We're on the road again. I think we got out just in time. Something terrible was set to happen, of that I'm sure. It's closer, now. He's closer. Whoever He's got following us - any money it's James, if he still lives - is closer now.
It's kind of hard to explain how my old compatriots do the following thing, because most of it is going to sleep in one place and waking up in another having bought some train ticket or convinced some trucker to give them a lift, but regardless of how it works hanging around brings them closer just like it does Him. One day whoever it is will wake up with a train ticket or an address that'll lead them right to us, and that's when it gets interesting. I've got a lot of contingencies, and to be frank, I really can't wait to try some of them out.
Not that any of them are too violent, mind. I cringe every time I see the words "fucked up another Proxy" thrown out as an afterthought. It never accomplishes anything, killing innocent people who've lost their free will. All it does is stain your soul and make you that little bit more used to killing. Well, that and deny some family somewhere any chance of ever getting their son, or their husband or their daughter back.
Do you want to know what the Touched do when they're not wearing masks? I'll answer the question for you. You don't. But I'll tell you anyway, and we can see if you'll all just learn to deal with what you've done and what you're doing.
Mostly they stare at walls, dead inside - nothing but an empty shell being driven by a poor impression of a human. Sometimes, they convulse in pain or with the intensity of 'His rapture', or speak in tongues about creatures long dead, thoughts long forgotten and the corpses of Gods. But occasionally, when He's busy elsewhere, when He hasn't bothered with the theopany in a while, they sit in the corner and cry. Or write letters to family that they'll never send, because what the hell do you say to people from a life you were torn from by a faceless God? Once in a while, some might even beg me to kill them, if they're feeling particularly hopeless.
These are people you're killing. Violent, dangerous, insane, cunning, demented people, but people nonetheless. Sometimes, they're not even Hallowed - and I have to use that word because Touched doesn't mean the same thing. We're all Touched, the Heretics and Hallowed and Taken alike, and sometime when you're "stomping the shit out of some proxy trash lol" you're just killing somebody indistinguishable from yourself a few months from now. What do you think Damien was like in his last few days? How do you think Maudin's going to end up if a prank ever goes too far? What separates them from us? The world isn't black and white, people. It's grey, endless grey, like a really shitty video game.
This post isn't for all of you, obviously. There are people out there who clearly understand the moral conundrum involved with murdering the shell of a person that's been corrupted by Him. But the more often you delude yourself into thinking you haven't been killing people, and every time you dehumanize the corpse you've just created, you do just that. Dehumanize them. This whole game - this whole fight - is one fought in the head-space of countless unlucky victims. And when a good part of that head-space just accepts the fact anyone He Takes is no longer human, it makes it very difficult for what's left of them to cling to humanity.
I get it. Killing people is hard, and it's easier when you convince yourself they're not people. And to an extent they're not, especially when they're trying to claw your brains out for besmirching His name and daring to resist His light. But somewhere inside that mind, buried deep within that grey matter and hanging from a Tree that doesn't really exist is a person, and they might not feel the pain as their body is destroyed, but they'll learn soon enough that it has been when they realise His Tree is the sum of their existence from now on.
And maybe, just maybe if you'd shot them in the knee, or been content to leave them unconscious on the floor instead of stamping their head in, they might've had another day weeks from then to enjoy a chocolate bar or watch a slightly more sane friend play Fable, or just have a shower and feel the water one more time. Or sit in a corner and cry about how much they want their mother. Like the person they are.
Friday, February 25, 2011
Tuesday, February 22, 2011
Frankly, it figures
Maybe it's all true, everything I've heard. Maybe Redlight was the sinful son of Adam. And also the anonymous nobody who first encountered the Slender Man, aeons ago. Maybe he did build the temple to Him, wherever it lies forgotten. Hell, every story I've ever heard about him was probably true, once, for one of him. It's a troubling thought. If there is a game he's playing and it involves Him, then we're all fucked. All of us. The Touched are like a lifeline of normality for Him. With them hanging from His Tree, he can kind of understand how people think, and he isn't so disgusted by us, so angry and violent. They keep Him watching, learning and growing. Without us, all He is, is wrong, and all He can do is what He does best.
And if Redlight goes, a lot of my former colleagues might go with Him. It's obvious enough that anybody with enough of themselves left to want out would have the best chance then, and losing Redlight might weaken Him enough - temporarily, that is - that they'd be able to break free.
I don't like it. Redlight's playing a game that's most probably going to end with everybody you've every talked about Him to dead. You can't game Him. He doesn't understand the rules of the world like we do. And He's been in enough heads to understand betrayal and it's appropriate response.
