Welcome to Night Vale - 176 - The Autumn Specter

Episode Date: October 15, 2020

It's the perfect time of year for getting candy, telling spooky stories, and fearing a soul-reaping, malevolent spirit. Weather: “Welterweight” by Nels Andrews. https://nelsandrews.bandcamp.com/ Livestream of GHOST STORIES on October 29: https://noonchorus.com/welcome-to-night-vale/ Transcript available at http://welcometonightvale.com/transcripts You can also support the Night Vale Patreon, to help us keep making this show: http://patreon.com/welcometonightvale/ Rescheduled tour dates for 2020: http://www.welcometonightvale.com/live/ Our third novel, The Faceless Old Woman Who Secretly Lives in Your Home, is out now: http://www.welcometonightvale.com/books/ Music: Disparition http://disparition.bandcamp Logo: Rob Wilson http://robwilsonwork.com Written by Joseph Fink & Jeffrey Cranor. Narrated by Cecil Baldwin. http://welcometonightvale.com Follow us on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram. Check out our books, live shows, store, membership program, and official recap show. Produced by Night Vale Presents. http://nightvalepresents.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey, Nightville, it is Jeffrey Craneer speaking to you from April of 2026 with a couple of cool things coming up. First off, we're going to be in Europe touring our newest Nightville live show, Murder Night in Blood Forest. We're going to be in Edinburgh, UK, on May 27th. We'll be in Manchester on the 28th. We will be in London on May 29th, and we will be in Amsterdam on May the 30th. You can get tickets for these shows at Welcome to Nightville.com slash live, and hopefully we'll have more. shows coming up later this year. Who knows? Just get on our newsletter. Go to Welcome to Nightville.com. Sign up for our newsletter. We will send you emails twice a month to let you know

all of the news that you need to know about Welcome to Nightville. One of the big news things to tell you right now is that our other hit podcast, Alice Isn't Dead, is coming back on April the 13th, written by Joseph Fink, produced by Disparition and starring Jacica Nicole. More episodes of Alice Isn't Dead return on April the 13th. So make sure you are still subscribe to that podcast. Finally, do you want some cool nightbale merch? Go to welcome to nightville.com, click on store, and we have

all kinds of cool t-shirts, things for the summer, tank tops, beach towels, and if you like coffee mugs, if you want calendars, if you want backpacks, all kinds of cool stuff there. So check out Welcome to Nightville.com and click on store, click on live. If you want to see our live shows, we will see you in Europe.

And hey, thanks. Lips. are the toes of the face. Welcome to Nightvale. It's Halloween again, Nightvale, my favorite day of the year. As a kid, my mother used to dress my sister, Abby, and I up in homemade costumes and take us door to door, vaguely threatening our neighbors until they gave us candy. When I was a teenager, I got a little old for trick-or-treating, so I started going to haunted

houses with my friends. A lot of those haunted houses were kind of predictable, with all their chainsaw killers and Victorian ghost children singing nursery rhymes who would follow you home and sing by your bed for months afterwards. But they always got to me. I loved the emotional rush of being scared. I still do, of course. I don't go out much to haunted houses, but I still love good, old-fashioned, scary stories. I thought today would be a great day to share some of my favorites with you. I had my new intern, James, put together a few spooky tales that are perfect for putting you in the Halloween mood. But first, let's have a look at the community calendar. This Saturday night at the new Old Nightvale Opera House is the annual costume gala. This event is the

Opera House's largest fundraiser and one of the most prestigious costume contests in the region. A panel of judges will be on hand to determine the best costume at the ball. Last year's winners were Joel Eisenberg and his partner, Danny Jimenez, who dressed in a tandem outfit of a stegosaurus. I was there, listeners, and it was impressive. The creature was so realistic looking. The craftsmanship of the costume was top-notch, but, listen, I have to confess, I'm always more into high concept creativity rather than realistic details when it comes to costumes.

