Things You See in a Graveyard - SCP Foundation

My pen scratches against the journal's pages as I write, back straining from being hunched over for so long. I don't exactly have a chair; I'm in a tent, for god's sake. This is a solo field mission.

I move my hand in a small arc, drawing bones onto the page. The curve of ribs, jutting out from the earth like a cage.

For I am camped within a graveyard.

It is not a normal cemetery, persay. It is not of marble tombstones, not of fresh flowers upon graves, not of ornate mausoleums. It is of massive, rising bones. Skulls with long, jagged teeth. Heads adorned by twin horns, or domes, or crests.

It is a resting place of ancient beasts. Their epitaphs carved into their very bones, christening them as hunters, songwriters, defenders, poets. Families and great deeds, etched into ribs. Names across skulls. All carved by careful claws millions of years ago.

And all watched by stony eyes.

Sitting next to me in my tent is a broken idol, picked up off the ground from where it had fallen.

It is akin to an archeopteryx, carved from stone. Three heads, six eyes. Wings spread open wide like a vulture basking in the sun. This one was broken, its one wing snapped from its side from when it had fallen. A leg was similarly broken, which left it unable to stand properly. I would not be able to return it to it's ancient post even if I wanted to. So I, when I had picked it up, devised to take it with me. The others back at Site-403 will likely be very enthused by the gathering of an artifact such as this. Despite its damages, it's still remarkably preserved for its age, and that's rare in this field.

There are countless other statues of this creature, all throughout the graveyard. They perch on skulls, on the peaks of ribcages. With their open, toothy jaws, widespread wings, and alert eyes, I figure them to be idols of a guardian. Not the God of Death that these ancients nary speak of in their texts, but something gentler. A protector, a guardian, a watcher of the dead.

A guide.

I put down my pen, and shift my hand to pick up the idol. It's a heavy stone, basalt, if I had to guess. Its one side more heavily eroded and moss covered than then the other after spending who knows how long fallen - but the side that had been against the ground, spared from the rain and wind, showed great and wonderous detail. Stone feathers, overlapping and almost sharp. There were bone-like ridges down the back. Its remaining clawed foot looked like it was meant to be carved bone as opposed to flesh and blood.

I begin to sketch it into my journal. Letting the thing come to rest against my water bottle- an item that it is no bigger than- so that it can stand straight.

When the sun dips below the horizon at last, I settle myself down for the night. Perhaps it is ill advised to spend overnight in an ancient graveyard, but it stretches for almost a mile. To backtrack would waste time and energy, so it was an easier task to rest here.

Hopefully the dead do not mind a temporary tenant.

The morning comes quietly, I rise from a dreamless sleep to find the idol had fallen during the night. I frown, and scoop it up. As I pack my things and prepare to keep moving, I find myself keeping it tucked under my arm. I worry it may be too fragile to keep within my bag, amongst the supplies I have brought with me.

With a swig from my water bottle, and a granola bar swiftly eaten, I set out further.

Within the cool morning, there is a thick fog. It blankets the mossy landscape, rolls over the grass and embraces the bones. It dulls their brilliant and deep browns, and turns them to shadowed figures. My tent had been set up in proximity to the massive skull of a Spinosaurus. It's long maw and massive back spine cut through the fog like an approaching ship.

I spare it a glance as I walk past, grasping my compass from around my neck to ensure I am going in the right direction- that I am continuing towards my destination.

Though I cannot see it through the din of gray, at the heart of this burial ground a massive crypt does lay. From the day before, I had seen it within the distance. It had been a tall spire- piercing the sky and carved from a dark stone not unlike the idol. Other details were hard to see, but it was built upon a hill. I will know that I am approaching when the grade of the slope changes.

But for now, I walk along flat ground. Amongst dew covered grass, past the shadows of massive bones. I find my gaze drawn to the idol again, raising it up a bit as I walk. The dew of the morning seems to have dampened part of it. The areas where it's wing and leg have broken off look wet- the stone darker and shining. I don't have much of anything to wipe away the water, though, so I leave it be.

