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WHO: Hannibal Lecter
WHERE: The fountain and the inn
WHEN: July 16th
OPEN TO: All (only the first at the fountain please!)
WARNINGS: Descriptions of violence and injury, mentions of cannibalism

The Fountain

There are few things that truly surprise Hannibal.

Will had surprised him utterly when he dragged him over the edge of the cliff. Hannibal was so surprised that as they went over time seemed to slow down as his mind sped up, noting every single detail, trying to understand. As their feet left the edge and they tipped over into nothingness, he saw the dirt and gravel shower down, falling around them, weightless as they were. Hannibal's arms circled Will, a gesture akin to acceptance, that the fate that Will had chosen for them both Hannibal would share, that whatever happened when they struck water or rock below, would happen to them both. They had been linked for quite some time, orbiting each other in a dance of life and death, never able to free themselves, irrevocably conjoined, it seemed, to a single fate.

The roaring of the water crashing against the rock face grew louder, the scent of salt spray stronger, and in those last seconds Hannibal rolled, his arms still around his friend, so that Will was above Hannibal, and Hannibal would strike whatever was below first.

No greater love than this, to lie down one's life for a friend.

Then he hit the water, and there was darkness.

When he awoke, he was under water, but it was different. He did not have time to work out anything beyond that thought before he was pushed upward, and he swam to the surface. His head broke the surface of the water and he gasped in air...and the air was different. What was more, he was in...a fountain?

He swam to the side and pulled himself up out of the water, and for a moment knelt coughing, clearing his lungs of the small amount of water he had inhaled, and catching his breath. Even that was different. Hannibal pressed a hand to his abdomen, where he had been shot by the Red Dragon. The pain was gone. He pulled up his shirt (NOT his shirt...he would never wear these clothes outside an operating room) and felt the skin. Nothing. No exit wound. And no soreness from the blows he had taken in that final battle, when he and his friend fought the Red Dragon and brought him down together.

He remained kneeling, catching his breath, looking around, trying to understand. There are few things that truly surprise Hannibal, and yet he'd been bowed by two in rapid succession.

The Inn

Hannibal was particular about his food, but had learned to make do. He had spent most of the last three years in a glass prison, with prison food. Indeed, his captors took sadistic delight in feeding him such substandard fare. Hannibal could appreciate their enjoyment. Not that he would ever do that himself. Oh no, food was too sacred to him. He'd feed people their own flesh before he'd feed them white bread and processed pseudo-cheese. But there was an ironic appropriateness that the man known for his particular diet would be denied even the basic culinary fineries which he was accustomed to. Chilton and Alana had used it as a carrot, sometimes literally, to get what they wanted out of him. Of course, he still managed to have the upper hand more often than not, and only gave what he wanted them to have.

The food at the inn was divine by comparison, even if it was relatively humble. As Hannibal ate, he scanned the room, watching the people, their mannerisms, their body language, beginning to draw sketches in his mind of who these people were, what they wanted, what their pressure points were. Anyone who approached was graced with a smile, gracious and friendly and welcoming. If they seemed so inclined, Hannibal offered them the empty chair at his table.

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That this man is new, there's no question — Even with the uptick in new arrivals lately, Karen's been meticulous in keeping track of them all. She cares less about personal welfare than someone like Mark or even Kira, but it matters to her, that there might be a pattern she could otherwise miss.

What's striking, though, is the calm demeanor, the ease; she's never seen this man before, which means he can't have been in the village more than a day or two, and here he is, eating a meal as blithely as if he were on vacation in the Poconos. He could be like Frank and Jessica, hopping from some other improbable scenario into this one, but it still seems a little odd. She would have expected at least some agitation.

"Hi," she greets with a small smile upon approach, sliding into the seat on offer, a notebook and pencil clutched in one hand. "I'm Karen. Welcome."

Hannibal had examined his wrist device soon after his arrival, and noted that his name was already recorded in the device. This was curious for a number of reasons, of course, and he was pondering the implications along with all the many, many other things he was pondering. But the most immediate practical concern was whether there would be people in this place who would recognize his name. After all, he had been the center of a veritable media typhoon when he was identified as Hannibal the Cannibal. His trial was a televised circus, and spawned several books, including the one by Frederick Chilton, which Hannibal proceeded to very publicly denounce, writing letter after letter to a wide range of publications.

So when the woman introduces herself, Hannibal briefly considers how he'll reply. He could use an alias. But if his name is already out there, it's possible it would only undermine any trust he builds. If she knows about him, he reasons, she will find out eventually, whatever he says now.

