Tonight
There were many students gathered in one particular clearing, large and surrounded by thick foliage, the sun was still hanging in the sky, though barely. The pale blue sky was darkening as the sun reached out for the horizon, like a child reaching for a blanket to cover up for its nap, the sun was reaching for the horizon to cover up for its own nap.
Three, six, nine, twelve students, all either twelve or thirteen years of age sat in a large circle, their four teachers scattered around the circle as well. They were used to sticking to their usual three-man cells, but now they were tossed randomly about, almost as if the teachers WANTED them to feel awkward. Of course they had all met before, many of them had gone to school together, but these four, three-man cells had not spoken often for a very long time, as of late. One cell was an entire year older than the others as well, in fact.
"Kakashi-sensei, what are we supposed to be doing?" Sakura asked as she found herself in the awkward position of sitting between Lee and Kiba.
The VERY awkward position of sitting next to Lee, especially after....
Well, that was chapter one.
"Mingle, talk, you're all sitting their silently, but none of you will be allowed to move until we see some healthy conversations going on, right Gai?"
"Hai!"
She turned awkwardly towards Lee, hoping that he did not hold hard feelings.
Then he saw him chatting comfortably with Hinata, who was on the other side of him.
She turned the other way to speak to Kiba, but found he was talking to Ino and Tenten.
Sakura was being left out!
It might not have been intentional on Kiba's part, but the way she looked at Lee and saw he was turned completely away from her, as though trying to completely block her from his life, she knew he was hurt. She had caused him so much pain, she had seen it in his obsidian eyes, that extra little twinkle in them had vanished and replaced by a cold, emotionless stare. He moved stiffly around her, as though the grace he had gained from learning Taijutsu so thoroughly had been completely wiped away. He moved as though he was a young child being scolded loudly by their parents for doing something of no harm.. Like eating a bug or something.
She sighed and turned back to Kiba, trying to slip into his conversation by laughing at his annoying jokes and inputting her point of view on his comments. Eventually she was welcomed and the group of three became a group of four.
"I don't see why Sakura-chan would do that, Lee-kun.. You're very nice." Hinata said with a shy smile, no blush, but that adorable little smile that spread lightly across her face when she spoke to those she was unfamiliar with.
"... Thank you, Hinata-chan.. Thank you for listening. It makes the hurt go away." Lee said slowly as he stared dead ahead, the exact opposite direction of Sakura and he beautiful, shiny, soft hair...
"I'm glad I could help you, Lee-kun." Hinata whispered once more.
He looked down at the small girl and saw her eyes dart across the circle to a wild-haired blonde boy with whisker-like stripes across his cheeks. His squinted blue eyes were staring at Neji as if he was the son of the Devil. Naruto still held a grudge against Neji ever since their last Chuunin exam.
"It seems you've found someone who catches your eye as well?" Lee asked innocently, offering a smile to Hinata who was now blushing an insane shade of red.
"WHATD'YA MEAN BY THAT?!" He turned his head over to see Naruto pointing accusingly at Neji once more.
"I said you had a bug on your shoulder, baka."
Naruto was fuming as his azure gaze flamed red, the frown across his face as he pointed at Neji grew until Shino reached up and plucked the bug off of Naruto's shoulder.
"I'm sorry." Was all Shino said as the bug crawled quickly up his sleeve.
Hinata was really blushing now, even giggling slightly at Naruto's overreaction, and the way Shino calmly took the bug away.
"He dislikes Neji..." Lee said as though the statement wasn't obvious.
"Ever since..." Hinata broke off quickly, touching her stomach with one hand and her forehead with the other, remembering the horrible event...
"Everything Neji says is insulting to him, I think he's trying to protect your honour in some way, Hinata-chan," Rock Lee continued as he looked thoughtfully across the circle at Naruto, still fuming, but Kakashi had calmed him down somewhat. He had turned his back on Neji and was now speaking to Shino, though was not getting much of a response.
