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vashs-turtleneck · 6 months

Text

Say my name.

Rating: EXPLICIT (18+ ONLY) Summary: After your heartfelt reunion with your boyfriend, Vash realizes how much he's missed hearing you say his name. Pairing: Eriks!Vash x fem!reader Word count: 6.5k Content: smut, angst, established relationship, oral, p in v sex, reunion sex, very service top Vash A/N: bro this took me so long. I put more effort into this than anything else I have ever written. Anyway, this is my first ever smut fic so uh please enjoy (had to make it eriks because he does things to my brain chemistry)

NSFW below, 18+ only, minors do not interact!

Vash holds your hand through the rickety, quaint house, helping guide you as you walk, avoiding the floorboards he knows creak louder than the others. As much as Granny and Lina adore you, he didn't feel like explaining why he was sneaking you in so late at night. Not only that, he didn't want to explain your relationship to them just yet. After all, the two of you haven't even gotten the chance to properly talk yet, about what your reunion after his two year absence means for you both.

Vash finally guides you into his little bedroom, quietly shutting and locking the door behind you two. He cringes at the how the door hinges creak loudly into the hallway, hoping it wasn't enough to wake anyone.

"So 'Eriks', huh? Did you pick the name all by yourself?" You tease him as your eyes dart around the room, taking in the space your lover has been living in these passed two years. Or... he was your lover. Is he still your lover? For all you know he found someone else during his time here. No, wait, that can't be right. He just snuck you into his bedroom.

Vash chuckles quietly, his gaze never leaving you. "Yeah... guess I did."

You can feel his eyes burrowing into you. His gaze follows you as you curiously take in the room, as you pat the bed draped in old linens, as you look out the window, taking in the scenery, the stars and moons illuminating the sky above. You've always had a tendency to look up at the sky.

God, you're as beautiful as he remembers.

He's pulled out of his own thoughts when you speak again, realizing he's been staring at you the whole time.

"Nice little spot you have all to yourself. Sheryl and Lina are both so sweet. They really do love you, I can tell. They're like family now, hm?" You say as your eyes finally meet his, your voice remaining soft, yet a hint of somberness weaving its way in. "You... You have a good life here."

You feel your heart start to beat faster, your head filling with a million questions that you're almost too scared to know the answers to. What if there was no room for you in his life anymore? What if he wanted to leave everything about his old self in the past, including you? What if, what if, what if...

You start to absentmindedly pick at the skin around your nails and rubbing your palms, subconsciously trying to calm and ground yourself. You're starting to lose yourself to your own mind, horrible thoughts filling your head like a poison.

Vash immediately notices the change in your tone, the subtle, shaky uncertainty in your voice, the way you anxiously play with your hands... Old habits die hard, huh?

"I do. The people here have been very kind to me. It's mostly quiet, apart from when I get myself into trouble. I'm grateful every day for it."

He takes a step towards you, his arms outstretched slightly.

"But, my life here is... incomplete without you by my side, mayfly."

He wants to hold you, feel your body against his, remind himself that you're really here, but he hesitates. What if you despise him for abandoning you? For leaving you behind to think he was dead? Worse, what if you hate him for the sins he's committed? For destroying July and taking the lives of its people? Not that he could ever blame you if you did. He hates himself for it. It's the whole reason he left you behind in the first place. How could he ever face you again after he became the walking demon with the 60 billion double dollar bounty on his head? He deserves every bit of venom spat his way for the things he's done, every bit of the nickname 'The Humanoid Typhoon'.

Yet, despite how much he knows he doesn't deserve you, he wants you so bad. Every moment without you had been agony. He didn't know where you were, how you were doing, if you were even alive. Hell, he wondered if he killed you in July too. So when he finally saw your face again, he swears he felt his heart beat for the first time in two years.

"Mayfly, I... I don't deserve you. I don't. I'm a monster." He takes another step towards you, trying to bridge the gap between you both. "...but I can't live without you. I... I need you. Here. With me."

He's fighting back tears, trying desperately to keep himself together. His vision is blurring from the tears pooling in his eyes, and all he can see is your wide-eyed expression. You're so beautiful, even if you might be about to break his heart.

"If you don't feel the same, I understand. If you want to hit me and yell at me for all I've done, I won't put up a fight. If... If you hate me-" Vash's words are cut short when you rush towards him and plant your lips against his in a feverish kiss, throwing your arms around his shoulders and clinging to him desperately.

Vash stays motionless and rigid in a moment of shock before he's flooded with relief at the feeling of your lips, your body, just you. His prosthetic naturally encircles your waist, pulling you in closer as his flesh hand tenderly cups your cheek, tilting your head to meet his lips with a practiced touch that makes it feels like you were never apart.

You became a shell of a person the day you watched him fall from the sky, like an angel stripped of their wings. You spent the passed two years believing, convincing yourself he had to be alive, or else you would have been lost completely.

With his lips finally pressed to yours, you feel whole again.

Vash can feel your lower lip tremble against his own, your tears mingling with his against both your faces as you each pull the other closer, closer, until there's no space left between your bodies, his stubble scratching your chin.

Your lips meet again and again, each kiss more desperate than the last, pants and sobs and the sounds of lips smacking filling the otherwise dead silent room.

"I missed you." You breathe against his lips, voice cracking from the overwhelming feelings of relief, love, and pain flooding you.

And Vash whines in turn, prosthetic tightening its grip around you.

"I missed you too. So much. Every day I thought about you." He whispers back, his voice strained, flesh hand pulling your face closer by the back of your neck. "I love you, I love you, I missed you."

"Love you too. Missed you so much..." Your voice comes out as a sob, trembling and broken. Your hands tangle into his soft locks. His hair is much longer now, the golden blonde mixing with dark raven.

You feel his tongue tease your lower lip, the warm muscle begging for entry, and you're happy to grant it. When your tongues entangle, he feels himself shudder with want, his body heating up as he gets reacquainted with the taste of your mouth. His hands move down your body, sliding down your waist, past your hips, and hooking themselves beneath the plush of your thighs. He lifts you up with ease, encircling your legs around his waist.

It's not close enough. He needs you closer.

He carries you to the edge of his bed, gently lowering you and as he towers over you, broad shoulders caging you in beneath him. He pulls himself from your lips and holds his weight on his hands, palms against the mattress beside your head. His face is flushed, lips wet with your kiss.

Vash is silent as he looks at your face, tears still staining his cheeks, his gaze reverent and adoring, yet filled with tragedy, like he almost doesn't believe you're real. His flesh hand cups your face again. His thumb traces your lips, your cheekbone, your jawline, his palm resting against your cheek. He takes in your features, committing the way your face has changed over the past two years to memory. You have new lines around your eyes, signs of how time kept passing for you, even without him around, signs of aging that he knows you won't see on his face. Fuck, he's lost this precious time with you, years he'll never be able to get back. Gone, just like that.

He'll be damned if he loses anymore time with you.

His hand trails down, thumb sliding along the side of your neck, down to the bit of your collarbone peeking from under your shirt. His breath hitches at the feeling of your soft skin beneath his hands, how your legs stay wrapped around his hips, your arms clinging to his shoulders like a lifeline. He can feel your body heating up at his touch, like it remembers him. He's missed you. He's missed your touch. So much.

"Please, I- I need to see you. Please." He begs, voice already breathless and needy.

"N-Need to see you too. I need you so much." Your voice comes out as a pathetic whine, but at this point you don't care. He's here. You have him again. You need him.

Vash wraps his prosthetic around your waist as he gently lifts your upper body up enough to pull your shirt over your head, tossing it aside. With your shirt finally off, you can feel contrast of his arms on your body, the cool metal of one, and the warmth of the other.

"I missed you. I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry for leaving you, mayfly. I'm so-"

You stifle his apologies with another hot kiss, your hands weaseling between your bodies and working quickly to take off his white button-up. Your fingers fumble with the buttons until his shirt is open, exposing the scarred muscles beneath. His hands leave you for just long enough to push the fabric off his shoulders. When his shirt is finally off, both his hands move to the back of your neck, pulling you in for another heated kiss, making you both groan into each other's mouths.

Your hands trail along his chest and back, tracing over the myriad of rough, raised flesh. Your touch is gentle, as though you're trying to heal him. He wishes you could. He wishes your touch could take away his 150 years of anguish, only made worse in your absence, and heal this body he's so carelessly destroyed. Yet, he knows he deserves every bit of it for what he's done. If nothing else, at least your touch is a momentary reprieve from it all, a moment for him to just be.

His hips twitch when he feels your hands trail down his chest, over his abdomen, to the hem of his pants, fingers working to undo his belt and buttons, working them off his body.

"M-Mayfly..." Vash mutters, his breath hot against your face. He works the rest of your clothes, practiced hands swiftly unclasping your bra before moving to peel off your pants, tossing the garments somewhere in the room, leaving you both in just your underwear.

Vash gently pushes your shoulders, moving you slowly like you're made of glass and laying you flat against the bed. He sits back on his knees to get a good look at you, propping himself between your thighs, his half-lidded eyes practically glowing as he drinks you in.

You're suddenly filled with this overwhelming shyness as you're laid almost completely bare in front of him. It's been so long since you've been looked at like this, and you can feel the heated rising to your face. Your body has naturally changed since he's last seen you, and the thought that he'll be disappointed weasels its way into your head, flooding you with insecurity. Without thinking about it, your hands move up to cover yourself, draping your arms over your chest and stomach.

Vash's gaze break from your body before darting up, his eyes softening when he sees your blushing and flustered face.

"Oh, sweetheart..." he coos, bringing himself down to pepper your face with soft kisses, stubble grazing your face. "Come on now. Don't hide from me. Please? I want to look at you. I love looking at you." His large hands gently wrap around your wrists, trying to coax you to uncover yourself. "Please. Let me see you. I missed looking at you so much."

Oh, how silly you are to think he'd look at you with anything but pure adoration and worship. He's only ever shown you love and acceptance, just as you have shown him. Vash can't even fathom the idea that you'd see yourself as anything other than breathtakingly perfect. Your body is his place of worship, every sound you make a prayer.

So, with a quiet whine, you let him pull your arms from your body, his hands gently pinning your wrists next to your head flat against the mattress.

"There you are..." Vash whispers adoringly, pressing a chaste kiss to the tip of your nose before leaning back again to look down at you.

He takes in the sight of you beneath him for the first time in two years, his hands letting go of your wrists and tracing up and down your curves slowly, savoring the feeling of your warm and soft flesh. The world hasn't been kind to you in his absence, your body baring new scars he knows weren't there before, and he hopes to God you didn't get all those looking for him, sacrificing yourself for his unworthy soul.

"So beautiful, mayfly." Vash purrs. His hands trail up your middle, up your sternum, before parting to grope your breasts, thumbs rolling over the perked buds. The act sends a wave of heat straight down between your legs, your hips involuntarily writhing against the bed. In turn, your reaction makes Vash suck in a breath, his hips gently grinding against the plush of your thigh, letting you feel his hardened cock.

You both need this. Badly.

"Mmph- you like that, huh, baby? That feel good?" Vash whispers, voice hoarse with desire as he circles his thumbs over your nipples again, this time rolling his hips right against your clothed sex.

You howl at the pleasure, hips bucking to meet his own. You bite your lower lip to muffle your cries, nodding your head up at your lover. "M-Mhmm!"

With a lewd grunt, Vash brings his head down, pressing his lips to your inviting body. He sucks on your neck, nibbling and licking slowly and sensually, finding the spots he remembers would make your breath hitch, your back arch, and your grip tighten around him. He lets out a deep groan against your neck when you react the way you used to, your voice pitching up to a needy, wanton moan when he sucks on your neck just right. You tangle your fingers in his hair as shivers dance up your spine, rolling your hips up against his.

He leaves a trail of kisses along your form, giving special attention to any scars he comes across along the way, just as you had done for him countless times before. His lips reach your chest, kissing along your sternum before moving his mouth to one of your breasts, his skillful lips enveloping your perked nipple, tongue circling the peak. His hand moves up to massage your other breast, kneading the soft flesh in his palm.

And you can only do what your body tells you to, your voice quivering into what only comes so naturally to you when he's worshipping your body like this.

"Vash." His name leaves your lips as a broken moan, but they hit him like a typhoon, shattering him to pieces.

Vash's body tenses, all his actions pausing as his lips part from your nipple with a quiet smack, his hot, ragged breaths against the wet skin of your breast. He tilts his head up, bringing his face closer to yours, letting your noses brush and his forehead press intimately against yours. His beautiful baby blues drink you in, eyes upturned into a longing, pleading stare. His eyes captivate you, trapping you under his gaze. From this close, you feel like you could drown in them.

"Please... Say it again." His voice is raw, fragile, and begging.

You have to blink yourself out of your trance, completely ensnared by him. Even though he's the one begging you right now, with that look on his face, you'd do anything he asked. So, without hesitation, you say it again.

"Vash."

And he whimpers.

A name he hasn't heard in two years, lost to his new life. A name that, despite the heavy weight it carries now, was gifted to him by someone very important. A name that has always rolled of your tongue with a softness he never felt he deserved, that he used to hear you cry out over and over when your voice was pulled taut with pleasure. His name.

He didn't realize how much he missed hearing it, and especially how it sounds leaving your lovely lips.

"Again. Please."

"Vash."

"One more time. I beg you."

"Vash."

Vash groans again, his eyes fluttering before pressing his lips to yours again, catching your bottom lip between his teeth as he pulls away.

"Mmph... Fuck, mayfly. The things you do to me."

His lips capture yours in a hot, wet kiss, tongues tangling, his hips undulating against yours and seeking out that little bit of friction between your bodies. He can feel the heat coming off your core against his hard cock, and his mouth waters as he thinks about how wet you must be right now.

"Need to taste you, mayfly."

Vash pulls back before he stands up between your legs and pulls you by your hips to the edge of the bed, grinding himself against your thigh again. His fingers hook to the elastic of your panties, his eyes not missing the wet spot forming on them already before meeting your gaze again. "Let me take these off you, baby."

And fuck, you are absolutely reeling right now, barely able to form a thought as he continues to handle your body with so much care and deadly precision, like he know it better than you. And really, he does. Despite the time you two have spent apart, his confidence in his knowledge of your body and his desire to please you is naturally weaving its way back into his mind like it's pure instinct. You can't tear your eyes from him as he stares down at you with the darkened, hungry eyes of a man that looks like he's just found his first sip of water in days on No Man's Land.

He tilts his head as you stare at him silently, taking in your half-lidded, hazy eyes. His fingers unhook from your panties, palms resting against your thighs.

"Mayfly? Do you want me to? I won't do it unless you tell me to."

You whimper needily, shifting your hips back and forth, unintentionally teasing him as your body begs for more of him.

"Please. Please, Vash. I need you to touch me." You beg, your voice shaking. You need him right now, both body and mind begging him to do something, anything to ease the ache between your thighs.

With a smirk that flashes his sharp canines and sends another shivering wave of heat to your core, Vash swiftly pulls your panties down your legs, letting them drop to the floor.

With you completely exposed to him now, Vash hooks his hands under your thighs, pressing your legs up and opening you up to himself, spreading you out on the mattress before him and watching as your slick drips from your sex as he practically folds you in half.

"Breathtaking." He purrs, staring down at your sweet flesh. "And so wet already."

"It's... It's because of you." You say back, your voice a pathetic, high-pitched whimper, feeling yourself pulse with anticipation.

Vash chuckles breathily, his eyes never leaving your sopping cunt as he lowers himself to his knees, propping himself between your thighs.

"I know it is."

With a soft sigh, Vash presses his tongue against your cunt, taking his time as his licks his way from your dripping entrance all the way up to your clit, gathering your sweet juices on the flat of his tongue with an audible eagerness. His mouth presses a fiery kiss to your clit, his lips wrapping around your little sensitive bud as his tongue flicks it with a skillful precision that is downright deadly, like it's all muscle memory coming back to him in this moment, as though his place in this world is right here between your thighs.

For Vash, you truly are an oasis on this desolate planet. In a life that's been so lonely and so filled with tragedy, you have been a solace that he never felt he deserved, yet he selfishly let himself indulge in. After being by his lonesome for so long, how could he ever turn away from your open arms? You unconditionally loved and accepted his broken mind and tattered body, and he was never able to deny your affections, no matter how much he told himself he didn't deserve them.

You are the only piece of heaven he's ever had.

"Mmmh... Taste so good, angel." He coos against your sex, licking his lips of your slick before tonguing another stripe up your cunt. "It's been too long. I'm absolutely parched for you, baby."

"Oh fuck, Vash!" You gasp out, your hands moving to tangle through his two-toned hair, holding it back and away from his face. You can feel his stubble grazing your plush folds as he eats you.

"Say it again, mayfly." He mutters against your cunt, the vibrations from his voice sending shocks of pleasure coursing through you.

Your mind is a pleasure-filled haze. You're barely able to think as your lover positively devours you, gorging himself on your dripping sex like it's more for his own pleasure than it is for yours.

"Ahh... w-wha-?" You manage to mumble, barely understandable.

His head pops up from between your thighs, hungry baby blues staring back up at you.

"My name. Say my name again for me, angel. Please."

"V-Vash..."

He growls as he dives back down to your cunt, his tongue teasing your entrance as his nose presses against your clit.

"Say it softer. Please."

"Vash..."

"Say it louder."

"Vash!"

His hips rut against the mattress as he pleasures you, pathetically rubbing his still-clothed cock against the old linen in tandem with his mouth. He can feel his boxer-briefs soaking up the pre-cum from his engorged tip. His body is aching for you, but he'll be damned if he doesn't make you come on his tongue at least once before he fucks you. He needs to taste you as you come.

His right hand slowly trails up the soft meat of your thigh, fingers dancing along your hot skin until they reach your pulsing flesh, swirling his fingers over your wet heat. Then, he gently presses his middle finger inside you, the long digit curling and pressing against your warm walls, gently stretching you as he takes you apart from the inside out.

You have to throw your hand over your mouth to keep yourself from crying out in white hot pleasure, hips undulating against his mouth and hand, seeking out more of the pleasure he's giving you.

"This okay, mayfly? Feeling good?" Vash whispers before circling his tongue over your clit again.

You don't trust yourself to speak right now, instead nodding your head frantically as you moan and wail silently against your hand.

Vash groans hoarsly when he sees just how well he's taking you apart, eyes fluttering closed as he focuses entirely on your pleasure. When he feels your body relax around his finger, he slips in a second digit, his dexterous middle and ring fingers meticulously and lovingly abusing that sweet spot inside you until he has you seeing stars behind your eyelids.

Your hand gently tugs at his hair, biting into your palm and clenching your eyes tight, your thighs trembling against his head. You pull your hand away from your lips just long enough to call out to him, your voice breaking, your body ready burst, "Vash! M' gonna c-come..."

He growls against you when he hears his name leave your sweet lips in a such desperate tone, tongue lapping away at you more eagerly, your juices dripping from his hand.

"Yes, baby. Come. Come all over my tongue. Wanna taste you..." he grunts, panting as he fucks you with his tongue and fingers and grinds himself against the mattress. Fuck, he's gonna come all over himself if he doesn't reel it back.

His mouth devours you, digits pumping faster into your fluttering cunt as he chases your high.