"Pleased to meet you, Karen. If in rather bizarre circumstances. My name is Hannibal."

"That's putting it lightly," Karen replies with a faint laugh, tucking a bit of hair behind her ear. "For most people, anyway. For me. I'd like to say things get less bizarre over time, but they really just don't."

She leans forward, notebook in her lap, and crosses her arms against the edge of the tabletop. "How long have you been here? You seem surprisingly calm for a man in such bizarre circumstances."

He smiles gently at that laugh, the sort of smile he uses to put a shy patient at ease, or to dispel suspicion. The question makes the smile fade a little, and he glances away for a moment.

"I arrived this morning." He returns his gaze to her. "I'm afraid that my own circumstances prior to my arrival had already been rather bizarre. For instance, by a strange coincidence, my last memory before I found myself in the fountain was falling off a cliff into the sea below."

"Oh my god," Karen replies, briefly lifting a hand to her mouth. "That's— I'm so sorry. That must have been awful."

He isn't the first, of course; all you have to do is ask around, and it becomes obvious enough that plenty of people have shown up from what they at least assumed was their moment of death. This is the first time, though, that anyone's come out with it to her so plainly.

Hannibal lowers his head slightly, his expression still calm yet with a tinge of sorrow. "The fall itself was in truth too brief to be especially traumatic, but the circumstances that precipitated it..." He allows his voice to trail off for a moment before he glances up with a small smile. "In any case, perhaps it was, coincidentally, a mercy. My arrival here was strange, but still somewhat of a continuation of what had occurred. I expected to find myself in the water, after all, and find myself in water I did."

So brave, this man who is trying so hard to see the good in his circumstances.

Or so he would like this young woman to believe.

It could have been worse, Karen supposes, but it's still a terrible thing to imagine, falling to your death like that. She thinks there's a scrap of an offer to ask about the circumstances involved, but even Karen has her limits of what she'll press a person on, and when. She's not after a story, here, and the man just died — Or thinks he died, which is effectively the same thing.

"I hope things are a little less harrowing for you here," she offers, not quite able to manage a sympathetic smile, but her eyes are soft with concern. "Where are you from, if you don't mind me asking?"

She doesn't ask for specifics, and he does not force them on her. After all, a man keeping a trauma buttoned down will typically not discuss it overmuch without prompting. So he takes the direction her question offers.

"Baltimore." His accent is most certainly not what one would expect of someone from Baltimore, or really from anywhere in particular, although perhaps closest to Eastern Europe.

Baltimore certainly isn't what she'd been expecting, but she mentally chastises herself over it instantly — She doesn't tell people she's from Vermont, after all.

"Lucky you, I actually know where Baltimore is," she replies with a little smile. "I lived in New York City, before here. I worked for the New York Bulletin, I don't know if you've heard of it. Sadly, journalism isn't much in demand here," she adds with a soft laugh.

Hannibal isn't familiar with the New York Bulletin, but it may well be a small enough periodical that it never made its way on the list of periodicals he requested while imprisoned in the Baltimore State Hospital. In any event, he doesn't remark on it, instead nodding toward the notebook Karen is holding.

"Once a journalist, always a journalist?"

"Pretty much," she allows, her smile quirking. "Although here it's really just record keeping, with the occasional dash of attempting to solve puzzles that don't want to be solved." And which, quite honestly, they all probably don't actually want to know the answers to.

"What did you do in Baltimore?"

To say Kira is bad at welcoming people to the village is, at this point, a bit like saying the guy who sits on his stoop with a brown paper bag all evening is a bad doorman for the building. The ability to sit on a bench near the thing and occupy himself with a joint, the entertainment of a half-grown corvid, and a copy of Frankenstein gone puffy and soft with use, makes him more of a convenient candidate than a good one.

And he hasn't exactly been trying, since cementing certain ideas about the place. New arrivals ask questions he either isn't allowed or isn't equipped to answer.

He smokes too much, too often, for it to quell that frustration.

So he's stopped sitting in wait, stopped taking shifts. He can make his observations at the group meals, eventually catching newcomers and the color of their watches, even if they've found new clothes in the interim. Today, it's just that the fountain is between him and the house, coming back from the other village. He's perfectly sober, carrying a bucket of fresh peaches in one hand, a makeshift lead for his dog in the other, Hoshi perched on the strap of his backpack.

When he sees the man knelt under a similar pack, navy scrubs stuck to skin, he almost diverts toward the inn. But he likes to think his judgmental bullshit holds him to certain standards, and that makes up for all the time he points it outwards. He can't tell Frank to try harder, then leave a man dripping and confused in the dirt.

