Work Text
“Listeners, some of you may have become aware of a distinct lack of black helicopters in our skies and bathtubs lately. The man in the cloud, that we presume is the sheriff, informed us that a portion of the Sheriff’s Secret Police has been sent on a very important mission, and by a portion I mean all of it. They are all gone. To where? We do not know yet, but until they return, our town’s security will be provided by the kind werewolves who tried to destroy us all last week. I’m here right now with the leader of the werewolves, Silvia Silvershine. It is good to have you back at the studio, Silvia.” “Thank you, Cecil. It feels good to be back. I see that you guys have done some redecorating.” “Well, when an angry werewolf tries to destroy a radio station, some remodeling is definitely in order, am I right?” “Oh, those were the good old days. We’ve returned to Night Vale not as conquerors, but as protectors. All the delicious inhabitants of Night Vale have nothing to fear, we’ll keep you all safe. No harm will come to those yummy flesh vessels of yours.” “I am glad to hear that, after all I don’t want anything to happen to my flesh vessel, it’s where I keep my entire being. Now, a word from our sponsors…”******** The bubblegum bubble exploded, covering LaFountaine’s face from their chin to the first half of the bridge of their nose. With their tongue they gathered the gum on their face, bringing it back to their mouth. Before they began to form another bubble, they pointed at the wind and declared “Here comes another one.” The loud noise the helicopters made were starting to have an effect on Perry. She could swear that she had figured out where in the puzzle the piece in her hand belonged, but the helicopters with their awful noise kept breaking her concentration and LaFontaine’s insistence in pointing out whenever one of them was coming by didn’t help. “Is something wrong?” LaFontaine asked, “You seem awfully angry there.” Perry dropped the puzzle piece on the table and raised her hands in a surrendering position. “All I wanted was one normal afternoon. Just one. All I wanted was to build a puzzle with my best friend.” “But we are! Look, I think we got about 15% of it done. That’s pretty good progress, considering we’ve been at it since morning.” “I just wanted to have some nice, calm, NORMAL fun. That’s is all, but now these-” “Here comes another.” “These helicopters just keep-” “And another.” “They just keep circling around the campus.” “So what?” their mouth produced another bubble of gum, their tongue gathering it back into their mouth after it exploded. “They haven’t done anything bad…yet.” “Look at them!” Parry stood up and went to the window. “Flying all ominously and…and…circle-y. They are probably being piloted by some sort of…evil supernatural thing, just waiting the right moment to attack us. I just know it.” “Relax, not every supernatural thing is after us. Besides…” LaFontaine took the piece Perry had abandoned and placed it where it belonged. The addition of that piece helped they realize where other two pieces went. “We got a mean, angry, super strong supernatural thing on our side.” “We can’t depend on Carmilla to save us every time something happens.” “We also got the Zetas and the Summer Society. Look, we’ll panic when it’s time to panic, until then…” LaFontaine got of their bed, went to Perry and with their hands on her shoulders lead her back to her bed, “we will continue to enjoy a nice,” they took a piece and fit it in its place in the puzzle, “calming,” they took another piece and fit it back where it should be, “normal puzzle game. Because you deserve a little break from all the weird I drag you into.” Perry smiled at her best friend. She took a deep breath, did her best to block out the noise coming from the helicopters flying in circles over the university and took a new piece into her hand, wondering where it was supposed to go. “I could take them down, you know,” said Carmilla, a smirk in her lips and one eyebrow lifted, looking up at Laura, waiting for her girlfriend to say anything that could be somehow interpreted as permission or doubt. Laura had no doubts that Carmilla would be able to karate kick a helicopter out of the sky if she put her mind into it, and although it really seemed that the black helicopters that had been circling the campus since noon were up to no good, attacking them without provocation didn’t seem like the best idea. For now Laura thought it would better to just study them, thought all she had done so far was to look at them with her binocular while she ate cookies at the shadow of a tree. “I have to ask, are those your mother’s? Did she have fighter jets and tanks as well?” Carmilla chuckled, conjuring the image of her mother being run over by a tank, which made her smile. “No, Mother never did have any use for military assets. I hazard a guess that when you are a vampire who is older than dirt and you have a god covering your rear, mundane weapons such as those are beyond unnecessary.” Carmilla closed her eyes as more cookie crumbs were about to fall on her face and sat up. Using Laura’s lap as a pillow wasn’t so romantic while her girlfriend was consuming her delicious unhealthy snacks. Taking cookie crumbs out of her hair wasn’t exactly what Carmilla qualified as quality time with her beloved. “What do they want? Who sent them?” Laura took a bite out of another cookie and spoke with her mouth still full, “shomeone hash tuh geth tho the botthom oh ish.” With one hand Carmilla wiped the cookie crumbs that had flown onto her face and stood up. “Alright then, Lois Lane. Your Superman is going to get your front page scope.” Laura stood up, but before she could protest and cover Carmilla’s face with more cookie crumbs, the vampire pushed her girlfriend against the tree and sunk her teeth in her neck. ********“…and this was traffic. Now a report on the general state of the town: the Temporary Werewolf Police has advised citizens to not leave their homes. Their leader, Silvia Silvershine, has stated that all the nutritious humans must stay indoors. If you start hearing strange voices coming from below the earth, the Temporary Werewolf Police advices you to ignore them, cover yourself in BBQ sauce and wait patiently next to an open window for a werewolf to pick you up. Now, for the sports news…” ******** Lawlinne gazed at the location she and her underlings had been monitoring one more time, then she looked at the pictures that were given to her one more time. The coordinates were right, they were where they needed to be, but the temple looked nothing like the pictures. It almost looked like a campus of a university. Maybe the guardians had done some redecorating? She had been told that they were awful at exterior design. “Oh crap! Oh crap! Oh crap!” said Sebastian on the radio. “What’s wrong this time, Seb? Over.” Lawlinne asked, making