When Vash feels your body tighten and convulse against his fingers, your sweet whimpers filling his ears, he moans louder than you, as if your pleasure is his pleasure, and it takes every bit of willpower in him to not come along with you.

Vash has always denied himself the pleasures in life, deeming himself unworthy for the sins he believes he's committed. But when it comes to you, to your pleasure, he's always eager to let himself indulge, his tongue lapping away at your sex like your come is a reward for his efforts until his mouth is dripping with you.

When he feels your body relax, your muscles unflexing, he licks one last strip over your cunt before pulling his mouth and fingers away. He licks your sweet cream from his digits, his other hand removing the boxers that have grown unbearably tight from his lower half. Slowly, almost like he's reluctant to leave his place from between your thighs, he raises himself up and towers over you again.

"You're so perfect, angel." He whispers, voice hoarse with desire, and you can see his need from the way his cock twitches as he stares down at you, his big hands holding you by the softness of your thighs. He brings his pelvis forward, gliding the hard length of himself along your dripping pussy, coating himself with a mix of your come and his own saliva.

"Vaaash~" You call to him weakly, your head still fogged from your intense orgasm, but your body craving him. Your hips rise to meet his own, and he grinds against you more desperately.

"You want this, angel? Wanna feel me inside you?" His tone is breathy and light, almost teasing, but you know more than well enough that what he's seeking right now above all else is your consent. How you got so lucky as to find yourself such a caring and thoughtful man (plant) is beyond you.

"Want it more than anything, angel." You purr back, using the loving nickname he's given you back at him as your hands reach for his shoulders. Because let's be honest, if anyone is deserving of the nickname, it's him.

A soft smile crosses his face when he sees you reach for him and, like a moth to a flame, he leans down towards your touch. One of your hands clasp over his shoulder, gripping him and pulling him closer to you. The other traces your thumb over his cheekbone, your finger dancing over that adorable birthmark under his left eye.

"Don’t go stealing my words now, mayfly." He teases back before his lips cover yours. When he pulls away, you feel him pant against your face, his body shaking and his cock gliding over you folds. Despite how much he's been holding back, putting your pleasure far before his own, you can feel now just how badly he wants this. He's at his limit.

Still, a pang of concern crosses over his handsome features, always thinking of you despite the agony he's in right now.

"If... If it hurts, I want you to tell me. Tell me and I'll sto-" You shush him before he can keep going, your thumb quickly moving from his cheekbone to his lips.

"You won't hurt me, Vash." You whisper tenderly, trying to ease the worries undoubtedly forming in that pretty head of his.

Hìs face softens again, his expression changing from one of concern to one that can be described as nothing short of reverent. His eyes might as well be hearts from the amount of love you see in them. With a shaky sigh, he nods his head once, and you move your hand from his face to his other shoulder, holding him tightly against you.

"Alright." He places doting little kisses to your temple and cheek, his hands on your thighs gently parting your legs further. "Let me take care of you, mayfly."

One of his arms weaves its way between your bodies, grasping his cock and aligning himself with your inviting entrance, placing a gentle pressure against your core with the tip of his cock. Vash's gaze never breaks from yours as he slowly sinks himself into your tight heat, the head of his cock splitting you open as he sheaths himself inside you, his mouth falling agape with a mewling whimper as he feels every inch of your sweet warmth.

Your breath hitches as he presses himself inside you slowly, your body taking him inch by sweet inch until he gently bottoms out, your nails digging slightly into his broad shoulders. You can feel him stretching you out on his thick cock, a mixture of the sweet sting and pleasure filling your entire body. You take in deep breaths to calm and relax yourself, your eyes fluttering up at your lover.

You're everything he's ever wanted, everything he's ever needed, everything his soul craves and begs for. He caresses your thigh and whispers between gasping breaths, a sweet smile on his face as your catch your breath, "You're okay, mayfly. Relax. Take your time. Tell me how you feel. I'm here with you, all the way." He coos, peppering your cheeks and neck with soft kisses as he whispers gentle words of praise and encouragement. His expression is one of pure love and adoration, seeing your body relax as you adjusts to his, your walls moulding to his cock, your breath slowly coming back to you.

"A-Ah... I need you to move, Vash. I think I'll explode if you don't move right now." You whine, hips bucking and writhing against his own, begging him to fuck you already.

His adoring smile never falters, chuckling breathily as you beg for him.

Fuck, he's missed feeling needed.

"Well, we wouldn't want that now, would we?" He teases with a shit-eating grin that splits his perfect face. He places a tender kiss between your brows before gazing back down at you.

"Hold on tight now," he purrs against the shell of your ear, tightening his grip on your thigh, his prosthetic palm pressing against the mattress by your head. He's trying so hard to keep himself together, but you can feel his arm shaking from the sheer euphoria as he supports his weight.

Gently, he pistons his hips against yours, his cock gliding along your inner walls at a sweet and tender pace and giving you the chance to adjust to the feeling of him stretching you out. As fogged as his mind is right now in a haze of lust and need, he is still acutely aware of you, and it would break him more than anything if he hurt you.

Vash stares down at where you two connect so intimately, watching how your body engulfs his cock over and over and coats his shaft with your arousal.

"You feel so good, mayfly. Taking me so well, like your body remembers me," Vash praises you sweetly, his face falling to the crook of your neck.

"V-Vash..." you mewl, thighs gripping his waist tighter, cushioning his hips as he pumps you full of himself. "Feels so good. M-More, please. I need you more."

"Of course. I'll give you more," he whispers, his voice dripping with tender affection as his hands move to your thighs, lifting them up and hooking your legs over his shoulders, folding you in half again. You moan wantonly at how deeply he can reach in this position, the head of his cock kissing your cervix.

Vash increases the pace, his thrusts gradually growing more deliberate and quick, pumping into you so deliciously that he wrings out every sweet sound you can make from your throat. He rocks his hips, his muscles tightening and relaxing as he pushes himself all the way in and pulls back out again, letting himself feel every inch of your velvety walls. Every pump of his hips has him pulling himself out to the hilt, leaving just his hot tip inside, giving you no time to breathe before he pushes himself back inside again, fucking you deeper and harder than before. Every time he pulls out, he sees your lips part slightly as you wait for him to ram back inside. And he does, over and over, making both of you moan louder as the room fills with the sounds of skin slapping.

"I love you, I love you! P-Please, please don't leave me behind again. Stay. I need you!" You cry out in rapture, tightening your grip around him and pulling him so his patchwork chest is against yours, your breasts squeezing and bouncing against his pecs.

"I'm here, mayfly. I'm right here. I'm not going anywhere. I can't- I'd die without you. I love you too much." He grunts against the side of your face, the sound of his labored breaths filling your ears.

He thrusts into you faster and harder now, the withered bed creaking and groaning beneath you both along with the sounds of your pleasured cries.

"Mmm~ Vash... Feels too good. Gonna come. Gonna make me come."

Your words break the last bit of restraint in his lovedrunk mind, grunting loudly against your ear.

"Fuck, say it again. Say it- Say it like you missed me. Like you thought of me every day. The way I thought about you."

"Vash!"

You can feel your body quivering and pulsing around him, and it only makes Vash moan louder, your pussy practically sucking him back in every time he pulls away. He moves a hand from your thigh to thumb at your swollen clit, desperate to feel you come undone around him.

"That's it. That's it! Mmm fuck~ I can feel it. Say it as you come all over me, baby. Please. Please."

Your orgasm hits you like a sandsteamer, your back arching harshly off the bed before you even have the chance to cover your mouth, crying out his name with a melodic and broken moan.

"Va- Vash!"

He's quivering, his grunts and breaths shaky as he feels your pussy clench around his aching cock like your body is trying to milk him for all he's worth.

"Ahh- S' too good... M' gonna c-come, mayfly. Gonna come with you."

Vash bites his bottom lip, trying to stifle the sounds of pure agonizing rapture, only for your name to leave his lips like a beautiful song to the heavens as he spills himself deep inside your heat. His hips stutter as he fills you with his hot come until you feel like you're bursting, hips slowing and gently rocking into you as you both ride out your highs until they gradually come to a stop. He feels his muscles go limp, pressing his weight down on you more than he means to as he collapses against your smaller frame. He covers your temple and cheeks with weak, tired kisses, whispering sweet words of affection until you've both gathered your minds a bit more.

"I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you." He chants over and over again with every breath like a prayer, eyes closed, relishing the feeling of euphoria filling his body.

He stays inside you well after you've both come down for your climaxes, cockwarming you on his thick shaft like he can't bare the thought of ever being separated from you again. But when he feels his cock softening, he carefully pulls out of you with an almost pained groan, disappointed at the loss of your warmth but his body completely satisfied and drained regardless. When he sits back on his knees and sees his seed spilling from your dripping hole, he groans, cursing under his breath. The sight is enough to get him hard all over again.

_________________________

After a night full of round after round of hot and passionate lovemaking, your exhausted bodies lay beside each other. The sheets are wet and tangled, your bodies slick with a mix of your arousals, but you're both far too content and tired to care about the mess right now, enveloped in each other's embrace.

"Mmh... bed's comfy. I see why you like it here," You coo against his head, his hair tickling your nose.

"Having a bed to sleep in has definitely been nice. Beats sleeping out in the desert," He mumbles and pulls you in closer to himself, nuzzling his face into the crook of your neck, his stubble scratching at your skin.

"But this bed might as well be a bed of sand if I can't sleep in it with you, mayfly."

"Always such a smooth talker," you chuckle at him. Then, your smile turns to a look of reluctance as you gently raise your head. "But I should probably go, huh? Don't wanna explain to Granny and Lina what I was doing here in the morning."

"Well, you were doing me." Vash snickers back at you, eyebrows wiggling teasingly.

"You're hilarious," you scoff with a deadpan stare, but you can't help the little amused smirk forming on your lips, "I'm glad to see your sense of humor hasn't gone anywhere."

He chuckles against the hollow of your throat, his lips ghosting over your skin.

"I know, I know. It's just one of my many charms."

"You won't need to say anything to them. I'll do all the explaining for you." His grip tightens around your waist, any thoughts of leaving the bed vanishing from your mind. How could you leave after everything that's happened? After you've both finally found your ways back to each other?

"Besides, they might already know you're here. We weren't exactly... uh, quiet." He chuckles nervously, and you can feel his face heating up as he thinks about just how much noise the two of you were making. You feel your own face heat up too. Yeah, the morning's gonna be a bit awkward.

Vash grips you tighter, his warm body flush against yours, clinging to you.

"Stay, mayfly. I need you."

Your body settles back into the bed, cuddling yourself up against the man you love most, and the world feels a little brighter.

"I'm right here. I'm not going anywhere."

#vash the stampede x you #vash x you #vash x reader #vash the stampede x reader #vash smut #vash the stampede smut #eriks x reader #eriks x you #eriks!vash #eriks! vash #trigun smut

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ddejavvu · 1 year

Note

you and jake in a forbidden kind of situation, maybe you’re an important admiral daughter, rooster’s sister, don’t know. you two get close, but he can’t really make a move on you, someday you end up in the same bed, you’re like cuddling and you just move a little too much, just enough to leave him hot and bothered.

now what’s really on my mind is his big hands holding your hips in place, so you wouldn’t move anymore, like warning you “you need to stop now or i won’t hold myself”

this is along the lines of a goose lives/nobody dies au? basically they're at the bradshaw home, so carole and by extension nick would still be living there, with the reader as his younger (but adult) sister. hope that makes sense!!

this post is 18+, minors dni.

The Bradshaw house is jam-packed, and you're lucky that you have a bed at all. As a resident and not a guest, it would be common courtesy to offer your bed up to one of the pilots that have come to visit, but the one you'd chosen, Jake, had some other arrangement in mind.

Said arrangement is his broad hand over your stomach, toned chest against your back and muscled arm hanging over your shoulders. You can feel the soft, warm air that he's exhaling, washing over the back of your neck in waves as he tries falling asleep.

You'd normally be squished in with Bradley, a trip down memory lane of all the times you'd crawled into your big brother's bed after a nightmare when you were little. You're much bigger now, but you still have the same twin bed, so having someone even more broad-shouldered and bulky than your brother in it means you're extra close.

Bradley's not happy with the sleeping arrangement. Before he could secure his spot beside you to ensure that none of his friends did anything sleazy, your two younger cousins had latched onto his legs, demanding to sleep in their favorite Bradshaw's bed. You'd take it as an insult, but you're their favorite when he's gone, because they forget he exists. So you'd snickered as he committed himself to a restless night full of cold little feet and floppy babies, and lead his rival to your bed by his large, rough hand.

It feels nice where it's placed over your belly. Warm and gentle, a constant presence that rises and falls with your breaths.

You don't start it on purpose, you really are just uncomfortable laying on your hip. So you tilt yourself backwards, towards Jake, and settle further against his chest.

Then he moves. It's slight, barely-there, but he pulls his hips away from yours. Only his hips, and he clears his throat against your shoulder.

The second time is an effort of confirmation. You feign discomfort again, grunting slightly as you shimmy even further back on the mattress, locking your hips to his once more.

This time you feel it. A growing bulge, stiffening ever-so-slightly as your hips move. He's frozen, hoping you somehow can't feel it, because he can't scoot further back on the bed or he'll fall.

The third time is just for fun. You grind back into him, and his hand shoots from your stomach to your waist. His large hand blankets your hip bone, squeezing firmly.

"Don't." He murmurs, stern.

"What? You don't like it?" You peer over your shoulder, face centimeters from his own, "Feels like you do."

I'm serious, Y/N." He squeezes harder at your hip when you try to move it, "Stop now, or I won't be able to hold back."

"Then don't." You parrot him, equally as stern, "Why do you think I chose you? And why do you think I asked my cousins if they wanted to sleep over tonight, too? This is not a coincidence, Jake. I want you, too."

He's still at the information, save for the hardening of his bulge. Then slowly, tantalizingly slowly, he moves his hand off of your hip, and covers your mouth with it.

"Silent," He commands, lips brushing your ear, "Absolutely silent. Do you understand?"

You manage a nod, and he pries at your pajama shorts with his free hand, trapped beneath your side. They're loose, and he's able to flatten his hand over your cunt without taking them off. He brushes a thumb over your clit, dragging ticklish stripes up and down your slit with his thick pointer finger. They gush gooey warmth just below your stomach, and you arch yourself into his grip.

"Easy," He hums, at the bucking of your hips, "If you move, and the bed squeaks, I'm stopping."

You're at his mercy now, body begging for touch and lips silenced by his massive hand. When you feel one of his thick fingers slip beneath your waistband and slide against your slit, you gasp. It's muffled, of course, but Jake freezes.

"What did I tell you?" He whispers gruffly against your ear.

You press a kiss into his palm as your answer, a vow of silence.

"Better." He grunts, applying gentle pressure to your cunt, finger just barely breaching your slit, "If Rooster finds out he'll kill us both."

With that, he pushes his finger fully into your cunt, and its met with warm slick. You're decently lubricated already, the excitement and scandal of whatever's about to happen pooling itself inside of you.

"Good," He whispers, pumping his finger in and out, in and out. Once it's fully slick, sliding easily through your folds, he adds another, keeping them pressed together as he guides them through your cunt. You're spread open quicker than usual, but you suppose it's because his fingers are thicker than yours, and more exciting.

It only makes you more wet when he hoists himself up to his knees, rolling you onto your stomach and keeping his hand over your mouth. He has to sit up to tug your panties to the side and take his cock out of his pajama pants, but once he's settled and ready to go, his free hand lands by your shoulder.

HIs cock is thick, far thicker than his fingers that had already been a stretch. But it's only a slight burn that accompanies his cockhead at your entrance, and when he pushes himself in and bottoms out, it's gone. Now there's only pleasure swirling beneath your belly, and it's insanely hard not to moan.

He has to go slow and gentle so that the bed doesn't make noise. You're dreaming of the day when he can jackhammer you into the mattress and you can scream his name, but for now the slow drag of his cock through your cunt below your ass is enough.

More than enough, you think, as the pleasure coupled from his fingers and his cock is starting to overwhelm you. He's working a steady pace, albeit slow, and each thrust into your soaked cunt is a reward.

You can tell he's already chasing his own high, too. You suppose it's the forbidden aspect of the sex, the fact that if you get caught by anyone, you're in trouble for life. He feels so wrong bucking his hips against yours, feeling the soft flesh of your ass against his skin, but that's why it feels right. And it feels wrong for his cock to slam against your insides, over and over again, twitching slightly, but that's why it feels right.

It's quick, hasty sex so that no one has the chance to catch you in the act. You ramp yourself up, imagine the sight of his cock disappearing beneath your ass and into your gaping cunt. In turn, he fantasizes about the noises you're biting back behind his palm, leaning down to bury his face against your shoulder.

"Cum," He grunts, lips pressed to your skin and forehead sweaty, "C'mon, darlin', can't get caught. Hurry up."

His insistence, where you'd normally consider it bossy and inconsiderate, is hot. He's demanding an orgasm from you, ripping it out himself with every thrust of his thick cock. There's no way you can't cum, not with his breath on your neck, his voice by your ear, and his cock in your cunt.

When you spasm, he does, too. The convulsion of your cunt, rapidly tensing and clenching around his rock-hard cock make him stifle a groan against your skin. He hits his own climax as you're coming down from yours, and your legs tremble at the feeling of his cum gushing into your cunt.

He braces himself on his knees, using his free hand to flip you over. Once you're on your back he collapses over top of you, panting beside your ear and muffling the sound into your pillow. He only removes his hand from over your face to kiss you, lips lazily suctioning to your own.

"Good," He hums, careful to keep his voice soft as it thrums through your entire body, warm in his chest, "Nice and quiet, darlin'. They'll never know."

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painted-bees · 1 month

Text

I decided to take up teaching myself piano for funsies, and...4 days in, I am enjoying myself. Autistic rambling behind the cut lmao

I've got the layout of the keys committed to memory, and I can find notes, [major]scales, and chords very easily (patterns!!). So--I'm dumping all my concentrated effort right now into building hand independence, and it would be feeling nearly sisyphean if I didn't know how brains worked. I'm still struggling to play through a five note scale with both hands at different paces [one playing in half notes, the other playing in quarter notes.] Literally the most basic of the basic exercises...but I figure there's no point getting much fancier than this until I can do it with some relatively clean consistency, and at a good tempo. It's brain neuropathway stuff--so really, so long as I take my time[extremely slow lmao] to be clean and accurate, I should be able to do it faster and faster as the days go by. And then once it feels like a relatively easy exercise [rather than something that blends my brain into soup], I can introduce some more difficulty.

I'm kinda curious to see how long it take to build the skill. Not even learning how to play songs, just learning how to make my hands and fingers move independantly, deliberately, to a set tempo. That shit's SO HARD lmao I thought I would graduate past this first exercise in a couple days, but it's gonna take...a bit longer. I can tell I am improving, though, because it takes less time for me to stop tripping up each time I sit down. Can't hold a steady tempo just yet tho, no matter how slow.

When I'm not doing that, I'm just playing around with random chords and trying to figure out why certain combos sound so good, and why others don't. And it really is all just...patterns. Which is cool! The theory side of things is making a lot more sense to me than I expected it to, and I really like it.

