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The grief rushes through his system almost instantly, the second he’s told about Beverly, he feels like he’s going to be sick. He sits, and he sees her, and he knows it was Hannibal. He doesn’t want to imagine what he’s done to her, no amount of empathetic imagination can predict the monster that is the Chesapeake Ripper.
The first thing Will thinks when the muzzle clamps around his jaw and the straight jacket crushes his arms against his chest is that he’s had worse days. Surely, he’s had worse days. Every decade of his life seems to bring along some mirage of hope and the bombardment of suffering. God help him if he makes it 40.
He tries not to think about the utter humiliation as he’s wheeled onto the crime scene of the only friend he had left, the wheels scraping struggling under the gravel as the guards push him along, as if they’re wheeling a plant into a shed. He hates himself now more than ever, the degradation of his jaw clamped tight, tight enough that his tongue is pressed to the roof of his mouth and all he can smell is cheap plastic and leather straps. His fingers flex uncomfortably at his ribs where his hands are splayed out.
He can’t wait to kill Hannibal, and that is not a thought a man who is futilely attempting to prove his innocence should have.
The smell of plastic is overwhelmed by the sudden stench of blood as his trolley is roughly shoved up the step into the silo. At first glance, when his eyes lay on his friend, his heart settles. He didn’t mutilate her, Hannibal didn’t decimate her like he does to so many others. The relief is short lived when his trolley is pushed further and the angle changes, and Will has to swallow the bile that rises, lest he drown in his own muzzle.
The look on Jack’s eyes when undoes the straps binding him to the trolley is one that digs a pit into the depths of Will’s stomach. Jack still doesn’t believe him, he’s still looking at him with such utter betrayal and disappointment. Like an owner watching their rabid dog attack.
He chalks it down to grief.
He knows it isn’t.
Jack hauls him up and he stumbles to catch his feet beneath him. He waits for a moment, for Jack to undo the binds that confine him to his own skeleton, but when all he receives is a look of expectation, he realises that he won’t be free any time soon. He can’t retreat into his mind like this, empathy is a powerful thing but it’s limited when his elbows are digging into his own ribs and the oxygen he’s only partially taking in is tainted by the blood of his friend.
Will moves to stand before his friend, all six parts of her; he blinks away his tears as Jack moves to stand by the door, the room emptied. It’s just them, like they’re back in the bedroom where he first met her, the interrogation room of his prison, just the two of them.
Will decides he’s imagining things, hallucinating, when he hears ticking behind him, instead trying not to break down in front of Beverly. In front of Jack.
The ticking grows faster, louder, before-
Before heat envelopes the building and Will’s vision goes black.
Agony. That’s all he feels. That’s all he cares about, as he blinks open his eyes and he startles awake. The building is crushing him, pressing and moulding him into the ground. A concrete slab is crushing his legs, his right knee bent at an awkward angle. He panics, head swimming with the lack of oxygen.
He can’t move. He can’t breathe. He can’t see.
He hears rustling faintly in the distance, the ruckus of officers realising that a wad of paperwork is about to hit their desks if they don’t get him out.
That doesn’t inspire much confidence.
His eyes shut as he tries to shuffle, his scream muffled as the concrete only crushes him further. He stops, freezes, and tries to take inventory. He knows for a fact he’s at least still got his limbs, aware only by the absolute agony that sends tears spilling down his temples.
The muzzle has cracked, which would’ve been a relief if the plastic hadn’t embedded itself in his cheek, making it tighter. Muzzled by his own flesh. His arms are crushed to his chest, his shoulder bent in an awkward angle. Broken. Is all he thinks, when he tries to flex a finger, only pulling a wrought, muffled scream from the depths of his soul. The sudden increase in pain only makes him breathe harder, his air restricted through the breathing holes in the plastic, holes that are slowly clogging with dust. He struggles. trying to take a deep breath. The expanse of his chest pushes his arms further into the concrete, disrupting the settlement, more debris falls, he feels one land on his exposed foot, and the crack of his ankle as it snaps beneath the pressure makes him vomit.
He swallows it down in a meagre attempt at keeping the small oxygen hole open, his mind dizzy with white hot pain. Someone will find him, right? They won’t decide this is a righteous end to a vicious killer? They won’t decide his life isn’t worth saving?
He doesn’t want to die like this- god no he can’t die like this-
A bitter, spiteful part of his mind supposes that this would be the only good ending he’ll ever get. He’ll die in agony with muffled screams, and one day the killings will start all over again, and they’ll realise they condemned an innocent man to a morbid end.
It was a childish thought, imagining Jack wrought with guilt, but considering his condition, he allows it.
He tries to calm himself, tries to move his arms in the jacket, when a particular pull makes him freeze. Something’s piercing his chest, and it’s with another careful, agonising tug that he realises that it’s his bone.
Oh god someone get him the fuck out of here-
He’s learned his lesson. Stay still. He’s acutely aware that his bone could’ve punctured his lung, if he pulls it out then- he’s gonna be fine.
He has to be.
He’s going to be fine.
Will isn’t a religious man, but when light suddenly shines down, blinding him, he thinks he may have died.
But then arms are pulling him, and his muffled screams are enough for them to stop. The rubble clears by his head, enough for hands to clasp the back of his neck and lift his head onto someone’s lap.
“Fuck- I got him-! I got him-!” Will blinks, the sudden light blinding as he looks up to find none other than Brian Zeller. The man looks panicked, more panicked than he’s ever seen, his usual biting humour vacant as he fumbles for the clasp of Will’s muzzle. “Stay with me man- cmon- stay with me-“
He gasps for breath as his jaw is freed, the plastic embedded in his cheek torn free, he barely flinches, the sudden rush of oxygen making him dizzy as he gasps for breath.
“That’s it- just breathe-“ Zeller sounds terrified, terrified for a supposed serial killer and it only makes dread settle in the fractures of Will’s bones. How bad does he look? How bad is it if people are actively fighting to keep him alive?
He hears shouts around him, the crash of concrete as firemen struggle to free him- firemen? When did they get here? How long was he under there?
“Just breathe, alright?” Zeller all but begs, Will must make a noise of complaint because a hand threads through his curls. “I know- shallow breaths, alright? Nice and slow-“
Will tries, he really does, but when he looks down as a piece of rubble is freed from his chest, he sees a steel rod straight through his hip and it sends another wave of utter terror and agony through him. He hears Zeller curse, feels him hold him tighter.
“You’re gonna be fine- Will-? Will-? Jesus fucking christ- Will-!?”
The last thing he hears is the sirens of an ambulance, before the pain consumes him entirely and the darkness envelopes him in a comforting hug.
His mind is sluggish, the gears struggling to turn with the tension. He’s surprised, his body hurts, but the enveloping agony has dulled. Probably the meds. The weight of casts on his leg and arm is far too heavy, and he’s pleasantly surprised to find that he can feel his limbs, all of them. That’s lucky.
He hears distant shouting, the gears in his mind picking up speed before he recognises the loudest as Alana.
“What in god’s fucking name were you thinking!?” She shouts, surely into Jack’s face. Will would smile if it didn’t hurt. “You couldn’t even be bothered to take off the muzzle!? Are you utterly INSANE-“ Will winces slightly as her voice booms. He’s vaguely impressed, considering Jack seems to be stunned into silence. “He wouldn’t be in half of this state if you had just taken it off!”
The room seems to fall silent, until he hears the lilt of a smooth accent; “All that matters is that he’s alive.”
Will disagrees.