"Yes?" she said. Then, "Yes. | see." She thought for a moment. 
"Yes, good work, Henri. You were right. | did need to see this." She 
opened a very special program on her phone. "We'll all need to see 
this, | think." 


The Seed of an Idea 


The small briefing room was intended to seat twenty people. Now, it 
held maybe sixty. 


Each and every one of the people crammed into the room were from 
the highest echelons of the Foundation. At least one of them was a 
member of O5 Command, though only one of them knew which. 
They were watching the recordings and analysis of the recent 
Site-17 security breach. Breakdowns. Analysis. 


Mostly, they were watching the footage of SCP-105. 


Just outside the doorway, a smaller group of five people watched 
the activity in the briefing room. The first was in heels, and seemed 
rapt by the presentation. The second wore a hat, and a glum 
expression. The third wore a dark suit and looked serious, 
accentuated by a somewhat military air. The fourth wore spectacles. 
The fifth wore a nice pair of gloves: Cordovan leather. 


These five were not members of O5 Command. An unromantic way 
of putting it would be that they belonged to O5's secretarial pool. 
Everything about them was classified: their histories, their positions, 
their roles, their names, even their genders. They were close 
enough to the top to have power, but still expendable enough to be 
useful. 


"You see 'em," Heels said. "They're thinking it too." 
"| can't believe we're actually considering this," Hat said. 


"She hasn't been able to practice her abilities for the last ten years," 
Suit said. "Since Omega-7." 


"Nine years," Heels said, watching the recording on the briefing 
room's projector. 


"Still," Suit said. 


"These aren't her anomalous abilities," Spectacles said. "Just her 
arms training." 


"Still," Suit echoed. "The way she handles the gun jamming." Suit 
shook their head in admiration. "Tap, rack, bang, without hesitation. 
That's extraordinary retention." 


"Why is this idea so damn appealing?" Hat asked. "It was a simple 
containment breach. Why does anyone care about this single SCP?" 


"You know why," Heels said. "Because she represents Omega-7 as 
much as Able. We wrote off Able. We wrote off Iris. Maybe we didn't 
need to write off both." 


"That's not enough," Hat said. 


Gloves smiled. "Because some people in the Foundation never 
stopped wanting to play with superheroes." 


"It's not just that either," Heels said. "We all know that the Council 
takes it as read that we need to make further use of anomalous 
assets. Amnestic use alone has ramped up massively in the past 
few years. And we wouldn't still exist without the use of Scranton 
reality anchors." 


"Those are anomalous largely for technical reasons," Hat said. "105, 
and anomalies like her, are things that shouldn't even exist. Even if 
that didn't matter, using sapient anomalies as weapons is always a 
bad idea." 


"It might be," Heels said. "But just look at her. She took down five 
hostiles and helped shut down a breach. You've seen her psych 
profile: she's absolutely loyal. And with her abilities — if we allowed 
her to develop them again — her potential is —" 


"Potential?" Hat asked. "What you're proposing is to take an SCP — 
one of our safest humanoids, to boot — and make it much more 
dangerous. And that's just for starters. Which other SCPs are we 
going to include in this project? Are we going to jump straight to 
running 076 again? How many Sites do you think we'll lose this 


time?" 
"You know we're smarter than that now," Heels said. 
"Are we? Why is this necessary?" 


"You've seen the archives, same as me," Heels said. "Back when 
Omega-7 existed, how many SCP objects had the Foundation 
archived? How many have we archived since then? How many have 
we archived in the past year alone?" 


They all knew the answer. 


"That doesn't make this the right response," Hat said. "Not what 
we're discussing. Not an anomalous task force." 


"We're at our limits. We can't just passively contain anymore. You've 
seen all the reports | have. All the new Thaumiels we've been forced 
to create? We need to go further. We need to make use of all our 
assets. We need to act now, or maybe we don't survive another nine 
years. And maybe the Earth doesn't, either." 


"A task force doesn't solve that problem." 


"Maybe not. Maybe not right away. But it's a start. It sends a 
message. Opens the door for other things." 


"The cost will be too high. You should know that." 


"| have some concerns as well," Suit said. "Project Resurrection will 
already suffer from comparisons to the Zero Incident and the 
Kondraki debacle. Omega-7 is one of the few projects imaginable 
that people might have a bigger problem with remembering than the 
destruction of Site-19." 


"| understand that," Heels said. "But... just look." 


Heels nodded at the group in the briefing. They were watching 105 
take out the invaders again. An analyst was explaining why Team 
Iris had been shuttered. She was taking questions. People were 
asking questions. The queue for the microphone stretched into the 
hall. 


"If we don't do this," Heels said, "someone else will, a few years 
down the line. And they will do it wrong." 


"| have to admit I'm surprised at the response," Suit said. "I thought 
a lot of people considered 105 irrelevant after all this time. Without 
her camera, pretty much neutralized." 


