A sample SCP-3525 manifestation, with identifying location information redacted.

The identity of the driver pictured is currently unknown.

Item #: SCP-3525

Object Class: Euclid

Special Containment Procedures: Total containment for SCP-3525 has not yet been achieved; accordingly, these procedures are still being developed and are subject to further modification as more information is gathered.

Foundation technicians have installed backdoors in all major rideshare application servers allowing them to intercept any ride pickup confirmations from perfectly-rated drivers who do not appear in those applications' servers. These drivers should be re-routed to available Foundation personnel for testing purposes if available and otherwise simply canceled. The same safeguards should be installed in any new rideshare applications developed, although where possible their parent companies should be acquired and shut down in order to avoid spreading Foundation technical resources too thinly.

D-class personnel assigned to test SCP-3525 should be fitted with standard exploding-bolt collars and tracking devices to ensure they do not avoid re-containment after their ride completes.

Description: SCP-3525 is an anomalous phenomenon linked to all major rideshare applications1 that manifests when the app assigns a driver with a perfect 5-star rating to pick up a rider. Upon entering into these drivers' cars, riders uniformly report a sense of vague unease without being able to pinpoint the cause. After a few minutes, the driver then asks the rider a number of personal questions, starting from innocuous questions about personal well-being and progressing to interrogating them about their secrets, desires, and fears alongside detailed questions about their home lives and work responsibilities. Riders report a growing certainty that the driver will cause them physical harm if they refuse to answer these questions, although this does not appear to be a strict compulsion effect and riders can choose not to answer. In no case thus far has an SCP-3525 driver caused physical harm to any rider.

While in the car, riders describe the scenery as becoming surreal and unfamiliar. Common descriptions include buildings bending at alien angles, people outside becoming blurry and indistinguishable, and all physical landmarks disappearing entirely. However, external monitoring only shows the car moving along the most efficient route to its destination. Ridesharing carpools affected by SCP-3525 terminate in one of two ways: either the driver successfully delivers the rider to their intended destination or they stop at a midway point and ask the rider to leave, refusing to keep driving until the rider exits. Riders who successfully reach their intended destination have been observed to exhibit erratic behavior following their exposure to SCP-3525, including memory loss, personality shifts, and general confusion. Riders who stop short of their destination do not display these symptoms. Riders additionally report that the time spent in the car feels significantly longer than the apparent elapsed time; this temporal discrepancy has been confirmed via testing (see test log below).

No information about SCP-3525 drivers can be found in the databases of the apps in question and the mechanism by which they are assigned is currently unknown. In addition, they share no apparent commonalities apart from their 5-star rating, varying on race, gender, age, appearance, and make and model of car; similarly, the riders who get these drivers appear to be randomly-selected. SCP-3525 cars additionally appear to block all transmissions; GPS signals, telephonic communication, and radio contact all cease the moment a rider steps into the car and closes the door, although they do resume once the car door is opened again.

While many of the SCP-3525 riders contacted the app companies to complain, these complaints appear to have largely been ignored. Accordingly, the Foundation only became aware of the phenomenon several years after it had been in effect when a Foundation agent happened to experience an SCP-3525 manifestation firsthand as a rider, at which point the anomaly was reported, verified, and contained.

Addendum 3525-a: Partial Test Log

Note: Given the wide geological range of this phenomenon and the sudden nature of its manifestation, many of these tests were performed in a somewhat ad-hoc manner, taking advantage of whatever D-class personnel that were at hand and with test plans invented on the spot. Dedicated testing protocols are still a work in progress.

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Experiment 3525-1

Location: Seattle, USA

Procedure: Control experiment; subject was given no special instructions. A D-class with limited exposure to Foundation assets was chosen to minimize information leakage. Subject was fitted with audiovisual recording device and remote broadcasting device.

Results: Subject was successfully transported to intended destination. While the outside time elapsed between source and destination was only 15 minutes, the recorder picked up an interrogation lasting approximately 4 hours that touched on all aspects of the subject's life to date, including his day-to-day life as a Foundation asset and his previous arrest for [REDACTED]. The visual recordings additionally confirmed that the view from inside the car's windows was at odds with its physical location and displayed scenery that bore no resemblance to the actual outside. The remote broadcasting device was rendered inoperable for the duration of the ride. After the test concluded, the subject was quarantined and observed; subject displayed an increased tendency to focus on his previous crimes and some apparent memory loss.

Experiment 3525-2

Location: San Francisco, USA

Procedure: Multiple Foundation vehicles blocked the driver in when he arrived for pickup, with orders to extract and contain the driver.

