288 - Doubles Anonymous

Hey, it is Jeffrey Craner here to tell you that welcome to Night Vale is going to be on tour very briefly here at the end of the month. I'm speaking to you from May of 2026. We are going to be in Europe. We will be in Edinburgh on May the 27th, Manchester on May 28th, London, May 29th and Amsterdam on May 30th. So come check out our newest welcome to Night Vale live show, Murder Night in Blood Forest. The show is so much fun and these live shows, they're written for the longtime Night Vale fan and the newbie alike. So bring whoever you like. They'll figure it out very quickly what's going on. These shows are a lot of fun. You can get tickets and see locations and showtimes at welcometonightvale.com slash live. Also if you like other horror and you know fictional podcasts, why not check out Alice Isn't Dead. We have three seasons already that ran a few years ago, but we have a fourth season that is out now. It is currently in process. So come check out this newest season of Alice Isn't Dead. If you were a subscriber before and haven't listened to this new season, re-subscribe. Go get that. And if you've never heard it, jump in. It's a crazy good, very, very tense and scary story performed by Jessica Nicole and written by Joseph Fink with production by Disparition. I think that's all I got for you. And hey, thanks. Of all the gin joints and all the towns and all the world, this one also has laser tag. Welcome to Night Vale. Jalen Rutherford woke up on the wrong side of the bed. No hooch last night, just a dame dancing around in that gravy can of his. He can't shake the thought of her. She's a looker, to be sure, but she's trouble and everyone knows it. But what woman isn't trouble? Jalen thinks. Actually, a whole host of gals are pretty balanced people. He corrects himself. In fact, his new boss, the tech, the gum shoe, the sneaky possum, you know, the private investigator, Dana Cardinal. She's got a mind like a steel trap that's caught its dinner tonight. A dinner made of clues. Speak of the big boss woman, Jalen checks the clock. He's late. Dana will be waiting and you don't want to keep DC waiting. But his mind feels like it's at the bottom of a well, like that cute little girl from the ring. His mind feels like he had a whole night of eel juice and hanky-panky, but he only gets to do the time, not the crimes. Still, his gray matter wriggles under the weight of that troublesome dame, Ilana. He can't shake the thought of her. But he can't be thinking of dolls and birds right now. He's got a murder to solve his own. Dana Cardinals on the horn with another DC, Diane Creighton, a data cruncher, a numbers junkie, a spreadsheet splainer. Diane Creighton is the kind of tough broad you go to when you don't know your rose from your columns, your sorts from your filters, your elbow from your pie hole. And Diane's always here to help a friend with a spreadsheet, whether it's taxes or evidence for murder. Dana thanks Diane and checks her watch, 9 a.m. as the crow flies. Jalen's late. Dana will have to start without him. She picks up her laptop and sits outside under the warm smile of the spring sun. The golden light holds her like a gentle father who is scared to hurt the baby. Dana sleeps well these days. She's good at what she does. She is loving friends, a healthy diet, a nice house and several adorable ferrets. You know, nickel weasels, snake terriers, long mice. They're not only great guide animals, but they spook away the plug, uglies and ruffians. In the buttery warmth of a spring morning, Dana remembers her last session with doubles anonymous. It's group therapy, but for people who killed their doubles, their doppelgangers, their Twinkies, their deuces. But in Dana's case, she doesn't know if she's the real Dana Cardinal or the double. She may never know who off to with that stapler. Dana had invited Jalen to join her at the next doubles anonymous meeting. You see Jalen Rutherford. Well, he's a double two. Only he never got a chance to kill his original. Some other hatchet man danced that jig first. Dana texts Jalen, asking where he is, but she's not worried. It's a sunny day and she might put on the old feed bag for some yogurt and berries. Jalen's due in figure eights around his bed. Sit what sort of sap oversleeps and then can't find his satchel. He feels like a sucker, a mouth breather, a fool. But he's found his gear and he's about to take a hike. That's when the pounding begins. The knocking on the door echoes in his aching noggin. He peeps through the Venetians and his heart skips like a stone on clear water, like a quarter note in a rag, like a hopscotch tournament. It was Ilana, the dame, the dish, the dull faced troublemaker. Ilana was a no good neck and he didn't want to open that door, but he had no other way out of this roach motel. Besides, she knew he was there. Like a turkey, he left his jalabi parked right in front. Might as well put up a neon sign that said DUNCE INCORPORATED, open for business. He cracks the door and silver light slaps him across the face, like it's threatening an eighteenth century duel. Why are you running? She says her voice all bass and breath, like a cello on a windy day. Why are you chasing? He snarls back, his voice breathless and scratched, like an old shoe on wet