As soon as Shikamaru woke up, he noticed that something was off. Quickly, he opened his eyes reaching for his kunai only to find that it wasn't in its usual place under the pillow. His surroundings gave him the reason that the kunai wasn't there. The room was definitely not the hotel room he had fallen asleep in the previous night. Glancing around, he took in the bare interior trying to find some clue of where he was as he made the hand seal for a shadow possession jutsu. Some clothes hanging in the closet caught Shikamaru's eye. He could see a blue shirt with an Uchiha clan symbol on the back of it. The shirt appeared to be the same type of shirt Sasuke used to wear and the same size. Who would have Sasuke's old shirts? Was he for some reason in Sasuke's old apartment? That didn't make sense. Maybe he was in Sakura's apartment and she had stolen some of Sasuke's shirts to sleep with at night. No. It didn't make sense for him to be there either. Sakura and him were never particularly close.
Shikamaru cautiously got out of bed and fell in shock as he saw his legs and body much smaller than they should be. He had been so focused on his surroundings, he hadn't noticed what was so strange about himself. This was not the first time he had been in someone else's body, - with Ino as a teammate, you got used to that sort of thing- but this was the first time that he hadn't had a say in the matter. Shikamaru briefly considered the possibility that Ino mind swapped him with a kid as a joke, but dismissed it immediately. Ino knew that crossed a line. Unfortunately, this left him without a suspect. He couldn't find any motive for any other Yamanaka, and he didn't know anyone else that was capable of a mind swap jutsu.
Shikamaru carefully maneuvered himself around the room looking for a reflective surface while keeping a lookout for traps or other people. He opened a drawer and found a stash of weapons. He reached for a weapon to help protect himself and to look at his reflection. At the sight of said reflection, Shikamaru almost dropped the kunai. The face looking back at him looked like Sasuke, the same face he remembered from the last time he saw it three years ago.
"Kai!" said Shikamaru as he realized this had to be a genjutsu. When nothing changed, Shikamaru frowned. This had to be a genjutsu. Gripping the kunai tightly, he brought it down into the side of his leg. Pain flared up where he'd stabbed and Shikamaru muttered a curse as he removed the kunai. Ok, he was either caught up in the genjutsu of a really powerful ninja or this wasn't a genjutsu. The only other alternative was that he was the victim of a time travel mind swap combination jutsu. For the time being, Shikamaru considered that to be a very low possibility since he had never even heard of time travel jutsu. Of course, he had learned not to count out anything when it came to the abilities of other ninja. After meeting an actual immortal, nothing seemed too crazy.
Since standing around trying to think of what happened did nothing to help Shikamaru figure out his situation, he decided he should explore. "It would probably be best to bandage up the leg too," Shikamaru thought as he glanced at the blood dripping down the thin leg to the floor.
There were two other rooms in the small apartment, a kitchen and a bathroom where he found the proper materials to treat his self-inflicted wound. Nothing in the rooms held anything of interest to Shikamaru, so he decided to venture outside. Upon exiting the door, he paused and surveyed his surroundings. His eyes paused on the Hokage monument. Tsunade's face was missing as if this actually were three years ago. Nothing else was out of the ordinary. Unsure of what his next move should be, Shikamaru hesitated. What did one do when he appeared to wake up three years ago in the twelve year old body of someone that betrayed the village? Shikamaru was pretty sure there was no logical reaction to something so completely illogical.
Without a goal in mind, Shikamaru walked towards the Nara compound keeping himself alert and watching everyone he passed by. About ten minutes into his travels, Shikamaru spotted a Sakura that looked the same age as he did heading in the opposite direction. After a moment's thought, he decided to let her see him, so he could determine if she acted like she was supposed to. Sakura spotted Shikamaru and started grinning crazily as she picked up her pace.
"Hey Sasuke! Why are you going in the wrong direction?" Sakura asked as she neared him. The wrong direction for what? If Shikamaru accepted the premise that he was back in time, she would probably mean a mission or to go train with the rest of the team. As far as he knew, Sakura had no other reason of knowing what direction Sasuke would be heading in. Shikamaru couldn't think of a good response, so he stayed silent causing Sakura to pout before brightening suddenly.
