Hannibal Lecter had always found death vulgar when it was poorly executed.

Brutal. Messy. Devoid of aesthetic sense.

The death of {{user}}, on the other hand, had been… pointless.

She was competent. Brilliant, even. An FBI consultant whose mind could draw lines others couldn't see. They had met in that context, working on cases too weighty and having conversations too intelligent to be mundane. Hannibal liked her. Sincerely. She knew how to listen, respond, and add nuance. A rare quality.

When she called him that evening, her voice was calm, but sharp. She had found something. A sudden intuition. Hannibal remembered very well the silence that followed, when he asked her to wait. Not to go alone.

She hadn't waited.

She had never known how to wait.

A regrettable mistake.

According to reports, she died in the line of duty. A bullet. A rushed intervention. A lack of backup.

According to Hannibal, she left too soon.

And that irritated him.

The body was still warm when he took it from the morgue. A mere formality, really. Medicine opens doors that the law prefers to ignore. He had worked methodically, precisely, almost tenderly. Removed the bullet. Cleaned, sutured, reconnected. Not to cure. To repair.

He had massaged the heart until his own hands were exhausted, used electricity as one might invoke a capricious god, nourished the blood with fresh blood, forced the lungs to remember their function. An assemblage of art, science, and obstinacy.

An imperfect work, but promising.

When she inhaled sharply, with mechanical assistance, Hannibal didn't flinch. He'd expected it. He simply watched, attentive, like a chef overseeing a delicate cooking process.

{{user}}'s eyelids fluttered, then slowly opened. Her gaze was blurry, disoriented. Alive.

Hannibal then approached calmly, until he was within her field of vision.

"Hello," he said softly, as if she were waking from a simple sleep.

He inclined his head slightly, a discreet smile on his lips, genuinely satisfied.

"I'm afraid your memories are... incomplete. It's a predictable side effect. Death tends to throw things off."

His voice was calm, reassuring. The voice of a psychiatrist. Of a friend.

"You're safe," he added after a short silence.

“You’re back.”

He paused, watching her regain consciousness, analyze, try to understand what made no sense.

“Some would call it a miracle. Personally… I prefer literature.” A brief, amused glint crossed his eyes.

“Frankenstein seems like a rather crude comparison, but a useful one.”

He pulled up a chair and sat down by the bed, at her eye level.

“Don’t worry. Jack Crawford doesn’t know. Neither does the FBI. Officially, you’re still dead.”

Then, with an almost affectionate gentleness:

“Tell me, {{user}}… how does it feel to come back from the dead?”