by Joseph Fink
And the lazy day continues. A neon sign advertising the World’s Best Burgers blinks uselessly in the glaring haze of the sun, its light as small as the probability of its claim. The Earth is starting to slow its rotation, joining in on the mass malaise. Magnetic fields are going crazy. They are the only things going crazy, everything else is completely mellowed out.
Those people with still functioning hearts and lungs are lounging around, saying “Ah, who cares?” and “What a bother” when presented with stimulus or thought. The Earth is slowing. Gravity is slacking off. My mic is floating.
Carlos is also floating, and he’s taking this opportunity to clean out the gutter on his roof. How industrious. How . . . ah. I don’t really have the energy to think of another word.
Radio waves are reacting strangely to the loss of gravity, the change in magnetism as the Earth slows, so if you are having difficulty receiving this message, we apologize, but we won’t do anything about it. Doing things, right? Movement, you know? Existing? Do you see what I mean?
Oh, what’s that? Intern Maureen is flicking her eyes up in her otherwise motionless face. Her mouth is set into a deep lull, her cheeks are slack. I believe she is indicating something. I suppose I should turn my head and look. I suppose. Oh. Oh, all right. Here I go. Listeners, I am engaging the muscles in my neck, and I am turning my head. Ah, I see. The sun is going out. Yes, a black tumor of darkness, of absence, is on the face of the brightness. The brightness is dimming. The source of all life is going, is joining the rest of us in taking today to do nothing. That’s probably not good. We should probably do something about that. But . . . It’s like . . . well, anyway, at least I got to see how Breaking Bad ended.
And now, I don’t so much take you, as just kind of leave you, just kind of disappear and gently nudge you toward, in the heart of a world that soon won’t be, the weather.
WEATHER: “Mijn Manier” by Brainpower
Welcome back. Welcome back, I guess, from a crisis. Welcome back from, I guess, a crisis. How was it solved? How was the day saved?
It wasn’t. It didn’t need to be. There are lulls and gaps and rests and stops, but this world stumbles on. The sun flared back. The world restarted. Still bodies, blue in the gray street, gasped suddenly and rose back into the blue-gray light of day.
We wake up. We move on. No state is our state forever. All is fleeting.
Frances Donaldson, manager of the Antiques Mall, has gone back to violently smashing her stock of old items, as is usual. The Faceless Old Woman Who Secretly Lives in Your Home has gone back to flitting around in the corner of your eye, rearranging your belongings according to some unknown purpose. The flies are still buzzing around that trash can, but with more verve, more zest.
Intern Maureen brought me some coffee. That’s helping. Coffee helps sometimes though, doesn’t it? Other times it just makes things worse. I mean everything does.
Business is booming. People are moving. Events, transpiring. All as usual, all returning. We are up! We are full of energy! We are ready for the next great thing to be made for us and delivered to us and done to us!
Carlos, meanwhile, says he’s had a busy day and might take a nap now. That . . . well that sounds nice. Listeners, I think now is the time at which I must say good-bye. There’s a place, here in Night Vale, a place I’d like to be just now. Maybe my lazy day isn’t quite done after all.
Stay tuned next for a keening howl, a scratch at the door, a hood falling suddenly over your face, and a delicious roasted squash recipe your family will just love.
Good night, Night Vale. Good night.
PROVERB: On this day in history: mundanity, and terror, and food, and love, and trees.
EPISODE 36:
“MISSING”
DECEMBER 1, 2013
MY FAVORITE PLAY IS THE LIFE OF GALILEO BY BERTOLT BRECHT. IT’S long and didactic, pretty stilted and varies wildly in quality based on the director. So, basically, go check it out if you haven’t already.
