Looking for yourself out there

Almost 23:23. Awesome. Uh. Honestly, I'm not too sure why I'm posting. It's... a gorgeous night out; snuck out of my tent again to sleep under the stars. Man. It's amazing out here.

You... have to wonder. Because of the way light travels, any other those stars could be dead at this very second, but they're alive to us, alive and shining and more... there than we can ever know. Stars! Constantly dying and being reborn and we don't even know it. We don't know... much of anything, do we?

In this context... it's scary. As people, we want to leave our impact. Somewhere, someone could be looking at something glowing and it's Earth, and it's shining despite being long, long gone. And nobody knows it's gone; it's just....

But isn't that testament enough? All the tragedy and awesomeness and heartbreak and joy and sadness. Everything. Because the world wouldn't be the way it is without it, right? I say don't worry about leaving your mark. Do something that matters today, because somehow, somewhere, someone will remember you.

Look at me, I sound like Walter or something XD. Aw well. I think I'll head back to camp before I encounter some kind of toothed carnivore, ahaha. Goodnight, everyone. I'll post again in the morning.

Happy Trails (And sleep well!),

Zachariah Lewis

I'm fine.

And you all left off on such a desperate note, I'm fine.

just

not really feeling like myself anymore.

but I'm still typing, right?

that show's I'm fine

pleaseohgodi'mshowingthemi'mfine

they're all dead

zach is with me though

still in the trees, not sure why we tried to leave

its nice here

reallynicehere

with all the blood and stuff

sometimes i can pretend, youknow

that this never happened

not sure what it means

probably more pain

hope not

hope doesnt count for anything

nothing ever meant anything

we all didnt die for anything

imsorry

imsorryimsorryimsorry

we didnt want this

i didnt want this

idontwanttodie

i still have somuch to do

i

i

nononojsutalittlelonger

please

PLEASE

ican
Suzedidnt have to

richard.

elliott.

alex.





run.



just



run.

The forest's gearing up for something.

The air around us seems different. Charged. Almost. . . waiting?

I've heard whispers of rescue plans.

Suze has already voiced the general opinion on this matter. Good luck. If something could've been done it would have been done already. Couriers have tried. That's what Harper tells me, anyways.

Can you believe I actually listen to the bastard? No wonder Suze thinks I'm a deserter.

She's not dead, by the way. So that's always a good thing. One less body to add to the smoulder pit at center camp. She's here and Richard's back, too. Got screwed up pretty badly by Collector by the looks of it. That's what he tells me, anyways.

A flash of red, he says. We see them around a lot. /I/ see them around a lot. A blur of crimson. A spark of what looks like fire, so intense that it sends a painful shot straight to your head and leaves you with an perfect shade of its former self, now teal and gray, exactly where you saw it.

Sometimes, it has eyes. If you're lucky, teeth. A grin a mile wide.

I call him Cheshire.

Camp calls me crazy.

Actually, traitor's the word that's on their lips most of the time. Traitor. Deserter. Back-stabber. They cycle through them. All because I want to play a tune or two every now and then. Or maybe it's because I've been wandering the forest every so often. This place really isn't too bad once you get used to it.

Not like it's safe to go out there. I mean, it was never safe. Just stable. Wander too long and you'd never see camp again. Sometimes I wonder if there's anybody left. The ones who wandered off, I mean. Sometimes I look for them when I'm out there. Listening for something, /anything/, that would tell me that somebody other than the seven of us and our resident 'caretakers' (and I use that word very, /very/ lightly) out there.

I've been unsuccessful. I'm even pretty sure that Cheshire's just a figment of our collective imagination.

But it's nice to pretend.

It's About Time.

Is there no better way to end a two month silence than with a cluster f-bomb? I think not. 


Previously in Class 123, people died. Shocking, huh? That's a plot twist to end all fucking plot twists. Next thing you know we'll wander in circles and somebody will run off screaming into the bushes.

Actually, wait. That already happened, didn't it? It was Chase. What a damn shame. 


Yeah, definitely bitter. If I wasn't before I sure as hell am now.

Rest in peace, buddy. Half of us wouldn't be here without you. Not that half counts for much where I can list off the remaining kids around camp on both of my hands. Me. Richard. Lyle. Alex, and a handful of others - though Alex isn't really Alex anymore. Poor bastard stopped responding to his own name a little while ago. Started talking about seeing Zach around camp and keeps notes on his arms about what the hell is going on here - which, all things considered, isn't much. At least bitch and Slenderfucker have graciously left us to die in what little dignity we have left, even if that traitor Broodmoor is still sneaking out every few night to play a song or two with the bastard.

Fuck I don't think I've ever needed a drink so bad in my fucking life.

Calm, Suze, caaaalm...


...



Alright. I think I'm going to be okay now. A few trees are now sans branches but what the hell, we've got thousands. Knowing this place they'll be bigger and fuller by the time we wake up tomorrow. Or what we think is tomorrow. Fucked if I know because the sun stopped setting a long, long time ago and our phones stopped giving us the right time long before that. I stopped caring. It feels like it's only been a couple weeks and suddenly all I hear around camp is two months, two months like we're in The Grudge or some shit.

Though that would be a pleasant fucking surprise at this point. Death by creepy Japanese kid crawling out of my phone. I think I'd be okay with that. As long as I don't have to look at Tall, Dark and Faceless' ugly mug every time I shut my eyes.

Richard's gone.

... Yeah, I've got no transition for that.

Richard left a while ago. Broodmoor was smoking somewhere in center camp (where the hell did he get cigarettes?) and said he saw him wander off. When I asked him why the fuck he didn't stop him he just kind of shrugged and took a drag.

"So it goes."


Asshole. People are dropping off left and right but he can at least pretend to be upset, can't he?

Can't you?


Another one bites the dust, I guess. Richard Battles, you crazy, brave, idiotic, masterful jerkoff I hope to whatever gods that might still watch over this place you went down in the blaze of glory you wanted to.

I'm not a religious person. I'm just terrified. 


And as for the ones plotting that little rescue mission? Yeah, I've been around the blogs. Followed the comments. Can't post, but there are some workarounds. Turns out there is a type of proxy I don't feel guilty about associating with. 


Call me close-minded.

Your rescue mission? Not going to work. We've been here for four months and we can't get out. You expect to come in, guns blazing, rip us out of camp and drag us back home?

Good fucking luck. 


Really. If those couriers or whoever the fuck is responsible for giving us provisions for the last little while can barely get in, (and apparently get kicked right back out) what hope do you have? It didn't matter too when things went south in July, did it? Why the interest now? Just leave us to die. You'll only add to the pile of bodies and frankly, we don't have enough fuel left to burn the current ones with. We don't need any more blood on camp's ground and we definitely don't need You Know Who or his little hooded bitch on our case again. We're just a bunch of college kids who got in way, way over our heads. There isn't enough of us left to be worth saving.

Did you know that when an animal thinks it's going to die, it panics? But when it knows it's going to die...


Well. I'll leave you to puzzle that one for yourselves. I'm not as determined as Richard or as crazy as Lyle or as lost as Alex or as smart as Walter or as...broody as Broodmoor. I've had four months and plenty of examples of what happens when somebody stops fearing death and welcomes it with open arms. And after watching it happen 42 times?

It's my turn. 

Please

Oh god, someone help us, please.

But there's no god in this place anymore....

