Chapter Text
Will Graham sits in his stuffy suit, in a stuffy courtroom, for the 13th time in the last month and wonders how he got here. He just wanted to be a little less lonely. He just wanted to trust someone. Was that too much to ask?
Apparently, it was too much to ask. And now, Will sits here in a stuffy purgatory. The original judge's untimely death had been a real coincidence. His subsequent retrial was considered nothing short of a miracle by his lawyer and whatever remained of his colleagues' guilty consciences. Will couldn't really bring himself to care though. It just felt like...delaying the inevitable. The game was over and he lost. That's all there was too it. Whether he got freedom or firing squad, as long as he didn't have to be a public spectacle any longer, he'd be fine with the outcome.
He stared forward at the wall in front of him, listening to the quiet ticks of his lawyer's watch while tuning out the trial that would decide his fate and, also, trying to ignore the feeling of someone staring at him. He could guess who he was but Will didn't feel like turning around just to witness that smug little smile that would be on the doctor's face. Whether he sat there for hours or days, Will wasn't sure. It wasn't until the Judge spoke once more that will was startled out of his daze.
"We are going to take our recess for the day. Members of the jury, please remember not to discuss this case among yourselves or with anyone else, and do not form any opinions until you have heard all the evidence. We will reconvene in this courtroom on Friday, XX/XX/XXXX at 11:00 am."
And with one final swing of his gavel, Will was back off to the looney bin.
———
It's been 3 days since his last trial. Alana had visited him, if only to prove to herself that he actually was crazy and unstable. They hadn't had a real conversation, more her talking at him and then apologizing for not recognizing his encephalitis. He responded with short words and small barbs, too tired to do much else. It seemed that Alana had finally had enough and walked out, talking about how she "couldn't see him like this." and "had to leave for her own good."
It was, overall, a rather obvious outcome that he should have seen coming. That didn't make him feel any better as he listened to the fading sound of her heels against the concrete floors of the BSHCI.
Will contemplates his life over the past few months as he lays on the cot of his new home (read hell). After years of cutting himself off from other people, he finally decided to trust people once more and to open himself up to the world, even if it was just a little. And he'd been happy with the results. He'd found camaraderie in Beverly and the rest of Team Sassy Science. Working for Jack had been awful but it ultimately had given him a purpose, and he'd found a true friend in...Hannibal.
The mere reminder of his name made Will's chest ache. Whether it was anger, sorrow, or neither, Will didn't know. He just knew that it clawed at the inside of his chest like a rabid bear gnawing on the steel bars of a cage. Will hadn't felt such strong emotions since grade school, when he'd first realized that disappointment required expectation. Since then, he'd quickly learned to stop expecting things from people. That mentality had worked for a while but, alas, he created an expectation for the doctor. He thought he'd always have Hannibal's support.
But Hannibal had failed to live up to Will's expectations. More than not living up to Will's expectations, Hannibal had taken it one step further and stabbed Will right in the back.
No, actually, a knife to the back would have been better than the complete betrayal that Will had experienced at the hands of one Dr. Hannibal Lecter VIII.
Hannibal had shown kindness to Will. He had shown a care and understanding for Will that Will rarely got from the people around him. Hannibal was his paddle, a way to steer his little rowboat through the treacherous seas of his mind and avoid capsizing. Hannibal was the first person Will had fully trusted since his literal father, and it was all a lie. What had hurt Will wasn't the fact that Hannibal was a murderer or a cannibal, but that he had let Will burn. He had watched Will struggle and beg for his help while he just sat there, knowing exactly what was wrong with him and just refusing to offer any kind of assistance. And then, when he was no longer interesting, Will had been disposed of. It was the complete...apathy, with which Will had been disregarded, that had hurt him so. Like a toy a child has grown bored of. Will felt used and discarded by the one person he had trusted not to hurt him. 'Wind him up and watch him go,' his brain so helpfully provided.
The encephalitis had thankfully been cured, but Will still couldn't completely rid himself of the feeling of maggots crawling beneath his too-hot skin as his brain boiled itself inside his skull. 'And Hannibal let it.'
'Who gets more upset over lies than MURDERS?'
Ah, so Will's guilt has suddenly decided to make itself known then. 'How selfish can I be?' Will groaned internally, turning onto his side and attempting to wade back into his stream. 'There's something wrong with me, that's probably why he found me so interesting.' That thought was a little too painful to think about and Will found himself digging into the palms of his hands with his untrimmed nails to try and forget about it. It didn't work.
'Of course the only person who could care for me would be a sadistic psychopath.' Now that one wasn't even true. Hannibal had simply pretended to care to earn Will's trust before promptly disposing of him to halt the Ripper investigation. A more accurate thought would be that not even a narcissistic serial murderer could care for him. And wasn't that a fun thought? Will was just too—broken? Weird? Wrong?—freakish, his brain finally supplied, to be cared for.
