Title: Demons
Author: Sumiare
Word Count: 2,000
Rating: T
Warnings: Blood, Death and Stags
Pairing: Hannigram
Notes: I remember sitting up last night talking with my friend Caroline about fanfiction plots and together we fleshed out a Destiel which I'll be writing later. This morning I though of this one, and we both were rather fond of it. Caroline, I dedicate this story to you. This Steak is to Die For. /wink
Please leave a review and let me know what you think so far!
Will always complained of having his own personal demons. It didn't help that he was constantly psychoanalyzing serial killers, and that those mental forms manifested into hallucinations that haunted his dreams. After a particularly horrifying case – the case of Garrett Jacob Hobbs – these hallucinations became more and more frequent in his waking life instead of just his sleep.
Crawford refused to acknowledge that his best profiler was going insane, continuously placing Will Graham into the mentalities of psychos until he gradually became one. A stag with raven feathers for fur haunted his sights, always somewhere in the background, watching him. Eventually he grew used to the sight of it while he was lying in bed, its antlers coated in the blood of the girls that Hobbs killed, striking their bodies through with pairs of antlers he had stored in the attic of his home. The stag would regard him with a cold gaze, its eyes glittering red as rubies, and then it would turn and leave, as if encouraging him to follow after it. Will never did, though. He could never be sure which level of insanity the deer would lead him to. Perhaps so far he wouldn't be able to return.
Today's case had been particularly exhausting. His mind still buzzed from the thought of it all, the blood spilt on the carpet, so thick that it would never be removed. He had long since tried to take the smell of iron and copper from his nose. It was a permanent thing, and he ignored it. Mentioning the ever-present smell of blood to any of his coworkers would get him recommended to yet another psychiatrist, and he really did not like psychiatrists. They would psychoanalyze the psychoanalyzer, peering into the very throes of his mind and plucking out things that they thought were important, all while ignoring the most important information.
A family had been found dead in their home, their heads shaved and the hair woven to form a work of grotesque art. The tapestry had been nailed to the wall above the bodies, who had been moved to sit underneath it, their glazed eyes to see no more. There had been four deaths, the mother, the father, and their twin girls, who couldn't have been more than eight. Will would have felt sorry for them if he was still capable of doing so.
Crawford coaxed him into slipping into the killer's mindset after clearing the room of all of the paramedics and police. The noise blocked out his mental process, all of the extra chatter would reverse the images and he'd be lost. Plus, Will just preferred his privacy, especially when his mind was so open to other people's thoughts.
"I had been watching the family for weeks now," he mumbled after clearing the scene, setting things right, with his head. The girls were in bed, asleep, their parents cuddled together on the couch, watching some sort of movie on their flatscreen. The kitchen light was off. "They were perfect for my plan."
He crept forward, and slipped through the kitchen window, careful not to make a sound. "I sneak in, ever so quietly. I have all of my tools in a bag – my knife, my razor, my needles to work the piece into its shape. The man and the woman do not hear me creep up behind their couch. I wield my knife, slitting the woman's throat before stabbing the man's neck with clumsy aim."
The blood coated his hands, drying quickly and leaving a maroon stain on his skin. It would wash off, he reasoned. Will reached into the bag that was not his own, and tugged out the razor. It was from the barber's; he had stolen it during his last haircut. They hadn't noticed it was missing.
"I shave the woman's hair off first, I find it much more beautiful, and pile it carefully onto the floor. I was careful not to get any of the blood into the blonde locks lest it ruin my masterpiece." He dropped clump after clump of blonde hair onto the floor, watching it fall and collect together. "When I take the hair of the man, I hear a creak on the stairs. It is one of the daughters, her hands clutched around a stuffed toy that I could not see. She will be my next target."
Will stole through the shadows, reaching through the rungs on the staircase to grab the girl's ankle, sharply pulling her down. Her head clunks heavily onto the railing, and she is killed by the head trauma.
"I pull her off of the stairs, cradling her as if she were my own child. I place her between her parents on the couch before removing her hair as well. It is brown, a lovely chocolate color that compliments the mother's blonde quite nicely. It will all look perfect once I pull everything together."
Will's eyes travel back to the staircase, following the way it curved off into oblivion.
"There is one more kill I must make before I begin my work. The stairs creak quietly as I sneak up them and into the girls' room. One of the beds is empty. I pull back the covers on the occupied bed, and stare down at the sleeping girl there."
She looks angelic lying there in her bed, the sheets tousled around her. They are a pale pink color, matching the walls of the room. Will feels almost regretful slicing a line through the dip of her collarbone, and then up her neck, as if performing throat surgery.
