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Hannibal Lecter stands in the Norman Chapel, not quite in Palermo. He’s been here enough times, more than he could possibly count, to know that where he resides is his memory palace. Grand by even medieval standards. But this time, something feels different. Uneasy, like his legs may give out from underneath him should he move too quickly and yet he feels weightless. It’s a restless sensation. Hannibal is not used to feeling restless. Between life and death, he supposes. He’s yet unaware of the blinding pain in his abdomen, nor the groaning pressure which has settled in his chest as it begins to flood with Atlantic waters. The Great Red Dragon, his wounds, the fall. Will Graham. Everything feels like a distant memory now, hazy, as the doctor admires his surroundings. And its silence is near deafening.
He’s vaguely conscious of a voice calling for him from somewhere he is unable to contact as of current, somewhere he may never see again. The disembodied voice sounds familiar, ridden with desperation and the budding of grief if he listens closely enough. It evokes a tug at Hannibal’s heart he is unable to explain but he chooses to ignore the quiet wailing of the outside world as a small, unexpected figure begins to make her way towards him through the grand entrance of the chapel.
Mischa Lecter.
He stares in awe. Just as beautiful and innocent and bright as Hannibal remembers her, maybe even more. Her straw coloured hair flows softly around her face, pink and plump with her youth. She looks happy. She doesn’t say a word as she gently raises her hand towards her brother. He understands the request in the way that he understands his mother tongue or sheet music; like a second nature. His very bones call to the child before him. In a way, Mischa was the catalyst to his becoming. It seems only fitting to depart from this intricate game of chess he had forged over the years by her side.
It would be so easy. To draw his left hand into the child’s and allow himself to be swept to the other side of the veil. He could spend whatever afterlife he may be presented with begging to his sister, his very joy, for forgiveness. Forgiveness for allowing her to befall the fate she did. For inadvertently leading her there.
Just as he begins to reach out in acceptance, the walls of the chapel reverberate with an anguished scream coming from before this limbo. Hannibal recognises it as his name - and a plea - and every piece of Will Graham begins to flood back to him. Every memory. Every feeling. Especially the ache in his chest the younger man so often tends to inflict. He realises he would miss the younger man’s scruffy charm masking unrivalled darkness, the bright flames of empathy behind his tired eyes, even the absence of his god awful aftershave would leave gaping holes in everything that Hannibal was.
“You have a friend.” Mischa says, it’s more of a statement than a question. Her eyes do not drift from her brother, entirely unblinking. She speaks in a way that she never had in life, her voice steady and pronounced in perfect English. Mischa did not know English. She was never given the chance to. It’s a sobering reminder that this was not Mischa and it never could be. No figment of imagination would ever be capable of truly imitating that wonderful little girl.
“Yes,” Hannibal replies with a remorseful smile and a sigh, “I’m afraid he may be expecting me.”
“I understand.” Mischa begins. “Then you must go to him. We may meet again .”
And for the very first time in his life, as Graham bangs on the borders of the doctor's memory palace; still fuelled with the admirable, impossible energy the Dragon nor the ocean were allowed to extinguish and as the feeling of burning air reestablishes itself in his lungs, Hannibal hopes he won’t have to visit Mischa Lecter for a very long time.
“We may.”
-
When consciousness returns to the doctor, he awakes to Will’s lips pressed against his own. According to the splitting pain in his chest he recognises as broken ribs, it's an attempt at CPR, of course. But even as the younger man pulls back in surprise and relief and joy at the very prospect of life; shouting Hannibal's name into his face in disbelief as if he had not seen him in years, Hannibal cannot ignore the urge to follow the profiler's mouth, to regain the lost sensation. He hastily buries the urge as he’s drawn into a tight embrace.
“I’m sorry,” mumbles Will, voice muffled as he nestles his face into the crook between the older man’s neck and shoulder. “About the fall. That may have been impulsive. And your ribs- Christ. I heard something crack at least once, I had no idea what I was doing.” Hannibal returns the hug with a warmth he may once have been unfamiliar with and clings to Will as if he were a lifeline, in a way, he is. The throb in his side from the foreign bullet is almost immediately forgotten.
