Chapter Text
I saw intern Jerry today outside the Moonlite All-Nite Diner. Had planned to go in there but seeing my formerly dead intern smiling so wide as to look inhuman with eyes the colour of obsidian totally ruined my appetite! Ugh, it’s like every time I try to do anything for myself I come across some weird or impossible thing and it’s like ‘oh well, I guess this is what I have to devote all my attention to now, since I am clearly involved in some way and ignoring this fact will only delay the inevitable etc. etc. logical determinism and so on.’
I wish I could just once have a nice evening out without this kind of thing happening. It’s such a shame, and especially recently it’s just become a daily nuisance. Am I not allowed to leave my house for some reasonably priced invisible pie without being stalked by a permanent phantom from my past? Is that too much to ask? Is it, Vague Yet Menacing Government Agency? I know you read these!
I digress, what I really meant to say is that I think StrexCorp is involved somehow. Actually, I should have probably written this note in code now that I think about it. This is why you don’t wait until the middle of a broadcast to write down important revelations, Cecil! Sorry, I’m not mad at you, I’m mad at myself, or the version of myself currently writing this note, if that makes the contradictory nature of time any easier to understand.
Look, I don’t have all day. In fact, I have to be back on air in less than three seconds. Oh, the sponsor’s just finished. I’ll make this quick. StrexCorp employees= Disturbing smiling people with black void-like eyes. Jerry strongly resembled this description. Probably connected. Better be connected, if not I just wasted two minutes on nothing. Text Carlos after work. Also buy milk. Okay. Bye.
Cecil left the station at an indeterminate time and decided to stop by the Ralphs on his way home to pick up some milk. This was mainly to give himself time to think, and also because they had run out of milk at home and Carlos hated black coffee. It was one of the many things about Carlos he had a hard time understanding.
Under the fluorescent streetlights, Cecil took stock of what he did and didn’t know. That was what any good journalist would do, after all.
What he did know: Intern Jerry was most definitely still alive in some capacity, as he had seen him very clearly, and any alternative was too terrifying to warrant thinking about.
What he didn’t know: Why? Who? How? Where? When? Some of these questions had drastically different meanings, which only he understood.
So, Cecil bought the milk from the current weekday shift manager, who happened to be a young man with a worn leather jacket and frightened blue eyes. He tried to get in and out as quickly as possible so as not to draw the attention of the inhabitants of the Hole. In the car, he played a voicemail Carlos had left him earlier.
“Hi Cecil, just letting you know that I might be working late at the lab tonight, so don’t worry about where I am. Only worry if the door is unlocked and you hear faint screaming from the storage closest. Then you should leave immediately and find somewhere else to sleep, preferably somewhere far away from our apartment complex, like, at least 25 miles away. Anyway, I’m sure you’re very busy with your radio broadcasting duties, so I won’t keep you any longer. I love you. Get home safe, okay?”
Cecil smiled. Carlos always made him smile. He always felt better after listening to him speak. It rarely solved any of his immediate problems but that wasn’t really the point. Carlos always made him feel like the problems that felt insurmountable and took on such great weight in his own mind were manageable while they were together. That whatever was going on, regardless of its urgency or importance, would be bearable, or at least survivable, because Carlos was there with him. He had never experienced such a feeling before, but it felt good. Secure as a triple-sealed titanium door, yet tender like a double-sealed titanium door. Which is to say, Carlos made him feel safe. And most days that was all he needed.
When Cecil stepped into their apartment after unlocking the door, he found a handwritten note from Carlos with ‘Leftovers in the fridge. Be back soon.’ scrawled in hastily written handwriting. He put the milk in the fridge and considered opening a bottle of brandy, but thought better of it. He had to be up early tomorrow morning, as he did most mornings.
He slept on the couch, not wanting to face an empty bed tonight. He rarely did.
Carlos woke him up at exactly 7.15.
Cecil blinked and mentally berated himself for not setting an alarm on his phone. He wasn’t the kind of person who needed to be woken up by their significant other because they didn’t have the foresight to set an alarm themselves. He was organized and accurate when it came to his job. It was one of the only things he was good at. He was below average at maintaining awareness in the face of any mind-altering entity that took a stab at influencing him, and his social skills could use some work, but he was good at his job, dammit.
