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A Mother's Love - Chapter Thirty Five
Nov. 24th, 2011 10:45 pmAs it was, Hannibal didn't even get the chance to worry about BA. As soon as he locked the double doors behind the van, he headed over to the corner to check on his patients and found a distressed looking Murdock holding onto Face’s fingers with one hand while he stroked his hair with the other. “He aint lookin’ good, bossman,” he murmured as Hannibal approached him. “That guy from the hospital, Pike’s brother, he do this to him?”
“’Fraid so, captain,” Hannibal replied, noticing that Face’s second bag of blood was two thirds through and bending to take his BP again. “And how are you feeling now?”
He saw Murdock’s shoulders under the thin hospital gown stoop and his head drop to stare at the floor before the pilot answered him. “I’m okay thanks, sir,” he whispered, “I’m sorry I zoned out on y’all there, dunno what came over me.”
Hannibal froze and stared at Murdock’s bent head. “Murdock,” he instructed firmly, “son, look at me here.” Murdock raised his head, his flushed, embarrassed face the last thing Hannibal needed to see at the moment. “You do know,” he said softly, “that you were poisoned don’t you? That Adele laced the cordial with some psychoactive plant?”
By the look on Murdock’s face, it was obvious he didn’t know. “She... she did that...?” he stammered, his eyes flicking to Face on the cot as sudden, horrific realisation washed over him, “and that?” he nodded, his voice rising the whole time.
Too damn exhausted and worried to get irate alongside Murdock just now, Hannibal only nodded as he finished off the BP reading, keeping his eyes on his captain, hoping that the news wouldn’t bring on a relapse.
“Fucking hell fire...” Murdock breathed, looking pale and shocked. “I mean, I knew she was up to no good, but wanting that for her boy,” he shook his head and Hannibal frowned at the tears he saw in Murdock’s eyes. “He doesn’t deserve that Hannibal does he? Poor Faceman...”
Hannibal sighed and got to his feet wondering if he could donate another unit of blood for Face as the kid’s BP was on its way down again, “Murdock,” he said soothingly, trying to keep the worry from his face, “he’s gonna be fine now. He’s got us, and you know that’s all he needs.” He pulled the covers back on the cot Murdock was sitting on. “Come on,” he instructed, “you’re cold and you still look a little washed out, get under the covers and try to rest.”
Murdock let Hannibal help him into bed and then stretched his hand out across the divide, trying to reach Face again. Hannibal moved out of the gap between the two cots and pushed on Murdock’s, sliding them until they were flush together. “Thanks bossman,” Murdock mumbled as he turned onto his side and lay one arm over Face’s chest, the other curling around his head, then he closed his eyes and Hannibal could tell he was asleep even before he’d managed to rig up the blood donation kit for himself.
It had been only three weeks since he’d given blood himself, but he didn’t want to run the risk of not having any available should it become essential that Face get some more, so settled down to watch his charges and the clock as the bag at his side slowly filled with warm, fresh AB+.
The unmistakable growl of the van’s souped-up engine startled him when BA had been gone just over seventy minutes. Hannibal surreptitiously slid his gun from its holster and snapped the safety off, keeping it hidden by his side for the time being as he listened to footsteps approaching the doors. Then there was the sound of a key in the lock and he allowed himself to relax just a tiny bit before the doors swung open and BA’s reassuring presence was looking in at him.
“Okay?” they asked simultaneously, and Hannibal allowed himself a dry smile. “Both sleeping,” he reported quickly. “And you?”
“No probs,” he answered, walking back to drive the van in, “no sign of anyone an’ I cleared the whole house of our stuff.”
Hannibal nodded, relieved beyond anything that BA had completed his mission uneventfully, but now faced with a decision that he’d always hoped he wouldn’t have to make.
Within minutes BA was standing next to him, looking down at Murdock and Face and the way that the pilot was still wrapped around their unresponsive team mate. “Well?” he asked quietly, knowing that Hannibal would know exactly what he was getting at.
A long drawn out sigh was the only answer he got at first, but then he watched as Hannibal reached out and placed a hand on Face’s shin, stroking the limb under the covers with his thumb as he spoke. “His BP is still dropping, I’m worried he’s got internal bleeding, I don't think we have much of a choice here.”
They looked at each other in silent conversation before BA asked, “You want to take him in now?”
The agony on Hannibal’s face was clearly visible. “I suppose so, but once they see those marks on his body, the bullet wound, they’re gonna call the cops for sure, maybe even finger print him anyway.” The same thoughts had occurred to BA as well, but what could they do? If Face was bleeding internally, then keeping him here was akin to shooting him dead themselves. Eventually Hannibal came to his decision. “One more bag of fluid,” he said quietly. “If his BP doesn’t pick up with this bag, we’ll take him in.”
BA added his sigh to Hannibal’s and then passed him a clear plastic folder, “Here,” he said watching Hannibal’s face carefully, “this is his emergency pack.”
Hannibal took it and opened it, looking at the top sheet before dropping the whole packet onto the floor at his feet and burying his face in one hand.
BA walked past him, squeezing his shoulder as he went by, giving the boss a bit of space and privacy to get himself back together. It had hit BA in almost the same way when he had looked at Face’s self-made file back at the house, although, really, he thought later, he should never have been surprised. Wasn’t it obvious that Face, the boy who wanted nothing more than a family and an identity of his own, should call himself ‘Jack Smith’ in his emergency i.d. pack?
___
Three days later...
