Twin Peaks fic: Wake Up and Face the Music (Part 2)
Because LJ grumbled over post size, I had to cut this in two. Part 1 can be found here.
ETA: made some edits to this part; that final scene still needed some polishing. Better now. :)
Title: Wake up and face the music (part 2)
Summary: Post-series fic, trying to resolve the issue of Cooper's little, um, possession. Albert Rosenfield's POV, pretty angsty all around... And a anything else would be spoilery for the story, really.
Pairing: Albert Rosenfield/Dale Cooper
Other characters: Harry Truman, Gordon Cole, Audrey Horne, and one other, which you'll have to read to find out. *g*
Rating: Not quite a solid R, I guess, but more than a PG-13. There is language, and references to sex, though never explicit.
Disclaimer: As always, David Lynch gets all the honors.
Wake Up and Face the Music (Part 2)
VII.
“To be fair, Dr. Rosenfield - I’m not sure I believe in hypnosis at all. Or feel comfortable with it, for that matter.”
“Oh?” He raised an eyebrow, tearing his eyes from the dismal-looking Jesus above the doorframe. “I’m sorry-” in a voice that said he was anything but. “Here I assumed life in convents was somehow compatible with belief in the unlikely. Can’t think what gave me that idea.” Shifting on the straight-backed chair he’d been offered, he allowed himself a joyless smirk. He was baiting her and she knew it. He could see it in those baby-blue eyes of hers - eyes that, by what little he’d heard from her, he’d expected to find gazing at some point at the far horizon, but so far hadn’t flinched from his. That in itself had been a surprise - though not half as much as finding he didn’t hate her on sight. He still didn’t mind seeing her cringe a little, though.
She smiled; a sad, knowing little smile that left him feel exposed without knowing why. “I know who you are.”
“I’d certainly hope so,” he shot back, switching his tone from the mocking to the offensive. “Unless there was some part of ‘Albert Rosenfield, FBI’ you didn’t understand, in which case I’d prescribe either an intelligence test or a hearing aid.”
“Dale said you always do this.” Straightening out the slate-grey skirt, hair cascading across her shoulders as she did so. “Plow over any attempt at conversation that might turn serious.” She shrugged, and his budding gratification at Cooper’s mention of him went straight back down the drain.
“Last thing I heard, you weren’t exactly on speaking terms with ‘Dale’ yourself,” he growled, hearing the cruelty in his voice and not giving a damn. If the chick insisted on making this personal, he was only too happy to oblige. After all, he’d been the one going easy on her.
“ ‘Cynicism is the only form in which base souls approach honesty.’ ” Spilling out as if she had the words lined up right there. But there was no triumph in them, just a dignity leashed so tightly it might have well have been chiseled on, and for some reason that galled him even more than if she’d been smirking right into his face.
“Good ol’ Nietzsche,” he countered, refusing to budge.
She started. “Yes.” Rhetoric dropped away for wide-eyed surprise, a switch abrupt enough it was almost disorienting. In a flash, she reminded him so much of Cooper it knocked the wind right out of him, and something inside him clenched.
The last two fucking innocents, he thought, feeling dizzy. No wonder Cooper had been smitten on sight.
“Fell for you like a brick, didn’t he?” he managed, voice the texture of sandpaper. “I can see what he saw in you - though knowing Cooper, I’m not sure that’s a compliment.” The latter with a sardonic look.
She blinked. “Funny. I was about to say the same about you.”
Albert shook his head, leaned back into the chair, and suddenly the silence they sat in was a little less suffocating. Shoot him now, but there was something about her - maybe the honesty that, in its shockingly naïve way, was as deeply rooted as his own - that made him feel a weird kind of rapport with the woman. Which still didn’t mean he liked her. He’d never had any patience for anyone hightailing it out of reality, be it in nunneries or drugs or anything else, and he wasn’t about to start. Hell, he’d pick a quiet life over chopping up corpses anytime, but there happened to be evil to fight, and so fight was exactly what he’d do. They all had obligations in this world - and if he had impossible standards for people, well, they were no higher than those he had for himself.
“You didn’t ask why I haven’t seen Dale again,” she said, face a careful blank.
Weary shrug. “Should I have? Fine. Consider it asked.”
