Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Cecil had now gone twenty five hours without sleep. Three of them had been spent packing his entire life into the back of his old pickup truck, twenty-one had been spent driving across several states, and one had been dedicated solely to finding a road that his map insisted should exist but that he had obviously been too tired to find the first five tries.

At long last, he was finally here: Night Vale Community Radio. The radio station was the entire reason he had packed up what little he had to his name and spent most of the last day driving to parts of the U.S. that he had never seen before. This was his newest place of employment, and he couldn’t wait to throw himself into work. 

Presumed place of employment, Cecil reminded himself as he pushed open one of the doors and went inside the building. And what perfect luck, there was someone right inside of the lobby, looking up at one of the ceiling tiles. It was a younger man with bright red hair and a badge clipped to his shirt collar that read INTERN: CHAD 2.

“Good morning,” Cecil smiled. “I’m Cecil. I believe I should have a meeting with Mr. Rout?”

Chad didn’t respond. He didn’t look down from the tile at all. Cecil glanced up at it, half expecting a spider or even a lizard—this was the desert, after all—but there was nothing. Not even a water stain.

“Uhm… hello?” Cecil tried again. “Chad, right?”

At the sound of his name, Chad blinked once. Then he blinked rapidly, tearing his gaze down from the ceiling to instead look at Cecil. 

“Oh, hello!” Chad smiled. “You must be Cecil. I’m Chad! It’s nice to meet the Voice.”

“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” Cecil grinned. “I was told there was one last interview thing I had to pass before I would know if I actually got the job or not.”

“One last…” Chad looked confused for a second before realization struck him, “Oh, the test! I completely forgot! Crap, oh, management is going to be so mad…” 

Chad’s gaze traveled to their right and he noticeably paled. Cecil had never actually seen someone pale so drastically before, and he followed Chad’s gaze expecting to see something absolutely horrible—but it was a completely normal hallway with a door at the far end. The door had a plaque that read MANAGEMENT on it, and there was a red envelope half sticking out of the crack at the bottom. 

“Oh, man, a red envelope…” Chad actually gulped. “I’m so screwed…”

“Mr. Rout seemed pretty nice,” Cecil tried to reassure him. “I don’t think he’d get mad over one small misstep.”

“One small misstep!” Chad’s eyebrows furrowed in dismay, “Oh, but this is a big one. I should have already had Carlos here!”

“Carlos?” Cecil repeated, eager for more information. “Is he the head honcho around here?”

Chad shook his head, “Look, I think I can save us both if I just get him here as soon as possible. Can you follow me?”

The intern didn’t actually wait for Cecil to agree. Chad started walking down the hall to their left, away from the door he seemed so afraid of.

Cecil knew he would probably be better off just going straight to management and introducing himself, but he could remember his summer as an intern and how terrified he had been to mess things up, so he followed Chad instead. He would do what he could to try and make things easier for him. 

Chad made a left down another hall and stopped abruptly at a door labeled SUPPLY CLOSET. When he opened the door, Cecil could see it was a supply closet. There were shelves on both sides of the wall with various cleaning supplies. A wet floor sign and a large roll-able mop bucket took up most of the room on the floor. There was barely enough room for one man to stand in there, let alone the both of them.

But then Chad reached in and pulled the chain to turn on the light and the room became illuminated. Where before Cecil had seen what was obviously a supply closet, now he saw that it was actually a much bigger rectangular room. There was a table set right in the middle of the room with two chairs facing each other, a fake blue plant—was that a person hidden behind it?—with large leaves, and an old radio sitting on a little stand against the wall on the left. The entire back wall was littered with symbols he couldn’t make heads or tails of.

For a long, ponderous moment, Cecil didn’t know what to think. The person standing behind the fake plant was wearing a tight, leather balaclava and was clad completely in black. There was a metallic smell in the air, as if the symbols that looked like they were written in blood were actually written in blood. 