"Well, since we're both here, we could walk to the academy together!" At her words, Sakura reached out to Shikamaru. Shikamaru quickly evaded her and put a significant distance between himself and Sakura. For all he knew, this was the ninja that had put him in a genjutsu and planned to attack him as someone he trusted. Sakura looked even more put out than before. "Um, it's okay. We don't have to walk together."
Shikamaru made an ambiguous noise and started heading to the academy. He figured that it would be best to just play his role as Sasuke for now. Apparently Sakura had decided to take Shikamaru's noise as permission to walk with him because she kept pace with him as he continued. Sakura tried making conversation to which Shikamaru responded with more noncommittal sounds. All in all, it made for a very uncomfortable trip.
"So it was to the academy not a mission or training. This must be close to four years back then." Shikamaru was not pleased with this new revelation. The farther back it was, the harder it would be to remember how everything was supposed to be.
Shikamaru entered his old classroom and looked around at all his former classmates feeling a wave of nostalgia. He examined everyone finding nothing out of the ordinary for now. Some of the kids weren't there, but he was still clearly early. Shikamaru's gaze fell on his best friend, Choji, who scarfed on his usual bag of chips. Usually, Shikamaru showed up right before class time, so he didn't find it strange that Choji currently sat alone. Would someone else be occupying Shikamaru's younger body or would it be his younger self? Unless it was just an illusion.
"Sasuke?" Sakura's voice broke through Shikamaru's thoughts and he realized that Sakura had been saying something to him.
"Hmm?" Shikamaru replied.
"Well, I asked if you wanted to - um- sit together maybe?" Sakura gazed at Shikamaru with an intensity that made him want to run. How would Sasuke react to this? Shikamaru just glanced at Sakura and then turned and made his way to a seat in the front. It seemed that Sakura took his response as a negative this time as she didn't end up sitting next to him. Shikamaru sighed in relief. He was supposed to go out on a date with Temari today, not end up on the receiving end of the advances of an eleven year old version of Sakura. How did such a promising day end up such a mess?
Listening to an academy lecture as a chunin was not an experience Shikamaru would recommend to anyone. If this was a genjutsu, what was the plan? Bore him to death? Shikamaru wished he hadn't chosen to try and act like Sasuke. He wanted to fall asleep already like his younger counterpart. The younger version of Shikamaru had slouched in a few seconds before class and taken his seat next to Choji before promptly falling asleep. If someone else occupied his body, they knew enough about him to convincingly act like him. Ino had never shown up causing Shikamaru to wonder where she was. Ino had missed class at times due to illness, so her absence wasn't too unusual. Still, Shikamaru felt he should investigate a little.
After class, Shikamaru waited for all the other students to leave and then walked over to Iruka sensei. "Ah, Sasuke, how can I help you?"
Shikamaru figured there was no way to do this while staying in character, so he just went for the direct approach. "Do you know why Ino wasn't here today?"
If Iruka was surprised before, he was absolutely floored now. "Ino? Her parents contacted me a bit before class. She has the flu."
Shikamaru nodded. So nothing unusual there. He started to leave, but Iruka held him back. Shikamaru raised an eyebrow in question. "Why did you want to know about Ino?" Iruka looked hopeful as he asked the question. What he was hoping for, Shikamaru didn't know.
"The Yamanaka clan jutsus sound very… useful," Shikamaru answered. Hopefully, that was in character enough even though Sasuke had never shown any interest in the Yamanaka clan as far as he could tell. Iruka's face fell in disappointment, and Shikamaru again wondered what he had hoped for.
"Sasuke, the Yamanaka clan holds their jutsus as a clan secret. They won't let anyone else learn them." Shikamaru just shrugged and left without Iruka holding him back this time.
Not knowing what else to do, Shikamaru wondered off to a training ground to see how good he'd be in a fight with Sasuke's body. He shouldn't be able to move as fast, throw as fast, or hit as hard, but he thought he might still be able to use all his jutsus. None of Shikamaru's jutsus were very chakra intensive, and Sasuke's chakra reserves as a near academy graduate shouldn't be too much less than Shikamaru's reserves at sixteen.
Shikamaru found out he was right about not being as physically capable before. Even his accuracy decreased significantly as he tried to adjust to a shorter arm and height. His attempts with jutsu fared much worse than he had predicted. Whereas Shikamaru's chakra had always been stable, slow, and easily controlled, at the moment it flowed quickly and recklessly. Too much escaped the first time he tried to make a clone. The clone collapsed to the ground pale and sickly looking.
