Hope for the Future
And How It Died
Team 1 - Rock Lee
Owaru Kaito- Extremely low chakra reserves. Uses mainly kenjutsu.
Hyuuga Renji- Typical Hyuuga. Attitude problem. NOT a genius.
Nekora Aya- Comes from a clan that bonds with cats. Uses swords.
Team 6 - Inuzuka Kiba
Ginnosuke Suu- Comes from a civilian family. Very determined.
Karasu- Origins unknown. Wears a hood and hitai-ate over eyes.
Akimichi Kaneshiro- Looks more brawny than fat. Unfortunate bully mentality.
Team 10 - Yamanaka Ino
Kazuhiko Yuki- Second generation ninja. No unique techniques.
Yumeryu Pyon- Clan focuses mainly on genjutsu. Excellent at illusions
Huouji Sakasa- Uses clan jutsu to focus destructive chakra to hands.
Disclaimer: If I owned Naruto, what in the world would I be doing HERE?!
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Chapter 2
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"Ah, here are my adorable students now!" Lee-sensei burst out enthusiastically. All three glared silently.
"Adorable? What gives him the right to call me adorable? I'm not adorable. I'm fierce! Right Si?" Aya thought. Si however sulked and refused to answer.
"Adorable? Oh that is so weird. I hope my sensei isn't some kind of pedophile. I mean, the spandex and everything... but no. They would never let a pervert teach children," Kaito thought confidently.
"Hn," thought Renji.
"Before doing anything else, we should get to know each other better, so let's introduce ourselves! I am Rock Lee, Konoha's handsome blue beast! I love training, all food, and the beautiful Haruno-san! My goal --" here his silly, love-struck expression became devastatingly sorrowful, "Is to honor Gai-sensei's memory."
He stood silent for a moment, brooding, then snapped back to attention, his goofy grin back in place.
"You next!" he beamed, pointing at the Hyuuga. Renji gave him a glare that would have stricken a lesser man stone dead.
"My name is Hyuuga Renji," he began in a slow monotone voice. "I like training and getting stronger. My goal... is to... become the strongest Hyuuga ever!" he finished, losing his composure near the end. He sat back and folded his arms, regretting his outburst. Lee-sensei beamed and gave him what was commonly known as the "Nice Guy Pose." Renji shuddered.
"Now you!" he said, pointing at Aya. She echoed Renji's earlier poisonous glare, and reluctantly began.
"My name is Nekora Aya, from the Nekora clan. I like my swords and my cat, Si." Si made a rusty purring noise from behind her. "I don't like my clan being compared to those nasty Inuzuka's and their grungy dogs!!!" she spat, baring her pointy teeth. "My goal is to master all of my clans taijutsu and ninjutsu, and be the best ever at them!" she finished proudly.
Kaito squirmed painfully. More so than ever, he felt weak and insignificant. And now he realized he was boring!
"Now you!" Lee-sensei beamed at him. Kaito looked up at the round eyes of his sensei, and was surprised to see sympathy and understanding in them. In his teammates faces however, he saw only boredom and disdain.
He dropped his head, letting his sandy hair cover his eyes, and muttering quietly, introduced himself.
"My name is Owaru Kaito. I like pocky, I dislike Dango and...mean people. My goal is to become a good shinobi," he said as fast as he could.
"Very good! We are done for today, but we will be meeting here at five o'clock tomorrow morning for your genin exam!" Lee said happily.
"Lee-sensei, we've already taken our genin exams!" Aya objected.
"No no no!" Lee-sensei said sternly. Everybody stepped back in surprise at the sudden change. With his thick eyebrows drawn over his narrowed eyes, the disapproving look on his face, and his admittedly intimidating height, he looked practically frightening, green spandex regardless!
"No, that exam is designed to weed out those who have no chance at becoming shinobi." Here Lee-sensei's jaw clenched, and real anger sparked in his eyes. He composed himself quickly though.
