It was a warm Tuesday and they were arguing about a case (a particularly complex one) in the halls of the BAU. Will and Alana were arguing intensely while Hannibal just watched them and added an occasional comment. After a couple of minutes, Hannibal asked they went to a temporarily vacated office to continue the heated discussion so the wouldn't have everybody's eyes on them, a relatively small place with a desk and a chair in front of it – even a small couch on the other side of the room. They continued arguing, trying to be as civil as possible.

Will thought all the efforts the FBI was doing were wrong, and getting them further away from the killer instead of helping them closing in on him. He said this was just precisely was this killer wanted, this was his design. The search in the pool, the chlorine, the suspect. All of it was wrong, just a plan from the killer to distract them, divert the attention from him. Bloom repeated that there was evidence of this man's involvement, that the suspect was the man they were looking for, that he was seeing conspiration were there weren't any. The suspect had no alibi and a good motive. Hannibal had never seen them disagreeing like that.

Maybe he should interject, say something, and make an effort towards reconciliation. Maybe. But they both had compelling arguments and the heating of that office was making him uneasy. Not to mention how strangely light-headed he felt. It was probably nothing, so he simply continued listening to the discussion.

He was about to interject something supporting Will's argument when the world started becoming strange. He was oddly dizzy and could see Will and Alana in front of him, but their features were becoming blurred, unclear, faded. They were there, but they were no longer there. Just as he was. What a strange sensation. And it was just too hot in that damned room. The desks, the chairs, even the walls seemed to be losing definition. He closed his eyes, trying to focus, see things better.

Hannibal could hear the voices of Will and Alana in the background, fading out. But why were they in the background? Weren't they just in front of him? Then why were they so far away?

Before he could begin understanding these confusing thoughts, the room started spinning around him dangerously and he tried to go some place for support, but didn't make it. He heard his name in the distance. He felt nauseated. The world disappeared.

There was darkness.

And he lost control.

Alana was angry about this case, she'd had a bad day and now Will was hell-bent on denying the obvious and making them stay extra-long. He was seeing things that weren't there, theories about super complex framing that simply didn't make a lick of sense to her. Will, on the other hand, could see everything clearly: how this man had manipulated evidence, done everything on moments were he knew this other man was alone. The suspect they had on custody was as much a victim of this as were the people in the morgue. More than that, he was the intended victim. And that was why he had to prove Bloom wrong, because they were just falling into the killer's trap. Doing exactly what he wanted. And it was making him angry.

Maybe it was the oppressive atmosphere of the room, too. Whoever worked there had the heating turned on badly.

"Accept it, Will. This man is guilty: he wanted to kill those girls and he did it. We have the tools he did it with, we have the times, we have evidence and we have him on all the crime scenes." Alana said, bored and tired.

"Can't you see it? It's just too clean, they put it in there!"

Will then remembered they were not alone in the room.

"What do you think, Dr. Lecter?"

Nothing.

"Dr. Lecter?"

Both of them looked at the man in time to see his eyes close and the man himself, the strong elegant and smart Hannibal Lecter falling to the floor unceremoniously. Alana breathed an "oh my god" while Will hurried and was able to stop his fall a bit before the psychiatrist's head hit the floor and laid it as gently as he could on the floor.

"Dr. Lecter?"

The doctor was on the floor, unconscious, arms spread to the sides. Lifeless. Will realized he had never seen the doctor looking so pale. Alana was there in seconds, kneeling in the floor next to her fallen friend and mentor.

"Hannibal? Can you hear me?"

There was no answer.

"Should we call an ambulance?" Asked Will, concerned.

He didn't like Hannibal's pallor. Or the fact that he had fallen on the floor unconscious. This man was his anchor. And he had ignored him all day.

"Let's just give him a minute. It was probably this heat, nothing else. Just… help me move him to that couch, ok?"

The next minutes , the fight completely forgotten, they focused on tending to the unconscious – in perfect harmony. They laid him on the couch and elevated slightly the legs, just as instructed in many first aid classes. Alana eased the man's tie and undid the first button his shirt so he could breathe more easily. She also took the silk handkerchief from Lecter's jacket pocket and soaked it in water. She'd taken it from a bottle she had retrieved from her bag and put it on the man's forehead to ease the heat a bit. She also opened the door and the window so more air could come in. Now they could only wait.

