The Notebook

I finished it.

I figured I'm going to just type the contents for now, the farther into the book Aggy got the less legible the writing was. I'm not going to make you try to read it.

One thing that worries me was her finishing note. Up until that point she had switched to charcoal and almost all of the pages were completely black. But the final page looked clean and nice.

Here's a picture of it. 

She's not going to be happy when she finds out I went looking for her anyway.

When you find it you'll know? Darnit Aggy! You're one of the blunter people in life. Now even you're talking in code?

She better be okay when I find her.


Here are some of the things in the journal that I thought were important.



Aggy's Tips For Survival.


1. Get comfortable with Him. Talk about Him often, and think about Him often too. He's not going anywhere anytime soon, no matter what it is your doing. So accept that this is how it's going to be, and get over it. When it comes to this kind of danger, the more at ease you are, the safer. If you have to, give Him a dumb nickname so whenever you think of Him you immediately associate Him with something funny. I use Mr. Kittykins, I'm sure you can come up with something better.


2. Don't stay in one place. I know it's been done, but keeping still usually ends in depressing out looks on life, and needless drama, which interferes with tip number one. Besides, moving keeps you focused on an action, which gives you less time to think about how doomed your situation is. That's another thing. Keep busy. I already know your good at that Opal so this shouldn't be a problem.


3. Just stay away from the damn trees! You're not doing yourself any favors by going in there, and believe me when I say it won't accomplish a thing. 


4. Get a safety blanket, or a metaphorical one. Just something that makes you feel safer. For most people, it seems a machine gun is a safety blanket, or a rosary. For M it's getting up on roofs, and the guys on Marble Hornets have their cameras. If it makes you feel safe. Use it. 


5. Get some music. Anything nostalgic, or uplifting. Anything that makes you feel happy or calms you. It's also works as an alarm system. If He gets close the music will turn to static. It's a nice early alert that can save you an unpleasant encounter.


6. You can talk to people. I know you suck at it, but I want you to still talk as much as you can. That's the thing everyone always forgets, and it makes me want to kick their asses when they do. NO ONE IS ALONE!!! I don't know how many damn times I have to say it! The proxies aren't alone, the runners aren't alone, the fighters, the victims, no one is alone but Mr. Kittykins, yet everyone is always whining about killing themselves or giving up. All of us are connected, in such a deep way no one even understands it yet. Every time we lose a person, we lose a part of us. Even the proxies hurt themselves when they kill victims, (though none of them will ever admit it, not even to themselves,) You're not alone Opal. Don't ever think you are. 


7. And my lucky number 7...Don't Panic. 

Aggy can be a bit of a character sometimes.

This was the other thing I found that I thought was important.

Throughout the journal Aggy has a bunch of notes and doodles. Like this page for example.



It's hard to read with all the charcoal, and operator symbols, but it looks like she was trying to describe something about how you can see Slender Man through a mirror. You can kind of see an eye and a dotted line. On the right side there's also a list of climates, and Desert was circled.

There was one page though, that while it was hard to read, there was quite a lot of writing on it, and the page was pretty devoid of any charcoal, so I assume she really was trying hard to keep it clean, since almost every other page was run over.


This was what it looked like;

Lignum Hypothesis


The human mind is so vast and complex that we have hardly begun to understand it's true potential. It's been said many a time that if we were to use our brains at their full capacity we could achieve a great deal more than conscious thought. Telepathy, telekinesis, clairvoyance even, who knows? It could be possible. But we of course have no way to prove that, and no one as far as the human race knows has ever been to activate their mind to such a potential. But perhaps something did activate it a long long time ago. Something from our nightmares. 
The brain has so much room for error, it would be easy for something to infiltrate it and use our brains against us. A disease maybe? Or a parasite.
Sometime back in, I'm guessing the late turn of the 19th century, was when He first infected someone. I'm not sure how, but it was probably a child, and the location was somewhere very rural and isolated in Nevada. That child probably started seeing something in the woods, or in the corner of his bedroom, and he would tell his parents and they would worry, but never believe him. And then one day that child would be found dead. And then the next week his friends, then the week after that a little girl in the town over. For years and years He planted Himself in people's brains and used their senses against them, creating a concrete being through their mind. A sort of shadow that would follow and kill anyone who was infected. Every version of Him was a different, depending on the infected person. Some saw ghosts of their loved ones, or monsters with fangs and claws. At this point He wasn't the faceless business man we all know and love, it was too soon, and He wasn't nearly powerful enough to actually construct a consistent form. But then technology advanced, the world began shrinking, and people became more and more connected. It got easier and easier to infect more and more people. By the 1960's we were probably up to about 200-300 victims who were either dead, or were going to be very soon. This was when He probably began appearing more like Himself. There were definitely differences though still. He was probably a bit more transparent, and out of focus. 
And then the internet rolled around, and He suddenly had access to billions and billions of people. Hundreds of millions of possible victims, all over the globe. Looking back there were probably many early posts about Him on the internet, but no one could really understand what they were, or if they found them, they didn't pay attention to them. Until one lucky winner finally got his fake paranormal picture recognized and the fire took off from there.
He can be whatever He wants to be now, but He's settled into a form He seems to like. 
He's one being, but He has access to at least a thousand minds at this point, stretching out for miles and miles and stemming back to that first dead child. Kind of like a big tree when you think about it.
Red-Light, used a similar method to switch his bodies. 


I think after you become infected the gates that keep you from using your whole mind unlock, and you start to realize your true potential, and you also open yourself up to a large hardwire of minds that our in-fact the brains of the other infected. I can hear it sometime when it's quiet, and I really focus. It sounds like a large chorus of screams. And then there's always the off chance if He finds a mind that's particularly strong or special, He'll crack it open and create a proxy. There's another hypothesis I'm working on about what quality a person has that makes them eligible to become a proxy. I think it might be something to do with a blood type.