concrete. Talk to me, Jalen. She implores, I'm not who you think I am. He says firmly, finding his lungs at last. Thankfully, they were where he last left them. I'm not who you think I am either. She says, stepping into his darkened studio apartment and pulling the door shut behind her. Dana Cardinal cracks open the spreadsheet, the grist grid, the tic-tac-toe board. Her eyes scan the numbers and the numbers make as much sense as a Jackson Pollock painting that fell into a paper shredder. She's not just trying to solve the murder of the original Jalen Breutherford. She's trying to crack the case of the locked library murder of one Marcus Vansten, AKA Billions with a B, AKA Erica, AKA Moneybag Cherub. How do you kill an angel? How do you kill someone in a locked room when they were the only one with the key and it was locked from the inside? And why? She's got the where and the when for this Cardinal sin, but not the how. She might, though, be close to the who and the why. Harrison Kipp, the archaeologist, the ditch digger, the mummy wrestler. Well, he's started a little congregation, a communion, a cult, if we're being honest. He's also started a radio show, the Twilight Gospel Hour, and two moons back. Old Professor Kipp, all but put the bracelets on and signed his own arrest warrant. He admitted that Marcus Vansten had promised a large donation to Kipp's religious goons, but that cabbage never made the soup. Kipp was burnt about the double cross, steaming like iron on cotton. It was enough to make a man murder an angel. So Dana had a who, Harrison Kipp. But why? Money madness. And how? Yes, that's the $64,000 question, isn't it? How? Indeed. Marcus was no dummy, no nincompoop, no goose. The richer you are, the deader they want you. Vansten knew it and Kipp knew it too. Kipp's a schemer, but he's a tad dim. She can't imagine how he would break into Vansten's Fort Knox. Dana turns on the kettle. Jalen's 20 minutes late and no text, no call, no blip bleep or bloop from that infernal little black rectangle in her hand. She's not worried. Not yet. Jalen leans to Alana's ear. She smells fresh as a daffodil, crisp as a cornet and revely. She smells like the gal he once knew, the good girl he loved. The one on the other side, the land of the doubles. That Alana? He adored. He'd have taken the slug for her, a bat to the bean. He'd have walked in front of a Mack truck to impress that femme thabulus. But this Alana? She's no Alana. You're right, Jalen says. You're not who I think you are. I loved you or a girl like you. But she was from the other side of the tracks, a different place, an ethereal plane of existence. You catching what I'm throwing? I'm not the same girl. Alana pleads, but give me a day, an hour, a little kiss even, and you'll forget her completely. No, Jalen pulls away. My Alana was kind. She was patient. She was a model in more ways than one. And you, Alana, exhales into his collar. You are true to your woman. You're nothing like the Jalen I knew before. He was rotten, a rat, a wag, an overcooked duck. Jalen looks surprised. Had he never considered that his double might not have been on the up and up? He did you wrong? He asks, but he already knows the answer. He ripped out my heart and stomped it out like a cigarette. Alana pulls him close and says, I'm glad that sorry lug is dead. Dana makes herself another cup of Joe. She takes her time with it. She likes the fancy pants, poor over style. No black sludge stuck to a stained carafe. No, DC takes her beans lightly roasted. Pale as a polar bear who just saw a ghost. While the Java brews, she mulls over some letters that were found in the original Jalen's files, letters between Vanston and Kip. She couldn't understand. Marcus Vanston was completely enamored with Kip and his mob of red, robed thugs. Why would Vanston suddenly revoke the greenbacks he promised? And more so, why would the angel of one God want to donate so much money to the church of a different God altogether? Why the good folks down at Temple Beth Shalom raised money last year for our lady of the shambling orphan. It was after the church ran out of gruel and tattered smocks for all the grime stained factory urchins. It's not uncommon for different religions to help each other in time of need. Dana thinks. But is Harrison Kip's religion really a religion? Or is it a cult? Kip said on his radio show, they can't take donations directly. And according to Jalen's spreadsheets, Marcus Vanston's gift was supposed to go through the community college where Kip heads the archaeology department. Eureka! Huzzah! Hot damn! She's on to something. There it is in Cell M78. Vanston's millions going to the college archaeology department. That dough wasn't meant to help students understand history or culture. It was meant to get laundered by Kip. But why didn't the college ever get the bread? Then her phone buzzes, a text, a missive, a message from Diane Creighton. Dana doesn't know it, but she feels it deep in her sinew that Diane has found something, something big. Jalen studies Alana's face, her mug, her grill. It's stone concrete, serious as a root canal. He broke my heart. She says, but worse, he broke my mind. I couldn't control my rage when I found out he had double crossed me with that floozy from Pine Cliff, that girl's a