“You didn’t have to wake me up,” he muttered under his breath, but Carlos heard him. Of course he did.
“I didn’t, but I also didn’t want you to be late for work. I know how much you value time management.”
Cecil propped himself up by his elbows, a stiff creak in his neck from sleeping on the sofa all night. “I appreciate that, but I do think I should be responsible for my own actions. If I forgot to set an alarm, I should have to deal with the consequences. This is my life after all.” He gestured broadly around the room to indicate his general state of existence. “If I make a mistake, I accept the repercussions willingly. Just because we’re married now doesn’t mean you have to feel responsible for me or my life. We’re still individual people. Can you imagine how horrible it would be if we accepted responsibility for each other’s actions so completely to the point that the lines between our individual selves became blurred beyond recognition until we were indistinguishable from each other?”
Carlos laughed softly. “All I did was wake you up so you wouldn’t be late for work, Cecil. But sure, I won’t do that again. This is clearly something you feel strongly about, and I would hate to intrude on that.” He offered Cecil a cup of milky coffee which he reluctantly took. “I have to swing by the radio station today anyway, so I can drive you to work if you want.”
Cecil took a sip of the coffee, which was much too cold, and narrowed his eyes. “Why do you need to go to the radio station?”
“Oh, Kareem is helping me with a project. He’s very interested in science, you know.”
Cecil thought he had heard the young man mention his curiosity about the many intricacies and contradictions of Night Vale before. He hadn’t really been listening though, since he usually took it upon himself to forcefully ignore anything that could get him on the City Council’s bad side, with heavy-duty noise cancelling headphones if necessary.
But if he wanted to risk it that was his business, though he did hope Kareem wouldn’t be too long with Carlos as he needed someone for filing duty at the end of the day and he was already pretty overworked as it was. But Cecil didn’t like to stifle his interns too much, young people were the future after all, so it only made sense to stay on good terms with them as they would one day be in charge of all mainstream government, and maybe even shadow government if they had the right family connections.
“Well, okay, in that case I’d actually appreciate the lift. It’s been three months since I dropped my car in to Nick Teller for some light repairs, and I still haven’t gotten it back.”
Carlos smiled knowingly. Cecil loved it when he did that, it made him look so smart and mysterious. “I’ll make breakfast.”
Cecil got to the radio station just in time. Like him, Carlos was very punctual. Kareem greeted Carlos at the door and started talking animatedly about something related to science. Cecil didn’t know any more than that about their conversation because he stuck his figures in his ears and ran out of the room as soon as Kareem mentioned the state of Michigan.
Maureen handed him his script and a hand-written note when he sat down in the recording booth. The note said ‘Taking the day off to help Michelle reorganize the redacted Beyonce tapes, won’t be back. Sorry. Actually I’m not sorry. You know what? I shouldn’t have to explain myself if I want to do something for me. It’s time I started prioritising myself more, you know? I’ve been so drained lately and I think it’s because I’m surrounding myself with negative energy. I should take up a hobby. Something totally random to remind myself that life can be spontaneous and fun. I’ve always wanted to try hand gliding…’ the note didn’t end there but in Cecil’s opinion it should have. It was looking like he’d have to pull another late-night shift to finish the paperwork currently piled haphazardly on his desk. Again.
He was already feeling tired, and he hadn’t even started the daily broadcast yet. His mind briefly ran through all possible ways he could relieve the stress of work, maybe he could push the paperwork back until tomorrow? No, Station Management would get agitated if he did that, and he really didn’t like provoking them. He was very non-confrontational when it came to mysterious entities not of this world with powers beyond human comprehension.
So, with a heavy heart he started the broadcast. There wasn’t anything particularly exciting to report. The otherworldly creatures from the Scrublands had unionized and were demanding a full 100% cut of all citizens deepest fears, claiming it was their sovereign right and blackmailing the mayor with her own secrets.
So far Dana was holding firm and staying true to their original negotiation, but Kareem had texted him to report that he had seen Dana outside the Earth Sciences building of Night Vale Community College trying to bribe the school counsellor into telling her any fears that the students were secretly harbouring, particularly any the dessert creatures didn’t already know about.
Cecil took his break during the weather, as he did almost every day. Except today he decided to take a walk around town for the first time in as far back as he could remember. He planned to pick up something to eat from the Missing Frog Salad Bar, but found himself subconsciously walking towards the Moonlite All-Nite Diner.
