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Description
Hours passed, and they were becoming increasingly worried about Rock Lee.
Once, Neji had suddenly jerked his head towards the taijitsu expert without warning in mid conversation, causing Tenten to nearly jump out of her skin. As it turned out Lee’s arms had merely shifted in his sleep.
Another time, Tenten definitely thought that she’d heard him stir: he had mumbled something, she was sure of it. However, Neji hadn’t heard anything, and so for a good half an hour or so they had watched him in silence to see if he would speak again: not a peep.
Tenten’s mind was aflame with worry, horrible possibilities bouncing about the inside of her skull like bingo balls. What if he didn’t wake up? What if they were down here so long that he’d starve? Without food in his condition he would do nothing but grow weaker. When she’d voiced her concerns, Neji reminded her that the same was true of them, and that given the lack of food Lee’s state of consciousness was actually an advantage. That had stumped her for a while. She hadn’t even thought of that.
However Tenten had continued to plague an increasingly irritated Neji with hypotheticals about Lee’s health until he had threatened to ignore her for as long as they remained imprisoned if she didn’t shut up. So she did. For her revenge she considered irking Neji further by mentioning just how frequently his own eyes flickered to that darkest corner of the cell when he thought she wasn’t looking, but Tenten knew better than to call her team mate out on something that so closely resembled feelings.

As for Neji’s physical condition; that had greatly improved due to what Tenten considered to be a stroke of genius on her part. After watching her companion wince several times by attempting something so simple as to shift his arms, she’d had enough.
Neji twitched in surprise as, quite suddenly, Tenten had slid very close to his back and was tugging insistently on his skirt.
“What are you-“
“Just, turn around, would you!”
The shinobi silently obeyed, his chains clinking softly as he gingerly turned about on the spot to face Tenten, who was busy fumbling about her feet. She muttered a curse under her breath. The heavy shackles were making her job very difficult and her hands clumsy. At last, she had accomplished her task: Tenten had removed her shoes, now gripped tightly in her hands, and was watching him expectantly.
“Hands, please,” she said firmly. Neji quirked an eyebrow.
“What-“
“Neji!” she scoffed, dragging her knees across the floor until they bumped his. She patted her lap, ignoring the sudden heat creeping up her neck. “Come on: I think this’ll help. For now, anyway. Besides, I can’t reach over there.” She rang her chains for emphasis: she had indeed reached the end of her let. Eyeing her suspiciously, Neji hesitantly lifted his bruised wrists and gently placed his useless hands on the curve of her thigh.
Tenten set to work immediately, her mouth set in a firm line as she concentrated on bumping his injured limbs as little as possible. Despite her best efforts to keep her touch light and Neji’s to mask the pain, it didn’t take long at all before his hands were instinctively flinching away from hers. Tenten sighed impatiently, but didn’t look up.
“I’m sorry, I know it hurts. I’m nearly done.”
“Hn,” said Neji stiffly.
After a few more moments of muffled grunts of discomfort and mumbled apologies, Tenten sat back to admire the results of her latest brainwave: she had slipped Neji’s still-swollen fingers through the strap of her shoe, the stiff rubber sole extending behind his palm and thus bracing his wrist. She had done the same with the other.
Neji carefully lifted his hands back into his lap. He flexed his fingers, testing. Then he looked up at Tenten with wide eyes.
“I would have strapped them up with, uh, part of my sleeve or something,” babbled Tenten, rubbing her nose with the back of her hand so that she didn’t have to look at him. “But I don’t know when she’ll be back, and then we wouldn’t be able to unwrap them in time before she got here and then she’d probably just take them off and destroy them or something and then we’d have nothing to use to keep your wrists straight, and I wouldn’t have any shoes which would be really annoying when we escape because what if I stepped in a puddle or something (that’d be horrible) or worse, stepped on something sharp: that could slow us down, but that point is that these should provide a bit of support for the bones so that they can get better faster and not cause you so much pain-“
“Tenten-“
“-but we’ll have to be quick when we hear that door go, because I think we’ve only got about thirty seconds to get them off again. In the meantime though I hope they help-“
“Tenten-“
“-and I’m so sorry: I’ve been studying those scrolls that Sakura gave me and she’s been trying to help me get the hang of this healing stuff, but it’s so frustrating! I’m just awful at it, and Sakura gets so sick of me sometimes-“
“Tenten-“
“-and then I’ll be reading them before training and you’re absolutely no help at all because you took one look at them and got it instantly and so now you’re the only one on this team with anything close to medical skills and it’s just so ridiculous because you can’t do a thing with your hands like this and if I was any better I could be so much more helpful and-“
“Tenten!”
The kunouchi’s mouth froze in a small “o”. Neji was glaring at her. And then she realised that he’d been trying to speak and she was mortified.
“Tenten, listen to me,” said Neji sternly. “You’ve been very helpful. Even if you could manipulate healing chakra, healing my wrists would do little good in the long run because our captors would notice, my wrists would probably be broken again and they would do goodness knows what to us as punishment. Your solution is ingenious. Thank you.”
Tenten blinked at him, quite taken aback. He was right, of course, but what had really stunned her was the smile. It had been small and brief, but right at the end of his speech he had really, genuinely smiled. She stared.
“You’re… You’re welcome,” said Tenten awkwardly. Neji nodded vaguely.

