Name: Sebastian
Title: a shift in perspective
Story: No Child Is Spared
Colors: Avocado: 4. There's room at the top they are telling you still / But first you must learn how to smile as you kill / If you want to be like the folks on the hill -John Lennon: Working Class Hero
Spring Green: 3. I don't wanna be another mystery
Under The Bed Black: 7. Creeping shadows
Supplies/Styles: Eraser (Slendyverse)
Word Count: 1167
Rating: PG
Warnings: Nothing quite?
Notes: This was supposed to be my story for Halloween. But ugh, that did not happen. Still I got it done which is what matters, I suppose.


He doesn't mean to disrupt, to disturb and startle. He has no intention to be something that troubles and yet it's exactly what he is now. Something that strikes fear in the heart of the one he is meant to protect, causing nothing but sleepless nights and obsessions that consume.

The Tall Man never meant to be any of that, never wanted it for his boy but here he is, watching from the shadows as the other pours over footage of his life, looking for the sight of him in the corners and shadows like he's some sort of fairy tale monster.

He wanted to give him so much more, to take care and keep the terrors at bay. Now it seems he has turned into the very thing that the boy fears most.

He is not a monster, not a ghost or a horror in the night. He was never meant to be any of that. All he wanted was to do his job, to keep close and save the boy from the fears that would rise up in his head.

He failed.

He failed at the one thing he is meant to do and it plagues him more than he knows how to even deal with.

He wants to believe he can be a good thing one day, that he can be seen as more than a monster lurking in the dark. The Tall Man was never anything that cruel, never something that was meant to harm. Yet he is now, he is harming his boy, keeping him up at night, making him not eat or keep himself clean.

He's done so much wrong and he doesn't know how to begin to revert all the damage.

A part of him says to appear, to confront his boy and tell him what he is, though he has no idea how that would go. On the one hand it could be freeing, it could set his mind at ease and maybe show that the Tall Man was not a horror but a help.

Or it could go the other way. He could perceive it as a trick, as a tactic to lure him in and let his guard down. With the paranoia raging in his boy's mind, he expects that would be the case.

But he's so tired of this sadness, this fear. He was not supposed to do this to him, he's not meant to create disturbances but rather, he was meant to help him survive.

Clearly he's not doing that right now.

He wants to make this right, to turn himself from a fear to a hope, to a promise of safety and comfort. He doesn't want to kill but to ease the hardships away.

He's been doing it this long, steering all the horrible things that wanted to come for his boy and the people he cares for. He guards and guides but he's clearly been doing it wrong, made him think he was a monster, a menace rather than a creature that is useful.

And oh, how he has tried to be useful. How he has taken on the burdens that the boy never knew he had and ease them all, absorbed them and held them away from him as he grew.

The boy looks at footage of the life he has led and the Tall Man watches, fingers itching to reach out, to wrap him in long arms and pull him close, to keep him safe, to guard.

But he knows that he will only make it worse right now, knows that he will harm rather than help. He knows now is not the time.

No matter what he says. No matter what his body wants him to try and do.

Long arms wrap around himself and a head without a face looks down at the ground, considering his options. He knows what it looks like, knows what the world says about people of his kind. Some of them are villians, driving people mad, ruining them for their own amusement.

But he is not like that, he never wanted to make anyone ache.

He could pull his boy away from the things that hurt him, keep him in his dark, quiet world and show him that safety can be found with him but he also knows that he does like his life in the world of the light. He has friends and lovers and a whole world here.

So no, that is not an option

Yet he keeps coming back to it, considering pulling him down into the dark and showing him what he can give. The more his boy stays awake, starves himself, goes through the motions a hundred times for the same act, makes him want to take him away, steal him and lead him into the dark instead.

He can ease his pain, ease his fear, if only he had the chance. If only he had done all this differently.

But time can't be reverted, at least not with his skill set, so he has to press on, try and change the future instead of the past.

He will make this better, he will make it right.

But until then he has to watch, to feel the pain that his boy is going through because this is his doing and he should not be allowed to look away. He has to face his mistakes, to remember this is what happens when he failed to do his job correctly.

He will remember, he will never let this happen again.

His boy paces the room, drinks another cup of coffee, does what he can to keep himself awake and the Tall Man observes, making notes on his patterns, even though he already knows them extensively.

And when his boy finally does sleep, when his body can't handle being awake any longer, then the Tall Man will do something. Then he will try and do what he can to fix this.

What? He has no idea but he knows he can't make a move now. Knows that his boy is too sleep deprived to be confronted. He will only panic, only run out of fear and desperation. It would be counter productive to do something now.

But in his sleep is a different story. The Tall Man can come to him then, slip into his dreams and try to talk to him, to tell him he is safe. Maybe even chase the nightmares that plague him, rip them apart like a dog with a toy.

He knows it may be not work, he may only make things worse but he can't sit back and do nothing anymore. He's done it for far too long and has made his boy do nothing but suffer. It's time to take things in his own hands, it's time to change, to make things happen.

He will go to him, to make him see. He is going to make this work, no matter what might happen in the process.