Chapter Text
[tape recorder clicks on]
A friendly desert community where the sun is hot, the moon is beautiful, and mysterious lights pass overhead while we all pretend to sleep.
Welcome to Night Vale.
Huh! That is an interesting slogan. I wonder if it is indicative of anything.
OH, wait, hold on, before I say anything else, it is June 15th, 2012, 12:09 pm. I am driving into the town of Night Vale, which is a scientifically intriguing small desert town in the southwestern United States that I will be studying with my team of fellow scientists! I am keeping an audio recording of my time here, for archival purposes, among um, other, personal reasons. Archives of scientific observation are very, very important, as they can be referenced later on and give a very detailed, accurate, and precise note of scientific occurrences.
Anyways, that thing I said earlier, about the mysterious lights passing overhead. That is what the sign marking the town line of Night Vale said, when we got here. It was written in squirming ink-black letters that I think may have actually been leeches, but when I moved closer to them to inspect the sign, the letters were replaced by a sentence scrawled out in chalk that said “soon, it will all be over, worry not, fear not, remember not, it’ll all be over”, making no mention of where we were.
It was so exciting! I have never seen something so weird and so scientifically fascinating happen so quickly and so unexpectedly! Night Vale is by far the most scientifically interesting city in the United States, and there are many scientifically interesting places in the United States, ones that are home to extraterrestrial beings, humanoid moths, odd seismic events, and a variety of other strange and scientifically anomalous attributes. And none of those places come even close to how interesting Night Vale is, which has shown itself to be scientifically outstanding in only a few short minutes! Or at least, I believe it was a few minutes ago. The clock in my car said 12:15 when I stepped out to investigate the sign, and it said 1:34 when I got back into it, and then 5:702.6 when I checked it a second time. I have a feeling...I have a feeling that time may be weird here. Weird’s a scientific word used to describe things that behave in a way that does not conform to the scientific standards set by the community. Everything that occurs naturally can be explained by scientific facts and standards, but there are many things that occur naturally and still have no explanation. The deepest reaches of the ocean, stretching far down into the earth, are full of unsolved mysteries! So much of it is unexplored, and every time a deep-sea exploration vessel travels down into the depths of the ocean, something new is discovered, something scientists were completely unaware of before. I believe that Night Vale is like that. A place that is full of unsolved scientific mysteries, and every day will bring about a new discovery that has heretofore never been heard of before! Except, I will be able to live here and not have to go back up to the surface, and can spend every moment here!
[distant sound of a car coming to a screeching halt]
I think it is also may be like the deep sea because a very large isopod is blocking the road right now. Isopods eat things such as sponges and cucumbers and radiolarians, but they eat dead animal carcasses, too! I wonder if that’s why this one is on the road! Maybe it enjoys roadkill! That would be an interesting reason for an animal like that to exist here. It also makes me wonder if the pressure in Night Vale is different from the pressure of other places in the world. Oh, it would be so interesting if it did! Imagine all of the impacts that would have on...on everything! Maybe I should take out my pressure gauge right now, which is a very scientific device used to measure air pressure, and measure the air pressure and see if it is different from the pressure everything generally is at. If it is any higher, it means that these sand wastes outside of Night Vale are very interesting as well, not just the town of Night Vale itself! It just radiates all sorts of scientifically mysteries that are all absolutely begging to be discovered! I thought that Night Vale was 100% the most scientifically interesting place in the United States, but I am beginning to think it may in fact be supersaturated with scientific intrigue, meaning it may reach levels even higher than 100%! Oh, this is just too exciting!!!
[tape recorder clicks off]
[tape recorder clicks on]
Night Vale, miraculously, had a lab space open for lease! It looks to be in good shape, with a good amount of space and lighting. One of the fume hoods makes a rattling sound when you get too close to it before sagging slightly and producing some kind of an orange ooze, but aside from that the rest of the facilities are amazing! David, Mark and Rochelle say that they feel very comfortable here too. It reminds me of what Rosalind Franklin said once about lab spaces, which was, “to a scientist, a lab is home. A lab is also the grocery store, the gas station you purchase nightcrawlers at, the hair salon, and the run-down barn you sit in on wistful summer nights and gaze into the terrifying sky above in while thinking about how much you really love this big, scary universe.” Most of the equipment we needed we brought, y’know, like beakers, bunsen burners, graduated cylinders, test tubes, pipettes, chainsaws, jackhammers, large strings of candy necklaces, electrophoresis units, umbrellas, and all of the meters that are needed to take various scientific measurements! I am very excited to use our new danger meter! It is a black box with a red light that blinks rapidly and loudly beeps when the danger of something is very high! It has lots of buttons and wires on it to, as all scientific devices do. It will be so exciting to use! Mark is worried that it might be on the fritz, because it has been blinking and beeping non-stop since we arrived in Night Vale and he has been carrying it in his car, but I think that it might be acting this way because there is a lot of danger in all of Night Vale, and all of the events taking place here that we are going to experience! Some of those events, yes, may be dangerous, but many exciting scientific events are also dangerous. When a scientific event is dangerous, however, it means the understanding of that event will help many, many people stay away from the danger of it. If there are many dangerous events occurring in Night Vale, it may be helpful to let the people who live here be aware of that, if they do not already know. Scientific occurrences of a dangerous nature can be readily observable, such as tornadoes, but they can also not be readily observable, such as radiation. One major part of being a scientist is learning about events and telling everyone about those events, so that people may have a greater understanding of the world around them.
