[ His relationship with Hannibal wasn't what anyone would consider healthy. Yet at the same time there was a purity in it's darkness, a raw honesty in the danger that came from the fact that they both saw the other with open eyes. Saw each other, completely, and stayed regardless.
Conjoined, as completely codependent as one could get. Which was part of why Will could see hints of the codependency between House and Wilson, and yet see where Wilson got as much from it as House.
Though from the outside it would always look as if House were sole beneficiary. ]
I'm going to ask him about his intentions. He can be just as curious as you are about poking something to see what it does, but I don't think he's going to be too fond of the idea of making himself more traceable.
On the bright side, the Admin does hell all about murders unless someone complains about it. And then she turns on your Beacon. I got Solomon's turned on for robbing me, too. Or helping Melborn cut off part of my ear. I pitched both in my network post just to cover the bases.
[ Reaching up, Will removed his glasses and rubbed at his eyes. ]
The sucker fish monster was merely acting to its nature. I expect it was traumatic, but this entire place is traumatic in one way or another and it is equally and unconditionally traumatic to each and every one of us.
[ Lowering his hand, he replaced his glasses. They fell down to the tip of his nose. ]
The attack on your ear by another member of our merry band carries a different psychological weight. [ He held up a finger. ] Before you try to say that it could have been motivated by an ... event in this place, the Admin wouldn't have cared if that was the case, would she?
Didn't think so. So that means they committed violence against you for something you said or did, vs a monster just being a monster.
Having my face practically eaten off was more excruciating.
[Just saying. He can't really argue that Royce and Alfie coupled with the Lavender's Blue song kicking up in his head while he'd been down and helpless had been more lasting in terms of the terror.]
[ There was a contemplative moment, before Will gave a small nod. He wasn't going to push further, though he did keep the door open; in a manner of speaking. ]
The events that kept Hannibal from eating my brain, lead to a situation were a plastic surgeon was going to remove my face, to transplant it onto the man who fed his face to my dogs.
Cordell's plan did not include anesthesia, or my being dead in any way at the time.
I still remember the first cut and tug of the scalpel.
[Okay, that's pretty gross. Less because it's a face transplant and more because House has seen the partial face transplant they did last year in France and while it had been impressive, it hadn't been that impressive. Maybe it's better in Will's time.]
Is there a particular reason he did that to you and not Lecter? Just... torturing Lecter by making him see your pretty face on someone else?
I believe that was the object of the exercise. [ Will confirmed, perhaps sounding more matter of fact about the entire situation than most normal people would feel. ]
I was a tool in a much more grand design. Verger's intended transplant my face onto his, then to slowly consume Hannibal piece by piece with Hannibal as the guest of honor, until Hannibal would finally succumb to the organ harvesting.
[ Will paused and his lips twitched upwards, an expression of pained amusement crossing his features. ]
Looking back on it all, I spent most of my time being slotted in as a tool to the execution of others' designs. Jack, Hannibal, Chilton, Verger ... both Vergers, Dolarhyde.
I think by the time I took us off the cliff, I was just so done with being reactive; I just wanted to be pro-active for once in my life.
[For as matter-of-fact as Will is being, this is still hitting at sensitive territory. That's not too unusual for them, but House can't help wondering if this is part of Will's design after the awkward way they'd ended their last real conversation. Will is opening up. Does he expect House to open up? About... what? They both know it was MN poisoning that drove the lick and bite.
House nibbles on his bone as the other man speaks.]
How are you gonna be proactive this time?
[He means about the suit. It's a cloud hanging over their heads. They both know Will is going to try to stop him and they both know House is going to try to outmaneuver him. It's a matter of how and when.]
[ For a long while, Will was quiet before he eventually responded with an honest. ]
I don't know. [ Oh he had an end goal in mind, just not quite a hundred percent sure how to get there. ]
It's a difficult one, House. I believe in this experiment, I agree with you about the necessity of the risk and I also appreciate that we're taking steps to try to make this work.
It's not just a reckless suicide experiment. [ He would definitely acknowledge these points. House deserved that. ]
But it still comes with an extremely high risk factor and my reasons for wanting to keep you alive are just as valid now as they were back when I first argued against people killing you.
