Disclaimer: Not mine, I just like to play with them for a little while.
A/N: A bit of back story that's been on my mind for years. One of my fics hinted at parts of it, but it was never explained.
My Brother's Dream
I have always wondered why my parents chose the name they did for me. It didn't suit the sickly, useless child I was. They probably picked it for the sound without knowing its meaning. I was fifteen by the time I learned the meaning myself and by then it had become almost prophetic.
No, my family can't have known. Most of the time my name didn't matter to them anyway. They just called me the Runt. It was my brother that was important and that's how people saw me, as his little brother.
Few of them actually knew that theoretically I am the older brother. I was born about an hour before him, or so our mother said. I'm not sure the information is reliable. Not that I want to call my mother a liar, of course, but a woman in labour has other things to worry about than watching the clock and it was a difficult birth. An estimate of time made under such conditions should never be trusted.
I was born first, though, a tiny, weakly child that held no promise, a disappointment to the family. If I'd been a kitten or puppy they'd probably have drowned me and called it a mercy killing. After me followed my brother, though and made up for all my shortcomings. I suppose I was the price they had to pay for having him.
It is normal in twins that one is stronger, healthier and bigger than the other from the start, but even experienced doctors who saw both of us were always surprised at the extent of the difference. It rather increased over time which might have been due to my more frequent illnesses, or maybe our family had something to do with it as well.
We are a family of soldiers. Even the most distant relatives and ancestors I know of were or are soldiers and I have quite an impressive number of commanders in my pedigree, good ones and bad ones and even a completely disastrous one whose name we never mention in public, but all of them big, strong and tough.
Big, strong babies usually grow into big, strong soldiers and nobody in our family had ever seen a bigger or stronger newborn than my brother. Or a smaller and weaker one than me. It was only natural that such an extraordinarily promising child would receive everybody's attention and get all possible support. A useless runt is so easily overlooked and forgotten.
It was obvious from the start that I wasn't cut out for a big career in the army, in fact my parents worried that my health would prevent me from passing even the basic training in the first place. They saw no future for me at all.
The first person to ever see me as something other than the little brother was our first teacher. I still remember my utter surprise at the things he said about me when one day my mother came to fetch us from school and enquired after my brother's performance.
"Well, he's excellent at all sports events," the teacher hedged. "It's just ..."
"What?" Mother asked anxiously. "If it's the fighting ..."
"Oh, he's not the only child in class that has problems controlling his temper," the teacher assured her. "No, I'm more worried about his grades. Particularly Mathematics isn't his strong point, but he's having a hard time with other subjects as well." He took a deep breath. "To be honest, he's the worst student in the class, maybe the worst I've ever had and it's not just laziness. He does try, but lacks the intelligence."
Mother looked a little taken aback so he hastened to reassure her. "Then again, maybe it's the comparison with his brother that makes him seem less intelligent than he actually is. It is amazing that twins can be this different."
"The runt?" Mother looked down at me incredulously.
"I've never seen a smarter little boy," the teacher said and smiled at me proudly.
He was probably exaggerating, but later teachers agreed that I was smart. No, the warrior academy wouldn't want me, but I'd do well at the science academy, they told my parents a few years later. They easily agreed that I should go there at fifteen. I'd be the first of my family not attending the warrior academy at all, but they'd never expected me to do well there anyway. Maybe it'd spare them the shame of me trying and failing.
My brother smiled encouragingly and nodded whenever I told him of those plans. Then he'd tell me of the armies he'd command someday and aliens he'd fight.
"I'll be supreme leader of our people someday," he'd say and we all knew it'd happen, if only the family supported him enough. "And then I'll make you my scientific advisor, or something."
Those were bad times for us, though. The war was demanding lots of victims and sometimes it seemed like a member of our family was killed or wounded in every attack. Our father lost his right arm in an explosion that year and a laser wound in her left knee left Mother with a permanent limp. At least they came home again, though.
It was when our grandfather died of a shrapnel wound that had gotten infected that I started to have a dream of my own.
"I'll kill those aliens," my brother told me that evening. "Someday I'll take all my armies and kill every last one of them."
"And I'll become a doctor," I decided. "If they'd had more doctors, grandfather wouldn't have died."
The family accepted my career plans with little interest. My future wasn't of any consequence, but having a son who wanted to become a doctor, because he'd seen so many people get crippled in war was at least a little less shameful than having a son who had to become a scientist, because he was more clever than strong.
About half a year later on a cold and windy autumn day my brother went out to play with his friends. He even invited me to come along, but I already had a slight cold and didn't want it to get worse, so I opted to stay inside and read. I think it was a book about chemistry that I'd picked out to prepare myself for the science academy. My name and pedigree would mean nothing there and students from scientist families would probably have a lot of advance knowledge. I expected to have a hard time keeping up at first.
It must have been interesting, for Mother had to come and get me at dinnertime. She was surprised to find me reading, because my brother hadn't shown up for the meal either and she'd expected to find us playing together. When I told her I'd last seen him leave with his friends she called one of them who said he'd gone home an hour ago. Our house was about half an hour's walk from the village, but the path led past several places where my brother loved to stop and play so we didn't worry.
When my brother still hadn't arrived by the end of dinner Mother sent me out to find him and send him home. I remember thinking that he'd get a beating for staying out after dark.
I didn't have far to go. My brother lay under a big tree about a minute's walk from the house, his body oddly twisted and a broken branch half buried under it. He'd always loved climbing trees.
I don't remember what happened after that, while a few random facts are burned clearly into my memory forever. I remember the sticky feeling of my brother's blood on my hands, how strange and cold his skin felt and the blood soaking my clothes. They told me later that my uncle heard me calling my brother's name and found me clutching and shaking his dead body calling "Nestor! Nestor!" again and again. I cannot remember calling out, nor how my uncle picked me up and carried me home.
It was the first time I saw death. I'd lost family members to it already, yes and heard of it often, but I'd never actually seen a dead body before, not even a dead animal.
Back then it shocked and horrified me.
One grows used to everything. By now death is a casual thing to me. Back then, though ...
Just like that from one moment to the next I'd lost the one person who had defined my life up until then. The last great hope of our family was gone, our future lost. By all rights I, the useless one, should have died instead. Or so it seemed.
I gave up my dreams that night. For the sake of my family and my brother I went to the warrior academy after all, for them I quit early and fought as a common soldier. I learned every dirty trick I could to survive as long as possible and against all odds I lived through all battles.
Looking back now and watching all those hopeful young officers coming out of the academy every year, I can see that my brother would have risen fast when I was just struggling to survive for another day, but there comes a time when strength and courage will get you no further and I understand now that he would never have made it past that point in his career. He would have made a more impressive soldier than I, but would never have impressed the people who became my mentors. His friends and supporters would have been soldiers like himself when it is politicians that make commanders.
Nestor would not have been able to manipulate the commanders the way I do. He would never have thought of making the deals that won me my allies. He couldn't have devised a strategy like the one that won me my position. He did not have the intelligence.
They haven't dared calling me Runt for a long time now. I was named after the human goddess of revenge, Nemesis. I guess you could say I grew into it.