𝑯𝑨𝑳𝑪𝒀𝑶𝑵 𝑶𝑩𝑳𝑰𝑽𝑰𝑶𝑵 •𝒃𝒙𝒃•

Reluctance ~ Age 12

"Aniki... What were mom and dad like?"

For some reason, he never found the will within himself to ask his brother that question.

Why didn't he?

Was he afraid of the answer? Was he afraid that they wouldn't be like he imagined them to be? Was he afraid that the little description in his mind would be wrong?

He didn't know why.

"That's... an unexpected question. What brought that up?" Minato brushed his bangs to the side as he faced him, a questioning look in his eyes.

Aizen averted his own, somehow feeling like he should't have asked, "I don't know. Felt like it." He gave the brief answer, shifting away from Minato.

The blond man went quiet for a few moments, before the lightest of breaths left his lips, "Well, for the most part, you're more like mother than father in the behaviour department." Came his answer.

"Behaviour?" Aizen mumbled out, blinking at his brother.

Minato nodded, a small smile curling his lips, "Yeah. Father was the more outgoing kind. I guess the only thing we got from him were the eyes and spiky hair." For a moment, he seemed as if he was going over some kind of memory, a memory which Aizen didn't have, "Mother used to scold us a lot, father and I, because we loved to stay up late and talk about his adventures during missions... We'd talk for hours and hours, sometimes even until dawn."

"What about mom? How were you with her?" That was something he was very interested in after hearing that he was more like her than his father.

Then, it was as if some kind of tension washed over the room, "Mother... was a difficult woman. She was rather distant, I guess, not that she neglected me. It was the opposite, actually. She cared for father and I a lot, and you when you were born, but she didn't show it in the way she acted. She showed it in her harsh words and commanding presence. She was the kind of woman who would stare into the eyes of death and say 'not today'."

Hearing that description, Aizen felt a sudden spike in his chest. So that was what she was like... It would be an understatement to say that he was surprised at the new information.

"Something that I really remember about mother is that she was always anxious when it was the time to leave on a mission. She would be unusually attached to father and I... She would even smile at us, which she rarely did on other occasions. I didn't understand it when I was younger, but I realised it after they left us. In the shinobi world, there was no telling if one was to return from a mission safely, unharmed. She didn't know if she was going to see us again after the mission. She didn't know if she would survive the mission," the more he spoke, the more his voice roughened up, "As a child, I hoped she would go on more missions just so that I could receive the warm smiles and kind words from her. Then, both she and father left, but they never returned."

Minato never told him something like that. Aizen never knew what kind of childhood his brother had... So, Minato was craving their mother's affection? Her love?

He didn't know what to say in a situation like that, so he remained silent, carefully watching his brother.

"I felt lost when I received the news. It was like my whole world got flipped upside down and I had no ground left beneath my feet. I got called to the Hokage's office so that they could explain what happened and... they intended to take you away from me." Minato muttered into the fabric of the pillow. His fingers had gripped onto Aizen's clothes, lightly bunching up his shirt, "I managed to convince the Hokage to let me keep you. If that didn't happen, I don't know what I would have done."