Now that He's started, He'll keep going until He's infected the world. Why do you think you started that blog Opal? Or why I'm writing in this journal. We want to spread the word because He wants to. He feeds off of fear, and the more of it there is, the stronger He becomes.


You and I have a disease that is one hundred percent deadly with no known cure. It's as simple as that. 


The only thing I've found so far that works is memory loss, but it's a temporary solution. Sometimes a person with a strong mind can create a way to kill Him that may in-fact work, but it wouldn't destroy Him permanently. The solution would only work for that one person, and they would probably just wind up infected again. I think that's what happened to Damien. 


Think about a tree Opal. How do you kill a tree? You cut it off from it's roots, and wait for three days. Then the tree is dead.


How do you cut His roots Opal? What am I supposed to do? 


After that she starts to doodle the (X)'s, and that's the last time she ever talks about this theory of hers.

It makes sense to me. More sense then the Tulpa theory. And there isn't much room for contradictions. Maybe a little in the dates and times, but most of it stays pretty consistent with the blogs I've been reading.

There was a picture on the page next to it.



Aggy's a Med Student who was trying to be a brain surgeon before all this started. (Thankfully she was nice enough to leave out all of the big complicated terms she put in her thesis so I could actually wrap my head around it.) She knows what she's talking about when it comes to the brain, so I'm guessing this hypothesis is correct.

It explains how he attacks different people at once, how sometimes he looks and acts different, and maybe even where he came from.

How do you cut his roots? I honestly don't know, and neither does Aggy so it seems. But it's a start, which is more than anything else at the moment.

I bought myself a new copy of Ender's Game today, (the other one got singed) and hung out and read in a coffee shop since I'm supposed to be taking it easy. Anne went out and bought groceries and some music for us to listen to in the car. Turns out she's a Julie Andrews fan as we now have Mary Poppins and the Sound of Music, to add to our road trip soundtrack. Sounds nostalgic and uplifting to me, so no complaints. She also got a CD with a compilation of great symphony pieces, the Beatles White Album, and a Muppets CD since it was on sale. I can hardly wait :)

Shout out to Nemo if he's reading this, since he's been a huge help in the last couple of days. Wanted to say thanks again.

I feel like things are going to get better, and I'm filled with hope for tomorrow.

Something is definitely going to happen soon, and whatever it is, is going to lead us to Aggy.

I know it.

- Opal

That's All The Proof I Need

He attacked us this morning.

The odd thing is I feel like I want to fall on the ground and start laughing about the whole thing. I actually was laughing a little while ago. Anne thought I'd lost it or something and she started shaking me.

She was all like, "Get a hold of yourself woman!"

Thankfully she didn't smack me, cause that would've hurt.

Maybe this is how I deal with being in mortal danger. Some people have panic attacks, other people cry. Anne deals with it by walking back in forth while telling herself to calm down.

I laugh.

I think I was just relieved nothing really awful happened.  That and maybe how ridiculous this situation really is.

I'll start from the beginning and explain it.

We made it to a little town right by Area 51 yesterday afternoon, and from there we've been able to drive around the area for a little while and look for anything that could tell us where Aggy was.
You can't get very close to the actual base. We tried, but some of the guards stopped us about a mile away from it and told us to get out.
We couldn't find anything else all that interesting, so we drove back to the town and pulled up in a McDonald's parking lot and spent the night there.

This morning I woke up at about five a.m. to find the car was freezing. That was the first sign something was wrong.
I climbed up into the drivers seat and started  it up to see if the radio was working. I didn't get anything but static.

Anne asked me what I was doing. She wasn't completely awake yet.

"Don't move." I said. "Don't say anything."

She looked confused, but she listened to me.

The radio was still garbling, and slowly I un-fogged the windows with my sleeve to see if anything was out there.

He was standing about ten yards from where we had parked, in the weeds behind the drive through. Great, not even McDonald's is safe anymore.

Now I'm pretty blind. If I don't have my contacts in I can barely see my own hands in front of my face. I had just woken up and they weren't in, and everything was pretty fuzzy. But when I was looking at him head on...I could see every detail.

His worn business suit, (wonder where he got that thing) his grey skin, his face, or lack there of. I was sort of curious what it would look like to see a person with no face. It's an odd thing to observe.

I didn't see any of those tendrils though. I think he had them hidden.

I could tell when Anne saw him, because I heard a small gasp.

We stared at him for a while. He was so still.  He definitely looked other-wordly, and I recall there being a buzzing feeling in my head.

Then I made probably the single most idiotic decision I have ever made in my entire life.

I got out the damn car.

Yeah, re-read it as many times as you need to. I spent two weeks reading all of these horrible stories about the many victims who have been gutted by Him, and instead of doing the logical thing, and hitting the gas pedal until I made it to Canada, I got out of the car.

Feel free to abandon me now, followers. I'll probably be dead in a week at this rate.

Of course, Anne, being the intelligent one, grabbed my arm.

"What are you doing?"

I didn't really respond. I think I might've mumbled, "Trust me," or something.

Of course I didn't know what I was doing. Maybe he was playing mind tricks with me. I remember wanting to get a closer look, to see just how real he was.

So I opened the door, and slid out really slowly. He didn't move or respond.

I inched a couple of feet closer and leaned in a bit. I was trying to see if he was breathing or not. It didn't really look like it.

He was just standing there like a statue.

You know how your brain will spit out random thoughts sometimes, and then a split second later you realize how dumb a lot of those thoughts sound.

Well I was in the middle of the first part. I was wondering wether or not Slendy was asleep, and if he was what that meant I was supposed to do.

