A cute pic of Dana by the delightful  kerothestrange as part of their request stream.

I honestly do not have much for Dana as of now. I have been wanting to progress her story, but I need the right pics to get it rolling. Hopefully we will see more of her in the future, but I need to get more art for her in order to do that. Maybe I should binge on otter in the near future...I'm just so behind on stuff....

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Dana loved the water. How it reflected a warm sunset and the twinkling stars that followed into the night. How it swallowed up her toes at the shore and splashed louder as she submerged more of her body into its embrace. How it slid across her face and her sides as she swam swiftly under the tide. How it followed her as she would leap out of the surface, arcing into the sky before collapsing back into itself. The water made her feel faster, smoother, and just more adept at everything than she ever did on land. She loved the water, and it almost felt like it loved her back.

She was smart enough not to believe a giant body of water cold love her, but she did find her attention falling on a few other regulars to the lake. She spoke to a few of the fellow swim team students back in High School, and while she was too focused on her education, she could not deny that she had more than a few dreams of swimming up close and personal with some of the high performers - including a crocodile! Her friend Brittany joked to her about it, especially given the croc in school was certainly going to end up many feet taller than her, but Dana couldn't help but wonder how well they could do the backstroke together. Then there was that one Dalmatian who was so shy it made her want to just hug him into oblivion, but she found out he was already spoken for. But she remembered Toby, another, bigger otter who swam as though he were born and raised underwater. His form always seemed poised for a good swim whenever she spied-er-watched him from a distance. Unfortunately, she could never get a way to talk frankly with him, and he got a sports scholarship at a college some place far away. She was not the only one lamenting his departure, but she quietly cursed her schoolwork from keeping her away from one of the best swimmers around.

In her college years, Dana made sure to keep her love of swimming alive, but she could feel the weight of adult life pulling her down. She tried joining the Swim Club, but drama bubbled up around her much to her dismay. There was no use trying to enjoy a good swim when some people were too busy fighting over which place to visit or what rules needed to be followed at what location. She preferred the unscripted fun of a good dive and swim routine, anyways. It was just harder for her to find a place to swim, being further from the lakes that her home town had. That did not stop her from swimming, though. Unfortunately, it may have caused some friction with her school work eventually, which made her studies stressful, which necessitated some good meditation swimming, and so forth and so on.

After graduation, Dana was able to land a job at Claus and Klaus, a prestigious if not exceptionally pretentious law firm near home. It was not the greatest job, but she could live at home and still be close to those lakes she enjoyed. She saw some familiar faces, now older and maybe wiser, and she saw a new batch of teenagers getting their paws wet in the passion of swimming, at least when they were in the water rather than texting each other from the shore. In one way, it felt familiar, but she also felt like an outsider, having returned years later. That did not stop her from letting the lake water dance with her in a good late night swim. It was a great way to reduce the stress. Not only that, but she realized that she was starting to get more noticed. While her parents preferred she considered getting a Master's Degree, they also pondered the possibility of an M.R.S. degree, too, and they bought her some bathing suits in support.

Unfortunately, her job would end before she could approach either degree, and thus began her year-long job hunt. Even the water did not give her the feeling of pleasure it once did. Each time she swam, she wondered if she could be doing something better. Maybe the swimming was keeping her away from that one job offer of a lifetime. Maybe she was wasting her time in the lake instead of in school or in some speed dating show or something. It was not pleasant for her, and the gnawing worries kept her from enjoying just about everything - swimming included.

Her job with Much Love Corporation was going to change that. She saw the salary numbers, and she knew that with some research, she was going to find a place to swim - whether it would be a gym with a pool or some park a few dozen miles out of the city. She even brought some of her favorite swimsuits from home. One such suit was a precious blue one-piece. It was just a charming thing to see, and she could only imagine what everyone else would think seeing such a happy otter leap from the water's surface and into the sky wearing it. She could barely wait.

First she needed to get her feet wet at her new job. Then she would be sure to show off her swimsuit and swimming skills somewhere soon!