A/N: This is my new "Sannin-centric" fanfic - taken from the Challenges section of Mortalone's profile. This will replace "Otogakure no Sato", as it will have much of the same plot, but enhanced and just better written overall. Hope you enjoy! (Original Ideas FTW!)
Chapter 1:
The Colour of Rain:
"The battle is over." The darkened sky pelted the ground with rain, and Orochimaru was, as he often was at such times, struck with a particularly inane thought – in this case; what is the colour of water?
It was a simple answer, of course, and complicated in its own way. In the sky, it was dark, the colour of carrion-crows and evil intentions – the pit of darkness in each man's soul. By the time it hit the ground, it was red, the colour of blood, and anger, and violence – the same red that stained his hands, and clothes, weighed him down with the sin of murder, provided the sole remembrance for those he had killed – and there were so very many. Black was an empty colour, but red… was alive, and full of purpose.
Red, the colour of Jiraiya – who wore a red shirt under his green Chuunin's vest, and had red clan-tattoos adorning his face, and had red, fiery determination in his gaze, and his actions. He stood tall, but limp, and Tsunade had to hold him to prevent him from falling. The same red that marked his soul covered his body, as blood that had erupted from his wound – a wound only sealed by the blue-coloured medical chakra of Tsunade. (He had suffered that on their first attack – attempted to defeat him with Taijutsu, only to be caught by a sudden Katana blow, which ripped him almost in two. Miracle he was still alive.)
Blue… mixed with the damp, straw-yellow of her hair, made the Green that Tsunade favoured, though it was stained irrevocably dark brown – covered with her blood, and Jiraiya's blood, and his blood, from the many injuries they had sustained over this battle. Green, the colour of life, and vitality – the vitality that drove her to glare at their sole remaining enemy, even as it was clear they were outmatched. (Even though they outnumbered him, he could defeat all three of them, with only a casual effort.)
Blue mixed within him, too, mixed with the red that stained his soul, and provided Purple – a colour Orochimaru had always associated with power, with purpose, with majesty. A shame, that his robe was tattered and singed, by the Katon that their foe was capable of, regardless of rain.(Testament to his strength, to defy the natural order so easily)
He was Grey, lifeless metallic colours, rusted from use and condition. Clunky steel headgear, layers of metal armour in the style of a samurai – even his eyes were a cold grey, unsullied by passions. Hanzō, the Salamander King, strongest shinobi of Amegakure no Sato. Their victorious enemy.
"The battle is over," he repeated, voice distorted by his mouthpiece. "Even were I to kill you, then I would be killed in turn. You three… for such young warriors, you have impressed me greatly. I, Hanzō, command you to, from now on, use the title of Densetsu no Sannin, for your deeds here. Go from this place, young ones – the battle is over." Flinty grey words from a metal, lipless mouth. His grey-scaled salamander groaned, and Hanzō stood there, rain pelting down across his form, awaiting their answer.
"You… bastard! It's… it's not over yet!" Jiraiya tried to take a step forward, faltered, and was caught by Tsunade. Orochimaru glanced at his team-mates, considered them. He could continue fighting, but not for much longer. His energy had been spent long ago – he only now regretted forcing his enemies to sing, before he killed them. Were he to fight Hanzō; alone or with the aid of the others, they would all be killed.
"Don't push it, Jiraiya! You can't fight any more!" Tsunade had to physically drag Jiraiya away, whilst the white-haired member of their team tried to push his way through to Hanzō. Whilst Tsunade had the greatest physical strength in their team, Jiraiya was truly the most courageous, or foolhardy, depending on what kind of mood Orochimaru happened to be in.
"We should retreat," he said, silky-soft, but both his team-mates heard. Tsunade silently thanked him, as his words could do more to stop Jiraiya than her actions. Jiraiya gaped at him.
"Orochimaru… you sayin' we should give up?" The way Jiraiya phrased it, Orochimaru had just asked him to cut off his manhood. Foolish, foolish child.
"Retreat, regroup, readdress priorities. He is beyond us. To continue to fight will lead to our deaths. We will get another chance." Tsunade joined in quickly, nodding her head and keeping up the barrage against Jiraiya's ego.