He caught himself just before he got there and turned back, but he would be lying if he said his eyes didn’t linger on the area of pavement just outside the diner where he had seen intern Jerry smiling and staring vacantly at nothing at all before vanishing into thin air. There was nothing there when he looked. Of course there wasn’t. Maybe he had imagined the whole thing, it wouldn’t be the first time. But if his brother-in-law Steve had thought him anything it was that in a town like Night Vale no possibility was too implausible to be ruled out.
On his walk back to the station he kept an eye out for anyone smiling eerily, or with eyes too black to be naturally pigmented, but saw only regular Night Vale citizens and the odd shadow creature. He was beginning to doubt the reality of what he had seen more with each ordinary-looking life form he passed.
He ate his salad quickly, as that impromptu stroll had taken up a lot of his time and he needed to be back on the air in a matter of minutes.
“Hey there, listeners. It looks like we have an update on the Scrublands negotiations. According to a string of texts Kareem is still in the process of sending me, the situation was resolved by none other than The Faceless Old Woman Who Secretly Lives In Your Home, who agreed to give the otherworldly creatures access to all of her fears, thereby indirectly giving them access to the fears of everyone in town as she of course knows everything about everyone here. She’s always watching after all.”
“I don’t know about you, Night Vale, but I think I’m okay with a Faceless Old Woman and some nondescript beings out in the Scrublands knowing all my deepest fears. After all, what are fears but a fiction we create to distract ourselves from the incomprehensible terror of mortality and the cold indifference of an unknowable universe? Besides, we all know the government controls our thoughts anyway, so who’s fears are they really? Certainly not mine. I think I’d have a better reason for being afraid of news reporters than ‘because their hats look weird’ and ‘because they could expose the inner workings of the shadow government at any moment if one of them gets too close to the truth’.” Cecil gave a single short laugh-more like a quick exhaling of air really-before continuing.
“Yes, our fears are the least of our worries. We may not be able to control them, but we can at least pretend to understand them in order to regain some semblance of that control. We can try to understand the unknowable, categorise that which refuses classification and assign meaning where there is none. This is how we are able to live our lives, to keep going every day, and to believe we have any agency over our own existence. But we don’t, and maybe if we truly accepted that we wouldn’t have any need for fear, or sadness, or joy, or anything really. We wouldn’t need to understand that which lurks all around us, sometimes just out of sight, but which is not meant to be seen or comprehended.”
“I cannot say which state of being would be more painless, only that none of it matters in the grand scheme of things. The universe carries on, regardless of how we feel about it. So let go of your irrational fears, Night Vale. Or don’t, it really doesn’t matter what you do. It never has.”
Cecil looked out at another pitch black night and thought about his life. Nothing specific, just random sporadic memories from various moments in time. Earning his Advanced Siege-Breaking Tactics badge with the Night Vale Boy Scouts, getting his internship at Night Vale Community Radio, the day he first laid eyes on Carlos, back when he was just a nameless-and extraordinarily handsome-interloper. He thought about how strange it was that all these seemingly random moments could amalgamate to form something resembling a coherent life. A somewhat linear path moving in a vague but consistent direction.
“It seems that another day has ended, and another problem that seemed insurmountable has been solved through an unexpected series of events that none of us could have predicted but seem to weave together in a satisfying enough way that we accept it and move on with our lives. What other choice do we have? Well, there’s always the dark and inadvisable pursuit of scientific knowledge but few find the mental and physical strength to examine the fabric of our fragile reality so closely as to expose the cracks in our quiet, comfortable lives.”
“I can see Kareem is sending me a detailed explanation as to why the creatures wanted to know all of our fears so badly. He is using a lot of strong punctuation and scientific terminology that he no doubt learned from Carlos or Simone Rigadeau-the transient who lives in the Earth Sciences building-and is making his point clearly and concisely while also conveying a sense of urgency appropriate to his discovery. Well, I can’t say I understand all of this, or even any of it if I’m being honest. I do not know if this is a good or bad thing. Maybe neither. Maybe both. Anyway, I’ll send him back a smiling cat emoji so he knows I value his dedication to objective journalism.”
