Nightmare

• Jeremy Burns, Grade 10, Yarra Valley Grammar School
• Short Story
• 2010

Finalist in the 'Word Express 2010' competition

Drifting. Turning. Bleak, parched images drifted in and out of perspective while scenes from fantasy and reality combined into indistinguishable grey matter, scarcely leaving room for acknowledgement let alone reflection before more fog became the centre of this dreary, demonic night. Rapidly, these images transform into feverish evils that seize and assault the usually uneventful nocturnal visions. The mammals of day, whose gaiety halted the darkest contemplation, now, in hibernation, became the very ghouls fit for the haunting of a graveyard. Confused convulsions transpired as malicious beings descended upon the vulnerable mind, indistinguishable yet present enough to convey pure terror deep within the mind and soul as creature after creature struck at an ever turning back helpless to their dark intentions. Dante himself could not have spawned a more disturbing creation which are these evenings, in which one is lost within a labyrinth of horror and despair that not even the brief and erratic stream of frenzied consciousness could hope to end, as inevitably one was drawn back into the heart of the furnace of fear. Battered, bruised and close to destruction, a body fights on attempting to banish the sinister spectres to the depths of hell from which they must have originated. All accounts for nothing, however, as immediately as sleep envelops, the demons consume once more the sanity which rest usually provides. Seconds become hours, hours become days, and the night is a lifetime of suffering under the curse that is the imagination of man, corrupted by their own creations from foolish ambitions. Sweat oozes from the victim as time continues to bear witness to the torture being undertaken, unsympathetic to the situation. An eternity of punishment for a crime not committed, the siege perseveres until the very conclusion of darkness and renewal of morning.

With the rise of the celestial sun the following dawn, the release from the shadows is provided, yet the mark of the night remains for some time. Life goes on, happiness finally prevails over evil. Yet it will remain always, waiting for further opportunities to ruthlessly claim more souls sleep. Lying concealed in the depth of human consciousness, the nightmares always return, petrifying as ever, to steal the night away.