AN: Hey guys! Long time no see! So yeah, I joined Welcome to Night Vale fandom. Don't shoot me. Guns don't kill people, so that'd be a waste of your time. This is just something that I really wanted to write, so I decided to... write it all. At one in the morning. Like everything I write. Yeah. Don't hate. I will get a better grasp of writing these two dorks at some point, and once I get there you will be given smut starring these two losers! Just... this is simple description here, friends. I'll get to the good stuff another time.
Carlos knows that there's something wrong with Night Vale.
It took him a while to really grasp that idea, but it was always in the back of his mind, slapping him with City Council regulated books and screaming like the unlucky citizens who got caught up with the helicopters depicting birds of prey.
It was brought to the forefront of his mind, however, when he began to date Cecil Baldwin.
Everything was relatively normal at first – raw, bloody Portobello mushrooms and the entire town turning into shadows for a first date, dead animals raining from the sky and an attempted "wheat by-product substitute" gone wrong for the second. Still, nothing had really set Carlos' senses tingling until the first time he had stayed over at Cecil's house. They didn't do much of anything, just got acquainted with each other's body, and yet Carlos could tell something was off. Perhaps it was the darkness under which they explored, but Cecil's eyes seemed more of a maroon, rather than the soothing violet he was familiar with. Perhaps Cecil's glasses held back some of the color.
That wasn't all, however. After that night, Carlos began to notice other things about the town. When he ran into Terry the barber, he could have sworn that he saw a forked tongue in the guy's twitchy smile. He ignored the obvious delusion, however, and continued on his way to the ritual bloodstone chant. Cecil had invited him to go, just to watch, and when faced with his boyfriend's adoring eyes, Carlos had no choice but to agree to come along. Cecil really was too cute for his own good.
For some reason, there were more hooded figures at the event than Carlos was used to seeing in public. No one made any mention of it, however, so Carlos simply assumed that they just enjoyed watching townspeople chanting around bloodstones. There was nothing else to it, clearly. Cecil took him home after that, and Carlos had no objection to the speed of which Cecil divested them both of their clothing.
Their coupling was just barely more than grinding against each other until hot, white come splattered their bare chests, but Cecil's teeth seemed sharper as they grazed across Carlos' flesh. He really, really enjoyed it, though, so he wasn't going to ask any questions.
Cecil grew more affectionate on the radio, and to say Carlos was pleased would be an understatement. Sure, it was strange when he had first moved to town and all he heard about on the radio was how perfect he was, but as he had gotten used to it, the praise became something like an assurance that something was all right with this insane town. Carlos has simply assimilated into the oddness after a few weeks, mostly because he couldn't stand listening to Cecil talk about Old Woman Josie's angels and not knowing what the fuck was going on.
Trees began to whisper to him. It was generally when he walked close to the Whispering Forest, but some of the things these trees breathed were simply too strange to have come from the wood of lies.
Feeling any different, Carlos? they would ask. How's the soul holding up?
Carlos pinned the words on the strange compliments received from the Whispering Forest, and ignored any mention of them. Becoming a tree was not a priority of his.
Having sex with Cecil, however, was.
It really all started to go downhill when Carlos had let Cecil slick him up and slide inside. Oh, it had been amazing; unlike anything he'd ever felt with another man (or woman, for that matter). Still, as he looked into Cecil's red-tinted eyes (he hadn't figured that one out yet) and moaned into his razor-toothed mouth, a strange, unbidden and unknown feeling niggled at him. He paid it no mind at the time, though, because the feeling of Cecil all around him, inside of him, was too much to bear. His every thought was simply Cecil, Cecil, and it was no help that the Voice of Night Vale would only whisper words that worshipped his body in bed. Carlos thought he was slowly developing a praising kink, simply because of the adorable dork he managed to land.
Still, when Carlos came, he saw stars. When Cecil came, spilling deep inside of him (oh, what a wonderful feeling), Carlos was sure he saw the shadows of large, reptilian wings flaring out behind his lover.
That really had been some hardcore sex if he was seeing wings erupt from Cecil's back.
But then, the red eyes and the sharp teeth didn't go away. At least, sometimes they warred with Cecil's purple-eyed, normal-toothed appearance. Carlos mentioned it a few times, commenting on the oddity of his changing features, but Cecil only smiled and shook his head. Perhaps this town was getting to Carlos more than he originally thought. Maybe he needed to take a vacation. Although, when he mentioned this to Cecil, his boyfriend panicked and threatened to lock him in the radio station until he came to his senses. He was joking.