She reciprocated with a shrug of her own. “It’s crazy, really.” Staring at the hands folded in her lap. “So far, no one’s even dared to ask - not even my sister, and she’s not afraid of anything. They all seem to think I’d break into a million pieces if they did.” She bit her lip, shaking her head as if to fight something off. “You said…” searching his face, “you’re worried about Dale because… he seems different since that night. But - dear God, I don’t even know how to explain it. When I saw him that morning, he wasn’t just different; he didn’t feel like Dale at all. It’s nothing he did or said, but… when I looked in his eyes, I felt like I was looking at someone - or something - else. Something dark and dangerous, and…” Hands clutched at her skirt, and Albert blinked to find he’d been unconsciously plucking at the cuff of his own sleeve. He scowled and let go. “They tell me it’s shock; I’ve tried to tell myself it’s shock, and maybe it is, but… I can’t get rid of the feeling. So I came back here, hoping... hoping familiarity would help. So far, it hasn't helped at all.”
He swallowed, hard. Occam’s razor - more likely we’re both right than we’re both crazy, huh? He weighed his words carefully, trying for once not to hide behind sarcasm. The thing was, he was out of practice.
“Miss Blackburn…” he began slowly. “I’m not going to tell you how insane all of this sounds, because I’m sure you realize that. However - ” A long pause. “I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t believe something about your experience holds a clue to whatever’s ailing Dale Cooper. I hate to disappoint you, I didn’t drive six hours just to gaze into blue eyes. But a feeling isn’t much to work with. I need to learn about the night itself.”
“Using hypnosis?” She bit her lip. “I’m still not -”
“You think it’s a load of crap, don’t you?” he cut her off, knowing all too well she didn’t. This was scaring the hell out of her, no surprise, but letting her chicken out would get him nowhere.
“I wouldn’t put it that way, but…”
“Oh, I would,” he barged on. “Total bullshit, always thought so. But Cooper didn’t, and right now, whatever Cooper believes is good enough for me.”
“I see,” she nodded, hesitantly at first, then with more conviction. “Well, whatever could help Dale - I’m willing to try.”
When he brought her out of it, a good ten minutes later, he still couldn’t quite believe he did this. Not so much the doing it - he’d done plenty of crazy things in his career, courtesy of Cooper more often than not - as the actually hoping it would work. He’d even brought a tape recorder, to make sure he didn’t miss any clue, which… Well, the irony of that was almost too much.
“So?” A nervous expression, less a smile than a twitch. “Did I… did my subconscious tell you anything useful?”
He started to run a hand through his hair, took it down when it made him feel exposed. “If by ‘useful’ you mean ‘tangible’ - no. Not unless three-word sentences are your idea of eloquence.” Which, he thought, was an understatement. All he got from her, trying to talk her through the events of that night, was the story he knew - the beauty pageant, Earle, a clearing in the woods. That, and a cartload of mutterings that men like Coop might find inspiring, but were telling him exactly squat. If he was even asking the right questions.
“What kind of three-word sentences?” Leaning in, eyes wide.
Albert pressed his back into the chair, instinct telling him to keep the distance. “Oh, you name it.” He shrugged. “‘Red and black’, ‘the waiting room’, ‘blood on the tiles’, yadda yadda. Okay, the last one was four words, but in terms of syllables, not exactly a winner.” Her shoulders sagged, and for a moment she looked lost enough he almost told her - but no, no. It might have been protectiveness or egoism or any combination of the two, or maybe he was the one chickening out right now… Still, better if she didn’t know. How she’d been babbling on about rooms and tiles, repeating like a broken record until he had snapped, much louder than he’d intended, “Where the hell are you?” Like raising his voice would make a hoot of difference. “What’s red and black? What’s -”
She’d shuddered then, head arching back against the couch. “In the Black Lodge.” Voice hoarse like a smoker’s, a sound that made his breath stick in his chest like syrup. “Dale is bleeding… on the tiles. I’m Annie. I’m Caroline. I’m -”
“What did you say?” An irrational moment where he tried to pry his hands from the armrests and compose himself, but of course no one was watching. “The Black Lodge, where’s the Black Lodge?” And then, in a flash of insight, “Who else is in there?”
“The good Dale’s in the Lodge - and something is out.”
He met her eyes, found them too close for comfort and looked away again. No, best not to tell her; it would complicate everything. The evidence case sat waiting on the table, the familiar snap as he opened it anchoring him a little. Still, his hands weren’t as steady as they should be. As he shuffled between his papers, he saw Annie Blackburn notice it, too, then pretend she hadn’t. She wasn’t a fool, that he had to give her.
