Beneath the Ceiling

Part 1: You Own No One

"It was 2016, I had just graduated high school. It was a normal boring day like the rest had been for an adolescent boy. turn the clocks forward five years to 2021 and the town I'm from would never be the same. Normal people in places like New York or Texas live among other people, humans. Where i had lived at the time, i lived among humans and these creatures called '''Mordos.''' It's what the chief of the lumber people called them.

The best way to have described them was like they were logs with feelings. Take a mannequin and give it life; that's how they were"

I turn to the interviewer and he says, " Please state your name for the video."

"Maverick Emerson...only documented survivor of the Walden Town Incident of March 3rd, 2021."

 Walden, California Feb. 23rd, 2019

"So I turn and there's this girl right...I look straight into her eyes and I'm telling you there is nothing but magic happening at that moment. She's a fine young honey from around the block and I'm like damn. This girl just mad fine B-dog" said one of my select few Mordo friends,Sacha.

I responded, "Yo' it sounds like that ass was A1 quality, you get her digits G?" 

Sacha pulls out his phone and shows me the number. "That figure, that beautiful angel on the dance floor at that party. It was like staring at the sun, except I was blinded by love you feel me B-dog? 

I appreciate the cold one with ya's but I have to run man. My mom's been sick, got to take care of that little woman. Take it easy brotha', don't get caught up in no problems." 

I say to him,"Don't worry man, I ain't going nowhere. Take care big g'."

Sacha leaves the bar and I begin thinking to myself whilst cleaning mugs for future customers. Ever since I began working at the bar Sacha had always come into cheer me up by telling me a few of his outrageous stories. He had come from what I like to call the "hood" part of the tribe and eventually that carried on over into integrating with our culture so he remained "hood".

 Last year in 2018 when the people of Walden spotted an unknown being in the forest, everyone was on edge ever since they found out including me. The news reported it was a hoax, a Big Foot impersonator, but it was much more. They had found an underground tribe living deep within grounds of Walden, about a population of almost 200. The tribe was dying off due to lack of resources and Walden's original plan was to contact the government to exterminate all of them, but that had become and inhumane decision. 

The chief, Wanderer, spoke in perfect English and negotiated not to kill the tribe. The Walden government found that if anyone outside the town knew of the existence of  another species it'd cause to much ruckus. The chief and the mayor signed a treaty stating that no human or Mordo shall harm one another. 

In months to pass on, the treaty became the concept of government for the Mordos including a set of laws and even granting them currency to use in Walden. Walden was no big of a town at all but we had normal places any other place would like McDonald's, Taco Bell, an Apple store, etc. At first folks were uneasy about the whole integrating another species into your own situation, but because they spoke English surprisingly well, it was mainly a matter of negotiation between humans and the Mordos to establish what happens. Being the good Americans we were we had provided food, eductaion, work, and oddly enough medical yet us humans had no idea how to tend the wounds of a Mordo. 

In fact, as far as we knew the Mordo tribe was definitively myhtical in the sense that they were possibly magical. I know that sounds crazy, but it's damn true.