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go-to-the-mirror · 8 months

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Every Time Mirrors are Mentioned in Welcome to Night Vale that is Halfway Relevant

[Plain text: "Every Time Mirrors are Mentioned in Welcome to Night Vale that is Halfway Relevant"]

Unabridged

Episodes featured: 19A, 26, 30, 33, 67, 87, 106, 108, 120, 122, 137, 148, 149, 160, 171, 209

Liveshows featured: "The Librarian," "The Investigators,"

CECIL: And now, a look at financial news. A fallow wheat field, grey sky, cut by black Vs of black birds. There is a child dragging a hatchet. His eyes cast down. His eyes tight. His eyes white and red and superfluous. He know not what he sees, but he knows what is there. A single black-wingéd beast, beak cracked, feathers rotting, alights roughly on the child's shoulder. They stop. The bird picks at the cartilage of the boy's ear, as if biting secrets into it. The boy groans, not unpleasantly. Heavy, slow clouds roll and rise, starkly contrasted against the flickering daguerreotype hills, which stoically keep the poisonous rains at bay. A sudden little river, partially walled by palsied shafts of grain, rolls by. The boy walks to it. He bends forward. His blank eyes stare into his reflection. Neither he nor his mirror knows the other is there. But the bird. The bird knows. The bird cackles. Or perhaps cries. Even the bird is uncertain. The boy takes a palm full of the dark water. Most of it runs out through his long, zig-zagging fingers. He licks the remainder from his dusty skin. A sound. Like thunder. Like drums. Like steps. The boy turns and hurls his hatchet behind him. The bird flies up and away. There is a hideous thump. The boy knows not what he has hit, but that it has been wounded. He waits for its retort. This has been financial news.

(Episode 19A - The Sandstorm)

CECIL: Maybe you should try paying more attention when you're at home. Or better yet, destroy all of your mirrors. As my mother used to tell me: "Someone's going to kill you one day, Cecil, and it will involve a mirror. Mark my words, child." and then she would stare absently through my eyes until I giggled. I miss her so much.

(Episode 26 - Faceless Old Woman)

CECIL: McDonald’s wants to remind you that the most important meal of the day is Breakfast. So why would you let a morning go by without staring deeply into the mirror until you no longer recognize the face staring back at you, mimicking your every gesture, mocking your every movement.

(Episode 30 - Dana)

TEENAGE CECIL: My mom seems really proud of me too. She hid from me for three days, the longest ever! And she’s covered all the mirrors in my house. I’m not sure why, but I think it must be because of pride. Being proud does all sorts of things to a...person. Uh, sorry, got distracted. That weird movement is back. It’s closer now.

TEENAGE CECIL: Interning is going great! Mom is gone. Leonard is super nice to me. My brother is gone too. Family, right? I think I’m learning a lot at the station. All of the mirrors in my house are uncovered now. Not sure who did that. I’m standing in front of the hall mirror right now. Am I changed? Am I becoming an adult? I look more grown, I think, more professional. Leonard said if I work hard, maybe I’ll be a radio presenter myself some day. Leonard said he once was smaller too, but that he is larger now, that everything is larger, that everything in the universe is growing to towering sizes, but all at once, all in unison, so no one notices and it is all the same relative to itself. Leonard lolls his tongue out of his thick purple lips. Leonard hisses. Being an intern is great. That flickering movement is everywhere now. Especially looking in this mirror. I see the flickering movement and I know. I know it. I think the radio station is fun. I think the radio station is hidden. I think the radio station is like a dark planet, lit by no sun. I think, therefore I soon won’t be. I’m looking in a mirror. The mirror is not covered. The flickering movement is just behind me. I- [He screams. There is gurgling. A body falls to the floor. Tape hiss continues. The tape shuts off. End teenage voice]

CECIL: No matter! I’m taking the tape, just now and I’m [GRUNTS] crushing it into little pieces. None of us have to think about it again. I’ll just double check that the mirror in the station bathroom is covered as usual and then that will be that. Done. Forgotten.

(Episode 33 - Cassette)

CECIL: The City Council warned that the mess left from Leonard Burton’s death is likely to draw Street Cleaners and that we should all take shelter. Cover your mirrors. Shade your eyes. Stay indoors and mourn. Stay indoors and mourn.

(Episode 67 - [Best Of?])

CECIL: Item: Big Ricos Pizza is looking for a new cashier. Must have retail experience and be good at not talking if they know what’s good for them. No funny business. No secret wheat speakeasies. Why would you even bring that up? Who have you been talking to? To apply, look at yourself in the mirror for a long time, until your face no longer seems to be your own.