It's been almost two months but it's hard to tell what exactly is going on

when what happened

when we are right now.

Because you know what? Walter was right. Zach was right. Even fucking Collectorshit was right.

I suddenly have this feeling that everything was connected. It's like I could see the whole thing, one long chain of events that stretched all the way back before this all started, and I'm not going to live long enough to find out the truth. I feel like I can see everything that happened, and everything that is going to happen. It's  like a perfect pattern, laid out in front of me.


And I realised we're all part of it, and all trapped by it. 

Time doesn't mean anything when you know you're going to die.

Nobody answers our posts anymore. We don't have admin so we can't even see if people are checking the blog in their apparent bout of apathy. But I see you all. I see you all fawning over M and joking about Robert and cheering on Maduin. But M isn't going to help us, and Robert and the Jester...

None of you care.

I'm starting to wonder if you ever did; If anyone ever did in the first place, because what does it matter? As long as you're alive then why in hell's name should any of this bother you; you all have your friends, your "families", and outside of that, the rest of the world can burn.

I don't blame you.

I can't blame you.

All those times chasing chicks and laughing with Zach, working my ass off in high school and being annoyed with my parents; the trip to Italy and learning to fight from that weird pale guy, crying when I fucked up that one time in the school play and seeing my mum cry as I moved out of the house...

... I'm tired of surviving. I just want to live; I want to go home and take a shower and hit something and go to the mall. I want to eat fast food and see a movie and get in a fender-bender. I want to do graffiti and bomb a test and say goodnight to my little brother.


But I can't go back to that anymore.

If this even gets out, if you're reading this, I'm not going to have much time left. That's good, I've got that, but once you realize this, you don't last long in here. It makes you comfortable. Or maybe that's what I tell myself, what I want to believe in this nest of fucking lies and liars.

Because I'm more afraid than I ever had been in my life. I barely sleep anymore; I can feel Him watching me, appraising me like I'm a hunk of meat. I look around camp and I shake. And shake. And shake. I can't stop, We won't stop.

And every so often, someone stops shaking and walks into the trees. The first few, I'd plead with. I'd beg. Scream myself hoarse that they still had too much to do, had people waiting for them, but why would they listen?

It's obvious that nobody's come looking for us. We're the class the world forgot.

Then I turned to violence. Broke some limbs. But Chase isn't... around. And they only ended up dragging themselves out of camp while calmly stating that I'd have to kill them to keep them from going. Even when they screamed for mercy until it all went silent, we didn't follow them. We couldn't.

I don't try to save them anymore.

But maybe I stopped being afraid when Adel gave up. When Wallace, his partner to the end, went into the trees after him. He was shaking too, but it wasn't with terror; and when Lily started screaming and Ian stared into her eyes and told her he loved her since fifth grade and then slit her throat from ear to ear,

She was trying to run to Him. So it goes. And so he wasn't afraid, not anymore.

Heh, look at me. I sound like Lyle. I sound like Zach. Can you blame me?

Because in our lives, this hell, you find something else; you find something that matters more to you than life. They threaten to kill you unless you give them what they want, but you all tell them you'd rather die. You face the fact that this is your life, and it's ending one minute at a time. You become calm. You become still. Maybe that's because you knew what was going on, maybe you knew what you were getting into.

But I didn't.  Twenty years old and I'm going to die because I wanted some extra credit.

It seems strange, seems foreign to type it out, see it so plainly written in this tiny word processor. To, as Walter would have put it, "Confront mortality; see it stretched out before you like a line in the sand, watching the tide of the end grow closer and closer".

He never said anything like that. I'm a fake. I've always been a fake. Trying to be brave for everyone, trying to give them all something to hate. At first I thought it was hate, too, how I would survive through this. Hate was all I knew, it built my world, it imprisoned me, taught me how to eat, how to drink, how to breathe. I thought I'd die with all my hate in my veins. But then something happened. It happened to me... just as it  will happen to all of you. 

... For four months, I've known that it was coming. I've apologized to no one and gotten no apologies in return; parts of me slowly dying, eaten by all my hate and then shutting up when I had nothing left; centimetre by centimetre.

12 by 9.

It's small, and it's grainy; it's a crappy screen on a crappy cellphone that spent way too much time hidden under a desk or in my pocket

And it's the only thing in this fucking place worth having. He's never going to take that from me.

Even if the Collector looks me in the eye as he stabs me in the heart, he'll never be able to take this away.

That's the only thing I can promise.

The only thing I have left.

And here's my last love letter; the last I'll ever write.

...I hope that whoever you are, you escape this mess. I hope that the worlds turns, and that things get better. But what I hope most of all is that you understand what I mean when I tell you that, even though I do not know you, and even though I may never meet you, laugh with you, cry with you, or hug you,

I want you to live.

I want to live. I want to know that all of this wasn't for nothing, that my life wasn't nothing, that somewhere  somehow, I made a difference. That this isn't all I'm left with. I want to die decently. I want to never stop fighting until the end.




But I've stopped wishing for things I know I'm not going to get.

I'm sorry. I'm sorry for everything.






"But before you go, I'd like to ask you something."
"Yes?"
"The Tsimtsum sank on July 2nd, 1977."
"Yes."
"And I arrived on the coast of Mexico, the sole human survivor of the Tsimtsum, on February 14th, 1978."
"That's right."

There's a dark jungle next to the village. People who go into it never return. The villagers fear the jungle. Then one day a man with a torch goes in, the villagers scream at him to not, but he does anyway.

"I told you two stories that accounted for the 227 days in between."
"Yes, you did."
"Neither explained the sinking of the Tsimtsum."
"That's right."
"Neither makes a factual difference to you."
"That's true."
"You can't prove which story is true and which story is false. You'll have to take my word for it."
"I guess so."

He returns the next night, crawling back, bleeding to death, claw marks on his back. With his last breath he says 'Within the Jungle lives a Tiger, who is twelve feet long, obsidian claws, and has fire in its eyes...'

"And in both stories, the ship sinks, my whole family dies, and I suffer."
"Yes, that's true."
"So tell me; if it makes no factual difference to you and you can't prove the question either way, which story do you prefer? The one with the animals, the one with the tiger, or the story without?"

'...but it is just a Tiger and it bleeds.'

"The story with the animals is the better story."
"... Thank you. And so it goes with god."







After that, he dies. 








--Richard Battle

Well I suppose that I should inform you

That this little twisted game is far from over.

Figured you lot should know.

Well, at least he kept his promise

If by promise you mean "LET'S TWIST EVERY FUCKING HOPE AND DREAM YOU HAVE, SMASH IT INTO THE GROUND, AND THEN SET IT ON FIRE."

Calm, Lyle, focus.

Nick came back.

Now he's dead.

And a whole lot of shit happened in the middle. fuck, my hands are shaking, I'm covered in blood, and I have to wonder if you're insane if you know you're going insane.

Sometimes I log onto the blog and can't see posts. We all used to tell each other when we'd put something up; for praise? Peer editing? I don't know. But lately everyone has been trying to keep things secret.

...I think they're trying to keep it from me.

... He didn't lie. Nick stumbled into camp in the dead of night, not that any of us heard him. We heard this from Richard, who happened upon him first, or did he, no, i'm the one that found him first, it's hard to remember...

But he didn't lie, didn't lie, didn't lie.

