Will hung back, staring at the family of corpses laid out on their tables. He was also watching the Chesapeake Ripper obscenely having the time of his life. Hannibal wandered around with an autopsy report in hand, taking turns between making astute observations, preening, and chatting up the techs.
Hannibal seemed to really enjoy Price's dry wit and hobbies. They currently had an ongoing conversation about bees. Hannibal liked how Beverly asked smart questions, and admired her insatiable curiosity. It amazed Will that Hannibal even got along with Zeller, the two trading off in black humor.
"I'm glad we didn't have guns in my house. Would've shot my sisters to get 'em out of the bathroom." Zeller said over the body of the little girl, tastelessly done so in Will's opinion.
"I liked having a big family." Beverly said. Will wasn't surprised by this. She seemed the type.
"My parents gave me a gift: a twin. Who wouldn't want two of me?" Price poked fun at himself.
"What does your brother do?" Hannibal asked.
"He's an undertaker." Price said without missing beat. "As you can imagine, we're a delight to have over at family dinners."
"Let me guess." Zeller turned towards Will. "Only child."
"Why do you say that?" Will said tonelessly, keeping his response in neutral.
"'Cause family is usually a catalyst for personality development." Zeller looked way to pleased himself about the quality of that joke.
"I was the eldest so all the friction rolled downhill." Beverly peace made. She liked Will, appreciated how freaking weird he was, though recently, Zeller seemed more accepting of him as well.
"Yes, all the attention and responsibilities heaped on the first-born children prepares them for success in the future." Jack said, reminding everyone in the room that he was there. He was prowling around the dead like they were going to start volunteering answers.
"My baby sister got away with murder. She had them all fooled." Beverly said, and if Will had been looking anywhere else other than at Hannibal in that moment, he would have missed it. A very complicated ripple of emotion passed under the Ripper's finely tailored person suit. Sorrow, deep gut cutting sorrow, anger, no, not anger, rage, barely continued within its confines of material, and...fear?
Fear.
It was there and gone in an instant, like a wisp of smoke, or the dancing of baked air off of mid-August asphalt.
"I thought the middles were the problem." Price said.
"Middle's the sweet spot." Zeller smirked.
"Gotcha," Will thought as he pushed off the wall to join Jack, purposely passing by Zeller.
"Always trying to figure out where they fit in. They can be great, uh, politicians, or, " he tilted his head at Zeller. It landed. "Or lousy ones."
"What about you?" Beverly asked Hannibal. "Where do you fit?"
"I don't. I was orphaned at the young age eleven, the proverbial orphan until I was adopted by my uncle Robertos." Hannibal said, instantly putting the room ill at ease, all while still not answering the actual question. Will wondered where he fit with Mischa, why she had never been mentioned before when they talked about family. Hannibal talked about the death of his parents with casual ease. Why not her?
"All the victims have defensive wounds except Mrs. Turner." Jack dismissed the air of discomfort with their duty to the dead.
"There's a forgiveness." Will said as he looked down at Mrs. Turner.
"What kind of victim forgives the killer at the moment of death?" Jack asked.
"A mother. This is about motherhood."
"Not motherhood." Hannibal corrected, " A perversion of it."
The sentiment held true. Connor Frist was their next lead. They went in expecting a crime scene. Life cruelly did not disappoint them. The smell was just as repulsive yet different with notes of charred flesh added into the nauseous mixture. Another family of the dead was carted back to the lab.
"Mr. Frist and the children killed first, saving Mrs. Frist for last. Same as the Turners." Jack said.
"Not exactly the same. Something went wrong." Will pointed out, feeling grey around his edges. He stared down the burnt up body of a child, and felt weary.
"Not a single present under the tree for Mrs. Frist." Beverly said. Another round of bodies, and there would be yet another dead family if they couldn't figure this out fast enough.
"He took her presents. He took her motherhood." Will knew who the mystery body's identity was already.
"To give to another." Hannibal said, "We need find out who is playing the part of Wendy, the pretend mother of the Lost Boys."
"They're traveling with an adult with some formative sway. It will be a woman, a mother figure. She's looking to form a family." Will nodded. They hadn't been looking at the Lost Boys in their entirety. "That's why they're killing the mom's last."
"Shooting Mrs. First once wasn't enough. First bullet travels beneath her scalp to its final resting place base of her neck." Zeller said.
"And it still didn't kill her." Jack grimaced.
"This is the point where things went awry for them." Hannibal said.