nothing, a wisp, a see-through. Everyone in Pine Cliff is a literal ghost. Alana adds while leaning into Jalen. What could he have seen in a chick he can't even touch? What are you saying, Alana? Jalen asks cautiously, did you kill my double? She pulls him close, their lips only an inch apart and says, what does it matter? You're here now. She kisses him. He kisses her back. The lovers stand silhouetted against the open window, the light growing brighter in the mid morning sky, but they were in too deep to care about the weather. Nothing material touching their hands, wishing they'd be worn. Years they spent looking for each other, once a few more, dreaming for their love. Covered in ash sand and some paper, all that was left from their fairy tale. But I, I believe that they got their happy end. And I, I believe that they just served more than just sadness. The people dreaming do is young. The people dreaming do is young. The people dreaming do is young. The people dreaming do is young. The people dreaming do is young. The people dreaming do is young. The people dreaming do is young. The people dreaming do is young. The people dreaming do is young. The people dreaming do is young. The people dreaming do is young. The people dreaming do is young. The people dreaming do is young. The people dreaming do is young. The people dreaming do is young. They were eating junk food from the comfort of their own panic attack. Underneath their covers, scratching away their skin on blue walls. Feeling trapped inside, no way out. They looked up, wanting Asia sky. Blinding is your sky So they got those flaked paintings Curled up hopeless embryonic Dreaming of a better morning But I, I believe That they got their happy end And I, I believe That they discerned more Than just sadness The people dreamed, but I, I believe That they managed to break out And I, I believe That they broke the chains They bind the people Oh, the people, the people who dreamed The lazy oh, the lazy oh, the lazy oh And they got their happy end The lazy oh, the lazy oh And it was worth your dreams and your nightmares The panic and the carcass or the carcass The years go by, you waited and you will But it was worth your illest you feel Ready to launch your business? Get started with the commerce platform Made for entrepreneurs. Shopify is specially designed to help you start, Run and grow your business with easy customizable themes That let you build your brand, Marketing tools that get your products out there, Integrated shipping solutions that actually save you time From startups to scale-ups, online, in-person and on the go. Shopify is made for entrepreneurs like you. Sign up for your $1 a month trial at Shopify.com. It's night and Jalen sits in a circle of chairs With a bunch of no-names, randos, schmucks. After the day he had, he wants out of here. He wants to run to Elana. He wants to run away from Elana. He doesn't know what he wants, But he knows what he doesn't want. He doesn't want to be at a meeting for doubles anonymous. But he missed work today with Dana, And he's feeling pretty low. He owes her this. The door swings open and in Dana walks All sunshine and popsicles. That is, until she sees Jalen. Her face turns sour, Like orange milk left in a car on a hot day. I'm surprised to see you at the meeting, Jalen, Ding says. Then she adds, Her eyes as stern as the back of a boat. We need to talk after. Jalen can't look at her. He knows he laid an egg, Gummed up the investigation by going a wall. Then the meeting starts, And Jalen forgets about his day for a bit. The gang lets him tell his story, Talk about his fears, his challenges. He tells them he learned that his original self was a louse, A twit, an oaf, And maybe as crooked as a hockey player's grin. He admits it's hard to accept that he is the double of a deadbeat. The strangers assure him that he is different. They are not we. We are not they. He's the mantra of doubles anonymous. And Jalen feels admired, Like a bronze idol or a snow leopard. Dana was right, Jalen thinks. Doubles anonymous is the bee's knees, The spider's butt, the hornet's fedora. He thanks Dana in front of the whole meeting, But her smile looks as phony as a $3 bill that was hand drawn while riding a bike. Jalen is over the moon, Happy as a rock at a landslide. He has so much to talk to Dana about, But Dana says she has something very important. It's about the case. I do too, Jalen exclaims. He tells Dana about Alana, About how she came to him today, How she's now the top suspect in his own murder. Jalen believes she killed the original Jalen in a fit of jealousy and revenge. I mean, that Casanova had it coming. Jalen adds, Maybe not the big sleep, But he needed a knuckle sandwich at least. Jalen loves Alana, But doesn't trust her. She's wild-eyed and unpredictable, Not like the Alana he once knew. This Alana was a conniver, With more plots than a Brooklyn boneyard. Jalen was in over his head, Both smitten and terrified. Dana takes a deep breath And says calmly, Alana is the least of your worries, kid. Dana scans the rec center parking lot. They're alone. She tells Jalen what Diane found In the original Jalen's files. See, Jalen was Marcus Vanston's bookkeeper. And according to Diane, The books Jalen kept were ringers, Set-ups, fake Arouskis. Dana said