empathicfault | IC Inbox

I’d like that. [He gets up and offers Will his hand.] I should have brought tea. I’ll bring a thermos next time.

[Once settled in Will’s home, Malcolm reaches for Will’s hand. Squeezes it gently. Brings it to his mouth to kiss the back of his fingers.] Are you sure it’s a good idea for you to be the killer when we do this? It seems like it takes a lot out of you. Did I hurt you?

[ Will seems far more settled once they're in his house, although he still takes the occasional deep, slow breath. The question gets a small smile from him. ]

No, not at all. If I'd been...myself, it would've been a real turn-on.

[ He smirks a bit, but he can feel the semi-joke fall flat. He squeezes Malcolm's hand back and leans against him on the couch. ]

It's all right. I realize you haven't seen what it is I do, not really. But that's common, even the shakes afterward. This Hobbs persona, it was already in me. It might even be good for me to have...aired it out a bit, so to speak. There were some parts that my conscious mind had forgotten.

How was it for you? What sort of feelings would you attach to the whole experience?

I don’t… know. It… felt like a case. Once… once I got into it. I think that part will get easier. Part of me thought that it might be prudent to shoot him in that moment that I had him distracted, but not… enjoying lethal force wasn’t really the motivating factor. I was thinking about her. The girl. I just… didn’t think she would want that. I didn’t. I didn’t want him to be free, but I didn’t want him to be dead, either.

Your priority was saving her.

[ He smiles, but there's a sadness to it. ] That was mine, too. But I still shot him in the shoulder. Maybe that's the police training, I don't know. Maybe it was the fact that I knew I couldn't talk him down.

I got lucky that I didn't shoot her accidentally. I was a terrible- terrible shot. Had to practice after.

But you managed to de-escalate- and I know, it was technically me, but I'd been...if I'd been less immersed, I wouldn't have listened. But Garret would. You hit on some of the things he cared about, very quickly. Things that would make him pause.

I'm always thinking about the victims. Understanding how killers think... sometimes I empathize with them. Sometimes I understand why they do what they do. What made them. How they broke. Sometimes I think I can help them, too. Maybe that's why this place appealed to me, when the Admiral asked. But it's just... always been important to save people from them. For all the ones I failed to save from him. What Hobbs wanted - to preserve something he thought was beautiful like a trophy - I get it. I get how... transitory things can feel and how nice it would be to never give them up and how lonely it is when they're gone. And that loneliness being a driving force... someone being willing to engage with the thing that's important to you. To share it with you. To explore it with you. It's the one thing you want more than anything when you feel like that.

[ Will listens but he watches Malcolm's face closely through the latter half of that. His smile is small but genuine, and he squeezes Malcolm's hand. ]

It is. We both know that feeling. Intimately.

[ He sits with that for a moment, in his quiet house. He thinks he knows the answer to his next question, but he knows he should ask it, anyway: ]

If you hadn't been able to save Abigail, what would you have done? What would you have wanted to do?

[He can usually save them. He frowns faintly.]

I still would have arrested him. …I might have been a little… less kind about it.

[ Will nods, taking in that small frown. ]

You would rather he be...contained, than entirely gone?

[ He's not sure that's the right word. He hunts for others. He throws out the nicer terms, as that's not really what they're here to explore. ]

Disarmed, incarcerated, under control...powerless?

The ones that have no hope for reform, the true psychopaths who will never feel remorse for the suffering they caused… that revelled in it, even… they’re the ones that deserve incarceration the most. They deserve to live long enough to experience a little suffering. Being kept in a cage, knowing they’ll never be free ever again. That’s justice. Why should they get a reprieve from that?

You assume they'd find that to be a punishment. The man who made the totem pole of bodies only did so because he wanted to be housed and fed...I'll grant that he was an unusual case.

[ Even among the serial killers. ]

How do you know if someone has no hope for reform?

