Filename: ANNA.TXT

<<transcript intercepted @ 17:06 on 11/20/12>>

<<process_DCRYPT active in memory.>>

"I think you will find this particular story very interesting. The correspondent I obtained it from was an author, she was inspired to write this by a report of a missing child. She had done quite a bit of research on the case, but sadly disappeared shortly after sending me this. I believe both her and the child are still missing. A shame... she seemed quite talented. - E"

<<opening attachment: ANNA.TXT>>

It all started one Winter’s night, in 1995. It was dark out that night, and bitterly cold. The wind howled ravenously as it sent flakes of blade-like ice flying towards the ground; the cold bit strong into me with chilling teeth. Twisted branches reached desperately towards the black sky, as if begging for salvation from the blinding snowstorm.

As if seeking solace from the dark thing they’d been forced to hide for countless centuries upon centuries.

"Anna!" I cry, pulling my thin coat tightly around my frame and shivering with cold. The wan beam of my flashlight did nothing to pierce the inkiness of the surrounding dark forest. All was a black and white blur to me, assaulting me with frost that stuck to my eyelashes and stung my skin where it was left bared. "Anna! Come home!"

Oh, Anna, my dear child Anna. A face like a cherub, a smile like the sun. She's only seven. This cold... this snowstorm, if she gets lost...

Oh God no. Not my only daughter. Please... please be alright; please, Lord, let her be alright!

"Anna, where are you?!"

No sound but the wind, and under that, silence. Pure silence. Not even the sound of snow crunching beneath my feet could be heard under that incredible quiet.

That silence in and of itself was chilling, far more so than the wind could ever be. For It had had that same aura of pure, deathly silence around It when It... when It had...

Remember what happened… You must remember…

----

He woke to the sound of her screaming, of her fearful cries for help. He had run to her bedroom, flashlight in hand, ready to vanquish whatever it was that so frightened his child. So quickly he had flung the door open, imagining already that he'd find her awoken from a nightmare, crying and needing solace in his protective arms. Needing a knight to destroy whatever dragon lurked in her dreams.

He did not find her in her bed.

The... thing, if It could be called a man, clung to his daughter with arms like jealous branches, arms far longer and thinner than he could ever imagine. It stood far greater than twice his height, easily outclassing his 6'3" frame despite being only half his width. And yet Anna made no sound, no cry for help, in fact looking strangely peaceful... as if she were exactly where she wanted to be, held close against the thing’s skeletal, business-suit-clad frame as if in her father’s own arms.

His breath seemed stolen from his lungs for a moment as the tall, intimidating creature slowly turned Its head towards him…

And revealed nothing.

He froze in the presence of Its eyeless gaze, trembling like a child before a strict parent. The blank canvas face of the creature did not move so much as an inch, locked unshakably onto him as if staring into his very being, spreading a numbing ice through his veins. Something... something black and vinelike reached for him from somewhere in the creature's back; now there were four, sixteen, twenty of them, all slithering towards him in hypnotic slow motion, all about to pull him close to the darkness surrounding It, all bringing an awful chill unlike anything God could ever create...

Their curious, slick tendril tips brushed against the skin of his face, and he recalled no more.

He remembered only waking up in his daughter's bedroom. The window was open. And Anna was gone.

----

"Anna... Bring back my daughter! Give her back... Please… Just give her back to me…"

My grief and fear pulls me down, down to kneel in the icy drifts at my feet. Something salty and warm slides down my scarfed face, quickly turning cold. My daughter... where is my daughter? Oh God, what if that thing... what if It...?

No. No, please no. She can't be dead. Lord above don't let her be dead!

I bring my trembling hands to my face in prayer, begging for help as my frame heaves with sorrowful dread.

Our Lord Who Art In Heaven, save my daughter. Please. Bring her back to me safe and sound. And if she can't be found... then bring her attacker to me, and smite It before my eyes. Please, Lord... Please...

I feel someone approach, a heavy presence pinning me to the ground where I kneel, as if the very gravity of the earth has increased tenfold. It’s so heavy I can’t move, even if I had wanted to.

And then the nausea sets in.

It comes in crippling, painful migraine headaches, the feeling of something starving my lungs for air and never leaving despite how hard I cough, the need to vomit and being unable to... I feel weak, so weak... and so incredibly cold, colder than the surrounding wind, colder than the chills slowly trickling down my vertebrae.

I look up and see nothing, but I clearly still feel someone approaching. Is it... could it be...?

"... Anna?"

I pull myself to my knees and turn, but the frame I see before me is not Anna.

The man, if I can even call It man, towers over me, staring sightlessly down, the blackness of Its suit standing in such stark contrast to the raging snowstorm that howls around It. The nausea and headaches are so bad I can hardly stand; I’m only able to stare back in disbelief. Even if I’d had the strength to run, somehow I knew I wouldn’t have made it back home anyway. It came for her first.

And now… now, it’s come for me.

But at least it would mean I’d have my dear, sweet Anna back.

"... You... You… thing. You awful, ungodly thing... You took her. You took my Anna! I want her back, where is my Anna!?"

The being gives me no response, instead tilting Its blank-canvas head as if intrigued.

"Answer me!" I scream, fear slowly turning into rage. "What have you done with my daughter? Give her back… please… I just want to hold her in my arms again…"

Pure and crushing silence follows. The creature reaches for me slowly, first with one long and slender arm, then with many, many more, all branching outwards at odd angles from Its back, all aiming for me. They pull at me and cling with incredible strength, unyielding in their grasp and far colder than the surrounding blizzard.

But I do not struggle. I do not need to. I suddenly can see no reason to attempt escape, not from this being that wishes no harm to me. He will take me to my daughter. I know this. He will.

The last thing I feel is something wrench painfully into my gut, spilling internal warmth into the surrounding snowdrifts, and the last thing I remember is the whiteness of the storm slowly, slowly fading to black.

<<end transcript.>>