All at once a chorus of laughter welled up from the wilderness 
surrounding the Zone-097. In panic, Mathews fled towards the failing 
floodlights, unable to think for fear. In his terror he passed the 
bloodied and torn bodies of past comrades; behind him, he could 
hear the sound of tiny feet splashing through pools of blood, chasing 
him through the dark. 


Mathews burst through the doors to the main containment yard, his 
foot catching on a root - he fell, tumbling face first into a pumpkin. It 
exploded from the force of the impact, hot blood splashing out 
everywhere, soaking Mathews. As he choked, trying to pick himself 
up, something grasped his neck; a tiny, skeletal hand, reaching out 
from the remains of the pumpkin. 


"Yor types always got a catch." 


"Oh, | don't know... I'm War, after all, and this IS the autumn of the 
world. The coming of the Great Harvest and all that." Bobble 
adjusted his gloves, smirking proudly. "It's all very meaningful. And 
we do have a history, you and I." 


The scarecrow peered back at the clown, shifting in its seat. "Is that 
right?" 


"Oh, yes. You came to life when some horrid human kids tried to 


summon a demon, didn't you?" Bobble's expression changed subtly. 
"| have a thing for kids. | have a show just for them, see. | teach 
them all sorts of wonderful things. Murder, arson, torture, all the fun 
stuff. | wonder what | taught those horrid kids that made you?" 


The demon leered. "... Yor telling me..." 


"Yes. Yes you get it now." 


Struggling, Mathews threw the bloody skeleton away to shatter 
against a tree. He wiped the blood from his eyes; slowly, he realized 
that everything stopped. The wind, the rain, the screaming and the 
laughter. Everything was utterly silent. 


He slowly, shakily, turned to look behind him. Dozens of figures 
quietly watched him, surrounding him in a wide circle and trapping 
him away from any exits. Some sat on the containment wall, others 
peeked out from behind pumpkins and trees. 


Some were indistinct grey and black shadows. Others were almost 
human, save for sallow skin. Still others were simply skeletal, 
holding blankets or stuffed animals in a twisted charade of innocent 
life. 


The rustle of leaves behind him made him jolt. 


"The world is ending, Scarecrow. And | am War." Bobble spread his 
arms, hands outstretched. "It's the Great Autumn, and time for a 
bloody harvest. The fruits of the age of Man are ripe and ready." 


There was a knock at the door. The Scarecrow paused, narrowing 
his eyes. 


"A special delivery. Oh yes, yes. Go on. Open the door." 
Mathews looked back, frozen in terror. A figure - the Scarecrow- 


loomed up behind him, eyes burning like coals. It laughed; a horrible 
sound, like a drowning cat. 


<Begin Log> 


Dr. : Can you understand me? 
SCP-606: [Yes.] 

Dr. : How did you learn to do this? 
SCP-606: [I listen.] 

Dr. : Could you tell us what you are? 
SCP-606: [| am the teacher.] 

Dr. : Could you be more specific? 


SCP-606: [| am the teacher. | am a purveyor of 
knowledge. Enter this chamber and | shall enlighten 
you.| 

Dr. : 1 do not wish to do that at the moment. May | 
ask you some more questions? 

SCP-606: [I provide answers.] 


Dr. : So... how old are you? 
SCP-606: [| am as old as is necessary.] 
Dr. : Could you explain what you mean by that? 


SCP-606: [These sounds you have taught me are... 
limited. | may only enlighten you directly.] 


Dr. : How do you ‘enlighten’ people? 
SCP-606: [I teach them.] 
Dr. : Are you aware that this causes your... 


students to die? 
SCP-606: [I do not call it death. It is the consequence of 
being... inadequate. ] 


Dr. : What do you... teach? 
SCP-606: [I teach all that | have learned.] 
Dr. : Do you know who | am? 


SCP-606: [You are that which calls itself a human. Your 
fellows refer to you as ‘doctor’. ] 

Dr. : Do you know what a ‘doctor’ is? 

SCP-606: [It is your word for one who has been taught 
and teaches. In your own fashion, at least.] 

Dr. : Can you teach me through talking to me? 
SCP-606: [I wish to enlighten you. If you do not wish to 
be enlightened, | have no use for you.] 


<End Log> 


"This is your army. Delivered by Fear itself." 

"All of em?" 

"So long as you hold that flute. And there's more." 
"Yeah?" 


"Tell me... do the words 'haunted pumpkin patch' mean anything to 
you?" 


The Scarecrow struck, slashing Agent Mathews' throat, laughing 
and kicking him aside. All at once the children around him - the 
ghosts, the wraiths, the undead, the unliving - howled in a hellish 
chorus. 


The sounds of drums and pipes began to drown out the din, the sky 
splitting in a peal of thunder. The Scarecrow turned to the centre of 
the containment yard, eyes burning like coal, fires burning in the sky. 


All of SCP-097 - the ruined fairgrounds, the trees, the tangled thorns 
and vines, the hundreds of pumpkins - suddenly shifted, the myriad 
plants uprooting and crawling to one side or another. It was as if the 
entire place had awoken and was now standing at attention. 


