So this horse walks into a bar. And the bartender nods. The horse then taps a code with its hoof. A doorway behind the bar opens into a dim, smoky room. The horse enters. Welcome to Night Vale.

###

Our top story today is about astronomy. Wait. Is it astronomy or astrology? I think one is the scientific study of the stars and planets, while the other is mysticism. This is a story about a comet passing near the earth, so I’m going to go with mysticism. In that case, I think the correct word is astronomy.

Okay, starting over. Big astronomy news, Night Vale. The earth will be passing through the tail of comet D/1770 L1 today, and the comet itself will be fully visible in tonight’s sky. D/1770 L1 is commonly called “Lexell’s Comet,” [pronounced Lex-ELL] and it was last seen in the 18th Century. Astronomers, using magic crystals, managed to map the orbit of the comet, but then the comet unexpectedly disappeared.

[phone ringing in background]

Lexell’s Comet was long thought lost, but nope! Here it is once again mysteriously passing within a hair’s breadth from our fragile little planet…. I’m sorry, listeners but our radio station hotline is ringing.

Hello. You’re on the air.

JOHN: Howdy, Cecil. John Peters. You know? The farmer?

CECIL: I sure do. What can I do for you John?

JOHN: There’s someone in my cornfield, Cecil. I can see them right now.

CECIL: Well… John. I’m not sure what I can...

JOHN: [John plows through whatever Cecil is saying.] They’re right there in my cornfield. A whole mess of ‘em. They’re crouched down and trying to hide behind the tall stalks of corn. (Real healthy crop this year, yep, I gotta say.)

CECIL: I’m sure it is John.

JOHN: But it’s real strange watchin’ all these people try to hide in the rows of cornstalks… Because it’s invisible corn, you understand.

CECIL: Oh yes, I know all about your invisible corn.

JOHN: And the thing is, these people look so dang silly crouchin’ and duckin’ in this giant field full of corn you can’t even see. It’s like that mime show. What was that mime show that was on TV in the 1970s, Cecil? Come on, you remember. It had ol’ what their heads in it? Sh… Shee… Sheeeelll…

CECIL: Shields and Yarnell.

JOHN: Well, I’m sure you’ll think of the name. Anyway, just wanted to let you and your listeners know about these weirdos in my cornfield. Later, buddy.

CECIL: I’m, uh, glad you did. Thanks, John.

Well, I’ll get back to some interesting comet facts in a minute. But now it’s time for sports.

###

This Friday, the Night Vale High School Scorpions return to gridiron action against the Lizard Monitors of Pine Cliff. Last year the Scorpions got off to a hot start but fell short of the playoffs after losing 3 in a row to close the season.

Coach Latrice Beaumont said she has high hopes for this year, specifically because they’re bringing a new defensive strategy to the team.

When I asked her to elaborate on this new approach to defense, she explained. I forgot to write her explanation down or record it, but it was something to the effect of “our very strong and fast athletes need to stop the other team’s strong and fast athletes from performing basic addition. If we can keep them from adding a bunch of numbers together, then our numbers will be higher than their numbers.”

I am very excited to know our local teams are finally utilizing advanced metrics. Go Scorpions.

###

And now a word from our sponsors. Today’s show is brought to you by Hewlett-Packard, who asks: What about ghost cats? Why aren’t we talking about that? Can’t a cat become a ghost? Why do only humans get to be ghosts? And if your cat was a ghost, would you even notice?

Or wait! How about flying cars, but they’re made of birds all strapped together, with like bungee or gorilla tape or something. OR just gorillas holding the birds. Gorilla’s can’t fly, but if they’re holding enough birds, they sure as heck can!

We’re just spitballing here, but ooh! Ooh! What about FIREworms? Holy crap. Can you even imagine. So. Cool.

Hewlett-Packard: No! We got it! Microfiber antfarms. Dude.

This has been a word from our sponsor.

###

And now back to the return of Lexell’s Comet, which is currently passing dramatically close to Earth, so much so that we are inside the comet’s tail.

[phone is ringing again]

Now, astronomers use a precise measurement system that involves ancient incantations in praise of the old gods. This is how they track the orbits of comets. So in 1801, the Paris Academy of Sciences announced… Sorry, listeners.

[a little annoyed] Hello?

JOHN: Howdy again, Cecil. It’s John Peters. You know, the farmer.

CECIL: Yes. John. Hi. Again.

JOHN: I hate to bother you, but false alarm on that earlier story ‘bout them people in my cornfield. Turns out was just some kids foolin’ around out there. I really thought they were corn thieves or worse, corn vandals like them folks up in New York City, always writin’ dirty words on their corn.

CECIL: That doesn’t sound right.

