7 Interlude 1.a

The orphanage matron sat on her chair, worry invading her mind.

It had been two days since Sekai had left the village, she had some of her children run away before, they gather the money in some sort of way and leave the village, and they return before dark hits when they get hungry, not having properly prepared before they leave, and always she is here staying up, with arms wide open and a nice bowl of warm soup.

A way to talk with them on why they left, and to help prepare them for later on in their life when they actually leave when they leave her.

But he hadn't come back. A day out and he still hasn't come back, although this wasn't the first time one of her children hasn't come back after a day last time that happened- a flash as an image ran through her mind, a mangled body crows pecking the eyes of the face of her baby and theywereeatinghisfacewhyweretheyeatinghersonsfacehewassupposedtolivewhywhYWHY- she shoved it down, helped by entirely too much practice.

What was she thinking of again? Oh yes, she was thinking about Sekai, he always did like to run, that was his first word in fact.

When he was one he watched the older children running around, and would always get so excited when they ran past him he would always try to crawl to follow them. One day while he was being held back by one of the other kids he yelled at the top of his lungs "RUN!" the shock was enough that the kid dropped him and he crawled as fast as he could towards the other kids.

When he finally learned to run he was impossible, we couldn't keep him in his crib because he would crawl out in the middle of the night and run out through the backyard with only the moon to show him where to go. She remembered when she found out she was so mad and worried that she had him doing dishes for the week.

Looking back on all of this, she realizes that she never could have held him here, he would have left, if she couldn't even keep him in his crib how would she be able to hold him here? Eventually, he would have left, all she wished was that he waited a bit longer so as to not give this poor old woman a heart attack.

All she wished was that he was safe.

In a forest of the Land of Hot Water

Orochimaru sat, looking through a paper from one of his few spies. He hadn't had the time to properly grow their numbers while being busy with his duties as a member of Akatsuki, the single spy he had in Kumo was his greatest accomplishment.

Said spy was currently sending in a report about some orphan that had run away, he hasn't come back but with a quick search from a team of veteran genin, no bodies have been found. It was likely that this was nothing but… perhaps this was an opportunity.

An opportunity he would seize without hesitation.