After putting Hannibal on the couch, Will had simply watched how Bloom worked. He didn't like this. Hannibal was lifeless, unmoving, pale – exactly like the dead bodies they visited. He could see him as the victim of a killer. Stabbed, shot, strangled. Dead. The things that were different, his imagination made similar. One of the doctor's arms had fallen to the side. It was grotesque. A responsive Hannibal would never carry his limbs like that. And why did he have to look so pale? How come he hadn't noticed it before?

Will simply couldn't deal with this. It was too much.

He's just unconscious, he tells himself, it's just a fainting spell.

Alana had noticed the way Will was looking.

"Don't worry, he'll be okay." She said, getting up and going towards Will. He looked anxious and uneasy. "You care about him, don't you?"

Alana's tone was soothing and calm and Will liked it. But Hannibal was still unresponsive.

"I… just… sometimes I hate the man and how he plays with my mind, you know? But he helps, and he is there through all of this horror and he helps me recognize thoughts and emotions.. .Help me sort out my head, sometimes even thoughts I didn't know were there. And here's there to talk about other things, too, and I just… It's being too long, isn't it? We should call someone, he's not waking up."

"Wasn't Dr. Keyes visiting?" Alana remembered. Dr. Keyes is a surgeon turned coroner, a bit of a star in the academic circles and she'd seen him in around the halls. " And I'm sure there's plenty of doctors around. Just wait here, I'll get one to take a look at him."

She went and left Will pacing around the couch with the unconscious doctor. He couldn't lose Lecter too. He just couldn't.

When Hannibal opened his eyes (which was strange, since he didn't remember closing them) he was not in front of Will and Alana as he'd been. In fact, he wasn't even standing. Lazily, he took that compress from his forehead and tried to get on a sitting position, but a hand on his shoulder stopped him.

"Easy there...you've been out for over three minutes." Will's voice said.

"I was?"

Right now, everything was a bit confusing for Hannibal.

"Yeah, you fainted. Bloom has gone to find a doctor, you just sit there, don't move around much."

Will breathed, relieved. Hannibal was awake and apparently okay. One less thing to deal with.

"Next time give us a heads up or something, okay?" Will commented, trying to let the anxiety out. "Alana almost screamed."

Hannibal finally sat, even if he still felt quite light-headed and tried to focus on Will.

"I apologize. But this is not something I have the habit of doing, I assure you."

A couple of minutes later Alana came back with a doctor who gave the psychiatrist a small check up. Nothing seems to be wrong. Lecter insisted he was fine and that it was just the heat of the room combined with exhaustion from a long day, but he still looked too pale for both Will and Alana.

The case and their disagreement completely forgotten, they went with Hannibal to the parking lot and insisted on taking him home. They even went with him to his door, where Alana gave him a long hug. Because in all the time she'd known him she'd never seen Hannibal so vulnerable and she wanted to, making him know she was there. And he still looked a bit out of it.

"Next time, if you're not feeling okay, tell us, will you? And take care of yourself, all right? We don't want that to happen again."

Hannibal nods and waves her goodbye.

When Will is about to do the same, he notes the doctor's hands faltering a bit and how he is leaning on the door for support. It's been a couple of hours since he passed out, but he was still feeling a bit woozy.

A bit light-headed. A bit wrong.

"Need any help?"

"I am all right." He insists, because he doesn't want to worry Will in excess and he knew the

But Will is not happy until he sees the doctor safely inside.

"Is there something on your mind, Will?" Hannibal said when he saw the man just standing there, looking at him.

"I'm sorry we were too focused on our conversation and didn't see that you were unwell. We should have done something."

Hannibal wanted to interject something but Will stopped him before he did.

"It's just… you scared me. Dropping to the floor so violently. Like Alana said, don't do that again, ok?"

Hannibal managed a small smile, touched by the concern of the profiler.

"I will try."

Will went away and tried to forget about the incident, to no avail.

Deep down, he knows that the image of Hannibal Lecter pale and unconscious (so lifeless, so quiet) will haunt his dreams.

A/N: Hope you enjoyed ;)

Always looking forward to your reviews!