Ready to serve

This day has been a long time coming, I have waited years under the demons control, and months of being cleansed and prepared by Father and now I am ready.  I am about to begin fathers mission to go forth and spread word of his existence, to eliminate those who think they can stand in his way, and to prepare those who barely fear him to accept his righteous judgment.  I have been given a handler, to direct my movements, so that I may more effectively serve my Father.  In turn I have been given command over "Phillip" to help me with my assignments.  It can not speak or think for itself, but Father has bonded it's will to me, and now I can use it as one of his greatest weapons when the time comes.

Tonight is the beggining, I have my first assginment, an elimination of a runner who has lost Father's intrest, but has still insisted on making a nusince of himself.  I will enjoy making him suffer for his sins.

A lot to sort out

Oh so much to do and so much to say.  I don't really feel like explaining it all in detail, but if I'm to put on a proper show for Father than there are some things you really should know.  First off, I am not FreedomCaged, he is dead, stripped from this body slowly and methodically.  He used to be a part of me, a demon controlling my actions and desires, a monster keeping me from serving.  When he finally rebelled against Father openly the body that held us both was taken to be cleansed of his taint.  He died slowly and painfully, and in the same manner I was built up.  Where once I was barely able to think and reason beyond wanting to escape the demons oppression and restriction, Father crafted me into a powerful and effective tool in his service.  He showed me how to hone my strength, and how to focus my mind, and now I am ready to go forth and cleanse the world for him.

The demon called me "Caged" because that was how he kept me, like an animal, locked in his mind.  And now I take that name for my own purposes, as a final insult to the useless soul that once ruled this body.  Because now I am now longer the caged one, now I am free.  Free and ready to serve.

I guess this is it...

Well today I'm feeling melodramatic, and in light of recent events maybe it's actually prudent to do this.  After all I'm running around, breaking proxy's noses, manipulating Hunted, leaving cryptic messages lieing around.  Clearly I haven't mentioned all of this to you, but I did say that I would lie to you, didn't I?  I should probably explain: this is my death post.  Even when I go a rare day or two without checking this blog I never go a whole week, so I guess if I go a week without checking and pushing the publish date on this back I'm either dead, trapped, or seriously injured, and in the end they all amount to pretty much the same thing: I'm not able to update anymore.  Ideally I would just be in a minor coma, but otherwise I won't be posting again, one way or the other, if you understand what I mean, I just want to prepare you for that.  Heh, listen to me, "prepare you," like you need to be prepared.  I actually like some of you, and to those I truly am sorry, but the rest of you, and possibly even those whose company I enjoy, probably won't even care that much about my passing, lets face it, I'm no hero to anyone.  On that note, if it turns out that I just got lazy for a week and then lost my Internet connection for a couple days when I meant to update, than this is the work of a hacker, and everything said above and below should be considered a complete fabrication, and not at all the truth.

I guess I should be honest here, last chance, right?  I've killed more than once.  Another mercy killing, though, this time, it had none of the rage or vengeance motivated by my first murder.  A couple of weeks ago a runner found me, someone I knew.  I remembered going to the same school as him, we weren't really close, but I guess we were freinds.  When we were kids he wasn't the most outgoing person, but when I saw him this time... brown hair and brown eyes, both ragged and worn; short, thin, and tired of running.  He asked me to kill him, and at first I didn't know how to react.  After I got over the initial shock I asked him why me, and he said he needed someone who would be able to do it, and he didn't have the nerve to do it himself.  So, I agreed, we got in my car, drove to the nearest lake, and I shot him in the head.  Now the gun only has five bullets in it, I guess.  This time I gave him a proper grave instead of just leaving his corpse to the tall guy.  And I knew his name this time.  His name was Joshua; Joshua J. Felker.

I suppose I have some things to say to some of you specifically.


Dia: Oh the secrets we've shared, why you've even been able to get one or two out of me.  You know you pretend you aren't half as clever as you really are, but even then you come out far brighter than many of the people around you.  I've enjoyed our conversations, and now you know that I really did take your secrets to my grave, however shallow it might be right now.  Here's hoping you weren't the one to put me there, yes, you know I've learned it's best not to underestimate you.



Knitwolf: I can't help but wonder which path I chose in the end, pins or needles.  I've always respected that you looked at both paths, you considered the outcomes, and then you took the one that was best for you and didn't look back.  And of course, stories are always fun.  I hope you always know what path to take, and that none of them leave you with any regrets.



Gargoyle:  You know, while I'm writing this you've just dug yourself out of your little hole in the ground, I'm not even sure you're alive right now.  Well here's hopeing you are.  Actually, scratch that, I don't want my life span to be shorter than that of an average runner, no offense.  You've always been intresting, and I do hope we can continue have some of those conversations, it's nice to meet a Hunted person with a new perspective from time to time.




Robin:  For the love of my sanity I hope you gave up all that ridicliouness of wanting to pay me back a long time ago.  You don't owe me anything and you never did, the fact is that I'm a least partially responsible for the trouble you're in, I told Him who you were, and for that I'm sorry.  If you ever find Alva tell her I'm sorry for her, too.




Aura:  I'm going to say something I haven't had to say in a while: you're too nice of a person, by now you know where you stand, don't let your life just happen to you, make something happen too your life.




Overseer: You know you've never done much beyond follow orders for a while now, have you.  The world you're preparing isn't a eutopia, and even if you somehow elevate your mistress byond the level of her fellow Fears.  You're playing chess wrong, when you get to the other side of the board you get promoted, but you don't switch sides.  Then again I've always found your research intriuging, if you're working on anything that brings the dead back to life my body is yours to try it out on.




Amy:  You're a new face to me, but an intresting one.  I can't quite place my finger on it, yet, but I can just tell that we're going to be good pals by the time this post goes public.  What can I say, I'm a sucker for a good cynic.



Phillip: You're an idiot, if you're the one that killed me then I deserved to die.




Elizabeth:  You won't see this, but know that whatever I did choose I'm sorry I took so long to choose it.  It stuck you in a limbo that no one ever deserves to be trapped in.  For the record, I do hope I chose to help you.



And now it's time for one last revelation: the real reason behind this post is that I just needed an excuse to listen to Mumsford and Sons. Hey, I like them, and this is kind of an ominous song, perfect for a "death post." As this is probably the last thing you will ever hear from me you are obligated listen to the whole song. And cry, you're obligated to cry, because I'm dead, and you all care about me.

So my traditional sign-off probably isn't appropriate here, so I'll just leave you with this:

It's been nice seeing you all

FreedomCaged

i shoulfdn't have done that what awas i thinking He's comeing for me now i just know it let him  c om e you need to tell them it's to late toos otps now thouagh.     i should join  fight run. myheasd i cant thnik...

tell them


right, tongiht i took liz into the woods. i had my gun i knew what i was tgoing to do i knew what i  had to do i made my cohice...  anf He was there standing gloriously monstorously terrifingly tall as he help open his hands.    elizabeth turned and looked at me, the faer ing her eyes was beutiful unbearable wrong.   and than it he phillip came.  i dont eeve n know from where but in a split second i felt him leap from behind me and land less than a foot in tfront of my face. he stood bewteen me and elizabteh.  all you had to do was let it happen there was only ever one choice i knew what i had to do.  I put my gun so it was just an inch away from the back of its his phillips neck and prov ed m y superiority put him out of his misery shot him point blank.

he fell


b ut he didn t stop b reathin g






he just looke d at me with those yellow soiuless eyes.

four bullets left


a waste of am m un ition 

the master monster Slender Man was mad, i told elizabeth to run. i told her to keep runing and not look bakc. He ignored her as she listned, and tuned to me instead.  He threw me into a tree and then a tentalce snaked down to phillip somehow helaing him, as he started to move i turned and ran.


He is comeing i know it i dont have much time but i need to tell you all

He isn't completelyuntouchable. there is a way to


oh fuck

he's here


a t  l a s t

Do I Dare Distrub the Universe?

