a fine line between silliness and supreme beauty

got into night vale earlier this year and this silly little podcast has my entire heart and soul and flesh vessel and unborn heir for three generations!! <3 currently at ep 65 (holy shit, btw) wanted to explore what framing devices i could draw for ceec's narrations and then got very carried away i have spent weeks on this i am finally freeee e e e e e

zoom zoom zoom behold my details!!

u should fear for him:

[super secret powerpoint reveal]

“What you have to understand is that I am a coward,” he whispers, and his voice doesn’t catch even once.

“Are you that starved for compliments that you’re coming to me?” Danton’s voice barely rises to make it a question. “I’ve no time to shower you in reassurances.”

“I’m ent-tirely serious,” here it is, the stutter, and soon Camille’s hands will fly into the untidy black hair and mess it up even further.

As if on cue, Camille raises his arms. Danton can’t decide if the familiarity is more exhausting or endearing.

“I’ve always been a coward, since that day at the T-tuileries. I was so scared I would die without g-getting a chance to s-s-speak, without a chance to be heard, f-for once.”

“Says the Lantern Attorney.”

“What do words on a page matter when soldiers are on the march?”

Danton would really much rather get back to reviewing his accounts, but apparently, Camille isn’t done yet.

That last phrase, though, it was too far out of touch even for Camille’s standards. All that man has ever done is spill words on the page, until it all but burst into flames, and watched the conflagration!

No, not that, not quite. Camille has probably not once stopped writing long enough to consider the death toll. It’s a miracle, this innocence, it’s exactly why every issue of whatever he has picked the name of his most recent journal will be in the lips of half of Paris before nightfall.

Now that Marat is gone, there’s really nobody else who can do it; make the people explode in rage, and make them hope too. Hébert’s only got the half of it.

“...and this is why I n-need you to…”

Camille is still talking, and Danton won’t even bother to ask Camille to repeat what he has missed, lost in thought. He’ll consider doing whatever Camille needs. Whether he will do it, that will be a matter of his own.

“I’m sure I will,” Danton says, and adds for good measure. “And I think, we’re all scared for our lives, these days; though not all of us would admit it.”

“What does that have to do with anything!” Camille jolts as if he was a puppet that got its strings tangled up by a rather impatient puppeteer. “I said – oh, don’t pret-tend t-to listen, I said, I’m scared for what will become of us.”

“If we lose the war?”

“If we lose it. If we win it. D-don’t you understand, this is why I need to keep writing.”

“What was it that you just said? What do words on a page matter...at war?” Danton can’t help himself.

“But now that’s all I have,” Camille’s voice drops, and Danton wonders if he is going to start crying.

It has happened before, once or twice; Camille cultivates a far more dramatic persona than he truly is; but he does cry, and Danton will forever be jealous of that.

“But now that’s all I have,” Camille repeats, all traces of stutter having disappeared again. “I would’ve made a fine martyr, that day at the Tuileries, but – but, a republic has no need for martyrs.”

There’s enough fury in Camille’s voice that Danton sighs, a token to placate Camille, whose friendship with Marat had never ceased to surprise those who knew both men well, and now… Well, Camille is definitely one to wallow in mourning.

Also, Danton disagrees, but what’s the point in dragging out the argument.

People will always need martyrs; but they will need stories too, and Camille’s pen turns history into a story. For better or… no, for the worst. At least for those who had become the targets of his vehemence...for himself, too.

“So what do you need from me, then?” Danton asks.

“Only the t-truth,” Camille smiles. “I d-don’t know why it’s so easy for M-maximilien, he doesn’t accept anything but the t-truth and doesn’t speak anything but it either, of course, he’s – well, he’s got h-help, the C-committee, Saint-Just, C-couthon, everyone, but it’s like I’m f-forever walking in the shadow.”

Danton shrugs. He makes no promises, but Camille will assume he has.

And well, he will try. For Camille. To the extent that he can. He briefly wishes he could still lie to himself, and swallows the lump in his throat.

And Camille isn’t done talking yet.

“It’s as if that day at the Tuileries was only time when I looked around and everything was – was bright, was sharp, was its own true color. Nothing has ever come close to it. And I guess I sh-should say that I’m s-scared to never feel it again, but, but, that’s not true. Not quite. It’s more that I’m s-scared that nobody else will. It’s why I k-keep writing.”

Camille’s coat is black, but Danton fancies he could catch a glimmer of green, in the sunlight through the window.

He knows Camille will rush out soon, and the faint amusement that he will inevitably feel for a moment afterwards will taste bittersweet at the back of his throat, like almonds. And then he has another speech to make, for the evening.