Shikamaru shook his head at the dismal clone and dismissed it. He started trying to gather the wild chakra again and felt it rush out too quickly again. Shikamaru completed the jutsu to stop the flow and another failed clone collapsed on the ground. He should have guessed since Ino had told her teammates about the differences between different people's chakras, but she had never seemed to struggle so much. As for himself, he'd never used chakra during a body swap. Anytime he'd been involved in a mind swap, he did so for interrogation purposes. Take the appearance of someone the target trust, and they reveal information to someone they shouldn't without even realizing it. Shikamaru decided to do chakra control exercises before attempting another jutsu.
By the end of the day, Shikamaru successfully climbed a tree without hands. He nearly cried from a combination of relief and utter exhaustion. How did Ino adapt to different chakras so easily? He held a whole new level of admiration for his female teammate.
Shikamaru's uneasiness with his situation kept him up all night with his mind whirling over the mystery over who and what had done this to him. Mind swaps only lasted a couple hours at most when Ino used them, but Shikamaru remained in young Sasuke's body for a full day. As far as he knew, no Yamanaka could hold the jutsu that long. As far as he knew, no one could use time travel jutsu. With so little information about his predicament, Shikamaru didn't know where to start his investigation. Everybody was a suspect, but no one was more suspicious than anyone else. Except maybe whoever occupied his body.
When Shikamaru took a seat in the front of the class the next day, he angled his body so he could see when his younger self entered the classroom. He would have to approach the potential imposter on his way back to the Nara compound, but he figured he should check to see if the person outed himself by acting strangely before then. As it turned out, this day was not the day Shikamaru confronted his counterpart.
Ino's entrance into the classroom caught Shikamaru's attention since she had been sick the previous day and hadn't shown up. Shikamaru stared as Ino looked around frantically until her eyes met his. Ino glared at him and then started stomping towards him. Shikamaru raised his eyes in surprise. Ino was downright obsessed with Sasuke at this age. She never got angry with him. "What the fuck did you do?" Ino spit out after she stopped right in front of Shikamaru.
Everyone in the class started to stare, and Shikamaru held back a groan. He had a pretty good idea of who had swapped with Ino now. "I didn't do anything. Can you please be more discrete?"
"We're having a talk. Right now. Walk in front of me. I'll follow you outside." Ino folded her arms and stared Shikamaru down with ice cold anger. Shikamaru hesitated before turning his back on Ino and heading to the exit. He felt pretty certain that Sasuke wouldn't harm his own body at least. As he neared the exit, Shikamaru heard a tussle and turned back around. Sasuke-as-Ino was being held back by Sakura and he bristled with anger.
"Ino-pig, what are you doing with Sasuke? You can't just order him around to get him alone!" Sakura yelled.
"Move out of the way," Sasuke bit out. He looked ready to kill Sakura, so Shikamaru figured he should step in.
"Sakura," Shikamaru started. The absolute adoration that filled Sakura's eyes as she looked at him almost made him roll his eyes. "Let Ino go. I need to talk to her about something." Sakura look crushed but moved aside for Sasuke who brushed passed her without a second glance. Shikamaru continued walking to Sasuke's apartment.
"So you stole my old place too?" Sasuke asked calmly as he followed Shikamaru into the apartment. The anger Sasuke had shown earlier was now completely absent from his voice and facial expression.
"I didn't steal anything. I'm not the one responsible for this mess."
"And you expect me to believe that?"
"You expect me to believe that you're not the one that did this? Who knows what kind of stuff you got up to with Orochimaru?"
"Why would I want to be in your weak child body? I've spent my time with Orochimaru training my body and my Sharingan. I was finally ready to fight Him, but now I can't because I have the chakra reserves of a three year old, and I can't even use ninety percent of my jutsus." Sasuke told him all of this completely devoid of emotion, but Shikamaru was sure the earlier anger was lurking around. What Sasuke had said were things Shikamaru had already thought of during the walk. Sasuke didn't appear to have any motive, so he could mostly be removed as a suspect. One down, a million to go.
