Chapter Text
For the third time today, someone mentioned Cecil Palmer and for the third time in a row, Carlos broke out his best confused stare. The young woman behind the counter was packing his groceries so fast she almost seemed to have an extra arm and she seemed oblivious in that moment to Cecil’s bafflement (perhaps his confused stare needed work).
“Everyone in town loves him,” she said, shoving his eggs into the bag just a little too enthusiastically. “Everyone.”
“So I can tell,” Carlos said as kindly as he could. Though he didn’t know who this ‘Cecil’ was or why people were intent on bringing him up, he felt that if he didn’t agree this young woman might take it out on his milk carton. “He sounds great.”
The cashier clasped all three hands in front of her chest as a grin stretched across her face. “I’m so happy you think so.”
Carlos stared for a moment longer before passing her a handful of cash and high-tailing it out of there. A vague and shadowed someone warned him of Night Vale’s oddities before he came here but honestly? Carlos was starting to wonder if someone knocked him out on the way here and now he was in a fever dream, teeth seconds from crumbling out of his gums.
The thought made Carlos grimace and hold one hand over his mouth as he strode quickly back to his car. There was a man hiding in the bush beside it, a balaclava sticking out a little over the top, but Carlos decided after a moment not to draw any attention to himself by asking too many questions. He just cleared his throat, sat down with the bags on the disused passenger seat, and then clapped his hands hard over his ears.
For some godforsaken reason the radio seemed to switch on whenever Carlos entered any vehicle or any enclosed room, even those without obvious radios in them. Mandatory listening no doubt, but all it did for Carlos was fill his ears with unbearable static. He pulled off his hearing aids with shaking hands, head still ringing as silence enveloped him.
“This town is strange,” Carlos informed the silence. The silence nodded gravely.
---
There was a man across the cafe covered in vivid purple tattoos and with an extra eye. He seemed determined to use all three to stare at Carlos as much as possible. For the first few minutes Carlos glanced over repeatedly in case his hearing aids weren’t working again and the man was trying to talk to him but no, not once did his lips move. Another stranger who was curious about the scientist, no doubt. He was not tall but not short, exactly, and his third eye was disconcertingly symmetrical, sitting dead centre in his forehead, framed by neat and even dark lashes.
Two weeks in Night Vale was already too much considering Carlos found the shape of the stranger’s extra eye more confusing than its existence.
Carlos lifted up the newspaper that had one article filled entirely with question marks in a number of different fonts, some of which seemed to be glowing. It was less unsettling than being stared at by the fairly attractive yet entirely bizarre man in the rose-red tunic and gaudy silver flip flops.
---
Three months into his stay in Night Vale and Carlos was finally starting to get the hang of the etiquette. Even in ‘ordinary’ society the social norms weren’t his strong point, but threatening glares from local Secret Police were helpful in driving the point home that it was not always polite to ask to study the genes of the three-armed woman or the man whose hands had three extra fingers each side.
“Maybe you should go test Cecil,” suggested the woman in the balaclava after the latter incident, smacking a nightstick rhythmically against her be-gloved hand. “I’m sure he would be willing.”
“Oh?” Carlos asked, whilst simultaneously certain he wouldn’t be doing that. Cecil was clearly some kind of celebrity here and there was no way Carlos would have the confidence for that. “I’ll think about it.”
“I can ask him for you,” she said, “if you’re too shy.”
The thing about dealing with the Secret Police was that it was even more difficult to assess their body language or facial expressions. Coupled with the fact that Carlos’s third set of hearing aids were starting to deteriorate, it was all but impossible to tell if she was teasing. “Oh,” Carlos said, because it seemed like a safe thing to say while he gathered his mind together. “Oh. No thank you.”
“Everyone in this town likes Cecil,” the police officer said. She slapped the nightstick extra hard against her hand. “Everyone.”
Carlos didn’t need his hearing aid at all to know a threat when he saw one.
---
It looked like sunset was approaching. Carlos glanced out of the window from his lab and carefully took out his hearing aids in preparation for the nightly burst of static that often triggered a migraine. It wasn’t all that dissimilar to the radio static, Carlos observed, but he did not let himself get distracted by the thought of studying the unusual acoustics. Not when there was so much else he needed to do.
Carlos opened up the almost useless hearing aid and sighed. This was another instance of all the inner workings slowly degenerating into some kind of green viscous liquid that smelled quite strongly of almonds.
