SCP-966 The Sleep Killer: the invisible creature that keeps you awake until you die

In the stillness of night, something is leaning over you as you sleep — something the naked eye can never see. It makes no sound and leaves no trace, yet the unlucky person lying beside it loses the ability to sleep for good, until exhaustion kills them. This is SCP-966, given the haunting nickname The Sleep Killer in the files of the secretive organisation SCP Foundation.

What is SCP-966?

SCP-966 is a predatory species entirely invisible to the naked eye. They are tall and gaunt, with unusually long limbs and translucent, elastic skin. The strangest part is that they can only be observed through an infrared camera or night-vision goggles; only through such a lens does the hideous shape appear, silently stalking prey deep in sleep.

The deadly aspect of SCP-966 is its ability to cause permanent insomnia. Anyone near the creature while asleep gradually loses the ability to fall asleep at all, and no drug or therapy can reverse it.

Object class: Keter

SCP-966 is rated Object Class: Keter — the most dangerous level in the SCP Foundation system. Keter anomalies are entities that are extremely hard to contain, constantly seek to escape and would do serious harm to humanity if they got loose. Being invisible, breeding in packs and hunting people actively, SCP-966 thoroughly deserves this frightening classification.

Containment procedures

Because they cannot be seen with the naked eye, the entire SCP-966 containment area must be fitted with infrared cameras monitoring around the clock. Security teams always wear night-vision goggles when approaching. Since the individuals tend to breed and gather in "families", the organisation has to check their numbers regularly to keep the pack from growing beyond control.

• Continuous monitoring with infrared equipment and thermal sensors.
• Personnel must never sleep or remain alone inside the containment area.
• Count the individuals periodically to detect signs of breeding.

Description and the chilling story

Victims of The Sleep Killer at first only find it hard to sleep and feel tired for no reason. But within a few days their bodies fall into a state of absolute forced wakefulness. Hallucinations begin, then trembling, memory loss, and finally the organs fail one after another. Death comes slowly and painfully, usually after weeks of struggling in a half-waking daze.

According to the file, SCP-966 was traced to an abandoned warehouse in rural America, where a whole pack had settled and quietly hunted people through the night. The most chilling part is that the victims never knew they were being hunted — the thing killing them stood right there, a few steps away, invisible as a nightmare made real.

Note: SCP-966 and the whole SCP Foundation universe are collectively created fiction (creepypasta / collaborative fiction). Every detail in this article is for entertainment only and is not real.