Naruto Fan Fiction ❯ We Call These 'Tweezers' ❯ 2 ( Chapter 2 )

Raven: (Stretches) Aa. That was good.

 

Dib: Everyone report to the theater to continue MSTing

 

All: I knew it was too good to be true.

 

(In ta theater)

 

"You can help Lee discover a new inner self, and bring it to the surface, to show his inner beauty without! I know this is something you can do, Neji!"

The Hyuuga hesitated, realized there was no way around it, and finally managed, "Okay..."

"You would do that?" Lee asked him, incredulously.

"Ah..."

"Not yet," Gai interrupted, suddenly serious. Lee and Neji looked up, a little put off by his odd tone of voice. That is to say, Lee was a little put off by his tone of voice, while Neji was a lot put off by the situation in whole.

 

Raven: I feel for ya, Neji…

 

"What is it, Gai-sensei?" Lee asked after it was obvious that Gai was waiting on the question.

"Lee, before Neji can help you with this, you have to ask him for his help. You can't just take it for granted that he has to help you when you need it."

 

Ed: (As Lee) Like when the unicorns come to haunt my dreams again?

 

Gaz: (Ditto) So many unicorns…

 

Lee stared at him, aghast. Did Gai not realize that he was telling him to ask his eternal rival for help in doing something he wasn't entirely sure he wanted to do in the first place? Did Gai think for a second that it was entirely possible for Rock Lee, the beautiful green beast of Konoha, to beg for help from some fate-centric, albeit, in his own, conventional way, also beautiful, Hyuuga?

 

Tenten: Gai never said anything about begging…

 

"Ah... he doesn't have to," Neji put in helpfully.

 

All: GO NEJI!!!!!

 

"Nonsense," Gai said firmly. "Lee, that is your new mission. Before the day is out, I want for you to ask for help from your teammate. After all, if you can't ask favors from your own team, how can you manage to work well together when it really counts?"

 

Ed: Like when you're tryin' ta-

 

Raven: (Covers Ed's mouth) PARENTS!!!

 

"But..." Lee frowned, but couldn't find a flaw in his master's logic. Very well, then. This was just another challenge and should be approached like the hurdle it was. After all, the rock had missed the telephone pole, hadn't it? So nothing too horrible would possibly go wrong. "Very well."

 

Gaz: You wish.

 

He would have to deal with it. It was just another obstacle in the race towards love.

 

Toboe: WHO'S love?

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It was midafternoon before he'd worked up the courage to ask Neji

 

Raven: To go to the prom with him.

 

for help.

His eternal rival was walking home from lunch with Shikamaru and Kiba, looking a little worn out from his training earlier but not overly worse for wear.

 

Toboe: If he thinks Lee is annoying, why is he having lunch with KIBA? Not my Kiba, of course… Nevermind…

 

His hair was still immaculate and one could completely ignore the faint bags under his eyes, appreciating the fine lines of his face. Lee frowned. His rival had everything, it seemed, over him- a pretty face that girls seemed to swoon over and talent that he hadn't had to work his whole life for. That was why they were rivals, wasn't it?

 

Gaz: (Sarcastically) Nooo, it's because Tenten's dating Neji but you want her...

 

(Pause)

 

Tenten: HEY!

 

Gaz: (Snicker)

 

Lee hurried to catch up with him; Neji, sensing the awkward mood his teammate was in, slowed to a stop and waited.

 

Ed: For Lee to fall off a cliff so that he could jump down, save him and act all heroish

 

"You know, Lee, you don't have to ask," he pointed out, knowing full well what the response would be but knowing he had to say it.

 

All: YAY!!

 

Dib: Are you gonna cheer ever time Neji is “Sweet” to Lee in this?

 

Raven: You bet!

 

"I have to," Lee insisted, shifting from one foot to the other. "It's what Gai-sensei told me to do. I have to earn my date with Sakura-chan."

The Hyuuga sighed. "Of course you do," he said resignedly.

"Neji..."

The boy in question rolled his eyes unperceptively. "Yes?"

 

Toboe: How would you know if Neji rolled his eyes? HE HAS NO PUPILS

 

Gaz: (Stare) That's what she/he meant by “Unperceptively” even though it's not a WORD

 

Raven: Read between the LINES, fool!

