The man snarled and ripped the book from my hands. “You know 
what it means!” He flipped to another page and thrust it back into my 
hands. This time, it was the second tale, A Counsel of Strangers. 
Every line of text had been crossed out, with the word “Hunger” 
repeated running across the top. 


“Who did this?” | asked. Turning the pages, | saw each had been 
defaced in a unique way. “You bought the book like this?” 


“| did it!” said the blonde woman. She stepped forward. “But what 
does it mean?” 


“That's-” | began to say, but her knife at my throat stopped me. 


“| can't read,” she said. She jabbed a finger at the page. “Read it to 
me.” 


“You can't... how is that-” 
“Read it!” she yelled. “From the beginning.” 


My hands shaking, | turned to the beginning of the book. What did 
she want me to read, the story or the notations? | cleared my throat 
and began to read from the margins. “Thirty times on thirty lands, 
thirty dead by thirty hands, dirty truth, dirty man, crawling roots, 
creeping sand-” 


“He's not doing it right. He doesn't know,” said the tall woman. 
“How can you tell?” said the man. 


“Listen to him. He doesn't understand.” Her voice was calm, but 
there was menace backing it. She, more than the other two, was 
dangerous. 


The blonde woman drew the knife back. She stared into my eyes, 
clicking her teeth together. “I don't think so either. | think he's a liar.” 


“He's not a liar. He's just an idiot,” said the tall woman. She shook 
her head. “There's no point in staying. We should leave.” 


“We can't leave when he hasn't told us anything,” said the man. 


“Shut up,” said the tall woman. “He can't tell us anything, because 
he doesn't know anything. Now let's go.” 


The man scowled, but backed off. The blonde woman made a small 
tsk-ing noise, and shoved the knife into the folds of her clothing. 


Together, they exited the alley, leaving me thanking God for my life. 


The next three months were uneventful. | pushed the night's incident 
from my mind, and attempted to focus on writing a second book. In 
this, | was unsuccessful. Until the dream | had felt little inclination to 
be a writer. Architecture had always been my calling, but now there 
was little hope of following it. Constantly | was being questioned by 
my publisher about when he might see the next book. A deluge of 
letters flooded my home, from fans, from enemies, from other 
authors. Everytime | went out, people swarmed like locusts, chewing 
through me with questions. 


It was after escaping some such people that | found the letter. | had 
fled to my room, hoping to get some peace, when | saw it under the 
mail slot. This struck me as curious, as | had arranged to have all 
my mail forwarded to a different address, as the volume had 
become too much to keep at home. It had no return address, only 
my name scrawled on the front in jagged letters. 


| set it in the trashcan and tried to forget about it. After several 
hours, my curiosity got the best of me. Inside was a single sheet of 
paper, written on a script so small | had to squint to read it. 


Dear sir, it began, 


| have recently purchased a copy of your recent book, Seventeen 
Red Tales, based on the recommendation of a friend. I'm sure you 
will be pleased to know that | read it and enjoyed it immensely. That 
is not what | am writing about. | have sent this letter (and dropped it 
off personally to ensure you see it) because of several experiences | 
believe are linked to your book. 


Upon reading the fifth story, A Sign of Rain, / began to feel as if | 
was being watched. Even laying alone in my room, the sensation 
never left me. | found myself unable to sleep, barely able to work, 
ignoring my friends and family as the fear of someone observing me 
grew. Even locked in my room, where it could be certain | was 
alone, it never left. The only that could make it go away was reading 
the book. 


(with titles such as "Complicated Math", "Difficult Math", and "Math 
You Need Your Calculator For") are visible. 


Subject: SCP-173 
Photographed Activity: Standing in its container. 
Photo Result: No change. 


Subject: Participants in SCP-176, photographed at 3.1 seconds 
through the 11.3-second cycle. 

Photographed Activity:Working on the device. 

Photo Result: (Unidentified researcher #1): [DATA EXPUNGED] 
Photo Result: (Unidentified researcher #2): [DATA EXPUNGED] 
Photo Result: (Unidentified researcher #3): [DATA EXPUNGED] 
Photo Result: (Unidentified researcher #4): Kissing unidentified 
researcher #2 

Photo Result: (Unidentified researcher #5): Using the toilet 


: ( 
: ( 
: ( 
: ( 


Subject: SCP-187 

Photographed Activity: Eating her evening meal while blindfolded 
in the cafeteria at Site 19. 

Photo Result: Eating a meal in [REDACTED] (a restaurant in the 
town of [REDACTED], where SCP-187 was taken into custody). 
SCP-187's blindfold is absent, as are the visible signs of malnutrition 
from which SCP-187 has not yet fully recovered. No changes are 
observed in the meal. 