They had fallen into a comfortable silence after that.
Now, upon Tenten’s insistence, Neji was taking a well-deserved nap. Left alone to her thoughts, Tenten’s knees were drawn up to her chest, her chin resting atop her folded hands. She watched him absent-mindedly: his back was against the wall, his wrists (still in her shoes) aligned neatly in his lap. His head and since dropped to his chest, which rose and fell gently as he breathed. Tenten was pleased to see him sleeping so peacefully: it had been days, as far as she knew, since he’d last slept. After all, it had been on his watch that the real trouble had started.

The infiltration had been quick. After weeks of planning and gathering information, Team Gai’s appointed captain had finally given his rearing-to-go-already team the go.
“It’s still too soon,” muttered Neji that night as they crouched around the map spread out on the forest floor. He brushed aside the twigs and leaves that they had been using as markers. “We will go over the plan again.”
Tenten groaned aloud, rolling off of her haunches and onto her bottom.
“Neji, we’ve been over this a thousand times. I’ll be able to recite your entry and exit strategies in my sleep, let’s stop fretting about the colour of your underwear when we go in and just go in already!”
Lee nodded enthusiastically.
“Indeed! The time is ripe!” He sprung to his feet. “The sun has set, the enemy is unawares, and Team Gai is prepared to strike hard and fast, paralysing our foes with the vigour of our youth, and the beautiful forest green of our matching undergarments!”
“Lee,” said Neji coldly. “Sit down. We will each wear whichever underwear we choose to wear, and we will go over the plan until I am satisfied.” He whirled on Tenten. “And you will cease encouraging him, am I clear?”
Tenten pouted, folding her arms.
“Crystal,” she grumbled, her eyes fixed on her feet. “But you were the one who said we would go tonight in the first place. Make up your damn mind already…”
“Tenten,” fumed an exasperated Neji. “I am not going to explain myself to you again. We need to be absolutely certain of every detail of the enemy’s movements before we act. These are not people to be taken lightly!”
“But Neji!” pressed Lee. “Our most splendid team has a one hundred percent success rate, and that count includes those against stronger foes than these in which we’ve had no time to plan at all! I believe in the strength and abilities of my team mates to perform to the best of shinobi standards, and in our coherence as a team!” Lee leaned forward, his fists curled upon his knees as he kept his suddenly serious gaze on Neji.
“I agree,” said Tenten eagerly. “Lee’s right. You’re over-thinking this, Neji. It’s just a simple in-and-out retrieval mission. This is hardly a challenge for us.”
Neji snapped his head towards Tenten, eyes searching her face. She glared back at him. He seemed shocked, and, she noted, confused. She knew why: when it came to arguments Tenten nearly always had Neji’s back, and they would use their numbers to suppress Lee’s enthusiasm when it posed as a risk to the mission. In this instance, however, Tenten agreed with Lee, which had ultimately thrown off what Neji had naturally assumed to be his given advantage. They all knew the plan, and they were a top-class team picked for this mission for not only their separate skills as shinobi, but as Lee had said their ability to work together. Tenten could see no reason in further prolonging the inevitable.
“Now is as good a time as any, Neji,” she added, her features firming with determination. “I say we go.”
Neji glowered at her, but Tenten didn’t yield. Lee’s eyes snapped back and forth from one to the other, his brow slightly creased with surprise: he hadn’t seen his team mates disagree before. Yet still, Tenten knew that despite being appointed captain for this mission, Neji would not go against the majority of the team when there was no good reason to.
So Neji consented, albeit extremely unwillingly. And, brimming with what hindsight proved to be over-confidence, Team Gai vanished into the night.

