It sounds preposterous, it sounds ridiculous, it sounds absolutely within the realm of possibility.

"Neither the Uchiha nor the Senju prevailed over time, huh." Izuna mutters. "Despite the village being founded after all."

The story Madara spun over the course of the last hours sounds like out of a storybook, like a poetic tragedy. A village founded to finally end the warring era, to protect the children; but what follows are four bloody wars that span across the entire continent, crueller and more methodical than ever before, bringing nothing but misery while continuing to take the lives of brothers and sisters, sons and daughters. The Bijuu, weapons of mass destruction, captured and sealed into children, to be used whenever necessary. Entire clans slaughtered by the big villages because of their Kekkei Genkai. The once prestigious Uchiha clan, reduced to its last member in a massacre orchestrated by no one other than that Senju-bastard's pupil.

Sage, he knew the White Demon couldn't be trusted; he told Madara, he told him, but he wouldn't listen! He wants nothing more right now than to scream it to his brother's face, I knew it, I was right all along! But what would that accomplish besides a short moment of satisfaction? His brother had suffered for over a hundred years already, he doesn't deserve his cruel words on top of that.

And Izuna knows that Madara loved his clan, protected it with his blood and tears for years through every hardship. His brother had always had its best interests in mind with every action he took, he had always done the best he could and then some. Besides, Madara is no fool, Izuna knows that too, he doesn't make decisions without carefully weighting all his available options first. The situation was hopeless from the start.

For as long as Izuna remembers the Uchiha and the Senju have always matched each other perfectly in strength. Neither had managed to gain ground on the other for a long, long time. The war had reached a standstill decades before Izuna was born, and somewhat of a balance had settled over the Land of Fire. That balance however shifted when his and Madara's generation was born, and they showed unrivalled prodigal prowess in the Shinobi arts. Madara and Hashirama, he and Tobirama, each of them was capable of fighting whole squads of enemy Shinobi singlehandedly and walk away victoriously. They were a match only to each other; Madara would fight Hashirama and Izuna would fight Tobirama every single time they met, for the sole reason that no other Shinobi could keep up with them. From the moment the four of them surpassed their peers and seniors, every battle became a dance on a knives edge. The fragile equilibrium would tip the moment one of them fell, and the conclusion of the war would be decided.

In the end it was Izuna who was struck down. His death had sealed the Uchiha's fate.

Oh, Izuna had hoped that his last gift to Madara would be enough to turn the tides once more, but his eyes had not been; on the contrary even, it had created discord within the clan. Some Uchiha honestly believed that Madara had stolen his eyes, hah! Goddamn it, Izuna had had to beg Madara to take them. But the truth didn't really matter, now did it? Not when a little rumour was all it took for his clan's people to start deflecting to those tree-fuckers. How could his family believe that Madara of all people was a Dōjutsu-thief? How could they betray their own clan head? Where did the sudden distrust come from? After everything Madara had done for them! Maybe this Zetsu bastard is to blame for that development; the more isolated a target the easier it is to manipulate after all, and Madara had been utterly isolated from everyone at the end. Betrayed and mistrusted. The thought grates him, to think that his brother had been entirely alone after his death, because his own clan was full of disloyal traitors.

Sage, at that point Madara had no choice but to agree to the founding of Konoha if the wanted to prevent his clan from splitting into fractions and destroy itself.

What disgusts Izuna the most in this fucked up mess though, is the show Hashirama put on in the middle of the final battlefield with Madara defeated at his feet. The nerve of him to offer his own life in exchange for Izuna's! As if that would have solved anything for Madara. What was his brother supposed to do in that situation but prevent it? As if the present Senju, least of all Tobirama, would have allowed their clan head to die before their eyes. Madara had to stop him or else it would have led to even more hatred against his person, and consequently his clan that had been defeated already. Whether Izuna likes it or not, by then Hashirama had been the only shield left protecting the Uchiha from annihilation. Madara had no choice but to agree to 'peace' to guarantee his people's immediate survival, but at the same time he had ultimately condemned them to exclusion and oppression under Tobirama's and Sarutobi's reign. Izuna knows that his brother had always wished for peace, but not like this, never like this; his clan in shambles and at the mercy of the enemy.

Maybe Hashirama really had meant well all along and was simply dumb as a log, but he had set the village up for failure the moment he pulled that show in front of every Senju and Uchiha. He had painted himself out to be the self-sacrificing messiah that granted his nemesis mercy, while Madara became the converted worshiper that changed his faulty ways lying at his saviour's feet. They were never equals to begin with, from the start Konohagakure was founded on an imbalance, never amongst equal parties. Madara had been pushed below Hashirama and into the shadows, further away from everyone until he became the perfect puppet for Zetsu.

