Description: SCP-877 is a set of four ten twelve microchips 
acquired between 199 and 201 from the cerebral cortices of 
different small mammals. Animals found to contain copies of 
SCP-877 include, but are not limited to, Sciurus carolinensis (the 
eastern gray squirrel), Felis catus (the domestic cat), and Eumops 
perotis (the western mastiff bat). The microchips are unmarked 
except for small stamps, readable only by electron microscope, that 
read “ALEXYLVA UNIVERSITY BIOLOGY DEPT,” followed by 
“GENERATION” and a number. However, no records exist of an 
institution named “Alexylva University.” Moreover, the abilities of 
these microchips are beyond the technological capability of any 
known laboratory to create. 


Copies of SCP-877 have a potential processing speed of 3.3x10 
million instructions per second at terahertz and storage capability 
estimated at petabytes. The chips are capable of interfacing with 
and controlling the motor functions of host creatures, though it will 
usually allow the animals’ instincts to carry out routine affairs 
(eating, nesting, mating). 


SCP-877 has only primarily been noted to take over its host for the 


"Right. I'm on my way," she said to herself. 


"We'll tell you when it's over." the nurse called after Joyce, who half- 
ran out of the room. Joyce refused to cry, but that didn't stop her 
from shaking. She took a seat in the waiting area and just rocked 
back and forth, trying to calm herself. She'd done worse in her day 
job. She'd lost lives before. Hell, she'd lost her own family before. 
Although, it does feel less real when they're ripped apart by eldritch 
abominations, or succumb to memetic hazards. 


"Why does this one have to feel so..." Real? Concrete? Palpable? 
Genuine? 


Michaels popped out from behind a forklift and shot a few rounds at 
the men across from him. MC&D must've doubled their detail since 
the last raid. He was already out of ammunition, and his team was 
running low altogether. A quick scan counted about twelve bogeys 
left. Michaels turned to the private next to him. 


"Turner, give me cover." 

"Where you headed sarge?" 

"You see that crate over there?" 

"Yeah?" 

"How much you bet this shipment's part of a weaponry order?" 


Turner opened his mouth to speak, but Michaels held his finger to 
Turner's lips. 


"Trick question. Never tell me the odds." 
"Just get going Solo." 


Michaels smiled and darted toward his prize as Turner let loose 
another round of bullets. A sharp pain shot up Michaels’ leg. Clean 
shot through the calf. The adrenaline carried him to the crate. 
Michaels cut the straps with his tactical knife, and then shot the lock 
off. The side of the crate fell open on its own. Michaels’ grin grew a 


little wider. 


"So normal?" Joyce looked up to see Niklo, "Sorry, thought it was 
worth coming inside to check in on you. Also the car was getting 
stuffy." 


Niklo took a seat next to Joyce. He had volunteered to drive her 
back when the deed was done, since she probably wouldn't be ina 
good headspace to be safe on the road. 


"It also helps he has a name. Not a number," Niklo continued. 
"Not helping." 

"Sorry, thought I'd just take your mind off of it." 

"Can you just, be quiet? Please?" 

"Right, sorry." 


Joyce returned to rocking as Niklo watched her. She put her 
headphones on again, but didn't play any music. She just wanted 
the pressure up against her ears to give her that feeling of isolation, 
the illusion of being alone in a crowded room. 


"Are you sure you need to be here for this? We can just—" 


"| said shut up! It's not your dad you're pulling the plug on! So just 
shut up!" The waiting room went silent. Joyce looked around, the 
color drained from her face. Just as her gaze reached the entrance, 
the nurse arrived, also looking pale. 


"Umm... Mrs. Michaels?" 
"Yes?" 
"| believe the doctor would like to, um, show you something." 


Michaels grabbed one of four devices. After untangling the device's 
tubes, wires, and plastic casings, he managed to get a grip on the 


thing. Michaels was about to break every rule they pounded into his 
head during training. 


He stood up from behind the crates and pulled the trigger. There 
was no recoil, no noise, nothing. Except a large hole that opened up 
in the security guard Michaels aimed at. 


Now, to rinse and repeat. 


Michaels aimed to take another shot. A bullet caught one of the 
tubes. Michaels collapsed, started screaming, and tried to hold the 
side of his body that just wasn't there anymore. 


Joyce nearly ran to the room. She flung open the door. 


A single, long beep rung in her ears. The heart monitor had gone 
flat. 


Joyce's dad looked over from the hospital bed. Finally awake. 


"Who are you?" 


After the firefight died down, Michaels’ screaming could still be 
heard throughout the building. Even with all the blood loss, he 
screamed. Even with a hole where his left lung used to be, he 
screamed. He felt it. And he kept feeling it. The world was all fuzzy, 
but it still hurt. It hurt so much. 


