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“Words have no power to impress the mind without the exquisite horror of their reality.”
-Edgar Allen Poe
The woman on the front steps was already dead by the time Will Graham and Hannibal Lecter had arrived at the Hobbs home. Blood was steadily pooling around her body, her life having already seeped out, now painted on the concrete. This woman was an innocent victim of Will and Hannibal’s curiosity, both of them wicked when their interests merged, bordering on evil.
Will rushed into the home, having to fake his heroics. All members of this household were going to die, if they weren’t already dead. One down at the front porch, two more to go. Will rushed into the kitchen, gun raised, his eyes focusing on the sight before him. The kitchen table was set for a breakfast that would never be eaten. Abigail Hobbs, the daughter of The Minnesota Shrike or Garrett Jacob Hobbs, was already bleeding out on the floor, the sound of choking playing in Will’s ears.
Garrett Jacob Hobbs was standing over her, bloody knife in hand, his shirt and arms covered in her blood. He had slit her throat, and now he was watching her bleed out and choke to death on her own blood all at the same time. He looked to Will, raising the knife.
Will emptied his clip into Hobbs’ body, blood splattering all over him. He could feel Hannibal watching behind him, his satisfaction at watching Will murder the last member of the Hobbs family practically vibrating in the air around him. He looked at the girl, her eyes starting to glaze over. He could see her fear. He knew she was waiting for him to help her, but he didn’t, simply watching as she bled out, her breathing eventually stopping as Jack Crawford burst in the door, announcing himself.
“In here, Jack!” Will called, holstering his weapon, his eyes still glued on the girl and her now lifeless form. She would have been a stray, but not one Will had any interest in keeping. She would have been too distressed from the events to properly bond with him. Besides, she was almost a grown woman. He wanted more control over his child’s life, which meant he needed a younger child.
Hannibal silently knew, which was why he had simply let the girl die when Will didn’t make any moves to stop the bleeding. Jack entered the room, muttering a few choice words under his breath as he surveyed the scene.
“He tried to come after Hannibal and me,” Will explained, sounding hoarse, adrenaline still coursing through his veins, “so I dropped him. She was already gone when we got here. So was the wife.”
“What about the fourth?” Jack asked.
Will looked at him, thoroughly confused. “What fourth? There isn’t a fourth. Just these three,” he explained, his eyes trailing to where Jack was looking, pools of blood and half in-tact footprints leading somewhere else in the house.
Jack nodded towards the prints and pools of blood, “well, someone else is here.” Will cursed at himself internally, unhappy that something had slipped past him. He was shocked Hannibal hadn’t noticed.
The three of them slowly made their way back and through the house, following the trail of blood, Jack’s gun drawn. Will’s was empty, so no point in even drawing it. Hannibal was weaponless, but he was arguably the most dangerous of all of them—not that Jack knew that.
“It goes into one of the guest rooms,” Jack said quietly, stopping at a closed door that was streaked with bloody handprints, “you think it’s another body?”
Will shrugged, “I don’t know. There shouldn’t be a fourth person at all. It wouldn’t make sense to bring a victim here anyways. He’s confident in his abilities. He wouldn’t have even known we were coming, so no need to bring victims here when he has his second location.”
Jack nodded, hand on the doorknob as he waited for Will to give him the go-ahead to enter the guest room and whatever might lie beyond it. After a silent count of three, he threw the door open, gun raised as he announced himself, “FBI!”
No response.
There wasn’t anyone in the room that one could see, only a trail of blood that led under the bed. Hannibal could smell the fourth person in the room, a mix of dust and blood and sourness that was working hard to bury an underlying sweetness—the natural scent of whoever was huddled up below the bed.
Will circled the outskirts of the room, crouching so he could get a look at who was hiding under the bed. They weren’t trying to get away, nor were they trying to find any kind of weapon to attack with. Leaning down, his palms planted on the hardwood floor, Will Graham made eye contact with a small, blood covered figured, honey brown eyes full of fear staring back at him.
“Jack, lower your gun. We’re safe,” he ordered, keeping his voice calm and even, not wanting to add to the figure’s fear.
“Who’s under there?” Jack asked, the question barked out in Jack’s normal rough baritone.
“It’s a kid,” Will replied, pushing up to look back at Jack and Hannibal, gesturing at the bed, “no need for a weapon. He’s bleeding pretty badly, Hannibal. We’re going to need a medical team.”
Hannibal’s face didn’t mold into any kind of look, but Will knew better. He was curious, interested in the child and his reaction to both Will and himself. He was silently asking Will if he wanted to test the child, before thinking about making him their own. Hannibal moved closer to the bed, crouching himself, then planting his palms on the floor so he could lean down and look at the terrified child himself.
Will resumed his own crouching and leaning, finding the face of the terrified child, unable to look away. A small hand was clamped over his right shoulder, blood oozing from under his hand, his muscles tight with discomfort and what was more than likely intense pain.
