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On paper, the Center for the Rehabilitation of Enhanced, Artificial, Transformed, Undead, and Reborn Entities is a shining example of the truce between normal humans and, well, the rest of the world. It exists to keep the peace by educating or rehabilitating beings who are born or become a special entity so that they can coexist peacefully with humanity, and it provides educational materials and seminars to humans so that they can coexist peacefully with everyone else. Any entity that has ever dipped a toe across the veil onto Earth can find information on themselves at a CREATURE.
In reality, though, Will finds the nearest CREATURE to be more like a Department of Motor Vehicles. Including the exceedingly long wait, crowded waiting room, and the number ticket that contains a number so high it’s more discouraging than reassuring.
But it’s either report to a CREATURE or report to a specialized psychiatric ward for creatures, so Will slumps in his seat and flips his ticket restlessly in his hands, waiting until his number is called.
He is very careful not to make eye contact as he waits. For one thing, some types of creatures regard eye contact as a challenge, and the last thing Will needs on his record is that he was part of or arrested for a fight. Also, some creatures regard eye contact as a flirtation, and he really doesn’t need that either. And he just doesn’t want to know the stories of those around him: not the centaur who is sobbing noisily into a napkin box, not the girl with only half a set of wings who stares gloomily out the window, not the man with flames for hair who carries a fire extinguisher under one arm and a very resigned expression. No one ends up at a CREATURE due to happy reasons, anyways.
After three mind-numbing hours, someone finally calls Will’s number. He’s waved over to station number 4, where a clerk immediately begins asking him questions the second he begins to sit.
“Name?” the bored clerk asks.
“Um, Will Graham. William, I mean.”
“Date of birth? Address? Occupation?” the clerk rattles off.
After Will confirms everything and presents his license, the clerk locates him in the database. They read his case for a few moments, and Will can see the exact moment they come to the field that is supposedly to give him a creature identification designation.
He can because his is blank, and no one ever expects that.
One of the clerk’s eyebrow goes up, but they remain professional. “And what is the purpose of your visit today?”
“Mandated identification session with a counselor,” Will says, trying not to squirm.
“Says here you’ve already had two session,s” the clerk points out.
“Which were both inconclusive.”
The clerk hums. “Yes, and that is unusual, but – ”
“Look,” Will says, “my last counselor mandated this; I didn’t want to try again. I know he faxed over paperwork explaining everything. Can you just go grab it so we can get this session over it?”
That earns him a slightly irritated look, but Will’s been sitting in the most uncomfortable chair for three hours and his butt is actually still a little numb, so he doesn’t really care. He faces the clerk’s annoyed face with calm, and after a moment, they rise and head over to the overflowing series of baskets that must be incoming faxes. All creature faxes come with a coversheet naming the creature in question and their designation, so the clerk is able to locate his – the sole occupant in the “unknown” basket – fairly quickly.
When the clerk reads the explanation for why Will has a new mandated session, their other eyebrow goes up. They also subtly scoot their chair back.
Will suppresses a sigh. “So, can I book a session or what?”
“Um, yes,” the clerk stammers, scooting back another inch, as if they think he’s contagious or something. “I can most, uh, certainly take care of, well. That. Um. How about today, we have an opening in two hours?”
Will glances at his watch. Two hours isn’t the best, but mandated identification sessions are rarely more than 90 minutes on one sitting. If he can get everything done in three and a half hours, he can get back to Wolf Trap in time for a late dinner with his dogs.
“I’ll take it,” Will says.
With his session booked, Will gets ushered into the CREATURE. Each CREATURE has various different sections: a processing and general affairs section, where new creatures can register or get information; a reproductive and monitoring section, where creatures that undergo intense reproductive cycles must report so that they don’t cause havoc; a counseling and therapy section, where creatures come for therapy identification session, and more.
The processing and general affairs section is boring and bland and beige, but the counseling and therapy section is white as snow, and it almost hurts Will’s eyes.
On the bright side, at least the blinding white chaise lounge Will gets put on in his blinding white room is comfortable.
Will passes the time by chowing down on some provided snacks, doodling on some spare paper, and counting the blinding white ceiling tiles. He’s gotten to one hundred and thirty nine when there’s a firm set of knocks on the door.
