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Everyone had seen the shadow. Looking up, they had seen the enormous glowing cloud that it belonged to.
A glowing cloud that had first come to their small desert town back in 2012, and since had floated away. It came back once, but as a citizen, not a threat. It hadn’t really done much to be noticed since then.
Carlos glanced out the window at the luminous cloud in the dark sky as he absently listened to his husband wrap up his show on the radio.
“It’s raining cats and dogs out there,” Carlos muttered to himself, “-literally.”
"And army-dillos, and birdies, too," came a small voice from behind him.
Carlos turned to face a small boy, who was about six years old.
"Esteban!" He exclaimed, "What are you doing out of bed? I already put you to sleep."
"But I wanted to listen to Daddy's show," Esteban explained, "I can't miss it."
"I know, I know, but you're a growing boy, you need your rest," Carlos said as he picked up his son.
"How come Daddy gets to stay up late?" Questioned the boy.
"Because he's a grown-up," Carlos told him, "-and his job needs him to stay up late."
"But why?" Esteban asked as his father carried him back to his room.
"It just does - and you just need to go to sleep," Carlos answered.
"But I'm not sleepy," Esteban claimed, holding back a yawn.
Carlos kissed his forehead, "Whatever you say."
The moments after Esteban fell asleep, Carlos lingered in the doorway for a second.
He looked around.
He saw his sleeping son, with his messy, unkempt brown hair and, of course, his favorite giraffe stuffed animal (the poor thing was only a few years old, but it looked ancient).
He saw the faint light of the glow-in-the-dark stars that dusted the ceiling.
Outside Esteban's window, he could still see the Glow Cloud's light.
Carlos shut the curtains, then turned out the light, and with a final glance at Esteban, shut the door.
He returned to where he had been standing in the living room, and he again looked out the window at the Glow Cloud.
It was still the same as it had been back in 2012 when he'd seen it for the first time.
Carlos recalled how it had frightened him at first, being that he was new to Night Vale and not familiar with its strangeness. However, being the true scientist he was, this did not shake him for long- in fact, it had motivated him more to learn more about this strange thing.
Night Vale was often like that- sometimes a large glowing cloud would hover above the entire town and drop dead animals where it pleased, and it would be normal.
Carlos pondered this as he heard the front door open from the other room- it must be Cecil. He might be as strange as the town, but at least he was consistent. Carlos liked consistency.
Cecil greeted him, but the conversation quickly shifted to what they were both thinking.
“Why would the Glow Cloud be doing this again?” Carlos wondered.
“I don’t know, it seemed just fine with its life for the past few years- it hadn’t even tried to drop dead animals on us!”
“It’s definitely doing something weird- I mean, even Khoshekh came home today.”
“Khoshekh came home? Is he still here?” Cecil asked.
As if with perfect timing, the cat strutted into the room.
“Khoshekh!” Cecil exclaimed, reaching out to pet the cat. Which looked kind of difficult to do, honestly, considering how many eyes Khoshekh had, but Cecil managed.
“That’s strange, though,” Cecil continued when he was done with the cat, “He usually only stops by once in a while, and I’m certain he came last week. Not that I’m complaining, but that and the Glow Cloud coming back is a weird combo. Maybe he doesn’t like watching small, dead mammals fall from the sky? I know I don’t…but you know, Kevin probably would…”
“Speaking of small, dead mammals falling from the sky,” Carlos cut off Cecil before he started talking too much again, “-did you have any trouble getting home?”
“No, but we do have a dead armadillo on the roof of the car that I don’t really want to touch…” Cecil told him, “-not sure what to do about that…”
They were quiet for a moment before Carlos sighed, "I'll take care of it later, but I don't want to go outside if Khoshekh doesn't."
"He is a cat, he would know," Cecil agreed.
"Maybe if we go to bed, it'll pass?" Carlos suggested, "It went away last time, so..."
"And Esteban's already asleep?"
"Yeah."
"Alright," said Cecil, "I'll go kiss him goodnight, but I'll be with you soon."
"Okay," Carlos answered, "Love you?"
"Love you too, bunny."
The next morning, Cecil woke up to find that Esteban was standing by the foot of the bed, watching his fathers sleep.
"Lights in the sky, Esteban, what are you doing?" A startled Cecil asked.
"I didn't want to wake you up," Esteban explained.
"Well...yes, but you don't need to watch us sleep. What did you need?"
"The clouds are gone."
"The clouds are gone?"
"Yeah, like the big glowy-ing one that dropped birdies."
"The Glow Cloud is..."
Cecil got out of bed, and he went outside, even without getting dressed. He looked up at the sky, and found...nothing.
The sky was blue, and the sun was bright, and Cecil could feel the desert sand beneath his feet. And of course, there was the helicopter that belonged to the Sheriff's Secret Police, but other than that, not a thing in the sky. No clouds to be seen, glowing or otherwise. It was just a normal, abnormal Night Vale day.
Cecil looked down to see that Esteban had followed him outside.
"The sky is so clean today. No clouds," The boy exclaimed, "-you can even see the eye in the sky!"
Cecil nodded before he heard his husband call from the doorway, "Get back inside, you two, you aren't even dressed!"
Back inside, Carlos inquired to Cecil about how the Glow Cloud had just disappeared so suddenly.
"I mean, it was at least seen floating away from the town before," Carlos said, "-now it's just gone!"
Carlos had thought that since Cecil was the Voice of this town, he should have a good idea of why it had happened, but really, Cecil knew as much as he did.
"I don't know why it happened like this. I don't know why the Glow Cloud just decided to cause chaos again after so many years, only to mysteriously disappear the next morning," Cecil had said in response, "-that's just Night Vale weather."