Setting the weighted bucket down, he ties Aurora to it and tells her to stay, loud enough to signal his approach. It's time to get back on the wagon: no dogs rushing in, no kicking the new guy in the dick. Putting his pack down beside her sends Hoshi flying, a loop of the space before he comes back to Kira's other shoulder, picking up a piece of his hair in his beak. Thinking a little more ahead, he taps out a message on his watch, asking one of the usual volunteers to keep an extra plate warm at the inn.

Now he just has to get the guy there. "Did you just come through," he asks as he walks up, going for obvious instead of absurdly conversational. "Do you feel alright? We have a clinic if you need medical attention."

Hannibal looks up at the sound of the voice, and sees the man with the dog, and looks down again, a smile tugging at his lips, one of appreciation for the irony, that the first person he meets in this place is accompanied by a dog. If Will were here, he would make a beeline for the animal.

The thought makes him look back to the water of the fountain, thinking that maybe Will is just behind him, and will shortly emerge from the waters himself.

The surface of the water remains unbroken.

When the man speaks to him, Hannibal carefully finds his feet, and slowly stands. A quick assessment of the man seems to indicate that he is not an immediate threat, so Hannibal relaxes, looking around.

"I'm well enough, surprisingly. Quite apart from the oddity of the situation." He glances at the man again. "Forgive me, I cannot say I have any context for what I am experiencing at the moment. One might wonder if this is some version of heaven. But I suspect that may be too simplistic a view."

Calm and philosophical is new, as far as Kira's recent encounters with the new arrivals go. He knows it can be like this--people who think they've died, people from situations so far-fetched or dangerous that the village is a breath of fresh air. Even if that air is damp and heavy with summer storms. With no imminent panic grating the man's voice, Kira chances a look overhead, gauging how long they have to get acquainted, out here.

Long enough; he made it this far without getting wet, and the new guy already is.

"I don't know," he says; he'll be saying that a lot, if the man has the usual questions. "Heaven always seemed pretty complicated to the people who believed in it, back home." Kira prefers ideas that are simple at their core: energy from one form to the next, resonance with existence, being a copy of a person, rather than that person plucked from space and time.

Even if the latter is slowly blurring the edges of his grasp, on anything. It makes more sense than prevalent theories. "Wherever we are, we have food and shelter. If you're alright to walk, I can get you to a hot meal and a place to change into dry clothes." And, because it seems allowed and likely to get a response, this go-around, he offers down a hand. "I'm Kira."

Hannibal accepts the hand, his grip firm. "Kira. A pleasure to meet you. My name is Hannibal." It's a gamble to use his real name, since it is distinctive and has been all over the news, so he watches for any reaction. "I confess I had not been one to believe in heaven, exactly. I was more agnostic on the subject. However...my last memory before finding myself in the fountain was falling off a cliff into the ocean below. It would not be a stretch to believe that I died. Indeed...that this is some version of the afterlife seems most likely."

He nods at Kira's offer to lead him to a place for a meal and dry clothes. "I would greatly appreciate that, thank you." He glances down at the scrubs with a sigh. "I don't believe I've worn scrubs since my time as a surgeon."

The final line at least ties together the rest: it's all a little clinical, the powder and snap of latex gloves over an existential nightmare. He takes a fortifying breath, tugging the man up. It always seems easier, here, for the people who think they're dead.

Would that he'd been given the chance.

"Don't thank me yet," Kira says, lifting his chin toward the inn before stalking back to his dog. Hoshi ruffles at his ear, but makes no real sound. It's been a long day for everyone in this old fountain park. "You haven't seen your other options. I hear it's a lot of overalls and socks, in those packs."

The man doesn't seem to react to Hannibal's name, which is both a benefit and a curiosity. Had he merely been the sort to not pay attention to the news? Had he been in a place where the coverage of Hannibal the Cannibal was minimal or nonexistent. Perhaps with time he will have to pry a little deeper.

The mention of overalls and socks prompts an amused lift of Hannibal's eyebrows. "Ah," he says genially. "Hell, then." How else would one characterize a place with clothing choices limited to scrubs and overalls? He looks at the dog and smiles, thinking of Will, and of how his friend and apparent murderer would be drawn to the animal. Of course, Hannibal himself is fond of dogs, and had been fond of Will's pets. He holds out a hand to the dog, palm down, offering it to smell.

If Hannibal is looking for a man with many pressure points, the tense man with a metal arm that hides behind a curtain of hair probably stands out like some sort of beacon. It's not hard to evaluate the way he ducks his head, the way his shoulders are in a perpetual state of drawn, the way he checks the faces of the people he passes, scopes the exits, the way his fingers twitch absently when anyone comes too close.

