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Chapter Text

CHAPTER ONE
AUGUST 27TH
LECTER ESTATE, ISLE OF YOUTH

www.Tattlecrime.com/topnews

MARYLAND FBI CRUMBLES AS INSTITUTION-WIDE COVERUP EXPOSED

"DRAGON SLAYER" WILL GRAHAM MISSING FOR FIFTEEN DAYS, SEARCH GROWS DESPERATE

JACK CRAWFORD AT THE GUILLOTINE AGAIN; HEAD OF CHESAPEAKE RIPPER CONSPIRACY

CHESAPEAKE RIPPER'S FATE REVEALED; MILLIONS TERRIFIED

KILLER AT LARGE AND SLAYER MISSING IN ACTION

Light. The sun has just raised her head above the horizon, dressing the sky and the water beneath it with beautiful yellows and soft, greyish blues. Whatever light reaches him, as he sits at his desk and flips through news articles on his tablet, filters into greens, reds, and rich blues when the stained glass window receives it. He is only half-reading; he skims through the headlines that grab at him, and no further. His fingertips are buzzing.

Warmth. The anticipation grows with each passing day. It distracts him with most things, inhibits what little he is able to do, and often leaves him staring longingly through the windows, wondering when he is going to see Will again. A little fire is burning under his chest -- it is tended to by the jolts of excitement he experiences whenever he thinks he hears footsteps coming to the porch, or whenever he envisions what Will might look like, having assumed his new persona. He could be Anton Whittaker, Hans Armine, or Maxwell Leblanc. Whatever his name, Hannibal spends most of his day, he realizes, waiting at his study window with the tablet screen going dark, and his eyes on the horizon.

Virginia officials say Will Graham may have already left the country, one of the articles reads.

Amused, Hannibal remarks to himself, I certainly hope so.

With gentleness, he flips the cover of the tablet closed and sets it aside in favor of finishing his morning tea. The brew is sharp and herby, strong enough to shock his only working eye open; this flavor reminds him of Will. His breakfast was grilled fish, caught fresh that morning -- he had gone to the market early to ensure no one else could graze on the fisherman's catch. The pleasant taste of brine lingers on his tongue; each reminder of Will is another batch of tinder to the fire that warms him so utterly.

This morning, he thinks, he will water the flowers. Lifting himself onto his feet, he suddenly feels a hundred years older. His body aches. Old scar tissue in his abdomen complains as it stretches. But this is pain he can endure. There is no pain he can't. He had resolved this to himself the moment he realized Will was not lying beside him when he first woke on the boat that night.

Will was missing, and Hannibal understood that he could not die.

He fills the garden can in the sink; meandering out onto the porch, he holds one hand out beyond himself to pass the front door's threshold without incident. Water drips onto his sandaled feet.

His flowers stare up longingly for their fill. With a smile, he indulges them. He leans over the patio's railing, choosing to stay in the shade even when the morning is still cool. The garden is larger than he intended it to be. With every vegetable or fruit he added to his collection, he thought of how he could prepare it to feed his dear Will. The flowers are those he believes would look beautiful when tucked behind Will's ear.

The water is showering over his squash when he quirks his head. He hears something in the distance. He turns and focuses with his good ear.

Pattering footsteps, too soft and too many to be human. Curious, he sets his watering can down by his feet. Water drools from cracks in the can and into the patio's adobe flooring. Maybe the neighbor got a new dog, he wonders. A street mutt is coming to eat Will's vegetables. That will not do.

A brown shape speeds through the garden and up the patio steps; the dog's tail wags so strongly that Hannibal fears it's going to tear the limb right off. The dog looks like it fell into an oil spill, tan and brown and black splotches obfuscating its form against the dirt and adobe around it. Its shiny black nose dives into Hannibal's robe; huffing in surprise, he feels compelled to pet the animal, even when he still isn't sure whether or not it's a threat.

"Oh, hello," he murmurs to it. The dog sniffs his robe pockets, staring up at him with large brown eyes. Its tail begins to wag impossibly harder. Scratching into its neck, Hannibal asks, "Where have you come from?" 

And here comes the sound that makes Hannibal's entire body still. His heart stops beating for the moment he hears it -- his hands freeze in the little dog's fur, and he feels tiny laps of its tongue on his thumb, unable to process anything except the sound of his name in someone else's mouth. In Will's mouth.

"Hannibal."

Hannibal looks up.

And there he is.

Will is standing there. He is standing. He is alive, and he is there, just beyond the garden, just beyond the moat of green and sunset-colored plants. Body visibly trembling, he settles his weight from one foot to the other, as if he were about to burst from his skin in the effort to run fast enough to catch the man he's been searching for. His skin carries a sheen of sweat, and his shirt is opened beneath the coat that threatens to fall off his shoulders with the slightest gust of wind. He looks completely, utterly, starstruck.

Whatever happened to your hair? he wants to ask. What instead leaves him is a soft breath of realization. His ribs shake, as do his hands, and he calls to his missing half, his soul having taken the body of another person;--

"Will."

Time shatters; the clock's hand churns one time and then again and again and again. Hannibal nudges the little dog aside -- Winston is its name, he remembers -- as Will charges across the garden and he charges down the stairs to meet him. His balance nearly tips him over, but he can't move fast enough to match the rapid beating of his heart.