Something is out. Like a line from a bad horror flick - it should have left him stone cold. Except he couldn’t even think it without his throat closing up, or his heart doing the conga. Realistically, it didn’t tell him anything, but it was close enough to his own suspicions for this not to be coincidence. Too damn close.
He could have sworn he’d stacked it neatly on the top, but when he found the picture, it was crumpled somewhere at the bottom of the case. BOB’s face, the pencil drawing Coop had brought with him to Philly. A face Annie Blackburn had never seen before, in life or on paper, so when he slapped it down before her, he was expecting no reaction at all.
He knew he was wrong when she started to scream.
VIII.
Truman met him outside the Double R. A drizzle had set in as he was driving into town, the kind that was more fog than rain, and hell on the windscreen wipers. It blurred the rows of houses, turned the street lamps and traffic lights into pulsing blobs of orange and green - as if all of this wasn’t surreal enough without Twin Peaks pitching in a contribution of its own. He lit a quick cigarette stepping out of the car, pulled in hungrily, once, twice, dropped the rest. Truman’s outstretched hand looked more reassuring than it had any damn right to.
He took the hand in a clean shake, no vigorous pounding of shoulders or backs. Wanted to grin and say “You haven’t changed,” except he had, the face, the eyes, the line of the shoulders, everything. Not much of a surprise there, even if that Packard chick really wasn’t worth the heartache - but that was Harry Truman for you.
“Been a while, Albert.” Still holding the handclasp, tight, and longer than convention prescribed. Then, a hooded glance, “Coop isn’t -”
“No.” He shifted and pulled back. “Gordon Cole didn’t think it’d be wise to send him out here, after the whole circus of last time.” That was a lie, of course. Gordon Cole didn’t know squat about this little field trip of his, and neither did Cooper. “Anyway, apart from Coop, I’m most familiar with the case, so…” Uneasy shrug - too uneasy - that he quickly covered up by straightening his coat. Ah, damn it. If there was one talent he lacked - apart from, as he was told, the social ones - it had to be skill at lying. He was lucky, he thought, with a twinge of guilt, that Truman was graced with a suspicious nature equaling that of your average household dog. Without that, he wouldn’t stand a chance in hell.
The diner was mostly empty as they entered, which he supposed wasn’t abnormal for the time of day. Still, in his memory, the last time he’d sat in one of these booths, it had seemed like a much livelier place. Not that lively was a good thing, per se - unlike some, Albert preferred meals to be quiet affairs if he could help it. He still remembered being squeezed between Cooper and Miss Pipsqueak from the Sheriff’s station, struggling to get down something that passed for steak in these parts, with Coop rattling on about Twin Peaks flora while attacking a piece of pie that gave Albert heartburn just to look at. It had been a memorable experience, if not actually a pleasant one.
They served decent coffee, though, hot enough to scald. He sipped his cup sparingly, feeling Truman’s eyes on him burn like an accusation.
“So.” He cleared his throat, put down the coffee. “How are things in Twin -”
A shadow fell across the table, then stopped. Truman made an impatient noise, and Albert found himself scowling up at a turtle-necked sweater, then into a pair of pale, keen eyes. It took him a moment to place her, match her face against the names from the reports, but then he knew.
“Audrey,” the Sheriff began, and cleared his throat, none too subtly. “Could we have this conversation in private, please?” But the girl - Audrey Horne, he thought, and really, even though Cooper had been tight-lipped as hell about the whole thing, how could he not remember her? - just smiled a candy-floss smile and stayed right where she was.
“Hello, Sheriff Truman.” Her hand fingered the hem of her sweater, trailed down towards the table and across the lid of the sugar pot. “I was just leaving, really.” Though still, Albert observed, not making a move to do anything of the sort. Then, with a meaningful glance in his direction, “Have a good day, Mister…”
Truman sighed, shoulders slumping like he’d just lost a confrontation. “Albert Rosenfield,” he introduced, with a resigned nod. “Colleague of Agent Cooper. Come here to, uh - round up the investigation. Dr. Rosenfield, Audrey Horne.”
“How do you do, Dr. Rosenfield?” She smiled brilliantly, in a tone smooth enough he was sure she’d heard the name before. “Are you a Special Agent too?”
“Guess I am.” He shrugged as the girl’s eyebrows rose. Then, with as dry a look as he could manage, “Sorry, cupcake. We can’t all have Dale Cooper’s looks.”