(Episode 87 - The Trial of Hiram McDaniels)

CECIL: I was so frightened, but still I looked into the washroom. He was standing in front of a mirror, looking right at himself. I never look into those things. Or at least I haven't in a long long time. "I think the radio station is fun," he said. "I think the radio station is hidden. I think the radio station is like a dark planet, lit by no sun. I think, therefore I soon won’t be," he said. I wanted to cry out to warn him. My mother told me to stay away from mirrors. And I knew he was in danger. I opened my mouth and tried to step into the room, but I could not speak, could not move forward. "I’m looking in a mirror," he said. "The mirror is not covered," he said. "Stop. Don't look into the mirror," I tried to say. But nothing came out of my mouth, only spit and inaudible wheeze. Tears stung my eyes. I waved frantically, trying to catch his attention. "The flickering movement is just behind me," he said. And then he looked right at me in the mirror. His eyes grew wide and wet. He said "I-. He said again "I-" and then he choked. Then he screamed. Then I screamed, only again no sound came out. He fell to the floor, and for a moment I remembered. I remembered blue lights and blood in my throat and a dark planet lit by no sun. And then I forgot it, or at least what it looked like, only that it was. Or never was. Or still is. His wallet was no longer in my studio. His...my driver’s license was no longer in my hand. My familiar teenage intern was no longer lying on the ground. The mirror he was looking into is now shattered into thousands of intersecting cracks like parched desert dirt. I approached the mirror, hoping to see a face I knew. A young man's face I just barely remember. But I only saw a multiplicity of me, a man divided, unrecognizably, under razor sharp lines. And behind me a glowing slash in the bathroom wall.

(Episode 106 - Filings)

CECIL: "Better not look in the mirror," Cal said as he nervously simulated the sound of laughter. A dribble of blood ran down his chin and onto his chest.

(Episode 108 - Cal)

KEVIN: Jason and Falisha wanted their friends to know they were happy, so they began to practice smiling in the mirror, but even they couldn't see a change in their faces. Plus, mirrors were upsetting because of all the people who would gather behind them in the reflection but that weren't actually there when they turned around to face them.

KEVIN: Their long house was a long pit. And every single mirror in their home was gone, along with the ghastly figures who gathered in the reflections.

(Episode 120 - All Smiles' Eve)

CECIL: Nazr did not see Barks Ennui. But he was not without his own troubles. He would find, some evenings, that when he looked in the mirror there were two of him. One of him sitting behind the other. He would stand and the second reflection would stand too. It would follow all of his movements from behind his primary reflection. This went on for days. Then, one night, he looked in the mirror and there was only one of him. He sighed, feeling some relief to the tension that had been with him so long as to become his new normal. And that is when, in the mirror, his second reflection stepped into the room, followed by Frances Donaldson. Nazr whirled. The room he was in was empty. He looked back in the mirror. There was his own face, terrified. And behind that, on the bed, there was himself again, with Frances. The two of them were kissing, passionately. He watched himself kiss. And then his reflection and the Frances in the mirror stopped kissing and looked up at him, with startled faces. They stayed frozen that way, and he stayed frozen too. After several moments, the mirror couple smiled. Their smiles got wider and wider, and then they were both dead, blood covered and sprawling at irregular angles. And then they were alive again and smiling at him. He shouted and stumbled back from the mirror. From then on, he took to covering his mirrors, and that worked for a few days, but then one day he came home to find himself in his bedroom, already sitting in front of the covered bedroom mirror. The him that was in his bedroom looked up at him who had just entered with wide eyes and a yawning mouth, and Nazr (who believed himself to be the real Nazr) turned and walked out his house. He checked into a motel and decided to stay there for awhile.

(Episode 122 - A Story of Love and Horror, Part 2: "Spire")

LAUREN: These shadows don't even have faces. We cannot discern their intentions or feelings. They move around in quick jerks and starts, flickering in and out of our vision, sometimes standing just behind us while slowly tilting their heads. And unless you're looking in a mirror, there's no way you can even see that.

(Episode 137 - The Mudstone Abyss, Part 3)

LEONARD BURTON: Let me describe to you the shape of Cecil Palmer. He is a line of leafless mesquite trees. He is a glass factory. He is golf ball-sized hail. He has a voice like distant highway traffic. He loves coffee and handshakes. He wears tight clothing and has never once worked with modeling clay. He covers mirrors with cloth and has an irrational fear of glowing lights beneath locked doors in dark hallways. You cannot know any of this because Cecil is my vision, not yours. He is real, all the same. He is to be my replacement when I retire. But he does not exist. So I can never retire. I am your permanent host.

