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Sunday 31 July 2011

-Doc- Inquiry Into the Disease Nature of Supernatural Stalking

I’ll admit, I’ve been scarce for a few weeks now. I’ve gotten a few knocks on the basement door from the others asking if I finally succumbed to the heat, and half of that is probably because I smell like something dead. However, it’s all been for a good cause: I’ve been going through records and attempting to find patterns in all of the cases I’ve handled over the past few years. Yes, I know I mentioned in my first post that I don’t offer medical services to the Stalked outside of this team, but that doesn’t mean I won’t take a look at someone if I happen to be on a delivery anyway.

I’ve been part of this business for several years, and I’ve been one of the Stalked for many more. After I performed my first few deliveries, I found myself awestruck by the seemingly endless variety of physical symptoms present within other Runners. On my fourth delivery, I started to perform physicals on the other Stalked, even accepting a medical history and physical in lieu of monetary payment if it was a freelance job. I’ve amassed quite an impressive collection of names and symptoms over the years, and I’ve begun to see patterns emerging from the murk and mystery. It’s nothing conclusive, and nothing universal. Some of the Runners display few or none of these symptoms, but the majority of cases I’ve been able to document match at least some of these criteria.

Before I launch into my explanation, I will say this: viewing this condition as a disease may be flawed, but it does make some sense. First of all, there is no hard and set definition of disease: after all, centuries ago, corpulence was seen as a sign of wealth, while today we tell an obese person that they should consider a diet and exercise program. Secondly, though I cannot define a universal set of symptoms, I can attempt to list and understand symptoms originating from a common cause. Chronic exposure to the Slender Man has been known to not only exacerbate preexisting medical conditions, but also to create new ones. If I attempted to list off every symptom I saw during every examination, you could probably find about a hundred diseases that could be blamed for only a fraction of those symptoms. Thirdly, I would claim that this disease could almost qualify as an infectious one. The Slender Man has been known on numerous occasions to find new victims who interact frequently with current ones. Though the pathogenic agent in this case is not microscopic, some manner of transmission is possible.

The most common physical symptoms I have noticed include fever, chills, joint pain, nausea, vomiting, predisposition to bruising, stomach ulcers and bleeding, fatigue, headaches, muscular atrophy, bleeding in the trachea and lungs, and bone degeneration. Many of these symptoms are also found in a variety of autoimmune diseases such as lupus. While a more controlled study into the possible similarities between autoimmune disorders and exposure to the Slender Man is necessary to draw any conclusions, I would be curious to see how patients would respond to treatments given to sufferers of autoimmune disorders. Quinine, which is usually used in the treatment of malaria, has been shown to be effective against lupus, though the precise reason why quinine works so well in those cases is still under investigation. I’ve been considering adding quinine to a few of the team members’ treatment plans to see if it helps alleviate some of their symptoms, but some of its side effects may be deadly, so I’m wary. For now, I’m going to continue to recommend non-steroidal anti-inflammatory medications (such as Ibuprofen) to deal with fever, pain, and inflammation, as well as prescription antiemetics as needed.

I’ll admit, a few weeks of pouring over old records is not enough to produce a viable hypothesis. However, if I’m right, the implications could be huge. I wish I could devise an ethical way to study the disease nature of this sickness, but try as I might, I cannot think of one. That’s just as well, I suppose: I don’t think He would give me enough time to complete and publish it.

I may need to get out of this basement for a while. Before it swallows me.

Saturday 30 July 2011

-Spencer- Team, we're heading home

Of course, we had a slight detour, but August can handle that one.

(Not really in the mood to be posting, to be honest)

But I feel we've had enough excitement for the next....

well, forever, really.

But fat chance of us getting any time off.So as soon as we're all back and chipper, it's back to business.
(I have never been so happy to say that, ever.)

Todd, glad to see everything went-
...
Well, you're alive, right? And so is Steele and Doc and deargodthiscouldhavebeenalotworse. So I suggest that you all lay low for a bit.

Oh, and guys?

If I figure out that ANY if you have been in The East Wing, I will personally drag you back to where I found you.
I'll leave it up to your imagination of what will happen from there.

Hugs and Kisses~!

-Amanda-

So we met up with Elaine last night. It went fan-fucking-tastically. I'm surprised that stupid restaurant didn't kick our sorry asses out. Hell, with the shit we started I can't believe the fucking cops weren't called. Fuck Spencer and his fucking theatrics. Sam's never going to shut up about this, ever.

So yeah, you could say it could've gone better. A lot fucking better. Spencer was still a bit out of it from finding him on that street corner which didn't help a damn thing.

He practically exploded when he heard Elaine's plans. Which are to stupidly trek across the country, alone, to finish up some business. Personally, I could care less but August and Spencer obviously care about this chick so she can't get hurt. Or I will be pissed.

I had to leave August and Spencer to take care of some stuff, so I'm two states over heading straight for home. Had to stop for the day because the shaking was making it hard to drive. Like hell am I letting Sam drive right now.

I'm gonna finish this pack and hopefully we'll be on the road again tomorrow

Friday 29 July 2011

-Amanda- Sob Stories

We all have sob stories. Fuck us. It's a requirement for this god forsaken job. We all have fucking sob stories.

Something about this little trip of August's has got me all introspective. I hate that, I hate it so fucking much. I'm never introspective. Can't afford to be.

I miss Adam, the little shit. He was always so fucking happy, until the end. That's what really killed me, watching my stupid kid brother wither and fucking die. He was so damn sad and small in that hospital bed. He looked at me, could barely fucking talk but he managed to whisper something in my ear, 'run Mandy, run from the tree man' He would've been 11.

Like I said, I hate being fucking introspective. I made us change hotels, the other one gave me bad vibes. Made my fingers feel all numb and fucking cold. Can't fucking stand the cold, the cold is His.

And we picked up a surprise while trying to find another hotel. Found Spence on a street corner, covered in blood and muttering to himself. Don't know if the blood is his or some poor fucking sap's, not that it matters. We hauled his ass into the van because fuck we can't leave him there. He's curled up in the corner of our new hotel room and won't fucking speak. How the mighty have fucking fallen.

I hate this fucking trip, but I can't let August down. Fuck, I've let too many people down already.

Thursday 28 July 2011

...
It's white here, blank, not the kind of white you see in the clouds or the white that you see on the first snow of the winter
it's blank, blanker than it's ever been

I read the blog

Cam's dead.

Cam's dead cam's dead and I'm not even there for my team

have you ever been falling for so long you're not sure if you're standing or if the ground is rushing up to meet you

pleased to meet you mr. slim, cause you see, he looked so happy on that night I just couldn't tell him, can't you see? I couldn't have told him, couldn't have, couldn't have, couldn't have, it would have ruined everything-

it's not my fault.
But it is my fault

because I didn't even try

"He was right behind him. Christ, they're not going to last, are they?"

I didn't mean it
I didn't mean it i didn't mean it I swear I didn't mean it

I wasn't sure how much they all remembered about the night I found them.
(alwaysalwaysnightnightnightalways)
Do you know what it looks like when someone is begging you to live? What about all the ones I didn't save?
What about all the ones I chose not to save?

I'm not even sure who I am anymore
Not sure what I'm for
what good I do
I don't do any good, it's just business, don't take it personally, but I can't take all of them in
or at least I tell myself-

... If I had told them
Told Cam.
I wonder.....

Would he have believed me?

I'm going to die here, aren't I?
I'm going to die and leave them all alone
Please god I don't want to die I don't want to help Him I don't want this I DON'T WANT THIS I DON'T WANT THIS ANYMORE
Please just let me keep Him away

I can't do that to all of them again
They need me
please god
they need me




... Don't they?


-August- Bleach and Blood

We arrived in Austin a little over 48 hours after we left the house. While shifts of three hours, off six hours is usually a lot kinder than what we usually get on delivery, it still wears on the team, so a stop at a motel was necessary.

(Look at me, sounding like Spencer.)

The clerk wouldn't stop staring at me the whole time.

It's okay, though. When Amanda is tired she's about 20% bitchier than usual and she pretty much chewed him out when he said they only had one room with a single left.

Still, I didn't sleep. Couldn't.

So much for being there for each other, huh, Cam?

Rest in peace. The world is a shade duller without you.

Anyhow.

We're at an abandoned farmhouse near the Texas/New Mexico border. I can tell Amanda and Sam want to go back home but they're not really willing to raise an argument with me right now.

I'm perched on the windowsill of what used to be an office on the second floor of a flax-colored farmhouse. Most of the south half of the house has been burned to cinders, but the north portion stands eerily intact, and you can stare from the kitchen and see the charred remains of the walls of the guest bedroom.

