Gaara vs Lee!

"YES! Now I can show the fruits of Guy-sensei's training." Lee yelled as he jumped over the railing, finding that taking the steps to the ring wasn't quick enough for his tastes as he landed in the ring. Gaara, however, disappeared in a swirl of sand and reappeared in the ring. "It makes me so happy to fight you." Lee stated with a grin to the emotionless Sand ninja before him.

Gaara's response was to pop the top of the gourd on his back and let the contents of it fall to the floor of the ring. "Wait, is that sand?" Naruto asked curiously. A look from the examiner told he was curious too, but nonetheless, he raised his hand and yelled: "Begin!"

Lee, fully intending on being the first to attack, charged straight at Gaara and jumped, performing a spinning kick in midair. "Hidden Leaf Hurricane!" Lee yelled out his attack as his foot went straight for Gaara's head, only for it to stop midair as it was intercepted by sand. That got looks from everyone in the room of surprise with the exception of the Suna team of course.

"What the... the sand intercepted the attack!" Naruto shouted out of shock, he had never heard of something like this before.

"What kind of a technique is that?" Shikamaru muttered, watching the sand defend against every attack Lee sent Gaara's way. Having seen what it could do in the forest of ****, he could tell it was insanely effective at getting the job done, and with the way he had used it, he had no problems to use its deadly attacks.

And it seemed that the defense the sand was giving Gaara was unbreakable. Every punch, every kick Lee did was caught. Even with his great speed, it seemed no use. "Why doesn't he use some ninjutsu or something? He can't win if he just uses hand to hand combat!" Naruto muttered in wonder.

Guy decided to fill them in. "It's because he can't use anything but taijutsu." That statement got looks from everyone as Guy looked to Lee after the strange leaf ninja was tossed across the ring by Gaara's sand. "Lee, you may remove them!" He yelled, getting a look from his student.

"But, Guy-sensei! You said I should only take them off when I'm protecting people who are important to me!." Lee said in surprise.

"It's okay, I will allow it!" Guy yelled, making him smile.

"Really? Really?!" Lee asked excitedly as he reached to his legs and pulled something from under his leg warmers, it appeared to weight.

"Are those...?" Chōji asked in absolute disbelief.

How old fashioned." Shikamaru muttered as Lee seemed relieved.

"Finally! Now I can move freely!" He yelled, tossing the weights away. No one expected anything unusual from them, 'till they hit the floor and twin pillars of smoke rose from the impact, nearly shaking the room to its foundation.

With shocked and surprised looks from all present, Lee charged again. This time he seemed to have the upper hand as his hits not only began to pierce the sand shield but came closer and closer to Gaara's body. "Woah, he's so fast! He's really faster." Naruto said in awe as Guy grinned.

"This is what a true taijutsu specialist is capable of." Guy said as Lee finally landed a hit on Gaara.

Shisui and The Sand team couldn't believe that the strange Leaf Ninja had pierced Gaara's defense like this. It seemed even Gaara's sand was having trouble keeping up with Lee's speed at this point. "No way! It's like Lee turned this match completely around! He could win this!" Naruto said excitedly as a voice got his attention.

"Don't think so. Gaara's just getting started and now that Lee hit him, it's only going to go downhill for him now." Shisui yelled from the other side of the room in a tone telling how bad it really was.

And it seemed Shisui prediction came true. Just as it seemed Lee was about to win, Gaara's sand exploded outward, catching the Shinobi off guard at the sudden attack and, with an insane look on his face, Gaara watched as the sand grabbed at Lee's body. Lee dodged it as best he could, but as the fight progressed, Lee even resorted to using the inner gates to beat Gaara. Such a feat was putting an immense strain on Lee's body, and it was draining all his strength to keep this fight going. Lee tried one final attack to end the match, his body not being able to take much more.

But as soon as Lee performed the reverse lotus, his strongest attack, Gaara got the upper hand as when Lee landed on the floor from his airborne attack. Gaara's sand wrapped themselves around his left arm and leg but before Gaara could do anything Shisui jump down and intervened in the match "That's enough, Gaara you have won." the sand starts to return to Gaara.

"Why did you intervene in the match? it wasn't over." Lee said.

"If he did the next move he was about to do it would have been over and you being a ninja as well would have been over."

"I agree, the winner of the fight is Gaara." The Proctor announced. Gaara and Shisui returned back to their teammates.