(no subject)

[tibetanmethod]

He goes to the bar to have a cup of coffee. Coffee is good. Coffee

(coffee that stays coffee)

smells good, it's a symbol of everything true and right and pure, it keeps the long arm of the law healthy and active. It cures what ails you.

Cooper takes a sip, and another. He's got a hand resting on the Bar, and the other hand holding his cup of coffee.

A moment later, he puts the cup down and goes down the (thank god) well-lit corridor to the men's restroom, moving steadily, calmly, as though nothing is wrong.




He notes absently in the stall a lot of Chinese, but he doesn't read it, because he's throwing up.


Ten minutes later the sound of a faucet turning on, and the paper towel dispenser fulfilling its function.

And then, eyes a little reddened, Cooper leaves the restroom and heads, head down, back into the main bar and up the stairs.



His cup of coffee is still resting on the barstool where he left it.

Comments

[tibetanmethod]

He doesn't look as bad as she's seen before. Not quite.

"Yes. Thank you." And it's nice, isn't it, to not be afraid of going through this door -- to know what's on the other side. There's light, and books and papers are open on one of the desks. This is a place of calm where work gets done.

Cooper isn't quite bewildered, isn't quite shocked, isn't quite lost -- but close. "I'm sorry for the interruption." A moment's pause; his mouth opens, closes, opens again. "Is now a good -- do you have time?"

[blue_ajah]

"I do."

For you, she does not say, nor for this, although both are true. She has rarely seen him so disconcerted, and the times that she has--

--well.

The Aes Sedai places a gentle hand on his arm, and nods in the direction of the small sofa and the armchairs beside it.

"There is no need to apologize, Dale. Come and sit down."

A beat.

"I have tea here, of course, and I can send for coffee if you would like."

[tibetanmethod]

He's shaking his head slightly as he takes a seat in one of the armchairs. "Tea would be better, I think. Thank you. Moiraine -- "

A slight hesitation.

"I know there are ways to get out of this place that are...unorthodox, but -- has there ever been -- "

"Have people ever been taken? A lot of people? At the same time?"

[blue_ajah]

"Taken?" She is already moving across the room toward a small table that stands against the wall and the tea service that stands upon it, but at this she turns back to look at him.

"I have known of such a happening, but never in significant numbers, not that I am aware of."

[tibetanmethod]

He's looking at the floor, and counting on his fingers. "Me. Crowley. Bernard Wrangle. Charlie McGee. Veronica Mars. Johnny Truant. Prometheus. Five, maybe six others, I don't know who they were. We just -- "




"I don't know how to begin to explain it."

[blue_ajah]

Some of the names she knows; some she does not. By the time he reaches the end of the list, she has returned with the tea.

Moiraine sets the service on the low table before the sofa, and seats herself in one corner. She pours a cup and holds it out to him, and her hand is steady as she does.

"There is time, I should think, is there not? Tell me what happened, and perhaps an answer may be found."

Her tone is calm, and as steady as her hand.

[tibetanmethod]

"Thank you." He holds the cup in both hands.

Silence.

"There was a door in the wall of the main bar," he says, finally. "I hadn't seen it before. I opened it, and I went through, and it closed behind me. It was a hallway -- a completely dark hallway. I was the third one there. Charlie McGee and Veronica Mars were there before me. Crowley came through afterward, and we could see light and the bar as he came in. The door closed behind him, and then it disappeared. We decided to try and find another way out, and we joined hands, and then..."

Cooper has been speaking almost tonelessly. Not any more.

"I was alone, in another place, and I don't know how it happened." He's looking at her, and shaking his head. "And it was still dark."

[blue_ajah]

"You were separated, then."

Quietly, and it is clear that her attention is on him fully.

[tibetanmethod]

Cooper nods.

And hesitates again.

And says, quietly, "I'd like to ask a favor of you, if I can." He's reaching in the pocket of his coat for his tape recorder. "I was -- alone, for a long time. And things kept -- they kept changing."

Cooper meets her eyes.

"I want to make sure I can trust my own perception." Beat. "I can't listen to this by myself."

[blue_ajah]

"Then you will not have to."

The calm, serene voice remains steady as she answers him-- and if Moiraine is remembering sitting with Harry Truman and listening to a collection of similar tapes in the Bookhouse outside Twin Peaks itself, she does not show it.

She holds his gaze, and does not look away even as she inclines her head in assent.

[tibetanmethod]

"Okay," is all he says as he sets his tea on the small table at his hand, and fast-forwards through to the end of the side before flipping over the tape.

(His hands don't tremble. Not when it comes to his tape recorder.)

Click.



Cooper sets the recorder on the table and sits back in the chair, hands in his lap, eyes on his hands.

[blue_ajah]

She remains silent, looking at the recorder as though it might reveal its secrets through vision instead of sound -- but her glance flicks to Cooper frequently.

"Diane. I'm in a darkened corridor..."

As he describes what he's -- not seeing, but experiencing, she listens carefully; taking note of the words said as well as the inflections of his speech.

"...the ceiling might be a little lower."


"I had scrambled eggs for breakfast this morning."

Moiraine's lips tighten.

[tibetanmethod]

Everything sounds as he remembers saying it.

