rolling out for a pre-canon test drive | twin peaks

[intuit]

Well, mun, I'll be the first to admit that I'm not sure what's going on. While I won't complain about being taken from my schoolwork — important though it is — I would appreciate some assurance in regards to both my immediate and my long-term future. There are some opportunities that come only once in a lifetime, but I possess a certain fondness for my current state and existing paths in yellow woods, so to speak.

I won't lodge any further complaint, as I believe I have made myself clear, so I hope you'll take this to heart.

Yours,
Dale B. Cooper

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[intuit]

And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth.

[innasci]

[ Epeius smiles, like Dale has told him a very funny joke or perhaps a fond anecdote. ]

They didn't like the idea of reading me bedtime stories. Like the kind other boys get to hear. I got Frost instead, but that's alright, isn't it?

[intuit]

I think so. More than alright. Poetry's got its own merits.

[ Dale smiles back, then, because there is something conspiratorial about being able to recite a poem — like being in on the same secret or having seen something that no one else had managed to catch. ]

Who are 'they?'

[innasci]

[ Epeius likes that the man smiles back. People very rarely did in his direction, though he's smart enough to understand why. ]

My parents. I can't recall their names anymore, but they knew I was smart, from the very beginning.

[intuit]

[ The boy's response is innately sad; Dale's brow furrows and the corners of his lips threaten to turn down as he listens.

He knows what it's like to lose a parent, but not both, and not at such a young age. ]

Have you never heard a bedtime story, then?

[innasci]

[ It's an honest mistake for Dale to make — Epeius' parents aren't the ones who are dead, it's Epeius himself. Perhaps, if the young Mr. Cooper pays close enough attention, he'll see it: the way the little boy seems to flicker at the very edges like he's some sort of optical illusion, illuminated from the inside with dim light. A ghost, or perhaps just a projection. ]

Once! They don't allow children on the ship — not really. But they made an exception once for one of the helmsman and I heard one. It was about children who got lost in a forest, but I can't recall their names anymore. [ He presses his lips together and looks vaguely sullen. ] It was nice, though. I think I would have liked bedtime stories. Just as much as poetry.

[intuit]

[ It's not a discrepancy that Cooper notices just yet. (In all likelihood, it's the sort of thing he'll remember once they're finished talking.) He's a little too intent upon what he's being told. ]

I'll tell you another one, some time, [ he decides, despite knowing that chance meetings like this are a rare thing indeed. ]

Did you have a favorite poem?