He had been so EXCITED when he'd first arrived, too.
Granted, the details of how exactly he came to be in Night Vale were a bit unclear. He remembered uncovering the magnetic anomalies of the area in some of his research earlier in the year, and then - there had been some kind of nomination process, he was sure. Probably funded by the university. Not that he didn't remember, he knew he remembered. He could tell you if he thought about it. But it hardly seemed important just now. Beside the point.
Anyway, he knew for certain he'd been awarded some kind of grant. And that he was happy about it.
How could he not be? He was like a kid in a proverbial candy shop. The most scientifically interesting city in America. He forgot who'd told him that. He'd always had a fascination with the unexplained, a love of the scientific method that amounted to reverence. Add to that an uncanny ability to focus his curiosity in a way that bordered on the obsessive and you had a formula that had driven him to the top of his class, all the way from elementary school through post-graduate work, much to the despair of his more ambitious classmates and colleagues. Carlos had always been too absorbed in his work to notice his rankings, which naturally raised the ire of those who viewed him as their primary competition. Nothing angers a competitive academic more than being beaten out by somebody who is oblivious to the fact that academia is a competition.
And now, here he was. Embarking on the single most fascinating project of his career. He double-checked the address and stepped out of the chill of his air conditioned hybrid and onto the scorched and dusty pavement of the parking lot of his new lab; the glaring mid-morning sun made him sneeze. He shielded his eyes to the brightness, and stood for a moment, soaking it all in. Then he gathered up the limited possessions he'd carried with him, and went to unlock the lab.
...
Here in Night Vale, the scientific community seemed – different than his usual university group. He met up with the other scientists for lunch at the local Pizza shop next to his new lab soon after he arrived. There hadn't been any of the obligatory mutual admiration expected upon the meeting of scientists who were top in their respective fields, for which Carlos had been grateful, but he couldn't help but notice that the team seemed unusually grave. And twitchy. They debriefed him in hushed tones about the work they'd been doing, which seemed to amount to collecting huge quantities of data on a variety of bizarre local phenomena, which they had then proceeded to pile up in different places – glass cases full of soil samples, bone samples, piles of surveys, photographs, hard drives - and then never actually managed to analyze. When the data itself had started to behave abnormally – catching fire, or alphabetizing itself, or developing a mucous membrane, they had started collecting data on the data's behavior, and it had become something of a vicious cycle. Carlos thought it sounded like they weren't making any actual progress at all, but he didn't want to say that, especially not so soon after meeting them all, so he mostly nodded and made "Hmmm"-ing sounds.
They'd been the ones to recommend the impromptu – and immediate – town meeting. They told him it was important – that he needed to introduce himself, to let them "get a good look, check you out."
"They need to see you're not afraid." They'd said. "You're not afraid, are you? Good….good. They can smell it on you."
Carlos wasn't afraid.
Carlos was already thinking about the earthquakes they couldn't feel, and the lights they couldn't explain, and wondering what additional modifications he'd need to make to the equipment in his lab if he wanted to analyze the data they'd been collecting on the data they'd collected.
Carlos was setting his watch for sunset.
...
The turnout for the meeting hadn't been that great, but he was impressed they got anyone to come on such short notice. Carlos stared out at the little group, most of whom were chewing on corn muffins, eyeing him with a mix of interest, suspicion, and something that Carlos couldn't place which might have been concern. There was an old woman, bundled up in a shawl, smiling vaguely at him, with empty seats at either side of her, at which she occasionally whispered; a dark haired woman with a sour expression in a business suit that must have been incredibly uncomfortable in the mid-day heat; and a neatly dressed man with the hungry and suspicious look of a reporter, who was muttering into a handheld tape recorder that looked like it had come straight out of 1995. A few men in dark suits stood off to one side – but if they were trying to look intimidating, the effect was ruined by the corn muffins.
Carlos stood, greeted the crowd, introduced himself. Night Vale, he explained to them, was a location of incredible scientific importance. It was, by his estimation, the most scientifically interesting community in the US, and yet very little scientific literature existed documenting the studies that had been done there. Actually, nothing had been published on Night Vale's unique scientific standing. Not yet."
"I'd like to fix that." He said. "There is so much that we stand to learn from studying the various physical, temporal, and geological anomalies of this area. There is a wealth of untapped potential information available here that cannot be obtained anywhere else, information that could substantially change our understanding of the natural world. Any scientist could easily spend a lifetime studying Night Vale. "
The man with the tape recorder was squinting at him, scrutinizing, and Carlos couldn't tell whether it was with hatred or admiration or confusion.
