I've Told You Before, If You Die, I Will Die By Your Side:: GuyLee Yaoi Fanfic:: One-shot

Disheveled and panting, a worn out, tired Rock Lee lay on the floor of his dojo. Wide, circular, onyx eyes glared endlessly at the rafters as his chest heaved, trying to inhale and exhale at a steady pace, breathing seemed to be the most difficult thing for the thin nin.

"Lee, are you okay?" The voice was easy and steady, not so much pitchy and confidence-filled. There were times when Guy could show generous concern, and actually express things in a serious manner. These were times he usually shared with his student.

"Sumimasen, sensei…" It was hush, and the breathy way that the youngling said it expressed a point of disappointment, most likely within him. The slight twitch in his lower lip and the slight twitch of his eyebrow signified a slight tinge of annoyance and a light sign that the raven haired boy may or may not start crying.

"What are you sorry for, Lee?" This usually took awhile. Lee wasn't really straight forward with his true emotions a lot of the time. Lee always played the esteemed, peppy, and happy-go-lucky child for everyone around him, because he knew that it gave them some sort of confidence, which gave himself the false-sense of confidence that would linger until he no longer felt good about himself. The one thing that Lee couldn't fake was his will, and his ninja-way. Lee was always trying to get better, and by getter better, he tried to get better at anything and everything, so that he could make up for the fact that he couldn't perform proper genjutsu or ninjutsu. His own lack of ability seemed to make him stronger, not just physically, but emotionally.

But still there was no answer. This is how it usually went. Lee would have these type of days, the days where he couldn't get up, and he couldn't even bring himself to talk to anyone. Those were the days when the young taijutsu-master crumbled down emotionally. Heck, the kid was lucky he was still alive after the fight he had in the Chunin Exams with Gaara. His days as a ninja had almost been lost before, and he's proven that it wasn't his time to give up on several occasions, whether it was doing something to please his teammates, the village, or his beloved sensei.

"I'm broken, sensei."

The bandages that were around his arms were unwound, and splayed across the wooden planks on the floor, his eyes were hardly open, his leg was bent in a slightly odd position, and his lips were slightly parted. Lee had a problem with his leg, it would always kink in the other direction when he'd lay down, or fall down. Besides the fact that his armbands were disheveled like the rest of him, he wasn't wearing his tight ivy spandex garments, or his neon orange leg-warmers. A white shirt, and a pair of black spandex was what he wore, besides his ninja-shoes, his weapon pouch, and his headband, which was oddly strapped around his forehead.

After not receiving an answer for at least a few minutes, the obviously older male, who was also his teacher, made his way over to his student. Kneeling besides his broken doll, he scooped up the lithe, well-muscled teen in his arms, sitting down crisscrossed on the floor, his trainee in his lap, supporting the back of the younger male's head with his arm, and his legs with his other arm. With a sigh, he softly stated,

"You seem to be lacking your usual vigor." The response this time was almost immediate.

"Sensei, you do not understand." Murmured the raven-haired teen beneath his breath, before he rested the side of his head cozily onto his educator's chest, seemingly almost asleep, he then hoarsely asked, "Why did this damned war have to spare me of all ninja, yet take away someone who mattered more? This war was evil, and only left those who were of lesser value. It should have consumed I instead, Neji should have lived…it should have been I…"

Everything had changed after the death of his team-mate, Neji Hyuga. Though the two didn't really get along in the slightest, they were still team-mates, and Lee had somewhat looked up to the older male in a way. Neji was everything that Lee wasn't. Neji was the prodigy of his clan, a master of taijutsu, ninjutsu, and genjutsu, and wielded the Byakugan, he was skilled compared to Lee, he had even had the eye of the female that Lee had a crush on when he was still a Genin, Ten-Ten. Lee was a shinobi who could only use taijutsu, not even good enough to be able to use genjutsu or ninjutsu, he saw himself as pathetic sometimes. He used to think that maybe he could be the best shinobi, even though he could only use taijutsu, he thought that he could surpass everyone else. But after the war, he learned that the tides had changed. Everyone was getting better than him, or that he was just swindling down into the depths of disaster. He felt useless at this point.

"Don't you dare ever speak those words, Lee." That was a command. That was also a command that Lee was going to have troubles following. His forehead had settled against the forehead of his student's, closing his eyes tiredly. Whenever they were in this type of position, where Guy was holding him in that way, he could always smell him. Lee smelled of cinnamon, spice, and juniper, the forest seemed to linger onto him.

Empty tears slid down the beige cheeks of the youth, his fingers lightly traveling up to find their ways to his sensei's neck, lightly wrapping his lower arms around the slender neck of his educator.

"Please do not leave me alone again…not as long as you did this time…" His voice held a plead in it, and it seemingly held a hush whimper behind it, as if his throat was trying to hold in audible tears.

"I'll try not to…I can't guarantee it…I'm a ninja, just like you are…I can't control what missions I go on." That had a sense of truth to it, given that he could never decline a mission without some sort of punishment.
"Fine, then I want to go with you, whatever mission you need to go on, I will go with you." Insisted the skinnier boy persistently, his eyes begging for the answer to be positive, though his eyes wouldn't receive what they were begging for.

