Chapter 4 The Mission Briefing Part 3

To say Lee was excited was an understatement, he was being given his first mission as a Chuunin, and the Hokage specifically requested him only from his team. While the thought of doing a mission alone gave Lee a bit of a scare at first, he also was overwhelmed with excitement. He would truly be able to make Gai-sensei proud when he completed his mission. Lee was so caught up in his thoughts that he did not see the moving tower of papers he was charging towards and collided with a loud crash, Scattering the papers all around the hallway. Joining the papers was a slightly dazed Sakura from the collision.

'W-what the hell ran into me?!' Sakura quickly regained her composure on the floor and looked around agitated at all the papers she would have to pick up yet again from the mess in Tsunade's office.

"Sakura-san, I am so sorry." Lee spoke offering his hand to help her up.

She accepted and extinguished her frustration with an agitated sigh, "That's ok Lee-san, but please watch where you're going next time." Sakura said, her voice rising slightly at the end in annoyance.

"Here let me help, as a way to apologize." Lee said while rolling his sleeves.

Sakura wasn't looking at lee at the time, "That's ok Lee-san I said it was all…right." She stopped and slightly gaped at what she saw. Lee was removing thick weights that were bound to his arms, placing them on the ground with a noticeable mini tremor that Sakura felt from her feet.

'Holy Crap...'

"Just place your arms like this-"

Lee motioned his arms in a way suitable for carrying this many papers while continuing, "-and ill re-pile them for you. It will only take a minute, any longer and I will do 2000 push ups while balancing a stack of papers on my back!"

Sakura honestly didn't know what to say, but did as instructed and murmured a 'thank you'. Within not even a minute, or in Lees mind, 57 seconds, all the papers were placed back in a pile in Sakura's grasp.

"Thank you Lee-san." Sakura said, still astounded by the speed.

"It is a pity you cannot perform ninjutsu lee-san, you would honestly have a seal forming speed that would make Kakashi-sensei look like a slouch." Sakura stated giving a soft smile.

It was then that she noticed the Chuunin Vest Lee was wearing, "You're a Chuunin now? That's great! Congratulations Lee-san." Sakura said giving a more widening smile. Lee was slightly embarrassed from the constant praising while placing back on his wrist weights.

"Thank you Sakura-san, however I feel I am the one who should be giving praise, you after all are the main reason I made it." Sakura almost dropped her papers when she saw Lee bow in respect, "Thank you."

Lee unlike many of the others, failed the following chuunin exam, despite him making all the way to a draw in the final matchup. It was an unfair calling by the judge as to why Lee didn't pass. Tsunade offered him a chance to have a special case examination, which required him to complete missions to demonstrate his abilities to be given exemption from the first two exams.

Sakura had been with him on every one of those missions, since Tsunade had assigned her as his examiner, "...Your welcome Lee-san. What are you doing here anyway?"

"I was just on my way actually to see Hokage-sama to receive my first mi-"Lee cut off his talk when his eyes widened to a realisation, he now was running late.

"Oh no I'm late!, sorry Sakura-san but I had better hurry." Sakura nodded, knowing very well how angry her sensei was when people were late.

But before Lee could departure Sakura looked once again at the now concealed weight wrist straps and her brain began to tick. Such speed like that, was such a thing she desperately needed.

"Lee-san, please forgive me for asking, but when you come back from your mission, could you possibly give me a few recommendations on a starting set for those weight wrists? I would really appreciate that, since Kakashi-sensei has been telling me in spars that I desperately need to improve my speed."

Lee gave his own miniature version of the nice guy pose, "Absolutely Sakura-san, but If I'm gone for too long, feel free to ask Gai-sensei, he knows much more than me." Sakura paled, while Lee was somewhat calm at times, Gai was downright crazy and personally freaked her out. Shaking her head she quickly stuttered her reply.

"N-no! Its fine ill wait for you to come back, good luck on your mission Lee-san." Lee waved and then continued his self proclaimed race to Tsunade's office, leaving behind Sakura looking down at the papers in her hands and letting out a groan.

