Doctor Hannibal Lecter was the head physician at the Belvedere Hospital; a recently constructed medical facility that treated a small number of soldiers. Most who ended up here only did so because larger and more conveniently located hospitals were nearly full to the point of bursting. It was a modest facility, home to only a dozen or so nurses, a couple mortally wounded men, and himself. While small and relatively unknown in the public eye, Doctor Lecter had a reputation in the area of being a miracle worker. He had saved the lives of countless men, whose condition elsewhere would earn them a merciful death. However, not everyone who came through those doors would leave quite so lucky, although that was the cost of business; or so the locals thought.

The Doctor was satisfied with his position here, as it allowed him the freedom to indulge in certain other activities with little to no scrutiny. As the head of the facility, he was allotted a very large leash, and it didn't hurt that the hospital was so far out on the moors, away from the town of Belvedere a few miles north. And so here Doctor Lecter stayed, content and simply riding out the days all the while a few soldier's on death's doorstep vanished every so often, presumed cremated or buried in the large cemetery down the hillside.

And then the ambulance came.

It had been a cool fall afternoon, low and even grey clouds overcasting the sky outside of the hospital. The few trees on the moors were golden and showering the earth with leaves, rustling with every breath of wind. There was the sound of bird song, the only indication of animal life in the vast fields. But there was something else that hung in the air.

The Doctor was in his office reading through a newspaper that had been delivered earlier that morning. He skimmed it, only half paying attention. The war was still raging, as was to be expected. He doubted it would end any time soon, and he didn't particularly care as it did not affect him in any direct way that mattered. The trenches did not stretch this far, and likely never would.

And then he heard it. An ambulance, sirens blaring as it rocketed up the dirt road towards the hospital, clearly going as fast as it could. It was still distant, but tangible to the doctor's impeccable hearing. The sound was not unusual, as they received new patients every so often from the western front. Still, it meant he had to get up and take care of the patient. After all, it was his job.

He lifted himself out of the large leather chair, setting the newspaper on the desk in front of him. "Barney?" he called out to his head nurse, who he could hear shuffling around in the hallway just outside of his door. There was a lengthy pause as footsteps approached the office until finally the door opened.

A tall, dark man stuck his head into the room, gazing around until he spotted Lecter. "Yes doctor?" Barney asked, voice low and even. Even from a distance, the man towered over Hannibal by nearly an entire foot, but there was not a drop of malice in his being.

"Please prepare a room for our new patient."

Stepping fully into the head physician's office, the head nurse looked quizzically at Hannibal. "New patient? I haven't received any word about a transfer."

Lecter met Barney's gaze, stepping from around his desk and towards the door. The nurse stepped aside to let him pass, and then began to follow him down the hallway towards the lobby.

Hannibal explained, not turning to face the man following him. "The mail came late today. I received the memo just a half-hour ago, although I suspect this patient is quite badly injured. Fresh from the trenches, so he's not a transfer. They should be here in… oh, about seven minutes. Please, go prepare a surgery room for him. Room 17B will do, as it should already be mostly set up. I took the liberty earlier."

It was only then that the sirens could be heard echoing over the flat expanses of grassland, and understanding dawned on Barney's face. Quickly, the man rushed off to prepare the surgery room for their most recent guest. Hannibal kept walking down the white-tiled halls lit by yellow lights encased in iron cages. He turned and weaved through the maze of hospital rooms towards the lobby.

Soon he entered a large, semicircular room lined with tall windows that looked out onto the moors surrounding the facility. It was painted white, just like the rest of the building. Hannibal knew the tint inspired a sense of cleanliness in the psyche of those inhabiting the hospital, but he felt it just made everything look sterile and anxious. A few potted plants did little to hide the effect.

There, just coming over the hill was the ambulance. There were already three or so nurses gathered there waiting for the new arrival, each looking to some degree concerned about the incoming patient. The doctor's face remained impassive as always. After all, this was only yet another soldier that would either live or die by his hand. He didn't much care which.

The large, box-like vehicle came to a screeching halt outside of the double doors just in front of the small group of medical professionals. The back of the car was flung open by unseen hands, and two men jumped out, quickly pulling a white gurney onto the dirt parking lot. A lean figure, covered partially by a blood-stained sheet could be seen strapped to the surface. But something felt off. Doctor Lecter waited, transfixed by the pale shape beneath that blanket. He couldn't place it.

A third figure came into view, pushing out the opposite end of the gurney out of the trunk, and between the three men they began the job of transporting the wounded soldier into the hospital. The hospital doors burst open as the two front men exploded inside, one muttering a vague profane phrase in the process.