And then he realized what must be happening, almost giving himself away with a laugh. It was all so done up, executed perfectly! 

It wasn’t the first time he had been hazed for being the newbie, but at least this one hadn’t resulted in him being blindfolded and shoved in a trunk, so it was already turning out much better than the time in college had. He wasn’t quite sure how they had pulled off the illusion trick to make the room actually look like a supply closet in the dark. Projections of some sort? He would have to ask when the whole thing was over.

“I’m going to contact Carlos, can you wait in here while I do?” Chad looked nervously over his shoulder. 

Cecil had to give it to him: he was really committed to his part. 

“It’s not a problem,” Cecil assured, going and taking the seat furthest from the door.

It was a strategic choice, putting his back to the balaclava person. It would be much easier to pretend he actually hadn’t seen them if he couldn't see them at all anymore; after all, he was nowhere near as good an actor as Chad.

Half an hour later, Chad came back in the room with a glass full of a green looking substance. Cecil peered into it, trying to decide if the consistency was more like a smoothie or yogurt. 

“Cactus eye juice,” Chad rushed out. “Good for hydration in this awful heat!”

He left before Cecil could even thank him. Cecil stared after him, and then looked back at his drink. He sniffed it cautiously and smiled to himself—petrichor. He tilted it just enough to get a lick. He wasn’t sure how to describe the taste of a cactus, but the bursts of sharp flavor made him think of their spikes. There was also just a hint of saltiness.

Cecil hummed to himself. He never would have thought that cacti juice would be so delicious, he was learning so many things about the desert already!

A little later, the door opened and one of the most handsome men Cecil had ever seen entered the room. He had perfect caramel skin and gloriously thick, dark hair that had a dignified, if premature, touch of grey at his temples. He was wearing one of those white lab coats, and Cecil had never thought of them as flattering before, but it really suited this man. The only other interesting thing about him was the bright orange briefcase he was carrying. 

Because he was weak, Cecil allowed himself one second of imaging his hands tangled in those wonderful locks, and then he blinked the image away, stood up, and put on his most charming smile.

“Hi, I’m Cecil.” Cecil held out his hand to shake, “You must be Carlos!”

“Today I must,” the beautiful man agreed.

He stared at Cecil’s hand long enough that it became awkward. The silence stretched on and Cecil lowered his arm, wiping his suddenly sweaty palm on his khaki pants.  

Never one to stay silent for long, Cecil forged on. “Chad didn’t really tell me what your role here is, and Hank—sorry, Mr. Rout—didn’t mention anyone else who worked here. What do you do?”

Cecil hoped he hadn’t just messed up. Calling a potential boss by their first name was normal where he came from, but Night Vale could be more traditional. The little game they were playing with him was unnerving him, and it was making him forget his manners. 

Luckily, Carlos didn’t react at all. He just opened his briefcase and pulled out a clipboard and pen, taking a moment to rifle through the papers. 

“I suppose your idea of things would probably label me as a scientist.” Carlos finally said, “I am here to make sure you’re compatible with our little community. To do that, I need a small sample of your blood.” 

Cecil almost smiled in sheer relief. They could try to dress it up all they liked, but he knew now that this was a drug test. 

Carlos glanced over Cecil’s shoulder, where he knew that balaclava person was hiding. He spoke loudly and deliberately, “We have some paperwork to go over before I can take your blood, and as you are new here and do not yet have the approved stamp to sign things with, the usage of a pen is allowed in this instance.”

The clipboard was pushed over to Cecil’s side of the table and he grabbed it up immediately. There were multiple pages and Cecil bit his lip, wondering if he should just sign and get it over with, but then the little voice in the back of his head that sounded just like his sister started to speak up and he resigned himself to reading every last word. 

