After a moment, Katsuko sighed. “It’s permanent,” she said, giving him a wan smile. “The best we can hope for is a way to stop the decay and calm down my chakra. They said that if they had some of the notes or reports from the experiments they’d be able to make a counter-seal, but...”

Ryouma leaned in, dark eyes fixed on hers. “Did ANBU bring anything back when they raided the facility?”

“No. They set the whole thing ablaze and got us the hell out of there.” She frowned down at her mug. “Any records would be with Kaminari in whatever hole she’s hidden herself in now.”

Ryouma looked very much like he wanted to kill something. Katsuko patted him on the cheek, fondly. “Enough. What’s done is done. Here I am babbling, not even giving you a chance to tell about how you came back from the dead.” Her gaze turned sympathetic. “...You don’t have to talk about if you don’t want to.”

He took a deep breath, taut expression easing a fraction, and shrugged as casually as he could. "It's not much of a story. No swash-buckling or daring escapes... I told you, I got knocked out by some bounty-hunters up on the way to Snow Country. Spent a month in Lightning Country while they tried to figure out what to do with me, drugged out of my head on chakra-suppressors, and then they shipped me down to Suna. I played brain-damaged, and the cocktail they had me on was chancy enough they believed me. After the first month or so they mostly gave up on gettin' anything useful out of me, and started tryin' to sell me off again instead. ANBU came for me three weeks ago." A corner of his mouth jerked up. "That's my second rescue. I'm pulling ahead."

“Lightning?” Katsuko’s breath hissed out between her teeth as she grabbed his hand, glancing over him again for injuries. There was a new scar on the side of his neck, raised lines of tissue jagged as, well, lightning. “Did they--?” Torture you got stuck in her throat; she grimaced and met his gaze, noticing new lines around his mouth and eyes that she hadn’t seen before. He’d been captured by Kumo before, she remembered, recalling the strips of flayed skin on his chest and the ruins of a snarling dragon tattoo. For that to happen a second time--

“Not then,” he assured her quickly, expression telling her he knew exactly what she had wanted to ask. “After what happened with Shiki, and last year at Dainichi Nyorai--I've been a diplomatic problem for Cloud before, and they didn't buy me from the bounty hunters so I could be a bigger one. I'm more surprised they didn't just kill me quietly. But I've got enough of a reputation up there, I guess, that they thought I'd be more useful traded to Suna. Don't know what they got in exchange for me, but I hope it bit them in the ass."

Katsuko sighed and leaned back, releasing her death-grip on his hand. “Well,” she jibed, struggling to regain her equilibrium. “You definitely deserve some sort of award for getting through all that. I don’t know about a medal--so tacky, don’t you think? Maybe a trophy, something with a plaque on the base that says ‘Cloud’s Number One Pain in the Ass for a Year and Counting’.”