How to Draw Smiles [Klein, Liltotto]

It had been an exhausting week for Klein, but more worth it than anything else ever could have been. He'd spent hours analyzing the abyss within his patient; hours more while she slept parsing the data, trying to reconstruct it and understand whatever it was that she actually was.

But he'd gotten to what he believed was the bottom of it. And in the process, he'd been able to enact plans of his own. Every sedative he'd administered, he'd ever so slightly increased the doses of the tailor-made supplements. Drugs to induce a sense of ease, to induce faint joy, and above all, to cause arousal. Klein was fully intent on convincing her that he was, of course, a catch.

"Well, we're finished for now. I can give you one last dose before you go, to make sure you're not in pain when you get out of here, but we can go over the test results first."

Klein entered with a clipboard full of notes, alongside a tray with a meal and, of course, another syringe of sedative, laced with the usual additions. He'd certainly miss this, one way or another.

Life felt like a dream the past few days for the gluttonous one, lying in bed within a pleasant bit of rest as she had waited for Klein to return like he'd said. The past few days... Well, she couldn't really reflect on them too well, like a warm haze made directly recalling them much, much harder to grasp. All she knew was that it was a pleasant time, and nothing really hurt. The sinking sensation her gut felt was hardly acknowledged, wearing a peaceful face as she stared off at the dark ceiling for the millionth time - an exercise that somehow didn't bore a hole in her mind.

It wasn't like she felt up to walking or getting around, her legs didn't really want to listen to her right now, especially after those deeper plunges into the confusing mist. What would have ordinarily been a pained fearful response was smothered by chemical redirection, those instincts warning her of something off having since been reduced to soundlessly banging on the window in the back of her mind.

Almost a reflex at this point, she sat up when his scent approached, attentive when he had walked in. She genuinely couldn't explain it, or properly contrast her emotions with before.. But she felt happy to see him, like a friend she hadn't seen for a while. Though her attention would draw to a wet feeling around her mouth, fingers raising to touch it - oh, she was hungry, no wonder she was drooling so much. She'd felt a disconnection with that tell tale signal that she should eat - the pain was gone, but the compulsion was strong as ever.. But yet again her attention was forced toward the... Plate of food, than the saccharine scent...

Oh, the tests, that's right.. She wanted to know - nodding along with what he had to explain, "..Okay."

Her tone was unusually light, dainty as she had come to start speaking amidst the week, her sentences shorter or one-worded for the most part, eyes rounded with interest. The moment the tray was drawn close to her, she'd start eating with little hesitance or asking, though a question dawned in her mind when her eyes drew on the needle, a glint of worry in her dull amber pools,

"..What if the pain comes back..?"

"Well, it shouldn't come back. The pain's only because of the way the testing works, so unless you go throwing yourself into more tests, you should be okay."

Klein offered her a light smile, a bit of a joke simply to test the waters. After all, he needed to know just how well he'd done at convincing this woman that he was a perfectly likable guy, and that was one of the best ways to do so. Looking back to his notes, he bobbed his head back and forth for a moment, before starting to run through his notes.

"As far as the notes go, you're definitely something outside the usual races. But you're definitely not some alien or anything, either; you fit into all the usual racial categories at least in broad strokes. Like a Type O person, know what I mean?"

Despite his more carnal interests, this was something Klein was just as fascinated in, and he was speaking genuinely on his findings to the subject in question.

"I think you're sort of right in both senses about being a piece of the Soul King and being a vessel for it. More like the piece made its own vessel, and that's you. Based on my findings, that piece is probably like...well, I guess a stomach. Not that I really understand why the Soul King would need that, but, there you go..."

It only raised more questions. Why was the Soul King shedding pieces like this? Was it some kind of evolution? Had the Soul King at one point been more mortal than he now was? Or was there some other explanation? Well, he didn't want to ruminate too long. Taking the golden injector from its tray, he carefully brought it to Liltotto's arm, and injected the last dose he'd be giving her for the foreseeable future. It also was the dose with the most supplemental additions yet, and so if ever he was going to see a payoff, now would be the time. But if he didn't, it was hardly the end of the world.

That little rising of concern was snuffed quite easily, her expression brightening an unusual amount for her typical attitude with the Arrancar's attempt of lightening the mood. It was moreso a reaction following his own, but that tiny bit was enough to reassure her - he hadn't lied to her since she gotten here, and the last few days had been.. Pleasant. She couldn't put her finger on it, but she'd felt plenty at ease, a lightness to her body that she hadn't quite experienced before... Her mind was too distracted to really care or register how strange that was, all she knew was that this was the happiest she'd sustained herself in a quite long time, much so that it was occasionally overpowering.

Listening to him with intrigue, a slight smile sat on her face - as if that was the safest way to visibly communicate that sensation that she could instinctively draw to. It was a little hard to pull your face when you could barely register it as your own.

"Yeah," She'd calmly respond, nodding her head in pronounced agreement with the concept. That was nice to know, at least - a little of everything, versus something completely alien? It made her stop, and go flat-faced in thought for a moment, as if she really had to concentrate for just a little.

"Oh, yeah, I had" There was already an answer known to this, she knew it well, she couldn't remember where she learned it, but it was as inherent as breathing, "Like, an actual organ?"

She never really got a read on whatever was going on with that region of her body, brief memories of unproductive checkups out of curiosity went by, some doctors confused by her results or amazed she was seemingly walking around with an 'incomplete' system. It literally being a stomach and not something stranger was not the expected answer... Was whoever the Soul King is just dropping vital organs or something? Something like that had organs to even lose in the first place? Huh..

"I guess, that makes me feel a little bit better... That i'm not too different..."

Liltotto looked at her offered arm as she spoke, watching the needle plunge beneath her skin so easily, a quiet scream on the senses grown hoarse from calling to her as the medicine emptied into her. It was just a brief burning in her arm... And then, everything was fine...

"Do you know what that is?" Her voice sounded airier, genuine curiosity guiding her thoughts, "The Soul King? I kept trying to look into it... I couldn't get a straight answer."

Her legs sat crisscrossed with her coming to lie on her side. She felt funny, but it was easier not to think about it.