Cody Anderson wasn't someone most would consider as successful. Or popular. Or a great guy. Or…

Well, you get the point.

Even before Total Drama, Cody had been pretty well known as a loser, nerd, geek, whatever lame term you prefer. He had tried so hard to fit in, make friends, and be a normal teenager, but it just never worked out. People always seemed to shy away from him, he always seemed to end up a shunned laughingstock, and he ended up as an outcast at the end of every school year. At some point, he realized being himself just didn't work, so he pretended. He made up the Codemeister, tried to act cool, be chill, and did what he thought would make people like him.

It still didn't work. He just got laughed at harder, beaten up worse, and ostracized even further.

He viewed Total Drama a little bit differently than most of the other 21 teenagers that had been accepted onto the show for its maiden season. For most of them, it was a chance to spend a summer away from home, competing for fame and a small fortune, but that wasn't what had mattered to Cody.

The money didn't really appeal to him - his family was well off enough that $100,000 was just a drop in the bucket to his parents, and he wasn't someone who valued material possessions that much (aside from his video games, comic books… you get the idea). What he really wanted out of the experience was friends. People who he could get to know, bond with, and stay in touch with after the show ended. And maybe a girlfriend - but who could blame him? He was a teenage boy, after all. And by some miracle, he got what he wished for.

At least at first.

Looking back on it, he could easily admit that some of the stuff he did on the island was dumb, goofy, and sometimes just plain creepy (just how he thought it would be a good idea to sniff Gwen's hair, he'd never know), but in the end it was a pretty great experience for him if you ignored the whole mauled by a bear thing. Trent, Noah, Owen, Harold, Justin, Beth, and even Gwen to an extent were people Cody thought he'd become pretty good friends with! And after Action was over, he stayed in touch with a good portion of them! Life was pretty alright for the first time. The Drama Brothers experience was an amazing time too, playing music, touring the world with his friends, all was good.

And then, World Tour happened.

There were so many things that went wrong for Cody this season that it would be impossible to list them all. Some of the highlights included losing his epipen in the Amazon and being bitten by red ants, nearly killing him, nearly freezing to death in the Yukon, nearly getting shit on by a camel in Egypt, nearly getting killed by a Dingo in Australia, getting poisoned by Sierra in the Serengeti, nearly getting killed in the tiebreaker versus Alejandro, being stalked for the entire season by Sierra, and that was just the stuff he could remember.

Yeah, it was pretty rough.

Despite his best efforts, he had lost, which really sucked because pretty much everyone was rooting for him. It did feel nice to help Heather win, but things really went downhill afterwards.

He became a social pariah. Sure, he sort of kept in touch with the rest of the cast, but outside of a few exceptions, people just generally faded out of his life with time. He knew that most of them still connected in big groups, but he was just out of the loop for a pretty good reason. It was way worse with his normal life, however. The rest of high school was agonizing, with most (all) of his school (the country) knowing him as the punching bag/wimp who got carried to within arm's reach of a million dollars, only to lose it all the moment he had to do stand up and do something on his own. He was abused, manipulated, and generally just a laughingstock throughout most of the show, and everybody made sure he never forgot it.

Also, Sierra had continued the creepy obsession after the show had ended, and after All Stars (which he thankfully wasn't a part of), that obsession just got worse. He had seen how insane she had become over Cameron, and how concerned everyone on the show was for him. It would've been nice if they showed that same care for him during World Tour, but since when did it matter what he thought? Eventually, he even had to get a restraining order, but it didn't do much to stop her. He had never had the best relationship with his parents, especially after the show, so it wasn't hard for him to convince them to let him move out and go off the grid.

So here he was, after so much, stuck living in some random town in the middle of nowhere, with no friends, working a dead end job for what was likely the rest of his life if he wanted any semblance of peace.

To put it mildly, it really sucked. Cody was miserable. He missed having friends. He missed belonging somewhere. He missed not having to keep eyes on the back of his head to protect himself from Sierra. And most of all, he somehow missed Total Drama Island.

As sucky as that experience was, he knew it was the happiest he had been in a long time. There were so many mistakes he made, so many opportunities he threw away, and so many chances he had lost in that crummy reality show. He'd give anything to get a second chance on Total Drama. He knew he wouldn't waste it.