"Come on, Jiraiya – we'll kick his ass next time, just you wait and see. We just… we just need to heal up, refill our chakra levels, that's all." Tsunade glanced back at the immobile Hanzō, and then turned away. Jiraiya glared at both of his team-mates half-heartedly.
"Fine…" he muttered. "We'll do it your way, but next time… next time, we'll do this my way." Hollow, empty bravado. We know there will not be a next time. For us, the war is over.
"Next time," he agreed. Tsunade shouldered the weight of Jiraiya, and then the three of them ran, as Hanzō turned away, to attend to his village. The battle was over. Though war still continued, Orochimaru knew, as two full squadrons of Iwa-nin attacked them mid-way to their base-of-operations.
--
"K-kuso!" Jiraiya gasped, and he spasmed, jerking the hands of Tsunade.
"Stop squirming! I need to set the bone!" Tsunade wiped sweat from her brow, uncaring that she merely replaced it with blood. Jiraiya gritted his teeth as she pulled at his rib, removing it from its prior position, dangerously close to puncturing a lung, and then healed the gaping, heaving tear in his abdomen. She glanced at Orochimaru, who was seated against a wall, breathing heavily. His hands were black now, so coated in dried blood – he, once out of chakra, resorted to the brutal method of tearing his enemies apart, from the inside out. Taijutsu was not his strong point, however, and one of the Iwa shinobi had managed to slip past his guard, and almost impale him with a sword, moments before Orochimaru had torn his throat out. Tsunade hurried to his side, placed hands over the wound.
"Kami… Orochimaru, you should have said something…" she said, and focused medical chakra to her hands. She was near exhaustion, Orochimaru could tell – the weariness on her face, the shiver that seemed to course through her entire body… When she was done, she nearly collapsed, legs turned to jelly beneath her.
"Tsunade!" Jiraiya half-crawled, half-scrambled over to her, and Tsunade gave him a small, weak smile.
"I'm still alive, baka. Didn't think I was going to go and leave Orochimaru alone with you, huh?"
They had taken shelter in a cave. Moving further, with such extensive injuries, was impossible. Outside, the storm still raged, and inside, Jiraiya did so – who knew what Hanzō was doing now; who he was killing – killing, when they could have fought him, stopped him. They were in no condition to do so now, Orochimaru knew – they would, most likely, be unable even to fight another Chuunin team of Iwa shinobi.
The Densetsu no Sannin, eh? They said legends were formed during war – how ironic it would be if this legend was snuffed out during its infancy. He smiled, and then coughed blood, hacking and wheezing.
"Orochimaru! Oh Kami, oh Kami…" Tsunade tried to stand, failed, and then Orochimaru's breathing slowly turned back to normal. "I'm sorry! I… I ran out of Chakra… I…" she was weeping, Orochimaru could see, though he could not understand why. Was it due to her weakness? Or his pain? Or war in general?
"I… am fine… Just need… rest…" He collapsed, gave a pained grin, though his chest was aflame.
"Shit… we're a mess…" Jiraiya said, holding a sobbing Tsunade in his arms. "We almost bit it back there, huh, Orochimaru?"
"Observant, aren't you… Jiraiya-baka?" Had it been a less solemn time, Orochimaru may even have smiled – their banter, verging on the insulting, was a key component of their team.
"Heh. As observant as you are tactful, Orochi-teme." A mock sneer, and Jiraiya stuck his tongue out – the signal for Orochimaru to respond with his own, overlarge tongue.
"Both of you… stop it…" Tsunade said weakly. "We… almost died. We shouldn't… shouldn't be fighting… who knows when the bastards will finish us off…"
"No." Jiraiya's voice was gentle, but firm, and suddenly serious. "We're not gonna die. Not us, 'cause we've got the best damned medic-nin ever on our team, and we've got the strongest shinobi ever, too. Orochimaru's not bad, either." He winked at his pale team-mate, who rolled his eyes. All part of their pantomime. "Still," he continued, "we're the strongest, because we work as a team. That's not gonna change." He fumbled for a kunai, then thought better of it. "Nah, there's no point in cutting ourselves again – there's enough blood here for a fuckin' surgery. Just… you two, put your hands on mine." Tsunade complied, a curious smile on her weary face, and Orochimaru slightly more hesitantly. Jiraiya grinned. "Right, now repeat after me. We three…"
"We three," his team-mates said.
