Her mouth opened. An inch. Two inches. It edged closer and closer, 
she could’ve sworn it pulsed in her hands, once, as it neared her 
teeth. The stench invaded her nostrils, piercing inwards like a jagged 
spear, and she gagged, lurching forward. The piece of flesh 
squelched again, popping from her grasp to splash down on the 
plate, throwing rivulets of blood up onto her face, allowing her the 
sensation of cold liquid snaking their way down her cheeks. Still, no 
mercy, nothing but the same waiting silence. 


She picked it up and held it against her face. Her tears of disgust 
mingled with the blood coursing down her cheeks. She looked at the 
lump of flesh that had forced her to do this, and she found that she 
hated it. How strange. And, as she experienced this new emotion, 
almost unknowingly, unwittingly, she bit into the placenta. 


She had known by now what it was, she’d known all along that she 
had to eat it, that it was customary. She had wished it wasn’t, upon 
finding out, that she had a say in the matter. Placentophagia, the 
practice of eating the placenta, was purported to help stem 
postpartum depression, contract the uterus after birth, and give back 
to her the life source that she had shelled out. The doctor had said 
so. She still didn’t want to. She had thought it would have been 
disgusting. 


It wasn’t. As her teeth pierced the livid, red flesh of the organ, 
breaking apart stretched skin and into the pliable flesh beneath, she 


instead experienced ecstasy. Her mind broke behind waves of 
pleasure flooding into her nerves centres, arcing lightning burst 
through her mouth and into her brain as the perfect taste filled her 
taste buds. She had found heaven, found it in the organ of her own 
child, in what was essentially part of herself. All thoughts of 
cannibalism faded away beneath the rising tide of blood choking her 
throat, and all her disgust was drowned in the apex of the moment. 
She was complete, once again. Hungrily, she wolfed down the rest 
of the placenta, each bite sending shudders and shivers down her 
spine, causing orgasmic delight to wrack her weak, tired body. By 
the end, she could barely move, but the smile that was plastered 
across her face threatened to tear it in half. She had never felt 
better. 


The erupting cheer faded into the background. Everything did. 


She felt ashamed afterwards, of course, as Ryan joked with her 
about how she looked like she really enjoyed the after-labour meal. 
She hadn't dared to tell him that she had. She didn’t tell any of them 
of the mind-blowing spikes that had lodged themselves in her chest, 
that sparked her fire and drove her insane. She couldn't. Instead, 
she just smiled and nodded, joked back with her husband, throwing 
small talk around the room as she tried to erase the memory from 
her mind, to forget the pleasure that she had experienced, to drive 
the hunger away. 


But it came back, a few weeks later, tearing at her insides with pure, 
maddening desire. She wanted, she fucking needed it, more badly 
than she had ever needed anything. She drew into herself, trying to 
control her urges, to chain the beast, but it was useless. Ryan 
thought she was suffering post-natal depression, had asked kindly 
about it. What could she say? Her silence continued. 


It went on like this, for days, weeks. She cradled her child absently, 
ignoring its cries as she screamed inside, drowning out the piercing 
wails with her own desperate pleas for the madness, the hunger to 
stop. It went on, until one day she could take it no more. 


She found herself alone that day, Ryan must had gone out for drinks 
with his buddies. She was alone with the baby, feeding it her 
precious milk, enduring the needling pain jabbing her breast as the 


hungry child tore into her nipple. Her life-giving fluids spurted out 
sporadically, tiny drops flecking the chin of the hungering monster, 
minute amounts of blood bitten from tender flesh mingling in with the 
milk. She stared at the child, transfixed, as she wondered. What if 
her hunger... what if? She had no time to think, the scraping against 
the back of her head had started again, the aching of her jaws and 
the tightness in her chest. She reached out with her left hand, her 
right still clutching the baby, holding it against herself, trapping it with 
nowhere for it to run. Her fingers closed about the fleshy, tender leg 
of her child, pulling it upwards with agonizing slowness. The baby 
continued to suck at her, to drain from her. 


She wondered, for a brief moment, if it was a sort of poetic justice, 
as her teeth bit into the milky-white skin, her canines puncturing the 
epidermis, and flesh found its way into her mouth. The baby began 
to scream, pain driving its tiny mind wild, but she wouldn't let go. 
She couldn't. Her teeth were already halfway in, the lower jaw 
resting lightly against the puckered portion of the baby’s meat. She 
couldn't do anything except bite harder and harder, her stained 
yellow teeth turning red as blood flooded her throat, filled her mouth. 
Her eyes watered, her grip tightened. The wriggling lump of flesh 
bawled, thrashing about, but it couldn’t escape her. Finally, her teeth 
met, parting aside prepubescent flesh with a squelch in order to hit 
the other half with a soft click. She tore her prize free from the baby, 
chewing with a furiousness born from desperation. She chewed and 
chewed, the blood spurting out of her mouth and onto her chin, 
dribbling in frothing bubbles onto her dress. She chewed until she 
realized... this wasn’t what she needed. In horror, it dawned upon 
her what lay in her mouth, what the bubbling mass of pink that rolled 
about her tongue actually was, and she screamed, for the first time, 
out loud. 


