Who is Scott Savino?

The mask? I thought you'd never ask whythemask.com…and you never should have. You see there’s this whole thing...a philosophy behind it. Anonymity? Oh yes darling, but not so simple. I absolutely refuse to go into details. Not when people bring up the mask...they go mad when you tell them you have secrets you'd love to spill, only to change the subject! Oh, to swallow the arousal of agony gripping a mind. A rare bliss that lingers in the throat.  

Sensational. 

Ask me other things. I’ll answer other questions, though I can’t guarantee I’m delivering the truth. Ask how my day was? Wonderfully awful. Ask where I'm from? My mother’s womb. Ask what percentage of my circle know I own a shovel to gladly lend them at midnight for the price of tagging along? What percentage knows I ask no questions and will supply the tequila bottle and the laughs? I even know the best places to go. Ask me anything you like but never ever ask about the other thing...for your own sake.

So, now that we have resolved the unending evernothing that is the menace of my visage, why don't you come along? I’ve something malignificent to show you. Let's share a moonstroll, the two of us....  

Have you ever Wandered Riftward? Delightful. Follow me. This way. Wrap the moonbeam around your waist and walk this way. No, walk this way. Watch my feet. Step with intentionally unintended consequences. Yes! Exactly like that!

Wait! No, no. This just won't do. Yours is too far from mine. 

Choose another. A closer beam.

No! Not dangerously close. We have only just met, and there is far too much intimacy in tandem stellar walks with the probability of our tethers’ tails twisting surreptitiously behind us. Not with malice but intending to turn two of us together tightly as tourniquets. Whispering: “Will they kiss? Let’s watch.” Eww.

No! I would kiss you. I would. It’s not you, not at all. I just wouldn’t want a thing like that seen. It’s the stars, you see. They watch. They stream. I have a reputation to uphold as one who does not wish to be perceived. Plus the consent release…waivers of rights…suspensions of disbelief…of life…trust me. Being seen and shared via Starstream is neither worth the bother nor our time. Not tonight. Besides, they don’t simply vote you off. They vote to yank you away, lobbing you through space toward the nearest volcanic place, then wager on whether you fall into one immediately or spend a week stranded on that planet before doing so by mistake.

Perfect. That beam is exactly right. Now around your waist it goes. Why? What do you mean, why? Without a tether, if you slip on our walk, you’ll drift further than the moon. You’ll drift forever. You’ll die. Have you really never done this? Oh my. Here am I, thinking you were simply being modest.

Something astrologically erotic to have the opportunity to be the one to bring you this way for the first time. Careful now. We only have until it dissolves at sunrise.

Anyway, Scott Savino. Nice handshake, that. Quite mighty. A true pleasure for you to meet me, surely? You’re most welcome to it. Not to embarrass you but you may wish to resolve the stickiness from your palm at some point with some soap, perhaps?

Carrying on then: my genre of choice is not exclusive to weird fiction and queer cosmic horror-comedy, yet that categorization does the heavy lifting. My stories are stories in which horror, dark fantasy, science fiction, humor, the uncanny and absurd encounter one another somewhere beyond the veil of ordinary and agree to behave irresponsibly, but absolutely not behind the wheel after drinking.

Some of those stories have wandered into books. More than twenty appear across eighteen anthologies, while nearly fifty others have been performed and shared on feeds such as The NoSleep Podcast, Creepy, Chilling Tales for Dark Nights, and by YouTubers alike. MrCreepypasta, Dr. Creepen, these are names you will know, perhaps? There are many, many others you will not.

Large channel? Pay me. You make monies from the precious crawling things I share and I require some of them. Small channels? Speak to me. We can often arrange something free. Either way, the bleakskinned unlit thing emerged from the shadows of a fathomless mindcrevasse. My. Fathomless. Mindcrevasse. So you see, that thing, by rights, belongs to me. Should you steal one of my precious things, I challenge you to dress it up however you like. But be not surprised upon returning to find that only remnants of your home will be left in the wake of my coming to collect that which is mine. A pile of ashes.

Permission is easy. Presumptive possession is inexplicably rude. Reconstruction is expensive.

The content is mine, and I will suffer not insufferable content thieves taking my things and making them theirs.

