A Hero
Chapter 9
I still don't own Naruto. I think that they just haven't gotten my basket with a single cookie in it. Sorry for such a long delay. I haven't been able to come up with something to put for this story for a while, now.
Naruto awoke in the same spot as usual, feeling a strange tugging on his arm. Opening his eyes, he saw that Hanabi was trying to move him for some reason.
"Good morning?" he commented, trying to puzzle out why the younger Hyuuga heiress was pulling on him.
"Naruto!" Hanabi shouted, "You're awake? Blast! I mean, I wasn't going to put you in Onee-chan's room while you were both sleeping as part of a big prank!"
Naruto was silent for a moment, before responding to her strange denial, "Okay, Hanabi. I believe you. Still, if you weren't doing that one specific thing, what were you doing?"
Hanabi looked at him, surprised to find him so gullible. Suddenly, a new plan formed in her devious little mind, causing a mischievous smirk to form on her face.
"Oh, I was just waking you up to go talk to Onee-chan," she lied, "She wanted to talk to you first thing this morning. She's in her room as we speak."
"Oh," Naruto said obliviously, "Thank you for telling me, Hanabi."
'That'll get Onee-chan to freak out when she wakes up and get him good,' she thought. Now, she, Hanabi, could have her revenge on Naruto for cheating during the spar. Keeping an amazingly stealthy amount of distance between herself and Naruto, she followed secretly. Nothing could possibly ruin this brilliant plan.
"Oh, hi, Hinata," Naruto said to the heiress as she began walking out of her room.
"Hello, Naruto-kun," Hinata responded, "is there anything that you need?"
"Um, no…" Naruto said, trying to figure out if he needed anything, "Hanabi told me that you needed to talk to me in your room, so I came here, with her following a bit behind me."
"Oh, I see," Hinata said, activating her Byakugan to find her little sister, who was hiding behind a sculpture of a lion in the hallway.
'Uh-oh,' Hanabi thought, 'Onee-chan is going to find me! Then, she'll…'
"Hello, Hanabi-imouto," Hinata said sweetly with a somewhat predatory smile on her face as she rounded the statue to get face to face with her sister, "So, what is this I hear about me calling Naruto-kun to my room?"
"Um…" Hanabi began, trying to save herself, "I don't know…?"
Hinata's smile got even more dangerous, making Naruto, who was watching the sisters' "talk", feel slightly frightened, yet also caused an abnormal heating of his cheeks and a strange feeling in his stomach that had nothing to do with Kyuubi, as it was rather nice, while when it involved the Kyuubi, it felt kind of weird in a different, unnatural way.
Feeling as if he should run away, Naruto looked from one sister to the other, and decided to act on that impulse. As he fled, he thought he saw Hinata with a wall of fire behind her as she loomed over her little sister.
"Good morning, Naruto," Neji said as the orphan who thought he was a statue rushed past him and curled up in a fetal position in the corner of the dining room. This would not do. Hiashi-sama would not take the presence of a frightened boy in the dining room well at all. Then, Neji would be blamed for the problem, because even though Naruto was Hinata-sama's charge, Hinata-sama was Neji's responsibility.
"Hey, what's wrong with you?" he asked, before Hinata entered the room, friendly as ever, followed by a frightened-looking Hanabi, who walked up to the strange boy and, after casting a fearful glance at Hinata, said, "I'm sorry for lying to you about Onee-chan wanting to speak to you. I'll never ever do it again."
"Good morning, Neji-nii-san," Hinata called cheerily, "Has Father not woken yet?"
"Um, not that I am aware of, Hinata-sama," Neji answered quickly. He wasn't sure what caused Hanabi to look to the gentler sister with such terror, but he was certain he wanted no part of it. Perhaps he should challenge Lee or Tenten to a spar later. If he won, at least his mind would be away from this strange occurrence, and if Lee got in even one good hit or the hilt of any of Tenten's weapons just happened to hit his head hard enough, it might make him forget whatever this was had ever happened. Either way, he was good with this plan. Now, if he could just get through breakfast. Fortunately, Naruto had just gotten out of his fetal position and had now taken his now customary position by Hinata's side. Well, at least one problem was out of the way. Then, Hiashi-sama entered the room, ready to eat his breakfast and begin his day.
Fortunately, it was a peaceful breakfast, with no real cause for alarm. Naruto sighed in relief as he left. Heading toward his team's training ground; he paused as he saw the two green blurs headed his way. Forgetting Tenten's words about what the blurs were, and only remembering what they did to the tree, he began running from them, as he didn't want to have any part of him break off this early in the day. Or at all, really, but he'd cross that bridge when he got to it.
Unfortunately, one of the blurs managed to get in front of him, while it released what sounded like a dangerous battle cry that sounded strangely like the word "youth."
At any rate, the blur stopped in front of him, and seemed to be a large man in green spandex unitard with a green flak jacket over it. Turning, Naruto saw the other blur stop as well, showing itself to be a boy dressed in the same spandex unitard, but without the flak jacket.
"What are you?" Naruto asked, still trying to puzzle out who they were, Tenten's comment completely lost from his mind.
"I am Konoha's Green Beast, Maito Gai, and this is my apprentice, Rock Lee" the man said, "No doubt you have heard of us."
Still not remembering Tenten's naming, Naruto replied, "Actually, I have never heard of either of you before. Begging your pardons, but I do have to get to my teammates before Kakashi-sensei gets there."
"You are Kakashi's student, yet you have never heard of me?" Gai asked in surprise, "How unyouthful of my Eternal Rival to not tell his students of me."
"Don't worry, Gai-sensei," Lee said, "We will teach this boy all about you, and the joys of youth!"
Frightened, Naruto began to try to figure out a means of escape.
'Run? No, they could easily catch me. Distract them? With what? Kill them? Even if I was fast enough, they have Leaf forehead protectors, so that would be bad.'
As Naruto thought this, the two spandex clad people were lecturing him on 'the joys of youth.' After a few moments, Lee asked him "Don't you agree, stranger?"
"Hm?" Naruto asked, having just noticed that they were looking at him, "Did you say something?"
"No!" the pair cried dramatically, "Darn you Kakashi for already infecting this child with your unyouthfulness and hip behavior!"
"We must go and run 9,001 laps around the village in order to remove the feeling of unyouthfulness that Kakashi's student has caused!" Gai shouted.
"Before we leave, Stranger-san, what is your name?" Lee asked in a slightly calmer voice.
"My name is Naruto," Naruto responded.
"Nice to meet you, Naruto-san," Lee cheered as he began to follow his sensei, "Remember; you must work hard to achieve your dream!"
"Well, thanks for getting them out of our hair for the time being," Tenten said, "They were planning on forcing us into the same sort of spandex suits they were wearing."
"That would have not been a pleasurable experience," Neji added, "Hello, Naruto."
"Hello, Tenten and Neji. It is nice to see you two," he replied, "I would enjoy talking to you more, but I must meet with my teammates. I think that they would grind me to dust if I did not arrive on time."
"Well, then don't let us keep you here," Tenten said cheerfully, "Run quickly, and you could still get there in time."
"Thank you very much," he said as he began to run, "Goodbye, Tenten and Neji!"
Once the statue was a good distance away, Neji turned to Tenten and said, "Tenten, would you like to have an intense sparring session in which neither of us will hold back unless the other is knocked unconscious?"
"You always know just the right words to sweep a girl off her feet," Tenten smiled, pulling out her scrolls.
