The Slenderman Mysteries Read online

  This edition first published in 2017 by New Page Books,

  an imprint of Red Wheel/Weiser, LLC

  With offices at:

  65 Parker Street, Suite 7

  Newburyport, MA 01950

  www.redwheelweiser.com

  www.newpagebooks.com

  Copyright © 2017 by Nick Redfern

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from Red Wheel/Weiser, LLC. Reviewers may quote brief passages.

  ISBN: 978-1-63265-112-9

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  available upon request

  Cover design by Howard Grossman/12E Design

  Forest image by photocosma/depositphotos

  Interior by Gina Schenck

  Typeset in Minion Pro and Nollanaama

  Printed in Canada

  MAR

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  www.redwheelweiser.com/newsletter

  “When, lo, as they reached the mountain-side,

  A wondrous portal opened wide,

  As if a cavern was suddenly hollowed;

  And the Piper advanced and the children followed,

  And when all were in to the very last,

  The door in the mountain-side shut fast.”

  —Robert Browning,

  The Pied Piper of Hamelin: A Child's Story, 1842

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  I would like to give my sincere thanks to all of the following people, without whom this book would not exist: my good friend and tireless literary agent, Lisa Hagan, for all of her hard and dedicated work; everyone at Career Press, including Michael Pye, Laurie Kelly-Pye, Jeff Piasky, Lauren Manoy, Gina Schenck, and Adam Schwartz; Allison Jornlin, for sharing with me her insights into aspects of the Slenderman phenomenon; Tea Krulos, for a thought-provoking and revealing interview; Robin Swope, who went beyond the call of duty in terms of giving me his views on the Slenderman; Ian Vincent, for nailing the connections between the Slenderman and the field of Chaos Magic; Jenny and Loren Coleman, whose work in the field of the Slenderman has proved to be invaluable; David Weatherly, for kindly sharing with me several cases from his files; Mike Huberty, who demonstrated to me that Waukesha, Wisconsin, is a place filled with paranormal activity; close friend Kimberly Rackley, who generously agreed to be interviewed on the issue of her personal encounters; Olav Phliips, of Paranoia Magazine, for an eye-opening insight into the Slenderman phenomenon; and, finally, my good mate Simon Wyatt for his phenomenal artwork of the Internet's most infamous monster.

  CONTENTS

  INTRODUCTION

  CHAPTER 1

  “THE BEST, NEW MYTHOLOGICAL CREATURE”

  CHAPTER 2

  “IT TENDS TO FREE ITSELF FROM ITS MAKERS' CONTROL”

  CHAPTER 3

  “MAGIC AND FICTION WERE STARTING TO HAVE A CONVERSATION”

  CHAPTER 4

  “IS ALL THAT WE SEE OR SEEM BUT A DREAM WITHIN A DREAM?”

  CHAPTER 5

  “FEAR OF THE GAS MAN”

  CHAPTER 6

  “CONSUMED BY THE SLENDERMAN”

  CHAPTER 7

  “WAUKESHA REMINDS ME OF A NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET

  CHAPTER 8

  “THERE WILL BE NO SAFETY IN THIS HOUSE”

  CHAPTER 9

  “DEMON-POSSESSED”

  CHAPTER 10

  “EVIL LIES IN WAIT FOR AN EXCUSE TO BLOOM”

  CHAPTER 11

  “SLENDERMAN IS A PHYSICAL MANIFESTATION OF OUR FEAR OF DEATH”

  CHAPTER 12

  “AND IN DID COME THE STRANGEST FIGURE”

  CHAPTER 13

  “A SLIM MAN IN A DARK SUIT”

  CHAPTER 14

  “I KNEW IT WOULD BE NECESSARY TO KILL HER”

  CHAPTER 15

  “A TALL, DARK, AND TERRIFYING ENTITY”

  CHAPTER 16

  “HIS ARMS ARE IMPOSSIBLY LONG”

