Chapter 33

Jiraiya and Orochimaru still clashed, sword against sword. Neither gave the other an opening to use any jutsu. They pressed against each other's defenses, each looking for the advantage.

"Do you really think you can win this way?" Orochimaru asked. "I've been using kenjutsu since I was eight. You took it up as a hobby when you were fifteen."

"I might not be the little prodigy, starting when you did, but when I learned how to wield a sword doesn't matter," Jiraiya retorted. "What matters is who's better now."

"That's a good point," Orochimaru said.

Jiraiya's heart sank.

"Let me show you." Orochimaru let go of Kusanagi's hilt. The sword still pressed forward, attacking without his wielder.

"Oh, you gotta be kidding me," Jiraiya complained, fending off the blade's phantom thrusts.

Orochimaru stood back and grinned at him, exposing snake-like fangs. "Surprised? Dismayed? Well, you haven't seen a tenth of my power yet."

"Isn't that classic badguy stuff?" Jiraiya asked. "Is it in your contract or something to brag about your unseen reserves of power? Because I've heard that a million times before. And not just from you."

He couldn't deny to himself that his wrist was getting tired. If he could put Ame no Habakiri on auto pilot, he would. But he wasn't going to show that he was being worn down.

Orochimaru's irritated expression was worth it. "Impertinence," he hissed. "I ought to finish you now and spare myself the ordeal of listening to your pompous accusations."

"Yeah, probably," Jiraiya agreed. "But if you could have, you would have by now." He knocked Kusanagi out of the way with a blow that spit sparks from both blades and slashed at Orochimaru.

Orochimaru hastily jumped back, infuriated.

Kusanagi retaliated by flying at his head.

Jiraiya turned the blade aside with a deflecting block. Kusanagi sliced past him, shredding through the trailing edge of his haori. Jiraiya hastily yanked off his haori and threw it at Orochimaru's face, betting that Kusanagi was still somehow guided by his teammate mentally. "Time for that to go anyway."

In the moment of confusion that caused both Orochimaru and Kusanagi – the blade hovered aimlessly as soon as Orochimaru's vision was blocked – Jiraiya hastily made the hand seals for a kage bunshin.

The haori fluttered to the ground in front of Orochimaru.

Jiraiya's double leapt out and grabbed the hilt of Orochimaru's sword before Orochimaru could regain control. "Gotcha!"

"Hang onto that thing," Jiraiya said. "Don't let it do anything crazy."

"Oh, I ain't lettin' go of this thing for the world," his shadow clone replied, yanking Kusanagi down with both hands.

"You think I can't create clones?" Orochimaru snarled. "I could create a thousand clones."

"But none of 'em are gonna be real," Jiraiya's shadow clone answered for him. "You hate sharing power with anybody. Most of all yourself. You'd never create a real clone like me. You'd be terrified you'd usurp yourself."

Orochimaru flushed angrily and fell silent.

Jiraiya laughed. "You tell him, other me." He didn't think he'd ever been so amused before in a battle situation. Hiruzen had told him once that shadow clones were actually pieces of the original person, and therefore retained all of their personality and abilities. This was that principle in action.

"You think you can control something that's mine?" Orochimaru said finally. He gestured, crooking two fingers.

Jiraiya number two suddenly found himself dragged towards Orochimaru, his feet slipping over the sand. He dug his heels in, found that didn't matter so much on this kind of terrain, and back-pedaled hastily, keeping himself in place against the pull of the blade.

"Do you think you can win merely by standing in stalemate?" Orochimaru asked, his smirk reappearing through his anger.

"No," Jiraiya said, leaping forward with Ame no Habakiri raised.

Orochimaru's eyes widened for a fraction of a second. Then he made a hand seal and spat silver senbon at Jiraiya from his mouth.

Jiraiya deflected them with his katana and bore down.

xXx

Kankuro stretched. "I can't believe they're not back yet."

"Yeah…" Temari sat on the floor and stared absently at the tv, watching some boring daytime tv show none of them had ever heard of. This was in the middle of when they were always working. And when they were kids, this was when they'd be at school. Nothing looked familiar to them. They could flip channels for an hour and not find something they recognized.

"What do you suppose is happening?" Kankuro asked, even though he knew it was naïve to think Temari had any answers.

"I don't know," Temari said, predictably. She chewed her lip.

"I'm sure they're just talking with some long-winded old guy from Rice in a pagoda somewhere, sipping chilled fruit juice and reading a mile-long contract," Aio said, dropping onto the sofa beside Kankuro.

