Chapter Text
He is intoxicating, filling the air with his presence that filters through Will Graham’s skin—Dr. Hannibal Lecter taints the purity that has begun to dissipate after Will has killed Garrett Jacob Hobbs with shaking hands which leave Hobbs’ chest riddled with ten, imprecise bullets, and, with those very same fingers that pull the trigger, clamp down on Abigail Hobbs’ sliced windpipe as she gasps for air with blood pouring through the severed flesh. And he remembers Hannibal, his face calm and betraying no emotion, precisely covering the laceration with his hand, staunching the blood while Will stands back, crimson blood splattered across his visage as he hyperventilates, holding his gore-covered hands away from his body as if they are contaminated, staining his pale skin.
Will looks down at his tense hands, clutching each other so tightly that the skin surrounding the area where his fingers wrap around is white with the edges nearing a dark pink. The last time he had stared at the very same hands, the blood of two different people covered them.
He is aware of the well-dressed man, shoulders defined in a tailored suit that is inscrutable by Will who wonders if it is wool or silk but avoiding blended cashmere or synthetic materials, cheap and mediocre, that the man wouldn’t dare sully his impeccable appearance.
Will’s eyes travel up the solid, uni-color navy suit that hides a platinum-colored vest underneath, up the crisp white shirt that is contrasted by a 100% imported silk tie that mimics the color of his suit jacket and tied in a symmetrical Windsor, pulled tight at his collared throat. A silver pocket square peeks out from the suit, pure silk rather than a satin and it stands out against the dark blue plane.
Will looks at his jaw, tracing the contours of his angled face, sharp cheekbones that slice through the air. Will pauses, unwilling to allow his own eyes to continue further up to look into Hannibal’s deep brown eyes that hide more than they reveal. Will’s eyes follow his cheekbones as Hannibal's head angles to the side.
The light refracts off Hannibal's smooth complexion, resembling burning fire so white that it is near-impossible to see as it flickers and wavers in the translucent light shining through it. He is an inferno, and Will can see the light that curls upwards from Hannibal's skin, and he closes his eyes, exhaling.
“You still cannot bear to look people in the eyes,” Hannibal observes, watching Will as he abruptly opens his own; he stares straight into Hannibal’s face yet does not make any proper eye contact.
“Quite nice of you to state the obvious,” Will responds, his eyes dropping back down to hands that haven’t moved, aside from the occasional twitch.
“It would be easier for people to trust you if you could somehow imitate consistent and proper eye contact instead of focusing on small details or flaws of the face,” Hannibal states.
Will’s head snaps up, looking at Hannibal in the face, yet still he avoids the analytical stare of the psychiatrist. He knows that Hannibal is aware of the fact that he is still incapable of looking at people in the eyes, and that Hannibal is aware that Will is not looking at his eyes.
“Jack wouldn’t rein you in like a dog breeder training his inbred pet to trot at the perfect distance on a leather lead with a tight collar to bite into his neck if he strays too far if you could,” Hannibal articulates, his noticeable European accent softening the consonants of his otherwise perfect diction.
“I am not a dog, or even a show dog,” Will spits through gritted teeth, retreating and flinching backwards from behind his plastic-frame glasses that have ellipse-shaped lenses, hiding behind them as he struggles to answer.
“I… I am not Jack’s dog.”
“Perhaps I used to strong of a comparison. You are a falcon, allowed to fly and escape for a short excursion, but always called back to the falconer. But you are not trained like a falcon to listen to its master. You choose to be the falcon wearing the leather hood over your eyes, domesticated when you should be free, and blinding yourself to the dangers that Jack so thoroughly convinces himself that are not there,” Hannibal counters smoothly.
“You think that I choose to be like this?” Wills’ eyebrows furrow, his brow darkening while his forehead wrinkles as he looks incredulously at Hannibal, yet still managing to avoid the eyes, “Why the hell would I want this?”
“To an extent, you do choose to be like that. It all depends on the perspective—the subjectivity of how you look at everything is dependent on how you react to it. You do not want it. Of course you don’t. You are afraid of the very thing you are forced to seek, afraid of becoming the very thing you are forced to find.”
