Item #: SCP-4373
Level 4/4373

Object Class: Euclid
Classified

Oceanic regions in which SCP-4373-1 instances have been spotted.

Special Containment Procedures: Special containment procedures have been updated following 2020/08/25 (See Addendum 4373-2). The total global population of the infraorder Cetacea1 is to be kept below 70 million. The Foundation is to support continued commercial whaling of these species in order to prevent population levels from approaching this threshold. Any instances of SCP-4373-1 located by ocean-based Mobile Task Forces are to be tagged with a GPS tracking device for study of migratory patterns or brought into Foundation custody for testing. All SCP-4373-1 instances are to be terminated after testing.

A SCP-4373-1 instance.

Description: SCP-4373 is a pattern in noises made by cetacean species while communicating or using echolocation. While all cetacean species have been observed utilizing SCP-4373 in testing, only 22% of them are known to do so outside of captivity. SCP-4373 paralyzes members of the superorder Selachimorpha2 that hear it, usually resulting in death by asphyxiation or predation. The effect of SCP-4373 decreases farther away from the origin of the sound, becoming mostly noneffective past approximately 100 m. Paralysis from SCP-4373 is not permanent, though most sharks expire before regaining mobility.
Cetaceans found using SCP-4373 in the wild or trained to use it in testing are designated as SCP-4373-1 instances. These cetaceans primarily utilize SCP-4373 for hunting sharks as prey or warding off predatory shark species. Cetaceans who do not prey on and are not preyed upon by sharks, such as Minke whales, have been observed using SCP-4373 to disable sharks in competition for the same food source.
Autopsies of toothed whale SCP-4373-1 instances have found that their melon3 transmits sounds faster than what the measured density should allow. SCP-4373 has not been sufficiently studied in other types of whales to determine what effect it has on their physiology.
SCP-4373 spreads exponentially, affecting Cetaceans at an increasing rate as the total number of SCP-4373-1 instances increases. Should SCP-4373-1 instances reach a global population level over 70 million, SCP-4373 becomes widespread enough to resonate even with non-anomalous Cetaceans. This creates a cascade effect that is lethal to all non-cetacean marine life within 500 km of the affected cetacean pod (see Addendum 4373-2).
Addendum 4373-1: Discovery: SCP-4373 was first discovered by GOI-18153 'the Shark Punching Center' in a pod of Beluga Whales. Since its discovery, GOI-18153 have employed SCP-4373-1 instances for use in their primary objective, combating sharks in a ritualized type of combat referred to as 'Selachian Pugilisim'. The exact date of discovery is unknown as captured SPC operatives have not specified any exact time, stating only that they "learned of the gnarly noises over decades of mutual blunt-force justice against the Selachian menace" (sic).
On 2018/02/14, a member of the SPC seen with an instance of SCP-4373 was captured and brought to Site-1894 for questioning. The following was recorded by a Foundation submarine en-route to Site-189 prior to capture of the SPC agent.

Interview Log 4373-1:

Interviewed: Coach Bay Russel, a captured member of the Shark Punching Center.
Interviewer: Researcher Michael Grooms
Foreword: Coach Bay Russel was brought in for questioning in regards to SCP-4373 and any possible GOI-18153 involvement in its creation.