Results: When the driver realized he was unable to leave, he immediately self-terminated by forcibly ripping his throat out with his fingernails, severing his carotid artery. An autopsy revealed no anomalous physiology. The frequency of SCP-3525 manifestations was not impacted in any noticeable way by the death of this driver.

Experiment 3525-4

Location: Paris, France

Procedure: Experiment 3525-2 was repeated, but this time the blockade happened midway through the ride. D-class subject instructed to attempt to drive the car if driver self-terminated.

Results: Driver self-terminated as before upon being impeded. The subject was unable to drive the car at this point, although she continued to record anomalous visual footage. After she opened a door, all anomalous visual footage immediately stopped and the car became drivable again.

Experiment 3525-7

Location: Shanghai, China

Procedure: Control experiment repeated; procedure exactly the same as Experiment 3525-1.

Results: Driver stopped midway. Recording indicates that this occurred after the subject was interrogated about the Foundation at length; no classified information was disclosed and no more detail was presented than in the first control experiment. Subject placed under quarantine but has thus far not displayed any erratic behavior.

Experiment 3525-12

Location: Jakarta, Indonesia

Procedure: Subject was provided with a syringe containing a calibrated dose of sodium thiopental and instructed to inject the driver during the ride. Foundation personnel would then extract and contain the driver.

Results: Subject was able to successfully administer the anesthetic; driver attempted to self-terminate but was rendered unconscious. Driver was extracted and contained at Site-44. Upon regaining consciousness, the driver lapsed into a semi-catatonic state; while she maintained respiratory activity, she remained unresponsive to all outside stimuli. MRI scans revealed minimal brain activity but no anomalous neurology.

Experiment 3525-16

Location: Boston, USA

Procedure: Control experiment performed for third time.

Results: Same as Experiment 3525-7.

Experiment 3525-23

Location: Mexico City, Mexico

Procedure: Control experiment performed for tenth time.

Results: Same as previous eight experiments. The only recorded experimental instance thus far of the rider successfully making it to their destination is Experiment 3525-1.

Followup: A re-analysis of riders subjected to SCP-3525 prior to Foundation containment revealed that those who made it to their destination are uniformly distinct from one another. That is, once a rider makes it to their destination, any subsequent rider with the same socioeconomic background and profession will invariably stop short.

Experiment 3525-37

Location: San Francisco, USA

Procedure: For several weeks a D-class subject was conditioned to respond to all personal questions as though he was a Foundation agent; a thorough fictional backstory was constructed, intended to cover all aspects of interrogation. No amnestics were applied and the conditioning was entirely psychological in nature. As with all previous tests, an audiovisual recorder was supplied.

Results: Subject was successfully delivered to his destination. Upon recovery, the subject continued to act as though he believed his fictional backstory even after multiple rounds of deprogramming. Subject additionally appeared not to recognize Foundation staff he had interacted with repeatedly, other D-class subjects he had previously been acquainted with, or photographs of his family members. Finally, the subject appeared to be equally unaware of certain aspects of his own fictional backstory; analysis of the ride recordings revealed that the only aspects he has maintained the veracity of were those that he was explicitly interrogated about during the SCP-3525 manifestation.

Experiment 3525-51

Location: San Francisco, USA

Procedure: Same subject from Experiment 3525-37 was assigned to be a rider. Subject continues to maintain his fictional backstory.

Results: The driver remained entirely silent for the duration of the ride and the elapsed time inside the car was precisely identical to the elapsed time outside. This is the first time either of these results has been recorded.

Experiment 3525-78

Location: London, UK

Procedure: Three subjects assigned to ride together.

Results: As with Experiment 3525-55, the driver first started interrogating one subject, picked apparently at random. However, exactly 2 hours and 14 minutes into this interrogation (elapsed time outside: 7 minutes), one of the indistinct pedestrians visible through the car windows on the recording rushed up to the car and physically slammed into it. The driver immediately sped up and drove silently for a full hour (elapsed time outside: 1 minute) before stopping and instructing all riders to leave.

Followup: All further subjects are to be provided with a dose of sodium thiopental and instructed that if one of the pedestrians visible via the car windows attempts to interact with the car, they are to immediately inject the driver and attempt to communicate with the pedestrian in question.

Addendum 3525-b: Transcript of audio recording, Experiment 3525-170

Note: The following is a transcript of the second encounter with a pedestrian during an SCP-3525 manifestation. For the purposes of this transcript the driver is referred to as SCP-3525-1, the pedestrian as SCP-3525-2, and the rider by his designation, D-17214.

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[Three hours of non-pertinent dialog omitted.]

SCP-3525-1: …when did you drop out of school, [REDACTED], and what drove that decis-

At this point a loud impact can be heard; the camera (mounted on D-17214's head) swivels to catch SCP-3525-2 pressed against the car window.

