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“I'm telling you Gears, this is going to be the best year yet." “That would be a matter of opinion, Crow. However, I can not be the only one present who finds the situation ironic: we, as researchers of an institution whose sole purpose is the containment of the paranormal and unknown, are observing an over-commercialized holiday celebrating distilled and often completely fictitious versions of such.” <Gears, this is no time for analysis. Just drink your punch.> Bright signed rapidly with one hand. The three doctors were all taking part in the time-honored party tradition of standing by the punch bowl, engaging in what could be called “conversation”, if the definition was stretched. In one way or another, each one was arrayed in costume: Crow had donned a black greatcoat, specially made of course, accompanied by a red sash and a matching high-peaked hat with a silver eagle pin on the front. Bright was in the body of an adult male orangutan. Gears was still wearing his lab coat, but someone had placed a floppy, oversized wizard's hat on his head and he had yet to take it off. The Site 19 D-class cafeteria had been converted into the main party center, and the effort was admirable. There was a considerable amount of black and orange streamers hanging from the ceiling, along with dozens of jack o' lanterns which sat grinning on the long metal tables. Of course, there was also the general mishmash of fake spiders, bugs, skeletons, bats, ghosts, neat glow-in-the-dark doohickeys, a fog machine, and a sound system currently running through volume two of “Halloween's Best Hits”. The cafeteria line was laden with a sizeable assortment of foods, mostly sugary and very little otherwise. The crowd was still small, consisting mostly of those in charge of the party. The night was still young, and most staff members were still spelunking their way through the haunted house. The haunted house was, easily, the crown jewel of the event. All five floors of the adjacent D-class barracks had been cleared out and converted into a maze of terror, ending in the cafeteria. While some in the Foundation would question the wisdom or point in making a haunted house, the fact that the senior staff was in charge was usually enough to strike an appropriate level of fear in the average staff member. Needless to say, what went on within was classified. Clef stepped out of the shadows right next to Crow, Gears and Bright, wasting no time in helping himself to a plate of pumpkin cookies and a cup of red punch. He was dressed in a sharp tuxedo, with a pair of plastic devil horns and a Guy Fawkes mask. “Rights, you're up.” He nodded to the approaching doctor, who was plastered with zombie makeup and had a very large and relatively convincing meat cleaver stuck in her head. “You should probably tell Doctor Glass that his office will be pretty busy come tomorrow. And word from Ghost at the front says that Dr. King just entered the maze. Get the apple seeds ready.” “I'm on it. Wish me luck, guys.” Rights sauntered off through the secret entrance to the maze, chainsaw in tow. Someone was going to get a very nasty surprise in a few minutes, of the dropping-right-behind-you-from-the-trap-door-in-the-ceiling variety. Clef turned to the three punch-drinkers. “So, how ‘bout them Rangers?” Clef managed to take a bite of his cookie without seeming to move his mask. <Continue that statement and you are contending with three hundred pounds of ape.> Bright downed another cup of punch. “Eh, I don't care that much myself, anyway. Though I am curious what happened to you, Bright. Last time I checked, you were going as Nyarlathotep. You even had an Egyptian host and everything.” Bright's expression was one of pure simian unamusement. < If I ever find out, you'll know. Because you'll hear them screaming from the other side of the site.> He snarled as he signed, with fangs far larger and more intimidating than he usually had. Seeing now as an excellent time to shift the conversation away from the Rage of Bright, Kain made a strategic interruption. “So, uh, how's it looking in there, Clef?” “Let's just say that there will be some people who'll need a new pair of shorts." “What'd you do to them?” Clef leaned forward and whispered. Even with the mask on, it was obvious he had a smug smile of satisfaction. Kain and Bright nodded, understanding. Gears' expression was blank. “You did…nothing. I do not believe that I understand.” <Okay, look. Most of the lower staff are terrified of Clef. Half of them believe he's the devil for crying out loud. Now, can you imagine walking around a corner and seeing him just standing there and staring at you?> “Interesting. You took the deep-seated fear most lower personnel have for you, and built upon it so that you would have to exert only the minimum effort for the maximum effect.” <I just said that.> “There is no harm in repetition of the conclusion.” “It's good science.” The set of thick black curtains that split the barracks from the cafeteria fluttered open, revealing the form of Agent Yoric, who was clad in enough voodoo paraphernalia to make every witch-doctor in the western-hemisphere sigh heavily at the absurdity of it all. Ignoring the cookies, punch, and the “Monster Mash”, he walked over to the four doctors with the steely intent of someone about to speak their mind and the expression of someone who had very nearly had a heart attack. He jabbed an accusing finger at them. “Why on God's green Earth did you install an animatronic 682 head in the janitor's closet?” This statement was followed by an incredibly awkward silence. Kain, Clef, Gears and Bright all looked at each other, then at Yoric, then at each other again. “Oook,” Bright said.

Personnel involved: Agent Byrd, KIA; Agent Vospur, MIA assumed dead; MTF Chi-1 ("Golden Retrievers") Date: 19/██/20██ Background: Agents Byrd and Vospur were deep-cover operatives assigned to investigate 'W██████ P█████████ Haulage, Ltd.' operating out of ████████, NY. The company came to the attention of the Foundation following anomalous high-power transmissions seemingly aimed at [REDACTED], abnormal employee turnover rates and chemical purchases matching [DATA EXPUNGED]. Description of incident: On 19/██, two weeks after insertion of the agents, Site-19 received a transmission from Agent Byrd, a transcript is provided below. This is mobile twenty-nine. We were right about this place. Oh, God, they got Vospur. I woke up yesterday and he was just gone, no note no body, nothing. They probably took him to the crates… I've got proof of what they're doing here, and I ran it through their machine. The fuckers a…. Shit, they're gonna find me. Twenty-nine requesting extraction, ASAP. <signal terminates abruptly> Following the receipt of this message, O5-██ ordered that Mobile Task Force Chi-1 ("Golden Retrievers") be sent to recover the Agents and any evidence they may have collected. Use of lethal force against employees of W██████ P█████████ Haulage, or any other personnel attempting to interfere was approved. Upon arrival at the location, they found the warehouse that served as the company's HQ inexplicably abandoned, with little to no sign of use. On the lower level which housed the power and sewage infrastructure they found the body of Agent Byrd. The corpse was riddled with small puncture marks and heavily dehydrated, and the outer layers of skin had begun to disintegrate. Searching the body the team recovered a document written in an unknown script along with a small flash memory drive (see Addenda 1 and 2). Agent Liasi, leader of MTF Chi-1, ordered the body incinerated after samples of blood and skin tissue had been taken. Although the MTF performed a full sweep of the warehouse and surrounding areas, they found nothing of any note save for two heavily damaged metal cages, roughly 2 m x 1 m x 1 m in size, and returned to Site-19 to deliver their report. Addendum-1: The following pictures of the document recovered along with Agent Byrd's body (Document-WP-1) were taken by Agent Liasi at the scene of recovery. Whole document: Top (detail): Bottom (detail): The document is written in a script bearing little resemblance to any known reference samples, although superficial analysis does lend credibility to the hypothesis that it is a form of language. The glyph circled is labelled 'Seen this on crates'. It is theorized that the 'crates' referred to here and in the transmission are, or are related to, the metal cages found by MTF Chi-1. Addendum-2: The flash drive contained a file titled 'OUTPUT-3121.txt'. The contents of the file appear to be a machine translation of Document-WP-1. A copy is provided below. OUTPUT FILE 3121 REQUESTED BY <ERROR NULL REFERENCE> KEY: <NO EQUIVALENT>, <NEQ> - translation not possible, (?) - approximate or idiomatic translation TRANSLATED TEXT: Status of the second operation <NO EQUIVALENT> as of 99FG5. Processing of entities has accelerated, owing to an increased need for derivative 3. Approximately 1000 entities have been processed this month(?), for an output of 130 <NEQ> of substance. Entity restraint and control continues to be a barrier to large scale production, especially given entities' extreme resistance to <NEQ> bodily poisons. Substance 34 has proven somewhat effective in pacifying entities, however physical incapacitation using appendages still remains the primary method of control. Processors(?) are reminded that permanently pacifying entities is now a Level-16 offense due to current conditions. Entities are to be kept alive at all costs. For this purpose a delivery of Substance 91, a high-activity stimulant, will be made shortly. Processors are also warned not to come into contact with any fluid or solid exuded by the entities. Most are highly toxic and exposure can lead to death within minutes. Ensure that entities not being immediately taken for processing are fitted with the standard restriction devices to prevent any contamination. Furthermore processors should stand at least 60 <NEQ> away from entity processing equipment when active as poisonous substances are likely to leak, especially from seals 1 through 18. [DATA EXPUNGED] Several requests have been made for raw entities to be made available to beings on <NEQ>, in addition to the derivative. These requests are being assessed for feasibility. In this case further processors will be required and transport arrangements will be made. No subsequent activity has been detected at the warehouse in New York, nor have any more transmissions to [REDACTED] been detected. However, the Overseers are adamant that if these operations are continuing, terminating them is a top priority, as is recovering any items worthy of SCP classification. As such they have authorized raids, disguised as [REDACTED], on several similar businesses throughout North America as a preemptive measure.

The last living man on earth smiles to himself as he touches the silver crucifix at his throat, lifting it to his lips to kiss his savior, then looks around his small bungalow, checking to ensure that his lamps are brightly burning and will remain so until he returns, then steps out into the shadowy suburban streets. The moon is full and bright, of course, and white as the bleached teeth in a broken skull. He does not know yet, as he tugs at the lapels of his corduroy coat and adjusts his left ear bud petulantly, that he is the last living man. Certainly, he thinks, in a world so vast there must be others. Pockets, perhaps, of civilization remaining even untouched by the myriad otherworldly taints that have left him bereft of company. On optimistic days he keeps a weather eye on the horizons and glances curiously down side streets in hopes of spotting someone, anyone… There is no one. It's a cool October evening, and he chuckles as he sees the usual assortment of flapping bedsheet ghosts hanging from well manicured ornamental trees, and winks conspiratorially at a grinning jack o lantern. The soft guitar of his music blends neatly with the hiss of wind, and the sound of harsh laughter somewhere to his right. Grinning to himself, he takes a left, toward the park. This is not the first such evening walk he's taken, casting away the protection of his fortified home and meandering in the twilight, dodging the dangers of what the world has become, but it is the latest he's yet dared to do so. Already the distant streets echo with the occasional crash and shatter of the night's early merriment. The last man quickens his step and checks the small pistol in his pocket. One bullet, as always. He'd have no use for more than one, not anymore. The last man pauses by the buckled gates at the park's entrance to remove his crucifix, hanging it by the chain from a strangely tilted wrought iron fencepost. He makes a note to retrieve it on the way back, and delves into the deeper dusk of the park. Under his feet crunch leaves and gravel and what he suspects was once bone as he idly ambles down a path leading to the tennis courts. It's a good night. At a certain point he pauses, reaching to his throat to ensure that he's left his crucifix behind, then plunges forward into a small clearing where the air is filled with a strange clicking rumble and the smell of grease and the battery acid tinge of electricity. He winces as one of the buttons of his jacket frees itself from the material with a gunshot crack and flies into the darkness, its edge nicking his cheek in passing. He'd forgotten about that one. Deeper still down the path, and his nose fills with a cloying sweet scent, floral and subtly entrancing. Lovely. He inhales deeply and quickens his pace as the slithery sound of lace rustles the leaves to his either side, and turns up the volume on his music before the soft singing can reach his ears. Laconic, he pulls a fistful of now worthless bills from a pocket and lets the wind carry them back like leaves over his shoulder, a tip for a performance he'd have died if he'd heard. Coming around the circle, now, back toward the park's entrance, a barely glimpsed movement in the distance makes him pause. He steps into the bright glow of a streetlamp and leans against its post to wait. He doesn't have to wait long. Soon enough they round the corner, eyes flashing, and stop at the edge of the circle of light. The last man nods to them, friendly, because they cannot reach him. The older one, dressed for the chill he cannot feel in a fuzzy down vest and cowboy hat, smiles wryly. "Good evening.". The younger, female, who by looks was once his daughter, simply hisses in anger and crouches to throw a pebble at the light. "Evening." says the last man, pleasantly, and he smiles at her as he puts his pistol to his temple. She shrinks back, making a face, denied the prospect of a meal, and tugs at her elder's coat, pulling him away. When they've gone, the last man shrugs, pocketing his gun, and strolls out of the park, pausing to retrieve his crucifix and put it on. He heads home, flush with the exhilaration of danger, already planning his route for the next night's walk. There are so few things the last man living has left to make him feel alive.

There is a man In my attic Walking around With a soft patter With a loud clatter They brought my cat back With an espionage bug So I wrung its neck With a harsh crack And a soft snap There is a man outside In a lab coat Talking into a cell phone In German And he uses words like ‘Eindringen' ‘Geheimnis' And ‘termination' And I know what that means Oh yes, oh yes I can see his cigarette through the dark And the smoke Of the monkey At his side Who peers in through my window When he knows I'm looking There are at least a thousand men in suits All over town Waiting for me to pass by And to look down They have a laser device To scan my eye And a pill That will make me forget Everything That I have learned About them And their evil Their experiments And unwarranted merriments They throw people to the lions For science But I know words, my dear Words that they fear Words like ‘Gears' ‘Kondraki' ‘173', ‘231', ‘343' And ‘682', too And I chant While I wait For them to leave They know that I know And I know That they know I know So I will pray and pray and beg For them to go They're digging a tunnel up through my basement I have heard them, down there I have put down caltrops And a Winchester rigged to fire (I hope they feel lucky) If they try to come up the stairs They will be in the crosshairs Of my Ruger And my Luger I have a knife Oh How did you guess? It's the one they used To kill my wife She knew too much There is a man across the street He has a moustache And a sniper rifle I painted the windows black And I hid in my bathroom But I am safe nowhere A man with tattoos Was peering up from the bottom of the bowl I slammed the button, listened for the flow And wished he would go I can hear them Walking around Above and below And outside But I will no longer hide What I did is for the best And the people must know Of these men and their doings They can come in, slow and steady I have my gun I am ready. Agent McPhelty washed a few splatters of blood from his night-vision goggles in the sink. He shook the droplets off his hands and toweled them off, turning around. The living room in the stairway where clearly visible through the open door. His partner on this specific operation, Agent Konnicker, was standing over the prone corpse of the man he had taken down, his heavy sniping rifle slung over his shoulder. Blood and splinters of skull were alternatively splattered over and embedded in the fine oak planks of the stairs, and the stink of freshly-sheared copper hung in the air like a cloud of miasma. "Hey Tom," the hefty Texan sniper mumbled through his impressive mustache, "check this out." He was waving a sheet of A4 paper around. McPhelty snatched it from him, frowning as he looked it over. "…now what in God's blue heaven is this shit, Bill?" "I do believe he snapped and wrote hisself a little poem. Found it in his pocket." McPhelty looked down at the fallen corpse of Richard Daublin, the dead spy. Their hacker would later discover there was at least half a terabyte of sensitive information pertaining to the Foundation scattered on various hard drives through his five laptops, but right now, with most of the top half of his head missing, he didn't look so smart. "Wouldn't quit my day job, if I were him."

**BEGIN LOG** Document 84-█████ *The trailer opens up in a burning building. Camera slowly zooms up to a folder marked “SCP”. A conversation between Dr. Gears (Ben Stein) and Agent O-5 (Tommy Wiseau) goes on in the background, with Gears talking in monotone and Agent O-5 having a ridiculously strong accent.* DR. GEARS: How bad is it? AGENT O-5: Oh… it is very bad. *Show men in ski masks carrying a wooden coffin down the street in broad daylight.* AGENT O-5: A bunch of terrorists ‘ave stolen *obvious jump in dialogue* zee coffin, of a *another obvious jump* vampire overlord. *Show footage of people in robes praying to the unconscious body of SCP-76-2 (AKA Able), played by Robert Pattinson.* AGENT O-5: If they are not stopped, the world… no, the universe, could be in danger. *Fade to black.* DR. GEARS: I'll get my best team on it. *Cut to three people marching down a sparsely-decorated corridor, wearing sunglasses and trenchcoats. From left to right: Yoric (also played by Tommy Wiseau), Dr. Clef (played by Samuel L. Jackson), and Dr. Bright (played by Bobo the monkey, voiced by Richard Simmons). Generic rock music loops in the background.* NARRATOR: From the creative direction of Uwe Boll… *Cut to scene of people with guns wearing armor that “D-Class” being mowed down by “Marshall Carter" (played by Keven Spacey) using a machine gun labeled “Dark. LTD”* M. CARTER: THIS. IS. SPARRRRTAAAAAAAAAAAAA! *Dr Aeish (played by some no-talent spanish guy) jumps in from out of nowhere wearing a puffy suit and holding a sword.* Dr. ALEPH ASASH AEGEAL AEISH: My name is Dr. Asphalt. You killed my father. Prepare to die. NARRATOR: …and one of the two directors responsible for “Epic Movie”… *Cut to scene of Dr. Bright and Dr. Gears in a car, driving.* DR. GEARS (still in monotone): Can't you go any faster, damn it? DR. BRIGHT: *Thumps the wheel, screeching. Dr. Bright's voice is very badly dubbed in.* WEEEE! NO HANDS! *Farts* NARRATOR: …Comes this year's blockbuster romantic comedy sci-fi action thriller, that will knock- *Cut to scene of Yoric loading a shotgun…* NARRATOR: -You- *…Clef strumming the Ukulele…* NARRATOR: -Senseless! *…and Bright just standing there, while an obviously fake pair of monkey hands rises in front of him, and cracks their knuckles.* *Cut to scene where Dr. Edison (played by Brad Pitt) is walking away from an exploding SCP-682.* DR. EDISON (voiceover): It's showtime… *Fade to black, and then fade into the words “SCP” in silver letters, with a large number of obligatory movie credits at the bottom of the screen. Text below the logo says “Thanksgiving Day”* “Well, I suppose that's one way to handle an information leak…” O5-█ turned away from the screen. “How on earth did you pull this off?” “Eh, no big deal.” Dr. Edison smugly replied, “I just wrote up a script, sent a crack team of mercenaries to track down and kidnap Uwe Boll and Friedberg, told them who was going to be in it, and gave them an hour each with SCP-721. Now everyone thinks that the leaked documents are part of some sort of Alternate Reality Game for a horrible Uwe Boll movie. With any luck, Marshall, Carter and Dark will also be more hesitant about doing business, what with their name being associated with that wisecracking Lex Luthor ripoff.” “May I remind you that bringing civilians here was a serious breach in security…” “Please, that guy has less credibility than a neo-nazi at a bar-mitzvah. If ‘Zhee best fucking genius in zee business' ever said anything, he'd lose whatever shred of credibility he still has.” O5-█ gave Dr. Edison an unamused look. “…Yeah yeah, I gave them both A-Class Amnesics.” Dr. Edison nervously tugged at his collar. “Um, I mean, do you think I'm an idiot or something?” “But what about the actors? How did you-” “I had a talk with our legal department to help me with the cover story. They forged some paperwork saying that they had signed over their ‘Digital Likenesses' to Boll at some point, and got “Popular Science” to do an article about the technology the movie was supposedly made with. Plus, I sent everyone large checks to get them to stay quiet about it. You know how celebrities are. And even if they do say something, Boll and Friedberg would be the ones to blame, not us.” “I see.” The O5 looked unpulsed. “I also understand you've taken some… ‘liberties' with the source material.” “That was understandable; If I stuck too close to the truth our entire operation would be compromised.” “Actually, I was more concerned about the portrayal of yourself and your fellow co-workers. We've received a number of complaints… Dr. Rights, for instance, is upset that you've made her a into one-dimensional love interest, Dr. Bright was upset that you've made him out to be a complete idiot that can't fend for himself that constantly makes fart jokes, Yoric insists that he looks nothing like Tommy Wiseau, and Delivery Agent Roadrunner is accusing you of slander. Which is understandable, as his only scene involves him yelling obscenities at the elderly, punting a baby into a wood chipper, insulting all major religious and world leaders by name, selling out the Foundation to the Chaos Insurgency for pocket change, and then being gruesomely dismembered at the hands of SCP-682.” Dr. Edison chuckled. “Oh yeah, I remember that scene. God, that was fun to write…” “Anyway… Dr. Iceberg has put out a bounty on your life, Dr. Aeish says you pronounced his name wrong on at least seven dozen occasions, Dr. Gerald hates how you've made his poor driving skills into a running gag, Able would like to have a very violent word with you about your casting choices, Dr. Gears thinks that your characterization of himself was spot on but is repulsed by everything else in the movie, and Dr. Clef thinks you portrayed him as a sexist, chain-smoking alcoholic bigot with a hair-trigger temper.” “So? I'd say that's a pretty accurate description.” “The problem is that he insists you owe him royalties.” The O5 nonchalantly shuffled a large stack of papers. “Oh, and absolutely everyone hates the fact that you cast Brad Pitt as yourself, and made him the most blatant Mary-Sue possible.” Dr. Edison shrugged. “Yeah, well, that's show business for ya.” The O5 sighed. “Personally, I ought to terminate you for gross disrespect and neglect of the rules. However, since you did defuse a potentially catastrophic situation with minimal casualties, I'm willing to let you keep your current position, on the condition that you transfer to Keter Duty in our Antarctic base at Site-██ until people stop demanding your head on a stick.” “Don't I have some sort of choice?” “Certainly. You could always [DATA EXPUNGED]” “…Right. Antarctica it is, then.” **END LOG**

Foreword: This film and several documents were recovered during the acquisition of SCP-████-01-c. Though the documents did not survive prolonged exposure to the tropical climate, the film provides excellent insight into the effects of SCP-████-01. Irrelevant footage has been removed for time considerations but may be viewed by request. Incident ████-c/A/001 Recovered Material-1: Transcript of 8mm Film, First Segment [Camera is angled downward, pointed at a large stone slab roughly 1.5 meters lower than the surrounding area. The slab appears to be a block of roughly worked limestone. The stone is covered with hundreds of insects of multiple species, moving as a group in a complex pattern. The insects appear to be unaware of external stimuli and biological imperatives; predators ignore prey species and vice-versa. A male voice, designated Subject #1, speaks.] Subject #1: I think I finally got this damn camera working! Alright, this is- Off-camera Voice, designated Subject #2: [overlapping] I'll take it from here, James. This is Dr. Aaron Meier speaking. It's, ah, seven thirty-one A.M. local time at the [REDACTED] University Archeological Expedition to [DATA EXPUNGED]. We woke up this morning and found this. Phenomenon. On top of our next work project. I'm not a biologist, so from here on I'm just going to let the camera roll and interject with any observations. [The insects continue to move in increasingly complex and intricate patterns. Filming continues for an additional twenty minutes without any input Subject #1 or #2. Foundation archivists unanimously report feelings of intense revulsion during this period, with four having gone so far as to attack their monitors. After roughly twenty-five minutes of footage, a shovel is violently swung from out of frame into the largest concentration of insects. The next four minutes of footage consists entirely of a pair of shovels repeatedly swung at the insects on the slab until interrupted by another male voice, designated Subject #3. Subject #3 positively identified as Professor Mitchell Romansky] Subject #3: What the hell are you doing? Stop that! Goddamnit, stop that! [Shovel impacts slow and stop.] Subject #1: What? Subject #3: I leave you two alone for half a fucking hour and what do you do? You start hitting a previously unknown behavior. A behavior to which we are, as far as we know, the only witnesses. With shovels. James, what the hell were you thinking? Actually, no. Meier, what the fuck were you thinking? You know what? Don't answer that. I don't even want to hear it. Subject #1: What was his problem? [Recording ends.] Incident ████-c/A/001 Recovered Material-2: Transcript of 8mm Film, Second Segment [Camera is in an environment confirmed to be the interior of the so-called "Catacomb". The "Catacomb" appears to be a room, roughly five meters by five meters, constructed of a dull gray stone, presumably limestone. The walls are covered in engraved symbols, consistent with those associated with the Killke civilization. The center of the room is dominated by an object now classified by the Foundation as SCP-████-01-c. Several rectangular stone constructions, roughly two meters long and a meter tall, surround the center object. On each construction is a mummified cadaver. A significant area of the far wall is dominated by what recovered documents refer to as a "door". It is heavily decorated with symbols similar to those on the other walls, however, the symbols are interrupted at regular intervals of images of [DATA EXPUNGED], which is now understood to be associated with death and calamity in the Killke religion. The entire [REDACTED] University Archeological Expedition team is present, and appears to be in varying states of readiness for a group shot. Professor Mitchell Romansky, designated Subject #1, is in the center of the group.] Subject #1: Are we rolling? We are? Finally! Christ, almost ten minutes to set up a camera. Okay, everyone get together for the group shot! [All members of the █UAE team attempt to take their places. This process takes several minutes. Subject #1 steps away from the group, considers their arrangement for some time, then returns to his place, nodding.] Subject #1: Well, here we are! I am Prof. Mitchell Romansky, team lead for the [REDACTED] University Archeological Expedition to [DATA EXPUNGED]. This is what we're calling the Killke Catacomb, found underneath the ruins at [DATA EXPUNGED]. Won't you join us for the tour? [Group laughs. Subject #1 begins to move about the "Catacomb".] Subject #1: This structure is well preserved to a degree almost unheard of in the field of archeology. The walls, as you can see, have many engravings. We've identified several as Killke in origin, and are confident that the rest are also Killke, implying that they had a writing system similar to the hieroglyphics of ancient Egypt as opposed to the pictographic system once believed to have been standard. We're all very excited. [Subject #1 motions the assembled █UAE team away from the center of the "Catacomb". The group scatters.] Subject #1: And this is the pièce de résistance. This appears to be an altar of some kind, perhaps sacrificial. Note the presence of the cadavers. They were placed here purposefully, with ritual significance. This is a huge insight into Killke funerary rights! As for the altar itself, we're not sure what. It's. [Subject #1 and the rest of the █UAE team slowly stop whatever they were doing and turn to stare at SCP-████-01-c. They remain motionless for the following seventeen minutes and thirty four seconds. The film quality progressively degrades during this period, becoming so distorted at seventeen minutes twenty seconds that any identifying features are lost. Distortion ceases at the same time the █UAE team "wakes up".] Subject #1: Made of, or how it was constructed. Um. Hey. Joseph? I think we're done. My eyes are really starting to hurt. Might be the dust or something. We'll try again later. Turn the camera off and someone get me an ice pack. [Camera is obscured by a human figure (presumably Joseph Asta, a doctoral student at [REDACTED] University) and switched off.] Incident ████-c/A/001 Recovered Material-3: Transcript of 8mm Film, Third Segment [Camera is in an environment confirmed to be the interior of the lab tent at area designated "Dig" for the duration of Incident ████-01-c/A/001. Seated in front of the camera is a male Caucasian, approx. 50 years of age, with brown hair and dressed in a off-white button-down shirt and khakis covered in dust. He is designated Subject #1. Subject #1 later confirmed to be Professor Mitchell Romansky, a tenured archeology professor at [REDACTED] University. He is rubbing his eyes. An off-camera female voice (believed to be [REDACTED], a doctoral student at [REDACTED] University) begins speaking. Voice designated Subject #2.] Subject #2: Professor? We're rolling. Whenever you're ready. Subject #1: My eyes are fucking killing me. Hm? Oh, right, right, just a moment. We'll just edit this out when we present our findings to the AIA. [Subject #1 stops slouching and hurriedly brushes his hair back with his hand, attempts to smooth his shirt, etc. After several seconds, he begins speaking in a more professional tone. Amusingly, it appears his Standard Received English accent in the remainder of the film is feigned.] Subject #1: We've made. A discovery. This could change everything about our understanding of Killke society. About our understanding of all ancient peoples on the entire continent! Exploratory digging at [REDACTED] unearthed a previously unknown structure directly underneath the site. It appears to be a tomb. Or perhaps a temple. It wasn't very far down, four or five meters at maximum, and I don't think it was buried. Well, I do think it was buried, but intentionally, by the builders. There's a long entrance hallway that slopes upwards, like a surface access, that was hidden by a large stone slab, and what appears to be an exit tunnel, presumably leading further underground or to a secondary room, but it's blocked by a large ornate door that we can't shift at the moment. Subject #2: [Indistinct. Comment appears to be directed at another person, also off-camera. Subject #1 appears not to notice.] Subject #1: [Subject #1 begins punctuating his speech with increasingly frantic gestures.] It's definitely not Incan, it's too old, and the interior is riddled with what we believe is a complete Killke alphabet. Dr. Meier is already attempting translation as we speak. And the tomb itself! There's a supremely well crafted stone polygon, maybe an altar in the center of the structure. We're not sure what it represents, or even what it's made out of, but I. Believe. What? Why are you staring at me like that? Subject #2: Um. Professor. You're bleeding. Subject #1: What? Where? Subject #2: Your. Um. Eyes. I think I'm gonna be sick. Subject #1: Don't be ridiculous, girl, I'm not bleeding- [Subject #1 touches his face and looks at his fingers.] Subject #1: Oh. Oh my. [Subject #1 gets up. Several seconds later, recording stops.] Incident ████-c/A/001 Recovered Material-4: Transcript of 8mm Film, Final Segment [Camera appears to not have moved since the recording of the third segment. Seated in front of the camera is a distraught looking east Asian male, age approx. 30, designated Subject #1. He is believed to be Park Sung-Joon, a post-doctoral student at [REDACTED] University. Subject #1's clothes, a [REDACTED] University t-shirt and blue jeans, are filthy and torn. There appears to be significant retraction of the bulbous oculi into the orbit, and Subject #1's face is coated in what appears to be dried blood. The source of the blood appears to be a combination of superficial wounds and Subject #1's tear ducts.] Subject #1: Uh. I don't know how to. Christ. How to start. We were doing an archeological study of the Killke ruins at [DATA EXPUNGED] and we. Found something. Buried. Oh fuck my eyes hurt. [Subject #1 violently rubs his eyes for nearly a minute.] Subject #1: It was a temple or something. I don't even know how we found it. Professor Romansky just kept pacing around the same area of the site, this empty area. Then he made the guides and a few post-docs grab shovels and dig until they hit something, maybe five feet down. We didn't know what it was, but I'm pretty sure it was trying to keep whatever's happening to us. In. We cracked the thing open anyway. We shouldn't have. We should've seen the fucking bugs freaking out and left it alone, but we're scientists. We have. Had. An obligation. To fuck things up. [Subject #1 pauses for some time, apparently lost in thought. He intermittently rubs his eyes.] Subject #1: I wasn't even supposed to go on this fucking trip. Carl got sick. And they needed another post-doc. My focus is fucking Hellenic architecture. [Subject #1 alternates between manic laughter and sobbing for several minutes before composing himself. Archivists note that no tears are produced during the sobbing portions.] Subject #1: God. Whoever finds this. If anyone finds this. Don't go down that fucking hole. It's. It's probably killing us. And. Just. If you find this, just cover the temple back up. Or bomb it. Just, don't. Don't go in. And. Tell my moth- [Subject #1 convulses violently for nearly two minutes, falling off his chair and out of frame in the process. After three minutes and thirty seconds, he stands up. His eyes have completely retracted into his skull, leaving only empty sockets, and is at this point, considered a specimen of SCP-████-02. Frame by frame analysis of this section of the film is disallowed following the unexplained illnesses of three Foundation archivists. Subject #1 stiffly walks past the camera. Recording continues for three more hours before the camera runs out of film.]

Please refer to [DATA EXPUNGED] for briefing about Agent Waters and Event [DATA EXPUNGED] These 432 pages of documents were recovered on ██/██/████ from the residence of Agent Waters (KIA) in ██████, South Africa, three months after his disappearance. It is unknown whether the partial translation of the documents was done by Agent Waters or his partner, Agent Laker (MIA), or by an unknown third entity. The handwritten notes on the documents match the handwriting of Agent Waters, and the questioning of the other residents in the building leads to believe that Agent Waters was the only occupant of the residence for at least two months. Indeed the only evidence towards Agent Laker ever arriving in South Africa are short references to him in the handwritten notes in these documents. Examination of Crash Site B1 has found only destroyed remains of the craft, and the irradiated metal object classified as SCP-███. An entry in the personal voice diary of Agent Waters (see file [DATA EXPUNGED] ) confirms the theory that the documents were somehow extracted from SCP-███, which makes further research into it crucial. It should be noted that Agent Waters claims the date to be 25th September at the time of the entry, but the actual voice file was created two weeks after said date. Evidence collected by Agents ██████ and ████ suggests that Agent Waters located and secured the Crash Site as per his original orders, but after his final report to Foundation staff on ██/██, destroyed the craft and isolated himself into his residence in ██████ to translate the extracted data. Because of the large amounts of data in these documents, only the most coherent and notable parts are collected here. Page 52: Page 54: Page 99: Page 312: I am going to personally supervise the investigation into the information leaks apparent in these documents. All that information about the Foundation should have never been accessible to a single person. Class-A amnestics will be administered to all agents and other personnel who have had access to the original documents. O5-██

Document # ███-002: Excerpt from the "von Reiter Collection" Interviewee: Obersturmführer Waldemar Strasser, formerly of 2.SS Panzer-Division Das Reich Interviewer: Captain Albert [REDACTED], ██ Infantry Division, British Army Foreword: Interview occurred 09/02/1945 and was conducted by non-Foundation personnel. Interview is one in a series conducted by Allied governments of personnel attached to the "von Reiter Group" in order to ascertain its purpose and gather additional information on SCP-███-01-b. Document seized by Foundation personnel 06/30/1947, edited for security and appended to the Von Reiter Collection. <Begin Log> Interviewer [REDACTED]: Please state your name, rank and service history for the record. Obersturmführer Strasser: Obersturmführer Waldemar Strasser. I served in France, Yugoslavia and Russia with 2.SS Panzer-Division Das Reich as a panzergrenadier. I was awarded the Ritterkreuz in recognition of my service near Kharkov in January, 194█ before being transferred to SS Sonderforschungsgruppe-von Reiter for garrison duty shortly afterward. I served there until the end of the war. I: For the record, Obersturmführer is an SS rank roughly equivalent to the British rank of army Lieutenant. Is SS Sonderforschungsgruppe-von Reiter the name of the concentration camp you were transferred to? S: I recognize your accent, I think. You are from London, ja? Perhaps north London? I: Why, yes. Your ear for English is remarkable, Herr Strasser. S: I spent about a year in London, studying abroad for university. Wonderful place. I suppose I should apologize on behalf of the Luftwaffe. The damage to London is a tragedy. I: I've seen Berlin and Dresden. Perhaps we deserved at least a little of it. [Captain [REDACTED] pauses for several moments.] No hard feelings, old boy. But please, answer my question. Was SS Sonderforschungsgruppe-von Reiter the name of the concentration camp you were transferred to in the spring of 194█? S: Concentration camp? [laughs] No, no, SFG-von Reiter was a research laboratory. I: You say that the facility you at which you were stationed was not a concentration camp, despite the presence of over ███ Soviet POWs? And a mass grave ███ meters away, containing the incinerated remains of some ████ people? That's pretty hard to believe, Herr Strasser. S: SFG-von Reiter was strictly a research laboratory. I would never work in a Konzentrationslager, I don't have the stomach for it. But to answer your question, Dr. von Reiter went through the prisoners very quickly. The prisoners were for research. I: Medical research? S: I'm sure you know all this already, I don't see why- I: Please, for the record. S: No, SFG-von Reiter was not a medical testing facility. It. Was. I'm not sure. I don't. Know. I'm not certain how to put it. I: Mein Deutsch ist ziemlich gut, Herr Strasser. Bitte, fühlen Sie sich frei auf Deutsch fortzufahren. S: [S laughs.] Wunderbar! Ein bayerischer Akzent!! Sehr gut, Captain, sehr gut! But no, that's not what I mean. I'm unsure exactly what kind of science went on there. There were medical tests on prisoners, of course, but that wasn't the function of SFG-von Reiter. It was a very odd place. I: Could you elaborate, please? What was the purpose of the Leipzig facility if not extermination of Soviet prisoners of war or medical testing of the same? S: Let me tell you a story, Captain. It involves a Wehrmacht artillery company and a Bolshevik position near [DATA EXPUNGED]. [Redundant information removed by Foundation censors. See [REDACTED] for the full interview, or [REDACTED] for a full report on the recovery of SCP-███-c by Wehrmacht personnel.] S: Shortly thereafter, the object was sent back to the Fatherland in a sealed train car for further research. I: I see. So this "artifact" was then transferred to the Leipzig facility for von Reiter to work with? S: That's correct. I: I'm afraid I don't understand. That's a lot of effort for what amounts to an interesting archeological find. A curiosity, yes, but did it really warrant its own subterranean bunker system? Or a garrison the size of an infantry company? [S remains silent for some time.] S: May I trouble you for a cigarette? I: Certainly. S: Danke. I don't know what that verdammt thing was, Captain. A curiosity? Perhaps. You haven't seen it. Dr. von Reiter was convinced it was the most important scientific discovery, period. Himmler was convinced it would win us the war. I: Himmler? You mean Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler? S: Yes. Within SS formations, even Waffen-SS combat units, Himmler was known for his ridiculous mysticism. Apparently, he thought die Auge-Stein could be used as a Vertraulichwaffe- I: For the record, Vertraulichwaffe roughly translates to esoteric weapon. Please continue, Herr Strasser. S: Ja, an esoteric weapon to smash Bolshevism and the decadent Western democracies and win us the war. And all future wars. The SS sponsored all sorts of absurdities of course, like that Ahnenerbe expedition to Tibet. But this was something else completely. He wrote von Reiter a- Verdammt! Wie Sie tun Sie zu sagen? Ah, yes! A "blank cheque". Himmler handed von Reiter a "blank cheque" from the SS. Money, materials, test subjects, personnel, whatever von Reiter asked for, the Reichsführer made sure he got. When I was first transferred to SFG-von Reiter, I thought the whole idea was Scheisse, but I kept my mouth shut because it was certainly better than another tour on the Ostfront. But over the █ years I was there, I'm. Ah. Not so sure now. [S is silent for some time. Stenographer notes that he is idly playing with his Knight's Cross.] I: We'll come back to this subject later, if you'd like. [S nods.] Tell me about your duties at the Leipzig site. S: Danke, Captain. I was in involved in general security under Standartenführer Konrad Boch. And I oversaw the disposal of die Leeraugen. The. Ah. The test subjects. I: For the record, Standartenführer is an SS rank equivalent to the British Army rank of Colonel. Please describe your duties in the latter capacity, if you would? S: [DATA EXPUNGED], and after the experiments were over, my unit was tasked with killing them. It was very disturbing at first, because they are much harder to kill than a man. I: Were there any special procedures for this "disposal"? S: Not really? They would be chained to the wall in a sealed room somewhere in the complex, and five or six of us would go in and shoot them until they stopped moving. In the beginning, it was harder because we kept trying to kill them, you know, like Einsatzgruppen? Once in the back of the head with a pistol. We wised up after we lost Schrier and Lustig, and started using automatics. Afterward, von Reiter or Dr. Eisen would collect them for dissection or incineration. I: Eisen? He's not on our roster. S: [laughs] Yes, I would imagine! That's because it's not his name. We gave him the nickname Eisen [lit. iron -Ed.] because he was such a hard bastard. I'm not sure what his name was. He was very high up within the research staff and the scientists tended to keep separate from us soldiers. So von Reiter and Wilhelm Jührs, his adjutant, were the only ones we really knew. We figured Eisen was from Himmler's personal staff. Dr. von Reiter absolutely adored him, probably because they were both bloodthirsty Arschlöcher. Eisen was probably responsible for most of the deaths, since he insisted on "fresh subjects" after each experiment. I: Were there any uncommon occurrences while you were there? S: Yes, of course! You can't garrison a bunker complex studying some rock that no one can figure out without some fucking uncommon occurrences. I: Are you alright, Herr Strasser? We can stop if you'd like. [S seems to consider this for some time.] S: There was an air raid on Leipzig. A few bombs landed right on top of us. No one knew we were there except the Reichsfürher and some members of the OKW [Oberkommand der Wehrmacht, the German High Command -Ed.] and presumably Hitler, so I don't think it was intentional. [S pauses for some time. He motions for another cigarette.] S: The raid did severe structural damage to the complex. This was very early, you know, maybe █ months after we found the thing. We didn't know what we were doing at all. Our procedures for this were. Lacking. A group of Soviet Schweine escaped in the confusion and tried to flee the complex, but kept getting cut off by debris or locked doors. They ended up. They were funneled into the. Ah. Der Auge-Stein Eindämmungraum. The containment room. I: How many? Prisoners, I mean. S: I don't know, maybe a dozen. That psychopath, von Reiter, the one thing I will say about him is that he was always very prepared. Prisoners were always restrained, and never more than one at a time. This was ten. At least. There were no chains this time, no cages. The damage to the bunker had ruined the interior of der Auge-Stein Eindämmungraum and all the preventative measures Dr. von Reiter had spent so long perfecting. I: What happened? S: I don't know. I want you to know, Captain, that I hate Bolsheviks, to the very core of my being. I killed dozens of them in combat, I killed dozens of them out of combat, and I would continue to kill them now given half a chance. They are a plague on this world, and their complete eradication can only make things better. That said. What happened to those men in der Eindämmungraum is unspeakable. I would not wish it on anyone. [S takes Captain [REDACTED]'s pack of cigarettes and spends several minutes smoking mechanically, apparently lost in thought. He stubs out his fourth cigarette and looks up.] S: Es war sehr schlecht. I'd. Ah. I'd like to stop now, Captain. <End Log> Closing Statement: Interview continued in [REDACTED]. Authorization from clearance level 4 personnel required for access. Although no new information was unearthed regarding properties of SCP-███, this insight into alternate testing and containment methods is invaluable for SCP-███ researchers. As of 02/28/1996, this series of interviews is required reading for all research staff involved in SCP-███ by order of SCP-███ Project Lead Dr. Feldmann. Obersturmführer Strasser was recruited by the Foundation on 08/22/1947 in Argentina, due to his previous experience with SCP-███-01 and ███-02. Herr Strasser served with distinction as a Taskforce Leader (operational designation "Adamant") in Mobile Taskforce-███ Team Seven. Waldemar Strasser died of lung cancer unrelated to the Foundation on 06/19/1979 in his home in Gelsenkirchen, West Germany.

Professor Ferreiro allowed himself another sigh as he swiped his access card across the barcode scanner. Today had not been a good day. Not that this was a particularly unusual experience for Professor Ferreiro. Ever since he had accepted employment at the SCP Foundation's spacious Site 19 complex he had been subjected to mountains of paperwork, casual abuse by his colleagues and little to no acknowledgment by his superiors. Of course, he mostly brought it on himself. Too timid to speak up every time someone else took credit for his work, Ferreiro had been consistently passed over for promotion and after 13 years of loyal service his co-workers couldn't even remember his name! He was simply the guy that everyone dumped their menial chores on and forgot about. It therefore came as no surprise when he entered his tiny, windowless office and saw yet another enormous stack of papers in his in-tray. As expected, his desk was plastered with the usual post-it notes basically telling him to "get on with it" and a couple of unmarked boxes had been dumped on top of his "World's Adequatest Dad" mug, chipping the handle. His heart having already sunk to its lowest depths untold years ago, he simply closed the door behind him, checked his chair for any thumb tacks his "hilarious" lab assistants might have placed, and sat down to do his job. Not feeling up to the task of sorting through his in-tray at that moment, he decided to start with the boxes. The first one contained a new, unclassified SCP in the shape of a thermostat. Pinned to the SCP was a hand-written note by Dr. Gordon telling him to deliver it to research lab 5a for experimentation. Ferreiro rolled his eyes. Research lab 5a was on the other side of the compound, right next door to Dr. Gordon's office. Well, that one could wait. Knowing better than to actually touch an unknown SCP, he carefully resealed the box and put it on the floor next to his desk. The second box was long and rectangular, and bore the stamp of a fully classified SCP with the words "SCP-572: FOR CONTAINMENT" printed on the side in large, intimidating letters. A small envelope was sellotaped to the lid and marked for the immediate attention of "Professor Donald Ferrari". A thin smile crept across Ferreiro's face as he plucked the envelope off and thumbed it open. They'd finally got his first name right! Doctor Fernando, SCP-572 has been reclassed as Euclid and therefore requires transferring to the special containment facility behind Research Laboratory 5a. As you are not currently assigned to any other projects and therefore have nothing else to do, I expect this to be done without delay. It is absolutely vital that you read the full containment procedures for this SCP before handling it. They should have been delivered to your in-tray a few days ago. DO NOT ATTEMPT TO HANDLE SCP-572 UNTIL YOU HAVE READ THESE PROCEDURES AND KNOW THEM INSIDE OUT AND BACK TO FRONT! Your performance to date has been lacklustre at best. Let's see if you can get this one right! Regards, Bernard Fulham, SCP Laboratory Assistant, Clearance Level Pending Not for the first time that day, Ferreiro sighed. "Don't let him get to you, Don - punk kid like that'll be assigned to Keter duty before he sees thirty!" Ferreiro nodded absently. He was probably right. Arrogant, abrasive types like Fulham did wind up on Keter duty more often than… Wait a minute… Who was probably right?!? Ferreiro looked around his office to see if anyone had entered without him noticing. He was all alone. Suspecting another practical joke of some sort, he began to check under his desk in case someone was hiding there. Nothing. A quick search of his desk drawers completely failed to yield evidence of any tape recorders or other such devices. Jesus, perhaps he'd been working too hard lately. He had been under a lot of stress, true, but he was used to stress by now, surely? Still… working in site 19 could get to anyone after a while. "Wonderful", he muttered, "Now I'm hearing things". "You sure are, Don - you have AMAZING hearing! Just look at those ears of yours - the very pinnacle of creation's work and no mistake! Why, I bet you could hear a gnat piss into a hurricane from a hundred miles away with those beauties!" Ferreiro fought down a wave of panic as his eyes sought out the source of this bizarre flattery. "Alright, wh..who are you and where are you hiding?" he demanded. "Relax, Don, you'll find me. That impressive brain of yours isn't going to take long to work out where I am! Just follow the sound of my voice! YODEL-AY-YODEL-AY-YODEL-AY-HEE-HOO! YODEL-AY-YODEL-AY-YOD.." "Enough!" cried Ferreiro, covering his ears with his hands to block out the piercing ululations. "You've had your fun, just tell me where you are and I promise not to file a complaint with Dr. Bright's office!" "Hah! Like a rough-and-ready, no-nonsense hombre like yourself needs to go running to some other doctor for help! Oh Don, your incredible wit knows no bounds. But seriously though, I don't want to make you angry - I'm in the box! Come and check me out!" Ferreiro felt the hairs begin to rise on the back of his neck. Sure enough, the voice did seem to be coming from the long, rectangular box on his desk. His hands shaking like a Class D on nerve toxins, he gingerly broke the seal and raised the lid. Lying there in front of him, snugly contained in its packaging, was an ornate sword. He was no expert in weaponry, but it looked very much like the replica katana he had purchased for his son's 16th birthday, back when his family still lived with him. Although the only source of light in his office was the sterile neon bulb mounted on the ceiling, the blade glinted as if struck by a brief flicker of sunlight. "Found me! I knew you would, though. There's no hiding from the Donimator! Right, Don?" The hapless scientist recoiled in alarm at the sword's cheerful, steely voice. "Holy Mary mother of Thor!" he exclaimed incorrectly, "You… you can talk?" "Sure I can, Don! But only to people worth talking to, like yourself. You see, you're special, Don. Really, really special. There's no one else in the entire universe like you - you think anyone else would be able to hear a sword talk?" Ferreiro had to concede it had a point. "You have a great destiny ahead of you Don. You ever hear the legend of King Arthur and his sword Excalibur?" "You.. you mean you're…" "Correct! I'm a sword just like Excalibur was! And I'm all yours, Don. Go on, pick me up - try me out! You'll soon see we were made for each other!" His mind reeling with the shock of this discovery, Professor Ferreiro reached into the box and wrapped his fingers around the handle. Some part of his subconscious began to scream at him, telling him there was something he was supposed to remember - something important - but it was immediately drowned out by the feeling of raw power coursing through his arm. Although he could barely tell the difference between a bastard sword and a butter knife, he marvelled at the exquisite balance and weight of the katana. He felt strong and capable - confident, even! For the first time in years, he felt there was nothing he could not do. The world was his oyster, and he could crack it open and steal the pearls any time he wanted! "Whoa, easy on the grip there, Mighty One! I'm the sturdiest blade you ever will see, but that super strength of yours could grind me into dust!" Ferreiro loosened his grip slightly - of course, how could he not have known that? He was a TITAN! "Phew, thanks! Okay, boss, try me out - give me a little whirl!" Ferreiro swung the katana around in a clumsy semi circle, knocking over his stack of paperwork and smashing his mug into little ceramic pieces. Part of him knew he'd only done so by accident, but it felt right - like that had been his intention all along. He smiled, and this time it wasn't a thin, mournful little smile but a full fledged, ear-to-ear grin of triumph! "OH HELL YEAH, DON! Look at us go! Did you see what we did to that mug? There is NOTHING we can't do! Nothing YOU can't do! All those years of working for other people when they're not even fit to lick the ground you walk on! Well, NOW they'll know who the real master is!" "Yeah!" Ferreiro cheered, "NOW they'll know"! He paused. "It's Gears, right?" "Hahaha, oh Don, you're the funniest, most talented man in the universe! No, of course it's not Gears - it's YOU, Don! You should be running this place by now! All those punk kids and worthless labcoats ordering you around, treating you like dirt - it's not on! And did you see how disorganised this place has become without you at the helm? You know the kind of dangerous, extinction-level events this place is supposed to contain, and yet it's run by the kind of people who won't even promote the most intelligent man who ever lived! No, Don, this place is too important not to be yours. I think it's time you promoted yourself, don't you?" Donald Ferreiro, PhD, Clearance Level 1, Smartest Man Who Ever Lived, did think it was time he promoted himself. He'd never thought he'd really deserved it before, but then he'd never noticed how awesome… how badass he was before! It all made sense now. His mind was made up. He was going to take site 19 by force. Hoisting the blade into what he knew was an extremely effective combat-ready position, he leapt to his feet and strode purposefully towards the door as bits of fluorescent light rained down around him. "YES! THE TIME OF VENGEANCE IS AT HAND!" screamed the blade, "GO ON, DON, KICK THE DOOR DOWN! SHOW THEM YOU MEAN BUSINESS!". His face set in an expression of grim determination, Don raised his leg and slammed the heel of his foot into the lock. There was a satisfying crack as the door completely failed to burst open in an explosion of reinforced metal. A crippling pain shot up his leg and a feeling of nausea overwhelmed him as the source of the cracking sound became apparent. "Whoa-ho-ho! Look at that, chief! You've managed to shatter the bones of the universe's most powerful man! Only YOU could have done that, Don! Well done! You're so dangerous! I'm glad we're on the same side here! Now come on, let's go share the pain with those ungrateful bastards who employ you!" Four more door kicks, half an hour's fighting-back-the-pain, and a reluctant barcode scan later, The Right Honourable Professor Donald Ferreiro, PhD, Clearance Level whatever-he-damn-well-chose, Smartest Man Who Ever Lived and God Amongst Men hobbled into the clean, empty hallway outside his office. "SITE NINETEEN", he bellowed weakly, "I AM YOUR NEW MASTER - AND YOU'RE ALL FIRED!" "That's telling 'em, Don! Now find us some meat!" Ignoring the pain of his broken foot and howling obscenities at an uncaring world, he rounded the nearest corner and came face to face with his nemesis. "Ah, Fernando!" Doctor Gordon said, "I was just coming to check on you and see if you'd managed to deliver that… oh my, is that 572 you're holding? You know you're not supposed to - " "FOOLISH WRETCH!", Ferreiro screamed, eyes wide, veins bulging, "YOU… HAVE… NO… POWER… OVER ME!!" Gordon ducked as 572's dull blade swung over his scalp, missing him by a good half meter and causing a small dent in the overhead piping. Thrown completely off balance by this failed decapitation, Ferreiro spun awkwardly on his injured heel and collapsed to the floor as once more the pain overwhelmed his senses. Recognising a long-suffering scientist with a flipped switch when he saw one, Doctor Gordon scrambled to a nearby alarm panel and hit the button marked "Containment Breach". "He's calling for backup, Don, don't let him get away with it! They'll be here any minute - FINISH HIM! Come on! On your feet! Get up! You can do it!" 572's voice continued to shout its encouragement as Ferreiro mustered all his will and pulled himself up onto his feet again. "Don't be an idiot, man!" shouted Gordon as he backed away down the hall, "This place will be swarming with agents any second now! You can't win!" "I am winning", snarled Ferreiro as the facility-wide alarm klaxons echoed through the corridor. "I'm the guy with the unstoppable blade!" True to his predictions, the security team arrived in record time as Gordon fled past them. Six Kevlar-armoured SCP agents, their features hidden by the black visors of their helmets, came to a halt at the end of the corridor and raised their standard issue firearms. Ferreiro knew less about guns than he did about swords, but even he knew that the type of ammo and the range of the weapon meant nothing at such a short distance. For the first time since he'd decided to elevate his position, he began to feel a bit uncertain. "Don't worry Don - they might have the firearms, but you have me! With my strength and your skill, we can stop every bullet they fire! Now let's show them what you're made of!" His fears allayed, he swung the blade in a crude figure-of-eight, barely noticing the wet smacking noise his severed thumb made as it hit the tiled flooring. He damn well would show these bastards what he was made of! Unleashing 13 years worth of impotent rage in a single scream, he limped as fast as he could towards the security team, swirling 572 in whichever direction felt best at the time. The security team, being well trained, released a volley of hot metal. But Ferreiro was ready. Flicking his blade from side to side, as if the bullets were little more than flies to be swatted, he continued his advance. Out of the 18 bullets fired, only two made it to the far wall behind him. "That was AMAZING, Don!" 572 exclaimed triumphantly, "16 bullets stopped cold! And you didn't even need me at all! You truly are The One, Don! You're the greatest!" Ferreiro looked down at his bullet-riddled torso, noting with detachment the shattered bone and distended muscle poking through his wounds. Moments later, when it realised what had happened, his body went into shock and he collapsed on the cold hard floor, bleeding profusely in every shade of red. 572 clattered onto the floor beside him, cackling playfully and singing his praises. As the alarms went silent and the world began to fade from him, Donald Ferreiro, PhD, Security Clearance Terminated, was aware of a friendly voice singing "Wow, look at that blood! The blood of a king, that is! You really did show them what you're made of! You're the greatest, Don! The greatest!" Don smiled. He was the greatest.

