Orochimaru clears his schedule. Danzō and his experiments can hang for all he cares. He's hit a rather galling wall—he must start again from the beginning. And, while he waits for new materials, he has the perfect excuse to check in on his student's growth.
It's almost amusing how easily Honōka fooled Danzō with her clumsy little act. He thinks it would have been even more so if it didn't mean Danzō now considers his apprentice a waste of time. But, and he praises Honōka's instincts for this, better a waste of time than a potential asset.
The time is eleven hundred. Orochimaru heads to the Third Training Ground. He'll have an hour to figure out if his student's new technique is a stroke of genius or just dumb luck. He reasons it must be rather simple if the Uchiha boy picked it up the same day. Uchiha Obito doesn't appear to be the sharpest kunai in the tool pouch.
He enters the training grounds, pausing as he passes the Memorial Stone. Not because he's feeling anything inane like nostalgia or guilt—he knows there are names on the stone that are very much his doing and, regardless, nothing he feels can change that fact.
What catches his eye is the single drop of blood on the otherwise pristine Memorial Stone. It's not recent—the oily serum and muddy clot have already separated, nearly dry even. Neither is it particularly old, as it rained early yesterday afternoon.
He's ready to shrug it off. There are plenty of shinobi who might have visited the Memorial Stone after a mission in less than ideal physical condition. But he does cast a quick look about, just to be certain.
There's another drop, and another. Oh dear, a trail. How highly suspicious. Whatever shall he do?
Never one to turn down a good mystery, he follows it. It doesn't go far—just into the clearing where his sensei once treated him and his fellow Sannin to the bell test. The three wooden pillars, bleached bone white from decades of weather exposure, are exactly as they should be.
But not everything is as it should be. The drip trail ends at the central pillar and the clearing is silent. He knows from years of experience that someone is on the other side of the obstruction.
He palms a kunai and approaches.
A familiar child holds their knees to their chest, drowning in an ugly yellow tarp-like raincoat. One lock of messy black hair sticks out from under the bloodstained hood.
Comprehension dawns, and yet still eludes him. Honōka-kun isn't supposed to be here for another hour.
He drops to a knee in front of her and lays a hand on her shoulder. She jolts and a blade flecked with rusty blood protrudes from her right sleeve. He parries with his kunai. She was aiming for his ribs—which just won't do. He will drill into her head to aim for the softer, far more vulnerable, belly—later.
"Honōka-kun, put down the knife."
"Sensei…?"
She slowly lifts her head off her knees and he experiences the oddest feeling—like his stomach has dropped into free fall while the rest of him remains frozen in place.
Her face is lopsided. Swollen, bruised like an overripe plum, left eye sealed shut from either the swelling or the tallowy fluid glistening in the creases.
She's yet to relinquish her bloody knife, and he banishes all the extraneous thoughts—and emotions—flitting through his mind. He can think about murder when he has determined his student's condition.
The knife trembles in her grip and he pushes her coat sleeve up, intending to pry it from her if he has to. As she is now, he wouldn't put it past her to collapse on the damned thing.
Only, there's no hand attached to the knife blade. It just protrudes from midway down her forearm, the border between flesh and blade a gradual transition. Henge, perhaps. He turns it over (palm up?) and she whimpers. There's more bruising on her arm. A large hand print.
"I'm sorry—I'm sorry…!"
He puts a lid on his fury, again, and scoops her up.
"I am not upset with you, Honōka. Who did this to you?"
"I'm sorry," she chants, over and over. "I'm sorry…!"
It takes every ounce of the considerable control he possesses to dull his killing intent. As it is, his presence of mind is just enough there that he produces an unused handkerchief to use as an impromptu swab of the blood on her transformed hand. Whoever attacked her won't be getting away unscathed.
He shunshin's the entire way to the Konoha Hospital, straight into the intensive care unit. A medical-nin warily approaches him, and he taps down the urge to snarl.
"Get Tsunade." He knows she's not on rotation in the field, and she lives at the hospital in much the same way that he lives at his lab.
"But—"
"Now."
They spin on their heel and run. Good.
He would commandeer a room and bed to put his student in, but he's not Jiraiya. Tsunade would never let him hear the end of it if he did something so impulsive.
She appears in a few minutes, wearing a white surgical gown and pulling off blood soiled gloves.