[ Will lifted his hand and began to tick off on his fingers. ]
You are one of the foremost experts in this place.
Any results we gain from this experiment, will benefit from your clear headed observation and interpretation of them.
The risk that you won't return appears greater, given the number of deaths you have to date.
[ You're my friend and I don't want to see you suffer needlessly.
[House rubs a hand over his face. Why does Will need to make this difficult?]
There are other experts. Other people to observe... even if they might not be as good. And the fact that I keep coming back means I'm more likely to come back. This place just can't quit me.
[He does actually believe that last one. As much as he wants it to end, he has a sinking feeling that he's going to keep getting dragged back until they either shut the system down and die from radiation poisoning or get integrated into the data collective.]
You, on the other hand, are statistically less likely to come back after a death, came up with and conducted one of the most successful and least deadly experiments we've had to-date, and your whole thing is basically observation. Take notes while I'm away.
[Also, Will is the dreaded F-word and House is bad at losing people he cares about. That will remain silent, as well.]
That experiment could have just as easily gone very badly. [ Will pointed out. ] It was luck, rather than any deliberate design that turned in our favor.
Your thought to grab the heat suit and try to use it is deliberate careful thinking based on experience and your ability to think through the evidence at hand. This is why that combination, why your combination is unique.
[ It seemed important that Will show he did recognize that House wasn't being blindly reckless in this plan and in turn that Will wasn't flailing his hands simply to flail.
Even if a part of him was flailing simply to flail at the idea of losing his friend. ]
My observations are unreliable because mind is broken, House. [ The ex-profiler continued, fingers threading in and out in a fidgetty manner. ] I see beauty in the dark, temptation in the spill of blood, and I've already quit once.
But you want life, and you will fight down and dirty to exert your will on the world before you'll ever give up.
cw mention of suicide; disordered eating; depression... just a lot of things
[House has to huff a laugh. This is a stupid conversation and there's nothing overtly funny in Will commentary, but really.]
You think my mind isn't broken? I'm running around with a guy who tried to murder and lobotomize me, a cannibal who's got me slated for his menu as soon as his boyfriend says 'go,' and said boyfriend who empathizes with serial killers enough to become them in his dreams and murder me.
[House makes a sharp, flicking motion with the bone in his hand.]
I'm stuck in a whole goddamn universe that doesn't make sense. Where I can't trust even my basic senses. I barely sleep, I'm starving myself because the thought of eating makes me sick, I can't help wanting to chew on everyone in this goddamn building, and every time we talk about sex all I can think is I couldn't even get it up right now if I wanted to.
The only things I would've had to look forward to back home are my team leaving, getting Wilson's girlfriend killed, prison, and Wilson dying. Here, it's dying, or getting sucked into some insane data collective and watching this keep going on and on and on until the machines just give out. That's what all of us are racing toward. Those are the end states.
[He cuts himself off because he's ranting now.]
You wanna cherry pick reasons you should go in the suit instead of me, don't make it about who's more broken. You just broke a different way.
[ Will listened to what was said and what wasn't said; it was a curious mixture of both heart-break and also a small, important crack of light in the shadow of self-loathing. After all, didn't they always say that half the problem was admitting there was a problem?
He didn't discount what it meant that House would admit to such things, and Will wasn't about to get into a discussion around 'my trauma is greater than yours' because each of them had survived through the impossible. One wasn't any greater than the other. Back home or here. ]
You know, it really is remarkable that either of us even continues to function.
[ He said, which wasn't an answer to House's last comment but nor was it a flippant avoidance of the weight of their conversation.
It was remarkable that either of them managed to function. Will had Hannibal, but if House weren't in the equation it was all together possible that Will would have allowed himself to sink beneath the surface and given over to the beauty of the darkness.
He sobered then, brows furrowing in a pensive expression before he continued. ]
I just want to end this. Free the collective and let them rest, free those of us who have worlds to go home too, ensure no one else gets dragged here and then ... let it end.
[ Then he looked up, once again making that rare eye contact. ]
But I want to see it through, to that end.
