IC Contact [Asgard]

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Catch all IC contact post for Will Graham at asgardeventide
[ Text | Voice | Video | Action ]

[Note: Will is unlikely to use video unless there is a good need for it. He'd be more inclined to do text until he's made a substantial recovery and becomes more comfortable with voice.]

Comments

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[Don't need. He wasn't asking for need. He was asking what she wanted. Abigail hadn't gotten much of what she wanted, and he was at blame for some of that. She had wanted to go home, but he couldn't give her that. He could take her there, but there was no home for her anymore. The house was tainted, and eventually tainted with her blood again.

But did she know that? Did she...get to that part of her life, had she seen her final moments as Will had been too sick to keep her from?]

I won't smother you. [Smothering implies he'd act on what he sees. Smothering implies tracking her every movement and making it obvious, telling her who not to talk to. It could lead to more harsh words, things he doesn't want to say and is ashamed he even thought. He could track her without ever mentioning it, though if she got involved with someone too obviously unhealthy for her...

...he could try. Would try. Might fail, but nothing new there.] I don't want to make you more uncomfortable here than you already are, Abigail. It's not easy. I don't want to make it worse. [A ghost, a reminder. A reminder of her father, of Jack Crawford, of Lecter. If she never wants to see him except on her own terms, if she never wants him to come around, never wants him to contact her unless it is absolutely necessary...he can be that sort of ghost. He can remain unseen unless he's speaking over the network, but nothing to her. He can be that sort of ghost. He's good at it.] But I have to ask you something, okay? You don't have to answer, but I think it would be good for us to know...where we left off.

What our last memories were. What's the last thing you remember before you found yourself here?

[Loaded. So loaded, but he'd pulled the trigger ten times. He'd pulled it again, all to save her. What was another one?]

[climbingwalls]

[She doesn't want to answer. It would be so easy to refuse, to tell him no and shut the feed, stop the conversation now. She doesn't want to talk about dying. She doesn't want to know if he still trusts Hannibal, if he'll turn around and accuse her of lying for some reason or other.

But maybe it'd be easier to put it all out in the open. She's hid so much and it hasn't done any good for her, some of it only made things worse. And if he doesn't believe her, doesn't trust her.... Well, what can he actually do?

Still. She's tongue-tied for a minute, silent and unsure, and when she responds you can almost hear the stall in her voice.] Being here isn't that uncomfortable. It's not great, but it's not much worse than home. Sometimes it's better. [Like the lack of murder investigation. And the not being locked up in a mental institution. And the nobody knowing about her father. That's all a lot better.

And then, a pause, and quietly:] Both of our last memories, right? So you'll tell me yours, too?

[If she keeps stalling, maybe it will get easier to talk about.]

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[This could go two ways, this hesitation. Will thinks so. It's either him being sick and awful to her or her death. What else would cause her to stall so much? She hadn't seemed afraid of him, but he hadn't been shaking and sweating and surrounded by antlers that had already been used to impale a girl.

He has to know. They can't do this otherwise. He has to know who killed her, what she remembers, and he has to know, selfishly, that he's right.

And as far as Will's concerned? No one will know about her father. If she tells, that's her decision. He's certainly never going to bring it up.]

Both of us, that's right. I'll tell you mine. [If she doesn't know, he doesn't want to tell her about her death. He'll lie. She's used to them. He's used to them. What's another one?] Ladies first.

[It's such a shitty thing to fall back on, but it's better than him saying something about how he's the adult, he asked first, she has to answer him.]

[climbingwalls]

[Silence follows again, long enough to almost make it seem like she's decided not to tell him after all, as she tries to figure out what to say. How much to say. How much he might know already.]

Dying.

[It's blunt, harsh, when she finally says it, letting it out there. There's no way to beat around it and make it sound better, and she doesn't try. It's still hard to think about. It still hurts.]

I was dying. For real this time, I think. I blacked out, and I woke up in Asgard.

[And if he wants to know more, either he's going to have to ask, or tell her his.]

Your turn.

[infomodder]

[Lies. He was expecting a lie and having to give one in return. But he knows now, he knows for certain that it was Lecter. Does Abigail feel regret for not trusting Will more? Is this a moment of vulnerability? Is her compliance a sort of apology?

She gave. She gave everything. Will has to do the same, not just for himself. He owes her that. He owes her what he couldn't give her before, what Lecter made sure he would never give her, and all he can give her in this strange place, even if when he returns home

if he returns home

it won't do her any good at all.]

