by Joseph Fink
“And so the church believes it is an actual giant centipede that will one day lift itself through the earth and eat everyone,” she finished.
“Fascinating. I hope it’s true.”
“Why would you hope that?”
“Because in most religions, the deities don’t physically exist, or there is no proof of their existence. It makes it difficult to scientifically study these beings that claims are being made about. If this Joyous Congregation is worshiping a corporeal being, there is a chance that we could study their god.”
“The giant centipede.”
“Centipedes are extremely scientific.”
“How about we kill it first and study it later?”
“No,” Carlos said, his voice unusually hard and decisive. “Absolutely not. We can’t kill a living thing just because we’re afraid of it, or even because we want to study it. A dead thing has less data than a living thing even if that data is easier to access. We don’t even know the first thing about the way it lives. Is it alone? Are there others?”
“Let’s hope not.”
“What does it eat?”
“According to the church, everything. The entire world.”
“Doubtful. How does a beast, even a large one, devour everything in the world?”
“Very carefully.”
Carlos nodded seriously. He had trouble understanding when something was a joke.
“It would have to be done carefully, yes.”
“Carlos, if that thing’s real, it’s going to devour the whole town before you get done writing one page of observations. If we want to talk scientific value, let’s talk about how it’s way easier to do good research when you’re alive and not inside an insect.”
“Actually, an insect . . .”
“ . . . has only six legs. You know what I meant.”
“Nilanjana, science isn’t about danger. Unless the subject being studied is danger. Then that’s what science is about. The hooded figures. This centipede. You’ve gotten quite an appetite for bravery.”
“If there’s something threatening my town, then I will do what I have to do.”
My town? Where had that come from?
“I mean, this town,” she said. “I mean any town. Forget it. Why were the hooded figures there?”
Carlos said “hmmm” in a voice far too loud for the small car and stroked his chin, which was his subtle way of indicating that he was thinking.
“The hooded figures are attracted to the Dog Park,” he said, “which is a connection to the otherworld. It’s possible they’re attracted to areas that have been attacked because there’s something about the otherworld in those pits.”
“We know that the house that doesn’t exist is connected to the otherworld. Let’s see if there are hooded figures there too.”
Carlos grimaced.
“The house that doesn’t exist. Going inside it was such a mistake. I was trapped in that otherworld for a year. I didn’t know if I would see anyone I loved ever again. I need to understand what happened to me, and whether it could happen to anyone else in Night Vale.”
“Somehow that house is connected to the centipede, I think, and the city, and Pamela, and the church, and everyone connected with the church, even . . .”
She trailed off and checked her mirrors. Pamela still was following them. Behind Pamela was a black sedan driven by agents from a vague yet menacing agency. It wasn’t unusual for any given car to be tailed by multiple spying cars. It was a common sight in Night Vale, long processions of cars all tailing each other. But there was another vehicle, behind the black sedan. A beat-up white van. At this distance she couldn’t see who was driving, but it didn’t look government-issued. Who was it and why were they following her?
“Could we go into the house?” she asked.
“No! Absolutely not, no. I know you’ve found some spirit of derring-do in yourself, but you would disappear into the desert otherworld and maybe never get back. I can’t let anyone else get close to it. That’s why I’ve been running remote experiments on it using my machine. Or trying to, if these attacks would stop sabotaging them. I improved my machine yesterday by adding a long, corrugated metal cone, which tapers up to a small red ball. When I turn it on, visible electrical waves form around it making sounds like ZZZZZT.”
“What does the cone do?”
“I just explained what it does. Weren’t you listening? What I said was—”
He stopped.
“Nils.”
“What?”
“What’s that van doing?”
The white van was pulling around the black sedan and Pamela’s car. Pamela waved her fist at them, shouting about tortures so unimaginable no one had even thought to make them illegal, but they didn’t seem to hear her. The van pulled up next to Nilanjana and honked its horn. Carlos looked straight ahead, trying not to acknowledge them. Nilanjana glared at the driver of the van. He had a huge, familiar mustache and a huge, familiar smile. The guard from the church. Next to him was Gordon, displaying his usual upsetting leer. The van accelerated away with a coughing roar.
“Who was that?”
“It doesn’t matter,” she said. It truly didn’t. Let them spy on her. She wasn’t afraid of them. “Look, we’re almost there.”
She turned onto the cul-de-sac and pulled up to the house that doesn’t exist. If she looked right at it, it looked like there was a house there, just like every other house on the block, but at the same time it wasn’t there.
“What would happen if I knocked on the door?”
“Don’t,” Carlos said. “You might not like what answers.”
“Fine. Fine. I just needed to see the place for myself.”
What did it mean that a house she could see and smell and hear and touch did not exist? What would happen if someone tried to buy the house and move in? It was like that old real estate mantra “Existence. Existence. Existence.”
“There!” she shouted, pointing.
A hooded figure meandered across the white pebbles that made up the front yard. They could hear the static from where they sat.
“The hooded figures appear to be drifting toward entrances to the otherworld,” Carlos said. “This means two probable things. One, the presence of the otherworld is especially strong now. The boundary between the two worlds is getting thinner. Our work in understanding it is more urgent than ever. And two—”
“Two,” she said. “The pit at Big Rico’s, and therefore all the other pits, are directly related to the otherworld.”