Do I blame them....? Can... I blame them? Somewhere in my head I know it's possible. I'm not so sure what they're afraid of, or at least I tell myself that, but I used to share my tent with Zach and now everything so quiet at night and you can hear everything

and I mean everything

And they're talking about me these days in harsh whispers and sideways glances. And this is SO out of character for me but I'm just going to spit it out;

I'm scared.

He had never been quiet or stealthy, but somehow, he made no sound as he moved. It was a voice that woke me up, not a scream or even a grunt, but I heard him, I heard HIM but that should be impossible

Sometimes... something just comes over me and I throw all one hundred and thirty pounds of my lanky body into doing things I... I don't want to talk about. Richard keeps looking at me, oh god, he's not looking at me, he's guarding me and my head is pounding

Just because you let it slip that you heard ONE whisper from Slender in your head, and it wasn't even cool enough to be directed at you, oh jeeze, just KNEW that William was in trouble and now they're guarding me like a fucking prisoner.

Got up, noticed a dark, moving shadow near the fire. Noticed the body. And another. And another. More people dead. It didn't matter, not at that second. Did it ever matter? Not your body on the ground. The dark figure moved over to Suze's tent.

I followed.

I am not Number Four.

It'll pass. It'll pass and either they'll forget or all go nuts or IT WON'T BE SO FUN WHEN IT HAPPENS TO THEM, WILL IT? I'm the only one that can remember everything.

Nick. Nick was back with that knife and that sick grin on his face and he was standing over Suze and I could see her chest move slowly up and down as she struggled to breath and his hand moved over his belt buckle and suddenly I understood

And split his neck open from ear to ear.

He didn't make a sound.

Then they'll know I'm not crazy.

Maybe it's just a matter of me convincing myself of that first.

... Thanks, Elliott.

And so the bearer of bad news is me once again.

As my musically-inclined classmate stated earlier, something happened in the forest today.

A few days ago you'll recall Suze and I found Jennifer and Joshua hanged hand in hand in a clearing not far from camp. Suicide, we ruled. Joined suicide. By the time we had gotten Lyle awake and functioning and returned their bodies had vanished, which lead to many a suspicious glance and paranoid assumption. We could only guess at what had happened to the corpses, though none of us really wanted to.

But I digress.

There were five of us out today - me, Lyle, Suze, Elliott and Richard - compass and map in hand, trying to find our way back to the campsite and trailer park a few kilometers south of where we had set up our own camp. None of us were particularly optimistic as all our previous attempts had landed us back on square one after several hours of wandering in circles, but hey it was worth a shot.

It wasn't like we had anything better to do with our time.

So imagine our surprise when we stumble upon a path that leads us to an area of the forest nobody had seen before. Hope began to spark somewhere inside all of us and we pushed further along, suddenly much faster and with new vigor.

We turned a corner through a thick bit of undergrowth and maybe fifty feet away we saw two figures, backs turned.

A few things happened next.

First, it takes us a few seconds to let this sink in. There are maybe thirty of us still around and everybody else was back at camp and we've been around each other enough to figure out who is who in a dark room based on the sounds of their footsteps.

These two people looked nothing like students from Class 123.

Second, Lyle and Richard kick into high alert. They shift their weight and are ready to deal with whoever or whatever these two people are.

Third, Suze shouts.

'Hey!'

It's at this point that I have no idea what she was thinking (or if she was thinking at all) but she makes a break for the two people standing in the distance.

She didn't see the black tendrils that held them flies in a spider's nest.

Fourth, the figures move in a way that isn't natural at all. Their bodies go limp and the black web withdraws, but the bodies stay standing and their heads just ... fall to one side like the necks has been snapped in half. They pitch backwards and then forwards and their legs kick out from under them and they walk in jerky strides, heads bobbing back and fourth ninety degrees one way then ninety degrees the other. From behind them suddenly appear Tall, Dark and Slender himself and the path goes dark because those tentacles of his are above us, below us, around us, circling us like a cage and this buzzing, this horrible buzzing overtakes my mind and I can scarcely see through the stars that are clouding my vision.

Suze stops.

Dead.

And she screams.

Suze never screams. Not when Zach died. Not when she watched Nick slice Bryan's throat from ear to ear. Not when she saw Slender for the first time less than a meter away. So close she could almost reach up and touch him.

She screams now.

The two figures are Jennifer and Joshua.

She screams and Slender is on her, grabbing her with whatever those black things are composed of, grabbing her and pulling her in opposite directions - not enough to pull her apart, but enough to pop both arms out their sockets and pull a shriek so shrill and so full of pain that I can still hear it in the back of my mind.

She falls to the ground and goes absolutely limp, still screaming and now sobbing and what's left of Jenn and Josh are on her, clawing, pulling, tearing and cutting. Her arms are useless and we can only stand there in horror and watch our classmate and friend be literally picked apart before our eyes.

There's a flash and a cry and Richard yanks one of the two off of Suze, butterfly knife drawn and slices Slender's holds clean off of her. The body falls and blood oozes from her eyes, ears, nose and mouth until the forest ground is coated red and warm and sticky to the touch.

Joshua is a little more difficult. Lyle flies into a rage and he's on him, but Josh is much stronger and doesn't seem to know anything of pain anymore. It takes me, Lyle and Elliott to get Josh (or what's left of him) off of Suze, who is long unconscious and pale from blood loss and pain. Her blood mingles with Jenn's until the entire scene is red, red, red.

Josh goes the same route as his beloved and we find ourselves alone, out of breath, exhausted and one of us heavily injured if not already dead against Tall, Dark and Slender himself.

And what does he do?

He leaves.

He just vanishes and the two bodies vanish and Suze is collapsed and bleeding and pale, my god she's so pale and her face is covered in blood and her nose is bent the wrong way and her eyes are shut and swelling, swelling and her arms are bent completely the wrong way and nothing about her looks right and the only thing in all our of minds is god, please be alive, please be alive...


We're back at camp in a blur.

Everybody is crowded around us and wants to know what happened. Elliott has to explain because Lyle is still shaking, Richard is high off of the adrenaline surge and I'm tending to Suze.

It's just after nightfall now and there's life in her, at least. Her face is swollen and her nose is broken but at least we've managed to pop both arms back into place. It'll be a long time before she wakes up and everyone is taking shifts making sure she doesn't die on us.

Nobody wants to see another classmate slip away.

Especially when we can maybe save that classmate.

She's in for one hell of a time when she wakes up, that's for sure.

Alex out.

Something's happened.

Regularly it's Suze's job to provide everyone updates on the crazy bullshit happenings of Class 123, but as she's currently . . . out of commission, I guess it's my job.


Take it away, Alex.

. . . What, you want a real post?

Guess I can't be cryptic forever.

He showed up on time, as expected. 10:30, and not a second later.

How gentlemanly.

Christ on a bike, the entire camp (or what's left of us) was watching when he arrived. Some were glaring, Lyle was shaking with rage and Suze was just . . . cold. But when the branches split and a dark hoodie entered HQ, you can be damn well certain everybody stared.

You couldn't see his face through his mat of hair. I'm not sure if it's actually brown or if weeks of being stuck in the forest with us just turned it that colour.

It has for us.


"Where's Nick?" it's the same question on everybody's mind, Suze's just the one that says it. She's brave, you know. Brave but protective and that makes her reckless.

"The same place you are all in when the song of the leaves engulfs you whole~" He laughs. "Subject Susan, did you really expect a straight answer?"


