Chapter 1 - Training
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The streets were quite busy in the humble village of Konoha, "old lady" Tsunade was doing her daily work as the Hokage of the village. Also, another surprising fact is that Naruto really does have a chance to be the next Hokage, fancy that? Vendors were out on the streets, the fragrant smell of udon noodles boiling could be smelled from the ramen stall, which was still Naruto's favorite hangout. Although, this was not where Team Gai was at the moment, no, no they were elsewhere. Even on a beautiful sunny day like this, they were out training themselves daily in the forest.
As usual, Tenten and Neji were still sparring partners. Gai believed they really evened each other out, Tenten having the advantage when at a farther range, and Neji at a closer range. Although, both of them were skilled shinobi, and knew how to take advantage of their opponents, no matter what the situation was. As for the two hyper active beasts, they did their own work out, 100 pushups, 200 laps around Konoha, sometimes even 1,000, and all that whatnot.
Right now, Tenten was gasping for breath, while leaning on a nearby tree. They were in a middle of a training session, and you could see she was not leaning towards the winning side of this little fight. She felt like her heart popped out when a sudden object was thrown against the tree she was hiding behind. She pulled out her own kunai from her small pouch and held it up against her neck while her eyebrows furrowed together. This might have been just mere training, but both of them took this on seriously.
As for Neji, he was also hiding behind a tree, far off the other end of the forest. He could target Tenten a little easier with his Byakugan, but that was not the point of this exercise. He placed three small shuriken in between his fingers and jumped on a branch, making the softest noise possible. He directly aimed at Tenten, although deliberately missing her vital points. Since he noticed that Tenten moved away from the tree, he thought it would be a good time to get a test throw. He aimed just above her head, a little to the left side of her leg, and towards the right side of her shoulder, just to test if Tenten would be able to dodge it perfectly.
Tenten was now pinpointing Neji's location. Without a special ability like Byakugan, she would have to reply on her senses to track him down. She was still behind the tree, but took a few steps to her right, carelessly revealing herself. Just then, she heard sounds, coming from deep within the forest, the rustling of leaves was heard, she could feel it, Neji was close by. Her eyes traveled across her surroundings as she took a quick turn and gulped. "Eh?" Three shuriken were launched directly at her. First, she dodged the first one by crouching down, the next by taking a step to the right, and lastly bending down while moving swiftly towards the left. She looked at the shuriken pinned to the ground. He almost got her there. She smirked and wiped off a bit of sweat and quickly devised a little plan.
Tenten could see Neji now, clearly in the distance. She took a silent approach and leaned against a tree, close to the one his stood up on. She could see him staring at her original place, taking aim with a few kunais. She pulled out a few of her own, three in between her fingers. She aimed quickly and launched them at different times. One was thrown above his head, the other below his ankle and the last near his stomach. She waited at least two seconds before launching each one. Slowly, she crouched down and sped off behind the tree Neji was on and hid behind it. She pulled out a simple explosive tag and snickered softly. She stuck it on the bark of the tree and jumped away from the "explosive" scene.
Neji dodged the three kunais perfectly. Although, he thought that the timing was quite clever, it would take most men off their guard. He remembered the place where the kunais had come from and thought that was her current position. Actually, he didn't get to see her move because he was distracted by the sounds or rather voices he heard in the distance.
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"LEE! 100 PUSH-UPS!"
"HAI! GAI-SENSEI!"
"LEE! YOU'RE YOUTH IS ASTOUNDING!"
"THANK YOU! GAI-SENSEI!"
"LEE!"
"GAI-SENSEI!"
"LEE!"
"GAI-SENSEI!"
"LEE!"
"GAI-SENSEI!"
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Neji rubbed his temples gently while he sighed in annoyance. "Those people and their silly antics.." He muttered softly. Nonetheless, he was wrong. While Tenten was elsewhere, he directed his attention to an empty bush. Fancy that, ne? In a matter of seconds, the explosive tag would explode. He could hear some sort of flickering behind him, but where? Soon, he figured everything out. They were only distractions. He quickly jumped off the branch and landed on another one far away from the explosion. He watched as the tree fell down and landed with a loud thumping noise. He folded his arms across his chest and sighed. He threw a kunai to where he thought Tenten was. A special kind of kunai, which was meant to signal the end of a training session.
