"Your psychological evaluation if anyone asks for one. You are totally functional, and more or less sane." Hannibal said as he finished signing an official looking document with a flourish. "Well done."
"Did you just rubber stamp me?" Will went for incredulous, but ended up amused.
"Yes, if anyone should ask for it. Alana will be appeased that Jack didn't break you, and our conversations can proceeded unobstructed."
"Alana won't be so easily appeased. She thinks I need therapy. She'll tell Jack as much if she hasn't already." Will pointed out, "You've created a conflict of interests by having them both walk in on us."
"What you need is way out of dark places when Jack send you there. Alana will care more about that than our relationship."
"You offering to be my guide out of those dark places? Plan on showing me all the sights along the way?" Will was back in Hannibal's intimating office, upstairs busily shelving books in the wrong places on the sly. It wasn't much, but at least it was something. He decided not to comment about it the R word. "Last time he sent me into a dark place, I brought back more than I wanted."
"Abigail" Brought Will up short.
"I was more referring to you, but we can talk about her if you want." Will changed directions, wondering where this was going. He was a little stunned that the narcissistic serial killer was passing on an opportunity to talk about himself.
"She comes with certain emotional obligations regardless of empathy disorders." Hannibal said in all seriousness.
"What is this? Do you feel obligated?" Will asked, leaning against the railing to stare down.
"Yes. I feel a staggering amount of obligation." Hannibal would have continued, but Will started to first chuckle before falling into full laughter. "I fail to see what is so humorous."
"You." Will got himself back under control after some internal struggle. "Okay, I'll play. Why do you feel obligated?"
"I feel responsible. My actions orphaned Abigail. That was not my intention."
"Then maybe you shouldn't have wound Hobbs up if you couldn't control his directionality." Will said flatly.
"I've fantasized about scenarios where my actions may have allowed a different fate for Abigail Hobbs." Hannibal lamented, making Will stare at him in disbelief.
"You're unbelievable." Will threw his hands up, already fed up with Hannibal's nonsense.
"What?" Hannibal had the nerve to look offended.
"Incredible. Is this your version of feeling guilty? I don't know whether to be comforted, or worried that you can experience that feeling in any capacity." Will asked incredulously, "Don't involve yourself anymore than you have to with her. I think you've done enough."
"Jack still thinks Abigail helped her father kill those girls."
"He isn't exactly the easiest person to relieve an idea from. I'm working on keeping Abigail safe from him."
"When do you feel safe, Will?"
"Why should I tell you?" Will shot back to receive an unimpressed look of 'quit wasting both our time'. "Sometimes when I can't sleep, I leave the lights on in my little house...and walk across the flat fields." He sighed, "And when I look back from a distance, the house is like a boat on a sea. It's really the only time I feel safe."
"You stand in the breathing silence of killers, the spaces they move through. Tell me, Will, do they speak to you in your dreams?"
"With noise and clarity."
"You can sense others madness. Like bloodhound." Hannibal said, "Do you feel like you're becoming these killers? Catching their madness?"
"I know who I am. I'm not anyone else except for myself, Dr. Lecter." Will stated firmly in a tone that brooked no argument, and oh, Hannibal did not like like. He enjoyed Will using his name, not his title.
"I'd like to see your house." Hannibal changed direction.
"Of course you would." Will sighed, "You won't like it. It's full of dogs and dog hair."
"I'll manage." Hannibal said as he got up to stand by the ladder, obviously waiting for Will to join him.
"What? You mean right now?"
"You've moved through my spaces at home and at my work. I wish to exist in yours."
"Maybe I don't want you moving through it."
"I have your address. I can go see it with you there, or when you're away. Which would you prefer?" Hannibal said with that thin knife smile of his.
"Let's go." Will gritted out. Of course, Hannibal insisted on driving.
It was well into night by the time they pulled up to the white two story farmhouse. The mist had already rolled in, surrounding the house like an ocean.
"Beautiful. It is just how you described."
