DISCLAIMER: I claim no ownership of Hannibal NBC or affiliated branding (sadly).

SUMMARY: Still shaken from Baltimore, Will is thrust into the midst of a horrific new case: a killer targeting close to home. He struggles between clinging to personal morality and fighting new influences. He reaches his breaking point and, horrified by the aftermath, becomes desperate for emotional stability. Solace is found in the only person he knows will understand. Set mid season two.

NOTES: See chapter end.

Chapter Four: Vuoto

They didn't catch the killer that night. Or the next morning. Or the next afternoon. Two days flew over Will's head, then it was day nine. The 'murder day', as Zeller began calling it.

Half-hungover and fully clothed on the floor of his kitchen, Will mapped the connections in his brain, well aware Doctor Michelle Spencer was probably laughing away with Jack Crawford this very second, warm and safe and wrapped so comfortably in the case that nobody would ever see she'd kicked dust in their eyes.

He thought if rest his head down he'd grasp a better purchase of his thoughts. Or at least calm his screaming. It didn't work. The tiles were cold.

At least the pattern was apparent now. Fibonacci seemed to match, though the sequence might later branch into alternative mathematical routes. The killer had an education, clearly.

(Like Dr. Spencer.)

He folded his arms, cupping his elbows and rubbing the feeling back into them. Midday's light was still strong, arching through his window and bouncing off his countertop, dispersing before it reached his eyes.

Faces lurked in the skin of his eyelids, grey lips and yellowing nails clawing from the shadows. Will spent his waking hours toiling through flayed bodies, and his sleeping ones toiling right back through them again - this grim endless tape in his mind never running out of footage. At the centre Hannibal Lecter stood, feeding new images, new experiences, new horrors into the cassette player flickering in Will's eyes.

Will stood. He scooped up his empty glass and tossed it in the general direction of his sink. It didn't shatter on the metal, but he half hoped it would. Give his hands something to do.

He slid onto his couch, the laptop light reigniting his headache in full detail as he flicked on the screen. He began scrolling. He scrolled past face after face, blog post after blog post, trawling through the social media of every teenager he could find listed in the FBI'S medical databases.

Or, more accurately, a database of Dr. Spencer's patients.

He ruled out a wheelchair bound preteen, lack of mobility and apparently strict parents lessening accessibility. But the suicidal fourteen year old boy and the social-butterfly autistic girl, the anxious kid and the nonverbal teenager: Will jotted them all down in his notebook. Of the previous victims, only three had been Dr. Spencer's primary patients. The others were unlinked in an obvious sense, but when Will tied together her close colleagues and their patients, it came together in a tightly woven patch.

But now his page was filled with a hundred names, scribbles filling each inch of the notepad. No amount of categorisation would narrow it down to eight before tonight. Will had peered into their lives only to offer a solitary few a death order, and the rest a false warning.

His phone buzzed. He didn't move. Time passed. Someone knocked on his door. He didn't move. Time passed. The knocking didn't stop.

"Will Graham. I didn't drive a full hour and a half for you to leave me on your porch."

Will unfroze. He scratched at his mind's database of familiar voices to place the visitor. "Go away, Alana."

"You know, I don't want to be here anymore than you want me here."

"You've made that clear enough already," Will muttered. He heard a small thump - Alana resting her head against the door.

"Jack wants to talk to you. Properly, Will."

"He said he wanted me to work on the case. I'm working on the case. Tell him to ring me."

Alana sighed. "He has been ringing you, Will. You won't pick up."

Will huffed. "Funny. Almost like I don't want to talk to him. Or you. Or Hannibal."

Alana fell silent. Will stopped fidgeting with his pens and brushed a hand over his face, squeezing the bridge of his nose as he stood and wandered to the front door.

Alana's voice quietened. "Just… just come in. He only wants to discuss your research with the team, so we can be prepared. Maybe together we can piece together a new idea." She paused. "And - And I want you there. I don't… I don't think any of us should be alone when… when it happens tonight. You're - I mean, we're not in the right headspace. None of us are."

Will gnawed at the flesh of his cheek. He exhaled. Hands unusually steady, he opened the door.

"I'll come in. But I'm not staying tonight."

"I promise Jack won't force you out in the field again."

"Because he didn't last time?" Will scoffed. "And that was so conclusive, wasn't it? I stared at dead kids for nine hours. How insightful."

"You were confused. You were experiencing a mental shutdown. Jack should've seen that."

Will looked down. "Jack should've seen a lot of things."

