Young Writers Society

James knew he hadn't really explained anything about where he was from, but it threw him for a moment when Sebastian looked at him confused. He knew it in his head, but he'd almost forgotten that there were people who had yet to realize the very real possibility (or rather, reality) that all of them were from very different worlds. Or at least, he was. He didn't know where he was, and it certainly wasn't Nye.

James pursed his lips into a frown and looked down at the buttons that Kivvien was pressing to make the "broadcast" work. If it wasn't like a phone call where people could talk back and forth, was it just one-way communication?

"How will we know if there are people listening?"

Kivvien tapped a panel of lights on the board, "This shows how many people are tuned in." He looked closer, tapping the panel a couple of times, "...It looks like we've got a couple of radios listening in."

xXx

Vanya was wandering through the rest of the station. She didn't exactly trust Kivvien not to screw with anything he shouldn't, but he wasn't exactly stupid enough to get anyone killed or anything. Most likely not in a radio station.

She found the break room and looked around, opening cupboards, looking around for signs that anyone had been there recently.

James, at the risk of revealing just how little he understood all of this technology, decided to keep asking questions.

"Can they hear all of us?"

Quentin shook his head - though it was admittedly hard to tell, given that all someone would see was the slight shaking of his armor's helmet.

"I doubt it," he said. "The microphone doesn't look strong enough. What they would hear is Adam's voice, but only when he's in front of it."

"That's assuming there's anyone here to hear it," Sebastian pointed out. He was in the middle of leafing through a book of old, dusty advertisements from years ago. "Radios being connected doesn't mean anyone's listening to them now - it just means they were listening to them earlier."

Adam leaned back from the microphone. "Well, there's an easy solution to that," he said, still not making eye contact with Sebastian. He cleared his throat and leaned back in. "If anyone's listening, please come to the radio station."

James hummed. He didn’t feel of much use here. He looked out towards the entrance.

“I can stand watch outside to see if anyone comes. I also don’t want to leave uh - my horse alone for too long. In this strange place.”

Sebastian resisted the urge to raise an eyebrow at what James said. The break in the reply sounded suspicious on its own, but the addition of the last sentence was what made Sebastian really question the truth behind his statement.

Adam opened his mouth.

But before he could get anything out, Quentin moved towards James.

"I'll join you," he said. "There's strength in numbers."

Kivvien went over to the cowboy - the name of whom was impossible to remember - and glanced out a window at the horse, "I think your horse will be okay. I remember one time Vanya's old warhorse, Tulio, had to hang out in this barn while Vany and I went into this creepy old cave for some reason, I don't even remember. Might have been for another oracle? Or something? I don't know, but Tulio was fine when we got back out and we were in there for, like, a day or two. It's hard to tell in caves."

James didn’t think he’d said anything that controversial, and hadn’t really expected to receive any kind of response other than “okay.” He could understand the push-back to a degree? And the comfort Kiivien offered was well intentioned, but he really just wanted to step outside. He felt useless amidst unfamiliar technology, and they all seemed to have an idea of what to look for, so he was fine letting someone else tale the reins on problem solving for once.

“Look... it’s not a big deal. I just want to get some air,” he said, turning and going out the door before anyone could say anything else.

Quentin also didn't give any of the others - specifically Adam and Sebastian - a change to protest his decision. He slipped outside after James. He tried to be silent, but his armor gave him away with a loud clank the moment he softly closed the door behind him.


Sebastian watched as Quentin left.

Adam had apparently decided to pretend that he didn't care. He was flipping through all of the little switches and buttons on the desk - Sebastian would have stopped him, but he doubted anything could go wrong. Even if it did, he doubted the colonel would object to Adam accidentally destroying part of a radio station.

(Sebastian didn't question how something like that would happen. He just knew how Adam worked, and knew something like that was very possible.)

Growing frustrated with the lack of hints and not wanting to deal with the noises coming from where Adam was, Sebastian decided to head through a door across from the desk. There was a simple little plaque that read "Management" - Sebastian tried not to focus on how off-tilt it was or the little specks of what had to be blood.

He opened the door.

He found himself in a room that looked, theoretically, like what a management room was supposed to look like. There was dried blood splattered throughout it, covering walls, the floor and everything on the few tables.

There was a pile of papers in the farthest corner. Each paper had a date titled at the very top of it, but the dates didn't go in order. Sebastian avoided a patch of dried blood on the floor as he went to leaf through them. It looked like transcripts of the radio broadcast. It was...strange. They all looked neatly typed, but Sebastian couldn't find a typewriter anywhere in the room.

