Second Chance

Summary: Shikamaru is back, war flashbacks and everything. But no matter how much foreknowledge he has, changing the future is not as easy as he thought. He couldn't very well explain why a 6-year-old would try and hunt down S-ranked criminals from an organization that isn't even known yet. His Hokage being set back to a snot nosed brat that reacts bewildered to any form of affection does not help. At all.

Meanwhile, the former Kazekage of Suna, loved by the public and constantly supported by his siblings is thrown back to being treated like a weapon, while said loving siblings look at him fearfully and avoid him as much as they can. And that doesn't even include the voice in his head, urging him to kill every step that he takes. He really needs someone to fix the seal this time around...

Chapter 1

"-don't know, I just found him like this!"

"Just like this? Sleeping?"

"I told you, I don't know! Can he? I mean, he didn't sleep before, did he?"

Gaara couldn't help the soft groan escaping him, causing the voices to fall silent immediately. Something about the situation seemed odd, for some reason. There was something, just barely out of reach of awareness, something-

Gaara didn't know what it was, but he wasn't quite ready to follow this train of thought. The voices still weren't talking. They seemed to be waiting. For what? For him to react? To wake up? Why was he sleeping at all?

Gaara frowned, trying to focus on something, anything, that could tell him where he was and how he got there. His thoughts felt sluggish, too slow and scattered to offer him any kind of explanation. Was he under some kind of drug? No, that didn't feel right. Giving up for the moment, Gaara decided to concentrate on the voices once more. They had started talking again.

"-think we should get someone?"

"I don't know." For a moment it was quiet. "He doesn't seem to be going crazy."

"Shut up! Don't talk like that, he might hear you!"

Well. Whatever he had expected, it was not an offhand comment about his admittedly questionable mental stability. He hadn't had those in years, not like this.

Gaara felt mildly sick. He was used to people being wary around him, even afraid – it was to be expected, with his position as head of one of the five big countries. Not to mention the reputation he had gained over the last few years, one of the Alliance's most valued shinobi during the War.

His mind seemed to linger at that thought, eager to dive into territory Gaara was unwilling to even graze just yet. Not here. Not now, where voices were talking about him like he hadn't experienced in years, talking in this quiet, muffled way that told him they didn't want him to hear them, were afraid of him doing so, afraid of him.

It didn't help that they sounded awfully familiar.

"Gaara? Gaara, can you hear me?" The feminine voice was speaking again. She sounded louder this time, though Gaara could tell with a sinking feeling that the speaker was a safe distance away from him, a bit too much to be mistaken as anything but intentional.

"What are you doing?!" It wasn't more than a hiss, from the male speaker this time.

Gaara decided he has had enough.

He opened his eyes, to be met with the semi-darkness of his room, his old room, not his quarters as Kazekage. He briefly let his eyes wander, coming to a halt at the window that allowed the last sun rays to shine through before nightfall. His eyes widened, taking in the sight before him.

He couldn't see much – he'd have to get up to get a better view, one he still remembered from his childhood – but it was enough. Because he could see Suna, his home, his village.

The village he hadn't seen in years, standing and whole, that is.

So much had been lost during the War, so much had been destroyed. And Suna had been the very first of the bigger villages to fall. He hadn't been present himself at the time, instead leading one of their troops on the front lines – to victory, eventually – and had heard about Suna's fall only hours after it was over.

While they had managed to evacuate most of its citizens, it had still hurt.

Gaara shook off the memories forcefully. Not all of them were fond, but Suna was still his home. A home he had lost years ago.

And yet, in this moment, his eyes were telling him otherwise. Genjutsu, was the first thought that struck him, but before he could think of it any longer his eyes finally settled on the two other people occupying the room. With his breath caught in his throat, his eyes widening, Gaara drank in the sight of them.

They looked young, so impossibly young and innocent (a word he would never have thought to use on Temari, who could terrify a grown jōnin on her worst days). If he had to guess, he would estimate their age to be around eight or nine for Kankurō, and one year older for Temari. They were tiny, nothing like his strong, dependable advisers – and self proclaimed bodyguards – they had been. Or would become?

