Naruto Drabbles (part one)-- Jiraiya/Orochimaru, Hebi Team
Spoilers up to chapter 352 are a given.
Crossposted.
Title: Turn the Mirrors to Face the Walls
Pairing: Jiraiya/Orochimaru
Words: ~500
Written for am3thyst
Orochimaru looked at him with the same patient, disaffected expression he’d worn when he’d watched men- victims of war-games and politics and all-around damned bad luck- breath their last at his feet.
Jiraiya’d hated and envied that inhuman calm- zen calm, psychotic calm- and blank stare his entire life, from the first moment he’d confronted it; he’d turned, reeling, from the battlefield to find some sense and reason in his still-living team and found less warmth than he’d hoped.
Orochimaru was cold, cold comfort.
The gross, gruesome spectacle of death, the blood and desperation, was reflected in eyes as empty of any human emotion as a corpse’s.
There is nothing new here to be seen, that gaze said. Nothing to be learned. Nothing to be gained. This is useless to me, and I have no time for useless things.
Tsunade had spoken just once, almost off-handedly, of emotional shields. Of vulnerability and defense. Of disassociation and disattachment.
Then she’d laughed strangely, not quite bitterly, and nearly fallen off her barstool, too drunk to keep herself upright any longer.
Jiraiya’d wanted to believe that she was right. He wanted to trust Tsunade understood Orochimaru even when he was like that, even when he went to that distant place within himself where no one else could follow. Women knew things, sometimes- female intuition and all that…so maybe she could see in a little through the peephole, even if Orochimaru locked her out, too.
He'd wanted to believe that the dark places weren't so dark that everyone who tried to look was rendered blind. There was still some light there, dim and flickering though it might be.
But light was blinding, too.
He’s going to kill me, Jiraiya thought, the idea too new, too raw, to actually mean anything, especially when…
He dodged the striking fangs of a pair of serpents, then brought his kunai up in a quick slash that gutted one and left him wide open to the other.
Or would have, if he’d still been there to be attacked.
The snake spat out the wooden replacement and honed in on Jiraiya’s hiding spot just in time to catch the brunt of his fire jutsu with its face.
The heat of the explosion blew Orochimaru’s long hair back from his face, and he grinned easily, the way he always had when he was enjoying himself more than he should be.
The way he always had when he wasn't taking something dangerous seriously.
The flat polished amber of his eyes caught the firelight and gleamed.
For a moment, he looked insanely alive.
For a moment… just a moment… Jiraiya felt a sickening swell of jealousy.
Then Orochimaru raised his hands.
Hold them out to me and I…
Irrational hope flared bright and hot in Jiraiya’s chest.
Orochimaru flicked his fingers through a series of seals, and drew scene to a cold, dark close.
Title: The Line Forms Here
Pairing: Karin/Suigetsu-ish, vaguely Kisame/Karin
Words: ~140
Written for maxxim_huzzah
Kisame looked annoyed for the briefest of moments…and then grinned easily and swung Samehada down from his shoulder to point it at the foul-mouthed girl who’d intervened- barely in time-to save the worthless Zabuza-wannabe from becoming chum.
Instead of saving her teammate, though, she seemed to take it upon herself to finish him off.
“Ahh-hah-hah,” Kisame interrupted her tirade and beat-down, half-chastising, half-laughing. “This was our fight. Didn’t anyone teach you better manners?”
Karin turned from Suigetsu to stare hostilely at the other Mist nin, and jabbed her glasses back up into place with her middle finger.
“Shut up,” she said briefly. “He’s had this coming for days. I’m not going to let you have all the pleasure.”
Kisame supposed that really, he should probably let the lady have her turn.
It was only polite.
Title: Taste of Blood
Pairing: Suigetsu/Sasuke
Words: ~360
Written for hiza_chan
Sasuke trusted Suigetsu least of his newly formed team.
Suigetsu was a predator, and predators had little sense of loyalty.
When he chose to, Suigetsu moved with a piranha’s striking speed.
He’d pressed against up against Sasuke in a motion that’d been a blurred flicker of glistening light to his unSharingan-activated eyes.
Sasuke’d wondered when they’d last bothered to feed him.
He knew he couldn’t keep Suigetsu from killing the throwaway nin that they encountered- sooner or later, he’d be true to his own nature.
“You’re such a Leaf, man,” Suigetsu had laughed, at ease with Sasuke’s orders even if he didn’t like them.
And you’re a predator.