On a much, much brighter note, I think we've been here too long. It's a middle of nowhere town halfway between another two middle of nowhere towns, but it has free internet in the hotel and I can't bring myself to leave. So we're going tomorrow, whether I want to or not. I can feel whatever's coming getting closer and nothing good is going to happen once it gets here.
Or maybe Robert's just crazy.
And if Redlight goes, a lot of my former colleagues might go with Him. It's obvious enough that anybody with enough of themselves left to want out would have the best chance then, and losing Redlight might weaken Him enough - temporarily, that is - that they'd be able to break free.
I don't like it. Redlight's playing a game that's most probably going to end with everybody you've every talked about Him to dead. You can't game Him. He doesn't understand the rules of the world like we do. And He's been in enough heads to understand betrayal and it's appropriate response.
On a much, much brighter note, I think we've been here too long. It's a middle of nowhere town halfway between another two middle of nowhere towns, but it has free internet in the hotel and I can't bring myself to leave. So we're going tomorrow, whether I want to or not. I can feel whatever's coming getting closer and nothing good is going to happen once it gets here.
Or maybe Robert's just crazy.
Saturday, February 19, 2011
Really Roughly Read Roadsigns
I can do alliteration too!
Drew's too superior to write it out explicitly, and he really doesn't approve of me mocking him (that's the title) or his old employer's more trusted subordinates (that's the content), but I have to say it.
When all this whitetext business turns south and Redlight turns out to be playing us all again, I so called it. Just saying.
Oh, and for the darling Broeckchen (I swear Drew actually called you that once and I'm so totally going to get in trouble for saying that), I spent most of my time in Europe proper on a bus tour driving through forest after forest and mountain after mountain, and I'm certain something was watching me for parts of it in that perfectly stereotypical, wonderfully creepy way. Germany was hauntingly beautiful with all the bare trees and the snow, but I just know I was being watched and that kind of ruined it. I don't think it's particularly hard to guess who was doing the watching, but I didn't see anything without a face. Just a whole lot of unpleasantness, you know?
Drew's too superior to write it out explicitly, and he really doesn't approve of me mocking him (that's the title) or his old employer's more trusted subordinates (that's the content), but I have to say it.
When all this whitetext business turns south and Redlight turns out to be playing us all again, I so called it. Just saying.
Oh, and for the darling Broeckchen (I swear Drew actually called you that once and I'm so totally going to get in trouble for saying that), I spent most of my time in Europe proper on a bus tour driving through forest after forest and mountain after mountain, and I'm certain something was watching me for parts of it in that perfectly stereotypical, wonderfully creepy way. Germany was hauntingly beautiful with all the bare trees and the snow, but I just know I was being watched and that kind of ruined it. I don't think it's particularly hard to guess who was doing the watching, but I didn't see anything without a face. Just a whole lot of unpleasantness, you know?
Friday, February 18, 2011
Redlight, Robert and Revenants
First thing's first - what's been happening lately? Absolutely nothing. We've been heading back south towards our old hometown just for somewhere to drive to, since direction helps this kind of thing, and there's been no indication whatsoever we're being followed. Which is terrible, terrible news, because it means whoever is following us knows me. That's literally all the news about us.
So Redlight.
The guy's a celebrity. Seriously. Half of my old colleagues had crushes on him, and that includes a good deal of ostensibly straight males. He's like the Jesus of the Touched community, with the added benefit of still being alive. The stories I've heard about him are obviously false, because, well, I'm almost certain he's never been to Australia and half of them are told by people who insist they've heard it from the man himself. I wouldn't worry about his 'mystical origins' if I were you, even if he is a Revenant. Still, I've heard told he's the only living descendant of Cain, the sinful son of Adam. There are stories we used to tell that say he's the first man to have ever seen Him or the first person to build a temple to a quiet forest spirit that would rather have been left alone but for some quiet worship from a few faithful followers, who was rewarded for his devotion with eternal life in service of a changing God.
It's all bullshit, of course. He may not know himself, but he's clearly Jay. It's too perfect not to be true. That's the way this works, you see - we end up telling stories, because stories feed Him while He sleeps, when our minds can't. First, He corrupts them, turns them into something more palatable - the facts change over time and we forget that this didn't happen and that did. Eventually what once was, is no longer.
