The sun rises bright and clear over the mountains, shining down on another bloody morning in your small town. In other locales, the finding of a dead body is usually greeted with shrieks, and hurried, frantic calls for the police. But not here - in this tiny town exasperation is what you get of late. No one wants to be the first to wake up and go outside. Luckily, someone else has gotten there first again today.

“Another one?” The young shepherd sighs, and turns his gaze from the recently deceased to the sheep standing next to him, grazing on a patch of weeds poking through the cobblestones in the Town Square. “Do you believe this?” His companion declines to answer. The shepherd kneels down next to the body of the young woman lying on the ground. She was the same as the others, unmarked except for a slit throat, a white envelope pinned to the front of her dress. Gingerly, the shepherd reaches out to remove the envelope and read what the murder has to say this time. His eyes widen, and leaving his sheep he hurries across the Square to the largest house.

The shepherd isn’t surprised when despite the early hour the Mayor opens her door at the first knock, fully dressed, holding a shotgun, and with what sounds like a kettle humming in the background. “Who is it this time?” she asks, sounding tired. “You’d better come in.”

“Mr. N. P. Conrad’s daughter,” he says, following her in. “Vicky Tim.” This killing appeared just as random as the others. There were no affluent people in this little town, and hardly anything anyone would kill to have. “I found this, Ms. Dark.” He holds out the white envelope, and Katie Dark sets her gun on the kitchen table and takes it. She reads the contents twice, face impassive, and then shoves her way past the shepherd back out the door.

“Call the undertaker,” she shouts behind her, striding into the Town Square. There’s a large bell near the fountain, only a few feet from the late Ms. Tim. She glances at the body with a grimace, and then pulls the bell cord forcefully three times. She had wanted to deal with this another way, but this was too much. Something had to be done now.

It’s a small town, but it still takes some time for all of you to rise from your beds and assemble in the Square. Enough time for the undertaker and his assistant to come and clean up the corpse, just like he had the ones before. The crowd grows, and the shepherd (wondering where his sheep has got to) brings Mayor Dark a soapbox to stand on. And also her shotgun, for a little extra authority.

“Alright, Katie, what’s this about?” shouts a weathered farmer from the back of the crowd. He’s holding a large and sharp pitchfork, as are many members of the crowd.

“You know what it’s about,” the Mayor replies, and the rumbling crowd quiets down. “Poor Vicky Tim was found dead this morning.”

Gasps erupted from the townsfolk, among them an old man in the front who pointed straight at the shepherd, shrieking, “LET’S LYNCH HIM!”

“No fair! I didn’t even do anything!” He shouts back, waving his arms. The Mayor rolls her eyes, and discharges her gun into the air.

Having thus effectively redirected everyone’s attention, Ms. Dark holds aloft the letter. “The killers left this with the body,” she says. Clearing her throat, she begins to read:

we are the mafia and someones going to die

each night until we are given total controll of the town

and maybe people might even die during the day too

who noes we are completely unpredictable and also

extremely sneaky so don’t even try to find us,

who are experetly hidden amongst you

HA HA HA WE WIN!!!!!!

Singed,

THE MAFIA

Silence.

“What the hell kind of stupid plan is that?” someone shouts.

Katie shrugs. “Illiterate or not, these mafia are dangerous –"

“But that’s like psychopathic behavior,” someone interrupts, yelling in a more thoughtful tone. “The Mafia is an hierarchically organized crime syndicate that uses force and extortion to control –“

“NEVERTHELESS,” the Mayor continues, “It’s quite clear what we have to do.”