Will takes off his glasses, rubbing his eyes with one hand while holding the plastic frames in the other. And he can only think of how correct Hannibal is, how he is becoming the very thing he is forced to find.
Looking up, he hisses through his teeth, “I liked killing Hobbs,” and he can see a dying Garrett Jacob Hobbs behind his closed lids, Hobbs struggling to breathe through punctured lungs as he whispers, with a satisfied smirk creeping up his face, “See? See?”
Yes and no. Will does see why, as he manages to look at Hobbs in the eye as his crazed conscience shines through them, illuminating his whole face with the euphoric mask that is burned into Will’s mind. But he feels it, the power of taking away someone’s life, the rush of adrenaline that tears through his veins, burning, searing his innards and cauterizing him, in a way that it hurts but mutes the bleeding, in a way he cannot ever hope to understand or explain.
“And so you finally admit to yourself that you felt powerful, holding the gun in your hands, ending his life as easily as God ends ours,” Hannibal says softly. Will cringes from the statement, his transparent face displaying the inner self-loathing that spills out, coloring in his face, filling in the lines that are deep ravines crossing his face.
“There is no shame, William. You saved the life of an innocent girl, Abigail Hobbs. With his death, you have ensured her survival. And what greater gift can you give to a human than life?”
Will stands up, ignoring the effects on his vision and hearing as his blood pressure drops while he straightens himself.
“Dr. Lecter, I don’t believe that you understand. I got too close. You know what will happen if I get even closer,” Will warns, his hands shakily replacing the glasses on the bridge of his nose, “And that is the very reason that Jack Crawford sent me here to see you for therapy sessions.”
“Jack is a fool who doesn’t see what you see. You should not judge yourself so harshly based on a silly man’s claims—”
“Which is obviously why he had me get psychoanalyzed by you to make sure that I didn’t go crazy and kill anybody after I shot Hobbs! But you handed me a letter including your signature confirming that I didn’t get ‘too close’ without doing a single, damn thing! And I still see Hobbs everywhere: in my dreams, at every crime scene… everywhere. Goddammit, Hannibal.”
A sob of torturous frustration rises from the depths of his throat, escaping through his clenched teeth as Hannibal notes the resentment that Will should rightly put on him turns inwards, manifesting in a sense of inadequacy.
“I wasn’t okay, but I still went back with that letter that you gave me that said I was okay to go back to the field. And as I was kneeling down besides that man that had mushrooms and mycelium sprouting from his flesh, growing across his skin and face extensively to the point his features were indistinguishable and unidentifiable, I saw Hobbs in that shallow grave instead,” Will dictates angrily, putting emphasis on “Hobbs” in order to add more urgency though he already knows that Hannibal understands with or without it, “He’s always there when I’m looking for something or someone. I can see those dead, clouded eyes boring into mine even when I try to look away from him.”
Hannibal looks at him, expressionless as ever, and asks, “So what are you going to do about it?”
Will pauses, expecting another analogy or enigma that somehow applies itself to his situation.
“I—I don’t know,” he stutters honestly, pacing back and forth as he contemplates, “To forget, I guess. I—I really just don’t know!”
Hannibal rises smoothly from his chair, joining Will on his feet.
“Come. Let me treat you to a nice, home-cooked meal, William, to get your mind off of what has transpired.” Hannibal stretches out his arm, pointing towards the door out of the office. Will, albeit hesitantly, follows Hannibal’s unsaid order.
-----
Will seats himself at the table, with silverware neatly set surrounding an empty space where the porcelain plate containing the meal will sit. He becomes hyperaware of the fact that he has not slept properly for the past week—the night terrors keep him afraid, weak. He cannot simply stand away, staring at his little house with every light blazing through the windows, a sailboat on a steady sea that brings Will a sense of comfort.
Will closes his eyes and attempts to relax his shoulders; he does not plan to fall asleep. And he sits there, at Hannibal’s dining table where he awaits a fanciful and artful meal, where he tries not to sleep because he is more afraid of his subconscious than an infantile child is afraid of the dark.
