Speaker 1: This program is intended for mature audiences only.
Speaker 2: You are now listening to Observable Radio. Hi.
Speaker 1: There, it's Cameron Suey. This month, we wanted to make
Speaker 1: sure we got an episode out for that most important
Speaker 1: of October holidays, the anniversary of the Cuban missile crisis.
Speaker 1: The story originally appeared in the anthology Shadows Over Main Street,
Speaker 1: edited by Doug Morano and d Alexander Ward, and exists
Speaker 1: between the kids on Bike's adventure and something else entirely.
Speaker 1: We hope you enjoy it and be sure to check
Speaker 1: out our Patreon for a look behind the scenes that
Speaker 1: are upcoming second season. And Now, after a brief word
Speaker 1: from the Observable Radio Company store, here's tonight's story. This
Speaker 1: is a test of the Observable Radio Emergency alert system.
Speaker 1: This is only a test. This concludes our tests. If
Speaker 1: this had been an actual emergency, the sounds you heard
Speaker 1: would have been coming from your own mouth. No action
Speaker 1: is required yet you are.
Speaker 2: Now prom Observable Radio the crisis.
Speaker 3: Erica hold onto my hand as we sit on the
Speaker 3: couch and stare into the wide eye of her father's
Speaker 3: color TV. Her sweaty palm pulses in time with her
Speaker 3: galloping heartbeat, and she sucks at the air in noisy hiccups.
Speaker 3: I have to press my lips together to keep from
Speaker 3: screaming at her to be quiet. They're showing the photographs again,
Speaker 3: the new ones. All week in school, we've talked about
Speaker 3: missiles and blast radiuses and blackades, the approach of Halloween
Speaker 3: all but forgotten. Our paper machine masks two grinning witches
Speaker 3: sit half finished in the corner. Casualties of the crisis.
Speaker 3: But it's all changed again and we can't catch up.
Speaker 2: The purpose and function of the structure are still anyone's guests,
Speaker 2: but by now it's clear that the Soviets had another
Speaker 2: purpose on the island of Cuba. Entirely, we still don't
Speaker 2: have a good explanation for how a sinkle of that
Speaker 2: size appeared seemingly overnight. The man on the television repeats
Speaker 2: what he can about the new photographs as sweat beads
Speaker 2: on his upper lip, vivid and crisp on the Doalberg's
Speaker 2: new screen. The man on the television doesn't know how
Speaker 2: to describe them, keeps tripping over his words as he
Speaker 2: tries to make sense of the aerial photographs. No one
Speaker 2: can I can hear mister Dalberg screaming in the kitchen,
Speaker 2: loud and angry. As of an hour ago, there's been
Speaker 2: no more communication with the USSR, and the President's demands
Speaker 2: for an explanation have gone unanswered. The man on the
Speaker 2: television pauses to drag his sleeve across his brow, and
Speaker 2: his hands tremble across a stack of white papers in
Speaker 2: the kitchen. Mister Dahlberg drops his voice, but I can
Speaker 2: hear the hissing of his whisper over the television. Erica
Speaker 2: mumbles something about Jackie Gleeson coming on soon, and I
Speaker 2: squeeze her hand tight, as if to say, please shut up.
Speaker 3: Do you have a shelter? Gloria, comes mister Dalberg's voice.
Speaker 3: Son of a bitch knew the rookies were moving, and
Speaker 3: he didn't warn us.
Speaker 2: Those aren't the sort of folk who deserve to survive.
Speaker 3: Erica turns to look at me, her expression blank. I
Speaker 3: drop her hand and shift on the couch. We both
Speaker 3: know what he's talking about. I want to tell her
Speaker 3: it's okay, that I understand there's nothing she can do,
Speaker 3: but my heart starts to stutter and skip into my throat.
Speaker 3: Missus Dalberg hisses something below the range of hearing, and
Speaker 3: the man on the television continues, we're just hearing now
Speaker 3: that an American bass in Turkey reported the sounds of
Speaker 3: explosions coming from the east. Shortly after we lost all
Speaker 3: communication with Moscow. But in the last ten or so minutes, Washington, indeed,
Speaker 3: anyone on the continent has been unable. There's a flurry
Speaker 3: of motion as glass shatters in the kitchen, a bright
Speaker 3: musical chord, followed by the heavy thudding of footsteps. As
Speaker 3: mister Dalberg strides into the living room. I tense, my
Speaker 3: legs ready to surge into motion as he lifts the
Speaker 3: stereo cabinet and puts the needle down on a record.
