"| can be your friend." The enemy slid into the barstool next to her 
and gave her a sultry, smouldering look. "| could be your very best 
friend in the world, hon." 


"That's okay," Spider said. "I'm really not interested..." 


The other three members of the party (including the KTE) got up 
from their booth and left the bar. 


Spider flinched. Big mistake. 


"Right," the enemy said curtly. She put a hand into her jacket 
pocket. "Now we've got a choice. Either we can quietly head out the 
back door to have a little chat, or | can cause some noise and we 
can disturb the nice people trying to have a quiet evening. Your 
choice." 


"I'll go quietly," Spider said softly. 
"Back door. Now." 


Spider got up from the barstool and walked out the door, carefully 
keeping her hands away from her sides. The alleyway behind the 
pub was quiet and dark. Not a soul in sight. Plenty of dark places 
away from the street lights. 


Not a bad place for an execution. 
The tiny bell in her pocket jingled once. 


Spider breathed a sigh of relief which immediately turned into a gasp 
of surprise as the stranger grabbed her and dragged her into the 
alley. "All right," the enemy growled, twisting Spider's collar as she 


pushed her up against the brick wall. "Who the hell are you and why 
are you following us?" 


The silence that followed was interrupted by the click of an 
automatic pistol being taken off safety. 


"| think that a better question might be, 'Who the hell are you and 
what the fuck do you think you're doing to our friend?” Fox sneered. 


Thank God, Spider thought. Backup's finally arrived. 


Aw, shit, Adams thought. / should have known she'd have backup. 


Her drink-addled mind was working overtime. Was this a 
coordinated hit? A chance meeting? Pure fluke of luck? Mugging 
gone wrong? "It's all right," Adams said, coolly sliding a hand 
towards the cell phone in her back pocket. "You can have my wallet 
and pho—" 


Someone kicked her knees out from under her and pinned her face- 
down on the concrete. Adams tasted blood, dirt, and concrete dust. 
She struggled, but a pair of strong hands pinned her arms behind 
her back, putting her expertly into a joint-wrenching wrist lock that 
promised dire consequences for continued resistance. 


"Frisk her, Kitten," a low voice growled. "Spider, what the hell's 
going on?" 


"Three women just walked out of the pub," the Asian woman said. 
"The blonde is the one on the bulletin that just went around last 
week about the Foundation reactivating their special assault 
force..." 


Oh shit, Adams thought. 


"Shit. Katie Eleven Nine Seven One?" the low voice growled. The 
muzzle of the pistol pressed tightly into the back of Adams’ head as 
another pair of hands frisked her roughly. "Where is it now?" 


"Probably out front. Dark red sedan. Three others, including the 
Katie. They had perimeter support, but I've had them chasing Lotus 


Dreams for the past half hour." 


"... all right,” the rough voice said. "If we wait for STRIKE, they're 
gonna spook. We'll do the snatch-and-grab ourselves. Kitten takes 
one guard, I'll take the other. You go for the target." 


"What about this one?" a third voice asked. This one was toneless 
and emotionless. A ‘grey' sort of voice. 


"I'd rather not kill her if | can help it. Hand me your taser," the rough 
voice said. 


Something behind Adams' eyes went click. 


She knew that it was suicide to move. Not with a gun pressed up 
against the back of her head and her arm pinned behind her back. 
But if what the enemy was saying was true: if the MTF backup was 
distracted and they were going to go after Iris, Blaire, and Chelsea... 


If she moved fast enough, moved strong enough, maybe she could 
throw her attacker off and get clear of the muzzle of the gun before 
the other person fired. Not much of a chance. But it was the only 
chance she had. 


She was tensing up to move when there was a bright flash of blue 
light and the sound of a simulated shutter snapping. 


There was a flash of light and an electronic-sounding "click." 


Spider turned. There was a darkened silhouette standing the 
alleyway. Female. Blonde. She had a smart phone in her hand, and 
she'd just taken a snapshot of the scene and ... 


A single line from the bulletin regarding KTE-11971: "Subject has 
limited reality alteration abilities, and can reach through a 
photograph to move and manipulate objects pictured..." 


"Oh crap," Spider whispered. 


She went for the only weapon she had left: the ritual knife in her 
right boot. There was a loud shout behind her. She saw, out of the 


the recording. The contestants will give anything as an answer if 
properly prompted, regardless of whether they could know the 
answer given, or content of the answer. The contestants, host, and 
audience will have no visible reaction to profanity, vulgarity, or racial 
slurs given as an answer. 


The questions appear to be randomly selected, and are different 
every time. Questions can be about any topic, and from any time 
period, even information from after the apparent recording of the 
show. The only apparent limitation on the questions is that the 
answer must be known by at least one person viewing the tape. 
Questions will occasionally be of a deeply personal nature; 
questions have in the past revealed extramarital affairs, illegitimate 
children, drug addiction, and [DATA EXPUNGED]. Anything known 
to any viewer can become a question. 