They are two parted waves crashing together, consuming each other--

Hands clap either side of Hannibal's face, and he realizes with a great terror that Will is close enough to touch. He flinches, feeling his soul's breath on his face. Will's body is searingly hot; his palms burn, and his shoulders warm Hannibal's own palms as he grasps his coat desperately.

"Hannibal." Will trips over his words, mouth trembling, eyes wild with something deeper than exultation -- he looks entirely mad. "Oh, God. You're -- you're alive." He shakes Hannibal's head, and he feels his dead eye swimming in his skull.

"Yes," he wheezes. Drawing his soul closer, Hannibal feels his bones through his clothing; he has gotten so thin. "I'm here, Will, I am alive."

All Will can say is, "Oh, God."

"And you've returned to me." Will's madness is infectious; not to say that Hannibal isn't entirely mad himself. He smiles against Will's palms, murmuring, "Finally, you've returned to me. In one piece, no less."

What Will says next, he doesn't know. His hands wander over Hannibal's face, making the unfamiliar familiar again. His thumbs trace the scars littered over Hannibal's visage, disappearing and then reappearing in sensation, like he is a lump of clay being molded back into shape by memory alone. The heel of Will's hand covers his blind eye, and his thumb covers the scar almost lovingly.

Will brings him closer, whispering another prayer, and then another, as his eyes redden; his lips are trembling, and how Hannibal wants to capture them between his own. To capture the man who has been gone from him for so long.

"I'm here, Will," he coos. "I'm not going anywhere."

What happens next, he's not quite sure. In a flash, Will is crying, praying aloud, and the next, his expression has curdled into fury, and Hannibal is on the ground, his face throbbing, appalled. Another flash -- he shouts in pain as a fist strikes into the soft flesh of his eye socket.

Will's shadow crosses over his vision; he holds his palm out, trying to say, "Mercy, Will--" when hands take him by the robe.

"Why did you leave, Hannibal?" Will cries. A sob leaves him like a drowning man choking up water, and he slams Hannibal into the planter he's fallen into. "Why did you leave me there?"

Tears splash onto Hannibal's cheeks like droplets of rain. His outstretched hand catches Will's next strike, bony knuckles flexing angrily against the pad of his palm. Will cries his name and collapses onto his body.

Panting with confusion, Hannibal blinks through the pain, whose throbbing epicenter makes him believe his eye has begun to bleed. "Will," he says, placing his hand atop his soul's temple, "I am here. You are here with me, now. Forget the rest. Forget the rest, Will."

Will's heart thunders against Hannibal's ribs. He breathes erratically. He paints Hannibal's palm in sweat as he soothes his head, and his body trembles as though he is having a seizure.

Hannibal can barely determine if the seizure is real when his soul stops moving all at once, sighing out the last of his energy before collapsing entirely.

"Will?" he asks, to no response.

He checks Will's pulse. It flutters like a bird beneath Hannibal's forefingers.

Grunting, he maneuvers himself out from underneath Will, hands placed carefully on each bicep. He leans close to Will's mouth, head parallel to his sternum, to see it rise and fall. Will doesn't breathe for a long while. Hannibal is ready to assume the position for CPR when Will's life rattles back into him; his lips part, and he wheezes quietly.

As he measures Will's pulse again, Winston sniffs at his unconscious form. Little whines leave the dog's mouth. Hannibal knows it is no use reasoning with an animal. He worms his hand beneath Will's head, ensuring it doesn't touch the garden's soil, and works the other beneath his legs.

He lifts Will into his arms. Will is much lighter than he remembers him being; he can almost feel his thigh bones through his jeans.

Hannibal shoulders the front door open; he walks past the warm tea on the stove, past the study holding news stories that don't know anything about the truth he carries against his body. He walks past his bedroom and to the second one at the end of the hall. The doorknob is dulled with dust.

He places Will on the bed. His unconscious form fills in the grooves of the mattress as if he'd been sleeping there for decades already. Cream colored sheets cradle him, creasing just barely. It is still too hot a time of year for any auxiliary blankets, but Hannibal places one across his legs for courtesy. The blanket is simple, made of knots of thick, wool yarn. It should bring pressure, not heat, for comfort.

He unclips the straps of Will's backpack and frees the bag from beneath him. Will sinks deeper into the bed, his chin now parallel with the opposite wall rather than extended toward the sky like it had been. After setting the backpack down -- he ignores the terrible desire to see what is inside -- he stuffs a second pillow beneath Will's head.

Will looks right at home with the decor. Hannibal has paintings of quiet beach scenes on the walls, windows framed with navy-blue curtains, and little ceramic figures of fish on the bookshelves, which were originally paperweights. A desk on one side of the room, and the window which faces the sun on the wall opposite, with his bed between. The window has sunlight pouring between the slats, striping down Will's form. Hannibal recalls the fishing supplies he has in the right side drawers of the desk, and smiles to himself. The dresser, he had custom-made by an artisan on the mainland -- its drawers carry all sorts of hidden storage compartments, both for clothes, as well as souvenirs, or perhaps paperwork. The room has slowly grown more decorated as the months have passed, populated with tchotchkes he thought Will might enjoy.