Speaker 3: Eddie Fisher lurches out of the speakers, dueting with Perry
Speaker 3: Como over the two loud distortion Rebecca Honey. He begins
Speaker 3: encircles to the front of the couch. He's not looking
Speaker 3: at me. He at least has the decency to look ashamed.
Speaker 3: We have to talk. The man on the television stops speaking,
Speaker 3: his face a mask of shock. He's looking to one side,
Speaker 3: past the camera, as if into the room at us,
Speaker 3: and what's about to happen. Then the lights go off.
Speaker 3: Grab her. Mister Dalberg hisses in the darkness. I can
Speaker 3: hear him lunge for me as I drop to the floor,
Speaker 3: grinding skin against a thick carpet. Erica contracts to a
Speaker 3: ball on the couch and wails. I kick up and
Speaker 3: take two lunging steps toward the front door, and then
Speaker 3: smack the wall loudly with the flat of my hand,
Speaker 3: before reversing direction and bolting for the screen door on
Speaker 3: the back porch as quietly as I can. My brother's
Speaker 3: old blindfold tag trick. I can hear the heavy bulk
Speaker 3: of mister Dalberg's accountant physique follow the sounds away from me,
Speaker 3: growling with feral fresh I slam into the screen door
Speaker 3: with my shoulder, snapping the hook from the frame with
Speaker 3: a tiny plink, and I tumble onto the wooden porch inside.
Speaker 3: Mister Dauberg realizes my deception and roars. Missus Daalberg is
Speaker 3: screaming at him to hurry, to be a man and
Speaker 3: do it already. And I get onto my feet and
Speaker 3: I leap down into the yard behind me.
Speaker 2: In the dark.
Speaker 3: My best friend howls in helpless terror and there's nothing
Speaker 3: more I can do. The autumn air bites at my
Speaker 3: cheeks and the tip of my nose, and I shiver involuntarily.
Speaker 3: My brother's woolen jacket lies somewhere in the Dalberg's hall closet,
Speaker 3: and I try to forget what it feels like, how
Speaker 3: safe and warm it smells. It's dark outside, darker than
Speaker 3: night has any right to be powers out everywhere. I
Speaker 3: try not to follow that thread to its meaning, and
Speaker 3: focus only on the lumbering shape that bursts from the
Speaker 3: dark bulk of the house onto the porch. My eyes
Speaker 3: aren't adjusted yet. When I hit the backyard fence, jumping
Speaker 3: up to wrap my fingers around the unfinished wood, splinters
Speaker 3: bite into my fingertips, but I grit tighter and pull
Speaker 3: myself up and over, Landing hard in a narrow alleyway
Speaker 3: lined with trash cans. To the north, across the platte,
Speaker 3: the glow of Omaha is absent. The sudden lack of
Speaker 3: the familiar light feels like a physical blow, and I
Speaker 3: fight to keep my breath. I hear him coming through
Speaker 3: the backyard, just on the other side of the fence.
Speaker 3: Then I hear another sound, a muffled thud, almost too
Speaker 3: low to be heard. It rattles my skull as it
Speaker 3: rolls across the lightless river valley. There's another thud, a distant,
Speaker 3: massive tremor, then silence. It's begun. I look for the flashes,
Speaker 3: like my father told me, eyes down to the ground
Speaker 3: and shaded by my hand, but there's no illumination beyond
Speaker 3: the watery moonlight.
Speaker 2: There's another rolling.
Speaker 3: Thud, and mister Dalberg unlatches the back gate a few
Speaker 3: feet away from me. He's heard the bombs too, and
Speaker 3: he's cleaning, a thin animal sound of panic and rage.
Speaker 3: But he's too late. My brother's bike is right where
Speaker 3: I left it, one torn red streamer from the Fourth
Speaker 3: of July parade, still clinging from the handlebars, I swing
Speaker 3: onto the phantom's leather saddle and press off chrome flashes
Speaker 3: in the moonlight, and once I have the momentum to
Speaker 3: stay upright, I flick at the light switches. A wide
Speaker 3: pool of yellow splashes across the gravel of the alleyway,
Speaker 3: and I stand up in the pedals, scattering rocks behind me.
