Mostly Void, Partially Stars

by Joseph Fink

3. Before Night Vale Fan Art became an enormous thing, and mostly dominated by three-eyed Cecil and handsome lab coat–wearing Carlos, we would get drawings of much weirder aspects of our show. This episode kicked off a tiny onslaught of photos of sandwiches with HARLOT printed across them.

  4. Somehow Coach al-Mujaheed wanders off into the “woods.” This is the desert. I definitely wrote this because: 1) I don’t know what a desert is and 2) I write most of the sports things.

  5. Originally I wrote this entire Subway ad in German, but it was too difficult to get the grammar/syntax/tone right given that I only took four semesters of the language twelve years ago, and it’s just not funny at all if you are of the not-knowing-German demographic, which seems to be the majority of our listenership.

  6. The Wire is a pretty good show. Have you seen The Wire?

  7. I grew up listening to a lot of rock and country from the 1970s. My stepsister Marsha was obsessed with The Wall, and while I’m not much of a Pink Floyd listener myself, I certainly respect their contributions to music. As a town out of time but filled with so many strange rules and residents, the idea that they would be obsessed with Floyd shows and lasers and all that seemed fitting. Syd Barrett’s ghost is here, and this short era of modern rock will never fully leave them.

  8. Danny Schmidt’s song “This Too Shall Pass” is my favorite weather we’ve had on the show. This being a book, you can’t hear it, but it’s the song Joseph picked for the weather segment, and it’s lovely. Later I would use his song “Esmee by the River” (from the same album, Parables & Primes) in a short performance-art piece that involved me eating vegetable shortening and having people spit milk and flour into my mouth, mama-bird style. I’m still not sure I ever explained this last part to Danny very well.

  —Jeffrey Cranor

  Silence is golden. Words are vibrations. Thoughts are magic.

  WELCOME TO NIGHT VALE.

  Next Saturday is the big lottery drawing, listeners, right out in front of city hall, and your community radio station has put together a few helpful tips for winning.

  The lottery is, of course, mandatory, but how can you get the best odds for drawing a blank white paper and not one of the purple pieces that means you’ll be ceremoniously disemboweled and eaten by the wolves at the Night Vale Petting Zoo and Makeshift Carnival? I know to some of you young people this lottery seems like a barbarous, outdated tradition, but, if not for municipally planned citizen sacrifice each quarter, how else would we find satisfactory meats to feed those sad, scrawny animals?

  So, here now are the three Is of playing the lottery:

  “I” 1: Identify. Learn to sense colors. Purple has a grittier emotional aura than white.

  “I” 2: Ignite. Set fire to your home. While it’s not true that wolves refuse to eat arsonists, it’s a scientific fact that they’re unable to detect the presence of one.

  “I” 3: Imitate. If you happen to draw a purple piece, impersonate someone who drew a white piece. You might be mistaken for a person who is colorblind. This, of course, will lead to months of painful color reeducation at city hall, but in most cultures that’s better than being eaten by wolves.

  Also, make sure to visit the Food Truck Festival, which will be downtown as part of the lottery festivities. Popular truck treats include Korean BBQ, vegetarian chili, and veal ice cream.

  Carlos, this station’s favorite scientist (no offense to Dr. Dubinsky in the Night Vale Community College Chemistry Department), dropped by our broadcast location earlier this morning for a little chat. Sadly, dinner or weekend plans were not among the topics. However, Carlos did request that we ask listeners for anyone who saw a series of bright, colorful flickers coming from Radon Canyon this past weekend. These flickers would have also been accompanied by unintelligible noises, possibly some form of coded communication or signal jamming technique. Carlos suggested that there could be some very sinister forces at work here. He declined to be interviewed live, claiming only that he was scared for us. Scared for all of us in our strange town. Then he drove away quickly in his economical but attractively sporty hybrid coupé.

  If anyone out there knows anything about these otherworldly lights and sounds, please contact us immediately.

  Night Vale school superintendent Nick Ford announced today that the Glow Cloud has joined the school board.