Shikamaru sighed in his seat as Tsunade finished her briefing on the mission. "This mission is probably going to be very troublesome, considering he hasn't been in Konoha a long time I will have to evaluate his new found abilities if he has any new ones that is." Tsunade nodded in agreement to Shikamaru's plan.

"That would be a smart thing to do indeed, according to the last letter I received, he has become very different than when he left the village."

At this Shikamaru snorted, "I have a very hard time believing that." Tsunade couldn't help but chuckle.

Before the conversation could continue there was a loud knock at the door.

"Enter." Tsunade announced.

The door opened revealing Rock Lee, the expression on his face left Tsunade confused, but was soon answered by his quick bow, "Apologies Hokage-sama on being late, I accidently had a run in with Sakura-san and helped her pick up some reports she had to fill out. It was my fault." Tsunade almost burst out laughing but a small snicker was all that escaped.

"That's fine Lee, although I must say I am VERY disappointed in our newly promoted Chuunin, that he can't even be punctual for his first mission that's above C rank as a chuunin. I thought your sensei was Gai, not Kakashi." Shikamaru couldn't help but smirk at the reaction Lee was giving from that clearly playful tease from Tsunade. Lee had noticeably paled and his eyes had gone wide. Before Lee could say anything, Tsunade had waved her hand dismissively and let out a light laugh.

"Don't worry Lee, your actually earlier than I expected. The run in with Sakura is partly my fault anyway." Shikamaru was about to snicker but suppressed it when he felt Tsunade's glare upon himself.

Lee was clearly confused by what was going on, but chose to not pursue it further, "You wished to see me about a mission, Hokage-sama?"

Tsunade quickly went to her official Hokage act, "Yes, I have picked you specifically for a special B Rank mission. The rest of team Gai is being assigned on another mission that doesn't require the full strength of a four man cell." Lee couldn't help but wonder what kind of mission his team was going on.

Almost as If Tsunade heard his silent question she responded, "They are going on a C rank scouting mission across the border of the fire country, where Neji's byakugan will be most useful."

Lee's mouth hung slightly open, but he quickly recovered himself, "I see, but what about Tenten? She has more experience than me as a Chuunin."

Tsunade raised an eyebrow at his modesty, "Oh? While that is true she has been a Chuunin for over several months, I thought it would only be fair to give you a chance at a high ranked mission, but if you want me to reconsider I'm sure-"

"N-No! Sorry Hokage-sama please continue."

Tsunade couldn't suppress the smirk on her face, 'So predictable, just like a certain gaki.' her mind thought.

"Now where was I? Oh yes...We have received a mission from the Wave country requesting for protection of their finally restored village." Lee looked down at the floor deep in thought, and then brought his gaze up looking at Tsunade wondering if it was ok to ask a question.

Judging by Tsunade waiting patiently for him to acknowledge, he asked away, "Isn't that the same country that Naruto-kun's team saved from Gato?"

Tsunade nodded, "Indeed, since you seem to know about the mission, I assume you know the result of the mission."

Lee pondered for a moment before nodding, "Hai, Gato was killed by Momochi Zabuza, and his gang of thugs were chased out of the village from the rallied up citizens." impressed by the Chuunin's knowledge Tsunade gave a small smile.

"Yes that's right, however, Wave has been receiving threats again from Gato's organization. It appears somebody else has taken over, while we don't have any actual identification at the moment, we have his name or alias at least, he refers to himself as osoreoni, or demon of fear."

It was then that Shikamaru decided to add his bit of information. "Judging by this so called alias, I am leading to numerous possibilities about the personality or traits of their new leader. The top three being he is either just a typical thug trying to intimidate people, or he is a skilled shinobi in the arts of sealing and/or genjutsu."

"Why would he be sealing master or genjutsu specialist?" Tsunade asked raising an eyebrow at Shikamaru's theory.

"If I recall right there are seals that can indeed be used to contact spirits to aid a shinobi in battle." Shikamaru hesitated slightly but continued.

"During the attack on Konoha, Sandaime used a forbidden seal to call forth the spirit called 'shinigami' to devour a portion of Orochimaru's soul."