“You know I would never hold it against you, dear Will.” He returns.
Will pulls away, placing his hands on either side of Hannibals’s face for just a moment, studying his eyes as if searching for any sign that he may lose the older man again, lingering only a moment too long before collapsing onto the sand the two sit on, letting out a breath he seemed to be holding. They’re designated to a shore with corroding grey walls acting as a backdrop. It's strange to view the cliff house from this angle, watching as it looms over the two of them. It feels like some sort of omen. Maybe one that has already passed. Will stares into the star speckled abyss above them and glances at Hannibal as if willing him to do the same, he complies. After three years confined to the same damning hole in his roof, the sky painted in deep blues and purples before them feels like the most wonderful sight to have graced his eyes. He glances at the wreck that is Will Graham momentarily, alive, albeit not well, noticing how unkempt his hair appears after smashing into the Atlantic blue, before returning his gaze to above with a satisfied grin. Well, he thinks maybe the second most wonderful.
“Look to your right a little,” Will begins, gesturing upwards. “Do you see the constellation?”
“Of course,” Hannibal answers, accompanied by a light wheeze his lungs unwillingly diffuse. “It’s Orion.”
“And near it, Jupiter. I admired constellations often during my time with Molly,” Hannibal attempts not to wince at the name, knowing that Will brings her up with no tinge of remorse or regret in his voice. No sign that he still needs her. “Our - Her son. Walter. He was big on astronomy. He would ramble for hours about the stars and their companions. The patterns they make. Sometimes I would stare into the night horizon and I wondered if you could see it too from that stupid view in your cell. I wondered if our stars were the same.” When Hannibal looks at Will again and when he meets his gaze, he recognises the look he receives as nothing, if not pure and utter fondness. Maybe it’s the blood loss. We should be more focused on that than the stars, you wreckless old fool.
“I believe some of our stars will always be the same.” He says instead. His accomplice dignifies this with a soft chuckle.
“The way things are going, should we likely die here, they will be.”
Hannibal groans and almost rolls his eyes.
“Ever the optimist. I can assure you, Will, I’ve had enough encounters with death for one night. Chiyoh will surely be around, I notified her of my escape when we reached the cliff house. Or the FBI could always get to us first. They’ll realise something went askew soon enough. You will return to your wife and child in Wolf Trap. I will return to my prison cell,” He attempts not to let the bitterness he feels towards the prospect slip into his voice. He fails. “Regardless, we will not die here.” There’s so many things I still want to tell you, show you. And yet…
“Although to die by your side would certainly be an end I would struggle to fully oppose.”
Will smiles, which slowly fades into an incredulous scowl, he turns away from the doctor for a moment, returning his eyes to the dark yonder. The older man attempts to not take this as a rejection. He lays silent for a moment, musing to himself, Hannibal presumes. They listen to the soft sound of crashing waves and their own ragged breaths. It feels as if they were at the edge of the universe. Realistically thinking, the two have been battered by several forces of nature with barely present intervals. Either of them could die at any point, riddled with stab wounds and bullets. And whatever Francis Dolarhyde may have harboured in his blood. Waiting for Chiyoh was a game neither of them were truly fit to play and an encounter with the FBI meant separation, which meant a fate worse than death itself. Neither of them were ignorant enough anymore to even try and deny that. And yet, they have no choice, other than to allow whatever plan God may have set up for them to take place. Finally, Will interrupts the ambience.
“You know, I spoke with Bedelia not long before all this,”
“Hm?”
“I asked her if you were in love with me.”
Oh.
“Did you now?“ Hannibal inquires. Slowly, unsure of just where this discussion may be headed.
“She told me via a quote from what I believe to be one of your plays that you did.” Will states. He sounds nearly whimsical.
Of course she did. Hannibal stutters dumbly, for one of the first times in his life, struggling for the right answer. A very quiet part of him wishes for the bullet wound in his stomach to just take him out or for the soft waves of the Atlantic before them to swallow him whole. This was not how he imagined this conversation going, what with them both bleeding out with their lives in the balance. Again.
