Chapter Text
“For today’s warm up question, I want to know what paradise is to you. If you could spend a day in a perfect world, what might that look like?”
Will scraped his heels against the white tile beneath him, leaving behind two black scuff marks. A group facilitator sat across from him in the circle of clients, her smile washed out by fluorescent gymnasium lights into a greenish white. Will’s attention drifted past the woman and to the long foldable table against the wall, its sticky plastic surface full of grocery store muffins and watered down coffee. Will had decided that this evening, free dinner meant he could sit through the forced make-up meeting.
Clearing her throat, the facilitator probed once again, calling on a random participant to answer.
“A day spent marveling in the will of God, in His creation, connecting with the earth and His magnificence.” Will’s eyes drifted lazily while the woman’s sing-song voice echoed sharply against the gymnasium walls, occasionally intercepted by sounds of mumbled agreement from the group.
It had been exactly fifteen days since Will had a drink. Alana had approached him carefully at Quantico with a bargain, sitting him down to a “go home and sign up for the rehabilitation group as I say, or find your desk indefinitely empty.” Every workday, he silently dropped a signed attendance log on Alana’s desk, turning his back towards her before she could say a word.
Will counted the seconds hand of the clock pass as the woman's story never seemed to end. After sixty more dragged on, the facilitator politely intervened to announce the end of the meeting, speaking overtop of the group as they rustled to put on coats and grab bags.
“Next week, we’ll be having a guest sit in with us for observation. He’ll be collecting data for a paper regarding the work we do,” the facilitator grinned widely, her smile lines stretching to accommodate it, “I will gather some consent forms from you all at the start of the session. I hope to see you all again soon.”
Another set of eyes, another unit of pressure. Will fumbled with his tortoise colored glasses as he rose, tugging his brown corduroy coat on. He briskly walked towards the exit, letting the emergency door slam shut behind him.
-
Waking up every morning was harder than the last. Will’s sleep was plagued by the same nightmares of his Southern hometown, dry wheat fields in the backwoods of Alabama at sundown, Will cracking and whipping against the branches of pine trees that tore into his skin. Whatever was chasing him never came into reach, and never took a rest. Will always found himself waking up wide eyed and doused in his own sweat, forced to peel off a now sour smelling t-shirt before dragging himself to the shower.
When he closed his eyes and pressed his forehead against the cool shower tile, he imagined himself standing on the rooftop of Quantico, past the guardrails and teetering on the very edge. After turning the water off, he’d stand for a long while and let the showerhead trickle its remnants onto the crown of his head. Will jumped from this great height in his mind as many times as possible, until his soft body didn’t get back up again.
At work, Will crumpled into his seat and stared across the various portfolios of unconfirmed suspects and gutted victims on his desk. Will mindlessly picked at the corner of the newest addition, staring at The Chesapeake Ripper spelled out in bold marker.
Each body found had been contorted into something abstract and grotesque for the unfortunate FBI agent that would analyze it. Lately, it had been Will, standing in the midst of the gore and the hunger for violence.
A hungry Ripper. Will looked down and realized he had begun to fold and fray a manilla corner until it was tattered.
“I hear Hannibal is coming to your group today?” Alana appeared unannounced before Will’s desk, arms crossed, a hip pressing flush into the old wood. Will looked up from the sea of folders towards Alana’s face, past the shoulder length hair that followed as she bowed her head closer to him.
Will furrowed his brow as he searched for the name. “The visitor coming to ‘observe’ us?” Reclining in his seat, Will watched Alana from beneath his brow. Alana trailed a hand across the folder closest to her, thumbing the edge of an evidence photo that threatened to spill over.
“Your facilitator doesn't mean any harm by bringing someone else around, Will. I’ve known Hannibal for quite some time, he mentored me through Johns Hopkins. This paper he’s working on is–”
“Doesn't mean any harm,” Will echoed wryly, dragging his palms down the knees of his pantlegs as he bitterly shook his head. He ignored the way Alana bristled at his childish interruption.
