“| don’t have the benefit of being a wizard, Dan,” she said. “If | go 
through with this unapproved, even if | was successful, they’d wipe 


during a ZK-class scenario are largely unknown and are 
becoming exceedingly unpredictable and dangerous to 
research, all further play-testing of SCP-591 and 
SCP-591-# is hereby suspended until further notice. 


Footnotes 
1. Includes sword controller 


« SCP-590 | SCP-591 | SCP-592 » 


my mind and leave me on the banks of the Willamette. | told 
Phineas this would be a long shot, and go figure | was right.” 


Merlo sighed as she pulled out her phone and sent a single text. 


She once again pocketed her phone and the two continued in 
silence, only stopping their solemn gait when they heard Holman 
calling out behind them. The older man was nearly sprinting, his 
breathing heavy as he finally caught up. 


“Sir?” Merlo asked. 


“You two... the AMAT Lab... now!” Holman said between gasps. 
Eventually he regained his breath and let out a final sigh. “There has 
been a development.” 


Merlo felt her phone vibrate. As she followed behind Holman she 
discretely checked the new text. 


Dust hasn't settled yet. 


Site-64’s Anomalous Materials lab was one of the newer labs in the 
facility. As such, when Holman, Merlo, and Navarro entered they 
were greeted with the sights and sounds of new scientific toys 
whirling, buzzing, and otherwise being scientific. A handful of 
researchers buzzed as they went about their business, excitedly 
chattering among themselves before they noticed the three 
outsiders standing at the threshold of their academic lair. 


A scrawny man in a lab coat with messy blond hair, and sleep 
deprived eyes stepped forward. His lips were turned up into an 
ecstatic smile, as he offered a handshake to Holman. 


“Director,” he said in a slightly monotone voice, “thank you for 
making the trip down here.” 


“Of course, Conwell,” Holman said, eyeing the chittering researchers 
in the background. “These are Agents Sasha Merlo and Daniel 
Navarro, would you mind telling them what you told me on the 


phone earlier?” 


Conwell gave the two of them a sharp nod, his smile vanishing 
briefly. 


“We've met.” 


“Long time no see, Sadman,” Navarro replied. “What have you got 
for us today?” 


“A flashdrive was left on my desk this morning. Inside was directions 
to synthesize a stable variant of SCP-1360-1,” said Conwell. He 
then took a small tray from a nearby work bench. Sure enough, a 
square of the familiar tough, black fabric that always covered 
Anderson’s androids was there. Conwell then handed over a small 
piece of paper. “This was found with the flashdrive.” 


Merlo snatched it from his hands and read it hungrily, Navarro 
reading from over her shoulder. 


Conwell, 

You and Johnson got pretty close to cracking this. | felt 
that you deserved an answer. 

Tell your superiors that all my cards are now on the 
table. 

Phineas 


“We're running a large series of tests,” Conwell added, looking to 
Holman. “But once we get your approval, I'd like to send this to the 
paratech devs. Self-repairing body armor could be a useful tool. 
However, | think you’d be more interested in this little tidbit.” 


Conwell took out a small spray bottle, and immediately sent a few 
drops of an unknown liquid flying at the fabric. Within seconds the 
aramid fibers shriveled into dust. 


“Phineas also provided instructions on how to destroy it. | imagine 
this, if weaponized, could be handy to Gamma-13, or any number of 
task forces dealing with Anderson robots.” 


Merlo and Navarro beamed at Holman. Both agents wore a smug 
smile. Holman sighed in response. 


“How much longer until you finish the preliminary tests?” he asked. 


“I’ve cleared our entire testing schedule for the day,” Conwell replied 
with a smile. “Give us a day or two to verify everything, and I'll have 
the full report on your desk.” 


“Have a copy ready to send to the paratech devs,” Holman replied, 
then turned to his agents and gestured to the hall. Merlo caught a 
glimpse of the AMAT lab techs scurrying about before the door 
closed, leaving the trio alone in the hallway. 


“So00000000000...” Merlo said, turning to Holman with a grin. 
“Phineas provided us with a dead Saker, names, locations, and has 
now armed us. He clearly wants Anderson taken down. If we don’t 
take him up on this offer, he’s going to find someone else. This is 
our shot, Edgar.” 


Holman rubbed the bridge of his nose. He then let out an 
exasperated sigh. 


“I'll pass this up the chain,” he finally said after several moments of 
silence. “No promises anything will come of it though. Our track 
record is not exactly top tier.” 


The Director slowly walked away, two fingers rubbing his right 
temple. 


“And for the love of all that is good and holy, behave,” he added. “Or 
| swear | will personally be dumping your bodies into the Willamette.” 


Agent Clarissa Shaw sat alone in a small coffee shop in downtown 
Seattle, the outside world soaked in Washington’s fall rain. Her long 
blond hair was neatly hidden under a red wig. Her usual thin rimmed 
glasses had been replaced by contacts that changed the color of her 
eyes from blue to green. As she sipped from her mug of coffee she 
looked at her watch. 