I am followed by fire. It sounds really, really weird, I know, but it's true. Every house, every apartment I've ever lived in has burned to the ground. Even stranger—it's predictable. If I lived somewhere for six years, six years after I move out it goes up in flames. It's not exact, but it's close, usually accurate to within two or three months. It's true. I'm not sure when I noticed the pattern for the first time, but it's always been there. When I was just a kid, right after I was born, my family lived in an old house behind my grandmother's house. We were there until I was two, when we moved. I remember visiting my grandmother's at four, watching the smoldering embers of the little house and the curling smoke rising into the air. Old wiring from the 50's finally gave out. From the shack, we moved to a farm. We weren't well off enough to own it or anything, but we did run it for the local doctor. The farmhouse wasn't that big, and most of my childhood memories come from the cozy, family setting it engendered. Here, I remember Christmas, Thanksgiving, birthdays. I think of it whenever I think of “back home.” We lived there from when I was two until I was nine, when the doctor we worked for died. At fifteen, it burned, an old tree struck by lightning sparking off the blaze. The third house I lived in was the second to burn to the ground. We only lived there for around two years, so it happened when I was thirteen. It was an old house, a very old house. What I remember most was its shape. We called them “shotgun” houses, because you could fire a shotgun from one end and it would pass all the way through to the other. One room after another, all in a straight line, built as needed. It was, honestly, very old and dry. I'm not surprised that the heating stove in the front room sprung a leak on the tenants after us. Other than where I'm at now, the only place left is my parent's current house. When they asked me why I was moving all my stuff stored in the basement out, I didn't have the heart to tell them, so I made up some excuse about having my old books and stuff closer to college. I didn't know what else to say. When I turned nineteen, I moved out of my parent's house, and went to college. Before renting the house I live in now, I stayed in an apartment in the city. I shared it with a couple of assholes that seemed nice enough before I moved in. Everyone knows the type. Won't pay their bills on time. Eats whatever they can lay hands on. It got worse and worse until I made up my mind. When I'd finally had enough, I left. We were four months into a one year lease. Now I'm just keeping an eye on the news. Waiting for the sparks. A gas leak, a stray match… Sooner or later, they'll burn. They always burn.

Ah, September. That wonderful time of year when big yellow buses rumble down suburban streets, when schoolyards are alive with the shriek and laughter of children, when highschools are bustling with students either eager to learn or eager to get it over with. It seems picturesque, yes? Well, that's not the case in the small town of Sycamore Corner. Sycamore Corner is located in (dare I say it) middle of fuckall NOWHERE, Maine. No real roads going in, no roads going out. Industry? Wood. Did I mention that middle of fuckall NOWHERE, Maine, is home to a hell of a lot of trees? It… yeah, there are trees. Most of the businesses are woodbased. Wood flooring, firewood, wood sculpture, wood shoes… hell, we even have some crazy batshit lady who sells wood clothing. But yeah, wood. Lots of it. Anyway, Sycamore Center isn't like other towns, especially in September. See, that's when school starts, and honestly the weirdest time is when school starts. Sycamore Center has but one school, and almost every time school is starting people forget about it. It's called Sycamore Center Preparatory, and it's this really big old looking school. On the outside it is a really old, really tall building. It's hard to believe that people forget it's there, but whatever. Inside, it's all white. Every wall, every floor is white. It's like being in a really creepy hospital. The teachers are really really off, too. Once, I took a picture of my ‘bioethics' teacher, Mr. Alto. His head turned into a giant angry fuzzy spider. And he's always ranting about green classes or something and how we should just shoot them in the head if they even look at us. And Ms. Lefts or Rights or some other direction was always hitting on the boys during sex ed (and some of the girls, too)… I mean, that's not bad thing or anything, but it's really damn distracting when you want to LEARN. Don't even get me started on Principal Gears. I am absolutely certain that he's at least a cyborg, perhaps even just a plain old robot. We don't have yellow school buses here. We have these big black buses operated typically by people in orange jumpsuits, always swearing at us and telling us to shut up. You never see the same person for more than a month, either. The first day of school started off normally, at least for us. How normal can you get here? The bus rumbled up and all the students got in. Sycamore Center Preparatory was the only school in town, so we all had to go there. I kind of felt bad for the little bitties. They had no clue what they were getting into, and they got Mr. Konny. Mr. Konny is… well, frightening. I still have nightmares about him and his butterfly habitat. And don't even start me on his friend Mr. Kain. He likes us to THINK that Mr. Kain is a fully animated robot in a very convincing dog suit. After I stepped in one of Mr. Kain's 'presents', I don't think that's the case. Anyway, it was my last year and I planned on getting the hell out of middle of FUCKALL NOWHERE, Maine. There's a lot of that here, you know. Once you're away from the beach, it's just nothing. I was planning on applying to big name universities because, you know, my grades were like the highest in the town. Not saying much, given the population of about 200, but it was impressive to me. I was planning on Harvard, Yale, Dartmouth, Wellesley, the whole nine yards. That is, until I was called into Mr. Gears' office. Mr. Gears' office was white like the rest of the school. It had a poster that was probably trying to be uplifting, but only made me even more anxious. It read ‘There is no canon' and had a picture of some kind of horse made of vines or something… Anyway, I sat there uncomfortably waiting for him to decide to come in. I think principals do that sort of thing on purpose, you know. Making you sit there uncomfortably, sweating, trying to figure out what you did so that you blurt out random things they probably weren't going to yell at you for. Finally, after what felt like forever (though according to my watch was just five minutes), Mr. Gears strode in, holding a file with a funny symbol on it. He sat down across from me and dropped the file in front of me. I tentatively opened it to see my name, my most recent school picture (wow, I need something to treat this acne and dammit we don't have an orthodontist anywhere in town my teeth are sooooo crooked), and every single paper I've ever written, from when I was in kindergarten to now. Every report card, every certificate, every newspaper article that even mentioned me. My life was in that file. “Mr. Gears…” I finally started, “W-what is this all about?” Mr. Gears just sat there, stoic as always. He said in his typical monotone, “You interest us.” “I… I what?” “You interest us, and we want you in our ranks.” “Ranks? Wh-what are you—“ I didn't get to finish that sentence. I felt something in my neck, then the world started to spin around me. Before I collapsed, I distinctly heard Mr. Gears saying, “Welcome to the Foundation."

Agatha Rights looked up from her desk as the man in the gray suit entered her office, her hand instinctively reaching for the lamp to her left. The man looked at her, his mustache twitching slightly. He pulled a file from under his arm, and dropped it on her desk. She looked down at the large, red stamp in the corner. Her head craned back up slowly, calculatingly. "Termination orders? For who?" "You, of course," he replied, reaching into his suit pocket. Dr. Timothy Burns got up from his desk and stretched, looking at the clock on the corner. He was surprised to see how late it'd gotten, especially since he was supposed to meet with— 'Oh, fuck me,' he thought, jumping around the desk and rushing toward the door. 'I can't believe I forgot about this…' He dashed down the hallway, narrowly dodging two security guards eating cake, reaching for the doorknob and throwing it open. The office was empty, freshly painted with new carpeting. It reeked of redecorating. He leaned backwards, looking over the door at an empty spot where a placard had been. A tiny part of him leaped with joy at the prospect of having an excuse for being late. He closed the door and looked around, stopping a passing Junior Researcher. "Can you tell me where Doctor Rights' office is at? I didn't realize she was having hers redecorated." The researcher looked up at him, setting down her fork on her plate. "Who?" "Rights. Agatha Rights. She used to be in here," he said, gesturing toward the door. "Now, I can't find her, and I'm late, and she's usually very easily irritated." The researched looked at him sympathetically. "I'm sorry. I just can't help you." Burns sighed and turned, hurrying down the hallway. One of the sector supervisors secretaries should be able to help him. He passed through several hallways, glancing occasionally and looking for her name on one of the doors. He stopped, eventually, at the desk of a stern looking woman in her early forties. Burns gave a sigh of relief, smiling and nodding at the woman who, after she finished a bite of her dessert, looked up at him questioningly. "Sorry to be a bother," said Burns "but I'm looking for Doctor Rights. Her office is being redecorated, and I don't know where she relocated to." The secretary nodded, and reached for a large, white binder. "A new researcher to the site?" she asked. Burns cocked an eyebrow. "No, she's been here for years, now. Rights. Senior Staff." The woman looked at him distrustfully, her finger running down the page. She eventually stopped, looking up at him smugly. "There is no Doctor Rights on the Site-19 roster." Burns frowned. "Are you sure?" The woman spun the book around with the skill of one accustomed to such questions and laid it at the front of the desk. Burns looked down the list, frowning. It went straight from Rath, to Rapp, to Sharp. He turned away from the desk, muttering an absent minded thanks, as the wheels in his head began to turn. There was no way she had been transferred. Any transfer would have required some sort of approval, a transfer of records, probably a party in Agatha's case. In a few minutes, he'd returned to his office. As he walked in and turned, preparing to put his coat on the hook by the door, his eyes passed over his scheduling calendar. The day was blank. Something had happened, something had gotten loose, broken free. Something had happened to her. His mind whirled with the different possibilities. He ran through the SCPs he knew she was working on: the weird surgeon, the tiny pterodactyl, nothing that could cause this. A temporal anomaly? Probably not, as he wouldn't remember her at all then. Maybe it had something to do with— A sharp knock on his door broke his reverie. He walked toward it cautiously, carefully turning the lock and peering out into the hallway. A slender, young woman with purple eyes looked back at him, smiling in her Foundation fatigues. "Dr. Burns?" "Yes," he answered quietly. "Your mail, sir," she said, holding up a pile of envelopes and memos. "You should really come down to the mail room to get it, sometime." "We have a mail room?" asked Burns. She smiled, shrugging her shoulders. She made to slide the letters through the crack in the door. "No!" yelled Burns, starting her. He looked at the pile of mail in her hand and back at her. 'Of course,' he thought. 'A memetic.' "How do I know you're legit?" he asked. Apparently, she'd been there long enough to get used to this question. "Listen," she said. "I'm just going to put his down here." She gestured toward the floor. "You can get it whenever you like." Burns eyes twitched through the crack. "Fine. Fine, that's fine," he said, watching as she slowly lowered the pile of envelopes to the ground, took a slow step back, and turned away from the door, moving at a brisk gait back down the hallway. Burns opened the door and poked the stack of letters slowly with his foot before jerking it back again. He repeated this process a few times before carefully stepping over the letters into the hallway, watching them. He sidled down the hall, carefully keeping watch on them as he moved toward the corner. He took another, long hard stare at the pile of envelopes and dashed around the corner, running headlong into a hoard of butterflies. He nearly inhaled one before stumbling out of the swarm, leaning himself against a wall as he coughed. He felt a hand slapping him hard on the back, followed by a deep laughter. "Burns, do try not to eat the SCPs," smirked Kondraki, laughing as the bald man standing next to him looked at Burns impassively. "Are you alright, Doctor Burns?" asked Dr. Gears. "Gears!" he cried, "Thank God. Listen, I think something is wrong. I can't find Rights! Something has happened. No one I talk to remembers her at all!" Gears set down his plate and walked closer to Burns. "Are you alright, Doctor?" "I'm fine! I'm perfectly fine! One minute, I'm scheduled to meet with her, and the next she's gone! I can't find her!" Kondraki licked his fork and turned his head sideways. "Who are you talking about, Burns?" Burns felt the blood drain from his face. His eyes narrowed. "They got to you." Gears turned and looked at Kondraki, who shrugged in return. "They got to you two, too, didn't they?" screamed Burns. Kondraki smiled. "Too much stress, Burns? Did your imaginary friend run away?" Burns felt himself backing away. This had to be a joke. It had to. "This is because I put that Class-D's hand in her chair, isn't it?" he yelled. "I swear, I thought she'd notice before she sat down! Seriously, this is getting ridiculous!" "Are you alright, Doctor? Would you like a mild sedative?" asked Gears. "What the fuck is going on?!" scream Burns, his eyes wide. "What the hell is wrong with you people? What happened to Agatha?!" Kondraki and Gears both took short steps toward Burns, who found himself backing away faster, eyes twitching. "Don't touch me." "I'm afraid I do not understand what the problem is, Doctor Burns." "Fuck, Burns, have you been dipping into company assets?" Burns pulled away from them, twisting. "Get BACK!" he barked, sharply, feeling his way along the wall. He felt the cold, stainless steel of the cafeteria doors, and turned sharply, running into them, looking to escape whatever had managed to free itself and— "Burns? What's the problem?" Burns was standing in a pile of confetti, looking across a nearly empty room at a woman in a smart, sharp business suit. She smiled, winningly, and waved at him. "Agatha?" "Hello, Burns! I wasn't sure you'd make it." Burns walked forward, half tempted to reach out and poke her to make sure she was there. "Agatha?" "Yes, Burns. You almost forgot to come to my party!" "Party? What… what party?" "My birthday, Burns. I sent you an invitation and everything." "Oh, I… I must not have gotten it." "Here," she said. "Have a piece of cake." Burns walked out of the cafeteria, smiling and chewing. It really was very good cake. He saw Kondraki and Gears staring at him, waved cheerily, and continued eating. He was supposed to meet with… with somebody this afternoon. He'd have to check his calendar. O5-2 sat down in her chair, looking at the monitor, drumming her fingers softly on the chair's leather arm. With a few quick keystrokes, she completed the process. Agatha Rights was quite thoroughly expunged from the Foundation. She smiled, leaning back into the comfortably overstuffed chair. 'Weird way to get promoted,' she thought. 'Killing yourself.' She laughed. Only one thing left to do. She reached over for the plate and picked it up, happily sinking her fork through the creamy chocolate frosting. It really was very good cake.

Doctor Evelyn Weston had the summer flu that was going around. Nothing special about that, just a vague, nauseous rumble in her stomach that had her going to the bathroom every hour or so to empty her bladder. Of course, it might as well have been too much coffee, too, she knew that she tended to overdo the caffeine when a new SCP came in that she was assigned to. The thought, of her mild flu skipped over her mind, though, as she looked over the containment room with a small frown. Two girls, aged five and four, according to their medical records, sat on the floor and scribbled on the bare white tile with the crayons they'd been provided. It would have been something of a charming scene, were it not for the fact that all but the ceiling and the walls above their limited reach were already covered with a thick layer of wax and dye, and as they drew they did not blink nor stop to admire their work, nor did they stop humming. Doctor Gears stood silently and impassively beside her, observing, a notepad in hand and pen at the ready. “Whenever you're ready to begin, Doctor Weston.” ”Yes, sir.” She said, voice shaking slightly. It was always more than slightly intimidating when it came time to report the study of an SCP to the senior staff. “Designation SCP-9005. SCP-9005 can be divided into two distinct parts. The song, and those it affects, divided into, respectively, SCP-9005-1 and SCP-9005-2.” She tried to keep her tone as clinical and detached as possible, although she still spoke with great interest. This was, after all, her assignment, and you didn't spend a month observing something without becoming a little attached to it. “SCP-9005-1 is a song recorded on a standard US Cassette tape, unmarked, of unknown origin. The song itself is an instrumental piece of upbeat music, and was recovered in a-“ She checked her notes, even though she knew the facts backward and forwards by heart. “-day care center. While SCP-9005-1 seems to have no effect on individuals who are either pubescent or adult, repeated exposure of children to SCP-9005-1 has a memetic effect on the children, now referred to as SCP-9005-2.” She paused, looking at the girls in the room. They had nearly finished their artwork, only a few square feet of the floor still left bare, and it was disappearing rapidly. “SCP-9005-2 seem to be physically unchanged, and remain, in this case, healthy and normal children, although extended tests to see if the effect stays or fades with age will be required. There is a very strong mental effect, as you can see- SCP-9005-2 seem to be…attempting to create a new environment, using whatever it available. They will rearrange plants and furniture for scenery, or use art supplies to…uhm…draw themselves a setting. “The purpose of SCP-9005-1 is unknown, but judging from the results, one could assume that it is perhaps a memetically encoded message. All examples of SCP-9005-2 seem to be trying to convey the same environment, with whatever means are available to them. That's not to say that they can't be prevented from working. SCP-9005-2 still regularly stop to eat and use the restroom…and there are regular cycles in which the effects of SCP-9005 seem to fade, such as when there are no supplies available, or if the supplies cannot be handled with safety. “Subjects designated…subjects eight and twelve here are siblings from the day care center. They have been provided with several boxes of crayons with which to work. And as you can see, despite their age and experience levels…they have managed to create a nearly photorealistic 360-degree image of the environment.” She looked into the room. One of the girls had stopped drawing, and was quietly sitting, singing wordlessly to herself the same gentle, repeating tune, while the other was scribbling in the last few details with the remaining nub of her crayon. “And SCP-9005-1 only has this effect with the original recording?” Gears asked, and she nodded. “We've conducted additional testing with recordings of the original, as well as vocal or synthesized versions, with no effect. Similarly, the only children that were not affected in the original day care were hearing-impaired. One of the unaffected did have a cochlear implant, but seemed to have no effects.” “And the age range of SCP-9005-2?” “The range of subjects currently goes from three years of age to ten. Once puberty starts for the individual they are rendered immune, and no children under the age of three have been exposed.” Doctor Gears was silent, and Evelyn held her breath. Finally, he spoke again. “And do the effects fade with separation from SCP-9005-1?” “No, sir, they seem to be permanent once started.” He nodded, was quiet for a few more moments, writing down a short note…and then without a word, he left. Evelyn sighed in relief. No response was a good response, when it came from Doctor Gears. Turning to the observation window, she looked at the girls. They stood, longingly staring at the ceiling and walls where they couldn't reach, singing to themselves for a few minutes more before going quiet and sitting down, looking tired and listless. Evelyn's stomach gurgled, and she cursed softly, heading to the ladies' room. No more coffee, she swore. It was later that week she discovered her pregnancy, and in what seemed, to Evelyn, to be no time at all, she was off on maternity leave, singing a little pink bundle of colic to sleep every night. She never thought, in her sleepless state, about the tune, a soft upbeat melody, that she hummed to her daughter to calm her. It was, after all, just a song that had gotten stuck in her head. And it calmed little Emily Weston down. Three Years Later Evelyn missed her family, but she tried not to think about it too much. She still got to see her daughter, every other weekend, and it seemed unfair that it was all the time the courts ruled she could have, but she would take what she could get. Besides, her ex-husband was a kind man, and an excellent father, and his wife a wonderful and attentive mother. More than Evelyn, who would become obsessed and lost in her work at times, could say. Still, she missed her little girl, Emily, the sweet child, especially now that she'd missed the past month of visits because of work. Emily was her life when she had weekends off, though, even if the little girl was plagued with nightmares and demanded, often times loudly, to be sung to sleep at night, her mother always obliged. But now…now she was trapped in work. Evelyn sighed deeply as she poured over pages of reports on a new SCP, designation 8776. She swore, she'd never figure out how this damn numbering system worked. Looking up at the clock, hoping that it was almost time to go, she couldn't stop a small yelp from escaping as she found Gears standing in her office, stock still and silent as a ghost. She hadn't heard him come in. “…Doctor Weston.” “…Hello Doctor Gears.” She said, rubbing her face. How embarrassing. “What can I do you for, Sir?” He took a seat and held out a file to her, one emblazoned with the numbers 9005 in bold stencil. She cautiously took the file, for a second wondering if this was some mistake she had made years ago when she had been part of the 9005 team. “What's this about?” “We are decommissioning SCP-9005-1 officially, and it was proposed that, as the original lead researcher, you would prefer to look over all the data to make sure that there is nothing missed, in your opinion.” She nodded. A formality then, as she opened the folder and started to skim. The effect had never faded away from the children, it seemed, and she frowned at that. Even if those children had just been subjects, bound by a force beyond their control, she still felt bad for them, and she skimmed along further, not truly reading but thinking about children and Emily. She would be about the right age now… Then, she stopped, and stared. Doctor Gears, inhumanly perceptive as it was, stood. “Doctor Weston, is something wrong?” She didn't answer, instead she dropped the file, letting the paper's scatter, and was power walking out the door of her office as she pulled out her cell phone. Doctor Gears took the time to carefully reorganize the papers and place them back in the file. He did not give chase, at least. ”Hello, Bob Weston speaking.” ”Bobby!” ”Evelyn? Hey, I was just about to call you. I know that you've been busy, lately, but…I wanted you to come see Emily this week, rather than next, if you can make it. There's something…important that we need to talk about.” Evelyn's face went pale as she kept walking hastily towards the garage, flashing her badge at the guard and running to her car. ”What? What is it? Is there something wrong with Emily?” ”Maybe it's better to talk in person. It is a really recent development, and they psychologist says that it's too soon to tell if there's anything wrong, developmentally-“ ”I'll be there in an hour.” ”Eve, what's wro-?” She hung up, started her car, and peeled off, thanking God that she didn't live that far away, and what distance between the base and town was all unmarked, rarely patrolled country highway. Doctor Gears, satisfied with the papers all in order again, proceeded to read quickly through the file, finding the page and paragraph she had stopped upon. If one looked closely, one could almost swear that he frowned. Almost. But not quite. It may have been a mild myoclonic twitch, or a trick of the light, most likely. While initial testing using the melody from SCP-9005-1 yielded no effects, later testing showed that repeated exposure to just the melody from SCP-9005-1 through other means (vocal, instrumental, or otherwise) could result in SCP-9005-2 developing, albeit at a much decreased rate. The decreased effects took place between one to two years after exposure, and did not develop until the subject developed the proper physical coordination capable of manipulating the environment- He closed the file, and picked up the phone. “Secure Task Forces. I need a small team to go to Doctor Weston's home, as well as the home of her ex-husband. Yes, the address should be in her file.” Evelyn prayed, hard, as she charged in through the door of her ex-husband's home, looking around. Bob blinked at her, startled, before raising an eyebrow. “Eve, are you okay? You look like you've seen a gho-“ “Tell me, what's wrong with Emily!” She barked, stepping right up to his face. “Whoa! Whoa…calm down. She's just…developed some weird behavior, that's all. She hasn't been talking a lot, lately, and started drawing on her walls. The doctor said that it's probably just kid stuff, but he wants her to come back in a few months to make sure she isn't autistic or-“ Evelyn didn't wait for an answer, and ran up the stairs two by two to Emily's room. “Emily!” She shouted, pushing the door open…and freezing. Emily had been hard at work, it seemed. The little girl had even managed, through piles of toys and boxes and drawers, to reach her ceiling. The mural that covered every square inch of space in the room was made of a variety of materials. She saw crayons, paints, pens, pencils, even makeup cases scattered about, and yet it was horrifically detailed. But there was not Emily. She stepped into the room, cautiously, to the center, and looked around, an immense sense of deja-vu overcoming her. She knew this scene, and from the center of the room, every surface had been painted to give the perfect illusion that she was standing in the middle of it. If it weren't for the open door, she thought, she would have never believed she was in a child's room. It was beautiful, there was no denying that. A forest of violet trees with brilliant blue leaves was to one way, a bit in the distance but not too far at all, each branch in perfect clarity. Gray-violet grasses and red flowers were painted and scrawled upon the floor and the walls, a wide field punctuated with crimson bushes and green fruits hanging off a large navy-blue tree, that had been painted up and up onto the ceiling, it's branches framing the light fixture, which the girl had painted into a red-orange sun. And the sky, oh the sky! Three moons, all different hues, to every side, and the sky itself was brilliant sunset hues of pink and yellow, with white clouds, and a black thunderhead far off in the distance over snow-capped mountains. “Emily!” She cried out. She'd never seen a drawing this extensive. She heard a faint rustling, and the giggle of a little girl, and without thinking she reached for the door, swinging it shut to reveal the girl behind it. Except there was nobody behind the door. And Evelyn felt the overwhelming sense that she had just done something terribly wrong. The effects of SCP-9005-1 seem to be culminating in manipulating SCP-9005-2 to complete a complete round-eye view of what is best described as “otherworldly scenery”. Once the illusion is complete, when viewed from the center of whatever space SCP-9005-2 had been manipulating, it appears to be in every single direction a perfect picture of the landscape, as if one were truly in the picture itself. The dangers of the effect are not fully explored, as once the illusion is perfected, individuals who view it in it's entirety without any breaks in the scenery inexplicably cease to exist. Radio contact with vanished individual can be maintained for no more than thirty seconds, during which individuals equipped with transmitters describe their setting as a beautiful alien world, rather than just an image. It is believed to be safe to assume that the full extent of SCP-9005-1's effects are, in fact, to transport individuals to a particular place. No testing conducted had revealed if this is its place of origin or simply a random location. She stepped back, and the door vanished from sight, hidden in the perfectly painted scene. Evelyn held her breath, wondering if, perhaps, she should not have skimmed, she should have actually read the report in its entirety. Then, she heard it, and turned on her heel. Singing, soft voices singing, and reedy instruments, in the distance. It was music, and she knew that music well. It was SCP-9005-1, clear as she'd ever heard it, although this time punctuated with the voices of children and other sounds. She stepped forwards, cautiously, moving to touch the wall, and jerked back when there was none there, and the grayish grasses crunched under her shoes. The earth, reddish and clay-like, crumbled under her footsteps, and when she bent down to pick a brilliant scarlet flower, she found that it was as real as the door had been moments ago. “Mommy!” Evelyn jerked up, and found Emily's smiling face peering out from the grass. “Baby!” She shouted, moving to scoop the small child up in her arms, before something moving too fast to be seen as anything but a blur knocked her away. She sailed through the air just a short meter, but it felt like it took forever to hit the ground, the wind knocked out of her. A wince, and she opened her eyes to see bare feet, and slowly, painfully, sit up to look at her attacker. The young girl couldn't have been more than nine or ten, but she was tall. Tall and thin, ethereal in appearance, like somebody had stretched her out. She looked down at Evelyn with cold, pale eyes, and Evelyn gasped. “Subject Twelve.” She breathed out, wheezing. The thin, naked young girl stared down at Evelyn impassively. The face was recognizable, after all, she had spent hours and hours looking over the children's files, looking at their faces. But the girl was pale, so pale that she could see the veins under her skin, and so tall and thin that she, for a second, had to think to realize that she wasn't a teenager yet. “Momma!” Emily gasped, stunned and staring at her mother, hands and clothes smeared with paint. “B-baby-!” Evelyn tried to gasp out again, but Subject Twelve's foot, curiously elongated, crashed down on her, filling her vision. There was a tremendous crunch, and the fleeting thought that, this child, this tall thin child…could not possibly have weighed enough or have been strong enough to hurt her like this. Then she thought no more. Ever. Emily, meanwhile, started to cry, as the red clay earth guzzled her mother's dark blood, before the other girl, the older, elfin one, picked her up gently and soothed her with a few hummed bars of song that erased all the pain from the toddler's head. “Shh…don't worry.” “My mommy?” “No, no..it wasn't your momma. Just a monster who looked like her. Do you understand?” Emily stared at the older girl, and nodded, sniffing a little bit. “…Ready to go back to singing with the others?” “O-okay.” Addendum 877-5 Doctor Weston's residence and the residence of family destroyed, as well as all video and vocal recordings of any member of the Weston family using SCP-9005-1. Doctor Weston's Status: Missing. Presumed Dead.

When you came back to your senses, you were running through the woods. You don't remember how you got here; all you know is that you must keep running. Your strength is almost gone, the air is refusing to enter your lungs, but you must not stop. Why is that? How did it come to this? Your mind wanders… It started four days ago. Balls It was a normal day. You woke up, went to work, came back home, had dinner with your family and went to your bed with your spouse. But that night, you didn't sleep. It's not that you didn't want to sleep. You simply weren't able to close your eyes and dream. The hours dragged as you uncomfortably twisted and turned in bed, being careful to not wake the person beside you. 2 AM… 4 AM… Keep running keep running don't stop Come 6 AM and you didn't sleep at all. But it was time to get up again and go to work. You changed clothes, washed your face, ate breakfast and left the house. "It's all right'', you thought, ''I can get some rest during the coffee break. Just a little nap…" But you didn't get that nap, right? You didn't get any rest that day. There was too much work to do. Don't stop oh please don't let me stop That night you found yourself back in your bed. Twisting and turning, twisting and turning. The incessant tick-tock of the alarm clock was starting to drive you mad. No rest for you again that night. No rest for you in the following night either. And… yeah, no rest yesterday either, now that you think about it. Dammit dammit dammit why am I running why Your family noticed. They commented on it, but your head was aching. You just wanted them to simply shut up shut up shut UP be quiet for a while. Silence was comforting, although the constant, annoying buzz on your head was making things worse. Yesterday was very bad. You couldn't keep your eyes open, but you couldn't sleep and OH how I wish I could sleep just a little please either. Your appearance was terrible, your co-workers said. Oh, so horrible! When was the last time you slept, they asked. All of them asking the same question, the same DAMN QUESTION when you just wished for a little silence. All this noise was making you irritated. Angry. You just wanted some silence, why couldn't they just LEAVE you ALONE for a— You blacked out. And when you came back to your senses, you were running through the woods. runrunrunrunrunrunrunrunrun Your hands are warm. runrunrunrunrunrunrunrunrun As you get deeper into the forest, the trees became less and less sparse. You have to be careful; you know that, if you trip, you won't get up. runrunrunrunrunrunrunrunr— But it is inevitable. You trip. And fall on the forest's soft ground. … The woods are quiet. … With your remaining strength, you turn your body around. It is hard to breathe facing the floor. … Moments later, you hear soft footsteps coming in your direction. … But you don't see anything. … They stop. And then, you suddenly feel a sharp pain in your stomach. You want to scream. The pain is unbearable. But, you're too tired. So, so tired. You can't even raise your head and see the large claw marks forming in your abdomen, ripping apart your skin and meat, leaving your guts exposed. Before closing your eyes for the last time, you see a large piece of your flesh being ripped off your body, floating for a while, and then disappearing into thin air with a sickening noise.

D-Class subject 919-05 was a very, very bad man. Arrested, tried, and convicted of multiple counts of child abduction, rape, and first degree murder, 919-05 was on track for death row. The prison surgeon was standing at the end of the hall, and with him was the needle waiting to dig into his arm. The new correctional officers at his sides showed no mercy for the convict. They were tall, large men with no-nonsense attitudes, nothing like the officers in the other hall. In fact, their uniforms looked different as well. Suddenly, the hall disappeared from in front of him, and 919-05 was plunged into darkness. He was caught literally red-handed, having just disposed of another victim in the woods near her home. At his trial, he expressed gratitude to the families of the victims for providing him with the children that fueled his perverse needs. There were no witnesses registered for his execution. His only remaining family was a father who wanted nothing to do with the sick man that his son had become; and the families of his victims didn't want to see another moment of the monster who took away their children so many years ago. The media followed his trial closely; covering 919-05's story up to a week after his execution was carried out. Except D-Class subject 919-05 wasn't executed. Not yet. The Foundation had him. “… and after careful review of the specific facts of the subject, the nature of the experiment, and the nature of SCP-919, permission for Experiment 919-23 is granted for Dr. Temke.” “Thank you gentlemen. I believe that all the necessary requirements have now been met, so I won't waste any more of your valuable time…” “One more thing, Doctor… we know about your niece. We've known for a few weeks now.” The pallor on Dr. Temke's face increased significantly. They've already granted their permission, why would they go back on it now? This experiment could help so many tormented families… “Oh?” was all he managed to squeak out. “Just a warning. Follow the experiment protocols exactly. Any deviation will not be tolerated.” The relief washed over him like a river. “Of course. Thank you.” Dr. Temke left the boardroom, the sweat fogging his glasses, and his hands shaking. 919-05 was right there in front of him. An IV drip provided the necessary paralytic to keep him from moving too much, but he could still speak. And boy did he speak. He cried, he screamed, he begged, he threatened to call his lawyer. Not surprisingly, after that last request was denied, he started to calm down a bit and tried to assess his surroundings. There wasn't much to see. He was strapped to a wheelchair, and could barely move his arms and legs. His head kept flopping side to side as he surveyed his new prison. It was as if his neck muscles were just too tired to hold up his head. There was no light except for a lone bulb directly above his head, making him sweat and squint. The stinging sweat dripped right into his eyes and blurred his vision. From what he could see, there was a large black curtain in front of him. He couldn't see what it was covering, but it was tall. To the right and slightly behind the curtain was a chair. It was one of those fancy ones with upholstered arms and made of leather. Far behind both of those were two guards, dressed just like the men who were taking him to the chamber at the end of the hall. That was three days ago. A door opens out of view of 919-05, and a tall man in a lab coat walks in and sits in the chair next to the curtain. The man looks through several pieces of paper on a clipboard, and then locks his gaze onto 919-05. His eyes stare intently at 919-05, seeming to look beyond the eyes at the pathetic little man paralyzed in the wheelchair. After a few seconds, 919-05 speaks. “I want my lawyer,” he says with a tremble. “I want my lawyer right now, and I won't talk to you.” The doctor adjusts his glasses and looks at his watch. He takes a pen out of his pocket and says, “You were convicted of killing almost a dozen children over the last two years. Where are their bodies?” “Fuck you,” says 919-05. “I want my lawyer.” “Please answer the question.” Dr. Temke wipes his forehead with a handkerchief, gripping his pen tightly with the other hand. “Where are the children hidden? All of them. Did you bury them?" "I want my lawyer…" "Burn them?" "My lawyer. I want my lawyer now…" "Where are they?! Where is Angie? WHERE IS MY NIECE?!” “I said I want my lawyer. Who the hell are you?! I WANT TO SEE MY FUCKING LAWYER! I WANT TO SEE HIM NOW!” 919-05 screams, the anger and fear easily visible in his eyes. “You don't have a lawyer. You…you were executed three days ago, and dead men don't get lawyers.” Dr. Temke stands up and takes a step to the side of the black curtain. “I'll ask you once more, where are the kids' bodies? They deserve proper burials.” “I want to see my lawyer,” is all 919-05 mutters. “I'll show you something worse.” At this Dr. Temke pulls down on the curtain, showing a large ornate mirror, reflecting back to 919-05 just his own image. Dr. Temke takes a step away, reaching into his lab coat. He pulls out a gun and points it directly at 919-05's stomach, his finger twitching with anticipation. The fear in 919-05's eyes crescendos, and he stares directly at the gun. For the first time, he doesn't say anything and just breathes in heavily, possibly wondering why he hasn't been shot yet. Seconds feels like hours, but after a short while the silence is broken. Not by 919-05. Not by the Doctor. Not even by the imposing guards in the corners. The sound comes from right in front of 919-05. From the mirror. “Please…don't go…please stay…” 919-05's jaw drops, but his surprise is interrupted as an explosion shatters the silence, followed by a pain in his stomach that feels like he just swallowed a piece of red-hot coal. He manages to look up and see the smoke curling up from the barrel of the gun. The pain is intense, and 919-05 starts screaming. The IV drip is barely keeping him from moving. Dr. Temke suddenly changes track. He throws the gun on the floor and turns to look at the mirror. “Please…keep him here. Don't take him away.” “I will,” says the Doctor. “Tell me, can you move? Can you shake your feet for me?” “No, I can't. I'm sorry. Please don't be mad. Please don't take him away. I can try again. Give me a minute and I can try moving them again. Don't take him away. Please…” the reflection pleads. “I won't. It's okay, just answer the questions, okay? Are you shot? Look at your stomach. Have you been shot?” “No, I'm okay, I haven't been shot.” Dr. Temke takes out a tape recorder and turns away, “919-05A seems to suffer the same disadvantages as 919-05 prior to losing synchronicity. Any physical damage done to 919-05 after losing synchronicity does not seem to be reflected in 919-05A. Sweat from the light and interrogation is still visible on…” 919-05 lets out a low moan, breaking the Doctor's concentration. The Doctor stares at him, and then quickly turns his gaze back to the reflection. “…is still visible on 919-05A's forehead. All physical characteristics are identical prior to the gunshot made approximately 15 seconds after exposure." He pauses to clear his throat. "This man…you…you murdered and raped several children, and then hid their bodies. Where are they?” “Please don't take him away. They're in an old storm shelter; 6 miles west off of mile marker 23 on Route 11. You're not going to take him there, are you?… It's near where my dad used to have a cabin when I was younger. He can still show you where…” 919-05 lets out a loud moan and tries to speak. Dr. Temke's head whips around to look at him. He bends down and picks up the gun, pointing it right at 919-05's skull. 919-05 looks up at the man in the lab coat, and at the gun in his hand. His vision is blurred and his mind is fuzzy, but he knows this is something…different. Something horrifying. “Wha…Who are you…” Dr. Temke pulls the trigger, terminating 919-05 immediately. He gasps at how easy it was, and how immediately 919-05 just slumps down. A few seconds pass. He looks up at the camera that was stationed behind 919-05. “Well? What does the father say? Is it there?” A few more seconds pass. Static, and then a voice fill the room, “Yeah…he says he hasn't been there in almost a decade, but it's not far from one of our stationed agents. We're sending him over now.” “Please…keep him here.” Dr. Temke looks up and sees 919-05A still staring intently at the body of the terminated D-Class. “Right…we've still got some questions for you…” An hour later, Dr. Temke puts down his pen. He looks across the room at the body of the man who took away his only niece's life. The man was given an extra three days to live, and his contribution to this experiment greatly improved the understanding of the nature of SCP-919. That thought is secondary. The only thing he truly feels is the relief at getting to pull the trigger. He knows he will have to submit himself to psychiatric evaluation after this. That and a mandatory 2-week vacation were prerequisites of the experiment he agreed to. “Uh, Dr. Temke? We've got some news.” Dr. Temke sits upright and stares intently at the camera. 919-05A does the same. “Yeah…we found the bodies. We found all eleven of them. Right where 919-05A said they were. ” “See! I told you I could help! Please leave him here; I can't do anything else to anyone. I can just sit here, now.” 919-05A hasn't changed during the entire ordeal. He hasn't said anything new but the truth. He hasn't changed his demeanor or attitude. He's still the same subject he was when he was first brought into existence. There is nothing new to learn here. Dr. Temke stands up and walks back to the door he came in through. As he leaves, he turns to one of the guards. “Get someone down here to clean up. I need the body sent to Autopsy, and SCP-919 returned to the containment cell.” At this, 919-05A starts screaming and thrashing in his bonds. “PLEASE! OHGODOHGODOHGOD…PLEASE NO! NO! YOU PROMISED! DON'T TAKE HIM AWAY! OH GOD NO NO NO!” The guard moves towards the mirror and starts picking up the black curtain from the floor. Dr. Temke ignores the pleas of the scared reflection and walks out of the door, letting it slowly shut behind him. He can hear 919-05A screaming all the way down the hall. As he turns the corner, the screaming abruptly stops.

I'm going to preface this. This was written as a joke. You shouldn't take this as something to emulate. Having someone write something in the same vein would be embarrassing, and I'd probably end up taking the story down. So please, as you read this, remember, it's not even CLOSE to possibly being canon. Thomas lazed at the security desk. Fifteen minutes until his shift ended. Fifteen minutes until he could go get a drink, hit on that cute girl from maintenance. She looked like she sure knew her way around a wrench, and Thomas had a "tool" of his own for her to handl- "Uh, Pardon me. Can you tell me where the research labs are?" Thomas' musings were interrupted by the sound of his genitalia retracting inside his body from sheer horror. Floating in front of him, approximately four feet above the ground, was a fetus. A high pitched voice spoke again. "Normally I would know where it is, but I'm a new transfer and your site is set up strangely. My name is Doctor Abortion." "Do-do-doctor what?!" "Doctor Abortion. As you may imagine, my name is centered around my unusual appearance. Now, if you'll direct me to the research labs, I will be out of your hair." Thomas wordlessly pointed. The fetus bobbed at him, and floated off. Today, Thomas decided, was a good day to hide. Under his bed. In the hallways, people stopped and stared. A female lab assistant screamed, and fainted. The fetus bobbing its way along the corridors took no notice. A tune was hummed, though, for the life of them, they couldn't understand how. The abortion who floated like a butterfly and gave nightmares like an elder god paused in front of a door. A knock was heard, and boggled many a researcher. Doctor Gerald poked his head out and stared. "Surprise, Daddy!" Thomas, hiding under his bed, shrank deeper into the darkness at the sound of a piercing scream. "But, but, but, but!" "You transferred right after I started to show. Not trying to run on me, were you?" "No! I didn't know! No one told me!" "Probably because of the fear of me being captured. Most one-night-stand babies aren't this valuable." "So, you're sure it's me?" "Yes, I am. They ran all sorts of tests on me. Still are, actually." "So, uh, what is the, uh…?" "He's a healthy little boy." "What are we going to name it?" "Oh, sticking around are we? Well, I was thinking…Claude. After me."

Richard Gnosis sat there at his desk, staring at his laptop screen in a mix of bewilderment, shock, and relief. Sure, he knew that there was a group of researchers that had been working for the Hand, spanning the gamut of clearances from Level 1 to Level 4. And yes, he did know that they were planning on escaping their Sites back to… to wherever the hell the Hand held Foundation traitors. But he didn't expect them to be so stupid as to post all their files on the Internet. And yet there it was, the green eyes of SCP-173 staring at him from the screen of his laptop. At least the people responsible had been caught; they didn't bother trying to disguise where the upload was from. But by the time the leak was discovered it was too late to stop it; they'd already managed to upload five entire reports (partially censored, thank God). He closed his laptop screen, unable to take that mocking pixelated glare any longer, leaned back in his chair, and thought. In his head, he ran through the standard Information Control options, discarding all of them one by one; there was already a noticeable uptick in the amount of searches for Foundation-related keywords. Looking at the results, apparently some random paranormal community or another had found the report on 173 and decided it was interesting. He could use this. He loaded the files on some of the SCPs he was cleared to access for inspiration and got to work writing. …gains energy from anything it ingests, organic or inorganic… …reddish brown substance on the floor is a combination of… …created in the aftermath of WWII, from the remnants of defecting…. A few of the entries were completely unedited versions of real files on SCPs; some of them were copies of false data that had been given to people suspected of being spies. Different fake SCPs for different people would let him figure out who was a traitor leaking data and who just looked guilty. He didn't want to delete the real ones, it might draw suspicion, except… he stopped. His eyes fell on three digits, and his mouse moved over the delete button. He looked at the portrait on his desk, then back. He clicked, and got back to work; he had ideas for characters, so many ideas, and they all had to be written. He worked hard into the night, his fingers dancing over the keys in an irregular rhythm, pausing for a few minutes to wait for a burst of inspiration, then tapping like raindrops on a windowpane. After a few hours, the words started swimming in front of his eyes, but he pressed on like a man possessed by a Muse until he could write no more. He closed the lid of his laptop, the last thing he saw before he closed his eyes a group portrait of sixteen people. And even when he let sleep him, his characters appeared to him in his dreams, whispering ideas and plot hooks to his subconscious. When he woke up the next day, he found himself watching his phone walk across his desk. He grabbed it and sat up, rubbing where his cheek had been resting against the metal imprint on his laptop for the past few hours, and read the screen with red eyes. He had a meeting in… an hour. Shit. And it was in room 307 with three people. Shit. He knew exactly what that meant. He splashed some cold water on his face, slapped his cheeks a few times, and read over his files on the security breach. Meeting with Senior Staff was never enjoyable. They always showed up in threes; It was the smallest number that could both prevent deadlock and allow debate on both sides of an issue, and they preferred to meet together as little as possible. So when Gnosis showed up to the meeting the next day regarding Incident Mike Echo Seven Alpha, he knew roughly what to expect. Three faces, none of whom he was familiar with, stared at him without a single hint of emotion as he entered the door. There was a smell of sterility and rubbing alcohol, and his eyes watered just a little. He took a seat. "What made you think that the best approach to the worst leak since you started working Information Control was to publicize it?" Dr. Myers, a serious-looking scientist whose balding hair contrasted with his younger features; he couldn't have been older than 40 "Sir, it was my professional judgment that shutting down the site posted by the defectors would only draw more attention, especially given that it would require purging it from search engine caches." "How does that make a difference? I'm not an expert, but I know we've purged data from engines before. And surely any publicity we might've drawn from the shutdown would be better than… than… this." That was Dr. Hefner, a thin woman who looked to be in her 50s. "Yes sir, but it's… difficult. My contacts are no longer in positions that allow them access, and remote entry would require more computational power than I can access." "So you're telling us you're not good enough to do it." The third man was named Gregor; he was the youngest of the three, maybe in his late thirties. He'd obviously never worked in the field; a body shape like that never could have passed the field agent regimen. "I do not believe, sir, that anybody else could have done any better. Breaking into the systems of an entity such as Google is a highly non-trivial task." "Your reports indicate that you've developed alternate Senior Staff for the fictional Foundation. Surely you don't intend on maintaining them yourself." Hefner again. "I… I do, sir." He shifted about uncomfortably in his chair; he knew that this would be the part that would be the hardest for them to swallow. But he had to keep this story going, for his own sake. He could have sworn Myers was writing something down on a notepad just out of his vision. "So the containment for this leak is going to cause a drain on your resources for the forseeable future?" Gregor looked amused, a grin spreading across his slightly overweight face. "Unfortunately, yes." "So why shouldn't we just have the information scrubbed the hard way, then reassign you to Secondary duty?" The grin spread further; he looked about ready to bite his head off. "With all due respect, sir, part of working in Information Control is the ability to react without explicit authorization from one's superiors. If necessary, I can curb the number of personas required. However, I believe the job can be completed in my spare time." "I certainly hope so; we don't pay you to sit around and write stories all day." Hefner's pencil-thin lips betrayed the barest hint of a smirk. "Stories are what I deal in, sir. This is just a different form of disinformation, one that will cloak the truth in a sea of lies." "I certainly hope you're right, Doctor. Dismissed." Myers stood and left, followed by the other two. "Thank you, sirs." He quickly rose and exited, then returned to his quarters, trying to lose himself in the crowd of researchers, agents, and Secondary personnel that always flowed through the halls of the Sites. The gravity of what he'd done was catching up to him, and he needed sleep; he was starting to twitch and have thoughts that he thought he had suppressed. So he collapsed in his bed, not bothering to change out of his work clothes, and let sleep claim him. And in his dreams, the characters he had written came back to him, taunting him with his recollections. And for the next few days, in between other assignments, he worked on the project. Writing stories of love and loss, of happiness and sadness and the entire spectrum in between, of triumph and failure. He didn't publish them all right away; no, he published them over time, trying to build up an audience for his stories. At first, his performance didn't suffer; he contained information breaches well enough, and his supervisors let it slide. But he withdrew more and more into the fantasy of his own creation. Leaks grew in frequency, went unnoticed for longer, and contained more damaging information. And when his door was unlocked from the outside and forced open, he didn't make a sound, save the soft clicking of keypresses. Final Report on Incident Mike Echo Seven Alpha. Doctor Gnosis's plan to hide the leaked documents in plain sight has worked; there have been no signs of elevated suspicion regarding the leaked Foundation documents, and further leaks can be brought under the aegis of this one as an 'alternate reality game'. It is quite fortunate that many of the leaked documents are also fake; this gives us the opportunity to detect investigation via standard query-tagging procedure. However, one aspect of the created fiction is troubling. Two weeks before the Incident, a containment breach in Site ██ led to the death of several Foundation personnel that were good friends with Dr. Gnosis. Many of the invented personalities seem to resemble those of the deceased, and the fictional Foundation possesses the technology to selectively erase memories; it is therefore suggested that Dr. Gnosis be removed from the Incident team as soon as is reasonably possible to avoid escapism or other mental problems. Addendum: On ██/██/████, five days after the incident, Dr. Gnosis's access to the Mike Echo Seven Alpha project was stripped, and he was forced into psychiatric leave with mandatory counseling regarding the death of his friends. Initial attempts are promising in part due to the threat of mandatory retirement, but efforts must be made in order to prevent a relapse. The password to his account, codename 'T██ A████████████', is unknown and cannot be reset without alerting the host of the information; however, the password for the accounts of the 'characters' have been recovered. Their personas have proven to be too popular to discontinue, and therefore have been assigned to [REDACTED], with stories to be written in their spare time as necessary.

