eurydice and orpheus

and when your line has fizzled out,

your legacy forgotten,

your shackles turned to rust,

i will remain

Ever since Tobirama entered the Shikkotsu Forest, it has gone quiet. Eerily so. On and on he presses, past the underbrush that just a moment were teeming with singing birds, deeper into the woods, and with every step he takes, the world continues to hold its breath. He walks and walks and walks.

By the time he stumbles for the first time, he is unable to tell the way he's come from the way he's going anymore. His armour clanks and rattles as he pushes himself back to his feet, and continues to set one foot in front of the other, right up until he falls again. And gets up again. And presses onward, ever onward, deeper into what he hopes is the heart of the forest.

He stops by a clear brook to drink and fill his canteen. Splashes some of the cool water on his face before wandering on. The thought of turning back crossed his mind a while ago, but the truth is he doesn't know which way is back anymore.

Evening comes, and he can only tell by the way the perpetual darkness grows even darker, until he is forced to curl up between the roots of a tree and wait out the night. Strange sensations fill his mind, and when he wakes, his sleep has not been a restful one. The next day passes much like the first, as does the one that follows. And the one after that, and the one after that.

Soon enough, Tobirama cannot tell how long he's already been here – could be four days. Could just as well be four weeks. The food he brought is running low.

His heart soars when he finds a glade full of mushrooms he knows to be edible, if not very filling. He stuffs his pockets to the brim. After a moments hesitation, tips out the bag of gold he brought, as well – fills it up with mushrooms instead. An expensive trade if ever he saw one, but by now survival has become paramount. He'd rather not starve a rich man.

Besides, what use for gold can any creature of this forest possibly have, anyway?

And so he stumbles on, and the fat coins remain behind, glinting faintly in the dim sunlight that filters through the canopy.

The slugs are getting bigger. They are clinging to the trees more numerously now, and Tobirama hopes that means he's getting closer.

On the other hand, when he sees one that is the size of his forearm spit acid at a nasty looking bug, the insect dissolving until nothing remains but a pair of giant pincers, he dearly wishes he hadn't shed his armour days back. His breastplate had been the first to go, followed by his pauldrons not a day later. Tobirama's heart had been heavy when he discarded his happuri the following morning. It had been a gift, once upon a time, albeit now, many moons later, useless and cumbersome as a he stumbled through a forest that held dangers so different to what his armour could have protected him from. So he let it go.

Armed with a bag of mushrooms and a sword tied to his belt which he cinches tighter with each passing day, Tobirama presses on and on and on, until his feet are covered in blisters and his sandals falling apart.

And, one day, the universe decides to take pity on him.

She is lounging across a low branch, completely motionless, and he might have missed her in his stupor if not for the way her eyes, wide and green, seem to shine out of the dark like a beacon. He stumbles to a halt, rubs his face, pinches his arm.

She remains.

Still stretched across the length of the branch, completely bare, long pink hair dangling past her neck and shoulders. One arm still raised with a slug curling around her wrist and across her hand.

Still looking at him.

He opens his mouth, snaps it shut again. She never moves. He drops to his knees.

"Please," he sobs, and his voice is hoarse from days and days and days of disuse. "Please…" He doesn't even remember what he's begging for. She says nothing.

"Please…," he stammers, "please, I came all this way…" Some time ago, he would have been ashamed. Tobirama never bent. Not to his father, not to the gods. But he does for this one. "Please, I beg you…"

She turns her attention back to the slug curled around her arm. The animal is eyeing him suspiciously, eyestalks twitching in agitation. She runs soothing fingers across its blue and white back.

"Many do," her voice, slow and smooth, filters through the air. She's not even looking at him… "Why you?"

He stutters, quiets his sobs, wipes his nose on his sleeve. "Why what?" he whispers. She huffs. Even in profile, she looks annoyed. "Why do you beg? What do you want?"

"I – I…," he stammers, racks his brain. There must be a reason he's here, there must be, but he can't remember, and oh gods – a flash of white and brown hair flits across his memory, and without thinking he blurts out, "my brother! It's my brother… Please." The woman sighs, her chest heaving and falling with the motion. "Will you help?"

She tilts her head, turns those green eyes back on him. As green as a freshly sprouted blade of grass. "Do you know how many come here?" she asks. "Wives, sons, sisters…" She trails off, mouth pinched. Tobirama shivers. "Do you help them?" he asks. Licks his dry lips. The woman turns back to the slug, dances her fingers along its glistening skin.

"No."

His heart clenches. "I – I can pay you!" he offers, reaches for his bag – filled with roots and mushrooms. The gold, his entire savings, forgotten in some clearing along the way. He falters, and the woman huffs in amusement. He understands that money wouldn't have interested her anyway. Again, Tobirama's tongue darts out to wet his chapped lips, his fists curl into his pants to keep from fidgeting. His wrist brushes something cool and solid. Fingers curling around the handle of Raijin, he holds onto the sword as if it were a lifeline. It is, in a way.

"I could simply force you," he says, running his eyes up and down her bare body. She is supple, and soft, with only a hint of muscle. It would be an easy feat for him. The woman sighs, and when she turns to face him seems almost bored. "Of course," she drawls. "But to what end?"

Releasing the slug onto a nearby branch, she slips off her perch in one fluid motion, crouches in front of him. Her pink hair clings to her shape like sea foam to waves. She tilts her head, considers him, and when she speaks, her words ring with the certainty of millennia. "I will wait. I will breathe until your entire line burns itself out, your history fades into nothing, and your shackles turn to rust. And when all that is you is gone –" She reaches out, runs the cool tip of her finger along Tobirama's cheek, under his chin. She smiles. "– I will remain. And you will be the poorer for it."

