Washing the filth of the world from my hands, I wait. The time had come again, as it always has, as it always will. Never a moment passed without an eerie reminder of what must be done, what has to be. Everywhere I turn, a hollow stare, a brief flash of terror, and it never lasts. The fear I seek so tenaciously seeps through every single one of them, and although it can seem eternal as it lurks behind man's worst fears, it is an ephemeral thing, such that people overlook its true power. Fear is the thing that can drive a man to be more than he ever could have imagined, to do things both great and terrible. It can change a boastful ruler into a frantic coward in the blink of an eye, or a humble peasant into a ruthless murderer.
And it is endless. Fear can come into being through any means, from any source, when treated correctly. Even the most mundane and commonplace items can be instruments of terror, things that strike fear into the hearts of many, and at times for no explainable reason. The things that scare a man into death by simply existing are the strongest of all these, and the hardest to come by. Fear is created by people, it is fed by people, and it never dies. Known or unknown, it will always be at the heels of those who know reason but in dire times can find no use for it.
I will always trail behind it, exiled from those who are fearful, marked as one who is feared, but I will never be fear, only a messenger. Such that I were a true article of fear, my job would be unimaginably easy. My mere existence would frighten an insurmountable quantity, and my presence itself would bring about the death and decay I work so slowly to bring about as I am now. Real fear needs no tools, no aids for its cause. Alas, as I am not a true fear, my pitiful, material weapons will have to do. Such burdenous things, that tear, slice, chop, and drip with the withering fluids of those who think they know fear, that tether me to them in my near-futile attempts to become what so many hate. One day I will find my purpose, but until then, I am simply an agent. When that day comes, I will know the desolace left by emotions that are shattered as I leave in my wake a populace, half-obliterated and trembling before the might of what they themselves unknowingly created. I will taste in the awesome wrath of unfettered power, and my affinity with this intangible force will at last be sated.
I will, however, miss my trench coat dearly. It's been through so much with me.