Omake: What happens in the Forest of Death, stays in the Forest of Death:
Naruto entered one of the deeper and more secluded sections of the Forest of Death after having just gotten back from a C rank mission with Team Ten while Asuma had gone out on another mission. They had gone on a routine reconnaissance mission that had ended with them being forced to terminate a small group of bandits. Despite the minor setback of some douche bags that thought they could take on a group of ninja, the mission had gone off without a hitch.
And now Naruto had some important business to take care of.
"Kuchiyose No Jutsu!"
There was a large puff of smoke before Gamabunta appeared within the clearing, "Eh? Oh it's you. What do you want brat?"
Naruto grinned at the toad boss, "I remember you saying something about needing to have a drink with you before I can truly be your summoner."
"Yeah, what of I-" Gamabunta blinked before he realized what was going on. He gave a low chuckle, which due to his size made the ground shake a bit, "In that case I'll need you to summon me back in a few minutes while I get the sake."
Gamabunta disappeared in a puff of smoke while Naruto prepared the seal that, if he was correct in his theory, would allow him to turn off his regeneration and actually get drunk.
***---***
Sometime during the night Team nine had been assigned a mission inside the village, one that was ranked as C-rank due to the place the mission was taking them. Apparently there were some rather odd noises coming from the Forest of Death and no one knew what to make of them. Because Mitarashi Anko was currently away on a mission, it was obvious she was not the reason for this disturbance and some were afraid it may be enemy shinobi or some scavengers of some kind.
It was not quite a well-known fact that Naruto often frequented the place. Out of all the people who knew him, only Tenten and Anko herself knew that the blond trained in the Forest. However, since Tenten knew that there were many things in the forest and the reports claimed it was odd noises that sounded like croaking, she figured it could not possibly be Naruto and thus remained silent.
Gai was in front of the formation, being the one who led the team especially when they were in a potentially dangerous place. He was followed closely by Neji who was their spotter with his Byakugan, and he in turn was flanked by Tenten and Lee. Normally having such a high level mission within the village would have excited the normally excitable Lee. However, given their present circumstances and where they were going even he knew to be cautious, "Neji-kun, can you spot anything yet?"
"Not yet," Neji shook his head while they traveled. "Whatever it is we're tracking it's far out of my range. Where did Hokage-sama say the noise was coming from exactly?"
"She did not know," Gai answered. "Since few ever venture into the Forest of Death the noise was only heard from the outside. No one has any clue where the noise comes from."
"Well I don't hear any noise now," Tenten commented. "All I hear is-wait! Do you hear that?"
They all stopped and listened and found that they could indeed hear something, though it was too far away and garbled to determine what. "I believe it is coming from the northeast," Gai placed an ear on the ground. "Neji activate your Byakugan and let's head in that direction."
Neji did as told and the group was on the move once again. As they got closer to the source the group began to hear the sound far more clearly and realized what it was.
It was singing.
Neji who had his Byakugan active saw something up ahead, "I see something ahead of us. It looks like a-" his eyes widened in surprise and he face-faulted, causing the others to stop.
"Yosh! Neji-kun are you ok? Did you trip over a most un-youthful root or something?" Lee looked around for something that his eternal rival might have tripped over.
Neji ignored them as he began speeding over to the direction of the singing. The others quickly followed him, being forced to catch up. When they finally did they were in the clearing and found a very surprising and very shocking sight.
Ten large barrels of what the group easily guessed held sake, judging by the stench in the clearing, were littered around the area. Sitting near the bottles was one very large and very drunk, toad. Even more surprising was that Naruto was also there, sitting right next to the Gamabunta and he too looked rather wasted. Both Naruto and Gamabunta had a large human-sized saucer right in front of them, and both were singing…pirate songs.
"Sixteen men on a dead man's chest…"
"Yo ho yo ho a pirate's life for me!"
"Shot/Shot!"
The pair picked up the saucers in front of them and began guzzling down the saucers of sake. It was a great surprise to see that Naruto seemed to be keeping pace with the large toad, though there was a little bit of overspill since the saucer was just too big for his mouth so a bit, quite a bit of the sake would slosh over the side. Not that he seemed to care that some of it was drenching his clothes. The pair set there saucers down and laughed. Right before they started singing again.
"Gai-sensei, these two are doing some most youthful singing I have ever heard in my life!" Lee exclaimed as tears ran down his eyes, "I must join them in this youthful excursion and fan my own flames with my youthful singing voice!" Lee ran over to them and began to sing, causing both Naruto and Gamabunta to look at Lee before looking at each other, shrugged and began singing again.
The other three merely watched this…odd sight with weariness, curiosity and embarrassment respectively.
"Um…Gai-sensei," When Gai turned to look at Tenten she continued. "Now that I'm pretty sure we found the disturbance, what do we do?"
"You know Tenten-chan, I'm not sure."