Nuclear Gunpoint - SCP Foundation

by Ethagon

Ending the Nuclear Arms Race had been a full success; the only thing that remained was the paperwork.

The Defense Division still had to monitor the situation for a bit to ensure the world would not relapse into old habits, but all in all their job was done. The mystical tlanex would be once again the sole domain of the nation Tlaneyanco.

At least that's what Yaotl thought until Adrix sat down at her desk with a stack of papers.

"And what's this?"

"Irregularities. You know how I've been looking at the distribution of uranium for the last while?"

"Yeah."

"First of all, there's a high concentration of experimental nuclear power plants in this region," Adrix pointed at one of the papers in the stack. A region in North America, US was marked. "And they don't follow the trends."

"What trend?"

"The end of the Arms Race had a noticeable impact on all nuclear research, not just the weapon sector."

Yaotl looked at the data. The power plants in the region did shut down or reduce activity, but there was a delay of a few months to the start of the reduction compared with other regions.

"It's not concrete enough, this could be an imagined pattern."

"I thought so too, but look at their start points."

Yaotl turned the page. At first, the region was empty. But as soon as the first experimental power plant was completed, they began springing up one after the other, far quicker than their counterparts in other regions.

Yaotl mulled it over. "It could still be a coincidence."

"We should at least check it out."

"If this is a trick to keep the Defense Division running…"

"I just want to be thorough."

"If our Division overexerts itself we become just as much a threat to Tlaneyanco as the nations we hide from." Yaotl stared at Adrix. "But taking a look won't hurt."

It ended up taking more than a look. Each power plant they visited had already been out of commission months prior. Every dead end left more and more of the allegedly delivered uranium unaccounted for. Both Yaotl and Adrix knew what somebody might need this much uranium for.

Eventually, they found a plant that was still running. Still, the personnel seemed oblivious. All questions of relevance lead to blank stares. Where is the ordered uranium? Who managed your logistics? What sponsors do you have? All resulted in hazy non-answers.

Yaotl suspected memory manipulation. So they brought in a master of the orange flame. Adrix was skillful in the control of Tlanexmonia, but this exceeded his capabilities. A few modified refreshments later the power plant workers spilled their newly regained memories.

They had a lead.

The lead brought them to a firearms factory. Given they were dealing with an unknown actor, barging in guns blazing wasn't an option. They needed more intel.

After monitoring the arrivals and departures of the factory for a while, they found their target.

The truck was well-guarded but stood no chance to the superior technology of Tlaneyanco. As always, they left no trace.

The truck brought them four subjects to interrogate and one plant in a rusty box. Yaotl was testing multiple devices on the plant to no avail. The rest of the world would call it a Geiger Counter. They'd be wrong in so far as a 'Geiger Counter' could not distinguish between the four divine flames, merely labelling it all as 'radiation'. But whatever this plant was, it was unrelated to any of them.

A door opened.

"One of them is willing to talk now."

Adrix left Yaotl to the device and went into the interrogation room.

Before her was a distraught man in a lab coat.

"So, who are you working for."

The man looked up at him. "Foundation."

"What foundation?"

"I… I don't know. They never told me."

"What were you transporting?"

"I was never told its properties, I was just sent to observe."

"Observe what?"

"Unusual properties during the transport." Adrix gave him a hard look. "Nothing happened. It stayed in the rusted cage." The man jolted up. "Did you open it? The object must be kept in a rusted cage at all times."

"Oh? What happens if we open it."

The nervousness returned. "That is above my clearance level. But it was implied it would be dangerous to let it escape."

Adrix could not think of anything created by tlanex that could cause such an effect. It must really be unrelated to radiation then.

"What can you tell me about your uranium?"

"U- uranium?" The man gulped. "I don't know."

Better to be nice about this. "Well, what do you think that it is for?"

"Uranium is a normal material, I don't know why we would– oh."

"What?"

"When I was instructed about containment breaches, the um, basically a prison break, it was implied there was a 'last resort' to make sure nothing escaped the Site."

