History Main / ThePursuingNightmare

** In "Chapter Seven," the Devil -- now in the form of Lenny -- traps Syd and Kerry in a ruined illusion of the Asylum, then begins hunting them down for fun. [[spoiler:Ultimately, a combination of David's power, Rudy's HeroicSacrifice, and Cary using a halo machine to trap the Devil inside David's mind end the chase, releasing the dreamers from captivity.]]
** Subverted in the second season, in which David and the Devil have gained enough power to drop the hunting aspect of their relationship altogether. From now on, the Devil, AKA [[spoiler:Amahl Farouk the Shadow King]] is more than happy to challenge his opponent to [[BattleInTheCenterOfTheMind psychic battles for supremacy]].
* ''Series/StrangerThings'': [[spoiler:[[BigBad Vecna]] cannot easily leave the Upside Down on his own, so, in order to compensate for this, he forces people into a sleep and then chases them in their dreams. He traps his unlucky victim in a nightmare that they cannot wake up from, and then continually haunts and pursues them, calling them by name repeatedly before the deed is done. Once Vecna corners his target, he'll lift them off of the air, and then use his PsychicPowers to [[BodyHorror contort their body into all sorts of unnatural shapes]], which affect the living body as well. Once he is done, the victim is reduced to nothing but a black, contorted husk. Dustin even compares Vecna's murder methods to that of [[Franchise/ANightmareOnElmStreet Freddy Kreuger's]].]]

[[folder:Puppet Shows]]
* ''Series/FraggleRock'': In "The New Trash Heap in Town", all the Fraggles have been [[PlaguedByNightmares having a recurring nightmare]] since Gobo got his leg thumped after a particularly violent encounter in the Gorgs' garden. The NightmareSequence shows Junior sledgehammering his way into the Rock, crawling in amidst screams of terrified Fraggles, and beginning, on all fours, to chase them.
-->'''Junior:''' ''[laughing maniacally]'' Okay, you Fraggles! I've busted in here, and now I'm gonna thump all your legs!
[[/folder]]

* ''Series/FraggleRock'': In "The New Trash Heap in Town", all the Fraggles have been [[PlaguedByNightmares having a recurring nightmare]] since Gobo got his leg thumped after a particularly violent encounter in the Gorgs' garden. The NightmareSequence shows Junior [[DropTheHammer sledgehammering his way into the Rock]], crawling in amidst screams of terrified Fraggles, and beginning, on all fours, to chase them.

* ''WesternAnimation/RickAndMorty'': Parodied in "[[Recap/RickAndMortyS1E2LawnmowerDog Lawnmower Dog]]" with Scary Terry, who is a rather insecure [[Franchise/NightmareOnElmStreet Freddy Krueger]] CaptainErsatz encountered in one of the deepest dreams accessed. He ''will'' chase potential victims relentlessly... but is at a complete loss when Rick and Morty just hide from him instead.

* ''Series/StrangerThings'': [[spoiler:[[BigBad Vecna]] cannot easily leave the Upside Down on his own, so, in order to compensate for this, he forces people into a sleep and then chases them in their dreams. He traps his unlucky victim in a nightmare that they cannot wake up from, and then continually haunts and pursues them, calling them by name repeatedly before the deed is done. Once Vecna corners his target, he'll lift them off of the air, and then use his PsychicPowers to [[BodyHorror contort their body into all sorts of unnatural shapes]], which affect the living body as well. Once he is done, the victim is reduced to nothing but a black, contorted husk. Dustin even compares Vecna's murder methods to that of [[Franchise/NightmareOnElmStreet Freddy Kreuger's]].]]

* ''Series/FraggleRock'': In "The New Trash Heap in Town", all the Fraggles have been having a [[RecurringDreams recurring nightmare]] since Gobo got his leg thumped after a particularly violent encounter in the Gorgs' garden. The NightmareSequence shows Junior [[DropTheHammer sledgehammering his way into the Rock]], crawling in amidst screams of terrified Fraggles, and beginning, on all fours, to chase them.

* ''Series/FraggleRock'': In "The New Trash Heap in Town", all the Fraggles have been having a recurring nightmare since Gobo got his leg thumped after a particularly violent encounter in the Gorgs' garden. The NightmareSequence shows Junior [[DropTheHammer sledgehammering his way into the Rock]], crawling in amidst screams of terrified Fraggles, and beginning, on all fours, to chase them.