Hannibal draws his attention back to Will. Will's eyelashes dress his cheeks, fluttering occasionally. His cheeks are flushed from the sunlight; he has a sunburn across the back of his neck. His body slumps in on itself as he sleeps, possibly dreaming. Hannibal places a palm over his forehead.

"Rest, Will," he says with no sound.

When he retracts, Will's face twitches.

He excuses himself to his own bedroom. Winston feeds into Will's room as he delicately closes the door behind him.

The wounds in the bathroom mirror don't look as severe as Hannibal guessed they were. He stands in his on-suite, the fingers of his good hand barely dressing the welts on his eye and cheek. His head throbs. The nerves in his teeth fizzle in reactionary pain. Thankfully, his eye is not bleeding. He traces the intact, though swollen, lower eyelid with reverence. Will certainly still has a fire in him.

After tending to his wounds, he changes out of his robe; he dons a white buttoned shirt, equally light linen pants, and an apron.

The kitchen welcomes him warmly, smelling of the same tea that lies dormant in his study. He weaves between the two-stepped island, toward the bend where his stove lies embedded underneath the largest window of the house; it drowns the room in light, and Hannibal only just barely registers that he should draw the curtains so Will can traverse unaffected. He observes the other half of his garden, which lines a gazebo built entirely of mosaic tiles.

His hands, he notices, are shaking in anticipation.

The first question that comes to mind is: what should he make for Will's breakfast? Should he make some coffee? Should he cook more fish? Something with pork and rice? Should he wait until Will tells him what he wants? Should he have something warm waiting for him? The questions buzz around his head like a furious hive.

As he reaches for his refrigerator handle, he hears footsteps tromping down the hallway. First, Winston comes to Hannibal's heel; it sniffs at the change of clothes, seemingly disapproving. The dog then wanders throughout the kitchen and loses itself in the dining room. The next steps come after that.

It might have been only half an hour or so since he set Will to bed. Hannibal eyes the clock above his dishware hutch, and as he does, a voice behind him croaks;--

"Hannibal?"

Hannibal returns to Will, who stands with a hand on the wall beside him for support, ready to flit across the kitchen's length to him. It's only now that Hannibal assesses Will's true state.

He might have filled in his clothes a year ago -- perhaps even his own skin; his shirt hangs off his collarbones, and exhaustion drags his face down his skull. His expression is of permanent disquiet. Hannibal would describe it as hollow. A man who has had everything he knows scraped out of his skull, only leaving behind neuroses. There is also an anger there, brewing behind the flickering light in his eyes, lining his vision like the redness that plagues him now; anger with whom, Hannibal is unsure. Perhaps everyone who participated in scraping the soft flesh of humanity out of him, leaving behind only an animal's instincts, or an animal's fury.

Or Hannibal himself. When Will draws his gaze over Hannibal's stiffened form, the fire in him lights anew. Hannibal suddenly worries he may try to lunge for him again.

"You've gotten so thin," he can't help but say aloud.

Will regards him as if he himself were an animal, or a hallucination of some sort. He manages to drag himself to the island, one elbow digging into the countertop. His legs visibly tremble. His head dips to catch different angles of Hannibal's face.

Hannibal waves to the bar chairs sitting expectantly around the opposite side of the island. He takes care to sound pleasant. "Please, have a seat."

"You've been here the whole time?" Will says instead of indulging him.

Hannibal returns, finding himself hesitating, "Yes."

"The whole fucking time?"

"I must insist that you sit down, Will." Again, he gestures.

"And you didn't do anything?" Will steps forward again. He struggles to even walk -- for reasons Hannibal cannot discern -- but his determination outpaces his strength, and he pushes onward despite. "Except sit here and wait?"

"I could not safely return to you, Will. You know that," he says. "You have returned to me; that is all that matters, now."

"Don't do what they did." He shakes his head. "Don't talk to me like that; I'm not a mental patient."

"How exactly should I be speaking to you, Will?"

At this, Will's mouth snaps shut. Something furious crosses his expression like a spotlight, there and then gone. He hobbles to the closest barstool he can reach.

Watching him painstakingly place himself onto the seat, Hannibal explains, "You have been unmoored from your foundations, mentally and physically. Upon realizing that fundamental truths have become fundamental lies, your mind is now fragile. You need a new foundation; something that will help you get your bearings again."

"My paddle on reality," Will remarks with venom.

"Exactly."

He hangs his head low. Winston comes to him, then, investigating him beyond Hannibal's sight. Neither of them speaks for some time. Hannibal respects the quiet; he takes the kettle off his stovetop and pours a serving into a mug -- Will's mug. It has small sketches of select leaves and flowers on it. Hannibal recalls buying it on one of his first excursions upon gaining his ability to walk again.

"Eight months," Will says. "You were dead for eight months."

Hannibal says, "I read," as he slides the drink into Will's palms. Will stares into it, blinking slowly.

"Did you think I was dead?"

"I watched them take your body away in a helicopter, presumably to the hospital. It was the only way they could fish you from the rocks." He settles across from Will. "The only confirmation I had that you survived was in the news. I've been waiting for you ever since."