And honestly? Carlos was getting tired of rebuilding them. He wasn’t very good at it.
For now Carlos carefully disposed of the potentially caustic or cursed liquid and went to bed. He would fix it in the morning, or maybe some time later in the week when he had less on his plate. Until then he would just have to get by.
---
The citizens of Night Vale were good people. Well, perhaps good was a stretch when their moral compasses were mandated out of existence by the numerous omnipresent shady agencies, but they cared for one another. They protected one another. They seemed especially loyal to one person in particular.
“I had no idea Street Cleaning Day was a thing,” Carlos admitted. “I almost didn’t get inside in time.”
“Don’t you listen to Cecil’s show?” Old Woman Josie asked with her eyes wide.
Carlos was trying to look at his Geiger counter after the latest massacre and that was quite difficult to do when he had to keep one eye on Old Woman Josie to read her lips. He tried his best to keep the irritation out of his voice. “No. It gives me a headache.”
Old Woman Josie smacked her lips disapprovingly and did not offer Carlos one of her newest batch of brownies.
---
After that things began to get difficult.
In other towns, disapproval from the locals would be inconvenient but ultimately harmless. Carlos checked about three minority boxes; he was well adjusted to the harsh glares. He was not, however, used to having a small but determined angry mob following home.
“Okay,” Carlos said as he locked and barricaded the lab door behind him, “you need to tell me what I did.”
The only one of his co-workers not helping the Valentines clean-up was Andre. He was also the only one who had been to Night Vale before this trip, although he never spoke about that particular visit and Carlos hadn’t asked again after the impressive howling that followed last time. “Um,” said Andre. “You left the lid off the grey mould and it made a nest in the air conditioning unit.”
Carlos paused, derailed from his confusion for a moment. “Really? We must get readings. But first you’re going to tell me why I got chased home by people who I assume were shouting. I didn’t stop for long enough to see since I was hoping to keep all of my limbs for future use.”
“Cecil is a nice boy,” Andre said.
“Okay,” Carlos replied carefully, drawn out and confused.
Andre rubbed a hand over his face. “That’s what they’re shouting. They’re still out there. No luck with the hearing aids?”
“The last set all but melted,” Carlos said. A heavy sigh dragged itself out of him. “Every time I think I understand this town I realise I’m wrong. So very, very wrong.”
“So you’re not listening to the radio.”
“Obviously.”
“Were you before?” Andre asked. He seemed hesitant. No, not hesitant. Tentatively amused, with a smile tugging at the corner of his lips.
Carlos bristled as he grabbed himself a much-needed bottle of water. “No. I can’t hear it. It’s just static to me.”
“Interesting,” Andre said. His thoughtful look was familiar to Carlos, but there was no time for Andre to get distracted and start studying Carlos’s reaction to local community radio. Carlos cleared his throat enthusiastically and Andre jolted. “Right. Uh, so you probably haven’t realised Cecil is in love with you.”
The bottle of water, still thankfully unopened, dropped straight to the floor. Carlos did nothing to retrieve it even as it scuttled off beneath a table with suddenly-sprouted legs. “What?”
“I guess that’s my answer,” Andre replied. He was grinning in earnest now. “Carlos, Cecil has been open about his affection for you since you arrived. I just assumed you knew and were playing it cool. Which, now that I say it out loud, is completely ridiculous. You are anything but cool.”
Carlos found his mouth had dried up and his throat had tightened against any words he could find. Not that any would come; his mind was blank, flat-lining pathetically. He couldn’t even respond to the (admittedly accurate) teasing.
“Whoa buddy,” Andre said, quickly dashing forward as Carlos’s knees started to give out. Andre caught Carlos and carefully set him down on the futon they kept here for when one of them inevitably forgot to go home in time for curfew. The amount of forms they had had to send off for that was obscene. “It’s not that big a deal.”
“I just got chased home by an angry mob,” Carlos pointed out faintly, “because I accidentally insulted a radio show host I’ve never met who claims to love me.”
“But the mob didn’t actually catch you,” Andre said. “I’d consider that a win.”
With a heavy sigh Carlos looked out towards the window. The streets were still glinting with the promise of torch-lit violence. “These people are persistent. They’ll probably be there in the morning too. That’s it, I’m stuck in my lab for eternity because some idiotic local celebrity has decided he wants to screw me.”