Copies of SCP-656 do not share its unique properties. Any copy of 
SCP-656 will play the recording as it appears when no viewers 
speak during play. Once a playthrough of SCP-656 has begun, it 
cannot be paused, rewound, or fast-forwarded. 


Three (3) commercial breaks occur during the show, all advertising 
known products with the correct advertisements. After a commercial 
break, the camera view sweeps over the audience. Upon closer 
analysis, the audience consists entirely of people who have viewed 
the tape, as well as those currently viewing it. In addition to the 
Foundation personnel known to have viewed the tape, six (6) 
unknown people appear in the audience. At the end of the taping, 
after the host announces the winner of the three contestants, the 
"Audience Winner" is announced, and a member of the audience 
comes forward and is given a copy of SCP-656. The "Audience 
Winner" always corresponds with the current viewer who answered 
the most questions correctly. The tape cuts off soon after this point, 
during a disclaimer regarding the awarding of prizes. The disclaimer 
contains nothing of note. The recording runs for a total of 20 
minutes, 3 seconds. There is an additional five (5) hours and forty 
(40) minutes of blank tape after the disclaimer cuts off. No 
anomalies have been detected within the blank portion of the tape. 


Addendum: All "winners" are to be monitored in the event of a 
change in conditions. Refer to Document 656- for a complete list of 


corner of her eye, a ghostly hand reach out of nowhere and struggle 
briefly with Fox for the pistol... 


The woman on the ground moved, terrifyingly fast. She twisted her 
body around, somehow causing Fox to lose her grip. The heel of her 
hand clipped Fox's jaw, hard, sending her reeling into Kitten. Kitten 
shoved the stunned Fox away, ruthlessly clearing her sight line, 
raised the taser... 


A shot rang out. 


Kitten sprawled to the ground, clutching her side. A flattened bullet 
clattered to the floor. She gasped for breath, obviously winded by 
the bullet's impact. 


The blonde stood a few feet away. Her trembling, bleeding hands 
held Fox's pistol. She quickly lowered it so it was pointing at Spider's 
head. 


"FREEZE, MOTHERFUCKERS!" she shouted. 


"FREEZE, MOTHERFUCKERS"" Iris screamed. Her heart was 

pounding. Her hands were bloodied. She wanted to throw up, but 
Beatrix had always told her that a loud, confident shout would do 
more than bullets to get an enemy to think twice about attacking. 


The kneeling Asian woman froze. She was holding a knife in one 
hand: a curved hunting knife with a hilt that looked like bone or ivory. 
What was it that Lombardi always said about a guy with a knife? 
Was it twenty or thirty feet that they can get you in? Or was that 
while the gun is holstered? 


The enemy looked into Iris's eyes. They stared at each other for a 
long moment. 


The Asian woman put her knife on the ground and held her hands 
above her head. The only sounds were Adams' labored breathing, 
the groaning red-headed woman struggling to get to her feet, and 
the gasping of the tall woman with the freckles and light-brown hair. 


Headlights. The sound of squealing tires. Iris saw a red-brown 


sedan drive up the curb and into the alleyway. "GET IN!" Chelsea 
shouted, as Blaire opened the passenger side door. 


Adams got to her feet and ran for it, racing towards the back door, 
diving past Iris and (if the sounds were any indication) tumbling 
head-first into the car's back seat. Iris backed slowly away from the 
three strangers, keeping the gun trained on each of them in turn. 


She climbed into the front passenger's seat and slammed the door 
shut. 


"Shit!" Spider growled, as the KTE climbed into the car and started 
to drive away. She hesitated. Kitten and Fox were both down. If she 
pursued... 


"GO" Kitten gasped, clutching her side. "I'll watch Fox! Don't let 
them get away!" 


Right! Spider scooped up her secespita and ran after the dark red 
sedan. She pulled the smart phone from her pocket and pulled up 
her grimoire. There might not be very much contagion between the 
skin cells on her jacket collar and the well-dressed brunette who had 
left them there, but if she worked quickly and kept the car in sight, 
she could still use the connection to... 


She slammed into a tall, Chinese woman in a black coat with short 
black hair. 


Spider let out a surprised squawk that turned into a cry of dismay as 
her smart phone fell out of her hand and clattered down a storm 
drain. "Shit!" She grabbed for the phone, but it was too far down to 
reach. She could see it there, right beyond her fingertips, LCD 
screen still glowing... 


She looked up. Too late. The car was gone. 
Spider searched angrily for the woman who had bumped into her, 


but that woman was nowhere to be seen. "Chow soola," she cursed. 


"Holy shit!" Blaire gasped, as the car sped away. "You guys okay?" 


"I'm fine, I'm fine," Adams protested, pushing Blaire's hands away. 
"Just a bit banged up. Iris?" 


Iris took a deep, ragged breath and dropped the pistol into her lap. 
Adams was oddly pleased to see that the safety catch was on. Good 
girl, she thought. 


