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[youwill]

[Spam for Will]

[He wakes very early. Something is changed, he can tell that almost before he opens the door. He can certainly tell when the small - robotic? - dog tries to take his leg off at the ankle. A solid kick allows him to retreat, to arm himself.

How much easier this would be, if his scalpel was where it ought to be. Instead, he palms a butter knife, good, polished silver, and holds its blade against his forearm. When he ventures out again, he's ready.

He was supposed to be ready.

It's some time before he returns, his head swimming with buried thoughts, buried plans. The mushrooms he finds in their cool, dark hiding place, the cappuccino machine and his tea pot forced to work in tandem. He plans ahead in such fragmented pieces that he's not entirely sure of the path from a to b to c, only that he accomplishes and moves forward, succeeds and proceeds.

He reaches Will's room, pauses just beyond the cell, adrift on a sea of scents and sensations. When he enters, it's on silent feet, tea pot held carefully in hand, one towel folded beneath it. It's noiseless when he sets it down, but when it comes to waking his friend, he pauses, hovering over the other man's bed instead. This is not appropriate. He must say something or leave.]

Will.

[It's nearly a whisper, soft but strong, nearly urgent. Trust. Honesty. He's come with a trade.]

[Open Spam]

[There is blood under his fingernails. He's not sure where it came from, only that he can feel it gush and dry and flake. His fingertips brush his palms around the knife and the duller ends of metal. Metal sharpened against metal. His mind cycles through all the words for it before settling on the only one that matters. Cutlery.

He smiles at his joke, and strides - no, stalks - down the hall. Which hall? He's lost count. He's searching, or hunting, or chasing or being chased; clarity shifts in and out of focus as he moves, an animal used to its stomping grounds, an animal that has finally been given the room to hunt. He is hunting now, hair out of it's usual careful slick back and falling across his eyes. He took off his tie at some point, realizing how much more useful it could be wrapped around someone else's throat than his own. His collar is half unfurled, the top two buttons torn: he is less put together even than his return from Ville de Rachat.

Both occasions were freeing, in their way. Underground, there were no eyes to track him, no judgement but his own.

Now, there is no judgement.

He walks like he is following something, someone. A flutter of a dress, the flash of soft curls, a carefree smile. He shifts, not quite man and not quite animal, but something more and less and hungry.]

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[youwill]

[He cararies a human veil with him wherever he goes. Usually, Hannibal would appreciate it, respect it in some way.

Now there is an animal circling his gut, clawing its way up through his chest, into his throat like fire yearning for freedom. He isn't real, whatever he is, and Hannibal sees that first. The lines he operates within are not human, not animal, not natural.

In his right mind, he would know better. In his right mind, he would control himself.

Hannibal is not in control, and it is with one quiet grunt that he approaches from behind, down wind, stalking. Dillon is prey, Dillon is not worth his life - Dillon will lose his nose as Hannibal rips it off between his teeth. ]

[orderfromchaos]

[If Hannibal were someone else, Helena or Zane, someone unstable, someone fractured, stepping into the tight streetlight radius of Dillon's aura would have a countering effect, stabilizing, healing. Hannibal is not damaged. His nature, his pattern, is being correctly, purely expressed; the part of Dillon that is not human or animal but fire and power he cannot reign in likes that, encourages it, whets it.

The part of Dillon that is a raw, tired, exasperated child catches a glimpse of fractal reflection when Hannibal is close, a step or a half-step away, startles out of stride that the star would prefer to keep more rhythmic. Not the startlement of fear; the kind of someone tripping on debris they hadn't noticed. He turns, scowling, slower than he should, a rapid metamorphosis from aggravation to concern as he sees what this atmosphere has inevitably done to him, purified, unleashed.

He gets a hand up as Hannibal surges and looms in his vision, slow, sloppy, and his eyes are wide and freaked but still more in the sense of the bizarre than the frightening, not adjusting fast enough to give him the benefit of adrenaline until pain, until teeth, until he's screeching what the hell even though he damn well knows and jabbing just there at the hinge of Hannibal's jaw, stumbling back after he forces it to release him. The blood drips in symmetrical, parallel tracks on either side of his mouth as his nose repairs itself.]

[youwill]

[Pain surges through his jaw, and Hannibal retreats like a wounded animal - wounded, but not badly enough. Certainly angry enough. His eyes flash - not the dullness of a base beast, but with light and intelligence. That doesn't make them any less bloody.

He swings with the shiv, stabs with the butter knife, all while circling around so that when he lunges again, he can trap Dillon against the wall. Trap him, break him, like the stupid child he is. There is a reason men will butcher lambs, calves, young: youth is tender. He knows this, and it triggers such rage in him that he surges forward again, teeth stained red and bare as he swings the shiv down at Dillon's shoulder. He will rip the cheeks from his face and eat and eat and eat.]