And when Michaels was carried away by his squad, who simply 
didn't know what else to do with the man, the screams and the 
moans of the others echoed around the warehouse. All those with 
lead in their chests, heads, arms, legs, lungs, hearts, feet, eyes. 
They writhed in the clutches of life. 


On that day 
The reaper laid down his scythe 
Turned in his shroud 
Bid farewell to the masses 
And quietly retired 


/ 
End of Death 


SCP-3984 


In The Dark 


Listen to the Audio Adaptation? 


Joe's head bounced off the metal table with a clang. The Man in the 
Suit behind him cracked his knuckles and walked around the table. 


Joe shook his head, the initial hit was still ringing in his ears. "Look. 
I'm still entertaining buyers. | swear you'll get your cut soon." 


"See, here's the thing." The Man in the Suit reached across the table 
and slapped Joe in the side of the head with his open palm. The 
force of the blow lifted Joe out of the chair and sent him flying into 
the floor. The Man in the Suit straightened his tie. "Carter and his 
associates handed you that truck on a silver platter. You left us 
holding our dicks for 3 weeks while you ‘entertained buyers’." 


Joe cradled his head as he felt a boot kick him in the stomach. He 
wretched slightly and curled into a fetal position. The Man in the Suit 
crouched in front of Joe and continued. "| vouched for you. You 
understand what that means right? You fuck up and it's my balls on 
the line." 


Joe tried to answer through the pain. "| swear I'll get you your cut 
before the end of the week." 


The Man in the Suit patted Joe on the side of the face. "I don't got 
that kind of time Joe. My boss is breathing down my neck about this. 
| had to tell him something. He's taking a personal interest." 


The Man in the Suit stood up and walked over to the only door in the 
grey room, knocked three times before opening it and moved to the 
corner of the room opposite Joe. The door swung open on its own, 
and Joe could see a bright light in the warehouse outside before it 
was eclipsed by something massive. 


Whatever it was had the rough shape of a man, but was far too tall. 
It ducked under the doorway and entered the room. Joe's eyes went 
wide as the lamp in the center of the room illuminated the creature. 


The creature's fingers reached all the way to the floor, terminating in 
sharp nails. From Joe's perspective it was difficult to tell where the 
fingers ended and the nails began, but they scraped the ground as 
the thing crept with staccato steps, leaning forward on backwards 
facing knees. 


The gray wrinkled skin covering the creature pulsed and throbbed 
under the light, with bulbous pustules rupturing and healing 
repeatedly. The thing's face was all smiles, with a grin that reached 
up and out of sight around the back of its head. As it stopped in front 
of Joe, it focused its single yellow eye on the man and opened an 
impossibly wide mouth. 


"Where," it began with a shallow and breathless voice, "are the 
fucking artifacts?" 


Joe shat his pants. It wasn't a subtle affair. The creature twisted its 
head to an impossible degree but continued to stare at Joe. 


Joe, for his part, couldn't have formed words if he'd wanted to. He 
had lost all control of his faculties. All he could see or hear or think 
about was the creature's eye. The creature finally looked up from 
Joe's paralyzed form at the Man in the Suit across the room. It 
opened its mouth again. "He's got a warehouse in Wicker North." It 
stopped and wheezed. "I've got the address. We'll go there after I'm 
done." 


For Joe the physical pain was gone. All he could focus on was the 
yellow eye. Probing. 


The creature's neck twisted grotesquely as it returned to staring at 
Joe. Joe's eyes filled with tears, but he didn't move. Then the 
creature moved back slightly and Joe began to gasp. Joe hadn't 
even noticed but he'd stopped breathing, and suddenly his lungs 
were screaming for air. 


"What," the creature gasped out as it looked up at the Man in the 


Suit, "do you think we should do with him?" 


The Man in the Suit stepped out of the shadow of the corner and 
shrugged. "He's a good earner. But I'm not inside his head. Is he 
loyal?" 


Joe saw the back of the creature's head as it smiled. The teeth did 
in fact go all the way around. "He is now." 


The Man in the Suit smiled back. "Good. I'll call Darke and let him 
know we'll have the artifacts by the end of the day." 


"Yes." The creature said, before standing up and moving towards 
the door. 


The Man in the Suit nodded. "Thanks, boss. Sometimes these kids 
are more trouble than they're worth." 


The creature didn't say anything else as both it and the Man in the 
Suit walked out of the room. 


Joe shivered on the floor for several more minutes before finally 
getting the courage to stand and leave. 


In The End 


You've done a hundred rituals like this. You can tell something's off, 
different this time. 