He allows himself to rake his eyes over the other man’s features, from the scar on his forehead, white with age to the newly born tear in his cheek. How one could be so tested by time again and again, and still remain so beautiful is completely surreal.
“Will.” Hannibal speaks softly. He says the name like a prayer. “Surely you don’t mean to tell me you’re only just now realising this.” Had light been slightly more present in the sky, Hannibal may have noticed the way that the younger man’s face flushes a bright red. He doesn’t need to after all as Will’s words fall from him in flustered splutters.
“Of course I knew- well, not of course- God that makes me sound so full of myself. What I mean is that- I just wanted-”
Hannibal puts him out of his misery. “You want to know for certain that it’s true. You want to hear me actually say it.”
Will is silent for only a moment, turning onto his side, meeting Hannibal’s eyes directly. “Yes.” It’s almost a whisper.
Hannibal mimics the movement, despite the pain and the effort he uses to achieve such.
“What else did Bedelia say to you?” I won’t let him have this, he thinks. Not this easily.
Will sighs. Likely out of both annoyance and exhaustion. Even in the darkness Hannibal can recognise the frustration in the other man’s face. He can’t help but find amusement from it.
“She asked if I “ached” for you in the same way.” Hannibal’s heart feels as though it stops.
“And do you?”
Will pauses. Thinking. It feels as though he pauses for hours. Hannibal’s chest pounds with a force he never thought he could feel for another living person. One could even call it nervousness. It feels sickeningly juvenile.
“I… When I first met you, properly met you I mean; at the motel, before Garret Jacob Hobbes. For the first time in months I felt normal. It was just such a mundane thing, shared breakfast with a coworker. It didn’t feel like you wanted anything from me and I never felt any obligation. We just enjoyed each other's company. For a moment, you made me forget about Jack Crawford and the FBI and all those dead girls. At the time, I fully meant what I said when I told you I found you uninteresting. I suppose you were right when you told me I wouldn’t.” Hannibal chuckles and draws a hand to Will’s hair, beginning to toy his hands through it when Will shows no indication to stop. They’re less than a few inches away from each other now and Hannibal resists the desire to close that distance entirely.
And God, does he desire closeness with this wonderful terror of a man.
“For the months where I thought of you as just some - eccentric European guy who was my kinda-therapist and cooked sometimes,” Hannibal audibly winces at the description. “Everything felt good. It was almost sweet. At the time I never could have identified my feelings for you. Whilst ‘Love’ was a word I couldn’t bring myself to associate with you - or any man at that - neither was just “friend”. We felt like something else entirely.”
“There’s not a name for what we are.”
Will rolls his eyes. “I’m sure you think you're hilarious. You’re not. Anyways. If you hadn’t hid who you were from me and framed me for your crimes and killed my friend then maybe I would have been able to call what I have for you ‘love’ earlier. To be entirely honest, I think I've always been angrier that you didn’t tell me you were the Chesapeake Ripper rather than the fact that you were. I almost felt left out.
“If I had to put a pin point on it, I’d say I recognised what we had as ‘love’ the night that Abigail died. I realised just how hurt I was. Obviously, from other things as well. Like the gaping stab wound you left me with and the murder of our surrogate daughter just to punish me. But mostly from the fact that I felt betrayed, despite how I had been double crossing you. I desperately wanted to run with you and Abigail, I had wanted you to make the decision for me, that even if the FBI’s agenda got the better of me, you would drag me tooth and nail across the world until I learned to not resent you. But you didn’t. I thought that as you held my face before cutting into me that you were going to kiss me, that I was going to let you. But you didn’t. It hit me as I sat on your kitchen floor, trying to stop Abigail’s bleeding and my own that I had been in love with you. I waited for the police to arrive gripping at her throat, wondering how things could have ended differently; what a life with you and her would be like and how much I yearned for it. And the idea that I had managed to throw it all away - because I couldn’t decide what was right according to my moral compass and what was right according to me - brought me more pain than any of the injuries you ever inflicted on me. Nothing stung like your absence. That’s what brought me to Florence after all. It’s what brought me back to you now. I helped plan your faux escape because I actually wanted you to.It felt like the ultimate apology for that night in Baltimore. I needed- need you to know that I really, really did want to leave with you. That I still do. The idea of losing you now seems beyond unbearable. If one of us should die, the other shall soon follow.
