A stonier mien, a more serious visage, chiseled tight like shrink-wrapped plastic around a skull—my bones feel like porous calcium. I'm under surveillance.
Picture after picture line the walls, like I'm supposed to toss a dart and nail one of them straight in the nose. My aim isn't that good, I'm starting to realize the magnitude of this situation, and I can hardly meet anyone's eyes: they're all dead. Though distant, it feels poignantly reverberating, like the veins around my guts begin to tighten and choke my innards: is this real? Are all these people dead? I feel a distinct lack of concern which only further frightens me—empathy should be steeping through my veins, seeping out of my lips in a perfumed breath of concerned and sincerely mortified rose petals, and if not petals, then tumbling down like gallstones from a slit stomach. My mouth feels dry, my throat feels thin—I nod, approvingly, as if I'm already drawing deduction after deduction, before I realize one pair of the stony set eyes fixated on me belongs to a living creature.
He looks like melted waxwork that was dressed in spare couch covers. I barely swallow a laugh and gag it down, a flitting smile gracing my visage, and I'd dare have the deign to classify him as something to be detested rather than respected if I hadn't appreciated the aura surrounding him.
Not literally, of course. There are no pentecostal tongues of fire flickering down from heaven and gracing his head like a crown, but the deep vibrations of saintly wisdom seep from his pores like a miasma. I'm awestruck, and I can't place why—I'd sooner think he was just another middle aged, graying man, trapped in a dingy building and making a living off saving lives if I didn't feel that strange sort of seeping sentimentality to him.
I stare, though impolite. I was raised as a Vaishnavite, and Christian imagery is still somewhat jarring to me: I think of Saint Cassian, of a pious martyr, of stern-lipped saints with swiveling, roving eyes lining the walls of Notre Dame.
What a peculiar reaction that such a simple person incites from me. I extend my hand, and I feel extremely boyish as I grasp his, blue and green veins laced over the tendons exposed by his pallid flesh. My throat itches, my bones ache, my blood feels effervescent: why is such a stupid looking man, some ugly anachronism, reverberating with what could only be described as pietism?
"Dr. Lecter, this is Ameya Thakore, the special agent now assisting in the Ripper's case. He's got some impressive credentials," he states, pleasantries exuding from his mouth like a register spitting out a receipt, and I nod as my voice catches in my throat. I feel boyish in his presence. He's so much older than me, but not in a way where I deem him oafish and old-fashioned, but somewhat mocking. Like I'm infantile, jejune. He looks expectant, and the cast of his eyes on me make my skin feel hot and rashed—I have no way to determine impressions other than what I feel. I cannot interpret what I feel. I can interpret what I know.
"Nice to meet you, sir," I say, and he greets me with equal sterility.
"Dr. Lecter is working as one of our profilers—I'm certain you've heard of him," Jack continues, and while he further ventures to describe his credentials and exploits, inserting smears of praise and recommendation wherever possible: so they're friends. I feel like I walked into a funeral, and they all mourn Will Graham while simultaneously trying to absorb me as a new limb to replace their loss. It's uncomfortable, but not unbearable; Jack begins to name victims, list taken organs (Will Graham indicates that pre-mortem mutilation and the removal of internal organs as surgical trophies is a token attribute of the ripper, which is so obvious, I don't know why people want to lick his shoes for drawing the most logical conclusion possible of all these dead people), describe locations found. I nod, rapt with interest, though only on the surface: they're all too deeply affected by the tragedy at hand. I have no experience of it. I see it in their tones, their censoring, their hesitance: they are emotionally incapacitated by the weight of these murders and how it tolled on their friend.
I want to scoff. Not out of arrogance, but to knock them out of this stupor. Empathy reminds me of rot, and they're all fermenting in their own self-pity and worries. Despite Mr. Crawford's rehearsed diatribe and evident lack of mentioning anything that too deeply involves Will Graham's work prior to my arrival, Dr. Lecter seems stagnant, distant. Jesus looks down on people receiving communion with neither hate nor adoration. How tailored he looks, how prim and proper—I can't even fathom what I would give to emulate that. He looks like he knows things that we could only hope to understand, that he's decoded every riddle and is only here to ensure that we don't get too bogged down in the inevitable discovery. It's in his eyes, his shoulders, the tendons in his face and the locked position of his jaw: interpret, don't imagine. I don't envision myself in his head. I see what I see, and I draw my conclusions.