Temari stood just a few steps away from him, watching him with wide eyes. She wore casual clothing, thin enough to be comfortable in Suna's desert sun and her trademark hairstyle, sandy blonde hair held back in four ponytails. A wave of nostalgia rose up in Gaara. His sister had discarded the hairdo after a stray attack nearly burnt off two of the tails, and worn it short after that.

She had fallen, trying to lead what was left of one of their troops to safety.

Losing her had been painful, unbearable nearly, and not because they had lost one of their most talented kunoichi. Temari had been his pillar, always supporting him, always there.

Determined, he shoved all his memories away in the very depths of his mind, sealing them with all emotions he wasn't ready (would never be ready) to face, and shifted to look at the second, even smaller person. Kankurō lingered just behind Temari, with one hand firmly on the door as if to push it open and disappear in just a moment if he had to.

He was missing his make-up (pardon, his war-paint – had he even worn it this early in his childhood? Gaara couldn't remember) and wore similar clothes as his sister, convenient to wear in the desert village that was their home.

Kankurō had died just weeks after Temari did. Blinded by their loss and not able to overcome his grief, Kankurō had charged headfirst into one battle after another. He had wasted no thought to his own safety, not caring, until it killed him as well.

It had been nothing short of suicide, and Gaara knew it. He understood it.

And now they were here, breathing, alive, and Gaara shouldn't feel anything but joy, endless relief to see his siblings again, no matter their age.

If it weren't for the way they looked at him. As he observed his siblings the look in their eyes told him everything he needed to know, filled with caution and worry and horrible, horrible dread. They were afraid of him, afraid of what he might do to them and that was such a distant concept coming from his siblings, Gaara had to take a moment to take it in.

He sat up a little from where he was slumped in one of the armchairs, causing Temari to flinch away from him. It felt like a punch to the gut, felt so, so wrong.

"Erm. Hey Gaara! Are, are you alright?", his sister asked cheerfully. It sounded so fake Gaara had to suppress a wince. The smile plastered firmly on Temari's face looked more like a grimace and he could see how tense she was, ready to jump into action – probably to flee the room as soon as Gaara made some sort of threatening move.

"I'm fine," he answered quietly, not trusting his voice to say anything more. He wouldn't have known what else to say anyway.

"Well um. That's great! We'll just, leave you to it then!" Temari's expression hadn't changed from the cheerful, happy tone from before and Gaara hated it.

Of course he recognized it. Temari had spoken to him this way for years, to make sure not to give him a reason to harm her and Kankurō. It wasn't something he wanted to hear from her ever again. He nodded, not wanting to force them to stay any longer when it was obvious how afraid they were.

"Alright then!" Temari flashed him one last, shaky smile before she hurried after Kankurō, who had left without so much as wasting another glance at his brother. Gaara couldn't blame them. He sat back in his chair, took a deep breath and started to organize his thoughts. They still felt all over the place.

He didn't know how he got here, or why he didn't seem more surprised (or suspicious) about the fact that he seemed to be a child again, back when the entire shinobi world wasn't at war (and wasn't it strange how fast he had dismissed the possibility of a genjutsu while it was clearly the most logical explanation?).

He kept his eyes closed, concentrating on the memories creeping just outside his mental awareness. He nearly gasped as they gave in, overwhelmed by their intensity:

Another battlefield, another of their victories that didn't feel like one-

Too many people dead, too many fallen, and wasn't it ironic to fight a war when slowly but certainly there didn't seem to be anyone left to relish a victory-

The smell of blood, a burning, burning pain-

(Gaara winced at that. Had he been injured? It felt bad, could have been lethal even.)

Next to him, a cough, a husky voice speaking to him in short, determined jolts-

Blonde hair, long and messy, normally bright eyes dull and nearly gray, rather than their usual sky blue-

(Naruto. No one had sunshine colored hair like he did, but what did it mean was he alright?)

On his other side a second voice, seasoned and calm despite their surroundings-

(Shikamaru? It had to be, the three of them had been travelling together.)

His memories left him there.

He opened his eyes, and turned to watch the surreal picture that was his home village through the window.

It wasn't much, but he had at least a vague idea of what must have happened last. He had been injured, if the phantom pain in his abdomen and the faint stench of blood he knew couldn't be real were anything to go by. He remembered Naruto and Shikamaru being at his side.