"Some did," Heels said. "Many don't." 


"If | may?" Gloves spoke up for the second time. "Iris Thompson was 
second only to Able as Omega-7's most important asset. For good 
or for ill, everyone remembers Omega-7. It left a mark on our 
organization bigger than almost anything else since the Insurgency. 
We cannot enter into this lightly." 


"Even if | agreed with this," Hat said, "it'll never be approved. A lot of 
people are going to react to this... poorly." 


"Any change of significance makes people angry,” Heels said. 


"The difference is that this time they'll have grounds to complain," 
Hat said. "And even if... even if it were approved... she won't 
agree." 


"105?" Heels asked. "She'll agree." 


"Able killed the rest of Omega-7, remember? With her parents gone, 
her former life gone, her team on Omega-7 made up all the people 
she cared about in the world. And she watched them all die." They 
paused. "She was fifteen. Fifteen. She'll never forgive us for that, 
and she'll never agree to this." 


"She will," Heels said. 


"| won't be a part of this," Hat said. "If you want to do this, you know 
what to do. If you need advice, you know where to find me. But | 
can't sign on to what you're proposing here. Sorry." 


Hat tipped their namesake and walked away. The rest stood in 
silence, watching the activity in the briefing room. 


"What are you gonna call it?" Suit asked Heels. "The Mobile Task 


Force. Gonna revive Omega-7?" 


"Not Omega-7," Heels said. "Too much baggage. We know we need 
to do this differently. We may as well start with the name." 


"You want numerological significance," Gloves said. "Important for a 
project like this. Go with Alpha-9." 


"So you're on board, then?" 


"Hell no. This is a terrible idea. It's probably the worst idea I've ever 
heard from some otherwise smart people." Gloves smiled. "But it 
should be entertaining as hell. | wish you all luck." 


The remainder of the group watched Gloves disappear down the 
hallway. 


"How about you two?" Heels asked Suit and Spectacles. 
Suit nodded. "I'm convinced for now." 


"I'm on board," Spectacles said. "My reservations aside, | can't deny 
that this is a natural fit for the Resurrection Project. | know a couple 
high-placed potential allies, people who would... jump... at this kind 
of opportunity. We can do it right this time. We gain nothing if we 
don't try. We can keep enough control this time that there need be 
no unnecessary loss of life or damage to the Foundation. If it turns 
out badly for us, then so be it. At least then we'll know." 


"Reopening Pandora's Box, then," Heels said. "| suppose in that 
myth, the box could never be closed again anyway." 


"Not Pandora's Box," Suit said. "Let's call it what it is." 
"And what's that?" 


"What was left over when Pandora's Box was opened,” Suit said. 
"Last Hope." 


Like We Were Ever Kindergarten Teachers to Start With 


A door opened, and Maria Jones' eyes slowly focused on the 
movement. 


"Oh, for Christ's sake." 


Jack Bright's voice echoed in the office, sound waves parabolically 
running directly into Maria's head. Maria had insisted on the 
enormous windowed room as her office when she became director 
of the Records and Information Security Administration. Very nearly 
her only condition for accepting the job, and O5-10 had been more 
than willing to accommodate. But the echo did, at times, cause a 
problem. 


Maria was halfway into her second Black Russian, no attempt being 
made to conceal the empty bottle of Barton's vodka and the near- 
empty bottle of Kahlua. Maria was a sloppy drunk. 


"Thisss... it's once a year, Jack," she said, "once a year. And look! 
The Barton's is empty. Maybe | won't buy the next one." She looked 
into the murky glass. "Maybe." 


Jack stood five-foot-one in his current body, but every inch was 
radiating judgment. "Pathetic. You never seemed like the cry-for- 
help type to me." 


"Oh, get fucked, Jack," she slurred again, turning in her desk, 
making more of an effort to seem like someone still on the clock, 
putting bottles away. "Five years ago, Jack. Just finished the vodka 
from the inheritance. Little Kahlua left, though. Maybe next year I'll 
just spike the late-night coffee and call it a night. Happy deathday, 
Dave, you and all the ashes and both bottles you left behind." 


"This is bad timing, Maria," Jack said. "Another administrator would 
have you out for this. At least a writeup. Maybe something more 
serious." 


Maria adopted the most unique facial expression humankind had yet 
invented: the smile on the face of a drunk person who heard what 
must have been the funniest thing they had ever heard in their entire 
lives. She cracked up laughing, throwing her head back. She put the 
glass down. When she came back into composure, she lifted the 
glass again and gestured at Jack. "Do it again," she said, still 


giggling. 
"Do what?" 


"Threaten me with a straight face," she said, the smile gone 
instantly. "| wanna see you do it again." 


"Some gravity. That's much better." 