And indeed there will be time
To wonder, “Do I dare?” and, “Do I dare?”
Time to turn back and descend the stair,
With a bald spot in the middle of my hair—
(They will say: “How his hair is growing thin!”)
My morning coat, my collar mounting firmly to the chin,
My necktie rich and modest, but asserted by a simple pin—
(They will say: “But how his arms and legs are thin!”)
Do I dare
Disturb the universe?
In a minute there is time
For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse.

I'm sitting here, holding my gun, the same one I took from my first kill, about to go into the woods one last time.  Elizabeth is out of the hospital, and I've already told here I found something, a way to keep us both from being stalked.  In a way I did tell the truth.  Tonight is the final test, The Slender Man is waiting, whatever Phillip became is going to be there, too, everything is coming together.  I can't wait anymore, nor do I want to, my choice is before me and all my experiences and decisions have culminated here.  Before me lays two paths, perfectly illuminated, I can see how far each of them stretches, where the thorns are prepared to scrape against my legs, and what monsters will assault me on each.  And I can see how one is superior, how all actions and decisions are leading me down that path.

Tonight I Dare.

I Dare to choose.

I Dare to take my place in a war beyond human understanding.

I Dare to walk down the path I have prepared and not look back.

  Tonight I Dare.

Tonight, I disturb the universe.

Good night my friends.

See you around?

FreedomCaged

Something,. Improved...

How do I start this, I'm still so amazed, in awe.  This was beyond anything I had truly expected, beyond anything I could have ever predicted.  And I was there, at the start of something so... breathtaking, oh this is the start of something incredible my friends, take note of where you are, because this changes everything.  I should start at the beginning, no point in spoiling such an incredible surprise without the proper buildup, is there?



It should not be an enormous surprise that I've had more than one of my midnight talks with the Slender Man and Phillip on the nature reserve.  But tonight was different.  It started out the same as it has so many times before, I arrived after Phillip, and then without warning he appeared before us, taller than ever before, looming over our heads with the sliver of the moon illuminating the tree behind him ever so faintly.  Phillip knelt as he always does, he was dirty and weary, having not left the woods in over a week now.  Yet still, as he knelt a sense of calm drew over his face, he knew this was where he belonged, and soon, so would I.  The air that had been warm and humid just moments before was now cold and dry, but completely still.  It was as though the elements themselves had calmed themselves, completely ceased there activity in honor of what was taking place.  I stood, as I always have, a few feet behind Phillip: watching, waiting, and learning.


The first hint that something was going to be different happened when He moved.  The Slender Man took two steps forward and placed a single hand on his shoulder and looked down at Phillip, and in return Phillip stared up into the eyeless face of something so much greater than any of us.  He has been speaking to me less and less, and more and more quietly, to the point where I barely hear him at all when he does choose to speak, but when The Slender Man snapped his head up to look at me I knew he was instructing me with one simple task.

Watch


And that's when it all began.  The Slender Man seemed to grow even taller and the tentacles began to pour out of his back, pulsing and writhing.  They grew and multiplied until I could barely even see Him, just a pale face and a hand on Phillip's shoulder, surround by a mass of moving shifting blackness.  Without warning one of the tentacles shot through his chest.  I expected him to start bleeding from the wound, but instead a black oily substance began flowing from the hole.  The appendage withdrew and I could see straight through Phillip's back.  But that wasn't the end of it, The Slender Man had barely begun.  A thinner tentacle snaked it's way around over the same shoulder that the Slender Man was still holding on to, across Phillip's back, over his neck, and up his check.  It seemed to stay there for a moment, almost as if it was comforting Phillip.  Then his neck snapped.

I could now see Phillips face, and as I watched more and more tentacles can forward and washed over his body, mapping themselves across him like veins.  Then they all began pulsing, drawing from him all that was human, Phillip began convulsing and writhing, his mind was already dead, but his body still tried to reject what was happening.  Tears of blood began streaming from his eyes as they grew cloudy and yellow, losing any resemblance to human eyes.  The color drained from his skin until it was a uniform white, and then it started getting darker.  Splotches of black and grey appeared across his face and arms, quickly dissipating and spreading across the rest of his skin in veins.  And still He wasn't finished, more and more tentacles came and surrounded Phillip, consuming him until I could see nothing else.

Eventually the tentacles started pulling back, The Slender Man recalling them as he returned to his original form.  Soon He was just a man in a suit again, standing with His hand on Phillips shoulder.  But it wasn't Phillip anymore, all that was Phillip was gone.  What remained was beyond human, All the fat and waste had been replaced with lean muscle, the eyes had been completely changed, removed of the iris and pupil, no more windows necessary, it was a body that housed no soul.  And the skin, what was once soft and malleable was now hard as stone, yet somehow, still flexible to allow movement.  The color was gone, replaced by a dark grey, literally glowing with power.  In an instant it was standing, and so quickly I could barely follow with my eyes it had disappeared deeper into the woods.

I stood there in silent shock, unsure of what to do, unsure of what I could do.  I looked at the Slender Man, a being of such power that it could create that out of what had once been human, and I did the only thing that occurred to me.  I knelt.


I think it's about time I made a decision.

See you around

Caged

You Liar

It Actually Worked

Threatening someone through the blog actually got them to come forward and make things easier for everyone, about time.  Anyways, it turns out that I was being followed by this guy who seemed to think I was somehow responisble for the vanisihing act his "apprentice" pulled some time back.  I've been following his blog, but I had no idea who Joshua was and I told him as much.  Actually the entire conversation was quite cordial, I'm almost disapointed this worked out so well.  Shade said he was "going to keep an eye on me" but since he won't find anything I'm not really concerned about that right now, it seems I have bigger matters to attend to anyways.

See you around

Caged

Haven't We Been Through This Before?

I can tell when someone's following me, you know.  Even if you were more subtle than you thought you were you're still forgetting that I notice Hunted more easily than most.  Look, this is the third time I've had to deal with this, so I'm not going to sugarcoat it anymore: tell me what you want, leave, or die.  If you don't choose one of those options I get to choose for you.  Seriously, how do you people keep finding me anyways?

See you around

Caged

Some Creative Title

So yeah, I haven't been posting much lately, partially because I don't really see much of a point in telling you all about every thing I protect Elizabeth from, and everything I have to do to put her in further danger, and partially because most of that isn't interesting enough to relate anyways.  But I suppose there's no point in hiding this, so I might as well make another post while I'm here.

Elizabeth is in the hospital.  In all likelihood she'll be fine, though, with luck she'll be a little fuzzy on what happened.  I'm here, too, waiting for her to wake up.  The doctors say it's a concussion, nothing serious but that they wanted to keep her for observation.  I know I should be concerned for her, worried if she's o.k, but all I can think about is how stupid it was that she got it in the first place, and how if she had actually thought things through this wouldn't even be an issue.  Instead she elected to take an action that could have major repercussions for both of us, when it would clearly have been safer to back off.

Right, you probably want the whole story.  Elizabeth and I had been at the library studying, because an eldritch abomination isn't really proper motivation to ignore your schoolwork, is it?  Well when we reached her apartment Phillip was leaving it.  Now ignoring the fact that Phillip was being an idiot and should have told me about his plans to leave yet another creepy message in her apartment, I'd have to say that any one's first reaction to a masked man leaving your apartment late at night should be running in the opposite direction.  That is, of course, even before you realize that said masked person is a servant of an incredibly powerful monster that just happens to be stalking you on a regular basis.  And yet, she chose to chase him.  I honestly had no idea she could even run that fast but Elizabeth almost tackled him before they reached the stairs. After barely a minute of wrestling she had gotten his mask off, and it was clear she recognized him.  I'll give Phillip this: he knows how to take advantage of a shocked opponent.  When she paused to wonder why he was behind the mask he kicked her legs out beneath her and threw her against the railing.  The sound of her head hitting the railing was not a pleasant one, but her loss of conciseness solved a lot of short term problems.  Unfortunately, Phillip, genius that he is, wasn't finished, evidently still in full on survival mode he took out a knife and was about to bring it down on her chest.  Fortunately, I had moved close enough to grab him at this point and prevent that.  I had to break his nose again, but I don't really consider that to be a negative thing at this point, in fact, I found it thoroughly satisfying.  But at the end of it all, I sent the proxy on his merry little way and called an ambulance, and now I'm writing this on a tablet in a hospital room waiting for her to wake up.  If she remembers too much I may have to have a Tall Gentleman ease her memory a little bit.