He felt as if he was struck by a blow. Something was definitely wrong with this man, draped like a ghost in white fabric. He couldn't quite understand, but something was different. Like reaching for something just barely out of reach.

Moving the strange sensation aside, but not forgetting; he settled into his position as head physician. "What happened?" Hannibal asked as he took the lead, moving towards the surgery room Barney had prepared.

"Bastard took on a trench by himself, one of the Germans knifed him real good on his right side. Had to hold his guts in just to get him onto the gurney. Must have spent ten minutes laying in his own blood before we found him. He's lucky to be alive," the man at the back of the group said. "Better stay that way, I owe him a drink," he noted, looking pointedly at Lecter. "We stabilized him as best we could on the way here."

The doctor hummed, indeed noting that almost the entire right side of the sheet was stained in a dark red. The face of the soldier was splattered with blood, most of it not his own, judging by the smell. Hannibal's eyebrows furrowed, almost imperceptibly. His face… it was smooth; skin showing no sign of facial hair, as if he had shaved within the past twelve hours. Or… no. Certainly not.

"Name?" Hannibal asked, intent on gathering more information.

"Jack Agnus," replied the same man.

"Allergies? Any recent injuries or trauma?"

"None that I know of."

"Blood type?"

"Oh negative."

As they rushed down the hallways, he took another look at Jack. His hair was short, light brown, clearly cut to the military standard. His eyes were closed, and had the appearance of being sunken in, most likely due to a lack of sleep, food, or some combination of the two. The sharp angles of his face led down to his neck, then disappeared underneath the cloth that covered him; which looked to be because of genetics rather than starvation. Still, there was something that was odd about him.

All of this was not what was causing him discomfort. There was a strange smell in the air, emanating from Jack himself. It was setting the doctor off, but the scent was so covered by the smell of blood and dirt that he almost couldn't detect it.

Oh… oh.

He was so surprised his steps nearly faltered.

"That will do for now," Hannibal said suddenly, his even tone not betraying the torrent of thoughts that erupted in his mind. "I will take him from here."

"What?" One of the men said, confusion evident in his voice.

"I will take Jack to the surgery room myself. All the staff I require are already there. Thank you, your service is appreciated but no longer needed."

"Uh, are you sure?" the man closest to him asked, "The wound is pretty severe…"

"I am very much capable of taking care of him. You may not have heard, but I am one of the top medical professionals in my field. There will be a better chance of saving Jack if I am the one who cares for him. I'll take him now. Same goes for the nurses. One of you please prepare a private room for Jack once he's out of surgery."

The group that followed Doctor Lecter gave nervous glances to each other, but eventually backed off and allowed Hannibal to take the gurney alone.

As he pulled the unconscious soldier along, he wondered just how, how Jack had made it here. And why he was even fighting in the war to begin with. Interest clawed at his insides, curiosity boiling in his blood. But first things first. He had to save his life.

Finally, Lecter arrived at the surgery room Barney had prepared earlier. Pushing open the door, he found the head nurse awaiting him, already dressed in his scrubs. "Doctor," he said, hands clasped together. He paused. "...Where are the other nurses?" the man asked, craning his neck to peer down the hallway.

"Barney, I trust you to keep what you see in here a secret."

"Doctor Lecter?" the nurse asked, trying not to look alarmed. Lecter could hear his heartbeat increase, and watched as the man's pupils began to dilate. He was nervous. "What's going on? What secret?"

"There's no time," Hannibal said as he pulled back the blood-stained sheet that covered Jack, and with one hand lowered the light above them so it illuminated the figure on the table below. "Disinfectant please."

Barney silently handed the doctor the bottle of disinfectant, in the process wheeling over the metal table on which the instruments of surgery laid and taking another bottle for himself. 'I take it then that we are performing this alone then?" the head nurse asked quietly, heart still beating like the flapping of a hummingbird's wings.

"Yes, so I urge you to stay focused."

The face of Jack was pallid, eyes moving rapidly back and forth underneath long eyelashes. His chest moved slowly, shallowly. He had lost much blood, that was clear. The tan trench coat he wore was thick and saturated with red, but mostly on the right side as indicated by the long laceration that obviously dug deep under his skin. He unbuttoned the uniform, revealing a simple white undershirt, stained with sweat and dirt and, unsurprisingly, more blood. Taking a pair of scissors from the table, Hannibal cut the fabric from stomach to neck, revealing what he had already known.

"What is that?" Barney asked, leaning over the immobile figure.

