before the first element from the SCP universe is 
introduced it might even qualify as a medical 
anaesthetic. Hopefully enough people appreciate what 
I've tried to do with 'Acquisitions'—as someone (if it was 
you, please let me know so | can replace this damn 
placeholder!) bemoaned on IRC: 'No-one writes normal 
shit’. Well, | didn't quite succeed in writing a completely 
mundane Tale set in the SCP universe, but | think this 
may well be as close as it's possible to get while 
maintaining interest at this length. And hopefully it's not 
shit. We'll see. 


Further documentation of phenomena relating to 
events referenced in this file: 


SRegan's Personnel File 


Acquisitions - a Marshall, Carter & Dark Tale Act | 


FoldUnfold 

Table of Contents 
Chapter One: "Jellybeans" 
Chapter Two: "Antitrust" 
Chapter Three: "Tender" 


Chapter One: "Jellybeans" 


The last will and testament of Bernard Gradley 


So, I'm gone. You're sitting there in dear old Mr Pierce's 
office, waiting for the big news. The only question in your 
minds is, how is this all going to work? Old Bernard's 
company must be worth a few bob. More than a few. I'll 
tell you, it's forty million. It'll be sold on to the Japanese 
or the Chinese or whoever the hell else is buying Britain 
by the time | snuff it and then you can go and get your 
places in the sun and never have to worry about where 
the money's coming from again. But are there strings 
attached? That's what you're asking. Beatrycze, you're 
wondering whether you're going to have to go cap-in- 
hand to Edward because I've left everything to him. And 
Edward's wondering if it's all going to be stuck in some 
tiresome trust until he turns thirty or forty or whatever. 


Well, that's not how this is going to happen. You can 
hate me all you want, because I'm dead, but I've thought 
a long time about what to do and this is the only course 
of action | can take and still hold true to the values that 
made me the man | am, or rather, the man | was. 
Beatrycze, I'm not going to pretend that you loved me 
while we were together. At best | was a nuisance 
standing between you and my money. | don't think it 
even occurred to you that you would have nothing had | 
not behaved the way | did—you wanted the great 


industrialist and the great family man, and | couldn't be 
both. The gifts | gave you were never good enough—too 
large, or too small, or last year's fashion. So here's what 
I'm leaving you—five hundred quid’s worth of crisp M&S 
vouchers. Have one last splurge on me, dear, and this 
time you can make sure it's right. 


And Edward. You've made me proud—and you've also 
made me disappointed. Everything you've excelled in 
you've dropped out of—the chess, art, music. Now it's 
philosophy, which I'm sure will be just as temporary. 
Guess it just seemed like too much hard work with a life 
of leisure ahead. I'm sorry that you've ended up thinking 
that way—I take the blame for that. And I'm sorry if I let 
you believe that you'd never have to work a day in your 
life. That's not going to be true. If you want to be rich, 
you have the intelligence and the talent to achieve it. You 
could be a philosopher, you could be anything. But you'll 
have to do it by yourself. You'll have to get your hands 
dirty, like | did. To my son, Edward, | leave nothing. 


Gradley Industries, my child, my prize, | leave to Gerald 
Spointer, who | know will continue his sterling work in the 
role of Chief Executive Officer... 


Edward Gradley swore softly as he eased the Vauxhall Astra around 
yet another one of the serpentine parking bays in Cooper Drake's 
gargantuan car park. All full, of course. He squinted at his watch. 
Eleven forty. Five minutes to find a spot, get out, run what seemed 
like two miles to the front door of the CD head office, check in, and 
get to his interview. He ran a hand through short dark hair. Calm 
down. 


Another painfully tight corner, maneuvering around bollards which 
seemed to have been designed for a Segway. And there it was, 
sitting invitingly between a black Cadillac and a lovingly maintained 
Bentley. A space! Edward gave thanks to a god he didn't believe in 
and pulled towards it hard. The Astra ramped over a speed bump 
and promptly stalled. Edward dutifully put his indicator on while he 
shifted out of gear, which didn't seem to bother the silver Mercedes 
which cruised effortlessly past, executed a distinctly cavalier three- 


point turn that almost claimed Edward's wing mirror and reversed 
into the spot. Its occupant, a neatly folded and pressed sixty- 
something in an expensive suit with incongruously gelled grey hair 
got out and raised an eyebrow in the direction of Edward, whose 
pale skin was turning vermillion. 


"Some problem there, young man?" He adjusted his tie, bared his 
teeth and examined the result in the window of his car. 


"Yes, actually, you prick," Edward said, a few dozen decibels too 
loud. "Didn't you see | was pulling into that space? | had my 
indicator on and everything! Plus, you almost hit me!" 


"Is that so? Well, 'almost' never needs apologies. Besides, how do 
you know this isn't my space?" 