Like I remember the 2015 gala when Amal Shammoon came dressed up as the concept of Anhui. She made herself 12 feet tall, dressed in a top long coat, and created a constant drizzling rain inside the ballroom. Anyone who looked at her got super sad and wanted a hug. Joel and Danny Stegosaurus was fine. Sunday afternoon is the fall craft sale in Old Town Night Vale, an inscrutable maze of stalls showcasing the finest products from our town's artisans. There will be cultural events for children like finger painting classes, puppet shows,

and a visit from the Autumn Spector. The Autumn Specter returns. It comes to collect its crops with its great and sharp sickle. It will harvest every ripe soul in Nightvale. The Autumn Specter is hungry. It is October, and it is time to feed. Hey James, this community calendar doesn't seem right. It's just a bunch of stuff about the Autumn Specter.

Also, this font size, what is this, 32 point? That's just much too large. And it's printed in red ink, and that is a waste of our color toner, James. Ew. Ew. This red ink is still really damp. Okay, plus, there's nothing about start and end times of the craft fair, or anything about the food trucks. Like, if the autumn specter is hungry, surely it wants some falafel or Korean barbecue or tacos.

James, could you just redo this story? James? James? Well, listeners, I don't know where James went. I can hear him breathing, but I don't see him anywhere. Yeah, it's fine. Let's just get on to our first spooky story. One quiet, moonless night not long ago and not so far away. A teenage girl sat in a house that was not her own.

It was the home of Tony and Sheila McDowell. The girl was their babysitter, and she had just put the two young Dowell children down to sleep. The girl watched TV alone in the dark living room, only the bluish flicker of a scary movie illuminating her face. The phone rang, abrupt and loud, startling her. She raised the receiver to her ear. Hello? She said with a slight quiver. Have you checked on the children?

Came a raspy voice. The babysitter ran quickly upstairs, opening the door of the kid's bedroom. She flipped on the light, and there they were, fast asleep. She went back to her movie, but the phone rang again. Have you checked on the children? Came the same voice, only more sinister. The babysitter again hurried upstairs, opened the door, turned on the light,

and saw the children still asleep. The caller called again, and again, and again. Have you checked on the children? The babysitter, So scared, barely able to move, hung up the phone before the voice could finish, its repeated query. When the phone rang once again, she answered and shouted, Stop calling me! But this time, it was a different voice.

The person on this occasion said, Ma'am, this is the police. We've traced the call. The call is coming from inside the house. Get out. Get out! The babysitter panicked and started to run, But then she remembered, she never called the police.

How would they know to even trace the call? So she crept fearfully upstairs to the children's room. And the phone was ringing again, the clamoring bell igniting her fright. And she cracked, opened the door, and she saw. She saw the young McDowell boy and his little brother hunched over a phone and giggling. They were prank. her. And she felt relieved, but embarrassed. And she told them to stop fooling around and go to sleep. And they all shared a good laugh. Let's have a look now at traffic. Okay. Well, I don't seem to have a

traffic report from intern James. Also, James isn't here right now because I sent him out to go pick up lunch a few minutes. Oh, hey James. James. James. James. Wait, why are you standing in the control booth? You were supposed to go get lunch. And also, I've asked you a couple of times not to wear that burlap bag over your head. I mean, yes, it looks great with the jackal lantern face drawn onto it. I mean, the mouth is a bit lopsided and the eyes are a tad uneven, you know, kind of flat and emotionless, but all in all, it's a cool look, but it's decidedly not allowed in station management's dress code. Oh, you're holding a knife too. So did you get, did you already get that lunch then? Well, if that's the case, you don't. If that's the case,

don't need to cut my sandwich in half, I'll take it whole. And also, I need that traffic report. Thanks. James? What are you waiting for? The Autumn Spector to do it for you? Hop to it. James?

Well, while James is working on that, let's get back to my favorite spooky Halloween stories. This one isn't a story, so much as a fun Halloween game. The legend of Bloody Mary. According to the lore, if you turn off all the lights and stare into a mirror, repeating, Bloody Mary, three times in a row, she will appear and tear your face off. I've never tried this because I don't own any mirrors, but my husband Carlos conducted this very experiment in his science lab. He said he darkened the room and repeated the name and nothing happened for a long time.

Then a figure of a woman appeared, silvery gray and shimmering, and she approached Carlos slowly. Her hollow white eyes never blinking. She brought her face only inches from Carlos and said, Are you for real? And Carlos said, yes, he was indeed real. And Bloody Mary said, okay, because this time of year, I just get a bunch of giggling, screaming teenagers, and I'm really tired of ripping off their faces for no pay whatsoever. And Carlos gave her some resources for starting a union and she thanked him and she offered to tear his face off in exchange for the consulting.

but Carla said no, he liked his face and wished her luck. Night Vale. Pay your malevolent spirits. They're overworked, especially around Halloween. And a 20% gratuity for poltergeists, phantasmence, and ghosts is standard. And now for... What the... Wait.

Okay. You know, I thought intern James had handed the traffic report to me, but this is just a piece of parchment with a nine-pointed star seemingly drawn by a finger dripped in blood. And then there are a series of ancient runes scrawled along the outer edges. Now, I took runic in college. I mean, most of my friends took Spanish as their language, but I thought living here in the American Southwest, it would be more useful to study ancient Scandinavian and Germanic alphabets.

And from what I can make out, these are a message about the return of the Autumn Specter. Oh, all right. Okay. I love that intern James loves Halloween and whatever this autumn specter is. In fact, James is still in the break room right now constructing a sacred totem out of ash tree branches and twine. He's been muttering to himself all day in a language that I don't recognize. And the only words I can understand are Autumn Spector.

But I still have neither my traffic report. port, nor my lunch. Wait. Do you think James is... Nah, put it out of your mind, Cecil. Let's tell another spooky Halloween story. There once was a beautiful young woman

who wore a green ribbon around her neck. She won the affection of a handsome young man. They fell in love, And one day the boy asked the girl why she always wore a green ribbon around her neck. She would not tell him. One day the man and the woman were to become husband and wife. In her white bridal dress, the woman still wore her green ribbon. The man asked her on their wedding night if he could untie the green ribbon,

but even on the most intimate of evenings, she said no. and he respected her answer, but he longed to know what she was hiding behind the ribbon. Through the years, the man asked the wife again about the ribbon, but she never removed it, nor answered his questions about it. She only warned him that he would not like what he saw if she were to remove it. He asked less and less, but his curiosity grew, and they began. became old, very old, and they knew their time left was short. The man asked one more time, my dearest wife, love of my life, tell me that I may remove the green ribbon from around your neck.

And the old woman said, my adoring groom, here in our room after all these many years, yes, you may. but I caution you, as I have many times before, that you shall not like what your eyes behold and hesitated, but finally reached his weakened, wrinkled fingers to the green bow along her nape, and he tentatively bawled the ribbon, and suddenly it unfurled falling from her neck, and the man gasped. upon her neck was a series of ornate letters spelling out goth life the woman said i got this tattoo in high school but kind of outgrew it and it's super embarrassing and the man replied it is for sure weird but also pretty cool i like it and she never wore the green

ribbon again. You know, listeners, I'd love to bring you that traffic report, but right now, I'm facing something much more urgent and more dire. My studio door has opened on its own, and as I turned around, I could see down the long, faintly lit corridor of our offices, and at the end of the hallway stands a figure, and he wears a jack-o-lantern mask, his head crooked to one side, like a dog asking a question, or like a hanged man, or both. And it is intern James,

and he holds a long knife, and he walks. He walks slowly toward me, and he is speaking at first in a mutter, but now louder, a restrained shout in an obscure tongue like a magician casting a wicked spell, and he is moving much faster toward me like a limping run,

and his blade is raised high, and James is not an intern, Night Vale, but the autumn spectre itself come to reap my soul. But before he does that, let me take you to the weather. It's a little grease, painful, and a wink for the moon jewels hide

in their boxes in between, frightened, frozen, and the footlights a starlit painted to and a part too big and a dress too small, the stage hands, fairer lines, and it's tin. 9 8

Swan song of the world to lead 7 889 You should have seen And it's 5 Take a fall and grab your feet 3 5 day and old Second time