sure to sound as exhausted as she could make herself sound to make Sebastian realize how tired of his bullshit she was. “My chopper is being attacked! Something just jumped on it! Over!” “Is it a guardian? Over.” “It’s a big cat thing!” “You mean like a puma? Over.” “I mean like a very angry panther! It’s on my windshield! It broke the windshield! It is on top of me! AAAAH! It’s biting me! AAAAH! It’s biting me while I narrate about it biting me! Somebody please water my plaaaaAAA-” Lawlinne watched as the helicopter piloted by Sebastian spiraled out of control and crashed. A great sorrow filled Lawlinne’s chest, she really liked that particular helicopter. She remembered the happy times she and that helicopter had together: their first mission, their first medal awarding ceremony, their first exorcism, their first date… “Attention all personnel!” she screamed into the radio, “weapons free! Weapons free! Let your weapons be as free as the birds in the sky! Let them enjoy the sweet embrace of independence and allow them to fulfill their deepest desires, their greatest dreams, their reason for living! Let your weapons go wild!” Every personnel of the Sheriff’s Secret Police took their weapons into their hands, closed their eyes and listened to the heart of their respective weapons. Their weapons told them where to aim, how to hold them and how to shoot. Their weapons felt particularly happy as they shot at nothing specific. LaFontaine grabbed Perry and dove onto the floor with her when they heard the shooting start. Only a few bullets made into their room, but their trajectories where far from where the two friends were taking shelter. “I just wanted a normal afternoon,” Perry complained to herself, “just one! Is it too much to ask?!” “Alright everybody,” said Lawlinne to her subordinates, “your weapons have enjoyed freedom enough. Put their leashes back on them, give them plenty of water to drink and- WHATHEHELL?!” The students poked their heads out of the doors and windows of their dormitories and sorority houses once the shooting stopped. Danny had a lot on her mind that day, she had been rather stressed and when it combined with the adrenaline that came from fearing for her life as people in black helicopters started shooting at random directions she acted without thinking. She grabbed the biggest rock near her as she stood up from the lawn near the women’s dormitory and threw at the closest helicopter, breaking the pilot’s window and hitting him in the head, causing him to lose consciousness and the helicopter to crash. Before departing, Lawlinne had told Maurice to wear a helmet, but nooooo. She made a mental note to never go inside an aircraft piloted by someone who had only piloted such means of transportation in videogames ever again. “Well, this wasn’t so bad, all things considered.” After making sure that all her limbs were where they should be and that no bone was broken and no internal organ was damaged, the miraculously alive Lawlinne looked at the disembodied head of her dead pilot and said “Hey Maurice, if you don't want me to go to your house and take all your cool stuff for me then say something...nothing to say, huh? Thanks for the presents, Maurice.” Shaking, Laura stood up from the lawn, pinching herself to make sure she wasn’t dreaming or dead. A helicopter had crashed at the spot where she had been sitting and eating. Had she not moved in time she would have been crushed. She presumed that she would never be able to move so quickly again in her life. She approached the metallic carcass of the thing that had once been a helicopter and shrieked as an arm came out from an opening. A tall, blonde woman, appearing to be in her early 30’s, wearing a SWAT like uniform crawled out of the crashed helicopter, apparently unharmed, and raised one hand, as if telling Laura to halt. “Hey, guardian. Cease your attacks, we came in peace.” ******** “…and this has been financial news. New reports from the Temporary Werewolf Police: they ask us to cover ourselves with less mayonnaise and more ketchup. They also asked us to stay away from the fissures that have been appearing on the ground. Really bad things would happen to anyone who would fall into one of them, so make sure to stay at a safe distance from the fissures, okay? Now, I just received a text message from my boyfriend Carlos, who is still at a desert in another plane of existence…”******** More and more students gathered near the women’s dormitory, as that’s the area where the black helicopters had landed. All Zetas and members of the Summer Society, some taking pictures and recording videos with their cell phones, others making angry faces at the people with SWAT like uniforms that had invaded their campus. Lawlinne finished counting how many of her underlings where there and decorated her lips with a bright and enthusiastic smile. “Good news, everyone: only four of us have died so far. We keep this up, and maybe half of us will be able to make it back home. We must do our best here, the people of Night Vale are counting on us!” “Ma’am,” said a recruit, “are you sure we shouldn’t do anything about the locals? They did kill four of us with little effort, and they seem to be a bunch of…” “Nutjobs!” said Perry as she joined her friends “those nutjobs are armed and they are clearly dangerous, so why are you all just standing here while they are right over there?! Where is campus security?” “I just checked with my bros,” answered Kirsch, “campus security ran away as soon as the shooting started.” “Unbelievable. What about the police?” “We already called them,” answered Danny, “their exact words were “yeah, you are on your own there, kiddo.” God, I hate this town.” “Don’t worry babes,” said one of Kirsch’s bros as he joined the growing crowd, “if any of those guys try anything, do you know what the Zetas are gonna do? We are gonna…” “Scream like frightened little children!” said Lawlinne to her subordinates, “then run around in circles as despair consumes them. That’s what the people of Night Vale are going to do if we fail our mission. So you all have to…” “Take a chill pill,” said Carmilla, seeming to be in a better mood than usual. “I’ve seen wars before, I’ve ended up in a couple battle fields back in my time, I can dispatch this sorry excuses for soldiers or whatever they are by myself. So could you simpletons please…” “Don’t lose your shit.” Said Lawlienne, “Things might be very ugly at Night Vale by the time we get back, so make sure you don’t lose your freaking equipment during the mission because you might need it later. Have I made myself clear?” Her men and women responded positively. “Have I made myself clear, Daisy?” “Oh my Mysterious Lights in The Sky,” complained Daisy, rolling her eyes, “That only happened once, okay?” “Very well. I shall try communicating with the locals. Wish me luck.” “She’s pointing at me,” said the confused