“I see.” The smile didn’t waver, and for one second, between the space of two breaths, it was like she really did see - saw through him like a leaf of paper. Something like envy in those eyes, maybe, envy or pity, then before he could be sure, she’d turned away.
Truman blinked at him from over the rim of his coffee cup. Made a face as if to ask what that was about, then seemed to think better of it and took another swallow instead.
“Well, Harry,” Albert threw in hastily. “Tell me. Have you got anything?”
“I think we do.” Voice turning low, conspiratorial, like a switch turned over. Leaning across the table, Truman glanced left and right before muttering, still in that same throaty pitch - which, by God, sounded more appropriate to certain kinds of call centers than a professional conversation - “So. You really think he’s back? Back and real -”
“ - and out to have a good time.” Albert twirled his spoon between his fingers, quelling the need for a cigarette. “Yeah. As sure as we can be, at least. We’ve had another murder.” That was lie number two, and it grated as much as the first one. He hoped to hell they would come easier once he got used to it. But he had no choice - he couldn’t drag anyone else into this, not knowing what he thought he knew. Secrecy might be the only advantage he had.
“And the perpetrator -”
“ - is either Bob, or something enough like him it’s just as bad,” he rushed on - three - wishing to God his heart would quit the ridiculous hammering. “Same old, down to the numbers under the fingernails. “ Four. “Like he’s mocking us, leaving a trail we can’t help but miss. Like he’s sure we can’t get to him.” He sighed, reached up and compulsively straightened his tie. “And I shouldn’t have told you even this. Shouldn’t have involved you, but -”
“Yeah, well,” Truman echoed his sigh. “Like I told you - no other way to get to Gerard than through us. Man wouldn’t talk, or answer questions - let his pal Mike answer questions, that is - to any outsider. And the type of questions you were asking, Gerard sure as hell can’t answer himself.”
“I know,” he nodded, terse. He’d had that explanation before, on the phone. He hadn’t liked it then and he didn’t like it now, but he’d have to make do with what he had. “You got the information, though? He agreed to talk?” His voice rose slightly, more than it should, and he toned it down before Truman could notice.
“Hawk spoke to him. Wasn’t easy, convincing him to do it, and anyway, this Mike isn’t actually a talkative guy - but we got something, at least. Taped the whole thing, too. Right here.”
Albert took the recorder and scowled at it, then reached for his evidence case. “Thanks,” he muttered, as he snapped the case shut again. “Did you -” He hesitated. “Did you listen to it? Is there anything useful, anything - we can use against Bob? Something that got overlooked before?”
“Not much,” Truman admitted, downing the last of his coffee with a grimace. “As I said, most of Mike’s statements are - well, cryptic is a pretty good word. But there was one thing.”
Albert blinked. “One thing being?”
“Apparently, Bob can’t stay inside a body that’s dying. Mike said he can’t either, no, uh, ‘inhabiting spirit’ can. If the host is harmed, they have to leave before death sets in, or they risk getting trapped.”
He swallowed, hard, glad for the table’s weight under his hands. “Like Bob left Palmer…”
“… after cracking his skull. Yeah.” Truman’s head bobbed left and right, left and right, in a way that was almost hypnotic. “Makes sense that way. Fat lot of good it does us, though. I mean, even if you know for sure who’s possessed - whatever you do, Bob could still get out fast, make his escape, or you’d need death to be instantaneous. And putting a bullet in the host isn’t exactly the pretty solution you’d like to - Albert? Are you - ”
“Fine. Just fine,” he managed, feeling dizzy.
The lies did come easier, didn’t they?
IX.
Digging into his pockets, he found the familiar shape of the bottle and upended it. Nothing. So much for the antacids.
Just an ordinary day at work, right? And after that, just one more night -
Suppressing a shiver, he tossed the empty bottle into the bin, stuck his hands under the smooth, FBI-standard tap and splashed his face. Glancing up into the mirror was a mistake. He looked, he thought, disgusted, like something the cat had just coughed up - eyes sunk deep enough it was a miracle they didn’t pop out the other side.
First, do no harm. That was what they taught, didn’t they? Of course, the dead never did complain, and then ‘harm’ was a relative concept, but he’d taken the oath, and lived by it. Those kinds of things mattered to him; not that your regular mortal ever seemed to take note. Plain and simple, Albert Rosenfield considered the global issues, and sparing fragile egos seldom qualified as one.
This, on the other hand -
His stomach tightened, and he cursed under his breath. Gripped the sink and swallowed thickly, tasting bile but nothing else.
