Disclaimer: The Slenderman Mythos isn't mine. Go figure.
A/N: This fanfiction is a part of the Anti-Cliche and Mary-Sue Elimination Society. Newcomers may find it confusing. To see more stories, visit our C2.
OOO
Insert Eldritch Internet Phenomenon Here
"Where the frigging hell are we?"
"You asked me that two minutes ago when we ran into this fandom, brother. If I didn't know then, what makes you think I'm going to know now?"
"Well I was putting some faith in your Plot Summary," Michael admitted, looking sadly at the tangled mess of plastic and wires that now protruded from Tash's bag. The Society leader growled and pressed the button on her phone to stop the screen from dying. In the pitch black night of their surroundings, it was their only source of light.
"Well, I'm sorry," Tash sighed. "But no Plot Summary, recognition or sparks of pure luck have given me any clue as to where we are, other than the obvious."
'The obvious' was a forest in the middle of nowhere.
"Well, you know, if I had to make any further guesses as to where we are…" Michael pushed his glasses up his nose and put his 'wise face' on. "I'd say, and don't quote me on this... we are in the woods," he proclaimed, pointing a finger up, one hand neatly behind his back.
"Ugh, look out mortals, I do believe we have a regular Sherlock Holmes, here," the Darkness deadpanned.
"Quiet, you."
"How's your plothole generator?" Tash added. Pulling out his ray-gun like device, Michael gave it a hopeless shake. It gave an unhealthy-sounding rattle.
"Eh, shorted out completely. No help there. We'll have to rely on your mad plothole skillz once we find them."
"Oh joy. They're both probably miles away by now," Tash huffed. "And we have no idea which way to go. It's the middle of the night and I don't see any signs of human habitation."
"Oh good, so nobody has to watch us stumble around like idiots." Michael sounded genuinely relieved, causing his sister to arch her eyebrows up her forehead. Her phone helpfully dimmed to save power again, and she impatiently unlocked it.
"Yes... well... shall we just start walking? We've got to run into something eventually. With any luck, maybe it'll be the Sue or the Stu and they'll have tripped over a tree root or something…"
Michael shrugged. It was very hard to feel down about being lost when you had a super-powered entity that liked to find creative new ways to rip people in two living in your brain. Besides, Tash could Plot Hole her way out of Cthulhu's mouth – they could get home any time they liked.
The hairs on the back of his neck abruptly stood on end as they crunched their way down the pathway. The sky above them was not completely black, but stained a murky brown through the clouds. It was slightly disconcerting to not see a single star. It was also unnaturally still. The trees around them stood tall and watchful, never crossing the invisible line into the pathway, as though they feared to intrude. Any creature could be waiting in this forest, and you would never know until it pounced, Michael thought.
He jumped and his heart raced, but it was just Tash stepping on a twig, and he berated himself for being so silly.
"I spy with my little eye," he said. "Something beginning with... L."
"I can't see shit," came the dry response. "Hang on – I need my glasses."
She thrust the phone into his grasp while she rummaged in her bag.
"Okay, sorry." The leader apologised, taking her phone back, and hissed as the glow died again. "Light?"
"Nope."
"Leaf?" she guessed, peering around the forest.
"Yup. Your go."
"M'kay. I spy with my little eye... something beginning with… G."
"Ground?"
"Nope."
"Gravel?"
"Yes."
"Technically you should have given me ground. I mean the gravel is the ground."
"The gravel is the ground, but gravel and ground are not the same, brother."
"Okay, okay. I spy-"
A piercing shriek filled the sentence for him, and both siblings froze. It had come from beyond the row of trees that lined the left of their pathway. Bolting like a pair of rabbits, both Michael and Tash charged for the trees, clawing their way through the branches that reached out to snare them, desperate to reach whoever needed trouble.
Experience in the Anti-Cliché and Mary-Sue Elimination Society had taught Michael that when somebody screamed, you were more than likely to walk in on blood (or fangirls). However as they burst into the clearing, he was astonished to find neither. There was no blood in sight along the dimly lit pathway, and there were definitely no fangirls. There was a very large, bare tree, with tall branches that reached up like spindly fingers to grasp at the night's sky. It was very creepy, but not worthy of a scream.
The only thing out of place was Nikka, the Mary Sue that they had been chasing. Strangely, she no longer looked hopelessly gorgeous. Her dark hair was knotted, and her fair skin was bloodless in the dim glow of Tash's mobile phone. She was on her knees, hands pressed over her mouth as she heaved like she was about to be sick. At the appearance of the two Society agents, she gave another shriek, and flung herself away onto her butt, before recognising them.
Michael was fully prepared for her to get to her feet and flee… so he was understandably confused when instead she let out an almost hysterical whimper of relief and flung herself around Tash's waist. Michael could never recall a situation where a Sue had thrown herself at them before… well, except for that Fifty Shades of Grey Sue, but that was a story best forgotten.
"Uhhh… Nikka?" Tash seemed just as surprised as Michael, but her confusion was rapidly giving way to concern as both siblings registered just how much she was shaking.
"Don't let it get me! Please don't let it get me!"
Experience had also taught Michael that the only thing he could rely on in this mad life of Sue Hunting was his own instincts, and there was a cold chill on the back of his neck which was telling him that they needed to get out of there.
"Nothing's going to get you." Tash had adopted what Michael thought of as her 'first aid' voice. Had her arms not been wedged to her side by the Sue, Michael was pretty sure that she would have been hugging her. "Where's Johan?"
At the mention of her partner in crime, Nikka burst into fresh terrified panting.
"I told him not to look, but he did! He did and it took him!" She seized the collar of Tash's jacket and began to shake the leader. "We have to leave! Please, we have to leave now!"