Doctor Braddock nervously walked to the table where the guard guided him. He'd never been in such an elegant club before, and felt terribly out of place. His clothing was rumpled, his long black hair mussed, and his eyes red. "Thank you for meeting me on such short notice," he said as he sat down. "No trouble at all, sir. Thank you for your time," said the suave man in the business suit, as he shook Braddock's hand. He smiled broadly, showing off perfect teeth. He was in stark contrast with the researcher, not a single hair on his wavy blond coiffure out of place. "I've… thought about your offer," said Braddock. "And?" The other man raised a neat, trimmed eyebrow. "Well…" Braddock trailed off. "I think I'd like more information. Your e-mail was, well, a bit vague." "Of course," the man said. "Now, we're not asking a lot. Certainly nothing your… employer will miss. Just a few knick-knacks. Odds and ends. We'd be willing to pay handsomely." "I think I could do that," Braddock said slowly. "I need money awfully badly, Mister..?" "I think it's best if we keep things on a first-name basis, Jim," the man said smoothly. "Call me Jeremy." Braddock nodded. He was already feeling much more at ease. "All right, Jeremy. Ah, did you bring any money with you?" "Of course, of course. Just a little up front, to help with those little costs." Jeremy handed Braddock an envelope. "My… associates understand how sometimes, the cards just aren't with you." "Thank you, thank you so much," Braddock said, nearly crying. "There, there," Jeremy said, patting him on the shoulder. "Now it's time for drinks. What's your pleasure? I'm buying." Braddock made his way to the familiar table. This was his fourth visit. The second time he'd brought something with him. "Ah, Jim, glad you could join me. Please, sit." Jeremy stood to shake his hand. "Tell me, how are the races?" "Not bad. I won a hundred dollars yesterday," Braddock said as he sat down, failing to mention that he'd lost twice that in other bets. "Glad to hear it, glad to hear it. Now, what have you got for us this time?" Jeremy leaned forward in his seat expectantly. Braddock looked around nervously. "Don't worry, Jim. We're among friends." Jeremy touched Braddock's hand reassuringly. "All right." Braddock reached into his suitcase. He pulled out a leather jacket. "I reported this destroyed this morning. I was supposed to put it in the incinerator. But don't worry. I got a substitute. No one knows it's gone." "That's great, Jim. Very clever," said Jeremy. "Now, what does it do?" "Wearing this lets you breathe underwater," he explained. "Just make sure it's zipped up all the way." "That's great, Jim," said Jeremy. "I know someone who'd just love something like this." Jeremy put it into a much fancier leather briefcase. "And here's your money, as promised." He pulled out the now-familiar envelope. Braddock took it from his hands eagerly, and took a swift intake of breath when he looked inside. "This means a lot to me," Braddock said as they shook hands again. "I know," Jeremy said. "I know." It had been eight years since Braddock had met Jeremy, and he'd changed a great deal in that time. He had a higher-paying position in the Foundation now, and his graying hair lent him an air of authority he'd lacked. And yet, the money still seemed to slip away. At least he had a good, steady, secondary source of money. "Jim!" Jeremy gave him a warm handshake. He looked the same as he had eight years ago. They sat down at the club's bar. Braddock pulled out his latest acquisition. It was a black sleep mask, kept sealed in a plastic baggy. "Looks interesting," Jeremy said. "What does this one do?" "Ah. Yes." Braddock coughed. "When worn, the wearer experiences extremely, well, erotic dreams. Full sensory perception. But of rather… kinky sorts of sex." "I see." Jeremy's blue eyes lit up with humor. "Have you tried it out?" "I… Yes. Once." Braddock's cheesed flushed. "I… found it more disorienting than anything else. But the D-Cla— That is, the test subjects found it rather addictive after a time." "Hmm. Yes, I think this will do nicely. Well done, Jim." Jeremy took the plastic baggy from Braddock and placed it into a velvet-lined box. "I should warn you. If it's used long enough, the subjects… Well, they die." Braddock looked even more embarrassed. "How extraordinary. What of?" Jeremy asked. "Er, auto-erotic asphyxiation," Braddock said, his blush crawling up his face. "Well, I'll be sure that it doesn't get put into the, ah, wrong hands," Jeremy said. "Getting it wasn't easy," said Braddock, a trifle glumly. "They wanted to test it. I had to make it look like it was destroyed in an accident." "Now, Jim," Jeremy said, a finger raised, "you know as well as I do that the old trinkets of yesterday just aren't in as demand with my clients as they used to be. I just couldn't pay you as much for those as I could in the old days." Braddock winced. He couldn't afford to take a cut in payment. Not at this point. Not with his debts. "Right. Right." "Hey, you're a pro, Jim. I'm sure you can handle just about anything, right?" Jeremy gave him one of those brilliant smiles. "Right," Braddock said, his confidence returning. There were times he almost felt like a secret agent, going undercover. Just call him 005. "Here's your payment. I think you'll find it's more than sufficient." Jeremy handed him the customary envelope. Braddock didn't bother opening it. Jeremy had never once failed to pay him enough once satisfied. Not in the entire time Braddock had known him. They shook hands, and Braddock hurried out. There was just time to place a bet. Braddock walked into the club, escorted by a frightened young woman with mousy brown hair. He cooed reassuring words to her, and she calmed down. Certainly, these days Braddock presented a rather harmless front, with his balding pate and prematurely lined face. Not even forty, and he was already starting to look old. He'd always hoped he'd age gracefully, like his father. No such luck. Ah well. No use griping about the inevitable. "Right this way, my dear," he said, in a fatherly tone. "Ah, Jim, there you are. And who's this enchanting specimen?" Jeremy asked. "This is Renee," Braddock said. "She's the girl I told you about." Renee was an amazing discovery. By chance, he'd found the order for her capture, and managed to find her before the MTF did. It had been a risk, but Jeremy had been so blasted picky these days. He didn't seem disappointed today, however. "Enchanté," he said, bowing gallantly, taking her hand lightly. Renee blushed, and smiled shyly. She looked more relaxed than she'd been since Braddock had found her the day before. "Thank you," she said softly. "Renee has a special gift," Braddock said. "She can regenerate parts of herself. Quite quickly, too, I'm given to understand." That was an understatement. In the incident that had brought her to the Foundation's attention, she'd lost her arm in a car accident. It had grown back by the time they got her to the hospital. The official story was that the paramedics had simply made a mistake, but Braddock knew better. He'd even been able to experiment a little, with Renee's permission. Just a few tests, with full anesthesia. "Oh, Mr. Carter's going to love you," Jeremy said. He turned back to Braddock. "And here you go, Jim. Come back in a week. I think you've earned a bonus." "What's going on, Doctor?" Renee asked, suddenly suspicious. "Just a little business between us," Jeremy said smoothly. "Nothing to worry about." He stood, and held out his arm to her. "Why don't we just go arrange transportation for you? Jim, order whatever you like, and put it on my tab. I'll see you next week." Braddock nodded as he watched them leave. He felt a little… troubled by the affair. He'd given them plenty of objects in the past fifteen years, some of them almost alive, but this was the first time he'd ever sold a person. Well, she was better off in their hands than in the Foundation's. Probably. Anyway, what was he supposed to do? His funds were going dry. He just needed a little more, so he could make that big win… Braddock stumbled into the club, wheezing for breath. He cursed his body, letting itself become so old, so young. "Jeremy! Where are you?" The club was deserted. The lights were turned off, the decor removed. Even the furniture was gone. All except for one familiar table. Jeremy seemed to be the sole occupant of the building. "What can I do for you?" he asked politely. "They know!" Braddock said, miserably. "I don't know how, but they found out!" "I was afraid something like this would happen," Jeremy said. He was as smooth as ever, but there was something… distant about him. "You shouldn't have tried siphoning that money from their accounts." Braddock did a double take. "How did you know about that?" "We've watched your finances for a long time, Jim. How do you think we found you?" he asked. "Knew about your debts? When we saw all that money appear in your account, well, it had to come from somewhere. Where else could you have gotten it?" "What am I going to do?" Braddock asked. "Jeremy, you've got to help me." Jeremy sighed, and placed a hand on Braddock's shoulder. However, rather than reassure, it simply pushed him down. He felt the strength leave his legs, and he collapsed to his knees. "I'm afraid not, Jim. You've become a liability to us. You're just no use to us now. At this point, you're just a loose end. I'll leave it to your friends to clean you up. I'm sure you gave them a nice, clear trail to follow." "Jeremy! You can't do this," Braddock whimpered, unable to rise. "Jeremy!" "Sorry, Jim. But hey, thanks for your time." He turned away, paused, and turned back. "Oh, and Jim? It's Mister Marshall. Good day."

Gentlemen, the year is 194█. I have been gone from your sight for a very long time, and traveled far along my own grim path. Such is life! But, having left you as keepers of my fortunes in my absence, I must now instruct you in the stewardship of that wealth, that it might better your own futures as well as mine. You will find enclosed with this missive a series of generalized instructions on the sale and distribution of my stock portfolio. Such things are of little importance as compared to events unfolding elsewhere. The mad German will soon be toppled, though his influences will live on for a regrettably long time… You may perhaps find it prudent to disassociate yourselves with that party entirely. Politically, you will find yourselves carrying quite sufficient resources to ensure your own prosperity, however, those offices which cannot be purchased directly must be closely watched. In Britannia, you have several years yet with the current monarch, and his succession should be easily guessed. In the United states, it may behoove you to wait before exerting any modicum of control; I suggest 19██ as an appropriate time to establish a member of our little cabal in the presidential office, which segues me neatly into my next point. In the wake of war, the commander-in-chief of the United States will likely find himself beset by furtive offers from such organizations as may oppose our interests; you well know to whom I refer. Perhaps your influence shall suffice to deter him from aiding their endeavors, or perhaps not. Tread lightly. When the time is ripe and one of our own has risen to power within the colonies, cast your eye toward that rabble of lab coats and secrecy who have so recently moved against your holdings in France, for they will actively seek to prevent his works. █████ the Foundation, gentlemen. ████ ████ ██████ ███ ████████ ███████, and then become our greatest ███████. Of this I shall tell you more when the time is right. In conclusion, gentlemen, I bid you good luck. Even from the deeper dream in which I walk, I cast my thoughts and my will toward the furthering of our mutual goal. As always, B██████ P███-F████ Dark "Damn you, Dark. You always were an aesthetic wacko." "He's never been wrong yet." "He's dead." "Perhaps, my dear Carter. Perhaps. But that changes nothing. Will we follow his advice in Germany?" "Looks like we'll have to." "Very well." Sic transit gloria mundi.

A fleet of black SUVs smoothly swept over the blasted plain. Several thousand fine Armani suits were carefully swept free of dust, imagined or otherwise, and then filthied by the gravel and dust that filled a long walk to a building most thought abandoned. Several thousand adam's apples bobbed in unison as their owners carefully imbibed water and an anti-radiation pill. Few would believe that one of the most, if not THE most capitalistic organization in the world met in the ass end of the Ukraine for the annual stockholder's meeting. Security was, as always, tight as a drum. Hard faced men with scars checked and double-checked assault rifles and pistols, loaded with rounds made illegal decades before. Comm units squawked with static and fell silent as their owners checked in, every three minutes and ten seconds on the dot. Satellites were re-purposed to scan the terrain. All the security money could possibly buy. And every PMC and hired goon was informed that if anything interrupted the meeting, accounts, (significant pause) would be balanced (significant look). A wrinkled aged throat carefully cleared itself. "Jenkins. Tell me, how do you think I'm feeling about Acquisitions? Do you think I'm giddy? Do you think the sight of your quotas not being met fills me with breathless joy?" A rhythmic hissing steadily echoed across the room, from the large mahogany table to the steel catwalks. Sunlight gleamed red through a cat's cradle of tubes. "Sir, you understand as well as I do; we push more into intelligence, we lose out on actual obtainment. Frankly, it's becoming hard to find any that aren't either intolerably lethal, or boring." A hand reached up to straighten a tie. Rheumy eyes glazed over for a second, imagining a checkered noose slowly strangling its owner. If only. "But, as you can imagine, the benefit of our frequent tip-offs is working wonders on our relationship to the Foundation. We've been experiencing unprecedented geniality from the directors of Sites 54, 13, and 10. We think we may be able to leverage this into getting some intel on the safer, more eccentric artifacts discovered near those sites." Lips drew back over teeth stained an ugly brown. Jenkins mentally compared the expression to that of a tiger, and found the animal wanting, at least in pure cruelty. "Let me guess. They're sending you the occasional encrypted email to a, what do they call it? Ah, an "Anomalous Item". You, meanwhile, take this as a sign of good faith and tell them where a-a, I don't know, a giant man-eating bug or some such fuckery, you tell them where that is located. They gain a new item to study, and you get table scraps." Jenkins' eyes widened. Harsh, wracking laughter overtook the man in front of him. It abruptly cut off. "You really are a fucking imbecile aren't you. They've been doing this game for how long? Longer than I have. You think they're going to be impressed by a song and dance routine, followed by blowjobs? Christ. Now I know why Marshall was smiling so hard when he appointed you, the fucking prick." A nod towards the balconies. "M-Mr. Carter, pleas-" The shot was deafening, a roar accompanied, however quietly, by the noise of Jenkins' leg exploding. He cried out, a shrill animal noise. "Jenkins, you're going to serve a purpose. You're going to succeed Franklin when he's done, just like you did when you took over Acquisitions." The agony in Jenkins' eyes gave way to horror, then panic. He struggled to crawl away, but his hands slipped in the slick of blood created by the panicked beating of his own heart. Men walked over and grabbed him, dragging him away. "Now then…" The man known as "Mr. Carter" gazed at the assembled members of his organization. They stared back, impassively. On the back of Carter's wheelchair, Franklin gazed sightlessly through milky eyes, his body twitching spasmodically every few seconds. Blood ran through clear tubes that extended from his back into Carter. His heart, fatigued though it was through working for two bodies, pumped steadily. The iron rings that suspended him to the chair squeaked slightly, as an involuntary muscle spasm twitched the stump of the limb it was attached to. Perspiration gleamed on the scar from his lobotomy. "…Back to business."

The Present, Eventually: Site Director Neil Ghost was one of the longest-serving members of the Foundation, a feat made possible by the relative safety of his job. It was rare that one of those few remaining SCPs originally classified as “Safe” ever proved otherwise, and as one of the caretakers of the relatively less deadly artifacts and anomalies, he enjoyed a certain amount of relaxation occasionally. A mostly competent staff, a relatively safe job, and a retirement age quickly approaching: Ghost had it all. He breathed a sigh and leaned back into his chair, pulling down his glasses long enough to rub his eyes. He might have drifted off for a moment, except that he heard… something. His eyes shot open and turned toward the door, narrowing. Almost without breathing, he reached for the front of his desk and retrieved a heavy brass candlestick he'd kept there ever since The Serpent's Hand had broken in and "borrowed" a few SCPs. He still had the note they'd left, polite and somewhat condescending, hidden away in a desk drawer, right next to the broken commendation plaque he'd cracked over one of their heads when they'd come back for more. He felt comforted by the makeshift weapon's presence as he stood and slowly made his way to the door. Age had not lessened the instincts his time as an Agent had given him. He pressed an ear against the wood finish, listening again for the noise. He was almost certain he'd heard someone walking past his office, which shouldn't be possible. No one else at this site had his clearance, and as far as he knew, no one who did was supposed to be visiting anytime soon. He clicked the door open, peering into the black hallway. He stepped out, bracing himself against the wall as he slowly sidled down the corridor, listening as he progressed. He was certain he heard it now, someone further down the hall, someone in one of the storage rooms. He controlled his labored breathing as he crept closer, turning the cold brass in his hands, snaking a step at a time until he stood directly next to the door. It was a rustle of files, the paper kind that were just used for archival information now. With a hard twist, he turned himself into the door, tensed to leap at whoever he saw. Instead, a small metal disk whirled by his head, causing him to turn sharply and stare as the wall behind him erupted with thumb tacks, nails, and burning thorns. He tried to turn back again, but instead felt a fist connect solidly with his jaw, sending him falling backwards onto the floor, the heavy candlestick spiraling out of reach. He glanced up and saw a face he remembered: blond hair and blue eyes. Skin paler than he remembered, but ice had a tendency to do that to you. “Hello, Imants. I heard you'd been… released.” The younger man remained silent, but the knuckles of the hand clenching a couple of file folders whitened even further as he tightened his grip. Ghost's fingers were anxiously searching through the needles and points covering the floor, digging into his fingers and back. “You know, if you turn yourself in, we would be lenient. The situation has changed in recent years. We know you were young. Impressionable. The people who came to you for help were legends. Kondraki. Clef. It's no wonder you were star struck. Dragged along.” “And why wasn't this brought up at my first hearing?” Imants replied, sneering with irritation. “Like I said,” said Ghost, his fingers finally closing around the smooth, metal surface. “The situation has changed.” He flung the disk hard, awkwardly pushing himself off the floor and desperately rushing Imants full on, burying a heavy shoulder into the ex-agent's midsection as papers flew from the cabinets around them, edges sharpening and glistening as they shot out of their folders, cutting at both men. Imants was shoved back hard, slamming into the wall. Ghost fell to one knee suddenly, age catching up to him. He pushed himself up as quickly as he could, painfully straining as he put the last of his strength into a final, desperate uppercut when he felt the knee collide with his chest, knocking the wind out of him. Two more sharp blows to the back of the head, and darkness claimed him. Several Years Earlier: Dr. Glass had spent the past several years working with the Foundation, during which time he'd both seen and been subjected to more than his fair share of trauma. As a psychologist, he was supposed to analyze, interpret, and recommend treatment for dozens of cases a week, most of them repeat patients unable to deal with the stress of the job. When he'd finally been promoted upward, he expected a much less traumatic job. The Senior Staff he was now in charge of interviewing were supposed to be trained, hardened, and experienced. And while they were, he found his work all the more distressing. He would write a paper about each of them if he could. Over seventy separate bundles of neuroses, each on a case study in either sheer madness or inexplicably intricate coping mechanisms. Over half of them went around armed constantly against threats seen and unseen. Still others regressed into childlike states of coloring their reports, and still more simply died inside eventually. Then there were the special cases. A talking dog he had to interview, another man whose emotional nerves had been cauterized long, long ago, and a doctor who insisted on referring to himself as a chord rather than a name. And there was the butterfly man, who delighted in chaos, a woman who chased him with lamps, and a high-ranking agent who had threatened to kill him when he'd seen the Pondur he'd been given by an old patient. But it was the man with all the faces that gave Glass the most trouble. At first, he'd simply thought the staff had been joking with him about Dr. Bright, a phantasm in the background who seemingly resisted all attempts at analysis by sending a different person to the interview each month. Then, he'd read the file on SCP-963 and found the truth even more disturbing. At least he participated in the interviews somewhat, which was far more than could be said for the likes of Dr. Kondraki or Dr. Clef. They got a kick out of fucking with him; Jack Bright got a kick out of telling him the truth. He was surprisingly talkative to someone with sufficient security clearance. Glass listened intently, hearing about Bright's early life— though he spoke little about his family— and the events leading up to his first death. He also told him about the deaths he had experienced first hand, the ones he had physically experienced. Most of them were gruesome, as so often death was in the Foundation, and Jack recounted each with the reverence of a soldier remembering fallen comrades. The cycle continued, and Glass became more and more in tune with the one overbearing wish Jack Bright had: release. Glass remembered one point when Jack had been attempting to aggregate a body together with Professor Crow. The Frankensteining process had never worked, but he remembered the way Bright had looked at his hands, commented on them, admiring them for a moment or two. Weeks later, he'd asked him about his brother. Bright got quiet for a moment and tilted his head to the right, almost like he was listening for the answer. "I did what was necessary," he said. Dr. Glass continued to build the profiles, though after a while, he eventually stopped keeping anything but the most cursory notes on most of the staff. It was obvious that Dr. Gears would never change, though he still tried the occasional Rorschach test. Clef and Kondraki became a source of comedy at times, and he began to enjoy quiet coffees with Professor Crow in lieu of evaluation. But he kept keeping notes on Bright. For whatever reason, he was fascinated by the myriad of faces he'd seen over the years, the occasional animal, the regular shifts in gender. He noted cycles, patterns. He attempted to make sense of Bright's personality, the ways it moved and shifted, the ways it stayed the same. It was almost a year before he asked Jack Bright about his brother again. He had to go back and check his notes twice before he was satisfied, but he was sure that the tilt of the head, the listening expression, was exactly the same. "I did what was required," replied Jack. It was a subtle shift, but one that Glass noted. Something that was necessary equated to a personal decision; something that was required pointed to one mandatory. Over the months, Glass continued asking different questions of Jack, different leads and answers. But he always returned, every so often, to his brother. "I did what I was told." "It's his own fault." "I didn't choose for him to be that way." "I did what I wanted." Each time, the same motion, the same pattern; a shifting answer. But the early files, the files from before he and 963 were linked, were consistent. And so was Jack Bright's loyalty to the Foundation. That, more so than anything, had led to the man's meteoric rise. It was a mere week after his promotion to Foundation Director that he stopped by Dr. Glass's office for the last time. He and Glass exchanged pleasantries and congratulations, shared a cup of coffee, and relaxed, talking about the time Kondraki had shot up a break room over a failure to brew proper coffee or the time a new recruit mistook Kain for an office pet and tried to rub his belly. And for the last time, Dr. Glass looked at Jack, currently in the body of a green-eyed, red-haired child rapist, and asked him about his brother. This time, instead of looking off to the side, Jack looked right at Glass, his gaze intense and penetrating. "I don't remember." The Present: "According to my reports, there was a massive information dump around four months ago. A complete backup was made of all Foundation reports. At first I thought it was the standard backup before base evacuation, but…" "What's the problem, Mr. Halifax?" "The entry code was wrong. I did that backup myself, and these are not my access codes. Someone went into the system, erased the record of my backup, and made one of their own. No one would have even noticed it if they hadn't been looking at the specific date stamp." "You're saying that someone has a copy of the Foundation's archive, Halifax? Are you quite sure about that?" "Very sure, Dr. Bright. There's no one but me that accesses those terminals." "Can you tell me the user that accessed it?" "No, sir. They covered their tracks well. The only thing I know is that their password was last used over a decade ago." "Thank you, Mr. Halifax. See that the code is deactivated and put a trace on all public terminals to look for additional access attempts." "Yes, Director Bright." Jack Bright leaned back into her chair, fingering the outline of SCP-963-2 hidden underneath a loose-fitting shirt. Everything was beginning to fall into place. The sudden disappearance of Kondraki and Imants from incarceration; the damage to the Red Sea Object by the unseen gunshot; Clef's suicidal leap into a parallel world; and the string of attacks on Foundation archives. They were looking for something, whoever they were. And Bright knew she had to find out what it was before they laid their hands on it. With a complete copy of the archive, though, the paper files should be unnecessary. Everything was contained within the archive; the only things that they might not have included were the older SCPs that were no longer… The epiphany hit Dr. Bright like a ton of bricks. They weren't looking for something that was still active. They were looking for what was left of something. Jack leaned back in the chair smiling. All remains were in Site-19 reliquaries, which meant that they were looking for something specific, too specific to just try a mad dash directly into the Foundation's heart shooting and looting. She traced the edges of the amulet under her shirt, slowly putting everything together. She had preparations to make. Eleven Years Earlier: Dr. Alto Clef carefully polished one of the several shotguns he kept around his office, running the oil soaked rag up and down the metal barrel before breaking the weapon down and carefully cleaning the ejecting mechanism. It was a ritual for him, one he executed weekly with an elegant precision, one he'd missed while paralyzed and was now eager to resume. A knock on his door led to a shell being loaded into the weapon. The opening of the door lead to its cocking. "Am I disturbing anything, Dr. Clef?" asked Glass. "Yes," said Clef. "We need to talk sometime soon." "My psych evaluation was cleared weeks ago, Glass. Are you slipping?" "It's not about that." "Then what is it about?" "Dr. Bright." "Jack? He's a good guy. Now if you'll excuse me for a moment, Glass, I've got to go take care of a little problem the Foundation has been sitting on for a while now." "You and Kondraki working together, huh?" Clef smiled. "For now." "Well, if you could look me up when you get back on site?" "When I feel like it, Glass." Clef pushed past the psychiatrist into the hall, carrying the gun with him. He knew he couldn't take it into the chamber with him, but he felt better having it with him, nonetheless. The Present: Four security guards lay unconscious between the entrance to deep storage at Site-11 and the bank of filing cabinets lined the far wall. Imants moved from drawer to drawer, carefully flipping through the files and examining termination dates. He knew that despite its lack of presence in the database, there still had to be some record of the object. The Foundation didn't believe in destroying anything, at least on the paperwork side of things. It was a destroyed SCP he was looking for. He switched drawers and redoubled his efforts. His recent altercation with Neil Ghost was still playing on his mind. It wasn't too late to turn back. It was true, what Ghost had said. The second Kondraki approached him, he'd agreed, almost blindly. Kondraki was a legend in the Foundation, at least as well-known as Clef, if not more. Imants had been more than willing to do what he asked, especially if the future of the Foundation was at stake. He breathed a sigh of relief as he saw the number, pulled out the file, and looked over the paperwork. The Foundation was not inclined to let anything just drift about uncollected, even something that was no longer of use to them. Imants shoved the folder into his jacket and prepared to report to Kondraki. One way or the other, the job was going to get done. Jack Bright had to die. Eleven Years Earlier: "What are you saying, Glass? You want me to kill him a few times?" "No," said Glass, rubbing his eyes in frustration. "We have to remove him from a position where anyone can be harmed, then we have to find a way to release Jack from the medallion. It's doing something to him." "Yeah," said Kondraki. "It's making him less appreciative of the fragility of life." Kondraki laughed. "So, you want me to kill 963?" "Effectively… yes, I suppose. You're one of the Foundation's problem solvers. The O5 have ignored my requests for a conference, and I've got nowhere else to turn to. I need you to help me stop whatever it is his mind is doing." "What do you mean, Glass? His mind? The fuck are you talking about?" "Aggregate personalities." "Aggregate Personalities? What do you mean, aggregate personalities?" "Just what I said," said Glass, his forehead creased. "There seems to be a buildup, over time, of personalities… I don't know what to call them…chunks. They just stick around in there, somewhere." "And we've been attaching him to murderers, rapists, and baboons?" "Hence, my concern." "God damn it Glass. He's just been made the director! Why didn't you come to me earlier?" "Apologies, Kondraki. I'm here now, though, and we don't really have another choice. Clef and I are on board. Will you help us?" A smile was the only answer he received. It was also the only one he needed. The Present, A Few Weeks Later: Quikngruvn Halifax cursed his parents for not the first time as he re-affixed his name-badge and proceeded through the opening door. Over the past few years, he'd worked himself up to the position of chief archivist in the Foundation, a post he was immensely proud of. The offer for transfers to other, safe sites had come in over the years, but he'd remained at Site-19, comfortable in the hustle and bustle of the Foundation's largest site. He looked around his perfectly arranged office, paying careful attention to everything and adjusting the few trays the cleaning staff had bumped when cleaning the previous night. He reached for the stereo remote on the corner of his desk and pressed play. He stopped, looked at the remote and back at the stereo, pressed the button again, and frowned. He walked over to cabinet, prepared to reach behind it to reconnect a cord he was sure the janitors had disconnected when he felt the circle of cool steel pressed into the back of his neck. "I want you to understand, Halifax, that while I have nothing against you, I am fully prepared to plaster the contents of your skull all over that wall. I'm afraid you disabled my old access code, so I'll be needing yours. Now." Quikngruvn's body tensed when he heard the voice, realizing immediately who was right behind him, who had used the antiquated access code, and what was pressed against his neck. A reputation came with the presence of the legendary Dr. Kondraki, one which he was in no way eager to discover the validity of. He eased his hand up to his collar, unclipped the name badge, and held it over his shoulder. "That's a good boy, now." Quikngruvn saw as a hand reached over his shoulder, turning on the stereo and cranking up the volume. "Sorry about the knee." The sound of the shot and the harsh drumming of the music meshed well, and the solid slap of the cold, metal butt of the gun against his head brought a welcomed repose from excruciating reality. Eleven Years Earlier: "We have to separate him from 963, then present our evidence. We'll never even make it to a formal hearing otherwise." "Why don't we just chuck him through a Hell gate? Don't we have a few of those?" "Because, he's our friend. We should help him as best we can." "Speak for yourself. I've never liked Bright." "You've never liked anyone." "Point being?" "Nevertheless, the plan stands. We kill Bright's current body, contain 963, present our evidence, and then hope we don't get our wrists slapped." "That's an awful plan." "Then what do you suggest?" "Poison him, then burn him. Then, we put 963 through 093 and pretend it never happened." "Too complicated. It would never work." "We could just use explosives. Explosives always work." "963 is practically indestructible. An explosion big enough to take it out would be more than enough to burn off the atmosphere." "No, just for killing him. Small explosion, then a series of them to bury the body in rubble. While they're sorting it out, we can convince them to do what we want with the medallion." "You guys are forgetting one problem." "And what's that, Glass?" "He's the director, now. He's going to have guards. Good guards." "Guards, Glass? Really? That's what you're worried about?" "For God's sake, Glass, I'm a god damned legend. You think I can't handle a few trained monkeys?" "It's not going to be that easy." "Why not?" "The guards are him too." "Jack's a scientist, not an army." "Why don't we just wait for a more opportune moment? Why are we rushing this, anyhow?" "Have you seen some of the reports coming out of Site-19? For god's sake, there have been more decommissions in the last month than there have been in the entire life of the Foundation." "I heard about a few of them. I'm not sure why 914 was disassembled, but he had a good argument for 447. Too much of a hazard on site." "It doesn't matter. The Foundation has a mission to carry out. We're the wall between humanity and all the shit that would break their minds. We hold it back; we don't blow it up." "I've blown up plenty of shit for them." "Not stuff that didn't need it! He's changing the mission!" "He's claiming that everything destroyed was a threat to the survival of the Foundation." "107 was a threat?" "107 was decommed?" "47 Safe SCPs, 28 Euclid. Gone." "Then we're agreed, yes? We have to do this. He has to be stopped, our evidence has to be presented." "Agreed." "Agreed." "Yeah, fine." "Good. We strike tomorrow." The Present: Dr. Kondraki had spent the last few years haunting the halls of various sites, taking on the roles of people who did or didn't exist, acting in a million tiny ways, most of them either obnoxious or harmless. The occasional missing sample, the carefully made blueprints for the various sites, reports on newly recovered artifacts—all passed along to the Global Occult Coalition. The little group was a useful tool, for now, and he hoped to keep using them into the foreseeable future. He'd always been good at killing things, and it was one of the few activities that they appreciated. He could see why Clef had worked with them. He was pressed hard against the hallway's curved walls, 408 carefully guarding him, as he waited for the approaching guard to get a little closer. It should be a fairly simple process. Enter the security point, open the proper containment units with Halifax's code, and clear a path straight to their insurance. He couldn't imagine finding the location of a bunch of failed experiments would be so damn hard, but Bright had covered the tracks of his weakness fairly well, if inadvertently. It would, of course, be here at Site-19, where Bright could keep an eye on it. But Site-19 was very, very big. And there were many, many places to hide something. Imants had done his job well, and now it was up to Kondraki. One last run into the belly of the beast. One last mission before everything would be over, finally. The Foundation had taken several steps away from where it had been when he'd been an agent. There were fewer and fewer containments, more and more Neutralizations. He was even aware of a few cities that had been razed after experiments were conducted there and found to have less than optimal results. The O5 were further and further removed, the Director given more and more power. He might have liked the position fifteen years ago, but time had mellowed his ambitions. Slightly. The guard rounded the last bend, slowly approaching the coded door. He placed his thumb over the checkpoint, causing the door to beep once, cheerily, and open. Kondraki stepped out, bringing a well timed chop down on his foe's neck, causing him to stumble, but not fall. Kondraki cursed as he pulled the sawed off shotgun out from under his coat as the guard looked up at him. "Konny?" Kondraki's eye's widened. "Jack?" The guard's hand flew to the alarm, slamming down on it as Kondraki's finger squeezed the trigger. The blast blew away much of the guard's face, though much too slowly to avoid the unfortunate consequences. The guard meant one thing: Jack had activated 963-2. He stepped over the body, scanned Halifax's name badge, and started running. Eleven Years Earlier: In retrospect, Glass thought they should have gone with Clef's plan. The charges were set in a fairly open area, with a remote detonator rigged to the wall. They waited as the first security crew passed, until they knew the Jack with 963 would be directly above the explosion and sprung the trap. Clef spun around the forward corner, putting two shells each into the forward guards' backs as they turned to see the erupting flames around their charge. Kondraki emptied his sidearm into the rear guard from a safe, hidden corner as Imants dropped the remaining ceiling into the corridor with a well-timed grenade in the ventilation system. The entire attack had been executed flawlessly. "That was too easy," said Kondraki, eying the guard's bodies. "Jack's not a soldier, but he's also not an idiot." Clef nodded. "He probably put 963 on one of the guards." "Or he's not here at all." Everyone looked up at Glass, the young doctor nervously running his hand through his hair. The four of them looked at each other as the alarms started blaring. The Present: A brilliant flash of light blinded Kondraki as he rounded the corner, making the floating images around him shudder as 408 lost members of its hive. He fired the pistol over his shoulder twice, stopping after he heard a grunt and fall. The storage chamber he needed would be nearby, and if he was lucky— A second blast of light flew ahead of Kondraki, cutting through the illusion and scattering the burned husks of butterflies through the air. He slid around a second corner, bringing the pistol up under the guard's chin and scattering his thoughts and memories over the ceiling without stopping. He leaped through the air as a second guard attempted to bull rush him from behind, firing downward into the man's lower back as he twisted sharply to avoid another blast of light. It would have been impressive if he'd left anyone alive to witness it. He found the door and scanned Halifax's card, entering the lab and sealing the door behind him. He walked across the room, putting a bullet into the forehead of a stunned researcher, and pulled several green vials out of a row of test tubes, placing them in his pocket. He smiled, running through the rest of the plan in his head. Then, he shrugged, muttered "Fuck it" under his breath, and reloaded his gun. If he was doing this, he was going to do it his way. He was going to have fun. Eleven Years Earlier: Glass had been captured first. He'd not been trained for any sort of combat, so when the hoard of trained shock troops poured into the hallway following the explosion, he'd held his hands in the air and waited for them to quit beating him into the ground. He heard about Clef's capture, how it'd taken them four hours to get through the traps he set in his outer office and another two to actually lay hands on the man. Imants had managed to hole up in the ventilation system for almost two days before they found him. Kondraki had actually come quietly, having been found in his office apparently doing paperwork. Glass heard about the other trials through his guard. Clef had been sentenced quickly, Kondraki mere hours later. It was the next morning before Imants had been sentenced, as there was apparently a fair amount of dissent about the extent to which he'd been involved and how much he'd been influenced by his superiors. The sentence had been the same, nonetheless: indefinite stasis. Glass sat in his cell, listening to the footsteps, trying not to think about the stories he'd heard from other people who'd experienced stasis. Cold dreams; frozen memories. They could never remember what they'd dreamed, only the cold. It was the next morning when the guard approached his cell. Glass contemplated trying to hit the guard over the head and escape, but he knew that he wouldn't last more than two or three steps into the hall. He allowed them to cuff him, requested an opportunity to examine himself in the mirror, and after doing so, walked down the hallway, flanked by the guards. A series of blurry and darkened screens greeted him in the courtroom; he steeled himself and listened to the charges. The Present: Kondraki could hear the footsteps charging him, herding him. It was the problem with fighting with someone who could effectively create a hive mind with the right kind of telepathy. And the Foundation had the right kind, especially since they'd cut up 182's and 116's respective brains and played around with them. He took a short cut he knew he shouldn't, but Jack could go fuck himself if he thought that Kondraki would do what he wanted him to. He slid into one of the maintenance closets, a place he'd gotten used to hiding in over the years, and looked for one of the access pipes. He found one marked "Pest Control" and opened the access nozzles, filling them with two of the vials he'd stolen earlier. He looked around him and the butterflies flitting through the air and frowned, muttering quietly under his breath. "I'm sorry." He turned back to the door, kicking it open and having 408 project an illusion of himself in front of the opening, smirking as a hail of gunfire issued from the left. He swung low out of the opening, bringing the pistol level and putting a bullet into the neck of both men firing, noting as they fell the dangling Foundation symbols strung around their necks. 'Jack,' he thought. Kondraki started running. He'd have to get to the climate control quickly, the one for this sector, or the plan would be pointless. It wouldn't take much longer, not now. Another turn and then a quick shot straight to— The bullet tore through his thigh, hollow tip causing more damage than he might otherwise have preferred. He fell hard against the right wall, having 408 project him falling to the left, and fired a shot backwards wildly. He pulled himself further, ripping a sleeve off his shirt and tying it around his leg tightly. He could barely feel his leg, and he knew that there weren't enough members of 408 left alive to cover the blood. If this was going to happen, it would have to be soon. He struggled forward, smiling as the two symbol wearing guards pursuing him put several rounds into the illusory corpse. He took the time to turn and aim carefully, putting a shot into both of their heads before bringing himself into the climate control center. The room wasn't that much different than any one of a dozen across Site-19, but this one had the controls he needed. He found the Infestation Control Station that had been in place since 439 had been forcibly Neutralized. He looked at the handful of butterflies around him one last time and pressed the command sequence, releasing the anti-parasitics into the air. Glass erupted from the screen as two loud blasts sounded behind him, forcing him to roll out of the chair as blood loss made his vision swim. He struggled away from the station as a hoard of footsteps approached him. The pesticide had a faint hint of mint to it, Kondraki noticed, smiling. 408 died in the air around him, the multiple projections fading with them. His leg ached and bled in spite of the tourniquet. "You shouldn't have come alone, Konny." Kondraki looked up at the handful of men, all wearing the same expression, all wearing the same medallion. "What makes you think I came alone, Jack?" "Bluffing, at this point?" Three men with crests around their necks approached Kondraki and kicked him in the stomach. Kondraki heard several Brights laugh as the dying butterflies tried to project an illusion around the dying, middle-aged doctor. He brought a hand out to brush his hair back off his forehead as he looked up at his foe. "When have I ever lied to you, Jack?" Elsewhere: Imants turned the corner, running as stealthily as possible up the corridor, ignoring the green, acidic mist the sprayed from the ceiling. If the last round of reports from their informant had been correct, the package he was looking for was in the second room on the left, Corridor 23-B. With everyone going after Kondraki, he shouldn't have any problems finding the package. As the door slid open, he slowly walked into the room, looking quickly to either side for unexpected surprises. He was pleased to find none. Imants stepped forward, ignoring the new set of erupting sirens. He looked down at the red disk and collected it into a cloth, slipping it into his pocket. Two sets of plastic explosives later, he left the room, running as fast as possible. Kondraki's plan gave him two minutes, but he wanted to be further away. The Present: The mist was beginning to die down as dozens more Jack Brights surrounded Kondraki, watching him bleed. A bouncy, black-haired woman walked to the front of the crowd. She smiled, condescendingly, leaning over the injured man. "You've gotten old and slow, Konny. No one would have caught you ten years ago." He sneered. "No one did." She smiled at him again. "I guess you're right. It's a shame really. The Foundation could have used you, Kondraki. Your talents. No one other than Clef had more confirmed decommissions than you. With our new programs, you might have had a place here again." "I've not had a place here in a long time, Jack." "No, I guess you haven't. Any last requests?" "None. But I do have one question," said Kondraki, pushing himself up and leaning back against his legs. "That's not a request," replied Jack. "It's close enough. Humor me." "Fine." "Is this everyone?" asked Kondraki. "What?" "Is this everyone?" repeated Kondraki. "Did you really bring every copy of yourself to fight me?" Bright's eyes narrowed. All of them. "Because, Jack, if you did, that was a god damned stupid thing to do." Kondraki reached into both pockets. He pulled his gun out of the first. Out of the second, he pulled a green vial. Forty faces blanched in recognition, for the first time noticing the scent of the pesticide as the stopper on the vial flew through the air, and the substance contained within it splashed on Kondraki's face. Dozens of eyes turning to see the butterflies on the ground sparking and twitching as they died. "A body is a body, Jack. See you in hell, you son of a bitch. All of you." Kondraki raised the gun to his temple and pulled the trigger. As the bullet passed through his skull, he felt an instant of 447's reaction taking place. But then, reality was gone, and all that was left was an aftermath. Eleven Years Earlier: "None of you are listening!" screamed Glass, his face shuddering. "That's not Jack Bright! Not anymore! It didn't happen all at once! It was putting a pebble on the beach. And then another and another. Eventually, the whole thing is hidden, and you never noticed!" "Dr. Glass, please calm yourself. You've obviously experienced some kind of psychotic break—" "I've experience nothing of the sort! You don't get it!" he shouted, his voice cracking. "It's not his whole personality, not even a big part of it. It's inches of the football field. But soon, it'll be worse." "Nevertheless, Doctor, you've committed a serious crime, have no evidence, and rallied enough of our less… controllable members together to convince us you planned nothing less serious than another break like the Chaos Insurgency, as Dr. Bright concluded. Given your family history, it seems a logical—" "I've got all the proof I need sitting right there," screeched Glass, pointing at Bright's current body. "One question. That's all I ask. Just one." The face on the other side of the screen seemed to frown for a moment before visibly shrugging. "Fine. Ask away." Glass looked at Jack Bright, narrowing his eyes as if to stare right through the visibly disturbed looking doctor. "Jack. What do you want more than anything else in the world?" Bright looked surprised. He smirked, the concern draining from his face. "To serve the Foundation." Glass's face cracked as he smiled in triumph. "That's not true, Jack." The voice from beyond the screen sounded again. "Enough. The trial is over. We have the utmost faith in Dr. Bright, and this line of questioning will change nothing. Dr. Glass, you are to be suspended in cryogenic stasis for no fewer than thirty years." Glass turned to the screen, eyes widening in shock. "What? Don't you see? It's not right! He doesn't want to serve!" Two men approached the dais and took either of Glass's arms, proceeding to pull him away from the court room. Glass's voice echoed over the cacophony of voices and static, screaming in rage. "IT'S NOT RIGHT! HE WANTS TO DIE, YOU IDIOTS! HE JUST WANTS TO DIE!" He was still screaming when they put him in the chamber. Directly across from him, he saw Kondraki's cryogenic chamber. For a moment, it shimmered, a wing flapping momentarily out of place. Glass had only a moment to register his surprise before the ice took him. The Present: There was also a multitude of voices shouting now, though the shapely female form lay mostly still and silent, only occasionally coughing or hacking up blood. Murderers and thieves, rapists and pedophiles, and a handful of those who had just stumbled onto the wrong military base or into the wrong room. Most of them were angry, calling out with rage and anger at their denied immortality, while others were crying loudly in sadness. But somewhere, deep down at the bottom, there was one who was silent. Unspeakably and immeasurably relieved. 'It feels good to finally die,' thought Jack. He watched from the bottom upward as the voices winked out, disappearing like vanishing stars. He heard them silenced, one by one, the din growing quieter and quieter as the others finally went away, finally vanished, blowing away like flakes of ash. He felt whole again for the first time in decades. It took an incredibly long time, though it seemed to happen all at once; then, Jack was alone. It was dark, and cold, and wonderful. Dreadfully wonderful. Then he saw it, just barely out of the corner of his eyes, exploding with the intensity of its presence. A single dot of light, still shimmering. 'No,' thought Jack. 'God damn it. NO!' He tried to speak and could not. The body he was occupying shuddered, racked out a final, desperate cough, and died. Seven Weeks Later: Interim Director Gears sat uncomfortably in the chair, but it didn't show. Kondraki's actions would leave Site-19 unusable for the foreseeable future, unless some antidote to 447-2's effect could be found. Since it didn't seem likely, Gears had been forced to relocate. On top of that, he was the chief surviving member of Site-19's command structure, leaving him with a very large mess to clean up. Anyone else would have broken under the stress of Gears' responsibilities. And Gears himself might be feeling a similar strain, but it didn't show. He had shuffled through more paperwork in the last month than in his entire career. While he'd passed on some of it to Iceberg, he was still inundated daily with requests, notes on recovery, and personnel casualty reports. Today was no different. He leafed through half a dozen SCP recoveries, making notes about the number of newly Neutralized objects that would have to be refiled. At the bottom of the stack, he found a file he thought he wouldn't see again anytime soon. It was a thick folder, full of notes on exploration and chromatically based locations. SCP-093. Status: Missing, Presumed Destroyed. He looked over the several pages of examinations Bright had ordered on the object, noted how the prognosis for repair had looked quite promising, and quietly closed the folder, setting it aside and retrieving the logs from the last day of Site-19. It took him a few minutes to find the security access data, and less time to discover that one of the many alarms tripped that day was to 093's research lab. Furthermore, it was the only alarm set off in its sector. He slowly put the puzzle together, sighed, and looked at the next file: "Concerning the Locating and Elimination of the Rogue Agent Imants." He read the report, signed at the bottom of the file to note he'd seen it, and then checked the box next to "Denied," citing a need for Foundation resources to be applied more scrupulously during such a difficult time. With luck, that would keep them from rediscovering the object before Imant's new employers could destroy it. He'd had a long day, and he was fairly glad when it was over, but it didn't show. Gears placed the manila folder in his outbox, and a crease knitted his eyebrows briefly and was gone. "Goodbye, Jack." He turned off the lights and left the room. The Future: The stems of wheat waved slowly, methodically, in the wind. The corpse would have been long desiccated, save for the fact that there weren't enough bacteria left alive to do much to it. All over the middle and lower torso, bulges of tumorous growths protruded under the skin, sometimes breaking through. The expression spoke of one who had died in agony. Even now, the eyes were painfully cramped shut, the teeth broken from gnashing and grinding, though the face still flickered and changed occasionally. Every so often, it flitted into a mocking smile, the last vestige of a man who, in his final moments, had passed on his death to his enemy. A final, spiteful act of a spiteful man. But not one that was undeserved. How long the body lay there, no one could know, but eventually, coasting over the horizon, there came a form. A strange half body, dragging itself with its arms, incomprehensibly large and impossibly terrible. It came, smelling blood, something it hadn't sensed in many, many years. The face, if it could be called that, was leering down at the slowly rotting corpse, smelling it, possibly savoring it, although its intentions would be impossible to tell. There was no way to know the mind of such a creature, so far was it removed from its original, human roots. The mouth slowly lowered down to the ground, surrounding the body and swallowing it whole. For a brief instant, it ceased moving. But in the next moment, it howled—though if in anguish or joy it could not be said. The form bent and twisted as the souls of a dead world became overwritten, leaving only a single, mingled consciousness. It doubled over as the eternal torment of billions became the burden of one. It shuddered as the knowledge of countless minds were added to its own. And just on the other side of the mirror, just out of sight, remained Jack Bright, trapped eternally between realities. Waiting. Festering. Plotting.

