"Not really, shark hit her in the head and she bounced off the table. 
Knocked her right out." 


Aeslinger sat up straight and nodded. 


"Oh. Well, a small victory then. Any day where someone doesn't get 
bitten in half by a falling tiger shark is a good day.” 


Bouchard looked at him funny. 


"| guess so, Doc. Anyway, after about 15 minutes, there's no more 
of them. The stingrays and most of the sharks are dead or dying, 
and that one tiger shark is flopping around trying to bite people's 
ankles. And all this time, no one's said a thing. Screams, sure, but 
no conversation." 


"Really? How odd." 


"Not really. | mean, sure, we've seen a lot of weird shit. It comes 
with the territory, | suppose. But, well, we've never had seafood drop 
from the ceiling. It's a new thing. So we're all kind of stumped." 


More scribbling. 
"Ah, | see. And then what happened?" 


"Well, like | said, no one's said anything, no one's moving and then 
all of a sudden, Dr. Cameron walks in. Diving suit on, snorkel and 
diving glasses on his head. He says something about miscalculating 
the alignment on an inter-reality thingamajig, yada yada yada flux 
calibration thing and how everything'll be sorted out soon. Then he 
flops off again, leaving us with a cafeteria full of stingrays and 


sharks." 

"How did that make you feel?" 
"Like calling in sick the next day." 
"Why is that?" 


"Cause | don't like fish, and | was pretty sure we'd be having it for 
lunch for a few days at least." 


Aeslinger blinked. "Right. Now, Agent Bouchard, are you sure you 
didn't leave anything out of your account?" 


"Quite." 

"You're absolutely sure?" 

"Positive." 

"Agent Bouchard, do you know why you're here?" 


"Not really. Ferguson called me into his office and told me to report 
to you." 


"Agent Bouchard, why did you punch that tiger shark you were 
talking about?" 


"|...ehh..." 


"Agent Bouchard, | have here some statements signed by several of 
your colleagues. | will read from one of them." 


Aeslinger shuffled a stack of papers on his desk and seemed to find 
the one he was looking for. 


"Ah, here we are. Now, Agent Fitzroyce states that, and | quote: 
‘Something came over Bouchard. I've never seen that look in his eye 


before, but he just leapt up and charged that thing’," Aeslinger read. 
"Now, what would you say to that?" 


"I-I really don't think | did anything anyone else wouldn't do?" 
Bouchard answered and squirmed in his chair. 


Aeslinger put his pencil down and steepled his hands in front of him. 


"Come Agent Bouchard, let's not beat around the shark-infested 
bush here: SCP or SPC?" 


Daniel sat back and watched the agent's lips tremble. 


"That's what | thought. Erickson, Winkler, you may escort Agent 
Bouchard to the temporary holding cells on the fifth floor until we 
figure out how he managed to transition into this reality construct," 
Aeslinger said to the two members of Site-82's Security Staff that 
had quietly entered the chambers. 


Bouchard stood up and for a split-second seemed to be gearing up 
for a fight. Then he dropped his head and nodded. Wordlessly he 
went with his escort. 


Aeslinger closed his eyes, thought for a moment and then wrote 
down a possible solution. 


Until point of entry for SPC infiltration has been found, 
put up posters of sharks on concrete walls. Anyone 
reporting to the site's medical staff with fractures in their 
hands is suspicious. 


The Warrior And The... Clown? 


All of Site 25b was flooded with seawater, polluted by lifeless 
bodies, all of its personnel lost in a desperate attempt to keep 
SCP-076-2 from breaching containment. 


Their sacrifice was for nought though, for Able now walked free. 


First, he had to punch his way through three solid cubits of titanium. 
That irritated him a little since back when he worked for Pandora’s 
Box it seemed like the researchers were always complaining about 
how their assistants kept insisting on using titanium for everything. 
‘We’re on a budget here, concrete will do fine!’ they'd say. When it 
came to him though, apparently they could afford to make three 
cubit thick walls out of the stuff. He guessed it made a little bit of 
sense, since they knew he could tear through steel and it would 
have to be corrosion resistant since they were immersing it in sea 
water all the time, but it still pissed him off. 


Once he did punch his way out of his titanium prison, he swam down 
the killing corridor whilst being electrocuted with 20 000 volts of 
electricity. Had he been mortal his muscles would have spasmed 
uncontrollably, but he was able to power through it and swim the 
three-quarters of a furlong to the security station in barely a minute. 
It would have been even faster, but his cape was not the most 
hydrodynamic garment and caused a lot of drag. 


As he swam he effortlessly dodged the fire of the close-in weapon’s 
system with the grace of a penguin (he would probably have 
prefered a comparison to a more fierce animal, but penguins are 
graceful underwater so it’s apt) and then punched his way through 
the plexiglass barrier. 


That’s when he switched from punching to slicing. 


