cook_the_rude | (no subject)

Littering would have been rude. Will couldn't imagine Hannibal doing that. Dumping a body through...

At least there wasn't blood on the seat. Will wasn't sure he could have gotten in otherwise. The seat was still warm from the man's body. It should have unnerved him but it didn't.

He does up the seatbelt and sighs, letting his head fall back. "Why do I only seem get in a car with you when I've been injured in some way?" Not always physically but he seems to always be aching when he's Hannibal's passenger.

"Because only then," Hannibal asserted as he deftly turned the car, "will you give up the sovereignty over the maps of your life, and finally trust that you need me to get where you have to be."

Edited 2018-12-27 10:25 (UTC)

"Sovereignty over the maps." He echoes, tasting the words. "Jack Crawford tried to take that off me a long time ago."

Hannibal chuckles.

"He never quite succeeded," he muses. "Not from the man who lived in Wolf Trap and would drive hours every day to faithfully return to his pack."

Edited 2018-12-27 10:34 (UTC)

His pack. The pack he's given over to his- to Molly and Walter. Safer that way. They have a future. He...

Didn't know.

"At least they're safe." Almost abstinently.

"Safe from the Dragon, and the smoke over our map," Hannibal agrees. "Who knows what pack awaits us beyond that."

"They're not worth anything to him. Not now he has me." And he's not referring to the dogs. Or just the dogs.

He turns his head, looking at Hannibal's profile in the afternoon light. "You still think there is a beyond for us?"

"There is always a beyond," Hannibal says. "We might just not be here any more, and leave the sovereignty of interpretation to other."

"You have a fucked up view on nihilism." Will mutters, shifting in his seat to adjust his weight. The tumble hadn't broken anything but he had some new bruises. One on his hip he didn't like.

"What did you expect," Hannibal says, glancing over at Will with a smile. "I'm me. Hannibal the Cannibal, legendary bogeyman to the credulous."

Pause.

"I'll see to that when we're at the house."

"You can't actually like that name." Will huffs in disgust.

"House?" He lifts an eyebrow. "It's just bruise." Probably.

"Where did you think we were going?" Hannibal says. "Of course we're going to a house. And we need you as fit as you can be when we face the Dragon, so you'll have to indulge me when I see to your bruises."

Pause.

"Nobody gets to pick their own nicknames," he then adds. "If that is what they know me as, then that is what I am to them."

Edited 2018-12-27 12:11 (UTC)

"I'm pretty sure I'm out of other options at this point." Other than to indulge Hannibal.

He closes his eyes and mumbles, almost to himself, "Murder husbands."

"They called us that as well," Hannibal nods. "Or rather, Freddie Lounds did. I never disliked the implication, you know, even if that was her intention."

Pause.

"Yes, even without an Abigail for us to be fathers to."

Will is silent for a long moment.

"I asked Bedelia if she thought you were in love with me."

"What did she say?"

"Yes. In many more words." He manages a tired quirk of a smile. "She's jealous."

"Of course she is," Hannibal says. "She already was when we were in Florence. She'd cut off a pound of her own flesh and serve it to me, if she thought that would bring me back to where I've never really been."

Pause.

"Poor Bedelia. Unlike Alana, she did not find a grand, victorious consolation prize."

"Alana didn't know what she was getting into. Bedelia wanted to be Bluebeard's Wife." There's a chuckle in his voice. "She's pissed you chose me."

"She was always fascinated be my feelings for you," Hannibal says. "It hurts her self-image that I'd chose those, over all the sophistication and devotion that she could deliver."

"You wouldn't give her the self distribution she wanted." His eyes are closed, the ache starting to really set in.

"She came out an honourable victim," Hannibal says. "That is all she managed. All I could let her have. There was more at stake, back then in Florence."

He reaches over to briefly touch Will's cheek.

"Tell me when you need me to shut up."

Will catches himself leaning into the touch. Just a little. "No, keep talking." He doesn't remember hitting his head but the knot of a headache forming is slightly foreboding.

