route_1065 | Though the truth may vary, this ship will carry our bodies safe to shore.

Current Mood: nervous
Current Location: Saffron City

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Though the truth may vary, this ship will carry our bodies safe to shore.

Who: Dale Cooper and Heather Mason
Where: A cafe next to the Saffron City Pokemon Center.
When: Roughly 2 days after the 4th Wall weekend, late evening.
Summary: Time has passed. Shit has happened. Everything sucks right now for (1) eccentric FBI agent and (1) trauma-worn teenager, but they have things to discuss and friendships to mend.
Rating: PG, potentially escalating to R if disturbing canon talk should arise.
Log:

The cloud of steam pouring from her mouth and rising in front of her as she stood at the end of the street housing the little cafe ironically made it look foggy and mysterious, its warmth and charm disappearing before her very eyes until the steam dissipated, whereupon it crept back in, glowing bright and yellow in the chilly darkness of this late November night. But even in its full, twinkling glory, the effect was somewhat lost on Heather, who had a gnawing sense of dread in her stomach.

It was right where he'd said it would be, nestled in next to the Pokemon Center, whose big cheerful logo never went unlit.

Roughly forty-five minutes ago (she had promised half an hour, but would be lying if she tried to claim she hadn't dragged her feet on the way here, like a prisoner walking down the longest hallway), a phonecall from Dale Cooper had interrupted her evening, which had originally been shaping up to be one spent curled up under the same sheets she'd been underneath all day long. Maybe it was a good thing that she'd finally gone out (her sudden emergence from the cocoon had been hastily explained to her father and travel-mates as the need to "get girl stuff from the convenience store-- it felt horrible to lie at this point, especially when it was so far from the truth, but hell, she'd lied this far. And the thought of telling the truth felt even more horrible). She couldn't stay holed up like a hermit forever, after all. That was Henry's style, not hers.

Still, even now that she'd gotten this far, there was a deep and awful urge to just run away, go back to the hotel and yank the covers up over her head again. To hide away rather than face the prospect of talking to the person she'd previously gone to every time... those things happened. And when quite a few other things had happened too.

... But there was no point in putting off the inevitable.

She exhaled deeply, sending more clouds into the air, and yanked up the collar of her coat (a black leather thing that she hadn't worn in almost a year-- it wasn't her style, things with sleeves never were-- but as soon as the chaos of that weekend had faded, she'd dug it out from the bottom of her bag and set it at her bedside for future use, after brushing off all the fur and feathers that had collected on it) a little more firmly before plodding down the sidewalk towards it.

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He'd been there on time, of course. He was always on time. And right now it's something to hang onto, in a sense - one goal at a time. But where he normally might not have minded the wait, he did now, feeling fidgety and restless in the chill. He occupied himself by counting tiles. Then windows.

Having a lot to think about doesn't necessarily mean that it's a good idea to. Still, he couldn't keep certain images and sensations from his mind, and it was probably a good idea to let one of them take place: the one that he'd have to share with Heather whenever she showed up.

He had every faith that she would, by the way. But he couldn't blame her for stalling. Yet when he finally spotted her it was with no small sense of relief, and once she was close enough for him to see her expression - solemn, nervous, tense? - he took the steps forward that allowed him to meet her mid-step.

There was no verbal greeting, just a touch on her arm and a search for her eyes, but once found ... yeah, she'd find herself in a hug.

She spotted him long before she actually arrived in his immediate vicinity-- it was hard not to. And yet, it wasn't until she'd actually come to his side that she looked up and made eye-contact. As she walked towards the bright yellow windows and the illuminated figure ahead of her, she kept her gaze down on her feet, as though worried about tripping on the bare sidewalk.

The entire way here, she'd been trying to rehearse what to say, but hadn't really come up with anything. So when she lifted her head to look up at him, there was indeed tension there. A sort of shame, too-- it went wonderfully with the rest of her, the sore redness around her eyes and the utterly neglected tangle of hair that hung around her face like a handful of briars. All things considered, she probably should have, you know, DONE SOMETHING ABOUT THAT before coming, but by the time she was actually able to bring herself to slide out of bed and leave the hotel, she'd have been even later if she'd stopped to do battle with a hairbrush.

Put simply, she looked like crap.

