Neji Hyuuga was somewhat excited for this school year, for he had his best friend Rock Lee and his crush Sakura Haruno in his class.

People often thought that he didn't have any friends, or if he did he only had them to beat on and steal money from. He hated those assumptions, but he couldn't really do anything about them besides brush them off. It wasn't his fault that his entire family had those menacing white eyes - sans his gentle cousin Hinata of course - or that his father and uncle were known worldwide about their intimidating aura he just happened to possess as well.

One day he remembered smiling at Lee's joke about a giraffe and some honey on the way home from school in freshman year. They had been walking past the shops because it was the quickest route to their respective homes, so lots of people were walking around. When he grinned, everyone turned to him and stared before mothers quickly directed their children away and men searched him like a criminal.

Despite Lee's denial, even he looked as if his best friend was some freak at that moment. And Neji never tried to smile or laugh again.

But this year was a new year! Maybe he can ask Sakura to go out with him! She is certainly everything in a woman that he would want! She was so flamboyant and peppy, much different than what Hyuuga women such as Hinata displayed.

Neji was so enamored by Sakura's jovial attitude that he didn't know that something had walked into him when he opened the classroom door. Not until...

BAM!

The young adolescent male found his rear end meeting the harsh linoleum floor in an ungraceful collision, feeling as if his entire jaw had lost feeling. Dazed, he looked for the source of the attack with an animalistic frenzy before he rested his cold white eyes on eyes that held more fury and ferocity than he had ever witnessed. And the worst part was that he didn't even have to look up to see them.

Neji wanted to fall unconscious at that moment, for right in front of him and standing in the doorway, was the school's renowned Handheld Panda: Tenten. Panda because of the brown panda-ear resembling buns she always wore, and Handheld because of her ridiculously small stature. Because of how short her height and even shorter temper, Tenten was renowned at the most dangerous girl on school.

And right now she had demonstrated this by practically one-hit KOing him with by striking him in the chin. She looked at him with annoyance; a small scene of kids around them watching in awe, mirth, and fear. And when she spoke, she sounded so much like a cute little panda bear that it almost negated the venom in her words, "You idiot, watch where you're going."

She quickly departed, stepping over his sprawled out figure as if he was just gum on the street she wanted to avoid. Neji had never felt more mortified in his life as he was too numb to haul himself up with the last of his dignity. Neji, the slightly creepy-looking student who had the best grades in his class, was just called an idiot by a girl he could have mistaken for a China doll. Students whispered around him, some about how scary Tenten is, and some about how much of a pansy he currently was. Lee had walked out of the classroom to see what was the commotion, and Neji had to snap it out of it so that he can hide his face from all of the jeering accusations.

"Tenten sure is fiery," Lee tried to amend as the two males quickly got to their seats. "Hopefully she will not try to hurt you again, my dear friend, for it is such an unyouthful thing to do. But, since she'll be in the same classes as us, maybe you should avoid her for a bit. To let her youthful self cool down."

Neji nearly choked on his spit. Tenten was going to be in most of their classes? He groaned and not even Sakura's happy bantering with Lee was enough to get him out of his depression.

The day was over, and Neji cheered up a bit more. Tenten only gave him a scornful look when she entered, but then again she did that to everyone. He was just a blink in her devilishly judging brown eyes, and was thus saved from any sort of unfortunate circumstances with her. If he kept out of her way, the event of getting his ass handed to him by a girl nearly half his height would fade away by the second semester.

He had chatted with Lee, surreptitiously flushed when Sakura talked to him, and generally enjoyed the day as best as a white-eyed bastard like himself could.

It all went to shit when he got home though, for in his backpack he found a love letter.

And it was from Tenten.

The nerves in his eyes seemed to light on fire and combust themselves because it took him a long time to even understand what he was looking at. It was a tiny pink envelope, almost rose in color, with a little bow on the front. And written in even smaller curly cursive were the words 'Tenten' written on the front in jade gel pen ink.

Neji didn't understand anything at that moment as he sat on his bed and stared at the love letter. For all three years of high school, he and Tenten had never exchanged hellos. They weren't in all of each other's classes until now by some stroke of sadistic happenstance, and she did just use violence upon him that day. They weren't in kindergarden anymore, and she wasn't a boy who smacked girls to show their puppy-love the best they could. It was just... bizarre.

What was even more terrifying was to try and tell her that he wasn't interested. If she was willing to beat him up when he was her crush, he couldn't imagine what she would do to him when he was the object that did not return her affections.

Feeling like his world was caught between a rock and the Handheld Panda, Neji swore softly and laid back on his bed to hold the stupid envelope up in the air. He ended up holding it up in front of the ceiling lights as well, and now he could see straight through it. Neji blinked. Interesting, he thought as all of the day's tension once again faded from him.

