Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Jiraiya wasn’t sure when they truly lost him; when the moment came that Orochimaru was too far gone. The slide felt gradual. Each movement down brushed aside with the thought of; He can still be saved; be salvaged. There’s a gentleness in him somewhere.

The first slip wasn’t only in Orochimaru.

***

A-rank missions are seldom handed out to genin teams. It breaks protocol and tradition; it's something not expected of them. In later years the practice would be strictly against regulation. But under Hiruzen’s ever pushing expectations, here they were, in the aftermath.

Eleven years old with blood on their hands and kills under their belts.

It has been hours since it happened. Jiraiya can’t seem to recall much of it. They killed four grown men. Were hired to do so. They did it. That’s what he knows. Crunching gravel under his sandals is the only stimuli his brain processes for a long while. Tiny stones striking tiny stones, grinding. The regularity of it soothes his shaking body.

They’ve been walking this trail all afternoon. The sun has started to dip into the high treeline, beams of light streaking between leaves and scattering across the ground. Jiraiya’s feet are dragging, pebbles getting caught between foot and sandals. His muscles feel heavy from overuse, but there’s another weight too. Guilt, maybe, that sinks his feet into the gravel.

When the adrenaline starts to die down, Jiraiya glances at his team. Tsunade up front, her eggshell blue dress licking up with the wind, back and forth. There’s a tiny tear in the right side, the frayed edge browning with blood. There’s a cut there that extends down her thigh, into the back of her knee. She’s chatting away quietly with Hiruzen, blonde ponytail bouncing with her steps. Pretty as ever, she’s composed.

Handling it.

Orochimaru, a hair ahead of him, to the left, is measured and silent. The pale lilac yukata he wears is stained in large bruising patches with blood that is not his own. His long dark hair is pulled to one side, over his shoulder, and he brushes his fingers through the ends frenetically. Occasionally a finger twists the strands gleefully. When released, the hair pings back to its silky, pin-straight form. Jiraiya must stare too long, or otherwise tip off Orochimaru’s ever perceptive mind. His head snaps to the side, golden eyes meeting Jiraiya’s.

There isn’t fear or regret there, no disconnected weariness of suddenly feeling the weight of their chosen career. In Orochimaru’s eyes Jiraiya sees barely contained elation. Unsatiated need. Against the deep purple makeup lining them, Orochimaru’s eyes gleam. It’s a stark contrast from the flat, disinterested affect Jiraiya has come to expect.

Though Orochimaru hardly ever smiles, he bares his teeth in some semblance of a grin that makes Jiraiya’s stomach flip and twist.

Maybe that’s how I should feel, too. I did what I was supposed to. We completed the assignment. Why does it feel so bad?

“Right up here, around the bend, is your reward for a victory well won.” Hiruzen’s voice snatches Orochimaru’s attention forward, as it always does.

A reward. The idea leaves a sour taste in Jiraiya’s mouth, until they round the bend and he sees where they’re going. 

An onsen. A nice one. Soap, steam, and warm water to wash away the road. The kind that kids like himself, and Orochimaru, can’t afford on their orphans pension. He’s been to the little bathhouse in Konoha plenty of times. It’s not the luxury of an onsen itself that inspires awe in him. It’s the size. The grandeur. Konoha doesn’t have anything similar.

It has tall walls and a beautiful dark wood entrance with intricate carved deer and foliage. Swelling and swooping lines of relief carving cover every inch. The stairs are tiled in deep reds and light teals. Interspersed with the solid colored tiles, are ones adorned with frogs in dollopy brushstrokes. Gentle billows of escaped steam surround the building and accompanying trees. It’s a large step up from the rickety, cheap, wood walls of the only onsen he’s ever been to.

Jiraiya finds himself walking faster, falling in synchronized step with Orochimaru. Only for an instant.  The closer they get, the more Tsunade falls back to walk with Orochimaru. The more Orochimaru speeds up to match her. They whisper together, arms intertwined. Absorbed in their little world that doesn’t include him.

They always do this. Drift together and exclude him. Once he had asked, ‘Why can’t I talk with you? Or sit with you?’

Tsunade sneered at him and tossed her hair over one shoulder, ‘Sometimes things are just for girls, Jiraiya. Mind your business.’

Her answer had only served to confuse him more. Orochimaru seemed similar enough to himself. But Jiraiya supposed his hair was long, his yukata closer to the robes and dresses Tsunade wore than his own. Jiraiya could also concede that Orochimaru was, in a word, pretty. Long silky hair, wide doe eyes, round and sharp in conflicting, but enticing ways.

Orochimaru hadn’t answered with Tsunade. Creeping oyster-pink spread over his cheeks. Those amber eyes of his avoided meeting anyone else's as he stared at his hands, clasped together in his lap. The longer he entertained the idea the more confused he became. 

Girl stuff. I’m not a girl. 

Jiraiya left it there.

Shaking off the memory like a confusing dream he follows after Orochimaru and Tsunade, three sets of sandals slapping against tile, as they take the steps two at a time. Hiruzen chuckles behind them, climbing the stairs briskly to keep up. 

A whoosh of warm air, heavy with incense and herbs, bursts forth when Tsunade shoves the enormous wood doors open. Jiraiya can hardly believe his ears, Orochimaru giggles beside him. The world feels rebalanced then, despite the violence, the wreckage Jiraiya fears they have caused. Excitement and relief overtake the fear of how his actions will ripple through other lives.

