Slender Man

[MoMo]

Origin

Due to his attire, the Slender Man has been linked to the notorious "Men in Black", who are thought to be government agents who harass and threaten UFO witnesses, and who some believe to be aliens themselves who take human form.

The only problem is that the Slender Man is actually a fictional character.

The Slender Man was born within the 'Something Awful' forums in 2009, when a thread was created to challenge members to create fake photo-shopped paranormal photographs. The idea, however, was not just to create these images, but to also filter them through the Internet, in a bid to convince those who sought out such things that the images created were "real" ghost/alien photographs.

Despite the Slender Man being a complete fabrication from the beginning, his legend has spread like wild-fire throughout the Internet as a successful "Internet MEME", a phrase used to describe a catchphrase or concept that spreads quickly from person to person via the Internet, much like an esoteric inside joke, that evolves with time, much like other famous memes such as the Lolcats and emoticons.

A YouTube sensation of sorts, the 'Marble Hornets Project', is a series of video clips that were supposedly recorded by a teenager named 'Alex'. The segments of video taken from Alex's camcorder tapes follow him as he becomes increasingly concerned by the fact that something sinister is apparently stalking him.

Whilst Alex himself has mysteriously vanished, the video clips he left behind him become increasingly disturbing, as the Slender Man peers from distant corners. While the Slender Man itself is completely fictional, the 'Marble Hornets Project' and other Internet adaptations of the entity have greatly increased the range of the Slender Man myth's reach, with some unfamiliar with the legend's origin taking it at face-value, and they in turn spread the legend's grip further still.



Appearance

Like its origins, the appearance of the Slender Man remains subjective, varying across related media. It is typically depicted as being an abnormally tall (ranging anywhere from 7-foot-tall (2.1 m) to the size of a large tree or house), skinny, humanoid figure, with a faceless or deformed head, usually lacking several or all of the face's sensory organs. It is usually depicted as wearing a a plain black suit and tie, reminiscent of the Men in Black, though this is often implied to be a part of the entity's body or a form of shapeshifting. It is occasionally shown to have something of a malleable body, enabling it to stretch and contort its limbs and body in to a variety of shapes, as well as produce a number of tentacle-like appendages, which are often shown has having the ability to ensnare the Slender Man's victims.




Behavior

The Slender Man is typically depicted as an observant, malevolent, and lurking being, stalking its victims for long periods of time while slowly driving them insanity with paranoia and sickness. Other adaptations point to a more violent Slender Man, which kills its victims by eviscerating them and hangs plastic bags of blood from trees.





Besides the ability to physically grow extra limbs, the Slender Man has a number of psychologically-based powers, typically the ability to induce memory loss, insomnia and insanity in its victims. In some cases, the extent of its power over the mind has seen it creating mindless minions seemingly bent to his will. The Slender Man's physical presence has been shown to induce coughing and sickness, as well as various degrees of audio-visual distortion in electronic media, a trait often used to denote its presence in Slender Man video series. In extreme cases, it has also been depicted with the ability to warp time and space and teleport.

[MoMo]

Excerpt from the journal of Dorothy Birch(pt. 908-01)

April 12, 1923.

I suppose this is will be one of the last voluntary entries in my journal, even though Dr. Keating told me to write down everything that happened. But I'm going to tell the entire story, which is what I should have done in the first place; drat my pride.

It was a biting and windy fall day, I still remember the date. October 5, 1918. Lizzie and I were playing hide-and-go-peek amongst the trees on the land behind my uncle's farm. She was only twelve to my fifteen, so she got her way most all of the time. It was my turn to find her, as I had given in to her incessant begging. She loved to hide.

I hid my eyes in my hands and leaned into the sweet-smelling bark of a thick oak. I called out the numbers until I got to ...98...99...100...! and set off to find her.

Looking back, I should have noticed the signs immediately. The wind which had blown out of the east all day had ceased entirely and there were no sounds in the forest save for my own uncertain footsteps breaking the virgin, untouched carpet of dried and fallen leaves. I kept walking farther into the woods, occasionally calling out for Lizzie. I was not answered except for the greedy silence and the still trees all around. As I kept walking, the large and stout oaks gave way to thinner, taller trees.

It was then that I should have turned around, it was then that I should have run back to Uncle Ed's cabin. But I kept walking.

I stayed on my way, still calling out for my sister, a bit more panicked now, as I almost always found her within a few minutes of starting the search. The taller trees soon engulfed me and a slight mist began to drift through. Then, a sequence of events commenced that will be forever burned into my memory.

I suddenly heard a cry of my name, “Dorothy~!” in a high-pitched, breathy sort of call. It was unmistakably Lizzie. I began to run now, my breath coming in harsh gasps as the cold air stung my throat. The mist came in quicker now, and it was difficult to see. Then, I got the unexplainable urge to hide behind a thicker tree, which I quickly obeyed, looking into the fog in front of me for evidence of Lizzie.

I can't tell you how long I sat there, shivering behind the tree. Then, a very very tall figure appeared faintly in the fog. It appeared to be a Man wearing a suit like Daddy's friends from the bank, but it also looked like he was wearing stilts too, like the clowns at the Fourth of July parade we saw. He seemed to be so tall that his head grazed the leaves. What really didn't make sense was his arms. Oh, his arms. They looked like several hoses left unattended and cranked up to full blast, but moving very slow. That's the best way I can describe it. This...man, I'll say, this Man stood there in the fog for a good few minutes, his (arms?) waving very slow. I got this weird feeling from the tall man, like I was intruding upon something I was forbidden to see, namely his presence.

I got a strange feeling as I gazed upon him, as if I wasn't looking at him, he was looking at me. No, looking through me. Then I realized that his head didn't quite make sense, in a way. It looked like it was moving, like, like.....there was a swarm of bees where his face should have been. Kind of like he was in between places and his head had not caught up with his body yet. I was very scared at that point and all thoughts of Lizzie had vanished from my head.

Then, as quickly as he had appeared, the tall Man was gone. He just faded away into the fog. It was then that I heard a whimpering sound close to where he was standing. I walked forward, propelled not by my feet but something else. I can't remember much of this time, I can remember walking up to Lizzie, who was lying amongst the leaves, and then my hands closed on something hard and heavy and holding it above my head. Then there was blackness.

The next thing I remember is sitting in Uncle Ed's kitchen, surrounded by Daddy, Ma, Uncle Ed, and a policeman, they were asking me questions and looking at me like we look at the tigers at the zoo; like I was something dangerous. Apparently I had....killed Lizzie with a rock to her head. I don't remember any of the actual...act. I still have trouble thinking of it now, but that's why I'm at Sunnyhaven, I suppose. However, the tall Man still visits me in my dreams. I hope that Dr. Keating can help me banish him forever.