Orochimaru was probably never someone who cared much about others. Everything he did was with a goal in mind. Everything he did was for himself.
If he did show kindness to someone, it meant that person had a use. He was like this before and he would not change now. He was too old to change much. For years he walked through the world, killing people left and right, with cold eyes and a grin on his face that it was hard to feel something, anything, now.
When he saw his proteges, Kyoko now added to the group, he saw only their future in them. Loyal pawns, not children who would fight giant pillow wars and continue to laugh childishly despite their own trauma.
But that was probably why he had no problem giving his father a hard time.
The man looked broken, constantly twitching, heavy bags under his eyes, and he was silent. Silent to the point of unnerving the rest of the family. Constantly he would look at the phone, as if he was just waiting for some bad news to arrive.
Orochimaru knew that the man was at the end of his rope, he just didn't care. He couldn't care less if this man threw himself off a roof here and now and just died. In the beginning, his information were quite helpful, but Orochimaru was still weak then.
Now he had a small army, many of them spies. A little information from the police department was nothing to him. So what use had this man for him then?
"Work is hard" Souta said wearily, trying to ignore the worried looks from his wife and son. "But everything is okay" he assured. No one said anything. Orochimaru just eyed him. How many more useful secrets do you have in that head of yours? He said nothing.
At least, those were the memories the Sannin got from his clone. He ignored them. In front of him he had his three students. All three were learning as he had asked them to. Kyoko had the most fun, the girl loved books. No wonder with her Quirk. She had an inner library. Once she touched a book it was added. After that she could make it appear in her hand to read it.
He was lucky with the Quirks of all his charges and he was glad because that meant he had made no mistakes in his choice.
Sora adored him. Orochimaru was like the big brother he never had and the Sannin gave him everything he could desire. The child's mentality was frail, but hardened to a certain extent because of past experiences. He was not afraid to see blood. "I don't care about others, but I don't like it when those I care about are hurt" were his words. He would do anything to keep the people he loved from the dangers of the world. Orochimaru was one of those people and if he said murder and torture would help him, then the boy would follow him.
Takumi was a slightly harder case. Even though he was disturbed by the bullying, he was never completely lost. He still had hope in this society and that someone would come to save him. He was bitter that this person was not a hero, not one of the white side, but someone who was supposed to be bad. He was still grateful. However, he had trouble accepting how deep the shadow of the Sannin actually went. Sora and now Kyoko and his gratitude towards Orochimaru were what kept him here the most. Orochimaru would change that.
And then there was Kyoko. He was frankly surprised by her appearance. Her hero, she had said. He found it rather ironic to be called that. But he would not complain. The girl had proven soon enough how genuine her feelings were, and Orochimaru wasn't afraid to take her in. She had potential. Potential that her father apparently couldn't see when he tossed her aside. But the previous training did her good and she was a genius. In both body and mind. In his old world, she would have made a good shinobi. She was like the cherry on top, because she'd already had everything she needed beaten into her since childhood, so the only thing Orochimaru had to do was keep polishing her.
A really useful bunch.
::
"I feel like I'm surrounded by lunatics" Takumi sighed abruptly and unexpectedly.
Orochimaru raised an eyebrow, Kyoko looked up in confusion.
"What do you mean?" asked Sora curiously. Takumi deadpaned and pointed at the blood splatter on the boy's pants because he had once again enthusiastically taken a person apart.
"I mean, don't you guys notice how abnormal you are?" all three of them looked at him questioningly and Takumi groaned in experation.
First he pointed at Sora, "You, you're nine and your hobby is taking apart corpses, like what the hell?" he shouted and Sora tilted his head as if he didn't understand what was strange about it. Takumi went over to Kyoko, "you're the daughter of an ex-assassin and you've been learning how to stick a knife into someone's back since you were little. I'm not going to comment on how unrealistic that sounds right now." The girl giggled innocently, absolutely not offended by his words.
And then he gestured to the Sannin, who had originally reworked the seal one of his clones had made. He looked up with interest, curious what the boy had to say about him. "And you... you..." his finger lowered slightly as Takumi thought about how to put the bullshit Orochimaru had put him through over the past few weeks into a few words. "You're a fucking creep who isn't even of age and has already broken laws that I didn't even know existed!" he then finally said. "And it's even sicker that I'm going along with all of this too" he said, his finger now pointed at himself.
Then he laughed "I thought all my life I was an outsider because I was weird. But when I'm with you, I'm an outsider because I feel like I'm the only fucking normal person among us!" he exclaimed, holding a hand to his own forehead as if to see if he was sick. Sora tilted his head and frowned "Takumi is not an outsider!" he shouted, looking shocked at the older boys words. The very same chuckled faintly, as if he had just heard a good joke. "If this keeps up then soon it won't" he said absolutely amused by his own statement.
Orochimaru couldn't help but silently agree with him. Soon Takumi would take the carefully prepared bait and when that happened the boy would be yet another piece for him to use on his board.