Tenten groaned aloud, dropping her forehead to her knees. “I’m sorry,” she voiced a muffled apology into her pants. “You were right. You’re always right.”

She doubled over, clutching the ferocious stitch pulling at her ribs. That had been close. Closing her eyes, she leaned against the face of the cliff and waited. Tenten wasn’t surprised that she was the first to arrive at the designated meeting spot: in fact, she’d been expecting it. After all, everything was going according to plan. Though, she admitted with a shaky exhale, it had almost gotten rough near the end…
Tenten’s fingers weaved their way under the collar of her shirt, closing about a small, hard object hanging from her neck, reassuring herself that it was still there. It was: mission successful. And so she waited.
About fifteen minutes later, a flurry of movement in the trees to her left caused Tenten to start. Curling her fingers about a kunai and already preparing a scolding on sneaking up on people, Tenten jerked about to face a winded and very surprised Neji.
“Neji?” she spluttered, her stomach clenching with an extremely unpleasant kind of astonishment. Not good.
His eyes narrowed as he fought to regulate his breathing.
“Lee?” he asked breathlessly. Tenten shook her head, pocketing her kunai, and Neji spat a quiet curse.
“C’mon,” said Tenten firmly, pushing past him as she moved back towards the foliage, dragging her fingers over the scroll at her hip. “We’ve got to-“ Neji’s hand suddenly clenched about her upper arm, stopping her dead. Tenten rounded on him. “Neji!” she hissed accusingly. “If you think I’m going to let you have us sit by while-“
“You,” he said firmly. “Are going to stay here, while I retrieve Lee.” Tenten opened her mouth to object, but in one swift movement Neji had turned her around and pushed her back up against the cliff. His hands remained firmly on her arms, keeping her in place. The kunoichi gaped at him. He narrowed his eyes dangerously. “This is not up for discussion.”
“But-“
“That’s an order, Tenten! If I’m not back in five minutes take the scroll and go back to Konoha.”
Tenten wrenched her arms free from his, shoving his shoulder aside as she made to pass him again. This time, however, Tenten stopped of her own accord. She bit her lip. As ferocious as the adrenaline bubbling through her veins was, Tenten couldn’t deny logic: as she hesitated, it dampened the fire in her gut like a damp towel. She had the scroll and so couldn’t risk being captured, and as a long-range fighter she would be of little use in the retrieval of her friend anyway. Neji would strike quick and hard and be out of the fray in an instant. She glanced guiltily back at her team mate. He tensed, watching her warily, gaging her reaction. And really, if she had listened to Neji in the beginning, she thought glumly, they might not even be in this mess. After a moment’s pause, she nodded. Neji sighed in relief.
“Five minutes, Tenten.”
“Don’t be late,” she muttered, her eyes serious as she raised them to meet his. He paused for a brief moment, and then he was gone.

Tenten eventually grew bored of watching the ends of Neji’s hair flutter as he breathed, and again she found her eyes on the sorry pile of limbs that was Rock Lee. Her expression sobered instantly.