 

Ed: (Snaps)

 

Tenten: (Stare) You're ALL stupid...

 

"Will you help me win over Sakura-chan?" Aside from a little stuttering on the first word the question was perfectly delivered, a fact that somewhat surprised both boys, who stood in silence for a second in the middle of the road, watching each other as though something unexpected had happened.

 

Raven: DON'T STAND IN THE MIDDLE OF THE ROAD, FOOLS!! YA WANNA GET RUN OVER?!?!

 

Gaz: There aren't and cars there...

 

Random Voice: (In the distance) Run away Horse Buggy!! Run for your lives!!

 

Raven: I rest my case.

 

Then Neji sighed again. "Come with me."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"What is that for?" Lee asked, pointing an accusing finger at the hair drier in Neji's hands. He reached up and brushed along the tight black cap of his hair. "My hair's not wet."

The Hyuuga sighed and plugged the hair drier in, turning it on low and pointing it down, at his hand, testing the warmth of the air. "This isn't for drying your hair, Lee. It's for... changing it."

"Changing it how?" the smaller boy asked, suspicion apparent in his voice. Neji sighed and lifted the nozzle, blowing the gentle stream of air onto Lee's bowl cut.

Nothing, not even a single hair, moved. It was like a caricature, like hair caught in amber.

Neji flicked the power onto medium. Nothing happened.

Neji flicked the power onto high. A dozen or so single hairs lifted into the air, danced half-heartedly, then fluttered back down into their exact original positions and froze still again. Neji stared in absolute disbelief.

 

All: (LTAO)

 

Raven: So much for Neji's Hyper-Sonic powered hair dryer!

 

Note: Inside joke.

 

"We're going to need more firepower," he said unnecessarily after a second of silence.

Ten minutes found them in the Hyuuga mansion back yard, aiming a roaring leaf-blower at Lee's head. The whole bowlcut of his hair was shifting around his head like a solid mass but not separating, to Neji's frustration. In fact, it took fifteen minutes of blowing and combing and poking before Lee's hair finally fell normally down to his earlobes, hanging in tangled disarray, then another hour or so of combing and a half gallon of hair spray before it was properly spiked and, in a strange way, oddly attractive.

 

Tenten: ...Where would NEJI get a half gallon of hair spray? I mean Hinata doesn't use hairspray...

 

(Silence)

 

All: (Laughing again)

 

And then it took another twenty waiting for Lee to stop sobbing in front of the mirror.

"My hair was perfect!" he cried out, his face buried in his hands. "Perfect hair modeled after the perfect shinobi; what happened to it?"

 

Gaz: It grew a fashion sense, decided you were a lost cause and ran away.

 

Neji closed his eyes, counted to five, and opened them again, reaching out a tentative hand to brush through the disarray he had made of Lee's hair. It wasn't quite long enough to look really good, but the improvement was obvious; hanging carelessly down to his earlobes, his hair swept haphazardly around his skull. "It looks better," he said, frankly.

At least that made the taijutsu ninja stop crying. Lee's fingers hesitantly followed his teammate's through the black mass. "Do... you think so?"

The Hyuuga thought back to the bowl cut and wondered if he could have made it look worse. "Yes." Figuring Lee would be fine on his own for a while, he got up and left the bathroom.

"Where are you going?"

"I have to find something."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

To say Neji was enjoying this... would have been an interesting thing to say. Because he wasn't enjoying himself; he was fighting against the demons of Lee's entire life, hair gel and misplaced facial hair and huge lower eyelashes under shapeless, colorless eyes. But on the other hand, there was something irrevocably satisfying about the whole affair, about wrestling that damned hair into something that looked presentable. And, with his new weapon held tightly in his hand, he felt ready to take on the rest of the job, ready to finish his latest mission.

 

Tenten: (Pouts) I can't get within five feet of Lee with a pair of tweezers without being tossed out the window...

 

Maybe fate had given Lee his current look, but fate also dictated the invention of what Lee would, with proper persuasion, someday regard as the greatest human tool ever created.

"What the hell are those?" Lee asked, sounding mortified and staring in horror at the frail metal jaws his teammate proudly presented to him.