"Tomorrow's test is the real deal, so come prepared. I'm not gonna go easy on you guys! Let the fire of your youth burn bright, and you cannot fail!"
And just like that, he disappeared.
Kaito didn't move as the others left, one stoic, the other muttering curse words. He was devastated. Another exam, presumably harder than the first?
He'd had such hopes too
He trudged home, his woes and sorrows taking the form of his own personal storm cloud, raining on him enthusiastically.
--
When they reached the training ground at five o'clock sharp the next morning, all three in various stages of not-awake, their eccentric sensei was nowhere to be found.
Slowly beginning to come out of her almost catatonic state, Aya took note of almost 20 piles of splinters and sawdust scattered around the field. She rubbed her eyes and stared at them blearily, wondering at their purpose.
"YOSH!" guess-who bellowed from behind them. All three jumped and screamed, even Renji. Kaito managed to notice that the normally stoic boy had an unusually high-pitched scream. He carefully filed that knowledge away as potential blackmail.
Composing himself quickly, and hoping the others had been too busy screaming themselves to notice him, Renji re-examined his new sensei, and once again found him lacking. The man was clearly a loss in stealth, he had to be over five feet tall, and with that green spandex and those orange leg-warmers, he must have been visible from a mile away.
"So what exactly is this test that we've heard so little about?" Aya asked, unimpressed with the extended silence.
Suddenly, both Lee-sensei's thumb and his big grinning face were invading her personal space. She backpedaled hastily.
"Excellent question Aya-san!" Lee-sensei bawled out. "The test is… To be able to strike me in hand to hand combat!" he declaimed happily. Kaito's head jerked up, wild hope filling his eyes.
"I will not attack or block, just dodge. If you manage to hit me, you pass!" Lee finished. His sparkling grin took up so much room on his face that his eyes were forced shut.
"That's it?!!" Aya cried out in disbelief. She hefted herself off the ground. "Piece of cake!"
But before she could take another step, Renji was in front of her.
"I will go first," he informed her. Aya huffed indignantly, but happened to catch a glance at Si, who had yet to wake up, and decided it was probably for the best.
Lee sighed in disappointment. They were already going about it wrong.
Renji stepped in front of Lee-sensei with a positively glacial scowl, and said in a spiteful voice, "You have no chance of dodging any of my attacks. No one can dodge the Hugo's Gentle Fist. You are wasting time for both of us." With that, he settled into his stance, and leapt forward.
Only to have Lee-sensei dodge the attack by leaning to the left. He didn't even have to move his feet.
Renji pumped more chakra into his fists and aimed a solid jab at Lee-sensei's stomach, who doubled over backwards, letting the attack sail over him harmlessly, and then snapped back into place. All without moving his feet once.
This continued on for a few minutes, Renji striking as fast as he could only to have Lee twist and contort like a snake with his feet firmly planted on the ground, leaving Renji sailing past him harmlessly.
Just barely containing his fury, he backed off. Forcing himself to calm down, he curved his hands into the familiar seal and shouted, "Byakuugan!" He had not thought he would need to use his bloodline.
"Eight trigrams, Sixty-four palm technique!" he called out, leaping forward. It was only thanks to his Byakuugan that he was able to even see a vague greenish blur as his sensei vanished. Then the blur entered his blind-spot. Panicked, Renji whirled around, but Lee-sensei moved too, staying firmly in his blind-spot.
How can he possibly be able to move that fast?! Renji wondered frantically, still spinning. Finally, he leapt away.
"How do you know about the Byakuugan's weakness?" he demanded, almost incoherent with outrage.
Lee-sensei bounced up, punching the air. "I know many things! Stoke the flames of your youth, and perhaps someday you might be as wise as me!" he cried dramatically.
Renji snapped. One minute he was using a correct, if slightly rough around the edges, taijutsu form. The next he was charging in wildly, swinging his fists. He was too enraged to even think of using chakra. All he could focus on was his desire to beat the moron in front of him into a bloody pulp.
