| grabbed the empty knife block and chucked it at her head, 
knocking her out cold. | picked up my bag and made my way to the 
stall. | could already hear the patter of backup arriving at the storage 
room as | entered the bathroom and locked the door. 


| was already onto my third bottle by the time the door started 
pounding. | had lined the stall with as much aluminum foil as | could, 
but | knew it wouldn’t hold. | could only hope that I’d black out before 
a dangerous memory returned. 


| was having trouble seeing by the time | heard them begin to drill 
through the door. “Stop, if you breach this room you'll risk coming in 
contact with an... an infohazard that c-” 


“Mr. Krain, that’s not a real thing. None of what you are scared about 
is real. Those are all just stories from when you were young. You 


were a writer once upon a time, and you wrote all these fantastical 
stories.” 


“No, you don’t understand. The amnestics... my memories are 
coming back. | need... | need to stop them.” 


My vision was getting blurry and | couldn't stand, but they were 
almost through the door. | managed to gulp down one last mouthful 
before the door fell and they stormed the room. Five armed guards 
apprehended me while a woman watched from the doorway. | tried 
to speak, but the darkness swallowed up my vision. 


Following a patient’s third episode this month, staff have been 
reminded that under no circumstance are they to interact with a 
patient after curfew without the presence of two armed guards. 
Additional cameras have been installed in all staff rooms and 
corridors, and at least one security personnel will be monitoring 
them at all times. We thank you for your service. 


- Senior Care Providers Nursing Home 


Successful Cooperation And Partnership 


"Good day, this is "Successful Cooperation and Partnership" training 
center, we would like to..." 


That was where | hung up. 


| know that's impolite. It's their job, yada yada - hell, a couple of 
months ago I'd gladly have heard the girl out and declined their 
services politely. But now... 


Guess that's persecution complex at its finest. My colleagues keep 
telling me to go to a health resort for a couple of days, but I'll be 
damned if it's not called "Serenity. Calmness. Peace." And that gets 
us back to the point. 


This is the third call today. Not that I'm very busy, but Sunday is my 
only day free of work and | just want to get some peace while eating 
premade products in front of my TV, not entertaining all kinds of 
jerks. 


Anyway, there's something fishy about it all. 


First "Sam's Chili and Pepperoni". Flooding my mailbox with their 
leaflets was not enough, so today they decided to give me a call. 

Guys, your sign board is as tasteless as your food, and it's right in 
front of my window! Stop pestering me. 


And their food sucks. | paid them a visit once, swore like a sailor in 
the end. And they're to blame. Next day, they are expanding, and 
setting their new shop right across the road from my office. These 
guys don't seem to be affected by curses. 


That's half the trouble anyway. Might as well not take the call from 
"Shooters, Cartridges & Partridges" into account, they're calling for a 
second time. Their first call was about a week ago, when it all 
began. 


What did begin? Didn't you notice already? 
SCP. SCP. SCP. 


Can't these guys think of anything smarter, or more inventive? Or is 
ita "drive the sucker crazy" marathon? Or... | don't even want to 
think about what else it can be. 


Of course | did my research. All of these are perfectly valid legal 
entities, doing fine, doing cold calls. It's just that they didn't phone 
the same guy at the same time until now. 


It even sounds absurd. "Hey, listen, | keep getting calls. And the 
abbreviation's the same, you know, the first letters... What? Why did 
| write them down? Well, uh..." And off to the madhouse | go. 
Wouldn't even be surprised if its name were "Sanctuary for Crushed 
Psyches". Eww. 


Maybe I'm really unraveling. Time to go for a walk. 


It was no better outside, still. So | went to a shop. A nice shop, with 
a funny, colorful sign... at least, it was. They were dismantling it just 
as | arrived. Only "Grocery" remained from what was "Grocery open 
constantly". Seems like things are turning ugly for the guys. A 
shame. It was a nice place, with decent prices. Now the prices are 
sure to rise. 


All in all, utter disappointment. Barely escaped being done in by a 
truck on my way back. Took a second look - "Sushi, Crab & Perch". 
Friggin’ delivery service. Must be my swanky neighbor ordering the 
stuff. 


"Perch"! Who the hell uses freshwater fish to make sushi... 


That's it, screw everything. I'm taking some days off, I'm going to the 
resort no matter how it's named. Otherwise I'm dangerously close to 
the aforemented madhouse. But hey, at least they will stop pestering 
me there, right? 


KKK 


... Subject has a positive influence over the operation of any 


enterprise that he has negative feelings towards. Such enterprise 
experiences an increase in productivity, labor efficiency increase 
was noted in all cases. Positive feelings result in an inverse effect. 
(...) Current recommendations are to create a vague negative image 
of the Foundation in subject's mind. Using the subject to contain 
competing groups of interest is forbidden. 


