Madara is in the midst of completing paperwork when Izuna pokes his head in through the door. Upon seeing his brother's expression, Madara immediately puts his brush down and prepares for the worst. "What is it?"

"First, you have to promise not to get mad." Izuna's words have Madara reaching up to pinch his nose. This is going to be interesting. Did a training ground burn down? Did someone try cooking and burn down a house? Did a jutsu go wrong and now there's a fire no one can put out in the street?

"What. Happened?"

"Promise me first."

"Fine. I promise to not get mad. Now will you tell me what happened?" If he didn't have to complete this paperwork, Madara would be throwing his brother into the koi pond right this instance.

"Right. Well. We mayyyy have a child-sized Hikaku problem."

Madara blinks and then blinks again. "As in the problem is the size of Hikaku as a child or the problem is Hikaku as a child?" He shoots Izuna a glare. It better be the former. If it's the latter…

"Uhhhh, the latter?"

Does he really want to know? Does he?

He looks at Izuna, looks down, and notes the lack of a child Hikaku. "And where is Hikaku right now?"

Looking completely calm, Izuna just shrugs. "Probably still at the training field, unconscious."

"Damn it." Madara hastily abandons his desk and the paperwork to head to the training ground in question. Izuna easily keeps pace beside him. "This is why you're not allowed to work with children without other adult supervision. Don't leave children unconscious in a training ground without some kind of protection!"

"But it's Hikaku!"

"Who is, currently, a child," Madara stresses. "Which—how did that even happen? What were you two up to?"

Izuna's nose crinkles in the way it always does when he's about to tell Madara something that Madara explicitly said not to. "So you know how you said not to fuck around with the time abilities of the Sharingan because we didn't know heaps about them? Anyway, uh, we might've done that. There might've been some Mangekyō involved. You know how it goes."

He does not know how it goes.

Honestly, Madara had—foolishly—expected better of his brother and Hikaku. The worst part is that he knows they're professional shinobi and capable. So, all things considered, they should definitely know better than to go about playing with time—possibly even space-time—jutsus especially when it involves the Sharingan.

Arriving at the training ground finds Hikaku, child sized as expected, conscious as is not expected. At the very least, he hasn't gone anywhere. He… looks to be meditating actually. Then again, child Hikaku trained a lot—as did all of them really. While it hasn't changed, training has become less a life-or-death deal, and they also stress not pushing yourself too far these days.

Hikaku opens his eyes and stares at them with a grumpy expression. Madara skids to a stop, arms pinwheeling, because that is the expression he receives when he's behind on paperwork, which he's not!

"I," Hikaku says, stressing the word, "am not some child to be knocked out Izuna and the next time you do that I'll see you stuck on bed rest for months."

Next to Madara, Izuna audibly gulps and wilts. "Heyyy Hikaku, long time no see?"

"You saw me just before you knocked me out and left me here," Hikaku says, stepping forward.

Madara's just grateful he's not alone in stepping back. Then he realises what Hikaku is saying and turns to face his little brother. "Wait, hold up, you knocked him out?"

"Okay, so this sounds bad," Izuna says, "but in my defence, he was suddenly a child!"

Unfortunately for them all, child-sized Hikaku still has all his speed and is now the perfect height to go for Izuna's knees. Madara watches as the pair of them roll around, Hikaku going for the attack with all his short limbs and overextending big time, while Izuna tries not to hurt Hikaku considering that he's now a literal child.

"So," Madara says, above the sound of Hikaku's hissed threats and Izuna's yowling, "does anyone have an idea on how to get around this? Or, you know, what you even did?"

No one pays any attention of him.

Scowling, he looks around and spots, with glee, a nearby pond that looks to be full of mud more than anything else. Madara grabs the collars of both Hikaku and Izuna, heaves, and tosses them in. The subsequent screeches are the best sounds he's heard in at least three days—which was when he last threw Izuna in the koi pond. It is, in one word, absolutely glorious.

As they scramble out of the water, now drenched in mud, Madara asks, "Do you know how to reverse this?"

"Some Sharingan thing," Izuna helpfully says, wringing out his hair as he does so. Unfortunately, all he succeeds in doing is rubbing mud into his hair. A split-second use of the Sharingan means that Madara catches that moment in picture-perfect clarity.

Hikaku sighs, shaking his hands and trying to get some of the mud and very much failing. "It's been hypothesised that the Sharingan can interact on some level, specifically the Mangekyō because they operate on a space-time level which, obviously, there's only one level on."

"And you… decided to test this? Why?" Madara can't help but be shocked. Izuna might not be better than this, but he'd thought Hikaku was. Then again, even the most normal ninjas like a flashy jutsu and the Sharingan does have a rather strong pull.

The pair exchange a look and Madara finds himself curious, because that hadn't been a simple 'just for fun' look. No, there's an actual reason behind this and, well, that might change things. Then again, Madara can't really think of anything that really explains this and makes up for the fact one of the Uchiha's best ninjas is now the size of a child.