Andre pulled a face. “I don’t think that’s what he wants. I mean... partially. But...” Andre sighed. “You’re not going to believe anything I say because you’ve never heard Cecil speak. Which means you don’t know that, despite being completely unstable and a little terrifying, Cecil seems to be a good person.”
“You think everyone is a good person.”
“I don’t think you’re a good person,” Andre said. He smacked Carlos hard on the back and stood up. “You get on with your moping. I’m going to get you out of this mess because scientists are there for each other. That’s the first thing scientists are. And because I owe you twenty bucks and you won’t dare ask for it again after this.”
Carlos rolled his eyes and then, just to be sure he wouldn’t have to pay attention to any of the nonsense Andre was saying, closed his eyes and tipped his head back on the couch. At least he couldn’t hear the simmering mob outside calling for his head.
---
A hand to Carlos’s shoulder had him jumping up and almost crashing into one of Leila’s worryingly effervescent experiments. Actually opening his eyes and clapping them on the intruder didn’t help; he was faced with a stranger who was not tall but not particularly short either with an extra eye in the middle of his forehead.
“Don’t hurt me!” Carlos shouted. He had no idea if he was coming across as threatening and defiant as he wanted so he grabbed the first thing that came to hand – one of the fizzing beakers – and held it out. “I don’t know what this is but I’m betting it wouldn’t do your eyes any good. Any of them. Even the symmetrical one, so stay back.”
The stranger lifted his hands palm-flat in the universal gesture for I-come-in-peace. At least that’s what Carlos hoped it meant in Night Vale; it could just as easily mean I’ll-eat-your-viscera. “Carlos. I won’t hurt you.”
Carlos studied the man more closely, chest heaving. The man had pale purple tattoos on his dark skin that curled right up to his fingertips in bizarre but beautiful lines. His eyes were a darker purple and full of depth and wonder that Carlos was a little afraid to face head on. Carlos would have remembered if this striking man had been a part of the small yet persistent angry mob, so he relaxed but did not yet put down the beaker. “What do you want?”
“To speak with you,” the man said. When Carlos could find no way to respond the man sighed and looked down. He spoke then but Carlos could not see the words with his head tilted down so dejectedly.
“You need to look at me,” Carlos said. All three eyes fixed on him intently. If Carlos wasn’t mistaken there was a purple tint beneath his skin. “Uh. I mean. I mean you need to look at me when you’re speaking. I can’t hear you.”
“I didn’t realise,” the man said, looking firmly at Carlos and pronouncing his words clearly and not too fast but not slow enough to be condescending either. “When I spoke of you I assumed you heard me as all others in this town do. I apologise for the people who followed you home today, Carlos. They were influenced by my sadness that you got a headache from listening to me.”
“You’re Cecil,” Carlos said. He tensed again but put the bubbling beaker down carefully. It bounced in what looked suspiciously like glee. “You’re the radio guy.”
Cecil blushed. At least Carlos was around eighty-nine percent sure that was what the faint purple glow to his dark cheeks was about. “Most people call me the Voice of Night Vale.”
Okay, so conceited as well as obsessive. Carlos really knew how to attract the wrong ones. “I’m sorry, Cecil. I really have work to do.”
“I got rid of the mob for you,” Cecil said. Despite clearly (and rudely) being dismissed he took a quick and awkward step forward. Carlos couldn’t ask the man to leave as he got momentarily distracted by the sparkling orange shoes Cecil was sporting. “...no plans to run you out of town,” Cecil was saying when Carlos gathered himself and looked back up.
“Thank you,” Carlos said uncertainly. “But I really do have things to do.”
Cecil sagged. He looked around the lab briefly then shot the most adorable and tentative grin towards Carlos, whose heart jumped in an unexpected and decidedly uncomfortable way. “Yes. Right. Well. I hope the science goes well, Carlos. I apologise for the confusion. I never asked anyone to gang up on you and believe me, I will be making sure each and every one of them presents their Inappropriate Mob Form 2H tomorrow. Including myself for accidentally instigating it.”
With a blank stare and a nod Carlos turned back to the beakers and moved them absently around the table until he was sure Cecil had gone.
---
I hope the science goes well.
Carlos snorted into his coffee at the sudden memory, spraying the hot liquid across the table. Thankfully he was aiming away from anyone nearby but it was still a race to mop it up before the hooded figures came any closer with their thick disapproving shadows. Spillages were not looked kindly upon here.