“I don't know how treating us like lab rats in a rehabilitative environment should make me feel, but I wouldn't exactly call it healing. It’s performative at best, clinical at worst.” Will eventually came to a pause, realizing how closely Alana was listening to him, her eyebrows drawn and jaw firmly set.
“This is the most you’ve spoken to me in weeks, Will. A group like this is bound to help you. I’m sure you’ll find Hannibal intriguing enough to stick around.” Alana picked up the folder she had been fiddling with, opening it to a photograph that slid down to the palm of her hand. A young woman was splayed out on yellowing grass, sternum and ribcage methodically opened, various organs missing from the cavities of her chest. Alana quickly shut the folder.
“I don’t find most people that interesting,” Will muttered as he took his glasses off, pinching and rubbing at the bridge of his nose before his hand fell down to his thigh.
Alana smiled warmly. “With Hannibal? You will.”
-
Will filled his paper plate with four banana bread muffins, balancing the coffee cup against the beveled edge of the thin platter. In between the group facilitator’s chair was a new and different body, straight postured and donning a suit with a pattern that almost seemed to shimmer beneath the terrible lighting.
Will watched the perfect silhouette of the stranger’s back while he wrote something down; not a sandy brown hair dared to come out of place when he turned to respond to the facilitator remarking on the group turn out. Will tore his gaze away, stopping at the end of the foldable table for a second plate to protect the top of his food.
Once Will was settled and the group’s small chat came to a natural end, the facilitator smiled even wider than before, splaying a hand towards the unfamiliar man sat before them.
“Good morning everyone! This is Doctor Hannibal Lecter. He will be observing you for the next seven days, focusing on the cohesion of our group and how we all engage intrapersonally and emotionally.” As the facilitator spoke with a corporate pride that hung strangely in the informal community gymnasium, Will’s face twitched into a scrunch. Cupping his hand across his face, Will pretended as if he had an itch on his nose that could be scratched away.
Behind his hand, he felt Hannibal’s eyes land on him.
“Could everybody go around the group and introduce themselves? I won’t bore you with any icebreakers,” she offhandedly remarked to Hannibal, earning herself a smile so artificial that Will could not miss its insincerity from the gaps between his fingers.
As the group went around, Will hung his head against the back of his chair, counting every crosspoint of four ceiling tiles that met. Various careers, ages, and different degrees of alcoholism were awkwardly shared by each individual.
When silence hung in the air to indicate his turn, Will straightened himself, tapping his feet for a moment before flattening them on the floor. Green flannel sleeves glided across his arms as he crossed them.
“Will Graham,” he said flatly towards Hannibal, who merely watched on in silence. “I’ve been working as a professor for Quantico’s Behavioral Department for over seven years. I find the job to be incredibly fulfilling. In fact, I celebrate every day I come home with a whole bottle of Maker’s Mark. And now I’m here.” Will had kept his eyes trained on the spot between both the facilitator and Hannibal’s shoulders, currently unwilling to fully meet the doctor’s gaze that had not faltered since he sat down. “I didn’t come to be ogled, or used to buff your resume–” for a moment, Will did meet Hannibal’s eyes, captured in the dark shadows cast by the light, “I don’t intend to participate for your benefit.”
“Participation isn’t mandatory, Will,” the group facilitator interjected before Hannibal could even move to speak, prompting Hannibal to shift his legs into a crossed position, hands coupled and holding onto a leather-backed legal pad. Will broke from Hannibal’s eyes, trailing his attention across the creamy white sheets and the immaculate cursive script that peeked out from the page. “If you want to miss this week’s meetings, that’s fine. It’s all delineated in the form I gave you when you first walked in.”
It sat folded into a million tiny squares in Will’s breast pocket.
“So, you enjoy teaching others how to see the world as you do, Will?” Hannibal’s voice was unexpectedly thick with an accent that Will could not place.
