Kalivax: Present! Sorry to you loyal fans out there. Updates have been seriously slow because of lack of time and major stress on my part-but hey! I got grounded so I'll be able to pick up from where I left off (hopefully). I've been going through some major stuff, a new exchange student from Japan is staying at a friend's house, I'm not really that close to said friend anymore, I got offered to go to China and be a student ambassador and all this other stuff... sigh... I need some major time to just slack off... man... but anyways I worked on this chapter during Spanish—it was fun writing it! Thanks to Tomomi, who was awesome and agreed to beta-read for a slacker like me! Oh by the way, the l33+ bunnies bit me while I wrote the disclaimer, but it wore off after awhile... mostly because everyone and their cousin know l33t-so I got rid of the spiffy l33t-ness…by the way, thankies for all the loverly reviews! It fueled my ego so much-I'll have a response section in the next chapter and I'll make sure it doesn't mess up! Hopefully...

Disclaimer: Psh. If I owned this series, I would be able to get Prince of Tennis stuff a lot easier because they're both in Shonen-Jump, and I would be able to visit my friend in Korea with the royalty money this show rakes in… Plus I'm lazy. The show wouldn't get very far…

7 O'clock News

by: Kalivax

(the one and only multi-fandom shonen-ai shinobi)

Naruto picked at his breakfast, the cloudy day matching his sullen mood.

"I hate my life," he remarked, grouchily, and threw his spoon into his cereal. Shikamaru rolled his eyes and then with a resigned sigh responded: "It wasn't that bad... So you ran into that Neji guy, big deal. Hurry up and eat, I don't want to have to rely on Kiba's insane driving to get us to school. I've already had enough death scares, thank you very much."

Naruto hmph'd and still pouted.

"Are you still angry at the kimono thing? Get over it, it's not that bad," Shikamaru shrugged, "so a bunch of famous people saw you cross-dressing—"

"Not that bad! Shikamaru! All my male pride has gone down the drain!" Naruto fumed, his baby blue eyes grew icy, "If it wasn't for that stupid pervert, I would've-GRR! I hate him!"

Shikamaru fought to suppress a laugh. He had to admit his friend did act like a girl sometimes, and yesterday he really did fit the part. He could see why Naruto was so upset about being forcibly cross-dressed then introduced—that practically tore down his last defense that he was a guy.

----Flashback----

"It's you!" Naruto roared, thrusting an accusing finger at the blinking pure white-eyed bishonen known as Hyuuga Neji.

"It's me," Neji agreed, cocking an eyebrow, and then cast his gaze over to the people behind the ticked-off blond, "The Sand, what're you doing here? I thought you all were in L.A.?"

Gaara shrugged and jerked a thumb in Temari and Kankuro's direction.

"Don't blame me, ask the two 'travel agents' over there," Gaara commented, nonchalantly, then grew curious, "What's one of the most sought after male models doing in a place like this? I highly doubt you got lost, too."

Neji just moved out of the way and held the door open.

"You'd be surprised," he muttered almost enigmatically.

"Naa-chan! Are you there!" Jiraiya called out from second floor.

"Oh kami-sama, hide me," he demurred and hid behind the closest person, which happened to be Gaara.

"He still hasn't stopped making y—" Gaara began skeptically, when a blur of white swooped down and grabbed 'Naa-chan'.

"Let me go, you big pervert! IRRRRRRRRUUUUUUUKAAAAAAAA!" Naruto called, pounding his fists on Jiraiya's back as he took the both of them to his room.

Shikamaru and Shino exchanged glances. This was not good.

"We'd better go get him before Jiraiya does what I think he's going to do," Shikamaru muttered to Shino who nodded. Gaara and Neji followed both boys as they rushed up the stairs, hoping to make in time.

Running to the room furthest to the left, where anguished yells were heard, Shino picked the lock with almost too much ease and Shikamaru kicked the door open. Neji's jaw dropped.

Standing there in a woman's kimono, Naruto eyed them and bit his lip. Jiraiya was having too much fun tying Naruto's obi to notice the new arrivals.

"Jiraiya, hands off now, or else I'm calling her," Shino commanded as Jiraiya tucked the last part of the obi in.

"What can she do?" he returned, fishing for a camera and make-up through his messy room, "She's in London on an important business trip."

While the banter continued, Neji looked around, surprised by the amount of nude women on posters this man could fit in one room. It was almost mind-blowing.