You can practically see steam pouring from her ears.


"He will be returned. Unharmed."

She clenches and unclenches her fists. "Tell me when, you blonde basta -"

"Suze, that's enough." That's me. That's me telling Suze to back off. A fight here wouldn't do us any good, especially if they had Nick - especially if Suze was the one doing the fighting. 

She glares at me and I know I'm not going to hear the end of it. But the Collector? He sighs. It's... melodious? 

"Aha, good to see that even I have allies in this madhouse."


"Hardly." Still looking at Suze, I reply in a heartbeat. "But we're not here to fight. We discussed this. Or did you forget about our little arrangement, Mr. Collector?"

"It seems that you lot are all talk and no action~! A shame, a shame..."

He grins. you can't see his eyes.

"Lead the way."

Suze says something to me before I leave. I'm not sure, but it ended with '... you idiot,' and I was guessing I was going to get to hear it many times over when I got back.

I set foot in the forest, the Collector behind me. Every last pair of eyes followed us until we were too far out of view.

No, I couldn't stop my fingers from trembling but yes, we did manage to hold conversation for however long it took us to get to our destination. Little things. How long we'd been playing, other instruments (he plays classical guitar as well, much to my complete lack of surprise.) and, of course, the subject of today's . . . adventure: Sonata Pathétique.


It didn't take us long to reach the boudoir grand he had set up in the woods. What took me well over two hours on my own the other day was maybe a hundred feet away from camp today. I was convinced that if I looked back I would see camp poking through the trees, but all I saw was a thick net of branches and leaves. This forest is a maze.

My shaking was hardly under control by the time we had sat down. I could only catch glimpses of his facial features under that hood and mask of hair. His eyes are, from what I can tell, a grayish blue and his hair looks to have one time been a light blonde.

What followed was . . . difficult to describe. Have you ever sat down with a blank piece of paper or instrument and utterly lost yourself in the feeling of raw creativity? Become a slave to those notes or lines on the page, letting it move your body, no, your soul?

That's what it was like.

Beethoven's Sonata Pathétique is a heart-breakingly gorgeous and it was almost an honor to play with someone with talent as opposed to just skill as a result of years slaving over ivories.

Almost.

Oh, and Mr. Collector?

It's a shame you never got proper training. There are things only years of lessons and professional teachers can teach you that no amount of personal talent can account for.

And don't think this means I'll do this again anytime soon.

Just because we had one good run doesn't mean we trust you.

Or will ever trust you.

Hey, look who's back.

That went much better than expected.

Sort of.

And another thing.

Tune that damn piano, will you?

I can't tell your D from your E flat.

Definitely self-taught.

How do your fingers move that quickly, Mr. Collector?

I can hardly keep up.

Found the piano.

And guess who was playing it?

He's self-taught, by the way.

The Fucker Came Back.

Elliott Wimbledon Broodmoor, I am going to kick you in the ass so hard you're going to see the curvature of the Earth.


He came back. He came back and he gave everybody in camp a fucking heart attack with that fucking shit-eating grin and fucking 'hay gaiz, what's up?' and the first thing I did was slap his stupid face because goddamnit Elliott what the hell is wrong with you?!


...

I thought you were dead.

Ithoughtyouweredeadithoughtyouweredeadithoughtyouweredead!

I swear to whatever figment of whatever culture's imagination is currently pleasing to your eyes, Elliott, the next time you wander off without my permission I'm going to...

Well.

Hahahaha.


We've already discussed this, haven't we?

We Couldn't Find Him.

...

Yeah.

Don't really have much else to say on the matter.

Rest in peace, you fucking, fucking idiot.

Suze out.

I Always Knew He Was An Idiot.

Suze here.

Elliott's gone, to the surprise of absolutely nobody.

Really, I knew we should have kept an eye on him the second he started going on about pianos and music and Moonlight Sonata. What the hell, guy? This isn't the Elliott that blares stupid indie music down the halls at school and sang shitty country songs as we roasted marshmallows and weenies.

Since when did Elliott like classical?


Whatever. I'm not here to judge. The point of this post is a bit of an update, I guess. I know this is Alex's job but he's been stuck in his tent and nobody wants to go in and ask what's up.

Selfish bunch, aren't we?

I guess impending doom does that to you.

Anyways, so Elliott's gone. Things have been pretty quiet after Nick disappeared; (honestly nobody reported on it because nobody gave a fuck; the kid was annoying and arrogant and wouldn't stop hitting on me) the delivery seemed to really ease everybody's nerves because, holy shit, there are people out there who are actually noticing us. 


Fantastic.

Richard and I are heading out to see if we can't find the crazy fool before the sun dips too low in the sky. Hopefully this will be brief.

Hopefully we're not too late.


Elliott, you fucking idiot, I'm going to chew you out so hard that you're going to wish that blonde brat had gotten to you when we find you.

So please come home safe?

Thanks. <3

Suze out.

Being baited.

But genre savviness is Lyle's job, not mine.

I'm finding that damn piano if it kills me.

Moonlight Sonata.

A favourite of mine, actually.

You sly bastard, how did you know?

Been out in the forest.

Hearing music on the wind.

I wonder if I'm not just going crazy?

As fun as it'd be...

This isn't the time for everyone to sit down and fucking cry.

Here at camp slenderland, things are not going well, at all. and really, if you can't see that, you're a fucking idiot.

So why are some of the others running around camp with fake optimism?

... It's not something that I'm going to try and understand.

Am I going to give up?

Fuck no. It's going to take a lot more than one of my best friends going to the dark side to make me fucking give up.

(Those cookies better be damn worth it, Walter.)

But we had to do something. Leaving all this shit around from the people who died (and the person that might as well be dead) is really creeping everyone out. Not me, of course; I can handle a shirt or two.

But Lyle...

Suze....

Christ, everyone is taking it hard. Especially now that-

(fucknoRicharddon'tthinkabouthim)

So we staged a pretty big bonfire last night. It was... soothing, in a way? I don't know; a few kept crying and a few kept laughing and really, they haven't stopped since.

... and I'm banking on nobody checking this, so I'll come out and say it.

I was going through Walter's tent, picking and choosing what we were going to burn because, fuckdammit, some of those textbooks he had were interesting and there was no point in putting them to waste because nobody wanted to be fucking sentimental....

Anyways.

I was rolling up his sleeping bag when I found a lump. Woulda just ignored it but it was unsightly and

okay. Is anyone surprised that I thought it was porn?

... It was better than that. This little soft thing, kinda worn. Still in pretty good shape; patched up with black stitches on white fur. Maybe whoever was mending it had run out of proper thread? Pinned to it was a little note;

"Wallllllllllllllly

I'm going to miss you! D: But Mum and Dad say that you really want to go on this trip and it's going to be good for your career and blah blah blah. They're lying, aren't they? I know you don't like this stuff, so I packed your favourite textbooks without you noticing. Teach Zach some, will you? He doesn't seem the most happy all the time, but he's nice. He said he'd take good care of you while you were gone, so I'll just have to trust him, right?

Try not to get too many mosquito bites! I can't wait to play with you once you get back, okay? No avoiding it for schoolwork!

Uh-oh, I can hear you walking back up to your room. Have fun on the trip, and sleep tight!

(P.S. If you rip Mr. Nibbles, make sure to fix him, alright?)"