Michael shuddered. Whatever it was, it seemed pretty powerful to take a level six Stu against their will. But it didn't exactly clue him in on what it was, or even what fandom they might be in.
"Aneki, plothole," he ordered. Chain of command be damned – every instinct in his body was telling him that he did not want to stay here and find out what had happened to Johan. Tash seemed surprised, but did as commanded with a click of her fingers.
Nothing happened.
"What?" came Tash's flat reply. She tried again, to no avail. The cold was creeping all the way up and down Michael's spine now. "We got into this fandom okay, so what the hell?" Something occurred to her, and she tapped the top of the Sue's head to get her attention. "Nikka, what fandom are we in? We jumped out of Harry Potter so fast I didn't have time to check your destination."
But Michael did not care anymore about Nikka's ability to reply. His stare had stretched out along the pathway, up to the tall spooky tree, and found something that was too pale to be a stray leaf. Pinned to the bark in the gloom of the night was a single piece of paper with two words on it.
"Help me."
Terrifyingly sick understanding urged him to pick it up... you can't win the game without all eight of the notes, he thought vacantly... but his feet were rooted to the ground.
"Oh God..."
And then it was Tash who screamed.
Michael whipped around, even as his stumbling brain screamed that that was a really bad idea. Then he saw it – taller and leaner than any natural man. A surprisingly clean black suit. A white egg-shaped head with no face. With a single terrified shriek, Nikka had ripped free of Tash's arms, shoved past Michael, and was bolting down the pathway in blind panic.
In the half a second it took Michael to right himself, the air filled with the sound of eardrum-shatteringly loud static. His vision began to grow fuzzy like a badly tuned TV, and panic surged through him – he couldn't see, and if he couldn't see then he couldn't run… Tash was screaming again and Michael had a sudden vision of half a dozen whipping, grasping tentacles that snapped angrily at the air, lurching from the back of that too-clean suit.
"What the bloody hell IS that thing?" the Darkness cried, the very evident tone of fear lacing his growling voice.
Michael did not offer an answer. Instead he seized his terrified sister by the back of her jacket and finally gave into his instincts to flee. The action of being grabbed seemed to jolt Tash out of her paralysis, and both of them bolted into the forest, flinching as the branches reached out to stroke and brush their shoulders. Michael didn't dare look back to see if any of them were tentacles.
"Aneki…" The chief agent finally found some spare breath to breathe, as he dodged a tree trunk that hadn't been there a second ago. "First rule… of Slender: The Eight Pages is… don't stare at the Slenderman!"
"I'm sorry!" he hadn't been aware that it was possible for Tash's voice to hit that kind of pitch. Not that he was much better – his heart was banging in time to every crashing footstep. "I just… fuck, I couldn't move! It was just there and…"
She let out a frightened gasp, and Michael impatiently yanked a tree branch aside. "What do we do? We can't even fight it… can we?"
"Hm. Darkness?" Michael questioned his inner parasite.
"Fuck you both! There is no conceivable way I am fighting... whatever the hell this thing is! I'm a fuzzy kitten compared to that creature's malevolence! You lot are on your own."
"He's being a big baby about it, and says he doesn't want anything to do with it."
Tash said something which might have been a swear word – it was too distorted to tell. Chancing a glance over his shoulder, Michael saw her anxiously looking back at the black forest behind them for any sight of their pursuer. He gave her a sharp yank.
"Eyes front Aneki! You know what looking back does in this game," he snapped, dragging her further into the trees before finally pulling to a stop, burying one hand in his face and groaning. Tash bent double by the nearest trunk, and Michael could hear the sounds of her losing her dinner.
"Okay... here's what we're gonna do. We're gonna go look for Nikka. We find Nikka, and we get the hell out of here because I'm pretty sure Slenderman is one of the few things we can't beat."
"I can't…" Tash was gasping. "I can't do it… my plotholes aren't working… it must be because we started the game by entering the forest. We can't get out."
She sounded close to hysterics, and another wave of nausea took her from the conversation. Tash was rarely terrified by anything, and to see her in this state unnerved Michael more than an entire forest of Slendermen… Slendermans? What was the plural for Slenderman anyway?
"I'm sure that grammatical conundrum will be of the upmost importance when you are dead!" the Darkness hissed. "Focus, boy!"
The scathing tone was for once appreciated, and Michael felt the shake from his hands die down to a manageable level.
"We'll climb over the fence and leg it to the next town if we have to," he said, rationally. "As far away as possible until we can use plotholes again – or until we have a decent enough signal to call the Library for help."
He scanned the area. No sign of Slenderman – he did have another victim to stalk – but he also had no idea where on earth in the map they were. They would need to find a landmark before they did anything else.
"This fandom is blacklisted," Tash reminded him weakly, wiping her mouth on the back of her hand. "The only reason we got in here in the first place was because we're leaders and have top level clearance."
Watching Tash worry was like watching bricks stack themselves up, one at a time, each looking more wobbly and unstable than the last. If they were going to make a long and treacherous journey through a densely packed forest in perpetual night, looking for a terrified, scatter-brained Mary Sue, all the while being stalked and potentially maimed by an evil entity even the Darkness was terrified of, Michael knew instinctively that he was going to have to try and keep Tash firmly rooted to the ground. He had to stop those bricks of worry from building themselves. He could not afford to be treating a panic attack in these circumstances.
"What a delightful itinerary host – I do so love your optimism."
"Fuck off – you're the one being a baby."
"I make no apologies for being terrified of that thing, host. And I don't think you do either."
Michael wisely said nothing.
OOO
She only had one thought.
Run.
Where? She didn't know. Any direction was better than being near that thing. She hadn't even seen it coming. Neither had Johan. That was why she had been the one to scream when their vision had started to fuzz up. She had been the one to run, and shriek at him to move. And why she had been the one to survive, while her partner had been cut into ribbons by that thing. She had chanced a glance back before fleeing the clearing completely – all she had seen was his remains spread out across the gravel, his torso ripped open like a present at an excited eight year olds birthday party.
