"| started nothing," the old man said calmly. "The man who did is 
now dead. This could have ended there. But you smelled blood. You 
wanted a piece. And once you'd had a taste, you could not leave 
well enough alone. You had to attack the hunters as well. And now 
the hunters have let loose their hounds, and you are afraid." 


"Fuck you!" the man in grey shouted. He was getting to his feet to 
say something more, but that was when Sandra drew the gun from 
her jacket and put it to his forehead. 


"Sit down, Mister Harrington,” she intoned flatly. "Or | will have you 


thrown out and you'll get no help whatsoever." 


There was a deadly, tense moment of silence before Harrington 
reluctantly sat down. Sandra kept her gun trained on him the whole 
time. 


If the old man noticed the interruption, he chose not to acknowledge 
it. "| follow a simple rule," he said softly. "You get back what you put 
in. Provide me with resources, and | will get results. The more 
resources you provide, the more results you get. This requires a 
modicum of trust... but then, when we stand with our backs against 
the wall, there is nowhere to go but forward." 


The man in the red robes, who had been sitting silently in the corner 
since the meeting began, rose to his feet. "Then you shall have 
everything." 


"Holiness!" protested the woman in white. "You cannot..." 


"The Teacher was right," The High Priest of the Broken interrupted. 
"As were you. This is no longer about The Great Work. This is about 
preventing The Final Shattering. This man has shown what he can 
do using the aid of a few. What more could he accomplish with the 
entire weight of the Church behind him?" 


The man in the red turned to the old man. "The armies of the Broken 
God are at your disposal, Teacher," he said. "Use them as you will." 


Basking in the Light 


Network Correspondence #000004 


From: Prof. Bjornsen, [07832] 
To: Dr. Dier, [06302] 


Dier, 


SCP-229 has largely been contained, and everything 
above D-9 has been incinerated or disabled. There's not 
a single connection, so we should be safe. We've had 
some trouble dealing with SCP-106, but the lack of living 
people in the lower sections have allowed us to lure it up 
to B-3 and set up temporary containment. The air 
filtration is running at just over capacity, but we've 
requisitioned H13 filters and they'll be here within the 
next two weeks. We haven't seen hide nor hair of 682 
since the first week. It took half an MTF down with him, 
but he got the torched. Seismic imaging hasn't picked 
him up, so he's being pretty quiet. Gives me the creeps. 
I'll Keep you posted. 


Bjornsen 


Dr. Dier's eyes looked away from the screen as he felt his bowels 
rapidly constrict. He pushed the portable laptop to one side of the 
bed sheets and leaned over the edge opposite. The contents of his 
stomach exited his mouth, consisting of little more than water, into a 
half-filled bucket beside him. The vomiting was an annoyance. It 
could be grown used to, but you always needed a pail nearby to 
prevent a mess. He considered calling the orderly, but he did not 
have the energy to yell to her. The smell of medicine was thick 
enough in the air to cover the vomit. It was the scent of cleanliness 
and bad flavoring, and it permeated the room horribly. 


The dwelling itself probably was a re-purposed home of one of the 


Foundation's few surviving retirees. Judging by the remnants of its 
previous owner (see, pictures frames, carnations), Dier speculated 
that it had been vacated so that the medical teams would have more 
space to tend to the wounded. 


A sharp pain radiated from the back of his skull. Tightly wrapped, 
white linen bandages held the mush that made up his head together. 
lt was tender to the touch, but the morphine was enough to dull 
sensations to a bearable level. The attending staff had told him he 
had suffered a skull fracture, and was at risk of contracting 
meningitis. Until it healed, he was not much more than a useless 
sack. Dier hated that feeling of helplessness. He wanted out of the 
hospital. Back to Site 17. 


He was too deeply in thought to notice the orderly return. She 
refilled the IV. Dier found himself slipping into unconsciousness. 


Network Correspondence #000017 


From: Prof. Bjornsen, [07832] 
To: Dr. Dier, [06302] 


Dier, 


We sent another MTF down last night. They didn't come 
back too pretty. Five deaths, four injuries. They didn't 
even fight 682 this time, it was just the walls, fucking 
exploded and speared the shit out of them. Future 
intervention has been put on hold until we have some 
way of fighting it. We've been finding traces of SCP-229 
tucked away all over D-8. A couple junction boxes had to 
be covered in gasoline and burned. Some of the other 
doctors have started talk about pumping propane into the 
bottom of the facility, another mentioned flooding it with 
molten brass. I'm inclined to listen to either one of those 
plans, but trying not to blow up the site is why we're in 
this situation. Dr. Wachtel said that we might be able to 
get some napalm, flood it down each of the primary 
electrical shafts. From there we could infiltrate the 
secondary shafts and go straight to D-9. At least then we 
wouldn't have to leave the place in ruins. 