So whoever Redlight was when he made that first post on Robert's blog doesn't really matter. Because it fits best if he's Jay. One day soon, when Redlight's story comes to an end along with Robert's, there'll be some small hint. We'll argue about it, quibble on this and that point and get caught up with the tiny inconsistencies that always occur when a person tells stories about themselves. But eventually, years after blogging about all of this has become trite and overdone, or after somebody discovers that you get left alone a whole lot more often if you stop telling people about all of this, then as long as He endures (which He will), someday somebody will stumble upon the circuit and discover it has changed since anyone last looked at it.
He'll have won every engagement, for one thing. As long as He outlives the civilization He haunts, that's what happens. The cold hard scientific facts of the past fade into obscurity until all that's left are stories in which the monster wins - because that's what He did so why shouldn't the histories reflect that at every turn? And if he makes the cut and remains something He remembers, then there'll be Redlight, perhaps a central figure, perhaps an unimportant footnote. But I'd bet my life he'll be Jay, because that would make the best story.
Anyway Robert and Revenants and I'll leave you all to tear my theory apart with the kind of scrutiny only your fellow Heretic is capable of. If I'm ever stuck in a repeating loop of imprisonment and insanity like that and you're given the chance to put me out of my misery, then put me out of my misery. For God's sake just let me die with some dignity. I don't care if it's Redlight or Him Himself that's offering whatever 'deal' will end up killing me, I'd really rather prefer to die.
Oh, and Robert, If you ever come across our little blog here, I'd stay out of the Forest Paths from now on, if I were you. It's kind of like taking a shortcut through a Police Station to escape from the cops. Eventually somebody catches on and locks the back door.
That's about it.
Oh, and before I forget, since I've said the word now and that kind of thing always invites speculation, I've never met a Revenant in my life. I'm still struggling to accept that they're real. When He's crawling around in your head shouting twisted memories at you constantly and trying to explode your brain by sharing His twisted versions of an emotion, you do kind of get an impression on how He works. And besides from being so terrifying your brain erases any memory of it as soon as it can, it also gives me the feeling Revenants are just not his style. Which means there's a reason a bunch of super-powered freaks are running around and it's not because He needs them. Which unsettles me.
That doesn't mean I'm not carrying around a can of mace. Super-senses aren't really the best idea for your elite warriors, seeing as it kind of makes anything capable of incapacitating a normal person because of sensory overload into a viable murder weapon. I've been trying to convince Ben to fiddle around with the car alarm to install a switch for it, since he knows a bit about electronics and that thing fricken hurts to listen to with normal ears and I'm not a huge fan of my chances of successfully employing the mace if it come to it, but he's not such a fan of messing with the car, which I guess makes sense.
And, uh, that's about it. And I mean it this time.
So Redlight.
The guy's a celebrity. Seriously. Half of my old colleagues had crushes on him, and that includes a good deal of ostensibly straight males. He's like the Jesus of the Touched community, with the added benefit of still being alive. The stories I've heard about him are obviously false, because, well, I'm almost certain he's never been to Australia and half of them are told by people who insist they've heard it from the man himself. I wouldn't worry about his 'mystical origins' if I were you, even if he is a Revenant. Still, I've heard told he's the only living descendant of Cain, the sinful son of Adam. There are stories we used to tell that say he's the first man to have ever seen Him or the first person to build a temple to a quiet forest spirit that would rather have been left alone but for some quiet worship from a few faithful followers, who was rewarded for his devotion with eternal life in service of a changing God.
It's all bullshit, of course. He may not know himself, but he's clearly Jay. It's too perfect not to be true. That's the way this works, you see - we end up telling stories, because stories feed Him while He sleeps, when our minds can't. First, He corrupts them, turns them into something more palatable - the facts change over time and we forget that this didn't happen and that did. Eventually what once was, is no longer.
So whoever Redlight was when he made that first post on Robert's blog doesn't really matter. Because it fits best if he's Jay. One day soon, when Redlight's story comes to an end along with Robert's, there'll be some small hint. We'll argue about it, quibble on this and that point and get caught up with the tiny inconsistencies that always occur when a person tells stories about themselves. But eventually, years after blogging about all of this has become trite and overdone, or after somebody discovers that you get left alone a whole lot more often if you stop telling people about all of this, then as long as He endures (which He will), someday somebody will stumble upon the circuit and discover it has changed since anyone last looked at it.
He'll have won every engagement, for one thing. As long as He outlives the civilization He haunts, that's what happens. The cold hard scientific facts of the past fade into obscurity until all that's left are stories in which the monster wins - because that's what He did so why shouldn't the histories reflect that at every turn? And if he makes the cut and remains something He remembers, then there'll be Redlight, perhaps a central figure, perhaps an unimportant footnote. But I'd bet my life he'll be Jay, because that would make the best story.