She knew something. She didn't want to be near that thing. Ever again. She needed to get out of here.
But where to go?
She didn't know where she was going. Everything looked the same. That tree on the right, had she passed it before? Was someone playing a cruel, sick joke on her and making her run in circles? Her lungs burned with exertion as she dashed through the trees, feeling the low hanging branches and wood cutting into her otherwise flawless skin.
She paused on another pathway with her back to a tree. That was good, right? No way to get snuck up on. She could see anyone coming up on her.
Or, as the chilling though came into her mind a second later, he could see her.
Suddenly, being out in this clearing was not a good idea. She didn't want to be vulnerable. She wanted to be hidden, out of sight. She should be feeling that, here! She was in the woods! Why didn't she feel safe? Probably because this was his domain. Rather than let the thoughts continue to eat away at self-restraint, she rushed off down another path, and kept on going. It felt blind, but blind was all she had.
Eventually, it seemed, her speed paid off. She stood in front of a brick wall that stretched off to either side. This was just as good a place as any. So, she quickly scoured the wall until she found an entrance, leading into a dark, labyrinthine interior. This was good right? Being out of sight was good, surely? If she was in the dark, she could wait until help turned up.
She walked in, using her hands to guide her through the darkness while her eyes began to adjust. She felt a little safer in here. However, it was quite filthy. Mould, mud and excrement was caked on the walls, spread everywhere, the smell almost too much for her. But she had to deal with it. Whatever kept her safe.
She found herself finally give into her exhaustion and she pressed her back against the wall and slid down, dirtying her clothes even further. She gave a low sigh and pressed her head against the wall, for the briefest moment regretting it. It was brief, because she could hear the soft crumple of a piece of paper. Frowning, she reached back and grabbed it.
It took her eyes a second to adjust, but she could see the picture, her eyes narrowing.
"Leave me alone"
She stared at it for a moment, dread filling her stomach again and her hands shaking.
She wasn't alone.
Her eyes scanned up.
She saw the suit.
Tentacles exploded from his back.
And she screamed.
OOO
"If we see the eight pages, should we pick them up?"
"Aneki, if we collect the pages, Slendy gets more persistent in his stalking. So that's not a good idea."
Michael swiped at another tree branch. It wasn't hard to tell that he was sick of nature after only ten minutes plodding through the forest. They couldn't exactly be quiet either, as Tash's phone was proving singularly useless as a torch, and they could only leave their feet to the mercy of the undergrowth.
Tash swallowed thickly. She hadn't been this afraid in a long time. She was afraid of one of them tripping and breaking a leg. She was afraid of not having any light at all. She was afraid of spying that blank face in amongst the trees, and at the same time, she was afraid that she couldn't. She was sure that Michael felt the same. He hadn't let go of her hand since he had helped her up from her knees on the path, and the pressure he was using to squeeze would have rivalled a woman in labour.
The path twisted and turned in on itself, churning Tash's stomach up again. There was a reason she had never played Slender: The Eight Pages. Aside from a terrible sense of direction, which had once got her lost in a French DIY store car park, she had an anxiety disorder which was uncontrollable when confronted with a fear stimulus. And there was plenty of that lurking in this dark, cold and uniform forest.
At least... it looked uniform until the tall thin man appeared beside a tree trunk, she thought to herself. And the worst part was you often only saw him out of the corner of your eye. She wished she could close hers, like a bad dream, and find herself back in her bed in the Library.
Suddenly fearful, she hurried closer to Michael's side.
"Please don't leave me," she whispered.
"Only if you promise not to leave me," he replied, deadly serious.
Michael, who breathed horror and all manner of tortures without blinking, was asking her for safety? Now she felt a million times more scared.
They pushed on through the woods until they came to a break from the clusters of trees.
"Petrol tanks?" Tash asked. She vaguely remembered petrol tanks in some of the Let's Plays that she had watched... when she wasn't cowering behind her pillow. "Isn't there usually a note around here?"
Michael shrugged. "It depends. The game randomly spawns them. And the map is pretty big."
He pushed an intrusive branch out of the way and beamed. "Okay, let's get out of the trees and back on the path. At least now we won't trip over stray roots."
The tanks were an ugly brownish yellow, flecked with rust and mud. Tash tried to count them all, but it was impossible to see in the darkness. She fished her phone out of her pocket and switched it on again, cursing herself for not downloading the flashlight app, as she and Michael weaved their way between the closest two.
"If we see... him." Tash swallowed hard. "What do we do?"
"Run like fuck," Michael said flatly. "And don't look back. That's all you can do against Slendy. We're no match for him. Even Adrian and the Counter Guardians would be no match for him." He snorted. "All those level ten Mary Sues we've faced? They wouldn't last two seconds against him-"
"Okay, I get it!" Tash held up her hands to stop the never-ending flow of nightmare fuel that was only making her paranoia worse. Her usual refuge in mockery or audacity wasn't going to help her here, when she knew full well that the eldritch abomination stalking these woods was one of the few things that would have been capable of killing Willowe herself.
Something shifted in the corner of her eye, and she whipped around violently, but it was only a tree branch catching on the moonlight. She huddled closer to Michael as they walked down the middle row of tanks. She wondered if any Sues had ever been stupid enough to come here, and face the wrath of the Slenderman. It was almost certain that they had not survived.
"Nothing," Michael said, peering down the next row of tanks. "Come on. Don't look back... just in case."
"Yeah..." Tash nodded, squeezing his hand. She hated the noise that her feet made on the gravel. Thoughts of her speed made her feel a little better. She and Michael were certainly faster than the average human being, thanks to their own powers, though Tash knew from experience that flashstepping while panicked often did not go well – a successful face-plant off a three story building had proved that.