"If you hurt my dogs, I will kill you." Will promised. It had been weighing on his mind.
"My cruelty is reserved for those who deserve it." Hannibal said lightly, "And I happen to like animals. Shall we?"
Having Hannibal in his home was surreal, Will watching him intently as he took his time looking at everything. The dogs were elated that there was another set of hands in the house to pet them, which much to Will's surprise, Hannibal dutifully did for each canine. It was equally disconcerting how well the dogs got on with him, Buster his new best friend. So much for animals being able to sense evil.
"Do you play?" Hannibal asked, tapping out a few note on the upright piano in the corner. It was woefully out of tune.
"No. Came with the house." Will said, wondering what Hannibal thought of all his many little dog statues, mismatched furniture, and his bed in the living room.
The upstairs had more furniture that wasn't his, pictures of dead strangers still on the walls. Only spiders and dust lived up there, but Hannibal explored it nonetheless. The kitchen was simple compared to Hannibal's own, stocked well enough to be functional a bachelor who mostly just made coffee and fish. The faded floral wallpaper and antiquated art were chosen by the previous owners, left up by Will who simply couldn't be bothered. The books, some decorations, fishing gear, and his work station for his fishing hooks were about Will's only input to the living situation.
"How's your nose?" Will suddenly very aware of how his house smelled.
"As perspective as ever." Hannibal said as he read the titles of Will's library. "You only use a total of three rooms in this entire space. Bathroom, living room, and kitchen."
That was a very Hannibal answer, odd and a touch unsettling. "Is it everything you expected?"
"And more." Hannibal's attentiveness more suited for a museum or art gallery than trying to decipher the placement of Will's knickknacks.
"Are you staying the night?" The question seemed to amuse Hannibal for some reason.
"It is a long drive back, and it's getting late." Once again, there was an amusement there, Will missing out on the joke.
"I'll find you something to sleep in." Will decided not to dwell on Hannibal's version of humor. "We're not sleeping naked in front of my dogs."
"That won't be necessary. I packed a bag."
"Of course you did." Will let the dogs out for their last wee for the evening while Hannibal retrieved his bag from the Bentley. Compromising, he only went to bed half naked, wearing a pair of soft drawstring pants.
When Will woke up, it was not due to the usual horrors he suffered from. They dwelled in Hannibal tonight, who muttered in his sleep, the language of it foreign to the empath's ears. Will was shocked to see that he was crying, the name Mischa coming up more than once. Will was unsure of what to do, but it seemed so wrong to witness Hannibal bawling like a child in his sleep. It was so...human. When Hannibal started to make small pained noises, Will decided to intervene.
Gently shaking his shoulder woke the monster up though, Hannibal reacting by grabbing Will by his throat, flipping them over so he was on top, his other arm raised to strike. Luckily for them both, Hannibal was the kind of person who turned instantly 'on' as soon as he woke up.
"My apologies, Will." Hannibal said as he immediately let the other man go, rolling off of him. Will was torn between sucking air back into his lungs, and checking his throat for bruising. He watched as Hannibal touched his face to find it wet with tears. "Thank you for waking me up."
"Must have been one hell of nightmare." Will said, his voice raspy.
"Did I hurt you?" Hannibal turning on the lights to look Will's throat over with his eyes. He refrained from touching, something Will was grateful for.
"I'll live." Will grumped at him, getting up to get some water for them both.
Hannibal blinked in surprise when he had a full glass shoved in his direction. "Thank you." He said quietly, "You didn't have to do that."
"I lose sleep from night terrors often enough. I'm not about to let others suffer through them." Will shrugged as he studied Hannibal.
"Even one such as I?"
"Not even you. Anything that can make you cry has got to be on its own unique level of terrifying."
Will studied Hannibal's bare back, his body as lined with scars as his face. It held history, long pale lines across his back. Someone had whipped him repeatedly at some point in his childhood, the scars old, and telltale consistent with years of abuse. Hannibal had said his parents had died when he was young. Will wondered how long he had been tortured for at the orphanage before Hannibal's uncle found him.
