That was a mistake. The spiders weren't just spiders. They were the 
idea of spiders, the fears and genetic arachnophobia of everything 
that had ever walked this corrupted Way. All concentrated in each of 
every one of the billions of spiders making up the wave. 


Sigurroés screamed as the mass swallowed her up. 


Alison was planting her focus flower in the middle of Site-17's 
personnel offices when a mental attack bowled her over. 


The entity was coming at her through Sigurrés. In her mind's eye, 
she could see a tendril lashing out, piggybacking from Sigurrés' 
mind straight into hers. 


She was only a couple gestures away from success — gods be 
damned, if she could just — 


NEVER NEVER NEVER 
Alison rolled on the floor, clutching her head as if that would help. 


WHAT IS MY NAME WHAT IS YOUR NAME WHAT IS MY NAME 
WHAT IS YOUR NAME 


She forced herself to hold still. Concentrate. 


ALISON CHAO — BLACK QUEEN — LITTLE SISTER — LOST 
SINNER — LAST SAINT — LONELY SERPENT — LOKI SCAR-LIP 
— LEASE SIGNATORY — 


LITTLE SISTER — LITTLE SISTER — LITTLE SISTER 


Her eyes rolled back up in her head. She struggled to hold on to her 
own existence. 


"Rita," Cross said. 


Rita was not in a very good state. She wasn't crying, but she was all 
but. The gun shook in her hand, but not enough that it wavered from 
being aimed at her sister's head. 


"| wouldn't believe it when they told me," Cross said. "My sister, 
working for the Foundation." 


No, shut up, wrong thing to say— Campbell thought. But of course 
thinking at Cross that she should stop talking was even less 
effective than telling Cross to stop talking. 


"My sister working for the Serpent's Hand!" Rita shouted back. She 
was tearing up. Campbell didn't know how to interpret this. "My 
sister the terrorist. My sister the woman trying to destroy the world!" 


"I'm not trying to destroy the world," Cross said. "I'm trying to save it, 
goddammit—" 


"Put that fucking thing down!" 

Cross slowly lowered the plant to the ground. "Rita—" 

"Don't you say my namel." 

"| think she's telling the truth, Rita," Campbell said, hesitantly. 


"And you," Rita said. "You've been working with her this whole time? 
| trusted you, Kendra!" 


"| didn't know a thing about this until today!" 
"| don't believe you." 


"You saw the interview logs," Campbell said. "| know you did, | saw 
your requisition request on them. You know exactly what | knew until 
today." Well, except the single unreported message, but Campbell 
wasn't about to split hairs with an angry woman holding a gun. 


"You read the logs of my interview with Dr. Campbell?" Cross asked. 
"| didn't think you would." 


Rita stayed silent. 
"Everything | said in there was true," Cross said. "Everything—" 


"Be quiet,” Rita said. "Just... for the love of God... shut up!" 


Sigurrés writhed in fear for a long minute, at the bottom of the sea of 
spiders. Then something in the back of her mind said really, now. 


The solution is obvious, actually, that small detached part of her 
mind said. The way to not be afraid of spiders is to be a spider 
yourself. 


So Sigurrés became a spider. 


She didn't just become any spider. She became the Queen of All 
Spiders. 


The other spiders around her bowed their spider heads in awe. 


She was about to command them to become something slightly 
more adorable when the Way's mind struck at her, trying to hammer 
her into submission with direct force. 


That's just insulting, Sigurrés thought. Not clever at all. 


She hurled her mind back in response. At the same time, she turned 
the world around them into cotton candy. Fluffy spider cotton candy. 


The Way didn't anticipate the simultaneous attack. Its physical body 
went toppling over, and its mind jerked away from her as it struggled 
to disentangle its body from the cotton candy. Sigurrés took 
advantage of that to probe again into the thing's confused, alien 
mind. 


No. Not mind. Minds. 


There was something else there, something that also wasn't there at 
all. A crouching parasite piggybacking behind the many eyes of the 
corrupted Way. 


Sigurrés knew its name, the name of the lack of name. Neverwere. 
Neverwere, Neverwas, Neverwillbe. 


She tried to think about what she should do, but... she found she 
could hardly think. She was beginning to feel extremely tired. 


It wasn't even the corrupted Way exerting its will at her. She hadn't 
had to exert herself this much on purpose in... in ever. 


Alison and the others had warned her about this. They said that 
when it happened, she should look for her foci. They would shine 
like bright stars in her mental landscape. Use them as anchors, they 
said. So you don't get cut loose and drift away. 


But there was nothing there. No foci. No bright stars. 


Had Alison and her friends failed to set up the foci? Her mental 
landscape was barren. 


The Way's tentacles wrapped around her. Each of them had a 
different emotion, a different tantalizing nature. Each one was a 
different path through the worlds. Each one could smother and 
strangle and kill. 


