Falling In Love With Slender Man

Chapter 18

(Hello! A new installment of Falling in Love with Slenderman is finally here! Thank you all again for your awesome comments on the last chapter, sorry I didn't really get to reply to them, but thank you all! Also, in the sidebar, where I typically post songs to go with the chapter, I've posted my brothers bands new song. It would mean a lot if you'd look at it! I personally think it's really good. It's not the whole song, but you'll get the idea. Please do listen to it! Let me know if you like it!) 

 --CHAPTER EIGHTEEN--

                 Ash stood in the lining of tall, thin trees in the woods not far from the old church. The church was now scorched completely to the ground, black ruins floating around all over the old property. Hunter’s had been shuffling through all the things the past few days, hoping to find something. As far as he’d heard, they’d found nothing other than the ashes.

            They had not mentioned Sage. Whether she was all right, or perhaps she had died. Whether she was taking the news of her love well, or if she’d killed herself in despair.

            Ash was honestly contemplating killing himself out of the utter unfairness of the world. But he knew, as he always had, he could not kill himself. Immortality came with a price.

            He knew he’d never asked for this. He’d never wanted to be immortal, nor had he ever wanted to be this monster.

            He hung is head in shame, thinking about his old home. He hadn’t been there in so long… The rolling hills, green and dotted with bright flowers. The sky the bluest of blues. The small cottage he lived in, his mother calling to him to go and milk the cows…

            He shook his head, trying to rid himself of the happy memories. He so badly wished he’d have died back then, in the same time his family had. Living this long was the worst thing he could imagine.

            He remembered walking down the bumpy stone path towards the shaky barn. The wind blowing his naturally black hair from his face in a gust of warm spring air.

            He sprinted through the grass as the cows let out an irritated chorus of moos. They stood in the fields, gracefully chomping on the green grass.

            Bucket in hand he had walked over to the smallest one, a brown and white mare with mud splattered all over her. As he set the bucket under her and that’s when he first noticed something was odd.

            All the other cows had fled into the barn and the one he was at had started to grunt restlessly. She kicked up a storm and then ran after the others.

            The air had taken on a chilly and eerie quality. Fog had grown thick and he could barely see in front of him.

            Slowly a woman had appeared out of the mist, her body a curvy silhouette. She came into view and he could see her clearly. Her clothing was far too revealing, more skin showed than he’d ever seen on another person before.

            Her dark hair framed her pale face and shocking violet eyes stared at him, illuminating in the darkness. Her full, red lips turned up in a sadistic smile, revealing sharp, pointed teeth. He held back a scream at the sight.

            “My boy,” she said in a voice like bells chiming. “You shall pay for the sins of your family.”

            Fear shot through him and he tried to run, but the woman had grabbed him. Her cool fingers had wound around his skinny ankle, feeling like the hands of the dead. After that he had blacked out. He woke up an immeasurable amount of time later, in his bed at his home.

            He’d walked out to see his entire family—mother, father, two brothers, and three sisters—all slaughtered and lined up neatly on the floor. His anger had bubbled up and he’d shot through the roof.

            That was the first time he’d ever turned into the horrid thing that he started to refer to as The Slender Man. Over the time he’d learned to control it, but at first he used to turn into The Slender Man in fits of rage. He’d black out and wake up later only to find he’d killed many innocent people. He used to cry himself to sleep after that had happened, mourning all the lost lives.

            He still had never found out who had done this to him, or what sins his family had committed, or even why he was the one who had to pay for them. And now it was centuries later, and he was still fighting the urge to vomit about what had become of him.

            And now, as Ash stood in the forest, thinking back on his origin—something her very rarely ever thought twice about, mostly due to the sadness and sickness he felt when he thought too long about it—he remembered how eventually he stopped caring about the people he killed. Now it soothed him, made him feel better. Made him forget everything when he killed. He was dealt such an unfair hand, why couldn’t somebody else deal with it too?

            And now Sage was gone… he had no reason not to kill. She had kept him from doing so, because he had realized that he wanted and needed her approval. He had to find her again. But then…

            Small footsteps crunched on the dried up leaves along the forest floor. “Hello?” called a tiny, hesitant voice. It was shrill and childish, and very much frightened.

            A young girl came into view. She couldn’t have been more than six or seven. She was wearing a little pink dress and her long pale hair was tied into two braids with black ribbons. Her blue eyes looked up, and her arms clutched her little doll tighter. She had seen him.

            Any other day, after any other horrible tragedy, he would have pounced on her, killing her. But as her hair that looked like spun silver shined in the midday light, and the freckles on her face mixed with mud from the ground, making her face look vulnerable, and he thought of Sage. He might have been bad in the past, but he hoped Sage could understand that the past was the past. But if he killed an innocent little girl now, simply because she had been taken from him, she would look on him with nothing but disgust.

            He stared at her, his featureless face judging the fear in her wide blue eyes that shinned with tears. He thought she almost looked like she knew death was going to come.

            Ash walked slowly toward her, trapping her with his trance-like gaze. He set his hands on her shoulders.

            Forget what you’ve seen, he said to the small girls mind. You’ll be safe, and don’t think twice about the bad things that live in the forest. Nothing will hurt you, darling.

            She blinked her eyes, and when she opened them he knew she would no longer seen him. Ash stood back in the brush of bushes and trees.

            “Lizzy!” A frantic voice called. A woman appeared, rushing towards the child. She looked much like her, with blonde hair and freckles. Although her eyes were a deep muddy brown.

            “Oh, thank god!” she yelled as she wrapped her arms around the girl, tears splashing down her face. “I don’t know what I would’ve done without you. C’mon. Let’s go get Daddy.”

            As Ash took in this seen, he knew how it would have went if he’d killed the girl. A crying mother, a father walking up behind her, tears coming to his eyes as he saw the limp form of his precious baby. He’d seen that many times, but seeing this was something different. Something seemed to snap in his heart. And if he’d been in his human form, he may have cried.