Unfortunately, he also knew that was bullshit. Time travel wasn't a thing. You don't get to redo your mistakes. You don't get second chances.

So he continued his plain, pathetic, disappointing life day after day, never deviating from his lonesome routine, fully expecting the rest of his days to be spent in a similar way.

Until one day, when something changed.

–

Knock knock knock

Cody shot out of his seat in shock at the sound of someone pounding on his door. He never had visitors, especially at this time, it was super late! The closest thing he had was the mailman, who just delivered his bills, and his landlord, who came once a month to check up on the place. And neither of them ever showed up unexpectedly. Had the day he had been trying to avoid for years finally came?

Had Sierra found him?

He prayed to every god he could think of that this wasn't the case.

KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK

The banging on the door was louder now, and seemed more urgent. However, Cody knew that if it was Sierra, she'd have broken in by now, or at least tried to while screaming for him to come out.

Even so, he was absolutely terrified to go to the door. But what did he have to lose? The person at the door certainly didn't seem like they were about to leave.

And despite how scared he was, Cody was a naturally curious guy. He kinda wanted to see who it was.

As he approached the door, the pounding didn't stop, even after he shouted an 'I'm coming!' to whoever was on the other side. It was getting louder and louder, causing Cody to cover his ears in a desperate attempt to block out the awful noise.

It didn't work.

Regardless, he somehow managed to make his way over to his door, haphazardly flinging it open to see… Heather?

"Took you long enough, nerdface!"

Cody just gaped.

"H-heather?!" He was shocked that he could get out anything other than unintelligible gibberish with how surprised he was, even if it was just one word. Barely.

"Duh! I thought you were one of the smart ones, Cody. My mistake!" She giggled at her own insult, but it didn't exactly come off as mean-spirited, as Cody had expected. She sounded like she was… teasing him?

"W-what are you doing here? How did you even find me?" He spat out question after question at rapidfire pace, still in complete shock. So much so, in fact, that he didn't even notice the fact that the pounding had continued ringing in his ears long after he had opened the door.

"I'm here to see you, dummy!" She snarked at him, but again it came off friendlier than almost anything he had ever heard from her. "Why else would I travel to the middle of nowhere, Canada? You really made it a pain for anyone to find you."

"So how did you find me?" Cody shot back, paranoid. "Is Sierra here? Did she put you up to this? And why do you want to see me?"

Heather sighed, rubbing her temples with her hands at Cody's frantic questioning. "Relax, dorkus. Nothing bad is going to happen. Just breathe." Strangely enough, Heather's attempt at comforting him worked, and Cody had soon calmed down enough to think rationally again.

"Thanks, I needed that." He awkwardly replied, rubbing the back of his neck sheepishly. The first thought that came to him was how weird it was that she would be doing this, but even weirder again was how she found him in the first place.

"Hey Heather… not that I don't appreciate the visit, but seriously. How did you find me?"

She just smiled at him again.

"We have our ways, don't worry about it."

Well now he was definitely worried - that did NOT sound like Heather. The voice was foreign to him, but Cody could've sworn he'd heard it before. It was faint and echoey, but very gentle. It kind of creeped him out. More than it usually would have, at any rate.

Also, did she say 'we'?

He blinked, and all of a sudden the scene melted away. Instead of standing with Heather in his doorway, suddenly he was standing in Hawaii again, on the same platform Alejandro had eliminated him from. And sure enough, Al was there too. The pounding had changed as well, morphing into the chime of an old grandfather clock.

"Hello again, my tiny enemy!" Alejandro sneered down at him, causing the geek to instinctively take a step back. "Dealing with you once wasn't enough it seems! Some pests truly are a pain to remove, I suppose."

Cody jumped back in fright at the swipe Alejandro had made for him, instinctively backing up and raising his own pole in defense. However, like last time, their fight was rather short, and after only a few more swings Alejandro had Cody backed up against the edge of the platform, with several eager sharks waiting for him to be knocked into the water.

"What's wrong, amigo?" Al taunted, amused. "Even with everyone behind you, you're still going to fail? You'd really disappoint them again? Shameful!"

With that, Alejandro swung his pole at Cody, who merely closed his eyes and braced for impact.

Yet it never came, and after a few moments of anticipation, Cody nervously opened his eyes to see the scene had shifted yet again.