Three days.
Neji was refusing to speak to Lee, who was sulking at the back of the pack rather than springing eagerly thorough the branches before his team mates. Tenten found that she too was addressing Rock Lee a little harsher than she normally would, but she attributed this to her lack of sleep rather than a lingering grudge (she had gotten most of her anger out on him fairly quickly in the form of a lecture and a small beating). In all honestly she felt that Lee’s own mortification and current state of misery was punishment enough without Neji turning back the clock to his 13-year-old self.
She stole a glance at the stony-faced shinobi skimming the branches beside her.
If the bags under his eyes were anything to go by he had refused Lee the watch again. Tenten frowned.
After they were sure that their pursuers were far behind them, Neji had allowed the team three hours to rest. Given that there were three of them, this meant two hours each while one took watch. Tenten had taken the first watch, but been woken with only an hour of sleep under her belt. Lee was passionately arguing against an impressively stoic Neji, and from what Tenten could make of it Neji was refusing to give up his watch to him on the grounds that “Lee was not to be trusted with the safety of the team”.
“Tenten!” wailed Lee, genuinely horrified that their quarrel had gone so far as to actually rouse her. “I am so sorry to have woken you from your nap, I did not-“
“Go to sleep, Lee,” said Neji quietly. “You’re distracting me.”
Lee cast a miserable glance over his shoulder.
“But Neji, it is my-“
“If I hand over the watch to you, Rock Lee,” spat Neji. “One who prefers to put your lust for battle before the well-being of the team and the success of the mission, I would disgrace myself as a shinobi. Now go back to sleep.”
A barked order from Tenten to stow their crap before she did it for them was enough to silence them. But an hour later, when she was gently shaken awake by an apologetic Lee explaining that it was time that they were moving, a quick visual once-over of her team confirmed that neither of the boys had slept.
They had continued this pattern for three days: constant travel, eating on the move, and stopping for three hours a night.
For three days, Neji and Lee had slept an hour apiece, if even, and it was beginning to show. And as for their acclaimed team dynamics… They seemed to be about ready to crumble. And Tenten, for one, wasn’t going to sit back and let that happen.
“Neji,” whispered Tenten, casting a quick glance behind her to see if Lee was paying attention. He wasn’t.
Neji ignored her, and quickened his pace.
Tenten bristled. That’s how he’s going to act, is it? Scowling, Tenten sped up until she was level with him again.
“Neji,” she hissed, louder this time.
“Tenten,” he replied evenly, keeping his eyes fixed ahead. He was not going to make this easy, thought Tenten crossly. Stubborn ass.
“I think Lee’s had enough, don’t you?”
Silence.
Tenten rolled her eyes.
“Nej-“
“No I do not, Tenten. Rock Lee-“ Tenten’s heart sunk a little at his use of Lee’s full name, which he only did on especially horrible occasions. “-endangered not only the mission’s success, but your life and mine. I have half a mind to report him to the Hokage upon our return, if we even make it back-“
“Neji! He was only-”
“Only what? You know I’m right.”
“He wasn’t endangering anything, he was just-“
“This was supposed to be an infiltration mission, not a confrontational one. I cannot excuse his actions.”
Tenten was flabbergasted. Neji hadn’t been this block-headed in years.
“He was just being Lee! You know, challenging the enemy for the good of youth, or whatever. You know he-“
“I am done discussing this with you.”
“Well I’m not!” Tenten said hotly. “From what I saw he was winning! You never know, it might have been to our advantage if you’d let him stay and fight! In fact we might not have at least one of these bastards following us right now-“
Neji’s head snapped to face her, his eyes flaming with anger.
“You saw?! You were watching?”
Tenten’s stomach dropped clean out of her body. Oops.
“W-well,” she stammered, averting her eyes. “I-“
“Tenten, you disobeyed a direct order. I told you to stay put and yet you came after me despite-“
“I came to help my friends,” said Tenten furiously. “Because that’s what being friends means, Neji! To be there when someone needs you!”
“And I needed you to stay out of it!”
Tenten’s words died on her tongue. Neji was looking straight ahead again, but was doing something funny with his lips: chewing them and licking them, as if he’d said something he shouldn’t have. Tenten stared.
“Neji I-I couldn’t,” whispered falteringly. “You were gone so long I thought that you and Lee might’ve-“
“And that,” he said sharply. “Was exactly why I told you to leave. If we had been killed, or worse, that would mean that whomsoever we had been pitted against was more capable than both Lee and myself combined. And even you, Tenten, would struggle against such an adversary. To ensure- To ensure the success of the mission, you were ordered to leave us behind, and yet you failed to do so.”
“But-“
“I’m disappointed, Tenten,” said Neji in a hollow voice. Tenten trapped her cry of protest in the back of her throat. “You are usually so dependable. And yet for the entire course of this mission the only thing I have been able to count on you for is letting me- and in doing so letting the team- down.”
That hurt. Tenten’s eyes burned, and with a nasty shock she realised that she might have been on the verge of tears. She was tired, hungry, cold, and to top it all off emotionally exhausted from her team’s constant bickering. She forgot that all of her team mates were dealing with these symptoms, not just her. Neji’s words, though in hindsight untrue, had cut deep. She swallowed the painful lump in her throat with some difficulty, draining from her heart the sadness until all she was left with was anger. Anger she could deal with. Anger she could harness. Her thoughts cleared. And her thoughts were: Neji Hyuga was not worth the time of day.
“So will you forgive Lee?” she said bitterly, abruptly changing the subject. Neji’s eyes flickered regretfully as he registered her detached tone, maybe even reconsidering his cruel words, but Tenten missed it entirely.
After a moment of consideration, he answered.
“I will think about it.”
“Great,” she spat. “That’s all I wanted. Sorry to bother you,” after a thought, she added, her voice dripping with scorn: “Captain.”
And without giving him the chance to retort she’d dropped back alongside Lee, who had been so lost in his guilt that he hadn’t even noticed the quiet exchange barely ten metres in front of him.

