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1.
Carlos checked his watch outside the studio entrance, wanting to make sure he didn’t interrupt Cecil’s broadcast. He was aiming to get in as the weather started playing, leaving him with enough time to explain about the experiments he was trying to run on Night Vale’s sewage system. A sewage system that his preliminary data seemed to indicate didn’t exist. After a while staring in complete confusion at the time displayed on his wrist, he remembered that time, and the devices that claim to keep it, just didn’t work in Night Vale, and unless he wanted to trudge back to his car to turn on the radio and tune into Cecil’s broadcast, he may as well head in and hope for the best.
He pushed open the door, stepping inside and catching sight of Cecil through the window in the recording booth. Still broadcasting, damn. Usually Cecil would have noticed the moment someone else entered the studio, mid story or not, but Carlos was relieved to see that for once he was completely focused. Although he was facing Carlos, his attention was trained on the sheet of paper he held in his left hand, while with his right he gestured in large sweeping movements, trailing ribbons of smoke from the cigarette he held carelessly.
“And, dear listeners, none other than that jerk Steve Carlsberg has written in to complain about the tax money spent on upgrading the picnic area in the Forbidden Dog Park. As you all know, it now features several interactive art installations, a fully functional and safety checked fairground, two olympic sized swimming pools, one fresh water, one chlorinated, and a flamingo enclosure. I must also remind you that the Dog Park continues to be forbidden to dogs and dog owners, and you should really try not to think about it too much.
"So let’s dive straight into this letter and see what Steve Carlsberg has found to complain about this time-”
Carlos slipped away from the booth window, there were certain people or places that caused Cecil to abandon his professional radio demeanor and degenerate into petty name calling. Desert Bluffs was one, the Apache Tracker- before his death- another, but Steve Carlsberg was perhaps Cecil’s most hated of all. Carlos knew from experience that once Cecil got started on him it could be a very long time until he moved onto another topic. Figuring he should do something with the time this gave him, he headed towards the men’s bathroom to see if there was any plumbing he could investigate.
He tickled Khoshekh under the chin as he entered, and smiled when the station’s floating cat purred contentedly.
Ever since Khoshekh had given birth, the men’s bathroom had become harder to maneuver than a military training obstacle course. It wasn’t just the floating kittens that posed a problem, although certainly having to duck and swerve to avoid the little balls of fur was difficult in itself, but the real challenge lay in getting past the structures erected haphazardly by the studio interns in order to feed and water the kittens, not to mention aim litter trays underneath them.
Khoshekh was lucky in a way, he was trapped in permanent suspension right next to the sink so looking after him was simply a matter of occasionally topping up the basin with water and balancing a food tray on the taps. The kittens however were all over the place, some near the ceiling, some near the floor, some near the walls, some in the centre of the room, one hovering a foot above the only toilet cubicle. Feeding them was a big concern so the interns had spent a weekend constructing all manner of strange ledges and bridges and cranes across the bathroom in order to deliver them sustenance, catch their waste, and generally keep them all alive and well.
While this was great news for the cats, it had rendered the men’s bathroom almost impassable and completely unusable, which was fine really because none of the station staff used it for anything other than the mirror.
Carlos ducked under a low hanging food bowl and into the cubicle, a short look in confirmed what he’d already expected. The men’s bathroom in the radio station, like all the other bathrooms around Night Vale he’d looked at, wasn’t connected to anything. There was no plumbing of any sort, no pipes leading to or from the toilets.
Earlier today he’d even popped open a drain cover and climbed down into what should have been the sewers, only to find himself in a large cavern, lit by a single flickering bulb, and filled with deflated footballs.
It was telling of how long he’d been in Night Vale that he was no longer even surprised or worried when he discovered things like this, merely intrigued. He pulled the flush in the men’s toilet, watching the water that lay in the bowl swirl down into the unknown, only to be replaced by fresh water pouring in from somewhere equally unknown. Possibly it was the same water, trapped in a sort of endless interdimensional loop. Carlos would have to work out a way of testing that hypothesis.
He picked his way back through the kittens and returned to the studio, trying to catch Cecil’s eye to let him know he was there, but Cecil’s focus was on his broadcast, still reading Steve Carlsberg's letter, voice quivering with barely restrained rage.
“ ‘In conclusion, the City Council has no right spending the taxpayers money on secretive projects like the Dog Park, and furthermore I suspect the Dog Park is a massive government conspiracy involving Aliens, the Russian Mafia, and the Hooded Figures. They are obviously all in cohorts.’ And then he’s signed it ‘Steve Carlsberg’.
“Well listeners, if you’ll allow me a brief editorial, may I just say that Steve Carlsberg is a massive JERK and if that’s the way he feels about our Night Vale then he should leave, right now, go on Steve, no one would miss you. Why don’t you run away to Desert Bluffs. JUST GO.”
