My Dark School Of Thoughts

“People are like stained glass windows. They sparkle and shine when the sun is out, but when the darkness sets in, their true beauty is revealed only if there is light from within.” – Elisabeth Kübler-Ross

Men of deeper discernment have long believed there is no clear boundary between reality and imagination. These sages claim that all we perceive passes through a delicate mental veil, shaped by our experiences and haunted by our private shadows. Yet those deprived of imagination dismiss such truths as mere madness or as the dangerous visions of minds too keen to bear ordinary existence.

It is precisely because of such narrow condemnations that I am driven to speak, even at the risk of incurring the wrath of the one who now lords over me. Speak I must. For we, fragile as we are, lack the patience and insight to truly weigh the recurring phenomena that haunt only the most sensitive among us.

My story which is sealed within the hollow core of this ghost town, is not simply a tale of misfortune. It is a testament to a deeper, more malevolent order at work.

Over a century later, historians labelled it a mere economic decline. A once thriving mining town swallowed by time. This lie gnaws at my cursed soul, for it deliberately cloaks the horror that devoured us.

I was born Madrilène Thelma Bramble in Norfolk, Connecticut. A child of privilege, living above mundane struggles. From birth, I was cursed with the gift of clairvoyance. While it isolated me, I found refuge in books. They filled my hours but left the true emptiness untouched. They tempered my anxiety, but not my greatest torment: the whispering voices in the dark, the glimpses of unfathomable shadows, the alien contact with sinister forces outside the limits of human understanding or knowledge.

When my father, a wealthy mining magnate, decided to move us to Aurora, Nevada, a newly booming mining town, I was heartbroken. I wanted to remain in Norfolk, close to my late mother’s memory. But my father would hear none of it.

We arrived in Aurora in March 1863. There, I met two gentle souls: Master Turtleneck and Ms. Washington. Master Turtleneck, a burly merchant with a comical face, and Ms. Washington, a delicate widow and seamstress, welcomed me as their own. They read scriptures to me each evening, a comfort I had not known since my mother died.

In their stories and gentle warmth, I found a fragile peace with my inner demons. For a while, it seemed the darkness could be held at bay.

But by November, that peace began to unravel. It wasn’t sudden. Rather, it spread like a slow poison, like a momentum building quietly in the town’s collective soul. Some arcane force festered, corrupting hearts with greed, lust, pride, envy and wrath, until Aurora became an unrecognizable shell.

I saw it all. The deepening shadows, the smoldering hunger behind blank eyes. Even as snow fell and the town glittered in Yuletide colors, an invisible rot seeped through every street and heart.

The town’s spirits seemed high. Houses dressed in red and green. Mistletoe hung above warm fires. Yet behind closed doors, residents shrank into themselves, gnawed by unseen despair. By day they stumbled through hangovers, haunted and brittle.

Violence erupted. Brawls turned fatal. Prostitution and public debauchery became common. Humanity dissolved as if shackles had been cast aside. Master Turtleneck and Ms. Washington sensed it too but could only watch in helpless dread.

December came, and Aurora radiated a malignant aura. A stench both physical and spiritual rose from the mines, thick and suffocating. At night, specters drifted from house to house, unseen by all but me. Terror claimed my sleep. My father, once my protector, rebuffed my pleas, lost to the enchantment gripping the town.

Then came Christmas Eve. Snow blanketed Aurora like a heavenly shroud. I woke to the comforting scent of roasted chicken, the air bright with the warmth of festivities. That morning, I felt pure happiness, chosen to play an elf in the town’s Santa parade.

We gathered at the town hall, singing praises to baby Jesus. Master Turtleneck, clad in Santa’s red, read from the Bible before we poured into the streets to celebrate. For a fleeting moment, Aurora seemed redeemed. It seemed like a day of perfect memory.

That night, exhausted and content, I fell into the first peaceful sleep in weeks. But terror soon snapped me awake. A suffocating malevolence filled my room. Gasping, I staggered to the window and saw a nightmare that shattered my mind.

Specters filled the skies, flooding into homes. From each, shrieks of pure agony tore through the night, the sound of souls being devoured. Hellish red glows pulsed through walls, followed by tremors that shook the town.

I thought of Master Turtleneck and Ms. Washington and ran, panic clawing at me. Their home was a scene of unspeakable horror. Master Turtleneck hovered midair, his body swelling and shrinking as black specters churned through him. Ms. Washington lay charred, her face contorted in an eternal scream.

When I turned back to Master Turtleneck, his face twisted into something beyond human comprehension. My sanity cracked. As I collapsed, the last thing I saw was a circle of specters gathering around me, triumphant.

I survived. But survival became my eternal curse. I awoke deep in the mines, my body mangled, my soul twisted. Crawling back into the light, I saw Aurora’s people fading into nothingness. When I tried to flee, an invisible barrier kept me bound. I was a prisoner forever.

Decades passed. In solitude, I pieced together fragments of that night. My studies revealed a dreadful truth hidden in plain sight.

The date of Christ’s birth is unknown. Shepherds could not have tended their flocks in winter’s chill. So what have we truly been celebrating? My research led me into pagan Rome, Saturnalia, a week of lawlessness honoring Saturn with drunkenness and violence. A chosen “Lord of Misrule” was indulged before being sacrificed, believed to cleanse darkness.

In northern Europe, Yule celebrated the sun god Mithras’ rebirth. Evergreens reminded people of life’s return and candles coaxed the sun’s reappearance.

By the 4th century, Christianity absorbed these festivals to ease conversions. December 25 was chosen for Christ’s birth, but Saturnalia’s dark soul endured. Christians celebrated, believing they praised Christ, yet in secret, they honored pagan gods. As these gods’ influence grew, their hunger deepened.

To satisfy this hunger, they dispatched a reaper to harvest souls as Santa Claus. His sleigh is not drawn by reindeer and his “elves” are not joyful helpers. He brings death, not gifts.

Years later, I saw clearly. Master Turtleneck had been that reaper, hiding among us. Even with my gift of sight, I was blind to him. I was chosen as his successor and transformed into a shepherd for the spectral horde that devoured Aurora.

Now, I exist in a realm beyond life and death. I am nameless, worthless, unredeemable. A floating wraith in an endless vacuum of decay.

I have come to know that the darkness within us is real and irrepressible. It cannot be slain, only understood. I am now part of that darkness. The eternal abyss where no light waits at the tunnel’s end.

We think light is purity, but it births darkness. They are one and the same, endlessly consuming each other.

Heed my words for the darkness within is potent and real. Be terrified, for there is a storm brewing inside us all.