"The dunce doesn't know when to shut up," Both Hinata and Lee heard someone say. The two turned to face
Shikamaru who was shaking his head at Naruto, but smiling at his stupidity. Chouji was nodding at Shikamaru as if everything he said HAD to be right, just because his IQ was over 200.
"Try spending 8 hours a day with him."
Sasuke was sitting between Shikamaru and Chouji, his chin resting on top of pented fingers as he stared idly over top of them at Naruto. His dark eyes were only half open, as though the goings on around him were quite dull.
Chouji looked to his left at Neji, who had shifted away from Naruto to face him.
Neji's eyes creeped Chouji out SO much!
The big-boned boy gulped and then turned the other way towards Sasuke, hating the fact that Neji was likely staring straight through him.
"Have we talk enough yet?"
It was Sasuke who broke the chit-chat as he gazed at Kakashi.
The silver-haired teacher was speaking with Asuma, Kurenai, and Gai, just as jounin friends always did.
"Oh! Right! Uhm... Gai? Your idea was next..." Kakashi prompted.
"GAME TIME!" The shiny-haired teacher struck another unusual pose, just as he always did, and smiled so his teeth made the absurdly annoying 'PING!' sound.
All twelve students and the 3 other teachers sighed heavily.
Asuma's jaw slacked, his cigarette tilting downwards in his mouth before he gained composure and took another puff of his cancer stick. Kurenai fanned the annoying fumed from her face while making a disgusted face when he exhaled right into her face. Kakashi's one revealed eye was only half open, and the lid simply drooped further as he gazed around at the many students.
None of them were at ALL enthusiastic about all of this.
"Whoever wins doesn't have to do Condition training for a week!" Kakashi offered, and Gai saluted the valiant addition to his master plan. The students seemed at least WILLING to participate now!
"What's the game then?" Lee asked for everyone, still not paying attention to Sakura, who was gazing at him.
"MURDER WINK!" Gai pronounced happily, and though Maito Gai was Rock Lee's teacher, and otherwise Idol, he still sweatdropped at that. Since Tsunade had become Hokage and he had almost lost all of hope of becoming a ninja, he never seemed nearly as excited about his sensei's words.
"The rules of the game are as follows, Everyone closes their eyes and I choose one student to be the murderer. The murderer must wink at people in order to 'kill' (he did the little air-quotes too) them. The others must guess who the murderer is before there's only the murderer and one more victim left, else the murderer wins. Once you are killed you must count to ten before dramatically 'dying' and you can not speak or guess at who the murderer is. If someone guesses who the murderer is before there is only the murderer and one other person are left, that person wins."
Gai seemed overly enthusiastic as he winked over-exageratedly at the students, then laughed at is own 'joke'.
"All right! EVERYONE CLOSE YOUR EYES!"
Everyone did as told, hoping to at least shut Gai up, he was insanely happy about being stuck with twelve kids and three other teachers who were less than please at his over-excitability.
Before anyone had closed their eyes for more than a second, Gai had returned to his original position and was giving the thumbs up with the shiny smile once more.
"YOSH! I've picked! Now everybody ENJOY!"
Everybody gazed around the circle at each other, nobody was even BLINKING, save Shikamaru who had plunked his head in his hands for a nap.
Then, Hinata died.
Naruto pointed accusingly at Neji.
"IT WAS YOU! WASN'T IT?! I BLAME YOU! I'LL GET YOU FOR THAT!" And he made a dive for Neji, only to be held back by Kakashi.
"It wasn't Neji, now you're out of the game, lie down and pretend you're dead like Hinata."
Naruto was growling loudly as he took a position on the ground and pretended to be dead, under the watchful eye of Kakashi.
Hinata was blushing pretty red for a dead person.
A few seconds later, three people simultaneously died, Ino, Kiba, and Tenten. Kiba pretended he had been shot. Ino grasped at her throat as though someone had slit it, and Tenten simply dropped dead.
