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defectivevillain · 8 months

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this broken design, ch12

pairing: Hannibal Lecter/Reader

summary: “Dr. Lecter?” You blink a few times, convinced that you’re dreaming. The man’s gleaming eyes and concerned expression seem a bit too realistic to be conjured by your sleeping mind, though. You’re not sure if you’ve ever seen him look worried. You quickly decide that you don’t like it.

“Hannibal, please,” the doctor responds nonchalantly. You stare at him in utter confusion. Just what is happening right now? You thought you were dreaming, but this feels a bit too vivid. “What are you doing out here?”

read from the beginning here.

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warnings: canon-typical cannibalism, violence, blood & gore

Hannibal eyes the clock on the wall. It’s nearly 8:00 p.m.—approximately the time that you should be showing up for your appointment. In the time Hannibal has known you, you’ve never been late to an appointment.

It’s not like this is the first time a client has missed an appointment. It happens a lot, especially within the practice of psychiatry and psychology. Events occur, people contact sudden ailments or forget commitments… It happens. Yet, this has never happened with you before. If the client were anyone else, Hannibal would resign to sitting at his desk and sketching until the patient showed up or twenty minutes passed—whichever came first. An absence has never bothered him before, yet when he glances over at the chair across from him, he can find no better word for the sentiment. Absence.

The clock’s hand shows no mercy. It spins mockingly from its brass confines, creating a subtle ticking sound that embeds itself into Hannibal’s very skin. He doesn’t understand this strange prickling feeling, this restlessness that eats at him from the inside.

For a fraction of a moment, he hears the telltale movement of someone’s hand turning the doorknob to his office. Hannibal walks over to the door and opens it, only to find nothing on the other side. There is no one sitting in the lobby—nothing waiting for him save for the foreign feeling of dread he seems to be accruing.

Hannibal spends the rest of the night resolutely refusing to read into your absence. It is a human’s nature to forget—you likely forgot to attend. He will follow up with a phone call tomorrow. You could have gotten called onto an assignment, too. Indeed, there are a multitude of rational explanations for your absence. Hannibal spends the rest of the night rifling through them in his mind, before firmly compartmentalizing any thoughts about you.

The next day, he calls you again. You do not respond. Foreboding threatens to trickle into his psyche, but Hannibal pushes it away insistently. You are fine. You are likely busy with work, busy sleeping, merely… busy. Hannibal immerses himself into the sessions with his clients that day, pretending that he isn’t avoiding the unshakeable facts staring him straight in the face. You’ve never missed a session. You always answer your phone.

He begins to grow accustomed to your voicemail message, to hearing the tranquility in your voice as you kindly tell him to leave his name and phone number after the tone. Days slip through Hannibal’s fingers and there is absolutely no sign of you.

Something must be wrong, because Hannibal is soon summoned to the Bureau. Once he arrives, he realizes that he very well could have been the last person to see you. Hannibal cooperates with Jack Crawford’s insistent questioning and pretends not to notice the man’s evident annoyance at the utter lack of information about your whereabouts. Hannibal isn’t your keeper, and he tells Jack as much. Jack doesn’t take too kindly to the remark, however, and he elects to murmur under his breath in the corner of the room. Hannibal folds his hands in his lap and pretends not to be amused by all the fanfare. Amusement is far preferable to any other foreign, forbidden feeling clawing at the unmarred carcass under his skin.

At some point, Jack steps away to take a phone call. Hannibal waits, with nothing but the insistent rhythm of the clock on the wall to accompany him. Before long, Crawford returns with a grim expression on his face.

“I have some news you may want to hear,” Jack tells him. His lips are pinched and there’s an unreadable emotion lingering in his eyes.

“Yes?” Hannibal asks. He already knows what he will hear. Indeed, he hears your name fall from Jack’s lips, with that tortured expression on his face—and he knows. Hannibal gets bits and pieces of the rest—Abel Gideon, abandoned residence outside Baltimore, a kidnapping.