Description
Hours passed, and they were becoming increasingly worried about Rock Lee.
Once, Neji had suddenly jerked his head towards the taijitsu expert without warning in mid conversation, causing Tenten to nearly jump out of her skin. As it turned out Lee’s arms had merely shifted in his sleep.
Another time, Tenten definitely thought that she’d heard him stir: he had mumbled something, she was sure of it. However, Neji hadn’t heard anything, and so for a good half an hour or so they had watched him in silence to see if he would speak again: not a peep.
Tenten’s mind was aflame with worry, horrible possibilities bouncing about the inside of her skull like bingo balls. What if he didn’t wake up? What if they were down here so long that he’d starve? Without food in his condition he would do nothing but grow weaker. When she’d voiced her concerns, Neji reminded her that the same was true of them, and that given the lack of food Lee’s state of consciousness was actually an advantage. That had stumped her for a while. She hadn’t even thought of that.
However Tenten had continued to plague an increasingly irritated Neji with hypotheticals about Lee’s health until he had threatened to ignore her for as long as they remained imprisoned if she didn’t shut up. So she did. For her revenge she considered irking Neji further by mentioning just how frequently his own eyes flickered to that darkest corner of the cell when he thought she wasn’t looking, but Tenten knew better than to call her team mate out on something that so closely resembled feelings.

As for Neji’s physical condition; that had greatly improved due to what Tenten considered to be a stroke of genius on her part. After watching her companion wince several times by attempting something so simple as to shift his arms, she’d had enough.
Neji twitched in surprise as, quite suddenly, Tenten had slid very close to his back and was tugging insistently on his skirt.
“What are you-“
“Just, turn around, would you!”
The shinobi silently obeyed, his chains clinking softly as he gingerly turned about on the spot to face Tenten, who was busy fumbling about her feet. She muttered a curse under her breath. The heavy shackles were making her job very difficult and her hands clumsy. At last, she had accomplished her task: Tenten had removed her shoes, now gripped tightly in her hands, and was watching him expectantly.
“Hands, please,” she said firmly. Neji quirked an eyebrow.
“What-“
“Neji!” she scoffed, dragging her knees across the floor until they bumped his. She patted her lap, ignoring the sudden heat creeping up her neck. “Come on: I think this’ll help. For now, anyway. Besides, I can’t reach over there.” She rang her chains for emphasis: she had indeed reached the end of her let. Eyeing her suspiciously, Neji hesitantly lifted his bruised wrists and gently placed his useless hands on the curve of her thigh.
Tenten set to work immediately, her mouth set in a firm line as she concentrated on bumping his injured limbs as little as possible. Despite her best efforts to keep her touch light and Neji’s to mask the pain, it didn’t take long at all before his hands were instinctively flinching away from hers. Tenten sighed impatiently, but didn’t look up.
“I’m sorry, I know it hurts. I’m nearly done.”
“Hn,” said Neji stiffly.
After a few more moments of muffled grunts of discomfort and mumbled apologies, Tenten sat back to admire the results of her latest brainwave: she had slipped Neji’s still-swollen fingers through the strap of her shoe, the stiff rubber sole extending behind his palm and thus bracing his wrist. She had done the same with the other.
Neji carefully lifted his hands back into his lap. He flexed his fingers, testing. Then he looked up at Tenten with wide eyes.
“I would have strapped them up with, uh, part of my sleeve or something,” babbled Tenten, rubbing her nose with the back of her hand so that she didn’t have to look at him. “But I don’t know when she’ll be back, and then we wouldn’t be able to unwrap them in time before she got here and then she’d probably just take them off and destroy them or something and then we’d have nothing to use to keep your wrists straight, and I wouldn’t have any shoes which would be really annoying when we escape because what if I stepped in a puddle or something (that’d be horrible) or worse, stepped on something sharp: that could slow us down, but that point is that these should provide a bit of support for the bones so that they can get better faster and not cause you so much pain-“
“Tenten-“
“-but we’ll have to be quick when we hear that door go, because I think we’ve only got about thirty seconds to get them off again. In the meantime though I hope they help-“
“Tenten-“
“-and I’m so sorry: I’ve been studying those scrolls that Sakura gave me and she’s been trying to help me get the hang of this healing stuff, but it’s so frustrating! I’m just awful at it, and Sakura gets so sick of me sometimes-“
“Tenten-“
“-and then I’ll be reading them before training and you’re absolutely no help at all because you took one look at them and got it instantly and so now you’re the only one on this team with anything close to medical skills and it’s just so ridiculous because you can’t do a thing with your hands like this and if I was any better I could be so much more helpful and-“
“Tenten!”
The kunouchi’s mouth froze in a small “o”. Neji was glaring at her. And then she realised that he’d been trying to speak and she was mortified.
“Tenten, listen to me,” said Neji sternly. “You’ve been very helpful. Even if you could manipulate healing chakra, healing my wrists would do little good in the long run because our captors would notice, my wrists would probably be broken again and they would do goodness knows what to us as punishment. Your solution is ingenious. Thank you.”
Tenten blinked at him, quite taken aback. He was right, of course, but what had really stunned her was the smile. It had been small and brief, but right at the end of his speech he had really, genuinely smiled. She stared.
“You’re… You’re welcome,” said Tenten awkwardly. Neji nodded vaguely.

