Though he stood like this for minutes, staring, unmoving, eyes wide, 
he gained nothing from it. His daze cleared and he turned back to 
the phone. He stepped towards it and something snapped under his 
shoe. He lifted his foot. Glasses. Her glasses. Not far off, the 
weaponized amnestic. The voices murmured, hers as loud as if she 


were right next to him, yelling, “Containment breach!! It’s not just K’s 
anymore!! It’s jumped! ” He could picture her lurching towards the 
cabinet. He had seen her over his shoulder. 


The images were rapid. He had run at her and she had shot him. 
Sprayed him in the face, but he had hit her arm and half the dose 
had misted uselessly to his left. He remembered the taste, 
peppermint and batteries and the way the world swung sickeningly 
in front of him as the drug sank into his nervous system. He 
remembered her panicked face. Her shouting. “My husband is 
named J...” She had flinched then, cringing away from him. “I can’t 
stay and help you. Take this,” jamming the inhaler in his hand. “It’s 
your only hope.” And he remembered wanting to choke her and 
telling her to run. Reaching for her and only getting her glasses as 
she fled. 


Ok. All set. He’d had enough. Investigation over. Whatever had 
happened, it had happened to him and he needed help. Send in the 
cavalry. He picked up the red phone and an operator answered 
immediately. 


“Yeas.” 


“| need help. There’s been a breach. There’s something wrong 
with... people are dead. Need assistance.” 


“Verify.” 


Fuck. Why hadn't this occurred to him? He’d need his clearance 
code, followed by his name, if he expected to be interviewed instead 
of simply terminated. 


“Ok. Listen. I’ve been amnesticized. | don’t know my name. | need 
some goddamned help. My code is easter, seven, griffin, wind 
chime, but | can’t remember my name.” 


“Verify.” Cold. Emotionless. By the numbers. Goddamn it. 


His eyes searched frantically. Something in this place must have his 
name on it. A report was spread on his desk. He was about to move 
on when he saw the phrase, “violent outbursts.” 


“Await authorities,” said the voice, gray and hard as slate. “Do not 
resist.” The line went dead. 


He barely heard. He put the phone back in its cradle and read the 
report. 


Description: SCP-3145 is an anomalous infection 
affecting people whose first or last names begin with the 
letter K. Vector for transmission of infection seems to be 
an airborne virus, though testing for the presence of a 
physical viral agent has been inconclusive. Early 
symptoms of infection are irritability, paranoia, and 
irrational emotional responses. Full onset of SCP-3145 
symptoms manifest approximately eight hours after 
exposure, at which point infected individuals will become 
violent, especially at hearing a name beginning with the 
letter K. To date, the only treatment for SCP-3145 with 
any success has been amnestics specialized for name 
recollection. 


Off to the side, there was a hurriedly scrawled note. 


newly infected 
Jennifer Bevan 
Michael Jones 
Robert Jandrue 


mutation? ??? 


His skull was a cauldron of agony. His teeth clenched until they 
would break. He dropped the report. He blinked, reptilian, shaking 
with rage. The shard of glass exploded in his clenching fist. His eyes 
moved to another sheet of paper. His handwriting. 


“It is my recommendation that until we know how this 
disease works, no one with any K’s in their name should 
be allowed to be part of SCP-3145 Research.” 


And he’d signed his name. 


Dr. Jacob Jespen 


This time when the pain came, it was greeted with a laugh. 


Histories 


There was a vast machine; a clattering and rattling, clanking and 
clicking, ticking and tocking machine. Its skeleton was plastic and 
tin, its veins were rubber tubes, its nerves were glass. Its blood was 
sticky red and pelagic blue and pus yellow and oily black and 
greasy-clear, pumped by the creaking electric bellows that formed 
the machine’s heart. Lightning trapped in bell jars, sputtering 
miniature suns burning white-bright, nested among the gears and 
piston-fingers. 


A man sat at the center of the machine, upon a reclined chair. An 
old man, whose eyes were filled with static, whose thin skins were 
crossed over and again with dark stiches, who at his edges looked 
smeared like oil paint. Pipes and tubes and cables flowed out from 
his arteries and veins, his spine, his skull, from underneath his 
fingernails and from underneath his rumpled, drool-stained shirt. 


The door opened, and the maid entered the room. The machine 
sang its clunky, noisy song, and the old man stirred. 


“Theo? Is that you, Theo?” His voice was weak, and he strained 
forward in his chair. His test-channel eyes stared right through the 
maid. 


“I’m sorry, sir. It’s just me,” the maid said. She took off her scarf and 
her coat and her gloves, and hung them up on the coat rack. 


“By God, Theo, how long has it been? Come in, come in!” the old 
man said. “It’s so good to see you again.” 


“It’s good to see you too,” the maid said. She opened a 
compartment of the machine and unfolded the ironing board. From a 
second compartment, she began pulling out laundry 


“Its such a shame that we couldn’t meet at the Hart, like we used to. 
They tore it down, did you know that? They tore it down, years ago. 


