Sleep Disorder

I think most, if not all of us have experienced some form of nightmare at one point or another in our lives, but personally the most terrifying kind is the experience of being attacked by a dark malevolent figure in your own bed while in a state of paralysis. Such phenomenon is widely known throughout every culture in the world and goes by many names. It has also been studied in detail by science over recent decades but while sleep disorders are well understood, it still brings to mind the state of vulnerability we enter during sleep either in the conscious world or subconscious.
I have tried to capture that unnerving feeling of vulnerability here with this scene without resorting to outright horror. The woman in bed seems to be peacefully asleep and oblivious to the looming menacing figure above her. Whether the presence is a product of the woman’s dreams or a real entity in the scene is irrelevant; the threat is obvious as well as the inescapable dread of what will happen next.