A Hannibal/Rosemary & Thyme crossover concept with a vignette…
I plotted this crossover. No joke. I plotted it all out, start to finish. It was supposed to be twelve chapters.
Botanist, Rosemary Boxer, and gardener (and former police officer) Laura Thyme, are in the states to fix up an old friend’s delightful little terrace. Bella Crawford had nothing but wonderful things to say about her English gardeners so Hannibal takes her recommendation and hires the pair of ladies to refurbish part of his yard and look into a few issues with his container garden.
Rated: G
“Ladies, this is the garden you’ll be redesigning,” said Hannibal, gesturing over the small yard off his kitchen. “The greenhouse will be erected here and the multi-leveled garden around it. You saw the initial plans?”
“We did! And they look charming. Not many people want Victorian greenhouses anymore – sort of an odd request.” Laura scanned the sod to be removed. “Is it for your wife?”
“I’m not married. I have an affinity for classic design and I’m in need of a experimental area for my botanical observations. It just seemed appropriate.”
“Observations? Like a laboratory? How interesting,” said Rosemary, “What sort of experiments?”
“Cross-breeding and some speculative sixteenth-century medical trials.”
Rosemary cocked an intrigued smile. “Searching for the elixir vitae are you?”
“Not exactly,” he chuckled. “Are you a history buff, Ms. Boxer?”
“A bit; but only when it comes to botany.”
“I may have to pick your brain, then … if you’re familiar with Victorian medicine.”
She waved her hand dismissively through the air. “Oh, just what I’ve learned from my ethnobotanist friends.” She brushed along a bush covered in a light, powdery dust. “You said you have a fungal problem too; is this it?”
“Yes; it’s in my herb garden inside and out here. And I fear I spread it to the garden at my office as well. I should have left botanical matters to the professionals,” he said with a
“Oh no! Well, that’s why we’re here,” she replied. “I’m so glad we were able to stay on a little longer. Have you seen Phyllis and Jack’s new terrace yet?”
“I have not had the pleasure, but Bella had nothing but wonderful things to say about you and Mrs. Thyme.”
“Ms,” corrected Laura, her lip curling into a disgusted grimace. “He got the house and I got my life back.” Her attention
“Well, if you don’t mind, I’m expecting someone.” He hesitated, then turned toward the patio door off his dining room. “I assume you two will be fine out here?”
Rosemary beamed. “Oh, heavens yes! We’ll be fine! And you won’t even know we’re here, Mr. Lecter.”
“Doctor,” he corrected.
“It’s pronounced doctor?” scoffed Laura, “Mr. Doctor?”
“Dr. Lecter,” he snapped with a sneer.
“Oh, right! Yes!” Laura nervously glanced at Rosemary, an embarrassed grin across her face as Hannibal scowled and slipped back into his home, leaving the pair to mull around his yard.
Rosemary peeked behind her at the strange grimace creeping across her good friend’s face. “What’s wrong, Laura?”
“He’s a bit of an odd duck, isn’t he?” she said, curiously peering into the dark kitchen window.
“You think?”
“His home looks like the trophy room of an African poacher. And that suit! Paisley, houndstooth, and were those buttons made of bone?” Her nose wrinked as she shuddered. “Where does he think he is? A Paris catwalk?!”
Rosemary tightened her lips, stifling a laugh. ”He’s a bit strange maybe, a little … intense … but at least he was polite.”
“Polite?!” she scoffed. “Would you call a snake polite?”
“Laura!”
“That man gives me the heebie-jeebies, Rosemary. Let’s hurry up with the garden. I don’t want to stick around here any longer than we have to.”
“Oh, Laura, you’re overreacting.” Rosemary brushed off her
“I won’t be overreacting when we end up bound and gagged in that man’s cellar, will I? And did you see his kitchen? It looks like an operating theater.”
Rosemary chuckled as she ran her hands over a bush of peppermint. “Well if we end up in his cellar, Laura, you have my total and complete permission to overreact as much as you see fit.”
In this fic, the ladies find start construction on the greenhouse and as they move and re-pot, they find a bunch of very disconcerting plants. Then overhear an intense argument between Hannibal and a patient that may or may not end in hard objects being used to bludgeon someone.
They stumble upon a late session with a shaggy, unkempt FBI agent, and draw some very shocking conclusions about Hannibal’s intentions with the scruffy young man.
They join Hannibal for dinner.
They make some rather poignant, though rude commentary about the food.
Then they find out just what’s in that cellar of his.