Uchiha Obito dies with a smile on his face, satisfied with the knowledge that he had died as Obito, not as Tobi, not as Madara, not as nobody. He dies sacrificing himself for Kakashi (again, and no, he does not plan to repeat that) and the last thing he sees is his old teammate's wide eyes as Obito crumbles to dust in front of him.

He finally sees Rin, realizes the true ridiculousness of his Sharingan abilities, and takes a detour from death - because, apparently, he could do that with Kamui.

This would have been helpful a decade ago, he thinks. Still, Kakashi needs him - or, at least, his eyes - if he and his team are to survive Kaguya and save the world, so Obito gives him his Sharingan (again, and honestly, it's getting a bit ridiculous.)

He returns to the afterlife, sees Rin again, weeps a few tears, and - Rin grins deviously. "What?" Obito asks with trepidation. He knows that smile because he had seen it for most of his childhood, as a warning to duck and cover. Who knew aspiring medic nins could inadvertently (though he does have his suspicions on that) set off so many explosions?

"You're not done yet, Obito," Rin says to him. You're screwed, says the quirk of her lips.

"I - what?" He says blankly. "...My body is literally dust, Rin. What am I supposed to do, swirl around and make people sneeze? I should have probably died five times over by now. Just - again?"

(Obito was getting a bit sick of the repetition in his life.)

"Not now, obviously," she replies with a roll of her eyes. "Besides, it's not like you'll be alone. I'll come along!"

"What -"

Rin's eyes turn soft. "...It's not a punishment, Obito. Think of it as the second act, like in those terrible romance plays Minato-sensei dragged us to all the time. Don't pretend you don't know what I'm talking about," she adds. "You cried at those even more than Sensei did."

Obito flushes red. "...You're talking about a second chance, then," he says, ignoring all that about plays because hiding under the seats (Namikaze Minato seemed to have no concept of age requirement rules) did nothing to help with his dust problem, and he would stick with that until the day he died (wait...)

"Depends on how you use it," she points out. "It's still a continuation from the first - nothing's erased, nothing's forgotten." Obito grimaces involuntarily, because as much as he didn't deserve it... he had hoped - "Still," Rin continues hurriedly, having evidently seen the expression on his face, "it means you will have the opportunity to change things. We'll have the opportunity to change things."

A jolt of hope in his heart. "When you say you're coming along..."

It had been too long since he had seen Rin, so many terrible years without the sunshine radiance of her smile, the simple understanding of him that no one else have ever had, the sudden realization that he had fucked up completely whenever she shouted, Obito, what the hell were you thinking -

...Yeah, the latter would have been incredibly useful in the past two decades or so of decisions that more-or-less ranged from bad, worse, to worst.

"It means I'll be there with you, Obito. But," she adds, "the last thing I will remember will be dying."

"So you won't remember this conversation with me," Obito realizes. "...You won't know what I've done." And as relieving as it was, that Rin wouldn't know about his countless sins (and would not spend a day or two completely and utterly kicking his ass while shouting obscenities) he knows that they were something that he would not keep from her. As much trouble as it would mean for him... Obito refused to lie to the people he loved, not again.

"To be fair," Rin says, "you won't remember this conversation either. Now, it's going to be a bit weird in your situation - honestly, Obito, even I didn't know your eye could do that - but I think you'll only remember up to giving Kakashi your Sharingan, again."

Obito starts. "Then what's the point of having this conversation?"

"You might not remember this specifically, but it'll probably stay with you subconsciously. I don't know for sure," Rin adds, wrinkling her face. "This is really complicated. But... Honestly, if you woke up in your old place right after dying... you would probably have burned your whole apartment complex down just because you would have thought it was Kaguya again."

"I - Okay, fine, maybe I would." Obito concedes. "...What about Kakashi?" He swallows, thinking of the final quasi-peace he had made with the man, and knowing how much it had affected Kakashi to lose him yet again. And then a horrible thought rises in his mind, of dark nights and burning buildings because - "Sensei," he chokes. "Minato-sensei, will he - ?"

"Our whole team," Rin says. "They'll remember up to their deaths, same as us... though it's a bit weird in Kakashi's case as well. Honestly, boys..." She shakes her head.

He stares at her, with just a little bemusement because... what had happened to Kakashi? But - "...What happens now, Rin?" Obito asks, glancing around at his surroundings.

"Now," Rin says, a grin on her face even as an intense light begins to emanate from every part of their surroundings, obscuring Obito's vision completely, "we kick Madara's ass."

Obito wakes up in an apartment he hadn't seen in two decades, in a body that was wholly his. He blinks with two eyes that weren't constantly draining from his pool of chakra - which, for some reason, didn't feel as large as he remembered.

