The sound of beeping filled Pitou's overly sensitive ears. It seemed so loud to them, that they tried to cringe away.

They felt the feeling of tubes inside their body, mainly in the stomach and arm area, and their face seemed to be wrapped in some type of cloth. Their chest rose and fell, although relatively shallow, and they noticed that the clothes that they normally wore were not on their body, having been replaced by something else entirely.

The only part of their face that was free of confinement was their nose and mouth. They still found it difficult to breath, however.

A fairly good amount of pressure on the center of their chest was what most worried them. It was rumbling, and it felt warm through the thin material of whatever they were wearing.

They tried to move, but all they succeeded in doing was twitching their hand every so slightly.

Whatever they were laying on felt soft. Maybe it was a bed?

They were so confused. Weren't they supposed to be dead? They fought that kid, Gon. They died, they were sure of it. So what was going on?

Pitou tried to move a bit more, struggling. The weight on their chest ceased to move though.

Suddenly, they felt their shoulders being pushed down by what felt like hands.

"Don't try to move, you're in critical condition right now. You'll damage the IV if you continue."

The sound of an older woman speaking filled their ears. Pitou didn't recognize the voice all that well, but they felt like they had heard it before.

They turned their head towards where they heard the woman's voice.

"Where...am I?" Their voice came out raspy and quiet, almost a whisper. It hurt to speak.

"Don't try and speak, either. You were found nearly decapitated, but one of our Nen healers managed to reattach the rest of your head to your body. But your vocal cords are still in the recovery process, so try not to talk too much. We've been feeding you foods that'll help them through tubes, although they don't contain any human flesh, they should help your body heal since your part human and cat."

They were confused. The woman talking to them seemed to be human by how she smelled, so why was she helping them?

"Who...are you?" They once again whispered out, not at all listening to what the woman had said.

She sighed in annoyance "I told you not to speak. I'm one of the doctors that helped heal you. My daughter was the one that found you while on a mission for our head council members."

This still didn't explain anything, and now they were even more confused.

"What's...on my...chest?" They were still curious on why the thing was rumbling and felt so warm and comforting.

Suddenly, it was lifted off, making Pitou feel cold.

"Sorry about that. Little guy is rather curious when it comes to new patients. We didn't have the heart to move him when he curled up on you, so we just let him be for a bit."

Pitou assumed it was an animal she was talking about, although they didn't know what kind.

A section of the mattress near their head dipped down and suddenly they felt their hand being lifted up, making them freak out a little. They couldn't see a thing and had no idea where they were or what exactly was going on.

Suddenly, their hand was placed on something fur like. It was warm, and Pitou could feel a bit of bone from what they guess was the ribcage of the creature they were touching.

"He's a cat, to answer your question more specifically." The woman said.

They kept their hand on top of the cat, the small bit of warmth coming from the animal making them tired.

A faint pat to their cheek made them snap out of it, however.

"You're awake now, so you need to stay that way for a bit. You've been out for nearly a week, and I need to remove some of your bandages."

Pitou let out a low whine, but didn't argue. Not that they could, anyway. They were way too tired to do much of anything.

"Wait here for a minute. I'll be back with another healer." The woman said. Pitou picked up on the sound of her footsteps receding and then a door opening and closing.

They were in complete silence now, save for the unknown beeping and the soft purring of the cat under their arm.

They tried to use their other senses to try and get a hint of where they were, but all they could smell was herbs, tea, and something like alcohol, or maybe bleach.

All the overwhelming new smells made the fur on their tail stand on edge. Losing their sight made all of their other senses heightened, so all of the scents flooding into their nose made them feel almost sick.

Pitou wasn't keeping track of how much time has passed, but their ears picked up on people -it sounded like two- approaching the door.

They smelled the woman from before, as well as a new person.

The door opened and Pitou could hear them walking in.

"Are you still awake?" The woman asked.

Pitou did the best they could to nod, but gave up. Instead, they just lifted a finger in response, along with a hum.

"Good. We're going to be removing the bandages on your face to see if anything needs to be healed over again. Anita, could you close the curtains?"