This, just as with everything else so far, was very thorough. He was honestly very impressed. Whoever had wrote up these papers had made it seem like they were actually legally binding, with clauses to protect him so that his blood was not used in: rituals, regardless of whether their outcome was meant to be good or bad; drinks; mind control of the blood or the owner of the blood; summonings, regardless of whether their outcome was meant to be good or bad; the opening of doors; the making of homunculi; or the making of a super crop of invisible corn that would out rival a John Peters’ crop.

“This all looks to be in order,” Cecil tried not to snicker as he signed and dated at the bottom of the last page. 

When he looked up, he realized Carlos had been busy taking more things out of his briefcase. There was now a needle, a mortar and pestle, a scroll that looked close to disintegrating, a liquid that shone like moonlight in a small stoppered bottle, and a mason jar of sand sitting on the table. 

“Excellent,” Carlos didn’t even look at him, too busy pouring the silvery liquid into the jar of sand and shaking it up. “Have you consumed anything of Night Vale?”

Knowing he wouldn’t be seen, Cecil rolled his eyes, tiring of this little game. 

“Yes, Chad got me some cacti juice.”

“Cactus eye.”

“That’s what I said.”

“No,” Carlos raised his head and enunciated clearly: “Cactus eye. Well, the tears to be specific. We’ve gotten much better about not having to take the whole eye.”

“I guess that explains the salty taste!” Cecil forced himself to laugh.

Really, this was all getting to be a bit much. The only thing he could think of was that this was going to be the first segment on the air that he did—a good laugh at how they had messed so thoroughly with the outsider. 

Or maybe one of those prank shows? He tried to glance around without being too obvious about it, looking for a hidden camera. 

Carlos finished shaking up the silvery liquid and the sand mixture, pouring a small amount of it into the mortar. It immediately turned a dark black and smelled pleasantly of lavender and oranges. He grabbed the scroll and ripped off a couple of pieces, sprinkling it into the grainy substance in the mortar. He used the pestle to grind everything together, releasing more and more of that lavender scent until the oranges disappeared entirely. 

“Alright,” Carlos set the mortar down with a definitive click. “Roll up your sleeve.”

Cecil rolled up the sleeve of his left arm, lying his forearm out on the table and making a fist to help the vein pop. He turned his head away as Carlos leaned over his arm, not wanting to see the needle go in. He could still hear his blood filling the reservoir, but it was over in a moment. 

Cecil looked back at Carlos just as the man held the reservoir filled with his blood up to the light, staring at it with wide eyes and an even wider smile. 

“You have beautiful blood,” Carlos complimented. 

That really should not make Cecil want to blush. He bit his tongue and pressed down on the little spot the needle had entered, trying to decide how much energy it would take up to be angry. Carlos hadn’t even used one of those little sanitary pads to wipe his arm beforehand!

But the problem was that Cecil was tired.  He had spent the last day awake just to get here, but it was more than that. It was all the things he didn’t want to think about, too, and it was easier just to go along with the hazing or the prank TV show or whatever it was because being angry would just be harder. He was too tired to be angry anymore. 

So he kept his mouth shut and watched as Carlos placed a drop of his blood in the mortar. Two drops. Three drops.

The black grainy substance in the mortar began to undulate, quivering and wriggling this way and that. It turned purple, expanding in the mortar like dough might in a bowl, little bubbles forming on the surface. The first bubble popped with the soft sound of a distant scream, and then another bubble popped with another scream, and then another and another.

The radio turned on with a loud blip of static and it made Cecil jump.

“The City Council announces the opening of a new dog park at the corner of Earl and Summerset, near the Ralphs.”

Was that his voice? Had those been his screams? Where did they get his voice? Where did they—

“ —Do not approach them. Do not approach the dog park— ”

The purple mixture began to smoke, yellow tendrils curling into the air—

“ —not look for any period of time at the hooded figures. The dog park will not harm you. ”

The mixture began to glow violently, growing, expanding, and Cecil tossed an arm up to cover his eyes as the light bore into them and then there was a loud POP as the mixture gave in and exploded and Cecil could feel a small splatter that landed on his hand burning him, branding him—

The radio turned off with another harsh blip of static. The room fell silent.

