His parents had died when he was young, both during missions that went wrong like they tended to do during a war. As a result, he had been raised by his elderly grandmother, ignored by the rest of his clan because of his decidedly unUchiha-like behavior.
In this life, his new parents drew their last breaths defending their lord during a coup d'état. It had been a death befitting samurai. Very honorable.
He didn't have a grandmother to take over.
Actually, most Uchiha adults had died the same way his parents had. It had been a bloody night.
That's where his older cousins came in being the only ones left who could raise him. The first problem; all of them were male and none of them had ever raised a baby personally without the help of a wife. The second? One of them was Madara.
Yes, exactly, the same Madara that had kidnapped him, orchestrated the death of the girl he loved and brainwashed him into trying to destroy the world.
Help?
Please?
"Are you certain it is him?" The oldest of his cousins' questions, holding Obito up in the air by the armpits. Unlike most Uchiha, his hair was brown. Two locks framing either side of his face were wrapped in bandages, and the rest was pulled back into a tail. His red eyes were underlined by blue markings. His kimono was black and red. All in all, his appearance was of an Uchiha from even before the Warring Clan Era as depicted in the most ancient of their clan records.
"Yeah, I'm sure." Tiny Madara grumbles.
"How do we know if he remembers?" One of the younger kids crowding around them asks, and Obito starts babbling loudly in response. Being a baby sucked, communications were impossible and how the hell was he supposed to inform them he did not appreciate being held like that! What if they dropped him?!
"That really doesn't communicate anything to us if you do remember." A Sasuke-lookalike, but not actually Sasuke tells him.
Obito frowns for a short second before he gets a bright idea. His nose scrunches up in concentration as he attempts to wrestle his muscles under his control.
"He definitely remembers." Madara sighs and wipes Obito's spit off his face with the corner of his sleeve. "Maybe keep him away from me for the foreseeable future, Indra?"
Oh, that felt good.
Wait. Hold up. Indra? As in the progenitor of the Uchiha clan? That Indra?
Currently in the compound lived nine people – including Obito – none of them older than twenty. Physically. Mentally was a whole other pouch of kunai.
The oldest by appearance, and second oldest in mind, was Indra. And yes, Obito had it confirmed; he was the ancestor of the Uchiha clan and the son of the Sage of the Six Paths. He was the one in charge of the rest of them.
Arata was the second oldest by appearance and had died in his late teens. He was Madara's older brother, and an extremely responsible man having been raised with the expectation of being the next Clan Head. He was unofficially in charge of the family finances; investing and such.
Hideki was Madara's second older brother. Now that he was free of his duty to fight for his clan in a never-ending war, he had discovered his passion for inventing. Explosions were a very common sound in the room he had commandeered for his experiments.
Madara was the eldest mentally and didn't act like it. His favorite pastime was dunking anyone who annoyed him or misbehaved into the decorative pond. The koi hated him. Obito hated him. Moreover, he had taken to his role as an older brother again with vengeance. No one was safe from his overprotectiveness. If anyone ever hurt any of them… Obito shudders at the thought.
Izuna, the prettier and flirtier Sasuke look-alike, was always off doing something. He spent a lot of time in Red Light Districts and had a great number of friends in the criminal underworld. Obito suspected he was the family spy and that he was working part-time with the slowly brewing rebellion. Not that he was complaining. That eight-headed usurper serpent in charge of their country was a piece of trash.
Shōta was the youngest of Madara's brothers. He had been murdered by Senju at the tender age of three in his own bed, so he was the only one who acted more or less his physical age. Refused to sleep alone for one, and his older siblings had been more than happy to indulge. Sleepovers were frequent and Obito was often invited (read: forced to attend).
There was also Hikaku, another Warring Clan Era Uchiha, the only other with a hair color other than black, and the single sane person in their family. He was in charge of making sure none of them went overboard and tried taking over the world. Again.
The last was Kagami. Senju Tobirama's student and the first Uchiha to be killed by Danzo. As far as they knew, anyway. They'd taken a mission together and Danzo had lost his eye to an enemy's blade. He probably had decided it was a good opportunity, because he had then stabbed Kagami in the back, and ripped out his eye while he bleed out on the ground. The day he found out that Danzo got away with his murder and then proceeded to orchestrate the death of the entire clan was not a day they liked to remember. And then, he found out all about how Sarutobi had intentionally and knowingly looked the other way…
"Gah!" Obito exclaims and rubs his head.