"Basically, I've come to study just what's going on around here" he said. He liked how the words felt in his mouth. They has such a ring of authority, of adventure, and as he looked out into the sea of faces, he felt a sudden rush of confidence. He was going to get to the bottom of this place. He beamed out at them, grinning broadly.
The men in the suits scowled.
The man with the tape recorder looked thunderstruck.
The old woman applauded.
Carlos stuck around after the meeting for a while, shaking hands and answering questions. The little old woman – she had been the one who brought the corn muffins, it turned out – had made him bend halfway to the floor so that she could get a good look at him, and had then reached out and patted his cheek, and told him that the angels would be keeping an eye on him. It was something his own gran had always told him, although it hadn't seemed quite as ominous coming from her back then, and Carlos had said he appreciated it, and she had smiled and tottered off.
The last one to leave was the reporter. He had been standing back, watching Carlos as intensely as he could without looking like he was watching him intensely. But Carlos had felt his eyes on him.
"Welcome to Night Vale," the reporter said, putting out his hand, and he was smiling. It was a nice smile. Carlos shook his hand, smiled back. "I was hoping I could ask you a few questions, get a few updates for the local radio? I'm Cecil, by the way." He added quickly, "I should have said that first….."
"Thank you, Cecil." Carlos said* -Cecil made a small, high pitched noise in the back of his throat that sounded a bit like "Nnngh!" - "…and sure, what do you want to know?"
Cecil looked a bit surprised to be asked. "Oh, um…well, I think the listeners would like to more about what you've found so far, maybe?" he smiled "Specifically, why we're so special? Scientifically, I mean?"
"Hmm. Well, of course you already know about the earthquakes…" Cecil cocked his head to one side a bit, looking confused. It reminded Carlos of a puppy. "No?" Cecil shook his head, and Carlos frowned. "Have the other scientists not been providing updates on this?"
"Not for a while, no….it's been, what, six months since we had an on-air update? None of them seem to want to visit the studio. Or call in. Or communicate with us at all, actually."
He glanced over at the other scientists, who were watching him, wide-eyed, and shaking their heads. Ugh. Carlos saw no point in that petty academic pride that drove people to conceal their work from their colleagues, or from the public. Cecil was right – the people of Night Vale ought to know what was going on.
"We should fix that," he said seriously, and Cecil was beaming at him like Christmas had come early. He hadn't expected to find somebody so interested in his work, let alone somebody who wanted to get the word out to the community about it – it was an amazing stroke of luck. "So yes, we've been monitoring the seismological activity from the station out by route 800, and there seem to be massive earthquakes occurring in Night Vale that – and this is the weird part, obviously – nobody can feel. We've checked the equipment several times, it's all working properly. So that's the first thing we're investigating. There's also some questions about radiation levels…but maybe don't report that yet, the readings aren't final and I think that data may be skewed. And we're going to investigate a new housing complex later today that we've been getting some strange readings from…maybe…"
Carlos hesitated, feeling suddenly nervous, and then feeling a bit stupid for feeling nervous. This was part of his job.
"Maybe…if you're interested, I could call the station later with an update on that…if you wanted…"
Cecil stared at him blankly for a second. "Yes!" he said suddenly, a bit too loudly, "Yes, that would be…that would be great!" He started scrambling in his messenger bag for something, and Carlos pulled out a pen, ready to write down the number.
Cecil turned, smiling, business card in hand, but his face went pale when he saw the pen. His eyes darted back to the suited figures in the back of the room, and back to Carlos.
"Um, Carlos, is that…is that a pen?" Cecil said, whispering the last word. Carlos raised an eyebrow at him. "There's a city ordinance" he continued, keeping his voice low, "you're not allowed...maybe I should…" he reached out, taking the pen from Carlos's hand gently, as if it might explode. "There. Don't worry, I'll get rid of this for you." He eyed the suited figures sternly, his gaze fixated on them as he said, rather more loudly than necessary, "You're new here. There's a 10 day grace period under statute 15 of the City Council's founding ordinances" he looked back at Carlos, a bit chastisingly "but you're really not supposed to have these here."
"But… What? Really, no pens?"
