tapestodiane | 025

Entry tags:

025 - video

[It's probably been a while since the network heard from this guy. It's safe to say he's been preoccupied - between being lightly obsessed with Tetris, the Halloween possession thing happening (which actually affected him more than he cares to admit), the train hijacking and those three days ... he's had a lot to think about. And, in truth, still has.]

[But Christmas perked him up and with the new year just around the proverbial corner he's feeling like things just might get better, and you know what else never fails to lift his spirits?]

[Local wildlife.]

[That's right. So today the network is treated to a video of a group of trees. It's pretty early so the sunlight is warm and yellow and sparkles just so in the snow, and as the video sloooowly zooms in on one tree in particular ... you can see there's a Hoothoot snugly nestled in a hollow of the trunk, looking asleep and kind of ruffled up.]

[It's actually a very beautiful image, because Cooper has a tendency to catch them like that.]

[And then he zooms out. ...no, wait, he's zooming in again - a little closer this time, really focusing on that sleepy little owl. Despite his thing with birds, he can always appreciate them from a distance. And this little fellow is admittedly very cute.]

Look at that.

The spitting image of comfort. Right there.

[He sounds sort of breathless and utterly wistful, then zooms out again just for a pan of the scenery - snowy tree trunks and the little lake behind him. The water isn't all frozen yet so the sunlight gets to show off in the surface there, too, before Coop aims the gear back towards the bird and zooms in on it again.]

Almost makes you jealous, doesn't it?

[Action for anyone in Ecruteak! He's hanging out just on the edge of the forest, stalking the wildlife.]

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_{[She WAS going to open her mouth and outright laugh at that first part. Because HEY-- are you kidding? That's HILARIOUS.]

[... And then he gets to the second part.]}

... Jesus.

_{[He merely shrugs in response, a gesture not common with him, and it probably takes a year or two off him when coupled with the way he looks to the ground for another small moment, echoing a young kid who doesn't have more to say and is uncertain on whether or not to keep talking.]

[Like there should be some kind of summing up but there just isn't much else to say. And there isn't, really, because that's the one event that really solidified it, the fear from abstract feathery figures to actual birds, and that's exactly how it went down.]

[There are those feather-figures too, of course, but he's not going to draw attention to them right this moment.]

[So he adds, instead, a little belatedly, an afterthought,]}

Left quite an impression.

Edited 2012-03-25 12:09 (UTC)

Yeah, sheesh. I can see why.

_{[She can't make fun of him for something like THAT.]}

So... that's what made you think there was a pattern with the starters when you got your owl, right?

_{[Well, no. There's a small headshake as he keeps going. There's a certain kind of alarm involved with birds for him, but the striking oh god of realizing just what he'd been given, taking into account what cave he'd been in only a few hours before ... that was a different kind of jolt entirely.]

[It just couldn't possibly have been chance.]}

Only partially. I'd been warned very specifically about owls some time prior to my arrival here.

_{[And he still hadn't figured that (what, clue? hint?) out.]}

_{[That catches her attention a little, because it's different than what she'd assumed-- that the deal with his bird starter was the same as with her dog starter.]}

Warned?

"The owls are not what they seem."

_{[He quotes it somewhat slowly, lets it come back to him the way it really was. It's been a long time now and a lot of things from his time in Twin Peaks aren't readily available in his mind anymore, but the Giant and his words had stuck with him for several reasons.]}

_{[... Ominous.]

[She pauses to look up at him, still walking along with her hands in her pockets. A thought had occurred to her.]}

... I'm probably gonna regret asking this, but... did that have to do with... um... you know?

_{[aka the main subject of their little diner discussion a week or two before.]}

Could be. I can't be sure.

_{[In that town - hell, in his life - he rarely feels comfortable making that kind of assumptions. In the case of the owls, he's thought about it, sure. He's thought about them as BOB, as agents for him, but he's also considered that they might be messengers or spirits in their own right, from either side or none of them. He doesn't know much about the Lodges. He's just working on the intuition that they're important and that the Giant can probably be trusted, but though the message had always struck him as a warning ... it's still a fairly ambiguous one.]}

_{[She nods, looking back ahead.]

[If he's not sure, well, that's a good enough answer for her. He wouldn't say that if he really WASN'T.]}

_{[He glances at her, almost carefully.]}

You're still thinking about it?

