The Town Mayor

The Town Mayor

Two men talk secretly in a dark room. The room is handcrafted out of planks of thick wood; the corners of the room are built from entire stumps, and above them are rafters of crudely hacked thinner pieces of long timber. In one corner stands a collection of oil lamps near a small table; on the table is a map pierced by a knife with an aged wooden handle standing sharply from its point. In the other is a standing lamp, which is lit; the light from this lamp bathes the room in an orange glow that casts deep shadows into the features of the men, especially around the eyes, which are filled with flat black shadow. There is a gun on the table between the men; now and then, both men take a glimpse towards it. Neither of them wanders too far from the pistol. Finally, one man takes a shot of refined screech that is made around the island's swamps. Then, the man grimaces, stating while gazing out the window an arm's length from the table, "look at that, a mist comes from the sea'there."

"What was that Allistar," this man says in an almost mocking tone while sipping from the screech, sipping in a way as to make sure he doesn't get too drunk. "I can hardly understand you over that drawl you have developed these last few years."

"I said," Allistar turns away from the window, clearing his throat, glancing at the gun, then back towards the man's eyes. "Hausef," inching back towards the table sloppily, "how long it is'ya'been mayor now, ten'rtwelve years," Allistar plummets back in a chair on the far side of the table. The gun shifts a little to one side, and the bottle shakes, its contents inside sloshing around. Allistar grabs the bottle and pours himself another shot.

Hausef raises one eyebrow, reaches surreptitiously into his coat pocket, and draws out a tightly wound bag that fills the room with the smell of refined tobacco, weed, and special mildly psychedelic herbs that grow wildly in the southern parts of the forest of the island. Then from the other side, he removes from another pocket a long pipe that seems like a thin goat's horn that spirals intricately as one does in nature. Hausef packs the blend in the bowl at the top, and with a flick of his wrist, a thin match explodes dramatically, filling his face with white light. His large nose is seen vividly, and his dark black beard and all the tightly wound dreadlocks inside it can also be seen. As he stares down towards the reddening herbs and inhales deeply, the bright blues of his eyes appear to move like waves in the deep sea on a white-hot morning. Exhaling the smoke and it leaves his lungs blacker than the shadows around him. Then, staring back at Allistar, he says plainly, "it's been eight years now," not once letting his pale blue eyes drift from his comrade's face.

Allistar takes his shot. Quickly pouring another mumbling a few rambling words as he does "eight years, feel'slike'eight lifetimes, now"

Sitting back in his chair, Hausef lets the smoke spiral around his thick black beard "why did you ask to meet at my office tonight."

Allistar takes another shot and lets silence wash over the room. From somewhere deeper in the large cottage, a few other villagers are heard shouting about the mist. Just outside the room, a few scattered bodies are seen running past the lightly frosted windows. Bells are listened to from atop doors that jingle. Allistar breaks the silence. "I asked ya here'tsee if I could convince ye to stand down as mayor of Inor'shala."

Hausef leans forward in his chair. Inhaling deeply on his pipe and with his free hand, he reaches for his drink, finally taking the entire shot and exhaling the black tar smoke afterwards, slides the glass towards the bottle of screech, and it connects with a ting. "You know Allistar," Hausef says calmy with a voice that sounds like a rough stone "this is a matter that is usually worked out in public and is always held to a vote with the citizens of this island, and every year we hold the same vote, and every year I am elected mayor, now tell me, tell me, why do you think that is"

Allistar stands from his chair sharply, and it knocks over to the ground with a loud bouncing clang. Allistar folds his hands behind his back and nears the window again. His hands turn white with pressure. "Because you are what they have adapted to."

"I am more..."

Allistar cuts him off, "but ye're weak."

"Weak I"

Allistar, in a sort of anxious anger, begins to lecture Hausef, "ye'r letting the island die. No new fishermen r here. The town runs dry of good catholic women. Supplies run thinner than'they should in the winters," Still staring out the window, which now displays nothing on the other side except deep fog, which has now surrounded the island.

"Why would you say this, who else thinks this way."