Gaara frowned, trying to make sense of the bits of information his mind could provide him with. Had they been planning? Was that it, was that the reason he wasn't more surprised by his current situation?

It wasn't an easy to believe concept, going back to change everything before it even happened. And yet it didn't feel unbelievable, didn't feel like anything but reality.

Outside in the streets was a family of three, two women each holding the hand of a little girl and swinging her in the air between them. He couldn't hear her laugh from this far away, but it was obvious from her wide smile and the giggles shaking her small frame.

In one of the darker alleys he could see a group of villagers stepping out of what might have been a bar. Less than polite hand gestures were exchanged, and slowly but surely their actions became more violent, pushing and shoving their counterparts and even exchanging punches.

Gaara's smile vanished quickly. He didn't like conflict, even if it was as meaningless as a disagreement among drunkards. Too easy could a harmless argument get out of hand, too important was it in dire situations to work together and he wanted them to stop to vanish to disappear in a cloud of sand never to be seen again-

He snapped away from the window, eyes wide and heart beating several paces to fast.

Where had that come from?

It wasn't like him to overreact to a simple argument he wasn't even part of, so why had he reacted this badly?

He focused, concentrating solely on himself and tuning out anything else.

He was met with a voice, distant and nearly forgotten, accompanied by the feeling of agitation, rage and bloodlust, a voice asking him to act, to kill-

His eyes snapped open, unfocused, and no, it couldn't be, couldn't be true.

But now that he had felt it once, the presence in his mind was unmistakable. It had been with him for a great part of his life, had cheated him of his childhood, had changed him to a bloodthirsty, unstable monster.

He knew now that most of the demon's insanity had been triggered by the seal, incomplete and doing more harm than good, influencing the demon (and, as a result, his host).

It was knowledge that didn't help him much at the moment.

He was back, in his old body, with his old seal and a voice in the back of his head whispering to him, driving him on edge.

All of a sudden it felt quite appealing to find whoever had had the idea of time jumping and make them Shukaku's very first human sacrifice.

When Shikamaru woke up it was very much not to the sound he remembered losing consciousness to – which, while slightly unsettling, was not half as unwelcome as it could have been.

He kept his eyes closed and groaned at the stiffness of his limbs. He didn't want to think back to what caused it and decided instead to simply enjoy the fact that he didn't seem to be in any kind of agonizing pain at the moment.

Sending out his senses, and not discerning any danger in his near surroundings, he settled down and thought back.

Wasteland for what seemed like miles around them, silence, save for the two other people with him. A soft voice, speaking with him quietly but determined – no, discussing, arguing with him –, a second presence next to them, strained words and rattled breathing and horrible, wet coughs-

"Naruto!"

Eyes snapping open, Shikamaru realized what it meant to not hear his friend anymore, what the unavoidable consequence was of him not speaking, not breathing.

He leaped up, looking around him frantically and almost desperately stretching his perception as far as he could, searching for his Hokage, his friend, and hoping, begging him to be alright.

"What-?" Shikamaru frowned.

No Naruto lying next to him (bleeding and gasping but alive), no Gaara in front of him, breathing heavily and just barely keeping upright (with a wound he suspected was much worse than his friend admitted), discussing their options before time ran out – not that there was much they could do.

He was alone.

Shikamaru took in his surroundings and had to muffle a gasp. He recognized the place immediately. Of course he did.

"You've got to be kidding," he muttered, to no one but himself.

He was standing on a wide field of grass, right next to a group of trees and the curve of a narrow river a few meters in front of him – one of the training grounds of Konoha.

He couldn't remember which one it was – it had been a long time since he even set foot in his home village – but he could remember how much time he'd spent here as a child. It wasn't one of the regularly used grounds, thus making it one of his favorite places to, well, do nothing all day.

Recovering from the shock of seeing the place of his childhood again, Shikamaru settled back down.

Now a bit calmer, he could actually concentrate on his thoughts and the conversation he had had before became a lot more clear.

They had argued, he recalled, discussing (and dismissing) options, searching for a solution, some kind of plan, anything except the insane scenario they had planned for countless months that they had been on the run.