Before Will can reply, he continues, "It would not have been safe for either of us if I had returned to America, Will." 

Will's face twitches in phases; he scratches his newly reappeared facial hair. He still hasn't drunk from his offering.

His hand disappears into one of his jeans pockets -- he withdraws a small metal figurine. He places it on the counter roughly, but his fingers still linger around it, as if apologizing to it.

"Look," Will demands. "Look at it."

Hannibal feels electricity when their fingertips brush. He takes the figurine in his hand and brings it close to his face. The urn is barely the size of the meat of his thumb, designed to feel insignificant in one's hand. Curious, Hannibal pries open the lid and glances inside. He wonders if they ever bothered to sand the inside of the vase. In the corner of his eye, he catches Will's apprehensive staring, glued to him like he will disappear if he ever blinks.

LECTER, 1969-2017, it reads on the bottom.

"I regard my own body in this moment," Hannibal murmurs.

"That was all I ever knew of you, Hannibal." Will holds his name between his teeth with such precision, pronouncing every syllable with diction now that the whole means something again. "All I ever knew."

"An imago."

Will nods, mouth flattened.

Hannibal says, "This was your connection to my soul, made material. I made a space for you in my home, as my material connection to you. Do I disappoint you, now that I stand here in the flesh?"

His eyelashes flicker. He stares off into the backsplash over Hannibal's shoulders, eyes flicking to each tile as if he were counting them. It seems like it pains him to say, "No."

"Should I have dropped to my knees and kissed your ankles? Am I seeking forgiveness?"

Will grimaces. Finally, he brings the cup to his lips. "You're right. I'm unmoored," he says after swallowing. He seems to enjoy it. He keeps going back for more, even when his tentative grip on reality makes him fearful of the drink. "I feel like I'm in a dream."

"Perhaps you've only just woken up." A smile warms Hannibal's face, but his wisdom does not seem to comfort Will.

After a long pause, Will tells him, "You don't look how I expected you to."

"How did you expect?"

When his soul doesn't answer, Hannibal retracts from the island, rolls up his sleeves, and makes for the kettle.

"You are meeting me for the first time again," he says. Maybe he will make something earthier to warm Will's stomach -- prepare him for a larger meal. Will presses the urn against his collarbone. "Here, I am a starving artist waiting for my muse to return to me after we lost each other in travel years ago. You were swept away toward the States, and I south to Cuba, with only my sketches of you and the promise you would come to soothe me."

Will warms his other palm on the sun-soaked countertop. "I seem to recall the name 'Simóne' being tossed around."

"It's Simon," Hannibal says with humor. He looks back toward his muse. "My name is Simon Orozco."

"Starving artist..." Will remarks, glancing around the home. "Who is certainly not rich beyond imagination?"

Hannibal exposes his teeth in his smile. "My neighbors mustn't know that. I would lose my supply of tangerines."

"Your neighbors?" 

"Yes. A husband and wife, Mr. and Mrs. Arenas. They live a mile or so westward. Both are quite young. They tell me they want to become photographers and travel to Europe." 

Will taps his nail on the countertop. A pause, then he says, "Are you going to kill them?"

Hannibal speaks as he feeds dried leaves and spices into a cheesecloth; he opens cabinets and fishes the ingredients he needs out, eventually bringing the mixture to his nose. "They have been nothing but polite to me. Give me fruits from their trees and vegetables from their garden. I, in turn, deliver meals."

"An ecosystem." 

"A relationship of equal exchange. Atoms lend one another energy by making contact and breaking the barriers of one another's electron shells. It would be detrimental to us both if I were to sabotage that method of conductivity." He refills the kettle; he reaches into the drawers at his hips and takes a pan in the stronger of his two hands, placing that and the kettle both on the stovetop. As he reaches, he recalls the watering can he abandoned on the porch.

He wonders if Will has blinked even once; he watches Hannibal's every movement, particularly eyeing the pan. "Show me your hands," he says suddenly.

With curiosity, Hannibal obliges. He stretches his fingers as far as they can go and presents the pair to his muse, whose own hands gather around the mug, as if to stop himself from touching. Will's knotted eyebrows seem to be asking, 'What happened?' His pupils flick from vein to vein, mapping each fingernail in his mind; Hannibal's right hand looks as though it had been split entirely in half and then stitched together -- stitched in a hurry, it seems, as he carries a twitch, and the scar runs deep from knuckle to palm, winding almost like a river. He has long since known that his fingers can never close around anything smaller than a glass of water, and they will never extend three inches past that threshold. Even now, as he attempts to spread his fingers, they refuse the action stubbornly.

After a moment, Will unfurls himself and takes the hand in his own. Hannibal ignores the electricity at their touch. He can't help but feel like Will is still in the animal state of mind, and must be regarded with patience, so he stands completely still.

Will, eyebrows taut, jaw set, flips his hand so that the palm faces the sky. His intense concentration, Hannibal infers, is from palming his own memories in an attempt to spark something.

