The traction device that kept Genma's left hand suspended made a high metallic sound as it moved along the track, dragged along as Genma pulled himself up. Raidou gave it an anxious glance, eyes flickering from glowing seals to the cage of surgical steel surrounding Genma's hand and wrist, then wiped his expression clean before the nurse caught it. She didn't look worried. If anything, she seemed pleased under her exasperation, pressing the call button and then moving quickly around the room to gather everything she needed.

Another nurse stuck her head through the door, then vanished to fetch a wheelchair and shirt at Kaori's request.

Genma looked a little like he wanted to squirm impatiently as Kaori unhooked his left hand with delicate, careful precision and maneuvered it into the padded sling. But ANBU weren't known for their squirming, and there was too much wary fear behind amber-brown eyes as the nurse's hands brushed close to recently shattered bones...

Focus pinned entirely on his partner, Raidou almost startled straight off the bed when the second nurse reappeared in front of him and dropped a shirt on his lap. "Need a hand putting that on?" she asked, pushing the wheelchair towards Kaori and hooking a tendril of cheerful blond hair back into a disheveled bun. "Or can you manage?"

After nine days of not wearing one, Raidou had almost forgotten what a shirt was. He stared at it, then grabbed it, blunt-tipped fingers hooking into the hospital-blue cloth before anyone changed their mind and tried to take it away from him.

"I can manage." The words came out fast and distracted, but truthful. He yanked the shirt over his head, automatically tugging it around bandage-covered burns with the ease of a decade's worth of practice. Head through, right arm through, cloth falling down to his waist--

He couldn't get his left arm up high enough; bandages constricted the movement, and pain snarled at him. The blonde nurse waited patiently, watching him struggle for thirty long seconds, then helped him without a word. Over her shoulder, Raidou watched Kaori insist that Genma wear thick socks beneath his hospital gown, and found half a smile at his friend's protest that it was April, for god's sake, not deep winter.

"Socks," said Kaori firmly, pulling them over his feet. "And just be grateful I'm not strangling you with a scarf."

"I wouldn't," Raidou said, even as his eyes ticked briefly to the fading ligature marks around Genma's throat. "He might get ideas. Betcha he'd love some booties, though, right?"

You are dead as a friend to me, Genma's look suggested.

Raidou grinned crookedly, only one side of his mouth lifting, and plucked at his collar. "Think I'd be pushing it if I asked for a sweater, fearless?"

He wasn't cold, but the weight of cloth (finally) felt almost better than armour.