<Begin Log>
Grooms: When did you first become aware of this… sound.
Russel: Huh?
Grooms: The one that paralyzes sharks, you had a porpoise using it with you when we brought you in.
Russel: Oh, you mean SPC-3930?
Grooms: Is that what your organization calls it?
Russel: I think so… You want to know about it? Well… one day I had just gotten back from this mission against some of those damn hammerheads and they had this tank full of baby porpoises. They told me the porpoises were a new anti-shark weapon that we were gonna test. So I picked one of them I named him Georgie, and we started training.
Grooms: So this was when you took on the porpoise, Georgie?
Russel: Yep, he was just a pup then but I heard his parents were part of the program too.
Grooms: So your organization has used at least two generations of porpoises…. Did Georgie take to using SCP-4373 quickly?
Russel: He did. It took a few months but eventually I got it so that I could make Georgie create SPC-3930 on command. After that well… let's just say my job got a lot easier. Before I met Georgie I struggled with Bull Sharks, but afterwards I was suddenly able to take on fucking Great Whites.
Grooms: But… does that count?
Russel: Huh?
Grooms: You… you're punching sharks that are pretty much already dead?
Russel: And?
Grooms: I'm confused why you consider punching immobilized sharks as 'Selachian Pugilism.'
Russel appears confused.
Russel: Sir… we're the shark punching center. Not the shark wrestling center. We don't care how the fist winds up in the shark's face, just that it does… It's not as fun as in the old days though.
Grooms: Why not?
Russel: I mean, it's just like you said. The sharks don't even fight back any more. It used to be life or death every day, the adrenaline rush was like nothing you could believe. But then SPC-3930 comes along and the sharks just like… float there and wait to be punched. Just kind of acting like sitting ducks with that creepy look on their face.
Grooms: Look?
Russel: Yeah, there's this… look they get whenever they hear SPC-3930, it's… it's hard to explain but it creeps me out. I've never seen anything like it. Though I guess I'd be freaked out too if I was suddenly unable to move while people punched me to death.
Russel laughs and looks over his shoulder
Grooms: Interesting… are there any other effects that you notice?
Russel: Eh… other than the paralysis not really. Though…
Russel hesitates momentarily before continuing speaking
Russel: Doc, you ever heard of something called a Pattern Screamer?
Grooms: I can't say that I have.
Russel: Ah, okay. It's just something I heard get mentioned by the guys in charge from time to time. I don't really know what it means.
Russel shrugs
Grooms: Do you know anything else about these… "Pattern Screamers" or their relation to… SPC-3930?
Russel: Eh… nope.
Grooms: Okay than, tell me more about Georgie.
Russel: Georgie? I love Georgie man! He's like… He has like that cute little porpoise face. Like, whenever I'm feeling down about Shark Punching or anything else I just look at him and he instantly makes me feel better, man. He's the best!
Grooms: Have you noticed anything about his behavior that's different from other porpoises?
Russel: I don't know. I'm not really an expert on marine life. I got a degree in Computer Engineering before I started working for the Center. You should ask one of our researchers. We hire a lot of Marine Biologists so one of them could probably tell you.
Grooms: Anything else you'd like to tell us?
Russel: I don't think so… can I go now?
Grooms: If you have nothing else to say then yes, but we'll be in contact with your superiors.
<End Log>
Closing Statement: Following this incident Coach Russel was administered amnestics and returned to the Shark Punching Center. The SCP-4373-1 instance was terminated.

Addendum 4373-2: Resonant Cascade Event (Incident-4373-A)
In 2019, due to the efforts of ocean conservation organizations the total population of Cetaceans rose above 70 million. On 2020/06/24, Site-189 detected a sonar pulse emanated from a pod of humpback whales 400 km away followed by the mass death of all non-cetacean marine life in the area around the pod. A MTF Theta-5 "The Bigger Boat" vessel was dispatched to the pod's location, however it never arrived. After a short investigation, the vessel was located by Foundation aircraft without any crew on it but otherwise undamaged. The crew were never recovered.
A cloning and restocking program was performed in response to the mass die off to partially replenish affected marine life. A cover story blaming the cause of deaths on industrial pollution was released and class A amnestics were administered to affected civilian communities. SCP-4373's containment procedures were updated to the current state following confirmation of recontainment.
A recording of the whale call recorded just prior to the event is below:

Addendum 4373-3: GOI-18153 "The Shark Punching Center" Correspondence
Following Interview-4373-1 and Incident-4373-A, Boris Vilakova, a Senior Researcher involved in multiple oceanic anomalies, contacted GOI-18153 in order to confirm the information given by Coach Russel. Their email response is transcribed below.