Tenten saw the kunai and pushed herself off the ground, and landed next to Neji. "That was quite strategic of you, Tenten." He commented. Tenten blinked and looked into those Hyuuga white eyes. It showed no expression at all, but she knew she should take that as a compliment. You wouldn't hear the Hyuuga genius say that to everybody would you? "Ne? Arigato Neji-kun." Neji looked over Tenten and nodded with a blank stare. "Hn."
Tenten smiled, but then again, she sighed lightly after Neji's reply. It was always "Hn" this, "Mn" that. A nod with a stern face, a simple blank stare, come on, did this guy show any emotion lately? Well, she has been used to his replies, and silent remarks for the past years. It was only reasonable since she was his team mate for the longest time, until now actually. In a way, she has grown to understand and translate what every simple "Hn" or "Mn" meant. But even so, sometimes, she was completely clueless with what he meant.
Neji leapt off the tree branch and landed on the ground, where he sat and waited while his arms were still folded across his chest as his gently closed his pearly white eyes. Tenten followed suit and leapt down before him and sat next to him frowning slightly. She had a lot of things on her mind, most of the things didn't concern their daily training or whatnot. But a whole different matter, something she knew Neji would not easily comply with.
Well, there was an upcoming festival that would be going on tomorrow night in Konoha. It was a new festival that has been only been celebrated recently. Usually, she went alone, well technically not alone, with her whole team actually. What she meant was with a certain someone she wanted to be with. Over the years, Hinata had the guts to confess her feelings for Uzumaki Naruto. Well, more like accidentally forced into. Kiba had Shino talk her into it. Thus, they formulated a plan to get Hinata to speak up. Then it triggered a certain relationship and Naruto was usually found alongside Hinata nowadays. As for Sasuke and Sakura, you can say Sakura's deep obsession has gradually disappeared, which helped Sasuke get along with her better, thus making their relationship stronger. Or so she believes. Almost everyone had someone, while she had technically no one in particular.
She sighed. The young kunoichi of sixteen knew it would not be easy at all to convince Neji to go with her. In fact, it was almost impossible. She tapped Neji's shoulder which allowed him to open one eye up. He stared at her in the eye and questioned with a single word. "What?" He asked bluntly. Tenten began to stutter as she waved her right hand in the air to signal it was nothing. "No, it's nothing. Just thinking…" Her voice was carried off and she didn't finish her statement. Great, after waking him up, she still couldn't bring herself to ask him.
Neji closed his eyes and began to sit up. "…About the festival? Forget it, I believe it's a waste of time." He put a finger on her lips to keep her from saying anything. "Save it Tenten." Slowly, he removed his finger away from her lips and let his hand fall to his side. He grunted softly and said a small goodbye before leaving.
Tenten was left speechless. The nerve of that guy! Although, she knew that was his regular nature, but she was a little hurt inside. Considering, the fact that she still has evident feelings towards Neji. She shook herself and closed her eyes and took a deep breath. It usually made her feel a little better at least. She put on a small smile but she started to frown again as her thoughts started to wander. After what had just happened, she knew it would be nearly impossible to win over Neji's feelings. With him, that wasn't the way. You would need to earn his respect yourself, and probably build it up from there. But even she didn't know how Neji felt about her. Did he think she was just being a pest? Or maybe, he only thinks of her as a team mate?
Tenten buried her head into her hands as she muttered a few curses to herself. She felt so stupid, thinking Neji would agree to her invitation. She placed her hands away from her face as she grew wide eyed and held in a small scream and only a small "Eeep." came out from her mouth. Lee was hanging upside down from a tree branch directly in front of her face. She pushed herself back as she leaned against the tree as she took a few moments for a few sighs of relief. "Lee-kun, y-you scared me..." She mumbled. "Ne?" She blinked and stared at him, getting a better look at his current position. "What are you doing?"