With a scowl that he might not know paints his face, Will presses one finger down at the second knuckle, his pinky, and watches as the finger curls and meets Hannibal's palm with resistance, but not outright defiance as the two middle fingers do. The pointer seems to be the most well-performing out of the bunch, omitting his thumb, which is almost entirely unaffected. Then, Will performs a mirrored exercise, pulling the fingers back and encouraging them to extend upright as far as they can go. None of them perform well. His eyes widen. Lastly, he drifts his fore nails down the scar tissue, barely touching, and Hannibal wishes to God to be able to feel it.

"This hand," Hannibal narrates, "was placed on your lower back. It split upon impact, and so did your spine."

Will curses, "Christ," and unhands him. The small humor leaves him; Hannibal can see the gleam of his teeth as he remarks, "I guess I broke your fall."

"So it seems."

He stares into his dead eye, and his confusion deepens further. "You can't be entirely rehabilitated."

"I'm not." He muses, "They say time heals all wounds, but ours appear still fresh." Phantom fingers lie imprinted onto the skin of his palm; under Will's careful watch, he retrieves the mug, rinses it, and places the tied cheesecloth inside. Once his hands are clean, he taps the ring underneath his dead eye and says, "I am entirely blind in this eye. As blind as the moment I struck the rock. It is a unique point of timelessness when I begin to notice the moments passing. It grounds me somewhat."

Will's thumb massages the urn's lid in small circles; he murmurs, "Punching you doesn't help in the healing process, I don't think."

Trying not to smile, Hannibal replies, "It does not." He pours steaming water into the mug and lets it soak. When the conversation lulls, he takes the opportunity to speak. "I was going to make the Arenas' a spiced pork roast; they gifted me the first peaches from their youngest fruit tree just recently," he says, knowing that he is setting a hook.

Will bites; Hannibal can almost hear his stomach grumble. He comments, "You've really set down roots."

"I had not much else to do." He places both palms on the countertop and asks his muse, "Are you hungry, Will?"

"Starving."

Touched, Hannibal retrieves the teabag and sets it aside. Will latches himself to its lip as soon as he's given the drink again. "Do you have any preferences for fish?"

Will parts to tell him, "I'll eat anything you make me."

Hannibal smiles.

Hannibal has his soul returned, and Will is finally home.

Chapter Text

CHAPTER TWO
SEPTEMBER 1ST
LECTER ESTATE, ISLE OF YOUTH

Quiet. Hannibal isn't sure when he wakes. The low silence of sleep is disturbed so subtly that he doesn't at first notice the shift. A change so small that he forgets what woke him. He doesn't open his eyes. The white noise in the room is rumbling a single note deeper, as though the figure standing beside his bed has interrupted the eternal churn of photons around him. They bounce off the silhouette, finally hitting Hannibal's ears a few moments longer than they should have. He doesn't know how long this figure has been here. The smallest sliver of light beats against his good eye; only half of it, as the result of the figure's corona.

Movement. Standing as still as a statue for so long that Hannibal had begun to think he was hallucinating, the figure finally moves. He hears a soft ruffle of fabric – a bundling of hands against a shirt or pair of pants. Is this figure contemplating something?

Hannibal pretends to rustle as a result of an eventful dream; he gathers air through his nostrils and releases it in a sigh, uncharacteristic of his normally shallow breathing. Will. The scent of Will floods him and sinks into his body. He must have gotten acquainted with the toiletries in the guest bathroom; he smells like a polite-scented aftershave, vanilla body wash, and inoffensive shampoo. A much preferred scent to sweat, as it had been before.

It seems he is still acclimating to Hannibal's presence.

Will stands over his unconscious form; the only evidence that his existence is material is when Hannibal feels an almost imperceptible brush of denim against his hand, as Will assumedly steps forward close enough to touch the mattress. He can almost feel the stare that bores into him.

A fingernail on his cheek. Two. Three. They drift down, following the curve of his cheekbone, then the landscape of his face; the caress stops at his jaw. Although Hannibal expects the visiting fingers to explore further, they do not move at all. They linger. They feel the tiny beats of a pulse in Hannibal's jaw.

Curious for his reaction, Hannibal sighs again and brings his head to the side. The shift seems to have spooked him. Will disappears like a flame blown out – Hannibal hears his faint gasp, and the scent leaves him at once. The air drags along in his absence; the peach hairs on Hannibal's face detect it, as do his eyelashes. When he cracks his eye open, the figure is gone, only an opened door in his wake. Will needs to learn how to cover his tracks.

•••

"Tell me what happened, Hannibal."

Breakfast. Will makes the request over breakfast. The mug is still held fast in his palms, a new object to attach to now that the urn no longer has any tethers. He does still keep it in front of him at all times; this morning, the urn sits beside his glass of water. It is slightly hidden where Hannibal has plates of sliced fruit and bowls of various granolas and mix-ins littered across the table. The ceramic islands make a landscape between his and Will's meals. They began with a round of eggs and pan-fried sausage, but after hours of sitting and acclimating – Will's gaze like two small drills that find a point on his face and burrow – Hannibal moved to bring something more nutritious to Will's table-setting.

Hannibal made them smoothie bowls, for lack of a better term. Various citrus and fibrous fruits have been condensed into a frozen mixture. Hannibal, as he set the food down, guessed that Will hadn't consumed much in the way of hydration or nutrition on his journey, and Will sheepishly agreed. He has devoured most of his serving.