"The Densetsu no Sannin…"
"The Densetsu no Sannin," Tsunade traded an anxious glance with Orochimaru. When Jiraiya came up with something like this at short notice, it usually meant that there would be great changes ahead of them.
"Will stick together, through thick or thin, for better or worse, no matter what, until our dreams are fulfilled."
"Jiraiya…" Tsunade started to say, leaving This isn't going to work hanging in the air.
"Say it." It will. I promise. What was left unsaid was another vital part of their team – what made them them, and not anyone else.
"Will stick together," Orochimaru began. "Through thick or thin." I believe you. Jiraiya wasn't the kind to make empty promises.
"For better or worse," Tsunade added. If you two are so determined about this… "No matter what." They both said this at the same time. "Until our dreams are fulfilled." Jiraiya grinned, and it spread, infectious, to first Tsunade, then Orochimaru.
"We're gonna get through this, you'll see. We'll get through this, and get back to Konoha, and when we've healed up, we'll take down Hanzō together. We'll win this war, and then… well…"
"You two… are going to be at my wedding, right?" Tsunade picked up. "I won't have anyone other than my team-mates there, when I marry Dan. I'll have twins, you know, and I'll name them after you – and we'll be a family." A smile, this time genuine, on the face of Tsunade, and Jiraiya nodded eagerly. Yellow. That's what colour was being shown now – yellow; peace, calm, joy.
"Sure thing, sure thing. I'll make sure to invite you guys, too, if I finally lose my senses and tie the knot with some hot chick." He smiled, in that dream-like, perverted manner they were accustomed to, then it became suddenly sly, and he turned to Orochimaru. "Heh. What about you, Orochimaru? Any girls got your interest? Or are you about ready to come out of the closet, perhaps? Don't worry, we won't judge you, or nothing." Hn. They were always badgering him – 'you won't stay young forever', as Jiraiya would say, or Tsunade, in a more sombre tone of voice – 'you never know when you'll go out for a mission, and might not come back.'
"The only thing I love…" he began slowly, giving a smile of his own, pretending not to notice the two hanging onto his every word, "is my dream. You could say… that I am already married to it."
"Oh? And what's this dream of yours?" Jiraiya smirked. Orochimaru closed his eyes, and began to recite it – the dream he had held since childhood.
"A world, Jiraiya, where this does not occur – a world where the old do not suffer, and the young do not fall. A world where all people may live as they desire, without fear of injury or defeat. A world, Jiraiya, without death."
Silence, except for the crackling of their fire, and the sound, faint on the wind, of a clacking puppet. Orochimaru opened his eyes, snake-quick, to see Jiraiya deep in concentration. With body-language and hand-signals, he communicated silently: Five of them – outside, twenty, no, twenty-five metres away. They've seen our fire; they're closing in on us.
What do we do? I'm out of chakra. There was a panicked tone in Tsunade's communication – shaky signals, wide-eyed anxiety. Oh Kami… I don't want to die-don't want to die…
Tsunade – get to the back. Me and Orochimaru will handle this. Jiraiya turned to Orochimaru, his face set in the grim, determined scowl he had when something distasteful needed to be done.
I will circle around – you hold them off from the front.
Understood. How long will you need?
As long as you can give me. Don't be a hero.
Don't be late.
Then they slipped away, into the cold wet darkness, to face enemies, knowing that even now, they could lose, could die.
--
The rain was Black now, in the night, no matter where it landed. Black rain pattered onto the corpse of his adversary, and ran in black rivulets down the gaping craters he had left, where it mixed with black blood, before dripping (or rushing, depending on how deep the gashes were) onto the black soil.
Such a simple view of the world – black, and white. The White of the skin of the recently deceased (or at least, it would be white if it did not have the dirt and grime of battle written across it).
Jiraiya's white hair, limp and unmoving – after Hari Jizo, it lay in the mud like a dying lion. He was dying. But he had held them long enough. Done more than that, in fact – two lay dead at his feet, one with a kunai buried into his throat, one laying entangled in the heaving mass of Jiraiya's hair, where he had been punctured by the individual strands.