The way he greets people with a tight smile that doesn't reach his eyes, and the way he slips into something distinctly uncomfortable shortly thereafter. In short, he's a walking pressure point.

He's also keenly aware of changes to his environment, and Hannibal's face is new. Though his gaze doesn't linger, it's clear the way his eyes slide warily toward the newcomer from a few tables down, discreetly assessing and then furtively glancing away again. New people arrive all the time, though, and he's getting used to it.

They seem to fall into an overlapping routine, though, because over the course of the next few days Bucky seems to find himself in the dining room at the same times as their newest resident for at least one meal a day. He hasn't quite mustered the sociability to greet him though, hasn't found a reason to.

Hannibal notices Bucky, of course. It would be hard enough not to notice, considering he has a metal arm. But Hannibal is much more interested in the man's behaviors than his prosthetic. He watches in such a way where the other man is likely not to notice, but watches nonetheless, witnesses those small nervous movements, the way he stands apart, guarded. Quite fascinating, really. Hannibal has theories, and when he finally approaches the seemingly younger man, it is partially in curiosity as to whether and which of his theories are correct. It is also, and tangentially, in curiosity of how that walking pressure point might one day be leveraged.

It is during one of the meals that Hannibal approaches, from the front so as not to startle the man, with a mild smile just enough to be friendly without being overbearing or creepy.

"Do you mind if I join you?"

He's not terribly surprised when one day their pleasant distance is crossed; this is a small community, a small town populated by apparently the friendliest people in any given universe. They've given him more courtesy than anyone in the last several countries he's lived (aside from Wakanda), and evidently this new man is no exception to what he's come to expect.

His eyes flicker cautiously over Hannibal's standing form, but ultimately he offers something of a strained smile, almost a grimace really, and nods toward the chair across from him. Hannibal will have to forgive his apparent lack of social skills, they're a work in progress.

Once he's seated, Bucky at least takes the initiative to start the conversation with an observation. "You're new."

Hannibal has a particular distaste for rudeness, of course, but he distinguishes between those who are rude and those whose social skills are still in development. While the former are, whenever possible, dealt with culinarily, he latter are likely to get his kindness...or at least what appears to be kindness. A developing mind and personality has such potential, akin to a lump of clay, or a block of marble. As Hannibal sits across from this curious man, he regards him genially, wondering what form lies within that marble, and what tools would best liberate it.

The other man's statement earns a wider smile, one of mild amusement. "And you are not. How long have you been in this place?"

Were he privy to the inner workings of Hannibal's mind he might suggest that he's not the marble so much as the tool used to break into the marble of others. He considers himself well apt to hack away pieces of beautiful things, with nothing truly left of himself to make his own shape. Tools aren't made to be liberated so much as wielded.

Eyes flicker over the way Hannibal carries himself, the way he lowers himself into the seat and deflects conversation easily. He's braille, impossible for Bucky to read, painting no clear picture and giving him no real conclusion to draw.

"I, uh-," He licks his lips, considering the question. Huffs softly, something dry and humorless. "I'm starting to lose track of time, actually. A few months by now, I guess. Too long."

Hannibal would disagree that a tool itself could not be beautiful. He has used many men as tools, and has taken great pleasure in molding them to his own aesthetic, like a finely crafted sword, or a carefully trained warhorse, both beautiful in form and function.

"I imagine that would be subjective. Whether a few months is too long of a time. Why do you feel it is?"

He can't help the incredulous little laugh that comes out at the supposition; he imagines there are very few people here who don't think a few months in this place is too long. Bucky's reasons are particular, though, and he scratches absently at the back of his neck.

"I was kind of in the middle of something back home," He starts. Hedges, and decides to add a little context, "A war. I'm not doing much good sitting here chopping wood while that's going on without me."

"I see."

Hannibal has already discovered that people here came from a vast array of worlds, a fact that is, in large part, to his benefit. Most obiously, nobody has yet recognized him or his name, but perhaps more importantly, he finds the variety, the possibilities, fascinating.

"I imagine that is quite frustrating. Where were you in combat?" Perhaps it is a war he has heard of. Or perhaps not. Certainly that prosthesis is well beyond the present capabilities of Hannibal's world.

"Wakanda," he answers easily and sounds certain in it despite the fact that likely no such country exists where Hannibal is from. He hasn't actually had the opportunity to mention the name of the country to anyone else yet, not even Sam. At least, not that he can remember. As such, he's not aware of the possibility that an entire damn country might be missing from alternate versions of the globe.