He’d already killed everyone by the time they flooded the whole 
facility. Then he just swam up the shaft, bashed through each of the 


five blast doors (titanium, again), and fought his way through the 
surface outpost’s defences. 


Now he was free. And angry. And wet. 


He appeared to be in a coastal heathland of some sort, devoid of 
people for him to kill or places for him to hide. Knowing the 
Foundation would be upon him shortly, he picked a direction at 
random and ran off at nearly high-way speeds. After running for over 
an hour with no sign of his jailors, he finally came upon his first sign 
of human life. 


A Circus, of all things, a couple miles to the southeast. 


There was something disquieting about it, like it didn’t want him to 
see it and he had to fight to focus on it. Whatever sorcery it was, it 
failed to bewitch his ancient and alien mind. The Circus would hold 
hundreds of the little people, if not thousands. They’d be even easier 
to kill than his jailors, unfortunately, but perhaps he could devise a 
way to use their sheer numbers and terror for his amusement. He’d 
lay waste to the Circus, slaughter men and women, children and 
elders, none would be spared from his — 


“Hey, Mister!” 


Able’s train of thought was broken by a cheerful, female voice. He 
turned and saw a ridiculous looking young woman in a childish 
purple dress, unbraided pigtails, and red and white clown makeup. 
Presumably, she came from the Circus, but what she was doing out 
here by herself he had no idea. 


“What’cha doin’?” she inquired. 


Able responded by summoning a small dagger and tossing it straight 
at her heart. It was more out of reflex than anything. Such a pitiful 
opponent was hardly worth the bother. Turing his attention back 
towards the Circus, he again began contemplating how to best to 
make sport of it. Perhaps if he started off by killing them 
surreptitiously, allowing panic to spread among the crowd - 


“Wow, this dagger is vanta-black. It’s so weird to look at. Where’d 


you get it?” 


Slowly turning his head in disbelief, Able saw that the Clown was siill 
alive and unscathed, holding the dagger in her hand. 


“You caught that?” he asked. 


“Oh yeah, I’ve been part of knife throwing acts for years now,” she 
replied. The blade suddenly dissolved into dust and vanish in a gust 
of wind. “Oh cool, just like the Morgul Blades from Lord of the 
Rings.” 


Perhaps this ridiculous creature might be worth a fight after all. 


“Do you have a name, girl?” he asked as he drew a sword from the 
void. 


“Li'l Lollipop, but you can call me Lolly,” she replied, drawing her 
giant wooden mallet from the hammerspace of her pockets. “And | 
think | can guess who you are. A red cape with no shirt? You must 
be a big Zack Snyder fan.” 


She slammed her hammer into the ground, sending a shockwave of 
soil careening straight for him. He dodged it with the grace of a 
dama gazelle (another animal he wouldn't like to be compared too, 
but nonetheless an apt comparison) and then threw a chakram 
which immediately decapitated her mallet. 


Her jaw dropped in shock as the hammerhead fell to the ground. 


"What the heck are these things made off? | fought a robot with this 
hammer once!" 


"That could just as easily have been your head, girl. Beg for mercy 
now and I'll consider making your death swift!" 


"Ugh, you're just two hundred and fifty pounds of toxic masculinity, 
aren't you?" she asked as she pulled out a roll of bright red tape to 
reattach the hammerhead to the mallet. "Do you know that song 

Indestructible by Disturbed? I'm somehow hearing that in my head 


just looking at you." 


Able smirked at the girl's audacity in the face of death, and decided 
to give her a swift death anyways. He threw his sword at her, 
expecting that the blade would be too long for her to catch without 
being impaled. But catch it she did, her arm stretching like it was 
made of rubber to grab the sword by its hilt, the tip of the blade 
barely half an inch from her face. She blew on it casually, causing it 
to disintegrate like a dandelion. 


“Huh, just what | thought,” she murmured. 


Able had to admit he was impressed that the girl had managed to 
catch not only one but two of his legendary black blades. But could 
she catch them as fast as he could throw them? He unleashed a 
flurry of daggers, several each second for five or six seconds, forty 
blades for her two hands to catch. 


And she caught none of them. 
Instead, each blade disintegrated before it ever reached her. 
“What?” he snarled. 


“Went off prematurely, it looks like. Don’t feel bad, it happens to 
every guy.” 


“How did you do that?” he demanded, drawing out a massive sword 
from his cloak. 


“As a Reality Bender, | know a thing or two about Hume fields, and 
those blades of yours have incredibly low Hume fields. It’s why they 
stop existing so soon after you throw them. All | have to do it ratchet 
up the local Hume-idity a tiny bit and they vanish before they can 
touch me. 


“That means no more projectiles, lazy-bones. If you want to fight me, 
you'll have to come over and do it yourself.” 


A murderous smile spread over Able’s face. 


“With pleasure.” 