“This is rather unexpected,” Hannibal began, his eyes searching just like Will’s were, “I am Doctor Hannibal Lecter, and this is my partner, Will Graham. We are from the FBI. Do you know what that is?”
The child nodded, his eyes darting from Will to Hannibal, still full of terror. He didn’t make any attempts to speak, making Will think the kid was quite possibly mute.
“Good. Now, I can see that you have some kind of shoulder injury. It must hurt quite a bit. If you come out from under the bed, I can help fix it and lessen your pain,” Hannibal offered, making his voice take on a gentle tone, his features growing softer. The boy didn’t move, his brain and body telling him the best course of action in this time of panic and danger was to simply freeze, hoping the predators in the room would move on and find someone else to prey on.
Hannibal’s head tilted, clearly growing more curious, a small smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. “You are scared we are going to hurt you like Garrett Jacob Hobbs hurt you. We are not here to do any such thing. Our friend, Jack, is about to come in here with paramedics so we can take you to the hospital. Would you rather they look at your shoulder?”
A shake of the head.
“Then will you come out from under the bed so I can have a look and help stop the bleeding?” Hannibal asked, picking his words carefully, ensuring he was as soft as could be. This child was delicate, and while that could be fixed with plenty of molding and subtle training, he didn’t want to risk the child becoming violent before Hannibal even had a chance to examine him.
The boy looked to Will, waves of crimson specks crashing into the honey hued irises, his eyes searching Will for any sign of danger. Will knew there was plenty of danger within him. There was even more in Hannibal. And yet this child seemed to see through him and know it already, uncaring because Will’s dangerous sides were directed at entirely different groups of people. Will nodded at him once, prompting the child to turn to Hannibal and then nod, using his uninjured arm to push himself out from under the bed and into Hannibal’s space.
“Very good. Thank you,” Hannibal praised, ever the gentleman he was raised to be, “may I know your name?” The boy opened his mouth, as if he was trying to force the words out, then shut his mouth. He tried again twice more, tears pricking at his eyes because he couldn’t answer the simple question. “It’s alright. Your mind is still trapped within fight or flight, and mutism can be a side effect because of the severity of your trauma and fear. Let us focus on your shoulder for right now, hm?”
The boy nodded, fingers clamping impossibly tighter around his injured shoulder, knuckles turning white from the force of it. Hannibal could see that it was a deep stab wound to his shoulder, and it would likely require surgery to fully repair the damage. Hannibal sealed his hand over top of the child’s, applying more pressure and more coverage to the stab, stopping the bleeding from worsening. The boy’s bottom lip was caught between his teeth, obviously suppressing groans of pain as the adrenaline in his system slowly began to decrease, making him feel his pain in depth.
The boy startled when the EMTs came rushing in with a gurney and all their medical gear. The first one to enter began assessing the scene, a sharpness in his eyes as he decided the best course of action to take. He crouched on the ground, pulling gloves on from his medical kit, “hey buddy. My name is Jacob. I’m an EMT. I’m here to help with your shoulder and get you out of here. What’s your name?”
The boy turned to look at Hannibal, anxiousness etched deeply into his features. Hannibal answered for them both. “He is currently non-verbal. I couldn’t get him to speak, nor does he really need to at this moment. The stab wound is incredibly deep. Keep his shoulder stabilized and the bleeding down, and the surgery he will need will not be nearly as bad.”
The man—Jacob—looked at him with narrowed eyes, lips quirking in what seemed to be skepticism. “And who are you?” he asked, taking out gauze from his bag. Hannibal moved his hand so the EMT could press it against the wound, allowing the fabric to catch the blood as opposed to his palm.
“Doctor Hannibal Lecter,” Hannibal answered impassively, trying not to ask if the young man had a business card, “I was an emergency surgeon at Johns-Hopkins for many years. Now, I would suggest you stabilize the shoulder quickly, unless you’d rather the muscles deteriorate quicker than they already are.”
Jacob nodded, muttering something to his team behind him, all three of them being careful as they secured the shoulder and arm so it wouldn’t move, then lifted the boy up so he could be strapped to the gurney and taken to the hospital. The boy looked utterly terrified the entire time, his gaze moving from the EMTs to Jack to Will to Hannibal, and then back again, repeating the cycle multiple times.
“I believe I’ll ride with them to the hospital, Jack. I don’t know if Will would like to accompany me or if there is anything else I am needed for?” Hannibal said, standing next to Crawford now. Jack simply shook his head, letting Will follow him out and into the ambulance. Will sat closest to the honey-eyed little boy, watching as he inhaled and exhaled harshly, eyes beginning to turn red from a new spring of tears.
Will blocked out the conversation the EMT and his husband were having, too focused on how this boy searched him, trying to find answers to unspoken—and perhaps unthought—questions. He wondered briefly if this boy would ever find his answers.
He hoped he would be the one to answer them whenever the time came, spoken or not.