Strangetown was very aptly named, to say the least. Aliens, robots, mummies...it was a lot to take in when I first arrived in this little town filled with nothing but sand and heat. But I did it, and I was here to stay. I was a part of the town itself now, after all.

But let me start at the beginning, how I ended up as manager of the Strangetown Hotel to begin with.

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I put the last few items I needed in the trunk of my car,which was a compact 1950's Chevy Chevelle, as my parents came out to say goodbye to me. I was leaving my home in Belladonna Cove after nineteen years to go to Sim State University, in order to study business. I wore a simple outfit consisting of a pair of ordinary blue jeans, a black alien T-shirt and sneakers. I threw my jacket onto the seat beside mine in case I needed it. I slammed the door shut and turned towards my parents, who each gave me a big hug as they said goodbye to me.

"Good luck, honey," my mother told me. "I have a feeling you're going to do really well. Be sure to text us when you get there, okay?"

"Thanks, Mom, I will," I replied, getting into the car and starting it up. "Bye, guys!"

It was then that I drove off. It would take me at least a day to get there, so I occasionally stopped for food and such. The stops padded out the driving time, so I drove during the night as well. At one point during the night, I found myself singing along to Joni Mitchell's 'A Case of You' as I drove. By the time the sun rose, I was well out of the city and driving along a road of sand rather than the concrete one, which had run out a while ago. I eventually went off-course and drove through a stretch of both sand and grass.

I brushed my medium length black hair out of my eyes as I kept my focus on driving. I was approaching a desert with a town not too far away. I knew I had to pass through it to get to the university, so I went in that direction. Unfortunately for me, though, my car started acting up and I knocked over a cactus on my way back onto the road. After doing a sort of lap around the Town Square, my car skidded to an abrupt halt on the side of the road near what looked to be a hotel, leaving dark tracks in its wake. Frustrated, I got out of the car and kicked the side hub-cap a couple of times. It came off, and it went spinning until it landed a few feet away from the now broken-down car. I groaned. Just my luck, I thought. Just as the thought that I needed to find someone who could fix it came into my mind, a man who looked to be fairly old approached me.

"Whoa, there, slick. You're running the wrong way, ain't ya?" he asked me. I raised my eyebrows. He continued, "Strangetown is dying faster than frogs on a freeway. What's your business here?"

"Well, I was passing through here to get to Sim State University, but my car broke down..." I explained, gesturing to the car, which had smoke coming from it.

"Car troubles, eh?" asked the guy, "Well, now, I'm known 'round here as something of a handyman, but don't believe anything else you hear. I'd be willing to have a look under the hood, if you don't mind."

"Really?" I asked. "Thank you so much, sir."

He opened the hood of the car and looked inside, examining the damage. "Shoot, kid. That engine's got more holes than a doughnut shop. It's gonna take a while, a few days maybe."

"Well, shit," I muttered. In normal volume and, well, more politely, I asked, "What do I do until then?"

"You could head on over to the Strangetown Hotel and secure yourself a bed. It's nothing fancy, but I hear they've got pillows."

"That the Hotel?" I asked, pointing to the building near my car.

He nodded. "You tell them Jebediah Jerky sent ya. I don't know that it'll help much, but I like getting my name out there."

"Thank you," I said again, and made my way to the door of the hotel. It looked like a nice place on the outside, but when I stepped through the door, it was dark and there were dust piles and what appeared to be nuclear fuel rods scattered on the floor. There was a concierge snoozing behind the front desk. I approached him and shook him lightly in order to wake him up. "Excuse me, sir—"

"WHA?!" His head shot up as he yelled in surprise. "Oh, ah...welcome to the Strangetown Hotel. Can I help you with, uh..." he stopped and sighed. "Oh, this is pointless. It's not like anyone is paying me anymore."

"Wait, they're not?" I asked, confused.

"That's right," he said, "My boss just walked out yesterday. He said he was fed up with the place, and—Hold on, is the power out? Wow, I guess I've been sleeping for a while. I've got to watch this desk...maybe you could stoke the furnace for me?"

"Uh...yeah, sure," I agreed. I didn't mind helping out. Especially since the old manager clearly didn't care about how he left the place. I felt bad for the concierge, to be honest.

"Thanks," he said. "It's in the basement through the door on the left. Head down the stairs and walk straight ahead. Pick up any of the fuel rods you find lying around—which clearly won't be hard at all—and toss them in the furnace."

"Okay. I'll be back up in a minute. Hey, do you want me to refill this brochure rack on my way down?" I asked as I noticed it was empty.