Many of Brecht’s ideas have popped up in my writing. This episode in particular, I wanted to deal with heroism. Not necessarily what it takes to be a hero, but what it means to need a hero. If you believe in free will, and if you believe in democracy, and if you believe in the wisdom of crowds, perhaps heroism is anathema. Perhaps you are the change you wish to see. Or more likely, you are part of a will of people to affect greater good to be moral and just.*
When Galileo is dressed down by his assistant, Andrea, for recanting his scientific teachings before a church inquisition, Galileo admits that he found it more compelling to live than to be martyred. Andrea says, “Unhappy is the land that has no hero.” Galileo retorts, “Unhappy is the land that needs a hero.”
Galileo’s (and Brecht’s) point is that we shouldn’t need heroes. We should have a perfect and peaceful communistic society and la la la. Plus, there is a distinct danger of having a culture that thinks it needs a hero, or, more specifically, thinks it needs saving. (See Clint Eastwood’s 1973 western High Plains Drifter for a prescient tale of early 2000s US politics—the dangerous power we give to those we think can protect us.)
With Tamika, I wanted to set up a hero that Night Vale thinks it needs. Does Night Vale need Tamika? Not saying they don’t or shouldn’t. I’m just saying.
—Jeffrey Cranor
* I write all of this before the 2016 US presidential election. So maybe Trump got elected and you’re a fatalist and a pessimist and you live in a bunker in the middle of the Australian Outback now. Lots of things are possible.
Red sky at night, sailors delight. Red sky at night, the sailors are howling and laughing. The sailors begin to surround us, and the night sky is so very red.
WELCOME TO NIGHT VALE.
Listeners, I hate to start our program off with sad news, but our new station owner, Strexcorp, handed me a missing child alert right as I walked into the studio. Strexcorp is asking Night Vale citizens to be on the lookout for Tamika Flynn, age thirteen. She is described as five-foot-one, stocky build, black hair, and dark eyes, dark, so dark, so wise beyond time, so deep in their understanding that to gaze into them is to gaze into your own death. It is not important where she was last seen or by whom. Why do you need to know that? Why are you asking so many questions? You are taking valuable time away from important and highly fulfilling work at your place of employment, the missing child report reads.
Strexcorp asks that anyone with any knowledge of Tamika Flynn’s whereabouts should contact Strexcorp headquarters by picking up a phone and talking. Don’t worry. You’re not hard to find.
I asked my new supervisor, Daniel, why it’s Strexcorp that is issuing a missing child alert and not Tamika Flynn’s family or the Sheriff’s Secret Police, but he just started shaking and sparking and humming. Then the hallway got too cloudy, and I couldn’t breathe, and my show was starting, so I left him alone. He’s still standing at the studio window staring at me, twitching, sparks subsiding, but his mouth has fallen open, revealing, is that motor oil? Tar? I don’t know, but it’s going to be hard to concentrate if he doesn’t leave.
Let’s go now to the community calendar.
Tuesday there’s a false start, a mistaken understanding of time. Tuesday we will wake and walk to our normal places—our showers, kitchens, cars, desks—only to find the day never began. We will slowly notice an absence of all matter, all light, all time. And then as suddenly as we false started, we will begin our actual day. And everything will happen the same, only because of our awareness of it all, it will happen differently. Less differently at first, but more differently later.
Wednesday will take forever. For. Ever. Not literally. But very near literally. Ugh, Wednesday hasn’t even gotten here, and I already want it over with.
Thursday a faint outline of a dull face will appear in the dark as you try to sleep. You will notice its blank stare, its straight, expressionless lips, its thick brow, and the subtle hint of slow, collected breaths. It will seem to be watching you, curious abo
ut you, as if it were not from here. It is not from here. You will lock eyes. You will barely be able to make out the face’s humanoid features, but you will know, deep down it is not human, not human at all. What does it want, you will think. Probably nothing. Let it go. Get some sleep.
Friday is an open house at the Night Vale Community College. Thinking about furthering your education? Considering taking Winter Semester classes? Well, it’s a trap. Do not go near the Night Vale Community College this Friday. Nice try giant worms, but we know your tricks. Faking a community college open house is very obvious, don’t you think? I mean, it was a nice touch creating a fake press release to get into various news outlets like ours, but we see through you. We really do. Your skin is translucent, and it’s kind of gross. No offense.