Anyway Robert and Revenants and I'll leave you all to tear my theory apart with the kind of scrutiny only your fellow Heretic is capable of. If I'm ever stuck in a repeating loop of imprisonment and insanity like that and you're given the chance to put me out of my misery, then put me out of my misery. For God's sake just let me die with some dignity. I don't care if it's Redlight or Him Himself that's offering whatever 'deal' will end up killing me, I'd really rather prefer to die.
Oh, and Robert, If you ever come across our little blog here, I'd stay out of the Forest Paths from now on, if I were you. It's kind of like taking a shortcut through a Police Station to escape from the cops. Eventually somebody catches on and locks the back door.
That's about it.
Oh, and before I forget, since I've said the word now and that kind of thing always invites speculation, I've never met a Revenant in my life. I'm still struggling to accept that they're real. When He's crawling around in your head shouting twisted memories at you constantly and trying to explode your brain by sharing His twisted versions of an emotion, you do kind of get an impression on how He works. And besides from being so terrifying your brain erases any memory of it as soon as it can, it also gives me the feeling Revenants are just not his style. Which means there's a reason a bunch of super-powered freaks are running around and it's not because He needs them. Which unsettles me.
That doesn't mean I'm not carrying around a can of mace. Super-senses aren't really the best idea for your elite warriors, seeing as it kind of makes anything capable of incapacitating a normal person because of sensory overload into a viable murder weapon. I've been trying to convince Ben to fiddle around with the car alarm to install a switch for it, since he knows a bit about electronics and that thing fricken hurts to listen to with normal ears and I'm not a huge fan of my chances of successfully employing the mace if it come to it, but he's not such a fan of messing with the car, which I guess makes sense.
And, uh, that's about it. And I mean it this time.
Thursday, February 17, 2011
I have been up all night
Reading all your damn blog updates off of Drew's account, since I'm too lazy to follow you all myself. Technically I was supposed to wake Drew hours ago so we could swap guard shifts so I could go to sleep myself, but it's literally taken this long to catch back up with the Internet. Not to mention 'the circuit' (that's you guys - or at least what Drew calls it all. Frankly I think it's a stupid name).
We can't find an internet connection for like a week and suddenly everybody updates. Literally everybody - I reckon there was at least one new post from every blog we're (well, he's, if you want to get technical) 'following'. Sometimes I wonder if you don't do this to mess with us.
Also you'll get a proper post from Drew when he gets up sometime in what is sure to be tomorrow afternoon. He's been sleeping like 90% of the day lately. I'm fobbing off of guard duty because Drew insists that he 'knows how my people operate and we're not getting attacked at like 5 in the morning unless we've got a tweaker following us - because even the touched need to sleep and they tend to do so in the mornings, so if you don't get tired until morning just go to sleep and stop worrying so damn much. They're not going to attack us in broad daylight in a service station carpark either so we're fine. Plus the car's locked, so unless he's got a gun we'll at least be awake for the whole attempt upon our lives.' Which is word for word how he said it, too. That's my thing. He always said he wished he had a mind for dialogue like I do.
And I'm rambling again, which I wasn't going to do because it's five in the morning and I need to sleeeeeeeep. Oh, and Broekchen, I'm not sure if I was imagining it or if 'our mutual friend' was involved, but I'll tell you all about Europe when I don't have a headache and I do have the time.
We can't find an internet connection for like a week and suddenly everybody updates. Literally everybody - I reckon there was at least one new post from every blog we're (well, he's, if you want to get technical) 'following'. Sometimes I wonder if you don't do this to mess with us.
Also you'll get a proper post from Drew when he gets up sometime in what is sure to be tomorrow afternoon. He's been sleeping like 90% of the day lately. I'm fobbing off of guard duty because Drew insists that he 'knows how my people operate and we're not getting attacked at like 5 in the morning unless we've got a tweaker following us - because even the touched need to sleep and they tend to do so in the mornings, so if you don't get tired until morning just go to sleep and stop worrying so damn much. They're not going to attack us in broad daylight in a service station carpark either so we're fine. Plus the car's locked, so unless he's got a gun we'll at least be awake for the whole attempt upon our lives.' Which is word for word how he said it, too. That's my thing. He always said he wished he had a mind for dialogue like I do.
And I'm rambling again, which I wasn't going to do because it's five in the morning and I need to sleeeeeeeep. Oh, and Broekchen, I'm not sure if I was imagining it or if 'our mutual friend' was involved, but I'll tell you all about Europe when I don't have a headache and I do have the time.