Speak of the literal dev il.  Well I guess that m eans I don 't hav e to arran ge an ythin g m yself.  I'll fin ish this later.







So yes, Elizabeth is fine and awake, and it's too late for me to care enough to go back and edit this post to reflect that properly.  Basically she doesn't remember enough to point Phillip definitively, but it's looking like she knows "her assailant" from somewhere.  I guess it's good they never actually interacted beyond being in the same class.  But he's still probably going to be receiving a visit from the cops shortly enough, so there's one useless helper down the tubes.  Not like he was ever really an effective proxy, I'm almost hoping they send someone competent to replace him.  I'm just wanting this whole thing to be over now, it's getting tiring.

One last thing: bloggers new system for writing posts sucks, someone make them change it back.

See you around

Caged

Road Trip 2 (The Sequel): Spring Break

Yes it's that magical time of year where all the partially educated twenty-somethings throw caution to the winds and abandon campus for exciting retreats with plenty of alcohol and no parental supervision.  And while I would no doubt love to join many of my contemporaries in (give me a moment to ask Google) Las Vegas this year, find a way to get my Slender friend caught on MTV and segue it into the stalking and subsequent evisceration of the entire cast of "Jersey Shore", it seems as though I actually have other obligations ( a lot of effort and spellchecking went into that joke, I hope you appreciate it).  Unfortunately those obligations do require me to be out of town for a few days, and that means I'm going to be away from my computer for a few days, maybe a week tops.

Honestly this doesn't really mean anything significant, I simply won't be posting on your blogs or making in new posts for that time, and there's only so much of a chance that I'd be doing that anyways.  The only real reason I'm making this post is because I'm tired of having that other one as my most recent post.  I've tried to erase it, I've tried to edit it, I've tried to figure out who was behind it, but I'm still no closer to figuring any of this out.  SO to whoever keeps hijacking my blog:

STOP IT.  

I'm dealing with enough things right now, and I really don't need some stupid hacker trying to tick me off.  I'm not sure why you're writing these things, I'm not sure why you're targeting me, but all you're doing is pissing me off, and quite frankly, I've got no problem slitting your throat and letting you bleed out.  Right now you're a distraction, and relatively low on my list of concerns, but if you ever turn into an actual nuisance I'm going to get a lot more serious about tracking you down, and in case you didn't catch it: you don't want that happening.

Bah, I'm starting to get tired of all this blogging stuff anyways, I think I'm actually going to enjoy my time off from this.

See you around

-Caged

Feburary 3rd, 2011

I feel like I should write this down.  I don't know why, maybe if I see the actual words on a sheet of paper that will just solidify how ridiclious this all is, like it's a peice of fiction or something.  I've never hullcinated before, but maybe this is just another extension of my psyche being

I'm not writing that out, that's not true, I have NEVER hallucinated before, what I have is not the result of insanity, just a product of being more aware of my mind than the average individual.  It's just me up there, everyone has their own voices, thier own Id, thier own Cage, I can just hear mine.  Why is he acting like this, I've always seen him, heard him, but Cage hasn't had more strength than Free in years, I put him in check long ago.  But lately.  And then today, that couldn't have been him.  I was just tired.  I just need to write this out put it on paper.

Today I saw a man without a face.









                             
You know what, I think that did it, it really does seem stupid now.  I don't know, maybe I'm just on edge, I mean my birthday is next week (yay!) and I've been feeling a little weird all week, like someone's always looking over my shoulder.  I just need to get more sleep or something, Cage is giving me another migrain.

No Turning Back

After my last post I called a "meeting" of sorts out on the campus nature trail.  Fortunately for my that thing isn't used very frequently anyways, and no-one is ever there on nights when there's class the next morning.  I met Phillip at the entrance and we went to a more isolated part of the trail where the Slender Man was waiting.  He was standing under a tall tree off the main part of the trail, illuminated in the moonlight.  As soon as Phillip saw him he knelt on the wet mud, and for a surreal moment I felt compelled to mirror the action.  Just something about the scene, the light, the intensity, the silence, just the image of a fellow human knelling before something so much more powerful than him, something so sure of it's right the rule, it called to something primal in me.  You know He's old, but if you've never seen him standing over someone he owns, you can't realize just how old he is.  But I've refused the kneel before him in the past, and as long as I remain in control of my own mind I will continue to refuse.

After Phillip stood I revealed my plan to them both.  I was... unsure about how the Slender Man felt, for some reason I wasn't able to read him as well as I have been in the past, though talking with him has never been easy.  Phillip, on the other hand, was ecstatic, though it's become obvious that's he's accepted his role as my subordinate and it's unlikely he'll ever appose anything I'll say.  So after a few minutes of collaboration with the two of them I left them to go walk the rest of the trail by myself.  I needed to contemplate some things, and the trail was still the safest place for me to let Cage take control for a while.  I've been keeping a tighter grip on him lately, because I can't allow myself to slip up, now more than ever, but the downside is that sometimes I need to simply give him complete control for a while, to balance things out.  Free does not approve, but he doesn't approve of much of anything I choose lately, then again, neither does Cage, neither do I.

So Friday, yesterday assuming I start typing this faster, I met Elizabeth.  That seems odd to say, because I do in fact meet her every day, as well as some others, I do have something of a social life after all.  But this time I met her with a specific purpose, one script in my mind detailing what what going to happen.  We "ran into each other" outside the student center, where Phillip had managed to delay her usual schedule to force a confrontation, and I asked her how she was feeling.  She naturally responded with deliberately vague answers about how she had been a little stressed out, maybe a little tired, how it was nothing to worry about, and then she asked me why I asked.  My response was also deliberately vague, I mentioned about how I was just feeling on edge for no particular reason, how I was tyring to figure out if there was something going around; I choose my words and tone carefully, designed them to set the idea in her head.  We walked for a few minutes, talking uneasily, dancing around the thing we were about to address.  When He showed up I started coughing, I almost ended up on my knees from putting so much force into it.  Elizabeth turned to check if I was alright and saw Him standing in the trees, watching.  When I recovered from my practiced episode I joined her in staring into the trees, still partially crouched.  Then I repeated the question she asked me not two weeks earlier: "Do you see it?" When she answered her voice was dripping with fear:

"Yes."

Then He was gone, having full filled his role in a plan he had agreed to, the Slender Man was content to leave the rest to me.  My dorm was closer, and my roommate was already gone for the weekend, so we went to my room and discussed our options.  I played some music to try and get the image out of her head and calm her down and asked what was going on.  She only told me things I already knew: She was being hunted, she couldn't sleep without having nightmares, she was receiving threatening messages and signs, and she was trying to find an answer, but I listened as though I was hearing it for the first time.  At first I pretended to join in her fear, to make it seem as though I was even more confused and lost than she was, I even acted as though I couldn't believe it was real.  Then I got angry, I told her that we couldn't lose to Him, that we would find a way to escape whatever was going on.  As we discussed options she mentioned that she had stumbled across a few blogs that seemed to be dealing with him, at first acted was skeptical, but then I had her tell me all she knew about the blogs.  I convinced her to go home for the weekend, and I told her that I would take over looking at the blogs for her, that she should focus on watching the various vlogs instead to see if she could find out anything there.  With our labor divided so that there was no risk of her finding my blog I decided it was best to wrap things up before she could suggest anything different.  I told her I had one last class I had to go to (which was, incidentally, the truth) and that she should go ahead and go home, that maybe getting out of the area would provide some relief for the time being.

So now I'm being "Hunted" along with Elizabeth, the good news is that I can keep her from finding out who and what I am, but the bad news is that I now have a much greater role in her active psychological torture.  And now she knows, for better or worse, that I can see him too.  This means that I'm now entrenched in this mess no matter what, there's no walking away to save myself and still not serving Him, the two options before me are more clear than ever before, and I'm far closer to having to choose one of them.  Somehow it seems that this happens every time I try to buy myself time, but my options beyond that are have always been few anyways.  I suppose that if I have to dig myself a deeper hole than there's something comforting about being the one holding the shovel.

