Chapter 10—Trigger

The sun was setting when Orochimaru and Tsunade found it. The forest they had been traveling through came to an abrupt end at the edge of a ravine. Directly below was a wide but gentle river flowing at the foot of the sheer rock face and level with the wide mouth of a large cave on its opposite shore. Just outside of the cave there stood an enormous white bird. Tsunade squinted down at it from across the ravine.

"What is that?" she asked.

"It's one of his jutsu. That one is used for transportation. He's here."

Tsunade nodded. "All right then. Let's get this over with." She was about to take a step when Orochimaru grabbed her shoulder and held her back.

"Look."

She followed his gaze and at first did not see anything at all. Then a fiery ray of sunlight cast a quick gleam off of nothing and she realized what it was. Thin wires were pulled tight across the trees ahead, some even reaching down from branches to the ground at the edge of the cliff

"Traps?" she murmured. "Or just alarms."

"Either way, we don't want to trigger them. We should find a way around–" He was cut off again as coughing shook his body once more. He put his hand out to steady himself against a tree until it subsided and he could catch his breath.

"…We should check the area carefully while we still have light," he said quietly.

They split up and checked the cliff and forest edges, making note of where the traps and alarms were set as best they could. They'd agreed to meet back where they had started, but neither returned soon enough to see the tiny white clay spider crawl out from the tree Orochimaru had used for support.

Tsunade returned to their meeting place but it was several minutes before Orochimaru made it back. He was moving slowly and when he reached Tsunade he almost collapsed. She caught his arm quickly and held him up.

It took us a whole day to travel here, Tsunade thought. It was too much for him. "We've got more information now," she said. "Let's get some distance and come up with a plan."

Orochimaru agreed but he could not walk on his own and Tsunade supported him as they retreated from the cliff edge. They were making tediously slow progress and Orochimaru was so quiet that Tsunade felt sure he was only semiconscious at best.

"…Thought about killing you," she muttered tentatively. Orochimaru did not respond and she gained some confidence, assuming he could not hear her. "When you were lying there, back in your old hideout," she continued. "Thought about it a couple of times. Thought up a couple of ways to do it. Stabbing your own sword through your throat would have been the most satisfying… Probably wouldn't have done the trick though, knowing you." She felt better for saying it. It was something she felt guilty for considering and she preferred not to have it on her mind if they were going into battle together.

It was silent in the forest again for a moment, making it all the more startling when Orochimaru spoke.

"You tried to save me," he said faintly, and slight color rose to Tsunade's cheeks. "You stayed with me. You didn't return to Konoha." He lifted his head and Tsunade felt him take on a little more of his own weight. "If you were acting as Hokage, you would have killed me and returned. If you wanted a quiet compromise, you would have just left then, without doing anything. You stayed."

"Well that's… that's just entirely beside the point," Tsunade said.

"What point?" Orochimaru laughed softly. "I thought we were just… thinking out loud."