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You were starting to think that this had been a bad idea. A pretty girl, alone in the woods at night, nothing but a flashlight in her hand – it spelled disaster, and you knew it by now. But it wasn’t like you had a choice anymore; you tried going back to your car, but the damn hunk of metal wouldn’t start. The chance was slim of anybody else coming down this lonely stretch of road, so hitchhiking was out of the question.
So here you were, wandering through the thick forest. You tugged the hood of your jacket over your head more as if it would keep the legends and lore surrounding these woods out of your mind. Slenderman, The Rake, Smile Dog, Jeff the Killer, you had heard of them all. Not that the knowledge would help you now. As you walked, searching for someplace to stay the night, you felt increasingly watched. You glanced around but saw nothing.
Something in the distance caught your eye, and you crept slowly closer to see what it was. A piece of paper? Who the hell would hoof it into the heart of the forest just to slap a piece of paper onto a tree? It had writing on it, and you shined the flashlight on the sloppily written text to read it better.
Help me.
The scribbled words sent a chill down your spine. They looked hastily written, as if the author didn’t want to stay in one place for too long. Maybe you shouldn’t either, your conscious told you. The feeling of eyes on your frame intensified, and you hurriedly folded up the note and took it with you on your journey to who-knows-where.
As your head started to clear, you began to think more rationally. There’s gotta be an end to these woods, right? All you had to do was find it and get to a main road. Fuck the car, you hated the heap of junk anyway.
With this new thought giving you a dose of hope, you walked forward with a new purpose. But no matter how far you walked, there was no end to these woods. You felt followed. You whirled around, breathing heavily from frustration and fear. It felt as if this thing was toying with you.
“Stop mocking me!” you yelled into the forest, but received no answer. You sensed amusement. You felt watched.
<-------≪≫------->
Your head hurt like hell. You now had five pages; you had no idea how many there even were, but you were determined to get them all for some reason. It was getting increasingly foggy, and it was getting harder to see where you were going. There were no places to sleep; the only building you had found was some sort of brick building with a whole bunch of tiled rooms in it. You didn’t feel safe in the slightest in there.
Every note was more unsettling than the last, and the most recent one you had picked up said two chilling words. “Behind you”. Needless to say, you bolted out of that area like a bat out of hell.
You sank down and leaned against a tree. You still felt watched, but you figured you had a moment to rest. As you sat there, unmoving, you watched the branches above you sway back and forth as if trying to hold hands. You sighed, remembering the whole reason you had even been driving down this road to begin with.
~Le Flashback~
“I’m not coming back! Leave me the hell alone!” you screamed and pressed the red button on your phone, slamming it onto the table. You sank into a chair and put your hands in front of you, watching them curl into fists and relax again.
You had just been in an abusive relationship, and you had finally gathered up the guts to run. The son of a bitch still persisted, claiming he still loved you, trying to threaten you into getting back together with him, even going so far as to do daily drive-byes. You didn’t know why he did that last part – maybe just to be a creepy fuck. That seemed his style.
On this particular day, he had parked in front of your house and called you on your phone. You glared out the window as his truck rolled out of view, furious tears threatening to overwhelm your well-built defenses. You had slammed your phone down next to your car keys, and you looked at them, brows still furrowed in disgust. Finally you snatched them and stormed out the door, consciously making the decision to leave your phone sitting on the table.
~End of Le Flashback~
The next thing you knew, you were jerking your head up from sleep. How long had you been sitting there? You looked around and almost instantly regretted it.
There was some sort of being standing alarmingly close to you. It was an abnormally tall man; he easily could’ve been at least nine feet tall. He was well-dressed; in any other situation you could say he looked dapper. Six abnormal appendages extended unnaturally from his back, each twitching furiously as if they had minds of their own. And he had no face – just pale skin where his features were supposed to be.
You acknowledged all this within a split second before springing up and bolting the other way. When you had gotten a safe enough distance away, you pressed your back against a tree and sucked air into your lungs. What. Was that? You were really starting to regret the decision to leave your phone at home.
Your hand grazed against a piece of paper, and you snatched it up, raising it to your face to read it.
Don’t look, or it takes you.
“Good to know,” you muttered, taking a glance around before shoving yourself off the tree and trudging on.
You saw him a few more times, but you were always able to narrowly escape somehow. You got the seventh note, and your heart thumped with adrenaline as you neared the eighth and final one.
That’s when two things happened simultaneously. You felt something rest on your shoulder, and you felt a warm breath on the opposite ear. Without turning around, you slammed your foot into his and savored a small victory when it earned you a pained grunt. Sprinting forward, you leapt and grabbed the final note.
Everything went quiet. The only sounds you heard were the rapid thumps of your own heart, accompanied by your breathing.
Suddenly a tentacle clamped down on your ankle, swinging you upside down to face your attacker – The Slenderman. You tried fighting back with all your might, but it was no use. He reared back a clawed hand and cleanly sliced off your head with one swipe.
Game Over.
~3rd person POV~
Slendy searched the girl’s pockets until he found his precious notes; all eight of them. He was secretly impressed. A human hadn’t been able to collect all eight for quite a while. He had to say; it was fun chasing her, getting on her every nerve until she was looking paranoid as an animal on the bottom of the food chain. He savored the look on her face when she had picked up the ‘Behind you’ note. That one was his personal favorite.
Years of practice washed away any pity he had for the now headless corpse. He didn’t need mere mortals; he was a creature of the night, a monster to be feared, and he wore the titles proudly.
He sighed and teleported to different places in the forest he knew like the back of his hand, resetting his trap. As he was placing the final one, he sensed another being disturbed from its place. His non-existent mouth curved upwards in a devilish smile.
“The hunt begins.”