The Soviet Sleep Experiment
The Russian Sleep Experiment is a creepypasta which tells the tale of 5 test subjects being exposed to an experimental sleep-inhibiting stimulant in a Soviet-era scientific experiment, which has become the basis of an urban legend.[1] Many news organizations, including Snopes, News.com.au, and LiveAbout, trace the story's origins to a website,[2] now known as the Creepypasta Wiki, being posted on August 10, 2010, by a user named OrangeSoda, whose real name is unknown.[3][4]
The Soviet Sleep Experiment
The story recounts an experiment set in 1947 at a covert Soviet test facility. In a military-sanctioned scientific experiment, five prisoners that were deemed 'Enemies of the State' were kept in a sealed gas chamber, with an experimental gas-based stimulant compound continually administered to keep the subjects awake for 30 consecutive days. The prisoners were falsely promised that they would be set free from the prison if they completed the experiment in the specified 30 days. The subjects behaved as usual during the initial 5 days, talking to each other and whispering to the researchers through the one-way glass, though it was noted that their discussions gradually became darker in the subject matter. After 9 days, one subject began screaming uncontrollably for hours while the others did not react to his outburst. The man screamed for so long that he tore his vocal cords, and was rendered mute as a result. When the second one started screaming, the others prevented the researchers from looking inside by pasting torn book pages and their own feces on the porthole windows. A few days passed without the researchers being able to look inside, during which the chamber was completely silent. The researchers used the intercom to test if the subjects were still alive, and got a short response of a subject expressing compliance.
On the 15th day, the researchers decided to turn off the stimulating gas and reopen the chamber. The subjects did not want the gas to turn off, for fear they would fall asleep. Upon looking inside, they discovered that the four surviving subjects had performed lethal and severe mutilation and disembowelment on themselves during the past days, including tearing off sections of skin and muscles, removing multiple abdominal internal organs, practicing self-cannibalism on themselves, as well as cannibalism of the second subject, and allowing 10 cm (4 inches) of blood and water to accumulate on the floor by jamming paper and pieces of flesh they tore from the second subject into several drains, who was found dead on the floor as soon as the chamber was opened. The subjects violently refused to leave the chamber and begged the scientists to continue administering the stimulant, murdering one soldier and severely injuring another that attempted to remove them. After eventually being removed from the chamber, all subjects were shown to exhibit extreme strength, unprecedented resistance to anaesthetics and sedatives, the ability to remain alive despite lethal injuries, and a desperate desire to stay awake and be given the stimulant. It was also found that if any one of the subjects fell asleep, they would die.
After being somewhat treated for their severe injuries, the surviving three subjects were prepared to return to the gas chamber with the stimulant by the orders of the military officials (though against the will of the researchers), with EEG monitors showing short recurring moments of brain death. Before the chamber was sealed, one of the subjects fell asleep and died, and the only subject that could speak screamed to be immediately sealed in the chamber. The military commander ordered for three other researchers to be closed inside the chamber alongside the two remaining subjects. One researcher immediately drew his gun and killed the commander and the mute subject by shooting both of them in the head, causing the other person to flee the room. With only one surviving subject, the terrified researcher explained that he would not allow himself to be locked in a room with monsters that could no longer be called people. He desperately asked what the subject was, to which the subject smiled and identified himself and the other fallen subjects as an inherent evil inside the human mind that is kept in check by the act of sleeping. After a brief pause, the researcher shot the prisoner in the heart, and with his dying breath on the floor, the subject muttered his final words; "So...nearly...free..."[5]
In the chapter "Horror Memes and Digital Culture" in The Palgrave Handbook of Contemporary Gothic, Tosha R. Taylor wrote that the creepypasta "reflects residual political anxieties as it purports to reveal a top-secret effort by Russian scientists in World War II."[8] Aleksandra Serwotka and Anna Stwora examined "Russian Sleep Experiment" and other creepypasta, stating that most creepypasta that focused on experiments feature scientists who "are frequently somehow related either to Nazi Germany or Soviet Russia".[9]
It's the most shocking story you may have never heard: a group of five men deemed enemies of the state are imprisoned in a secret Soviet military research facility in 1947, where they are exposed to a sleep-inhibiting stimulant.