"Not like Neji-san at all at this age. He was much more restrained." Lee-sensei murmured, frowning.
Further incensed by the mention of the man he was expected to live up to, Renji did something rather surprising.
"GRAWR!" he roared.
Lee nearly missed a step. In all his years, with all his close association with the clan, he had never seen a Hyuuga lose control of himself like this before. He had certainly seen Neji get angry before, and several times even enraged. But he most certainly had never roared!
Why is it that every single Hyuuga seems to have emotional problems? he wondered to himself.
"All right, that's enough Renji-kun." Aya called, seeing that Lee-sensei was holding Renji off with one finger on his hitai-ate, while the Hyuuga was throwing wild punches, none of which connected. He had apparently forgotten that he could have closed every tenketsu in his sensei's arm by now.
Renji gave Aya a glare angry enough to make her regret adding the suffix, and stomped over to throw himself onto the ground, clearly not in control of himself yet.
Aya took a moment to gather her thoughts, and decided to begin with a slightly extravagant form often used for intimidation.
She slowly began to stand up, her arms out to the sides, her legs unfolding. She looked eerily like a cobra rising from a snake charmer's basket.
Si vaulted in front of Aya, hissing and snarling, her fur puffed out until she looked twice her size.
"Dai Doko Henshin no jutsu!" Aya cried, flashing through ten seals.
In a burst of chakra smoke, Si disappeared. In her place was an oversized tiger. Her stripes were made up of the kanji for seals, the thinnest and most delicate script forming a light tracery on her face.
Aya took a running leap and landed gracefully on the tiger's back, simultaneously extending her finger claws. Despite the grace of her movements, sweat beaded her forehead from the strain of the jutsu.
"Well done Aya-chan! That is a very complicated jutsu and hard to master!" Lee-sensei praised.
Without acknowledging his praise, Si and Aya launched themselves into the air, all four sets of claws extended.
The plan was to catch him with Si's claws, while Aya pinned him in place (literally) with hers, and then cushion their landing on top of his body. It was a heavy damage move, and usually ended a fight. After seeing Renji's fight, Aya figured she had to pull out all the stops.
Unfortunately for her, the success of the move depended on actually being able to catch the opponent. Because suddenly, Lee-sensei was just not there anymore.
Si recovered splendidly and landed in a crouch, but Aya was weak from a lack of chakra, and was thrown from the tiger's back. She rolled to a stop on the grass, exhausted and dizzy from having landed on her head.
Her fight had lasted less than thirty seconds.
Lee-sensei's disappointed face loomed over her. "I hope you have learned your lesson about jutsus that require more chakra than you can spare!" he scolded. Then he gave her what he considered an encouraging smile, squeezing his eyes shut as his teeth twinkled. Aya shaded her eyes, squinting.
Si, once again a small black cat, scurried over and silently apologized. Aya scratched her behind the ears.
Kaito sat in the grass petrified. He couldn't do this! The Rookie of the Year, and their best kunoichi had both literally fallen on their faces before this man. And he had done nothing other than dodge!
Renji, who was already in a pretty foul mood, quickly tired of watching the lanky boy hyperventilate. "Do something, baka!" he hissed, giving him a good solid kick in the shoulder.
Kaito stumbled to his feet, giving the Hyuuga an indignant scowl. His expression of self-righteous fury held nothing on the patented Hyuuga glare however, and he ended up looking away sharply.
He walked over to Lee-sensei and sank into the basic academy taijutsu form. For a long tense moment he didn't move, eyeballing his sensei. Then he stepped out of his stance and walked back to the others.
"Give up already?" Renji sneered.
"No. But I need your help. Both of you." Kaito said seriously.
"And why in the world would we do that?" Aya asked disbelievingly.
Kaito looked at them steadily and said, "Because you'll also be helping each other. And I'll be helping you."
