"Who the fuck makes a costume like that?!" Quinn gesticulated. 


"Why?" Darnell snickered, his face starting to hurt from the grin he 
was giving. "Do you want one for yourself?" 


"| want them put on a watchlist." 
"Tell me what a Dakuramen is, and I'll see about it." 


Quinn rolled her eyes and stepped out of the elevator the instant it 
dinged onto the second floor. There were a pair of goons by the 
door to the Richard Griffin room that she recognized as Agent Chalk 


and Agent Cheese. They looked like they could be twins— same 
haircut, same unamused face, same blue eyes, same earpieces, 
same suit. They were unrelated, but Quinn knew them— old 
partners from an art crime task force. 


"Don't antagonize," Darnell said, walking out of the elevator and 
towards the agents. He got out his badge and displayed it, Quinn 
doing much of the same. 


Chalk looked them over, and smirked at Quinn. "Big Mac," he said. 
"on the Short Bus, with the Little Leagues." 


"Can it, Chalk," she snapped. 


"Or what?' He grinned. "You'll wave sage at me? Hold a cross up in 
my direction? File paperwork ?" 


"Mmm, no." Quinn replied, pursing her lips. "Well, yes on the last 
one. I'll just report you to the head of operations here for 
unprofessional conduct. Christ, man, you're almost forty. Get a life." 


Chalk went as pale as his namesake, and opened the door to them. 
Inside, she heard someone whose voice sounded like seniority 
gesticulating to a crowd of assembled agents. 


".,.one sicko poured chlorine into the hotel, so now, yes, we have to 
be here every year 

for the foreseeable future." The speaker was one Agent Herschel 
Beauregard— Quinn also recognized him. Head of an anti-terrorist 
task force, which wasn't good. "I would like to remind all agents to 
avoid unnecessary contact with the civilians, convention-goers or 
not. Should one approach you, do not acknowledge them. Making 
physical contact with you can be considered assaulting an FBI 
agent, should it come to that—" 


The closing of the door alerted Beauregard to the entrance of the 
UIU agents. The entire task force looked at them, silent, before a 
snicker came out from the back. Beauregard laughed, "And Mulder 
and Scully are here, all the way from Ohio!" 


Quinn crossed her arms with a strained smirk— Beauregard was in 


the know about the anomalous world, so a few jabs could be 
forgiven. A few. "Congratulations. You are the one-millionth person 
to make that joke. You win my eternal scorn." 


"| haven't won that already, Agent MacAllister? As | was saying," he 
turned to face the rest of the agents, expression once more growing 
stern. "If you have inclinations that correspond to those attending 
the convention, please, do that on your own time. Right now, you're 
on assignment." He adjusted his glasses. "One last thing— we're 
going to be working with a security firm for the duration of this. 
Gasleck Security Solutions going to be taking up residence next 
door in the Martin Knight room..." 


Quinn turned to Darnell, and frowned. "Gasleck? That's..." 
"Skippers." He turned away, letting out a soft "Fuck." 


"At least they're not using SCP in every damn front organization 
anymore," Quinn put her head in her hands and moaned. "How long 
did that take them? Ninety years before someone started connecting 
the dots?" 


"This one's worse, though. Look up what 'Gasleck' means in 
German." 


Quinn would later do this, and, for only the fifth time this year, would 
regret the choices in her life that led her to this career. 


After the briefing had ended, the two agents were greeted by a 
petite woman with slightly tanned skin and red hair. She was 
wearing a suit with sleeves that looked like they were too long— 
Quinn could see scar tissue coming out from underneath them when 
she shook hands. The woman smiled behind her glasses as she led 
them to a table. "Our usual liaison is indisposed— he's stuck in a 
bare room with an open door." 


"Same thing happened to one of our teams," Darnell said. "I'm Agent 
Christman, this is Agent MacAllister." 


"Dr. Katherine Sinclair, Occult Studies." She pulled the chair out and 


sat down opposite them. "What do you know of the occult?" 


Quinn looked at Darnell— the look of concentration on his face 
showed that he was digging in his brain. "We've confiscated the odd 
grimoire or two. Neither of us can do anything described in them, but 
he's pretty good on the details." 


Dr. Sinclair nodded and placed a folder on the table, opening it up to 
a photograph of a cat— or something cat-like, standing on two legs. 
Its entire body was covered in swirling designs of blue woad, its 
whole form hunched over, and its eyes were black pits. The 
photograph itself was in a forest, dense, and the foliage seemed to 
be glowing. It took a while for Quinn to pick this out, but there were 
eyes in every dark corner of the picture. 


"What do you make of this?” Dr. Sinclair asked. 


Darnell looked over the picture, and picked it up, before placing it on 
the table once again. After wracking his brain for some seconds, he 
started speaking. "Creature is similar to the one found in UIU case 
file 1973-45, Codename: "Wait Til Martin Comes." 