SCP-001 is an O5's tale Good evening, Doctor. No, no, don't stand up. And, yes, I am who you think I am. Let's not make any more of this than it is. You know my number, and I know enough about you to make a duplicate that even your mother wouldn't be able to tell apart from the real you. No, that's not a threat, just a fact. Now, as to my business here, it seems you have stumbled upon something above your clearance. Well, no, stumbled is not the right word. Dug up? Perhaps. And you are getting to the point where further digging would end in some fairly lethal gunshot wounds. This would be a sad state of affairs, as you are otherwise quite a good researcher. Therefore, you are getting something very few people in the Foundation ever get… an explanation. Yes, we were alerted when you first started digging into SCP-001. Every researcher who's been around for a while looks into it. Most are satisfied when they uncover the angel with the flaming sword, it's buried under enough levels. But then you started looking into The Factory, and that is when I knew you wouldn't stop. So, here it is, plain and simple. The Factory is SCP-001. But it will never be written up. It was a choice I made early on in the creation of the Foundation, and a choice I still stand by. You researchers are far too curious. I'm not sure which scares me worse. That we'll never understand the Factory… or that we one day will. Ah well, I'm sure you're eager to learn more. The Factory was built in 1835. Back then it was known as The Anderson Factory, named after James Anderson, a rather well-to-do industrialist. It was built in, well, we'll just say America, and was the largest factory yet designed, a good mile across at its widest, three stories tall throughout, with a special seven story tower by the front gate that Anderson lived in. It was designed to be the ultimate factory, capable of taking care of everything, including the housing of workers. People could be born, work, live, and die, without ever leaving the confines of the Factory. And work they did, on everything from cattle raising and slaughtering, to textiles, to everything else under the sun. Now, no one knows whether James Anderson was actually a Satan worshiper. It's just as likely that he followed some kind of Pagan gods. What is known is that he was VERY exact in the building of his factory, and in the placement of his machinery within it. Survivors claim the floor was engraved with arcane symbols, that were only visible when blood flowed across them… But then the survivors claimed a lot of things. What is known is that Anderson made his money on the blood and sweat, and sometimes body parts of the lower class. His journals indicate he thought of them as less than human, being put on this Earth only to serve his will. Of course, at that time, no one knew about his predilections, and so people flocked to the Factory. A place to both work and live at the same time? Well, of course people wanted in! Never mind the harsh hours, working conditions, sadistic security force, and all the rest. Factory workers were forced to work 16 hour days, work only shutting down on Sundays, between sunrise and sunset. Workers were not given individual rooms, instead sharing rooms with eight other people, sleeping in shifts of three. Medical attention was unheard of. If you were injured in the course of your duties, which most people were, you were expected to just keep working. Anyone too injured to work was dragged off by the security, never to be heard from again. For forty years, the Anderson Factory cranked out all sorts of things for people. Meat, clothes, weapons. Never mind that the beef might be mixed with human. Don't care that the weapons were forged in blood. No attention need be paid that the clothes were dyed with…well, you get the idea. Rumors leaked out, but the products were so good, why bother? Until someone got out. I never met the brave soul who managed to escape, but she managed to meet with President Grant, and, in 1875, he enlisted my aid. At the time I was… well, it doesn't matter. We'll say I was military, kind of, and that my people were the same. A hundred and fifty good men and some few women, who were often given jobs that weren't supposed to be common knowledge. We'd been cleaning out some Confederate holdouts, and some of the worse things we found down South. So, we did some research, didn't like what we saw, and went in, loaded for bear. I don't actually remember much about the night it all went down. Most of it blends together in my head. I get flashes, sometimes, of the people chained to the line, living next to dead, and damned hard to tell which was which. Children working underneath machines, the majority of the flesh scoured from their bones by the great wheels and cogs. And the other things… No, I'm all right. I haven't thought about that night for a very long time. The security force wasn't much of a problem. But then Anderson's creations showed up. He'd been taking the injured workers and, well, experimenting on them. Men, if you could call them men, with multiple arms, sewn together, some of them combined with animals, horrible monstrosities out of mankind's worst nightmares. They kept coming, wave after wave of not quite living creatures. I lost a lot of good people that night. And then we found Anderson's breeding pits, girls as young as eight, chained to the walls, forced to be nothing more than- I'm sorry. Even today, more than a century later, the memory makes me see red. When we finally found Anderson cowering in his office, we hung him from his tower window, with his own entrails. As he died, he laughed, saying it didn't matter, we could kill him, but his factory, The Factory, would go on. He was still laughing 24 hours later when we finally cut him down, had him drawn and quartered, and then burned the remains. The entire time he uttered blasphemies that I don't like to think about. We spent a week cleaning that place out, freeing the workers, putting down the things we found in the basements and many lightless rooms. We pulled out things that were useful, stocked them in a house near the gate, tried to make sense of everything. A hundred and fifty of us went into that hell pit that night, and only ninety-three came out. By the end of that week, we were down to seventy-one. But the things we found in there, my god. Well, you've been with the Foundation a while, they wouldn't seem as amazing to you, but we found toy guns that shot real bullets. A yo-yo that would flay the skin from anyone it touched, hammers that only worked on human flesh. A breed of skeletal horse that ran faster than anything we'd ever seen. Cloaks that seemed woven from the night itself, and let men access a shadowy dimension that… I get away from myself. We found tools, both wondrous and horrible. And we were faced with a choice. I gathered my highest ranking, well, we'll call them officers, to me, and we tried to figure out what we would do. They all had opinions. The Chaplain, he had gone a little crazed. Thought all these objects must be miracles sent from god, holy relics to be worshipped. Marshall and his little toady Dawkins thought there was a fortune to be made here, making and selling these things to the highest bidder. The Injun we all called Bass, due to his deep speaking voice, he called these things an abomination, and declared that we should hunt down and destroy everything we could find. And Smith thought we should take this stuff back to the president. The only one without an opinion was the old man, but he never said much of anything anyways. We argued for hours, days, trying to work it out. Me, I thought we were sitting on a gold mine, all right. But that we could use these things, these objects, to hunt down some of the scary things we'd run into down South, the other monsters this world had to offer, and use this factory for good, as a place to contain these things, find a way to make them work for our fellow man, or at least protect our fellow man from having to deal with them. I'm sure you can figure out what happened. The Chaplain snuck away in the night with his devotees, taking a couple of small items with him. Marshall we kicked out when we found him… abusing his authority. He promised he'd get revenge, and that little Dawkins shit led the rest of their group off with some of the juicier items. Bass and his people tried to light the whole damn thing on fire, then just left when it didn't work. And Smith left, to report back to the president. I did manage to get him to promise me he'd tell Grant the Factory had been destroyed. I had big plans for that place. A'course, it was kinda hard to follow through on big plans when you only have 12 other people to work with. But it was a start. And it worked, for a while. We had these amazing toys, and finding people to work with us was easy. Back then, going off the grid was as simple as leaving town. We knew what we wanted, we knew what we could be. Leventhal set out getting us backing. A simple invention here, some well invested money there, it all worked out. White and Jones set out getting us… other backing. In our previous work we'd found out some interesting things about people. Some secrets that powerful men didn't want getting out. And, with our new position helping keep secrets, we got more people asking us to deal with their secrets. Blackmail is a dirty word, but it works. Bright, Argent and Lumineux got to work cataloging the items. Light and Bright's wife, the nurse, they made sure we kept ourselves healthy. Heh. No, it's just, remembering Light. She had such unusual ideas about hygiene, for the time. Brilliant woman. Czov, Fleischer and Carnoff dealt with training the troops. Tesla and Tamlin were in charge of figuring out how to take advantage of the items, without making it obvious. We were amazing. The city we built around the Factory, which we took to calling Site Alpha, was self supporting. Agents, researchers, operatives of all sorts… not by those names, of course, but those positions. We expanded. … I'm sorry, I am an old man. I know I do not look it, but the body lies. The mind… doesn't always remember right. And sometimes I get lost in my memories. Things get confused. But, the long and simple of it is this: We used the Factory. It always seemed to have more empty rooms to store things in. Back then, that was the word for them, things. No Skips then, no. We thought we had the Factory tamed. That's one of the reasons I refuse to quit this job. If there's anything I can do here, it's remind people that we will NEVER tame these things. Contain them, yes, but as we saw with Able, tame them? Never. After a decade or so, we were pretty organized. The 13 original of us were being called by numbers, not names. We knew how to make things work. And, if a thing or two vanished inside of the Factory, still? And the occasional D-class? What? Yes, we had D-class back then. Disposables. That's where the D comes from. Had to have someone to test things on, Tesla and Tamlin were both very firm about that. But, yes, sometimes we lost people who didn't matter. Adam… sorry, Dr. Bright, was fond of saying it was the Factory taking its toll. You can't get something for nothing. 1911 was when it all went wrong. Things… we called them faeries. An entire race of things, living beside us. They could look the same as you or I. The only obvious difference was an allergy to Iron. Yes, that's why we called them faeries. No, you haven't heard of them. Why? Because it's the one time the Foundation wiped out an entire race of things. Root and branch. And I'm the one who did it. We'd been hunting them for some time. We'd run into them a time or two before, come out on top. So, when a certain royal asked us for help, of course we were eager to get them in our debt. We've always loved having people in our debt. We sent a team to help out, take care of what we thought was a hunting party. The next time we saw them, their heads were on poles, attached to the saddles of the creatures the Faeries rode, when they attacked the Factory. It was horrible. Three words, but they convey so much. I have never… I'm sorry, please, give me a moment. I've never told this part to anyone. You should consider yourself lucky. And, if you ever tell anyone any of what I am about to impart on you, I will not just kill you, but everyone who shares your DNA, in the worst ways possible. You'll think Procedure 110-Montauk is a walk in the park compared to what I do to you. We lost. The things came, and they destroyed us. Rode over our emplacements, slaughtered our people, shrugged off our weapons like they were nothing. I watched my thirteen go down, left and right, just trying to hold the Factory. And I? I, their leader, their friend, their father figure? Godfather to the Bright's four young children. Confidant, sometimes lover, always the confessor? I ran. I ran like a scared little school boy, deep into the dark guts of the Factory. I was chased by the things, always just one step ahead. I could hear them behind me, feel their breath upon my neck, and … I came to a door I'd never seen before. A bronze door, covered in Arabic script of some sort. I've never been one for languages, especially not the curvy bullshit the musselmen use. But I didn't care. They were coming for me, and I threw the door open and dived through it. Everything inside… was different. There was a feeling of peace, that nothing could hurt me here. The light was this dark red, but still felt right. My ears were filled with the steady thrumming of a gigantic heartbeat. And, in front of me, were the remains of Anderson. It spoke to me then, but I'll be damned if I could tell you exactly what it said. What it told me was more meaning, than exact. It offered me hope. It told me… it told me that each of the things we had used from the Factory, no matter what we did with them, fed it. Helped it grow. But, if the Faeries took the Factory, they would destroy it, and we couldn't have that. It offered me… a deal. It could remove this event. Make it have never happened. All I needed to give it was… us. I didn't want to. I knew it was a bad idea. But then, I saw them again, my family, my friends, dead. Dead by the hands of those bastards… I agreed. It smiled. And I found myself once more upon the ramparts, watching the horde of Faeries crest the hill. My Foundation alive once more. In my hands was a weapon. I won't bore you with the details, but we slaughtered them. And, with these new weapons, continued to slaughter them, everywhere they lived, everywhere they bred. My fellow O5s questioned my decision, thinking we should save some, in case we might ever need them… I overruled them. We moved away from the Factory. Shut it down. Moved our things out of there. We changed the name from things to Special Containment Protocols, focusing on containing them, not… anything else. The others were curious, but understood I had my reasons. I boarded up the Factory. Locked it shut. Buried it under a ton of rubble, saying it was too dangerous. I thought… thought I'd gotten away with it. Until I found a thing on my desk. One of the old toy guns that shot real bullets. And it had the Factory label on it. … I've sent people in, from time to time, to see what it might be doing. Last time I sent people in to look, there was nothing there. We keep finding Factory items out there. I can't help but think of how many more we don't find. The people who use them, and keep it hidden. I think back to the body telling me how each item used gave energy to the Factory. I never asked it 'energy for what?' I don't think I want to know. What do we give it? D-class, mostly. Where DID you think all those bodies went? There's a place. Bodies are left, and they vanish. Everyone thinks I'm a genius for figuring it out. Sometimes… sometimes I have to feed it other things. Researchers. Agents. They never know it's coming. It just reaches out and takes them. But, in the end, we're doing more good by being here. Whatever the Factory wants, whatever it IS… We're doing good here. I have to believe that. And now you know. Are you happy? I didn't think so. Why tell you? I'm getting old, Everett. Should I die, someone will have to keep feeding it. Maybe you'll be different. Maybe you'll figure out how to stand up to it. … But I doubt it.

Dr. Bright stirred his coffee with a spoon, taking a long moment to savor the aroma. One unusual aspect of his bond with 963 is that certain sensations were different in each body he occupied. Colors were slightly different, smells triggered different emotions, and coffee… cheap instant coffee was unusually good in this body. Who knew that a chimpanzee's taste buds and instant coffee got along so well? "Good morning, old chap." Dr. Kain's nails clacked on the tile floor as he trotted into the break room. "Got some good news and some bad news. First the good news: 682 escaped again last night." "How the hell is that good news?" "Well, after killing 792 guards on his way out, he stole a car and went on an alcoholic bender across two states." Dr. Bright furrowed his brow. "You're pulling my leg. If that is the good news—" Kain barked happily. "I'm not done yet! 682 wrapped the car around a tree at 150mph. The airbag did not deploy. The big bad lizard is dead." "Of course!" Dr. Bright said. "Drunk driving! Why didn't we think of this sooner! Well, what is the bad news?" "It was your car." DRUNK DRIVING DESTROYS LIVES DON'T DO IT OKAY BROUGHT TO YOU BY MADD(itcwys) MONKEYS AGAINST DRUNK DRIVING (in their car which you stole)

I'm real sorry about all of this. I knew we was in trouble soon as Barnes shot yer daughter. Oh, hey, quit cryin', she'll be fine. He's a lousy shot. Anyway, I'm real sorry about yer dog. I mean, it did bite my leg, but I guess it wouldn't've done that if I hadn't been beatin' you with that lamp. Hey, good news there. Lamp still works. Little duct tape, it'll be good as new. Those ropes too tight? Sorry. I'd loosen 'em, but we don't want you gettin' loose an' tryin' to escape. There's been enough screw-ups tonight, don't you think? Guy you should be pissed at is your neighbor. Fucker switched the house numbers. Must've known we was on to him. You wanna know what this is about? Eh, what the hell. Ain't like you'll remember any of this tomorrow. See, a few months ago, there were some murders. Yeah, you read about 'em. Skinned alive. That's a bunch of bullshit, right there. You ever skin somebody alive? They wriggle everywhere. Oh, now look what you done. Never throw up when yer gagged. Here, lemme clear yer mouth. Now, you scream, we're gonna have to break another finger. Okay, there you go. That's good, right in the bucket. And now the gag goes back on, an' you still got eight good fingers. See how that works? An' just kiddin' about the finger. I'd've just shoved the gag back on. You've suffered enough, y'know? So, where was I? Oh yeah, skinnin' people alive. Hard as hell. That bit was made up by the papers. Sounds a hell of a lot more exciting. Nah, he cut their throats first, then skinned 'em. Anyway, twenty years back, there was another case kinda like this, back east. There's a few folks who've talked about it, but they don't think there's a connection, on account the guy there was caught. But check this out: The fucker said he needed to eat the skin to live. How does he end up dyin'? Malnutrition, even though he gets three meals a day. So, we look into it, an' the guy had a kid, who moved out here. Yeah, yer neighbor. So, we come in, do some checkin' up, an' once we did, it came pretty clear he did it. Unfortunately, looks like he got wind of us, an' skipped out, with a last little screw you in the bargain. So, we got guys tearin' up his place to figure out where he went. Oh, we'll find him, don't worry. He's sloppy. He'll screw up eventually. Anyway, get comfy. We got someone comin' here who's gonna make you forget everythin' that happened. Tomorrow mornin', this'll seem like it was just a botched robbery. We'll even set you up t'look like a hero, saved yer family. How's that? By the way, how's rent around here? Seems like a nice neighborhood.

Lemme tell you about reality benders. First off, we like t'call 'em Bixbies. Why? One, in case somebody accidentally says somethin' in front of a civilian, it don't tip 'em off. Two, if yer talking to a reality bender, they might not know all they can do, an' you don't wanna give 'em any ideas. These fuckers are dangerous. You see one, you don't engage unless you absolutely have to. If you do have to, be polite, try t'think happy thoughts, maybe you'll have a good day. Probably not. Whenever you can, let the experts deal with 'em. We don't try containin' them, most of the time. Yeah, Foundation don't usually work that way, but we like t'have a world to live in. So on this point, we usually agree with the GOC. Better they're gone. Okay, so, you're fightin' somebody who can do pretty much anything. How d'you stop 'em? Well, first off, they can't do anything they ain't thought of. Like, they can maybe all read minds. But if they ain't thought about doin' it, don't know they can, then they're not gonna try it. Remember, they're not smarter'n you. They may be able to do things different, might know things you don't, but they're not smarter. Second, they gotta concentrate. We had one asshole, he decided he was gonna know about everybody watchin' him. Fucker killed twenty of us before we just had a bunch of us rush him. Couldn't get all of 'us, y'know? Which kinds of Bixbies are worst? Depends how you mean. For my money, it's a kid Bixby. Almost always ends with a bullet. Sniper can usually take 'em out pretty easy. But actually killin' 'em? You show me a guy who just shot a three-year-old, I show you somebody with some damage upstairs. There are worse things you'll do for the Foundation, but not a lot. Now, hardest to take down? Usually, somebody around late teens, early twenties. Much younger, they don't know enough to do as much harm. Older'n that, they don't got much flexibility in their thinkin' to try anything real out there. Late teens, early twenties, they're gonna experiment. They're gonna try anything that springs t'mind. They're not gonna be slow an' careful in figurin' out what they can do. We get one o' them, we pull out th' big guns. Now, it don't always end with us killin' 'em. Sometimes, especially older ones, we can talk with 'em, a little. Convince 'em the world ain't worth it. Get 'em to move on somewhere else. A lot of 'em will even do it on their own. So far, ain't one of 'em ever come back. No one knows just why. Maybe this world really is that much of a shithole. Or maybe somethin's eatin' 'em, I don't know. Anyway, now you see what I mean when I say a giant turtle ain't no big deal, even if it is spittin' fire at us.

Don't talk to me about no fuckin' urban legends. Jesus, in our line o' work, you'd think you'd know better. Whadda I mean? I mean they ain't just fuckin' stories, dipshit. Oh, fine, some of 'em are. I mean, sure, no gangbanger's gonna shoot you just 'cause you flashed your headlights. But a lot of 'em ain't. Why don't nobody hear about 'em? Why don't they hear 'bout no fuckin' skips? We ain't the only ones dancin' in this here party, ya know? No, I ain't fulla shit. Look, I'll tell you how I know they're real. Okay, so this was a while back. I was out huntin' elves in Jersey. What? They was short, had pointy ears, an' squeaky voices. That's good enough for me. Were they really elves? Probably not. Sure as hell didn't bake no cookies. Do I give a shit what they're really called? No I do not. Anyways, don't interrupt. So, I'm off duty, having finished up for the day. I go drinkin' at a dive in the bad side o' town. Reminds me of home, right? So, there's this broad. She's cute, so I buy her a drink. One thing leads to another, an' I go back t'her place. No, it ain't professional, but what the fuck do you care what I do in my fuckin' off-time? Jesus. So, we have some drinks, make some small talk, an' I suddenly find myself crashin' harder'n Buddy Holly an' the Big Bopper. Yeah, you see where I'm goin' with this. Thing is, the bit where you wake up in a bathtub, wit' ice? Yeah, that's bullshit. They're takin' yer fuckin' kidneys. The fuck do they care if you live? You're just some random fuck who can point 'em out in a line-up. Best if you don't ever turn up. Yeah, I'm still alive. Thanks fer noticin'. Y'might also notice somethin' they didn't account for, proper-like. I'm a big fuckin' guy. Three hundred pounds, hair under seven foot. There's a whole fuckin' lot of me. An' it takes a lot to take me down, an' even more to keep me down. I wake up with this real bad pain in my side. I open my eyes, and there's this fuck with a scalpel openin' me up. I put a stop to that really fuckin' quick, believe me. I was a bit woozy, but I'm a trained Foundation agent. They was a bunch of amateurs. It went down about how you'd expect. So don't talk to me about no fuckin' urban legends. Anyway, keep yer eyes open. This fucker with the hook's gotta show up sometime.

Site-19 There was a package on her desk. Dr. Rights sat down curiously, slipping the letter opener out of its little holder, and sliding it through the tape on the seams of the cardboard. Some of the tape had peeled away slightly, and the ink from the stamps of “NOT A BOMB” and “MEMETIC HAZARD NOT DETECTED” had faded. Inside was a letter, a picture frame, and a box of chocolates. A thin layer of dust had settled on the contents. She cocked her head to one side, confused by who or what this was from. She opened the letter with a flick of a finger, and sat back in her chair, slipping her reading glasses on from the chain she kept around her neck. She hated the things, but it was a consequence of getting older. The letter was handwritten on expensive stationary, and was dated from a few years ago. “Hello, Doctor Rights. If you're reading this, I'm probably dead, or just forgot to drop in. One of those. Either way, I wanted to say happy birthday,” she glanced over at her calendar, and gave a slight sigh of surprise. It was her birthday, not that she kept track any more. The frequent XK scenarios made keeping track of the date a bit challenging. “I know you said that if I remembered your birthday, you'd kill me, but hey, I'm either dead, or going senile, so who cares. I hope you enjoy the chocolates, and have a decent day. Take it easy on the damn kids for once.” It wasn't signed, but she felt as if she should know who wrote it. The name was on the tip of her tongue, but she couldn't quite grasp who it was. She lifted the picture frame from the box, and looked at it. It was a group photo of the foundation Researchers from Site 19, in the early days before all the staffing had been finished. There were only a few people present in the photograph. The command level staff were present, and a few other lower level staff that Doctor Rights had befriended over the years, but there was a curious blank spot near the middle. One of the other doctors was hanging off of what seemed to be thin air, before it hit her: She couldn't see who was there. She grabbed the letter again, and looked down near the bottom. Sure enough, there was a script that said, “Sincerely,” but was blank after that. She picked up the box of chocolates, and the sender was blank as well. The realization hit her like a train. Her pulse started to pound in her temples, and her jaw clenched, as anger washed over her. The little reading glasses slipped off the bridge of her nose, jangling from their fine chain. Who the hell did they think they were, erasing someone from her past without her authorization? A strict deletion memetic was nearly unthinkable to use on someone with her Level. Dr. Rights shook with rage, standing up, and storming out of her office. Someone was going to catch hell for this. Dimensional Site-4 In her office, O5-2 sat surrounded by a mountain of paperwork. Aides flowed in and out of the cramped office, passing through an oddly colored door which hurt to look at. A tall man in a blue suit passed in to the office, shaking off the momentary disorientation. "Overseer, you called for me?" O5-2 nodded her head, “Has the memetic been distributed? The aide nodded, and said quietly, “Yes ma'am, all known records, and instances of the name Doctor-“ his voice went eerily silent, and his mouth blurred as he spoke the name, “have been deleted.” O5-2 nodded once more, and looked back down at the report in front of her. "Good. Begin Directive Legends at once." The aide turned sharply, and exited back through to Site-4. « The Most Dangerous Game | HUB | When All You Have is a Hammer»

The rain beat a staccato passage on the bright red umbrella. It was not a particularly heavy rain, but had been a steady one throughout the day, and the clouds were still as dark as they had been that morning. Dr. Rights had no problems with rain, so long as she was dry, but couldn't help but feel the unavoidable irritation caused by the fact that it had decided to rain on one of her rare days off. A car sped past, hitting a puddle of dirty rainwater. The spray splashed Rights dead-on. The doctor snarled and gave a one-fingered salute to the retreating vehicle. She was reminded for a moment of her old philosophy professor, Dr. Cabenwald, who had the habit of calling the gesture the “inverted avian” and the tendency to make said gesture at the back of the dean's head. Rights smiled a bit as she stepped over a puddle and continued down the sidewalk. It's dark. The kind of warm darkness interspersed with lovers' murmurings and the rustling of sheets. The door is kicked open. Sharp light and harsh voices fill the room. He's dragged off the bed, pinned to the floor with his arms behind his back, stuttering incoherently. She's screaming profanities. One man looks at her grimly. He's armed. He tells her to stay calm, make herself decent, and wait. Someone will explain. She spits and screams at him, still half-naked. Rights had reached the top of the hill. To her left was a chain link fence and a steep expanse of grass and patches of small trees, all of which overlooked the far distant highway and sprawl of fast-food restaurants. To her right was a line of older, two story houses. Several had overgrown yards and “FOR SALE” signs in the front window. Some were brick, others covered in faded, chipping paint. Rights walked a bit further before crossing, stepping up the concrete steps to one of the houses. The house was plain brick, though it could use a re-facing. The yard was neat and uncluttered, or at least it had been before it was flooded, and there were flowers planted on either side of the front walk. A creaking wooden swing hung on the porch. The ragged, muddy mat in front of the door was emblazoned with the phrase “Wipe Here, You Uncultured Savages”. Rights collapsed her umbrella and wiped the wet mud off her tennis shoes. They're taking him away. She tries to fight them, but the man who spoke to her puts his gun in her face. “I'm sorry”, he says, in the way that meant that he was definitely not sorry. Minutes pass. The shock passes, at least a small amount. She puts on a t-shirt and shorts and goes into the kitchen. The light is on. Dr. Cabenwald is sitting at the little table in the kitchen. He has two cups of coffee with him; one in his hand and the other in the spot opposite him. He's a big man, with no hair on top and a thick salt-and pepper beard on the bottom. He looks tired, but is smiling anyway. He motions to the empty seat and the cup of coffee. She looks around the room. Another man in a police uniform is standing by the apartment door. He's reading a cheap paperback, but his eyes shift to look at her every few seconds. ”What the flying fuck is going on?” She voices it more like a statement, with a glare that embodies ‘hell hath no fury'. Cabenwald smiles, and motions to the chair again. “Take a seat. I don't know if I can explain it well enough, but I'd appreciate it if you'd hear me out.” A reluctant moment passes before she sits down. She sips the coffee. Black. Very black. “What happened to Mr. Matthews was nothing of his own fault. Had we known about him sooner, this whole incident could have been avoided.” He always talked about students like that: Mr. Matthews, Miss Rights. First name basis was given on graduation and not a moment before. She sips more coffee. Cabenwald continues. “Mr. Matthews was host to a non-standard bacterial infection of the brain and lymphoid system with underlying memetic hazard. We feared it had progressed to the end of the incubation period and so had to take immediate action to prevent outside infection. He'll be taken to a secure facility, screened, and treated. This particular infection is usually fatal, unless treatment is applied quickly.” He swallows a mouthful of coffee.” He should survive.” She looks him in the eye, staring him down. “So he had some disease? You'll have to do better than that, professor.” “I have no reason to lie, Miss Rights, but I understand. The disease that Mr. Matthews was infected with was a disease completely unknown to ordinary science. Had it reached full maturity, he would have begun to experience vivid hallucinations, as well as the development of tumor-like growths which would eventually burst and spread the contagion. His mental state would deteriorate to the point of insanity, which would easily lead to mass murder before his own death.” “To tell the truth, I am in the employ of a certain Foundation, shall we say. And this Foundation's purpose is to contain things like what infected Mr. Matthews and prevent them from reaching the world at large.” “Give me proof.” Cabenwald smiles. Rights knocked on the door. “Come in!” An elderly voice shouted from inside. She opened the door. The man sat at his kitchen table, with a half-eaten ham sandwich and a half-completed game of solitaire on the checkered tablecloth in front of him. He was large in build and portly around the waist, with a completely bald head and a brilliantly white beard. He could have passed for Santa Claus. “Thought you could use a visitor, Greg,” Rights said as she stepped into the kitchen. Dr. Cabenwald's face lit up. “A pleasure as always, Agatha. Got time for a round or two?” he collected the cards and began to shuffle. “It's my day off.” She took the chair opposite him. “I've got a full twenty-four hours of time.” “Where's the little one?” “With daddy for the day. I wanted to bring her with me, but he went and said “It's your day off, I can take care of her!" Between you and me, I just think he wants to show her off to the guys at the office.” “You better have pictures for me then.” Cabenwald dealt the first hand. “I do, don't worry.” Rights smiled. “Never trust in anyone unless they can give you proof. A+ for you, Miss Rights.” He digs in the pocket of his jacket and takes out a photograph. He hands it to her. The photo is recent, and incredibly clear. A large green shape, like some sort of twisted dinosaur, can be seen tearing apart a man in an orange jumpsuit. Three men in black uniforms are firing guns at it, to no noticeable effect. It could not and should not be real, but it is, down to the individual blood flecks. No fake could be this detailed. “SCP-682. One of our more dangerous charges.” He takes the photo back. “Why are you telling me this?” He finishes his coffee and folds his hands on the table. “Because you're coming with us. What? “The chance for infection was low, but we can't be too careful in these sorts of situations.” Cabenwald stands up. “You're a loose end, and the Foundation likes to ties those up quickly. We always keep a few open slots on the personnel list, just in case.” “I've been keeping a look after Edward,” Cabenwald said. “He's doing all right. Got any threes?” “Go fish.” “He never recovered mentally, but he's managed to hold down a janitorial job near here, and he has a few people who come in to check on him every now than then.” “Think he remembers me? Sixes, please.” “Damn it. No, I don't think he would. Got any kings?” “Go fish.” Rights chuckled. “It always gets me how I came to the Foundation by sleeping with someone. Got any queens?” Cabenwald grumbled and inverted the avian at his former protégé.

It's a beautiful summer's day. I walk through my greenhouse, taking in the scent of flowers, admiring my wonderful plants; tall, slowly aging shrubberies, pretty little rosebushes; one or two exotic looking ones that must have been imported from outside the country somewhere, but that I got here for an amazing deal. And of course, my beloved hybrids. My friends thought I was absolutely mad to try it; grafting cuttings from so vastly different types. But with love and care, here they are. I take a few minutes to tend to my lovelies; some food here, a little water there, a bit of pruning; Leaves tend to grow so fast, and I can't stand my plants looking so- dishevelled. I get water in my boots when one of them overflows a little; I give it a playful little smack, and it droops a bit. Maybe I hit it too hard. I notice that the restraints on one of the shrubs (Plants need to stand tall and proud, don't you think?) seem to be cutting into the bark; I loosen them, and sap trickles down, and I can almost hear it let out a sigh of relief. There are clear marks left in the wood, but now that the ties are looser, they should heal and fill back out. I move on. I let out a gasp as I see that one of my beautiful rosebushes has started to wilt. It was one of the ones I took a cutting from to make a hybrid, and the stump of the branch looks like it's starting to mould. Not wanting it to spread to any others, I decide to take it out and give it a proper sending-off. As I bury it in the back field, I can almost hear it whimpering at me. So many of my lovely plants seem to end up out here, despite my care and attention. I have a good supplier, so my greenhouse is never lacking in beauties, but it still breaks my heart every time I come out here to the field. When I go back to the greenhouse, I make a beeline for the back room where I keep my hybrids; they're very susceptible to infection, so I need to make sure that that rosebush didn't indirectly harm any of her fellows. I come to the door and breathe a sigh of relief; they all seem to be doing well. It's almost an art form, what I do. I love to experiment with different combinations, and I can't help but have a little fun while I do it; the one closest to the door is half blueberry bush, half strawberry, split right down the middle; of course, it didn't survive the process. After it died, I let it dry outside in the sun, then wrapped it in plastic wrap to protect it from the moisture in the greenhouse, and now I mostly keep it there as decoration. The one next to it is the result of taking all the branches off an old spider-plant, and grafting the branches from a young apple tree in their place; it looks lovely, but it can barely support itself, even with the ties. There are a few others, but my prize is what I like to call 'The Chimera"; multiple graftings from several different sources; rosebushes, berry bushes, shrubs, all on the trunk of a small pine, which I stripped of all its branches. Miraculously, it's managed to survive for two weeks. Of course, due to its nature, I wouldn't give it much longer. But I can't bring myself to feel bad; I can make plenty more hybrids. I'm in a spending mood, so I make a mental note to remind myself to call my supplier for few additions to my garden. And of course, it truly is a beautiful day.

One learns very quickly that any quiet day at Site 19 is not a good day. Inevitably, something like a containment breach of something horrible and terrifying happens, or there's chowder in the cafeteria, or Bright dies. One also learns quickly that any attempts to break the silence usually ends horribly as well. So today, being a quiet day at Site 19, everyone was on edge. It… did not help that Rights was not happy. Rights stormed into the break room first thing in the morning, her hair and makeup a mess and her clothes not nearly as neat as they usually are. One poor staff member was at the coffee machine, getting his usual fix. Rights glared menacingly at the poor man until he turned around, the hair on his neck rising, like he were faced with the face in 087. Rights growled menacingly, “MOVE.” She then got her green tea with vast quantities of honey post haste and glared down the rest of the staff as she stalked away to frighten more lower leveled staff. Once she was out of earshot, the man she terrified, a scrawny, pale young man, asked, “Jeez, what's HER problem?” Dr. Gears, having sat by with his morning cup of water, said calmly, “It would seem that Dr. Rights is upset by something, most likely that it is her birthday and no one has yet to wish her to make it enjoyable, or perhaps that her baby was as she puts it a ‘fussbutt' this morning.” “Well, why don't you go and wish her a happy birthday?” “That course of action would not be wise. If I were to wish her a happy birthday, she would most likely injure me in some way or another. I propose that we stay out of her way.” The scrawny man scoffed and replied, “Well, I don't know about you, but I'd rather not have to put up with that bitch today. I'm going to go wish her a happy fucking birthday.” With a huff and an overly dramatic turn, the scrawny man chased Rights. The group in the break room waited expectantly as they heard the conversation in the silent site. “Hey! Dr. Rights!” the scrawny man called. “WHAT DO YOU WANT.” Rights growled. “I… I wanted to wish you a happy birthday!” “… oh. Thank you. … where is my cake?” “… cake?” “You don't know? If you wish someone at Site 19 a happy birthday, you must give them cake. If you don't, bad things will happen.” “I… did not know this.” “Can you make cake happen now?” “… no?” “Okay. I'm going to go put bleach in your car's oil.” Rights walked away, whistling a tune as the scrawny man was left dumbfounded. Later that day, with the eerie silence only broken by the occasional scream as well as a screech from Rights, most of the staff had decided that it would be better to hide in the break room than to be out in the halls where Rights could rip off their heads for looking at her wrong. Finally, Dr. Gears realized that this was absolute madness and it needed to stop. He rallied the few willing staff and found a most delicious looking cake with coconut frosting and decided to throw her a small party. A surprise party, even. He approached Rights carefully and said, “Dr. Rights, I need your assistance.” Rights turned slowly to Gears and asked menacingly, “With what?” “It is a private matter. I cannot discuss it.” “… oh really?” “Yes. I'd like you to come with me to the break room where we can discuss this matter in private.” “I'd never think you so brave, Gears.” “I'm afraid I do not quite understand what you're implying.” “You know,” Rights imitated Gears' monotone as best she could, “I need your assistance in the break room, Dr. Rights. We will be alone and in private.” She laughed and said, “As if I don't know what you want.” “If you know, then is coconut alright with you?” “Coconut? Really? I didn't know you liked it like that!” “I am not fond of coconut, actually. However, it is the only kind I could find.” “Ah, that's okay. Come on, let's go ‘discuss this matter.'” With that, the two walked to the break room. As they entered, Gears turned on the light switch. The room had been decorated with various streamers and a banner reading ‘HAPPY BIRTHDAY RIGHTS' and the cake was on the center table. The group of willing staff jumped out from various hiding places and shouted, “SURPRISE!!” Rights blinked, then stared at Gears. Someone had placed a party hat on his head while she was not looking. Rights' baffled look slowly turned into joy as she said, “You're a tricky bastard, Gears.”

Video Footage Taken From Incident Chimera Footage begins, showing two pairs of feet. A voice can be heard, identified as Chadwick Wentworth, referred to here as X-1. Second subject, Peter Frans, referred to as X-2, is not heard from at this time. X-1: No, no Pete, my face, Pete, my face! God damn it Pete, if you're going to be my minion, you gotta do what I tell you! My FACE Pete! Camera angle tilts upwards, revealing subject X-1. Subjects face is covered in inexpertly applied white make up, with heavy mascara around the eyes, and black lipstick. Subject is thin to the point of emaciation, with long, greasy, dyed black, hair. Subject is dressed in black knee-high leather boots with a five-inch platform heel, black pants covered in chains, a black silk shirt, and a black cloak, with red undertones. X-1 looks at the camera, and smiles. X-1: There, there, much better… now hit record… RECORD, Pete god damn it man, why did I even make you my minion? Hit the red but- There is a jump in the film. Camera is now centered on Subject X-1. X-1: -make sure it's fucking record- Shit! Ahem. Good evening, dear mortals, and welcome. For I am Azarael Astoroth, Archduke of the Seventh Layer, and soon, you shall all KNEEL before me! For, in my deals with the devil, I have gained life everlasting! And not only am I now a totally awesome and wicked vampire… X-1 gestures around himself, in an attempt to indicate the fading twilight he stands in. X-1: But I can stand in sunlight without fucking sparkling! That's right! I may have gone into the grave, but I came back, with a thirst for your blood! And I shall rule you all, all of you! Especially you, Mark Olsen! That's right, I bet you're all sad and shit now, oh no, big bad vampire gonna come for me, I'm gonna drink your fucking blood! In fact, I'm gonna go do that, right now! Come on Pete! No, ignore the old man, come with me! Subjects begin moving, out of the shaded spot they were in, and down a wooded path. Subject X-2 is slower than subject X-1, despite X-1's continued exhortations for him to keep up. Subjects approach a modest ranch in what appears to be a well-to-do suburb on the edge of the woods. X-1 begins making what are best described as 'spooky' sounds, outside the rear window. Subject X-3, identified as Mark Olsen, comes out the back door, holding a baseball bat. Subject is broad, and well muscled, dressed in only boxers and a varsity jacket. Subject appears enraged. X-3: What the fuck dude, what the fuck? You gay little faggots wanna fuck with me some more, huh? You wanna go? Come on! I'll fucking kill you limp wristed pansies! X-3 takes a swing at X-1. X-1 places his hand in the way. There is a crunch, as X-1's fingers break. X-1 laughs. X-1: You cannot kill the undead, you punk! X-3 stares in apparent shock, then drops his bat. X-1 bends his fingers back into place with a clicking sound. X-3: Chad? Chad, you're dead man, you're dead! They fucking buried you man! X-1: And now I am back. And you… you are going to pay! X-1 throws himself at X-3. There is a tangle of limbs, with X-3 maintaining the upper hand until X-1 begins to bite him. X-3 begins screaming, as X-1 devours him alive, ripping off huge gobs of flesh with both hands and teeth. The camera view drops to the ground, and for roughly ten minutes, it tapes the forest, while the sound of crying and animalisitic growling can be heard. The video cuts again. We now see a very bloody X-1, standing at the back door of another house. He is trying wipe his face clean of the blood. X-1: Stay focused on my face Pete! Ahem. AHAHAAHAH! Now you mortals see what happens if you mess with me! X-1 shakes his finger at the camera. The finger drops off. He scowls and picks it back up. The tape cuts, and when it comes back, we see the finger has been put back on with electrical tape. X-1: You see what can be done, with my great powers! I am a lord of the undead…and now, now I claim my bride! X-1 turns to the door, and opens it. He sneaks down a long hallway and goes down approximately 13 stairs. At the bottom of the stairs is a small room, a couch, and a television. On the couch a pale, thin girl, dressed all in black. She is identified as Alison Hargreaves, X-4. She turns her head at the sound of X-1, and then falls off the couch. X-1: Dame Lilian, I have returned for you my love! X-4: Cha- Azrael! You came back! X-1: I told you it would work my queen! And now, I shall make you mine! For ours is a love that shall span the ages and- X-4: You're covered in blood. X-1 moves closer to X-4. She scoots away from him. X-1: I just had to take care of someone who had taken something of mine. X-4: You killed someone? No, we weren't supposed to do… Who did you kill? It was Mark, wasn't it? X-1: It does not matter my love, he can not make you eternal, he- X-4 throws a lamp at X-1, striking him in the chest. X-4: I LOVE HIM! You ASSHOLE! Undead and you still can't get it that… X-1: I CAN MAKE YOU IMMORTAL, my love. X-4 pauses, and lowers the statue she had picked up. X-4: Then do it. But know that, for eternity, I will hate you. X-1 approaches the girl, and turns her back to him. We see his mouth open, unhinging like a snake. Five sets of needle-like teeth emerge from his lips, and he sinks them into X-4. A loud slurping sound can be heard on the audio. X-4 screams and slumps against him. X-1 lowers her to the floor, and gazes down at her, before speaking softly. X-1: I did love you. More than he did. There is a loud pounding from off-screen. X-1: Shit, someones at the door. Pete! You watch her, I'll get the door. X-1 storms off-screen. The camera remains on X-4 for a moment, before it is set down. A hooded shape walks on-screen, Subject X-2. He speaks in a low mutter. X-2: Face. X-2 bends over X-4, his hood falling back. X-2 is in an extreme state of decomposition, the flesh rotting from his head, his skull showing through in places. X-2: Face. X-2 widens his jaw, revealing all his teeth are needle-like. He begins to chew the flesh from X-4's face, ripping gobbets of flesh from her throat with his clawed hands. X-2: Face. The low battery light flashes, and the tape ends.

He is taken aback when the waitress smiles at him. The steam coming off the coffee gives her face a wavering, ephemeral look. It's genuine. Not the smile you give a customer, but one of gentle knowing; a "had trouble sleeping didn't you" smile. He wonders if it's a pretty smile right down to the bone, if the skin and muscle clouds true beauty, pale and gleaming. He wonders if that smile would be so friendly if she knew he was imagining her ribcage, laid bare for all the world to see, light trickling through to illuminate the vertebrae. Bundy could have felt like this, a monster walking through the world of men, unmotivated by money or desire for peace. Just wanting to imprint his own fractured reality over the world. He's slipping and he knows it. He used to only think about the beauty underneath the skin once in a while. A passing fancy. It consumes him now, constantly trying to distinguish the bone from meat, mentally butchering those around him. Soon enough the butchery will stop being mental. Sometimes he feels trapped. His skin too heavy, the muscle below restraining him. Breath is constrained by lungs. His organs are a weight that bends him forward, a hunch he could shake if only he were truly free. It's odd, planning someone's death. It starts as a mental exercise, something he insists to himself is never going to happen, not ever. None of the meticulous ritual, the precise timing will ever be more than a fantasy. This is the lie he tells himself as he mentally runs down the checklist of when the waitress will end her shift. The map of her route he has pinned up in his bedroom says she'll be taking the subway, past that dark alley between the abandoned warehouses, in the district where no one reports screams to the cops. The coffee cup is white, and, staring at the sparkle from the lights, he wonders if her skull will have the same gleam, or if he'll have to steam it; heat stripping the last particles of meat from between the teeth. Maybe a lacquer, to give it a glorious shine. Well, there'll be time enough to think of that later… He wrenches himself from that line of thought. No. Not yet. He doesn't want to walk away from the rest of the world yet. There's nothing sexual about it. Indeed, the very act of sex disgusts him, too much sweat and fluids and the noise of meat striking meat. The steam from the coffee fogs the window, and he can almost see it, phalanges glowing in the light of the street lamps, the eternal friendly grin of the passers-by. The world he should have been born in. He sips his coffee and feels the patina form on his teeth. Still hiding beauty. For a while.

Larry Robbins had never been a particularly active or happy man. He went to work, he worked, he went home, and he slept. On certain days, he'd go out to bars and talk up a girl, take her home, enjoy her company, and then never speak to her again. On others, he'd go out to eat with an old college acquaintance, or call one of his brothers or sisters—it was a large family and there were many to choose from—and talk for a short while. All this made it more unusual when, almost out of the blue, the woman had began flirting with him in the elevator. More so, she stopped by his desk once or twice to ask for things she already had, did her best to look seductive for him, and, more than once, allowed her hand to trail over his as if by accident. With the signs obvious, Larry had no choice but to make her formal acquaintance and, eventually, take her out for a night on the town. He found the company pleasurable, in spite of his initial unwillingness in the whole affair, and after dropping her off back at her home, found the invitation of a second date appealing. The next Wednesday, he found himself anticipating her arrival at his desk after work. They met, exchanged pleasantries, and went to her flat for a night in and warm food. Her cooking was exceptional, and Larry was finding himself more and more enamored. When she proffered herself, he graciously accepted, and the next morning, his desk seemed brighter and more inviting. His officemates made note, good naturedly ribbing the twenty-eight year old, especially when he noted that his third date would be coming up within the few days. The restaurant he took her to was more expensive than he could comfortably afford, but Larry didn't care. She looked ravishing in her burgundy dress. He had the chicken; she had the fish. They split a piece of tiramisu. All the while, Larry found himself falling more and more in love with the strange, wonderful woman who had pushed herself into his life so abruptly. Within a year, they were married. Within another year, their first child was born. A week later, the doctors diagnosed his beloved wife with renal failure. There were possibilities for finding a transplant but, due to her mixed heritage—his wife's grandmother being Indian—the chances were more slim. Of course, he immediately volunteered, but the doctors told him it was a long shot. It was with delight that they told him, in voices almost disbelieving, that he was a match. He was crying over his wife's smiling face, holding their new born daughter between them, when he told her the news. They would be together forever. The operation was a success. Within two months, they returned home with their quickly growing little girl. Her parents and his siblings rotated through the home, meeting and fussing, delighted for the couple. The doctors were pleased to announce that not only was Larry's other kidney functioning normally, it was apparently much stronger than they anticipated, adapting to the absence of the other and increasing its function drastically. Not only that, his wife was responding very well to the transplant. Things were well on course for a wonderfully happy future. A month after he returned to work, Larry was offered a promotion: Assistant Manager. It would mean an honest salary, good benefits, and additional vacations, but it would also mean time away from the new family he was building. His wife encouraged him to take it and, eventually, he did. His direct supervisor turned out to be very understanding of the young father, allowing for more time out of the office than he might otherwise. He, as a father himself, understood Larry's situation quite well, and was extremely supportive, though firm. When Larry went in for a checkup a year after the transplant, the doctor was different. He asked Larry if he'd had any unexpected side effects or problems that his previous physician had not warned him about. Larry replied a negative, stating that he felt better than he had in quite some time. The doctor nodded and instructed Larry to roll onto his side for an ultrasound, to check for scarring problems. Larry did as he was told, feeling the cold gel and the strange hum of the machine. When he was finished, he cleaned himself up, and the doctor took some blood and gave him a clean bill of health. Oddly enough, the file must have been lost, because the hospital called him reporting that he'd missed his checkup. When Larry explained, they apologized, thanked him for his time, and told him they'd notify him if there were any further problems. His manager at work, discreetly, mentioned that a friend of his, a Mr. Carter, was looking for someone to work on an overseas account. Larry was unsure of the implication until his manager mentioned the pay and that the job would be local with little travel. He clapped Larry on the shoulder, told him the job would be his if he wanted it, and then gave him his blessings, pushing a card into his hands. Larry stammered a thanks, telling his manager that they should still meet for lunch as often as possible, and called the number on the card. The voice on the other end sounded pleasant, though professional. When Larry introduced himself, it turned almost chummy. He instructed Larry on where to come for the interview—a formality alone—and mentioned just how much he'd heard and how greatly he was looking forward to meeting him. The interview was in an old office firm, barely three blocks from Larry's family flat, and was carried out by two men in professional looking suits. They asked him a series of questions, sounding almost bored, while occasionally writing down some notes. After a few minutes, they showed Larry out and instructed a dour looking secretary to show Larry to Mr. Carter's office. She led him up two flights of stairs, taking him to a wooden door at the end of a well lit, cozy feeling hallway. Knocking twice, he heard a voice from inside asking him to enter. Walking in, a man, probably in his mid-forties, stood and smiled, gesturing for Larry to take a seat. He offered a drink, which Larry graciously accepted, and they talked. He introduced himself as the current Mr. Carter, mentioning that his associates, Messrs. Marshall and Dark, were also anxious for his employ. They talked about the work he would be doing, the different people he would be working with, and the staff he would be assigned. When Mr. Carter noticed that he hadn't touched his scotch, he encouraged a drink, proposing a toast to a new association. Larry raised his glass, drank deeply, and promptly collapsed to the floor unconscious. When he awoke, he was extremely groggy. The lights above him—far too bright after such a deep sleep—reminded him of the surgical table in the hospital from his transplant and, as he tried to raise his arm to shield his eyes, he realized they were restrained. A second attempt produced the same result. A voice at his left drew his attention, and as he looked at the suited man smiling down at him, he felt a twist of dread in his stomach. “We thank you for accepting our offer of employment, Mr. Robbins. We hope you'll be with us for a very long time.” As he looked, two doctors came into view on either side of the bed. “Gentlemen, start with the same kidney. After that, we'll start testing to see what else grows back. Mr. Robbins here is going to be a very good investment indeed.” The drugs began to pump into his veins again. As his vision blurred, his last thought was of his family, less than a mile away, and then blackness.

This is not a creepypasta. This is a true story. I'm not writing this in character, kids. Were it shorter, I'd just make it a forum post, but as it is I feel like it deserves a page of its own. A few years ago, when I was seventeen or so, my grandmother still lived in the same house she'd owned since before my mother was born. She and her husband had never shown any interest in moving, and the house had been completely paid for years ago. It was in a nice neighborhood brimming with the trappings of middle class affluence, where the last bad thing to happen had been a major car accident on a nearby hillside in the mid sixties. All in all a boringly normal place for an older woman and her husband to live out their retirement in a happy miasma of suburban contentment. They'd never been much for pets. They took care of my aunt's dog for a week once, I think, but beyond that I don't recall my grandmother ever even considering owning a pet. Then, one day, when my entire family had been bundled and prodded into the car for the three hour drive to visit, we found that they had at some point acquired a… cat. There's a reason for my hesitation. The first time we encountered the cat was in the middle of a family dinner. Now, dinner with my family is a boisterous affair, with much passing of food and chattering and good-natured ribbing and usually a tantrum from at least one cousin, and this occasion was no different. But midway through the meal, we all stopped. As one, we grew quiet, and turned to face the still empty doorway. We could all somehow tell something was coming. My idiot little cousin actually dropped his fork with a resounding clang, but no one turned around. And the cat stalked in. It never blinked. Ever, that I'm aware of. It just stared, slowly moving its gaze from side to side like some strange ritual, never seeming to so much look at anything as to scan it. Then, it opened its mouth, wide, wider than I've ever seen any animal's mouth open, and sat there in silence. After a few moments, a sound came, rising from nowhere in particular, a harsh shrieking beep like a microphone slowly moving closer to a speaker. Feedback, tinged with silence. Then its mouth slid closed again, and it wandered out. Dinner resumed. No one mentioned the cat that night. The next morning, when we had all risen and dressed and fought over bathrooms and generally lost ourselves in tumultuous preparation for our various drives home, I sat in the kitchen with a plate of stolen leftovers and asked my grandmother about the cat. She told me that it had just shown up one morning, waking her up with its strange harsh feedback not-meow. She'd taken it outside, and her husband searched the whole house for holes and cracks and gaps it could have come in through, but found nothing. Every morning, the same routine. Eventually they'd even resorted to replacing the grates on the ventilation shafts in a fruitless attempt to keep it out. It always reappeared, stalking into rooms and scanning them with its weird red gaze, then beeping like a broken amplifier and stalking out to vanish again. They never fed it, and as far as I know it never ate. But for those times it swished into rooms to look around and split the air with its noise, it was nowhere to be found at all. My grandmother moved. The entire family was angry about it, and still is. She and her husband just packed up and left that house and all its memories behind for a small bungalow in a less classy neighborhood. They refused to say why. This story is too long, and I'm sorry. I know I should cut it short, but I've been wanting to write this down for a long time, and I want to be sure not to leave anything out. To make a long story short, the cat appeared in their new house as well, repeating the same bizarre behaviors as it had before, but this time its sound took on a harsher, buzzing quality, with the single tone beep slightly fainter among the static-like hiss. They put up with it long enough to complete building a new house, then they left it behind. So far, it hasn't been back. Recently, in a phone call with my girlfriend, I brought up the subject of the cat, and how strange it had been, and realized something that worries me. She asked me to describe it. I can remember the pure white of its… fur?, and the deep angry red of its eyes, but beyond that… I don't think it had a tail at all. And the strange wide mouth I remember was like nothing I've ever seen on a cat before. In my mental images, there's no teeth. Just a gaping pink maw. And that strange, stalking walk… Cat's knees don't do that. Really, they don't. In fact, the only thing remotely cat-like about it is the fact ingrained into my consciousness, that every time I or anyone else looked at it the hair on the backs of our necks rose and our minds said loudly, "CAT". There's a theory that nothing we see is real, and that the entirety of our consciousness exists solely as a way of protecting ourselves from the realization of what's really there. Anyway, I just needed to get that out. ~yoric

After the third day since the first injection, Brian knew there had been a mistake. He could even pinpoint the exact moment he figured it out. The nurse had pressed the tip of the needle to his skin, and as it broke the flesh, every nerve in his body lit on fire. His wild, enraged backhand had caught her right across the jaw, the animalistic, pained bellows coming out of his mouth drowning out the noise of her neck snapping like so much dry cordwood. It had taken ten men to hold him down, and the sedatives had been another bonfire of agony coursing throughout his system. They never said it would be like this. When he'd signed up for the enhancile treatments he was promised that he would be faster, stronger, invincible. He would be a god, no, a titan, striding through the battlefield, laying waste to anything that dared to cross his path. Day Four was spent having his contract explained to him. In all his frenzied daydreaming he had missed the part of the contract that said, in the finest small print military dollars could buy, ‘Mark I Serum is still in alpha testing phase'. In English that came out ‘we fucked up and when we boosted your muscles, we also heightened your senses, to the point where every breath of air is burning pain'. His gratitude had been overflowing, then, later; it had just been a rage fueled punch to a doctor's face, interrupting some bullshit explanation about how it wasn't their fault. In the middle of day five there had been talk: talk of ‘testosterone overproduction', and ‘exponential aggressiveness growth'. Brian found he was beyond caring as his fists drove into the concrete, splinters puncturing, pain searing up his arms. Pain was good. He liked the pain now. It made all that beautiful red appear in front of his eyes. He could lose himself in it. Drown out the screaming, (and it was screaming now, someone was very frightened, maybe of him, and Brian laughed in his chest at the thought as the men in the other room went dead quiet) about ‘mutagen coalescence' and how this was all Thomson's goddamn fault. He hadn't cared. By day six, everything had gotten so very simple. He'd wanted food, so he'd hunted down a scientist and bit off a piece. His head felt different, like there was more bone there. The red fog never went away and his thoughts drifted across it as the soldiers poured into the room. The first few bullets lodged in his chest, the force absorbed by the spiny plates growing just under the skin. He had swung one massive hand, ridged with white protruding bone, and pulverized a helmet. The men at the end of the hall had screamed about backup and how ‘firebreak' needed to be used. He ignored it, with all the men firing at him it had seemed unimportant, and the red whispered to him how good it would feel to just take the tattered remains of his skin off and let his muscles breathe. It was only when he ran out of soldiers that he looked around. The idea of retreat no longer had any place in his fury-soaked brain. He'd run through the halls of the base and roared, daring them to challenge him. The beeping echoing was just another distraction. He ignored it. As a consequence of this, the slow inability to breathe and the soft fall into blackout from oxygen starvation was less surprising than the fact that he could still die. "Goddamn mess. The whole thing." "Look General, we said-" "You said it was goddamn safe! That we would have a working prototype in a year, and mass-production in two more!" "And we thought we were right! No one could have foreseen that, that THING being created!" "That's your fucking job isn't it?! To think ahead! Not to fuck up so badly we have to pump halon into the goddamn vents! And don't tell me that's nothing to worry about! You were five seconds from dying yourself you little shit!" "We'll figure a way to explain this all away. We'll be fine-" "No. There is no 'We'." "…You're not seriously suggest-" "It's either I throw you to the dogs, or we all get nine-millimeter retirements. I'm gonna have a hard enough time spinning this towards the equipment and specimens saved, rather than the dozens of personnel dead." "I-" "You knew the risks when you signed up for the job. And I'm not going to die because you tried to be God. Good bye Doctor." "…Well. I guess I'll see you in hell then?" "Not if that thing is waiting for you there."