Edward fell silent for a second as something small at the back of his 
mind tried to draw a conclusion from that and didn't like it. 


"| didn't see a name on it," he said, at significantly reduced volume 
but still carrying a boom that made the little voice cringe. 


"You're right! My word," said the older man, winking at him before 
walking towards the offices. "Must be | just like to screw with 
people." 


"Wanker!" shouted Edward after him in a moment of catharsis 
before realising that the whole exchange had cost him close to a 
minute. 


Edward finally arrived in the Cooper Drake reception at eleven forty- 
six and thirty seconds, trembling and breathless. The secretary gave 
him a sympathetic glance before passing him a series of forms and 
a viciously sharp name badge, which he just about managed to get 
pinned to his suit (thirty-five pounds from Matalan) without goring 
himself. 


"Edward! How are you doing?" Edward jumped and turned to see a 
short, stocky young man about his own age grinning up at him. 


"Erm, hi." 


"How are things with the—oh, you know, the..." The over-familiar 
stranger patted Edward on the arn, rolling his eyes in what was 
apparently meant to be a gesture of solidarity. 


"Terribly sorry, but this is going to seem awfully rude. Do | know you 
from somewhere?" 


"Nope! It's David. David Went." He held out an immaculately 
manicured hand, wrist graced by a Rolex. "Don't mind my 
introductions, | always like to see how people react. You've passed 
the first test, by the way. | always tell Peter not to hire people who 
try to bullshit by pretending they remember me. Or if they tell me to 
go away, of course. I'm lead Partner for Stocks and Shares, so | get 
to sit on all Peter's interviews. That's Peter Davis, by the way. He'll 
be your line manager. So, let's get you introduced!" 


This process first required a lengthy trek through the halls of power. 
Cooper Drake wasn't anywhere near as old or established as 
Redmayne-Bracknell, Edward's previous firm, but it made a bigger 
return on almost every investment it made and was widely seen as 
the uncrowned king of the British investment portfolios. There had 
certainly been an attempt to create the impression of old money, 
thought Edward, looking at the rich, slightly worn dark green leather 
seats in the consultancy area and the lacquered wood finish on the 
walls, adorned with a dizzying array of digital and analogue clocks 
displaying the time in New York, Moscow, Beijing... 


Finally Edward was ushered through into a comparatively small 
office with a polished oak desk. At its head was a bored-looking 
ponytail in Raybans, probably no more than thirty himself. He was 
toying with a half-eaten sushi box while trying hard to appear 
absorbed in a slim document file. 


"Peter! Meet Ed—can we call him Ed?" Edward nodded mutely, 
knuckles white on his slightly battered travel case. "Great. Come on, 
let's get sat down and we can have a chat." 


Peter Davis removed his shades and seemed to see the document 
in front of him for the first time. "So, Edward," he drawled, ignoring 
David's suggested nomenclature. Edward thought the man sounded 
like Nigel Mansell after a few dozen pints. "Edward Gradley. Now, | 


look at that, and | think—any relation? To, you know, erm—" 


"Bernard Gradley? The industrialist," prompted David, smiling 
broadly. Peter seemed to have taken that as the culmination of his 
question, so Edward drew himself up. 


"He was my father, yes." 


"Hmm, must mean you're pretty loaded." Peter's critical eye swept 
Edward up and down with the implication that he had done an 
exceptional job hiding it. "So, why are you slumming it with us?" 


Edward groaned internally. Secret origin story in three, two, one... 


"Unfortunately, he didn't leave me a square nickel of it." Peter 
seemed visibly surprised—David just continued his Cheshire cat 
grin. 


"Not a penny?" Peter crossed his legs and did a passable imitation 
of 'sympathetically distraught’. 


"No." 


"Must be some resentment there!" exclaimed David, rather too 
happily for Edward's tastes. 


"To be brutally frank, yes. | hate him for it. | don't hate him because | 
think | was entitled to something | didn't earn. | hate him because he 
let me believe | was preparing for one way of life, one mode of 
existence, then gave me another one altogether." 


"That must be the, er, Philosophy degree talking," said Peter. 


"Now, as | recall Mr Gradley passed away two years ago. Did that 
have any impact on your work?" David walked his fingers over the 
table and slid out two sheets of paper with the Redmayne—Bracknell 
letterhead clearly visible. Jesus Christ, thought Edward, they've only 
gone and told RB that | asked for an interview at another firm. I'd 
better pull this off, otherwise | won't have a job to go back to. 


"| think you know it did. At the time | was an intern, and not a very 
good one." 


"Honest!" exclaimed Peter through a mouthful of rice; he'd given up 
any pretence of examining Edward's CV and was tucking into his 
plastic clamshell of norimaki. 


