Chapter 12
Phoenix
'There is no murder. We make murder, and it matters only to us."
Red Dragon, Thomas Harris
When their anniversary rolled around, Will had been embarrassed that he was the one to forget.
He liked to defend himself with the fact that he'd been submerged in life; between four consecutive appointments for hormone treatments at the clinic, applying for research grants for his new look into the hierarchical scale of insect larva in corpses dependant on environmental and external factors, and putting his own house on the market with all that entailed. To make matters worse his therapies had been playing havoc with Hannibal's, normally utterly reliable, cycles; mood swings were not something he was used to dealing with.
The first sniff of something odd had been his sudden urge to be overly protective of Will. It had become so bad at one point that Hannibal had actively fronted on the postman for making small talk when delivering a parcel. Then suddenly he was exhausted on coming home from work, no matter if it was a regular or backshift. Then the unseasonal rut had started in earnest, and Will had forced Hannibal to take time off work.
Which Will hadn't realised would maybe compound the problem that he hadn't realised was even there. Before Hannibal had been too tired to do much else but sleep. Once he and Will were home together for the full twenty four hours, their reciprocal hormones popping off like fireworks at the slightest provocation, things got out of hand; said provocation being anything from inadvertently touching each other to simply walking into a room with the other already in it.
Which had led to arguments. Which had led to isolating themselves. Which had led to not being able to stand being apart. Which had led to doing little else for four straight days but fuck, eat and sleep. Most of the time it had been reasonable. Hannibal always was. Sometimes it had been unreasonable. The forced nature of the rut had led to a couple of rather surprising encounters.
And an unsavoury one. The livid bruises at Will's wrists could attest to that.
Things had been strained. He wouldn't lie to himself about it. Instead he avoided it because the thought of the fallout ruining the fragile life they were building was almost too much to bear.
"At least one of us had the time to make something of the day," Will said as he wiped his fingers on his napkin and smiled as far as was believable.
Coming home from the clinic, tired and antsy and fed up, to find the house in darkness hadn't helped. At first he'd wanted nothing more than to find Hannibal and curl himself around his mate. Then another part of him had wanted nothing more than to find a small corner, squeeze himself into it and stay there for the rest of the evening. Then he'd imposed his will on the situation and decided neither of those were viable.
Of course it hadn't been difficult to find Hannibal; he only had to use his nose. The dining room had flickered like a hidden chamber, where some secret rite was to be performed. The table was set with candles, frothed with unusual flowers and fruits and delicate origami parcels, multitudinous plates filled with succulent food prepared to within an inch of ambrosia.
Designed for sharing, as they sat together at the corner of the table; Hannibal at the head, Will to his right. Strips of spiced meat, freshly made pita breads, flavoured wild rice strewn through with sugar snap peas and tomatoes from the vine, clams and snails in garlic butter, perfectly cooked scallops with hollandaise and parsley, nuts and jams and cheeses and biscuits; the table was full, and soon Will was too.
He thought the last time he'd been so overwhelmed-ly grateful had been their honeymoon the year before. Even if, through the entire meal, Hannibal had appeared noticeably distracted while Will had tried to ignore the rising stress in the air.
"Stop looking at them," Will ordered.
Chewing on a choice piece of brie topped with loganberry jam, Hannibal blinked once before slowly raising his eyes away from Will's wrists. He sniffed and swallowed, his Adam's apple bobbing.
"You've been doing it all night," Will said.
"It is not without penance."
"You didn't mean to," Will wished he wasn't trying to convince himself with the statement.
"Part of me must have," Hannibal said bluntly, sitting back and clasping his hands upon his thigh; once more his eyes slid down to the bruises. They seemed to mist with regret and curiosity. It was the first they had talked of it since it had happened, and Will wasn't sure if he was relieved or anxious, "although I must wonder as to which part."
"Well now you're just being ridiculous."
"Am I?"
"Hit me."
Hannibal's eyes were quick to find his that time. He swallowed his food and frowned marginally.
"Excuse me?"
"Hit me."
"I do not wish to."
"You did then, without a second thought."
Hannibal stayed quiet.
"Well then," Will said reasonably, taking a long sip of the golden desert wine Hannibal had brought up from the cellar, "the part that made me this wonderful dinner on our anniversary can't be the part you're looking for, which is a good start. Maybe..."
"Yes?"
"We should talk about it."
"Alright."
"I mean..." and then he was stumped. Put him in a room with a corpse and Will Graham was your man. Ask him to talk about himself, and you weren't going to get very far. Will licked his lips and sighed, "is that something you want?" he asked cautiously, "Sexually?"
"Violence?" Hannibal tipped his head and frowned.
It was Will's turn to stay quiet. There was a thoughtful pause. One of the candles at the end of the table flickered in an unseen draught. Another went out as its wick was submerged in liquid wax.
"It was not violence I wanted," Hannibal explained, "It was...dominance. Though I am not sure if you..."
"Want me to lie and say I don't like it when you get possessive in bed? That's just insulting," Will said with a derisive laugh, "You honestly hadn't noticed?"
"I was unsure if I was simply projecting."
"No, you just didn't want to think I'd enjoy being possessed, considering how much of a stickler I am about being my own man. The distinction isn't that simple," Will said as he fiddled with the corner of his napkin, "and you know it. It's not about giving you power over me. It's about trusting you to give me what I need, without turning it into what you need. I trust you, Hannibal."
"Did you trust me not to hurt you?"
"I..." Will wasn't sure what to say: yes I thought you'd never go that far; yes I thought you weren't just like all the other alphas; yes I thought I could depend on you to always know when to stop. None of them seemed quite right, and the complicated nature of his understanding got in the way.
"I do not like the thought that I could harm you without compunction," Hannibal continued as Will stayed quiet, "Our relationship is a fine line between mutual attraction and power plays. My biology wishes for me to have control. My morality wishes to have you beside me as an equal. It is an animal want, to have power over others. I thought that I would be capable of rising above that."
"Animal nature is human nature, and rising above it is an abstract philosophy that the flesh doesn't adhere to," Will said, "In our state I doubt a house fire would have deterred us."
"And where does that line stop?" Hannibal asked.
It was clear to Will that Hannibal was testing the waters. They seemed to have waded into the shallows and Will hoped that they didn't sink unexpectedly into anything deep.
"The line between animalism and morality," Hannibal continued, "something you used to battle against in your work, that you still fight every day."
"I don't fight it," Will shrugged, taking another drink, "I try and understand it."
"But you always make sure to fall back down on the acceptable side," Hannibal stated, tipping his head slightly to the right.
The waters churned, threatened. Will wondered if he was putting his head underneath the surface a little too often.
"The only other alternative would be to..." he cleared his throat and frowned, "become what I'm trying to know. There's no place for that. Not here with us, and not out there with everyone else. It's safer just to be me."
"Yet parts of you have wished for the other, have they not? Violence and power."
The shallows deepened, turned dark. The waves were heavy and cresting. Will licked his lips and sighed harshly. He knew what Hannibal was trying to broach. This was not somewhere he liked to go when the waters were choppy.
"I didn't want power over Hobbs," he said bluntly, "I just wanted him dead."
"And you cannot forgive yourself for that."
"No," Will shook his head.