“So yes. I suppose that you could say I ‘ache’ for you.”
Hannibal is totally hushed as his hand stills on Will’s undamaged cheek, the older man’s jaw hangs agape in a total loss for words which is shockingly out of character for him. He does his very best to will away the tears he feels forming.
Oh.
“Will, Mylimasis, I-“ Hannibal is cut off as a light hits the shores. Both men flinch at the intrusion, a little-on-the-larger-side boat beginning to make its way towards them. It gives no indication of who it is, something the FBI wouldn’t do. No, Jack Crawford had always been a loud and proud man. Chiyoh, Hannibal thinks. He almost feels disappointed that the tender moment is being interrupted, even if it is the thing that’s going to prevent them from bleeding to death. Will begins to stand and with great effort finds his way to his feet.
“Can you walk?” the younger man inquires.
“Likely not on my own. I believe I may have sprained a ligament when you hurled us off that cliff. Which I must ask for you to never do again for both our sakes.”
Will extends a gentle hand, it’s deeply reminiscent of Hannibal's earlier encounter with his sister, but knowing that this is the very real Will Graham, who is very much alive, he takes it without hesitation. He chooses life.
Will wraps a cautionary arm around Hannibal’s waist and pulls him from the ground with an arm thrown over his shoulder. The two are finally at eye level with one another. They face the boat towards them and surely enough at the helm is Chiyoh Lecter. Their ticket to freedom. If they squint hard enough they may be able to see the mild delight and disappointment she bears simultaneously at the display of them together. Both men begin to chuckle at the sight, which turns into a harsh laughter. Harder than either of them had laughed in years. We’ve made it. In a moment of utter hysteria Hannibal tilts his head towards his companion, only to find him staring back.
“I love you, Will Graham.” Hannibal begins. “I love you more than I love life itself. I crave you in a way I have, and never will need anything or anyone else. Not in this life or the next or anything after. I want you to stay by my side for as long as either of us live. I want to show you wonders. In all my years I have never met someone so endlessly fascinating. Although, I’m sure you knew that already, cruel boy.”
“I suppose I just wanted to hear you say it.” Will responds, face painted with carefree smirk. And in nothing but an instant, Will once again presses his lips to the corner of Hannibal’s mouth. Only a light peck, as if testing the waters, to which Hannibal only tears down such sheepishness, cupping Will’s face with his free hand and pulling their mouths back together. It feels dizzying in all the right ways, to finally have the man he loves in his arms in such a manner. Years of fighting and killing and wanting finally dispersed all at once. They are relentless, completely disregarding the boat edging closer. Including it’s captain who feels deeply out of place.
Hannibal smiles into Will’s mouth and allows the droplets of water to finally fall from his eyes.
“If only your darling Molly could see you now,” he begins. “I do hope you tell her all this when you return to your home.”
“I’m beyond glad to know that your sense of humour is still intact.” Graham replies sarcastically. “I have no intention of returning to Wolf Trap or Virginia. Hell, maybe I’ll never see America again. Because I don’t need that. I need you. Wherever you go, I will remain by your side, whatever it takes. If you would care to take me, that is.”
Hannibal studies Will’s face intently, searching for a change of mind or regret which he knows, truly, will never come. Will Graham finally belongs to him, just as much as Hannibal Lecter belongs to Will Graham.
“In sickness and in health.”
