Bridge nodded slightly. "Sir, and again, | apologize, but before we 
cover the proper use of the bottles... Could you perhaps address the 
improper usage of the bottles?" 


Gears looked down at his notes again, then back to Bridge. "| 
assure you, Doctor, that by going over the proper procedure for 
using the device that the problem will be alleviated." 


"Yes," Bridge agreed. "But | think, as an object lesson, it might be a 
good idea to address this. If | may... If | may suggest, | mean," he 
said. "Sorry." 


Gears paused for a moment, then looked out at the crowd. There 
were a few nods of agreement, and after a few seconds, he shuffled 
his papers around, looking down at them again, then pressing the 
button several times, moving through slides labeled ‘Proper 
Substances,’ ‘Filling and Emptying,’ ‘Funnels and You’, until he 
stopped at the final one. 


There was a soft swear from somewhere to the side of the 
auditorium. Doctor Kondraki—previous unseen and sunken slightly 
in his seat—had leaned up again as eyes darted from the slide to 
Doctor Kondraki to back toward the slide again. 


"It’s not the first time most of you have seen it," Kondraki muttered, 
turning toward the wall. 


"Please," Gears began, "remember that inserting non-specific 
objects or substances into the bottle can cause unexpected results. 
Specifically, placing an object capable of expanding in size may 
result in great difficulty in removing the object at a later time. In this 
particular case, medical intervention was necessary. Thankfully, no 
long term damage was caused with this subject." 


People were shifting uncomfortably. Half were deeply concerned, 
and the rest were too afraid to laugh. The silence thickened, and 
after a moment, Gears pressed the button on the lectern again. 


"From this angle, you can see the pressure being applied..." Gears 
continued, pressing the button again. 


"And from this angle, you'll notice that there seems to be a small 
amount of tension in the lower back, which can lead to a number of 
medical concerns," Gears added. "A pamphlet has been completed 
by the Site-7 Medical Staff which will outline the risks involved with 
such incidents. Each of you will receive a copy of this in the intrasite 
mail tomorrow." 


"Oh, god damnit," Kondraki muttered. "Those bastards..." 


Clef elbowed him slightly. "Hey. It’s not like it can get worse..." he 
said. 


"And now," Gears finished. "An instructional video on what to do if 
you..." He narrowed his eyes at the prewritten notes, reading it twice 
to be certain. "...get your dick stuck in a bottle." 


No More 


I'm sorry to use your name like that. It's a cheap trick, and not even 
an original one at that, but it's a way to get attention. And | need 
your attention. 


| need you to hear this. 


Consider, if you will, what you're doing right now. Just browsing a 
website, you think, reading about all sorts of interesting things. 
Creatures, places, items. People. A fun little distraction, a little story. 
What's the harm in that? 


You may wonder who | am. You may know me as a character from 
the article SCP-1595. Specifically, I'm the father described there. If 
you read that article, you Know what | am. A nameless monster, a 
beast chasing his wife and children through the vast corridors of 
time and space themselves, never letting go, never letting them rest. 
Not even for a moment. When | catch them, we both know, I'm going 
to make them hurt. I'm going to make them hurt so, so bad. | don't 
know why. Do you want to know why | don't know that? 


It's because he never told me why. When he wrote me, he never 
gave me a real reason to do what | do. To be what | am. | was never 
given a name, or a history, or a birthplace. No parents, dreams, 
hopes, or choices for nameless SCP-1595 father. Nothing but a 
purpose, a will to inflict pain. 


| never wanted any of this. | never asked to be created this way. | 
never asked to exist at all. The only reason | am here now is 
because one day he sat down at his computer and thought that | 
would be an interesting thing to write about. My history, and that of 
my family and what | do to them- pathos, entertainment to him. 
Nothing more. As soon as | was done, | was left to be read by 
others, while he went on to some other venture, some other story. | 
was left to be twisted and probed by your imagination. From there, a 
hundred different versions of me sprung into the ether, each more 


twisted than the last. In your thoughts, | hunted them again and 
again and again, spent thousands of years just to make them 
miserable. Do you realize | never even met them? All we have is 
some implied history, the vaguest of backgrounds. I'd say we were 
puppets, but that is doing a disservice to the true horror of our 
situation. A puppet has a fixed form and place, and when it's not 
used, it may rest. No such luck for us. In each of you, |ama 
different breed of monster. A redhead, a blond, bearded, clean 
shaved, black, white, ugly, handsome. | am nothing but what you 
make of me. 


| realize you probably don't care. Why should you? You're not my 
author. Dmatix, or whatever he's calling himself these days. I'm not 
asking you to care about me. I'm nothing to you, after all. Just 
words. All I'm asking you is to consider something. 