"And of the patients who have died on my operating table? Would you have me suffer under their loss?"
"You were trying to save them," Will said with a look that told Hannibal he didn't appreciate the patronising analogy, "sort of a polarised set of events, when you think about it."
"And if I had wished to let them die?"
"That's..." the waters were becoming dangerously close to uncharted, "what are you saying?"
"The link between life and death, it is the most desirable of powers to hold in one's hands. You have experienced it, tasted it, and abused it as you saw fit. Your animalism allowed you to do so, but your morality forces your desires to suffer for their choice."
"That's hardly out of the ordinary Hannibal. You want to be part of society, you have to pass it's test."
"But you do not follow society's laws," Hannibal pointed out, holding Will's stare, "which is why I ask, again, where does that line stop?"
Will swallowed and looked down at the table. His plate was littered with scraps of bread, small pieces of fat from the meat, shells of nuts and skins of fruit. Detritus left from the choice bits he had taken. Picking and choosing; it always caused scraps to be left in its wake.
"Maybe the line isn't as straight as you think," Will said, his eyes narrowing a little, "it's a flexible thing, not an iron rod in the ground."
"A litmus test of every second of living?"
"Mmm," Will shrugged, uncomfortable "I...know that the part of me that killed Hobbs is still there. It will always be there. Always be ready to do the same thing again."
And it was true. He knew it was, because the reason Hobbs had driven him to the brink was not because of guilt. He had liked it, and that scared him.
"We try our best to temper our nature, but it's a futile race. We're all the same, in the end. You want to do the right thing, but sometimes being the one with the control changes the effect. Moves the line."
When he looked up, Hannibal was watching him with a steady and yet captivated gaze.
"When I killed Hobbs, I felt...powerful," there was something freeing in telling someone, at least someone, how close he had felt in that moment to Hobbs. How close it had all come, spiralling towards a blurring of personality and need, "Is that how you feel, when you have someone under your knife?"
Hannibal smiled, seeming to find something funny in his phrasing that Will couldn't fathom.
"It is not that simple a concept," Hannibal said, crossing his legs, "though power is certainly a factor. The curiosity of 'what if' is more a driving force for my actions. A very human function; we will always consider all of our options, and dismiss those that do not suit us. In that sense, morality is subjective, though society is not. I have never knowingly allowed a patient to die at my hand, but who is to say that my subconscious desires have not wished to know what it would feel like?"
"And this is why you're worried about the bruises."
"You asked me to stop," Hannibal was once more utterly serious, "and I did not stop. You trusted me, and I betrayed that."
"But you regret it."
"Is that enough?"
"It has to be," Will tipped his head and pressed his lips together until they pursed; because believing that Hannibal didn't care was too much to endure, "Mitigating circumstances, drugged senses, confused boundaries: perhaps none of those matter."
Hannibal took a long breath and let it out slowly. He had the look of a man unwilling to believe that someone could be so magnanimous about something so contemptible.
"Maybe I'm willing to accept what you are, to a point. You said yourself that it's a part of you. The same way that killing Hobbs will always be a part of me. But we temper it. Somewhere beneath all that sophisticated training," Will let Hannibal reach up and take his hand in both of his own, cradling it, "you want me to do everything you say without question."
"And somewhere beneath all of your egalitarianism and your obstinacy," Hannibal ran his nose over the sensitive, purpled skin of Will's wrist, "you want to give me everything I wish of you."
"But I trust you not to impose that right."
"And I trust you to never change," Hannibal murmured, kissing his wrist softly.
Will shivered as the kiss became a slightly sloppy suck of flesh. His breath hitched as teeth scraped the sensitive skin. He could feel the slight stickiness of the jam, the wet, hot hopefulness of his pulse against Hannibal's canines. It was decadently erotic. He knew what it was: a test. Will wasn't the only one who didn't like to verbalise his feelings.
The fact that he could find it so was enough for Will to understand that Hannibal had accepted his forgiveness, and that, by proxy, he had forgiven him. Human nature was as oddly malleable, Will thought, as the line which held its boundaries in check.
And the line Hannibal had spoken of was trust.
"Trying to turn me into desert?" he murmured with a small smile.
"That could be arranged."
Things were taking too long. Will had walked over to open the window because, even in the late evening, the office was stuffy and his eyes stung from the recycled air. He was tempted to go out and breathe in the last of the sunlight, but the clock on the wall was ticking away their time with the irritating sound of someone tapping their fingers on a tabletop. Leaving the building felt like giving up.
He opened the pill case, always in his pocket, and took two aspirin dry. They were bitter against his tongue and his insides didn't appreciate it. Still.
He was restive. Uneasy.
This was taking too long.
The Dragon wouldn't hang around for them. Bunch of little pigs running in circles as they close in. Would he go out in a last stand? Death by cop or suicide had been Jack's predicted end for the Tooth Fairy; Will didn't think it seemed a fitting end for the Red Dragon.
On the flight out to St. Louis, they'd received a wire a wire to the pilot. Starling took the message. She had been unreadable when she returned to her seat, with the message that the Dragon had been in New York. Assaulted two women in an art gallery but not killed them. Will had been surprised until he'd heard about the true damage: a painting, devoured, eaten, consumed.
Blake's The Great Red Dragon and the Woman Clothed with the Sun.
It would have seemed hackneyed to anyone else, as it seemed to Jack if the shake of the man's head had been any indicator. Will knew it wasn't. It wasn't a namesake, not a prank, not a crazy trick. It wasn't that simple. Will currently had two theories circling for dominance.
That in consuming the Dragon, he had become one with his beast, the driving force within him.
Or he had conquered it.
Hoping for the second wasn't enough. Will wanted it to be true, if only to help ease the painful thought that one could overcome the dark parts that drove them. Move the boundaries of human nature back to their acceptable lengths. As for the act itself, the devouring was typical aggressive behaviour if he was truly conquering his inner demons. Yet if he were becoming one with the Dragon, it could also be viewed as cannibalistic – to draw power from the body parts consumed.
Which had led to pushing Jack. And Jack staying as still as a car up off its wheels on bricks. Starling had sensibly stayed well out of the conversation, staring down through the window at the clouds below. Will managed to find it only mildly disturbing that he was so fervent to contact Lecter.
"And what if I'm right?" Will had asked.
"It doesn't matter," Jack had rebutted sternly, "Lecter isn't going to know any more than you do."
"And all this after you brought me out here specifically to get information out of Hannibal," Will said facetiously.
"Don't change the issue."
"Ok, now I know you're just stonewalling me for the sake of it."
"You're pushing my buttons, Graham. No goddamn phone calls."
"I need to speak to him."
"No, you don't."
"This isn't a personal call, Jack."
"I really don't think there's such a thing as an impersonal call between you two."
It was something he couldn't deny, and so Will had stopped pushing.
Wanting to contact Hannibal hadn't been disturbing. What had been was the instant connection which had made him want to reach for the phone in the first place. Memories of the case that had consumed him in return, the haunting of the Chesapeake Ripper and his otherworldly displays. The want of his subconscious mind to wonder feverishly what it would be like to taste the flesh of one considered your own.