"| was marking time, waiting to get bored of investment banking like 
I've gotten bored of a lot of things. Then—well. The will basically 
said | was a disappointment to him, a dropout. I'd like to say that it 
was a sober wakeup that | took to heart, and that's why | pulled my 
finger out. It wasn't. | just wanted to prove him wrong. So | came in 
at five every morning, got coffee for the traders, did research on the 
hot stocks for the morning; did everything | could to add value. After 
six months | told RB | thought | was ready to trade. They recognised 
the effort | was putting in and gave me my first account." 


"But now you want to leave them," prompted David. "Do you think 
you have loyalty issues?" Edward drew a deep breath. One of the 
tricky questions. 


"RB took a chance making me a trader; | appreciate that. They 
invested in me. And in return they've made a profit from me of 
almost six hundred thousand pounds. That's after factoring in my 
salary. | believe in money—|I wouldn't be in the business if | didn't. | 
believe in contracts. And the contract | signed with Redmayne— 
Bracknell says | have to give them four weeks' notice. I'm in 
investment banking because | want to get rich—" 


"Don't we all!" interjected Peter with a glazed expression. 


"And that won't happen if | stay at RB. Cooper Drake has taken over 
one thousand four hundred clients from the firm since | joined. 
You're going to flatten it." 


"And you want to be on the upper side of the boot, so to speak?" 
David asked. He was looking for something under the desk. "I 
wonder, will your gratitude to Redmayne—Bracknell get in the way if 
you have to do business with them?" 


"No. That's based on my philosophy of business." Edward wondered 
if he was about to put his foot in it. Please, please, said the little 
voice, don't start lecturing. 


Description and containment procedures updated accordingly. 


Additionally, it appears that in the event of a SCP-571 "critical mass" 
carrier population, defined as a population above [REDACTED] 
within close proximity to one another, the psychological deterioration 
effect can be staved off indefinitely. However, the compulsion aspect 
remains permanent. 


« SCP-570 | SCP-571 | SCP-572 » 


David had found what he was looking for—a glass jar full of 
something colourful. Right now he was trying to get the lid off. Peter 
waved his hands ineffectually in David's direction as though offering 
to try and open it before thinking better of it. 


"Please, just give us a précis. It's really good to be able to get inside 
the head of someone coming to work with us." David beamed. 


He didn't use ‘potentially’; that's got to be a good sign, right? Edward 
marshalled his thoughts. 


"Businesses are collections of individuals, just like countries or 
religions. The difference is that companies recognise—or should 
recognise—the fact. The ideal of capitalism is that everyone working 
for his or her own interests—and purely for his or her own interests 
—is ultimately beneficial for all. When | do business with 
Redmayne—Bracknell—or Lyons Patrick, or Kleiner, Puttel & Minsc, 
or swap stocks with colleagues, I'll be working in my best interests. If 
I'm working for you, my best interest makes you money." 


"| like him!" chortled Peter, rocking back in his chair and twirling his 
Raybans. "David, what do you think? Give him the job?" 


"Not just yet. We normally say 'we'll let you know in a week’, don't 
we Peter? | will say that I'm impressed. You did well on the phone 
interview; you did better today. Have a jellybean?" 


Edward blinked at the non-sequitur and saw David was holding out 
the jar, the lid still firmly jammed on. 


"Thanks." Edward took the jar, gripped the lid firmly and with a sharp 
counterclockwise twist managed to push it past the obstruction; a 
flattened sweetmeat caught in the screwthread of the lid. Edward 
delicately reached in and took one orange jellybean. He looked up, 
suddenly conscious that he might have done the wrong thing. Peter 
was smirking and looking sideways at David with a knowing glance. 


"Well done," said David. "Just a little something | like to do. Pinched 
it from Reagan. Decisiveness, will to profit, ability to hear and 
remember terms of contract. Bean, singular. Very good. Why 
orange?" 


"Well, Belfree's jellybeans only come in two flavours—plain, and 
orange." 


"Really?" Peter was mesmerised. 


"They have two vats; one with just the sugar, corn syrup and starch, 
and another where they add orange flavouring. They found in the 
nineteen-fifties that the orange flavour was the most popular and 
that there were no other strong preferences, so they cut costs. 
There are eight colours, but orange is thirty percent of each pack. 
The seventy percent is their profit margin. You eat a red jellybean, or 
a black jellybean, or a white jellybean, and you think you can taste 
raspberry or blackcurrent or lemon. You can't; that's your body's 
learned response to the colour. You offered me a jellybean—I chose 
the more valuable flavour. Plus, | happen to like oranges." 


"Fuck convention," announced David, after a second's silence. "| 
think we can move this along. As far as I'm concerned, you're in." 


"Oh—yes, right, sure," Peter chimed in, leaning over the table. "Well 
done." 


"Thanks. Glad to be on board." Edward got up and shook Peter's 
hand, then extended his hand to David, who pumped it 
enthusiastically.