The Truth, Part 2

I had meant to type up excerpts as I went along, little tidbits of Cam's journals, talking about his life and interactions with me. Reading through them, it's painfully obvious that I underestimated how much of his life revolved around me.

It's humbling, really. It's obvious that the journals were never meant for my eyes. The first one starts the day I got involved with Slender, and they don't miss more than a few days up until his death. So many notebooks, full of his hopes and dreams and fears, and I'm honestly not certain if he ever went more than a page without mentioning me in some way.

And I pieced together a story. Now I know why I don't remember much of anything before I hit twelve.

When we were little, Cam and I were inseparable. Cam had a twin brother named Joey, but he was a bully and neither of us liked playing with him. I only very vaguely remember Joey, but I do remember being scared of him, a little. I told you before of how I woke up in the forest and he was dead. But Cam remembered what happened. Cam and I liked to play in the woods behind our back yards. Our parents didn't mind so long as we didn't go out of range of the walkie talkies they made us carry.

Joey hated the woods-he liked to play inside, didn't like being out with the bugs and the heat and the dirt. But that day he followed us-probably to torment us about something. He caught up to us at exactly the wrong time. We went to our normal spot, where there was a small clearing we liked to play in. For whatever reason the underbrush was almost nonexistent in that part of the forest.
And there he was. Slendershit. Tall and faceless as ever. We didn't know what to do. Cam and I shied away, but Joey walked straight up to him and took his hand. There was a long moment of silence, then he came at us with a rock.

Cam doesn't know what exactly happened next. He says he darted into the hollow tree trunk behind us, and I stood there and tried to fend him off. He remembers a shout from Joey and a scream from me, then a dull thud. When he peeked out, I was clutching a big rock and Joey was on the ground with a big dent in his head. And slendershit had his tentacles out, looking furious, and I stared him down. As Cam recalls it, I stepped forward, dropped the rock, put my hands on my hips and said 'You can't have him'.

Then. 'Take me instead. I'll do whatever you want as long as Cam is safe'

I stepped forward, Slender took my hand, and I started laughing.
He vanished, I passed out, and Cam woke me up and started screaming about a man in the woods and Joey being hurt into our walkies.

Everything looked fine for a little while. They started hunting for the man who killed Joey, ruled that the two of us had undergone trauma from the incident, and life went on mostly as normal.

Until Cam caught me sneaking out into the woods. He followed. Watched me kill.

I killed fifteen people back then. He was there for eight. To talk me down and comfort me when I woke up covered in blood and scared and confused.

And then I killed my brother and my parents. When I snapped out of it, I slipped out the window to go to Cam's. Apparently we used to do that a lot-our bedroom windows faced each other. He let me in through his window and hid me in his closet, trying to talk me down.

It didn't work, they found me, and I got locked up.

Apparently, Cam visited me as often as his parents would allow, but for two years I was completely unresponsive.  I started out heavily sedated, but as time went on, they realized they didn't need to. All I did was stare. And Cam grew more and more worried. After two years, he gave in and decided to do something about it. Cut a deal with slendershit. The past four years would be wiped from my memory, and Cam would be allowed to live long enough to, as he put it 'make sure I recovered enough to make it alone'. In exchange, Cam offered himself as... a toy, basically. To be tormented and kept until I'd recovered enough, and not one moment longer.

And so it was his life. Helping me. Always there, always sacrificing any chance of a real life for himself, because he was going to die. Never saying a word about what he endured-he only rarely mentioned the torments in any detail in the journals and the couple descriptions I found were enough to give me nightmares.

While I was on the street he was frantically trying to find me-he tried to run away once, to come help me. He got caught, wasn't allowed to leave the house unsupervised for months. Never said a word.

That was always the name of the game, I've learned. He did so much for me. Never said anything, never told me what he'd sacrificed, worked so hard to make it seem easy, to make sure I never noticed anything amiss. I spent so much time staying with him, living with him, and he made sure I never even got the slightest hint of his pain. Nor did Jake, really. He knew about me, but Cam was certain that Jake never knew about the torture he went through regularly.

And then the dreams started a couple days after I got out of jail. And he knew that it was a warning-that his time was coming to an end. And he was so fucking relieved. He wanted the end so badly, the only thing that kept him alive was... well, me.

I didn't know.

And now I feel like so much scum, compared to the man who literally gave everything he had to me.

...I'll do you proud, Cam. I promise.

More Travel and Page Theory

Shrody and I left Ro's house this morning. We were both kind of sad to go, Ro's been very nice to us, but I think the situation with David had all of us on edge, and we'll all be breathing easier now that we've left.
All the same, I'll miss him. We had some great late night conversations, and Frank really adored him.