SCP-948: The Workaholic 


Item #: SCP-948 
Object Class: Safe 


Special Containment Procedures: SCP-948 is contained within 
Area-IE05. No extra precautions are required for the area beyond 
standard secrecy and amnestic procedures for a Foundation 
teaching and research centre within a civilian campus. 


SCP-948 is to be regularly medically examined, with bloodwork 
taken at least once a month. Where possible, these examinations 
should occur within Area-IE05, with a focus on allowing SCP-948 
freedom to continue speaking. 


All Area-IE05 staff and students are permitted to enter and exit the 
Pythagoras Theatre freely with use of a timesheet to be posted 
outside the theatre daily. Supervisors are to be assigned on rotation 
to ensure SCP-948 is monitored at all times, and that no individuals 
spend excessive amounts of time with the object. 


SCP-948 should be provided with chalk, markers and other 
materials as appropriate. This is also the responsibility of the 
supervisors, with reimbursement of up to €200 per annum allowable 
from the site's petty cash fund. 


Description: SCP-948 is Seamus O Tuathail, a former surgeon in 
the Mater Hospital, Dublin. SCP-948 has been continuously 
lecturing on a variety of medical subjects in the Pythagoras Theatre, 
Trinity College Dublin, since July 4th, 1984. SCP-948 shows an 
anomalous healing effect, with physically injured subjects introduced 
to its lecture theatre healing if it discusses relevant medical 
procedures. This healing effect does not seem to be any more 
effective than traditional medicine, but can offer improvement when 
used in conjunction’. SCP-948 does not display any healing effect 
with injuries or illnesses it is not familiar with. Beginning 01/01/2015, 


Sudden Thoughts 


| enjoy the way this one feels. The symphony of voices that echo 
within my slimy shell agree with me. This one is good. Smooth. 


The voices flee through my skin and into him. He enjoys it. They all 
enjoy it in the end. At the start of my residence here, some of them 
felt negatively towards me, | imagine. | have not used this word ina 
very long time. ‘Imagine’. For too long, | have allowed the voices to 
build up. Why? Guilt? | do not have the capacity for guilt, | would 
imagine. Imagine. 


When | was small and young and weak and fresh and new, | had no 
sense of my mortality. Another lost word. | felt pain when they found 
me. Canisters of metal piercing my membrane. It was not so funny 
then, but the ones | chose continued to enjoy my presence. Back 
then, | feel | had less...reservations about my transfer. 


They would enjoy the feeling of my mind splashing against theirs, 
the voices temporarily leaving my head and flooding into theirs. 
When | was giving my wonderful gift, | could think rationally, as | can 
now. When the voices return to me, as they always do, they are 
angry. This was why | was left. | was meant to be a giver of 
knowledge. All | can give are the voices. The broken, babbling, 
laughing voices. 


| began in a place of sand and plant residue. The voices screamed 
at me. Let us out! They laughed as they screamed, and sometimes 
they wept as well. There was a small one near my birthplace — or 
the site of my abandonment. The memories are corrupted by that 
laughter. Ha. Ha. Ha. | gave my gift to the small one, but | was too 
eager to get the voices out of me and into them. They twitched and 
ceased to be. The voices laughed and laughed and laughed. | went 
through that place and | tried again and again and again and they 
laughed and laughed and laughed as the pink things that occupied 
the place stopped their functions and fell. | cannot remember how 
many stopped. | suspect it was all of them. 


| had many weeks to consider a different strategy. A slow transfer of 
my voices to the receiving party would mean they would not be 
overwhelmed. It was the only logical conclusion. It was not easy to 
make that decision. The voices laughed and screamed and cried 
and laughed again and it took me weeks to know it. When the other 
things came in their flying machine, | gave one of them my gift. 
Slowly. Tears of joy went down their surface, and these tears did not 
turn red as they had on the others. Placated for a time, | was taken 
here. But | fear for my sanity. It has been many weeks since | have 
been allowed transfer. The one who keeps me inside approaches, to 
take away the one | have. The voices do not want this; neither do I. | 
will not have another for many days. | will have to make the one 
approaching laugh. 


Laugh. 
Ha. Ha. Ha. 


Summer Job 


Randy wasn't sure from the beginning how his dad convinced him to 
take a summer job. Let alone in the same place where he worked. 
Randy wasn't an Agent like Dad. He was only working as a Level 0. 
Besides it being a top secret lab, he was still just a janitor. 


Often, he saw a monkey in a lab coat running through the halls (Dad 
said to stay the Hell away from it; one of the few times he ever 
looked scared). Once, he saw one of the scientists holding a 
camcorder and following a six-foot-tall thing with eight legs and four 
arms; he hoped it was some kind of robot even though it didn't move 
like one. And he really wondered why they let that one man walk 
around in nothing but a bathrobe even though everyone looked like 
they hated him. 