Anyways, I've been hammering on this thing a lot, since I only just got it and the novelty has me captivated. Like...a couple hours each day. I recon that'll slow down once the novelty wears, but I hope I never lose interest completely. So long as I can sit down and practise consciously for half an hour each day, I figure it'll get me to a point eventually where I can produce something that resembles...music lmao

we'll see, I guess. The exercises are actually fun to do tho...which is more than I can say for drawing 😂

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ghostsvacuumcleaner · 10 months

Note

Hi! I saw your alejandro NSFW alphabet and I was in love! Mind doing a John price NSFW alphabet if you are comfortable?

Absolutely comfortable with my favorite dilf omg 🥵 took me a while since I'm working on other requests and I'm sorry bout that but I hope you're still around here! also I'm so SORRY this is so LONG, couldn't help myself!!! Hope you enjoy even so 😭 To work:

TW: NSFW, SMUT. MINORS DNI!

John Price NSFW Alphabet

masterlist | ao3

A = Aftercare (what they’re like after sex)

There will always be plenty of it, even if he's in a bad mood, even if he's really pissed at you: he'll always love praising his babydoll the most. After he's done with you and absolutely sure your thighs are sliding from the slick that's still down there and exhausted from intensely riding him, he'll hold you fondly against his bear chest and kindly brush his worn fingers through your hair, caressing that very soft spot in your scalp. Although you're in his office and it's kind of necessary for you to get ready and leave quickly before someone can come in and catch you fucking your captain, he'll take his time and offer you a drag of his cigar, and find it very adorable if you inhale wrong and cough; "Gotta let the smoke get to your lungs, love, inhale... that's right, good. Now let go... there you go." he'll say, while his fingertips brush deliciously calmly your bare back, contouring your spine; if you don't choke and is actually an avid smoker like himself, he'll be glad to share and will offer you cigarettes or cigars from his pack evertyime he feels like.

B = Body part (their favorite body part of theirs and also their partner’s)

You'd hardly say he has a favorite body part of yours, because he'll spare no efforts in worshiping it whole - every part of it. If he absolutely had to pick one particular thing, he'd probably say your thighs and legs. Before the two of you engaged in a official relationship, it wasn't often he could see them because you'd mostly wear those average cargo pants; the very first time you accepted to go out with the team and not so unintentionally decided to wear that damn tiny dress, your thighs started living rent free in your cap's mind. He had a hard time staring them all night long, craving it as the dress kept riding up your thighs while you danced - against other men. Almost like you were challenging him in finally coming to you after days of incessant innuendo and stares at work.

As for himself, he loves his hairy, perfumed and broad chest. He feels vivid like he doesn't in much time when you brush those small soft hands of yours across it, when you're with them all over him like you own him - particularly in those times you feel jelly when you see some other woman staring at him. Like stating he's your man. He loves it.

C = Cum (anything to do with cum, basically)

Before the two of you made a commitment, he was very careful with it. By that time, you getting pregnant could be a very big problem for both of you - not only because you're considerably younger than him, but mostly because he is your boss. Your captain. That could come off the wrong way for his superiors, could hurt both of your reputations. He'd grab a twisted handful of your hair, his other hand digging tight on your waist as he digs, buries his cock deep within your swollen walls - your leg bent, resting over the desk and your cunt so exposed your clit rubs lightly on the wooden surface each time he thrusts - you're going insane. You came minutes ago and there he is still fucking you dumb, making you bite your own cheeks trying to keep your voice down, till suddenly contact's broken and he steps back, pumping his cock a few times only to release his spend on your beautiful thigh, with a muffled groan. "Bloody fuckin'- ah, doll, y' gonna kill me like that..."

Today's day with the two of you dating, nothing will get him more relaxed than forcing his seed inside you, watching his own cum drip through your folds once he pulls off - and he'll gladly tell you after, that he really hopes it catches this time.

D = Dirty secret (pretty self explanatory, a dirty secret of theirs)

He's been watching you closely from your very first day of work. He'd never tell you or anyone else - and sometimes, he denies it to himself out of shame, that he intentionally recruited you on his team because of his crescent infatuation with your young, beautiful and strong self. It's not that you're not highly competent and good at your job, definitely not. But that wasn't his only reason to pick you, and he'll bury this secret with him - that he once in his life chose to be unprofessional, because he wanted you. But btw that didn't stop him from being tough and demanding with you, especially on your first days. heh

E = Experience (how experienced are they? do they know what they’re doing?)

He's definitely very experienced, in every pure aspect of it. It was a part of the reason you grew interested on him with no time - he was experienced like none of these young guys you had before. Knows every right places, mature, caring. Bit old fashioned. It was all you wanted; It'll get on your nerves sometimes although, because you're not the only one to think that he's the hottest shit alive. Many woman fancy him, some older than you - which will get you really concerned sometimes. He'll reaffirm you whenever it's necessary, he's yours, have never been anyone's like he's yours.

F = Favorite position (this goes without saying)

It generally depends on his mood, but again if he had to absolutey state a favorite one: on your side or behind. Stressing day at work, comes home to find you waiting for him in bed - he'll love fucking you on your side, heavy panting on your ear as his hand squeezes your perfect sized breast - his hips moving ever so slowly as his hand brushes the skin of your belly down to your folds, where he'll comfortably make room for his fingers against your clit in slow, circular movements. "God I fuckin' need you today, hun..." - he'll grunt in your ear in his raspy voice.

G = Goofy (are they more serious in the moment? are they humorous? etc.)

Not in the moment particularly, not when fucking you - but on all other times, he'll find room to be goofy and make you laugh at his terrible jokes.

H = Hair (how well groomed are they? does the carpet match the drapes? etc.)

He's hairy on all parts of his body, no thread. He's very clean and groomed, yes - he loves his beard and moustache, spends a hideous amount of money in lotions and perfume and combs it after every shower he takes, religiously. Wears a big beard for so long now he probably can't picture himself with a shaven face anymore.

I = Intimacy (how are they during the moment? the romantic aspect)

Price is the perfect balance between rearranging your guts whenever you're a brat and he's got to teach you a lesson, and pulling multiple orgasms out of you by fucking you slow and passionately when he's affectionate. He'll have you on his lap, his arms wrapped around you, his hand supporting your back while he spares no efforts in trailing kisses from your breast to your neck, smelling your hair and letting out a low mewl to how amazing you feel. He'll be lazy, slow, move your hips ever so slow making you roll against him like you're dancing on his lap. "Mmm-" he'll moan, before taking your mouth in a passionate sloppy kiss again.

J = Jack off (masturbation headcanon)

He doesn't need much of it anymore, so only in cases of much need - in mission and can't concentrate in anything else but work, some of you had to travel for any type of reason, he's really horny and you're sick - he'll do it. But as for before having you, he'd be embarassed to admit how many times he had masturbated to you in the shower.

K = Kink (one or more of their kinks)

Brat tamer, and it doesn't surprise anyone. He doms almost everytime. He absolutely loves it when you put up an attitude - not acting childish, no, when you stand up and defy him. He'll be the boss. He'll be proud of himself for marking you everywhere he possibly can, for owning you.

A bit of exhibitionism. He loves fucking you raw against his office desk or honestly anywhere else it's plausible in the headquarters; he loves it that he has to cover your mouth or else you'd be a loud moaning mess. It was hard restraining himself when someone knocked on the other side of the door, all curtains down and the slight sound of your mouth gagging on his cock. When you mentioned to stop, he forced your head hard till your nose met the hair in his groin, and oh only God knows how hard it was finding room for all that length in your throat.

L = Location (favorite places to do the do)

When I mean anywhere he can, I mean anywhere he can. He even would enjoy it if he had someone watching the two of you, but for the bare reason of: he's the one fucking you. He's making sure that this other person watching knows it, that you're his and only his. If anything, he wouldn't share, quite the opposite. But the idea that there's a dangerous possibility that someone catches the two of you arouse him; so, in his office, in the deposits, sometimes in the briefing room if it's late and empty.

Of course, that doesn't exclude the special place in his heart that his big, comfy bed has. He loves having you on his bed, cozy, warm, and very domestic.

M = Motivation (what turns them on, gets them going)

Seeing you being the badass youngster you are turns him on; not exactly when at mission, because at those times he keeps himself strictly professional and very concentrated. But in the backstage, he loves it when you defy him and when you brat around - that'll give him further reasons to punish you later.

N = No (something they wouldn’t do, turn offs)

Wouldn't do anything if he gets the slight sense that you don't want to, nothing to hurt you (not for real) and wouldn't share. Perhaps, he'd love to have someone seeing it but sharing is a huge no. Watcher can't touch or get closer, only watch, while he makes you cum.

O = Oral (preference in giving or receiving, skill, etc.)

Can't possibly say he has a preference, he adores both equally. He'll love burying your face deep in his groin till you feel that little ache on the back of your throat, and keep you there till you're out of air; he'll also love burying himself between your thighs, especially when you wrap them tight against his face and squeeze it - he could die on the warmth of your thighs and cunt.

P = Pace (are they fast and rough? slow and sensual? etc.)

As mentioned before, it highly depends on his mood. When taming, when fucking you rough, punishing - he'll go fast and rough enough to get you out air while trying to restrain your voice; "Hell- hm, d'you like it now, are you gonna keep the attitude- hn- now? Hm?" he'll moan, pressing your whole body against the wall, fucking you standing.

If passionate, he'll take his time with you in a slow pace, slow movements more like a dance of his hips against yours in syntony. He'll hum pretty words in your ear and promise you the world; "M' gonna fuckin' marry you, hun... have this pretty little cunt everyday."

Q = Quickie (their opinions on quickies, how often, etc.)

Although he likes to have freedom and time to fuck you straight and get at least two delicious orgasms out of you, he's a very busy man and you're too a very busy woman, and quickies are simply very convenient for the both of you. I'd say quite often, giving the circumstances - which doesn't mean that he doesn't, at least twice a week, spares time to fuck you the way he likes.

R = Risk (are they game to experiment? do they take risks? etc.)

He's a bit old fashioned, but he's willing to experiment if it's nothing too eccentric. If you ask nicely, he'll try; if you're not familiar with it he'll also love teaching you a bit more of bdsm, since he's bit of an adept.

S = Stamina (how many rounds can they go for? how long do they last?)

Lots of stamina. Wouldn't go all night long because he simply doesn't have to, he's very experienced, good at what he does and he knows it. He knows what buttons to press to make you feel good; he lasts two good delicious long rounds, and that's enough to get you to heaven.

T = Toys (do they own toys? do they use them? on a partner or themselves?)

Again, a bit old fashioned; so I don't think he own many toys. He does own ropes he'll love to use on you, and as for the rest he'd rather use his own hands. He wouldn't refuse to use toys if asked though, probably wouldn't be too comfortable with using on himself, but would definitely use them on you.

U = Unfair (how much they like to tease)

Oh, he loves restraining you, girl. Days without seeing him? You won't touch, won't relieve yourself in any other way. You'll wait, patiently, agonizingly, like the good girl you are, for him to arrive. He'll let you climbing up the walls, craving him. If he's in mission, he'll send you pictures, videos - that'll make you want to scream for not being able to touch yourself while watching. When he comes back, IF he thinks you deserve it, he'll fuck you; if not, he'll make you beg. If you disobey him, get yourself ready for when he arrives. That'll be a fun ride.

V = Volume (how loud they are, what sounds they make, etc.)

Not exactly loud, but very vocal. He grunts, says dirty things against your ear in a low, raspy whisper - will get moans out of you for he loves seeing his little girl squirming under him. Will encourage you not holding your voice back, and if you're in a dangerous spot and could possibly be seen, he'd shush you with a deep thrust - or by occupying your mouth with his fingers instead.

W = Wild card (a random headcanon for the character)

Has a picture of you in his wallet and finds it the most absolutely romantic and cute thing ever. And he's right it is

X = X-ray (let’s see what’s going on under those clothes)

He's definitely big, but that's not the best part of it, not what really caught you off: he's thick. Swollen, a little thicker in the middle and thins towards the tip - just enough to stretch you out entirely anytime he goes inside you. Full of blood pumping veins and surrounded by a fair amount of hair, arghhh I want it

Y = Yearning (how high is their sex drive?)

He though he was going back to his teenager years in those first months after meeting you. Hell, he'd be craving for you for the least things - he definitely felt young again. It's high, he's not compulsive but the bare sight of your body makes him think of the nastiest things - and that's been even before the two of you actually started that fling, that later one became the relationship you have now.

Z = Zzz (how quickly they fall asleep afterwards)

This is a very tired man we're talking about. After making sure you're okay, all good, clean, warm, cozy, not thirsty and feeling loved, he'll collapse on your bare breasts hugging you for dear life - don't you dream of waking up before him because you won't get to push him out of yourself, like - no way.

#cod fic #john price #captain john price #john price x you #captain price x reader #captain price x you #captain price x female reader #price x you #cod mw2 #price smut #john price smut #captain john price x reader #captain john price x you #cod smut #call of duty smut

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mamayan · 9 months

Text

Don’t Cry: Part 1

Yandere! Giyu Tomioka x Fem! Reader

He’s just so pretty I couldn’t help myself…

Don’t Cry: Part 2 (NSFW)

The water Hashira just wants you to love him. The means don’t need to justify the end.

TW: Implied Kidnapping•Isolating•Terrorizing•Minor Injuries•Yandere Themes•Implied Death

You knew your chances were slim. The fact that it was the middle of winter, that your shoes weren’t meant for outdoor use, and your weakened physical state all held you back.

You knew it was highly unlikely you’d escape, but when the chance arose, you took it.

Who knew you’d actually make it so far? Already you’d passed the first village, no where near home but far enough from his home that you felt like you could breathe. Staying discreet and on the low, you’d found an old temple to settle down in for the night. Only an old monk running it, who kindly gave you a room, bedding, and food. If not for his generosity, you might’ve failed. Worse, you might’ve died out there. The wind having picked up, rattling the only temple walls struggling to keep the cold sharp air out. You’d been in your futon for several hours, sleep eluding you in the most painful of ways. Paranoia likely to haunt you for time to come, if you truly do manage to escape his grasp.

You didn’t want to demoralize yourself. You truly did still hold a flame of hope inside that you could do it. Completely rid yourself of the demon slayer Giyuu Tomioka, a Hashira. Though, despite what little effort he put into explaining what it is he was and did, you’d already highly doubted his mental sanity. You’d certainly met a priest as a child that claimed to see spirits and could cast away demons plaguing your village. Giyuu seemed nothing like that quack, only able to cast out dust bunnies at the most. Giyuu’s dark blue gaze, like the depths of the ocean, seemed so honest. It was difficult not to believe him, but you supposed that was what made him so dangerous. It’s what made you vulnerable to him, letting your guard down because someone so upright like Giyuu couldn’t be evil, right?

Looks could be deceiving. Like a fool, you fell into a honey trap, his silent yet steady demeanor so captivating.

You’d found him nearly a year ago, same time of year, bloodied and left in the snow. He wasn’t dying, still alive and able to speak albeit quietly and in clipped words. You couldn’t help it, taking him to your home and helping him heal. Couldn’t help being dragged into the sad soft eyes when he spoke about his sister and friend. It was too late for you by the time you realized something wasn’t quite right with him mentally. His silent protective nature turned a bit violent, once breaking the hand of a man who drunkenly stumbled into you on your way home from the market one evening. He claimed the man had bad intentions, but no crime had been committed yet, so why cripple a man? A farmer no less who needed that hand to feed his family. Giyu had been icy when you’d questioned his reasoning, he’d become closed off when you’d try to figure out what exactly was going on with him. Why he’d disappear for nearly a month at a time and reappear again as if he never left your home.

You never got an answer, just awoke one morning in a new house you’d never been to, isolated in a forest you didn’t know, with only Giyuu.

Giyuu, who never answered your questions with anything in-depth, surface skimming explanations that made little to no sense. “I’m protecting you, like I should’ve done for them.” You thought he’d have nefarious thoughts, taking a young unmarried woman away from her home like an abducted bride usually resulted in something. Except he let the anxiety fester, never once did he lay a hand on your or become violent. His only indication of impatience or irritation for any disobedient actions was silence and isolation. You didn’t like the isolation, didn’t like when he’d leave without a word for so long and you’d be trapped in that forest with nothing and no way out without him. He knew it riddled you with panic and depression. It’s not your fault you took the chance to run when he’d taken you out of the forest to pick herbs, he’d gone out of eye sight, and you took off towards the village in the horizon.

So why now, after all this had happened, did you feel strange? Still anxious as if he’s right around the corner? Or are you anxious because he isn’t around the corner? His lack of presence bringing back fear of being left to die alone in that maze of a forest with no one. You tried to close your eyes and focus on your breathing, hoping it lessened the misplaced guilt you felt for leaving. He doesn’t deserve any pity. He’s a mentally ill man with far too much strength and intelligence and should be arrested-

An ear piercing scream has you jolting upright, adrenaline pouring into your veins as you hear what you pray isn’t the breaking of bones and tearing of flesh. Bile rises in your throat but thankfully your body doesn’t betray you and moves to quickly throw on your outter robe loosely and sandals to cover your feet as you bolt out of the room and head straight to the exit. You’d think about the old priest later, but you were certainly in no position to play hero. You need to get out and away from whatever animal broke in. You turn the corner, the temple entrance closed but not locked thankfully as you sprint for the double wooden doors.

Except you don’t make it. The back of your left ankle becoming oddly itchy before your legs give out and you collapsed. Confusion wracked you, as you turned to look behind you only to see a lot of blood. So much, flowing from the back of your ankle, and it takes your brain a moment to realize you’d been sliced by something. “What…” you can only mumble before noise breaks your thought and someone- something stumbled out into the communal area of the temple. You couldn’t even scream if you wanted to, the monster hideous and deformed, humanoid but grotesque in it’s similarities too. It had four arms, sharp and elongated, with knife like claws for fingers. Teeth razor sharp and an unhinged jaw covered in blood- and oh no, the clothing of the priest? Tears were already spilling down your cheeks, unable to form words let alone breathe because this demon was eyeing you with hunger. All four eyes.

Would your last thoughts be an admission that Giyuu isn’t crazy…? Would you be alive then, if you’d just stayed by his side…?

It lunges, and you don’t have the heart to watch the beast kill you, so you close your eyes and turn away. Awaiting the impact that will likely crush and kill you painfully. The demon screeches, and then wails as a new sound has your heart nearly stopping.

“First form, water surface slash.” You look, unable to really fathom what was happening, as Giyuu cut through the beast, throwing it off your trajectory. Water moves with his blade, seemingly out of no where, as it cuts through the demon, making it wail and cry out viciously.

“A Hashira?! Here?! No! No! No! No! Why are you here?!” It’s screeching voice like knives on granite, irritating your senses as you scrambled away from the fight to the far corner of the temple. You were unable to walk with the injury to your foot.

You couldn’t tear your gaze away from the fight, unfathomable as it all was to you.

The demon regrew it’s damaged body, lashing out at Giyuu and causing a new wave of panic to overtake you but Giyuu moved seamlessly. His stoic expression still in place despite the monster screeching and lunging for him, destroying portions of the temple in it’s rampage. Giyuu moved like he was dancing, elegantly dodging and swinging as if in accompaniment to a song you couldn’t hear.