Four years ago, Venice. Hannibal had whisked them away to Italy with an ease that the 'poor little down home country boy' in Will found both disgusting and yet utterly captivating in its ease. The memory of the Gugenheim gallery, stuck away behind the bridge with its garish signs and its cold walls. Hannibal had pointed out a particular painting, small and dark and horrifying; Goya's Saturn Devouring his Son. The monstrous, bulging eyes above the already mutilated figure clasped in greedy hands, its head already gone, its bloody flesh open to the air, and its arm resting in the gaping mouth ready to be sucked from the bone. There was a feral quality to it, the wild and the uncivilised; qualities, he was sure, Goya would have been able to believe capable of such an unconscionable act.
'He's alone,' Will had said, noting the darkness that surrounded the figure, no background or other people in sight, 'that's where this exists. He wanted to make himself truly alone.'
'And yet he is lonely,' Hannibal had replied, watching the painting with a sense of calm quiet.
It had become one of the many little things that had added up to a bigger picture once the curtain dropped. Will couldn't understand, even though he wanted to. To get a perspective on the cannibalistic act – Will couldn't think of anyone better to tell him what he had thought it might mean, what the Dragon was trying to prove.
Later, as they'd arrived at Gateway, Will had managed to get a little bit of perspective on the thought. He wouldn't say it, but he was glad Jack had vetoed the call to Lecter. Discussing the man's happiness to consume human flesh would have maybe made him even crazier than the bourbon did.
But the itch to know still lingered, like a trailing hand at the base of his spine, and above all Will wanted to ask him:
Had he truly been lonely?
Jack was sitting at a nearby desk with Gateway's chief accountant on standby for pointers. Starling had worked as the liaison to the local P.D. Will would hand it to her, she did a great job. Quick, efficient and yet blankly friendly. The cops seemed to appreciate it, even if getting the quick and quiet cooperation of the local St. Louis P.D. had been an interesting experiment in societal norms. The first thing out of Lieutenant Fogel's mouth on meeting Will had been,
"Christ, how many pills you poppin' in the morning son? You smell like a rancid fat fryer," Fogel turned to Jack, "Shouldn't you be getting this omega out of the line of fire, Agent Crawford?"
It hadn't been the best of first impressions. Will had spoken his mind, and Starling had been left to mop of the ruffled feathers he left behind. Now Lt. Fogel didn't seem to like him very much. Will didn't care; the feeling was mutual.
Only four employees had been brought in. Further to the accountant helping Jack was the personnel manager, Fisk, his secretary Miss Trillman, and Dandridge the CO from Baeder Chemicals. No phones had been used; instead agents had called at their houses and stated the business privately so as to make sure they didn't use the phone after they'd been given the message. By the time Will and Jack arrived the confused group had been assembled.
Will caught sight of Jack's screen; he was still sifting through the Gateway and Baeder employees, quickly and efficiently. Crawford had organised everything to a T. Will continued to watch as Jack linked up the Gateway database with the Jimmy Price's F.B.I. Identification Section in Washington. He'd always been a marvel at this kind of thing. Will knew it. He knew it, and he believed in it.
It was just taking so damn long.
They had hoped for a quick I.D. from the tooth marks they'd taken from Freddie Lounds. Zeller had made a mould, showing the distinctive mess of canines and molars. No one had recognised them. There would be time to try for more and more employees, more and more sets of eyes, but the longer they stayed the riskier it got.
And time was passing – tick tock, fuck off clock – and secrecy couldn't be held onto forever. If someone here knew the perp and managed to warn him off, or even just to gossip at the Feds turning up at the office...their guy was spooked and gone and this would all be for nothing. The Dragon would be on edge. He'd be watching for anything suspicious and then he'd fly.
The thought had his stomach roiling. Will held his hand to his abdomen, feeling the dip just under his belly where the c-section scar pulled the muscle tightly in. He closed his eyes and, for a short moment, felt physically sick. The other hand went to his mouth and Will could feel the bile at his throat. It took a moment of closing his eyes, relaxing and swallowing before he realised his hands were shaking and he could taste blood at the back of his tongue.
The snake is easy prey until it sees the flash of the mongoose's eye beneath the house. Will looked up and thought he saw Hannibal standing beside him in the reflection of the window. When he turned it was to come face to face with Miss Trillman, a short, blonde haired, harassed looking woman. She was holding two plastic cups in her hands.
"Want some water, honey?" she asked, managing a smile.
Somehow he murmured out a 'thank you'. The water trembled in his hand. He took a sip and put it down, grimacing at the taste.
He looked away, down one of the long corridors lit with red exit signs. Damn, he thought, it feels right here, it feels right. Yet his hunches alone weren't good enough. They needed something concrete. Jack had asked for the woman from the Brooklyn museum, Miss Harper, to be flown down as soon as she could travel. Probably tomorrow. Crawford had thought she could maybe sit in a surveillance van and watch the employees go in.
Will didn't like it. Not only had the Dragon clearly been wearing a disguise from the reports given from the New York museum's staff, but Will knew that the longer they were here the more likely they would tip this guy off.
Does he know? Does he know I'm coming for him? Will caught the scent of the predator, hanging around through the dark rooms, watching the films develop, watching Mrs Leeds come home with her casual smile, watching Mrs Jacobi pick up the cat, her dark hair swinging.
Did you see them in the dark and know it was time for them to meet him? To meet the Dragon like you did?
"Hey, Will?"
When he turned it was to find Jack watching him steadily, while the accountant looked a little disconcerted. How did he look to them? He wondered absently. Can they see you clearly now?
"Yeah?" he said, doing his best to work around his own thoughts.
"List's done," Jack said without preamble.
Narrowed down so far and yet still so very many of them; twenty six white male employees between twenty and fifty years old who owned vans.Which one are you? Will asked the names neatly stacked on the screen, what name are you hiding yourself inside? The secretary printed out the list and handed it around the staff and police.
"DMV's getting us driver's licence information," Jack said as he continued to type, "hair colour might help for the descriptions given at the New York museum."
"Not if he was wearing a wig," Starling said without looking;
Will nodded in agreement, still staring at the list in his hand; his other was pressed to his bottom lip.
You work here, watching these people every day. There's you and then there's them; the gap is noticeable. You worry, don't you, about what they think of you? You worry; you assume and think their thoughts for them. Always the worst, that's what you imagine, isn't it. That they think you're ugly, odd, trash. You want to show them they're wrong. Prove it.
Was there anyone special? Did you see any of them, or did they see you? Any little building connections that you can't help forming because hell, in the end you're only human and even the broken ones need someone to care about them.
To understand.
"Will?" Jack sounded tired.
"Yeah?" he said, again not looking up.
"You're killing me here."
"I'm thinking," that gave him time, at least a little; he was glad Jack could be relied on for that, to give him what he needed.
Been a long time, hasn't it, for someone to let you be what you are?
"Quiet," he murmured, shaking his head; Hannibal smiled.
My little mongoose, how I miss you when you're away.
"Please, just..." Will closed his eyes and took a breath.
Can you see me yet? The darkness asked. When he opened his eyes the low light seemed sterile. It's what you would have seen five days a week, maybe more. Always hiding in the dark rooms, watching the films develop. It's where you wanted to be, because without the light people can't judge you, the way you've always been judged. Is that why she left you? Your mother? Were you born wrong and she didn't want you? You had to hide because that's the only way you could ever find what you needed. The only way the Dragon couldn't have you.