The authorities promise to free the prisoners after 30 days if they complete the experiment, but on day 15, they turn off the stimulant and open the locked chamber only to find a scene of carnage; one prisoner is dead and the others have suffered various forms of extreme self-mutilation, including disembowelment. The survivors have also developed an inhuman strength and a resistance to drugs and sedatives, which causes them to murder one of the soldiers who attempts to remove them from the room.
In the case of the Russian Sleep Experiment, the story rings true because it fits with common knowledge about unethical experiments on human beings in the 1940s, including during World War II, as well as later CIA experiments with sleep deprivation, Stubbersfield said. He recalled a visit to a museum in Budapest in the former offices of the Communist government's secret police headquarters, where a basement exhibit recreates cells in which people could only stand up.
"If you keep people awake for a long time, they become more suggestable," he added. "The sleep deprivation element, the human suggestion, rings all sorts of bells about all of these things in the past. It helps the question about whether there may be an element of truth to it."
Everything was fine for the first five days; the subjects hardly complained having been promised (falsely) that they would be freed if they submitted to the test and did not sleep for 30 days. Their conversations and activities were monitored and it was noted that they continued to talk about increasingly traumatic incidents in their past, and the general tone of their conversations took on a darker aspect after the 4 day mark.
The only remaining subject that could speak started screaming to be sealed in now. His brainwaves showed the same flatlines as one who had just died from falling asleep. The commander gave the order to seal the chamber with both subjects inside, as well as 3 researchers. One of the named three immediately drew his gun and shot the commander point blank between the eyes, then turned the gun on the mute subject and blew his brains out as well.
We know that sleep is a vital requirement for us. We also know the effects of going without sleep for a few days. But what would happen if someone went without sleep for a whole month? No, we are not talking about sleeping for two or three hours a day. We are talking about remaining wide awake for a month.
Even after being removed from the chamber, the surviving prisoners continued to show extreme strength, incredible resistance to drugs and sedatives, unimaginable ability to remain alive even after lethal injuries, and a desperate desire to remain awake and being given the stimulant gas again. The researchers also discovered that when any subject fell asleep, they instantly died.
With two of the subjects were dead, the surviving three were treated for their injuries and prepared to return to the gas chamber. However, within moments, the EEG monitors revealed that all the subjects were brain dead. Just before the chamber was sealed, another prisoner fell asleep and died, while the researcher shot another one dead.
Before shooting the last surviving subject, the researcher asked what he was, to which he identified himself as the evil that resided in every human mind and kept in check by sleep. Soon after, the researcher shot him dead and went about covering up any trace of the experiment.
The Russian sleep experiment is an internet horror story that first appeared on a Wiki page in 2010. The author is unknown, but their username was Orange Soda. Wiki is a site where users modify content found on the internet to make them interesting, unbelievable, creepy, or funny. Even the images of the Russian Sleep Experiment found on the internet are all modified versions of random browser-generated images.
One of the most infamous scientific experiments by the Soviet secret services was the poison laboratory. This was a secret research facility developed by a professor of medicine Ignatii Kazakov and headed by lieutenant general Pavel Sudoplatov. The purpose of this facility was to test various kinds of poisons, developed with the intention of attacking the West. It is believed that the laboratory was activated again in 1991 and is still used to create deadly poisonous biological weapons for secret operations in the West.
Human experimentation was rampant in the laboratory, and the subjects were mostly political prisoners. The goal of these experiments was to find a colorless, odorless poison that could not be detected even after the person died. Most of the victims died instantly. Some of the poisons tested were mustard gas, digitoxin, ricin, curare, and cyanide. The laboratory was also the place where supposed enemies of Russia were brought to be executed with these deadly poisons. 041b061a72