Chapter Text
The Voice of Night Vale. Standing in Carlos' lab.
He was... well...indescribable, really.
Literally.
There wasn't a single word in any language that could describe him accurately enough.
For a moment, they just seemed to stand and stare at each other before something seemed to click for The Voice.
"Oh, you're looking at me-" He said. "I'm sorry, I make a life out of speaking to the whole town every night, but I can't even talk to a guy!"
He laughed nervously at himself, and Carlos inspected him.
For science. Of course.
The only feature of his that Carlos could actually make out was his eyes.
He had three of them- and they looked just like any eyes would, if you set aside that they were purple. But the third one was different- it looked exactly like the ones that had been watching him. Except these, of course, were actually attached to a person. Was person the right word? He wasn't sure, but he also didn't want to be rude. Definitely a who, not a what, at least.
Carlos looked away, having noticed he was staring.
"You're, um, The Voice, right?" He ventured.
"Oh, yeah." The Voice said. "But that's not actually my name, that's just what the town calls me because they don't know it." He stopped there before realizing that it would probably be nice to share his name, and he continued, "It's Cecil. My name, I mean."
"Uh huh..." Carlos heard him and understood, yes, but now he had let his gaze drift and was focused on the floating eyes. They were back, and there was far more than before. They were all floating around and watching Cecil rather than him now- though, of course, some of them were looking at Carlos- such as Cecil's eyes that didn't float midair.
"Sorry, I was just looking at the eyes... scientifically, I find them very interesting."
Cecil looked away from Carlos for the first time so far to look at the eye floating closest to him.
Interestingly enough, when Cecil looked at them, they didn't do anything weird- they just stared back. Carlos wondered why the eyes only did that for him, but he didn't ask. In truth, it was partly because he thought it'd be rude, but mostly because he was too nervous to ask.
"Oh, these guys? Yeah, they're fun."
Though Cecil didn't look away from him for long.
"So, um..." Carlos hesitated. Would this be rude to ask out of nowhere? "-How do you know who I am?"
"I know who everyone in this town is," Cecil replied casually.
"Yeah, but...how? I heard that you never come down from your glow cloud. Actually, come to think of it, why are you here to talk to me despite what everyone says about you never-"
"It's like a second sight, kind of," Cecil said, cutting Carlos off and ignoring that second question before Carlos could think about it too much. "It helps me keep tabs on the citizens of my town. All the information for my broadcasts, and none of the socializing. Not that talking is usually an issue for me. It's not even an issue now. I'm normal."
Carlos seemed to have forgotten his other question as he pulled out a notepad and pen to write this down. As a scientist, he always has these on hand, of course.
"Interesting..." He murmured to himself. "A second sight..?"
"How does that work, exactly?"
"Uh..I'd say it's like...huh," Cecil thought for a moment. "It's always been easy for me to do, but actually, it's kind of hard to explain." He laughed nervously. "You might not get it, because as a human being, your sight is more limited than mine, and I can imagine that it'd be hard for you to imagine- not that there's anything wrong with being a human, I mean, it's just, you probably won't get it. But I can try to explain the best I can."
"What these eyes see, so can I." He gestured to the floating eyes, a few of which were now curiously inspecting Carlos' lab equipment.
"It's like...if you had a pair of glasses, and one lens was colored, and the other was normal. The normal lens is what you would see, and what I can see through the two regular eyes I have. The colored lens, though, is a little bit different. It can see other things- if I'd like to, I can see what all of these eyes can see all at once. I could also cherry-pick which eye(s) I'd like to see at any time, though."
Carlos wrote all of this down, of course. His pen could hardly keep up with his brain. He realized while looking over his notes that even though Cecil was this...well, Carlos wasn't sure, but even though he wasn't human like Carlos, he really did just act like a regular guy.
"If I'd rather just focus on what's in front of me," Cecil then closed just his third eye, and all of the floating eyes disappeared. Carlos realized for the first time that he was actually alone with Cecil, now that the eyes weren't watching them (even though they were Cecil anyway). "I close my eye, and now I only see you."