Hannibal looked at all the hospital monitors as they bleeped and flashed and wondered if he could work out what each one was actually doing here. But then he realised it didn't matter, all he had to know was that they were bringing life to the broken body on the bed, and that as long as they continued to do that, he wouldn’t worry about them.
He had taken a huge risk coming in here, but three days without word had been almost more than could be tolerated. He’d had the place under surveillance of course, and knew that the police were very, very suspicious of the tale they’d been told and the injuries they had seen. It would only be a matter of time before something similar to the truth came out and then there would be no going back. Hannibal only hoped that he was long gone by then, dragging the rest of the team down with him would be the greatest sin he could ever commit. But eventually he’d decided the risk in one single visit to ICU was worth it, after all, they were driving up into the mountains later this same day, so who knew when he would be able to get the opportunity to come back? Maybe this was the only chance there would be to explain that they were going out of town, maybe for quite a while...
But when the push came to the shove, he hadn’t said a word to the pale, still figure lying in the bed, had only stared and tried to work out the medical jargon in the notes at the end of the bed and if he had done the right thing three days ago, was doing the right thing now. He pulled his surgical mask up a little higher, knowing that the strict anti contamination rules they had in place here were protecting him from the ever present CCTV cameras as well.
He sighed and took a step closer to the bed, determined to say what he had come here to say, deliver the messages he wanted to stay behind as he left LA, possibly for quite a while, but as he opened his mouth to start he heard voices out at the Nurse’s station in the corridor and looked up, brow creasing at the two cops leaning on the desk, obviously showing the nurse on duty there a photograph.
Hannibal took a step back, as the nurse shook her head, but pointed in his direction anyway and Hannibal knew his time was up. With one last, long look at the silent figure on the bed, he slipped around the bed, and keeping his mask on and his head down, walked in the opposite direction to the nurse’s station until he came to the fire exit right at the far end. Without a backwards glance, he buried his regrets, along with his gown, cap and mask, in the linen chute and slipped out into the stairwell, heading up as fast as his long legs would carry him.
He went up to the seventh floor and then cut across the entire hospital until he came to the glass elevators overlooking the main street below. There were no police cars, no MPs and so Hannibal felt fairly safe in riding it down to the main entrance where he buried himself in the mass of people milling about and made sure he ‘sneezed’ at just the right time as he was passing the CCTV camera by the main doors.
In seconds he was out in the sunshine and striding purposefully toward where he had left his nondescript Station wagon, a replacement for the trusty Chevy, and knowing he had to get back to the warehouse soon as leaving Murdock and BA on their own for any length of time was just a complete recipe for disaster. He was almost there, could see its dirty brown front end jutting out further than any other car when a voice to one side startled him and he looked around.
Frowning at the sight that met his eyes, Hannibal looked quickly around and then changed his path, walking right up to the person who had called him, the person who was sitting on a bench in the sunshine, watching him carefully.
“What are you doing here?” Hannibal snapped as his opening greeting, “I told you I would only let you come if you waited in the car for me!”
Face shifted uncomfortably, leaning his stick against the bench so that he could adjust the sling that supported his arm. “It was fucking hot in the car,” he grumbled, “and I just wanted to know how she was,” he added plaintively, “just wanted to know if she’d made it...”
Sighing, Hannibal sat down next to him, letting a big hand rest gently on his knee as he forced himself to remember how hard all this had been on Face. That last bag of blood had done the trick, finally boosting his BP up into acceptable limits and Hannibal realised that maybe the kid had lost more blood than he had at first thought, and with a sense of relief so high, he had packed the emergency i.d back into the fireproof box where they stored all their most important things and settled down to watch Face through the night while his other two men caught up on their sleep.
It had been just after three in the morning, when a sharp intake of breath alerted Hannibal that Face was awake, and trying not to let his hopes soar too high, Hannibal had slipped of his chair and knelt on the floor next to the cot, stroking Face’s forehead and gripping his fingers tightly. “Hey baby,” he whispered and watched as Face’s pupils struggled to focus on him, “How you doing?”
It took a moment, but then that focus was clear and the most amazing, beautiful angel’s smile filled Face’s entire countenance. “Boss,” he whispered, quiet and exhausted still, “you got to me in time.”
Hannibal smiled back, tears in his eyes and stroked Face’s hair back off his forehead, “I did, sweetheart,” he whispered, “I did.”
Face let his eyes slip shut, but the smile remained. “Tired,” he said, already drifting off into a more natural sleep.
“Then go to sleep,” he whispered, “and we’ll all be here in the morning as well,” and Face had done just that while Hannibal watched him. And then when BA had woken and taken over the watch, Hannibal had pushed another cot along Face’s and Murdock’s and laid down, draping his arm next to Murdock’s and finally letting himself get some rest.
________________________
When Face awoke again, the sun was high in the sky, not that any of the occupants of the unit could see, there being no windows at all to let in the natural light, but that had been one of the reasons that Hannibal had chosen this particular unit in the first place. He came back to his senses slowly and cautiously, enough of the pain and terror of the last twenty hours remaining to pervade his foggy consciousness.
But then the feel of a hand in his hair and the identities of the voices around him permeated through the fear and, eyes starting to flicker, he smiled again, despite the pain from his injuries that were all starting to wake up and announce themselves to him.
“Hey, kiddo!” Hannibal’s deep voice was the first to direct itself at him in particular. “You back with us? How’re you feeling?”
Face opened his eyes to find his head on a pillow in Hannibal’s lap, his body stretched out on the cot and lovingly wrapped in blankets against the chill of the unit. Hannibal was sitting at the head of the cot, his back against the wall, BA perched on a chair next to them both and a pale looking Murdock was curled on his side under the blankets of the cot next to BA, his head, resting on two pillows, down at the end opposite Face.