  The Glow Cloud passed over the entirety of Night Vale several weeks ago, dropping small and large animal carcasses, controlling our thoughts and tertiary muscle groups, and erasing every last recording device. We’re still unsure the Glow Cloud even existed, as no one remembers it or has any digital record of it. If not for a few intrepid citizens who used old-fashioned pens and pencils to record the event in their diaries, we would have no remaining knowledge of that day.

  I, of course, can only thank those journal writers anonymously here on the air, as the Night Vale City Council long ago banned writing utensils, along with margarita glasses and barcode scanners, and I don’t want to get my fellow reporters in any trouble with the Sheriff’s Secret Police.

  According to Superintendent Ford, the Glow Cloud’s visit on that nearly forgotten day was simply an effort to find a nice neighborhood with good schools to raise a child.

  Now, what kind of progeny a powerful, formless cloud of noxious nightmares and spiritual destruction might produce, I dare not even speculate. But I do know one thing: that little cloud is going to get one heck of an education in the Night Vale School District.

  And isn’t it heartening to hear that the little puff of despair’s father (or . . . mother?) will serve on the school board?

  I mean, no matter how good the school, a student can only get out as much as the parents put in. We should all take such an impactful role in our children’s scholastic lives. Especially you, Steve Carlsberg, you don’t do anything except bring unacceptably dry scones to PTA meetings and take grammatically disastrous minutes on your shifts as meeting secretary. Get it together, Steve.

  Superintendent Ford offered the following statement of support for the newest school board member: “All Hail! All kneel for the Glow Cloud! Sacrifice! Pestilence! Sores! All Hail the Glow Cloud!”

  And now, traffic.

  This morning I saw a running man. He passed by my home, panting, limping, running desperate. I tried to stop him but he would not meet my eye. This noontime I saw a running man. He was coming down from the mountain holding a bag, his knees were bloody, and face covered in tears. This evening I saw a running man. He was leaving town, legs pumping like a terrified heart. I think he was missing a hand. Is it that he wouldn’t meet my eye, or that he had no eyes? Now I wish I could remember. There are many things I wish I could remember. This has been traffic.

  New billboards have appeared all over town, bearing the image of a turkey sandwich and the single word HARLOT in large block letters. These billboards have caused some confusion, both due to their ambiguous message, and to the fact that the entire structure of the billboards materialized overnight in places billboards are not usually constructed, such as the living rooms of local homes, the middle of busy thoroughfares (causing multiple car accidents), and, in one case, directly through a living dog, who has not appeared harmed by the addition to his body and has carried the entire billboard around town while going about his usual canine business. The Department of Health and Human Services recently claimed responsibility for the billboards, saying that they were part of a campaign to promote nutrition and healthy living among children. The original draft of the release also mentioned something about an offering to a long-dead god, but this was altered to “Fun, active lifestyles are important for kids of all ages” in a subsequent addendum.

  We’re receiving several phone calls from listeners and from the Parks Department that those flickering lights and unintelligible noises we reported on earlier were coming from the Pink Floyd Multimedia Laser Spectacular.

  I contacted Carlos about this, and he said that the situation is even worse than he imagined. He, again, d
id not mention weekend plans.

  A sports scandal has shook our quiet little town. The Night Vale Scorpions have faced multiple allegations of possible game tampering this football season. Representatives for the Desert Bluffs School District, speaking in unpleasant and high-pitched voices indicative of weakness of will and character, complained to the Regional Football and Traffic Code Authority that Night Vale quarterback Michael Sandero’s recently grown second head counts as a twelfth man on the field, thus invalidating the wins brought on by his also recently acquired superhuman agility and strength. The RFTCA said that they would look into these allegations with the utmost seriousness, along with their concurrent investigation into whether Night Vale’s “Invisible Crosswalk” policy is actually a desperate bid to save town funds at the cost of pedestrian lives.

