Hyperhydrosis. I'm going to die because of Ernie Niles' hyperhyrdrosis. Cooper leaned his back against the wall of the farmhouse, careful to rest against the radiator and not the section of baseboard with the rusted nail protruding from the rotten wood, as he drew his knees up and set his elbows on top. The plastic binds used to lash his wrists together cut into his flesh; he resisted the urge to move his hands too much, and had given up entirely on wrestling them free. The gash below his eye—sustained after the trade, when Sergeant King whipped the butt end of his pistol at his face to force his compliance—burned and hurt like hell, but it was nothing compared to what it might feel like to be shot, again.

He tried to keep the fear from his mind, but found it a daunting task. He remembered the pain from the last time; indeed, he could still feel the twinge of pain with sudden movements, the sometimes inelegant and ungainly twists of his upper body during absent moments, from the bullet wound. He didn't relish the thought of having another bullet rip through his body, but at least he had small consolation knowing that he would likely not survive long enough to feel the pain.

Death, he thought. I could die here. I might die. It was not something he wanted to give into, but he tried to allow himself the mental space to feel it and come to some kind of peace with it. He hadn't lived the life he'd wanted, not entirely; his regrets from the night of his hotel room shooting resurfaced with a vengeance, and he found himself closing his tired eyes and wishing for cool grass on a tall hill, a stack of unsolved FBI files on one side, a beautiful woman on the other…

The woman he pictured was Audrey, and that made him snap his eyes open. At least I got to kiss her that one last time, he thought, trying to remember the colour of the fabric in her suit jacket, the shape of her legs, the ebony-cast wave in her hair…

"You are a lonely man, Agent Cooper?" Renault asked him from his place at Cooper's side.

"No," Cooper replied.

Renault tapped his gun against the soft drywall. Flakes of paint flitted down, caught in the long beams from the police car headlamps as they drifted to the floor and the tops of Renault's shoe. His captor grew thoughtful. "But it must be a lonely life you lead, always here and then there, never in one place long enough to know anyone."

Cooper shrugged as best he could, stating the cold facts, emotionless. "That's not always true. I've been in Twin Peaks for nearly a month."

"Ah," Renault said. "Friendship with the Sheriff. His deputies." He flicked his shoe, dusting the paint crumbs as he did. "The Horne girl."

Cooper nodded.

The French-Canadian clucked his tongue. "When she was up at One Eyed Jack, she talk in her dream," Renault said. "'Special Agent…Special Agent…'" the man laughed. "You are more than a friend to her."

Cooper's response was measured. "That's none of your business."

"She is a pretty girl," Renault said. "I would have liked to keep her for myself. She smell like—eh, comment ça se dit? Canelle?"

Sergeant King wracked his brain for the English translation. "Cinnamon," he said finally.

"Oui," Renault sighed. "Cinnamon. That is the right spice? She is cinnamon spice." He again tapped his gun against the wall and peered outside the window at the rotating red-and-blue of the lights. "You know, Mr. Cooper, I should very much have liked to be with her. You know? To possess her."

Cooper closed his eyes again and tried to visualize a scenario in which he escaped unharmed, pushing all emotional thoughts to the side, but Renault's teasing was making it difficult.

"How many time did you have her?" Renault asked.

Cooper counted the space between his breaths to calm himself down.

Renault was undaunted. "I am just trying to understand what would drive a man to cross a border for a girl," he said. "But then again, as they say in the village where I am from: 'Comme on fait son lit, on se couche.' Whom you lie with is not my concern…"

Sergeant King chuckled at the crude sexual innuendo and double speak. Cooper, on the other hand, had had enough.

"Audrey Horne was an innocent pawn in a sordid game that you are still playing," he said finally. "One you're not going to win."

Renault was silenced; Sergeant King peered up over the windowsill again and, anxious and nervous, squatted once more against the wall. A long, silent moment passed; Cooper thought he heard more cars pulling up outside. He hoped Truman had a plan.