and scared Laura as the tall blonde woman left the company of her friends and pointed at her. “why is she pointing at me?” “I think she’s calling you,” answered LaFontaine “I’ll go,” volunteered Danny, “I’m gonna go over there and show them what happens to people who-” “Hold your horses, Xena. Let Cupcake take this one.” Carmilla gave Laura a little push, ignoring the worried expression in her girlfriend’s face. “Be our ambassador; go make peace with the evil SWAT people. If anything goes wrong, I’m right behind you.” “You…you’re enjoying this, aren’t you?” Danny accused, putting her hands on her hips and looking down at the short vampire. “Me taking pleasure at armed forces invading our University after the most excitement I had in the past two months was watching Laura hunting for shiny Pokémon? Perish the thought, my dear Xena.” Laura left her crowd, Carmilla smirking and giving her thumbs up when she looked back. She met the tall woman in SWAT like uniform in a middle ground between the two groups. The woman extended a hand and Laura reluctantly grabbed it to complete the friendly handshake. “Let us try this again,” began the tall woman. “I am Lawlinne Lawsome Lawless III, the Senior Executive Producer of the Sheriff’s Secret Police of Night Vale.” “Errr…” Laura took a few steps back. “The who of the what of the where now?” ******** “…and that’s how I got this new tie. Pretty neat, huh?...Listeners, I just received information that tentacles have started coming out from the fissures that opened on the ground all over the town. The Temporary Werewolf Police is herding citizens into the City Hall, and they asked for us to not put salt on ourselves, they said that human meat is already salty enough on it’s own…Silvia? What are you doing here?” “There is no time, Cecil. There never was.” “What do you mean? Hey, stop!” “Stop squirming you juicy fool!” “Get your paws off me! Listeners, while I fend for my life, please listen to this pre-recorded messages!...”******** “This isn’t happening” said Perry, sitting with her legs crossed next to LaFontaine, her best friend caressing her hair in an attempt to sooth their worried friend. “There is something seriously wrong with the people of this university.” “Well, we made peace with the invading Secret Police of…” LaFontaine looked at Danny. “Night Vale” Danny completed for her friend. “Yes, thank you. I think this is a good thing, more people to protect us from weird supernatural stuff. And they have guns! They can take care of things the Zetas and the Summer Society can’t.” “I still don’t trust them. Not to protect us in case we ever need them to, and neither to sit next to them on the grass to watch one of Laura’s puppet shows. Their leader doesn’t even has a rank someone would have in a police force, polices don’t have Senior Executive Producers. These people are seriously messed up!” A member of the Sheriff’s Secret Police who was sitting right next to her gave her a hurt look, the kind of look a person has when someone says that their casserole is terrible when they had always been proud of their casserole. “No offense.” The entirety of the Summer Society, the Zetas, the Sheriff’s Secret Police plus Perry & LaFontaine were sitting on the grass , all facing the little cardboard stage that Laura and Lawlinne had set up to explain the situation. “Okay everybody!” Laura said from behind the cardboard stage, “the situation goes as thusly.” Lawlinne lifted one hand, presenting the sock puppet of a strange looking person, representing the average citizen of Night Vale. Laura lifted both her hands, one hand with a sock puppet with a light bulb for a head and the other with a monstrous sock puppet with dozens of little tentacles. Lawlinne began narrating the story her gargoyle foster parents had told her when she was little. Long ago, the people of Night Vale worshiped many, many gods. It was kind of messy at first, but we managed to work things out and coexisted peacefully with the great Old Ones. Everything was going well, we were happy and they didn’t demand many human sacrifices. Trouble began when Ujeerk arrived.
He seemed harmless at first, many deities passed by Night Vale back then and we were happy to offer them a place to spend the night during their travels and offered them some tainted blood. We were famous for our tainted blood, best tainted blood there was in the whole world, an old family recipe you see, but it has been lost along with many things.
Ujeerk seemed like any other traveling deity who passed by, but he ended up staying longer than anticipated. We didn’t want to seem like bad hosts, so we let him stay for a while longer. It was quite sad at first, Ujeerk had never had any worshipers, and he seemed to have some trouble talking to mortals, we felt bad for him. We hang out with him for a little bit and he opened up to us. That’s when things went downhill.
You see, Ujeerk mistook our friendliness for awe. He asked for us to begin worshiping him, but we didn’t feel that way towards him. We explained that we were just friendly towards deities of other religions and we didn’t want to begin worshiping any new ones at that moment. He kept insisting, however. He was all “but I’m a nice deity!” and we were all “okay, we got that, but we really don’t want to worship you. We already have gods.”
He wouldn’t back down. He kept insisting, he was all “oh but you’re polytheists! You must add me to your pantheon, I’m a nice deity!”, and we were like “dude, we don’t want to worship you, leave us the hell alone!”, but he was all like “how can you call yourselves polytheists and not include me in your pantheon? Real polytheists would at least give me a chance.” We were losing our patience, we said “dude, that’s not how polytheism works. I think it’s time for you to leave and don’t come back.”
Ujeerk got furious! He accused us of leading him on, he even used all those trademark Nice Deity lines such as “mortals prefer gods of jerkness” and “It’s so hard for a nice, omniscient deity like me to find pure mortals who value omniscience over omnipotence.” He even went on a rant about how the oppression mortals face is irrelevant because mortals prefer omnipotent gods over gods with limited power, as if that made all the oppression towards mortals okay. He wasn’t even omniscient, he just thought he was. He was pretty dumb actually
Anyway, he got angry and tried to destroy us. The damn bastard was so dense that none of our weapons had an effect on him, not even explosions! The only thing that would penetrate that thick head of his was the Spear of Innur’Fahce, but sadly Innur’Fahce was away visiting his parents in the astral plane and took his spear with him, so we used his shield instead. His shield produced a magical cage in which we locked Ujeerk in. We threw Ujeerk with shield-cage and all into the bowels of the planet and that’s the last time we saw him.
