There was people coming and going. Nurses, doctors, the occasional visitor.

Outside, the weather had worsened. The wind blew and the trees shook, even the biggest ones. It rained and then rained and rained again and the wind was cold. Will felt like he hadn't seen the sun in years. Which really didn't help. It was like an alternate reality where the sun and the good weather didn't even exist. Where the sun was just a distant memory of a better life, something that was never really his. Something his mind had invented to make him hopeful, to not give up completely. Something of another time, another place. Something that day after day he hoped would appear and never did. It was making people sad and angry, they kept complaining about it. No sun. Only endless cloudy dark days that became weeks and the hope that the sun day would one day come again.

A bit like Hannibal's voice.

He hadn't heard it in so long... but he hoped. He hoped he would hear it again.

Will had hope.

He remembered it sometimes, heard it in his head - it haunted him. He remembered the first time they met, when they were investigating Hobbs. He hadn't liked him. He was too clinical and knew too much about him just looking at him and hearing him speak. Too much. He'd wanted to get inside his head and that was never good. But after the horrible experience in Hobbs' house they had gotten closer, if only a bit. He was back at the man's office and then back again. Hannibal had helped him put his thoughts in order. Helped him accept feelings that were there before they turned into nightmares or hallucinations. He had been there. He had spoken with him, with Crawford, with Bloom. Sometimes he felt it was Lecter the one that moved everything behind them, the one that changed everything and made people do what he wanted, see what he wanted. Like an evil puppeteer who held all the strings. Sometimes Will thought Hannibal was the evil force that was driving him insane.

Others times he felt the doctor was the only thing preventing him from going insane and crossing that last line. And he felt that he needed that man more than he needed anything or anyone else.

And sometimes he saw the psychiatrist as a victim. Will knew there wasn't any evidence, but he was convinced there was foul play involved in this. Hannibal was too careful to get suddenly sick like this. And the fact that nobody knew what was wrong... If he died now nobody would think it was murder and the killer would remain free. The perfect crime.

As the days went by, Hannibal started getting worse, a bit every day. He was in a coma now, paler and than ever. One could still see it was him, his face was still there, with those striking features - but it was as if the sickness had gotten deeper on him, infiltrated the face. There were dark shadows under his eyes, even if he slept all day and night. Will liked to watch the slight rise and fall of the chest and leave the rest of thoughts behind. Focus on that. A sign of life. Like there was nothing else in the world. Like he wasn't even there, didn't even exist. There was only Hannibal, breathing.

Some time later understanding and following for once Bloom's advice, Will had tried to leave. Went back home and stayed there. Tried to read. Tried to cook. Tried to talk to other people. Tried to go back to the university. But every time he tried to do something like that there was something that stopped him. He stopped himself before calling someone, before going away. He froze. He didn't really want to do all those things. This wasn't his scene, it wasn't his time. So he went back. He went back there, again. To the white room, to the peace, to the doctor. It had become his world and he didn't want to change that.

Sometimes, Will spoke to Hannibal. Because it's apparently good to talk to people in a coma? No, he was just bored. Sometimes he would tell Hannibal about his nightmares, others about his youth, others he would simply comment the tv programmes.

And then one day, there was an unexpected visitor. Will had been on the verge of falling asleep on a chair when he saw her: the one and only Beverly Katz in the door, with an awkward smile.

"Hey, can I come in? I brought you some magazines."

Will tried to compose himself, woke up a bit, and nodded. Katz entered.

"I thought you were on holiday or something when you stopped coming. Then Jack told me everything. Must have been rough." She said and went close to the bed. "How is he?"

"Not good. They're saying that if his breathing gets worse they will have to put him on a ventilator."

Will didn't like that. Those damned doctors were shattering the little hope he still had.

"That bad, huh? Jeez, poor man. What do you think it's wrong?"

"They did something to him, I'm sure. Something subtle, something that doesn't show up in regular tests. There's someone out there who has done this, but since there's no evidence I can't just open an investigation because there is no evidence, no signs of nothing and I..."

Will tried to calm himself. Take a deep breath. He'd seen other people die before and it hadn't affected him so much. Why was this so different?

"Well, very intelligent people tend to have very intelligent enemies as well." Katz stated. That was true.

They were in silence for a while but it wasn't awkward - it was a comfortable silence. Then they talked about old cases for a bit.

"Say what" Katz said, after some musing. "I've got a friend at the toxicology department, maybe I could talk to the lab here, ask them to get some blood samples and send them to her. She can have a deeper look, look for masking agents that may have hidden whatever's causing all this, look for anything weird the labs here may have missed."

Finally, a glimmer of hope. Justified hope.

"You would do that?"

"Yeah, I'll tell her to do it as a favour, I don't think there will be any problem."

"Thank you. It's...it's very kind of you."

"Don't worry about it. We have a new guy working with us... god, he's terrible. He thinks he's so smart but he really isn't. He's not half as intelligent as either of you were, and is very annoying. Such a high-pitched voice, horrible, really."

They shared a smile. It was nice being appreciated.

Eventually, Katz left and Will was again alone with his thoughts and the comatose doctor. It had been nice. No one had told him to leave, no one had told him to live - his former co-worker had simply accepted that he was there and offered to help. And maybe there was hope yet. Maybe they would find the cause for this and start an investigation and eventually Hannibal would wake up and maybe, just maybe, this would all end. This would go well again.

That night he dreamed about the people he knew, looking at him, disappointed.

What are you doing, Will?

Bloom, Crawford, Abigail- everyone, surrounding him.

You should have let him die.

They looked at him as if he'd committed a crime.

He's manipulating you even from that bed.

No, he wasn't. He was in complete control of his actions. Wasn't he?

You will regret this.

Maybe he could change it. End this situation once and for all, so that nothing like that would ever happen again. So that Hannibal's influence would be gone, forever. He took the pillow and walked towards the bed. Will smothered the man in the bed, slowly but surely. It was easy. He never woke up. And that was it, the end. He had killed him.

When Will woke up, it was night and he was still in the hospital room. And he hadn't killed anyone. He breathed, relieved. And started wondering how long he would have until he actually did those things he dreamed.

"Wake up, will you?" He said to the man on the bed. "I still need you."

A/N: This is even weirder than the previous one and not a lot happens. And I don't even know why I'm posting anymore. But there it is. Things will happen, rest assured. Do comment, what you liked, your theories, everything! Feedback is much appreciated ;)

You know you want to review!