Sigurrés was finding it harder and harder to care. 


All these visions. All these visions of things she'd never seen, 
touched, tasted, experienced. She'd thought she had it okay, drifting 
around and watching in an astral body, keeping her physical form 


asleep. 


She was wrong. She'd experienced nothing like the visions she was 
seeing now. 


She was walking the beaches of Zebedee. Running through the 
jungles of Albenon. Tasting the redfruit juices of the Ravelwoods. 


She could die here, and that would be okay. Rather than live 
experiencing a twentieth of a lifetime, she could die experiencing 
what most wouldn't experience in a thousand lifetimes. 


But... 


Then she saw the vision she'd had before, the vision of the future, of 
the Way-Neverwere-Way self-destructing into the hole in reality that 
would stay forever until the heat death of this universe. A black 
smirch where there once was a living, promising planet. 


Her fault. 
No. 


There were still things she needed to do. Here, on Earth. She'd 
never been to high school. She'd never played a video game. She'd 
never gone to a movie theater. She'd never been grocery shopping. 
She'd never been to Disneyland. These were silly things, but 
sometimes the silly things mattered the most. 


No. Not yet. 


She pulled herself back from the brink and threw off the Way's 
tentacles, one by one. 


The Way-Neverwere-Way resisted. It flung its mind at her again, but 
this time its mind was like a world in and of itself, an overwhelming 
force full of emotion. She couldn't directly counter it — she 
envisioned its mental attack as a vast metal scorpion's tail, and 
barely deflected it with a conjured mirror-shield. 


The tail-sword deflected off the mirror and flew upward in the sky, 
striking it as if it were a dome, cracking the sky down the middle. 


The world around them turned to barbed wire and ice. She 
transformed it to autumn leaves and gentle snowflakes. 


The world turned to blood and ash. She transformed it to strawberry 
jello and diamond dust. 


The world turned to the deep blackness of space. She transformed it 
to the cool midnight of full moons. 


Finally, she managed to reset things back to normal. 


Unfortunately, time was still running out, and to borrow a sports 
metaphor from games Sigurréds only half understood, she was only 
playing defense. 


Two minutes left until the end of the world. 


"I've been thinking about this a long time." Rita steadied her arms. 
"This is about courage. The courage to do the right thing, even when 
everyone else is telling you not to." 


"Are you going to kill me, Rita? If | pick up this plant to save the 
world, are you going to kill me?" 


"| will if | have to," Rita said. "That's what courage is." 


"The courage to kill your own sister? Are you even listening to 
yourself?" 


Thunder rolled in the background. Flashes of light came from 
outside. Campbell glanced at the cameras. Most of them were 
down. 


The few left showed... places like other worlds, protean, shifting. 
Distant views of a grudge match like the world almost never saw, 
between ancient gods from the primordial world. Campbell tensed, 
ready to... ready to she-didn't-know-what. 


"Maybe it is about courage," Cross said. "Sure, the courage to do 
the right thing. But what the hell is the right thing here?" 


"It's about having the courage to follow the rules," Rita said. "Even 
when it's the hardest thing to do." 


"What if the rules are wrong?" 


The walls shook. Black ice crept across the windows, then receded. 
The area of effect of the reality bender fight was increasing, rapidly. 


"We're not wrong," Rita said. Though there was a slight note of 
hesitation in her voice. "The Foundation defends reality. We're the 
last line of defense between humanity and—" 


"The world could end any second right now," Cross said. "Literally 
any fucking second! There are two reality benders fighting out there. 
Sigurrés is trying to save the world. The other one is trying to wipe it 
from reality. | want to help Sigurrés. That's the only reason I'm here. 
That's all this magical plant does. And you're making sure | can't 
help her. What kind of last defense of humanity is that?" 


The two sisters stared at each other. A thunderstorm raged, 
suddenly, in the corners of the room, replaced by radiant diffuse 
gold light, replaced by a rainbow array of snakes, which finally 
vanished altogether. 


Cross' shoulders slumped. "I'm sorry," she said "I've never been a 
good sister. Not when we were young and | hid your dolls all the 
time... and not after that either. I'm sorry for steamrolling over you 
all the time. For not caring enough about your feelings. Just... 
please. Help me save the world." 


"Even if you're right," Rita said in a quiet voice, "it wouldn't matter. 
You don't understand the reach of the Foundation — even if the 
world ended right now, they could bring it back three times over — 
you can't just /eave something like this, you can't —" 


"Please," Cross said. "Please just listen." 
"| can't," Rita said. 


They were all surrounded by snow and sleet, for a split second, and 
then it was gone. A flock of winged blue frogs flew overhead. 


"Please," Cross said. "You don't have to be alone anymore. Come 
with me. Come home." 


"Maybe they can bring you back too,” Rita said. 


Campbell saw the decision on Rita's face a split second before she 
pulled the trigger, and leaped at her. She collided with Rita just as 
the gun went off. 


