5 – Nunchaku

Watching Lee train again brought a smile to my face. I still wanted to kill him for leaving so soon after his surgery on the doomed mission to save Uchiha, but he had come back, looking so proud of the fact that he had gotten to help a bit that I couldn't stay mad at him for long.

Neji was still recovering, which was frightening in its own way. He had never been beaten up so badly in a fight as he had this time. The gaping hole in shoulder had almost been too much. I had visited him a few times but only when he was unconscious. I knew him well enough by now to know that Neji wouldn't want people fretting over him in his weakened state.

"Did you see that?" Lee called out and I had to bring myself back quickly to cheer on his newest move.

"That was very good Lee," Gai-sensei said evenly. It was a bit odd to find him acting more reserved then normal, as though Gai-sensei's infallible spirit had faltered for a moment. "Let's stop for now."

"But Gai-sensei!" Lee cried. "If I don't complete a fifty flying roundhouse kicks, I'll have to run around the town a hundred times."

"I think you've done enough for today. In fact," and now Gai-sensei graced us with his usual bright smile, "I think you've recovered enough that you will be able to accompany Tenten on the next mission! Hokage-sama gave her approval, so you're back to full ninja status!" He threw up a thumb and Lee began to cry.

"What is it?" I asked quickly, hoping that would preempt the chorus of names and flow of hugs that were surely about to begin. I hoped there would be some travel involved, I was tired of being stuck in the village.

Gai-sensei outlined the basics of the mission to us, something about delivering a dozen or so messages to families scattered across the outskirts of Konoha. It wasn't something that would make for a grand adventure or anything but Gai-sensei was going to let us do this one by ourselves.

He kept working though I knew he had seen me. I was prepared for him to throw something at me but he just lumbered about until he was done.

"Going off again?" he asked, coughing slightly as he turned.

My brow furrowed a bit. "I was but now I'm thinking you might be sick."

He waved me off. "Just a cough, nothing more. You get that working around the smoke as long as I have. Where you off to now?"

I shrugged. "Just around the outskirts to deliver invitations."

"Wedding invites?" he asked.

"Yeah, how did you know?"

He shrugged. "Most of the families in Konoha like to get some ninja to deliver them. Status symbol and all that. When your mom and I were married, we had about a dozen ninja traveling across the country, bringing in all her relatives."

I stopped. He had just brought up the forbidden topic: my mother. I didn't want to press him about her, but the subject came up so rarely that I couldn't miss the chance to explore it further. "Yeah? Didn't that cost a lot?"

He shrugged. "Your mother had the money but they did it for free. Most of them were my friends," he smiled a bit. "Figured this was the least they could do."

I smiled. "You have good friends."

He looked down at the weapon in his hands and nodded slightly. "Yeah, I did." From the tone of his voice, I knew that the topic was closed again. And I knew better than to pry any further.

"Here," he said, tossing them over to me. "Nunchakus. By themselves, those two poles can do some mean damage. But with that chain in the middle? You get more speed and a much more vicious attack. You should have it down pat before you get home."

I smiled and went off to pack my new weapon away with the rest of my gear. A few minutes later, my father was bellowing up the stairs that Lee had arrived, and I hurried down before Lee's enthusiasm could wear him out.

As I left, I made him promise not to work too hard and to get some bed rest, warning that if he was still coughing by the time I got back, I was going to drag him to nearest medic-nin. That, at least, seemed enough to make him promise me he'd take it easy.

"So what did you get?" Lee asked, moving behind me and pointing to the bulge the nunchakus made in my pack.

I pulled them out and let him examine them. "These are pretty cool," he said, giving them a quick twirl.

"You look good using them," I smiled.

He handed them back, shaking his head in protest. "You know me, Tenten, I'm only good with Taijutsu."

I examined them again as we walked down the street, slowly twirling them on either side of me as Gai-sensei had shown me once in training, picking up the pace as I gained more confidence in their use. It was only as we arrived at the first village that I realized two things: the first was that the nunchakus were unlike any of the weapons I had trained with before. The second was that Lee hadn't said a word since he had handed them back to me.

"Here's the first address," I said, pulling him towards the third house down the street listed on our itinerary. I knocked loudly on the door, and when it opened, I quickly explained our purpose to the woman there. She nodded slightly and reached forward to sign for the letter, closing the door without a word of thanks when she was done. I gave the door an irate look and walked off, Lee trailing behind me.

"Well THAT was highly unsatisfying," I yawned. "The lady didn't even look impressed."

Lee merely nodded at me, continuing to shuffle forward. I came to a full stop, glaring at him until he realized I'd stopped moving and turned around to face me. When he did, I noticed that the usual cheeriness was gone from his face.

