When the lights go out, the darkness remembers how to hunt.Pinehaven was the perfect American suburb until Christmas Eve, when a power outage plunged the town into absolute darkness. Six-year-old Tommy Chen watched his family, his neighbors, and everyone he loved transform into something that wore human faces like masks. By Christmas morning, he was one of only two survivors of a nightmare that should have been impossible.Thirteen years later, Tommy has spent half his life fighting the ancient organisms that consumed Pinehaven consciousness networks that predate humanity, sleeping in Earth's deep places, and waking when the lights go out. As director of the clandestine Lightbringer Initiative, he's destroyed seed after seed, saved city after city, and made impossible choices that haunt his dreams.But the emergences are accelerating. More networks are waking. And when Tommy travels to Antarctica to destroy what he believes is the source of the threat, he discovers a horrifying truth: the monsters aren't invading. They're coming home.Now Tommy must choose between extinction and synthesis, between destroying an ancient intelligence or becoming the bridge between two forms of consciousness locked in a war for Earth's future. His decision will determine whether humanity faces the darkness alone or learns that some monsters can teach us what it means to survive, to connect, and to transform.Because in the space between light and shadow, between human and hive, between individual and collective... that's where evolution happens."A masterclass in psychological horror that asks profound questions about consciousness, identity, and what we're willing to become to survive.""Terrifying and beautiful in equal measure. This is horror that illuminates rather than obscures.""Pinehaven will haunt you. Tommy Chen's journey will change how you think about darkness, connection, and what it means to be human."Themes: Apocalyptic suspense, hive consciousness, and Psychological horror - First contact - Transformation - Found family - Impossible choices - Christmas horror - Small-town terrorContent warnings: Body horror, transformation, mass casualties, psychological trauma, loss of loved ones, and Existential dreadLights Out Before MidnightA Power Outage Turns a Peaceful Neighbourhood into a Nightmare of Fear, Fire, and Festive ParanoiaBy Prasanth N.M.During a Christmas blackout, neighbors turn on each other as unseen horrors move in the dark.The war against the darkness begins when the lights go out.Are you ready to cross the bridge between worlds?