“Damn you! Damn! Damn! Damn! I’ll kill you!” The demon screams, except it doesn’t leap for Giyuu again, this time it turns it’s attention to you. You don’t even realize you’ve cried out until after Giyuu springs into action, and just as the beast is about to grab you…

Giyuu beheads it. Blood splattering across your chest and abdomen from the demon, as it’s head goes rolling away. It begins evaporating, body and head, ashes rising up and dissipating as if it was never there in the first place.

It’s quiet. Save for your trembling little gasps and whines escaping as you try to calm yourself down.

It doesn’t work.

Your panic too high, and with it, your blood loss greater.

Despite your seemingly endless tears, you can make out Giyuu’s twisted expression of concern and it breaks your heart as you sob. “G-Giyuu!” His name different on your lips than any other time you’ve said it. More whiny and needy than you’d ever care to admit, but you were terrified and dizzy. You were seeking the only comfort available.

Despite his steely expression as he gazed down at you, bleeding out before him, he crouched down and moved to check your injury.

“I need to stop the bleeding…” he’s talking more to himself than you. Moving quickly, you barely registered him tearing the end of your kimono, using the fabric to wrap and halt the bleeding of your severed Achilles tendon. The pain thankfully wasn’t registering, but once Giyuu was close enough, you were quick to latch on to him desperately. He halted and stilled, hand still applying pressure to stop the bleeding, but frozen otherwise as you wrapped your arms around his neck and cried his name again.

“Giyuu… Giyuu… I’m sorry… I’m sorry…” your voice faltering as you whimper in pain as he begins working on your injury again. He’s silent as you plea and whine in his arms, even as he picks you up. “I was wrong… wrong… hurts… Giyuu…” it’s only muffled words against his haori, trying to melt into the very man you’d run away from. It was your only form of comfort, the itching in your ankle becoming a burning hot pain that was consuming a majority of your thoughts not still occupied by the creature from hell you’d encountered tonight.

The demon that would’ve killed and eaten you if not for Giyuu Tomioka.

He’s gentle, carrying you, and allowing a few strangers dressed all in black to treat your wound. They’re careful, quiet and respectful towards Giyuu, calling him Tomioka-sama and showing only the highest regards to. His hold isn’t suffocating, he’s not berating, only softly petting your hair occasionally to comfort any sniffles you release.

Then you’re being carried back. Not back to his home like you figured, no you’re traveling along a path to a city you’ve never been to and entering through a side entrance to an enormous mansion.

“G-Giyuu…?” You’d fallen asleep on and off during the journey, not once did the man holding you waver or show any signs of fatigue despite walking the entire way with you in his arms.

“Hn” he’s curt, expressionless as normal, but as his eyes look down to meet yours, they seem softer somehow. Warmer than the usual icy depths you feared previously. You can only clutch closer to him, anxious of the new environment despite the pretty scenery you passed going towards a building illuminated by lanterns.

“Where are we going…?” You’re unsure how to answer, how to even interact with the man you’ve shown nothing but hostility to. It left you awkward and fumbling over your own thoughts regarding him.

“Hospital.” Oh, you’re surprised by how normal his response is.

“Are you… hurt?”

“No. You are.” You’re most certainly aware of being hurt, the pain killers you’d been given hardly any help.

You remain silent as he takes you inside, a few small girls moving about on light feet carrying this or that. He continues past them, ignoring how they pause to bow and murmur his name respectfully. They do curiously look at you, fascination and an adorable hint of gossip forming in the depths of their eyes. You can only bury your face in his neck out of embarrassment, his minty and fresh pine scent soothing to your frayed and exhausted nerves. He’s warm too, you’d never really noticed, but he seemed to run hot despite how cool he seemed to be.

Regardless, you enter a room, with a regular bed pushed in the corner and medical equipment stored on shelves.

Giyuu places you down on the bed, finally moving away from you to look down at your sorry pathetic form. At least, that’s how you feel you must look.

His eyes are still soft though, and it only makes tears spill down your cheeks again as you feel a sense of utter dread he’s going to leave you here alone, and regret for doubting and running away when he had been honest about his intentions. To keep you safe. In his own strange way, he was repaying you for saving him likely. He knew those monsters existed, and wanted to keep you away from them. He disappeared so long because he was hunting them.

“Don’t cry…” he looks at a loss, unsure and clumsy as his rough calloused fingers move to wipe away the seemingly endless stream of tears.

“How can…” sniff “…I not? I was so horrible to you and you still saved me… I’m so sorry…” you’re choking over your own distress.

“Giyuu…” you can hardly make his figure out through your tears blurring your vision, his efforts to wipe your tears and keep them dry futile. He looks truly confused and worried.

“Yes?” He sounds unsure of himself.

“Thank you.” His eyes widen, shocked by your gratitude, but the warm smile that graces his features is enough to have your heart skip a beat. He’s always been handsome, but he seemed so untouchable and reserved before.

You didn’t notice another person enter, but Giyuu didn’t acknowledge them in favor of comforting you.

“Oh my… making a patient cry is terrible you know?” You startle, clutching onto Giyuu instinctively as you look up and at a lovely woman standing in the doorway. Her smile kind, eyes gentle, and beautiful features striking.

“Good evening, I’m sorry for startling you. My name is Shinobu Kocho.” The woman just stands there, gentle smile in place, but she gave off a somewhat odd feeling inside you. It only had you trying to pull Giyuu closer. Most noticeably on the woman was a katana, like Giyuu carried, and you wondered if this woman was also a demon slayer.

She must be.

“Tomioka-san, is this your wife?” Her question was strange, her gaze unwavering and not blinking as she stared a hole through Giyuu. He remained impassive and unresponsive, but his eyes did move to meet your own. You didn’t know what to say, the way she asked was as if you couldn’t be here if you weren’t. Did you need to lie? You felt felt more awkward as the time passed, neither Giyuu nor Shinobu made any indication that the silence would be broken.

“U-um… I, I am?” You noticed Giyuu’s form stiffen, and you briefly felt concerned you’d said the wrong thing. But the fatigue of the day and night was wearing heavy on you, you just wanted to rest safely. You wrapped your arms around Giyuu’s form, trapping the man who could easily escape but chose to settle as you wearily peaked at Shinobu behind Giyuu.

“Oh, I see! How lovely Tomioka-san, you’ve gotten yourself an adorable wife!” Her charismatic voice and smile weirded you out, both seeming highly disingenuous as she claps her hands together sharply.

“Mm” only a grunt is Shinobu’s reply from Giyuu, but the woman doesn’t seem offended.

“Well, I’ll leave you to rest then, Tomioka-san” it takes you a moment to realize she’s speaking to you. You can only give a weak reply, waving a little as the woman leaves. You slump in Giyuu’s arms, who is thankfully quick to catch you and hold you up against him as he sits beside you on the bed now. You’re limp and pliant in his hold, surprised deep inside how natural it feels. You hated him not even a day prior, wanted nothing to do with him, resented him.

What exactly changed so quickly?

Or did you not hate him? Just didn’t understand him? Or how to communicate. This was the most he’d ever touched you, but you realize it had all been initiated by you personally.

“Do you want to bathe? Or sleep?” His question broke your inner monologue, as you glance up at him. His expression melted back into a soft smile for you, and it had you fighting a smile of your own back. You pondered his question, admitting you were indeed exhausted but also disgusted by the blood of that monster and your own still covering you.

Licking your dry chapped lips, you answered.

“I’d like to bathe first…”

With that answer, you were back in his arms as he stood up with you, carried swiftly out of the room and several corridors down.

You let him lead, as he took you to what appeared to be an indoor bath house located inside the mansion. You took note of the direction he took.

“Tomioka-sama, let us help?” Two sweet little girls that looked awfully familiar from earlier stood before you two now. Their sweet and innocent expressions melting you internally. Giyuu’s embrace tightened momentarily, alerting you to look up at him. Though he didn’t speak, his silence was enough to let you know he wanted your answer.

“O-okay, that’d be lovely. Thank you girls.” You were replied to with little giggles, as Giyuu took you into the initial bathing area and sat you on a changing bench.

“I can’t go any further…” he seemed reluctant to leave you, making that ball of guilt swell up again in the pit of your stomach, choking you.

“I’ll be quick? Will you wait?” It sounded desperate, even to you, but the way he smiled made you think it was the right question.

“Mm” his nod of affirmation comforting, as he stepped out and the girls began helping you undress carefully despite your wounded foot.

“Tomioka-sama smiled! Did you see? Did you see?” Their excited and hushed whispers adorable as you let the girls help you limp over to the buckets of water. They scrubbed and massaged you, helped you into the hot bath with your injured ankle left out, and gave you a few moments of privacy. You felt sick and relieved all at once, dots connected and questions answered but you wondered if the price for them was worth it. If you hadn’t escaped, would that… would that old priest still be alive? Or would more people have died if Giyuu hadn’t looked for you?

…had he looked for you?

#demon slayer #water Hashira #x reader #fem reader #18+#yandere giyuu #kny giyuu #KNY #Giyuu Tomioka #Fem! Reader x Giyuu Tomioka #Giyuu smut #kny Giyuu smut #yandere Giyuu Tomioka #sub! Giyuu Tomioka

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yourfavbunni · 6 months

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Satoru x Reader

Synopsis: Part 2 of Heartbreak | Part 1

It had been about 2 weeks since you had decided taking a break from your relationship with Satoru. Despite all his wrongdoings, you still loved him and you knew he loved you dearly too.

Not being able to go on with it him you finally text him.

"Hey. I was hoping we could talk or something…"

Satoru received your message, a mix of excitement and nervousness coursed through him. The thought of seeing you again after your break filled him with both anticipation and anxiety.

"Of course, Y/N," Satoru replied, trying to sound as casual as possible despite the butterflies in his stomach. "I'd like that. Where and when works for you?"

He waited anxiously for your response,

His mind racing with thoughts of what this meeting could mean for the two of you . He knew that it wouldn't be easy, that the two of you still had a lot to work through, but he was determined to show you just how much he had changed and how committed he was to making things right.

Finally, your message came through, suggesting a local coffee shop as the meeting spot. It seemed like a fitting choice, a neutral space where we could have an open and honest conversation.

"Sounds perfect," he typed back, a sense of hope beginning to blossom within me. "I'll see you there. Looking forward to seeing you again."

As he made his way to the coffee shop, Satoru’s mind buzzed with thoughts of what he would say.

As he entered the coffee shop, his eyes scanned the room, searching for your familiar face. And there you were, looking just as stunning as ever, a mix of anticipation and caution in your eyes. He approached you with a warm smile.

"Hey", he greeted you with shyness behind his voice "It's good to see you again".

Butterflies filled your stomach, who would of thought being away from him for merely 2 weeks would have you feeling like you had when you first met him. You let out a small "Hi", smiling.

The two of you didn’t say much as you made your way to a quiet corner of the coffee shop. As the two of you settled into your seats, a mix of anticipation and nervousness hung between the two of you like a delicate thread.

Taking a deep breath Satoru was the first to speak he looked into your eyes, his voice filled with sincerity. "I want you to know that I've spent these past two weeks reflecting on my actions, on the mistakes I've made. And I want to apologize from the bottom of my heart for the pain I've caused you."

His gaze never wavered, his blue eyes locked with yours, "I've been working on myself, addressing the issues that led to our break. I want you to see that I'm committed to changing, to becoming the boyfriend you deserve."

You listened as he talked, taking in the way he looked at you with those soft eyes of his, you knew he was telling the truth, Satoru was many things but a liar.

The weight of his words hung in the air as he reached out to gently hold your hand. "But words alone won't be enough. I know that actions speak louder, and I'm ready to prove myself to you. I'm ready to show you that I've learned from my mistakes and that I'm willing to put in the effort to rebuild our trust."

He paused, giving you a moment to take in my words, to gauge your reaction. "I love you, baby. And I understand if it will take time for you to trust me again. But I want you to know that I'm here, ready to do whatever it takes to earn back your love and to make things right between us."

The air around felt charged with emotion.

After what felt like forever, you spoke, "I’m glad, I was scared you weren’t going to agree to meet. The past two weeks felt miserable without you…I missed you…".

A soft smile tugged at the corners of Satoru’s lips as he listened to your words, feeling a rush of relief and joy wash over him. It was a reassurance that perhaps there was still hope for the two of you , a chance to mend what had been broken.

"I missed you too, baby," he confessed, my voice filled with genuine affection. "Being without you was like a constant ache, a void that nothing else could fill. I realized just how much you mean to me, how much I rely on your presence and your love."

Leaning closer, he gently brushed his fingers against your cheek, his touch tender and affectionate. "You're more than just someone I love, you're my best friend, my soulmate . I missed having you around".

His gaze held yours, unwavering and filled with determination. "I'm ready to put in the effort, to shower you with love and affection. I want to be there for you in every possible way, to support you and cherish you. Please, give me the chance to show you just how much you mean to me."

You smiled softly, you were head over heels for him, "I would like that".

The two of sat in the cafe for a few hours talking, catching up, you had ordered yourself a strawberry shortcake, Satoru watched as you ate a dorky smile plastered on his face, "Is there something on my face"?, you said putting a hand up to your mouth. "No, he chucked, "I’m thinking how lucky to have such a beautiful girlfriend like you in my life."

Your face blushed up, heat rising to your cheeks, "I love you Y/N, he said eyes softening, I love you too, Satoru", you said…

Satoru then laughed, "You know, Geto and Shoko tried beating me up after I had told them what happened.." You giggled "I would’ve paid to see that".

#gojo angst #gojo x you #gojo x y/n #gojo fluff #jjk gojo #gojo x reader #gojo satoru #jjk satoru

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thebibutterflyao3 · 1 month

Text

Day Twenty - Prompt: Brush @rosekiller-microfic

March Daily Series - 694 words

Tw: Piercing in progress - not graphic

<<<Previous Part OR Start Here

While Evan worked on his first customer, Barty strolled into the shop as though he didn’t have a care in the world. He joked casually with Emmeline in the waiting room while Evan seethed in his stall. Thankfully, the woman under his needle was either asleep or altogether unperturbed by his clenched jaw and hissed curses.

“You’re really going through with it? I figured you would back out,” Emmeline taunted. There was an edge to her voice that Evan appreciated. “It’s quite a commitment. You’ll have to abstain for at least a month, can you manage that?”

Barty snorted derisively. “I’ve gone longer. I’ll manage.”

Not recently, you haven’t.

Evan attempted to brush the thought aside before his overactive imagination started recreating scenarios. He was having enough trouble without a hard-on to hide. Especially while he was tattooing a woman’s chest. The last thing he needed was for a client to think that he couldn’t act like a fucking professional.

“Right,” Emmeline retorted with a laugh. “I reckon you can’t help but show it off to anyone who will have a look.”

“Don’t you dare.”

The threat slipped free before Evan could bite it back. He winced hard when their conversation halted abruptly. Adding to it would only make things worse, so he shut his mouth and focused on finishing the massive moth under this woman’s barely covered breasts.

Barty cleared his throat noisily. “I think I’ll keep this one to myself for a while, actually.”

“Probably best,” Emmeline agreed, sighing heavily. “Anyway, the boss is ready for you in the office.”

Evan kept his head down as Barty walked past. If he met his gaze now, the game was up. He was barely hanging onto his indignation as it was. Anger wasn’t the primary emotion that his mind associated with Barty, despite his best efforts to redirect it.

Emmeline stepped into his stall and leaned over his shoulder. “Smooth, Ev. Real smooth.”

“Shut it.”

“No, really. Why don’t you go on in and watch? I’m sure Barty wouldn’t mind.”

Evan huffed a laugh and shook his head. “Kingsley would kill me.”

She shrugged lightly, then leaned her chin against his temple for a brief moment. It grounded him more than he expected. Evan lifted the machine and closed his eyes as he soaked in Emmeline’s show of support. With Regulus and Pandora still in Wales, he was struggling to keep it together on his own.

A slew of curses burst from Kingsley’s closed office door. Simultaneously, a shudder of dread and a shiver of delight rushed down his spine. Evan felt Emmeline’s grin widen against his temple.

“Are you alright?” she whispered.

“Not even a little.”

“Understandable.” She patted his cheek fondly before stepping away. “May want to let her take a break and have a smoke.”

Evan nodded, then woke up his client and did just that. He left the door ajar and listened to the strained words that filtered through his boss’s door. It was equally horrifying and satisfying to hear Barty descend into hell over and over again. By his count, Kingsley was still on the third piercing.

“Need a breather?” Kingsley asked brusquely.

“N-No. Just get it –fuck!– over with.”

“If you say so. Hold onto the arms of the chair if you need to, but you have to remain still.”

“Tr-Trying.”

The sharp whine that followed twisted Evan’s gut in knots. He hated this. All of this bullshite was tearing him to shreds and now he was forcing himself to endure Barty’s agony too. It wasn’t healthy to be obsessed with a bloke, especially this one, and he knew that. It also wasn’t a choice.

“Crouch, if you can’t sit still, we’re done.”

“No! I just n-need…bloody hell! Evan!”

Evan didn’t hesitate. He dropped his cigarette and bolted inside. The panic in Barty’s voice drowned out every fibre of fury he’d clung to this past two weeks.

When he pulled open the office door, Kingsley shot a harsh glare at him, but didn’t say a word. Evan swallowed hard, then nodded as he slipped inside. He was in a world of shite, in more ways than one.

#barty crouch jr x evan rosier #evan x barty #barty x evan #barty crouch junior #barty jr #barty crouch jr #evan rosier #rosekiller microfic #rosekiller #slytherin skittles #marauders era

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slashthrashandcrash · 2 months

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*still twirling phone cord, hi it's me again* I think one of the other things about the slasher x final girl dynamic is the subversion of expectation. For so many of us girlies like myself we're used to men being aggressive, violent, even abusive, but when the slasher (maybe even covered in blood, maybe even after committing terrible acts earlier in the film) is with her, how is HE the only hand that caresses her gently? How is HE the only one who genuinely cares about her safety? It's both hot and romantic and terrifying and also oddly childlike in how incongruent it is with previous patterns. It's not fair but it feels both nice and wrong and intimate and dangerous and

Are you there God, it's me, Danny--

See see see, you and @unnamed-blob would get along swimmingly when it comes to loving soft yanderes that are possessive and sweet to their darling while being a killing machine towards anyone who gets between them. Me, though? I like that spice, I want him to still be rough and mean because frankly, it's all he knows and understands. Grabbing things that he wants has always worked before, just make her settle down by force and eventually it'll be smooth sailing.

But this new feeling of love and desire is so painfully foreign, he doesn't know how to hold himself together when it comes to her. He knows violence and bloodshed and the thrill of the chase, not butterflies in his stomach when he thinks about her alone. It feels similar to bloodlust, in fact that's what he assumed it was at first when he went after her, but every time he corners her he just...fuck, he doesn't know what he wants. He wants her. It's making him crazy, confused, angry -- what the fuck kind of hold does she have on him? If he could get rid of her then everything would go back to status quo, but he just can't bring himself to do it. It's her fault he's like this, she either needs to fix it or be punished for it.

It makes the times when he genuinely tries to be soft and gentle all the more rewarding, because god damn is he trying but still failing so miserably. Flowers and gifts and hair pets, those are things girls like, right? So if she likes them, then she'll like him, and then he can finally understand the turmoil inside of him and...oh, wait, yeah she's rejecting every token of affection he's trying to force on her, be it because it's still soaked in blood or because she just doesn't trust anything he drops in her lap. He's hurt by her rejection, can't she see the effort he's putting in just for her?? Doesn't that earn him ANY favor?? Well, if she wants to be ungrateful, then she'll have to make it up to him instead to win back his kind gestures.