"This isn't my car, so I can't vouchsafe for the content of the glove compartment," Hannibal says. "All good glove compartments ought to contain painkillers, cough drops, and caffeine candy, but this might be a bad one, full of ammunition and donut coupons."

"Keep talking anyway." Will looks, trying to ignore the smudge of blood that transfers onto his hand as he opens it. There are painkillers, if cheap generic ones. He shakes three loose and dry swallows them with a grimace.

"There is a bottle of coke behind my seat," Hannibal supplies, semi-helpfully. "Again, I plead innocence; it's warm, generic and contains corn sugar. But it's liquid and contains some caffeine, too."

The bare minimum, apparently.

"I think I'll live. Thanks." He runs a hand through his hair in a half aborted stretch. "Any place you have agency over will have coffee."

"Yes," Hannibal says. "Decent coffee. I'm afraid that stopping for it on the way is not an option. I am sure Jack is keeping a lid on things for the time being, but some horrified little barista might recognise us."

"I think the lid is well and truly off." he huffs.

He rolls his head to look at Hannibal, brow cocked. "You just don't want to be seen in public in that jumpsuit."

"And this haircut," Hannibal says. "I look terrible -- like somebody with no agency about his own appearance. That makes people suspicious even before they look at my face."

He smiles fondly at Will.

"You, on the other hand, are wearing your usual invisibility cloak."

"Vanity, thy name is Hannibal." His eyes are closed but he hears the smile.

"Mediocrity is the best defence against interest." And one that's got him through most of his life.

"I think that is your most underestimated gift," Hannibal says. "You are anything but mediocre, in any way, but your command of human mimicry allows you to appear utterly harmless and rather plain."

"Not unlike your person suit?" He opens one eye a crack. "Bedelia's analogy." By way of explanation.

"Not unlike that," Hannibal says. "Yes, she used that analogy to me as well. It's hard to believably wear one, though, when one is put into this kind of unperson suit."

"Is that what you think was done to you?"

"In making me wear this?" Hannibal says. "Yes. This kind of uniform denotes an unperson."

"The contained monster." Will sighed, remembering his own incarceration. "I don't think they know how well tooth and claw can be sharpened on those walls."

After all, Will had send the copy-cat to kill Hannibal while locked up.

"No, the ones who hold the key know least about the place," Hannibal says. "But we do."

"Alana-" he was about the say knows but that isn't right either. "Is aware enough to know there are things she'll never understand. Fredrick Chilton was as aware of his surroundings and a gold fish."

Past tense. A piece removed from the board.

"That aware and conscious?" Hannibal says, amusement in his voice. "You really think that?"

"An insult to goldfish?" Will asks, chuckling too.

"Definitely," Hannibal says. "Goldfish are related to koi, after all, and koi are very personable and interactive fish -- not just decoration, proper pets. We should get some. Dogs don't fish, after all, unlike cats and Will Grahams."

"I've never fished for koi." Which is to say he's never had a reason to study their habits and behaviours.

Will turns to study Hannibal's profile. "Already planning our future." Not phrased as a question.

"Looking for new antlers to shape plans after," Hannibal amends, "after the eye of the needle that we must go through."

Pause.

"We may as well end up measured and found too thick."

"Always planning." It's not an insult. Will's own agency had grown since he started to think that way more than just reacting to stimuli. But he still feels like he can't think past the Dragon. Can't see the person he'll be on the other side of that fire.

"No firm plans, just a messy tangle of what-ifs," Hannibal says. "You do speak Spanish, don't you? Good."

"Functionally." it's almost a question. Almost wanting to hear about Hannibal's what-its. "Can't discuss the finer points of art but I can ask directions and make conversation." If he has to. He'd rather not but that's less to do with language and more to do with social transactions.

"That might be something to build on," Hannibal nods. "You are adaptable. After all, you sailed the Atlantic all by yourself and then found your way around Europe until you came to me in Palermo, then Florence."