"No." he said, deadly serious, "Or margarita glasses, either, just so you know. Actually…." Cecil looked suddenly worried, but he forced a laugh "You know, Night Vale can be a bit tricky for newcomers. Like any new, scientifically interesting city - there's a lot to learn!" He added cheerfully. "Here, why don't I give you my personal number, too…" he flipped the business card he'd pulled out of his bag over, and pulling a lump of something dark out of his pocket, scratched 10 digits into the back of it. "If you have any questions, you can call me anytime." He looked up at Carlos, earnestly, "Seriously, ANY. TIME. I'm always available. Always."
"Oh. Um…thanks." Carlos said. No pens? Really? The other scientists had said the city legal situation was weird but that seemed a bit much…"Thank you, I will."
Cecil made another one of those high pitched noises, but he looked pleased. "Oh!" he said suddenly, flushing a bit, "Oh, and, you should listen to the show! It would be a great way to get more information about what's going on in town – we put a lot of work into it. We make it as informative as possible! It's a point of pride."
Carlos said he would, and Cecil had continued beaming at him, until after a few moments, Carlos had coughed, and said he'd probably get back to the other scientists, and Cecil had spluttered an apology for keeping him, reminded him he could call for ANY. REASON. and left.
He watched Cecil leave, saw him slip the pen into the trash can as he walked out, flexing his fingers as if it had burned him.
Carlos laughed. The guy was definitely weird, he thought. But then… Carlos had a bit of a soft spot for weird. And he seemed….sweet. And genuinely interested in helping out. And it couldn't hurt to make friends with the locals, right?
A few minutes after he left, Carlos pulled out his cell phone, and typed in the 10 digits scrawled on the back of the card. "This is Carlos, the scientist." He texted. "This is my personal number. Just so you have it, in case something comes up."
...
A scientist learns to be a skeptic. That means, if you're smart, checking, double checking, and obsessively triple checking everything from your instruments to your calculations to validate any unexpected results before you get overexcited and alert the local news media. Even if that media was just a local community radio show.
Carlos was a professional. He'd seen what happened with the guys at OPERA and that whole faster than light neutrino fiasco. So it was several hours before he was ready to accept that the most reasonable hypothesis they had to go on was that the house…just didn't exist.
"It seems like it exists." He explained to the Night Vale Community Radio studio intern when he called to deliver the promised update. "Like it's just right there when you look at it, but we've run over 15 different diagnostics, testing for the expected background radiations, photoelectric effect, that sort of thing, and we've determined…"
"Uh huh." said the intern. "I'm going to need you to slow down a sec, and make sure you're using terms our audience will understand. I'm supposed to get this ready to read off as a live update I need to refill my cocktail straw…"
Carlos thought it best to just let that last bit slide for now. "Oh, really? You're going to report it today?"
"Yeah, I've been waiting for your call," she said, sounding a bit put out, "I was told this was important breaking news, right?"
"Um….yeah. Yeah, it is." He said. It probably wasn't, considering the other data they had been collecting, but he didn't want her to feel like he she was wasting her time.
"Okay." She said again, "let's take this from the top."
...
The sun was setting over Radon Canyon.
It was setting late.
Carlos had checked his watch, and confirmed the time with another scientist, and it was at least 10 minutes late. Which was interesting, and concerning, and a little exiting - but he was going to have to start compartmentalizing anomalies if he wanted to get anywhere researching this town, Carlos thought, because they were not measuring time right now.
They were measuring radiation. And, it seemed, they were measuring a LOT of it.
This was surprising for two reasons. First, neither the quantities nor the types of radiation were what they had expected. Generally, when you have an enormous lead door in an abandoned canyon that claims to be protecting you from massive amounts of decaying plutonium, you'd expect a large amount of the "plutonium is decaying here" type of radiation. And you'd expect it to be coming from the general vicinity of the door.
Their results weren't showing that. There was a large amount of thermal radiation, some kind of eerie green photoelectric effect, and some deep melodic humming, but basically no gamma radiation - at least not coming from the door.
That was the second surprising thing. Their equipment was picking up an alarming level of what seemed to be gamma radiation coming from the town itself - radiation which either hadn't been there or for some reason hadn't been detectable a few hours earlier.
The other scientists were discussing possible sources – terrestrial gamma ray flashes from lightning being the popular choice, in spite of the fact that they were several thousand feet too low and there weren't any lightning storms.
