Chapter 1: The out of place man.

Robert hated running.

But whatever kept him away from the computer made his life so much easier, his friends had seen the state he was in and it had been getting to them too, Rob had gotten angrier and more hostile since the summer had started. His eyes were always blood shot and the bags under his eyes had doubled from the last time he had come out into town, even then he seemed pre-occupied and blank, staring in to the distance with an uneasy look, sometimes moving erratically on his chair, shuffling from side to side as to get a better view into the distance.

So his friends took him running, swimming, drinking all to keep him away from an unknown pain.

Rob walked up the second part of the hilled wood, he was pleased with himself because he always walked at the start of the hill, this time he ran. He had more energy, more adrenaline, a will to finish the run as quickly as it had started.

It was never enough.

His friends were slimmer and fitter than him and had run ahead. They were already calling for him to take the next left down the hill so that they could start the 2 minute sprint to the finish. Robert hated sprinting as well; his belly and chest wobbled and shook as he ran, not by a lot but just enough so he could feel it.

Robert came to the path that lead towards the downward slope to the end of the forest. Out grown trees and bramble bushes clung to Rob’s shirt and tracksuit bottoms, the clearing shrunk into a small and muddy path.  In the distance a dark cloud brewed over the tree line and birds flew from the swaying branches, He was almost alone in the forest now, it was late and all the dog walkers and runners had all left to return home to their Saturday night TV and warm beds.

The only person left beside Rob was a tall man standing on top of two tall stumps, his arms held onto two nearby branches and the two piece suit he wore blended into the night, only his white under shirt could be seen under the pressing light of the upcoming moon.

'Hey, are you alright mate?!' Rob had a feeling that the man was out of place.

Not that he wore a suit in the middle of the forest or that his featureless face seemed to blur into the surrounding trees and bushes. He was just out of place.

Rob ventured forward, his friends voices dissipated into the thick growth of the forest and soon all that Rob could here was the cracking of sticks underneath his feet and his own heavy voice. Even the forest grew deathly silent.

Rob came into the clearing, a perfectly spherical opening with two tall logs crossed over each other, forming an X over the forest floor. There stood the man, feet either side of the middle of the X. He was not standing on two tree trunks, his legs were the trunks, they were ridiculously tall, slim and tall. His suit stretched over his twig thin legs that lifted him high above the biggest branches of the trees to either side of him. His arms were not hidden by the branches. They were the branches, both spread wide root like finger tips filtered down each other and spread themselves wide, stretching across the cold and harsh air.

                Rob looked up and cried, the figure had no face and no hair. The head sharply tilted downwards, looking at Rob as if the creature had eyes and burned his very soul. Rob fell to his knees and coughed violently. A piercing headache split his head in two and his eyes dripped blood every time he blinked, soon his eyes were full with tears of blood and his coughing had forced him to lie crumpled on the floor. The figure contorted over Rob’s violently twitching body and pressed his head against the crown of Rob’s cold and sweaty head.

A voice shot through Rob’s headache and spoke into his deepest consciousness.

“You researched me, you wanted to know me. So I wanted to know you, I have watched you in the darkness and in the light, I was with your enemies and your family and your friends, I watched you sleep and eat and cry, and I deemed you not worthy, not strong enough for me. You were a waste of my time and now I will take your fear so that you can repay the time you wasted' His voice was cold, monotone, distorted.

Rob screamed through his coughs as the branch like arm wrapped over his chest and his neck.

'YOU...WEREN’T...REAL! YOU... WERE... A.... STORY!'

The slim man spoke into Rob’s head once more.

'YOU Humans brought me to life with your thoughts and fears, now I will use them to bring myself into this plain'

Rob spoke for the last time: 'You are Slenderman'

 'I am Slenderman'