"Two dozen teenagers found dismembered on a retreat in the 
Ozarks, with the sole survivor, One Nathan Proctor, claiming to have 
seen a hulking cat tearing them apart, covered in blue paint. Single 
photograph was taken, depicting the entity as it fled the scene. 
Proctor was allegedly spared because they had brought their own 
cats to the retreat with them." 


"Occult symbology was found corresponding to a Celtic demi-deity 
known as— am | allowed to speak its name?" 


"It's not a very powerful one,” Sinclair nodded, her expression 
growing more surprised by the second. Her eyes were starting to 
protrude from behind her glasses. 


"Corresponding to a Celtic demi-deity known as Irusan Cat Sidhe. 
Also known as the King of Cats, Monarch of Familiars, Lord of 
Pucas..." 


Quinn held up her hand. "That's enough." Turning back to Sinclair, 


she said, "I've heard him go on for hours about a cursed Bowie 
knife." 


Sinclair folded her hands, and looked at Darnell with no small 
measure of admiration. "That's one hell of a memory you have 
there." 


"Anyway. lrusan," Quinn looked over the photograph. "I take it that's 
what we're here for? A literal cat god among a sea of people in 
animals?" 


"It could be worse," sighed Sinclair, her face betraying a nasty 
memory coming to mind. "One year, Bast decided to crash 
Anthrocon. She's a god of cats and fertility. There were—" 


"Stopping you right there," Quinn held up her hands, before the 
conversation got to the point where she was begging for brain 
bleach and anti-vomiting agents. "So, where is this Irusan? And 
what does he want here?" 


"What does any obscure god want? Worshipers, sacraments... 
sacrifices." Katherine rubbed her arms, her eyes flitting down a bit of 
scar tissue that appeared to have an "I" branded on it. "Gods like 
him are starting to go extinct— the only reason he's really around 
anymore is because he was in a video game. Not even joking.” 


"So, basically," Quinn thought aloud, "the objective here is: find the 
god, find those who worship him, neutralize both. Preferably before 
the civilians downstairs find out that cats have more than one way to 
skin them." 


Both Darnell and Katherine's palms met their foreheads; the former 
had a bit more force behind it. They groaned, and Katherine 
muttered something about "fucking pear trees". 


"You get one," Darnell sighed, hand sliding down his face. 
Half an hour later, the two FBI agents and the mage were on the 


convention floor, surrounded by synthetic fur and overly-excitable 
nerds. In the background, there was techno music playing, with 


throughout the house for observation purposes. 
The following was recorded on the forty-third day of his stay. 


VIDEO LOG 


22:34 


2F Bedroom: [ D-209 is lying upright in 
bed, reading a novel. ] 


Living Room: [ Live-feed experiences a 
Jagged, vertical distortion in its display. This 
begins on the left of the frame, near the 
front door, and crosses over to the right 
side towards the hallway. It lasts 
approximately twenty-three seconds. ] 


22:35 


1F Hallway: [ Floodlights from the window 
opposing the camera are obscured by 
something entering the hallway. A similar 
distortion effect occurs center-frame, 
masking the object. The image quality 
further degrades before ceasing 
trasmission. ] 


2F Bedroom: [ D-209 jerks upright, alert. 
Claims to hear a slow prolonged scratching 
sound coming from the first floor. He begins 
to get up out of bed. } 


Note: [ SCP-783 manifestation confirmed. 
Visual distortion taken to be an indicator of 
SCP-783's physical placement within the 
house. ] 


lyrics including ‘They just want to'("What the fuck does that word 
mean?" Darnell asked.) me with their bad dragon ("You don't want to 
know," Sinclair replied.)' 


"Furries have no taste in music," Quinn's shoulders sank as she let 
out a soft groan. "Christ, fucking techno. Hear one song, you hear 
them—" 


"HUGS!" exclaimed a blue-and-white tiger, popping out from the 
crowd in front of Quinn. She just flashed her FBI badge at him, as 
well as a stern look, before he melted back into the crowd. 


"In addition to being cursed with being followed around by bad 
music," Quinn grumbled, putting her badge away and rubbing her 
head with the other hand, "I'm being accosted by people who think 
they're animals. Great." 


"You know," Darnell mentioned, looking at an artist's table with some 
degree of curiosity, "I originally was going for a cultural anthropology 
degree. If these guys were around back in the day, | would've had 
one hell of a thesis." 


"They've been around since the 80's or so," Katherine explained as 
she took out a small wooden rod. "The internet has just made them 
more prominent." 


Quinn just gave her an incredulous look. "That some kind of magic 
thing? It's not going to turn us into newts, is it?" 


"Even if it did, you'd get better," she shrugged, bringing it into both 
hands. "And no, it doesn't. This thing is designed to do one thing, 
and one thing only.” She took the rod in her hands, and with a sharp 
crack, broke it in two. "And that is set off every fire alarm in about 
three-hundred yards." 


