In the 16th century they might have called me a witch. That would be inaccurate on several counts. Firstly, it would be unfair on the witches of the time to charge them with the crimes I am intent on committing. It would negate the reality of good works on their part, such as their abilities with herbs and the like. Secondly, it would rob me of my rightful credit for the scientific discoveries which have led to what previous generations may have called (or indeed branded) a ‘gift’: I can summon horrors.

In fact, my research has revealed the possibility that those self-same witches, whom I have just damned with faint praise, might contain within their ranks one with the same powers as i have. though they would be cursed with that power involuntarily, unable to understand, much less control, it.

I have taught myself the summoning ability, as well as its control, and intend I to use it.

My research was into the marginalised of society. Those with special powers or fearful symptoms. We back-diagnose mental illness to these people, or patronise with suggestions of epilepsy or aurora-migraines. We have tried to explain their visions and their writings, where such exist. We have tried to explain away their reported communion with other-worldly creature, and we dismiss those stories which tell of demented horrors from other realms as the product of the same, sad, ‘poisoned’ psyches.

I went into my research with a more open mind, and I found that there is indeed a gateway. A gateway which, if left unguarded, may be stormed by creatures too terrible to control. Ninety-five percent of Western-born humans filter this out through so-called civilisation. But I have built a controllable doorway, a doorway to which only I hold the key. And I invite those creatures to come through when I will them. And thus they do my bidding.

The world would do well to prepare its psychic defences.