A spring mattress' skeleton hangs precariously from what used to be the master bedroom. Queen sized. A patchwork quilt used to sit on top with an array of furs and other small blankets. One was stuffed with down. There will pillows as tall as a mountain, and an Indian-weaved carpet on the floors. The floors themselves were hardwood, a deep brown so polished that you could see your reflection. A painting hung above the bed. Fire-Swept Algoma.

The mattress skeleton is home to a family of birds now. The painting's frame lies in ruins on the floor below. Glass is scattered at least fifty feet in each direction.

A paper blows by me now. I catch it. A receipt. Scrap metal. Payment due: well over five thousand dollars. Dated 2004.

Sam and Amanda are downstairs, rummaging through the house for anything useful. They won't find anything. Drifters have scraped this place clean. It's been standing like this for months.

Passed the fields of what used to be corn (now just a mess of tangled weeds with the occasional angry scar of burned, uprooted ground) is a metal building. One of those as-seen-on-TV kinds. Inside there's a combine harvester. John Deere. The paint is rusting with the metal.

There's a warm breeze tonight. It glides over me and makes the scraps of paper dance around the office. Some are newspaper clippings.

"Children missing o-"

"-found dead in-"

"-ocking developments-"

"-no leads, says chief."

There's a common theme.

...




I grew up in Washington.

My dad was Japanese. My mom, Swedish. My dad worked with his father overseas, and my father was sitting on a massive fortune thanks to his electronics company. My mother ran a daycare for all of the other trophy wives, who went out and got their nails done and banged other, younger men behind their husbands backs.

My dad had a brother who was a little bit... unhinged. Nobody in the family liked him. He was unsuccessful and had dropped out of high school. He came to visit us over Christmas. We should have known something was wrong. His eyes were dark and he laughed at the worst times and it was all wrong, wrong, wrong.

On the third night of his visit, I woke up to my mother screaming. I ran into the kitchen. Slipped on something on the ground. The floor was covered with it. When I opened my eyes, my father's head was staring back at me.

I started screaming as well.

The floor was covered in blood and the cabinets were covered in blood and my father was cut to pieces. One arm was lodged down the garbage disposal. Another was laying on the floor beside his head. The torso had been torn open. Bleach was poured inside. I didn't know it at the time, but I could smell it everywhere: bleach and blood. Bleach and blood.

I still smell it sometimes.

My uncle had my mother by the hair and had taken her clothes off. No prizes for guessing what he intended to do, but he heard me fall and he heard my scream and he turned around. He was grinning, but it didn't reach his eyes.

My mother was screaming. Screaming for help, screaming for me to run, but I only stood there and stared.

And then my uncle spoke to me.

"Merry Christmas."

He took the same knife he had used on my father and lodged it through my mother's left eye. Then he stalked towards me.

You know what I did?

I ran.

I ran as fast as I could. Out of the kitchen and over the piles of presents under the tree and out of the house through the snow and the ice and out of the yard and into the neighbours and rang the doorbell until they saw me, little 12-year-old August, screaming and sobbing and begging for help.

They called the police.

It was all over the news the next morning.

My mother died. My uncle had gone back and finished the job. I went under witness protection and they found me a new home in Texas.

I never went back to school.

My new father's name was Allan. He lived on a cattle ranch and also grew corn. Briar Ridge Acres. That's what the farm was called. Allan was patient and loving. He let me sleep in the master bedroom, where I could curl up under the furs and the patchwork quilt and the down-stuffed comforter and pretend that awful, awful night never happened. He was patient when I didn't speak for almost two months after I joined him. He never protested when I called him 'Allan' or 'sir,' but never dad. I couldn't bear it. I wouldn't let myself forget. I learned how to cook and to clean to keep myself busy. I was trying to forget. I wouldn't let myself forget.

Eventually, I found out Allan was more than a cattle rancher.

Allan Sherwood was a specialist in UFOs and crop circles, and not in the zealot way. Allan Sherwood made and faked crop circles and UFO landings as an extra source of income. He taught me how to make the circles and how to assemble a working UFO. He taught me how to flatten an entire crop in a night, and when the two of us worked together we could create some of the most intricate and beautiful designs.

England had nothing on us.

We sold whatever of the crop we hadn't ruined and the cows would be abducted on a regular basis.

Well, eventually somebody caught on.

The government, who else?

They caught him for fraud and made him give back every dollar we had ever gotten from that business. We were left with scarcely a penny to our names, and it hit us hard. Allan started to sleep less and fell into a horrible sickness. He wouldn't stop coughing. His mental condition was getting worse, and a lot of nights I'd see him out in the fields where the circles used to be, just staring into the woods.

But that wasn't the money's fault, was it?

Turns out Allan had actually managed to find files on Slim and Trim while perusing forums on extraterrestrials. He became fascinated and... well, we all know how that ends.

We kept dogs. Five of them, actually. Three of which were half wolf. They were there to protect the cattle, and occasionally, us.

One day, we found one dead on our doorstep. She had been cut open and stretched out.

Bleach and blood.

Over the next couple of weeks, three others disappeared. The last one, Apollo, was with me the night I heard my father scream.

He was in his office. Apollo jumped up and started barking like hell itself had invaded the house. I barely had my eyes open before he tore off upstairs.

I followed suit, nauseous.

Guess who was standing with Allan in the office?

Bleach and blood. Bleach and blood.

I watched life drain away from his eyes. It was the first and last time I'd ever call him dad.

So it's Slim and Trim and me, seventeen, alone in a room.

A few things happened at once.

The air contracted, a hiss like the sound of a vacuum turning on. I could see the faceless man stand before me, unnaturally tall and alien yet somehow... comforting. Time is moving in slow motion. There is no sound after the hiss. I can't move. My head is in a cloud.

Bleach and blood.

There were ten of those tentacles screaming behind him, flailing and whipping up the papers on the table and the books on the shelves.

I read the headlines as they float by.

"Children missing o-"

"-found dead in-"

"-ocking development-"

"-no leads, says chief."

Silence is ripped apart.

There's an awful roar and a burning as I realize I'm being held by those black tendrils that adorn His back. He is standing there, indifferent, as I scream and, with horror, realize the house is burning.

I'm thrown against a bookshelf and it falls and breaks over me. My head is bleeding and I'm seeing stars, sobbing, mutters 'father allan dad mom oh god i don't want to die'

I can't run. I can't move. He's in front of me again. Slashes and burns like whips and I'm hurled out the window onto the roof. I roll onto the ground and hit with a damp thud.

My vision is gray and darkess is creeping from the corners. It doesn't hurt, but I'm panicking. I can't stop panicking.

Bleach and blood. Bleach and blood. Bleach and blood.

The house is on fire.

The Tall Man is staring at me through the window.

Vision nearly black. I'm picked up again. A woman's voice from behind. Pale arms. I can't see who's grabbed me.

Mom? Dad?

I think I'm dying.

Bleach and blood.

I'm listening through a pool of water. The world is monochrome.

Everything goes black.

...

I wake up.

I'm in a van, my body screaming bloody murder at me. Burns litter my body. There's a bad one on my wrist.

There's somebody in the front seat. A gray streak is in his hair, but he's far too young to have gone gray.

A woman with the face of an angel is applying pressure to my arm. I gasp sharply in pain, pulling it away, only to hit something in my chest and scream.

"It's broken for sure, boss."

Really? I couldn't tell.

That was the first time I met Spencer and Doc. Apparently, Allan had asked to have some files delivered, and then had stumbled upon me, crawling, crying, begging to be spared.

They took pity on me. Spencer said I 'might be useful.'

How did he know?

Maybe it's not my place to ask.

All I know is I've been working for him ever since. It's been enjoyable, even if the team is... oddball, to say the least. We're a family, and that's what matters.

I wouldn't have you guys any other way.

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to try and find a hotel.

Wednesday 27 July 2011

-Steele- Day Tripper

Well, my trip was a total bust. I left to try and find a little normalcy, but guess what: The rest of the world’s just as fucked up as our little corner of it.

And it doesn’t feel as cold as the stony walls of our dilapidated abode, either. Which was novel at first, but then the unfamiliar heat just began to remind me of the Motherland, and all the connotations I had been running from. (God, my life’s just been one sprint to another, each trying to escape the situation I was in before, and landing in a new, equally unfortunate one. I’d be depressed if that lifestyle didn’t agree with me so much.)

Until I got to New Jersey. New Jersey was cold.

The weather was just as balmy as the rest of the East Coast, but as I looked off into the Atlantic, an icy breeze came in, chilling me to my core. I looked around at the folk on the boardwalk, shivering, biting my lip…They all seemed just fine. Continuing on, milling about…I felt sick. Christ, not again. I left the wooden planks behind and sat against a tall tree, looking up at the branches, gulping down fresh summer air.
There were no leaves to speak of. The tree was dead, gnarled bark crackling slightly beneath my weight, as I felt my stomach drop and my eyes shudder.

