A/N: Apologies for the delay in publishing this chapter. Take it as a given that I'm always sorry for delays, that I have stuff (don't you just hate stuff?!) getting in the way of my planned writing time and that although progress is slow, it's also steady.

Thanks to those of have read the story so far - it will now be my re-imagining of Season 1 and longer than initially planned. I hope you'll stick around :) Feedback has been more forthcoming on another fic site I'm posting on (*cough* AO3 *cough*) so I'd love to know what readers over here think. Please leave a comment/review if you can. :)

TW this chapter for canon-typical violence and blood, lots of blood.

Chapter 4

Will kills the engine and squints through the rental car's windshield, sun bright and high in the cloudless sky. They're parked in front of a cookie-cutter tract house, surrounded by trees and shrubs that are beginning to turn copper and gold as fall transforms the landscape from lush and green to the sparse, withering amber of winter; dead leaves abound, bleak but beautiful.

In his peripheral vision, Will can see Hannibal watching him, lips upturned as though he's privy to some scintillating secret. Will turns to face him, "What are you smiling at?"

The smile fades from Hannibal's mouth but still manages to crease the corners of his eyes. "Getting to peek behind the curtain."

Will huffs out a gruff breath and unfastens his seatbelt, unsure of exactly which curtain Hannibal is referring to peeking behind; the FBI's or his own. "Well, what's behind the curtain isn't always as fascinating as people imagine," he says, almost rolling his eyes, before he slips his glasses off and pinches at the bridge of his nose to ease the band of tension that is steadily tightening across his brow.

"Another headache?"

"No need to be concerned, Doctor," Will answers wryly and reaches into his pocket, producing a small white bottle, rattling the pills inside for effect, "I brought my own aspirin this time."

The direct reference to their first meeting brings a knowing smirk back to Hannibal's lips and Will finds himself mirroring it before he catches the slip-up, drops his gaze, and pops two of the pills into his mouth, swallowing them dry.

They've spent the whole morning together. Impromptu breakfast at the motel (a peace-offering from the man, or possibly a lure; he's not yet sure which) followed by the first of the day's investigative tasks; a visit to the cramped trailer office of a local construction site (the only one in the state to use the type of sheet metal that proved a match with the sliver they'd found on Elise Nichols' body) so that they could search through endless personnel files, looking for anything that might bring them closer to finding the identity of the Minnesota Shrike.

The tension between them has abated by this point, at least to a degree. The silences feel less charged, their exchanges more cordial. Will finds his reaction to Hannibal curious; a bewildering combination of aversion and attraction. From their first encounter, he had felt both disconcerted by and grudgingly appreciative of Hannibal's unflinching attention. It's no secret that he had been less than thrilled by the good Doctor's unanticipated appearance in Jack's office - and more than pissed off to realize that he was there, in part, to take on the role of professional babysitter to his fragile psyche - but Will doesn't have a high enough opinion of himself to presume that the psychiatrist's placement at Quantico was anything other than an ill-fated coincidence. Even though he hadn't planned on seeing the man again, much less investigating a case alongside him, Will isn't exactly a stranger to feeling discomfort at work; he'll deal with it, just like he's learned to deal with everything else. He'll build a fort, bolt the door. In truth, he'd rather put up with the skin-prickling awkwardness of Hannibal knowing him in a substantially more intimate way than any of his other colleagues than face the toe-curling embarrassment of confessing to Jack - and Alana, if she doesn't know already, (they are 'old friends', after all) - that the reason he doesn't want Doctor Lecter, in particular, keeping tabs on him is because they had shared a night of semi-anonymous sex just weeks before.

And despite how he'd first reacted when he found a grinning Hannibal Lecter on his motel room doorstep at the crack of dawn, he's glad now to have had this little time alone with him - without Jack or anyone else around - to clear the air, to make his boundaries clear. (Not that Hannibal necessarily wants to sleep with him again - he knows he's not exactly a catch - but, whether its real or imagined, he feels like he can still see that shameless, seductive glint in Hannibal's eye when he looks at him; that he can feel that same interest he'd laid bare before, can hear it in that silky-smooth voice, and it - as well as his own reaction to it - is…inconvenient). Will knows that he has too many emotions that aren't his own clouding his judgment, undermining his fragile sense of himself and complicating even his most casual relationships. He can't afford to let anyone get too close. Momentary lapse in judgment and undeniable attraction to the man aside, that door is now closed, and it should stay that way (even if he thinks he can already feel Hannibal toying with the latch).

