She laughed, interested in this young man. He seemed to not understand what danger he was still in.
“You may refer to me as Slenderwoman. I eat your kind, and have for many, many years. You are trespassing in my home, as many of your idiot race have done. None of them are living, though I have learned much from them, as well have kept myself in prime condition.” Her fingers twitched in anticipation, her stomach reminding her of the meal she was currently conversing with.
“Slenderwoman? Well, that’s a pretty impersonal name. Most slenderbeings I’ve met just went by a nickname or something like that - ‘Sis’ or ‘Eli’ or ‘John’. Don’t you have anything like that?” Although he hadn’t grown completely confident around the woman, he knew that displaying fear or weakness would be an immediate invitation to being mauled. The best he could do right now was to try and set back that for as long as he could.
“Well, that explains why no other explorers had come out of these tunnels. I just assumed they must’ve been really easy to get lost in… A pretty stupid assumption, considering what I know. Still, it seems that it would be hard to sustain yourself just from the people coming into the tunnels. Not a many know about these place… right?”
She sighed, a deep sound that was almost a groan. “Some call me Shannon. Is that more to your liking?” At that moment, she wished she had an eyebrow to raise. For her future dinner, he was quite pushy.
“Many know about it because many people they know have disappeared. I can tell you now, there is one other person in these tunnels, who I intend to eat after you. So please, do take your time.”
Alright, this was getting him nowhere.
The slenderwoman was clearly not in the mood to make friends, which only made things all that harder to Jeff. All he could do right now was try to please her and pray it would work.
Not that praying had ever worked before.
“Shannon. That’s a nice name, I’ll remember it. Look, what I’m trying to say is…” He stopped for a minute, seizing his situation and trying to think of the right words “… Well, I’ve gotten around. I know a lot of things, probably have more experience than your average human being. And now you have me here, completely at your mercy: Just eating me could be considered a bit of a waste, don’t you think?”
Okay, this seemed to be going somewhere.
“Consider it an investment: Give me a task, a victim or a target and tell me what you want me to do. Let’s call it ‘temporary proxydom’. What do you think?”
“Food is never a waste, Mr. Killer. However, proxies are. They are stupid, they get caught, and they always taste horrible.” She stood to her full height, turning away from him.
“But, you do seem able to hold your own… So I will take you up on your offer. Come, now. And please, don’t try to get away. It will just get messy.”
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