See you around

-Cage

Running Interference

You know, throughout my life I've found several things that should require effort or concern are in fact relatively easy for me to do.  Murder, for example, is easy, you just stand there and push the blade into someones chest, you don't even have to know their name.  Lieing is incredibly easy, you just need to imagine that you truly are speaking the truth, and false information flows from your lips without so much as a waver of the voice to betray your dishonesty.  Running is far easier than some of you make it out to be, you just forget what you had and who you were and go.  Manipulation by itself is not all that difficult, identifying a target, predicting a persons reactions, leading them where you want them; these are all things you can learn without too much difficulty.  However, doing any of those things becomes difficult if your goals include not letting anyone know you're doing them, and when you're trying to exert complete control over someones life, over multiple people's lives, without anyone realizing that you're trying any harder, that isn't easy.  Though I suppose that when one of those people is Hunted and the other is Hollowed that helps.

Every Tuesday and Thursday I go to a class that I share with both Phillip and Elizabeth.  I sit maybe 15 feet away from either of them, and spend the majority of my time trying to figure out how to trick them both into staying away from each other.  Honestly it doesn't really help that things are accelerating faster than I had planned.  Elizabeth pretends that nothing is wrong, she hasn't mentioned the Slender Man or anything resembling him to me or any of our other friends, yet, but I can tell she's already seeing him on a regular basis.  Phillip, on the other hand, is very vocal about his plans and schedules and ambitions.  He can talk for thirty minutes straight about how much work he put into the letter he slipped under Elizabeth's door (I retrieved it before she saw anything), or how honored he is to be working for "Father," but beyond that he seems incapable of casual conversation.  I've had him go on at length about his agenda, but as soon as he's done he just stops talking and stares off in the distance, unable or unwilling to react to anything else for a very long time.  Sometimes I'm really glad I can't see what he's looking at, I promise I'll never envy anyone whose mind has gone through that much trauma.

It's complicated keeping both of them at arms length while trying to make sure neither one is ever within arms length of the other.  I have to monitor my calls with either of them, and I try to never interact with Phillip when Elizabeth is around, if she ever figures out what he is then I don't want her jumping to any conclusions about me.  I've found that as a neutral party I'm not capable of being a very effective buffer, but I'm still faced with my original dilemma of being unable to directly show support for Elizabeth.  This has ended up with me doing a lot of very minor sabotage of Phillip's activities, of course because my role in our perceived partnership is to keep a closer eye on Elizabeth and gauge her reactions I'm able to convince him that the notes he's been trying to leave around have reached her.  The good news here is that Phillip is very easy to manipulate and deceive, he's a predictable element with nowhere near the amount of creativity or depth your average human should posses.  The bad news is that Elizabeth isn't, even with as much as I know about her I can't prepare for her every reaction, and being Hunted makes her much less predictable.

Also in the bad news pile is the fact that she's started doing research.  A couple of nights ago we were with a few friends at her apartment for a movie night.  I'm never very comfortable in groups, but I went anyways, both for the sake of seeming normal and to use the opportunity to keep an eye on her.  Throughout the movie I saw her look out the window several times, even though her antagonist never made an appearance.  Part way through the movie I excused myself to go to the bathroom and covertly checked the search history on her computer.  She had been looking up Slender Man.  If she finds the blogs I'm in trouble, I haven't said anything here that could guarantee she would know it was me, but that's not something I'm willing to risk, I have to find a way to control what information she gets.  I have a plan set up, but it's not one I'm excited about putting into action.

I haven't been Hunted in a long time.  It hasn't been long enough.

See you around

Cage

An Important Message

You know things have been pretty calm this past week or so, so I thought I'd take a break from talking about myself and do something I'm substantially better at: talking about all of you.  Well perhaps that isn't completely accurate, but this is about something that's at least slightly relevant to or directed at most of you.  I'm talking about something that many of encounter on a regular basis: Captha codes.  You know those strings of letters that you have to type in to put your comment on someone else's blog?  They're designed to keep computer programs from posting in places where they aren't supposed to, and in general I suppose that's a good thing, although I turned my captha's off in October, and never once has a program posted here.  You know, a while ago I didn't even mind, but lately they've been getting on my nerves.  Here, let me provide some examples:

(mundona)

This is about as bad as they used to get, which is why I didn't really mind.

(redit)                                                  (stole)

Sometimes they even came out looking like real words, every now and then they would even be words relevant to the comment that I had just made.  I always found these coincidences pretty amusing.

(cooties)                                          (dablog)

And I mean come on, how could you not laugh at a few of them.

(slain. t(r or i)v(I think that's an e followed by a v, maybe)I(not i, I, evidently there's a diffrence now))

But evidently they got tired of being laughed at, and google edited the captha's to prevent human posting as well.

(astere(t or i)(d or l) souls,(" or '', yes there is a diffrence))

It's very irritating trying to figure out what goes on in those blotches.

(usuldo What)

Eventually the codes were later re-edited to allow humans to post again, though still not as easily or entertainingly as before.  "What" indeed, this is actually on of the easier ones.

So yeah, sorry if I got a little whiny there, but it really is easy to turn those things off (just go to "Settings", then "Comments", go down to "Show word verification for comments", and select "No," it's quite simple), and it makes commenting around far less frustrating.  That's all I have for this post, but I really don't want to leave it at this.  I know, how about a song with a tangently relevant title and completely unrelated lyrics?  No, I don't particularly care that it doesn't fit the theme of the whole post, I like the song.

See you around

Cage

What really happened

I might as well say right now that the other post did get at least some of it right, even if those bits were still partially inaccurate.  I may as well just skip forward.

Sunday afternoon Elizabeth and I were walking near the campus nature trail, not on it, but we were going to the student center, which is located somewhat in front of it.  She was stressed, and beginning to feel the paranoia that eventually afflicts all the hunted before they realize what they're dealing with.  She wouldn't tell me exactly what she was feeling, but I knew enough to guess it.  I noticed right away when He showed up; I was annoyed, but I'm fairly decent at concealing my emotions, so Beth didn't notice anything.  Until she noticed Him.  I felt her reaction right away, she backed away and griped my arm, staring into the woods.  At that point I really didn't have much of a choice, I pretended I couldn't see anything, I tried to convince her that she was just imagining it.  I can't say I was very effective, but I did manage to calm her down a little.

After she had recovered a little we returned to her apartment.  When we got there we discovered someone (who I later confirmed to be Phillip) had broken into her apartment and spray painted an Operator's symbol over her bed.  That one's just brimming with originality, he is.  Anyways, this disturbed Elizabeth even further and so I convinced her to talk to the police and stay the night with a friend, not like it makes any difference, but it's probably a good idea for her mental state right now.  She did not spend the night at my dorm, she stayed with a different friend of ours.  I was hesitant to involve anyone else, but I thought it wisest to keep her away from me for the time being while I tried to get into contact with Phillip and confirm his involvement.

That's basically it, not much of a story, I know, but there really isn't anything else I can add.  However, just to be sure, let's recap some things:

• I was with Elizabeth when she saw the Slender Man for the first time on Sunday.
• I did  not plan any part of it, I merely recognized the situation and played along with it.
• Elizabeth's apartment was broken into.
• I was not the person who broke into her apartment.
• The break in could not be qualified as a ransacking.
• Elizabeth did go to the police.
• I was not present when this happened.
• Elizabeth did stay with a friend that night,
• That friend was not me.
• We did not stay up all night discussing our hopes and dreams, or any BS like that.
• My blog was apparently hacked.
• I am probably going to stab or shoot somebody as a result of this.

Any questions?

See you around

Cage

About that last post

If you've seen my comment then you already know: that wasn't posted by me.  I'm not sure who posted that on my blog, or why, but whoever it was knows some things that they shouldn't, as at least part of that post was true, even though I hadn't told anybody about it yet.  Unfortunately I can neither erase nor edit the post, so I can't get rid of it, I'm not sure how this was done, I even looked a the HTML for the thing and it won't let me change it.  I'm guessing most of you can grasp the unfortunate implications of this problem, but unlike the Phillip incident I have a feeling that this will actually be seen by whoever is messing with me, so I'm going to repeat what I said then: if you come forward, I'm not going to kill you, but if I catch you through other means (and one of my majors is computer science, I will figure out how you did this) I'll need a very good reason to let you live.  On my good days I'm never in the mood to handle these kind of violations of my privacy, and right now I''m dealing with a whole lot more than I normally have to, and I will not tolerate distractions like this when I am already in such a delicate situation.

Anyways, I just wanted to post this to clear up any misunderstandings that may have occurred because of that last post.  I was going to share what actually happened last weekend in this post, but that feels like it deserves it's own page, so I'm going to type it up separately and post it in a little bit.

See you around

Cage

The Other Side of the Coin

Did you guys notice I have a title now?  Apparently I'm a batman villain now, and unsurprisingly I'm kind of o.k. with this.

Well I was, but after this week, I'm pretty much sick of all of this.  You think I would have been able to hold this off a bit longer, but no, I'm clearly not the only one playing this game, and apparently I'm not even the only one cheating.  You know what, that's not even fair, I've probably had a better week than any of you, possibly excluding some of the proxies in the audience, but I really don't care all that much.  Because this is the week I betrayed a friend.  It's not like I didn't see this coming, like I haven't spent this time mentally preparing myself for when I had to make this choice.  But then it's not like I ever really had a choice, is it?  Do or die isn't much of a choice, really.

So yes, my  good friend  the Slender Man payed a visit to Elizabeth this week.  How do I know this, you might ask yourself, well I know it because he payed me a visit shortly prior, good friend that he is, to let me know he wanted a "favor."  Obviously I'm paraphrasing.  He wanted me to introduce him to Elizabeth, or rather, he wanted me to help set the mood.  I didn't exactly have the necessary cards to say no.  Both of us know there is a line, a constantly shifting, moving, unseen line that he can't cross and another equally unstable line that I won't cross.  The day either line is broken one of us gets hurt... and I get killed.  I don't know exactly where either line is, but that wasn't it, so I agreed to his suggestion.

So Saturday I broke into Elizabeth's apartment.

That's not true, I ransacked her apartment, I flipped furniture, I destroyed her television, I stole her computer, I emptied her trash all over the floor, I made sure the place was a complete wreck.  My final touch was to add an operator's symbol to her mirror in blood.  This is a point where having a school with a good biology department is a mixed blessing.  I made sure that no one saw me entering or exiting from the apartment, and I made sure to stop by the security room and destroy all of the recordings from that day.  Fortunately not many people stay on campus during the weekend here, so I didn't have to worry too much.

After that I returned to my dorm and waited.  I just sat on my floor and waited for what was going to come, I might have passed out at some point, but I honestly don't remember either falling asleep or waking up at any point in all that time, so maybe I didn't. maybe I've been awake for almost 48 hours now.  I'm going to sleep after I finish typing this.  It was around two in the afternoon when what I was waiting for happened: Elizabeth called.

She had just gotten back from visiting her parents for the weekend, I can only imagine what went through her head when she opened the door to her apartment and found the chaos waiting for her.  The chaos I had left for her to find.  She called me before she called the police.  Is that ironic or just sad?  I ran there to make sure I arrived before the campus police did, the ones I told Elizabeth to call.  I found her in the apartment's parking lot, waiting for me.  She was holding herself and shivering, even though it was probably the warmest day in a month.  I don't even remember what I said, but somehow I calmed her down as quickly as I could, and I got her to tell me what was wrong.  When she told me someone had broken into her apartment I rushed up there as quickly as I could, telling here to stay behind.  She didn't, just like I knew she wouldn't, but when we got to the door and I went inside she waited outside, just like I knew she would.  I should have made a mistake, I should have thought up a worse plan, but I didn't, I knew exactly what I was supposed to do and I did it.

I made a big show of flipping over the furniture, burying through piles trash, and looking in ransacked cabinets. I made sure to put my hands as many places as I could, to leave as much of a mark behind as possible.  To contaminate the crime scene.  I found a wrench where I had left it in my original mess, under the last piece of furniture in the room.  I picked it up and held over my shoulder like a bat and moved towards the bedroom door.  Elizabeth called after me nervously, asking what I was doing.  It wasn't difficult to make my voice nervous and uncertain, it may of been for different reasons than she believed, but I was barely holding myself together at that point.  Have you ever had to destroy the very sense of security and peace of someone you cared about, then had walk through the shattered bits of their happiness while trying to convince them you're just helping?  It isn't easy.  But I told her I was going to look in her room to make sure whoever did this was gone, and I said it with a straight face.

I didn't have to do as much to her room, after I opened the Elizabeth couldn't see me any longer.  Still, I made a point to move the bed and open the closet, just to make it clear that I had examined the room.  However I tried to avoid wasting any more time than I could afford, in my mind I could see the campus police pulling into the parking lot, and preparing to take control of the situation, the real police right behind them.  I exited the bedroom and moved to the bathroom, making sure to gasp loudly enough for Elizabeth to hear.  I heard my name called from the doorway, then the voice of a man asking what was going on.  I quickly touched the blood on the mirror, completing my claim that any evidence of my involvement happened after the crime.  The blood was mostly dry, but I still managed to get enough on my hand for what I needed before the campus police officer came and piratically dragged me out of the apartment.

After we got outside he turned to say something, and stepped back after noticing my eyes; for a brief moment I was acutely aware of how easily I could have pushed him over the second floor balcony.  But he recovered and proceeded to ask what I was doing in the apartment and give me a lecture about disturbing a crime scene and going into a potentially dangerous situation that lasted until the real police showed up and took over.  Elizabeth and I both had to answer several questions before we were allowed to leave, and by that time Elizabeth was even more uneasy and scared.  This was the plan, she had to be as vulnerable as possible, she needed to be scared and confused and hopeless, and I needed to be there to save her.

So I suggested we go somewhere to calm her down.

I suggested the campus nature trail.

I walked one of my only friends into a trap I had meticiously laid out for her, and I did it knowing full well I would have to watch her lose every shred of hope drained from her eyes, and I did knowing that I would be lieing to her and pretending I was really helping her all the while, and I did it anyways.

Because the nature trail was where it happened.

That's where the Slender Man made his move.

I saw him standing off behind the trees, and I saw her see him.  I watched the color drain from my friends face, I felt her grab my shirt.  I heard the fear in her voice as she asked if I saw what she saw, as she asked if the monster she only knew from a fictional series on youtube was really standing there, watching her.  That's when I did the most despicable thing I did that entire day: I smiled.  I gave Elizabeth the calmest, most reassuring smile I could manage, and I told her nothing was there.  I pretended convinced her that what she was seeing was just stress or shock or anything but what she thought it was.  I told her she was the only one who could she the darkness about to consume her mind.

I told her she was alone.

I took her back to my dorm, I convinced the RA to let her stay the night, and I told her to get some sleep.  I got online and looked at a few things, but it wasn't even an hour before she woke up from her inevitable nightmares.  We spent the night talking, neither of us slept, even though my roommate passed out long before dawn.  We both saw the man in the window, I'm sure, but neither mentioned him once.  We talked of life, fate, the future, hope, dreams, we spoke of these things as though we had them, we acted like they were obtainable for us, rather than just illusions that would ultimately serve to crush us even further.  I even spoke like I meant them, even though I didn't.

When the sun took to the skies I left Elizabeth in my room to get some sleep, to descend further into the madness of her nightmares, and I went to class.  When I got back she was gone, so I sat down and typed this up.  I just betrayed a friend in the worst way possible, and I wrote it up to put on a freaking blog read by a mix of stupid victims that don't even realize what's going on, and egotistical psychopaths who live to hunt down the victims.


I can't publish this.  I'm erasing this and going to sleep.

This needs to be seen.