"Who were those guys?” Chelsea asked. "Church? Insurgency?" 


They called her a Katie, Adams realized. KTE. "Coalition," she said 
softly. 


"Fuck." Chelsea's eyes were big, wide, and very, very scared. 
"Iris?" Blaire said. "| need you to do me a favor." 
"What?" Iris asked. 


"| need you to take that gun, strip it down, and toss all the pieces out 
the window," Blaire said. 


Good idea, Adams thought. "Global Occult Coalition puts tracking 
chips in all their weapons." 


"Shit." Iris popped the retaining pin from the pistol and stripped the 
slide, leaving blood behind on the steel. 


Adams frowned. She grabbed Iris's hand and held it up to the light. 
"You're bleeding." 


"I'm fine," Iris said, gulping. "It's just... remember, when | said that 
reaching through that phone was like pushing through wet sand? | 
scraped my hand up doing it..." 


"GOC sorcerers can track you by your blood," Adams said, taking 
the pistol. "We need to clean this. Blaire?" 


"| got it," Blaire said. She pulled a lace-edged handkerchief from her 
purse and began carefully wiping down the weapon. 


"How the hell did they find us in the first place?" Chelsea wondered. 
"Is there a mole? Were we breached?" 


Just bad luck, if what those three were saying is true, Adams 
thought. Fucking shame. | liked those bars... She fumbled for her 
phone, realized that it had been taken from her by their attackers. 
Damn. Command is going to tear me a new asshole for this... 


"Iris?" Blaire asked. "Are you okay, hon?" 


Iris didn't respond. She was wrapping her brand-new scarf around 
her scraped knuckles to avoid getting blood all over her clothes and 
Chelsea's car. 


"Hey," Adams said, putting her hand on the girl's shoulder. "You did 
good back there. Thanks." 


Iris nodded. "Sure," she whispered. 


The car continued down the freeway. "What do we do now?" 
Chelsea asked. 


"We can't go back to the safehouse,” Blaire said sternly, "and they 
know your Car. Sorry, hon, but you're going to have to ditch it." 


"Aww, shit. And | just finished paying for it, too..." 


They left the car sitting by the side of the road in the bad part of 
town. Blaire disassembled the gun and tossed the pieces into the 
river while Adams hopped the fence into an all-night parking lot. A 
few minutes and some fiddling with some wires later, the four 
women piled into a white minivan and drove off into the night. 


The minivan's previous owner had left some blankets in it. Iris 
wrapped herself in one and rested her head against the foggy 
window as the minivan drove through the desert towards Site-17. 
She drifted in and out of sleep, listening to the soothing sound of the 
minivan's engine and Blaire and Adams' whispered conversation. 


"What about the stuff you bought at the mall?" Blaire asked softly. 


"I'll have someone pick up our stuff from the safe house later," 
Adams explained. "For now, let's get back on-Site. I've got some 
reports to make." 


"O5's not going to like this," Blaire pointed out. "They're going to say 
you recklessly endangered an important asset." 


"O5 will be right," Adams admitted. "But they're going to like even 
less that the Gocks know we've reactivated Omega-7. The one who 
was shadowing us talked about how we'd reactivated our ‘special 
assault force.’ Someone spilled the beans about Alpha-Niner." 


"... well, shit. That's all we need." 

They continued along the road in silence. 

"Hey, Adams?" 

"Yeah, Blaire?" 

"... allin all, this was still a better night than ‘Molotov II."" 

"You're never going to let me live that down, are you... ?" 

lris drifted to sleep with the dark desert speeding past the window 


and Adams's chuckling in her ears. 


They drove the van through the gate and parked it in the 
underground parking lot. Security would handle the disposal of the 
vehicle. They were good at that. 


The Site was silent at this hour. Most of the doctors and staff were 
asleep. Only the night shift security was up and about. They passed 
through the gates and the identity scanners and into the steel-walled 
elevator, which rapidly descended into the earth and opened up on a 
sterile white hallway with thin colored lines painted on the walls. 


"... I'm hungry," Blaire said. "Anyone want to eat?" 
"| could eat," Adams admitted. 
"Yeah," Chelsea agreed. 


Iris nodded mutely. 


They headed into the site cafeteria: darkened and still at this late 
hour. Blaire rummaged through the refrigerators, managing to find 
some bread and sandwich fixings. Chelsea cleared off a table, and 
Adams poured some drinks from the soda fountain in the corner. 


lris sat down at the table. She stared at her bloodied hands for a 
long time. 


Then, as Blaire set the turkey-and-swiss cheese sandwich down in 
front of her, Iris finally began to cry. 


Warm, soft arms wrapped around her shoulders, hugging her close. 
"It's all right," Blaire's gentle voice said. "You did good, girl." 


It was another four hours before the interviews and debriefings 
ended. She was interrogated about everything that happened from 
the moment that she and Adams had left the Site. Reliving the day 
was twice as exhausting as living it had been.