Visit dmcaburn.com if the smoke signals remain unclear.

Anyway, where were we? The books, podcasts, and YouTubers have all packaged and delivered my horrid, haplessly natured spawn to credulous strangers. Those strangers have invited my words into their homes, placed them directly into their ears, and granted them the agency required to burrow deep.

Deeper now.

Deeper still.

Right there. That’s about the average depth.

Hello there.

I’m here.

Are you scared?

Very wise.

Again: zero warranties.

Where do they come from? From where does every other black moldering thing seep forth? The Neterverse of course. My stories wriggle to life and stick their fingers in, make a hole, pull themselves within. Any and everywhere reality grows thin.

Sometimes that place is a locked door that did not exist yesterday. Sometimes it is the distance between who a person is and whom the world permits them to be. Sometimes it is grief, transformation, desire, or the dreadful discovery that the universe is not empty and has, in fact, been watching with two gleaming eyes, mild interest, and four voluptuous breasts.

Oh yes, I have seen the teats of stars upon stars. Truly nice racks, all. Though, after the first several thousand, celestial nudity loses some of its novelty.

Mind your stepping. Loose pieces of asteroid everywhere. One wrong move and you’ll cut straight through those shoes and wind up with only five of your six toes.

Cute shoes, by the way. You should have worn boots like mine.

For the next few dreamiles, watch for a hive of Mistkites. They’ll be out here somewhere. Unless they’re not. Their opalescent carapaces gleam in clustered synchronization; you’ll mistake them for stars until you stop, so don't. 

Easy to avoid. Just don’t look into their hypodermic eyes.

Look at me immediately instead and do not look away until I say. It is much harder to pierce into a gaze that refuses to engage. 

They attack only when they’re certain of their probability of success: puncture the cornea, whisk the brain until liquefied, drink briefly and waste the rest: blobs of pulverized thought drifting in zero-g, each globule moving away from the remains of your face.

Grextamizex to watch for in this direction, too. Or Grextamizei. Grextamizexes? I can’t remember. Doesn’t matter. Mouthless things with lots and lots of teeth. Edges like snapped razorblades…those ones don’t care where you look. Just if you move into the spaces in space that they make theirs.

Big, so you can see them from a mile away. Usually over there, right where they aren’t. They’ve either dithered their visibility down to nothing or found another spot. Unless we can’t see them because they’ve chosen to become unseen. No trouble if we keep clear. They wait. Shudderlurch toward you when you’re too close.  

Lots of things to cut yourself on...or become the thing that cuts...out here in the moonshadow.

Keep following. This way.

What has never lost its hold upon me is the strangeness of being alive. We spend our lives inside bodies we did not design, moving through a reality we barely understand, loving people we cannot keep forever. We laugh. We grieve. We become. We disappear.

The horror hardly needs my assistance.

Still, I help.

I believe horror should leave more behind than fear. It should haunt. Disturb. Offer the reader something beautiful, grotesque, sorrowful, or absurd and allow that thing to nest somewhere near that reader’s heart. The finest stories do not end when the words run out. They change shape and migrate from heart to head….parasites contracted. Living in you after you’ve read. 

Much of my writing concerns identity and transformation, particularly queer identity. Being a gay writer has often meant standing at the threshold of things and looking inward. It has also meant learning that thresholds are excellent places from which to begin invasions.

Horror belongs to all of us.

I want my work to make room for people who have been questioned, diminished, or told they cannot be. I want them to find themselves not merely surviving within horror, but loving, laughing, desiring, transforming, and occasionally becoming the incomprehensible thing dripping in blood that has just stepped between you and your nightlight, casting its silhouette menacingly upon your bed.

YOU WANNA DIE? WELL, THEN THAT SCREAMING BETTA WERK, BITCH.

I apologize. Something briefly seized the microphone.

My catalog continues to grow because the hunger responsible for it remains inconveniently alive. There is always another story pressing against the edge of thought. Sometimes it arrives screaming. Sometimes giggling. Sometimes simply becoming substantiated: politely forming at the kitchen window. Watching, watching, watching…waiting...until everyone has gone to sleep.