A thought bubbled up in her mind, and a small giggle burst from her lips.
"What's so funny?" Michael asked, a concerned frown on his face. Tash wondered if she were perhaps a little hysterical, and tried to get herself under control.
"I was just thinking," she said, her mirth clearing up quickly. "How we are so lucky that Passion died before this game was released."
Michael's eyes widened in horror, and he gave a shudder. "Yeah. Fuck, he probably would have found a way to release three Slendys just for the lols." He examined the wall of the next tank. "No note... there might not be one here-"
They both froze instantly. An ominous 'boom' was echoing from far away, over and over again like the blood in their ears.
"Did you pick up a page?" Tash asked, knowing that particular audio cue and what it meant.
"No." Michael shook his head. "There was one back on the pathway, but I didn't have time to pick it up. It must be Nikka. She might just be following the game because she's too frightened to do anything else. We'd better find her soon before Slenderman does..."
He leaned around the next row of tanks. "Nothing. Last one, and then let's move on. The toilet block is just over there-"
He broke off, rounding the tank corner, and catching sight of something fluttering in the wind. Tash saw it too – another note, hanging there innocently, unaware of the kind of horror it could attract. There was a tug on Tash's hand as Michael pulled her along the side of the tank, picking up the note with his free hand.
"Always watches. No eyes."
"I thought we weren't going to pick them up?" Tash hissed in terror. She didn't want to be near the thing – a shiver went up her back at the very thought.
"We're not," Michael said, rummaging in his pockets for his lighter. "I'm going to burn them – Slendy can't follow us if we don't have them, and this way, Nikka won't pick them up."
Tash's banging heart seemed to calm slightly, but the chill on the back of her neck remained. "Okay… that makes sense I guess." She glanced off across the path. "Hey, is that the toilet block?"
Michael squinted through the darkness and nodded as he saw the brick building come into his line of vision. "Yup, probably better to do it now, before we get more notes. You do not want to be trapped in there."
"Mhmm…" Tash said absently, as her legs started to tremble. "Hey, Michael, you said we were out of trees didn't you?"
"Yeah?"
Tash drew a deliberately deep breath, and squeezed his hand before whispering.
"So what's that on my shoulder?"
It was there – slithering up over her jacket and softly brushing at her ear, but it was enough to make her stomach turn and roll in a sickening fashion. Michael turned to look, and instantly the tentacle tightened across her face, smothering the screams that burst out of her mouth, while another wrapped around her waist and squeezed like a boa constrictor. She was sure she was going to break in half, her body's feeble resistance already crumbling as the tentacles whipped her around to stare at the blank face of nightmares.
Thicker snake-like tentacles burst out from behind her and seized the ones holding her in a vicious struggle for dominance. The grip fell slack and she fell to the ground, looking up to find Michael, eyes glowing yellow, whipping at the attacking tentacles in an effort to keep them back. But the element of surprise was gone, and Slenderman was recovering fast, reaching out to ensnare them both once again.
"Run!"
Rolling to her feet, Tash fled into the woods, heart pounding again, and the ghost of that horrible tentacle still teasing her neck and shoulders. Not stopping to look back, she gave into Michael's advice, and ran like fuck.
OOO
Michael was sure in that minute that he was going to die.
And yet as he smacked off another onslaught of tentacles he blinked, and Slenderman vanished as if he had never been there, leaving him sweating and panting by the petrol tank.
"Where did it go?" he asked, his eyes scanning the area for any sign of that suited figure.
"How the hell should I know?" the Darkness retorted. In spite of its earlier ruthless determination to save Tash, Michael was shocked to hear an undercurrent of terror in the parasite's voice. He had never heard the Darkness afraid before, and it unnerved him more than the sudden disappearance of their tormentor had. He gave into his impulses, and turned and fled across the clearing and into the shadowed forest.
It took him a moment to realise that he was missing something… or rather, someone.
"Aww, frig!" he cursed, scanning the trees. But he knew it was hopeless. He had seen Tash fleeing blindly, putting some much needed distance between her and Slenderman. The thought crossed his mind that the eldritch abomination might have abandoned their fight in order to chase after her. He banished it swiftly. It could quite easily have gone after Nikka, after all…
"So much for not fighting that thing," he said, slowing to a brisk jogging pack through the trees. In the distance, he could see something tall and metal looming ahead. He aimed himself at it.
"It was a one off – believe me," the Darkness assured him snidely.
"Uh huh…" Michael drawled.
"And just what is that insolent tone supposed to mean?"
"Well, I'm a little bit touched, actually," Michael teased, dodging between two close set tree trunks. Teasing the Darkness made him feel better, and it was such a rare opportunity that he would be a fool to pass up on it. "I mean, we've found a creature that even you fear to face, and yet when my life is in danger, you put that fear aside and come to my aid. Could it be that you're starting to care about my wellbeing?"
"Of course I care about whether you stay alive, you fool!" The Darkness snapped, peevishly. "It would be most inconvenient for me to find another host… particularly one as interesting as you."
Michael's elation at something resembling a confession of care from the parasite was swiftly eclipsed by curiosity.
"Interesting?"
A chuckle answered, and he cursed – the tables were being turned again.
"Oh my dear, sweet host," the monster crooned. "If you were any old mortal in my home fandom, I could and would have driven you out of your mind a very long time ago – nothing personal, you understand. It's simply that it's very rare for mortals to hold my attention. Some do of course – but most of you are very boring lifeforms."
"Thanks," Michael deadpanned, finally spying a break in the trees ahead, along with the base of a tall, rusted metal structure. He slowed his jogging to a brisk walk.