Will exits the car, Hannibal tailing behind him, and scans the carefully tended yard as he readies himself to follow up on the lead that has brought them here, to the outskirts of Bloomington, Minnesota. It all appears to be perfectly ordinary; a normal house in a normal neighborhood. Appearances, though, can be deceptive and if Will is on the right track - if the simple omission of a forwarding address on Garret Jacob Hobbs' resignation letter (a needle plucked from a haystack; hundreds of resignations, union membership forms, payroll files, now seized and boxed, held in the trunk of the rental) is evidence of this man's desire to hide, to buy himself extra time while his residence is traced in the event of an investigation just like this (which is why he wants to visit him right away, before the news of the FBI searching the office of his former employer gets out) - then there is a chance that hiding behind this perfectly normal facade is a cannibalistic serial killer; the antithesis of normal.

Will looks back to find Hannibal following slowly behind him. He seems hesitant, and from what little Will knows of him so far, he isn't a man prone to hesitation - in fact, he'd attest that quite the opposite is true; unlike Will, he seems to know himself, to act with purpose, sure and confident in every move he makes - but before Will opens his mouth to tell him to keep up, he hears the sharp, creaking sound of a door swinging open, a plaintive gasp, and whips his head back toward the house in time to see a woman being shoved out over the threshold, clutching her throat, blood already drenching her clothes as more seeps through her fingers, and she falls, doll-like, onto the porch as the door slams shut behind her.

Will rushes to the woman's side, attempts to stem the flow of blood but it's clear that it's already too late; her eyes are unblinking, unseeing, and her arms, streaked in crimson, gashed with defensive wounds, fall lifeless to her sides. Will grabs for his gun with a blood-slicked hand, kicks in the flimsy front door and calls out the name of the man who, it would seem by his actions, has just admitted his guilt.

Inside, just beyond the doorway of the kitchen, a short, slight man holds a knife against a girl's throat - the girl just like the others that are missing, as he knew she would be; late teens, slim, auburn-haired and pale-skinned - and she squeals, high-pitched with fear, as the man starts to haul the blade across her throat. At that motion, something snaps in Will, a reflex to protect, and without pause, he fires his gun. (He'd hesitated before, back when he was still working homicide in New Orleans; it had gotten him shot, ended an innocent life and cost him his career as a cop. He isn't sure why it feels different this time, juse knows he won't let that happen again). He squeezes the trigger a second time, a third and fourth and fifth, until the knife falls from the man's hand, his body thrown back and away from the girl now bleeding out on the kitchen floor.

The room spins vertiginously, the air thick with the acrid scent of propellant layered with the dissonant aroma of sausage and pancakes, still warm on the stove. Will drops his gun, sinks to his knees and paws uselessly at the gushing wound on the girl's neck, hands trembling from the rush of adrenaline, from growing panic, as her blood rushes out, stark against her alabaster skin, like spilled wine as it flows dark and slick across the tile floor.

Blood feels like it's all around him; warm on his hands, covering his arms, smeared across his glasses and flecked wet, still warm, on his face. The organic hum of it rushes in his ears and it feels hot and slippery, syrupy-thick, beneath him. It puddles under the man, who must be Garret Jacob Hobbs, where he slumps against the kitchen counters, like a marionette whose strings have been snipped, and trickles from the murderer's slack mouth before there's a rasping, garbled sound and then, soft but clear, he says, "See?" with a blood-curdling smile in his eyes before the flicker of life leaves them dark, blank, his body limp. In the moment Will does see; can't help but see, and it terrifies him.

There's a firm touch to Will's forearm, drawing his attention away from the man he has just killed, causing him to flinch, and Hannibal is kneeling beside him, moving Will's hands away from where they are failing to staunch the endless flow of blood from the slash to the girl's wind-pipe, so that he can circle it with his own firm, steady hand instead in a methodical, life-saving grip. She gasps for every impossible breath, blue eyes wide with shock and horror; her family brunch turned into a bloodbath. "I'm sorry," he says - thinks he says - before a uniformed officer is pulling him upright and he's outside, leaning his weight against the rental car, sirens blasting and lights flashing around him as paramedics rush toward the house, the porch where the lifeless body of Mrs. Hobbs still lies, beyond help. One of them pauses to ask Will, "Are you injured? Is this your blood?" while he shakes his head 'no' and says simply, "Inside."

He stays there, slumped against the car, breath ragged in the stagnant air, and relives that same moment again and again as an endless blur of activity ripples around him, until the girl's body is hauled out on a stretcher, neck dressed in thick gauze, her blood-soaked hair accentuating the unnatural pallor of her skin, and Hannibal by her side - the man who saved her life while it almost slipped through Will's fingers. Hannibal looks at him as he passes and reaches a bloody hand to briefly, firmly, squeeze his shoulder. "I'll be at the hospital," he tells Will. "Call Jack."

