The Thing, whatever it was, released its grip on him. For now. He 
had come to a realization of late, imagining that the terror he felt 
when the Thing came over him, must be nothing compared to what 
the little girl must also feel. Every time. Tears streamed down his 
cheeks, even as the calmness returned to his face. 


Ninety-eight. Ninety-nine. One hundred red leaves. One hundred 
little red specks, scattered all over the ground before his path. The 
words of his Father came to him, as they often did. They told him 
that he did not have to understand, and it was better that he did not. 
He was part of something bigger. Something grand. He was 
something that would help mankind to its completion. The little boy 
often asked his Father about the little girl, meeting the same wall of 
secrecy each time. But he never asked his Father about what 
completion meant. Deep inside himself, deeper even than the Thing, 
he knew that he did not want to ask that question. Father may 
answer it. 


The little girl picked up her pink backpack and ran into the school. 
The little boy followed, running across the empty field of one 
hundred red leaves. 


The little girl took her seat at the wooden picnic table by the side of 
the office building. It was lonesome, off on its own beneath an 
overhang. But the covered hallway gave her some protection from 
the weather while she ate her apple from the cafeteria. She liked to 
watch the wind blow the tall trees behind the school back and forth, 
as it whipped down from the north. She would meet her friends after 
eating lunch most days. 


On this day, a little boy watched her from across the blacktop, 
peeking out from behind a tetherball pole. He looked comical, trying 
to hide. She waved to him. He didn't return the greeting, but instead 
moved hesitantly closer, as though he were one of the stray cats by 
the overgrown baseball diamonds. He looked very serious, not like 
the other boys in her class who were constantly pulling faces or 
shouting about something they saw on TV yesterday. She waved to 
him again, encouraging him to come closer. Step by tentative step, 
looking over his shoulder every few seconds, he came closer. She 
did not recognize him; he must have been in Mrs. Worthington's 
class, or maybe one of the special ed kids. When he finally came 
close enough to hear, she told him it was okay to sit down. He 
waited a few seconds, then did so, directly across from her. 


She asked him what his name was. 


"M-Marshall," he replied, almost in a whisper. He was clearly 
nervous. Some boys were like that, she thought. 


He glanced at her, looking like he wanted to run away and hide 
again behind the tetherball pole. "What's y-your name? Is it, uh, 
Clara?" 


She giggled. No, of course not. He must have mistaken her for 
someone else. 


He looked pained, like her answer had somehow wounded him. 
Marshall wiped his brow; his forehead had a thin sheen of sweat, 
despite the autumn chill. The little girl was confused. Boys didn't 
usually act like this. Something was not quite right about him. 


Marshall looked away, into the trees. "Did you, um. Did you know 
that people have all sorts of, uh, stuff in them." 


D-209 expresses distress immediately 
before being dragged backwards forcibly, 
and off-camera. He begins to scream. ] 


Note: [ SCP-783 and D-299 remain in the 
hallway for the duration of the night. 
Snapping is heard intermittently. D-299 
ceases screaming at 04:27. 


At 05:01, a wet suckling noise can be 
heard, followed by rapid thumping. ] 


Incident 783.1 


Concurrent with the noises heard at 05:01 during the D-209 trial, all 
twenty-seven living victims in Foundation care went into seizure. 


Despite the fact that the majority were brain-dead or wholly 
paralyzed, they convulsed for several minutes. Two present 
researchers were injured during the incident. Life-support systems 
for several patients were compromised, killing five. 


A vast quantity of earth was disturbed on the outskirts of town 
during this time. 


Update: 


Personnel tasked with investigating the recent seismic event were 
met with resistance from Temby locals, who crowded around an 
area in a field to the south of town. After a brief exchange, Agent 
Collins drew her firearm and discharged a round into the air. The 
crowd dispersed. 


Several elongated toes were immediately visible protruding from the 
freshly-exposed earth. 


A dig team was assembled, and by the following afternoon had 
unearthed a mass grave containing several dozen nude victims of 
SCP-783. The bodies were well-preserved, yet desiccated. Their 


The little girl shifted nervously. What did he mean, stuff? Like guts 
and other gross things? 


The little boy's widened. He continued to stare into the distance. 
"Not just that. There's other things in there too. Things that, um, 
need to come out. Like, uh, escaping. Father says that people have 
truth in them. That it needs to, to see daylight." 


The little girl noticed that he was trembling now. The sweat was 
beading up and running down along his neck. She saw that his 
hands were gripping the bench where he was sitting, so hard that 
his knuckles were white. She wanted to go now. 


