It takes him a moment to realize that she's smiling at him. Not that twisted bit of lip she does when she's accomplished something. Not that superior smile she looks down on him with, even though he is taller. Not that coy, grim slash of mouth she gives him whenever he does something wrong, no. She's smiling at him, as though her heart wasn't black, as though he wasn't a freak, a monster. She's smiling at him like this is the most normal thing in the world.

Maybe it is. He didn't know. In that moment the only thing he knew was that when she smiled at him he sees something that isn't an evil witch, a seductress woman, the person who kidnapped him. He sees something that he didn't want to see. Something deeper.

So he tells her so, and she just shakes her head sadly. Her hand moves forward, and he thinks that it's going to choke him, but she touched the part of his chest were his soul rested. And she just looks at him.

He wants to push her away, call her names until she's mean and narcissistic and familiar again. Back to the witch he knows and hates. But his hands are chained and he can't find his tongue, even though it was where it should be.

"Tell me Franken, have you ever had a wish?" she asks him without looking him in the face.

For a minute Stein thinks about it simply making a smart-ass retort, but there is something too calm in her eye that stops him. "What's the point of having wishes? They just get in the way of real life."

"What do you know about real life?" There is nothing in her voice but pure curiosity, and he feels something collect in his stomach.

"At the moment I am sane, or as sane as I can get. I'm not hearing voices or seeing hallucinations."

"How do you know?"

For a moment he wasn't going to answer, but then he smiled. "I have hope."

"And she gives you hope."

Stein blinked at the hollowness of her voice. "Who?"

"Marie." Medusa's fingers were faintly up and down his left shoulder now, and the way she said Marie's name sounded more like a sigh, but it was obvious that she hated the Death Scythe.

He grew uneasy. "What does this have to do with Marie?"

"If she dies would you love me?" She freezes up, her left hand clutching his shoulder, her right on his soul, her eyes lowered near his abdomen.

"Medusa?" his eyes were wide.

She presses her forehead to his collarbone. Both her hands are on his shoulders now. He suddenly becomes aware that they're on a bed with his hands tied to the headboard with her vector snakes.

"I love you," she said as her thumbs grabbed sides of his coat and bring them off his shoulders.

"Medusa?" he tries again. His thoughts were tied in-between Marie and Medusa, whether or not the later had gone insane seemed the more pressing issue at the moment though.

"But you don't love me." Her voice was a quiet sob. Her snakes let him go as she pulled his coat off his arms. He tries to attack her, but the snakes are too quick for him, making him lye still on his back. Her eyes are sad as she watches him. She wrapped the coat around her for a moment, then smells it, and throws it onto the ground.

"What can I do to make you love me?" She reaches up his shirt for a moment and feels his hard stomach, then blushes with another smile that Stein's never seen. It almost looked nervous. Her hands went to the bottom of her shirt. She pulled it off, revealing that she was wearing nothing underneath. "Does this help?"

The first thing he notices is that she doesn't have her snake tattoos on. He looks over her muscular stomach, her breast, her collarbone. She leans down to his ear. "You want to dissect me, don't you? If I let you do it will you love me?"

His eyes were wide again, but he does his best to ignore it. She laid down next to him and wriggled against him lovingly. The snakes force him to wrap his arms around her. She sighs contently and she pulls the blanket up over them.

He hears the door open, but he doesn't look. Anyone seeing him with Medusa like this was bad.

Especially another Medusa.

She blinks at the Medusa in Stein's arms, then growled. Medusa stomps forward and wrenches the other Medusa off of the bed and throws her on to the floor.

The first Medusa starts to cry, sobbing about how Stein doesn't love her, and the second Medusa raises a vector arrow and decapitates the first.

She looks at Stein. "Another failed experiment." She shrugs and smiles at him. "Though that is a very interesting possession that you're in. I might want to take advantage of the situation."

He growls and she laughs and leaves Stein laying on the bed spread eagle and the fake Medusa's corpse on the ground.