He smelled food.

And not half-burned rabbit or squirrel or… or whatever the hell they could get their hands on. He smelled real, honest to kami food.

Plain brown rice with a dash of soy, a drop or two of wasabi if he wasn't mistaken, and eggplant. Eggplant. He hadn't had eggplant in months, and he'd had to fight Sharingan no Kakashi for it! In the end, they had agreed to split the eggplant, but it had taken a long and bitter struggle to get that concession.

Between that and the futon he was lying on, it was clear he was hallucinating or under a genjutsu. Or both – the combination resulted in some particularly strange ones.

Smoothly rising to his feet, Katashi glanced out the window and froze. Definitely a genjutsu. Moonlight was falling down on Sunagakure, months after it had been wiped off the map by Akatsuki's efforts, sending the entirety of the population to Konoha to join the Fourth War for good. But the moon was bright, clear and soft in its light, so gentle compared to the burning sun of his desert.

Not the dark, twisted thing it was supposed to become in Madara's victory, triumphantly glaring down on them all as they went about their lives unaware.

What was going on?

"Running late again taich-oh shit!" before he could process just who he was hearing, Katashi had thrown a shuriken from the holster he kept strapped to his leg at all times, the individual in his doorway twisting aside to avoid the whirling edges and the tool embedded itself in the far wall.

He lunged forward with a kunai in hand, the no longer shocked target grabbing his extended arm and slamming him against the hall's wall, the adobe quivering with the impact. He shook off the bruising and wrenched the shuriken out to throw it again, following up with chakra-string deflection so the first dodge wasn't enough.

"The hell is going on here?! Taicho! Kohai! Enough!"

He froze, a tremor he was unable to suppress running through him at that voice. The voice, so far as he was concerned. The kunoichi he had been manhandling jerked at the tone too, the surprised quarter-flinch a move so familiar it made him doubt.

"Taicho?" his second, his partner, walked closer and he couldn't bear to look at him directly, couldn't bear to take more than the corner-of-his-eye glimpses but something in him breaking and wailing at not being able to blankly stare and drink in every detail of those living features.

"Kaoru, get going, you'll be late for assignments," the kunoichi nodded shortly and darted away, Katashi not letting his eyes stray from the place where she'd been tensed, ready to defend herself from him again.

"You died," Katashi finally rasped, frozen in his half-crouch, still ready to lunge at a no-longer-there opponent.

"Ah hell, taicho," Takeshi sighed, his fellow ANBU pulling him upright and into a half-hug, Katashi hooking his fingers on the man's jounin vest and shuddering. "Just a dream this time, taicho. Just a dream. What did it this time?"

"That kid," Katashi shuddered again, convulsively. There was no doubt who he was referring too, and even after becoming his Kazekage's personal guard-medic-advisor-friend rolled into one, references to the man's earlier state sent a chill down his spine and a tremor into his hands. Suna before the invasion lived with a time-bomb in its walls, the ANBU lived with a crushing KI and doom every damned day. There was a reason that their elite forces had the shortest lifespan of any in the Elemental nations, and that reason was named Gaara.

Takeshi knew it too, everyone knew it, and he didn't bother with platitudes and instead let Katashi finish reassuring himself that today, at least, it wasn't true.

"Taicho, we do have assignments being handed out in twenty minutes, and I actually managed to make food successfully this time, which you know is rare on my rotation. So we should get moving."

Katashi nodded, straightening and heading back to his room, getting ready with practiced speed and forcibly shoving aside questions as to what was going on, where he was, and if this was seriously happening because if he wasn't completely insane, if this wasn't a genjutsu then – then this was unbelievable. Incredible. And stupid.

Securing his jounin vest over the standard issue dark tan shirt, he pulled on his knuckle-covering gloves and checked the buckles on his holsters while he bitterly mused on the uselessness of his position. What exactly could he do, now? Gaara psychotic and murderous, at least five years out from the failed invasion, with him not obtaining his highest rank until after that.

He had no influence outside the ANBU, he wasn't political, he was just another ANBU captain. There was nothing he could do right now.

Not true, he forced himself to think, walking out of the room after securing his head-cloth and hita-ate. Not true at all. I can train. I can be ready. And when Gaara comes back Gaara, I can be here.