Enough of this. Any longer, and he’d either plain crack or at the very least betray himself some other way. The element of surprise was all he had.
It had to be tonight.
He packed his case slowly, meticulously, though there really wasn’t much left to be meticulous about. He’d spent most of this week and the previous one collecting what he needed, stowing everything in the back of his locker in his private dressing room, which, of course, no one would ever dream of checking. FBI’s best and brightest, eh? And Gordon - Gordon who trusted him implicitly, kicked down several holy houses to get him in his team… Christ, if he messed this up - which, in all fairness, wasn’t very unlikely - he wasn’t sure how he’d face Gordon again.
Of course, chances were if he did mess up, he wouldn’t be seeing Gordon back at all. He’d either be six feet down or they’d put him away for life, take your pick.
Driving home, case stowed securely under the car seat, he found he lacked the energy to even be nervous - though he should be, should be terrified out of his wits. Instead, he just felt numb. That was fine, though, just peachy. It might even make things easier. After all, he hardly wanted to appear to Cooper - or whatever pretended to be Cooper these days - like a ticking time bomb on the loose. He’d have to play it cool, somehow.
Even now, he couldn’t pinpoint when doubt had become suspicion, suspicion a heavy certainty. There were moments, yes, glimpses of something definitely wrong - like the day Gordon had relieved him of chaperoning duties, declaring Cooper fit as the proverbial fiddle. Just for a second, Cooper’s eyes had widened at the news, glinting with something hard and cold and so much like triumph that Albert’s spine had turned to ice. Still, none of that proved a thing, did it? Irony of ironies, all he had were exactly the kinds of hunches he’d given Cooper hell for in the past, so why he could be so certain, he didn’t have a clue. Only that he was.
He had it all thought out. Arrive at the apartment before Cooper would, then unpack his case and prepare, quickly. Take out the syringe, tuck it at the back of an unused nightstand dresser, out of sight but within easy reach. His hands kept steady though all of it, didn’t shake even when he snapped the case shut and shoved it under the bed. It only hit him as he was loosening his tie, peeling off the vest and shirt like they were something filthy, something to get rid of and burn. He’d planned to shower and change before Cooper came in, cling to normality for as long as was needed, but getting up from the bed suddenly seemed like an insurmountable task.
He hadn’t meant to lie down for more than a minute, would have laughed at the mere notion of dozing off, but the next thing he knew was Cooper, standing over him with a strange half-smile on his face.
“Coop? What - ” he sputtered, flailing for a frantic second before getting his arms under him. “How - did I -” Already scrambling up, but Cooper caught him with a hand on his shoulder.
“You were asleep,” he offered, softly. “And giving the impression of a man who needs it, too.” Hand absently smoothing down the pillow, and of course that was the real Cooper talking - his Cooper, he thought with a stab of bitterness, because that would just be goddamn fitting now, would it? Trust Coop never to make things any easier. Except this wasn’t just Cooper - there was Bob, lurking just below the surface, itching to get out, probably laughing his ass off at Albert right now.
There was Bob. He had to remember that.
“Yeah, well,” he grimaced, reaching up to rub the stubble already dotting his chin. “Occupational hazard. Nothing a good glass of Scotch can’t cure, anyway.”
“Oh.” Cooper drew back, pulling a mock-hurt face. “And here I was assuming a different kind of cure.”
“Assume away,” he rasped, leaning in to cup Cooper’s jaw in a motion that was as familiar as breathing - and a good thing, too, because he couldn’t have managed otherwise. He felt dizzy tugging Cooper against him, working his way down, button for button, along the shirt, stopping just short of unbuckling his belt. In an impulse, he spooned Cooper against him, pressing chapped lips to the nape of his neck, feeling all the while like any moment now, he wouldn’t be able to breathe, or think, or have the courage to do what he had to. Felt Cooper shudder and grow still in that way he had, the way that meant he was focusing on one sensation and one only, then, in a fluid maneuver, flipped him around and onto his stomach, pinning him from behind. Cooper made a strangled noise, the kind of noise that made Albert’s stomach flip every time, except now it was for a whole other reason.
There was no way in hell he could do this and he had to.
“Just a second,” he growled; let Cooper - let Bob think it was need turning his voice ragged. “Let me just get us a -”
There was sweat in his eyes, he thought. Twisting around towards the nightstand, he could barely see what he was doing through the haze. One heartbeat, two, three heartbeats before he found the drawer knob by touch - not the top drawer this time, the bottom, right there, shit, sweet mother of -
He didn’t flinch as he slammed in the needle.