Tsunade winced at the memory, but ushered Shikamaru to continue, "In saying that, Orochimaru also used forbidden jutsu's to revive the deceased previous Hokage's. Following this I don't see how it could be too farfetched for there to be more spirits out there that can be summoned, and maybe this 'demon of fear' is one of them."

Shikamaru paused briefly flickering a quick gaze between the two other people in the room, surprised to see that Lee was showing signs of understanding his theory, maybe he underestimated the miniature Gai's intelligence by placing him in comparison to a certain blond knucklehead. He was more than interested when Lee decided to add his own input.

"Genjutsu would aid this person as well since he would be able to fool people into believing they are seeing an actual demon when in actual fact it's nothing real."

Both Tsunade and Shikamaru nodded, Tsunade fixed her gaze to Shikamaru, "What is your third possible theory on this demon of fear's identity?" Shikamaru sighed scratching the back of his neck briefly before answering.

"There is a chance that maybe this person is related to Gato personally, and is taking over the business so to speak via inheritance. Do we at all know if Gato had any family?"

Tsunade briefly looked out her window in thought then turned back to Shikamaru, "I'm honestly not sure if he did, I had read over Kakashi's report of that mission before summoning both of you earlier and found nothing, but that idea doesn't sound too unrealistic either."

Tsunade gave the theories a run over in her head before deciding to continue with the briefing, "The both of you will be travelling to Wave together, once you have arrived you will make contact with Uzumaki Naruto who will be waiting for you around the border of the bridge outside Wave."

At this Lee's interest perked, "Naruto-kun will be joining us? But isn't he training with Jiraiya–sama and not meant to return to Konoha for another half a year?" Lee asked, although he could not contain that bit of excitement in his voice. Lee and Naruto saw each other as rivals in a way after what happened with Sasuke, and had numerous spars before he left for his training, the thought of catching up with Naruto again earlier than expected would indeed be great, even though it was for a mission.

Lee was dragged out of his thoughts by hearing Tsunade sigh, "Well you see APPARANTLY, Jiraiya said he has some...important matters to handle, and he doesn't want Naruto around to deal with. Seeing as he found out about this mission and the information we have so far, Jiraiya decided to include Naruto as a mandatory team member for this mission."

'I swear, if this is just all part of some plan for your 'research', I will beat you to death the next time I see you.' Tsunade mused in annoyance to the frog sannin, but didn't share with the two Chuunin.

"Shikamaru will be leading this team, if by chance assistance is needed at all, Naruto has been instructed by Jiraiya to use a toad to send a message back to us for requesting reinforcements. I wouldn't want to send too many shinobi out in case this entire incident is a mere bandit situation. Especially since we are quite low on available shinobi at the moment due to numerous missions, while the payment we received for this mission covered B rank, the honest truth told to us by our client is that the mission can be anywhere from C ranked up to possibly A ranked."

"Will we need to make contact with the client?" Shikamaru asked.

Tsunade shook her head, "Naruto knows the client personally from Team 7's first mission, and he already has made contact and gathered all the information you will need. If you need to speak to the client once again because the gaki forgets, I'm sure you will know what to do." Tsunade said, chuckling lightly at the end of the last part.

Shikamaru had one more question on his mind but he had a feeling he knew the answer he was going to receive, "Hokage-sama, I would like to make a request on an additional team member on this team for this mission."

Tsunade raised an eyebrow but nodded her head to signal Shikamaru to continue, "While I am aware you already said you are short on number of available shinobi. For a mission that carries a very large risk of potentially becoming extremely dangerous we are missing a very vital team member. While it is a smart idea to have a team consisting of a tactician, and two very strong offensive fighters, what is the use if one of us, namely Naruto and Lee here get badly injured or worse, poisoned? As team leader I am responsible for their lives, and I know that we are simply too far from Konoha to get a rapid response rescue if something did happen. What I am asking is that a medical Nin is added to the team."

Tsunade sighed, she knew very well that Shikamaru would ask this, especially considering what happened to his best friend, Chouji and Neji and even Naruto during his first Chuunin mission. Tsunade also knew he was right, and didn't want to have that mistake happen again, "Alright Shikamaru, I know who I would trust with such a task...and chances are she is going to be very thankful for it since you just saved her from paperwork which will be coming back to ME again."