Something wicked this way comes.

I didn’t stay in Jersey for long. I was holed up in a motel, making good use of the minibar (emptying the bottles of vodka and gin, and replacing them with water. Hey, it works sometimes) and listening to the news. Nothing particularly strange. Car crashes, murders, disappearances…Nothing stood out. Nothing obvious. Nothing to make me feel the way I did.

But something was going on.

I hightailed it out of there as soon as I could, only to find my way to New York where August’s little debacle was going on…Only to find my way right back home, where everyone seemed to be in an almighty tizz about this wedding I’ve heard so very much about.

I’m almost sad I missed it: seeing Spencer in full badass mode, and August as a fairly successful harlot is always the highlight of my time in this job. But I spent my time well as I waited for my normalcy, getting a bit of R&R in Vermont. Sure, nothing was going on there (does anything ever go on in Vermont?) but sometimes that’s preferable, y’know?

But now, as I sit back in my garage, listening to the faint sounds of the house settling, and a faint rustling from upstairs…that’s seeming so very far away.

Welcome home, I guess?

Tuesday 26 July 2011

todd's trip

todd made a delivery. lots of bad things happened on this delivery. but todd wouldn't tell his friends about those things.

todd wouldn't tell his friends about how mr. tall, or
Festuca was everywhere. he was behind every tree. he was in every alleyway. he was in every window. he was there when todd saw the man who looked like Servus, standing above his lifeless body. he was there when todd walked out of the music store.

todd wouldn't tell his friends about how he didn't look back as he heard the old man scream what were probably his final screams.
and todd definitely wouldn't tell them about being caught in the loop.

before any of this happened, todd was driving to his hometown, when he noticed that the road kept going straight when it should have been turning. He stepped out of the car, where it was very dark. the kind of dark where you could probably see more by closing your eyes. so todd tried that.

when he did, a path appeared before him. he followed the path through a desert. as he walked along, he saw eight dying trees. these trees looked like they should have been easy to cut down, but he noticed that they all had many axe cuts in them. he looked and saw that there were people amongst the trees. there was a small boy, and next to him a man in a hoodie sleeping.

''who are you'' asked todd.
''i'm Sybylla,'' replied the boy. ''but you can call me sybil."
''isn't sybil a girl's name'' asked todd.
''isn't august a boy's name'' responded sybil.
''how do you know about that''
''i know lots about you.''

''how/ who are you/ who is that.'' asked todd, pointing to the man in the hoodie
''oh, him/ that's Venator. he goes by grosvenor, though.''
suddenly, grosvenor woke up. while laying down, he looked up at todd.
''oh. you.'' he said.

''me/'' said todd, confused.

''you woke me up,'' he said
''i'm....sorry'' responded todd
''don't be. i've been asleep much too long.'' he said, sitting up. ''you should probably get going. your friends are in some trouble. they probably won't need you, though.''
''how do you...'' with a movement like light, grosvenor stood up and covered todd's eyes. todd opened them and was back in his car.

todd wouldn't tell his friends about that.

todd wouldn't tell his friends a lot of things.

oh and spencer, you can have todd back. it's not so lonely in here anymore.

-Todd- Just incase anyone wants to know

Well then.

So, my trip went good. For the most part. As good as things can get with this life, you know?

I only ended up visiting my hometown for a little while on the way up. Place has gone to shit, and not in the way most towns do. There are a lot more trees now, apparently nine kids have just gone missing in the last couple years, and there's even a memorial to this girl who committed suicide. I can only imagine how that happened.

But here's a fun story. I went to this restaurant. Nice little place I don't remember being there when I was around. I wait by the front, and this nice old lady escorts me to a table, and on the way, I see a guy, who, no kidding, looks fucking exactly like Spencer. From the quick glance I got at him, anyway. Unfortunately, I was seated in a place where I could only get a view of the back of his head. I kept an eye on him while I was eating, much to the waitress's uncomfort.

He got up and walked out, so I followed . (I left my money on the table so they knew I wasn't dashing). I followed him out to the parking lot, where he started to look a lot less like Spencer. I mean, they still looked alike, but the main thing they had in common at this point was possibly a Blood Alcohol Content. This guy catches a glimpse of me, cusses me out, calls me numerous nasty names, and vomits a little. I walk back in the restaurant, pay, and leave. Once I get back out, I see the guy lying in the middle of the road, head just fucking smashed in.

the weird thing is, with his face smashed in, he looked a lot more like spencer.


But the delivery. The delivery is what you all want to hear about. So, a few hours after that, I go to the address on the package, which happens to be a music store. I walk in, with some indy rock shit or something playing in the background. The owner of the store, eighty something year old guy with the biggest pair of glasses I have ever seen in my life and a "I'm going to die at any moment" disposition about him. At first he backs away, then he sees the package in my hand.

"Oh thank god," he says. "You are exactly what I need right now."

I give him the package, and he gives me a wad of hundreds. I flip it through my fingers, just sort of an automatic thing most people do when they're given a lot of money. He gets a worried look and says "Oh, it's not enough, is it?" And he rushes in the back. I yell to him that it's fine, he doesn't really need to give me more, and he walks out with the most expensive looking trumpet in the store.

I insist that he doesn't have to do this, and that I really can't play because of bad fingers. He nods, walks to the back, again, and this time, walks back with a very shiny trombone. I take it, just cause I really don't want upset this old guy. I give him the package, and try and walk out. He insists that I stay so he can show me what he got. He opens the box, and pulls out a necklace with the operator symbol on it.

Shit.

"It keeps Him away, you know. This symbol."

I smile. Poor fucker. I get out of there as fast as possible.

Not much else happened.

Sunday 24 July 2011

Uh...

Hey...

Uh...

On my way back, and...

...

What in Christ's name is going on?

I'm trying to read these posts in the dark and I'll I got is a wedding, a fork, a pipebomb, and pajamas.

Fuck it. No need to summarize. Just tell me if I should go to the house or meet up with someone somewhere, or something.

-Sam- Driving

I’m not sure where we are right now.

I’m writing from the backseat of the FREE CANDY van. Amanda’s driving at the moment, and August is in the seat in front of me. I think he’s either asleep or crying, or maybe both. I don’t want to ask.

If you’re reading this blog you probably already know what happened to Cam. I found out when August dragged me out of bed at 4:00 in the morning, eyes red from crying and clutching his injured chest, and told me to get in the van. I was still three-quarters asleep, so I didn’t even realize what was going on until I was sitting in the backseat next to a pissed-off looking Amanda. Then I remembered I was still wearing pajama pants and I’d left my glasses in the house, but before I could run back and get them, August had started up the van and was pulling out of the driveway. When I asked him where we were going, he said “Just read the blog.”

So I did. And…fuck.

Elaine, I’ve never actually talked to you, but if you’re reading this, just know that we’re on our way. Everything’s going to be alright. I have no idea how long it takes to get from Vermont to Texas, but we’ll be there as fast as humanly possible.

See you soon.

-Sam

-August- Going After Elaine

Amanda, Sam, you're coming with me.

Doc, somebody needs to watch out for Spencer.

We'll be home soon.

(I hope. Jesus Rollerblading Christ, I hope.)

Friday 22 July 2011

-Spencer- Team, I love weddings

Because everyone likes suddenly getting thrust into doing a job when you're supposed to be having fun-

Wait, am I getting this wrong?

August and I sobered up and were up and ready for the ceremony. It was gorgeous; even I could see that and I'm an uncultured schmuck.
But I'm also not an idiot. When the busboy with the ridiculously fake German accent turned up, I can't say I was very surprised to see it wasn't simply an exchange student trying to earn some cash.

(Well, you idiot, what did you expect? You barely ever stop moving and you decide to go to a wedding? Stupid!)

So August and I slip in our earpieces and get on it. Doors were locked, I pinned the suspicious character, and I figured everything would go alright from there.


I don't need to summarize what's already there. Read what they said. Go on, I'll wait. Point being, I stabbed a Proxy's eyes out with a FORK and laughed while I was doing so.
... According to August, at least. I'm not sure if he's trying to get back at me for last night or not, but I can't remember doing that.

Well fuck.

Naturally, though, we didn't have time to worry about looking fancy once we got rid of 'em. There was work to be done.

Because, children, what you don't realize is that it's REALLY FUCKING HARD to keep all your conquests under wraps and away from media attention. Keeping all you Runners out of jail isn't easy, but it's something I do.

So I have about half an hour to draw attention away from the hotel massacre.

This is pretty bad. It's even worse when the fucker won't connect me to the chief. It takes three minutes to get to the right person, but boy, is it worth is.

You should've heard him gasp when he heard my voice. It's nice to have power around here. And then August suggested that a small scale explosion would probably work as a distraction.