They had fallen into a comfortable silence after that.
Now, upon Tenten’s insistence, Neji was taking a well-deserved nap. Left alone to her thoughts, Tenten’s knees were drawn up to her chest, her chin resting atop her folded hands. She watched him absent-mindedly: his back was against the wall, his wrists (still in her shoes) aligned neatly in his lap. His head and since dropped to his chest, which rose and fell gently as he breathed. Tenten was pleased to see him sleeping so peacefully: it had been days, as far as she knew, since he’d last slept. After all, it had been on his watch that the real trouble had started.

The infiltration had been quick. After weeks of planning and gathering information, Team Gai’s appointed captain had finally given his rearing-to-go-already team the go.
“It’s still too soon,” muttered Neji that night as they crouched around the map spread out on the forest floor. He brushed aside the twigs and leaves that they had been using as markers. “We will go over the plan again.”
Tenten groaned aloud, rolling off of her haunches and onto her bottom.
“Neji, we’ve been over this a thousand times. I’ll be able to recite your entry and exit strategies in my sleep, let’s stop fretting about the colour of your underwear when we go in and just go in already!”
Lee nodded enthusiastically.
“Indeed! The time is ripe!” He sprung to his feet. “The sun has set, the enemy is unawares, and Team Gai is prepared to strike hard and fast, paralysing our foes with the vigour of our youth, and the beautiful forest green of our matching undergarments!”
“Lee,” said Neji coldly. “Sit down. We will each wear whichever underwear we choose to wear, and we will go over the plan until I am satisfied.” He whirled on Tenten. “And you will cease encouraging him, am I clear?”
Tenten pouted, folding her arms.
“Crystal,” she grumbled, her eyes fixed on her feet. “But you were the one who said we would go tonight in the first place. Make up your damn mind already…”
“Tenten,” fumed an exasperated Neji. “I am not going to explain myself to you again. We need to be absolutely certain of every detail of the enemy’s movements before we act. These are not people to be taken lightly!”
“But Neji!” pressed Lee. “Our most splendid team has a one hundred percent success rate, and that count includes those against stronger foes than these in which we’ve had no time to plan at all! I believe in the strength and abilities of my team mates to perform to the best of shinobi standards, and in our coherence as a team!” Lee leaned forward, his fists curled upon his knees as he kept his suddenly serious gaze on Neji.
“I agree,” said Tenten eagerly. “Lee’s right. You’re over-thinking this, Neji. It’s just a simple in-and-out retrieval mission. This is hardly a challenge for us.”
Neji snapped his head towards Tenten, eyes searching her face. She glared back at him. He seemed shocked, and, she noted, confused. She knew why: when it came to arguments Tenten nearly always had Neji’s back, and they would use their numbers to suppress Lee’s enthusiasm when it posed as a risk to the mission. In this instance, however, Tenten agreed with Lee, which had ultimately thrown off what Neji had naturally assumed to be his given advantage. They all knew the plan, and they were a top-class team picked for this mission for not only their separate skills as shinobi, but as Lee had said their ability to work together. Tenten could see no reason in further prolonging the inevitable.
“Now is as good a time as any, Neji,” she added, her features firming with determination. “I say we go.”
Neji glowered at her, but Tenten didn’t yield. Lee’s eyes snapped back and forth from one to the other, his brow slightly creased with surprise: he hadn’t seen his team mates disagree before. Yet still, Tenten knew that despite being appointed captain for this mission, Neji would not go against the majority of the team when there was no good reason to.
So Neji consented, albeit extremely unwillingly. And, brimming with what hindsight proved to be over-confidence, Team Gai vanished into the night.