They probably had that in common.

As she looked up to make eye-contact, she was already opening her mouth to say... well, something. She was pretty sure some arrangement of words that were more or less suited to the situation would come out if she tried. But nothing had a chance to, because before she even realized it, Cooper had closed the distance between them and the arms she'd initially expected to be held in stiff repose like they'd been during the conversation they'd had back on a bench in Goldenrod... were gathering her into a hug.

Far from being a coherent greeting or statement about the conversation to come, the first sound that escaped her was one of muffled surprise.

Arms held out slightly in surprise, Heather didn't back away, but did stumble for a second until both her balance and her brain had caught up with her.

"Wh-- ... Cooper, what..." Something almost like a croaky laugh escaped her, not out of derision or even particularly of amusement, but just because huh? "Are you-- ... are you okay?"

YOU DO REMEMBER WHAT WE CAME HERE TO TALK ABOUT, RIGHT?

SHUT UP AND ACCEPT THE HUG.

He didn't answer that, because the answer would have to be a "no", and he didn't feel like dealing with admitting it. She wasn't okay either, though, and as much as Cooper had witnessed people feeling mixed up and strange from what happened during those days when things just weren't quite ... normal (as normal as they could be in this world) it seemed like a handful of people were always going to be hit particularly badly.

And it was all too obvious - and had been for some time - that the two of them were among the unfortunate winners.

So he breathed out and withdrew some to look her in the eyes again, and that might have been where she'd find that he wasn't Quite Okay himself. It was mostly in the eyes, in a more haunted gaze than normal.

But his focus was on her.

"Murder is the unlawful killing of another human being", he said quietly, stressing the last three words and searching her face. A beat, then, "I saw the one with the knives."

Well, she certainly wasn't pulling away! Which was... admittedly more due to bewilderment than anything else. They probably looked sort of funny, actually, to anyone passing by. A man earnestly hugging a girl whose twiggy arms just stuck out of the hug like droopy branches on a snowman. It needed a caption or something.

Needless to say, when he withdrew, it was with a new sort of worry that Heather looked up at him, and-- yeah. Yeah, his state was not lost on her. It wasn't necessarily a surprise (after all... neither of them ever seemed to be particularly happy after those weekends, did they?), but it wasn't reassuring either, and the haunted look made her suddenly dread what he might say next.

Of course, then he said it. She didn't get it at first.

Her brows furrowed briefly as she stared up at him, lips pursing in silent '... huh?'

And then it hit her.

It was hard to describe, exactly, the avalanche of meaning that washed through her. Relief? Happiness? Thankfulness? It wasn't really any of those, alone or otherwise. But it was something, all right, and it was something overwhelming.

Her eyes grew very wide, and she gaped wordlessly up at him for a second or two... before, without saying anything further, suddenly leaning forward and throwing her arms around him to return the hug with a gasp that could have been the prelude to a sob.

He readily hugged her back, of course, gathered his arms around her again and rested his chin on top of her hair, letting her take what she needed from the embrace. It was emotional to him, too. The empathy he was feeling for the girl had been near overwhelming when he'd finally understood, but beyond that there was also a relief. For her, in regards to her humanity and knowing that she still had it, something he'd been doubting and had a sense that she might have been as well. But also for them, because if he'd never learned about this - the creatures, monsters - he very well might have turned away from her despite not wanting to.

It wasn't the first time he'd realized with some surprise just how much he'd come to care for Heather, but it didn't make it any less true. So in a way, maybe he was making up for the distance between them the last few months like this.

He didn't say anything, just hugged her and absently watched the streetlights on the other end of the sidewalk.

The silence didn't last too long-- although it would have been all too easy to LET it. But despite the sheer weight of what he'd just told her, the complete transformation of what she had walked all this way dreading, she still felt like she had to say something.

So after a couple seconds she pulled away a little, words coming out of her in a small, stammering flood.

"Coop, I-- I didn't realize you'd-- I'm sorry you-- you weren't MEANT to-- ... to see it," she squawked after a moment of floundering. Her voice was croopy and hoarse, although admittedly that had been more a product of the general hell she'd been putting herself through before he'd even called. The emotion of the moment wasn't helping it, though. "I was... I swear I was gonna tell you, I just didn't want..."