He's so desperate for her love and attention that he'll get it through any means necessary, and the minute, the second, she reciprocates even a fraction of affection, it's all over. He'll be her smitten lapdog. He's had a taste of what he's been craving but could never quite name and now he's starving for more. It doesn't matter if it was something she said in a panic, if she was just trying to distract him, was lying to play along with his obvious fantasy as part of her escape attempt -- he doesn't care. He needs more of it or he may actually slaughter this entire town in his search for her. If he can't have her, then he'll make sure there's no one left who could.

#ask #anon #slasher x final girl

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sl-walker · 1 month

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The First Grader

CW for discussing the rape of children.

I've spent the past four years doing a lot of taking stock of myself and my life. It's not as easy when your brain has been swiss-cheesed by trauma and mental illness, leaving years-long gaps in your memory, but I've been doing it anyway. And I think I've come a hell of a long way, considering where I once was.

I was sitting with my assistant manager today out at lunch and we were talking; both of us have lived a parallel course to one another in some ways. Both of us were raped when we were single-digit children; both of us turned to storytelling to get us through our childhood and teenage years something like sane. And both of us were the kinds of lost, soulsick children who tried to bargain and beg and bribe people to be our friends.

There's a godawful kind of loneliness in that. And the scars it leaves are deep. Even when I've overcome a hell of a lot of my issues, and am working on more, that lonely first grader I was then still lives somewhere in me. I was telling him about it today and almost started crying in the Bob Evans.

I remember being that keenly. I have lost so many good memories, but I remember being this devastatingly heartsick little first grader, standing with a teacher, asking people to be my friend. And oh, do I remember the suffering that followed. And followed. And followed.

The upshot is that I'm aware that the sad little girl in me still wants to beg people for friendship. Or even to just care the bare minimum amount. For a long time, even very recently, I hated that kid. Yeah, she was me, but she was pathetic and no one wanted to hear that shit. No one cared. They didn't care in first grade, they probably mostly don't care now.

I'd like to pretend that I believe otherwise, but you know what?

I don't.

The difference is that I'm not a broken first grader anymore. The difference is that I'm learning how to stop giving a fuck back, in leaps and bounds. And I'd like to say that I'm sad to be doing so, but I'm not.

You should wanna be my friend. I'm loyal, I'm honest, I'm willing to give you the actual shirt off my back (and have) or hide a body for you (I haven't yet but could); I love my friends in a deep and committed and lifelong kinda way. The ones I have, the ones I know love me, don't have to really do much to keep me. Some of them I don't talk to for months at a time, but one thing I sure as hell never stopped feeling from them was like I meant something besides whatever can be gained from me.

You should wanna be. But if not, that's fine. That's honestly your loss. If you do wanna be, hold up your end. Give a fuck. Stop looking at the reflection of that sad little first grader and wondering what else you can get out of her with minimal or less effort. It's really as simple as that.

I'm an account manager over a major high dollar contract with twenty-seven employees I'm in charge of and responsible for. I'm a university student majoring in Fine Arts. I'm a wife and a mother and a storyteller. I'm an artist and an archivist. And I'm done hating that little girl crying for her loneliness. It's about time I protect her, instead.

Hold your end up or hit the fucking bricks. Or I'll make sure you hit them.

#not aimed at anyone in specific #just in general #this isn't the only spring cleaning i think i'm gonna do #but it's a good start

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scarletsaphire · 5 months

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This is the second fic I did for @ecto-implosion. This one was for @skarlettskwrl's art, which can be found here. Very cool art with a very interesting concept, lots of fun to write!

Summary:

Jazz moved away for college to start her own life, far away from ghosts. She didn't expect for her parents to finally capture the ghost boy and bring him to their lab. She didn't prepare to race back to Amity Park in an effort to save her brother from whatever grizzly fate awaited him. No matter how fast she went, she wasn't fast enough, or strong enough. She would never make that mistake again.

Trigger warnings for: Gore, violence, permanent disfigurement, dissection, unwilling transformation, patricide/matricide, bad parents jack and maddie, and wolves

Jazz's heavy breathing kept time with the pounding of her footsteps on the pavement, which in turn matched the pain in her head. She was tired. She was so, so tired, but that didn't matter. She couldn't stop. She was too late as it was.

Danny had assured her that he would be just fine. "You don't need to put your whole life on hold just to look after me," he'd said with a roll of his eyes. "I took care of myself just fine before you figured everything out."

Jazz had mirrored his eye roll. "Yes, because getting beaten up twice a day, failing your classes, and trying to give yourself stitches at one in the morning is taking care of yourself."

"I survived, didn't I?" He'd said.

"No, I'm pretty sure you didn't," Jazz had said. "But you are right. You've gotten better at taking care of yourself. And Sam and Tucker will still be here to clean up whatever messes you make." She ruffled Danny's hair. "I'll accept the offer."

The next few months had passed in a whirl of ghost fights and preparation until the day was finally here. Jazz had packed up her car with her belongings and had driven twelve hours to her new college campus. She'd declined her parents offer to help her move in; she appreciated it, of course, but she wanted to commit to the move - jumpsuits and the GAV weren't the greatest way to make a first impression.

Jazz wasn't able to disconnect from Amity entirely. She watched the news every day, normally as background noise while she studied. It was nice to see what her family was getting up to, even if it was normally accompanied by some kind of massive fight.

It was, of course, stressful. The first few days had her regretting her choice to move away at all, with every live report sending her down another spiral of what ifs. But she had been working on managing her anxiety, and she'd been a part of those fights enough to know how they would go; ghost shows up, Danny kicks butt, their parents show up, Danny runs away. She didn't need to worry.

And then Danny had gone down to a surprise Fenton Bazooka, gotten sucked into the thermos, and been carted away in the GAV, and Jazz knew she had messed up.

She'd already been awake for nine hours before she'd seen the news.

She hadn't grabbed anything besides her keys, hadn't even bothered to check traffic or the weather or anything. She just ran down to her car, skipping as many stairs as she could, and peeled out of the student parking lot. She'd driven as fast as she could, but the drive was still twelve hours, and she had to stop for gas, and she was still human and needed to eat and it didn't matter what she did she wouldn't be there fast enough.

Jazz was beyond tired by the time she entered Amity Park. If she hadn't pulled so many all-nighters in high school and then so many more as a part of Team Phantom, she would've been a mess. But she was fine. She was fine. She had to be fine because Danny-

She hoped that her hunch was wrong.

She hoped that she'd get home, and find her whole family, safe and sound sitting around the kitchen table, fighting off a hoard of ectodogs before deciding that they should just settle for takeout again. She hoped that Danny would be playing Doomed in his room and her parents would be down in the lab, trying to figure out how to remake their technology to not hurt Danny.

She hoped that Danny had gotten a chance to tell them and their love for their son was stronger than their hatred for ghosts or their need for knowledge.

Jazz hoped. But she knew her parents, and she knew, with a sick kind of certainty, what she would find when she finally reached Fentonworks.

Amity Park was nothing short of a disaster. Some time during her drive, another ghost had attacked. Neither Danny or her parents had answered the call, which left Valerie to try and take the threat down by herself. The roads were torn up from the fight, and traffic was at a complete standstill no matter what way Jazz tried to take.

It had only taken a few minutes stuck in traffic for Jazz to ditch her car entirely and start sprinting across town. She ignored the exhaustion clouding her brain, weighing down her arms and legs. She ignored the pain in her chest and her head.

She needed to keep going. She needed to be faster.

It took far too long for Fentonworks to come into view, another small eternity on top of the long one she'd already put up with in the car. She barreled up the front stairs, tugging on the door knob. It was locked. The door was never locked; locked doors didn't do anything to stop ghosts, and that was the only concern that warranted concern in the Fenton household. Jazz fumbled her keys out of her pocket. She squinted down at them, trying to figure out which one of them opened the door.

It took too long for her to figure out which one it was. It took too long for her tired, clumsy fingers to open the door. It took too long for her to get into the house. She shouldn't have left in the first place. What had she been thinking, abandoning Danny like that? Her own brother, who had been working so, so hard to keep everyone safe, and she'd just up and left.

She was a horrible, horrible sister.

She pushed her way into the house. It was dark, and quiet, and mostly clean. That was terrible. The only time Fentonworks was anything comparable to clean or quiet was when her parents were busy. And they were only ever busy when they were in the lab.

Jazz started the walk into the basement on shaking legs. She should be running. Maybe if she ran she would be able to stop them. She would run down the stairs to find her parents standing over an unconscious Danny. They'd be shocked to see her, and listen to what she had to say, and they'd apologize and hug her and Danny would wake up with no memories and a family that loved him.

Maybe, if she had stayed. Maybe if she had been faster. Maybe if she'd been a good sister. Maybe if she'd kept her promise and been the only other Fenton that put family first, that didn't get swept away in their own desires. Maybe, maybe, maybe.

Maybes didn't matter right now.

Right now, Jazz was descending the stairs, and she could taste the sour tinge of ectoplasm mixed with a too-strong metallic flavor, and she could hear the sound of her parents talking, even if she couldn't make out the words. And then she turned the corner, and she could see.

The portal at the back of the room was the same bright green it almost always was, rendering most of the room as green tinged silhouettes. Everything except for the table in the center of the room, the blinding fluorescents all resting on three people and lighting the scene with blinding clarity. Jazz's family.

Jack had his back to her, humming a familiar tune to himself. His normal orange suit had an additional mask.

Jazz recognized it from a half dozen science experiments the two of them had worked on when she was younger. He'd worn it while they worked on her first baking soda volcano, Jazz wearing a much smaller, teal one. They'd added too much, and had gotten the mixture all over their suits. She remembered laughing about it as they wiped their hands across their faces, trying to clean off their eye protection.

Now, Jack's suit was covered in a bright green liquid, specks of red just barely visible in every splatter. His hands weren't busy wiping off a harmless foam, but carefully depositing something into a jar. It might've been a liver, but Jazz tore her gaze away before she could properly identify it. She didn't want to know what it was.

Unfortunately, her eyes found something so much worse. Maddie was dressed nearly identically to Jack. She was faced towards Jazz, just enough for her to make out Maddie's expression. Her face was steady, frozen in a look of concentration, but Jazz could recognize the glimmer of fascination in her eyes. A fascination that was directed at Danny, lying unconscious on the table.

At least, Jazz hoped he was unconscious. If he wasn't, then he'd be aware of Maddie's hands wrist deep in his chest cavity. He'd be aware of his skin peeled back and pinned to the sides of the table to keep it out of the way, as if it was nothing more than a nuisance for Maddie and Jack to deal with. He'd be aware of the fact that his organs were being carefully packaged into labeled jars, that he was being taken apart piece by piece as if he was some fucked up puzzle that they were going to rebuild later. If Jazz didn't do something, then maybe they would.

But Jazz was going to do something. She didn't know what, exactly, it would be, but it certainly wouldn't be pretty. She wanted to make them hurt, just like they'd made her baby brother hurt. But how could she? Jazz may be strong, but her parents were stronger.

And wasn't that just the theme of the day?

Jazz just wasn't enough. She wasn't fast enough, wasn't strong enough, wasn't dedicated to protecting her family enough to keep them safe and sane. And now she'd lost all of them.

It didn't matter.

She wasn't going to just stand there and watch. Even if she couldn't actually do anything, even if the only result was that she'd end up on the table next to Danny, then she'd do it. Jazz lunged down the next step, charging towards Maddie as fast as she could. She was the one who was hurting Danny. She was the one that needed to be stopped as soon as possible.

Somewhere in her leap, something shifted in Jazz.

Originally, her jump had been clumsy. She hadn't put any real thought into what she would do when she landed, pushed forward entirely by her frustration at herself, at her parents- at everything that had happened.

She definitely didn't put enough power and care to soar through the air, and yet that's what she was doing; her feet were stretched behind her, yet never so much as brushed the ground, even as she traveled further than she had intended to.

That was fine. It just meant she was closer to her goal.

Jazz landed crouched on the ground just ahead of where Jack was standing. She was moving again before his shocked yelp even reached her, continuing towards Maddie. Jazz tackled her, knocking Maddie away from Danny.

Good. That was the goal.

Jazz tore at Maddie with her hands, sharp claws tearing through both protective clothing and skin. Maddie shrieked, the sound shrill and loud. Maybe it was from how long Jazz had been awake, but the sound made her head spin.

She blocked it out. She couldn't afford to get distracted.

Her hand was sticky with blood when she felt the burning pain of an ectoplasm blast, she whirled around, snarling towards Jack. His eyes were wide with terror, a Fenton Blaster pointed directly at Jazz, the muzzle dripping the small bit of ectoplasm that had liquefied during the blast onto the floor.

Jazz almost laughed; was he really so far gone that he couldn't recognize either of his children? He should know that that wouldn't work on her.

Oh well. It worked in her favor.

She left Maddie bleeding on the floor, pushing off of the ground with her hands and feet. She stayed low; the Fenton Blaster might not be able to hurt her as badly as it might hurt a ghost might hurt Danny but it was still unpleasant. As long as he had the blaster in his hands, Jazz needed to stay small and fast. Another blast went over her shoulder, leaving a sizzling puddle on the ground where it hit.

That was her opening.

In just a few bounds, she was next to Jack. She wasn't sure what came over her, but before she could think, her mouth had closed around his leg, teeth digging into soft flesh. She could taste the latex of the jumpsuit he always wore, but the flavor was quickly washed away by the salty, metallic taste of blood.

Jack howled and tried to tear his leg away, but Jazz only bit down harder and harder. Distantly, Jazz could hear the sound of the Fenton Blaster being fired again and again, but Jack's aim was just as terrible as ever. Still, Jazz bit down harder.

The snap of bones between her jaw was not surprising.

Jack was strong, and his continued struggles only put more and more pressure on the bone. Honestly, the fact that Jazz had managed to keep the leg clenched between her teeth in the first place was impressive. With the breaking of his bone, Jack crumpled to the floor, the blaster flying from his hand and skidding across the metal floor with a horrible screeching noise that caused Jazz's ears to ring.

She let go of his leg and made her way so she was positioned just above Jack. His eyes were filled with tears, and broken pleas to not hurt him, to let him and his family go, that they didn't do anything wrong tumbled from his lips.

This time, Jazz did laugh at the irony of the situation, but all that came out was a low growl.

She could spare him; he'd learned his lesson about messing with her pack- he wouldn't be making that mistake any time soon. And he was still her father. Her eyes met his gloves, stained a sickening mixture of red and green.

No.

He hadn't had any mercy on her baby brother, on his own son.

She wasn't going to have any mercy on him.

Once again guided by instinct, she snapped down on his neck. Jack's strangled cry of pain was quickly stifled as he choked on his own blood.

Jazz stood up from the fresh corpse. She should wipe the blood from her mouth, but her job wasn't finished yet. Maddie was still whimpering and moaning from her side of the room, unable to move from the damage to her abdomen.

Jazz could finish her off now. It would be easy.

But Maddie wasn't her priority. She never had been.

Jazz padded up to the table to start assessing Danny's injuries. She could just barely see him, the edge of the table blocking most of her view. She must still have been crouched, even though she felt like she was standing.

She tried to straighten to her full height, only to find that she couldn't. Maybe she'd hurt something without realizing it, but she didn't feel hurt. The only pain was a slight sting from where Jack had hit her with the blaster.

If she wasn't able to stand, Jazz would just have to pull herself up. She reached both of her arms to the table, trying to grab the edge and was met with the sight of clawed paws drenched in blood. She flinched backwards, and the paws flinched with her.

Oh. That was her.

Jazz felt the familiar feeling of panic surge in her chest yet again, carrying with it the taste of bile. She forced it back down and returned to her quest of getting to Danny. She couldn't afford to panic right now, not while Danny was on the table bleeding out. Everything else was a secondary concern.

This time, when she lifted her paws, she did not flinch away. Moving felt weird, now that she was aware of the changes, but she managed to lift her head up to get her first clear look at Danny.

She wished she hadn't. Just as she had seen before, his abdomen had been cut in a neat Y shape, the skin peeled back and held down by evenly spaced clamps. His rib cage was exposed to air, and the left rib bones had been severed, letting her see straight to the thin layer of flesh on the other side, no organs or muscle to block her view. His stomach cavity was exactly that; a cavity. Everything had been removed until all that was left were some twitching muscles.

His face had not been spared from the mutilation. His mouth had been pried open with a metal gag, the device still stuck between his lips. Teeth had been forcibly extracted, the front part of his tongue had been cut off, and dried blood and ectoplasm pooled in his open mouth. His eyelids were pulled back, similarly to his torso, and his eyes had been completely removed. The cavities left behind had been filled with some kind of brownish silicone mixture. They had been trying to make a mold. Jazz didn't know what to do. If she'd had hands, then she'd be able to gather the organs, stitch Danny's torso back together, and inject him with the emergency ecto dejecto. If they were lucky, then he might be ok, at least physically. Eventually. But now she didn't even have that small hope.

She couldn't stifle the whimper that came out of her throat. She couldn't recognize it as her own, far more animalistic than any sound she should be able to make. By all accounts, nobody should be able to recognize it as her, and yet the moment the sound passed her lips, Danny's mouth opened.

His voice was broken, garbled and strained, but his words were still understandable. "Jazz?" he whispered. He seemed to be trying to lift his head to turn and look at her. He couldn't, obviously. Jazz couldn't actually reply, couldn't offer the comforting words she wanted to, no matter how empty they may have been. She couldn't offer the apologies she'd been reciting in her head for hours now. All she could do was whimper again.

"I..." Danny said. He gave up trying to move, letting his head and neck go limp. "I knew you'd come."

If Jazz hadn't forced Danny to drive her to the Far Frozen to learn ghost medicine, she would have panicked as Danny's body started to glow a soft blue, and then started to collapse in on itself until all that was left was a glowing orb in the same color Danny had glowed. But she had, so instead she saw it as a symbol of hope.

It was very, very hard to permanently end a ghost. Most of their physical forms were built on ectoplasm, so they could sustain a lot of damage. Even the worst injuries could be healed in time. However, in the case that they were seriously injured, they could retreat. Reduce themselves to just their core, focusing all of their energy into fixing their form.

Doing this meant that ghosts could heal nearly everything in a matter of weeks, sometimes sooner. It wasn't something that could just happen at any time; the ghost needed to feel truly, completely safe, and even then, it took energy to condense like that, so if a ghost was too far gone by the time they got somewhere safe, they wouldn't be able to do it.

Danny had enough energy to retreat into his core, and had trusted Jazz enough to do it. As long as Jazz kept him safe, then he would heal. He would be ok. Jazz nudged Danny's core gently off the table and into her mouth. She'd seen videos of dogs carrying eggs in their mouths before, and figured that was the best way for her to get Danny out of the lab. She was surprised to find how natural it was, even with how incredibly cold Danny's core was.

Jazz made her way out of the lab, not sparing so much as a glance at the carnage she left behind.

She had already failed Danny once. She wouldn't be letting him down again.

