#orochimaru and tsunade having Deep Moments and Discussions while offscreen Kabuto and Shizune Hate Each Other So Much is so funny to me

[valiant-typhoon]

Writing Tsunade and Orochimaru is really fun actually. *clenches fist* The conflict, the history, the angst Also might be giving myself OroTsu feels? Hm.

Progress for "Both Feel the Same When Your Eyes Are Closed"

Tsunade examining Orochimaru's arms and he brings up the Edo-Tensei

“That jutsu requires a sacrifice,” she said quietly, unable to bring herself to meet Orochumaru’s eye. Afraid she’d see kindness there more than she feared to see victory.

He did not ask how she knew this, because he knew her. Knew that in her darkest moments she’d considered using the jutsu herself. It was why Tsunade never allowed herself to ever learn it, she knew she would not be strong enough to resist its temptation.

“How many lives have we taken for no cause at all?” Orochimaru asked her, almost gentle. “No reason except that our hokage demanded it of us?”

He chuckled and Tsunade understood why. How many lives had they both taken? To pretend to flinch away from the idea of killing now was almost an insult to the lives she’d ended.

“That jutsu was created with the most vile of intentions,” Tsunade heard herself say, repeating what her grandmother had once told her. “To force the dead to continue to fight even after they had already fallen at the cost of one still living.” She swallowed around the knot in her throat, clinging to the memory of her grandmother’s steadfastness. “You should never have used it. Just as sensei never should have used the Reaper Death Seal.”

“Had Konoha respected your wishes or the wishes of Mito Uzumaki then sensei and I never would have been able to learn them at all. Yet that wretched village did not even consider such a thing, did it? It was too important for them to cling to knowledge they’d taken from the Senju and Uzumaki clans, absorbed with their own quest for power all in the name of the Will of Fire. Even you, the daughter of both great clans, were ignored.”

He was right about the village. “And how are you different?” Tsunade dared ask, meeting his eyes. “You want to learn every jutsu in the world and to gain immortality. You don’t care about cruelty nor do you care for the sanctity of life or death.”

“I am honest about my intentions, I do not hide behind ideas of camaraderie and claim I act for some greater good. I act only for myself, for my own goals.” His head tilted to the side, dark hair falling to the side. “You know I dislike falsehoods, Tsuna.”

“And what would destroying the village do for you now? Sensei is dead, you have the young Uchiha in your grasp.”

“Maybe I want to clear out the rot from this world. There are still many others that are deserving of both our blades.” He smiled, a sharpened tooth peeking out, reminding her of their childhood. “Heal my arms and I will return your loved ones to you and destroy the village that took them in the first place. You and your people would be welcome in my village. Together we could discover not only how to undue death but how to defeat it entirely.”

“Jiraiya would come for us.”

“He would not succeed, not against the two of us together.”

“My apprentice would never agree.” Even to her own ears it sounded like an excuse. "Especially after you've taken her hostage."

“Perhaps you’re underestimating her loyalty to you,” he suggested. “She was always such a bright girl, in truth my own apprentice reminds me of her. I’m confident that with time and your guidance she would come to see the truth of our world. That death does not need to be permanent, that it doesn’t need to happen at all. She is a healer is she not? She staves off death just as you do, what greater victory for a healer could there be? After reuniting with her beloved uncle I’m sure she’d reconsider.””

Shizune would follow her to the ends of the earth, but Tsunade knew she would never follow her into the sweet darkness Orochimaru promised. If Tsunade accepted such an offer she would lose Shizune. She couldn’t imagine Dan or Nawaki accepting such a thing either.

But they would be alive, part of her whispered.

Even if Dan and Nawaki hated her, even if Shizune swore to end her life for betraying every ideal she’d ever taught her they would be alive and together.

She imagined their faces twisted in confused betrayal. Shizune would spit curses and poison, Nawaki would look at her like the stranger pain had made her, Dan would realize that her heart had died with him.

She could see it now. Could see Dan’s blue-green eyes staring at her in horror as he asked, “what have you done?”

Tsunade had made a poor replacement for Shizune’s true family, Dan would be there for her, would comfort her. And there was no one in the world she would trust more with her little brother than Dan and Shizune, she knew in her heart they would take care of him. The three people she loved most in the world would take care of each other.

Gods, was she really considering this?

Song for this scene is Love and War by Fleurie "You and I, always in disguises/Lover, hunter, friend and enemy, you will always be every one of these/Nothing's fair in love and war"

@moldy-flowers