When he lagged behind the group, half-forgotten by Karin and Juugo when he was silent and ignored when he was not, Sasuke felt the hairs on the back of his neck prickle in instinctual awareness.
He glanced over his shoulder once, silent and coldly annoyed, and Suigestu dragged his gaze up his body with deliberate slowness and smirked, then shrugged and increased his pace.
Suigetsu followed because he knew that there’d be blood in the water sooner or later.
Sasuke knew it wouldn’t matter to him whose blood it was.
For my part, I’m going to stick close to Sasuke.
Mist’s bloody “education” had served as a primitive form of eugenics, weeding out those too innocent, too compassionate, too empathetic…too human.
Sharks tore the weak to pieces, turning even on their own.
Suigetsu grinned casually at Sasuke over the evening’s fire and he took the first watch without much of a fight.
Fearless leader…
Sasuke didn’t sleep.
He lay on his back, stared at the stars, listened to the wind in the trees, and waited.
He caught Suigetsu’s wrist with crushing force when he reached for him.
“Just a taste,” he murmured, his usually abrasive voice hushed and his eyes wide and bright in the mellow light of the full moon. “Just a little taste, Sasuke; you know what I want. Just a little, ne? I’m so thirsty…”
Suigetsu met Sasuke’s stare steadily.
Another unhurried heartbeat.
The pause was all the permission needed.
Suigetsu groaned with pleasure as he drank.
Predators were always blood-thirsty.
Title: The Precipice of Heav'n Receiv'd us Falling
Pairing: Juugo/Kimimaro, Kabuto/Suigetsu, Orochimaru/Karin, Uchihacest.
Words: ~550
Written for erisabesu.
Kimimaro had been so achingly beautiful, it had taken Juugo’s breath away.
He seemed so fragile, a figurine carved in pale mother-of-pearl.
So easy to break…
The back of Juugo’s throat tasted coppery, like hot blood, and the excitement that jagged through his body and stained his skin was the rapturous joy of the monster he couldn’t control.
When he came back to his senses, ten minutes later, flat on his back with the other boy’s sharpened ulna pressing into his throat, he’d cried in mingled horror and gratitude.
The other prisoners didn’t dare laugh at the spectacle the two of them must have been- the hulking beast tamed only at the hand of the tiny, delicate beauty.
Juugo never dared to touch Kimimaro when he was in his right mind. It didn’t seem right.
It would be blasphemy.
Kimimaro had been the only one to actually thank him for his blood, as though the seal were a blessing rather than a curse.
“You have made it possible for me to better serve Orochimaru-sama,” he’d said, and Juugo’s stomach twisted at the intensity of his tone.
There was a fine, fine line between Heaven and Hell.
All of them were so far fallen from grace.
Juugo listened to Sasuke’s steady breathing as he slept, and watched shooting stars scratch fire down the speckled dome of the sky.
Kabuto hadn’t seemed threatening to Suigetsu.
He looked like a push-over, too young and too weak to be taken seriously.
Too damn pretty to be a real shinobi.
It had to be a joke, Suigestu’d first thought, rolling his eyes. Escape from this place is going to be a fucking cake-walk.
He smiled sweetly back when the young Mist nin bared his teeth at him.
Suigetsu never stood a chance.
Months later, he knew he was one of the lucky ones.
He’d lived.
“Go on,” Orochimaru’d said, watching her with amusement. “Eat it.”
Karin hadn’t even looked at the piece of fruit he offered. The contrast of its brilliant red skin and his pale hand had been both temptation and distraction.
She’d kept her head lifted proudly. She wasn’t going to beg, or grovel. She wasn’t going to show the same pathetic desperation as the other prisoners groaning in the shadows of the dungeons, not to this man.
Not to the lord of the deep dark.
“You don’t deserve to be down here, do you?” he’d said, the words dragging in a sensual purr from his lips. “You are talented. I could raise you up above all this filth.”
“Wha…” Karin had cleared her throat. She hadn’t spoken to anyone in days. “What do you want from me?”
“Nothing at all,” he’d murmured, and his eyes slitted with pleasure as he gazed down at her. “You. I just want you.”
That first bite of apple, rich and juicy, had been so very, very sweet.
Sasuke thought about his brother.
“I will always be with you, as the wall you have to overcome.”
Itachi’d smiled at his little brother that afternoon.
“Bonds!? Bonds!? What use have I for worthless bonds!?
No matter how many times Sasuke screamed for Itachi to stop, stop, STOP, BROTHER STOP!...