He was now on the boat the cast had taken to escape Hawaii at the end of World Tour. The sun hung low in the sky as the boat moved east, but the rest of the world fell away as his eyes landed on Gwen - the only person within his view. She looked nervous, shyly glancing around the ship as if waiting for someone to come.

Cody started to make his way over, excited, but before he could, Gwen seemed to find who she was looking for. She instantly perked up as Duncan appeared before her, and Cody felt his heart break for the millionth time as the two embraced. He thought he was over Gwen, but apparently his heart had other plans.

A strong hand on his shoulder made him jump, only to relax the moment he realized who it belonged to.

Trent stood behind him now, shaking his head at the scene, before turning his attention to Cody.

"Would you really want to go back to this, dude?" He questioned, his voice strong yet kind as he stared down at Cody. "All the heartache, all the drama, all the humiliation, would it really be worth it? This show hurt so many people, including you. Would you really want to go back to it if you were given the chance?"

Cody wanted to immediately agree, but he held himself back. He thought about the countless people the show had ruined - Courtney, Duncan, Ezekiel, himself - and paused. He looked to his side and saw Courtney, devastated at Duncan and Gwen's cheating. He saw Heather in despair and Alejandro encased in a robot suit after the World Tour finale. He saw himself be humiliated, manipulated, and mocked over and over again and take it all in stride, only to lose in embarrassing fashion anyways. He saw Sierra, insane for him after All Stars, and he saw Cameron, the victim of her and Mal, wrapped up in a bubble by the end of the show again. He saw Ezekiel, feral and deranged, sinking into an active volcano. The sun had set now, and the only lights that flashed down were from the big, bright stars that set the sky above them.

Would it really be worth it to go through all that pain, all that humiliation, again?

The answer was still yes. There were so many things he could've done better, so many people he could've helped, so many chances that were squandered due to his naivety and stupidity.

Any change he made would be for the better. And it wouldn't be like anyone but Cody was going through the show again. It would be a fresh start for him, and a new experience for everyone else.

Trent and Gwen could never be manipulated by Heather, and their relationship could last.

Duncan and Courtney's relationship could never spiral out of control, leading to the awful situation between them that lasted from Action to All Stars being prevented.

Lindsay could be saved from three ridiculous eliminations, robbing her of victory over and over again.

Everyone could not be manipulated by Alejandro in World Tour.

Ezekiel could never go feral, being driven solely by the idea of taking the million dollars for himself.

Cody could be happy. Cody could have friends.

Despite not giving any sort of outward reaction, Trent seemed to know his answer.

"If you really think you can make a difference, good on you." Trent said, almost apathetically. "Good luck, though. It won't be easy."

Trent simply clapped him on the shoulder, and Cody woke up.

–

Cody rose with a splitting headache, the pounding in his ears blocking out any other stimulus for the time being.

Of the things he could feel, his bed felt softer than it had been in years. Real feather pillows and soft cotton sheets were a luxury he could hardly afford these days.

His body also felt… weirdly better? He had so many long lasting aches and pains from his time on Total Drama, ones that still thrummed dully with pain to this day, yet besides his current migraine, he felt better than ever!

A moment later, he suddenly felt the familiar urge to vomit take hold, and all of a sudden he did not in fact feel better than ever.

Despite quickly realizing that wherever he was was certainly not his bedroom, he was still able to quickly find the bathroom and barely kneel down next to the toilet before he began vomiting.

A lot.

Black and yellow bile spewed out of his mouth a mile a minute, and this lasted for several agonizing seconds.

When it ended, he felt absolutely empty, and absolutely exhausted.

He tried to stand up, before realizing that it was a big mistake as his head began to spin. After a few more moments of pain, he was finally able to blink the stars out of his eyes and see clearly.

Was he always this short?

And these pajamas, he hadn't had these since he was a… teenager…

No way.

No fucking way.

Cody pinched himself, and it hurt. He did it again. It still hurt. He rammed his shoulder into the wall, causing the paintings hung from it to wobble slightly. His shoulder now hurt like hell, but that's the thing.

He was feeling real pain.

Cody wasn't dreaming.

As this revelation began to finally settle in, he began to hyperventilate. Was he going insane? Was he still actually dreaming?

Or was this real?

