Slenderman's History
The Slender Man has no specifically confirmed history, but contributors to the mythos placed early sightings of Slender Man-like beings in Germany in the early 1600s and before. Historically, the entity often took the appearance of a knight or a noble figure. Germanic myths and fairy tales have been cited as containing Slender Man-like creatures as cautionary tales for children.
Photographs from the early 1900s are the first confirmed reports, where images of the Slender Man can be found in old photographs. Reports from this time indicate sightings in America, the UK, and Russia, usually connected to reports of child disappearances.
In the mid-1900s, several run-ins occurred in the war zones in Germany, which is theorized to be the Slender Man's native land. Soldiers were the primary targets here. In America and Canada, there were reports of missing skiers and children, mainly coming from forested and unoccupied areas. He is also held responsible for several strings of buildings burning with no apparent cause, and multiple related deaths. The few survivors of Slender Man attacks, along with accounts left by victims, show the following historic traits:
- If the victim was a child, he would often approach them in a friendly fashion at first and attempt to gain their trust.
- The adults he stalked have one common trait: they had all been through a terrible tragedy in their life. Interestingly, in many cases, the tragedy was originally caused by Slender Man as well.
- If the victim was an adult, Slender Man would stalk the victim for long periods of time. This caused an illness that became known as "Slender sickness.�?� Symptoms include massive paranoia, nausea, nose bleeds, nightmares, and hallucinations.
- Eventually, The Slender Man would abduct the victim, usually into a nearby forest, where they would be killed.
- In 'messy' cases, Slender Man may remove evidence of its existence by burning the victim�??s home, place of work, or school, often causing the death of others in the line of destruction, generally those close to the initial victim.
The Slender Man originally killed its victims by impaling them on the branches of very tall trees and allowing them to bleed to death. The victim�??s organs would be individually removed and placed in plastic bags, which were then returned to their original positions in the body. The victims' corpses did not show any sign of a struggle. However, as time went on, it seems that Slender Man abandoned this practice.
In the late 1990s, the more common use of cameras and camcorders allowed technology to shed more light on the creature, and the Slender Man was recorded and photographed stalking potential victims many times. In the late 2000s to early 2010s, several individuals recorded ongoing stalking and attack scenarios with themselves and friends. These video accounts are codenamed Marble Hornets, EverymanHYBRID, DarkHarvest00, MLAndersen0, and TribeTwelve, as well as certain Rivn videos.
New accounts of the Slender Man's powers, abilities, and attacks show some drastic differences from his original behaviors. Gone is the original desire to impale targets on trees, his overtly aggressive attitude, and the tendency to target mainly children. He now appears to target people who encountered him as children, often stalking them for years. It does so in such a way that the target is often unaware of his presence for months, years, or even decades. Typically, the victim won't be aware of its attention until far too late. Because of the somewhat contagious nature of Slender Man�??s attacks, an initial victim may not even be aware that they are causing others to be targeted, since they may not know that he is stalking them.
The Slender Man�??s stalking behavior is remarkably passive. He torments an individual by repeatedly appearing and vanishing �?? usually without harming the victim in any physical way. He invades the mental safety of his prey by appearing inside their house, outside their home, on roads they travel, at their place of work when they are alone or ensuring only the victim can see him, or while the target is sleeping. The sporadic and unexpected nature of these manifestations causes fear and unease, which eventually can grow into incredible paranoia. This period of stalking can last anywhere from several minutes to decades. The longer Slender Man stalks a victim, the greater strain on their mental health, which may be one of his goals.
Prolonged stalking causes what has been named �??Slender Sickness,�?� which is both a mental and physical ailment and can cause paranoia, nightmares, coughing and difficulty swallowing, convulsions, exhaustion, vomiting, hallucinations, etc. The physical symptoms naturally affect an individual�??s mental health, but it is believed that Slender Man exerts a direct effect on the mind as well. However, this phenomenon and Slender Man�??s control over it have yet to be fully explained.
As mentioned, the behavior of taking organs out or impaling targets appears to have been abandoned. If reports of Slender Man�??s new modus operandi are to be believed, it now vanishes with his targets, leaving no traces behind. Victims are usually alone when they vanish, leaving no witnesses. What little camera footage has been found is incredibly distorted and it is nearly impossible to even theorize as to what they depict. The victims are almost never found, dead or alive, and it has been speculated that perhaps he does not kill victims immediately.
One of the most powerful new traits Slender Man exhibits is some form of memory inhibition. Like Slender Sickness, this effect can be caused simply by proximity, although it seems to vary as to exactly how powerful. In some cases, individuals will forget the past few minutes, but extended contact has led to people awakening in locations they are unfamiliar with, with no memory of how they got there. In some cases, it is believed Slender Man itself will deposit a victim in an unknown location and leave them to awaken after an attack (possibly to continue stalking them further.)
Victims who are stalked by The Slender Man for extended periods show excessive damage to their social life, physical health, and even their careers. Typically individuals will show massive mood swings and constant irritation, lose track of large periods of time, and have difficulty maintain communication with friends or holding down steady work. Memory losses can be as long as several weeks or months, and often an individual awakens and attempts to return to their life only to find it ruined.
These patterns are possible indications that The Slender Man has at least some indication that he has knowledge and experience with how the human mind works and reacts to various stimuli. It is possible that he exploits this deliberately. Abandoning its more blunt tactics of impaling and gutting its victims, it is possible he has moved to more subtle forms of attack, such as invading their mind, surroundings, and thus eliminating any feeling of safety and driving them to insanity in a slow torment.