Carlos kept asking him basic questions, and he answered them, of course.
Carlos also noticed that since Cecil had closed his third eye, he had yet to open it again. He watched Carlos, listened to him speak, and answered questions when necessary. Carlos was confused by this- Cecil made himself sound rather social on the radio, but now he was just quiet.
Maybe it's the anxiety of talking to a person face-to-face... Carlos wondered. He is said never to come down from his cloud, really.
What Carlos hadn't noticed was that for Cecil, just being able to admire Carlos' perfection was enough.
He could watch Carlos for hours.
In fact, he had.
Just last night, he'd had several eyes watching Carlos. Even more of them after he fell asleep. More than he'd ever and ever would spare for any normal citizen of Night Vale. Well, not normal, but Night Vale normal. Plus, it wasn't even weird, because Carlos knew about it. He would stare directly at the eyes that watched him, which was basically just at Cecil. Whenever Carlos looked at them- at Cecil -he simply didn't know what to do with himself.
He couldn't help it, Carlos was just so...perfect.
And Carlos had only been in Night Vale for two days.
"Cecil? Are you listening?"
Oh- had Carlos been talking to him again? He must have zoned out again...
"Hm?"
"I asked your age- or even just how long you've been in Night Vale?"
Carlos wanted to know how old he was... maybe he was into Cecil, too? He hoped so.
"Oh, just...y'know."
"I don't," Carlos replied.
An awkward pause.
"...Me neither."
Carlos looked at him with a puzzled expression and wrote something down on his notepad.
"So...those eyes." Carlos began. "You said you watch the whole town with them, but how many of them are there?"
"Roughly enough for everyone in town, give or take. Though, 'give or take' as in the number of eyes literally changes every day." Cecil answered.
"Is there a reason for that, or..."
"No. Sometimes they'll cease to exist one day and come back the next."
Carlos nodded, and again his gaze wandered from Cecil's eyes.
On Cecil's arms looked to be tattoos, maybe? Night Vale style tattoos at least, because they were moving.
The pattern seemed to be...tentacles, in purple ink. Empty spaces were filled with- you guessed it -more eyes.
Cecil must've noticed his staring, because he said, "Oh, yeah, I've had these forever."
"Uh, those eyes..." -Are staring at me again, "Theoretically, could you see out of them, too?"
"Not these, they're not the same," Cecil said.
Scientifically, this piqued Carlos' interest.
"How so?"
"These are more sentient than the floating eyes. For example, when it's cold, they'll all gather near my chest for warmth. If it's hot outside- which is usually -they'll come out onto my forearms, like this."
"And," He added, "They enjoy touch."
Cecil gently rubbed his own arm, and one of the eyes blinked a few times, while others gathered around it.
Well, honestly, what was Carlos expecting? Eyes can't really express too much on their own. At least, not to Carlos. But Cecil said that this was them experiencing joy, so...
He took note of this and continued to ask Cecil questions on the nature of his existence until he noticed the sun coming up through the window.
Had he really spent all night here studying Cecil?
"Oh, wow, I didn't realize how long it's been. The sun is coming up now," Carlos acknowledged out loud.
Cecil looked back at the window behind him.
"I should really be going then...Khoshekh must miss me," He remarked.
"Khoshekh..?"
"My cat," Cecil explained.
"You have a cat?" Carlos hadn't expected Cecil to have a pet. Not because he didn't seem like a pet person, more so because he lived in a giant glow cloud that hovered over the town. But also, for Night Vale, cat could be a very loose term.
"I really do have to go, but if you wanted to see me again, I could tell you about him...?"
"Uh, sure, we could meet up again..."
"Neat!" Cecil exclaimed, before he then instantly clapped his hand over his mouth in embarrassment. "Uh...see you later, maybe!"
Carlos had only blinked, and Cecil was gone.
Literally. Because this was Night Vale, and he could do that.
Carlos decided that there was no point in going back to his apartment, since this was when he would've been showing up to the lab anyway.
He spent the whole day working- or, pretending to work. Really, he was just thinking about Cecil.