"You're welcome," the Darkness replied, it's tone musing. "And make no mistake, little host, you were nothing particularly special…until you took me outside of my home. What possibilities, I realised. A chance to explore and strike terror across the multiverse. Suddenly you weren't that dull after all. I could have left, as soon as the Oneshot wore off, or just killed you myself and expedited the process. But no…I decided to wait, and see what would happen. Make you my permanent host."
"Do not think me harmless, though," the parasite warned, its tone turning back to its usual sneer. "I am fond of you, in my own way… you are rather amusing, and it is fun to push you to the limits of your emotions. Such delicious feelings you have… both bad and good…"
In the back of his mind, the parasite shuddered in delight, sending an unwilling shiver down Michael's own spine. Swallowing thickly, he put one hand on the base of the metal silo for support. Rust coated his palm.
"So, in answer to your question," the Darkness continued, once it had regained itself. "Yes, I do have some investment into your wellbeing. The possibilities of the multiverse, and the enjoyment of watching you struggle and suffer, are more delicious than anything I could have found in my own fandom. And that, little host, is why I keep you alive, in spite of my own feelings towards that… creature."
Michael was not quite sure how to respond to all of that. Never, in all the years that he had put up with the parasite in his head, had the Darkness spoken so candidly with him.
"I'm… not sure how to take that," he admitted. In the back of his head, his freeloader chuckled again.
"Don't dwell on it too much," the creature soothed, before turning to a more business like tone. "Now if we're done with the character development, perhaps you could enlighten me as to what we do now in this game?"
"Erm…" A quick glance around the base of the tall water silo confirmed what Michael had already vaguely noticed – there was no page around here. He could still feel the first page crumpled up in his pocket, where he had shoved it during the fight. "We'd better keep going – I'd say we should continue round the edge. We've got to run into Aneki eventually."
As they set off, Michael realised that his walk was far less tense than it had been earlier. Feeling surprisingly optimistic, he put it down to his new understanding of his tenant. It was harder to be fearful when you knew that someone (or something) had your back.
OOO
Nikka was running.
A normal person would have collapsed from exhaustion by now. But Nikka was a Mary-Sue – such feats of athleticism were easy for her. Especially when they were fuelled by enough adrenaline to resuscitate a blue whale.
She had fled out the back of the toilet block, out of the grasp of those terrifying tentacles, the page still clutched in her sweaty hand. She had not dared look back, instead bolting along the pathway and turning right at the end. She had stumbled across a broken down caravan and truck, another of those notes flapping ominously on the windscreen.
"Follows."
It did follow, and it had followed. As she had grabbed the page and yanked it off the glass, her vision had begun to tunnel, and her ears had filled with a shriek of what sounded like static. Her body had broken into terrified tremors as that white face appeared again in the corner of her vision, peering in and out of the trees.
She had turned and run. Her breath seared at her throat, and she let out a shriek at the sight of every tree branch reaching out for her. As she thundered down the pathway, she caught sight of the huge tree with spindly branches, and she let out a terrified whimper as she realised that she had run in a circle.
The page was still there, pinned to the bark. She did not even think about it, reaching out blindly to grab it before running again. The haziness of her vision had stopped, but there was a banging in her ears, louder than her heartbeat, and she just knew that that nightmarish creature was not far behind her. Her breath misted in front of her face, and her stomach rolled in fear.
Branches cracked in the distance, and she let out a squeak of terror. Every branch looked like a tentacle – every leaf looked like that blank face.
"Leave me alone! Leave me alone!" she begged, clapping her hands over her ears to block out that horrible sound. The notes crackled like flames, as she crushed them against her head. Not knowing what else to do, she fled once more, begging her feet to take her somewhere safe.
She felt a fresh surge of terror, as she realised that they had nowhere safe to take her.
OOO
Her lungs and throat were burning like someone had jammed a poker into them. But no matter how far she had run, or how hard her heart was banging against her ribs, Tash always had enough energy to curse her own stupidity.
"Moron!" she panted, crashing to a grateful stop into a tree. "You stupid moron – you let go of him! Why would you do that?"
Rationally, she might have been able to argue with herself that letting go of Michael had not been her fault. It had been Slenderman that had grabbed her and ripped her away. Her only recourse as soon as she was free had been to run. The thought of that horrible blank face chilled her like a cold fist gripping at her stomach. The urge to vomit was back, but she had nothing left.
She hated herself for a lot of things. She hated herself for taking this mission in the first place. She hated herself for not having a map or even a torch. She hated herself for letting go of Michael's hand. She hated her blind fear of the abomination that roamed this forest. But most of all, she hated her own weakness. She was supposed to be the leader of the Anti-Cliche and Mary-Sue Elimination Society – not shrieking and almost wetting herself at a survival horror game. She was not afraid of blood or physical horror – she had the Gary Stu Gutter for a sibling – but psychological horror was and always had been the one thing guaranteed to unhinge her.
Shakily she stumbled out onto the pathway. Every single one of these paths looked the same, and she had no idea where she was – she could have come full circle back to the start and she would not have had a clue. Her eyes swept the trees, but there was no sign of Slenderman. He now had three victims to chase, and three times the fun. Her terrified brain felt like it was trying to fly apart inside her own head. Was this what madness felt like?
She still clutched her phone, and she hastily lit it again. The pathway continued ahead of her, ending in a tall, arching grey tunnel, which seemed to stretch off into the dark.
Tash felt a fresh stab of fear clench at her heart.
"I am not going in there!" she declared bluntly. But there was no one around to listen, and even as she studied the long darkness, she caught sight of the tiny pinprick of white, pinned inside. She felt a whimper escape from her throat. Of course there would be a page in there.
Should she go and get it? Michael's words had been wise – Slenderman only followed you if you collected the pages. But his idea to burn them had been a solid one. She could burn it and throw Slendy off their trail. And this way, Nikka would not pick it up.
