Never to Tell, Never to Hear - SCP Foundation

You already know how this is going to end

AstersQuill

⚠️ Content warning: This article contains the following topic:

Allusion to child abuse and death, hanging, and burning alive

If these topics are upsetting to you, please refrain from reading this article.

Thank you.

Never to Tell, Never to Hear by AstersQuill - Author Page

⚠️ content warning

Your name was once Freckles, a wayward child born under the constellation of the cat, and your dreams were full of death.

All the little boys and girls and other, more secret things born into the circus were given a stage name when they joined. Your siblings of the circus walked the grounds with names like Pogo, served concessions and ushered seats with the name Wally, and carefully fed the lame lion with the name Snoots.

But you were Freckles, on account of the white speckles that dotted your shifting, cosmic-grey skin. This was a name you knew, even before you were born, long before you discovered how you knew it. Everything was dark when you learned who you were, not a sight nor sound nor smell in your surroundings, adrift in a seemingly endless space. When, out of luck alone, your infantile foot brushed something more solid, you found yourself confronted with an overload of sensory information that would have made you cry if you could, if only you had the ability to. You saw inky figures standing around you, tending to you, while one with an almost regal air about him smiled with sharkish grin as he announced you "Freckles." And shortly after, you were born.

The circus, whose name changed as frequently as the towns that hosted it, was nothing more than a collection of tents and ramshackle structures that would be pushed over by the average day's wind. It was in one of these tents, just close enough to concessions to smell the saltiness of popcorn and just far enough away from the animals to not smell their dung, that you spent most of your early days. Your eyes strained against the soiled red and white canvas that hung overhead, but, lucky for you, you would find more than enough respite from it while pressed against your mother's chest, hand gripped tight around her ringless finger. You were content with this; no greater love than warmth, no better assurance of that love than touch.

Oftentimes, your few moments of consciousness were spent wrapped in decorative cloths that bore a striking difference to those of the circus around them; sovereign red and gold blankets adorned with cats, contrasted to hastily stitched costumes of burlap.

But while your hand was gripped around your mother's finger, you found yourself slipping into a mosaic of dreams and nightmares, realities appearing and disappearing to you as the many threads of rope. With as much focus and strength as your body would allow you, you reached out to the closest strands.

You watched as a man with a regal blue jacket lurked just from a distance, watching as a mother raised her child. He wrote down its measurements each birthday, anointed it with oils and tinctures of extraplanar origin, and celebrated with hedonistic delight when the child learned of its gift.

You watched another scene: a mother holds her child, half-dead in her arms, and pleads for someone, anyone, to save it. A man with a blue jacket emblazoned with a winged creature cuts through the increasingly smoking scene, ending just as a hand reaches towards her.

The pictures leave nearly as quickly as the pain arrived, and you released your mother's finger with the wailing of tears. She attempts to sing you a song to calm you, but your cries only grew louder. It is only after she places a small, brass music box next to you, that your tears faded away. You slowly drifted to sleep to the sound of its alien song.

The moment you rose to your two feet, you were inducted into the everyday life of the family; there was always work to be done, regardless of the size of the hands doing it. The space was vast, almost labyrinthine in it composition, designed to entice and lure circusgoers to peel back the curtains to discover what was inside. It was a joyous place for a budding mind, especially one such as yours that was always viewed as "overactive." You thought often of what you thought were your dreams, quickly running and tucking yourself into bed to see them again. But you never did.

Even still, you learned what the rules of the show were very early on; you knew not to poke the man-bear as he slept, nor frighten the fractal-like contortionists, nor steal the seemingly infinite length of handkerchief the painted performers held in small, shimmering portals just beneath their wrists. That would incur the wrath of the Ringleader, whose blue, tasseled-jacket and shined gold pins demanded the attention of the crowds.

To be on the man's good side was to be praised, to potentially be granted entry to his inner circle that would relish in the fruits of the circus. To be on his bad side, though…

The man was once lauded in some far off place for his skill of jumping through rings of fire unharmed. It was a skill for which he bore a deep pride, for which he credited his entire existence. A skill he made those who stepped out of line attempt to repeat. Oftentimes, they would walk around the circus singed, burned, bearing the scars of a man forcing others to relive his prime.

One night during the slow season when you were between cities, you decided to mimic your mother’s techniques on one of your "brothers", stealing an old guidebook that was tucked on a shelf in her stall just above the muddy ground.

Your mother was the circus' fortune teller, a cheiromancer to be exact, and a skilled one at that. You watched her read the fortunes off the calloused palms of the blue collar workers that stopped by the circus after their shifts for a cheap show and even cheaper beer, and off of the smooth palms of people who hadn't known hardship in their life. The circus was a great equalizer; a place of life, potential death, taxes, and fate.