“Cecil…”

Cautiously, Cecil lowered his arm. When he realized the bright light had faded, he peeked one eye open slowly and then the other, staring down at the table in horror. The substance had exploded over the table in an almost ellipse-like shape, with the majority of the goop landing in a weird heap in the center of the ellipse. It was still smoking, and the mortar had melted into a sad stone crumble.

And Carlos was staring at him with an enraptured expression, “You’re perfect, Cecil. Perfect for Night Vale.”

Cecil stared at him. He didn’t know what to say or what to do. He didn’t know what to think. His mind felt like it was buzzing, humming, like the static of the radio was filling every last corner. 

Idly, he rubbed the small bit of goop that had landed on his hand off. His eyes returned back to the rest of it that had landed on the table. Something unnerved him about the shape. What was it? The curve of the ellipses, the different levels of the substance in the middle? There was way more of the mixture than he thought made sense. Too much. Was it still growing? 

“Cecil?”

“Is this-” Cecil’s voice cracked. He had to swallow once, twice. “Is this going to be a segment for my first show, then? You guys really went all out for this prank.” 

“Fascinating…” Instead of giving up the charade, Carlos just looked even more besotted. He reached across the table and put a hand over the one that Cecil was still scratching at, “Do you want to go on a date?”

Cecil looked down at his hand, but his gaze went back to the purple goop on the table. He realized all at once what the shape reminded him of, what had been making his skin prickle.

It was an eye.

And it was looking back.

Chapter Text

It hadn’t been a prank.

It hadn’t been some elaborate TV show, either.

He had done so well convincing himself of that, but then he had politely excused himself to the bathroom to splash some cold water on his face and he had seen the floating black cat. He had felt all over but there were no wires holding the cat up, and he had been unable to move him despite how hard he had tried. 

The cat was just floating by one of the sinks, and Cecil finally had to acknowledge that whatever was happening here was real. That or he was insane, which… he would just have to operate under the assumption that everything was real. 

Cecil spent a minute considering what he should do next, and he almost laughed when he realized how simple of a choice it was. He could just leave!

And that was exactly what he did. He walked out of the bathroom, he walked past where Carlos and the balaclava person were talking just outside of the storage room, he walked past Chad, and he walked right out of the radio station. 

No one tried to stop him.

They didn’t need to.

Two hours later, Cecil gave up. It didn’t matter what road he took; it didn’t even make a difference when he had been desperate enough to just drive straight out into the desert. He always ended up back at the radio station, or at the pizza place downtown. 

Tired, hungry, and frustrated, he pulled his truck over in front of some random house. He had just passed a giant car lot, but the cars he saw in the lot were hazy and one dimensional and he was too scared to actually go inside of it just in case he also started to fade out of reality. 

Cecil put his head down on his wheel and clenched his eyes shut tight. It was obvious he couldn’t leave, and it would do no use to continue to try, but what else could he do? What other options did he have?

A knock on the window to his right made him pick his head back up. He looked over and saw an older black woman staring at him with an unimpressed look on her face. She had used her cane to knock on the window, and now she made an impatient gesture with it. Cecil rolled down his window just an inch so that he could hear her. 

“Look, could you maybe have your little breakdown somewhere else?” She huffed, “You’re making my angels sad.”

“Oh, I… I’m sorry.” Cecil scrubbed a hand down his face, “I just… uh, yeah, sorry.”

“He’s not from here,” a new voice spoke up behind the older woman.

He hadn’t seen anyone else behind her, and he blamed his exhaustion for it. This other woman dwarfed the older woman entirely, taller and paler with two arms on each side and too many eyes for him to try to count. It hurt to look at her directly.

The older woman’s expression softened, “My apologies, young man. I know this town can be a bit much for newcomers. I’m Old Woman Josie, and this is one of the angels, Erika. Why don’t you come in for some moondrop tea?”