Speaker 3: As the shwin accelerates behind mister Dahlberg spits a curse
Speaker 3: that shocks me even now and turns to run back
Speaker 3: into his house. The brief elation of freedom is drowned
Speaker 3: by the understanding that he's heading for his car. The
Speaker 3: phantom is fast, but I know my limits. I hit
Speaker 3: the end of the alley, the Phantom's tires gripping the
Speaker 3: McAdam road and surging forward. As I press my whole
Speaker 3: weight into each pedal and turn east toward home. People
Speaker 3: are trickling outside, clutching flashlights close like childhood blankets. Widow
Speaker 3: van Gundi grips an old rifle and stands on her porch,
Speaker 3: wet eyes fixed out on the horizon for any sign
Speaker 3: of the Russians. Some of the people look at me
Speaker 3: like mister Dalberg. Did they know my father wasn't quiet
Speaker 3: about the shelter or the ones he helped a dozen
Speaker 3: other families dig. I lean over the handlebars, pressed faster
Speaker 3: and avoid eye contact. Mister Dalberg's old ford fair lane
Speaker 3: barks a cough as it rounds the corner onto Seventh Street.
Speaker 3: I can see his wide, wet smile behind the headlight glow,
Speaker 3: and the car cough says he presses it into gear.
Speaker 3: I cut through the alleyway between the Cooper's and the
Speaker 3: Wallace's houses. Both families watch me in mute confusion from
Speaker 3: their front yards, the Phantom's tires hurling a plume of
Speaker 3: loose gravel into the air. I'm halfway through to sixth
Speaker 3: Street when mister Dalberg's fair Lanes screeches to a halt
Speaker 3: with a blast of the horn. The alleyway is too narrow,
Speaker 3: and I look back to see a map of veins
Speaker 3: bursting forward on his sweaty brow. He's screaming now to
Speaker 3: anyone who will listen, wildly pointing at me.
Speaker 2: Someone stop her.
Speaker 3: Her parents are with them. On any other day, this
Speaker 3: might have sparked laughter. My parents have lived in Plattsmuth
Speaker 3: since they were children. My dad has worked across the
Speaker 3: river at off At Base since the end of the war.
Speaker 3: He's the secretary for the odd Fellow's Lodge and volunteers
Speaker 3: with the fire department on weekends. But tonight, in the
Speaker 3: impossible dark, with the rumbling promise of the end on
Speaker 3: the horizon, it doesn't seem so out of place. At
Speaker 3: the mouth of the alley had swiveled toward me, blank
Speaker 3: scared eyes are praising I push faster exit the alley
Speaker 3: onto sixth Street, hook left and then right again, towards
Speaker 3: the looming expanse of Garfield Park. I can hear the
Speaker 3: fair Lane a block behind, an angry song of rubber
Speaker 3: and road. I slow the Phantom as I enter the
Speaker 3: dark hollow of the park without the street lamps, the
Speaker 3: trees become hazy clouds of shadow, and I feel momentary
Speaker 3: solace in the dry whistling of the oak leaves. The
Speaker 3: silver slash of the moon provides just enough light to
Speaker 3: pick out the outlines of the swing sets in the gazebo.
Speaker 3: The whine of mister Dalberg's fair Lane in the distance,
Speaker 3: another drumbeat of distant roars, and I shake off the
Speaker 3: familiar comfort. Only a few more blocks, Mom Dad the
Speaker 3: shelter safety on the far end of the park. I
Speaker 3: stop the Phantom and lean it down in the wet
Speaker 3: grass lying beside it. My skin ripples with goose flesh,
Speaker 3: and I let myself shiver with cold dread. The fair
Speaker 3: Lane rounds the corner onto Fifth Prowling like a lion.
Speaker 3: Mister Dalberg's head and arm hang out the window as
Speaker 3: he scans the dark houses. Halfway up the block. Mister
Speaker 3: and missus Talbot sign frantically to one another as they
Speaker 3: pack a half dozen lumpy double bags into the back
Speaker 3: of their truck. Their fingers dance in a private argument,
Speaker 3: arms swirling as if to approximate shouting. No one else
Speaker 3: is in sight, no one else who might have seen me.