Somehow, there is little discussion about what will be done next. Jack regards him for a moment, before evidently deciding that his presence will be useful. Jack simply nods and turns on his heel, ever the leader. Hannibal follows, mildly surprised by the show of trust. He isn’t very close with Jack—has only invited him to his residence a few times for dinner. He sees value in having Jack as an acquaintance—another chess piece—and therefore quells his pride and follows after him.

“Right under our noses, this whole damn time,” Jack sighs once they’re comfortably situated in the helicopter. The man’s jaw is clenched tightly. Hannibal recognizes that he doesn’t want to talk about it. He asks for details anyway. Crawford then recounts the phone conversation he had with you all those days ago. A maelstrom of irritation, amusement, and something far darker rages inside Hannibal’s mind palace. The ivory walls are crumbling and peeling. Dust falls from the ceiling every few seconds, coating neglected surfaces with more memories. He clenches his fist at his side, annoyed with the onslaught of feelings he had thought long buried. Hannibal can’t remember the last time he’s felt so…bored. Unfulfilled.

They arrive soon enough and far too late all the same. The helicopter lands in a grassy field, across from a nondescript house that almost appears to be molding and decaying at the seams. Jack is quick to run to the front door, which has already been thrown ajar by the agents that must have arrived before them. Hannibal follows the man, turning the corner to find a dilapidated dining room. Wallpaper crumbles and falls from the walls, coating the floor in a truly unsightly amount of dust and debris. The room reeks of decay and death. Truly, the only indication that the room is meant for meals is the delicate, purposeful organization of plates and silverware near each seat. All the chairs are empty. As Hannibal blinks, he realizes he can see what the killer saw: a full table, listening with rapt attention and hanging off his every word. The head of the table is the puppetmaster, content to watch as everyone trips over themselves to earn his favor. Hannibal understands the vision, but the execution is rather lacking. His eyes travel from the table to the chair at the other head of the table with frayed ropes attached to the arms.

Jack suddenly bursts into movement at his side, moving towards a figure collapsed against the far wall. It seems Jack Crawford only has eyes for his agent. Hannibal, on the other hand, finds his gaze searching for the one presence that is currently unaccounted for. Gideon was here; he’s dead now—at least, according to Jack. Hannibal warily walks through the hall before he stops in his tracks. Abel Gideon lies dead in the hallway, a bullet wound carving a neat path through the center of his temple. Blood colors the wooden flooring near him. The weapon is nowhere in sight. It doesn’t take long for Hannibal to comprehend what happened here.

You escaped from your bindings. Chilton and Lounds were present, too. In an effort to keep them out of the crossfire, you stumbled back into the hallway. It’s a rather long passageway with several doors on each side—apt for concealment. Perhaps you stumbled into the closet on the right wall, or the tiny bathroom on the left wall, and hid as Gideon trailed you. Perhaps you stood there silently—a hand over your mouth as you tried to stifle your breathing. You only had a dagger; you knew that stealth and speed were your only advantages. As Gideon passed, you jumped out and stabbed the back of his neck. There’s a smattering of blood on the floor a few feet from Gideon’s corpse. You two brawled. Gideon, overcome with fury at your insolence, clasped his burly hands around your neck and squeezed. You managed to break free of his grip by stabbing him in the eye. You picked up the gun as he dropped it and fired it at his temple. A clean shot.

Your dagger lies in the crimson puddle of Gideon’s blood. Hannibal feels himself reaching out to grab it before he can rationalize the urge to do so. He’s taken by way droplets of blood slowly slip down the weapon, catching the light briefly before falling down to stain the floor. He manages to suppress the unexplained urge.