“I…” Cecil hesitated for just a moment. “Yeah, okay. That would be nice.”

Cecil turned off his car, got out of it, and followed Josie and Erika into the house. He was instantly reminded of his grandmother’s house; warm and comforting and inviting, at least as long as he didn’t look too closely at the shape of the skulls on the mantel or the weird stone circle in front of the fireplace.

Josie went and settled herself down in the armchair, leaning her cane up against the coffee table in front of her. Cecil sat on the couch opposite her, scratching at the burn on his hand. Erika excused herself to the kitchen to get them their tea. 

“What’s your name?” Josie asked. 

“I’m—” 

“He’s hurt,” a voice said from behind him. “Should I get the first aid kit, Josie?”

Cecil jumped, nearly giving himself whiplash with how fast he turned his head to look at this new person behind him. There had been no one else in the room when they entered it and his vantage point on the couch should have let him see anyone come in, and yet here someone was.

This person had four arms just like Erika, but all of them were on their left side. Cecil couldn’t make a guess at gender, just tall with long hair and fewer eyes. 

“Yes, thank you, Erika.” Josie said.

Cecil watched as this new Erika went down the hall, “How many Erikas are there?”

“Look around.”

At first, Cecil didn’t understand what Josie meant. He looked around the room and now that both Erikas had exited it was just the two of them. It was as he turned his head to look at the circle of stones a little more that he caught something just on the edge of his peripheral vision.

And then he couldn’t not see them. Every way his eyes flickered, there were more and more beings on the edge of his vision. There one second and gone the next, too quick for him to focus on and get any real details. Definitely too many to count, because all of them looked slightly different in their shape or their clothing or their wings or their lack of heads or their number of eyes or their glows. He clenched his eyes shut and tried not to see anymore, but he could feel as the couch sunk in on his left and he almost shrieked when something touched his hand. 

He opened his eyes again, but it was just Erika. Well, just the one Erika that had four left arms. One hand was holding something easily recognizable as a first aid kit, and one hand was lifting his own to look closer at the burn as they made a soothing noise.

“They can’t all form at once or there’d be no walking room,” Josie sighed.

Unnerved and unsure what else to say, Cecil decided to round back to a question he hadn't been able to answer.

“I’m Cecil Gershwin-Palmer, and it’s very nice to meet you. Uh, all of you.

“Oh, hun.” Josie’s voice dipped a little, and when Cecil looked he could see something like pity on her face. “Sorry for making you look. I know it can be a bit much, but it will be better for you to learn here in friendly company. Not everythin' on the edges of our vision is happy to stay there.”

Cecil flinched as the Erika wiped something across his burn, “This place is terrifying. How can you stand it?”

“I was born here,” Josie laughed. “You’re always welcome to leave.”

“I can’t, actually.” Cecil admitted. And then, because he still couldn’t believe it: “I can’t leave. I spent the last two hours trying, but… it didn’t work.”

“Huh…” Josie leaned back in her chair, “No wonder you decided to pull over and cry.”

“I wasn’t crying!” 

"Of course you weren't," Josie agreed easily. "What made you come here?”

“I was offered a job at the radio station, but when I went it was… well, I guess normal for you, but I had no idea about any of it. Some guy called Carlos made sure I was ‘compatible’ with Night Vale and he said I was, but there was this weird eye, and…” Cecil shuddered. “Even now I can feel that damn thing looking at me.”

The Erika paused for a moment where they were putting a bandage over his burn. They turned to give Josie a long look, and whatever passed silently between them was not something he could figure out.

"You..." Josie trailed off for a moment, "You didn't know anything about Night Vale?"

“No!"

