Slenderman
A Ghost Hunt Fic
By: Shadow of Malice
~X-x-X~
Summary: When Naru accepted the case located in the middle of nowhere, he never expected to have anything more than a residual spirit. But he was wrong. Very wrong. Set a year after Eugene's found.
Disclaimer:I do not own Ghost Hunt and no way in hell do I own Slender. He may kill us... I researched everything there is to have researched to make this as realistic as possible. Enjoy~
A/N: There will be the case file about Slender Man revealed in this chapter as it's easier than just writing everything in a long authors note and it helps the story progress. I'm doing this because some of you don't know the origin of Slender Man. No. Some guy didn't just say 'Hey, that's cool. Let's post it online.' Slender Man or Der Ritter have been recorded all the way back to and before the time of the Egyptian Pharaohs. So please pay special attention to this chapter and any further questions you have leave a review where I can respond to or a name to reply in the next chapter or just PM me. Thank you.
Previously on Slenderman:
The team set about their tasks while Mai leant down by the corner of boxes in which the men had placed the equipment. It wasn't hard to sort through the items they usually needed on the first day of an investigation, but she couldn't help the feeling of being watched. And when she stood to look out the window, she saw something.
A dark silhouette half hidden by trees; an unnaturally tall figure that seemed to be a statue.
It was then that they heard the scream...
...The investigation had begun..
Chapter 3: Smile – Cheshire Moon
Mai was perplexed, to say the least. Not only was it the police chief that had followed them, but now she was separated from the team and… with him. In a creepy forest! She wasn't even sure how it had happened.
'What luck.' She cursed under her breathe, regretting having only gone out with John and Masako. 'If only I stayed to help Monk. Stupid! Stupid Mai! Why can't I ever listen to my head?'
She flinched from a protruding branch, ignoring the annoyed grunt Dazo released as said branch hit him in the face. She couldn't help the little devious smile that slipped its way onto her face; the mild satisfaction helping her through the awkward situation…
Just a little.
"Hey!" Dazo called, huffing as he caught up to her, "Do you even know the way back? It seems you're leading us in circles."
"I'm not…" She pause caused a chill to run down his spine, "But he is." The cryptic meaning made him gaff.
"Nonsense! There is nothing paranormal about this. No matter what you think. This is just a typical case of estranged fellow who needs to be brought to justice before anyone, especially those missing kids, are hurt."
The determination in his voice gave Mai the impression that the police chief wasn't as bad as she first thought. But with a sigh, she brushed the thought aside and looked up. With a sudden gasp, the brunette came to an abrupt halt, causing Dazo to stumble into her, jolting the young woman out of her stupor and back into reality. Her eyes widened, body ridged as her head whipped from side to side, panic evident in her urgent mumbles.
"Hey girl?" Dazo asked, sighing when she ignored him, "Stop!" He grabbed her shoulders and made her look at him, causing her to glare at him, the glint of fear that shone in her eyes easily making a mark on the police chief, "What's wrong?"
"What's wrong?" Her voice was incredulous as she looked at him, "Are you serious! Look at the sky!" She quickly pointed to the sky, making sure he saw what she wanted him to see what she wanted him to see. The sky was rapidly darkening, the first few stars of the night popping into existence in the velvet background faster and faster. Soon, they would be stuck in an unfamiliar forest, in the dark, with no food, water or any idea where to go. "Do you see that? Soon we'll be completely lost, in the dark in some strange place with some… thing that's meant to be most active at night. And out here we're even easier targets than the children were!"
He blinked down at her, for the first time letting the severity of the situation sink in as she explained to him everything they had discovered earlier that day.
-Case Day 1-
The SPR team burst into the lobby with Mai at the lead as they frantically searched for the source of the scream. A woman was on the ground, desperately screaming and motioning to something outside the door.
"Yumi! Yumi! Give me back my Yumi!
Monk was the first out the front doors, chasing something he had seen amongst the trees.
Police chased after him in seconds, stopping the team from following. Mai took the chance of confusion to talk to the couple in distress. The woman that had been screaming was being held in the arms of an older man, the matching rings on their fingers showing they were married. The sorrow on the womans' face tore at Mai's heart and the brunette leant down to them.
She waited for them to notice her.
"My name is Mai. What's your name?" It was all she could do to try calm the couple down enough to get the answers she needed. The elderly woman, with silver hair and pale grey eyes, stared straight into hers, almost as if she was trying to pierce right through her.
"My name… It- It's Nami. Nadoru Nami. And this is my husband, Tokura. My Yumi. It took her. She told us the other night that she's been seeing things since the children went missing… But we didn't believe her. Oh Kami! Tokura. Our baby's been taken!" The wails of the mother rang through the room, not stopping for a second, even as Monk was dragged kicking and screaming back into the lodge. Mai could only watch as Dazo ordered his men to take the blonde to a secure room.