He grabbed a paper at random.

He scanned the transcript.

CP: Fun fact. Did you know that a group of dragons is called a “weyr”? A pride of lions, a murmuring of starlings, an ennui of buffalo, and a weyr of dragons. Interesting, right?

And now the news. There’s a weir of five-headed dragons burning down City Hall right now. There is another weir of dragons stomping great holes in Route 800, the only highway leading out of Night Vale. And yet one more weir – did you know that it’s also correct to refer to this as a “flight” of dragons or even a “thunder” of dragons? – tearing open the aqueducts along the town reservoir. More on the complete annihilation of our city, as this story develops.

Mm. I’ve gotten several frustrated calls and letters about our program a couple of weeks ago. Because the program was called “A Story about Huntokar”, many listeners rightly anticipated a story about Huntokar. But all they heard was radio static over faint sounds of inhuman screaming. We apologize for the disappointment, and we will more closely review any programs before putting them on the air. I’m sure it was a tough time for you to voluntarily listen to a sub-par radio program.

The rest of the transcript was covered in a suspicious looking stain.

Sebastian stared at the words, trying - and failing - to comprehend what he had just read. This seemed like a serious radio station, but the transcript didn't make any sense. Dragons didn't exist.

Better yet, there was blood all over this room.

Just where were they?

James slowly walked over to Shadow, hearing Quentin's heavy armored footsteps behind him. Shadow was fine, thankfully. It didn't look like anything had transpired since they'd ventured into the radio station, and Shadow was just sniffing the ground, finding a small patch of grass. Nothing substantial, though, for sure. Not in this desert.

As he approached, Shadow lifted her head, and he brushed his hand down her neck.

She was dusty, and dirty. He walked over to the saddlebag hanging off the saddle and started digging through it. Though it wasn't his, he searched through it with all of the confidence of someone who owned it and all of its belongings.

Quentin watched James and his horse from a distance. Animals didn't tend to like him much now - it was something about the combination of his appearance and the touch of magic he gave off. It was best to stay away from the horse.

James found a brush in the bag. He didn't know if he'd have time to take off Shadow's saddle and all the tack, but he could at least brush a little. He started on the horse's neck, brushing slowly and methodically while keeping an eye on Quentin in the corner of his eyes.

He didn't seem too interested in conversation, and James was fine with that. In the meantime, he would focus on Shadow, who seemed to be relaxing, lowering her head with a quiet, pleased whinny.

Kivvien got bored and wandered off to find Vanya. He went through the very creepy abandoned hallways and peeked into some of the rooms. "Vanya?" he called in a stage-whisper, "Slayer of men?"

"That isn't one of my titles."

He jumped and whirled around to find Vanya standing in the doorway of the means bathroom, wearing the face she always got when she found something perplexing, also known as 'unreadable-expression-plus-the-eyebrow-thing'. Even her eyebrows were blue, he noticed.

"You're such an anime character," he said, earning a scowl. He grinned.

"You have to see this," she said and vanished into the bathroom.

He followed, and his grin was replaced by a wrinkled nose as he looked at the state of the radio-stations bathroom. It wasn't dirty. Not like highway-rest-stop levels, anyway. It was just like something out of a cheap horror movie. Like no one had been there in a long, long while.

Then he saw it.

"Whoa."

Vanya nodded, "Don't touch it."

"It's a cat!"

"I can see that."

"Why is there a floating cat?!"

Vanya gave him the look. Yeah, not the right person to ask.

"You think it's dangerous?" he asked to replace the stupid question.

She shrugged, "Maybe. Could you go get one of the others for me?"

"What are they gonna do?"

"More than you are."

He rolled his eyes with a chuckled and went back out to find the others. He didn't take the time to see what they were saying or doing, just jabbed his thumb in the direction from which he came, "Vanya found a freaky thing."

Adam perked up the moment he heard Kivvien speak. There was only so much fun he could have messing with the radio devices - some random, freaky thing was exactly what the doctor ordered.

But then Sebastian stepped out of the management office.

Adam looked away; he was still upset with Sebastian.

"I found something freaky, too," Sebastian said. Adam gave in and glanced over at him - he was holding a sheet of paper with a suspicious stain. A suspicious red stain.

Now that he thought about it, wasn't the room behind Sebastian covered in blood?

Adam got to his feet. He was torn between checking out the paper and checking out Vanya's discovery. After a moment, he turned back to Kivvien - eyes meeting Sebastian's for the briefest of moments.

"What did Vanya find?" Sebastian asked.