In any event, nothing much to report there. The big reason for this post is that I promised you lot a review of Page Theory, and while recent events have conspired to delay it a little while, I'm putting it up today.

Here's the original write-up.

The theory attempts to explain several things: the way the Path of Black Leaves works, the reason slendershit can be in several places at once, the reason slendershit seems to work differently for different people, and the existence of loops-or labyrinths as they were once commonly known.

To summarize, the actual theory is as follows:
Everyone sees the universe from their own point of view. This makes up THEIR universe, or page. Everyone has their own page, and all of the pages together make up the stack, or the universe at large. Pages can be crossed through, and people from different pages can interact without a problem. The space BETWEEN the pages is where loops form, where the outside edge where all the pages meet is the Path. In addition, Slendy works kind of like... stabbing a pushpin through the pile. He can be present on multiple pages at once.
As far as WHY we're split into pages, Spence has several theories, none of which he seems to have a particular preference for. It could be the presence of slendershit himself, or possibly a direct result of the creation of loops, or possibly it's just a matter of everyone having their own perspective. I tend to think it's the latter-there doesn't seem to be a reason to make it any more complicated.

Generally, I'm extremely hesitant to adopt anyone else's theory on anything regarding our current mess, specifically BECAUSE of the variable nature of slendershit's influence on all of us. Page Theory, however, is perhaps the absolute NEATEST explanation for this phenomenon I've ever had the good fortune to come across.
Page theory has the added bonus of explaining why Spence's team are so damn good at finding people. If everyone has their own slice of reality, it would theoretically be possible to flip through the pages to find the right one. Maybe?
Didn't actually ASK Spence about that one, I'm just guessing...

So, that's Page Theory. And the last of the things Spence gave Cam. Next I'll start putting up Cam's notebook. But. Um. It's...
Well, you'll see. When I can put it up. Right now... I need to think about it some more...

Back to Work

I'm sorry about last night's post. Yesterday was bad.

When I escaped Star's diabolical plans, instead of heading straight out of town like I said I would, I went back to the apartment. I needed my notes, my money, some clothes, and the things Cam left for me. A pile of letters and a notebook.

The idiot made one of THOSE notebooks. And I never knew. Hidden in the blank pages is a pretty accurate picture of... of how he died. He definitely drew it. I... I don't know when he did, but he knew. He fucking knew. What the fuck is this? Apparently he was never as Slendyfree as he said he was. I just don't understand why he lied.

While waiting for Nick at the apartment, I started talking to Shaun, and he...I dunno, he went fucking nuts and started freaking out about how I wasn't safe. I didn't know what else to do, so I ran. Six blocks faster than I've bugged out in a long time. Found myself at the cemetery. Got to see Cam one last time before I left town...

That was where Nick met me. I was an absolute mess, I'll admit it. I was lucky that it was deserted that morning. Not many people want to visit a graveyard on a bright, hot morning. The rest of the day was spent alternately doing things like setting up a meeting with August and Spencer and selling the car and randomly breaking down on poor Nick. I'm not proud of it, but I had my one day. I let myself grieve for one day. I gave an entire day to the fear and misery and desperation.

No more. I've got work to do if I want to help those of you who need my help. I don't have time for tears and crying.

August, Spencer, I'm sorry you had to see me like that yesterday. Dinner went badly, and a lot of that is my fault. Thank you for all of your help.

And It All Goes To Hell Again

I'd hoped that when I posted tonight to let you know that I got away safely I would be able to tell you that things were starting to look up. That maybe now that I was free and moving and with Nick I'd be able to find some peace.

I should know better by now. 

I'm tired of losing my friends. I'm tired of being afraid, I'm tired of fucking Slendershit and fucking crying and never knowing who's going to be next because everyone I care about is wrapped up in this.

I don't... I can't talk about this right now. I'm going to go to bed and hold tight to Nick and hope that everyone will still be alive when I wake up.

One of You Now, I Guess

Don't have much to say here, really. I'm not exactly verbose in the normal way of things. I'd planned on leaving the blogging up to Cam and Elaine, they're the ones with things to say. I'm kind of the muscle here. Not that I have a problem with this-protecting people is what I do best.


But I figured you all might like to know that I've seen him now. Last night. Went out to the big balcony thing we have for some air while Cam was asleep, and there he was. Just staring. Now I see why you all were so scared. There aren't words. He's... I'm reminded of reading Lovecraft in high school. That overwhelming sense of horror and the realization that there's nothing that can stop it. I've stared down the barrel of a fanatic's gun, I've been captured and tortured, I've been in fights where the entire world is chaos and gunfire and debris, and yet somehow none of it was a tenth as terrifying as this faceless man in a suit.