(Episode 148 - The Broadcaster)

CECIL: I can see myself in their reflective face. I... I do not like this. I do not like this at all. Please go. Please leave. I cannot. I... I am covering this window with a sheet. I do not like this mirror. I do not like it one bit. No.

(Episode 149 - The General)

CECIL: ... [somber] and *that* is what I saw in the mirror that day, and why I do not like to go near mirrors ever.

(Episode 160 - The Weather)

CECIL: Do you ever stare at yourself for so long in the mirror that you no longer understand what you look like? Is this the same effect as thinking about someone you miss so much that you forget the shape of their face? Why would you do that? Why would you refuse to maintain order? Are you refusing? Or are you a victim of your own mind? Do brain cells dictate souls? Is thought matter? Does thought matter? Who can say? Can the person looking back at you from the mirror tell you the answer? Just because you can see a person, does that mean that person exists? Is it you you are looking at? Or is it someone else?

CECIL: Basically, why do I know I am me? How many times have I seen myself in the mirror? Is it bad that the answer is rarely? Shouldn’t we all be afraid of mirrors? Or is it just me? How many times, in a fit of dissociation, do we see someone else behind us? Are you, too, too afraid to turn around? Do you really want to challenge the veracity of your eyes? Do you think disbelief in death will make it disappear? Are awareness and manifestation one and the same? So, what did I see in the mirror today? Don’t we all see the same thing? Isn’t it a person who looks exactly like ourselves? And weren’t they making the same physical gestures? And behind that person, in the reflection, did you not also see, just over your shoulder, a pair of eyes? The curve of a head? And did you notice how that head was human in shape but maybe only a third the size?

CECIL: Who is behind you in the mirror? Or what is behind you? Should I speak in present or past tense? Is the face there? Or is the face gone now? Are you no longer at the mirror? Do you feel safer? Why do you assume that because you aren’t looking in the mirror right now that the tiny face and spiny digits are not still behind you?

CECIL: Are you thinking about it? Are you starting to forget exactly what it looks like? Do you want to go to the mirror again? Do you want to stare and stare at it until you can comprehend what it is?

CECIL: What if we went to the mirror together? If we don’t feel alone in our feelings, could we conquer our fears? Are we in agreement, you and I? What are you even looking at? Is your focus drifting to your shoulder? Can you not do that? Can you resist the urge? What will staring directly into your terror accomplish?

CECIL: When was the last time you saw your mother? It’s been since childhood, hasn’t it? Didn’t she warn you about mirrors? Didn’t she tell you they would be your demise? Or was that just a popular bedtime story?

CECIL: What did your mother tell you about swing sets? What did she say to you when you yelled to her for help? Did she lean over your sobbing face and ask you: “Why are you crying when you don’t even exist?” Did she tell you again about the mirror?

CECIL: Did you figure it out? Could you see past your own mental inventions? Who out there looked beyond the long, gape-jawed figure and its inexplicable whines? Did you see the table? There in the mirror image of your house, did you see the table? You hadn’t noticed the table before, had you?

CECIL: Why was the table only in the mirror? Why isn’t it real?

CECIL: What’s inside the drawer of the rickety table in the mirror? What other uncanny discoveries await you if you could just break through? Is it as simple as breaking through?

CECIL: Do you want to know what’s in the drawer below the table? Shouldn’t it be as easy to obtain as a lightweight, wool button up coat, all black? But nothing easy ever is, is it? How do you get to a table that’s right in front of you, but only visible in a mirror?

CECIL: Are you only concentrating on the table now? And you’re sure it only exists in the mirror? You double checked? Do you want to know what’s inside the drawer on the front of that table? Are you willing to break something? Are you willing to break the mirror, yes, but so much more? Are you willing to go to a place from which you cannot return? Are you willing to learn things you cannot unlearn? Do you have a hammer? Or if not, can you find something heavy that you can lift? Will you smash the mirror? Will you do it quickly? Why are you hesitating? Have you let your comfortability lapse into carelessness? Why did you take your eyes off the creature on your neck? Did you see the blood or feel the pain first? Is it tearing into your flesh? Is that why you’re screaming? Can you still break the mirror? Are you losing consciousness? Are you? Are you? Are you?