You and your "brother" snuck into Miriam’s A-Mazing Maze of Mirrors, crouching down into one of the corners only the unluckiest of guests would find themselves in. A majority of the frames were rusted, with the reflective surfaces either cracked or smudged as people felt their way around the space. In the distance, you could hear the cries of a child, before another loud thud fills the space. They would never find you, nor could they perceive you if they did. Your form, as usual, was covered in concealing layers that revealed only your dim, pupilless eyes that refracted in the decaying mirrors.

Most thought it was just part of an act; a perceived artistic commentary on how the concealing layers and the grey skin served as a statement on the hidden, yet foundational work done by the behind-the-scenes workers of the show. Your mother joked to the more inquisitive guests that she was a prophet who served a shadow from a far off land of plenty now lost to historical records. Or, at least you thought it was a joke. Normalcy at the cost of a white lie, a fact you would become well acquainted with soon.

You were barely able to cup his hand in yours before you felt the visions rush into your head. In an instant, it seemed you were able to know every detail about his life from the moment your hand clasped his wrist to the moment he closed his eyes forever. It was almost as if a thread had unraveled itself to you, though not nearly as long of a thread as you would have expected. In the reflection of the mirror, you watched your form change; not in the usual funhouse way of being compressed or bent, but in the way that where you once were in the mirrors, someone new was staring back under the rags. The last thing you remember before your head hit the floor was the warm, metallic taste of blood that dripped down your face from your nose.

When you finally woke up hours later in your rough cot, you found yourself returned to the normal you were used to. However, two figures hovered over your half-conscious form: your mother, whose expression was one of horror, and the Ringleader, who grinned from ear to ear at the prospect of his prophetic windfall.

Your name was once Oriana, the promised blessing, the dawn. Named after an exiled oracle long forgotten and spoken of even less.

When the circus arrived to the outskirts of another city you didn't bother to learn the name of, you found your role in the family changed.

Overnight, a small shack was constructed for you on the other side of the circus, at a point as far from your mother and as close to the Ringleader's tent as possible. It was made with the best half-rotted wood and torn cloth that could be found, but specks of glitter and fresh paint made the structure somewhat pleasing to the eye. Within waited not only a new costume, one that exposed much of your arms and face to the world. You believed this to be the first day of your new life.

Your mother and the Ringleader also waited for you there, the expression on her face not nearly as bright as the one the man standing next to her wore.

She held in her hands a large tome, not the one you stole previously, but one of more ancient build. It was written in a collection of runes and symbols you saw only in quick half-glances into the Ringleader's tent, and she spoke in a tongue only bitterly heard there before. Importantly, within the collection of yellowed-pages, you learned the rules of not only divination, but of fate itself as your mother did from her mother, in the place she refers to simply as "home."

Rule #1 of Divining: Unless asked, matters of death are not to be shared freely.

Most patrons were more focused on the mundane questions; it was much more important to the average circusgoer to see if they would experience some unexpected fortune than to dare question their own mortality.

You didn't have that luxury of ignorance, however, but all gifts come with a price, the Ringleader assured you.

Truthfully, you thought yourself grateful for the new life that was afforded to you; you lived in much better conditions compared to your siblings, spending less time doing menial tasks and more time studying to understand what you have now become. You missed the physicality of it all, being able to dance among dry hay and sand or even just being able to laugh at the interesting stories from the day.

Now, those dances only happen in private, lest the inquisitive eyes of the Ringleader find you, his new prodigy, not playing its role. Even your siblings, your promised family, shied away from you, fearful that the sword hanging over your head may cut them too.

Life was simpler before you learned you could tell the future, before your mother began looking at you with a quiet sadness, and before you were whisked away by the Ringleader to learn about your "home" and an impossible to pronounce language and how you, barely an adolescent, would be the key to bring them back to it all.

It felt wrong to be ungrateful about a gift, but sometimes you wished you could simply act your own age again.

A girl, not much older than you, came to visit one day with her father. Seeing someone her age being held to such high regard was instantly captivating, and her father produced the last few, fading bills from his wallet so his daughter would remember the night fondly. Her name was Emily, though she thought you a friend and told you to call her "Emmy" instead. She giggled excitedly as your form shifted before her, the sudden weight of curly, auburn hair now sitting on your shoulder. She asked, as all girls her age did, about school, about middle school crushes, and finally, if she would lead a long, happy life.

You prayed that night hoping there was a reality where she would.