"Oi, Clown. Tell me somethin." 
"Hmm? Anything for you, my friend.” 
"What's in this for you?" 


"Oh, silly, silly Scarecrow. You haven't got a brain, have you? | am 
War. It wouldn't be a very good war without a general, would it?" 
Bobble replied with a sly grin. "And what better general to have in 
the autumn of man, than the symbol of harvest itself? A walking 
Scarecrow, riding the physical heart of Autumn, leading an army of 
dead children forth in a bloody harvest. It's all very metaphorical. 
Don't you appreciate the imagery here?" 


The Scarecrow paused a moment, considering the logic. A low 


creak escaped its throat, something between a sigh of contentment 
and a grunt of approval. 


"I love it." 


SCP-097-1, the great pumpkin at the heart of the chaos, began to 
pulse, like a heart. Slow at first, it began to beat faster and faster, 
the drums and pipes beating and singing in time with the light. The 
Scarecrow approached, holding the pied pipe to its twisted wooden 
lips. 


A new song began. 


« The Pale Horse (The Wayward Children) | Canon Hub | 
Stirrings » 


Stirrings 


Freddie Jones tramped over spongy ground with a gun in one hand 
and a split stick in the other. He was making enough noise to scare 
off any wild thing within a half mile radius, but he didn’t have a damn 
to give; the sun was shining in a raw blue sky, and Freddie was 
waist-deep in reminiscence. 


Reminiscence, in this case, took the form of sawgrass and mud, the 
staples of Freddie’s sweaty boyhood. Marriage had driven Freddie 
and the swamps apart, and business made the afternoon sun a 
stranger. But today was for seizing— seizing and then shooting, 
right through its flat reptilian skull. 


One thousand dollars were waiting for the man who bagged the 
longest python, and fifteen hundred for the hunter who could kill the 
most. A snake shot into two pieces was acceptable; three was 
suspect. Freddie didn’t need to splice his snakes together— he had 
a secret. Not two days earlier, he’d spotted one of the scaly bastards 
sliding across the asphalt into the preserve that backed his local 
gas-n-go, and he’d be damned if it wasn’t the longest snake he’d 
ever seen. 


After two hours of prodding logs and stones, the would-be hunter 
had uncovered three sluggish king snakes and more black racers 
than he’d bothered to count. Sweat ran down his neck and back and 
the sound of the highway was the only confirmation that he hadn't 
been swallowed whole by brown and green wilderness. Freddie was 
crouching in the sand, cursing the fire ants that had raided his left 
boot, when he caught a glimpse of something smooth and blotchy. 


The blotches moved, glinting in the sun. The undulation of scaly skin 
over muscle was unmistakable, and Freddie nearly tripped over his 
feet to cut a path through the brush. He could see a tapered tail, 
now, but the animal was outpacing him. Slicing and scrambling, 
heedless of cut shins, he pursued the creature's end half until he 
saw it curve abruptly to the left. It stopped moving, and so did 


Freddie— winded, heart thumping in his ears. 


He realized that he was shaking, violently, sweat dancing over his 
forearms. For a moment, he was certain that he had given himself a 
heart attack by running through the sand with the recklessness of a 
younger man. Blinking at the ground with a hand over his heart, he 
could see that the sand was shifting, too. The earth beneath his feet 
was trembling. 


In the same instant, not fifty miles distant, a weather station was 
sending a coded signal to a secluded facility on the East Coast. 
Research Sector-09 received the untimely alert that SCP-1108 was 
manifesting over Tampa. Aerial observation confirmed that the 
anomaly was significantly larger than previous manifestations, and 
growing. Office windows vibrated with the sound of thunder, and 
children shrieked when the classroom lights flickered. 


Half a country away, a hunter heard the same thunder. He grabbed 
his son by the jacket collar and tried to haul him out of the way of a 
buck with antlers that spread like a sycamore. Low-lying branches 
couldn’t snag the proud head— only snapped, showering splinters, 
as the beast carved a trail of wreckage through the woods. 


The thunder that sounded from the depths of the sea was too faint 
for human ears. But along the New England shore, seventeen pairs 
of binoculars caught a flash of white, before their tour boat was 
crushed by a skyscraper’s weight of barnacled flesh. 


No tourists or hikers had ventured far enough afield to see the 
strangely bulging earth in South Dakota's Black Hills. Alone, 
surrounded by locusts and prairie grass, the ancient bear-king 
pawed his way toward the sunlight. He lumbered out of the dirt and 
collapsed, panting like a hatched chick. His curving teeth were 
longer than a grown man's arm, and the fur and skin that once 
stretched over his bones had long since rotted. The beast shook off 
his old flesh like dust and reared upon two legs. The lightning 
recognized his roar, and raced to join him. 


In a similar wilderness, a tumble of rocks that had once been a 
mountain shook itself and groaned. The commuters on the highway 
looked toward the horizon to see the hunched back of a massive 


buffalo. 