Sadly, Innur’Fahce got angry that we used his shield while he was away, “saving yourselves from obliteration is no excuse to touch my stuff” he said. We told him that if he just gave us his spear we could kill Ujeerk and get his shield back, but he wouldn’t listen. We broke up our worship of him and he departed.
Now, it seems that Ujeerk’s constant attempts of breaking the shield-cage has finally drained the shield of it’s holy power and it is trying to get out of the planet’s underground to kill everyone in Night Vale. We were sent here because that’s where Innur’Fahce’s parents said he had moved to. We need his spear so we can finally get rid of Ujeerk once and for all.
The curtains closed and the spectators applauded Laura and Lawlinne’s masterful sock puppet acting. Someone had recorded the whole thing and posted it on YouTube, which would go viral in the future, receive the internet award for Best Sock Puppet Show in the further future and get a high budget Hollywood remake with Laura and Lawlinne as creative consultants in the even further future. For now, in the present, the two were content with their work and held hands and took a bow as people applauded and officers of the Sheriff’s Secret Police threw flowers at their feet. “Great,” said Carmilla, “now where are we going to find this ex-god of yours? I haven’t seen anything that looks remotely like a man with a big light for a head, and frankly I had enough of deities of Light for an entire century.” “I think JP found him!” LaFontaine shouted, pointing at their phone where JP’s digitalized ghost had recently settled in. "We need to go to the basement!". ******** “Listeners, I am safe, at least for now. I am broadcasting though the mobile radio transmitter that management got to me in exchange for a vial of my blood.” “Management?! You said there was nobody else left in the station!” “Calm down Silvia, Management can take care of itself. What about you, are you okay? Let me see that wound…oh God…” “It’s nothing…I’ll be fine.” “This is my fault. If I hadn’t-” “Don’t blame yourself. Protecting the people of Night Vale is my temporary job now, remember?” “I’m sorry I suspected the Temporary Werewolf Police were staging all of this just to try to eat us all again. And you protected me, even after all the mean things I said.” “That’s what friends are for, right? You’re my friend, Cecil. You’re also part of a balanced breakfast, but you are my friend first, and nobody, not even a whinny deity, hurts my friends.” “Where are you going?” “I’ll gather what is left of my werewolves and prepare a last stand against Ujeerk. We’ll buy the Sheriff’s Secret Police some more time to come back with that weapon. So long, Cecil. It has been delicious.” “Silvia, don’t go!...Listeners, Silvia Silvershine, the most heroic werewolf I have ever had the pleasure of knowing has left on a suicide mission to buy our police force more time. I hope you’re all safe, and to all the werewolves who can hear me, you are all heroes. Please be careful. As our brave Homo Lupus march into battle I bring you all…to the weather…” ******** Lawlinne’s subordinates, along with the Zetas and the Summer Society, tore down a wall in the university’s basement, revealing a big chamber with a huge dark hole in the middle. They approached the opening in the ground carefully as LaFontaine delivered to them JP’s findings. “He says that the university was build on top of the entrance to the Placiis Tuh Crashys. According to legend it is the place where deities like to go to get away from all the holy and/or mortal business. It seems to be an alternative dimension that exists within our own. The deities usually take their temples with them.” “Oh boy, oh boy. Seems like a fun place to spend a millennium.” Said Carmilla, looking into the hole, unable to see anything inside it. “Has a great view. Stuff of poetry.” “We’ll take it from here,” said Lawlinne, “thank you all for your assistance.” “What? No way we are backing out now, bro-lady.” Said Kirsch, telling his bros of the Zeta Omega Mu to come closer with a wave of his hand. “The Zetas have rules. Whenever a hottie has trouble with an ex-boyfriend, we give her a hand. There are some hotties in your ranks, you included.” Kirsch winked at Lawlinne, doing a double-pistols motion with his hands as his bros commented on how smooth he was. “And this Innur’Fahce…” he looked at LaFontaine, who gave him a thumbs up to signal that he got the pronunciation right. “Yeah, this Innur’Fahce god-dude kinda sounds like an ex-boyfriend, so you can count on the Zetas to help you out, bro-lady.” “The Summer Society will help too.” Danny declared, the fit and athletic women of the Summer Society looking at each other and nodding, both approving of Danny’s declaration and reassuring one another that they were capable of going head to head with a deity. “We can’t just city idly while some crybaby deity is trying to kill innocent people just because they have the right to say no to unwanted advances. We are going with you.” Laura poked Carmilla once, twice, thrice, on the fourth time Carmilla sighed and raised her hand. “Heroic vampire here, nagged into duty.” “Thank you all. Now, we have some holy butt to kick.” Lawlinne jumped into the hole first, her subordinates along with the Summer Society and the Zetas went right after. Carmilla was at the edge of the hole, arms crossed. Laura tried pushing her into the magical portal dug into the ground, but the vampire didn’t budge. “Carmilla, you said you would help!” “I say a lot of things, Sweet Biscuit. Doesn’t mean I actually mean them.” “Carmilla please, there are people in danger!” “There is always people in danger somewhere, do you want me to be heroic vampire on a regular basis and walk the Earth saving every person I come across?” “You don’t need to save everybody, just the people who come asking for help and could really use a supernatural hand.” Carmilla sighed again, turned to her human girlfriend and kissed her on the forehead. “Okay then, Muffin. I’ll go help the Commander’s Hidden Squad of Somewhere-or-Other, but with one condition.” “Which is…?” Carmilla leaned backwards, about to fall into the mystical hole in the ground. “You’re coming along for the ride.” Carmilla grabbed Laura’s arm as she was about to fall. Instinctively Laura tried to hold on to LaFontaine, who grabbed Perry’s hand as they were dragged into the hole. Carmilla let go of Laura’s arm and her chilling