"She could always take a helicopter for emergencies. It would take her a while, but the longer she waits, the more ticked off she'd be," Shikamaru added, coolly pulling out a cell phone.

Jiraiya stopped, and then pushed Naruto and all of them out of his room.

"Never mind then, Naa-chan," he laughed nervously, and Naruto was about to give his uncle a piece of his mind when Iruka called for him downstairs.

"But—" Naruto was about to run to his room when Jiraiya grabbed and whisked him downstairs, Naruto's best friends following.

"You should see Naruto now, he's so-" Iruka fought the urge to shoot himself when Jiraiya placed a beyond angry Naruto in front of them, "Jiraiya!"

Naruto was about to go strangle the nearest person when he noted the famous people in his kitchen.

"Uh, oh, shit," he blurted before Iruka could stop him. With a sour face, he bit on his lip as he heard Jiraiya chuckle behind them. "Sh-shut-up!" he growled at him.

"Naruto," Iruka began, warningly. He really didn't need this now. Why was life so cruel to him?

"Uh, I'm, uh, Uzumaki Naruto." He informed, averting his eyes to the now oh-so interesting floor.

Iruka felt sorry for him and cast a hateful glance at his cousin and decided to come to his nephew's rescue: "Uh, this is for the school play, right? You're performing the Taming of the Shrew yes?"

Naruto looked up and nodded quickly, elbowing Shikamaru to agree. "Yeah, Shika here is the male lead, and they thought I'd be perfect for the female, hehe—go figure," he began when a rich tenor voice cut in: "I wonder why?"

Naruto's head snapped around to face the owner of the voice. Smirking at him was one of the most infamous actors in history—"Uchiha Sasuke. Charmed. Now pray tell why are you staring at me? Another gay fan?"

"Don't flatter yourself, I'm not that desperate. Besides, I can see why you have so many gay fans. You look like a woman yourself, so technically they're not gay," Naruto snapped back and gave a smile so fake it had Iruka cringe. Sasuke's eyes narrowed and he was about to wittily retort when Kakashi thumped him on the head.

"Stop flirting and let everybody else introduce themselves," he grumbled. Sasuke turned crimson and shot him a frosty glare. Kakashi ignored it and with a shrug smiled at Naruto: "Do you remember me, Naa-chan?"

Naruto's eyes lit up and he beamed bewitchingly. "I know you! You were here last time when that guy was harass—" a carefully calculated swap on his head by Iruka stopped his babbling.

"My, My, ahaha, he has quite an imagination," Iruka mumbled nervously, a blush evident, "Yes, this Kakashi—"

"—my rival!" a man with Beatle-esque hair cried, standing up.

And so introductions went in the same tangent. With Kakashi was the bubbly, happy-go-lucky, tween-movie(1) actress Haruno Sakura, who at side glances at Sasuke and Gaara seemed to be more interested in acting her age than acting cute and stubborn, the two words that described all her roles.

With Gai, Beatle-haired, who introduced himself as a "promoter of the powers of youth and beauty" (complete with poses), was the acclaimed and supposedly 'drop-dead gorgeous' male model Hyuuga Neji, who, just to tick Naruto off, kept smirking all-knowingly at him; the infamous action star and self-proclaimed "Fueler of the weak fires of Youth" Rock Lee, who eerily was dressed exactly like his manager in Green formal Chinese attire, blushing at Sakura, who seemed to not notice him.

Finally, there was a girl dressed in punk rock attire (personally, to Naruto it looked like she just raided a Hot Topic(2) store) that kept staring intently at Shikamaru, until she finally announced, recognition dawning on her: "Aha! I know you! You're that guy Ino's always calling! Do you remember me? I'm in the band Mamushi! I'm Tenten!"

Shino and Naruto both turned at the exact same moment to glance at their friend questioningly: What? Who was this "Ino"? Why haven't we heard of her before?

Shikamaru, for his part, ignored the stares and just shrugged. "Well, now you all know my name." He ignored Naruto's incessant nagging: "Who's Ino? Hey, Shika—who's Ino? She your girl? How come you never mentioned her? Seriously—who's Ino?"

Next to him Shino wisely interjected: "Aburame Shino."

Jiraiya bowed mockingly as he announced, "I am Jiraiya, beloved uncle to dear Naa-chan." To which Naruto and Shikamaru snorted. Iruka gestured to Gaara and his siblings who did a group shrug.

"Gaara of the Sand," he muttered, flatly.