(Feels like days ago, instead of hours.)

The whole monologue about the eggs, and the juicer, and --



When the growl comes from the tape recorder, his widened eyes go to it, and his head turns.

Cooper makes himself reach for his cup of tea and sips, slowly.

[blue_ajah]

It's followed by the sound of a door slamming, and then Cooper's voice, impossibly steady:

"Who's there."

No answer, save for strange creaking sounds, uncannily blended with the steady hiss of the tape recorder.

Moiraine is very pale, now.

[tibetanmethod]

He knows what comes next. He knows. He lived it, and not all that long ago.

His knuckles are white, until Cooper forces himself to loosen his hands.

Sound effects. Growls. Footsteps. He hears himself fall, hears himself run for the door, hears himself go through the door. Hears the door slam, and his footsteps still. Hears a long sigh. Hears himself start to speak.

"Diane, I seem to have found a staircase."

[blue_ajah]

On the tape, Cooper calls out, and is answered only by echoes.

Here in the study, Moiraine glances sideways at him as his recorded voice says,

"I'm alone."

"Again."

The Aes Sedai reaches out and lays a hand on his arm as the tape continues.

"I have to accept the possibility that I'm not going to make it out of whatever this is alive."

She opens her mouth as if to speak, but then shakes her head, silently. They continue to listen, as Cooper starts down the staircase into more nothingness, as he reaches a landing, as he remarks upon the temperature and a meditation technique.

Click.

"But you have." Moiraine's tone is soft and certain. "You live."

[tibetanmethod]

"It was a very close thing. More than once." Distant. Quiet. "You heard the -- noises the place made. Every time that happened -- "


"Moiraine, when I sat down to meditate, the floor disappeared under me. I would have fallen, but somebody came with a flashlight, saw what was happening, and pulled me back." Bewildered, again; Cooper passes a hand over his eyes briefly and lets it drop. "The walls and floors moved. I don't know how, or why. There wasn't any...logic to it. Not that I could see. And it was...dark."

There's only one person besides Cooper who knows the entire story of what happened to him within the Black Lodge, and it's not Harry Truman.

[blue_ajah]

"Yes."

Very softly, still, and there is something of clear understanding in the depths of her glance.

In addition to being well aware of Dale Cooper's previous experiences, Moiraine herself is far from unfamiliar with being trapped in places that have nothing of expected logic to them.

"A place in a fold of the Pattern, perhaps. Such things are not unknown."

[tibetanmethod]

Cooper nods, tiredly.

"I disappeared again." That's after a moment, after another sip of tea. It's settling better than the coffee did; Cooper is grateful for that. "And the people I found myself with got into a fistfight. I don't know why. It was so -- pointless." Frustration.

[blue_ajah]

She leans back against the sofa, picking up a cup of her own.

"It is not an unexpected reaction to finding one's self in a trying situation, I should think," she observes.

[tibetanmethod]

Cooper shoots her a look.

Near-miraculously --

It's a little wry.

"Have you ever tried to stop a fight you couldn't see, Moiraine?"

(He can feel himself evening out, beginning slowly to realize that the walls aren't going to move, that he's not going to disappear again.



He still wouldn't be surprised if he did.)

[blue_ajah]

Surprisingly, a flush of embarrassed color rises in her cheeks.

"I do not think that I would be especially successful in doing so," she manages.

She cannot weave where she cannot see, after all.

[tibetanmethod]

Cooper looks a little startled -- but chooses, delicately, not to pursue that line of questioning. He says, simply, "It took a very high-pitched whistle. And then..."

Then they ran, but --

"We found ourselves in what looked like the living room of somebody's house. And it was -- normal. And we could see. It wasn't cold any more, and we could see."

"And that's when the ceiling started to cave in." Very, very quietly. "The front door led to Milliways. We all made it out. Barely."



"I don't understand."

[blue_ajah]

"At least it was not a tower," she murmurs, and then offers him a faint smile.

"Some things, it would seem, are far more difficult to understand than others. This may well be one of them."

A pause, as one finger taps idly against the side of her teacup.

"But you have survived -- as have the others, I presume--"

If not, she thinks, likely he would already have told her.

"--and there is something to be learned from that, in any case."

[tibetanmethod]

"That we're very, very lucky."

"Among other things," Cooper says, tiredly, "that aren't coming to mind at the moment. Running on adrenaline only works until you stop."

[blue_ajah]

"Then perhaps you should rest," she says, far from unkindly. Moiraine gestures gracefully toward the neatly-made bed in the far corner of the study.

"You may remain here, if you wish; my chambers are next door, and you will not be disturbing me, should you choose to do so."

[tibetanmethod]

Cooper hadn't even thought about what he was going to do next. The idea of going back to Twin Peaks right now -- it's not unthinkable, but.

The dead are walking, there's an impending turf war, and there aren't any wards

(keeping the doors in place)

on the doors.

"I appreciate the offer, very much." Beat. "And I think I will." His eyes meet hers. "Thank you, Moiraine."

[blue_ajah]

She looks back at him and says simply,

"You are welcome, Dale."

There is, of course, more than one meaning to the statement. Moiraine continues, serenely,

"And may Light illumine and protect you, both here and elsewhere."

Perhaps to that one, as well.