  Meanwhile, the school board is due to announce its decision in their ongoing hearings as to whether appealing to angels for a win constitutes illegal game tampering. Several angels agreed to testify at the hearings; however, their testimonials were cut short when it became apparent that the hearings were actually elaborate traps set up by the City Council to finally capture the angels, whom the council does not recognize as actually existing. Fortunately, the angels easily escaped from their cages in a blaze of heavenly light, presumably returning to Old Woman Josie’s house, out near the car lot, which has become something of an informal shelter for local angels.

  When asked about the controversy over his team’s winning record, Coach Nazr al-Mujaheed said, “Our boys are good boys. They’re good boys at football. We win ’em, with the boys, the football.” He then smiled vacantly, waved at no one, and wandered off in the direction of the woods. More on this story as it develops.

  And now a word from our sponsor.

  Step in to your nearest Subway restaurant today and try their new six-inch mashed potato sub. Top it with a delicious assortment of fresh vegetables, like French fries and Nutella. They’ll even toast or poach it for you.

  There are several Subway locations in Night Vale, all easily accessible through witchcraft and chanting.

  And between now and November 30, buy nine reverse colonics and get a free forty-ounce soda or freshly baked tobacco cookie.

  Subway: Devour your own empty heart.

  Exciting news about the abandoned mine shaft outside of town where people who vote incorrectly are taken by the Secret Police: HBO On-Demand will be made available to prisoners during their indefinite detention. All your favorite shows, such as The Wire, Sex and the City, and even new hits like Game of Thrones will be available in every cell. Additionally, the Secret Police announced they will be randomly executing one prisoner a day until all incorrect votes are corrected.

  This just in: We’re receiving word from the City Council that there was absolutely not a Pink Floyd Multimedia Laser Spectacular this weekend at Radon Canyon. That there never was a Pink Floyd Multimedia Laser Spectacular, ever, near Night Vale. Pink Floyd is not even a thing, said the council in a very stern, but quiet statement just received by me, here, via phone. The council, and this is strange, the entire council—not just a representative of the council—the entire council issued this statement, all speaking in unison, just now, over the phone, that Night Vale citizens are prohibited from discussing any lights or sounds coming from Radon Canyon this past weekend and that they should just stop remembering Pink Floyd shows all together.

  The council reiterated that there is no way that they are huge Floyd fans privately using public funds on a laser-powered séance to talk hard-rockin’ classic jams with the ghost of original front man Syd Barrett, and that Syd wouldn’t even say anything juicy anyway, because he is such a gentleman and an artist. This did not happen at all.

  So, listeners, we urge you to look away from Radon Canyon. Avert your eyes, ears, and memories from that which is no longer allowed you. Comfort and distract yourselves with dense food and television programming. As the old adage goes: “A life of pain is the pain of life and you can never escape it . . . only hope it hides, unknown, in a drawer like a poisonous spider and never comes out again even though it probably will in unexpected and horrific fashion, scarring you from being able to comfortably conduct even the most mundane, quotidian tasks.” Or, at least, that’s how my grandparents always phrased it.

  And now the weather.

  WEATHER: “This Too Shall Pass” by Danny Schmidt

  Teddy Williams, over at the Desert Flower Bowling Alley and Arcade Fun Complex, has an update on the doorway into that vast underground city he found in the pin retrieval area of lane five. He says that every window of the city is now glowing both day and night, and he heard the shouts and footsteps of what sounded like an army marching upwards toward the world above. He also said that, given that nothing really matters now, bowling is half off and each game comes with a free basket of wings. Mmm. Nothing like those Desert Flower wings.

  Let me leave you with this, dear listeners. We lead frantic lives, filled with needs and responsibilities but completely devoid of any actual purpose. I say, let’s try to enjoy the simple things. Life should be like a basket of chicken wings: salty, full of fat and vinegar, and surrounded by celery you’ll never actually eat, even when you’re greedily sopping up the last viscous streaks of buffalo sauce from the wax paper with your spit-stained index finger. Yes, that is as life should be, Night Vale.

  Stay tuned next for a special live broadcast of the Night Vale Symphony Orchestra performing Eugene O’Neill’s classic play The Iceman Cometh. It is a good night, listeners. Goodnight.