Sorry, guys. but when we get out of here, I'm going to be returning this. Plus, this rabbit has a damn bowtie. A BOWTIE.

Beat that, Slendershit.

... and to close on some good news, though it's kind of paranoia inducing;

We got a special delivery yesterday. Food. Water. A bit of medicine. After weighing the risks, we've decided that it's all we've got right now. The paths are so bad that it takes hours to reach the river and minutes to get back. Almost like the forest is going nuts or something; ah well.

Only question is...

Who the hell left it, if nobody can get in?

(Though if somebody doesn't end up keeling over dead, well....

We've obviously got someone watching over us.)

Fight 'till the end;

--Richard Battle

//Collecting// new allies

And so another one joins the ranks. Absolutely wonderful, if I may add. A brilliant mind, clouded not only by a desire to seek the truth, but also, a desire to seek revenge~! Answers are never /easy/, but if you look hard enough within the shadows, well...

you might start to understand them if you become one of them.

The man you knew as Walter is /gone/, my Subjects. An empty, hollow shell filled with unadulterated /rage/ is all that remains; what a faithful servant he's already proven himself to be...

If only all the failures were this useful.

(Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him, Horatio: a fellow

of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy: he hath

borne me on his back a thousand times; and now, how

abhorred in my imagination it is! my gorge rims at

it.)

Spinning, weaving webs of lies and disappointments. Yet you live. You all live.

There's a reason, a difference between the worth and the unworthy; the ones gifted with /sight/ and the ones /gifted/ with blindness.

(Here hung those lips that I have kissed I know

not how oft. Where be your gibes now? your

gambols? your songs? your flashes of merriment,

that were wont to set the table on a roar? Not one

now, to mock your own grinning? quite chap-fallen?)

Of the ones who were left behind, left to be purged, destroyed, forgotten, which of those still /lived/; still breathed and laughed and thought and created? Which of those did you come back for?

(Now get you to my lady's chamber, and tell her, let

her paint an inch thick, to this favour she must come; )

Forgotten.

Sleep well, Subjects. Your wilful ignorance will not save you.

( Make her laugh at that. )

Not anymore.

I really have to get over myself

If I want to live.

You all saw what happened. Walter... fuck. Walter left.

And we all know what he is now.

But me, I couldn't leave it at that, oh no. Suze is smart. She fought back in words.

(Not that it did anything)

But me, for some reason I thought, I don't know. Was I even thinking?

So I followed him.

It doesn't get less genre-savvy than this, folks. But Walter had changed. In the moment that he had reached... some sort of realization, something turned into something else.

(I know I'm not making a lot of sense, sorrysorrysorry)

Either way. He knew. And not like my tripping and stumbling in the undergrowth made it any better.

"I assume you're not here to come with me."

He gave me a sad smile and his eyes positively shone in the moonlight and for some reason he didn't seem human anymore-

"Walter. Walter, you don't have to do this. You're being stupid."

I'm a genius, you know that? He took one step towards me, then two, and I instinctively stepped away.

Well fuck.

"I think the climax of the book will be the execution of poor old Edgar Derby. The irony is so great. A whole city gets burned down, and thousands of thousands of people are killed. And this one American solider is arrested in the ruins for taking a teapot. And he's given a regular trial, and then he's shot by a firing squad..." He looks down at the ground, still smiling softly.

"Um."

"Don't you think, Lyle, that's really where the climax should come?"

Slaughter-House Five. One of Zach's favorites. I'd read it the day after he...

"You don't have to do this, Walter, this isn't your fault!"

He tilts his head at me, and for a second I panic because I seem to have a two phrase vocabulary.

"Just because it isn't my fault doesn't mean I can't do something. You're all afraid."

Guilty.

"And I'm not a madman because I accept my fear."

And I try and look up at him, accept what he is saying.(IwillrunfrommyfearIwilloutdistancemyfearthenIwillhidefrommyfearIwillwaitformyfearIwillletmyfearrunpastmethenIwillfollowmyfearIwilltrackmyfearuntilIcanapproachmyfearincompletesilencethenIwillstrikeatmyfearIwillchargemyfearIwillgrabholdofmyfearIwillsinkmyfingersintomyfearthenIwillbitemyfearIwilltearthethroatofmyfearIwillbreaktheneckofmyfearIwilldrinkthebloodofmyfearIwillgulpthefleshofmyfearIwillcrushthebonesofmyfearandIwillsavormyfearIwillswallowmyfearandthenIwilldigestmyfearuntilIcandonothingelsebutshitoutmyfearIn this way I will be made stronger.)

"You ARE a madman, Walter. What happened to saying that you weren't giving up? That you weren't going to let anyone else give up?" And he turned away from me and muttered

"I said I wasn't a madman. I never said I was a person."

And he left me standing there. Standing there until I was so cold and numb that it didn't hurt anymore to look at the blank space that he had been standing in. I came back to camp empty handed. Richard was busy staring into space, and when he saw me, he put his head into his hands.

Everyone else was asleep.

Everyone else was awake, waiting.

And I didn't say a thing.

What.

What.

What.

Fucking what.

Walter Bishop Reeves, are you out of your fucking mind?!

Did all of that philosophical bullshit finally drive you insane? Are you some kind of idiot? Joining //them// solves nothing. They'll use you like a tool and then kill you when they're bored of you.

Just like the rest of us.

Zach was their toy. Lyle is their toy. I'm their toy. You're their toy and once they're finished with Walter Reeves we're going to find him in a garbage bag, cut up into snack-sized cubes served with a fragrant sauce of blood and other bodily fluids.

And that's if they're feeling merciful.

If you're not back in camp by midnight tonight I swear to God I will hunt you down myself and make //he// does seem like a fucking picnic.

Am I understood, motherfucker?

... What.

New avenues

I tell you everything that is really nothing, and nothing of what is everything, do not be fooled by what I am saying. Please listen carefully and try to hear what I am not saying. ~Charles C. Finn

Lies are easy.

Being afraid is easy. Accepting something without explanation is easy.

Being a philosopher, a truth seeker, however, is something that is very, very difficult.

Especially when the truth is not evident, not right in front of you.

It was so simple.

It was so simple and I never noticed. Return to Zero, back to idioms and White Elephants, to something as simple as fairy tales of dragons and Sages, Reach for the surface of the water and watch it ripple.

London Librarians and Latin curses, Let Us Live in Dreams in Darkness. Take the Myths and make them your own, but don't Shoot The Messenger upon Ravens and Writing Desks. Create an Origin of Simulation and keep Venting Hate. Become Stardust and tell a Really Bad Joke. Seek Truth and Record Impossibility.

Speak in circles.

I've got that one down.

False Dichotomy. A basic fallacy of logic. I thought there were only two choices available to me in this forest;

Escape or die.

It's almost funny because I realize now... I have more options than that.

More options than any of you could imagine.

I said I couldn't find answers.

Turns out I was looking in the wrong places.

If we're going to be in a war, I'm going to join the winning side. It's nothing personal; in fact, I suggest that all my fellow Subjects join me.

Because I can't die here.

There's just too much for me to do.

Bertrand Russell ocne said that "The Observer, when he seems to himself to be observing a stone, is really, if physics is to be believed, observing the effects of the stone upon himself. "

If only we could bring ourselves to believe that was true.

Farewell.

The Nights Are Getting Longer

And the deaths less frequent.