... To seem like she was making excuses for herself. Or begging him to feel bad for her.

Not meant to see it, huh ... funny how that works, because Heather had never been meant to encounter BOB or any of the terrors from where Cooper came, either. But maybe there was a depressing balance in that. A bit of her hell in exchange for some of his.

But as terrifying as the experience had been - and he couldn't even begin to start imagining what it had been like for her and her father, to see and experience that kind of thing in the flesh - he was happy to have witnessed it, if only to be able to understand her better. Things were falling into place. And that was something, at least, even if it all painted a picture of something that was too much for words.

He shook his head slightly, moved a hand to her shoulder in a grip that was meant to be reassuring. He didn't tell her that it was okay, nor hush her. Instead his voice caught a little. "I'm sorry I doubted you."

Fate worked in strange ways, and it DID have an odd sense of balance... even if it sometimes didn't seem that way. Although to truly be even, Cooper would need to face a monster in a capacity other than merely witnessing one.

... But then again, that was how Heather's meetings with BOB had started out, hadn't they?

Heather's eyes were starting to get embarrassingly shiny in the rosy-yellow light of the cafe as she looked up at him, lips pressed tight together to hold back whatever undignified noises might be fighting to come out.

"I'm sorry I MADE you doubt me," she said, because it wasn't really like it was his FAULT he'd had doubts. Anyone would have, after the stunt she'd pulled and the things she'd confessed to. "I just-- I-- I was-- I couldn't explain that stuff just like that, I had to... I thought I should just... tell you the other stuff first, and... and then later..."

It would have been easy to say that she should have told him, but in the end that really wasn't something he had any right to voice.

"Heather-", softly, a quiet request for attention. "Slow down."

He squeezed her shoulder, looking for calm despite not feeling any himself, not particularly. But it was cold, they were outside, and they had somewhere else to be.

"We can talk about it inside."

For once, she actually listened and shut up for a second.

And then, when he made his not-so-subtle suggestion, a tearful laugh bubbled up out of her throat before she could stop it, because haha yeah, they were sort of standing out in the freezing cold for no good reason, weren't they.

With a slight sniff, she reached up to swipe at one eye with her sleeve, despite the fact that slick leather wasn't exactly the best material for soaking up pre-shed tears.

"U-uhm, yeah, good idea... let's g'inside."

There was a hint of a smile in response before he sort of nudged her in the right direction and fell into step with her the short distance back to the cafe door. It was a homey kind of place, with soft lighting and a bell over the door which jingled pleasantly as it opened and they walked right in, trailing a bit of snow and wind behind them.

It had turned into one of Coop's favorite spots and the waiter by the counter gave him a wave as he walked in, which he returned with a small nod - but on the whole? He didn't waste a lot of time in shrugging off his jacket and searching for a good place to sit, a hand lingering almost protectively on Heaher's shoulder.

She ducked her head a little as they went, but went willingly. The warmth was more than welcome after the bitter cold, and quite frankly so was the hand on her shoulder. The dread had dissipated into relief, and that couldn't be more welcome either.

Not picky when it came to seating, she quietly slid into a booth towards the back-- relief or no, she didn't want whatever talk was to follow to take place in the middle of the cafe.

It wouldn't be hard for her to appreciate why it had become a favorite of Coop's, though. The place was cozy and with the dustings of snow outside... well, it as easy to not to want to leave.

He followed her lead, thinking the same thing: the topics they were facing were far from pleasant and very personal. He sat down opposite of her but refrained from starting that discussion until he'd both ordered and received his coffee and made sure Heather had gotten something as well.

Right now, though, that coffee was doing better as a mini-radiator than a beverage as he kept his hands wrapped around the mug, absently tapping a finger against the porcelain as he looked over at her.

Their friendship had taken quite a tumble those few months back and regaining that ground would take a while, but they had ... well, quite a head start in the understanding department, at least on his end.

Still, that wasn't an easy thing to remember and much less bring up, especially when he had his own terror breathing down his neck - not that that was a hindrance in itself, but he was more aware than usual of how sensitive the Past could be to breach.

So eventually, he just asked again, tentatively so, tired and weary but still concerned, still worried. "Are you okay?"

