Thompson's Light: Preface

         There's something about a dark room that can drive a person crazy. Imagine a room like this with no windows or electricity; it pays no mind to the sun or to the light bulb. Now, take away all the objects that could possibly reside in this room. It is suddenly transformed into a makeshift prison cell. Its darkness is eternal, its solitude unforgiving. Put your enemy of choice in this room, and watch with delight as their sanity slips from their grips within a matter of days. The slightest sound produced by the most harmless of objects will have their imaginations creating the deadliest of creatures and most unfortunate of scenarios.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


         A tiny flame reveals itself from the corner of the room, casting its dim glow on the face of a madman. His hands in a white-knuckle fashion tightly grasp the cigarette lighter that produces this orange-yellow phenomenon, and his eyes begin to focus on his victim as he slowly draws near. The path before him wears blood stains like a nightgown, and the glow reaches her huddled body in the opposite corner. She makes a final attempt to scream for help, but realizes her vocal cords were put to waste long ago. For three sleepless nights she resided in that room, waking up to the pungent aroma of gasoline with aching pains in the back of her head the very first night. After hours of blindly searching every square inch for a light switch she retired to the corner where her imagination twisted her perception of reality, and crushed her hopes of ever again seeing the sun she took for granted a week before. Every tap, every scratch, and every ambient sound imaginable convinced her that she was accompanied by the night terrors and dark figures that haunt every nightmare and dark alley across the nation. And now, the light she so eagerly sought and longed for stood before her in the most nightmarish of fashions.

         "What do you want!" she asks repeatedly in a hoarse voice filled with tears and terror as the smell of butane and cologne reaches her senses.

         The flame slowly dies down and the grin on his face begins to take shape as the room goes pitch black again. A thud echos throughout the room as his knees hit the floor and his arms wrap around his now shaking body. Her voice is drowned out completely by the scream of utter horror that escapes his mouth as he bathes in the darkness, and she can hear him frantically fumble his pockets for what she assumes will be the gun or knife that will end her life. Once again he produces a tiny flame, this time created by a match, and without hesitation he tosses it downward and she desperately tries to escape it. Her clothes and skin immediately ignite, and she attempts to put out the flames with a pathetic stop, drop, and roll that fails miserably. Nick Thompson backs up quickly with his eyes now fixated on the light that he created, the light that saved him so many times in the past.

         As the fire slowly dies down and the midnight creatures come back out from hiding, a tiny flame forms once more from the hands of Nick as he exits the room, leaving its eternal darkness to swallow the ashes of his latest victim.