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[empathicfault]

"Will Graham here. Leave a message."

[Open for text/audio/action/whatever.]

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[empathicfault]

Will's enthusiasm for watching the dermestids immediately crumbles at her question. He lets out an embarrassed chuckle while rubbing his face with both hands. "Oh god, that's...yes. There've been multiple during my past decade or so of time in the FBI, hunting serial killers. 'Best' probably implies Hannibal Lecter, since he was the most successful. And the signs seem to want to be as obnoxious as possible."

He fully expects more signs centered on Hannibal, before the flood is over. There's a lot of material to work with. "Do I even dare ask what it says?" He's a little glad that the beetles are being so attention-grabbing, as his gaze is kind of naturally down there right now, anyway.

[skitter]

Bearing up his theory about the signs being obnoxious, hers cycles over to "Has cut out the eyes of two enemies. Once with a knife, once by eating them with bugs," while he's watching the beetles.

"'Abandoned his family to have a murder-date with his best cannibal,'" she recites, glad she still has the whispers and doesn't have to actually sound out the words. "There are a lot of ways I can interpret that."

[empathicfault]

Will groans, but it's rather dramatic. "Jesus Christ," he mutters. "Out of all the ways to put it..."

He shakes his head, then looks back at Taylor to explain- and immediately catches at least part of the new sign. His eyes widen a bit, too- apparently it's hard to not do when reading 'cut the eyes out'. But that's as far as he gets before he's focused on his explanation again.

"So that's...I can just tell you what happened. I was in an FBI profiling job that was...let's put it charitably and say 'extremely bad' for my mental health. My fellow consultant and friend made things worse by being the most prolific of the serial killers we were hunting. That's Hannibal Lecter."

Will runs his tongue over his teeth as he thinks about how to continue. "I quit it all when Lecter was finally caught. Moved across country, met a wonderful woman, married her. And three years later, my old boss comes sniffing around, wanting me to do 'one last job.' It ended up with a serial killer targeting my wife and stepson, pointed there by Lecter." He swallows. "They almost died. And it wasn't going to stop unless I stopped it."

[skitter]

"I'm- going to assume that FBI profiling isn't the office job that it is in my world." She glances at him, and while her expression is interested, there's something handcrafted about it. Intentional.

"So you went to kill the serial killer? And Lecter?"