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Everyone knew.
But no one said a word unless it was absolutely necessary. Even then it was only as a calculated risk; shared under pain of death. Anyone who spoke out never spoke about it - or anything else - again. They were always found strange circumstances as well and between the unusual brutality inflicted on the bodies and the rapidity of retribution, there were only a handful that shared.
If you needed a discreet, nigh invisible, doctor, you went to the alley behind Mullally’s. It had to be dark - after midnight but before dawn. If you stood, hunched, passed out, or got dropped in a heap, whatever the case may be, you made sure it was under the broken street light in the corner where the buildings had been cobbled together to bridge the gap between the bar and the shitty apartments. You waited.
If you were lucky, you woke up hours, maybe a day or two later, in the same spot, in the same clothes, but your injuries were either healed or well past the dangerous stage. If you were unlucky, you left the alley at dawn and ventured to the overcrowded, understaffed, and underfunded walk in clinic. If you were really unlucky… well. It didn’t matter then, did it?
Will was aware of none of this. His abdomen burned, slick and throbbing as he held as much pressure as he could to the bullet wound. He stumbled as he struggled through the downpour. He’d thought the wind that blew the storm into stinging needles and the persistent lightning would keep the women and their patrons indoors and all he’d have to do would be drive a few quick circles around blocks before he could call it a night. Profilers, even highly regarded FBI profilers, rarely ventured from the safety of a desk job. Will was different. He intuited things from the sites, could put himself in the state of mind of a criminal - in this case a suspected city-hopping gangbanger who was known to enmesh himself within the city’s lowest element and use gang protection to murder working girls.
He was mostly correct. The side walls of worn buildings, where women usually leaned with one heeled boot kicked back to press against the uneven surface to show off their tiny skirts, were unadorned. The doorways were mostly dark and vacant. All except one.
The slow crawl of the car could be taken for caution in the rain or cruising for a brief date and she didn’t want to miss any chances. She took a deep drag, stubbed her cigarette out on the doorframe, and sauntered with hips swaying towards the car. He hadn’t been sure he’d seen her; the brief flare of the cigarette had pulled his gaze but he wasn’t immediately sure and he stopped a good ten feet past her recessed nook. A white t-shirt clung to her, a second skin that did nothing to keep her from the elements. The short shorts covered less than most panties he’d seen. She looked like she was trying to win a wet T-shirt contest, and though she was too flat-chested and shivering, he could tell that the image probably usually worked for her. At least enough that she thought it worth it to be at work. Before she could get to the curb, he hit the gas and left her behind. It was rude, bordering on downright mean, but he couldn’t pick her up and he couldn’t be seen enough to be recognized when he returned.
He turned the corner, twenty feet down the walk from where she retreated back towards the shelter of doorway. Will watched through the mirror and then the passenger window, straining to keep her in view as long as possible before the edge of the building blocked his line of sight. As slow as he was going, he could see her for a decent amount of time but …
He’d have sworn he didn’t blink, didn’t lose track of the white-turned-amber by the streetlight shirt, but a moment before he passed the edge she was gone. There hadn’t been time for her to get beyond his gaze. She’d been tottering on heeled sandals and in the rain her walk was slower and more careful than what her usual probably was. Had she fallen?
Pressed so closely to the wall suddenly that he didn’t notice? Had there been a dark blur a moment before he lost her? Fuck. He could circle the block again… make sure from the warm driver’s seat that she got back to her spot and cruise away. But that would take several minutes, even if he picked up the pace, and the more he thought about it, the more he was certain he’d seen something - someone - the instant before she vanished.
A careful man would chalk it up to the rain, the unsteady light, the distance, to a thousand little things, and drive around, certain that the woman would be smoking and waiting. He’d never been accused of being careful. And he was certainly not going to let it go as a trick of circumstance while he was looking for a murderer of sex workers. It was too much to risk losing - his lead, her life, the lives of future victims, if he let this chance go.