* ''Series/FraggleRock'': In "The New Trash Heap in Town", all the Fraggles have been having a recurring nightmare since Gobo got his leg thumped after a particularly violent encounter in the Gorgs' garden. The NightmareSequence shows Junior sledgehammering his way into the Rock, crawling in amidst screams of terrified Fraggles, and beginning, on all fours, to chase them.

* ''Series/FraggleRock'': In "The New Trash Heap in Town", all the Fraggles have been having a recurring nightmare since Gobo got his leg thumped after a particularly violent encounter in the Gorgs' garden. The NightmareSequence shows Junior sledgehammering his way into the Rock, crawling in amidst screams of terrified Fraggles, and beginning, on all fours, to chase them.
-->'''Junior:''' ''[laughing maniacally]'' Okay, you Fraggles! I've busted in here, and now I'm gonna thump all your legs!

->''That's right, my little fish, just keep swimming away. There are no boundaries in dreams, no restrictions from one's own physical body. You have entered a new world, where the spirit is free and that freedom is limitless, EVEN FOR SOMEONE '''LIKE ME! HA HA HA HA HA!''' ''
-->--'''The Thief,''' ''Anime/{{Paprika}}''

[[folder:Anime & Manga]]
* In the anime adaptation of ''Literature/{{Paprika}}'', Atsuko/Paprika is eventually able to confront the BigBad responsible for stealing the DC Mini -- namely [[spoiler:Chairman Inui]]... only to find too late that [[DreamWithinADream she's still dreaming]], and Paprika finds her DreamWeaver powers outmatched for the first time in the story, leaving her with no choice but to leg it. The whole thing quickly descends into a nightmare, with the thief's crawling vines chasing her through the corridors, the thief's accomplice following her into artworks to block her escape, and the thief himself countering her mermaid form by becoming a leviathan that swallows her whole and spits her into the Parade Dream.
[[/folder]]

* ''Film/{{Dreamscape}}''. When Alex enters the President's dream to protect him from Tommy Ray, Tommy attacks and pursues them within the dream, taking on various forms including that of a ninja and a snakeman, while also sending zombies and wolves to hound them as well.

* ''Franchise/ANightmareOnElmStreet'': This is a popular tactic of [[BigBad Freddy Krueger]] throughout the franchise, for in the event that he doesn't just torture a dreamer to death on the spot, he enjoys slowly hunting his victims across his labyrinthine boiler room -- or kicking up the pace into a literally nightmarish pursuit through dreams. Indeed, [[Film/ANightmareOnElmStreet1984 the first film]] begins with Tina being stalked through the boiler room, and it's not until their second meeting that a proper chase ensues. Worse still, Freddy's NightmareWeaver powers allow him to complicate the pursuits by teleporting, turning himself into a monster, or just delaying his victims in some way -- as Nancy discovers in the first film when the floor under her feet turns to glue.

-->?I dreamed I was you. Well, I was me, but I was you too. And something was chasing you. Me.?
-->"Well, did it get us?"

* In the Literature/{{Discworld}} novel ''Literature/{{Hogfather}}'', Mr Teatime's heist crew find out the hard way that [[EldritchLocation the Tooth Fairy's Castle]] defends itself by conjuring up manifestations of their own worst childhood dreams. At least two of the party are chased down by their respective monsters, and one is so left terrified during the pursuit that he loses his footing on the spiral staircase and falls to his death. On the upside, they can't actually die in the Castle, as it's a mystical realm based on the imagination of children, so death has no meaning there... but on the downside, that just means that the victims are teleported back to reality, where they promptly die from their injuries anyway.

* ''Series/DoctorWho'': In "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS31E7AmysChoice Amy's Choice]]," the Doctor, Amy, and Rory all find themselves in two wildly differing scenarios by [[DreamWeaver the Dream Lord]] and are forced to guess which story is a dream before it kills them. While one features the TARDIS being slowly frozen, the other is set in a small country town where Amy and Rory have settled after their adventures with the Doctor ended... and it's currently being invaded by [[WhenEldersAttack the Eknodines]]. Here, the Doctor and co find themselves [[SelfParody once again]] running from aliens, for though the Eknodines [[LowSpeedChase can't move very fast]], they never abandon their pursuit. Worse still, all three characters will fall asleep and [[DreamWithinADream wake up in the other scenario]] the moment they hear birdsong -- which can happen at ''any'' time, ''including'' when the Eknodines are in danger of catching up, to the point that the Doctor has to force himself to stay awake until he can lock himself in a storeroom. [[spoiler:The twist is that ''both'' scenarios are dreams.]]

