Summary: Raph is hurt, and more truth is uncovered than he let April know about.

Mild Raph/April pairing. (Requested by pollaicy over on Tumblr, and I'm always a sucker for some good Raphril.) Enjoy. :)

Warning: Mild language.

Green Looks Good on You

April knew it was bad before she even got to the Lair. Mikey had called in a panic, babbling something about Donnie needing more morphine and gauze, and the redhead hadn't even changed out of her pajamas before grabbing her med kit and rushing down to the sewers.

A fact of which she was now painfully aware as she trudged the last few feet through the Lair's entrance. In the summertime, the guys normally didn't run the air conditioner (being cold-blooded and all), but for some reason it was cold enough down there to freeze Brazil; she'd only been there for three minutes and she was already shivering.

A desperate voice brought her back to the present and she remembered why she was in the Lair at two AM. She hurried into the lab, already holding out her med kit to the nearest turtle, and gagged.

The stench of blood hung heavy in the air, and it wasn't hard to see why.

For a few precious seconds, all April could do was stand there and gape as Mikey silently took the proffered bag from her, and Leo offered her a tired wave with his free hand from where he sat hooked up to an IV, and Donnie's own hands flew steadily across Raph's body in an effort to stem the crimson that ebbed out of the brawler's chest and arms. The large, formerly white bandage wrapped around his right thigh seemed out of place in comparison to all of the new blood - Donnie normally did everything systematically, so for something to already be wrapped meant that that injury wasn't brand new.

"What happened?" she gasped as her brain finally processed everything.

"Buckshot," was all that Donnie said, but it was enough to make her blood boil. Their patrol tonight was supposed to be a recon mission of one of the Purple Dragons' new bases, but evidently it hadn't turned out as expected.

"Who the hell brings a gun to a swordfight?"

"You've got it backwards," Mikey called over absently as he sterilized another set of tools for his brainy brother. "It's 'who brings a knife to a gunfight?' Sean Connery was the real MVP, dude."

April ignored him and focused on the purple-banded turtle. "What can I do to help?"

"We need to finish stitching him up. Can you dig out the gauze you brought? My supply is gone."

She winced and nodded. If his supply was gone, then they'd been getting hurt a lot more than she thought they had. As if he could read her mind, Donnie shook his head.

"Raph had a bike accident last week, and Leo took a shuriken to the shoulder on patrol."

Someone hasn't been keeping me updated. The kunoichi fixed her electric blue gaze on Raphael's slack face and made a mental note to discuss that with him once he woke up.

As soon as her hands came into contact with his skin, her eyes went wide. "He's burning up!"

"From the bike accident. One of the cuts on his leg got infected. That's why it's cold in here," Don explained. "Until we can get him stitched up, I don't want to risk an ice bath to bring down the fever again. He'd bleed out in seconds. Mike, bring me those forceps, would you?"

The youngest wordlessly handed the tool over and went back to sterilizing. April assisted in any way she could - holding this, handling that - until Raph's body was once again whole, albeit a little more patched together than it had been last time she'd seen him.

Donatello aided her in hooking up the IV bag of Leo's blood to the inside of Raph's arm, instructed Mikey to stay with her, and headed upstairs to his room for some well-deserved rest. Leo breathed an audible sigh of relief and made for the door, too - much to his youngest brother's chagrin.

"Don't leave me with them," he begged. "April's got her murder-y face on!"

"Don't be ridiculous," the leader replied. "She's gonna kill Raph, not you."

Despite that reassurance, Mike fled from the room as soon as his brothers weren't paying attention. And then April was alone in the lab with nothing but the beeping of machines and an unconscious ninja turtle to keep her company.

"Hey, Red."

Make that mostly unconscious. "A bike accident, huh?"

Raph grimaced and shifted around slightly but didn't open his eyes. "Sorry."

"You could've called, Raph. I mean it happened, what - Tuesday? Wednesday? We talked Thursday night and you didn't say a word."

"...I didn't want you to worry."

"Bullshit."

That got his attention. His eyelids snapped open and that neon green gaze pinned onto her face. "Excuse me?"

"I call bullshit. I worry about you guys all the time, so why would worrying about a bike accident be any different?"

He sighed and looked away, and when he finally spoke again his voice was quiet. "I was being reckless. I know I was. Went too fast and turned too sharp. The bike went into a skid and I went down, cut my leg up pretty bad and then got into a fight with some Foot on the way home. Ended up with a cut full of dirty rainwater and my ears full of Leo's voice soon as I got home." The stocky turtle huffed a laugh, looking more upset with himself than anything else. "I was so pissed that I forgot to clean out my leg, and here we are."

"And the buckshot?"

"What kind of guy brings a rifle to fight ninja turtles?"

"Fair enough." April let out a long breath, relieved that she hadn't had to rake him over the coals to get her answers.

"By the way," Raph said, "Green looks good on you."

The kunoichi blinked, stumped for a moment until she realized what she was wearing. Her cheeks blazed hot as the turtle smirked at her. The silk pajamas had been a gift from her aunt for her eighteenth birthday, and April had completely forgotten to change out of them in her haste to make it to the Lair.

"Red would look sexier, though," he added, almost as an afterthought.

And as April's mouth opened and closed in shock and outrage (and maybe just the tiniest bit of pleasure), Raph winked at her, rolled over, and went back to sleep.