He wasn't sure how long he sat there on the tile floor, tears streaming down his face and breathing hard, just trying not to lose it, but it was a long time.

When he finally did calm down, the first thing he did was check his phone, which was sitting conveniently on the night stand by his bed. Of course, it was the futuristic year of 2014, so his brand new -

His old flip phone, the first phone he ever had, sat proudly on the nightstand, displaying one new message.

Good luck on that little T.V. show, Cody! Dad and I are rooting for you! - Mom

The date sat proudly above the message from his mother, staring back at him unflinchingly.

Sunday, June 8, 2008.

The day before Total Drama Island was set to begin.

Cody knew what all of this meant. His old phone, him being shorter, him being in the hotel he had been booked into for the weekend before Total Drama Island started, the date.

But that didn't mean Cody believed it.

Time travel, at best, was pretty damn near impossible. Especially regarding traveling back in time. So many paradoxes existed, so many laws of physics, it was supposed to be an open and shut case on its plausibility.

Supposed to be.

Cody squeezed his eyes shut, trying to remember anything that could explain whatever the hell was going on with him. He didn't use drugs, nor did he drink, so that was out of the question. Maybe virtual reality? That was scrapped too - technology wasn't that advanced! But then again, the other option was time travel…

The only things out of the ordinary for him recently were his recent exhaustion and that weird dream he had last night. He was a firm believer in a good night's sleep, and always got at least eight hours per night. However, over the past week or so, he had been absolutely spent by the end of the day, even going to bed early a few times hadn't helped.

And then there was that dream he had last night, or at least he thought it was last night - he wasn't too sure about anything right now. It had felt so impossibly real in the moment, despite some aspects of it obviously not making sense in a real world sense.

But now, sitting here on the edge of his bed, Cody couldn't remember anything specific about the dream. He remembered the sound of a grandfather clock, but that was it. He knew there was more, he could feel it, but it escaped him for the time being.

He sighed into his hands, staring at the ground. What was he supposed to do now?

Isn't this what you wanted?

Cody wasn't proud of the incredibly high-pitched squeal that came out of him at the sudden voice in his head, nor his sudden jump that went so high he hit his head against the ceiling, but could you blame him? Hearing voices in his head wasn't usually a good sign.

Maybe he was going insane after all.

There were no more intrusive voices after that, finally leaving Cody at peace with his thoughts. At least, as much peace as he could achieve when being thrown back in time half a decade and hearing voices that weren't really there.

But… was the voice right?

Assuming he really did travel back in time, and assuming Cody wasn't going insane…

A jolt went through Cody's system as the implications of what was happening finally reached him.

Cody was a teen again.

Cody was about to compete on Total Drama Island again.

Cody could change everything.

Cody had a second chance.

He would make sure not to waste it.

—

A/N:

Yeah, I should probably be focused on Wanderer and not start writing other stories that have nothing to do with it.

Yeah, this idea of Cody going back in time and competing again has been done to death.

Oh well.

Whenever I get to the middle of a chapter of Wanderer, I always end up slowing down and burning out. It's why Chapter 2 took five months to finish, and why Chapter 3 isn't out yet. I wrote this in like four days, and not only is it something I want to write, it's making me want to write Wanderer more. Aside from this new project, I also got another thousand words or so into the next chapter of Wanderer, speeding up the release date for it drastically. This won't take time away from Wanderer, if anything it will make chapters more frequent, since I'm certainly not going to focus on one story over the other. One chapter per story at a time (at least in regards to this story, I might double up on Wanderer chapters in the future).

Also, despite Cody time travel fics being done to death, I always struggle to find stories that are a) finished, or at the very least not abandoned, and b) of decent quality. I will finish this or die trying, same as Wanderer. I also hope this at least is better than some of the other stories floating around here - I'm going for a realistic take on Cody getting a second chance and the aftereffects.

The biggest inspiration for this story is Time Brand by The Canadian Honeybadger, but unfortunately it seems like that story is never going to be updated. Still, it is probably the best Cody time travel story out there, and is my personal favorite! It may be unfinished, but the story is still worth a read imo.

Thanks for checking this out! Let me know if you like it, and let me know if you didn't! Feedback is always appreciated, and this type of story is even more new to me than Wanderer was when I started writing it.