Any second now... she thought. The door to the coffee shop then 
opened. Shaw hid her smile behind the mug. 


As Phineas promised, a thin young man with a mop of curly blond 
hair and thick glasses entered, a short, middle aged woman with 
shoulder length brunette hair and faint blue eyes followed behind 
him. Four businessmen trailed them, each looking about the room in 
a seemingly random pattern. Jason Contos and Dr. Medea Contos 
had arrived. 


Shaw turned her head and scratched her ear. A gentleman in the far 
corner of the room folded his newspaper, while two women in 
different corners closed their laptops. The company of six had only 
just sat down after obtaining their drinks, when Shaw and the others 
stood in unison throwing several canisters to the ground and 
covering the room in a fine cloud of white powder. The four 
businessmen attempted to stand and draw pistols hidden on their 
person, but rapidly fell apart as the powder coated them. Thick black 
puddles were all that remained. 


Shaw and her fellow agents lost no time in drawing their pistols, the 
barrels trained at Jason and Medea. The two scientists held their 
hands up, Medea shaking in terror as she looked around at the 


approaching agents. Jason maintained a vigil of hatred. 


“Gotcha,” Shaw said with a sly smile, and tapped Jason on the nose. 


In a studio apartment on the edge of Three Portlands, an old, bald 
man with a large white beard watched the rain come down. 
Occasionally, he’d glance at his phone, each time there would be no 
new messages and his heart would sink a little deeper. 


“Something has happened,” Phineas said to himself as he turned 
around, and went to the kitchen where he started preparing water for 
tea. Saker-45 and Saker-32 should have checked in by now, as 
should have Douglas Walker and Tessa Kim. With Jason and 
Medea now in Foundation custody there was much to do before the 
final blow could be struck. All hands would be needed on deck. 


The kettle whistled as the water came to a boil. Phineas reached 
into his overflowing sink and pulled out a dirty mug in which he 
placed several bags of peppermint tea. As the water took on its light 
green-yellow hue, Phineas sighed. They had just kicked the hornets’ 
nest. 


“| hope no one else got stung,” he said to himself, and looked down 
at his steeping tea. 


Shikt 


There was a sharp pain in his back. Protruding from his stomach 
was a large, thin blade. Phineas felt himself forced forward, a 
powerful electric shock blasting through him, destroying the 
functions of his mechanical limbs. He used his arms to keep him 
from slamming into the kitchen counter, the devices powering down 
as they locked in place. 


“You bastard...” a metallic voice said behind him. “Did you think 
there was any place you could hide that | wouldn’t eventually find 
you? Don’t you remember all that we’ve done to build this company? 


Don’t you remember what I’ve done?!?” 


Phineas coughed. He could taste blood in his mouth. Slowly turning 
his head, Vincent Anderson came into view, his silver tragedy 
mask shimmering in the dim light of the room. 


“Hey Vince,” Phineas said with a small smile. “You finally fixed that 
voice module, | see.” 


“Silence...” Anderson hissed, twisting the blade and delivering a 
fresh wave of pain. “How could you do this to Jason and Medea? Of 
all people...” 


Anderson trailed off. He reached into the pack he carried and pulled 
out a large black helmet covered in wires, carefully placing it on 
Phineas’s head. The helmet quickly began to hum. 


“Initiate.” 
The old man felt a sharp jab at the base of his skull. 


“What are you up to?” Phineas asked. He felt his mechanical limbs 
grow rigid while his biological self grew weaker. Even a cyborg of his 
caliber still needed his internal organs. 


“Its one of Wilson's gizmos, creates some kind of electronic neural 
imprint or something.” Anderson said in a matter-of-fact manner. “I 
don't really know, Wilson made it before signing on with us. The 
point is, I'm digitizing your memories. It will take some modifications, 
but I'll have my friend back. Then we’ll get Jason and Medea, and 
put this mess behind us.” 


Anderson paused for several moments. 
“Then all will be well again.” 


Phineas gave a short laugh before coughing up a large amount of 
blood. 


“| was wondering when we'd reach this point,” Phineas said as he 
spit out the dark red fluid. “You can’t just edit out the parts of people 
you don’t like, Vince.” 


“Don’t tell me what | can and can’t do, old man,” Anderson replied. 
There was a static sound. Phineas imagined that his old friend 
would be crying now if he was still able. “I'll see you real soon.” 


Anderson then pointed his right index finger at Phineas’s head. 
There was a bright flash as lightning. Then Phineas was still. 


Anderson stood motionless for several moments, and then slowly 
slid down to the floor. He pulled off the tragedy mask, and placed his 
head in his hands, slowly rocking back and forth. 


“It's okay...” he said to himself. “I can fix this. | can fix everything. It's 
Okay... it's okay...” 


