The story is practically legendary. It's the sort of tale that draws you in with its own

special blend of intense narrative and complete horror, and once they've read it from start

to finish, most people have a difficult time forgetting it. It said that a group of scientists in

Russia ran an experiment in the late 1940s on a handful of political prisoners. The goal was to

test the limits of the human body when faced with a lack of sleep, and to help them in that quest,

these scientists used an experimental drug. The five prisoners were locked in an airtight chamber,

and then a prototype gas was added to the ventilation system, and it seemed to work. Five days

into the experiment, all of the prisoners were still awake and alert, but something was different.

Their minds were beginning to crack.

Without exploring the horrific and gory details, everything came to an end over two weeks later

when the prisoners were discovered to have lost all touch with reality. Their madness even drove

them to engage in cannibalism on themselves, and when the researchers intervened, they found that

their subjects wanted nothing more than to remain awake forever, attempting to chemically induce

sleep only succeeded in killing them. Like I said before, the story is one of those perfect

blends of history and horror, but there's a problem. None of it is true. It turns out the tale is

nothing more than an urban legend, born not inside a Russian research facility in the 1940s,

but as a story published in 2010 on the website known as Creepypasta, which is equal parts

disappointing, and a relief. The stories we tell have a way of sticking around, regardless of

whether they're true or not. They pass from one listener to the next, sort of like a virus,

until an entire community seems to be infected, and no matter where you grew up or what sort of

culture you feel at home within, there's a good chance you've heard a few of those tales yourself.

Most of the time we're safe to ignore them, or at least enjoy them for the entertainment they

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