SCP-869: Summer of '48 


Item #: SCP-869 
Object Class: Euclid 


Special Containment Procedures: The facility housing SCP-869 is 
to be owned and operated by Supertastic Carnival Promotions, a 
Foundation front company, and is to remain in operation and open to 
the public for its intended purpose. A secondary service bridge is to 
be built to replace SCP-869. SCP-869 is to remain closed to park 
staff and the public. Both ends of SCP-869 are to be monitored by 
Foundation personnel operating as park security officers for the 
purpose of preventing unauthorized access. 


All surveys of SCP-869 and the area beyond are to be conducted by 
Level 1 personnel operating in groups of three or more. Survey 
personnel are to be dressed in clothing appropriate to late 1940s 
mainstream American fashion and are to carry no more than ten 
dollars in pre-1948 US currency, as well as period-appropriate 
identification badges identifying them as local police, FBI agents, or 
Foundation personnel as necessary to facilitate interaction with park 
officials. Personnel conducting surveys are not to carry any 
equipment, technology, or personal effects that were not available to 
the Foundation in 1948. Personnel are to exit SCP-869 no later than 
8 P.M., one hour prior to the park's scheduled closing time. 


Description: SCP-869 is a service bridge attached to the 

Historic Pleasure Pier, an amusement park located on a pier 
extending out over the ocean in the US state of [REDACTED]. 
SCP-869 was built in 20 concurrent to the construction of the park 
itself, a recreation of an earlier pleasure pier which existed on the 
same site from 194 until it was severely damaged by Hurricane 
[REDACTED] in 19 and subsequently demolished. 


SCP-869's anomalous properties manifest whenever the park is 
open for business and none of the park's attractions have been 


Went out of business, and then someone tore it down and built a 
new one. | think it’s called the Queen, now. The Black Queen. It’s 
not the same, not the same at all...but, | don’t think we should let 
that stop us. We're fine as we are. Do you want something to drink, 
something to eat?” 


The maid began ironing the old man’s shirts. Their once-bright 
colors had faded to near white, and their threads had been worn thin 
enough to be whisper-light. Oftentimes the buttons did not match, 
having been replaced so often. He had once been very fond of 
buttons. 


“Ah, fine. No, it’s no trouble at all. I'll have the maid fetch you 
something if you change your mind.” The old man settled back in his 
chair, sunk low. “No, | don’t Know where Edwin is. | haven’t seen him 
in years, and | don’t care to. | don’t like that crowd he ran off with. 
Shady sorts. A man who puts money in front of friendship is not 
worth asking about.” 


The maid folded each shirt with exact precision. Each line was 
clean, each seam straightened, each bulge and wrinkle ironed flat. 
Folded shirts were placed neatly in a wicker basket at her feet. 


“Though...| miss the old days, Theo,” the old man said. “The three of 
us ready to make something fantastic. It hasn’t been the same since 
you left. We could have done something fantastic, the three of us, 
but...fate, | suppose. No, | don’t blame you. You were always the 
Queen’s man first. I’m glad to see it worked out for you.” 


The pile in the basket grew ever higher as the maid worked with 
mechanical precision. Threadbare slacks and faded silk ties were 
added to the shirts. 


“No, I, uh...business is not as good as | would like. Sales are down, 
and I’ve had a lot of failed projects of late. The Misters and Misses 
series never took off as big as I’d hoped. | brought in some people 
from the outside to help: they know all about business and 
marketing and shares and stocks. Synergy, too, they like synergy. 
They brought a lot of people with them, so now | have management. 
With executives, even.” The old man bobbed his head back and 
forth. “It’s all Greek to me, but they say that they'll help.” 


The maid finished folding the last item of clothing: long jacket that 
had started purple, been turned into a patchwork of quilt squares, 
and then eaten up by moths. 


“| don’t understand it much either, sir,” she said as she folded up the 
ironing board. She took the basket and the clothes over to another 
compartment and stored them away. 


“They claim it’s not actually magic, but | don’t believe them. It has to 
be magic. Though they are a grey and dull sort of wizards.” 


“Very disappointing, sir,” the maid said, drawing a feather duster 
from a machine closet. 


“| wish there was another way, Theo, but Redd’s dead. | had to put 
him down. He wasn’t right in the head, just like all the others. Every 
single one has been defective. None of them lasted, none of them 
worked. But...” the old man’s eyes brightened for a moment, and he 
looked to have a stirring of pride in his heart. “I have a daughter 
now, Theo. A beautiful little baby girl. | made her special, more so 
than any of the others. But...” the old man’s face furrowed. “I think 
she’s defective too. | think she is. She was supposed to have 
everything, all up in her head, but there’s nothing there. She’s a 
beautiful, wonderful child, but she doesn’t have the stuff. None of it 
at all.” 


