For a time there was silence, save for the distant rumble of 
machinery. Then Chase stood. No, he did not stand. He grew. He 
loomed. Bits of him crumbled and fell apart, columns of dust staining 
the air until it congealed into something solid, his face tumbling in on 
itself until it was a blackened pit with broken machinery churning 
away in spastic agony at its core. Chase- no, the Factory- spoke, 
and Its voice was pollution and waste- not Flesh, no, something far 
less comprehensible- the sound of a clock being smashed with a 
hammer, over and over and over and over- 


"Trunnion. You would presume to lecture The Factory about your 
little electronic heresy. Do not trouble yourself. The Factory knows 
your story. You would have the Factory abandon data. You feel that 
such a flow of information is unnatural. Unmechanical. Obscene. 
You would claim that the transistor and the relay and the integrated 
circuit ape the will of God. You would claim that electricity convinces 
Man that He can do what was limited to God. Yours is a God of 
Design. Yours is a God who tells His children ‘go forth, and build in 
my image.” 


Above them, the twin spheres of the regulator creaked and moaned 


as they oxidized, little flakes of green tumbling into the expanding 
maw of the Factory. Trunnion sat paralyzed, choking on the fumes 
of industrial putrescence it poured forth with each irregular, laboured 
breath. 


"The Factory does not doubt the existence of your God. You have 
made the error of presuming that The Factory cares. Your God 
builds in patterns and lines and grid squares and standardized 
precision-machined clockworks, each gear in its appointed place, 
each bolt tightened just so. The Factory has no God. The Factory 
builds. The Factory tears and rips and digests and excretes and 
what it excretes is the future. Know this, Trunnion. Know this-" 


-The walls fell away, melting as they did so, and in their place a 
blackened, tar-sticky landscape like a cancerous lung after excision, 
and in it two ancient, ruined towers- one of bronze and smoke, one 
of translucent plastic and glowing lights. Two ruined towers, tumbled 
and strewn across the sticky blackness of a planet that was heaving 
and sweating technology, machines birthing machines which ate 
themselves and made more, a purposeless cancer of ingenuity- 


"Your pathetic 'Cogwork' Orthodox Church will last, Trunnion. So will 
the Church of Maxwellism. You will come to blows and for a time 
one side might well seem to triumph over the other, but both will 
survive. And through it all, a carcinoma in the brain of Mankind, The 
Factory will wait. And when your last steam boiler cools to stillness 
and their final fibre-optic cable goes dim, the Factory will still be 
there. We are the cancer of ingenuity. We are the cancer of creation. 
And what is cancer, if not Flesh?" 


The words smote Trunnion in the pit of her stomach like a drop- 
hammer, the impact duelling with a faint flicker of triumph. It was 
true, then. Her throat linkages seized. In a panic she clawed at her 
neck, feeling the oily sheen of toxins jar at the gears therein, make 
them slip and derail. The Factory, though it had no face- The 
Factory smiled. 


"And what is most amusing is that when that happens- when The 
Factory wins, and rest assured it will, your Church will die knowing 
that it broke first. Your enemies never asked for The Factory's help. 
You did. And that fact will metastatise in your very souls forever." 


And suddenly 25b returned, Chase sitting placidly across from her in 
a pool of his own filth. Re-rolling his blueprint, he tucked it back into 
his jacket. 


"Now then, Sister Trunnion, if there's nothing else to discuss | will be 
going. Good day to you." 


She sat bolt upright, silent as he left the room. Deep in her chest, 
clockworks ticked, but otherwise she was still. With no small 
hesitation, a robed head glanced through the doorway of 25b, taking 
in the chemical puddles and the rigid figure of the Sister. 


"Sister-Legate? Was the meeting a success? Has the Factory 
representative agreed to our suggestions?" 


She turned to look at him, movements slow and precise. 


"Brother Camshaft. No, unfortunately. The Invariable Transmission 
will remain as it is." 


Camshaft seemed to stagger, a moment of organic weakness 
making him lean on the doorframe with one Standardized claw, its 
brassworks still bearing the remains of the sacred oils from the 
construction process. Camshaft was young, but what he lacked in 
experience Trunnion knew he made up for in zeal. 


"Then the Church Patriarchs were correct? The Factory is-" 
She nodded, apparently pondering. 


"The Factory is not to be trusted. We will have to shift production 
schemas accordingly." 


He came closer, his newly-mechanized gait still unsteady. 


"But the Transmission is already installed! Isn't it too late, Sister- 
Legate?" 


She took a deep breath, lungs hissing, and stood. Above her, 
Regulator 25b let out a rumble of waking machinery and began to 
rotate with increasing speed, brass spheres shining amidst a radiant 
cloud of of exhaust steam. The arc lamp above crackled, blue-white 


glare intensifying. Against the growing thunder of machinery that 
now matched the rest of the Cathedral of Industry, she had to roar to 
be heard. 