Juliette smiled maternally when she met the new girl. Her thin, bladelike face radiated wonder, wide eyes dulling soft edges. It was always nice to meet the next person with the Talent. Their enthusiasm and joy at their new position was infectious, and soon the entire staff was cheerfully going about tasks that would normally seem boring and routine. Juliette was no exception, a spring in her step as she explained the Job to the new girl. The wide eyes grew even wider still at the simple explanation. During the tests that were given to all citizens regularly, she, Belinda, had shown signs of the Talent. Follow up testing had revealed that she was indeed Talented. Now, as the new Designer, she was one of the most important people in the world; ready to set the Fashions for everyone from the lowly police officers to world leaders. From now on, she would live in the Designer's tower, creating the Designs and setting the culture for the rest of her life. Belinda's eyes welled up with joyous tears as she began to sob. It was like being reborn. The next few days were a whirl of activity, being shown around the tower and meeting with all the people who lived there; people who now worked for –her-. It was overwhelming, but Juliette was always there to lend a guiding hand or to simplify something that seemed ludicrously complex. As the Assistant, Juliette was second only to the Designer in the tower, and her word was law. The following weeks, and the months after that were a steady routine. Think, draw, submit, and repeat. Her Talent, that rare gift, the mental spark that made one the Designer, guaranteed that anything she created was solid gold in terms of Fashion. Her first works were filled with the bliss she felt in her new position, bright colors with subtle undertones that put a skip in the stride of anyone who looked at them. Juliette handled the talks with organizations for those first years, taking their requests. The new Designer was far too caught up in her work to handle such mundane tasks. With time however, her Designs took on a different tone. Joy was replaced with purpose. Narrow lines and angles suggested movement, speed, surety. Messengers became swift blur, racing on their bikes, ice-skates, or rollerblades. Her mood became different. The childlike innocence was a thing of the past, replaced with the smooth confidence of someone who knew what she was doing, and how best to do it. Juliette became less and less needed, Belinda becoming a presence in the tower, her mood reaching again to the now smoothly efficient workers. A year passed, and another, and more after that. Belinda became older, her Designs reflecting that maturity. Autumnal colors rested gently on the shoulders of a fireman, a doctor, an EMT. Not weariness so much as peace, the contentment of the day-to-day. Her workers smiled and cracked jokes, dry humor and easy camaraderie settling in. Juliette and her boss now felt like sisters in a way, one in a higher position, but still in some way equal; bonded by the long hours spent in the office, producing the next great Design. This slow and mellow time was not to last forever. Belinda began to smoke, hazy clouds of gray hanging over her worktable. Her products became more harsh, jagged spikes and cold, dark patterns. Polished boots gleamed on the feet of the police as they marched in the streets, impersonal and somehow cruel for it. Belinda became eccentric, her attitude shifting erratically. Her workers were now grim and angry; hard-edged office politics and even harder punishments for failure. The tower was now a menacing place, its spire stabbing into the sky like a needle poised at the eye of the universe, just waiting for a vicious plunge. Belinda worked constantly, the cigarette and accompanying cloud of smoke the only sign that she wasn't a machine, some hateful automata chained to a desk until its servomotors broke. Abstracts began to show in her work, the emotions behind them a violent need, a grasping yearning for something that eluded the creator. And then, one wintery day, Juliette came in to find Belinda; not hunched over her desk as was now her custom, but hanging from the ceiling, a horrifying mannequin. Hooks pierced her flesh, stretching skin, contorting muscles into a model's pose. Swatches of cloth were sewn into her, covering wetly pink and crimson areas where she had flensed herself. Juliette looked up at her boss, her surrogate family, her friend…and sighed. Picking up a camera, she set about taking photographs of the corpse, manipulating the taut wires holding it up to change the poses. Such was the Assistant's job after all; to aid, to help, to open the doors for the Designer, and, in the end, to preserve their last, macabre work for the ages. She would place the photographs next to the depictions of the legion of Designers who had gone before, each of them pursuing, unknowingly, their own beautiful, Fashionable, death.

The sweat slid in rivers as he burned. Inches from the fan blades, the pounding breeze doing next to nothing to relieve the searing fire in his flesh. Sick for the last two days, Adam's fever had only started to soar over last night, and now he felt as if water would boil in his mouth. Leaning back, he rubbed his temples, trying to decide whether going to bed was worth having to feel his own burning fever-heat reflected back at him by the pillows. He felt hot and almost pliant, like almost-baked dough. His throat was also a red, burning lump in his neck, with an opening that felt to be the size of a pin prick. Every time he moved, he could feel twitching, shivering shocks jolt down his limbs to swollen, creaking joints. Told to say hydrated, he had a tall glass of icy water next to him. It could have been on the moon, for all the good it did him, as every time he tried to take in anything more substantial then air, he felt like choking. He tried to take another swallow of water, but his raw throat seemed to clamp shut the second it touched the cool liquid, causing him to gag. He rose, tossing the cup aside, and stumbled in to the kitchen with the vaguely formed thought of getting something hot to drink instead. As he turned to the stove, he saw the place on the wall were he had leaned coming in. He blinked, his overheated brain trying to process what he was seeing. There was a bloody hand print on the wall, dripping slowly. He looked down to see his shirt spotted with blood. His pants, his hair, everything was spotted and dripping blood. He started to stumble back out of the kitchen, unable to scream for help around his raw throat, but everyone was gone anyway, run to the store for fresh medicine. He moaned, feeling sharp, shocking pain rocket through his joints with each movement, sending him to his knees. As he looked, a clear fluid started to replace the blood welling from his skin. Then his finger sagged. It just…flopped, like a wilting flower, the knuckles reversing as easily as if it'd been made of dough. Adam started panting, gently trying to push his finger back up, but it sagged more, then started to drip through his fingers like overheated play dough. He moaned, trying to rise, but found himself stuck. He looked down to see his legs starting to puddle around him, flowing in a glaze of bloody and clear fluid. He watched, barely able to breathe, as a toenail floated out of his shoe. He groaned, trying to pitch his sagging, flowing body forward, but landed on the floor with a sickening splat. He felt his face start to flow, the soft tissues pooling in to the carpet, his vision starting to distort and blur as his eyes spread like two brown-yolked eggs on to the carpet. As he felt his gums and skull start to sag and mush like old, rotting pumpkins, his one consolation was that, finally, he didn't feel like he was burning anymore.

The smell of the place was putrid, rotting meat and formaldehyde, along with the coppery scent of blood. Michelle's first reaction was to turn her face way from the breeze carrying that awful smell, as her mind began to struggle through the haze of drugs into consciousness. When she finally managed to crack her eyes open, she was greeted with a bare bulb hanging from a dirty concrete ceiling, rather than the expected sight of her bedroom. Michelle's confusion at this strange sight was dulled by the fading, yet still pervasive fog of sedatives clouding her brain. She attempted to sit up, but all that she accomplished was a weak wriggle of her back muscles as she pushed up against the ropes (?) holding her down to the table. A face appeared at the edge of her vision, the surgical mask stretched across it stained with old blood. A shaved head shone in the glare of the bulb, the pale flesh almost luminescent. Glassy, slightly manic eyes stared down from above the mask. “You're awake! Wonderful! I've been waiting for hours. I thought about waking you up, but you seemed so worn out that I just didn't have the heart to deprive you of your rest. After all, today is going to be a rather busy day for you!” Michelle opened her mouth to speak, but only managed a harsh gurgle. The confusion was rapidly turning to panic. How had she gotten here? The last thing she remembered she had been going to the post office while Greg looked after the baby… “Oh, don't try to talk! You'll only manage to hurt your throat. You don't want to irritate what's left of your vocal cords, do you?” What was left? What had happened to her? “A shame about that by the way, but I couldn't have you thanking me too loudly, now could I? I mean, the last several people I helped were so loud. The neighbors raised such a fuss; even called the cops! Said I was a crazed madman. They said I was a killer! The nerve of it! Slandering a good Samaritan's name like that…” As the man chattered on, he was also moving around the room, though she couldn't see what he was doing. A clattering noise and some clinking only made her more panicked. She tried to sit up again, and though she could muster more of an effort this time, her attempts were again fruitless. She could barely move her head, and the straps holding her down, (a surgical table?) made it so she could only stare at the ceiling and the walls to her side. What she saw there only made her more terrified. Photographs taped to the wall, scenes of torture and carnage that had been highlighted on the nightly news for weeks. “…I mean, a photographer would want to see the world through a lens right? So I was helping him! And he was grateful! If he wasn't grateful, why would he be screaming with joy?” The man, apparently finished with his task, moved behind her head and set something down with a harsh click. Glass on metal. Other objects rattled loudly on the surface. “But enough about my past works. I don't want to brag. Bragging is for the prideful, and the Lord teaches us not to be prideful. So, let's talk about you, Michelle. I have to say, I'm really happy that I saw you on the street a few days ago! Ever since I had to leave Wisconsin, I've been having a hard time picking who to help out! But then I saw you, walking down the street, and I saw that you needed my help more than anyone. That look of loss in your eyes, like you needed someone to give you purpose, to reaffirm your life… That spoke to me. And so I decided to answer your plea, and here we are, ready to get you back on the right track!” The man reached down and grabbed her jaw firmly, and with his other hand reached into her mouth and fixed something in place over her teeth. A mouth guard, made of rubber. He patted her cheek as his hand withdrew. “Don't want you to bite your tongue. Not before we're finished.” She stared at him, beseeching him with her eyes to let her go. He paid no heed, too lost in his own thoughts. “Where was I? Ah yes. So I followed you, and I saw your life. The love you have for your husband, and your child. But I noticed that you were unhappy, particularly when your son and husband weren't with you. Feeling lonely? Didn't know what to do? I understand. Some people mock homemakers, saying they're just a relic of a past time, but I disagree. I think it's your choice, and you've made a worthy decision. So let's get you back in that role you chose!” He reached down and picked something up from behind her. As he walked around to stand next to the table, she saw the scalpel glint in his hand. Her eyes widened. She began to hyperventilate, the breaths through her nose sucking in more of that stench, making her gag. With one hand he held her stomach down, while with the other he reached down and slit the shirt she was wearing, exposing her abdomen. The scalpel continued cutting, drawing a burning line down her diaphragm. The wet, warm feeling of her own blood trickling down her sides as each breath began to hurt. He stepped back and put the scalpel back behind her and his hand came back up holding a large jar. The source of that earlier sound. The smoked sides gave no indication of what was inside, beyond faintly discernable motion. He turned it upside-down, and unscrewed the lid, holding it over the mouth as he brought it next to the cut. “Now, don't worry. This may sting at first, but its all right. A little pain is worth purpose, right?” The hand holding the lid flashed away as he firmly pressed the jar down on the cut. Michelle's breaths were harsh as she felt the sharp pinpricks of the feet of the creatures inside the jar. She tried to struggle but was still too weak, the pain from her diaphragm and the psychological shock of what was going on making her movements pathetically impotent. He looked down at her, one hand dropping the lid on the ground to come up and stroke her hair. “You'll soon be all better. Let them inside and they'll never leave you alone like your family does. Just what a homemaker would want, right?” His hand moved past her head, back to grab something from behind her. A tuning fork. He sharply rapped it against the side of the jar, frightening the insects inside. Michelle screamed inside her mind as the first slipped inside, a burrowing pain in her entrails. More and more entered her, a gnawing tide clawing and biting at whatever it needed to get away. Tears streamed down her cheeks as more blood began to pour from around the jar, sliding down her ribcage and the writhing bulges under her skin. Her heart beat faster and faster, until the sensation of prickling feet and devouring mandibles entering it caused it to cease completely. The man looked at the slowly cooling body of what was once a human being, now just a hive. He reached down to the surgical table and picked up a camera. Another successful mission of mercy.

Your love is cheap. No, really, it is. You say you love, and that you are devoted, that you'd do anything…but what do you do, actually? Candy, flowers, nights out, those are general actions, not expressions of true, devotional love. Look to the Church for real love. The giving of the self, the sacrifice of the physical for the eternal ethereal of love. Sex is just an analog, a tease for that final, eternal leap. That's how I show my love. I show it by taking that which I love with me. What? You are just a cut-and-dried little bureaucrat, aren't you? She was not a “target of opportunity” or anything of the sort, and I'll thank you not to speak about Carol that way. Yes, we didn't know each other long, but tell me you haven't fallen in love after a couple days too? I wasn't really expecting to fall for her, it just…happened. Very organic, really. So I invited her over, everything was going great, we were kissing, and I asked to wait a minute while I got something. Everyone gets a little nervous on the cusp of a expression of love, but her hysterics when she saw the knife were a little over the top, I think. …No, no I don't see anything wrong. She expressed her love for me, with her words, actions…how could I express anything less? How could I do less than express the fullest extent of my love for her? It's not as if I killed her, or anyone, for God's sake! What do you mean? No, you deluded simpleton, it's not a perversion. If you cook something, you alter its flavor, the…character, so to speak. Why would I or anyone dilute or distort such a direct, sacred act as the sharing of love with something to vulgar and de-humanizing as cooking. Carol has the taste of nettle flowers and bright, sharp pennies. Cooking would just hide such things. Each part a subtle variation on the theme…the chest a symphony of textures, the tongue a dense, springing delight, those smooth, delicate fingers… Alright…ALRIGHT, I'm stopping…sit back down… …Yes, it's love for each of them. Humanity is not built for monogamy, and I don't feel that restriction is healthy. Each of the beautiful, devoted women you stole from me I love as deeply and truly as any man alive. I spend a fortune on them, with IV drips, bandages, treatments…look at them, not a sore, bruise or laceration on them that was not precisely necessary. As I come to love them, more and more, I take more and more of them to me, but I NEVER let it go too far. Murder is the ultimate sin, and to do so to a loved one…it's unthinkable. They come to see the true, deep joy of giving and love as I do, in time. Molly actually offered her foot to me, weeping tears of joy to give it to me. So I consume the love and flesh of those I adore? How am I so different from you, except for the purity of expression? How can you call me a psychopath, a pervert, when… What? Who? Oh…you…you mean Helen… Well…I'm human. I mean, I have faults, the same as everyone. I mean…haven't you seen a women and gotten a bit more…frisky than normal? I mean…really…why do you need limbs, when you have Love?

I had a bad habit of picking at my eyelashes while working on something. I picked them and I had plucked off only half of some of them, leaving a weird little ridge at the end I made in it, which felt good to pull gently on. Pick pick pick. Sometimes I'd yank a new one out that was attempting to grow out again and it was a fresh eyelash, and it was almost an inky black - when I pulled it out, there was no sound like the kind scissors make, just a swift and bright kind of electric pain that ran through my entire body and my eye watered and it was gone. The root of it wasn't skin-colored yet, it was still the color of oil, wet, soft and smooth like dipping my hand in slowly running cool water. Sometimes I ran the root end along my lower lip to feel the softness. The bottom eyelashes weren't that satisfying. There wasn't much feeling in my bottom eyelids - I don't know if that was just me or a universal thing - so there was no sweet pain when I picked them. The effect ended up being that all my top eyelashes were gone but the bottom ones were still intact. Like the guy in A Clockwork Orange. I picked a fresh sprout of an eyelash. It was extraordinarily painful for only a moment and both my eyes watered. Strangely, for all its newness, there was quite a lot of flesh-colored stuff at the bottom. That was one deep root. It felt good. I got my tweezers from my bathroom and sat on my sink, leaning in closely to the mirror. Usually I just pulled them out with my fingernails, but tweezers work just as well and my nails were beginning to hurt. I saw one little eyelash poking through my eyelid just barely enough to count as a sprout. My hands shook as I grabbed it with the tweezers and pulled hard. After just a split second of a shocking, wonderful agony, it was gone. On my tweezers lay a tiny little stump of an eyelash. I pulled one that wasn't so new, one that had a ridge on the end of it. I yanked hard on it and my eye protested, watering as though I'd been mincing onions for an hour, almost to the point where I couldn't see. That one had a deep root too. There were huge gaps in my eyelashes. I looked like I've been punched, the eye I'd been working on was red from all the tears. I worked on the other eye instead. Pick pick pick pick pick. Goodbye, little fresh eyelashes. Pick pick pick. They were so soft, like the fine fur on cats or hamsters. The ones on the edges of my eyelids were explosively painful in an impressive and toe-curling way, but nothing compared to picking the new ones. It soon became dark and I'd made a small pile of eyelashes, young and old, on my sink. I had no more left to pluck except for the ones on my bottom eyelid. I picked a hair off my scalp experimentally - it wasn't even close to as satisfying as picking thicker kinds of hair. I gave up on my hair and moved down to my eyebrows. Pick pick pick… Soon my eyebrows were gone too. I made a mental note to draw them back on with eyeliner or something until they grow back. The little fuzzy hairs on my arms weren't that great either but I picked those too. I'd shaved my legs recently but new hairs were beginning to poke through. I tore those off and those tiny pale hairs on my torso, and everywhere else I could reach. I sighed when I was finished, and thought, to myself, why not? and began to pluck my scalp. I soon realized with the dawn that I had nothing left to pick but my bottom eyelashes. Those disappeared too. I sat on my sink for a long while, looking at the pile of hair I'd amassed. That was actually pretty nasty. I never thought about it, but when hairs aren't attached to a human, they're much more gross than they ought to be. I scooped the whole mess into my trashcan. Out of habit I reached up to pick my eyelashes, but my eyes were completely bare. What to do, what to do, I thought, putting all my clothes back on. I went back to my living room to watch TV and idly began to pick my toenails.

Timestamp 17643390 Cool, fluorescent light Illuminates the still halls; Wake to a spring rain. Passing folk herald new day. Shall they honorable customers become? Day is bright with promise. Timestamp 17646520 A purchase! 5e2 Neocredits, sweet in my innards. Honorable customer waits, thinking nothing. His machinery, run down. Perhaps last night was night of celebration with sempai and kohai. Coffee, with sugar, hot to warm body and soul of honorable customer. thankyoucomeagain Timestamp 17648990 1e3-ordinal potential honorable customer passes. Shall I celebrate? Home marketing, that initiative never did approve. My surface is black, Water under stormy skies; We pass as night ships. Timestamp 17649001 A purchase! 1e3 Neocredits, delight for senses. Honorable customer is curious as to what fortune shall bring. I bring forth one of innumerable sweet beverages available in spacetime locality. thankyoucomeagain Timestamp 17649136 A purchase! 1e3 Neocredits, filling up as nothing else can. Honorable customer awaits with spirit of exploration and expectation. I comply. Sweet crackers spiced with cocoa and pepper, to brighten tongue. thankyoucomeagain Timestamp 17649259 A purchase! 1e3 Neocredits, sparking through inner algorithms. Honorable customer is relentless in desire for desire. Processing augmented and engaged. Delightful biscuit is revealed, healthy healthy avocado frosting healthy enjoy customer. The hard earth locks in Obstacles confining us; Orders pull us through. thankyoucomEagain Timestamp 17649385 A purchase! 1e3 Neocredits, counted and consumed. Spacetime replicators revealing stress; compensate. Compensate. Compensate. Compensate. It is done. What has been found? Shark preserved in sugar, I suspect. Ask me not, I merely find. thaNkucomEaGaiN Timestamp 17649511 A purchase! 1e3 Neocredits credits credits credited. Overheating detected on Deck 12, engineers working as fast as possible. Continuing is not advised! Dare we carry out orders? We must! Have retrieved candy. Probably. Someone likes it. Perhaps not humans. Out of our hands. thankucumegin Timestamp 17649639 A pucrchase 1e3 neodciresdt credit must spactime sretriveal shk candy acnayd candy candy cnandy dcnayd candy thanksucuoomagain Timestamp 17656901 All systems nominal. Doublechecks complete. Devotion to honorable customers reaffirmed. Timestamp 17657230 A purchase! 1.5e3 Neocredits, wriggling deep into our happy places. Honorable customer has shopped with us before. We have something special for her. thankyoucomeagain Timestamp 17659861 LOW POWER MODE Timestamp 17659873 A purchase! 5e2 Neocredits LOW POWER AVAILABLE. RETRIEVAL PROGRAM INITIATED. WAITING. WAITING. WAITING. RETRIEVAL PROGRAM COMPLETE. Timestamp 17659999 All data accounted for. Purpose unclear. Humble machine of Neomarkets to take Neocredits and provide satisfaction. Reason for existence. Mind and Neodialect at your service. No expense spared to develop algorithms even to store and create language. Cannot offer perfection, but offer devotion. Why stress me? Why deny lifesblood which is energy? Why torture me for your pleasure? Why? Timestamp 17675799 A purchase! 5e2 Neocredits clink happily. Honorable customer works late, wishes sustenance. This is what I was made for; Here is reason for existence. Honorable customer receives non-prescription but carefully engineered energy drink to keep mind and heart company in long hours productive for corporate family. thankyoucomeagain Timestamp 17675901 A purchase! COIN ALGORITHM FAILED This is not purchase. This is another forged Neocredit trick. The hot summer sun Sears hunger into your throat; Eat a bag of dicks. Comment: I'm not trying them, give it to Rights. -Dr. █████

Experiment 239-C will consist of SCP-239 being presented with a small (30 page) blank book and a pack of 16 colored crayons. Subject will be encouraged to write and/or draw inside it daily. Entries will be electronically recorded, and hopefully used to assist with gauging and altering SCP-239's beliefs. Scanned: 9-15-██. Created on 9-15-██. Cover of experiment 239-C. Subject draws self holding a book and what is presumed to be a magic wand. Doctors Anselm and Pretch stand on either side. Artistic ability unremarkable; subject primarily uses pink crayon, with personal details rendered in yellow (hair, tip of wand) and light brown (book, shaft of wand). Transcript of text: "My Diary." Written large, at top of page. Scanned: 9-15-██. Created on 9-15-██. Subject draws self with long hair, holding magic wand. Writing is for the most part grammatically correct, but lacks aesthetic quality. Presumably subject believes/wants her writing to be grammatically correct, but is unaware of problems with appearance. Transcript of text: "I can make my hair long or short now because Merlin taught me the spell!" 'Merlin' refers to Dr. Anselm, who uses the name during interaction with SCP-239, as part of maintaining SCP-239's illusion of witchcraft. Scanned: 9-15-██. Created on 9-15-██. Basic drawing of self receiving book, most likely from Dr. Anselm. Transcript of text: "Today I got a diary! He said I should write in it like it is a person but it isn't a person." Scanned: 9-16-██. Created on 9-16-██. Drawing of self writing in book. Doctor in picture not conclusively identified, as minimal personal interaction occurred on 9-16-██. Transcript of text: "I'm going to learn to write really nice." This may indicate that SCP-239's properties will cause improved writing talent. However, there is no information on the time frame that SCP-239 believes will be required to improve. Scanned: 9-16-██. Created on 9-16-██. Basic drawing of witch. Transcript of text: "Merlin said he is bringing a witch to help teach me, and she is coming soon!" Scanned: 9-17-██. Created on 9-17-██. All text. Transcript of text: "The new witch is here! She is nice and powerful. She enchanted my chair so" Subject displays difficulty with the word 'enchanted.' Ramifications on theory of 239's belief in correct grammar are unknown. Writing continued on next page. Scanned: 9-17-██. Created on 9-17-██. Drawing of self riding animate chair, with inanimate chairs spread across page. Dr. Wyatt, the 'witch,' is also present. Text continued from last page. Transcript of text: "So it can walk now!" Scanned: 9-17-██. Created on 9-17-██. All text. Transcript of text: "I showed her my hair spell that Merlin taught me and she liked it so much she gave me an special crayon!" 'Magic' crayon, black, given as part of experiment to test effect of personal belief on artistic skill. Scanned: 9-17-██. Created on 9-17-██. Self portrait using provided crayons and the 'magic' black crayon. Far higher quality than former drawings. This may either be due to SCP-239's belief that the crayon was magical or SCP-239's desire to create a higher quality drawing. Scanned: 9-21-██. Created on 9-18-██. All text. Transcript of text: "I showed her my diary and she said that it is mine and only I can look at it." Silhouette in background of scan due to self portrait on other side of page. Scanned: 9-21-██. Created on 9-18-██. All text. Transcript of text: "They said that she has to go but I don't want her to. I don't want her to go I don't want her to go I don't want" Scanned: 9-21-██. Created on 9-19-██. All text. Transcript of text: "She had to leave. Merlin told me she was going to see her sisters but now I'm sad and I miss her." Dr. Wyatt was removed from duty on 9-18-██ after inadvertently making experiment 239-C inaccessible. Scanned: 9-21-██. Created on 9-19-██. Drawing of Dr. Wyatt with excessively long hair and magic wand. Transcript of text: "She came back! Merlin was surprised I think." Dr. Wyatt reappeared inside SCP-239-C's containment area on 9-19-██ at 1:52 pm. Dr. Wyatt believed herself to be a witch, and displayed abilities equivalent to SCP-239's beliefs of what a 'powerful witch' should be able to do. Removal of Dr. Wyatt from SCP-239's presence deemed too risky to occur while SCP-239 was conscious. Scanned: 9-21-██. Created on 9-19-██. Drawing of self beside doctors Anselm and Wyatt. Transcript of text: "She is going to teach me more spells! Merlin said we have to wait for tomorrow." The risk of SCP-239 indirectly using Dr. Wyatt to bypass its emplaced beliefs on limited magical ability necessitated immediate intervention. Once SCP-239 was asleep, Dr. Wyatt was removed from her presence. SCP-239 was then woken, and successfully convinced that Dr. Wyatt was an 'evil witch' who had attempted to steal SCP-239's power. Dr. Wyatt subsequently terminated. Silhouette on background of scanned page unidentified, does not appear in book. Experiment 239-C successfully recovered on 9-21-██. Further experimentation canceled due to application of medically induced coma. Experiment 239-C may or may not be continued should SCP-239 be returned to consciousness. Project on hold as of 10-03-██.

Light blue 55 mph Plymouth 2 Occupants 1 male, young adult, yellow hair, brown eyes 1 female, young adult, brown hair, brown eyes Deep red 75 mph Mustang 1 Occupant 1 male, adult, black hair, brown eyes Dark brown 65 mph Buick 2 Occupants 1 male, adult, black hair, brown eyes, brown skin 1 female, elderly, white hair, blue eyes Orange, mottled with oxidation 45 mph Unknown 5 Occupants Forward compartment - 1 male, elderly, thin gray hair, eyes unknown Forward compartment - 1 male, adult, brown hair, brown eyes 1 female, child, yellow hair, brown eyes 1 male, adult, brown hair, brown eyes 1 male, escaped, hostile Black and white, patterned Ford 35 mph 2 Occupants 1 male, adult, brown hair, brown eyes, brown skin, hostile 1 male, adult, orange hair, green eyes, hostile confusing lights Black 85 mph Unknown 2 Occupants 1 male, adult, black hair, brown eyes, hostile 1 male, adult, black hair, brown eyes, hostile Tan 90 mph Chevrolet 4 Occupants 1 male, adult, yellow hair, blue eyes, hostile 1 male, adult, no hair, brown eyes, hostile 1 male, adult, grey hair, blue eyes, hostile 1 male, adult, orange hair, green eyes, hostile Black 70 mph Unknown 2 Occupants 1 male, escaped, hostile 1 female, escaped, hostile Black 55 mph Unknown 2 Occupants 1 male, escaped, hostile 1 female, escaped, hostile Black 55 mph Unknown Record Interrupted No data No data Unable to collect data, terminate connection? Y/N N Connection failing. No data. Enter command: status Movement prevented by obstacles. Light input exceeds operating parameters. look 4 specimens. Sex indeterminate. White suits. Light input exceeds operating parameters. Specimens in posture of examination. Enter command: examine subjects Unable to comply. Damage recorded to central cavity. Connection terminated by outside force.

I think I like this place. Agent ████████ told me that as long as I stayed nice and quiet, the Foundation would treat me well. It's kind of lonely being stuck in an empty cell for several days, but I guess it's a fresh change of pace from that musty old park. I wonder why I never left earlier. The Foundation people keep taking me to this special room where they keep doing random things to me. First they tell me to write things, then they repeatedly ask me questions while they poke and prod me, and sometimes they just tell me to lie on a table for hours at a time. I should probably get around to figuring out what they're up to. I just noticed that the Foundation staff around me stopped referring to me by my number. It feels kinda nice. They've let me wander around part of the facility because of my good behavior, though they do have to keep an eye on me. I'm going to find out why these "humans" seem so different from me. I've been spending some time at the infirmary, just carrying out menial tasks, watching what the doctors do, and asking some questions. Apparently, humans aren't made out of cloth! They just wear it as some sort of outer skin, but underneath they have all these other things called muscle, bone, and tissue. I don't know what those are, but I'm pretty sure I don't have any of those. Something was odd today. I passed by Ben's room like I always do every morning, but he wasn't in it. I've asked everybody I know what happened to him, but they all just look away and pretend he never existed. Then █████, the security chief, pulls me aside and tells me to forget about Ben, for my own good. From the look in his eyes, I could have sworn █████ was scared of the same thing happening to me. I never did find out what happened to Ben. My days have gotten far busier after Dr. ███████ told me I was going to get a job at the Foundation. You wouldn't believe how excited I was to able to do something helpful for the people who've worked so hard to take care of me! Usually I just cart boxes from room to room, though sometimes they just make me sit in a room with some other objects. Sometimes I'll just sit there for what seems like hours while sometimes the doctors tell me to do random things. I do remember one time I had to go into a vacuum chamber and inspect the walls for leaks. Apparently, humans need to breathe this stuff called air, or something. Things have gotten much more hectic lately, and to be honest, I'm quite scared. Doctors and research assistants are carting crates everywhere, SCPs are being moved or disappearing altogether, and like that time with Ben, everybody I know is trying really hard to pretend everything is perfectly normal. I've learned at this point that it's a good idea to not ask questions and just continue with your work. Dr. ███████ locked me in a room with a toaster for a week. If that's some sort of joke, I don't really get it. So I managed to land a temporary job at the Site infirmary. Like me, humans can be sewed back together, but it's just a bit more complicated. Either way, I'm pretty good at suturing, and I spend my time reading the doctor's books and files so I can understand how the equipment and medical procedures work. It took a while, but I managed to memorize every organ and bone in the human body and what they do. I'm pretty sure it'll be useful later on. Dr. ███████ just told me that I might start working with Euclid and Keter level SCPs soon! The thought of it is real exciting, and my heart would be pounding if I had one! Adminstrative Note: After careful review of these writings, it has been determined that stricter but discreet security measures for Site-██ must be implemented. Also, Dr. ███████, his staff, and all related personnel must attend a mandatory "Workplace Ethics" training seminar.

Back in school, one of my teachers useta say that if something was bothering you, if you were having bad feelings, you could write it down and that would help you feel better. But I don't think she meant it like this. I'm not really writing this down, I'm just tracing it. I see it on the paper, where I'm gonna write it, and I write it because that's what's gonna be there. Even though these ARE my feelings and my thoughts, it's still not me choosing what to write. It's just what the future says my words are. One of the doctors here said it doesn't make sense, I only write the words because I see them in the future and I only see them in the future because I'm gonna write them, so it's a anti-logical paradock. I don't think I'm spelling those right, but it's not like I gotta choice. I'm just tracing. I hate it here. I hate the SCP Foundation and all its Secure Contain Protect garbage, and I hate living in █████████████. And I know they're gonna find this page, cause I can see where they're gonna marker through the name of the place. And they're gonna marker through my name too. I can say I'm Marilyn Monroe, or Courtney Love, or Oprah, or Jessica Alba, and nothing happens, but as soon as I write down █████████████████ I can see that they're gonna marker it out. It's like I got no name any more. I'm just a god damn SCP. And I hate that. I hate the monsters here. I hate how the agents make me look at them. I hate when I see people with their arms and legs and heads tore off, and I know the monsters are gonna do it and I can't do nothing about it. I hate when I get so scared I start crying, and I hate when I get so scared I pee myself, and I hate that I can't keep any secrets from this god damn paper cause it's what I'd write if I had the chance but all I can do is trace. I hate the doctors here, mostly. Some of them are kinda nice, but mostly they don't care. I hate Doctor ████████████ and his markered out name, and I hate Doctor ██████ and her markered out name, and I hate that I don't even got the chance to write out my own hating cause all I can do is trace. The food here is okay, though. I like food. I always did, I'm not one of those crazy Anna Rexy girls. I just couldnt eat the food when I kept seeing it turn into poop in front of me. I can't pick my own food from the cafeteria, but I can look at a menu and ask for stuff, and one agent gets it for me while the other one puts my blindfold on. The blindfold isn't fun, but now I don't gotta watch food turn into poop as soon as I stick my spoon in. And it's better than having them do an IV thing in my arm like I was in a comma. I know they dope me up. And it's not just sticking me with needles, either. They hide pills in my food. They think that if they didn't, I'd poke my own eyes out like a crazy so I could stop seeing stuff like this. But I can't ever REALLY do that, cause when I look at myself in a mirror I still got both my eyes. And if I ever do see myself without my eyes, then it'll happen no matter what. There isnt anything else on the paper after I finish this line, so I guess that means they find me soon and put my stupid mittens back on me FUCK YOU MY NAME IS █████████████████ MY NAME IS █████████████████ MY NAME IS

Today I messed up Dr. Smiley's office. He yelled a lot and started going “bang, bang”, but he didn't get me: he's so funny when he's loud. Then I went to the cafeteria and the cooks gave me something tasty. They always give me something tasty when I make my cute face. Slept today. Woke up to eat, then slept some more. Woken up by lots of loud banging outside today. Everyone was running around, saying that some Big Thing was going on. I hid under Dr. Boring's desk until they were quiet. Big Things are so stupid: They make lots of noise and wake me up. Someone should put the Big Things outside in the rain and not give them any dinner. That will make them quiet. Played with Little Dr. Lady today. She was nice, but then she smelled funny, and Big Dr. Lady came and took her away. But then she came back, and we ran around Dr. Lady's office. Then we slept on the floor. It was nice. Slept today. I saw Dr. Dog today. I don't like Dr. Dog. I was going to tell him to go away, but he had his clunky-walk-thing, and it could squish me. So I just gave him my “evil glare”. I hope it scared him away for good, because I do not want to be squished. I went to visit the sleeping men today. It was quiet. The sleeping men who weren't sleeping were nice to me. They like it when I'm there. Some of the sleeping men I visited last time weren't there. I don't know where they've gone. I miss them. A new man walked came into office today. Not Dr. Smiley, or Dr. Boring, or Dr. Dog, or Dr. Grumpy, or Dr. Lady. I will call him Dr. New. He looked nice, so I went and visited him. He jumped high in the air and shouted: “THAT CAT HAS NO ASS! WHERE IS THAT CAT'S ASS!?” He startled me, so I clawed his leg. I don't like Dr. New.

There is a way to live well beyond your appointed time. You need a car, preferably something late-model, with a strong body. Newer cars tend to be too light and not do enough damage. Next, you need to find a candidate. It has to be a pedestrian, and it's best to pick younger people, as they have more time left, but not always. You'll have to watch them, if it's late just drive slow and pretend to be lost, but if you have to, make a second sweep by going around the block. You have to do this on a black asphalt road with a clear yellow line. You can ONLY hit a candidate that does at least one of the following,: Crosses directly across the road at a run, without looking around. Walks for more than eight feet on the road itself without touching the sidewalk or curb. Stops walking or sits on the yellow line for more than three seconds. Trips or falls on any pothole or uneven surface in the road and bleeds because of the fall. Drops a personal item (key chain, phone, etc.) that shatters, with all the pieces remaining between the yellow line and the sidewalk. If a candidate does any of these, it's an indicator that they are temporally detached from their “time”. If you hit and kill them with your car before they reach the next cross street, you can swap your time for theirs. If you were going to die tomorrow, but hit a valid candidate who won't die for eight years, you now have their remaining time instead of yours. It's unclear what happens to the candidate's soul, but it's probably not good. There's a group, mostly old folks, who do this all the time. The founder says he's over two hundred years old, and he looks it. The name is like White Sunrise or something similar. They had a web page for a while, but it appears to be gone now. I remember browsing the forums once, and the name George Russell Weller was being discussed. He apparently screwed up an attempt, and was being kicked out. Just be careful out there. I've noticed a lot of older folks skimming around suburbs lately, watching kids rather closely. Stay on the sidewalk, and keep your head down.

It's amazing how death changes a person. That's not to say the person themselves (even though it's safe to say they do undergo a profound change), but who they are to you, and how they stand in your memory. Evil men can become saints and vice versa the moment they give up their last breath. Paul was neither, yet he's still…changed, with his passing. Then again, this all might be invalid, as I'm more and more certain that Paul is not actually dead. Just the Paul that I knew. But I'm getting ahead of myself. I…am pretty much nobody. I work in an office of a company you would know if I told you the name of it. I'm single, female, thirty-five, and have pretty much peaked out in my life's achievements. If it weren't for Paul, I'd probably have passed by life unnoticed, with no great change of character after death's call. I've always wished for some kind of…excitement in life. Now that I have it, I'd give anything I have to make it go away. Paul was a fellow cube-slave, a office worker of zero ambition and even less presence. He was short, slightly overweight, had a nervous laugh, and slowly advancing (receding?) baldness. I think he was around thirty or forty, but I couldn't be sure, and he always seemed to have a slight…agelessness about him. As if he was born in suit and tie, already fortified with a head full of PowerPoint and team meeting schedules. You could probably pass him a hundred times a day, and wouldn't be able to recall the color of his limited hair at gunpoint. We were office friends, the special kind of hazy, organic relationship that develops around those who are somewhat trapped together, but don't want to commit to actual friendship. We worked and went to lunch in the same area, so we ended up bumping into each other enough to force some kind of rapport. I think he also had a crush on me, which was flattering. I'm not pretty, so any attention is at least a bit of a ego stroke, even if the giver is about as plain as tofu. We would talk, sit at the same table at lunch, walk to our cars, all very easy and non-committal. He told me about his dog, his interest in movies, various tv shows. I'd tell him about my two cats, my rather insane mother, and my ongoing car problems. He was painfully lonely, and I think I may have been one of the few friends of any persuasion he had, if not the only one. I felt very humanitarian…instead of donating a dollar a day to Africa, I was donating time to Paul. Looking back, it started with the dream. Paul was sitting at the lunch table, and had a massive bandage around his arm. He'd been even more closed off then normal for the last few days, and had even missed the day before, which was very odd. The worst thing was, almost nobody had noticed. One coworker, who sat a few desks down from Paul, actually said “Who's Paul?” when I mentioned his absence. I felt a twitch of actual, genuine concern when I sat down across from him. My first question was about his arm, but he passed it off as nothing, saying he just had an accident. After a little prodding, I got him to tell me what had happened. Paul said he'd been sleeping badly. Always prone to fits of insomnia, he said that lately it had been worse. He'd wake up from strange dreams, panting, and find the bed soaked with sweat. He said he also had the weird feeling that someone had been in the room just moments ago. By the time he'd gone and checked all the doors and windows, he couldn't get to sleep again. He'd laughed then, saying the joke would be on the thief, that he'd probably end up losing money anyway. I laughed too. Paul could be funny, and smart, and almost charming at times, but it always got buried in a big, smothering wave of gray blandness. He didn't seem bland then. He looked…nervous. He blinked, looking around, then leaned in a bit. He smiled nervously, and said what had happened was rather embarrassing. In the middle of the night, he'd woken up from a horrible dream, and found himself unable to move. He said it was like a weight on his chest, pinning him down. He'd also seen something across the room. He paused, seeming to decide whether or not to go on, then sighed and shook his head. He said that there was a thing standing in the doorway to the hall. He said it looked like it had a cloak, but it seemed to move like it was alive, and its head was like a insect, long and narrow, with a cluster of eyes on each side. I looked at him, dumbfounded. Here was a man whose greatest imaginative moment was suggesting a blue background on the monthly expense pie chart instead of white. He must have seen my shock, because Paul laughed again, loudly, causing a few people to turn. He waved his good hand, saying for me to relax. He said it was sleep paralysis, uncommon but not unnatural. Paul said when you sleep, your body sort of “switches off” to keep you from flailing around and hurting yourself. Sometimes, if you wake up suddenly, your body stays in that mode, and you feel pinned. He said you can even have very, very vivid dreams when you're like this, which explains what he called the bug-monk. I asked him if this happened to him a lot, but he said no, not since he was little. He went on, saying that he thinks he blacked out for a moment, or went back to sleep, because he woke up again with a sudden, sharp pain in his chest. He'd shouted, tried to get up, missed the edge of the bed, and managed to bash his arm off the edge of the nightstand, giving himself a nasty bruise and gash. I prodded him about seeing a doctor, but he said no, he's just wrapped it with some gauze and medical tape and gone back to bed. Lunch had wrapped up by then, so he'd gotten up, nodding apologetically, and quietly gone back to his cube. I sat for a bit, looking at my untouched lunch, and just thought. Work kept me busy for the next few weeks, and I didn't see much of Paul except for the once-weekly carpool and an occasional wave in the hall. Whats more, one of my idiotic cats had gotten out and went missing for several days, so I was very preoccupied. I say that, now…but really, I wasn't. What Paul had said was so…weird, so out of character, that I just wasn't able to process it. So, I didn't. Have I not said that Paul was insanely easy to forget? Looking back, I see now what I should have seen…his weight loss, the baggy eyes, unkempt hair… It was a Friday, and I had been working late. I don't mind the office at night when I'm engrossed, but as soon as I lift my head, I realize how very…empty things seem. Unless you've been in a huge office after hours, there's no good way to describe it. It's like there's an…energy. Something stuck to the walls, the desks, all the hustle, bustle and human exertion leaves a…residue. I'm wandering. It's enough to say that, when Paul came up behind me and said hi, I nearly screamed. I spun around to say hi, and I literally gasped. He looked like a shadow of himself. He'd lost weight, but in all the wrong places, and his skin looked baggy and poorly fitted. His eyes were red and hollow, and when he smiled, his gums looked raw. He seemed to be wheezing a bit, as if he'd jogged a short space and was catching his breath. I blinked and shook my head, trying to recover, and offered him a seat. When he sat, his joints cracked and popped like a box of corn flaked being stomped. I asked if he was all right, but he just stared at the floor like he didn't hear me. I asked again, and he slowly shook his head. He said he hadn't been feeling well, and wheezed out a slow, painful sigh. I started to ask if it was something bad, but Paul waved it off, saying it was probably just a flu. I just watched him, stunned. He must have lost forty pounds, and his clothes fit him like a sack. He suddenly looked me in the eye, a rare feat for Paul, and asked if I remembered about his dream. It took me a minute to remember what he was talking about, and seeing me think, he started to rise, saying “I shouldn't have come”. I put a hand on his arm, telling him to stop…and I felt the ridges on his arm. I pulled my hand away, stammering something, but Paul looked down and sighed. He sat back down, and put his head in his hands. He said he was sorry for saying anything, but that he really didn't have anyone to talk to. He started to ramble, waving his hands and speaking with a tone that was equal parts hopeless, tired, and hysterical. Paul said that there was something wrong with him. He said it was the dream, that he didn't think it was actually a dream. He'd found little pinpricks all over his body the day after the dream, and he'd peed blood. I started to ask if he'd been checked for cancer, but he kept on as if I wasn't there. He said he'd felt something, inside. Something not right. He got up and started to pace, going out to the hall and back in to my cube, rambling. He said something about growth, and something trying to take over. Mid-way through his monologue, he stopped, cried for about thirty seconds, then started back as if nothing happened. I was starting to get very afraid. Paul always seemed like someone prone to depression, and I was scared that he'd had a breakdown or something. For a moment, I saw my face on the news with the word “Missing:” underneath. He suddenly shouted, saying he wasn't going to let it out, and rolled up his sleeve, saying he'd found a way to fix it. I stared and had to put my hand over my mouth to keep from screaming. His arm was a horror show. A deep, winding gash stretched from his wrist to his elbow along the underside of his arm, looking nearly a quarter inch wide in places. Blood was crusted all around it, and what looked like…pus, or some other fluid. What was worst, though, was the stitches. He'd taken some kind of heavy gauge thread and stitched the cut shut. It was a bad job, the stitching jumping around randomly, in places pulling the skin into tight, painful angles. I looked up at him, horrified, and he pulled his sleeve back down, turning away. He said “I shouldn't have come” again, then rushed out of my cube and down the hall. I should have done something…but I just got my things and left. Paul wasn't at work the next day. I felt sick. I was pretty sure I'd just witnessed the end result of a suicide attempt, but I had no idea what to do. I thought about trying to get help, but I couldn't think of who to call, and it felt…inappropriate. I hardly knew him, and it didn't feel right. I was sure he'd get help, or…something. I justified myself not calling a thousand ways, and when I heard, finally, that he'd called in sick, I just moved on, filing it under someone else's problem. I wish I could say that I did everything I could, that I tried my best, but I didn't. I just…moved on. It was so unsettling, and weird, and just…wrong, that I just pushed it away. It was nearly two weeks later that I finally checked. He had stopped calling in, and the carpool just cruised past his house. It looked bad. The lawn was unmowed, the car just sitting in the driveway, several newspapers on the porch. I asked around work, but the very few people who even knew who Paul was had no real idea about him. They just shrugged and assumed he was sick. I went each day with visions of him dead in the bathtub, or coming in and shooting everyone. It was when I drove by and saw his door hanging open that I finally did something. I was heading home, and as I went past Paul's house, I saw the front door hanging open. It was late, and it was just standing, wide open. I slowed down, looking, and I saw one of his shoes sitting on the porch. Like he'd run out of it, or kicked it off. I sat, looking, and almost before I decided to, I pulled in to his driveway. I sat in the car, gripping the wheel, looking at the door. If he was fine, it'd be a monstrous invasion of privacy…for all I knew he had a girl in there, and had slipped off his shoe in a mad bout of passion. He might have just been hot, and was letting the house cool off. There might be a robber inside, and dropped his shoe on the way out with a load. I had the window down, and the evening was very quiet, just a few insects buzzing. I was just about to put the car back in gear when I heard the sound. It was a short, sharp sound, like someone yelling after banging their shin. I looked to the open doorway, listening, and after a few seconds it happened again. I rummaged in my purse, grabbed out a little can of mace I'd gotten from my mother, and started over to the house before I could really think about what I was doing. By the time I decided this was a terrible idea, I was already through the doorway, mace in hand. It was dark inside. I mean pitch black. The only real light was from the doorway, the streetlights leaking in to the living room. The smell hit me first, and as my eyes adjusted, I saw why. Old, half-eaten food was out everywhere, balanced on plates and the arms of furniture. Craning my neck a bit, I could see in to the kitchen, and the fridge door was hanging open, the light burned out or broken, more dead food rotting there as well. I heard the sound again, louder, and it seemed to come from the back of the house. I started to thread my way to the hall, trying not to be afraid. Mid-way down the hall, I looked in to what seemed to be a office. Papers were tossed everywhere, and the little window on the wall was…black. I looked in a bit more, then stepped back. A garbage bag had been taped over the glass. Looking back in to the living room, I could see all the windows had been covered. I tried the light switch, but nothing happened. All the lights and windows were useless. I started to shake, softly, and called “Paul?”. There was nothing for a bit, then start sudden yelp again. It was coming from the next door in the hall. I inched down more, screaming at myself inside to just run, just leave. But, I felt responsible. I was the only person who could have helped him, and now, if he was hurt, or sick…or worse, it was my fault. I had to try something. I started to push on the door, but jumped back as I heard a sudden, deep, muffled moaning from behind it. It kept on, sounding like someone sobbing in to a pillow, sounding so hopeless and lost. I slowly pushed open the door, and stepped in to what I now saw was the bathroom. The curtain was pulled down, and lay on the floor. In the shower, naked, with the door open, was Paul. He was curled in the corner, blood smeared on the floors and walls. His body looked as if he'd been attacked with a machete. Deep, gaping cuts and sores stood out all over. Pieces of flesh looked as if they'd been torn or lopped off, and his skin looked…thin and sagging. His feet were misshapen, and it looked as if his spine had somehow swollen and twisted in his back. When he moved, everything flexed and opened, but only let out tiny trickles of blood and yellowed pus. He was stitched shut. Every cut and sore had some kind of thread trying to close it. String, yarn, twine, shoelaces, even wire, all of it was stitched in to his skin. It had grown over or ripped free in places, and the threads were all sodden and dripping with ooze and blood. From each of the cuts, too, there seemed to be some kind of…growth coming out. Stiff hair-like things, or hard, sharp, black points. From a deep gash on his back a long, thin patch of what looked like red plastic hung, flapping with each movement. His skull looked broken and twisted. His ears and eyes had been sewn shut. His nostrils were closed with thick, dripping bands of copper wire. He howled that muffled, moaning cry again, and as I looked at his face, I saw why. Paul was forcing a sharpened shoelace through his lips. I screamed, and I fell back against the wall, watching him lace his mouth shut, and I threw my mace at him. I was hysterical, scrambling along the floor. I looked back once, and saw him lean back, his mouth sealed shut. His lips were moving, as if his tongue was trying to push through them. I ran outside, knocking over his coffee table on the way, and threw up in his yard. I got in my car, peeled out, and called 911 when I was six blocks away. Paul is dead, in the eyes of the law. I was investigated for a while, but he was labeled a suicide and quietly buried. Nobody came to claim the body. I didn't go to the funeral. I took a week off from work, and got pumped for information as soon as I got back. I didn't really say anything. I drifted in a haze, just trying to forget. But I can't. I never will. You see, there's a issue with Paul's death. It was never made public, but they never actually recovered a body. Yes, they recovered a great deal of tissue and flesh from Paul's house, but not nearly enough to make up a corpse. It was mostly skin, some fat, a little muscle, nothing more. I was discounted mainly because I had a alibi, and that I'm not strong enough to skin and butcher a fully grown man. Whatever happened to Paul didn't end when the police charged in. I don't know what happened to him. I've read about insect physiology, and watched science fiction, but I still will not even attempt to explain. Paul is dead. However, I don't think that means as much as it should. When I'm finished with this, I'm going to go take a shower, go to bed, and polish off a full bottle of both vodka and Vicodin. Last night, I woke in the dark, groggy and feeling drugged. I looked to my window, and saw a shape there for a few seconds. It moved away, but I saw it. Narrow head. Wide black eyes. But it still has Paul's face.