Will hastily sits up and brushes the crumbs off his shirt. “Um, yeah, enter,” he calls out.
The first counselor Will ever had was an old rock troll, more prone to snoring through Will’s sessions than conducting them. He hadn’t been bad, necessarily, but he certainly hadn’t put more than a token amount of effort to help Will find out what kind of creature he was. And his second counselor, well . . .
The less said about Frederick Chilton, the better.
The man who walks into Will’s room now is not like either of Will’s former counselors. He looks the most human, for sure; no shimmering eyes, no unique limbs, no unique skin or eye or hair colors. He even has a very fine and expensive suit on, which means he’s either so good at passing that humans feel fine with coexisting with him or that he’s something so minor that they don’t care that he isn’t human.
He also radiates danger like a blazing fire. As he walks in, Will feels rather like a rabbit being forced to share a room with a lion – and a lion who still hasn’t decided if he is friend or food yet.
The man holds out his hand. “Dr. Hannibal Lecter. It’s nice to meet you.”
Will looks from Lecter’s hand to his face. He raises an eyebrow. “You do know what happened to the last guy who shook my hand, right?”
Lecter doesn’t waver. “I did familiarize myself with your file, yes. However, you needn’t worry; I will not fall prey to the same . . . effects as Frederick Chilton.”
He pronounces the name the same way one names a pile of fresh dung. It’s kind of funny.
“Will Graham,” Will says, shaking his hand as fast as he can and pulling back. He’s seen what happens when counselors are overconfident, after all, and he has no desire get another mandated session. “Identification unknown.”
“I didn’t ask.”
“You didn’t need to. It’s what everyone asks anyways. Figured I’d get it out of the way. And yeah, I went through all of those aptitude tests. Nothing.”
Lecter gives him an amused look. He unbuttons his suit jacket and sits on the nearest chair, crossing his legs like a proper gentleman at some kind of fancy dinner. It almost makes Will feel underdressed.
“I have read your file,” Lecter reminds him. “I’ve seen the results. Your former counselors seemed to have relied too much on the aptitude testing.”
“Aptitude testing has a ninety percent success rate of identification.”
“Which leaves a not insignificant ten percent in the cold, which, considering the estimated population of creatures, is a rather large number. Not to mention that for rare creatures and entities, the success rate falls underneath thirty percent.”
Will blinks. He had argued the same thing to his former counselors when he had requested specialist testing, and they had constantly pushed back citing the high success rate and that an error had just occurred.
“I can see that you are not unaware of these statistics,” Lecter says, studying his face. He tilts his head. “In that case, shall we discuss your recent symptoms?”
“I – ”
“The most recent of which,” Lecter flips through his file, “was a sudden bout of priapism that your last counselor suffered from after your session together. Twelve hours. Impressive.”
“I didn’t mean to,” Will mutters.
“It is impressive nonetheless. Now the symptom that prompted this session: it says here that you were on a date and your date suffered, in the paramedics words, a breakdown?”
If one could call ‘lunging frantically after Will screaming incoherently for him’ a breakdown. “Sure,” Will says awkwardly.
“And your first ever documented symptom: an fascinating case where you and another person were kissing and they lapsed into a coma.”
Will squirms on the chaise. It’s so soft and fluffy that it mostly just conforms to his body, but he wishes it would swallow him whole. It’s so strange to hear the most horrifying and embarrassing moments of his life discussed so coldly and clinically, but what’s worse is that he can tell the Lecter is more fascinated than terrified by it.
Chilton had been fascinated too. It hadn’t ended well.
So Will does what he does best – he lifts his chin and squares his shoulder and puts on his most confrontation tone. “You don’t need be delicate, doctor,” he snaps. “Call them what they really are. They’re incidents.”
“An incident requires intent.”
“I don’t see how I could’ve given someone a twelve hour case of the unending boner accidentally,” Will says in exasperation.
Lecter hums. He delicately shifts his legs so that the left is now crossed over the right. “Frederick is, shall we say, not well known for his adherence to the proper protocols of protection,” he says, and now there is amusement to match the fascination. “A counselor’s place is to guide and assist. We cannot do so if under the uncontrolled influence of our mentees.”
“You say that, but I don’t see any amulets on you.”
“Amulets are for amateurs,” Lecter says dismissively. “I have no need for them.”