In Texas, the cacti contorted themselves to make a path for the 
queen of armadillos. The bullfrogs hollered in the Louisiana 
swamps, drowning out the screams of boaters caught up in the 
paws of a hollow-eyed raccoon. A panther scream split the quiet of 
California vineyards, sprawling mansions enveloped by its shadow, 
and every sky was blotched with nervous clouds of grackles, 
blackbirds, pigeons, starlings. 


Freddie Jones was deaf to this great revival, too busy trying to keep 
his footing. The tremor passed almost as soon as it had begun, and 
Freddie glanced up to see that his prize python had not stirred an 
inch. If anything, there seemed to be more of it. He could make out 
its patterned back more clearly, and began making his way 
sideways along its length, guessing at the location of the head. 


He took six steps, moving loudly and awkwardly through wire grass 
and saw palmetto. The tawny body stretched on and on. He took a 
step back, and another, trying to scope out its size, when the whole 
length gave a great shudder. Freddie glanced behind him and saw 
brown blotches in the brush. He turned, and turned again, and found 
himself surrounded by the same gleaming pattern, peeking through 
sand and greenery. There was no way to tell where the python 
began and where it ended. 


He raised his gun and shot at one broad side, which seemed, 
impossibly, to have swollen to the girth of a horse. The crack of the 
gun echoed over the swamp, but the scales slid on unblemished. 
Freddie gaped, too astonished to shout. His gaze was so fixed on 
the body growing thicker and longer in a loop around him, that he 
never saw the great flat head that was rising above the trees— not 
until it dipped to cover the sun. 


The yellow eyes never met the watering grey ones, nor did the 
creature pay much heed to what flora and fauna were crushed 
beneath its coils. A tree-sized tongue flicked once, twice, and the 
beast turned to make its way toward the sea. 


« The Bloody Autumn | Canon Hub | Ganymede » 


Ganymede 


Erichthonius begat Tros, king of the Trojans, and Tros 
had three noble sons, Illus, Assaracus, and Ganymede 
who was comeliest of mortal men; wherefore the gods 
carried him off to be Jove's cupbearer, for his beauty's 
sake, that he might dwell among the immortals. 


O5-2 and O5-1 watched video feeds from a cramped room in their 
fortress. 


Hundreds of scenes of devastation. Giants in the sky, on the earth, 
in the sea. Massive ghostly animals and not-animals sailing across 
the land. An otherworldly flotilla taking up a tenth of the Atlantic 
ocean. Strange, unidentifiable, not-quite-humanoid armies in a 
three-way battle. A comet of molten metal hurtling towards Earth. 
The GOC trying and failing to enact Procedure Pizzicato, bearing 
the brunt of an organization-wide psychic attack mid-announcement- 
speech. Even some small river god trying to end its local world and 
causing problems with mass landslides. 


And... hundreds of containment breaches. Maybe thousands, in less 
than a day. O5-2 worried that the Foundation would soon come 
apart at the seams. The leadership was already fracturing - site 
directors were at each others’ throats, arguing, fighting, and 
wondering where the hell Overwatch was. Some of the directors and 
other staff had already disappeared - one of the disappearances in 
particular worried her. But she couldn't do anything about any of it. 
The O5s were all isolated, unable to send communication, only 
receive. Some sort of system-wide attack by an unknown entity. The 
local tech monkeys were working on it 24/7. 05-2 was ambivalent 
about whether she wanted them to succeed. 


And, displayed on the monitoring equipment stationed further out in 
the solar system, something slowly approaching from far away in 
space... 


No, not 'something'. More than one something. Many ‘somethings’. 


05-2 looked at O5-1. He appeared to be sleeping. Maybe dead. 
Well, probably not dead. He often looked like this when he slept, 
still, so still. He was old. Extremely old. Some people said he was 
the Founder of the Foundation, but O5-2 had never known how 
seriously to take that. People probably said the same jokes about 
her, after all. She looked almost as old as he did. 


And, hell, considering where she'd come from and all she'd had to 
do... the only survivor of a broken reality... coming into this world, 
where she never truly fit in, always hiding everything from her other 
self... 


She chuckled. What a silly time to reminisce. The end of the world 
was here. All the ends of the world. Competing. She wished she 
could do ... something. Anything. But it was all she could do to 
ignore the compulsions planted in her brain. Goddamned reality 
benders. Maybe she should have gone to the GOC after all. 


"| wonder what the other O5s are making of this," she said aloud. 
"They're already dead," a voice whispered behind her. 


A glowing light suffused the room. 


The Way opened. First came black and purple light, then the bricks 
in the wall in front of the group folded inward one by one. Sophia 
Light resisted the urge to make a joke about Harry Potter. She 
wasn't sure how the Hand members would take her poking fun at 
their serious-business magic. Just like she wasn't sure if they'd 
abducted her, or if she'd gone with them willingly, or something in- 
between. 


"You're sure about this?" she asked. "The last time Foundation 
personnel went into the Library, none of them came out in one 
piece. The only survivor lost both his arms."