In the seconds it took to make up his mind he had parked at the curb, yanked the keys from the ignition, and started back around the corner, his body reacting to the subconscious urge to go.
Sure enough, she wasn’t there. He walked slowly, scanning across and down as far as the rain would allow. Her doorway was empty and the stoop was dry so she hadn’t gone inside. He kept walking, cold despite the leather jacket, and feeling sympathetic for the determined hooker. He wondered if she’d been taken by his suspect. If she’d be murdered and mutilated. If it wouldn’t be better for her if she was. What kind of life necessitated selling your body in a midnight storm? With a head shake he banished the thought. No one would be better off murdered. He repeated it to himself.
The sandal and half-smoked butt were kicked into the gutter, five feet in the opposite direction of where he’d pulled up. He should call it in. But the lone shoe told him she was likely in danger and the timing said she couldn’t be too far. It kicked him up to a jog, heading for the next corner. He wasn’t sure where they’d have gone but it was the easiest and therefore more likely way. He was certain he was dealing with a smart, alert individual, who was also prone to shortcuts and not going the extra mile. It was part of the profile he’d built based on the past scenes.
The shove from the side knocked him off his feet, making him land heavily on his hip and almost sending him into the street. He hadn’t seen the doorway as he passed. There was a large sheet of plywood mostly obscuring that section of building and he’d mistakenly identified it as benign. He reoriented rapidly, standing up, ready to move but it wasn’t fast enough. The limp form of the woman was slung across the shoulders of the attacker and she jostled as the attacker moved. Will saw the gun in the same instant that it fired.
The world narrowed to a pinpoint as the sound of the shot hit his ears. Then the impact registered and everything blasted into a nebula of pain that doubled him over and on to his knees with the air punched from his lungs. The suspect hitched the woman higher on his shoulders and turned to leave, his waterlogged clothing obscuring all identifying detail. It probably would have been alright. His own cell was left behind, probably still attached to the power cable on the kitchen counter, but he probably could have floundered his way back to the waiting vehicle with its police radio hidden under the passenger seat and called for back up and an ambulance. But that idea was dead the moment a second bullet took him through his left shoulder, knocking him to his back on the ground. He lay, stunned, his eyes barely open beneath the deluge, as the guy quickly rifled through his pockets and took the keys. He tried for the gun he should have been carrying at the ready but that was now pinned under the small of his back. The shout of pain he barked a moment later would have drawn attention almost anywhere else but her and now it was lost as the thieving son of a bitch stomped on his belly and dragged the rugged sole of his boot across the now much larger hole, making it a frayed and crushed mess. Then he unceremoniously shoved Will onto his side, and took the gun. He left, woman still swaying over his shoulder with his movements.
Getting up was a bitch. But he knew he had to or he’d die right there. If the choice was to die here or go for help and die somewhere between now and help… he could tell whatever may be in the afterlife, if there was one, that at least he tried. Now he tottered his way down the empty street. The apartments would be of no help. The occupants were immune to gunfire and pleas for help - especially those of an outsider who looked too much like a civil servant to be in the area. Doubly distrusting so close to midnight on a weekday. The bar wasn’t open either - at least, it looked derelict. The front double doors were chained with links the size of his wrists. The windows were covered over in a mix of years-old newspapers and tinfoil. Some of the papers were upright, aligned, and were he able to read them he’d have seen the bar’s opening day announcement and other notable occurrences up to the day the bartender had been shot and killed for denying a patron another round. None of it mattered anyway.
He thought he remembered a side entrance in the alleyway and he was fairly certain someone had said that the front was a facade to keep unwelcomes out.
It felt like a long trek and his breathing grew erratic. His shoulder ached and pulsed, each breath grinding the broken edges of his clavicle together. He knew that was the lesser problem. It had been poorly placed - missed his heart, his lungs, his throat. It hurt like a bitch. But it was essentially a flesh would. His arm still moved and he could feel the shoulder blade and back muscles working so the bullet probably stuck or fragmented in the collarbone break.
