Here's a one-shot that I'm posting. I don't know how far this story will go, but I've been experimenting with Slash stories and I thought I would give this little plot a try since it's been bugging me for a few days.

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto, but any characters you do not recognize belong to me. Please do not use them without my permission.

Chapter 1

It would be another long night grading exam papers again, Touya sighed and gripped his mug of lukewarm tea tighter in his right hand as his left was busy splashing red ink all over one student's essay. The grammar mistakes nearly made him cringe. With a flourish, Touya circled the boy's low score and wrote that he needed to do his homework in order to succeed on the test. Touya doubted that his words would have any effect on the slacking student, but maybe a demonstration on what chakra control really was in class tomorrow would help.

Making a mental note of it, the Chunin teacher placed the test paper on top of similar red marked exams and diligently moved onto the other slowly depleting pile. Maybe if he had actually done these on time, he wouldn't have to do them last minute and at eleven o'clock at night. To be at the Academy on time with his teaching materials prepared, Touya had to be up in six hours. Another sigh, it looked like an all-nighter.

Touya put down his pen to stretch out his arms, his fingers reaching for the ceiling. A glint of silver caught the soft light coming from the lamp in the living room of his small apartment which made Touya glance at the silver rings that decorated his middle and index fingers. Plain, tarnished, and all around unappealing, the Chunin had had the plain bands for many years, but it was what was in the rings that made them special. He cracked his knuckled as Touya thought about the poison-master who had lined the inside of the bands with a toxin which released the deadly powder into an enemy's face due to a small, but powerful spring loaded contraption that only activated when certain pressure points on the ring were pressed simultaneously. Only meant to be used in an emergency, Touya had used only one, but it had been enough to get him out of a tight spot and he had got to see what the toxin actually did to a human being. Well…it wasn't pretty.

Touya lifted the cup of tea to his lips that had gone cold but took a sip anyhow even though his lips twisted in a grimace. He needed the caffeine in order to stay awake and finish grading. He picked up the pen again and snatched the next paper off the pile and began reading.

Before long, the clock on the wall chimed midnight followed by a loud thump that startled Touya into turning his letter C into a crooked O. Immediately wary, Touya jumped up from his chair with his hand settled on the kunai pouch tied around his thigh. The noise had come from right outside his door. When no one tried to bust down the door or crash through the closed window, Touya slowly relaxed his tensed up muscles and sorrowfully glanced at the last test paper with the giant O on top compete with a tea stain that was slowly smearing the ink into one giant mess.

"Damn," Touya whispered. "What am I gonna tell, Maya?" He questioned as he dashed to the kitchen to snatch up a rag to sop up the mess he had made of his drink. Tossing the wet rag into the sink, Touya glanced at the ruined paper. There wasn't a way he could fix it. He ran his fingers through his long, dark brown hair that was now tied in a loose ponytail that brushed against his lower back whenever he moved and looked over to the door.

There hadn't been any other noises, but that didn't mean there still wasn't an enemy outside. Or it could just be one of his neighbors getting home late. Or a stray cat. Or…why didn't he just get up and look?

Touya decided to do just that. With one hand still on his kunai pouch and his right finger fiddling with one of his silver rings, the Chunin silently opened the front door to his apartment and glanced outside with his penetrating ghostly blue eyes.

He waited a few seconds for his eyes to adjust to the darkness before looking around for the source of the noise. You can bet Touya was surprised to find the neighbor from across the hall passed out on his front doorstep with the key to his apartment still clenched in his hand. Touya couldn't remember for the life of him what his name was even though they said 'good morning' to each other before Touya had to go off to work. All he knew was that the masked man with the crooked hitai-ate was a Jounin, and that he liked to read porn from what Touya had seen from the brightly colored orange book. That was pretty much it.

Oh, another thing that he could add to his list was that the man went on highly ranked missions that usually lasted for a few days. Touya always knew when the man left for missions; he didn't get his usual morning greeting. It had become sort of a routine and Touya expected to hear the silver haired man call out to him with one hand raised in a lazy wave and the other holding an Icha Icha book. It felt strange right now that the Jounin was quiet and that his eyes were closed in pain rather than a mysterious wink.

"Hey," Touya called out from his doorstep. "Ummm…" he couldn't recall the shinobi's name. "Are you alright?" No answer.

He might have passed out, Touya thought and abandoned his cautious nature to walk across the hall and check his neighbor's condition. Sprawled out on his stomach, Touya couldn't accurately check his condition, but he wasn't a medic-nin either. With a grunt, Touya gently rolled the –surprisingly heavy- man over. Yes, there were rips and tears in his clothing, but no blood. Internal injuries maybe?

Touya lifted his hand to unzip the man's vest, but stopped himself when a mortified blush swept across his cheeks. Was he really going to undress a stranger without his permission and right outside his home? But Touya had to see if the guy had any life-threatening injuries that would force Touya to take him to Konoha hospital. He didn't have the training needed to properly treat wounds. Maybe a cut here and there when his students accidentally nicked themselves on their shurikens when they first began using them, but broken bones or a ruptured spleen? He didn't even know what a spleen did! But undressing a man while he was unconscious? What did his inner, more morally situated voice say?