_{[She could lie and say 'Nah, just thinkin' in general'. But what good would that do? So she sort of nods, shrugging.]}

Yeah, I guess.

... On the night that... y'know. That weird weekend...

I remember hearing an owl outside. Right around the same time I saw him.

_{[She'd figured it was a Noctowl. After all, Pokemon and animals didn't sound THAT different outside of the name thing.]}

It was probably a coincidence, but...

_{[An owl. It comes back to him in that moment, the image of BOB-as-an-owl, and he frowns when he furthers remember Major Briggs disappearing right after the call of one.]

[Both very troubling things.]}

I don't think so, Heather.

_{[Slowly, and he looks to the sky, still thinking.]}

Everything is connected. There is no such thing as coincidence.

... Yeah, I guess there really isn't...

_{[She mumbles this with a slight sigh. Because really, after everything she's been through, there's no reason to assume that coincidences are a thing that actually exist anymore. EVERYTHING happens for a reason.]}

... I wonder what it meant.

In many cultures it's an omen of death.

_{[... that's not a very optimistic thing to say, Coop.]}

_{[... You're such a little ray of sunshine, Special Agent.]

[Heather can't help but throw a slightly :/ REALLY, COOPER? look in his direction, but then she shakes her head and turns her gaze forward again.]}

... Wellp.

Death.

Been there, done that.

What's a few more?

Edited (HTML) 2012-04-15 08:59 (UTC)

_{[He sends her an apologetic look in return and goes on softer, as if to make amends for that previous blunt statement. He does that, though - think out loud. And he'd been pondering the significance of the owls for a while.]

[And given what BOB does, that detail sure seems to fit.]}

You can't die here.

_{[She gives a nonchalant shrug.]}

Well, not permanently, anyway.

_{[Which, let's face it-- is pretty much the same situation she'd been in back in Silent Hill. Except that it applied to everybody now, and hopefully wasn't the work of some twisted occult archangel.]}

_{[It had always saddened Cooper to deal with cases where there were children involved because he knew that they, especially, can't walk away unchanged from the experience. And to hear Heather talk about it exactly like that, the way he really doesn't like hearing, with a weary resignation like it's not even a big deal, that bothers him.]

[(Not that he's heard others talk like that bout dying, but certainly about death in general.)]

[He doesn't know exactly what's going on in her head, but he still recognises the tone. So he gives her another look before he answers.]}

I still find the fact reassuring.

_{[Because it does mean he doesn't worry as much as he would have had they'd been back home.]}

_{[The look gets another shrug, but the resigned tone is a little less hidden when she replies.]}

Well, yeah.

It means death isn't the end.

_{[... But it still hurts. Every time.]}

_{[He nods, but doesn't answer this time.]

[They're close to home but he finds that he's walking a little slower as a result. He'll probably stay out a while longer.]}

_{[The silence carries on for awhile-- because let's be frank, there's not an easy way to break that sort of awkward quiet. But as the hotel comes into view, as it so often has been when the two have wound up on walks together, she pipes up.]}

So, hey.

We should totally do this again sometime.

_{[... As though she's talking about having like, gone to the movies or something as opposed to attempting to massacre each other with snow like a couple of ten-year-olds.]}

_{[He breathes out a smile. Her saying that lifts a lot of the death-fog from his mind - he'll be happy to go back to that later. Not now. Things are looking far too bright outside for that.]}

We should. _{[And a quick grin, just for good measure. (also puns)]} It's as they say, Heather: revenge is best served cold.

Edited 2012-04-15 22:25 (UTC)

_{[If there's one thing Heather's good at, it's using that mischievous streak of hers to distract from the bad stuff. Both for herself AND for others.]

[Grinning right back (and letting out a little groan), she reaches out to give him a friendly shove to the shoulder.]}

Ugh.

I oughta pop you with another snowball just for that awful pun.

_{[Oh come on Heather it's not like you don't make horrible puns CONSTANTLY.]}

_{[He lets her without much more than a sidelong smile. ALSO SHUT UP HEATHER PUNS ARE THE BEST.]}

If we're getting into another snowball fight I'd like to take the opportunity to make a rule against tickling.

_{[... Nice try, Coop, but NO.]

[She gives him a broad smirk.]}

Uh, as if.

That was WAY too funny to outlaw.

Besides, you're the one who said 'All's fair in love and war', remember?

_{[aka FAT CHANCE, because Heather hangs onto her secret weapons HARD. Better learn to live with it.]}

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