Profile
Half-asleep character thunk'd March 12, 21 - drawn April 2, 21. Dan's a local cryptid in some middle-of-nowhere hillbilly town surrounded by a dense, mountainous pine forest. He's often whispered about ominously and used to threaten kids away from getting any funny ideas. The whole town knows about him and a good majority believes in his existence. For good reason, too - Dan's been sighted multiple times. He lurks the woods at night, often drawn in by campfire light or the sound of a small group of people. He never comes very close, but his towering shape in the distance, all black and white, is enough to scare just about anybody off. He's capable of shifting into various amalgamations of teeth and eyes and more than one blurry trailcam photo of him doing so exists. However, news never seems to leave the town. Most people that live there are there to stay and visitors typically just don't happen
In reality, Dan's just a guy (sure, a monster, but a guy) who doesn't know what's going on. Mentally, he's younger than he really is, almost having the mind of a child. He can make some weird noises, but otherwise doesn't speak. Humans, as he sees it, are spooky things that come tromping through his home with all sorts of scary things. And they're very loud! They make a lot of noise when they see him and he doesn't like that : ( As such, he's taken to flashing his teeth at them because it makes them leave so he can enjoy his nightly wandering in peace
Dan is, at some point, discovered by a handful of your typical screw-the-old-people teenagers. They're here because they have to stay with one dude's weird relative or something because bad stuff happened back home. And they hate it. The locals are trying their hardest to get them to believe in some guy in the woods to scare them straight. In typical teenager fashion, they both do not listen and then go out into the forest at night on purpose. Sure enough, they shortly stumble upon Dan. He tries to scare them off, but these kids are preeeetty annoyed at this point and think this is just a redneck on stilts trying to teach them something. They get closer despite his (honestly obviously supernatural) attempts to get them to go away. They're doing a lot of angry yelling and reaching for him with grabby little hands. Once it becomes clear that he isn't going to win this battle by typical means, Dan quickly converts into a terrified puppy. The teens pull at him, trying to disassemble what they think is a costume, but they just knock him over where he then begins to tremble and wail on the ground. Reality sets in and the delinquents realize this ain't normal. And...they really close to it. Reasonably panicked, they abscond, leaving the cryptid lamenting where he lay
After getting over the initial freak-out, a couple of the kids start feeling...maybe a little bad. Obviously they'd come across some type of horror, but they got out of it in one piece. He didn't even attack them or anything. He just...cried? Their curiosity-guilt eventually spurs them to venture out again. Once they manage to locate Dan again, he recognizes them and quickly decides he's not going to stick around this time. They're no match for his stride, so they have to give up the chase pretty fast. They leave a flashlight behind as a sort of "friends, maybe?" gift because...they didn't have anything better on them. Dan retrieves it after they leave (as they left the light on) and proceeds to be confused, assuming they dropped it
This process repeats a few times, with the teens intentionally bringing Dan random gifts and trying to lure him close from afar as if he were a stray cat. He usually leaves quietly, but sometimes stares from behind a tree until they grow weary and go home. He has no idea what's going on, as this has never happened, but he is getting really curious. To the kids' surprise, they find him in the backyard of the house they're staying in one day. It's not even night, just sunset. And he's hiding in a lampshade he's got on his head. He drops all the 'gifts' where the yard and the woods meet, returning lost items, in his mind. Nobody really moves, so he sheepishly wanders off and disappears
With it established that something was happening, the quest to befriend Dan is on. They have to keep it a careful secret from the crazy locals, though. Ever so slowly and over the process of many, many visits, Dan lets the kids come close. Then, he slowly starts hanging out with them, even willing to peek out from beneath his lampshade. Once they gain his trust, he's very happy with his new friends! : ) He's never had friends before and is obviously very pleased