Wednesday, February 9, 2011
This sucks
What you people do is no fun. Just thought I'd point that out.
For anybody interested, we're holed up for the night at some random roadway services. We don't really have them in Australia like they did over in Europe (or, at least, they're not called roadway services), but we do tend to have petrol stations with McDonalds or a crappy restaurant or something attached, so this is about as close as we get. Fortunately it's a twenty-four hour place and filled with truckers who look like they'd kill anybody who started a fight, so Drew figures we're probably safer here than we've ever been lately.
We haven't seen much of anything because Drew's refused to stop in one place longer than is strictly necessary to get a night's sleep so I guess that's a plus. He's still babbling incessantly about a million and one possible situations we might find ourselves in sometime in the future, what we need to do to be prepared for them and how to act once we're in them so as to increase our 'survival chances'. "Get the hell out of there and remove whatever obstacles are in your way in as time efficient a manner as you can possibly think of" about sums up every plan he's laid out. I just don't know if I'll be able to deal once one of those obstacles becomes a person. I'm not keen on facing a 'servant' of any description, though I'm less keen for a proper run-in.
I'll be honest - I'm terrified. Drew's being so matter-of-fact about how to defend yourself from somebody trying to kill you (not to mention being matter of fact about incapacitating or killing somebody), and acting like somebody trying to kill us in our sleep one day is just something we have to accept. It's not even the 'top brass' that scares me so much as it is the fact that his first rule is 'assume everybody is trying or planning to kill you all the time and act accordingly'. His second is 'if you see him get out and leave me behind if you have to so much as pause for me, just make sure you leave as fast and to as far away as possible', so that doesn't help much.
I don't know how he does it. We're being followed - of that I'm sure. I haven't seen anybody, but I just know that if we stop somewhere too long they'll catch up. Drew keeps assuring me of the fact, but he wouldn't even have to say it for me to know it's true. It's like staying in one place for too long just lets whatever is watching us grow and grow until that thing shows back up. A part of me wants to stay, though. We've discussed it at length, about the way it makes you curious and tries to terrify you into inaction, so I know any desire to stand and fight, or to investigate or to sacrifice myself for my brother's safety or just give up is just mind tricks designed to make me stay in place long enough to lose my mind, but regardless of all that I still know we need to run as sure as I know the Sun will rise tomorrow.
I can still feel what it was like to have it watching me, and that's enough to keep me firmly in the 'run away' camp. It was only for the briefest few seconds as Andrew dragged me back to the car screaming "Now do you believe me?" in my ear the whole time that I saw it, but it was still the sickest, wrongest and most terrifying experience of my life. He says I'm talking in my sleep now too, crying out for help and demanding something get away from me (three guesses what). He says I'm calling for Mum, telling her not to go into the closet, begging her to ignore what Andrew says.
I don't blame him or anything. I would've done the same in his place. It's all too long ago to remember what really happened, but I know enough now to be sure whatever it is killed her when Andrew begged her to make it stop watching him at night. I never saw the dark man with the teeth, but I do remember Andrew telling me about him out on the crown lands around the corner from our old house and how he made him scared of the house, scared of the closet and most importantly too scared to sleep. I know for a fact I never 'met' him until Drew showed up just like I never knew my neighbour over the road used to take photographs of me while I slept. That still creeps the hell out of me by the way.
It's not like he ever has trouble sleeping anymore. He's been having the most peaceful fricken sleep ever lately, while I'm tossing and turning all night and day watching him sleep with that damned smile on his face.
I may want to smack him one, but I guess that's what happens when you force two brother's who haven't seen each other in forever to sleep in a car right next to each other most nights when only one can drive. This rant's kinda helped a little though, which is nice. All this blogging is kinda therapeutic, especially through the nice blur of sleep deprivation. All this driving has torn my sleeping patterns to shreds, but Andrew says that doesn't really matter, because you can either have proper well structured sleep that's easier for him to get into but harder to corrupt, or fitful, unsatisfying and uncomfortable sleep that's never enough, which makes it harder for him to get into but easier to corrupt so that it all evens out in the end. But the coffee's starting to wear off now after that rant so I'm going to wake Drew back up where he's slumped over the table and head back to the car for the night. At least it's a station wagon with enough space to lie down.
Anyway, until the next time I'm angry at Drew for snoring so loudly and sleeping so well while I can't but am unable to take it out on him by ribbing him about how cars always make him fall asleep, I guess I hope you all stay safe and should thank you for the well-wishes. (Drew's on my back to be polite, but really, thank you.)
