A/N: Co-written with voidsmoocher/childofbloodandbone from Tumblr. I wrote the first part (Will's POV), and she wrote the second (Abigail's POV). I'd say enjoy, but this pained me when I wrote it, so I doubt there'll be much fun to be had! lol And I know it seems like I'm posting a lot lately, but I'm going through a lot of my old unpublished writing from Tumblr and sharing. The fandom's been so quiet lately, so I want to contribute any little thing I can!
"Don't Let Go"
For a moment, Will had forgotten how to breathe. Or perhaps that was because he no longer wanted to. Gazing wide-eyed up at the ceiling, his breath rasped like dead leaves rustling on a branch, each heave of his chest proving to be more difficult than the last. In between his trembling fingers, he could feel his insides pushing against the gash across his stomach, his intestines all akin to hot, coppery eels.
Behind him, Abigail's wheezing warbled in and out of his subconscious. He felt adrift – far too gone to be of any real use – and with a stifled, guttural cry, he managed to roll over and reach for her. So fragile, so delicate, and yet capable of slicing with her sharp edges. Even when the very life was draining from her body, Abigail Hobbs was tenacious and unbreakable. She wouldn't break now. She couldn't fucking break. He wouldn't let her – not now. Not when he needed her.
By this point, Will had managed to drag himself toward her trembling form, a smear of bright red streaking the floor from where his own wound had grazed the hardwood. "It's okay," he whispered, "it's okay…" If he repeated that enough, perhaps it would actually come true. Reaching with shaking, weak fingers that were just as weak as the still-beating heart in his chest, Will curled a hand around Abigail's elbow and dropped his forehead to her shoulder, a noise catching in his throat that was somewhere between a sob and a scream.
"Will you…hold my hand?"
He jerked at the sudden sound of her voice. Somehow, her request had the power to filet him more deeply than Hannibal's knife ever possibly could. Unsure if the moisture on his cheeks was blood or tears, Will attempted to clasp Abigail's gushing wound closed as her wide, bright eyes turned up to him imploringly.
This was it. She thought – knew? – she was going to die.
A tremor racked through him, and Will swallowed past the assurances that yearned to come tumbling through. He couldn't bullshit her. Not this time – not anymore. Instead, he smoothed the hair back from her cooling brow with one hand and fumbled for her wrist with the other. His breathing had grown hollower by this point, and as his shaking fingers clasped her hand, he drew their jittery appendages up so that he could cradle her hand over his heart. Will had always yearned to hold and console and be there for Abigail, but not like this – not fucking like this.
"Don't let go," he hoarsely whispered against her hair. Tightening his hold on her hand, he begged, "Please…don't let go."
The house would no doubt turn into a decoration of bodies, a slew of carnage for someone else to clean up. Abigail felt the cold dead hands of all the people she was responsible for reaching for her, body numbed from fear and adrenaline. It's okay. The frozen hand of Nick Boyle reaching for her ankle. It's okay. Alana clasping her fingers around Abigail's wrist. There's a warm hand, slippery and very real, at her elbow. Will's managed to crawl closer, to touch her, despite his own surely fatal wound. She feels more tears at her eyes.
In the small amount of time she felt slipping through her fingers, she felt small and out of control and cheated. She felt scared and dizzy and disposable. Will makes a sobbing noise next to her and her heart aches. She wants to apologize, she wants to be able to go back in time and change this horrid fate. It wasn't supposed to end like this.
She's hardly able to breathe, but she wants his hand to hold hers, so maybe the ghosts won't drag her off - so maybe she won't die so alone here. An inch of comfort in this endless field of misery.
"Will you…hold my hand?" She's able to rasp out her request, hand opening in anticipation. He tries to clasp her neck, another attempt to save her life. She never understood Will, but his dedication to her was always so jostling. Even now, in the wake of his own demise he reached for her. Abigail forces herself to turn and look at him, his eyes wide with pain and fear. Please, she wants to say. If there was a time when she needed him, it was now.
He does what she asks and grips her hand, and she feels her hair being pushed back with trembling fingers. A part of her wishes she was the only one left bleeding out on the floor, but she's also grateful he's here. She doesn't have to die alone.
She soaks up the touches like a sponge, holding onto his hand as tight as she can afford. She sobs against the waves of chills overtaking her, tips of fingers getting numb and watching the ceiling blur with tears.
"I'm sorry," is all she can say to his pleadings, all she can offer him. "I'm–" she struggles to finish her sentence, voice cutting out with blood hot in her throat. She's drowning in it, and she squeezes his hand with what feels to her like an iron grip. She doesn't want to let go. She doesn't want to die. The abyss nips at the corners of her vision insistently, but she pushes it back. He had asked her to hold on, so she would do her best for as long as she could...