Since our little run-in with Slender that left the camp in pieces and filled Nick with what I can only call hopeless bravado, (and we all saw how well that worked out) things have been pretty quiet around here. A lot of us are beginning to relax and the air of the camp almost feels ... calm. Elliott brought out his guitar last night and we all ate squirrel and blueberries and forgot the fact that we're all almost certainly doomed.

That's not to say they've ceased, though. Every once and a while, I'll lay awake in my tent at night and realize that I'm not the only one who finds a time for reflection and soul-crushing realization that we're stuck here, and most of us won't live to see civilization ever again.

I've dropped from a size 14 down to a size 10 and I don't show any signs of stopping. You look around camp and suddenly everybody's bone thin and pale as death; the lack of sun and proper food really isn't really good for us. Even Richard is starting to succumb to malnutrition and lack of sleep, and this is a man who is build like an ice box and moves like a snake.

Lyle (who was skinny as a rake to begin with) looks like a skeleton saran-wrapped in a web of dark veins and white skin. I equate him to something of an old thermos: he seems solid and reliable on the surface, but it's only until you fill him up and watch the life drain from his eyes that you realize the glass inside is broken.

On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everybody drops to zero.

There's been more than one time when I've angsted all over the post editor just to hit backspace until the words are gone, because I know there's a time and a place for that and the middle of a post isn't the time and the blog isn't the place.

The internet, unlike real life, has the most beautiful invention known as the backspace key.

Anyhow.

It's somewhere around 3:30 AM - or is it? I woke up one night to find my clock telling me it was January 23th, 2323. (Haha, motherfucker. Nobody's laughing.) Silence has fallen upon the camp for the first time in ... ever, really. It's hard to find silence anymore. 

As I've stated, everybody else seem to take this sudden lull in activity as a sign of things looking up. Well, except for the ones who've known something was wrong from base one. Lyle, Alex, Richard ... surely you know which ones I'm referring to by now. The ones who blog. The ones who have kept you informed and me sane.

The lull makes me wonder if something big isn't about to go down.

The calm before the storm.

We're playing into their hands

Hello.

It sure has been a while, hasn't it? Yet again, there really hasn't been much to say.

Nick did recover, but that depends on what you call recovery. The minute he could walk, he ran into the forest and-

Really, you should know the rest by now.

It's getting a bit hopeless, our situation. Some, like Richard, still show hints of wary optimism; trying to keep the glass eyed dolls somewhat engaged, from looking at the darkness that circles us, prowls the paths at night, branching tendrils that follow silently behind you in a wave of something that you don't quite understand and will eventually-

I digress.

Today we discuss Hegemony, but first, perhaps, a detour?

Dominant ideology. In Marxist theory, is a set of common values and beliefs shared by a majority of people in any given society, setting a precedent how that majority will regard different topics. Marx argues that, in his socio-political worldview, Dominant ideology is used to reflect and serve the interests of the almost superior class in that society- if it conflicted with the legitimacy of the superior class's rule, than the society would appear to be at a constant state of chaos within itself; superiority appearing as an illegitimate occupation.

This theory is therefore summarized; "The dominant ideology is the ideology of the superior, dominant class."

Whereas basic Hegemony is child's play, its offshoots are a tad bit more complicated. Really, Hegemony is described as an indirect form of imperial dominance is which a leader state (in this case, the Greek Hegemon), rules sub-ordinates by the implied means of power, as opposed to a direct showing of military force. Curiously, Hegemony is used in languages to describe a means of application and creation; any source that classifies information is, intentionally or not, part of a Hegemonic process, in that source can only contain a finite amount of information. Therefore, in the particular selection of information that is displayed, the source is limiting and skewing the information that the recipient gets; influencing the recipients choices based on that information.

... Leading into Cultural Hegemony. Gramsci, a martyr of his time. Now, he stated that a culturally diverse society can be easily dominated (and therefore ruled) by one social class by manipulating the social cultural beliefs, explanations, perceptions, and values, so that the resulting ruling-class worldview is imposed as the socialistic norm;

which is then perceived as a universally valid ideology and status quo beneficial to that society, while in actuality it only benefits the ruling class.

Interestingly enough, it is impossible to have full understanding of these three concepts without understanding the others, for they go, almost universally, hand in hand. Curiouser and curiouser.

So the superior class, the ruling class, uses Cultural hegemony to set dominant ideology; in simple terms; the set the rules and then use their authority to keep them in place. The very nature of hegemonic rule keeps this behaviour perpetuated, resulting in maximum profit and success for the ruling class.

Yet...

How do they maintain this level of control? Surely, if we realized this was going on, we would not allow it; after all, we are creatures of choice, not to answer to any master! We are our own kings of destiny, conquerors of logic and cheaters of death! How dare I, in my impudence, even so much as suggest the opposite?

Of course you would say that. That's what everyone says, because we are taught to think that. We are taught to be happy as lobotomized salves to our own shackles that we call "choice".

After all, the best form of control is control that your subjects are not aware of.

Now, as per usual; how does this tie into our current situation? I have been made aware that one; I hold very little power in this place, two; that I therefore hold very little sway, and three; there is very little I can do to remedy this. Perhaps it was better when the wool was over my eyes, when I felt that I could make a difference, that with enough research, I could fight against this.... Thing, that my knowledge counted for something.

I was wrong.

I didn't even get that Sarah was in danger until it was thrown into my face that she was dead, didn't assist Clair until it was too late, didn't apprehend Lyric by any means necessary, didn't even get to speak with Robert or confide in the Doctor before it became clear that the Collector holds all the cards, and I just keep betting on a useless hand.

(Didn't, or couldn't? I still ask myself this as I read Nick's last post; It bleeds? What nonsense is that? How could It bleed, when it towers over us, watching, observing, as impassive as a god?)

I believe that I said in my first post that I refused to give up, that if I ceased my efforts than I would have to give up my own personhood. It's coming to my attention that perhaps slow degradation of this view is something that we all experience...

"Did I do any good?" That question, it seems, comes up a fair deal; though, it only seems to surface near the time of death, the time of reckoning. I need no validation. It still stands, regardless. Though I feel it's less that, than rather...

"Did I do enough?"

And the answer, of course, is a quiet

resounding

no.

HE BLEEDS

HE BLEEDS.

HAHAHAHA. MOTHERFUCKER.

He bleeds.

Hebleedshebleedshebleedshebleeds

HE BLEEDS.

SLENDERFUCKER.

Hahahahahhahaaaa.

AND IF HE BLEEDS I CAN KILL HIM.

Hahahahahaa.

Erin, I'm going to get you out of here babe. I'm going to kill the motherfucker and we're going to run away from here and not give a fuck about anybody else and we'll buy a home in california like you always wanted.

But first I have to go kill the faceless FUCK who's been stalking us since day one.

That's right motherfucker. Keep laughing. I didn't know who you were but you were some FUCKING IDIOT in the trees just watching us as we set up and I didn't care at the time because I thought you were just some tourist or some shit but now I know and I know you bleed and you're going to die.

Hahahaha you're going to die.

Be right back.

Saw HIM

I saw HIM.

The stupid faceless FUCKER. He was just starin' at me even though he doesn't have eyes and his head was sideways and he just STARED and I tried to punch the motherfucker but he's too fucking tall man, too fucking tall to be HUMAN. What the fuck is he? I tried to punch him but I just got this BAD fuckin' throbbing in my punching hand and now my fingers look all mangled and shit and doc says they're not broken so I'm just supposed to WAIT until they get better again.

Motherfucker.

IT'S ON.

Are you scared?

I didn't find him the fucker I bet he's hiding from me. I didn't seem him and I got this STUPID FUCKING HEADACHE doc do you have any tylenol or some shit? I could really use it and I got this really bad cough but I think it's going away now. Stupid fucking pussie ass bitch.

Doc where's that tylenol? My arm hurts like a motherfucker.

Read the blog

You guys are a bunch of pussies. I mean, Richard is the only one who does any real FIGHTING around here and Lyle and Suze just sit off in their corner with Alex and Walter and just talk and talk and talk what the fuck are you guys doing? We're all DYING and you're havin' fuckin' story time. The doc really doesn't want me moving and stuff but I've got the urge to FUCK SOMETHING UP and I think I want to go after Collector or bitchface or whatever you call him.

I'm gonna go for a walk.

Doc says I'm okay now

It's about fucking time!

I've been telling you for fuckin' days, doc, I'm doing fine! Geez! A little broken ankle and a couple dislocated arms and you think I'm going to die or somethin'. I'm not a little pussy like Trent I can get a little fucked up without dyin' ya know.

Who was the faceless fucker in the suit who attacked us? Slenderman or somethin'. Dude's got some nerve if he thinks he can mess with NICHOLAS MOTHERFUCKING DAY. I'm gonna cut him up and serve him for DINNER.

And what's with that PUSSY ASS BITCH with the boxcutter? He's lucky I wasn't busy trying to protect Erin or else I would have fucked him up too.

(Suze is sayin' I need to stop cussing on the blog. "NAG NAG NAG we get enough of it in camp at least try to be formal you idiot NAG NAG NAG")

Stupid fuckin' forest with it's stupid fuckin' maze. Where the hell are we? Suze and Lyle said they found the campground but nobody was there. BUT WHY THE HELL DIDN'T YOU GO FURTHER? You could have gotten out man, fuck the rest of us!

Whatever. I'm out.

Hope Spot

Lyle and I found our way out of the forest today.

Sort of.

While what we found wasn't ... whatever the fuck it is we're trapped in now, the desolate campgrounds beyond the forest's tangle of creepers and rotting branches continues to be very, very far from my idea of salvation.

Alex and Richard were steadfast about not going back into the forest. Did I blame them? Of course not. Alex's cough's been acting up (not that he's admitting anything) and he still hasn't posted the Status Report, so either something's wrong or he's just getting lazy. (Not that he's admitting anything.)

So Lyle and I decided to go.

We both knew very well this wasn't the greatest idea, but hell. Chase has been ... well, you've seen his posts. We were both worried because the last thing we needed was two more corpses to the pile, (nononooptimismSuzeoptimismoptimismyou'regoingtobeokay) but we figured medicine > everything (and escape > everything, but hadn't we all given up on finding that?) and, hell. I'm not going to lie. Getting out of that camp even for a little bit was nice, even if the though of Slim n' Trim loomed over us (metaphorically and literally at one point, luckily we only encountered the faceless twit once.) like an anvil at the end of one big, fucked up Wile E. Coyote scheme.  

So we walked.

Lyle and I don't really have a lot to say to each other. Other than Zach we have literally nothing in common, and he isn't exactly what I'd consider the socializing type. We were completely silent until we got a point where the path was blocked by a fallen tree, when we stopped to look at each other.

"Gotta go over it."

Lyle, being the gentleman that he is, kindly offered to let me go first. But as I set a foot on top of the log and put my full weight on it, I felt it give and roll forward.

I fell into the thicket beside the rotting tree with a the grace of a cow piloting a 747 and swore with all the lady-like sophistication of a sailor who had had five too many bottles of rum.

And what I landed in wasn't what I expected.

At all.

What I had expected was a further tangle of undergrowth and my hair getting caught in a billion places, each one more painful to remove than the last.

What I didn't expect was to roll an extra couple feet and find myself in the middle of the campgrounds where all the rich folk and their RVs had been left to rot.

We couldn't find anything inside those tin cans called RVs, and what few tents still remained had been torn to shreds. Everything was burned, and soot choked our lungs like the fog choked the air. There wasn't a single structure that hadn't been touched by the fog, and everything held within its grasp seemed devoid of both colour and life; the soot that clogged our throats and caused us to cough (though we both knew, though neither of us wanted to admit, that Someone Else was also responsible for it as well) was also found like a blanket, hugging every surface it could hope to land on, and then some it couldn't.

It may have been raining, because through the fog and between the trailers (hoping - no, praying that we found somebody, anybody inside of those thin metal walls, always finding nothing and always losing a little more hope when we did - or rather, didn't) we were hit with icy dagger from above that soaked our hair and our clothes and turned the ground sticky and black.

Neither of us spoke a word.

It was ... quiet. I know you'll hear people on this blog go on about it all the time, but I don't think they've ever heard true silence. The silence we have at the camp is peppered with breathing and shifting and wind howling and trees rustling and, if you strain, screaming. (Or maybe it's nothing at all. Guilt-ridden hallucinations? Fabrications of our imagination? Maybe it's all in our heads. Chase seems to have it the worse right now, what with bitchface's little butchering of the Hippocratic Oath.)

Well, the silence that fell on the campground was complete. Even the rain that soaked us to the bitter bone fell without a sound, and our footsteps seemed as if they weren't there at all. When we turned our heads to look behind us (which we did a lot, both out of paranoia and ... okay, maybe it was only paranoia, but that isn't the point) the places where our shoes touched the ground and we fought to bring them back up from the sludge on the ground were undisturbed.

This went on for two hours.

We went through every tent, every RV, every garbage can and hiking pack.

And who did I see perched atop an RV?

A blonde brat in a hoodie.

Bitchface was laughing; he'd probably been watching the entire time.

Oh fuck you.

"...There's nothing here." It was Lyle who broke the silence, saying what I had been thinking for the last twenty minutes or so.

"..."

I couldn't stop glaring daggers at our Collecting friend.

"... Yeah."

Whatever.

I shook my head, offering him a smile as hollow as the RV we just emerged from. "Yeah. Let's go."

You know, a lot of the time I complain about the fact that this is The Place That Physics Left Behind. When there's a clearing in front of camp one day and a river the next, after a while you kind of just give up and go with it. 

What choice do you have?

But after a couple hours of playing chicken with bitchface and not well equipped enough (or in the best condition, especially after last Saturday. Wow. A week already?) to do anything about it, I was thankful to cut through that foliage and find camp, not the road.

It's about time we got a bit of a break.

Going to catch up on some fucking sleep,

Suze

//Collecting// the history

I swear by The Leader, the healer, the savior , and the creator, and I take to witness all the witnesses to keep according to my ability and my judgment, the following Oath and agreement:


To consider dear to me, as my parents who sacrificed me, Him who taught me this art; to live in common with Him and, if necessary, to share my goods with Him; To look upon His children as my own brothers, to teach them this art.

I will prescribe regimens for the good of my patients according to my ability and my judgment and never undo harm to anyone.

I will not give a lethal drug to anyone if I am asked, nor will I advise such a plan despite their pain and suffering, But I will preserve the purity of my life and my arts and my selfishness.