He bolted towards her, seemingly unencumbered by his massive 
sword, swinging it so rapidly it was barely more than a blur. To his 
astonishment, she was able to keep up with it, dodging each swing 
with impossible speed. Growling in frustration, Able simply thrust the 
blade forward, impaling nothing but the ground. His eyes darted 
back and forth searching for the Clown, only for her to strike him in 
the head with her mallet from behind. 


The blow was so powerful he saw cartoon stars circling his head, 
though that was actually a magical property of the hammer and not 
a sign of a severe concussion. 


"Oh goody, it still works." 


During his brief moment of disorientation, Lolly pulled the sword 
from the ground and cartwheeled a safe distance away with it. 


“Hey Mister, look what else | can do.” She kissed the blade, causing 
a visible flare of aspect radiation to flash off of it. She made a few 
demonstrative swings with it, illustrating not only her skill with a 
sword but the fact that the blade was no longer as ephemeral as 
normal. “Fixed it! Now we can have a proper sword fight. Having a 
sword and hammer fight is pretty silly, after all, especially since you 
already broke it once you jerk!” 


“You sangdu nutuku, do you have any idea what that sword is?” he 
demanded. “Those blades are formed in the Darkness Below, 
brought into this plane by half-real Daevite sorceresses, apostles to 
the Scarlet King himself, you cannot tamper with such sacrosanct 
spellcraft!” 


“| don't know the meaning of the word sacrosanct. Literally,” she 
said, sticking out her tongue at him. 


“Insolent Wretch!” Able roared, veins bulging in his neck, 
summoning two more swords. “I have been but trifling with you now 
because it amused me, but if you do not surrender that blade to me 
this instant you will face me in the full fury of my rage state!” 


“A rage state? What’s a rage state? How is that different from just 
being angry? Oh, is it like being triggered? | get triggered 


figure appearing on one of the station's monitors, walking 
slowly. After several minutes of observation, the doctor 
then reported seeing several black figures appear on 
different monitors. When one of which was recognized 
as having been recently passed by Dr. , he 
reportedly fled the room in a state of panic. 


After an extended period, Dr. recounted eventually 
coming to a halt in a corridor, falling to the ground out of 
exhaustion. The doctor recalled having fallen asleep in a 
seated position, despite apparently having intended to 
continue his exploration, having been awoken by the 
shouts of the approaching search party. The doctor was 
subsequently retrieved, during which time he repeatedly 
expressed disorientation and claimed to have fallen 
asleep in a different hallway. Dr. later retracted this 
statement, citing uncertainty. 


A medical check-up revealed Dr. was physically 
unharmed by this experience beyond fatigue. The doctor 
was reprimanded for neglecting Foundation procedure, 
and his security clearance has been downgraded 
following the incident, with a review pending in 6 months. 


« SCP-976 | SCP-977 | SCP-978 » 


sometimes, so trigger warnings are important, especially when -” 
“The sword! Now!” 

“No. | told you, we’re going to have a sword fight.” 

Able growled, shaking his head in disdain. 

“So be it, Clown!” 


Screaming like a wild, rabid, animal in musth and possibly on PCPs, 
he came charging at her with each sword spinning at thousands of 
rpm, swinging his arms at her as if he had massive circular saws for 
hands. He was certain that even she would not be able to evade 
such swift blades, and she made no attempt to. Instead, she thrust 
her own sword straight up into each obsidian vortex. As they struck 
her blade, each of Able’s swords came to an instant halt, generating 
such devastating force that they broke his wrists so violently it left 
white shards of bones piercing out from his own skin. 


As the swords fell from his now useless hands, he kicked Lolly's 
legs out from under her. Stomping on her chest so hard she couldn't 
breathe, he leaned down and bared his sharpened teeth at her. 


"You should have taken my offer for a quick death while it lasted," 
he spat at her. "Now I'm going to eat you alive, starting with that 
ridiculous face of yours." 


As he lunged forward to tear her face off, a small door opened in her 
forehead and a Swiss cuckoo bird popped out, impaling him in the 
eye and causing him to lighten his foothold on her enough for her to 
escape. 


"Pakhta! Sajila hkmara goitht yuimmoh! he howled in Assyrian. He 
attempted to pulverize Lolly into the ground with his dangling fists, 
but he hit nothing but dirt. 


Instead, she ducked between his legs and grabbed hold of his 
crimson cloak. 


“No capes!” she shouted in a European accent as she tossed it over 
his head and twisted him up in it. With his hands dangling by sinews 


from his shattered wrists, he wasn’t exactly able to free himself from 
it. He tried flexing and biting his way through it, which eventually just 
deteriorated into him screaming and slamming himself against the 
ground. 


When he looked back up at her, he saw that she was recording him 
with her smartphone. 


"Sorry, but just having proof you were here is going to be great for 
business. Oh, can you say 'The Circus of the Disquieting fully 
accommodates the differently Ab/ed’?’ And really put the emphasis 
on Abled."