He didn’t seem convinced. “Are you sure? You’ve been acting kinda 
weird lately? Spending too much time with the box, maybe?” He had 
to adjust himself to remain facing me as | walked, before eventually 

giving up and following me. 


“Oh, no, I’m perfectly alright, Jordan. If | really wanted to, | could 
always get amnesticized and forget all about the box. Probably 
could get reassigned, too.” 


“Dr. Solys, I’m not sure that’s how that works. You meant if you need 
to, not if you want to, right?” He stopped me by placing a hand on 
my shoulder. 


| looked over my shoulder at him, flashing a weak but truthful smile. 
“Yes, you're correct, Jordan.” 


He sighed. “Alright, whatever you say, Caleb. Just...get some help if 
you need it, okay?” 


| nodded. “Yes, yes, of course.” 


Jordan released my shoulder and turned away to return to whatever 
duties he’d forsaken. Paying the interaction no mind, | continued 
down the hall. 


Soon, | reached a set of two doors branded with that 4-digit number. 
| swiped my card across rightmost door’s sensor and stepped inside. 
Instantly, | was overtaken by the music and felt the pressure in my 
shoulders drop. | let out the breath | hadn't noticed | was holding and 
eased into the office chair resting in front of the controls. 


Moonlight Sonata. Interesting. After around my 20th time being 

exposed, it seemed to have run out of ideas and began playing any 
random song. Yesterday it was an upbeat Led Zeppelin song that | 
couldn’t remember the name of. Today, classical. It almost seemed 


to match my mood, but it was too loose of a correlation to make any 
sort of note on it. Besides, who knew if Site Command was going to 
count that as more “testing”, and who'd want that? 


| quickly glanced between the metal case in the next room, and my 
terminal. It was stronger today. It wanted to draw me closer. But, | 
knew that. So | wasn’t going to give in to my daily temptation. 


Or...was |? 
Before | could stop myself, the passphrase was keyed in. 
The office chair pushed aside, and the door slid open. 


A wave of my ID and the heavy containment door bulkily crawled 
open. 


Before | could stop myself, | was staring directly at that pink music 
box, albeit from a rather safe distance. | might hear things, but it's 
nothing | can’t handle. 


“Caleb?” 


| glanced around briefly before remembering what the box did. She 
wasn’t real. She died years ago. Before | joined. 


But still... 
“Claire?” | asked out into the void. 
“Caleb? Come to me, love. Come.” 


“It...itis you. Of all the apparitions that thing could throw at me, why 
you?” 


“Come to me, my love. Come forward.” 


| knew how this box operated. It wanted me to get close, at which 
point I’d think Claire- 


No. The voice. I’d think the voice was trapped inside, and that | had 
to free her. 


So, | wasn’t going to do it. | wasn’t going to approach it. 


“Darling, come on! Everything will be okay again. We...we can see 
each other again. Please...” 


| shook my head. “You know that | can’t.” 
“You have to! We can be together again, Caleb! After all this time!” 
“Claire...” 


| don’t know how much time passed. | wasn’t keeping track. | sat ina 
stalemate with the voice until a jolt snapped me out of it. A shock, as 
if I'd just touched a live wire. 


“Caleb. Come.” 


Claire had changed tone so abruptly that it honestly had shocked 
me more than the jolt. It took me far too long to understand what 
was happening, especially given my experience. | soon did, 
however, and took a step back from the box. 


“N-no, my dear. You know | can’t.” 
“Caleb, just come closer.” 


A shock flitted through my left arm but | almost didn’t even feel it. | 
took a step forward, spurred by impulse and the jolts trying to hijack 
my nerves. 


Another step. 
Another. 


Soon, | was in range of the box. The feeling that had been described 
to me so often, that the voices were trapped and needed liberation, 
developed at the back of my mind but | shrugged it off. | Knew she 
wasn’t trapped. She died before | came to the Foundation. She died 
years before we found this thing. There wasn’t a chance. 


| stood there for around a minute, staring at the music box. | 
watched its gears turn in silence, Beethoven’s composition now 


grown into a violent crescendo. 

| thought of my time at the Foundation. | thought of the box. | 
thought of the test subjects. | thought of Site Command. | thought of 
my frustration with their leadership. Clearly there was something we 
didn’t know about the box. | wouldn’t have been standing here 
otherwise. 


| thought of Claire. 
...was there a chance? 


Not thinking clearly, | lunged forward and grabbed the box in one 
swift motion before turning on my heels. Clutching the box, my box, 
under my arm, | quickly strode out of the containment room. | closed 
and locked the door behind me, being careful not to trigger any 
alarms. It shouldn’t cause too much of a fuss, anyway. What’s wrong 
with a project lead visiting his project? 


What’s wrong with that? 


They’d catch me on the cameras, though. Any second now, the 
lights would switch and that alarm would ring, alerting everyone to 
my crim- 


And there it was. 