"It's a new exercise routine Gai-Sensei and I are working on. 200 leg pull-ups." Lee made a thumbs up sign and grinned. He continued to dangle on the branch until he thought it would be best to talk on the same level as the person, so he leapt off the branch and landed next to Tenten. "Ah, Tenten-chan! Eh? You look pretty gloomy today." He pointed at her small frown as he wore a very confused expression. He held a canteen bottle in his hand and took a quick gulp from it.
"Oh, it's nothing. Well, it's y'know.." Tenten made a little hand sign, which she knew Lee would understand. She knew she needed to push these feelings aside from now, they each had duties now. Plus, she knew that missions would soon pile up for them once the festival was over. She sighed and clasped her hands together, lacing each slender finger together as she took a deep breath. "But… it's okay right? I mean, I still have you guys as friends."
Lee made the "nice guy" pose and flashed a small grin. "Of course you do! And, if it would make you feel any better, I would gladly go with you!" Tenten chuckled lightly at this and smiled at her friend's funny antics. Though Neji thought it was just plain annoying, Tenten thought otherwise. She thought it was fairly amusing. Although, deep inside, she wondered if it would be right to go with Lee, of course it would. But there was one condition.
"Ne, ne! Lee-kun, I suppose you could go with me. But one condition, you remove those green tights and wear something else at the festival." Tenten said this with a small devilish grin. She knew how Lee has grown so attached to that green jump suit over the years. She wanted to see his reaction, if he didn't want to, she would surely not force him, but it was just fun to mess around with him every once in a while.
Lee's eyes widened. As if they weren't big enough. He bit his lip until you could see him shake. He closed his eyes and opened them. Once they opened, they sparkled with passion as he stood right in front of Tenten's face and grabbed her hand with two of his own. Tears began to fall from his eyes like a waterfall as he jumped back and waved his fist in the air.
"FOR THE BEAUTIFUL FLOWER OF OUR TEAM, I SHALL GLADLY REMOVE THESE GREEN TIGHTS! FOR I AM ROCK LEE, THE GREEN BEAST OF KONOHA!"
Lee began to remove the zipper of his green tights as Tenten's eyes widened in shock and in fear. Heremoved a part of his sleeve and began to slide off the bottom part of the suit.She could see his cheeks getting a little red, she didn't know why, but that was not important right now.She quickly zipped it back up before "anything" was revealed. She shook Lee back and forth while screaming at the top of her lungs. "Lee-kun! Not here! I mean during the festival!"
Lee put a finger next to his chin and cocked his head to the right. "Ne? So you want me to unzip these tights during the festival?" At this, Tenten literally slapped her forhead and wailed. Was Lee usually like this? A while ago, he seemed pretty normal. Unless. She spotted the canteen he drank from earlier and took a quick sniff. She sighed and shook her head lightly. What he drank from it was sake. She gulped. Everyone in town knew by now how hyper active and strange he gets when he drinks at least the smallest anf tiniest drip of sake.
"Lee-kun, are you drunk?" Tenten was almost afraid to ask. Lee spun around in circles and landed on Tenten's lap. "OF COURSE NOT! FOR I AM THE GREEN BEAST OF KONO—" He fainted and silently snored while he lied down on Tenten's lap. Tenten blinked and stared blanky at the green beast. Tenten now had a small smile spread on her face as Lee was sleeping soundly on her lap. Even though Neji's words had hurt her earlier, Lee made her feel a little better.Also, even though what happened here was strange, it enlightened her mood. "Thank you my friend, for being here when I needed you." She whispered softly in his ear. Slowly, she jumped up and carried Lee on her shoulder as she made her way towards the village
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A/N- Pretty strange right there. A little Tenten and Lee moment there, just between friends. Also, I know Neji is so cold at this point. But I have a little plan how this fic will end. Also, the chapter is a little off, but I'll find time to edit it a bit while writing the second chapter.