Several thousand feet too low, and far, far too close to the town. Carlos's feet crunched across the grit and gravel of the canyon as he stalked over to the pile of equipment, grabbed one of the few handheld devices they had, and trotted back to his car, speeding up as he got closer.
He turned the key in the ignition, holding the Geiger counter out the window in one hand and the steering wheel in the other. He had only been here one day, and he'd be damned if some misplaced lightning storm, or whatever, was going to decimate the population of his new town before he even had a chance to collect any decent data on it.**
He snaked back towards the town, the quickly cooling desert air whipping at him through the open window, letting the frequency of the popping Geiger counter guide him. There was a steady increase in the frequency, which meant whatever is was, it was centralized. And if he can just get to the source…he swerved violently as he turned a corner and saw tall, shadowy figures with their arms raised around a bonfire in the middle of the street, and detoured around Oxford street…if he could just find the source then maybe he could stop it.
Carlos came to stop in front of the Night Vale Community Radio building, the Geiger counter popping out a steady pace in his hand, like a tinny, high pitched heartbeat. Carlos felt his stomach go cold. He got out, slammed the car door, and ran across the parking lot.
...
"Wait – I'm sorry, Mr. Scientist, but you can't…"
Carlos pushed through the door to the recording booth, watching his hand anxiously as the Geiger counter continued to pick up the pace. He shouldn't be able to stand, with this level of radiation – none of them should. They shouldn't be there. Was it the adrenaline, keeping him moving? Or sheer force of will?
"Oh…Carlos, hi!"
He looked up for the first time to see Cecil pulling down his headphones. He was flushing, but smiling, an open, genuine sort of smile that clearly said "I have no idea why you're here but I am both very confused and very pleased." He refocused on the machine in his hand, which was, in the language of technology, flipping the hell out.
"We – um – well we got your update about the house. No response yet from the listeners, but I think…." He heard Cecil's voice trail off "Oh, are you doing science right now? Sorry I just…what are you looking for? If there's something I can do to help…"
The Geiger counter, much to his dismay, was leading him directly over to the chair where Cecil sat, still smiling politely but looking slightly concerned as well.
"Um just…." Radiation is a trigger word for people, Carlos, don't say radiation, "I'm just scanning. For…materials…"
"Oh," said Cecil, "Oh, alright."
They needed to run, Carlos thought, at this level of radiation, he should drop the counter and run.
He took another step forward, and the Geiger counter started to hiss and sing.
Another step, and he was between Cecil and the microphone. Cecil was looking back and forth between Carlos and the counter, a mild but interested look on his face, as if he were waiting patiently for Carlos to explain what he was doing.
He placed the counter next to the microphone, and it went insane.
Carlos nearly dropped it in shock as it began to harmonize with itself in a chorus of angry, shrill chirps, backed by a loud hissing, and became hot in his hand.
"Wow!" Cecil said smiling. "It really likes the microphone!"
Carlos took a step backwards, eyes still fixated on the counter.
"Cecil, you need to evacuate. This whole building, everyone needs to ….we need to go. Now."
Cecil laughed. "What? Go where? Carlos, we're in the middle of the show!"
"I'm serious, Cecil, this is incredibly dangerous. The damage is probably already done…"
"Oh…I'm sorry, but I can't" he said, as if he were turning down a dinner invitation he'd really have liked to accept, "I really have to finish up. It won't be much longer, maybe after I wrap up we could…"
"I'm not kidding, Cecil, seriously we need to run!" Carlos said, suddenly snapping, but his legs were locked, torn between an impulsive panic reflex to bolt and an inability to leave another human being so obviously in mortal peril. He reached out and grabbed Cecil's shoulder, to shake him out of it or to pull him from the chair, but suddenly there was a loud thrashing from outside the booth, and a shrieking, and when he looked back at Cecil…
Cecil was smiling. Far, far too broadly. His eyes were too reflective, like old incandescent bulbs, and he seemed to flicker violently under Carlos's hand, as if by touching him, Carlos had somehow knocked him out of tune.
When he spoke through his too wide smile, his voice was too deep, and too slow, and too clogged with static to be human.
"But, if I leave, Dear Carlos," he said, "who would finish the show?"
Carlos's felt his heart drop out of him, and he turned, and let go, and ran.
...
*Carlos was horrible with names. He had seen a study once that repeating a person's name when you first met them helped you to remember it, and since then he'd made a concerted effort.
**You don't end up top in your field, investigating a place like Night Vale, by being the kind of person who runs AWAY from the fire.