People were growing anxious now. All of them were ninjas but they couldn't pick out ONE person who was simply WINKING?
Lee fell over, pulling a VERY dramatic scene as he did so, falling backwards off of his seat and even hitting his head by accident.
"Itai."
"Dead people don't say 'ouch'," Came a response from somewhere in the crowd of students left.
Sasuke, Neji, Shikamaru, Chouji, Sakura, and Shino were all that was left at this point, Sakura's eyes were darting about wildly, who was the killer?!
Neji needn't have moved to see everyone, and yet he STILL hadn't noticed who was winking.
Shikamaru snored.
Chouji munched on some random chips.
Sasuke glared.
Shino simply gazed over his sunglasses.
Then Neji leaned over, closed his eyes, and simply pretended to not move. He had obviously just died.
"Wow they're good, to get two Hyuuga's!" Asuma commented quietly to the other teachers.
Sakura gulped.
Sasuke glared.
Chouji Munched.
Shino gazed.
Shikamaru snored.
Shino dropped dead.
Sasuke raised on hand high into the air.
"It's Shikamaru."
Shikamaru stretched and looked at Sasuke, wiping the little bit of drool from his mouth.
"Nice guess."
Sakura blinked her turquoise eyes at Sasuke. She knew he was awesome, he was PERFECT, after all.
"How did you know?"
"You can't see Shino wink through his sunglasses, so even if he was winking at people nobody would have seen.
You're eyes are moving to fast to have even THOUGHT about guessing you. It was either Chouji or Shikamaru and Shikamaru was putting up a good front. I was watching him move and as his head lolled, somebody in that direction always died about ten seconds later."
Sasuke felt a little superior, but then added, "I like condition training, so I don't want to skip it, though."
Everyone was back up on their seats, Hinata was still blushing and lee was nursing the back of his head gingerly.
"YOSH! Now, what's next?" Gai said, turning to Kurenai quickly.
There were many students gathered in one particular clearing, large and surrounded by thick foliage, the sun was still hanging in the sky, though barely. The pale blue sky was darkening as the sun reached out for the horizon, like a child reaching for a blanket to cover up for its nap, the sun was reaching for the horizon to cover up for its own nap.
Three, six, nine, twelve students, all either twelve or thirteen years of age sat in a large circle, their four teachers scattered around the circle as well. They were used to sticking to their usual three-man cells, but now they were tossed randomly about, almost as if the teachers WANTED them to feel awkward. Of course they had all met before, many of them had gone to school together, but these four, three-man cells had not spoken often for a very long time, as of late. One cell was an entire year older than the others as well, in fact.
"Kakashi-sensei, what are we supposed to be doing?" Sakura asked as she found herself in the awkward position of sitting between Lee and Kiba.
The VERY awkward position of sitting next to Lee, especially after....
Well, that was chapter one.
"Mingle, talk, you're all sitting their silently, but none of you will be allowed to move until we see some healthy conversations going on, right Gai?"
"Hai!"
She turned awkwardly towards Lee, hoping that he did not hold hard feelings.
Then he saw him chatting comfortably with Hinata, who was on the other side of him.
She turned the other way to speak to Kiba, but found he was talking to Ino and Tenten.
Sakura was being left out!
It might not have been intentional on Kiba's part, but the way she looked at Lee and saw he was turned completely away from her, as though trying to completely block her from his life, she knew he was hurt. She had caused him so much pain, she had seen it in his obsidian eyes, that extra little twinkle in them had vanished and replaced by a cold, emotionless stare. He moved stiffly around her, as though the grace he had gained from learning Taijutsu so thoroughly had been completely wiped away. He moved as though he was a young child being scolded loudly by their parents for doing something of no harm.. Like eating a bug or something.
She sighed and turned back to Kiba, trying to slip into his conversation by laughing at his annoying jokes and inputting her point of view on his comments. Eventually she was welcomed and the group of three became a group of four.