“Urm, yeah,” he cleared his throat and shifted his weight slightly, “pretty much like BA rolled on me really. Yeah, like that.”
Hannibal and BA laughed, and Face was filled with a spreading warmth as he felt Hannibal’s laughter rumbling through his chest. “You wanna coffee there, Pretty?” BA asked him, already getting to his feet in anticipation of the answer.
“Fuck, yes,” Face answered and his stomach rolled loudly in agreement.
BA laughed again as he headed off to the other side of the unit, “I’ll find you somethin’ to eat as well then.”
Face smiled in thanks and turned to Murdock who hadn’t moved, hadn’t made a sound since he had awoken. “Hey, buddy,” he greeted him cautiously. “You feeling better now?”
Murdock nodded. “BA says you saved my life...” he said quietly. “From all them drugs I took. You know I never meant to.”
Face struggled to sit up and he felt Hannibal’s hand in his back, pushing him up, helping him to save his ribs. “Of course I know that,” Face reassured him earnestly. “I know you, HM, I know you didn’t mean it.”
Murdock nodded. “Thanks though,” his face was still sincere, “I appreciate it.”
Winking, Face smiled at him, swallowing around the lump in his throat, “You’re welcome, bud,” he knew from past experience that arguing with Murdock here was pointless and it was better to let his friend just get all this off his chest if that’s what he wanted. But then his expression darkened as a rather unwelcome memory suddenly came back. “After all,” he said bleakly, lying back in Hannibal’s lap, “it was my mother who tried to poison you...”
He missed the dark look that passed between Hannibal and Murdock at that point and closed his eyes for a moment, opening them again to smile flatly up at Hannibal but they were prevented from any further conversation by the arrival of BA with coffee and Pop Tarts.
_____________________________
Conversation had been nothing more than light banter as Face demolished his Pop Tarts, and BA went back to make him some more. But then, at a nod from Hannibal that Face really couldn’t miss, Murdock said he was going to go to the bathroom and try to get as good a wash as the tiny sink would allow him, while BA offered to go with him as the pilot was still a little unsure on his feet.
Face waited until they door to the tiny washroom had closed behind them and then he sat up again, wiping Pop Tart crumbs off the bandages wrapping up his ribs and twisting slightly to look over his shoulder at Hannibal. “Alright, boss,” he asked quietly, “what is it?” For a second it looked as though Hannibal was going to brazen it out, but then Face saw him visibly wilt and scrub a hand through his hair and look so tired and fed up that Face felt his heart start up in fear. “What?” he repeated, a little edgier this time.
Hannibal shifted forward and pulled the blankets around Face’s bare torso, frowning at the goose flesh he could already see between the dressings and the wounds, then held the blankets together in Face’s lap himself, straddling the cot right in front of his boy. “Boss...?” Face prompted again.
“Okay,” Hannibal swallowed and looked right into those fear filled blue eyes. Taking a deep breath, he started. “When we were leaving Pike’s lock-up, he was waiting to ambush us, he had some kind of automatic weapon with him.”
Face frowned, this was where he may expect to hear that one of the team were down, but they weren’t, he’d seen them with his own eyes, just three minutes ago, they were fine all fine, he looked up, his face pulled in confusion, and then something hit him, something that made his heart pound even faster and sweat stand out on his chilled skin. Hannibal shifted even closer and, keeping one fist tight on the blankets, let the other hand drift around onto Face’s hip, stroking him through the layers of fleece, keeping him grounded.
“He got in a lucky shot, hit Adele in the back of the head.”
“No!” Face physically recoiled, it was like he was the one who’d been shot and Hannibal kept a tight hold of the fleece, keeping him close, while the hand on his hip slipped around to the small of his back holding him steady.
“She was breathing when we left her, the EMT’s were only minutes away and she had a friend with her.” Face just stared, far too shocked to even say a word. “I haven’t been able to get through to her friend since though, and the hospital won’t tell me a thing, not even if she’s still alive or - not. I’m so sorry,” he finished lamely.
Still Face just looked at him and Hannibal felt his heart break for the kid, the confusion in his expression, the hurt, the hopelessness and the anger. They just stared, Face wrestling with all that was inside him before he finally, forlornly, shook his head, tears standing in his eyes. “I-,” he started and then swallowed, hard before trying again “All... All she ever did was lie to me, Hannibal,” he whispered brokenly. “She just used me to get to some fucking fictional pot of money that Pike spun had her a line on; she never loved me, never wanted me.” Hannibal rubbed his back trying to offer just a tiny crumb of comfort. “She lied about why she left me,” Face continued quietly. “She lied about how I was conceived, she lied about not knowing who my father was...” He shook his head, totally and utterly destroyed by it all and Hannibal stored away that fact about his father for later, to revisit at a better time.
“She never cared about me,” Face whispered and his eyes fell on Hannibal’s fist where it tightly gripped the blankets in his lap and, as he followed his boy’s stare, Hannibal felt his chest tighten at the two silver droplets he could see standing on the green fleece of the blanket.
He lifted his hand from Face’s back and ran it up to his nape instead, a solid, comforting presence and Face, taking strength from that support, took a deep, shuddering breath and ploughed on. “She didn’t help me when I really needed her to, when I was too small to fight my own battles, and then gave me away when she couldn’t face what she’d done,” he whispered and Hannibal filed that statement away for later as well. “She drank coffee while Pike tortured me,” he added, so matter of fact that it brought an involuntary tightening of the hand at his neck, “and she could have killed my best friend...”