They were unanimous in their need for coffee-- in Heather's case, it's both for the comfort of warmth and the caffeine. She's tired, despite (or maybe BECAUSE of) the fact that she had been doing almost nothing BUT try to sleep since she had woken up from that awful weekend, and everything seems worse when you're exhausted. And frankly, it was bad enough already.

While Cooper warmed his hands and watched her, Heather just hunched over the coffee, nursing it quietly. Was she procrastinating? Not on purpose, really, but maybe a little. Still, she knew the question would come at some point. When it did, she shifted a little in her seat.

He knew the answer, of course.

He'd known it over the 'Gear, too.

Was there really any point in trying to deny it? ... Or even speaking up to confirm it?

So, biting her lip, she just stared down into the milky depths of her coffee for a moment.

"... Yeah," she finally said in a tiny voice, the urge to deny winning out for the moment, although the lackluster quality of the claim said pretty plainly that she didn't expect him to believe her. It was just a meaningless word.

It wasn't meaningless, no, but it lost its intended meaning when it had to contend with the rest of her, the way she looked and sounded. What it did mean was what might have been obvious anyway, but reinforced it regardless - that she wasn't okay but wanted to be or at least wanted people to think so.

Then again, she was just as clear as he was about the fact that neither of them were ... and more importantly, that they both knew it. Maybe that's why he allowed the cracks he was usually guarding so fiercely to show: there was no point in hiding them, just as little as she could hide hers.

"Me too."

It took the shape of a small smile, wry and weary.

Cooper had a knack for saying the right thing sometimes.

A little surprised, Heather looked up from her coffee and once again took in the haggard state of of the agent. Cooper so rarely let on when something was wrong, and it was even rarer that he let his appearance reflect it. But it was plain as day that he was far away from being 'all right', and the honest truth was she had no trouble believing it.

After a second or so, her mouth cracked into a similar smile as she looked back down at the dark depths of her coffee.

"Man, look at us. ... Some pair we make, huh?"

It was joking and sympathetic all at once. Sometimes all you could do was find the humor in something, and even though there was nothing remotely humorous about what had happened to her, probably what had happened to him, and the things that had been stewing between them both over the past few months, it was still funny. This was the first time she'd found any reason to laugh about it since that weekend.

Maybe this was a good thing.

"An unlikely one", he said, both agreement and summation. They really were, though, and in a way it was kind of astonishing all on its own how familiar this scene was: quiet, worked up conversation on topics no one should have to touch on in a place that only did so much to soothe it.

Yet, it had a nice little flipside this time around, since it wasn't only about the terror but about the two of them making up.

And the tone they'd just managed to set wasn't half bad, in all honesty. Not that Coop could find it anywhere in himself to laugh, but the shadow of a smile remained.

If she was going to be entirely honest, it was a scene she hadn't thought she'd ever see again. Quiet moments spent discussing horrendous things from the shelter of a cafe booth had seemed very, very far away for a few months there. She could hardly believe she was here right now, actually.

But she was.

The awkwardness somewhat broken by Cooper's remark, Heather picked up a spoon to idly stir in another sugar cube (or three) to her coffee.

When she spoke, her tone, though still tired and cracked and croaky, was sheepish rather than broken.

"So... about the monsters..."

Edited 2013-01-28 22:12 (UTC)

He nodded, but let a beat pass before he answered her. And he too sounded tired more than anything else, nowhere near his usual direct poke-and-prod. There was less purpose, in some way, to this question. Understanding of a different kind. "Are they all like that?"

He didn't mean violent, bloodthirsty, macabre. Instead, he was recalling that she'd mentioned Claudia's father in addition to Harry's murderer, and ... well.

Starting was the hardest part. Once the ball was rolling, it was easier. And when Cooper responded, she couldn't help but feel a twinge of relief. Because she could talk about the monsters. She had long since come to terms with those. The more recent happenings? Not so much.

"People, you mean?"

Clasping her hands around her cup in an unconscious mimicking of him, she gave a slight shrug of the shoulders.

"I don't know. That's why I only mentioned ... you know. The two. They're the only ones I know were human... you know, underneath."

She paused, another smile curling the corners of her mouth, although this one had a little less good humor in it.