The hall was suddenly engulfed in darkness before the darkness 
was in turn cast out by a deep red. Alarms blared. A voice, Site 
Director Peterson, resounded throughout the halls on the PA 
system. “All personnel, be advised that there is a Euclid level 
containment breach in progress. Security teams, Dr. Caleb Solys is 
designated for kill on sight.” 


| didn’t alter my gait. | made my way cautiously yet purposely to the 
elevator. This was fine. | could take them. They didn’t know how this 
thing worked. | did. | could use it against them. | could win. 


Before | could reach the end of the hall, multiple security officers, 
including ones I’d worked with, filed in. They took formation and fired 
without hesitation. 


| used the box to protect my chest, the thing was damn near 


invulnerable. To cover the rest of me, | just sidestepped. One of the 
things I’d noticed in the incident was that the D-Class had been 
given increased dexterity well beyond what should be reasonable. 


At least, that was what | thought. | was able to dodge the first few, 
mostly by predicting who would shoot first, but soon the volume 
became too much. My leg was hit first. My waist. My shoulder. 


My hea- 


| struggled to catch my breath. What had just happened? | couldn't 
remember. 


Wait, yes | could. Why was | here? | was shot, but... 


| glanced around. | was in my office. My calendar said the right date, 
but the weeks seemed slightly off. 


Why is it...? | checked my computer. Yeah, today’s date: April 29th, 
2017. 


Yeah, that’s right. | had gone back to my office after lunch with 
Jordan to fix up the box’s document. It was due for a revision. The 
incident last week only showed us that there was more to that thing 
than meets the eye. 


| opened my browser and was greeted with a notification. A 
message, from Site Command. 


“Dr. Solys, the containment breach on 04/23/2017 was far too costly. 
In light of the new dangers that SCP-3704 presents, testing will be 
suspended until further notice. See Document Incident Report: 
3704-A for more details. Thank you for your compliance. 


- Robert Peterson, Site Director” 


No. Something felt wrong. This can’t be right, we need to keep 
testing. We don’t know anything about it yet! Following my strange 
compulsion, | quickly drafted a request to Site Command asking for 
reinstatement of testing on SCP-3704. 


This had to be wrong. 


My reply came two days later, in the form of a short, to the point 
email. 


“Request denied.” 


%) experience at least two from the following list: 


¢ Elevated engine temperature (often accompanied by 

malfunction of temperature sensors to indicate a lower 

temperature than is actually present) 

Intermittent malfunctions in ventilation systems 

Partial or total blockages in filters and/or fuel line 

Fluid leaks 

« Fluctuations in engine responsiveness 

¢ [DATA EXPUNGED] 

* Stiffening or softening of the suspension system of one or 
more wheels 

¢ Loosening and/or slipping of belts 

Increased fuel consumption 

¢ Electrical and computer malfunctions 

¢ Excessive or inadequate fluid pressures 


More severe malfunctions have been noted on occasion, including 
brake failure, wheel detachment, steering failure, soontaneous 
airbag deployment, [DATA EXPUNGED] explosion. These occur 
very rarely, in less than % of cases. If a vehicle has existing 
damage, defect, or other trouble in a particular part or system, that 
part or system will be especially prone to involvement in SCP-941 
symptoms. 


Vehicles affected by SCP-941 are contagious for the entire duration 
of the infection. SCP-941 spreads to new subjects when air 
containing exhaust from an infected vehicle enters one or more 
cylinders of the new subject's engine, with probability of infection 
depending upon the concentration of affected exhaust (see 
Document 941- for details). Once the exhaust has been diluted by 
at least [REDACTED], it is no longer capable of spreading SCP-941. 
Other than the presence of SCP-941, no anomalous or distinctive 
traits have been identified in exhaust produced by infected vehicles. 
In addition, vehicles that have recently been affected by SCP-941 
seem to gain a temporary resistance to reinfection, though this 
resistance gradually decreases by [DATA EXPUNGED]. 


SCP-941 currently appears unable to infect vehicles without a four- 
stroke gasoline-fueled internal combustion engine. It should be 
noted that gasoline-electric hybrids, due to their more extensive 


Some of These Things Don’t Need Food 


| have been with the Foundation for a few years now, but never in 
this deep. Up until now | had just been serving meals to the human 
test subjects. It felt like serving meals to prisoners — and some of 
them were death row prisoners who wanted the Get-Out-Of-Jail- 
Free card by agreeing to be tested on. Certainly a weird 
environment. The test groups were changed out on a monthly basis 
and | never questioned why. | assumed they all went back to their 
lives when the testing was done and that was that. 


But where | am now is much different. I've been told this is a 
promotion, yet the pay is not much better and the restrictions are 
much tighter — this is where the real Foundation shit goes down. 