Silence fell and Hannibal waited, his eyes on the back of Face’s bent neck, the mark from Silas’ injection still visible as Face struggled to hold it all together, his shoulders heaving with the effort of keeping things locked up tight. He took his own deep breath and forced his simmering anger back down; that was not what Face needed here, and Hannibal was determined to do whatever it was that Face needed. He leaned in and pressed a kiss on top of his boy’s dirty hair, trying to tell him it was okay to feel whatever he was feeling, that he was here for him, always would be.
Face looked up and, even though it was expected, Hannibal felt a searing pain in his chest on seeing those tear tracks down his cheeks. “So, why?” Face asked, his voice small in the huge space of the unit, his eyes, huge and shining and begging Hannibal for an answer. “Why do I care whether she’s dead or not?” he shook his head. “She certainly wouldn’t lose any sleep if it were me that’d been shot, so why do I care? Why does it hurt so much? Right fucking here.” His fist thumped hard over his heart at that last word, and Hannibal winced, knowing the pain inside that had led to that action, but also seeing the bruising to those ribs that Adele must have stood by and watched happen.
But there was no time to dwell on that further, or time to consider any of the revelations that Face had dropped on him so far, because the last words out of his mouth had finally done what Adele hadn’t managed to do, and broken him so completely that he sagged forward into Hannibal’s arms, letting himself be caught and held and loved.
“Oh, baby, I’m sorry,” Hannibal murmured into his head, holding him and rocking him while Face just slumped against him, too shattered even to cry any more. “I tried to get everyone out in one piece and BA was doing the best he could to cover...”
“Not your fault,” Face mumbled against him as Hannibal could feel his whole body shuddering with emotion, “either of you. Shit. It’s not like she didn’t have it coming to her...”
Mindful of his ribs and the bullet track in his bicep, Hannibal hugged him closer, trying to still the shaking. “I’m sorry I wasn't there for you when you saw her, when Silas took you. Hurt you...”
“You’re not gonna be there for every mess I ever get into, boss,” Face whispered brokenly. “You can’t beat yourself up over this.”
Hannibal felt his heart swell at those words and ran a hand through Face’s hair as he spoke. “I’m not,” he reassured him, thinking how typical it was of Face that he were trying to comfort him, trying to make him feel better after all this crap. “I just wish I could have saved you from all this hurt.”
Face laughed from somewhere in Hannibal’s sweatshirt, but it was broken, a hollow, empty sound. “You couldn’t have helped me; you weren’t there from the day I was conceived. I think my card was pretty well marked from then on in.”
Going back to kissing his head, stroking his back, Hannibal wished with everything he had that things had been different for Face as a child. But then, he admitted to himself, if they had, would they be where they were right now? Together? That possibility, a life without Face at his side, was just too awful to even contemplate.
“It hurts you so much,” he said, going back to Face’s earlier question about Adele, “because you are a good, good, soul, Face. You care about people, and you care enough to want to make things better for them, to put yourself on the line for them. That’s not a character trait that Adele has ever had. I’m afraid the only person she has ever cared about is herself.”
Frowning, Face lifted his head from Hannibal’s chest and Hannibal couldn’t resist cupping his cheek and leaning in for the lightest of kisses on his bruised mouth.
“She said,” Face was still frowning as Hannibal pulled away; he was trying to chase a memory that just wouldn’t sit still. “She said she loved my father...” Hannibal waited in silence, sensing that a word here could lose the tenuous memory forever. “No,” Face’s frown deepened. “No, she didn’t, she said he’d loved her.” Hannibal thought of Eddie’s dog-like devotion and wondered how well Adele cultivated her gift of snaring people. “She said I’d loved her,” Face admitted quietly, his guilt ridden eyes on Hannibal’s.
“Of course you did,” Hannibal soothed him, knowing that this was something that Face needed permission for, his complex feelings over the woman that had hurt them all so much. “She’s your mother, Face. You were bound to love her,” he smiled sadly at the intense devastation in Face’s eyes. “You still love her now, don’t you? You have such a pure heart, you can’t help it.”
And there it was, a new, searing wave of pain let loose with Hannibal’s words. “I hate her,” Face replied brokenly, fresh tears welling up in his eyes. “For all she’s done, I hate her!”
“I know, baby,” Hannibal soothed him, letting go of the fleece now, two hands on his cheeks, stroking him gently. “I know you do. Anyone in your position would, but you can’t shift all that love you once had for her either can you? Not completely?” Face just stared at him. “And that’s fine too, Face. I understand, anyone would understand. Doesn’t mean you like her, doesn’t mean you want to see her, just means you are beautiful enough to still love her despite all she’s done.”
Face just stared at him and Hannibal waited, seeing the turmoil in those expressive blue eyes and patiently waiting for it to resolve itself.
“If she dies,” he whispered eventually, “then it’s all over isn’t it?” Hannibal frowned slightly, not quite sure he understood. “All the things I’d always hoped for, that one day I’d find her and she’d like me and she’d want me and I’d have cousins and relatives, you know? That’s all gone then isn’t it?”
Hannibal had been sure he couldn’t have felt any more desperately sorry for Face than he had done five minutes ago, but that little speech, straight from the heart of a six year old, who despite every way his feckless mother had treated him, desperately wanted her to come back and start acting like a real mommy for once, well, that was just about more than he could take. If Adele did survive Pike’s bullet, he would have to work hard to resist the temptation to shoot her again himself.
