One Last Chance
Hey guys, this is my first story, and I really hope to bring this one into fruition pretty soon. I'll be using British spelling since I'm more comfortable with it anyways even though I'm an American.
This will be a Sasuke/FemNaru Time Travel fic. This MAY or may not deviate from the main storyline. Other pairings will pop up if I plan them to.
Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto.
'So close…'
Sasuke turned his head to the left. The unmoving, unmistakably dead body of his best friend laid there, a gaping hole in her chest. His Mangekyo began flickering from lack of chakra in his body. Behind him were the remnants of the Allied Shinobi Forces, a once-proud army of over 80,000 ninjas and samurai from the Five Great Nations and the Land of Iron.
Gaara gravely stepped forward, eyes glinting defiantly. Temari immediately realised what his brother was doing,
"Gaara, no! We've still got a chance at this!"
Gaara tilted his head back at the gathering of people behind him. Despite the terribly desperate situation they were in, his mind couldn't help but wander.
'Where have we gone wrong?'
Immediately he knew the answer, but shook his head before he could even complete the thought. His gaze turned to Naruko's still body, still leaking blood from the gaping hole where the right lung once called home. He closed his eyes and turned to face Madara,
"A girl once told me that a person is truly strong when they are protecting people they love. That same girl is now lying at our feet, it is only natural for us to do the same as what Naruko and thousands of others did, and lay our lives down for what we believe in.
For if we don't fight for what we believe in, why fight at all?"
Gaara steeled his nerves and clamped his hands together. His blood briefly ran cold when another hand was placed on his clamped hands. He turned his steely gaze to the person responsible, only to see Sasuke with a Chidori in his other hand. His bangs hung limply over his tear-streaked red orbs, and his shoulders were shaking in grief and exhaustion. Despite that, however, he somehow found the strength within him to grin slightly.
"You're right, Gaara. If we don't fight for what we believe in, why fight at all?"
A blur appeared to Gaara's left, and a battered Kakashi appeared with his Sharingan open. His jonin vest was ripped to shreds and his mask has come clean off. He also had a tendency to lean on his left leg, since his right leg no longer exists.
"Can't let my adorable juniors beat me in mushy talk, can I? Time to fix my accident."
Kakashi turned to Sasuke and eye-smiled. Sasuke was suddenly struck by just how…FINAL the eye-smile was. It felt like the last poke Itachi gave him, before saying his final farewells. Hard to believe it was only a few months ago. A lone tear escaped from his eye.
"Sasuke-kun, if we don't survive this, let me just say thank you for joining our side again after all Konoha's done. It's been an honour fighting with you, and I'm sure Naruko felt the same."
Everyone involuntarily nodded at that sentiment, and Sasuke couldn't help but let loose a small smirk at that,
"The dobe did have a special way with people."
Kakashi's face turned back to their adversary, hand held together in a ram seal to mold his chakra for possibly his last jutsu.
"You loved her, didn't you?"
Sasuke didn't answer that question, preferring to turn back to Madara as well. Gaara shook his head slightly.
A grimace was shared between all three ninja. They knew that what they were about to do could normally land themselves in a psychiatric ward for suicidal patients, but at this point there was no hospital left in any corner of the world that would care about that.
Uchiha Madara grinned haughtily and said, "Well, if you all insist on your premature deaths, who am I to deny your request?"
Sasuke leapt at the Jubi Jinchuriki, ignoring the imaginary screams of protest that his muscles were giving off. Gaara's clamped hands began molding chakra, and Kakashi's eye started swirling.
"Chidori!"
"Sabaku Nadare!"
"Kamui!"
Madara chuckled at the futile attempt at his life and his Rinnegan whirled into a Sharingan form as well. He charged headlong into Gaara's jutsu and Sasuke's path.
"Sei Kamui!"
As he dashed, Sasuke began having flashes of memory go through his eyes. When Naruko called him out on eating tomatoes in class when they had the no-food rule. When she inadvertently kissed him because someone bumped into her. When she cried over his waning body in Wave. When she declared that she'll go to the ends of the world to get him back from Orochimaru. When she almost single-handedly destroyed the Zetsu army and nearly tipped the scales in their favor.
When she fell in order to protect him and the rest of the forces from Madara's last attack.
Where had he gone wrong?
When Naruko fell, it felt like the world crashed before his eyes. He felt the Curse of Hatred attempt to grab him once again, but he quickly realized that and quashed any vengeful feelings against Madara, no matter how right those feelings felt. Naruko wouldn't have liked that he went back to old Sasuke, anyways. She made that pretty clear when he declared he would join the Allied Shinobi Forces.
Of course, he wouldn't mind sticking the Chidori in his hand through Madara's chest cavity either.
A sudden sensation jolted him back to reality. Kakashi's Kamui and Madara's Sei Kamui clashed with each other, both of them battling it out to see which gate is more powerful. Gaara's sand was sucked into the dueling dimensional gates and was whipped about. Sasuke attempted to stop, but the inertia made him trip and fall into the mess. Suddenly, it appeared as if time slowed everywhere, and the images of everything around him began rending asunder.
Scary when your sensei's mouth began melding into Gaara's chest.
Everything whirled and whirled, and he distinctly felt like a fish trapped in a whirlpool. Only, this whirlpool wasn't as simple as water being sucked down into itself. This was something completely different, if not dangerous.
Of course, Sasuke had no idea what was happening. His Sharingan eyes glanced around, trying to make sense of what the colorful tornado of ripped images was.
Suddenly, everything was all white.
Clap clap
His head automatically turned to the cocky person who would dare clap when everything was clearly not clapping-worthy. His inner self was screaming for him to punch the person. Until he saw who it was that was clapping.
"Nii-san."
"Ah, sorry, but I'm not Itachi-kun."
Sasuke squinted his Sharingan eyes. No, he was pretty sure that was his brother. In a white version of his ANBU outfit. With teal-grey eyes.
Outwardly though, he replied, "Then who are you? And why do you look like my brother?"
The not-Itachi gestured around and replied, "Why, I'm whatever you want me to be. The human brain is like that, they imagine stuff that isn't truly there. For instance, what if I told you my true form is a 6-headed phoenix that breathes rivers of ice, and has a lion attached to my butt?"
Sasuke inhaled.
"Well, I'm not. I don't have a true appearance, I don't even have a physical manifestation. I'm what the beholder wants to see. As for your first question, I don't have a name, but people usually refer to me as It-Who-Controls-Time-Space-And-Your-Life. Or you can just call me Kenji."
Sasuke mentally groaned,
'Great, I'm dealing with a nutjob metaphysical entity with a huge ego. Yay.'
Kenji's eye twitched and he/it said, "I can hear your thoughts, you know."
Sasuke's face reddened in embarrassment and he said aloud, "So where are we?"
Kenji smirked and replied, "In the absence of time and space, there's nothing. We're in a protected haven made by Amaterasu in the event that something like this occurs. Those 'jutsu' that those two people did completely destroyed the barrier between time and space, then combined them. This cannot happen, since the laws of the universe allowed the time and space dimensions to run parallel, not intersecting, in order for stuff to exist. The end result is similar to the meeting to anti-matter and matter, when combined the two annihilate each other in a spectacular explosion of energy. Here, the energy released by the dimensional rift is so powerful it completely destroyed your world.
In essence, everyone you knew is now dead. And, to be fair, so are you. You, Sasuke, are the only survivor from your dimension. This place, this safe haven, is known as the Interdimensional Safe Zone."
Kenji's face contorted into a grimace, and continued, "You, Sasuke-kun, are in limbo."
Sasuke's mouth dropped in a very un-Uchiha-like manner. Out of all those words, he only got the part about his world being destroyed, and him being in limbo. But the message came across.
Fuck.
"So what do I do now?"
Kenji's face relaxed and he/it gave Sasuke a cheerful grin, "Whatever you want. The deities are working to fix the rift and make sure that mortals can't open a rift using that technique again, anyways, so I guess problem solved."
"Am I stuck with you for eternity?"
"Yes. Unless…"
Sasuke leaned forward to listen closely to this 'but' statement.
"There is a way. All dimensions normally are the same, with a few exceptions. Your dimension was one of several. If you want, I can revive you in whichever body that your chakra matches. Generally, it's your younger or olde-"
"Do it."
Kenji's mouth closed, and a shit-eating grin spread across his face.
"Are you sure? Remember, you won't have the chance to come back here again. You will die, just like everyone else, go to the afterlife, just like everyone else."
Sasuke replied sternly, "Anything to fix what happened in my world."
Kenji nodded understandingly, "Yes, yes. You know, you are the second person to come here, and the other person chose to move on to be a watcher of sorts. Over all dimensions. You could do the same. You could be immortal, time will never age you."
However, the Uchiha's mind was already set. Kenji's grin slowly softened into a soft smile,
"This is about love, isn't it?"
Sasuke's head arched up in shock. Kenji shook his head and said, "We metaphysical beings, deities and watchers, we don't really feel love. If it's one thing that everyone here hates about humans, it's their ability to feel an emotion so powerful it transcends their natural instincts of self-preservation. You guys think that you are so powerful when you fight for someone precious to you. Sad to say, you're right, and it's the one thing that some of us don't like about you guys."
"I'm…sorry?"
Kenji replied wistfully, "No, its fine. We get immortality as a bonus, so it evens out in the end anyways. Anyways, even though I can't feel love, I can understand how it works. I'm assuming you wish to be brought back as far back as possible, back to when your love interest is still alive?"
Sasuke never nodded so fervently in his life.
"Ah, ok. Let me see, which one to send you to…"
Rustle rustle.
Sasuke had a distinct feeling that the dimensions were kept in his ninja pockets, from how Kenji was feeling around his pockets.
"This one should do the trick!"
He took out a scroll and unfurled it. Inside was the most complex sealing array he had ever seen. Coupled with moving images of people.
"Kami-sama found it appropriate to make the dimensions' physical form into scrolls. Something about being poetic and writing your own story. Sasuke-kun, you sure about this?"
Sasuke grunted in assent.
"Good, good. Place your hand in the middle of the sealing array, where there's a hand print. Yes, there."
He heaved a sigh, and he slammed his hand onto the scroll. A small sliver of sand curled up onto his hand when he pressed it. Sasuke's eyes widened at the sand, but before he could say something the world started whirling again. However, he could still hear Kenji's voice as if he was right beside him,
"Remember, don't die too soon! And try out some food while you're there, we immortals don't get to eat human cuisine too often! I heard onigiri was nice…"
The world began picking up speed in its rotation. Sasuke's brain began closing down for the night. In other words, he fainted.