Marshall's face snapped toward her. She startled at the sudden 
movement, dropping the rest of her lunch onto the ground. The little 
boy looked terrified, as he trembled through sweat, his face flushed 
and his eyes wide. She leaned back in her seat from his gaze. 


"|...1 think y-you should run. You should run now. Please run." 


The little girl tripped and fell back, getting up to leave but unable to 
look away from him. Not taking the time to dust herself off or check 
for scrapes, she ran for the classrooms. She was not looking at him 
now. 


Looking down at his hands, Marshall noticed a thin trickle of blood 
dripping onto the ground. He had gripped the bench he was sitting 
on with enough force to dig splinters of wood into his fingers. They 
began to throb, the pain acknowledged now by looking at the 
wounds. His chest heaved, the shortness of breath making him feel 
like he hadn't exhaled for the entire time he had been sitting here. 


The little girl had left her backpack by the opposite bench, forgetting 
to take it with her in her sudden need to leave. That was stupid, 
calling her Clara. She hadn't been Clara since two towns ago. He 
must be better about remembering names. Stupid, stupid, stupid. He 
blinked back tears of exertion as he struggled to catch his breath 
again. 


The lightheadedness began to subside. His vision was clear again. 
He felt as though he were himself again. Or whatever he was that 


remained after all of the name changes. He picked up the little girl's 
backpack, absentmindedly wiping his bloody fingers off on the side, 
the red streaks dark against the bright pink fabric. She had forgotten 
her things. He would have to find where she had gone later. He 
needed to return something to her. 


Father drummed his fingers on his stainless steel work desk. The 
motion dislodged tiny bubbles in the specimen jars lined up next to 
his hand. He didn't like the way the little bubbles floated up past the 
tiny little lumps of vaguely-humanoid flesh as they bobbed in the 
fomaldehyde solution. The effect made it look like they were moving. 
The little boy wished he would stop doing that. 


"The school tells me they are thinking of consulting a specialist. That 
you display abnormal behavioral traits." 


The little boy was silent. This information was new to him. 


Father's face, ruthlessly clean-shaven even in the evening, was hard 
for Marshall to read. The closest thing he could guess was... 
amusement? But the little boy had never seen anyone have that 
expression while something funny was happening. Father was 
smiling, yes. But his eyes were full of something between pity and 
hatred. 


"This is quite something, you know. A specialist. How can you 
specialize in deviance from a normal condition when they don't even 
know what normal is? That's funny. Don't you agree, son?" 


Nothing about what happened at school was funny to the little boy in 
the slightest. He remained silent. 


Father sighed. He turned away, looking contemplatively at the 
strange rifle mounted on the wall above his desk. The little boy had 
seen pictures of guns before, but he had never seen anything quite 
like it outside of Father's office. The strange wiring around the barrel 
looked more like a movie prop. It seemed to glow faintly at night. 
Father's recommendation to think twice about touching it had been 
warning enough. 


"| forget sometimes, you're not like me. You, your kind. | must be 
patient as you learn." 


Father turned back around. He crouched so that he could look the 
little boy in the eye, on his level. The little boy shivered. 


"Son, you must remember. Not too soon. You cannot help but reveal 
yourself. In fact, you must. But in the course of time." Father stood 
up again. He looked down upon the little boy, a simulacrum of 
kindness in his warm smile and calculating eyes. "They will all learn 
from you. You will teach them. But you must teach them in the 
proper manner. Believe me, | know." 


Marshall always felt that he understood less whenever he spoke 
with his Father. But as ever, his instructions were clear. He must 
work harder, to act like the others. To keep certain Things hidden 
away. For a time. To help ensure that they would not have to move 
again prematurely. 


"Now then. | have much to attend to, Son. Visit your mother, would 
you? She's useful for soothing matters such as these." 


The little boy remained in the office. "Father, am | a bad person?" 


Father's eyebrows crept up, tilting his head. Confusion. "Bad? As in 
evil? That concept is so strange, and yet it has taken quite a hold 
among these people, hasn't it?" 


The man considered the question. He put his hand on his son's 
shoulder. 


"My boy, something like you can't be evil. Through you, these 
people learn to understand something about themselves, something 
that they must one day address, once and for all. A quality about 
themselves that they must repurpose, if they are to live together in 
lasting peace." 


Father's eyes crept towards the mounted gun on the wall again. 


"Son, | will be here with you, guiding you in one form or another until 
your final breath. And then, | will be with you at the next beginning, 
to help you on your path. As | have done before." 


The father embraced the son now. 


"Until everyone has learned. Until there is peace. How can someone 
who brings peace be evil?" 