But he had no idea at all on how to answer Face’s question, what to say that could even start to make it alright, so instead he had just pulled his boy back into his chest and held him tight, stroking and soothing, murmuring words of love, until Murdock and BA came out of the washroom.
Next
“’Fraid so, captain,” Hannibal replied, noticing that Face’s second bag of blood was two thirds through and bending to take his BP again. “And how are you feeling now?”
He saw Murdock’s shoulders under the thin hospital gown stoop and his head drop to stare at the floor before the pilot answered him. “I’m okay thanks, sir,” he whispered, “I’m sorry I zoned out on y’all there, dunno what came over me.”
Hannibal froze and stared at Murdock’s bent head. “Murdock,” he instructed firmly, “son, look at me here.” Murdock raised his head, his flushed, embarrassed face the last thing Hannibal needed to see at the moment. “You do know,” he said softly, “that you were poisoned don’t you? That Adele laced the cordial with some psychoactive plant?”
By the look on Murdock’s face, it was obvious he didn’t know. “She... she did that...?” he stammered, his eyes flicking to Face on the cot as sudden, horrific realisation washed over him, “and that?” he nodded, his voice rising the whole time.
Too damn exhausted and worried to get irate alongside Murdock just now, Hannibal only nodded as he finished off the BP reading, keeping his eyes on his captain, hoping that the news wouldn’t bring on a relapse.
“Fucking hell fire...” Murdock breathed, looking pale and shocked. “I mean, I knew she was up to no good, but wanting that for her boy,” he shook his head and Hannibal frowned at the tears he saw in Murdock’s eyes. “He doesn’t deserve that Hannibal does he? Poor Faceman...”
Hannibal sighed and got to his feet wondering if he could donate another unit of blood for Face as the kid’s BP was on its way down again, “Murdock,” he said soothingly, trying to keep the worry from his face, “he’s gonna be fine now. He’s got us, and you know that’s all he needs.” He pulled the covers back on the cot Murdock was sitting on. “Come on,” he instructed, “you’re cold and you still look a little washed out, get under the covers and try to rest.”
Murdock let Hannibal help him into bed and then stretched his hand out across the divide, trying to reach Face again. Hannibal moved out of the gap between the two cots and pushed on Murdock’s, sliding them until they were flush together. “Thanks bossman,” Murdock mumbled as he turned onto his side and lay one arm over Face’s chest, the other curling around his head, then he closed his eyes and Hannibal could tell he was asleep even before he’d managed to rig up the blood donation kit for himself.
It had been only three weeks since he’d given blood himself, but he didn’t want to run the risk of not having any available should it become essential that Face get some more, so settled down to watch his charges and the clock as the bag at his side slowly filled with warm, fresh AB+.
The unmistakable growl of the van’s souped-up engine startled him when BA had been gone just over seventy minutes. Hannibal surreptitiously slid his gun from its holster and snapped the safety off, keeping it hidden by his side for the time being as he listened to footsteps approaching the doors. Then there was the sound of a key in the lock and he allowed himself to relax just a tiny bit before the doors swung open and BA’s reassuring presence was looking in at him.
“Okay?” they asked simultaneously, and Hannibal allowed himself a dry smile. “Both sleeping,” he reported quickly. “And you?”
“No probs,” he answered, walking back to drive the van in, “no sign of anyone an’ I cleared the whole house of our stuff.”
Hannibal nodded, relieved beyond anything that BA had completed his mission uneventfully, but now faced with a decision that he’d always hoped he wouldn’t have to make.
Within minutes BA was standing next to him, looking down at Murdock and Face and the way that the pilot was still wrapped around their unresponsive team mate. “Well?” he asked quietly, knowing that Hannibal would know exactly what he was getting at.
A long drawn out sigh was the only answer he got at first, but then he watched as Hannibal reached out and placed a hand on Face’s shin, stroking the limb under the covers with his thumb as he spoke. “His BP is still dropping, I’m worried he’s got internal bleeding, I don't think we have much of a choice here.”
They looked at each other in silent conversation before BA asked, “You want to take him in now?”
The agony on Hannibal’s face was clearly visible. “I suppose so, but once they see those marks on his body, the bullet wound, they’re gonna call the cops for sure, maybe even finger print him anyway.” The same thoughts had occurred to BA as well, but what could they do? If Face was bleeding internally, then keeping him here was akin to shooting him dead themselves. Eventually Hannibal came to his decision. “One more bag of fluid,” he said quietly. “If his BP doesn’t pick up with this bag, we’ll take him in.”
BA added his sigh to Hannibal’s and then passed him a clear plastic folder, “Here,” he said watching Hannibal’s face carefully, “this is his emergency pack.”
Hannibal took it and opened it, looking at the top sheet before dropping the whole packet onto the floor at his feet and burying his face in one hand.
BA walked past him, squeezing his shoulder as he went by, giving the boss a bit of space and privacy to get himself back together. It had hit BA in almost the same way when he had looked at Face’s self-made file back at the house, although, really, he thought later, he should never have been surprised. Wasn’t it obvious that Face, the boy who wanted nothing more than a family and an identity of his own, should call himself ‘Jack Smith’ in his emergency i.d. pack?
___
Three days later...
Hannibal looked at all the hospital monitors as they bleeped and flashed and wondered if he could work out what each one was actually doing here. But then he realised it didn't matter, all he had to know was that they were bringing life to the broken body on the bed, and that as long as they continued to do that, he wouldn’t worry about them.