To: Dr. Boris Vilakova
From: Charles Plinth

Honorable members of the Secure Contain Protect Foundation,
While our two organizations have come into conflict in the past, we still have a lot of respect for you blokes and the things you do for us. There are some Center secrets we're not really supposed to be talking about like how we have secret nuclear strike capabilities or that we have a hidden moon base for high risk Shark Punching experiments or that the Grand Pugiliator is really a chick, but I do think that we owe you an explanation on this one. So I'll just go out and type it out. SPC-3930, is Pattern Screamers.
I imagine you'll have some questions for us, so I'll try to answer whatever I can. We didn't invent SPC-3930, we just discovered it. The first whales that could use it were a pod of Belugas just North of Russia, back then though it effected everything not just sharks. You see, these Pattern Screamer aren't your old-school gribbly tentacle monsters, they're a lot more abstract than that. They can exist in anything that contains patterns and a song, even a whale song, is just a pattern of sound. We don't know how the Screamers ended up in the whales, but we are always looking for more developed occult pugilation techniques so we were, needless to say, fascinated.
We did a few tests and it worked like a charm. Well… other then a few of our agents not using enough soundproofing so they heard it, sank into the ocean and drowned. We were amazed by the results but knew that we needed a way to get it to work without losing too many of our own guys. It was a big problem that didn't seem to have an easy solution, but eventually we found a breakthrough. We found out how to communicate with the Pattern Screamers. We realized that they had been using SPC-3930 to try to communicate, we just needed to figure out how to decode the message.
Once we did we figured out that these Pattern Screamer guys had some issues. Like, I actually kind of felt sorry for them. They don't exist, or maybe just don't exist the way we do and our existence is extremely painful to them. They also hate your Foundation, a lot. But, we are the SPC so we knew one thing. No matter how bad the Pattern Screamers were, the sharks are far, far worse. We thought that if we could make them feel better about the whole 'unending agony' thing then they'd be less willing to kill us. Furthermore, we realized that nothing makes people and Eldritch Horrors happier then Selachian Pugilism. So we taught the Pattern Screamers to punch sharks. Turns out their nonexistent, smaller then a neutrino fists are really effective antiselachian weapons.
And it worked, after a few years of communications we managed to convince the Pattern Screamers to only attack sharks. That's right, we potentially stopped the apocalypse. You're welcome Secure Contain Protect Foundation.
- Charles Plinth, Bodacious Assembly.

Addendum 4373-4: GoI-18153: "The Shark Punching Center" Threat Level Review
Site-189 was re-designated as a monitoring outpost for all future SPC activities following the update of SCP-4373's containment procedures. Requests to upgrade GoI-18153 to "Suppression Advised" status were denied after O5 review.

+ 1 New Message

- Close

ACCESS GRANTED

CLASSIFIED
Notice from the desk of O5-01

To:
Dr. Boris Vilakova, Director of Site-189

Subject:
Re: GoI-18153 Threat Assessment
Timestamp:
2020/07/02 13:21

Dr. Vilakova

We understand your concern given your history of involvement with oceanic projects but our resources are limited. It is hard to pencil in "stop the idiots punching sharks" between "cleaning up Sarkic monstrosities" and "out-bidding the GOC at a Marshall, Carter, and Dark auction" in the Foundation ledgers.
Current containment procedures are holding, mass marine deaths are easy to explain away as the result of pollution, and it isn't hard to get nations to increase their whaling activity. Is it a shame? Yes, no argument there. Is it worth our time and money? No. Furthermore, I fail to see the danger in letting them pacify one anomaly themselves. If the Center are willing to contain a potentially Keter or Apollyon anomaly for us I say we let them.
Future requests to reevaluate the SPC will be summarily denied.
Sincerely,
O5-01
false

Addendum 4373-5: GoI-18153 Audio File
The attached audio file was recorded by Site-189 following scouting missions on SPC operations in the Arctic Ocean off the western coast of Greenland.

Footnotes
1. Aquatic mammals including whales, dolphins, and narwhals
2. Sharks
3. A mass of fatty tissue and air sacs found in the foreheads of toothed whales that acts as a sound lens for the purpose of communication and echolocation
4. A site specializing in oceanic anomalies.

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