The following story is brought to you by Jill's strange and slightly demented mind. The ideas within are all her own, though Masashi Kishimoto owns the characters.

Okay, so that wasn't a little faster…in fact, I think it took longer to update this time around, but whatever.

NOTE: If you read Chapter 4, and noticed it was the same as Chapter 3, it has been changed now. Luckily, the story still makes quite a bit of sense without that chapter (or is that unlucky?), so hopefully no one was confused. Anyway, I've changed it now and you might want to go back to read it to make sure you get the full experience of this Youthful story.

Fighting Gai's Eternal Rival: Part II

As Kakashi formed the seals and molded the chakra to place an illusion on Lee, Gai's student charged forward, planning to perform one more of his special "Konoha Whirlwind" techniques on the jounin before hugging him.

After that, Lee was sure Anko wouldn't bother fighting him, but he was prepared to battle her as well if she insisted. Sakura-san would surely just allow Lee to hug her, and maybe while he was at it, he would see if she would finally agree to become his girlfriend. He was being so cool and youthful today that she could hardly turn him down!

Kakashi's hands finished the seals and Lee immediately noticed, even in his advanced speed where the scenery was already blurred, that the surrounding area had altered.

Lee kept running anyway. "Not good enough, Kakashi-sensei!" he proclaimed. "Gai-sensei has trained me in the art of knowing when I am in an illusion and I am not foolish enough to ignore the fact that the scenery has just changed." He kept running towards the area he had last seen the jounin in, hoping the man would still be there. If he could surprise the silver-haired man by moving despite the genjutsu, Lee would be able to hug him that much sooner.

"Hmph!" Kakashi snorted from somewhere to the left. "I wouldn't expect you to stop moving in this. Even Naruto can tell that this one is a genjutsu."

Lee wasn't sure what to make of that, but he turned in the direciont he heard Kakashi's voice come from, hoping it wasn't being altered or deflected by the illusion.

In some illusions, the victim can see the caster. In others, the victim can hear the caster. In most of the Sharingan-made illusions, the victim can see and hear the caster. In this one, Lee could hear the caster but he got the direction wrong.

"Oof!" Lee exclaimed as he ran straight into a building that he couldn't see.

"Ouch!" Anko said, wincing in sympathy. "That's almost as bad as face-palming yourself into oblivion."

Sakura was luckily still unconscious on the floor. Anko sighed slightly.

Kakashi watched as Lee blindly ran around, crashing into buildings. He knew he should remain quiet so the boy would stop hurting himself when he thought he heard Kakashi, but it was just too funny. He snorted with laughter again, and Lee's ears twitched slightly, as he turned his head towards the sound.

"Aha Kakashi-sensei! I have found you this time!" Lee declared.

"No, you haven't," Kakashi replied simply as Lee charged into another building. If Lee was the type to swear, Kakashi was sure they would be long past the simple words like "kosu" or "shimatta," and long into the more colorful words provided by the English language.

However, Lee wasn't one to curse, and instead just stood up every time, shook his head to clear it, and continued to run around with a genjutsu placed on him.

It was very amusing to Kakashi.

"Kakashi!" Anko called, interrupting his musings.

He turned to her, an irritated look on his face. Well, in his eyes, anyway.

"What are you doing to him?"

He eye-smiled at her. "He's in a simple genjutsu. At the rate things are going, I should be able to wear him out until he collapses, then no one else will be hugged."

Anko nodded, thinking. "It's kind of slow, though," she said.

Kakashi frowned, trying to think of a new plan.

With the pale boy

The boy wondered what was going on down there. His notes were rather random, and he wasn't so sure anymore that the library would be of any assistance to him in deciphering these "interactions" he was watching.

He may have to get himself more involved in the circumstances if he ever wished to understand.

With Team Eight and Ino

"This video is going to be random as hell," Kiba stated.

The other three nodded.

"Poor Lee-san! I hope Sakura is able to help him when she recovers," Hinata said.

"We are going to have so many hits on YouTube!" Ino said gleefully.

Shino nodded, zooming in on the camera to capture Lee's expression close-up. He panned out over the area, and paused the camera on Kakashi-sensei at what appeared to be just the right moment. There was a slightly evil, slightly mischevious glint in Kakashi's eyes.

Shino had seen that expression on Kiba many times before. "Uh-oh…" he said.

The others looked at him confusedly for a moment, before turning back to regard Lee. They could all tell, even from this distance and with his mask in the way, that Kakashi was smiling in smug satisfaction as Lee stopped moving, only a foot from another building.

Kakashi had just upgraded the genjutsu.

With Lee, a foot from the building

Lee knew it would be unwise to move. He was confident he was still in a genjutsu but his sense of his surroundings was nonexistent.

Whereas before, he had a vague idea of where he was and could change direction based on the sounds he heard, he now had absolutely no clue where to go and was only confident that he was still in Konoha because he remembered what had occurred before he looked into Kakashi's bright Sharingan eye.