At least, Carlos thinks he was joking.
The straw that broke the camel's back was, incidentally, all Carlos' fault.
He was in the middle of a highly dangerous experiment, as always. The beaker of acid really shouldn't have been where it was when Carlos knocked it to the side, and really, he should have been paying more attention to the thing, but the accident happened nonetheless. Carlos cringed as the stereotypically green, viscous fluid dripped from various places on his weekday lab coat (his favorite one, too), and definitely winced and shut his eyes when he heard the sizzling of his only defense from certain death melting away, but when the sound of his imminent doom stopped and he felt no pain, he cracked one cautious eye open. He expected to see the burnt husk of his left hand as he lifted it up to meet his inspection, but to his surprise he was perfectly fine.
As he checked over his entire body, he was shocked to discover that no damage was done to him. This was the last incident in a long line of incidents, and due to that, Carlos promptly began to freak out. He called Cecil, his voice breaking over the words, "I am calling for – for very personal reasons."
When his boyfriend arrived, Carlos took him by the arm and forced him outside. "Let's have a stroll," he muttered, "it's easier to talk on a stroll." Cecil tried to argue that the Secret Police would hear everything, but Carlos simply refused to let that get to him. He needed to ask a question. It burned at the back of his throat and filled his mind with a myriad of terrifying answers, each one worse than the last.
"What are you?" Carlos blurted out after an extended silence. "What are the people of this town?"
Cecil smirked. The ruby shine of his eyes created a shiver that traveled up Carlos' back. He licked his lips deviously, and that forced a shiver of something entirely different down Carlos' stomach and straight to his dick. Oh boy, Cecil sure was in a mood.
"Well, since you're coming along so nicely…" Cecil purred, wrapping an arm around Carlos' shoulders and pulling him in for a quick (and dirty, oh dear) kiss. "My dear, sweet, perfect Carlos… we're all citizens of Night Vale. There's nothing wrong with us."
The way he annunciated 'us' sent off warning bells. "Is there something wrong with me?" He asked, and at this point he knew he wouldn't like the answer. Cecil frowned, a beautiful droop in his pale, pale face. He wiped an unruly lock of blond hair out of his eyes.
"No, my gorgeous Carlos, there's nothing wrong with you. Only… you're different." Cecil's shoulders shrugged upwards. "We're trying to fix that. City Council hates different. I, for one, love it. But hey, it's their town, not ours."
Carlos was… confused as fuck would be a good explanation for it. "What do you mean? How are you – changing me?"
"My dear Carlos, have you not even seen your beautiful face?" Cecil asked, a forlorn ring in his voice as Carlos shook his head. It was as though he was genuinely displeased that he hadn't looked at his own reflection for a while.
"Good thing I carry this around," Cecil chuckled as he pulled a pocket mirror from God-knows-where. "Look," he leaned in to breathe against the shell of Carlos' ear, "you're wonderful."
Carlos could not say anything as he took in his – was that really his face? Black pits stared back at him. Where had his brown eyes gone? His mouth was hanging open in shock. What the hell? His teeth… they were pointed. His gaze quickly flew over to Cecil's mouth, where similar teeth smiled back at him. He flicked his eyes back to the reflection. He drew one hand up to touch at his teeth, only to startle in unabashed confusion as a clawed finger pricked itself on his… fangs.
Cecil took away the mirror, clearly not seeing the fact that Carlos was in a state of complete shock. "You're not done yet, of course," Cecil admonished, "You still have to grow a few other things like tentacles or tails or, oh boy, even wings! But," he soothed, taking Carlos' cheek in one hand and stroking his scientist's hair with the other, "you'll always be perfect to me. My dear beautiful, sweet Carlos…"
He leaned in to press his lips firmly against Carlos'.
After a moment, Carlos thought What the hell, I'm never getting out of this town anyways, and opened his mouth into the kiss.
If you couldn't beat 'em, join 'em. At least he had his Cecil by his side.
His Cecil. What a strange concept. Perhaps it was the mindset of Night Vale slowly sinking into his very bones.
Carlos didn't care so much at that point. All he knew was that he wished they had been talking indoors, where he could strip his lover of clothing so they could really do some property damage.