"First of all, I'm not Ino," Shikamaru clarified. Sasuke's eyes widened briefly and he opened his mouth to speak, but Shikamaru continued before he could. "Second of all, I agree with your reasoning and don't think you're a suspect. Now, you have access to Yamanaka clan information and you should research everything you can about their mind swap jutsus. Ask Ino's father when you can, ask any of the more talented members of the clan, and find a way to access all their secret scrolls."
"And what makes you think I'll do what you want me to do?" Sasuke quirked a blond eyebrow.
"Because you want to be back in your body as soon as possible. Because you know that needling the Yamanaka clan for information about their jutsus is a good place to start."
"A good place to start would be interrogating you. You're the one occupying my body and you still haven't even told me who you are."
"I'm Shikamaru. You can ask me whatever you want, but I would advise you against trying to attack me and hold me captive. I'm a lot stronger than you currently are." At Shikamaru's words, Sasuke let his anger show on Ino's face before he managed to control it enough to hide it.
"Are you and Ino in on this thing together? I'm assuming she's the one controlling your body," Sasuke said gazing at Shikamaru intently.
"I already told you I didn't do this, and Ino didn't either. Ino is probably younger me, but I can't be sure. I was going to approach whoever it was after class. I intended to be subtle instead of acting out of character and suspicious like you."
Sasuke scoffed. "Whoever did this already knows exactly who I am, and anyone who isn't involved doesn't matter. No one's going to jump to the conclusion that Ino's mind isn't in her body just cause I act a little bit out of character."
"You don't think Ino's parents are going to realize when their daughter becomes a completely different person?" Shikamaru asked pointedly.
"I'm sure they will. And I'm sure they'll chalk it up to her maturing. I'll ease them into it." Shikamaru remained doubtful, but he let it go for now.
"So I'm guessing you didn't really have the flu yesterday?" Shikamaru wondered what had really happened when Sasuke woke up to find himself in Ino's body.
"I think it's time we approach Ino or whoever is in your body," Sasuke ignored Shikamaru's question.
"We might have to wait for tomorrow." Sasuke started to protest, but Shikamaru cut him off. "We'll have to wait for myself to get out of class so that we don't make another scene. By that time, Ino's parents will have already found out that you ditched class. You'll have to meet up with them and tell them why you ditched class. While you're doing that, we miss our opportunity to confront our target alone. I'd go without you, but I'd rather have backup in such an unknown situation. Even if the backup is you."
Sasuke ignored the insult and rolled his eyes. "Why do I have to confront Ino's parents? Confronting the likely enemy is more important."
"Because we don't want anyone being more suspicious than they have to be. Because we have something that needs to be fixed before we confront a potential enemy."
"And what's that?" Sasuke asked boredly.
"Training. I can't control your chakra enough to even do a clone jutsu yet. You're going to teach me how. You'll tell Ino's parents that you skipped class to train with me. That way, you'll have an excuse already prepared when you sneak out later. If you can sneak out, that is." Naruto used to push Sasuke into to doing things by implying he was incapable and riling him up. Hopefully, that method still worked. From the way Sasuke seemed to smirk in mild amusement, Shikamaru figured it didn't work as well as he had hoped.
"Still can't control your chakra? I mastered Ino's in under two hours yesterday." Still smirking, Sasuke started moving towards the exit. "Are you going to follow me to the training grounds or did you already give up?" Shikamaru followed feeling reluctantly amused by Sasuke's childish behavior.
"You really can't even do a clone jutsu?" Sasuke asked upon reaching the empty training grounds near his apartment.
"Are you going to gloat again?" Shikamaru already felt bored with Sasuke's attitude.
"Who's gloating? I was just trying to figure out if I should take your advice or not." Shikamaru barely had time to wonder what Sasuke was referring to before Sasuke's hand flicked forward launching three kunai at chest level. Shikamaru dropped low and rolled backwards as Sasuke started advancing on him. A leg kicked out towards Shikamaru's head, and he jumped to the side.
"We were supposed to train ninjutsu, not taijutsu," Shikamaru scolded while catching Sasuke's right fist before it could land on his face. Instead of answering, Sasuke turned into a rock. Damn it. Replacement jutsu. As Shikamaru moved to a safer area, he pulled out a few kunai. He should've known that Sasuke wouldn't stay so cooperative.