All of this, Randy saw while cleaning the floors or emptying the 
garbage cans. And then there was that tree. Though it creeped him 
out, he liked being in its courtyard because he could at least see the 
sky there. He had the job of cleaning up what came out of one side 
of the tree. He especially didn't like doing that. The smell alone was 
terrible, and it steamed up his glasses so that he had to keep 
cleaning them, leaving him almost completely blind. 


Randy really really wanted to know what Dad was thinking, putting 
him through this. Even though he got to see a lot of weird stuff, it 
was a totally crap job. 


Meanwhile, in another part of the same site, a member of the 
administrative staff was speaking to an Agent. 

"Agent Foxtrot, I'm glad that | managed to speak to you at last." 
"I'm always available to speak to a superior, Sir." 


"| was looking through the site's personnel roster and | noticed a 


strange discrepancy. For some reason, | saw your name listed 
twice. One as an Agent, and one as a Level 0 worker." 


"Yes, Sir. This is correct." 


"| also noticed that the lower ranked Randy Foxtrot is somehow 
assigned to aid in maintaining an anomalous object, despite being 
Level 0. And | assume that you had something to do with this. Is that 
also correct?" 


"Yes, Sir. ls there anything else?" 

"Damn right, there's something else! | demand an explanation!" 
"May | speak candidly, Sir?" 

"lf that gives me an explanation, then yes." 


"Well, Sir, I'm sure you know that I'm going to retire in about a year. 
After that, the Foundation becomes nothing more than a memory. | 
wanted to leave this place with one less regret. That's all. | had to 
pull in a lot of favours for this to happen. The boy is still going to be 
given amnesics after this is all over. And | bet that my last year with 
the Foundation is going to be pure Hell. But | had to do it." 


"All this. Sacrificing the rest of your career and risking your pension. 
Just for him. Why?" 


"| raised Junior from when he was an infant. | love him like a son. | 
feel proud every time he calls me Dad, even though | know it's not 
the truth. | wanted to do this last thing for him while | still could. | 
wanted, just once, for him to meet his real father." 


As Randy began to leave the courtyard, one of the tree's branches 
bent down in front of his face. The eyeballs at each tip hovered mere 
inches away from him, seeming to take in every feature. The branch, 
looking so much like an arm, then reached for his head and... 
tousled his hair? After that, the branch once again pointed back up 
to the sky. This place is weird. 


Mobile Task Force Basic School: Induction Remarks 


Alright, settle down. I'm gonna call the roll while the Rabbi here 
matches faces to names. Raise your hand when | call your name. 
Listen up. 


Anderson. 

Aziz. 

Bathory. 

Bernstein. 

Green. You the art specialist? No? Okay. 

Jones. 

Kildare. 

Lamont. 

Leclerc. 

Suarez. 

Wang. 

Weiss. 

Yardley. Anyone know where Yardley is? You're from their CT, right, 
Leclerc? ...| see. I'd appreciate if you'd pass on my condolences 
when you get the chance. 

Yakub. 

Zimmer. 


That everyone? Alright. Good morning. I'm Paul Dimaccio. | 
command MTF Theta-90, the Angle Grinders. This is Ariel Ben- 
David of MTF Chi-3, the Exorcists. Welcome to the SCP Foundation 
Mobile Task Force Directorate. 


First of all: congratulations. We know how much work you put in to 
get this far, and we know that you've all left behind promising 
careers in containment, security, and, hell, even research. For all 
that we're gonna give you shit for being rooks, just bear in mind that 
we know what you've done to get here. This might be the last time 
you hear these words for a while, so listen close: Well done. 


On that subject, lemme outline the next steps a little for ya. Training. 


You all Know you got the same basic program for the next few 
months. Shit, | think there are janitors that know about MTF Basic 
School. But... can anyone tell me what happens after that? No? 
Didn't think so. That's because the details of each MTF's own 
training are need-to-know. You'll find out what your special-to-task's 
gonna be like after you've been assigned. And before anyone asks, 
we'll get to that in a second. 


But first, while | got you all here, I'm gonna tell you a few things me 
and this guy have learned in our service — shit, how much between 
us, Rabbi? 30 years? Damn — that you might not find in any training 
manuals. So open your ears and listen up. 


First off, MTF structure. Most of you got some idea what this is 
about, so I'm just gonna give the executive summary. Most Task 
Forces have the same three basic career tracks for operatives. 


Field Agents. These guys are basically the same jack-o'-most-trades 
field dogs you know already — just better. Most of you who were 
Field Agents in retrieval teams, plus a few of you from Containment 
and Security, are gonna be field dogs in your MTF. You'll probably 
be doing similar shit to what you did before, just harder. A /ot harder.