I'll make him do the next update the next time we find some wireless. It's absolutely shit here, but the password was just 'password' and Drew got it first try, so that's alright even if he did hog the laptop until he decided it was bedtime and did absolutely nothing with it.
For anybody interested, we're holed up for the night at some random roadway services. We don't really have them in Australia like they did over in Europe (or, at least, they're not called roadway services), but we do tend to have petrol stations with McDonalds or a crappy restaurant or something attached, so this is about as close as we get. Fortunately it's a twenty-four hour place and filled with truckers who look like they'd kill anybody who started a fight, so Drew figures we're probably safer here than we've ever been lately.
We haven't seen much of anything because Drew's refused to stop in one place longer than is strictly necessary to get a night's sleep so I guess that's a plus. He's still babbling incessantly about a million and one possible situations we might find ourselves in sometime in the future, what we need to do to be prepared for them and how to act once we're in them so as to increase our 'survival chances'. "Get the hell out of there and remove whatever obstacles are in your way in as time efficient a manner as you can possibly think of" about sums up every plan he's laid out. I just don't know if I'll be able to deal once one of those obstacles becomes a person. I'm not keen on facing a 'servant' of any description, though I'm less keen for a proper run-in.
I'll be honest - I'm terrified. Drew's being so matter-of-fact about how to defend yourself from somebody trying to kill you (not to mention being matter of fact about incapacitating or killing somebody), and acting like somebody trying to kill us in our sleep one day is just something we have to accept. It's not even the 'top brass' that scares me so much as it is the fact that his first rule is 'assume everybody is trying or planning to kill you all the time and act accordingly'. His second is 'if you see him get out and leave me behind if you have to so much as pause for me, just make sure you leave as fast and to as far away as possible', so that doesn't help much.
I don't know how he does it. We're being followed - of that I'm sure. I haven't seen anybody, but I just know that if we stop somewhere too long they'll catch up. Drew keeps assuring me of the fact, but he wouldn't even have to say it for me to know it's true. It's like staying in one place for too long just lets whatever is watching us grow and grow until that thing shows back up. A part of me wants to stay, though. We've discussed it at length, about the way it makes you curious and tries to terrify you into inaction, so I know any desire to stand and fight, or to investigate or to sacrifice myself for my brother's safety or just give up is just mind tricks designed to make me stay in place long enough to lose my mind, but regardless of all that I still know we need to run as sure as I know the Sun will rise tomorrow.
I can still feel what it was like to have it watching me, and that's enough to keep me firmly in the 'run away' camp. It was only for the briefest few seconds as Andrew dragged me back to the car screaming "Now do you believe me?" in my ear the whole time that I saw it, but it was still the sickest, wrongest and most terrifying experience of my life. He says I'm talking in my sleep now too, crying out for help and demanding something get away from me (three guesses what). He says I'm calling for Mum, telling her not to go into the closet, begging her to ignore what Andrew says.
I don't blame him or anything. I would've done the same in his place. It's all too long ago to remember what really happened, but I know enough now to be sure whatever it is killed her when Andrew begged her to make it stop watching him at night. I never saw the dark man with the teeth, but I do remember Andrew telling me about him out on the crown lands around the corner from our old house and how he made him scared of the house, scared of the closet and most importantly too scared to sleep. I know for a fact I never 'met' him until Drew showed up just like I never knew my neighbour over the road used to take photographs of me while I slept. That still creeps the hell out of me by the way.
It's not like he ever has trouble sleeping anymore. He's been having the most peaceful fricken sleep ever lately, while I'm tossing and turning all night and day watching him sleep with that damned smile on his face.
I may want to smack him one, but I guess that's what happens when you force two brother's who haven't seen each other in forever to sleep in a car right next to each other most nights when only one can drive. This rant's kinda helped a little though, which is nice. All this blogging is kinda therapeutic, especially through the nice blur of sleep deprivation. All this driving has torn my sleeping patterns to shreds, but Andrew says that doesn't really matter, because you can either have proper well structured sleep that's easier for him to get into but harder to corrupt, or fitful, unsatisfying and uncomfortable sleep that's never enough, which makes it harder for him to get into but easier to corrupt so that it all evens out in the end. But the coffee's starting to wear off now after that rant so I'm going to wake Drew back up where he's slumped over the table and head back to the car for the night. At least it's a station wagon with enough space to lie down.