But still… she examined the arching pipe, and shrunk at the idea of going in there. It was dark, and enclosed, and the perfect place for an ambush.
Maybe if she was really quick? Carefully, she crept towards the entrance. It loomed like the opening to a cave, and she had the sudden mad notion that she was no knight about to brave a dragon horde. She was a terrified princess. The note gave a flutter, even though there was no breeze to move it.
Gently, Tash took a terrified step into the tunnel. Immediately the sense of closeness wrapped itself around her, and she turned and fled, gulping down the cold, sharp air outside again. Sweat was cresting on her forehead, and a single bead ran down her temple. Everything about that tunnel was wrong, wrong, WRONG. And every sense in her body knew it. If she went in there, she would die.
But she had to go in there. Arms wrapped around her body, she suppressed a shiver as she stepped in again. It was unnaturally warm, and the air clogged in her already tight throat. Squeezing her eyes closed, she forced her feet to move, one in front of the other. Her legs trembled in response, and she place one hand on the wall to guide her. The concrete scraped against her palm like sandpaper, and her shaking fingers caught every single bump and crevice, with unnatural sharpness.
Something snapped nearby, and she froze, not daring to look behind her. Childishly she knew that if she didn't see Slenderman, he wasn't real. Her senses sharpened for any sign of danger, and her tense muscles started to tremble. She wanted to turn and flee this horrible dark enclosed space, but like the fear that gripped her after a nightmare, she could not move to escape it.
The note fluttered again against the concrete.
There was a burning in her jaw now, and the hot air was pressing against ears. She could smell her own fear in this place, tasting like desert sand and burning. And so could he.
Cautiously, she lifted one foot and took another step. Her heart banged with the certainty that death was nearby.
Another step. The hot air had crept into her lungs, squeezing them like hands. She couldn't breathe… she didn't dare to.
Another. The note was so close. Still she did not move her hand from the concrete, even as a protruding piece of rock sliced a gash neatly into her palm. Now her hand was hot with blood.
One last step, and the note was in reach. She stretched out with her undamaged right hand, and grabbed it.
"Don't look or it takes you."
Her nerve broke, and she tore out of the opposite end of the tunnel into the cold night air. There was a mist creeping out around the trees, and the sharp damp air pierced her lungs, her body breaking out into cold shivers.
Unseen by anyone, Tash began to sob.
OOO
In spite of the danger they were in, Michael could not help himself.
"Oh my God, a giant rock!" he exclaimed, enjoying the sounds of the Darkness giving the mental equivalent of a facepalm.
"Our protagonist, ladies and gentlemen…"
Michael ignored the Darkness, and began scanning the base of the rocks. He really hoped that there was a note here… it was more than likely. If he could find his lighter it was definitely sheltered enough here to burn the pages.
"You aren't seriously planning on collecting all of them?" the Darkness asked. "Wasn't it you who said that finding them would only encourage that abomination?"
"Yes, I did say that," Michael agreed, as he finished circling the base of the first rock. "And I still fully support my plan to get to the fence, and high tail it away from here. But I'm not doing it without Aneki. So while I'm here, I'm going to find the notes."
The Darkness muttered something about humans not making any sense, before its metaphorical head jerked into alertness. "Something is coming."
Fear seeped its way back into Michael's skin, even as he heard the terrified squeak that definitely did not belong to Slenderman. Hopeful, he peered out from around the second giant rock, and saw the approaching figure.
Slenderman did not run. And if he did run, he did not flail around and stumble over rocks like that.
"Nikka!" Michael was disappointed that it was not his sister, but the sight of another human being was such a relief, that he stepped out from around the giant rocks and smiled at the Sue. She gave a terrified start at his sudden emergence, but the sound of his voice had stalled her enough to realise that he was not dangerous, and she immediately changed trajectory and bolted towards him. Michael gave a grunt as she ploughed into his waist.
"Behind me!" she wailed. "He's right behind me! Please help me!"
"Okay, Nikka," Michael said, trying to keep a rational tone, while the Darkness rolled its eyes. "I'm looking over your shoulder, and he's not there. I promise you."
It was true – the path up which she had run was mercifully deserted. Her body was hot, and she was wheezing like Louise after a PT session. But as the meaning of his words registered, she seemed to stop shaking.
"Please, can we leave?" she begged. Michael shook his head, and she let out a wail of fright that sent shivers down his spine. Michael hoped that wherever she was, Tash was not in a similar state. He strongly suspected that the only reason that he had not succumbed to panic and hysteria himself was the presence of the pushy parasite in his mind demanding that he man up.
"I'm not leaving without Tash," Michael explained firmly. "So the sooner we find her, the sooner we can get out of here. Okay?"
He glanced down at her hands, and saw the scrunched up pieces of paper. "How many pages do you have?"
"Umm…" She blinked in surprise as she registered the notes in her hand. "Oh, three."
She held them out like an anxious student presenting her teacher with her artwork. Michael yanked the fourth note out of his pocket and handed it to her.
"Where did you get them?" he asked. "I got mind on the petrol tanks."
"Uh… the toilets, the truck and the tree where you guys found me…"
"Okay," Michael had a vague idea of the direction she had come from now. As his eyes scanned the forest again, he could not help but notice that the mist around them was thickening. "That's four… and this one makes five." He said, reaching out to the third rock, and seizing the piece of paper. This one was more decorative than the others, with trees and a stick man, alongside a single name.
"Slenderman."
Almost as soon as Michael grabbed it, the fog began to thicken, and a chill washed over his body. There was an odd echoing roar in his ears, like the sound of air being sucked through a tube, and Nikka clung to his elbow.
"Okay…" Michael said, carefully handing the note over to Nikka with the others. "It might be that Aneki has found some notes of her own. We should get moving."