[ He was going in the damn suit, he'd manipulate, fight, tackle, hog tie House if he had too. But this was as close to a promise as he could give, and perhaps that House would accept, that Will wasn't getting in that suit with the intent to leave. ]
[House's tense posture sags a little bit. He's wound up, but he's exhausted from that outburst.]
Dude, it's a miracle anyone functions. Kids like Elric, Brown, and Quark have been here longer than me.
[And there are days when it seems like all of them are handling this place better than he's ever going to. It's half a joke when he says that he's just a regular guy from Jersey, but it's half-serious. Most of the people here are from insane, futuristic, magical, techno-enhanced worlds where they're fighting wars, living in the apocalypse, or fighting super villains and monsters regularly.]
I just wanna solve the puzzle.
[The admission is quiet, vulnerable. There's an echo of the little boy Will had met in House's dream. He just needs to know the answer, then he can rest. And getting in that suit is part of maybe getting the answer, of being right there to get it. There's no way that he loses. If it works, then he gets in and he's the first one to interact with NIMA, use it. If it doesn't... then he doesn't have to deal with losing a friend who might not come back.]
[ Deep within, the jaded voice in Will Graham's psyche was pointed out that he was being played. Unfortunately, Will wasn't really listening. He wasn't about to alter course on his plans, but he was starting to feel a definite sense of guilt and internal conflict around what he intended to do.
It was not going to help his insomnia any!
In fact he glanced down and away, probably exposing more of his sense of guilt and conflict than he intended too, as he changed the subject entirely. ]
That experiment was all of us. [ He said in a quiet tone. ] The one you keep referring too. It was the product of the participation of everybody who was willing to risk it going wrong.
I didn't do anything other than ask for help.
[ You know House, ask for help? That thing you're kinda bad at admitting you need? ]
[House is looking for any and all cracks he can worm his way into. That flashed look down is satisfying, but half of this is genuine. Then Will goes and changes the topic on him and the puppy eyes are pulled back in favor of the fundamental argument.]
You came up with the idea, you organized it, you executed it. Own it, Graham Cracker. I'm not praising you just to stroke your ego.
[ Will looked ready to argue the point again, but he stopped himself and glanced off to the side. If he kept the conversation going, it would just continue to be uncomfortable, so he was going to let House get in the last word and move on.
She can't have it! [ That comes out a little more quickly and sharply than Will usually responds and almost immediately he appears to regret the minor outburst. ]
I couldn't help it. The damn thing looks exactly like my dog Winston. [ There was a brief pause before Will decided to try to explain a little more. ]
Winston was the one who kept coming home to Wolf Trap, looking for me when I was locked up. He was the one who walked miles with me one night when I had a sleep walking incident.
He was the only one who didn't ... eat any of Verger's face.
He was my friend. [ Probably the only one in Will's life who hadn't ended up corrupted by Hannibal or turning on Will in the end. ]
I sat for hours talking to the skeleton about the dogs and particularly about Winston. [ He'd needed a good mope!
However. ]
Though I guess I didn't really spend a lot of time describing what he looked like. [ And the plush really was a good likeness, even down to the mottled red and black coat. ]
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
rubikscomplex) wrote2015-08-27 10:05 am
cw: codependent relationship issues
Conjoined, as completely codependent as one could get. Which was part of why Will could see hints of the codependency between House and Wilson, and yet see where Wilson got as much from it as House.
Though from the outside it would always look as if House were sole beneficiary. ]
I'm going to ask him about his intentions. He can be just as curious as you are about poking something to see what it does, but I don't think he's going to be too fond of the idea of making himself more traceable.
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I really wasn't exaggerating when I told Squalo you'd been through worse.
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I tell you I had a sucker fish monster attach itself to my face, and you think the ear is worse?
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The sucker fish monster was merely acting to its nature. I expect it was traumatic, but this entire place is traumatic in one way or another and it is equally and unconditionally traumatic to each and every one of us.
[ Lowering his hand, he replaced his glasses. They fell down to the tip of his nose. ]
The attack on your ear by another member of our merry band carries a different psychological weight. [ He held up a finger. ] Before you try to say that it could have been motivated by an ... event in this place, the Admin wouldn't have cared if that was the case, would she?