Will nods and watches them pile into the back of the ambulance, the door slamming as the vehicle careens down the narrow road, a swirl of red, dead leaves tumbling on the asphalt in its wake. He pulls himself upright, closes his eyes and attempts to arrange his thoughts into some semblance of order so that he can tell Jack everything that just happened, that he'd managed to do what no one thought he would, what he couldn't before; he'd pulled the trigger, taken one life to protect another. He wipes his hands on the clean tails of his shirt, gets rid of as much drying blood as he can, before pulling his phone out of his pocket with still-shaking hands and scrolling to Jack's number. As he waits for him to answer, he realizes that the harsh ringing sound on the line doesn't make him wince like it usually does, and that the headache that's been plaguing him for weeks, months now, has all but gone.

He tells Jack - as coherently as he can - about what happened; it's a little frenetic, he's sure, lacking the clarity it calls for but his body is still coming down from the flood of panic and surging chemicals, his voiced raised to be heard over the chatter of officers and paramedics, the murmur of idling car engines.

"I'm not sure exactly how many times I pulled the trigger."

"It'll all show in the report. You did what you had to, Will. If the girl survives, we'll hear what she has to say," Will flinches at that; if. "Get cleaned up, get some rest and get back here on the first flight you can."

"I want to see the girl first."

The girl - Will has left her without a father and her father has left her without a mother. The weight of that feels heavy on his shoulders, not least because he can still feel a lingering peal of paternal attachment from her father; she was special to him, despite what he almost did; he wanted to keep her close, keep her with him, always. He was scared to lose her. Will can still feel an echo of his fear, his compulsion to protect what is - was - so precious to him.

"Will—"

"I just…I just need to go to the hospital, Jack. Doctor Lecter is already there with her."

"Okay," he says, somewhat placated. "Okay, good. Talk to Doctor Lecter. Have him call me. And rest, Will. You did good. We'll talk again soon."

Will nods, as if Jack can see him from the other end of the phone, and ends the call.

The drive from Bloomington to the motel in Duluth is a blur; his hands are still tacky from blood and it clings to the steering wheel as he drives. He isn't sure how he'll explain that to the rental company, but he'll worry about that later. No way to cover that with the protective sheeting one of the CSIs had given him, alongside an evidence bag for his clothes, "Just in case," she'd said.

When he's safely inside his room he strips, bags his bloody clothing as carefully as he can manage and climbs into the shower, heedless of the fact the water has yet to warm up.

His skin prickles with gooseflesh under the cold spray and he feels, for a moment as he watches the water flow pink around his feet, that someone else is there, in the room with him. He tenses, grips the shower curtain and yanks it back, but all that's there is his own shadow against the chipped bathroom tile, spectral in the bleached glow of the strip light. He's not sure if it's relief he feels or something else, but lets out a long, deep breath, pulls the curtain back into place and scrubs his skin until it hurts, until the water runs clear.

When Will arrives at the hospital to see the girl - Abigail - there's a police officer guarding the door to her room, looming like a dark shadow amidst the pastel scrubs of the medical staff. He flashes his badge and enters to find Hannibal still there, in the chair by her bed, fast asleep. He feels a strange senseless relief at the sight of him. His face soft, hair falling over closed eyes. His hand rests on the bed, covering Abigail's, and the slight stretch in the position bares his shirt cuff, shows the bloodstains there, dark and devastating against the crisp white cotton. Will feels a pang of guilt for dragging him into this, his first day of working in the field with the FBI and he saw two lives taken, helped to save a third.

Will sits at the opposite side of the bed, settles in the chair and looks at Abigail Hobbs. Her face is achingly pale, dotted with freckles that earlier, when she had been laying on the kitchen floor bleeding under his hands, he'd thought might have just been specks of spattered blood. She looks painfully young amidst the tubes and wires, frail under the fluorescent light.

He slumps in the uncomfortable chair, eyes flitting between them both, neither stirring in his presence. Hannibal looks placid in slumber; Will hadn't dared look at him like this last time. He wonders if the Doctor will have nightmares about what he saw today. He'd remained so calm in the face of the savagery they'd witnessed, calmer than Will had. He wonders what it might take to rattle him; if anything can.

Sleep soon takes him, too; the lulling pulse of the heart monitor strangely soothing. He dreams of a dark stag, with vast, twisting, black antlers, its scruff adorned with a plume of raven feathers, entering the room and simply watching him, silently. He doesn't attempt to chase it away, just allows it to idle in the doorway, unsure if its function is that of predator or protector. It makes him feel unsettled, but not afraid.