He knew that after six notes, Slenderman became a constant spectre, always lurking just behind the player. Tugging on Nikka's arm, he pulled her north back onto the path, staring determinedly ahead.
"You may come to regret this, host," the Darkness said, and for once, he did not sound condescending.
"I know… but I wouldn't be able to live with myself if I just left her."
Neither of them said it, but both of them were definitely thinking it. If they collected any more pages, they would not be alive to live with it at all.
OOO
Vision hazy with tears and terror, Tash stumbled from tree to tree, choked sobs forcing their way out of her throat. She did not want to be in the trees – she felt like every one of them concealed him – but she did not want to be out on the path either – then she was exposed and vulnerable. In one hand she held her phone, prompting a whimper of fear whenever the light cut out, and in the other she still clasped the note.
There was a terrifying echoing noise in her ears now, and every time she inched her head to the side, she thought she caught a glimpse of something tall and thin hiding amongst the trees. She did not bother to study further, instead keeping her gaze on the path ahead, running as fast as she dared. Her body seemed determined to hinder her, her heart banging so hard that she thought she was going to be sick again. She fought to breathe through her sobs, and her legs were weak with terror. For every meter of ground she tripped and staggered through, she fought a battle inside her head, that told her to curl up and make herself as small as possible – her default reaction to a panic attack.
Had Tash been of a slightly more coherent mind, she might have appreciated the mystique of the area in which she was now stumbling. As it was, all she saw were six charred fingers of petrified wood, reaching up into the sky as though to clasp a handful of stars. She crashed sideways into one, and saw the flutter of the page caught in the moonlight.
"Can't run."
She couldn't run. She could barely stand. The roaring in her ears was unbearable, and the edges of her vision began to tunnel again, sending her lurching forwards in terror to get away from the abomination. As always happened when she was in danger, the taste of the hot desert seemed to choke her.
"Burn it!" her mind thought desperately. "Make it stop!"
Doubled over with terror in the middle of the clearing, she latched onto that hope with a single minded terror, and snapped her shaking fingers. She screamed as the misplaced spell seared across her eyebrows, and the shriek of static burst through her head, warning her that he was there. In a frantic effort to escape, she threw herself forwards blindly, hands clasped over her eyes to smother the flames, but her misaimed fear sent her careening straight into one of the pillars. The world tilted sickeningly, and as she crashed into the ground, her ankle wrenched back on itself against the fall.
She landed flat on her back, squinting through her fingers at the blank face barely an inch from her own. Tentacles slashed through the night, and she found that she had no breath to scream.
OOO
Michael heard the shriek, and saw the flare of magic through the clinging fog. Nikka, whose trembling had not really stopped, now shook like leaf in high wind. But Michael was not turning and running. Only one person in this forest could use fire magic.
Yanking hard on Nikka's hand, they burst through the trees in time to see tentacles enveloping Tash. Michael was aware of himself shouting, but he had no idea what – possibly Tash's name, possibly a curse – before the Darkness roared to life and took over completely. Pinpricks of orange enveloped his eyes, and thick, snake-like tentacles crashed into those of their attacker like battering rams.
But Slenderman knew this trick now, and was wise to it. In the blink of an eye, he was gone, and Michael yelped as his vision began to distort and wave, flashes of that face bursting into view.
"Oh no, oh no, oh no, oh no!" Nikka was panting. Blindly, Michael reached for his sister and the Darkness latched onto the back of her jacket. She gave a startled yelp as she was tugged up, but by some miracle, Michael found her hand and yanked her round back the way they had come.
They screeched to a halt instantly, as Slenderman reappeared directly ahead. It should have been impossible to read any emotion on a head with no face, but Michael just knew that the eldritch creature was pissed. Even the air seemed sharp with malevolence. They would not leave his forest alive.
But Michael would be damned if they didn't try.
Hearing Nikka's hysterical shrieking, he dragged them both off to the right, trying to ignore the blackening around his vision. On the left, the thin suited figure reappeared – he wheeled them right, feet pounding along the path, and crunching on stray twigs.
"Oh no!" Nikka shrieked, her head snapping to the right, and catching sight of that face again. Michael gave her an impatient yank, and dragged her attention forwards again, darting around trees and over rocks. The Darkness hissed, slashing branches and debris out of the way, and occasionally shrieking when it sensed the presence of their attacker.
The trees spread out ahead revealing a long brick wall, crossed over with another long brick wall. The bricks were murky in the foggy night, but they were getting so close now that Michael had no trouble catching the blot of white in the darkness.
"The eighth page!" the Chief Agent realised, stumbling slightly over a tree root, sending another surge of static through his vision. He forced his legs to push him forward, and it dimmed enough for him to see the fluttering paper again. There was a tug on his hand, and he realised that Nikka had seen it too.
Then, in a move so fast that Michael would never have believed it had he not known what she was, Nikka was slowing, reaching around and yanking the other two notes out of Tash's startled hands. Her own hand slipped out of Michael's, leaving her standing on the pathway. In spite of himself, Michael skidded to a halt, turning around to face her, his eyes catching Slenderman standing predictably behind her.
"Nikka!" he yelled.
"Go!" she shrieked, picking up her feet again and racing towards the wall. For a moment, Slenderman seemed to ponder his options, before vanishing again and reappearing in the trees off to Nikka's left. She immediately adjusted her course, taking her on a dead straight run towards the final page.
Michael could feel Tash yanking on his arm as if to wrench it free from his body, but he was too busy struggling to comprehend Nikka's apparent plunge into insanity. Had he heard her wrong? Did she have some kind of plan? It didn't make sense. She wasn't begging him not to leave her. She was telling them to go.
And then Michael understood. Nikka knew what sacrifice needed to be made. That there were no winners when you played The Eight Pages. Even when you got all eight, he still found you…
But if he was finding her, then he wasn't finding them.