#ectoimplosion2023 #danny phantom #danny phantom fanfiction #danny fenton #jazz fenton #tw gore #tw dissection #tw permanent disfigurement #tw blindness #tw matricide #tw patricide #tw bad parents jack and maddie #jack fenton #maddie fenton #tw transformation #werewolf jazz

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tangarang · 10 months

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So any word of Coupon Kids or are you unsure/trying to keep quiet about it for right now? I like quat's redesign. It's more visually distinct than the original.

tldr: I am trying to pick back up on Coupon Kids, reworking the story (yeah , the actual story) with a lot more intention! Idk how long it will take, but just know that I'm taking it seriously.

If you want the LONNGGG story of it, here it is!

Last time we left off in the comic, I was in quarantine with my niece and sister! I was helping to raise my niece so my sister could get out of a horribly abusive relationship. I was a full time nanny which was tough! Cause I had to still make rent from home on commissions, but no one was buying them because we all became RLY RLY poor all at once.... go figure.

I turned to Coupon Kids for support because umm I was kinda fucked tbh 6_6. I had run out of money and had no time to make more, but I SQUEEEZED out the last of the Halibut Jones arc! (which, even at the time of completion, I knew it was an underwhelming piece of work, but I finished it and I'm proud I did!) Thanks to everyone's support, I had enough financial padding that I could rely on Patreon's passive income and refocus on supporting my sister/niece as well as plan to make the move down south to continue my schooling once the quarantine let up. So thats where I had left the comic for the time being in terms of story, with a sprinkle of short strips here and there, but nothing plot related, because the plot was horribly fucked right from the get-go.

I had to take multiple severe hiatuses with Coupon Kids because I got my ass handed to me on several accounts through ought. Horrible breakup, friend break up, severe mental illness, best friend got cancer, best friend died, quarantine, unexpected parenthood, gallbladder disease, then school. All the while Coupon Kids was something I made in the deepest pits of my depression.

I absolutely hated my self, my work, and my art. That all looped back to being a strange source of peace for me to make stuff w/o fear of judgement. No one could hate Coupon Kids as much as I did. I was the #1 Coupon Kids hater and I ruined it by making it. (this is a retrospective pov obv... I dont think my work is worthless anymore thx wellbutrin lol)

Coupon Kids was very liberating to write in that I had no standards, but the lack of structure kinda eventually lead to its own downfall once I started to get better. I had a very loose idea of what I wanted the story to be, but I was so disoriented by chemical imbalance and weed (I smoked SOOO much weed) I didn't rly care about the ending because tbh I thought I was gonna be dead before I got anywhere near the ending. But then Kira died, So I officially abstained myself from death's sexy loins and committed myself to giving life another go.

Sorry for the autobio dump: its kinda hard to convey Coupon Kids development w/o getting into the nitty gritty of what I was going through at the time of making it. The point is this: I made Coupon Kids with the intention of it being a stain on my legacy- but then I ended up loving the stain and it's inhabitants. Its made coming back to it difficult, because I want to put genuine effort in it but that clashes with it's overall tone. Instead of creating in spite, I'd like to create it in celebration of my artistic short comings and to do that is to completely rework the entire moral of the story and all of the characters. If I'm gonna do it right, I'd like to take my time.

Not sure how many people made it to the end of this one! Sorry I'm so quiet about my process. tbh the last 4 years have been the best of my life despite holding a lot of dread. I'm doing a lot better now and am really excited to work on what I love and be grateful I have the power to do so ! So thank you for reading if you are still interested, it means a lot!

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sihaya74 · 5 months

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NEW The Lessons of Bryan Fuller's Hannibal S1: E6 -- HOPE IS THE THING WITH SURGICAL TROPHIES

Lessons of Bryan Fuller’s Hannibal

S1:E6 – HOPE IS THE THING WITH SURGICAL TROPHIES

Hello readers and #FannibalFamily! Yes, it’s been a hot minute since I have updated this blog. What can I say? Life has a tendency to intervene. A few real-life events knocked me out of my daily writing pattern and I am just now beginning to regain my balance. This blog is, however, something I am committed to finishing no matter how long it takes, and so, I am digging back into the scripts of Bryan Fuller’s Hannibal and prepared to create my next installment – an analysis of the theme, the message, the universal lesson in the happenings of Season 1, Episode 6: “Entrée.”

I must make an important note that at this point, I have rewatched the show some five or six times. But this is my first time delving into the scripts for all the episodes. I have to occasionally remind myself about scenes in these episodes or lines of dialogue that wound up being cut or moved to a different episode. But since I am approaching this project as an English major and analyzing both the show and the scripts as a TEXT – (my literary theory professor, Dr. Hogue, always said that everything in life is a TEXT and he was damn sure right about that) – then I see no issue with the fact that sometimes the words I am analyzing didn’t always make it to the screen in the exact form they started out in. Hannibal is a series that is a feast for all the senses – its visual beauty, its soundtrack and score and sound effects, the effort put in to rendering the most beautiful depictions of food on the screen and so perhaps the viewer can imagine their taste – (I have dreamed feverishly about those High Life Eggs more than once, I can tell you) – but all of it begins where good stories start – on the page. And so, it is to the page and the words that I remain loyal.

This episode of Hannibal, “Entrée,” had two authors. Kai Yu Wu conceived the story and Wu and Bryan wrote it together. The episode was directed by Michael Rymer.

In the order of our French dishes, by which each episode of the first season is named, at this point in the series, we have partaken of the following: a pre-dinner drink, a little bitty appetizer, a bowl of hearty soup, some eggs, and a chicken or fish dish baked in a sauce and served in a scallop shell or scallop-shaped dish. And so now, a viewer must ask, “What’s next?” That or: “I need to take a break because I’m full.” At which, Bryan Fuller points at the viewer’s plate and says, “You’ll clean your plate and you’ll like it. You’ll love it. You’ll beg me for another season when we’re done.” Just trust him. He’s the chef. You always trust the chef. They know what they’re doing.

In a classic French meal, the entrée is not necessarily the main dish and it is not always served – sometimes they skip courses. When it does appear, it is usually a meat dish, in a sauce (GOTTA HAVE A SAUCE), and with sides. In American cuisine, entrée has come to mean a MAIN COURSE always. And what an entrée is in American cuisine varies wildly by what is on the menu, who is eating it, and how many fried cheese sticks and jalapeno poppers the person had prior to the entrée arriving at their table. Still, the idea holds. When you say the word “entrée,” people expect a main course – something substantial, something that sticks to your ribs. And in this episode, there is definitely a lot of meat – meat that has been rubbed and aged over the last five episodes and is now sliced and steaming from the oven. This episode is mostly about advancing the MAIN storyline – that of the Chesapeake Ripper and the FBI’s and namely, Jack Crawford’s, attempts to catch the seasoned killer. (Seasoned… see what I did there? YOU GOT PUNNED!)

And on a thirsty side note: After viewing the scene in which Will Graham reenacts the murder of nurse Elizabeth Shell, the fact that the episode is named “Entrée,” makes complete sense. Hugh Dancy in that scene is an entire meal with ample meat for leftovers. (Seriously – JFC – if you haven’t seen it, or seen it lately, do yourself a favor and have some GOOD FOOD.)

We start the episode with our introduction to one of the series’ completely original characters, Dr. Abel Gideon, a former transplant surgeon, who after being convicted of the murders of his wife and her family, has been incarcerated in the Baltimore State Hospital for the Criminally Insane, for the last two years. The character is portrayed with amazing skill, subtlety, and awesomeness, by Suzy Eddie Izzard. I have been a longtime fan of Izzard’s work and was insanely pleased to see the actor amongst the cast members.

I must point out the literary significance of the character’s name – Abel Gideon, a smorgasbord of Biblical allusion. The import of the Doctor’s first name is obvious – Abel, in the Biblical version of things, was the first murder VICTIM, slain by the hands of his jealous brother, Cain, who was angry that God liked Abel better and had a right fit about it. The character of Gideon is slightly more complex, but basically it goes as follows: Gideon was a prophet in the Old Testament. He destroyed the idols of Baal and others in his town’s temple because the townspeople were worshipping false gods. An angel told him to. Then, Gideon led the Israelites against other “heathen” tribes and won. They wanted to make him king, but he told them their only king was God. Still, he had them melt down the golden earrings of all their enemies who had fallen in battle and they wove the golden thread into an ephod, a priestly garment that is worn under the breastplate. Gideon put it in the temple and the people started worshipping it as an idol, because I guess, it was gold. Old Testament people always seem really impressed by gold. The Scripture is unclear, but it does say that the ephod was “a snare unto Gideon, and to his house” (Judges 8: 27).

You could say Gideon was a hypocrite, or more accurately, a terrible fool because he tried to stop the people from worshipping false idols and then he just led them into doing it again by creating something they would see as a sacred object. At best, Gideon was naïve. At worst, he was a fraud.

Dr. Abel Gideon’s name therefore could translate into something like: Dr. VICTIM FRAUD – or Dr. VICTIM FOOL. Despite his intelligence, he is lured directly into Dr. Chilton’s trap to believe and admit he is the Chesapeake Ripper solely because of Frederick’s needy ego – Frederick wants more feathers in his cap – he doesn’t have near enough and Hannibal Lecter’s are brighter and bespoke and where the fuck did he even find a custom featherer in Baltimore?

Then, later in the series, Gideon is led directly into the trap of the true Chesapeake Ripper and probably desperately wishes he had stayed in the BSHCI and eaten his stewed apricots and minded his own business.

Poor Abel is nothing but a puppet for two different egotistical psychiatrists. Unfortunately for him, one of them happens to be Hannibal Lecter.

And so, we begin the episode with the scene of Gideon passed out on the floor of his cell in the BSHCI and a team of prison guards approaching his limp form very cautiously and eventually shackling him, hand and foot, to a gurney, and wheeling him into the hospital infirmary, where he is treated by the aptly named Nurse Shell.

As evidenced by my previous discussion of Gideon’s name, I have come to realize the significance of character names in Bryan Fuller’s work. They are often allusions or tributes – homages to the work of other writers, directors, artists, scientists, and so on, that Bryan admires. For example, one has to assume that the surname of Bryan’s beloved Bedelia (another original character), Du Maurier, is a tribute to author Daphne du Maurier, author of many books and film adaptations of suspense – such as Rebecca, which Bryan and many of his horror colleagues discuss in the fabulous AMC/Shudder series Queer For Fear, on which Bryan was an executive producer and director. Basically, Mrs. Danvers was either literally or only metaphorically all up in Rebecca de Winter’s undergarments and when the woman died, Mrs. Danvers decided to make it everyone’s problem. The movie is awesome. Go watch it if you haven’t already. And then watch Queer For Fear. I believe they discuss Rebecca in both episodes two and four.

Anyway, Nurse Shell is correctly and tragically named because a shell of her former self is what she winds up as when the deluded Gideon is done with her.

As Nurse Shell turns her back, Gideon extricates the broken-off tine of a fork he has hidden in an incision in his palm. I believe this scene is an homage to the scene in The Silence of the Lambs when Dr. Lecter unearths a metal fragment from the back of his jaw, the inner workings of a ballpoint pen that has fallen into his hands. He uses this makeshift lockpick on his own handcuffs, much to the chagrin of Lieutenant Boyle and Sargeant Pembry. Classic scene.

Anyway, Gideon uses this tine to pick the lock on his handcuffs and when Nurse Shell turns around upon hearing the heart monitor hit a flatline, it’s lights out for the poor woman. We do not see Gideon kill her, but we see the results of his work soon.

Next, we see Jack Crawford and Will Graham vaulting up the front steps of the hospital, Jack explaining that based on the method of Nurse Shell’s murder, Freddie Lounds has run an unconfirmed story suggesting that Abel Gideon is the Chesapeake Ripper, which would explain the lull in murders for the last two years. Will is indignant that he is “fact-checking for Freddie Lounds,” but Jack coddles him with the statement, “You’re fact-checking for me” (Wu and Fuller 2).

There is heavy foreshadowing in the following exchange between Jack and Will before they enter the hospital:

WILL GRAHAM: I’m always a little nervous going into one of these places. Afraid they’ll never let me out again.

JACK CRAWFORD: Don’t worry. I’m not going to leave you here.

WILL GRAHAM: Not today (Wu and Fuller 3).

I really do recommend you watch the series more than once so this dramatic irony is not lost.

Once Jack and Will enter the hospital, we see the first appearance of another of our main characters and one of the most important in the Hannibal canon: Dr. Frederick Chilton.

In Fuller’s series, Chilton is rendered flawlessly by actor Raul Esparza, a deep daddy of mine (see ADA Rafael Barba of Law and Order: SVU fame). Esparza is another Fuller Favorite, having appeared in one of Bryan’s previous masterpiece shows, Pushing Daisies.

There have been three actors who have portrayed the petty and obsequious Dr. Chilton, starting with Benjamin Hendrickson in 1986’s Manhunter. The second actor, and perhaps the most well-known portrayal, is that of Anthony Heald who took on the role in both 1991’s The Silence of the Lambs and reprised the role in 2002’s Red Dragon.

Heald’s portrayal of Chilton is masterful – the Doctor is intelligent, but smarmy – officious and gladhanding – his pass at Clarice in the early moments of the film immediately puts the viewer off on him. Hannibal only seals the audience’s hatred of the Doctor by regaling Clarice with Chilton’s petty tortures of him, which are effectively contrasted by the treatment Hannibal receives from the ever-present orderly, Barney Matthews, played by awesome Frankie Faison, who treats Hannibal with a cautious respect, as a zookeeper might treat a venomous reptile. Barney never forgets what Hannibal is capable of. Chilton supposedly knows as evidenced by his relation of Hannibal’s biting attack on a nurse – he left only one of her eyes, ate her tongue without his pulse getting above 85 – but still, Chilton prods and humiliates Hannibal in unnecessary ways that LITERALLY come back to bite him in the end.

Esparza’s Chilton is as intelligent as Heald’s, but slightly more savvy, ounces more petty, a bit more of a drama queen, and as opposed to Heald’s Chilton, who is ostensibly tortured and eaten by Hannibal at the end of The Silence of the Lambs, Esparza’s Chilton, in Fuller’s hands, is the favorite whipping post of killers and law enforcement alike – being practically disemboweled by one murderer, shot in the face by a traumatized Ripper victim, and later suffers the fate that Harris’ original Freddy Lounds suffers, a lip-ectomy and burning at the hands of Francis Dolarhyde. Freddy Lounds dies in both Manhunter/Red Dragon from this attack, but in Fuller’s Hannibal, no matter what, Frederick Chilton continues to survive, almost Fuller’s own version of the endlessly respawning Kenny of South Park fame.

By my calculation, at the end of Season 3, Chilton is down 3 lives, so logic dictates that he has 6 left. If Fuller ever gets to make the full 7 seasons of Hannibal he imagines, if Chilton averages a death per season, he should survive the completed series with 2 lives left over, proving him to be the true winner of The Hannibal Games.

But, once again, I digress…

As Jack and Will sit in Chilton’s office, Chilton can barely seem to contain his curiosity about Will. Chilton’s open is clunky and obtuse; he says, “Doctor Bloom just called me about you, Mister Graham. Or should I call you Doctor Graham?” (Wu and Fuller 3). From his first line, Chilton seems to embody his later Season 2 remark, a gem from Harris’ canon, that attempting to analyze Will “makes [him] feel…like a freshman pulling at a panty girdle” (Fuller and Lightfoot 20). Chilton’s questions are telegraphed from a mile away – his overtures for more information are blunt and tasteless. Chilton’s questioning of Will, throughout the series, is contrasted with that of Hannibal – the difference is like watching a skilled surgeon with a scalpel as compared to a poorly trained medical student with a plastic spoon. Chilton can’t cut it, in any fashion. Will seems to understand this from the beginning – he sizes Chilton up correctly from their very first meeting.

In their conversation, Chilton betrays himself a little, saying of Nurse Shell, “I can’t help feeling responsible for what happened. I had sessions with Gideon for years…I had no idea what he was hiding. And now one of our staff is dead” (Wu and Fuller 4). Of course, this is foreshadowing of Hannibal ascertaining later in the episode that Chilton is indeed COMPLETELY at fault. However, the most interesting thing about this exchange is Jack Crawford’s reaction. The script indicates that after Chilton’s remark here, it “strikes a chord with Jack…who can relate” (Wu and Fuller 4). Undoubtedly this “relation” is about Miriam Lass, Crawford’s lost trainee, who is first introduced in this episode.

This is all important because of our lesson in this episode and because it highlights one of the driving motives of Jack’s character. In Episode 1, Jack and Alana agree that one of Will’s deepest motives is fear. If that is the case, then we can say that one of, perhaps the most, significant of Jack’s driving motivations is GUILT. Jack’s guilt is so present, so prevalent, so real, it is almost tangible. He feels guilt about Bella, about Miriam, later about Beverly, about Will, about Pazzi. His guilt is so weighty, so integral to his being, that often it overwhelms him, wobbles his sense of reason and the health of his psyche. Our lesson is not about guilt, but it is about an emotion Jack Crawford will not allow himself. In his position as Special Agent Jack Crawford, head of the FBI’s storied Behavioral Analysis Unit at Quantico, Jack does not allow himself much in the way of the easier emotions in life – laughter, joy, wonder – these are not things he can traffic in. Jack Crawford lives in a chapel of death. He is a chronicler of pain.

As Chilton continues to prod Will for information, Jack finally states, “Graham isn’t here to be analyzed” (Wu and Fuller 5). It’s funny to me how people in the show, including Will, keep insisting that he’s NOT THE ONE to be analyzed, but since the very first moments of Episode 1, even the murders seem secondary to everyone else’s analysis of Will. It’s ironic, but I imagine purposefully so. Chilton retorts that “perhaps” Will “should be” analyzed; Chilton wants Will to speak to his colleagues in the hospital, but then he stops himself, saying, “no, no, not this trip. Dr. Bloom was very severe with me on that point” (Wu and Fuller 5). I also find it quite ironic how no one listens to Alana’s advice about handling Will. It speaks to the usual patriarchal pooh-poohing of women, even when they are extremely accomplished members of professional fields. Thankfully, Bryan saw to it that everyone who discounts Alana’s advice winds up paying for it.

Just before escorting Jack and Will to the infirmary where Will can view the crime scene, Chilton says, “Next to a battle lost, the saddest thing is a battle won” (Wu and Fuller 6). This sentiment is attributed to the Duke of Wellington, and later to writer Robert Jordan, but to me the importance of it here is how it so perfectly illustrates the difference between Harris’ Chilton and Fuller’s Chilton. Every once in a while, especially in Season 3, Chilton seems to disinter these gems of wisdom from the muddy bottom of his intelligence. Often, lines like these, coming from Frederick are like an icepick of truth stabbed into the temple of the scene. A viewer who is familiar with all of the Hannibal canon can see – Fuller’s Chilton is smarter and more poetic than Harris’ Chilton, who is a slick, sad functionary who is both out of his depth with Hannibal Lecter and out of his league with Clarice Starling. Fuller’s Chilton is never in Hannibal’s league, but at times, real insight flashes up from the shallows of his brain, and it makes his character more sympathetic to the viewer. We feel sorry for Fuller’s Chilton. Harris’ Chilton never arouses such pity.