"Fucking pricks. Picking this day to send me this horseshit," she 
said, pointing to her leftmost computer screen and the email pulled 
up on it at the moment. She had had six hours to receive it, read it, 
dismiss it, delete it, recover it, reread it, consider it, delete it ina 
more permanent fashion, use Level 5 authorization to recover it from 
complete oblivion, and finally just stare at it. And the last hour had 
been spent mixing drinks accordingly. 


"It's happening, Maria. We're doing it again. We're taking another 
shot. This isn't some kind of lark—" 


"Oh, don't you even try to tell me what a fucking /Jark Omega-7 was 
the first time around." Maria took another drink, trying to hide the 
tremble. "No fucking redactions for this user account. I've seen all of 
it. I've seen every after-action report from every mission you fuckers 
ever sent Able on —" 


"Maria, you know full well | didn't send —" 


"— every mission you fuckers ever sent a sociopath and a teenage 
girl and a pack of jarhead patsies on, every death, every ‘action- 
oriented casualty incident' where a Chaos Insurgency operative 
happened to put a bullet into an Omega-Sevener's head, complete 
with every redacted autopsy record strongly suggesting death by 
edged weapon of 'indeterminable composition’ at close range. Every 
interdepartmental memo — fucking nine of them from your office, 


Jack! Good fucking work there! — claiming that Able would never 
behave — " Maria deepened her voice for this "— would 'never 
behave in such a dishonorable fashion during a combat scenario 
due to his warrior ethos’. He's a fucking homicidal sociopath, and 
you fuckers romanticize that to a 'warrior ethos' because he had old 
tattoos and because he cashed your checks for a little while." 


Bright said nothing. Maria watched him meander across the room, 
looking at bookshelves. Maria realized at some point that he wasn't 
going to respond to her. Under different circumstances, she would 
have taken that as a cue that she had pushed her luck. Under these 
circumstances, however, she was going to speak her mind. 


"Yeah, Jack. Let me bend over backwards here with all the effort I'm 
going to make taking your word for it — or the word of whichever 
grand, glorious shadowy voice is speaking into your ear this week — 
that things are going to be different this time. Things are different 
every time. You know what never changes? These conversations, 
Jack. Greek letters change. Mission statements are rephrased by 
the new interns. But here we find ourselves every time, right on the 
edge. 


"This is the fucking cliff, Jack. Every time we put ourselves into one 
of these new ‘initiatives’, one of these new ‘programs’, one of these 
new ‘projects’ or whatever the hell buzzword we have to convince 
ourselves we're not funding the road to hell again, every single time, 
we come to this place again, the /ast place where we can stop 
ourselves, and we can say 'no, God dammit, this is not what we do 
here.' And every fucking time, we go right off the cliff again.” 


Jack was standing, arms crossed, leaned against the nearest wall. 
Maria was half-panting, trying to regain her breath after the last 
speech. 


"Hey, Maria?" 
Maria sighed. "What, Jack?" 


"You know what the moment is when | realize that we don't need to 
have you drugged, amnesticized, given an elaborate cover story and 
dropped into a sinecure in some state office in Wyoming 


SCP-702: The Trader's Residence 


Item #: SCP-702 
Object Class: Euclid 


Special Containment Procedures: SCP-702 is to be contained ina 
crate lined with mundane packing materials. The crate is to be kept 
in a standard security locker with armed guards at all times. If the 
crate is breached, under no circumstances are any personnel to 
touch the SCP without wearing a pair of standard insulated gloves 
and an insulated coat. The slated destruction of SCP-702 is 
indefinitely postponed due to the unknown effects on SCP-702-1 

and possible containment breaches. 


Description: SCP-702 is a simple red vase of unknown design. 
Human contact with the vase causes an entity (herein referred to as 
SCP-702-1) to emerge from the vase and initiate contact with the 
individual coming into contact with SCP-702. The method of 
detection seems to be thermal in nature, as SCP-702-1 emerges 
when contact is established through thin, heat-transmitting 
materials, but does not emerge when contact is established through 
an insulated material. SCP-702-1 is a sapient gas-based life form 
that communicates through coordinated vibration of the air around it. 
A sample has been impossible to gather due to SCP-702-1's 
tendency to react violently to anyone coming into physical contact 
with it. Upon emergence, SCP-702-1 greets the subject establishing 
contact with SCP-702, and attempts to persuade the subject to give 
it a gift. If the subject refuses, the entity [DATA EXPUNGED] and 
takes a single object or part from the remains. Some objects are 
rejected by SCP-702-1, claiming that it "already has one", and 
demands a new gift, returning the offered object. If SCP-702-1 
accepts the offered gift, it returns an object of roughly equal value to 
the subject and disappears. See Experiments 702-001 through 
702-004 for a transcript of successful transactions with SCP-702. 


Addendum: