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PART ONE: FROM CHICAGO TO NIGHT VALE
Constable Renfield Turnbull hastened along a corridor of the Canadian Consulate in Chicago, about to leave for a visit with Sarah Zelda Turnbull, his American cousin in Night Vale. He stepped into one of the offices that included a closet, opened the closet door, and passed from the closet into…a cabin in the Borderlands, occupied by the ghost of Sergeant Robert Fraser.
“Sir!” Turnbull exclaimed, saluting the senior officer.
Bob Fraser returned the salute. “Constable Turnbull, is this a social visit or do you bring word of official RCMP matters?”
“Oh Sir, it is neither. Silly me, I’ve stepped through the wrong closet door. I meant to step through the one to Night Vale. My cousin Sarah Zelda, who is a Night Vale resident, has invited me to attend a special event there, ‘The Gathering of Goudists’ ”.
“Ah, gouda,” murmured Bob. “That makes me think of my old partner, Buck Frobisher, although he’s more of a gorgonzola man. If you’d like, I can get you his recipe for moose hock rolled in wild boar tongue covered with gorgonzola cheese.”
“Yes indeedy, Sir, and thank you kindly. I am ever willing to expand my culinary repertoire, and I look forward to that, but for now I must bid you adieu and find the closet door to Night Vale.”
Following another exchange of salutes, Turnbull went on his way, found the correct closet, and stepped through it onto Highway 800, the only highway to or from Night Vale. Something fluttered down from the sky and Turnbull reached out to catch it (as Cecil Palmer of Night Vale Community Radio often said on his radio program: “there are so many things in the sky”). This particular thing was a pamphlet that said “Welcome to Night Vale, a pleasant place in the American Southwest where the sun is hot -- of course -- and the moon is beautiful --expectedly -- and where eldritch rites, inexplicable horrors, and multitudinous conspiracies are a natural part of our close-knit and yet friendly desert community. And where in everyone’s home there lives The Faceless Old Woman Who Secretly Lives In Your Home.”
PART TWO: BIG RICO’S PIZZA & ENTERTAINMENT ZONE, NIGHT VALE
“The Gathering of Goudists” was being held at Big Rico’s Pizza & Entertainment Zone. Every resident of Night Vale had heard Cecil Palmer again and again proclaiming on Night Vale Community Radio “no one does a slice like Big Rico -- no one”. It was a cheese haven, plus the added attraction of the recent change from being simply Big Rico’s Pizza to being Big Rico’s Pizza & Entertainment Zone, with the entertainment zone concept including a ball pit, a snake pit, a custom-designed ball pit that contained hidden snakes, and an animatronic band called The Table Scraps. Big Rico’s Pizza & Entertainment Zone was an obvious choice of venue as the place for the cheese-worshippers to hold their special event.
When Turnbull walked into Big Rico’s, the first thing he heard was Chrissy Cockroach, Pasha Possum, and Rodney Rat -- The Table Scraps -- singing their cover version of “The Smell of Cicada Death” (the original recording of which -- by local popular band “Paradoxical Undressing in Hypothermia” -- could be purchased at nearby Dark Owl Records). The second thing he heard was The Faceless Old Woman Who Secretly Lives In Your Home and who was also at the same time Secretly Living At Big Rico’s during the Goudist proceedings.
“Praise the Gouda! It’s brought us an interloper!” The Faceless Old Woman shouted.
Turnbull, otherworldly in his own way, was undaunted by the occurrence of a faceless voice, and responded “Yes, praise the Gouda…but dearie me, it’s not my intention to be here as an interloper.”
The Faceless Old Woman explained to Turnbull that shouting the word “interloper” was the common way of greeting a newcomer in Night Vale. Then, finding Turnbull to be agreeable company and a good listener, she proceeded to tell him a bit about herself while they waited for the Goudist opening ceremonies.
“I was born on a boat in the Mediterranean Sea in 1792,” she began, “and my mother died in childbirth. In 1813 my father was murdered and I dedicated my life to hunting down his murderer, but then I too was murdered.”
Turnbull’s thoughts went for a moment to his fellow Canadian Constable, Benton Fraser, who suffered the loss of mother early in life and the murder of father later in life, but who did successfully hunt down his father’s murderer. He would tell that story to The Faceless Old Woman later. It was a story that took exactly two hours to tell, and now was not the time because “The Gathering of Goudists” was formally beginning with the chanting of “The Four Noble Truths of the Gouda: The Truth of Cheese, The Truth of the Origin of Cheese, The Truth of the Cessation of Cheese, The Truth of the Path to the Cessation of Cheese”.