-----
Will is still seated, but Abigail Hobbs watches his face intently, staring at his eyes as he tries his best to not look into her own, piercing blue ones that often scream out hurt from underneath the trembling, dark eyelashes.
“Dad,” she says, “Why aren’t you eating?”
He looks down at his plate. Instead of the fine china that Hannibal is particular about, it is a simple ceramic piece that has been fired a tan color with a clear glaze coating it. And in that clear glaze, he can see his own reflection.
Garrett Jacob Hobbs’ face stares back at him, his dead eyes boring into Will’s own, his body still riddled with bullet holes exactly where Will had left them.
“See?” Will whispers to the plate, and Garrett Jacob Hobbs’ face twists into the satisfied smirk that Will remembers looking up to while clutching his daughter’s bleeding neck,
feeling her gasp for air through the cut.
Abigail looks at him, worried, her eyelashes beginning to flutter rapidly, faster than a hummingbird’s wings as it gathers nectar with its long, piercing beak that is only used to draw the liquid that is dire for its survival. She is afraid.
Will stands up, staring at a particular freckle on her pale face. He reaches and grabs her, dragging her into the kitchen that is not Hannibal’s. It’s his—Garret Jacob Hobbs’.
“Shh. Shh. It’ll all be over soon. I’m sorry… I’m sorry,” he whispers softly into Abigail’s ear as he holds her close, grasping a knife from the wooden knife rack and pressing it against her soft, pale flesh.
She struggles against his solid grip, stretching her neck.
What a fool, Garrett Jac—Will thinks, it’ll only make it easier for him to slice through that delicate, thin membrane that constricts her throbbing pulse. He can see her tendons tensing and stretching.
“I’m sorry,” he whispers again, pulling the blade across her trachea.
-----
“Will?”
He snaps his head up as he sees a Hannibal whose hands are laden with white, porcelain dishes that have golden glaze around the rim. Simple, but elegant.
He walks over to the table and sets the dishes that hold the delicacies that he can craft so well down.
Hannibal pours a deep, red wine into Will’s glass before attending to his own. Will struggles to not think of how similar the color is to the crimson that spread across Hobbs’ shirt, and he feels bile rising from his roiling stomach.
“Pork rillettes garnished with thyme sprigs spread on pain de campagne with a side of tripoux made from sheep tripe,” Hannibal informs Will as he waits for the guest to begin eating first.
Will sits there, staring at the dish in front of him. Hannibal sets down his knife and fork.
“It still troubles you.”
Will does not make any indication that he has heard a single word that escapes from Hannibal’s thin mouth though he knows it is true.
He affirms the statement in his head, but instead reaches for his glass of wine and downs it, more desperate than a man dying of thirst discovering a clear fountain of water in the desert, and the glass empties more quickly than Will would like it to. Hannibal watches him impassively, but Will feels that he is disappointed.
"Criticize me," Will mutters, "It won't be the first time you have today." He reaches for the crystalline wine decanter, only to have Hannibal to grab his wrist in a swift, fluid motion, preventing him from intoxicating himself more than his conflicting thoughts already have.
"Enough."
Will freezes and finally looks into his eyes, his limb still held captive by Hannibal’s strong grip. He can feel his eyes twitching rapidly, side to side, as he alternates focusing on the two almond-colored eyes, deep and blazing like a whiskey in a clear, cut-crystal Swarovski glass.
Will would become an alcoholic if there was an endless supply of that whiskey to be his choice method of slowly killing himself. He wants to feel that whiskey sliding down his throat, scalding but cleansing.
They stare at each other, expressionless but not waiting.
And here Will is, circling in an empty universe with the single star that is his sanity floating away from him as he is at the aphelion of his orbit, with Hannibal grasping at his fraying conscience, holding him in place.
Still staring into Hannibal’s eyes, Will decides that instead of Swarovski, the whiskey would be too precious for that. No, no. He would pour it and savor the whiskey, Hannibal’s whiskey, in an old Baccarat bucket glass that would not tamper the flavor.
Hannibal suddenly lets go of him, and his arm drops, Will’s mind not registering the loss of pressure or support. He knocks over his empty wine glass, and the thin glass shatters upon contact with the solid ebony table.