You can be here, and hate. And hate and hate and hate because of what he did and what you couldn't – he forced himself to stop thinking. To focus instead on the box of rice and eggplant with a touch of soy and wasabi, just like he'd smelled earlier, that Takeshi had handed him with chopsticks as they stepped out the door. The pair of them had lived together since their genin days, two orphaned veterans from the Third War banding their limited resources together, and even though now they could more than afford their own apartments, the brief experiment when Takeshi had advanced to jounin before him had ended rather quickly. They were just too used to living in one another's pockets.

So when a kunoichi, rejected by her civilian family in the capital, had joined their team and they had spotted her utter rat's nest of an apartment, they'd kicked down the door and dragged their little kohai kicking and screaming to the spare bedroom-then-office of their apartment and refused to let her leave until she found a place of her own that wasn't a hazard to any living thing within a block's distance.

Alive alive they're alive alive all alive so alive so happy so alive alive, he could sense the mantra repeating, barely sensible, barely coherent in his mind, just looping back and forth back and forth as he took in the scent of his village the taste of his eggplant the warmth of Takeshi's presence beside him.

Running over the roofs while eating fresh food from an old take-out box was nothing new, so by the time they reached headquarters for their assignments he had finished and deposited the box in a waste-basket, the chopsticks licked clean and tucked into his vest for later, much to Takeshi's long-standing disgust.

Expertly ignoring the sanitation rant of his friend, he paced the familiar route to their lockers, opening his with a flash of handsigns and flicks of fingers to unseal the personal security he'd added to the thing, pulling his sand-shaded burnoose and draping it over his daily uniform, hooking his mask to his belt and securing the ninjato over his left shoulder per usual. Depending on assignment, he'd come back and ditch his vest entirely to don the battle-armor lurking in his locker.

The old uniform, a second skin after all these years, felt a comfort, a homecoming. The special extra-long turtleneck standard for Suna-nin to keep sand out of their noses was secured up to cover half his face (how he had laughed to find out that Hatake half-funded the black-market for Suna shinobi gear) and he glanced over at the similarly garbed Takeshi, who squinted a smile at him before leading the way to the central room for their assignments.

As was usual, the date and time were read out at the beginning of the assembly, and they all stiffened to attention as the shift-commander took his place in front of them. Katashi could feel the date twitch in his mind, shivering its way through his memories as he tried to recall the reason it sent a tremor through his heart. Being a shinobi, days and deaths had a way of blurring, only the most memorable, the most fantastical truly embedded in the mind with deaths taking far greater priority over days.

Before he could reach a conclusion, the shift commander said flatly, "The Kazekage's youngest is missing, presumably wandering the desert."

No one spoke. No one dared breathe lest it call attention to them.

"This will be a solo mission, search and observe. Should the… boy wander further than ten miles from the village, he is to be returned by any means necessary. Standing orders are that back-up is called if he hits the eight mile mark for safety's sake."

It was the one order that few Suna shinobi followed. They had seen enough comrades pay that bloody desert god that they wouldn't drag more with them. If it weren't for the terror of someone figuring a way to control the beast and sending it to attack them, someone would have figured out a way to let him wander all the way to another nation.

All of this was known, understood. It had happened often enough, and there hadn't been any newcomers recently so everyone had seen one of these missions get issued and had heard about the near inevitable ending. Every two out of three, someone, several someones, was crushed to a bloody paste and their name was added to the monster's toll.

If there were something he truly hated, it was Shukaku.

This entire process was a delay of the inevitable, the reading of the next name on the list. They went through all the currently-active ANBU in order of date joined, so the newest ideally had some time before their name was called. What it really meant was that everyone knew exactly when their time was up and it was their turn to play a game of chance with the desert's personal blood collector.

Bakemono Eiji finally glanced at the list in his hand, a useless gesture in all likelihood, and his eyes tightened, a reaction unusual in an ANBU, but too common in these circumstances. Katashi waited for the name, unable to remember who had been called last with so many years lying between his most recent memories and today (how had this happened, he shoved aside again), before recognizing the slight tremor in Takeshi, standing shoulder to shoulder with him as usual.

His eyes widened with horror as he realized why the day was important, why it quivered painfully in his mind. Takeshi. It was too soon! He had three more days, three more days! No, no this couldn't – changed already? How – no time no time no time "I volunteer."