Will's eyelashes catch the sunlight and make them glow nearly blond. Hand twitching near his spoon, he keeps his gaze trained on Hannibal's every movement.

"Hannibal," he repeats. Hannibal watches his forefinger tap against the mug's ceramic, and finally focuses onto his piercing gaze. He isn't sure if he's ever seen Will blink since returning to him.

He says, "Hmm?" as he pushes a blueberry across the bowl's surface.

"Tell me what happened."

Hannibal tips his head curiously. "Do you not remember?"

"Don't." Will's fingers curl until the tops of his fingernails brace the mug, and not the pads. Then, he relaxes. "I remember as much as I think I'm going to."

"There are still gaps," he surmises. Will nods with a nervous frown drawn onto his face.

"I was screaming your name. I went unconscious in the surf. Then, I woke up in a hospital bed with no memory of what happened."

"It is possible to induce amnesia. Accidentally or through foul play."

Will's frown sours. He leans forward and says with importance, "You're avoiding the question."

Hannibal reasons, "I am gauging your mental state, Will." He feeds himself a hefty spoonful, and tart berries pop pleasantly in his mouth, chased by the cool sweetness of the smoothie.

"That's all they did. Gauge. Avoid. Say it was to protect me. I don't need protecting. I need to know." He moves his own meal aside. "And I need to hear it from you, Hannibal. You."

Hannibal's sigh squeezes his lungs. Slowly, he sets his utensils down. He returns to Will, whose pupils are resizing with the intensity of his stare.

"Let me take you to the sunroom," he says.

His muse looks like he wants to have an outburst. A vein practically pops in one of his eyes. He lets Hannibal take the plates and arrange the appropriate leftovers, having been left twitching at the dining table.

Will remarks, "You're going to let some light on the subject?" as he follows Hannibal down from the kitchen and toward the back patio. Hannibal only chuckles.

There is the living room, arranged around a fireplace built of opaline stones, and through a wall of glass, a second set of sitting furniture lies waiting to be enjoyed. These sofas and chairs are more durable, made to withstand the sun. They're a deep teal color; a striking color palette that Hannibal thought would be appealing against the bright room. Underneath their feet is a mosaic tile pattern with swirling, dancing colors. Around the inside perimeter of the glasshouse are cabinets, laid with white countertops. This used to be his patio. He places Will's mug of tea on the glass coffee table and soon himself on the main sofa. A yellow decorative blanket throws its tassels over his knee.

Will is squinting against the sunlight. Winston's nails scratch the tile; Hannibal motions to the door on the right end of the room, and when Will opens it, he releases the dog into the backyard. Hopefully, it will know to contain itself in the Cuban sun. And not to fertilize his most delicate flowers.

"This is every suburban mom's wet dream," Will says. He sinks into one of the off-hand chairs.

Hannibal ignores the slight and pats the empty space beside himself; his muse hesitates a moment, likely finding his seat luxurious. The weight of his body tips Hannibal's hips off-kilter. He appreciates the reminder of reality. Will is right here.

He catches Will's scars. His sketches are mostly accurate, even if they were educated guesses. The Dragon's claw has torn a meandering line into his cheek; the corner of his mouth bears a stitch scar, likely having rebelled against the union of skin as daily movement interrupted the healing process. Both that and his forehead scar shine a dusty pink against his newly acquired sunburn. They appear slightly swollen. His cheeks are flushed in the warm Cuban morning, and Hannibal can't help but find it endearing.

Will looks at him. His eyebrows draw low over his eyes. Hannibal is so distracted by this artwork before him that he barely registers the impatience in his expression.

They're so close, Will only needs to whisper. "What happened, Hannibal?"

He returns to the horizon and breathes in preparation to speak.

He tells me that it is beautiful. In that, he tells me that I am beautiful. That he, here, bleeding from the mouth and with eyes on fire, is beautiful. He is. Oh, he is.

He brings his head against my chest. His hands tighten where he has captured me, bringing me closer, threatening to rend me. Our temples meet flush against each other as we embrace; I want to bring his face deeper into the pocket between my neck and shoulder. I want to shield him from the world so that he can break himself out of the cocoon that has restricted him so. So that his tender body can feel safe against mine. So that he may complete his transformation, wet and soft and trembling, to harden into the creature he was always meant to be.

Will's ear cups my beating heart, slow despite the flush of adrenaline through my body – something I can't remember happening since I was a child. I can feel his heartbeat echo against my ribcage. I feel the exact moment it slows, lulled into a peaceful thud. Skin to skin. Blood to blood.

The teacup has yet to shatter. The very edge of its ceramic lip hovers frozen over the tile. The moment we spend entangled in one another stretches infinitely beyond us.

I know that I am going to die when he brings his arm around my neck.

He may be killing me, but I allow myself to die. Only by his hand may I allow myself to die. No one else has the right. He knows this. My lips brush his ear, whispering permission that does not need to be spoken aloud.

We rock once on our heels. He hesitates; I don't let him. He has made his decision. Will sways, and I allow myself to be brought with him.

He tips us over the edge.