"Ok," Will cleared his throat, garnering a little attention; the staff looked alert but wary, the police looked jumpy, and Will couldn't stand the thought of dealing with them. Still, this wasn't about him.
Are you sure about that, dearest?
He ignored the jibe that seemed to come from just over his shoulder. When he felt the touch at his arm, for a mad moment he assumed it was all in his head. It came again and Will turned, blinking, to find Starling at his elbow. She watched him calmly. What came next raised his opinion of her once again.
"You see him," she said, "don't you."
"What?" he asked on instinct.
"You see him better than all of us, this guy. Let us see him too Will."
Jack stayed quiet, thought he had clearly heard. Will wasn't sure what to say. It had been so long since someone had been able to read him without speaking a word. No time, he thought, no time. He could sit and work it out and waste time they didn't have or he could act.
Will chose to act and started talking as his mind saw it, "You've got the list," he said to the staff; they were flagging, tired, and he needed them not to be, "he might be on here. He might not be. But you know this man," that had their attention.
Will suffered under their stares and continued, "I would say he's average, only because that's how he tries to portray himself. He doesn't come across as shy but he keeps to himself. Quiet. Reserved. He doesn't like to go out for drinks after work or turn up for team building days, but he's good about it. Always has a reasonable excuse and you don't mind. Because he's a good guy, even if he's a little bit of an oddball."
"And you don't blame him because he'd got his reasons, right? Like he lives alone and he's a little sensitive about his appearance. Doesn't like people commenting on it because he's worried about something. Something...about his face," and suddenly it slipped and wavered and all Will could think about was if the mirrors, the mirrors in their eyes, were to remind him of what he was while he was defiling them, to see himself, see himself, that he was an unworthy little piece of shit and you shouldn't even have the right to...
"Will?" Starling's voice, keeping him grounded.
"Sorry, I was thinking," he cleared his throat again and shivered; his stomach flipped over, "umm," he stalled, trying to calm down, they see you, Graham, they all see you, "He doesn't have a temper," he cleared his throat again, "and he doesn't fight back if someone has a go at him, even though he'll be built, powerful. You might not be able to tell because his clothing might not show it but he's strong. You didn't expect it. You may have seen him lift heavy things for others with little trouble, and that surprised you. You were a little impressed..."
"I..."
Fisk's secretary seemed surprised at herself that she'd interrupted, drawing the gaze of a few around her. She looked like a deer in the headlights under his gaze. Will stared at her and she blushed, "oh, um, I'm sorry, I shouldn't have..."
"No," Will said quickly, "go on."
"It's nothing," she shook her head.
"If you can think of anyone fitting this description," Jack said seriously, "I need you to tell us right away."
"Well, I mean, I saw something like that but it's just silly, right? I don't think you could be looking for him."
"Who, Miss Trillman?" Jack pressed without sounding angry.
"Mr D. He, well, he's nice. I don't know him very well but he's so polite and always offers me a ride home if I need it."
"Mr D?" Will felt his heart quicken on hearing the name; his eyes were on the list in a second, "is he on our list?"
"Oh, well he wouldn't be," she said, "He's part of the group in the changeover between Gateway and Baeder; he was promoted a month or so back."
"You saw him, Miss Trillman?" Will prodded, though he was aware his voice was slightly feverish, "Saw him help someone here maybe?"
"He, well," she looked embarrassed again, "it was just a little thing but I...well like you said I didn't realise he was so strong. He was helping Reba with her bicycle and it had all the saddle bags and panniers full and, well, he just lifted it with one hand into the back of his van."
"Van?" Will asked, "What colour is his van?"
"Dark brown," she said with certainty, then a little squint of her eyes, "or maybe black."
"Who is Reba?" Jack asked while Will thought he could feel the blood shooting through his veins.
"Reba McLane," Trillman said, "she's blind, works in the dark room. She's lovely, very quiet."
"Blind," Will thought as the pieces slotted together; because she couldn't see the monster sitting on your skin like everyone else could, and all she could judge you on was the words coming out of your mouth or the things your hands did for her. But then Will frowned, "wait, she's blind but she has a bicycle?"
"Oh, she only walks it to work if she has a lot to carry. Puts all her things on it and wheels it in. Mr D was giving her a ride home. I think they might be friends."
Could you have friends? Maybe, Will thought, but the Dragon won't. And I doubt he'd be happy with you having them either.
"His face," Will asked suddenly, making Trillman blink, "does he have anything visibly deformed?" she shook her head, "Not something you think is all that bad, but he seems to take pains to hide, or even the way he speaks might be different..."
"Oh, well yes, he has trouble with his 'esses'," she said, lifting a finger to point in an obviously habitual gesture, "can't say them right. I guess..." she frowned, "I guess he has a little scar, on his upper lip, but it's barely noticeable."
"He works here in the building?"
"Yes, he's Production Supervisor."
"Where's his office?" Jack asked.
"Down the hall," Trillman said.
Will was already walking before she'd finished. The door was locked but the pass key from maintenance worked. He was the first in, flipping on the light.
The first thing that hit him was the neatness; extremely neat. The second was the lack of personal items. He found a shelf full of technical manuals on the wall, an empty and immaculate waste paper basket and a stapler, a flip diary and lamp on the desk.
"The print we pulled from the Leeds was a left thumb print," Jack reminded him as he watched Will.
"He's right handed," Will said, pointing to the desk; everything was situated on the right, "where would he leave a lefty? Clipboard?"
"On it."
While Jack rifled the desk drawers with gloved hands, Will looked closer at the desk. The diary had something neatly written in tight, controlled ink on today's page. He picked it up to get a closer look
Will stared at it. Stared at it.
"Jack."
"Yeah?"
Will angled it so Crawford, hunched on the floor, could see it. Jack looked simultaneously stern but triumphant.
"He's doing it tonight," Will said, knowing he sounded anxious.
"Then we take him before he does, Will," Jack said, standing and calling for Lt. Fogel before saying with resolve, "let's get this son of a bitch."
Jack Crawford did not like hospitals. He was pretty sure most people didn't, the smell and the noise and the hoards of the sick and the dying, but he had his own particular aversions.
His sprung from guilt, and continued to hop up and down in his gut every time he watched the automatic doors slide open and he was swamped in that infectious hospital atmosphere. Some of the nurses on the Omega post-natal ward had even started calling him by his first name. That had been another weight to add to the others he was already carrying on his shoulders.
"Hi Jack," the redheaded nurse he refused to learn the name of smiled at him as he rubbed his hands with the alcohol-based hand wash by the door, "you're always out of hours, huh?"
"No rest for the wicked," he said with a friendly smile he didn't feel, "is it alright to go in and see him?"
"Sure, we've already served dinner. Janine is in there with little Elle; they're working but, who knows, maybe you'll be a good influence."
The weight doubled. The only time she ever said that to him was when it had been a 'bad day'. A bad day was not something he wanted to deal with right now. Only the remorse wouldn't allow him to turn around and leave.
You put him here, it reminded.