"Told… you… Orochi-teme… Don't… be late…" He gave a pained smile, then shuddered. His chest was pin-pricked with senbon needles, and Orochimaru remembered that one of the men he had killed had been a puppeteer, hiding behind his wooden doll before Orochimaru took his head off, and disassembled his puppet's limbs with a single blow. (It came undone so easily, like a child's toy).
"And I told you, Jiraiya, don't be a hero…" His own black hair hung low, touched the face of his friend, who grimaced.
"You… picked a hell… of a time… Comin' out… eh, Orochimaru?" (Continue the pantomime, until the final act)
"We will survive this. You will not die here." (Won't allow it. You cannot die, it's not in my dream). He lifted the larger man, who was beginning to shudder uncontrollably, spasming as the poison destroyed him from the inside out. "Tsunade… she must know something…" (she's the best medic-nin, that's what you said).
"Heh… Sorry, bud… We both know how… this works… Need to know… what poison… find cure… Too late…" Then there was only one way. He made the seals, laid Jiraiya onto the earth. "Orochimaru…? What… what're you doing?"
Rat-Ram-Rat-Dog-Dragon-Ox-Pig-Dragon-Ox-Ram-Rat.
"Kinjutsu: Tensei no Jutsu." (Such a risk… haven't tried it… incomplete…)
Placing long, elegantly-fingered hands onto the chest of Jiraiya, Orochimaru paused a moment, then focused his chakra, his energy, his life to his hands, and into Jiraiya. He screamed, and moments later so did Jiraiya. Still, he held it there, knowing without seeing that he was re-building him from the inside out – destroying the poisoned, failing organs and growing new ones, restoring the damaged nervous system, infusing new supplies of blood. When he finished, he fell limply to floor, and Tsunade came running from the cave, not knowing whether there were enemies or not.
Orochimaru mustered up enough energy to look at Jiraiya with a sideways glance, saw confusion on the face of the man who had been dying.
"Why?"
"Dream… isn't… fulfilled… Jiraiya…" Mumbled into the ground, there was no way that Jiraiya could hear, but he did, and he smiled.
"I don't know what you did, Orochimaru, but whatever it was… thanks."
Orochimaru couldn't hear, no matter how loud Jiraiya said it. He fell into darkness, unsure of when he would emerge, only knowing that they were safe, and they were fine, and that was all that mattered.
--
Help me get this bastard up, Tsunade…" Jiraiya sat up, reached up to pluck the needles from his chest, but they weren't there any more. He saw them lying in his lap, and ran a hand over his chest – there weren't even holes anymore.
Jeez… What did you do, Orochimaru? He couldn't even feel the injuries he'd sustained before, when that bastard Hanzō had cut him apart with his sword. Damned geezer – how'd he get so damned fast?
He retracted his hair, uncoiling it from around the corpse of the Suna shinobi, and stood, feeling… great, in fact – fresh, as if he had not even been in battle. Tsunade put hands to her mouth as she saw Orochimaru lying there – and for the life of him, Jiraiya couldn't figure out how one earth it had switched from him laying down and dying, whilst Orochimaru stood over him, to Orochimaru lying motionless on the floor whilst he was unharmed.
"Oh Kami… what happened, Jiraiya?" She bent down, checked the pulse of Orochimaru.
"I… I don't know… I was down – one of the Suna bastards got me with his puppet, and then the next thing I know, Orochimaru did some creepy stuff, kind-of like Medical Ninjutsu, and I was… fine. Is he okay?"
Tsunade shook her head.
"There's a pulse, but his breathing is shallow, and diagnosis points to complete chakra exhaustion, along with… Neural collapse? Oh Kami… Jiraiya, he's nearly braindead! I… I don't know how to heal this!"
"Jeez… He said it was a Kinjutsu… What the fuck were you thinking, Orochimaru!? Is he okay to move?"
"He… he should be, if we're gentle…" Tsunade said, and Jiraiya lifted his frail team-mate onto his shoulders.