And then something hit me with the force of a semi. I hit the ground hard, and I think I heard Anne scream, and then I was flung up against the car, and knocked down again. The second time I hit my head really hard on the asphalt, and there was this smacking noise. This was all in the course of about maybe five or ten seconds.

I didn't have time to yell or anything. In fact I doubt there was even any air in my lungs to scream with.

Then something came flying at me, and struck my right shoulder. Then I screamed.

And suddenly there were a bunch of quick images flashing through my head. I can't remember most of them, due to the fact it happened so fast and I probably had some head trauma going on, but I do remember seeing the snowy forest from my dream.

And then I was falling through the air again. But this time someone pulled me up when I hit the ground.

"Get up! Idiot! Get up!" Anne grabbed me and shoved me in the backseat of the car. Then she climbed up in the front and slammed on the gas pedal. He rammed the car once, (Darnit Slender Man, my insurance isn't going to cover that dent,) but I guess he decided not to kill us, because we somehow managed to get away.

Anne drove to a hospital, (Didn't I just get out of there?) and yelled at me the entire way, while muttering some words I'd rather not repeat. We almost hit several cars her hands were shaking so badly.

We pulled up in the parking lot, and she helped me out of the car and into the building. This was when I had my giddy little melt down. I was just kind of in shock at this point. I couldn't move my shoulder and my head was bleeding pretty badly, so everything was a little topsy turvy.

Anne shook my head, (which friggin' hurt by the way!) and told me to keep it together and not lose it yet. I did stop laughing, but it wasn't because of anything Anne had said. Oh no, no, no...

She was bleeding.

Granted it was a tiny cut across her forehead, and I had probably lost a few gallons of blood by this point. But it was enough to get me to stop laughing like an idiot.

After all, Anne saved my life today. I'm happy she's with me, but at the same time I need to be smarter. I can't go walking up to Slender Man and expect that the both of us will be okay. What if he'd attacked her instead? No more idiot decisions like that. It's time I started taking this a lot more seriously.

We made it into the doctors office, and thankfully the damage wasn't too bad. I had a small concussion (Yay! More brain damage,) and dislocated my shoulder.

She gave me an ice pack and popped my shoulder back into place, (which is a really weird feeling if it's ever happened to you.)

She said that I wouldn't need a sling, but I definitely had to relax and take it easy, and that I should try to move as little as possible for the next week or so.

That might be a bit hard taking into consideration how these injuries were obtained, but the doctor didn't know that. She was under the impression I'd been run over by a bicyclist. (That's are alibi Anne?)

By the time we were released it was about seven o' clock in the evening. We went out and got a gallon of cookie dough ice cream and sat in the car and ate it. We didn't talk about what happened. We still haven't talked about what happened.

But I think it's safe to say we're both believers now.

I Shouldn't Be Up

But I am.


Three posts in under 24 hours. New record.

I had the bad dream again, except it was worse this time. It went a bit further than I remembered.

It started out the same. I'm in the woods and it's snowing, and I'm trying to get through, but I can't because the snow is too deep, and the wind is blowing really hard. The tree's look taller than they  should, and it's so cold. I get to the part where something grabs my neck, but I don't wake up. I'm coughing, and I fall to my knees, and I look up. There's a little boy standing over me. I cant make out his face, but I know he's glaring at me and behind him his shadow is twisted and distorted. It makes him look like something monstrous. I start suffocating, and my whole body is burning as his tiny hands tighten around my neck. Then he leans down and whispers, "I'll save you the trouble."

Anne woke me up. She said I was fidgeting, and crying in my sleep. I guess that happens now.


What's wrong with me? Better yet what am I doing?

Well I Finally Figured It Out

I'm living in the Matrix. That's what it is! I'm living in the Matrix. All I have to do is find find some guy in a long black leather jacket with super reflective sunglasses and I'll be fine from there on out.

I watched it for the first time with Anne tonight. We were by one of those One Dollar Rental vending machines, and I'd never seen it and I wasn't getting any of the references I'd kept finding on the blogs.

You know how sometimes you'll find things that seem so ironic you start wondering if it's less than a coincidence. That's what this movie was like.

I mean the Alice in Wonderland quotes were creepy enough, what with Aggy's user name at all. But after a while, when they started talking about how the reason Neo was believing crap was because he was expecting to wake up.

It was like those scary reflective glasses were about to turn their mirror shades on me.

I didn't watch the end. I got out of the car and rented The Frog Princess, and we watched that instead. Much less ironic thank you very much.

The more I reread my blog and the other blogs, the weirder it feels. Like no matter what I'm looking at it just feels like everything leads right back to this blog and all the crap going on inside it.

I thought this wasn't going to be my damn diary anymore. Didn't I say that like four hours ago? 

Ughh...I'm getting cranky cause I'm sick. I need to stop sounding so sarcastic, it is the lowest form of humor. I'm already low enough as it is.

Tomorrow Anne and I are going to try something different...I came up with the idea this morning and we mulled it over during dinner. Anne thinks it's crazy, but she thinks everything we've done has been crazy and that hasn't stopped her from doing it. I think she's buying into more than she wants to admit.

This morning I read that one of August's friends is going to escort some guy to Nevada. He's researching something and according to his email, and I quote, "Everything points to Nevada."

Remember what I was saying about Irony.

Well if you think about all the stuff that would cause Nevada to be a bit abnormal, (besides all the Elvis wannabe's and crazy drunk gamblers,) you come out with one place.

Area 51.

Yep...Were going to go check it out, see what we can find. Hopefully Camo-Dudes won't snipe us or anything. If there's a place Aggy might have gone, that's the best I can think of. It's close, and it's probably the reason she was in Nevada in the first place.

Who knows, maybe Slender Man really is the big secret they've kept hidden in that place. Maybe he's an alien.

One way to find out.

Starting to wish I'd taken the blue pill.