Inside, foliage seems to burst from every available space. Enormous potted plants reside in the corners of the room. They hold big, leafy ferns that droop under their own weight. Macrame plant baskets hang from the ceiling and drip with string of pearls, ivy, and creeping fig. The check-in counter is dotted with sunshiney orchids. It smells more like outside in this building than the outside itself.

Tsunade and Orochimaru huddle close and chatter exuberantly. Hirzuen talks to the woman at the front desk, gesturing over to them. Jiraiya will have to go to the men's side with him. A small frown forms on his lips. Hiruzen is boring. 

Preachy.

Old. 

Over the tiled countertop an issue seems to arise. She points over to the kids with a scowl. Jiraiya follows her fingertip to Orochimaru. Hiruzen’s voice rises, hers to match it. The hostess lets out an exasperated sigh, “Well, then, I’ll have to see.”

Hiruzen rolls and squares his shoulders, a smug look on his face.

“Orochimaru. Here.”

Like a switch being turned, Orochimaru's giggles cease. He makes his way to Hiruzen’s side quickly. Swishing air licks at Jiraiya’s ankles when he passes by. Happiness, what little Orochimaru seems able to hold at a time, vanishes in their teacher's presence. He is the favorite, the prodigy, the genius. Hiruzen’s expectations for Orochimaru are lofty, bordering on unreachable.

The adult conversation drops to harsh whispers over the counter. The woman points at Orochimaru whose eyes glaze over at words Jiraiya isn’t privy to.

Hiruzen reddens in the face, “Go ahead and look then!”

His words feel explosively loud. He tugs the woman by the arm to join him around the counter. Jiraiya wants to ask what the problem is, why can’t they just get their towels and go? Words start to form on his lips, and die with Hiruzen’s grasp on Orochimaru’s yukata.

Orochimaru’s clothing is yanked open. His small, pale hands scramble to hold the layers closed. Jiraiya feels stunned at the flash of white skin he sees. The atmosphere in the lobby changes.

This is wrong.

The hostess, this woman they don’t know, peers down the front of Orochimaru’s yukata. 

“I see. The men's side, then,” she tuts, frowning.

Jiraiya’s excited, for an instant. Maybe he can have fun if Orochimaru tags along. The weird kind that follows the other orphan, but it’s something.

Where Orochimaru’s eyes were gleaming they are dewy now. Dull, under the accumulating tears. This is the first time Jiraiya has ever seen him cry. Squirming discomfort and confusion slip through the tensed muscles of his throat. All the joy at having a companion his age along with him, fizzles out.

Tsunade starts to stomp forward, fist balled and threatening. “Why did you do that!?”

“Tsunade!” Hiruzen barks. It’s enough for her to give pause and wilt. She steps back in line with Jiraiya. Her angered breaths practically puff out her nostrils. The hostess returns to her counter and hands them all towels, one at a time, her lips a thin line. A large towel for Tsunade, one small towel each for Jiraiya and Hiruzen. Two small towels for Orochimaru.

They split to separate onsens then, opposite ends of the hall. Tsunade is red in the face, and Hiruzen is grumbling under his breath. Orochimaru weeps silently, tears mixing into the blood stains on his robes.

In the showers, Jiraiya takes great care to keep his eyes to himself; his back firmly turned to Orochimaru while they undress. He isn’t all too certain what the issue in the lobby was, or why Orochimaru has been grouped with him suddenly. The change is dizzying. Orochimaru and Tsunade’s secret girl talks, their perpetual unity. This feels like forced separation.

Impulsive and slow to the point as Jiraiya may be, he knows better than to intrude further. The only glimpse he catches is of shaking hands when they place their folded clothing in the same locker. Jiraiya hadn’t even noticed until it was time to undress that his own yukata was an entirely different color. Brown where blood seeped into his usual green.

Separated by wooden stall walls, sniffles are the only indication Orochimaru is even in the shower room at all, after that.

Warm rushing water and soap only lighten the mood so much. Enough for Hiruzen to whistle when he leaves them to go soak. Small sea sponge in hand, Jiraiya washes away the day. The gore, the guilt, the confusion. His skin reddens and aches under his effort.

“Will you walk out with me?” Orochimaru whispers. Preoccupied with getting dried blood and rolls of someone else's skin out from under his nails, Jiraiya jumps at his voice. He isn’t one to ask for favors, least of all from Jiraiya. If anyone can make do alone, it’s the serpent-like child in front of him.

Orochimaru’s wobbling voice tugs at an ache in his ribcage.

“Sure,” Jiraiya concedes. 

They rinse quickly, and Jiraiya covers himself with his towel. For modesty, suddenly embarrassed to be witnessed in his nudity. Especially by him. Especially here. 

“Um.” Jiraiya closes his eyes before he turns, then thinks himself stupid for it, and opens them. 

Orochimaru is curled in on himself, one hand clutching a towel across his chest. The ends of it are tucked into his armpits. His other hand holds the second towel over his crotch. Tears trickle down his round cheeks. Makeup has begun to break apart and slide down his face.

Under Jiraiya’s eyes Orochimaru curls in more. His hair falls across his shoulders like a protective sheet. Nodding his head towards the door, Jiraiya leads them out to the bath.