“-transcribe them for you,” Old Woman Josie was saying when Carlos looked up.
He hadn’t seen her arrive and he had no idea she had been talking to him so he smiled sheepishly and offered her the chair opposite. “Do you mind repeating that, please?”
“Of course,” Old Woman Josie replied. The hooded figures, Carlos noticed, had disappeared. In their place tall thin figures stood stark naked with wide glistening wings. Knowing better than to look at an angel face on in public, thereby acknowledging their existence, Carlos kept his gaze on Josie. “It’s important that you should be listening to the radio show. Since I realise now that it’s not possible for you, and to apologise for the previous misunderstanding, I took it upon myself to transcribe them for you.”
“Oh,” Carlos said with all the eloquence he could muster. He stared at the heavy pile of thick paper in her hands. “Isn’t this...”
“Illegal? I found a loophole in the shape of my old typewriter,” Josie said with a small innocent smile. “Read them. You’ll understand life in Night Vale a lot better, I think.” The definitely-not-angels crowded around the table. One of them ruffled Carlos’s hair quite violently but probably affectionately. “Outsiders need all the help they can get with that, I think.”
Carlos looked around the room as a woman near the window put a bucket on her head and began flailing her arms wildly. No one else even blinked. With a sigh Carlos took the transcripts. “I think you’re right.”
“Of course I’m right, dear,” Josie replied. She waved a hand towards the pile as she stood up. “Cecil’s phone number is in the back. Do text him when you’re done.”
The words should have no reason to put a thick blush on Carlos’s face, but they did.
---
Would you meet me in the Arby’s parking lot?
Carlos had been hesitating over this for far too long. With the obsessive diligence of a school crush he had carefully phrased and rephrased it, trying to find the perfect balance of friendly and not trying too hard. He took a deep breath, hit send, then immediately regretted it and sent a hasty follow up text.
Don’t worry if you’re working. I can wait.
With that text gone Carlos decided that he should never be allowed to interact with other people, human or humanoid. He hadn’t remembered to include his name and it would be awkward to send another third text to clarify. Or would it be worse to leave it? Carlos flopped back in the car seat and groaned, hating this unfamiliar feeling of caring so much when usually his own social discomfort passed quickly (i.e. as soon as some science distracted him).
The transcripts had made interesting reading. Carlos had gotten no science done all day, too intent on catching up with months of radio shows that started the day Carlos arrived. He was mentioned right off the bat, then again here and there in a way that was both confusing and oddly nice. Cecil perfectly presented the strangeness of the town and almost made it seem normal with his measured words and astute philosophical observations that admittedly went over Carlos’s head most of the time. He was an empirical man, not one with his head in the clouds.
In these transcripts, Carlos saw a kind, passionate man who loved his city and for some reason extended that love to Carlos, the Outsider, when others did not always. Though social situations could be opaque sometimes, Carlos knew when he owed someone an apology.
It could only have been a few minutes even by Night Vale time when Carlos opened his eyes but there was Cecil standing in front of the car, fiddling with his hands and staring over his shoulder. Carlos jolted and sat up, scrabbling to grab the one working hearing aid he had managed to cobble together. He slipped it into place the moment he got out of the car, smiling tightly and feeling his heart flutter as Cecil opened his mouth. At last Carlos had the chance to hear the voice of the Voice of Night Vale.
Then Cecil spoke and Carlos fell to the ground as his mind filled with dry static. It grated through him, blinded him, took his voice. Carlos was alight with pain but his groping hand somehow managed to grasp the hearing aid and he ripped it from his ear, throwing it hard onto the concrete floor.
Blissful silence.
When Carlos came back to himself he was hunched over his own knees, hands over his own ears, eyes squeezed shut. His pulse was racing and his whole body felt fragile, brittle, as though his shaking would pull him apart. He opened his eyes with some effort and saw Cecil crouched in front of him, brow high and mouth open on pointed teeth, grimacing in horror.
No, not horror. Concern. Guilt, too.
“Carlos, perfect Carlos, I’m so sorry. I should have known my voice is too much for that technology,” Cecil said. He carefully approached and when Carlos didn’t flinch back he wrapped an arm around him, carefully drawing him up to his feet. Behind him sat the hearing aid, already oozing acrid green smoke. “I never wanted to harm you. Never.”