Jack’s voice draws him out of his thoughts. Hannibal remembers himself and turns his back on Gideon’s corpse, before walking to the dining room. He finds himself thrown into sheer chaos. Freddie Lounds is being questioned by a few agents. More agents are huddled around a dining chair on the ground. Hannibal takes another step forward and realizes that they’re surrounding Chilton, who is unconscious and mutilated. He is in a rather dire state, yet the sight of his mangled face only incites indifference within Hannibal. It’s laughably easy to conceive what happened there: Gideon’s grudge against Chilton prompted him to kidnap the man and mutilate him. The man had no intention of killing Chilton. Why would Gideon kill him, if he could instead ensure that Chilton lived as a mangled mess of limbs and skin in constant pain?

Hannibal then looks over to the wall, where he finds Jack kneeling and speaking to someone. It’s you, he realizes. You’re on the ground, holding a hand to your side. You’re shaking and shivering, a glassy glaze over your eyes as you stare at Jack. Your hands are drenched in blood and your clothes are bloodstained. There are several markings developing near your neck—evidently from your scuffle with Gideon. You look frail—vulnerable in a manner Hannibal has never quite associated with you. Hannibal feels himself walking toward you before he can take another breath. He mimics Jack’s posture and glances at him. The department head looks uncharacteristically troubled. Hannibal wonders if the rumors of his favoritism for you are somewhat founded.

There’s a scar ripping down the left side of your face, spilling bloodied tears down your cheek. It’s a gruesome sight—clearly performed to anger him—yet all Hannibal can fear is a strange sense of reverence. You look like a painting, a textured canvas brought to life in vivid colors. There are lacerations on your wrists from the ropes that kept you bound to your seat at the dining table. Horribly rude, Hannibal thinks. It is much more gratifying to entertain willing dinner guests. Evidently, Gideon didn’t fully grasp that notion.

Within moments, the paramedics enter the scene. Hannibal follows the medic who is currently carrying you. Jack nods at him—a symbol of approval and reassurance. Hannibal nods in response, knowing what the man is trying to convey with the slightest gesture. Crawford is the head of the BAU—he’s needed elsewhere. Hannibal meets the paramedics in the driveway and they move you onto a stretcher. You’re wheeled into the ambulance. Hannibal finds himself faced with the paramedics’ questions: who you are, if you have allergies, what wounds you’ve acquired. He answers to the best of his ability and, with a subtle mention of his past as a surgeon, he’s allowed to accompany you in the back of the ambulance.

As the ambulance speeds down the road, Hannibal reflects. Something about you eludes him, and he can’t quite figure out what it is. He wants to wind you up and see what makes you tick. Through your sessions, he’s built a rudimentary understanding of you. But… he wants more.Hannibal wants to know everything about you. You’re special. He’s met with dozens of clients throughout his years as a psychiatrist, but none of them have stimulated his mind as much as you have.

You’re sharp. You’re never lost in his extended metaphors or hyper-specific references to the arts or academia; rather, you easily understand them and see directly past them to the root of his psyche. The thought provokes an equal amount of exhilaration and wariness within him. You look at him and you see him. You don’t see Hannibal Lecter, the well-read surgeon or Hannibal Lecter, the Chesapeake Ripper—although he feels you’re clever enough to have had a fleeting suspicion of him before. Your organic, effortless insight into his perspective is something Hannibal has been entirely unable to find anywhere else.

Perhaps that is why Hannibal finds himself lingering in your hospital room, waiting for you to wake. The chair at your bedside has become his seat; even when you have other visitors, that chair is always left alone. He stays long enough to learn which nurses care for you during different shifts. He stays long enough to fall asleep with his hand resting on the mattress next to you.

You’re still unconscious after a few days. Hannibal knows you must be in significant distress; he wonders if you unintentionally exacerbated your injuries during the fight. Your adrenaline must have been pumping—otherwise, he can’t quite conceptualize how you escaped with your life. Hannibal knows you’re a force to be reckoned with, but to his knowledge, Abel Gideon was, too. He supposes he is pleased with how things turned out—Gideon would have grown rather annoying. Judging from the scar on your face, Gideon wanted to confront Hannibal himself. It would have been a waste of time. Abel Gideon is far from the ideal prey; in fact, the ideal prey is now unconscious in a hospital bed next to him: you.