"I don't see why Sakura-chan would do that, Lee-kun.. You're very nice." Hinata said with a shy smile, no blush, but that adorable little smile that spread lightly across her face when she spoke to those she was unfamiliar with.
"... Thank you, Hinata-chan.. Thank you for listening. It makes the hurt go away." Lee said slowly as he stared dead ahead, the exact opposite direction of Sakura and he beautiful, shiny, soft hair...
"I'm glad I could help you, Lee-kun." Hinata whispered once more.
He looked down at the small girl and saw her eyes dart across the circle to a wild-haired blonde boy with whisker-like stripes across his cheeks. His squinted blue eyes were staring at Neji as if he was the son of the Devil. Naruto still held a grudge against Neji ever since their last Chuunin exam.
"It seems you've found someone who catches your eye as well?" Lee asked innocently, offering a smile to Hinata who was now blushing an insane shade of red.
"WHATD'YA MEAN BY THAT?!" He turned his head over to see Naruto pointing accusingly at Neji once more.
"I said you had a bug on your shoulder, baka."
Naruto was fuming as his azure gaze flamed red, the frown across his face as he pointed at Neji grew until Shino reached up and plucked the bug off of Naruto's shoulder.
"I'm sorry." Was all Shino said as the bug crawled quickly up his sleeve.
Hinata was really blushing now, even giggling slightly at Naruto's overreaction, and the way Shino calmly took the bug away.
"He dislikes Neji..." Lee said as though the statement wasn't obvious.
"Ever since..." Hinata broke off quickly, touching her stomach with one hand and her forehead with the other, remembering the horrible event...
"Everything Neji says is insulting to him, I think he's trying to protect your honour in some way, Hinata-chan," Rock Lee continued as he looked thoughtfully across the circle at Naruto, still fuming, but Kakashi had calmed him down somewhat. He had turned his back on Neji and was now speaking to Shino, though was not getting much of a response.
"The dunce doesn't know when to shut up," Both Hinata and Lee heard someone say. The two turned to face
Shikamaru who was shaking his head at Naruto, but smiling at his stupidity. Chouji was nodding at Shikamaru as if everything he said HAD to be right, just because his IQ was over 200.
"Try spending 8 hours a day with him."
Sasuke was sitting between Shikamaru and Chouji, his chin resting on top of pented fingers as he stared idly over top of them at Naruto. His dark eyes were only half open, as though the goings on around him were quite dull.
Chouji looked to his left at Neji, who had shifted away from Naruto to face him.
Neji's eyes creeped Chouji out SO much!
The big-boned boy gulped and then turned the other way towards Sasuke, hating the fact that Neji was likely staring straight through him.
"Have we talk enough yet?"
It was Sasuke who broke the chit-chat as he gazed at Kakashi.
The silver-haired teacher was speaking with Asuma, Kurenai, and Gai, just as jounin friends always did.
"Oh! Right! Uhm... Gai? Your idea was next..." Kakashi prompted.
"GAME TIME!" The shiny-haired teacher struck another unusual pose, just as he always did, and smiled so his teeth made the absurdly annoying 'PING!' sound.
All twelve students and the 3 other teachers sighed heavily.
Asuma's jaw slacked, his cigarette tilting downwards in his mouth before he gained composure and took another puff of his cancer stick. Kurenai fanned the annoying fumed from her face while making a disgusted face when he exhaled right into her face. Kakashi's one revealed eye was only half open, and the lid simply drooped further as he gazed around at the many students.
None of them were at ALL enthusiastic about all of this.
"Whoever wins doesn't have to do Condition training for a week!" Kakashi offered, and Gai saluted the valiant addition to his master plan. The students seemed at least WILLING to participate now!
"What's the game then?" Lee asked for everyone, still not paying attention to Sakura, who was gazing at him.
