What is a heart?
Chapter 4
Ulquiorra woke just as he always did. Looking around his room t the various things that he could say was 'his'. The small desk in the corner of the room was filled with several books on humans. All were given to him by Szayel. He had read through them at least twice. He was told that these books applied to all human aspects: behavior, needs both physical and mental, and reading human reactions. and of course human emotions. The girl was truly strange. Little of what he read of applied to her.
He sighed and walked to the just as Grimmjow was about to knock on the door. "What do you want?"
Grimmjow gave him a pissed off look. "I don't like playing messenger boy for you!" he growled.
Ulquiorra slammed the door shut. He turned back to the books and looked through the pictures of human expressions. He paid little mind to his door which flew past him and broke when it hit the wall.
Grimmjow stomped to him angrily. "What the hell is your problem Ulquiorra?" he yelled.
He ignored him and continued to read.
Grimmjow was far beyond pissed at this point. He ripped the book from Ulquiorra's hands. "What the hell is so important?" he looked in the book. He was baffled at the many emotions humans could have.
"This has something to do with the human girl?" he asked.
Ulquiorra took the book back. "Why else would I read such ridiculous things about humans?"
Grimmjow picked up another book and flipped through the pages. "So, what are you looking for? Didn't you read all these already?"
He nodded. "I'm trying to find out what expression she gave me." He turned the page and scanned through it.
Grimmjow began to read a passage about human emotion. "Emotion is a complex psychophysiological experience of an individual's state of mind as interacting with biochemical (internal) and environmental (external) influences. In humans, emotion fundamentally involves physiological arousal, expressive behaviors, and conscious experience. Emotion is associated with mood, temperament, personality, disposition, and motivation. Motivations direct and energize behavior, while emotions provide the affective component to motivation, positive or negative."
Ulquiorra glanced at the picture of a woman holding her body. He took the book from Grimmjow and studied it. The expression, it was just like the one she had displayed. He looked below the picture and read the discription of the emotion. "A "sense of shame" is the consciousness or awareness of shame as a state or condition. Such shame cognition may occur as a result of the experience of shame affect or, more generally, in any situation of embarrassment, dishonor, disgrace, inadequacy, humiliation, or chagrin.
A condition or state of shame may also be assigned externally, by others, regardless of the one's own experience or awareness. 'To shame' generally means to actively assign or communicate a state of shame to another. Behaviors designed to 'uncover' or 'expose' others are sometimes used for this purpose, as are utterances like 'Shame!' or 'Shame on you!' Finally, to 'have shame' means to maintain a sense of restraint against offending others (as with modesty, humility, and deference) while to 'have no shame' is to behave without such restraint (as with excessive pride or hubris)."
"Humans are such weak creatures. Shame, what kind of unnecessary emotion is that?" Grimmjow asked.
Ulquiorra closed the book and turned to Grimmjow. "Why are you here anyway?" he asked in his usual, expressionless manner.
"Oh right, Lord Aizen wishes you to take the girl to Szayel." Grimmjow said as he headed for the doorless doorway.
"Very well." Ulquiorra used Sonido and stood in front of Grimmjow. "I expect my door to be repaired by the time I return, Grimmjow Jaegerjaquez."
Before Grimmjow could reply, Ulquiorra had vanished once again. "Damn that bastard!"
He knocked on the door. "I'm coming in Woman." He entered the room to find it quite quiet. He looked around the empty room. He looked to the couch and froze. Never had he seen something so beautiful before. Orihime lay on the couch with her long autumn hair fanned out around her. The glow of the moon leaving her body in a sort of halo-ish light. Her lips were slightly parted. She was far beyond any he had sceen. Far beyond the beauty of an Arroncar. Not even Tres Espada Tier Harribel could compare to her.
The expression on her face changed to pain. She tossed and turned as she tried to fight the enemies known only to her. He stepped forward to wake her. "No!" she yelled causing him to come to a halt. "No! I didn't mean too!" she waved her arms in the air defensively. "Sora! No!" she shot up out of the bed. Her hand was trembling. "I-It was a dream…just a dream…" she said trying to convince herself it was such.
