empathicfault | IC Inbox

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.

[ Will takes the hand with a small smile and accepts Malcolm's help up. ]

Good plan. Is your mother still living there, though?

Edited 2023-11-06 00:35 (UTC)

Yeah. It's her family's legacy home. She refuses to give it up for him and his crimes.

[He goes to the computer and starts entering information.]

[ Will stands back a little from the computer, letting Malcolm work on the details. It's probably too early to judge, but considering what he knows of her so far... ]

And I'm guessing she didn't move while you grew up, either.

Oh. No. I grew up there.

[And now they’re on a residential street in New York. One of the opulent rows of old money brownstones that populate the Upper East Side. Malcolm gestures to the stately front door made of black lacquered heavy oak.]

Shall we?

[ Of course Malcolm did. Will briefly pinches the bridge of his nose, but he doesn't comment any further on it. He'd always thought his world's psychiatry was in a dire state, but he does wonder about Malcolm's...

Regardless, they're here, and Will recovers enough to looks around at the fancy neighborhood. ]

I think I prefer New York with no real people in it. [ He smiles slightly and nods. ] All right. Lead on.

It does have a sort of post-apocalyptic charm. [A joke. He walks up the steps and pushes open the door.] I’ve programmed the house without any people in it, but in the real world, my mother would probably be home and at least a couple of her staff definitely would. [The entrance hall is opulent, the design classic. Timeless. Malcolm leads him down a hall and through double doors to the formal sitting room, then to a door in the corner that leads to a plain wooden staircase, lacking the adornments of the part of the house meant to be lived in and seen. Down the stairs to an only partly finished basement with cement floors.] That was my father’s office in there. I was with him that night. He was teaching me about the nerves of the hand. Then he told me it was time to head up to bed. I was walking through here… [He gestures to the hallway where they’re standing, then points to the end of the hall. A room without an actual door in the doorway.] I heard something from in there. I went over to see what it was. [As they approach the room, the travel trunk is quite plainly sitting right there on the floor. Pandora’s Box.] She was still alive. The girl in the box. I found out later that she saw me when I saw her. I opened it and saw her in there and I screamed. My father grabbed me from behind and put a chloroform soaked rag over my mouth and nose until I passed out. [He turns and looks at Will.] We were supposed to be in the Hamptons, but a road closure brought us back home soon after we left and he had to hide her quickly. Hastily. Hence the trunk. [He gestures to a nearby wall, then walks over and opens a hidden panel.] One of his kill rooms was right here. But he was waiting for us all to go to sleep so he could move her.

[ Will follows Malcolm through the opulent house, then down the far less fancy basement. An old house like this having an unfinished basement was a bit of a surprise, but of course serial murderers love having spaces to hide away like that. Martin got lucky.

He follows Malcolm through the description of the trunk and then the chloroform and the hidden panel- yep, he knew it. He takes in all the spaces but keeps his eyes on Malcolm's face for the most part. ]

But he didn't kill her...you said you found her later. Alive. [ Right? ]

[Malcolm nods.]

The chloroform was starting to lose efficacy. Imagine how many times one would have to chloroform a ten year old for it to lose efficacy. So he and his… accomplice - John Watkins - decided to take me and the girl… [He looks inside the secret room.] She must have been here all that time. I… don’t know how much time. I only have fragments of memory. They decided to take us on a camping trip and finish us both off. The girl, it turned out, worked for Nicholas Endicott, the ultrawealthy powerbroker my sister later killed. She convinced my father to let her go in exchange for dirt on Endicott that he could use as leverage if he was caught. And then… I’ve had to extrapolate a little bit. I think John wanted to finish me off. He grabbed my arm and I stabbed him with a knife my father bought me. And I ran. My father says he just couldn’t bring himself to kill me, but I think that was the moment he felt that way. He saw a sign that I could be like him.

[ Will nods through the explanation. Okay, so the camping trip happened after...and yeah, some of this is going to be lost to the chloroform. God, doing that to a kid...

The last bit has him grimacing, because he can understand how it follows now. ]

His narcissism was satisfied, seeing you display something he interpreted as sadism. You were just trying to live.

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