"MURDER WINK!" Gai pronounced happily, and though Maito Gai was Rock Lee's teacher, and otherwise Idol, he still sweatdropped at that. Since Tsunade had become Hokage and he had almost lost all of hope of becoming a ninja, he never seemed nearly as excited about his sensei's words.
"The rules of the game are as follows, Everyone closes their eyes and I choose one student to be the murderer. The murderer must wink at people in order to 'kill' (he did the little air-quotes too) them. The others must guess who the murderer is before there's only the murderer and one more victim left, else the murderer wins. Once you are killed you must count to ten before dramatically 'dying' and you can not speak or guess at who the murderer is. If someone guesses who the murderer is before there is only the murderer and one other person are left, that person wins."
Gai seemed overly enthusiastic as he winked over-exageratedly at the students, then laughed at is own 'joke'.
"All right! EVERYONE CLOSE YOUR EYES!"
Everyone did as told, hoping to at least shut Gai up, he was insanely happy about being stuck with twelve kids and three other teachers who were less than please at his over-excitability.
Before anyone had closed their eyes for more than a second, Gai had returned to his original position and was giving the thumbs up with the shiny smile once more.
"YOSH! I've picked! Now everybody ENJOY!"
Everybody gazed around the circle at each other, nobody was even BLINKING, save Shikamaru who had plunked his head in his hands for a nap.
Then, Hinata died.
Naruto pointed accusingly at Neji.
"IT WAS YOU! WASN'T IT?! I BLAME YOU! I'LL GET YOU FOR THAT!" And he made a dive for Neji, only to be held back by Kakashi.
"It wasn't Neji, now you're out of the game, lie down and pretend you're dead like Hinata."
Naruto was growling loudly as he took a position on the ground and pretended to be dead, under the watchful eye of Kakashi.
Hinata was blushing pretty red for a dead person.
A few seconds later, three people simultaneously died, Ino, Kiba, and Tenten. Kiba pretended he had been shot. Ino grasped at her throat as though someone had slit it, and Tenten simply dropped dead.
People were growing anxious now. All of them were ninjas but they couldn't pick out ONE person who was simply WINKING?
Lee fell over, pulling a VERY dramatic scene as he did so, falling backwards off of his seat and even hitting his head by accident.
"Itai."
"Dead people don't say 'ouch'," Came a response from somewhere in the crowd of students left.
Sasuke, Neji, Shikamaru, Chouji, Sakura, and Shino were all that was left at this point, Sakura's eyes were darting about wildly, who was the killer?!
Neji needn't have moved to see everyone, and yet he STILL hadn't noticed who was winking.
Shikamaru snored.
Chouji munched on some random chips.
Sasuke glared.
Shino simply gazed over his sunglasses.
Then Neji leaned over, closed his eyes, and simply pretended to not move. He had obviously just died.
"Wow they're good, to get two Hyuuga's!" Asuma commented quietly to the other teachers.
Sakura gulped.
Sasuke glared.
Chouji Munched.
Shino gazed.
Shikamaru snored.
Shino dropped dead.
Sasuke raised on hand high into the air.
"It's Shikamaru."
Shikamaru stretched and looked at Sasuke, wiping the little bit of drool from his mouth.
"Nice guess."
Sakura blinked her turquoise eyes at Sasuke. She knew he was awesome, he was PERFECT, after all.
"How did you know?"
"You can't see Shino wink through his sunglasses, so even if he was winking at people nobody would have seen.
You're eyes are moving to fast to have even THOUGHT about guessing you. It was either Chouji or Shikamaru and Shikamaru was putting up a good front. I was watching him move and as his head lolled, somebody in that direction always died about ten seconds later."
Sasuke felt a little superior, but then added, "I like condition training, so I don't want to skip it, though."
Everyone was back up on their seats, Hinata was still blushing and lee was nursing the back of his head gingerly.
"YOSH! Now, what's next?" Gai said, turning to Kurenai quickly.