Silence, then a flurry of rustling as everyone turned to stare at him, Takeshi's eyes boring into the side of his head while Katashi just raised his chin and locked eyes with an incredulous Eiji. "I volunteer," he repeated, panic settling again, subsiding as he acted.

"Like hell you – "

"Don't. Make. Me. Stab. You," Katashi growled, voice low and dangerous and so achingly desperate how could no one hear that? – no matter didn't matter not now.

"You are aware, that this does not remove your name from the selection?" Eiji informed him calmly, "The current placement does not change, that operative will be next, and when your turn comes again it will still be yours?"

"Yes," Katashi said shortly. Everyone damn well knew 'that operative' was Takeshi. And they all damn well knew that right after Takeshi's name on that list was Katashi's. He was volunteering for two jobs in, possibly, as many days. For nothing, really. For not even a significant delay for Takeshi.

All he needed to do was get him past these three days. All he needed to do. If he had to figure out a way to lead Gaara through the desert for three whole days without exiting the ten-mile window, he'd do it. He'd kill his future Kage, his future friend his future leader because he could not let Takeshi be crushed to paste before his eyes, not now, not again, not ever.

"Very well. Squad Alpha, your assignment – "

"The hell are you thinking?" Takeshi hissed in his ear while Eiji continued issuing squad-level assignments. "You bastard it's not going to changeanything – "

"Not today, Takeshi," Katashi murmured, eyes bright with desperate grief and fear and kami it hurt so much, "Not today."

"The dream. Are you fucking serious this is because of some – "

"Not. Today."

"So what, if you hadn't had that nightm-"

"I'd have let it go," Katashi lied, "I damn well know it probably won't change a thing. But not today. Not today."

If he had to he'd volunteer for every damned assignment from here until his death to keep Takeshi off that list and out of that grasp. Until he figured out a way to get through to Gaara himself. Until he resigned himself to sticking a crackling hand through his Kage's child-sized torso.

Takeshi glared at him, recognizing the lack of something in his response but unable to pin it down – Katashi always could lie to him, just barely – before letting it go and barking an acceptance to Squad Epsilon's joint assignment with Gamma, smoothly taking command of the now one-man down squad.

Katashi let his fingers brush against his second's sleeve as he turned to leave, Crow mask slipping over his face and hood raised over the ensemble, straps tightened to secure them both for his run through windy dunes. He didn't need to ask for directions, he was a half-decent sensor, and that was all he needed to detect that poisonous raging chakra to the northeast.

Chakra burst into his limbs and he launched over the roofs of Sunagakure, running faster than anyone going after Sabaku no Gaara at this point had a right to. But he needed to get this over with, to put the sight of his comrades of his friends behind him and think about what the hell he was going to do. Because Takeshi could not die this way. He would not let it happen again, not while he still breathed.

And fat lot of good he would do with all these years locked up in his head, critical knowledge lurking in his mind, if he died today.

The ripples of his death, he felt, would be relatively insignificant. Maybe Takeshi would become the protector-advisor-friend to their next Kazekage, maybe Takeshi would take his place in the ranks of the Fourth Shinobi War and the chaos that followed and preceded.

At least the fight with Hatake would be averted, Takeshi didn't particularly care for eggplant.

He launched up onto the cliffs, flashing handsigns at the patrols conveying his purpose and one custom sigil developed in recent years returning to him every time. It was a variation of the standard good luck gesture, seldom used by anyone because luck was scorned by professionals (fools), but this variant essentially meant 'may the demon not thirst for your blood today'.

He didn't hold out much hope, because Takeshi.

It had been a bare half-hour – half over rocky cliffs, half across dunes – when he caught glimpse of the bright red hair and pitifully small figure that had Suna cowering. He stopped, crouching down to observe the target. He didn't appear to be going anywhere, the sand around him moving unnaturally as the boy practiced his abilities.

On one level, since he wasn't going anywhere and they were well within the ten mile limit – even the eight mile limit was a ways off – Katashi could sit here and watch, and wait, and eventually the boy would head back to Suna for lack of any other options and needing food.

On another, Katashi knew that if that happened, this would happen again one day and Takeshi would be sent out because he wouldn't let Katashi volunteer for him again without drastic actions being taken, and Takeshi would be crushed again and Katashi would break. He could not witness that again.

He remembered reports from the chuunin exams and invasion years ago, he had been assigned the home-guard and had missed it, but he had heard of it. And he had heard of the attack of chirping lightning that had drawn blood and – if it had been a bit more true, a hair more powerful – could have killed him.