“Yes,” he said.
“Maybe it was like I thought,” she said. “Maybe the pits are caused by the giant centipede, but it’s not moving underground. It’s moving from the otherworld.”
“That is a possibility.”
They were so caught up in their conversation that the loud knocking on the passenger-side window was followed by a startled pulsing in their chests. It was Pamela, leaning over the car. Carlos rolled down his window.
“We were warned about you,” Pamela said. “We were warned about the otherworld, and about that monster that lives there. The Wordsmith alerted us to all of this, weeks ago.
“And after we heard from him, we knew we had to do anything to stop you. So keep that in mind. We will do anything to stop you.” She met both of their eyes, and behind her the static noise of the hooded figure grew louder. Two more hooded figures appeared, and then two more, drifting across the lawn.
“Anything,” Pamela reiterated, then returned to her purple PT Cruiser and drove away.
Nilanjana clutched the steering wheel tightly, trying to stay aware of the hooded figures’ movements without looking at them directly.
“Darryl said he just gave them a tract, that he was just trying to convert them,” Nilanjana said quietly. “But he’s been on the church’s side this whole time.”
“It would appear so,” said Carlos. “I’m sorry. I know you liked him.”
He didn’t touch her, because he himself
didn’t like being touched, and so did not like to comfort people that way. But he leaned toward her and gave her a kind and concerned frown.
“It doesn’t matter.” She was fine. Darryl was probably somewhere with Stephanie right now, laughing about how easily he had undermined her and how excited they were to summon this monster from another world.
“I’m going to tell you something, something I’ve never told anyone,” Carlos said. “Can I do that?”
“Absolutely.”
“I’ve never told Cecil the whole truth about the otherworld because I love him, and I don’t want him to experience more pain than he has to. He experienced a year without me, and that is enough. But that is not all I endured.”
“Carlos,” she said softly, meeting his eyes. “What happened?”
“From the point of view of Night Vale, I was in the otherworld for a year. But time moves faster in the otherworld. From my point of view, it wasn’t a year. It was ten years. I spent ten years, not eating or drinking, not aging, not truly existing, just waiting in stasis, alone, away from the people I love. It is a place that is empty and hollow. Ten years.”
He shuddered, the first time she had seen him do that. His eyes were steady but distant.
“No one must ever go through what I experienced.”
There was nothing she could say to make it better, not even a little bit, and so she just said, “Carlos, I’m so sorry.”
Past the hooded figures, who now looked like bored, overdressed security guards, Nilanjana saw a light in the front window of the house. It was daylight out, but she could tell the light was on because she could see a modest iron chandelier over a simple round wood dining table. On the table was a plain glass vase. A shadow moved across the back wall and then a woman. There was a woman in the house, a woman in her fifties, wearing a simple, flower print dress. The woman lifted the vase and placed some fresh flowers into it. She left the room and returned a moment later with a cup, with which she poured some water into the vase. She looked out the window for a moment, as if savoring the morning light. She stretched, and yawned, but the yawn didn’t end. Her jaw swung wider, and her arms got longer. She looked like she was caught in a black hole, helplessly elongating. Her mouth was half her body. Her arms bent backward as they pushed against the ceiling. Her eyes sank back into her skull. She was just a mouth, two empty eye sockets, and warped arms creeping along the ceiling like vines. And then the woman dissolved, all of her, mouth and eye sockets and arms, into dust, which fell out of sight onto the living room floor.
“Carlos. Are you seeing this?” Nilanjana moved to clutch his shoulder, and then, remembering, stopped herself. “Was all that real?”
He shrugged.
“It happened in a house that doesn’t exist, so technically no, I suppose.”
27
“The scientists want to study the Smiling God,” said Pastor Munn. “They think there’s something ‘scientifically fascinating and absolutely terrifying’ about a giant centipede.”
She looked at Darryl from across her desk. Gordon, who had returned from his surveillance mission in the van and was back at his usual place, behind her, glowered along.
“Does that sound right to you?” she asked. He was uncertain if she meant correct or justified.
“In my experience,” Darryl said, “scientists find everything scientifically fascinating. It’s one of their best and worst habits. They’re always shouting about how the entire universe is an extraordinary place, and that the vast sparkle of a nebula and the grinding burp of a broken blender are all part of a spectrum of things that exist and how that is so unlikely and beautiful.” He sighed. “It gets tiring. Especially when you have been raised with the heady and inspiring stuff that is a Smiling God coming to devour us all.”
The pastor narrowed her eyes above her friendly, natural smile, but it didn’t have the effect she wanted because it was hidden by her huge hat. She removed her hat and narrowed her eyes again.
“And what do the rest of you think? Is Darryl telling me the truth? Can we trust him or has he betrayed his faith?”
Darryl was flanked by Stephanie and Jamillah, and each one of them put a hand on him, claiming him as one of their own.
“There’s no one more invested in this community than our Wordsmith,” said Stephanie. “No one has put in more volunteer hours, or tithed more to support our foreign missions to Venezuela and Mexico and Double Mexico.”