Will shrugs. “Suit yourself, then.”
“So how did these symptoms make you feel?”
“Wowwww,” Will says, before he can stop himself. He rolls his head to the side so that Lecter can get a perfect view of his unimpressed face. “Going straight for the low hanging fruit there, aren’t we, Dr. Lecter?”
“Low hanging fruit would be asking if your mother or father had noticed any symptoms growing up and if so, why none were reported,” Lecter shoots back smoothly.
Will winces. “Okay, fair.”
Lecter leans back in his chair. He folds his hands neatly over his knees and gazes at Will with the air of a surgeon preparing to decide where to make the perfect incision, focused and anticipatory. He tilts his head and says, “Perhaps we can start again, then. Let me rephrase. Did you notice any particular emotion or feeling or sensation before these symptoms began?”
“No.”
“Had you done anything differently in the hours beforehand? Visited a particular place, participated in any ritual?”
“Nope.”
“Did anyone ever remark upon a particular talent of yours? Something that seemed a little . . . too good to be human?”
“No. Well,” Will amends, “I have what you shrinks would call empathy. But that’s not some kind of creature power. That’s just mirror neurons and overactive imagination.”
Lecter lets the shrink comment pass without comment. Instead he says, “Pure empathy?”
“What, is there another kind?”
“Hmm. Tell me, Will, what do your dreams look like? Are they haunted with the ghosts of your waking hours: blood and bone and death?”
Will stares. He has done dream therapy before, but he hadn’t particularly liked it, and no one had understood just how vivid his dreams were. How rivers ran red with blood, how the earth would ooze dismembered skeletons and decayed flesh, how the sky would be filled with ravens. How killers would whisper into his ears and leave his soul ringing with their songs.
How, sometimes, he’d had his own case of priapism after dreams, which was only solved freezing cold showers.
Lecter continues, voice smooth as butter. “I imagine that you can assume any point of view: mine, or the clerks outside, or the creatures waiting in the line. Even the ones that frighten you. Although, perhaps frighten is the wrong word, yes?”
Will wonders, just for a moment, if Lecter is a type of creature that can read minds. Lecter’s voice is so knowing that he has to fight the instinct to cover himself like he’s naked. He feels rather like the lion knows what shameful things the rabbit has gotten up too, deep in the dark twisted corners of the warren.
“Perhaps,” Lecter says, “these dreams caused a sense of . . . arousal?”
“How the hell did you – ”
Lecter smiles. “Call it an educated guess. Let’s try a little experiment, shall we, Will?”
Will is, to be put it lightly, not a fan of experiments. His volcano in middle school hadn’t gone off right, to start with, and his empathy meant that he was more likely to be the experiment than conduct it in university. He’s spent more time hanging up or deleting requests to participate in new studies than he has anything else where communication with academia is concerned.
When he sees the room Dr. Lecter intends to do his newest experiment in, he comes to a dead halt.
“What,” Will says flatly, “the hell.”
That earns him a faux concerned look from Lecter. “Is something wrong?”
“There’s only one bed.”
“Yes . . .?”
“Why the hell is there only one bed?” Will hisses, barely resisting the urge to throw something. Or perhaps to take Lecter by the throat and shake him like a ragdoll.
Lecter rattles off reasons like he’s reading a grocery list: confident, swift, and as if nothing is overly consequential. “A consistent pattern has been that you are not displaying overt or conscious symptoms, so perhaps it would be useful to observe your sleeping patterns. It is possible that symptoms are displaying while you are unconscious that you are not aware of. Prolonged touch and close contact seem to have been triggers for prior symptoms, so a single bed will allow for both of those to be tested.” He pauses. “Also, you noted in your intake documentation that you were not sleeping well, so at the least you might get some sleep out of this.”
“You want . . . to get close to me,” Will says slowly, because he’s not entirely sure he’s heard that right.
“Yes.”
“For a prolonged period of time.”
“Yes.”
“You do know that the last counselor to have prolonged contact with me – and we didn’t even touch beyond a handshake, we were just in a counseling room for an hour – went home with a twelve hour case of an unresolved – ”
“Yes, Will,” Lecter says, cutting him off. “I have been fully briefed. I am fully aware of the possible consequences that may come of this. But I believe the benefits will outweigh the risks.”
“What, you don’t care if you’re stuck with a stiffy for half a day?”
Lecter’s eyes flash – not a trick of the light, they literally flash. It’s over and done before Will can truly process it; he can’t even really figure out the color, except that it is bright and shining. Lecter takes a step forward and then another, and with each, his body language changes, just slightly, until he’s right in front of Will and nowhere near the mild-mannered man who first walked in the door.
No, this man is a predator. This is not a lion. This is something bigger and darker, with sharp teeth and sharper weapons, with a power only outmatched by its hunger.
Will was taught, as all creatures were, that there is a sort of instinctive hierarchy. Some creatures are simply more powerful than others. And when they bring that strength to bear, it is only natural for the weaker to submit or bow or acquiesce. Will has never felt that urge to bear his throat.
He feels it now.
Still, he is not just his instincts. He is also Will Graham, with a functioning brain and a degree. He lifts his chin and stares Lecter down.
A small smile flits across Lecter’s face. This is not like those performative empty ones, the ones he favored Will with in the beginning. No, this is dark and secretive and hungry, this smile whispers of blood and teeth and bone, this smile wants.
“You may not know what I am,” Lecter says, after a long moment, in a tone so low that it is at odds with how it echoes in the room, “but trust me, Will: I am more than strong enough to deal with whatever you might deign to throw at me. There is very little you could do to even damage me, much less kill me.”
Will frowns. Creatures are strong and powerful, but even they are mortal. Even they can be wounded and killed.
Then Lecter leans back, just a little, and it’s like the weight has lifted off Will’s chest. In a normal tone of voice, he says, “Besides, I imagine whatever powers you have are severely weakened by your lack of food and sleep.”
“I get enough food.”
Lecter’s nose twitches. “Greasy fast food fries do not count.”
“That’s creepy. And I had a hamburger with them.”
“That does not improve things,” Lecter says darkly. He tilts his head at the bed. “Get in the bed, Will, and try to get some rest. I will join you shortly. Let’s see what little secrets may make themselves known under the cover of darkness, shall we?”
Will throws his hands up. “Your funeral,” he says, and stalks towards the bed.
It’s very comfortable. Even more comfortable than the chaise, really. It feels almost like laying on a cloud. It’s almost enough to make Will feel a bit sorry for whatever happens to Lecter.
Almost.
“If you steal the covers,” Will warns him drowsily, “I will shove you off the bed. With my hands.”
“Duly noted. Sweet dreams, Will.”
Will isn’t sure what wakes up, minutes or hours later. He doesn’t even remember waking, really. Everything moves molasses slow around him, like time itself has bent to Will’s wishes, and things seem simpler and clearer. Doubts, propriety, common sense – none of them exist, except as specks in the wind, here and gone in a second.
Will is awake. Will is hungry. And Will has a nice warm body beside him that can sate the hunger.
He reaches out, maneuvering under the blankets until his fingers meet cloth. A shirt, but only a distraction. Will moves his hand underneath the shirt until he feels flesh – malleable, warm, delicious flesh. He strokes it absently, feeling the skin twitch underneath his power, and the pulse underneath the skin picks up.
Yet aside from the slight uptick in the heart rate, there is no other reaction.
Will’s meal does not welcome him with eager sounds and open arms. He does not tear off his clothes for Will so that Will may touch him as he wishes. He does not even open his eyes.
Will calls a little louder. The heart rate duly rises again, but only slightly. There is no other reaction.
And Will – Will is starving, and when a feast is laid in front of a starving creature, well.
He’s not quite sure what happens next, exactly. At some point, his clothes end up flung to the floor and walls, discarded and forgotten in an instant, so that the cool night air can wash over his skin. He destroys the clothes of the man in front of him, shredding the shirt into ribbons with his fingers and tearing madly at the pants and underwear until they are nothing but scattered tufts of fabric. He tastes skin – beautiful, delightful, delicious skin – and even more than that he tastes power, deep and dark as the treacherous ocean.
Will wants, and what Will wants, he takes.
The man stirs with a startled groan when Will takes him in his mouth. A hand lands upon his head, but Will digs his fingers into the man’s thigh before he can be pushed off. He growls, petulant and angry, and sucks harder to drive the words out of the man’s head. Too much and the man will lose all capacity for thought and speech, but right now Will cares for nothing besides the taste.