The pool in front of them is enormous, easily three times the size of the one in Konoha. Hiruzen is already chin deep, eyes closed on the far side. Dotted around the outside edges of the bath are elderly men. It’s the early evening, on a weekday. These must be regulars, retired men. Jiraya twists his face up at their wrinkles, the way some of them walk around without towels at all.

Despite their presence some of Jiraiya’s anxiety subsides. Orochimaru hurries to the edge, sinking down into the bubbling, verdigris water of it. His hands remain firmly on his towels. Clutching them like lifelines.

Their entry stirs up murmurs from some of the old men. They squint and tilt their heads. 

Jiraiya joins him in the water, shuffling close, until they both start to make their way to where Hiruzen sits. Orochimaru crouches so low in the water that his hair fans out around him, only visible from the nostrils up.  His towels remain. Jiraiya folds his own, plopping it onto his head like he’s seen grown ups do. The water is bubbly and steamy enough that it obscures anything beneath.

One man in particular stares the two of them down as they trek across the pool. His frown, compounded by drooping wrinkled jowls, ignites anger in Jiraiya. Sticking his tongue out, he pulls down his eyelid with a pointer finger and jeers at the man until he huffs and looks away.

Good.

Hiruzen doesn’t so much as say hello when they arrive. He cracks one eye open and humphs. Orochimaru perches on the step, hunched over, white knuckling his towels. Water covers him to his navel. Jiraiya wonders why he doesn’t get all the way in. Translucent green, the water sloshes against Orochimaru’s pallid skin. Forgetting himself, Jiraiya is mesmerized, watching the tiny current of the bath swell and recede at his hips.

The quiet they sit in is hardly tranquil. Around them is the babble of water being pumped in. Little bubbles swirl in eddies. Muffled conversation carries across the water's surface. Adding to all this is the rhythmic inhalations of Orochimaru’s crying. His tears are almost mechanical, an unnatural phenomenon.

Divots of annoyance become beveled in between Hiruzen’s brows.

I wonder if Tsunade’s having a better time…she’s probably still angry.

Thinking of her, somewhere behind the wall beside them, makes his cheeks feel hot. Before the scene at the check-in, Jiraiya was preparing himself to be jealous. Orochimaru doesn’t know how lucky he is. Always being with her.

I wish that were me.

In the baths like this, his gaze feels less intrusive, so he lets it wander back to Orochimaru, whose form is crumpled in a protective c, just a few feet away. The towel around his chest begs many questions.

Does he have a big scar? An ugly one? Some forbidden tattoo, a disfigurement, a weird birthmark?

The last thought beckons his fingers to the side of his nose, tapping on the mole there. When he teases Tsunade too much, or yanks at her skirt one too many times, she tells him he looks like a toad.

Maybe it’s something like that.

After fifteen boring minutes of stewing in the heat Jiraiya decides to try a joke. He bobs closer to Orochimaru, spitting water in a little arc in front of him. The other child tenses and presses his legs tightly together.

“Hey, Oro. Do you think Tsunade’s side is full of ugly wrinkly ladies?” he whispers with a snicker.

Laughter doesn’t follow. Orochimaru’s mostly quiet tears erupt into air-sucking, desperate sobs. Jiraiya is dumbfounded at his ability to always make things worse. He isn’t sure why that was the wrong thing to say.

This is, apparently, Hiruzen’s last straw.

“If you’re going to cry the whole time, go wait outside,” he snaps. Heads turn at his outburst, until it feels like the entire onsen is staring at the trio.

Orochimaru’s bloodshot eyes widen, and for a breath his crying stops. Water splashes everywhere as he stands, and flees the bathhouse at a run. His inky hair sticks to his skin. Slapping footfalls echo through the thick air. Jiraiya feels a lump in the back of his throat, and the taste of bile.

It’s wrong. Everything that has happened in the last hour is a type of violence he has never witnessed. But it’s violence all the same. The discomfort in his soul tells him so.

He tries his best not to look at Orochimaru’s exposed skin as he leaves; attempting to give him grace, like throwing back a freshly molted crab.

Jiraiya fails.

His eyes stick to Orochimaru’s calves, the curve of his leg, the same way Orochimaru’s hair sticks to his spine. In turn, guilt sticks to him. Jiraiya wonders if he has now contributed to the awful thing that happened today. The idea makes his stomach threaten to spill. He can’t decide if the deaths or this make him feel worse. Which coin weighs more? Their combined weight surely tips the scale of his deeds to bad.

After a while, thinking about it means he can’t feel much at all. Jiraiya uses the towel on his head to mop sweat from his brow. He wonders if the steam has made his hair frizz, as it’s prone to do at the lightest insistence.

Maybe Orochimaru is on his way home. Maybe he left. I would, if that happened to me.

It’s a terrifying thought; Orochimaru out in the woods, alone, damp, bloodied, crying. He’s leagues ahead of Jiraiya in terms of skill, but still a kid. Still vulnerable.

Jiraiya blinks. Hiruzen is snoring, across from him, towel over his eyes. Slipping his own towel back down to cover himself, Jiraiya leaves the water as silently as he can manage. Orochimaru’s footprints are still visible on the stone floor. Placing his own in their boundaries, he feels the panic Orochimaru left the room with.

In the locker room, his clothes are mostly undisturbed, if a little damp. Still blood stained, it’s stiff now, as the fluid dries. Jiraiya drenches it under the spray of the shower. Ruddy water sprays everywhere. He kicks it back into the drains, frantically.