  CHAPTER 17

  “THERE'S NO STRUCTURE TO THE FACE”

  CONCLUSIONS

  BIBLIOGRAPHY

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  INTRODUCTION

  Imagine the scene: It's the dead of night and you are fast asleep. Suddenly, things change radically and you find yourself far from asleep; you are now wide awake but unable to move. You are completely paralyzed. You try to cry out but it's no use. Your heart pounds and your head spins chaotically. Worse still, you see hunched over in the shadows of the bedroom an eight-to-nine-foot-tall skinny and emaciated creature. It is dressed in an old-style black suit, and has a pale face that lacks eyes, a nose, ears, and a mouth. As for its arms and legs, they are almost like those of a spider: long, thin, and spindly. Rubbery, octopus-like tentacles protrude from its torso; they wave and flicker ominously in your direction. To your horror, the night-fiend slowly moves toward you and leans over. Its foul breath makes you wretch. It whispers that you are about to die or that it is coming to take your soul. Maybe you will be its eternal slave in its forested, ancient abode. Now in a state of complete terror, you finally manage to cry out and wake up in a cold sweat. The terrible thing is suddenly gone. You have just had a trauma- and fear-filled encounter with the Slenderman. But, mark my word, he will be back. He always comes back eventually.

  The Slenderman has curious origins. He began “life” purely as an Internet creation, specifically the work of a man named Eric Knudsen. In June 2009, Knudsen, via the pseudonym of “Victor Surge,” uploaded a couple of doctored photos of the Slenderman to the Something Awful website forum. In no time at all, others began writing and posting their very own tales of the Slenderman. Short stories, blogs, novels, online games, chat-rooms, and more soon followed. Then, something menacing and sinister happened: People all across the world began to see the Slenderman. Not just on the Internet, not in novels or in the pages of comic-books, but in their homes. In their bedrooms. In mysterious woods. In dreams that rapidly escalated into full-blown nightmares.

  The Slenderman had come to life.

  Since 2009, countless numbers of people claim to have seen, and been attacked, plagued, and terrified by this skeletal, pale giant in black. But how could such a thing have happened? Is the creature a Tulpa, a Buddhist word that means “thought-form”? When enough people believe in something, the theory goes, that same something can stride out of our darkest imaginations and right into the heart of our own reality. By accepting without question the idea that the Slenderman is more than just a piece of Internet fiction are we also giving him some degree of life? Maybe even independent life? If so, can we extinguish that life? If not, does that mean the Slenderman is here to stay?

  Another theory suggests that the Internet is slowly becoming self-aware. Could the online world into which all of us are hooked be the culprit? In September 2012, the Sydney Morning Herald published an article titled “A self-aware Internet not so far-fetched” and asked, “Could the internet “wake up”? And if so, what sorts of thoughts would it have? Would it be friend or foe? They are important and integral questions, and particularly so when it comes to the matters of the Slenderman and what it really is (Falk, 2012).

  Is the Internet turning against us—in a situation not unlike the vast Skynet system in the Terminator movies—and attacking us with digital equivalents of our very own online nightmares? Could those same digital equivalents take a running leap out of the Internet and into our very homes? And, particularly so, the Slenderman?

  There is no doubt that the saga of the Slenderman has reached extremely disturbing proportions both on the Net and in our world. In 2014, Newsweek reported, “In late May, in the Milwaukee suburb of Waukesha, Wisconsin, two 12-year-old girls allegedly lured a friend into the woods and stabbed her 19 times.” The terrible attack was undertaken all in the name of—yes, you guessed it—the Slenderman. It was an affair that shocked the people of Waukesha to their very core and gave the Slenderman the widespread infamy he was surely craving (Jones, 2014).

  In a January 24, 2015 article that appeared in the U.K.-based Birmingham Mail newspaper (titled “Spooky Slender Men spotted in Cannock”), the editor Mike Lockley wrote that an investigation

  ...has been launched in the Midlands following four sightings of Slender Men—long, stick-thin specters feared around the world.... Slender Men have been a part of global folklore for centuries. They may be known by different names, but their harrowing, elongated appearance remains the same around the world (Lockley, 2015).