Surprisingly, though, the man laughs. “Clever boy,” the man says, tone full of lustful admiration. “Helping yourself to a proper meal, well done.”
The words mean nothing to Will. They’re just noise, meaningless. He grips the man tighter and sucks harder.
The man groans. His fingers tighten in Will’s hair – but he does not push Will aside. If anything, he pulls him down, guiding him up and down, and attempts to spread his legs underneath Will as if to give him better leverage.
“Yes, yes,” he pants, “take it, all of it – yes, good boy, Will.”
The last scattering of sounds rings of bell, distantly, in Will’s mind. He slows and makes eye contact with the man. He doesn’t pull off, but he does make a questioning sound.
The man must like it, because he hisses and his eyes fall shut. “Yes, you are Will, dear one,” he says between groans. “And I am Hannibal. Don’t you remember? I am helping you.”
Will sort of remembers help. He remembers questing hands and greedy eyes and pokes and prods. He remembers confusion and shame and anger.
He does not want help.
He wants more. He wants much, much more. He wants everything. He wants to drain Hannibal dry until he is nothing but bone that he can crack apart and scrape the marrow from for one last delectable snack. He wants.
And just like that, glutting himself on Hannibal with his mouth is not enough. He wants more, needs more, must have more.
Will pulls off of Hannibal. When Hannibal shifts as if to move, Will hisses at him and digs his fingers into the Hannibal’s side. The scent of hot blood fills the air, and at another time he might have stopped to get a taste, but for now it serves its purpose; Hannibal ceases moving, instantly, and he bears his throat and lays still underneath Will.
It’s easy, then, to settle atop Hannibal’s hips. Even easier still to line himself up perfectly with Hannibal. And easiest of all to drop down, inexorable and unstoppable, to claim all of Hannibal’s power for his own.
Age old instincts Will hadn’t even known he had awaken like a rusty car that’s just gotten jumped. He knows how best to move so that not even the slightest bit of energy is wasted as he rises up and then falls back down. He knows how to press his weight into Hannibal to prevent him from moving and how to wrap one hand around Hannibal’s throat to ensure he doesn’t even think about it.
And he knows, somehow, how to ride each wave of all-consuming, all-burning, all-golden pleasure so that every single iota of it nourishes a hunger he didn’t even know he had.
Hannibal, underneath him, groans and writhes and sweats. He contributes a few thrusts, here and there, but when Will makes his displeasure known, he ceases his efforts and instead switches to words, pouring more of those meaningless combinations of sounds that fall upon Will like the morning mist, cool and refreshing but unable to stop the ride of heat burning Will up inside.
At least, until the edge’s been taken off the hunger, and the sounds start to mean things again.
“Oh – Oh my – god,” Will stammers. “Oh my god, we – we’re having sex!”
Hannibal’s eyes flutter open. He grins, savage and wide. “Welcome back, Will.”
“Did I even – Did I destroy your clothes?!”
Hannibal shrugs. “It was efficient, if reckless and needless. I would have gladly bared myself to you.”
Will tries to stop. He tries to stop riding Hannibal like his life depends on it. He tries to stop squeezing Hannibal’s throat like he thinks Hannibal will run away. And he tries most of all to stop being bowled over with each wave of pleasure. But he can’t.
“Why can’t,” Will pants, “I stop? Why, what – what did you to do me?”
“Me? Nothing.”
Hannibal raises a hand, seemingly completely unfazed by the whole affair, and cups Will’s cheek. His palm is like ice against Will’s skin; he instinctively turns his head and nips at it, eager for anything that draws away the heat burning in his skin.
“Vicious little thing,” Hannibal says, and he sounds downright amused. “No, Will, I did nothing. I had my suspicions, but – you have surpassed them, utterly. You are beautiful.”
Will looks down and for the first time, he notices that things are different. He didn’t shred Hannibal’s clothes with his fingers; no, he shredded them with his claws, sharp things that glint under the moonlight at the end of his fingers now. Hannibal isn’t just clutching at his hair; he is clutching at horns that wind themselves out of Will’s skin, for they are firmer than the curls around them. And he isn’t keeping balance out of some miracle.
No. He has . . . something. Something that winds in the air and balances him like a rudder.
