*Author's notes: This is a repost of the chapter I literally posted an hour ago. I realized I forgot my disclaimer and I wanted to mention a few things. Firstly, I'm sorry for the late update! I just moved last week and was only able to get internet hooked up earlier today. Secondly, I know that Mizuki is actually a lot closer to Genma's age than Iruka's if you look at the Wiki bios, but with the timeline and him, in canon, being Iruka's childhood friend that didn't make a lot of sense to me so I made him closer to the trio's age. Third, "fuck's it to you?" is the way my friends will ask, "What the fuck?" and such. And lastly, I love and appreciate the feedback I've been getting, so please feel free to drop me a review if the urge hits you! And now for the important part: Naruto and characters belong to Masashi.
Everything Genma did, he did hard. He fought hard, trained hard, laughed hard, drank hard, flirted hard, fucked hard. He teased and probed and pushed boundaries and crossed lines. When people thought of Genma, they didn't think 'gentle'. But as the night progressed and the three shinobi drank, Raido noticed something strange in his best friend. Genma was laughing and drinking and flirting, but his usual hard edge had softened considerably. His pace had slowed to match Iruka's, he kept the volume of his voice lower than usual, and his flirting had taken a subtler, more wholesome turn.
Iruka's face had been bright red nearly all night.
It was only about eleven when the kid's energy dropped to an almost non-existent level. He slumped a little against Genma, and had difficulty keeping his beer bottle in his hand. Raido spotted the signs of a growing headache and nudged his blond friend. "Better think about getting him home. He seems pretty spent."
In truth, Iruka had been feeling spent when he had arrived. Before he had been released from the hospital the doctors had given him a particularly gruelling physio session, and then run him through multiple exercises that would help him bring his chakra flow back up to normal. The doctors had tried to exhaust him so that when he reached home he would get some much needed sleep. But instead of sleeping, Iruka had come to the bar.
It had been difficult for him to keep his grip on that first bottle, his aching fingers fighting him more and more as the night progressed, but he hadn't wanted to say anything. He was hanging with elites; how embarrassing would it be if he'd needed to ask for help drinking a beer? So he'd kept the pain to himself and drank slowly, doing his level best to fight off the fatigue that was gnawing at him. It seemed though that his mask was slipping as he noticed Raido watching him a little too attentively.
Genma's eyes turned to study the boy that was leaning against him and swallowed around a lump in his throat. He'd been so busy enjoying Iruka's company that he hadn't noticed the fact that the kid seemed dead on his feet. "Okay, time to go kid," he murmured as he shifted, helping Iruka to stand and then letting the teen lean against his shoulder. "I'll take him home. See you tomorrow?"
Raido nodded. "Hey, make sure he does something about those hands once he's home. His fingers look like they're stiffening up pretty bad."
Genma grunted in acknowledgement before turning and steering his young friend to the exit. Iruka brushed the hands off of his shoulders and led the way, his feet dragging and his shoulders slumped. Genma kicked himself. This was too much exertion for the kid's first day of freedom, and the tokujo should have known better. But he'd just wanted to cheer the teen up, let him know that he had a friend in not only himself, but in Rai as well. He actually didn't even really want the boy to go back to his apartment and be on his own just yet. He knew Iruka wasn't too steady on his feet, had next to no chakra, and very little control of his hands. With Iruka living alone and not apparently not having many good friends, anything could happen while he was alone in the apartment. He could collapse and be unable to get help. If for some unknown reason the teen was attacked in his home, he wouldn't be able to really defend himself. Really, anything could happen to him and no one would know for hours, maybe even days. Genma's heart rate sped up. He supposed he and Rai would just have to drop by and check up on Iruka. A lot.