evil laugh echoed in the tunnel where they were descending as the three normal humans clung to each other, their hearts racing as their screamed in terror. Suddenly the hole had become much wider, several kilometers wider. The distant walls, after a better look, were not walls anymore. Very far from them, a city occupied the space around where they were falling. That cylindrical city seemed to stretch out forever and the three friends feared that they would keep falling for the rest of eternity, but their fall suddenly became much slower. They fell at gradually slower speed until their bodies came to a halt in mid air. “This isn’t happening, why is this happening, this shouldn’t happen…” “Calm down, Perry, we’ll be okay.” LaFontaine reassured her best friend. “See, we stopped falling…somehow.” “We are not okay. We are in the middle of some hole which is not a hole, is a cylindrical city and we are stuck in space and I want to go home!” The three began moving again, to the side this time. Their bodies were dragged towards the city, to the portion of it that was located to their left. Their clung to each other tighter as their approached the ground of that cylindrical plane of existence. As it happened before, the three slowed down as they came closer to the roads beneath them. When their bodies came to a halt they were floating a few feet above the ground of a busy street. Deities of all shapes and sizes walked, flew, crawled and moved in ways the three could not comprehend. Some looking at them and making mean remarks about mortals. “Hmmmm…excuse me.” Laura called the attention of a giant; they had a feminine passing human body, curvaceous and voluptuous, though they also had the head of a male lion and the tail of a male peacock. “Could you please show me where the temple of Innur’Fahace is, your holiness?” “OF COURSE, MY DARLING.” The giant deity spoke with a voice that was neither masculine nor feminine. Before Laura could thank them, the deity flicked the three friends with a finger. They weren’t hurt, but they became scared as they were back at moving at inhuman speed, floating above the ground and traversing several kilometers in just a few seconds. They gradually lost altitude and speed, passing by the huge entrance of a temple. They prepared for impact as the ground got closer, but when their bums touched the ground they were moving at a harmless sleep, sliding on the smooth floor of the temple’s hallway and coming to a stop at Carmilla’s feet. “There you are. You three sure took your time. What were you doing?” “That…was…AWESOME!” LaFontaine jumped to their feet with their arms raised up. “Wewerefallingbutthenwewerenotandthenwefellagainbutweweren’tfallingweweremovingtothecideofthecircularcityandtherewherethingsandITWASAWESOME!” “Breath, young one.” Lawlinne approached them. “Don’t forget to breath.” “So this is your ex-god’s house then?” Laura asked as she helped Perry get back on her feet. “His temple, yes.” There was nothing but a long corridor, the walls were made of stone, with mosaics depicting a giant with a ball of light for a head, wielding a spear and a shield. The mosaic went on and on, a record of Innur’Fahce’s countless godly feats. As the crowd made it deeper into the temple, statues of humans with moth heads suddenly became part of the scenery. “I don’t think those were there when we passed.” Perry pointed out as she looked back. “I’ll see if JP got any info on-” A hard and cold hand slapped LaFontaine’s hand, launching the phone in which JP inhabited away. The statue grabbed LaFontaine by the neck and lifted them up while preparing to punch them with the other hand. “Let go of my friend you dusty museum reject!” Perry tried punching the statue, but it hurt her much more than it hurt it. “Try it like this!” Carmilla jumped at the statue, bringing it to the ground and breaking it apart with her vampire strength. The statue released LaFontaine so it could fight back, but Carmilla reduced it to pebbles before it could touch her. “Living statues, this takes me back. I think it was back in 1784…” “Hey Batsy.” Danny interrupted. “Batsy? Seriously? Come on Xena, you can do better than that.” “I’m sorry to interrupt your trip down memory lane, but…” The rest of the statues began moving, each striking a different pose which Laura recognized as being a form of intimidation, but still reminded her of the Power Rangers, which made it a bit hard to take them seriously. “Ooooh!” said Lawlinne. “Those are the guardians. Ha, I knew you kids couldn’t be the guardians, you’re are much squishier.” She looked at the unimpressed faces of the Silas students and stroke a pose of her own, putting her left hand on her hip and pointing forward with the right one. “Weapons free, everybody! Weapons free! Show those granites the power of a free weapon!” At that moment, officers and weapons resonated with each other. Each wielder could listen to the heart of their respective weapon, and the weapon could hear that of it’s respective officer in return. The union of Human and Destruction was absolute. When they fired, they fired truly. No shot wasted, every bullet found it’s target. Wielder and gun were one. The Sheriff’s Secret Police fired relentlessly at the statues that advanced at them from the front and from the back, but some statues reached the students. Zetas and Summers worked together, wrestling down the stone guardians and trying to break their limbs with sheer brute force, but that tactic had little success. A stone guardian made it to Laura, Perry and LaFontaine, but Danny put herself between them and the ugly statue. She tried punching it and the stone guardian made a sound Danny understood as laughter as all the young woman accomplished was hurting herself. “Hey tall girl!” The recruit Daisy called Danny’s attention. “Try this on for size!” Recruit Daisy tossed her riffle to Danny. Later Danny would brush it off as just one the many unexplainable oddities that had become part of her life, but at that moment what Danny felt was almost magical. As she touched the weapon she could hear a cheerful voice in her head telling her how to hold her weapon and how to Destroy. The strange cheerful voice mixed with her own inner voice and Danny felt that she had two heart beats. She and the riffle became one and the same. The stone guarding before her was reduced to smithereens before she even realized it. She looked back at the normal trio, “Are you all okay?” “Peachy.” LaFontaine