"We've already taken our turns though." Aya pointed out.
"Lee-sensei didn't say anything about only getting one chance. Hell, he didn't even say anything about taking turns at all!" Kaito exclaimed.
They hesitated further.
"Oh come one!" Kaito hissed, fueled by desperation. "With three of us attacking at once, somebody is bound to be able to lay a hand on him!"
Renji and Aya reluctantly followed Kaito, instinctively forming a circle around Lee.
Rock Lee was of course, ecstatic. His students had finally figured out the purpose of his test! Unlike the infamous bell test, it wasn't nearly so hard to come to the conclusion that teamwork was needed, but it was by no means easy either.
Renji moved first, striking for a tenketsu on Lee's shoulder. Aya lunged for the tendons on the back of his knees with her swords. Kaito attempted to drive his palm into his sensei's stomach.
While he was excited by their new teamwork, this sudden bloodlust was a little alarming, especially Aya's determination to hamstring him. He gracefully back flipped out of danger. Naturally the three attacks collided.
Renji stumbled back, having received Kaito's hand to his stomach. However, he was not convinced it had been an accident after all. Kaito howled and fell back, nursing deep gouges in his shins, while Aya shrieked at Renji in fury for having (painfully) disabled her entire left arm.
"Such unyouthful language Aya-chan!" Lee-sensei cried out in shock.
Aya spit out a few more profanities, and as one, all the genin wannabes leapt towards him, Renji's hands glowing with chakra, Aya swinging the five swords still available for her to use, and Kaito stumbling and swearing.
The first to score a hit was surprisingly Kaito, and even more surprisingly, it was a total accident. His wounded legs had finally failed him, and just as he was pitching forward to land on his face, his forehead had bounced off of Lee-sensei's knee.
Everybody paused to stare at Kaito blankly.
"Sensei, does that count as a hit?" Aya inquired breathlessly.
"Yes, actually it does," Lee admitted. Both of the remaining children growled and sprang at him.
The next to score a hit, to Renji's eternal disgust, was Aya. In a wild slash to Lee's head, she had extended her claws further at the last second. It was a good strategy, so Lee allowed the tip of one blade to ghost across his cheek.
Just then, a pebble rocketed past his bowl cut. Kaito, unwilling to be thought of as a useless burden, was continuing to to help from the sidelines, flicking pebbles, although whether he was throwing them at Renji or Lee was hard to tell.
With Aya still occasionally jabbing at his ankles and Kaito throwing rocks, Renji was having a hard time getting in close enough, but he finally slid through Lee's defenses in a weird, crablike sliding motion and managed to brush his bicep with two fingers.
Leaping back ten feet and rubbing his now-sore arm, Lee called out enthusiastically, "Congratulations, you all pass!" Grinning and winking, he struck the famous nice-guy pose. However, they all felt too tired to shudder.
Leaning forward with his hands on his hips he continued. "Do any of you know why you passed?"
"Because we managed to hit you," Aya said in a straightforward tone.
"WRONG!" Lee-sensei bellowed. "If you had continued attacking by yourselves, no matter what happened you would have failed. So it is really thanks to Kaito-kun's youthfulness that you passed!"
Kaito was instantly pinned between twin glares.
"That was the object of the lesson today! THE YOUTHFULNESS OF TEAMWORK!!!" he roared. His voice echoed through the training field several times.
Lee struck his nice guy pose one more time, and announced, "Tomorrow will be a training day! Show up here, at five o'clock! If we do well, then the next day will be a MISSION!"
And then he promptly vanished.
"I'm not looking forward to tomorrow," Kaito muttered, as they began to drag themselves home, painfully in his case.
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AN: My favorite part is at the beginning, where Kaito decides that perverts would never be allowed to teach children. Ahem, Kakashi and Jiraiya, please stand up!! :)
p.s. What do you guys want to hear about more, Naruto's trials as Hokage, Lee's new genin team, or an equal mix of both?