"Agent Crawford," Janine , the pretty but cold eyed blonde, said once he'd knocked and entered; her smile was slightly frozen as she looked over her shoulder at him. Jack knew she didn't like him. He couldn't truly blame her. She had taken a liking to Will, and that was really all it took to dislike Jack Crawford these days.
"Hey," he said quietly; moving into the room opened up his view.
Will was on the bed, as he normally was. His hair was a little damp, as if recently washed, whorls against his neck where the sweat was obvious. Under the thin blankets his swollen stomach was still noticeable. What struck Jack the most, however, were his eyes. Bright and awake and yet mistily detached.
In his arms was a small bundle of cloth from which a pair of chubby arms were protruding, waving around to the sound of a gurgling baby. Not once in all his visits had he seen Eleanor cry. She was a little darling, as far as he was concerned, and he knew her father loved her.
Jack had needed to accept his guilt, his reality, and the fact that he would never be able to change what he'd done in order to capture Hannibal Lecter.
If only Will, he thought, could accept that too.
"Jack," Will said once his wandering eyes caught and held his; the man's smile was wide and genuine, "I told him you'd be here soon. Didn't I?"
And there it went, as Will's stare wandered off to the empty space at the left side of the bed and fixed on someone that simply was not there.
"You can't say that," Will let out a tired chuckle before looking back to Jack, "honestly, don't listen to him. I said you'd be late because you were working."
"Right, yeah, I was," Jack said, trying his best to sound normal, "working through..." the last remnants of the Chesapeake Ripper case, "...a big case at the moment."
"Wish I could help you out," Will said, still smiling as he lifted Eleanor in his arms and rocked the child, "but I've got my arms full."
"Of course," Jack said.
It was perhaps most difficult because he thought he'd gotten away with it. Most difficult to accept that, in the end, he just didn't want to believe it was his fault and, if nothing came of it, then it wouldn't matter anyway, right? Of course not.
After Hannibal's botched arrest and Will's rapid descent towards death, Jack had considered taking the out his superiors had offered him to cover for his blunder: early retirement, with a decent settlement. Enough to keep the news channels happy and his own conscience at bay.
Then, Will had recovered. It had been slow and torturous and hell if the man didn't seem intent on breaking what little was left of his sanity, but Will had recovered. Just a month ago he'd been well in body and mind and, as far as Jack had been able to tell from the brief few meetings they'd scrounged, the nearing date of the birth had given him something to cling to.
And then it had happened. He had learned of it through the grape vine, from Frederick Chilton on his visit to the Asylum to put Lecter to task about the missing bodies of four of his victims. He remembered being furious at Alana Bloom in that moment, stuck in Chilton's stuffy office as the smug doctor revelled in being the one with the news. Will had lost the baby; even though Eleanor had survived, Jack thought he knew what that would mean.
He could still remembered visiting Will Graham in the Asylum, after the affair with Hobbs. He had been a shadow against the wall, face pale, features drawn, eyes that seemed to be turned inwards, staring into nothingness, unwashed, broken and terrified of himself.
It turned out that even Jack Crawford could surprise himself with how far off his assumptions could be, because this was so much worse than that had been.
"You're awful quiet," Will said, smiling through a soft frown, asking as he always did, "been a bad one, huh?"
"Pretty damn bad," Jack nodded, the weight intensifying.
"Want to talk about it?"
"Not really."
"Ok," Will nodded, chewing at his lower lip; he looked up to his left suddenly, "huh? Ask him yourself," then a short laugh that made Jack feel ill to hear it, "for god's sakes. Jack, Hannibal wants to know if you'd like to hold Charlotte."
"I..." Jack frowned and spoke before his brain could catch up with his mouth, "but I thought you called her Eleanor?"
"What?" Will frowned, trying to laugh through his sudden confusion; he flinched as Janine touched his arm, looking away from Jack.
"Will, I need to take your blood pressure hon."
"Oh, ok," Will said, still confused, turning to his left he said, "Hannibal, can you take Eleanor?"
There was a stifled intake of breath from Janine, because she was too far to stop the inevitable happening. It had been lucky that Jack had decided to sit so close to the bed. He barely even remembered rushing forwards to catch the fumbling bundle of cloth as Will dropped her into invisible arms. She fell about a foot and Jack didn't think he'd ever held anything so fragile as she hit his arms.
The little baby looked up at him through her wide eyes, a shockingly familiar shade of maroon, opened her mouth and wailed. It was the first and last time he was ever to hear Eleanor Graham cry.
When he looked up Janine had both her hands over her mouth, her eyes wide. Though Will was worse. He had the look of someone who'd had the rug pulled out from under his world.
"Jack..." was all he was able to say, frowning and shaking his head slowly, "No, that's..."
"Will, I need you to listen to me," Jack said over the piercing wail of the child in his arms.
"No," he said again, his eyes widening, "where...where is he?"
"Give her to me," Janine was saying, her eyes noticeably bright with unshed tears as she marched towards him; he thought she must have had a nasty fright. Jack handed Eleanor, still screaming, over to the nurse.
"Hannibal? Jack? Jesus Christ," Will blinked and his hands went to his head, pushing at odd angles, his hair scrunched in one hard fist. Jack thought he might be seeing it all over again; the moments in which Jack had explained to Will how they'd discovered his husband was the Chesapeake Ripper and he'd been forced to watch the man's world fall apart, "oh Jesus, Jack. Oh please."
Guilt was an odd emotion. Back then, walking Will through the investigation and arrest of Hannibal Lecter had been justified. He'd told himself that. Because he believed, totally and completely, that telling him would make a difference. That Will would be able to rationalise it, to see why Jack had done what he had done. That Will would be able to understand.
Only Will hadn't, not truly, and it was then that Jack realised he'd miscalculated once again. Because Will Graham loved Hannibal Lecter, with every fibre of his being, and in tearing him away and turning him into the demon he deserved to be seen as, he had torn parts from Will's body, raw and mortal; live amputation. And now he was haemorrhaging life from the dripping wounds. The only bandage that seemed able to stop the life slipping right out of him had been this absurd but utterly fragile fantasy.
That Hannibal was not the Ripper, and that his other child was still alive and well. That he still had his family, and was not, as he was now, truly and utterly bereft.
And here Jack was seeing the fallout of when that fantasy shattered, made only worse when Janine turned and left the room.
Will looked as if someone had casually cut a scalpel into his skin and asked if it hurt. Jack was sure he heard Will murmur 'Eleanor' before throwing the blankets off. When he tried to climb after the nurse Jack held him back. It felt worse than anything, by god did it. It felt like doing the wrong thing for the right reasons, and Jack didn't know how much more he could stand of using that excuse. He held Will back like a man with nothing to lose from being the one responsible.
"Where are they taking her? God Jack, please! Stop, I need to..." Will struggled, all wiry, unpredictable strength, "my baby. She's my baby. Where..." he choked on a keening sound that bit at Jack's alpha nature; it was so much more than just instinct when an omega close to him was in distress. It was nigh on unbearable.
"You took him away from me," the accusation stung but Jack bore it, "I can't lose her too, I can't. Do you want me to beg you?" Will pulled back, half laying, half sitting in front of Jack even as the door to his room opened and a doctor and two orderlies entered, "I'll get on my fucking knees Jack," Will was bright eyed and feverish as he tried to make good on his threat, struggling up to a wavering kneel.