* ''Series/{{Farscape}}:'' In "[[Recap/FarscapeS03E16RevengingAngel Revenging Angel]]," Crichton is left comatose after a violent altercation with D'Argo, resulting in [[AdventuresInComaland a dream scenario]] in which he tries to survive being hunted down by an imaginary D'Argo while resisting the urge to just take revenge. Crichton can [[DreamWeaver partly control the dream]] by [[ToonTransformation turning himself and everything around him into cartoons]], but though his roadrunner act can keep imaginary D'Argo on the ropes for a little while, his attempts always end with the funny cartoon adventure degenerating into horror as his pursuer corners and temporarily kills him. [[spoiler:In the end, Crichton goes on the offensive through cartoonish traps and refuses the call to revenge, awakening from his coma without losing himself.]]

* ''Series/{{Legion}}:''

[[folder:Puppet Shows]]
* ''Series/FraggleRock'': In "The New Trash Heap in Town", all the Fraggles have been having a recurring nightmare since Gobo got his leg thumped after a particularly violent encounter in the Gorgs' garden. The NightmareSequence shows Junior sledgehammering his way into the Rock, crawling in amidst screams of terrified Fraggles, and beginning, on all fours, to chase them.
-->'''Junior:''' ''[laughing maniacally]'' Okay, you Fraggles! I've busted in here, and now I'm gonna thump all your legs!
[[/folder]]

* ''VideoGame/ResidentEvilVillage'': During the visit to the Beneviento Estate, Ethan Winters' falls under [[MasterOfIllusion Lady Donna]]'s hallucinatory influence, resulting in a nightmare in which he's stripped of his weapons, trapped in the basement, and chased by a giant fetus-like monster. [[InvincibleBoogeymen It can't be hurt or harmed in any way]], so Ethan has no choice but to run until his pursuer is out of reach, hide when it shows signs of catching up, and find a way of escaping the basement.

* ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic:'' Inverted in "Do Princesses Dream of Magic Sheep?" in which the protagonists must pursue the Tantabus nightmare across the dreamscape when it escapes Princess Luna's mind.
* ''WesternAnimation/RickAndMorty'': Parodied in "[[Recap/RickAndMortyS1E2LawnmowerDog Lawnmower Dog]]" with Scary Terry, who is a rather insecure Freddy Krueger knockoff encountered in one of the deepest dreams accessed. He ''will'' chase potential victims relentlessly... but is at a complete loss when Rick and Morty just hide from him instead.

** In the finale, Mal raises the possibility that Cobb never awoke from their initial dream exploration of Limbo, and that he's been dreaming all this time -- even suggesting that the law enforcement agencies and corporate hitsquads that have been hunting him around the world were really just Projections, casting the frantic chase scene in Mumbai in an entirely different light. [[spoiler:It's soon confirmed that Cobb ''did'' awake from that particular dream and is actually being haunted by Mal's shade for the lengths he went to in order to awaken them from Limbo.]]

* ''Series/DoctorWho'': In "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS31E7AmysChoice Amy's Choice]]," the Doctor, Amy, and Rory all find themselves in two wildly differing scenarios by [[DreamWeaver the Dream Lord]] and forced to guess which story is a dream before it kills them. While one features the TARDIS being slowly frozen, the other is set in a small country town where Amy and Rory have settled after their adventures with the Doctor ended... and it's currently being invaded by [[WhenEldersAttack the Eknodines]]. Here, the Doctor and co find themselves [[SelfParody once again]] running from aliens, for though the Eknodines [[LowSpeedChase can't move very fast]], they never abandon their pursuit. Worse still, all three characters will fall asleep and [[DreamWithinADream wake up in the other scenario]] the moment they hear birdsong -- which can happen at ''any'' time, ''including'' when the Eknodines are in danger of catching up, to the point that the Doctor has to force himself to stay awake until he can lock himself in a storeroom. [[spoiler:The twist is that ''both'' scenarios are dreams.]]

* ''Series/FraggleRock'': In "The New Trash Heap in Town", all the Fraggles have been having a recurring nightmare since Gobo got his leg thumped after a particulary violent encounter in the Gorgs' garden. The NightmareSequence shows Junior sledgehammering his way into the Rock, crawling in amidst screams of terrified Fraggles, and beginning, on all fours, to chase them.

* In ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaLinksAwakening'', it is revealed that [[spoiler:every monster in the game is this, since Koholint Island is actually a dream of the Wind Fish. Link dying against them will cause him to die in real life, and they will never stop coming after him because he will cause the island to vanish if he wakes the Wind Fish up]].

