"Only when | look at you." Adams smiled. "Relax. It's a milk run. 
Greenberg shows all the signs of a low-level bixby. Intel has the op 
planned out from start to finish, and despite what you've heard, the 
plan usually survives until at least second or third contact with the 
enemy. Sometimes fourth." 


"Funny," lris said. She knew all about plans. 


"You'll be fine. Seriously. I'll be on standby if things go wrong. Your 
team knows what they're doing. And ask yourself this: Is there any 
chance this will be worse than—" 


"No," Iris said. And she realized Adams was right. No matter what 
happened, it wasn't the worst thing. That had already happened. 


Adams nodded. "You've got this, kiddo," she said. "Go kick some 
ass." She gave Iris a pat on the shoulder, then picked up her rifle 


and jogged off to the armory. 


Jerry watched warily as Mr. Greenberg walked through the door into 
the subject's hallway. He had to stand on a chair to see through the 
bars, but he hated not knowing what was going on. It was supposed 
to be a no-testing night. 


"Mr. Rodriguez, | am going to discuss the matter of our funding with 
the local constabulation. Please make sure that the area is secure." 
He glanced around the hallway and sniffed. "And clean." 


Jerry relaxed. He wouldn't be going upstairs. 
"Yes, Dr. Greenberg.” The guard looked pointedly at Jerry. 


"Oh, and set a contingency of guards to sweep the perimeter. It will 
give them something to do." 


That night, Iris found herself huddled about a mile from Greenberg's 
facility with thirty-two of her new closest friends. 


"Ma'am, we have confirmation that Greenberg has left the 
perimeter," said Jiang. He was her second-in-command. He'd been 
in field ops for over ten years, and had a flawless record. He was, 
frankly, a babysitter. He'd made it clear that he wasn't going to take 
over unless things went very wrong, but he would let her know if she 
was screwing up. He reminded her of Agent Lopez. She missed 
Agent Lopez. He'd always made her feel safe. 


"Thank you, Jiang," she said. "We'll hold for half an hour, and then 
move." 


He nodded. "Any words first?" 


She took a deep breath and nodded. If she was going to be in 
charge, she needed to act like it. 


Jiang motioned for everyone to gather close. 


"All right, everyone. You know what we're here to do. We take it one 


room at a time. Most of the guards are above-ground, so we clear 
those first, then we'll take the lower part.” 


She looked them over. They were wearing body armor, most of 
them carrying assault rifles. A few had other equipment, things like 
axes, crowbars, and a portable ram with "Skeleton Key" painted on 
it. They had all turned to look at her. Some of them seemed to be 
listening intently. Some didn't seem to take her entirely seriously. 


"You all know who | am. Maybe you don't think | should be here, but 
at the moment, | am running this op. If any of you don't like that, you 
should have requested reassignment. Any questions?" 


"Sounds good, Iris," said one of the agents. She recognized him. 
Jackson. He'd been part of her security detail a few years prior. 


Jiang coughed meaningfully, and Iris fixed the young agent with a 
cold, hard stare. 


"Er, that is. Agent Thompson. Ma'am." He looked about ready to 
crawl down inside his PPE. 


"All right, people, sit tight. We move in twenty-five mikes," Jiang 
said. 


They didn't bother hopping the fence. A pair of bolt cutters had a 
hole opened up in under a minute, then everyone was pushing 
through. 


The point man put his fingers up, and everyone crouched down in 
the bushes. Someone was approaching. Several someones, having 
a discussion. 


"Think it's gonna rain?" the first voice asked. 
"| hope not. Hell of a night for patrol if it does," said a second. 


"Well, it's not like the rain's going to wait for a more convenient 
night," the first voice said. 


"| didn't say it would. I'm just saying it'd be a shame, is all." 


"The real shame is that we got picked," said a third. "Out of 
everyone in, why us?" 


"| don't know about you, but | think Rodriguez has it in for me ever 
since | was watching that shark show," said the first voice. 


"| think he's oversensitive, personally. Not everything's about him." 


"Try telling him that. Idiot thinks that—" The second voice stopped. 
"Did you hear something?" 


Iris held the photo out and waited for it to finish developing. The 
guards were just turning towards her when the first one tripped. The 
second felt a tap on his shoulder, and then the third found his hat 
falling down over his face. 


The MTF members had them bagged up before they understood 
they were under attack. 


Snapping the shutter felt right. Reaching through the polaroids felt 
right. Every time she used her powers, she felt like herself again. 
lronic, she thought, that the thing that made her feel the most like 
‘Iris Thompson’ was the same thing that got her named 'SCP-105'. 


Five agents hung back to keep watch, while the rest moved forward 
towards a side door. 


The team breached the door like clockwork. They'd done this similar 
times at all sorts of compounds. This was nothing new. Even Iris had 
done this a few times, though in her previous experience, it mostly 
meant cleaning up after Able tore through the opposition. 