Saturday everyone is their own person. You are free to disregard others and recognize yourself as one, for once. Pour some wine. Draw a bath, light some incense, and grab a city-approved novel. It’s you time.
Sunday will be full of regret. Also joy. Also laughter. Also conversation. Also long stretches of unmemorable moments. It will mostly be that last thing. In your old age, as you look back on your life, if someone were to ask what happened on that Sunday . . . you remember? that one Sunday with the regret and joy and laughter and conversation? . . . If someone were to ask you that, you would be hard-pressed to come up with a single memorable moment from this coming Sunday.
This has been the community calendar.
An update on our missing child report. We just received word that thirteen-year-old Tamika Flynn is not missing. This word came from Tamika herself. Witnesses said they saw Tamika standing atop the pedestal of one of this town’s most historical works of art: the 138-year-old bronze statue of actor Lee Marvin, just outside the Night Vale Post Office. Tamika told a gathered crowd that she was not missing, has never been missing. She clarified that she has always been where she has been. She has always been from where she is from. And she will always be going where she is going.
Witnesses reported that Tamika had a canvas tote bag full of heavy stones over her left shoulder, a worn-out copy of Willa Cather’s Death Comes for the Archbishop in her right rear pants pocket, and that she was still holding the severed head of the librarian she defeated so valiantly in August, saving our town and all of the participants of the library’s treacherous Summer Reading Program.
As yellow helicopters began to approach her, Tamika shouted to the gathered crowd to stop looking for her. I am found. I am found. I am found, she repeated dramatically, rhythmically, the crowd swaying and moved by her homiletic passion. Stop looking for me and find yourself, she was last heard crying over the crescendo of helicopters landing. The remaining crowd, still singing her phrases, still undiluted, inadvertently blocked the Strexcorp agents from reaching Tamika before she disappeared in plain sight.
Strexcorp has issued, just moments ago, several dozen more missing child reports. They say children keep going missing. And they bet that if you find one specific child. One specific, very determined and difficult child (and they mean that in the best possible way). If you find that one child, you will probably find all of the missing children. Strexcorp is asking that if anyone has seen Tamika Flynn, to contact them immediately. She is a missing child, and shouldn’t you care about that? Shouldn’t you care about the children, Strexcorp asked. Children are the future, they added. Wish you felt the same way and would help us find this . . . this . . . child, they stammered, looking slightly agitated.
More on this soon.
Let’s have a look now at traffic.
There’s a man. Imagine him. He’s leaning on a fence, shirtless and weary, he seems wise near the eyes, but his impatient feet suggest insidiousness. He’s marked with dried mud and maybe some very deep but quickly healing cuts, from the tree branches most likely. Or perhaps the birds. Okay, I’m not telling you the whole truth. It was definitely the birds. Imagine these cuts and scratches, dry and brittle now but tender to the touch. He is certain he did not offend the birds, but he is uncertain whether his complacency was construed as equal to said offense.
Picture this. Picture the man leaning on the crisscrossing metal wires, waiting. The birds are gone but other things are coming. He doesn’t know specifically what, but he knows it’ll come for him. You know this too because I have told you. The man says nothing.
There’s never not something that has been displaced, marginalized. There’s never not something that—when feeling pressed to the wall, to a place with no room left to run—gathers its numbers, gathers its forces, and turns savagely on its oppressor, turns viciously and without inhibition even on those who merely look like its oppressor. Do you catch my meaning? Can you imagine the scene I am explaining? How much of the world makes sense to you? What does it mean to be a hero? To be a human?
The man thinks about his heart. It beats. It beats normally. Earlier it did not beat normally. Think about your own heart. Is it beating normally? Listen. I’ll give you a long moment.
[A long moment is given]
How is your heart? Do you remember the man? The one on the fence, shirtless and scarred, with the normally beating heart? He’s not real. Take him out of the story, but leave the story. Take him out. Leave the story. Do you catch my meaning? Do you?