Following the lead of the compass, I press onwards. The air is still and quiet, the fog weighing heavily everywhere around me. It could be construed as a frightening thing, but it's almost serene. Though this place is of the dead there is still life to be had. Ferns grow in the shadows cast by ancient bones, their leaves curl as I brush past. There is thick grass and lichens, gentle moss clinging to bones. From the skeleton of an exceptionally large sauropod, whose neck spans the gap of a small ravine, ivy dangles down like a curtain of deep greens.

It was going to be a long walk, but it was a beautiful one, and it will be a fruitful one. The scientists of Site-403, the Department of Paleontology, have been looking into finding more of this ancient religion. A prehistoric pantheon, so to speak. Paleotheology is the word they've begun to ascribe to it; the anomalous phenomena of dinosaur religion. This graveyard, buried deep in an old Nexus only unearthed recently, is no exception.

The search for any knowledge on their god of death has come up exceedingly dry. They nary transcribed a word of it. The general consensus was that the god was not spoken of out out fear, out of not wanting to draw it's attention. Hence why we have found no name, only epithets. They all knew its true name anyways, so why bother recording it? Why risk it?

Thus Death's name is lost, and we can barely find anything of it. But this discovery wields hope of something, anything relating to it. A colleague of mine back at the site, the archivist Dr. Wysdan, had dug up some older files for me prior to setting out on this solo-mission. Fi found that there are records of a group of individuals known as the 'Gravetenders', those who put aside the apparent social taboo of death. Those who regarded it not with scorn and fear but with respect and acceptance.

Which made them the likely makers of this place, of this graveyard, the carvers of the artifact in my hand and the crypt that lay ahead. I can hope that within will serve some sort of answer, anything to record. The knowledge would be priceless, and a glimpse into an unknown aspect of their mythology.

Speaking of, I am almost there. The flat ground turns to a slope. Amongst the fog I see an old stone path, partially overtaken by moss, and patterned with the imprints of theropod tracks. I briefly kneel down to brush my hand against one of them. They're mostly uniform in size. I wonder if it's the work of one very dedicated individual, or several of similar size and species.

The path leads further onwards, and eventually, through the fog, I see it. A massive gateway of dark stone yawns open, the doors parted. Were they left that way? Or had the elements forced their parting?

I step inside.

The first part of the structure is a massive, circular room. The edges have little shelves and benches along its curves. It is of black and white stones- likely basalt (like the idol) and perhaps marble? The floor has an interlocking pattern that looks like fishbones- thin and sharp stripes of white rock branching off in a spiral, like the bones of some great serpent that coils around a dip in the center of the room. This pattern continues to rise up, curl around pillars. The walls are all carved with the symbols of bones. Curved claws, limbs, teeth, skulls.

It takes me a moment to realize that it is not just miscellaneous patterning, not just intricacies meant to fill space, until my eyes trace all the way to the top of the high wall.

To the massive skull that crowns the ceiling.

Unlike all the other carvings, which are indents filled with white stone, this is three dimensions. The skull is that of some theropod, a tyrannosaurid if I had to guess? It's jaws are parted to reveal jagged teeth in two rows. Empty eye sockets stare down at me from their place at least 40 feet above where I stand.

I hear a faint drip-drop, drip-drop, and quiet little splashes. My gaze falls back down to the dip in the center of the room, only now realizing that there is a liquid within it. Water, perhaps? The dark stone makes it appear black as pitch, filling up the space by a few inches.

More droplets fall down from the maw above.

The three-headed idol in my hand has grown warm.

A stark contrast to the chill of the building that was beginning to work its way through my clothes. I place it down on one of the stone benches as I take out my journal and click open my pen.

I sketch out the space around me, the winding patterns of bones, the skull at the helm. With the level of extravagance to it all, I wonder if it is a symbol of something larger. A sculpture this grand can't just be a decoration. It has to be more.