They were in. She moved in with the rest, camera at ready. The first 
two in already had a prisoner, a skinny man in a grey and black 
security uniform. His hat, she realized, had the emblem of the SCP 
Foundation on it, but with the points of the arrows replaced by two 
capital Gs and an A. 


She motioned for the rest to keep moving forward. The rest of her 
team streamed in behind. 


There were two casualties as they cleared the rest of the ground 


lethargic than normal and exhibit many signs of both physical and 
mental fatigue. However, these symptoms are light, and are easily 
countered through specialized medication. Subjects show a 
decreased response to external stimuli. 


Late Stage (Exposure time: 10-12 days): The symptoms shown in 
the Middle Stage of exposure begin to worsen. Also, the subjects 
begin to slowly become transparent. However, none of the subjects 
appear to notice these phenomena. Instead, the subjects will 
continue with the daily routine they had set during the Middle Stage, 
with slight variations. Late Stage subjects show almost zero 
response to external stimuli and appear to be completely unaware of 
their condition. 


Terminal Stage (Exposure time: 14 days): Subjects become 
completely transparent, with a faint silhouette being the only visual 
marker of their presence. The symptoms of fatigue increase 
significantly as shown from the movements of Terminal subjects as 
well as their unwillingness or inability to respond to external stimuli. 
Subjects will no longer follow through with their daily routine and will 
instead wander SCP-710 aimlessly, still unaware or uncaring of their 
current condition. 


Expiration: (Exposure time: 15 Days): Subjects will essentially fade 
from existence. No physical evidence of their presence remains, and 
attempts to track their movements and whereabouts after Expiration 
have so far proven unsuccessful. 


So far, there seems to be no way to counteract the effects of 
SCP-710. Tests with D-Class personnel show that once Middle 
Stage symptoms manifest, the process is impossible to prevent or 
reverse. This leaves a small window of only several days for 
personnel to enter SCP-710 without risk. 


The exact cause of this phenomena is currently unknown. All that is 
known is that SCP-710's ability manifested sometime in 19 , 
causing the disappearance of approximately people. The event 
was covered up as a natural disaster. 


Notes: /t's no coincidence that SCP-710 manifested so suddenly 
and randomly. Perhaps it had something to do with the [DATA 


floor, both of them guards. The rest were tied up and bagged for 
later removal. 


The second floor was mostly asleep, and there were no problems 
capturing the personnel there. The third floor contained several 
spacious rooms, most of them with expensive furniture and random 
pieces of art. There was also a fake looking laboratory that looked 
like it had been made for a movie set; there didn't seem to be much 
actual scientific equipment. Finally, there was a large door. 


"Break it down," Iris said. 


Several of her men took the ram and pounded on the door. It ended 
up taking three tries to break it down. 


Inside, there were... filing cabinets. And kittens. 


"What the hell?" One of the agents crouched down for a closer look. 
There was something wrong with the faintly mewling kittens. They 
were bloated, and their fur was patchy, with open sores in places. 


"Careful," Jiang said. 


As the agent reached out to touch the kitten, it suddenly doubled in 
size, then exploded with a loud bang, knocking the woman back. 


"Shit!" Jiang grabbed the wounded agent by the back of her collar 
and pulled her out of the room. 


"Fall back!" Iris said. 


As they moved, she took a picture of the doorway. As soon as it 
developed, she started flicking at the living bombs through the 
photo, detonating them far enough away to avoid anymore injuries. 


"How is she?" she asked Jiang. 


"We've got the bleeding under control," he said, "but I'm not sure 
she'll keep the arm." 


She felt a twinge in her stomach. She'd lost teammates before. But 
now she was in charge. The agent had been under her commana. It 


was her responsibility to keep them all as safe as possible. 


"Fuck those things,” one of the other agents said, spitting towards 
the smoking remains of the kittens. 


"Keep moving, but carefully," she said. It was also her responsibility 
to get the job done. She steeled herself. They were there despite the 
risks. She could get them killed just as easily by not doing her job. 


They took it slowly once they entered the room, but there didn't 
seem to be any explosive kittens left. 


"Montoya, start going through those files,” Iris said. "See if you can 
get a Cliff's Notes version of what's in the basement." 


"Yes ma'am." 


"Be quick. We're going down as soon as we have this floor secure." 


There was something wrong. There was shouting and shooting 
upstairs, and Jerry wondered exactly what was going on up there. 


The guard, Mr. Busby, kept by the door. "Don't pay any attention," 
he said. "Just keep sweeping. The guards upstairs have it covered." 


That was when Rodriguez came down. "We're compromised," he 
said. "It's time to liquidate the assets." 


"Liquidate?" 


"Kill them, shithead! We can't let anyone else take them. Dr. 
Greenberg is not going to want to see his investment in someone 
else's hands." He gestured to Jerry. "Start with that one." 