When Will and Jack finally view the nurse’s body, it is described as follows:

She’s IMPALED on the BROKEN FRAMES of several PRIVACY CURTAINS that have been fashioned into SPEARS. They PROTRUDE from wounds over the entire canvas of her body. Additional shards of wood and metal prop her organs above her corpse, giving them the appearance of floating outside her body.

(Wu and Fuller 6)

The visual of this tableaux is important, as it will contrast with the Chesapeake Ripper’s actual rendering of the famous medieval Wound Man shown later in the episode in a flashback. Later, Will calls this murder “plagiarism.” The viewer, especially one who has watched the entire series at least once, can understand Will’s assessment easily. The Chesapeake Ripper is an artist – even when his tableaux are deconstructionist in nature, like Beverly Katz’s murder scene in Season 2, there is still a lingering sense of the whole that once was. The essence of the thing that has been taken apart is still suggested by the Ripper’s composition. Gideon’s attempt at mimicry is just that – a sad parody. He merely skewered organs like Nurse Kabob. He merely jabbed implements in her like Nurse Pincushion. There is no whole left to be had. In Act One, we see the replaying of the gurney scene at the beginning of the episode, except this time with Will in Gideon’s place. This time, we see the attack on Nurse Shell; this time at the hands of Will, who is doing his mental recreation (pendulum swingy – this is my design-y) of the scene.

Will’s recreation here is filed very lovingly by the #FannibalFamily under the title, “THINGS THAT HAVE NO BUSINESS BEING INSANELY HOT,” but Goddamn it… it is.

It’s not just Will’s torn open shirt – it’s not just the visible sweat on his muscled chest and furrowed brow (although those things REALLY HELP) – it’s the power and the confidence Will exudes when he is in the mental guise of the killer. In truth, every time Will does a mental recreation of a crime, he becomes inordinately hotter because he is not the unsure, confused, flinchy Will Graham of outside-his-mind – he is the take-charge, aggressive, Will Graham with some goddamned agency, that he only seems to be able to muster when he slips into the minds of other people – that is until the end of Season 1, anyway. Will’s agency gets a glow up in “Savoureux,” just wait.

I will say that when Will gouges Nurse Shell’s eyes out with his thumbs, that’s a major ick for me. Eye stuff always deeply bothers me. I had two very invasive eye surgeries as a child and I think it makes me sensitive. The needle in the eye scene in Fire In the Sky is a trauma from which I will never recover.

After Will’s recreation is finished, the viewer is then treated to a flashback three years earlier when the character of Miriam Lass enters the series. It is well known that Miriam Lass, played astonishingly by Anna Chlumsky, is Bryan’s substitute for/homage to the character of Clarice Starling, who, because of copyright issues, Bryan could not use in Hannibal. This, of course, is a damn shame, because Clarice is a god-level character and I would love, love, love to see what Bryan could do with her. (I would also like – if we ever get future seasons – to see Ardelia Mapp, Barney Matthews, and Multiple Miggs show up, but I digress…)

Miriam and Clarice share similar backgrounds – they were both FBI Forensic Fellows – Clarice had the great distinction of studying under fingerprint examiner par excellence, Jimmy Price – but they both came through the same program there and at the FBI Academy. Their university degrees differ a little – Clarice is the daughter of a lawman, which Miriam does not seem to be – but both women are the same with regards to their stunning intellects, dogged determination, and their fascinations with and devotions to “the Guru,” Jack Crawford. It reminds me of a passage from The Silence of the Lambs. At the end of the chapter, (I tell you, Thomas Harris knows how to end a fucking chapter) – after Starling and Crawford return from the Potter Funeral Home in West Virginia, Harris writes, “She watched him walk away, a middle-aged man laden with cases and rumpled from flying, his cuffs muddy from the riverbank, going home to what he did at home. She would have killed for him then. That was one of Crawford’s great talents” (96).

Jack tells Miriam that he has culled her from the herd of FBI hopefuls to work for him in the Violent Criminal Apprehension Program (VICAP) because she is at the top of her class, has impressive credentials, and wrote him a fan letter when she was accepted into the Academy. When Jack brings up the Ripper, he says, “The Ripper is very hot right now” (Wu and Fuller 10). Jack is, of course, indicating that the Ripper is on a spree, having taken “his last two victims in six days” (Wu and Fuller 10). But I can’t help but think of Zoolander every time I hear Jack make this remark. “Ooooh, that Ripper – he’s so hot right now…” And let’s be honest, if there’s anyone who could pull off a perfect “Blue Steel,” it’s Mads Mikkelsen.

Miriam impresses Jack with her assessment of the Ripper – not a “true sociopath,” but a killer with “some of the characteristics of what they call a sociopath,” but that in truth, “they don’t know what else to label him” (Wu and Fuller 10). Jack then begins briefing Miriam on the case and we are flashed back to the present and find ourselves sitting with Alana and Will in Frederick Chilton’s office.

Alana and Will are both there to interview Gideon – they will be conducting their interviews separately and then comparing notes. Chilton is “convinced” Gideon is the Ripper (when he knows damned well he’s not), Will is convinced Gideon is NOT the Ripper – Alana is unsure. Chilton informs Alana that even though she only had two sessions with Gideon when he was first admitted to the BSHCI, Gideon has “given [her] a lot of thought” since then (Wu and Fuller 12). It ups the creep factor and of course mirrors the novel Red Dragon, like much of this scene does, except that the inmate is Hannibal Lecter and the person he’s “given a lot of thought to” is Will Graham. Hannibal thinking a lot about Will is deep canon. Always has been. Always will be.

Alana goes into interview Gideon first – when she does, the script indicates, “The STEEL DOOR of the maximum security section closed behind Alana Bloom. She hears the bolt slide home” (Wu and Fuller 13).

I’m always deeply thrilled at how often the writers of Hannibal return to the “Forward to a Fatal Interview” from Harris’ Red Dragon and snatch little phrases from it they leave like glistening Easter eggs for fans to find. This is one such bejeweled egg – a Faberge of one, in fact. This forward is about how Thomas Harris came to create the characters of Will Graham, Clarice Starling, and most importantly, Hannibal Lecter. In the final paragraph, he says, “When in the winter of 1979 I entered the Baltimore State Hospital for the Criminally Insane and the great metal door crashed closed behind me, little did I know what waited at the end of the corridor; how seldom we recognize the sound when the bolt of our fate slides home” (XIII).

An adaptation is a beautiful thing when you have such beautiful source material to work with. I am forever fascinated by what different filmmakers and actors have done with the Hannibal canon, but we cannot, should not, ever forget the mind that created it and created such compelling characters that withstand the test of time and are enriched every time a new generation of writers and viewers return to them.

The interviews between Alana and Gideon and Will and Gideon are now intercut with each other, a wonderful technique that allows the viewers to compare and contrast for themselves, the differences and similarities between Alana and Will in their questioning, the differences between Gideon’s reactions to Alana and to Will. The most important fact that seems to arise from the interview is when Will says to Gideon about the death of Nurse Shell, “Brutalization of the body was done posthumously. The Chesapeake Ripper usually does that sort of thing during, not after” (Wu and Fuller 15). Will never buys Gideon as the Ripper. His other murders were spontaneous, not planned. Gideon is not an artist; he’s a plagiarist. What Will can’t figure out is why Gideon is copping to murders he didn’t commit.

We begin Act Two with Jack Crawford arriving unannounced at Hannibal’s office, just as the Doctor is about to leave for the day. Hannibal asks if Jack was just “in the neighborhood?” – Jack answers, “Something like that” (Wu and Fuller 16). This line is one of those TV/film chestnuts that you hear over and over and it never actually happens in real life. I have never in my life had someone show up at my door saying they were “just in the neighborhood.” Just like I have never had a cat suddenly jump on me from some unseen elevated position when I am in a darkened alleyway or corridor and things feel all spooky. It’s film logic. It’s kooky, but it works.

Bella is out of town and Jack has come to Hannibal to pry some sort of information out of him about Bella’s cancer – how she’s feeling, what she’s saying, what she thinks – all of which she is not telling Jack and all of which Hannibal cannot tell Jack due to doctor-patient confidentiality. Jack becomes angry. Their conversation is enlightening with regards to Hannibal’s character:

JACK CRAWFORD: You talk to me about Will Graham.

HANNIBAL: Will Graham isn’t officially my patient. We have conversations.

JACK CRAWFORD: What do you consider this?

HANNIBAL: Desperate coping.

(Wu and Fuller 17)

The line here – “desperate coping” – is such a wonderful illustration of how accurately Hannibal is portrayed as having some sociopathic tendencies or at least the tendencies of a narcissist. Throughout the series, Hannibal shows how he can go cold at a moment’s notice – how he can so easily shift from a seemingly caring, compassionate individual to a nightmare of stone-faced, murder-eyed calm. It’s terrifying. I was once very much in love with a man who could do this – he was not a murderer, but he could go dead-eyed and cold on you like this in seconds – and you never knew when it was coming. It scared the shit out of me.

Some might say that Hannibal’s line here is compassionate, that he feels for Jack and his attempts to handle the imminent death of his wife – but I think the line is meant to cut Jack to the quick – he slices right into the meat of Jack’s pain here – as if to say, “Yeah, your wife’s dying. Pull it together, wimp.”

It is canon that Hannibal prods people to cause pain – it is entirely for his own pleasure. A good example is from The Silence of the Lambs. When Hannibal meets with Senator Martin, supposedly to tell her the “real name” of Buffalo Bill (ha ha), he makes a cutting remark about the Senator breastfeeding her daughter when she was a baby. Then this happens: “When her pupils darkened, Dr. Lecter took a single sip of her pain and found it exquisite. That was enough for today” (201).

The man drinks pain. What else is there to say?

Then Hannibal immediately “salves” the wound he has created (“Salve” is the word used in the script directions) – saying “I’ll offer this one insight: she thinks she married the right guy” (Wu and Fuller 17). See Hannibal playing with Jack? Always playing.

Jack then says, “I look at her side of the bed and wonder if she’s going to die there or where she’ll die and I feel myself going uncomfortably numb” (Wu and Fuller 18). I believe this to be a reference to Jack’s actual, canon death that Thomas Harris wrote for him in the novel, Hannibal. It is a death that I completely understand but hate like fire because I think a character like Jack deserved a lot better. I feel that Bryan was writing a better end for Jack.

The end in question is as follows. Clarice Starling has already been drugged and hypnotized, pulled into a strange “relationship” with Hannibal – they live in Buenos Aires together under assumed names. Clarice finds out that Jack has died from the FBI website. Apparently, “after Crawford was home for a month from the hospital, the chest pains came again in the night. Instead of calling an ambulance and going through it all again, he chose simply to roll over to the solace of his late wife’s side of the bed” (483).

I understand it, but dammit Jack deserves better. I believe Bryan was going to give him better. At least he gets to go to Italy and kick Hannibal’s ass. At least he gets another chance.

Jack and Hannibal have a conversation about loss, which leads Hannibal to ask, “Who else couldn’t you save, Jack?” (Wu and Fuller 18). Once again, Hannibal pokes at the wound, tugs at the scab. We know full well that Hannibal has Miriam Lass hidden in a damp, darkened oubliette of a well in a secret farmhouse – all wet and cold with a missing arm in a dirty nightgown and in desperate need of some wet wipes and dry shampoo. We know this – which means all of this questioning about “the lost trainee” is just Hannibal enjoying himself, just Hannibal savoring Jack’s pain. I really do think he lets Miriam live because he likes her – (the same reason book/film Hannibal lets Clarice live – she’s a “deep roller”) – but I also think he lets Miriam live solely to give her back to Jack – just like he gives Bella back to Jack when he thwarts her suicide attempt. Just as he takes Abigail away from Will, then gives her back, then takes her away again – Lucy and the football. Hannibal is “curious” what will happen, but also because he loves the pain. Pain is so much more than hum-drum everyday life – and Hannibal doesn’t like mundane pain – like the worries and neurotic spoutings of Franklyn Froidveaux or Neal Frank, no. Hannibal wants Greek tragedy level pain – a boy who wants to be a killing monster, a girl who wants to kill the brother who has been raping her all her life, a man watching his wife die, a man torturing himself with guilt because he lost another girl, and Will Graham, whose pain is beautiful in its kaleidoscopic, ever-changing qualities – it is always the pain of the killer he is profiling, the victim he is investigating, and sometimes, Will’s own deeply buried pain, abandoned by mom, distant from dad, outcast at school, outcast among colleagues, always alone and beautiful, always alone and confused – in terms of pain, Will is 31 Flavors.

At this point, Jack refuses to tell Hannibal about Miriam Lass – but later on he breaks. The breaking is always Hannibal’s favorite part.

We are now flashed back again to three years earlier; we see Miriam and Jack surveying the Wound Man tableaux rendered by the authentic Chesapeake Ripper. The victim is lashed to his worktable, and all of his tools from the peg board on which they once hung are dug into the man’s body in varying places all over the corpse.

This is not an unfamiliar moment. Jack with a whip-smart profiler assessing the carnage of a crime scene; he has also cleared the way for that profiler by sending all “the others” – the crime scene techs and photographers and forensic creatures -- away. Jack seems to understand that the brilliant ones need to be unfettered by noise and stimuli, even before Will Graham joins his pack. Miriam concludes several important things about both the murder and the murderer, namely that the victim was awake during the attack, and that the Ripper was selective about the organs he harvested. Miriam calls these organs “surgical trophies” – in this way, she is half right (Wu and Fuller 19). It is Will who will determine that the Ripper’s trophies are edible and et. The Ripper is a medical doctor, male, and – and I love this line – “exotic somehow” (Wu and Fuller 19). I believe the “exotic somehow” is meant to refer to the fact that Hannibal Lecter is European. I assume Europeans do not consider themselves “exotic,” but most Americans are flabbergasted by anyone with an accent different than theirs, so… If “exotic” is referring to the fact that the Ripper is being played by masterful and devastatingly beautiful actor Mads Mikkelsen, then yes, he's EXOTIC AS FUCK. Point is, he’s not your run-of-the-mill American. He owns a cravat – more than one probably. He probably has a bidet – he calls sedans “saloons” – and he buys all his table linens and china at Christofle. Miriam compliments Jack’s “peculiar cleverness” and we move out of the scene back into the morgue at the BAU, where Team Sassy Science is examining Nurse Shell’s body and Will is observing (Wu and Fuller 20).

The team is discussing the similarities between Nurse Shell’s murder and the Wound Man murder. They are attempting to rule Abel Gideon IN or OUT. They are unsure how Gideon could have known about the wound patterns the Ripper inflicted on his victims because those details were kept away from the press. Will says, “I see the Ripper but I don’t… feel the Ripper. He’s an artist. This is… plagiarism” (Wu and Fuller 21). Will has his finger on Hannibal’s pulse from the very beginning of the show – whether it be Hannibal as the Copy Cat or Hannibal as the Ripper – when Will finally realizes the two are one and the same, it seems like something that has been on the tip of his tongue since the very beginning. And Will is also very correct in assessing that the real Chesapeake Ripper is not going to let Gideon take credit for his work.

We end Act Two with Jack Crawford at home, asleep in his bed alone, his wife still out of town at a NATO summit. The phone rings. Jack shakes awake and picks up the phone. The clock reads 2:47 A.M. Clocks are an important motif in Hannibal, especially in Season 1. I will address what I think the motif means when I get deeper into Season 1, when Will’s encephalitis begins to worsen, but needless to say – clocks are humankind’s desperate attempt to not only measure but control time – and quite frankly, time rarely cooperates.

When Jack answers the phone, he doesn’t recognize the voice at first – or perhaps he doesn’t believe what he is hearing. The words said by the caller are important because it is these words used to torment Jack for the rest of the episode:

MIRIAM LASS’S VOICE: Jack… Jack… Jack… It’s Miriam. I don’t know where I am. I can’t see anything. I was so wrong. I was so wrong. Please… Jack… I don’t want to die like this. (Wu and Fuller 20).

And then the line goes dead.

We start Act Three back at the BAU. Beverly Katz has checked all the online databases for telecom systems and says she cannot find a trace of any call to Jack’s home at 2:47 AM. As Brian Zeller continues to question Jack’s skills of perception and memory (that maybe Jack dreamed it, that he doesn’t remember what Miriam sounds like), Jimmy Price points out, “whoever called could have tapped in from that little box outside your house. Or the junction in your neighborhood. There would be no trace signal to track” (Wu and Fuller 23). We, the viewer, know this is exactly what the Ripper – Hannibal Lecter – has done, solely because he is Hannibal Lecter, the James Bond/MacGyver of serial killers. He is a psychiatrist, a medical doctor and a surgeon; he speaks/reads/writes at least four languages that we know of. He is a world-class chef, butcher, snail cultivator, beer brewer – he can tie knots, sew, handle a variety of weapons. He can fist-fight – he can ballroom dance. He can give lectures on Dante in the medieval Italian. Obviously, he knows how to tap a phone line. I also feel very certain that Hannibal can fly a plane, hack into any computer (although he finds it distasteful), make his own soap (Fight Club style), and he knows at least one martial art, if not more.

Incidentally, tapping into phone lines is also something Francis Dolarhyde can do – both later in Season 3 when he taps into the phone line at Hannibal’s office and calls Hannibal in the BSHCI with the call masked as Hannibal’s lawyer. But, according to Bryan, the Marlow murder in “Apéritif” is one of Francis’ early murders, and he had to tap into the Marlow phone line to record Mrs. Marlow’s call to the security company. It occurs to me that being a serial killer must create endless hobbies, solely based on things you have to learn, like phone tapping, lock picking, glass cutting, tree-climbing, and “this-is-my-designing.”

Will points out that the 2:47 call obviously didn’t come from the BSHCI, and therefore, could not have been Abel Gideon. When Brian Zeller again suggests that perhaps Jack dreamed the call, Jack shouts at him, “I know when I’m awake” (Wu and Fuller 24). The script then indicates, “Will reacts to that, not always sure he knows the same” (Wu and Fuller 24). Poor Will’s encephalitis is worsening. It only serves to isolate him from others who might possibly help him. And the only person he thinks can help him is actively worsening his condition. I forgive him later, but from this point through the end of Season 1, I am mad as hell at Hannibal. My loyalty is to Will. Hannibal not only doesn’t help my poor baby, he purposely alienates Will from the people who could help him. Grrrrrrr…

Next, we see Will in his classroom at Quantico. Soon, he hears the clacking of hooves on the floor of the corridor. When he looks up, he sees the Black Stag sidling toward him – then this vision morphs into the reality of the circumstance, Alana Bloom and Jack Crawford walking into the room. Jack floats the idea of baiting the Ripper with a well-placed story in the media, a story that will anger the Ripper because the reporter will heavily suggest that Abel Gideon is the REAL Chesapeake Ripper. Will thinks the scheme is dangerous. He says, “You might push the Ripper to kill again just to prove he isn’t in a hospital for the criminally insane;” to which Jack replies, “I have to push, Will” (Wu and Fuller 26). Jack’s statement is very telling – not just about his relentless pursuit of the Ripper, but of himself as a person. Jack does indeed “push.” He pushes everyone. He pushes Will so hard he practically has a nervous breakdown. He pushes him into the hands of the Ripper himself. He pushes Miriam so hard, he pushes her into that same man’s hands. He pushes his wife so hard, she flees to that same man for advice.