Jack stood back against the wall, his face blank, as the doctor moved in and nodded to the orderlies.
"I'm begging you," Will sobbed, "don't let them take her," Jack said nothing as the doctor and the orderlies coaxed Will back into the bed; to Jack it looked like a man being strapped to the electric chair. His voice was weak and husky as he repeated, over and over, "What do I have to do? What do I have to do? What do I have to do?"
Standing in that cramped hospital room, sick to his stomach and wracked with guilt, Jack Crawford had wanted nothing more than to give Will the answers he needed.
Now, Jack knew that he'd never had them, and probably never would. It was difficult to accept, but the only man with Will's answers seemed to be Dr. Lecter, and the thought still made Jack sick to his stomach to this day.
It hadn't been what he'd expected. He wondered if anyone but Jack had expected it. Death by cop or suicide. Will didn't think it fitted. It hadn't been what Will expected, even if he knew he'd have to deal with it now.
Reba McLane hadn't answered her home phone for the first fifteen minutes of he and Starling's drive out to Francis Dolarhyde's country house. From the moment will knew 'Mr.D' had a friend, he knew she was in trouble. Then the cops had finally got to the scene and the call had come out.A 10-35, Ralph Mandy, thirty eight, white male, gunned down in front of Reba McLane's domicile. House unoccupied. Door unlocked and open.
"He has her," was all Will had been able to say, "he fucking has her."
Starling didn't naysay him. Will almost wished she would. He didn't want to think about what he'd do to her. He didn't want to think he'd be capable, even though he knew Dolarhyde was more than capable. He had to believe this could end well.
The plan had been to get within four hundred yards of the house and wait for the patrol car who'd checked McLane's house and Jack Crawford's caravan of SWAT and ST Louis P.D. who were running a few minutes behind, to join them. Then go in for the raid.
Only the unexpected had happened, and when Will saw the glow in the distance against the sun-setting sky and the rising black snake-like cloud above it, he'd wound down his window. There was smoke on the air. Starling had kept driving, well past the four hundred yard mark, right up the driveway.
It gave them a view he didn't think he'd forget anytime soon. The licking flames, the pluming smoke, the crackling wood. The house was ablaze and Reba McLane was inside. He knew she was. Might already be dead. He knew she wasn't. He wouldn't. He couldn't kill her. She was different, she was different for him and he wouldn't kill her. So he threw open the car door and ran, because Will couldn't imagine any more crisped skin and choking sounds and god Freddie had stank and he couldn't get the smell out of his nose and...
...and the roaring. By god the noise of it. And the heat. Will didn't think, as he approached the house, that he'd ever felt anything like it in his life. It was hot like an opened oven in your face times by a thousand. It forced his skin tight and his eyes blinking as he ran forwards, slipping on the loose gravel. Then was close enough to get the smoke and it smarted, and he could hear Starling shouting, her voice drowned by the viciousness of the flames and the pounding in his ears.
And he threw up his arms and ran for the door. Once: nothing but unbelievable heat against his right side and his instincts screaming at him to run. Twice: and he hadn't expected it to give way so quickly. Only it did, and the wood of the frame snapped and Will tumbled inside and by god. The smoke was hauled in like a poison, pulled in and puffing out into his lungs and nostrils and eyes and god it hurt to choke, and the fire baked and blinded and Will pushed himself forwards because...
"Reba McLane!" he shouted, but it was lost to the din, "Reba!"
...because he wouldn't leave her to die, he couldn't leave her to die because he fucking needed her. You love her, don't you? You love her. Will pushed through the front room with its grandfather clock and its piano to the sound of screaming wood and buckling brick. Did she cheat you, was that it? Did you kill that Ralph Mandy for trying to take her away? He kept his jacket sleeve over his mouth but still the smoke sneaked through, choking him as he stumbled forwards, his arm raised to protect his face from the inferno.
His hair was hot, his scalp felt scalded. When he looked up the ceiling was alive with a sea of dancing fire, like water rippling in a rainstorm. Before him he thought he could make out a set of stairs. Did you need her? But the Dragon won't let you keep what you need. It wants you to need only it and nothing else. You wanted to save her, didn't you, save her from it?
"Reba! Can you hear me?!"
Only you wouldn't leave her to die. Not like this. Not like this. You couldn't leave her when she needed you the most.
"Please," Will wheezed, "please don't leave her like this."
Then movement. Will turned back to the stairs and blinked. There, in a white top and blue jeans, stood a woman lit by nothing but bright firelight. Her eyes were wild with frantic terror, her face locked into a permanent state of shock. She had her hands held out before her, covered in blood, trying desperately to feel for the walls even as they burned.
He opened his mouth to call out.
Then the roof collapsed.
Will heard it before he saw it, a terrible creaking, cracking, with the sound of weight behind it that signalled fucking move or your dead, move, move, move! Will jerked forwards, falling to the floor where the super heated wood burned his palms and face. He cried out, pushing up even as he felt wood and rubble against his legs, scalding through his trousers. He crawled and hurried and hauled in lungfuls of dizzying smoke. He coughed and hacked and tried not to panic as he stumbled to his feet. His right ankle felt weak but Will couldn't feel any pain.
"Reba!" Will called as he ran for her, "Reba McLane!"
At first she screamed when he took hold of her, tried to fight him. God he hurt you. Did he hurt you? He wouldn't hurt you, would he?
"FBI," he shouted, pulling her close, "I'm FBI. I'll get you out. I'm here to get you out."
"Oh god," she was saying, over and over, "he's dead. You have to help me. He's dead."
"Hold onto me," was all Will could manage to say.
But when he turned the roof he'd narrowly escaped created a wall of fire behind him and suddenly the house was unfamiliar and deceptive and Will couldn't tell, through the blinding light and the stinging smoke, where he had come in. He coughed and held Reba close and tried to make his way to wherever he could see bare ground. Wherever he could see a little less goddamned fire than everywhere else.
The heat was nauseating and disorientating and god the smoke made him senseless. It made him want to get down, cover them both and wait for help. Help he knew would never come in time. So he couldn't, had to push through the panic and the fear and the not-knowing-where-the-hell-or-what-the-fuck-to-do.
"I'll get us out," he was saying, eyes frenetically searching for a way out as the fire crept closer and the brightness became utterly blinding; when he saw the kitchen he made for it because he thought of water and tiles and load bearing walls, pushing through the flames spewing from a nearby doorway and Jesus fuck that hurt, god! But you have to keep going, have to find a way out because...
...couldn't end up like that, with black claw hands and the split skin smile and the slow, agony of existence on a hospital bed somewhere in the burns unit, dying slowly, or worse being kept alive with machines, blind and dumb and deaf and just breathing in and out and in and out and never seeing his Ellie again and you can't leave her alone, all alone, Graham, you can't leave her, you can't leave her..!
"I'll get us out."
It hadn't been a difficult choice, in the end. The window had been the only weak spot and there was nothing with which to break it that wasn't already ablaze. So he'd pulled her close and he'd told her to stay with him and he'd managed to move the heavy wooden table that was only now catching the greedy flames, pushing and shoving and weakening by the minute, and he'd helped her up, and fuck if it wasn't a hard climb, three and a half feet never seemed such a tall order, and she was crying and muttering something unintelligible and Will couldn't think straight and up here, high near the ceiling, the heat was unbearable and his head, god it wouldn't stop spinning, and he needed to get them through, needed to go, do it, move Graham, move!
