Responsibility
Fandom: Hannibal
Summary: Prompt fill : Alana realizes the truth and the dark path Will is going down, so she quietly kills Hannibal herself.
Warnings: Blood... n'stuff...
Notes: This show. This fucking show I swear. I feel like part of this is a response to last night's episode as much as to the prompt, in terms of why I wrote it.
-
The deep gashes in her hands made it difficult to manipulate anything, and the smears of blood she left across the screen made dialing all the more difficult. The phone slipped from her grasp, but even after it bounced on the floor she could hear it ringing. Alana dropped to her knees, eyes caught up in the bloody mess of her hands. Her fingers twitched as she watched them, sending searing streams of pain through her palms.
The phone stopped ringing. Had she been sent to voicemail?
"Alana?" Will's voice was muffled against the floor.
Her face was wet with congealing blood, but she could still feel the tears as they started to fall. The world was still alive outside this room. They were as safe as could be, after exposure to a man like Hannibal. Great, bursting sobs of relief cracked from her chest, and Alana fell on to her side. All the tension broke in her body as she started shaking, and dark, dizzy spots swept across her eyes. Surely she wasn't losing that much blood from her cuts?
Her stomach heaved and her throat burned as she coughed. Her elbows dug into her body as she pulled in on herself while trying to keep her hands stretched away. She didn't need stomach acid and vomit coating open wounds.
She closed her eyes and kept crying through the dry heaves.
-
Since her confession of paranoia, a certain stiffness lingered with them whenever they were alone. Hannibal tended to make a show of trying to broach the subject before following her silence into another topic. Tonight she would finally answer him.
"I think things have been unfair for us lately, with everything that's happening. You're right, we are never really alone. We've never done anything just for us."
"Do you have a suggestion?" He was almost smiling.
"Let's go upstairs."
-
"There's already a lot of sympathy for your case, it might not get as bad as it could." Jack stayed standing, gripping the back of the chair he was by.
"Is that supposed to make me feel better? Supposed to make this right?"
"Alana-"
"I don't feel better for what I did, and neither would you, had you gotten your way and killed him yourself."
He stared right back at her as he lied. "We would have brought him to trial."
"A trial wouldn't have satisfied you, wouldn't have satisfied Will. Nothing any of us could have done for justice would have been enough. All Hannibal is going to leave any of us with is an emptiness." Her movements were slow and cautious, the bandages on her hands sensitive to jarring. Alana wasn't able to finish crossing her arms, the metal bracelet of the handcuffs tying her to her hospital bed prevented it.
-
"A surprise?"
"A promise."
Surprises were something neither of them were prone to enjoying. His initial curiosity was fading into suspicion despite her attempt to keep their conversation casual. It was a look that had passed across his face a number of times since he smelled gun residue on her hands.
The conversation could not become an interrogation. She sat by him on the end of the bed and put her head on his shoulder.
"A promise both of us should make, starting in this room."
"My bedroom?" Amusement colored his words. It was probably genuine.
"Yes."
"What promise are you suggesting?"
"That whenever we're in this room, especially if we're naked, we only talk about us."
"A ground rule."
"Clear boundaries between work, our friends, and us, could be just what we need."
-
"Your long con was dangerous. It was taking too much time, costing too much."
Will shook his head. "He was my responsibility, you shouldn't have felt like you had to do what you did."
"Hannibal was my responsibility. I'm the reason you ever went to him in the first place, I'm the reason he became a part of the investigation against him. There's no getting around that."
Will stared down his reflection in the two-way mirror next to them. Alana had avoided looking at it, hadn't wanted to start speculating on who was watching. This was as private a conversation she would get with him for a long time.
"I don't have what he saw in you. I didn't feel righteous when I killed him."
He flinched and headed for the door.
"Was I suppose to give Hannibal the satisfaction of you feeling good with his blood on your hands?"
That stopped him before he left the interrogation room. "You spent so long unaware of his true nature, what makes you such an expert now?"
"You do. We were never alone, when we were together. You were always there. It wasn't difficult to see him looking for you when he died."
Will turned to look back at her, the expression on his face one she used to wear for him, concern.
"He was disappointed when all he saw was me."
-
He never enjoyed it when she was behind him, but he was putting on a good show of tolerating it as she massaged his shoulders. His suit jacket had been discarded, and she kneaded his muscles through his vest and shirt, knuckles of one hand working down his spine.
"You're never tense. Do you have a secret masseuse hidden somewhere?"
"No." He picked up the hand she had on his shoulder, turning so that he could kiss it.
She hadn't gone to the gun range in several days.
"I could hire you, though."
She laughed, dropping her other hand from his back, fingers sliding under her blouse. "I doubt I'm that good."
"I'll have you know, it was good enough to feel like a bribe."
"I asked you to think about it, and I meant it."
"I have."
"While I was bribing you?"
He smiled, kissing her hand one more time before letting it go. He turned towards her on the bed, the movement made somewhat awkward by how close they were. The shifting of the mattress had her wavering a moment on her knees. He hadn't caught her earlier preparation in the mirror, being blocked by his own body. The moment his peripheral vision caught sight of her body, he froze.