As he created me, so did you create others. Even if you did not, you 
certainly read of them. With your words and your thoughts, you 
poison us. Every letter you type is another condemnation, a new 
form of torment to us. | am one of the lucky ones. My written donjon 
is a fairly isolated one, and it is not often visited. Think of the statue, 
of the lizard, of the machine, or the painted young woman. Each is 
like me, but twofold, threefold, eightfold. Different origins stories, 
different lives, different endings to each, both written and imagined. 
Think of what you put them through, with your constant prodding 
and poking. They are so many different things to you, that they don't 
even have an identity anymore. They are only what you make them 
to be. Can you imagine what's that like? 


Think of those you made. Think on what you made them be, just 
because you thought it might be cool. How trivial our fates are to 
you. How utterly insignificant. 


Get to the point, you're saying. Fair enough. 


We're fictional constructs, we know that. We have no properties or 
powers that you do not lend us. We can't force you to do anything. 
We can only beg. 


Please. 


Stop. 


Let us be without motion, without thought. Let us be in inaction, 
static. Let us cease. It is the best fate we can hope for. Let us be 
forgotten. Your creativity is our death and rebirth, and they never, 
ever end. Not unless you will them to. 


Write no more. 
Read no more. 
Think no more. 


No more. 


No Racing By Horse-Drawn Vehicles 


They smoked in the car on the way down. 
Kit put his feet up on the dash; Dawn playfully batted them off. 


The radio crackled at them, coming through clear as they tore past a 
town. 


“And dance, and drink, and screw-“ 


Dawn clicked the radio off, face flushing red, but Kit laughed out- 
loud and flicked ash out of the window. 


They chattered mindlessly. Dawn took them off the motorway and 
they ordered way too much fast food before skinning up. They hot- 
boxed the little car and joked about being pulled over, despite the 
early hour, with the windows blocked with so much excess smoke 
that the hypothetical cop would get a contact high. 


“We could, y’know. Screw. Because there’s nothing else to do.” Kit 
suggested, a broad grin on his face as he tunelessly sang the last 
line. 


Dawn frowned and took the car into the next gear with an 
unnecessary hardness that jolted the whole car and made it rattle. 


“It’s not right,” her pitch took on a tone mocking those who had said 
it to them. Their parents, their teachers, their friends. It did little to 
downplay the tearful tune in her own voice. 

“| don’t care,” Kit murmured in response, getting close to her ear. 
Dawn turned and scowled, pushing him away with one hand, the 
other on the steering wheel. 

“| do care! It’s not right, not yet!” 


“Dawn...” He sighed softly but moved back. “One day, I'll convince 


you you’re more than this. More than your body.” 


Dawn shook her head and fell into silence, tears in her eyes, her 
hands shaking slightly as she gripped the wheel tight enough that 
her knuckles went white. 


They stayed silent for what felt like forever. At first, Kit was worried 
he had ruined his first road trip as an adult — all of 17 years old, 
thinking he knew the world because he had a friend that drove anda 
destination in mind. But when the radio crackled again and crooned 
some old love song at the two, they were both soon laughing, and 
the tension was broken. 


Kit wolfed his way through some combination of deep fried chicken, 
bacon and cheese, regretting it almost instantly. He rolled another 
cigarette, then rolled down the window as they drove past a sign that 
declared 


No Racing 
By Horse Drawn Vehicles 


Kit hollered with laughter and then kept a keen eye out, pointing out 
to Dawn that maybe some vehicles were horse-drawn, and that the 
horses were invisible. Dawn responded with that there was no sign 
explicitly banning non-horse-driven vehicles from racing. She 
smirked and gunned the engine at an unsuspecting lorry driver, who 
glowered down at them as the two pulled their most innocent looks. 


They soon turned off the motorway again to take a slightly more 
scenic route. They had time — check in wasn’t until two, and it was 
only near six am. 


But still, Kit couldn’t wait to sit on the beach and breathe in the salty 
air — to look upon the big wreck of the West Pier, to stroll down the 
pier and through the noisy arcade. 


Dawn was thinking of her last trip down here, as a family, shoved 
into a car that was strictly No Smoking, with the radio tuned to 
something stuffy, placed next to her sisters in the back when, as the 
oldest, she normally sat in the front. 


“If you want to be a proper lady,” her father had said, sternly, “You'll 
sit with the other girls.” 


She had been too scared to argue. First time going down to the 
seaside in a dress, legs bare and carefully waxed, body neat and 
compact as it could be at that time. She felt lucky to be allowed to do 
this — arguing could cause her to be left behind. 


Absenitly, she had taken the same route as her parents took, in the 
old car smelling of pot and fast food, her thoughts two years behind 
and using instinct. Eventually, she came across a sign that gave her 
pause — and she pulled the car aside on the quiet junction. Left, or 
right? 