Naruto pouted. "Oh come on, Gaara, try something more exciting—you're a rock star!" he emphasized his point with frantic arm waving, while the others just laughed at how dorky the blond was.

Temari thumped Shikamaru playfully in the arm as she walked past and dramatically said, "I'm the Sand's drummer, Temari, and this is my other brother, Kankuro, our base." Kankuro winked at Tenten and Sakura who had twin looks of "You wish" on their faces.

"Oi—Naruto! I need to hide out over here! My mom's furious I accidentally hit a tree(3)—what in the—" Kiba so brilliantly burst in through the front door. He looked around the room and dropped his bags: The room was full of infamous stars; Naruto was in a dress… Stars… Dress… Wait… then Naruto was… cross-dressing!

Kiba immediately let out a howl of laughter while commenting, "Bwahaha! Finally showing your true colors, eh! Haha! I always knew you were too wimpy to be straight! Wahaha!"

Naruto, trying very hard to not just run over and beat Kiba, informed with a twitchy eyebrow, "He's an idiot. Don't worry about him. He was even in a special-ed class."

"That was a flaw in the system!" Kiba yelled, laughter forgotten, and then noted Gaara, "Oh, you're here? Did you mess up the flights again, Kankuro?"

The other scowled and argued, "FYI, we're on paid vacation—and it's not my fault! Blame your stupid hick-town airport with rude people and bitchy flight attend—"

Temari decided to keep this conversation short. "Kiba… what did you do now? You were kicked out of the house last time we were here, too." Shaking her head, she noted the looks of confusion on most of the stars' faces at their lack of formality with each other…

----End flashback----

"To think, you have the most wanted newsmakers in your house—the press would have a field day," Shikamaru mused, stirring his cereal lazily, "—again. They were practically wetting themselves when Gaara came, but if they saw everyone in your house it'd be like the all reporter-version of Woodstock. Your lawn would never be the same."

Naruto chose to ignore him as he got up and grabbed a cereal bar from the counter, sulking still as he lazily ripped off the wrapper and chomped on it with malice, as if it was all the cereal bar's fault.

Shikamaru rolled his eyes and nonchalantly placed his bowl in the sink. He looked at the phone on the counter next to the box of cereal bars. It was a perky light aquamarine with little fish decals, smiling cheekily everywhere… Who knew such a cheery-looking device could result in the death of him?

With forced calm, he shakily walked closer to the phone, ignoring everything and everyone around him. His hands were trembling as he began to dial his home phone number when Shino suddenly interjected beside him: "Unless you like hearing your mom yelling at you for waking her up so early, I wouldn't."

Now, normal people would jump and back away, but Shikamaru was far from normal, so he just placed the phone down and gave his friend a cool stare, waiting expectantly for an answer.

Nothing.

"Damn it Shino, I can't read your mind remember? You keep fricking guarding your thoughts so you just might as well tell me why the dragon lady (4) is not over here screeching about how come I didn't tell her I stayed over; why I haven't gotten her those chocolates she sent me out for; why I haven't cleaned my room; why my grades are still too low; why I'm so low in class ran—" Shino knew the list of what Shikamaru's faults with his mom were and he wanted to get to school on time today so he spared him.

"I went over and got your things with my dad," he murmured and gestured to the freshly packed navy duffel bag nestled next to Naruto, who jumped when he noticed it (apparently he still wasn't used to people or objects popping up randomly).

"When did you—" Shikamaru began, but soon a thought entered his mind and he stopped in mid sentence, "Oh. I see. Thank your dad for me." He shuffled over to the bag, grabbing the cereal bar from Naruto, who still looked confused, and as he was walking away commented, "For someone who says he can't control the guard on his thoughts, that was pretty easy to read that one moment."

Shino didn't respond, instead he adjusted his glasses and got another cereal bar next to Naruto. "Did I miss something again?" he questioned the quiet boy next to him, "How do you keep Shika from reading your thoughts anyways, Shino?"

Silence and then:

"Are all these people going to school with us? Because if so, tell them to hurry up. I hate waiting."

It then dawned on Naruto that while he was still in pajamas, Shino was in a baggy dark blue shirt with cargo pants and flip-flops, backpack already hanging on his left shoulder.

"Crap! I gotta get ready for school! It's almost—gaaaah! It's 8:50!" Naruto cried and rushed off, knocking everything and everyone in his path down without a moment's hesitation.

