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The door didn’t stand out. It was just one of several nondescript entryways in a nondescript corridor. There was no gush of hellfire from inside. In fact there wasn’t even a light on. Why should there be? Will held no illusions that Hannibal Lecter was actually living in this shabby apartment complex. If he really was alive, he was watching from a safehouse nearby, settled in one slightly further away. He probably had a few dozen scattered across the country.
No, this was just the place he was leading Will tonight. And Will had followed, right up to the peeling paint on the doorframe. It wasn’t as though the absence of flame or blood blooming out into the hallway meant Will wasn’t dead the moment he opened the door. A knife. A saw. A needle. Though Hannibal could do it quite effectively with his hands before Will had a chance to look twice.
Will drew the little key from his pocket and rubbed his thumb over it gently, feeling the teeth. There was really no reason to think he’d find anything here but another little clue. Another piece in the puzzle he’d been dutifully solving for months. No reason to think he’d find the man himself. The monster.
Despite that truth, Will knew with a certainty (that perhaps should have been chilling, but wasn’t) that this was another point of no return. He’d had more than his fair share of those, over the course of his life. Some of them he’d ignored. That didn’t mean he didn’t know how to recognize one.
He wasn’t ignoring this one. The key went easily into the lock. He felt no thrill of excitement, but no spike of terror either. Simply the certainty that he wasn’t leaving this building without knowing what was behind door number one.
Will pushed the door open with more laziness than caution, knowing he should be going in gun drawn, checking his corners. There didn’t seem to be anyone around to critique his form. Once the door was open, he carried himself across the threshold without pause.
It was dark inside the apartment, but enough light from the street cut in for Will to take in the shoddily-furnished kitchen beyond the tiny entryway. His lip twitched. If he hadn’t been sure already that this was a drop point rather than a domicile, this confirmed it.
Will pressed the door shut behind him and felt the soft click echo through his fingers. Here came the hard part. Every instinct called for him to check out the scene, or at the very least look around. Instead he crossed the distance to the card table that stood before the modest window. This position cut off his view of nearly everything else, including the darkened entryway to the rest of the apartment.
He still had no idea whether he was alone or not. His neck prickled, but Will was smart enough to know his own nerves and paranoia could cause such a reaction regardless of company, wanted or otherwise. He was in possession of empathy, not extra sensory perception. He calmed himself with the reminder that, if Hannibal wasn’t here, he had nothing to lose. Unless, of course, this was some less intimately familiar threat that had been baiting him for half a year. Will didn’t think that was the case.
He let his fingers brush absently over the cheap vinyl of the table in front of him. “Before we start anything,” though casual and quiet, Will’s voice struck his own ears as loud to the point of overstimulating in the silence of the apartment, “I’d like you to know that Jack doesn’t know I’m here.”
And then there was a noise. Every involuntary muscle tensed, but Will didn’t allow himself to move. That had been the sound of a few light footsteps, he was almost certain of it. The doorway he’d noticed before, behind him and slightly to the left. He didn’t turn. “I could be lying, of course, but I doubt you’d fall for that simple a trap.” Again , he did not add.
Another slight shift of the shitty carpet dispelled any doubts that there was another person there with him. At this point, if it wasn’t Hannibal, Will was definitely fucked. The irony of Hannibal sneaking up behind him being the good option wasn’t lost on Will, but he’d already made the choice to come here.
Simple nerves compelled him to speak again, but he resisted. Just waited. There were no further sounds of footfalls, but he suddenly became very aware that there was a presence more directly behind him. Again, his instincts were screaming, but he remained utterly still.
The tension may have distorted the time, slightly, but Will was pretty sure at least a full minute of silence passed.
“But you’re very good at lying to me. Aren’t you, Will?”
Will had thought he’d been prepared for this, but at the sound of Hannibal’s voice, he nearly lost control. The urge to bolt back out the door--or perhaps the window, they were only two floors up--was matched only by the compulsion to spin around and drink in his presence. He’s alive . Despite the clear hunt Will had been lead on, despite his own certainty...he hadn’t truly let himself believe it until then.