"But... since I didn't hear about any mysterious mass murders after it all went down, I'm gonna guess that they weren't."

She didn't bother to clarify what she meant by 'mass murder', because the implications were obvious. After awhile? She had stopped bothering to keep a body-count.

He looked a bit more alert at that, of course. It's hard to ignore someone saying such a thing no matter what it's in reference to. It really was obvious what she meant but that didn't exactly help matters, did it?

"How many were they?"

Stressing that question, just a bit. He wasn't disbelieving of what she was telling him in any way - it was kind of hard to be when you'd seen it with your own eyes - but it was just really unnerving to hear.

The smile fading, the shrugging shoulders rose and fell in a sigh.

"I don't know, Coop."

It was funny, how quickly the nickname came back to her speech, although she did shoot him a slightly apprehensive look, as though checking whether or not it was okay to call him that again, after everything.

"I stopped counting. Gave up after the first... I don't know. Two hours?" Three? Time worked funny in the Otherworld, but either way it had quickly grown futile to keep track. "They were everywhere. And all the people were gone."

It was as if someone had scooped every human being (save for a select few, of course-- the ones who were connected, and a few unfortunate souls who were unlucky enough to get caught in the rising tide) in the world up and replaced them with a horrible, monstrous counterpart.

It sounded like a tale told by some crazed schizophrenic who'd just gone on a killing spree, and the similarity had occurred to her on more than one occasion (especially after Vincent had pulled that dirty trick on her...). They were monsters, judge! I swear it! Every one of them! Monsters, I tell you!

But no.

If she had just gone insane and left a path of bloody human carnage in her wake all the way from Bangor to Silent Hill, she'd have heard about it afterwards, and she'd be in jail. That was the conclusion she'd arrived at, and no cute little remarks from that greasy creep could convince her otherwise.

Although, on a related line of thought, she spoke up again, her voice quiet and contemplative.

"I mean... they could have been people once, I guess. Disappearances... Silent Hill's history is full of 'em. People just... up and vanishing without a trace. No evidence, no body... If they disappeared into god-knows where and just ..."

She shook her head.

"But it's pointless. Think like that and you'll just go crazy. ... I'd go crazy."

Another pause.

"... Crazier."

She stared at the booth opposite them for a moment, seemingly realizing how much she'd just rambled to a person who two days before she'd thought she might never be able to talk to like this again, then looked back down at her coffee, stirring it despite the fact that the sugar had long since dissolved.

"Sorry..."

Edited 2013-01-28 22:51 (UTC)

If he had any problems with the nickname, he didn't show it. Really, it only told him that she wanted their relationship back as much as he did, so if anything it was nice to hear again. But he didn't think about it at the time, was busy listening to what she was saying, finally drinking some of his coffee as he did.

True to his usual ways, he didn't interrupt her, and instead just let her words sort of ... wash over him, in a sense, letting them be heard before he attempted to truly internalize what she was saying. Again, not that it was hard to believe her. The trouble was picturing her in the mess she was describing.

He shook his head when she apologised, because she really didn't have to, but didn't say anything about it.

Instead he found himself touching his face, rubbing a few fingertips over his cheek, looking every part the troubled thinker when he studied her face.

"Do they answer to the Cult?"

... and he'd thought they were the sole problem.

Well, that was.... a thing.

Heather didn't answer at first, instead just sucking her lips inward and staring down at her coffee, which seemed to be the go-to place for her eyes to stick themselves when she was working out something that needed some thought.

"... Not... really..."

Because... well? They didn't.

"Leonard, and the Missio-- Claudia's friend, they were cultists. But the rest... there were more monsters than people who are even in the cult. And I'm pretty sure..."

She paused, apparently to evaluate her answer before she gave it.

"... I'm pretty sure that most of the monsters would've attacked a cultist just as soon as they'dve attacked me."

Not true in every scenario, of course... Claudia, she figured, probably hadn't had anything to worry about. But the monsters... the Otherworld, that was a force of its own. No one commanded it. Not even the cult that had caused it. The lot of them were damn lucky that they hadn't been involved in Claudia's plan. Because everyone who had been (that Heather knew of) was dead.

Except for her.

... And, you know, Douglas.

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Though the truth may vary, this ship will carry our bodies safe to shore.

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