Alana's coat rustled as she shifted her weight onto one foot, stepping aside for Will to join her. Her car was parked, ice studded, in his drive. "If we head off now you'll be back before dinner. I swear."

Will glared at her. Her thin smile was unfaltering.

"Fine."

"You're off the case."

Will didn't falter. His arms were glued to the steel armrests of his chair. "Why, exactly?"

Jack was a brick wall, the thin lines on his face cementing his position. "Because I said so."

Will maintained a blank-canvas of an expression. Emotionless. "And why did you say so?"

Jack's eyes flickered to Alana, who overlooked the meeting from the corner of the room, her body angled away to deflect all guilt towards Jack. Will saw through her like clear glass. Jack shrugged. "I've been having discussions with Dr. Bloom about your… emotional well-being." The words swam foreign in Jack's mouth. He spat them out in something akin to scepticism. "And Dr. Lecter, as an extension of her."

"Oh." Will's voice came out hard, heavy like thick smoke. Jack's eyes fixed on Will's face, gauging a reaction. Will didn't return the favour.

"What Jack is trying to say is that Hannibal and I are worried about you," Alana chipped in, as she walked towards them. The light caught her face and cast away the shadows, along with any previous respect Will kept for her lingering in the shreds of his clothing.

"If - if you'd wanted to dismiss me, I would have appreciated you doing it before you dragged me out here."

"I was genuine in what I said. I don't want you to be alone out there."

"If you didn't want me to be alone, Alana, you wouldn't have left me after Baltimore."

Alana's face hardened. "You tried to kill Hannibal."

Will's mind conjured a thousand responses, detailing every horrific thought he'd ever had as to the death of Hannibal by his hand — each image grotesque in intensity. What came out was subdued in comparison. "I - I wasn't myself."

"You're never yourself Will," Jack said. There was a tempering in his tone, the floodgates straining under pressure.

Jack was dangling what little leniency remained in his arsenal in front of Will like a fisherman with a lure. Will was growing accustomed to feeling more like the fish than the hunter. He tapped his fingers on the table. "I am more myself now than I have been for a long time."

"That's what worries me."

"Worried for me? Or about me?"

Jack narrowed his eyes. "Worried about the lengths you'd go."

Will caught the undercurrent of truth: the true story lying tantalisingly close. His stomach fell apart and dripped acid into his limbs at the hint of threat in Jack's tone. "Lengths you pushed me to."

"I played my part."

"Yes. And your defence?" Will scoffed "Minimal. Another sacrifice for the good of the bureau."

Jack interlocked his fingers. He surveyed Will, his eyes betraying the awkward regret tucked stiffly into his posture. "Alana. I'm going to speak with Will alone."

"Jack!" Alana's voice was indignant.

"Dr. Bloom. Now."

Alana threw a frosty glare at him as she left. The door swung shut behind her with an audible thud.

Silence dusted the scarce decoration on Jack's desk. Will waited. Jack closed his eyes and rubbed his forehead. "Will -"

"Jack."

"I've been easy on you since Baltimore. But I cannot maintain that trust if you continue to bend the rules."

"If I remember correctly, you ordered me to bend the rules."

"Yes. So you can catch Hannibal. Not for your own inexplicable impulses."

Will swallowed. His throat hurt. He layered his face with a strong scowl. "Are we - are we talking about Randall Tier? Or Dr. Spencer?"

Jack looked at him. Both.

Will nodded sharply. "Right. Okay."

"I trust your judgement. But you're so wrapped up in Hannibal that he's clouding your senses."

"I know what's real, Jack. I know Randall Tier was a murderer. I know Dr. Spencer is a murderer. And Hannibal Lecter. When have I ever been wrong?"

"I've split you between too many tasks. You're obsessive, because your mind is sharpest when you're thorough. So, I want your focus back on Hannibal."

"Hannibal kills slowly and he kills fairly." At Jack's hidden alarm, Will hastened to cover his tracks: "Or, in his eyes, he kills fairly. Dr. Spencer is murdering children as fast as she can deceive them."

"Dr. Spencer is doing nothing beyond being a reliable consultant and colleague on this case. Your determination to prove her guilty has undermined any of your genuine use. You accessed her files yesterday morning and have hidden away since."

"Because," Will enunciated his sentence clearly, "I know I'm right."

"Will." Jack's voice broke through the brick wall, anger dusting the remnants. "You misled us two nights ago. You prompted a severe lack of officer presence in the locations of the actual murders, and caused undue stress to a woman who has been by my side for over a decade."

"Jack, question her! Trace her history of patients. It's all connected."