The fluorescent grey of the hospital room stings when he eventually blinks awake. He looks at his hands first, is sure he can feel the thick film of blood on them, but when he looks, they're clean. As clean as they can be under the circumstances. He's aware of eyes on him instantly, straightens his posture, runs a hand through his hair and looks across Abigail's still form to find Hannibal, awake and straight-backed as he watches him with almost scientific curiosity.

"Will."

"I wanted to see for myself that she was still alive."

"She is, thanks to you."

Will blinks, tilts his head in not-quite agreement. "She didn't bleed out, thanks to you."

"We both played our part."

"Well, my part orphaned her."

Hannibal considers Will carefully for a moment, lips drawn into a small pout before he speaks, softly. "You did what had to be done, Will."

"I know," he says quietly and clasps his clammy hands between his thighs. He wonders if they'll ever really feel clean again. "That's what Jack said."

"There are worse things one can be than an orphan," Hannibal says with a surety that implies deeper significance. "She is hardly alone with both of us here, now, concerned for her wellbeing."

"She'll be okay?" He'd already spoken to a nurse on the way in, but still, he wants to hear it again. Needs the reassurance.

"She lost a lot of blood, naturally, but there is every chance she'll make a full physical recovery."

"Physical recovery." But what about her mental recovery? This poor kid; witness to her mother's murder, almost killed by the father she watched die, shot multiple times by an FBI special agent. Now comatose, and when she wakes up she'll have to find out that her dad was the Minnesota Shrike.

Hannibal sems to hear what he leaves unvoiced. "She will undoubtedly require extensive therapy."

Will nods and avoids Hannibal's eyes. "A future patient."

"Perhaps."

He's sure 'extensive therapy' is no exaggeration. He grimaces at the part he's played in her trauma. Neither of them say anything for what feels like too long. Will breaks the silence by asking, "Are you…okay?"

Hannibal's eyes crinkle, apparently warmed by Will's concern. "I'm fine. I was an ER trauma surgeon prior to turning to psychiatry. I regret to say, I have seen worse."

Will nods, a small, sorrowful motion. Something they have in common, then. Feeling self-conscious, he diverts his gaze, and thoughts, back to Abigail. It's striking how much the girls her father had chosen looked like her. She'll have to learn that, too, when she wakes up - learn to live with it. He swallows, stands to stretch his stiff legs.

Hannibal's eyes raise to meet his. "How are you, Will?"

"I have no idea." He huffs out a humorless breath of laughter and runs a hand through his hair just for something to do, moves towards the end of the hospital bed, edging closer to the door. "I think I'll go get some coffee."

"Have you eaten?"

Not since the breakfast you made me, he thinks, but voicing that feels somehow too raw, too familiar. He just shakes his head instead, shoves his hands into his pockets.

"Nor have I." Hannibal stands smoothly, circles the bed to stand beside Will as he looks pointedly at his watch. "It's late. We would both benefit from getting some food, and some proper rest."

"I'd rather stay here, with Abigail."

Hannibal cocks his head as he looks at him contemplatively. "For her sake or for your own?"

"What is that supposed to mean?"

"It means that there is little to be achieved by our remaining here all night."

"You waited here with her until now."

Hannibal simply looks at him with a laconic quirk of his brow that implies it wasn't just Abigail he was waiting for. "She is under expert care, and police supervision. We can leave instruction to be contacted should she wake up. When she does, we would only be asked to leave while she is examined in any case," he pauses, steps closer and lowers his voice, "Perhaps the first thing she sees when she wakes shouldn't be the men who were present for her father's death, and her injury."

Will knows that Hannibal is right - he probably always is. For that very reason he doesn't want to admit it. He stays silent, bites at the inside of his cheek as he looks back to Abigail.

"Rest for what will no doubt be a busy day tomorrow would be more beneficial." Hannibal continues, drawing Will's gaze back to him. "Unless you simply do not wish to be alone."

He lets a harsh huff of breath slip from his lips. "No need to worry about that, Doctor. I always have my imagination to keep me company."

"Precisely my point. Maybe corporeal company would be more beneficial tonight." He reaches out and places a hand softly below Will's elbow, a gesture of the comfort he's offering. Will fights the innate desire to lean into it as Hannibal continues to speak, tone as tender as his touch, "We have both been through something traumatic today. You in particular. I will admit that I would rather not face the evening alone, either."