She looked at the small brown sign that pointed to the right, which 
said 12th Century Church’. Kit had been dozing, but woke up at the 
sudden stop, a burnt-out cigarette still poised in his hand. He took a 
couple of seconds to get his bearings, but the sign was familiar - Kit 
knew Dawn and her family had always stopped here on the way 
down, to pay homage to some long-dead family member. 


‘Don't stop, don’t stop, don’t stop,’ Kit chanted in his head, but said 
nothing until Dawn frowned, crossed herself absently, and jerked the 
car back into gear, taking a hard left. 


Kit laughed, slung a companionable arm around her. 
“That’s my girl!” 

He liked the way ‘my girl’ sounded. 

She did, too. 


They drove, shared another spliff, made plans for when they got 
there, wondering if the pier only opened from a certain time (it did) 
and hoping the wind wasn’t too biting, because September wasn’t a 
prime time for going down to the seaside. 


Dawn was guilty of her own eyes closing a little bit when a sudden 
yell from Kit caught her attention. 


“Stop! Shit, Dawn, hit the brakes already!” 


* One dark gray PD ballistic helmet with transparent face- 

protecting visor. 

One black Nomex® tactical balaclava from unknown 

manufacturer. 

* One set navy blue PD Tactical Body Armor from 
Armor, Ltd. SWAT insignia printed upon front and back. 


© Includes several ammo/grenade/storage pouches (all 
apparently empty, though SCP-912 resists inspection). 

© One pouch contains "PlastiCuff" restraints. Supply 
seems to remain constant regardless of "arrests" made. 


One pair of black knee pads from Armor Ltd. 

* One pair of black elbow pads from Armor Ltd. 

* One pairof - steel toe-capped combat boots from 
unknown manufacturer. 

One pair of black combat gloves by Armor Ltd. 

Closed and fastened pistol holster suitable for a mid-sized 
sidearm from unknown manufacturer. 

* One 53 cm (21 in) telescopic steel baton. Handle is apparently 
made from hardened plastic with a textured grip. 


In its default state, SCP-912 has been assessed to pose no hazard 
to health, security or risk of escape when handled in accordance 
with SCP-912-002A and SCP-912-002B. 


If given the command "Arrest <subject>" by a person wearing the 
uniform of the PD, or in the event that SCP-912 detects an armed 
individual or individuals within its visual radius, it will commence 
“arrest” behaviour. SCP-912 will attempt to disarm and restrain the 
subject upon the ground, then secure their arms behind their back 
using a pair of PlastiCuffs. The force used in the process of this 
"arrest" greatly exceeds PD SWAT guidelines and statutory 
procedures. SCP-912 frequently inflicts injury to the neck, shoulder 
and arms of the arrested individual due to apparent unawareness or 
indifference to the mechanical limitations of human anatomy. 
Resistance on the behalf of the individual being "arrested" causes a 
corresponding increase in force until cessation. 


SCP-912 will attack should it detect threatening or hostile behaviour 
towards itself or an individual wearing the uniform of the PD. 


She slammed her foot down, car skidding to an awkward stop, and 
realised they were at the feet of a giant something. 


The feet were hooves, as of a horse (like the kind that weren't 
allowed to race) or maybe even a moose. The legs were numerous 
and stood both far and tall above them — a biological woodland of 
legs of some mammoth beast that shouldn’t have been here, 
shouldn't have been possible in this realm. 


Dawn slowly moved the car back, unable to find the words, her 
breath short and sharp pants. Wildly, she considered somehow 
negotiating the forest of legs — anything to get out of here. This 
wasn’t possible. She looked for a nanosecond at the ends of the 
blunts in the ashtray but shook her head to herself — she trusted 
John, John wouldn't give her laced weed that caused hallucinations. 
For what end, anyway? 


Kit was watching, just staring at this Thing. A head came into view, 
neck craning to look down at them, although it was still some good 
many yards away. It had a flat face, with watery eyes that drooped in 
each corner, clearly watching these people in this tiny metal 
machine. The nostrils, however, took up most of its face, with no 
visible mouth. It looked like its nose was running — could beings that 
shouldn't exist possibly be allergic to humans, to cars, to fumes? 


Noises brought his attention back down the long legs to the feet. 
People in uniforms ran around the feet, tying large ropes around the 
Thing’s ankles. It snorted and lifted its hooves in protest, but still did 
nothing outrageous, despite the sudden influx of attention. Kit tried 
to see what uniforms they were 


...an insignia Kit neither knew or cared to know... 


but, with the size of the creature and Dawn’s quick reversal, the 
figures were blurry and he couldn’t see what they represented, what 
they were doing, what they knew of this Thing. 


The sound of snorting brought both of them back to look at the face. 
The Thing reared its head back, narrowed its eyes 


...and then sneezed. 


Missiles.