"Excuse me. That is my employee that you are detaining." The cold air in the room instantly drew everyone's attention to Naru, who, without any sign of fear. "I ask that you release him so that we may proceed with our investigation and locate our missing client."
At the mention of client, Nami's cries increased ten-fold, forcing her husband to remove her from the room with a quick bow to Mai, sending her a look that asked her to find his daughter. The tension in the room was thick as the police took on defensive stances while the team of parapsychologists took their place beside their boss. The young CEO refused to blink as he waited for Dazo to respond, even as the police chief became visibly agitated at Naru's behaviour towards him.
"And he was a threat to us all with his actions. For all we know he could have been an accomplish to the kidnappings-"
"Takigawa would never do something like that!" Ayako jumped in, pushing to the front of the group. She didn't flinch when Dazo glared and she didn't budge when he stepped towards her. She only stood her ground and waited.
"You're right. He must have been the mastermind behind all this!"
There was silence as the team simmered in their anger towards the police chief, each wishing they could hit him where it hurt. It was Mai who spoke first.
"Then we'll prove it to you! We'll prove that Monk is innocent and we'll show you that it isn't a human causing all this!" The brunette yelled before turning on her heel and running back into base.
Papers flew and laptops were opened as the team scurried after her. Naru and Lin opened internet browsers and made phone calls. The others opened history books on the location, notes on the case file they had gathered while others went to work researching the kind of entity that could have caused the drama going on within. They worked mainly off what John had told them before the case, the small suspicion of the 'Tall Man' being at play being very important to their research. It took hours to gather everything they needed and compiled it into a mass file that Yasu took the liberty of reading out to everyone.
"So, going off the key features of the victims and their families, a tall white figure would be seen seconds at a time, usually a day or two before the person who sighted it went missing. Out of all the victims, Yumi is the first adult to have gone missing." Silence filled the room as Yasu made a quick note on the page before going on, "The 'Tall Man' is also known as a Tupla Effect, which is caused by a multitude of people thinking of the same thing to create a 'thought-form'. However, the 'Tall Man' spans the globe in a number of ways and dates back all the way back to the Egyptians in 3100 BC. The image of a Tall Man is found in a hieroglyph and is often referred to as the 'Thief of the Gods' or 'Thief of Kuh', the Pharoah Wazner, whose tomb the carving was found in. It's the only glyph of its kind throughout all of Egypt. There are cave paintings in Brazil from 9000 BC, recorded even earlier than the hieroglyph in Wazners' tomb. The figure was elongated and leading children by the hand somewhere unknown."
"All this is all very interesting Yasuhara, but how does it relate to our current predicament?" The impatient question showed how frustrated Naru was as he paced the room, trying to piece together all the information in his head.
"I'm getting to that Big Boss. The details on his looks are important." Yasu took a second to find his place again before he continued, "The most famous recording of this creature are in wood cuts by a German man by the name of Hans Freckenburg from the mid-sixteenth century in Halsteburg castle. The piece, Der Ritter, was put under x-ray once it was discovered, and the findings were chilling. The translation of the carving is 'The Knight', only, when they x-rayed it, the imaged changed to a long skeletal figure leaning over a dead body. The 'Tall Man' gets his name from the German meaning of Der Grosse Mann, which links into an ancient story from the Black Woods in Germany, which is considered to be the origin of the Tall Man. The journal entry of the story goes like so; Der Grosse Mann was a fairy who lived in the Black Forest. He chased bad children that snuck into his forest and captured those who couldn't get away. Creepy, I know. But it makes an odd connection to the Roman myth of the 'Tall Man'. A written record of the myth is found through another journal entry which is now known as the Legend of the Tall Man; 'The Tall Man stood in a clearing, dressed as a nobleman, all in black. Shadows lay over him, dark as a cloudy midnight. He had many arms, as long and boneless as snakes, all sharp as swords and they writhed like worms on nails. He did not speak, but made his intentions known'. The reference links to some of the victims saying he had many arms. And he stalks those who become paranoid about him too from some reports."
"Ok. So let me get this straight." Ayako started, blowing hair out of her face as she lifted one finger, "This 'Tall Man' or whatever, can stalk anyone, though he mainly goes after children. Most likely because their easier." With a nod of his head, Yasu confirmed her words and she lifted a second finger, "He literally lives in legends that keep him alive as some kind of Tupla or whatever, and because he centres around woods, the legend probably manifested him here." The team took a second to register her words before realisation set in. She lifted a third finger. "He is literally a weapon because he has more than two arms which a lot of people describe as sharp tentacles."
There was silence throughout base as they took it all in. Plans flying through their minds but none coming to pass their lips.
Hold on a minute. Miss Matsuzaki." John started, drawing the teams attention.
"Yes, John?"