CECIL: If you look into the mirror you just smashed do you see that the creature is gone? Cool, right? But isn’t it strange that all about you on the floor are shards of the mirror you shattered, yet in front of you, the mirror remains, fully intact? Strange? Or scary? Wouldn’t you think that the mirror being simultaneously broken and unbroken is strange, while the fact that you have no reflection is scary? Is that true though? Do you have a reflection? Do you see yourself? On the floor of the mirror’s world? Is your body crumpled on the floor like a wet towel? Is your lower jaw hanging open because you died screaming, or because of gravity? Do you have a blanket of some sort? Why don’t you cover that mirror up? Why don’t you cover all the mirrors, in fact? While you are walking about your home, do you notice the antique table by the door, with its tarnished, yet ornate, brass bulb knob? Was that table always there? Did you enter the mirror world? Or were you always in the mirror world? What else is different around you?

CECIL: Now what? Will you cover the mirrors and sweep the floor and pretend it never happened? Will this prevent it from happening again? Are awareness and manifestation one and the same?

(Episode 171 - Go to the Mirror?)

CECIL: Whatever the Distant Prince keeps behind the Narrow Place has left me hollow and shambling. Less and less of me. This time quite literally. When I looked again, I did not have a nose. It is quite upsetting to see your own face but without a nose. Think about this now. Think about looking in the mirror and seeing your face, but the nose is gone. So you will understand why I vomited in the street. And this other me, he vomited too, for exactly the same amount of time, stopping precisely when I did.

(Episode 209 - The Black Coat)

FACELESS OLD WOMAN: I am less good at being seen, but I am working on that using a system of whistles and mirrors. CECIL: Huh. Mirrors.

("The Librarian")

EARL HARLAN: Oh yes! Yes, I will wake up that morning, and I will stare at myself in the mirror repeating, “You can do this, Earl. You can do this, Earl. You can do this, Earl.” Until my reflection says, “You’re right.” And then we’ll brush each others’ teeth, and trim each others’ mustaches, and comb each others’ hair… CECIL: Awwww! EARL HARLAN: …and then step through the mirror and once again switch places in each others’ mirrored world for the day.

("The Investigators")

JEFFREY: Yeah, yeah. Yeah turns out most people are afraid of what they are, so now I’m also terrified of mirrors and reflective surfaces, so…

("ALL HAIL")

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desert-bluffs-and-me · 1 year

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Wtnv quick rundown - Live show - The Librarian

Featuring the voices of Andrew W.K. as Intern Andrew, Sympathy Sanders as Tamika Flynn, Meg Bashwiner as Deb, Kate Jones as Michelle Nyugen, Hal Lubin as Steve Carlsberg, Dylan Marron as Carlos the Scientist and Mara Wilson as the Faceless Old Woman.

If wishes were horses,those wishes would all run away, shrieking and bucking, terrified of a great unseen evil. Welcome to Night Vale.

The main plot of this live show is that a Librarian, Randell, has escaped. It wants to try out other professions* but is eventually taken back by other Libarians (along with a courple of citizens) due to this being impossible. Before this it enters 'a' theatre (indicated as being whichever one the show is taking place in via encouragments by Cecil for audience participation), where it briefly terrorises patrons.

The Librarian escaped when it's titanium electrified cage was damaged by the collapse of the papier-mache and balsa wood scaffolding during the construction of a new children's wing, knife pit, upgraded computer room with several empty desks and a loud speaker which repeats the phrase 'technology ruins lives!' and thicker plexiglass.

The construction crew is called Colston Constractors Inc and were told they're constructing a new Pinkberry so they'll actually do the job, since nobody wants to work so close to Librarians. They apparently have antennae.

Intern Andrew** is sent to investigate. He had friends called Johann, Jamie, Xerxes and Hasad. He dies trying to fight a Librarian.

WEATHER: “Serpentine Cycle of Money” by Carrie Elkin and Danny Schmidt.

Intern Andrew**'s mother used to work in the coal mines before they were converted into holding pens for those who vote incorrectly. This involved her doing something with a fencing sword, axe and a pig. She was also looking for both coal and the tiny valuable hearts of rare bats.

Down there she would see and fight hazy, feathered, swarming, weeping, gawping, gasping things with claws and spokes and stingers. When she came home she’d be covered in coal dust and lymph.

**There are bonus tracks of the intern in the library where instead of Intern Andrew it is Intern James Urbaniak, Intern Molly Quinn or Intern Wil Wheaton.

There is also a bonus track of a new segment called 'Louie Blasko's Music Moments'. Louie himself is present, where he avoids answering anything about his insurance fraud, of if he's been appearing is children's mirrors to teach them bluegrass and then takes their souls to the mirror world. He teaches us some bluegrass (which is mostly a lot of screaming, angry lyrics about making people close their eyes and just well, lots of weirdness).