I will not cut for stone, even for patients in whom the disease is manifest; I will leave this operation to be performed by practitioners, specialists in this art, and leave them to die as they scream my name in agony.

In every house where I come I will enter only for the good of my patients, keeping myself far from all intentional ill-doing and all seduction, infringing on only their shattered psyche and leaving nothing else in my wake.

All that may come to my knowledge in the exercise of my profession or in daily commerce with men, which ought not to be spread abroad, I will keep secret and will never reveal, despite the fact that it may save them.

If I keep this oath faithfully, may I enjoy my life and practice my art, respected by all men and in all times; but if I swerve from it or violate it, may the reverse be my lot, may I be trialed, judged, and sentenced to death.


See, you almost forgot~! Let me remind you, Subjects; you are playing by my rules.

They will die, despite your best efforts, and there is nothing you can do about it.

Need Sleep.

Still haven't gotten any since wednesday and now it's really starting to show.

Well the Collector was right about one thing it's that he's pretty good at predicting who is and who isn't going to survive. But out here is anybody really surprised when we're already short supplies and Alex and Richard come back with nothing. Not that I'm blaming them but they'd be REALLY, REALLY USEFUL right about now.

Actually.

They'd always be useful because if you haven't caught on by now it's an almost certain that we're all pretty much boned.

Three of them were lucky enough to get sick from the infections, fall asleep and just never wake up. I'm envious of them in one way but in another I guess I'm thankful I'm alive.

(I look across the camp and someone is on the ground, screaming. There are five hundred black trees surrounding the camp and I can count the leaves on every last one of them. They're twisting and writhing and they're picked up by Everyone's Favourite Faceless Bastard and torn to shreds and the blood pours like a fountain and I'm covered in it the tents are covered in and the trees are painted red, red, red and there's enough of it to put out the fire and what's left of them hangs from the once-black-now-red branches.)

One of them just managed to disappear when we weren't looking. I was with Lyle talking about what we were going to do now that we're going to run dangerously low on supplies, and Suze popped in and asked where Opal was.

(She's another one of those 'peroxide blondes' i told you about way before all of THIS happened. Cute girl with a pretty smile and sparkling blue eyes. Her boyfriend was a total douche and he didn't deserve her at all. Well now nobody has her.)

The only thing I could think about was how she would have managed to stumble out of camp with a shredded muscles in one leg and a fractured femur in the other, where she shouldn't be able to PUT WEIGHT on her foot without SCREAMING in pain let alone get out of camp unnoticed.

Then again who said she had to walk?

I heard people coughing.

(And I look at Suze and when I blink it looks like she's been literally hit by the metaphorical semi that she's mentioned. Pieces of bone jut out from where the bridge of her nose used to be and there are two empty sockets where her eyes should be with cheeks caked in wet over dried over wet blood that forms like mountains around what's left of her dimples. What used to be her scalp has been completely removed and there's grayish pink matter - as if we don't know what THAT is - dripping down the sides and her ears are bleeding heavily as well and she lets out this long moan of pain and I blink again and she's fine.)

But if there's anything good to be said about the situation it's the Nick seems to be healing nicely.

His broken ribs are slowly healing and his arms are both back in place, and other than a hair-line fracture that's already healed and a ton of ripped muscle tendons he looks like he'll be okay. He's managed to fight off the bacteria and feels like enough of his old self to be A TOTAL ASSHOLE to the classmate trying to save his life.

He's lucky I put professional practice before my OUTRAGEOUS EGO.

But the fact that his name is still crossed off worries me. I guess if I expect us all to die (OH WOW IS THAT EVER DEPRESSING) I shouldn't be bothered by it but there's something so foreboding about seeing that 1 pixel line through a name that gives it an air of foreboding.

What's that Suze says?

On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero.


I don't think I've seen a shorter timeline or a lower survival rate.

Someone Needed to Change the Blog Description

So I changed it.

Radio Silence ending in...

Three...

Two...

One...

And here I thought that we may be better off just shutting up and not saying anything, but, fuck, Chase is losing it and with most of us hanging on by a thread... It's, shit, hard to type without swearing every two seconds, because I'm not too sure what to say. What can I say? The /Collecting/ bastard seemed to sum it up pretty clearly, though real classy, implying that we're all injured or worse. Ha ha, you fucking wish.

(They're not dead yet They're not dead yet They're not fucking dead yet Why is everyone acting like they're not alive anymore?)

It came out of the night like a bat out of fucking hell. Or, at least, I'd like to say that. We were all on edge because of, well, how could you not be on edge in our situation? But we were all sitting around the fire, not really saying much of anything. Richard was chatting on about god knows what (I swear, he likes to hear his own voice more than anything), but this sense of almost calm had almost pervaded the camp like the sickness has pervaded our lungs.

Like that was going to last. There was this... rustle, this kind of crack, and everyone's heads whipped to the source so fast we all could've gotten whiplash or something.

You heard Suze mention Trent. And to be honest? She really, really didn't give him justice. I'm not sure I even can. He had just gone to the goddamn perimeter of the camp; not far out into the forest, to look at the symbols carved into what now are bloodstained trees.

I like that imagery as much as the next guy.

And we all go as white as a sheet, because he's stumbling towards us, towards Chase, all while whimpering desperately;

"helpmehelpmehelpmehelpmehelpmehelpmeIdon'twanttodieIdon'twanttodieIDON'TWANT

TODIEHELPMEHELPMEHELPMEHELPMEHELPME"

And so on and so on. And you know what? That was plenty bad enough.

(Trent was a good kid who never decided to write on the blog because "I don't want to bore the hell out of whoever is reading this out there. They deserve better than me!". He doesn't even mean anything to you, all you guys have is a name. But he played guitar, not well though; never had the time to practice. He had a girlfriend back home who was studying to be a lawyer. He had an older brother who he got along well with. He played hockey, and had talent, but wanted to get a full time job so he could get married. He did alright in our coursework, but tried harder than most of us.

And now he's dead.)

But it got worse. Of course, it got worse. The... the videos never really give It justice. It was behind him, tentacles out and ready to wreak havoc, some of the slick with (don'tthinkaboutitdon'tthinkaboutitdon'tthinkaboutit). And we just stared.

And there was this blur and this same general air of unease and someone's abdomen fell out and the screaming began and it was every man for themselves.

All things considering, it happened pretty quickly. Chase ran around, checking the bodies of those who fell for a pulse, and Richard starting barking orders and here we are.

There's just one thing that bothers me.

The Collecting bastard made a few things clear. People dead. Slender. An attack. Infection. So, assuming that the ones we have alive stay that way...

Are we going to end up having to fight our own people?

Shit. Five days ago, Richard and I were looking around the clearing, trying to find a possible way out, and he said

"It couldn't get any worse."

He was wrong. Obviously.

Now let's see if that first aid course has done me any good so Chase can get some sleep.

(At first, I didn't care. Them, not me, you know? It was knowledge versus ignorance and if they couldn't deal with it then it would be their bodies on the ground, not mine. But then I started to know their names and see their faces and get used to them, just like I got used to Zach, and suddenly they weren't faceless meatshields that would keep me from dying, and when they started to die it felt like someone had punched me in the gut and if I could I'd just let them kill me if it meant they could all get out because I've started to care.

I don't know what's worse. That none of us are getting out alive or that there's not a damn thing I can do about it, no matter how hard I try.)