He had taken a huge risk coming in here, but three days without word had been almost more than could be tolerated. He’d had the place under surveillance of course, and knew that the police were very, very suspicious of the tale they’d been told and the injuries they had seen. It would only be a matter of time before something similar to the truth came out and then there would be no going back. Hannibal only hoped that he was long gone by then, dragging the rest of the team down with him would be the greatest sin he could ever commit. But eventually he’d decided the risk in one single visit to ICU was worth it, after all, they were driving up into the mountains later this same day, so who knew when he would be able to get the opportunity to come back? Maybe this was the only chance there would be to explain that they were going out of town, maybe for quite a while...
But when the push came to the shove, he hadn’t said a word to the pale, still figure lying in the bed, had only stared and tried to work out the medical jargon in the notes at the end of the bed and if he had done the right thing three days ago, was doing the right thing now. He pulled his surgical mask up a little higher, knowing that the strict anti contamination rules they had in place here were protecting him from the ever present CCTV cameras as well.
He sighed and took a step closer to the bed, determined to say what he had come here to say, deliver the messages he wanted to stay behind as he left LA, possibly for quite a while, but as he opened his mouth to start he heard voices out at the Nurse’s station in the corridor and looked up, brow creasing at the two cops leaning on the desk, obviously showing the nurse on duty there a photograph.
Hannibal took a step back, as the nurse shook her head, but pointed in his direction anyway and Hannibal knew his time was up. With one last, long look at the silent figure on the bed, he slipped around the bed, and keeping his mask on and his head down, walked in the opposite direction to the nurse’s station until he came to the fire exit right at the far end. Without a backwards glance, he buried his regrets, along with his gown, cap and mask, in the linen chute and slipped out into the stairwell, heading up as fast as his long legs would carry him.
He went up to the seventh floor and then cut across the entire hospital until he came to the glass elevators overlooking the main street below. There were no police cars, no MPs and so Hannibal felt fairly safe in riding it down to the main entrance where he buried himself in the mass of people milling about and made sure he ‘sneezed’ at just the right time as he was passing the CCTV camera by the main doors.
In seconds he was out in the sunshine and striding purposefully toward where he had left his nondescript Station wagon, a replacement for the trusty Chevy, and knowing he had to get back to the warehouse soon as leaving Murdock and BA on their own for any length of time was just a complete recipe for disaster. He was almost there, could see its dirty brown front end jutting out further than any other car when a voice to one side startled him and he looked around.
Frowning at the sight that met his eyes, Hannibal looked quickly around and then changed his path, walking right up to the person who had called him, the person who was sitting on a bench in the sunshine, watching him carefully.
“What are you doing here?” Hannibal snapped as his opening greeting, “I told you I would only let you come if you waited in the car for me!”
Face shifted uncomfortably, leaning his stick against the bench so that he could adjust the sling that supported his arm. “It was fucking hot in the car,” he grumbled, “and I just wanted to know how she was,” he added plaintively, “just wanted to know if she’d made it...”
Sighing, Hannibal sat down next to him, letting a big hand rest gently on his knee as he forced himself to remember how hard all this had been on Face. That last bag of blood had done the trick, finally boosting his BP up into acceptable limits and Hannibal realised that maybe the kid had lost more blood than he had at first thought, and with a sense of relief so high, he had packed the emergency i.d back into the fireproof box where they stored all their most important things and settled down to watch Face through the night while his other two men caught up on their sleep.
It had been just after three in the morning, when a sharp intake of breath alerted Hannibal that Face was awake, and trying not to let his hopes soar too high, Hannibal had slipped of his chair and knelt on the floor next to the cot, stroking Face’s forehead and gripping his fingers tightly. “Hey baby,” he whispered and watched as Face’s pupils struggled to focus on him, “How you doing?”
It took a moment, but then that focus was clear and the most amazing, beautiful angel’s smile filled Face’s entire countenance. “Boss,” he whispered, quiet and exhausted still, “you got to me in time.”
Hannibal smiled back, tears in his eyes and stroked Face’s hair back off his forehead, “I did, sweetheart,” he whispered, “I did.”
Face let his eyes slip shut, but the smile remained. “Tired,” he said, already drifting off into a more natural sleep.
“Then go to sleep,” he whispered, “and we’ll all be here in the morning as well,” and Face had done just that while Hannibal watched him. And then when BA had woken and taken over the watch, Hannibal had pushed another cot along Face’s and Murdock’s and laid down, draping his arm next to Murdock’s and finally letting himself get some rest.
________________________
When Face awoke again, the sun was high in the sky, not that any of the occupants of the unit could see, there being no windows at all to let in the natural light, but that had been one of the reasons that Hannibal had chosen this particular unit in the first place. He came back to his senses slowly and cautiously, enough of the pain and terror of the last twenty hours remaining to pervade his foggy consciousness.
But then the feel of a hand in his hair and the identities of the voices around him permeated through the fear and, eyes starting to flicker, he smiled again, despite the pain from his injuries that were all starting to wake up and announce themselves to him.
“Hey, kiddo!” Hannibal’s deep voice was the first to direct itself at him in particular. “You back with us? How’re you feeling?”
Face opened his eyes to find his head on a pillow in Hannibal’s lap, his body stretched out on the cot and lovingly wrapped in blankets against the chill of the unit. Hannibal was sitting at the head of the cot, his back against the wall, BA perched on a chair next to them both and a pale looking Murdock was curled on his side under the blankets of the cot next to BA, his head, resting on two pillows, down at the end opposite Face.
“Urm, yeah,” he cleared his throat and shifted his weight slightly, “pretty much like BA rolled on me really. Yeah, like that.”