JOHN: But nope, this was just a few dozen neighborhood kids playin’ grabass in the corn. You know how kids are. They see a cornfield and they just wanna gather a hundred or more of their friends and pretend they can’t see each other hidin’ in broad daylight.

CECIL: Wait. How many children are in that cornfield, John? You don’t even live in a neighborhood. You live on a farm, so they can’t be neighborhood kids.

JOHN: Say, I heard your story about the Scorpions. I think they got a good team this year. Might go all the way to state. Gotta improve that defensive line though. Like you said, Cecil, them boys in the A-Gap are gettin’ blown right off the ball. That leaves the Mike unprotected, and in Cover-One, that can lead to big plays up the gut.

CECIL: That’s roughly how I reported it, yes. Well, John, I’ve got to get back to the…

JOHN: Well, Cecil. I’ve got to get back to the farmin’. Gonna go out and tell them kids it’s all right if they wanna be in the cornfield, just no stealin’ or breakin’ my corn. And absolutely no writin’ curse words on it neither.

CECIL: Bye, John.

Okay, well. More on the comet soon, but we’ve got to get to Traffic.

###

Looking now at the local highways and byways, I can see that all of the tractor trailers have become sentient. They’re driving around with no humans behind the wheel. They’re currently circling Estes’s truck stop over on exit 13 of Route 800. So I imagine that means gas prices are really good there. If you’re out on the road right now, listeners, let me warn you right now to keep your eyes open for sentient big rigs. And follow them to Estes’s truck stop for an affordable fill-up. This has been traffic.

###

A new man came to town. I met him the other day at the Spiked Hammer coffee bar. He had a microphone and a laptop. He said he was a podcaster. Well, we have all been podcasters at one point or another in our lives.

This man seemed sort of lost and lonely, so I thought I would welcome him with a friendly “Identify yourself, interloper!” He said his name is “Joseph” and I said “Hi Joe. I’m Cecil.” And then he said “Please don’t call me that.” And I winked real big and said, “Why would I call you Cecil, Joe? That’s MY name.” He laughed. Not a hearty laugh and a knee slap, more like a heavy sigh and fingers to his temples.

I apologized for the silly joke about his name and offered to buy Joseph a coffee. He cringed and said “They don’t filter their coffee here, though. It’s just chunks of smashed up beans floating in warm water.” And I chuckled quietly to myself, because it was clear that Joseph had never had a real Franchian-style espresso.

But he seemed like a smart and likable person, so I invited my new interloper friend to come up to the radio station anytime he wanted. Perhaps he’d like to be part of my new Interloper Spotlight segment. Or maybe just learn more about broadcasting. Radio is the future! I assured him.

Then I offered him an internship. He laughed. It wasn’t a ha-ha laugh. More of a single ha laugh. Like a gunshot or a belly flop from a high dive. I told him to think about it and got up to leave.

But before walking away I asked “Say, what’s the name of your podcast?” And he said, get this… He said “Welcome to Night Vale.” That’s when I laughed. It wasn’t a ha-ha laugh. More of a ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha laugh. Like the spin cycle of an unbalanced washing machine. This Joseph guy is a real delight. If you run across him, listeners, give him a friendly shout and point.

And, Joseph, if you’re listening, good luck with your podcast. I’m happy to come on as a guest any time you need me!

###

And now back to the comet. So last I left it, astronomers had divined through the dregs in their tea cups that [phone starts ringing again] Lexell’s Comet shortly after it passed by earth in 1770 must have gotten too close to Jupiter. The gravitational sway would have then caused the comet to get slingshotted in a totally different direction. But today proves that that is not… ARrrgh!

[aggravated] Hello??!!

JOHN: Howdy Cecil. It’s John Peters….

CECIL: Yes. The farmer. I know. [calmly] What is it, John?

JOHN: Okay good. You remembered me. Well, turns out it was a false alarm on that false alarm. I went out to talk to them neighborhood kids, and they ain’t normal kids. Ain’t from around here neither, I don’t believe. They’re all feral-like. And they don’t speak in any language I ever heard of. There wasn’t no discernable syntax or even differing words, only a series of high-pitched staccato squeals like the sound shoes make on a hardwood floor during a basketball game.

But I didn’t worry none about their language. I was worried about them killing a buncha animals in my cornfield.

CECIL: Wait. What?

JOHN: [louder, slower] I said “I was worried about them killing a buncha animals in my cornfield”

CECIL: [patiently] What kind of animals, John?

JOHN: Well mostly rats and some grackles. Nothin’ any of us gonna miss. But they’re getting’ blood all over my corn. I cannot sell bloody corn. Plus, the weird thing is they weren’t just killing these things with magnifying glasses and acid-baths like normal kids. No, they were ritually sacrificing these poor creatures to some god.