"Yeah, that'd be good," he said. I nodded and did that as I picked up the fuel rods on the floor. At the bottom of the basement stairs, there were even more, though not as much dust. I picked those up, too, and did as asked, putting them in the furnace and watching the power flicker back on. I noticed other containers around the reactor room that seemed to have once held fuel, but they appeared to be empty now. Maybe that's why I needed to bring the rods down here to refill the furnace.

Anyway, I went back upstairs and went over to the concierge's desk as he said, "Yes! The power's back on. Thanks. Each of those fuel rods last 3 days, though the furnace can obviously hold more than one at a time."

"No problem," I said, "And yeah, I figured that out pretty quickly. What's your name?"

"Cory," he said. "And you're Alessa?" he asked.

I raised my eyebrows again. "How do you know my name?"

"Well, I wanted to ask you—did you drop this note when you came in? I found it behind my computer monitor after you left. Here...I didn't read it but it had the name 'Alessa' on it so I assumed that was you."

I took the note from him and read it over twice, carefully. It read,

There's a reason for everything, Alessa. The sun shines, the Earth spins, and smart people like you run hotels. Good luck. The citizens of Strangetown need your help.

Run....hotels? But I wasn't even out of college yet—hell, I hadn't even started it! But I had been about to study business there, so...

I tucked the note in the pocket of my jeans. Before I could say anything more to Cory, the hotel door opened and Jebediah walked in. "Just wanted to make sure you were all set," he said. "Phew! This place isn't exactly a palace, is it?" he observed as he gazed around the dusty lobby.

"We never saw more than one guest a month, Jeb," interjected Cory, "There was never any reason to clean up."

So that explained it. And yep, I was right. "That's backwards thinking!" Jeb countered, "If you want to bring in the customers you gotta clean the place up! Pick up the trash, vacuum the place...it's easy."

"You may be right, but..." Cory let out a big yawn, "...but I'm not supposed to leave this desk, so Alessa will have to do it."

"Oh, yeah, I wanted to ask what your name was," Jeb looked at me. "Yeah, that's a fair trade. If I'm gonna fix your car, you're gonna have to vacuum this hotel. Deal?"

I remembered the note. "Deal," I agreed, and noticed the vacuum near Cory's desk. It seemed to be cordless, so I just had to turn it on and get started. I found a random thumbtack while vacuuming, but I just pitched it since I didn't know whose it was. I also found a gold tooth, which I would later sell and get $50 for. Coincidentally, a man in a red shirt and black pants walked in looking rather angry just as I finished cleaning away the dust piles. He didn't even notice me, just went over to Cory and started talking.

"You there! I want answers, you hear me?" Cory wasn't too fazed by his tone, surprisingly. "What's this about the owner of the hotel wanting to skip town?"

"He's already gone, Mayor Jackson, he slipped out last night," Cory replied calmly. The mayor, on the other hand, flipped out.

"EGAD! Without a functioning hotel our tourist trade will plummet! We'll be done for!"

Wow, this hotel was pretty important to Strangetown, wasn't it?

"Well, sir, we're doing the best we can, but--" Cory tried to console him, but the mayor just bulldozed him and continued ranting.

"The economy will crash! People will starve! Wars will rage! And I'll be forced to cut my recycling programs! We must do something! Anything! Everything! Now! Please help!" He made some sort of wailing noise. "Oh, what a world..."

He seemed to have gotten pretty dramatic near the end. I mean, wars? Really? That seemed a tad extreme to me. I wanted to tell him I was willing to help and that it would be okay, but a woman walked in before I could speak. She had short brown hair, and wore a pink skirt and brown boots with a blue jacket over a white shirt.

"Mayor Jackson? Excuse me; I've been looking for you everywhere. It seems you have a meeting at—"

"He's gone bonkers again, Mrs. Hogg," Cory explained, gesturing to Mayor Jackson.

"Oh heavens," she said, and then she noticed me. "Is this kid some kind of agitator or something?"

"No, I was just helping clean up the hotel," I replied, "He came in already like this. It just sort of got worse."

"Ah, I see. Well, when he gets emotional there's no solution but to restrain him with soothing words. Otherwise he'll stay loopy."

"I was already debating trying to comfort him, so that's perfect," I replied. As she walked away to get a brochure, I noticed she seemed a little bit sad. But I decided that Mayor Jackson was my main priority right now. I walked up to him. It took a few minutes and a lot of talking, but he eventually calmed down. "Wh-what's happened? I feel funny. Did I go on one of my rampages again?"

"Yeah," I answered.

"Sorry about that. What do they call you, kid?"

"My name is Alessa," I told him. "I'm kind of new to the town."

"Nice to meet you, Alessa. Listen, we're in trouble here. This hotel is one of the only sources of money in Strangetown. If it goes under, the town goes with it."

"Well, Mayor Jackson, I actually have--" I started to take out the note, but he cut me off.