“Yes, you have a tail,” Hannibal says, his tone completely matter of fact. “It’s rather usual for incubi, in fact.”
“Incu-what?”
“Incubi. You’re an incubus, Will. One of the rarest of creatures – so few demons walk the mortal world anymore. No wonder you were so difficult to identify. Such power, and it only came out when you released your own conscious control and allowed yourself to truly be. Absolutely beautiful.”
“There is no way I look anything but ridiculous with a goddamn tail that’s – ”
Will has to cut himself off, mostly because his sentence ends in an involuntary yelp when Hannibal’s hand moves from his cheek to grasp the base of his tail. He doesn’t even see Hannibal moving; it’s like lightning, here in one second and gone the next.
It’s also incredibly, amazingly, blindingly good.
Hannibal strokes his thumb, gentle and rhythmic, and Will moans and writhes. He has no frame of reference for it, just that it feels amazing, and he draws blood when he scrapes his claws down Hannibal’s chest in an attempt to ground himself.
“Most definitely an incubus,” Hannibal notes. “A young one, to be sure, and underfed but – well, we can take care of that, can’t we? Keep eating, dear one, you must be nearing to burst.”
And he’s not wrong – Will is starting to feel a little full. Yet this hunger does not seem to go away when he gets fuller; if anything, he wants to gorge himself even more then more he eats. He wants, and he has no idea how to stop.
“Hannibal,” he says through gritted teeth. “Hannibal, I can’t – ”
“I know,” Hannibal soothes. “I know, I know. Just a little bit more, just a little – there we go, that’s it, keep going – you’re almost there, Will – ”
Will sobs. His claws leave great rends in the bed as he wails.
“Oh, darling. Let’s give you a little help, shall we?”
And Hannibal strokes his tail with one hand, and he digs his heels into the mattress to put real power behind his thrusts, and he closes his other hand around where Will is hard and aching, and it’s too cold and too hot and too much and –
Will dies. Or comes. Or both. Really, he has on idea.
Maybe that’s how incubus die, anyways.
The next time Will wakes up, he is definitely more coherent. The world is still a little fuzzy, but it’s a different kind of fuzzy. This is more akin to how Will feels after a good long day at the stream and a good long night scaling and cooking fish and a good sleep after digesting a wonderful meal. He aches, but pleasantly, and finds that he has no desire to move even an inch.
“Ah. There we are. I imagine you are feeling much better, aren’t you?”
Will opens his eyes to find Hannibal still in bed with him. Still naked, in fact, and covered with blood and sweat and . . . other things.
He glares. “You knew,” he accuses, and he knows it’s true before the words even leave his mouth.
Hannibal doesn’t even have the grace to pretend. He shrugs. “It has been a long time since I have met an incubus,” he allows. “But your power is . . . unmistakable. It leaves traces in the air, upon the skin. If one knows how to look.”
“And you couldn’t use a normal test because . . .?”
“Well.” Hannibal flashes him a mischievous smile. “Wasn’t this so much more fun?”
“Pretty sure it’s more unethical,” Will says, but his tone is without heat. He sighs. “So what now?”
“Now you sleep again, and when you are rested, we shall update your identification in the database. That will ensure that no one else can try and perform any further tests.”
There’s a very strange note in Hannibal’s voice. Will, who had almost fallen back asleep, jolts wide awake again. He is startled to realize that his empathy has not gone away now that he knows what he is and, somewhat, how to use his power. If anything, it is amplified. He barely even has to gaze upon Hannibal to know that –
“You don’t want anyone else seeing me like this.”
“Of course not. It was I who found you. It was I who helped you. It was I who gave you your first meal, and by the laws of the old days, you would be mine and I would be yours.”
The words echo in the air. It sounds like a ritual, or perhaps a ceremony, or perhaps some ancient rite. Will shivers.
He whispers, “What are you?”
Hannibal smiles, deep and dark and treacherous. He raises a hand and places it gently on Will’s skin, tracing random patterns, as he did when Will first began tasting him – but this time, it is not merely the sensation of brief ice that is left behind. Now crackling silver shimmers follow in the wake of Hannibal’s fingers, like a trail of stardust.
Raw magic. Will’s never seen it, but he knows it in his bones.
