The room was filled with raucous screams, gunfire, and occasional slurping noises from a bank of video screens lining one wall. There were at least twenty of them and each screen bore a scene from either Hannibal "the Cannibal" Lecter's or Ex-Special Agent Clarice Starling's past.
And there, on the opposing wall, was little Hanni, hanging on the wall as if crucified. Clarice let out a yelp and ran to him.
"Oh my God!" A quick examination assured her he wasn't physically injured, and she could see no means to his support on the wall. She grabbed his waist, and with a tug, he came away from the wall into her arms.
She turned to Hannibal with a sob, "What the hell did you do to him?"
Hannibal looked at her in shock. How could she think he would ever harm their son?
"I had nothing to do with this!" He turned to the flashing screens depicting everything from Clarice's childhood to the demise of his most recent victim. Clarice also turned her attention to the screens and they stood like that for what seemed hours, watching their secret painful experiences broadcast for all their eyes.
At one point, they all seemed to break from their trancelike states and Hannibal walked over to his wife and son. For the first time in their lives he wrapped his arms around them both, and Clarice looked at him tearfully, whispering:
"Why didn't you tell me?"
He just shook his head and pulled Hanni from her arms to hold him, his hand pressing his son's head into the crook of his neck. He said simply: "I'm sorry."
The little boy just wrapped his arms around his father's neck and held on for dear life as the power went out and the room fell silent. Night had fallen and they could barely make each other out in the dark.
"Hannibal, let's get out of here," whispered Clarice.
"Come here." He pulled her toward the pitch hole of the doorway, pausing to pick up the fallen bat and hand it to her. "Take my hand and whatever you do, don't let go. Doc, you hold on to me. I need my hands, so don't let go, okay?"
"Okay."
They left the room, Hannibal guiding them in the absolute dark by his mental blueprint of the hotel. A deadly silence surrounded them as they made their way to the main corridor and saw the hint of light coming from the stairwell. The backup generator lit the reception area, and they gratefully emerged into the low-wattage light.
They all agreed that they didn't need to venture into the darkened halls to gather any of their belongings; they were just going to go, Clarice's bathrobe and all. As they approached the office, Clarice saw the door damaged as before, but the man's body was gone. Just as she was about to warn Hannibal, in the space of a blink, he appeared in the doorway, the mangled side of his head evidence of their last confrontation.
He faced them, but his hideous countenance no longer had the power to strike fear into the three who had just faced all their demons. They stood there, Hannibal with his Harpy, Clarice with her bat, and Hanni with his Merlin—which brought a look of surprise to both his parents' faces, but they quickly put it aside to deal with the matter at hand.
And just as quickly as he had appeared, he disappeared.
They all looked around in confusion. What had happened? The dim lights had brightened and the interior of the grand hotel seemed to take on a gleam so that everything shone, bright and beautiful. It was Hannibal's palace, Clarice's childhood kitchen. Surrounding them were the young, beautiful, healthy faces of people they loved.
John Brigham was handsome in his government issue. Jack Crawford was hale and hearty with a smiling woman at his side. Clarice's family was waiting happily for her to say something to them, her siblings and parents dressed in their Sunday best. Mischa stood, perfect and whole, in a lacy white dress, holding her handsome father's hand, who in turn had an arm around his lovely wife with the flowing dark hair. Everywhere, there were little white lambs skipping about, and a young mare that Clarice almost didn't recognize without the scars.
Both Hannibal and Clarice looked in wonder, lost and amazed.
Hanni just saw the Overlook.
There was a faint growl outside the entrance, and then another, more strangling kind of growl. There was a terrible sound, as of fingernails on blackboards and the images Hannibal and Clarice beheld wavered ever so briefly, but it was enough to bring them out of their dangerous reverie. Hanni ran to the door and swung it wide, running out before Clarice could stop him. It immediately slammed shut, a thunderous bang ringing throughout the maze of halls, followed by an unnatural silence.
Something in that loud sound seemed to rouse the edifice, like some great beast from slumber.
Hannibal and Clarice looked at each other in horror as a terrifying scream erupted just outside the door.
"Hanni!" Clarice screamed. They tried and tried, but the monstrous door was immovable. Hannibal grabbed the bat and ran forward, preparing to break through a window, but was thrown roughly back with such force that he slid several feet across the polished marble floor. Clarice prepared to try to jump through the same window, but was stopped by a projectile that hurtled through it. It was a body, not Hanni's, but a man's. It landed several feet into the room and lay still.
There was a low rumbling under their feet and Hannibal gathered Clarice and moved toward the opening in the window, knocking out the few remaining shards of glass. Just as they climbed through, the rumbling stopped. The doors burst open, shedding light into the darkness where they saw a panting Hanni, standing in the midst of a large circle of debris, mostly leaves, his Merlin glinting in the light. Behind him, there was a steaming snowcat.
Hannibal and Clarice ran to their son, and only when he was safely in Clarice's arms did they turn to face the hotel. Hannibal and Clarice saw their beloved ones gathering at the door, they heard the cries, pleading with them to stay with them, arms beckoning.
"Please stay with us."
"Please stay."
"Please!" They pled, a cacophony of screams.
Hanni felt the hold gathering within his parents' hearts, and his blood ran cold. What he saw was the real thing: Danny Torrance, a grown man now, back in the hotel that had wanted him so desperately for so long.
He had spent more than a day traveling from a small island west of Kauai, the farthest he'd been able to get from Colorado without leaving the country. He had tried to help them as best he could through his contact with Hannibal and the old toy that had remained in the Overlook over the decades. It had never reopened after the incident with his father.
Somehow, a part of the hotel had gone with him when he'd escaped all those years ago. In his dreams, he was always still there in the hallways, the maze, running from room to room with nowhere safe to hide. It was a madness devised to bring him back, and when he isolated himself and refused their summons, they'd called another.
If anyone could truly understand the evil of the Overlook, they would understand how it was possible that it could have contacted a caretaker for its twenty-year unused facilities, how it could have an email address, phone number, and food supplies, let alone electricity to incubate its plan.
But it was over now, Danny thought. He was frightened, yet almost glad that his torture was coming to an end. He couldn't let them take the boy in his stead, and he would see to it they left his dreams alone. He went willingly.
His bloodied body was lifted from the floor, and he was held upright, suspended in the center of the lobby, his arms raised at perpendicular angles to his body. It started slow, the spinning, as they took him, his energy, by almost centrifugal force. But it started slowly. And he was still very much alive.
Hanni understood, and pushed away from his mother and ran, charging through the doors with a battle cry. He met Danny's eyes for a brief moment before he launched his Merlin across the distance and straight into Danny's heart with deadly accuracy. He died, his mouth forming a round 'no,' but it was the Overlook that sounded the word for him.
"NOOOOOOOOOOOO!" Came the unearthly roar.
Hanni was already outside and pulling his parents' into the snowcat. The mesmerizing effect of their visions had broken as soon as the Merlin had struck, and they were hightailing it out of there at a bone-rattling twenty-five miles per hour. Clarice looked back and saw the figure spinning faster and faster with a blue light flashing around it, and then it disappeared in a flash like lightning—there and gone.
Then came the thunder, a loud rumbling as the roof started caving in and big chunks of plaster fell, smattering powder that puffed out the door like a breath in the cold. Then, all at once, the building crumpled into a pile of rubble right before her eyes. Still unaware that the hotel was its own management, she said: "Oh, I don't think our stipend is gonna cover that."