"Come on, Lee, cheer up!" said Guy, hovering anxiously over his listless disciple as he watched him soak in the men's section of the hot springs. "So what if the Lady Hokage said you'd never recover from your injuries? She clearly knows nothing about the infinite potential of the Power of Youth™!"
Guy shot his disciple a thumbs up and smiled, but his teeth did not twinkle.
"Now come, join me in another lap around the baths in handstand!" Guy went on, undeterred. "The road to recover begins with a single step, so here we go!"
Might Guy flipped upside down— and at that very moment, a drunken Tsunade stumbled into the men's side of the baths, dragging a wriggling Sakura and Shizune by the collar, both hanging onto their bath towels for dear life.
"Kyah!" Guy yelped in an uncharacteristically high‑pitched voice as he caught sight of Tsunade, Shizune and Sakura. "L‑L‑Lady Tsunade!?"
"Gyah!" Sakura shrieked, covering her eyes as Guy's towel slipped from his waist and fell to the floor. "My eyes!"
As it turned out, the men's section was populated by just as many wrinkly, shrivelled old prunes as the women's side was graced with wrinkly, saggy old prunes.
The corner of Lady Tsunade's mouth rose slightly as she smirked at Guy's… endowment.
"Sho, I don't know anyshing about the Power of Youth™, ish that it?" she said sarcastically, slurring her words. She pinched her thumb and forefinger together suggestively. "Clearly you're the ekshpert, Guy… hic!"
"It gets bigger!" Guy exclaimed in dismay, flipping back onto his feet and fumbling to wrap his towel around his waist, face flushed. "But, Lady Tsunade, what are you doing here, in the men's section of the baths!?"
Sakura was slightly mortified by the real reason for this particular doctor's visit.
Lady Tsunade had clearly had one drink too many. The instant Shizune hinted she was lying about checking in on Lee, she had clamped her iron grip on her two nearest victims and hauled them, kicking and screaming, into the men's side.
"Couldn't we have just waited for them to come out— or at least stopped by the changing rooms to get dressed first?" Sakura moaned. "Why did I get dragged into this?" She sniffled, adjusting her too-small bath towel to better cover herself. "I can't be a bride any more…"
"Let's be honest, I was never going to be meeting any good men, spending all day every day looking after Lady Tsunade," Shizune sobbed into her hands. "But after this, I can especially never get married!"
"Why am I here? To check on Lee-kun, of courshe!" Lady Tsunade said dizzily, ignoring Sakura and Shizune. "Why elshe would we be here, huuuh?"
Sakura glanced around worriedly. Their current appearances were far too stimulating for the average geriatric to handle… what if one of them had a heart attack because of their curves?
"What is the point? My life as a ninja is over," Rock Lee said, his tone uncharacteristically harsh. "I was never going to become a splendid shinobi, with only taijutsu, so… just leave me alone."
"But Lee," Guy argued. "Your youth…"
"Youth is a lie, it is nothing but evil," Lee said distantly. "Those who rejoice in youth are perpetually deluding themselves and those around them. They perceive everything about the reality surrounding them in a positive light. Even if they make a life-threatening mistake, it would still be seen as proof of their youth, etched into a single page of their recollections."
Sakura, Tsunade and Guy gaped at him in stunned silence.
"Let me give you an example," Lee went on, nonplussed. "If an academy student were to dabble in criminal acts such as defacing Hokage Rock or performing lewd jutsu in public, and encouraging children to emulate such acts, it would be called 'youthful indiscretion'. If they fail their graduation exam three times in a row, they would claim the ninja academy is not a place only for studying. So long as they are in the face of 'youth', they will be showcasing a distortion of any commonly held beliefs or social norms."
"Lee…" Guy said, his eyes tearing up.
"Under their discretion, lies, secrets, crimes and even failure are nothing but the spice of one's youth," Lee recited. "And in their corrupt ways, they discover something peculiar about failure. They conclude that while their own failures are generally a part of relishing in youth, others' failures should be shot down as just failures and nothing more."
Tsunade's cheeks bulged.
"If failure could be seen as proof of one's youth, would it not be strange not to consider those who fail to learn ninjutsu or genjutsu as experiencing the height of their youth?" Lee continued bitterly. "Of course, they would not acknowledge it."
"Blaaargh…"
Sakura patted Tsunade's back as she doubled over and vomited into the hot springs, sending the bathing old farts scrambling out of the water.
"There, there, Lady Tsunade," she said soothingly. "Let all the bad stuff out…"
"Youth amounts to nothing. The whole thing is nothing but a result of their opportunism. Therefore, youth is a sham. Full of lies, deception, secrets and fraud that ought to be condemned," Lee sighed. "Those who indulge in youth are evil. That is to say, ironic as it is, those who do not glorify their youth are the truly righteous ones."
Lee nodded to himself in a self-satisfying manner,
"In conclusion," he said with a touch of aplomb, "geniuses, go blow yourselves up."
"Lee, surely you don't mean that?" Guy blubbered, fat tears streaming down his face. "Didn't we agree we'd show everyone it was still possible to become a splendid shinobi through taijutsu alone?"
Lee shook his head.
His body was broken beyond repair. His youth had been spent chasing an impossible ideal— a false idol of youth, born of a washed-up, over the hill has‑been's attempt to vicariously relive his glory days through his student.
"What if I said I could heal you?" Sakura suddenly blurted out. "But the price you would have to pay is… incalculable."
"Sakura, the worst thing a medic can do is give their patient false hope," Tsunade said queasily. "We owe our patients the truth, and there's no jutsu in this world that could— urp— give Lee-kun back the use of his arms and legs… and the right half of his body. Hic!"
Lee was shocked. For the first time in weeks, the gaze meeting his own held no trace of pity.
"F-for real?" he said, astonished. "Then, yes. No matter what happens… I would like to be all better again, please."
Sakura tapped the tattoo on her wrist, summoning Makoto. The blade glinted pink in the morning light…
"Now, don't move a muscle, you don't want me to miss," she said warningly, taking aim at his privates. "Yin-Yang Style: Gender Reversal Jutsu!"
Sakura swung her sword, the blade phasing through his thighs, and…
"GYAHHH!"
A terrible scream echoed throughout the hot springs as Sakura's blade separated Rock Lee from his 'ninja pals.' Tsunade, Shizune and Guy watched in horror, and then in wonder, as a golden glow began emanating from Lee's body… and then, Tsunade's eyes rolled back in her head, and she fainted.