The gut wound though… that, he could tell, this was bad. Too low to hit his stomach, probably - he hoped - too high to rupture his bladder, but there was no doubt of multiple layers of intestinal damage and if there’d been any angle at all there could be kidney or other organ damage. He was lucky that they were hollow point low caliber and he mentally added that to his profile. The women had all been killed by variants of oxygen deprivation. A plastic bag, strangulation with a belt, drowned, and left in a running car with a broken exhaust that was redirected to the closed interior, among other things. None had been shot.
He tried to switch hands keeping the pressure on his gut but the injured muscles made him give a little growl in pain. An edged pain stabbed into his neck. The periphery started to go grey and a sudden liquid heat that felt like it was coating his skin from the inside out as well as flooding his chest. Something had dislodged from somewhere and done something. He guessed it was either a splinter from the shattered bones or a shred of metal within him had jostled loose in his reflexive shrug. His mind wandered and he lolloped past the unassuming real entrance to Mullally’s was lost behind him. He may not have gotten direct help, but unless there was such a thing as a deity being a petty dick, there’d be a 9-1-1 call made. If only to keep from having a nearly dead Fed in the bar.
Instead, the increased blood loss told him that he could get to the car if he went through the alley, forgetting that the keys and probably the car itself were stolen and the alley didn’t go through. When the wall appeared he almost faceplanted in to it. The darkness due to his dwindling vision was amplified by the lack of any lighting this far. He laughed. Laughed though it hurt and it made him dizzy. He spread his arms to his sides like an offering, tipped his face up into the rain. Wounds shrieking agony, face in a defiant, gritted grin, he let out a final laugh.
He fell backwards into the corner. Trash and soaked detritus did little to break his landing but he was beyond giving a fuck. He’d thought about it more than once - how he’d want to go out and it wasn’t this. This was lunacy - to be taken down on a semi-routine, should-have-been-easy case that he hadn’t needed to be physically present for. He’d insisted to be allowed to visit the area so he could do what he did so well. It had been so boring lately and he’d been so restless and driven to just ~go~ that he took the first hint at opportunity. And he’d gotten killed for it.
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
—————-
He was restless but there was no outward sign to betray that fact. The deliberate stillness of his body usually helped to distract and calm his caged tiger of a brain that needed savagery and sinew, a puzzle and prey. Tonight he couldn’t focus on the pressure of his fingertips pressed together in sinister mockery of prayer. Or the angles of his elbows against the hardwood. The deliberate long pauses of breath.
He got up from the desk. If it didn’t work by then it wouldn’t happen now and it was a terrible waste of time to keep trying. Keeping his stride even and calculated, he held his hand clasped behind his back. He’d take a look at his surveillance monitors - hidden cameras throughout the city that he occasionally turned to for help in situations like tonight. There were only three monitors, each observing very specific and narrow site lines. None were guaranteed to show anything of interest. He let very, very few determine that there was any reason to occupy that space and on most of the instances he didn’t deign to take notice. Restless his mind may be, but he was not desperate or indiscriminate.
The three locations represented three separate hungers, different needs. The first screen that showed a fairly narrow ledge under a bridge. People didn’t specifically know why, but anyone that was active in the homeless community knew to stay away from that ledge. It was dangerous, haunted, not worth the shelter it provided. Transients sometimes holed up in the space. If their chosen night happened to coincide with one of his hungers… well, no one knew to look for them, did they. He took his sustenance and dumped the bodies in the churning water.
The third monitor kept track of a long angle view of a depressingly mundane looking garage space nestled in a long line of collapsing and derelict small homes. People still lived in those homes; the lowest of the low income wandered from rust bucket vehicles into the weathered dwellings and listless dogs wore dusty circles in dry yards. No one looked beyond their fences. No one had the energy to care.
Even if they did, there was no reason to suspect that the garage in question was a facade. One that housed a unique and well protected safe room. Safe for him, that is. It was a rare occasion he had to go there - only when someone remembered too much and talked. The blood washed nicely down the sewer, the sound proofing kept even the dogs from reacting, and the lot and garage were owned by a man who was presumed to be a hermit within the home but was actually dead.
