Unknown Date
His eyes slowly opened, seeing trees towering above him. Bruises and cuts covered his body and his knees felt like they had been shattered. What breaths he could take, felt like someone punching him in the chest. He felt death.
Gabriel lifted his hands to his mouth and wiped off the blood. He didn't know where he was but knew that, wherever he was, it was the middle of the night. He gazed at the moonlight that was shining down at him before turning his head to look down.
Standing in a circle around him, the Faceless watched.
"What the fuck..." Gabriel struggled to mutter. His breathing became frantic and each breath became more painful. He wanted to scream but he knew that he wouldn't be able to. Gabriel was alone in the forest and he was theirs to play with.
"Please," He mumbled. "Please don't."
They all watched him, their heads perfectly still with moonlight reflecting upon their pasty skin. Tears rolled down Gabriel's cheek as he sniffled and held his hands over his eyes. The forest was silent. Not an animal to be heard, not a gust of wind through the trees, not even a twig snapping - there was nothing but complete silence. The only noise Gabriel felt he could hear was their stares.
"What do you want?" He managed to say a bit louder, coughing up blood in the process. They said nothing. Each one of their blank faces were fixated towards him with their long arms hanging to their sides. It was an experience that Gabriel could only compare to being alone in a dark mall surrounded by mannequins, only a hundred times worst.
One of the Faceless slowly approached the stone altar that Gabriel was laying on. There was no escape, Gabriel was unable to crawl, nevertheless walk away.
"You're not real, you're not real!" He screamed at it.
It didn't move. All it did was keep its head cocked to the side and stare at him, almost as if it was mocking him - laughing at him.
We missed you, a voice in Gabriel's head said.
"Leave me the fuck alone! Get out of my head!" Gabriel screamed. "Please... please." He sobbed uncontrollably. He didn't know if this was a nightmare or some sick fucking prank but he had had enough of it. It wasn't funny anymore - it wasn't funny to begin with.
Deep down, Gabriel knew this wasn't a prank. And it felt far too real to be a nightmare. No, this was real and these were really the Faceless. It had to be impossible though, they were just suppose to be a myth, a legend. The Faceless were a tourist trap, nothing more.
"Fuck, fuck, fuck," Gabriel muttered. They could probably read every thought he had - could probably sense the immense pain he was feeling. If they had mouths, they would be laughing at him, showing off their hideous teeth. But they didn't have mouths, or eyes, or noses, or hair, or even ears. There was nothing but a divot where the eyes would go.
"What do you want?" Gabriel asked once more
Nothing. They still wouldn't respond to him, nevertheless stop creepily staring at him with their blank faces. There couldn't just be a haunted house, no, there had to be walking mannequins stalking people through the forest. How could this be real?
They're not real. They're myths. Please, please, please don't be real.
The moonlight slowly began to fade away as a large rolling black cloud began to pass in front of it. It was the only thing that made Gabriel feel safe and, now, it would be gone, swallowed by the clouds.
Almost as if synchronized, all the Faceless turned their blank faces to the moonlight. Gabriel followed as began to feel immense dread. He had to get out of there, before the clouds would take away his light.
He pushed himself off the stone altar, feeling his body crash into the cold hard ground. All of his body shot up in pain but he had to escape, before it was too late. Gabriel pried his bloodied hands into the dirt, pulling himself away from the altar, away from the Faceless.
Don't leave us Gabriel. You're our family now.
Inching forward, he let out muffled screams. The pain was immense and his breathing was fractured. Every time he crawled his way forward, he felt like he got punched in the chest. Death was crawling with him, trying to pull him back and embrace him. He wouldn't give in. He had to survive.
I love you, Gabriel, one voice said.
You're my brother, another said.
Gabriel screamed. Hearing their voices burned his mind and he couldn't stop them, couldn't cover his ears. They were playing with him and he knew it. A few feet away, the light that illuminated a tree faded away and Gabriel watched as the darkness crawled up to him. In mere seconds, the darkness had swallowed the forest.
He could see nothing but black. His breaths became frantic and he could hear his body shaking against the ground. There was nothing to do now but wait - wait for whatever came next.