He squeezed his son tightly. The matter was closed now. He 
ushered his son back out of the office, as he returned to his tasks, 
indecipherable to the boy. 


Marshall ascended the stairs out of the basement, into the kitchen. 
His mother stood in her usual spot by the wall-mounted telephone, 
eyes fixed on him as he closed the the door behind him. 


"There, there,” said his mother, looking at her son, moving not a 
single muscle, as was her way. "There, there." 


The little boy proceeded down the hallway to his bedroom. Behind 
him was the sound of his mother repeating her remark, over and 
over, to the now-empty kitchen. There, there. There, there. 


The interior of his bedroom was covered entirely in plastic. The 
Thing inside him wanted nothing more than to look at one of the 
books filled with photographs that he and his Father had taken 
several towns ago. Or to open the concealed door in the floor of his 
closet. The Thing would have to wait. It must be trained to wait. 
Father insisted. 


The little boy lay on his bed, the wind howling outside as the dusk 
overtook the woods surrounding the house. Sleep would not come 
easily this night. 


And It Starts With A Song 


The end of the world starts with a song. 


You wake up, still hopped up on the pain pills they pass out like 
candy here. Someone changed the radio station while you were out, 
instead of sports scores there's singing. Your head is clearing 
quickly, not leaving the usual headache behind it, for once. You 
reach to change the radio station, and stop. 

It doesn't hurt. 


You look at your arm, at the tubes stabbing into it, and see the 
sagging skin pull back, tighten, heal. You sit up, and the song grows 
louder, and you realize that you're sitting up for the first time in 
months. You wonder if you're dead, if you're dreaming. 


You aren't. 
One minute has passed since the song started playing. 


You try to get up just to see if you can, and you can, and it doesn't 
hurt. You walk awkwardly, legs still stiff, steps still unsure after so 
long without use. Your bare feet tingle as they touch the carpet. 
There is a small cactus perched on the windowsill, and you could 
swear that it twitches slightly, thorns growing imperceptibly. 

Well, you decide, it's a dream. Might as well enjoy it. You step 
outside into the hallway, and hear the song being broadcast from 
every speaker in the building 


Other doors are opening, all down the cancer ward, and pale people 
in sky blue hospital shifts are stumbling slightly as they remember 
what walking is like. You see that some of them still have tumors, 
those for whom you can tell, and you run a hand over your neck. 
There's still that small lump. You aren't cured? You feel cured, 
though... 


The small potted trees, placed to give some feeling of life, are 


rustling as if in a light breeze. You pinch yourself suddenly, 
automatically, perhaps even unwillingly... itis, after all, a very nice 
dream. It hurts, but it stops hurting quickly. You walk for the main 
desk of this, the top floor, the hospital's hospice. The receptionist is 
standing and staring, and you laugh when you think of how she's 
been put out of a job. Is this real? Probably not. It seems real, 
though, and feels real, and by now that's enough. You stroke the 
lump on your neck again, and it somehow feels bigger. 


Two minutes in, and the song plays on. 
You need to see the sky. 
Three minutes. 


You stand on the roof, and hear the song being played from every 
direction. The grass is green, and trees that had lost their leaves to 
the sinking heat of autumn are growing new ones, bigger and 
thicker. People are there, too, just standing and listening. You laugh, 
loud and without care, and try to sing along, but the song is in words 
that you do not recognize. It seems as if everything that can play the 
song is piping it to the heavens, a song of genesis, of life. 


Life responds. 


A dull ache is there in your neck, you realize. It feels heavier, too, as 
if padding were being placed on the tumor. You reach your hand up, 
and feel a mass of flesh twice the size that it used to be. And all the 
trees put forth flowers at once. 

And everything begins to go wrong. 


Four minutes have passed since it started. 


You see someone down below keel over, suddenly. She vomits, and 
a sapling shoots up out of the mess. Others begin to clutch at their 
stomachs, some fall over, many throw up or suddenly vent their 
bowels. Small plants grow from the waste. You feel nothing but the 
steadily growing tumor. 

You stand, transfixed, until 


Five minutes have passed since you first heard the radio sing. 


Things are moving faster, now. The grass seems to double in height 
in a matter of seconds, though from the roof it's hard to tell. New 
branches are sprouting forth from every tree you can see. Most of 
the people down below have stopped moving, and you watch as 
they bleed green that rises towards the sun. It's life, you realize, 
feeling detached. The hospital was sanitary. You've been fed 
through tubes for months, but there's bound to be something inside 
you waiting to grow. You don't care. You've been dying for too long 
now to care. 

You sit down, legs dangling over a rising forest. 


Six minutes.