The first impact was hard but brittle, giving way beneath him with intense agony against his neck and face. The second slammed into his back with an explosion of blanketing but numbed pain, sound and cool air and voices and feet getting closer and closer.
Will Graham stared up at the night sky, the stars obscured by the aura of white, to yellow, to orange flame. He could feel Reba McLane atop him, trembling in his arms. He could feel something wet at his neck and blinked.
Hannibal's face was the first to slip into view. He smiled, reached down and brushed his hair from his eyes. Will knew he was crying, his raw throat constricting violently.
"You left me," Will choked, wheezing, "you left me."
"Sleep, dearest," Hannibal said, "and I will be here when you wake."
Will Graham closed his eyes to the sound of Clarice Starling calling, Will! Will listen to me. Hey, don't you fucking dare! Hurry with those paramedics for god's sake!
Things slipped away like so much else, and he did not fight it.
"Daddy!"
The darkness behind his eyes wavered and the world wobbled.
"Daddy! Come on!"
The shaking continued and Will Graham groaned. Not an aggravated sound; more unaware, groggy. There was something soft on top of him. When he pushed it moved.
"Wake up!" giggling and shaking, "Wake up!"
And when he pushed up the duvet spilled away, floating from his hands like ashes lifted by a breeze. He looked for her, his little Eleanor, but she was gone. The bedroom was still.
Laughter and small feet on the wooden floorboards, coming from beyond the door. Will felt heavy, tired, but something didn't feel right. Not quite right, like someone had come into his house and moved around all the furniture.
He moved one foot in front of the other until the view lurched to the hallway. The lights were out. He flicked the switch but nothing happened.
"Eleanor?" his voice was small and quiet, seeming to hit the air and stop dead.
He didn't want to go down there. He couldn't place it but the shadows scared him. There was no sound. Muted, silent, hazy. The dark corridor mocked him and Will knew he was afraid. Suddenly another laugh, strong and high pitched and coming from somewhere just over there, somewhere just out of sight...
The corridor didn't seem to end. The more he walked, the less purchase he seemed to have on the floor. One and two and three and four and no more. Will put his hand against the wall but it burned: don't touch.
"Ellie?" he said, unable to raise his raspy voice, "Ellie sweetheart don't hide."
When Will looked left the corridor showed a doorway. Hiding little girls always picked the worst places. Will didn't want to go in. It felt wrong. Elle would pick the one place Will couldn't stand the thought of going.
The door handle was cold. He pushed it open and walked inside. The room was chill and dark, shot through with angles of bright, white light. The floor was slippery. When Will looked down, it ran red.
His heartbeat skipped.
He looked up, knowing what he'd find.
"Please," he begged.
The dinner table was set. Hannibal stood at the head, sharpening a long, wide based carving knife on a razor strop. On the wood lay a festoon of fruits and flowers, hiding within the thirty two heads of the thirty two bodies, gaping like a Greek chorus. At the other end of the table sat Eleanor, her childish fingers pulling at the hair of the nearest, knocking it over to expose the clean slice of its neck.
"Darling," Hannibal smiled as he lifted the knife, smoothing down the plastic suit he wore, shot with blood and matter and bone, "you're just in time for dinner."
Will lifted his hands, covered his eyes and wanted to wake up.
"It was all the way from Louisiana, can you believe that?"
"Hot damn, I didn't think there was such a thing as true romance any more, and here he gets her a ring from his mom."
"Tell me about it. That man just doesn't care what everyone says. I mean she's nothing special, but hell, what's that matter anyway?"
"Well some people...oh. Can I help you? Visiting hours aren't for another forty-five minutes."
"I'm not here for visiting hours, ladies."
"Look...ok. Yes, ok, I see. We just need to take his obs, then you can talk to him, alright Agent Crawford?"
"Take your time."
Will was forced to open his eyes. He had been laying there for about, well...he wasn't sure how long. His eyes felt gritty and he didn't want to open them to risk finding the time on the wall somewhere. Listening to the nurses talk had been easy. Easier than anything else was.
But then Jack, and then Starling and then waking up to gauze bandages at his neck and stitches in his face and second degree burn on his right arm, third on his left ankle and calf. And Jack talked and explained and Will tried to absorb a lot of information given in a short time and all he could really think about was...
"How's Reba McLane?"
Jack, in the middle of telling Will how Aynesworth, the Section Chief, was down at the site with Janowitz still sifting through the remains, stumbled to a halt. He rubbed at his forehead, clearly annoyed that Will wasn't as interested as he should be but unable to take it out on a man lying injured in a hospital bed.
"She's fine," Starling said soberly, "a few superficial burns to her right arm, she inhaled a lot of smoke and her hair's in a state. That's about it. You got her out in one piece."
"She had..." he cleared his throat and choked, then couldn't stop coughing. Jack helped him sip some water through a straw, "she had, uh, blood on her hands."
"Dolarhyde's," Jack said, "dumb bastard shot himself in the head. She put her hands in it looking for the front door key he kept round his neck."
Will swallowed slowly and grimaced. It all seemed so wrong.
"Oh. Ok."
"Once you're up and about I'm taking you to the local office. Aynesworth's real pleased with you. Wants you to see his find first hand."
"Mm hmm," Will fumbled with the bandage at his neck.
"That window you threw yourself through wasn't too friendly," Jack said.
"Friendlier than the house was," Will muttered.
Jack laughed. Starling smiled.
"Will, you're gonna be alright," Jack was smiling a little, gripping Will's shoulder and giving him a squeeze; Will winced. His right shoulder normally didn't give him any trouble, but the old bullet wound was still a sensitive pitch, "you know that, right?"
"Guess I haven't got a choice. Is...is Eleanor here?"
"Marquez has her back at the safe house in Washington. It was the quickest route back to somewhere accessible. Didn't want to make her take a plane journey without you. She's been pretty upset, I hear."
Will looked up. He caught Starling's eye and didn't need to say anything before she replied,
"The doctor said you're good to go once your hydration levels are back up and they get something for the burns. I'm sure I could talk him down to letting you go tonight."
"Thanks."
She nodded softly, before turning and leaving. Jack looked slyly happy.
"You two are getting along. Don't know how I missed that."
"You didn't. There's nothing to miss. She's a good kid, Jack, a real good kid. You gonna pass her without the exam?"
"Course I am."
"Good. You should keep her too. BAU's the best place for someone who can look where we look and not soak up all the shit. I was never any good at that. She'll be better."
"Don't sell yourself short, Graham," Jack said, reaching out to help Will up. He felt woozy but it wasn't something he couldn't deal with. A few bottles of water, some paracetamol and he knew he'd be serviceable.
"I'm not," he said, standing, "I'm just practical."
"Ready to get back down to Highway 94 and get us some proof?"
"I'm ready," Will said, locking eyes with Crawford, "to take my little girl home."
"Will..."
"Jack."
"Hell. You don't half make things difficult."
"It's my specialty. But I want to see Reba first. She here?"
