PROLOGUE
If there is one thing Orochimaru can respect snakes for, it's their dedication to their prey.
No matter if it's the paralyzing strangle of whatever unlucky enough to be slain or the slow, measured digestion of its food. Snakes are stubborn, fierce, and relentless. If this is the reason why most fear snakes, he sees no reason as to why he shouldn't act like one as well.
"Tsunade." He beckons his teammate over with a terse movement.
The medic doesn't move at first. She huffs then saunters to his side. "Hm."
"How good is your enhanced strength with a quarter of your chakra?"
Tsunade wrinkles her nose while he speaks. "Using that much is a waste. What are you up to?"
"Obey. I am your leader."
"Arguably." Tsunade pulls at the strap of her leather greaves. "I can topple an area bigger than the Home, I guess. But, I won't. Not if it'll put other lives in harm. We can do things without going so low—"
"As if our enemies would be so kind to us."
"Well, that doesn't matter! What do we become, huh? And their families? And those who survive?"
He holds a palm in her direction. Tsunade presses her lips together.
"At night, you strike their camp. If it so pleases you, you can remain in the back to heal."
"That's low."
"It is a necessity," says he, staring ahead. "Especially after the people they killed."
Night cannot fall fast enough. Ahead, obscured by the plentiful trees within the Land of Fire, is the camp housing 200 shinobi. They are tired, far from home, and disconnected from their allies. Isolated and exhausted enemies makes way for desperation.
It would be no problem at all to surround them with insurmountable forces, use a little sound illusion to scare all animals away, and let them slowly starve themselves until they surrendered their secrets. It would cause no fighting. No bloodshed.
Tsunade wouldn't let him even suggest as much to the captain.
For her, there must be a battle and prisoners to take. It isn't something he would do as a first option, but Tsunade is too useful of an ally to ignore.
The peak of night emerges. The new moon leaves the forest darker than ever before. Staring at the shadows of the trees and plants swaying in the spring breeze can drive one mad. A few Wind shinobi stand out on the outskirts of the camp, their torches burning like grounded stars, eyes opened as wide as can be.
He sees as much while perched on a tree branch some meters away.
Demonic Illusion: False Surroundings Technique.
His chakra slithers through the inky splotches. Just outside the circle of light, the trees warp ever so slightly. If the shinobi move their eyes, they could dismiss it as a trick of the night.
One shinobi blinks. And shuts his eyes tight. Once they open, he calls, "I think—I need to rest!"
"What's wrong? Falling asleep?"
"No…I guess I'm exhausted? I keep thinking I see eyes in the shadows."
He darts lightly off his branch, all while paranoia sows in his enemies. One by one, the shinobi start to second guess themselves. They cry Release! and cast their chakra forwards not knowing where the illusion begins to end it. On the ground now, he can feel the shinobi scurrying to their feet. Their talking allows for him to cut his thumb and drip blood at his feet.
"On guard! Prepare for an attack!"
"Careful! We don't know how many are out there!"
"Puppet Brigade, Exploding Dandelions!"
He lets out a breath hearing that. Reluctantly, he pulls out a kunai.
From all cardinal points, the brigade sends out puppet vultures. The wooden monstrosities cut through sky soundlessly, navigating through obstacles as their beaks pry open and release paper tags set alight.
They flutter down like petals. One, then two, four graze the coldness of his chakra and explode with a blast that disperses a bitter cloud of smoke. It makes the night all that more obscured.
He has no choice but dodge the tags. He figured they would be foolish enough to set fire to the forest, not use chakra-seeking explosions. They're hardly explosions, they are diversions. Unfortunately for them, the tags all explode near the same time, giving them nothing to work with—
Something reaches for his shoulder.
He spins his kunai to stab behind him, only for his wrist to be caught.
"Thought you were hurt," Tsunade whispers.
He pulls his hand away. "Thanks. Change of plans. Take out the brigade."
"How am I supposed to do that? I bring that camp down, we're gonna lose sight of them. We can't take down dozens of birds, Orochimaru."
He closes his eyes. "I would not tell you to do something if I did not know it would work."
"How am I supposed to know what you know? It just looks like luck—"
"Enough."
He sprints off to regain an advantage. Treetops won't cut it now. Being on the ground, however, is even less beneficial. He raises in arm to his face. From his sleeve slithers a thin, black snake looking no different than the veins on his pale arm. "Yesss?"
"Suji"—the brigade is preparing to send out another force of birds, this time carrying light—"what are we dealing with?"
"30 are wounded. There are decommissioned puppets. If they have more of those, they are too big to be used out here. None have any notable amount of chakra."
"Right. Tell the others to be careful of Tsunade. Take them out from the inside."
