“Will you stop glaring at me already, bitch? It’s been two weeks! Give it a break.” Tayuya irritably muttered, giving a stink eye to Guren who just scoffed but continued her glare-session with passion.
The only reason why Tayuya had the courage to say these things was that Guren was stuffed full of restricting seals and could barely show the prowess of a high genin in her current state. Not that Tayuya was in a different situation. She also had a lot of restriction seals on her but the fact they both were at high genin level gave her a measure of courage.
That, and the piled-up irritation.
The bridge in the Land of Waves was finished and that meant both the Konoha and Kiri teams decided it was high time to go back home. It was decided that Tayuya and Guren would go with the Mizukage… which made Guren even more irritating than ever… and that was the end of any sort of plotting of escape for them.
If they went with the Konoha team, there would still be a small chance to get away or that Lord Orochimaru would try to rescue them…
But even if he did, with Ringo Ameyuri present, it wouldn’t really matter. In fact, Tayuya deeply believed Orochimaru would avoid that particular woman like a plague.
This was fine by Tayuya. In fact, she was happy about it. After all, she did decide to betray the Sound Village and surrendered in the spur of a moment. Her life would not be nice if she was captured by the Sound ninjas.
Guren, though, still held onto her loyalty to Orochimaru.
After they left the Land of Waves, it took three days for them to reach the Village Hidden in the Mist. Unlike Tayuya expected, their accommodations were not a damp cell with occasional entertainment through torture. Instead, they were left alone with nobody bothering them… as if they were not all that important.
Which… Tayuya had to begrudgingly admit… they probably were not.
Alas, any sort of non-torture treatment was welcomed by her. She was a captured enemy kunoichi and those usually didn’t have a nice ending. Considering that Iwa and Kiri had a reputation for being extremely cruel to their prisoners… Being ignored was nice.
The only annoying thing was that she had to share her cell with Guren and that she was utterly unsure what the future had in store for her.
That made for a few sleepless nights…
A week and a half slowly passed in this anxiety, and their captors finally found time for them. Tayuya expected many things but to be knocked out was not one of them.
When he woke up, she didn’t expect to find herself on a very comfortable sofa in a lavish room, a room that wouldn’t be amiss in Daimyo’s palace. Tayuya was momentarily awed… at least until she heard the grumpy Guren’s growl and spotted the woman glaring at her. Again.
“Haa~,” Tayuya sighed. “I know you are angry I surrendered but I had no other choice! The enemy was simply far too strong. Can you blame me?” She helplessly asked, knowing it wouldn’t really help.
“Yes, I can!” Guren heatedly answered.
“Figures, bitch.” Tayuya mumbled, deciding that trying to persuade Guren was pointless.
“How can you betray Lord Orochimaru! He basically raised you! Gave you home!” Guren hissed, with every word making Tayuya angrier. “He trained you an-“
“Will you shut the fuck up finally!?” Tayuya loudly exclaimed, “Raised me? Gave me home? Are you nuts, you spoiled bint? I don’t have some extremely rare Bloodline Ability like you!” She snarled, “I was never raised to be one of Orochimaru’s top fighters from the start. I was experimented on and forced to kill people in fighting pits since I was just a little girl! What do you think my life was like in there!? I had to be smart and use everything in my arsenal to survive, to get stronger! The only reason why I survived long enough to become one of the Sound Four was that I used my brain and had talent for genjutsu! You can take that emotional extortion and shove it!”
Guren stared in shock at the heavily breathing Tayuya who, for the first time in the past two weeks, returned her the glare full of hate. Only now did Guren remember what the other three from the Sound Four liked to call Tayuya a slut in jest and how fiercely and angrily she responded every time. Guren always thought it was just a joke among them, especially since Tayuya had such foul language. But now that she was looking at the rage-filled look of the girl who was notoriously known in the Sound Village for being so sadistic and stuck-up she castrated anyone who tried to flirt with her…
An awkward silence spread between the two women who refused to look at each other. Frankly, Tayuya wanted nothing more than to leap at Guren and rip her hair off. The only reason why she didn’t do it was that she knew it was pointless. There was no benefit in such a thing other than making her feel a bit better. Especially since they were still ‘prisoners’ and for all she knew, they might be observed right about now.
Well, that was also a small part of the reason why Tayuya revealed that information about her. She hated her weak past self. The one who suffered in the dark damp cells of Orochimaru’s fighting pits. But if it helped her to earn even a bit of sympathy from her captors, then she would damn well use it!
And under Orochimaru, Tayuya quickly learned when to suppress her own wants and desires for the ‘bigger picture’ anyway. To set her own personal feelings to the side in order to reach her desired goal. She was doing it for as long as she could remember.
Tayuya didn’t really want to escape. Not if a better life awaited her here. Even if it was just slightly better than her life under Orochimaru, she would take it. That said, she didn’t survive so long by being naive. She made sure to look for escape routes from the room the second she woke up, and she was also certain Guren did the same.
In the end, if it came to fighting for her life, Tayuya would do her best to survive or take with her many of the would-be attackers. Having Guren’s support would be indispensable at that time. Getting into a fight with the irritating woman was simply not in Tayuya’s best interest.
“I am sorry.” Guren quietly apologized, making Tayuya give her a weird look. She certainly did not expect that.
“Meh, doesn’t matter.” Tayuya grumpily nodded and rolled her eyes. In her mind, the only words she had for Guren were, ‘Fuck you!’, but if she could make Guren feel bad with a different response, she didn’t mind bitting into her tongue. “I know your life was not smooth sailing either.” She offered an olive branch despite inwardly sneering at these words. Compared to her, Guren was living like a fucking princess if one took into account Orochimaru’s child-raising standards.
“Yeah…” Guren weakly nodded and the room fell again into an awkward silence.
Hands abruptly grasped the left shoulders of the two girls and slightly squeezed in what would be a reassuring manner if it didn’t come out of nowhere and scare the living daylights out of them from how suddenly it happened.
Somebody appeared behind the sofa they were sitting on and they didn’t notice! Their carefully honed instincts didn’t alert them! Even if their chakra was suppressed, their trained instincts were not! They were still on par with S and A-rank ninja respectively!
A chill instantly went up to their spines as the realization they could be easily killed without them even noticing settled in their heads. They prepared for a fight, even if it would be a futile effort before…
“Heeh~, I see you got quite comfortable under our roof.” An amused man’s voice resounded from behind them, “Good to know at least one of you has a good head on her shoulders.” The man removed his hand from Guren’s shoulder but kept it on Tayuya’s in a reassuring manner, causing her to slightly relax her guard.
‘So they really left us alone in an empty room to observe our reactions and see what we would do.’ She happily thought, ‘Letting out my past and showing my discontent with Orochimaru in front of Guren was definitely worth it!’
Something must have shown on Tayuya’s schooled face because…
“Not that it matters anyway.” The man suddenly added before chuckling, making Tayuya mentally face fault because she just knew she was the reason for his apparent amusement.
‘Fucking strong people… All of them are sadistic assholes!’