Subject: SCP-239 
Photographed Activity: Testing denied by O5- 
Photo Result: Testing denied by O5- 


Subject: A single umbrella under the effects of SCP-243 
Photographed Activity: Floating in a containment chamber, 
separated from its flock 

Photo Result: Photograph depicts a complex, radially-symmetrical 
aerial structure of unclear purpose, composed of an estimated 
minimum 10,000 individual animated objects. Items include various 
household objects, articles of clothing, pieces of laboratory 
instrumentation, instances of SCP- , [DATA REDACTED], and six 
exact copies each of the Bruce Nuclear Generating Station's A and 
B reactor assemblies. A mass of batteries ~12 m in diameter, 
believed to be SCP-243 itself, is visible at the structure's geometric 


| finished it in less than a day, then started again, eager for the 
peace that reading offered. | neglected meals, neglected work, 
neglected my body, all to engross myself in its pages. And the more 
| did, the more | became aware of another feeling. The feeling of 
knowledge. 


It crept into my brain like a vine, growing larger each time | finished 
and re-started the tales. Each sentence, each word, gained new 
form upon each reading. The deeper meanings became apparent. 
The patterns upon patterns, the layers of truth running underneath 
the stories, the hidden paths your text laid bare. By the eighth 
reading, the world around me seemed completely changed. The 
paths had opened up to me. No longer did | feel like | was being 
watched. Rather, | was watching the world as it unfurled before my 
eyes. | could see the secrets that people kept, and lies they spun. | 
could see the way they tried to control their lives, and the hundred 
ways they failed each day. | could see the pulses of the world, the 
rivers of time we all flowed through, the dust of fallen planets, the 
roots that crawled from the stars, the sand that crept through our 
minds. And | knew what they were. 


Only we understand. The true gods are descending, and only we 
can see them. Will you join me with them? Will you help me sprout 
the seeds of the world? 


It was not signed. | looked for any indication of who sent it, but there 
was nothing. The roots that crawled from the stars, it had said. The 
sand that crept through our minds. Had the book my kidnappers 
shown me not said something similar? Were they linked? Could one 
of them have left me the letter? But why not take me again, if they 
wanted to speak? 


| decided to show my publisher the letter. The next time we spoke, | 
gave it to him, and told the story of my kidnapping. He did not seem 
surprised upon hearing it. In fact, he seemed relieved. 


“| thought | must have been insane,” he said, putting the letter down. 
“I've been feeling a similar sensation lately. I'm not sure quite when 
it started, but it must have been around when you first showed me 
the draft of Seventeen Red Tales.” 


| pondered this as | poured another spoon of sugar into my tea. 
“Have you heard anything else about this?” 


He shook his head. “No. It was such a minor thing, | didn't feel the 
need to mention it to anyone. If anyone else felt it, I'm sure they 
thought the same.” 


We stared at each other for a moment, then | stood and walked to 
the couple eating at the nearest table. “Excuse me sir, madam, but | 
have a question. Have either of you happened to have read 
Seventeen Red Tales?” 


They nodded. “We both have,” said the man. 


“Have you by any chance, and | know this is odd to ask, felt like you 
were being watched since reading it?” 


The woman blinked several times. The man's jaw fell open. “How 
could you know?” he said. 


“Well,” | said, leaning in and close and bringing my voice to a 
whisper, “I must confess a similar feeling. My friend over there has 
felt it as well.” 


“That's impossible,” said the woman. 
“| would've thought that too,” | said, “but it seems it is not.” 
“What could it mean?” said the man. 


| shrugged. “God only knows.” 


That night | sat in my room, thinking. | took a copy of Seventeen Red 
Tales from my shelf and began to flip through it. Since writing the 
book, | had felt none of the sensations described by my letter or 
associates. | had felt only one thing. Fear. A slow, creeping fear, that 
picked at me wherever | went. | could not identify the source or 
target of it, | only knew that it was there. Constantly. When | ate, 
when | slept. And when | held the book, it changed from unease to 
terror. 


My hands shook as | opened the first page. What did | expect to 
see? | do not know, but | only saw the same writing | had composed 
many months earlier. | turned to the next page. Again, only writing, 
and a small illustration | had drawn to go with it. | turned to the next 
page, and saw only text. And yet, my fear did not abide. | flipped 
through the entire story and found nothing there, nor in the next. | 
opened the first page of A Sign of Rain and almost dropped the 
book. 