Rule #2 of Divining: The future happens when it's meant to, never sooner nor later.

The inches of white snow covering the fairground brought an unplanned hiatus to the circus, so you used this time to… experiment with your gift. Truthfully, you had grown jaded over visions of life or death, and you instead began to relish the other, more interesting facts of fate.

So you gathered secrets, both using your gift and not, building your own spider web amongst the shuddering metal pipes and damp ropes of the circus. While taking the form of a lame lion, you discovered affairs between acrobats, while collecting firewood with some of your "siblings", you learned about the pickpocketing schemes of hands only believed to be holding concessions. They warned of a man in a blue jacket, one that watched all the performers with a prying eye and asked far too many questions to not be searching for something. You tucked these insights into the back of your mind for later.

But one day, the Ringleader invited you to his tent, an ill omen for those who had proven themselves to be significant, and a privilege for those who returned. His tent was more akin to a king's bedroom; running water, enough space heaters to blunt the bite of the cold winter's air, and a collection of filigree and ornate artifacts of gold and jewel, bearing the forms of cats and foxes and bears and wolves all bound in rope.

He sat on a red and gold tasseled couch, idly swirling a chalice filled to the brim with a deep, amber liquid. Your mother sat across from him on a similar seat, stiff, seemingly ready to spring out of the tent if only given a signal to do so. It seemed the hollow thud of your boots on the wooden planks was not that signal, and you could see the light fade from her pupilless eyes as the Ringleader hailed you forward.

"Welcome, Oriana. How would you like to help me return to our home?"

You noticed the seats were arranged in a way that you could not reach out to take your mother's hand, but you were close enough to take the man's. Once you were… comfortably seated, the man placed his drink on the table and stood up, holding his hand out to you. Then, in a language you were still largely unfamiliar with, he spoke.

Oh, fortune teller, take my hand;

Read the weaves, untie the strands.

Oh, fortune teller, be our hope;

I seek the King bound in rope.

Oh, fortune teller, lead the way;

His court waits for the promised day.

Oh, fortune teller, heed my call;

Watch me climb, see me fall.

So, as you would for any other person attempting to peer into their fate, you took the man's hand, slowly shifting into his form. You felt the unkempt, patchy beard on his face, his bruised and taped together knee, and the subtle but haunting weight in his chest that caused him to hide wheezes with a performer's smile. And before you, in your mind's eye, was the man's thread. It was frayed and knotted, multiple loose strands burning away to a bright flash, and then nothingness. You saw fantastic success, tragic failure; he would never receive the prize he sought.

The Ringleader listened to your words closely, scanning for any sign of trickery or hesitation. As much as it crossed your mind to do so, there simply wasn't a point. What use was lying in the face of a more dramatic truth? To this, all the man could do was laugh; a chuckle at first that grew boisterous in nature. Out of the corner of your eye you watched your mother grip her chair tighter, bracing herself for what came next.

The man's hand gripped your wrist tightly, causing you to break concentration, to lose sight of the small details, and return to your form. The man lifted you to your tiptoes, and you met his eyes, seeing within them the same desperation you saw in the many caged animals that rested but a few tents over. He cursed you, he wailed, and he broke down and prayed, seeking penance from the liquor in his chalice. But you knew this would happen, and you knew that when he would finally set you down that as you were rubbing the pain from your wrist, the man would be setting in motion the very decisions that would lead to his ruin.

Your new name is Vesper, a curse, a promised ending. A name given out of hatred. The last light of evening before the day slips into the night.

You once believed that fate was kind to its wielders, that somehow knowing what was going to happen would, in turn, mean better things were going to happen.

Rule #3 of Divining: knowing fate won't give you the power to change it.

One night, under the soft glow of the worm moon, your presence was once again requested by the Ringleader. The months following your last encounter were not kind on the man; he grew skeletal, leading more of a funeral march than a circus. He took out his fading ire on you and your family. Day after day you talked of fortune, of love, of bitter tragedy all the while hiding the several bloodstained rags and medication needed to ease the strain. Blood, sweat, and tears at a price, one you were blind to the fact you would be paying.

The man awaited you in the main tent, pacing alone in the show's space, coil of rope in hand. He smiled as you approached, and you could more clearly see what he was holding: a noose. The arena was empty besides the man, rough sigils carved in the dry, woodchip floor, and a ring on a tall base, slick with oil, aflame. The ring was much smaller than any you had seen prior, just wide enough for a small dog to pass through and little more.

"Ladies and Gentlemen, boys and girls, children of all ages! The star of our show finally arrives."