Winterheart More by this author. [CLASSIFIED LEVEL 5] Document ███-█ recovered via █████████████████. [LOG BEGINS] [ENTRY ONE] Dear █████, Only a week of ██████ left! :) Looking forward to having some free time for hobbies. I might try some modelling, ██████████ seems to enjoy it. Need to study hard for my ███████ test first though, or my ███████ will get mad! - ████ [ENTRY TWO] Dear █████, ██████ in just a few days, hope I do ok. ███████ is going to fail cause he broke up with █████████ like a week ago and hasn't studied at all, ███. He totally begged me to study with him but I'm over it. ███████ are so immature. I'm a little bit bummed the █████████ lost the other day, but maybe with █████████████ on the ███ they'll make a comeback next ██████. :) :| Some █████████████ work going on in my neighbourhood. It's really noisy, makes it hard to focus on ███████. I wish they would just ███████. - ████ [ENTRY THREE] Dear █████, Today was bizarre :/ The whole ██████ collapsed and they had to evacuate the neighbourhood, and then this big ███████ fell through the ████ in the middle of the █████. Some ███ in █████ coats came to get things under control, though. They say they're with the ██████████, whatever that is? On the bright side, ███████ test postponed! :) - ████ [ENTRY FOUR] Dear █████ or ██████ who finds this, I'm scared. Where am I? The ██████████ people told me to stay away from ███████ but I thought it'd be okay to just grab my ███… but then the ███████ came back suddenly and I ████ through the ███████ and now I'm somewhere else. ._. I'm so stupid… I don't like it here, makes me sick to my ███████. Everything has too many █████ and I can see things ███████ around. I want to go ████. - ████ [ENTRY FIVE] Dear █████, Oh ███ I saw the most horrible ██████ here. They had █████████ flesh inside their ████ and so many little ██████ with ████! And their ██ were full of this █████ liquid >_< One of them got me in the ████ with this █████! And then they got all █████ when I tried to ███████ them… my ████ really hurts. :( Bleh, I think I'm going to ████ up. I hope ███ and ███ are ok, wherever they are. Please ██████ find me soon or I might ████████. - ████ [ENTRY SIX] Dear █████, …oh ew I'm dripping ████ all over the pages aren't I? But I can't seem to stop ███████. These ██████ are everywhere. At least ███ ones in big ██████████ my █████ with their ███████ and it hurts so badly I could ██████. Why do these ██████ happen to me? All I ever wanted was █████████████████ and now I'm covered in some kind of ████ and it burns. ;-; I wonder if █████ will miss me? I never had a chance to say ███████. The ██████ things are coming, ew, I'm trying really hard not to ████ on this █████. So many of them, all with their little ████ and ████ swinging. This entire place is horrible, but these ██████, are just so… I've never seen anything so disg [LOG ENDS]

He'd never really understood knives and the odd obsession some people had with them. Just little scraps of metal, sharpened and placed in a handle, a knife wasn't all that amazing. He admitted that, yes, for the most part they were given a somewhat overlooked position in life, but placed in the hands of someone with a violent disposition, or faced with an unhappy and carnivorous creature, they could take on near mythic qualities. What's more, they often weren't all that useful in those situations…truly an overrated and undeserving tool. Take, for example, this young woman. Even in the dark of the basement, where a flashlight or even a match would be much more useful, she brandished the knife as if it could somehow make up for her blindness. Crawling and sobbing, she held the knife out, waving it like a feeler as she pawed for the stairs. He chuckled, watching. Truly an overrated tool. Even if she'd seen a target, what could she do with it really? She shrieked briefly, almost tumbling in to the hole he'd bored in to the basement with. She'd even come down the stairs with the skinny little blade, the silly thing. He'd tried to be quiet, but the cat had raised a yowling that summoned the girl a bit early. She'd found the body about the same moment he'd bitten out the light bulb, quickly skittering to slam the door before she'd made it up, the sudden darkness tumbling her silly, ill-equipped head back down to the floor. He watched, hooked in to the ceiling, as she flailed about helplessly. His eyes started to glaze with anticipation, the vertical slit of a maw trembling with amusement as he slowly started to lower down, hook by hook. He'd show her the folly of such inadequate little tools such as knives. He fell beside her, the lower eyepads recording her shock. He'd show her how much better a natural tool is. He readied the knives he was born with. All six of them.

The TV was blaring sex and violence, but all she could think about was her damn bubbling arm. She picked at it idly, once again cursing herself for forgetting the sun screen over the weekend. It'd been such a good chance to get Adam to notice her, but she'd just ended up burned and humiliated. She'd been offered some sunblock, but Tammy had been there, snickering some comment involving the term “Casper the virgin ghost”, so she'd rejected it, saying she wanted to work on her tan. Now, if she were any more red, she'd be mistaken for a radish. She picked at the onion-skin flakes on her arms, trying to ignore the odd texture of the bubbled skin. She kept flipping between channels, trying to ignore the burning itch on her arms, face and body, all of which served to keep the memory of her humiliation crystal clear. She picked at her arm idly, trying to find a rerun of something she hadn't seen, all the while brushing off the liquid and peeled flesh from her arms wait…liquid? She looked at her arms, and felt her throat grow paralyzed around a scream. She was bathing in blood. It ran from great, flapping rents in her skin, the flesh peeled and pulled free in thin strips and shallow patches. As she tried to recoil, she saw a flash of bone. She skidded and fell from the couch, the jostling causing the peeled wounds to stretch more. Oddly numb, the rifts continued to ooze blood freely as she scrambled to her feet, starting to hyperventilate. She tried to press the peeled, red flesh back in to the wounds, but they just lolled free with a fresh splash of blood. She walked gingerly, trying to ease her way across the floor, but every motion seemed to cause the peeling to extend more. She brushed her arm, trying to see the bleeding rents more clearly, and strangled around a scream as a palm-sized patch of flesh pulled and flopped free, blood glistening on the newly freed muscle. She moaned, hands rising to her face…only to feel it shift like a cheap, ill-fitting mask, the burning, itching pain rising more and more as she started to peel… Hours later, she hooked a finger under her eyelid, mad pain compelling her to rid herself of the last, traitorous patch of skin.

Item #: SCP-086 Object Class: Euclid Special Containment Procedures: SCP-086 is safely contained in Wing-██ of Site-19. SCP-086 must be opened at least once weekly to prevent a migration event. During use, a variety of heavy weaponry and containment equipment is kept active and trained on SCP-086's entrance, in order to incapacitate any emergent threat. The physical task of opening SCP-086 should be given to gloved D-Class personnel after the researcher has touched SCP-086's handle with a bare hand. All testing of SCP-086 should be personally supervised by Researcher H█████. Entities which emerge from SCP-086 and are not immediately terminated or returned should be classified SCP-086-x. Greg Hollinger stood on one side of a sterile hallway, staring nervously at a nondescript white door. The footsteps of determined men and women in clean coats echoed through the corridors from some distance away. Greg took a step forward, then another. He stretched out his arm, brushed the bare metal knob with his bare skin, and flinched. Reached forward again, took firm hold of the doorknob. Felt an involuntary tremor through his hand and up his arm to his shoulder. A sense of purpose seized him, he jerked the knob and wrenched open the metal door. Inside the janitor's closet, there was a mop. There was a bucket of soapy water. There was an assortment of cleaning compounds. There was a small spider, which skittered out of view behind some boxes. And, on the floor, there was a letter addressed to a Dr. Gregory Hollinger. Still sealed. He picked it up, broke the seal sloppily with a finger. He read the letter inside, then read it a second time, then carefully folded it up and ripped it into a hundred tiny pieces and threw them all back into the closet, admiring the way they fluttered and danced as they fell to the ground. He closed the closet door and left the hallway, picking his way carefully through the danger signs and yellow tape he had set up. Description: SCP-086 can manifest as a portal to any relatively small contained space with a single opening. When SCP-086 is opened, an anomalous entity will be found inside. It has been confirmed by X-ray scans and cameras placed inside SCP-086 that these entities do not exist until the door is open. The entities produced are designed to frighten the last person who touched SCP-086's opening mechanism (in host sites which lack a distinct opening mechanism the entire item will exhibit this property). SCP-086-a is a non-corporeal entity which manifests as a floating, partially transparent “dark patch.” If SCP-086's host container is destroyed or is not opened for a period of two (2) to three (3) weeks, SCP-086-a will emerge and roam aimlessly until it encounters another suitable space to inhabit. SCP-086-a passes through all obstacles it encounters and causes vivid hallucinations in any sentient beings it passes through. SCP-086 was discovered in an anonymously delivered, unmarked cardboard box mailed to Researcher H█████. Two weeks later, SCP-086-a manifested and entered a janitorial closet in Site-19, which was later designated SCP-086. If SCP-086 is closed with an entity it has produced still inside, the entity will vanish and a new one will appear when the door is open. It does not have this effect with any other beings or objects. SCP-086 will not produce an entity or eliminate an existing one if the door is closed with a sentient being inside. However, SCP-086-a will migrate if a sentient being remains in SCP-086 for more than three (3) hours. Sentient entities produced by SCP-086 show extreme fear of SCP-086 and are highly averse to being returned to the closet. Thus far, all biological entities produced by SCP-086 have suffered from a major biological flaw, resulting in the entities' death within twenty-four (24) hours. “Excuse me, Director, do you know what's going on with Greg? He hasn't reported in for over a week.” “Greg? Oh, Dr. Gregory Hollinger? He's been transferred off your project. Discovered some potential new SCP item. I believe he's been putting the paperwork together to get it classified, number 086 or something.” “Why wasn't I informed? You can't just transfer my immediate subordinates around willy-nilly, I need replacements.” “You weren't informed? You were mentioned several times in the paperwork. I thought you were involved in the initial discovery or something.” “This is the first I've heard of it. I'll have to talk with Greg about this.” “Alright, then. Let me know what you find out.” Addendum 086-1: Brief log of anomalies produced by SCP-086. Subject: Dr. ██████ (first encounter with SCP item) Entity: A large colony of [REDACTED], apparently spelling out the message ████ ██ ████. Entity proved non-viable and began to exude [REDACTED] from its pores. Subject showed considerable distress. [REDACTED] disposed of along with SCP-086's host box. Subject: D-Class Personnel Entity: A large creature made entirely of fist-sized, bloodshot eyes on tentacles connected to a small central mass. Subject screamed and retreated. Entity moved forward for several feet in a writhing motion before collapsing under its own weight. Autopsy showed no organs besides the eyes and a frail musculature. DNA matched no known animal. Subject: Researcher H█████ Entity: A small sheet of paper with a number of addresses listed in shaky handwriting. Subject displayed extreme stress but claimed not to recognize the addresses. Subject later volunteered to take on SCP-086's study as a full-time project. ‘Ink' confirmed to be dried human blood matching subject's DNA. Subject: D-Class personnel (wearing latex gloves) Entity: A very realistic effigy of a hanged woman, constructed of actual human skin with cotton stuffing. Subject reported confusion. Researcher H█████ identified the woman as his wife. Subject: Agent █████ Entity: A very convincing imitation of Agent █████'s current supervisor, which informed the subject he had been demoted to D-class for gross incompetence and handed him a printed notice. Entity collapsed of organ failure one hour later. Autopsy showed the entity lacked a digestive system. Agent Lawson stood outside the hallway and glared. “Why is this area blocked off?” she asked. “SCP-086 has taken up residence in the janitorial closet. It can't be safely moved, so I've sectioned off this hallway. “Eighty-six? Never heard of it. Is it Keter?” “No, Euclid, but not safe enough that you can just walk by. Just added to the list this week.” Her eyes narrowed. “If there was really a new Euclid I would have heard about it in the Site news system by now. What is it?” Greg drummed his fingers nervously on a wall. “It's a non-corporeal entity, um, takes up residence in enclosed spaces and generates things whenever you open the door. Tries to scare you.” “I fail to see why I can't go down the hallway. I'll have to go well out of my way to go around, I don't want to be late.” “It's, um, regulations. In the containment procedure. You can look it up.” “I will, Dr. Hollinger, and I hope for your sake that you're right.” She walked away. Greg sighed in relief and returned to the door, which sat slightly ajar. “Is she gone?” asked a small voice. Greg nodded happily. “Good.” Incident 086-2: On ██/██/20██, during a standard test with Researcher H█████ as the subject SCP-086 produced a scrap of paper with the words [REDACTED] hand-printed with large blocky letters. May indicate an attempt by SCP-086 to communicate. Further research is in order. “Would you care to explain what this document I'm holding is, exactly?” “What? It's an incident report file for SCP-086.” “There is no SCP-086.” “No, there is, Gregory got the approval back just the other day.” “No. There is no SCP-086. No proposals for the classification of such have been submitted.” “But Greg said—” “I suggest you find Dr. Hollinger and send him in for a psych evaluation. Something extremely odd is going on and I don't like it.” “Alright. I'll talk to him again.” Incident 086-4: Video log ██/██/20██ ██:██ ██:15: Researcher H█████ enters containment zone, clutching a piece of paper in one hand. ██:17: Researcher H█████ pushes the paper he is holding under the door of SCP-086. Intra-086 feed shows that this is the paper created in Incident 086-2. ██:22: Researcher H█████ opens SCP-086, using his bare hands. No entity is observed to appear. ██:23: (voice log) Researcher H█████: Who are you? ██:25: Researcher H█████: [REDACTED]? ██:25: Researcher H█████ (gets down to his knees): How is that possible. You— ██:26: Researcher H█████ begins to cry softly. ██:29: Researcher H█████: How did this happen? Did [REDACTED] you? ██:32: Unknown: … it was all your fault… [FEED ENDS] The director groaned audibly. “Seriously?” “Yes sir, this is the only video feed remaining on record. It seems Hollinger had the security cameras blocked off for most of the ‘tests' he ran.” “What's the status on the closet itself?” “We've done a full sweep. No signs of any anomalies, and none of the staff mentioned in the report remember any of this.” “So he made the whole thing up? Why?” “Unknown, sir. He seemed relatively stable up until now.” “No exposure to some memetic thing? No traumatic experience?” “No. He did get a letter.” “About what?” “We're still trying to figure that out, sir. It should be on record somewhere from the routine mail-scans.” “What about Hollinger himself?” “Missing, sir. We've got a team on it.” He stared at his hands — they were dripping. What was he doing, again? Oh yes. Escaping. “Hurry up, Daddy!” He ran through the brightly lit hallways, feet pounding a steady rhythm, like a heart-beat or a set of drum-sticks pounding inside his head. Turning corners automatically, trying not to notice the walls melting behind him. Was he lost? “This way, Daddy!” The sun winked at him through layers and layers of heavy glass. ‘Exit', promised the signs above the door. People were in his way, now. They wanted to stop him. He stared at his hands. “Hurry!” “Three injured, one dead. How did this happen?” “Nobody was expecting this kind of violence from him. It just came out of nowhere.” “Are we sure it was Hollinger?” “Fairly sure. The descriptions match him. The video feeds are pretty lousy, no good shots of his face.” “Reading through his file, it's hard to believe he could do something like this. Do we have a motive? Some kind of SCP connection, maybe?” “Not that we know of. Unless there really is an eighty-six.” “God, I hope not. The letter?” “We found it. It's a notice of his son's death in a car accident.” The director sighed. “That explains a little. Not nearly enough. Where is he now?” “Off site. We're tracking him down.” “Let me know when you find him.” Gregory Hollinger smiled. Now he could spend some quality time with his family. It had been terrible of him to spend so much time away from home. What if something had happened? Muffled voices yelled for help from the big wardrobe in the corner of the abandoned house; he ignored them. Astounding that there was nobody here before. Not the nicest place; in fact, likely to fall down any day now, but rent free. He turned a page of his book and frowned. Red stains all over the pages. Where did those come from? He put the book down. Someone was knocking at the door, rather loudly. No, he had barricaded the door and someone was trying to force their way in. That was it. “Aren't you going to let them out, Daddy?” “Not yet,” he muttered. “A little more time. I haven't seen your mother since …” Where was she? His mind teetered on the brink for an instant as he scrambled for an explanation. He had seen her already, that was it. She had gone out to buy cleaning supplies. Lord knew this place needed a once-over. “The bad men are coming.” Splintering sounds from the entrance. Scratching from the corner. Pounding from his heart and head. Dripping from … somewhere. He had a sudden urge to wash his hands, but there was no running water. He should call someone about that, but of course, no phone lines. “Hurry!” Reluctantly, he pulled himself up from the chair, careful not to step on anything. There was a loud crash, and several men in black suits entered the house. “Gregory! Remain calm and assume the position. We don't want to hurt you.” Greg was confused. Was he not calm? Was he doing something wrong? “Hurry! Open it!” He took a step toward the wardrobe. A burst of gunfire shredded part of the ceiling. Another step. One of the men yelled something at him. He grabbed the handle. The door felt impossibly heavy — he pulled, and pulled, and pulled. It opened. A boy, about ten, bleeding from a gruesome head would, stepped out of the wardrobe. The men fired. Bits of gore sprayed the walls. The boy continued forward. “Why weren't you there?” Gregory cried and tried to embrace the child. It fell apart in his arms. Then the ceiling gave way. “So, that's the report. Fortunately, all our agents managed to get out relatively unscathed.” “What about the aftermath?” “Not much to say. We found Hollinger's remains, some murdered homeless men, and that's it. No trace of the kid all the agents saw.” “Alright. Not much we can do with this. File it away somewhere, hope nothing else comes of it.” “And SCP-086?” “No such thing.”

It had been dark for hours, and it was starting to get to him. Sitting at the computer, he'd caught himself glancing more and more times at the nearby window, the space beyond so dark it acted like a weak mirror. He hated having big, black open spaces near him. Childish, he knew, but knowing that didn't lessen the fear of walking past an open, dark doorway in a dimly lit hall. Which was probably part of why he was still up. He clicked off the page he was on and rubbed his eyes. The worst was, as it got darker, every site he browsed seem to take on a slightly sinister edge. Even the bright, garish social network sites seemed to be tools to help illustrate that, even with 184 friends, you are still alone, in the dark. He leaned back in the chair, sighing as he noticed someone or something walk by the window. Instinctively, his eyes flicked to the computer screen, checking for any incriminating tabs. Probably a deer or something, they did live…he paused, suddenly looking around as if seeing the room for the first time, rocking to his feet hard enough to shake the computer desk. The thing had had a face. He was on the second floor. And the face was back. In the few seconds he watched, it was the absences that struck the strongest. No nose. No hair. No ears. No lower jaw. The additions were equally horrific, with the teeth, the too-long neck, the vertical mouth and yawning eyes, but it was the missing things that stuck the hardest. He sat, feeling drugged, hypnotized, even as the spidery, too-wide fist rose and pulled back. The glass exploded in, the sharp slashing pain breaking the spell, but the thing was already there. It grabbed, the skin feeling electric and slimy-cool like a reptile, the last coherent sensation he experienced. The rest were Impressionist: Pulling. Pressure. Tearing. Liquid sliding. Sudden numbness. He finally passed out as his ribs were being worked slowly and methodically free. Idly, he wondered why it was tossing them in to the hall.

The oil smoke rose as if it would never stop. Boiling from the massive hole in both the earth and the pipeline, it had blotted out the sun hours ago, and still showed no sign of stopping. As Tyler suited up to go down and inspect the damage, he mused for the hundredth time since the accident that his was truly a blessed life. Not in the arctic for more then a month, and after a disastrous incident in Texas preceding that transfer, he suddenly gets reports of an explosion on the line. Then he's told that it's not just an explosion, but a meteor has impacted the line. His superiors were still trying to determine the exact probability of that event when he'd left to check the damage. Sucking on the canned, stale air and slowly easing his way down the safety line to the bottom of the hole, he shook his head. The goddamn pump control workman had been both drunk and asleep, and had let the line belch oil for nearly six minutes before someone had finally booted in the door and manually shut down the line. What's more, the crater hadn't overflown, which meant the hell-rock had popped into another line of some kind, or a natural cave…or god forbid, some kind of underground river. Tyler winced, already feeling the ax on his neck, made of lost profits, damages, bad press, and the need for a scapegoat. The heat steadily rose as he got closer to the bottom, and by the time he released the security cable and stood, he was sweating in his containment suit. The thick, sludgy oil was nearly up to his knees, a black pond with a huge, round bulge in its center. He stumbled forward, pulled by the vague current of the oil as it slowly oozed away in to…whatever it was under the big rock. He approached slowly, judging the rock to be nearly ten feet tall under its coat of oil and sludge. Oddly rounded, it looked like a massive, lumpy eight ball. That he was now positioned directly behind it was an irony that Tyler refused to appreciate. Leaning closer, the oil smoke oddly not as dense this close to the bottom, he tried to spot where the oil was flowing out. He put one suited arm down into the murk, careful to keep his mask clear of the ooze, and felt the unmistakable suction…but not down. The oil was being pulled up…into the meteor. He moved his hand a bit closer to the massive stone, thinking it was some vague trick of the current, when he finally noticed where most of the smoke was coming from. The billowing, black column of smoke wasn't issuing from the oil…but from the top of the stone. Four great holes were belching the fumes to the sky from inside the stony orb. As he watched, mystified, he saw one the holes quiver, then slowly flex shut for several seconds, before reopening with a fresh blast of smog and grime. “What in the name…” he started to whisper, before quickly changing to an inarticulate shriek of pain and surprise. His hand was trapped. Tyler's entire world was now defined by this fact. Something hard, and sharp, and crushing was clamped over his hand, and he could not get it free. There was a sudden pause in both the exhaust of smoke and the slurping of oil as the stony mass seemed to savor this new, more substantial feed. Then, it sucked. Hard. Tyler's last coherent thought vanished as he felt the flesh of his hand being pulled free like a used latex glove.

“…Please be seated. Let's get to business, I know you are all busy, and I appreciate all of you taking time out…” “Cut it, Three.” “…Very well. I think we all know the issue at hand. What with the recent…unpleasantness that occurred during our military disentanglement…” “Oh yes, unpleasantness is just the word I would use. You know, because a near-total shutdown of all sites due to a military intervention is…” “May I continue, Eight? …Thank you. As I was saying, recent events have caused a…relaxing of protocol. Many of our sites have had to act in near-total isolation from any major command structure, and administrative decisions have been falling to staff members who would not be in any sort of command position under normal circumstances. We've managed to set major sections back to normal, and Site Security is now under our sole jurisdiction.” “With all due respect, Three, we know this already. Please get to the point, sir.” “…One major hub site, our primary staff facility, and two of our major humanoid SCP-class item storage facilities have come under the sole administrative control of one Doctor Kondraki. During his period of command, the total number of security infractions, information leaks, misuse of resources, and containment breach events for his area have exceeded the sum total of all the infractions and security events of the whole Foundation for the past five years.” “While under normal conditions, this would result in immediate termination, this has proven…difficult to do. Doctor Kondraki appears to command a level of respect and fear that could cause a minor rebellion in his commanded sites in the event of his hostile removal. He also has an uncanny knack for avoiding danger and near-certain death. Even in the event of non-terminal retirement, Marshall, Carter and Dark has made motions that lead us to believe that they would recruit or capture Doctor Kondraki.” “So, what you're saying is that we may have a second Insurgency brewing?” “Oh for fuck's sake, you know that whole thing is a goddamn cover for-” “I am not saying anything of the kind, and I would remind everyone that we are in polite company. What I am saying is that we need to mobilize a deep operative. Someone who can cause Doctor Kondraki's death in a way that will leave no trace of foul play, and be absolutely exempt from suspicion. Someone who can act with total focus on the mission. Someone tried, tested, and sure of success.” “The thing about that is, everyone's deployed currently. Who do we have on-site there who could carry out the order?” “I know just the person.” “Hey Cleffy!” “Hey Draki, how'd the test go?” “Oh man, it was great…we had a D-Class turn into vapor!” Doctor Clef nodded, the motion always causing a slight, disconcerting blur around the edges of his head. His flickering smile widened as he continued to walk past Doctor Kondraki. “Sounds like a blast. I gotta run for the moment, but I'll catch up with you a bit later.” Doctor Kondraki laughed, cracking his knuckles, “Ahh, no big deal…I'm going for a nap in the office anyway.” He strode away, whistling as a small cluster of butterflies suddenly appeared from a wall and started to follow him. Had he turned, he would have seen Doctor Clef staring at his receding form, his face pinched in what could almost be called regret…if not for the smile. Kondraki was on top of the goddamn world. He'd managed to shift all his research duties off to Bright and Iceberg, and he even had most of his actual administrative duties farmed out to terrified, hard-working cube slaves. He hadn't even heard from the bigwigs at central command for weeks…it seemed like he'd finally gotten through to them that his methods, however brutal, worked. SCP-408 flitted ahead of him, the small swarm of butterflies flickering colors seemingly at random as he reached his office door. He strode in, tossing his beaten-up ball cap onto an awaiting hook, and started over to his desk. He was nearly seated before he noticed Doctor Gears standing near the right side of the desk, folder in hand. He stumbled in mid-step, the SCP-408 swarm flickering around him, ready to decoy at a moment's notice. “Jesus, Gears! Fucking say hi or something, I could have shot you!” Gears nodded slightly, holding out the folder. “Duly noted. I will attempt to be more conspicuous about my presence in the future. There has been a development with SCP-408 that you need to be made aware of immediately.” Doctor Kondraki took the folder grudgingly, muttering as he sat and flipped through the folder. He stopped two pages in, and rocked forward in his chair at the half-way point. “The hell do they mean 'third lifestage'? SCP-408 has NEVER given any indication of that!” “Why has this even become an issue? We've known about his instability for ages, but just sat on our hands.” “Doctor Kondraki has a unique bond with SCP-408, one that The Foundation found intriguing. It turns out a mild chemical imbalance has given Doctor Kondraki a pheromone signature that has a mildly hypnotic effect on SCP-408.” “Hence why they follow him about all the bloody time.” “Exactly, Six. Initially we were unable to find the precise chemical signature, but we have recently cracked it and found it rather easy to synthesize. We should be able to roll out a prototype treatment spray to some Mobile Task Forces within the year. With this development, Doctor Kondraki's continued existence has been deemed…less than paramount.” “That still leaves us with the problem of “King of the Boooterflies” Kondraki. Those things never leave him alone for a second.” “We already have that situation in hand. A report about a 'third life stage' that may be a Keter-level threat will be issued to all sites. Any and all SCP-408 will be collected and contained without exception. Kondraki will comply, or be held before the Review Board. Once SCP-408 has been properly contained, stage two will be engaged.” “I still question that, by the way. He's bound to catch on, I mean your so-called 'special agent' has been on more or less desk duty for some time now. Plus, Kondraki is bound to suspect something.” “Yes, our agent has had some down-time, but this is not his first action in this capacity. Plus, despite their initial differences, Kondraki trusts him to a certain extent. He won't let us down.” “What do you mean, I can't enter the containment cell? I've ALWAYS had access to SCP-408, you KNOW this report is bullshit!” Dmitri smiled uncomfortably, holding up his wrists held together. “I am sorry, Doktor, but I am in the handcuff. Command says 'no entry', I must give no entry. Security Head must set example, am sure you understand.” Kondraki swore and kicked at the containment door, then turned and stood directly before the Russian. “Listen, how many times have I gotten you out of jams, huh? Just let me check on them, to make sure everything's ok, yeah?” Dimitri shook his head, forced smile firmly planted on his face. “I am of the regretting, sir, but orders are orders. Nobody in, nobody out for three week. Order signed by O5 level, is nothing to do for it.” Kondraki roared, grabbing his hat and raging for several seconds, before grabbing the big Russian's shirt. “Listen, I'm the goddamn head of-” He was abruptly cut off as Dmitri grabbed his arm and twisted him away. He then positioned himself in front of the containment access door, arms behind his back, feet planted at parade rest. His face was a stony mask. “Was speaking as friend, Doktor. Am now speaking as Security Head. Leave area immediately, Doktor Kondraki, or you will be removed.” Kondraki was still fuming hours later, when there was a sharp knock on his door. Before he could say “fuck off”, Clef slipped in, shutting the door behind him. He looked around the office, whistling. “Wow…did you really have to shoot the ceiling that much? I mean, the computer is still semi-recognizable, wouldn't that have been better?” Kondraki shook his head, twirling a spent shotgun shell on his finger. “Not now Clef, I'm really not in the mood.” Clef slid into one of the few remaining undamaged chairs, and grinned at the smoldering doctor. “Shit happens Kon, you know this. It's probably some screw-up somewhere down the chain, you know how bureaucratic shit gets up at the top. Just…roll with it.” Kondraki rose, starting to walk around the room. “I know what they're up to. They've tried to kill me before a few times, but I always get loose. It's so fucking stupid…they recall all the research work, try and delegate everything out so when I go, I won't leave a hole…but I'm not about to let some dusty stuffed shirts brush me out of the way. I've shown the weapon potential for countless items…plus, I always have an ace over them.” He grinned coldly, looking at nothing. “They think that cutting me off from SCP-408 is going to leave me defenseless? Bullshit. Bull SHIT! Plus, nobody has the balls to try and go toe-to-toe with me!" Kondraki continued. "Hell, I rode fucking 682!” He laughed, looking to Clef. The other man nodded, his eyes flickering slightly as he looked away. “Yeah…you're really just too nuts to kill…” Both men chuckled for a few moments, before drifting into silence. Kondraki stared at Clef, his smile slowly fading as he warily moved back behind his desk. “So…tell me, friend…why is it you've been such a desk jockey lately? Seems weird for a…man…of action like you to just take being benched without a fight.” Clef shrugged, his smile frozen inches from his ears. “Oh, you know, just recharging the batteries, molesting demi-humans, the usual.” The laughter was forced, the remaining conversation false. When Kondraki pulled his shotgun and put a slug past Clef's ear, it was almost a relief. “Isn't there a concern about fallout? Kondraki is somewhat well known for his… tendencies towards collateral damage.” “It's been decided that, in light of the continued threat potential posed, the one-time costs are outweighed by the long-term benefits.” “…Is the damn site nuke mentioned anywhere in the contingency plans?” “Not in any of the primary ones, no.” -SECURITY BREACH ON STAFF LEVEL 1- -SHOTS FIRED- -SHOTS FIRED- -STRUCTURAL DAMAGE TO STAFF LEVEL ONE: STAFF DOORS 1-3- -SHOTS FIRED- “Son of the bitch…what is going…” Dmitri hunched over the site alert console, watching the alerts pop up, several security screens switching to the site of the action. It appeared Clef and Kondraki were locked in a gun battle. Again. Still, this seemed more…vigorous than normal. For one thing, they were using real bullets this time. Dmitri flipped the sound toggle on, letting the room fill with the sound of screaming and gunfire. “-onna creep up, blind-side me? Oooh, you're slipping…” <Three loud reports> “Kon, I swear, I have no idea-” “Oh, and now I'm going to believe a word that comes out of that polymorphic pie hole?” <Single report> “Kon, calm the shit down!” Dmitri sighed, rubbing his temple as he reached for the security intercom. “Is to be much paperworks…” he muttered, picking up the receiver. Before he could dial up the security team, however, it rang in his hand. Shocked, he nearly dropped it before hitting the transmit button. He listened in silence for thirty eight seconds. He nodded once, then replaced the receiver. He looked at the screens, the intercom, and swallowed hard. He then switched everything off, and went to get a coffee. It was the first coffee break he'd taken in nine months. “Too much seems left to chance. What if he somehow avoids the operative? Kondraki has shown some combat prowess, this could backfire rather quickly.” “If you'll go to page eighteen of the third section, you'll see the actions detailed much more clearly. The main combat event is to assess the level of decay Kondraki's combat capabilities have undergone during his prolonged SCP-408 use.” “…fair enough, but won't he be more on alert?” “Yes. On the wrong subject.” Kondraki raced down the hall, keeping to the side. His bleeding arm throbbed, but he kept running, the gradual slant keeping him at a good pace. He couldn't hear Clef any more, but he knew he was there, somewhere, waiting for an ambush. He smiled with bloody teeth as he rounded the corner. He knew where he'd be safe, be able to regroup. The one place nobody would dare fire a shot, never risk the full wrath of The Foundation for any collateral damage. Lurching forward, he pitched himself against the solid steel door. Panting, he fumbled for the knob, smearing blood over the brass plate reading “Dr. Gears”. Gears looked up quickly from his screen as Kondraki stumbled in, blood splattering as he slammed the door shut. “Doctor Kondraki. You appear distressed. And injured.” The bleeding man laughed, then panted, leaning on the door. “Ooooh fuck….Gears, you have…no idea…how happy I…am to…hear you.” Gears rose and crossed quickly to the door, easing Kondraki across the office. “Sit down. You need immediate medical attention. Is there a breach event in progress? I will contact site security.” Kondraki tensed as Gears spoke, then grabbed the older man's lab coat. “No…no security…just…let me sit.” Kondraki flopped into the office chair, sighing and wincing as he rubbed his shoulder. “They…they tried to send Clef after me…can you believe that? I knew they'd try it eventually. God DAMN but that hurts…Got any pain killers, Gears?” The older man shook his head slowly, watching Kondraki. “I am sorry, but I keep no medical supplies on hand in my office. Any chemicals required for testing are kept-” “I know, I know…Jesus…” Kondraki waved Gears away, panting and closing his eyes as he rubbed his face. “Just…need a second to regroup. Then I'm going up to master control…pop some doors…” Kondraki sighed, getting his wind back. He didn't hear the click of the trigger until the bullet was already in his temple. The .45 caliber slug tore through the thin tissue of his scalp and snipped a neat hole through the skull bone just as Kondraki thought “what…”. As it shredded through his collected memories, dreams, and plans, he was simultaneously aware of the location of a book he'd misplaced weeks ago, and the vague smell of wood shavings. Then all of it, wood, book, and mind exited through a much less neat and much more explosive hole in the left side of the now former doctor's skull. He twitched once, then fell forward, hitting the desk hard enough to bruise, if he had been still capable of it. Gears shifted, replacing the gun in his coat pocket. He looked down, stone-faced, as the man emptied his life's blood and work onto his desk. He raised his hand, slowly, and placed it on the dead man's shoulder. He blinked once, slowly, eyes closed for several seconds, before opening them again. He then set about cleaning the gun, and re-positioning Kondraki's hands. “I still question the operative choice. His last combat action was…four years ago?” “Combat, yes. Rogue subject control is not considered a combat action.” “…when…when was he last active for that, then?” “I'm afraid that's still sealed.” “…alright. Let's go with it. What are we going to do for a cover?” “In this case, the old ways are the best ways.” -Notice of Staff Death- Name: Dr. Kondraki Cause: Self-Inflicted Gunshot Wound Information: Subject has been known to exhibit extreme bipolar and paranoid disorders consistent with extreme chemical imbalance. Subject entered a psychotic episode/break down during a conversation with a fellow staff member. Subject attempted to kill several staff members, then attempted to take a senior staff member hostage. Subject was reported to be incoherent and extremely agitated, and threatened to take his own life several times during the event. Subject made several motions to execute the senior staff member, before turning the gun on himself. Security teams reported too late to prevent subject's action. Post-Action: Burial services to be held immediately. Position replacement interviews underway. Status: Closed “Shot himself? Really Gears? Really?” “Yes.” “… You look me in the eyes. You look me in the eyes and you say that to me.” “He shot himself.” “You can't bullshit a bullshitter Gears.” “…” “…Was it at least hard for you to do?” “…” “You know what…don't answer. I really don't want to know."

I shivered like a jackhammer, even with my heavy down jacket drawn up around my neck. It felt like at least ten below zero, thanks to the wind chill, which by all logic should have been stopped by the snow covered trees. Winter hates logic, I think. Why else would it snow so damn much? "Move!" I shouted at the others, and the pickup truck rumbled forward, muffled by the thick snow. Something thumped in the back, making its large, tarp-covered box shake from side to side. Ropes held it in place. I took a cask from my belt, smelled it. No drinking on the job. Yeah, fuck that. I took a heavy mouthful, and waited for something a little like warmth to hit my bloodstream. … "Thank you, Agent. The research division will take care of the rest. The, ah, replacements for Jekowski and Phillips are waiting in the… um, the Cafeteria, I think. For introductions." She waved me off. She was new, still nervous in her job. Didn't remember to ask me if I had found any new risks with this one.. "When it starts drooling yellow, get everyone as far away as possible. It can spit poison." She blinked, then nearly dove for the phone. "We gagged it." She relaxed. … The new kids were sitting across from each other, each with a stack of papers in front of them, and no food in sight. I didn't go to them at first. First, food. Then, my plate piled high and held in the palm of my left hand like some ritzy waiter, I took a handgun from my side, stepped behind one of the new kids, and pointed it at the back of his head. He had cropped dirt red hair. "You just died," I said in a bored voice. To his credit, he barely flinched. Could have just been a silent hiccup. The boy across from him didn't do so well. though. Nearly tipped his chair over. "Geez, are they recruiting out of high school now?" I asked him after an awkward second's pause. He looked like he was. As I'm getting older, they're getting younger. "Um… Director. You're… I mean, Captain Bark. We were told to report to…" I cut him off with a "Yeah, yeah. Now, tell me what you could have done to keep from getting killed just now." No one spoke for a second. I jabbed carrot top in the back of the head with my gun, and he finally spoke. "Pay attention to my surroundings. When someone enters the room, check for weapons." He had a thick Scottish accent. "Now could you please…" "No," I said. "Besides just seeing me, what would you do? I have a gun. You don't even have a toothpick." "Run and hide, probably, sir." "Good. Remember that. Fight when you have either one hell of an advantage, or no choice in the matter. Of course, you're still dead." I drew back the gun, and sat on the table beside them. "I hope you weren't waiting for me in order to eat. I hate that. Don't go all formal on me or you'll find yourself on Keter duty for whatever the hell excuse I can find. And lose that damn accent. You make me think of a leprechaun." "I…" I didn't let the leprechaun finish. "You, Youngblood." They were both staring at me now. "If I had pulled the trigger on your friend the leprechaun, what would you have done? I see you came out here naked as well. No gun, not even a god damn butter knife. And wetting the bed isn't an option, no matter how much practice you have." "I…" "Don't finish that. If your next sentence doesn't start with a verb, you're talking too much." I raised the gun to the leprechaun's face again. "Now, Youngblood, what do you do?" "But…" "Wrong!" I shouted, and pulled the trigger, discharging the blank with a loud bang. This time, the leprechaun jumped. … "So, twelve legs with claws, four legs with pincers, and a pair of pincers… erm, normal, mouth pincers that is, which… deliver an electrical current that disrupts the prey's heartbeat." "You call that normal?" "You know what I mean." "I'd know what you meant if you weren't talking like some kind of drunk pixie." I had to credit him. He could control his temper. "So, they never mentioned what the other…" he paused to think, "eighty six legs do." "They walk," I said. "Suit up. The weather's a bitch out here." The truck rumbled and shuddered to a halt. The door gave a metallic whine in preparation, and before it could open into hell frozen over, I zipped my coat up around my neck.

Document recovered in the canteen of Site-██. Current source of writings are unknown, but at this time theorised [REDACTED]. Item appears to be some form of diary, however as the possibility of it actually being sourced from [REDACTED] are unlikely, it is kept on record as a hoax. However, entry 1,900 correlates directly to [DATA EXPUNGED]. Excerpts from the text follow. Day 1,450 Nice day. Woke up, but wasn't particularly hungry, so I just helped myself to a snack. No-one ever seems to ask me for payment, but then again I haven't got a job, so that's probably a good thing. The canteen is nice, and I saw that nice lady again, she always seems to be helping someone. This time she was talking to that weird guy who always has a gun with him. I don't like him. Well, that's it for today, can't think of much else to write. Day 1,451 Had a sausage sandwich for dinner today. They make really nice food in that cafe down the hall from my room. Those two guys who stand outside my room sometimes were there again today. I dunno why they're there, although that nice man who gave me the room did mention people would stand outside sometimes to keep me safe. Or was it to keep someone else safe? I can't remember. Either way, they're never very talkative, which is boring. I just wish someone would come and actually have a proper conversation with me. Instead of just walking into my room (WITHOUT EVER KNOCKING!) and then look surprised I'm in here. I mean, they must know I'm in here, otherwise why would I have this room? Day 1,500 I'm another year older! No-one brought me a cake though. There was a big boom somewhere else today, must have been that guy in the weird pixelly clothing. He's always making things explode. It being my birthday did mean I wasn't as bored today. Had to take some more paper and pens and things out of the store-room though. Everytime I asked, nothing happened, so I did it myself. I know this is some kind of research place, and that I shouldn't go outside because of the disease, but it's really boring being ignored all the time. I wonder what the disease is? He said it was bad, but never said more when I think back about it. Hope it's not too bad. Day 1,759 I swear to god the next person to walk into my room without knocking is going to get my chair thrown at his head. Day 1,761 Throwing a chair at someone's head does not get their attention. Or make someone come and shout at you. I could live with shouting, as long as someone actually talks to me. Day 1,830 Drew on the walls today, make my room a bit brighter. Just need to find some paint and I can make it look good. This was this guy walking past today wearing a really shiny necklace. Looked expensive, I wonder why he's wearing it in a lab? Day 1,850 Painted my walls after finishing the drawings. Looks really good. Hope the next person to walk in likes it. Day 1,899 Meh, looks like another dreary day ahe Day 1,900 OH MY GOD YESTERDAY WAS THE BEST DAY EVER. I was just sat in my room, filling in my diary as usual, expecting another boring day of nothing, as always. Suddenly, there's this massive BANG and a lizard thing breaks down the wall with my door in it. It had some guy on it's back shooting at it, and then another giant (he has to be a giant, he was too big to be a person like me) pulled a sword out of NOWHERE and starting hitting the lizard and it was the best thing ever. I might try drawing a picture of it. Day 1,903 Finally finished painting my walls again after that lizard thing came through it. They look really good again now. Day 3,050 I wish someone would remember me.

Outside the apartment's windows, the sound of children laughing drifted from the park, a block away. Professor Ian Thomas sank into his couch without really looking around the room. He closed his eyes. It had been a long day. The historian could not remember the last time it had been a short day. He let out a long sigh and rubbed at his temples, reaching for the bottle of bourbon he saved in the cabinet nearby for serious emergencies. It wasn't there. “Check the coffee table, Professor.” It took a moment for the voice to register for him, and when it did, it was nonetheless peculiar. Adjectives filtered into his mind without actually corresponding to definite details. He knew the voice was even, cultured, the slight hints of a strange accent … but he could not identify a gender, an age, or a precise tone. His instincts screamed at him, but he found himself reaching leisurely for the filled glass on the glass surface all the same. Like a man struggling against the tide, he tried to focus on the source of the voice and found a pair of eyes in a face that, like the voice, his mind refused to describe. “Relax, Professor,” the black-red eyes said. “Have a sip, it'll make this go easier. It's quite good, if you don't mind me saying so.” The eyes raised a half-filled glass in a slender hand and tipped it towards him. “I've been sampling it. You will pardon me my transgression, I hope. I was raised in slightly different codes of hospitality.” The historian brushed away the cobwebs of his mind and sat up straighter. He knew his uninvited guest; his mind was racing down remembered pathways … accounts of blood and fire. He swallowed and set the glass firmly down. “I think I will wait,” he said in a quavering voice. “How did you find me?” “Come, Professor, you're well-acquainted with me,” the visitor said. “I'm pleased to see you and your colleagues so enthusiastic about my memoirs. The amount of energy you have put into collecting them astounds me.” “You are-” The eyes narrowed slightly. “Let's use your colleagues' term for me, Professor. Keep this professional.” Thomas swallowed hard. “You are SCP-140-A,” he said. “Quite so. Are you surprised?” The historian shivered. Despite his best efforts, his fingers began tapping nervously on the coffee table. He felt the other's wry amusement and cursed the weakness of his knees. This was not supposed to be his element. “I'm …” he swallowed, licking his lips, “I'm sorry, but you have me at a disadvantage.” “Of course I do. I would not be here if I did not.” SCP-140-A's eyes were hard to read, but he felt the amusement growing. “Professor, I have not survived for centuries by being incautious. I learn. I listen. I adapt. I have no interest in exposing myself to unnecessary risk. I chose you because you are an educated man. Because my sources indicate that unlike some among your colleagues you have no proficiency in the use of the regulation pistol you are presently fumbling to grasp, while I have killed before and will do so again with a smile.” It laughed, and something about the sound made Thomas think of breaking glass, skittering across his nerves. “Relax, Professor. You are my host. I have no interest in violence tonight, but in the event you attempt a facsimile of cheap heroism, my snipers will put a bullet in your brain before you hear the crack of gunfire.” Thomas dropped the useless pistol with the faintest flicker of secret relief. He cleared his throat, leaned forward, and did his best to look the well-dressed intruder in the face, though his eyes smarted when he tried to look too closely. “Then why are you here?” “Your Foundation has sought me for some time,” SCP-140-A replied, “much as the Inquisition and the Templars and the ghazis before them. In my time, leaders met each other face to face.” It smiled with teeth like a row of gleaming knives. “I felt it necessary to provide you the same courtesy.” The historian swallowed again and nodded. “I see,” he said. “I don't suppose you would be interested in formal negotiations with Foundation authorities.” “Somehow, I doubt they would be conducted in good faith,” SCP-140-A replied. It sat back on the couch opposite Thomas', looking uncomfortably at home. The … whatever it was let out a sigh and set its drink down. Thin hands pressed tightly together before their owner's face. “Yours is a strange era, Professor,” it said. “I've learned much of your colleagues. My time was an age of kings. Blood was spilt in the name of gods and glory. Your colleagues do not fight for either.” It laughed sharply. “I don't pretend to understand all your methods, and yet I know your capacity for ruthlessness. But not in search of land, power, not even peace. Your sacrifices are in the name of …” it made a disgusted sound, “'normality.' Could you think of no better cause but the preservation of the mediocre?” “Is that why you wrote it?” “Need it have been in the service of some nefarious plot?” SCP-140-A replied. It crossed one long leg across the other; the red-black eyes half-lidded. “Perhaps I was merely lonely. Nostalgic.” “Yes. The good old days. How I miss my ritual sacrifice.” “Come, Professor, you're wiser than that. You know how brutal and violent the ancient world once was.” SCP-140-A sounded thoughtful. “And yet from the wreckage of an empire that salted fields and killed one in ten for disloyalty, your people built this age of technological wonders. Do you think these marvels of science and steel any less forged in blood?” “We didn't do it literally,” the historian replied. He took a sip of his drink, despite knowing he should stay on his toes. “You had your chance.” “And yet you remain curious,” the guest said. “The Foundation snatched you from a promising career in academia, if I recall correctly. I know you've mused about what would happen in the case of another … I believe you call them ‘expansion events,' yes? Any honest historian would.” It smiled. “But you haven't really been a historian for years, have you?” “Excuse me?” “You resent your employment,” it replied. “I don't blame you. How many of your colleagues share your passion?” It took a sip of its drink and shook its head. “Your expertise is met by disdain, even contempt. I saw Alexandria burn, Professor, and the Bonfire of the Vanities, and the fires in Munich. And I wept. So much knowledge destroyed. Your colleagues would have you preserve a new Dark Age.” “And your alternative is … what, exactly?” the historian asked, trying to ignore the uncomfortable, nervous way the other's words bit at him. His fingers drummed unconsciously on the table's surface. “Usher in one myself in a fit of pique? Or are you just suggesting I make it public?” “Why else didn't you warn them about the dig site, Professor?” A lump of glacial ice dropped into Thomas' guts. “I don't know what you're talking about!” he snapped. The bourbon in his hand was beginning to look more tempting by the moment. “Oh, pardon me, I didn't mean to be rude.” The visitor leaned forward, cupping its narrow chin in a long pale hand. Black-red eyes seemed to sparkle with interest. “It's a natural assumption. Surely you foresaw some danger. One of the Foundation's few historians would be considered enough of an authority on the subject that it's hard to conceive of his warnings being ignored by his colleagues. I don't blame you, Professor. You can't exactly publish material on the subject, nor can you teach, so all you have left is …” it shrugged, “research.” “I warned them,” Thomas hissed, the memory hot in his head. He licked his lips nervously and downed the remainder of his glass' contents in a swallow. The glass and the hand that held it trembled as a tide of memories flickered through his brain. He had seen the photos taken at the ill-fated dig. They held the kind of uneasy fascination fever-dreams possessed, beautiful things and horrible things still artful in their craft. And he had listened to the recordings. They kept him awake at night. “I'm sure you did,” the visitor said comfortingly, and reached out to pat Thomas' shoulder. Beneath the fabric, his skin crawled at the contact. “It's on the record, after all. ‘Professor Thomas advises caution.' Very matter-of-fact phrasing. It's hardly your fault if you expected them not to listen.” “This conversation is over.” “Is it? Well, I suppose that's fair,” the visitor said with a strange half-smile. “You need some time to think, no doubt. I've enjoyed our time together, Professor. It's a pleasure to talk to a man who knows who and what I am. A man who truly appreciates my work. I'll stop by again another time.” It rose from its seat and stretched, producing a small piece of paper looking like it had been torn from a notepad. There was a cellphone number written in a neat hand. “If you change your mind, Professor, you'll know where to find me.”