Bjornsen 


Bjornsen rolled backwards onto corrugated cardboard. He gave the 
message a once-over before pressing the 'send' button. The small 
bar which displayed the loading time crept across the page. It would 
be several hours before Site 17's emergency systems would find the 
bandwidth to send it. Large-scale breaches were relatively 
uncommon in the Foundation, but those which compromised the 
containment of one or two SCPs happened regularly. He had his 
share of experience dealing with these kinds of problems, and it was 
simply best to deal with it and do your job. Complainers had a habit 
of being 'reassigned to Keter duty’ and ‘voluntarily’ putting 
themselves into similarly lethal situations. Resources were tight, 
especially during a disaster, and there was no point bothering 
people for unnecessary things. The loading bar traversed a pixel on 
the screen. He sipped a cup of cold coffee and set it down beside 
the terminal. It tasted terribly sour, but a flashing light on his phone 
took his attention away from it. 


- - - AGENDA: MEETING AT 2320 - - - CURRENT TIME IS 2251 - - 
- (1) MISSED CALL - - - 


Someone called him? Those blasted earplugs must have dampened 
his hearing more than he thought. The screeching coming from 
floors below was still loud as hell. It had gotten a lot worse lately, the 
random insults devolving getting a bit more common than anyone 
would like to admit. When he was supposedly out of the range of the 
speakers, some whispers would reach him. There were others who 
would hear them on occasion, crews which would report back that 
someone else was in the tunnels. The PA system and its adjuncts 
pervaded every floor, attempts to sever connections between them 
made no real change. Much of the broadcast system was hidden 
beneath concrete, to survive even extreme duress, and they would 
be the culprits of that terrible noise. The maintenance teams had 
much larger problems to deal with than a few errant machines, 
anyway. 


Bjornsen grabbed his phone and stood up. The loading bar had 
made just a little progress. There would be no point in watching it 
creep until the meeting. He shuffled through a list of alerts. Repairs 


needing work mainly, but there, a call from Dr. Vang. Since most of 
internal communications were shut down, staff had to rely on 
portable phones and walkie-talkies. Tonnes of dirt were the enemy 
when it came to speaking with anyone. He shuffled out of the 
makeshift office and held the phone in the air, before hitting talk. 


No luck, his ear was met with beeping and failure. The lights 
sputtered down the hallway. He figured that it would be better to get 
moving and see if reception could be obtained someplace else. 
Small clouds of dust were kicked up by his shoes with each step he 
made, and the air was terribly irritating in his chest. It was possible 
that six-eight-two was just doing this to bother all of them. It was a 
spiteful asshole. The phone suddenly let out a terrible ring right next 
to his ear. Bjornsen swore silently as he picked up. 


"That you, Vang? | thought you had to get Norton Antivirus still." 


"Injured? How the hell can you injure someone who lives in 
dreams?" Bjornsen rubbed his brow. Dr. Vang had always seemed a 
bit peculiar but at the moment he sounded much more eccentric 
than usual. Something was wrong. 


"Yeah, well, just get someone to dream they're a surgeon or 
something. Why a- oh. Oh." 


"Well fuck.” 


"How long before it reaches," Bjornsen looked at the nearest office 
plaque, "Hallway 102? | thought it was contained off this level." 


"Shit, fuck, can't you send some-" 


A terrible screech erupted from the speaker. It clattered as it struck 
the concrete floor, Bjornsen cursing as his ears rang. The noise did 
not stop, and he drove his heel into the phone's screen. It died 
immediately, but the noise did not stop. It seemed to be growing, 
coming from deep beneath the floor. The lights flickered intensely for 
a few seconds, and he began running for the stairs. The noise made 
his ears blister, but he wished it was loud enough to drown out the 
sound of walls cracking and bursting several floors below. The 
ground trembled, and the air became thick with dust. He felt his 


heart quicken. The stairs were just a few hallways down, six-eight- 
two couldn't possibly move that fast. 


Dr. Vang would have alerted site security by now, undoubtedly, they 
would arrive soon. Bjornsen dared not turn around, the screeching 
and cracking already erupted from the opposite end of the hallway. 
A massive eruption of dust pushed him forward. Panting, he ran. 
The thing clawed its way through the metal and plaster. He fumbled 
for his sidearm, the gun on his hip all he had for protection. The 
offices blurred past, the lights beginning to shut off. But there, the 
door. The stairwell! 


He grabbed the knob and with tremendous effort thrust the metal 
open. It was when he turned to pull that he caught the first glance of 
his adversary. A writhing perversion of metal and flesh, it thrashed 
against the concrete with enough force to demolish walls. He looked 
at it oddly, pausing in his panic for a few brief seconds, 
remembering something from his past. 