It was the middle display that caught his eye. A man stumbled through the deluge, shoulder bouncing against the wall and his arm wrapped around his belly. The black and white, rain soaked image gave no detail but he knew the man was injured and had just blindly tottered past the bar’s entry. It was likely that he was headed for the dark corner then. A willing pickup, waiting for deliverance.
His lip curved up in a brief show of wry pleasure. It was perfect. The perfect victim for his building urge at the perfect time.
It took only a few minutes but the injured man was pale. Chilled to the touch by the rain and blood loss. He was barely clinging to life and deeply unconscious. In other words he was perfect. The way back to the penthouse wasn’t so rapid as the way out, burdened as he was with a surprisingly solid young man, but they made it before death could snatch his prize away. He had personally ensured that no one would observe his comings and goings in person or via security camera. It wasn’t his forte, meddling with electronics. He was skilled at suggesting tasks to people. People who then carried them out without knowing why and forgetting they had done it immediately after completion.
The need was growing, burning in his skin. It was a primal need, as deep and almost as fierce as the need for blood. The needs were imposed upon him by the one that had infected him - changed him. His urges were sharpened, becoming vital to life as opposed to indulgences that he could satisfy sporadically as opportunity arose. Now he had to hedge his bets, lay traps, encourage the situations subtly.
Tonight the urge wasn’t for blood, but for flesh. Not the usual desire for the flavor, the feel of well-prepared meat in his mouth. This was baser, cruder, messier. The need to fuck.
Conventional lust was easy to ignore or to satisfy - willing and desirable participants were, if not easy to find with his refined tastes, at least available without subterfuge and trickery. Sex was a part of life for him. A rare part, to be sure, but he understood the psychological necessity and as long as he found his partner desirable he was able to satiate it. People were always charmed by Hannibal’s practiced manner and his striking features.
This type of sex…
The blood had all but stopped and he looked at the two wounds. The gut wound was a tempting sight. The neck wound … well, the fact that it had nearly caused him to bleed out said it was the immediate danger. He almost sighed in annoyance. He’d have to take care of that first if he wanted his prey to live long enough to be satisfying.
Carefully, he crossed the dark living room into the bedroom. He lay the man on the bed and drew in a long breath as the larger wound beckoned to him, stirred him, making the delay physically annoying as well as mentally. The room was barely lit, with only a low watt lamp shrouded in a corner. It made pale skin take on a more natural tone and deepened shadows. It made the sight more erotic.
He knelt next to the bed, the lank line of throat at a level with his chest. Dark hair was starting to dry at the ends, and he brushed it back to look at the young face before him. Long lashes. Enough scruffy stubble to accent his lines without giving an unkempt edge. Probably handsome were he not dying. The wry quirk crossed his lips again as he let his control over his craving slip and a rush of heat pooled in his groin. It was enough to raise the power that he knew lurked under the surface of the lust. That raising was enough to let him take care of the nuisance that would kill before he was done.
The bullet wound tasted metallic as he bent forward and closed his mouth over it. Copper and lead. The lead tainted the experience but his body was too far gone to care as he licked along the edges of torn skin, exploring. Cool skin and still-warm muscle enveloped his tongue and he slowly rolled and thrust into that warmth. He knew that his movements would be orgasmic were he performing them on a partner, but it wasn’t his preference to service orally during sex. He preferred this. Bleeding, fresh. His mouth felt like he was tonguing a nine volt battery - electric metal and power. The arousal spiked as blood started to flow anew. He knew that as his body became more and more excited his fangs would emerge and begin to secrete the strange fluid that would wend its way through the ravaged shoulder and far into the surrounding tissues and structures. It would heal as it flowed, mending the breaks and tears and forcing the shards from the body.
