Keep the promise she made in the past.

Bella kept her face hidden, daring not turn to face the sergeant or turn her bouquet of curls towards her. "Ralli... Stand over there. I'll wash your back... and we'll talk about us. Okay?"

Unseen by the braineater, Ralli nodded, then turned to stand facing the other shower head, her body stiff and her heart pounding. She gasped as she felt the other woman's breasts press against her back, then her arms wrap around her shoulders. "It does not seem... you intend to wash my back."

"No, Ralli," a breathy whisper came in her ear. "I'll wash your front for you."

The deathspeaker had obviously already gotten her own front, but she let it happen regardless, feeling the hypnotic pattern of painted nails and delicate hands caressing her skin. "I knew it... This feels obviously right... It feels... nostalgic..." the sergeant muttered, growing more and more comfortable until she began to get drowsy.

Bella didn't say anything in response. Instead, two of her curls snaked down so that her eye stalks could hook into her knight pendant and lift it off, granting her the pink skin, the head of stalked eyes, and the face-covering lips that were her true form. Even as she massaged her former partner, she didn't smile, holding her large lips evenly as she kept Ralli placated. "Ralli... aren't you ready to meet a nice man or woman and settle down?"

"You're... a nice woman... Bella..." the hypnotized deathspeaker muttered from her dream.

"I'm not, Ralli. I wasn't then... But I'm trying to be, now."

"Yeah... feels... nice..."

"Good. Stay calm. Focus on that nice feeling. Focus, and kneel," Bella whispered in multiple voices all at once, standing over the taller woman once the sergeant was on her knees. "Focus..." The wide lips of the braineater parted, her jaw opening wider and wider, extending like a snake's so it could fit around the entire upper head of the deatheater.

Even with her mouth occupied, Bella's voices resounded through Ralli's head. "Focus... focus... focus..."

This time, the braineater didn't need to do as thorough of a job as she had before. Back then, removing the entire memory of the suicide mission Ralli had been granted and her duty to their king had taken a night, and had required her to take with it nearly every trace of the deathspeaker's memory of her time serving as a demon. Planting the false memories of an unheard of "distaste for human flesh" and the willing desertion of one of the demon army's servants most specifically forged for loyalty had taken even longer. All in all, that process had been an entire night of probing Ralli's brain with her long, inhuman tongue... This would only take a few minutes. All she had to do was get the memory of her offer to shower together, and what had transpired when they did...

It had been over a year since Bella last tasted Ralli's memories. It was nostalgic, as a human might enjoy a local hometown treat before moving away at a young age. She had to be careful not to overindulge.

She had promised herself she would never do this again... However, more importantly, she had promised she would give Ralli a chance to start a new life with a new partner, one who didn't have to lie to her every day about having never known her before they "first met." That was the important promise to keep, and Bella would do it any way she could, even if it meant breaking her lesser promise.

Unlike a human, a deathspeaker's mind was normally simple and neat to parse. They were designed that way. However, Ralli's head had filled with far more than any ordinary deathspeaker since her departure from the demon army, so the process was slightly more difficult. Finally, Bella tasted it. What she had been searching for filled her senses... the taste of Ralli's current feelings for her. She only needed to probe a little further to find the offending knowledge and consume it...

Was it right to stop there?

Bella could taste every one of Ralli's relationships she'd forged in her time among the humans on the tip of her tongue... and, a certain sugary, saccharine taste like cotton candy. She could tell she'd gotten a hold of the entirety of the deathspeaker's feelings about her. If she tore this out and swallowed it... wouldn't it be easier for her friend to move on and meet someone else? Was that what she wanted?

She realized now that their relationship and the decision she now had to make was complicated, even more so than she had anticipated. Was it right to take anything more at all? Bella had never questioned that role of a braineater before... "No, this isn't about our roles... this is about the two of us, and my decision. There is no easy path, but there is certainly a right one. Do I eat everything of myself, then extract myself from her life, once and for all? Do I eat just enough to cancel our romantic encounter and resume my role as her fun but painfully off-limits "friend"... continue the lie? Or do I eat nothing at all... and finally reckon with what I did to her, knowing that could be the most painful for both of us?" A part of her simply wanted to remain on that shower floor, savoring the taste of Ralli's thoughts and feelings for as long as she could before she had to face reality.