In his early days in the Foundation, Bjornsen had acted as research 
assistant during the initial investigation of SCP-543. The corpses, 
the feces, and the blood, inextricably bound into metal wires, and 
the stench, like vomit, constantly. He remembered Dr. Trebuchet 
interviewing that one D-Class, and he recalled a feeling of intense 
remorse. That D-Class' eyes were shaking, bloodshot marbles, but 
he could not look away from them. Her expression was that of a 
small child, afraid of the unknown. 


The wires were not unlike the thing in front of him, the tangling metal 
and horrid smell, and somewhere in the back of his mind he knew 
what she felt like, a primal instinct to escape. He sprinted into the 
stairwell, the beast surging closer, and slammed the door closed. 
His lungs screamed for rest. His feet struck against the reinforced 
staircase as tendrils of fluid-soaked wiring tore out the door's bolts. 
He reached another flight, but the sickening squelches and grinding 
wires made him run even faster. It would overtake him soon, but a 
glisten of rubber came from several floors upward. He pushed up 
and up, glancing down to see that mass of circuits moving towards 
him just as fast. It had pushed past the steel door like it was tinfoil, 
he feared that his body would be like tissue paper. The world around 
him became a trembling, whirling mess, fear swelling inside of him. 


was a protective spirit, and ritualistically left it offerings of 
livestock. In 1995, a joint effort between Foundation 
forces and UN peacekeeping troops re-situated the 
village 9 km downriver with a minimal loss of civilian life. 


Relevant Incident Logs: 


Incident 856-A 

Date: / /1956 

Events: A troop of twenty-one Anya-Nya guerrillas attempted to ford 
the river from the west bank, apparently with intent to attack 
Village. Eyewitnesses claim that when the party was approximately 
halfway across the river, SCP-856 sprang upon them from down- 
stream. Three of the soldiers were killed and several more were 
injured within thirty seconds. Wounds inflicted on SCP-856 by 
gunfire appeared to harm it without consequence ("It bled but never 
stopped"). The remaining men fled from the area. 

Notes: Reports of this incident led to the first investigation of 
SCP-856 by the Foundation, and the establishment of rudimentary 
containment procedures. 


Incident 856-B 

Date: / /1971 

Events: A surveying motorboat drifted within the section of the river 
containing SCP-856, resulting in the deaths of two junior 
researchers. The first was killed by a laceration to the throat, and the 
second expired later due to blood-loss from a severed limb. The 
researchers were members of a three-week task force sent to gain 
further information on SCP-856 through observation and 
experimentation. 

Notes: Following this incident, extant containment procedures for 
SCP-856 were intensified. 


Incident 856-E 

Date: / /1995 

Events: A team of five engineers were attacked while attempting to 
lay a temporary bridge over the section of river containing SCP-856. 
One suffered fatal injuries. 

Notes: Security footage confirms that at no time did any personnel 
or bridge component come into contact with the water. It appears 
that under certain circumstances, SCP-856 is able to leave the 


He felt his foot hook beneath the edge of the next step. The stone 
was brutal, and the fall forced the air from his lungs. Winded and 
hurting, he pulled himself up the ledge, turning over and looking 
back down the stairs. The wires convulsed as though they knew 
their prey was close. Already his hands grabbed at the railing, but he 
knew that the beast was too close. Endlessly wrapping and curling 
closer, the perversions of nature lashed out. Bjornsen's hands rose 
to protect his face. 


He expected immediate death, but he felt something entirely 
different. Heat, unimaginable heat. It rose in sharp percussion, bright 
orange and yellow light pouring from around his fingers. Oh, sweet, 
purifying flame! The glisten of rubber had become several men in 
the time he looked away from them, men in full armor and with their 
guns and weapons prepared. The arrows-in-a-circle, the symbol of 
the Foundation, adorned their vests. They were the single match, 
torching relentlessly against a mighty adversary, for ever burning 
deeper, through skin, flesh and bone. Bjornsen pulled himself to his 
feet, stumbling in a strange mixture of relief and pain. One of the 
men caught him, holding the wounded professor upright. The yells of 
the terrible scorches on his forearms were muffled by adrenaline. He 
looked down in a haze, seeing the monstrosity of wires charring with 
the heat of burning gallons of napalm. The smoke was quickly 
overcoming him, and he coughed uncontrollably. 


Bjornsen felt himself jostled as he was lifted up the stairs. He turned 
and made an effort to spit at the burning thing. These were the small 
victories, the ones they worked for every day, the ones that would in 
the end, pay off. Yes, because even for all their failures, there were 
countless victories. They would not wait and let the world die. 


Network Correspondence #000021 


From: Prof. Bjornsen, [07832] 
To: Dr. Dier, [06302] 


Dier,