His hands came up as she moved, only one set of fingers being caught between the wire and his throat. His free hand gripped her arm, trying to pull her off balance.
Alana had wrapped the ends of the long wire around her hands, minimizing the effort she would need to hold on to it, focusing her strength on tightening the length she had around his neck. It cut into her skin as it bit through his fingers and tendons. The bruising force of his hand on her arm didn't stop her from crossing her free hand over, continuing to tighten the makeshift garrote.
If he had gotten his other hand up in time, she would have had to cut through his fingers before breaking the skin on his neck. Unhindered by a barrier, the cheese wire she had bought earlier that day cut into his artery without much effort.
They toppled off the bed as the first burst of arterial spray coated the room. He landed on his back, with her half on top of him, arms trapped under her. The wire had embedded itself in her palms, clinging to her even as her arms lost tension. Hannibal's body convulsed while she tried to disentangle herself. She had wrapped the wire around her left hand more times than her right, and it was easier to remove it than it was from the thinner, deeper gashes on her other hand. By the time she was back on her knees, he had stopped moving, but his eyes could still focus on her.
The steady spray of blood from his neck had slowed to a sluggish pulse, pushing the pool gathered under him farther out from his body. The shoulder to down past the first button on his vest was soaked.
His focus went past her, not quite clouded, desperate to find the other presence in the room. Alana watched the barely discernible rise and fall of his chest, noted the ashen color of his skin, made more noticeable by the red, air oxygenated blood around them. He died with his eyes open, unable to see they were alone.
Alana pressed the side of her face to his bloodied chest, terror telling her she would somehow find a heartbeat.
She couldn't hear anything.
-
What they found in his basement didn't matter. When Alana had decided to kill Hannibal, she had no hard evidence. The others' suspicions, her anger at being used, it had been easy enough to act. Easy, when she thought of the man Will Graham used to be. Easy, when she remembered how decisive Jack Crawford once was.
It was difficult when she realized she used to be happy, but she had long believed in putting others before herself. Her relationship with Hannibal had seemed wonderfully selfish, until she realized how much of it was by his design. That had helped her become angry all over again.
Alana had not been unaware of the consequences her actions would bring. Being able to accept full responsibility for what she had done was the only relieving thing about the ordeal. She had done something unexpected and unanticipated while of her own mind.
Hannibal Lecter had miscalculated when it came to her. Gideon had been right, she had been expendable in that man's eyes. It had made him ignore her as a real threat.
He had been the biggest mistake of her life, it was good to know she had been the oversight that ended his.
Summary: Prompt fill : Alana realizes the truth and the dark path Will is going down, so she quietly kills Hannibal herself.
Warnings: Blood... n'stuff...
Notes: This show. This fucking show I swear. I feel like part of this is a response to last night's episode as much as to the prompt, in terms of why I wrote it.
-
The deep gashes in her hands made it difficult to manipulate anything, and the smears of blood she left across the screen made dialing all the more difficult. The phone slipped from her grasp, but even after it bounced on the floor she could hear it ringing. Alana dropped to her knees, eyes caught up in the bloody mess of her hands. Her fingers twitched as she watched them, sending searing streams of pain through her palms.
The phone stopped ringing. Had she been sent to voicemail?
"Alana?" Will's voice was muffled against the floor.
Her face was wet with congealing blood, but she could still feel the tears as they started to fall. The world was still alive outside this room. They were as safe as could be, after exposure to a man like Hannibal. Great, bursting sobs of relief cracked from her chest, and Alana fell on to her side. All the tension broke in her body as she started shaking, and dark, dizzy spots swept across her eyes. Surely she wasn't losing that much blood from her cuts?
Her stomach heaved and her throat burned as she coughed. Her elbows dug into her body as she pulled in on herself while trying to keep her hands stretched away. She didn't need stomach acid and vomit coating open wounds.
She closed her eyes and kept crying through the dry heaves.
-
Since her confession of paranoia, a certain stiffness lingered with them whenever they were alone. Hannibal tended to make a show of trying to broach the subject before following her silence into another topic. Tonight she would finally answer him.
"I think things have been unfair for us lately, with everything that's happening. You're right, we are never really alone. We've never done anything just for us."
"Do you have a suggestion?" He was almost smiling.
"Let's go upstairs."
-
"There's already a lot of sympathy for your case, it might not get as bad as it could." Jack stayed standing, gripping the back of the chair he was by.
"Is that supposed to make me feel better? Supposed to make this right?"
"Alana-"
"I don't feel better for what I did, and neither would you, had you gotten your way and killed him yourself."
He stared right back at her as he lied. "We would have brought him to trial."
"A trial wouldn't have satisfied you, wouldn't have satisfied Will. Nothing any of us could have done for justice would have been enough. All Hannibal is going to leave any of us with is an emptiness." Her movements were slow and cautious, the bandages on her hands sensitive to jarring. Alana wasn't able to finish crossing her arms, the metal bracelet of the handcuffs tying her to her hospital bed prevented it.
-
"A surprise?"
"A promise."