Ulquiorra watched her closely. Studying her every movement. The expression on her face now was call sorrow. He knew this because of the books. This emotion is the one his face most resembled. Sorrow, such a useless emotion.
As if the realization had slapped across her face, she shot around and stared at the Espada. She was unsure how long had had been standing there but she knew it was longer then a few moments. Tears began to swell in her eyes upon seeing him. Without thinking she ran to him. Just the feel of his body against hers seemed to calm her and brought about the same feeling of protection as her elder brother had given to her. She buried her head in his chest. What little comfort it provided her was enough.
He seemed annoyed at this. She was acting like a helpless child. How disgraceful to behave like such in the presence of an enemy. Yet, the feel of her body against his was intoxicating. Though she trembled as she did he was feeling something odd. Never had he felt this way before. He pulled his hands from his pockets. Slowly he raised them as if to embrace her…
"Ugh!" she yelled as he pushed her to the couch. She starred at him, her eyes surprised at this.
He turned around and headed for the door. "Come Woman, Lord Aizen wishes you to see Szayel."
She smiled sadly at this. "Of course, Ulquiorra-sama." She said as she stood up and fallowed him.
Szayel had shoulder-length pink hair and amber eyes. The remains of his Hollow mask take the form of rectangular-framed glasses, giving him a scholarly appearance. The placement of his Espada number tattoo was unknown to her. His Hollow hole is located on his glans. His clothes differ from the rest of the Arrancar uniforms. Instead of a normal jacket, Szayel wore a long shirt that covers his entire torso up to the top of his neck. He had three stripes on his uniform, each starting at his collar with one running to the left side of his chest , one to the right side of his chest, and one down the middle. He wore the regular pants with a slight length taken away. He also wore white gloves. His face is the only part of his body that is exposed in this uniform. Like many of the Espada he was fairly hansome though, he was little to nothing to her.
He smiled crookedly. "Ah, so this is the human female I've heard so much about." He said looking her over. She cringed at this which only made him laugh. "Seems you're a modest one, which will make this all the more fun." She looked at him with a look of confusion. His smile grew wider as he pulled a curtain back.
His lab was large and covered in white walls and white tiled floors. There were three surgical beds each with surgical tool kits next to them. To the left wall seemed like a chemest's would have killed to have. There were more test tubes that she would care to count and even far more jars labled with different chemicals. On the right wall were charts and diagrams which she could neither read nor make out. To he back wall was a door to a room with a large window that looked in, yet the room was far too dark to see what was inside. She turned back to Szayel whom was getting dressed into a white surgical coat.
Orihime took a few steps back in fear. It reminded her of that Shinigami, the one who looked to her like a clown. Mayuri Kurotsuchi, he was the first to try and study her. Saying he would allow her to wear clothes at night, and be treated far better then his other test subjects. Her eyes grew wide as she thought of what they would do to her. She took another step back when all of a sudden, the image of Ishida Uryu appered in her head. He was standing in front of her yelling at Mayuri to stop such non-sence as that. Saying that as long as he was still alive, he would never let such awful things happen to her. She then saw the image of Kuchiki Rukia. She stood before her holding her pure white Zanpakuto defensivly protecting Orihime. Yasutora Sado was next as he protected her from the Arrancar called Yammy. Lastly, the image of Kurosaki Ichigo as he saved her from being killed so many times. She froze. Though she was afraid she had to allow them to do as they wished with her. She owed it to her friends. They risked their lives for her, this was all she could do in return. All she could do was protect them. Szayel turned to her then. His smile had yet to fade. "Ulquiorra, plase leave. We wouldn't want you to make the young lady uncomfortable when she undresses now would we?" Orihime tightly gripped her trembling hand with the other. "U-Undress?" she asked in a shacky voice. Szayel smiled. "Of course. You're here for your health inspection. It's nothing more then a…what's the word you humans use…oh yes, a physical. I'm simply making sure you're as health as you can be. Though, one of the idems I was asked to check is quite odd of Lord Aien to ask of me." Orihime felt no comfort by this. She looked to Ulquiorra whom only glanced at her before he left her in the care of Szayel. Yet before he could leave, Szayel had one final comment for him. "Don't worry Ulqui-chan, I've no interest in human females."