Considering that Hannibal and Jack don’t officially meet until Episode 1, Hannibal is already WAAAY involved in Jack’s life and already deeply embedded in Jack’s head. It’s funny upon their first meeting in “Apéritif,” that Jack is meeting his nemesis and doesn’t know it. The man who took Miriam from him, who will take Will from him, who will take Beverly from him, who will almost take Jack’s own life. Talk about “a bolt of fate sliding home.”

Will is disgusted with the idea that Jack is going to cahoot with Freddie Lounds, but you know how Jack has to push, so the next scene reveals Freddie Lounds entering a conference room at Quantico to meet with Jack, Will, and Alana. Jack and Alana are amiable and friendly to Freddie; Will is cold and bitchy (and insanely hot…) Jack tells Freddie he wants her to confirm her story about Gideon being the Ripper. Alana promises to talk to Chilton to get Freddie an interview with Gideon. In one of my favorite of Freddie’s lines, she says, “Not to snap bubblegum and crack wise, but what’s my angle? Is he the Chesapeake Ripper or you just want me to tell everybody he is” (Wu and Fuller 28). Jack suggests he could be because Gideon is a surgeon. The three then discuss the fabled list of professions which psychopaths most favor – journalists and law enforcement being two more. I often wonder if there is also a list of professions that psychos LEAST inhabit. Like, in the bowels of the BAU, a criminal profiler is saying, “Well, we know he’s not a pet psychic, a cupcake baker, or a crossword puzzle author, so we can rule those out! Thank God!”

We are then transported to the high security sector of the Baltimore Hospital for the Criminally Insane and see stylishly dressed and coiffed Freddie Lounds entering the prison and introducing herself to Abel Gideon.

When Freddie’s story is finished and published to Tattlecrime.com, we then see Hannibal at his desk with his little tablet reading it – his face as close to “bothered” as you ever see Hannibal come. This is the same face he makes when Franklyn leaves a soiled tissue on his end table, when Mason Verger stabs his chair. I like to call it Hannibal’s “I’m About To Cut a Bitch” face. This is one thing I will say for Mads Mikkelsen over and over again – he acts with every part of his body, including his beautiful face. Fannibals love to discuss Mads’ microexpressions – the little twitches at the corners of his eyes, the dead-eyed, yet sarcastic stares, the tears that appear from nowhere, the minute turnings of his lips into wry smiles – and the most prized being the MIKKELSNARL, the King of All Expressions. The look on his face when reading Freddie Lounds’ story makes you fear for her. Amazingly, she survives. It’s actually insane.

We then see Dr. Chilton and Alana dining with Hannibal at his home. Hannibal says that the dish is a lamb tongue served with Duxelle sauce and mushrooms, created by famous French chef Auguste Escoffier. After some tongue wagging amongst the diners, Hannibal says to Chilton, “Don’t give me ideas. Your tongue is very feisty and as this evening has already proven, it’s nice to have an old friend for dinner” (Wu and Fuller 30). This line is, of course, a tribute to the ending scene of The Silence of the Lambs, Hannibal’s phone call to Clarice in which he implies he will be soon killing and eating the bumbling Dr. Chilton. As previously stated, Fuller’s Chilton stubbornly survives every season.

Alana, Frederick, and Hannibal begin discussing Abel Gideon. Frederick proudly claims Gideon to be the Ripper. Alana begins questioning Frederick and asks, “Is it possible that you inadvertently planted the suggestion in Gideon’s mind that he was the Ripper?” (Wu and Fuller 31). Frederick replies, “Psychic driving is unethical” (Wu and Fuller 32).

I have to admit that I NEVER heard the term “psychic driving” before Hannibal. Truly, it sounds like a Cronenberg video game for the Atari 2600. Hannibal says that psychic driving is allowable “in certain circumstances” and actually seems to arouse some gentle suspicion from both Alana and Frederick (Wu and Fuller 32). They don’t seem suspicious that Hannibal is the Ripper – we are a looooong way from that – but they both seem a little shocked that Hannibal might condone the practice, even in narrow cases. Hannibal so desperately wants to play, I think he actually overplays his hand here. He so rarely gives anything away and usually only does so on purpose – perhaps Hannibal’s admission is just to facilitate the conversation Hannibal has in the kitchen with Frederick, in which he states that he believes Frederick already has “psychically driven” Gideon, but it seems a little haphazard to me. Perhaps he’s still amped up because Freddie Lounds has landed a hit on him.

Speaking of Gideon, we now see him in his cell at the BSHCI, this time being questioned by Jack, who states point blank to the prisoner, “You’re not the Chesapeake Ripper” (Wu and Fuller 33). Gideon tries to convince Jack, tries weakly to explain why he, supposedly as the Ripper, takes surgical trophies, why he didn’t display the bodies of his wife and her family, and so on. Gideon ascertains that Jack is not concerned with those prior crimes.

DR. GIDEON: But you’re not here to talk about my wife or even the night nurse.

JACK CRAWFORD: What am I here to talk about?

DR. GIDEON: Your trainee. Miriam something.

(Wu and Fuller 34)

This minor detail, the fact that Gideon does not know Miriam’s last name, proves beyond the shadow of a doubt that Gideon is not, cannot be the Chesapeake Ripper. The real Ripper, Hannibal Lecter, has a meticulous memory palace built in his mind. Thomas Harris explains the grandiose proportions of the Doctor’s psychic estate in both Hannibal and Hannibal Rising. In Hannibal, Harris even treats us to a description of the palace’s interior. It has a “Great Hall of the Seasons… [a] hall of looms and textiles…[and a] Hall of Addresses,” just to name a few wings (252-254). Hannibal actually retrieves Clarice Starling’s address from this cognitive library, buried in a mental construction that Harris says, “is vast, even by medieval standards” (252).

I know for a fact that Hannibal Lecter remembers the name of every victim he ever killed, how he killed them, what organs/limbs he took, what dish he made with them, and how they tasted. There is no way he forgets a victim’s name. With the exception of the incidental goons from the Questura in Season 3 or Mason Verger’s goons, Hannibal knows the name of every victim he chooses. No way he would forget Miriam’s last name. Gideon is an amateur.

As their conversation continues, Jack’s phone rings. He walks out of Gideon’s cell block to answer the call as the caller ID announces the number as “HOME.” Jack misses the call and redials. He believes the caller to be his wife, having returned early from her trip. Whoever answers the phone (you know who), then plays the same haunting recorded message – Miriam Lass scared, alone, and begging Jack to help her.

Immediately, we are in Jack Crawford’s bedroom, where Team Sassy Science is pulling and processing evidence from Jack’s bedroom carpet, bedside phone, and even his wife’s pillow. Will is once again observing. Jimmy Price pulls three sets of prints from the phone – the first two sets are identified as Jack’s and his wife’s. The third set is later identified as belonging to Miriam Lass. Beverly even finds a long blonde hair on Bella’s pillow. Will, of course, asks questions: “Did Miriam Lass know where you live?... Did you know you were sending her after [the Chesapeake Ripper?]…” and then states, “Whoever made that phone call thinks you were close to Miriam Lass and feel responsible for her death;” to which Jack replies, “She was my trainee. I am responsible for her death” (Wu and Fuller 36). Jimmy Price floats the idea that Miriam may be alive since her prints are on the phone. Jack cannot accept the idea.

This new evidence spins Jack into another flashback – the circumstance of Jack’s last meeting with Miriam – the last time he saw her alive. They are back at Quantico – Miriam has skipped a class called “Exclusionary Rules of Search and Seizure” to ask Jack’s opinion about a report she left on his desk (Wu and Fuller 37). Jack seems needlessly cruel to Miriam in this scene. He tells her “go back to class” and “Frustrated, Lass? Better start forming a callus or frustration is going to wear you through” (Wu and Fuller 37).

This is perhaps one of the reasons Jack feels so guilty about Miriam’s death, or what he believes to be, death. In their last conversation, he wasn’t very nice. This is one of the unfortunate things about life. The last time I saw my father, the night before he died, the last thing I said to him was, “Dad, don’t eat all that ice cream.” My father was a diabetic and my mother and we children fought him tooth and nail to eat better. Towards the end of his life, he merely circumvented us – he hid Snickers bars in the clothes hamper, peanut butter crackers in the visor in his truck – he finally just broke down and started buying all the sweets he wanted himself since my mother refused to buy them. He was unstoppable. The last time I saw him, he was digging into a half-gallon of Blue Bell chocolate ice cream, and so I told him not to eat it all. All he said to me was, “Bye.”

If I had known that was the last time I would ever see him alive, I would have told him that I loved him. I would have told him that even though he was a shitty dad, abusive and obstreperous, that I still loved him, and I always would. I have to content myself with the idea that either my dad knew that I loved him or he just didn’t care.

Miriam’s report makes a smart but dangerous suggestion in the hunt for the Chesapeake Ripper. She explains, “If the Chesapeake Ripper is a surgeon, we should look at medical records of all the known victims” (Wu and Fuller 38). Jack points out that this search would obviously be illegal – medical records fall under very tight privacy laws. Then, the following conversation proves yet another thing to the viewer about Jack’s character:

JACK CRAWFORD: It’s one thing for a trainee to go poking around private medical records without a warrant, very much another if “The Guru” did it…

MIRIAM LASS: Better for a trainee to ask for forgiveness than an FBI agent to ask for permission?

JACK CRAWFORD: In my experience.

(Wu and Fuller 38).

There is something to be said of the fact that this is exactly the way that Jack “loses” people. This strategy is how he loses Will, how he loses Beverly – sending subordinates to do things he can’t do. I suppose it is a comment on larger patriarchal culture – how men in power get little people to do their dirty work for them – everything from cleaning their toilets to fighting their wars. It is not lost on me that two of the people that Jack “loses” this way are women. Strong, stubborn, beautiful women who went off doing things Jack couldn’t do because of “rules.” I love Jack Crawford with all my heart – but he should feel guilty. The loss of Miriam Lass IS very much his fault.

After this conversation, Miriam wanders off to begin her search of the medical records and we are flashed back into the present where we see Alana Bloom again at the BSHCI, again interviewing Dr. Gideon. Two scenes here at the end of Act Four and the beginning of Act Five, one where Will has a conversation with Chilton, and one where there is a lockdown in the prison were cut from the final episode, so I shall skip them.

The scene we alight upon is Jack, back in the present, walking down a hallway at the Academy, and once again his phone rings. Jack accepts the grim possibility that the call might once again be the Ripper taunting him and answers it. It brings us to one of the most interesting and important locales in the series, the abandoned observatory. The real location is the David Dunlap Observatory in Richmond Hill, Ontario, Canada. We see the observatory several times in the series – it is always a place of gruesome revelations.

We see Will, Beverly, and Jack approaching the building – Beverly explaining that the last call Jack received from the Ripper “traced here. Or within a 100 feet of here” (Wu and Fuller 42). Jack then redials the last number the Ripper called from – one that wasn’t masked or anonymous. They hear a distant ringing coming from inside the observatory.

They enter the building, and underneath a bunch of discarded equipment, at the base of the main telescope, they find a severed arm, the hand holding the ringing cell phone. A note on a card beneath the arm says, “What do you see?” (Wu and Fuller 43). The viewer understands that this is Miriam Lass’ arm – it explains the fingerprints on the phone in Jack’s bedroom.

I must say, I do find the image kind of funny… Hannibal in his squeaky murder suit – which I affectionately call his “garment bag” because DAMMIT that’s what it looks like – a garment bag with sleeves turned sideways – in Jack’s bedroom, opening a plastic bag and tweezing out one of Miriam’s head hairs, laying it on Bella’s pillow – making the call from Jack’s bedside phone and then laying Miriam’s decapitated hand over the receiver – pressing the finger pads down with his own to make sure the prints stick. I always imagine Hannibal waving Miriam’s arm around with a dramatic flourish when he’s done – like some morbid maestro conducting an insane symphony all of his own composition.

The episode ends with a flashback – Miriam Lass showing up at Hannibal’s office door to question him. The Wound Man victim was a “Jeremy Olmstead” Hannibal had treated for an arrow wound in his thigh the man received while bow hunting – when Hannibal worked in the emergency room, most likely at Maryland Misericordia Hospital in Baltimore. Hannibal says he doesn’t remember the man (he totally remembers) – but under the guise of going to retrieve his notes from the years he worked in the ER, he leaves the room, removes his shoes, and then in his stocking feet creeps up behind Miriam, just as she discovers Hannibal’s own Wound Man drawing and begins to realize the trouble she is in. Hannibal begins choking Miriam – this is the episode’s second installment of “THINGS THAT HAVE NO BUSINESS BEING INSANELY HOT.”

The script describes the scene as follows:

Hannibal is like a column of marble, motionless as Miriam twists and throws, trying in vain to knock him off balance. She reaches behind her head, clawing at Hannibal but he presses his face almost sensually against the back of her neck to protect face and eyes from her slashing fingernails. Miriam’s eyes roll, defeated, tear-filled, knowing she’s going to die. She begins to go limp in Hannibal’s arms.

(Wu and Fuller 48).

This scene is an homage to the same scene in Red Dragon when Hannibal attacks Will from behind, just as Will spies a medical book on Hannibal’s bookshelves that contains the Wound Man drawing. Will’s gut is slashed by Hannibal in this attack – in Fuller’s Hannibal, Will’s gut is spared until the end of Season 2.

This is why I adore Bryan’s Hannibal so much – it is not just an adaptation; it is a remix. Scenes are moved and laid in the hands of different characters. Conversations are shifted – things Hannibal said to Clarice, he says to Will – characters are gender-swapped or their fates are interchanged. Much of Bryan’s remix remains the same – like the tiger scene between Reba and Francis in Season 3 – but so much of it is recut, reimagined, broken down and put back together. Hannibal is an artist of deconstruction and reconstruction and so is Bryan. I still say and always will that Hannibal is the best show ever on television. Good God, it is that fucking good.

But, you ask, “JESUS CHRIST! WHEN ARE YOU GOING TO GET TO THE LESSON?” I shall now deliver.

The lesson takes place in the scene just before Miriam’s attack. After having discovered Miriam’s decapitated arm, Jack is badly rattled and goes to see Hannibal at his office. When questioned by Hannibal as to what he believes the Ripper’s motives are for trying to convince him that Miriam is alive, Jack responds “Hope. The Ripper wanted to cloud my vision in the fog of hope;” Hannibal then says, “It can sometimes be brave to allow yourself hope” (Wu and Fuller 44).

Hannibal then asks Jack when he gave up hope that Miriam would be found alive and then makes the leap from one woman in Jack’s life to another saying, “Don’t give up hope for your wife. Not yet” (Wu and Fuller 44). At the end of the scene, Hannibal coaxes Jack into telling him about Miriam, even asking what her name was. I have to say it, but making Jack tell him, as if he is absolutely unknowing of the details, about Miriam Lass and her disappearance seems almost masturbatory to me – Jack is talking dirty to Hannibal and doesn’t even know it. Hannibal sits there, absorbing every minutiae, every crease of pain in Jack’s face, every flutter of guilt in his eyes, enjoying every moment knowing exactly where Miriam is, and how she disappeared. Perhaps it is in this discussion with Jack that Hannibal decides to spare Miriam’s life. Perhaps that was always his plan. Hannibal couldn’t have known he would be called in to consult with Jack on his beautiful, but twitchy profiler, so who knows how long he was willing to wait, keeping Miriam alive, bleeding her for info that would bring him directly into Jack’s domain. All of it is devious and cruel.

It is perhaps the cruelest of things for Hannibal to talk to Jack about hope. The viewer knows that Hannibal is the one who has given Jack this “false kind” of hope (Wu and Fuller 44). It is important to remember that on a first time viewing, an audience member is not aware that Miriam is still alive. Just as on a first time viewing, the audience does not know that Abigail Hobbs is still alive after her ear turns up in Will’s gullet and then his sink. This “give the desperate loved ones a piece of their missing people and taunt them with hope” like a sadistic kidnapper, but one with no asking price, is a pattern Hannibal uses twice in the series – both times to manipulate people he cares for – to spin them in circles and watch the motion – no doubt in this spinning, Hannibal searches for weak spots, but he also delights in their pain and confusion.

It is interesting to think that the people Hannibal seems to care most about are the ones he plays with in this way. Will, Jack, Bedelia – he offers hope; he yanks it away. He lies and lies until suddenly, at the precise moment it will make the greatest impact, he tells the truth. A colossal tease is Hannibal Lecter. But he plays with these people because they interest him enough to invest time and effort into them, into both their pain and their pleasure.

Hannibal pokes at Jack’s hope not just about Miriam, but about Bella. As a surgeon, Hannibal knows the hope for Bella is even more of a longshot than for Miriam. But he wants Jack to hope because without hope, there is nothing to lose. It is best that Jack, Will, Bedelia, Alana – that all of them have something to hope for, something to lose. They will all become truly dangerous to Hannibal if they don’t. Which is basically what happens with most of Season 2 to Will, and for Jack and Alana in Season 3 – vengeance arcs – when Hannibal has stripped them of hope.

Our lesson resides in Hannibal’s line: “It can sometimes be brave to allow yourself hope” (Wu and Fuller 44). Leaving aside Hannibal’s qualifying statement of “sometimes,” the most important diction in this line is of “brave” and “allow.”

Mostly, we allow hope for others. For a sick friend, a family down on their luck, a whole group, a whole country – a sports team or a heroic dog – we can give our hope to them. That makes sense. And it feels good.

But often, hope is not a thing we are willing to give ourselves. It seems like something only for other people, like compliments or compassion or birthday cakes. Hannibal says it’s “brave” to allow ourselves hope because when our lives are in abject turmoil, hope is the last thing we want to give ourselves because… hope hurts. When things don’t turn out as we want – when we don’t get the promotion – we lose the contest – we fail the test – we screw up the date – or worse yet, our loved one dies – when we crash and burn, utterly crash and burn – we remember the hope we had beforehand and say, “You fool. You stupid fucking fool. How did you even dare to hope?”

And so the lesson, dear reader, is this – as he often is – Hannibal is right (the bastard…)

It is brave. Let yourself have it.

ALLOW YOURSELF HOPE. BE BRAVE.

I know it seems easy for me to say. It’s not. It’s hard for me too. Some days, I just can’t do it. But you and me… we’ve got to keep trying. I deserve hope. And so do you.

It seems impossible is this world full of pain and death and smiling villains.

But if Jack Crawford can muster hope from a decapitated arm and a dying wife who won’t talk to him, you and I can too.

Here endeth the lesson…

References:

Fuller, Bryan and Steve Lightfoot. Writers. “Kaiseki.” Hannibal, season 2, episode 1, Chiswick Productions, 2014.

Harris, Thomas. “Foreword to a Fatal Interview.” Red Dragon, by Harris, Berkley, 2000, pp. IX-XIII).

Harris, Thomas. Hannibal. New York, Delacorte Press, 1999.

Harris, Thomas. The Silence of the Lambs. New York, St. Martin’s Press, 1990.

“Judges 8:27.” King James Bible Online, www.kingjamesbibleonline.org/

Judges-8-27.

Wu, Kai Yu and Bryan Fuller. Writers. “Entrée.” Hannibal, season 1, episode 6, Chiswick Productions, 2012.

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