“I think that’s the closest I’ll ever get to flying on a personal jet,” Martin says, stretching as they emerge from the walkway onto the concourse. His shoulder muscles pop audibly, and he straightens, looking relieved.
Tim can sympathize. He’s incredibly stiff and cramped himself; he can only imagine how Martin must be feeling. Thankfully, they only had to be on the tiny eight-passenger plane for the last leg of their journey, but it’s still a long time to be crammed in a loo paper tube with wings. He reaches over to pat Martin’s arm comfortingly, then looks down at Charlie. “You okay, buddy?”
“Yeah,” Charlie says, but it’s not very convincing, and he’s holding the strap of his bag tightly in both hands. “This one’s smaller than the others.”
“Well, Night Vale is a smaller town than London or Chicago or Los Angeles,” Martin points out. "It’s not a bad thing. It means it’ll be easier for Jon’s cousin to find us.”
“Should we wait for him here?”
Tim shakes his head. “No, we have to leave and go to the main part of the airport, remember? They don’t let you come to the gates without tickets. We’ll go this way, and when we get to the end there will probably be a lot of people waiting for someone to get off the planes. He’ll be there.” He hopes.
There are signs hanging on the walls of the concourse, advertisements and tourism posters. One shows a half-buried Ferris wheel and aggressively declares We will show you FUN in a handful of DUST! Another seems to be advertising a pizza restaurant; a third features a cheerful message about investments from the Last Bank of Night Vale, which is an interesting choice of names. A slightly threatening sign with a law-enforcement symbol of some kind at the bottom warns: If you see something, say nothing, and drink to forget. Most of the official-looking posters have a large, prominent eye at the top, which Tim finds himself stealing uneasy glances at. They seem harmless enough, anyway, but he still hustles the others along. They don’t seem to mind.
At last, they emerge into an open space where two hallways converge and find a bustling crowd, moving around with suitcases and rolling bags and animal carriers, calling to one another and generally being loud. Charlie stares around him with wide eyes, but he seems marginally more relaxed now that they’re in a more open area. Tim makes a mental note of that.
Jon hums absently, but it’s got a proper tune to it. Tim’s about to ask him about it when he suddenly stops, tilting his head slightly, and goes from humming to singing under his breath. A grin blooms on his face, his eyes lighting up in a way that’s almost but not quite the way they did when he saw Tim and Martin in the airport after his last trip to America, and he turns, raising his voice to sing as he does so. “Johnny’s so long at the fair…”
“Jonny!” The man coming towards them can’t be anyone but Jon’s cousin. They’ve got the same eyes—what the Keeper once described in a statement as a warm and guileless brown—and general coloring. The other man is taller than Jon, not quite as tall as Tim, but surprisingly muscular for a scientist (then again, Tim supposes he’s pretty muscular for an academic, so he’s not really one to talk), and his hair is thicker and fuller than Jon’s surprisingly fine strands, but the delighted grin on his face is identical to the one on Jon’s.
He gets within a few feet of them, arms outspread, then slows to a stop. “Oh, right. Is today a hug day?”
Jon laughs and spreads his arms out as well. “More often than not these days. You?”
“Saved one up for you.” Jon’s cousin hugs him tightly for a moment, then pulls back and looks Jon up and down. “You look much better than the last time I saw you. Taking better care of yourself, are you?”
“Yes. Well, not without significant prodding.” Jon gives Tim and Martin a fond smile over his shoulder.
The man smiles up at them, too, eyes flicking back and forth between them. “You must be Jonny’s partners.”
“Yes, this is Martin, and this is Tim,” Jon says, indicating them in turn. “And this is our boy Charlie…ah, this is my cousin Carlos.”
“Hi.” Martin holds out his hand for Carlos to shake.
"It’s so good to meet you,” Carlos says warmly, shaking Martin’s hand, then turning to shake Tim’s before kneeling down on Charlie’s level and offering him a bright, friendly smile. “Hey there!”
“Hi!” Charlie beams back at Carlos, revealing the gap where his lower left canine used to be. “What kind of science do you study?”