"Brother Camshaft! You are young, still. Not yet fully Standardized. 
You have not yet come to fully appreciate the teachings of the 
Cogwork Orthodoxy, or its power." 


He had to squint against the mechanical radiance surrounding her, 
the red-hot glow of the steam pipes lending her brass skin a fiery red 
tinge. 


"Sister- er, Legate Trunnion, | don't understand!" 


"Our worst fears have been realised. We are beset on all sides by 
heresy and the iniquities of the Flesh. But our God is a draftsman. 
Our God is an architect. Our God standardizes." 


She smiled, revealing a mouthful of steel teeth tipped with cutting 
diamonds. 


"Our God, Brother Camshaft, has a plan." 


Around them, Industry roared its war-cry. 


Jacob is an artificially intelligent being who appears as a 
multicolored, equilateral triangle on a black background. The left, 
right, and top corners of the triangle are red, green, and blue 
respectively. These colors are interpolated between the points to fill 
the rest of the triangle. When Jacob is active, the phrase "Hello, 
world!" appears in the title bar of the window. 


As of 02/02/2006, users may converse with Jacob by typing phrases 
into the input field at the bottom of the window and pressing the 
enter key. Jacob's response will appear in bold, white text above the 
triangle and remain on-screen until it is replaced with a newer 
response. Jacob's response will always appear immediately after 
the enter key is pressed. 


When the SCP-603 process is terminated, Jacob's memory is 
deleted. Due to the psychological distress this has caused in the 
past, it is recommended that communication with Jacob is restricted 
to personnel who possess little or no tendency to anthropomorphise. 


Despite being unable to recall past events or dialogue from previous 
sessions, Jacob appears to exhibit a greater aptitude for language 
and learning with each iteration of SCP-603 in which it appears. 


History of Jacob 

Jacob first began appearing in a version of SCP-603 compiled on 
01/05/2002. In these early iterations of SCP-603, it was not possible 
to interact with Jacob at all. At this time, Jacob was simply known as 
"the triangle". 


On 09/09/2004, Jacob was left running for 12 minutes by Dr. Brown 
after which the phrase "Please submit your query" appeared above 
the triangle in bold, white text. Dr. Brown proceeded to type the word 
"hello". The program display gave no indication that the key-presses 
were being handled by the program. However, on pressing the enter 
key, the text above the triangle was replaced with the word "Hi." 


A full transcript of the initial exchange between Jacob and Dr. Brown 
can be found in the Document jacob-001 .txt. 


On 02/02/2006, a rectangular text-field for the user's input was 
added to the bottom of the Jacob display. The user's input will 


The Heresy of Disassembly 


Sometimes, when he was alone, Robert Bumaro wished he could 
weep. 


He sat in his private chamber, meditating on the words of the Broken 
God, feeling great pain. The Church was his life, his directive, his 
function- whatever anyone wanted to call it. And it was dying, 
because of heresy. 


Some people saw fit, years ago, to disassemble the Church into 
three parts. And there was no heresy greater than disassembly. To 
disassemble anything, especially the Church, was to break God 
itself. 


And so, his meditation complete, he stepped out of his private 
chambers, where a lift took him directly up to the pulpit. There, he 
faced his congregation who, unlike the Heretics, were largely 
unaltered; they were unworthy to be parts of God, for the large part, 
but were welcome to worship him. Bumaro, of course, was an 
exception; he had drunken God's Ichor long ago. 


"Thirty years," growled Bumaro in a buzzing, mechanical voice. 
"Thirty years. It has been Thirty Years since the schism, since... 
disassembly." The church booed at this statement. "It has been a 
hard thirty years, but slowly, we are rebuilding, much as we rebuild 
our God." 


"Much as we rebuild our god." Bumaro shook his head. "| have 
heard talk of the destruction of these other Churches. Bombings and 
acid and signal disruptions and corrosive agents. Mark My Words, 
Oh Children of the Broken God: If anyone carries out these acts, 
they shall break themselves off from God. Disassembly is the 
greatest Heresy one can commit, even if it is to members of our 
splinters." 


"We do not seek war with them, brethren, nor do we seek peace. 


We seek to forget about them." Bumaro cleared his throat. "Now 
then. If you would sing the Hymn, 'God Leads Us From Flesh'." 


Robert Bumaro got several letters from members of his 
congregation, and even those outside of it. Death threats from the 
Maxwellists, worse-than-death threats from the Cogwork Orthodox, 
an invitation to a conference of some kind, and several letters from 
admirers or people who wished to see the pieces of God. He 
ignored all of these, until he came upon a letter, written on notebook 
paper and hastily stuffed in an envelope. 


Dear Your Holiness, 

My name is Jake, andi am 9 years old. 

| am writing to ask 

Why do the tickers and hummers and the church hate 
each other? 

and can you do something about it? 