"Hydrostatic shock of shell hitting the skull would've cause brain damage." Beverly nodded.
"Her body went into convulsions." The most recent crime scene began to fill in with more color and clarity for Will.
"Shot her again. Put her out it her misery. Different gun." Zeller said.
"So, it's a safe bet that this Wendy, pretend mommy, shot Connor's real mom." Price mused.
"So who is our additional corpse in the fireplace?" Jack asked.
"I think it would safe to say that it's Connor Frist." Hannibal beat Will to it, the profiler nodding at that assessment.
"He had been prepped to shoot his mother, not watch her suffer." Will confirmed.
"Connor couldn't put his panic back into a bottle so he got shot too." Jack reasoned out.
"Whoever shot him, disowned him." Will said, "In every sense of the word."
Will would have been happy to stay with the science gang, but instead, the profiler soon found himself at Hannibal's dinner table with Jack sitting across from him. The mood he was in, Will didn't see this ending well so he applied wine to that feeling, and hoped for the best.
"A modified boudin noir from Ali-Bab's 'Gastronmie pratique'." Hannibal announced the food, "You promised to deliver your wife to my dinner table."
Will aggressively drank his wine, earning him a side eye from Hannibal. He ltried to avoid thinking about Hannibal bringing up double dates, or heaven forbid, a regularly scheduled couple's night.
"Well, we're gonna have to polish up on our act. We can't have you diagnosing our marital problems all in one fell swoop." Jack said jovially, practically a different person with good food and wine in front of him. "What am I about to put in my mouth?"
"Rabbit." Hannibal lied.
"He should've hopped faster!" Jack laughed as Will tried not to choke on his wine.
"Yes, he should have." Hannibal smiled back, "But fortunately for us, he did not. More wine, Will?"
"Please." Will managed, somehow resisting the urge to kick Hannibal under the table. With his luck, Hannibal would turn it into a game of footsy.
"You seemed haunted today, Will." Jack said, shifting gears. Will would have preferred to be ignored for the rest of the evening, and just sort the recently adding gruesome things in his head.
"We don't know what nightmares lie coiled beneath Will's pillow." Hannibal said, "Best to leave it alone."
"No more than usual." Will shrugged, hoping that would be the end of it. Jack really had no clue how his 'gift' worked. That Will had just lived through the fear and death of two families, living and being murdered as nine different people, five of them children for fuck's sake. It had taken its toll.
"Children killing other children is not an unfamiliar notion to Will." Jack wanted to play it like that then.
"You still suspect Abigail Hobbs in her father's crimes." Hannibal stated more than asked.
"You know I've changed my view on that now that I've gotten to speak with Abigail for a fair amount of uninterrupted time." Will said, "You're barking up the wrong tree."
"Perhaps the nightmare under Will's pillow is that he's wrong about her." Jack "You were wrong about the copycat."
"Thank you for the meal. It's delicious, but I've lost my appetite." Will told Hannibal as he got up. He was done. He was going to do something regrettable if he remained sitting across from Jack.
"Will needs an anchor, Jack, not heavy weather that sends him adrift." Will heard Hannibal admonish Jack before going after him.
"I don't care who you threaten to kill, I'm not going back in there." Will snapped as he was caught up to in the foyer. His car was back at Quantico, but he could call for a ride there.
"I'm not suggesting you do, but you have had a lot of wine. You shouldn't be driving." He wasn't wrong, but Will still wanted to fight, even if that someone was the Chesapeake Ripper. Will figured if Hannibal killed him, then at the very least, he wouldn't have to put up with Jack anymore.
"I'm not sticking around here for whatever bullshit stunt you have planned." Will snarled, "I am not waking up here to find you making breakfast for him."
"You almost sound jealous."
"Go to hell." Will hissed, turning for the door.
"I'm afraid I really must insist." Hannibal said, something in his voice making Will ready himself for a fight. It was a pleasant thought that he'd finally get to punch Hannibal. As he swung, Will knew that he would have to be quick, but as per usual, Hannibal was already quicker as he side stepped the blow, fluidly turning to strike. Will stared down at the emptied syringe that had suddenly appeared in his arm as if by magic.
"I'll be sending Jack off on his way soon enough." Hannibal sounded like he was talking underwater, or maybe his head was just swimming. Whatever Hannibal had injected him with worked fast. It dropped Will like a sack of potatoes right into Hannibal's waiting arms. That was the last thing Will remembered for a long while.