Cecil could tell from the darkness encroaching outside his window that the broadcast was nearing its end and decided to end it then and there. He didn’t have anything else to report, after all, and he wanted to see Carlos. He wasn’t sure why he felt this vague longing to see his husband when he had spoken to him just that morning, but he felt like seeing Carlos would reassure him that nothing was wrong. Seeing Carlos often had that affect on him, but today it felt…different somehow.
He drove home without stopping, not even for red lights. He was usually a very responsible driver but tonight he felt a sense of urgency he hadn’t in a long time. He planned to apologise to Carlos for snapping at him that morning, or maybe explain that he valued his free will and liked feeling in control of his own schedule, but he decided before he got home that that would be too much information and he should just be casual about it. No need to add unnecessary weight to something small. Maybe he didn’t even need to apologise at all. Maybe Carlos had forgotten about it. Since it was so little of a big deal.
Carlos opened the door to him. His eyes were bloodshot with dark shadows nestled under them. He smiled when he saw Cecil. A small, tired smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes.
“How was your day?”
Cecil sighed and stepped in the door. Their apartment looked just the same as it always did, but there were papers strewn across the floor with seemingly random numbers scrawled across them. This wasn’t that unusual however, so Cecil chose to ignore it.
“Oh, you know. The usual.”
Carlos nodded. “Same here.”
Cecil gave the chaotically organised papers on the floor a quick glance, then looked back at Carlos. He could tell he’d been working more than he should be. His perfect hair hung messy over his forehead, and his lab coat was stained with an unknown brown substance that Cecil resolved not to ask about.
“Carlos, would you believe me if I told you anything?” Cecil asked. “No matter how unbelievable it was, you’d hear me out?”
“Well, if it was scientifically inaccurate I would probably have a hard time believing it. After all, science explains everything that could possibly exist. But I can concede that there are limitations to our current knowledge about how reality works, and living in Night Vale has thought me to never rule out any possibility, no matter how scientifically implausible it may seem. The universe is vast and complex, holding within it a wealth of information science can only begin to comprehend.” Carlos paused for a few seconds. “What I’m trying to say is that if you told me anything, I would believe that you were telling the truth and were convinced of what you saw, and we could go from there. Using all available evidence to piece together the truth, or at least the closest approximation to the truth we can get, is the backbone of the scientific method. If you trusted me with anything, no matter how seemingly impossible, I would listen and try to help you work it out in any way I could.”
Cecil smiled. “You always make everything sound so simple.”
“I’ll make tea, and we can talk. It looks like we could both use a break,” Carlos said, smiling back not with his mouth, but with those beautiful caramel eyes of his.
So they talked.
Carlos brought Cecil a steaming mug of tea and they sat at the kitchen table. Cecil blew on his tea and took a sip, avoiding Carlos’ concerned gaze. “I saw intern Jerry outside the Moonlite All-Nite Diner last week.”
Carlos looked slightly taken aback by this, as if he had been expecting him to say something else, but he stayed quite, presumably waiting for Cecil to continue.
“He wasn’t doing anything. In fact, he wasn’t even moving. He was just standing motionless outside the diner. And he was…smiling.”
A flash of something darted across Carlos’ face then, but it was gone to quickly for Cecil to tell what it was. He kept his neutral expression, eyes only showing the appropriate level of concern, but Cecil knew his interest was piqued. He knew Carlos so well at this point he could read him at a glance. Most of the time, anyway.
“But his smile looked different. It wasn’t a smile exactly, more of a forced upturning of the lips. And his eyes were completely black. Now that I think about it, they looked hollowed out.” Cecil took a short breath, a simple inhaling and exhaling of air that held so much weight in that moment. “He looked like a StrexCorp employee, Carlos.”
His husband’s eyes widened at the company’s name, but still he maintained his composure. There was silence for a few agonizing seconds. Then, Carlos spoke.
“When did you see this?” His tone was measured, but Cecil could hear the anxiety in his voice.
“Like I said, just last week. I know I should have told you sooner, but you were so busy and you seemed stressed so I didn’t want to burden you even more. And I wasn’t sure how you would react. I was worried you’d feel responsible for protecting me.”
Carlos took a sip of his tea, which was actually coffee. Cecil narrowed his eyes, knowing Carlos was probably planning on staying up late to work on whatever incredibly interesting thing had captivated his attention this week. But he shouldn’t really be focusing on that. Carlos was always working on something; his curiosity and dedication was one of the things Cecil liked most about him. But sometimes he did worry about him. He never outright forced him to take a break, but he would usually give him a gentle hint if he noticed Carlos neglecting his physical health and staying up past midnight multiple days in a row.