'And poor Abigail, you've already forgotten about her.' Will physically flinched at the too-familiarly-accented reminder of his daughter. Yet two more things Hannibal has taken from him: his mind and his child.
Truthfully, what was he left with? Even excluding that Hannibal had turned out to be the Chesapeake Ripper, it wasn't like he had much else left of his life. Jack clearly had never cared for his well-being—one of the things Hannibal was, annoyingly, correct about— and neither Alana nor Beverly believed him. 'Or in him.'
It was at moments like these when Will missed his dogs. If he had been at home, Buster would have already crawled onto his chest, followed closely behind by Ellie who would claim his legs and Winston, who would sweetly nose at his hand until he pet him. Zoe probably would have brought him some kind of offering in the form of her favorite chew-toy while Jack, Harley and Max would've laid by the fire, taking turns coming over to check on him. The dogs had always helped to ground him whenever he got too deep into his mind; now they were just another reminder of where he wasn't. 'All thanks to Hannibal.'
The buzzing of the hallway lights felt too loud, like a wasp nest in the middle of a hot summer. He felt so overwhelmed, so alone, so tired. His only grace was that he couldn't see the people in the cells around him. He didn't need more people in his head after the way Hannibal had ripped it apart and burned it to the ground. Or was that Jack? Will wasn't really sure who had dealt his brain the most damage anymore and he didn't really care. In the end, the damage was there, as a reminder that Will Graham just wasn't meant to be loved. Hell, even sweet, loving Alana knew that.
The affirmation of what he'd already known really shouldn't have hurt this much, but it did. Why though? 'You know why,' his traitorous brain whispered. And Will did know. He knew exactly why his chest hurt so badly, why his heart ached and his lungs begged for air despite being full. It's because it was him.
Hannibal, his psychiatrist. Hannibal, his friend. Hannibal, his...everything.
Despite having promised Hannibal a reckoning, Will wasn't sure if he could follow through. I wasn't as though Will didn't resent Hannibal—if Will could shoot daggers with his eyes, Hannibal definitely would have been dead by now. It was just, not worth the effort. That and, deep down, Will wasn't sure what he'd do afterwards, in a world without Hannibal...
Will couldn't remember when he became so dependent on Hannibal. Maybe it was when he moved Will's hands away from Abigail's neck so that he could save her, or maybe it was when he held Will oh so sweetly through his seizure. It didn't matter anymore, all that mattered was the result. 'What a sadist. Couldn't just frame me and lock me up, nooooo. He had to give me more than I could ever imagine and then rip it away.' Will felt that usual anger and spite rise up like bile in his throat. 'Then again, what else would I expect from the Chesapeake Ripper?' And, just like that, the anger was gone again, replaced with a strange hollowness.
Will had been feeling like that a lot lately. Like the encephalitis had taken his life and all that remained was the grotesque shell of flesh that had once been him. A husk flayed open and dripping his last few drops of blood through the place where his stomach should've been. Not even his anger for Hannibal left behind to ground him. Sure he was upset, but those emotions were quickly fading. He cared for Hannibal deeply, that he knew for sure, but Hannibal didn't care about him. To Hannibal, Will wasn't even an annoyance worth some level of contempt. He was just...there, and that made everything so much worse. It made Will feel valueless, like there wasn't a point to him existing.
But what could he do about it? Nothing. 'Anything.' his brain corrected.
The thought was like a sudden shock to Will's system. He could do anything. He was already locked up in a psyche ward, what could possibly be worse? Nothing. The worst of the worst roamed these halls, why couldn't will join them. It seemed that, in some ways, Hannibal was right. Despite being locked up, this was probably the free-est that Will Graham had ever been.
Will could feel that familiar Guilt arriving. Saying that he couldn't do that to his dad, that he couldn't abandon his dogs. Even as awful and unlovable as Will Graham was, he had to keep living for those who depended on him. He'd be even worse if he didn't.
But those thoughts no longer meant anything. He didn't have any attachments to worry about anymore. His father was dead, he was never going to see his dogs again and he didn't have a single person in the world who cared for him. Actually it would be better for everyone if Will Graham wasn't around. They wouldn't take his Ripper allegations seriously, preventing anyone from ever getting too close. By dying, Will Graham would protect the people he cared about, both Hannibal and the BSU.
The BSU might feel bad for a little bit, but they'd get over it. After all, Will's death would be for the greater good. One life for many, Jack Crawford would be proud.
The more he thought, the lighter his body felt. And once he started, he couldn't stop thinking about it. Maybe he didn't have to rot in here with memories of a life that never was. Maybe he didn't have to cope with hell using memories of sweet lies. Maybe he could be free of everything: his mind, his body, his life. Everything.
All he needed was something sharp.