- Opal

I Must Be The Most Annoying Horror Story Victim Ever

Me and Anne had to cut our search a little short today. I started feeling sick again around noon, so we went back to the car and I slept while Anne drove around looking for Operator Symbols. After a while she just parked and took a nap herself. She's been super tired too.

I can see her snoring away through the window of the restaurant I'm typing from right now.

I just posted a whole bucket load of comments on blogs I've barely had the time to read. I felt really dumb and awkward whilst doing it though. Some of them were so horrible I just clicked away so I wouldn't have nightmares tonight. And there were sometimes I just commented because I didn't know what else to do.

Look at that. Even on the internet I'm socially awkward.

Wonder how long I have before it all goes to hell.

The idea of something killing me doesn't scare me too much. I mean yeah it would suck, but it sounds a great deal more interesting than any other options life was dishing out at the moment. I came to terms with death a long time ago. No, no, I'm just worried about all the people who are going to drown because I dragged them down.

The idea of being a murderer doesn't bode well with me. If Anne gets hurt, it's my fault. If someone reads this and gets killed, it's my fault, if I get in the way and there are consequences, you can see where this is going.

I still can't believe I'm buying into all of this. I am a gullible idiot, but this is a new low. I guess I'm just going with it right now. Buying into it has given me more leads than anything else, so why not?

Though I still keep waiting for someone to yell cut, and I'll wake up on a sound stage in California with people congratulating me on how believable my performance was.

Well is other news I got a cute little page in the notebook that was definitely a bit more upbeat. Aggy wrote in a list of things I should do if I want to avoid Slendy and be safer. It included buying some cheery music, using a safety blanket, and calling him Mr. Kittykins or anything ridiculous like that, so you start to get comfortable with his existence and stop getting scared.

Oh Aggy and her black humor.

I'll post the rest of the list when my phone recharges, or when I'm actually not so lazy that I'll type the whole thing.

This blog must be such a disappointment in comparison to the rest. I need to stop using this as my personal diary. I have to two brand new followers! Better buck up and start acting like I'm not the hopeless idiot I am.

Coming Up With All These Titles Is Pretty Difficult

Well today was pretty much a bust. I knew we probably weren't going to find Aggy in Vegas, but I was sure there would at least be a few more of these 'Runner' guys hiding out in the city. I mean, first of all it's like five hundred degrees and the sun is out everyday. It's crowded and loud and the only tree's I've seen were palms or cactusses. I don't know, but I think Mr. Slender Man would look a bit silly hiding behind one of those.

I had an idea to go down town and try to see if anyone had graffitied an operator symbol on a wall or something, (since that appears to be what people are doing.) We couldn't even find a vaguely frightening phrase, (unless you count all the rather vulgar things people like to graffitti but I doubt those are secret cries for help.)
Makes me feel odd. Like people are avoiding this place. I really hope I'm not on top of Slender Man's Hell Mouth.

Well so far Las Vegas has been pretty neat, but the Motel me and Anne are staying at has persuaded me to never come back unless I have the means to stay in a five star resort of some kind.

THERE ARE BUGS EVERYWHERE!!!! And Anne found a dead Rat under the bed. I think we may just go sleep in the car.

We're going out again tomorrow. We're going to try some back alleys. See what we can find.

I'll keep you posted.

- Opal

Can't Say I Was Expecting...That...

Things have taken a turn for the weirder as I spent most of last night going through the URL's Aggy gave me, and reading a few more pages of the notebook.

I...really don't know what I should think.


I guess if anyone actually has been reading this blog lately, (I probably scared of Kupkakes with how insane these entries have been sounding lately,) but if anyone else reads this, they probably had the brains to google Slender Man. (If you didn't have the brains to google Slender Man, don't feel bad because I didn't google him right away either.)

From what I've gathered, he's a monster, who stalks people and drives them crazy until he eventually kills them. Wether that entails them killing themselves or just waiting until they die of old age, or just plain gutting them and hanging them from a tree, (why do I sound so calm about all of this?)

Anne thinks that Aggy's gone nuts, and that August (Mr. Mom, did I mention I found him online, here's his blog; Mr. Mom's Blog ) is using her insanity as a means to attack me with a chainsaw. At least...it seems that way I suppose. She hasn't said anything against trying to find Aggy, and she hasn't denied that the police don't seem to be doing what they're supposed to, but she definitely doesn't believe some supernatural being is running around killing teenagers.

I'm not so sure...and looking back in my blog posts and at the drawings I made...I'm starting to put pieces of this together and not liking how well they fit together.

The bad dreams, the constant coughing and chest pains, the notes with the operator symbol and the mysterious apartment arson...the guy on my street.

It's all there in the blogs.

And it's not just one, it's hundreds, thousands maybe. All with almost identical problems.

But it can't be true. Things like that aren't possible.

But it fits. But at the same time it doesn't fit.

I hate not being able to decide what's right and what's wrong. It the equivalent of doing nothing.

You know how all little kids get scared of the dark every once in a while, because it scares them not knowing what's lurking there and their imagination runs wild. But then they get older and while they don't stop being afraid of what they can't see, they learn how to have courage, and the fears become more realistic. Fear of a broken heart, fear of being robbed, fear of dying. Then eventually I think we reach a point where we get so old that nothing can scare us anymore.

But now I'm scared because I feel like I'm going backwards. Like all the courage I had is gone, and it's just things I don't know, things that will destroy me in every sense of the word and I won't even see it coming. I'll look into the dark and something will pop out, and I won't even know what it is.

I need to snap out of it. I'm wigging out and I shouldn't be. One of the things Aggy wrote in the notebook is that it's imperative that I always be calm, and happy. Even if there isn't a monster after me, it seems like a good plan.

Fear is good, fear keeps people alive. But I'm not going to let it freeze me in place while I anticipate whatever is headed my way.  I just have to take what comes to me as it comes.