It was a strange byproduct of this particular perversion. The need to consume combined with the need to fuck and the need to harm. Neither blood nor sex, or even the secret pleasures he took in the removal and consumption of a delicacy made of the most taboo of foods, could alleviate this feeling on its own. No. He had to have it all.
As the wound healed he was no longer able to work his tongue into its depths. It was fine. The man was gaining some vitality as the punctured artery mended and his blood was replenished by the power from the healing. He didn’t awaken or stir but the gut shot began weeping blood again.
This time the tight lipped smile caught both corners of his mouth as he rose. Crimson circled his mouth but he didn’t wipe it away. Instead, he began to disrobe, removing the suit jacket and carefully draping it on the back of a chair. It was followed by the silk tie, then the trousers, all neatly laid aside. His dove grey shirt spread to his sides as he unbuttoned it to show the snug fitting T-shirt beneath. He looked nearly obscene. Taut and elegant even in his underclothes and socks with muted light behind him. He teased the points of his sharp canines, one at a time with the tip of his tongue, the movement as pleasurable as it would have felt were he doing the same to sensitive nipples.
The wet clothing had to go. There was no slow care or seduction in it. Just efficiency as the items hit the floor in a pile on the small mat he placed for the occasion. The layer of bedding that had been saturated joined the jumbled and gory cloth. It was easy to glide into bed next to his new toy and he maneuvered their bodies so they lay on their sides facing each other.
Hannibal made sure to be positioned with his head above the level of the other’s, carefully fitting into his desired location. It was mildly awkward, his left arm nigh useless from here but the pose was perfect in all the ways that counted. He let his fingertips glide down the smooth side of his partner. Restored blood flow lent new heat to the skin as he trailed down to hip bone. Instead of perhaps working back to caress the man’s bare backside or maybe exploring his non-arousal, the caress found the traumatized and ragged viscera. His body stiffened involuntarily and he spasmed forward in a thrust as his fingers penetrated. It was always incredible, the feeling he got from fulfilling this desire. Even the simple act of pressing his fingers into a body made him erect and anticipatory. His breathing deepened, roughened as he worked in and out. The smooth, yielding organs were tight but pliant, as good as or better than any sex with either gender. The pain would have been incredible from the deep, even thrusts of his skilled fingers had the guy been awake. But that thought just spurred his need and he jerked his hand from the velvet innards to pull his hard length from his boxers. He was so hard that it almost hurt and the need to reposition himself even the scant few inches he needed made him nearly growl.
Only a few seconds later he did growl, hunger and satisfaction in the low hum as his body connected and pushed into the blood soaked man’s abdomen.
This. This is what the primal desire wanted. Sex and blood and the mist forbidden. His hips rolled forward as he dragged their bodies closer together. If it had felt amazing to have his fingers enveloped by viscera pulsing. He traced the edge of the damage, mimicking the trail he’d made with his mouth, making his body twitch. It was a tease and a promise - the messy, gruesome orifice was so deliciously heated and welcoming. When his considerably sized head was crimson and throbbing he hooked his right knee over the man’s strong thighs, using the solid yet pliant limbs to ensure the most gratifying position.
The bullet wound itself was surprisingly small with most of the damage having been done by the coup de grâce and it was there that he focused, starting with a shallow, guided thrust. It was enough to rouse a pleased hum from him. As carefully as he would have taken a virgin, he pulled his thick cock almost away from contact before easing back in, deeper this time. The sedate pace was an immense turn on, the comparison of deflowering a virgin even more so. It was so good, this torment to his pleasure and he only wished he had a wakeful and willing partner who would writhe and cry out, begging him to fuck harder, deeper into them. Each motion if his hips drove him deeper into the tightness and he could feel as even more tears opened as his ample girth invaded. He’d had a few women and a couple of men that couldn’t comfortably take all of him. A few of those trysts had ended in that sound-proofed garage after his black nature took over and pushed past their limits, driving himself too deeply, too hard until he drew blood from them which would bring him to orgasm. He never intended to eat his sexual conquests - he was slaking a thirst that had begun when procreation began and he would oblige it because he knew that ignoring his want would be problematic. But he sometimes did wait too long. It was a part of his personal nature to sometimes delude himself into thinking himself above baseness.