Dear god, remind me to give that kid a hefty bonus.

Sure, he's tiny and frail, but watching a guy in a dress assemble a miniature pipebomb is something you REALLY need to see to believe.

There was SLIGHT property damage; a vacant tiny house had it's foundation cracked but the one next to it had nothing but a good jolt. Otherwise, the explosion was magnified using tricks to make it sound worse than it actually was. Dry ice makes great fake smoke, and enough well placed megaphones can make a mouse deafening.
Of course, it was a hit. The media jumped on it faster than a starving panther. Mission accomplished.

I dropped off a package, too. So it worked out in the end.

August... Team, I only ask this; MAKE SURE HE RESTS. I need to go back into The Wing to sort shit out. But he's got a cracked rib that he's been walking on.
(using The Path really didn't help things, but hey)

But otherwise?

It was fun.


(Outside from the team, I really didn't have friends. Is it right to say that I feel that I do now?)

Thursday 21 July 2011

-August- Ngggh.

Jesus Rollerblading Christ.

Where did this headache come from?

Why is my makeup smeared?

(Why am I wearing makeup in the first place?)

...

Why is this dress ripped why am I in a dress and why, why, why, why why is it stuffed with fifteen phone numbers and at least two hundred dollars in cash?

...



Spencer.

What in the world happened last night?

Tuesday 19 July 2011

-August- Back Home

Well, that took considerably longer than I thought it would.

Almost a week longer than I thought it would, actually. All thanks to a note taped to the sender's door when I arrived on Wednesday night.

"To the courier -

Took the package myself. Hope the money will cover the gas cost.

God bless,
Stephanie"

I could already see this was going to be a nightmare, because of course I'm not allowed to just say 'oh, well, it's been taken care of' and take them money and run because of course it's never that easy, because there's no such thing as a normal delivery, especially if you're doing it by yourself and especially if you called us to do the delivery in the first place.

Oh, and the small stack of bills she left didn't even begin to cover the costs of travelling from the house to NYC. So there's always that.

... So I was going to hunt her down, then. A near impossible task considering the size of the big apple and the fact that Runners are usually really, really hard to find considering they're people who manage to stay mostly out of reach of Slim N' Trim himself.

Not exactly the easiest of tasks.

But as luck would have it, what do I hear over the radio as I start up the FREE CANDY van?

"... no evidence found. One child reported a man in a suit near the scene of the crime. Police are investigating."

After twenty minutes of staring hopefully at the radio, the story wasn't mentioned again. I didn't catch the location, but if the fact that this was a little too coincidental was anything to go by, I figured I could take a guess as to where the body had been found, and who the body belonged to.

I got to Central Park a bit before midnight, (Jesus Rollerblading Christ this is such a big city.) meaning most reasonable people had left and most of the police force had been sent out. I'll save you the details and tell you that the Central Park Police really know what they're doing.

Looks like I'd get lucky twice today, because the package was on the girl (or what was left of her) and I managed to get out without being caught.

I don't know how, either.

The drop-off was some little village called Mystic in Connecticut. (You may proceed to chuckle at the coincidence; I certainly did.) A five hour drive to avoid the mind-numbingly boring I-95.

But hey, despite having a case of wicked nausea that kept me pulled over every hour or so, (still haven't gotten all the Slendergunk out of me) I had Queen to keep me company.

She's a killer queen
Gunpowder, Gelatine
Dynamite with a laser beam

Let me tell you a few things about the village of Mystic.

The village of Mystic is not a recognized municipality.

The village of Mystic has a population of 4001 people.

The village of Mystic has a total area of 3.8 square miles.

About ten percent of that is water.

The village of Mystic is located within another city by the name of Groton.

And on top of this, there's also the village of Old Mystic, which is about two miles bigger and actually marked on a map.

Needless to say, it was really, really easy to miss.

And guess which one I wasted a whole day in, before driving back out to the larger town of Groton to ask somebody who might actually know what they're doing.

Well, I found it.

It was Sunday by then. I had split the driving up into two days (I think I would die driving for five straight hours. Three hours on and off when I go on delivery with someone else is torture) and wasted Saturday in Old Mystic, growing increasingly frustrated and loathsome of the tiny cardboard box in the passenger's seat. I had decided sometime around Friday evening that there would be nothing short of heaven on earth that would make this delivery worth it. Hunting down a victim, stealing evidence, hundreds of dollars in gas money and fast food.

There's a reason I learned how to cook, you know.

Maybe one day I'll tell you.

Ha.

But back to the delivery.

On the box was an address somewhere in the middle of the suburbs, (And by suburbs, I mean about fifty town houses clustered together with a park somewhere in the middle.) and guess who was waiting for me when I arrived?

Nobody. I was about ready to break into the house, steal whatever was of value, drop the box and get home when their neighbor, regarding the package in my hand, approached me.

"Excuse me, little miss, can I help you?"

He was in his late 40s; salt-and-pepper hair and crow's feet clinging to his eyes. A slight grin was playing on his face, brown eyes looking me up and down.

Creep.

"Delivery for mister... Church?" I ignored the middle bit of that statement. You're here to do a delivery, not to make enemies. Calm, calm...

His brow raised slightly. "Ian's not around, girly. If you step inside I'd be happy to sign for-"

"If you could just give me the spare key I can leave it inside."

Oh, you have got to be kidding me. Nothing in that man's eyes was to be trusted. I took a step back and cut him off, trying very, very hard to hide the obvious irritation in my tone.

Needless to say, I failed.

He didn't like this one bit.

"Now listen here, you gotta be a little more respectful than-"

"We have explicit instructions from both Ian and the sender to leave it inside. It's very valuable. Something about a deceased relative? Anyways, he wants it inside and told me one of the neighbors would have the key."

Blatant lies.

Spencer had taught me well.

(And the nausea's acting up again. Jesus Rollerblading Christ. I need to get into a bathroom. Quickly.)

He didn't argue much after that, retreating back into the house and returning shortly with a key. Grumbling and some less-than-savory language may have been involved in the process, but I was beyond caring. The end was finally in sight.

There was no note because no doubt Mr. Church had expected this package days ago. He was probably on his way to New York to see the sender and... well, he wouldn't like what he found.

I entered the kitchen and left the cardboard box on the counter, glad to finally have that thing off my hands.

And then I realized.

I didn't specify payment.

And how did I know this?

By the stack of bills sitting in a clip on the counter, marked 'FOR THE DELIVERY.'

Notes on the fridge, on the table, in frames on the walls and written on the floor told me this guy had horrible memory issues. Induced by Slim N' Trim? Maybe. But I really didn't care. Something told me this guy would need the money for himself, if only to buy more stickies to write down his name, his home address, and why he's living alone and what was in the package.

A wedding band.

...

Suddenly, this hell became completely worth it.

I didn't take the cash, but there were some fantastic Italian cookbooks in the drawers next to the kitchen. I grabbed a couple (and one East Indian, mmmmmm~) and left my own note.

The drive home would take me another nine hours. Again, I split it into two days.

So now it's Wednesday at 5 AM and I come home, and of course the house is still a mess because I can't expect them to clean, but somebody did the dishes and the kitchen has been scrubbed down, though the smell of vomit and Slendergunk still clings to the air.

I'm dead tired and collapse onto the kitchen table, realizing how comfortable the chair is and what a great pillow this table makes.

I realize the others will be up in an hour or so.

I realize somebody needs to cook them breakfast.

Siiiiiiiiiiiiiiigh.

I drag my legs up from under the chair and practically crawl towards the fridge, stubbing my toe in the dark (because by now I'm used to the headlights of the van) on the counter and yelping like a puppy who's taken his first fall down a flight of stairs.

The light from the inside of the fridge burns my eyes, and I'm looking through two hazy slits.

What's sitting on the top shelf?

A piece of cake, covered in plastic wrap, garnished with a piece of paper.

"Happy birthday, August!

"

Awwwwww.

It's got strawberry frosting jesus rollerblading christ strawberry frosting is my favorite and it could be made of sand and garnished with dandelion heads and it would still taste like sweet, sweet, strawberry-frosted heaven.

Breakfast would have to wait a few minutes, and the slight sugar high made pancakes much, much easier. I also only ended up cooking for five of us seeing as Steele and Todd have flown the coup, (at least for now) which is good because I only made half the recipe.

Anyways, Spencer says we're invited to a wedding tomorrow? I guess I'll have to catch up on blogs some other time. I've got a week's worth of sleep to catch up on and an outfit to plan out.

...


Wait.






Spencer, I'm wearing a what?!

Saturday 16 July 2011

-Sam- A little too quiet

So now there's only four of us here.

That would be just fine, if we lived in a different house. But no, our house has the East Wing. The fucking East Wing that hasn't let me sleep in days.