The door in front of him opens, and Arata steps out with a smile. "Forgot you can't phase again?"
"It's so annoying." He sulks. Passing through matter had been second-nature to him before, and in the years since his reincarnation, he had found it hard to break that habit. Most of his cousins enjoyed watching him walk into things wherever his head was in the clouds, and his pale skin was constantly bruised.
"Maybe we should get you a helmet." Hideki jokes approaching them. "You'll get a concussion one of those days."
Obito sulks harder.
Eventually, their little family grows to include two more cousins. Two very familiar cousins. Eight years old Itachi and three years old Sasuke. Neither were particularly pleased to see him, but he wasn't either so… At least, not until he heard their news of the wilder world.
They weren't orphans. Apparently, their parents had met several of their old friends and had accidentality ended up with bounties. They decided it would be safer for their children in a tyrant-controlled country than on a boat that was one bad day away from being considered a pirate ship.
"Kushina is here?" He repeats in horror, and Itachi solemnly nods his head. Poor little Sasuke, who had probably never spent much time around his former sensei's wife and as such didn't understand what kind of a whirlwind of trouble she could be, crosses his arms and glares furiously, annoyed that Obito was still monopolizing his beloved older brother's time. It was cute. Those chubby cheeks and that pout… He better get used to it. If Shisui was also here, Obito got the feeling he and Itachi would be permanently attached to the hip.
Shisui was here.
He had literally appeared out of nowhere during an otherwise normal evening just in time for dinner and nobody questioned it. Much anyway.
Worrywarts they were, Indra and Madara fussed a bit over the bandages he wore over his eyes, but once they found out he wasn't actually blind, only severely sensitive to light, they went back to their meals and that was that. Izuna had a similar problem, though not as bad. Must be because they had died without their eyes.
Kagami, once he found out the kid was his direct descendant and that he was also killed by Danzo, grabbed him into a rib-crushing hug and refused to let go. He then tearfully promised to help him kill Danzo back if they ever found the traitorous bastard.
"And that idiot Sarutobi." He sobs. "Tobirama-sensei had trusted them!"
Madara and Izuna scoffed at the mention of the Senju. Death had not made them like him more. It led to some funarguments between the three of them. Kagami defended his beloved teacher from the other two with determination and lots of fire. Literal fire. They blew up a wing last week.
Kagami bristles and let's go of Shisui. Itachi snags his confused cousin by the hand and leads him to hide behind the new fireproof oil-paper umbrella Hikaku had calmly pulled out and placed in front of him like a shield. Sasuke joins their huddle. Obito ducks behind the fusuma – also made of fireproof paper – with Arata, Hideki and Shōta. Indra remains seated on the tatami mats and reaches for the sake bottle on his chabudai with a long-suffering expression.
The screaming match starts.
Contrary to the Senju, the Uchiha didn't produce just warriors. Many of them had side-skills they spend many hours practicing. Because of their typically fire nature, things like pottery, glassblowing, and blacksmithing were very popular. They had developed a lot of Jutsu to help with the work. Obito found the pottery especially calming. He always had plenty of plates and bowls and vases to throw if he got angry.
Madara gets his gunbai back thanks to his older brother who was their resident expert blacksmith with a focus on blades. He made their own weapons, and they occasionally sold the exemplars that are of lesser quality. The war fan looked almost exactly the same, though Hideki had fiddled with it, and created a system that allowed the gunbai to not only burst on fire but spit out giant fireballs too. Emboldened by his success, he then proceeded to also create a sword for Sasuke that could be electrified.
Itachi picks up a crow Zoan Devil fruit somewhere. Arata shows off his exceptional wirework on a pair of rōnin. Izuna destroys a rival noble family encroaching their territory with a few well-placed words. Kagami tries out a few of his plans for Danzo and Sarutobi on a couple of corrupt officials. It was… disturbing. The man's switch between his usual happy go-lucky personality and his guilt-ridden, revenge-obsessed one reminded him a lot of him when he was going from Tobi to Obito.