He inhaled deeply with a low sigh and withdrew until only the head of his cock remained sheathed in guts.
A slow exhale, throaty and almost moaned accompanied the next push of his hips. He pulled his toy closer using the leverage of his leg across the other’s and try did moan when he was flush against him, so deeply embedded that he thought he could feel the edge of spine against his head. His trimmed hair mingled with the line that trailed from navel downward. He held himself there, rocking just enough to drag the bone over his slit a few times. It wouldn’t matter if he did damage - the same healing factor he’d bestowed on the shoulder would work here as well.
The side lying was still burdensome and again he wished for a conscious partner who he could give suggestions to. The idea of this man fucking his own spine, bleeding and moaning from where he sat on the couch with his torso at waist level… he wondered what emotion he’d see in those eyes were they open.
He needed more. It was sublime being able to fully bury himself into the body. But it needed more. He slid his left arm under the right arm of his partner, wrapped his own right over his shoulders and rolled them. The man shifted easily under strength and his legs were spread to the sides, his upper body held up off of Hannibal’s chest. The line of sight was perfect and he watched as he again drew out and pressed back in. His dick was painted in crimson and he dug his fingers into the shoulders he held above him. The man’s head drooped, a wilted flower on a damaged stem. His hair was more dry now, waves of overgrown locks swayed each time he was penetrated.
What would it be like to feel this man’s chest heave with whimpers and gasps. The tiny light let shadows flicker as he moved, creating the illusion that the man was participating. It was scintillating to think about. A new level of depravity that became fantasy as he continued his rhythm. He didn’t enjoy the aftermath and clean up of any of his activities but maybe having more … wakeful … partners would be worth it. His balls tightened and he felt orgasm nearing. Quickly he let one shoulder go, switching his one hand to the chest to keep him up and using the other to grasp at the man’s lower back and buttock to press him downward, heightening the imagined vitality and after a few more staccato pumps he moaned and again flipped them, lightning fast, now straddling the other’s thighs, his hand working up and down his shaft a few fast time before his orgasm rolled through him like an avalanche. His breathing hitched as white streaks of cum pooled briefly before being drawn away into the flesh.
It had been one of the most satisfying sessions he’d ever had. He was not usually a selfish man. Nor was he in any way stupid. He knew he had a limited opportunity to take advantage of this situation. He gracefully drew his leg over the lap he straddled and out of the bed. He had some medications to gather. A beautiful new toy to take care of. And the anticipation of another time with this wound. All he had to do was keep him alive and unconscious. Easy. This time the smile was closer to real than he’d allowed himself in a long time.
——————-
“Hey. Hey! Yo! Man!! Wake the fuck up dude!”
His head flopped back and forth, shaking him awake from what had to have been the mother of all nightmares. Every inch of him was stiff and achy - “fossilized” his grandmother had long ago joked. His eyes wouldn’t open.
“Man! Wake the fuck up! You can’t be sleepin out here. It’s broad daylight in the middle of the alley! You looking to get mugged or murdered or something?”
“Hmmm? Wha?.” His eyes finally opened and the sunlight seared them closed again. He blinked furiously, raising a hand to shield his face.
“I said. You gotta go! Fuck off. It’s too early to be this drunk.”
He finally looked at the large, greasy man bending at the waist over him. The guy had in a frayed Grateful Dead shirt that was covered in tiny cigarette burns and already visibly sweaty. He looked down at himself. His clothes were intact and he remembered putting them on. Using the corner that he had been leaning into he dragged himself upright. He felt the gun’s weight at the small of his back. He could feel the weight of the keys in his left front pants pocket and his wallet was a familiar rectangle in his back pocket.
“Didn’t the guy… didn’t someone take my keys last night?” He was muttering to himself and he put the heels of his hands over his eyes, trying to massage away a headache and coax in the memories.