Josie muttered something in a language Cecil didn’t know, “I’m sorry, kid. There’s a law in place that’s supposed to keep stuff like this from happening. It makes businesses go through City Council and the Sheriff’s Secret Police if they want to hire outsiders. The Sheriff’s Secret Police is supposed to vet the person thoroughly, and if they pass that check then the outsider must be informed of our city and provided with a newcomer welcome packet to help them prepare.”

“And they take that welcome packet stuff at face value?” Cecil didn’t know how anyone could. He certainly wouldn’t have.

“There has been some push back from outsiders because most of what they’re told and what’s in the packet is a little hard for them to believe, but we do try to warn them.” Josie shrugged, as if that was enough to wipe their hands clean of whatever resulted. “Regardless, failure to follow this law is punishable by banishment to The Cube.”

“And let me guess, the cube is worse than death?”

“You have a version of The Cube where you’re from?” Josie sounded surprised.

Cecil sighed, “No, I just had an inkling that would be the answer.” 

There was a knock on the window. Cecil didn’t look, but he heard an Erika slide it open. A second later, this Erika, one with just two eyes, brought Josie a piece of crumpled up paper. Josie thanked her and carefully smoothed it out.

“Does the name Hank Rout mean anything to you?”

“Yeah,” Cecil sat up a little straighter. “He’s the guy that reached out to me about the job.”

“Carlos wished to let you know that he doesn’t exist,” Josie looked back up at him.

“I…” Cecil shook his head, unbelieving. 

Josie handed the note back to Erika and Erika brought it over to Cecil so he could read it himself.

Hank Rout doesn't exist, but that doesn't mean the station isn't hiring you! Management seemed excited when I told them how well Night Vale took to you, and because your position on payroll is just as nonexistent as Hank Rout. Good news is that you can start tomorrow, which is great because that's when the new dog park opens and the radio already made it clear you at least do a show on that.

Here's my number if you need anything 554-55534-111344. Or if you don't need anything!

-XOXO Carlos

A small amount of giddiness started to bubble up inside of him and Cecil fought off the hysterical laughter, “I talked to him twice!” 

“Well… I suppose this could just mean that whoever Hank Rout really is is not Hank Rout. A lawbreaker and a liar, how tedious!”

“It has to be someone at the station, right?” Cecil tried to grasp at something, “I mean, who else would hire someone to host? Plus, Chad knew about me!”

"We all knew about you," Josie dismissed. When Cecil just gaped at her, she continued. "You were in our shared dream last night. Well, Station Management's annoyance at you being brought in was in our dreams last night. They've been quite happy running their hourly segments of screeching intermixed with wolves howling and fungus communicating.”

Josie’s eyes widened, and she glanced at the window the note had come through. Cecil looked as well this time, but most of the view was taken up by a bush.

“Erikas, if you could provide some noise, please?”

A buzzing noise rose up from all around them, mouth after mouth after mouth making a grinding noise that shouldn’t be possible. A headache bloomed to life, making him wince. A hand squeezed his, and Cecil looked to see it was the Erika who had tended to his burn. They offered him a small smile before joining in the cacophony of noise, but he could no longer hear it. He looked up to see Josie watching him.

“No prying ears can get through that,” she explained smugly. “I didn’t want poor not-Jeremiah out there to actually have to use those handcuffs he carries.”

Cecil opened his mouth and then closed it. Things would move a lot quicker if he didn’t ask questions and if he ignored the :( that was now drawn on to the window in crayon.

“See, I and a lot of the other normal citizens had assumed the radio station to be just like the Night Vale Harbor and Waterfront Recreation Area and—”

But he couldn’t help himself, “What’s wrong with the harbor?”

“We are a desert community, dear.”

“...in my defense, I haven’t slept for over a day now.”

“Poor thing,” Josie tutted. “You can sleep on the couch tonight, if you don’t mind an Erika possibly joining you.”

“What were you saying about the radio station?”

