"You're a real prick you know that? You don't get a gold 
star for buying me an empanada. | just wanted a ride 
home, away from that asshole." She said, as she walked 
towards me. | felt a jolt, and looked down to see my liver 
in her hand, her freshly painted nails standing out 
against the dark red blood. The pain came next. 
Everything was red fresh agony, as she laid in to my guts 
with raw strength | couldn't even fathom... 


| sat down on the E train car, and pulled out my phone. 
I'd managed to find the only car that didn't have a 
homeless guy camped out in it, and opened my E-reader 


app. 


Someone's getting on, but I'm not gonna turn my head. 
Rules of the subway, never look at anyone else. That 
would acknowledge that they're there, and that's not 
okay. 


Oh god, | can smell it now, there's this...horrifying 
stench. Homeless guy is getting on the train. Fuck me, | 
mean...shit, | want to fix the homeless problem. But | still 
have to get to work, and | don't want to smell like rancid 
shit. 


| hunker down a bit, as he drags five plastic bins on the 
train, creating a little hobo apartment. Fuck man. I'd get 
up, but he's in front of the closest door, and his crap is in 
the way. 


| hear him now, "Hey, | don't wanna cause trouble, can 
anyone spare some change? Just a quarter or 
something, just anything? If not, | understand, God 
bless..." 


He walks past me a couple times, there's three or four 
other people on the train, | don't carry cash, but even if | 
do, | tell them | don't. | want to fix the problem, but come 
on. | shouldn't have to deal with this in the morning. 


He stops in front of me. Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck. Is this guy 
gonna do something crazy and attack me. | feel his eyes 
on me, the smell is completely overwhelming. "Hey 
buddy. Spare some change? Anything'll help." 


| look up, and his eyes lock on mine, his face covered in 
dirt and worse. "I don't carry cash, sorry." 


He shuffles a step to the little fortress of dirty blankets 
and bins he's set up on the bench. | look down at my 
phone, reading again. "Ever get tired of that shit, Chris?" 


The sound of my voice causes me to look up. He's not 
stooping over anymore, as he stares at me. "| mean, 
come on. 'Don't carry cash'? You just ate a $4.10 protein 
bar from the World Trade vending machines. You're just 
a dick." 


| get angry, and put my phone down, "Hey, fuck off 
buddy. I'm not the one begging for change. I'm going to 
work!" My words ring out angrily, and | cringe slightly as 
the sound hits my own ears. | didn't mean to yell so loud. 


"You're a real prick, you know that? All | wanted was 
some food." He walks forward, and shoves his dirty 
fingers in to my mouth, the taste of the disgusting milleiu 
invading my senses. He's choking me, and the pain 
slowly increases as | feel an intense pressure on my 
spine. Why won't anyone help me! With a loud crack I... 


"How many more?" The man in the grey suit says to the 
younger man beside him. His companion sits in front of a 
series of monitors showing the subject's vital signs. 


"Six-hundred twelve." The young man replies, looking 


down at the sobbing, heavy-set man in the chair. 
Electrodes stream down to his skull, and a quietly 
pulsing machine glowing with some internal light 
hummed in time with the impulses. 


"Six-hundred eleven, that one's done. After this, we can 

move on to racism, then violence?" The man in the grey 
suit checks off a box on his clipboard. "I'll let the Director 
know." 


The heavy-set man's sobs echoed in to the white-painted 
walls of the halls, as he relived his every slight, every sin 
and his victims got their state-sanctioned revenge. 


Don't by Doctor Cimmerian 


Don't worry, there's no one else down here but you and 
me. 


They left you because | snapped your ankle. Don't blame 
them. 


Your other friends out there right now with the police. 
They'll convince them to come here with guns and tanks 
and no one will think they're crazy. No one will think they 
killed you. 


Then again maybe no one is coming. They know what 
this looks like. Maybe they'll just go home. Better to live 
guilty than judged. 


Honestly am | so bad? It's quiet, it's dark, and it's warm 
down here. Why would you want to go back to the 
cowards and killers? 


Don't worry. You're the first friend I've had in years. We 
can play together! But first we need to take care of that 
ankle. 


There. Now they're both broken. Don't scream! This is a 
happy place! 


SCP-948 does not reply for some time. It removes its 
glasses and wipes them, slowly, then places them back 
on its face. 


SCP-948: Eleanor, what you're asking... You don't "fix" 
people, not in that way. 


Dr. Bridge: You've fixed others, though. I've seen it. Just 
by talking, lecturing. Bones healed, skin patched, giant 
scars just... gone. You cured a kid of cancer after a day 
of reading up on it! So you can fix me, right? You have to 
be able to. 


SCP-948 appears extremely uncomfortable. 


SCP-948: Eleanor... What you are describing is 
impossible. That's not how medicine works. 