"What is it?" I asked, suddenly very worried. This wasn't like him at all. When he didn't answer, I grabbed him by the arm and dragged him out of town. If I had to shake it out of him, I would, because having Lee act like this was unnerving in the least.

We stopped near a lake not far from the road. Letting go of Lee, I crossed my arms to show that I wasn't budging until we had had this out. He let out a sigh and walked towards the water, kneeling down to pick up stones to skip across the water.

"It's just... Sometimes, I feel like I'm the weak link in the group," He confessed, not looking at me.

"What the hell are you talking about?" I demanded.

"Neji is always going to be stronger then me," he continued. "And you… you're getting stronger every day. I think one day, I'm going to look around and you'll both be gone."

I stared at Lee's back a moment, before moving to stand beside him, my gaze resting on the water.

"..That's what I think about you and Neji sometimes," I replied softly.

"Really?" he asked, finally turning to look at me. I nodded. "But you're so good with weapons and you've got some great jutsu mastered!"

"So do you," I countered.

"But I can't use chakra," he said.

"And my taijutsu will never be close to yours," I retorted. "So I'll cover you with genjutsu when I can and you cover me with taijutsu."

"And Neji?"

I paused. It was true that Neji was the 'perfect ninja' and might not need us in that sense, but...

"But after that… he just never smiled again. I was just hoping… that maybe for you…"

…I was beginning to think that he needed us in another way.

"He needs us, just not in a way he's willing to admit yet," I stated ambiguously.

"Look…" Kneeling a moment, I pulled free my newest weapon from my pack. "You, me and Neji, we… we're like this nunchaku." I passed it to him as I spoke, Lee letting each baton roll across his fingers, the chain jingling slightly as it moved. "Those two poles are strong on their own, but when you attach the chain, they become something completely different. Something better."

"..I guess," he said softly. Hand tightened around one of the batons, Lee began to twirl the nunchakus, heavy brows tightening in thought.

I stood up and brushed off my legs. "We need to get moving. Still lots of deliveries to do." Lee tried to hand back the nunchakus to me, but I wouldn't take them. "Like I said," I grinned, "you look better with them." And before he could protest, I started to walk away.

We made our way quickly to the next village and I smiled as I caught Lee constantly trying to figure out how to twirl his new weapon effectively. A few times he bumped himself on the head and I had to refrain from laughing.

When we finally strolled into town, I grabbed his arm. "I have a great idea," I told him, knowing that this would help lighten his mood.

The first recipient of the invite might not have been impressed, but the rest of them were.

First, I hit the bell of their door with a senbon. When it opened, Lee would appear to deliver the message in a flurry of wind and leaves. As soon as they'd signed the scroll and he handed the invitation over to them, I would toss a few smoke bombs, letting him disappear without a trace.

By the time we'd finished, we were convinced that we had found our true calling. In fact, we were already thinking of incorporating a fleet of shinobi messengers under the flag of "Ten-Lee's Ninja Deliveries - Faster Than a Poof of Smoke!"

Apparently, our antics had so highly impressed the family members that they were all calling our contactor to tell him that. Needless to say, we had a nice tip waiting for us when we got home and a free dinner on Gai-sensei.

But the best surprise was having Neji come out with us.

The hospital had just cleared him and now he was trying to make a show of being okay. We didn't ask him how he was, because Neji would have hated that, so instead we related our misadventures as couriers over the course of our meal. Gai-sensei laughed openly and was quite impressed when he saw the nunchakus hanging at Lee's side. Neji was quiet for the most part, but that was normal for him and to expected after his long period of recovery.

Until Lee began demonstrating with the nunchaku and hit himself on the head again.

Neji smirked. Lee got mad. Then promptly challenged him to a duel. Gai-sensei laughed, I worried a bit about Neji's injuries, but didn't say anything out loud, settling for complaining that it would ruin dinner instead. Neji, of course, accepted and we had to move things outside

As we made ready to leave the restaurant, Lee tapped my shoulder and winked. "I think I see what you mean about him," he said, before skipping outside to prepare for the fight.

I had to smile at that. Lee had picked up on the fact that Neji was still not over his near-death experience, and that he needed things to be back to normal.

So what better way for Lee to help than to challenge him to a fight like he always did?

Since the first day, we had been something of a motley crew. And I think, in some ways, Lee's concerns were right. We would grow differently, and eventually we'd walk our own paths.

But he was wrong to worry that we would ever leave someone behind. In our own different ways we needed each other, and that would keep us together.

Like, for example, right now? Lee needed me to go get him a medic.

Author's note : Special thanks to Farli with all the help editing :)