After a couple minutes, his yukata drips only clear water. It’s soaking wet, and somehow no less stained than when he started. Jiraiya purses his lips at his own impulsivity, realizing he now has to shrug the soggy garment on. He does just that. Wooden sandals rinsed and shoved on his feet, he stomps back to the entrance, determined to find Orochimaru. Every step echoes. Wood on tile.

The woman at the front desk is still there, unbothered. Jiraiya tries to give her the stink eye on his way out, but she ignores his glare.

Orochimaru isn’t hard to find. At the bottom of the stairs, four or five paces off to the side, he sits on a stump. His yukata is dry, apart from where his hair hits it. It is also stiff with blood. Knees drawn to his chest, he looks dead ahead at nothing in particular.

Jiraiya hurries down the tiled steps, skidding and slipping on water his yukata drips.

I should have wrung it out.

The racket he makes doesn’t convince Orochimaru to turn his way. Near the bottom of the staircase he slows, to approach cautiously.

What if I make it worse again? He might not want me here. 

He sits in the dirt at the base of the stump. 

“Hiruzen fell asleep,” Jiraiya says, forcing a laugh. It sounds fake, even to him. He worries his big toe into the soft wet dirt. 

Above, Orochimaru nods. Up close like this, Jiraiya can see his weeping continues. Trembles wrack his narrow shoulders. When he breathes, it sounds ragged and snotty.

At a loss for words, Jiraiya reaches up and slips his hand into Orochimaru’s. He’s not sure why he does it. The ferocity with which his hand is held back makes him want to cry too. Orochimaru’s hand is clammy and cold. His long pointed fingernails dig into Jiraiya’s skin. He doesn’t mind the sting.

“I’m really sorry,” Jiraiya tries again, earnest and soft. Somehow, Orochimaru crushes his hand harder, holding on like he’s over the edge of a cliff. Jiraiya squeezes back, as if to say, I’ll pull you back up.

“I thought I was a person to him, at the very least.” His words are so hushed, Jiraiya takes several seconds to parse them.

“You are a person…” It comes out half a question. With his other hand, Jiraiya strokes his fingers across the top of Orochimaru’s foot. It’s the only other skin he can reach. Hugging him right now would be bad. But he can do this.

Finally, Orochimaru turns to look down at him. His makeup has slipped and melted. His eyes are rimmed in pink, bringing an unnatural amount of life to his features. Orochimaru cocks his head, his hair falling limply across their joined hands. His fingers wriggle their way between Jiraiya’s, lacing their hands together fully.

“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” Orochimaru hisses. His pupils shrink to severe lines in baths of ocher.

The rub of his thumb into Orochimaru’s skin seems to ease the tears a little. Jiraiya has never held hands with anyone before. Today is a day of firsts. His first life taken. His first hand held. The first crack in his faith.

Despite everything, an odd peacefulness eases over the two of them.

Tsunade’s stomping entrance shatters that. Her angry expression gives way to hurt and confusion. Jiraiya is far too quick to rip his hand away at the sight of her; flushed from the heat, face round and pretty. Orochimaru becomes deadly still, and small.

Jiraiya gets the feeling he has stumbled into another set of wrong answers.

Chapter Text

In their fifteenth year things feel…tense. On the edge of something new. They have graduated to chunin. Technically, they are no longer a squad. Tsunade and Orochimaru still end up on many of Jiraiya’s mission assignments. The first time could be brushed off as a fluke, availability being low. After the fourth time, the fifth, Jiraiya knows Hiruzen has his hand in things.

Their differences have compounded, grown like ice in cracks over four years.

Tsunade’s strength, her anger easily surpasses both his own and Orochimaru’s. She’s grown tall, and loud. Busty. Her heart shaped face is lovelier than ever. Jiraiya makes a fool of himself for her attention, negative or otherwise. Pulling her hair, tugging at the ties of her dress. The time he tried to go for a kiss on the cheek she blackened his eye.

It’s no surprise that Jiraiya starts to fall behind, chasing after girls when he should be sparring, studying, practicing. In his “free” time he scribbles desire after desire into small leather notebooks. About girls, and kissing, exposed skin, fantasies of things he’s never seen.

Orochimaru is leaps and bounds ahead of him. Shortlisted for Anbu and helping Jonin leaders in laboratories. He’s the tallest of them all, lanky and severe. His baby fat giving way to sharp, high cheekbones and a delicately squared jaw.

The two of them struggle to make friends. Tsunade and Orochimaru are still close, but there’s a gap where there once wasn’t. Jiraiya isn’t sure why. Orochimaru holds her at arms length when Jiraiya’s around.

So they spend time together, on missions and otherwise. Orochimaru has been his neighbor their entire lives, in the dingy complex of housing for parentless children. Before the last six months Jiraiya pretended this fact wasn’t true. For whose sake, he couldn't say.

Orochimaru shows up at his door only. Not the other way around. Jiraiya knows where his apartment is. He’s lingered outside before. On one nervous occasion, he knocked, fleeing soon after. Intrusion on Orochimaru’s space, his things, is a boundary Jiraiya desperately tries not to cross.

He’s been intruded upon enough.

Orochimaru sits on his pitch-pocket and knothole-ridden floors. He’s prim and tense, poised like a weapon in all circumstances. Silky white robes pool around his knees, lined and tied in purple satin. Small trinkets hang from his belt. Ceramic tokens, woven charms and rope tied in thick swirling knots. Large yellow eyes watch Jiraiya’s every movement.

