Summary: It's a dirty job, but someone's got to do it. Takes place about four months after Hit. Raphael is 13, but the men think he's 18.

Rating: T (Rated T for dark themes, language)

Word count: 1,380

STITCHED

Gripping the curved needle he had just sanitized with a pair of medical pliers, Raphael gingerly punctured the swollen flesh on Ryuu's shoulder blade, trying his best to keep the circular motion of the needle smooth and swift as Ryuu flinched and hissed through his teeth. Raphael's fingers were too thick to tie the thread of the stitch, but with a pair of pliers in each hand, he managed to knot the first suture.

"Quit moving, this hard enough already," Raphael grumbled.

Ryuu unclenched his jaw and looked over his shoulder from the rickety chair he straddled. "How many more do you think I'll need?"

Raphael assessed the cut, using some damp gauze to clean away the blood that had seeped from the wound. "At least three more."

Groaning in resignation, Ryuu buried his face in his palm and let out a stream of expletives as the needle dug in once more.

Raphael rolled his eyes. They all sparred with live blades, and getting cut and stitched up now and again was a part of life. Not to mention the fact that Ryuu had been clipped by Tsuneo's kusurigama in training and hadn't whined half as much about the gash itself as he was now about the stitches.

Raphael tied the second suture and frowned at his sloppy handiwork. "You know it's going to leave a horrible scar, right?" he asked. "I'm the worst person to come to for this kind of shit. You should have gone to Jiro."

"No way in hell," Ryuu retorted. "Jiro and Katsu got into some sort of argument this morning and I have zero interest in asking him to stitch me up when he's in the middle of a lover's spat. Those guys are fucking terrifying when they're pissed."

Raphael snorted; Ryuu was just as deadly, albeit twenty years their junior. He had a point, though. The tension in such a small place was insufferable on the rare occasions that Katsu and Jiro had it out, and no one wanted to risk being on the receiving end of their subsequently short tempers.

At least he and Ryuu were now senior trainees, having been residents at the farm for a few years. There were about thirty active members of the Elite, and all of them had done their time at Takeshi's farm in the beginning. Raphael and Ryuu had reached the point where they still technically lived there, but were absent for longer stretches of time in other towns and cities, stashed away in hotels or safe houses on missions. They were being trusted with more and more tasks as they proved their loyalty, while Master Shredder figured out what niche of the Foot Clan's business they would eventually be best suited for.

"Ow! Son of a bitch," Ryuu barked, jerking forward.

"Shut up, ya wuss, I'm done," Raphael carped. "If you pop a stitch, you're on your own. I'm leaving tomorrow for a few weeks."

Ryuu got up and leaned against the porch railing, watching Mezu graze in his paddock in the distance. "Do you know what you're going to be doing yet?"

"Interrogations, likely," he sighed. "It seems to have become my specialty. Would be great if Master Shredder saw me as more than a living lie detector."

Raphael's thoughts became dark as he used a wet rag to clean his friend's blood from his hands.

His heightened senses gave him the ability to know when someone was lying through subtle changes in their scent, voice and pulse with startling accuracy. It had mostly been a novelty among him and the men at the farm, a joke used to call out braggarts or a test around the campfire as they all became increasingly intoxicated. Once Takeshi, and ultimately, Saki, had caught wind of it, they found a much darker use for his talent.

When he had been called to Tokyo City a couple of months prior, Raphael had been elated. He had thought that this was it, he was going home. The Shredder himself had greeted Raphael the day after his long journey and explained that they had someone detained for questioning. The small entourage of five Foot Soldiers that accompanied him was Raphael's first disappointment. Rumor had it that Karai was never far from her father's side, but she was no where to be found in the dank warehouse. The woman they questioned was innocent of any trespasses against the Foot, just caught up in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Raphael had been called in to oversee two more interrogations since then, and those few people had been active members of plots to harm their clan. Master Shredder had ordered Raphael to execute them, and despite doing so as quickly and painlessly as possible, he had felt ashamed of killing an enemy that was bound and helpless. In those instances, Karai's absence was a relief.

The damp rag was cold and limp in his hands and Raphael dropped it into a bowl of water alongside the soaking needles and pliers. The silence between them had probably stretched on too long while he'd been lost in his thoughts, but Ryuu was preoccupied as well.

His muscles visibly tensed along his bared torso, Ryuu scanned the area repeatedly before poking his head in the door to the farmhouse to make sure no one was inside. When he seemed satisfied that they wouldn't be overheard he went on.

"I'm not supposed to be saying anything about my recent missions, but this is going to be common knowledge soon enough," Ryuu said quietly. "I want you to be prepared."

Feeling like a rock had settled into the pit of his stomach, Raphael waited silently for him to continue.

"The Yakuza treaty has gone completely to shit and I've been keeping tabs on the leaders of one of the factions in Tokyo. They are determined to drive out any influence the Foot Clan has in the district. They've put bounties out on all of the high-ranking members – any of the Elite, some generals, Master Shredder himself..."

Alarm tightened Raphael's chest as Ryuu trailed off. He recognized the expression on his friend's face; it was the look he gave Raph before he said something that he knew would make him angry.

"Karai," Raphael finished for him.

"The money being offered is tempting other factions of the Yakuza to join them, as well as some other bottom feeders willing to profit off of our deaths. And yes, they seem to think Karai will be the weakest link."

Raphael sprung from his seat and paced the porch, his anger simmering into something dangerous and wild. "Why am I still here where I can't protect her? WHY?!" he roared, his fist flying out at the nearest object with the full force of his rage. The crack of the section of wooden railing he had punched through was loud enough to make Ryuu jump and spook Mezu into an agitated canter in the field. Raphael wanted to keep going, to destroy everything in his path until he was too tired to move.

"Raph."

He didn't know how many times Ryuu had called his name, but he finally bit back a snarl and listened.

"This has been kept quiet because we are fairly certain there are people on the inside who are in on it. That means they will be questioning our people. They will be relying on you and your bullshit detector to figure out who the traitors are, so you need to be able to keep a cool head."

Our people.

Raphael closed his eyes, starting to feel the throb in his knuckles. Traitors would be executed, and he would likely be the one to do it. People he had known, people he had trained with, their friends and families. All a part of the Foot Clan and it's network, people he had to protect, even if it meant a cull from within.

He let out a long, shaky breath, allowing the dizzying heat and turmoil within his head to settle.

Stay cool. Pay attention. Be sure.


Author's note: I'm so sorry! RL is kicking my ass.