  More and more people are following, and arguably even worshiping and devoting their lives to, the Slender-man as he becomes ever stronger and more physical in our world. Where did he come from? What does he want from us? What are the many witnesses to the Slenderman telling us? Is there just one creature, or are we looking at multiple Slendermen? How can we stop him from terrorizing and torturing us? Can we stop him? Or has he become an unstoppable, unbeatable nightmare?

  These, and many more, are the questions asked and answered in The Slenderman Mysteries: An Internet Urban Legend Comes to Life.

  1

  “THE BEST, NEW MYTHOLOGICAL CREATURE”

  At first glance, the ways and means by which the Slenderman was created appear to be very simple. At second glance, however, things are just about anything but simple. Indeed, many things in life are so often not what they seem to be. With the Slenderman, though, just about nothing is a
s it seems. As for the wholly down-to-earth explanation for the Slenderman's “existence,” it all began in early June 2009, specifically on the 10th of the month. That was when a man named Eric Knudsen chose to do something that some might view as intriguing, others as ground-breaking, and many—from today's perspective—as downright dangerous. Knudsen molded, nurtured, and duly unveiled what is just about the creepiest and most hostile creature that the Internet has ever seen: the Slenderman.

  By his own admission, Knudsen had more than a few inspirations for his creature of choice; some were from the world of horror-fiction, others came from the all too real, and all too dangerous, domain of the supernatural. They included the notorious Men in Black of UFO lore, the Mothman, the collective works of H.P. Lovecraft, sinister Shadow People, Zack Parsons' That Insidious Beast, the works of Stephen King, and an eerie character known as the Mad Gasser of Mattoon. (You will learn more about all of these as the book progresses.) The goal, Knudsen explained, was to create “something whose motivations can barely be comprehended and causes general unease and terror in a general population.” He certainly achieved his goal and way more (slenderman235, 2011).

  It's very clear that a great deal of thought went into how, and under what circumstances, the Slenderman was destined to become the bad-boy, rock-and-roll-star of both the paranormal world and the Internet. Given the nature of the Slenderman and his dark deeds in fiction and, later, in reality (as well as in a hazy combination of both) you might very well be forgiven for assuming that the creation of the creature occurred in the darkened bowels of a creepy, old house. Or, even, in the cellar of something resembling Castle Frankenstein on a dark and thundery night. Not so. Actually, the complete opposite is the case. According to one of Knudsen's colleagues, it was a slow workday afternoon when the Slenderman imagery began to emerge in Knudsen's mind and quickly came to fruition. How profoundly odd and down-to-earth that the definitively unearthly Slenderman was born amid an afternoon of boredom in the workplace. In no time at all, the Slenderman—phenomenon, meme, and soon-to-be entity—began to take shape. In fact, said Knudsen, “It was pretty spontaneous” (Ibid.).

  By now, there was absolutely no going back.

  FROM TWO PHOTOS A LEGEND IS BORN

  Using the alias “Victor Surge,” and prompted by a competition launched by the folks behind the Something Awful website to create images of a supernatural variety, Knudsen set out to do his best. Knudsen secured a pair of black-and-white-photos and digitally altered them. He inserted into the pictures a grim, tall, thin monster in a suit. In a black suit. Knudsen then uploaded his pair of carefully and skillfully manipulated images to the forum section of Something Awful, which is known for running competitions that revolve around Photoshopped imagery. They were the very first images of what became known as the Slender-man. Rolling Stone's Bryn Lovitt said of Knudsen's actions:

  “The idea was to see who could use their Photoshop skills to create the best new mythological creature. Activity and praise for Surge's tall, faceless ghoul flourished around the post immediately” (Lovitt, 2016).