First it was the sleepwalking. You already know about that. Wherever I try to sleep, I wake up in front of the East Wing door. I tried sleeping in front of the door for a while, but Spencer put a stop to that pretty fast. So I dragged every piece of furniture I could find against the inside of my bedroom door, to slow myself down. It kind of worked the first night. As in, I woke up on the pile of furniture instead of the East Wing. But after that...things changed.

Dreams. So many dreams, and they're all exactly the same. I'm breaking into the East Wing. I always know exactly where I'm going, and I'm always looking for something. As I feel myself getting closer and closer, shadows grow longer and everything starts to twist in on itself, and then I find it.

My parents, torn apart on the ground. My grandmother, burned almost beyond recognition.

And then I see him, and he's holding my sister. She's still just a baby and she's alive. She's alive. She's alive in the East Wing.

And as I'm reaching for her, he's reaching for me at the same time. And then I wake up, with unidentifiable whispers echoing in my ears.

Some part of me really believes she's still alive in there. And I'm scared that with only three other people around, I'll be able to break into the wing before anyone notices and drags me back out.

I know it's not real. I know it's not real. It's all a just a fucking dream.

I also know they never found my sister's body.

-Sam

-Amanda- Well Then

It seems the rats are jumping the doomed ship. Can't say I blame you, I feel it too. That feeling in my bones is getting worse, screaming at me to run to run as hard and far and fast as I can, But that won't help me. Been running for nearly four years and I know I cannot lose this, this strange motley group of people haunted by the same ghosts and locked in a a wrong house. We've, I've, lost too much already to ever just give this up.

Besides, someone has to guard the women and children, as it were. So, good luck you guys. You're gonna need it. I won't say goodbye because we don't have the luxury of goodbyes. Goodbyes are ends and have too little time for ends.

Steele, I'll be saving that bottle of absinthe for your return.

-Todd- In which Todd follows suit

(You know, I'm probably going to regret leaving Spencer with three girls... but will it really make that much of a difference?)

I kinda don't get why we run this blog. We've haven't been getting any orders through Tumblr from what I can see, and any orders we do get are the kind we get all the time. And I don't care what anyone says, shit is more likely to hit the fan harder after we start writing it down.

There's an order out east, near the town I used to live in. I'm definitely taking this one, but I'm sort of debating visiting the place where it all started. Where I met Him. I don't know for sure, but I think I've heard He gets stronger in the places where his victims have memories connected to Him. Or maybe I dreamed that. maybe.

Anyway, this will be one of the first times I've made a delivery this far on my own. Normally, Spencer wouldn't trust me, on account of "Oh shit, Todd went batshit insane". And that opinion hasn't changed, but he seems to understand that I need to get the fuck out of here. This house is getting quiet, and it's messing with my head. I'm losing time but not blacking out. I need noise, I need light, I need interactions with people other than the living dead.

(Sorry about that.)

I'm bringing all the meds I can get. My usual arthritis meds, along with some sedatives, for, you know, just in case. I'll probably bring a phone, too, and I'll make a post if there's anything to report, which there shouldn't be. Hopefully. hopefully. So, while I'm gone you'll all need to...

Fuck.

I don't do anything important, do I?

Ugh. I'll see you guys.

i'll keep him safe. don't you worry.

Friday 15 July 2011

-Steele- Out to Dry.

I think it’s about time for me to hit the trail. The hand is…no longer oozing noticeably, thanks to it being copiously bandaged up (Courtesy to our resident sawbones) but Doc also says it will never function anywhere near as much as it used to, due to the bones not setting right or something (Doc takes the IKEA approach to re-assembling bones, apparently: As in, throws away the manual, plays it by ear, and winds up with a couple of pieces left over. Close enough.) but the important thing is, it’s mine, and it’s still firmly attached to my body. There is Buckley’s chance I'm going to get it cut off, no matter how gnarled and dilapidated it may look.

But as a vain motherfucker, I need to go purchase some gloves. Reason one why I am heading off for a bit.

Reason two? This goddamn house is getting me down. Well, not down, just…strange. I haven’t slept well since it happened. I’ve…Well, I’ve been hearing noises from above the garage. Chittering. I don’t know if I’m imagining it, or if I’m going insane. It’s the East Wing. It freaks the hell out of me…

…But I want to go back. I don’t lie awake scared, I lie awake…curious. Excited…Longing? No, not quite at that stage. And I know Spencer will throttle me if I head in there again, at the very least, so…

I’m getting out. I’ll have my laptop and my phone, but you guys won’t be waking up to my glorious pantsless visage like today until we’ve got another big delivery. And it is a Thursday. (I can only hope you will keep No Pants Thursday alive, in your hearts and your souls.) Until then, I’m going back to the cities. At least there we don’t have the same goddamn closed room syndrome; at least there, people can hear you scream.

I was only here for August’s free food anyway.

Tuesday 12 July 2011

-Amanda- Strange What You Remember

So today's August's birthday. Eighteen. Fuck, he shouldn't be here. None of them should be here. They should be off having fucking normal lives with normal problems.

Instead, they get this. This fucking bullshit with Him, stuck cooped up with those of us cold-hearted and sneaky enough to last as long as we have in this goddamn housing counting down to the fucking inevitable. They're just fucking kids for christ's sake.

I remember when I turned eighteen. Been running for nearly two fucking years. I spent my eighteenth birthday huddled on a park bench in some city I don't even remember the name of. Already a chain smoker, already a caffeine addict of the highest order, already drinking enough to make me look like Spencer's goddamn apprentice. Thank fucking god only two of those stuck.

It was cold, the bad kind of cold. Could barely breathe and what I could breathe cut my throat up like fucking glass. My last cig trembled between my fingers and I just couldn't stop shaking. Some people actually stopped to ask if I was alright. I fucking wasn't, but what could I say? 'Some tall guy in a suit with tentacles want to kill me'? Hell no. I wasn't risking their fucking lives with that bullshit. Bad enough they even came up to me. That's enough sometimes

Some lady with the kindest fucking eyes and red hair pressed a five into my hand. She couldn't have known it was my birthday but it was the nicest present I could've gotten.

So, August? Enjoy your fucking birthday. We have too few anyway.

-August- P.S.

There are a week's worth of reheatable dinners in the fridge. They've all got separate cooking instructions, but if you're having trouble figuring out how the stove works, just remember this: nuking it from orbit is the only way to be sure.

(And by that I mean microwave it. Don't get any ideas.)

You're on your own for lunch and breakfast.

The west wing needs to be vacuumed on Wednesday. North, Friday. The south wing should be fine until I get back.

All the windows (all of them) need to be Windexed and wiped down by Tuesday.

Thursday is for dusting. Don't forget the floorboards and windowsills.

Cleaning supplies are in the broom closet in the kitchen, next to the pantry where Amanda hides her cigs. She knows the one.

If you could mop the kitchen floors that would be absolutely fantastic, seeing as there's still black stuff between the tiles. Mop's in the closet with the supplies. Bucket's on the shelf. Use water from the tub, not the sink.

Laundry can wait until I get back. We've got no major deliveries scheduled for a bit and most of you walk around half naked anyways.

Oh, and if you could do the dishes that would be great.

Call it a birthday present.

-August- Happy Birthday To Me.

Eighteen.

Hey Todd, you're finally allowed to not feel guilty about staring at me like that in all fifty states.

Woo.

Spence has something in NYC he needs me to pick up. Normally I'd argue why he couldn't get it himself, but we've already had our weekly disagreement (twelve years, huh?) and I'm kind of glad to be getting out of the house. The events of the eighth don't exactly give me any grounds to argue on, (as the boss pointed out himself) so I guess it's living in a van for a few days for me.

New York's a ways away and I'll be handling a couple small things of my own; cameras in certain areas and those radio stations are still in need of repair, especially considering one went down with a fire in Manhattan.

(Maybe our little pyromaniacal friend from before? No, no, no, he should be... )

Taking the van. We've got bikes thanks to Spencer's... connections so if you really need to get out there are always those. We're all hermits anyways so I really don't see how it matters.

Love love, be home soon, don't do anything stupid,

August

Monday 11 July 2011

~Steele~ I suppose explanations are in order.

I'm back in the land of the living, and have now got a decent amount of experience typing with one hand. (Yeah, yeah, yuck it up. God reaching the parenthesis is hard.) So I think it’s about time I…elaborate on that night. This will not be a lengthy post, though. Mostly because I am typing at half capacity.

I remember it, kind of, though almost as if I was a mere onlooker. Floating above myself, sitting in silent comprehension of the House and its Master, as I darted down its burning corridors.