He looks up into the face of Hannibal – a face that is now angled in shadow, with eyes that burn with an eternal flame and sharp teeth that are more fangs than teeth and a great shadow that swallows the floor and wall behind Hannibal. It’s not a true shedding of a glamor, but Will knows instinctively that he is getting a glimpse behind the mask.
And, well. There’s only one type of creature with that kind of power anymore.
“You’re one of the fae,” Will realizes.
The shadows dance as Hannibal smiles. It’s almost like they have independent movement, twisting and arching even while he lies still.
“Clever boy,” Hannibal says. “Yes, I am one of the fae. Only we really have memories of the demons anymore. We used to ally with each other; it was a fine thing to play tricks on humanity and see who could pull the best trick.”
“And this? Is this a trick?”
“No, dear one. I am honored to help you. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen an incubus feed. It was a beautiful sight.”
“I sense an unspoken and lurking in there,” Will says dryly. He doesn’t even need his empathy to spot that.
Hannibal looks delighted. “And,” he purrs, stroking the skin of Will’s thigh as if they’ve been lovers for ten years and not less than ten hours, “I can give you what no one else can, and deep down, you know it.”
The fae, Will remembers, played tricks on humanity. They liked to watch humans lose their lives or homes or children to little twists on wordplay. They liked to gamble with whole communities. They enjoyed watching hundreds die, just for their amusement.
But they never lied.
Will says, “I mean, not necessarily. Incubi have survived off of humans before, after all. I’m sure my counselor could find plenty of willing ones.”
“You little minx.”
“Or,” Will continues, relentless and reckless, “I could pair up with another creature. Perhaps a vampire or something. They could have the long life keep pace with me, I think. I’m sure my counselor would be happy to help arrange that, right?”
Hannibal bears his teeth, savage and fierce, and his shadows rise up and swallow the bed until Will can see nothing but darkness – darkness above him, darkness below him, darkness to the left and the right and all around, with Hannibal as the one thing that shines like a beacon amongst the void.
“Your counselor,” Hannibal says, eyes alight with anger, “would recommend one dedicated feeder, one who could actually sate your hunger.”
“Oh. Huh. And who might my counselor recommend? Just so I understand everything clearly, you know.”
“You won’t be understanding anything but me after I’m through with you,” Hannibal snarls.
“Oh yeah? Prove it,” Will taunts.
The bed is a little tattered after round two. Round three makes it creak alarmingly.
And round four, well.
The bed is well and truly destroyed after that.
“Don’t even,” Will says sleepily when Hannibal kisses his neck. “I’m so full I might vomit.”
“That’s impossible, you know,” Hannibal murmurs, but he settles against Will with a sigh and drapes an arm around him, possessive and protective. “I am glad you are well fed, though. Truly, you were malnourished, dearest.”
“Hmm. But seriously: what will happen now?”
Hannibal hums. “I will ensure that your record is updated to contain your proper identification. I will also ensure that no charges are pressed against you for anything you have done in the past; you had no idea how to control yourself, and therefore you bear no fault for prior incidents. And,” he says, voice thick with satisfaction, “I will ensure that you have a proper feeding partner of adequate strength and magic to sustain you listed in the database, so that no one will question that you are being taken care of properly.”
“Yes, yes, you have a nice large – ”
“Not just that. Your human vessel needs nourishing as well.” Hannibal nips at his skin. “I will enjoy introducing you to the luxuries of fine food, my darling.”
Will yawns. “As long as you don’t try and get me in a penguin suit.”
Hannibal . . . does not say anything.
Will cracks an eye open. “Hannibal.”
“Yes?”
“If you try to get me into any kind of suit, I swear to god, I will maul you.”
“Do you promise?”
“Oh my god, do you have a blood kink?”
Hannibal laughs. He picks up one of Will’s hands and begins to kiss each finger, as reverently as though he is a man worshipping at an altar. The claws have since retracted – Will learned how to do that in between round two and three – but Will knows that Hannibal would have done the same even if the claws were out.
“No. I just enjoy seeing you, as fierce and free and yourself as you finally are,” he says, voice full of admiration. “You are beautiful, darling, claws and all.”
“I’ve got a bit more than just claws.”
“Claws and horns and fangs and tail,” Hannibal says, and kisses him sweetly, “and all.”
FINIS