"Well," Izuna begins, "if the Sharingan operates on a space-time level, then it makes sense that we can move things back and forwards in time, right?"

Madara frowns, brows furrowing. "Why would you want to move something back or forward in time? Messing with time… There's a lot that could go wrong there." The Uchiha have been theorising about how time works and what happens when you mess with time for years. There's a reason why people don't do it and there are stories of Uchihas getting lost in time, never returning.

Then again, Madara's always considered such stories a bunch of lies and the real story is that someone got killed on their mission—which is much more common and doesn't make such a good story. However… Well, there's no way of really knowing. Maybe they did get lost to time when experimenting with their Sharingan and came out in a different time period, maybe they didn't.

Whatever the case is, there's certainly never been a story like this one—in which a ninja physically goes back in time without actually going back in time.

The very thought is doing Madara's head in. How does it work? He doesn't know, but he does know that the Lore Keeper will be interested in this and he'll definitely be sharing his view of it later, as Hikaku and Izuna will too.

"And," Madara adds while Hikaku and Izuna argue silently with their facial expressions, trying to force one another to explain, "do we have an idea on how to return Hikaku back to his… proper size?"

Hikaku grimaces at that, turning away from Izuna. His expression and mannerisms are that of the Hikaku that Madara is used to, and neither fit his current body size. It's a comical thing and if Madara wasn't so worried over the possible repercussions and negative effect of this whole thing, he'd definitely be fighting laughter.

"We can try to do what we did again but backwards?" Hikaku says. "It's not… Well, there's no way of really knowing. Nothing like this has happened before. As for what we were doing…" He trails off, lips twisting together. Madara senses his chakra flare, a dim spark that he only senses because of his familiarity and closeness with Hikaku, and then Hikaku's eyes are spinning red with the Sharingan.

That answers one question at least—the Sharingan is still working and that's great except for the part where Madara can't actually send a child on missions or onto the battlefield. Not to mention, there's no way that Hikaku can continue his current duties with the body of a child. Even if his mind is that of an adult, his body isn't and it's likely all his hormones and emotions will be off too. That said, Hikaku—thankfully—hadn't been an overly emotional child like some Madara could name, Izuna.

"I mean it could work," Izuna says, still working on trying to get mud out of his hair. It's a futile effort, but Madara's not about to say anything about it. "Only, that twist towards the end, I wasn't controlling that and I'm assuming you weren't either?"

Hikaku frowns and shakes his head. "It was instinctual more like the twist to get from Sharingan to Mangekyō, you know?"

While Madara doesn't know what either Izuna or Hikaku are saying, he does understand the twist that they're speaking about. Sure, activating the Mangekyō on the battlefield is more or less a matter of simply pushing more chakra into your eyes, but you can also activate it by twisting your chakra into the pathways that the Mangekyō uses as a main source of chakra. Not many Uchiha can do it, but it's very helpful when you're trying to avoid flaring your chakra to reveal what you're about to do.

"I get that, but that explains nothing. And what were you trying to do again?" Madara asks, bringing them back to the topic on hand. Hikaku and Izuna can try and identify what went wrong and what went right later. Right now, they need to explain themselves and figure out how to reverse it.

"We were trying to reverse the damage done to one's eyes if you use the Mangekyō," Hikaku says bluntly, glancing sideways at Izuna. "It was your brother's idea."

At that, Madara can't help but freeze, left blinking in shock. Hikaku and Izuna are the only ones aware of how badly his eyesight has deteriorated, and only Izuna knows the true scope. He turns to look at his brother who gives him a tight smile and, well, not all is forgiven considering they still have a child-sized Hikaku problem on their hands, it's understandable now. After all, Madara would do the same to try and save his brother's eyes—and those of the clan too.

"And you managed to reverse everything else rather than just your eyes?" Madara asks.

Hikaku nods, before pausing. "Well, we haven't quite checked whether any deterioration is still there but…. As far as I can tell, my vision is sharper than it's been in years."

Beaming, Izuna said, "So all we need to do is localise the effect and isolate it to just the eyes and then-"

"It's possible!"

Madara grins. It's great news all round, there's only one thing left to do. "Now we just need to get Hikaku back to normal and localise the effect, and we could… could finally have a way to heal our eyes."

"We?" Izuna says, raising an eyebrow, and beside him, Hikaku's expression becomes downright gleeful.

With a sigh, Madara smiles. "Well, I'm not about to let you do it all alone now, am I? That'd just be irresponsible and, unlike certain other people, I am a responsible adult."

Izuna sticks out his tongue and Hikaku snorts, but both of them are smiling and, well, Madara just knows things are going to get better from here on. With what's happened today and the new things they've found, he kind of feels like their world is about to change—for the better.