Night-Gaunt Rewrite

	Night-gaunts are shadowy succubi that are typically stalk their victims for years at a time, usually starting from childhood, with the Gaunt of a similar age to the victim, and extending into the adult years. This hunting occurs during the night, while the victim is sleeping in bed and alone. They begin by waking up their victims by using their various tentacles to ‘tickle’ them awake which continues for the rest of the night. Then, using their goo, they appear as various different nightmarish shapes that dance on the wall or tease the victim as their tentacles continue their act.

These experiences are usually horrifying for both adults and children alike. Children often complain to their parents of a ‘boogey man’ who tickles them during the night, a fear that goes unfounded by many. Adults tend to rationalize these events as night terrors, the tickling as sensations from sleep paralysis. This haunting, however, is not able to be completely rationalized. Often, when a victim of a haunting is faced with a dangerous situation or certain death, they will find themselves enveloped by nearby shadows and spirited away, feeling sleepiness and joy before waking up in their own bed. In the adult years, the tickling becomes slower and more intimate, gently stroking the victim's skin as the shadows seem to calm down.

Eventually, usually in the adult years, the victims accepts that the shadows are, in fact, alive, and while they torment them during the night, they protect them as if they were their only possession. It is at this point the shadows engulf the victim in the night and Night-Gaunt reveals its face, revealing to the victim the object of their terror and safety as the feelings of joy rush back to the victim. At this point, the Gaunt recognizes their quarry as their husband, and engage in slow, intimate, and passionate sex with the quarry, using their tentacles to gently stroke their body, enjoying the occasional tickling session as years prior. It is also that this point the night gaunt sticks to her husband’s shadow, unseen to all but him as she embraces him still in the day.