The maid dusted off a shelf of tin machine-men soldiers; Aged 
veterans all, who had traded their long and distinguished tours of 
service for the quiet, forgotten gloom. 


“| don’t know if | have the stuff anymore, either. | can fee/ them, all 
inside my head, but | can’t think them. As if those parts of my mind 
are made out of clay. | try to bring them back, to light the fires back 
up, but nothing works. My other mes are as good as dead. After all 
that trouble finding them, working with them, picking them apart to 
find out what made us all tick, nothing. Nothing, nothing, nothing.” 


The maid swept up the crumbs that covered the coffee table, so that 
the black carbon bits wouldn't attract clockwork mice. 


“All | wanted to do is make toys, Theo. To make people happy. Toys 


help make life better, and people deserve better lives than what they 
have. That’s all | wanted. But all | have is a failing company anda 
daughter who is stuck in her own imagination. She was going to 
make things right, Theo. She was going to make things right. Where 
I’d failed, where Redd had failed, where all the others failed, she 
was going to make things right.” The old man stared out into the dim 
room, at the machinery that was his home. “She'll have the 
company, but what good is that? She’s going to be devoured. 
You've seen what they’re like out there. All the factories in the world, 
just eating and eating, forever, until there’s no world left.” 


The machine’s choked notes and flickering fires filled the silence. 


“She was supposed to beat them.” The old man’s voice had an edge 
to it now. “She was going to beat them, Theo. She was going to burn 
that damnable factory down to the ground!’ 


The old man leaned forward as far as he could, holding out a 
shaking arm. An iron manacle, and a single link of chain, hung on 
his skinny wrist. 


“Do you see this, Theo?” he shook his arm at the maid, his voice 
rising in pitch. “l was chained to my desk! | saw children born to 
mothers on the assembly lines and thrown into the furnace! | saw 
machines greased with blood, porridge made out of their bonemeal! 
The factories devour, Theo, and they will eat the sun! | cut myself 
free, | was free, / WAS FREE, but | never escaped! The World’s 
Fair, the new name, the new toys, none of that helped! None of that 
helped!” the old man was screaming now, waving his blistered wrist 
about in the air. Tears poured down his wrinkled face. 


“The factories are still devouring, Theo! They are feeding humanity 
into the furnace! What good is a toymaker when coffins come in 
child sizes? Why do coffins come in child sizes, Theo?” 


“Children die sometimes,” the maid said. 


“No! No, no, no! Wrong! All wrong! | will not stand for it! No more, 
not again! No more child-sized coffins! None! I’m Doctor 
Wondertainment! I’m Doctor Wondertainment! | am Doctor Goa- 
Damn Wondertainment! No factory, no Edwin Dark, not even death 


itself is going to stop me!” The old man sobbed, his wheezing breath 
choking in his throat. “But | can’t do it. | can’t do it, Theo. Coffins 
come in child sizes and | can’t do anything about it. | can only make 
toys, and my toys aren’t good enough. | can’t save them. | can’t 
save my company, | can’t even save my daughter.” His voice trailed 
off. He slumped back in his chair and was silent and still. 


The maid drew an object from a cabinet and walked over to the old 
man on his chair. He noticed her this time, perking up his head just 
slightly. 


“Ah, there you are, dear. Have you met Theo? He should be around 
here, | think he’s using the toilet.” 


“I’m afraid Lord Theodore has to leave now, sir,” the maid said. 


“Oh, does he? A shame, a shame. We were having such a good 
time. Well, make sure to tell him to visit again.” 


“| will, sir.” 


“You’ve been such a help for all these years. I’m sad to send you off, 
but send you off | must. There’s nothing left for you here. | wish you 
the best of luck.” 


“Thank you, sir.” 

“| left a gift for you in the kitchen, a little going away present.” 
“Thank you, sir.” 

The maid hovered there at the old man’s side for a moment longer. 


“You’re free to go, dear,” he said. “Don’t look back. You don’t work 
for me anymore. Go find something new for your life.” 


The maid took a last, long look at the old man, and pressed a finger 
to his neck. His eyes flicked, and then went dark. The machine’s 
song slowed, and faded, rumbling into silence. The bellows went 
soft, the lights dimmed, the gears fell asleep, the pistons ground to a 
stop. 


The maid stepped down from the machine and walked over to the 
hat rack. She put on her hat and her coat, and wrapped her scarf 
around her neck. As the old man had said, there was a parcel sitting 
on the counter, wrapped in brown paper and twine. 


The machine let out a groaning sigh, and began to fold in upon itself, 
the old man it its center. It folded and folded and grew smaller and 
smaller, leaving bare walls behind it. 


Emma Aislethorp-Brown stepped out onto the midwinter stoop and 
locked the door behind her. She walked away under the crystal sun, 
and did not look back. 


History 


There once was a D-Class from Matlock, 
Whose dick was too big for his sock, 

So he rolled up his sheet,