  PROVERB: We are living in an immaterial world, a ghost world, and I am an immaterial girl—a ghost.

  EPISODE 9:

  “PYRAMID”

  OCTOBER 15, 2012

  CONTRIBUTOR: REGIS LACHER

  THIS EPISODE MARKS THE FIRST COLLABORATION WITH AN OUTSIDE WRITER. Unlike later episodes, where guest writers would cowrite the main story line and eventually entire scripts, this was a blind collaboration experiment, where our guest writer wrote based on a vague prompt and then I built a story around what he had written.

  The messages from the pyramid were written by our Twitter friend Regis Lacher. I’ve known Regis for years on the Internet on various sites and under various usernames. He, at the time, had a Twitter avatar of a pyramid and specialized in making cryptic all-cap pronouncements. Essentially, we asked him to imagine that his Twitter pyramid had landed in Night Vale and began doing its thing there. We edited his messages a bit for length, but for the most part kept exactly what he sent us.

  The beauty of having a completely independent podcast with only two people overseeing the writing is that we can do things like invite a friend to write weird messages and then put those messages in a loose framework of a story primarily based on the fact that I personally like to eat cereal at night.

  This isn’t quite a TED Talk yet, but I’m getting it there.

  —Joseph Fink

  Weird at last. Weird at last. God Almighty, weird at last.

  WELCOME TO NIGHT VALE.

  The Sheriff’s Secret Police are asking the public’s help in catching a dangerous fugitive on the loose in the greater Night Vale area. They say he is armed and should be approached with extreme caution. For everyone’s protection, they are keeping the name and description of the fugitive secret, but indicate that all strangers should be mistrusted and avoided, as well as friends and loved ones because how well do you know those people anyway? Are you aware of their location every second of every day? Who among us does not have secrets? The fugitive is wanted dead or alive, and vigilante justice is, as always, highly encouraged.

  Our top story today: a large pyramid has appeared in the center of the Beatrix Lohman Memorial Meditation Zone, destroying over half of the zone’s state-of-the-art meditation equipment and paraphernalia. Experts have been contacted as to what could cause sudden pyramid existence; however, as it turns out, there are no experts in pyramid materialization, and the town’s other experts offered up
merely shrugs, followed by panicked conjectures, and, finally, screams and moans, all of which fell uselessly upon the City Council’s merciless ears.

  The pyramid has been described as a kind of triangle shape, only three-dimensional. It has made no movement despite repeated Taserings by the Sheriff’s Secret Police.

  Many suspect that this may be a publicity stunt pulled by our own local cereal company Flakey O’s, who are launching their new line of nighttime-only cereals next month. An angry mob has formed outside of the cereal factory just in case.

  Telly. You remember, the deceitful barber with a shriveled soul who, just a few weeks ago cut perfect scientist Carlos’s perfect beautiful hair very short, so very, very short, thus depriving our community of our only remaining pleasure. Well, Telly was seen recently wandering the sand wastes, howling at the sky, and holding up Carlos’s shorn locks, as though begging God to reverse the crime he has done. Reports indicate that his skin was blistering, that his eyes were bleary, and that he was recently seen trying to give a cactus a haircut, whispering and cooing into what he seemed to think was its ear. Listeners, I am not one to stand aside harshly and say that a man deserves the punishment that comes to him, but I also am not sorry to see Telly in this state, given his crime. In any case, if your cactus is in need of a haircut, try Telly, out wandering the sand wastes.

  Ladies and gentlemen, I must say that I am not a cat person, but I have really grown to love Khoshekh, the stray cat that has made his home here at the radio station. I discovered Khoshekh several weeks ago hovering in a fixed location in the men’s bathroom, and he’s remained there since. The men at the station, of course, have taken to keeping the sink at a light trickle so he can get water, and we even take turns buying Science Diet Low Calorie Cat Food (turns out little Khoshekh is getting a bit chubby since he can’t actually exercise in his unmovable, levitating state).