"This better be important, Orochimaru. I was in the middle of a training seminar—" it occurs to her then, that the form her most eccentric teammate carries is a child—one that is clearly injured. "This way, now."
He follows her without a token response into an empty room where she methodically preps the operation table. He lays his student down, who has been in and out of consciousness since the start. Her right eye blinks twice before shutting again.
"How long since the trauma occurred?"
"Up to eighteen hours ago." Likely soon after he dismissed her.
"IV, now."
He proceeds with her go ahead. Tsunade takes a flashlight and checks her pupillary light reflex. It seems obvious to him that his student is concussed—but Tsunade is the expert here.
Honōka reacts to the unexpected light in her eye by flailing her bladed hand. He pins it down and Tsunade continues her examination without flinching.
Tsunade's hands glow in what appears to be a new diagnostic form of the Mystical Palm Technique. Her brow wrinkles and she traps an angry sound behind pursed lips.
"Multiple skull fractures, swelling, but no bleeds. The orbital blowout fracture appears to be the worse. Ruptured globe and vitreous hemorrhaging."
"Can the eye be saved?"
"I can save it—but even I can't predict what the quality of vision will be after."
Tsunade looks unhappy with that prognosis. Orochimaru is.
"Whoever stomped on her face aimed for the eye—she needs to go into surgery right now for me to have any chance of reconstructing it. But," she gestures at the blade arm, "that's got to go first."
It's a henge, so a sufficient jolt to the chakra system should disrupt it—only Honōka's chakra system is resistant to such intrusions. Tsunade is already attempting to disrupt it and is meeting with the expected result—nothing.
"It won't work, Tsunade. She's immune to genjutsu—a brief flare will not disrupt her transformation."
Tsunade is rightfully incredulous—total genjutsu immunity is unheard of. To make the leap from there that his student has an uncompromisable chakra network is bold but true.
"You can't be serious."
"I assure you, I am."
"What's this kid's deal anyhow? Who is she?"
"Tsunemori Honōka. She is my apprentice."
Tsunade is surprised, but doesn't comment.
"Alright. Let's wake her up then."
She rather crudely jabs a needle into his student's fingertip. Honōka flinches, intact right eye rolling back and forth.
"Honōka, my name is Tsunade. You're safe now, but you've been injured—"
"I'm sorry… I'm sorry…!"
"You're safe, Honōka. You need to undo your henge so that I can help you."
Honōka keeps apologizing, and Tsunade continues on with her usual bedside manners. Orochimaru inserts himself into the unproductive mess.
"Honōka-kun, mission report."
She stops apologizing mid breath, eye squinting.
"Orochimaru-sama…?"
He sees her attention slipping away.
"Undo the transformation, Honōka-kun." He orders.
She comes around again, somewhat coherently responding to his authoritative tone.
"Henge…transformation?"
"Your right hand, Honōka-kun."
She tries to look but can't lift her head or her right arm.
"It hurts."
He shares a look with Tsunade. Another wound, most likely.
"You need to undo the transformation for us to look at your hand, Honōka." Tsunade tries.
His student has begun shaking and mouthing 'no' over and over. A sheen of sweat coats her face.
Tsunade grabs an oxygen mask and hauls over an obnoxiously large monitor. He sits on the edge of the operating table and carefully immobilizes his student's thrashing head.
"She's going into shock—either get off the table and tie that arm down or do something to strip the transformation off, and fast."
"Honōka-kun—" no response. He cups her cheek in his hand. "Honōka-kun. Look at me."
He meets a near delirious blue eye, her red pupil pinpoint small. Her gaze is unsteady, but she's not looking away.
"Undo the transformation on your right hand. Now."
Her lower lip trembles, and she signals 'yes' with her eye.
The blade morphs rather than reverts. It expands and becomes dark and shadowy before abruptly being a hand again. A hand with mangled digits barely attached.
Tsunade swears and moves to stabilize the limb, swearing again as his student's body jerks, spasming violently. A seizure.
"Don't let her fall off the table, for fuck's sake!"
She doesn't need to tell him. However, doing so while attempting to let the seizure play out unrestrained is hard. It passes after a long minute.
"Recovery position." Tsunade instructs after checking her pulse. She slips the oxygen mask over her mouth and double checks the IV. "Surgery prep now. Either get out and get me my assistant or shut up and suit up."