Music of the soul

I was going to put up a post today, but it still needs work, so instead I figured I'd just put up something simple.  No bonus points if you guess who the band is, it should probably be obvious by now.  

For the record, I have no idea who Mirwin is, I just selected the first video that had the lyrics in the video.  Now I need to get some sleep, it's been a long couple of days.

See you around

Free

Insects of Stone

Hey there, I know I haven't been around much lately, but to be fair, the most I'm used to on this end is classes and tests and the occasional social obligation.  Lately, however, I've found myself running interference between Elizabeth and Phillip (fortunately the run away mannequin from Men's Warehouse hasn't gotten involved just yet).  I've already talked about my first technique to buy myself some time: introducing Elizabeth to Marble Hornets.  So far that has worked about as well as I had predicted it would: Beth has admitted to me that she has felt a bit paranoid because of the videos, and even experienced a nightmare based on them.  I was concerned at first, but after listening to her description it sounds like something concocted by her own mind, rather than a dream implanted by, well, I can't think of a clever moniker right now, but we've all read some version of this sentence before.  We only got to about entry #18 before she decided she was too creeped out to continue watching.  It's not that surprising, considering we were watching it at night, some of those videos even creeped me out a little, despite the fact I've dealt with the real thing.  Still, I think we might watch some more entries this weekend, Elizabeth said she wanted to see where it was going, so I guess I have no choice but to ride this decision out, hopefully it won't backfire too terribly.

On the other hand, this seems to have given me a little leverage when dealing with Phillip, which is now an almost daily chore.  I'm going to be honest, Phillip isn't that clever.  I suspect he's been hollowed (or whatever term you want to use) enough that he can't think that creatively, on the whole he's actually been inclined to believe whatever I've told him.  When I told him about Marble Hornets it was enough to convince him to back off his own plans (breaking into her apartment and leaving cryptic messages, like I said, he's not that clever).  Right now he looks at me like I'm a superior, he was led to believe that I was going to be his partner and handler for this assignment, and that it was my job to train him.  He's still a little upset that I broke his nose and forced him to walk a mile to the nearest road, but "infecting" Elizabeth has convinced him I'm on his side (thank goodness he doesn't actually check this blog).  He remains loyal to me and what he knows of my plans, and I can use that to my advantage in the future.

I've considered talking to Him about all of this, but right now everything is still fairly safe and simple, and I'd prefer to keep it that way, at the expense of potentially finding out more on the situation.  Look at me, taking the safe route, aren't you all so proud.

I know I haven't been active much lately, but I'll try to get on more often in the future.  Hopefully I'll even get better about making posts about what's happening, even though I haven't gotten much practice at that until now.  You know, I always knew this was coming, I had just never let myself believe it would be happening so soon.

See you around

Free

Not A Coincidence

I learned something interesting today, I learned who was being hunted in my class.  Sadly it was not the teacher, it might of been amusing to watch his lectures and examples slowly become filled with ramblings and operator symbols.  Instead it was someone else, someone I knew of all things.  Her name is Elizabeth, and we've been friends for a while now, she is, in fact, the only person in that class that I actually know.  Naturally I refuse to accept this as a coincidence, I believe in luck, but it's looking more and more like He's trying to force my hand.

Now the curious are probably wondering how exactly I know this, and the epically observant might even notice that I discovered this on a Friday when the class we shared was on Tuesdays and Thursdays.  Elizabeth didn't come to class this past week, evidently she was recovering from a mild cold.  This morning she texted me, asking if I wouldn't mind coming over to her apartment to share notes from our mutual class, I of course accepted.  When I went over there I didn't notice anything at first, and when I did it was so subtle that I couldn't even identify it right away.

Perhaps I should explain here.  I'm sure that by now most of you know what Mr. Talls presence feels like, there's the paranoia and fear, yes, but there's more to it than that.  It feels like he's physically projecting something.  I believe he is, I'm not sure what, but what ever it is leaves something behind, it's like this smell that just lingers long after the product is gone.  It's like radiation that never goes away, a sensation that something is wrong, and if you know what it feels like, you can figure out when someone has been hunted by him.  That feeling was there, with Elizabeth, and it was so faint I almost missed it.  I'd be surprised if she had even seen Him yet.

After I realized what was going on I realized what was going on: He wants me to choose.  The Slender Man is tired of having this little neutral person off in his own corner making a ruckus, and he's devised a lovely little situation designed to either bring out the worst in me, or the best.  He knows that this is something I can't ignore, I know the victim, and that means I have to get involved, one way or another.

Like I said, I can't just ignore this, it will be literally impossible to ignore this because Beth and I are close (as much as that can mean for me).  When things start getting worse she will most likely come to me, and I will either have to help her or sabotage her, the line between those options is so narrow even I can't maneuver it safely.  If it comes down to it I'm not sure I would be able to sacrifice Elizabeth for my own safety.  On the other hand, I'm not sure I'll ever be willing to surrender what I know, knowing full well it would mean a quick death for the both of us.  For that matter, I'm sure any kind helpful behavior would be bad for both of us.  So, this time at least, I took a different route: I introduced her to Marble Hornets.

I know that what I did didn't really buy me much time, if anything, things will escalate more quickly now that she knows what she's dealing with.  But now she knows what she's dealing with, she'll have some idea of what's going on and what she needs to do.  I still earn points because this does drag her in deeper, it does make her an easier target, and it does make her more paranoid.  But in the end, she won't be flailing when He starts showing himself, and she'll know where to look to find more information.

I'm not sure if I'll be able to pull something off like this every time things start to escalate, but right now I don't know what I'm going to do, so I need to find a way to put off this confrontation for as long as I can.

EDIT: You know, looking back on this a few days later I realize that this was written up pretty poorly.  I suppose it's good it's an account and explanation of what I know, rather than a piece of fiction brought before an audience of talented writers for the sake of entertainment.  That would be rather embarrassing.  Still, I'll try to make future updates more acceptable, I do try to hold myself to a certain standard of writing, even if it is a personal story.

See you around

Free

Or maybe not

So I had a nice little boring informational post on the Year of the Dragon planned, initially planned to go up on the Chinese New Year.  Anyone who knows when that is will probably notice I'm a bit late for it.  In fact, I've decided to postpone that particular post even longer because I've had a bit of a long week, and I'm still too lazy to get both it and studying done.  So instead of doing anything particulairly useful or intresting I'm just going to leave some music here.

See you around

FreedomCaged

Did I say seven?

Oh, I must have misspoke, I meant five.  Seriously though, because this isn't really supposed to be a blog about me I'm going to go ahead and work a little moral into this story:  When announcing plans online for dealing with someone in an aggressive nature, always lie about your schedule and/or specific plans.  If you take them early they will be caught off guard before they're ready, and if you take action later than you said you would, then they will either be burned out from anticipation or believe you to have forgotten your plans.  This is true for both the Hunted and Proxies, by the way, just so that's clear.  Anyways, I'm sure you lot want the story so I'll go ahead and share it now.

It is astonishingly easy to find out all you need to know about someone when you know their name and location, which is why I've never been running around sharing mine (though the notably observant should have narrowed down my location to four or five states by now).  Anyways, I was able to find Phillip's (that's the proxy's name for those of you wondering) room quite easily, and conveniently enough he didn't have a roommate.  It was easy to ambush him after his last class, a rope around his neck cut off his oxygen supply, and when I had parked close enough to his dorm that getting him to my car without anyone noticing was simply a matter of timing.

You know the economy really has taken it's toll.  It's almost a shame there are all these neighborhood filled with empty houses.  After driving to the place I had set up for our talk I dropped off Phillip and made sure he wouldn't be leaving or alerting anyone in the area of his presence anytime soon and returned to school for a couple of hours, just to make sure there wasn't anything I missed.  Around 3:00 in the afternoon I returned to the house to find my proxy friend awake and confused.  The following conversation is not verbatim, but it is close enough to get the general idea across.

Me:  (while removing a gag) So you're awake, good, we can have our conversation now.

Phillip:  (glaring) What do you want?

Me:  I want to know why you're here.