Will looked at the spot between Hannibal’s eyebrows. “I don’t particularly wish for anyone to see it how I do,” Will’s eyes darted back to the familiarity of the clock on the wall, “I just want them to see the killers for who they are, how they leave traces of themselves besides physical evidence.” Will’s voice trailed off as he turned back to the ground, finally focusing on his worn out oxford shoes.
“And how do you see them, beyond the evidence?”
Will’s mouth quirked slightly down. “It’s not seeing, it’s becoming. To catch them, you have to–”
“Well, Will, I’m glad to see how much you’re opening up,” in a far too high-pitched voice, the facilitator broke the conversation apart, clasping her hands together. “Unfortunately, it’s time for us to move onto the next person, and get to our first processing topic.”
For a fraction of a moment, the annoyance on Hannibal’s face manifested itself in the twitching quiver of his crow’s eyes, the smallest flare of his nostrils. Will watched intently until it all slammed shut in his face. Hannibal was back to the perfect neutrality of a marble statue, leaving Will at the base.
“In the past few days, has there been anything particularly distressing for you, or something on your mind that you’d like to share? Let’s work our way around the room.”
-
Once the final grueling hour ended, Will rolled his neck around, removing his glasses to wipe at them with the corner of his flannel. Every awful memory and painful story recounted by the group remained in Will’s mind, dancing around and kicking down feeble fortresses constructed to keep himself sane. Alcohol induced memory loss had been the final line of defense between him and the Ripper. Will slid his thumb against the worn down buttons of his car fob, contemplating whether he wanted to call out of work as he stood up.
“It was a pleasure to meet you, Will.” Hannibal’s voice was measured as he suddenly stood before Will, a brown trenchcoat folded over his arm.
Will stuffed his keys in his pocket before adjusting a nonexistent tilt in his glasses. “Guess I should say the same for you.”
Hannibal smiled. Unlike towards the facilitator, it felt sincerely friendly, and the rest of Hannibal’s face fell into a similar warmth. “If you allow me the opportunity, perhaps we could get to know each other. I suspect we have more in common than you’d believe.”
Will dryly laughed, hand in pocket as he turned to inspect the members leaving the room. “Most people wouldn’t describe me as relatable.”
“Relatively speaking, we share a similar background. I suspect you are familiar with Alana Bloom?”
At the mention of Alana, Will’s expression softened, and the hand in his pocket began to flex. “Do you happen to stare at dead people all day long too? I’d think you know better than I what that does to your head.” Avoiding the topic of her was easier than admitting their arrangement to Hannibal.
“After completing medical school, I love it as much as you do,” Hannibal chuckled through his words, and Will glanced from the side towards him. A small, frail smile crept onto Will’s face.
“Behavioral science lends itself just as much to private practice. Identification of, for example, a classic psychopath through total insertion of yourself into their perspective is a uniquely destructive approach.” Hannibal’s steady, time-worn hand buttoned his suit back together, maintaining steady eye contact with Will as he llooked anywhere else.
Will cleared his throat, brown downturned, “Sorry, but is this a pre-assessment? Wanna pitch your business card at me next?” Will chewed out his words as Hannibal bowed his head in acquiesce.
Hannibal began to put his coat on, looking across Will’s attire and towards the ground.
“Is that your plate? I wouldn’t want you to leave it behind.” Hannibal's eyes gestured towards the plate and coffee on the wooden floor beside Will’s chair. A hot blush quickly formed across Will’s face as he bent down to gather the plate and cup, gripping the second plate covering the muffins tightly.
“Thanks.” Will balanced the cup atop of the plate tower. Hannibal took a moment to allow Will to collect himself.
“I hope we may see each other next session.”
Will had begun to walk away, momentarily raising a free hand once he was near the exit to indicate a goodbye.
Hannibal took inventory of the spread of store bought baked goods across the room, the sound of his dress shoes reverberating across the glossy gymnasium floor.