"What do you know, Scully," Fox Mulder asked thoughtfully from behind his desk as soon as she entered the room, "of a Special Agent Dale Cooper?"

Dana Scully gave him a strange look as she sat down wearily. "I don't believe I've heard the name. Why? What's this about?"

He leant over and handed her a slim file, before leaning back again and putting his feet up on the desk, which was, as usual, in a state of disarray. "February, 1989, in the small seemingly idyllic logging town of Twin Peaks, Washington, right up on the Canadian border," Mulder began with a slight smile, "a high-schooler named Laura Palmer was found dead on a riverbank, naked and wrapped in plastic. The murder matched the profile of a killer believed to be connected to the death of another girl elsewhere in Washington State, and the FBI got involved. Special Agent Cooper was sent up to investigate." He paused dramatically for a second. "He never returned."

"What happened to him?"

"Nobody knows, Scully. It's been half a decade since anyone at the bureau has heard from him, or from the local law enforcement up in Twin Peaks."

"Did they find out who the killer was?" Scully asked, flicking through the file and removing a couple of pictures- a photograph of a girl, blue-lipped and frozen, almost glittering with ice, and the image of a tiny piece of paper on which was typed the letter 'R'.

"Well, Scully, this is where it gets a little…spooky. Before his disappearance, the case was solved by Agent Cooper. It turned out to be the girl's father, except it wasn't quite that simple."

"What exactly is that supposed to mean?" Scully frowned.

"Cooper reported that Laura Palmer's father was possessed by an unearthly spirit, demon-like entity named Bob…"

"…Bob? Seriously?"

"…who originated from," Mulder continued, ignoring her, "from a mystical place known only as the Black Lodge. Cooper also reported that he solved the case with help from cryptic dreams featuring inhabitants of this Black Lodge, including the dead girl herself."

"A demon-like entity?" Scully stared at him in disbelief. "Right. And this guy…he was an FBI agent?"

"Yeah, and I want to know what happened to him. You'd better get ready. We're heading up to Twin Peaks in a few hours to do a little digging. Oh, and Scully?" He stood, frowning slightly.

"Yes, Mulder?"

"Um, I think it's worth mentioning that this guy…he was, well, a close friend of mine."

"Figures," Scully muttered under her breath, turning to leave the room.

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"So how come nobody's investigated this before? I mean, an FBI agent just vanishes and no-one thinks to look into it?"

They were in the car, surrounded on both sides by lush evergreens scantily clad in wisps of silver fog, their emerald tips swaying gently in the moody grey sky. The window beside her was slightly open, and Scully could smell the distinct pureness of pine needles and feel the ambient caress of cool bucolic air. She had lost track of exactly how long they had been driving; it seemed like it had been quite a while. The road ahead was long and winding, the clouds low and full; the setting had a postcard feel to it.

"I've been asking that very same question, Scully, and I can't seem to figure it out either. As far as I can tell we're the first to even mention this case in over five years." Mulder grinned, eyes shining. "In fact, I was asking after the details of the case recently when I was directed to a Regional Bureau Chief Gordon Cole- you might've heard of him."

"The name sounds familiar," Scully admitted, taking a brief look around her at the misty woodlands; out of nowhere a chill ran down her spine. Blinking, she elected to ignore the feeling, and looked back to her partner with some curiosity. "What did he tell you?"

"Well, uh, he was meant to be Special Agent Cooper's direct superior; however, when I talked to him-I say 'talked', but we were both yelling the whole time-" he deflected Scully's questioning glace at this particular comment, "he gave away little to nothing, but…I don't know, Scully, I felt like he knew what had happened. Like he knew, and he was trying to hide it."

"Mulder, why on earth would it be in this man's interest to hide what had happened to one of his agents?"

Mulder hesitated. "I'm not sure, but there was definitely something he wasn't telling me."

They sat in silence for a while. Scully wondered how much further they would have to drive. Something didn't quite feel right about these woods, about the ambiguity of her surroundings; she didn't feel comfortable, despite the natural beauty she found herself encompassed with. Trying to direct her mind away from the abstract, she opened the folder on her lap, scanning its contents quickly.

"It says here that Agent Cooper wasn't the first to disappear while investigating this case, Mulder. In fact, in 1988, Special Agent Chester Desmond seemingly disappeared while looking into the death of Teresa Banks in southwestern Washington," Scully read with a frown. "His partner Sam Stanley returned alone."

"There was also another one, Scully, agent Philip Jeffries," Mulder interjected with an infuriating half-smile, "who vanished from Buenos Aires, Argentina, in 1987."

"How exactly was he connected to the others?"

"Well, he returned briefly, out of nowhere, with knowledge of this mysterious Black Lodge in '89, before disappearing again. Hey, Scully, we're here."

The pair had driven past a faded sign displaying the words 'WELCOME TO TWIN PEAKS- population 51,201', presented charmingly amongst the picturesque fir trees and set against the backdrop of the crisp, jagged mountainside. As they entered the town, a presence could be felt, or something similar; it was almost as if they had stepped back in time as they crossed the threshold into the charming little burgh, into a world that seemed, to the outside observer, as if it were filtered through a glowing lens, golden in colour and peaceful in nature. A sense of something washed over Scully, something she could not describe in conventional terms. It wasn't an unpleasant feeling, but it made her uneasy all the same.

"Would you look at this place, Scully," said Mulder gently as they made their way slowly through the town of Twin Peaks.

"It's certainly got a feel to it," Scully agreed.

"Like something out of a storybook, or a movie or something. Can you feel that? That there is the feel of town with secrets, Scully, and lots of them," Mulder remarked with a light-hearted smile.

"Anyway," Scully interrupted pointedly, "looks like we'll be meeting up with a, uh, Sheriff Harry S. Truman. Shouldn't be too hard to remember that."

"Really? That's seriously the sheriff's name?"

"That's the sheriff's name."

"Wow."

Scully smiled, before letting it fade away as the unrest prickled away at her. She was probably, she thought to herself, just tired; they had, after all, been travelling for a long while, and she hadn't managed to get much sleep immediately preceding the journey. These were the rationalizations she made to herself. In reality, however, she knew, she knew, something just wasn't right here, something that to her distress she couldn't quite place.

"You all right, Scully?"

Her partner's concern made her jump as her train of thought was broken.

"I'm fine," she replied vaguely. "I was just thinking about what you said…that this town feels like it's full of secrets. Mulder, I think you might be right."