Katashi knew it was a sign of trust that Gaara had not objected to his learning it from Kakashi when the two Kages had been plotting together and their chief protectors-minders-friends had only the other for company.

Trust he was going to break, because the holder of that trust was as good as dead and he could not, would not, risk Takeshi for a man who might very well not exist anymore, may kami forgive him. He knew (hoped, hoped desperately) that Gaara, the Kazekage he had come to know and respect (love, as a leader, as a brother, as a son) would understand and agree.

He ventured closer, letting chakra gather in his hand, slowly pooling as he formed the jutsu he had struggled with so desperately just so he couldknow, if somehow, somewhere, he encountered something so strong and fierce as Shukaku he had a chance, until the boy detected him, while he was some hundred yards out. Better than he expected at that age, but not good enough with his speed and new jutsu.

Plunging recklessly forward as lightning spiraled into his palm, crackling and chirping and sounding damned cheery for an over-the-top assassination jutsu he was frozen by a tone he recognized, though odd in a higher-pitched voice, barking, "Crow! Hold!"

He froze, quivering, unable to resolve the figure with the tone and hating himself for it because he had lost his chance, lost it utterly and now he was going to die for nothing –

but…

There was no sand. No chakra charged sand surging up around him, filling into his lungs and suffocating him in burning hot grains as he strained against its unyielding hold and screamed screamed while bones and organs and everything was crushed crushed crushed until all that was left was blood and paste and porcelain dust –

"Crow! Release the chidori before you fall over!"

How did he know the jutsu's name?

Blankly, he let the jutsu dissipate and dropped to his knees, staring into the unnervingly green eyes in confusion, confusion turning to faint hope at the familiar gleam of worry so foreign to those eyes at this age, faint hope strengthening at the furrowed brow and solidifying at the achingly familiar utterance, "Katashi-san. Report."

"Godaime?" he rasped, "You – you remember?"

"I remember," Gaara confirmed, eyes widening with shock, deep circles under his eyes so much darker and deeper than they were as an adult. "You – you came back too?"

"I did, sir. What happened? I remember an idea to counter Tobi's time-space jutsu, to keep him from phasing through our attacks, but nothing else."

"The attempt went wrong, all I can presume is that instead of countering the jutsu we were thrown back in time and somehow woke in our old bodies. I was exhausted and ran outside of Suna as fast as I could, so that I could fall asleep and rebind Shukaku without casualties."

"I woke up in my old apartment," Katashi supplied, shifting so he was sitting sprawled on the sand, Gaara joining him and the sand forming to comfortable seats and cushions under his direction. It was an old trick, a tired trick by the time they traveled back, but one that was comforting in its tiredness. It was the final confirmation he needed (as if he hadn't confirmed it enough) that Gaara really was his Kage again.

"I… was very confused. Attacked my youngest teammate when she spoke to me, I believe I thought she was some genjustu construct or imposter. Then – Takeshi, my second in command and other roommate, was there, and I somewhat accepted I had traveled back in time somehow, before reporting in for assignment with ANBU."

Here he paused, unhooking a canteen of water from his belt and taking a sip before passing it to Gaara, who accepted it with a mute nod of thanks, before he continued, "Your disappearance had been noted and someone was going to be sent out on a search and observe, possibly retrieve, mission and before he read the name on the list I remembered that three days from now, last time, Takeshi died when our squad was sent out to fetch you and I – I couldn't let that happen. So I volunteered in his place and… and decided that Takeshi alive, now, was worth more than the hope that I could avoid changing things enough you had a chance to become the Kage I remembered again."

Unable to think of anything else, he prostrated himself at Gaara's feet, not even able to apologize because it would be a lie and he respected Gaara too much for that.

An incongruously small and soft hand tucked under his chin and tilted his masked face up so their eyes could meet, Gaara having a small, barely there smile on his face (near a grin for him) and he said, "I understand, Katashi. You very rarely spoke about the times prior to the chuunin exams, but I heard you and Kakashi-san getting very drunk one night you were off duty together and remember the name at least."

"But you're here," Katashi said simply, before sitting up on his heels and laughing, "You're here we're both here! Kaze- hmm. I suppose I can no longer call you that."