-
Will awakens on a surprisingly comfortable blow up bed, seemingly aboard a moving surface. The bed slowly becomes uncomfortable as he realises the dampness of his clothes and a thirst which feels unquenchable. Fever, albeit a broken one apparently. He takes a moment to become familiar with his surroundings, a small living room decorated in a casual yet expensive sort of style which he recognises as akin to Hannibal’s old home in Baltimore. Hannibal. His memories of the prior events begin to piece themselves together in his mind. My name is Will Graham. It is currently 4:38am. I am on Chiyoh Lecter’s boat, yacht, whatever. Before I made it here I killed a Great Red Dragon, attempted a murder-suicide out of fear of how much I enjoyed killing said dragon and confessed my undying love to a cannibalistic serial killer, who I then proceeded to kiss. And be kissed by. It was the most alive I have ever felt in my life. But my recollection ends there. Why does it end there?
His inner-monologing is inturupted by the owner of the boat walking through the door to the living room, showing no shock nor excitement that Will Graham is in fact alive. As she proceeds to a sofa close to his make shift bed however, she offers him a kind smile.
“I had told him you would pull through.”
“He was awake before me? How is he?” Will asks, confused, since Hannibal’s injuries were much more severe than Will’s.
“You appear to have suffered a fever, Hannibal mentioned you’ve seen them many times before due to prior brain inflammation,” Chiyoh responds.
“Oh yes, he knows all about that.”
“He has been beyond worried about you. He thought you may have relapsed, but since you’re lucid as of current, I would assume it was only minor.” It doesn’t feel fucking minor.
“And he’s coping, by the way, Hannibal. He’s hardly fit to begin any type of new life as of current but he’s walking again, cooking too. You’ll soon learn that it’s almost impossible to feed Hannibal Lecter anything he hasn’t seen to himself. He’s made progress. You have been unwell for about a week since you boarded the boat. You were out under mild anaesthesia to be stitched up and you simply didn’t awaken. Every night Hannibal had managed to untangle his way out of his life supporting equipment to ensure for himself that you were alright. He’ll be pleased to see you surely are.”
She helps to change his bandages and adjust his IV, before making her way once again to the exit, stopping with her hand resting on the door handle filled with hesitancy.
“I… would like to apologise. For the sleeping arrangements. And pushing you off a train. And shooting you in Palermo. You are not quite as dreadful as I would have anticipated.”
Will huffs from his makeshift bed.
“Living with people like Hannibal Lecter? You either become contempt with murder attempts or succumb to them. It’s all bygones.” Chiyoh laughs sweetly at this. He gets the idea that she understands completely.
“Hannibal is asleep I believe, he is in the room next door. If you would like to see him, just do your best not to startle him.”
Will pretends to consider this. He was decided as soon as the name ‘Hannibal’ was spoken.
“Yeah I’d like that.”
Chiyoh assists the man to Hannibal’s door. She confirms as to whether he will be alright on his own and leaves, presumably for her own room. She’s probably more exhausted than anyone else on the boat. Will finds as he rests his hand on the door knob that he is unsure. He remembers how he spilled his heart out on the beach and feels over exposed, naked. He wonders if Hannibal really meant anything he said or whether it may have just been delirious ramblings from intense blood loss. And then he remembers the way Hannibal looked at him before kissing him. Besotted awe someone would need not pure empathy to notice. Fuck it.
He opens the door, as softly as possible. Hannibal’s room is much more bedroom-like, with an actual bed as opposed to a blow up mattress, Will finds himself envious until remembering that Hannibal was much more mortally wounded. He notices how Hannibal flinches lightly as colour seeps through the door.
“Chiyoh?” the older man mumbles, his accent thicker with sleep. It’s something Will had never truly seen in him before. It was almost unfathomable for Hannibal Lecter to ever be sleepy. He seemed so vulnerable, so very human.
“Sorry to disappoint.” says Will as he hastily B-lines to Hannibal's bed as to not change his mind and clambers in next to him. He does not ask for permission. He knows he does not need it.
“I would hug you right now but I’m definitely sweaty.”