D-17214: Oh… oh, right, okay, here we go-

A flurry of movement occurs. Followup investigation revealed that D-17214 missed the injection point (inserting the syringe into SCP-3525-1's shoulder instead) and SCP-3525-1 managed to self-terminate.

D-17214: Whoa. [laughter] Man, that's messed up. Guess he just wasn't into needles, huh? [laughter] You, uh, you saw that he did that to himself, right? I had nothing to do with it, just want to make that clear. Annoying prick, though.

D-17214: Okay, now where's that other guy gone off to?

The camera swivels to the back window. SCP-3525-2 is still visible, although several dozen feet away now. After a short pause, it begins to walk towards the car, eventually pressing its face up to the window again. From up close, SCP-3525-2's features appear to shift repeatedly in size and shape every few seconds, as though being refracted through a number of lenses in rapid succession.

D-17214: You're… real hard to look at, buddy.

There is no response. D-17214 pulls out a Foundation-written questionnaire.

D-17214: So much for small talk. Okay, uh… who are you, and what is your purpose here?

SCP-3525-2's mouth moves slowly but no sound is audible.

D-17214: Hey, do you hear me? Who are you? Do you have a name?

SCP-3525-2: (quietly) Two-eight-four two-three-three two-seven-eight two-five-oh two-fo-

D-17214: Is that… what is that? Is that your name?

SCP-3525-2: (louder) Name… name. Name. Name?

D-17214: Yeah, dummy, name. Like, my name is [REDACTED], and your name is…?

SCP-3525-2: Name. Name is Carl… no, Carlton? Carlton.

D-17214: Huh. Surprisingly normal, for a creepy jello-faced guy. All right, Carlton, what's your purpose here? What are you doing here, exactly?

SCP-3525-2: Don't… know.

D-17214: Okay, well, they didn't give me a lot of instructions about followup questions, so I'm just going to take that one at face value. Moving on: What is this place, and where is it?

SCP-3525-2: Nothing.

D-17214: So… is that an answer to both questions, or-

SCP-3525-2: It is a lack. It stretches on without end or meaning. The buildings are shells, empty. Dewey stole eight bags. No one speaks, or hears, or knows. It's a place to lose yourself, softly. Jerry scored eighty-seven.

D-17214: Uh, okay, this next one I am actually interested in hearing you answer: Why are these drivers asking us all of these questions?

SCP-3525-2: Drivers?

D-17214: Jesus, the… the guy in the front seat of the car here, who kept asking questions all the damn time. Why? Why did he do that?

SCP-3525-2: The buildings aren't the only things here that are hollow. The people need to be filled up. Yaz smacked seventeen dingers. So they can leave.

D-17214: Filled up with what? Leave to where? …Dingers?

SCP-3525-2: Two-seven-seven. Two-three-four. Two-six-oh. Two-two-five.

D-17214: Well fuck me for trying to get a little more out of you, I guess. Next up: Are you also a driver? Is the driver… the, uh, the man in the front seat, is he one of you?

SCP-3525-2: He contains nothing. I contain more. You contain more, still. You and I, we… do not have the hunger that comes with nothing. Yet.

D-17214: Some, uh, mixed messages there, but we're almost through this thing and I figure if I push you I'll just get a bunch of numbers, so last question: Have you always been in this place, or did you come from somewhere else originally?

SCP-3525-2: I came from… I can't… it was a room. They brought me into a room and there was a man there and I was more scared than I had ever been before. And he asked me questions and he… took from me. That was the year Torrez let Bucky Dent homer off us and it broke my heart2. I used to have so much more. I can't… it's all gone, now, except…

D-17214: A room, huh? Not a car?

SCP-3525-2: What did you say your name was?

D-17214: [REDACTED].

SCP-3525-2: [REDACTED], where were you born?

D-17214: Oh no, I'm not going through this shit again. Sorry, Carlton, we're done here, I'm out.

SCP-3525-2: No! No, I… gave so much to you, I don't have… you have to give me something. Please, just talk to me, I need to keep something, it just keeps going on and on and on without end and I have to have a real piece, to hold on to… I won't take anything you need, please, just - you have so much, and-

D-17214 reaches for the door handle on the opposite side of the car from SCP-3525-2.

SCP-3525-2: I don't want to become-

There is a sound of shattering glass behind D-17214 as he opens the door. When the camera turns around, SCP-3525-2 is gone and the scenery has returned to normal. There is no apparent damage to any window.

Footnotes

1. Including but not limited to Uber, Lyft, Grab, and Didi Chuxing.

2. This, along with several similar asides made by SCP-3525-2, appears to be a reference to the 1978 Boston Red Sox baseball team.