Carlos set his mug down and looked Cecil in the eye for the first time since he got home. “I don’t feel responsible for you, Cecil. I never have. But I do care about you, and I don’t know why you’ve been so touchy about that lately. I want to know you’re alright because I know what this town is like. I think we both do. I love Night Vale, and I know you do too, but most of the things that happen here aren’t exactly safe, at least not by mainstream definitions of safety.” Cecil gave a brief nod of acknowledgement. There was a time he wouldn’t even have done that. There was a time he would probably have reported Carlos to the Sheriff’s Secret Police for saying that, but he was in many ways a different person now. They both were.
“And StrexCorp,” Carlos continued, staring down at the table instead of meeting Cecil’s eye, “what they did to your radio station, they…”
He trailed off. He didn’t need to say anymore. Cecil remembered. Carlos hadn’t been there, but he had heard the stories. The stories didn’t really convey the raw horror of what actually happened, but Carlos got the gist of it.
“I just really don’t want you to get hurt, or possessed, or some worse third thing I don’t know about yet. If what you’re saying is true, then StrexCorp might still be active, and we don’t know what they want from us.”
“But that’s just the thing. The angles bought out StrexCorp ages ago, they no longer have a company to their name. Dessert Bluffs doesn’t exist anymore.” Cecil took a long slug of his tea only because he didn’t want it to grow cold.
“Unless…” Carlos looked deep in thought for a moment. “What about the Dessert Otherworld? Kevin set up a radio station while I was trapped there, and it only took him a few weeks to start broadcasting. Granted, I doubt he had any listeners back then, but…”
Cecil knew where he was going with this. “You think there’s a chance StrexCorp has been reestablished?”
“Not exactly, maybe StrexCorp is gone for good and Kevin is simply using the power of his grinning god-“
“The Smiling God,” Cecil interjected.
“Right, that. Maybe he’s using that to mess with the people here. It’s a shame, really, when I hung out with him he seemed so relaxed and friendly. But he did have a strange obsession with blood and was always offering to ‘redecorate’ my house.”
Cecil visibly shuddered.
“In any case, it’s impossible to know what motive Kevin could have for coming back to Night Vale. We’re already making too many assumptions, it might not even be Kevin, there were plenty of other former StrexCorp employees out in the dessert otherworld, any one of them could be behind this.”
“Or I could have hallucinated the whole thing. That’s a possibility.”
Carlos looked concerned. “Right. I do believe you though, and I think we should talk more about this. If you’re in any danger, I’d rather be able to find a way to help you in any way I can. You’re the most important person in my life. I would never try to push your boundaries, I just have to know that you’re safe.”
Cecil sighed. “I know. I’m sorry I’ve been so weird lately. You’re right. I know you care about me, and I know you don’t have any bad intentions when you express that. I think I just don’t like feeling like someone else’s responsibility. I want to be in control of my own life, not have someone else feel like they have to do it for me.”
Carlos looked at Cecil again with his dark brown eyes. “I understand. Is this a control thing?”
Despite how gently Carlos had said it, Cecil flinched. Carlos had never broached the subject that directly before, and he wasn’t sure how to feel about it. He knew about the cassette of course. And Cecil knew that requiring all mirrors be covered at all times wasn’t exactly ‘normal’ behaviour, even for a resident of Night Vale. And Carlos knew about Lot 37, obviously. Everyone in town knew about Lot 37.
But Cecil didn’t want to talk about any of that, even indirectly. He didn’t like thinking about the gaps in his memory, or anything that would warrant more questions than it was worth. But this was Carlos. He could speak to him. They were partners. Sure, he still hid a lot of things from him, and he knew Carlos had secrets too, but they had at least a basic level of trust when it came to sensitive topics like this. And for Cecil a lot of things were sensitive topics, things that others wouldn’t consider difficult to talk about like the exact date of his birth or the existence of mountains.
They had spoken about Cecil’s lack of memory of his childhood, and the occasional times his recollection of specific events would contradict themselves, albeit briefly and with the understanding that delving deeper wouldn’t lead to anything good. But Cecil knew Carlos wouldn’t judge him or tell anyone else about anything he said in the privacy of their own kitchen. Maybe it would be alright to open up, even a miniscule amount.
