Ma Fille

Hannibal's daughter Caretta moves back home to live with her father. Soon Hannibal finds out that his daughter is more like him than he ever hoped. The question is, is that a good thing or a bad thing.

Prologue

Richard Martin stood at the counter, running his hands over the warm water, washing the blood off of his knuckles. The skin on his back was still hot from the recent punishment that he had given. Everyone was told to never make him angry; he just recently showed her the reason why you should never make him angry. "I was hoping that the last time would have taught you a lesson. I don't like to do that to you."

Her footsteps were light against the floor, her legs were bruised, and all the way up to her thigh, a grey sweater covered her shoulders, arms, stomach and back. "I should have known better. It won't happen again." She whispered slightly.

"Good." He said, keeping his eyes in the sink. He didn't see her come up behind him. She held her arm behind her back. "Make sure that it doesn't, I really hate putting you back into your place."

Her eyes glinted "You won't have to again. It won't happen again."

He didn't have time to move away from her when she sliced his throat. His blood spurt into the sink and all over the counter, dying the crisp white counters red. He looked at her, eyes wide, looking into her eyes to see one thing…hate. He grabbed his neck to stop the bleeding with no avail. She followed him as he fell to the ground and tried to scramble away from her. She still carried the pair of scissors in her hand; her eyes were dark holes of nothing. She caught hold of him and straddled his stomach "You won't ever have to worry about me again…" Then she raised her scissors up into the air….

I climbed out of the cab and paid the driver, the train of red from my dress soon followed behind me, "Thanks for the ride, sorry that it was so far away."

"It's alright honey; as long as I get paid then I don't have a problem." The cab driver stated with a smile.

I managed to give him a slight smirk "understandable." I said before giving him the money "Have a safe night; there are some unstable people out this late at night."

He nodded and drove off into the distance. I turned and looked in front of me at the house where I had been dropped off; it hadn't changed a bit since I had last seen it. "Please dear God I hope he doesn't turn me away." I thought to myself as I pushed myrself up the stairs to the door and knocked slightly 'if I remember correctly then it should be just about dinner time.'

I looked around at my surroundings, the cold air caused me to shiver slightly, while the dress I was wearing was a beautiful dress, warm was not a word to describe it, on the contrary it was one of the coldest pieces of clothing. 'I definitely don't want to be out in this weather in this dress.' I thought once more.

Finally the door opened and I turned around, trying to smile but finding it difficult with the chattering of my teeth and the fear in my heart. He hadn't changed a bit. His eyes looked over the me in surprise, he wasn't expecting me of course it was a complete surprise, whether he would find it rude or not I wasn't sure, but the look on his face was a little bit more than I expected. "Caretta?"

I, still trying to hold the slight smile looked into his eyes "Hello father."

Hannibal Lector, psychologist extraordinaire, handsome, talented, intelligent…this man was my father; and I, Caretta Lector, was his child, his legacy, and whether I was living up to his expectations was yet to be seen. He dried his hands on a hand towel. Usually he was dressed in a three-piece suit but now, he was dressed in a black shirt and a white apron. "What a surprise, to what do I owe this visit?"

'Well…I happened to be in the neighborhood and I thought that I would stop by and see you. I hope that you don't have company."

"No, Not tonight…"

I waited for the awkward silence for a moment "Can I come in?"

Hannibal, as if taken out of some sort of trance looked back into my eyes "Yes…yes of course, come in you will catch your death out here."

I smiled once more and stepped into the house, "Are you hungry?" He asked helping me out of the coat that I wore and giving me a light kiss on the cheek. I moved my hair back to where it was, across my back, causing him to become suspicious of my intentions. I saw that clearly, he was going to watch me more intently for more of these actions.

"What a silly question coming from you father. Especially when it comes to your cooking."

He smiled slightly "You look beautiful. What was the occasion of such a dress?"

"Thank you. My friend was getting married this evening."

"Well I was just in the middle of cooking, come into the kitchen and we can talk there. Can I get you something to drink?"

"Whatever you are drinking will be fine."

I knew that my father had a taste of wine. Of course I had been taught that excellent taste. I knew elegance at an early age because of my father and I must say, I was proud that I had it. He handed me a glass of wine then went back to his work. "How has the practice been?" I asked taking a sip.

"Wonderful, as a matter of-fact I have been booked solid with clients for the past couple of weeks."

"That is wonderful!" I said happily

He smiled gently "And you?"

"That is one of the things I wanted to talk to you about…among other things."

He looked at me but didn't stop cutting at the potato that was in his hand, he was analyzing my face to see what I was up to, I saw that from a mile away. Knowing that I couldn't hide anything from him, I continued "I am about to take a job as a professor here at the local college…"

"I always knew that you would be a teacher, from the day you were born you always wanted to teach me things." Hannibal said "Of course you will try to keep in touch a little more."

I looked at my glass sheepishly "Actually father, I was hoping that you would allow me to come home for a while."

The knife stopped once again and he looked at me, I moved her hair out of my face and smiled "It isn't working with my current roommate; he doesn't like my job…"

When I looked back up at him I knew that my father saw something else in my eyes.. he looked back down and began cutting and said "There are some clothes upstairs in your room, why don't you get out of that wet dress while I get dinner ready."