"There were parts where I was thrown from a train." He points out.

"As far as I know," Hannibal chuckles, "that wasn't owed to your inability to make your own way around Europe, but rather to Chiyoh's slightly overprotective nature."

"And now I'm here. Going... where, exactly?"

"To the place where we meet the Dragon," Hannibal says. "My cliff house. Taking the advantage of picking the field of battle. I'll show you the salient points when we get there."

Edited 2018-12-30 10:07 (UTC)

Will nods and closes his eyes again. The motion of the car starts to lull him to sleep. One hand falls open on the console between them, palm up.

Hannibal turns on the radio, an utterly mundane gesture; but because he is Hannibal, the slightest twist of the dials brings on a Brandenburg Concerto, calm and quiet.

The common preferences of the cops who used to inhabit this car mean that the sound favours the bass; with Bach, it means that the basso continuo will come to the foreground, increasing the soporific effect of the car's gentle motions.

Will sleeps easily for the rest of the journey, only waking as the cat turns into a gravel driveway. "I smell the ocean." he comments without opening his eyes.

The car stops.

Hannibal reaches out to briefly touch Will's still-open palm as the motor cuts out, and the radio falls silent.

"We're here," Hannibal says. "At the cliff above the sea; I'll show you."

Edited 2018-12-30 10:33 (UTC)

For a moment Will's fingers close around Hannibal's, transferring the smear of dried blood. But then he lets go and rubs his cheek, opening the door and stretching and he gets out.

It's nice. He could like it here. If they hadn't come here to die.

Hannibal stands, and stretches to the sky, and breathes in deeply.

"Home away from home," he says. "Jack's lot never found it."

"How many didn't Jack find?" Will asks, slightly amused. He heads for the edge, stepping past a ring of larger stones.

"Enough," Hannibal says. "He missed a few of my places, and most of my stashes. I let him have those that were burned anyway, or not that useful."

"And now me." It's said softly, mostly to himself. Jack missed many things. Including how far from being his man Will had become.

"He thought you his useful tool," Hannibal says, starting to walk around the house. "He thought he could dump you into a peaceful life and pick you up whenever he wanted to. I do have to blame him for not realising you'd break. He lost his former edge since Bella's death."

Will doesn't follow. He stays where he can see the ocean. Where he can hear the regular beat of the waves.

"It wasn't Bella. It was you. And me."

"Because he fell for my traps, and underestimated you?" Hannibal says. "Ah, but do you think he would have if Bella had still been with him? She saw through me much sooner."

"We weakened his sense of infallibility. At a time he couldn't control life and death, he thought he could control other things. Us."

"And then, one of us had to be the very monster he was hunting," Hannibal answers. "What a blow. Then, he first got the wrong one, and when he finally got the right one, you failed to drop back into the line as if nothing had happened, just a small regrettable mistake."

Pause.

"What a surprise."

"How many times did he believe he has the Chesapeake Ripper?Abel Gideon, Chilton, me, you. And even once he had you-" he gestures around. To their freedom. However temporary.

"He didn't manage to hold on to me," Hannibal nods. "He never realised I only stayed for your sake."

"No. No, he didn't." He walks closer to the edge, feeling the salt on his skin. "I doubt Alana knew."

"She was too scared to think straight," Hannibal says. "Which is why I threatened her and her family, now."

"Will you? Hurt them?" his tone is neutral but Will keeps his back to Hannibal now, eyes only for the waves.

"If we survive the Dragon," Hannibal says, "do you think I'd waste resources on making her unhappy, just because?"

Pause.

"If she had been thinking straight, she'd have realised I don't usually threaten people. As long as she's running in the opposite direction, she can't get in the way again."

"You don't usually break promises either."

He turns his head then. "I need a shower. Do you think we have time?"

Hannibal steps up behind him, and smiles at him.