Flashback

Kakashi watched Lee running into buildings, realizing Anko was right. This was going to take forever. Sighing, he paused to think of a new plan.

He couldn't think of another genjutsu to use, and he really wanted to just end this quickly, before Lee could use a powerful move on him. "I want to avoid a hug, but incapacitating you to do so seems a little extreme. But…" Kakashi dropped the genjutsu for less than a second, and his Sharingan eye seemed to glow even more than usual. Lee couldn't help but look at it.

Suddenly, the surrounding street and the dango shop disappeared. Lee found himself in the middle of a battle field, dead bodies all around. There was no noise, but the atmosphere was heavy and the suffocating despair of death hung over everything. Lee felt very depressed.

End flashback.

Lee reached for a kunai in his weapons pouch and decided to end his life there, just to end the awful sight, and terrible, depressing feelings. It was so unyouthful…

"You can't use Mangekyou on him!" Lee heard a voice say from very far away. He couldn't see the person who the voice belonged to, but it sounded familiar. It echoed in Lee's ears and a part of Lee knew that was because of the sight before him.

"But—but," another voice whined. Was that Kakashi-sensei? "But he'll hug us if I don't! Besides, he's only in a basic genjutsu right now," that second voice continued.

"Then why don't you block your eye?" the first voice demanded.

"Because I was sort of planning on upgrading the illusion…" the man's voice said sheepishly. A loud thump could be heard, followed by the rather disturbing laughter of what Lee assumed was the first voice.

Lee stood carefully still, wondering if this was another genjutsu. If so it was stronger than the last one, and much more powerful.

Oh! Lee thought. He put me in an illusion using his Sharingan. Lee couldn't help but be impressed at Naruto and Sakura-san's teacher's quick thinking, though Gai-sensei was clearly more youthful.

Of course, this news wasn't very helpful to him because he still couldn't get rid of the genjutsu, but at least he knew now that he could still run around. Although…his chance of running into a building was even greater than before, and he had already crashed into five buildings while under the last illusion…

He would have to focus on his other senses.

Closing his eyes to listen hard, Lee turned slightly at a subtle shift he felt in the air. Hmm…Kakashi-sensei is moving around. Is he walking closer to me? I can't hear or see a thing like this! Lee allowed himself a small second of panic before he went back to Youthful mode. I'm going to have to think of something to do…

Lee suddenly remembered something Gai-sensei had once told him. "If you lose all your other senses, you must fight on anyway. When it appears that there is nothing else you can do, you must rely on your Spirit Sensor."

Of course!! Lee thought excitedly. My Spirit Sensor! I must activate my connection with Kakashi-sensei's heart and mind so that I can get around this genjutsu and tell where he is. Then I must hug him! Spirit Sensor...on!!

Lee saw in his mind Kakashi-sensei leaning down on his haunches, watching Lee carefully. "Don't worry, Anko, he'll be fine. I'll make sure it's nothing traumatizing," Kakashi said. His Sharingan eye changed slightly, and Lee sensed the alteration to his surroundings as his Spirit Sensor connection faded.

Lee opened his eyes to see Kakashi-sensei standing in front of him, smiling broadly beneath his mask.

The world was black and white, with a red background. It looked as though they were back in front of the dango shop, but they were the only two there, and that couldn't be right.

Kakashi cleared his throat and stopped smiling, attempting to be serious. "Lee, I am going to put you in an illusion. You will not be able to break free, and you will spend twenty-four hours in here, in my world, watching Naruto defeat enemies using only taijutsu. You will not be able to join him or offer him any advice. You can only watch."

Kakashi shimmered out of sight, and Lee stared in horror as his own Youthful Rival fought multiple opponents with terrible taijutsu. Lee desperately wanted to correct Naruto's stance, but he found that his voice wasn't working. Naruto launched himself into a Konoha Senpuu, and tried to lift his opponent into the air, but all he succeeded in doing was push the man back a few feet.

No! Lee shouted in his head. You have to spin faster than that! Focus on your feet, not their's! What are you doing?! he yelled at the Naruto in his mind, but the blonde couldn't hear him.

It was terrible. Lee had to watch his rival destroy the beauty of taijutsu and there was nothing he could do to prevent it.

Lee blacked out before even viewing an hour's worth of the illusion.

"Wow," Anko said, shocked.

"Hm," Kakashi said, equally shocked, but trying to act cool for the sake of his reputation. That wasn't even a second in the real world…what did he see that would make him black out that quickly? Kakasi wondered. "Still," he said aloud, "at least he won't be able to hug anyone anymore."

Anko nodded, then grabbed Kakashi by his collar, dragging him back into the dango shop. They left Sakura and Lee in the road, and ordered some food.

"Well, that was…interesting," Ino said.

"Yeah…" Kiba said. "What happened?" he asked.

"I have no idea," Shino said.

Hinata just stared.

"I absolutely must visit the library," someone said.

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