  As for the two photos, they were similar in the sense that both images showed the tall, thin, black-suited and faceless Slenderman in the midst of groups of children. The creature also sported a number of octopus-like tentacles, which waved in the air and beckoned menacingly, and which was admittedly an undeniably great touch. Thus, the Slenderman's infamously unhealthy and dangerous connections to kids and teenagers was born and unanimously accepted. Where there were children, there was sure to be the Slenderman. In rapid-fire time, there was a new boogeyman in town. The ghoulish thing was like a human stick-insect, but an obscene, malignant, and terrifying one. Knudsen increased the interest in his creation by adding fictional captions to the photos, something that gave them an air of genuineness, albeit that certainly wasn't Knudsen's goal.

  It is important to note that there was no deception at work here; this was not a case of Knudsen creating a hoax and then trying to pass it off as the real deal. Rather, the aim really was just creating a fearful and entertaining entity for the people who gravitated to Something Awful. The first caption, dated 1983, read: “We didn't want to go, we didn't want to kill him, but its persistent silence and outstretched arms horrified and comforted us at the same time.” The words were attributed to a “photographer unknown, presumed dead” (Vincent, 2011).

  The second photo had a date of 1986 attached to it. The accompanying text read as follows:

  One of two recovered photographs from the Sterling City Library blaze. Notable for being taken the day which fourteen children vanished and for what is referred to as “The Slender Man.” Deformities cited as film defects by officials. Fire at library occurred one week later. Actual photograph confiscated as evidence (Peters, 2011).

  In this second case, the photographer was a “Mary Thomas, missing since June 13th, 1986” (Ibid.).

  THE SLENDERMAN COMES TO LIFE

  In terms of how the Slenderman came to be perceived as a real entity—rather than just as a creation for, and paradoxically of, the Internet—it's worth noting that the seeds of this “fact or fiction?” angle were sown immediately. In fact, following Knudsen's uploading of the photos, a commenter at Something Awful, using the name of “Slidebite,” predicted that it would not be long at all before whole swathes of the paranormal research community would come to embrace the Slenderman as a real entity.

  The fascination for the Slenderman grew quickly and dramatically. Driven by Knudsen's initial photos, more and more people created their own Photoshopped pictures and posted them to Something Awful. Just five days after the phenomenon began, “Thoreau-Up,” who was another Something Awful fan, commented that the imagery and descriptions of the Slenderman mirrored a monstrous creature from Germany whose origins dates back centuries. Its name is Der Grossman; in English that translates to the Tall Man. He was a threat to children and lived in the heart of Germany's Black Forest.

  It's important to note that, just like Eric Knudsen, “Thoreau-Up” was not creating a hoax or a fantasy. The story of the Tall Man is indeed a very old one and certainly does parallel certain aspects of the Slenderman phenomenon. You'll be further exposed to this proto-Slenderman later on in the book. A good case can be made that it was the comments of “Slidebite” and “Thoreau-Up” that made at least some of the readers of Something Awful think there just might have been something about the Slenderman that went way beyond mere fantasy.

  Perhaps echoing what “Thoreau-Up” had to say, the mysterious and one-syllabled “I” commented very soon after: “The Slender Man. He exists because you thought of him.” “I” then added: “Now try and not think of him” (Weatherly, 2014).

  For so many people who were now hooked into the Slenderman phenomenon, trying to wipe the imagery of the creature from their minds was not an easy thing to do. In fact, just about everyone who regularly checked out Something Awful was unable to stop thinking about the Slenderman. The monster was already taking hold of minds and souls, and he hadn't even yet achieved an appreciable degree of reality, which is pretty impressive in a curious and disturbing fashion.

  As the days progressed, more and more works of fiction on the Slenderman made their way to Something Awful. Many of them had a distinct air of reality to them—in the way they were written, at least—even though they were nothing of the sort. Yet again, though, there was this expanding issue of reality meeting fantasy, which grew and grew, and which still exists to this very day.