Edge

Foreword

I read somewhere that fear SCREAMS.

I suppose that it could be true, and that fear would cover a myriad of unsettling prospects. For some, the possibility of drowning, facing spiders square on, or even snakes, would likely fill the void between holding onto dear old sanity, and losing one's mind all together. Or maybe for a few of us the worst would be labelled — staggering on-stage and feeling seven-hundred pairs of eyes in a packed hall blazing at our half-preparedness. We've almost all, I would imagine, at some point or another feared something. Or, maybe still. The dark — on a personal level — was what bothered me severely when I was small. And although there is; on closer inspection, a distinctly higher level of fear we refer to — as horror, I'm however in disagreement that even horror is the worst of things that you can bump into at night. Or it, into you, inside an unfamiliar cold place draped in a blanket of blackness. Particularly when you're not yet convinced that there's at least a small window to break with something, to cry out for help. Or worse, to discover a locked key-less steel door, so you can't plunge to the floor and scamper out, but have to wait your turn with your back towards it. But even that, is to be merely a layer that is sandwiched in-between. In-between what, you'd well wonder? Terror. Of all the things read and said — about terror, one thing is for certain. Unlike terror; whether it's fear that screams — or horror; laughing, as it pulls your hair, in both cases, you can almost always close your eyes and wish them gone. Or face away from a horrid collision with fate and the awful unsettling likes of it. Chances are with both fear and horror, at least you'd still wake up. Only, stiff or sore. At most.
I'm suggesting that slight or medium DISCOMFORT in a psychological or physical sense would accompany imminent anticipated fear; say between zero and four, or five out of ten on the scare-meter. Had such a device even existed, and had you not fully managed to circumvented fate. Horror, I've always seen somewhat different from fear. With horror, I would put the dial on between five and nine, maximum ten. Of Which the results could pose long-term metal scarring or physical wounds that may battle to heal.
Terror, however, can't be measured. Terror, is by design the very black gluey soot that had been applied when evil was birthed, and it needed to be painted; hiding it in plain sight, precisely for when the lights go out. It is said that hell at the time, had barely been constructed, and its pillars were still drying. Unlike with fear and horror, hell was not nearly ready to chain back and bolt down terror. Not that terror deserves to be put on a pedestal or has earned itself the very right to stand out above fear that screams, and horror that would laugh while it pulls your hair when the lights go out. But then, this was the coastal city of Hedon. Is it not ironic that it's so simple to describe terror? You see, of all things, terror doesn't do screams. Terror is shrewd in its muteness. It wants to be your friend first and hold your hand to lead you away from what you perceive as danger. It even gets you to love it.

Terror, WHISPERS...