There is suddenly a wild scramble as everyone attempts to arm themselves to be able to keep up in their weekly training sessions and Hideki gets a lot of practice making swords. At the rate he was going, he'd be making Graded blades soon enough.
For his birthday, Obito becomes the second Uchiha to eat a Devil Fruit. Somehow, his family had tracked down a Fruit with similar abilities to his Kamui. Equipped with a strong Hideki-made chain with manacles for his wrists as an additional weapon the likes of which he used to used once, Obito finally feels truly safe and knows he will burn down the world for his cousins.
Not late, not late, he's…
"Late." Sasuke announces blandly. "You're late again."
Obito winces. "Sorry. I left extra early, I swear! But there was an old lady, and she needed help with her groceries, and then I remembered I forgot something so I had to go back to the inn then there was this group of bandits attacking civilians and I had to walk them to their village to make sure they were safe –"
Shisui snickers and he shuts up embarrassed. Look at him! Feared S-class shinobi, and he's acting like he's a genin again.
"It should not take you half a day to travel from the clan compound to here." Sasuke hisses angrily. "They're not even two hours apart!"
Kagami grins cheerfully, hands crossed behind his head. "Give it up, kid." He advises. "Obito's always going to be late to everything."
One of Itachi's pets drops an expensive-looking ring into his waiting palm.
Hikaku groans. "Please tell me that's not who's I think it is."
When he had arrived, Shisui was unsurprisingly delighted with Itachi's crows. There had always been a number of the birds living by the compound, but after Itachi started feeding them, they began following him everywhere. There was never less than ten around him at a time and they turned out to be very smart. Smart enough for Shisui to train them to steal shiny. It occasionally caused them trouble when they took things they shouldn't. Like right now.
The ring was one of a kind commissioned from Hideki and belonged to a person they definitely did not want to know the Uchiha were more than a cowardly clan of talented isolationistic artisans hiding from the world in their forest. All their plans for riding their country of tyrants will fall apart if they are discovered too early.
"But I just go here." Obito whines. "I wanted to explore the city! Indra never lets us have days off! It's always training and training and more training."
"Leaving." Hikaku orders uncompromisingly. "Explore later. I don't feel like dying today."
What was Black Maria doing here anyway?! Shouldn't she be with the Beast Pirates?
"Here," Izuna says one morning and throws a bunch of paper on their chabudai.
"What is it?" Madara asks, ignoring with practiced ease Shōta's squawks as the boy struggles to save his breakfast from under the pile.
"Recent newspapers from the Grand Line," Izuna tells them. "It took me some work to get those."
With Wano's isolationistic laws, getting outside news was a difficult job, so everyone eagerly forgets eating in favor of reading.
Obito is busy with an account of the invasion of Enies Lobby – so they had been reincarnated too? – when Arata passes him a bounty of a humanoid wolf. "Isn't that your Hatake friend?"
And it was. Furry and without his mask, but still Kakashi.
"He's wanted for piracy." Hikaku comments, peering over his shoulder.
"We're going to need allies to fight the dragon." Indra musses lightly.
Obito gapes at his ancestor. "You want me to recruit a pirate to help with our coup d'état?"
Indra shrugs elegantly. "Why not?"
Why not indeed. Bakashi thrived on chaos and he'll love the challenge of overthrowing Kaidō. Obito will just need to elude unwelcome Marine attention and avoid causing trouble while away from the Land of Wano. It'll be a quick, easy trip. What could go wrong?
Obito adjusts his backpack and tries not to look annoyed when Indra asks yet again if he had packed enough clothes.
"I did." He rolls his eyes. "C'mon, I'm not a kid, I know what I'm doing."
He wasn't even the first to decide to leave. That had been Sasuke, surprising everyone with his decision to leave his precious older brother. Itachi and Shisui had followed soon after. Then Kagami, eager to begin his hunt for Danzo and Sarutobi.
Madara and Indra did not need to worry so much. He'll be fine.
Two hours after he left Wano, his boat gets sunk in a storm and he is picked up in the nick of time by an anthropoid wolf.
No, it wasn't Kakashi.
"Call me Sakumo." His savior tells him cheerfully, and Obito's jaw falls open.
I don't own Naruto or One Piece.