Anyway, until the next time I'm angry at Drew for snoring so loudly and sleeping so well while I can't but am unable to take it out on him by ribbing him about how cars always make him fall asleep, I guess I hope you all stay safe and should thank you for the well-wishes. (Drew's on my back to be polite, but really, thank you.)
I'll make him do the next update the next time we find some wireless. It's absolutely shit here, but the password was just 'password' and Drew got it first try, so that's alright even if he did hog the laptop until he decided it was bedtime and did absolutely nothing with it.
Friday, February 4, 2011
I might've lied about when we were leaving
Which means we might be out of contact for a while and is also the reason Ben's throwing caution to the wind and (gasp!) talking to you guys for once. I don't know when we'll get back to an Internet connection, since we're planning to go off the grid somewhat and the only places that might have free wifi in the smaller towns will be few and far between. And James (or whoever James had in line to replace him as my 'consultant' if I ran and he died), if you're hiding out the front in that house waiting to ambush us, well, by the time this shows up we'll be long gone over the back fence, so better luck next time. Or not.
We left at 10 o'clock, or thereabouts - I'm not so good about writing about future plans as if they're past events. Suck on that. I'm a huge fan of time delayed posting right now, I just wish it wasn't raining so damn hard outside, even if it makes the escape significantly more stealthy.
Anyway, why we had to leave, and also why we had to leave earlier than I told you all: There's been a former colleague of mine living across the road from Ben for some time. I kind of had a suspicion there was when I discovered one of Ben's neighbors watching the house rather intently, but it's not exactly the kind of thing you can prove just watching some old guy watching your house.
I took a little bit of a risk, calling around to see if there was anybody in the area (I said I needed someplace to stay in-between two cities which I'm not going to name, because the town Ben lives in is really the only option insofar as accommodation goes). Fortunately for me, news of my car-crash apparently hasn't traveled, since nobody seems to know I've changed sides.
Turns out there was, and he had a phone number I could contact, so I gave him a call while I was watching the neighbor watch me. We had a nice little chat about how the Touched operate, and since he was pretty far gone I managed to convince him that he'd have to spend a couple of days staring at us creepily without doing anything, since that's what people think Touched do. I won't go into detail but as far as I know it kind of works in a feedback loop and makes it what Touched do, just like all of them writing in code all the time (though, admittedly, imprinted behavioural patterns also plays a part in the code-writing being so prevalent).
Anyway, I figured we had until the weekend before he started doing anything after our little chat, since he wasn't exactly the youngest or most spry Servant I've ever met. I also figured he had orders to alert whoever he's in contact with (which if I'm going to guess is most probably James if he's still alive) when we left, so as to help arrange an ambush or set up a tail. I also figured somebody was probably watching the blog (possibly him, since he was up with it enough to use a cell-phone). Hence 'leaving' on Saturday night and actually leaving now-ish. Actually, make that now, or the ten-ish minute it'll take to pack the last of our stuff. Ben's getting a little paranoid - which I don't blame him for, I am too - so I'm going to have to go. We've got his car parked two streets away, so as to not be seen leaving. Wish us luck.
We left at 10 o'clock, or thereabouts - I'm not so good about writing about future plans as if they're past events. Suck on that. I'm a huge fan of time delayed posting right now, I just wish it wasn't raining so damn hard outside, even if it makes the escape significantly more stealthy.
Anyway, why we had to leave, and also why we had to leave earlier than I told you all: There's been a former colleague of mine living across the road from Ben for some time. I kind of had a suspicion there was when I discovered one of Ben's neighbors watching the house rather intently, but it's not exactly the kind of thing you can prove just watching some old guy watching your house.
I took a little bit of a risk, calling around to see if there was anybody in the area (I said I needed someplace to stay in-between two cities which I'm not going to name, because the town Ben lives in is really the only option insofar as accommodation goes). Fortunately for me, news of my car-crash apparently hasn't traveled, since nobody seems to know I've changed sides.
Turns out there was, and he had a phone number I could contact, so I gave him a call while I was watching the neighbor watch me. We had a nice little chat about how the Touched operate, and since he was pretty far gone I managed to convince him that he'd have to spend a couple of days staring at us creepily without doing anything, since that's what people think Touched do. I won't go into detail but as far as I know it kind of works in a feedback loop and makes it what Touched do, just like all of them writing in code all the time (though, admittedly, imprinted behavioural patterns also plays a part in the code-writing being so prevalent).