Dr. Bridge: But I've seen you do it! Not read about it, not 
seen it on a camera, but actually watched as you cured 
people without even touching them! Look, I've got a book 
on depression and brain chemistry shit in my bag, can 
you just- 


SCP-948: No! These things you claim.... either you are 
lying, or they're some, some perversion of your sick 
mind. Don't push your madness on me, ask me to play 
along. 


Dr. Bridge begins to cry. 


SCP-948: | am a man of medicine, Eleanor, of science! 
Never in my life has someone come to me with such, 
such astounding lies. | thought better of you. 


Dr. Bridge: You can't even imagine I'm telling the truth? 
That there are w-wonders of science you haven't ever 
dreamed of? You've been lecturing for thirty-two years, 
Seamus! Non-stop! Y-you never stopped to wonder how 
you managed that? 


SCP-948: Don't be absurd, | can't stop! Just pack up and 


I'm sorry! I'll fix your feet! 


How did that make it worse? You're not being a very 
good friend. Don't be like them. Stop crying! 


I'm going to cover up your face until you stop making 
noise. There. Isn't that better? Quiet. 


We've got so much more time together. 
Staying quiet is so much better isn't it? Friend? 


Don't go. 


Hush by Shaggydredlocks 
The end of humanity. 


It is a slow, incremental end. A war of attrition - one that 
has been playing out for decades, if not centuries. 


At first, it seemed like they were content with our upper 
echelon; our politicians, our kings, our rulers. The 
invaders took them, one by one, with the apparent 
purpose of subjugating Earth and her people; or perhaps 
they sought to mine our resources after consolidating 
power. It is only now that | realize what it is that they 
really want. 


They're parasites; and they won't rest until every man, 
woman, and child is host to their foul spawn. | know this 
now. 


It begins with a buzzing. That's their probe. It's how you 
know you're infected. Next come the sirens: gawdawful, 
grating, shrill chimes and clanks that induce migraines in 
listeners. It's how they communicate with one another. 
This way, they can plot and scheme in the open while 
the uninfected remain oblivious. 


| can hear it now. | can, | can feel it. | certainly hear it. 


| imagine the plight of a late-stage carrier. What must it 
be like, to be confined to that dark space in the back of 
your mind? To become a passenger, an observer, as the 
puppeteer wears your face? 


| imagine it to be a fate worse than death. | must 
concentrate on this fact. | need to. It may make what I'm 
about to do more bearable. 


| clean my knife. I'll have silence yet. 


| creep across the kitchen, tip-toe through the darkness, 
avoid the places that creak and groan. Adam is a light 
sleeper, and | wouldn't want to wake the boy. If any of 
the Things wearing my family wake, this one will give me 
the hardest time, so I'm visiting him first. 


| say a silent prayer as | slip through the sheet hanging in 
his doorframe. It's like stepping into the grave. Save for 
the pale amber glow pouring through the sheet, his room 
is pitch-black. My oldest son lay reclined in an easy-chair 
in front of the television. In a few, calculated steps, I'm 
behind him. 


| ready my hands. My dominant hand holds the blade 
horizontally, an inch from his its throat; the second is 
poised, cupped, ready to cover his mouth. 


It really is a shame. He'd been getting better recently; at 
managing his rage, showing temperance. He was on 
track to grow into fine young man. Then again, this was 
most likely the parasite at work. 


‘A fate worse than death’, | remind myself, and | make 
my move. 


Damn it if it doesn't try. It flails about wildly with its free 
hand while the other tries to keep the blood in. It 
screams its little electronic heart out the whole time, 
growing louder and louder. Loud enough, | fear, to wake 
the others. My probe hears its cries. It responds in kind, 


vibrating intensely as its comrade bleeds out. The sirens 
cease, the probe falls still. | rise. 


| clean my knife. I'll have silence yet. 


The twins are next. Molly and Ann's bedroom is right at 
the top of the stairs. | keep my eyes to the ground - | 
can't get lost in the photos on the wall. | can't waste a 
single minute reminiscing, wishing there was another 
way. Not while I'm still in control. 


The girls' room is brightly lit from Molly's night-light; it 
projects stars and planets on the walls which circulate 
lazily about the room. Molly's tucked away in a tussle of 
sheets, and Ann has kicked her blankets to the floor 
again. | start towards her IT first. 


Deep breaths. | close my eyes. | concentrate on what 
needs to be done. What has to be done. | focus on the 
torment she must be experiencing, the hell of being 
imprisoned in one's own mind. 


Her parasite doesn't have a chance to sing. She herself 
squeaks, and falls limp. 


| move swiftly to her sisters bedside, quickly tear away 
the sheet, silently raise the blade. Her parasite wakes 
before her. It screams, and my probe responds with a 
furious shake in protest. She stirs, sees me above her, 
notices what I'm holding. 


| look anywhere but her eyes until the sirens stop, and 
my probe become inert. Each of my angels receive a 
parting kiss on the forehead before | tuck them in. 


| clean my knife. I'll have silence yet. 


| make it back to the hallway. | vomit; swallow it. | skip 
over the bathroom and open my bedroom door. The love 
of my life lies asleep in our bed, quietly curled up around 
one of her King novels with her glasses pressed 


awkwardly out-of-place. A perfect picture of the woman 
she once was. 


