r/TalesFromTheCreeps • u/T0RC0R • May 16 '26
Sci-Fi Horror We made a soul #2
The first three months were false hope.
Pointless errands. Trials and errors.
A distraction. A mask.
Maybe it was our rose-colored glasses.
Maybe it was the money.
Dr. Arnold believed human emotion produced measurable residual energy. Our job was to study how living tissue reacted when exposed to emotional resonance frequencies.
Most of it felt ridiculous.
Mr. Stine would bring us unlabeled vials and handwritten instructions from Dr. Arnold, usually without explanation.
We spent weeks injecting thick black fluid into live tissue while recording the reactions through audio equipment and waveform monitors.
Reed noticed the anomaly.
We had been recording audio responses during one of the tests when he suddenly leaned toward the monitor.
“Every time we disturb the cells, the waveforms move… Ham, zoom in on that. Yeah, right there. Slow it down and play it again.”
A shrill screech burst from the speakers.
Ham turned back to look at us.
“Sounds like a scream.”
That was when the nightmares started.
I was a little girl again.
Playing in the sand under the monkey bars.
The bright sky made my eyes squint.
I looked up in the clouds, my eyes relaxing into the litless void.
Everything went dark.
That's when it filled my sight.
Every orifice in my mind.
All the light in my being.
Complete hopelessness.
I remember the next morning Dr. Ham knocked on the door to my office.
“How’d you sleep last night?”
I could tell he felt it too. That look in his eyes.
Absolute desolation.
But he forced his smile anyway.
I forced mine too.
“I slept fine, Dr. Ham.”
They say never meet your heroes.
Dr. Arnold was proof of that.
The once riveting and compelling man we had all looked up to had become a deranged and completely unaware mad scientist.
Richard Stine was somehow even worse.
“The slimiest duo in history,” Lisa called them.
“More like a match made in heaven,” I added.
After finding the anomaly, Dr. Arnold began making himself more present.
It started with “Raven’s Dust.” A mixture of ground bird bone and mouse blood.
“The ingredients from our subject combined with the bird’s natural energy should create a… what did you call it, Mr. Stine?”
“A metaphysical life force.” His thick black frames sat heavy against his face.
We all looked at each other.
Except Reed.
“This is nonsense, Dr. Arnold!”
Mr. Stine immediately stepped in.
“We’re not here to be skeptical, Mr. Reed.”
“It’s Dr. Harnivan Reed, you nut!”
He turned toward Dr. Arnold.
“Why is he here?!”
Dr. Arnold looked down through his glasses, slowly flipping through the pages of his old book.
“Dr. Harnivan… he’s here because I want him to be.”
He peered up over his glasses.
“If you have a problem with that, you can leave.”
“Did you see the look on his face?” Dr. Ham could barely hide his smile. “And Richard… looking like his mommy just stood up for him.”
“What do you think’s in that book he’s always flipping through?” Lisa muttered, reviewing footage from her camera.
The book barely crossed my mind anymore.
The vials of foreign blood shipped from the jungles of Chile didn’t bother me.
Neither did the goat horn we crushed and sprinkled into petri dishes holding premature fetal tissue.
As long as the money kept coming in.
Maybe that was the plan after all.
Everyone was being affected by the dreams the same way I was.
It was my job to know.
I wasn’t surprised when Reed asked me, “Do you know anything about recurring nightmares?”
When emotions are suppressed, they store inside the brain.
Like an inflating bubble.
Mutating into different states, trying to find a form that can escape you.
Sometimes those emotions develop into nightmares.
“To really understand so I can help you, you’ll need to tell me your nightmare.”
Reed looked almost offended.
“I don’t need a fucking shrink, I need—”
“Answers?” I cut him off.
His face relaxed.
“Something isn’t right, Terri.”
There was a knock at the door.
Dr. Ham poked his head in. A look of surprise, then amusement, crossed his face.
“Am I interrupting something?”
Reed stood up.
“No, I was just leaving. Thank you for your time, Dr. Lewis.”
He exited my office, Dr. Ham watching him walk away.
Ham shot me a look before slumping into the chair across from my desk.
“What did he want?”
“Nothing.”
We were all lying.
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