Didn't think so. So that means they committed violence against you for something you said or did, vs a monster just being a monster.
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Having my face practically eaten off was more excruciating.
[Just saying. He can't really argue that Royce and Alfie coupled with the Lavender's Blue song kicking up in his head while he'd been down and helpless had been more lasting in terms of the terror.]
cw: discussion of torture
The events that kept Hannibal from eating my brain, lead to a situation were a plastic surgeon was going to remove my face, to transplant it onto the man who fed his face to my dogs.
Cordell's plan did not include anesthesia, or my being dead in any way at the time.
I still remember the first cut and tug of the scalpel.
cw: discussion of torture
Is there a particular reason he did that to you and not Lecter? Just... torturing Lecter by making him see your pretty face on someone else?
cw: discussion of torture and suicide
I was a tool in a much more grand design. Verger's intended transplant my face onto his, then to slowly consume Hannibal piece by piece with Hannibal as the guest of honor, until Hannibal would finally succumb to the organ harvesting.
[ Will paused and his lips twitched upwards, an expression of pained amusement crossing his features. ]
Looking back on it all, I spent most of my time being slotted in as a tool to the execution of others' designs. Jack, Hannibal, Chilton, Verger ... both Vergers, Dolarhyde.
I think by the time I took us off the cliff, I was just so done with being reactive; I just wanted to be pro-active for once in my life.
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House nibbles on his bone as the other man speaks.]
How are you gonna be proactive this time?
[He means about the suit. It's a cloud hanging over their heads. They both know Will is going to try to stop him and they both know House is going to try to outmaneuver him. It's a matter of how and when.]
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I don't know. [ Oh he had an end goal in mind, just not quite a hundred percent sure how to get there. ]
It's a difficult one, House. I believe in this experiment, I agree with you about the necessity of the risk and I also appreciate that we're taking steps to try to make this work.
It's not just a reckless suicide experiment. [ He would definitely acknowledge these points. House deserved that. ]
But it still comes with an extremely high risk factor and my reasons for wanting to keep you alive are just as valid now as they were back when I first argued against people killing you.
[ Will lifted his hand and began to tick off on his fingers. ]
You are one of the foremost experts in this place.
Any results we gain from this experiment, will benefit from your clear headed observation and interpretation of them.
The risk that you won't return appears greater, given the number of deaths you have to date.
[ You're my friend and I don't want to see you suffer needlessly.
Will kept that one to himself. ]
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There are other experts. Other people to observe... even if they might not be as good. And the fact that I keep coming back means I'm more likely to come back. This place just can't quit me.
[He does actually believe that last one. As much as he wants it to end, he has a sinking feeling that he's going to keep getting dragged back until they either shut the system down and die from radiation poisoning or get integrated into the data collective.]
You, on the other hand, are statistically less likely to come back after a death, came up with and conducted one of the most successful and least deadly experiments we've had to-date, and your whole thing is basically observation. Take notes while I'm away.
[Also, Will is the dreaded F-word and House is bad at losing people he cares about. That will remain silent, as well.]
cw mention of suicide
Your thought to grab the heat suit and try to use it is deliberate careful thinking based on experience and your ability to think through the evidence at hand. This is why that combination, why your combination is unique.
[ It seemed important that Will show he did recognize that House wasn't being blindly reckless in this plan and in turn that Will wasn't flailing his hands simply to flail.
Even if a part of him was flailing simply to flail at the idea of losing his friend. ]
My observations are unreliable because mind is broken, House. [ The ex-profiler continued, fingers threading in and out in a fidgetty manner. ] I see beauty in the dark, temptation in the spill of blood, and I've already quit once.
But you want life, and you will fight down and dirty to exert your will on the world before you'll ever give up.
cw mention of suicide; disordered eating; depression... just a lot of things
You think my mind isn't broken? I'm running around with a guy who tried to murder and lobotomize me, a cannibal who's got me slated for his menu as soon as his boyfriend says 'go,' and said boyfriend who empathizes with serial killers enough to become them in his dreams and murder me.
[House makes a sharp, flicking motion with the bone in his hand.]