I'm starting to get a headache. I'm gonna wrap this up.

Me and Anne are in a motel outside Las Vegas right now, and tomorrow we're going to start looking around the city, for anyone who's seen Aggy.

I'll be sure to write what I find.

-Opal

On the road!

So right now, I'm sitting in a Starbucks in Utah somewhere, (I think the guy at the counter wants me to get lost but I have stuff to write first.)

So I left yesterday night, after I picked up some crap from the remains of my apartment and pulled some money out of my savings.

I know my blog made it sound like I was going to spontaneously fly off to Nevada right after Mr. Mom, (wish I asked him what his name was, I feel I'm not giving him the credit he's due,) delivered that notebook, and told me to find Aggy, but as it turns out Anne reads this blog and caught me trying to sneak out.

Smart Opal...Smart...

I'm really not going to waste your time rehashing the argument, but in short, Anne's here with me.

Why does everyone think I need a babysitter? I'm 21, I can handle a road trip to Utah on my own.

Of course Anne thought the fact I was going to Nevada after being sick (feeling a lot better thanks for asking) wasn't the best idea. Especially after hearing the part about Mr. Mom, (I guess if you weren't there to meet him he would sound pretty sketchy.)

She wanted me to go to the police again with this, but frankly, the cops have sort of been sucking at their job lately. I mean Aggy's car has already been through three regions and is probably getting close to four, and no one has noticed it yet? I mean they have her license plate numbers, and a description of the car, and it took me all of six seconds to spot it. Yet Mr. Mom has mysteriously managed to elude them.

Plus they've been super lax about letting me take pictures of all the evidence, and posting them online. It's like they don't care. Or maybe they've been tipped off? I don't know, but after what Mr. Mom told me, I feel like this is one of those things where the Government turns a blind eye.

How did I get involved in a conspiracy theory you ask? Hell if I know.

Ahh, but I'm getting off topic. Long story short, Anne decided she'd let me go to Nevada for a week or so, but only if she was there to supervise. Her words, not mine. (You know Anne, I am older than you. No need to treat me like I'm three.)

It's not so much that I don't like her there with me, it's just...She doesn't need to get involved. Mr. Mom made it pretty clear that there were people after Aggy, (and judging by the state of my apartment, they don't seem like incredibly nice/sane people.)

Anne shouldn't get involved in that. She's sweet, and one of the most caring people I know. I don't want a rope around her neck just because there's one around mine.

Wow...there are people out there who want me dead, (or possible maimed, but I'm guessing the former is more likely,) that's a really scary thought.

Maybe I should've gotten a gun license before I went on this trip. I do have a kitchen knife though...

Oh crap I'm really going to get killed.

Urgghh!!! Don't focus on that Opal! We'll cross that bridge when we come to it.

Alright, so anyway, I have the notebook with me right now. I'm trying to decide wether or not now would be a good time to read it.

What the hell is wrong with me? Of course now is a good time to read it! I'm in the middle of nowhere putting Anne in danger and I don't even know what I'm up against.

But then again...

I know I must look like the dumbest person alive right now, but the notebook really...it just makes me uncomfortable. (Oh gee Opal, it's fine if you and your closest friends get gunned down by mobsters, just so long as you're comfortable.) Really though, when I look at it I start getting the jitters again, and then I just want to shove the thing somewhere where I don't have to look at it.

It's weird. Like the point of it, is so you don't read it.

Just gonna get this over with. I'll take pictures.

This is the cover.

Inside page. Very promising...

and after that, it's just four pages of URLs labeled references.

These are all blogs. Blogs with weird names. Most of them don't look very cheerful. 

We have some youtube pages, here. And hey look, she added my blog to the list in purple. 

Is that good or bad?

The starting letter. 

Slender Man? 

Why is everyone so worried about me not taking this seriously? Mr. Mom mentioned it, and now Aggy has too. 

I really hope the part about me never seeing her again isn't true. Mr. Mom just saw her a week ago at the least, so there's still a chance I can find her.

Beware the tree's and start running? Is that code? What does it mean? And why did she tell me to remember? What does she want me to remember? Remember when I was a kid and I made all those drawings, or remember how I turned up in the park? 

How can a single paragraph invoke this many questions!?

Shoot, I knocked over a coffee cup and it shattered, and the guy at the counter told me that I have to leave.

I'll update when I can, in the mean time. I'm gonna wait to look at the blogs before I get any farther in this notebook.

-Opal

In Which A Very Feminine Guy Consols Me, And Gives Me Some Words Of Wisdom

As you can tell by the title of today's entry a guy showed up at Anne's house today.

As you've probably guessed I haven't been doing great lately. After what happened yesterday, with the apartment, I don't know I've been really out of it. Anne was on the phone with the doctor again last night, and told him she was afraid I was going into shock or something. I wasn't paying a lot of attention.

I guess I did kind of shut down, there's been too much going on, and I just sort of phased out.

But I'm getting off topic.

So I slept in really late this morning, and woke up to find that Anne wasn't there. She was kind enough to leave me a note saying she had to go to the store for a little bit. (I'm starting to feel like Anne has declared herself my mother or something.)

So I wandered around a bit and eventually went outside. It was raining fittingly enough, so I sat down on Anne's porch and watched cars drive by, and waited for her to get back. It was after a few hours of that, when I noticed it.

It was her car. It was Aggy's car! I may not be the most observant person in the world but when I saw the beat up Ford Explorer I knew there wasn't any comparison. It had been her Dad's before her's and I spent hours listening to her gush over that thing, and now here it was, parking itself in front of Anne's house.

For a brief moment of euphoric joy, I thought Aggy was back and that she was going to jump out of the car and everything would be alright somehow.

But then someone else got out of the car.