Looking back at me was a terrible eye. It filled the page. It seemed 
to fill the entire room. It was every color | had ever seen in a single 
point, but also in an infinite number of points, all around me. It saw 
through me to the marrow. It saw through to the soul, and even 
when | hurled the book against the wall and fled the room, | could 
feel its gaze. Three weeks later, when | gathered the courage to 
enter the room and take the book, it was just as strong as when | 
first opened it. And when | burned the book and scattered the ashes 
on the wind, the gaze remained. 


Time is difficult for me to tell nowadays. | do not sleep much as of 
late, and time seems to blur together. It was three months after | 
burned the book, | think, that | first heard of Fifthism. It was in the 
daily newspaper, nestled away in the corner of the seventh page. “A 
man in the slums of London proclaims himself a prophet, and has 
gathered together much of the vagrant population,” said the article. It 
discussed the weekly meetings in the park, which had grown to hold 
hundreds of people, and the book that they had rallied around. 
Seventeen Red Tales. The reporter was hesitant to mention specific 
details about the group. | felt a sense of unease in his writing. There 
was much he knew that he was not telling. Many questions left 
unanswered. He mentioned that he had attended one of the 
meetings, but gave no details about what had taken place, 
describing it only as “an event”. It did not mention how the group 
was interested in Seventeen Red Tales, only that they were. 


A week (or maybe two) after that, a man appeared at the door, 
holding a copy of the book. He wanted to speak to the man who had 
changed his life, he said. My book had showed him what the world 
could be, he said. To what the world used to be. He tried to force his 


way inside, but | pushed him back. He claimed that he could feel a 
presence inside my house. The pupil of the universe was staring at 
him. | locked the door, and after several hours, he left. 


More people came, trying to get a look at me. They wanted to see 
the prophet. The creator. The iris. A dozen different names. When it 
became too much, | tried to flee my home, but it was only a few 
weeks before they found me again. They stopped trying to breach 
the doors, but that doesn't mean they left. They arrived in droves, 
sitting outside the house when they were barred from entry. There 
was no movement, no speaking. Just staring at the house, waiting. 


When | ran out of food, | tried to sneak out of the back. | was quickly 
found, but they didn't try to attack me. Instead, they stood and 
moved as a group to follow me. When | entered the butcher's shop, 
they stood outside and waited, then walked with me back home. 
None tried to approach or speak to me. 


After another week outside my house, they began to disperse. Only 
a few at first, but after three days all but a handful were gone. Soon, 
they had left as well. 


The day after the final watcher left, | had another dream. The feeling 
of being watched still kept me from sleeping most nights, but this 
slumber came easily. | closed my eyes, and when | opened them, | 
was standing under blood-red stars. In front of me was the man from 
before. 


you are beginning to understand, said the voice. 

“What have you done to me?” | said. 

i have done nothing. you came to me. you found me in the folds of 
the universe. this is the consequence of your act. The land around 


us pulsed with the cadence of the voice. 


“| didn't come to you! | was doing nothing when you first spoke to 
me. What could | have done that deserves this?” 


The world shifted. The hills disappeared and were replaced by 


ocean. The waters were jet-black, reflecting hundreds of thousands 
of red points. We floated several meters above as if on a floor of 
glass. 


you cannot un-see what has been glimpsed. i am a part of you now. 
| saw something out of the corner of my eye, but when | looked, 
there was nothing. you will soread me across the world. it is 
unavoidable. what you have seen will smother the fire of humanity. It 
was there. Right in the corner of my eye, a great beast pushing 
against the world, filling the sky. | could see its movement, but every 
time | tried to look directly, it vanished. 


“| will not,” | said. 


you will, said the voice. you already have. you are the third prophet, 
no matter what you claim. 


The beast in the corner of my eye surged forward, and fear surged 
through me. It had almost broke through, that time. It couldn't be 
held for much longer. 


| opened my mouth to speak, but before the words could form, | 
woke. 


| have tried to fight the impulse. | have felt it ever since the dream, 
the need to write again, the burning urge to craft another story. And | 
have told myself that | cannot. That | will not give in to this creature, 
that | will not spread its word, not do its work. | am a human being, 
not an animal. | will not be manipulated into this. 


But | cannot hold out any longer. | am weak, and the need is too 
strong. Writing this will be my last act. | have tried to prevent the 
word from slipping through, but | cannot be certain. | hope only that 
whoever discovers this will have a better understanding than | did. 
Perhaps they will know how to stop this. 


God damn me, for | have damned us all. 


There's Magic in the Air 


| find the Theology Department to be quite troubling at 
this site. The Occult Studies subdivision in particular has 
been gum in the hair of Site 87 ever since it was 
founded. There are currently only two people staffing the 
entire subdepartment, not a single D-Class requisitioned 
since 2012... this is most troubling.