"You're dealing with a lot of dangerous implications here."

The man turned pale.

"Are you saying that your factory has a self-destruct button that uses nuclear detonation?"

"I– I don't know for sure."

They talked for a while after. It was not all that much information. The factory was a cover story for 'Site-21', a prison for abnormal entities and objects. Of other Sites, he had no knowledge.

Adrix left the interrogation room.

"You got everything out of him?" Yaotl had finished examining the plant.

"Yeah, he didn't know much. The transcript should be on your desk."

"Good." Having made a decision, Yaotl's eyes started burning with the amber flame.

"No. No! NO!" Adrix rushed back to the interrogation room, but it was too late. The researcher's head had been burnt out from the inside. The result of Yaotl's unique application of Tlanexpoloa that she had been recruited for in the first place.

"Why?"

Yaotl crossed her arms. "We can't take any risks. Not with an enemy this unknown."

"They aren't even using it for warfare!"

"It doesn't matter. They have the capacity."

"If that were enough justification we would have stopped all nuclear research. Not just the weapon aspect."

Yaotl scoffed. "Are you saying we should just let these people go without interference?"

"No, but," Adrix tried to get her thoughts in order. "I think a slower approach would be beneficial here. If they're unburdened by national concerns they might even understand the sacredness of the tlanex."

"You're always making this distinction," Yaotl said. "Tlanex when we use it and 'nuclear' when the rest of the world does. It's the same thing. We just got to it first. And I intend to keep that advantage."

Adrix was aghast at a statement so close to blasphemy.

"Either way, we should just light their own bomb remotely and be done with it."

Adrix composed herself. "We need to know more to gauge what reaction that will cause. I say we operate as usual. Slow infiltration followed by surgical strikes to guide them away from nuclear energy."

Yaotl knew she was right, even if she'd rather be done with it as soon as possible. "Fine. We infiltrate. But as soon as things go south, we're switching to my plan."

Getting in was trivial. After getting suited up, Adrix simply laid down on one of the muddier roads that the trucks of Site-21 covered. She ensured the road was just muddy enough that the car had to slow down without stopping and then attached herself to the bottom of the car. A little orange flame manipulation would ensure she would stick to it throughout the ride.

When they were in the Site proper she still hung to the car until the signal came.

All clear. That was the signal from Yaotl. They were communicating via the tlanex. As a user of the orange flame trained for this, Adrix could interpret the radiation signal directly while Yaotl had a radio able to convert the signal back to their base.

Yaotl was just as vital to this mission as Adrix. Back at the temporary base were multiple binoculars modified to see all kinds of radiation generated by the Site. Yaotl was telling her that no human was near her now.

That way they had also found out that the bomb was towards the centre at the bottom of the Site. The bomb was not their goal today.

Adrix rolled out from under the car and went into the facility proper.

As she peaked into a corridor the first thing she noticed was a state-of-the-art security camera. State-of-the-art for the rest of the world still included the occasional failure, however. Per the tlanex link, Adrix provided Yaotl with the coordinates of the camera cable relative to her.

A small amber flame appeared right next to the camera. Adrix quickly sent corrections before the camera could notice. The flame vanished and the cable sparked.

Adrix waited a moment longer. Yaotl sent her the location of where the camera cables terminated.

Unfortunately, they couldn't do this trick more than once. One malfunction would be the maximum they could get away with without raising too much suspicion.

Adrix snuck past the rest of the surveillance. Her suit changed appearance to match the wall, so even if she was caught on camera she would likely not stand out.

At one point she had to hook herself to the ceiling as security personnel walked in the direction she came from. Were they checking on the camera already? She briefly thought about sending Yaotl a message but decided against it. It wasn't unlikely she would pull the trigger even for such a minor thing. Better to carry on.

She arrived at the surveillance room.

Two people inside.

Adrix used as little of the orange flame as possible to slowly transform the closed door into an open door without making a sound. She asked Yaotl for the status of the two.

No reaction.

So they weren't looking at the door.