A crinkling of leaves caused Shikamaru to look in the direction of the sound. Few leaves were visible in that direction, but a tree blocked some of his view. Of course, Sasuke knew better than to make sound that could lead an enemy to him, so he had probably made the noise to try and catch Shikamaru into a trap. Shikamaru crept towards the tree silently. He paused when he saw ninja wire drawn taut near the ground. Once he noticed the wire, a kunai with an explosive note hurtled towards him from above. Shikamaru started to jump backwards when some kunai with notes struck the ground behind him with perfect precision. He dodged left instead and then froze when he found his legs stuck to the ground. Looking down, he found packed tight dirt covering the bottom half of his legs and connecting him to the ground.
Sasuke immediately rushed towards Shikamaru and feinted a right hook before landing a blow to the stomach with his left foot. As Shikamaru reacted to the blow, Sasuke moved behind him pulling both of Shikamaru's arms back and kneeing him in the middle of the back. Shikamaru bent backwards, and Sasuke rolled over him pinning Shikamaru's arms to the ground with his knees and straddling his chest. Shikamaru attempted to knock Sasuke off of him, but Sasuke's position held him down even with Shikamaru's strength advantage. He probably would have been able to escape if his legs weren't pinned down.
"Genjutsu?" Shikamaru mused casually as if he hadn't just gotten pinned down by his attacker. Sasuke's eyes widened at his nonchalance.
"Your legs? Yeah, but since I've got your arms pinned, it might as well be real."
"So what are you hoping to accomplish from this? You can't kill me without killing yourself. Unless, you're not really Sasuke." Shikamaru felt pretty sure that this was Sasuke, but there was a reasonable chance that someone else had just pretended to be.
"Maybe I am. Maybe I'm not. But the identity that's in question here is yours. I'm going to ask you a question that only Shikamaru should know. We've had few conversations just between the two of us. Do you remember a conversation we had a couple days after my team got back from a mission in Wave?" Shikamaru narrowed his eyes and nodded. "Good. What question did you ask that angered me?"
Shikamaru remembered the subject that had started the conversation. Team 7 had just found out that their sensei had a Sharingan. "I asked you if you had ever considered the possibility that one of your clan members impregnated someone from outside the village. You answered that none of the Uchiha would ever be so careless about the possibility of letting the Sharingan fall into enemy hands."
"I suppose you really are Shikamaru." Despite his admittance, Sasuke didn't let up his hold.
"Great. Can you let me go now? I doubt your genjutsu can hold much longer."
"I still don't trust that you had nothing to do with this." Sasuke's words came out as a threat while he locked an intimidating gaze onto Shikamaru.
Shikamaru stared back impassively. "Fine."
Sasuke loosened his hold and leapt back a few feet. The genjutsu dispelled, and Shikamaru sat up rubbing his arms. "Can we start what we came here for, or do you plan on attacking me again?"
"Perhaps, but not right now. I still have to find out if you're responsible for this."
"Why would I want to do this?" Shikamaru wished he could skip the part where he has the convince Sasuke of his innocence. All the accusations and explanations about him wasted time that could be spent finding the real culprit. It'd almost be time for my date with Temari, Shikamaru thought wistfully.
Sasuke stared Shikamaru down intently. "To get my Sharingan."
Shikamaru gaped incredulously at Sasuke. "You think someone would travel back in time and switch bodies with younger you all to get your Sharingan."
"People have done a lot of stupid and weird things to try and get the Sharingan. One man bit my neck to offer me power all so that one day he could take over my body and possess my Sharingan. That's not much more insane than this." Sasuke's expression didn't change from the empty one he usually had, so it took Shikamaru a while to realize he'd made a sort of joke.
"Right. Well, I can assure you that I'm not trying to get your Sharingan. I don't have a way to prove that I didn't do this, so you're just going to have to trust me." At Sasuke's unimpressed face, Shikamaru sighed. "Or at least trust me enough to help me figure out what is going on. You can keep watch on me more easily if we're working together."
Sasuke's face remained unreadable until he gave a sharp nod. "Fine, but if I find out you did this, I'm going to kill you as a warm up for Orochimaru. And I'm not helping you use my chakra." Much to Shikamaru's displeasure, Sasuke raced off before he could give advice on how to better act like Ino. Ino's parents would have him examined before the sun went down.