They’ve been sitting in half-comfortable silence for some time now. Jiraiya on his ratty couch, scribbling away at his notebook, inspired by a tattered skin mag he dug out of the trash by the local bar. Despite living alone, he squirreled it under his pillow.

His apartment is unkempt at best. Jiraiya has a little table that rocks on the uneven floor. Well worn cushions surround it. He really only needs one. Maybe two. He has mismatched rugs in green and red, the weave coming undone on the edges. In the far corner, behind Orochimaru, is his bed. An overused futon, deflated. A little rumbling fridge sits in the opposite corner. It isn’t much.

Orochimaru begins to brush through his hair. He selects small sections from above his ears to braid. The precision of his fingers steals Jiraiya’s attention. The pattern is hard to follow at the speed his deft fingers move.

“You should teach me to do that sometime.” Jiraiya says. His voice cracks on the last s. Orochimaru turns his half lidded gaze up at Jiraiya. His fingers continue their dance, tucking hair here and there. Jiraiya figures his own hair should be long enough. He’s spent the last four years growing it out. Most days he wrangles it into an unruly ponytail. Right now it’s down, curling every which way and taking up more than its fair share of room. 

“I don’t see why not,” Orochimaru’s lips curl into a smile on just one side. “In exchange, I want to see what you write in there.” When he gets to the end of the braid he lets go. The hair unravels itself like machinery.

Jiraiya blushes. It’s hardly a fair trade. He’s just finished a five page rambling on kissing, teeth on skin, tongues rubbing together. Frenzied word after word about the softness of skin, fullness of breasts. Not that he would know. Tugging on his ear, he shrugs. “I don’t think you’d find it interesting.”

Orochimaru blinks, slow and feline. “You don’t know.”

Ignoring the squirmy anxiety in his chest, and the way his heart thumps faster, Jiraiya tosses his notebook across the room. Orochimaru snatches it out of midair.

He sits back, curling one leg underneath himself. The other slips the layers of his skirts and splays out, toe pointed. Orochimaru cradles the notebook in his slender fingers.

“Which page shall I begin on?”

He regrets ever pulling the damn thing out in front of Orochimaru.

“Maybe the beginning.” It’s less embarrassing in the front of the book, this one at least. Orochimaru thumbs through the pages, and decidedly settles on the newest five.

Little indication of opinion crosses his face while he reads. Amber eyes dart back and forth, devouring Jiraiya’s clumsy words. A minute eyebrow raise here and there are the only reactions he can parse.

“It’s rather vulgar, hm?” Orochimaru breathes the word across the room.

Jiraiya scrubs at his face, “I-I yeah.” All there is to do in the silence is wring his hands, adjust his yukata, and fluff his hair.

“Jiraiya?” His name in Orochimaru’s mouth is cut into awkward syllables. The vowels are skewed. “Have you ever kissed a girl?”

He sputters and knows his whole face goes blistering red. There’s a half beat pause before he manages a quiet, “Nah.” He wants to. So badly. It’s embarrassing.

This is pathetic, he thinks, morosely.

Tsunade pops into his mind. Her arm linked with Orochimaru’s. All the time they’ve spent alone. He casts his gaze down. A lot of that notebook he’s written thinking about her. Her swooping blonde bangs, long legs, the way her thighs have thickened with her strength. It doesn’t mention her by name, he isn’t that much of a pervert. Jiraiya views it as wishful thinking. Hopeless pining may be more accurate.

“Have you?” Jiraiya asks back, incredulously.

Orochimaru wrinkles his nose, “Why would I?” His expression smoothes seconds later. He continues to fan through the pages, pausing when something piques his interest.

Jiraiya can’t watch him read anymore. He flattens out on the couch, one foot off the edge, the other propped up on the arm.

“You could kiss me, if you’d like,” Orochimaru says, snapping the notebook closed and sliding it across the floor with both hands. The movement is slinky but unpracticed. He straightens back up. Jiraiya swears he can see the color in his eyes vibrating.

His heart hiccups in his chest. Time feels deadly still around him, the offer hanging in the air. Orochimaru doesn’t shy away from prolonged silence. His gaze doesn’t waver from Jiraiya. The only sound in the apartment is the gentle thudding of Jiraiya’s upstairs neighbor moving around.

“Yeah.”

Jiraiya’s answer is imperfect, a slant rhyme of sorts. Not that he notices. Orochimaru smiles, with only his eyes, and stays perfectly still where he is.

He isn’t sure if he should move or not. Letting Orochimaru approach first, as you would with a wild animal, is what he’s used to.

“Are you going to?” His voice is so quiet. Scathing, somehow.

Jiraiya slides off the side of the sofa with little grace. Each heel smacks into the floor harshly. Ridiculous as it makes him feel, he starts to crawl over to Orochimaru on his hands and knees. Each time Jiraiya moves forward, Orochimaru counters with a slide backwards. Until his silk covered back is pressed flush to the wall. Until he’s on top of Jiraiya’s sad excuse for a bed.

When Jiraiya pauses at the edge of the futon, Orochimaru waves him forward with a coy smile. At least he thinks it’s coy. Emotions settle onto Orochimaru’s face strangely. He scoots close enough that their knees touch. Just that innocuous press of clothing covered skin feels electric.