You tried to turn and run, but you felt a noticeable shift in the air, now much heavier around you. The exits were blocked, there was no way out.

"Vesper, my dear dear child. You were promised for so much more but, alas; we cannot choose what fate has in store for us."

The man stepped closer, brandishing a curved dagger in his free hand.

"But none of that matters now. Me, your mother, everyone here will finally be given the chance to return to paradise, to our home, to Alagadda. Sometimes I even pity the fact you won't live to see it."

You knew there was no fighting the man; even in his weaker state, he had both the height and strength to run you down. The room grew silent as you circled one another, and your eyes were fixed squarely on how his feet dragged through the woodchips, while yours seemingly glided atop them. You tried to think back to how the scene played out in your head, how you told the man this scene would end just months prior. And then you felt it: the heat of the ring at your back, oil hissing and screaming as if poured on the flame by some hidden decanter.

"You know, Vesper, our show is one of misdirection, a spectacle of lies to people who have no choice but to believe. Years upon years of jumping through hoops and I was not a single step closer to my goal, but the crowds loved me. They loved you too, you know. You could have been a star if only you had given me what I wanted."

The man stepped forward and reached out to grab you, but you stepped to the side.

"But that's the thing about stars, isn't it? Eventually they all burn out."

He threw out the rope, the heavy knot catching you on the side of the head, knocking you to the ground. The man, triumphant, limped over to you as you attempted to come to, but your vision was fading. He lifted you up by your collar, murder and fire in his eyes. You thrashed and attempted to break his hold, but to no avail.

"Oh, fortune teller, take me home. I hope you rot amongst the loam."

With all your remaining strength, you reached out to something, anything that you could use to escape, your hand catching the burning ring beside you. The oil and flames bit at your hand, but it did not matter. You watched the ground around you ignite. The man, bewildered, dropped you, as the flames slowly began to overtake him. How fitting it was that this would be his undoing, a career born and ended by the flame. Ash to ash, dust to dust.

You awoke under the collapsed structure of what was once the main tent. The air reeked of burnt corn and sulfur, fading perfumes and rotted oak. You tried to lift the heap of boards off yourself but found that you simply were too weak to muster the strength to do so. You wondered if your mother had seen this as your death, but you knew she was bound to the same rules as you. You hoped that, wherever she was in this moment, she could come to terms with the fact that it wasn't her fault. Resigned to this being your end, you closed your eyes as the heat rose around you.

Rule #4 of Divining: Those who see the future of other's are never to tell, nor hear, their own.

Fate, it seemed, had other plans for you, though. For although you saw this scene play out before, you missed a much larger picture.

Your mother already knew of these events when you were practicing with her, you could tell she wasn't telling the full truth to you. You knew what the future would hold, sure, but it's in the small details where fate truly manifests; a water droplet off target can erode a stone down enough to cause a landslide, a reflection of the light at an angle just right enough to cause a driver to swerve, dodging a nail that would have prevented them from being there to meet their newborn. And it was in your mother's secret that your future was made.

You heard the scraping of board above you, and the sound of two people frantically talking to one another, focused entirely on pulling out of the wreckage what they seemingly knew was there. When they finally unearthed you, your mother lifted you from the ground and embraced you, a man in a blue jacket caught his breath on the side.

At a distance, fate often obfuscates the clarity of events, leaving diviners to rely on only a few pronounced details in their observations, details only trained and focused eyes can see. As you swayed between life and death at your mother's side, you got a better look at the man before you: he was younger, and had short black hair that was now sprinkled grey with ash. Most importantly, he wore a blue, nylon jacket emblazoned with the emblem of an eagle.

You don't remember much outside of that, though you never thought that moment would be the last you saw of your mother, at least for a while. In a final act of mother's love she gave you to the only people who would allow you to live a relatively normal life, a chance to live outside of the show's spotlight. You travelled from city to city, Des Moines to Boise, Portland to Portland to Portland, each time finding people not unlike you, not unlike the other members of the circus.

It was among those people that you found yourself drawn to the stage, finally free to dance and act and fly. There was a monologue that you held close to you, one you picked up during a brief stopover in London, Ohio.

All the world's a stage,

And all the men and women merely players;

To you, life had been nothing but one, elaborate show. It only seemed fitting that, when given the opportunity to do so, you would begin the next act of your life as a player in that show, seeking providence in your new beginning. Seeking those secrets that twisted predictions ever so slightly. Who knew what the future would bring for you, Vesper. Who knew what the show would have in store for you next.

The Noble Knight Thompson and The Beast of Crimson

Echoes of a Forgotten Shutter

Coming Soon...