“Shit,” Will mumbles, grabbing his napkin and dabbing at the shards of crystal that bleed droplets of the wine. Hannibal stands up, excusing himself to grab a small dustpan and brush.
Will attempts to pick up one of the larger fragments, only to have his shaking hands slip as he picks it up, and the glass cuts a shallow, red line across the pad of his index finger. Gingerly stepping to his feet, Will walks out of the dining room—he needs to find Hannibal and ask for some disinfectant and a bandage to cover his bleeding skin.
“Leaving so soon?” Hannibal’s voice asks from behind him.
“No,” Will turns to see Hannibal holding a wooden brush and dustpan. Of course he uses wooden ones, Will thinks bitterly, he’s so particular about quality.
“Let me see your hand.”
Will debates whether or not to do so. He does not enjoy trusting people. People have left him alone, so he tends to his fishing rods, to his whiskey, to his dogs that he knows are laying around the front door and eagerly awaiting the sound of his footsteps clambering up the front porch steps. But he wants to drink whiskey the color Hannibal’s eyes instead of his own drink.
“Why are you afraid?” Hannibal asks him, and Will struggles to look up at Hannibal’s face that begins to show an ounce of curiosity rather than his constant blank face that shows a hint of a smile.
He’s your therapist, Will tells himself. Will knows that he’s already opened up, but emotional openness never gets any easier with physical contact.
“N-nothing,” Will stutters, and lifts his arm up, palm facing upwards and Hannibal takes his hand delicately. Will shivers at the foreign touch, and he can feel his body locking up with Hannibal’s fingers lightly pressing themselves on his wrist and hand.
“It is not deep. Let me get my kit.”
Hannibal lets go of Will’s hand, but this time, Will holds it up rather than letting it fall. Hannibal looks at Will’s bleeding finger, and for a second, Will can almost see a flash of emotion pass through his face—it seemed that Hannibal hungered to taste his blood, and there was a certain desire that Will could not pinpoint.
“Don’t leave,” Hannibal instructs him, and he leaves the room.
Will is frozen, standing there in the doorway from the kitchen to the dining room, his hand held out with the blood still covering his thin fingers, seeping into the lines and cracks in his palms, and the gesture in which Will stretches out his arm is almost making it seem that he is holding out an offering to some deity.
Will doesn’t know what he is worshipping. Sometimes, he feels like he’s sold his soul to the devil, stuck in the purgatory that is a conscience composed of pure empathy, feeling and feeding off the emotions of everyone else.
As he stands there waiting for Hannibal to return, he wonders why he ever agreed to become Jack’s dog—Will doesn’t even have enough self-worth to compare himself to a falcon that still has chances for excursions, fleeing for a brief period from his master before being called back. But as a dog, he has no choice but to keep obeying, and Will hates himself for that, hates himself for being what he is.
Every time he tries to turn away and escape from himself, he is always drawn back to this hell, working with the FBI, empathizing with what he is so afraid of. He can feel himself changing, taking little bits of what he sees and holding it within his crumbling conscience. He can feel Garrett Jacob Hobbs nesting in his head, curling around the base of his hypothalamus and becoming a more integrated aspect of his psyche.
Hannibal returns with a first-aid kit. He sets it down on the dark granite counters of his kitchen and motions for Will to move closer. And Will, the trained little dog, comes as he is called.
“Let me see your hand.” Will obeys and holds it out, and his eyes carefully watch Hannibal’s hands as they delicately encompass his own.
“It did not sever anything major. I shall disinfect it and bandage it,” Hannibal thinks aloud to himself.
Will glances up to see Hannibal staring intently at him, making unintentional eye contact. He cannot pull himself away from the alluring stare, and he can see that aura again, that light that seems to come from within Hannibal’s being as it manifests in a translucent halo of white light that burns, shining through his skin. It is almost intoxicating as the man himself.
Will feels like he has managed to swallow down a sip of that precious, fiery whiskey, igniting his throat and insides as it slides down his esophagus and trails through his digestive track, marking him from the inside, marking him as Hannibal’s.