Touya shook his head. If he was talking to himself, then he was more tired than he thought. He'd leave a note. There, that sounded reasonable. His situation all figured out, Touya plucked the tiny, copper key from the higher ranked ninja and unlocked the man's front door. As Touya slung the unconscious Jounin's arm across his shoulders and wrapped his arm around the man's waist to steady him, the Academy teacher hoped that the Jounin hadn't booby trapped his apartment. But, thinking on it, the man was a Jounin, and everyone knew that all the Jounin were off their rockers. All of them had a screw loose somewhere. Touya hoped this one was just crazy and not paranoid.

Touya held the masked man tighter when he began to slide from the Chunin's grasp and heard a nearly inaudible grunt of pain. Looking at where Touya's arm had pressed tighter, he guessed the Jounin most likely had bruised or broken ribs. But he wouldn't know which until he actually got a look at them. Kicking the chipping apartment door open wider, Touya walked in and headed for the couch that was situated in the middle of the room. He would have put the older man into his own bed, but Touya didn't want to snoop around his home while he was unconscious, so a stiff neck would have to be a consequence.

"Geeze," Touya grunted. "You're heavier than you look."

And indeed the Cyclops was. He looked thin, but there must have been more muscle on him than the Chunin thought. Alright, ending that thought right there.

Gently, Touya deposited the taller male on the couch.

"Alright, Hazukishen. What do you do now?"

Touya tilted his head to the side and actually looked at his neighbor who hadn't moved from the sprawled out position he had placed him in. Touya couldn't understand the multiple love notes the ninja got from women on Valentine's Day. His face wasn't even visible! Maybe the mystery of his face made women fall in love with him? He shook his head. Like he would ever understand women. They were crazy.

Maybe he should actually check to see if his neighbor would live through the night. "Sooo…I know you can't hear me but I'm going to warn you just in case because I've heard that people in a coma can really understand what you're saying, but I guess you're not in a coma just unconscious. But isn't that the same thing?" Touya shook his head. Why was he babbling like a nervous schoolgirl? And Touya would know, he taught the shy nine year olds who had crushes on their instructor. It had been cute the first couple of weeks Touya had worked at the Academy, but after a handful of years of love struck little girls, the cut out red paper hearts wouldn't fit in his bottom desk drawer anymore. He also had to clear out his CONFISCATED drawer. Touya didn't think another kunai or blow dart gun would fit.

"Anyway, I'm going to take your clothes off." He paused. "That sounded weird."

Without another thought and the impassiveness of a medic-nin, Touya quickly unzipped the vest and lifted up the man's black turtleneck shirt to see if his ribs were either broken or bruised. If they were broken, then they would have to make a midnight trip to the Hospital. If not, then a quick wrapping and pain killers would be the solution. With gentle, steady hands Touya pressed against the ninja's chest. Nothing seemed to be sticking out and he didn't feel any breaks in his ribs. He would just have a colorful display of bruises and no missions for a week.

Touya left him alone for a moment in order for the Chunin to head to his apartment and dig out his first aid kit. As he pulled it out from the top cabinet from his kitchen and headed back to his neighbor he noticed how…bare the apartment seemed. Besides the couch, the only furniture in the room consisted of a table and one chair. Touya was tempted to check the fridge to see if there was any food in it, but decided not to at the last moment. The Jounin must not be home except to sleep. And Touya had noticed that no one came to the door except for the postman, so if the man didn't have company over then what was the point of having nice furniture or decorations in order to entertain guests?

He shrugged. Not his problem.

The moon shined brightly through the window and cicadas sang in the summer heat while Touya silently bandaged the Jounin's wounds. It had to have been one in the morning before he finished and taped the loose end down. He flattened his palm on top of his neighbor's chest and waited for him to deeply breathe in and out to make sure that the bandages weren't too tight or too loose. Touya hadn't been on a mission in a while where he had to provide field medicine, but it felt good to know that he hadn't gotten rusty while teaching junior ninjas.

Touya placed the rest of the gauze back into the first aid kit as well as some generic numbing cream that would hopefully work as well as painkillers since Touya couldn't get him to swallow anything while he was asleep.

He had to wake up in four hours and he was falling asleep on his feet. Maybe tomorrow they wouldn't have a demonstration in class; a pop quiz sounded like a good way to spend the day. After that…a long recess and then class would be let go early. Touya stood up. Or he could cancel class altogether.

The Chunin headed out the door with the kit in his hand. He turned around to check on his no-name neighbor who had lived across the hall from him for three years before closing the door behind him and walked back to his own apartment. Touya glanced around his home and couldn't help but compare it to Cyclops's. All around the wall were knickknacks from the different countries he had visited because of missions he had been assigned from the Hokage. A glass bauble from Wind country, a shell from Water country, and a naked dancing girl from…well Touya didn't remember where that one came from but he was sure that it had been a great night with plenty of sake and entertaining company. Scrolls and books littered a bookshelf that stretched to the ceiling and furniture that had been worn in from lazy days spent reading a book.

Touya looked around his room one last time before yanking off a blanket from the couch, opening the door to his neighbor's apartment, and spreading the blanket over the softly snoring shinobi. He looked…peaceful.

Right. Time for bed.