack-jawed awe.
Despite his halfhearted attempts at shooing the younger by away, Fugaku can't pretend to himself that it doesn't feel good to have somebody admire him.
-'-
Uchiha Fugaku is fifteen years old. He has just lost his mother.
She was a member of the Anbu Black Ops, a tough and loyal ninja even after birthing three children. Somehow she found time to be a mother to them when it mattered, and now she is gone, killed in a battle with a rogue Cloud ninja.
Her partners tell her boys that she died bravely, like a true shinobi, knowing that this is little comfort to the three stone-faced young males who are staring dazedly at their mother's casket.
After this, their father takes more missions than ever before, and Teyaki begins to follow suit. Fugaku is an official ninja as well, but nobody says anything to him about staying home and taking care of the youngest member of the family, who hasn't even started at the Academy yet. Fugaku wonders if his brother and father expect him to leave Mekka to fend for himself. Or if they even care at all.
He can't leave his little brother alone all the time. The kid would fall apart. With their mother gone he has started clinging to Fugaku even more. He needs him.
But then what of his career? His duty, his birthright?
In the end he curses his conscience and stays home with his brother as much as necessary, which is pretty much all the time. At first his teammates and sensei are sympathetic to his plight, but sympathy won't fill in the gap left by Fugaku, and a two-man team just won't function properly. Eventually they find another Genin to fill his place, and Fugaku tries to swallow his burning resentment as his friends serve Konoha while he plays housewife.
-'-
Uchiha Fugaku is sixteen years old. His younger brother has just started training to be a ninja himself.
Hallelujah.
-'-
Uchiha Fugaku is seventeen years old. He has just started dating.
When Mekka headed off to the Academy it left Fugaku with a suddenly large amount of time on his hands. He decided to devote it to strengthening his ninja skills, through both books and physical training, so that maybe he can become a real shinobi again one day.
And this is how he meets her. Mikoto. She's a relative of his, but only a distant cousin, so he doesn't feel guilty when he kisses her.
Guilty or not, however, he still blushes red as blood when Mekka catches them at it and starts to grin.
-'-
Uchiha Fugaku is eighteen years old. His little brother has just graduated the Academy.
He attends the ceremony since neither their father nor their eldest brother can, and finds it interesting that Mekka ends up graduating a year late, just as he himself did. He mentions this to the fourteen-year-old, who glances up from admiring the sheen of his forehead protector with a blank look.
"Late?" he inquires obliviously. "What do you mean? I graduated at the same you did, nii-san."
Fugaku stares, dumbfounded, at his little brother. He wonders if he should be flattered that Mekka wants to follow in his footsteps so badly or grim because this kind of idiocy will get the boy nowhere in the world.
-'-
Uchiha Fugaku is twenty years old. He's about to take the test to become a Jonin.
Mekka, now sixteen, is preparing for a B-ranked mission his cell has been deployed on. He passed the Chunin exams a few years back, and is therefore qualified to handle these types of assignments Still, he is often nervous before one, constantly looking for encouragement from his elder brother.
Today is no exception. "Nii-san, we're guarding some foreign official on his way home today."
A grunt from Fugaku, who is stressing out over his test later and does not want to be pestered.
Oblivious to his brother's dark mood, Mekka persists. "He says there are rebels from his own faction trying to assassinate him. Says they're probably Jonin-level, so we should be on high alert. It's making me nervous as anything." He gives a weak laugh, inviting the older brunet to join in, but receives no perceptible response.
Frowning now and unused to being ignored, Mekka speaks again. "Nii-san, are you even listening?"
Fugaku slams his hands on the table and stands so abruptly his chair is knocked backwards. The resulting bang adds to the sudden tension. "Will you shut up for once!" he hisses, teeth gritted anxiously.
Mekka scowls. "Jeez, older brother, I was just trying to talk to you."
"No, you weren't!" Fugaku snaps. "You were looking for kind words from me, as you always do. Did it ever occur to you that I might be worried about the test I take later that I can only take once in my lifetime? The test that will make or break my entire career?"
"All right, all right!" his brother exclaimed, sounding chagrined. "I'm sor-"
"You always run your mouth off! Think of someone besides yourself for once!" Fugaku rants.