Kankuro smiled at the older puppet master halfheartedly. As amusing and comforting as that image was, he doubted it was true. The pit in his stomach was too convincing in arguing otherwise. "I think they're in a battle. I think it went wrong."

Aio squeezed his shoulder. "If it did, you know they're going to win."

"Yeah, maybe." Kankuro didn't want to argue. He really wanted to believe Aio was right. He needed Aio to be right. Or it all would be ruined. Everything. He had too much riding on this to contemplate failure any longer.

Josei sat down on Kankuro's other side, silent and sympathetic.

Kankuro remembered the day of his graduation test for the Academy. He didn't know how it worked in other villages, but in Suna, parents were invited to attend and look on. Even though their presence was screened from the view of the children, everyone knew about it from their older siblings, their parents, and sometimes the teachers would admit to it. It was hardly a secret.

He'd known in advance that his father was unable to make it because the Council had scheduled a meeting during the time that he was going to take his test. His father had sent Josei instead to observe and report back.

What he hadn't expected was for Josei to come out after he'd passed his test and give him a congratulatory squeeze on the shoulder. He'd blushed bright red in front of everybody. And then, on top of it, Josei had treated him to lunch, then brought him to his father's office to tell his father in person. He'd gotten to come in wearing his forehead protector and everything.

Kankuro suddenly felt tears in his eyes and knew he had to tear himself away from the memories or cry. He looked around for something to distract him.

Then he realized that Gaara sat at the kotatsu table staring at the wood grain, with an oddly pensive expression.

"How are you feeling?" Kankuro asked.

Gaara sighed and bowed his head. "I am filled with an irrational sense of discomfort."

"How come?" Kankuro asked softly.

"I do not know," Gaara said.

"Is it about Dad?" Kankuro asked.

Gaara gave Kankuro a suspicious look. When he discerned that Kankuro wasn't making fun of him, he nodded slightly. "I am filled with a sense of unease and speculation. Wishing without influence is a useless way to live. But I feel myself…beginning to wish…" He hesitated, and looked down at the kotatsu table.

"What?" Kankuro prompted gently.

Gaara stared at the surface of the kotatsu table. "I wish that Otousama wouldn't die…"

xXx

Orochimaru twisted to one side, but the evasion wasn't enough. Jiraiya took a diagonal slice out of his head. The next two slices lopped off Orochimaru's arms, and the final cut slashed across Orochimaru's chest.

Jiraiya jumped back and landed in a crouch, his blade up defensively.

Orochimaru didn't bleed. Pieces of his body fell away, revealing nothing but pale, bloodless flesh. Jiraiya was reminded of the way imitation crab looked, and wanted to throw up. Orochimaru's body was nothing but thin layers of flesh rolled into a deceptively human-like shape.

"Like my newest attempt at immortality?" Orochimaru asked.

Jiraiya gagged as a severed parts of Orochimaru's body quickly heated up in the desert sun, hissing against the sand and releasing a horrifying, familiar stench.

Orochimaru's remaining eye turned black, and liquid darkness unfolded from inside like black wings.

The imitation body fell to the ground, toppling limply without its wearer inside of it.

Orochimaru stepped to one side, looking at the body for a moment as if to make sure that no part of it touched his clothing. He wore a black kimono, hakama, and haori. His skin was pale, almost as white as death. Age had ravaged him. There were dark lines around his eyes, and a scar across one side of his face.

Jiraiya stared. He coughed and covered his nose and mouth with his sleeve as the stench of rotting increased.

His shadow clone actually threw up, since he couldn't spare a hand to cover his nose with. He still had to hold onto Kusanagi's hilt. "Nasty," Jiraiya number two complained.

Orochimaru looked at Jiraiya with glittering eyes, cold hatred frozen there for an eternity. He traced the scar on his face. "Yes…you left me this the last time we fought. As a matter of vanity, I do prefer to cover it up…but you have ruined my meat suit."

"Oh, god," Jiraiya said. "You're really over the deep end."

"Long ago," Orochimaru agreed pleasantly. "Now die." He made a hand seal against his throat and blew purple smoke.

Jiraiya's eyes widened. Poison.

And it was a windless day.

Jiraiya leapt back, but the billowing clouds of purple smoke spread in all directions, much too quickly. He looked around wildly. Is this really how it ends?

The poison might not kill him outright, but if he got poisoned, he would fight slower and slower, until Orochimaru could finally strike the killing blow.

Smoke was everywhere…

Jiraiya flinched and covered his mouth and nose as much as he could.

"Not so fast," someone called.