Anderson then got to his feet, and flicked the tragedy mask with his 
index finger. The masks expression changed to comedy. Anderson 
placed it back on his face, and made his way towards the door, 
grabbing Phineas's phone on the way. He quietly scanned the texts 
and sent a reply. 


Ready or not, here he comes. 
Anderson stepped out into the Three Portlands rain as Phineas’s 


apartment erupted into flames. 


«Realignment | Austringers | Bal-chatri» 


Bal-chatri 


Arcs of electricity left Vincent Anderson’s body as he walked through 
the Three Portlands rain, the wayward bolts striking nearby buildings 
and light fixtures as he slowly marched down the center of an empty 
street. Occasionally, he could be heard mumbling to himself, “It’s 
okay... | can fix this...” 


Anderson eventually reached the foot of a hill near the edge of the 
anomalous city. At the hill’s peak stood the remains of a school. He 
stood motionless for several minutes, the rain making a light tapping 
sound on his mask as he eyed the decrepit building. A small silver 
droid crawled out of his pocket and up his arm before perching on 
his shoulder. The tiny spider-like drone’s single red eye looked up at 
the school, then back toward its master, shaking off the rain with a 
tiny wiggle. 


Anderson reached beneath his mask and removed a small drive and 
placed it within the droid. 


“Take care of yourself, Benny,” Anderson said, “I'll see you soon. Be 
good.” 


The small drone gave a salute and crawled away. Anderson 
watched it go, and then turned his attention back to the distant 
school. 


“| can fix this...” he said to himself again and continued his ascent. 


The Tristan Academy of the Arts had been a prestigious school in 
Three Portlands between 1972 and 1998, when the death of its 
founder Abraham Tristan and subsequent financial problems 
resulted in the school closing its doors. Since then it had remained 
abandoned, its windows boarded over and its halls filled with all 
flavors of trash, graffiti, and stagnant puddles of rainwater leaking in 
from the numerous holes in the roof. On this day in November, 


however, the building came to life once more. As an academy 
teaching both mundane and anomalous practices, the entire building 
was fortified against magic. It was for this reason, Agent Sasha 
Merlo assumed, that Phineas selected the abandoned school to 
serve as the location of his intricate trap. 


Merlo stood on the stage of the school’s auditorium and checked her 
phone. Her brunette hair was tied back, and the MTF field uniform 
she wore gave the normally laid back agent an appearance of 
authority. On the screen appeared the same message that had been 
there for the last two hours: 


Ready or not, here he comes. 


Merlo and the rest of MTF Gamma-13 were now rushing to put 
together the final pieces of Phineas' plan, a good fourteen hours 
ahead of schedule, and without a Phineas. 


Merlo turned to the center of the stage. There stood two vacant 
folding chairs, each over a glyph drawn in red chalk. The area 
surrounding these glyphs was covered in an even larger glyph, the 
final touches of this one currently being drawn in white chalk by 
Agent Daniel Navarro, his focus intense as he quickly worked on the 
many intricate lines and curves needed. 


“How much longer?” Merlo asked. 


Her colleague didn’t look up but simply continued his work as he 
spoke. 


“Binding glyphs are not something you can rush,” Navarro said. “If | 
draw this wrong it could turn into a killing curse, or interact with 
teleportation circles under the chairs and explode, which is the exact 
opposite of what we want. | will give Phineas credit though, this is 
high end magic. The kind people go to schools to learn. It’s going to 
get the job done... assuming I’ve done it right.” 


Merlo nodded, opening her mouth to reply, but stopping when a 
series of voices blasted over her radio. 


“Austringers, this is Sentry 1. We have visual on the target, ETA ten 


minutes!” 


“Austringers, this is Sentry 2. We have visual on target... he’s 
performing a type blue event... Visual lost!” 


There was the sound of a distant explosion. The lights in the school 
all died at once. 


“Fuck...” Navarro said, as he lit up the room with his flashlight, the 
glyph he was working on still incomplete. 


“He’s here...” Merlo replied. “Il guess we’re doing this live.” 


Agent Clarissa Shaw was in the main hall of the school with four 
other agents when power went out. Dressed in the MTF field 
uniform, with her blond hair tied back and her glasses replaced with 
goggles, she and her colleagues readied their arms. The main doors 
blew off their hinges. A wave of Peregrine Androids flooded in 
through the breach. The team scattered to avoid the incoming 
shrapnel, taking cover in the nearby classroom doors. The opposing 
forces began to exchange fire. Within seconds the hall was littered 
with bullet casings, hole-riddled droids, and the bodies of two dead 
agents. 


The remaining Gamma-13 agents lost no time in tossing several 
canisters into the hall, quickly filling the area with a fine white 
powder, the oncoming wave of droids crumbling into slick black 
puddles. The ones that the powder failed to destroy were subdued 
with bullets. The hall became quiet, save for the heavy breathing of 
those left alive.