Before he can even register his sudden calming, something sounded like a window being roughly shoved open and loud banging from the living droom. In his house.

Now his body was rigid for a different reason because Neji lived on the second story of the large apartment complex his uncle owned, the entire floor was for himself. Even if he did leave a window open, who in the right mind would try to climb that distance just to rob him? He wasn't exactly skilled in the art of self-defense, but he wasn't a weakling either, and thus cautiously got up while he listened to the commotion. To his relief, he had left his trusty broom in his room as well, and grabbed it as he pressed his ear to the door.

"Where is it?" something murmured to themself, followed by something falling. "Ow!"

At least his robber sounded incompetent. Unconsciously Neji shoved the love note in his pants pocket as he prepared to surprise-attack the intruder. He didn't have the time though when his door was yanked open and he nearly tripped over his two feet.

It was dark in the living room due to it being late afternoon, the only light coming from his bedroom, so he didn't have the clearest idea who the person was except that they had really small feet and wore really pink socks.

"Hiyaaah!" something roared, and Neji rolled to avoid the roaring crack of something smashing wildly against the spot his head once occupied. He quickly scurried to his feet, trying to get to where the light switches were. "Oh no you don't!" Something whacked him on the back, and he cringed. Something about that voice sounded... squeaky and... familiar?

He tripped again when he felt something like a long stick ram itself between his shoulder blades, and only by chance did his hands land on lights. He turned around just in time to dodge what looked to be a bo staff getting jabbed into the wall beside him; broom still clutched firmly in his grip. And in front of him stood the Handheld Panda herself.

Now usually she scared the living daylights out of him, but not now. Not when her long brown hair was untied and flowing around her head in long wavy curls. Not when she was wearing what looked to be a light pale pink frilly nightgown with a lot of ribbons and lace and sleeves that fell over her small little hands. Especially not when she looked like a ruffled parakeet and was adamantly glaring up at him with more of a whiny pouty face than the roaring dragon she had been before.

Right now she looked like a precious China doll.

"What...," Neji began, too confused for words. "What are you doing in my house?"

And then Tenten began to tremble and made an even funnier pouty face, looking so embarrassed and like she was going to cry as she pulled back her bo staff from the wall and shouted, "Give it back!"

This time, Neji was able to block her strike with the broom, surprised at how much force she had put behind it. Then it became a chase of Neji running around his living quarters blocking with a broom as an angry and disheveled Handheld Panda was out for his blood shouting at him to 'give it back!'.

He is sent tumbling when Tenten launches herself at his back, the force causing him to nearly hit his head when he falls to the hardwood floor. Unfortunately - fortunately? - Tenten ends up hitting the side of her head against his coffee table, her small little body pinning him to the ground like a tiger does its prey.

"Give it back," she growled after a terse moment, dropping the staff to begin grabbing at his hair and pulling. "Give it back!"

If Neji hadn't had a higher pain tolerance, and if it weren't for fear of waking his neighbors, he would had squealed like a rented mule at the pain bursting from his scalp. "I have no idea what you're talking about, Tenten! Ow! Let me go!"

"Of course you do!" she retorted, still clutching angrily to his long hair. "You know damn well, so give it back! It wasn't for you!"

In his moments of excruciating pain, something clicked and Neji nearly whimpered as he said, "The love letter?" He then remembered when he held it to the light. "There was nothing in it!" Tenten ceased immediately, and Neji chanced a look at her face. She was mortified as she slowly released him.

"I-I-I-I," she stuttered, possibly worse than his cousin. "I fo-forgot th-t-the l-letter?"

Trying to defend himself further, Neji reached into his pocket and held up the envelope to her face. "There's nothing inside," he clarified, hoping to calm the girl and get her out of his house before she ends up breaking something other than his spine. He'd call the police, but he feared that she'll hunt him down and slash his throat at night. Tenten snatched the envelope, ripping it open and began shaking when she saw that what he said was true. "Can... you get off me, please?"

She quietly moved off him, allowed for Neji to get up and awkwardly watch as she tearfully looked at the envelope. "If it helps...," he ventured tenaciously, "I don't have a crush on you."

Her eyes quickly sparked back with fire, her entire demeanor igniting into the fearsome Panda everyone knew her for. Neji felt like wetting his pants when he saw her reaching out for her bo staff. "Good," she whispered darkly, "but that doesn't mean I'm going to let you live." She swung at him, and on pure instinct Neji leapt back and was able to dodge.

Their wild game proceeded to continued, only with a renewed need to kill and an even bigger need to survive.

"A good whack to the head and you'll forget all about it!" Tenten assured him wickedly, punctuating her sentence with sharp jabs and swipes. "You'll never think about this incident ever again!"