Jiraiya worries he’ll throw up from anticipation.

Orochimaru lifts a hand slowly to slide fingers across Jiraiya’s jaw. Smoothing his downy new facial hair against the grain. A shuddering breath forces its way from Jiraiya’s lungs. Up close he can see that Orochimaru’s face is still baby smooth. No prickling facial hair, no acne. Dark, thick, eyelashes swoop in pleasant arcs, softening the predatory eyes behind them.

Jiraiya tries to touch him similarly. His own blunt fingers reach for the delicate curve of Orochimaru’s brow bone. Their breaths puff into each other, creating close air between them.

Finally, Orochimaru makes the first move.

A quick dip forward, mouths pressed just right of aligned. Jiraiya closes his eyes on instinct. Orochimaru’s lips are cold and closed against his. Downy soft and cool. Buzzing, a kind of high pitched whine rings through the air. Warm, unsure delight dances in the lower part of Jiraiya’s stomach. Up his spine. He goes to lick his lips, force of habit, when Orochimaru presses in closer. Open mouthed and shaking.

It’s odd. Tasting another person on his lips. Feeling a tongue that isn’t his swipe along his bottom lip. Orochimaru tastes like the smell of rain, freshly wet stone. He’s sweet like nothing before has been.

Comforting.

An accidental grinding of teeth together makes them both come up for air; gasping. Panic bubbles up, fighting for space amongst Jiraiya’s breaths. Maybe whatever spell was in the air has worn off. They’ve kissed, so maybe it’s over. He clambers to straddle Orochimaru’s thigh and lean back in, hyperventilate into his mouth. 

Just a little longer, please. Please.

The moan that rings from Orochimaru makes him shake. It’s similar to the tremors from a bad fever. Jiraiya feels lost in a fog, wanting to stay connected like this, losing time. He doesn’t pay much mind to the movement beneath him, the quiet shift of silk on skin. Even when Orochimaru grabs his wrist he continues to work their mouths together. All he wants is more of the rain, more of the sweetness.

Orochimaru’s hand is cold and vice-like. It drags Jiraiya’s under his yukata. When his fingers hit plush, round, skin, Jiraiya gasps and attempts to yank back. Orochimaru simply covers Jiraiya’s hand with his own, and eases his fingers into cupping the small breast they find there.

An astonishing, overwhelming sense of stupidity crashes down on Jiraiya.

Two towels.

His hesitation is felt two-fold. Enough that Orochimaru’s hand continues to puppet his own, moving his fingers to squeeze, once, twice. He shifts under Jiraiya’s weight, huffs into his mouth. Bites his lower lip hard enough to draw a single drop of blood.

There’s a pulling between what he wants to do and what he thinks he should do. Part of him, the little childish fragment he pretends has grown, wants nothing more than to cry for Orochimaru. Jiraiya rubs his thumb against the pillowy soft skin. Tracing the little bumps and ridges around Orochimaru’s nipple. Like all of him, this flesh is cold. Silk rushes past the back of his hand, hitting his thigh on the way down.

“Can I look?”

Orochimaru’s answer is as unexpected as it is quiet, “No.”

Jiraiya’s eyes remain closed. It’s a bit bumbling, how his other hand lifts up to touch Orochimaru’s body. He goes too high, at first, and his fingers drift down until he finds the pleasant curve of what he seeks. Gentle fingers pry his hands away, set them back in his own lap.

I went too far. I shouldn’t have asked.

Jiraiya’s own presumptuousness stings and gouges at his dignity. The act of dislodging himself from this situation, with closed eyes, teems with humiliation. As he begins to shift back in retreat, Orochimaru’s fingers dip under the crossed edges of his yukata. Inch by inch he’s rid of his top layer. The fabric pools in his lap, covering idle hands. The desire to keep backing up balloons in him, If we keep going…what do I do if we keep going? Is he going to take all my clothes off? All of his? 

Curious and nimble hands traipse across his skin. Cup and stroke and squeeze him in like with how he has touched. The dip of a pinky into his navel snatches a whine out from his lips. He’s slow and deliberate. Orochimaru flicks his nail, gently, gently, across one of Jiraiya’s nipples, and then the other until they’re both hard. He feels caught, obligated to be inspected. Part of him must refrain from preening.

Orochimaru’s nails dig into the dip of Jiraiya’s back. Drag him forward with pinpricked pressure. The bump of their bare chests together allows him a calming breath. Jiraiya’s hands leave his lap again, to encircle Orochimaru.

Please don’t keep taking our clothes off. I won’t know what to do if you do. I want to look.

He doesn’t.

Jiraiya slumps into Orochimaru’s shoulder, his mouth flush to the pretty curve of his neck. He’s tempted to kiss him there, and so he does. Little pecks, at first, until he can no longer help himself, and after that he leaves mottled bruises with his front teeth; with his canines.

This way, Orochimaru’s mouth is by his ear. The noises he makes are so quiet Jiraiya doubts he hears them at all. But his every movement, every bite, is rewarded with tiny exaltations, strangled near silence from Orochimaru’s vocal chords.

Eventually Jiraiya’s jaw tires. They prop each other up then. Sticking skin to sticking skin.

“I’d like to show you something,”  Orochimaru murmurs.

Jiraiya worries that more clothing will fall. Hopes it will. Hopes it won’t. He’s not entirely sure what he wants.