This is the part where Doc and Amanda tell me I was tripping balls, so I’m going to blow that little theory out of the water right now. I felt as sick as a dog, and wanted to throw up, but the adrenaline kept me going with a mostly clear head. I was not chemically altered in any sense other than that. (Unless we are talking a really groovy acid flashback, but I think I’m going to have to go with just plain Loopy as my reason for my…mis-identification of certain indicators.)

And…that thing…The shadowy things I saw. I think they were hallucinations…they looked almost human, but walked on all four hands, with inky black skin…But they were tiny, like children…

Maybe it isn’t as clear in my mind as I thought, even now I can feel the exact details of the chase slipping from my mind. But I remember the library. Their nest, with their Master overlooking them from the mezzanine above. Them, and me. I hid behind a bookshelf to send a message (what very well could have been my last), put the phone away, pulled out the gun, and spun around the edge of the bookshelf, but He was already there, tentacles whipping upwards and outwards, elongating, as if worms escaping from a dried out husk…they swung towards me lightning fast and I flicked my hand up to block it (Because blocking Him is going to work), but he wasn’t aiming to hit me, he grabbed me by the hand and flung me up, swinging me like a doll as my hand splintered and I screamed, I think I fired off a shot because my other hand clenched up so tight and the pain was so real that the sickness faded, and all that was left was red rage bursting from my pores, pure venom shooting from my eyes as I landed on the mezzanine level and got pulled into the wooden balcony. He wasn’t even trying to pull me, he was toying with me, giving me a rest before the rest of his slimy little appendages curiously curled their way up here, and then I would be lost, ripped from end to end, stomach in one tree, intestines in the next…but I was still on His leash, he still had me by the hand…

There was no time to think. I jammed the gun barrel into the black mass encasing my other hand, and pulled the trigger, once, twice, three times, four, my skin exploding in red-hot shards of intangible pain, but his tentacle let go and I pulled myself away towards the mezzanine level door, but even as I looked back, there he was, just beyond the balcony, dangling from spindly legs which exploded from his shoulders and reached down towards the main library.

I stood up straight, turned around, and aimed down the sight, feeling dizzy and noting that my hand was shaking violently (which was nothing compared to the mangled mess of the other limb), as I readied myself to make my final shot as His arms reached out lovingly, a gesture of reconciliation, of acceptance, of union with He…

Then I felt a sharp pain in the side of my neck, and it was lights out.

I know why I did what I did. I should’ve stayed in the garage like a good boy, yes. But damnit if I hear a member of this household in trouble, there is no amount of rules I would break, and sacrifices I would make that could stop me from trying to save them. Like it or not, we’re a family, and even though I am the absent uncle of it most of the time, I wouldn’t trade it for the world.

I guess I should count my lucky stars that Amanda and Doc feel the same way.

Sunday 10 July 2011

-August- Everything We Know About The Boss

Evidently, not a whole lot.

The boss is but one of many, many things in this house that seem to be shrouded in more mystery than the beef in Taco Bell's Spicy Gordita Crunch. Where does he get all his money? Where did this house come from, and how did Spence come to own it? What's with the east wing, and why does he willingly live in there? Why all the alcohol? And on the topic of all the bourbon, how is he not dead yet?

And what was that post yesterday about?

Well, I have a few ideas, all of which seem to tie back to the above post.

But let's get through what we know first.

Spencer has access to large amounts of cash.

The boss has outright stated that he has a ridiculous amount of money. This is the man who hands out $50 000 bonuses like they're pieces of candy, and you'd be shocked at the number of zeroes at the end of our paychecks.

Does he have it legally? I don't know. Do I care? Not really.

Spencer has been Slenderstalked for a long, long time.

This comes from the fact that it's fairly obvious to anyone that Spence knows much, much, much more about Mr. Slim n' Trim (and running from him, while we're at it) than he should.

Spencer is, on the surface, much saner than most of the Slenderstalked.

If the events of the 8th show us anything, it's that while a majority of the team was busy freaking out or being possessed, Spencer played Big Damn Hero and basically saved all of us. He's boss for a reason, I guess, but I would think that being stalked for a while longer than us would make his symptoms when everybody got Loopy worse. Then again, maybe it just ties into the fact that...

Spencer consumes enough alcohol to kill every liver north of the equator.

And somehow, he's still alive. Another thing to note is that Spencer is always cold; his skin is freezing to the touch and he's so pale his skin almost looks gray, and is completely translucent.

I read through Doc's report of the injuries following the 7th, and I realized that something didn't seem quite right.

"Boss - pulse 78, 98.6°F. Sustained minor injuries in the struggles last night, needed stitches, nothing else to report."

Nobody saw Spencer get injured.

Amanda's post didn't mention anything about the boss getting hurt. Doc didn't see him become injured, either. Todd doesn't remember anything but has intuition enough to put every woman on earth to shame, so I'm just going to take his word on that.

And I know what you're thinking: he probably just had an older injury that got re-opened.

That's exactly my point.

Why lie about it? Were Amanda and Doc covering for him, or did Spence tell them that as well? Wouldn't Doc notice if the injury had been re-opened, and wasn't fresh? Was she too drugged up and Loopy to care?

Does it matter?

Anyways. Onto our next point...

Even if he isn't insane, he's at the very least bipolar and disturbed.

The fact that he's disturbed isn't a surprise. Anybody stalked by an eldritch abomination isn't going to come out of it all sunshine and rainbows. But the fact that he takes it in stride is more than a lot of us can attest to.

It's also pretty obvious Spencer is bipolar. It's obvious in the very first post of this blog, when he shifts tones so quickly readers should end up with proverbial whiplash. There's no place where it's showcased better than in the post that is the subject of today's... analysis? I guess?

Or maybe it's not. After all...

Spencer is a lying, cheating, dirty-fighting bastard.

Heh. This is something that really has to be seen, seeing as how new this blog is. The boss is apt at fighting. Frighteningly so. He's cold and ruthless when in battle and seems to have every move calculated. He's proficient in almost every weapon I've seen him fight with, (and probably more that I haven't seen) and while he prefers his shovel, he has no qualms with using other weapons if need be.

He also lies like a rug.

Of course, I have no evidence for this so far. The only real proof I have is the fact that his possible bipolarism leads to some very interesting comments from him, all of which seem like Spence showcasing his less-than-excellent acting. He's dipped into dark stuff before and will again, and the bright and cheery optimism seems glued on.

Of course, that's what we know.

But let's move onto today's topic.

Spencer's last post.

Given his cryptic nature, I'm very suspicious when I'm presented with anything that may or may not clear the fog surrounding the boss' past. This isn't the first story he's told us and it certainly won't be the last, and all Joker parallels aside I'm convinced he's not a serial murderer, regardless of how many Proxies we've had to cut through to get the job done.

(They are people, you know; with lives and families and pets and hopes and dreams. We're not allowed to forget that. I'm not allowed to forget that there's the blood of 13 people with jobs and ambitions on my hands alone. The moment we lose our morality and start seeing them as bags of flesh is the moment we're no better than the faceless bastard we're trying to avoid.)

So, does this post explain...

Why Spence has a lot of money?

Yes. Cults the size of towns tend to amass reasonable fortunes.

Does it make sense that Spence would 'robbed the cult who had deceived him blind'?

Yes. This is the man who has stolen Doc's favorite knife right under her nose, and kept it away until she posted. See 'Spencer is a lying, cheating, dirty-fighting bastard' for additional reasoning. (Though not much.)

Does this support the theory that Spencer had been Slenderstalked for a long time?

The implication of the story is that he was born into one of those cults in Indiana. So yes. He'd have been stalked for his entire life, but it wouldn't have gotten worse until he decided to run. Since he was fifteen, by the looks at it. Assuming the service has been running for three years (I've heard him mention it on and off. Sometimes it's seven. Sometimes it's five. Sometimes it's three, sometimes even one. Three is the most common; three is what I'm sticking with. But it can't be one, because Doc says she's been around for two and a half years. I've been here for a little over nine months.) it means Spence has been on the run for at least ten years.

(Then again, nobody knows his true age. We just go by appearance.)

That just seems too far-fetched, even for Spencer. There's absolutely no doubt in my mind that the boss ran for a long time, but eight years of having no place to call your own and constant paranoia is enough to drive anybody absolutely insane, and Spence just isn't that crazy/stupid.

For all his alcohol-induced bipolarism (or maybe the alcohol tones it down? I haven't seen him sober for long enough to tell.) Spencer is far from stupid. Let's just say if there's a scale of genre savviness the boss is somewhere between the one holding the strings and the villain who decides to shoot the hero (twice for good luck) once he's got them in his grasp.

I should also mention one line in particular that stands out in the post.

"Focus, Spencer, focus. Maybe tell a story? God knows you probably won't post this anyway, but you've got to let your mind wander to navigate this, come on, stop thinking...."
Spence, do you know this post is up?

You have to. You commented on it. Allow me to rephrase:

Do you realize what you wrote in this post?