Jerry's mouth dropped. The mop fell from his hands. 
"What? C'mon, Marco. He's just a kid." 


"If you're too much of a pussy, I'll do it." Rodriguez pulled out his 
gun, and Jerry looked around desperately for someplace to hide. 


Busby punched Mr. Rodriguez in his mouth, and a few shark teeth 
went flying. "Run, kid!" he shouted. 


Mr. Rodriguez shot Busby in the stomach, and was leveling the gun 
at Jerry when something foul smelling and brightly glowing hit him in 
the face. "What the fuck?" he shouted, as he tried to wipe it from his 
eyes. 


Mr. Quiet made a throwing motion, and an invisible rope snagged 
Mr. Rodriguez's arm, making the gun fall to the floor. 


Jerry tried to grab it, but he accidentally kicked it down the hallway, 
past the devil's circle. He began running after it. 


Rodriguez bit at the air, and Mr. Quiet fell back as the cord snapped. 
The burly guard began running after Jerry. "You're fucking dead, you 
freaks! Starting with the brat!" 


Jerry was running as fast as he could, but Mr. Rodriguez's legs were 
much longer than his. He started to skirt around the side of the circle 
when he realized Mr. Rodriguez was just behind him. 


With no other choices, he jumped through the glowing circle. 


There was a sensation of something trying to grab him, but 
somehow slipping past him. He fell out the other side, and rolled to 
his knees. He heard a scream, and looked behind. 


Mr. Rodriguez was halfway through, and he hadn't escaped the 
grasp of whatever was in there. His body began to grow longer. His 
mouth was a grimace, and it kept getting bigger, until his jaws were 
stretching the sides of his face unnaturally wide. His skin was 
turning grey, and his clothes were tearing. His arms shrank and 
flattened until they became fins, and a tail began to grow from his 
rear. In moments, a ten-foot-long shark was thrashing on the floor. 
The last thing to change were his eyes, going from brown to pure 
black, the panic fading from them. The thing struggled within the 
circle, trying to find water, until it finally stopped, exhausted, its gills 


gasping. 


Jerry sat there panting for a few minutes longer, then he carefully 


made his way past the other side of the circle until he reached Mr. 
Busby. The man was still alive, if hurt badly. 


"Fuck," he said. "He shot me. Why'd he do that?" 


Jerry reached into Busby's pocket and pulled out his keys. The 
guard offered no resistance. 


He was about to start unlocking the cells when he heard the door to 
the stairs kicked open, and suddenly men with guns came streaming 
down. He stood up and grabbed the only weapon in reach: his mop. 


"Found something, ma'am," Montoya said, handing her a file. 


The file simply had a -5 at the top. A quick glance showed it was 
about a young boy. "Our caller," she guessed. The report was thick, 
with pages and pages of revisions. She wondered how long 
Greenberg had been holding him. There were a few pictures. He 
looked so scared. 


"We're ready to breach the basement," said Jiang. 


"Right. Let's do it," Iris said. She followed him down the stairs back 
to the first floor. 


The breach team was ready, and on her signal, they proceeded 
down the stairwell and broke through the door. 


On the other side, they found themselves confronted by a short, 
skinny little boy holding a mop, standing over a guard bleeding out 
from a gut shot. Behind them was a... a shark? In some kind of 
glowing circle? There were doors along the hallway, and faces could 
be seen looking through little barred windows at them. 


"Don't... don't hurt my friends!" the little boy said. He was obviously 
terrified, but nor was he making any move to back down, despite his 
shaking knees. Iris recognized him from the file. 


"We're not here to hurt you," Iris said. "We're just looking for our 
friend." 


"Then why do you have guns?" he asked her. 


Jiang looked at her for orders. Even a ten-year-old could be 
dangerous, depending on his abilities. 


Instead of answering directly, Iris opened the file again and glanced 
through it. "Subject refuses to reveal anomalous abilities. Proposing 
further experimentation.’ What kind of tests... 'Exposed to open 
flame... aggressive dogs... low-to-mid-level interrogations..." 


Iris looked back at the little boy standing between her and the other 
prisoners. There weren't many scars. Not that showed, anyway. 


She walked forward, knelt down, and pulled the mop aside. Putting 
her hand on his shoulder, she said, "It's okay. We're not going to let 
him hurt you anymore." 


The little boy looked at her solemnly. "You promise?" 
"| promise," she said. 
"And you have go help my friends, too," he said. 


"We'll do our best," she said. She wished she could promise him 
more, but it all depended on what the Foundation decided. She was 
still sure, though, that they'd be better off with the Foundation than 
with Greenberg. 


She turned back to her team. "Agent Jiang, please inform the 
Director we won't be able to bring Greenberg in alive. We've 
determined he's too dangerous."