Amaterasu, how Izuna hates it, how he hates himself for being the cause of all of this. If he had dodged Tobirama's damned teleportation Jutsu none of this would have happened! His brother wouldn't have had to suffer for over a hundred years.

The fact that the Senju clan hadn't survive either is only a small consolation. And at the end of the day, what does it matter? They are not in the Elemental Nations anymore, Uchiha Madara and Izuna are dead, their corpses reduced to ashes and their souls reborn in Tokyo as Junichi and Ren, the worthless sons of a nameless whore. Shinobi like they know it don't exist, neither does chakra, living in big settlements with one's clan is outdated, and wars are but a section in history books.

"Are there others like us?" Izuna asks when his brother remains quiet. It's time to change the subject and distract Madara from his own thoughts, seeing as more and more shadows settle over his downcast eyes. "Reincarnated souls I mean."

Madara at least looks up to meet his gaze. "I don't think so. At least I have never met or heard of someone like us. If the phenomenon was a common occurrence people would be talking about it, but I never came across any information regarding reincarnation that isn't fiction. Besides, I suspect that regaining the memories of our past lives is connected to the Sharingan, since we remembered on our fourth birthdays, the exact moment our eyes manifested. If anything, it would be other Uchiha like us out there somewhere."

"Then we should at least keep our eyes and ears open for 'quirks' resembling the Sharingan."

Madara simply nods in agreement and the heavy silence settles over them again.

Amaterasu help them, this is all so absurd. It will take a while for him to get used to this situation, his new tiny body, this new world, and most importantly, to his brother.

Izuna can see it in the way his eyes are duller than he remembers, in the way he slouches more, and in the way his voice is tired with decades of pain. This man, or child, is not the brother he knows. Madara is undoubtedly still in there, but his soul is frayed at the edges and his smile is worn down by tragedy. Izuna wishes he had been there in all those years his brother had been wandering the nations with no company besides that poisonous parasite; if he could, he would swap their places, but he can't.

At least they have each other now, right? They have a chance at a future together, unchained by war and duty, even if that means they have only each other. But who needs that treacherous clan anyway? They don't need Hikaku, or Yuki, or little Kagami, or Haru, or-

They will be fine on their own. Izuna will make sure of it.

.

.
"Anything?" Izuna asks as he rounds the corner.

"No." Madara shuts the ancient encyclopaedia with a heavy thud, causing a small cloud of dust to rise. "No mentions of Shinobi, Shinobi villages, or the Elemental Nations."

Izuna flops down on the chair across his brother, his short legs making the endeavour unnecessarily difficult. "I haven't found anything either, it's like history before the appearance of quirks got erased."

They have found disappointingly little information about the time without quirks, even though they had read through the entire history section of the shabby little library in their neighbourhood.

"Perhaps, but I think the absence of chakra is reason enough to believe that we are in another dimension entirely, and not simply far in the future. Energy such as chakra does not simply vanish. The fact that we haven't found a single mention of anything Shinobi related only confirms that theory."

Izuna groans longsuffering. "Does that mean we have no way of gaining our chakra back? No more three walking, no more fireballs and no more Genjutsu?"

"Don't be dramatic, we may have no chakra at our disposal, but we still have our Sharingan."

"What good is that supposed to do? You said it yourself, we have no chakra." He huffs. How can Madara be so calm about this? They are Shinobi goddamn it! And what is a Shinobi without his Jutsu?

"I haven't tested the limits of my eyes yet, but I did experiment on the rare occasion. I can assure you Izuna, the Sharingan does us a lot of good." Madara says cryptically.

"What's that supposed to mean, Nii-san?" Izuna whines, slumping onto the tabletop.

Madara ignores his dramatics as he does most of the time and slides down from his chair. "How about I show you?"

Izuna perks up and watches with some curiosity as his brother walks over to the librarian, who is sitting half asleep behind the counter. Madara catches his attention with something he says, but the moment their eyes meet the man freezes on the spot, becoming unnaturally stiff. A moment later his eyes roll back and he falls forward, his head landing on the counter with a dull thud.

Izuna is intently on his feet and rushes over to Madara, who smirks satisfied, his eyes a deep, deep red.

"That was a Genjutsu, but how is that possible?" Izuna asks excited, inspecting the unconscious man with unhinged fascination. "I felt no chakra!"

"Because I have not used any. This," Madara says pointing at one of his eyes. "Is what this world calls a quirk."

Izuna gapes at his brother. "But that- that means not chakra exhaustion, no way to detect a Jutsu, or backtrace it to its user, that means no countermeasure to Genjutsu by disrupting the flow of chakra!" He stills when another realization dawns on him. "That means no deteriorating eyesight due to overused chakra pathways."

Madara's silence is answer enough.