But he didn’t move. He allowed himself one, shuddering breath--oh god, was he tearing up?--and flexed his shoulder in what he hoped was a casual and unconcerned gesture. “It’s been a long time since I lied to you, though.”
“Yes. But it’s been rather a long time since anything at all has passed between us.”
“Only a year.”
“Only? Did it feel short to you?”
“No.” No point in lying. But Will hadn’t intended quite so much raw emotion to come out in that single syllable.
Perhaps Hannibal hadn’t either, because there was a pause before he spoke again. “Did you think I was dead?” His tone was one of light curiosity.
“At times,” Will admitted, pleased at how well he kept the tremble out of his voice. “I certainly told people I did. Convinced most of them, I think.”
“And did you ever convince yourself?”
Will considered the question. Again, there was no point in lying, but Will wasn’t exactly sure of the answer himself. “Maybe. Not consistently.”
There was no response. Will could picture the mild, prompting look he was getting behind his back.
He sighed. “When we went over, I meant for us both to die. My design did not...extend beyond that completion.” He paused for a moment, not sure if Hannibal would want to speak the conclusion he was sure they had both come to. Apparently he didn’t. “Even when it seemed impossible that you’d be alive, I knew it...it just wouldn’t make sense. If I was and you weren’t.”
Hannibal was quiet, briefly, then, “I assume you aren’t speaking simply of survival statistics.”
Will almost rolled his eyes. “No, I am not.”
“Then what was it that made you so sure?” Hannibal’s voice had shifted to whisper that made Will desperately want to see the expression on the other man’s face.
He resisted the urge to turn, but he held nothing back in his reply. He had gotten himself to this point. If he wanted to continue, to make it beyond this point, he was going to have to commit himself. When it came to raw emotion, Hannibal could always smell a fake. “Fate as a concept doesn’t generally appeal to me,” he let his gaze wander to the street lights he could see through the gap between the window frame and the peeling, plastic shade, “but I have started to associate it with you.”
Hannibal did not respond. That was fine, as Will was still searching for a way to voice the point he wanted made. He was not relaxed, not by any stretch of the imagination, but his mind was calming. Or, at the very least, was running slower. “I once told you that I was curious whether we could survive separation. I’m not curious, anymore. I know.”
“After you told me that, you tried to sate your curiosity.” The knife.
“So did you.” The saw.
“Yes. You tried again last year.” The cliff.
Will’s arm actually twitched with the effort not to turn to Hannibal then. He tried to calm the snarl building in his voice, but didn’t think he was very successful. “ You tried it again. I took us together. You left.”
Silence fell again, as Will mentally awarded one point to Hannibal. That admission of resentment, of abandonment, left him feeling more vulnerable than the simple gesture of turning his back.
He took a deep breath. Hannibal had abandoned him in Abigail’s blood too. And then left a trail right to his doorstep for Will to follow. “But you lead me here,” he spoke before Hannibal had to.
“You’re sure of that?”
That actually tugged a smile out of Will’s mouth. “Yes, Hannibal.” He let the name exist in the space for a breath. “I’m sure.”
“Will.” A clear call to look, to face him. See him. Will still didn’t turn, but a tangible warmth washed over him at the sound of his name on Hannibal’s lips. God only knew it shouldn’t have felt as good as it did.
“Yes?”
“Are you going to turn around?”
Will exhaled a short breath through his nose. Honesty. “I haven’t decided yet.”
“I imagine there are a number of things you haven’t decided on, then.”
“Perceptive as always,” Will murmured.
“Recalling Orpheus, perhaps?”
Another smile for that one. “You seem to have led yourself out of the underworld without my help. I was thinking more along the lines of Schroedinger.”
“Until observed, Will. Not doubting your senses again, are you?”