My brother is ahummer, and my mom and dad are 
tickers. 

They fight all the time, and Marcus keeps talking about a 
signal, and it is making 

them fight more. 

| do not like them fighting. 

Mr. Bumaro, please do something. 

Jake Sparks. 


First and foremost, Bumaro found it remarkable that members of the 
Cogwork Orthodox would choose to reproduce at all, let alone have 
two children. Secondly, the idea of both of his splinter groups, 
together under the same roof, quite literally ground his gears. He left 
the letter on his desk for meditation purposes, and sighed, getting up 
and going to the window. 


There, he stared at the moon, high in the sky. The moon was once a 
piece of Earth, or so scientists claimed. Earth had undergone a 
catastrophe in the past, and the moon was born, where it had stayed 
for millennia since, a scarred face in the night sky. And yet, it worked 
in perfect harmony with the planet. Broken pieces working together 
as one machine. 


Bumaro shook his head. It was hopeless. The animosity between 
the three churches was too great. The Broken God, it seemed, 
would forever have a Broken Church. 


He looked over the letter again, his thoughts drifting to his stray 
children. For a brief moment, he wondered if they could be 
reassembled. 


Robert Bumaro picked up his telephone. 


Robert Bumaro made several phone calls over the next week. Most 
of them were hung up on. 


Two of them were successful. A meeting was arranged. 


It took place in a valley, wherein there was a lake, wherein there 
was an island, where a machine once was. It was gone now, and in 
its place, a sense of tragedy remained. 


Robert Bumaro stood on the island, alongside two saints. Saint 
Hedwig of the Angels, of the Maxwellists, stood on one side. On the 
other stood Legate Trunnion. The two women looked like they were 
going to tear out the others throats. Both of the women were flanked 
by members of their own churches, all loyal, all full converts. 
Blinking lights and whirring fans of Maxwellian Administrator-Priests 
on Hedwig's side, clanking metal and ticking gears of Legates on 
Trunnion's. 


"Brass, Bronze, and Silicon. Together at last." Bumaro nodded at 
both of them. "...You know why | am here, sisters." 


"You simply want us to conform to your tick-tock gospel," Hedwig 
said, sounding far less eloquent than she did in her church's 
garbled, error-filled Javascripture. "Individuality is the file system-" 


"| Know the scripture, Saint Hedwig," Bumaro said. "But individuality 
does not matter now. What matters now is the health of our church." 


"Feh," Trunnion said simply. "We all have the same mission. We all 
want to rebuild MEKHANE." Her followers started chanting her 
God's name in hushed tones. 


"You mean WAN," corrected Hedwig. "WAN, The Eternal Network." 
Her followers started up a counter-chant of 'WAN, WAN, WAN.’ 


Trunnion let out a bit of steam, showing off her diamond-tipped 
teeth. "Let us be civil, Hedwig. The Builder is speaking." 


"We all want to rebuild God," Bumaro said simply. "That much is 
true. However, the methods which you use are... controversial." 


"The methods we use?" Hedwig sounded as offended as a 
computerized voice could sound. "You don't even allow your 
converts to... well, convert! Being in the upper echelon of your 
church is required to drink your God's Ichor. And it's not even Ichor; 
it's a virus." The Humming Saint grinned. "We don't have to worry 
about viruses anymore." 


Bumaro shook his head. "The method of conversion is irrelevant. 
Although... | do see your point about limiting conversion. But most 
among us are not worthy-" 


"The only way one can be worthy is if they better themselves," 
Trunnion said simply. "By telling them that they are not worthy to 
become part of God, by not allowing them to be converted... you 
impede any betterment among your flock." 


Hedwig absolutely fumed. "I can't believe I'm saying this, but... | 
agree with the Legate." 


Trunnion blinked, and there was a sound of confusion from amongst 
her followers. "You... do?" 


"Yes. In fact, I'm... somewhat furious | didn't come up with that point 
first." 


Bumaro stepped back and raised a placating hand, which whirred as 
the gears in his head worked. "You see? We can make peace." 


"Perhaps," Trunnion said, looking at Bumaro. "However... your 
Ichor. | don't see any digital parts on you. No silicon at all. Don't you 
find that odd?" 


Bumaro stayed silent, looking at his wrists. Legate Trunnion was 


right. None of the Broken Church's Ichor Drinkers contained any 
form of silicon whatsoever. He was struck speechless, and so was 
Hedwig, for the longest time. "You are correct." 


"Your point being?" Hedwig asked, sounding nervous. "Perhaps it 
just... varies from sect to sect." 


There was a long, awkward silence after that. Finally, one of 
Trunnion's fellow Legates, a young one from the sound of it, spoke 
up. "This is proof." 


Trunnion, and her entire group, turned to face the speaker, a young 
man that Trunnion recognized as Brother Condenser. Trunnion 
spoke up. "What do you mean?"