“Yes. I mean, I think so.” Cecil pinched the bridge of his nose. “I can’t control a lot of things that happen to me, so it makes sense that I would want to hold on to the things I can. Am I expected to carry on like nothing ever happened, like everything’s fine? Is that what you want? Do you want me to be someone else?”
“Of course not!” Carlos said resolutely, but it was as if Cecil couldn’t hear him anymore.
“I can do that. My identity was never that consistent to begin with. If you want me to stop resisting your attempts to protect me I can do that. I can do anything you want, be anything you want. What am I but a voice, a vessel for the externally produced language that warps our perception of the world around us? Everything is subjective and ever-changing. Nothing is constant, and so it makes sense that I should be as malleable as the fluid nature of reality. What do you want me to say? What can I say? It doesn’t matter. None of my actions matter. Words? No, these are just sounds I am making with my mouth, a futile plea for acknowledgement in an uncaring universe. I…”
Cecil trailed off, his brow furrowed. “I don’t know what you want me to do,” he said in a much quieter voice.
Carlos touched Cecil’s hand cautiously. When he didn’t pull away, he grasped both his hands across the table. “Cecil, look at me.” His wandering eyes snapped back to Carlos, and it was then that he realized how lost Cecil looked. “You don’t need to do anything. I love you because of who you are. You might not believe that, but it’s true. Even as a scientist, I don’t understand the mysteries of the universe any more than you do, I don’t know whether our actions matter in the grand scheme of things. But even if they don’t, it shouldn’t prevent you from living your life. You know that, right?”
Cecil’s gaze wasn’t focused on Carlos anymore. He looked distant. It wasn’t a look Carlos like seeing on him, because it always meant he was thinking too much. No, not too much. Carlos loved his constantly-active mind. He just looked like he was thinking a lot, and that was worrying. Because with Cecil overthinking usually had unpredictable consequences.
“Yes, I know. It’s just been a long day.”
“I know.” And Carlos did know. He knew better than anyone.
“I think I want to look into this thing with intern Jeremy. If I imagined it, it couldn’t hurt to investigate, and if it was real…”
Carlos nodded. “The people of Night Vale need to be well informed if StrexCorp is active again. And you think you have a duty to protect this town. Which you don’t,” he added firmly. “But maybe it wouldn’t be such a bad idea to ask around. As long as you don’t do anything risky.” He fixed Cecil with a hard stare.
Cecil smiled. “Don’t worry, I’ll be careful. I am capable of delivering objective journalism without putting myself in life-threatening situations.”
Carlos laughed, and it felt for a moment like the tension that was present just seconds ago from the unspoken fears weighing heavy on both of them had partially dissipated, and they were just two people drinking tea together without the threat of evil corporate encampments coming to their town and bending it to their misguided will. And for now, that was good enough.
Somewhere out in the sand wastes, Jeremy stumbled along with no direction in mind, but knowing his destination wasn’t far away. The air was thick and viscous, and every breath felt laboured as he tried to suck as much oxygen from the dense fog created by the heat as he could. But Jeremy wasn’t upset. He smiled as his lunges protested their lack of oxygen and his lips cracked from dehydration.
His legs had become numb from performing the repetitive motion of putting one foot in front of the other for far too long. They gave out from under him as his breathing become ragged and desperate.
And still, he smiled.
A figure stood over him, a shadow against the scorching dessert sun, and Jeremy wondered briefly if he had finally begun to hallucinate from the lack of sleep or nutrition.
The figure was smiling just like him. A smile so wide it made him forget his troubles for a short time. The figure paused for a few seconds, taking him in. The man looked close to death, if he wasn’t dead already, the only sign of life being his unwavering smile and open empty eyes.
“We’re going to need an immediate extraction,” the figure said into a device on her wrist.
More dark figures came and hauled him up to a standing position. They carried him to a small pickup truck and hurled him unceremoniously into the boot. One of the smiling people gave him a plastic bottle of water which he gratefully gulped down.
The truck’s exhaust blew smoke out at a steady pace as it drove smoothly over a sandy surface. Jeremy lay on his back and looked up at the cloudless sky, a blank canvas with nothing in all directions.