A few more stumbled blocks north had the pair arriving at the base of a run down apartment building. Genma prayed that this wasn't where Iruka lived, but he was disappointed as the Chuunin climbed the outdoor stairs to the second floor. The building smelled like alcohol, musk, and piss, the walls were stained with blood and water damage, the roof tiles looked like they were about ready to fall off, and the stairs were precarious at best. The tokujo didn't know anyone else who even lived in this part of the village. That thought left a bad taste in his mouth; he knew a lot of people who were willing to live in some extent of squalor, but he'd never known anyone who lived in conditions such as these. He followed as Iruka opened his apartment door and switched the light on. There was a rustling noise coming from the kitchen and Genma threw a well aimed kunai without a second thought. When he heard a yelp and a hissed curse, he turned and looked.
A boy Genma had never seen before was standing near the fridge, his arm reaching toward a cupboard. The kunai had sailed through the air and hit the cupboard door between the boy's fingers. His green eyes flashed, and the kitchen light reflected off his shoulder length silver hair almost blindingly. His hitai-ate was tied around his head much like Genma's own, but the metal was polished and unscratched, new. "Ruka, what the fuck?"
Iruka gave a single shouldered shrug as he stumbled toward his couch and collapsed in a tired, mildly drunk heap. "Why didn't you turn the light on? You sounded like a rat."
The silver haired boy snorted as he eyed Genma calculatingly. "In a place like this, I'm surprised you heard me and not the rats. They climb up here when it's wet."
"I don't have any good food here. You'll have to go to Anko's."
A heavy unease settled in Genma's chest. Who was this boy in Iruka's apartment? He hadn't visited Iruka once in the six weeks he'd been in the hospital, and Iruka hadn't mentioned anyone having free range of his apartment. "The fuck are you doing, slinking around here in the dark?" Genma asked the silver haired boy, his eyes narrowed in suspicion.
The boy snorted again. "Fuck's it to you? I should be asking you, what are you doing in the home of a young, drunken, apparently incapacitated underling? That seems like a grave misuse of your superiority, Jonin-san."
Genma shot a glance at Iruka only to see that the teen had completely passed out on the sagging, torn couch, before turning a glare to the other boy and growling. "Don't challenge me, kid. Get the fuck outta here. He's been in the hospital for over a month and all his food's bad anyway. Go mooch off somebody else."
The teen gave a smirk that set Genma on edge, but moved for the door. "I don't know if I should leave him alone with such a strange man, Jonin-san," he hissed around his eerie grin, "but that sounded like an order to me, so I'll just be on my way out." Genma watched with sharp eyes as the teen zipped his flak vest up and stepped out of the door. Just as he was about to shut it as his voice floated back in, saying, "See you around, Shiranui-san."
The blond man stood in the middle of the room, perplexed and uncomfortable. None of his comrades had ever made him feel so uneasy before, no Leaf nin he had ever encountered had gotten under his skin in such a way. His gaze fell back on the slumbering Chuunin, and he was only pulled out of his discomfort when he noticed the stiffness in Iruka's hands. The tokujo jumped into action, rummaging around the bathroom and bedroom cupboards until he found the bag that Iruka had brought with him from the hospital. From it, he pulled a jar of pasty white and foul smelling cream. He then sat on the couch and grabbed one of Iruka's hands, knowing from all those times of watching the nurses that the teen was too exhausted to be of much danger if he suddenly awoke, and that it was unlikely he would wake in the first place. He scooped some cream into his fingers and massaged it thoroughly into his young friend's tan skin, working it especially carefully into the joints of his fingers and his wrists. He wished that he could use healing chakra and infuse the cream with it; he'd seen the nurses do that and it seemed to help a great deal, but he'd never had any skill with healing chakra at all. Maybe he'd ask Rai to give it a shot some time.
When Genma had finished rubbing the cream into both of his comrade's hands, he picked the teen up off the couch and awkwardly dumped him on his bed, hesitating only a moment before jerking the blanket out from under Iruka's body and laying it over him. He thought about leaving then, but the memory of the other boy's green eyes and strange smile made Genma decide to crash on the couch. Someone should be around to make sure the kid sleeps aright his first night out, he told himself as he balled his flak vest up and rested his head on top of it. The first night is always the hardest.