#i just love making up fake scenarios to hurt carlos with

[mississpissi]

so we know carlos wasn't originally intended to be cecil's love interest. in an interview in 2018 cecil baldwin said, "He was meant almost as a foil to Night Vale; he was the outsider who wanted to quantify everything in this town where nothing is quantifiable." (and i'm pretty sure this has been repeated by finknor too iirc) carlos. was an outsider who wanted to quantify everything in a town where nothing is quantifiable at first. kinda... familiar sounding. maybe.

the only thing that changed this was cecil. falling in love, finding community, starting a family- without cecil, would carlos be another lubelle? obviously he has some core personality differences to lubelle, but without cecil vouching for him, framing his as a good interloper, immediately telling night vale that carlos was a positive addition to their community, who's to say how carlos would react to night vale?

what if he was instead greeted with hostility, with distrust? what if cecil hadn't been so enraptured by him and told the town the scientist was dangerous? would he have dug in his heels and sought for answers more aggressively? would he try to leave (he would probably try to leave...)? would night vale let him leave after luring him there? would he decide to stay because he needs answers? would he find himself making decisions like lubelle out of desperation? would he think of his mentor/coworker's(?) ruthless persistence and try to call upon that when he realizes he's stuck? just- who would carlos have become without cecil's immediate intervention? would he be threatened or would he become a threat?