Minutes later, looking into the mirror, he got his answer - and a vast number of questions. Had Kakashi and his team defeated Kaguya? Had his death been for vain? And... why was he here?

...Had the last two decades of utter hell been... a dream? Just a single night fantasy of the weakling of the Uchiha clan? Obito's common sense told him no, it had happened - but he, of all people, knew the power of dreams.

He forces chakra into his eyes, and - no, not a dream, Obito decides, as he feels the tightly coiled power of Kamui in his eyes, stronger than they had ever felt because he had both of his eyes and wasn't suffering from extreme chakra exhaustion. The mirror reflects his blood red pinwheel eyes, merely confirming what he already knew. He tries for Mokuton, even though he knows that he does not have the Senju DNA that would allow him control of that rare ability -

- what? Obito blinks. He knows that it was physically impossible for him to still have control of the Mokuton. He doesn't have Senju DNA, not anymore. But while he could no longer feel that power thrumming under his skin, as it had for close to two decades, there was - what? Just... something familiar there, where Mokuton usually was.

Impossible, he decides. Just his imagination. He did not have the requisite Senju DNA. Mokuton was lost to him... but what he gained was so much more.

The past, Obito thinks. The past. He could end Madara now, he knows, because regardless of how strong the man had been in his prime - he was old now, and Obito was young and remembered all the techniques and skills that had made Uchiha Obito a S-ranked threat in the future. True, his body was in no way prepared, but if only he could get to Madara, he had all the advantage of surprise.

He glances at the clock on his wall and, for the first time in years, realizes that he was... late.

Punctuality had not been the chief concern for either Uchiha Madara or Tobi. When one was the leader of a criminal organization, one quickly realizes that the rules of punctuality rarely apply. But here and now, he was Uchiha Obito, who was late to training with his team. No doubt, Kakashi, still the ill-tempered little midget he had been all those years ago, had already began to gripe.

That was when he hears the knock on his door.

Rin and Kakashi are at his doorstep, and it takes Obito so much just to not cry, right there and now. For decades, he had thought that his tears had all been expended in the aftermath of Rin's death. Maybe, they had simply been saved for now.

And then, Kakashi speaks - and Obito's world is turned upside down.

They remember. They remember, and the next few moments pass in a blur. He tells them the truth, tells them that he survived, because he cannot handle the look of guilt and pity they give him every few minutes when they had no idea what he had done. When Minato-sensei enters, and - he remembers as well, and Obito knows - knows - that he cannot keep this from his team.

The Sharingan swirl into being in his eyes, and even as Rin cries in alarm, he pulls Minato-sensei into a genjutsu.

Minato-sensei figures it out quickly. Namikaze Minato had never been a stupid man.

Obito doesn't know what to expect. The first time his sensei had learned of his survival, had realized what Obito had become - well, Obito had been left bleeding out in the middle of the battlefield. Only his activation of the jinchuriki technique had saved him, and even that had been a close thing.

He stands without speaking, waiting for the other man to make the first move. Being a genjutsu, even if Minato injured him, maimed him, killed him here... it wouldn't be permanent. Not that Obito didn't deserve anything his sensei would do to him, but in order to make any kind of amends for his sins, they had to know who and what they were facing. Even if Obito died here, Madara would only find another pawn.

"Obito," his sensei repeats. Obito's Sharingan takes in his every move - the slight twitch of his hand toward his kunai pouch, the gritting of his teeth as he took in the revelation - but the man makes no move to attack. "...It was you, that night?"

"Yes," he says. "It was me."

"Why?"

For a moment, Obito is speechless. This... out of all he had imagined, he had not expected Minato - Minato-sensei - to demand an explanation, instead of exacting his revenge. But maybe... he had not been thinking of what Namikaze Minato would have done. Obito had been thinking of what he had done, that day so many years ago, as he sobbed into Rin's broken body -

- and what was he to say? He swallows. It's not an easy thing, his fall to darkness. Yes, Rin had died. Yes, Kakashi had been the one to put his hand through her heart - the true reason behind the act, Obito had only found out later. But he had not started a war because the girl he loved had died. It had been a combination of factors, of the seals and mental conditioning Madara had forced upon him during his captivity, of the childhood spent in the midst of war and bloodshed, and yes, of that - that day.

"Uchiha Madara told me that this world was inherently corrupt," he says finally. "He offered me a chance to transform it into something better. A place where everyone could be happy." He spits out the words, because after Naruto... he could see the falseness behind that idea, the childishness of it all. And, because it had been because of him in the end that Madara had targeted Rin, not because of Minato-sensei, not because of the village - "He arranged Rin's death so I would believe him."