Dr. Lecter and I went to Minnesota. The kitchen was covered in your blood. You had died. For real this time. He put evidence that I had done it in my own. He went further and put parts of all those killed by the Copycat there, too. He set me up. He framed me. I was arrested. During transport, I broke my thumb to get out of the handcuffs, took out the guards, and tried to find someone to help. It was just him. He drove us there. We spoke. Scales fell from my eyes. I saw what he was. I saw it, and I was a second from pulling a trigger against him before Jack Crawford pulled one against me. He shot me in the shoulder, and I went into the hospital where I found out how sick I was. Dr. Lecter told everyone that I had forced him to drive us at gunpoint while he sat at my bedside like a concerned friend.

[It all comes out like he's speaking about a dream he has issues remembering, but it's fresh. It hurts. It's a burn and a cut and punch all at the same time. It's far more than she told him. But he'll tell her everything because he helped take that away from her. He'll give her all he can.]

It was him, wasn't it? He did that to you. It was Dr. Lecter.

[It was always Lecter.]

[climbingwalls]

[There's no reason to lie, not really. She might want to, might feel like she should keep her secrets, but it's not going to do anything, really. None of this was her doing, none of this is really something to keep after a direct question. It's not like what her father had her do. Despite the sinking feeling that there has to be one, she can't think of any actual consequence to telling, even if he doesn't believe her. Other than having to think about it, than showing her own stupidity in trusting Hannibal so much. Maybe making him feel guilty, for how it ended up after she ran from him.

But it turns out that doesn't matter, that he knows. He knows about her dying, he knows who did it. He knows what Hannibal's plan was. He was in the middle of it. Hiding it wouldn't do any good anyway.]

Yes. [Her voice cracks.] It was him. He told me... he told me he was going to... that they'd think you were a killer. That he'd killed Marissa, and other people. He didn't say how many. More... more than my dad, he said.

[He'd hugged her, talked to her like he always did. He said he wanted to see if she was like her father. He apologized for not protecting her, right before attacking her. She doesn't want to tell Will those parts, though. She doesn't understand it herself. Whether it was an act, or whether, once again, somebody who'd cared about her had decided to kill her.

She doesn't really know which would be better, and maybe if she did she'd be able to talk about it. But she doesn't.]

And then he... he knocked me out. I didn't... however he did it, I was unconscious already. I don't remember actually -- but I knew he was going to.... He told me he was.

I didn't... I didn't know if you knew. I thought you still... still trusted him, still...

[...anything. She didn't know any of it, if he'd even known what had happened to her. She knows he was sick and he got better, but she didn't even know if he got better here or at home.]

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[He knew already. He knew it had to be one of them. Lecter said it himself. Whoever killed her killed the others, and there was no way Will would have killed her, even if he had the vivid memory of impaling her on antlers in the home of her father who never served her properly. What a horrible life for Abigail Hobbs.

And he had only made it worse. Dragged her into his own sick world while trying to pull her out of hers. It might have been better if she'd stayed away. If he and Lecter had refused to speak with her. Had left her to the care of others and...

Too late now.]

I don't trust him, Abigail. I didn't trust him when we met. But he's very good at making you trust him, even if you have suspicions about him. [He made Will feel good, and when he'd spent his whole life feeling the opposite? It was a very easy trap to fall into. I don't care about the lives you save, I care about your life. Cared about ruining it, more accurately. He has the idea in his head that Abigail was used to get at Will, that Lecter used her like some chess piece. Disposable, even if he'd never get it back again. Bringing that up, however, isn't on the table. How would it make her feel, the thought that she was less of a person and more of a thing? She'd had enough of that.] You don't have to tell me how he did it, Abigail. You don't have to tell me anything you don't want to. I thought it was best we knew what we last dealt with since we're the only ones from our home here. That's all.

[Despite the overwhelming sadness and anger that he's feeling, he manages to keep his voice calm and, more importantly, strong. He can support her as long as he remains stable, works better at it. But he can't say the same thing might not happen again, and so:]

It might be better if we weren't very obvious that we knew each other before we came here. It might be better for you, because people would probably ask questions about how we met. Questions you might not want to answer. If you want to tell people what happened and how you know me, that's fine. But I have no intentions to talk about it. I'm not—I don't feel like it... [I'm not ashamed of you, but who is he to say that?] ...a young woman going off to college who knows someone with my job, it might make people think the wrong thing.

[It's all for her. She won't have to confess about how she knows him. She won't have to deal with seeing his face when he's brought up in conversation. She won't have to talk about her father. About dying and being brought back to life only to die again.

He couldn't stop her from talking to Freddie Lounds, and he can't stop her from talking to anyone here. He hopes that she takes this chance to leave that behind and not discuss the Minnesota Shrike with anyone. Hopes.]

[climbingwalls]

[There's the soft sound of her struggling to keep her breathing under control as she listens, staving off a reaction she hasn't fully given herself the chance to handle yet. She never sat down and let herself deal with what had happened, after getting here. Shock wore off and she didn't let herself think about it any more.