The world changed to water. Thick water, suspending them all in 
slow motion just for one moment. In that split second, Campbell saw 
Cross falling backwards, blood ballooning outward. 


Without anything to anchor her, Sigurrdés floundered. The 
Neverwere/Way chanted in her head. 
Whatismynamewhatisyournamewhatismyname 


My name is Sigurros Stefansacttir, she thought. It's a good name. 
But | might not have it for much longer. 


She felt like she was floating at the top of a well, with deep, deep 
water before. It would be so easy to just ... let go, and sink, sink 
forever, into the blissful abyss... 


She didn't let go, but she sank anyway. 
She felt herself becoming half-real. Half-real, and falling asleep. 
One minute left until the end of the world. 


never... never... never... never... 


Cross lay still on the ground. Rita coughed, spat out alien water, and 
scrambled to her feet. Campbell was impressed to see that she'd 
managed to keep hold of the gun. 


For a moment, Campbell and Rita just stood there, neither knowing 
what to do. 


Then Rita's eyes widened, and her body went limp. She collapsed to 
the floor, gun clattering away from nerveless fingers. 


Campbell looked over at Cross. She was clutching her side with one 
bloody hand. The other hand held a jagged piece of metal, aimed at 
Rita. 


A... wand? 


After a moment, Cross dropped the piece of metal, picked up the 
strange plant and determinedly started making hand gestures again. 


Abruptly, a web of light burst from the pot end of the plant and 
rooted itself in the floor. The red-pink blossom at the end suffused 
with light. 


The Neverwere loosened its grip on Alison's mind, sensing Sigurrés 
was becoming — astonishingly — an easier kill. And certainly more 
tempting. 


Alison forced herself into action. She pulled herself off the floor, held 
onto the damned focus flower stem for dear life, and with great 
difficulty performed the last two hand motions. 


She allowed herself a small victorious smile as the flower bloomed 
before her eyes, lighting up the room. 
Thirty seconds left until the end of the world. 


Sigurrés had almost lost sight of the surface when she saw two 
sudden lights bloom in her mind's eye. 


They called to her. They pulled her mind back towards them. Her 
anchors were here. 


With a sudden burst of metaphysical adrenaline, and the pull of the 
foci, she forced herself through the heavy water and back into her 
own mind. 


Fifteen seconds left until the end of the world. 


vaporization, however due to SCP-714's low threat level this has 
been deemed an unnecessary use of resources. Footage 
sequences of SCP-714 reforming from various states of disrepair 
are available upon request from Dr. or other appropriate 
sources. 


Attempts to track the history and ownership of SCP-714 have 
proven futile due to the nature of its recovery; Agent reported 
feeling abnormally drowsy even after several mugs of strong coffee, 
and was found to be wearing SCP-714 with no memory of having 
come into possession of it. Agent has been reprimanded as 
appropriate, and measures have been taken to ensure SCP-714 
stays in its locker at all times. 


The draining effects and compulsion to rest make use of SCP-714 
as a protective measure against certain SCPs highly impractical. At 
this time SCP-714 is not believed to have any other serious effects, 
beyond the danger of dehydration and starvation of personnel who 
fall asleep wearing SCP-714 as a result of being unable to rouse 
themselves for sustenance. 


Experimentation Notes: Text Transcripts of Audio Logs, Compiled 
by Dr. 

Entry of 01-05-20 

"So far all attempts to find the cause of SCP-714's effects have 
proven fruitless. | don't think | need to emphasise how useful this 
could be if we could pull it off without the negative effects, but so far 
everything we've tried has come up with blanks, hence SCP-714's 
ongoing Safe/Euclid classification. We know what it does but not 
how it does it. As much as | want to say it's 100% safe, there's 
something about it that's not quite right about it." 


Entry of 12-05-20 

"Still making very little headway. Trying to acquire a date on 
SCP-714 has given us mixed results. Parts of it date back as far as 
very early AD, circa 100 to 200, and are probably from China. Other 
samples are, relatively speaking, more recent... like it's been made 
out of multiple pieces, though it is without question a single, 
structurally flawless jade ring. On the plus side we've had some luck 


She was encompassed by the tentacles of the Way-Neverwere- 
Way, both in the physical world and the spiritual world. Instead of 
panic, the position brought her a burst of clarity. 


She'd been going about this wrong. You couldn't kill a Way. It was a 
Way. And you couldn't kill a Neverwere. You couldn't put something 
out of existence that didn't exist in the first place. 


Five seconds left until the end of the world. 


She felt the creature's anguish reach its fever pitch in response to its 
contact with her mind. 


Zero seconds left until the end of the world. 


But she wasn't afraid anymore, because she knew the answer. She 
didn't need any more time to stop the end of the world. 


She couldn't kill this creature. But she could heal it.