From the Darkness

Asleep to the sounds of rain on canvas.

Dead to the world.

Well, not entirely.

Not in the sense that someone has snuck up on my unprotected tent and come in without my noticing, with that high-pitched zip opening noise that only a tent-door can produce.

Heaven forbid that a face should appear at the flimsy plastic window over-looking the mist-covered Loch and seal my fate.

Okay, awake now and probably for the rest of the night.

Thanks for that.

Why is it that in the remote, often romanticised locations of a Scottish Glen and Loch, in the blissful dampness of a Scottish Summer, thoughts turn to supernatural serial killers and visitors of the knife-wielding variety?

I could blame Mr King, my usual port of call, but is he in fact responsible?

There must be something within my psyche that sought out his stories of the weird and wonderful, of the scary and the beautiful.

I could have chosen to read anything.

Indeed, the stories my mum read to me were the usual mix of fairy-tales with hidden, and sometimes not so hidden, morality tales.  They were full of princesses and fairies and magic that changed the world for the better.

So why did I feel drawn those characters who were always trying to upset the balance?

As much as I wanted to see the wicked witch defeated, why was I upset when a house landed on her head?

Perhaps we are drawn to the darkness.

Perhaps we like to see what it would be like to live in a world where we can do anything we want to do, and not have to bend to the will and consequences of the real world.

Perhaps it excites us.

The adrenaline rush of not knowing how things will turn out, of expecting something to happen at any moment that could be good, or could be bad.   

We feel fairly certain that the hero-proxy to ourselves will win in the end.

Fairly certain.

Because they don’t always.

A rise in ambiguity has led to the creation of a greater level of suspense for the reader, as they really do not know who will triumph in the end.   

Even if the hero-proxy does prevail, they could be killed off at the end having fulfilled their mission.

They could die trying and let the task fall to less able characters, those in whom we are not certain of success.

But how much sweeter the victory when they prevail.

The greater the ambiguity, the more satisfying a successful conclusion.

Ahh, but is it really the end?

How many times have we thought a killer to be defeated only to have them resurface time and again, their powers of resurrection seemingly unstoppable, giving them that supernatural ability to come back from the dead.

It’s easier to cast them in that mould because then they are not human.

For the things they have done, and the horrors they have committed.

How could they possibly be human?

I feel I am straying once more into the boundaries of the real world, so for now I will place my opinions on pause, and not debate the true horror that is humankind.

It is easier to think about and control fictional evils.

Mostly.

They do seem to take on a life of their own sometimes within my writing, perhaps through my own desire to explore the realms of the darkness.

Then they need to be reigned back in, usually with a humanistic component that makes them a little less evil, a little easier to relate to.

And easier to kill.

If I don’t give my killers flaws, how on earth are my heroes going to defeat them?

Can’t have them wandering around, looking for more victims.

In remote Scottish Glens, beside misty Lochs.

Beneath the flimsy canvas.

Can we?

Wait … what was that?

I thought I heard a noise from the darkness...