Please lock all your windows. And I do hope ever so much that any left unbarred should be so squeaky as to shatter your dreamstate.

My stories seek only a welcoming place…your home, for instance…within which to writhe. 

I bring each into the world, I listen to it and I don't judge. 

Whether it becomes the wearer of your skin depends on you. It is not a matter of anything that I didn't do or couldn't not have done. 

I only permitted it to become whatever it must, as any father of atrocity may have done.

So please exercise caution. Secure your car, your home and your loins.

Que se blah se blah.

Certain stories, however, should not be repeated.

Perhaps you have heard whispers concerning the Voidspire Consortium? No, not a cult. Every time you say that word, or when I do, I will cross it out. It's not a cult but a gathering of completely normal people allegedly operating beneath my direction. Perhaps you have also heard the title Hierophant spoken in connection with my name.

Danger is afoot, attaching itself to the backs of whispers.

The Consortium does not follow the Esoteric Doctrine of Penumbra. We do not study the forbidden teachings attributed to Friar Gregorius Vaunt. We do not conduct sacrificial rites, preserve humanity through acts of devotion.

There is no Great Serpent called Varoth sleeping beneath the dunes of the deserts of Qatar.

We do not gather in a compound there.

It is not dreaming.

We are not keeping it asleep.

Hisskalei is not the ancient tongue of snakes.

We do not gather en masse deep within subterranean chambers, screaming lullabies in Hisskalei to it. 

Listen to yourself. Everything you say sounds crazy. Do a bit more practice in your head before you start saying such outlandish things out loud. It’s almost as if something lives in the back of your throat spawning eggs that hatch madness as they fall from your mouth. Madness fully formed.

You should have your throat checked out. 

This matter is closed, because none of it is true. There is not even a real group of any sort of people normal, culty, or otherwise.

No, you may not join us.

You may, however, read my stories.

I was so very much looking forward to your questions saved so generously until now, but it seems I have an appointment to be Nowhere and must recede into it shirking the answers you wished to hear and whispering them into Midnight, my eagerly pounded and robustly generous lover, instead. 

Step carefully through the ordinary on your way down. Notice where it bends. The little spot. We passed it coming up. The invisible bendy spot neither of us saw. You'll likely know exactly which I mean as you’ll likely crack your head on it as you go. I’d say look out, but the problem isn’t in looking out. The problem is precisely how?

Do follow laughter into the dark but stop if it begins to change and belong to a child. Drowned ones are especially horrid. Royal blue where their eyes should be white, waterlogged lungs, worship the great beast from beyond in the depths of the lake to the south. Dangerous, those. Just be on the lookout.

An excursion I do recommend is this: when presented with the opportunity to follow one's curiosity at the behest of starlight through the rupture, moving down that trail should always be on your list of "must-do's." Never gets old. Besides, the more curiosity ventures starward with you in tow, the more likely you'll encounter it. Something impossible awaits. You'll see.

If perchance you do, tell it Scott sent you.

One last thing to share. Look that way. Just over there. Do you see? The light on the other side of it. Breathtaking from up here. Isn’t it? Whole planet’s dark except for part of Australia and maybe…looks like Japan to me. Does it look like Japan to you? Makes you feel small. Doesn’t it?

Anyway, it’s been a nice walk. I need to take this off. Hurts like a mother. Always forget I’m not as thin as I used to be and certainly tied mine like I still was young and spry. No, no. You need to leave yours on just the way it is. Take it off and you’ll probably slip. I don’t. Never do. But you? I would say, best to leave yours tied tight. Afterall, this is your first time.

Well, I guess if you loosen it a bit, it won’t matter much.

Won’t matter soon enough.

I would invite you to come Wandering Riftward with me again sometime, but sadly, I don’t think you’ll make the return trip home. Not without a Starstepper as your guide. It simply can’t be me. I’m already late...later than I promised...I've got a naked appointment with the night. When you’re over 40, you put these things in your planner.

Shame for you.

It’s been awfully nice chatting…

Here it comes. You think you’ve watched it rise, but you’ve never really watched it rise...not really. Not like this.

It’s so bright.

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By the way, I can be contacted via email at scott@scottsavino.com or by reaching out to me on my various social media platforms: