Frank had woken to the sound of chatter and footsteps outside of his bedroom door, alerting him in an instant.
He had been about to let his reflexes take over, hands reaching out to grab his blade and mask before going in for the kill, waiting for further instructions from The Entity.
When none came, he took a second to mentally reboot and realize that he was no longer in The Fog.
He was in the mansion he had been scoping out not even a day before.
He had been brought here for the time being, just until his friends or even the Entity came to look for him and take him back to his familiar icy realm in the hellish fog-riddled landscape.

Blinking in the harsh platinum sunlight that was heavily masked by marbled grey clouds above, Frank rose and stood up, the bed creaking forlornly as the killer's weight lifted from its springy surface.

His clothes were rumpled and he still smelled of dirt and rainfall, but he was here. He was alive.
He was ready to see what today would bring; bloodshed or chaos? the choice was his.

Though it was only his second day in the mansion, he seemed to be adapting quickly, despite some of the residents trying to take a stab at him or catch him off-guard with a jumpscare or a knife to the neck, just to see what they could get away with before Slenderman could intervene.
Thankfully, being trapped in the Entity's realm -crudely replicating his icy hometown of Ormond- Frank was fast and wouldn't go down easily, and each time he was caught in a tousle with the others he was wearing a maniacal smile underneath the matching grin scrawled on his mask.

His fingers spun and gripped his knife with expert ease, the tips no longer blue with cold thanks to the lack of snow around the mansion, not to mention the building's windows were all intact; that is, if a few of the more violent killers didn't get any funny ideas.
At least Slenderman seemed to be the one to keep the residents on tight leashes when they began to get out of hand.

The Canadian killer couldn't deny, Slenderman was a lot like the entity, from the very presence of his being to the way he commanded his followers to fall in line, sometimes without even the use of words at all.

In fact, it was the Slenderman's words that jerked the frenzy-loving slasher back to reality on this cloudy, overcast morning.
Beforehand, Frank seemed to be absorbed into carving his toast into smaller and smaller bits, using the side of his fork to rip it apart.
Every so often, he quickly stabbed one of the pieces and swiped it into his eggs' bleeding yolks, before consuming the piece quickly.
The way his hands darted so quickly from A to B, it was hard to tell if he was moving at all or if he was moving too fast to even comprehend in the early morning haze, seemingly almost a blur as he silently scarfed down his food with his head bent over his plate.

Frank continued to devour his meal, tuning out the small talk for now, until a word from Slenderman grabbed his attention.

"Victims..."

Frank's head snapped up, eyes instantly on the towering eldritch being, still silent as he munched on the last morsels of his food.
The other killers and non-humans were also focusing their attention on Slenderman, waiting for his next declaration.

"All of you will be assigned a partner to cover more ground, we have a select number of targets today. All groups will have at least one, then if you wish it will be free reign on any other humans you find" Slenderman ordered.
"Report back to me once the targets have been dealt with, whether or not you choose to remain killing for a while longer. Understood?"

Almost instantly, a clamour of affirmations rippled from the table like uneven waters.

"Furthermore, as we have our newest member-" Slenderman paused to gesture with one bony hand to Frank, whose mask had been slipped back down to cover his maniacal expression beneath, "-the pairings may be a little uneven, but to make things fair the proxies will go with one other non-proxy rather than being lumped together in one group."

Frank could feel the eyes of the other killers on him, their judgement and evil intents radiating from all that crowded him like white hot metal.
His fingers curled in his lap, and he felt that all-too familiar shudder skittering down his spine, as if a cold breeze had abruptly graced his skin with its kiss.
His stomach rolled deliciously, and his heart was pumping quicker, quicker, into a frenzy, his twitching eyes switching from one face to another, though he remained silent in a fake display of calm serenity.

Not too long now.
Not too long before he could shed blood once again, just as his brain had been screaming at him to do from day one of arriving in this supposedly otherworldly dimension.
Although, to be perfectly fair (Frank thought to himself), anything could seem otherworldly if one had been trapped for decades within a fog-littered expanse of land that had no concept of time or sunlight.

Though his knife was sheathed, for now at least, he knew its blade was begging for blood to decorate its dull silver shine.
And it will be covered, just as his bandages covered his bruised hands.

