Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto. Some people have requested that I write a lemon related to this fic. Maybe. I'm more interested in the story than the smut and am not really sure about making it ALL smut anyway. I enjoy it just as much as anyone else but I've got some reservations about how far I'm allowed to push the envelope. Anyway we'll see. By the way, every thing is on a roll lately. Three chapters in a single day! Well, 24 hour period anyway. It's something to do while downloading Naruto episodes.
"Hai, shoot the messenger."
"You know if you can't stop staring like that your eyeballs are going to burst", Lee remarked, "then where will your Byakugan be?"
With great force of will, Hyuuga Neji tore his eyes away from the two girls and turned to face Lee. It still looked like was about to do something rash. Like kill a certain blonde-haired, blue-eyed bastard ninja.
Rock Lee looked apprehensive. "Now isn't the time for revenge, Neji." he said calmly. "There's too many witnesses about anyway. And what will killing your cousin in front of her prove anyway? There's a time and a place for everything."
"What's your stake in all this? Why are you helping me?" Neji enquired suspiciously.
Lee made a dismissive gesture. "Tenten and I hooked up last year. It was just lust but it still hurt when she left me. I intend to get a little payback." He wore a disgusting smirk.
Is everybody but me actually gettin' some?
Neji looked at him strangely. Where was the flamboyant, passionate ninja that he knew from their genin days?
With one fist on his hip and the other fist pointing straight in the air, Lee thrust out his pelvis and cried,
"YO-OSH! THEIR FIERY YOUTHFUL EXPLOSION IS NOTHING COMPARED TO THE GREEN BEAST OF KONOHA'S REVENGE!!!"
Ah, there he was.
The last few days of his well-earned holiday had been absolute bliss. It showed in all his movements and all his gestures, that Naruto was living his life as fully as he could before having to go back to his jounin duties. He received more than a few hard looks from his colleagues who still went about on their missions, or were saddled with training new genin teams. Neji in particular seemed to hold something against him and appeared to be planning something nasty, but what he could not tell. Naruto wasn't really fussed about that anyway. Neji always had a chip on his shoulder about something.
He had settled into a sort of pseudo-domestic routine. Tenten and Hinata had surprisingly simply decided to move in. Not even a by-your-leave. It was if, between them, they had mapped out the rest of their lives together. That vague thought nagged at the back of his mind like a cancer. Tenten's parents were Anbu, were gone on missions most of the time and didn't have any younger siblings to worry about. To Naruto's dismay, Hinata had simply packed up her belongings and left. Her father wasn't too keen on her "living in sin" with the Uzumaki brat. From what he heard of local gossip, she had apparently told him in clear and precise terms, that he could take his opinion of her "shame and dishonour to the Hyuuga family name" and shove it far enough up his arse so that he could choke on it. Those weren't here exact words however. Hiashi-sama apparently blanched at her choice of terminology long enough for her to beat a hasty escape without reprisal. For now anyway.
Every day, they would wake up early in the morning at the butt-crack of dawn and prepare a morning meal. Tenten had introduced him to the joys of nutritious food and Hinata got him started on greens. If he didn't see another vegetable between now and the rest of his life, it would still be too soon, however unlikely that was. There were compensations of course.
He had training partners who didn't mind learning what he had to teach and he didn't mind learning from them. No, he didn't mind at all. While he worked on improving his fairly shoddy chakra control with Hinata, she learned a great deal about long-range combat from Tenten while she worked on her raw stamina, which is where Naruto excelled. It was a perfectly symbiotic relationship.
Generally after they got too tired and beat up to train anymore, they'd stagger back home to have dinner and a shower. Sometimes two. Afterwards, sex. Absolutely mind-altering sex.
How could he forget the sex? He really liked that the most.
Welcome to life with a penis.
Naruto knew it couldn't last. Something would happen to ruin their little slice of paradise. Jounin duties. Chuunin duties. Missions for the village. Whatever surprise Neji had cooked up. He wasn't stupid, it was only a matter of time that Neji would find out about Tenten's new personal status and take umbrage. Then of course, there was the ever lurking danger of Hiashi's revenge over Hinata's insult.
Now that had surprised Naruto more than anything else that happened over the last week or so. Hinata had seemed to shed more and more of her old personality as the days flew by. She became much more forthright in her opinions and more confident of her abilities. Hinata now exuded a palpable aura of self-assured confidence. It appeared that nothing fazed her now.
The dreaded day finally arrived. His holiday was over. He wanted to just stay in bed all day and forget about returning to work. Naruto mumbled into his pillow and tried to go back to sleep. Hinata sighed, knowing that things would only get worse if the Hokage had to send a messenger. With that thought in mind, she roughly kicked him out of bed.
Falling out with a thump, Naruto bit back from muttering a curse. Tenten had opinions about foul language. He wasn't about to volunteer to forfeit meals for a month over something like this. He couldn't even call upon Hinata for help in those situations, they tended to gang up on him. Not that he minded all that much. It was just that he had the feeling that they had some preconceived notion of how he ought to be and they were going to stuff him, despite his protests, into that image. Naruto sighed, it was safer not to argue. Feeling a tad henpecked, he stumbled into his clothes and left for his meeting with the old hag.
"Ohayo, obaa-chan!" Naruto shouted as he bundled into the room. For some reason, Iruka-sensei was with her as well. He was holding a large file envelope in his hands. They appeared to be laughing over something.
The Fifth Hokage then straightened and shuffled the files on her desk.