Phillip:  (struggling against the ropes) I'm here because you kidnapped me you physcho! (remember this isn't verbatim, some of it has also been strategiclly edited to be more family freindly.  In case you haven't noticed I'm not a very profane person.)

Me:  There's plenty of people out there that would call you a physcho just as quickly.  ( I retreived his mask from my backpack (yes he had a mask, it was in his room, not even well hidden))  I know what you are, I knew from the second I saw you, now why don't why try again? ( I flipped open my knife) Why are you here?

Phillip:  (He showed surperise at first, followed by a breif flash of fear before he answered with an ovbiously false bravado) Oh so you're a runner  ( Somehow it was both refreshing and annoying to be mistaken for a runner) you'll never get away with this "Father" (yes, he's one of those proxies) will protect me (he sneered).

Me:  (rolling my eyes) Oh well, good for him.  (I moved behind him so he couldn't see me)  Do you know who I am, Phillip?  Have you heard of (I said me real name here, I will of course not repeat it to the masses).  Or perheaps "FreedomCaged"

Phillip:  (he shook his head) No why should I?

Me:  You shouldn't, and it's fortunate for you that you don't.  (I leaned forward and put my knife against his neck) But I still need a reason to let you live, I've come this far, and to let you leave here would be a waste.

Unfortunately for dramatic timing this is when the Slender Man himself decided to make an entrance.  I mean sure it was a good place for him to enter, but if I had been in charge of his timing he would have appeared a few lines later at a much more dramatic moment.  Still, I suppose it was good enough placement to present adaquate theatrics.  After I was informed it would be in my best intrest to let Phillip go I gladly cut him loose and sent him on his way.  Admitadly he didn't have a car, and I may have been less than skillful when removing his binding, but I have no doubt he made it to a public road long before there was any risk of death by blood loss.  After that the big guy and I had a little talk about boundries, by the end we of course hugged and made up, or at the very least neither of us treid to fattaly wound the other, so I'm calling it a sucess.

Long story short: it turns out the proxy was simply a spook, asigned to someone else in that class (I'm not sure who, yet, I haven't noticed any Hunted, but it gets easier to tell the longer they're exposed to Slender shenagians, so I'll figure it out.).  So that's the story, I bet is was just riviting.  I'd add a soundtrack, but my next class begins rather shortly, so I'll just say so long for now.  The next post will be about someting other than myself, so rejoice in that.

See you around

Caged

You Hav e On e Week

That's right, seve n days, to tell m e who you are b efore I catch you off gaurd, haul you som eplac e disc r e et, an d gut you like a fish.  I thought I m ade it c lear that I didn 't wan t tab s kept o n me, I was sure I m ade it ov b ious that I did n ot wan t to b e ob serv ed without m y kn owledge, an d I kn ow I made it perfec tly well-kn own that I am n ot ab ov e killin g people who don 't ob serv e those sim ple rules.  You thin k I didn 't n otic e you were a prox y the sec on d you en tered the room ?  An d then you had the n erv e to sit down direc tly in fron t of m e?  It's takin g phen om on al effort for m e to fin ish this post, when I would m uc h rather hun t you down right n ow.  B ut for the sake of c iv ility, I'll hold off for n ow, after all, if you kn ow who I am, then you kn ow ab out this b log.  An d if you don 't kn ow who I am, you're ab out to fin d out.  Rem em b er, sev en days, if you haven 't given me a reason to let you liv e b y then, you won 't get the c han c e.

See you aroun d

C A G E D

The Aura Interview

Look at that, I am killing it with these creative post titles.  Seriously though, this has been a good week for me, despite the thousands of miles transversed, I'm still in a good mood.  The only thing I can account this to is how much I enjoyed my visit to Eden Two, so at this point, if I haven't done so enough already I want to again thank both the Overseer and Aura for allowing me to see the facility, and interview you both.

I realize that until now I have neglected to describe Aura's appearance, let me rectify that now.  Aura was about my age, though she was a little shorter than me.  She had short brown hair and very green eyes.  She had a very casual feel about her, which was an interesting contrast to the Overseer's formality.  Anyways, after the Overseer let her in I started the interview right away.


Me:  Thank you for agreeing to be interviewed.

Aura:  Your welcome, it feels nice and interesting to be doing something like this.

Me:  So what's it like living in the Eden facilities?

Aura:  It's actually quite nice.  I still miss the way I used to get to live when I was a kid but not all bad to live here and keep safe.

Me:  So do you ever leave Eden Two, or are you just stuck here all the time?

Aura:  There's a rare occasion every so often where I'll be allowed out for a bit. But it's rare and has to be in a controlled environment. Try to have no risks I guess.

Me:  That makes sense.  You work with the Eden Facilities on some of their projects, correct?

Aura:  Every so often, I just like to see what I can do to help out while I'm here.

Me:  So do all of the people rescued by Eden participate to a degree, or was it just something you decided to do?

Aura:  I think I was the first to volunteer but a fair few end up helping out in some ways if they can.  Like how Jensen is volunteering to help, too.

Me:  How is Jensen coming along, by the way?

Aura:  I haven't seen him in a while but I hear he's doing fine. He hasn't regressed or anything. He must really feel safe now here.

Me:  That's good.  So, what is your job here at the facility?

Aura:  Oh, um, technically not a job per se.  I sort of just drift from work to work.  Like I help out sometimes with some of the paperwork or talking to new people like Jensen.  It helps to have a friendly welcome and proof of safety I guess.  Now that I'm on blogger I have been helping out with keeping watch though for more events going on.

Me:  So how much do you know about Eden's operations?

Arua:  I know we're trying to help people be safe from Him, I know that they keep trying to make new technology to help with stopping Him.  Umm, what else, what else?  Oh, right, and Overseer recently got that goo thing to experiment with too.  I don't really know much of the ins and outs I'm sorry.

Me:  That's o.k., I didn't expect a full list of operations.  I just wanted to see how well informed the average resident was.

Aura:  Oh, phew, that's a relief.

Me:  So you've been here 12 years now, correct?

Aura:  That's right.

Me:  Have you ever experienced the Product, as the Overseer calls him, since then?

Aura:  Thankfully no, I haven't had any encounters or effects in all this time.  The nightmares I guess but that's a given.

Me:  Not even on your rare trips outside the facilities?

Aura:  As far as I'm aware, no.  Unless one of the guards saw him and didn't let me know, or none of us saw him, or I saw him and forgot.  But as far as I know, I've been safe from him.

Me:  That's impressive.  Would you be willing to describe some of your nightmares?  If not I would understand, but I'm naturally curios.

Aura:  Oh, I'm (she pauses), I might at some point go into more details on my blog If I feel up to it.  The most I feel like saying right now is, it usually feels like I'm on The Path.  There's always black leaves.  He's always there but yet not.  Oddly the sky has usually been practically on fire during it too.  They've always been the constants in it.  There's differences as well though, sometimes everything is a wasteland, sometimes an abandoned city, sometimes no one, sometimes people I know (she pauses for a fair amount), sorry that's the best I feel like saying at the moment.  They can get pretty vivid, too vivid for my tastes.

Me:  I understand.  I remember some of the dreams I used to have, it's not a pleasant experience.  Have you ever had any contact with anyone you knew as a child?

Aura:  Sadly, no, I miss everyone so much but I can't risk any danger.

Me:  So what do you do here with your spare time? 

Aura:  Well I actually get supplied with some books, DVDs, Internet; although that one was obvious, even some games. So I tend to just relax with all that a lot.

Me:  I understand that until fairly recently you weren't permitted to search out information on the Product.  Why was that, and why did it change?

Aura: 

Me:  Well thank you for all that, and thanks for your time, is there anything else you want to say for the record?

(Aura surprised me here by actually having something to say.)

Aura:  More people need to start offering sympathy for the actual severe problems and not just the soap opera stuff going on to everyone.

Me:  (Slight chuckle) Yes the drama is a bit thick in this community, isn't it.  Anything else?

Aura:  Nope, that seems fine. Was nice to get to talk to you and take part in this.

Me:  Thank you, it was nice talking to you as well.