That, at least, elicits a reaction. The other man freezes in his step at the revelation, and when he looks at Obito again, it is with - no, it couldn't be - sympathy in his expression. But just as quickly as it appears, Minato-sensei - no, Minato, because Obito did not deserve to call him by the former, not any more - frowns, his expression shuttering off. "Why Kushina, then?" Minato asks, a hard look in his eye "Why Naruto?"

Obito almost winces, because... out of everything he had done in the two decades of his life, his unleashing of the Kyuubi had been the one he had regretted most. In one fell swoop, he had destroyed his village and orphaned the biological child of the only two parental figures he had ever had. After that, there truly was no turning back (or so he had thought, before a certain blonde menace decided otherwise.)

"Madara wanted to reform the Juubi and become its jinchuriki," he explains curtly. "Only with that would he have the power to use the Eternal Tsukuyomi, and place the entirety of the world under his illusion of a better world."

"You didn't get the Kyuubi that night," Minato points out. "I sealed it again -"

The genjutsu world reforms around them, changing from scorched Konoha landscape into the flat plains on which the Fourth Shinobi War had taken place. Even here, he can see the large army of shinobi against which he had faced for his new world - and, in the distance, the towering figure of what could only be the Juubi. He looks away before he can take in the two humanoid figures standing on top of it, and meets Minato's eyes. The man freezes, and that is how Obito knows that his 'Uchiha Madara' appearance had given way to his unmasked form.

"...Inside your son. I know." Obito swallows, because this was the hard part. "I... started the Fourth Shinobi War," he says in a rush. "In the end, I brought back the Juubi -" and quickly added, at Minato's flinch, " - though at a state of less power, because the jinchuriki for the Hachibi and Kyuubi were still free. Madara had been resurrected by then with Edo Tensei - he had died about a year after he first took me in."

Minato takes in the news without a single flicker of expression. "But you died," he points out calmly. "You wouldn't be here if you hadn't. You failed, didn't you?"

"The situation became more complicated than that," he admits. Technically, at the end, he hadn't failed in his objective. But by then, that objective had been to make sure Kakashi and every one of his students got out of the war alive - not that Minato knew that.

"Madara wanted a true resurrection, not the half-life granted by Edo Tensei. Madara had put a control seal on me the moment he had dug me out from under those rocks. He had made use of it throughout my time with him, I have no doubt, but now he exercised full control... he forced me to perform the technique that would bring him back to life at the cost of my own."

Minato's eyes are wide as he takes in the ramifications of what Obito had just said. "Then, that was the last you remembered?"

"No," Obito says bluntly and just a bit too quickly, because he did not deserve the pity in the other man's voice. "Madara underestimated me. I subverted his technique at the last moment, and I used it to seal the Juubi within myself."

The genjutsu changes, yet again. Even without looking, he knows that the skin of his body had turned an unearthly pale, his hair a bleached white. Before Minato, now stands the monstrous form of the Juubi jinchuriki. Obito hears an intake of breathe from the other man, but presses on. "...And, that's where Naruto comes into the picture."

"My son," Minato says. He can't seem to look away from Obito, a look of horror on his face.

"Yes, your son." Obito allows himself a small, reluctant smile, and... he tells Minato everything.

The blonde stares in stunned disbelief as he talks about Naruto, the idiotic brat (who had been too much like himself for comfort) who had seen something worth saving in the monster before him. Naruto, who had somehow dragged out what little remnants of Obito that had existed within Tobi/Madara/nobody and forced him to see his actions for what they were. The boy who had the sheer charisma and heart to convince a damned man to come back into the light.

"That worked?" Minato asks, with no little amount of disbelief.

It spoke to just how revolutionary Uzumaki Naruto was for the shinobi world, when even the boy's father found the sheer power of his charisma unbelievable. In fact, Obito was doubtful that even his younger self saw the world in such optimistic terms. Had Naruto ever had to kill an enemy, or had he been able to convert all of them?

"For a minute or two... yes," Obito replies with a grimace. "But that was enough time for him to separate me from my power. Madara took advantage of my moment of weakness, and turned on me to engineer his own resurrection."

And then... that had been when he had found out about the sheer depth of Madara's manipulations. His hands clench into fists just at the memory. By then, he had already been jolted by Naruto from the steadfast certainty that two decades of blind faith had instilled within him. The knowledge that Rin had died because of him... that Obito had just been another one of Madara's pawns... it had been the last straw.

"Then..." Minato says slowly, evidently convinced that this was indeed the end of Uchiha Obito.