"It is Gaara, as I have said before, and now I will say again," the red-head glared and Katashi finally ceded victory, after years of arguing, and only because of their new circumstances which made his common formality unwise. "Very well, Gaara-san," he said, before continuing, "But you arehere now, and you have control of Shukaku – and Takeshi is safe from him. We're safe from him now, by kami we're safe."

Everything, all that had happened, his panic, his confusion his terror and adrenaline and joy and winds knew what else was collapsing over him like an oncoming sandstorm and it was all he could do to keep from breaking down into humiliating sobs. As it was, he shuddered and collapsed in on himself, silently cracking right down the middle from sheer relief.

And in a gesture he knew it had taken Naruto-san quite a few years to get Gaara in the habit of, he found too small arms wrapping around him in an attempt to give comfort he greedily accepted to try and shore up his composure until he could activate his room's privacy seals and one-way silencers so he could completely break down without anyone demanding why and locking him away as yet another shinobi-gone-mad.

Finally he stilled, drawing himself in enough that he was able to restore his composure, his shinobi-mask, and he straightened, shifting so he was sitting more comfortably again in the sand. Gaara's arms remained tight around his waist and he noticed that his Kage – so small, so fragile – was also shaking. Mutely, he wrapped his arms around the child and returned the favor he had been granted, waiting with unending patience for the trembling to stop and for Gaara to pull away.

He didn't, even after the trembling had halted, and Katashi could hear his too young too quiet voice from where his face was buried in his burnoose, small fingers clinging to his vest, saying, "Temari and Kankuro are scared of me. They're so scared Katashi-san."

Katashi knew the pain Gaara was feeling right now, understood it oh so well as teams broke and shattered around him. The two Gaara had grown to love and trust with everything and had in turn loved and trusted him with everything back were gone. Merciful kami their world was gone – as hard and brutal a fight as it had been they had to go back to killing their old allies, their old friends. Would he come up against those Kumo-nin he had worked with in the first battle, recognize their voices from joking taunts around campfires before he killed them? Would he – kami forbid – go on the invasion mission and come up against the Konoha-nin he had come to view as a near extension of Suna?

"But they won't be," Katashi replied, finally, "They weren't even with five more years of Shukaku's terrorization bearing down on them so that can be fixed sooner than later."

"You're not – you don't think I should try and preserve the timeline?" Gaara asked softly.

Katashi held back his immediate, violent rejection so he could give a more reasoned one, "No," he said, "No I do not. Because it would mean Shukaku killing recklessly and wantonly and I will not let you go back to Suna if that is your decision, my Kage or not."

Gaara shook with silent laughter, before saying, "I did not plan to. I could not do that, not to my people. I meant more the drastic events, the multi-nation ones."

"Like the invasion?" Katashi sighed heavily, "I do not think we can avert it."

"Maybe not before we arrive in Konoha, but if we could somehow approach the Hokage and tell him about the plan we could cut off Suna's involvement at least," Gaara pulled back from him and sat down, sand forming a comfortable seat around him, "But I also find myself considering who was with us when we constructed that time-space jutsu."

Katashi nodded, looking up at the bright, bright near-full moon shining down on them. The thought had also crossed his mind, "Naruto-san and Kakashi-san."

"And Naruto will most certainly not be preserving the timeline perfectly," Gaara chuckled (giggled, but Katashi would never tell him how adorable he sounded), "So we had best try and get in contact with them."

"I will start taking missions further afield and try to get assigned those out towards Konoha," Katashi sighed, "There is not much else we can do. Neither of us have summoning contracts to send messengers with, so we'll just have to wait."

Gaara sighed, before slumping tiredly into the sand, "I'm exhausted."

"Sleep. I'll keep the watch," Katashi replied, stretching out on the sand himself and letting his senses expand, noting and cataloguing the inputs so he could quickly recognize any disturbance.

Even and steady breathing from the body now curled against his side gave away Gaara's exhaustion, and he just smiled, hand dropping down to rest on the boy's back, other arm twisting up to rest under his head and he stared up at the stars and moon, the sky so clear so crisp so cold in the desert he had missed like a limb, phantom and tingling and aching until he was here. Here and home and better, so better, already.

His Kage was here, in Suna, with his team, his friends his friend-second-partner-Takeshi and they were safe. They were safe and by everything he held dear he would keep them alive and breathing and so, so alive until he could breathe no more.