"All human actions have one or more of these seven causes: chance, nature, compulsions, habit, reason, passion and desire." –Aristotle

05: Desire

There was something different driving Neji's motivation. She could sense it in every exchange of blows. Sparring open-handed, she ducked under his arm and drove up, only to have her uppercut blocked by a forearm strike. Her breath came hard as she fought, but with mounting satisfaction she continued to hold her own, forcing him back on the defensive for a moment.

"You've been practicing," he complimented, fluidly dropping his center of gravity to kick out and sweep her feet from under her.

With a strangled outcry, Tenten thudded against the hard dirt of the training field. Gritting her teeth, she slapped the ground and rolled backward, propelling herself into the air. "I hate it when you do that!" she managed, gasping for breath.

"Take you down?"

"Talk while fighting!" Her last word became a yell as she threw a straight jab.

Ignoring the obvious feint, Neji tilted his head and let the punch fly past him, catching her right hand as it prepared to uppercut again. Ducking into her inner ring of defense, he absorbed her hasty knee to his abdomen with a grunt and used its energy to fuel his palm-strike to her chest. Even as he did and she flew back, her lips twisted in a pained grin.

Questioningly, he tilted his head, then glanced down to see a wire threaded around his neck. "Wha–?" And her momentum dragged him to the ground with her. Faster than he could react, Tenten scrambled atop him and pinned his body with her own, a kunai to his neck.

There was silence for a moment, broken only by their heavy breathing and the sound of the wind rustling through the trees. "I thought," Neji said finally, raising an eyebrow at her face only several centimeters away, "that we agreed not to use weapons."

"I cheated. I'm a ninja, after all."

"Ah." Closing his eyes for the briefest of seconds, his Chakra exploded, surprising her just long enough for him to wrestle the kunai from his neck and flip her over. Pinning both her hands with his own, he knelt atop her, his heavier weight restraining her more effectively than she had him.

Tenten tensed, then relaxed, knowing she couldn't break his grip. "I thought we agreed on no Chakra." Her chest heaved beneath him from exertion, and he abruptly rolled off her.

"I'm a ninja. I cheated." Without looking at her, he sat up and focused on catching his breath. Crossing his arms, he closed his eyes and inhaled slowly, trying to calm the way his heart had suddenly jumped in his chest. Assuming it to be dehydration, he reached toward the water bottle set neatly atop a flat rock.

Faintly, the sound of hammering drifted on the wind from the repairs being conducted in the village. As Neji had predicted, Konohagakure was rebuilding. Tenten sat up as the wind shifted, carrying the sounds away, and stared at his back. "Neji... can I ask you something?"

A glance over his shoulder was the only response she received as he raised the bottle to his lips, but she took it as consent. "Your match with Naruto... your fighting style changed right after that. Why?"

"What are you talking about?" His breathing under control, he turned to face her, resting his hands on his crossed legs and setting the bottle down again.

"You've become more..." she trailed off, trying to think of the word, then shrugged. "Gai-sensei would say 'hot-blooded'."

His eyes narrowed, but she pressed on. "Before you always just walked through training sessions, using your superior skill to overwhelm opponents. Now you're actually trying to improve."

He leaned forward, the rare small smile crossing his lips. "You noticed."

"It's difficult not to." With a self-depreciating laugh, she rubbed her chest where he'd struck her.

Glancing away, he shrugged. "Maybe that match brought something to my attention. Maybe our fates aren't as set in stone as I'd assumed."

"So, what does that mean for us?" Tenten shuffled around to peer at his face.

"I don't know," he admitted softly. "I'm still trying to figure that out."

"So you think... if you work hard enough... maybe the Hyuuga clan will acknowledge you as something more than branch family?"

He tilted his head back to look into the sky. "Maybe." Tapping his forehead with his thumb, he added, "This curse can't be removed."

"I kn–"

"But the protector said something to me. When I lost," he continued as if he hadn't heard her. Words tumbled from his lips like a confession, and his voice was soft enough that, if she hadn't known better, she would have thought he'd forgotten that she was there. "Something about how a bird can be caged, but once it knows how, it will open the lid of its basket with its own beak, for it desires to fly freely in the sky again."

Silently, Tenten stood and walked a few steps back to where she'd laid the massive scroll she used when training, the one that contained the signs for all her weapons.

Behind him, Neji heard her summon something. Sensing a thread of murderous intent like a subtle poison, he leapt to his feet and whirled, hands shooting up at the sudden glint of steel from a katana.

A soft smile adorned her lips as he caught her wrists above his head and stared questioningly at her, eyes flicking to the live blade in her hand. "Well," she whispered, leaning in to make sure he could hear her, her nose almost brushing his, "let's see about breaking that cage."