Hannibal and BA laughed, and Face was filled with a spreading warmth as he felt Hannibal’s laughter rumbling through his chest. “You wanna coffee there, Pretty?” BA asked him, already getting to his feet in anticipation of the answer.
“Fuck, yes,” Face answered and his stomach rolled loudly in agreement.
BA laughed again as he headed off to the other side of the unit, “I’ll find you somethin’ to eat as well then.”
Face smiled in thanks and turned to Murdock who hadn’t moved, hadn’t made a sound since he had awoken. “Hey, buddy,” he greeted him cautiously. “You feeling better now?”
Murdock nodded. “BA says you saved my life...” he said quietly. “From all them drugs I took. You know I never meant to.”
Face struggled to sit up and he felt Hannibal’s hand in his back, pushing him up, helping him to save his ribs. “Of course I know that,” Face reassured him earnestly. “I know you, HM, I know you didn’t mean it.”
Murdock nodded. “Thanks though,” his face was still sincere, “I appreciate it.”
Winking, Face smiled at him, swallowing around the lump in his throat, “You’re welcome, bud,” he knew from past experience that arguing with Murdock here was pointless and it was better to let his friend just get all this off his chest if that’s what he wanted. But then his expression darkened as a rather unwelcome memory suddenly came back. “After all,” he said bleakly, lying back in Hannibal’s lap, “it was my mother who tried to poison you...”
He missed the dark look that passed between Hannibal and Murdock at that point and closed his eyes for a moment, opening them again to smile flatly up at Hannibal but they were prevented from any further conversation by the arrival of BA with coffee and Pop Tarts.
_____________________________
Conversation had been nothing more than light banter as Face demolished his Pop Tarts, and BA went back to make him some more. But then, at a nod from Hannibal that Face really couldn’t miss, Murdock said he was going to go to the bathroom and try to get as good a wash as the tiny sink would allow him, while BA offered to go with him as the pilot was still a little unsure on his feet.
Face waited until they door to the tiny washroom had closed behind them and then he sat up again, wiping Pop Tart crumbs off the bandages wrapping up his ribs and twisting slightly to look over his shoulder at Hannibal. “Alright, boss,” he asked quietly, “what is it?” For a second it looked as though Hannibal was going to brazen it out, but then Face saw him visibly wilt and scrub a hand through his hair and look so tired and fed up that Face felt his heart start up in fear. “What?” he repeated, a little edgier this time.
Hannibal shifted forward and pulled the blankets around Face’s bare torso, frowning at the goose flesh he could already see between the dressings and the wounds, then held the blankets together in Face’s lap himself, straddling the cot right in front of his boy. “Boss...?” Face prompted again.
“Okay,” Hannibal swallowed and looked right into those fear filled blue eyes. Taking a deep breath, he started. “When we were leaving Pike’s lock-up, he was waiting to ambush us, he had some kind of automatic weapon with him.”
Face frowned, this was where he may expect to hear that one of the team were down, but they weren’t, he’d seen them with his own eyes, just three minutes ago, they were fine all fine, he looked up, his face pulled in confusion, and then something hit him, something that made his heart pound even faster and sweat stand out on his chilled skin. Hannibal shifted even closer and, keeping one fist tight on the blankets, let the other hand drift around onto Face’s hip, stroking him through the layers of fleece, keeping him grounded.
“He got in a lucky shot, hit Adele in the back of the head.”
“No!” Face physically recoiled, it was like he was the one who’d been shot and Hannibal kept a tight hold of the fleece, keeping him close, while the hand on his hip slipped around to the small of his back holding him steady.
“She was breathing when we left her, the EMT’s were only minutes away and she had a friend with her.” Face just stared, far too shocked to even say a word. “I haven’t been able to get through to her friend since though, and the hospital won’t tell me a thing, not even if she’s still alive or - not. I’m so sorry,” he finished lamely.
Still Face just looked at him and Hannibal felt his heart break for the kid, the confusion in his expression, the hurt, the hopelessness and the anger. They just stared, Face wrestling with all that was inside him before he finally, forlornly, shook his head, tears standing in his eyes. “I-,” he started and then swallowed, hard before trying again “All... All she ever did was lie to me, Hannibal,” he whispered brokenly. “She just used me to get to some fucking fictional pot of money that Pike spun had her a line on; she never loved me, never wanted me.” Hannibal rubbed his back trying to offer just a tiny crumb of comfort. “She lied about why she left me,” Face continued quietly. “She lied about how I was conceived, she lied about not knowing who my father was...” He shook his head, totally and utterly destroyed by it all and Hannibal stored away that fact about his father for later, to revisit at a better time.
“She never cared about me,” Face whispered and his eyes fell on Hannibal’s fist where it tightly gripped the blankets in his lap and, as he followed his boy’s stare, Hannibal felt his chest tighten at the two silver droplets he could see standing on the green fleece of the blanket.
He lifted his hand from Face’s back and ran it up to his nape instead, a solid, comforting presence and Face, taking strength from that support, took a deep, shuddering breath and ploughed on. “She didn’t help me when I really needed her to, when I was too small to fight my own battles, and then gave me away when she couldn’t face what she’d done,” he whispered and Hannibal filed that statement away for later as well. “She drank coffee while Pike tortured me,” he added, so matter of fact that it brought an involuntary tightening of the hand at his neck, “and she could have killed my best friend...”
