Chapter 1
Any nurse would tell you; that it is not the screaming patients that you prioritize, it is the silent ones. If you have the energy to scream, you have the energy to live. Ruth just turned 62 and she was an excellent nurse; she lost only two patients in her 47 years in ER, on their little spot in the world. And Hannibal Lecter would not be her third one. Her roar echoed, as she ran.
Hannibal could make an educated guess that their time was running out. They fell, feet-first, in fact, from limited rotation, his left foot was broken in multiple places and swelling up fast in a shoe that miraculously enough stayed on top of his foot. Difference in their height, was probably the only reason, that they did survive.
His lungs were larger, filled with air, from their breathless kiss. They sunk into the darkness at almost a vertical line. His spine pulsing with pain.
Salty water burned, pushed up through the nose into his mouth hole.
Will was knocked unconscious, he guessed. His senses were on edge, he knew, perhaps three seconds after the impact, Will's body relaxed, head sinking. His brain was screaming for survival, a spasm, an instinct, the only reason he did not let go.
The water pushed them up to the surface. Like a balloon.
He turned on the back, dragging the younger man on top, ignoring the scraping and the pain, his shoulder blade dislocated. His elbow burned and bled, skin on his forearm was scraped off as if ice-cold water was a blade.
They were drowning.
Will could be dead already.
He would choose to drown; if he was.
Heart pounding in his chest.
He longed for life, this kind of life. Two of them, as they were meant to be. Together. How bittersweet it was.
Adrenaline would last just a few minutes, his heart pounded faster. The body of the younger man was like a slippery anchor sliding off into the water. His ears were ringing, and with remaining willpower he squeezed swollen fingers, holding into his own arm, holding the shorter man above the surface.
Water carried them, to swim away from the ocean at night, was impossible. This kind of death was a blessing.
Nineteen-century open-cast mines saved them, the coastline of Bell Island consisted almost entirely of cliffs that towered above the water with rock formations mined into pure iron ore, piles of it left behind, scattered on the flat ocean floor.
Rough wet stones cut into his back. The water pushed them across one of such piles, the water rolling them. Cold water was forming into a wave. He rotated his body, rolling Will off on the sharp grovel. Swinging with the last of the energy, slamming his body weight into the back of the younger man.
They had one chance.
Will puked his own death out; coughing water out from his lungs.
Breathing.
Alive.