Anyway, I figured we had until the weekend before he started doing anything after our little chat, since he wasn't exactly the youngest or most spry Servant I've ever met. I also figured he had orders to alert whoever he's in contact with (which if I'm going to guess is most probably James if he's still alive) when we left, so as to help arrange an ambush or set up a tail. I also figured somebody was probably watching the blog (possibly him, since he was up with it enough to use a cell-phone). Hence 'leaving' on Saturday night and actually leaving now-ish. Actually, make that now, or the ten-ish minute it'll take to pack the last of our stuff. Ben's getting a little paranoid - which I don't blame him for, I am too - so I'm going to have to go. We've got his car parked two streets away, so as to not be seen leaving. Wish us luck.
Thursday, February 3, 2011
You know what? Fuck this
Andrew's being dramatic again, trying to get a rise out of me. I'm not scared of posting because I'm having trouble admitting what's going on, I'm scared of posting because talking to all you guys is a risk. Andrew's been ranting all day and night about what things constitute risks and potential imprint patterns and opportunities for growth within subconscious desires and how to train my mind to reject any of the psycho-magic our mutual friend (Andrew won't let me say or type the name) works while he's trying to get into your head.
I'm worried enough with what went on (that I'm not allowed to tell you about until we leave Saturday night) being one of Drew's risk factors as it is to start integrating myself with 'the community that identifies as sighted', to quote my brother. He thinks being part of the group that calls themselves his victims/stalkees makes you more susceptible to 'psychological attack'. He's got one crackpot theory about 'Narrative Causality' that says the only reason all this stuff happened was because he made the blog and started talking about himself, but that can't be helped either way so I'm mostly just trying to minimize all the risks he's talking about so he'll get off my back. Also I might be a little scared of possibly opening up my mind further.
So sue me. I don't want to become one of Drew's 'colleagues', so I'm probably not going to post often, lest I give the 'subconscious plot being enforced by his memetic nature' an oppourtunity to turn me into a SupErCoolWRITingHALlowedDUde.
That doesn't spell anything, by the way. And if you want all those "The This", "The That" labels Drew, do it yourself. I can't be bothered. And I saw what you did to my about me section. Glad to see your 'job' didn't force you to grow up any.
I'm worried enough with what went on (that I'm not allowed to tell you about until we leave Saturday night) being one of Drew's risk factors as it is to start integrating myself with 'the community that identifies as sighted', to quote my brother. He thinks being part of the group that calls themselves his victims/stalkees makes you more susceptible to 'psychological attack'. He's got one crackpot theory about 'Narrative Causality' that says the only reason all this stuff happened was because he made the blog and started talking about himself, but that can't be helped either way so I'm mostly just trying to minimize all the risks he's talking about so he'll get off my back. Also I might be a little scared of possibly opening up my mind further.
So sue me. I don't want to become one of Drew's 'colleagues', so I'm probably not going to post often, lest I give the 'subconscious plot being enforced by his memetic nature' an oppourtunity to turn me into a SupErCoolWRITingHALlowedDUde.
That doesn't spell anything, by the way. And if you want all those "The This", "The That" labels Drew, do it yourself. I can't be bothered. And I saw what you did to my about me section. Glad to see your 'job' didn't force you to grow up any.
Wednesday, February 2, 2011
Alright then
I can't say an awful lot, because James knows people who know the address of where we're staying at the moment and I'm not sure if he's still alive or if he's told somebody about the blog, but suffice to say I discovered some things yesterday that basically give us a week as of my arrival before we have to be out of here. To keep it simple I figure we'll be leaving Saturday night or the very first moment I see something I don't like. Fortunately my nocturnal habits have been paying off since Ben used to get up every morning at five for a jog. Insanity like that is inexcusable since there really shouldn't be a five in the morning, but it makes sleeping in shifts really, really easy since we're practically pre-programmed for it.
I'll tell you all about what happened once we've left.
Also all that worry about self-fulfilling prophecy was bullshit. "Ben is not safe anymore" was about right. I'll see if I can make Ben introduce himself tonight or tomorrow, but he's kind of absolutely terrified of making a blog becasue "whah, whah, whah posting makes it real like I'm admitting it or something whine, whine, whine. NO FACE!"
I might be taking the piss. But it is a whole lot more hilarious when you're here.
I'll tell you all about what happened once we've left.
Also all that worry about self-fulfilling prophecy was bullshit. "Ben is not safe anymore" was about right. I'll see if I can make Ben introduce himself tonight or tomorrow, but he's kind of absolutely terrified of making a blog becasue "whah, whah, whah posting makes it real like I'm admitting it or something whine, whine, whine. NO FACE!"
I might be taking the piss. But it is a whole lot more hilarious when you're here.
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