The doctor's heartbeat sped up as he confirmed what he had noticed earlier. Still, he was a professional. Now was not the time to act like a deer caught in the headlights. He examined the wound, which stretched like a red ribbon up from the mid-thigh to just below the armpit on the right side. It went deep, and he could see both bone and the small intestine, as well as parts of the large intestine. Seemingly, nothing but muscle had been cut, which was convenient. The wound itself, he noticed, was most likely caused by a standard German trench knife, six inches long and double-edged. An uncommon weapon, he noted. Most were one-sided.

But just above where the laceration ended was a band of tightly-wound fabric that encased Jack's upper chest in a prison of stiff bandage. The fabric did what it could, but it still rose and fell in two distinct, smooth hills of flesh.

"Jack- He's… He's a..." Barney stuttered, seemingly at a loss for words.

Hannibal blinked, looking from the soldier below him to the head nurse. "Do you understand why I asked you to keep this to yourself?" he asked, holding the man's gaze intently. He would not let this get out to the staff, nor the public. No, he was too curious to let whatever this charade was fall to pieces just yet.

Barney nodded mutely, and seemed to gather himself. Then, he began to work on saving this… Jack's life.

Doctor Lecter too began to work, all the while wondering just how a woman had managed to make it into the trenches, and not even bothering trying to figure out why. Yet.

While he had few concerns about his skills as a doctor, the thought still lingered in the back of his mind. The wound was deep, and she had lost a lot of blood. What if she didn't survive? The idea bothered him more than he expected it to. He'd never cared before whether a patient lived or died, although to his credit it was usually the former. He was still a medical professional, even if his... extracurriculars did not meet the industry standards. As he worked over the inert form of the soldier below him, he refused to let his mind wander any further. This required his full attention, and Doctor Lecter did not let anything escape the highest standard of which he was capable.

Barney too was quiet, concentrating solely on the patient on the table. Hannibal had a great respect for the soft-spoken nurse. He never infringed on his patience, and always seem to understand when he was wanted and when he was not without having been told. Not to mention that he excelled at his practice and his work was always excellent. Barney was by far one of the best nurses he'd ever worked with, and there had been many in his long years of service.

Hannibal concentrated on the flesh below him, clear and pink since the other man had washed out the grime and dirt. He confirmed that nothing but sinew had been sliced, so "Jack" had evaded internal damage in terms of organs. But it was deep, about four inches deep, and it pulled apart like a valley. Stitches were needed, clearly. But it would not be an easy recovery.

"Barney, please get me a blood transfusion. Oh negative please."

The nurse set down the antiseptic bottle and rushed towards the back of the surgery room towards where the blood samples were kept. Hannibal began work on stitching the wound up. He reached for the needle and surgical string, and with the precision of a master he pushed the tip through the skin and pulled.

Skin is a marvelous thing. Its ability to stretch and regenerate were beyond anything currently scientifically available to him. "Jack" was lucky that she had only suffered what by all accounts was a clean wound, and no tearing or loss of flesh was present. Plastic surgery was not a reliable science by any account, and he was glad he would not have to perform it now.

The nurse returned with and IV, and hanging from it was a blood bag. Barney wasted no time in inserting the tube into her arm. The doctor began to feel more comfortable with the operation now, but they were not out of the woods yet. He continued stitching together flesh with flesh and skin with skin in an almost artful criss-crossing of string. He felt a sense of pride in his work, his skill, and he was no stranger to showing it.

The only sound now was the dripping of the IV and the quiet slip of needle into skin for the next half-hour. Barney rushed from task to task, completing the odds and ends of the surgery while Hannibal did the heavy work. The nurse removed all the scraps of clothing that had covered the woman below them, and replaced it with a modest green surgical sheet; maintaining a level of professionalism the doctor was convinced the female nurses would not have been able to attain. It was not a gendered statement, merely more of an observation of their personalities. He did not much care for them.

Doctor Lecter finally pulled back from his position over the figure, satisfied with his work. The stitching was designed to produce minimal scarring, and would be easy to remove when the time came. Still, the dark string against her pale flesh was jarring. The sliced wound was a couple feet long. She must have been in considerable pain before losing consciousness. He vaguely wondered if she had quickly given into the bliss of sleep, or if she had fought for every breath. After a second, he was sure it was the latter. A woman who had snuck into the army, and invaded an entire enemy trench on her own? Surely she was courageous until the bitter end. An admirable trait.

Some color had returned to her face with the introduction of foreign blood. He was confident they had performed the surgery to the highest standard to which they were capable. Now, it was up to her. Would she wake up, or would she become just another casualty in this Great War?