“I’ll take you to my lab while you’re here and show you some of our experiments,” Carlos promises, which isn’t exactly an answer, but Charlie seems willing to accept it. He gets to his feet and looks over his shoulder, smiling. “Honey, come here and meet the rest of our family.”
The man who steps forward now is also smiling broadly. He’s a little taller than Carlos, a little less muscular but roughly the same girth, with hair the color of cornsilk and dark blue eyes. Nestled in his arms and studying all of them with the peculiar blend of interest and deep skepticism only a toddler can manage is a very small boy with round, chubby cheeks, floppy hair, and one blue eye and one brown. Tim is only vaguely aware of this, because his brain is still trying to cope with the rest of our family.
“Cece, this is my cousin Jonny, and his partners Tim and Martin, and their son Charlie,” Carlos says, pointing them out one by one. “This is my husband Cecil, and our son Esteban.”
Cecil shifts Esteban to his hip and holds out his hand to Jon. In a deep, sonorous, almost portentous voice, he says, “Welcome to Night Vale.”
“Ah—thank you.” Jon shakes Cecil’s hand. “We’re glad to be here.”
“We’re glad to have you.” Cecil’s voice drifts into a slightly higher register as he looks down at Esteban. “Can you say hi?”
“Hi,” Esteban echoes, grinning at Jon but clinging tighter to Cecil just the same.
Carlos wrinkles his nose in a smile at Esteban, who mimics the face back. “You must be hungry. We can head home and get you all settled in, and then I’ll finish up dinner. Do you have any checked luggage, or—”
“INTERLOPERS!”
All four of them jump, Charlie practically into Martin’s arms, and Jon almost falls over backwards. Tim catches him and then abruptly thrusts him at Martin, shoving between his family and the woman striding towards them without a moment’s thought. Her hands and arms drip with red, spattered across her torso and clotting the blade of the hatchet thrust in her belt, and her eyes gleam the same color, all of it glowing so bright it hurts Tim’s eyes. It’s always harder for him to control this when he’s tired or scared or angry, and the yell caught him off-guard enough that his grip on it has slipped.
And the problem is, now it’s worse, because if this woman isn’t actually an avatar of the Hunt, she’s been Marked by it very deeply. Which sets off every single protective instinct Tim has.
“Hi, Leann,” Carlos says, in the same tone of voice Jon Prime uses to speak to Institute donors. Tim looks at him and immediately wishes he hadn’t. A bright green glowing line runs up his left arm, from his finger to his chest, terminating at a marbled mess of grey and yellow directly over his heart; the grey streaks in his hair and beard glow as well, and his eyes are flecked with indigo. And that’s just what Tim sees before he drags his gaze away.
Well, he definitely has some statements for them.
Leann—if that’s the woman’s name—nods distractedly at Carlos. “Carlos. Cecil. Are these friends of yours?”
“My cousin and his family,” Carlos says. “And they’re probably tired, so we should get going, if you don’t mind.”
“Sure, sure.” Leann eyes them again. “Leann Hart, editor of the Night Vale Daily Journal. Maybe we could sit down for an interview at some point while you’re here.”
“Absolutely not,” Tim growls. Static crackles on his tongue, and Leann actually takes a half-step back, looking surprised.
Martin, thank God, steps in, slipping an arm through Tim’s. “We’re not supposed to talk to the press without express permission from our boss, sorry. But it’s nice to meet you.”
The static is building, and Tim’s not sure if it’s contained in his head or all around them, but either way, if they don’t get out of here now, there’s going to be an incident and he doesn’t want to screw up Jon’s first visit with family in a decade. He also doesn’t want to scare Charlie, or Esteban for that matter. He does want her statement—the sharp, hungry ache stabs at him in a way that’s becoming depressingly familiar—but he grits his teeth against it. The risk of her retaliating against the people he loves is too great if he just takes it.
Jon brushes a hand against Tim’s elbow, not exactly holding it, but maintaining contact nevertheless as he addresses his cousin. “We’ve got one checked suitcase, but we were trying to travel light.”
“Sure. Right this way.” Carlos smiles brightly and Esteban matches it.
“Good night, Leann,” Cecil says, in a very final tone of voice.
Leann nods and backs away, but Tim can still feel her suspicious gaze on them as they walk away.