I'm stuck in a whole goddamn universe that doesn't make sense. Where I can't trust even my basic senses. I barely sleep, I'm starving myself because the thought of eating makes me sick, I can't help wanting to chew on everyone in this goddamn building, and every time we talk about sex all I can think is I couldn't even get it up right now if I wanted to.
The only things I would've had to look forward to back home are my team leaving, getting Wilson's girlfriend killed, prison, and Wilson dying. Here, it's dying, or getting sucked into some insane data collective and watching this keep going on and on and on until the machines just give out. That's what all of us are racing toward. Those are the end states.
[He cuts himself off because he's ranting now.]
You wanna cherry pick reasons you should go in the suit instead of me, don't make it about who's more broken. You just broke a different way.
cw: a lot of things
He didn't discount what it meant that House would admit to such things, and Will wasn't about to get into a discussion around 'my trauma is greater than yours' because each of them had survived through the impossible. One wasn't any greater than the other. Back home or here. ]
You know, it really is remarkable that either of us even continues to function.
[ He said, which wasn't an answer to House's last comment but nor was it a flippant avoidance of the weight of their conversation.
It was remarkable that either of them managed to function. Will had Hannibal, but if House weren't in the equation it was all together possible that Will would have allowed himself to sink beneath the surface and given over to the beauty of the darkness.
He sobered then, brows furrowing in a pensive expression before he continued. ]
I just want to end this. Free the collective and let them rest, free those of us who have worlds to go home too, ensure no one else gets dragged here and then ... let it end.
[ Then he looked up, once again making that rare eye contact. ]
But I want to see it through, to that end.
[ He was going in the damn suit, he'd manipulate, fight, tackle, hog tie House if he had too. But this was as close to a promise as he could give, and perhaps that House would accept, that Will wasn't getting in that suit with the intent to leave. ]
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Dude, it's a miracle anyone functions. Kids like Elric, Brown, and Quark have been here longer than me.
[And there are days when it seems like all of them are handling this place better than he's ever going to. It's half a joke when he says that he's just a regular guy from Jersey, but it's half-serious. Most of the people here are from insane, futuristic, magical, techno-enhanced worlds where they're fighting wars, living in the apocalypse, or fighting super villains and monsters regularly.]
I just wanna solve the puzzle.
[The admission is quiet, vulnerable. There's an echo of the little boy Will had met in House's dream. He just needs to know the answer, then he can rest. And getting in that suit is part of maybe getting the answer, of being right there to get it. There's no way that he loses. If it works, then he gets in and he's the first one to interact with NIMA, use it. If it doesn't... then he doesn't have to deal with losing a friend who might not come back.]
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It was not going to help his insomnia any!
In fact he glanced down and away, probably exposing more of his sense of guilt and conflict than he intended too, as he changed the subject entirely. ]
That experiment was all of us. [ He said in a quiet tone. ] The one you keep referring too. It was the product of the participation of everybody who was willing to risk it going wrong.
I didn't do anything other than ask for help.
[ You know House, ask for help? That thing you're kinda bad at admitting you need? ]
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You came up with the idea, you organized it, you executed it. Own it, Graham Cracker. I'm not praising you just to stroke your ego.
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Or in this case, sit in awkward silence. ]
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You planning to do anything with the dog toy you got the other night? We run into Ecks again, watch it like a hawk. She'll want it.
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I mean, I'll keep it out of sight.
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I'm assuming you named it if you're that attached to it.
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Oh. Wait. ]
I couldn't help it. The damn thing looks exactly like my dog Winston. [ There was a brief pause before Will decided to try to explain a little more. ]
Winston was the one who kept coming home to Wolf Trap, looking for me when I was locked up. He was the one who walked miles with me one night when I had a sleep walking incident.
He was the only one who didn't ... eat any of Verger's face.
He was my friend. [ Probably the only one in Will's life who hadn't ended up corrupted by Hannibal or turning on Will in the end. ]
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However. ]
Though I guess I didn't really spend a lot of time describing what he looked like. [ And the plush really was a good likeness, even down to the mottled red and black coat. ]
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cw: suicidal ideation
cw: suicidal ideation
cw: suicidal ideation
cw: suicidal ideation
cw: suicidal ideation
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