It's not the ritual. The ritual is the same, you're pretty sure. Not that 
you can be totally sure. You never remember exactly what you've 
done after, and not because of amnestics. Command never bothers 
to hand down amnestics. Things like what you're doing can't easily 
stay in human memory. Your brains aren't built for it. At least, not if 
you finish enough of the ritual to comprehend the result. You and 
your team of collaborators have an admirably high completion rate. 


But while you can't recall exactly, the motions are familiar. The steps 
like muscle memory. The blood. The chanting. The casting of raw, 
fresh bones. The drawing of ever-more complex designs in 
substances you don't care to identify, handed to by the pitiless white 
gloves of Command's Agents. 


Agents theoretically just like you. Agents of the SCP Foundation. 
Except they're nothing like you. Such is the power of the hierarchies 
you never would've guessed existed before. 


In another sense, they are exactly like you. In a very literal sense. 
You see your mirror, Command's second-in-command (heh), a grim 
person standing there, watching you, but with the lack of interest of 
a sated predator. 


You're extra concerned by this. Not because your mirror is here. 
(No, you're the mirror. Not the other way around. They cast the 
reflections. You are all the reflected.) Mirrors are almost everyday at 
this point. You've personally killed a mirror of yourself (or someone 
you know, even someone you cared about, but only a mirror, only 
ever a mirror) more times than you care to remember. 


That's your job. You're a Collaborator. You know how the universal 
hierarchies are set up, and you're doing what you can to keep 


everyone you know alive. 


Why you're concerned: your mirror is here at all. Command doesn't 
usually bring agents from his neck of the woods. But besides your 
mirror, you count half a dozen more, recognizable as Command's 
people by their clothing. Three in grim labcoats over suits, three in 
military uniforms, all bearing Foundation insignia (far more 
ostentatious than your own familiar Foundation agents, or most of 
the mirrors you've ever seen). They're flanked by a cadre of black- 
suited, black-helmeted (telekill, they call it, and somehow their 
telekill doesn't seem to blow everyone up) Foundation Agents. 
(Mirrors, too? Who knows behind those helmets?) 


Why are they here? They don't like to risk themselves, these people 
you never know what to call besides Overwatch, which used to 
mean something different, back when you still had a real O5 
Command. 


Maybe they're just here to observe business as usual. But you doubt 
that. Command is clearly restless. You don't like when he's restless. 


You continue carrying out the ritual. The ritual is nearing completion. 
You retroactively recognize the eerie-yet-familiar flashes of light, the 
pits in reality that form and vanish before your eyes, the growing 
feeling like you're collectively grabbing a live wire out of the deep 
hidden circuitry of the universe. The vast artificial room (titanium 
alloy — why do they make everything out of titanium, anyway?) 
pulsing to the tune of an alien, arrhythmic heartbeat. 


You steal another glance at your mirror. You wonder if you killed — 
what? your original? — if you would simply shrivel up or turn to dust 
or simply drop dead. You wonder if nothing would happen at all. 


You can't be thinking these thoughts. You could never, ever, ever 
betray Project Palisade. Or you're the next stake in the wall. 


Instead, you watch Li. She's new at this. This is her first time. She 
was doing alright earlier. As she dips her hand in the flowing blood, 
her hands are visibly shaking. You pity her. And envy her. 


She doesn't have literal blood on her hands yet. But she's about to. 


The ritual is almost complete when Command barks the order to 
stop. We collectively stare at him like confused sheep. 


"We're trying something different," Command says. 


"Like what?" you blurt out. (It's always been your job to speak for the 
group, since Command's mirror — someone you cared for deeply — 
died during the first ritual your group ever carried out to completion.) 


"It needs to be darker," Command says. 
It's such a banal thing to say that you have no response. 


"This," Command says. "This ritual. All this. It isn't dark enough. Not 
in a cosmic, or literal sense. It lacks impact. Real impact. We're 
going to make it darker." 


Behind him, your mirror nods in agreement. 


You look around. "Like, make it darker how? Paint everything 
black?" 


He doesn't laugh at the joke. 
"Bring in the subjects,” he says. 


They bring in the subjects. You start to feel sick as you watch. A 
group of children. No older than preteen. The youngest is barely 
walking. They're wide-eyed, baffled, scared. 


"What are we supposed to do with them?" you ask. 
He looks at you like you're stupid. "They're all virgins." 
"Of course they're virgins," you say. "They're children." 


Your mirror steps forward, removing a printed sheet from a set of file 
folders. Hands you the sheet. 


You glance over it. Everyone else in your group is watching you. 


"You can't be serious," you say. 


purpose of propagating itself (see Addendum 877-2). The 
mechanism by which this takes place is unknown, but the behavior 
associated is well-documented. A host animal will approach another 
animal and immobilize it by the most expedient means available to 
it. The host will bite the creature somewhere on the head, making 
blood contact between the animals. The original host will release the 
animal after ten minutes.