~*~
That same evening, Orochimaru decided to go home again. Originally to collect some books from his shelf that he didn't have in his lair and just to check the situation at home without using a clone. While he had plenty of chakra, he was no Naruto who could spam those things for hours without exhaustion.
What he didn't expect was to get a call from Midoriya, who asked with a lot of stuttering and talking around if he could spend the night at his place. Supposedly his mother was away for a few days because of her work and she didn't want to leave her son home alone and since Kenta was his only friend, he was his only option.
Too bad that at that moment Orochimaru was in the kitchen getting something to drink and his mother with her far too sharp senses overheard the conversation and kindly asked him to invite the cinnamon roll named Midoriya. Ok no, that was a lie, she had threatened him and held the cooking spoon dangerously in front of his face. He wasn't the type of person to be particularly impressed by such a ridiculous threat, but his mother would bug him until he couldn't hear the end of it if he declined now. Under other circumstances he would have refused without hesitation, but now he probably had no choice.
"It's good for you to have a friend over once in a while" his mother just told him with a smile before he walked back to his room. Now he probably had a hero fan hanging around his neck, and he could spend all day tomorrow teaching him that he wasn't planning on becoming a hero himself. Again.
~*~
"We got a lead" one of his co-workers informed him. Satou took a deep breath, fatigue clearly visible on his features. He rubbed his temples and looked at the documents in front of him.
"OK, get ready. Call the pro heroes, we need to act fast!" he ordered and the other nodded before leaving the room. His gaze fell to the picture of his family on his table and a faint smile played around his lips before it was replaced by a deep frown.
"Hopefully everything will go well" he muttered, reaching for his cell phone. He couldn't have anything go wrong.
Not again.
~*~
"Thank you for letting me stay with you for the night," Midoriya said as he stood at the Takahashi's front door the next day with his luggage. "It's okay" Misaki reassured him as Orochimaru slowly came trudging down the stairs. She gave him a warning look for clearly being late, but he shrugged it off. "A..ah Kenta, h..hello" Brokoli-head called out, smiling shyly but cheerfully at him. "Midoriya" the latter confirmed with a slight nod and once again he could feel his mother's gaze on the back of his neck. Again, the sannin ignored her. Instead, he led the boy up the stairs and towards the guest room. Coincidentally across from his own room.
He opened the door and walked inside. Behind it was a simple room. Comparable to his own, only with a little less furniture. A large double bed in the middle of the room, a large carpet with futuristic patterns, a mirrored wardrobe, a small sitting area and a large window front. Simple, but you could still tell you were living in a completely different price range here. "I..is this m..my room?" asked Midoriya uneasily, seeming anxious to touch anything.
"Make yourself comfortable" Orochimaru replied, opening the window to air out the room. He then turned back to the boy to see him standing stiffly in the middle of the room, not knowing where to put himself. Orochimaru raised an eyebrow "Put your bag in some corner" he said and the boy flinched slightly, as if he had been caught at something. Nodding, he placed it neatly next to the bed and then stood up straight again. He began to play with his fingers as he waited for more orders.
Silently, Orochimaru went out of the room and gestured for the boy to follow him, which he did hurriedly. They both walked into the room across from them, his room.
"Sit on one of the seats," he said as he moved the curtains aside to let more light into the room. When he turned back, Midoriya was sitting frozen in one of the armchairs. The same one he always sat in. Orochimaru sat down across from him and briefly they were silent. Orochimaru stared disinterestedly into the air while Midoriya nervously tried to start a conversation. It was the same as always. And as always, the greenette's self-confidence decreased with every second he failed to attract the snake boy's attention.
Suddenly Orochimaru's mother came bursting into the room with a tray full of snacks and drinks and a few board games in her hand. She was probably the only one in the family who did a good job at hosting. The men of the family just couldn't seem to manage it, so she had taken it upon herself to make the guests feel comfortable.
"Do you like your room Midoriya? I hope you don't feel uncomfortable" she started smiling and the meek boy nodded hurriedly.
"It i..s a nice r..room" he answered honestly and smiled at the sight of the nice woman.
"That's good" she replied, her eyes flashing happily, "I brought you some games. I know it's easy to get bored with Kenta," she said, glancing in her son's direction, who just raised his eyebrow unimpressed. She sighed, but quickly the smile had found its way back to the corners of her mouth.
"I wish you a good afternoon. Dinner will be in two hours" she said and left the room. After the door fell shut, silence followed again.
"Uhh... do you want to play?" the greenette asked undecided, pointing to the selection in front of them. Orochimaru nodded silently and took out one of the board games.
~*~
"-And t..then I g..got his autograph. I..I still can't believe it" Midoriya told him, who warmed up while playing and was now talking like a waterfall again.
The two were playing chess and Orochimaru could proudly say that he destroyed brocoli-head. He had never been much of a chess player, and rarely played shogi, but he guessed that was what old age, wars, and secret organizations did to him. Anyway, he could see through the boy's tactics in a split second without straining.