"Wait one minute!" Mekka responds angrily. "Does getting nervous before a difficult mission and hoping my older brother will comfort me make me selfish?!"
"Don't try to make me pity you," the older male snarls. "It won't work this time."
"Pity me?" Aghast. "What do you mean by-"
"You've always clung to me!" Fugaku isn't even hearing himself anymore. He takes every negative emotion he's ever even half-felt towards his brother and flings it at him with vicious force. "I've taken care of you! I gave up years that I could have been fighting to practically raise you, dammit! And you've never thanked me; you just keep taking and taking without a single thought for anyone else! Sometimes I wish you-"
He freezes mid-sentence, but the damage is done. The words 'Didn't exist' hang in the air, invisible but still painful. Silently appalled, Fugaku wonders just how big a rift he has driven between them with those untrue words. But such is his pride, and his anger, that he can't bring himself to apologize right away.
Someone knocks on the door; the younger boy's team, no doubt.
"Go," Fugaku mutters, still not looking at Mekka. "You're already late."
The boy leaves the room without a word. Fugaku follows and lingers in the hallway as his otouto opens the door and starts to leave. The boy pauses, and without turning around says softly, "I'm sorry, nii-san. About..about all of it."
There are tears choking up that normally upbeat voice and it shreds Fugaku from the inside out. But before he can say anything his younger brother is gone and the door is closed.
-'-
Four days later, Uchiha Fugaku is still twenty years old. He has one brother.
He begins making funeral preparations for his otouto, who died on a bodyguard mission whilst rescuing his team's foreign client.
And he gulps down the guilt that keeps trying to surface in the form of hot tears.
-'-
Uchiha Fugaku is twenty-five years old. He has a wife and now a nephew.
Teyaki married a year ago after retiring due to unfixable injuries, sustained on the same mission which killed their father. Now his wife, Uruchi, has just given birth to a son. Shisui, they say they'll call him.
Fugaku isn't really overly excited about being an uncle, but he does feel a strange and selfish sort of excitement at Shisui's birth all the same. Because it means that when he has a son of his own (somehow he doesn't doubt that it will be a son), then that son will have an 'elder brother' of sorts.
Even though he knows from experience just how difficult being an older brother can be, he still takes relief from the fact that someone will watch over his child.
-'-
Uchiha Fugaku is twenty-seven years old. He has a son.
Itachi is tiny, frail, and utterly helpless against the world. Fugaku is often away on missions, but he knows his little son still has a protector. Shisui, despite being only two years old, has already taken a shine to his baby cousin-the only person near his age in the compound-and Fugaku has faith that that bond will only grow in time.
-'-
Uchiha Fugaku is almost thirty-two years old. He has a wife who is pregnant again.
This, he knows, means that it's Itachi's turn to be the older brother. So Fugaku starts pushing his son harder to excel at his lessons, because he must learn to be strong and protect his little brother like Fugaku could not protect his.
-'-
Uchiha Fugaku is forty years old. He rarely has time for reflecting on things anymore, but this is one of those times when he does.
At some point along the way he realized his perfect little picture of a family was doomed to fail from the start. Any adult Uchiha could tell you the story of the great Uchiha Madara and his own younger brother Izuna, and how a sick sort of inheritance spawned from them.
Brothers (regardless of whether they are born to the same parents or not) are an unspoken tradition in the Uchiha clan. Uchiha brothers and blood go together like peanut butter and jelly; when two boys share such a close bond everyone around them inwardly flinches in anticipation of some sort of tragedy. The recent death of Shisui only proves this over again, and Fugaku now turns his watchful eye to his own sons.
The strange thing is, he looks upon his own family and sees many things wrong-but one thing that seems perfectly untouched by all of the clan madness is Itachi and Sasuke's relationship. They are close, very close, and appear to love each other dearly and deeply.
It gives Fugaku some hope. Leaning back, closing his eyes, he wonders if perhaps Itachi and Sasuke will be the brothers that break the chain.
-Owari-
A/N: And we all know how that turned out. –winces-
Despite the fact that it went everywhere in places, I'm rather proud of this one.