I started my long and arduous journey up the cliffside of Hopeless Harbor by driving on an extremely narrow road called Slippery Street. The conversation with Jack still mulled in my mind, and the cross he gave me was safely tucked away in a backpack. As I ascended up the cliffside, I tried my best not to look down at the dark ocean that churned below. I drove slowly with my high beams on out of an abundance of caution. After all, “Slippery Street” was not a place where I wanted to test fate. Soon however, the road had ascended into some moderate fog, which prompted me to switch to my low beams and drive slower. Eventually, the road turned inwards and I now had no need to worry about careening off the side into the dark ocean below.
It was a short but winding drive through dense fog, dead trees, and a few bits of road that were poorly managed. In no time however I arrived, and I was not surprised to find The Motel De Muerté looked as gloomy as the rest of Hopeless Harbor. It was a two story building that bore a dilapidated Mid-century aesthetic on its exterior. The paint was peeling because of the sea air and vines of ivy were crawling up the walls and rooftop. A large neon sign showed that there was indeed vacancy at the building but some of the neon letters were broken.
I pulled over into the nearest parking spot on and stepped out of the car. It was much colder up here than down by the docks that even with my jacket, I didn’t feel warm. There were two large wooden doors to the Motel’s main entrance that were poorly illuminated by old gas lamps. Each door had a symbol carved into the wood similar to the one I saw at the Anglers Maw: an eye atop octopus limbs with each holding an unknown symbol. I grabbed my backpack from the back seat and locked my car before heading inside.
Inside the building was rather warm. Almost too warm. Most everything in the lobby was colored red as well: walls, floor, furniture, even the decorative plants themselves. Like the outside, the building was poorly lit by gas lamps which gave the building an even more foreboding presence. Sitting at the desk was an old woman, who at first glance seemed more like a skeleton wearing a dress than a living person. She appeared to be reading some book and playing some eerie sounding music on a record player nearby. When I approached the desk, she put the book down and turned off the record player and turned her attention towards me.
“Welcome to the Motel De Muerté.” She said. She had a very posh way of speaking but seemed to speak in a labored, rattling sort of way. “How might I help you?”
“Yes.” I said. “I’d just like one bedroom for the night.”
“One bedroom?” She said. “I will give you room 13 on the second floor. For tonight, that is $100.”
I quietly handed her the cash and she shakily gave me a key with the room number.
“Have a good stay.” She said with a smile. Though it was an unsettling smile and seemed forced in some way.
“Thanks.” I said.
The old lady went back to her book and music. The book was entitled something along the lines of, “The Mysteries of the Otherworld.” and the cover was an indescribable, otherworldly hue. I lingered for perhaps a second to look around the room. There wasn’t much of note except a large picture above the doorway of what appeared to be a bunch of fishermen. Perhaps the founders of Hopeless as Jack had mentioned before. Though I noticed one seemed etched out of the picture. I didn’t bother to ask why.
I ascended some stairs to the second floor. There were pictures of random people I didn’t know. The higher I ascended the stairs, the more grotesque these individuals seemed to get. There was a portrait of a man whose face resembled a horse. He was extremely wrinkled with long teeth and an eerie smile. The placard underneath read something to the effect of, “Gramble H.Sanderson: Hopeless’ most valued organ donor.”
And straight across was the portrait of a woman who resembled a toad in all sorts of ways, from her monstrously wide mouth, to the lack of neck between her head and body. A placard underneath read something to the effect of, “Greta G. Grunchhauer: Hopeless’ Treasurer in chief, vineyard owner, and esteemed member of The Society For Worldwide Fattening.”
Once I finally reached the top however, I was staring down the stretch of a long hallway with doors on either side. At the other end, I could swear to see a large eye etched into a wood placard that was hanging on a far wall. The walls themselves were a sickly blood red and the carpet a ghastly orange. Though the lighting here was poor too. The wallpaper itself had eerie patterns of what looked like twisted, contorted faces. But that could have just been the light playing tricks on me.
