You Know THEY'RE Watching You

Am currently reading the quite fun Bad Magic by Stephan Zielinski and one of its conceits, the third eye, made me stop and think for a while.

In the story, characters who have their "third eye" opened are vulnerable to the dangers of the supernatural world (whether old gods, demons, elementals, etc.). This reminded me of that scene in the movie Constantine, wherein the young John attracts the attention of demons because he discovers the other side of Heaven and Hell.

Obviously, this idea tickles me pink given how local stories also concur: opening one's "third eye" is not a good idea unless you want to see spirits and ghosts haunting each and every third street corner.

My own friend, who had his supernatural sense developed in college, relates that it's hard driving with one's "third eye" open sometimes as it can cause accidents. I can see his point: are you sure the person standing in the middle of the road and you've just avoided while driving is a real person or a ghost? What's more, he says that spirits and ghosts can "see" you once you can "see" them-- like some kind of a supernatural radar.

This brought me to my fourth thought: Amelia, one of the characters in John Wright's Chaos Trilogy is an extra-dimensional alien being. In our dimension, she is just a nubile young girl but in the fifth dimension, she is actually a winged, goat-feeted being. Obviously, there is some advantage of seeing things through an extra dimension but for Amelia, this is not the case as being able to "see" through the fifth dimension makes others see her.

In other words, you really don't want to do that. (Unless you really, really, really want to.)