The suggestion had come from Naruto – no surprises there – as nothing more but an innocent remark none of them had taken seriously at the time. He had noted how far he had mastered the seals and techniques developed by his mother's clan, laborious collected by them month after month in form of nearly illegible, incomplete scrolls, the notes of a clan full of geniuses, seal masters like there hadn't been anyone else.

Winning the War had not been a common thought at the time, there simply weren't enough of them left. Traveling in small groups, ensuring they weren't easy to track down and constantly on the move, their life had seemed an endless sequence of hiding, fleeing and desperately searching for a solution, anything they hadn't thought of in the months, years that their lives just as well might have come to an end.

On the off chance of completing the (not even) half developed technique Naruto had managed to dig out from who knew where, they had tracked down any remaining clues that may have been left by Naruto's clan members.

It was at that time that Shikamaru thought – not for the first time – how little credit Naruto was given for his intellect. He may not have been a genius in the straightforward definition most shinobi would use. But he had also completed the technique left behind by his father, a task the Fourth Hokage himself had not managed, when he had been 13 years old. Not only that, he had been able to use any techniques in this unique and creative way of his, finding new ways to use them to their fullest (just as he did with his trademark shadow clones). It was a shame how long it had taken for people to acknowledge his talent.

And he had done it, in the end.

Naruto had one day announced (ecstatic and nearly vibrating with excitement) that he had completed the strange space-time jutsu he had mentioned to them now and again over the course of the last months. The technique that was the reason why they hadn't moved their hideout for far too long. With that cheerful smile of his he had explained that they could change everything, prevent their friends' death (and there had been many, so many), the fall of the big countries, everything.

Then they were found. There had been no warning, they hadn't known the enemy was onto them, though they should have been smarter than to stay in one place for so long.

But Naruto had needed time. He wasn't able to accomplish anything with them on the run with no end, so they settled down, let him train and, as it turned out, complete the technique.

But with the enemy on their heels, the fight starting without any prior warning, there had been no time to make plans.

It had ended with him, Gaara and Naruto just barely subduing their opponents, Naruto choking on his own blood before them, Gaara not admitting to anything, though Shikamaru strongly suspected a serious injury to the stomach. Both of them had been desperately trying to come up with some kind of way out, because what Naruto was trying to explain to them sounded so impossible, so final.

In the end they had listened, of course – trying (and failing) to ignore how it got harder and harder for him to breathe, how the life drained out of their friend right in front of their eyes.

Shikamaru let his eyes wander, taking in the sight before him. This particular training ground was near the border, giving him a clear view of the Hokage Monument, without any buildings blocking the sight. He looked up at the four Kage, gaze lingering just a little longer on the Fourth Hokage.

The sun was already starting to go down, casting her last daylight over the village he loved.

Eventually, Shikamaru got up from his seat in the grass, stretching and sighing tiredly. He didn't want to think about everything that was to come, didn't want to think about who he would have to meet again.

His features softened a little. At least he wouldn't have to face all of it alone. If he arrived in the past unharmed that meant two other people had come with him, two of the best people Shikamaru had ever known and definitely the kind of people he would wish for on a mission like this (because that's what it was, a mission).

His thoughts trailed off to Suna briefly, hoping Gaara was alright. It was regrettable, but he would have to hold out on his own for a while – after all, it wasn't like any of them could simply walk out of their village for a visit.

But Gaara was smart – he hadn't become Kazekage at 16 for nothing – and Shikamaru was certain he would be fine until they found a way to contact each other. He sighed, idly wishing they would have had more time to plan. He barely had anything to go by, would have to improvise for the moment.

Instead he thought of the second person he couldn't wait to check up on. Even though Shikamaru doubted that he would have any injury back from the future – he himself didn't have a scratch – he simply couldn't help but worry. It wasn't hard to guess why, he supposed. Naruto had been bleeding out on the floor the last time they saw each other. Besides, the sooner they started to discuss the situation the better.

Mind made up, hands in his pockets and trying to look as carefree as possible, Shikamaru started looking for the man who would one day, once again, become his Hokage.

A/N: Thanks for reading! This is my first time writing... anything, really, so please leave me a review and tell me what I can do better! I'd love to hear what characters you like, where you think this story is going and what you'd like to see.

Please leave a review, thank you!

~Gwen

PS.: Find me on tumblr as 'xxgwenstacyxx'!