"The fourth kill is finished. I take the final collection of hair downstairs, and begin work on my tapestry. When I finish I hang it on the wall. It looks lovely there."
He stepped back to admire the work he has created. There is a buzzing in his head that does not belong on the scene, and Will ignores it. He turns to the bodies he has arranged on the couch – the mother and father, with their twin daughters placed between them.
"I feel that the owners of the tapestry should sit beneath my masterpiece. I push the couch over to the wall, and create a perfect family portrait."
Will takes a deep breath, and exhales shakily.
"This is my design."
The scene melts back into the state he had walked in on. The bloodied carpet, the family sitting quietly under the tapestry of their hair. He is standing alone in the living area of the house, his hands clutched into fists, fingernails digging into his skin despite the thick latex gloves covering his hands. Through the gloves he can feel his hands are sweaty once again. Will takes another shaky breath. The stag is standing in the doorway to the kitchen. It watches him silently, before trodding past, out the main door, before it slips into the shadows and vanishes into the darkness awaiting.
That was nearly three hours ago. The drive from Baltimore – the site of the murder – to his home in Wolf Trap, Virginia is just over that. He had rushed out of the crime scene as if it were aflame, and drove away like the cops were on his tail. He calmed himself with the thought he just wanted to see his dogs again instead of the truth, that he had a little too much of blood and death and murder and, 'Will, what do you see?'
It is when he pulls off of the freeway into Wolf Trap that he notices something is different. While his town isn't all that populated anyway, there is no one out and about. It is nearly six; many people would usually be out walking their dogs or driving home from work. But it is barren.
Will drives slow through the main area of town before turning onto his street, the gravel crunching under the weight of his tires. There is still no one. Trees thin to yellow grass, and there is not a sound. Not even crickets chirp their song tonight.
There are no strays wandering the streets, there are no sounds distilling the air. Everything seems to be holding its breath, waiting for the break, for the illusion to fall apart. Will continues to drive slowly, eyes scanning for someone, anyone, anything. He'd even appreciate a skunk if it were to walk into the streets and show itself. But there is nothing.
He pulls into his driveway carefully. His house looms over him in all of its disintegrating glory. There are shingles falling off of the roof, and one nearly hits him as he walks up to the front door and unlocks it with his keys, letting himself in. The door creaks, the sound echoing through the empty house. Usually his dogs would be waiting right by the door for him, slobbering excitedly over his hands as he bent to pet each and every one of them. But there is silence, and there are no dogs.
He checks every room for them. Usually if they weren't by the door they'd be in the kitchen waiting for their dinner. But they aren't there, and the only sign they'd ever been was the spilled container of dog food, kernels contaminating the off-white tile floor. Will stoops to pick up the plastic container and set it on the counter by the sink. He'd have to scoop up all of the spilled pellets later when he had a dustpan. Right now his priority was figuring out what was happening in Wolf Trap.
Will takes a breath before walking upstairs to inspect there. Nothing has changed since he left this morning. The sheets on his bed are still a mess (he had long since abandoned his duvet, it just made him sweat even more), his pillows falling off of the bed. The lamp on the bedside table doesn't work, and the windows are closed. There is nothing on the roof outside other than an unfortunate collection of bird poop.
He is stumped, for once. It seems as if everything living has run from the town into the wilderness. What could have happened while he was gone?
It is that moment that the doorbell downstairs rings, an echoing, haunting noise that rattles Will's bones after several minutes of absolute silence, other than his breathing. His footfalls on the wood echo through the house alongside the ringing of the doorbell. He hesitates to open the door to whomever – whatever – may be standing outside there. He doesn't have a peephole or a mail slot to spy on his visitor prior to yanking open the door to stare them in the face. It could be someone dangerous, it usually was, and Will didn't keep a gun on him unless he was working. But he was off the clock and he didn't have a gun in the house and oh god he was freaking out now, nearly hyperventilating.
Calm down, Will, he told himself, removing his hand from the doorknob to clutch at himself. He counted down from ten, slowly, while the person on the other side of the door rang the bell several more times. Once he reached one he grasped the cool bronze knob in his hand and turned it slowly, pulling the door open ever so slightly to peer outside. He saw no one for a heartbeat.
A face suddenly pushed into view, eyes wide with – was that fear? Will pulled the door open fully to stare confusedly at his visitor. The man had flaxen hair – which, somehow, was perfectly styled after it seemed as if he had been running – and wore a three-piece suit that didn't really fit the atmosphere of the man's expression. The stag was standing behind him, watching Will with calculating red eyes.
"Thank god you're here, Will Graham. We are in much danger," the man gasped, his accent sounding rather foreign, the way he pronounced his words was smoother, longer. "We need to run."