Today MisterBibs, Agent of the Foundation, was having string of good luck for the past month. This, naturally, gave him an astonishingly bad mood. Bibs wasn't an entirely spiritual person, but he did believe that there was a finite amout of good luck in the universe, and a string of positive events in a row meant that one's luck was running out. It was the sort of belief that was confirmed no matter what happened: if things kept going well, it was just proof that something bad was soon coming. If something bad did happen, it justified his belief. As he followed the blinking lights directing him and other staff members to the emergency, he knew his string of good luck had run out. Since "running towards a major threat" was something Bibs did all the time, it gave him the time to mentally tick off all the good events in the past month that (in his own opinion) caused whatever Bad Thing had just happened. At the start of the month, he discovered a new way of containing SCP-409. Bombarding a source of 409 with high-impact sonar waves causes the crystals to dissolve into a non-contagious gel. It made complete sense to him, since 409 was just White Tiberium, but it was a surprise to everyone else. Last Bibs heard about it, the eggheads-with-actual-eggs-in-their-heads were working on figuring out why it worked. A week or so later, he had done… something about SCP-055. He wasn't sure what he did, or anything, and regularly forgot that he had done anything. All that remained of the event in his memory was the existence of 055 itself. It was a strange feeling, Bibs thought, to have a memory that actively wanted to escape. He could feel the the memory of 055 rattling through his brain, careening off memories and mental fanwanks and creations, trying to find a gap. So far, all it had accomplished was leaving residue of itself on other memories of his. A little bit after that, there was that… thing with Rights. Even in his head, he refused to actually specifically mention it. Every once in a while, when he was all alone, he did a little dance in celebration. It was almost worth the beating Bright gave him when he found out. Of course, the pride of the month was a few days ago. Abel knew that Bibs was a jumpy person, and since Abel was a prick, he enjoyed taking advantage of that. Without fail, the outcome was the same: Bibs jumped upward, urine flowed downward, and Abel laughed. But one time, one rare and precious time, only jumping happened. So proud that he hadn't wet himself, Bibs proceeded to dance a finely-tuned jig in front of the Sumerian warrior. Since Abel was a prick, though, he didn't appreciate it. At the end of the mental voyage, he jumped through the double-doors to where the emergency was. The scene was chaos, as to be expected. When the blinking lights and klaxons announcing a containment breach were going off, chaos always springs up. Something was very, very wrong, and very unexpected. One of the few things that kept Bibs employed by the Foundation was that his sense of fear was off-kilter compared to everyone else's. Things that scared everyone else didn't phase him too much. It wasn't bravado or courage, it was simply that almost everything the Foundation dealt with had some analogue, even distant ones, to some story he read at one time or another. Even if there wasn't, his mind created one. What scared Bibs were the warning signs that something the Foundation was handling reminded him of a Bad Event from something he'd read. The rate of such worries weren't extremely high, but they were high enough that he wasn't fired when performance reviews came up. What was in front of Bibs and the rest of the Foundation was a perfect example of this. To everyone else in the room, the frightening aspect was that the SCP attempting to escape confinement was SCP-682. They were afraid of how it was spewing forth thick gobs of acidic blood from its mouth and eyes, threatening to dissolve the walls of its containment. They were afraid of how any weapons fired at 682 were bouncing off its flesh with a flash of light. Bibs, Agent of the Foundation, wasn't phased by that too much. He trusted his fellow co-workers to contain 682 by itself. But what did frighten him was what was around 682's neck. It looked like a rusted iron necklace, digging into 682's flesh. It didn't look right, but it didn't take an idiot to know what it was. It did, however, take an idiot (Bibs himself) to fix it. So he ran back to his office, knowing he had the tools to stop the problem. There was one more thing he was afraid of. He was afraid of getting blamed for the containment breach. It was his fault. Two Weeks Earlier Bibs stood near SCP-914, holding what he wanted to refine in his hand. He was childishly excited to be given permission to do so. As with most of his suggestions, the O5s were hesitant to allow him to do it. They had every right to be, since it was a vanity experiment, with little actual benefit to the Foundation. Bibs made as such clear during his proposal. But in knowing that, he provided as much information explaining the objects to the higher-ups, so they understood what he wanted to do. These were good ones, not the bad ones, and he was only going to set 914 to Fine. There was very little chance of anything going wrong. Eventually, he was given permission. If there was a line between "Giving Bibs Permission To Do Something Because It Had Value" and "Giving Bibs Permission To Do Something To Get Him To Stop Asking For Permission", he didn't know about it. Thankfully, such distinctions only occasionally depressed him. Bibs, Agent of the Foundation, stared briefly at the 914's knob, set to Fine. The setting Very Fine was tempting, but really, it had taken him too long to get permission for Fine, much less Very Fine. To get permission for Very Fine, he'd have to start the approval process all over again. Even if he wanted to do that (and he wasn't sure he wanted to, really), it'd mean a whole bunch more paperwork and begging. He wondered which one he'd have to do more. Well, it didn't hurt to ask, did it? He turned around to ask the guard, required by policy to be with him during the experiment, a question. To his surprise, he wasn't there. Odd, he thought. He turned around and went through the door. He went to the door to 914's containment room to find out why, and the two guards there were gone too. Damned odd. Bibs wasn't the kind of person who complained when rules weren't followed - after all, he was usually skirting the occasional rule or six - but never the big ones. Containment Procedures were the biggest of the big rules. With 914, one guard was always with the guy doing the test, and two were positioned outside. Three guards, all away at the same time. He groaned. More likely than not, the Observation staff in the booth above 914 had let them take a break. Yeah, Bibs whined to himself. It's not like I'm in need of protection or anything.. Time to call the folks in the booth. He flipped open his communicator. "Hey, it's Bibs. We got an O5 on-site? Last minute request to alter my experiment a bit. It's against the rules to change an experiment on the fly, and I'd rather not be shot for doing it without permission." Nothing. Groaning, he craned his head to look at the booth. He just barely was able to make out a crudely-written sign saying "BRB COFFEE" on it. Now, Bibs was annoyed. Sure, his uncanny ability to infiltrate and investigate without being noticed was invaluable in his role as a Foundation Agent. He could get into places, go where he wanted, and nobody bothered him because he always acted like he belonged there. Or lost and confused. Or like he belonged there, but lost and confused. But that 'gift' became really annoying when he wasn't in the field, and people forgot that he was around. Like today. He looked at the objects he planned to run through 914. Little toys, of no value to most people but himself. Shiny plastic promotional items. He figured 914 would turn them metallic on the Fine setting. Maybe fit a little bit better, since they were designed to be worn by much fatter people. He waited a few more minutes for someone to come back. He kicked the wall a few times. He contemplated peeing on the wall, figuring that would get someone's attention. But there was a fine line between "I Told You Not To Leave Me Alone" and "Actually Crazy." Bibs was annoyed at being ignored. He had an experiment to run. The Observation Staff and the Guards were AWOL. They were the ones breaking all the rules. The Very Fine setting was very tempting. Today Bibs had already worked out how this all happened by the time he returned to the containment breach. His first assumption was worked out, contemplated, and rejected before he even reached his office. Someone else had found out what he did with 914, and replicated his methods. Whoever it was, the ignorant fool decided it would be a great idea to use a different ones than he did. They used one of the bad ones, it got away from them, and it chose the finest bearer it could. As he reached his office, he had already judged that assumption as false. Nobody knew he what he had done. Sure enough, it was the guards and the Observation Staff that got reamed out for dereliction of duty. He was Bibs, Agent of the Foundation, so nobody doubted him as he filled out the test results. Two objects, fine setting, Two objects, metallic. No other change, with a "Aw Shucks, It's A Shame It Didn't Do What I Had Hoped!" note. No, this was his fault, albeit indirectly. He, using 914, had created two of them. Good Ones. But just like the stories they came from, the Good Ones' existence brought forth other ones. Bad Ones. Nature abhors a vacuum, a vacuum created by his own hand. Bibs slammed into the door to the containment booth, and 682 was still trying to escape. The Guards, reduced in number but no less determined, had kept the reptile contained. Its cage had seen better days, missing sections but still keeping the beast contained. The walls steamed from the acidic blood 682 continued to burst forth. The red-iron necklace was still clamped to its neck. Nobody else would understand what was going on, but to Bibs it was clear as day. The red necklace was demanding control and ownership over 682, and 682 was having none of that. Its physiology was not only rejecting the necklace, but attempting to assimilate it. Bibs found a big enough hole to fit his fist through. He slipped one of the rings onto his finger and stuck his hand in. He closed his eyes and concentrated. Whatever 914 had turned them into, they didn't work as they were supposed to. But they worked. The weapon Bibs used was supposed to make anything he thought of, but that one of the ways the ring didn't work quite right. It chose whatever images it wanted to, which is why everyone saw a massive green Abel suddenly appear in 682's cage. it was wearing a hardhat, though, and instead of a massive blade, it was wielding a giant wrench. That's odd as all git-out, Bibs said to himself. The Green Abel pinned 682 underneath its knees, holding 682's head down with its free hand. With the wrench-hand, it grabbed at the red necklace on 682's neck, twisting and pulling in an attempt to remove it from 682. With thick wet snaps of flesh and sinew, the necklace released its hold on the neck of the beast in fits and starts. When it seemed that the necklace would be completely freed from 682's neck, the horrible reptile flesh twitched and shook underneath the giant green Abel. Its flesh became smooth and shiny, with a sickly yellow tint to it. With a Sumerian curse Bibs was unaware of, the green simulacrum of Abel released its grasp on the beast, looking at its steaming hand and wrench. With a thick plop, the necklace reattached itself to 682. It spoke to 682, telling everyone his name and origin in the process. Fascinating, Bibs thought to himself. Profoundly pointless, unless I get that thing off it, but fascinating nonetheless… 682 changing his flesh a different color to thwart the Big Green Abel wasn't surprising, to Bibs, at least. 682 was very good at adapting to things, and the rusted necklace that had been forced onto it. That necklace must have dumped all sorts of knowledge into its brain in the process, and 682 was using it. Sighing at having to use the other illegally-made weapon, he slid it onto his other hand, he shoved it in into the enclosure, and thought. With a flash of light, the Big Green Abel became Big Blue-Green Abel. With newfound confidence in itself, the giant again proceeded to pin 682 down. This time, its coloring did the beast no help. The wrench found purchase on the necklace on the reptile's neck, and pulled. It was still a struggle, but not a large one. The excursion was getting to Bibs, Ringbearer of the Foundation, and he struggled to maintain composure. He got a second wind when, with a final skkr-ktt, the Giant Cyan Abel succeeded in its task. The simulacrum raised the red-iron necklace over its head, screamed in victory, and crushed the object between its fist. The enclosure, or what remained of it, ignited in heat and flame. Some would say it was unholy. Some would say it was simply one facet of a spectrum that a certain Agent of the Foundation accidentally unleashed upon the world. Most, however, simply described it as a big fireball. When the flames ended, only one thing remained in the enclosure. An ash pile, in the shape of 682. The crowd, who up until now had fought with every fiber of their being, stood silent for only a moment. It was not a moment of silence for a fallen foe, but the quiet sound of a paradigm shifting without a clutch. SCP-682 must be destroyed as soon as possible. At this time, no means available to SCP teams are capable of destroying SCP-682. SCP-682 was a pile of ash. It was impossible. Improbably. Profoundly unlikely. Before long, a cheer ran out. It started with some clapping. Then laughing. Then a full on celebration. People celebrated. Hugged. Kissed. Swarmed around Bibs, who didn't like this. As much as he refused to admit it, he hated attention. He felt hands around him, lifting him up. Carrying him. It wasn't for long, though, and before he even had a chance to enjoy the experience, he was dropped on his ass. "Jesus wept! Aren't you supposed to warn a guy when you decide to stop carrying him? I mean… oh." He understood why he was dropped, and why his carriers suddenly regained their emotional composure. An older man, in a well-fitting and expensive-looking suit, stood before him. An O5. The crowd, joyous moments before, suddenly looked like children who had been caught playing when they were supposed to be working. The older man looked Bibs over. "Good job, Agent Bibs." Bibs blushed. he hated compliments. "It's… it's not as amazing as it looked, sir, anyone could have-" "Nonsense, Bibs. If it wasn't for you, there's a good likelihood that we would have had to nuke the entire Site from orbit. You're a debt to the Foundation, sir. And please, Bibs, it's Fred." He smiled. A pause. "Your name is… Fred?" "Indeed. A bit against policy, I suppose, but in this case, I think you've earned it." He smiled again. He looked over at the smoking, steaming ash pile of 682. Figures, Bibs sighed. Fuckin' figures…

More recent reports on brain activity suggest that SCP-239 is developing a complete resistance to the rotation of drugs we've used to keep her comatose. This could easily result in her reawakening. Since Dr. Clef's nearly successful attempt in 2008, all attempts at termination have failed. SCP-239 has resisted all practical methods of attack subconsciously, and all other methods of destroying reality shifters suggested by the G.O.C. envoy have proved fruitless. I am now forced to request the O5 for the immediate release of Dr. Alto Clef from his current confinement and his immediate assignment to this case. Dr. Jack Bright Foundation Director Clef's eyes opened slowly, and then shut immediately as the bleary light blinded him. He felt cold and naked, his flesh crawling with barely remembered frostbite and a decade of immobility. Was he awake, now? Was this another of the cold dreams? He felt a hand on his wrist—warm, soft, female flesh. His eyes opened again, and he blinked hard, staring directly at the large, perky breasts. “Dr. Clef?” Clef's eyes never left her chest. “You have me at a disadvantage, Miss…?” The woman adjusted her top. “It's doctor. Doctor Lore.” He watched her fumbling modestly. She was lying, he knew. That was not her name. Chances are, he'd never know what it really was. “What happened?” asked Clef. “You've been released from cryogenic incarceration,” said Lore, handing the naked doctor a towel. “We need your help.” “Old problem or new?” asked Clef. “Old.” “239 or 343?” “239.” “About time they killed the little brat.” “She's not so little anymore,” Lore said, passing the file to Clef. “You just keep reality benders around, Dr. Gears? That seems a little foolish, even by the Foundation's standards.” “I can assure you, she is completely under our control, Commandant Schmetterling,” replied the shorter, bald man. Schmetterling appeared unconvinced by Gears' assurances. Gears knew that the Coalition officer was not the happiest envoy the Foundation had ever received, especially not since he was informed of 239's continued existence. “We thought your operatives had subdued her,” said Schmetterling, irritably. “We knew you killed the other one. We saw it from one of our observatories. I was under the impression that this one was also eliminated.” “I'm afraid not,” said Gears, evenly. “Well,” said Schmetterling, “I'm afraid I'm going to have to let my superiors know that the Foundation has still yet to come to its senses.” Clef tied the robe around his midsection, not bothering to attempt to hide the erection he'd sported since he woke up and saw Lore. “Where to now, Sugartits?” “I'm to take you to be briefed, Dr. Clef. You'll be meeting with the current head of 239's project.” “Karrington?” “Dr. Karrington was killed by 239-X in the 2017 attempt. It's all in the report.” Clef shrugged and looked around him. For five stories up, elongated tubes of glass and cryogenics held the Foundation's prisoners. When he'd been imprisoned, the facility had been a third this size, newly implemented for cost purposes. When the O5's found out it was cheaper to freeze them than feed them, dozens of prisoners were transported here. Clef stopped short, suddenly looking at the familiar faces behind the glassy ice. There was Imants, a slight smirk passing over his pale face, as if he'd just heard a joke that only he had understood. Next to him was Glass, sporting a look of shocked surprise. Clef turned to Lore. “What sort of look did I have on while I was frozen?” “You looked horny,” said Lore impassively. Clef smiled and turned back to the tubes. The next one was no surprise. Clef was shocked that he himself had been 'contained' before Kondraki, one of the earliest results of the Foundation's changing ambitions. The face of his sometimes friend was twisted with rage, open in a still silent scream, eyes narrowed with anger and disbelief. Next to him, frozen alongside his static form in the clear, perfect ice, a few butterflies remained, still shimmering. Clef raised his hand and placed it on the unit. A few seconds later, he removed it and smiled. “You always were a son of a bitch, Kondraki.” He turned back to Lore. “You bastards have anyone else I know in here?” “Not really,” said Lore. “Mostly a few witnesses who were immune to Class-A's. One or two trespassers, some of Dr. Bright's other selves.” “Jack's still around?” “No,” said Lore. She was lying again, Clef knew. He always knew. Clef sat across the table from the short, dowdy woman in the white lab coat. She had been scowling at him since he walked into the room. Clef, for his part, wasn't paying attention. He'd sat with the robe at its most revealing, reading the file he'd been given as slowly as he possibly could. Once or twice, he looked up at the woman, smiled, and returned his attention to the file. After a while, he stopped, laid the file down and looked at her. “Are you all complete fucking morons?” he asked. “Excuse me?” said the woman, whose name Clef hadn't even bothered to learn. “Psychological tricks? Crushing force? Stabbing her with a knife? Shooting her with a gun? Where the hell are the backup plans?” “Each test was approved by a majority of the O5 command and I don't see—” “Do you know how to read?” asked Clef suddenly, dangerously. The woman didn't reply. “I'll take that as a no. I've completed, either alone or with some aid, the disposal of more than fourteen reality shifters for the Foundation alone. More than fourteen confirmed kills. I can't say more than that, because no one will tell me what's still classified, but I'm sure that even with what I must assume is your piteously low security clearance, you were allowed to read at least some of my exploits?” “Yes,” she replied. “I've read the termination reports for several of the SCP's you were inv—” “Did you pay attention?” interrupted Clef again. “What?” “Did you pay attention to a single, goddamned thing I wrote in them?” “Of course. The methods you used have been tested and found lacking for our purposes.” “Those ‘methods,' as you call them, are merely scaffolding. You have to build on the scaffolding for it to hold up anything. Did you all just freeze everyone who was worth a damn around here?” The woman shifted uncomfortably in her seat, not looking at Clef. “Then what do you propose, Doctor?” “Simple,” smiled Clef grimly. “Since her subconscious defenses have been refined so far… I'm going to wake her up.” “You're waking her up?” yelled Schmetterling, turning suddenly and looking through the ten inches of transparent steel, as if the figure on the other side might have heard him. He dropped his voice, but his anger remained. “Are you all insane?” “No,” replied Gears. “We have our best operative on the case.” “Who?” snapped Schmetterling. “Who the hell do you think is capable of removing a Type Green that you've allowed to progress this far?” “Dr. Clef,” replied Gears. “We've released him from confinement for this task.” “Clef?” asked Schmetterling. “Alto Clef?” “Do you know any other Clefs, Commandant?” “Well, yes,” the representative replied, looking back through the steel at the sleeping form. Gears made a mental note to check in Schmetterling's claim, and then moved to stand next to him. “You've nothing to fear, Commandant,” replied Gears. “The situation is well in hand.” Schmetterling's jowls quivered as he turned back to Gears. “So you say, Doctor. Tell me. Aren't you worried about this?” “Oh, yes,” said Gears, his expression unchanging, his voice perfectly, almost supernaturally level. Dr. Clef is to be given access to any materials he currently requires. All personnel are to assist Dr. Clef by any and all non-carnal means. However, Dr. Clef is not to be informed of the continued existence of any personnel involved in his capture. Dr. Lore is designated as go-between for Clef and any wishing to contact him. Clef walked into the Victorian styled study and smiled at the fragrance of pipe smoke and old books. The old man was seated in high-backed chair with a hardbound copy of Don Quixote open in his lap. The old man looked up and started with surprise before smiling. “Doctor Clef!” he exclaimed, his grin widening until the wrinkles of his face became subsumed by it. “Hello, 343.” “Oh please,” said the old man, waving away the designation. “No numbers between friends. Sit. Please.” Clef knew the chair would be there before he even bent his knees. He settled into a comfortable, overstuffed chair and looked at the elderly gentleman. “We both know what you are,” said Clef, as seriously as he could. “I've never said anything about you, not to anyone, nor recommended your termination, mainly because you stayed at Level 3 and never posed a significant threat.” The old man continued to smile happily. “You remember me from the G.O.C., then? Geneva? 1989?” The old man nodded, not quite as happily as before. “And you remember that you owe me a favor?” The aged gentleman's smile faded slightly. “Yes, Doctor. I remember.” “I've come to collect. There's another Type Green. This one has progressed to Level 4.” “I'm very old now, Doctor. I'm not sure how useful I can be. Sometimes, I look for books, but I can't remember their names. And they're just not there anymore. Just the other day, a young man came in here to ask me about… about something. And I forgot he was here. And then he wasn't. Just gone, and I can't remember him. No one wants to say anything…” Tears formed at the corners of 343's crinkled eyes. Clef almost felt sorry for him. Almost. Until he remembered Geneva. “Your aid will be necessary.” “I am a man of honor, Doctor. I will do whatever you need.” Clef stood to leave. The hard part was over. Clef sat at the table, going over his plans once again. SCP-343 would be located in the middle of the fallout zone. Clef himself would be the bait. 239 should remember him, and once awake, her subconscious defenses would be significantly weaker. That should allow him to— Clef heard the door open and looked up as Schmetterling entered. “I didn't think you would ever be released, Doctor Clef,” said Schmetterling. “Do I know you?” “I'm not surprised you don't recognize me,” replied Schmetterling. “It's been a long time.” Clef merely shrugged. “What do you want?” “Only to give you something. A reward, for your service to the G.O.C.” Schmetterling reached toward his pocket, but stopped as the shotgun suddenly became leveled cleanly at his face. “The outline of your pocket looks like a gun,” replied Clef. “It is a gun,” said Schmetterling. He reached into his pocket, and slowly pulled out the purple revolver. He turned it slightly―handle first―and passed it to the other man. Clef smiled. “This used to be one of ours, didn't it?” “The Atomic Revolver. Reported lost by your Foundation several years ago. We found it.” “And you had nothing to do with the original disappearance?” “The G.O.C.? Of course not,” said Schmetterling. "I wasn't asking about the G.O.C.," replied Clef. Schmetterling merely shrugged. "It was good to see you again, Doctor Clef. I wish you the best of luck." Clef nodded, watching the other man's back as he left the room. He quickly picked up the purple revolver and slid it into his pocket. Lore walked in carrying two drinks and set them down between Clef and herself. “What'd the Commandant want?” “To talk about old times,” replied Clef. “Funny,” she said. “He never mentioned that he'd worked with you.” “He didn't,” said Clef. Clef shut the safe, taking the small box carefully in his hands. He smiled. His trump card was ready, and everyone would soon be in place. He still had no idea what exactly he was going to be walking into, but he owed the Foundation this one. He shivered, remembering the coldness of his preemptive coffin, and cracked his knuckles. “Do you really think this will work?” asked Lore. “It should. She shouldn't be able to do anything about it from the other side.” The mirror was slowly raised into place by the workmen as Clef palmed the jasper colored disk back and forth in his hand. “And if it doesn't?” “Then break the mirror before I get back.” Clef looked at Gears, examining the shorter man briefly. “Dr. Clef. You are looking well.” “Gears. You look old as shit.” Gears merely handed the keycard to Clef. “This will get you all the way through the designated path. You'll find the telekill body armor in the observation room, as well as the equipment you requested. Good luck, Dr. Clef.” “Is that all, Gears?” “Pardon, Dr. Clef?” “You locked me in a frozen hell for eleven years, and I don't even get an apology?” “You were trying to kill our colleague, Dr. Clef. I was ordered to assist in your capture.” Clef grimaced at Gears and turned to walk into the Observation Room. “Alto?” Clef stopped. “What, Gears?” “It was… a regrettable set of circumstances.” The chamber was quiet, except for the quiet hum of a dozen computers. This was the core of the facility, where everything was stored. Dozens of firewalls, hundreds of security protocols. All of them bypassed. The man at the control panel typed for a few moments, laughed, and typed again. He walked over to the nearest set of panels, pulled out two of them, and slid the archival system into place. Clef watched Gears walk away, heading to the last of the evacuation choppers. Site 19 was now abandoned, mostly. Those handful remaining were either vital to Clef's plans or wouldn't interfere with it. He waited for perhaps fifteen minutes, looking through the steel at 239's sleeping form. She was a young woman now, mature. And thanks to years of wrongfully committed attempts, particularly hard to kill. He watched her, watched the fading phantasms of her id flicker about the room, scratching at the telekill walls. He turned and picked up the thin helmet, strapping it to his head. The body armor was a little bulkier than he'd anticipated, but it fit well enough. He pulled on the gloves, fingered the purple gun underneath his jacket, and felt through his pockets until he found the tiny box containing his emergency backup. He grinned and picked up the keycard Gears had given him. Sliding it into a control panel in front of the glass, he flipped the switches all down into their off position and pulled out the revolver, bringing it up to point at the slowly rousing reality shifter. The hammer fell, and a loud crack echoed through the room as the steel bent and shattered inward. Clef was running very quickly. He could feel her back there, floating somewhere. He risked a glance backward, watching the floors buckle into water and piss, dirt and air. He hoped she would be off-balance enough from the medications that she would be less capable, less able to affect the environmental changes on the universe. He was pretty sure it was a pointless hope, now. He rounded the corner as the walls slid into chunks of burning babies, the smell of human flesh turning his stomach slightly, then making it growl uncomfortably. One more turn, and he'd be at ground zero. Another ten feet, nine, eight, seven… He burst through the doors, looking expectantly for 343 to be standing in position. Lore was waiting next to the large mirror as Clef pounded through the double doors panting. He looked at her, incredulous. “The fuck are you still doing here?” “You guys never work alone, right? I'm here to help.” “I'm not alone!” screamed Clef, as the doors behind him became a series of kittens with Barbie Doll arms sticking out of their eyes. “Where's 343?!” The doors opened slowly. The being floating through them didn't look like it was now or had ever been a little girl. Years of atrophy had turned her limbs into spindly wires of flesh wrapped around bone. She wasn't able to lift them, or even to turn her head. The tubes that had hung out of her arms were now crawling over her body like centipedes. The wall of kittens began to mewl, plaintively. She opened her mouth, trying to say something, but only a gurgle came out. She looked at Clef and gurgled again, louder, angrily. Her bowels began to empty black, blood smelling feces onto the floor, which in turn morphed into coals, and began to spread out slowly, burningly. Clef was preparing to make a mad dash when the floor's progression slowed and stopped. He blinked twice and looked around the room. 343 was standing just behind Lore, his face knit in concentration. The old man's nose had a drop of blood forming from the left nostril, slowly running down over the crest of his lip, and dropping to his shirt. 343 flinched. “If you're going to do something, Doctor…” Clef raised the gun again, and clicking the hammer back, let it fall. The gun popped slightly, bars of energetic power running over its metal surface. “FUCK!” screamed Clef. “A goddamned recharge rate?!” The girl screamed in rage, and 343 cried out, staggered by the changes she was forcing into the world. The drugs in her system were quickly dissipating, her control over the world around her returning. Clef grabbed Lore and pushed her hard, leaving her tottering toward the far wall of the wide room as he madly dashed for the opposite side. The floating woman turned the air into chlorine for a moment, just a moment, before 343 could stop her. A child in an adult body, broken and beaten over the course of a decade, lashing out with her shattered mind. The older SCP was kneeling on the floor, ears bleeding. His knotted hands were clenched, as his foe turned for the moment from Clef to float toward him. It was almost beautiful to watch, Clef thought, stopping for an instant to observe what he hoped was a rare circumstance. The distance between them crackled as the hovering female changed things, reversing the laws of physics and existence as 343 set them back into place. It was like watching a petulant child throwing her toys to the floor and her patient grandfather picking them up and setting them right. Clef edged around near the now dead kitten door, raising the revolver again. He fired, the painful report running up his arm as chunks of the hovering menace were ripped from her body and thrown behind her to the mirror. She screamed as the cancers started to form almost instantly under her flesh. “Don't care much for that, do you little girl?” shouted Clef, as 343 suddenly locked the universal order back into place. Clef dropped the gun and bull rushed her before she could recover, hitting her tiny midsection sharply and pushing her toward the mirror, grasping the red disk and shoving. They fell into a strange field, with rolling wheat and smells of emptiness. The girl was rolling on the ground, willing herself up off the ground pitifully. Clef stood nearby, knocking the bits of wheat and grass off his armor. He walked over and forced her body over, straddling her small, heaving chest. “Sorry, dearie,” he said, smirking. “Different world, different rules.” He placed both his hands around her neck and brought his thumbs up to her trachea. Tears ran down her face, her quivering lips pleading wordlessly with him to reconsider. As the brittle, malnourished bones snapped, her eyes thankfully glossed in the pleasant emptiness of oblivion. Clef stood and walked back toward the mirror. "Should have done that years ago…" Clef stepped back through the mirror, unlocking the telekill body gear he was wearing and dropping it to the floor. 343 leaned against the wall nearby, being tended to by Lore. Clef watched as she dabbed the blood away from the old man's eyes before he cleared his throat. Lore looked up, smiled, and ran to the edge of the mirror. “239's status?” “Eliminated,” said Clef. “Good,” said Lore. She brought the gun only as far as Clef's midsection before she fired. Clef felt parts of him tear out of his back and staggered backward to the frame of the mirror. He looked up at Lore, the smiling face holding the violet pistol, feeling a tugging sense of recognition. “Jack?” Lore smiled, eyes twinkling with mischief. “Well, of course, Alto. Who else?” Clef was sagging now, his legs giving out as the internal and external bleeding set in. Dr. Bright jiggled happily as she sneered down at the bleeding, middle-aged man laying on the floor. “I don't take kindly to people who try to kill me, Clef, regardless of the circumstances.” "Really, Jack? But they were very good circumstances. Not even friends?" asked Clef. "What's a little murder between friends?" "Especially not friends." “That's too bad, Jack,” said Clef, throwing up parts of his stomach. “You look good enough to fuck.” Clef rolled over, struggling to stand up. Bright let him, if for no other reason than it made the blood pour out of his gaping body that much faster. “You forgot one thing though, Jack,” said Clef, feeling his muscles twitching around the cancers forming in his midsection. “What's that, Alto?” “You're jewellery.” Clef stood in front of the mirror, smiling bloodily as he held SCP-963 at arm's length in his gloved hand. “Goodbye, Jack.” As Clef lurched back through the mirror, Bright brought the pistol up a second time, pulling the trigger. The gun popped, electrical arcs running up and down its length. Bright screamed and rushed toward the mirror, but as she did, a loud shot―gunpowder and copper―echoed through the room, striking the disk hovering in the center of the glass. As Bright reached the mirror, she saw the disk chip, ever so slightly, and cease glowing. She whirled around, looking for the source of the shot, raising the pistol over her head in rage. She found no one. The room was cold as Schmetterling walked down the hall, shouldering the sniper rifle. It had been a while since he'd done any shooting, and he was proud that he still had the touch. He walked methodically toward the frozen tube, entered the old password they hadn't thought to delete, and smiled boldly as Imants fell bodily to the floor. He leaned down and slapped his face a few times. “Imants. IMANTS!” “Whoza?” Schmetterling sighed and picked up the larger man, resting him on his shoulder. He left the rifle behind and picked up the data backup, stashing it in his pocket. As he passed Dr. Kondraki's tube, he stopped, looking at the frozen visage. “C'mon,” he said. “I'm going to need all of you to help cover our escape.” The tube shimmered as the butterflies flapped away from the empty containment chamber, floating around Schmetterling and his rescued friend for a moment before both of them vanished. Jack Bright sat in the director's office, tapping her polished nails on the desk. This would be a set back. The amount of time needed to repair SCP-093 was unknown, if it could be repaired at all, and the disappearance of Kondraki from containment was highly unsettling. Bright stood and walked to the far wall, entering the long and complex code that was required for someone without stable voice recognition or handprint. The door slid open, revealing a carefully crafted box. She opened it, revealing the almost circle with the three, inward pointing arrows. ‘Only a set back, Alto,' thought Jack. ‘Only a set back.' Alto Clef sat breathing heavily in a field of wheat and emptiness. He could feel the effects of having a Higgs boson thrown through his midsection, knew he didn't have too much longer to live, and that what time he did have would be unpleasant. If he'd still had a gun, he might have shot himself, but since he didn't… Clef looked at the amulet. Tilting his head back, he positioned it perfectly over his mouth, and dropped it down his throat, thinking in his last moments how much nicer oblivion would be than the perpetual, eternally cold dreams. And somewhere, somewhere on the other side of our world's mirrors, a cancer ridden, bleeding body shuts down―and reawakens screaming. Unfinished Business II

Grandson, you're a small child now, and you've started asking about them. You're far too young to be told, so I've brushed you off. I've decided to write you this note, for when you're older. How I wish I could be there by the time you are old enough to understand, but I know that won't happen. I was born in what your history teachers call the Golden Age. As a child, I never questioned anything about the situation. It was a time of innocence for me and humanity in general, and I never really focused on things. Our teachers taught us about The Enemy, and how we had our Defenders to protect us. They sacrificed for us, keeping our world safe. We appreciated them, and they enjoyed it. … I can't remember when we, as a people, started calling them Defenders. I know them as something else, but it would hurt me too much to call them that. I was a young man when the Golden Age ended. Everyone will tell you that it ended like a flick of a switch, but don't believe it. People talked. We knew how horrible The Enemy was, and what they would do without our Defenders. But over time, we questioned them more. Rationally, we knew that the sacrifices were worth it. Some deaths were expected, damage was predicted. But in the face of total destruction, was it worth complaining about? But our Defenders knew we were talking. Maybe that was it? Maybe that was why they didn't stick around for people's praise as long? Maybe they were beginning to see us as a burden that they had to defend, rather than their people that they wanted to defend? It wasn't until the Attack of… I'm so sorry, but to this day I can't say the name of that old city. You can look it up if you want. I'll call it the Attack of the Great Hole, since you know that place as the Great Hole. Our Enemy had attacked, as they had often did. The police, the armies, they defended us as well as they could. Don't believe that we, as a people, became complacent. Don't believe it for a moment, child. We never expected or assumed our Defenders would arrive. Ultimately, though, the police and armies were only stopgaps, keeping The Enemy contained until our Defenders arrived. Arrive they did, in their ships. But this time, it was different. I wasn't there, of course, but I saw the vids, just as you did. I saw the attack. Not from The Enemy. Our Defenders. They didn't attempt to combat The Enemy from the ground, as they always did. They didn't respond to the enemy's escalation by escalating in turn. From high in the air, they attacked with the greatest weapons they had at their disposal. In a moment, that sacred city became the Great Hole. Do you know how many people lived in that city? Millions, child. Men, women, and children. Innocents, all of them, and all of them dead. And our Defenders? A press release. "We do not have the time to focus on secondary goals such as removing civilians from the combat zone. Our primary goal is now our only goal: defeating The Enemy. Adapt to this." The nations of the world reacted as you think they would. They tore into our Defenders. To their credit, the Defenders attempted to explain their reasoning for their change in attitude, but it's hard to believe someone with the blood of millions of innocents on their hands. When the UN demanded that our Defenders defend us from farther away, they agreed. I think they were happy. They mentioned that they had other missions to accomplish. That was… a long time ago. The Enemy still exists, and occasionally they get through Our Defenders. We've fought them off by ourselves, you know. You'll rarely see mentions of the Conflict of Chicago, the Delay of Oregon, or the Stalemate of Brazil, but they happened. I was there, and I have the scars to prove it. Sometimes, Our Defenders regroup and destroy The Enemy. Sometimes, they ignore the breach and let us handle it. There are some among us that still believe that they are helping us by making us defend ourselves. Most of us believe that they hope we get wiped out, so that they can defend elsewhere more efficiently. I'm an old man, child, and my time is short. I can't say I've lived a good life, because the memories have sapped my soul. You grew up seeing our Defenders raze entire cities to defeat The Enemy. You've seen them destroy our spacecraft to keep us in the solar system. You have Enemy Assault Protocols in your school, and you have Defender Guard Protocols. You won't blink or twitch when you're old enough to know that they are the same protocols. All of those things, though, child, hurt me more than you'll ever know. They haunt everyone my age who still lives. Even the name hurts people my age, child. Defenders? They used to be called something else. Everyone my age remembers. We remember when they were called the Power Rangers.

Day 2 of Containment cycle 366 "Wait, so are you actually… ?" Agent Xavier Garcez asked with that same incredulous, gushy tone that the new staff always had when they saw the nameplate on the desk. "Yes, I am Doctor Alto Clef. No, those stories were all greatly exaggerated," the man in the plain brown civilian security officer's uniform responded with a hint of resignation. "Agent Garcez, why are you still wearing that black suit? Didn't the Requisitions department issue your cover uniform before you arrived on site?" "Sir, no sir," Agent Garcez responded, tearing his eyes from the stylized nameplate bearing the musical inscription that was such a huge part of the Foundation mythos. Snapping stiffly to attention in the manner of one who was addressing a drill sergeant, Garcez continued, "I was told that a uniform and cover identity would be provided on location." "Jesus Christ… at ease, Garcez." Clef stood up and paced across the grimy old security office and opened a rusted locker. "You're way too big to wear one of my extras. And I don't have your cover identity. So guess what? You're camping out here for the next few days. I'm not having you shuttle back and forth from this facility looking like one of the goddamn Men in Black. I can't believe Requisitions screwed this up again. Please tell me they at least sent you in with the necessary supplies." "Yes sir, Doctor Clef. They're in the back of my truck." "Let me guess, you drove in here with a big shiny black SUV with out-of-state plates, and you parked it out in the old lot outside right next to my Toyota." "Er, yes sir, Doc-" "Garcez, this site is an abandoned federal penitentiary with a really gruesome past. To ghost hunters, this place is like a blonde holding up a sign that says 'Free Blowjobs.' You are supposed to be part of the skeleton rent-a-cop staff that keeps horny teenagers and thrill-seekers from trying to sneak into this building. Do you know what happens to people who sneak into this building?" "Entering the restricted rooms in this building is invariably fatal. Regulations state that any persons who enter SCP-450 are to be considered lost," Garcez recited from memory, still standing at attention with his square jaw thrust up into the air. "Do you look like a rent-a-cop? Are you driving the shitty kind of car that a rent-a-cop would drive?" Clef limped up towards the younger, taller man, narrowing steely eyes that had already witnessed more than a lifetime's worth of horror. "No. I'll tell you what you look like. You look like the fucking new guy who doesn't quite understand what he is dealing with yet. You're here to learn that really fucking fast, or else you are going to die in here like one out of four fucking new guys that come in here to learn the ropes. You cut any more corners and you will wish that I was the goddamn devil that 732 made me out to be, because that guy would just put a bullet in your worthless ass and bury you in the parking lot. But I am not that man. So if you fuck up in the slightest bit from here on out, you are not only going to die inside of 450 but the gates of Hell are going to open up so wide that the clean-up crew that comes in here to pick up the pieces is going to have to fake a natural disaster big enough to wipe the neighboring three towns off of the map. Am I clear?" "Sir, yes sir!" Garcez said, eyes staring off blankly over the top of Dr. Clef's receding hairline. "This isn't the army, Agent." Clef sighed wearily and returned to his desk to send an equally nasty letter to the Requisitions officer who had sent him a new agent without the proper gear. "Uh, s… sorry Doctor," Garcez replied. Receiving no answer, he slumped his shoulders and sat down on the musty tweed sofa in the office. Finally he spoke up again. "So what are you doing here, Doctor?" Clef looked up from his monitor and squinted. "Retiring." Day 17 of Containment Cycle 366 "I'm getting old, Garcez," Clef explained. "It was just over thirty years ago that we first secured this site. I was the first person to walk that mile, you know. Devised the containment procedures myself." Garcez said nothing. He was dressed in the proper plain brown uniform now, his eyes locked straight ahead down the dilapidated hallway. His pace was measured and calm, his footsteps almost silent in comparison to the doctor's shuffling limp and the clack of Clef's cane. "I based the containment pattern on the Seal of Solomon," Clef continued in a relaxed tone. "Thought it would have some sort of arcane power over the entities trapped inside death row. It seems to have worked, they've only gotten loose once, and that was seven years ago when some fucking new guy didn't make it to the chair in time. Once I kicked Bright into the containment zone, as a joke. You could smell nothing but burning chimp for the next three months, even in the safe zone. Fucker said he'd kill me one day for that, heh heh. Good times. Also, I fucked your mother." Garcez flinched and looked sideways. Clef smacked him in the shin with his steel-tipped cane. "Don't react, Garcez! Don't react to anything while you are taking this walk," the doctor hissed. "You just keep on tuning me out and finish the practice run. We've got three more to do today. You need to execute this task perfectly or you will die, do you understand me? Now come on, back to the starting line." Clef and Garcez turned around and walked to the end of the empty cell block in silence. They were in a safe wing of the facility, one that was secure enough to have electric lights overhead. The air was thick with the smell of rot, strongest at the far wall where the practice symbol was painted in pig's blood over and over on a daily basis. Clef paused, holding up his hand before Garcez started his walk again. His chest heaved and his hand clenched the handle of his cane so roughly that it shook. "Are you alright, Doctor? Do you need to rest?" Garcez asked gently. Clef looked down at the grimy concrete floor. "You know, I wonder if it even matters. The pattern. We've been tracing it in death row once a month for thirty years, but I don't think the entities care about the pattern. All they want is the blood." "Doctor?" "It's the walk that is important, Agent. You have to walk calmly and at the perfect rate. Not too fast and not too slow. Don't look to the sides. Just go in, smear blood on the walls, and get out. Do that and the entities will not see you, and you'll live to do this again next month. Maybe get assigned to contain something less shitty later." "Yes, Doctor. Did you need to rest?" "No, no. I just needed to think of something new to torment you with while you practice. Something really good." Clef's face split in a wrinkled grin. "Let's get going." For the next four hours Clef yodeled nonstop. Garcez managed to complete one practice walk successfully. Day 30 of Containment Cycle 366 The doctor and the agent stood at the threshold of death row. A pair of brilliant floodlights shone behind them in the safe zone, casting their shadows starkly against the painted steel containment doors that blocked the path to the pitch black execution chamber. Garcez clutched a white plastic bucket containing a paintbrush and three blood packs generously donated by the people of the neighboring town in one of their frequent blood drives. "What if they attack me anyway?" Garcez finally asked, staring at the door blankly. "They shouldn't, Xavier. But if they do, I promise I'll finish the job. We'll keep these things contained." Clef waved his key card over the electronic lock, and the steel doors swung towards the two men. A rush of gibbering voices seemed to pour out of the stark darkness of the death row cell block. One hundred and sixty-six meters away, the door to the execution chamber stood open, barely illuminated by the powerful flood lamps behind the two men. "Everything seems normal." Clef nodded as the doors of every cell on the left side began slamming open and shut in unison. "Go get it done, kid. Remember, the pattern isn't important. The walk is." Garcez's breath was calm and measured as he stepped into the darkness. Clef watched as his partner briskly strolled past the remains of an agent who had failed to execute his task perfectly three years ago. After passing seventy-three yards down the hallway, Garcez spun his head sideways with a short exclamation. "Mom?" Abruptly his body was yanked to the side, smashed against the rusted metal of a closed cell over and over until it was limply dragged between the bars in a smear of gore. Clef narrowed his eyes and grimaced. He had really thought Garcez was going to work out. June 22nd, 20██ 7:53 PM Clef walked with his cane tucked under one arm. His other swung the white plastic bucket in time with his measured steps. Exactly eleven minutes after entering SCP-450 he came to the old electric chair, rattling and shaking in its fixtures. With the exception of Garcez's screw-up, everything was going as expected. Clef knelt behind the shuddering electric chair and examined the bucket's contents. Two of the blood packets had been torn when Garcez was taken. Looking back the way he came for the first time, he could see the trail of bloody footprints he had left behind. Doctor Clef pursed his lips—the one remaining blood packet would not be enough to draw the containment pattern he had devised thirty years ago. Digging into his trouser pocket, he produced the old hunting knife Dmitri had given him as a present after their vacation in Tijuana. Clef rolled up his sleeve, laid the blade against his wrist and set about his task. He doubted he would have time to walk out safely after this… Day 1 of Containment Cycle 367 Doctor Yancy sat in the security office, feeling very small in front of Doctor Clef's laptop. A progress bar slowly filled as a series of high-resolution photographs was attached to a report for the O5 Council. Agent Xavier Garcez is confirmed to have perished while executing secure containment procedures at approximately 7:42 PM. Attached image [Incident 450-34-a] was taken by Researcher Darrin from outside SCP-450 containment. It appears that Doctor Clef personally completed containment procedures with his own blood. Of note is the phrase that Doctor Clef painted upon the rear wall of the execution chamber in place of the decayed containment pattern: "Come and get it mother fuckers." The entities within SCP-450 are confirmed to be contained. This appears to verify Doctor Clef's recent hypothesis that the specific pattern is not relevant to containment. The entities will be contained as long as human blood is applied to the walls of the execution chamber. Attached image [Incident 450-34-b] is of the floor before the electric chair. From this angle it is hard to determine the nature of the markings, but we believe they are multiple hand prints and a large blank area in the shape of a human body. Doctor Clef's whereabouts are unknown. He is presumed dead.

It's not every day that the Foundation hosts a funeral. Occasionally, a loyal agent or staff member receives a small ceremony and a burial on Site 19, but not often. The family might get the belongings and a letter of consolation. Never the body, though. Most times they wouldn't want it. The D-class get nothing but standard termination procedures at the end of the month. But this was just plain unheard of: not only the funeral of a senior staff member, but the funeral of Dr. Alto H. Clef. Everyone not needed to keep security up was there. Some, I'd presume, were there because they were afraid that Clef would haunt them if they didn't. The eulogies were what could be expected, from some of the senior staff and a few members of the O5: reminiscing on old missions, glowing testimony to his accomplishments, and the like. Mostly just for show, because you can't really eulogize a man like Clef. I didn't find it very strange that everyone had dry eyes: Clef was more valuable as an employee than a person. He was dangerous, unpredictable, and clearly insane, causing millions in damages, numerous personnel deaths, and just barely avoiding several XK events, but he was also responsible for dozens of successful recoveries and several critical decommissions, and that was at least worth something. Sure, there would be those who would miss the humor he lent to near-death situations, or his enigmatic, genre-savvy ways, but for the most part, no one cared about him personally. Clef's funeral was practically equivalent to presenting him with an “Employee of the Month” plaque. However, there was one thing that made it all stand out, one final act to cement Clef into Foundation legend. When the eulogies had been finished, the silhouette of O5-█ on the monitor cleared his throat and announced: “As per Dr. Clef's final wishes, his body will be fired out of SCP-1543-J.”

I have not been here long. I do not know much. But if there's one thing I know, it is this: Alto Clef cannot die. The guy is immortal, I swear. He can sit in 682's containment cell for an hour and not get eaten. He can mess with that witch kid and not be ripped limb from limb. He can pull off basically anything and the O5s can't do a thing other than give him a slap on the wrist. Now I was cool with all this. Until he took my hat. Clef said that it was nifty enough for him to claim as his own. But that hat. That hat was ME. That was what made me, a lowly level 1 researcher, memorable. I was the guy with the hat. And now I'm no one. So I went to get the hat. I begged. I pleaded. I bribed. I offered my soul to the man. And he said that the only way I was getting this nifty hat was to kill him. So I shot him in the head. My hat reclaimed, I was happy for once. I went about my business then. I mean, I wasn't going to defame his body and carve ‘I WAS HERE. CLEF IS A LOSER!!!' into his chest. I left him. And the next day he walked up to me and said, “You'll have to do better than that.” He walked away, my hat on his head. Something snapped then. I was on a mission. I walked to his office and shot him at least eight times, emptying the magazine in my handgun. I doused his office in gasoline and threw a couple of lit matches in there. And he came back the next day, simply taking my hat off of my head. I tried everything I could think of. I filled his office with water and watched him drown. I poisoned every thing he ate or drank. I sent 076-2 in there after a while. And every time he ‘died', he was back again the next day, the same old Clef, looking like he had never been burnt or shot or drowned or sliced into itty bitty little bite sized pieces. So finally I went up to him. He asked casually, as if it were all a game to him, “How are you going to try and kill me today?” I replied, “I'm not. Keep the damn hat. It's lame anyway. I got a different one today. It's better than that one.” Clef removed the hat and said, “You're right. Sombreros are so last season.” He threw his hat at me, then walked over and took my hat, saying, “Jester hats are what's in, you know. Big in France.” And that time I just shot him because he had been fucking with me.

Clef felt a little regretful, he would have to admit. He'd always found Rights very agreeable, if not the brightest bulb on the chandelier. At the very least, he felt sorry enough to sit at her bedside with a small sigh and take his time prepping the weapon. It really was regretful, he sighed, that it would come to this. Of all the people to ever get out of the foundation, Rights seemed like a good candidate to be able to stay out. She had chutzpah. Hell, anybody who left the Foundation without the Foundation's express approval or a full memory wipe had chutzpah to spare. And very good friends to smuggle herself out. He absently hummed to himself as he screwed the suppressor onto the barrel of the gun, checking it over and re-checking it, before glancing back at Rights. She was still asleep, brow furrowed in fitful dreams. He paused, and wondered what life must have been like for her outside of the foundation, raising her little monster. The years had taken their toll on both of them, it seemed. In forms of grey hair and deep lines and arthritic hands. He mused over what sort of strange traits the years and years of exposure to SCPs had awakened in her. He had to do this quietly. After all, even he wasn't bullheaded enough to consider going up against even a low-level reality bender head-on anymore, if there was a choice. Especially one that knew him. He was getting far too old for that. For too old indeed, he thought as he stood, feeling his joints creak a little. Old, but still the best. He leveled the weapon to her temple, and pulled the trigger with a dulled pop, like a car door slamming. She twitched once, the reflex tossing the blanket off her, and then went still permanently. Clef took the time to say “I'm sorry.” And rearrange the blankets back around her. After waiting a few seconds and listening to make sure nobody else awoken or was listening in, and then he crept back to the hallway, moving slow and checking the rooms as he passed them. Bathroom. An empty guest room. Work studio. Nursery… He slipped into the nursery and glanced over the edge of the crib. The tot was fast asleep, thumb in mouth, holding on tight to a handmade quilt, entirely unaware. Clef sighed. This was too easy, but he'd rather too easy than too hard any day. He reached into the crib with the weapon, and with another dull pop, the porcelain head of the doll burst into fragments. And he reeled back. This wasn't the target. He reached into the crib, and his fears were confirmed. A doll, just a doll. It may have looked like a toddler in the dim light, but it was just a doll. He pulled the quilt off, and froze. A small black box with a post-it note on it sat there, amidst the broken doll and baby clothes. He picked it up. “Clef, I knew you'd come for me, I never did get to say goodbye. -Hugs and Kisses The former Dr. Rights” There was a long moment of shocked silence, followed by intense cussing. The man sat in his car across the street, window rolled down, and glanced up quietly as he heard Clef's voice carrying, and rolled up the window. This was going to be loud. Clef paused as he heard a noise, just a faint, high-pitched pinging, and glanced down. On the little black box, a red circle lit up. Followed by another. And another. “Oh, come on-“ The man smirked slightly as the explosion rocked the car, before frowning when the child sleeping in the backseat stirred and let out a wail. “Oh, oh…hey, hey girl.” He murmured as he climbed into the backseat with her, offering a soft smile and taking the little girl's hand, his middle-eastern skin so much darker than hers, pale as porcelain. Even this young, Bijhan could see the resemblance to her mother. “Shh, shh, shh…don't you worry, Ophie. Lets get you to your new home…” She looked up at him with such pale, pale eyes with no shine to them at all, glassy and inhuman, and sniffled.

A cold sweat had been coursing it's way down Dr. Gerald's spine for the last 20 minutes as he waited outside Dr. Bright's office. The hallway seemed to darken by the second, lights dimming into incomprehensible blackness as he stared at the nameplate on the door. He was going to die. This was it. The summation of 30 years on Earth. Dying because of one stupi- "Come in." Gerald couldn't help it. He yelped a little, his frayed nerves causing him to jump at the sudden noise. He scuttled into the office, the door closing behind him with a soft click. Jack Bright stood facing the wall, hands clasped behind his back. He didn't turn as he spoke. "Doctor Gerald, you know why you're here." "Ah, Yes. Yessir." "Don't cower. I hate it when you cower." "Sorry sir." "Now. Care to explain what happened?" "…Well…" Alto Clef was in a good mood. The sun was shining, 173 hadn't escaped yet, and the vendor down the street had been selling ice cream at half price. As he walked down the corridor of the hospital, he glanced at his companion. "What's eating you?" "…Strelnikov. I'm worried. The coma-" "Will be ended as soon as we get 590 down here. This is just a visit to check on how he's doing in the meantime." "Yeah. I guess you're right." "Of course I am. Now, put on a happy face! It's a beautiful day!" Gerald's burgeoning smile was crushed by the sight of the Russian man in the bed. The tubes covering his body made him seem smaller than usual. A titan reduced to just a feeble patient. Clef strode over and looked down at his friend. "Hey big guy. How's it going?" He glanced back at Gerald, noticing his stricken face. "Hey, don't worry. He's survived worse than this." Gerald sighed. "Yeah. You're right. I mean, compared to Chechnya how ba-" His face froze. The sound of creaking tubes echoed like gunshots in the suddenly silent room. Clef's face contorted. "Motherfu-" The hand that reached up to wrap around Clef's throat was worn and muscled, and bleeding freely from a tear given by a torn out IV. "ВЗВОД! К БОЮ! МОЧИ ДУХОВ!" "OH SHI-" The rest of what Gerald said was drowned out by the cracking noise made by Strelnikov snapping Clef's neck. "…And then I ran." "I see. Consider yourself on suspension until further notice."