Surprises were something neither of them were prone to enjoying. His initial curiosity was fading into suspicion despite her attempt to keep their conversation casual. It was a look that had passed across his face a number of times since he smelled gun residue on her hands.
The conversation could not become an interrogation. She sat by him on the end of the bed and put her head on his shoulder.
"A promise both of us should make, starting in this room."
"My bedroom?" Amusement colored his words. It was probably genuine.
"Yes."
"What promise are you suggesting?"
"That whenever we're in this room, especially if we're naked, we only talk about us."
"A ground rule."
"Clear boundaries between work, our friends, and us, could be just what we need."
-
"Your long con was dangerous. It was taking too much time, costing too much."
Will shook his head. "He was my responsibility, you shouldn't have felt like you had to do what you did."
"Hannibal was my responsibility. I'm the reason you ever went to him in the first place, I'm the reason he became a part of the investigation against him. There's no getting around that."
Will stared down his reflection in the two-way mirror next to them. Alana had avoided looking at it, hadn't wanted to start speculating on who was watching. This was as private a conversation she would get with him for a long time.
"I don't have what he saw in you. I didn't feel righteous when I killed him."
He flinched and headed for the door.
"Was I suppose to give Hannibal the satisfaction of you feeling good with his blood on your hands?"
That stopped him before he left the interrogation room. "You spent so long unaware of his true nature, what makes you such an expert now?"
"You do. We were never alone, when we were together. You were always there. It wasn't difficult to see him looking for you when he died."
Will turned to look back at her, the expression on his face one she used to wear for him, concern.
"He was disappointed when all he saw was me."
-
He never enjoyed it when she was behind him, but he was putting on a good show of tolerating it as she massaged his shoulders. His suit jacket had been discarded, and she kneaded his muscles through his vest and shirt, knuckles of one hand working down his spine.
"You're never tense. Do you have a secret masseuse hidden somewhere?"
"No." He picked up the hand she had on his shoulder, turning so that he could kiss it.
She hadn't gone to the gun range in several days.
"I could hire you, though."
She laughed, dropping her other hand from his back, fingers sliding under her blouse. "I doubt I'm that good."
"I'll have you know, it was good enough to feel like a bribe."
"I asked you to think about it, and I meant it."
"I have."
"While I was bribing you?"
He smiled, kissing her hand one more time before letting it go. He turned towards her on the bed, the movement made somewhat awkward by how close they were. The shifting of the mattress had her wavering a moment on her knees. He hadn't caught her earlier preparation in the mirror, being blocked by his own body. The moment his peripheral vision caught sight of her body, he froze.
His hands came up as she moved, only one set of fingers being caught between the wire and his throat. His free hand gripped her arm, trying to pull her off balance.
Alana had wrapped the ends of the long wire around her hands, minimizing the effort she would need to hold on to it, focusing her strength on tightening the length she had around his neck. It cut into her skin as it bit through his fingers and tendons. The bruising force of his hand on her arm didn't stop her from crossing her free hand over, continuing to tighten the makeshift garrote.
If he had gotten his other hand up in time, she would have had to cut through his fingers before breaking the skin on his neck. Unhindered by a barrier, the cheese wire she had bought earlier that day cut into his artery without much effort.
They toppled off the bed as the first burst of arterial spray coated the room. He landed on his back, with her half on top of him, arms trapped under her. The wire had embedded itself in her palms, clinging to her even as her arms lost tension. Hannibal's body convulsed while she tried to disentangle herself. She had wrapped the wire around her left hand more times than her right, and it was easier to remove it than it was from the thinner, deeper gashes on her other hand. By the time she was back on her knees, he had stopped moving, but his eyes could still focus on her.
The steady spray of blood from his neck had slowed to a sluggish pulse, pushing the pool gathered under him farther out from his body. The shoulder to down past the first button on his vest was soaked.
His focus went past her, not quite clouded, desperate to find the other presence in the room. Alana watched the barely discernible rise and fall of his chest, noted the ashen color of his skin, made more noticeable by the red, air oxygenated blood around them. He died with his eyes open, unable to see they were alone.
Alana pressed the side of her face to his bloodied chest, terror telling her she would somehow find a heartbeat.
She couldn't hear anything.
-
What they found in his basement didn't matter. When Alana had decided to kill Hannibal, she had no hard evidence. The others' suspicions, her anger at being used, it had been easy enough to act. Easy, when she thought of the man Will Graham used to be. Easy, when she remembered how decisive Jack Crawford once was.
It was difficult when she realized she used to be happy, but she had long believed in putting others before herself. Her relationship with Hannibal had seemed wonderfully selfish, until she realized how much of it was by his design. That had helped her become angry all over again.
Alana had not been unaware of the consequences her actions would bring. Being able to accept full responsibility for what she had done was the only relieving thing about the ordeal. She had done something unexpected and unanticipated while of her own mind.
Hannibal Lecter had miscalculated when it came to her. Gideon had been right, she had been expendable in that man's eyes. It had made him ignore her as a real threat.
He had been the biggest mistake of her life, it was good to know she had been the oversight that ended his.