Shino was still munching on the cereal bar when he heard someone scream and there was a loud THWACK coming from the upstairs corner bathroom to the left. With a shrug, he placed the wrapper in the nearby trash and greeted the two newcomers by tapping on the counter.

"Shino, what are you doing just standing there? Let's go, I want to stop by Hinata's," came the familiar whine of Kiba as he padded past, settling to sit at the table, "Let's go already! Where are Uzumaki and Nara?"

Shino studied him for a minute.

"Does Kankuro know you're wearing his jacket?" he pointed out, leaning against the counter, realizing it would be awhile.

The other newcomer hit Kiba on the head as he sat across from him. "No wonder I couldn't find it! You, bastard! I knew you were planning something when you suddenly took up rooming with me(5)!" Kankuro accused and gestured to his clothes, plain black baggy –shirt and regular jeans, "You idiot! We're supposed to not attract attention—do you remember what happened last time! I'm not even wearing my make-up! Take off my jacket!"

Kiba frowned and threw the cursed piece of clothing at his friend, revealing his black shirt and jeans. He would've been matching if not for the "Squirrels gone wild" message, complete with the furry animals in bikinis running around, on his shirt.

Kankuro raised a brow. "You have problems," he thought aloud, shaking his head, not noticing his siblings and the Gai troupe walking in.

"Naruto's running around upstairs panicking," Gaara reported, red hair tucked away in a messy blond wig, in—Shino noted with suspicion—Naruto's red sweater and jeans.

Temari, in a blue sundress with loose boots and a long length red-headed wig, looked over at Lee. "You two are begging for trouble if you don't disguise yourselves."

Tenten, in a polka-dotted mini-skirt and black top nodded as she braided her hair (which was quite a feat to do both at once). "I've been telling them that, but they won't listen," she grumbled, "Lee keeps insisting he's wearing normal clothes."

Neji, next to her in a tight shirt and black pants deadpanned, "I don't see what's wrong. I'm only wearing Vuitton(6)."

Lee nodded. "Yes, and I am only wearing my traditional training outfit." He tugged at his gi(7), which (no surprise) was green. "I wore it to school all the time back in Mainland."

Tenten felt the urge to hit the two. "One, it's not Mainland over here—it's just China. Two, you went to a martial arts academy. Three, Vuitton is hardly what common everyday people wear," she informed, tying her braids, "Now change both of you before I get Gai to choose your clothes."

Neji paled while Lee reminded: "He would agree with what I'm wearing!"

Tenten turned to the others as if to say, "Ya see what I have to deal with?" and Temari decided to come to her aid.

"If you two aren't in normal clothing by the time I'm done counting to ten, I'll have Gaara and Kankuro try out a new stage move on you two. Right, brothers?" Temari's threat was further illustrated by the maniacal looks, especially Gaara's face, and the rumors of The Sand having a shady past…

It was these reasons the two were quickly dashing up the stairs.

1) I have to admit, Sakura has grown on me, but I still see her as a tween-actress…that's not always a bad thing though, Ann Hathaway is a marvelous tween-actress…in my humble opinion…

2) Before you ravenous Copyright bunnies chew me up: I don't own Hot Topic—or else they would be fully loaded with American McGee's Alice things… but alas I do not own that franchise either…

3) Now how can such a careful driver hit a tree? The world may never know…not! I'm surprised he isn't hurt at all! Kiba's crazy…hey! That rhymes!

4) Shikamaru loves his mom so much…and it shows…

5) Back fangirls, back! -waves fire around- Kiba and Kankuro are friends…not together, even thought that would be intresting…

6) Vuitton—is so freaking expensive and just for a wallet! Hnh, screw that, I go to China town for my goods!

7) I honestly for the life of me had a huge brain fart and forgot how to spell the word for those martial art suit-thingies

(Tomomi: It's right ;;)

(Kalivax: Ok, yay! -goes off to find Azuma Kazuma plushie-)

Meh…this chapter was too long. And I've been working on it for a year! (Ok, I just kept adding on and on) but now the hard part is over. I have three typing up and I'll post sometime soon. In it we see how school can twist people and the horror of fans. Also, what exactly happened last time to the Sand, how does Shikamaru know a rock star? Why isn't Hinata and Choji in this chapter again-nah, I kid, Choji's back but he's acting really weird and why is Hinata hiding? All this and more-till next time!

Review, 'cause it helps my ego and in turn my ego overrides my laziness and I finish writing!

p.s. the Title from the chapter is a song from my ill-fated Spanish class...