Quest of the Green Beast:
The Impossible Challenge
Disclaimer: Naruto is the copyrighted property of its creator, whom is in no way me.
Summary: A brilliant idea, shining like the most glorious of stars, descends from the heavens and crosses paths with the ever so beautiful Green Beast of Konoha, or rather, Maito Gai to his friends and rivals. Sometimes, to be a Shinobi, means that there are times when you must socialize with others and there are also times where you must speak more than three words in each sentence. Gai-sensei and his dazzling thumbs-up signs now must tackle the largest challenge in his lifetime: to turn Aburame Shino, Hyuga Neji, and Uchiha Sasuke, into happy, smiling, socializing citizens of the Hidden Leaf Village. Will Gai succeed? Or will his quest be in vain? Read on to find out... or not...
Pairings: There probably will not be outright pairings in this fanfic, although there may be many small hints just to keep readers content.
Also featured in this story: All the other Leaf Genins and their teachers (with similar missions)
Warning: Mild character bashing once in a while, a bit of Gai bashing (but nothing very severe), mild OOCness and mediocre not following the Naruto timeline.
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(Review Responses)
I've decided that, (and at risk at sounding like Shikamaru) writing responses to every single review is too troublesome. So therefore: I won't. - Sorry if I disappointed you. If you are incredibly against this, then you may argue your case and I won't hold it against you. –Grins- But thank you anyway for all your great reviews! They really make my day!
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(NOTE: Sorry for the rather late update: My computer was experiencing some technical difficulties.)
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(Key :)
"................." talking
'.................' thinking
--- Beginning/End of Chapter/Change of Scene
(End of Key)
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The music of life and nature preformed their ever-existing duet; water flowing over troughs and crests, wind whistling while birds chirped and sang. The melodious sounds, however, were completely disregarded by three certain members of Team 10.
Yamanaka Ino stood with her folded arms resting on the railing of a small wooden bridge as she surveyed her surroundings. On her left was Shikamaru who was predictably lying on his back staring up at the steely grey sky, wearing a troubled expression as if upset by the fact that there were no clouds to gaze at. On her right, sat Chouji who was busy... eating... The only thing different today was that he was eating different flavored chips than yesterday. The blond kunoichi breathed a sigh. It just wasn't fair! Why only her team was completely singled out from the others? The girl slid her head down to rest on her arms. Then a voice cut through the almost silence, snapping her out of her mournful thoughts.
"Hey Ino? Do you have any food?"
Of all the Genins she could have been stuck with... she gets these guys.
Woe is her.
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Chapter 5: Day One: Survival Training and Surviving Training
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Kurenai paced around her new students much like in the manner of a drill sergeant, her ruby eyes lingering slightly on each girl. Hinata, one of her original students, was shyly avoiding eye-contact with everyone in the vicinity, gingerly pressing her index fingers together, as if unsure of how to act around her new teammates. The Jounin's eyes left the Hyuuga as she stepped over to stand before Gai's pupil. TenTen, a Chinese brunet was watching her intently with a mixture of attentiveness and hopefulness. Kurenai then turned the Kakashi's pink-haired pupil who was carefully watching them all with analyzing eyes, as if she was sizing them up.
The red-eyed Jounin nodded to herself in confirmation. They were all wimps. Together the four of them were some of the least important characters of Naruto, and although they worked their hardest to get to the top, were still highly unsuccessful when dealing with the male counterparts. And the three had never actually been able to technically win a fair fight on their own. In the Chuunin Exam, Hinata lost to Neji. In the Chuunin exam, TenTen lost to Temari. And in the Chuunin exam, Sakura tied with Ino. And she herself had been badly outclassed and outmatched by Itachi. She came up with one solid decision. She, Yuuhi Kurenai, new Jounin in the village of Konoha, Genjutsu specialists, was going to toughen up these girls! And no one, NO ONE, would EVER see them as negligible once again!
"All right!" she announced in a business like manner, surprising her students, "I want to get right down to business! With me, you're going to train like you've never trained before! And by the end of this week, you'll be expected to be at least double the strength you are now! Or else! DO YOU HEAR ME?!" White, brown and green eyes focused on Kurenai sensei in shock. This new development wasn't foreseen at all.
Hinata stared at the dirt ground in worry. Kurenai-sensei wasn't exactly acting like herself... Kurenai was usually a kind, sort of strict but understanding individual. She was rarely like this... except for once a month and seven days a week...
Sakura was starting to become at bit frustrated and anxious with the expectations and the empty threat of 'or else' hanging in the air. How was she going to double her skills in a week? She didn't even have any special attacking or defending jutsus to rely on! All she could do was Bunshin, Kawarimi and other textbook jutsus, average taijutsu skills and a few smarts. How do you double the value of zero?
TenTen was, if anything surprised. She had been expecting Kurenai to be a stereotyped girly teacher and start to lecture them on something unimportant such as flower arranging and the like. From her appearance, Kurenai did not seem the drill sergeant type.
A few loud claps broke the three kunoichis from their various and rather different trains of thought. They looked up to see Kurenai produce out a whistle from the folds of her clothing.
"All right! Give me 100 laps around the field! Then 50 sit-ups and push-ups! C'mon! I WANNA SEE YOU GIRLS SWEAT!!!" She hollered. After exchanging a few heavy sighs, the girls set off to work.
Woe is them.
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"WOOF! WOOF WOOF WOOF!" A paw clutched at a jacket.
"SETTLE DOWN, AKAMARU! AND NO! WE JUST GOT HERE!" The jacket was pulled away by an indignant owner pulled away.
"WOOF!" The paw reached out for the clothing again.
"I DON'T CARE IF YOU'RE CONSTIPATED!" A light blush tinted the Inuzuka's cheeks at his puppy's vulgar language, and he hoped that the others had not heard; not that anyone else understood.
"ANO SA! ANO SA! CAN WE HAVE RAMEN AFTERWARDS, KAKASHI-SENSEI?!" An orange-clad boy leapt up and down to emphasis his question.
"YOSHI! I'M GOIING TO DO MY BEST AND MAKE GAI-SENSEI PROUD!" A thumbs-up sign was displayed, a black eye adorned with hideous lower eyelashes which was framed with thick bushy brows sparkled as perfect white teeth sparkled and 'Pinged!'
"WOOF!" A puppy argued his case.
"DO WE HAVE A MISSION TODAY, KAKASHI-SENSEI? AKAMARU WANTS TO GO HOME!" Annoyed, the owner turned to his sensei.
"ANO SA! ANO SA! WHAT ARE WE DOING TODAY, ANYWAY, KAKASHI-SENSEI?" The orange-wearing ninja stopped jumping and also turned to face his teacher.
"YEAH, SENSEI! WHAT ARE WE DOING TODAY? KURENAI-SENSEI ALWAYS TELLS US TO RUN LAPS AND DO PUSH-UPS AND SIT-UPS! ARE YOU GOING TO MAKE US DO THAT, TOO?" Kiba hoped that the answer would be 'no'.
"ROGER! LAPS! I'LL RUN 100 OF THEM AROUND THE FIELD, AND IF I CAN'T DO IT, THEN I WILL KICK THE TREE 200 TIMES, AND IF I CAN'T DO THAT, I'LL DO 300 PUSH-UPS! AND IF I CAN'T DO THAT, THEN I'LL FIGHT 400 PEOPLE AND..." Bowl-haired boy was so excited and was carried away far, far away, into the land of pointless self-imposed rules, not noticing that they actually weren't told to do anything yet.
"WOOF!" A puppy barked his opinion on the thick-browed boy's speech.
"AKAMARU SAYS YOU'RE CRAZY!" The owner clarified, rather helpfully since he noticed that not everyone seemed to be able to understand Akamaru.
"I AM NOT CRAZY! THIS IS JUST THE SELF-IMPOSED RULE, TAUGHT TO ME BY GAI-SENSEI!" The green-bodysuit-wearing boy believed with all his heart that anything that was said or taught to you by Gai-sensei was perfectly sane and definitely NOT crazy.
"WELL, GAI IS CRAZY!" The brunet countered, his statement contradicting terribly with the mini-Gai's belief.
"DO NOT INSULT GAI-SENSEI!" A gasp was uttered by the boy, aghast at how anyone could insult the wonderful Gai-sensei.
"HEY, HEY! KAKASHI SENSEI! ARE YOU TRYING TO IGNORE US?" A finger pointed accusingly at the masked-Jounin who WAS in fact, TRYING to ignore them, because heaven knows how IMPOSSIBLE that could be...
"YEAH, KAKASHI-SENSEI!" The black-haired and the brown-haired ones stopped their debate about whether or not that Gai-sensei was a stupid-old-coot-that-had-his-sense-of-style-stolen-from-him-and-drowned-in-a-puddle.
"KAKASHI SENSEI!" Three boys called out, trying to get their teacher's attention, failing to understand that Kakashi-sensei was very annoyed right now and didn't WANT to hear them calling out his name over and over.
"KAKASHI SENSEI!"
"KAKASHI SENSEI!"
"KAKASHI SENSEI...!"
"KAKASHI SENSEI...!"
"KAKASHI SENSEI...!"
Inner Kakashi-sensei's now strangely pupil-less eye was twitching violently, a sure sign that someone was going to suffer a painful death... Outer Kakashi-sensei looked as though he were merely still reading his tell-tale orange book. If only he had the mangekyo Sharingan, then he would 'tsukiyomi' these brats, and he would enjoy it immensely! But he didn't. So then, he would have to do the next best thing. Muha. Muhaha. MUHAHAHAHAHA!