“Buddy, I didn’t touch your damn wallet. I seen you when I came to take out the trash. I thought you was dead at first.”
Will took a tottering step. “Last night. In the rain. He took her. Shot me. Stole my car and my gun.”
“Rain? Last night? It didn’t rain since Monday night.”
“Monday. It’s Tuesday then?”
“Jesus man you’re alcohol poisoned or some shit. It’s Thursday. Now get the fuck outta here. If you’re gonna die I don’t want you to do it anywhere near here.”
But he had been dying here. Hadn’t he? He had the worst headache of his life. It took everything he had to move past the now standing and irritated guy that had awakened him. His steps were slow, shuffling. The car had been down this way, hadn’t it? But wasn’t it stolen? The guy had the keys. But no… he reached into the pocket and the keys were there.
By the time he left the alley he was able to walk without difficulty. He looked up and down the street. People went about their routines every here and there. No one paid him any heed as he looked at the plywood that leaned against the wall. The ass hole had used that as cover and ambushed him. Shot him twice and left him right here. On Monday night. But it was Thursday. He was so confused. He ran his memories over again as he walked. He knew the car was stolen. With no uncertainty. He almost gaped when it was parked at the curb. Right where he’d left it, out of the eye-line of the sidewalk he’d just taken. It was in its usual condition. No new flat tires it vandalism. If it had been here for two and a half days, it would likely have been stripped and spray painted. But it wasn’t.
The headache was like a separate pulse behind his eyes. The door unlocked easily and he practically fell into the seat.
“Uh, dispatch, this is Will Graham, checking in.”
“Can you repeat that sir?”
“Yeah, I’m Will Graham. I seem to have lost some time and I need someone to meet me here with an escort home. I don’t think I should drive until I get this situation sorted out.”
“Ten-four. What is your location?”
He gave the approximate address. Fifteen minutes later a talkative rookie was animatedly chirping in the driver’s seat.
“So we knew you were out doing surveillance or something. Simmons saw you on his way back from patrol. But then you never answered anyone when they tried to reach you. They sent a couple cruisers out to look for you. Couldn’t find hide nor hair and u swear to you on my mom’s life, this car was not here when they came by. Everyone in the precinct knew to look for it once they determined you weren’t at the hotel or around here. Hell, they were ready to say you’d up and left until all your stuff and your phone was still in place. They knew then that something was wrong. We were just divvying up for a search when they told us you’d called in.”
What the hell had happened? Had he imagined it all? Had he been passed out in that alley for days? It didn’t make sense.
The rookie dropped him at the hotel after some arguing about coming to the station for a report and debrief. He’d agreed to come in later, after his headache went away. The excitable kid hopped into the training squad and they’d left after he got inside.
He stripped off his shoes and padded into the bathroom. If he’d been comatose in a dirty alley, he’d be gritty and grimy. If he’d been shot? He’d be bloody and … probably dead? He’d been sure he was dying. But the clothes were clean. He leaned into the mirror and studied. His stubble said it had been days. But he was too clean, too fresh for it to make sense. His eyes flicked down to look at his shoulder. It had been broken… he prodded at his collar bone. No pain rose. But he felt a change under his finger pads. A difference in his shirt texture. He pulled it off and brought it up to the light. It looked like someone had mended it in a couple places. Tiny stitches in the exact color of the fabric. Like holes had been sewn closed. He lowered the shirt and something in the mirror stopped him cold.
His shoulder. The one that he was sure had been injured. It was whole. No wounds. But there were a couple scars. Including a round and slightly raised shiny pink patch at the exact spot he would have sworn the bullet entered.
The shirt hit the floor and his head swam. So then… he ran his hands down his abdomen and he gasped at what he felt. He made himself look. It looked like a cartoon blood splatter rendered in scar tissue. The original penetration point looked like the shoulder did. But in a constellation spreading outwards were elongated, ragged scars. Dark pink and healing.
What the absolute fuck?