"It'll be over soon, my son," A voice said
"Dad?" Gabriel said. "Dad? Is that you?"
"It'll be over soon," The voice said once more
A large ear-piercing screech rang through the forest all around him. It sounded like an animal, but distorted. Suddenly, thousands of footsteps quickly shuffled through twigs and leaves and closed in on Gabriel. There was even more of them then he had saw.
Dozens of hands began grasping Gabriel, pulling him back into the darkness. He screamed, but no one would hear him. Death had caught up... and death would embrace him.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
It couldn't breathe. There were lungs and a throat but nothing to suck in the air. All it could do was try to gasp for air - but it would never be able to suck in that air. It couldn't breathe but it could never die. The life it lives will be a breathless one.
It couldn't smell. The nose was gone and the usual odors that it could once smell were once gone. However, it could still smell blood. Yes, the sweet delicious smell of blood. And, it could smell emotions: happiness, anger, stress, and its favorite of all, fear. Fear was the best smelling one of them all. It fed off fear, needed to smell it. But not through the nose, because there was no nose.
It couldn't hear. The holes where its ears once listened to the sounds of the Earth were closed off. It would no longer hear the sounds of traffic, birds chirping, planes flying by, or a child's laughter. No, instead it would hear the thoughts of those it preyed on and the thoughts of those it would call family. No secret was safe from it. It would hear all of them.
It couldn't see. Not to be confused, it still had eyes, but the eyes were closed off forever. The only thing it could ever see again was darkness. Over time, the eyes would wither away from never being able to see the light again. But that was alright. It didn't need eyes because eyes could never see what it could. It could see everything now.
It could feel. The feeling of everything was overwhelming but now it could truly feel. Every slight change in the wind and temperature, every vibration in the earth, every organ in a person's body - it could feel them all.
It would hunt. What ever poor soul wandered in the forest was Its to hunt. There would be no killing, that was a delicacy that could only be truly relished once its prey had been played with. It would listen for somebody's thoughts, smell for their emotions, and most importantly, feel them when they entered its forest. Once it found its prey, it would begin the hunt.
It would stalk. For a while, it would stalk from the shadows and begin to understand its prey. It wanted to know every little thought that crept into their mind and it wanted to know every little dirty secret. At times, this was the best part for it. It was almost like a date, getting to know somebody. Only, it was getting to know them and they would never to get to know it.
It would craft. The animals of the forest would no longer linger around whenever they felt the presence of it. But it once had a memory of the various animals and would craft little wooden mahogany animals to give to its prey. They were always more trustworthy of the figures when they were carved in the shape of an animal. Little did they know, the animals had been infused with the essence of it, just like that house they call Mathew's Manor.
It would play. Laughing, giggling, whispering were all fun ways to play with its prey. Often, the prey would brush it off as them hearing things, believing that nothing was in the forest at all. After toying with them for a while, it would give them the animals. The real fun would begin and they would begin to experience hallucinations. They would begin to feel attached to the figure, never wanting to leave its side. Their mind would begin to play tricks on them and they would never know if what they were seeing was real or not. It would be their haunting.
It would frighten. Once the prey had begun to lose their mind, it would bring out their worst fears. Whatever dark secret they kept, whatever fear scared them, it would use it to breathe in their delicious fear. It loved fear and found that their prey tasted oh so much sweeter when their prey suffered from absolute terror.
It would feast. Ripping through their organs only tasted so sweet when fear was sprinkled on it. It would isolate them, injure them, and, like a suffering animals, it would put them out of their misery. But it could never gain that satisfaction from a child. Children were forbidden, as it found that children were good for making their parents all the more fearful. Some prey would never be feasted on. Some prey were so vile with darkness in their soul that it was only fitting that death wouldn't be given to them. They would be brought before the stone altar to suffer the same unending hunger, suffocation, and misery that It felt.
It was no longer Gabriel. Gabriel had died upon the stone altar and would no longer live as a human would. He would become It and It would live its new life in the forest, constantly on the hunt and constantly needing to feed. It would no longer know to love, to feel happiness, to feel anything but pain and misery. There was no death for It.
It was Faceless.
END of Epilogue
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