"Nothing lasts forever." is a phrase with two meanings, and they're both true. Welcome to Night Vale.

All of Night Vale is aglow. There is music in the air. You know what that means, listeners. The obelisk has returned!

It’s been nearly 8 years since the obelisk last appeared, but it’s right back where it always shows up, in Mission Grove Park, over on the east side, right next to the Wailing Pit, but a little south of the Memorial Debris Heap.

The obelisk returns every 5 to 10 years, sometimes as long as 50, and it brings with it joy, anticipation, and a deep fear. A terror so deep in the gut that it feels like you’ve eaten too much ice cream, but in all reality, your body is simply bracing itself for death.

The obelisk has always behaved benevolently, but so has the sun, and we don’t trust that thing fully, either. Past performance is not an indicator of future results.

Unlike the sun, the obelisk radiates a soft blue light, but like to the sun, the obelisk makes a lot of noise. In particular: music. The obelisk sounds like a Bach concerto played by a French Horn and a Theremin from inside a refrigerator.

Everyone in town is gathering at Mission Grove Park to see the obelisk in person, to pay homage to this rare visit, and to confront their fears head on.

Hopefully everything works out fine, because there are some cool events I want to get to this weekend, and it would be terrible to have to cancel them over a rogue obelisk.

Let’s look at that community calendar.

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This Friday night is opening night of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Tony-winning musical, Sunset Boulevard, at the Night Vale Community Theater. I’m very excited to finally see this show. It’s supposed to be a really lavish production. And it’s based on one of my all time favorite Billy Wilder films about an aging silent movie star who finds an amulet that lets her travel in time. But whenever she moves through time, she enters someone else’s body and can’t leave until she saves their life.

This staging of Sunset Boulevard is directed and produced by… oh god… Susan Willman. Really? Honestly, this has been a pretty long week. I might need to just rest at home on Friday.

I’m not trying to be rude here, but Susan Willman is the worst. Did you know she once judged the Chili Cook-Off, and I came in third. Third! Behind Joel Eisenberg – which, fine, Joel’s an okay cook – but also behind who else? Susan Willman! You can’t be a judge and win first place!

I’m also pretty sure Susan used a pre-packaged spice mix in that chili. I don’t have that verified through a secondary source, but I can confirm it was oversalted. Again, I’m not saying. I’m just saying.

Anyway, go see Sunset Boulevard on Friday if you want to watch uninspired actors and muddled blocking.

Saturday afternoon is the PTA bake sale fundraiser to send our Academic Decathlon team to a tournament in our state’s capital. The PTA secretary… *sigh*… Susan Willman says this money will go toward hotel and bus travel for our brilliant and talented AcDec squad. “Academic Decathlon is about intelligence and perseverance,” says Willman in this overwrought press release. “AcDec is about freedom and fastidiousness. It is a celebration of hard work, and we want Night Vale to show the rest of the state that…” blah blah blah. God she just drones on. I mean yes, AcDec is very cool, and I wish our kids well, but chill with the grandstanding. Anyway, go buy a cake to support those amazing students, even though I’m sure Susan will still manage to mess up a box mix.

Sunday is Youth Reprogamming Day at the Night Vale Museum of Forbidden Technologies. Does your child love learning about new gadgets and advancements in electronics? Well come to the Museum of Forbidden Technologies on Sunday for a day long reprogramming event. Docents and curators will engage those curious kids through hands-on unlearning. They’ll take their patented Mind Wipe beam, point it right at each child’s forehead until all interest in forbidden technology has been removed. Kids love the Mind Wipe beam because it smells like grapes and they don’t feel any pain for weeks after. Youth Reprogramming Day is a family friendly day of discovering that you know too much, and knowledge is treason.

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Today’s appearance by the obelisk is the 19th in recorded history. Little is known about what the obelisk is, who controls it, what it wants. Most scientists and historians agree that it was created by subterranean gods millennia ago. They think its purpose is as a type of census for life at ground level.