And it's just in time Swans song Take a fall and grab Take a fall and grab your RBC Training Ground has discovered potential in over 20,000 Canadian athletes and counting County. Your story could be next. If you've got the drive, they'll help you find your path to the Olympics. Let's see what you've got. Sign up for free at rbc training ground.ca. So during the weather,

I went to Human Resources and requested a file on intern James. Oh, I'm fine, by the way. And James is not the autumn specter. But I'll get to that. So I found a copy of James's resume and cover letter for the position of radio station intern. His application was originally submitted in 1845. That's almost two centuries ago, I exclaimed, but according to HR, they're pretty backlogged on the intern apps. Well, what are you going to do? We get to them when we get to them, they said from the bottom of their abandoned well.

Paper clipped to James' application was a wrinkled and yellowed news clipping from the Night Vale Daily Journal, and the article says that James died. on Halloween night in 1849 when he was hit by a train. I then went to the Hall of Public Records and found that our radio station was built in 1850 atop the very train tracks where James met his end. James's soul has been wandering the halls and offices of our radio station ever since. for all James ever wanted was to be a radio intern,

to serve the listening community to lift high the voice of journalistic truth. And it was his death that led to the shutdown of those train tracks and the eventual construction of a new station home and the building we still use now. So I was wrong about James. He was an intern, after all, and not a malevolent Halloween spirit. But I was right that the Autumn Spectre had come for me. For when I turned to see James running down the hall, I did not notice the Autumn Spector behind me with its bony hands and scarecrow mouth.

And I did not notice its soul-reeping sickle, which it had raised high above its oversized head and stick-thin body. and James had given his life for the building of our radio station and in death gave his soul for the very same cause and James threw himself upon the autumn specter and he tried to stab the spectre's neck and chest but it did nothing and the specter pushed James aside and then turned its black coal eyes upon me and it raised its curved blade once again and swore. I tried to duck, but was too slow.

And just as the sickle's edge reached my face, James dove in front of it and vanished in a burst of white flame as he was struck. And the room was empty, and the autumn specter was gone too. To the family and friends of intern James, he was an okay intern. not always on top of his writing deadlines, but he literally sacrificed his soul for a radio station. I can't bring you a traffic report today, but I will live to bring you one tomorrow if we find a new intern. And HR tells me that we have hundreds of candidates,

although most of them are not yet aware that they are candidates. Stay tuned next for our new cooking competition show, Flay Bobby Flay. And as always, good night, Night Vale. Good night. Welcome to Nightvale is a production of Nightvale Presents. It is written by Joseph Fink and Jeffrey Criner and produced by Dysperition. The voice of Nightvale is Cecil Baldwin.

Original music by Dysperition. All of it can be found at dispirition.bancamp.com. This episode's weather was Welterweight by Nels Andrews. Find out more at nelsandrews.bancamp.com. Comments, questions, email us at info at welcome to nightvail.com or follow us on Twitter at nightville radio. Or tell all of the little animals to please stay out of the road. It is not safe for you there. Check out welcome to night veil.com for info about our upcoming live stream of ghost stories for this Halloween month. Get spooky with us. Today's proverb,

The Road to Hell is paved with cobblestone. It's super bumpy, not at all comfortable, and really bad for your car's suspension. Hey, Jeffrey Kraner here to tell you about another show from me and my Nightvale co-creator Joseph Fink. It's called Unlicensed, and it's an L.A. Noir-style mystery set in the outskirts of present-day Los Angeles. Unlicensed follows two unlicensed private investigators who small jobs looking into Insurance claims and missing property are only the tip of a conspiracy iceberg.

There are already two seasons of Unlicensed for you to listen to now, with season three dropping on May 15th. Unlicensed is available exclusively through Audible, free if you already have that subscription. And if you don't, Audible has a trial membership. And if I know you, and I do, you can binge all that mystery goodness in a short window. And if you like it, if you liked Unlicensed, please, please rate and review each season. Our ability to keep making this show is predicated on audience engagement. So go check out Unlicensed, available now only at audible.com.