To Be Lost On The Road To Life

Chasing Blindly

'... Strange.'

That was what Obito thought as he looked on at the scene before him.

He had moved into Minato and Kushina's apartment ever since he was released from the hospital, but had essentially been living on his own for the first month. Kushina had inexplicably ended up in the hospital(well, he assumed that the reason had to do with the Kyūbi, but he had yet to make certain of that fact) while Minato had started spending more and more time out of the house. Obito was still unsure of where the man went as his sudden absence had not happened last time, but the raven attributed that to his brief hysteria from a month ago. It was very well possible that Minato was trying to make sure that Obito could remain a Shinobi, as the mentally unstable were usually denied the right of becoming part of the force—it presented far too many complications and risks for the council to take that risk, especially for the black sheep of the Uchiha clan. It was also likely that Minato was doing something else, but Obito had no other idea on the matter so he had eventually shrugged it off and went on with his usual habits.

That was possibly the reason why the scene before him seemed so... Odd. It wasn't a bad sort of odd though, not in any way, shape or form. No, it was just different, something foreign to Obito, and it made him feel a mix of pity and disgust for his younger self. He was once a lonely, pathetic child indeed.

Kushina hummed happily from the other room as the sizzle and smell of food wafted into the dining room, where Obito and Minato sat, the latter with a freshly brewed cup of coffee i one hand and a newspaper article in the other. It was so domestic, so normal, so...

So very much like a family.

It left Obito with a full feeling, making him hyper aware of the emptiness he wasn't aware he had. His team was, certainly, his family, but this... Obito had never felt this. He had his team, and they were very much like siblings to them, but being here in this environment made him feel like... Like a child with his parents. He wasn't even aware that he had craved the love of a mother and father, as he had once been convinced that Rin was worth destroying everything, and that all he needed was his team in order to be happy again.

'Apparently not,' he thought quietly as he sipped at his cold glass of orange juice. The only things that he truly felt the atmosphere was missing, were... Rin. Kakashi. The rest of his team should have been there, he couldn't help but think, as they were his family.

Naruto.

He winced slightly at the thought. In a way—if he allowed his condemning thoughts to drag him into that part of his mind—he was robbing Naruto of something precious. He was taking the boy's place, this position as the "son" of the family dynamic. This thought only brought back his initial wishes, his original thoughts on the whole idea of time travel and the fact that he had come back.

The raven wasn't nearly as depressed and... Averse to the idea or situation as he once was, but it was an accepted fact in his mind that he was not the best person to travel back into the past, for multiple reasons. One, first and foremost, was his tendency to cling to the past and dwell on unimportant topics—his current train of thought being a prime example. Two, the fact that he truly didn't feel like he rightfully deserved the chance to see his loved ones again, not when he was the cause of their deaths. Especially when Naruto was possibly the most deserving individual in regards to seeing his parents, the people he never got to truly meet thanks to Obito. Three, he was not the revered child of prophecy, and plain and simple should not try to tamper with what is construed as "fate." He wasn't the little ball of sunshine, Naruto, who could even make the most corrupt of individuals turn a new leaf. ... No pun intended.

His current situation coupled with his damning thoughts didn't particularly help, in all honesty. He couldn't help but feel that it was Naruto who was supposed to be here, eating with his parents, chattering away about nonsense as he came to truly know the great people that had brought him into the world—