Silk, however, slides up not down. Orochimaru redresses himself before helping Jiraiya shrug his own clothes back on. His eyes remain unopened.

“It’ll be hard to see with my eyes shut.” Jiraiya grins at the end of his own bad joke. A scoff, his face is playfully pushed away.

It’s too bright when he opens his eyes. The sun has started to set and streams in from the window behind him, unrelenting. Orochimaru is so close to him, as close as he’s ever seen his face.

In the light, flecks of warm brown are visible in his eyes. His hair is mussed and tangled, levitating in loose knots; structures that sway and are built by fine, thin, hair. Unexpected, lovely, and flushed, his face is relaxed. Jiraiya’s mouth is open, but his words die on the tip of his tongue. Orochimaru pushes his chin up, his mouth closed, with one finger. There’s something like a smile gracing his lips; toothy in the wrong places, sharp and glinting with light.

“Come with me.”

He’s unsteady, getting to his feet. Embarrassment stings across his scalp. Orochimaru offers an arm and hauls him up. Jiraiya still isn’t used to having to look up at him, since his last growth spurt. At times it feels as though Orochimaru looms over him like a great tree, swaying in a strong breeze.

“Where are we going?” Jiraiya asks, reaching up haltingly to fix Orochimaru’s snarled hair. 

He crowds close, his breath on Jiraiya’s lips once more, “You will see.” He’s out the door in the next breath, leaving Jiraiya to hurry after him. 

They descend two flights of rickety stairs, before turning right down a balcony of apartment doors. Orochimaru remains three strides ahead of him, head held high. 

Jiraiya knows the path they’re taking, he’s had it filed away in his brain for years now. It’s the way to Orochimaru’s apartment. He feels another surge of possibility, undercut by anxiety. 

If Jiraiya’s apartment is unkempt, Orochimaru’s feels hardly lived in at all.  It’s clean, almost antiseptically so. Inside there’s a pristine cot, a tiny kneeling table for one, and a wall of terrarium after terrarium. The tanks are the largest indicator by far that anyone has even moved into this unit. He can’t immediately see their inhabitants, but there is soil and branches in all of them, small bowls for food and water. Jiraiya stays with only his toes over the threshold.

Orochimaru waves him over. His expression is unsettlingly calm and guarded. 

“Oro-”

“I want to show you what I’ve been working on.” 

His anxiety eases, leaving him oddly disappointed. Orochimaru’s work is that of labs and calculations. Jiraiya doubts he’s slinking out of his clothing in Konoha’s laboratories. There’s still elation under everything, that he’s being let in, shown things that seem secret.

Orochimaru kneels in front of the wall of cages gracefully, tucking the layers of his robes beneath him. Jiraiya shucks his sandals off and makes his way over. He sits just beside Orochimaru, an inch or two back, making sure to sit close enough that his knee touches his thigh. All he wants to do is be touching him, but he hopes the action feels innocent enough, accidental even.

Up close, the occupants of the cages are obvious now. Large, beady eyed rats sit in the corners of the top and bottom biggest glass terrariums. Another holds a small white snake with touches of red around its eyes. The last swarms with dozens of small beetles, tan with dots of black and white all over them. Their enclosure has tiny gleaming bones sunken into the dirt.

He’s never seemed interested in animals. Never mentioned having pets.

“What…are their names?” Jiraiya asks lamely. The rat in the top cage scratches at the glass and grinds his yellowed teeth into it. His fur is jet black, shining a reddish brown where light catches.

Orochimaru trills under his breath, “I don’t name them.” His hand dips into the lower cage and scoops up the smaller of the two rats. Zigzagging scars interrupt its cream colored coat, little jagged marks where hair won’t grow any longer.

“Everyone believes victory makes you stronger…” His words are tired. Orochimaru pets the rat for a moment, holding it close to his chest. Jiraiya can’t meet his eyes, they’re trained on a nonexistent far away thing. Deep in thought. A lightning fast movement of his arm and Orochimaru dumps the scarred rat into the upper cage, with the agitated one.

Ear shattering squeaks, if you can even call them that, erupt. They sound like children screaming. The scarred one pounces as soon as its paws hit dirt. Jiraiya sits in stunned silence watching the rats tear at each other, screech and snarl. Blood flings against the glass in a mist. Beside him, Orochimaru watches intently, expression flat. One little downy ear is partially torn and discarded in the dirt. Jiraiya isn’t sure which rat it belongs to with the way they’re tumbling over and over in a blur. Both animals rear back to sink their teeth into each other over and over. Desperate. As though they’ll die.

Surely this whole day must be a cruel dream.

The fight is over quickly, the scarred rat missing an ear, bleeding in the dirt. Red overtakes his light color in a half dozen places. The other keeps screeching, long after Orochimaru’s pale hands retrieve it from the cage. He doesn’t flinch when the animal sinks its tiny razor-like teeth into the meat of his thumb. The blood that trickles from the puncture wounds pulses pink in Jiraiya’s vision.

Why?

“I used to let the losers go,” Orochimaru pipes up, contemplatively as he stands and goes to the window. Squirming, the rat in his hand continues to bite and scream. The window creaks as he opens it and dangles the animal from its tail outside in the open air.