Then a swift wind blew the clouds of smoke away. Jiraiya's long hair billowed out in the direction of the wind, the gust was so fierce. He lowered his arm from his nose and mouth and grinned at Orochimaru's chagrin.

The wind died down, and Jiraiya knew who was standing with him even before he looked. He looked over his shoulder. A blinding grin spread across his face. "Baki!"

Baki walked up to join him by his side and stopped when they were shoulder to shoulder. "That's right." He gave Jiraiya a nod. Then he turned his attention to Orochimaru, his gaze cold. "You can't have my brother."

"You're second cousins, once removed," Orochimaru said. His hair was disheveled by the blast of wind Baki had created, and raw lines contempt stood out around his mouth.

Jiraiya flinched and glared at Orochimaru angrily.

"Not anymore," Baki said. He reached up and squeezed Jiraiya's shoulder. "We're not removed. We're brothers."

Jiraiya blinked, disarmed by that touch to his shoulder. Then he regained his grin, with new force. "Yeah! And you can't take either of us down!"

The shadow clone Jiraiya had created popped up from underneath the sand, his haori covering him. He tossed his haori aside and shook sand out of his hair. "Yeah! Me, too!" He still held onto Kusanagi, which made sense. The sword hadn't put up any fight since Orochimaru blocked visual contact with the poison smoke.

"Hey, that was clever," Jiraiya said, gesturing at the haori.

"You would have thought of it if you'd still been wearing yours," his shadow clone said modestly. Then he waved. "Hi, Baki."

"Hi," Baki said wryly, smiling in spite of himself.

"I'm a shadow clone," Jiraiya number two announced.

"I guessed as much," Baki said.

The shadow clone grinned and chuckled. He crossed over to stand on the other side of Baki. "Now you've got three brothers to deal with," he informed Orochimaru.

Jiraiya laughed. "Oh, no. Three? Three Akagizume brothers could conquer the world. You don't stand a chance, Orochimaru."

"Shut up!" Orochimaru roared. "Is everything a joke to you?"

"Well, yeah," Jiraiya said. His expression became serious. "Especially you."

They lunged at each other, three against one.

xXx

Yondaime stared down at his prisoner. He had anticipated Kabuto regaining consciousness, sealing the man in a gold dust coffin up to Kabuto's neck, confining without crushing.

Kabuto came around with a moan, struggling for a moment as he found himself completely immobilized from the neck down. Finally, he opened his eyes, squinting against the sun. A smirk appeared on his face as he saw Yondaime staring back at him. "Oh, well done," he said with a laugh. "I'll have you know it isn't easy to immobilize me."

"That would be why the Fourth Kazekage is guarding you personally, while others fight your master," Yondaime said evenly.

Kabuto let his head drop back down against the sand. "I am honored."

Yondaime thought there was rather a lot of dishonor involved. "Why did you do it?"

"Hmm?" Kabuto raised an eyebrow, then looked away, across the desert at the distant battlefield. "Our orders were attack you unless you were a pushover, you know."

"Not that," Yondaime said. That he could actually understand. "I mean why you joined up with Orochimaru."

"For the reasons I said," Kabuto said.

"But he's killed countless people," Yondaime insisted. "He's murdered men, women, and children with his genetic experiments, and his blind lust for power. He's a serial killer. A psychopath. And a narcissist." He'd been aware of Orochimaru before meeting Jiraiya, but the personal insights Jiraiya shared painted a grisly picture of overall mental unwellness.

Kabuto rolled his head to one side, as if he would shrug if he could. "I'm not saying that I condone what he does, or that I'm a personal fan like Kimimaro-san." He smiled sardonically. "Now, Kimimaro-san would tell you that you are off-base for referring to our great leader as a serial killer." His gaze fell at the wreck of bones lying still some fifty yards away. "But Kimimaro-san is dead, isn't he?"

"I hope so," Yondaime said frankly.

Kabuto laughed. "At least you're honest. A step up from the Leaf scum I deal with."

"You have a lot of hatred in you for someone so young," Yondaime said.

Kabuto rolled his eyes. "You don't have to have age to hate."

Yondaime thought back to Gaara. "No…I suppose not." He looked out across the desert at the distant battlefield. The remote figures of Jiraiya and Orochimaru, and now Baki, were still fighting. He couldn't make out from here what was going on, and he didn't want to waste chakra by sending a floating eye to investigate. Not to mention what that would do to his concentration. He had a feeling Kabuto would require much of his attention. The rogue medical ninja was far too glib and collected for the situation.

Baki…Jiraiya…be safe.