"Hello, Madeleine," the voice slithered through the quiet stillness of the living room.

"Dr. Lecter," she nodded with polite stiffness from her perch on the couch.

"I trust you are well."

"Physically? Yes, thank you."

"Mentally, though..."

She shrugged. "It's quite disconcerting to find that your real life is fiction and fictional works are now fact."

"I should think it would be easy for a writer of fiction to adjust to the situation — you have complete freedom to write the story as you like."

"Hardly. Stories depend on the characters to act according to their nature. Otherwise they lose credibility, and with it, the readership. If no one reads it, there's no story."

"True, indeed."

"So what is it you want from me — why have you done this?"

"Simple, really. You shall write for me."

She laughed bitterly. "But I haven't written a single publishable work. I'm just a fan-fic hack with a mundane day job. Surely there are better writers..."

"Dearest Madeleine, don't sell yourself short. Many fan-fiction writers are better than they realize — you yourself admire some of them greatly. All they need to get published are their own characters and settings." He paused, contemplating. "In some ways, though, the really good ones are more talented than the original authors, because it takes more to get inside someone else's head, to get a good feel for another's imaginary worlds, than to pull things out of your own imagination. The field of psychology is similar. First you discover how your own mind works — quite a daunting task for most people — but it's infinitely more difficult to piece together the behavioral clues on how another person's mind operates. Few professionals actually achieve predictable results — the rest just muddle through. Anyway, it so happens I need a fan-fiction writer, and while there are more talented writers as you say, you were most convenient for my purposes."

A piece fell into place. "The Mountain comes to Mohammed. I'm flattered, Dr. Fell."

"Very good, Madeleine," he chuckled lightly.

"You're the mystery employee at BMF Inc with whom I've supposedly been working for the past few months."

"So, you recognize that little moniker of mine?"

She nodded. "You used it in Florence while playing museum curator just before Inspector Pazzi recognized you and you..." she trailed off in obvious disgust.

"He sold me," he explained mildly. "I merely gave him what Danté described as the just fate reserved for gluttony and treachery. But I did not take my pseudonym from the Old Norse fjall, or mountain. Rather, it was from the Latin fello for fierce, terrible or cruel. Causing death. Similar to felling a tree. Or already fallen. Or was it just a skin, from the Latin pellis, to pull over my inner organs, to make me a likeable fellow?" He smiled ghoulishly over his own pun.

"What if I'm not interested in working with you?" she asked cautiously.

"Well!" he exclaimed as if he hadn't considered that she might refuse. He drew in a sighing breath, "Perhaps I'll be in the mood for 'Jim'-balaya Brass...no? Perhaps an appetizer of 'Grahams' au foie-'Gris'?"

"You can't do that," she blanched.

"Why not? It's in my nature to do so." He winked one crimson-tinged eye.

"You can't kill canon characters — to do so would change the canon story! It's a basic fan-fic rule: the events must interact seamlessly with canon in order to maintain credibility. You could try it, and occasionally it might work if the side-plot really pulls it off, but then you dead-end the story, and more importantly, you risk turning off the fan readers who love these characters. And without the readers—"

"—the story dies. Well, I can always move on to the next writer. Leaving you here, along with the leftovers in the fridge, of course," rubied orbs grinned at her.

She blinked rapidly, digesting the idea before regurgitating, "OK, what is it you wish me to write? If it's not too objectionable, I guess it would be better than the alternative."

"That's my girl, Madeleine. I think you will find it most agreeable. It's simple, really. I'm getting on in years, and retirement with my love has been rather enticing. All that killing, as pleasurable as it was, is a younger man's game nonetheless. We just want to be left in peace the rest of our days, so I don't have to keep swatting at gnats. Surely you can do that?"

"It's agreeable," she had to admit — more than she would have hoped. "I'll see what I can do to help."

"Good."

"Dr. Lecter?"

"Mmm?" he answered her girlish plea with the magnanimous tone of a man who had everything he wanted.

"Why Jim?" Simple curiosity.

Interesting, he thought. "Why not? You clearly like him for his human qualities. And so many fans overlook him. Doesn't he deserve some happiness?" Malice lurked beneath the bland expression. "His name fit the story pretty well, too. Perhaps that's why..."

With a flutter of curtains, he was gone as suddenly as he had appeared.