Now that was interesting. A simple silence would have done perfectly well as a response. That line from Hannibal was almost...goading. Hannibal was eager. Will suddenly knew it as surely as he’d known it was Hannibal leaving him these breadcrumbs to follow. Will’s smile solidified. “No, not doubting. That was only when I had you helping me out.”
“I have always tried to help you, Will.”
Will couldn’t help it. He laughed. The stygian silence that followed informed him that Hannibal didn’t think it was funny. For some reason, Will kept grinning. “Even you must realize how ridiculous it is that we’re standing here.”
“We are simply having a conversation.” And despite that, Will got the distinct impression that Hannibal was immensely pleased with himself. Or perhaps just with Will. The conversation was not going the way Hannibal had expected, but, Will knew, Hannibal very rarely expected anything. They had both entered the apartment that night simply to see what would happen.
“Exactly.” Will found he wasn’t particularly displeased himself. Hannibal was eager. Hannibal wanted . That meant Will could decide whether or not he got it. It was sick, and it was awful, and Will felt right at home. He rolled his shoulders again, this time not feigning his comfort. “Are you going to kill me?”
“What a question.”
Will managed to keep the smile to himself that time. “I guess it is. I can be more specific.”
“Please.”
Hannibal had needed reassurance of mutual survival just as much as Will had. Maybe more, as Hannibal had been given no Jack or Freddie Lounds around to distract him from the aching emptiness his departure had left.
“Can I leave this building tonight, alone, without looking at you, drive back to my house, and wake up alive in the morning?
“Is it so important to you that you not look at me?” A distinct lack of information in the other man’s tone clued Will in to how much he was getting to him.
“Right now, yes.”
“I can’t say I understand your reasons.”
“Yes. You clearly want to see me rather badly.” Will let his voice dip just slightly into an insinuation, the nature of which neither of them had yet addressed. That seemed to shut Hannibal up. Will grinned out the window. Despite the nagging expectation that he’d feel a blade in his back at any moment, this was the most fun he’d had in a year. “I’m going to leave,” he said, almost genially. “And if you don’t kill me, and the FBI doesn’t start a search for Hannibal Lecter in the D.C. area, then we’ll both be a lot surer where we stand than we would be if I left with you now.”
That time, Will didn’t sense the movement itself, but was very aware of the new feeling of breath on his neck where he certainly hadn’t before. It would be so easy to fall back into the void that now hovered, he was sure, mere inches behind him.
“What are you proposing?”
Actually, he was struck with an acute, and almost painful desire to feel that solid chest pressing into his back. The last time he’d touched Hannibal was at the cliff, as they fell. Before that, it had been so long.
“A simple trust exercise, Dr. Lecter.”
A sharp exhale against his neck. “You think you know the result then?”
Will managed to turn his shuddering gasp into a soft laugh. “I’m undecided about a number of things.” He turned his head just slightly, still not anywhere near far enough to see the other man. “You said so yourself.”
“Indeed.”
There was a soft shift in the breathing and the presence behind him. Will realized Hannibal was smelling him. He resisted making a number of biting comments that came to mind at the action. Their interaction thus far had made it clear Will wasn’t allowing Hannibal to see his face or touch him, so Hannibal was taking his proof of Will’s existence this way. Will sensed it would be...unwise to deny him that, at least if he wanted the remainder of this encounter to continue as planned.
“Well,” Hannibal said eventually, as brusque as if they were back in his office, “I shan’t keep you.”
Though you desperately want to , Will knew, but he let it pass without comment. He opened his mouth to speak, then realized the presence was gone. Of course. It wasn’t as though they were going to exchange calendars. Will was, for the moment, satisfied with the knowledge that Hannibal wouldn’t disappear on him for too long this time.
He turned, finally. The main room was empty, as he’d known it would be. Out of the corner of his eye he could see that darkened doorway to another room. Will decided that the odds were about fifty-fifty as to whether Hannibal was still watching him from just beyond the threshold. He didn’t check.
Without another pause, Will crossed the room, opened the door and made his way down the hall.