Even so, even if it were, it wouldn't be a typical place for combat on any other world but his own. African countries certainly have their array of conflict, and US troops are stationed in most of them, but their presence there is drastically undermentioned compared to conflicts in, for example, the middle east. The typical idea of where the military resides might end around the very northernmost part of the African continent. "It's, uh- it's probably... not a war you've heard of."

Even in a place that seems to be so inclined to draw people from all over the place, Druitt has something of a tendency to stand out. Not so much for his clothes, here, given that he's wearing the same sort of clothes as most anyone else in the village, but he wears them with a casual ease that suggests that he doesn't really mind that they aren't exactly flattering. (It helps that black is one of the colors he tends to prefer, when given a choice, but that fact isn't one that's particularly obvious by sight.)

Beyond that, his actions are generally those of a gentleman - he smiles, nods, is otherwise polite - but to a particularly sharp-eyed individual there are a few oddities that might stand out. For one thing, he doesn't seem to be at all inclined to slouch or otherwise do anything that would make his (considerable) height less imposing. For another, he carries himself with an air of someone who is very sure of himself, and while that might not be particularly concerning, it does certainly suggest that there's more to him, somehow.

That said, he doesn't directly make his way over. He's hardly about to interrupt someone if they're eating, but he does offer a polite nod as his path draws near to where Hannibal is sitting. And if a conversation should happen to result, he isn't likely to have any complaints.

As Hannibal surveys the crowd, he finds his attention drawn to the man, and he watches him for a moment. His poise, his ease, his physical dominance, is reminiscent of the physicality of a tiger gliding through the jungle, and it is deeply familiar to Hannibal. After all, a predator recognizes a predator. And the fact that he seems to be a polite gentleman makes him even more interesting. Hannibal suspects it is this man's "person suit," and can appreciate the craftsmanship.

When he man nods, Hannibal nods in return, his smile polite, genteel, even while his eyes were sharp in a way a fellow predator might notice. He does not call the man over but rather returns to his meal, glancing up periodically to glimpse how the gentleman is interacting with others in the room.

In a sense, it absolutely is. One crafted out of the person he used to be; a mask to hide the roiling anger and call to violence that lurks just underneath the surface. Admittedly, it's not quite the picture of the Victorian gentleman he used to be. Time alone would have seen to that, and the corresponding shifts in society. But it still stands up well enough, tarnished though it might be from the 'original' as it were.

Still, there's a curl of smile at Hannibal's nod. One that's just sharp enough to suggest that he's noticed the edge in the other man's gaze without looking too out of the ordinary to anyone else who might catch it; it lingers just long enough for him to be sure that Hannibal's noticed it and then it vanishes again as he turns away.

He moves easily enough through the room, too, offering a word here and there to people from time to time though it's more the casual pleasantries of politeness rather than a full conversation. None of them close enough to quite tell what he's saying, mind, though the rumble of his voice and the casual ease to his words is easy enough to pick up on.

And eventually he does make his way over to see about claiming something to eat. Not that he seems terribly likely to make his way back to the table Hannibal has claimed, or at least, not without being directly waved over, but it's clear enough that he means to stay for a while at the very least.

Noctis felt detached from the place well enough as was that he couldn't recognize a new person from a person who has been here for some time and he's just not yet met. It made little difference to him at first, but after a moment of conversation he would come to find the person he's only met was either a new arrival or someone who has been here longer than he has. The man he now stared at, from across the room, looked to be just as interested in staring at others.

Noct had that habit, it was far more comfortable to watch than to approach someone.

It was a habit he was intending to break and with some mental preparation he finally stood from his chair in the adjacent room and walked over toward the man he's not yet met. He pulls at the shirt of his teal scrub. The hem of his pants cling to his waist beneath the shirt, Noct is thinner and paler these days, but everyone sort of had that thinning look in the pair of scrubs they were gifted with.

Noct pulls in a breath, swallows down the nerves in his throat and pulls his hands together before him before he speaks up, "Hello." He stops just a foot or two away, it's evident who he had addressed.

Hannibal watched genially as the man approached tugging on his scrubs. Hannibal's own dark blue scrubs were now dry, and he appeared entirely at ease in them. Indeed, he was the sort of man who appeared entirely at ease in any clothing, from scrubs to a prison jumpsuit to a kill suit of plastic. When the man arrived at his table he gave him a smile. He appreciated people who were as observant as himself, and thought this man might well be a valuable resource.

"Hello. Would you care to join me?"

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