Speaker 3: Mister Dalberg passes my hiding place, screaming to himself, a
Speaker 3: noise like a kicked pig. He drives his foot into
Speaker 3: the accelerator, and the fair lane leaps ahead, circling the
Speaker 3: park again. I stand the Phantom up and run beside
Speaker 3: it toward the road. I jump onto the saddle, slamming
Speaker 3: my bony thigh hard enough to bring tears and pin
Speaker 3: wheel my feet in search of the petals. He still
Speaker 3: hasn't seen me, and I lean forward to accelerate. I'm
Speaker 3: hooking around the corner, so close to the shelter when
Speaker 3: the bells in the county courthouse begin to ring. It's
Speaker 3: a frantic, irregular rhythm, and I turn to look, slowing
Speaker 3: the phantom without thinking, there's a new light on the horizon,
Speaker 3: a bright shining star that for a moment gives me
Speaker 3: hope that the power has returned. But it's rising Beneath
Speaker 3: it rises a column of billowing smoke, lit by the
Speaker 3: crackling glow, an unfurling flower stretching up to touch the
Speaker 3: black sky. Another blossoms beside it, then another to the west.
Speaker 3: I see another cluster of arcing lights on the horizon.
Speaker 3: My heart frosts over and I watch the cearing line
Speaker 3: split the night. I'm not moving any longer. One foot
Speaker 3: in the mat him, I can't stop shaking, and wish
Speaker 3: again for my brother's jacket. He honks the horn just
Speaker 3: before the impact. I turn to the sound and throw
Speaker 3: one hand to block out the headlights, and the fair
Speaker 3: Lanes strikes the back of the Phantom. The bike frame
Speaker 3: bends and shears in two with an almost musical screech.
Speaker 3: My head hits the concrete just in time to watch
Speaker 3: the Phantom's back wheel and gears slide beneath the fat,
Speaker 3: white walled tires. My thigh is crashed between the frame
Speaker 3: of the bike, the pain a bright flare of white.
Speaker 3: But as soon as the car is free of the
Speaker 3: Phantom's wreckage, I drag myself out and kick off the
Speaker 3: ground with my good leg so close the fair Lane
Speaker 3: screeches to a halt. As I begin to hop skip
Speaker 3: away and I hear the car door grind open. My
Speaker 3: hurt thrashes in my chest, fighting with my lungs, and
Speaker 3: I'm sure I'm going to be sick less than a
Speaker 3: block until home, just fifty more yards, and then Dad
Speaker 3: will be there, and then all of this will make sense.
Speaker 3: But I can't run, this will ever make sense. I
Speaker 3: let the tears go now, and they burst forth, as
Speaker 3: if held under pressure. My nose leaks down onto my
Speaker 3: upper lip as I shuffle forward on my bent leg,
Speaker 3: letting the heavy sobs drive my irregular gait. Rebecca, Honey,
Speaker 3: oh god stop, I'm so fucking sorry. I never Mister
Speaker 3: Dahlberg's voice warbles as he begs. The heavy, flat slapping
Speaker 3: of his footsteps are almost behind me. There's a figure
Speaker 3: in the dark coming out of the Geller's house, head
Speaker 3: covered in a cowl of black shape on a black background.
Speaker 3: It glides towards mister Dalberg a silent motion, like the
Speaker 3: release of a spring, and I see the figure pull
Speaker 3: a long object from his coat. The sliver of the
Speaker 3: moon glints off gun metal. Rebecca, sweetheart, you can without
Speaker 3: without you, Erica and her mom and me, his words
Speaker 3: blur together as he starts to cry along with me,
Speaker 3: his hands up in a gesture of peace. See he's
Speaker 3: shaking every bit as terrified as me. His heavy lips
Speaker 3: quiver as he struggles to speak, and then the shotgun
Speaker 3: sparks a plume of fire from a few feet away.
Speaker 3: Mister Dalbert curls inward, does his hips and torso. Wrapped
Speaker 3: into a wet ruin, he collapses in the center of
Speaker 3: the street without uttering another word. The man with the
Speaker 3: shotgun turns to me, and in the hollow of his hood,
Speaker 3: I see the warm wrinkles of our neighbor, mister Myers.