There was a gasp, more startled than pained, a wild flutter of arms and legs as Cooper tried to free himself, and then went limp altogether. The whole thing couldn’t have lasted more than five seconds, which was way too soon - the stuff should kick in fast, but this fast, no way. So either he’d botched the composition, or -
“Albert?” The voice was rushed, breathless. He glanced down to find Cooper lying absolutely still, fixing him with a look of shock morphing quickly to tightly leashed anger. Then, in a tone Cooper tended to use with maniacs and murder witnesses only, but was still unmistakably his own: “Albert? Would you, ah, mind explaining to me - what just happened?”
He winced and shifted his grip on Cooper’s wrists, trying to block out the pulse hammering against his palms. Well, what had he expected? That BOB would just come leaping out, yelling “you got me!” like a kid caught in a game of hide-and-seek? Of course he’d crawl away behind the real Coop for as long as he could - counting on Albert to lose his nerve. Not a bad plan either, he thought, darkly.
“Nerve toxin,” he muttered, which made it sound like a confession. “Painless, but fast-acting.”
Cooper’s eyes widened, but to his credit, he didn’t flinch. “Ah.” Nodding sagely. “Yes. That would explain why I seem to have lost feeling in my legs. Still, that doesn’t tell me the reason you -”
Leaning in, he squeezed Cooper’s arms, hard. “Coop, you gotta listen to me. I know it’ll sound insane, but there isn’t much time, so I need you to hear me out.” Pause, and Cooper inclined his head minutely. “Something…” He cut himself off, tried again. “Something happened to you in Twin Peaks. You came back - changed. And for a while now I’ve been suspecting - in fact, I’m pretty damn sure - and I wish there was a way to break it to you gently, I really do, but…” Ah, to hell with it. “You’ve been possessed by BOB.”
This time, Cooper didn’t look quite as unfazed. Long beat, then, “Albert, not that I’m not willing to believe you, but I…” He frowned, as if turning the premise over in his head like it wasn’t the most crazy thing he’d heard in his life. “I truly don’t - feel any different.”
“Well, you wouldn’t. It’s like Leland Palmer said: when BOB’s been busy, you don’t remember. But you’ve been acting different, I can tell you.” Albert blinked, had to stop to wipe the sweat out of his eyes. “Like - blanking out, doing something that’s just not like you, then forgetting about it afterwards. Deep down, you have to have some inkling of - strange memories, moments you’re missing… Don’t you remember any of that?”
Cooper bit his lip, frustration plain on his face. He was also, Albert noted with a twinge of foreboding, beginning to breathe just the slightest bit harder. “No, I don’t. There’s - there’s nothing, Albert, nothing at all -”
Albert shushed him with a hand to his forehead. Tried frantically to think of something, a clue for him to latch onto, but came up absolutely dry. He’d been prepared to go up against BOB, dammit, not talk Coop into working with him; he didn’t have a thing, except -
Stiffly, he sat back and let go of Cooper’s other arm, peeled his undershirt back from his shoulder. It was a stupid thing, not to mention melodramatic as hell, but -
Cooper’s breath hitched.
“Do you remember doing this?” he said, baring the angry red blotch under his left collarbone, edges already turning an ugly yellow.
“No.” Cooper’s voice was barely audible. “No, I don’t -”
“That’s because you didn’t,” he growled, shrugging the shirt back on with a grimace. “You wouldn’t do it, that’s exactly the point. But something else did. Remember when you went missing that one night, in Twin Peaks? Annie Blackburn told me what she saw back then. ‘Dale Cooper is in the Black Lodge’, she said, ‘and something is out.’ BOB’s out, Coop. He’s out, and he’s got you.”
“You went to see Annie?” Cooper said, in a tiny voice, and for a second Albert wanted to scream. “God, Albert, I -”
“The point is,” he interrupted, “I’ve been doing some digging - and this was the only rabbit I could pull out of my hat. Incapacitate him, corner him on my turf, not his, and force his hand. We can beat BOB, Cooper. I think - I actually have a shot at this. But -”
Cooper nodded, and Albert all but saw the pieces click into place in his head. “Did I - apart from -” Pained shudder, and a meaningful glance to Albert. “Apart from that, I didn’t do -”
“No. You didn’t do anything - unforgivable. That I know of. Yet.” Awkward pause, then, “But I don’t think we can hope for that -”
“ - to last.” Cooper’s face turned grim. “I know. We can’t let him run loose.” Distantly, Albert wondered why he was even still talking to Cooper, not BOB - like he didn’t care they were planning for his end? Then, softly, “How much time do I have?” Eyes closing for a long moment. Too long. “Based on how rapidly this seems to be working, I don’t suppose…”
“Principle’s the same as curare, in fact,” Albert heard himself say, tone metallic, clinical. “Damage isn’t permanent until - right near the end. From this point, I’d say thirty minutes until vital organs shut down.” Shaky breath. “But I don’t intend to let it come to that.”