if this spreadsheet was a false front, Then there must be a real ledger somewhere. And Dana found it. It was hidden in Jalen's computer Under the file name, Boring old numbers who cares Don't even bother looking.xls. This original Jalen was a trickster, A grifter, a con, A real shifty lizard. This spreadsheet was for an LLC With JR financial services. And it proved that the donation from Vanston Never made it to the college. Instead, it went to this JR. That's right. Jalen Rutherford, Dana says, I think you're double. Double crossed his boss And was going to launder Vanston's moolah for himself. And he adds, smug as a thug, Stealing a rug. That's it. Jalen snaps. Maybe Ilana killed the original Jalen And stole the money. If I play my cards right, Dana interrupts. Hold your ponies. I found one other thing. I visited the coroner again To go through Jalen's belongings. I found his key ring With his apartment keys, A car key, And one other key. Dana pauses for effect. And says, A key that fits the lock On Marcus Vanston's library. Of course, his trusted bookkeeper And assistant would have a spare key. But the room only locks from the inside. Jalen says, Ah, but if he had a special accomplice, Dana says, A shapeshifter, Another angel, A sentient patch of haze even. Jalen gasps. Or a ghost, he says. Ilana had said the original Jalen Was catting around with that broad-from-pine cliff. A girl with a body that won't quit. But a body you can't touch. A lady like that Could walk through walls. That's the ticket, Dana exclaims. Vanston discovered the deception. Confronted Jalen, And Jalen and this immaterial girl Bumped off the billionaire. By golly, Jalen says, You've cracked this case. Cracked it wide open, boss. Then, another voice. Hey Dana, hey Jalen. From behind a Dodge Grand Caravan In the rec center parking lot There's a man in jeans, A t-shirt, and a baseball hat That says, Sheriff's Secret Police. I was just hiding under this minivan Eavesdropping, says the undercover copper. And it sounds like you're really making Headway on those murder cases. Dana agrees and asks If the secret police have been hitting the bricks Sussing out perps and the like. Oh no, not at all. The flat foot says, Murders are really hard to solve. But it looks like this one Is getting pretty easy. We can take it from here. What? Dana says, Arrest this man. The law man calls out. Many undercover officers Emerge from beneath cars And grab Jalen Rutherford. You're under arrest For the murder of the angel, Marcus Vanston. And you call him? No, not me. It was my double who did it. Jalen's double shouts. And we don't even have proof of that. Dana pleads. Well, you're the closest looking thing We have to the murderer. The cops explain. As the prowl cars slither away Under clinically white street lights. Dana stands dumbfounded and alone. She has to solve these murders. And soon. But if it turns out, Jalen was Vanston's killer. And not Kip. Then the fuzz could make trouble For Jalen's double the likes of which Elana couldn't even imagine. And who murdered Jalen? That jealous mall Elana? That greedy breeze of an accomplice? Sometimes an answer is just another question In disguise. Stay tuned next for the slam Of a cell door and baleful whistling. Good night, Night Vale. Good night. Welcome to Night Vale as a production of Night Vale Presents. It is written by Joseph Fink, Jeffrey Craner, and Brie Williams. Sound design and production by Disparition. The voice of Night Vale is Cecil Baldwin. Original music by Disparition. The voice of Night Vale is Cecil Baldwin. Original music by Disparition. The voice of Night Vale is Cecil Baldwin. Original music by Disparition. All of it can be found at Disparition.net. This episode's weather was Elysium by Eda Persiai. Find out more at the link in our show notes. Comments, questions, email us at info at welcometonightvale.com Or follow us on Blue Sky at Night Vale Radio. Or on Instagram, Tumblr, and TikTok at Night Vale Official. Or remember when that straight was closed because Tron was the only one. Or remember when that straight was closed because Tron did so bad at war. Unless it still is by the time you hear this. Very possible. But mainly check out WelcomeToNightVale.com where we have a twice monthly mailing list that is the best way to keep up to date directly from us to you. The economy is fake, but connecting directly with the artists you love is very real. Speaking of which, if you are able to, please support us on Patreon. It is our lifeline in a podcast called Night Vale. It is our lifeline in a podcast business that goes up and down on the whims of the market. We couldn't do it without you. And there's a bunch of fun bonus stuff and a good community out there. Today's proverb. Call me old fashioned, but anything you can say to me over text, you also could have delivered by horse. Are you squeamish about horror movies, but kind of want to know what happens? Or are you a horror lover who likes thoughtful conversation about your favorite genre? Join me, Jeffrey Kramer and my friend from WelcomeToNightVale, Cecil Baldwin, for our weekly podcast, Random Number Generator Horror Podcast Number 9 where we watch and discuss horror movies in a random order. Here's the short version. Random Horror 9 wherever you get your podcasts. Boo.