Down Every Road - Tumblr Posts
Hiiii how about a prompt for Further Down Road One, political marriage!Shikasuke, maybe something from an Uchiha's POV on the Shikabane-hime's meteoric rise in power, international acclaim, and political capital? And how it ripples out onto the clan as a whole?
I mean, the point of Road One is that the arranged marriage itself already does SO MUCH to change the trajectory of the Uchiha clan’s fate for the better that, basically, everything else after that is kind of a bonus. The fact that Shikako’s smart and powerful and a good person is NICE, yes, but just being engaged to Sasuke already earned so much approval from the clan as a whole that it’s just kinda… ehhhh…
Although… and this somewhat of a tangent to the prompt… it would be funny if… okay, let me set this up by saying: I don’t necessarily like Itachi as a character. When he was kind of a psychopath and apparently just murdered his entire family to test his power, that was at least a… strength of will or conviction that kind of resonated thematically. Like, what if Will of Fire goes bad kind of thing. Or the pressures of being clan heir, of being pushed too hard and too fast, would lead to a genius of violence snapping and using said violence. Then when it turns out he was given orders to murder his entire family and his one condition was that Sasuke would get to live is like… what the fuck dude. It’s both backtracking to make Itachi weaker as a character and also, somehow, even more of a psychopath in my opinion. And, like, sure, Danzo maybe used Shisui’s Sharingan to unbreakable genjutsu him into it, but I don’t think that really absolves Itachi.
All that being said, theoretically in this kinder world of Road One, we never get to that point. Additionally, there’s less pressure on Itachi to continue to excel SO OVERTLY since the clan isn’t getting isolated and also because Shisui is still there and alive to share the burden.
BUT, I do still… the idea that the Uchiha elders have been wanting one of the clan to become Hokage is something that I hold to be true unless proven otherwise. I do think the clan elders would push more for Itachi to be Hokage—because he is clan heir and so has the pedigree, while Shisui (just as powerful, literally Flee On Sight in the bingo books at such a young age) I think we’ve fandom agreed is an orphan or at least a lesser branch of the Uchiha clan.
Anyway, all of the above leads me to: Shisui and Itachi trying to PR campaign for their sister-in-law Shikako (who WILL be an Uchiha once the marriage actually) to be the new “best candidate” for an Uchiha Hokage. Like, really just them listing off all of her accomplishments to not only the Uchiha elders but the rest of the clan (who, again, already quite like her).
I also think, in this universe, that Shikako would DO SOMETHING about Sora-ku once she feels a little more comfortable making decisions—or, at least, making proposals with attached logistics—for the Uchiha clan. Like. It’s a huge chunk of territory that seems to be an abandoned city. But it’s apparently functional enough to have a community of sorts of black marketeers and a support system. Like, it’s not so out of the way of things that nobody bothers with it, which implies that it could be rejuvenated with the time and resources. I think I read a theory once that it’s because Senju used their skills to desertify the area so there just wasn’t enough food to support a city of that size. BUT, now they’ve got Shikako. And Shikako’s connections. Whether that is the ANY clan alliance or Tenzo/Yamato or upper echelons of Hidden Mist’s administration (Haku is an ice user, yes, but like he and Zabuza wouldn’t throw a squad of Mist nin with water nature to help with irrigation at Shikako’s request for free) or even the literal oasis creating ancient god Gelel.
So, you know, she’s more than proven herself to the world. And with the Sora-ku rejuvenation, already brought a level of prosperity to the Uchiha clan than they could ever imagine. “Shikako for Hokage” is not a hard sell for Shisui and Itachi whatsoever (and also, they do think Sasuke would be so happy as her First Gentleman/trophy husband)
Yeah, that’s kind of all I can think of for this prompt in terms of it being different than how the Nara clan or DoS canon clans for that matter would view her meteoric rise. Hope you enjoyed, anon.