** In the final level, Raz is pitted against the Butcher, the nightmarish memory of [[spoiler:Coach Oleander's father]]. Not only is this gigantic monstrosity immune to Raz's psi powers, but the camera is oriented towards him, railroading the player into a chase sequence in which Raz must stay one step ahead of the Butcher until he gets one of his knives stuck in the ground, allowing Raz to clamber up his arm and attack his head up close. Things only get worse when [[spoiler:the nightmare incarnation of Raz's dad]] teams up with the Butcher and even ''merges'' with him. As such, it's not until the very end, when [[spoiler:Raz's father]] [[EleventhHourSuperpower imbues Raz with enough psychic power to give him an edge over the Butcher]] that the boss battle actually becomes a straight-up fight.

[[/folder]]

!!Examples

[[folder: Anime & Manga]]
* In the anime adaptation of ''Literature/{{Paprika}}'', Atsuko/Paprika is eventually able to confront the BigBad responsible for stealing the DC Mini - namely [[spoiler: Chairman Inui]]... only to find too late that [[DreamWithinADream she's still dreaming]], and Paprika finds her DreamWeaver powers outmatched for the first time in the story - leaving her with no choice but to leg it. The whole thing quickly descends into a nightmare, with the thief's crawling vines chasing her through the corridors, the thief's accomplice following her into artworks to block her escape, and the thief himself countering her mermaid form by becoming a leviathan that swallows her whole and spits her into the Parade Dream.

[[folder: Film - Animated]]

[[folder: Film - Live Action]]

** Extractors will eventually find themselves up against Projections of the dreamer's subconsciousness. The mental equivalent of white blood cells, they react with increasing hostility towards any intruders - even friends of the dreamer - and will grow steadily more numerous and violent in their efforts to eliminate them. Because [[ZergRush Projections are limitless in number]], Extractors have to hide somewhere out of the way while they finish their work... and if that doesn't work, all they can do is run like hell in a desperate attempt to stay ahead of the Projections - as Yusuf finds himself stuck doing in Level 1 of the heist.
** Mal, the LivingMemory of Dom Cobb's wife, regularly pursues him whenever he dreams and sabotages any job he's assigned to. For good measure, it's not uncommon for her to chase and corner Cobb's allies in sequences that range from tense to outright nightmarish - even teaming up with a mob of Projections in Ariadne's training session so she can stab the apprentice architect to death.
** In the finale, Mal raises the possibility that Cobb never awoke from their initial dream exploration of Limbo, and that he's been dreaming all this time - even suggesting that the law enforcement agencies and corporate hitsquads that have been hunting him around the world were really just Projections, casting the frantic chase scene in Mumbai in an entirely different light. [[spoiler: It's soon confirmed that Cobb ''did'' awake from that particular dream and is actually being haunted by Mal's shade for the lengths he went to in order to awaken them from Limbo.]]

* ''Franchise/ANightmareOnElmStreet'': This is a popular tactic of [[BigBad Freddy Krueger]] throughout the franchise, for in the event that he doesn't just torture a dreamer to death on the spot, he enjoys slowly hunting his victims across his labyrinthine boiler room - or kicking up the pace into a literally nightmarish pursuit through dreams. Indeed, [[Film/ANightmareOnElmStreet1984 the first film]] begins with Tina being stalked through the boiler room, and it's not until their second meeting that a proper chase ensues. Worse still, Freddy's NightmareWeaver powers allow him to complicate the pursuits by teleporting, turning himself into a monster, or just delaying his victims in some way - as Nancy discovers in the first film when the floor under her feet turns to glue.
* ''Film/TheNightHouse'': Beth finds creeper shots taken by her husband, Owen, of a woman who looks just like her. She tracks the woman, Madelyne down, and it's revealed that Owen was ostensibly thinking about an affair. Only he wasn't - he was tracking the women to bring them to the house and kill them. Beth freaks out Madelyne, but she eventually tells Beth a story that, the night before, she dreamed of Beth (who was her) and someone was chasing them.

[[folder: Literature]]

[[folder: Live-Action TV]]
* ''Series/DoctorWho'': In "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS31E7AmysChoice Amy's Choice]]," the Doctor, Amy, and Rory all find themselves in two wildly differing scenarios by [[DreamWeaver the Dream Lord]] and forced to guess which story is a dream before it kills them. While one features the TARDIS being slowly frozen, the other is set in a small country town where Amy and Rory have settled after their adventures with the Doctor ended... and it's currently being invaded by [[WhenEldersAttack the Eknodines]]. Here, the Doctor and co find themselves [[SelfParody once again]] running from aliens, for though the Eknodines [[LowSpeedChase can't move very fast]], they never abandon their pursuit. Worse still, all three characters will fall asleep and [[DreamWithinADream wake up in the other scenario]] the moment they hear birdsong - which can happen at ''any'' time, ''including'' when the Eknodines are in danger of catching up, to the point that the Doctor has to force himself to stay awake until he can lock himself in a storeroom. [[spoiler: The twist is that ''both'' scenarios are dreams.]]