"It's not connected. You connected it," Jack said. "And I did question her. When you returned home. Her alibis are foolproof."

Will opened his mouth, scrambling for some snide reply.

But Jack pulled the rug from under his feet. "Hannibal agrees. He thinks she's innocent. He's worried the strain on your mind may be due to personal relatability to the case."

Will stopped short. He leant back, his heart racing, the blood in his ears loud. There was a scream drilling into his jaw and through his teeth. "You're trusting the Chesapeake Ripper to advise you on my mental stability? Again?"

Jack, for the first time, broke eye contact. He sighed. "Will -"

"Jack. He manipulated me. He framed me for murder. For his murders."

Jack moved to say something. Will powered onward. "Hannibal Lecter has spent the last year tearing my neurons apart for his messed-up human art project."

"And that's why I think he is more suited to tell me what is happening inside your head than you are," Jack said. His voice lacked anger, lacked rage and authority and disappointment. It was regretful.

It was truthful.

Will stuffed his hands in his pockets. They shook. "You're feeding me to the wolf and trust the wolf to tell you whether I enjoy the pain."

"Do you?"

(No. Yes.)

"I know you don't enjoy this job, Will," Jack said, relenting, "but I need you. You are saving lives."

Will was sickened by this open vulnerability from Jack. He wanted to hate him. He wanted to hate him because it made fighting him easier. "So. You're kicking me off the Spencer case. So I can adorn myself on a silver platter for Hannibal."

"Yes." If Jack was anything, he was honest. Will's sorrow subsided minimally. "But I want you here tonight. If you're not with Hannibal."

"Worried I'll run off?" Will smiled thinly and blinked quickly.

"Worried you'll do something drastic."

Will raised his eyebrows. "Drastic times call for drastic actions."

"No. They call for calculated, law-abiding protocols."

"When did you become so rule orientated, Jack?"

Jack's voice strengthened. "I realised how wrong things can go when people are left to their own moral compasses."

Will scraped his fingers across the table as he stood and faced the door. "Then I think I've outlived my service here."

"Not until I say you have." The steel in Jack's tone froze Will in place. Despite his world of efforts, Jack's authority over him had never wavered, not even in Baltimore. Will turned back, drawn to Jack's blank glare — he gathered his emotions into his arms and pushed them behind his spine. No doubt Jack had done the same. "You are to remain in the station."

"I'm beginning to feel more like your dog than your so-called protégé."

"Because you've begun acting like one."

"You've given me no choice. I - I have a complete lack of autonomy in my decisions. Everything I do is you. Or it's Hannibal."

(Will had never felt so vulnerable, not to Jack, but the deadness in his voice held back the authenticity for threat.)

"I would rather have you unhappy and under my control." The alternative went unsaid. "I'm not watching you lose yourself on the field. Not again."

(And that admission held as much vulnerability as Jack would ever spare, and Will was drowning in the implications.)

"Is - Is that all?" Will asked. He couldn't see past the thin sheen in his eyes. "Sir?"

"Yes, agent, that is all. Dismissed. Go - go talk to Alana. She's better at this than I am."

Will pulled his coat tighter around his shoulders as his limbs unglued and he could move like a normal person. He didn't feel normal as he pushed down the door handle and left Jack's office. His hand flew to his mouth to catch the sickening cry building behind his sternum. It never came, silenced by the dread blooming in his lower stomach, the nausea overpowering the pain. He didn't stop walking until he'd reached the far end of the facility. He sank onto a bench near the parking lot. Alana had driven them there in her car: another calculated move. He couldn't afford a cab the whole way home. He was trapped, like in Baltimore, the walls closing in damply as he clawed for an exit, or for air, or for his fading grip on reality.

Except now it was all snow and open sky and so many possibilities. All Will was sure of was that eight people were going to die tonight and he could do nothing. His head spun, dizzy on an acropolis of opportunity.

Minutes blurred. He watched people check in and out, the ones leaving wishing luck to the ones clocking in, their faces stiff with cold and apprehension.

And then there was Dr. Spencer. Will watched her come out, the wind blowing her hair back from her head until he could barely see the skin of her face. She was swift, her steps unwavering, the hand around her handbag tight — but she paused to smile and talk with the trainees passing her by.

Will studied her. He analysed the tail of her coat as she unlocked her car, and the steadiness of her hand as she adjusted the wing mirror, and the curl of her nails as she slid into the driver's seat.

Will analysed.

And then he began to walk.

A/N: Thank you to the favers, followers, and all the readers lurking in the shadows :D