"Lee, you can't go on missions…" The words were difficult to say to the once beautifully youthful male. Now he had been confined to the quarters of his dojo. The results of the war had taken a toll on the large-browed male, leaving him with a crippled foot, which didn't allow him on missions any longer. Now the younger male could only train and train, though with no hope to ever be able to go on a single mission again in his life. He was growing skinnier, and quieter as the days rolled by. He was beginning to look sickly.

"I don't want you to ever leave me again!" This time he cried out. That was rare of the usually well-contained young-man. Shaking his head violently, he continued,

"I want you to watch over me, like you used to do, and take care of me, and spend time with me all day, like we used to. I don't care if you treat me like a child or a full grown shinobi, it doesn't matter anyways because I will never fulfill my wanted role as a ninja because the war took away my foot forever! I don't want to be alone when I day! One day I'm going to die and you're going to be on a mission. Nobody would care anyways, because I don't save them anymore, and they don't see me do anything anymore because I'm a crippled, disgusting teenager who can't even do anything by himself anymore!"

This outburst surprised his mentor, his lover. Carefully, he lightly rested his fingers on the chin of his student, lightly tilting his head backwards in the slightest, and lowered his head down to meet the younger's. Pressing his lips chastely to the pair of his lover's, his glided his lips easily and lovingly, trying to soothe the hurting male.

Whimpers filled the pure kiss. Tears streamed down the other's face, pooling at his chin for moments to come, though leisurely slithered down his neck after a slight build up.

Drawing his lips vigilantly away from the other's, the older man hushed tenderly,

"Don't cry…I'm not worth your tears."

Baffled, the teary-eyed ex-ninja blinked, flabbergasted at what his lover had just said. Though, he couldn't let himself believe what he had said, because it couldn't be true, at least not in his mind. The arms that were faithfully drawn around the back of his former –teacher's neck locked on sturdier, and he brought himself up, so that he was now sitting in his lap instead of laying. With that completed, he swung around leisurely and straddled the older man, placing his forehead against the other's.

"I don't care if you say that you are not worth my tears. You are worth my tears. You mean everything to me, and I am not sure if you understand that to the fullest. You already know that I would die for you, that I would willingly sacrifice my own life for your's. Do you not see how much I devote my own being to you? Can you not process the clear and obvious fact that I love you, no matter what you do to me?"

His voice was quiet, yet firm. He was trying to get a point across. Tilting his head to the side rather carefully, he planted another firm kiss on the lips of his former-educator, allowing his hands to slither up to meet the back of the familiar neck, lovingly caressing the wisps of hair that draped down on the back of his neck. Though the hair was only the slightest bit there on the back of the neck, it was still enough for Lee to express his emotions in a simple way. And again, he made a separation between their links,

"Just….do not leave me…" His fingers clutched at the slippery green fabric of the full-body spandex that the older male wore, his fingers trying to find a way to cling there, scraping endlessly against the rubbery material. If her had nails then maybe it would be possible for him to clutch the material firmly.

"I know you don't want me too, Lee. I'm stated already…it's not my choice." It was hard to tell the adolescent "no". "No" was a foreign word at one time, when Lee was still a ninja, and still fully mobile. A refusal never pleased Lee in any way, shape, or form. It just didn't work.

"Let us face it, Guy-Sensei, I am going to die one day and you are not going to be there for me when I leave. I will be by myself when I perish. Ten-Ten would not care, she is still grieving for poor-old' Neji," There was spite within his voice, as if he was angry about Ten-Ten's undeniable love for the deceased Hyuga, "And who is there else to care? Sakura-chan has already confirmed the fact that she dislikes me greatly, Naruto is the Hokage and busy, Gaara already made it a factor which lead up to the incapability that I have now…and you'll be away, in some other village, not a care in the world…"

"Lee, please stop speaking like that!" There was a growl hidden in the back of the words, though it was hushed compared to the actual yell, If you need me to say it one thousand times, I will, but I do love you! You're hurting me with these words! How do you not understand that I love you and never want to leave you! It is not my choice! If I could spend my nights with you for the rest of my life, I would, I have to take care of the village too though."

The ex-ninja shook his head slowly before saying quietly, "You can retire…" He was trying to think of any possible way to have his sensei stay with him, "You…you can stay with me after you retire…and we can live a peaceful time in the times of peace…Ten-Ten doesn't need you anymore, she has herself…she's probably going to retire as well…please…think about it…stay with me…"

He himself couldn't believe that he was asking his own former sensei to quit his life as a ninja. I am so….selfish.

"Lee…."

Why couldn't the child take a simple 'no' for an answer? But…he loved him so much.

"And Lee…if you are to die in this process, just know that I will die right next to you."

"Lee…I will retire for you, and stay by your side…I promised you once that I would die by your side…I will not go back on my word. This will be my new ninja way. You are my ninja way."

With that, the older male wrapped his arms tightly around the younger male, falling gently onto his back on the dojo floors, nuzzling the top of his head, burying his nose into the silky raven strands of hair. He loved his little Lee with all of his heart.

"I've told you before, if you die, I will die by your side…"