"You are afraid to die?"

"No."

"Every man is afraid to die," Renault continued.

"I am afraid of not living," he said.

"There no difference," Renault said.

Cooper didn't respond, but instead focused his ears again on the outside noises that seemed to grow. King crept up again to peer over the windowsill.

"More deputies. Sharpshooters," he sank down. "Let's deal and let's run."

Renault took his time to reply. "Will they let us run, Agent Cooper?"

Cooper didn't need a second to deliberate. "No," he replied flatly.

"So you think they will deal?"

"No."

"What do you suggest we do?" Renault asked.

Cooper sighed. "Surrender."

Renault nodded. "Ok."

Sergeant King wheeled on his partner. "Are you crazy?"

Renault shook his head. "No. But first we-we must decide to give up quietly or to kill him."

Cooper replied as calmly as he could, his voice even. "Then we both die."

"I know," Renault fired back.

Incredulous, Cooper turned his face toward Renault. "Is my death so important to you?"

"My two brothers die," he said. "I hold you responsible."

"Why?"

"Why?" Renault parroted. He knelt down, his face level with Cooper's. "Before you came here, Twin Peak was a simple place. My brothers deal dope to the teenagers and the truck drivers. One Eyed Jack welcomed the businessman and the tourist. Quiet people lived a quiet life." He paused. "Then—a pretty girl die, and you arrive, and everything change."

Cooper's ears perked up.

"My brother Bernardo: shot, and left to die in the woods," Renault continued. "A grieving father smother my remaining brother with, ah...the pillow. Kidnapping...death...suddenly, ah, the quiet people, they're quiet no more. Suddenly the simple dream become the nightmare."

Cooper forced himself to move past the guilt he suddenly felt, the same guilt he'd carried for so many years, whenever disaster followed him. His hands ached and his back was sore; he said nothing.

"So," Renault finished. "If you die, maybe you will be the last to die. Maybe you brought the nightmare with you. And, maybe, the nightmare will die with you."

It was suddenly clear to Cooper that death might be a welcome reprieve from the life he'd been living, and all the pain he'd been causing those around him. He flashed back to moments in his childhood—the death of his mother, of Caroline, of his long-ago friend Marie, all moments of intense grief and sadness and anger but also disillusionment—as he'd done so many times before, but was still faced with no answers as to how he could have fixed things, how he might have made things better by doing something differently. For the first time, he wondered how his presence in this lifetime could be a good thing at all to anyone; he couldn't remember saving a life, only others losing theirs. Had he ever made anyone's existence better by simply being?

Cooper hung his head and absorbed the feeling. If it was his fate to lose his life in that farmhouse, he would do his best to embrace it.

It was Sergeant King who spoke next, but Cooper wasn't listening. He watched the man leap into action, peering over the window ledge, only for his eyes to widen. "Jean," he said. "Take a look at this. You order any food?"

"No!" Renault answered, and suddenly his captors were moving, positioning themselves at the doorway, hands at the ready on the handles of their guns.

"No, no no no," Renault said. "Let her come…let her come. It's just a girl."

Cooper's mind flashed. Who could it be? he wondered. Lucy? Please not Audrey…oh, God, please let it be anyone but Audrey…

He saw a shadow cross the doorframe and the inset window, and in an instant he knew it was Denise: dressed as a Double R waitress, carrying a tray of pies.

"Hello," Renault said as he opened the door.

"Suppertime," Denise purred, and as Renault grabbed the tray and Denise lifted the hem of her skirt, Cooper knew what he had to do. In a blur of movement, he grabbed the gun from the hidden holster and aimed it at Renault, levelling it as best he could with his bound hands and firing into the darkness of the farmhouse as Renault dashed off behind a wall.

When it was over, Sergeant King was handcuffed against the wall with varsity wide receiver Agent Bryson's knee in the small of his back. Jean Renault was dead.