She had explained afterwards that a wild stray dog had bit the baby 
while she had brought it downstairs to the void deck, and that the 
blood on her dress was from her rushing the baby to the hospital. 
She had cried, tears streaming down blood-stained cheeks, in 
Ryan’s arms, sobbing her heart out in what Ryan thought to be 
relief, but she knew to be frustration. She needed something else, 
something more. She needed what she had tasted before, what she 
had grown to hunger for. She needed the placenta, the prime cut. 


She tried looking for it, searching online. It only came back with 
animal placentas, pills and dried facsimiles that she found no 
interest in, no desire for. She bought slabs of raw meat, hid it from 
Ryan, from her baby, who now lay in the cot recovering. Wolfed 
them down in the sink. Spat them out into the bin. It was no use. 
She needed the real thing. 


And that’s why she found herself where she was now, sneaking into 
the hospital at 2 in the morning, drifting along the hallways with 
furtive glances cast behind her. Turn left. Two turns right. The 
maternity ward is just ahead. She made it there without anyone 
noticing, against all her wishes, all her hopes, she hadn’t been 
caught. She imagined what it would have been like if she had 
bumped into a nurse, if they had found her. The relief would have 
washed over her, the madness and darkness evaporated beneath 
the soothing touch of humanity, suffocated by the constricting knots 
of the straitjacket. But no, instead, she found herself at the door, 
whorls of laminated wood staring back at her as her fingers rested 
against the knob. She walked in. 


Ryan thought she was having a night out, watching a movie and 
taking a break from watching the kid. He was at home, dozing off at 
the TV, rocking the cradle once every few minutes. And here she 
was, holding a pillow above the face of some woman she didn’t 
know, pressing it down as hands clawed at her. The woman’s body, 
young and lithe except for the distended belly possessing her 
spawn, struggled and bucked under her grip, but she held on, a 
strength that could come only from insane hunger pressing down 
her arms. The monitor rattled on the table, unplugged cord 
scattering about the floor, the bed shivered with the dying woman’s 
convulsions. Her grip upon the pillow softened as the woman 
struggled less and less, until finally, the flailing hands fell limply 
against the sides of the bed. The room was silent, except for her 
panting, interspersed with mumbled apologies and hungry growls. 


Her hand gripped the scalpel, tightly, pilfered from a small room 
adjacent. Her knuckles were white, barely visible in the dark room, 
trembling as her fingers dug into her palm. She moved closer to the 
corpse. Her hand touched upon the protruding belly, feeling about. 
Thud. She felt something move, with a jolt. The spawn. The 


SCP-610-L2 


During construction of the perimeter surrounding SCP-610's 
containment area several Class-D Personnel were infected due to 
assaults from infected villagers or animals roaming the area in 
addition to a number of infections as a result of escape attempts and 
careless behavior. Most of these infected personnel were 
immediately destroyed with flamethrowers. However, a small 
collection of infected were contained in cold storage units which 
prolonged the inevitable progression of SCP-610's mutative 
properties. The decision was made to utilize some of these infected 
personnel as video relays and dispatch them into nearby sites. 


Due to the concern over loss of equipment as evidenced in 
SCP-610-L1 all three subjects that were used in this manner were 
sent in with a single video system to Site C. Additional equipment 
issued for this dispatch include: 


A one (1) gallon container of gasoline. 

Three (3) emergency flares. 

Three (3) 9mm pistols with three magazines of ammo each. 
Three (3) single serving food rations 


The infected personnel were instructed to observe and avoid 
interaction with the infected villagers as long as possible but should 
a situation arise where they are met with aggression or feel they are 
losing themselves to SCP-610's influence they are free to kill as 
many infected villagers as they so choose and do as much damage 
to infected objects and property as possible while maintaining video 
feed. The intent of this order was to provide data of SCP-610 
infected communities in a raid situation so a plan of eradication 
could be better established. 


At the time of this expedition Site C was suspected to be a possible 
origin point for SCP-610, having far fewer mobile infected than other 
sites as well as structures which appear to have been layered over 
several times with the terraforming effects of the immobile infected. 


woman’s larvae. It still lived. She was supposed to feel remorse 
now, as if one life taken was fine, but two had crossed an invisible 
line. She was supposed to hate herself. 