"I – I…" Tobirama falters. His shoulders sag. Suddenly, the weight he has been tasked to carry becomes too much, and for the first time in his life, he bows his head before it. It seems that, for all that his abilities and conquests have been touted, asking an immortal being to heal his brother is the end of the line. He's finally bitten off more than he can chew, simply because here stands a creature whose will is still greater than his own.

How very humbling.

The woman picks up the bag that lies forgotten by his knees. She sticks a hand into it, withdraws a mushroom and rises, places it in the branch above her head where the slug can reach it.

"Why did you leave it?" she asks, and when Tobirama only looks up at her in confusion, she clarifies, "The gold. Why not keep it?" He glances between her face and the bag, hangs his head in exhaustion. "Living was more important."

She is silent for a moment, and when she finally speaks, he almost doesn't process the command.

"Walk with me."

He is clumsy in his haste to follow, tripping his way over the roots and vines she seems to glide across with otherworldly ease. She never looks back at him and Tobirama is almost tempted to reach out, grasp a strand of that silky hair, and tether himself to her so he won't end up lost. But he doesn't.

They walk and walk and walk. He's not sure for how long.

At some point, the glint of blue metal catches his eye a ways off. His breastplate is twinkling at him through the trees, and for a moment, he wants to veer off the path to fetch it. But the woman never falters in her steady pace, and so he leaves behind his armour and follows. They pass the glade of mushrooms as well, but there is no time to gather up the fat coins there were supposed to buy her allegiance, because he fears that if he slows even for a moment, he will lose sight of her, and he dare not ask her to stop for a bit.

From here on, step by step, the forest becomes lighter, the air less heavy. He can hear birds singing in the distance. She hops over a brook that Tobirama simply splashes his way through, and when her hair lifts and swishes mid-jump, he thinks he can make out a white net of lines criss-crossing across her back. A trick of the light, perhaps. They reach the edge of the forest, and while Tobirama breathes easier out in the open, his heart is heavy and he drops to his feet. This woman was his brother's only hope. His only hope. Perhaps he should have sent Hashirama instead – his older brother has always had a way with people. But then again, he thinks as his eyes slant back to the woman standing in front of him, taking in the planes of rolling grass that stretch just outside the Shikkotsu Forest, maybe she doesn't really count as people.

"Hand me your sword," she orders. Too tired to protest, he does as asked. A warrior never parts with his weapon. But here, Tobirama thinks, at the edge of the woods, he is not a warrior. He is a man nearing the edge of his tether. So he presses Raijin into her waiting hand without further question, and his face burns up with shame when he sees the identical scars running round her wrists like a shadow image of the shackles that have crumbled off a long time ago. He almost apologises for threatening her.

But his tongue is heavy and so he merely looks on tiredly as she gathers her waistlong locks in one hand, drags the blade across is. Pink strands dance through the air when she lets go, carried away on the wind like pieces of candy floss. Hair now falling around her chin in a choppy cut, she turns to hand his weapon back to him. He is too exhausted to even reach for it, every fibre in his body screaming with exhaustion and pain.

"Why…" he mumbles, sways a bit. She holds his gaze steadily. "I always cut my hair when I leave the forest." He gapes, draws a shuddering breath, stares back at her. "It makes counting the years easier." He doesn't answer, trying to wrap his head around her words while his heart is already soaring with hope.

"Come now," the woman says to him, but her face is not unkind as she presses a glowing green hand to his shoulder and a wave of energy sweeps through him. She pushes Raijin into his fingers which are no longer shaking and lax. "We have a long way to go."

She turns and walks out into the open field. Tobirama stares after her with his mouth hanging open. "Wait!" he calls, jumps to his feet, hurries to catch up to her, struggling to sheathe Raijin at the same time. He shrugs out of his blue haori, holds it out. "You'll need to… I mean… You know." She rolls her eyes, but pushes her arms through the sleeves nonetheless. Makes a face when she ties it around her bare body. "You stink."

He gapes at her for a moment, and a moment longer still. "Let's go," she says, and he collapses, sheer pure relief forcing him to his knees as he finally allows himself to believe what she is saying.

"Thank you," Tobirama groans as he presses his forehead against the ground before her feet. "Thank you, thank you, thank you…"

Red eyes snap open.

A hand flies up and closes again, snatching at the air, fingers now balled into a tight fist. He stares at it for a moment.

"What is it brother?" someone asks across the crackling fire. Shaking back is black hair, the man looks at his hand for a moment longer, twists something around his fingers. "We're breaking camp," he announces, and rises to his feet in one fluid motion. As people hurry to follow his command, rolling out of their sleeping bags and gathering their scattered equipment, his brother sidles up to him. "Why the sudden hurry, Madara?"

He looks up at the moon, high above and unsympathetic in its brilliance.

"They did what we couldn't," he says, voice low and shaking with barely controlled rage. He opens his fingers when the wind picks up once again. "She left the forest."

They are gone soon enough, melting into the night like shadows. All that remains is a pit of faintly glowing embers that flare brightly each time the wind whispers across them, and, tangled high in the twigs of a nearby oak tree, a strand of silky threads that shimmer a faint pink beneath the moon.

A/N: Yeah, so I hope you had fun with... whatever this is. It's so random I could almost be tempted to feel sorry. I couldn't sleep last night, and I always like the powerplay between desperate humans and immortal creatures who just don't give a f*ck. So this is the result of my nightly ramblings! COVID-19 has got my sleep pattern shot.

To prevent any future heartbreak: this will stay a oneshot. I have way too many TobiSaku's I am working on at the moment. But still.

Let me know what you think!

Lots of love,

planless