At the instant the wood split, the fire alarm went off, and a confused 
horde of convention-goers made their way to the nearest exits. "All 
right," Sinclair said. "Look for anyone who isn't leaving, or who is 
reluctant to leave." 


"Oddly specific... magic thing." Darnell frowned. "Do you need to 


use it a lot?" 


"...we're the Foundation. You should know the answer by now." She 
nodded and looked around the convention hall. "Eyes peeled." 


"Never understood where that expression came from," Quinn said, 
before her eyes darted to a man at the back of the hall, retreating 
into a ballroom. "Hey, Darnell." 


"| saw it," he said. His pistol came out of its holster, and he ran to 
the doors. 


Sinclair and Quinn followed after, Quinn's own holster emptying into 
her hand, and the safety on her pistol going off with a click. Sinclair, 
for her part, was producing from her coat a large, metal ring that was 
in the shape of an all-too-familiar symbol two circles, with three 
lines pointing towards the center. "Seriously?" Quinn chided. 


"It's a phylactery," she shrugged. "Not our fault the people in R&D 
are vain." 


The two agents kicked open the doors to the ballroom, and inside, 
found a dozen people. They were all clad in grey, tabby-colored 
robes, and they were all chanting an incantation in an ancient 
tongue that none of them could, or wanted to, understand. "F'im fey 
lrusan, F'im fey Cat Sidhe, F'im Fey Irusan, F'im dh'fey ra..." 


They were grouped around an enormous, slumbering calico, with an 
inflatable pool next to it serving as a bowl of milk. The calico had 
blue whorls of woad painted onto its fur, and smelled heavily of 
catnip, dead mice, and self-confidence. It slumbered, still, gaining 
power from those around it. 


Quinn frowned, and held up her badge. "FBI. You know what that 
stands for?" The figures turned to look at her. "It stands for 'anyone 
who doesn't want to die a virgin, leave now'." Three of the figures 
got up and fled; Quinn saw, to her chagrin, that they were wearing 
the visages of foxes and wolves and tigers underneath. "Anyone 
who's not a virgin and has something left to live for, you get out too." 
Six more left, leaving only three figures, who Quinn couldn't help but 
pity. "Fucking millennials." 


Sinclair stepped in, pulling out another rod. She shook her head, bit 
her thumb, and rubbed blood on the stick, before throwing it into the 
air with a cry of "Nathair athrd bata!" 


In mid-air, it changed into a boa constrictor the size of a car, and 
landed with a thud next to the remaining cultists, who fled the room, 
their robes being shed and exposing their costumes. Darnell just 
gave Katherine a mystified look, eyebrow raised at an almost painful 
angle."Was that—" 


"Yup. There's an entire school of magical theory based around that, 
believe it or not." 


"Anyway," Quinn grumbled, taking cautious steps around the snake 
and the cat; the former had begun to revert into a rod. She inspected 
its face, and found that the cat had two sets of eyes, and what 
appeared to be an extra mouth in its forehead. "...if | was an idiot, I'd 
say we euthanize it." 


"Dealt with gods before?" Sinclair asked. 


".,.there was this one time back home." Quinn's shoulders dipped, 
and her voice wilted. "Never again." 


"| read the incident report," Sinclair replied, her mood briefly somber. 
"Let's get this over with." She came close to the cat, phylactery in 
hand, and pressed it up against the god's forehead. She began 
singing softly, in Gaelic, a siren's song that the agents had to 
actively resist listening to. 


Unfortunately, it wasn't very effective against the cat. It came awake, 
and batted the doctor away, the phylactery still attached to its 
forehead, the spell incomplete. Sinclair landed against the wall with 
a sickening crack, and lay still. 


"Shit!" the two agents cursed, the syllable leaping off their mouths in 
synchrony. They drew their weapons, and fired into the cat's hide, 
watching as the fur just absorbed the bullets. 


The cat rose to two feet, and laughed, running out the room, its form 
changing and shrinking as it did. Its face became more plush- 


looking, its eyes duller, and its fur took on the texture of plastic fiber. 


"well, fuck," Quinn said. She ran towards Sinclair, who was on the 
ground, nursing her arm. 


"Fuck," she winced, standing up. "I think it's broken. And doing 
magic with a broken arm is not a good idea- interrupts the flow of 
energy, and— nevermind." 


Quinn took off her jacket and fashioned a sling for the doctor. "It got 
away. It could be anywhere in the hotel by now." 


"Son of a bitch," Sinclair said as she stumbled towards the door, 
Darnell coming over to heft her up. "I'll be fine, | just need to see a 
doctor. You two have to contain it. God help us." 


"How?" Quinn asked. "It looks just like any one else here, now." 


".,.there's a song, or rather, a cadence, that's linked to the binding 
spell. | can sing you it, and maybe you two can come up with 
something. | don't suppose- ow!" She winced as she went over the 
threshold of the ballroom, foot catching on some raised carpet, "That 
you two are any good at karaoke?"