But then, I'm a fucking soldier. I don't just cower in the corner, no matter the fear. Didn't stop me from being pants shittingly terrified, but I refused to let it defeat me. I went into the living room and started watching a cheerful movie on TV until he went away. Before too long, Elaine came out and saw me, and she sat with me. She saw him too, which isn't too much of a surprise, really. Not long after, he left, and we discussed plans until we were ready to head back to sleep. I'm not sure Cam or Nick even knew we were awake.


I expect I'll do some heavy duty freaking out later, but for now I'm just kind of in shock. The good thing about being a soldier, though, is you learn to deal with the fear, so with any luck I'll be able to manage this until what Elaine's trying to teach me can kick in.


Either that or I'll bugger off to a shooting range for a bit to relieve some tension. Possibly both.


Jake

Checking in

I've no indication anyone's reading this, but just in case someone is, Cam and I are both fine. He's started driving me to and from work, days when I go in. He doesn't have a proper job right now, so he has the time. In a few weeks, when he has to go back to work at Haven, then we might have a bit of a problem.
In the meantime, I stay as safe as I can, under the circumstances. After catching up with Jekyll's blog and starting to read Maduin's, we've started trying to keep from freaking out, in the hopes that it really will help.
So far, good news. I haven't seen him since my last post, though that's


...
Fucking hell.
Genre-blindness much?
I swear, that was the stupidest thing I could have said.
Because he's at my window now. Motherfucker. Going to get Cam and River.Alpologies for any typos, I don't fucking dare look away. I'll try to check back in asap to let anyone watching knwo that I'm still alright.

In which my decision making skills are fucking AWESOME

So, it's a bit harder to be scared of an eldrich horror apparently invented by the internet (though I know that's not quite right) when you've had a really fucking shit day at job one and you're about to be late for job two because job one kept you for an hour past when they were supposed to.
My manager at job one wouldn't fucking let me go. And I was supposed to be at home ready to take calls from internet perverts for cash half an hour after the first job FINALLY let me go.
It was 9 o'clock at night. Had I gotten out of work on time, I could have taken the long way home and avoided the park AND gotten home before dark.
As it stood, if I wanted to get home on time, so as not to be late logging in to work, I had no choice but to walk home through the park, like I always would have.
I really considered just being late to the second job, I could have talked my way out of being in trouble. But unfortunately, I'd had such a shit day at the burger place, so many idiots and assholes, including my absolutely useless manager, that any fear of Slendyshit was buried under pure rage.
I managed to convince myself that I was being stupid, that I'd only seen tall, dark, and ugly last night because I was terrified and tipsy. He couldn't really be real, and so I should stop being a moron and walk home the short way, so as to not be late for work.

So, lets recap. Angry, stupid Elaine, walking home alone, at night, through the woods. Yeah. The outcome was entirely predictable. He was there. The entire walk home, he was there. Just watching me, head tilted at that creepy as fuck impossible angle. Every time I moved out of sight, he was there standing beside a different tree.
Thankfully, my self-preservation instinct kicked in at that point, and I remembered M's rules and didn't run. I walked as fast as I could, but I didn't dare risk running. It worked, clearly, otherwise I wouldn't be here, but it was terrifying. Cam called me ten kinds of idiot when I told him, too.

I think the worst bit was getting home and having to be sexy for pay for six hours. Especially because he kept fucking staring at me. Do you have any idea how hard it is to get a guy off when you've got a motherfucking eldrich horror watching you do so? Yeah. It's rather difficult.
I should get hazard pay or something.
Now, Cam and I are huddled in our living room, with the blinds very tightly drawn. River, our cat, has been freaking out all buggering night. It's not hard to figure out why.

I really should start following the horror movie rules, before my idiocy gets me killed.

Clarification

Okay, to clarify, nothing's actually chasing me. Yet. But I'm not stupid. I know the signs, I've done my research, and when you find a notebook with strange pictures of slenderman and odd scrawls and PLASTERED in Operator signs, you start paying attention.
Especially when you found it in the heavily wooded park you can see from your apartment window. I honestly thought it was just a myth, some stupid story cooked up by the SA trolls. But the previous owner of the notebook is missing, and I'm starting to see him in the corner of my eye when I'm walking home.
In fact, I stopped walking through the park in the hopes that if I stay away from the trees maybe he wouldn't come.
I haven't seen him properly yet, but I feel his eyes staring.
Maybe I'm just paranoid. I hope to god I'm just paranoid. But my cat seems to be convinced there's something here. Last night she spent an hour angrily meowing at my window. She's NEVER done that before.