"Tenten!" Neji shouted, hoping to get past her fury and to a more reasonable situation, "I won't breathe a word to this to anyone! I promise! Put the bloody staff down!"

"You're dead, Hyuuga!" SMACK! Neji's foot barely got out of the way. "You're dead because you weren't supposed to get that letter!" SMACK! SMACK! "You're dead because it was for Lee, you stupid idiot!"

At that, Neji was too shocked and the staff indeed hit him on the head that time. Sadly he didn't pass out and get sudden amnesia like Tenten had hoped for. He merely yelped like a rented mule and curled into a ball clutching at his cranium. He grappled for another way to stun her violent outrage, anything to keep her from bringing that dreaded staff down for a second time. "Lee?" he gasped, wondering if he heard right. Bruises were forming everywhere, and he will be damned if he doesn't make her feel bad emotionally as he does physically. "You like Rock Lee?"

The goofy student council guy who loves martial arts and has that stupid bowlcut and those giant frog eyes? It would have made Neji crack up if his sides weren't aching and his head wasn't swimming.

Tenten's anger puffed up before it all popped, like a leaking hot air balloon. She dropped her weapon, hopefully for the last time, and sunk to her knees in front of him. Once again she was on the verge of tears, her cheeks red hot with humiliation. Good gracious this woman was bipolar.

"I like Lee," she whispered, as if she was not just coming to terms with it. She brought her tiny hands up in front of her, and Neji slowly tried to stand up and reach for the phone. Within a flash she had those same tiny hands around his throat, squeezing tightly until he was choking beneath her. "And I know something about you too, Hyuuga! You like Sakura!" If air had been in his lungs, it would have fled at her words. Was he really that transparent? Finding out that she was now in control, Tenten smirked. "You've liked her since the second year, and she's been my best friend since the first. I can easily tell her your not-so-secret affinity for her."

Manly pride wounded, Neji gasped out, "I'm Lee's best friend, I can tell him your secrets too." Oh hell she was crushing his windpipe now. He had to think up of something before she really did kill him. "Tenten, what if I made you an offer?" Making diplomatic decisions was in his blood, and it was hopefully the thing that would save him.

"An offer?" she didn't sound convinced.

To avoid his demise at the hands of what could be the equivalent of King Kong in the body of a China Doll, Neji put his own over hers and looked her straight in the eye. "You're Sakura's friend, and I'm Lee's friend. You like Lee, I like Sakura. We - you - shouldn't be trying to kill one another, but instead we can help each other." The grip slackened, but he couldn't relax now. She was still a ferocious dragon and still a threat. "I promise to get you with Lee. I know him, so I can assure you the best chances. And in turn, I pray that you will help me in doing the same for me." And maybe not kill him.

Tenten began considering this, all of the tiredness she was feeling showing itself now in her mussed hair and dress and sleepy eyes. After a long pause, she dropped her hands and nodded. Feeling that she was finally placated, Neji got up and frowned when he felt marks already forming. Tenten got up as well, but Neji barely realized this because she came up only to the top of his ribcage.

"Sorry for attacking you," she said softly, and quickly began to make her exit - much to Neji's relief. He watched curiously as she went to the second bedroom, the one he didn't even use, and began to climb out the window. Only out of curiosity did Neji follow her, to try and found out where she had come from in the first place.

Like a mouse, the brunette slipped out with ease, bo staff held firmly in her tiny little paw.

And then Neji realized that she lived in the dingy little house next to his.

All of the components for murder were there; because his window was right next to the one of her bedroom, so she could slip right in. Neji sat next to Lee in class, and they had very similar backpacks, so she could have easily mistaken them. The location of where he lived could be accessed off of the school's public computers, so she could have easily tracked him down. And Tenten's insane, so she would be very willing to kill him.

Neji made a mental note to put a lock on that window, less his cousin be picking out gravestones early.

With ease Tenten descended into her bedroom, turning to stick her head out one last time, eyes alight with passion and resigned consent. "One wrong move from you, Hyuuga, and Sakura will never speak to you again." To punctuate herself, she slammed her window shut and turned out the light a second later.

Oh.

That totally made Neji feel better.

A/N: Yeah, I admit it, I love AU's. To satisfy my craving, I'm going to use Neji and Tenten in them, and while their personalities might change or the situations might be off, this is very experimental at trying to put two characters of one show into another. I thought Toradora would be a good stepping-stone, considering how drastic I had to change them to adhere to the main storyline.

Each chapter will most likely be a one-shot, and at the end I'll add the show or piece of literature I put them in. If you have a particular AU for them, just ask and I will certainly look into it.

As for now, enjoy the 3,181 words of Neji getting the shit beat out of him by a really small Tenten.