* ''Series/{{Farscape}}:'' In "[[Recap/FarscapeS03E16RevengingAngel Revenging Angel]]," Crichton is left comatose after a violent altercation with D'Argo, resulting in [[AdventuresInComaland a dream scenario]] in which he tries to survive being hunted down by an imaginary D'Argo while resisting the urge to just take revenge. Crichton can [[DreamWeaver partly control the dream]] by [[ToonTransformation turning himself and everything around him into cartoons]], but though his roadrunner act can keep imaginary D'Argo on the ropes for a little while, his attempts always end with the funny cartoon adventure degenerating into horror as his pursuer corners and temporarily kills him. [[spoiler: In the end, Crichton goes on the offensive through cartoonish traps and refuses the call to revenge, awakening from his coma without losing himself.]]

** In "[[Recap/LegionS1E5Chapter5 Chapter Five]]", Syd finds herself cornered in David's mind with the Devil slowly pursuing her around it, clearly taking great delight in the fact that Syd can't escape and David is helpless to stop him. [[spoiler: Worse still, getting ensnared by the Devil results in Syd, David, and the rest of the mutants getting dragged into a NightmareOfNormality set in Clockworks Asylum.]]
** In "Chapter Seven," the Devil - now in the form of Lenny - traps Syd and Kerry in a ruined illusion of the Asylum, then begins hunting them down for fun. [[spoiler: Ultimately, a combination of David's power, Rudy's HeroicSacrifice, and Cary using a halo machine to trap the Devil inside David's mind end the chase, releasing the dreamers from captivity.]]
** Subverted in the second season, in which David and the Devil have gained enough power to drop the hunting aspect of their relationship altogether. From now on, the Devil, AKA [[spoiler: Amahl Farouk the Shadow King]] is more than happy to challenge his opponent to [[BattleInTheCenterOfTheMind psychic battles for supremacy]].

[[folder: Video Games]]

* ''VideoGame/NeverendingNightmares'': Because Thomas can't fight back against the monsters, he can only evade if he wants to avoid [[DreamWithinADream waking up in yet another dream]]. He can hide when pitted against the baby monsters and [[AxCrazy the asylum patients]], but most of the time he's forced to keep moving, either staying a few steps ahead of slow-moving foes like [[CreepyDoll the dolls]] or running blindly down a corridor from the swift and deadly [[spoiler: Nightmare Thomas.]] And some threats, like the [[LivingShadow shadows]] in "Childish Things", literally can't be escaped at all. Worse still, Thomas is asthmatic and [[AthleticallyChallenged can't run very far without getting winded]], so he has to conserve his energy or run out of breath with a monster right on his heels... and in the "Wayward Dreamer" level, Thomas is even worse off as he's left struggling to outrun the same threats [[spoiler: as a ''[[FountainOfYouth child]]'' with an even ''worse'' case of asthma.]]

** In the final level, Raz is pitted against the Butcher, the nightmarish memory of [[spoiler: Coach Oleander's father]]. Not only is this gigantic monstrosity immune to Raz's psi powers, but the camera is oriented towards him, railroading the player into a chase sequence in which Raz must stay one step ahead of the Butcher until he gets one of his knives stuck in the ground, allowing Raz to clamber up his arm and attack his head up close. Things only get worse when [[spoiler: the nightmare incarnation of Raz's dad]] teams up with the Butcher and even ''merges'' with him. As such, it's not until the very end, when [[spoiler: Raz's father]] [[EleventhHourSuperpower imbues Raz with enough psychic power to give him an edge over the Butcher]] that the boss battle actually becomes a straight-up fight.

[[folder: Western Animation]]

* ''Series/HouseOfAnubis'': Senkhara, who has dream-walking powers, has appeared chasing Sibuna down the school hallways twice. She cornered Amber with no escape and came very close to cursing her with the mark of Anubis, only prevented when Nina woke her up. Later, Nina had a dream in which she ''was'' Senkhara, chasing her friends and Victor through the halls and eventually cornering a terrified Fabian and Amber in a bedroom.