He didn't answer her question, which caused me to worry that he was going to say no. CI did the thing that I could do, nod slightly and stepped off of the stool, taking my glass of wine with me. "Alright." My hope dropped the minute he said that.

I trailed my way up the stairs, holding onto the banister with a slight smile on my face. I remembered the days that I would pretend to be a princess in a castle, right in this house, right on this staircase. My father would call for me in his study and I was allowed to read the books after, of course, I did her work. It was here that he also taught me how to play the piano. I took ballet here, I learned German here, I became me in this house. At the top of the steps there were two hallways, to the left was my father's room, to the right was mine. I stepped into my old bedroom and smiled. The bed was a queen, the room itself was black and white walls, the chest was black wood and the bookshelves were all white. I was an avid reader, just like my father. I opened the drawers to see a grey off the shoulder sweater. I touched it and started to shake slightly, the feeling of the fabric and the smell of my past motion caused me to shiver. I, satisfied with my choice in clothes, threw it on the bed and found a pair of blue jeans; the sizes were all different because I had lost quite a bit of weight. I was always comfortable with wearing a bigger sweater though; the pants would be a problem. I only hoped that I could find a belt. I couldn't help but sigh when I was pulling the pants up under the dress and over my legs, there was no way that these jeans were going to stay on my hips. I stripped the dress off over my head setting the dress on the bed, It was going to have to do.

I, not wanting to keep my father waiting, threw on the grey sweater and my jeans and found a pair of black ballet flats. I quickly ran into the bathroom and found some gauze to cover up the cut and bolted down the stairs. Hannibal was waiting for me at the bottom with a slight smile on his face happy that I had finally returned. "It seems that you have lost some weight since the last time I saw you." He said analyzing the fact that my jeans were baggy."

I tried to hide my frustration and smiled "Yeah I was just noticing that myself."

"Well no matter, I am sure that you have clothes that will be moving with you."

"of…of course."

He walked with me to the dining room and we sat down together for the meal. "It looks wonderful."

"Did you change your perfume Caretta ?" I heard him inhale slightly and my head shot up from my plate, I had forgot my father's impeccable sense of smell and I was mentally cursing, I had thought about lying however, my father knew when I was lying too… I took a bite from my plate "No…No I don't think I have. Why do you ask?"

"Something about you smells different." He was trying to work out what the smell was, I could see that in his eyes, and that caused me to panic slightly. I could only imagin that he was thinking She looks like a scared rabbit that knows her time has come. Something is wrong, this isn't Caretta …This isn't my daughter.

I looked back down at her plate and began to eat my dinner. "You said that you will be teaching as a professor, what will you be teaching?" He asked trying to make me settle down and relax

"The history of murder."

"How very interesting, a very interesting part of history."

I nodded, "Very important as well. It shows the history of predator and prey, the Cain and Abel." I said. My father's words to be exact "I think it was you that had said that what separates someone from being predator and prey is primal and tame, that is going to be one of the main topics of my history lesson."

My Dad looked at me and smiled "So I did. Very good Caretta ."

"I had a good teacher." I said taking a bite of my food again "You made veal. And if I am not mistaken you are trying a new sauce, is it… a beef tenderloin with veal tail, it was cooked in merlot wine?"

"It would seem that you have more of my taste than I realized."

I laughed but then caught my rself when the pain hit me in the side, something had pulled and I felt a spurt come out of my back. I grabbed at it and winced. Unfortunatly My father noticed immediately before I could recover "Stand up." He said, his voice was stern. It caused me to straighten up "What?"

"I said stand up."

I had been caught, and I knew it, I sighed and stood up and tried to stand up straight. He stood up and started to walk toward me, his footsteps hard against the floor. "Turn around."

I didn't make any movement, instead I held fast. Dad knew that I was stubborn, that was the only thing about my mother that I had gotten. He took hold of my wrist and whipped me around so that my back was facing him. I fought slightly until he touched the spot on My back by accident and the pain shot up my back and into my shoulders causing me to got stiff, crying out slightly at the pain in my back. My Father, wanting to get to the problem, reached for her shirt and lifted it up to her middle back and saw the sight. Black and Blue bruises covered her back some healing, some of them were brand new, but that wasn't the worst part, on her lower back, reaching from the top of her left him and reaching up almost to the middle of my spine, was a large knife slice, it was red, and from what I am sure my father could smell, it was getting infected. He let the material of my sweater fall back over my back but he wasn't done examining me I was sure, instead he moved my hair out of the way to see the bruises went up to the back of my neck. They didn't end there, instead they went down my legs, my buttocks, my chest, stomach and everything else was bruised. Any place that was easy to hide was bruised. He turned m e back around to see that tears had suddenly formed in my eyes. I rose up her sweater in the front to show that the bruises were on my stomach as well, he wanted to see it all, I was going to make sure he saw it all. I looked back into her father's eyes "I couldn't take it anymore, Dad. …He, he wouldn't stop."

My father wrapped his arms around her and kissed my head, running his hands over my hair, I was sure that he could feel that my heart was beating so hard that he could almost hear it. "I am so sorry that I let him do this to you."