"Of coursssse…"
Suji returns. He skids to a halt. This should be far enough. Crouching to the ground, he runs through hand seals before pressing his palm to the soil.
Earth Release: Earth-Style Spikes.
He can feel the slight sluggishness in his body as his chakra leaves and converts itself into spikes jutting from the ground in a straight line. Every point soars out the ground with little warning. With it being so loud, it draws the attention of all shinobi and injures none.
"Over there! Brigade, fly!"
He grits his teeth, readying to run through hand seals faster than ever before.
All birds go airborne like shooting stars. The reach their apex above him. His body heats up as their amber glow surrounds him. This time, their chests open for golden tags to fall, set alight.
It is silent as they drift.
The first tags reach almost a couple meters overhead before a command rings out clear: "Brigade, destroy!"
He cannot move fast enough. He manages to reappear on a tree branch. But it almost doesn't matter. The sound is deafening. A shockwave from the explosions nearly pushes him off. He can't even take a breath of air. His lungs won't fill, the stench burns. Among the myriad of bombs, there is screaming.
He tries to survey the damage, but the giant fire and black smoke complicates things. He's forced to move in closer—
Their camp is obliterated. The earth juts up at odd angles as if trying to form mountains. Torches are quenched or deserted on the ground.
The shinobi still standing are shouting. No battle commands leave their lips. Only sounds of terror. They pull at their uniforms as if covered in flames. They topple to the ground. The ones who still seem sane pull at their teammates and wonder how to help them.
Leaves spiral into the sky before him, revealing Tsunade. The raging fire lights everything on her face except her eyes. "Orochimaru—"
"They are fine," he says and coughs. Seems the odor found its way down the back of his throat. "The snakes cause delirium. Before long, they will faint and everyone will be fine."
"There are wounded! If I didn't see them, you would've let me hurt them?"
"30 wounded. You avoided them—" He coughs again. He feels the acidic remains of his stomach burning his chest.
Tsunade huffs and shakes her head. "This isn't right! We should've have fought them like we've all been working for. This is—so cowardly and childish."
"We're outnumbered. You hated the other option."
"That's torture! You need to respect people. We're the same as them, we just think differently."
"Would you just shut up about this holier-than-thou nonsense, Tsunade? This is war. Your family died cause of war. Our friends."
"Stop," she growls.
His golden eyes shine as bright as the flames. "This isn't a game. This is the life of everything we love versus the death of everything we fight for. I'm not going to let you get yourself killed and screw over the world because you want to play hero like your grandfather."
"I'm warning you…" Her fists clench tighter.
"Newsflash, it doesn't matter how good you think you are," he hisses, "because if you get a fleet of our shinobi killed, you're as good as dead to the Leaf."
She raises one first, breathing hard.
"How many dead would be happy you're acting like this? How about Jiraiya?"
Tsunade brings her fist down onto the ground and deafens the world.
AN:
Hey! 2020 was hot garbage. There's nothing saying 2021 won't be worst, but let's hope not.
I was reading my old stories and reading new stories, exploring different media contents, and reading reviews. Sufficed to say, I am not proud of where Stuck Between Slugs and Toads fic is/was going. It was supposed to be a slow burn of cowardly passive slowly becoming the nightmare we all loved and enjoyed - until the murderer of two kage and children just gets a slap on the wrist? It drove me nuts.
Still does.
So! I revamped it: Between Slugs and Toads is less of a traditional slow burn. The story flips between past and present. In the past, Orochimaru is not quite the same character you read. In the future, Orochimaru is cunning, keen, powerful, and arrogant of the knowledge of his failures. Does that mean Orochimaru will become the main villain with knowledge over everyone? Will he use his power for good and become an overwhelmingly dominant, benevolent force? Who's to say?
In another way: the story is from Orochimaru's perspective: that being his journey, experiences, relationships, and battles (both the literal and metaphorical kind). These characters shape who Orochimaru is and what he does. At the same time, the characters also push the plot and world forwards using the crumbs Kishimoto left us! In short, Tokonoma and Hazuo provide a family and a reason for him to remain attached to the village as opposed to treating everyone like lab rats. Being on team with these two show off different sides of the Leaf, one worth protecting, one worth destroying. Killing Madara & Zetsu are the ultimate goal and where the story ends, but we can all agree the Leaf is fundamentally broken at this time.
Bonus, maybe spoilers?, lots of worldbuilding from the 1st to canon will take place. I tried super hard to capture the essence of all the 5 nations and their people and their nuances, so that I can better explore the politics of the war. As a result, there will be OCs and new concepts born of the overly generic and/or glossed over bits of information. Hope that's okay. The goal is to have this reach canon this time around.
Anyway, here goes the newer version. Much like its predecessor, short-ish chapters. Forgive me?