Tenten groaned aloud, dropping her forehead to her knees. “I’m sorry,” she voiced a muffled apology into her pants. “You were right. You’re always right.”

She doubled over, clutching the ferocious stitch pulling at her ribs. That had been close. Closing her eyes, she leaned against the face of the cliff and waited. Tenten wasn’t surprised that she was the first to arrive at the designated meeting spot: in fact, she’d been expecting it. After all, everything was going according to plan. Though, she admitted with a shaky exhale, it had almost gotten rough near the end…
Tenten’s fingers weaved their way under the collar of her shirt, closing about a small, hard object hanging from her neck, reassuring herself that it was still there. It was: mission successful. And so she waited.
About fifteen minutes later, a flurry of movement in the trees to her left caused Tenten to start. Curling her fingers about a kunai and already preparing a scolding on sneaking up on people, Tenten jerked about to face a winded and very surprised Neji.
“Neji?” she spluttered, her stomach clenching with an extremely unpleasant kind of astonishment. Not good.
His eyes narrowed as he fought to regulate his breathing.
“Lee?” he asked breathlessly. Tenten shook her head, pocketing her kunai, and Neji spat a quiet curse.
“C’mon,” said Tenten firmly, pushing past him as she moved back towards the foliage, dragging her fingers over the scroll at her hip. “We’ve got to-“ Neji’s hand suddenly clenched about her upper arm, stopping her dead. Tenten rounded on him. “Neji!” she hissed accusingly. “If you think I’m going to let you have us sit by while-“
“You,” he said firmly. “Are going to stay here, while I retrieve Lee.” Tenten opened her mouth to object, but in one swift movement Neji had turned her around and pushed her back up against the cliff. His hands remained firmly on her arms, keeping her in place. The kunoichi gaped at him. He narrowed his eyes dangerously. “This is not up for discussion.”
“But-“
“That’s an order, Tenten! If I’m not back in five minutes take the scroll and go back to Konoha.”
Tenten wrenched her arms free from his, shoving his shoulder aside as she made to pass him again. This time, however, Tenten stopped of her own accord. She bit her lip. As ferocious as the adrenaline bubbling through her veins was, Tenten couldn’t deny logic: as she hesitated, it dampened the fire in her gut like a damp towel. She had the scroll and so couldn’t risk being captured, and as a long-range fighter she would be of little use in the retrieval of her friend anyway. Neji would strike quick and hard and be out of the fray in an instant. She glanced guiltily back at her team mate. He tensed, watching her warily, gaging her reaction. And really, if she had listened to Neji in the beginning, she thought glumly, they might not even be in this mess. After a moment’s pause, she nodded. Neji sighed in relief.
“Five minutes, Tenten.”
“Don’t be late,” she muttered, her eyes serious as she raised them to meet his. He paused for a brief moment, and then he was gone.

Tenten eventually grew bored of watching the ends of Neji’s hair flutter as he breathed, and again she found her eyes on the sorry pile of limbs that was Rock Lee. Her expression sobered instantly.