He hated himself. He wished that he could think of a way – any way – to save all three of them. But his mind was full of panic, and he had no spare thoughts to pull together into a solution. He wasn't sure that Tash even comprehended that Nikka was gone. Fear had already driven her to one single primal instinct – to survive. And in this playground of horrors, Michael did not blame her.
So with a wrench of guilt, he turned his back on the wall, the pages, and on Nikka, and ran with Tash into the forest where the high fence awaited them.
Behind them, the trees rang with the sounds of screams.
OOO
They were running… through trees and branches that never ended. The fog twisted and wrapped around their limbs, snagging at their clothes and tripping them from their sprint. They were going to die here, and there was nothing they could do to stop it…
Tash awoke with a scream. For a moment, the dark shapes in the room seemed to merge into that tall thin figure with no face, and she felt her body convulse in terror. But after a moment, the bedside light flicked on, and she saw that it was just the dressing table mirror and the clock hanging above it.
"Shh…" Adrian was there, arms wrapping around her shoulders, and securing her tight against his chest. Still trembling, she dragged her shaking legs up so that her knees were under her chin, and she was completely nestled against his body. Her muscles screamed at the movement after all the running that they had done that day.
They had run for forty five minutes, through forest, and along a deserted highway, before they had finally been far away enough to generate a plothole back to the Library. By the time they crash landed in the monitor room, practically the entire Society had shown up to watch. Tash hadn't given them a single thought, instead focusing all her senses on the strong arms and familiar scent of Adrian, as he wrapped his arms around her and whispered that she was safe. Michael had to make do with Harriet, who had quietly and darkly told (a) to block all access to the Slender fandom for all agents regardless of rank or status. Nobody would ever set foot in there again.
After seeing that both leader and Chief Agent were alright, most of the other agents had quietly cleared off, leaving them both in the capable hands of the more senior members. Valerie had diagnosed both agents with significant psychological trauma, and shock. In addition to which, Tash had twisted her ankle again when she had fallen over in the gutted wood. Now it lay on the mattress, wrapped in a support bandage, as Adrian stroked her hair and whispered gentle words into her ear. She barely heard what they were, but the tone eased her trembling somewhat. How long would it be before she was able to sleep again?
"Do you want a nightlight?" Adrian whispered softly, and Tash shook her head. She already knew that pitch blackness was better – in the faint glow of a nightlight, she would see shadows and faceless beings everywhere.
"He can't get you here," the Librarian said gently, kissing at her ear. His fingers got to work on the muscles between her neck and shoulders, and she immediately started to relax. "I promise you. No one gets in here without my say so. I don't let evil into my Library to torment my family… especially not you, Wildflower."
He finished the term of endearment with a kiss to her neck, and the last of the tremors subsided with a shaky sob.
There was a knock at the door, and all the tension came flooding back into her body. Adrian uttered a curse, and got to his feet.
"It's okay, it's just Michael," he soothed, already sensing the loyal, determined aura tinged with the hint of malevolence that came from the Darkness, standing just outside the wood. Checking that he was decent first, the Librarian tugged the door open.
Michael's bed-hair would have been funny under any other circumstance, as would the thick Pokemon duvet he was currently huddled in. But Tash was more interested in craning her neck, and trying to check that nothing insidious was loitering behind him in the corridor.
"Sorry," the Chief Agent mumbled. His glasses were slightly skewed, as if he'd shoved them on in a hurry. Grabbing her own so that she did not have to squint, Tash saw the huge shadows under his eyes – apparently sleep wasn't on the cards for her brother either.
"I don't wanna be weird…" he said timidly, his eyes darting back down the dark corridor like tiny, terrified moths. "But… I don't want to be alone. Can I sleep in here, with you guys tonight?"
He sounded so small and afraid, that Adrian clearly did not have the heart to say no. And after all, their bed was big enough for four.
"Sure." He jerked his head into the room and Michael shuffled in nervously, but quite clearly relieved not to have to stand in the dark corridor on his own any longer. Tash obligingly rolled the covers against her so that there was room for the extra set, and Adrian snuggled up on the other side, spooning his girlfriend as Michael made himself comfortable in his roll of duvet.
They all jumped, and Michael fell off the mattress with a thud, as there was another knock at the door. This time, the visitors did not wait to be received, and opened the door of their own accord, causing a whimper of fear to escape Tash's mouth.
"Is this the kinky kind of sleepover, or can we all join in?" Harriet asked, her head poking around the doorframe curiously. Below her, Emily's head popped in too.
It took a while for everyone to nod off on the huge bed, but eventually they started to slip into slumber; Michael snoring, Emily muttering about French toast, and Adrian now curled up in kitty form like the world's most adorable plushie. Even Tash could feel her eyelids getting heavy, and sleep beginning to win the long fight. Still, the worry lingered in the back of her mind – were they truly free of him?
There was a shifting from the end of the bed, and her body froze in terror. Something was moving, pushing covers as it went, sending jolts of fear when it touched her legs and hip. She lay, frozen under the duvet, her heart banging against her ribs.
"No, no, no…please, go away…"
There was a shuffling noise from near to her head, and then a tiny little smacking sound. She jolted in alarm, as something damp pressed against her sweaty hair, and deposited a gentle kiss there. A little rush of air preceded a humming, and then a tiny voice whispered through the room.
"Don't worry Daddy. Don't worry Auntie Tashy. I'll protect you from the man with no face."
Carefully, so as not to wake anyone, Tash slowly released the breath she had been holding. The duvet felt warm, and the room safe again. Under the watchful eye of Combee, she felt the rush of fear wear off, and sleep start to creep up on her again.
As she lost the last sliver of awareness, she vaguely thought she heard their young protector whispering again.
"Everything will be alright now…"