"Your exorcisms work best around trees. Correct?"
"Yes. Why? What are you getting at John?"
"I know!" Mai chirped, standing up in triumph. "We find and rescue the kids and Yumi, most likely in a dark place that the Slender Man would have hidden them, and then we get you to exorcise the forest. I read in the notes that in Scotland, they refer to him as Fe… Fear Dubh. The Dark Man. Which means if we can get rid of the evil shrouding this place, he won't be able to manifest because there won't be any darkness!"
The red head blinked at her, bewildered by the crazy idea. "No way. That actually just might work!"
Everyone turned to Naru to see whether he approved or not. Only, the dark haired male was focused on Mai, his eyes holding something close to pride as he looked at the brunette.
Feeling the groups eyes on him, however, caused him to come back to reality and he nodded his head. "That seems the most suitable thing to do. John, Masako, Mai. You three will go outside, together, and search for any clues as to the children's whereabouts. Lin and I will work on getting Monk out of containment. Miss Matsuzaki, I would like you to make protective sutras for the lodge and prepare for the ritual you need to perform once we have the victims of Slender Man back. Yasuhara, I would like you to continue research on the creature and any find any oddities between them and the police reports. Are we all understood?"
A series of agreements echoed throughout the room before they all went off on their assigned tasks; John, Masako and Mai grabbing a set of torches, their jackets and a compass before heading out of the lodge.
Little did they know that they were being followed…
-Base : Current Time-
Base was buzzing in the late afternoon as Masako and John burst through the door, both panting and covered in sweat as they stumbled into the room. They weren't surprised to see Monk lounging on the couch, but they were shocked when they noticed a certain brunette was missing.
"Where's Mai?" Was the first thing out of Masako's mouth as she scanned the room, making sure she hadn't missed the brunette by accident.
"What? She should have been with you!" Ayako yelled, her sutra's flying through the air as she stood up, nearly tipping the coffee table she had been writing on with the force of her movements. "How could you lose her?"
"It wasn't us!" John defended, even as guilt pulled at his gut and made him sick to his stomach, "The police chief, that Dazo man, he ambushed us. Mai told us to run. So we did. We thought she'd make her way back here if she couldn't find us."
"You guys know this is Mai, right? She wouldn't come back unless she knew you were safe!" Monk yelled, jumping up. He shared a look with Naru before they grabbed a few items around the room. "Stay in contact. We're going to look for her! We have a radio, so just use that!"
With that, the pair was out the door, armed only with torches, a compass, and a desire to save a certain brunette.
-Forest-
The pair passed a set of trees when something white caught Mai's attention. Without a second thought, she pulled Dazo in the opposite direction, keeping away from the figure she desperately didn't want to run into.
Again, she saw it and desperately tried to pull Dazo towards safety when the police chief pulled back, tearing himself from her grip and causing her to skid to a halt. The second she stopped, a sense of dread pooled in her stomach and she turned to him slowly, eyes growing wide at the sight of a gun being pointed at her. But that wasn't what scared her. It was that they weren't moving. Which meant it had time to find them… Or… Catch up to them per say.
It always knew were someone was while in its domain.
"Enough of the games girl! No more joking around! Now tell me who's behind all of this so I can get out of the god forsaken forest!" His voice was harsh and his hands shook as he held the pistol, fear showing in his eyes as he glanced around the dark forest. "Now. I'm going back to the lodge and placing you under arr-"
His sentence was cut off as long black limbs wrapped around him, like an octopus wrapping its legs around its food. He struggled in the things hold only to be pulled into the darkness.
All Mai saw was the flash of shots before a bullet flew by her cheek, cutting into her flesh as his screams filled the air. Her body acted on instinct and she ran, ignoring the way blood dribbled down her chin or how the full moon cast an eerie glow across the ground. She didn't even care where she went, as long as she stayed away from him.
She didn't get far enough though as a tentacle wrapped around her ankle and pulled her off her feet. She knew struggling was useless and resorted to the chant Ayako had taught her.
"Rin! Pyo! To! Sha! Kai! Jin! Retsu! Zai! Zen!" A horrible screech filled the air as the limb loosened, the dark aura lifting from around her temporarily. But just as she tried to get up, she heard a crunch from under her hand and she grabbed whatever it was.
It turned out to be a page; a roughly scratched image marring its surface. The message frightened her.
'Don't look… Or it takes you…'
XxXxX
Sooooooooo... There you go. Chapter 3 of Slender Man. I've been really sick lately, so I haven't been able to write. Along with studying for my Certificate 3 in childcare, I don't have much time. But I try. For you guys. And the reviews really helped me get this chapter done, so I'd like to give a special thanks and acknowledgement to those that reviews. Please keep inspiring me with your feedback! Thank you for your patience. Thank you to the following for reviewing and helping me get this chapter out;
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