Tempt Fate | Orochimaru x Reader

18 - Konoha

You just stood there, paralyzed and unable to take your eyes off the village you once called home. "What.. What is your plan..? Why are we here?" You questioned Orochimaru but he just chuckled. Typical.

Your mind started to wander, what was his business here? Did he come to just gather information or does he, maybe, want to attack the village? Now? Right now? You felt utterly unprepared for whatever was bound to happen and the uncertainty of it all made your stomach sink.

"You seem to be be quite nervous." Orochimaru spoke, now with a serious expression on his face. "Would you run now, like a dog with its tail between its legs, if I told you I was planning to attack the village and assassinate the fifth?" He mustered your face. Your eyes widened, then you quickly turned your head and stared at the leaf. Your mind was racing but at the same time it felt empty. You wanted revenge, yes, but did you really want to destroy the whole village? And the fifth hokage, Tsunade Senju... No she kept the truth from you on purpose. Becoming hokage in the first place, for a village which you know is so corrupt is questionable enough.

Orochimaru's voice shook you from your thoughts. "You're getting worked up over nothing. I am here simply to gather information, but if I can tell you something." He paused, filling you with both relief and anticipation. "When something traumatic happens to a human, children especially, it is quite common for them to erase the memory from their brain, for self protection."

Why would he say this now? You furrowed your brows in confusion, waiting for him to make sense of this statement but his lips remained shut, gaze focused on konoha, he seemed kind of nostalgic, looking at the village like this.

You decided to speak up, he couldn't just say something like that and not continue. "Orochimaru-sama... What are you getting at?" He chuckled, crossing his arms, then looking at you coldly. "I can tell you more about this after we complete the mission successfully. Sometimes, only a few years later does everything start to make sense... We should go, I don't plan on standing here and wasting time for much longer.

-

You went to the north gate of Konohagakure, the rain was still rapidly hitting your hood but you didn't notice, your mind was somewhere else. Orochimaru almost sounded like he spoke from experience when he talked about the mind erasing certain memories, was that something that applied to himself or... But why would he tell you this? Was there anytime in your life where you didn't remember what happened?

"Welcome to Konoha, what is your businesses here?" You heard an unfamiliar voice speak up. You quickly lifted your head and spotted two men guarding the gate you had arrived at. One had black spiky hair and a peculiar piece of fabric running across the bridge of his nose, the other one had dark brown hair, that was covering his right eye and seemed quite unassuming.

"We are just humble visitors from Iwagakure." Orochimaru spoke smoothly and bowed slightly to the two guards. Taken by surprise, it took you a few seconds to follow his example and bow to the two men. "Ahh I see! That is nice, we don't get visitors from Iwagakure often, enjoy your stay!"

One of them said. Was it really that easy to get into the village? You were shocked. "Thank you very much!" The disguised sanin said, having a really uncharacteristic, wide smile on his face. "Thank you.." You mumbled quietly as the two of you stepped through the huge gate, into the village. As you were walking, you quickly looked back to the gate, just to see that you had nothing to worry about, the two shinobi seemed to be talking and smiling at each other, not suspecting a thing.

"Orochimaru-sama, is it really alright for me to walk around here undisguised? I mean people are definitely to recognize me.." You told him your worries. He turned his head towards you, surprisingly, even he wasn't disguised anymore. "You don't have to worry, as long as you keep this hood up, the chances of someone noticing you are very small. Konoha is not very secure, I heard members of the Akatsuki walked in several times already and nobody noticed."

Was that really true? You always felt Konoha was a pretty safe place to live but it seemed you were wrong.

-

You had been walking threw the streets of Konoha for a few minutes now, you still didn't know what exactly Orochimaru's plan was. You were thinking about asking him about it but before you could even finish thinking you spotted a familiar face. Kakashi, Kakashi Hatake and next to him Might Guy. Your heart almost stopped, they can't notice me, oh no, what to do? But before you could continue overthinking you felt a sharp pain in your head. Before you could start groaning from the pain, the same cold hand from last night was covering your mouth, keeping you from making any sound and you got picked up swiftly. Your vision was blurry but it was clear that Orochimaru was taking you somewhere, you lost consciousness, but it couldn't have been for more than 10 minutes. As you opened your eyes again, the pain was still as intense as it was when it started so you grabbed your forehead. You couldn't make out where you were, you only saw Orochimaru, he seemed to be trying to hand you something. "Here, drink this, it will help you." You knew what he wanted but your whole body felt stiff and you couldn't think straight. Orochimaru didn't hesitate and grabbed your hair, lifting up your head andforcing the liquid down your throat.

That was the last thing of reality you could sense as you suddenly felt. Next you found yourself in a dream like state, recalling the events that took place that day one by one. Everyone knew. They had planned all this for a long time. Your parents had suspected something was going to happen and they got killed trying to flee the village with you. You started recalling more and more faces of the attackers, many of them were familiar.

You head was hurting tremendously. Why did they keep you alive? How could you have forgotten about this? Is what Orochimaru said really true, do people just... forget like this? You felt sick, you wanted to throw up, like that would remove all these horrible feelings from your body, but you couldn't even do that. You shut your eyes as tightly as possible but it didn't keep the images flashing in you mind away, countless tears ran down your face, you felt so helpless.

You quickly sat up, your eyes were wide and sweat was dripping from your face. The pain was still there but you felt... enlightened. "I.. I know what happened now." You whispered to yourself. "You know?" An unexpected voice from directly next you made you jump. You turned your head to see Orochimaru standing there, next to the tree you were leaning on. You looked to the ground, thinking about everything that had happened again. It still didn't all make sense to you and you still had questions but you were undeniably sure that everything you remembered now was the one and only truth.

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Thanks for 2k reads! I know a lot of stuff doesn't really make sense yet and seems impossible but I will explain it all later in the story! Tysm for reading!!
(I will edit a few of the earlier chapters so it's more coherent.)