"Do you know the occupations of all the victims, sir?" I say, and Jack Crawford indicates to the case file arranged neatly for my taking. I nod, I thank him, I pick it up and I leaf through it. "I'll look into it. I've been following this case, I'm certain I'll be of help. However, with all this evidence, no patterns can be confirmed—at least, none that I can assist with—until there is another victim. Verification comes with presence and I can't exactly verify much only with pictures and sparse information."
"Sparse?" Crawford questions, sounding incredulously offended though somewhat amazed that I have the insolence to insult his record keeping, but he doesn't do much more than nod. "The point of this is to prevent another victim, Mr. Thakore."
And I purse my lips. Too personal. No more lives, he probably thinks, we gotta catch him right now, tonight, today, this second. I want to remind him that I never was personally involved until now and I'm not like Will Graham and I can't look at pictures and string them together, I have to be there, be involved, see the position, be present. But I say nothing. "Of course, sir. I'll do my best." And I excuse myself as fast as possible.
It's sort of an unstated fact that I'll do everything I can on my own time to work on this and accompany them to the next victim—if there is one—where I will assist with profiling. As I pass, I hear that strange lilt, a preacher's drone possessing the malleable morals of all his listeners: Dr. Lecter is speaking. My hand lets go of the knob as I lean close, looking as if I'm resting against the door as I examine my evidence: I hear them. Muted, low-voiced, but I hear them.
"So what do you think?" It's Jack. Assertive and brazen. I can see his pockmarked chin moving carefully with his spotless enunciation.
"Is it necessary to draw conclusions so early?" That's Dr. Lecter. The viscera on my intestines tightens like a tourniquet. "I mind remind you that I'm no mind-reader: I didn't see much more than, most likely, you did. Skittish, though unremarkable, he seems inherently and indisputably average. Intelligent, I suppose, but average."
"I'm not here to make a profile for him," Jack reminds him sternly, "I'm here to see if he's going to absorb the magnitude of this all as much as Will did. I specifically selected him for his penchant for logos instead of pathos—it was noted he's distant in regards to others."
"Depersonalization of tragedy," Lecter ventures, and I hear his shoes shuffle, dark oxfords against the hardwood floor, and I can almost envision his padded shoulders moving under the suit as he adjusts his arms to limply lay at his sides. "A lack of empathy is the parallel of Will's abundance: though, I suppose, this will allow him to carefully construct a barrier between the deaths he is to absorb and the killers he is to find, it's uncertain whether a dam will hold back a typhoon. You and I possess experience that he does not."
There's a pause, and for a moment, I'm terrified they'll open the door. However, Jack exhales, and Lecter makes the slightest humming noise in the back of his throat, as if sympathizing with his worry. "He creates an 'it' when dealing with suffering instead of a 'they.' The detachment will almost certainly ensure he doesn't end up in the same position as Will. A young prodigy, a bright student with a promising future, untapped potential and a refusal to gain anything but from hard work," he muses, and the compliments make my heart flutter. He sounds like he's congratulating a child, but it came from someone who I can't help but to admire, to fear, to worship. "I could draw a conclusion."
"About him?"
"About you."
I pause. The collar of my shirt feels rough against my neck, my skin feels like hot rubber.
"I don't need you to say it," Jack amends, and I can practically see him, looking at the floor, guilt stooping his posture, Lecter standing rigid and unwavering. "Miriam Lass was a tragedy. She cared too much. Will cared too much. He looks like he doesn't care about much more than getting this finished so he can put it on his credentials. He is no repeat Miriam or repeat Will—and I'm certain of this! My judgment is sound, and that's part of the reason why I picked him: I know he'll stay far enough away as to not get personally involved. The deaths of the victims are a tragedy enough, I don't need to be personally reminded that my shortcomings take the lives of people who trusted me," he states, and I think I've heard enough. Footsteps come closer, I feel the unwavering presence of a human form lumbering behind the door. I step away, walk down the hall, turn the corner and vanish out of sight.
I feel like scum, a bug pinned to a board as they argue about what genus I come from. Part of me wants to prove them wrong—slivers of pride, vanity, I suppose—part of me wants to just stay meek and humble. I am something that repeats itself with minimum grace and little variation, a long line of tin soldiers that get less and less emotive and poignant as they turn out. Sloppier, less real, until their carved and etched faces and distinguishing characteristics are all smooth, untouched nothingness.