This lab is next to a pizza restaurant that must be very popular. A lot of people park their cars in its lot and go into it. However, a lot of people don’t come back out. I saw a man with a blue shirt get out of his yellow convertible, and some indeterminate amount of time later, a different man in nothing but a teal catsuit got into the yellow convertible and drove away. Other times, I have seen people get out of one car, and then get into a completely different car parked in the same space as the previous one. It’s definitely a really popular restaurant, called Big Rico’s, I think. Maybe I should go there, sometimes, not just to investigate the strange occurrences in the parking lot that I have observed but also to investigate the pizza they have.
I got to thinking, just now...did we ever actually call ahead of time to lease this lab? I remember thinking when we drove into town that the lab we rented out was by some pizza restaurant. When he arrived, a large red sign that said “LEASED” was plastered over its previous “FOR LEASE” sign, and I found an envelope in the glove box with a set of keys and a letter from the building’s owner. But...did I actually call the owner and ask? Or did Mark or Rochelle or David? I should ask them and then thank them for being proactive, which is the fifteenth thing a scientist needs to be.
[tape recorder clicks off]
[tape recorder clicks on]
We held a town meeting today! We wanted to tell the members of this community why we are here, what we are hoping to accomplish, and other aspects of our being in this town. I do not know how happy the citizens of Night Vale are with our being here, though. In general, they seem very averse to people who are not from here. There was a lot of shouting of the word “interloper” that lasted for...several minutes, I think, although with the way I am beginning to understand time here, it may not have been several minutes, and could have been several hours. When it finally quieted down, I was able to talk to them, and ask them some questions about their town, to which they all answered with “you’ll get nothing from me, interloper!” and started chanting “turnips” until someone else changed the word being chanted. I did not get any answers, or questions to answer, but I suppose it makes sense that people in a fairly insular place would be wary of an outsider. And, it is...it is not the first time I have felt out of place somewhere, like it was not my home, but someone else’s. Sometimes, feelings are very cutting, but they are so familiar, the amount of hurt you feel doesn’t register as strongly as it might ordinarily. And, in any case, I do not think Night Vale will become my home, necessarily, so much as a temporary place in which I will conduct a lot of research on the scientific happenings in this enthralling town.
I met someone at the town meeting, though, someone who seemed...so much more open and welcoming than the rest of the town was. He was...oh, he was wonderful . He had a rich baritone voice, beautiful eyes, and...and, um, I, I don’t know, when he came up to me with a smile on his face I felt my heart start beating much faster than usual and I felt blood rushing to my face which usually does not happen. In fact, it hasn’t happened in...in quite a while. I had not felt that flustered in so long, I didn’t really know what to say to him. His name um, his name is Cecil, and I think he is the community radio host in this town. That makes sense, given the mellifluous deep temper of his voice with inflections that make the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. He said that he would be willing to report any scientific findings I found to his listeners, and that I should be careful, because existence is full of horrible things capable of ending one’s existence, and isn’t science just the study of those things exactly? I was listening to him, but, um, admittedly, I was not listening at the same time. I was listening to him, and his gravelly voice, and also admiring his outfit, which consisted of a glittery tie-dyed shirt and beautiful bedazzled fringe pants. I noticed, um...other things when he turned around and left. He is definitely very handsome and charismatic. It must be why he is the community’s radio host. I bet the entire town really loves him. It must be very nice, being so firmly cemented in your home the way he is. Waking up every morning and feeling at home...it is something I wish I felt, and something I hope he feels.
I...I haven’t been able to stop thinking about him. I have not forgotten any of the short few minutes I spent talking to him, an amount of time that should have been minuscule but for some reason feel like they amounted to something really huge, something really scary, something really beautiful. He was...just thinking about him, I, um...well, scientifically speaking I mean, that is, according to science, I, um...I fell in love instantly.
[tape recorder clicks off]