The obelisk is about 25 feet tall. It is oily and soft like a fresh brick of parmesan cheese. And when it appears everyone in town carves their name into one of its four sides. We do not know why or when this practice began. It’s simply how it’s always been done. And to question tradition is to admit weakness.

When the obelisk eventually disappears – perhaps today, perhaps several days from now – it will take our names with it. And when it returns, those names will be gone and we will begin the tradition anew.

No one knows what happens to those names. Are they simply erased? Or are they read and recorded? Is this data-mining for some ancient tech startup? Or does the obelisk truly belong to the gods?

We only know what happens to one of the names carved on the obelisk. And for that person we feel both envy and pity. For while the obelisk has always behaved benevolently, past performance, et cetera.

Let’s have a look now at traffic.

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Route 800 is shut down until 4pm today, as it has turned into a river. No cars are on Route 800. It’s just water, rough and choppy, spiking white rapid caps atop nearly black rushing death. Highway officials are investigating the sudden appearance of this river perfectly overlaying our main thoroughfare in and out of town.

Beneath the quickly moving rush of the river, a single fish. Probably a bass of some sort. Highway officials are uncertain because they don’t think about fish. Why would they?

Highway officials are annoyed that you think so little of their awareness of fish species. They can tell a salmon from a marlin from a mackerel.

“See what you made us do,” one highway official said. “We could have been repairing Route 800 but you started picking on us for not knowing if that’s a bass or a mackerel or whatnot.”

“In fact,” the official continued, “We just looked it up on Wikipedia, and it is a bass. And fun fact,” they added, “did you know bass can grow up to 25 pounds, have 4 rows of human teeth, and can speak Spanish at a first grade level.”

The river is now branching out down side streets and into neighborhoods. Pavement everywhere is a network of freshwater capillaries through town. Expect delays of up to 10 to 20 minutes as you try to get to Mission Grove Park.

This has been traffic.

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The whole town feels like a carnival right now, with the flashing lights of the obelisk and its crescendo of lively music filling the cool twilight air. We dance, we sing, we revel in togetherness and share our fears of what will happen next.

What will the question be? And more importantly, what will be its answer?

When every name has been placed upon the obelisk, then the blue glow of the towering monolith will die away. The entire structure will turn to black, all except one name. One name will remain lit on the obelisk. And that person shall be sent forth to ask their question.

They may ask any question they choose, and the obelisk will tell them and only them the answer. No one else can hear this communication. If the receiver wishes to share what they now know, they are allowed to do so.

Many years back, this ritual was more organized. Early Night Vale townships planned a democratic approach to this opportunity. A Committee of the Obelisk was formed to decide on the single most important question to ask. This approach came about in response to the Supper Blunder of 1932 when a six-year-old boy named Bartholomew Thomasson was chosen to deliver the question. He asked the obelisk if he was, quote, “gonna have corn for dinner.” The obelisk apparently said no, because little Bart started crying and the obelisk quickly disappeared, not to return for almost 10 years.

By that time, the Committee of the Obelisk was established and they chose the question: “How do you cure cancer?” This is a good and noble question, but the citizen chosen by the obelisk was a farmer named Barry McKenny who tried his best to take careful notes, but a lot of the detailed medical jargon was too complex for him.

The committee tried this question again 6 years later, but the obelisk refused to respond to any question it had already answered, so Sidney Lanyard of Old Town Night Vale, not having a back-up question from the committee, asked if his wife Jessica was cheating on him with Gerald Framingham. The obelisk said no, but it only said that because Gerald’s actual last name was FramingTON. Sidney just messed up.

Over the decades, the Committee of the Obelisk asked “Is God real?” and the obelisk said yes, but nothing more. After this, they tried to ask questions that would elicit more detailed responses. One year they asked “Who planned the assassination of JFK” and were disappointed to learn that it was a CIA-Fidel Castro-Frank Sinatra triumvirate that conspired to murder our 35th president. This was the most boring answer, but it at least verified what everyone already knew.