This Anita person let out a 'yes' before the sound of fabric swishing filled the room.

Two pairs is hands were suddenly placed on the back of Pitou's neck and the back of their knees, making them flinch.

"Don't worry, we're just helping you sit up." The woman, who Pitou still didn't know the name of, said.

The hand on the back of their neck moved to sit in between their shoulder blades, pushing them up.

The hands under their knees pushed up too, making their demarcated joints pop and pull from lack of use.

Pitou let out a hiss, not for defense, but because of the aching pain in their body. They hadn't really noticed when they had woken up, since they were laying down, but now that they were being moved around, the pain presented itself, and it wasn't kind.

Both Anita and the still mysterious woman managed to sit Pitou upright, their back now resting against the headboard of the bed.

They breathed heavily and winced at the stinging pains everywhere in their body.

"Anita, hand me a pair of scissors please."

Pitou heard the sound of metal and then felt fingers pressing against the back of their head

They felt one of the bandages being lifted away from their hair and then heard a snipping sound and the bandages began to loosen.

The woman started unwrapping them, stooping every few seconds to snip another one, as the cloth began to pile on their lap.

Pitou kept their eyes closed from under the bandages that were still covering them, waiting for them to be off.

As soon as the last one fell, Pitou slowly pulled their eyes open.

Only for them to squint back shut.

They let out a yowl at the brightness of the room and pressed their eyes into their shoulders, hissing.

The woman sighed "turn off the light as well, Anita."

Soon enough, from behind their eyelids, Pitou noticed it get dark.

They opened their eyes again, and let out a small sigh of relief once they didn't feel the pain of light on them.

Pitou painfully lifted their hand to their left eye, noticing that it was blurrier to see out of than the right one.

They finally locked their gaze on the two women Infront of them. One was a short woman with strawberry pink hair and honey colored eyes. She had a round face and button nose, which was adorned with freckles. She was a bit chubby, but she looked healthy. She wore a white button up shirt and dark brown, knee length skirt under a white lab coat.

The other woman was fairly tall, with S/C colored skin, brown chest length hair, and E/C colored eyes. She wore a white lab coat like the other one, except she was wearing a black button up and black trousers, along with a white tie that was loose.

Pitou noticed the tall woman had a pair of scissors in her hand. So this was the doctor.

The other woman, who Pitou now figured was Anita, pressed a hand to their face, a familiar light surrounding it.

'Nen' they thought. 'she's either an enhancer or emitter, but it's hard to tell.'

Pitou soon noticed the blurriness in their left eye began to disappear, as did the stabbing pain in the rest of their body, leaving it at a dull ache.

Anita pulled her hand away, deactivating her hatsu, before standing up and walking away from Pitou.

'she must be a pretty strong Nen user to be able to heal the rest of my body in just a few seconds. Impressive.'

The tall woman approached Pitou and began removing some of the tubes in their body. Mainly the ones up their nose, and one of the ones on their arms.

"You'll still need to be fed through tubes for a few days as you continue make a full recovery. After that, we'll find out what to do with you."

Pitou's ear twitched as they tilted their head.

The woman sighed "the head council members don't know what to do with you yet. They only let us operate on you because you were near death. They all thought we could study you, see how your body works, stuff like that. Once you get better, however, it's hard to say what'll happen from there."

Pitou nodded and leaned their head up, staring at the ceiling. Their tail swished from under the blanket, bumping against their bare ankle every now and then.

Pitou felt a weight on their lap and looked down, seeing a grey and white fluffy cat plop down on their thighs.

Pitou ran their hand across the cats fur, being careful not to hurt him with their claws.

If they served no purpose when they were healthy, what was going to happen? Pitou didn't know what had happened to the other Chimera Ants, nor did they know what had happened to the king and the other royal guards.

But what they did know, was that they had to stay alive for now. Maybe they'd try and win over those supposed council members.

They didn't know if they could use Nen right now, but it would probably be best not to.

Closing their eyes, Pitou adjusted their body to lay down, curling around the cat in their arms.

Maybe they could just sleep these thoughts away for now.