With the table dismissed shortly after the agenda was spoken, the dishes cleared and any and all weapons acquired for the hunt, the killers were all sorted into pairs and in some cases threes; a few with a proxy in the group, but most without.

Thankfully, Frank was one of the fortunate ones to have a proxy in the group he was in.

He was a quiet fellow, his face obscured by a pair of goggles with amber lenses and a black and white surgical-style mask which hid a hole in his cheek that was still healing.
His weapons of choice were a pair of hatchets, sharpened to perfection with the blade keening for fresh meat washed down by blood like a filling meal.

The proxy's hands twitched involuntarily, and every so often his neck cracked with a sickening 'snap', followed by a light tremble as he zoned back in from his murderous daydream.
Frank couldn't shake the feeling of macabre enjoyment brought on by this sad-yet-rabid puppy of a killer, especially one so loyal to the Slenderman himself, but it was still a new experience thanks to his isolation in the fog.

The proxy's hand flicked and spun the hatchet with ease, giving Frank a smirk beneath his mask, as the interdimensional slasher copied the smirk beneath his maniacally smiling mask, before turning his attention to the other male in the small group.

The other guy that Frank was grouped up with was a wiry male of about early 20s, wearing a white hoodie, black jeans and black Converse sneakers.
He would have looked like a regular man, were it not for his bleached skin or the large, bleeding Chelsea grin carved into his cheeks, giving him a twisted smile that stretched painfully from ear to ear.
He brandished a knife that looked like it had already seen its fair share of victims, its shine dulled only partially by old blood; thankfully the faithful blade hadn't rusted on him. At least, not yet.

Finally, the last member of the sinister quartet was something else entirely.

Though the last member was a similar height and build to Frank himself, it would be a harsh debate on whether to call this....THING....a man.
It was more of an IT.
With ashen skin and hands that ended in bloody claws, the being dressed in just a simple black hoodie and dark jeans, Frank couldn't help but notice the most iconic item of clothing the thing was wearing.
A cobalt blue mask, in a similar shape to his own, but this mask only had what looked like black pits where its eyes should have been. A black, oozing liquid that looked like tar or thick treacle dribbled from the eye-sockets.

Part of Frank's mind wondered if the creature secreted the liquid itself, but most of him didn't want to know.

His name was Eyeless Jack.
'How weirdly appropriate' Frank thought, turning his attention to the whole group once more.

The four then made their way out into the dense forest, as grey clouds loomed ominously over the surreal landscape. A cold wind flicked and kicked up the leaves and debris left by careless hikers -many of whom were no longer in the mortal world- while the leaves on the trees rustled and whispered in a foreboding fashion, almost as if the landscape was awaiting the group's arrival.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It was simple enough; stalk the assigned targets, kill 'em (and maybe loot the bodies if they were lucky), then get back to the mansion without being caught by any passer-bys.
Thankfully, the cops seemed to only patrol the edge of this endless forest, so with any luck -or, hell, any tricks or cloaking techniques from the tall man himself- the police wouldn't be a bother.

After a brief discussion and short plan to regroup once the assignments were dealt with, the four split up and went in different directions.

Though the others didn't say who their targets were, to remain discreet, Frank chose to focus on the target he was given.
He silently, and swiftly, made his way through the forest, leaves kicking upwards in his wake before fluttering back down to the ground peacefully, when he stopped under the shadow of a thick oak tree that looked like it had been around since the dawn of man, if that was even possible.
The branches above cast the perfect shadows below for him to remain unseen, his ragged breath quiet all the while he studied his surroundings, before-

There it was!

A small campsite with fat little camouflage tents, a makeshift fire pit, and two fishing rods stationed at a stream.
How quaint.
And ripe for the picking....

"Alright, we each take a camper" EJ said softly, his voice crackling and husky from not speaking as often as the other residents.
"As soon as our target has been killed, we-" he then stopped, noticing something was amiss.
Toby and Jeff blinked and did a double take, when they all realized a millisecond too late.

Frank had vanished!!

"Where did he go?!" Toby exclaimed quietly, clutching the handles of his hatchets tightly.

"Who knows? and who cares? let's just go!" Jeff growled, stalking off and leaving EJ and Toby looking baffled.