They know how to do this. To play ‘you’. It's what makes 
them so dangerous. It's why no-one else will catch on. 
It's how they'll take us all, eventually. The least | can do 
is to spare them. It's my duty as a father and as a 
husband to protect them. I— 


The siren comes suddenly, shocking me back to the 
moment. The thing in Suzan's body rouses its puppet, 
who mumbles incoherently. It strains to focus its eyes 
before a look of realization surfaces. It cries out in horror, 
asks me why I'm covered in blood. 


Everything becomes a blur. I'm all speed and fury and 
vengeance. | stab her again, and again, and again and 
again and | lose count after that. 


It takes far too long for me to register that the noise, the 
vibrations, her fighting, have long since ended. | let 
myself fall off of her. | hit the ground with a heavy thud, | 
piss myself. It takes a minute to come to, and | rise toa 
knee. Need to stay, need to stay calm. | have to. | need 
to stay strong. It is at this moment that | hear my 
youngest cry out through the baby monitor. My heart 
sinks into the ground. 


| clean my knife. I'll have silence yet. 


| stand over its crib. It looks up at me with my son's big, 
dopey eyes. | ready my knife. It blows a bubble. | focus 
as hard as possible on the alternative, on the fate worse 
than death. | concentrate on how he'll never know 
freedom, or be able to live his life. His parasite calls out, 
taunting me and beckoning to my probe. 


| press down and don't stop until | reach bone, and all is 
quiet. 


I'm only just able to back away from the scene, double 
over as everything hits me all at once. Waves of bile 
come pouring out of me, punctuated with brief gasps for 
breath. My body's wracked with shakes and convulsions 
as | let it all go. The torrent slowly fades into dry heaves, 
hyperventilation, hiccups. A laugh. | did it. The bastards 
can have me now for all | care! | shift my weight, 
laughing some more, satisfied with my victory. 


The sirens begin again, the vibrating. | become aware of 
a familiar lump in my back pocket. | fish it out. 


Alarm - 2:00 a.m. 

Alarm - 2:05 a.m. - Repeat 

Alarm - 2:10 a.m. - Repeat 

Alarm - 2:15 a.m. - Repeat 

Next alarm in 04:46 - tap to snooze 


| clean my knife. | let silence find me. 


Lurch, by minmin 


On Monday Eva woke up to find that her right foot had 
swelled to the approximate length of fifty-two point five 
centimetres. 


She treated that matter with some degree of cautious 
alarm. This was a matter of concern, for she knew that 
the average woman's foot bore a size of twenty-five point 
two centimetres - adjusted for height and weight, 
naturally. Why she knew that was of no concern to her. 
What mattered was her foot. It wasn't that it had actually 
been bigger - for no matter how she looked at it, squinted 
at it, compared them against the shadows on her wall - 
by all senses other than her physical, her foot had 
indeed swelled. Experimentally, she supposed whether 
her foot had been twenty-five point three centimetres, or 


twenty-five point four. And so on and so forth, until she 
had reached the comfortable number upper bound of 
fifty-two point five - or uncomfortably large, as it now 
were. 


She sat up in bed for a while, taking in the stock of her 
new body. Then, gingerly, experimentally, as one might 
move a boil close to popping, she wriggled her toes. It 
felt like moving a string. Not numb, but at a distance. 
Slowly, she lifted her new foot up over her sheets and 
rested it on the floor, finding in the act a new weight, a 
new purchase, that she had never felt before. 


Eva took a step across her room, feeling her body lurch 
over her like a skyscraper. 


She thought of calling her doctor, but her inner voice 
produced vaguely a Chinese saying: Cure the head 
when the head is in pain - cure the foot when the foot is 
in pain. The problem then lay in deciding whether the 
saying was more idiom than proverb. Should she have 
called him? He was entirely a man of the mind, 
prescribing little white pills for little white pains. What 
knew he of the foot? 


She dragged her useless foot to the shower, reeling as 
she went. Jackknife-step-jackknife-step, like a reverse 
pendulum, and it was only when she reached the door 
that she realised her other foot had swelled, too, large 
and clumsy like a block of wood. Lurching, she reached 
for the door handle, steadying herself just in time with a 
hand that had until recently been her own. 


Tall, too tall! The door gave. Eva squeezed her body 
through, a puppet a million miles away, frantically 
emerging on the other side, hallway stretching before 
her. Presently she thought of the meds, in the drawer by 
the bedside. Too late for that now. The other end, the 
bathroom, the ones she had hid in the unfinished crack 
between the mirror and the wall. Feeling herself borne 
along the hall as much as being pulled by her own feet,