Both of them were sitting and not talking to each other. A trivial task to sneak up on each of them and let them smell her prepared handkerchief.

They'd just think they dosed off whenever their senses would return to them.

Time to investigate.

The monitors were each handling multiple cameras, this was really bleeding-edge technology.

She studied the footage of the Site for a while until she was sure where its archives were located. Adrix and Yaotl communicated for a while longer to reconstruct a floor plan of the Site based on the footage, then she left.

The Archives were far from her current position, but having doctored the footage, the cameras weren't a problem.

Finally, she was at the treasure cave.

The door had to be changed again to gain access. Once inside, she started reading.

Or rather, Yaotl would be. Adrix wasn't so much reading as she was dictating words via the tlanex link to the base.

She remained undisturbed for five hours.

Two. Incoming.

Adrix quickly hid before two researchers entered the room.

"The file should be up there," said the first voice.

"Is it this one?"

The first voice was silent.

"Mark?"

"You would not happen to know somebody that'd have interest in this folder, would you?"

"No?"

"Good. Because it's above the clearance level of anyone but three people here."

"Okay?"

"And it was not in this position yesterday."

That couldn't be. Adrix had put everything in exactly the way she found it. It could only be off by half a centimetre at best.

The first voice spoke into their handheld radio. "Mark here, I need you to look at the footage for the Archive for the last 24 hours. Over."

The radio was silent. Adrix tensed.

"Please respond. Over."

Silence.

The first voice cursed. "Stay in the Archive. If anything's suspicious, press the breach alarm."

"Yes, sir."

Before the owner of the first voice to could leave the room, Adrix had stepped out of her hiding place and incapacitated him. The other researcher was so shocked that he didn't have time to register being knocked out.

This was still salvageable. It was inevitable now for the Site to find out that they were breached, but not by whom. Her footage was already deleted. All that mattered now was leaving the Site undetected.

Then the handheld radio spoke up. "Mark? What is the problem?"

There was no way she could respond to this.

"Mark?"

The voice had hardened for the second call.

"Mark. Respond."

Adrix left the Archive.

From this position, her exit was only three corridors away, plus this section seemed to have next-to-no traffic, giving her–

The lights turned red. Walls rammed into existence on both sides of the corridor. An automated voice started giving orders.

Adrix sunk against the wall. She had been so close.

Site stirred up. Are you compromised?

Adrix thought about a way out of this. Could she bulldoze through the walls until she was outside? Maybe. And then what? There is no way they wouldn't tail her. No way she would make it out without revealing the tlanex.

Are you compromised?

Adrix hardened her suit.

Yes.

It took only a moment for the bomb to go off. Not in the unclean way that was the only way the rest of the world could grasp the nuclear, but in the pure amber flame of Tonatiuhtcipactli.

She just let the explosion wash over her. It wouldn't harm her as the rest of the Site caved into itself, bereft of any foundation to hold it together.

Adrix listlessly freed herself of the rubble. For the last metre a hand reached down and pulled her out. It was Yaotl.

"No time to laze around. We have to be gone before any reinforcements arrive."

Adrix looked around. She wasn't the only point of interest. They were also digging out the few imprisoned creatures that survived the shock. Yaotl had also brought the plant.

"What are you doing."

"Our ultimate goal hasn't changed. Do the best we can to discourage the use of nuclear weaponry."

The plant was set down amidst the rubble. The personnel started burying it while Yaotl engulfed it in her amber flame. The plant grew thorns and started thrashing its cage, not knowing what to do with all this new destructive energy.

"If they think the explosion just made their prisoners more dangerous, they're less likely to use it again."

Adrix stared as the plant vanished under the remains of the Site.

She sighed. "At least it's over now."

"I'm not so sure about that. This was just one Site. You were right in thinking we should infiltrate this organization so things develop as we need them to."

Yaotl moved past Adrix. "But that's for the Queen to decide. Maybe this will be the last time we hear from each other."

When the Foundation forces finally arrived, nothing even hinting at the existence of the Defense Division of Tlaneyanco remained.