Will lets his eyes linger on the dried blood stain on Hannibal's shirt cuff before glancing at his face, allowing his own voice to soften. "Misery loves company?"

"A more apt idiom, in this case, would be a problem shared is a problem halved."

"I'm not in the mood for a therapy session," he says, more of a condition than a refusal, and forces himself to pull away from the tempting warmth of Hannibal's hand.

Hannibal is still looking at him thoughtfully, soft amber eyes belying the stern set of his jaw. "Nor am I. However, it would be beneficial for us both to lean on each other at this difficult time."

"Did you talk to Jack?" He asks and Hannibal nods, once. Will sucks in a steely breath. "Did he ask you to do this? To watch me?"

"He did, however that is not the only reason I'm asking."

Will purses his lips, annoyed by the implication that he's too fragile to be left alone. He appreciates Hannibal's honesty, though, as well as - if he's honest with himself - the unspoken inference: not the only reason.

"Come back to my hotel, it's more spacious than your…room. We'll order in a light dinner and can talk if you wish, or…"

Hannibal leaves the alternative hanging; bait on the hook, to see if he'll bite. He licks his lips, then frowns at his own telling, if involuntary, reaction to the purposely ambiguous proposal as he looks down at the polished floor, at the door and then, finally, at Hannibal. "Or?"

"Or we could engage in any other activity you feel would be beneficial. Talking is not the only effective means of communication we have at our disposal."

Will swallows dryly, his throat audibly clicking as he watches Hannibal watch him; his eyes dip to Will's throat, his Adam's apple, causing him to remember the feel of Han—Hannibal's lips there, teeth scraping dangerously, deliciously at his throat. The door he'd previously closed is being tested, pried open; he knows the latch is about to give, but he still can't help but fight it. "What I think you're suggesting would be unethical under the circumstances, Doctor Lecter."

"You are not my patient, Will."

Will feels his pulse quicken, shoves his hands back into his pockets to stop them from betraying him, from reaching out to touch. "Not officially," he blinks back at him, resolve ever-weakening. "But we're colleagues."

"By the narrowest definition," Hannibal replies without hesitance. "Two separate consultants for the same institution. We each have other professional concerns. Our extracurricular association hardly poses any significant conflict of interests."

Will's eyes narrow and he worries at the skin inside his bottom lip, searching for another excuse to deny himself the comfort that suddenly craves, but knows can't possibly come without some kind of complication, now. His mind grasps for eloquence, for an objection that won't come.

Hannibal takes a step closer, dips his head so that Will is forced to meet his penetrating gaze. "Have your concerns been sufficiently addressed?"

Will pouts, still considering - or at least, pretending to.

"If you remain unconvinced, perhaps I could attempt to appeal to your better nature," Hannibal pauses, allows a small smirk to curve his pink lips. "I have no transportation; you drove us to the Hobbs house this morning and I rode the ambulance here. I would appreciate a ride from you, Will, if nothing more."

Will sighs softly in surrender (even if the seemingly innocent request for a ride sounds anything but in that sultry voice, that salacious tone). He's in no hurry to return to his motel room, to look at his battle-stained clothes and face the nightmares that are bound to come, asleep or awake. And he feels calmer for having seen with his own eyes that Abigail Hobbs is alive; he needed the image of her bleeding, wide-eyed and wounded at the scene of a crime (fuck - multiple crimes) to be replaced by something more sedate, if not yet settling.

"Okay."

"Okay?"

"I'll drive you back."

"And dinner?"

"I don't have much of an appetite," Will says, and Hannibal frowns deeply. The sight pains him more than it should. He aches to give in, to relive their previous night together, to draw from Hannibal's strength. The case is all but over, anyway; maybe Jack Will let him go back to teaching, now the Minnesota's Shrike's gone. He lets his eyes fall shut, rolls his neck until it cracks, and adds, "But I could murder a drink."

He instantly winces at his unfortunate choice of words, shakes his head slightly, tenses his lips in apology as he glances at Hannibal.

"As could I," Hannibal replies, seemingly unperturbed by Will's slip of the tongue, and moves to collect his ruined suede jacket. He folds it over his arm and returns to stand at Will's side, close enough that Will can feel his body heat.

"Just a drink, though," Will says, utterly unconvincingly even to his own ears.

"Hmm, we'll see. A man must eat," Hannibal says, eyes dark in conquest as he motions towards the exit, urging Will to lead the way to what will surely be his own downfall.

He casts a lingering glance back at Abigail, the steady zigzag line on the heart monitor beside her bed. When he looks back to Hannibal, he can't deny he feels a sudden stab of hunger. Decision made, he swallows his reservations and heads towards the open door.