Obito couldn't help but grin. No, if nothing else, Uchiha Obito was stubborn. He had survived several tons of rock, several missing appendages, having the equivalent of ten tailed beasts ripped out of him at once, and a technique so chakra consuming that all previous users had perished as a result - in fact, it had taken complete and utter disintegration by a physical goddess/demon to keep him down.

"I survived," he says. "But after that, after finding about what Madara did to Rin... I would be a fool to continue following Madara. I turned on him. After that, all my efforts were centered on getting Kakashi and his team out of the war alive - an incredibly difficult task, as you can imagine. That's how I died, incidentally - I took a fatal blow meant for Kakashi. That was the last thing I remembered, before waking up as a boy again."

A brief silence. Obito forces himself to meet Minato's eyes. He could no longer hide his many sins behind the promise of a new, better world. This was the only one he had, and he would accept the consequences of what he had done.

"So," Minato says finally. "You're claiming that you're no longer planning on - what was it - subjugating the entire shinobi world under your and Madara's will? Obito, what reason do I have to believe you? For all I know, you're telling me all of this just for the opportunity to put a knife in my back." Unspoken was: After all, you already did it once before.

He grimaces. "You don't have one," Obito says at last. "Nothing other than my words. I don't expect you to believe me. I don't expect you to forgive me - not for what I did to you, to K-Kushina-nee, to everyone else. I just need to - I want to take Madara down, along with the creature that's manipulating him. I know more about him than anyone else alive. I know his weaknesses. I... don't care about what you do with me afterwards."

"You destroyed my village," Minato says softly, and Obito flinches. "You ripped the Kyuubi from my wife's body and soul, and forced me to give my life to seal away the beast into my own son. You singlehandedly waged war against all shinobi in order to make your own new world."

A flare of chakra is Obito's only warning as the blonde disappears in his trademark yellow flash, and he panics because for this split second, he cannot tell where Minato was, even though this was his genjutsu. It was impossible - or so he thought, and it is in this brief moment that he feels a sense of resignation. The other man could not take his revenge here, not in Obito's world of illusions, but breaking out was a matter of a simple 'Kai' and no thirteen year old, regardless of the age and experience of the soul, could stand against a vengeful Yellow Flash in his prime.

Not that he would try to fight back, not when he knew he deserved it. Obito feels the presence moving toward him at an insane speed, closes his eyes, and braces -

- for a warm hand to make contact with his head, ruffling his hair in a motion that he remembered, even though it had been almost two decades since the last time he had been on the receiving end. With it comes a rush of emotions so familiar that it sends a chill down his spine, of surprise/outrage/joy. Almost involuntarily, he squawks in indignation. "S-Sensei!"

- and he freezes, because that hadn't been his voice since he had hit puberty more than a decade ago. This wasn't Uchiha Obito at thirty one. This was Obito at age thirteen, and this was Obito now.

The blonde - Minato - Minato-sensei gives him a small smile. "And after all of that... you still managed to turn back," the man says, and there is an odd tone of - could it be - pride in his voice. "...I'm glad that you survived, Obito. I'm not nearly as glad about everything you did after that," he adds just as mildly, "but I suppose I do have my own share of blame to take for that."

Obito jolts. "W-Wha - Minato-sensei, the only people to blame for what I did are Uchiha Madara and myself, you -"

"And I was the reason you ended up in the hands of a master manipulator," the blonde says calmly. "Maybe it's irrational. But from what you've told me, you spent months at the whims of the enemy. That, with the seal he placed on you, as well as Rin's death... I have seen experienced shinobi crack under lesser circumstances, let alone a thirteen year old chunin."

"That doesn't excuse anything I did -"

"No, it doesn't." Minato-sensei sighs, sounding much more weary than his two decades. "...I'm not going to hurt you, Obito."

"You're not -"

"Angry? No, I'm very angry. In fact, I'm furious," and it only sounds more frightening in Minato-sensei's calm tones. "But not at you. Not just at you, in any case. Though, I do have to warn you... if you end up on the same path you did then..." The threat was unspoken.

"Yeah," Obito says. It - It's relief that he feels at hearing that, not fear. He didn't want to be the man he had been - never again, he swore. Even if he had to die before. Especially if he had to die before. "I know. Thank you, Minato-sensei."

[A/N: A lot of stuff here. Please give me your feedback. My main point of concern is the Minato-Obito talk - too much exposition? Not enough exposition? Were the characters both in character? (Though yes, Obito's sudden change in personality from his shift from adult to child form was intentional.)

It is also here that I begin to lack a concrete plan for future chapters. Any suggestions? I have Kannabi Bridge in mind, but if anyone wants the story to go more off the rails from canon... I certainly wouldn't be adverse.]