I move towards the water(?) at the center of the room, its surface smooth like glass until a single droplet hits it's surface from above and spreads ripples across. My reflection shines remarkably clear within it, the dark stone at the bottom of this little pool makes the water look far deeper than it truly is. It makes the water appear as though it is a deep, deep black. The bottom of the pool had little flecks of white amongst the smooth basalt, it sparkled at the bottom like stars.

It's quite beautiful.

I can see the reflection of the skull the hangs above, too. Whenever a droplet hits the pool, it distorts the image. It looks as though it moves with each ripple. It looks like the jaw twists, or that the skull bares its teeth or turns its head this way or that. I know that it is the water, but it still makes me recoil, makes me look up at the sculpture to childishly assure myself that it has, in fact, not moved from its post.

But the idol had.

I slip my journal back onto my person once I'd satisfied my need to record, returning my pen to its place tucked behind my ear. And the three-headed statue was gone.

I whirl around, scan the circular room for any trace. Did I get turned around? Forget where it lay? It did blend in with the stone that surrounds.

My eyes are drawn back towards the center of the space when I hear a splash.

The idol is sitting in the water. It is not the still, lifeless thing it was before. The three heads click their teeth and tilt their heads. I stare warily.

Hm.

Against my better judgement, I crouch down and approach the stone construct. I watch as it dips its heads into the water- the liquid splashing it down its stony back like a bird in a birdbath. The remaining stone wing flutters.

When I get about a foot away from the edge of the water, it jolts its heads up and stares. All three heads, all six eyes.

I go still. I do not know what it is capable of. Are all the other little statues within the graveyard alive? Is it a property of the building I am within? Or a result of my disturbance of it?

The creature in the fountain does not attempt to flee, nor approach, it stares at me blankly.

A drop of water from above falls again, it hits the middle head of the idol and rolls down the side of the face, down the neck, down the stone-feather chest, to the break where the one leg once was.

Another drop.

The another.

And another.

It becomes less a single drip-drip-drop and becomes a steady stream of water from the maw above. The pool ripples and distorts in response to the new flow. I watch as the liquid (it may not be water anymore) shifts and condenses on the broken parts of the statue. It's drawn into the cracks, melts in- reforming it?

A new wing. A new leg. It is far darker than original stonework of the statue. It looks almost as though it was repaired like a kintsugi- except instead of gold, it was a deep, midnight black.

The idol jumps to the edge of the pool, hops out. It trails water behind it. The pouring from above has ceased back to the single drops. I glance back up at the skull, then back down to the statue.

"…what are you..?" my voice echoes within the acoustics of the circular room, surrounds and reverberates off the walls.

It stares at me. Wings open, then close, then open again. To see basalt move and shift like flesh and feather? It sends a shiver down my spine.

"Are you a guardian?" I ask.

It does not reply.

"Are you Death?"

It looks up at the skull, then back down to me. I do not know how to feel of that implication.

The air is cold.

"Are you a guide?"

That gets it to move significantly. The wings flap, a sound like grinding stone. The idol unhinges its three jaws and makes a low rumble. It vibrates in my chest, like the deep bass from a concert that rattles your very bones.

An unsettling thing to feel from something so small.

The creature turns, jumps, takes flight to one side of the room. I shake my head and push myself up, my limbs feeling achy now. Had I been so tired when I arrived? Had the walk really been that long?

I turn to find where the thing had went.

The idol stares at me, perched above a doorway on the far side of the room. A doorway that I had not seen upon entering.

Had it always been there?

Or had it materialized it there?

I stare up at the stonework beast, and it stares back. Three heads. Six eyes.

It drops down to land in front of the arch, then turns; it's claws clicking against the dark floor. It gets a few steps through the gate, swivels its three heads to me. Stares. Three heads. Six eyes.

It then spreads its wings. Stone feathers sliding against each other, a gentle scrapping sound.

Beckoning.

Beckoning.

Beckoning.

…

I follow.