He had longish black hair, and a really small and girly kind of look. I didn't recognize him but I was immediately on edge.

He however, looked like rather relieved when he saw me, and he smiled and walked towards me.

"Hello," he smiled. "You wouldn't happen to be Opal Jones? Would you?"

I didn't answer that, instead I just asked him where he got the car.

"Your friend gave it to me," he said, as though that was fine. "She gave it to me in exchange for this," he pulled out a green notebook out of his jeans and handed it to me. He frowned and looked worried. "Do you know where's she's been, what she's been up to?"

What was I supposed to say to that?

"Why no, complete stranger in my missing friend's beloved car, pray do tell me what hilarious shenanigans my friend has been up to, while I ponder over this new delivery and compare it to the rest of my horrifying mail."


Instead I asked him what he knew about Aggy.

His frown deepened at that, and he looked nervous. "I know enough to be able to tell you're both in danger," he said. "She asked me to give this to you,"

I was freaking out again at this point, and I was getting the jitters as well. The ones that told me I should sit down and take it easy before I passed out a second time.

"Who are you?" I asked him. "Are you one of Aggy's friends? Where is she?"

"Somewhere in Nevada last I saw her," he said. "But by now, who knows." I remember he looked distracted like something else was bugging him. "I'm just a courier, it's not really my job to ask where or why something is delivered." He stopped and looked at me very hardly for a moment. "Please, please, read everything in that notebook carefully. Whatever's in there could be what keeps you safe. If not, it'll at least help you piece back together what happened to your friend."


Happened, what happened to Aggy...I remember that part really bugged me. Like there was nothing to be done about any of this.


"What's going on?" I demanded. "Is she okay?"


Then I realized something. What if this was the guy who had broken into my apartment, or what if he was in cahoots with the guys who did.


"Are you in on this?" I yelled. "You can't just throw all this at me and expect it to be fine!"


He fidgeted a bit'. "Please Miss, it's difficult to explain. If anything I'm in the business of protecting you from what you're going to find inside the notebook in your hands."


It was the first time I actually really payed attention to the notebook. It was a light green color, and a pretty intricate design on the cover. It gave me bad vibes all over, and the jitters got worse and my hands started to shake.


"She's okay." he said, "She's on the run from some people who are going to try and hurt her, though. The sooner you read this book and find out what's going on the sooner you can find and help her."


"But who's chasing her, what's going on, and where do you come into all of this?" I sounded less suspicious now, and more like a whiney kid who was looking for it's mother. I really disgust myself sometimes.


"Listen, I really can't explain everything to you right now." he sighed.  "Everything you'll need to know -everything Aggy wants you to know - is inside that notebook."

"as for me," he said. "like I said earlier, I'm a courier. I help people like your friend get what they need to stay alive."

I don't know what it was, but when this guy talked it made me feel like a little kid. He wasn't all that much older than me, but he had a mommy vibe about him. Like Anne except much less discreet.

I wasn't going to let any mommy vibes stop me from finding out what I needed to know. 

"I don't trust you," I told him, and I wasn't lying.

"You shouldn't," he smiled. "but you can trust Aggy can't you,"

Then I don't know. Maybe it was the mommy vibe, or the fact that I was pretty much destitute, or that in little over a month my life wasn't mine anymore, and that it had become this dark horrifying place I didn't recognize, or maybe just because I really friggin' missed Aggy, but I lost it. 

I broke down and just started sobbing like an idiot, in front of this random stranger who I had every right to call the cops on. And of course he was right beside me comforting me and telling me that it was all going to be fine even though we both knew he wasn't sure.

It must of looked pretty hilarious now that I'm thinking about it, me out in the rain in my bathrobe crying my eyes out, and a girly looking guy with his arms wrapped around me trying to get me to stop crying.

Aggy would've laughed at me, and told me that only I could get into such a situation.

So eventually I pulled it together, and managed to stop jittering a bit.

"Just tell me one thing," I asked him.

"What is it, sweetie?" he asked gently.

I'm impressed that I ignored the odd pet name and cut right to the chase. But of course this was the one thing that had been bugging me so much, ever since Aggy disappeared.

"The symbol, the circle with the X through it. What does it mean?" I told him about the drawings Aggy had made, and the ones I found from when I was a kid.

He stiffened up immediately, and was quiet for a while. I guess he was contemplating wether or not it would be fine to tell me.

"...It's called the Operator Symbol," he said "It's nothing but bad news."

Then he stood up.

  

"Miss Opal," he said. "Please be careful. These next few days are going to be dangerous, I can tell. What you'll read in that notebook...Will be difficult to believe. But I want you to trust everything in there as fact."

I nodded and stood up myself, when I realized something else.

"The people who are after Aggy, they're after you too aren't they?" 

He nodded. "For a long time, but I have a family, and people to keep me safe. That's a luxury I'm afraid you and Aggy won't have for a while."

Then he gave me a very serious look. "Opal..." he paused for a second. "Find her, nothing is going to be worse than facing this by yourself."

He gave me a business card if I ever needed to get in touch with him. I'm looking at it now and it's a pretty odd card. 

It says:

RETURN TO SLENDER

"You pay, we deliver."

abreathofaugust@gmail.com

I gave him my phone number in turn, in case he ever needed help. Then he got in Aggy's car and left.

And you know what? I actually felt a little bit better. At the very least, now I have something to do, and I know that Aggy's still out there somewhere. 

I checked the notebook to make sure it was her hand writing, but I haven't gotten much farther than that. 

I'm going to have to read it at some point, but I know when I open this thing this little scrap of my old life is going to go out the window, and I'm going to have to face the facts about the situation. I'm not sure if I'm ready, but I guess that really isn't my choice. All I know is that I'm going to leave Anne's tonight. 

I'm going to Nevada, and I'm going to find Aggy.

-Opal

Someone broke in while I was gone.

They set fire to the inside of the apartment. The smoke killed Bast.

This was all I found.

I went missing?

I did, for three days apparently. I don't really remember what happened. I was at home in bed, and then yesterday afternoon I woke up in the middle of the woods, with the worst headache I have ever had in my life. My first thought was that maybe I'd gotten drunk or something, but I don't drink very often so that didn't make any sense. 

I had my phone with me, (Thank God on High) and made a short video of where I ended up.

Hear how sick I sound? I felt like I was freezing, despite the fact it was like 90 degrees out. I called Anne and she drove over quicker then you can say 'Hangover,' and rescued me from the park. This was where she told me about the fact I had been gone for a whole three days. I was too wasted to know what to make of it. I sort of passed out on the ride home and she took me to the hospital. 

The doctor told me it was lucky I didn't die after spending a night in the woods with pneumonia, even if it was just a minor case. They didn't find any alcohol in my system, and Anne was worried that I had gone missing like Aggy did.

There were some weird marks on my legs.

It's starting to look like someone did kidnap me, but who would kidnap a person only to dump them in a park ten miles from their house?

And then there's the weird post I found on my blog when I woke up. I bet it's the same person who sent me the squirrels, and they know about the blog. That's the scariest part, knowing whoever is doing all this knows me personally.

The doctor is going to let me go home this evening. At this point Anne is demanding that I come stay with her, and I guess I can't blame her after what happened. As soon as I get better I should probably consider grabbing Bast and just getting out of town for a while until they catch whoever this is. I'm not eager to go back home anyway, which is weird because before the last thing I wanted was to leave. 

I'm probably going to post again tonight when I get back, me and Anne are going to get my stuff and drive it over to her house. I guess in this case I can afford to be a burden.

- Opal

Welcome Back

it was cold the day i died. i had been running for so long, and my legs were aching. the tree's and forest kept getting deeper and deeper. but i wanted to meet those tree's and find what was lurking there. then she found me, and attacked me. i ran harder, but she held me down, and jammed something into my neck that stung.                 she thought she killed me.                but He has revived me                                                           and I am grateful               (X)

A Freaking Psycho! That's what you are!

God, I just, I don't even know what to type!

This whole mess, I just can't get a break! Ughh! Even now I'm so upset I keep hitting all the wrong keys.

Last night, someone left a package outside my apartment, (Anne brought it in for me after she stopped by.) So I opened it up to see what was inside and I found these;

Along with this note;

How are people supposed to react to this kind of stuff? All I know was that opening a box to find dead animals is just...Whoever wants to screw with me this way! You're sick! Sick! 

Anne took the squirrels outside and we called the police (again!) They dusted for finger prints on the box and on the note but didn't find anything. They took the package and note for evidence, and today a vet came over and looked at the squirrels to see what it was that killed them. I'm supposed to hear back from them in a few days.

This entire situation just went from freaky, to macabre. The squirrels themselves were scary enough, but the note...What does that even mean? Welcome back? 

And just to top it all of, the (X) symbol makes a reappearance. Whatever psychopath sent this to me, knows about Aggy and the drawings. Or what if it is Aggy? And this is some crazy way to get back at me. No that's dumb Aggy wouldn't kill squirrels, I don't even think she could catch one.

And no one else I know reads this blog, except for Anne. (And don't anybody think it's Anne because she bawled her eyes out trying to dissect a frog,) and even if other people did, I don't have any crazy enemies. I try to be nice to the people I know, and there really aren't that many to begin with. I just can't understand why any of this is happening. 

Anne wants me to stay with her until everything blows over, but classes are starting up in five days, and she's already blown off one day of work to help me with this whole squirrel problem, (it almost sounds funny when you say it like that,) and I can take care of myself. She doesn't need to worry about me.

Or maybe she does...I don't know. 

I feel scared, all the time now. The apartment's gotten so cold, and the bad dreams are getting worse, and sometimes when I look out my window, for a second I'll see this guy standing there, and then he'll be gone. I don't know if he's real or not, but it's happened multiple times. I can never get a good look at him before he disappears, but he scares me so much.

...Maybe I really have gone crazy. 

Being Sick Sucks...

Well I stayed in bed all day yesterday, and all day today. God I feel awful.

Now that I have had Pneumonia I can safely say that it is by far the worst kind of sick I have ever been. My throat hurts, my chest hurts, my head hurts, and I actually threw up a little yesterday after a pretty bad coughing fit.

I called my boss and explained what was going on, and he was nice enough to give me some time off. (I really need to write a Thank You card or something cause' I didn't expect him to be so understanding,)

Other than that, I've been spending most of my time reading and sleeping. I'm just about to finish a book called Ender's Game which has been really good. It's sort of like All Quiet On The Western Front meets Star Trek. I have to say it's been really interesting.

I'm trying to remember who recommended it to me, it was one of my friends before I went to college. Ughh and now the headaches coming back with a vengeance. No more thinking for a while.

- Opal

Bad News From the Doctor...and Other People

Well I went to the doctor's today. He said I've got pneumonia, and he gave me some medicine for it. He said I probably caught it since I've been so exhausted lately, and stressed out.

Kinda sounds like a broken record right?

My classes start next week, and it looks like I'm going to be absent. I don't even know what I'm going to do about work.

Ughh...Shouldn't be blogging about this. Should be relaxing. 

I'm going to go to bed early tonight. 

G'night.

- Opal

Crap

Yep the title pretty much sums up how I've been feeling lately. Like Crap.

Anne took me out to dinner tonight, and we watched movies over at her house. She said I needed to calm down, and relax since I've been really stressed since Aggy disappeared.