Allistar turns his head, so only half of his face is shown to Hausef "the town doesn't need't say it, you can see it on their face, the way they seem accepting of never leaving here, or never living happily here if they can't leave." Then, under his breath, he turns back towards the window and murmurs, "and ye'eeps'us locked in with your poison screech from th'swamps."

"Then why is it they always elect me mayor if things are so bad like you say."

Allistar turns around, "because they're scared of'yee." His face is red in the orange light of the room.

"Scared about what exactly."

Allistar slams his fist on the table, and finally, the bottle of screech falls over to its side and rolls back and forth. "Not about ye looks, or ye mannerism, it the way ye'mind be changed, changed after smoking that cursed herb, we all know it be cursed."

"It is hardly cursed."

"the way you'sneak off in the middle of'th nights, whisperin to yur selves."

"A man is allowed moments peace."

"the way you disappear into that secret bottom cellar door of that old haunted manor on the top of the cliff."

Just as Allistar says this, Hausef drops the face he has been wearing for eight years. As if a mask designed to look just like his face fell to the floor, and some new man was under it. Some hidden man lurking beneath the surface of his flesh. Allistar backs from the table but holds his hands along the edge.

"You been followin me, have you."

"I've'ye"

"What else have ye seen?"

"I saw't all, heard it more too."

"it's okay" Hausef puts the pipe down on the table, which still cherries a fine reddish-green "you can tell me what you think you saw."

"I saur em" Allistar stares at the gun, "I saw ye in that goat mask, and all'th'others up er on the third floor, the lights."

Hausef stands from the table. Turning around to face the lamp in the corner, his back wholly blackened in shadow as he removes his oversized coat, which falls to the floor like a wet sack. That is when Allistar sees that it is actually moist in appearance and the inside is damp with dense moisture. Hausef's voice is different now as he says, "what else," almost as if water was being gargled while he spoke. Another undercoat falls to the floor in the shadows. Then something soaking and damp also plummets in a splatter.

"I heard'yeas, meandering talks about water gods and beasts and ye feed the islanders to it in the sea, I hears it all and yur strange demon chanting too" Allistar stares at Hausef in the darkness of the room who now stands there, thin. Thinner then was possible of whatever man was underneath those big coats. And something was moving there in the light. Something moving around his body like thick snakes. That's when something else in the room fell sloppily to the floor with a squashing of soggy matter, and it moved too.

"Tell me, Allistar, do you believe in demons?" That's when Hausef turns around. Turns around to show his body, pale as if something had been feeding off it for years, feeding off it underwater with its rippled white texture like the flesh of hands that have been underwater too long, with pockets of popped flesh that secrete yellowish pus.

Allistar screams as he reaches for the gun. Screaming at the thing wrapped around his face. Screaming at the giant appendages that dangle outwards from the twisted eyes of the face of the man he once knew. Screaming as he pulls the trigger at the flaky slithering appendages that move capriciously towards him in the darkness. Lightning strikes the sky, and it deafens the noise of his cries.

One man stands silently in a dark room, putting on a fresh cloth outfit from a closet; the clothes are bleached red and made of old cotton. There is a soupy sogging mass of slime on the floor, filled with black fibrous hairs. The man in the room stands erect at a mirror now. Smiling at his own reflection coquettishly. Playing with his balding hair and stubble as he says, "Lookin'yunga Allistar, look'n yunga," coughing as things under his coat move hungrily. Walking to the southern wall nearest a small table placed in an unorthodox manner close to the corner. On the table rests a map and knife. Looking back at the smouldering pile of goop with a smile as Allistar pushes the blade forward, and it clangs and makes iron noises and mechanical clinks. The small table slides to the right, along with the floor it stands on. Mystical light exhumes outward from the widening crack. Revealing ancient stone stairs that shine with a phosphorescent green that originates from somewhere deeper than can be seen in the hidden passageway. The sound of water dripping fills the room. Allistar pushes the knife towards him, heads down the green stairs, and disappears below the closing floor. In the distance, further out towards the sea, a horrible rumbling can be heard closing in on the island of Inor'shala.