A strange kind of gleam in Cooper’s eyes. “You really are sure about this, aren’t you, Albert?”
“Yeah. I am.” He started to brush back Cooper’s hair, found that he couldn’t. “I’m sorry.” And was Cooper - smiling now? He was, wasn’t he? A tiny, shattered kind of smile, but still -
“I told you - I’d need the very best.” The smile deepened, then Cooper’s jaw set. “And I trust whatever happens, you’ll do what needs to be -”
The transition was almost like flipping a switch. Cooper gasped, and Albert lunged, and the next moment it wasn’t Cooper but something else, blinking out of Cooper’s eyes like an owl from the foliage.
Then that something chuckled, and Coop - the real Coop - slipped right out from between his fingers.
“Oh, well played.”
Cooper’s lips were moving around Cooper’s voice, but somehow, the figure splayed out before him no longer looked, or sounded, like Cooper at all. More like a predator, Albert thought, and clenched his teeth around a shudder.
“Well played, yes,” the not-Cooper giggled, rapture mixed in with the hint of a threat. “You have me where you wanted me, isn’t that what you said? Cornered, defenceless? One little game between the two of us, isn’t it, Albert?” Name flowing suave, throaty, like all of those nights he’d held on to Cooper, never quite knowing what was him and what wasn’t. Except, he thought, stomping down on the fear and the nausea, this time he did know who he was facing.
“Your little secret’s out, BOB,” he spat. “Game over.”
“Oh, but is it?” the other purred, dangerously. “Tell me - how will you play this game, hmm, Albert? What will you do when I call your bluff? Break out that antidote, turn me in with your FBI friends?” Beatific smile, and somehow all of that was even more chilling with Cooper - BOB - not moving another muscle the entire time. Still, that was something, he guessed. At least inhabiting spirits didn’t magically make the host immune to toxins - however idiotic that sounded as a theory. At least BOB wasn’t about to pounce and claw him in the face.
“But you can’t turn me in, can you?” Cooper/BOB was chattering on, sounding more and more amused. “You have nothing to use against me. I’m still Dale Cooper, angelic soul - I’ve been a good boy, Albert. And incapacitate me as you will, there’s nothing you can do to force me out. So, stalemate.” Another brilliant look, and now the grin turned feral. “Except I have all the time in the world, and you haven’t.”
Somehow, Albert’s voice was still in working order; even the scorn was intact. “Don’t bullshit me, BOB. I know you can’t stay inside a dying body.”
“Ah.” Cooper/BOB blinked, looking in no way more worried, and Albert pressed down something that felt very much like panic. For some reason, he’d had expected the same manic, hooting, incoherent version of BOB they’d found in Leland Palmer. This BOB, though, seemed almost chillingly sane. He wondered, with a shudder, if that was the host still peeking through; how much of all of this Cooper was aware of.
“But you see,” BOB said, in a conspiratorial whisper, “this body isn’t dead yet… And honestly, Albert, I don’t think it will be.” There was a dragging wheeze in Cooper’s voice now, and Albert fought against the impulse to check his watch. “Because you want everything, don’t you? Save him, and get rid of me. You really still think you and your Cooper can walk out of this intact.”
There was something obscene about Cooper’s voice speaking those words; Cooper’s lips, pulled into a slanted rictus of a smile. For a moment, Albert actually felt sick - and then sicker, because Bob was fucking right. He did want to save Cooper’s skin. It was the only way he could have made himself do this - play it as a bet, a bluff, one he believed he actually had a chance to pull off. And of course he’d forced himself to be realistic, consider every possible outcome, including the one where he lost, big time. Only - theorizing sure as hell wasn’t the same as facing the music.
Because - what if he lost?
As if reading his mind, the form on the bed wheezed, “I'm afraid you’ll have to choose, Albert.” Pupils black and hard and dangerous, and no longer quite amused. “You’ll have to decide… if you want to have your cherry pie, or eat it. And I’m guessing you want your Cooper alive.”