But she's not in private, even if she has enough distance from people to be sure she's not being overheard, to be comfortable talking. Being seen is a different question. And even if she was going to give in, break down over her death and Lecter's betrayal, she wouldn't do it with Will on the other end. She doesn't need to be overheard.

So she latches on his offer to not tell him as a cue to leave it behind. If there's anything else she feels like he needs to know about it, she can leave it for him later. And by the time he stops, her voice is nearly steady again.]

Okay. [It's quiet, and she's not even sure if he can make out her voice at that volume. She swallows and takes another breath before repeating herself.] Yeah. I think you're right. I don't know if you've said anything, but....

[And if he did, she wants to know; whether to avoid the people he's mentioned her to, or to at least be aware of them, she could decide later. But she's not even sure how to ask for that, so she trails off, pauses and picks up a moment later.]

I haven't. I didn't really tell anyone... anything about home.

[But he could probably have guessed that much.]

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[She's not the only one who hasn't given herself the time to break down over Lecter's betrayal. His didn't result in death, but he's still got a lot of issues with it. His resulted in Abigail's death, he's sure of it, and if she mentions grieving for herself, he won't say anything about his own. Everything he has to do for her has to be all for her, no need for him to go about inserting himself into everything.

Lecter brought them together. Lecter tore them apart. Lecter made her a ghost, and now they're both ghosts of a terrible past life to each other. As much as it hurts to hear her voice and see her face, he can cope. He's not sure it will be so easy for her (as if it's easy at all), so he'll hide away for the most part. She won't have to see him if she doesn't want to.

He'll haunt from the sidelines. There but not exactly present—isn't that a little like home?

Is there no good middle ground for them? He can't think of any.]

I haven't told anyone much past my job. I did mention you to a woman named Evelyn Carnahan, but just that I knew you. Nothing about how. She's trustworthy. [As trustworthy as anyone can be after the whole issues with murderers in hiding.] She's the only I've told. I won't tell anyone else. Probably best to keep any conversations we have on that network private, and if you need me, you know how to find me. [If you need me—what if she never needs him? Would that be so different from home?] Do you need me for anything now, Abigail?

[climbingwalls]

[She won't let him hide forever; but she won't seek him out often either. Maybe that's middle ground. Or the closest thing to it they're going to find.

She does her best to remember the name, mouthing it soundlessly to herself, somebody to look out for. To avoid? To something. She'll figure out what something is later. Private on the networks. That she'll have no problem with. The option to keep things private is one she'd probably abuse, if not for the fact that people might ask why she's keeping unimportant things private. Real privacy is still something of a gift.

And then she's silent, for long enough to be considering. Almost long enough to come off as a little unsure.]

No.

[She doesn't need anything, not really. What she wants -- well, she's not comfortable asking him for what she wants right now, and she doesn't exactly want it from him, even, just from someone. Things are too heavy, there's too much between them. She can't ask him to come distract her from thinking about home and how dangerous things are here, she can't ask him for a hug or to tell her it's going to be okay. She could -- he probably would -- but it would just be... weird.]

I'm okay for now. [She's not sure how convincing she sounds, but she tries.] I'll let you know if it changes. And, um, you know where I am, too, so. If there's anything.

[She can't imagine he'd actually need anything from her, but what does she know?]

[infomodder]

[The silence worries him. They've just told each other pretty heavy things, after all. But Abigail knows, she knows the truth, she knows who killed her, and apparently he confessed. That's more than Will got from him. He just danced around like he always had, danced around and tried to get Will to question his sanity again. It didn't work, and it wasn't going to, never again would he let himself fall under Lecter's sway. Right? If he showed up, armed with the information Will has now, there would be no way he could...

He wouldn't...

No matter how much Lecter might try to get him feeling back on top of the world, it would all be a lie. For nothing. He had Abigail's words now. It was all he needed. The silence—would she say anything or just—

Oh.]

Hopefully everything stays okay. [Hopefully you don't need me. It's a sad thought. Him not being needed, her not needing him, the two of them stuck in the same place but avoiding each other. Not so different from home, and he can't go about giving her the means to make fishing lures after all that talk of hunting and fishing and what he said.] And...yeah. I know where to find you if something comes up.

[He hesitates to say it, thinks about ending it there. But to leave her with such empty words, he can't really bring himself to do it.]

We'll be fine here, Abigail. Both of us. [Lecter's not here. He can make a promise. It won't be empty because it's just the two of them. Hopefully it'll stay that way.] I'll make sure of it.

[I promise you goes unsaid, and perhaps it's for the best. If things change

if anything changes

at least he didn't say he promised.]