*Liesel Schmidd, who owns the auto body shop near 'Somerset and Gray' hears an eery voice which asks her if she likes what she does and tells her it's lonely and wants to come home with her. This is Randell, the librarian, who wraps a limb around but is scared off by a blowtorch wielded by Liesel's sister, Pica.

*Randell also visits the Green Market board president, Tristan Cortes and delivers his mail.

*He also gets into the Dog Park, where the Hooded Figures flee in all directions (revealing matching black and white Nike shoes) but is repelled by Tamika Flynn and her armed child militia. As they cause Randell to flee, they shout suggestions for new material to him.

Tamika also gives a speech (recorded at the time because there is always several organisations recording everything) about the importance of books and how she and her army will never back down from defending NV.

Librarians are described as being pseudo-reptiles with exoskeletons and childlike hands which enlarge and slither in a serpentine way. They have a rigid caudal spine, many round black eyes and hairy brown teeth.

Deb is promoting American Express Obsidian Cards. It’s accepted worldwide by any merchant that keeps their store dimly lit, and lingers sadly all day on memories of lost loved ones. It gives you full purchase protection, extended warranty on electronics, a deathless hunger that can never be sated by mere carnal appetite, and the quiet loss of one part of your body every month (which one is a surprise). It also gives you points for airlines or it points at the nearest airplane if you put it on a flat surface (she doesn't remember which). It replaces everyones existing card, wallets, things around them and if they touch it and touch somebody else it will kill them.

Cecil has an 'Amex' card which is just a post-it note that says Real Amex card on it with a thumbs up and he's kept it since college despite never finding anywhere which actually takes it.

Cecil also admits he tries not to listen to or remember anything anyone says to him since taking in knowledge can be dangerous.

The SSP are buying people's illegal or unregistered firearms. This was not supposed to be told to anyone.

There is a Thursday night event at Dark Owl Records. Michelle tells us about it, where she and her staff plan to discover fire for themselves (using gasoline and lighters). She says she doesn't really want anyone to know.

She also says she already knows about the librarian and many other things due to a magazine called Füteür. You can find this magazine by going to the heart of the Whispering Forest, something Michelle can do because she's immune to positive feedback (so isn't tempted by the trees compliments) and climbing a tree called Redge to find the kiosk. Michelle likes it because it means she never has to have her parents or anyone over 30 tell her something she doesn't already know. She is wearing an outfit made of spiders.

Route 800 is going to shut down so construction crews can play Bloody Mary.

There's an annual Children's Fair at city hall but nobody can attend until all the feral animals there are under control.

Steve Carlsberg is secretary-elect to the PTA so stands in for Diane Crayton (who has throat spiders) telling us about the funraiser they're having at the rec centre to increase the number of school clubs. It will involve a seated dinner, a silent auction, a live auction, a secret underground auction, two fake diversionary auctions, and a raffle drawing where we hunt, capture, and clean the winner. The intended clubs to be funded are a glee club, a drama club, a chess club, a pyrokinesis club, an blood stone circle prayer society, a speechless debate club, and an armed political insurgency club.

Cecil asks about a science club, even though he doesn't know why science is beneficial, and though Steve is weary because most parents don't believe in science he says he'll see what he can do.

The NV Junior League is opening a time capsule from 1915 which was buried by disgruntled Subway employees.

Carlos has a machine that lets him listen to Cecil whilst in the otherworld. Sometimes he hears broadcasts from before they met and from the future (which he turns off). He doesn't understand why everyone is afraid of librarians, as he heard from his friends who liked to be in libraries that librarians were mostly kind normal people. Carlos himself has 'never had to read a book' so never went to a library in college.

The Greater NV Medical Community is asking for people to donate blood. As well as by needle, they say that citizens can give blood via court injunction, satellite, wolverines or a carefully-staged 'accident'. They also seem to think 'you' are cute and want to know if 'you' are seeing anybody. Cecil tells them 'you' are, to take pressure off of 'you'.

NV has artificial natural disastors, like scissor fog.

The FOW states that she is still the best candidate for mayor. She also whispers a shorter name she goes by to Cecil, but he's not allowed to tell. She also warns him of many dangers that 'we can't see' but this is also done in whispers.

In NV, Stephen Kings' 'The Dark Tower' series is considered a nonfiction travel guide.

Stay tuned next for a shuffling movement outwards, the dimming of lights, and a large hall left empty and silent until the next time it is not. Goodnight to all of you, listeners. And goodnight, Night Vale. Goodnight.

Proverb: To quote the great Herman Melville, “call me.”

#wtnv #wtnv quick rundown #wtnv the librarian #long post #welcome to night vale

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