“This isn’t life.” Softly, anger creeping up into his throat and starting to spill over. “This is hell.”
“Oh, the drama.” Mocking, almost petulant now. “Do you seriously expect me to believe destroying me is worth his life to you? That you'll let him die a slow death? And don’t give me the ‘painless’ talk, Albert. Death from asphyxiation? Really.”
I trust you, Cooper had told him. I trust you to do the right thing.
“You’re right,” he said, and his blood was rushing loud, so very loud in his ears. “I won’t.” And pulled out the case from under the bed.
He barely heard when he clicked off the gun’s safety.
The rest of it happened too fast to make sense of. Later, the only image that would keep replaying itself before his eyes was Cooper’s head snapping up, which the toxin should have made impossible, except it clearly wasn’t, then opening his mouth on a screech that was like a thousand nails scraping across blackboards, before lolling back like a puppet with its strings cut. Albert was already jumping in, but then something was flapping at his face, scratching, keening, except he couldn’t see a thing and his hands were clawing at thin air. Somewhere in the chaos he dropped the gun, and there was a thump followed by an almighty crack that meant it had gone off right then and there.
He came back to himself disoriented, panting, to find Cooper’s eyes open and looking straight at him.
In retrospect, he’d never be able to tell why he’d been so sure this was Coop, whole and alive and with Bob gone (for now, at least; just for now, but he could live with that). Only that right then, he’d never been more convinced of anything in his life. Then Cooper moaned, and Albert was scrambling for his case, jerking out the syringe with the antidote.
“Albert, I’m so sorry,” Cooper breathed, and his face was filling with memories, layers on layers on layers of them.
It took him three attempts to find a vein, but then the antidote was in, and he was fumbling for the phone, starting to dial 911.
“Don’t.” A whisper, but one that brooked as little resistance as if it had been shouted into his ear.
Albert sputtered. “Cooper, don’t be a fool. Sure, there’s an antidote, but that doesn’t mean you’re out of the woods. I have no intention of risking you folding from heart failure or an aneurysm just because -”
"And I'm not risking you being suspected of foul play." He'd already opened his mouth to protest, only to find the words sticking in his throat at the look on Cooper's face.
Slowly, through air that felt stifling and thick like syrup, he put down the receiver.
Whether it was that, the drop in adrenalin - which God knew he'd been running on for the past day or so - or just stupid lack of something solid in his stomach, he couldn't even say. Only that, suddenly, exhaustion was rolling over him like a wave, and he had to grip the edge of the mattress as his universe did a wild Hamilton spin before leaving him right side up again.
"Albert? Are you -" A hand collided with his knee, and he blinked furiously, shaking his head until his vision cleared. Caught the errant hand, looked down just in time to see Cooper's eyes widen, and -
God damn it -
Cooper's body spasmed, caught in a series of lurching shudders. Grabbing for the medical bag that had tumbled to the ground, Albert jerked out one of the dozen-or-so syringes he'd prepared to account for any complication he could think of - and then some. Studied the label and changed his mind, went for another one.
"What's..." Cooper lay still again, breath coming in ragged gasps.
"Painkiller," he muttered, biting his lip as he checked the dosage. "I told you, Coop, that antidote is one nasty bitch - this is likely to get worse before it gets better. And I still say I should have called - "
"No."
He stared. "What do you mean, no?"
"Please, Albert." The voice was too soft, and too much Cooper, to bear. "I would very much like to be... in control of myself. No drugs. Not unless you have to." Another raging shudder, and Albert's hand moved instinctively to hold him down. "You understand that, don't you?"
He had no answer to that. Of course he hadn't. Put the syringe away with hands that were less than steady, and just sat beside Cooper as the night crept by, watching and waiting and cursing himself for being the sappy idiot he was. But he didn’t touch the syringe again, and by the time dawn filtered through the windows, Cooper had slipped into a fitful sleep.
With a groan, Albert pushed himself up from the bed, stretching to work out a crick in his back. Eased himself into an armchair, looked down at the silent form next to him and let out an unsteady sigh of his own.
"Now what?" he muttered, darkly, at the ceiling. "We watch telly? Play checkers? I order in Chinese?" You walk out and find your Annie, we pretend none of this was goddamn real?
"We'll work something out, Albert." A murmur and the rustle of sheets, but Cooper’s eyes had already closed again.
He was asleep in the chair before the words sank in.