“Oh, yes, sorry.” Josie rubbed at a spot on her jeans with a frown, “There was no radio host before you, just Station Management and whatever racket they made the intern play. So why bring you in? If it was City Council or Sheriff’s Secret Police then I can’t see why you weren’t told about things. So who’s going to try and control you?”

“I’m not going to let myself be controlled,” Cecil protested.

Josie waved this off, “We all say the same at first.” 

Cecil just stared at her. An Erika patted his arm soothingly, then another Erika put a cup of moondrop tea in his hand, and then all the Erikas stopped their buzzing. He was sure he should feel something, but he couldn't feel anything at all anymore.

Chapter Text

Cecil cracked his fingers and rolled out some minor stiffness in his neck. After a suspiciously long sleep—he’d woken up sometime around 3pm with a few feathers in his mouth and his hair, so he was pretty sure who he had to thank for that—he was feeling a little more ready to take on the world. Or, in this case, to take on Night Vale specifically.

He had decided that he just wouldn’t think about most of it. There was already so much he was refusing to think about it, what would it hurt to ignore a little more? He couldn’t leave, so it would be better to just try to go along with things and figure something out from there. 

Cecil glanced up to see Chad counting down. When the intern hit one, the red ON AIR sign lit up and he got to work.

“Good evening, Night Vale!” Cecil grinned at Chad, and Chad gave him a thumbs up. Good, that meant they could hear him. “My name is Cecil Palmer and I am your new radio host. Well, a friend I made last night told me I’m your only radio host, so I hope actually hearing talking isn’t too much of a surprise!”

“I have had…” Cecil paused, debating how to phrase things for a moment. “Quite the welcome, so far! There’s a lot that I didn’t know when I came to, uhm, interview for this position, but I promise that I am trying to learn as fast as I can.”

“Now, to start things off, I have an announcement from the City Council. The City Council announces…”

Cecil trailed off, reading the announcement. He swallowed and crumpled the paper up, already knowing what it said by heart after what he had heard yesterday.

But he could change this much, couldn’t he?

“Alright, so, it looks like there’s a new dog park that’s been built!” Cecil put on a cheery tone and scratched at the burn he had gotten yesterday through the bandage, “Unfortunately, no one can actually go to the dog park. Not even dogs. So keep that in mind, Night Vale! If you see hooded figures there, don’t think too much about it and just go the other way.”

Cecil continued, “I’m new to Night Vale, so I admittedly don’t quite get why a dog park would be built that no one is allowed to access. I just got my welcome packet today and I’m still reading through it, so if I make any faux pas please ignore them. My new friend, intern Chad, will be watching over me from the control booth and doing his best to help guide me.”

And the show continued like that. Cecil read the news bits that Chad had gathered for him, putting his own spin on things where he could. It was the first time that he had felt anything approaching normal—radio was something he was already used to, and he loved talking to his audience. 

“There was a press release this morning,” Cecil leaned back in his chair and spread out the papers in front of him. “The Night Vale Business Association is proud to announce the opening of the brand new Night Vale Harbor and Waterfront Recreation Area. Out of curiosity, I went with Old Woman Josie this afternoon to view the facilities, and I can tell you that it is absolutely top of the line and beautiful. I’m no expert in this stuff, but it seems like it's well made and sturdy. There’s a boardwalk for pedestrians, and plenty of stands ready for local food vendors and merchants to turn into a bustling public marketplace.”

Cecil had to remind himself not to laugh, but it was impossible to keep the amusement out of his voice. He had never been great at concealing what he was feeling. 

He cleared his throat, “Now, the rather obvious drawback does seem to be that we are in the middle of the desert and there is no actual water at the waterfront. There’s just sagebrush, rocks, and a lot of sand to look at right now. Maybe wait until a flash flood to get the full waterfront experience?”

Josie continued to knit her newest project as she listened to the boy on the radio. She hadn’t expected to have him stay so long, but a few of the Erikas had taken it upon themselves to make sure he got plenty of rest, and by the time he had woken up it was just easier to show him around town and get him his welcome packet. 