Instead, she raised the scalpel high, cheek-burning smile splitting 
her face in two, frame shivering in anticipation. And she plunged it 
down, as she prepared to dine once again. 


Message In A Bottle 


The following is a transcript of a handwritten letter found in a 20- 
ounce glass beverage container, found near Lake [REDACTED] in 
southwest Wisconsin. Signs of struggle were evident, and upon 
closer examination, several fragments of human bones were 
discovered nearby, badly charred. 


"In the name of God, the Compassionate, the All-Merciful, | offer you 
my greetings and my profoundest gratitude, O my liberator. | pray 
you, read what is written here, and understand. 


"Firstly, Know that what you hold is no simple sheet of paper. | have 
assumed this form to attract your attention, for my natural shape is 

imperceptible to the eyes of man. | apologize most profusely for my 
duplicity, but | have heard that your people tell stories of messages 
in bottles. Allow me to relay my pitiful tale. 


"My name is Ahmed bin Yusuf Abdul Hakim. | am an Ifrit, a fire spirit, 
of the Jinn. It occurs to me that, in this age and this place, word of 
my people may have escaped your ears, honored one. Know that it 
was Allah, the Creator and the Shaper of forms, who fashioned my 
people from smokeless flame, even before He sculpted the first man 
from the blessed clay, and that our people are as brothers in his 
eyes. 


"lam a stranger to these cold lands; those of my tribe are folk of the 
desert, and of the caverns beneath the sands. My lineage is old and 
proud, known to the birds of the air and the beasts of the earth, but | 
myself am young and, | must confess, foolish. Thus it was that | was 
tricked. 


"Some months ago, | was wandering the desert night, as my folk are 
wont to do, when | heard a voice on the wind, calling my name. | 
followed it for many leagues, on foot and in the air - for Allah the 
most Generous has gifted my people with wings, and we are able 
fliers - but could find it nowhere. | was confounded, but the voice 


offered guidance, and told me to dive beneath the sands. | obeyed, 
plunging downward through sand and stone alike. Suddenly all grew 
dark and cold, and | found myself in a human dwelling not far from 
here. 


"And | saw the source of the voice, who wore the shape of a 
beautiful woman. She had summoned me from afar, drawing me to 
her bedchamber with secret sigils and diagrams, with which she 
then entrapped me in a bottle, the same bottle you have found, O 
my savior. At first | thought that she had summoned me to be her 
husband, for as you may know it is not forbidden for our peoples to 
intermarry. Such was not to be my fortune, for although she was 
lovely in appearance, she was an evil woman of much malign intent, 
and desired only my power, to assist her in wicked deeds. My good 
heart compelled me to refuse, and she grew very angry. 


"She resorted to threats, but we of the Ifrit are clever folk, and so at 
each turn | reminded her that to harm me she would be forced to 
open the bottle, and in so doing, set me free. Her temper raged like 
a storm, but after many nights she grew quieter and more calm. And 
here | hoped, in my foolishness, that she would finally release me. 
Indeed she wished to be rid of me, but alas, so too did she wish to 
make me suffer. She cast me into the lake, telling me as she did so 
that the bottle would be trapped in the ice, and would eventually 
shatter, and that | would die in the cold waters. And she abandoned 
me to my fate. 


"May Allah preserve her, for it is Allah, the Preserver, who has 
saved me. As my captor predicted, this bottle was trapped beneath 
the ice of the lake. And yet, as | floated and prayed in that abyss of 
frozen fear, | saw the stirrings of great fishes below me. And as the 
fishes swam and cavorted throughout the long winter, the ice did not 
entrap me further, and when spring came, | remained alive. And yet, 
| had grown weak from my months of solitude and starvation. When 
this vessel washed up on the shore, | had but a spark of my fire left, 
for the winter in your lands is cold indeed. | could do no more than 
assume this form, as a final act of desperation. As paper | will not 
die, but neither have | the strength to return to my true form, for now 
the fire has left me. 


"Thus | pray you, return to me my essence. Any source of flame will 


serve; | know your people are most ingenious and have devised 
many marvels for this purpose since the days of flint and steel. 
Simply set this paper alight, and | will be free. You will not see the 
joy of my liberation, for as | have said, my people are not easily seen 
by human eyes. Nor does the human form appear clearly to us, 
truly. But | will shower upon you such blessings as are mine to give, 
O my savior. 


"If you wish to know the full scope of my generosity, write your full 
name upon the reverse side of this paper, prior to burning. | will 
return exactly one year thence, having recovered my strength, to 
grant your heart's desire and to hound your enemies. In the name of 
God, the Compassionate, the All-Merciful, it shall be so." 


Monsters