“We’ve been covered in worse bodily fluids over the past few days, dearest. I don’t care.” Will tries not to cringe at the way Hannibal phrases that. Well he’s not exactly wrong, he thinks as Hannibal wraps his arms around Will’s waist and nestles his face beneath his chin. It all feels so very domestic, nothing like how he should feel being held by a cannibalistic serial killer. He allows himself to drag his fingers through the older man’s hair gently.
“I thought I might lose you for a while.” Hannibal mutters.
“And?”
“And I didn’t like it.
He presses a soft kiss to Hannibal’s hair. God, What am I even doing?
“You can call it payback for nearly dying on me on the beach.” He feels Hannibal huff against his chest and can’t help but smile.
For a while they just lay there, unspeaking in a mockery of rest.
“I can tell you're still awake.” Says Will.
“As are you.” Hannibal returns.
“Where exactly are we, may I ask?”
“We’re currently in the middle of the Atlantic ocean. We have enough supplies to last 10 people for two months, which is more than enough for three. I had figured that it should be you to choose our destination. I care not for where we are, home to me can be anyplace I can bask in your presence. Although I'm sure you know that Virginia is not an option.”
“Believe me, I knew as soon as I devised the plot to get you out that a normal life in Virginia had been taken off the cards. I even left Molly and Walter letters for when I would not return.”
Will pauses before Hannibal speaks.
“And you mean to tell me you truly do not wish to return to them. You were confident enough to marry the woman, Will. That means something.”
Will sighs before pulling slightly away from Hannibal to stare into his eyes.
“Take my left hand in yours,” The older man does. “Do you feel a ring?”
“… I do not.”
“No. You don’t. Now, take my right hand. Is there a ring there?”
“Will-“
“Tell me. Do you feel a ring, Hannibal?”
“No. No I don't.”
“Exactly. Do you want to know what happened to that ring? I lost it after dragging you from the damn ocean. I wasn’t even aware of its absence until it was staring me right in the face as I was forcing life back into your bastard heart. And I felt no panic. No guilt. Molly was my best friend for three whole years, sure, but something never felt right. It felt like two people who just wanted to play happy families. Of course I loved Molly. But not in the way that I loved you.” Hannibal’s breath hitches at the use of the word.
“Hell,” Will continues, “I think even she knew I was in love with you. She once told me that I spoke about you in the same way she speaks about her former husband, who she most certainly wasn’t entirely over.”
Hannibal laughs at that. “Probably the only thing Freddie Lounds was bang on the money for was ‘murder husbands’.”
“Ugh, of course you read those articles. They were utterly obscene with all the bullshit Lounds was implying. They were all about how you had seduced me. Why were you always the dominant force?”
“Now, you just told me that you were in love with me long before those articles were even drafted. Don’t try and tell me you didn’t enjoy them.”
Will lies in a quiet embarrassment.
“Alright, maybe a little.”
The two simply chuckle to one another for a while in a moment of utter serenity they’ve needed for years now. They forget every wound, physical, emotional and mental. Every betrayal and heartbreak. All that’s left is them.
“Cuba sounds nice,” Will finally decides. “But you need to recognise that this is going to be difficult. You can’t be killing people on the weekends, at least not as the Ripper. We need to lay low. We’ve worked too hard, came too far to be where we are today to throw it all away by one or both of us being put back in the BSHCI. And I need you to understand that things aren’t always going to be good. We’ve hurt each other too much over the years for things to simply go smoothly, I think we both know that. But that does not mean we can’t make this work.”
Hannibal understands fully. “Then, Will, I must ensure that you know that I'm going to make mistakes. Know that you will too. And know that no matter what, we need to forgive each other. For everything and anything. Because all we need is each other.” He states.
Will smiles and kisses his lover in agreement. It’s not like the beach, hesitant and rushed, he takes his time to fully appreciate the man before him in a way that he never would have anticipated when they first met. He relishes in the soft noises he draws from Hannibal, knowing that he gets to hear them for the rest of his life, however long that is. Knowing that such a man as Hannibal could be loved. Even be in love. And to know that he is the article for such love fills Will with a joy greater than he’s ever felt before.
“Because all we need is each other.”