Right now, I'm apparently the last person who saw her, so the police have been asking me a lot of questions. I have a feeling they think I'm a suspect, since we didn't really part on great terms. But I didn't do anything! I swear!
It's also been days since anyone has heard from Aggy, (the comment she left on my page wasn't enough proof to clear me since I could've easily hacked it.) I think the police are assuming that she might have been murdered.

I haven't been getting any sleep cause I keep having more of those nightmares. I'm in the snow, someone grabs me, I wake up coughing. It's like clockwork!

Anne says that there's not much I can do, I just have to stay positive, and pray that Aggy is safe.

The weird thing is, is that nothing has really changed about my daily life at all, (with the exception of the police coming by to interview me,) I wake up, I feed Bast, I go to work, watch T.V. and eat food. It sort of makes me wonder what you're supposed to do when someone you're close to has gone missing. While I have all the anxiety, and drama that you hear always hear about, you never hear about what the person does besides all that.

But there's something else that's been bugging me. It has to do with the drawings and the weird comment Aggy left me. I keep feeling like there's something watching me, and there are times I'll look and think I see something but then there isn't anything there. I have a feeling that something is very very wrong, and I should know what it is, but what? What am I not thinking of?

I need some sleep, I'm starting to go nuts. Anne says I should go see a doctor since I've been so sick lately. I think that's a good idea.

That's all I got tonight guys, sorry.

-Opal

Talked to the police. They sent out a notice for people to keep their eyes open for Aggy, but right now they don't have any evidence or witnesses so there isn't much they can do. 

One of the officers I talked to, told me not to worry, and that I needed to stay calm. I told him about the drawings, but he didn't really know what to think about it.

I'm sick today, couldn't even get out of bed this morning.

I hate this. I hate it so much.

Something really weird going on...

Aggy still hasn't called me, and if I was worried before it's nothing compared to how I feel right now.

I went over to her house again, after work today to see if she was back (of course she wasn't,) except this time I decided to just check on the inside to see if she really wasn't there, just in case. I know where she hides her spare key, and I managed to get inside. Yeah, I know, that's technically breaking and entering, but I swear I wasn't stealing anything.

So I got inside, and found out that the electricity was down. None of the lights were working, and something smelled so I assume the fridge wasn't doing it's job. Did she just up and leave cause the power went out? I went over to the neighbors afterwords an asked if their electricity had been working and they said yes, so only Aggy's house didn't have power.

And if that alone weren't freaky enough, I found this at Aggy's house.

There were actually a few of these, they all had that symbol with the circle and X through the middle, and they all had a 9 * 30 on them. I don't know why they were there but they look like Aggy was desperate when she made them, especially with the "Beware," and the "Let Me G(X)," If you look really closely you can see her fingerprints. I found some pastels (which I'm guessing she used to make this) and there were black hand prints on some of the walls of her house.

However, the creepiest thing about this isn't the numbers or the crazy way she made them. Look in the bottom right hand corner. You see the weird scribble that kind of looks like a stick figure with swirly arms. Now look at this picture.

I have dozens of these at my house, including a few with the (X) symbol on them. They're all drawings I did as a kid, and they all look about the same.

There aren't any numbers or messages in them, but they it's still weird that they look like what Aggy drew.

And why the hell am I blogging about this?

I'm calling the police. If Aggy really didn't want me to, she would have commented on the blog by now.

It's Raining it's pouring!

Well this morning I finally decided to get off my lazy butt and go take an early morning walk in the park, and coincidentally while I was on it, it started to pour buckets. Now I suppose most people would be annoyed by this, but hey we're in the middle of a heat wave, and walking in the rain is pretty fun.

Except now I'm not feeling so hot. My nose is pretty stuffed up, and I've been coughing a lot. I sure hope I didn't catch a cold or something. I've always gotten sick pretty easy though, ever since I was little. This years been especially bad for some reason, I missed like a dozen classes because I was out with the flu.

Of course I already used up my quota of sick days after last Friday, so I ended up going to work anyway.

I keep calling Aggy, but I'm not sure where she is right now. I went over to her place last night, but the lights were all out, and the door was locked. I guess she must've gone on a trip or something, but it worries me. I've called a few of her other friends but they told me that hadn't heard from her in months.

I'm not sure what I should do. I guess I'll wait for a week or so and see if she comes back, and if not...I don't know, maybe call the authorities or something.

Aggy if you're reading this, please comment. I'm sorry, and I'm really worried about you.

- Opal

I feel bad...

So yesterday I got in a fight with Aggy. She was asking me to come over again and I sort of blew up. I was tired and frustrated, (which aren't great excuses,) and said some things I regret saying now.

Since then she hasn't been answering her phone, and I think she's avoiding me. I feel awful. I left her a message and as soon as she calls me back I'm going to apologize.

I also went shopping for some text books today. Classes are getting ready to start up again if you can believe it. I wish summer was longer.

- Opal

So tired...

Jeez it's late. I was at Aggy's house all day and I just got back.

This weekend was really busy. I hung out with Aggy friday night and watched more of those videos. I swear to God she's obsessed or something. That's all she's wanted to do since we met up last week. Here, I uploaded one so you can see what they look like, since I'm ranting about them right now.

See? It's really just a bunch of static and white noise. I mean, you can see a window for a few seconds but the camera is really shaky and the quality is awful. I just don't get why she wants me to watch them, what's the point? Is she just trying to annoy me or something?

Well anyways, I went over to Aggy's on Friday, and then I met up with Ian Saturday evening. The two of us ended up going to the art museum since it was raining, and that was really fun.

Afterwards I went over to Aggy's (yes a second time) to watch more staticky videos, and wound up spending the night. And then as of a few minutes ago, I was over there watching videos for a third time.

It's like she can't stand to be separated from me, I don't get it.

She can probably read this but I'm too tired to care right now.

I'm going to bed, night guys.

- Opal