There are a few different... criteria. Are they capable of feeling remorse? Some people truly aren't. Is it possible to make restitution for the things they did? Some crimes are too heinous and wanton. Though, I guess... maybe the Barge is making me reconsider that notion. That there's a level of psychopathy where redemption isn't possible. Though I'm not sure there are Earthbound institutions capable of delivering what the Barge does.

[ That's a more measured response than Will expected, but he generally agrees. Time to see what might affect it. ]

I don't think our worlds would have a chance at it, no.

You said that justice is keeping them in a cage, knowing they'll never be free again. [ He smiles slightly. ] Is that satisfying to you? Knowing they have to stay where you put them? Knowing they can't be free to choose? Knowing that the time drags for them, as they stare at the walls? That they might face some of the same dread their victims did?

It just seems... fair that they get the outcome they want the least when that was all they offered their victims.

Mmmm. [ It's a small hum in agreement, but he's somewhat lost in thought. ]

Hannibal gave himself up at one point, so I would always know where he was. He'd...committed to me, by then. He was trying to show me that he valued me over his freedom, and that he knew I'd come to him when I needed him again.

...and I did, eventually. He asked if it was good to see him. I said no...it wasn't for me. I didn't like seeing him caged. Restricted. But I was...I was in deep, by then. And my experience with jails was very different than yours.

So it seems fair to me, too, but...i's not the outcome I'd aim for, anymore. It hasn't been for a long while, now.

Wow… I’m… really going to have to step up my romantic gestures, huh?

[It wasn’t the outcome Will aimed for. Achieved. Malcolm knows that. He didn’t know about the wooing by sacrifice.]

[ Will is surprised into a chuckle. ]

Oh, that wasn't romantic. I had just told him I was done. I didn't want to see him, I didn't want to think about him. I didn't want to know where he was or what he was doing.

He called the FBI within the hour to turn himself in on my lawn. So I would 'always know where he was.' [ Will licks his lips and shakes his head, looking mildly frustrated. ] Only Hannibal would turn a full-fledged surrender into an attempt to control.

Edited 2023-11-03 22:44 (UTC)

[Malcolm presses his lips together and nods.]

When my father was arrested, he told me - age ten - to remember that he would always love me because we’re the same. So. Not only him.

[Malcolm leans over to tilt his head against Will’s, pulling his legs up onto the couch.]

Do you… want to see the house where I grew up? See the basement where I was made?

[ Will nods in acknowledgement, because of course Martin Whitly was also that obnoxious. Not to mention, manipulative of his 10-year-old son.

The offer is accepted immediately, with Will putting an arm around Malcolm. ]

I would. If you'd be all right with revisiting that place.

[Malcolm smiles.] Oh, yeah. [He taps his temple with the hand on the far side from Will so as to not dislodge himself from the embrace.] I go there all the time. May as well take you with me.

Kind of figured. It might be good for you to 'be' there in a situation where you have control of the setting.

[ He looks away from Malcolm, towards a dog bed on the floor, as he continues. ]

This scenario, the one we just went through, that's where I started my...metamorphosis. It wasn't just that I shot Hobbs. It was that it felt right to me. Good. I'm not sure what to do with the idea that I might've been able to keep them both alive.

We… don’t know that she’ll live in my version. I probably should have shot him when I had him distracted, but I thought I could keep him talking long enough to get close enough to grab the knife.

[A confession.]

...half a year in a mental hospital, a year hidden with Hannibal- in order to be used as a 'gift' to me...she didn't live in my version, either. Not really. Just performed an extended swansong.

[ He bites his lip. ]

You were minimizing harm. It's all a gamble, but you made a good one.

[Malcolm nudges Will’s knee with his knee playfully.]

Even though it’s not the sexy choice?

[ That surprises a laugh out of Will. Malcolm really knows how to kick him out of a melancholic rumination, sometimes. ]

Well...it's probably better for the sexy choices to happen in more sexy situations, anyway.

That's a good point. Okay. [He drags himself up from leaning against Will, then offers his hand.] Let's go see my mom's house, then, so we can come back here afterwards and decompress.

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