"You're late Naruto. You're very late. I think hanging around Jiraiya and Kakashi too much seems to have rubbed off on you." She threw up her hands in mock prayer and made some muffled comment about another generation being corrupted.
Iruka cleared his throat and handed Naruto the file. "All the other jounins have already left to be introduced to their teams already, Naruto-kun. This is the file for the team assigned to you. Normally before we would have just picked teams that had overall equal strength. But that was before you came along and messed all our calculations up."
Naruto just smiled in pride.
"Anyway", Iruka continued," Now we're trying something else. We're tailoring each team to the personality and the skills of each jounin team leader. This means each of the teams can further specialise for different roles."
Naruto looked excited. "And you gave me the best of this year's crop because I'm obviously such a great teacher and brilliant ninja right? you've got to give the best recruits to the best ninja right?"
Tsunade choked on her tea, spraying hot liquid from her nose.
"Yeah, uh...that's right. That's exactly it. You've hit it right on the head. Well done." she congratulated him.
Iruka's lips began to twitch at the corners.
"Anyway, I'd better be going then!", Naruto grabbed the file and left, dashing out of the tower, eager to meet the new elites that he'd mould in his own image. Pausing for a moment to glance at the names on his list, his eyes widened.
"RAAAAAAAAARGH!"
Tsunade and Iruka heard the scream of outrage and collapsed on the ground, laughing.
Lee was talking with Neji at the barbecue pits. A great many empty bottles of sake were lying around them. Only Neji was drinking. Everyone knew what happened to Lee when he drank. Konohagakure didn't want to see anything like that again. Lee looked longingly at the bottle of Hida shochu that Neji was waving around. It was said that, the stuff could kill a fair sized young tree if poured on the roots. He was drinking tea. Lee was sick of tea.
Neji was raving about love and betrayal and how his life sucked. What was the point of it all, when you really got down to it. He was sobbing quietly into his chin, taking the occasional swig from the clay flask he was holding.
Lee was oblivious to the other's drunken ramblings, his eyes darted back and forth watching the motion of the flask enviously. Even over the smell of roasting meat that filled the bar to overflowing, he could still scent that aromatic tang, that beckoned to him.
Just one taste it sang to him just one drop would take all your troubles away.
He noticed that the meat in front of him was burning and hurriedly scooped it up and put it on a plate. It was at that moment that he noticed Tenten enter the restaurant with Kurenai.
Don't tell me she's bonking her now, he thought nastily.
Glancing at Neji, he fervently hoped he wouldn't notice the pair at the bar and cause a scene. It was too late, he had already risen and begun to stagger towards the bar, clutching the ninja-to he had bought as a gift. Lee muttered a few choice oaths under his breath and started looking around for an escape route.
Tenten was chatting with Kurenai about the quality of this year's crop of genin recruits when a horrible smell started emanating from behind her. At first thinking that it was Kiba, she was about to tell him to quit stalking her but found, in equal parts surprise and disgust, that it was Neji.
"Ahm sho shorry Tenten", Neji bawled. His breath smelled like a syphilitic skunk had crawled in his mouth and died. She shied slightly away from him.
"Ah've been an absholute beash! I'm sho verwy shorry!", drunken tears running down his cheeks.
Kurenai started telling him to go home and sleep it off, but Tenten interrupted her. She had noticed Lee trying to hide behind a menu but there was no disguising his bowl cut or his distinctive green uniform. She was going to enjoy this.
"No, I want to hear this." She did however, move her stool further away.
"Pleash forgiffe mee? Ah'm sho shorry fer beein shuch a hic prick. I mushta been a real shellfish jerk!." He slapped the ninja-to on the counter in front of her.
"Ah've got dis fer yoo.....ta shay ah'm'n shorry hic. Ai lovesh yoo!" he declared at length.
Leaning on the counter with one hand he pointed at her with one hand. Neji hesitated as if the words were slow to travel from his brain to his mouth but he eventually started to ramble again.
"I lovesh yoo! Whysh you going ta shleep with Hinata eh? You'sh a leshbian? But I'sh lovesh you sho mush! Whysh you go breaksh my heart like dat? Whysh you go on fuckin' Ushu...Ushum...dat dobe." he managed before trailing off. His next words, albeit muffled from the booze, were clearly recognisable.
"Shlut."
The silence in the bar was deafening. You could of heard a mouse fart from across the street. Rock Lee was desperately mouthing a prayer to the Seven Fortunes. The other patrons, although initially were amused by the Hyuuga's predicament were now edging towards the exit.
"What did you say?", Tenten asked in a deceptively sweet voice. That in itself should of told Neji to run for the hills but he was in no state of mind to pick up even that hint and continued on regardless.
"Can I see that blade, Neji-kun?", she said, gesturing to the elegant weapon. "Mmmm, that's quality workmanship, right there. Why'd did you get me this, Neji-kun?". Even Kurenai was stepping backwards now. Tenten was beginning to scare her.
"Ah got it fer yoo. I figgered yer'd come back if I got it fer ya. Ah hic weally want yoush to help me train agin. I needsh to get shtronger to beat up datsh Ushu-...Oozu- .....dat dobe." he sobbed.
"I see." Tenten replied, smiling. She pulled out the blade from its sheath and admired the razor-sharp blade in the lantern-light. "Such an exquisite blade, Neji-kun, it's so perfectedly balanced", she seemed to coo," but here's what I think of it."
She rammed it straight down into Neji's palm and through the counter right on up to the hilt, before storming out.
The rest of the patrons sighed in relief. Neji had gotten off lightly.