| [Nov. 29th, 2013|06:38 am] |
"—toe-licking, piss-shitting, goat rotted—hi, taichou—mouth-breathing—" Katsuko was saying, when he opened the glass-plated office door. Chakra shifted, and, very quietly, bone gave the crunch of rapid re-healing. "Mother—"
Raidou raised both eyebrows.
"—hugger," Katsuko finished.
"You only just got to the collarbone?" he asked.
Ryouri-sensei came around the exam table, flicking her long purple braid back over one shoulder. "Had to make sure the chakra was in order first," she said. "Namiashi, you look like hell."
Raidou tipped his chin down. Even in solid-heeled boots that gave her an extra two inches, Ryouri only came up to his mid-chest. Despite that, she was square in the shoulders, powerfully built for a tiny-framed woman. Two green arrowheads marked her left cheek, legacy of her clan. Her white labcoat draped across the back of her desk chair, discarded. Just like every other time he’d seen her, she was wearing plain jounin blues, no vest, and an expression of slightly acid judgement.
And then there was the sixth finger on each hand, because every doctor on this floor had some kind of inherited weirdness.
"Rough week," Raidou said dryly, and nodded at Katsuko. "How’s the patient?"
"Less than patient," Ryouri said, to Katsuko’s visible eyeroll. "The collarbone’s knitting. I was going to work on the cuts next—which, what the hell, did you drag her through a hedge with teeth?"
"Yes," Katsuko said. "Angry, vengeful hedges."
"It’s a surprisingly common problem," Raidou said.
"I’m sure," Ryouri said, and turned away, putting her hands back on Katsuko. Healing green chakra rose like a veil across scar-cut skin. The bandages had already been removed, and Katsuko’s jounin shirt was off and folded up, held against her stomach; Raidou watched as scabbed wounds drew together, skin bonding until there was nothing but raised, reddened lines. Only specialized medics could heal without leaving scars, and only for agents who exclusively served in infiltration and espionage. Regular shinobi lived with their marks, and were thankful they weren’t worse.
Or celebrated them, depending on the ninja.
"I could do a better job if these weren’t old," Ryouri said, sounding annoyed. She poked Katsuko in the shoulder, where demon teeth had left a half-moon circle of notches carved over the unbroken clavicle.
Katsuko hissed. "Watch your nails, evil woman."
Ryouri hissed back, longer and louder, and exacted revenge by healing the thin slice across the side of Katsuko’s throat. Then the mostly-healed gash on her forehead, and a ragged wound on Katsuko’s outer left thigh, where a serrated demon leg had slashed her. A half-dozen other cuts, scrapes, and lesser injuries were attended, while Katsuko focused on the opposite wall and visibly counted seconds. The long, messy injury down the outside of her right arm was the last thing to go.
"There," Ryouri said, sitting back and getting her breath. Small beads of sweat caught the light at her temples; it wasn’t easy to dance with Katsuko’s chakra, or force it to bend inwards for healing.
Katsuko let out a shallow breath, then scrambled back into her shirt, dragging it on so quickly that she got it backwards and had to stop, pull it off, and try again. "Thanks, sensei," she said, muffled through cloth.
"Welcome," said Ryouri.
Raidou kept his eyes at face level, not on the sweeping, netted hack-job of scars that criss-crossed Katsuko’s lean stomach. He’d seen them before; quick glimpses when her shirt rode up in training, and the two memorable times she’d suffered catastrophic uniform failure in the field, but mostly she was careful to keep them hidden. She finished pulling her shirt down to her hips and immediately crossed her arms low, layering an extra shield over rumpled blue cloth. Her eyes ticked away, not quite landing on Raidou or Ryouri.
Fourteen, her file had said. The parts of it he could read past heavy censorship. She’d been fourteen when some lunatic with a scalpel had sliced her apart and played medical hopscotch with her insides. Which still made her an adult, according to shinobi law. You were an adult the moment you graduated and accepted the hitai-ate, and everything that went with it, but—
A very small adult, in a much bigger world. |
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