(no subject)
Sarah Palmer isn't moving. Her hands are bound, but she's ungagged; she's gone catatonic. Sometimes things can be too much.
Ben Horne is gagged, and still trying to rant and protest through it.
Phillip Michael Gerrard has his one arm handcuffed to his belt. And Sheriff Cable is holding the line that strings them all together.
"You're sure this is--"
Without looking up: "Yes." Hank's got a book, and as he begins to read from it, Cable starts forward, dragging his prisoners along.
This place, the twin of Glastonbury Grove, has none of its menace. In a perfect circle of twelve white stones, there's a pool of black oil, and while that is itself unnerving to see, the woods itself are graceful and fragrant. Even at night, as it is now, there's nothing frightening about them, especially compared to Deer Meadow itself.
Nothing frightening except the people in it, and what they've brought with them.
Hank keeps reading.
There's no red curtains; it's a blaze of white light, that sketches Hank's face sharp and malevolent. It's accurate.
White sky. Verdant, untouched jungle. The quality of the light is unreal, too real, liquid. Some kind of stone ruin, crowned with a throne and festooned with the feathers of tropical birds, rises up
(In Xanadu did Kubla Khan)
and before there stands an Abyssinian maid, clothed in hides and paint.
"I brought sacrifices," Cable says, hesitantly; a masterful man outside of his mastery, his brutal stupidity failing in the face of wonder. There's something wrong with his voice; he can hear that.
"Fear and love open the doors," the woman says, and it's wrong with her voice, too. Something in echo, in timbre, in speed. It sounds too fast, but it's neither fast or high-pitched. It sounds... the way the light feels.
Everything about this is terrifying. So why is Sarah Palmer looking like that--at peace? Why is Ben Horne finally shutting his everlasting quack?
Why does the shoe salesman look like he's trying to remember something? Something fond and lost and wonderful?
"You have taken the easy door, and yet the test must be passed. Sit."
Cable sits. It's a throne. He can get behind that.
(He's in a house, a mansion, one he's built day by day and step by step every moment of his life. With every choice he drove a nail, with every scheme he laid a plank. It's a dark place, a haunted place, a place of twisted walls and blood-dark wood and... red curtains.)
"From the greatest heights, to the deepest depths," intones the Abyssian maid, and they all drop.
This is the heart of the Black Lodge, strobeland and shadowplace, a maze of red curtains and floors that seem to slope and twist and kink.
Someone's screaming.
Cable's not, although he wants to. He's running, though, and his captives stagger desperately after him on their line, and then he stumble-shoves through a curtain and come face to face with--
"Laura," says Ben, wondering, the gag around his neck.
There's nothing in her eyes, white mist, and he feels his gorge rise. She screams, directly into Cable's face, and he freezes like an animal in the headlights. A silence, and another scream. A silence, and another scream.
The curtains ripple, part again, and Cable's own doppelganger shoves through. There are others, too, all of them blind, all of them moving unnaturally and herky-jerky. "gArMoNbOzIa," the white-eyed sheriff leers, and what happens next is--
It's not unimaginable. You just wish it was.
Laura Palmer's doppelganger screams again. It goes on and on, and on, and on. And then Sheriff Cable simply comes apart, in what seems like far too little blood for a man, especially one so big and florid and solid. It splatter everywhere, the consistency and color of creamed corn, but it's bloodpainsufferinghorror, and the doppelgangers dance horrible reversed celebrations, and stoop to scoop up their nourishment.
The prisoners flee.
In a wood-panelled room, there's a door. It's shut. Locked. Agent Dale Cooper is there, sitting in a cross-legged position Ben Horne cannot name but recognizes as part of his bizarre meditation.
"We can't leave him," Sarah says, her voice hoarse but firm.
His eyes are closed. "What if--"
She just looks at Ben, and he nods, and together they lift him. The one-armed man takes point.
Ben Horne is gagged, and still trying to rant and protest through it.
Phillip Michael Gerrard has his one arm handcuffed to his belt. And Sheriff Cable is holding the line that strings them all together.
"You're sure this is--"
Without looking up: "Yes." Hank's got a book, and as he begins to read from it, Cable starts forward, dragging his prisoners along.
This place, the twin of Glastonbury Grove, has none of its menace. In a perfect circle of twelve white stones, there's a pool of black oil, and while that is itself unnerving to see, the woods itself are graceful and fragrant. Even at night, as it is now, there's nothing frightening about them, especially compared to Deer Meadow itself.
Nothing frightening except the people in it, and what they've brought with them.
Hank keeps reading.
There's no red curtains; it's a blaze of white light, that sketches Hank's face sharp and malevolent. It's accurate.
White sky. Verdant, untouched jungle. The quality of the light is unreal, too real, liquid. Some kind of stone ruin, crowned with a throne and festooned with the feathers of tropical birds, rises up
(In Xanadu did Kubla Khan)
and before there stands an Abyssinian maid, clothed in hides and paint.
"I brought sacrifices," Cable says, hesitantly; a masterful man outside of his mastery, his brutal stupidity failing in the face of wonder. There's something wrong with his voice; he can hear that.
"Fear and love open the doors," the woman says, and it's wrong with her voice, too. Something in echo, in timbre, in speed. It sounds too fast, but it's neither fast or high-pitched. It sounds... the way the light feels.
Everything about this is terrifying. So why is Sarah Palmer looking like that--at peace? Why is Ben Horne finally shutting his everlasting quack?
Why does the shoe salesman look like he's trying to remember something? Something fond and lost and wonderful?
"You have taken the easy door, and yet the test must be passed. Sit."
Cable sits. It's a throne. He can get behind that.
(He's in a house, a mansion, one he's built day by day and step by step every moment of his life. With every choice he drove a nail, with every scheme he laid a plank. It's a dark place, a haunted place, a place of twisted walls and blood-dark wood and... red curtains.)
"From the greatest heights, to the deepest depths," intones the Abyssian maid, and they all drop.
This is the heart of the Black Lodge, strobeland and shadowplace, a maze of red curtains and floors that seem to slope and twist and kink.
Someone's screaming.
Cable's not, although he wants to. He's running, though, and his captives stagger desperately after him on their line, and then he stumble-shoves through a curtain and come face to face with--
"Laura," says Ben, wondering, the gag around his neck.
There's nothing in her eyes, white mist, and he feels his gorge rise. She screams, directly into Cable's face, and he freezes like an animal in the headlights. A silence, and another scream. A silence, and another scream.
The curtains ripple, part again, and Cable's own doppelganger shoves through. There are others, too, all of them blind, all of them moving unnaturally and herky-jerky. "gArMoNbOzIa," the white-eyed sheriff leers, and what happens next is--
It's not unimaginable. You just wish it was.
Laura Palmer's doppelganger screams again. It goes on and on, and on, and on. And then Sheriff Cable simply comes apart, in what seems like far too little blood for a man, especially one so big and florid and solid. It splatter everywhere, the consistency and color of creamed corn, but it's bloodpainsufferinghorror, and the doppelgangers dance horrible reversed celebrations, and stoop to scoop up their nourishment.
The prisoners flee.
In a wood-panelled room, there's a door. It's shut. Locked. Agent Dale Cooper is there, sitting in a cross-legged position Ben Horne cannot name but recognizes as part of his bizarre meditation.
"We can't leave him," Sarah says, her voice hoarse but firm.
His eyes are closed. "What if--"
She just looks at Ben, and he nods, and together they lift him. The one-armed man takes point.