My hands claim what they can around Will's body. The wound in my abdomen screams as I bring him infinitely closer; I know how we are going to fall. I come to his lower back, the other hand cupping his head to lean forward onto my shoulder so that when he lands on the rock, his upper half won't ricochet. What is perhaps my greatest oversight is where my own head will be.

The water meets us in a wall. Water erupts around us and consumes us like a hungry maw opened. Something impacts. I do not know what the epicenter is.

I find that I have gone unconscious. The world blinks, and I remember Will's hands around me. Will is still alive. Therefore, I am still alive. I rise out of the water, not yet understanding why my vision is half-drowned by ink, and drag his screaming form into the crags.

For the first time since I was a child, I do not know what to do.

My arms push me forward; I cannot recall my thoughts in words, only movement, only the next flash of instinct to muscle that brings Will's body against a jutting boulder.

My hand is useless, and yet I try to use it, clipping Will's belt secure around the boulder I've chosen to be his anchor. Will is screaming. My name is the only word he knows.

Hannibal, he cries.

Will.

Hannibal.

Will.

I can't move my legs, Hannibal.

I know, Will, it's alright.

I'm so scared, Hannibal.

It's okay, Will, you're secure. You're safe.

Hannibal, everything hurts.

A white boat breaks the distant fog. Chiyoh's flashlight blinks once, then twice. I gulp for air, and I turn back to him. His hand reaches for me; I press it against the rock. My palm warms his freezing cold knuckles.

Will, I'm going to get help, I say.

No, Hannibal, stay here. Please.

Please, Hannibal.

Hannibal! No!

With only the occasional blinks of light through the fog to guide me, I lunge back into the water. Lethargy begins to grow like a fungus. I swim for what feels like hours. I am barely able to drag myself over the boat's lip; hands take me by my clothes, and I land onto the deck with a thud.

Chiyoh, I say. My mouth is numb with blood. Will is there.

We have to go, she says.

When I rise again, there are lights in the sky. A helicopter's spotlight. Will's body floats, infinitely small in the teeth of the cliff. He has stopped screaming.

You will kill him.

He is already dead.

Then let me die.

She takes my shoulder when I haul my body to enter the water again. She does not allow me to move.

Sirens cry in the distance. The boat churns away, farther and farther. I am helpless. I am helpless. Blood weeps from every place I can imagine. My hands are dripping with it. I collapse at Chiyoh's feet.

I wake in the cabin, naked, wrapped in bandages. Chiyoh has a bowl of stained water in her lap. She seems to have been sitting there for some time. She has given me morphine; I know this from the dull delirium clouding my mind. Pain echoes in the back of my skull, but I pay no attention to it. I focus on bringing my lips together to speak.

Will? I say.

He is not here.

I don't believe I hear her. Will, I say.

She says again, He is not here.

Will, I say, blinking slowly.

Chiyoh says nothing more, and neither do I. Will is not here; I understand with striking clarity that I cannot die. He must come back to me.

That is his design.

"Then, I came here, to Cuba," Hannibal says solemnly. One knee is crossed over the other, and his hands lie in a bundle in his lap. It reminds him of their days in therapy.

Will works through a knot in his jaw. He stares off into the distance, where Winston has made itself at home beneath the gazebo.

He says, lifting his eyebrows, "So, should I be mad at Chiyoh?"

"You don't have to be mad at anybody," Hannibal considers.

Will's face works through multiple emotions at once. Anger is what comes back again and again, pushing through the expressions of concern and upset that try to color over. He wipes his jaw, freshly shaven.

His voice is clipped. He says, "Aren't you angry?"

"Is that not what you wanted to hear?"

"I don't know what I wanted to hear." Will fidgets. He brings a hand to his temple, pauses, returns, and smooths his eyes down, and then faces Hannibal more fully, tilting toward him. He says with importance, "Hannibal, it felt like– It felt like my entire being was engulfed by you in that moment, and then you were torn out of me. You were missing. An entire structure built within myself was missing. When I found out you were alive, I nearly killed myself trying to find you. All that to tell me Chiyoh wouldn't let you off the boat? That's what stopped you?"

"I would have died if I tried to return to you in that moment. Any manner of things would have killed me if I hadn't lost consciousness. I could have torn every organ from my abdominal wall trying to swim and hemorrhaged. The water could have induced hypothermia. If they saw me, still alive, still moving, trying to take you from the rocks, they would have killed us both. There is nothing I could have done except stay put."

He scoffs and looks away. "A bullet in each of our heads is a greater mercy than everything it took to get here."

Hannibal wants to hold one of his hands. His speech slows to embed each point into his mind. He says, "And yet, all of it led to this moment. Where you are clothed, fed, speaking to me. Both of us alive. I would prefer that over any alternative."

"I could have gotten here sooner. I could have started here," Will says, nearly exasperated. "If I got out of the belt. If I swam. If I didn't pull you over that damn cliff."

"I understand what happens to the mind when it shrouds itself in the theoretical. It cannibalizes itself; it drives the soul mad when it cannot process anything other than what could have been. Not what happened." As a test, he drifts a hand across the sofa's spine, and his fingertips brace Will's shoulder. "Speculation feeds this madness. Has it done you any good?"