EJ and Toby stalked and observed from the trees while Jeff took the more....direct approach, taking out his trusty knife and slowly made his way towards the campsite.
Before he could get close enough to sink his blade in the man's back, there was a scream before it was suddenly cut off by a gurgling noise.

Then silence.

Intrigued, Toby made his way in the direction of the scream, only to stop in his tracks at the scene before him.

//A/N: the description is going to be a bit gory, so please feel free to skip it if it grosses you out//

One of the campers was impaled on the tree, the branch going through his left eye.
His expression was one of frozen horror, mouth hanging open in a rigid, fixed scream of agony as a brave fly briefly zipped into his mouth and back out, only to land on his only remaining eye that was wide open and rolled back to the point the green iris was barely visible.

All the colour had drained from his face, the only remaining semblance of colour being the thick red blood that oozed from his impaled eye socket and the back of his head, leaking down onto his waterproof -but certainly not blood-proof- jacket.
Slashes and cuts were on his shirt and coat where someone had obviously stabbed and swiped at him with wild, reckless abandon, some of the wounds looked quite deep as they still oozed with blood and puss.

Red droplets decorated the leaves below him, only for the wind to rustle them and pitifully try to hide the evidence under the corpse.

The body seemed to be looted of anything of value, and what was even more disturbing, his other eye was still stuck on the end of the spiky branch, pristine and on full display as if the tree had sprouted it on its own.

The other campers had heard the scream, Jeff managing to grab one and slit his throat while EJ had dragged the final camper into the trees, disappearing with him for a brief moment.
Jeff sauntered over, twirling his now bloodstained knife between his fingers, and stopped beside Toby, who was still staring at the macabre display.

"So, what do you think?" came a familiar voice, jolting the two out of their silent analysis.

Jeff and Toby both bristled and turned to see who it was, only to hear the clink of a zippo lighter's top being opened, followed by the hiss of a spark, as Frank appeared from a nearby tree, lazily leaning on the tree which displayed his grisly handiwork, and lighting one of the cigarettes he had looted from his target.

Jeff and Toby said nothing, looking at Frank quizzically.

"I have to admit, the guy was a fighter.." Frank mused, sucking in a mouthful of nicotine and lifting his mask to exhale the smoke.
His fingers managed to smear blood on his grinning mask, only making the garment seem more deranged.
"Nearly overpowered me, the fucker. But he got his, I'll tell you that. There were no hooks around, so had to improvise, and...here we are, I guess" Frank concluded with a shrug, glancing at the other two killers to gauge their reactions.

Nothing was said for a while, apart from Toby's verbal ticks as he twitched and knocked the butt of his hatchet against his leg involuntarily.

Another rustling of leaves and twigs snapping caught their attention, only for EJ to emerge from the dark forest, purring in content and licking the blood from his fingers.

He stopped, mid-lick, seeing the displayed body, and nodded in approval, before turning tail and making his way back to the mansion, still holding the arm of the man he dismembered.
Jeff and Toby wordlessly followed, Toby glancing around as if searching for a disembodied voice (maybe even multiple voices) and Frank trailed after them, leaving the corpse to whatever else was housed in those woods.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It had been a successful mission.
A surprising one, but a good one nonetheless.
All four of them had been coated in blood, and even now Jeff had been handed a cig from Frank's pilfered spoils.

The four of them were nicely content with walking in semi-silence, cleaning the blood from their weapons or tallying up their winnings as they went.
They had never known Frank to be so...brutal.
And most of them had been killing for years!

Toby was more than eager to let the 'boss' know how the mission went, but first, the four had to get back to the mansion before the other killers deemed it a good idea to form a search party.

The group made their way up the creaking steps to the mansion's front door, and Frank turned to Jeff, who was sporting a genuine yet sinisterly impressed look.
Expecting sarcastic remarks or a bark of a laugh in response to what Frank had done, he remained silent and twirled his -now bloodied- knife in his bandaged hand, awaiting the comment.

But no sarcasm, and no laughter, came from the other killer's mouth.

Five words left Jeff's scarred mouth, and it was enough to give Frank the sense of belonging for the first time since arriving at the mansion.

"Not bad, kid. Not bad...."