After that I talked a bit more with Aura and the Overseer, but I elected to return to Memphis as soon as possible so that I could get my car and return home.  Thus concludes my posts on the Eden facilities, for anyone who didn't get the link in the first post I'll plug the Overseer's and Aura's blogs again here.

See you around

FreedomCaged

The Overseer Interview

After the tour of Eden facilities we all went up to the Overseer's office, which was on the 47th floor.  It was larger than any of the offices on the lower levels, and it had an almost "working from home" feeling about it.  The Overseer sat at his desk and I sat across from in him, where I assume that his subordinates and colleagues sat when giving updates or receiving orders.

Me:  I want to thank you for letting me take a tour of your facility, I enjoyed it.

Overseer:  As did I in getting to allow someone to participate in a tour.  I want to thank you as well for showing such an interest.

Me:  Of course, your facilities have interested me for a while now.  My first question is this: where does all of your funding come from?  Obviously the law firm downstairs provides you some income, but I doubt it would be enough to pay for all this, plus eleven more.

Overseer:  Some of it has been provided by myself personally through the claiming of a particularly large inheritance.  Some additional funding is provided by a supporter within the American government itself.  A few other facilities have cover much like this one that helps provide income as well.

Me:  So when was the first facility built, and how long was it before you began to make more?

Overseer:  We had the first finished for the most part during 1999, work was already beginning on the others but slowly.  It took us most of the remainder of that year to finish up the last details on Facility 1.  After that particular incident in the Millennium; the other facilities stalled temporarily so we could make sure.  Within two months we felt assured that Facility 1 was a success and so continued on to make the others.

Me:  So why are you based here if the first facility was built in England?

Overseer:  Part of Project Destiny, the starting part is located here. I wanted to oversee it as much as possible personally.  It is also because a vast majority of those involved in this battle tend to be in America.  In fact, I notice a fair amount seem to be from the east coast, too.

Me:  That is a valid point.  So how do you keep track of all your different operations, the number you have in this building alone must require a lot of time and oversight.

Overseer:  Each department usually has it's own head to report to who will gather the information and file it to me.  It takes a while to look through which is why I don't have time to regularly post and comment many times.  Each facility also has their own head when I'm not there.  Their own sub-overseer I suppose we could put it as.  Who will help manage the projects there and report directly to me.

Me:  So how much does each person know about projects they aren't involved in?  They clearly know other projects exist, but if they wanted to could they learn of another projects focus or successes?

Overseer:  Likely not, for security reasons we tend to keep as little information shared as possible between the sections.  Certain projects tend to mix together so more info will be shared but never outright knowledge is given.  The heads however tend to know more to aid further with the planning but even then they don't gain the full picture.

Me:  So you're the only one with the full picture?

Overseer:  Correct.

Me:  So now for one of the bigger questions: How do keep your facilities safe from the product?

Overseer:  The perception filter plays a key role in that but also so does the way we manage our operatives.  We tend to make sure they don't go on a direct path back to facilities.  They are usually required to meet up with a security member from a facility on the way back.  They'll usually make sure that no one else is with them or following them as well as perform a psyche evaluation on the operative.  But I do think that the fact we haven't yet taken a full on offensive role against The Product has tied in to the lack of danger.

Me:  So it's more of a common sense and good fortune routine than an actual secret defensive weapon.  I'm sure some people will be disappointed to hear that.

Overseer:  Well we do have manners of defense prepared but we haven't yet been required to use it.

Me:  It's always good to have a back-up plan.  I suspect if I ask you won't tell me exactly what that defense is?

Overseer:  [chuckles lightly] I'm afraid not.  I'm sure you understand.

Me:  Of course, what about the other supernatural creatures that have a tendency to spring up and terrorize people, do you have projects dedicated to them or are you focusing exclusively on the Product for now?

Overseer:  We do have some small projects putting time into learning about them.  The Product is our sole focus but as seen by what Aura said in her story.  Those other beings were involved too.  We try to be more discreet with our investigations into them though.  These facilities are aimed at defence from The Product.  We're not overly keen on testing the effects of attention from the others.

Me:  I noticed on the post where you invited me to this facility that you recently had a problem with some of your scientists involved with testing the Azoth.  Would you care to elaborate a bit on what happened?

Overseer:  Ah yes, Dr. Fei Wong has been a long time colleague in this project.  Occasionally my employees will recruit new workers into our midst.  I will usually screen them myself too.  I made a mistaken in treating this too personal as I had good faith in his judgement and didn't screen the new scientist he employed two weeks ago.  Dr. Gordon Knox it turns out was someone not affiliated with this project but with someone else's efforts to fight back against The Product.  Corporate Espionage even in this fight it seems.  He tried to steal a sample of The Azoth and somehow much to my disappointment got past the other scientists.   Fortunately security was not lacking in their own job.

Me:  That seems like an interesting turn of events, do you know who he was working for?

Overseer:  Operative: Spiral is currently investigating the matter.  I'm aware of the existence of a few government agents that are fairly well-known and have interest in The Product but I strongly doubt that people like Fisk have anything to do with this.  It's likely someone low down.  It's possible it might not even be a government agent.  As you've no doubt seen.  There is a structure for many who serve Him now.  Their own corporate ladder for lack of a better term.

Me:  I've noticed.  How did you find runners and proxies to "rescue" before you began your blog?

Overseer:  Mainly through operatives out in the field and again through our employees keeping an eye on the news of different locations.  Especially different towns local news.  It's interesting how much that involves The Product fails to make mainstream news.  Some were easier to locate due to their insistence on wearing symbols like that Operator symbol on their clothing.

Me:  Why did you begin all of this, what was your thought process or end goal behind starting the facilities?

Overseer:  [there is a slight pause] I'd like to say it was out of a sense of justice or "that it was the right thing to do."  I do feel attached, I do feel a great pride in what I'm doing.  But admittedly it started off so I could prove that I could.  The standard drive behind most actions a scientist will take, even if some won't admit that.  It is always what fuels the desires of a scientist, to prove that they can.

Me:  (Slight chuckle) That's what fuels an alarming number of people, I'd suspect.  Tell me about Eden Eight, how, or possibly why did it fall?

Overseer:  Le Fay, short for Morgan Le Fay was the sub-overseer of that particular facility.  It was her actions that led to a lot of my current decisions when it comes to security.  She put too much of her personal bias and judgement into the role.  Far, far too much.  In her rash decisions; she ended up bringing in those on the Agent level of servants.  Ones that had no real desire to change and to make matters worse.  She had given them directions, she had made the location known.  They called The Product to that facility and he destroyed it.

Me:  Why would she take such action?  Surely even personal bias can only account for so much of such drastic actions.

Overseer:  I'm not quite sure.  I have a feeling her desire for the project shifted in some way.  Her contacts with me seemed to bear a tone of hostility in those last few days before the fall.  But, she died with the fall of that facility so I'm not quite sure on what exactly changed.

Me:  Well, you'll remember the posts she made in November, do you have any idea how she's still alive, or who might be impersonating her?

Overseer:  That I'm not sure on.  Although there is one possible theory: Le Fay was always (he pauses) fearful of the possibility of things to come.  Worried about what could happen in the future if this project was to fail, what could change in times to come.  She feared the future.  When my operatives investigated the ruins of Facility Eight, Le Fay's body was found in one of the labs.  Near one of our hypnotic devices.  These devices were electronically operated.  Bear in mind this is just a theory and to me it sounds unlikely but, I sometimes wonder if her mind was fragmented into the electronics, and that recently The Manufactured Newborn, as it is known, came into contact with her.  It seems impossible though so I don't quite know what to make of these comments.  Regardless, whoever it is has clearly learnt to manipulate a perception filter as I am still incapable of seeing them.

Me:  Let's see, that's all I have on my agenda, unless there's something you'd like to add for the record?

Overseer:  That seems to be all that comes to mind for myself, too.

Me:  Very good, do you mind if I use this office for my Interview with Aura as well?

Overseer:  Not at all, feel free.

Me:  Thank you, and thank you for your time.

After that Aura came in and I interviewed her as well, I'll try to have that post up later today. 

See you around

FreedomCaged