“Phone or any recording devices in the box,” Marta stated bluntly as 
the receptionist pushed a plastic box across the counter. 


| pulled my phone out of my uniform pocket, checked it one last time 
to see if | had any new messages, and reluctantly dropped it in the 
box. 


“Why can’t | have my phone?” | asked ignorantly. 


Marta and the receptionist exchanged a look that said “this guy is 
stupid as fuck, isn't he?” 


“Well, Jay, what you see in here cannot be seen by the outside 
world,” Marta explained. “One picture gets out and boom, you’re 
dead.” 


| assumed she was joking, yet the cold look in her eyes suggested 
she was entirely serious. The fact there were two heavily armed 
guards on each side of the doors leading to block three also 
reinforced this idea — why the hell did | take this promotion? 


“Now, grab the cart and let’s move,” she demanded once the 


receptionist cleared her for entry into the block. 


Marta Anderson is an interesting woman. She’d apparently worked 
for the SCP Foundation since the 60s. Originally she was the only 
female and the only African American until the 80s. Now into her late 
70s she was retiring and passing the torch onto me. However, I’m 
not sure if | want her torch. | certainly don’t want to work here till I’m 
her age. 


“So a nice change from your other job is that you only have to do 
this once a day and to fewer patrons,” she said in a way that 
suggested that those where the only nice things about meal delivery 
in block three. 


Looking over the railings as we walked, block three was five stories 
deep seeing as it was underground. | didn't see how there were less 
people in this block than in the test subject area. 


“Are you sure there are less people here?” | asked while comparing 
the amount of food in the cart to the number of rooms. “Because this 
block is a heck of a lot bigger than the test subject block.” 


Marta scoffed. 


“Nah. We only have to feed thirty-two here.” She tapped the piece of 
paper resting on the top of the cart. “These are all the rooms we 
have to deliver food to. I've memorized what rooms | serve, but | 
brought the list to make it easier on you.” 


| still wasn't convinced. This block was far too big. 


“So besides the thirty-two rooms we go to, are the rest of the rooms 
empty?” 


She laughed. 
“No, but some of these... things don’t need food like you and | do.” 


Things? What the hell does that mean? | thought. Was she 
suggesting that some of these cells had inhumane creatures in them 
or was she just dehumanizing the starving people in the remainder 
of the cells? 


She stopped me in front of one room before putting a finger to her 
lips. | remained quiet as she went over to one door with the words 
‘RM550 SCP173’ inscribed on a plaque. She knocked once before 
moving back towards me with a cheeky smile on her face. 


| froze when | heard the sound of concrete grinding against concrete 
coming from inside the room as something moved its way closer to 
the door. It appeared to stop just at the door and remain motionless. 
| turned to Marta with a confused, but mostly terrified, expression. 


“Some of these things don’t need food,” she whispered. “Whatever's 
in there is not human. Hell, | don’t even think it’s organic.” 


“Do you know what’s in there?” | asked in an equally quiet tone, 
afraid to speak loudly in the presence of the concrete creature on 
the other side of the door. 


She shook her head. Funny, all these years and yet she had no clue 
what was in there. On mutual agreement we got away from that 
room as quickly as possible. 


“So tell me where our room is,” she requested. Of course she knew 
where we had to go first, but she was training me. 


“Err, it says ‘RM474’ so | assume that’s the seventy-fourth room on 
the next floor down?” 


“Yeap.” 


We took the elevator down to fourth floor. It, along with the stairwell, 
was only accessible with the Foundation key cards so | was going to 
be so fucked if | lost it. 


“So are most of these... things dangerous?” | muttered to Marta as 
we headed for room 474. 


“Yeap.” 
“Including the ones we're giving food to?” 


“Yeap.” 


“But they’re well-contained, right?” 

“Yeap.” 

“Have you ever been attacked by one?” 

Marta glanced toward the ceiling as she thought. 


“I’ve come close with a few. One time a scrawny thing with sharp 
fingernails tried to get me through the food port when | opened it. | 
had a pretty nasty cut on my hand afterwards.” She then glanced at 
the walkie-talkie attached to the tray to make sure it wasn't on. “The 
most recent injury I've gotten was actually at the hands of a security 
guard who pushed me out of the way when there was a containment 
breach. Something down on the first floor got loose and | was in the 
middle of my run when the guards came flooding in. | got thrown 
against a wall and injured my shoulder.” 


| inhaled deeply. Those would not be fun injuries to suffer through, 
but they assured me that this job wasn't as dangerous as it sounded 
if a scratch and a shoulder injury were the only major damages she 
suffered in all her years of working here. 


My very first time delivering food in block three was incredibly 
unspectacular. | opened the food port, slid the tray in, closed the 
food port and that was it. | didn't even get to see what was inside — 
but that was probably for the best. 


“So when do we collect the trays?” | asked. 
Marta shook her head.