The gentle touches helped draw Carlos back into himself, though he could no longer see Cecil talking. It was not until Cecil ran his fingers through Carlos’s hair that Carlos jerked back, startled and frowning.
“I’m sorry!” Cecil said, raising his hands in apology.
Carlos folded his arms. “I’m going home now.” This meeting had not gone as planned, not at all. Carlos could feel the start of a migraine thudding behind his eyes. “I just wanted to... say sorry. About assuming you were an asshole before I really talked to you.” It seemed important to force those inelegant words out however much they wanted to stick in Carlos’s throat. “I can see you’re not. An asshole, I mean. Although I would appreciate it if you asked before stroking my hair next time.”
“Oh,” Cecil said. He didn’t seem inclined to add to that, so Carlos backed away as casually as he could.
---
Carlos gave up on the hearing aids. They were never going to work and honestly, life was a lot easier when you didn’t have to listen to the howling at the void every evening. For a few days Carlos did not emerge from his lab at all, even to sleep; he fashioned something of a nest in one of the spare rooms and passed out there when necessary.
He couldn’t risk seeing Cecil while his thoughts were so confused.
Next time.
Why had Carlos said that? It was just a figure of speech, right? Although Cecil’s fingers had felt so cool and gentle against his scalp, Carlos could not afford to go running into something involving touching with a man who could destroy technology with his voice alone. And those teeth...
Okay. Carlos had to admit in the name of science that he did quite like the teeth. Even the thought of kissing Cecil had its appeal, despite the risk of tongue-based injury or accidental piercings.
The experiments in place were unimportant compared to the ones he should be doing out in the city, especially around the house that did not exist. On the fifth day of solitude, the police officer hiding in the bushes outside his window whispered that Carlos should probably do some science out in the world if he wanted anyone to remember he was there, so he put on his cleanest lab coat and walked quietly into the strange world beyond.
When Carlos had come to Night Vale he had been overwhelmed by its oddities. He had never submitted the correct forms on time and was at constant risk of re-education, avoided only by some kind of awe for the label ‘scientist’ which seemed akin to priest in this town. Carlos had recoiled at the extra limbs and missing bodies and screaming sunsets. Now walking along the street watching a gaze of raccoons breakdancing to an inaudible beat made Carlos smile and feel more at home than ever.
Carlos wondered whether Cecil would be reporting on these raccoons or whether they were unremarkable in the eyes of long-term residents.
A few steps later, Carlos realised the fleeting thought of Cecil had run amok, burrowing in and providing him with countless vapid considerations focusing on whether Cecil was working right now and whether he would be thinking of Carlos. Whether Cecil forgave Carlos for being such an idiot the few times they had met. What it would feel like to have Cecil’s fingers in his hair again, and maybe some other choice places too.
Just as Carlos was realising he needed to stop thinking about the potential of talented hands in hidden areas, the object of his sudden and rather public desire strolled around the corner and very nearly ran into him. Carlos was pretty sure he squeaked.
“Carlos! I didn’t mean to startle you,” Cecil said, hands on Carlos’s shoulders to steady him. Then his eyes (all three) widened and he stepped back, raising his palms. For a moment Carlos wondered whether Carlos was about to apologise but then, with the practised tension of a new-learner, Cecil began to sign.
Please forgive me.
Cecil was fairly certain his heart might burst.
“There’s nothing to forgive,” Carlos replied, signing along with his normal speech. “Did you learn that for me?”
I did it for you , Cecil signed and then added, “Am I doing it right?”
“It’s perfect,” Carlos replied. “Thank you, Cecil. You don’t know what that means to me.”
Cecil blushed that charming shade of purple. He held his hands up to sign again, but dropped them after a couple of incoherent attempts. “I was wondering if you would mind teaching me some more.”
“Of course,” Carlos said. He took a sharp breath, seeing the opportunity for what it was and deciding at the last minute to grab it, however much he stuttered. “Maybe, I, maybe over dinner? Together? Are you... Cecil, are you okay?”
“Yes,” Cecil said, although the darkening purple was frankly worrying. Cecil’s sharp-toothed grin would have been intimidating to anyone else. “That would be neat.”
“Great.” This town had its oddities, and maybe one of them was Carlos from how strongly that warmed him. “And the first thing I’ll do is show you the sign for ‘neat’.”