Silence fell and Hannibal waited, his eyes on the back of Face’s bent neck, the mark from Silas’ injection still visible as Face struggled to hold it all together, his shoulders heaving with the effort of keeping things locked up tight. He took his own deep breath and forced his simmering anger back down; that was not what Face needed here, and Hannibal was determined to do whatever it was that Face needed. He leaned in and pressed a kiss on top of his boy’s dirty hair, trying to tell him it was okay to feel whatever he was feeling, that he was here for him, always would be.
Face looked up and, even though it was expected, Hannibal felt a searing pain in his chest on seeing those tear tracks down his cheeks. “So, why?” Face asked, his voice small in the huge space of the unit, his eyes, huge and shining and begging Hannibal for an answer. “Why do I care whether she’s dead or not?” he shook his head. “She certainly wouldn’t lose any sleep if it were me that’d been shot, so why do I care? Why does it hurt so much? Right fucking here.” His fist thumped hard over his heart at that last word, and Hannibal winced, knowing the pain inside that had led to that action, but also seeing the bruising to those ribs that Adele must have stood by and watched happen.
But there was no time to dwell on that further, or time to consider any of the revelations that Face had dropped on him so far, because the last words out of his mouth had finally done what Adele hadn’t managed to do, and broken him so completely that he sagged forward into Hannibal’s arms, letting himself be caught and held and loved.
“Oh, baby, I’m sorry,” Hannibal murmured into his head, holding him and rocking him while Face just slumped against him, too shattered even to cry any more. “I tried to get everyone out in one piece and BA was doing the best he could to cover...”
“Not your fault,” Face mumbled against him as Hannibal could feel his whole body shuddering with emotion, “either of you. Shit. It’s not like she didn’t have it coming to her...”
Mindful of his ribs and the bullet track in his bicep, Hannibal hugged him closer, trying to still the shaking. “I’m sorry I wasn't there for you when you saw her, when Silas took you. Hurt you...”
“You’re not gonna be there for every mess I ever get into, boss,” Face whispered brokenly. “You can’t beat yourself up over this.”
Hannibal felt his heart swell at those words and ran a hand through Face’s hair as he spoke. “I’m not,” he reassured him, thinking how typical it was of Face that he were trying to comfort him, trying to make him feel better after all this crap. “I just wish I could have saved you from all this hurt.”
Face laughed from somewhere in Hannibal’s sweatshirt, but it was broken, a hollow, empty sound. “You couldn’t have helped me; you weren’t there from the day I was conceived. I think my card was pretty well marked from then on in.”
Going back to kissing his head, stroking his back, Hannibal wished with everything he had that things had been different for Face as a child. But then, he admitted to himself, if they had, would they be where they were right now? Together? That possibility, a life without Face at his side, was just too awful to even contemplate.
“It hurts you so much,” he said, going back to Face’s earlier question about Adele, “because you are a good, good, soul, Face. You care about people, and you care enough to want to make things better for them, to put yourself on the line for them. That’s not a character trait that Adele has ever had. I’m afraid the only person she has ever cared about is herself.”
Frowning, Face lifted his head from Hannibal’s chest and Hannibal couldn’t resist cupping his cheek and leaning in for the lightest of kisses on his bruised mouth.
“She said,” Face was still frowning as Hannibal pulled away; he was trying to chase a memory that just wouldn’t sit still. “She said she loved my father...” Hannibal waited in silence, sensing that a word here could lose the tenuous memory forever. “No,” Face’s frown deepened. “No, she didn’t, she said he’d loved her.” Hannibal thought of Eddie’s dog-like devotion and wondered how well Adele cultivated her gift of snaring people. “She said I’d loved her,” Face admitted quietly, his guilt ridden eyes on Hannibal’s.
“Of course you did,” Hannibal soothed him, knowing that this was something that Face needed permission for, his complex feelings over the woman that had hurt them all so much. “She’s your mother, Face. You were bound to love her,” he smiled sadly at the intense devastation in Face’s eyes. “You still love her now, don’t you? You have such a pure heart, you can’t help it.”
And there it was, a new, searing wave of pain let loose with Hannibal’s words. “I hate her,” Face replied brokenly, fresh tears welling up in his eyes. “For all she’s done, I hate her!”
“I know, baby,” Hannibal soothed him, letting go of the fleece now, two hands on his cheeks, stroking him gently. “I know you do. Anyone in your position would, but you can’t shift all that love you once had for her either can you? Not completely?” Face just stared at him. “And that’s fine too, Face. I understand, anyone would understand. Doesn’t mean you like her, doesn’t mean you want to see her, just means you are beautiful enough to still love her despite all she’s done.”
Face just stared at him and Hannibal waited, seeing the turmoil in those expressive blue eyes and patiently waiting for it to resolve itself.
“If she dies,” he whispered eventually, “then it’s all over isn’t it?” Hannibal frowned slightly, not quite sure he understood. “All the things I’d always hoped for, that one day I’d find her and she’d like me and she’d want me and I’d have cousins and relatives, you know? That’s all gone then isn’t it?”
Hannibal had been sure he couldn’t have felt any more desperately sorry for Face than he had done five minutes ago, but that little speech, straight from the heart of a six year old, who despite every way his feckless mother had treated him, desperately wanted her to come back and start acting like a real mommy for once, well, that was just about more than he could take. If Adele did survive Pike’s bullet, he would have to work hard to resist the temptation to shoot her again himself.
But he had no idea at all on how to answer Face’s question, what to say that could even start to make it alright, so instead he had just pulled his boy back into his chest and held him tight, stroking and soothing, murmuring words of love, until Murdock and BA came out of the washroom.
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