RAISED TO THE GROUND

In the blink of an eye cities are built and burned. It can take only a moment for a great civilisation to rise and fall. Only a brief second for a legend to be made and forgotten. Only a single lifetime to build a happy existence and a single heartbeat to destroy it. Many people, I believe, will find that surprising, upsetting, unbelievable. I don't. You see, I have never had the advantage of a positive disposition; my brother did, but not me. Never me. I can only imagine what it is like to look at a candle and see something other than the shadows that surround it, watch a sunset and anticipate anything other than the night that follows. See a smiling child and just enjoy that happiness as it lasts, without waiting for it to end.

I always tried to take the same joy from life as my brother. He could always find something extraordinary in the ordinary; he always saw the clichéd 'silver lining' in every situation. He once told me, as we stared at the orphanage's rusty gates, carrying our almost empty suitcases and gawking at all the scruffy children, that 'at least we wouldn't ever be lonely again'.

Of course, the other children hated us; pathetic little Mokuba and his big, scary brother Seto. It wasn't our fault we didn't fit in, although being bullied by orphans was a new low for us, we just weren't the same as them. We were always different. My little brother was brilliant, a true genius, only a little less intelligent than myself. It is that intelligence that they hated us for, their obvious inferiority that so irked them. It's also what got us out of that hell-hole.

We clawed our way out of that place, clinging to the small chances we received like strays to scraps – a fitting description for us, I believe. And finally, our big chance came with the world-renowned billionaire and munitions manufacturer, Gozubaru Kaiba. A cold, calculating creature. Not even worthy of the term 'human'. The man I would grow up to curse and praise in one horrified breath. My adoptive father.

I have been blamed for his murder once or twice. I do not believe I received the honour of finishing him off myself; nonetheless, I would have relished the chance. Why, you ask, did I loathe the man so? Well, he was abusive, to say the least, I kept the brunt of his anger from Mokuba, obviously that meant I got it much worse than usual, but my brother's safety is far more important than my own in the end.

My adoptive father – I will never call him simply 'father' – worked me to the bone too; I learned everything about business and money and warfare and weapons and manipulation and how to act exactly as he did... Cold. Empty. He taught me to be obedient, never called me by my name, took from me my freedom and my joy. "Study" he would tell me and I would.

But despite all that, I can't ever say that I would have changed things. Because, regardless of what he did to me, he gave my brother and I a fighting chance in this world. We had money, security and, perhaps not a good or kind one, but a family. And, of course, he had the good grace to die and leave me, his sole heir, everything he owned.

From there, things appeared to look up for Mokuba and I. We had enough money to live comfortably, my bruises and scars were fading and Mokuba still retained his innocence and childlike cheer, even if I didn't. But, as was to be expected of my life by then, things did not stay that way for long.

Did I ever mention to you why I am the way I am? I realise you most likely don't particularly care, but I'm not writing this for you, I'm writing this for him. That's why I do everything, you see. For him. He's the reason I never went with the other adoptive parents, they only wanted one child prodigy after all, he's the reason I took beatings that were twice as bad as they should have been, why I lowered myself to answering to that despicable man, head bowed and eyes averted.

Everything for him.

For Mokuba.

And I would do it again a million times over and suffer much worse than that if it meant I could change one day. Just one day. The day he died.

The day I came home from hours of sitting in a penthouse office, leading a company that no longer worked in weaponry and warfare, but instead created children's toys of the finest quality. And I found my home gone, just as I had done fifteen years ago.

A five year old boy

A twenty year old man

Staring at the charred remains of his parents

Staring at the charred remains of his brother

And desperately

desperately

Wishing that it wasn't real

Wishing that it was him that had died instead

And as I stared at him, at Mokuba, at you, my dear little brother, I wanted so badly to be the kind of optimistic person you had been. The kind of wonderful person that could pretend that there were no shadows around the flames, pretend that at some point the night would end and the sunrise would chase all the darkness away, pretend you could still smile at me as you used to and see that extraordinarily amazing world. I wish it were me that did the right thing and saw the good side of life; I wish it were me that was responsible and a good brother. I wish it were me that had died.

But it's not me.

It's never me.

END

I wanted to write a Seto and Mokuba fic ('cause I love them), but I wanted to write something sad.

I dunno if I managed to pull 'sad' off but I tried my best.

The title's supposed to be a play on words, the storie's about how Seto and Mokuba grew up (how they were raised) and about the house burning down (razed), if the idea's stupid tell me and I'll change it :)

Disclaimer: Yu-Gi-Oh isn't mine, hence fanfic.

I'm still pretty new to fanfictionDOTnet, so bear with me while I struggle through.

I don't know if this'll make all that much sense to someone else, so sorry if it doesn't.

Constructive criticism would be loved and reviews will be adored but not demanded. I wanna know if this is okay