Hannibal finds himself unable to dismiss such an opportunity. You aren’t getting too many visitors these days, since you still haven’t woken up. Hannibal reckons he has a few days before you’ll wake. That’s more than enough time to kill a nurse, take their scrubs, and enter your room unencumbered. Frighteningly easy, really.

Perhaps that opportunity is why Hannibal finds himself looming over you in someone else’s skin, reaching for the scalpel to cut you open. Security around the hospital is laughably lackluster—Hannibal reckons he didn’t have to go to such lengths to conceal himself. Even so, he doesn’t intend to go to prison any time soon. Captivity would be a horrible bore.

Your wound’s location is far too convenient, Hannibal thinks to himself as he removes your sutures. Surely, it would be foolish not to capitalize on it. With that recognition lingering in his mind, he pushes the scalpel to your skin and allows his vision to be flooded with the sight of skin, tissue, blood. His gloved hands move with practiced precision. He’s first greeted with the mesentery, which briefly impedes his access to the meat. The small intestine also serves as a momentary obstacle. Finally, after some manipulation, Hannibal finds the tube he’s looking for—the ureter—and removes a portion of it to free the kidney. His right hand almost moves on its own, reaching down and yanking at the organ. Hannibal puts your kidney in cold storage and then moves to stitch your skin back together. By the time he’s finished, your wound looks exactly the same as before.

He stares down at you, before taking a slow breath in. That process was laughably easy. When you wake, you will feel pain—but that pain will be easily attributed to the gunshot wound. The nurses already performed blood tests in the days prior. With your normal functioning, it is very unlikely that the medics will order more tests. You likely won’t even wake within the next day or two. By then, Hannibal will have returned to his residence and feasted on the meal you provided him. Meanwhile, you will be reclined in your hospital bed, feeling none the wiser. The thought sends a thrill down his spine and shivers down his skin. Hannibal can already envision the dish he’ll make: deviled kidney on toast. The dish is traditionally associated with breakfast, but Hannibal will likely eat it for supper. He has a loaf of fresh-baked panettone bread, which will pair beautifully with the flavors of the meat. He feels the insides of his cheeks stinging with salivation as he walks out of the hospital and leaves the receptionist with an amiable departing remark.

Hours later, he sits at the head of his dining table with a beautifully constructed meal in front of him. Hannibal almost doesn’t want to consume it. It is truly a vision to behold. Hannibal gives himself a few moments to breathe it all in, before finally picking up his fork and letting it pierce the meat. The sauce coating the kidney dribbles from the piece on his utensil. Hannibal brings you to his tongue, his lips twisting in a morbid, macabre mockery of a smile.

next chapter

Thank you to my bestest friend and #1 Pinocchio simp, @pinocchiospissrock, for helping me with the medical stuff. I’m not the least bit knowledgeable about medical stuff, so if there are any remaining inconsistencies, they are absolutely my fault and I urge you to blink at them for a moment before moving on. Lol.

Some small lil details: Apparently, panettone bread is rather difficult to make, since the dough is very sensitive and the entire baking process is time-consuming. It made perfect sense to me, therefore, that Hannibal would both have a loaf on-hand and also display absolutely no struggles with the baking process, in true mysterious Hannibal fashion.

I used a lot of alliteration in this chapter, yes. You can rip it from my cold, dead hands.

“Looming over you in someone else’s skin” is more of a reference to Hannibal wearing someone else’s clothes. However, in Silence of the Lambs, Hannibal does actually wear someone’s skin, so… take that as you will.

“Hannibal brings you to his tongue” okay, buddy, take me on a date first. sheesh.

and we finally we got to some more cannibalism. *maniacal laughter escalates*

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