Carlos, standing just inside the studio, began to notice some strange changes overcoming the broadcaster as he ranted and raved, prodding the air with his cigarette to punctuate his points. The air around him seemed to shimmer with a dark luminescence, as though he was both a source of light and the shadow it cast. The rest of the booth, already hazy with smoke, dimmed until Cecil was simultaneously the brightest and darkest point in the room, impossible to look away from.
“You know what Steve Carlsberg, I am so sick of you, all you ever do is complain. Maybe if you have problems you should try KEEPING THEM TO YOURSELF like the rest of us do. What, you think you’re the only person to ever have an issue-”
Cecil cut himself off and closed his eyes briefly, as though to calm himself down or gather his thoughts, but when he opened them again a third eye opened too. Sat in the middle of his forehead it glowed a gentle, pulsating purple, contrasting nicely with the black void of his other two eyes. As Carlos stared in fascination at the transformation happening before him, Cecil resumed talking.
“I mean sure our City Council has some faults, and sure it’s more than likely they’re working with the Hooded Figures, and sure the purpose of the Dog Park is probably some sinister plot. But no political authority is perfect. Our City Council works hard to keep Night Vale functioning and Night Vale citizens safe, and if they want to get involved with shady organisations on the side then that’s THEIR BUSINESS okay Steve Carlsberg, IT’S NOTHING TO DO WITH YOU-”
Tentacles, green and lithe and powerful, erupted from Cecil’s back and shoulders. They twisted in the air, whipping around, and it was as though they had appeared simply because Cecil had needed more limbs to gesture with, as though his anger and frustration at Steve Carlsberg had built up so high that it managed to manifest physically.
One of the tentacles wrapped around the letter Cecil was still holding and crumpled it up into a ball, throwing it across the room. Another tentacle darted out and grabbed the microphone, pulling it closer until he could hiss into it.
“You know what Steve Carlsberg, I am done with you. Don’t bother writing in with your stupid opinions any more. I don’t want to know and Night Vale doesn’t want to know.”
He sat back and took a deep breath, one of his tentacles sweeping away a tendril of hair that had fallen in front of his third eye. He brought up his cigarette, pausing before it got to his lips.
“Sorry about that jerk listeners, he really gets on my last nerve. I mean, some of the things he has the audacity to complain about-
“You know what, no, I won’t say another word about him, he’s taken up far too much of our time already.
“Let’s go now, angry and indignant, to the weather.”
Cecil pressed a button, flicked a switch, and took a long drag on his cigarette.
Carlos took that to be his cue and cleared his throat to announce himself. Cecil’s eyes slid up to him and his face broke out in a grin, teeth pointed, all three eyes crinkling at the corners. “Carlos!” He exclaimed “Have you been here long?”
“Cecil, I actually came here to check the plumbing- you know there’s no sewage system in Night Vale right? Where does all the sewage go? Also, wow, your tentacles and that eye and the glowing thing you’re doing. That’s really something. And by something I mean fascinating and incredible. Can I run some tests on you? I mean, would that be okay? For science obviously”
Cecil beamed in response, “Absolutely!”
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Carlos was driving home when Cecil's voice came back on the radio.
“Dear listeners, you’ll never guess who just came to visit me during the weather. It was Carlos. Beautiful, perfect Carlos. He said something about the plumbing not being real in Night Vale, but then he called me fascinating and asked if he could do some experiments on me... ON ME!
“How romantic is that! Do you think it’s another date listeners? Is that what scientists do as an expression of affection and love? I can’t say I’ve ever dated a scientist before Carlos, so I’m not sure of the dating etiquette in scientific circles...
“It sure does seem romantic though, just me and him and all those beakers and flashing lights. I wonder what sort of experiments he’ll want to do; and whether it will be followed by dinner plans. Oh listeners, I’ll be sure to keep you updated on any scientific breakthroughs I assist with!
“Now, onto actual news. Hiram McDaniels announced in a press conference earlier-”
Carlos sighed, he was very aware that thanks to Cecil the whole of Night Vale was stupidly up to date and invested in their blossoming relationship. In the last week alone he’d had five complete strangers approach him in the street and make him promise to treat Cecil right ”or else you’ll wish you never came here. Do you know how easy it is to hide a body in the desert, do you!?”
It seemed that privacy was just another one of those ‘rest of the world’ things that didn’t exist in Night Vale, much like plumbing, or boybands, or oil based paint, or mountains. It probably didn’t help his quest for a quiet life to be dating someone with a radio show and a tendency for oversharing, but Carlos was beginning to find the invasion of privacy didn’t bother him in the slightest.
The more Carlos found out about Cecil, the more intrigued he became. Images of tentacles and shadows and third eyes swam through his mind, Cecil really was magnificent in that form. Utterly beautiful, radiating power, unlike anything Carlos had ever seen before. To have him as a willing test subject was a dream come true.
Cecil was close to wrapping up the show as Carlos pulled into his parking space, so Carlos waited a few extra minutes before shutting off his engine and listened to Cecil make the final announcements, then mouthed along with the sign off, a smile on his face and a heart full of butterflies.
“Goodnight Night Vale, Goodnight.”