By the 1990s, though, the Committee of the Obelisk had fallen out of fashion after years of corporate funding and corruption. This controversy exploded in 1997 when the question put forth by the committee, which at the time was headed by the CFO of Pepsico, was “What’s the best tasting carbonated soft drink on the market today?”

The obelisk’s answer, to the chairman’s great disappointment, was Surge.

Today, whoever is called on by the obelisk is given free rein to ask whatever they choose, however many news outlets regularly publish lists of recommended questions. But there is always the risk that someone will ask something frivolous like “What’s Jason Mraz up to these days?” or “Where is the body of my missing father?” (God, please don’t call on Susan Willman. She’ll blow it.)

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Listeners the obelisk has gone dark. The music has ceased. The whole town encircles the tower waiting for its declaration, for who shall ask the question.

In the quiet night, under few stars peeking through the purple sky, we can hear only the sounds of crickets. The obelisk, so black as to appear cut out from reality, suddenly shines a small blue line. It is a name. It is on the South face. And it is.

Oh no.

No.

Listeners, I don’t know if I can stop this, but I will try. Let’s go now, to the weather.

#WEATHER: “Pros and Cons” by Sugar & the Mint#

Well, it’s too late. She’s asked her question.

I’m not sure how I could have stopped this disaster even if I made it over there before she could ask it.

As you know by now, the obelisk lit up with Susan Willman’s name. *sigh* She grinned smugly and did that fake “who? Me?” gesture and then walked on up to the obelisk. The crowd was calling out questions to her, like a game show audience trying to help a contestant. No single phrase discernable above the others.

Susan looked around, her big goofy eyes scanning the people around her as if she would actually lower herself to listen to their questions. She thinks she’s so high and mighty with her PTA officer status and her hit broadway musical production.

No, Susan’s above us all. Just as important as can be. She waved her arms like wings for quiet. And the audience obeyed. She’s so self-important, so attention-seeking.

And then she asked her question. The one question we as a town get only every decade or so, and Susan said “Hey, so what’s your name?”

What’s your name??? What a waste! Did she forget we only get one question? The crowd began to boo. Or I did. I started booing, and I am part of the crowd.

The obelisk began to speak only into Susan’s mind, and Susan listened closely. She giggled at first, like a little girl hearing a silly joke from a grandfather. Then her tear-filled laughs turned into tear-filled breaths, which eventually became tear-filled sobs. After about 3 minutes the obelisk vanished, and Susan stood alone on the small hill between the Wailing Pit and the Memorial Debris Heap and she told us what she heard. Or she told us some of what she heard.

Susan said in an unusually booming, authoritative voice: “Whosoever speaks aloud the name of the obelisk shall become the obelisk. Whosoever becomes the obelisk shall live forever. Whosoever lives forever shall know all things. Whosoever knows all things shall be damned. And whosoever hears the name of the obelisk spoken aloud shall perish.”

The crowd parted for Susan as she left the park. They mumbled their disappointment in both the question and its answer.

Some spoke with pity, some with disdain, while some thought it was all pretty cool and new. “Much better than last time when Dave asked who would win the 2013 NBA Championships” said one person. “Dave won a lot of money on that answer though,” responded another, “He has a yacht now, over at the Harbor and Waterfront Recreation Area.”

But most everyone whispered their fear for Susan’s power itself. Susan received a gift today… a cursed, cursed gift.

You know what? I think I might go see Sunset Boulevard after all. And love it. I don’t get to tell Susan very often what a visionary theatrical director she is. I might even put some stacks of cash down on her cakes Saturday too. Really support that Academic Decathlon team. They’re the spirit of American ingenuity and perseverance, and all that.

Good question Susan. I’d like to never learn the answer, but good question nonetheless. You’re one of, if not the, best person I know. Thumbs up.

Stay tuned next for our newest game show: “Nothing Will Ever Be the Same”

Good night, Night Vale. Good night.

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PROVERB: Bite your tongue! Fun, right?