"Lee," Neji said, sounding exasperated and anticipant at the same time, "we call these, 'tweezers'."

"Oh, god," Lee murmured in horror.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Neji looked up, irritated, and ran his fingers through his long hair, flipping stray locks out of his face. "You have got to stop crying," he said, rolling his eyes slightly as his 'eternal rival' looked up and glared at him through red, poofy eyes. "Honestly, Lee. It was about time."

 

All: (Dressed as cheerleaders, pompoms included) GO, NEJI, GO!!!

 

"My beautiful eyebrows," the taijutsu shinobi wailed, burying his face in his hands. "They were perfect!"

 

Gaz: Somebody got dropped on their head as a baby.

 

Dib: I TOLD YOU, THAT WAS AN ACCIDENT!!!

 

"They were huge!"

"Big but beautiful!" Lee was crying again, tears making little shiny tracks down his face. "And my eyelashes! What did you do to them?"

"I ripped them out." Hell would freeze over before he regretted it. In fact, he felt like he'd been holding his breath for the past two years and had only let it out just now, like he'd been waiting for this moment and now that it was here it was a huge relief. Dammit, he was still crying. "We're not done yet. Stop acting like you have tits, you idiot." Maybe Tenten would have kicked him for the comment, but to Neji, Lee was acting like a girl.

 

Tenten: I AM going to kick you for it... As soon as Raven gets around to fixing the transporter...

 

 

"You're not done yet?" The red face lifted from his hands and blinked swollen eyes at him.

Neji sighed again. He did that a lot around Lee- although, truth be told, the beautiful green beast of Konoha did look a lot better. Without the huge, square eyebrows he looked more human, and the loss of the lower lashes made him look more adult. His hair added to both, and somewhere inside of him, deep down, under all the squishy parts, a semi-attractive boy was wrestling to be freed. "Nope. Come on." He held a translucent blue case, roughly an inch and a half long, which he popped open in one hand while guiding Lee back into the bathroom with the other.

"What's this?" the taijutsu-ninja asked, trepidiciously, as if he wasn't sure he wanted to know.

"Contacts." Neji slid them into his teammate's hand.

Lee sounded ridiculously offended when he yelped, "My vision is perfect! I never miss when I'm in target practice with Gai-sensei and if you think your stupid Byakagen is that much better then-"

"Oh, for god's sake. They don't affect your vision, idiot. They change the color of your eyes."

"What's wrong with the color of my eyes!"

"They don't have one."

"You should talk!"

Neji grinned and flicked a lock of hair back behind his ear. "The white is sexy, and that's a quote," he said, simply, distractedly adding eyedrops onto the contacts. Looking up at his teammate in slight surprise, Lee couldn't think of a damn thing to say to that.

 

Raven: Yes... (drool)... White is very sexy...

 

Tenten: (Hits Raven on the back of the head)

 

"What color are they?" he asked after a second, in regards to the lenses.

 

Raven: Duhhhhhh... PINK!

 

All: (Laugh)

 

Note: `Nother inside joke.

 

"What color do you think they are? Put them in."

"How?"

"You just pick them up like this and... press them up against there."

"Oh my god!"

For somewhere around the thirteenth time- but who was counting?- Neji sighed in exasperation. "Here. Let me do it."

"No! I can do it- let go, Neji!"

 

Raven: (Shakes head) Bad images! BAD IMAGES! B-A-D I-M-A-G-E-S!!!!

 

"You're going to poke your eye out."

"Ow!"

 

Ed: Too late!

 

Five minutes had Rock Lee blinking profusely at the mirror, as if unable to believe that the plastic saucers were actually in his eyes. "Wow," he said after a second, looking left to right to make sure the contacts fit in his eyes- which they did. "They're green."

"No (Beep)." At least he wasn't crying. He might have been scared to.

"So. Are we done?"

"Almost."

The more-or-less happiness melted from Lee's posture. "We're not done?"

"No."

"What's left?"

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

 

Raven: Break time!

 

Dib: I-

 

Raven: Listen, I gotta pee. If you wanna stop me, you're going to have to tie me to the chair.

 

Dib: ... (Looks at glaring Raven) Okay, break time.