"Help us turn this dingy dormitory into a world-class palace of leisure. Just say yes!"

"That would be grand," agreed Cory," We could get a pool, a couple of lounges, a restaurant, maybe a gallery, and perhaps—"

"Perhaps," interjected Mrs. Hogg, "we should start by building a casino."

"Good thinking, Mrs. Hogg. That's a perfect way to attract guests. Alessa, talk to Tristan Legend about building a casino. He's our local handyman."

"Tristan?" Mrs. Hogg's eyes lit up. She obviously had a little crush on this Tristan guy. "Ooh! Actually, maybe I should talk to him for you. I know he likes to hang out in the desert, so—"

"Stay out of this one, Mrs. Hogg. Alessa, are you willing to help us?"

"Yes," I said, "I have a note here, actually. Do you want to read it?" I handed it to him. He read it over and grinned.

"Perfect. I think I know who it's from, too. Alessa, follow me. Before you go looking for Tristan, I want to show you where you'll be staying, now that you're the new manager and all. Come on..." We headed over to a door opposite the basement, which contained a suite that was fairly large, but didn't have a lot of furniture inside. The old manager probably took a bunch of stuff with him when he left, I would imagine. "So, here's the Manager's suite," Mayor Jackson went on, "your home base. You've got the basics to start with—a bed, a shower, etcetera—but you can feel free to decorate it however you like. And this over here on the wall is a Stat panel, sort of like a computer that tells you certain information you may need. Not the registry, you'd need to talk to Cory about that yourself. Anyway, get to know the place before you get to work. Relax and, well, take a shower before you go looking for Tristan. You're smelling a little ripe. I'll see you later." He then left.

I had been planning on showering anyway, knowing that, so I decided to get that over with immediately. I also got something to eat quickly, and I took a look at the rest of the town to see if Tristan was in any of the buildings. There was a store, the City Hall, a saloon and the Sheriff's station. Across from the station was a lot where cows and a bull were hanging out. I didn't find Tristan in any of those places, so I decided to check the desert as Mrs. Hogg had suggested earlier. And he was, indeed, there. He looked devastated, though.

I approached him. "Hello," I greeted him, trying to be friendly.

"Hi," he replied sadly. "You ever caught a meteor with your bare hands? It takes time to get used to the heat and the pain, but it's a good cure for loneliness."

"What's wrong? Why are you lonely?" I asked.

"Why am I lonely?" He repeated, "Well, I'll say this: It ain't an easy thing to see the woman you love carried off by a pack of giant scorpions."

"Wait, what?" I was confused. "Are you serious?"

"Yeah," he said, "Although they were probably some kind of aliens, you never know. Strangetown's seen plenty of those. Hey, I didn't recognize you. What's your name?"

"Alessa," I answered.

"Fascinating," he said, "So what can I do for you, Alessa?"

I explained why I'd come, what Mayor Jackson and Cory had sent me out here for and everything.

"A pair of strong hands for building, huh? How kind of you. And I'd be happy to help you...if I were happy at all. But I'm not. I think I'm going to stand right here and mope a bit. I'm trying my best to do a little crying, too, so step back."

The thing was, he looked like he had already been crying. And you could hear it in his voice. And right after he said that, he sniffled.

"Look," I said, trying to comfort him, "It'll get better. I know it's really hard right now, but things might be better tomorrow. It is another day, after all, you know what I mean? I think you should try and...and move forward. It'll take time, but it's possible. Trust me, Tristan."

He looked up, tears forming in his eyes. He wiped them away and gave a weak smile. "You're right, kid. Tomorrow is another day...I can't believe I never thought of that."

"Sometimes I think I should've chosen social work as my major," I said, and he laughed.

"So Honest Jackson wants me to build a casino, huh? Well OK, I can do it but we'll need a building permit first. Honest knows that!"

"Wait, his first name is Honest?"

"Yep," he replied. "You can buy building permits at City Hall. Anytime you want to add a room to the hotel you have to buy one. Then they usually send me to build it. Do you want me to come with you?"

"Yeah, sure," I replied, and we both headed back to the town. On the way to city hall, I got to know Tristan a little bit. He also told me a fair bit about the town. It was one of those towns where everyone knew each other, and looked out for each other for the most part. A few people moved here from other places, though they did so voluntarily. We were able to get the building permit no problem, and Tristan told me it would take a couple days to get the casino built. During that time, I called my school and let them know I couldn't make it to my registration and that I wouldn't be attending. I also let my parents know where I was in case they wanted to see me and all that. Basically, I got settled in and got to know some people. It was nice. It wasn't until the casino was built that I would find out the degree of strange the town achieved. Or, at least, the tip of the iceberg.