Challenges

Disclaimer: This is a purely fan-made piece that is using the world and characters from Masashi Kishimoto's Naruto and is made entirely for enjoyment. No financial gain has been made in the making of this piece

Summery: Lee confuses Suna

Author's Note: Possible out-of-characterness

Constructive Criticism is always welcomed

Published: 4 February 3008

Rating: K

Suna didn't quite know what to do when Kohona sent an escort to their village for a diplomatic talk and a show of good faith. It wasn't because Kohona wasn't serious about keeping the peace or that the escorts were bad ninjas; it was a matter of the fact that Rock Lee was on the team.

In a village of close-mouthed and stoic killing machines, Lee did not fit. He was loud. He sparkled. He refused to put on any drab and sensible colours. He sobbed noisy manly tears over strange things. He trained during the hottest part of the day. He wore spandex andlegwarmers in the desert

When he had come to the village with Kurenai, TenTen, Neji, and Chouji, everyone else had bowed and murmured a respectful 'Kazekage-sama' when they meet Gaara. Lee, on the other hand, made the entire village twitch. Ignoring the fear and respect that should be shown to someone like Gaara, he had grinned a big shiny smile while sticking his thumb out. He cheerfully announced that Gaara had grown more Youthful and Strong since the last time he had seen him and called Gaara his 'Rival'. He then proceeded to give Gaara a huge, bone-crunching hug.

Convinced they'd have another war because some empty-headed jounin who wore too much green and orange got pulverised on the Kazekage's front steps for hugging GAARA OF THE DESERT, the Sand's ANBU were already moving in to pull the other Konoha Ninjas out of way to minimise the damage when Gaara simply said "Lee. You're squishing me."

There was no blood, no crazed anger, no massive amounts of carnage; just a simple 'you're squishing me'. Every Suna ninja within hearing distance stopped and stared

Lee—seemingly not realising how close to being mauled he had been—boisterously apologised and announced that for causing Kazekage-sama discomfort, he would run around—

The Suna ninjas couldn't believe it when Gaara interrupted Lee. "Don't call me 'Kazekage-sama' again," he said flatly.

The head of the Interrogations then ordered all of the food that Gaara had eaten be examined fully for anything that could possibly be altering Gaara's moods or thought processes. She also got the resident therapists in to observe him the rest of the afternoon to see if he might be cracking and if he would try to destroy the village in the upcoming minutes.

The next day, the desert village nearly had a heart attack when during breakfast (after he had run around Suna one hundred times backwards as a light warm-up), Lee merrily asked Gaara if he wanted to spar that morning. It didn't help when Lee declared that if he couldn't land the first hit on Gaara, he would perform five hundred crunches on an incline.

One elder really did have a heart attack when Gaara agreed.

Suna had its strongest and most reliable ninjas strategically placed around the field to first, get that stupid, moronic, brain-dead Konoha ninja out of there and second, to contain Gaara. Numerous members of the council started drafting eight different official and diplomatic apology letters as well as formal statements to be issued. When the shit hit the fan—damn it—they were going to be ready to do all they could to stop a complete and utter diplomatic fall-out.

Nobody believed it when Lee not only landed the first hit, but walked away from it. Mutters and frightened glances were thrown at the Leaf Ninja when he left the field—with Gaara following looking as un-murderous as Gaara could.

Experts were brought in to see if there was some sort of jutsu involved.

Kankuro, Temari, and Baki were all grilled about Gaara's habits so it could be ascertained whether or not the Gaara who was trailing behind the crazy and unnatural jounin was really their Kazekage.

Not that the older two siblings were much help. Kankuro had shrugged and made numerous flippant comments about how 'fuzzy-brow' felt it was his personal duty to challenge everything, alive or dead. Temari had threatened them with painful rearranging of their bodies if they interfered with Gaara's 'friendship' with Rock Lee.

The idea of Gaara having a 'friendship' with anyone—much less somebody as annoying and loud as Rock Lee—was physically painful for the council. More experts were brought in to see if Lee could possibly be using those scent-based drugs to influence the Kazekage.

Lee, in the meantime, insisted that Gaara try his curry.

The council nearly ripped out its hair (those that had it, at least) when the Kazekage not only tried it, but then insisted that Lee show him how to make it.

After the third cooking lesson and the twenty-eighth sparring match, Suna was forced to come to the possibility that, maybe—just maybe—Rock Lee had something that no other ninja could compete with and perhaps the man wasn't entirely a bad thing for their village, even if hedid wear legwarmers all the time.

x Fin x