answered as they, Laura and Perry clung to each other once again in the middle of all the chaos. “Don’t you worry, I’ll Destroy these ceramic bastards!” “She seems to be enjoying herself.” Said LaFontaine. “Did she just say “destroy” with a capital “D”? How do I even know that?” Laura asked herself. The group advanced into the temple’s corridor, the stone guardians becoming more numerous as they approached the main chamber. Seeing the trouble the Summers and Zetas were having, the officers of Night Vale landed their weapons to the students, who inexplicably gained the marksmanship skills of veteran soldiers and the strange habit of saying “Destroy” all the time and pronouncing it with a capital “D”. How exactly could they speak like that would forever be a mystery for most of them. Danny felt guilty for taking Daisy’s weapon, but when she saw the recruit again she noticed that she had a snake tail from her hips down, which she used to wrap herself around the stone guardians and crush them. For a moment Danny wondered how she didn’t notice that before, but quickly came to the conclusion that it didn’t matter, she had some Destroying to do. Laura, Perry and LaFontaine stayed at the center of the group. Perry in the middle, her arms around the waists of her friends, keeping them close while the other two held each other’s hand while hanging on to Perry with their other hands. The three watched as their fellow students gunned down the stone guardians and the strange officers of the Sheriff’s Secret Police improvised without their weapons, one of them spitting hot lava at the attacking statues, another tearing them apart with her super strong six arms, another lifting guardians with her mind and smashing them against the walls. Each officer had a surprise of their own. “These people are like the X-Men!” LaFontaine pointed out. “I wonder why they even have weapons in the first place.” “Nothing this people does make senesce.” Said Perry bitterly. “Why wonder anything at all?” “Are you okay?” Laura asked. “You seem a bit on edge there.” “On edge? Why would I be on edge? I was enjoying a nice puzzle game with my best friend and now I’m in a pocket dimension where deities go on vacation and watching a woman who looks exactly like me shooting lasers from her eyes at stone people!” She looked at the officer who looked just like her again, the woman winked at her and blew her a kiss before proceeding to cut a guardian in half with her laser vision. “So no, I have no reason to be on edge!!” When they made it to the main chamber, the last surviving guardian looked around to make sure it was the last one standing. When it’s fears were confirmed it got on it’s knees and bowed before the invading forces of Silas and Night Vale. The stone guardian grabbed a basket full of candy that seemed to have appeared out of nowhere and presented it to them as a peace offering. Carmilla ran towards the stone guardian and kicked it in the head, launching the poor creature into the air. The stone creature spiraled in the air and crumbled as it hit the spherical head of the huge statue at the far end of the main chamber. The sounds of cheer and the touchdown sound effect echoed inside the chamber as confetti rained down on the vampire. “I think this place is trying to get on my nerves.” “The old tales say that Innur’Fahce had a silly sense of humor.” Explained Lawlinne. “Sense of humor, is it? He thinks we are here to entertain him?” The sound of a bell rang from all directions, as if Carmilla had answered correctly to a quiz in a game show. “God, this god is pissing me off.” The ceiling of the chamber was sustained by several columns, The wall at the left held the huge mosaic depicting the moment when Innur’Fahce surfed on the Horse Head Nebula for the first time, and the wall at the right contained the huge mosaic that immortalized the moment when Innur’Fahce invented French fries. On the far end there was an altar with the Spear of Innur’Fahce floating in a beam of light that came from the ceiling. Behind it there was a huge statue which reached the ceiling of the big man himself, The statue of a man with well defined muscles, wide hips that sustained a stylish skirt and a spherical head with stone thorns that floated around the big round head, imitating rays of light. The statue raised a hand and closed it into a fist. With a few steps Innur’Fahce got close enough for his fist to reach the miscreants that dared invade his temple and destroy his guardians. Carmilla jumped forward and met with Innur’Fahce’s fist midway. She kicked the huge hand and her vampire strength triumphed the stone, Innur’Fahce’s fist and forearm broke with it’s pieces flying everywhere. One of the officers of Night Vale stopped some of the pieces from hitting the group with her telekinetic powers. Laura rushed to intercept Carmilla’s falling trajectory, jumping and grabbing her in midair and falling on her back to soften her girlfriends fall. “Oooouuuuch….that hurt more than I thought it would.” “You fool, what did you do that for? I could have resisted that fall.” “My girlfriend was falling from several feet high, I had to -ouch- do something.” Laura had some trouble getting up, the pain that now dominated her back was making things a bit difficult. Carmilla took her into her arms and sighed. “Thank you, but next time leave the hero stuff to the woman with super strength, okay?” “Okay, but with one condition, some back massage would be- WATCHOUT!” Innur’Fahce’s remaining hand shock the earth and shattered it. Hadn’t it been for Recruit Daisy’s quick action Laura and Carmilla would have been crushed. The recruit zapped in their direction when she saw the deity preparing another attack, Not having much time, Recruit Daisy used her snake tail as a whip, hitting Carmilla and tossing her against a pillar. Daisy’s heart rushed, a few inches more and her tail would have been crushed. Daisy was about to return to the group when the statue of the deity grabbed her by the tail. Doing as Laura insisted, Carmilla put her girlfriend down and rushed to repay the favor, put the stone thorns that floated around Innur’Fahce’s head left their position and went after the vampire. Carmilla dodged them, but instead of maintaining their trajectory the huge thorns turned and followed her, forcing her to run instead of helping the recruit, otherwise she’d have to face impalement while trying to break Innur’Fahce’s hand. “Grenade