#the-fifth-wind-shadow

[orochimartyrdom]

//Apologies for silence. I made a title card for Tanuki-chan's thread to make up for it.

[orochimartyrdom]

Desert Viper :: Gaara & Orochimaru

What was the world coming to when a man couldn't enjoy a relaxing ride across the desert without his caravan spontaneously combusting?

Against any of his accompanying subordinates' wishes and wills Orochimaru wanted nothing more than to rest in the cab of the small carriage. It was being used to transport a super-cooled generator for a cryogenics freezer to another base where it would be put to better use. That kind of technology was rare and expansive to produce, even if he had helmed the invention. It was heavy for its size but nobody was going to complain about the few extra pounds of their serpentine master (without dying). 

On the outskirts of Sunakagure his escorts were armed with a heightened awareness. Any attack coming from that direction would have been expertly deflected. The sprawling, encircled city in the desert offered no offensive but /someone/ had caught wind of them. It was a local gang, probably hired specifically to ruing Orochi's day.

A hailstorm of kunai descended on his already nervous attachment from behind. This was nothing he was going to bat a lash at if one single kunai did not sail beyond anyone useful. It struck the cargo, scraping steel into the fragile generator. The following silence held only subtle clicking of the destabilizing core. That was enough for Orochimaru to know his day was shot and slip from the carriage and into the sand as quickly as possible.

The core exploded with a larger force than anticipated. His company was obliterated. And was blasted into glass...or perhaps it was ice. As it were the layers of desert he had put between himself and the explosion acted as a shock absorber but also as sandpaper, sloughing cloth and skin from his back.

Ignoring broken ribs Orochimaru shifted gears with a henge jutsu. He transformed himself into a small viper to avoid being crushed by the wave of sand the blast deposited.

That size of explosion would have alarmed to nearby hidden village. He hadn't the time to disappear across the length of the desert before anyone showed up on the scene. Luckily there was no paraphernalia to suggest it was in fact an Otokagure caravan besides the cargo and...well himself. There were a few members of the gang spread around but the rest fled. His men and the carriage were a twisted, mangled mess.

Orochi stayed half buried at the surface. The small horns of the desert viper form he now occupied protruded above the sands. If he couldn't cease being a white snake he could at least be an indigenous white snake. He rested, waiting to see if he could salvage anything.

[onehellofaninja-blog]

Adrift | Jun & Gaara

“I would never doubt you, milord. I know you will not leave your favorite servant to languish.”

“Shhh, little one, quiet now. Just as soon as I have my perfect vessel, I will return for you.”

“I await the day, milord.”

A light touch of his forehead. Chakra slid into his own network like a lullaby; gentle and slow, but insistent. He drifted out of consciousness and into stasis, the ceiling above him blurring.

The world was pain.

Every inch of his body ached. His limbs were as weights, struggling against his need to right himself; his eyelids refused to open more than a flutter. His ears detected nothing but silence, and he panicked, a low moan ripping from his throat and reassuring him he had not gone deaf. Dust and dryness coated his mouth, froze his tongue, burned at his eyes. A single shaft of light played across the ceiling, seen only in bursts.

His will was not enough, and he fell back into slumber, albeit a lighter one than the first.

The second time he woke, the pain and lethargy receded and the dryness advanced. His eyes obeyed him, revealing a stone ceiling above, and though the muscles in his back protested, they lifted him upward.

The lab remained as he remembered it; stark, ordered, nearly lightless. Dust covered every visible surface, decay scented the air. He took a deep, shuddering breath, feeling the air rasp past his parched tongue.

One leg swung over the edge of the table, then two. His muscles screamed their protest as he rose, stumbling into a nearby countertop. A beaker tumbled to the floor, shattering upon impact. This was not the body any ninja was accustomed to; a body that refused such simple tasks as standing and walking. He was graceful, he was smooth, he was the perfect shadow.

Stumbling through the complex, he cried out for someone, anyone, to explain, to aid him. None of the Sound Five replied, nor his Lord, nor even the cruel Kabuto. In desperation, he called out other names: those who liked him not, those who knew him only in passing; even those of the dead.

Silence.

He limped out of the abandoned complex, forcing his legs to carry him upward and out of the mouth of his Lord's burrow. A stream nearby slaked his thirst, a series of tubers filled his empty stomach, and he rested against a tree to collect his thoughts.

“Suna,” he decided aloud, voice rusty with disuse. It pained him, to be reduced to this – jerky, uncontrolled movements, a voice tainted by too much rest – but he couldn't dwell on it. He knew not where the other Oto bases were, but in Suna he could await word from his Lord. Though it was a touchy alliance, the Suna-nin would respect an Oto hitai-ate. At worst, they would detain him until his Lord could be reached to confirm his identity.

Forest gave way to plains gave way to desert. He was no Suna-nin, but he kept himself alive, if barely. The gates of Sunagakure rose up in his blurred vision, and he made it within view of the gate guards before his world went black.

“...poor thing nearly died out there... what did he think he was doing, all alone...?”

“...set of kunai and chakra supplies suggest ninja... musculature wasted away...”

“...oh god! Get Baki-sama, this is a Hidden Sound hitai-ate!”

Gently, slowly, he washed up on the shores of consciousness. His last memory was of collapsing at Suna's gates. It should have been alarming, but a glance at the IV in his right arm explained his calmness.

The space around the IV clarified until it became a hospital room, with himself in a bed. His kimono lay neatly folded on a nearby chair, as did his hitai-ate. There was no sign of his kunai, but that was to be expected. Allied or not, no one let a foreign nin go armed if they could help it.

He snorted, shaking his head. He couldn't see himself as being a threat to even the youngest Academy student right now. His body was pathetic, sluggish, drained of muscle as one might drain a waterskin. It had taken all he had just to catch the animals of the Suna desert he had used to sustain himself during his journey.

A voice floated in from the other side of the door. “-sama. We have run every available test; he's no threat to anyone as he is. No one on staff recognizes him, whether personally or by clan. He has no scars, no tattoos; if he wasn't carrying an Oto hitai-ate we would think him a vagrant, not a ninja.”

“I will take care of this,” came another voice, more masculine, and the door opened.