This has been traffic.
And now a word from our sponsor.
Deep, deep, deep in the grass, grass, grass, what grows, grows, grows? Who knows, knows, knows?
Strex
Strrreexxxxx
Strrrrreexxxxxxx
Strexcorp Synergists, Inc.: Working hard so you can work harder. Work harder. Seriously. Work harder. Strexcorp. Get to work.
More on the missing children story: Several helmeted and sunglassed helicopter pilots have stepped forward to announce that they had nothing to do with the missing children. Sheila Nowitzki, a pilot for one of the many black helicopters that are routinely circling Night Vale, said she’s a harmless spy from the World Government and would never harm an American child without a direct order.
Marco Padilla, a pilot for one of the many blue Sheriff’s Secret Police copters, said nothing, but you could see in his face he meant no harm to our kids.
And a shadowy haze that claimed, through telepathy, to be the pilot of one of the mysterious helicopters with elaborate murals depicting birds of prey diving, admitted that while their helicopters were the ones that took away all the children in Night Vale several weeks ago, they brought them back. They brought them back, okay. And they’re fine. Get off of me, the humid, gray haze emphasized. God, you take a bunch of kids one time. One time. Geez.
Listeners, today I want to talk to you about the dangers of deer. Are they beautiful? Yes. Are they graceful and picturesque, even borderline majestic beasts? Yes, yes, and yes. And are they helpful to the community because real estate agents live inside of them? Of course. But deer are also dangerous creatures. They are terrible, deceitful, and vile animals. I’m not being mean. This is just basic science.
Look, I know deer are cute and friendly looking. We all remember adorable little Bambi from the classic animated movie, with his sweet voice and white-freckled rump. But we also remember the bloody end that he wrought on the humans at the end of the film, the graphic beheadings and trees streaked with gore during the famous, revenge-fueled climax. The lesson of that movie, as in life itself, is that nature is gorgeous, and it is horrible, and it will kill you.
This has been the Children’s Fun Fact Science Corner.
This just in: Oh my, some disastrous news. Quite terrible. There has been a helicopter crash out by the old car lot. Witnesses report hearing youthful shouts and screams followed by loud metallic clanging. They saw smoke trailing across the cold, dark afternoon sky, because of course the sun again did not rise today. They saw a yellow mangle of metal and rotors, and . . .
Um, listeners, Daniel is still standing at my studio door. He has stopped staring. He is now yelling, but without noise. He looks very upset. I can r
ead his lips. He is saying: Turn it off. Shut it down. No more news today. We are shutting you down.
They’re going to turn off my microphone. Night Vale, I’ve locked the door, which will buy me some time while Daniel goes to find a security guard with keys. So, let me take you now, for as long as it can last, to the weather.
WEATHER: “Peanuts” by Sam ’n Ash
[Cecil speaking into something of much lesser broadcast quality; he is on a cell phone, outdoors.]
Listeners, I do not know if you can hear me. I am only trusting that I did this right. I wired my phone into the soundboard and then wired the soundboard into the radio tower, which is running on auxiliary power. It’s a cool trick my childhood best friend Earl Harlan taught me, back when we were in Boy Scouts together earning our Subversive Radio Host Badge.
I doubt Daniel or any of the new Station Management can hear me, as they do not like listening to radio shows. Also I’m hiding up on the roof with my makeshift studio.
During the weather, I got word from some witnesses at the helicopter accident. The Sheriff’s Secret Police found several large slingshots and heavy stones nearby that matched in size and shape the dents on the helicopter’s engine casing. They also found a well-worn and heavily notated copy of Death Comes for the Archbishop by Willa Cather. Inside the book was a bookmark, marking page two hundred sixty-seven. On that page was the underlined phrase “I shall not die of a cold, my son. I shall die of having lived.” And on the bookmark was a handwritten note. It said: “Your pilot is fine. She is ours now. She will return when she is ready. But she will return . . . better.—T.F.”