launcher!” Lawlinne demanded. “Hey-hey-hey-hey-hey-hey…” the officers said as they passed the grenade launcher to one another, quickly reaching Lawlinne. “You had grenade launchers this whole time?!” Danny asked surprised. “Always save the best for last, kid.” The shot when straight to the bottom part of Innur’Fahce’s forearm, destroying it and sending his hand flying with Daisy in it. Officer Mindy grabbing the hand with her telekinetic powers and opening it enough for Daisy to slither out. A sound that LaFontaine recognized as being Godzilla’s roar came from all directions inside the chamber as Innur’Fahce lifted one of his feet in an attempt to step on the intruders. “Another!” Lawninne ordered. “Wait, where is LaFontaine?” Perry asked, looking around for her best friend. LaFontaine threw themselves forward, landing on their knees and sliding on the smooth floor as an energetic and upbeat voice became one with her inner voice. “Time to Destroy!” They shouted as they took aim with the grenade launcher and fired at the knee of the leg Innur’Fahce was using to sustain himself, exploding it and making the deity fall on his back. The stone thorns stopped following Carmilla and turned to dust. “LaFontaine!” Perry shouted as she ran towards her best friend. “Guys…I think this grenade launcher spoke to me…” said LaFontaine as they put the weapon down. Perry ran towards her friend, but she couldn’t reach embrace them, she kept moving way past her best friend and ended up hitting a pillar. Along with her Laura, LaFontaine, Carmilla, Danny, Lawlinne, the Sheriff’s Secret Police, the Zetas and the Summer Society all began levitating. Gravity had simply stopped working The spherical head of Innur’Fahce’s statue began to crack, light coming out of the spreading fissures. The head of the statue exploded and light filled the room. Each block of stone that formed the chamber went to a different direction. As the blocks of stone separated the vast emptiness of space revealed to be behind them. Suddenly they weren’t at Placii’s Thu Crashys anymore, but far way in space, seeing the Milky Way from a distance. “Bro!” said Kirsch as he hugged the one Zeta that hadn’t drifted away from him, “this is beautiful bro!” “Yes, it is bro!” Agreed his fellow Zeta as they gazed at the beauty of the cosmos. Each person, as it was with each individual stone block and column, drifted to some random direction, separating most of the numerous crew that had invaded the temple to get the spear. “Oh crap, the spear!” shouted Lawlinne. The spear moved from it’s fixed position, it’s size growing as it approached the hand of it’s colossal owner. Innur’Fahce, in his true form of holy flesh, golden bracelets encrusted with planetoids adorning his arms and legs, his skirt made from stardust, an elaborated necklace of constellations floated and undulated around his neck. At the top of his magnificent body the small sun that was his head shinned his heavenly rays upon the trespassers, and when he spoke all creatures heard his voice.
“MY STUFF! DON’T TOUCH!”
“Hmmm, Mr. Fahce? Mr. Innur’Fahce?” Laura called his attention as she drifted in space, not comprehending how she could still talk and breath, but a gifted horse…"Your Holiness, sir. We kinda need that spear to kill-”
“UJEERK, I KNOW!”
“Then give it to us already!” Demanded Lawlinne. “HOW DARE YOU?! I RECOGNIZE THE BLOOD OF NIGHT VALE IN YOU AND YOUR UNDERLINGS. YOU THINK YOU OF ALL MORTALS CAN INVADE MY HOME AND MAKE DEMANDS?! I’LL DESTROY YOU AND ALL THOSE WHO CAME WITH YOU!!!” Innur’Fahce held his spear with both hands, preparing to strike down the insolent mortals who desecrated his temple. Divine punishment was near. “Carmilla! Punch him! Kick him! Do something!” Shouted Laura. “I can’t! I can’t control where I’m going!” Carmilla tried moving forward, tried rushing towards the douchbag god, but zero gravity didn’t allow her. Perry breathed heavily the strange air that shouldn’t exist in space as tears left her eyes. The Sheriff’s Secret Police couldn’t reach Innur’Fahce with their powers, The Zetas and Summers were separated from their borrowed weapons. Everyone was far from her. With the corner of her eyes she found LaFontaine, catching their phone where the digitalized soul of JP was. She saw them embracing the phone and crying. “This was supposed to be a normal day…” Perry looked at the Milky Way behind Innur’Fahce. Outer space was no place for her. She was just a normal woman, with normal hobbies and normal skills. Then why? Why was she here now gazing at her galaxy as a god was about to strike her down? What had she done? “I just…I just wanted…” A grenade launcher drifted in front of her, at arm’s reach. She grabbed it. No voice whispered in her mind, there was no second heart beat, no second soul. There was just her, Lola Perry, a normal woman. “I just wanted!” She fired the weapon, the projectile hitting the god in the chest. “AAAAAH! H-HOW COULD YOU?!” By firing the grenade launcher she was pushed back, she hit a column and used it to take impulse to jump towards another grenade launcher. Innur’Fahce was a big target, she couldn’t miss. “A nice!”
“AAAAAH! STOP THAT YOU MISERABLE CREATURE!”
As she was pushed back again her trajectory coincided with that of another grenade launcher, she grabbed it, aimed and fired. “Calming!”
“AAAAAAAAAAAAH!!! IT HURTS!!!! IT HURTS!!!!
She hit a stone block, taking impulse to jump towards another grenade launcher and fired. “Normal!”
“AAAAAAAAAH! STOP!!! STOOOOOP!!! I BEG YOU!!!”
She went from a column to another, and another, a stone block and finally reached the last grenade launcher. “STOOOOOP!!! WHAT ARE YOU DOING TO ME??? WHAT ARE YOOOOUUUU!!!” “I just wanted…a nice…calming…normal…game of puzzle!” Sacred blood spread around the cosmos as Innur’Fahce’s holy flesh was desecrated, burned, exploded, destroyed. One of the supreme beings older than time itself finally began to grasp the bizarre concept that mortals refer to as “death”. He saw the final grenade being fired. His blessed body, not used to pain, could not react, paralyzed by this strange and grotesque new feeling. The grenade went straight to his face. The grenade disappeared in the light of the small sun. Suddenly the light ceased, the sun became a black mass, cracked and when it exploded, the deity’s final words were heard throughout all of creation.
“NNNNNNOOOOOOOOTTTTTTTT CCCCCOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOLLLLLLL!!!!!!”