[orderfromchaos]

[It's like chess, he thinks, with some far-off part of his mind. He can see the attacks before they happen, the potentials and the aims, ply and ply, but he can only move so many ways in response, only so fast. He twists away from the shiv, already wincing the second before the butterknife sinks into the meat of his arm, and part of him seizes the pain like a hungry dog on a bone, locks its jaws on the proof of his vulnerability. It's not just a veil, not just a shell. He's human, human enough for this, human for three heartbeats at a time as blood pours and seeps and stops, skin of his shoulder and neck and cheek parting and reknitting under the frenzied onslaught like a crowd swallowing a landmark, like the surface of the ocean broken only briefly by debris, ripples and red foam.

But not human enough to fall. He kicks out, just the right spot, where Hannibal will be when the swift swing finishes, shatters his kneecap, does the same to his ulna as Dillon shoves him back, a much less plausible strike, not one any fighter could make, but the possibility is there, a tiny waiting fault line, so he finds it.]

Get away from me.

[He's angry, he's so - angry, about the way he had to run when Helena's raw wounds started to pink over with concave scars, the way Abigail's fractures have wedges in them, the way he fixes the nightmare around them as well as everything else. And Hannibal is right here, giving him a reason. He knows, he knows as he says it that Hannibal is far too far gone to take it, to even consider. But he is just cognizant enough of himself to make the offer.]

Get away or I will ruin you.

[youwill]

[The butter knife sinks in and Hannibal smells fresh blood. It sharpens him, a sword on a whetstone, a beast in a man's shape. He should hate these metaphors. He should abhor him. But the part of his mind that cherishes all the best society has to offer - the class, the wonder, the delicate etiquette that dictates how people must treat one another - that part has been silent for days, and he doesn't remember the sound it should make. The quiet restraint. The calm suggestion. The man reigning in the beast.

Will asked him days ago if he would hunt. But he isn't a hunter. He isn't entirely a man. He holds that shape, plays that part, but sometime the skin must be pulled back to reveal the truth.

His kneecap shatters and Hannibal makes a guttural sound, a low, near bellow, near moan. His arm, too, and there is a prickly in his thoughts, a question, how, how, how.

There is no answer, and instead he sways, the butter knife gone from his hand, left to hang or fall from Dillon's arm. He can only see the boy's face, now, not human either. It's time to peel back the skin.

Hannibal hurls the shiv with his good arm, launches himself with his good knee to reach stiff, digging fingers for Dillon's throat. They are all monsters beneath the surface.]

[orderfromchaos]

[The shiv grazes his temple, nicks his eye, but this time he doesn't even flinch. It still hurts, little bright fireworks that are no quieter for the way they crackle and fade, but he blinks, twice, restores himself. He doesn't push Hannibal away now. Hannibal's hand squeezes and he squeezes back, hand around Hannibal's wrist. The bones grind and don't crumble - he could, easily, the possibly looms and tempts. But that's a very temporary solution. He doesn't want more of that. He is done.

He's never done this on purpose before. But the power is there, the power is always there, whether he calls it or not, inexorable as gravity, and he channels it now, the force of a supernova pressed against Hannibal's three-pound brain, his wriggling pink human soul. No finesse, this, just blasting away everything that is not smooth, calm, helpful operation, a satellite drawn into Dillon's orbit with its poisonous skies ripped off by a pulse of solar wind. No animal appetites, no human schemes. Emotions, but pure ones, beneficent ones, without qualms or reservations, without complications, scoured clean.

Hannibal's bones and tendons are healed, unconscious spillover from the sheer energy Dillon slammed him with. He drops his hand.]

[youwill]

[He is made up of rage, every cell is fury, every nucleus bent on carnage. He is nothing but destruction one moment, a beast roaring into the wind, giving voice to his only purpose of being--

And the next he is still, quiet, confused. He's - good Lord, he's covered in blood, he has his hands around someone's throat - Hannibal's hands tremble with the force of his division, his bafflement. His hand uncurls from Dillon, and he steps back as his brow knits, as he looks down at himself, studying his hands and the blood beneath his fingers. He does't feel hurt - he doesn't feel hurt at all, then where...

His eyes find Dillon's again, and all the animal fury has been replaced with human concern.]

Are you hurt?

[orderfromchaos]

[He could be - sick. He was sick when he realized what he'd done to Carol Jessup, to so many. He's decides not to give Hannibal the satisfaction. He's been a monster since he was fourteen years old; he's the stronger monster. He's wrecked people's minds deliberately before, for worse reasons than this. None of this is new. And frankly, Hannibal is a lot easier to deal with for now. He decides not to dwell.

He wipes blood off his face, bares smooth skin, gulps down a breath.]

Yeah. I'm fine.

[youwill]

[Some things are gone; some things he still knows. It's a doctor's careful eye that follows the path of Dillon's hand, looking for any cause for concern. He finds none, and remains baffled by the blood, by all the signs of trauma and pain but with no physical signs to accompany.

Hannibal nods, satisfied enough, and looks down at himself. He doesn't grimace. He's too uncertain.]

I think...I will go and change, then.

[orderfromchaos]

Good plan.

[He thinks of a room full of roller blades, an offhand remark about missing it that his followers took as holy writ, his peace filling all the places they used to be their own dinged and dented people. He doesn't make any other suggestions.]