Three days.
Neji was refusing to speak to Lee, who was sulking at the back of the pack rather than springing eagerly thorough the branches before his team mates. Tenten found that she too was addressing Rock Lee a little harsher than she normally would, but she attributed this to her lack of sleep rather than a lingering grudge (she had gotten most of her anger out on him fairly quickly in the form of a lecture and a small beating). In all honestly she felt that Lee’s own mortification and current state of misery was punishment enough without Neji turning back the clock to his 13-year-old self.
She stole a glance at the stony-faced shinobi skimming the branches beside her.
If the bags under his eyes were anything to go by he had refused Lee the watch again. Tenten frowned.
After they were sure that their pursuers were far behind them, Neji had allowed the team three hours to rest. Given that there were three of them, this meant two hours each while one took watch. Tenten had taken the first watch, but been woken with only an hour of sleep under her belt. Lee was passionately arguing against an impressively stoic Neji, and from what Tenten could make of it Neji was refusing to give up his watch to him on the grounds that “Lee was not to be trusted with the safety of the team”.
“Tenten!” wailed Lee, genuinely horrified that their quarrel had gone so far as to actually rouse her. “I am so sorry to have woken you from your nap, I did not-“
“Go to sleep, Lee,” said Neji quietly. “You’re distracting me.”
Lee cast a miserable glance over his shoulder.
“But Neji, it is my-“
“If I hand over the watch to you, Rock Lee,” spat Neji. “One who prefers to put your lust for battle before the well-being of the team and the success of the mission, I would disgrace myself as a shinobi. Now go back to sleep.”
A barked order from Tenten to stow their crap before she did it for them was enough to silence them. But an hour later, when she was gently shaken awake by an apologetic Lee explaining that it was time that they were moving, a quick visual once-over of her team confirmed that neither of the boys had slept.
They had continued this pattern for three days: constant travel, eating on the move, and stopping for three hours a night.
For three days, Neji and Lee had slept an hour apiece, if even, and it was beginning to show. And as for their acclaimed team dynamics… They seemed to be about ready to crumble. And Tenten, for one, wasn’t going to sit back and let that happen.
“Neji,” whispered Tenten, casting a quick glance behind her to see if Lee was paying attention. He wasn’t.
Neji ignored her, and quickened his pace.
Tenten bristled. That’s how he’s going to act, is it? Scowling, Tenten sped up until she was level with him again.
“Neji,” she hissed, louder this time.
“Tenten,” he replied evenly, keeping his eyes fixed ahead. He was not going to make this easy, thought Tenten crossly. Stubborn ass.
“I think Lee’s had enough, don’t you?”
Silence.
Tenten rolled her eyes.
“Nej-“
“No I do not, Tenten. Rock Lee-“ Tenten’s heart sunk a little at his use of Lee’s full name, which he only did on especially horrible occasions. “-endangered not only the mission’s success, but your life and mine. I have half a mind to report him to the Hokage upon our return, if we even make it back-“
“Neji! He was only-”
“Only what? You know I’m right.”
“He wasn’t endangering anything, he was just-“
“This was supposed to be an infiltration mission, not a confrontational one. I cannot excuse his actions.”
Tenten was flabbergasted. Neji hadn’t been this block-headed in years.
“He was just being Lee! You know, challenging the enemy for the good of youth, or whatever. You know he-“
“I am done discussing this with you.”
“Well I’m not!” Tenten said hotly. “From what I saw he was winning! You never know, it might have been to our advantage if you’d let him stay and fight! In fact we might not have at least one of these bastards following us right now-“
Neji’s head snapped to face her, his eyes flaming with anger.
“You saw?! You were watching?”
Tenten’s stomach dropped clean out of her body. Oops.
“W-well,” she stammered, averting her eyes. “I-“
“Tenten, you disobeyed a direct order. I told you to stay put and yet you came after me despite-“
“I came to help my friends,” said Tenten furiously. “Because that’s what being friends means, Neji! To be there when someone needs you!”
“And I needed you to stay out of it!”
Tenten’s words died on her tongue. Neji was looking straight ahead again, but was doing something funny with his lips: chewing them and licking them, as if he’d said something he shouldn’t have. Tenten stared.
“Neji I-I couldn’t,” whispered falteringly. “You were gone so long I thought that you and Lee might’ve-“
“And that,” he said sharply. “Was exactly why I told you to leave. If we had been killed, or worse, that would mean that whomsoever we had been pitted against was more capable than both Lee and myself combined. And even you, Tenten, would struggle against such an adversary. To ensure- To ensure the success of the mission, you were ordered to leave us behind, and yet you failed to do so.”
“But-“
“I’m disappointed, Tenten,” said Neji in a hollow voice. Tenten trapped her cry of protest in the back of her throat. “You are usually so dependable. And yet for the entire course of this mission the only thing I have been able to count on you for is letting me- and in doing so letting the team- down.”
That hurt. Tenten’s eyes burned, and with a nasty shock she realised that she might have been on the verge of tears. She was tired, hungry, cold, and to top it all off emotionally exhausted from her team’s constant bickering. She forgot that all of her team mates were dealing with these symptoms, not just her. Neji’s words, though in hindsight untrue, had cut deep. She swallowed the painful lump in her throat with some difficulty, draining from her heart the sadness until all she was left with was anger. Anger she could deal with. Anger she could harness. Her thoughts cleared. And her thoughts were: Neji Hyuga was not worth the time of day.
“So will you forgive Lee?” she said bitterly, abruptly changing the subject. Neji’s eyes flickered regretfully as he registered her detached tone, maybe even reconsidering his cruel words, but Tenten missed it entirely.
After a moment of consideration, he answered.
“I will think about it.”
“Great,” she spat. “That’s all I wanted. Sorry to bother you,” after a thought, she added, her voice dripping with scorn: “Captain.”
And without giving him the chance to retort she’d dropped back alongside Lee, who had been so lost in his guilt that he hadn’t even noticed the quiet exchange barely ten metres in front of him.