…when he woke up his family was still dead and their blood was still on Itachi’s hands.
Crossposted.
Title: Turn the Mirrors to Face the Walls
Pairing: Jiraiya/Orochimaru
Words: ~500
Written for am3thyst
Orochimaru looked at him with the same patient, disaffected expression he’d worn when he’d watched men- victims of war-games and politics and all-around damned bad luck- breath their last at his feet.
Jiraiya’d hated and envied that inhuman calm- zen calm, psychotic calm- and blank stare his entire life, from the first moment he’d confronted it; he’d turned, reeling, from the battlefield to find some sense and reason in his still-living team and found less warmth than he’d hoped.
Orochimaru was cold, cold comfort.
The gross, gruesome spectacle of death, the blood and desperation, was reflected in eyes as empty of any human emotion as a corpse’s.
There is nothing new here to be seen, that gaze said. Nothing to be learned. Nothing to be gained. This is useless to me, and I have no time for useless things.
Tsunade had spoken just once, almost off-handedly, of emotional shields. Of vulnerability and defense. Of disassociation and disattachment.
Then she’d laughed strangely, not quite bitterly, and nearly fallen off her barstool, too drunk to keep herself upright any longer.
Jiraiya’d wanted to believe that she was right. He wanted to trust Tsunade understood Orochimaru even when he was like that, even when he went to that distant place within himself where no one else could follow. Women knew things, sometimes- female intuition and all that…so maybe she could see in a little through the peephole, even if Orochimaru locked her out, too.
He'd wanted to believe that the dark places weren't so dark that everyone who tried to look was rendered blind. There was still some light there, dim and flickering though it might be.
But light was blinding, too.
He’s going to kill me, Jiraiya thought, the idea too new, too raw, to actually mean anything, especially when…
He dodged the striking fangs of a pair of serpents, then brought his kunai up in a quick slash that gutted one and left him wide open to the other.
Or would have, if he’d still been there to be attacked.
The snake spat out the wooden replacement and honed in on Jiraiya’s hiding spot just in time to catch the brunt of his fire jutsu with its face.
The heat of the explosion blew Orochimaru’s long hair back from his face, and he grinned easily, the way he always had when he was enjoying himself more than he should be.
The way he always had when he wasn't taking something dangerous seriously.
The flat polished amber of his eyes caught the firelight and gleamed.
For a moment, he looked insanely alive.
For a moment… just a moment… Jiraiya felt a sickening swell of jealousy.
Then Orochimaru raised his hands.
Hold them out to me and I…
Irrational hope flared bright and hot in Jiraiya’s chest.
Orochimaru flicked his fingers through a series of seals, and drew scene to a cold, dark close.
Title: The Line Forms Here
Pairing: Karin/Suigetsu-ish, vaguely Kisame/Karin
Words: ~140
Written for maxxim_huzzah
Kisame looked annoyed for the briefest of moments…and then grinned easily and swung Samehada down from his shoulder to point it at the foul-mouthed girl who’d intervened- barely in time-to save the worthless Zabuza-wannabe from becoming chum.
Instead of saving her teammate, though, she seemed to take it upon herself to finish him off.
“Ahh-hah-hah,” Kisame interrupted her tirade and beat-down, half-chastising, half-laughing. “This was our fight. Didn’t anyone teach you better manners?”
Karin turned from Suigetsu to stare hostilely at the other Mist nin, and jabbed her glasses back up into place with her middle finger.
“Shut up,” she said briefly. “He’s had this coming for days. I’m not going to let you have all the pleasure.”
Kisame supposed that really, he should probably let the lady have her turn.
It was only polite.
Title: Taste of Blood
Pairing: Suigetsu/Sasuke
Words: ~360
Written for hiza_chan
Sasuke trusted Suigetsu least of his newly formed team.
Suigetsu was a predator, and predators had little sense of loyalty.
When he chose to, Suigetsu moved with a piranha’s striking speed.
He’d pressed against up against Sasuke in a motion that’d been a blurred flicker of glistening light to his unSharingan-activated eyes.
Sasuke’d wondered when they’d last bothered to feed him.
He knew he couldn’t keep Suigetsu from killing the throwaway nin that they encountered- sooner or later, he’d be true to his own nature.
“You’re such a Leaf, man,” Suigetsu had laughed, at ease with Sasuke’s orders even if he didn’t like them.
And you’re a predator.
When he lagged behind the group, half-forgotten by Karin and Juugo when he was silent and ignored when he was not, Sasuke felt the hairs on the back of his neck prickle in instinctual awareness.