Will does and says nothing. Frozen, his hands cramp in his lap as he stares into the window.

Leaning forward just so, Hannibal says, "Could it be that it was only in this instance, this set of circumstance and action, that allowed us to survive?"

"I don't want to think about that." Will breathes deeply through his nose.

"Release yourself from these chains, Will. I have forgone all other alternatives. The teacup's pieces are settled. They've come together again; mismatched, crooked, chipped, but together. It would have landed that way no matter any effort on your or my part."

Hannibal opens and closes his fingers near where he touches Will, and Will doesn't seem perturbed at it. In fact, he might be craving it. He flexes his bundled hands, glancing at his lap.

He murmurs, just barely a breath for speech, "I believed them for so long."

"You were vulnerable. Very vulnerable. Being so injured, your loved ones could mold your reality to their whims. The structure within your psyche that held my shape was torn out of you, then replaced. A reality where I was dead."

Will's eyes mist in recognition, as though he's had this conversation before. He wipes his hands on his jeans.

Hannibal says casually, "Do you believe it was all Jack's doing? Or maybe Molly?"

"All Jack's doing?" he says.

"The story they told you."

He can practically hear Will think. His drink has long been abandoned, sitting sun-warm at the coffee table. The sun smiles over him; he squints as he says, "I think it was his idea, employed in a unanimous decision. Molly told me they wanted to protect me from myself."

Hannibal's hand drifts lower; he grasps his bicep lightly, and Will turns to him, one knee propped on the cushion, dislodging himself. It disappoints him for the few seconds before Will's hand winds under his own. He brings the bundle to his lap, and Hannibal theorizes aloud, "Protect you from yourself, as in the literal 'you' or the metaphorical 'you' that has taken my shape?" 

"I don't know," he murmurs. "Maybe both." 

Hannibal says, "They know how fierce you become when you have set your mind to something."

"I think they were waiting for the other shoe to drop. Molly told me that I can get dangerous." 

"You can," he says with great affection, "when you suspect your mind is being tampered with." 

"You'd know a lot about that," Will can't help but say.

Hannibal chuckles. "They have yet to understand that you are entirely unpredictable."

Will sighs, "Well, they got one hell of a wakeup call."

Satisfied, he leans into the sofa with a smile. The quiet between them permeates for some time. Winston has come back to the door. Its wet nose stamps onto the pristine glass. Will snorts at it; he removes himself from Hannibal's hold and lets the little dog inside; he immediately plants a hand between Winston's shoulder blades, as if feeling the warmth from its nap in the morning sun.

Tracing the corona of light around his muse with his eyes, Hannibal says, "And the amnesia? Do you know whose idea that was?"

Will stares blankly at him; his eyebrows knit together, and he replies, "I had amnesia, Hannibal."

"Sure," he says, blithe, "but whose idea was it?"

Not yet understanding the insinuation, Will frowns, confused; then, he bares his teeth. He plants himself back down beside Hannibal, closer this time, scratching Winston's chin as the dog joins their conversation. Its shoulder brushes Hannibal's knee. Winston is indeed quite warm.

Will reasons, "I was at a hospital, Hannibal, a real hospital; I don't think anyone with the good sense of a doctor would condone inducing amnesia." 

"At one point, I could have been considered to have the good sense of a doctor."

His jaw shifts, and he nods, conceding. "They told me I hit my head, but my head wasn't hurting."

Hannibal feels a curious little nose at his knuckles. Whiskers brush.

"Do you recall waking with the typical symptoms of head trauma?" he asks.

And Will replies with some humor, "I don't recall much of anything." 

They share a chuckle; Hannibal's chest has grown quite warm, and not because of the sun. Though it does accentuate the rosy complexion of his soul.

He asks, "Did you experience issues with balance or coordination?" 

"Not outside of the obvious," Will says. He gestures to his legs. Hannibal is overcome with a doctor's curiosity, wanting to poke a hammer at his knees.

"Any distinct changes in personality?"

"Maybe. But it might not be so much head trauma as mind trauma." Winston finally settles down beside Will, sighing heavily, like the nap was exhausting in itself. Suddenly, Will snorts, and he tells Hannibal, "The first thing they said when I woke up was basically, 'Welcome back, you hit your head, your spine is broken, and Hannibal is dead'."

"Well, look how far we've come," Hannibal says. "Only one of those is true, now."

Will laughs. It's a choked thing that struggles to get through his teeth, but a laugh nonetheless. Maybe a little exhausted himself, he rubs his eyes with the heel of his palm.

Hannibal catches the hand while it's still midair; his hand settles into his palm like it was settling down to sleep.

He watches his soul lend his weight to the sofa, his head cradled by the thick fabric. His eyes wander to Hannibal's face and stay there. Slowly, his face falls. Not into upset, but into deep thought. Will has resumed memorizing every detail of Hannibal's new face. Hannibal decides his only form of retribution is to memorize the hand between his own.

It escapes. Just as Hannibal notices that Will's ring finger has a tan line, he withdraws from him; he places a few careful fingertips onto the soft underbelly of Hannibal's dead eye.

Hannibal is holding the teacup's pieces, and Will is finally home.