Looking away, Will reminded the profiler in him not to humanize the Chesapeake Ripper. A terrible past didn't give anyone the right to do what the Chesapeake Ripper did so extraordinarily well.
The empath part of him was not complying though. It could still hear the child Hannibal had once been, scared and crying out for another. Will wondered if Mischa was his mother or sister. He wondered if he should ask, if it were even safe to.
"Do you want to talk about it?" Will heard himself ask as he got back into bed. Hannibal finished his water, and did the same, looking over expectantly at Will. Gesturing for him to scoot in, Will smiled at how bizarre his life was, him being the comforting big spoon for the Chesapeake Ripper after a nightmare.
"No, but I would like to listen to you talk." Hannibal said after they settled in against one another.
"What about?" Will yawned.
"Anything."
"I truly doubt you'll find anything to do with fly fishing particularly riveting." So Will talked about what he knew best. He lulled Hannibal back to sleep with stories about serial killers and death.
Will recalled the case of the Saw Man, a particularly vicious sadist who cut open his victims with a circular saw, and then cauterize the wound with a blow torch to do it all over again until they died. Will talked about the Bougie Man who abducted small children, using taxidermy to turn them into dolls. He recalled the Lovers, a couple who murdered newlyweds after raping them both. Whatever had terrorized Hannibal was soothed by these retellings. Will wasn't sure how to feel about that.
The call came for them both too early for either of their liking. Jack told them to get their asses on a plane. They had four bodies out of state, a ruined family praying at a table full of decay.
"What do you see, Will?"
"Family values." Will wished Jack would stop fucking doing that, interrupting the reconstruction. For someone who was desperate for answers, Jack just couldn't seem to figure out when to ask the right questions, or get his timing down. Hannibal watched him like a hawk, but at least, he was quiet about it. Taking in account of his nose, Will was surprised by how near the table full of rot and other spoilage as Hannibal orbited him and the family.
"Alright, Karen and Roger Turner. Childhood sweethearts. Owned a successful real estate business. Pillars of the community. Three children." Jack reeled off for the team.
"Minus one." Will pointed out, getting up to study a collection of family photos up on the mantle.
"Uh, son. Jesse. Disappeared last year. Last confirmed sighting had him boarding an RV at a rest stop on Route 47." Jack said, "Possible runaway, probable abduction."
"Or both." Will said, counting all the picture with just Jesse and his mom in them.
"When misery rains, it pours." Jack sighed.
"False faces in family portraits, layers and layers of lies, betrayed by a sad glint in a child's eyes." Will was getting lost in thought. That almost never boded well for other people.
"Well spoken." Hannibal nodded, joining Will at the mantle to study the family photos.
"Norman Rockwell with a bullet." Price was also appreciative of it.
"Alright, any signs of forced entry?" Jack asked.
"No broken windows, or torn screens. It's all sealed up tight." Beverly said.
"Yeah, they probably rang the front door." Jack was not a happy camper. Will couldn't blame him. Cases that involved dead kids were always the harder ones.
"I got bullet holes on the upper section of the wall, and again over here." Beverly said.
"Okay, pull the slugs for ballistics."
"They aren't frangible. It shouldn't be a problem."
"Those elevated termination points match what I see on their bodies. Angular cranial impact coupled with acute exit wounds, conical spray. Shooters went low to high. Probably crouching." Zeller said, the last part catching Will and Hannibal's attention.
"When was Jesse abducted?" Will asked.
"Uh, a little over a year ago." Jack said, watching with interest as Will and Hannibal exchanged looks. "What are you two thinking?"
"That they were low to high not because they were crouching, but because they are that tall." Hannibal said, "That they didn't have to break in because they were welcomed with open arms.
"Like I said, family values. Jesse came home to see his family," Will swallowed tightly, "One last time."