“Don’t-don’t do that. C’mon, Orochimaru,” Jiraiya protests. His stomach flips. This is not entirely unfamiliar. On missions, occasionally, Jiraiya catches a glimpse of this Orochimaru. Who revels in pain, in orchestration, in control. The remaining rat breaths heavily, laying on its side. He swears he can hear the animal's heartbeat. Perhaps it’s his own.

“I think there’s something to be said for letting the failures try again. Underdogs have a way of surprising us, no? Getting stronger. Living.” Orochimaru swings the rat back and forth, before gently depositing it on the outside edge of the window. It scurries off without looking back.

“Why did you bring me over here? To do that?” Jiraiya tries to keep his voice level and free of anger. Free of fear.

“I wanted to share something with you. Like you did with me.” Plain and simple. Orochimaru’s eyes are bright, but he looks confused. The longer Jiraiya can see his face, the more his expression falls sullen, disappointed. He silently tends to the wounded rat with quick weaving hand signs; healing jutsu’s, the same for his own hand. Jiraiya’s stomach is leadened and heavy. A hobby for a hobby; this was meant to be an exchange.

He’s alone too often. He’s confused. Maybe it’s our fault. Hiruzen’s fault. My fault. I can fix this.

I can help him.

“Hey, Oro, why don’t we go spar? There’s still some daylight left,” Jiraiya offers with faux lightheartedness. Anything to get them out of this apartment. Both of them.

Tumbling wind blows through the window and catches both their hair. Orochimaru crumples in on himself, his shoulders scrunching small. He finishes up with the rat and plucks the removed bit of ear out. It’s a chunk of dripping wet red. The sliver of flesh is then flicked into the beetle terrarium. They swarm it as though they could smell the blood two tanks over. Jiraiya winces.

“Sparring. Always sparring.” Orochimaru’s voice is pointed and envenomed. But his eyes are wet, sad.

***

Out in the training fields, this sparring is not their usual fare. Jiraiya has become accustomed to a fight that feels more like a chase. Dodging genjutsu and nasty long ranged attacks, always chasing at Orochimaru’s heels. Awestruck at the long list of jutsu he uses proficiently. Jiraiya often counters with the same moves, over and over, winning on very rare occasions through brute force alone.

After they arrive there’s an awkward pause of unmeeting eyes, stuck words. Orochimaru takes two steps forward, extending an arm, and Jiraiya begins to extend his own; for the unity sign.

He’s wholly unprepared for the right hook Orochimaru lands under the juncture of his jaw. It lays him out flat in the dirt. Dust wafts around him and stings at his eyes, along with watery tears. Vibrating pain radiates from his chin like a target. Jiraiya touches the area, sharply taking in air at the wave of new pain. He expects blood on his hand when he pulls it back, but there is none.

“Sometimes you stare at me just as Hiruzen does.” Orochimaru’s ever even voice quakes. His feet are planted wide, his hand still forming a fist.

“I don’t know what that means,” Jiraiya sputters. Being compared to Hiruzen hurts far more than being hit. His teeth feel misaligned, greeting each other in all the wrong grooves.

“You think of me as odd.” Orochimaru’s voice erupts into crackles, dancing between choler and distress.

“Don’t you think the same about me?” Jiraiya asks, creeping forward, leaning until he can get himself into a crouch. He throws his weight back, hard, and swings his foot out to collide with Orochimaru’s ankle. Despite seeing it coming, Orochimaru makes no attempt to dodge or counter, he lets himself get knocked flat into the dirt as well.

The question levels their anger.

“I do,” Orochimaru whispers. There’s little to do after that than stare at each other.

“I want you to let the rat go,” Jiraiya finally whispers back. His head spins with the day's events. A whorl of mouths together, blood, screaming, velvet skin under the pads of his fingers.

“Why?” The word is heavy and flat. A wall between them, “I don’t see how this is any different from what we do.” The words are scathing, Orochimaru’s tongue carving them into the very air.

That very first fatality pushes against the backs of Jiraiya’s eyelids. He’s killed more since then, they all have. They’ll be expected to kill more. But the first one sticks to him. The man’s clear green eyes. He sees them in his dreams sometimes, on restless nights. The rat in the cage and the man in his memories breathe the same shallow breaths. One. Two. Three.

“It isn’t right. You know it isn’t.” Strangely, he feels embarrassed to say it. Orochimaru chews his bottom lip a little, worrying the edge.

“And why is that? Because I wasn’t told to do it? Is that what makes it okay for you?” His words twist between a genuine question and mockery.

Jiraiya hangs his head. All he can do is repeat, “I want you to let it go.”

They sit in a stalemate, eyes locked across the dead air. 

“I’ve learned all I wanted to already.” To anyone else, this wouldn’t sound like a concession. Jiraiya knows it is.

After a time, quieter, a secret from them both, Orochimaru says, “I wanted to prove something about us.”

Us. Orphans. Discards.

“You already have.” Jiraiya shuffles close as he says it, desperately. Tapped for Anbu. Hiruzen’s voice is clear in his head, calling Orochimaru a genius, a once in a generation child.

That cliff Orochimaru clung to years ago is one he’s now threatening to jump from; Jiraiya pleading with him to move from the crumbling edge. He punches Orochimaru’s shoulder lightly. His hands tangle in Orochimaru’s hair; he’s twisting and wrapping the ends in the valleys of his fingers. It’s all he can do to keep from shaking him, trying to make the words reach him.

“We can go back right now, set him loose.”

Orochimaru nods. He’s quiet after that, far away and sullen.