Something tells me that if you'd be sober enough to actually look through the blog you'd realize what you posted, because it's evident you weren't very sober when posting that.

Final question, half out of finally being out of points, and half out of Jesus Rollerblading Christ this post is massive.

Does this story provide a likely history for Spencer?

Yes.

Does this mean that this is likely what happened?

No.

But it's the closest we've got.

-Todd- Just a little pissed.

Only slightly.

I'm no expert on irony, but what happened was something close to or comparable to it. Normally, I'd be used to waking up after blacking out, and everyone around me being hurt. What happened to me in Anxiety seemed to be a subversion of the usual. I woke up, hurt and insecure, but I hadn't harmed anyone. Then that night, (or morning, depending on whatever time it was. Fuck, I don't even know.) I wake up after blacking out to find everyone else mentally or physically damaged in some way.

Except for me. To quote Doc; "Todd - pulse 90, 98.9°F. Nothing else to report." Not even a headache or something, for Chrissakes. But pretty soon, I find out that none of it was because of me. Or, that it all started with me.

For the record, and really hope you guys trust me on this, I have no recollection of writing any of 'prolonging'. But I cannot say in all honesty that I'm not familiar with some of the events described in it. Especially that last scene, to quote... myself, I suppose; "[T]he ...[Slender Man], standing above the dead bodies of the seven protagonists." And yes, that includes me. You know how it is with trying to sleep and dreaming and the like. Although, I have no idea where the whole film festival thing came in.

On a side note, I know no Latin, like, at all. So you're guess is as good as mine when it comes to what those names mean. Although, as Steele pointed out (in a needlessly threatening way, I may
mention), Apparently, I'm a fox, and he is a lion.

Tell me, what sense does that make? Why would I make Steele a larger, and more deadly animal then myself? (I would never refer to a lion as majestic, Steele. The only things they know how to do is eat, sleep, and hump. And kill.)

So, in summary, I black out, I wake up, everyone's fucked up, except for me, and Steele's got it out for me.

Spencer, if we get any orders, assign me. You all need to rest, and frankly, I need to get hurt.

Saturday 9 July 2011

-Sam- I'm okay now

So this morning I woke up tied to a chair, with the worst headache ever and only the foggiest memories of what happened the night before, and I kind of assumed the worst. Then I saw August puking into the sink and Todd sitting on the floor looking confused, and I remembered.

Then I threw up. All over my shirt.

I'm really sorry about what happened last night. I wasn't myself. It's really, really hard to think rationally when your entire (long-dead) family is whispering in your ears that you can't fuck up again and let anybody else die, like you let them die.

They did it all night. That's why I was fighting you so hard, August. I don't know what I said to you, but I didn't mean it, I swear. I'm so sorry.

Anyway, whatever that drug August gave me was, it didn't like me much. I had to throw up a couple more times after breakfast, then I went and took a nap. And what do you know. Fifteen minutes later, I woke up from a nightmare. Leaning against the wall. Next to the entrance to the East Wing.

I dragged myself back to my room, and it happened again. Fall asleep, nightmare, wake up, East Wing. I did it three times before I finally just gave in and curled up on the floor right where I woke up.

And for the first time since I was about nine, I slept without a single nightmare. I just woke up. I'm sitting across the hallway from the East Wing entrance on the second floor right now as I'm writing this.

Don't worry, I won't go in.

Grandma says it's not time yet.

-Sam

-August- Three Hours Together After

A night of near-death experiences, mad hallucinations, enough black sludge to fuel every car in the US for a month, and Slim n' Trim himself...

And we're already back to squabbling like children.

You stay classy, team.

I'll deal with the mess in the kitchen (and I'm not just talking about the reminders of last night, either; these people eat like pigs when they really have to. And what can I say? My pancakes happen to be fantastic.) later, maybe see if Oxiclean can't get this black garbage out of my clothes.

But right now?

Right now, some sleep would be absolutely fantastic.

-Doc- Licking Our Wounds

Last night was...damn. Just, damn. I'm not sure how clear this report will be, I had to take a couple of Vicodin to deal with some injuries of my own, but I have to put down some sort of report while I'm away from my files. I'll copy it there and modify everyone's treatment plans later.

Amanda - pulse 102, 99.1°F.. Not sure why her temperature is elevated, but unless she breaks a fever, I'm not going to worry about it. Pulse is elevated due to stress.

Sam - pulse 74, 97.9°F. She is conscious, and still feeling the effects of the medication August administered to her last night. She seems normal otherwise. Pulse is still a bit depressed, so I'll be keeping an eye on things.

August - pulse 88, 98.7°F. The cocktail of medication I gave seems to be doing its job.

Todd - pulse 90, 98.9°F. Nothing else to report.

Boss - pulse 78, 98.6°F. Sustained minor injuries in the struggles last night, needed stitches, nothing else to report.

Me - pulse 82, 98.9°F. I'm...not feeling that great. My head's been killing me since last night. I tripped on a loose board during the escape and hit my head pretty hard. From what I can tell, my reflexes are fine, so it's probably just sore.

Steele - pulse 68, 102.4°F. He's in terrible shape. The dose I handed off to Amanda to stick him with might've been a bit much. First thing this morning, he was conscious for nearly an hour without showing any real response: just stared at the ceiling and drooled. He mumbled to me a little while I was taking his vitals, but i couldn't make it out, and he didn't react when I tried to speak to him right after. I've gotten him up and around a little, but I don't think he knows what century it is. Unfortunately for the poor bastard, that's not the worst he's got going right now, and I'm not referring to his fever. His left arm was badly dislocated during the escape, but I managed to pop it back in. His left ankle is sprained, but with some time and proper care, it should heal. It's his right hand that I'm worried about. It's been...well, excuse the crude terminology, but it's completely shattered and fucked up. I'm trying to make him as comfortable as possible right now. His reflex tests seemed relatively normal given the circumstances, so I don't believe he's suffered any head injuries. He won't be happy when he becomes fully lucid again, that much I can say. I hope he doesn't need a prosthetic, that's a bit beyond my usual area of expertise. I know some back-alley orthopods who would do it, but I'm sure Steele would prefer to keep his own hand.

General prognosis: we'll all live, but it won't be pretty. Business as usual.

-Amanda- Recap Time

Fuckfuckfuckshitfuck. So I guess I should tell you what happened last night. What with having to rescue Steele and all that bullshit.
So we found Steele. The fuck was holed up in a library I didn't even know we fucking had. (And August don't be a fucking smartass I don't want to know what boss man gets up to in that wing) Anyway, we found the stupid fuck holed up in the library. He was screaming something I can't even begin to understand and I really don't want to understand.
Oh, and he was trying to shoot Tall Dark and Motherfucking Creepy. Let's review that sentence. He. Was. Trying. Shoot. Mister Slim. If you follow the fucked up train of a blog you know how monumentally stupid that is. For christ's sake there is one rule, and one rule only all us Runners agree on and that is don't try to fight Him. It just ends in tears. And bodies up trees.
Me and Doc looked at each other and know this is going to be a lot harder than we had bargained for. And we had bargained for a fucking lot. But jesus fucking christ we were going to have to face Him to get Steele back. And I'll admit, I was scared shitless. I don't scare easily, even before all this shit went down. But I was scared last night. Todd was gone, replaced by some Latin-spouting freak, and Sam was hearing voices and August was puking up that shit that smells like tar and smoke and something fucking dead and I was the only sane one. Let that sink in. I was the sane one, the fucking moody insane chick with a fucking crow. And I had to hold this group of sick, sick people together long enough for someone, anyone, to take them away from me.
And now I had to go face Faceless Himself. Fuck my life. Fuck all of our lives. But you don't just leave a teammate. That's not how it is. We fucking need each other and like hell was I leaving Steele there.
So I tell Doc to give me a syringe of the strongest stuff she has cuz we were not getting Steele out of there with out a fight. He was in full on rabid dog mode, just wanted to kill the bastard and get it over with. If only it was that fucking easy.
The plan was simple. Doc would stay at the door as sort of lookout, I'd go in, dose Steele and drag his sorry ass out of there. And we would just pray He would let us go. I haven't prayed that hard since I was ten and my grandmother made me go to church with stories of burning in hell. She's laughing somewhere, the crazy old bitch.
Doc wasn't lying when she said that was strong stuff, Steele went down like a ton of bricks. That was the thing I forgot to account for. I'm a 5'4 scrawny, malnourished weakling and I had to drag him out of there without help. Well, guess what? I fucking did it. Because I had to it. Luckily, Doc helped take some of the weight when I reached her. Then we just had to hightail it out of there. And that's where it all went even more fucking sideways. We were fucking lost in the east wing and I knew He was following us. It's a fucking weight around you, like an iron hand wrapped around your chest. And still we ran, or tried to run, through corridors that made impossible turns and stairs that lead to fucking nowhere. Christ, I never want to see the east wing ever fucking again. Spence can have it, can do what ever he wants with it. It makes me sick to my stomach, messes with my head. It's fucking wrong, plain and simple.
We turned a blind corner and stumbled through a door and suddenly the hand around my chest tightened so much I couldn't breath. I stumble under Steele's weight and I couldn't fucking breathe.
And my only thought was, 'we didn't get Steele out. we failed. i let them down when they needed me.'
And maybe there is a fucking god because right as the world started going gray around the edges, Spencer is just there. I don't remember him being there, I don't remember him getting there and I didn't give a shit because Spencer was fucking there.
Somehow he managed to hoist me up over his shoulder and take Steele's weight. Everything after that is a bit of a blur of dizziness and blackgraywhite. I came to in the kitchen with the others. Someone drank all my coffee, my cigs were gone, it smelled like crap from August's vomit, and I didn't care. Because we were all there and whole, as far as I could tell. And that was more than most people like us could say.

