#skingames

“erik?”

charles already knows he’s awake, of course—he’d known that from his own bedroom, could hardly mistake erik’s thoughts—but it is half past four. he knocks twice as a courtesy, lets himself in as soon he hears the click of the lock.

he has the chessboard tucked under one arm and a bottle of scotch in the other, and he had changed into his pyjamas and made a valiant attempt at sleep for the last two hours before finally accepting that the triple threat of the house itself, the nightmares of the teenagers in it and his own anxieties weren’t about to have such mercy on him.

erik, for his part, doesn’t appear to have been trying.

“i am not who you think.”

there is a knife to the throat that is not hannibal’s, a knife that had moved so fast in the man’s hand that he could hardly see it and a few years ago he could not speak, not move, but he is stronger now. he cannot afford to be afraid, cannot think of the frigid air and the cleaver and prašau, prašau, prašau—

the papers that had brought him here, wearing this face, are scattered on the floor around him and he sees murder in the man’s eyes. he sees murder and in seeing murder he sees kin. lady murasaki has warned him about his gift—you are special, hannibal, but they will be afraid, you mustn’t show anyone—but he does not want to be murdered as this nazi, this friend of them—and so he raises his hands and sheds his face, gains an inch in height and loses a hundred pounds in weight and forty years of age, and this hideous face becomes the one that he most often calls his own. if he is going to be murdered for something, this is the skin he will die in. this is what he will die for.

“Does it make me a completely terrible guest if I ask for some alcohol in this?”

The coffee is sweet and spicy and warms her through the chill that’s clinging despite the fact that she’s been in from the cold for a while now, but it’s... been a long few days, to say the least. None of it seems real—Dr. Gideon, Will, all of it—like it’s all some kind of awful dream.

If not for the fact that it’s obvious in hindsight that all of this has been brewing for months, and she’s sitting opposite one of the few other people who seemed able to see that, beyond all the awful gossip flitting around the Bureau.

“well. you know. the first thing that comes to mind is that bullshit. ‘if you quit you’re just letting them win.’ or whatever.”

it was never about quitting for rebecca albright. it was about giving up, sure, giving in, yes. but it was an active choice she had to make. the people she had to hurt. the apple she had to take and bite into. see, rebecca, all things considered– she’s already quit. she’s already sad. she still puts in the work, sure, she still gets caught up in the shit. she still looks at masked murderers and thinks well but maybe there’s something in there worth saving.

“people who say that. they’ve never been in your shoes. i don’t think. or. they have, and they just. forgot what it was like.”

there’s an inhale, an exhale, a big heavy sigh through her nose. she sounds sad, too. she sounds like she’s been putting in too much work. little girls are always taught what an honor it must be to be coveted; no one wants to admit the awful truth of what being coveted must do to them. so now it’s up to girls to pry the coveting off them like scabs.

is that an unpleasant metaphor? yes.

one can hardly imagine how much more unpleasant the reality behind it must be.

“you’re allowed to quit, laurie. you’re allowed to be sad. you’re allowed to be fucked up about it. it was a fucked up thing that happened to you.”

in which alana bloom blows up your phone@skingames || [ sms msgs ]