Speaker 3: His smile absent, his face looks wrong without it, and
Speaker 3: my head swims in the uncanny confusion. I turn around
Speaker 3: to see another hooded figure almost beside me, arms reaching
Speaker 3: out for me. I try to shrug away, but I'm falling,
Speaker 3: my leg giving way. At last, my father catches me
Speaker 3: in his arms. His face beneath the hood is grim too,
Speaker 3: but his eyes still twinkle. He nods to mister Myers,
Speaker 3: who slides another shell into the open breach. Yeah, mister
Speaker 3: Meyer says to us, I enjoyed that, and then strides
Speaker 3: away from us. Into the gloom. Dad looks down at me. Hi, Beck,
Speaker 3: I was hoping you'd make it. This might be a
Speaker 3: rough night for you, honey, might be. I want to ask,
Speaker 3: but as he holds my shaking body aloft, I see
Speaker 3: the wild arcing of missiles across the sky and I
Speaker 3: can't speak. He walks, holding me as if I were
Speaker 3: still five years old, toward a house. I can see
Speaker 3: a faint glow from the back, the shelter safety. I
Speaker 3: made it from behind. I hear a brief scream, and
Speaker 3: then the roar of mister Meyer's shotgun, then silence. Nothing
Speaker 3: makes sense. I whimper into the collar of Dad's strange jacket.
Speaker 3: The cloth is rough and faintly musky, but beneath it
Speaker 3: are his familiar, warm sense. It never did, honey, and
Speaker 3: it never would have. This was for the best. Come on,
Speaker 3: I think I can help you understand. We pass through
Speaker 3: the side yard of the house, back towards the glow
Speaker 3: of the shelter, but there is no shelter, only a
Speaker 3: perfect sinkhole, the sides lined with slick black rock, where
Speaker 3: other channels split away into a twisting network from deep
Speaker 3: within the central shaft, a hazy glow washes out in waves.
Speaker 3: The light seems to have both substance and weight as
Speaker 3: it curls into foggy tendrils of indescribable shades, coiling upward
Speaker 3: toward the yawning sky. The shelter, I murmur, It was
Speaker 3: never going to be a shelter, he says, not once
Speaker 3: mister Myers and I found the old echoes buried. There
Speaker 3: lots of digging these days, lots of people hearing it
Speaker 3: all over the world. We got to talking organizing. You'll see.
Speaker 3: We keep going past our proper, up to the gentle
Speaker 3: rise where we used to eat suppers on a picnic
Speaker 3: blanket on warm evenings. Down the other side, the Missouri
Speaker 3: flows like oil in the night, only visible in the
Speaker 3: flickering glow of the missiles and moonlight overhead. Dad sits
Speaker 3: me down in the grass, and if I shut my
Speaker 3: eyes and hold perfectly still, I can almost believe everything
Speaker 3: is normal. He ruffles my hair. I love your dad,
Speaker 3: I mumble, pressing up against him. I know, and I
Speaker 3: feel like I love you Beck. But that's just the
Speaker 3: cruelty of chemicals. It's just the lie that keeps the
Speaker 3: whole thing going. But not anymore. We don't have to
Speaker 3: lie to each other anymore. Across the broad plain to
Speaker 3: the east, there's a flash, and I instinctively look away.
Speaker 3: Another light flares, and I see the red blood of
Speaker 3: my eyelids. As the spheres of light dim, I open
Speaker 3: my eyes and catch the hint of movement at the
Speaker 3: horizon above, missiles arc downward, American missiles tilting down to
Speaker 3: strike American soil. It takes a long moment for me
Speaker 3: to accept what I see. The old ones can set
Speaker 3: us free, so we cleanse the world for their coming.
Speaker 3: More bright blossoms of fire paint the night, and flashlight strobes,
Speaker 3: and I try to look away, but my eyes still sear.