"Checkmate," he said with a grin, and Midoriya stopped talking to look down at the chessboard. "O..oh, K...kenta you w..won a..again" he said, laughing nervously.
"We should play something else" Orochimaru said, looking at the games they hadn't played yet. Except for a few games based on luck, he had won them all.
"Uhhh... c..can I ..go to the bathroom for a minute?" asked Midoriya nervously and Orochimaru nodded.
"You know where the bathroom is?" he asked, and the boy nodded before getting up and walking to the door. Immediately after the door closed behind him, Orochimaru dropped the game he had been holding onto the table. The glasses clattered loudly, but he wasn't bothered by the noise. His gaze turned to the clock, dinner would be soon, and then he looked out of the window. Slowly the sun moved towards the horizon, bathing everything in a deep orange hue with many shades of yellow and pink.
Suddenly, Eleven appeared in a corner of the room and Orochimaru's hand twitched dangerously. His eyebrows drew together in annoyance and he turned to the glass of water in front of him.
"What is it?" he asked, his undertone threatening. There was no time right now.
"A group of police officers and pro heroes were found at our base in the underworld" he began, his voice sounding rushed despite his lack of emotion, and Orochimaru's gaze darkened. Already? They were fast, you had to give them that.
He leaned back in his chair. "What did they do?" he asked, his fingers closing tightly around the glass, and just as Eleven was about to answer, he heard footsteps coming from the hallway. Orochimaru's eyes shot to the door and with a wave of his hand he sent Eleven away. The latter seemed hesitant to leave. Whatever else he wanted to say seemed important, but in the end he could not disobey the order and disappeared. The door opened and Misaki came running in. "Dinner's ready!" she called cheerfully, and Orochimaru's hand twitched again.
It wasn't until the second moment that she realized her son was alone. "Where's Midoriya?" she asked, her eyes silently wondering if he had driven the boy away somehow.
"Restroom" he answered curtly, having to pull himself together not to kick the woman out now.
"Oh" she blinked and then smiled again "when he comes back tell him dinner is ready" and with the words she left again. When she was finally gone, the annoyed expression finally found its way onto his previously motionless face.
" Eleven" he growled and on comand the man reappeared in the room.
"Keep it short" he hissed, his golden eyes boring into The Shadow's black ones.
The latter nodded.
" They have Forty-three."
And Orochimaru cursed.
"Go!" his eyes flashed dangerously, "Watch the situation. Don't get caught" the shadow saluted and disappeared. Just at that moment, Midoriya came running into the room.
"Kenta?" he asked worriedly when he saw the expression on his friend's face. He had never seen so much emotion on it before, and it was probably not good to note that the snake boy was clearly extremely annoyed about something. Had he done something wrong? Of course you did! It's a wonder Kenta even bothers with you, muttered a voice inside him and he looked to the ground, his hands clenched into fists.
"Dinner's ready" the blackette repeated his mother's words and Midoriya nodded uneasily. "Go ahead without me" he winced at the words. 'Go ahead without me', Kenta really didn't want him around. He probably didn't want him to stay here overnight either. Stupid, stupid Izuku, how could you be so naive?
"Y..yes" his body began to shake as tears built up in his eyes. He couldn't bring himself to say any more words as he turned and just about fled the room.
Orochimaru scoffed. He didn't have time to worry about the boy.
Without hesitation, he sought the chakra of the seal and let his consciousness slip into that of Forty-Three. He did not hesitate long and began to destroy his entire mind. He could remotely hear the shadow begin to cry out in pain as his entire being was eaten away from the inside.
The memory films shattered like glass around Orochimaru and rained down into the ever darker depths of the subconscious. The long strings that belonged to the control of the body were cut with a simple movement of the hand and once again screams rang out, more and more pleading, bloodcurdling, as if the person was suffering pure torture. He did not care.
Just as he was about to attack the main consciousness, he encountered another person. A man, short black hair, clearly not a part of Forty-Three's psyche. It was another intruder, a parasite. Orochimaru cursed.
The man turned around and his eyes widened "Orochi-" faster than he could look, Orochimaru had cut him off and killed his consciousness. The man disappeared and again Orochimaru cursed. He made quick work of the rest of Forty-Three's consciousness, who screamed even louder, but he didn't even flinch. Shortly after, when he was enveloped only by black emptiness, he left the place again. His golden eyes flashed dangerously as he stared angrily at the ground in front of him.
Suddenly, Misaki burst through the door again, a critical expression decorating her features. " What's taking you so long?" she asked impatiently, and Orochimaru put on a disinterested facade. His hand twitched.
"I'm coming," he pressed out. The woman only arched an eyebrow before she disappeared again.
He followed her silently, inwardly already planning his next moves. Now things would soon get a little messier again. His hand twitched in response.
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Am I the only one who gets the feeling that the story is getting boring?
And I noticed that I like to repeat myself.
Somehow I can't bring myself to like the story. Well, I have prewritten up to the seventeenth chapter. I'll upload those over the next few days and then discontinue.