I finally reached room 13 and was met by, surprisingly, a very normal looking hotel room. With an couple exceptions however. For one, it used primarily gas lamps for light. I was thankful to have a lighter on hand to light the lamps myself.
For another, Next to the bed, there was a large painting of a man wearing a hideous white mask. It bore two large black voids for eyes and a large grin that wrinkled the corners of the mouth. Its gaze pierced a bit too deeply into my soul and so, unnerved by the awful decor I decided to take the picture down and replace it with the Crucifix.
I closed and locked the door. As I didn’t have any clothes to sleep in other than the clothes on my back, I decided to look outside the window for a moment before heading into bed. I could see the little courtyard below where my car sat, but not much further due to the fog.
“Such a strange place.” I thought to myself.
There was a chair near the window that I decided to sit in for a moment. Next to the chair was a bookshelf of various books and a couple maps of Hopeless. The books included the following titles:
The maps were mostly of Hopeless Harbor and its surrounding areas. It charted the various roads around and where they went. They seemed a tad out of date but more or less conveyed the landscape of Hopeless: including busses and railway lines which, for a small harbor didn’t seem necessary.
I had a small notebook with me and a laptop that I used for various hobbies of mine. I decided to take out the notebook and write a little about my observations to conserve what charge I had on the laptop.
I had no dreams of that which Jack spoke of that evening. But at 3AM I woke suddenly and found I could not fall asleep. I decided then that instead of trying to force myself to sleep, I would thumb through a couple of the books and do a little studying on my current location.
Picking up the big grey book, I began to read through the first page.
Hopeless Harbor, once called Hopeful Harbor, has been home to many secrets and strange occurrences. From missing persons to ghost ships, the Harbor has been subject to much controversy, albeit not widely discussed. In some places, it’s seen with great fear while in others, it’s seen with enticing intrigue. In this book, I will discuss some history of the harbor, as well as some of it’s greatest mysteries still alive to this day.I flipped on through and skimmed across the pages. Much of what I saw was not much different from what Jack had told me in the Maw earlier. But there were a few interesting finds. Supposedly some years after the Harbor’s founding, there was said to be a man who would occasionally pass through and set down strange stones plaque in random places. Each plaque was written in a strange language that none in the town could read or understand. And this man spoke in a language that was equally difficult to understand. This man would always be seen wearing a suit and tie as well as a white mask with black holes for eyes and a wide-grinned smile. In fact, the same mask depicted in that horrible picture I took down from the wall.
It was thought by many he was part of a religion. Others say they never had seen him and thought he was a hoax. But one thing stood out to me as I read through: each stone had the same ghastly eye symbol engraved somewhere upon it.Supposedly others noticed statues being erected of this being that I couldn’t describe for the life of me. Some claim it is a sea god, like Poseidon, but others see it as the hateful effigy in the strange dreams that Jack mentioned.
I tired of that and decided, out of curiosity, to pick up the “Otherworld” book to see what this was about. But when I opened the book I found it to be unreadable. For it wasn’t written in common languages but instead a series of strange symbols: the same symbols seen on the stones in the grey book, and being held by the insignia I kept seeing around the town. Or at least that’s how it seemed at first, until after staring at the pages of the book, I started to notice the glyphs shift themselves into words I could understand.
Good Evening Peregrine Thorn.I quickly closed the book shut and placed it on the bookshelf. Then stood up and started walking towards the bed.
“Nope. I'm not having any of that.” I muttered as I got back into bed.
I laid there for a while. Eventually, I went back to sleep. I was able to acquire about six hours worth of sleep before finally waking up the following morning. I wish I could say that this morning was any less strange than the night before. For one matter, the picture that I had taken off the wall was back on the wall: staring me down with its hideous black voids. The crucifix was hidden away in my backpack, as if I had never taken it out.
For another matter, my car was missing.