She didn’t know what Night Vale had in store for him, but he had already been claimed. She had seen a lot die in this town, and one day with him hadn’t been enough to tell her if he would be one of the lucky few who made it. She hoped he would be, though. He was nice and had manners.

Cecil’s voice was bright and clear. He had a good voice for the radio. His tone was only a little different than when he had been with her last night—a little deeper, more like he was talking to a close friend than a stranger. Warm and inviting.

They hadn’t gotten to discuss much of his past, but it was easy to hear in his confidence and how little he hesitated that this was work he was used to. That was good, he’d need some kind of normal if he was going to make it.

“The weather for today is… just music?” Cecil’s confusion was clear even through the radio.

Josie looked up and shared a glance with one of the Erikas. There was a rustling noise as Cecil did something with papers in his hand, and a long moment of nothing but silence.

Then a voice, hissing from a distance: “Cecil! Cecil, what are you doing?”

“That’s Intern Chad, everyone!” Cecil announced happily. “He’s currently judging me from the now slightly open door to the control booth and trying to pretend he isn’t after I just said that. But as we are reporting live, I thought we could just go ahead and check the weather live as well!”

“You’re not supposed to leave the booth!”

“Oh, it’s fine.” Cecil’s voice got further away, “We have mobile equipment for a reason, and all I’m doing is going to a window. Now hand me that headset. No, the other one. Yes, thank you, and…” Cecil’s voice got closer again, “Sorry about that, everyone, but I thought I’d bring you along with me.”

This new microphone seemed to be more sensitive, because Cecil’s footsteps were picked up. There was a secondary set following just behind him, and Josie could just picture that poor intern following him and wringing his hands. 

“Ah, here we go! Well, it looks like the sun is just starting to set, Night Vale. I assume it’s probably still hot, but let me just—” a grunt as he pushed a window open. “Oh.”

A long pause.

“Well, listeners, it’s actually kind of cold. And, uh, raining? Even though it looks dry?” Cecil laughed, “Right, why wouldn’t it be. I guess it might be a good idea to bring an umbrella with you if you plan to do errands tonight.”

Cecil’s footsteps resumed, “Okay, I guess we’ll just go to… Well, the weather, just to make sure Chad doesn’t try to strangle me with that cord he’s holding.”

Chad hissed something in the background, but it was too faint for Josie to hear. One of the Erikas laughed.

Cecil wrapped the cord of the microphone around his fingers while waiting for the music to stop. For a minute, he thought that maybe the song somehow conveyed the weather to a normal Night Valean, like maybe the genre meant a cold rain or something, but then he looked up and saw Chad’s confused scrunched up face and figured it was just another absurd thing in a long list of absurd things. 

He looked down at the hand playing with the wire of the microphone. He admired his favorite purple nail polish, and the little silver purple quarter moons scattered within, the ones that had taken him so long to get just right because the tiny moons on them had refused to cooperate. Even now, one of the sneaky little things was trying to slide off his pinky nail—

That wasn’t his hand. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath, and then slowly released it. When he opened his eyes again, his hand was just as it should be: fingernails that were bitten down to nothing at all instead of grown out and painted.

Cecil unwrapped his hand from the cord, but he didn’t realize that one of the corners of the bandage had started to come up and gotten caught on it. He ripped it right off, wincing at the surprise sting of pain. He picked the bandage off of the cord quickly and folded the sticky parts against themselves, tossing the thing into the nearest trash can.

The man singing kept going on about digging deeper. Cecil looked at his burn to find it looking back at him. Saliva filled his mouth and he had to swallow against the rising tide of nausea, heat pricking across his face and his lower back. No wonder he had felt like he was being watched still.

An eye. The burn was an eye.

Was he hysterical? He felt a little hysterical. He didn’t know how one knew if they were hysterical or not. 

The eye blinked, and Cecil began to laugh.