Creepypasta: Induced Nightmares
During the summer of 2008, the MIT ran some tests on human subjects of a big computer called "Dream-maker". The Dream-maker was a machine capable of transforming images and virtual ambiences into shockwaves that the human brain could interpret, which basically means it can control one's dreams. The dreams used in the tests were pretty basic and weren't suppose to cause fear or night terrors, but the predictions failed during the tests.
In the first test ran, a subject was induced to a very simple dream, which was a walk through a park. Once the subject reached superficial sleep (when dreams take place) the generated dream was induced. As predicted, there was a small change in the cardiac rhythm due to the shock of changing the scenario so quickly. However, the heartbeat rhythm wouldn't settle and would actually raise from time to time. After the eleven default seconds of a regular dream, the subject woke up and started to sweat, asking for coffee. When the researchers asked him how it was, the subject claimed to be the scariest nightmare he'd ever had. When he was asked if he was aware that the induced dream was a walk in a park he agreed, and stated that that was not the scary part. He said that what frightened him took place at the beginning and the end of the dream. In his words "it was a man, stiff and slender, with a weird deformed face where I could see the rest of the previous dream. He had long hair, and it looked as if he was under water."
The researchers got puzzled: the image the subject described was not in the planning. They thought and theorized for a week, unable to come to a any persistent conclusion, thus opening the test lab once again. This time, the researchers called more subjects, a total of 10 people.
Curiously, all of the subjects had the same reaction, always describing the same man: a tall and skinny man, completely stiff, with a screen-like face and long hair, as if it was under water, or as if it was fire coming from his head, but a black fire, thicker, sand-like.
The reactions went from sudden wake-ups to violent night terrors. The worst reaction was a girl with whom the program failed. The dream was the same as everyone else's, but during the induction, there was a bug and the system blacked out. Three seconds after the error, the girl woke up screaming and ran to a corner. She was screaming "IT'S RIGHT THERE!" and pointing, to the researchers' fear, at the Dream-maker. One of the scientists approached the girl and took the electrodes out of her head. She was panicking and nothing seemed to make her settle down. When one of the researchers asked her what she had seen, she said "I... saw... God..." and fainted.
The next day, the girl seemed to be fine. When she was asked if she was asked about the previous day experience, she claimed not to remember it. She emphasized that, in fact, she'd had a great night sleep, which made the researchers uneasy.
After this experiment, it became clear for the scientists that the subjects would see the reported image every time the screen turned black. However, it remained a mystery why they would do so, or even who that man was.
The inventor of the Dream-maker thus tested the machine on himself to see what the other subjects did. After the procedure, he locked the machine away in a hidden place inside of the MIT foundation, screaming to his researcher team never to use it again. He commit suicide one week after the incident.
Not long ago, one the new researchers got access to the machine. The last file it had ever recorded was a bug report with a console record attached to it. It said that the subject had been exposed to blackness for over two hours. The "Escape" button was torn in with blood, and so was the "Power" button. The inventor had been exposed to that man for over two hours, driving him completely insane. The Dream-maker remains dead inside of the MIT foundation, and whoever was inside it.