Status Report

There really isn't much to report. Other than the blackout on the weekend, nothing has really occurred over here in Camp Slenderland (Richard's nickname. It has a nice ring to it, in a Friday the 13th sort of way.) aside from Jennifer and Josh.

Suze told you about them earlier. The couple who managed to get away long enough to seal their own fates before Collector got to them - or worse. You almost envy them. I'm by no means the type of person to say suicide is okay, but considering the alternatives? They're lucky. Some of the girls found them this morning, and the commotion woke up the entire camp. Suze was, obviously, distressed, and went straight for Jennifer's tent.

She emerged a couple minutes later, a paper in hand.

"God of power and mercy, you have made death itself the gateway to eternal paradise. Look with love on us, and make us one with Your Son in His suffering and death, that, sealed with the blood of Christ, we may come before you free from sin. 


Amen."

It was fairly obvious what we had to do at that point.

Lyle and Richard looked over the bodies and Walter agreed that they had to be given a funeral just as the others did. But by the time they had returned to cut them down... well. Nothing was there to be cut.

The nooses hung empty.

Lyle is now off in a corner somewhere, freaking out as usual. But is he really to blame? Everybody's freaking out. Everybody except me, it would seem. And to be honest, that's freaking me out. Walter says I'm just trying to block it out, and eventually it'll reach the point where something will snap.

Great.

So now we're sitting at camp and it's late at night and we've got a bonfire going.

The summer solstice.

Midsummer's night.

Back in the medieval times, people would create great fires on midsummer in order to ward off evil spirits. I wonder if that's why the fire seems so big tonight? We've got a viking funeral going - minus the swords and the boats, of course. The bags are sitting in the fire and pouring out wicked black smoke and the entire camp smells like burnt hair. How hot does a fire have to be to turn a human body to ash? I wonder if being cut up helps it any.

Wow. Now that's pretty screwed up.

Anyways.

I'm not sure if we're doing it out of cleansing or out of the fact that nobody's got a shovel and is willing to dig a hole. Or maybe we're all just a little too into the idea of the summer solstice - this isn't the first time it's shown up in this Mythos, afterall - and the local Quebecois (William. He's got an account but hasn't posted yet. I wonder if I should talk to him about that... might be interesting to see what he has to say.) tells us about midsummer celebrations back home. Says we should find marigold and throw it into the fire to purify the camp.

Personally, I think it'll take a lot more than a few flowers to cleanse us of what we've seen, and even more to wash the blood off of the camp floor.

Who knows. Maybe under all the ash you won't be able to see the stains.

Alex out.