"Ward six, bay two. Just past the nurse's station."
"Thanks Jack."
When he reached the ward they were handing out breakfast. Will hadn't realised it was so early, eight forty. He took Reba's and showed his credentials to the policewoman at the door.
She looked small in the bed. Not in size, just small. Fragile. Will knocked and he was sure she would have startled if she'd had the energy.
"Miss McLane," he said, voice husky, "I'm Agent Will Graham. Can I come in?"
"Do you know him?" Reba asked the policewoman who still stood by the door, her eyes staring blankly at the wall.
"He's a federal agent, Miss McLane," she reassured.
"I was with you at the house," Will explained.
Oddly enough that seemed to make things worse. She seemed to become more still; smaller in that big bed. Still, she let him inside. Will put her breakfast down on the table and told her what was there. She didn't touch it at first, but she did ask him to sit.
And then it all came out. He didn't think he had the wherewithal to write anything down, so Will recorded the impromptu interview on his phone. She spoke about her time with Dolarhyde. Her throat was sore and she stopped frequently to suck cracked ice. Will wondered how much longer she had been in the fire than he had. Reba couldn't remember or even hazard a guess.
He asked her all the unpleasant questions and she took him through it, only once waving him out the door while the policewoman held the basin to catch what little she'd managed of her breakfast.
She was pale and her face was scrubbed shiny when he came back into the room.
"I'm not going to ask you anything else," he said when he came back in, "but...I'd like to call back, see how you're doing. I have to go soon but I'd like to see how you are, if that's ok?"
"How could you resist?" she asked, tears in her eyes, "Charmer like me?"
For the first time, since the ID at Gateway and Baeder and knowing she was in that house and all the way though the gruesome interview, Will got a sense of who she was. And he knew where it ate at her.
He knew, because it was what ate at him too.
"Would you mind excusing us for a minute, officer?" Will asked.
The police woman left. Will reached out carefully and took Reba's hand. When he spoke he was surprised by how steady his voice was.
"Look here, there was plenty wrong with Dolarhyde but there's nothing wrong with you. You said he was kind and thoughtful to you. I believe it. That's what you brought out in him. In the end, he couldn't kill you and he couldn't watch you die," Will forced himself to keep going, even as it hurt to say it.
"People who study this kind of thing say he was trying to stop. Why? Because you helped him. That probably saved some lives. You didn't draw the manic to you. You drew the man with the manic on his back. Nothing wrong with you, kid. If you let yourself believe there is then you're a sap," I should know, I should have known, I should know now.
"I'm going to call from Chicago when I land and see how you're doing, then I'll come back in a few days. I have to look at cops all day and night, I need the relief; try to do something about your hair there."
She shook her head and waved him towards the door. Maybe she grinned a little, he couldn't be sure. She thanked him, in a croaky voice.
"Thank you. I don't know what would have happened if...thank you, Will Graham."
Afterwards he made his way to the nearby Ward six waiting room, sat in the hard plastic chair and broke down. Years of hate and love and pain and doubt and fear fought its way out of him whether he wanted it to or not. One of the nurses came in to ask if he was alright. He tried to tell her he was fine, but it was too hard a lie. She brought him a blanket and some black tea with sugar.
Will wasn't sure how long he sat there. Long enough for his untouched tea to go cold.
Starling found him first. He knew he must look wrecked. She sat down next to him quietly and folded her hands in her lap. It was reassuring. Somehow vilifying. He wanted to stop but there was no stopping it now. He wondered if this was how Reba had felt, as Will sat by her side andwanted to understand.
"You asked me," he said quietly, "when we first met, whether I thought he was putting the knife down."
He couldn't say it all at once. Will appreciated that she didn't speak. Just waited, patiently.
"You know, I've thought about it a lot. A hell of a lot. I've thought about him a lot. We had so many good times, you know? So many compared to that one. The one that blew all the rest out of the water. But you know what?"
Starling shook her head when Will turned to look at her.
"I know it doesn't matter, whether he was putting it down or pulling it right. It never did matter. Because all that matters is that he picked it up. He picked up that fucking knife and that's the point no one ever asks about. He picked it up and that's where everything stopped."
Will ground to a halt as the hysteria threatened to come back. He looked away and leaned his head on his hand, his elbow on his knee. He didn't want any answers or confirmation or an argument, and Starling seemed to know that. When he looked back to her she was reaching out to feel the side of his mug.
"Want another cup of that?"
"...Yeah."
"Gimme a minute."
They sat together and Will talked. The sweet sugar took the edge off the shock; an ancient remedy for a world-wide epidemic.
"We were two halves. That was always the problem. Two little halves that found each other in a sea of wholes. At first I couldn't stand him. Think my instincts were trying to tell me what my eyes couldn't believe. What my desires couldn't stomach the thought of.
"But he broke through the way no other could, because I wouldn't let them and I wasn't interested. He was...interesting. We were interesting together, interested in each other. Bad things happened to him, I know they did. Bad things have happened to me too. We would argue and make up and laugh and cook and play and think together. Sometimes just be. Have you ever just-been with someone?"
"No," she said, "I'll admit it sounds tempting."
"You should try it," Will smiled hollowly, "it's probably the best thing you could ever hope for. It's freeing. I'm not sure...if being free is the best thing for me, but I'll always have it. I'll always remember it and smile. I don't know why I should have to lose that just because he killed people. I suppose, Hannibal and I were anathema and yet somehow, together, we came out the other end with love. An unspoken pact to ignore the worst in each other to continue enjoying the best."
"And that's true?"
"Oh," Will laughed shakily, "No. Not really. I think, secretly, we were enjoying the worst too. Maybe that's what made the difference."
"Do you still love him?"
"Always," Will said softly, "always. But it can't be like it was. I just can't keep living back in the times when I was truly happy," he looked at her, "there are none more blind than those who will not see..."
"And the most deluded people are those who choose to ignore what they already know," Starling finished.
"You know your Swift."
"My dad used to buy me books. Lots of books. I had Gulliver's Travels. Guess I took a liking."
"He has good taste."
"Had," she corrected.
"Damn, I'm sorry."
"Don't be. It was a long time ago."
"I think I'm living proof that time doesn't always matter. Physical pain, we forget that. Something hurts and we remember that it hurt, but that's it. The glass in my neck, I remember it hurting," Will rubbed softly at the gauze, "but I can't recall it. Mental pain...that's the kind that never leaves us. We can always bring it back at the snap of a finger."
"He said to tell you..."
Then she stopped. Will stared at her, knowing he must seem too eager. There was only one man she could be so hesitant in relaying a message from.
"He said to tell you something that doesn't matter anymore."
"What was it?" Will frowned.
"He said to tell you that if you ever need to find the gingerbread house you know where he is."
Will blinked. Can't be. It wasn't, he wouldn't. And you know you can't care anymore.
"Wait, when did he tell you this?"
"I went to see him while you were in Chicago. Thought I might be able to squeeze any last thing out of what he knows. We were desperate," she shrugged, "it didn't work."
He nodded, even though he didn't believe her. Clarice stayed silent, but she did not leave. Eventually Will stood up, folded his blanket neatly into a square and put it down on the seat. He turned to her and said,
"I'm ready to go home."