Speaker 3: The world heaves and its death throws. As the ground
Speaker 3: begins to shift. There again, something moving, something vast. I
Speaker 3: try to put it together in pieces in my mind,
Speaker 3: but it keeps leaping apart, impossible to conceive even as
Speaker 3: it strides across the world. It rises from beyond the
Speaker 3: curve of the earth. It stretches far above the thin
Speaker 3: clouds and across half the width of the horizon, numberless legs,
Speaker 3: like iron spikes, the width of city, the rise and
Speaker 3: fall matching the rumbling rhythms of the night. Somehow they
Speaker 3: join into a nexus, a central torso. But when I
Speaker 3: try to look directly at it, my eyes slide away.
Speaker 3: Some were swimming in the night above. There are eyes,
Speaker 3: There are eyes like black stars, and they see me.
Speaker 3: At last, I understand. Another blast paints the sky white.
Speaker 3: I raise one hand to cover it, and the phantom
Speaker 3: images of fingerbones shine through the dry autumn grasses. Whisper
Speaker 3: as Mom strides up the hill to sit with us,
Speaker 3: her hooded robe reeking of blood and a seeping wound
Speaker 3: in her gut. Duck and cover, she sings beneath the
Speaker 3: rising roar in her sweet and warbling voice. We sit
Speaker 3: in silence, letting our eyes burn and fade. As it approaches,
Speaker 3: one of the unthinkable legs strikes the ground at the horizon,
Speaker 3: and the earth cracks. Fire and liquid stone leap into
Speaker 3: the sky as miles of Iowa farmland vanish beneath each step.
Speaker 3: Tornadoes scour the planes behind it, conjured into being as
Speaker 3: it tears.
Speaker 2: Through the air.
Speaker 3: We wanted to tell you, Beck, but you were too young.
Speaker 3: My father lays one hand on my shoulder, like a
Speaker 3: cold slab of meat. Your brother made us promise before
Speaker 3: he left that we'd keep you innocent of all this,
Speaker 3: even if we knew you'd see our way in the end.
Speaker 3: I want to think about Jacob, the whole of his
Speaker 3: absence and the fawn warmth of his memory. But what
Speaker 3: fills my mind instead is disgusted at the useless hulk
Speaker 3: of my clumsy, broken body bathing in nuclear radiation. How
Speaker 3: good it will feel to slough it off and be
Speaker 3: free of the clanking chains of flesh, to let all
Speaker 3: thought and being evaporate before the sweeping gaze of the
Speaker 3: eyes like dead stars. He wanted to be here with
Speaker 3: you at the end, but the stars were right. It
Speaker 3: had to happen. I understand, of course I do. Mold
Speaker 3: has no claim on the apple. This was never our world. Yeah,
Speaker 3: I gasp as I let go of it all, the
Speaker 3: old word bubbling deep from within, and then we are silent.
Speaker 3: We sit on the hilltop to wait for oblivion and
Speaker 3: watch as the world is reborn.
Speaker 1: You have been listening to Observable Radio. Tonight's episode The
Speaker 1: Crisis was performed by the Ensemble featuring Perporina, written by
Speaker 1: Cameron Suey, produced by Cameron Suey, Phil van hest Perperina
Speaker 1: and Wendy Heckner. Edited by Cameron Suey. Our psychology consultant
Speaker 1: is doctor Elisa Liel. Art by Carinn Fletcher. Our theme
Speaker 1: is the Backrooms performed by Mew. Additional music from this
Speaker 1: episode provided by Almost Here, elm Lake, Enigmatic, Martin Lanstrom, Gutta, Lucina,
Speaker 1: Ellen Peel, and Water Mirrors. Observable Radio is listener supported
Speaker 1: thanks to all of our patrons and listeners, including Kathleen
Speaker 1: John Tidd, Russ, Rick Callison, Brianna Zach and Jasper. Patrons
Speaker 1: fund the production costs of the show, as well as
Speaker 1: get access to behind the scenes information, extra production material,
Speaker 1: a discount at the Observable Radio Company store, and an
Speaker 1: ad free early release feed of this show all at
Speaker 1: patreon dot com slash Observable Radio. Thank you for listening
Speaker 1: and stay tuned.
Speaker 4: Yeah yeah, yeah, so sorry.
Speaker 3: It's so it's such a silly fucking lovecraft. I think
Speaker 3: it makes me laugh because it feels like I'm saying
Speaker 3: a weird version of.
Speaker 4: Yeehaw yeah yeah yeah yeah, all right.
Speaker 3: I hope you got a good one out of those