On another note, if an enemy had been nearby, they probably would have had their eardrums burst open by the three loudest ninjas in Konoha. How did they ever become ninjas anyway? He smelled corruption, pure corruption. He, Copy Ninja, Hatake Kakashi of the Sharingan, vowed to make sure that these loud-mouthed brats with think twice before emitting a single sound ever again... And he had the perfect strategy yet...
"KAKASHI SENSEI!"
"KAKASHI SENSEI!"
"KAKASHI SENSEI!"
He twitched yet again. Oh, just these brats wait...
"Listen..." he said simply, holding out a palm, his voice nonchalant and displaying no evidence of the inner turmoil inside of him. To his astonishment, they did.
"What is it, Kakashi-sensei?" Naruto asked eagerly. Kiba and Lee also leaned over in interest. The corners of Kakashi's hidden mouth drew up into a smirk. An evil smirk, a sinister smirk... This would kill them...
"I'm going to start off by giving you a training exercise. It shall help you practice your..." here he trailed off to let an imaginary ominous black cloud descend upon the students, showering them with droplets and droplets of pain, fear and misery! Naruto, Kiba and Lee watched him with wide eyes. "...stealth." Two gulps were heard as well as a soft whining.
Strange fireballs could now be seen in Lee's eyes, defying the laws of physics, biology and chemistry. "YOSHI! I'LL DO MY BEST!" he declared, not noticing that what he did was the very thing that he was not supposed to be doing.
"..."
"..."
"...stealth. Stealth could be described as the following: furtiveness, surreptitiousness, sneakiness, slyness, craftiness, secrecy, and covertness." Kakashi trailed off for a bit, regarding the loud ninjas. "All of which, you completely lack."
A few minutes later on into the story, leaves Kiba, Naruto and Lee, standing in rather uncomfortable positions atop three very tall, and very thin metal poles. Kiba swayed slightly as he moved his left leg onto a more stable position. Beads of sweat rolled down his cheeks. The ground below him strangely came in and out of focus like it did whenever someone looked down when they were crossing a thin log bridge resting on top off two very high cliffs.
Lee, had surprisingly been able to balance himself quite well, due to his extensive taijutsu training. Now the only thing that he had to worry about was what Kakashi told him about earlier.
Naruto wasn't having much luck. Firstly, it was already hard for him to stay still, even when he had both feet firmly planted on very solid ground, let alone on one foot, standing atop a thirty-four foot metal post. Naruto tried desperately not to ruin his already-ruined image anymore by flailing his arms around uselessly in a pathetic attempt to convince himself that he'll actually not fall off. But he just couldn't help it. So therefore, he flailed his arms around uselessly in an attempt to not fall and he also could not suppress a small squeak.
Now, we will move to a more, microscopic point of view.
Naruto's brain detected and received a small electric shock. It quickly translated the signal and automatically interpreted it as an emotion: fear. Whirling furiously, it translated the emotion as an automatic physical reaction. The brain sent the command by sending another spark down the nervous system to, the vocal chords. The chords read the signal and vibrated themselves, corresponding to the brain wave patterns. The vibration hit the surrounding air particles and the air particles collided with other particles, creating a chain reaction.
The particles now travel away from the mouth and into the surrounding area. These sound waves now traveled, cutting through its surroundings, and finally striking the ear drum of a certain Copy Ninja. His sensitive eardrum vibrated along with it and this triggered a signal that was transmitting to and registered by yet another brain and translated this as a sound. A squeak, to be more specific, a squeak that came from Naruto.
Now, let's return to a less microscopic view.
On hearing the sound, Kakashi swiftly tossed a rather large stone that collided painfully and ricocheted off Naruto's head before landing with a few bounces in the earthy ground. Naruto fell soundlessly off his pole and stifled a cry of pain earning pitying and sympathetic glances from the other two boys.
"Remember boys, stealth is the key to victory in many situations. You three will practice balance and patience while you stand on the poles; without using Chakra control and if you make a sound, I will throw rocks at you, which will hurt. If you fall off more than three times, then you will be tied to the pole until tomorrow morning. Understand?" Three boys wished to scream in protest but decided against it. Kakashi smiled and sadistic smile from where he was seated, cross-legged and reading his favourite book. A large pile of stones were heaped beside him. Kakashi lazily watched the struggles of the three boys.
Yes, he loved his job.
In the corner of the training grounds, a white puppy whined as it trying to drag itself home.
Woe is them.
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Announcer: So, it seems that the other teachers are enjoying themselves! But what does Gai-sensei have in store for Aburame Shino and his unfortunate teammates? Hopefully, you'll find out next time!
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Frontier of Darkness