"She is on borrowed time," he says. "We all are, and cannot run from it. Even the earth crumbles underneath our feet."

Standing beside Will, he peers down at the roiling sea in its narrow bowl between the cliffs, white waves foaming up at the bluff, eating at it, while the middle stays dark.

"The bluff is eroding," Hannibal says, conversationally. "There was more land when I was here with Abigail; more land still when I was here with Miriam Lass."

"Now you're here with me." He reflects, turning to look at Hannibal.

Hannibal is still looking into the abyss.

"And the bluff is still eroding," he says. "You and I are suspended over the roiling Atlantic. Soon, all this will be lost to the sea."

He catches Will's eyes then, and smiles minutely before turning towards the house.

"And yes, showers are definitely on offer. I don't want to risk dying in this unperson suit."

Will followed him inside, touched the frame as he entered.

Chairs covered by cloths, thick carpet.

And Abigail's ghost, hanging in the air. The life they could have had here. He talked from room to room, looking for hers. And he knew it, as soon as he opened the door. Her scent lingering.

"Is this where we would have come, if I'd gone with you?"

"As a first stop, yes," Hannibal says. "For a breather. Then, on to the airport before Jack or Alana recovered enough to speak."

"Everything that can happen happens. Has to end well, and it has to end badly. Has to end every way it can. This is the way it ended for us." He takes a slow breath. "I told her that once. After you killed her."

He doesn't wait for Hannibal to reply. "Which way to the bathroom. I assume you have spare clothes in my size."

"Of course I do," Hannibal says. "And some toiletries that might suit you, even without the ship on the bottle."

Pause.

"Even if salty is your usual state of being, it doesn't have to be from sweating, or from the sea."

Another pause.

"The room beside hers.

Will huffs darkly and turns away, heading into that room and closing the door.

The sun has set by the time he comes out, clean and dressed as he leans against the window, looking out at the sea.

"He won't be long now," Hannibal says.

He emerges from another door, smelling of steam and oud, wearing neutral colours now, his hair still badly cut, but damp and free.

Will looks over, looks him up and down. Then looks back at the window. "At least you'll die looking like you."

"If I have to die," Hannibal says. "We may yet come out of this alive. Once the Dragon is here, the outcome is fully open."

He runs a hand through his hair.

"But yes, this may be a last moment for me to be myself."

"What does that make me? My becoming? If you cease to be you." He looks around to Hannibal, eyes dark. "Do either of us survive separation."

"If we do," Hannibal says, "you will take me into the future within yourself, or I you: - the only remaining person who could really see the other."

"What will there be to see, if we're both changed by the Dragon."

"Then we just leave pieces for Jack and Alana to puzzle over," Hannibal says. "Which would be a waste, so let's by all means avoid it."

Will toyed with something light and silken, brushing it between the fingers of one hand. One of Abigal's scarves, the ones she use to hide her father's scar.

"We wasted too much as it is," Hannibal says, as if picking up on that. "Time. Potential. Perfect moments."

Will turned sharply, harsh words on the tip of his tongue. His eyes blazed at Hannibal.

And then the moment passed and he dropped the scarf, shoulders sagging. "I need a drink."

"I'll get us some wine," Hannibal offers, smoothly. "And music. There is no point in waiting in silence, with bated breath."

Will turned his back, staring out at the darkened sea, watching the moonlit crests of waves.

Soft piano music starts to play from unseen speakers as Hannibal's steps retreat downstairs, towards the inside of the cliff house.

Will closes his eyes and tries not to feel Abigail at his side, or hear her voice.

"If everything that can happen happens, you can't really do the wrong thing. You're just doing what you're supposed to do."

Hannibal is making noises that involve wood and glass, as if to let Will know where he is.

Abigail's presence is slight and ephemeral, like her silken scarf.

Will sniffs and lets her ghost go, like a waft of perfume on the air.

as Hannibal's steps return, with the clink of glasses an a bottle.

Edited 2018-12-30 16:01 (UTC)