"Let's get out of here – Sarutobi-sensei must know some technique that can help us. If we run into trouble, I'll handle it, okay? You take Orochimaru and run." No way I'm putting him in unnecessary danger… He gave Tsunade a quick chakra injection, enough to ensure that she'd be able to move without floundering like a limp fish, and then the two sped away, the rain pelting them as they went.
--
Jiraiya could be patient, when he felt like it. All those times when he'd stayed in that precise spot, in that precise tree in Konoha, so he could see into the ladies' bath at Konoha hot springs, for hours even, was testament to that.
However, even the legendary pervert would admit instantly that there was a great, great difference between peeping on ladies, and waiting to hear if his friend – because Orochimaru was, even for all his strangeness, the best friend of Jiraiya – would ever be able to wake up again, or if he was going to be a vegetable for the rest of his life.
He tapped his foot endlessly as he sat outside the building Sarutobi-sensei and Tsunade had commandeered for their experiment, and glared daggers at the former team-mates of Sarutobi, who had recommended that Orochimaru be left to rot for performing a Kinjutsu. He'd have smashed their old, decrepit faces in, if Sarutobi had not summoned Enma to hold him back whilst he reprimanded Homura and Koharu.
He stood immediately when Sarutobi came out, looking infinitely weary, but smiling.
"He is awake," he said, and left with his advisors to discuss just how they were going to defeat Hanzō. Jiraiya immediately rushed into the building, seeing Tsunade holding Orochimaru's hand. The dark-haired member of their team gave a weak smile. Glad to see you're okay.
"Orochimaru! What the hell were you thinking!" Jiraiya roared. Kami… Why the fuck did you put yourself in danger?
"It was… necessary…" I survived, didn't I?
"You could have died…" Yeah, you did.
"I didn't." How are you?
"Well then… could you explain what you did to me?" I don't quite know, yet.
"Tensei no Jutsu," Tsunade explained for both of them. "It's an experimental technique, developed by Kugutsu no Chiyo – Orochimaru must have found it whilst we were infiltrating Suna. It heals at a rate unlike anything I've ever seen before – and it heals everything, but not just at the cost of chakra – it's life-force." It's… unbelievable, genius. It could revolutionise Medical Ninjutsu!
"Life… force? How… how much did you use?" You didn't just heal the poison, you healed everything
"I would guess… something along the lines of forty years of my life…" Orochimaru said, after a moment of thought. It was worth it.
"That… that means…" Kami… you could die within the next ten years…
"I have planned for this… I will survive." Don't ask how – you would not want to know the answer.
"What's important here… is that we're all alive," Tsunade interrupted. Through thick or thin. She placed her other hand on top of Orochimaru's. "We're all still here." For better or worse.
"Jeez… Just… don't do that again, Orochimaru… I don't want to live, if it means my friends die…" Glad to see you're fine, though. It'll take more than this to kill off a genius like you.
"How… ironic. I was about to say the same thing." We can't die yet. We have yet to complete our dreams.
"You two… always fighting…" We will… All our dreams, because we've got each other.
"Damn right – what's life without a little competition?" We're the Densetsu no Sannin.
"Without competition? Then life is the colour of rain." And we are more than that. Far more.
A/N: So... there's the prologue. How did it look? I experimented a bit, with some "Thoughts" being in italics and others being in (brackets), to show the erraticness of Orochimaru's thought processes.
Some people may find my version of him "OOC", and I suppose he is - if you like "I'm an immortal villain who will destroy Konoha!" Orochimaru, you won't find it here - this Orochimaru is not good, but neither is he wholly evil. Same with Jiraiya and Tsunade - they're not going to be perfect, pure beings - things will very much be in shades of grey. (And not just the Sannin, in fact - the whole world is shades of grey).
For reference, this is when the Sannin are in their early twenties, from Jiraiya's flashback about Hanzō a couple of chapters ago. There'll be a couple more chapters detailing their exploits during the Second Great Ninja War, then expect a quite large timeskip. I apologise if I made Tsunade seem weak here, but this chapter was very much about Orochimaru, with a bit of Jiraiya POV. Tsunade will get her time to shine, don't worry.
Reviews are appreciated, as always, and Review Focus for this chapter (i.e. what I want people to mention in their reviews as good, bad, or if it requires improvements, where), is the application of Colour to Orochimaru's view of the world.