He glanced over his shoulder once, silent and coldly annoyed, and Suigestu dragged his gaze up his body with deliberate slowness and smirked, then shrugged and increased his pace.
Suigetsu followed because he knew that there’d be blood in the water sooner or later.
Sasuke knew it wouldn’t matter to him whose blood it was.
For my part, I’m going to stick close to Sasuke.
Mist’s bloody “education” had served as a primitive form of eugenics, weeding out those too innocent, too compassionate, too empathetic…too human.
Sharks tore the weak to pieces, turning even on their own.
Suigetsu grinned casually at Sasuke over the evening’s fire and he took the first watch without much of a fight.
Fearless leader…
Sasuke didn’t sleep.
He lay on his back, stared at the stars, listened to the wind in the trees, and waited.
He caught Suigetsu’s wrist with crushing force when he reached for him.
“Just a taste,” he murmured, his usually abrasive voice hushed and his eyes wide and bright in the mellow light of the full moon. “Just a little taste, Sasuke; you know what I want. Just a little, ne? I’m so thirsty…”
Suigetsu met Sasuke’s stare steadily.
Another unhurried heartbeat.
The pause was all the permission needed.
Suigetsu groaned with pleasure as he drank.
Predators were always blood-thirsty.
Title: The Precipice of Heav'n Receiv'd us Falling
Pairing: Juugo/Kimimaro, Kabuto/Suigetsu, Orochimaru/Karin, Uchihacest.
Words: ~550
Written for erisabesu.
Kimimaro had been so achingly beautiful, it had taken Juugo’s breath away.
He seemed so fragile, a figurine carved in pale mother-of-pearl.
So easy to break…
The back of Juugo’s throat tasted coppery, like hot blood, and the excitement that jagged through his body and stained his skin was the rapturous joy of the monster he couldn’t control.
When he came back to his senses, ten minutes later, flat on his back with the other boy’s sharpened ulna pressing into his throat, he’d cried in mingled horror and gratitude.
The other prisoners didn’t dare laugh at the spectacle the two of them must have been- the hulking beast tamed only at the hand of the tiny, delicate beauty.
Juugo never dared to touch Kimimaro when he was in his right mind. It didn’t seem right.
It would be blasphemy.
Kimimaro had been the only one to actually thank him for his blood, as though the seal were a blessing rather than a curse.
“You have made it possible for me to better serve Orochimaru-sama,” he’d said, and Juugo’s stomach twisted at the intensity of his tone.
There was a fine, fine line between Heaven and Hell.
All of them were so far fallen from grace.
Juugo listened to Sasuke’s steady breathing as he slept, and watched shooting stars scratch fire down the speckled dome of the sky.
Kabuto hadn’t seemed threatening to Suigetsu.
He looked like a push-over, too young and too weak to be taken seriously.
Too damn pretty to be a real shinobi.
It had to be a joke, Suigestu’d first thought, rolling his eyes. Escape from this place is going to be a fucking cake-walk.
He smiled sweetly back when the young Mist nin bared his teeth at him.
Suigetsu never stood a chance.
Months later, he knew he was one of the lucky ones.
He’d lived.
“Go on,” Orochimaru’d said, watching her with amusement. “Eat it.”
Karin hadn’t even looked at the piece of fruit he offered. The contrast of its brilliant red skin and his pale hand had been both temptation and distraction.
She’d kept her head lifted proudly. She wasn’t going to beg, or grovel. She wasn’t going to show the same pathetic desperation as the other prisoners groaning in the shadows of the dungeons, not to this man.
Not to the lord of the deep dark.
“You don’t deserve to be down here, do you?” he’d said, the words dragging in a sensual purr from his lips. “You are talented. I could raise you up above all this filth.”
“Wha…” Karin had cleared her throat. She hadn’t spoken to anyone in days. “What do you want from me?”
“Nothing at all,” he’d murmured, and his eyes slitted with pleasure as he gazed down at her. “You. I just want you.”
That first bite of apple, rich and juicy, had been so very, very sweet.
Sasuke thought about his brother.
“I will always be with you, as the wall you have to overcome.”
Itachi’d smiled at his little brother that afternoon.
“Bonds!? Bonds!? What use have I for worthless bonds!?
No matter how many times Sasuke screamed for Itachi to stop, stop, STOP, BROTHER STOP!...
…when he woke up his family was still dead and their blood was still on Itachi’s hands.