“…Per…Perry...” That distant voice…so familiar…so dear…“Come on…Lola Perry, don’t you dare die on me!” When Perry opened her eyes she found herself back at the basement of the university, her head on LaFontaine’s lap, a multitude of people around them, looking at her, Zetas, members of the Summer Society, the weird X-Men SWAT people. They all cheered when they saw that she was alive. “Wha? What happened?” Perry asked as she tried to get up. “Welcome to the Badass Club, Spitshine.” Said Carmilla, helping Perry get back on her feet. “We have customized shirts, mugs and we play strip poker every Tuesday.” “What are you talking…oh God…oh God…I killed a god!” “You sure did, Spitshine.” “Who needs Carmilla?” asked Perry, hugging her best friend. “When supernatural trouble comes, Lola Perry will kick it’s butt!” “B-b-b-but what about the spear?” “Ta-da!” Lawlinne presented the Spear of Innur’Fahce, downsized once more for human use. “And if it doesn’t work, we’ll just come back to take you to Ujeerk. I’m sure you could take him down if nothing else works.” “Oh no, no need to take me to your town, I’ll pray for it’ll work.” “After what happened,” said Laura, “I doubt any god will be brave enough to not answer your prayers.” Lawlinne waved goodbye to the students and the black helicopters took off. As they disappeared in the horizon, all the students made a point of thanking Perry personally for saving their lives. Once all the thanking was done everybody went back to their business as usual. All but Perry’s friends. “So Miss Godslayer, what shall you do next?” Danny asked. “Well, I’d like to finish my puzzle now.” All of the girls smiled and agreed that a puzzle game sounded fantastic. They prepared snacks, drinks, they told jokes and shared funny stories of their teenage years. They worked on the puzzle while watching Angry Beavers episodes (which Carmilla found grotesque) and by the time they all (but Carmilla) feel asleep the puzzle was done. It was a custom made puzzle that LaFontaine had given Perry as a graduation gift when they finished High School. It was an old picture of the two of them when they were kids. A memory from nice, calm, normal times. ******** “Listeners…we are safe once again. When everything seemed lost, when the last few of our werewolves friends prepared to face what seemed like certain death, the Sheriff’s Secret Police returned. Their Senior Executive Producer, Lawlinne Lawsome Lawless III, jumped out of her helicopter with the Spear of Innur’Fahce in hands and pierced the whinny deity that tried to kill us. When the weapon penetrated Ujeerk’s impenetrable body he was petrified and turned to dust. Another close one, but we are still here. Oh…listeners, the leaders of our groups of heroes are here in the studio right now! We can't hear you applauding, but even so let us give a round of applause to the Pack Leader Silvia Silvershine and the Senior Executive Producer Lawlinne Lawsome Lawless III.” “Thank you, Cecil. Thank you, citizens of Night Vale. Thank you, Temporary Werewolf Police. And…a special thank you to you…Silvia. I’m sorry we took so long.” “It’s okay. I knew you would not fail.” “Oh, some listeners are sending questions via Tumblr. Lawlinne, Vedinamel asked if it is true that you had the help of a vampire to-” “How is your arm?” “This? Oh, it was just a flesh wound. The vet said my arm should be good as new in a few weeks.” “That is great news, girls, but the listeners want to know if-” “I guess I never apologized for punching you last week.” “Oh, don’t worry about that. I tried to eat you, you had all the right to defend yourself.” “Girls, it’s good that we are all friends now, but the listeners want to know about-” “I’m glad Night Vale was in such capable hands. Paws, I mean paws.” “Hehehe. It’s okay, darling. You know, I feel safe now that you’re back.” “Oh stop, you’re just saying that.” “It’s true. Being near you…when I saw you jumping out of that helicopter to kill that tentacle monster deity that was trying to crush me…I felt that everything was going to be fine forever. It’s a silly thing to say, I now.” “Oh, it’s not silly at all. You know, there was a whole procedure we had to follow to be sure that the spear would really work on him. But when I saw you in danger…I said “to hell with procedures” and jumped with the spear and all.” “You…you did that for me?” “Yeah. I mean, you’re a…very special werewolf. I couldn’t just let him do anything to you.” “I think you are a very special human too.” “Ha, thanks. Your fur…hmmm, it’s so soft, and smells of strawberries.” “You like it?” “I love it!” “You know, humans aren’t the only thing I can prepare. I know how to bake cakes, they are my specialty, actually. I’ve been working on a new strawberry cake recipe, would you like to help me bake it? I promise you’ll love it.” “I would love you. To! To! I would love to! Oh my…” “I would love to have you…as my assistant. For baking the cake.” “Hehehehehe.” “Hahahahaha.” “Soooo…shall we go, Silvia?” “Yes, let’s go, Lawlinne.” “…Soooo…they left…no interview then. Listeners, I know that it is tiresome that our lives are in constant danger almost daily. We get exhausted of all the fighting with the world and everything there is in it. But…we keep fighting. We may lose moral sometimes, we may stumble, we may fail sometimes, but we keep fighting, we keep pushing forward. Have you asked yourself why? It is my personal belief that we all have something that motivates us. Be it a handsome scientist boyfriend, in my case; be it the blossoming love between a female police officer and a female werewolf; The love of…hypothetically speaking…a human woman majoring in journalism and a centuries old vampire; There is also the love of two best friends, of course, not every love is of the romantic or sexual sort. Love for the community you live in, for your family, love for something you do. Some of us are even pushed forward by the search of something to love. Love for yourself. Love is diverse, has many forms, some of which we may not comprehend, but it is certainly something worth fighting for. Listener, if you can hear my voice now it is because you are alive. You have made it this far, I don’t know what you fight for, what kind of love pushes you forward, but it has brought you this far, to this moment. Think back on all the things you’ve been through, all the obstacles that stood in your way, the small ones and the colossal ones. You have bested them all; the fact that you are hearing me now is proof of that. It is proof that you’re strong, it is proof that you can keep going. You’ve made it this far, listener, and I’m sure you can go much farther. I’m sure of if, because you’ve made it this far and I’m proud of you. So now we lay our heads to rest from the battles won and prepare for the battles we will win. Stay tuned next for the sound of your own beating heart. As always, good night, Night Vale. Good night.”