“I wish you could have seen the tons of hours he spent teaching our missionaries Double Spanish,” Jamillah added.
“It’s the doubling of the vocal cords that’s the tricky part,” said Darryl. “Once you’re past that, it gets a lot easier.”
“Or if you don’t believe him,” said Stephanie, “believe me. You know that I want nothing more than to be a Church Elder. I wouldn’t let anything get in the way of that goal. And I know that Darryl is loyal to the church.”
“Mm.” The pastor said nothing more. She tapped the tips of her fingers together thoughtfully.
Gordon coughed.
“Pastor,” he said. “Ma’am. You know I always am behind you one hundred percent, no matter what. But, well, we’ve known Darryl since he was little. I taught several of his classes. He stayed with my wife and me for a few weeks right after the Ramirezes . . . after his folks . . . uh . . . passed. I have watched him grow into a joyous, faithful follower of our Smiling God.”
The pastor did not change her neutral smile.
“If you don’t believe him, though,” Gordon continued, “I don’t believe him. For sure. But if it was me, just me, on my own, I think I would believe him. He wrote our brochure, for teeth’s sake.”
“Thank you, Gordon,” the pastor said, her tone gentle, but not inviting further feedback. “And you, Darryl, what do you say for yourself?”
Darryl paused and collected his thoughts. As good as he was at writing, he knew he could be deeply unconvincing when speaking. His sincerest thoughts sometimes seemed to convey ulterior motives or inappropriate tones. And now he needed to be as convincing as it was possible to be. He rode a slow breath in and out.
“To me, there is no separation between the bodies in this room and the belief in our hearts and jaws,” he said. “I think that what we believe and what we are, those are inseparable and singular. Every time I move my finger, it is a prayer. Every time Stephanie makes a joke and Jamillah laughs, that is a prayer. Every song Gordon leads is a prayer. Every touch, every thought, every conflict, every moment of weakness, even, is a prayer. The Joyous Congregation is everything that our lives are made of. I couldn’t deny my faith any more than I could deny my skeleton, couldn’t leave it without leaving every minute that my friends and I have ever spent together. I love the people in this room. And with that same love, not the same level of love, but the same single impulse of love, I love the Joyous Congregation, I love the Smiling God, and I love each of you.” He looked into Gordon’s eyes, and then into Pastor Munn’s. He touched Stephanie’s fingers on his shoulder. He held Jamillah’s non-power-drill hand. “I don’t know if that answers your question.”
Jamillah ran her power drill a little, she couldn’t help it. Stephanie gave his shoulder a hard squeeze. Everyone but the pastor was crying. Pastor Munn was smiling.
“Darryl,” she said, “I knew you were special. You have always been special to this church. Not many of us in this generation grew up with the faith. Most of us drifted into the Joyous Congregation out of lives of temptation and heresy and Bloodstone Circles. But this faith raised you.” She reached out a hand across the desk, and he took it. It was a long reach for both of them. It was a really big desk.
“The Smiling God does not know grudges. It does not understand transgression. It only knows hunger. It only devours. It is perfect that way. And you still have a place with all the rest of your siblings of the faith in the dark, acrid belly of the Smiling God. Will you join us there?”
“Yes,” he said. “Pastor, absolutely yes.”
She smiled at him. He widened his lips as far as they would go and showed his teeth. So did his friends, and Gordon. They all showed their teeth to each other, indicating how happy all of them were.
“I have something important to show you,” Pastor Munn said. “But first, a blessing. Please, stand, bow your heads, and keep your eyes firmly closed. Gordon, will you lead the prayer?”
“Yes, uh, which prayer are we—”
“The one about the Mark,” she snapped.
“Okay. You heard the pastor. Eyes closed, heads down. ‘O Smiling God. Who, more than you, hungers? Who comes out of the sand, like you, and devours all It can see? Who has larger teeth? Who has more teeth? Who else is an enormous centipede? No one. Only You, our gracious Smiling God.’”
As they recited the prayer, the pastor gave Gordon a tin of thick black paste that smelled a little like moss and a little like urine. None of the others had any idea what the paste was made from (it was made from crushed centipedes), but he smeared it under each of their right ears, drawing three interlocking triangles.
“‘So you are marked, may you be eaten,’” Gordon continued. “‘So you are devout, may you be devoured. So you are together, may you be together within the stomach of our Smiling God.’ To this we all say:”
They all said it. “Amen.”
“Well great! Together, we are the devout, the devoured,” Pastor Munn said. “That’s super. You all can sit or whatever now. And hey! Now I can show you the book. I want to show you the book. It’s all happening so fast. It’s quite exciting.”
Even Gordon seemed a bit wary at this. People in Night Vale are not comfortable with books in general, understanding that they are, in the best cases, wastes of time and, in the worst cases, traps left by the Secret Police to find out who the curious ones are so they can be removed from the population. Plus, Gordon was the only Elder in the room. He was the one who should get to see whatever exciting book she was going to bring out. Deep down, he hated and feared books and would prefer never to have to read them, but if anyone in this room deserved the right to get to read a book, it should be him.