-Spencer- "When you don't have a plan..."

"It's impossible to know whether your idea is good, bad, or average. Everything just dissolves into chaos and you're left hoping for the best."

... I think I read that somewhere.

It's quiet. Really quiet as I step into The East Wing, and I can almost hear a sigh of relief (from who?) and a bit of a groan (from what?) and then the headache starts and....

Focus, Spencer, focus. Maybe tell a story? God knows you probably won't post this anyway, but you've got to let your mind wander to navigate this, come on, stop thinking....

Once upon a time, in a little town in god knows where, USA, there was this kid who was born. Like every other day, minute, and hour, another little buggered popped out and gave the world a bid hello.
However, you could see that his parents exchanged a look of something awful when it finally happened.
The kid started to grow up. Was home schooled, didn't have any friends, not that it mattered to him much. Was smart. Too smart for his own good, probably. He always noticed something was up; something that was only discussed in harsh whispers and dark corners and that was probably the reason everyone looked at the trees so reverently and with so much...

fear

And he grew older, eventually a decade old, and finally he started to notice where his parents were constantly going to and what all those dark meetings were about. And he was fascinated.

So it goes.

And he found solace in those harsh whispers, because maybe then everyone wouldn't look at him with those dead eyes like he was only second rate, only good for something he didn't understand.

It was the night before his fifteen birthday that everything went wrong. He was ready, ready for what he had been told he had to do, ready to become a part of the people with dead eyes, and he was very, very, afraid.

he was told it would hurt
it would hurt
it still does hurt sometimes

and he stood on the edge of the forest and saw it
and saw It
Him
And he could only stare
this was their god?
something had gone, terribly, terribly wrong
and as soon as the first ray of light hit the treetops he had started to plan
robbed the cult who had deceived him blind
and ran
and ran
and ran
and then they gave him a-


Ohey, look, found 'em! Amanda, Steele, Doc, dear god you look like shit. But they're alive, folks, that's the good news. Alright, kids, let's get you out of here. Fuck, Steele is heavy. stick close, yeah?
(The girls are going to kill me for this later.)

...

They wouldn't have lasted for much longer.

-August- Explanation And Damage Control

Or, as much damage control as I can do perched atop the kitchen counter.

Sam's been out cold since I gave her whatever Doc put in that syringe. Doc, I don't know what you put in there, but it worked wonders.

I'm feeling considerably better myself. The vomiting has stopped for the most part, but it got worse as the night went on because I realized it would be really, really stupid of me to get knocked out by all pills Doc gave me, and even stupider to OD on them. Sam escaped from the chair twice before I finally put her under, and she's been sleeping like a little angel ever since.

Why no, I haven't slept, thanks for asking.





Oh, alright, well, Spence just dropped Todd off and he seems okay. Spencer wants to rip my throat out but at least they're both alive and okay.

Really, Spence, I'm doing better. I'm not seeing ghosts or Mr. Slim n' Trim and the physical symptoms are fading. Slowly, but they're fading.

Sam is still with me and Todd's with me now and Spence is off with the determination and arsenal of a small army, and he is not pleased. At all.

(Not that I blame him.)

Still nothing from Doc, Amanda and Steele. But if the boss is heading back up there, assuming they're alive, they should be back.

Spencer is the only one who seems to have any idea what's going on in that wing, and I'm not the first one to note it as suspicious. That place likes to change layouts like teenage girls change boyfriends and somehow, he knows where he's going.

Well, I'm not going to argue.

And seeing as I certainly don't want to go back and read that disaster of a series of posts, (Eleven of them. Jesus Rollerblading Christ.) I doubt you, mystery reader, want to as well.

(Sam's awake now. She seems mostly sane so I've given her blogging privileges, but she's not being untied until I'm sure she's clean enough to think with a clear head.)

So let's start at the beginning.

We got stuck in a Loop during our last delivery. Normally this isn't really a big deal; we can handle mazes, we can handle Proxies, heck, we can handle Tall, Dark and Faceless - to an extent.

But there are always side effects. Injuries from fighting, Slendersickness, and everybody always feels a bit disoriented after leaving a Loop. The Loops basically completely screw up your internal sense of direction and completely disregard the laws of space-time, so it's not surprising that us mere mortals end up a little strange after being in one, especially after three days of real time.

Normally, we manage just fine.

Doc has a cure for most things and what she can't cure, she just knocks out. Sometimes there will be hallucinations, (a la Sam and Steele) sometimes we succumb to a little bit of the... influence, (a la Todd) and sometimes the sickness just hits us like a semi to the face. (A la me.) The effects are usually randomized, and have less to do with what happened in the Loop and what our current mental state is, and more to do with what's the most inconvenient for us at the time.

Normally, it's not that bad.

There are a couple days when we're seeing figures in the doorways and voices in our head and we sleep with a bucket next to wherever we've decided is the best place to sleep, and then it's back to work.

Not so much this time.

It started with Todd writing us all into his own version of House of Leaves. There's nothing tongue-in-cheek about it, and the lack of capitalization at the end and the general tone threw us off. It was fairly obvious that something wasn't right.

Again, to be expect. Having reality ripped apart and hastily stitched back together doesn't do great things to your health.

But then Amanda went and googled "Dignus est Agnus." We found a prayer. Here's the translation:

"Worthy is the lamb who was slain to accept power and divinity and wisdom and strength and honor and glory and blessing..."

Absolutely wonder, right?


Doc, apparently now high off of whatever she had just taken, and now she's getting Nam-style flashbacks to... well, we don't talk about that stuff. Ask her if you're so curious.

Again, to be expected. Maybe it's that it doesn't seem to bad when it's spoken aloud in conversation, because we're all too far gone with our various symptoms to notice, but in retrospect it all seems horrid and definitely not healthy.

Hindsight is 20/20, I guess.

Amanda was away on the east coast with her own delivery, so she escaped the symptoms. Her post was the small bit of common sense and reassurance that got us together and in the kitchen, and I'm a little bit afraid of what might have happened if we had stayed in our separate parts of the house.

The next post belonged to Sam.

Oh god, Sam.

Sam's fresh meat. She's the newest of all of us, and this was the first time she'd been in The Place Physics Left Behind.

(And even as I type this there are drafts going up from Amanda and Sam. Amanda, we do have a library. It's the boss'. Christ. What was he doing in there? If you're posting I take it you're okay. Spence will be up there soon. Just try and hold on until he finds you.)

We also expect her to get it kind of bad. Worse than the rest of us, certainly. I was a mess of black gunk and hallucinations and mad raving for a week my first time. It does something to you, and not good things. Not good things at all.

Spence's post. Common sense. Ordering us around because Jesus Rollerblading Christ, some direction is what we needed.

Todd official dived off the deep end.

Spencer went into the east wing after him.

We're convinced at this point that Todd's crossed the line and Turned.

"im so sorry
im so sorry
please just dont hurt me
please
ill give him back
i just wanted to get out for a while
im so sorry
"

I'm neither sure of what that means, nor do I know who's speaking. Slim n' Trim? (Not likely.) A split personality? (Possibly.) But it wasn't good, wasn't good at all, but Spencer seemed to have... talked some sense into him?

Everything from here is out of my element. Amanda and Doc went off to try and rescue Steele, because it's obvious now he's gone completely off the rails, and his posts and comments and posts speak for themselves.

And from there Amanda will have to summarize for you, because it was just me having way too many pills, trying to keep Sam sane and visibly flipping the hell out.

Those pills have really made me sleepy. The fact that I haven't slept probably isn't helping.

Todd is doing okay. Sam is still a little woozy and seems a bit high, but other than that the three of us seem to be doing okay.

Spence, Amanda, Doc, Steele.

Please stay safe.