I don’t know their god’s name, but I think they were trying to convert me to their religion. They kept chirping at me, and then they drew a picture of their god in the dirt.

It was a winged serpent. Now, this winged serpent wasn’t nothin’ like the beautiful Aztec god Quetzalcoatl [John pronounces it Ketzel Co Waddle], who controlled the winds and the crops. Plus, these kids’language, dress, and aesthetic depictions of their gods were far from those of the ancient Mesoamerican cultures who built the Aztec pantheon.

Besides, this winged serpent looked more like a big old rat snake with some little fluffy wings, not dissimilar to the kind you might put on a baby for Halloween.

CECIL: I’m losing the thread here, John.

JOHN: The long and short of it, Cecil, is somethin’ need to be done about these kids and their very aggressive religious practices. I’m okay with people findin’ God and talking about it all the time. Just not on my land.

I’m a little scared to get back out into the corn and talk to those children, because they got a bunch of scary-looking farm tools, and I remember seeing that Stephen King movie from back in the 1980s. You remember that movie, Cecil? Had a bunch of children. And they were in the corn… What’s the name of that?

CECIL: [of course] Chariots of Fire.

JOHN: That’s the one! Catchy soundtrack, that movie. But scared the bejeebers out of me.

CECIL: John. We’re up against it here. Good luck out there, okay?

JOHN: Well, I gotta be going. Gotta feed the cassowaries. Ciao, bubba.

CECIL: Listeners, I’m so sorry. I was excited to talk to you about the comet today, but we’re running short on time. Let me take you now to… would you look at that sky, just the brightest golden glow! Gorgeous. Our planet must be in the heart of the comet’s tail right now.

It’s as good a time as any, then, for the weather.

###

WEATHER

###

[phone is already ringing] And we’re back. It looks like the earth has finally passed out of Lexell’s Comet’s tail. But that doesn’t mean you can’t still catch a beautiful image of…. [frustrated] Oh my god!

John! What is it?

JOHN: Hey Cecil. Well, I went to talk to them kids again. This time they didn’t say nothin’. They just stared at me. And it was only then that I noticed they didn’t have any irises or pupils. Just solid white eyes. And all of ‘em had gray lips. And as I was trying to figure out if they were possessed or undead or just really goth, I heard one of them start humming. Then all of ‘em started humming. And I saw they were in a circle around me.

Then I felt something grab my leg. I looked down and it was the biggest snake you ever did see. It started coiling around my body, but it didn’t crush me. It lifted me high into the air. And we were flying. I was flying. I was prouder than a baby goose in springtime, but scareder than a snail in a salt parade.

And this snake thing took me up into the sky and we entered what I thought was heaven, but I think it was just a metaphysical palace. The inside of it was a vast room. It was not ornately detailed like one of them Taj Mahals, but it was made entirely of gold. And it smelled like cake and jam. When we stopped I saw that I was alone in this palace. Except for a tall, buttressed plinth in the middle of the Herringbone-tiled floor. And on top of that was a hand-made scarecrow doll, no bigger than an ear of corn.

I reached down to pick up the totem, and suddenly I was back on the ground again. Back on my land. The kids were gone. The serpent god was gone. But so was all my corn. What once was a vast field of corn so invisible as to make the field look empty… was now just a vast empty field.

I’m still holding the scarecrow doll now, Cecil. And it has my face.

CECIL: John, I’m so sorry.

JOHN: It’s pretty cute though. I’ll probably put it up on top of the mantle.

But still, I’d rather have my corn crops than this effigy of myself. Thankfully, though, my avocados and peppers came in real nice this year. So I’ll be okay.

CECIL: Do you know what happened to the kids?

JOHN: Oh who cares? They’re probably off trying to convert other people to their religion. You know how kids are, once they get into snake gods, they just don’t let it go. They’ll eventually get bored and go do something else. Some new Zelda game’ll come out and they’ll be back on their Intendos [deliberately misspelled]. I’m just glad them kids were playin’ outside.

Say, you never finished your story about the comet, Cecil.

CECIL: Oh there’s nothing to say, really. It’s just a regular old comet. Same as every other comet. A little closer, yes. But there’ll be more. Anyway, Lexell’s Comet is visible tonight in the southwest, it should be a little brighter and a lot prettier than our stupid moon. The end.

JOHN: Dumb ol’ moon.

CECIL: The worst. Well, time to wrap up the show. Thanks to our unexpected guest, John Peters.

JOHN: Adios, y’all!

CECIL: Stay tuned next for entropy. Relentless entropy.

And as always, good night, Night Vale. Good night.

###

PROVERB: Give a man a fish and he'll be like "gross. get that fish away from me." TEACH a man to fish, and he'll be like "you? again!? what's your deal?"