Your Hand in Mine
The gunshot interrupts Hannibal before he can finish his notes on the session with Will. A sixth sense tells him Will is on the receiving end of the gun this time, and Hannibal, who never rushes anywhere, rushes to the exit behind the building, his phone already out.
As soon as he sees Will lying on his side on the ground in a pool of blood, he dials 911. He calmly requests an ambulance as he shrugs his suit jacket off and drapes it over Will in a paltry attempt to keep him warm. The operator wants him to stay on the phone; he explains that he's a surgeon and he needs both of his hands. He hangs up and slips his phone into his pocket as he kneels next to Will and evaluates the situation.
The weak illumination from the streetlights is far from adequate as he pushes Will's bloody hands aside and shoves his left index finger into wound. The superficial femoral artery, not the deep one, has been compromised, and if Will survives, that will be one reason why.
Hannibal thinks of his scalpel, left behind on his desk, as he inserts another finger, pushing past the tear in the vastus intermedius and sartorius muscles to reach the breached artery. Blood has already soaked into his trousers from the pool nearly a meter wide beneath Will. Not just the superficial femoral artery but the vein, too, is torn. Will has lost blood at an alarming rate.
Hannibal locates the artery with his index finger and presses down to stop the bleeding. With his right hand, he searches for an exit wound, sliding his fingers between blood-wet khaki and concrete. He finds none. Will's odds for survival tick up a few percentage points.
Keeping his fingers on the artery, Hannibal palpates the pulse above the wound and reaches up to Will's neck. Hannibal counts 167 beats per minute. Will's pulse is regular but weak and thready. Hypovolemic shock. The skin of Will's neck is cool to the touch and sticky now with his own blood. The bloody prints Hannibal leaves on his neck would be elicit a far different response in another context. Now, they're just further evidence of the situation's severity. Will isn't supposed to die this way. This can't happen.
Will drifts in and out of awareness, sometimes opening his eyes when Hannibal talks to him, sometimes not. What matters is that he's fighting. It's no surprise. Will is a fighter.
Hannibal hears the ambulance in the distance as Will lifts a hand weakly and rests it on Hannibal's arm. Hannibal sees in his eyes that he thinks he's dying and he wants to say something, but he hasn't got the strength to speak.
"You're going to be okay, Will," he says with assurance he doesn't feel.
Will does have a chance, and as the lights flash in the pool of blood, his odds increase again. He'll have an even better chance if these EMTs are real paramedics, and competent ones.
"I'm a surgeon," Hannibal calls out before they can tell him to move. "His superficial femoral artery is severed. I need scalpel and a clamp."
One of them returns to the ambulance without asking any questions. So they are competent: willing and able to work outside their protocol when the situation demands it.
He looks at the other one, a young but hardened woman. "Start an IV." The fact that she already has the equipment with her cheers Hannibal.
Will's hand falls away as Hannibal releases his neck. Something he can't explain makes him stop and give Will's hand the briefest of squeezes. Will can't die like this.
And he won't, Hannibal thinks as he takes the scalpel from the male medic. Hannibal has brought people back from more dire situations than this.
"I need light," he says calmly.
A flashlight clicks on and he can see the wound properly. The medic cuts Will's slacks so Hannibal can see around the wound. He slices deep into the muscle to expose the artery, takes the proffered clamp, and closes the bleed.
"Another," Hannibal demands as he locates the ascending vein. Another clamp appears and he thinks that this medic is quite well trained indeed as he clamps the vein shut.
"Two more," Hannibal says.
"We don't have any more."
The medic offers gauze instead and Hannibal stuffs it into the wound to control the bleeding from the still open sections of the artery and vein.
The other medic has started the IV and taken a set of vitals, which she calls out to them both: tachycardia, extreme hypotension resulting from severe hypovolemia. He's lost close to two liters of blood already – far too much. Hannibal expects to know within the next ten minutes whether he'll survive.
He stays with Will, holding the gauze in place with one hand and the bag of Ringer's lactate with the other, while the paramedics bring the backboard and gurney over. Together, they roll Will onto the backboard and lift him to the gurney. He passed out a while ago, thankfully.
Hannibal climbs into the back of the ambulance with the male medic and gives more orders. The sirens start up again and the vehicle launches forward. Hannibal has to force gloves over his sticky hands as he moves to Will's head. He accepts the endotracheal tube and laryngoscope, and intubates Will as though it hasn't been years since he's performed the procedure. He's careful not to chip Will's teeth. The medic secures the tube and attaches the bag valve mask while Hannibal returns to Will's leg to ensure that the clamps haven't torn the delicate vessels.
They arrive at the hospital before he can fuss over the clamps much. Hannibal stays close to the gurney, moving like he's the attending physician rather than a visitor. He talks the gatekeepers away from the bloody state of his clothes and gets far enough inside to find that, to his great relief, the actual attending physician is one of his former students. She gives him ample latitude, consulting with him as nurses prep Will for surgery.
"I have to call the police," she says apologetically. She's picked up on how special Will is to Hannibal; she always was perceptive.
She offers to direct him to the showers so he can clean up while Will is in surgery. Hannibal politely declines.
"Will is a good friend," he says. "I'd prefer to observe if possible."
"I thought you'd say that," she replies with a smile. "But you look out of place right now."
Hannibal glances at his ruined clothes, still wet with Will's blood, and the dried blood on his hands.
"Perhaps you could direct me to the shower room after all," Hannibal acquiesces.
He leaves Will reluctantly. She tells him where he can get a pair of scrubs and a towel, and soon he's stripping off his shirt, trousers, and everything underneath. As he washes off the sweat and scrubs his arms and hands, he feels adrenaline begin to fade. He's still tense – he needs to see Will come out of surgery successfully before he'll be even remotely satisfied – but he's tired, too, now. It's an all-too-familiar physical state that transports him twenty years into the past.
Images from that time flash before him but he doesn't allow himself to dwell. Instead, he focuses on scraping the blood off where it won't wash away. Little flecks of iron-rich life come off and lodge in his fingernails. They'll distract him until he finds a nail brush.
Hannibal dries and dresses quickly, finds a bag for his wallet and a few other things he prefers to keep on his person when he's in the office, and walks with purpose to the operating theater where he's politely directed to an observation area.
He would prefer to be working on Will himself. He doesn't know the surgeon leading the team. Surely he won't be as careful as Hannibal would. But Hannibal recognizes the impossibility – indeed, the impertinence – of the request and resigns himself to watching closely.
When the operation approaches the two hour mark, he begins to reassess the surgeon. Perhaps he is thorough after all.
Hannibal follows Will to recovery and then to his room on the critical care floor. He'll be monitored carefully until his vitals stabilize.
The police catch up with him outside Will's room and talk with him for nearly ten minutes. They're polite enough, but by the time they say that Will is lucky that a former trauma surgeon was so close by, Hannibal is anxious to get back.
That's the thought he's been avoiding since Will went into surgery. He shoves it aside and sits by Will until the time comes to talk the nurses into letting him stay for the night. It's an easy sell.
Once Will is truly settled, Hannibal is exhausted. He moves the chair so it won't obstruct the nurses' work and takes Will's cool hand in his own. In spite of his tiredness, he sits forward for a moment so he can rub warmth back into Will's hand.
Will doesn't stir. Nor will he for many hours. Shock, hypovolemia, hypotension, and tachycardia don't mix with two hours of anesthesia and the additional trauma of the gunshot and the surgery. It will likely be a few days before he regains consciousness.
But that's also a thought for another time. Instead, Hannibal focuses on Will's now-warm hand in his and lets his chin drop to his chest as he gives in to sleep.
