THE FOLLOWING DOCUMENT WAS TAKEN AS EVIDENCE IN A MISSING PERSONS CASE FROM OCTOBER 2009. THE CASE TURNED UP COLD, AND IT HAS RECENTLY BEEN RELEASED AS A MATTER OF PUBLIC RECORD.

I stand on the sidewalk, opposite my destination: a three story residential home in the heart of American Suburbia. I’ve been preparing for this mission for months. The pavement below my feet is almost as black as my attire. This is it, I try to tell myself. This is the last time I have to do this. I try to reassure myself over and over that this time will somehow be easier than the dozens that have preceded it. I try, but I know in my heart it will be harder than ever.

No cars drive by as I cross the street. The streetlights flicker on and off as I move, making me nigh invisible in the cool night air. I look up toward the third floor of the building: Exactly where I need to be, the last place on earth I want to be.

I hear the faint click of the lock mechanism and the door opens in front of me. Since this job (if you could even call it that) was thrust upon me, I’ve learned my ways of getting into secured areas. As anyone who knows me may attest, I’m taking the long way. I could be at that window in a matter of seconds without even setting foot in the house. Years ago, that would’ve taken me an hour. Years of practice and all that jazz. Of course, the times I did that were the times I was all too eager to get it over with. Eager to get back to the Higher-Ups with my charges, report my success, and be sent on the next mission.

I have to bend over to get under the archway. I take care to close and lock the door behind me, and I begin my walk toward the opposite end of the darkened house. Toward the staircase. I’ve never been in the house before, but somehow I just know where to go. I silently walk through the dining room, the kitchen, then the parlor.
I reach the stairwell. It’s tight and claustrophobic, and the walls on both sides seem to close in on me. It’s funny. How many people fear me, yet I’m troubled by a set of walls that are too close for comfort. I lay my shoe on the penultimate step, only to hear a loud creaking. The owner of the house stirs, and a light emerges from under his closed door. I freeze and ready myself. This isn’t the first time this has happened on a job, and I know what to do if I am discovered. I’m not here to do him harm, but if it comes to that…

No. The light turns off, and I can hear covers rustling and finally, snoring. The man must’ve lost his nerve. He couldn’t muster himself to see exactly what went bump in the night. Good call. For him, at least.

Next up, a series of hallways. As I traverse them, I take note of some of the photos lining the walls. The residents have failed to notice, but I’m in quite a few of them. Behind a group of picnickers, an arm or a leg jutting out from behind something, maybe hiding in a tree, but I’m there. I’ve been casing this one for a while I think to myself. Of course, it’s things like this that have made the Higher-Ups angry with me. In the long line of men and women who’ve held my position, they say, I’m the only one to have ever been seen. The only one to have been captured on camera. They say I’m sloppy. Lazy. That I have no clue how to do my job correctly and I’m discrediting the mantle that was given to me. “Good,” I would tell them. I don’t want to be a credit to it.

I finally reach the door. I don’t even have to open it, as it’s been left slightly ajar. I place my pale hand on it and push. It swings open without making a peep. The room before me is simple enough. A desk lays on the left of me, with a fully stocked bookshelf next to it. In the far right corner of the room is a sliding door closet, ironic as a massive dresser, complete with mirror and all, is just a few inches away from me.

Across from me on the far side of the room, underneath a small, shuttered window was a bed. Patrick O’Malley, a seventeen year old honor student never did a bad thing in his life. He never got into trouble, hell; he had never even been late for class. He doesn’t deserve what is going to happen to him.

I stand at the foot of the bed for quite some time, debating when I should set this boy on his journey. My neck cranes across the room to photographs on the top of the dresser. I am in none, and my absence shows. In the photos, I see Patrick smiling as he is surrounded by friends and family at the crossroads in his life. Winning his first Little League game, getting his license, and his junior prom. I lament. I hate myself for I’m still about to do. If I don’t do it, the Higher-Ups will send worse agents still, ones far less forgiving than myself.

I shake my head and look into the mirror. I stare for a long time at the ebony suit I have worn for nearly a century, the inky tendrils coming from my back, and blank, emotionless slate that lies where my face used to be.

I am writing this using a page from Patrick’s school notebook. I would like to formally apologize to all those who have been effected by my actions in the last one hundred years. Know that I was cursed by the mantle I bear now. By the mantle I have been ordered to give to Patrick. In a few moments, the essence that ebbs through my body will flow from my fingers and engulf him in waves of black and grayness. As his body morphs and his face fades away to look as mine, I will dissipate into a cloud of dust, when time finally catches up with me.
My deepest sympathies to the O’Malley family. I’m not proud of these actions. I grieve for the path fate has chosen for me, and I do not envy the one it has chosen for your family. Or Patrick.

Signed,
James Ross
AKA: The Slenderman