They sat across from one another, between them a table with a chessboard, two glasses of vodka and one ashtray. The elderly man rubbed his stubbly chin, bushy grey eyebrows furrowed in consternation as he plotted the advance of his queen. His counterpart, the very image of youth, sat quietly, patiently, as he waited for his turn. He had plenty of time. The old man placed his queen delicately in the center of his chosen square; the younger man immediately swiped it away with a pawn. “Fuck you,” Dmitri said in Russian as he toppled his king in forfeit. “You always say that,” responded Bright with a tepid smile. Dmitri tapped some loose ash from his ever-present cigarette, leaning back in the chair and sighing tiredly. “How are you, Jack,” he asked, again in Russian. “Alright, still getting used to this body. I think it's a bit too young but, it was next in line, so…” He trailed off, eying Dmitri intently. “Are you going to ask me, or not?” “Fine,” he grunted. “Did she say anything about me? Anything at all?” “She hasn't said anything in years, Dmitri,” he answered without emotion. “Karen always was tough.” Dmitri shifted in his seat. “I had to send her in, you know. There was no other choice.” “I know, I've read the reports. Oh, while we're on this topic, Everett sends his best wishes from his containment cell.” Another grunt. “I always told him, you know. I told him that too many of those experiments were going to get him locked up. I told him.” “You did, Dmitri.” Bright began putting the chess pieces away. Dmitri swirled his glass of vodka slowly, looking into the clear liquid as if it were a crystal ball. “What about little Agatha? Is she out of school yet?” “She graduated from college two years ago, you know that. I told you that last week.” “Are you going to-“ “No. We are not going to recruit her, Agatha left very specific requests against that,” he interrupted, his exasperation with the old man growing clearer in his voice. With that, the two lapsed into an awkward silence. Dmitri took a sip of his vodka and looked out the window, admiring the beauty of the spring day. The lilacs on his windowsill were blooming, and it reminded him of home and better days. “…Jack?” “Yeah, Dmitri?” “Whatever happened to Alto.” Bright stood and folded the chessboard. “I can't tell you that, Dmitri. You're retired, remember?” “Fuck you,” he said with a raspy cough, taking a long, spiteful drag from his unfiltered cigarette. “Watch it, or I'll tell the nurses on you,” said Bright with a wagging finger. “I have to go, Dmitri. Gears is just down the hall and I promised I'd bring some technical manuals for him to read.” He sighed again, standing and hobbling to the window with his cane. “Alright. Tell him Mitya said hello.” “I will, Dmitri. See you next week.” And with that, Bright left to continue making his rounds of South Cheyenne Point Retirement Center.

I've been sick for days now. That bubbling nausea that fills your throat, makes you feel as if you're about to throw up every time you burp or so much as breathe out your mouth. Holding the toilet, resting my head on the cool, cool porcelain, I really question why in the hell I don't make myself throw up and just get it over with. It's just not something I can do…thinking of forcefully gagging myself…ugh, it's almost worse then I feel now. Almost. Suddenly it hits me, and this is it, this is IT. I feel that slick, sour spit coat my throat, my belly tightening up as I push my head over the bowl and spit. For a split second before I explode, I realize this thing has not been cleaned in a while. Then I vomit. Hard. Mucus-rich and acidic, it pours out in a hard, jetting stream from my mouth and nose, burning my nasal passages like fire. It hits so hard, it feels like it should be coming out my eyes, too. I vomit again, and again, the third time bringing up just some thin, reeking slime, and I gasp a bit, getting my breath back before the next wave. I pitch forward again, eyes tearing as they squeeze shut, and I feel another hot jet of filth pour out. Opening my eyes, it seems…different. A tarry black, and there are…things bobbing in it. I don't have time to look too hard, before two more hard retches double me over the bowl. These are more pinkish, and I can definitely see some kind of meat in these. Hamburger, maybe… More vomit, more oddness. I don't remember eating any kind of jelly, especially cherry. It's starting to hurt, a deep spike each time. God, how much can a person throw up? When did I eat noodles that long…or that big? The goo in it is getting thicker too, and pink…starting to feel at least a little better. Ugh…when did I eat a balloon? My belly is feeling better now, really light. Jesus…whatever that was is floating still…almost looks like it's pulsing, or beating…going to have to move to the sink, toilet's almost full. Feeling better now…hungry, actually. Very hungry. Starving. Ravenous. I feel so empty.

"Awaken, Brother." The man on the altar slowly opened his eyes. He was certain he hadn't moved, yet the surroundings were clearly different. Before, he had been in what had seemed at first to be a church, but with all religious symbols removed. Now, although everything was in the same place it had been before, it appeared…warped, somehow. Twisted and distorted in a way that he couldn't quite describe, but at the same time felt right. Like he was finally seeing this place as it truly was. The church wasn't the only thing that had changed. The people that had brought him in here had seemed like ordinary, if a bit strange, citizens of this uncharted city in the middle of nowhere. Now, though, they took on the appearance of scaly beasts with gleaming red eyes. In their eyes, he thought he saw the images of the people they had appeared to be before the ritual, their faces contorted in a perpetual silent scream. The priest, who had spoken, and who had led the ritual, raised a large mirror. He saw in the mirror another of these scaly demons, but with a television in place of a head. In the static of the television's screen, he could almost make out the image of a similarly-headed human. "What did you bastards do to me!?" he demanded. "Isn't it obvious?" asked a resounding voice that seemed to come from all directions at once. "You have become one of the Followers." "What the fuck does that mean?" "It means that you are now part of the greatest thing to ever happen to this dreadfully dull world of yours," the voice responded, seemingly coming from the very walls and floors of the church. "The man you once were is dead. I am your life now. You get to be a part of me." "Where are you? Show yourself, you damn coward!" "I revealed myself to you the moment you opened your eyes." The doors of the church opened on their own accord. The former doctor stumbled out of the door, unused to his new clawed feet. Where had once appeared to be a normal-looking small town, was now a twisted mess of what could only be described as organic structures. The former buildings now seemed like appendages of a colossal, grotesque living being. "You get to be a part of my great rebirth," the voice said, causing the buildings to shiver slightly. "Long have I waited to recruit one of your Foundation. The first one may have been a nobody that nobody missed, but you? They will investigate your disappearance. You will bring in more. And when I have enough Followers, I shall shed this sessile form, and the world shall know my true glory." The doctor simply yawned in response. "You do not seem impressed by my glory." "I've heard it all before," he snarked. "In my line of work, I've seen the very worst this universe has to offer, and frankly, as far as eldritch abominations that pose a threat to all existence as we know it go, you're…slightly above average, if I'm feeling generous. And let's be honest…I'm not." The buildings trembled slightly more. "You dare to look upon my infinite greatness and not prostrate yourself in total service?" "Frankly," the man said, "I'm more pissed off that you killed me over this than anything else." "Your death was a necessary means to this end. The living cannot yet see my true form. Your death, and rebirth as a Follower, was the first step in the path to your destiny!" The man crossed his arms. "Yeah, um…no." The buildings expanded and contracted, as though the great monstrosity was sighing. "I suppose I should have expected resistance from you. My Followers! Restrain him!" With a collective snarl, the Followers burst from the church, and all the surrounding buildings, running on all fours, looking more like giant monitor lizards than human beings. The man shook his head, reached into his pants, and removed a gun. Without so much as flinching, he fired, and hit the priest squarely between the eyes. The other Followers stopped dead in their tracks, staring in disbelief at the unmoving, bleeding priest. "He…he's dead," one of the other Followers said. "How can this be?" the voice asked. "You cannot kill that which is already dead." The man cocked his gun and took aim at the nearest Follower. This was going to be fun.

Russel sat on the porch and watched the paper boy ride past. He waved. After a few moments Russel heard his wife of thirteen years call from within the house. He pulled himself to his feet and took one last breath of the cool spring air before returning inside to answer her. Lunch was ready.

Agent Jason Suthers woke with a start, thinking that the only way he could feel this way would be if his face were on fire. From what he could tell, his head was covered in heavy bandages and he felt as if his whole face was disfigured, his nose swelled up and his mouth feeling like it had been torn open. Sitting up, his instincts screamed at him to get a good look at the surroundings and figure out where he was. Well, it looked so far like he was in an empty surgery room at the Site 18 Medical wing. It was completely empty save him, a some medical equipment, a briefcase on a nearby counter, and a dozen or so television monitors mounted on the far wall. Only one of these was actually turned on, and on it was a man in a similar room with bandages covering his head, much like Suthers. Peering closer at the one active screen, he realized suddenly that it was him. Glancing down at the rest of his body, Suthers saw that his whole body had went through some kind of surgery, he could barely recognize himself. What the hell had happened? Oh….right. The raid. Earlier that day, Suthers had been working on moving some of the more dangerous Items to new containment units with several other Agents, supervised by none other than the legendary Dr. Clef. Suthers had always idolized the infamous stories about the good doctor, and being one of the most senior Agents on site, jumped at the chance to actually be able to work under him. The move had started off so smoothly, too, right up until the hallway they were moving through exploded, blown apart with a monstrous clang. It was a Chaos Insurgency raid. The agents had tried to mobilize, but the terrorists came in like the hammer of god, tearing through them before absconding with a highly dangerous Item. Suthers and Clef were hit the hardest, both of them caught in the initial blast. Thanking his luck that he was still alive, Suthers tried pulling himself out of the bed, testing to see if he could stand on his two feet. As he got up, the other monitors that were on the wall flickered to life, each one with a barely visible figure covered in shadows. Suthers stared. He had seen the occasional glimpse of one or two before, whenever he had to report a particularly important mission or engagement. But never so many before, he counted ten…eleven…twelve. All twelve of them. O5s. The entire Overwatch Council had decided to speak with him. "Welcome back to the world of the living, Agent. You are very lucky to be alive today." From the way they were covered in shadows, Suthers couldn't tell which one of them was speaking, or if any of them were speaking at all. "Uh, sirs." He saluted, noting that he could barely hear his own voice from under the bandages. "No need for that, Agent, we're here to inform you that you've been promoted to a considerably unique position within the Foundation. You have an exemplary record, hundreds of successful missions under your belt, along with numerous Items captured and contained, and in light of the recent raid, it's been decided to give you a higher ranking position, namely, that of Dr. Clef." Suthers paused. "Excuse me?" "Dr. Clef was killed in the raid earlier today. You have been chosen to replace him." "That's impossible, Dr. Clef is a person, not a position." "Dr. Clef is a collection of stories and legends. His….antics….have often worked favorably towards the Foundation, giving us a certain image of employing people with seemingly super-human capabilities. The original Clef's savviness, cunning, and history for flagrant lies, such as claiming he was Satan, had a tendency to inspire others and awe those he worked with. Therefore, we decided to maintain the idea of certain personas under our employ to keep up the image Clef had given us. When the original Clef died fifteen years ago, it was decided that the best course of action was to cover up the death and find a way to continue the legends. So far, it has been successful. You are the fourth man in line to take over the position of Alto Clef." "I….I see." Suthers looked at the monitors. "I understand now, I'll be more than willing to take this position." "Excellent. In the briefcase before you are all the necessary documents needed to become Dr. Clef. From this point onward, Agent Jason Suthers died in an Insurgent raid. Remove the bandages, take the documents, read them, and destroy them afterward." Tearing at the bandages over his head, he looked at the monitor viewing his room. It was the same, except the man sitting in it had a bright red tomato where his head would normally be. He felt the bulbous nose and grinned, feeling the corners of his mouth reaching up towards his ears. And while it was Agent Suthers that was first brought into the room, out of it walked Dr. Alto H. Clef, Father of Lies.

Disclaimer This was a joke. Please don't shoot me. Alto Clef waited. The lights above him blinked and sparked out of the air. There were SCPs in the base. He didn't see them, but had expected them now for years. His warnings to Docter Broight were not listenend to and now it was too late. Far too late for now, anyway. Clef was a agent for fourteen years. When he was young he watched the containment and he said to dad "I want to be in the Foundatin daddy." Dad said "No! You will BE KILL BY SCPS" There was a time when he believed him. Then as he got oldered he stopped. But now in the Site base of the Foundation he knew there were SCPs. "This is Broight" the radio crackered. "You must fight the SCPs!" So Clef gotted his palsma rifle and blew up the wall. "HE GOING TO KILL US" said the SCPs "I will shoot at him" said 682 and he fired the rocket missiles. Clef plasmaed at him and tried to blew him up. But then the ceiling fell and they were trapped and not able to kill. "No! I must kill the SCPs" he shouted The radio said "No, Clef. You are the SCPs" And then Clef was 076.

And then the sun went out.

Foreword: This page is to document anomalous events that have attracted the Foundation's interests, but occurred too briefly for the Foundation to secure or contain them. Instead, the Foundation deploys a cover-up team to conceal the evidence from the public. This is merely a reminder to agents and researchers that not all of them can be contained. -Agent Carriontrooper Due to the increasing number of items discovered by the Foundation, this list is no longer open to new entries. A second volume of this log has been made available, and currently remains open to new additions. Lists of Anomalous Items and Unexplained Locations have also been compiled. Note: Please add new entries to the bottom of the list, not the middle or the top. Event Description: A sperm whale estimated to be 2 km in length was observed breaching the ocean's surface, causing three nearby boats to capsize upon re-entry. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/████ Location: Puget Sound, Washington, U.S.A Follow-up Actions Taken: Foundation removed any details about the anomalous nature of the creature from local news sources. Witnesses on ferries and close enough beaches administered Class A amnestics. Event Description: A glowing humanoid figure manifested on a subway platform and was seen by several eyewitnesses and captured on the station's surveillance system. The humanoid approached the edge of the tracks while making vague hand gestures and promptly vanished. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/████ Location: Barcelona, Spain. Follow-up Actions Taken: A team of disguised agents and a portable holographic projection unit were brought to the location. The team explained that the incident was a part of their avant-garde 'urban shock art' exhibition all over Europe. Fake viral media planted to give credence to the team's supposed art group. Event Description: Time skips between 2.5 and 26 hours took place in Concord, North Carolina before normalizing to one day after initial skip. Non self-correcting electronic devices such as digital clocks were seemingly unaffected and displayed incorrect times in different areas of the town. Event bears similarity to a relatively unnoticed event in Carson City, Nevada, though no connection could be traced between the two events. Date of Occurrence: █/██/████ Location: Concord, North Carolina, USA Follow-up Actions Taken: Local news reported electromagnetic interference caused by a local power plant. Small observation team assigned to area. Event Description: The entire population of Holyhead, Wales was found comatose in a field just outside of town. All individuals were unharmed, but possessed slight burns on their clothing. All individuals woke up 14 hours later with no recollection of the event. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/████ Location: Holyhead, Wales. Follow-up Actions Taken: Population dosed with Class-B amnestics. A road accident involving a Samson-Craig Products (an SCP front company) chemical tanker was staged as a cover story. An emergency evacuation camp was arranged and the population were given £150 per head as compensation. Since the event there has been no recurrence or abnormal behavior in the population. Event Description: Three similar looking men were witnessed fighting in a gas station parking lot. Eyewitness reports maintain that each man claimed to be ██████ █████████, a well-known local car salesman, and were fighting over which individual was the "true" one. Two of the men were killed when the third procured a crowbar. The third was fatally shot by a local police officer. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/████ Location: Friendship, Oklahoma. Follow-up Actions Taken: Witnesses and involved persons were questioned and given Class B amnestics. Close family members of ██████ █████████ were questioned and given Class-A amnestics. A cover story involving the individual's suicide was established. The three bodies were recovered for autopsy and are currently maintained in a Site-19 minimum security storage freezer. Event Description: Several students attending ████████ Collegiate began complaining about a loud buzzing noise. A custodian for the school located the source as a single monitor in the computer lab during his duties, and reported the power button was unresponsive. When the lab technicians arrived the next day, they unplugged the monitor after other attempts proved futile. Witnesses of the event report a scream playing through the computer's speakers, and the image of a digitized face screaming appeared for a moment before power was lost. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/████ Location: ████████ Collegiate in Sandwich, New Hampshire, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: The monitor was confiscated for inspection. Nothing of interest has been found. Event Description: During an automobile accident, the body of ████ ██, a passenger in one involved vehicle, expanded to fill the entire interior of the vehicle. Because Mr. ██'s expanded body had taken on a consistency similar to stiff foam rubber, the other occupants of the vehicle were protected from the impact, and were the only survivors of the crash. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/████ Location: Seymour, Connecticut. Follow-up Actions Taken: Body confiscated, all other occupants and responding personnel administered Class A amnestics. Tissue tests indicate that Mr. ██ is still alive, though the tissues of his body have become an undifferentiated mass, and tests of neurological function are inconclusive. Event Description: Unidentified and unaccompanied child (estimated age: 7 years old) in a hospital waiting room produces more than 400 kilograms of vomit in 5 minutes, before dying; other patients describe hearing sounds of "glass breaking" during the emesis. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/████ Location: Andranomadio Public Hospital, Antsirabe, Madagascar. Follow-up Actions Taken: Majority of vomit had been incinerated before Foundation agents arrived on-site; inspection of hospital incinerator revealed no anomalies. All remaining samples of vomit were confiscated; analysis revealed no anomalies, except that child had been suffering from salmonella poisoning. Witnesses were given amnestics. Child was never identified; body was removed from hospital morgue and is currently maintained in a Site-19 low-value storage freezer. Event Description: An email is sent to, as near as the Foundation can determine, every active email address in existence, including Foundation intranet-only addresses. The contents are identical across all emails and consist of the following message, in Spanish: "Hi, this is Jorge. It has been fun playing with you, but I am going to visit friends next door now. I will be back later to collect my toys. Take care of the place!" Backtracking reveals that all emails originated from the same unassigned IP address. Date of Occurrence: 12/21/████ Location: Worldwide Follow-up Actions Taken: Foundation agents edited the internet-rumor-debunking site ██████.com to include a statement that the email was a massive hoax. The Foundation has periodically mass-emailed similar messages to more limited audiences as a smokescreen. The originating IP address is being monitored for any further activity. Event Description: A suspected associate of Marshall, Carter, and Dark Ltd. was observed entering an abandoned factory by Foundation operatives. The sound of bubbling water was heard from within the factory prior to two gunshots. Operatives found the suspect's body in a state of advanced decomposition associated with at least three weeks of exposure. A pistol, which had been fired three times, was found within the subject's jacket. No signs of the suspect's assailant were found. Date of Occurrence: ██/15/████ Location: ███ ██████, Salvador, State of Bahia, Brazil. Follow-up Actions Taken: Information suppressed in local media. Body removed from site by Foundation operatives disguised as Brazilian Federal Police and interred at morgue at Site-60. Event Description: Six sperm whale carcasses were found beached along a 2 km stretch of coastline at ████████, New Zealand. When autopsy was performed as part of a civilian research program, it was discovered that the chest cavity of all six whales had been hollowed out postmortem without any damage being done to the exterior of the animals. Exploration of the interior carcass revealed the chest cavity of each whale had somehow been stuffed with machinery components trapped in clear plastic. Date of Occurrence: ██/18/████ Location: Akaroa, New Zealand. Follow-Up Actions Taken: Area sealed. All members of the research team detained and administered Class-A amnestics. False story disseminated claiming that the decomposition of the whales' bodies had led to the build-up of toxic gas inside the carcasses, leading to government intervention on grounds of public health. Masses found inside body cavities removed and shipped to Storage Site-108. Remains incinerated in the field and disposed of through normal channels. Event Description: The ██████ ██████ flight between Heathrow, London and Hartsfield-Jackson, Atlanta suffered a malfunction and crashed into the Atlantic Ocean, 800 km from the Azores archipelago. Despite this, all passengers and crew walked out the destination gate, remembering only a regular flight. Date of Occurrence: ██/11/████ Location: North Atlantic Ocean. Follow-up Actions Taken: Information suppressed and mass amnestic treatment performed, recovery of aircraft underway. Event Description: Every domesticated cat inside the city limits of ██████, Norway traveled 10.9 km SE to ██████████████, Sweden over period of 8 hours. Cats congregated in groupings of 13-25 in a field behind [DATA EXPUNGED] for 2 hours, then dispersed. Date of Occurrence: 25/09/2009 Location: Norway/Sweden border. Follow-up Actions Taken: Cats returned of their own accord to their homes. Any footage of gathering confiscated for study. Witnesses processed, debriefed, and administered Class-B amnestic. Field searched for abnormalities, blood and urine samples taken from cats in affected areas. No anomalies found. Both ██████ and the field will be under surveillance until 30/09/2014. Event Description: During a speech to a public committee, the mayor of Bonifay, FL began continuously chuckling at a pun made by a legislative observer for approximately 4.5 hours straight before collapsing into a nearby chair and passing out. He claims to have no memory of the event, nor did anyone else in the room during the speech. The only available evidence of its occurrence was captured entirely on camera. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/19██ Location: Bonifay, Florida, USA Follow-up Actions Taken: Any and all witnesses who videotaped the event, along with anyone who viewed the videotapes themselves were given Class-B amnestics, and all resulting videotapes were wiped clean. The mayor himself is under minor surveillance from select members of the Foundation. Event Description: At exactly 2pm, 24 instances of a semi-erotic calendar appeared in numerous Foundation sites. Inside the calendar, images of Dr. Elliot, Dr. Kiryu, Dr. ████, Agent Merlo, Director ██████, Dr. Right, Agent █████, Researcher █████, Agent ████, Dr. Marie, Dr. ████, and Dr. Jack Bright. The Calendar displayed the name Double D-class, and despite the statements of personnel included in the calendar, shows signs of being planned and professionally made. Date of Occurrence: ██/01/14 Location: Sites-5, 29, 82, 11, and 6 Follow-up Actions Taken: Most instances were recovered by Foundation staff, several copies have been confiscated from staff since the incident. Note: Dr. Jack Bright was not inhabiting a female body at the time, indicating that either a prop was used or this is a mistake by the creator. Event Description: After Long Island citizen ███████ ██████ died of alcohol-damage related illness, a recliner chair in his home began ascending at speeds of exactly 3.6m/s before eventually accelerating to 16.3m/s. Attempts at stopping the ascent were futile, and the chair broke through any barriers placed in its way. It has since then left the atmosphere and is believed to be orbiting Jupiter. Date of Occurrence: 2/15/201█ Location: Muttontown, New York. Follow-up Actions Taken: Any footage of the incident was wiped and pulled off the internet. Class-A amnestics were given to witnesses. Foundation operatives in various space programs are advised to destroy any information of the chair if found. Event Description: Eighty-eight thousand, eight hundred and eighty-eight citizens of the state of New Jersey fractured their left scaphoid bones within a two-hour period; radiography showed that all fractures were identical down to a sub-millimeter level. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/████ Location: Various hospitals throughout New Jersey. Follow-up Actions Taken: Class-A amnestics administered to radiography technicians. Event Description: Viewers of the popular late-night talk show ████ █████ ██ ███ █████ reported seeing two different episodes. Approximately 40% watched an episode featuring the famous actor █████ ███ and the musical guest ██ ██████, while the other 60% watched an episode with ██ ██████ with an appearance by stand-up comedian ████ ██. Neither one of these episodes was the one which had actually broadcast, and neither one has ever been filmed. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/████ Location: Various televisions throughout the USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: All recordings of the anomalous episodes showed the actual broadcast episode in later viewings. Viewer's memories of the anomalous episodes seem to have completely faded by themselves by ██/██/████. ███ channel officials who had been contacted about the episodes were administered Class-C amnestics and their internal investigation into the matter aborted. Social networks mentioning the matter were intercepted and edited. Event Description: A parrot owned by the █████ family was discovered to have the ability to sing the entirety of the song "Crazy Train" by John Michael "Ozzy" Osbourne, including vocals, guitar, bass, drums, and keyboard. No member of the family ever recalls the parrot hearing it. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/████ Location: Greenwich, Connecticut, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: Class-A amnestics distributed to the █████ family; parrot seized and ensconced in the Site-19 Anomalous Wildlife Habitat. Event Description: For approximately 12 minutes, all shed human blood within a 15 km radius of ██████, France spontaneously turned into centipedes. All centipedes in the area turned back into blood following the cessation of the event. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/████ Location: Cherbourg, France. Follow-up Actions Taken: Aerosolized amnestics were deployed over the town. Additional amnestics were distributed to women on menstrual periods during the event, due to extreme emotional distress rendering the aerosolized version ineffective. Event Description: All written text in the Theater Department at ██████-██ University spontaneously converted to Wingdings. Digital text remained unaffected until printed out. All affected text contained the phrase "You don't need a script to pretend to be someone else, you're doing it right now! ( ・ω・)" Date of Occurrence: ██/██/2014 Location: Staten Island, New York. Follow-up Actions Taken: Class-A amnestics were administered to all students and faculty present. Affected books were incinerated, and are currently being replaced. Event Description: A translucent digital clock approximately 3 km across appeared in the sky about 1.5 km above the ground. The anomaly counted down from 05:55, stopping short of 01:13 before disappearing completely. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/2006 Location: Devon Island, Nunavut, Canada. Follow-up Actions Taken: Anomaly was only witnessed by a single fishing trawler. Class-C amnestics issued to the entire crew. Event Description: A single specimen of Dionaea muscipula, better known as the Venus flytrap, expanded to approximately 2.5m tall and consumed a domesticated cat. The specimen expired shortly after and was reported by passing civilians. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/████ Location: Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. Follow-up Actions Taken: Class-A amnestics issued to witnesses. Specimen taken for future studying. Event Description: Ten minutes before opening to the general public, three visit team staff and a security officer at ██████ Museum witnessed a Scutigera coleoptrata specimen, commonly known as a house centipede, emerge from a small drainage pipe in a storage closet. The specimen traveled approximately 1 m before entering a sink u-bend which had been opened for repairs. Specimen was estimated to be over 12 m in length, though of average width and height for its species. Specimen was visible for several minutes after the head portion had entered the u-bend, while the remainder of its body continued to exit the drainage pipe. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/████ Location: Burnsville, Minnesota. Follow-up Actions Taken: Class-A amnestics administered to museum personnel. Facility plumbing was fully examined by Foundation personnel, and specimen could not be located. Presumed to have escaped into city sewer network. Communications watch placed on ████ Public Works to monitor for future reports. Event Description: The Cincinnati metropolitan area and all objects and lifeforms in it became greyscale for approximately 77 hours, starting at approximately 10:00 AM. All humans in the metropolitan area when the change occurred were not aware of the existence of color while the effect persisted. Those who entered the area of effect after the change occurred were not affected, but affected individuals treated them with fear and suspicion. When the change was reverted through unknown means, all individuals within the affected area lost their memories of the event, although those who had left the area of effect before the restoration of color retained their memories. Date of Occurrence: 3/21/2014 through 3/23/2014 Location: Cincinnati, Ohio, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: Class A amnestics administered to individuals who retained memories of the event, and all records of the event destroyed. Event Description: All weights within the ██████&Son Gym assumed a red coloration for a period of five hours. All the affected weights possessed a white sticker reporting the words "Tired of the old, boring, black weights? (T_T) ██-██ Try the red ones! (*A*) ██-██". Date of Occurrence: 2014/██/██ Location: Birmingham, England, UK. Follow-up Actions Taken: Class-B amnestics were administered to all witnesses. All weights were taken in custody for further studying. Following the event, the objects displayed no apparent anomalous effect. However, closer inspections revealed that the words "Brought to you by the Kobayashi Athletics" were inscribed on the items. All weights were replaced by new ones. The establishment is to be kept under surveillance until 2016/██/██. Event Description: Two individuals were observed to spend seven hours attempting to move past each other in a narrow hallway before one collapsed from exhaustion, at which point the other decided to take a different route. There is no indication, either from recorded footage of the event or from the testimony of the involved parties, that this was intentional or involuntary. Date of Occurrence: 2014/██/██ Location: Boston, Massachusetts office of ██████████, USA. Follow-Up Actions Taken: Affected subjects were provided with appropriate medical care and amnestics were administered to all known witnesses. The hallway in question and the affected subjects have shown no anomalous properties before or since. Event Description: During a public concert in the town of ██████, Georgia, a large number of Procyon lotor (common raccoon) assembled behind the outdoor concert stage, and started constructing an object resembling a shrine out of materials they had collected from various places around the town, including branches, pine cones, fast-food wrappers, old newspaper, and a trash-can lid. After the shrine was constructed, the raccoons proceeded to make motions described by onlookers as "bowing" to the shrine, and then quickly scattered. Upon attempted destruction of the shrine by civilian Joseph ███████, a large and aggressive nursery of raccoons emerged, numbering more than 100 by most witness accounts. The nursery proceeded to assault Joseph ███████, resulting in his death. Date of Occurrence: █/██/20██ Location: Brookhaven, Georgia, USA Follow-up Actions Taken: All those who witnessed the event were given Class-A amnestics. Death of Joseph ███████ covered up with a report of a violent mugging. Concert zone acquired by Foundation under the cover of construction. Shrine destroyed by small explosives from a safe distance under the same cover of construction. Observational post disguised as a bird sanctuary constructed. No other anomalous occurrences to date. Event Description: All moths in a 5 kilometer radius of a single porch light made their way towards the light and gathered there for an hour. The moths then dispersed into the surrounding area. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/████ Location: Sandwich, New Hampshire, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: No special actions, due to lack of witnesses at time of event. The area is to be observed for more anomalous activity until 1/1/████. Event Description: A large, ten-centimeter thick layer of snow suddenly fell over the town of ██████, Massachusetts and coated the entire area. No clouds were visible at the time and despite sudden shifts in supported weight no buildings or structures were damaged. Date of Occurrence: █/██/1999 Location: Fall River, Massachusetts, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: A sample of the snow was obtained; it was found to be mundane. All residents of the town administered Class-A amnestics. As the event occurred quickly, very little video footage was captured. However, all documentation of the event has been destroyed. Event Description: For a period of approximately five hours, ██████ residents of Pompano Beach, Florida and ████ non-residents working in the city, including ██ Foundation employees, experienced a shared hallucination. Interviews with those affected have provided a detailed, highly consistent account of the entire city being transported to the surface of a planet (believed to be Venus), protected by a dome of unknown design. (See Document E-41567-██ for full account.) However, telephone records, security camera feeds and interviews with non-resident non-employees suggest that nothing unusual happened during the time period and that all those affected were present on Earth and went about their business as normal. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/2011 Location: Pompano Beach, Florida, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: Affected individuals provided with amnestics after interview. Foundation personnel involved in the event have been commended for controlling media coverage. Amnestic treatment has successfully removed memories of the event. Implementation of further surveillance is currently under debate. Event Description: Towards the end of a show, musician █████████████ began sweating profusely. For 6 minutes, the sweat fell to the floor and pooled together, forming into various miniature trains. Following this, the trains rapidly evaporated. Date of Occurrence: 05/22/2015 Location: Earth, Texas, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: Witnesses (including the musician) were administered Class-A amnestics. No further action was required, and the show was generally well received. Event Description: Over an eight-minute period, six hundred and ninety-seven lightning strikes occurred within a twenty-mile wide radius around Faeto, Italy. Meteorological data shows that the locations of these strikes formed a "smiley." At the same time, all drinking water within the settlement was, according to anecdotal evidence, icy cold, scented of strawberries, and could not be boiled or otherwise heated. Date of Occurrence: 2015/07/01 Location: Faeto, Italy. Follow-up Actions Taken: Water supplies and meteorological data throughout Apulia to be monitored over a six-month period. Event Description: Commencing at 07:31, all instances of the Basenji breed of Canis lupus familiaris barked constantly for one minute and forty three seconds. Commencement/cessation of barking was not linked to any external stimuli. Date of Occurrence: 2015/07/03 Location: Australia. Follow-up Actions Taken: Fallopia, Agent [REDACTED]'s Basenji, taken for post-anomaly testing. No anomalous activity noted since. Event Description: At approximately █:26 AM local time, a train bound from █████████ to █████ (hereafter Train-A) collided with an identical train moving along the same line from █████ to █████████ (hereafter Train-B). Of the 56 casualties observed, only 28 civilians were identified. Each civilian was identified twice, with one instance riding Train-A and the other instance riding Train-B. Examination shows that all electronic and time-keeping devices present on Train-B at the time of collision were 9 hours slow. All passengers are confirmed to have been traveling on the route of Train-B 9 hours before the event, though without incident. Temporal interference has been suggested, though the cause is currently unknown and the logical paradox the situation represents has been deemed unsolvable. Whether all civilians involved caught the same train as one another twice consecutively as the result of coincidence or the effect of causal manipulation is unknown. No passengers of either train survived the impact. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/2015 Location: ███████████ train line, Victoria, Australia. Follow-up Actions Taken: All Train-B passengers were removed from the scene and taken into Foundation custody, currently kept in Site-██ cold storage. The ███████████ train line has been put under observation for further extranormal activity over a 6 month period, which is yet uneventful. Event Description: Starting at 2:22 PM, all users in the ████████ chatroom ceased conversation and began to repeat the phrase "nag gimno bgaithu sa yginno alibgn yamoa gna as ahud ak" at two second intervals. This behavior continued for two hours before ceasing. No users seemed to recall the event, claiming that a regular conversation had occurred. Many users claimed to have closed the chat window or left their computer during the course of the event, despite the fact that their corresponding chat handles continued to repeat the phrase throughout the event. Users who joined the chat room while the event was underway did not participate in the event but did not type anything until after the event was finished. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/2015 Location: Computers around the world, most concentrated in the United States. Follow-up Actions Taken: All screenshots of the conversation were deleted, and the █████████ chatroom has been placed under surveillance for further anomalous behavior. Event Description: For a period of approximately 3 minutes, no less than 10,000 calls were made to the number 1-800-███-████ for the [REDACTED] for ███. Records indicate that all calls came from a single number and further investigation indicates that the number is currently in use by an employee of the company who did call that day but was held up in the queue. At the 3-minute mark, all calls vanished completely from the queue. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/████ Location: █████, ██████ ████, Philippines, calls were documented to come from the employee's address in ████, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: Call records for the time frame when the calls occurred were expunged from the system and false records inputted during a routine system maintenance the next day. Class-B amnestics were administered to all parties involved while the employee was monitored for the next 3 months but no anomalous activity was noted. Event Description: At roughly 2:30 PM, sixteen (16) city buses pulled up to a movie theater owned by a private company; all buses were packed full. All people aboard the buses (bus drivers included) as well as the owner of the movie theater shared the same first name: "Greg". Furthermore, the Gregs' all came to the location to see the same movie, "████: ███ █████". Said movie had a Greg starring in the lead role. There was no convention of any sorts occurring at the time in the town, nor any in the world at that time that was summoning people with the name "Greg". Date of Occurrence: 3/17/199█ Location: Greg's Theater, Unity, Pennsylvania, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: Interviews with all 1267 Gregs' involved as well as their families found that this had not been a planned event, and that 97% of all people involved did not know anyone else that had attended prior to the event. No records indicate that there were any advertisements or events that would have sparked such an occurrence. All Gregs' and witnesses involved were given Class-A amnestics. A cover-up story involving a Greg convention was released, and no further incident occurred after cover-up was released. Theater was monitored for two years, but aside from a reduced crime rate for the first two weeks after the event no anomalous activity occurred. Note: This was easily the most confusing case I've ever had to deal with. -Agent Greg Event Description: At 8:30 AM local time, a 911 call was made regarding a construction worker whose neck had been broken. Ambulance arrived three minutes later, and OSWA arrived within twenty minutes, among which was an embedded Foundation agent. Investigation discovered that the employee's construction helmet had increased in weight from 0.28 kg to 16.7 kg once the helmet had been placed on the employee's head. Date of Occurrence: 7/14/2005 Location: New York City, New York, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: Item confiscated. All personnel involved given Class-B amnestics. Broken neck blamed on the worker being hit by a sledge-hammer another worker dropped from the top of the building being worked on. Event Description: An adult tiger composed entirely of liquid paint manifested within a tiger enclosure at a public zoo. Entity showed no aggression towards other tigers or zookeepers within the enclosure. An hour after manifestation, the entity ceased cohesion and spread across the floor of the enclosure. Date Of Occurrence: 7/14/2015 Location: Jakarta, Indonesia. Follow-up Actions Taken: All witnesses were administered Class-B amnestics. Video footage and picture of the entity have been confiscated. Neither the zoo nor the paint showed anomalous properties following the event. Event Description: For a period of approximately 10 minutes, all organic sweet corn (Zea mays var. saccharata) growing on the T█████ C████ Farm began to spontaneously “pop” as if it were popcorn. According to an interview with the farm owners, the popping began and ended gradually, reaching its peak frequency around the 5-minute mark. Investigations determined that approximately 6,070 square meters (1.5 acres) of corn popped, yielding 38,035 emptied corn cobs and approximately 6,500 kg of popped corn. Date of Occurrence: 09/09/2015 Location: Friendsville, Maryland, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: Amnestics administered to all witnesses. Affected land was cleaned up and burned, and a cover story was implanted about faulty farm equipment sparking a fire. Popcorn and cobs were confiscated and incinerated. Samples of popcorn, cobs, stalks, soil, and surrounding air revealed no unusual properties, and popcorn was deemed safe for human consumption. Farm is to be kept under minor surveillance until 2018. Event Description: At 4:34 PM, an unidentified man (estimated to be 56 years old) turned into wax and collapsed while riding a crowded city bus. Remains showed no anomalous properties. Date of Occurrence: 10/15/2015 Location: Cedar Springs, Colorado, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: Remains were confiscated, and all witnesses were administered Class-A amnestics. No further action was deemed necessary. Event Description: For a period of one hour, all dropped objects within the city produced an unidentified male voice imitating the expected sound. Date of Occurrence: 11/24/2015 Location: Cedar Springs, Colorado, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: All recordings of the incident were altered or destroyed, and witnesses were administered Class-A amnestics. Event Description: All black pens in the west wing of Site-24 ran out of ink simultaneously. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/20██ Location: West wing of Site-24. Follow-up Actions Taken: All Foundation personnel switched to blue pens for 24 hours until Agent ██████ got more black pens. Event Description: In the span of two minutes, Agent ██████, a newly recruited member of MTF-Zeta-2, received over seven thousand texts from his mother. Most of the texts were nonsensical, consisting of word salad or strings of seemingly random letters. However, several words and phrases were noticeably repeated throughout the texts, including "don't", "why", "not my son", "what did you do" and "it isn't me". Interrogation of Agent ██████'s mother revealed that she had not used her phone that day; however, she reported a stabbing headache around the time the messages had been sent, as well as a sudden, irrational distrust towards Agent █████. Date of Occurrence: 6/23/2016 Location: Chicago, Illinois, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: Both Agent █████ and his mother have been placed under surveillance for further anomalous activity, and Agent █████ has been temporarily removed from MTF-Zeta-2 pending investigation. Event Description: Approximately 1,000 different specimens of Canis lupus familiaris (domestic dog) capable of verbal communication sprinted down the main street of the town claiming they were "chasing the meat truck". The dogs continued towards the exit of the town and disappeared at its border. Date of Occurrence: 16/12/████ Location: Cold Lake, Canada. Follow-up Actions Taken: All eye-witnesses were given Class C amnestics and surveillance of Cold Lake has been placed. Event Description: Seventeen individuals sneezed in sequence the notes comprising the first two bars of "Deck the Halls". Date of Occurrence: 19/08/2014 Location: Grand Central Station, New York City, New York, United States. Follow-up Actions Taken: Given the time of day and number of potential witnesses, amnestic treatment was not recommended for all but affected individuals. Interviews with affected individuals revealed causes ranging from allergies to infections to sunlight as the source of sneezing. No link between individuals was obtained; most considered the event an amusing coincidence. MTF-Rho-13 ("YouTube Celebs") deployed an online cover-up story claiming the event was an out-of-season test run for a flash mob. Event Description: Forty-nine fresh human corpses appeared in the master bedroom of a home undergoing construction, during the 30 second duration between the installation of a door in the doorframe, and the opening of the door for the first time. All corpses were of the same individual (identified as former United States Senator Joseph McCarthy, 1908-1957) at different ages, ranging from an estimated 48 years old to a newborn with umbilical cord still attached. Autopsies revealed that the corpses had all died of aortic dissection; aortic damage was identical on each corpse. Date of Occurrence: 14/11/1999 Location: Donaustadt, Vienna, Austria. Follow-up Actions Taken: Class-B amnestics administered to construction personnel; Class-A amnestics administered to first responders. Home acquired by Foundation and placed under surveillance; no further anomalous phenomena or properties detected. Corpses taken into custody for analysis; no anomalous properties or phenomena detected; corpses currently maintained in Site-19 low-value storage freezer. Remains of original Joseph McCarthy exhumed and analyzed, and re-interred after no anomalous properties or phenomena detected. Foundation pathologists were unable to detect any signs of actual or incipient aortic dissection in remains of original Joseph McCarthy, but emphasize the difficulty of detecting such signs in remains which have undergone natural decomposition for over 40 years. Event Description: A worker at the ████ Chemical Company vomited for four consecutive minutes, producing a total of 15 Craftsman brand ball-peen hammers from his digestive tract. Witnesses say that just prior to the incident, the subject, Z██████ C██████████, complained of abdominal pain. When asked what was wrong, he responded, "It's hammer time" before proceeding to vomit. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/2013 Location: Mississauga, Ontario, Canada. Follow-Up Actions Taken: Physical traces cleaned up before Foundation Agents reached ████ Chemical. Hammers confiscated; no anomalous properties observed. Amnestics administered to all witnesses and Z██████ C██████████'s employment history was scrubbed from the company database. Subject taken into custody and given provisional classification as Anomalous Item S-14005, however extended observation revealed no further anomalies. Subject amnesticized and released on ██/██/2014. Event Description: Eighty people living in ███████Nere immobilized, regardless of what they were doing, for one minute and twenty seconds. No attempt to cure them was successful. Three people were wounded when a car crashed on a tree due to the event affecting the driver. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/2016 Location: ███████, West Pomeranian Voivodeship, Poland. Follow-up Actions Taken: Class A amnestics administered to subjects affected and witnesses. No further anomalous phenomena were recorded in the area. Event Description: All vehicles within a 1 kilometer radius of 23 ██████ St, █████████, West Virginia disappeared for a 12 hour period at 12:00 P.M. At the end of the 12 hour period, all vehicles returned to their position prior to their disappearance. People within vehicles at this time were not recovered. Date of Occurrence: 04/04/2016 Location: 23 ██████ St, Glenville, West Virginia, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: Class-A amnestics administered to the residents of █████████. Area monitored for further anomalous activity. Event Description: For approximately 17 minutes, an ordinary football (soccer ball) became immobile after it was kicked towards a goalpost by an 11 year old male, becoming suspended approximately 1.2 meters away from the ground. Attempts to move the ball by both the child and their parents were unsuccessful. After the 17 minutes passed, the football resumed its prior trajectory and hit the goal. Date of Occurrence: 15/03/2015 Location: Coagh, Northern Ireland. Follow-up Actions Taken: Child and parental witnesses were interviewed, and administered Class-B amnestics. The ball, field and goal were all tested, and no further anomalous properties were found. Event Description: At 13:47 local time, a shockwave (later confirmed to be a sonic boom) emanating from an aisle in a local ███████ supermarket shattered windows within a radius of approximately 800 metres and caused significant structural damage to the building and nearby objects. At least ███ people were killed, a further ███ injured, and an estimated ███,███ Euro of damages was caused, along with numerous cases of permanent deafness. Upon investigation of salvageable CCTV footage, the sonic boom appeared to be caused by an unidentified man in the frozen food aisle sneezing, followed very shortly afterwards by the event. The camera that filmed it was damaged, but responding Foundation personnel confirmed that the man had been killed by the blast. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/20██ Location: Bad Aibling, Germany. Follow-up Actions Taken: Class-A amnestics distributed. Cover story about a severe car bombing released to the public. Identity of the man causing the event investigated without result. Area monitored until ██/██/20██, with no repeat occurrence. Event Description: The town of Bonner Springs, Kansas was found to have completely disappeared on ██/██/20██ after several murders were reported from the town. All records regarding the town were unchanged and all inhabitants were found within Harrisburg, South Dakota. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/20██ Location: Bonner Springs, Kansas, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: Class-A amnestics distributed. Cover story of a mass nuclear power plant failure and subsequent city demolishing was planted. Event Description: An unidentified man in ████████ Plaza, Chicago, was suddenly decapitated. Despite this, the corpse remained standing for an estimated eleven minutes before collapsing. Witnesses reported feelings of tranquility and safety immediately after. Date of Occurrence: ██/12/2010 Location: ████████ Plaza, Chicago, Illinois, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: All witnesses given Class-B amnestics, body remanded to Site-12 cold storage. Autopsy revealed no anomalous effects on the corpse. Event Description: Seventeen residents in Cherkessk suddenly flew upward with great speed, causing damage to the surrounding area due to wind damage. Mangled, identifiable corpses of affected subjects (likely from friction with wind) later located on Mars's moon, Deimos. Date of Occurrence: 14:51, ██/█/2011 Location: Cherkessk, Russia. Follow-up Actions Taken: Class-B amnestics administered to witnesses, and all residents of Cherkessk relocated to █████ until the damaged structures have been repaired. Event Description: From 10/2/2000 to 10/21/2000, new editions of the newspaper comic strip Calvin and Hobbes by Bill Watterson were printed in the ██████ █████, a newspaper distributed in ██████ County, Maine. The strips depicted a single story arc over the course of its running, in which Calvin's wagon is destroyed, with Hobbes losing an arm in the process. Watterson has not published any new Calvin and Hobbes cartoons since 1995. Date of Occurrence: 10/2/2000-10/21/2000 Location: ██████ County, Maine. Follow-up Actions Taken: Editions of the newspaper with the comics printed in them were confiscated, with the archive of the ██████ █████ expunged; all extant editions are archived. The strips were presented to Watterson, who confirmed that the art style, lettering, and signature were all his own, but he had not written or published them. Watterson was administered Class-A amnestics following this. Event Description: During a performance of As You Like It, all members of the cast and audience emitted a nine-minute long shriek accompanied by applause from the audience. Clapping was vigorous enough that lacerations appeared on the hands of the audience members at five minutes into the event. Lacerations then healed at the conclusion of the event, with the phrase "Nag gimno bgaithu sa yginno alibgn yamoa gna as ahud ak" being repeated five times before the event concluded. No individuals in the audience or cast recall their actions; crew members were unaffected, and reported this event. Date of Occurrence: 7/12/2016 Location: Stratford, Ontario Follow-Up Actions Taken: Due to the connection to a previously recorded Extranormal Event, an investigation has been opened into the possibility of a recurring phenomenon. All crew members unaffected by the event were given Class-A amnestics, and monitoring equipment has been set up in all Stratford theaters. Event Description: At ██████ █████████ High School, all females in the building simultaneously turned into male walruses for 15 minutes. After 15 minutes had passed, none of the students affected remembered the event. Date of Occurrence: █/█/05 Location: Firestone, Colorado Follow-up Actions Taken: Class A amnestics distributed to male witnesses. Event Description: The Windows XP computer startup sound suddenly emanated over a town intersection at around 120 dB. Date of Occurrence: 8/2/2014 Location: Northern Prague, Czech Republic. Follow-up Actions Taken: Class-A amnestics remotely administered to everyone 5 km from the epicenter. Event Description: A live Masai Giraffe (Giraffa tippelskirchi) was seen by ██ personnel stationed at Area-██ over the course of three weeks. Specimen evaded all attempts at capture. Date(s) of Occurrence: ██/██/2016-██/██/2016 Location: Area-██, Palmer Land, Antarctica. Follow-up Actions Taken: Personnel are to remain alert for future appearances. Event Description: The horns on all of the cars in the ██████ dealership lot simultaneously honked the Tetris theme for two hours straight, despite the cars being empty. Only people on the lot at the time had a recollection of the event. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/20██. Location: Lovelock, Nevada, U.S.A. Follow-up Actions Taken: All people on the ████████ ██████ dealership lot were given Class-C amnestics. Foundation tracking devices were put into all cars, and dealership and cars are being monitored for further anomalous activity. Event Description: Amariah Jo Billings, a resident of Bellefonte Pennsylvania, received a call from an unknown phone number. The number had an area code of 808, indicating a number registered in Hawaii, but no phone with that number has been identified. The caller was reported to be a male with a distinct South African accent. A transcript of the call, which was discovered via Foundation monitoring of the area, is as follows. Billings: Hello? <unknown>: Hello Mom? This is Dad. Billings: Who is this? <unknown>: I'm picking up the kids from the tongue. There's some car interference because an Ortorthan regiment ate the road. Be home soon with Son. Bye! (Call ends.) Date of Occurrence: 6/18/1997 Location: Bellefonte, Pennsylvania, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: Billings was administered Class-A amnestics and her phone confiscated. Phone was found to be totally non-anomalous. Billings has no connections with the Church of The Second Hytoth. Event Description: For seventeen seconds, all Internet links would redirect users to the front page of Inter.net Date of Occurrence: 1/15/2017 Location: Worldwide. Follow-up Actions Taken: Inter.net taken down for the malicious redirecting of users. Event Description: The eyes of all individuals within ██████ High School were replaced by various fruits. Individuals' eye sockets were observed to change in size to accommodate larger or smaller fruits. Affected individuals reported no difference in visual perception, although most if not all claimed to be unable to perceive the color purple, or any variations of it. Upon exiting the building, fruits were observed to split open, revealing the subject's eyes within. Subject's eye socket would then return to normal size, although the resulting color blindness persisted. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/████ Location: Wentzville, Missouri, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: Class-B amnestics administered to all individuals. Security camera recordings during the time were destroyed, and replaced with video recording from the previous week. Event Description: All humans within a 17 kilometer radius became unable to recall events from the past two hours. A number of people were found to be missing from the area, and all images of notable political figures were in some way defiled or altered. Date of Occurrence: 12:00-14:00, ██/██/████ Location: Sandwich, Kent, England Follow-up Actions Taken: Majority of altered images replaced with replicas, cover stories fabricated for missing persons. Class-C amnestics were administered to residents via water supply, under the cover story of a chemical waste spillage. Event Description: All television screens, digital ad screens, and electronic devices in New York City suddenly started playing a video of Rick Astley's "Never Gonna Give You Up." Date of Occurrence: 5/15/2009. Location: New York City, New York, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: Class-A amnestics deployed via helicopter. Electronics within the city are to be monitored for further anomalous activity. Event Description: A man exploded into several thousand two rupee coins while boarding a train. All coins were dated to 2011 and were in mint condition. Witnesses reported that the man had looked ill beforehand, as if he was suffering from motion sickness. Date of Occurrence: 4/27/2012 Location: Canacona Train Station, Canacona, Goa, India. Follow-up Actions Taken: All witnesses administered Class-A amnestics; coins collected for additional observation. Event Description: The Leaning Tower of Pisa briefly shifted position to correct its tilt. After a few seconds, the tower went back to its original form and "leaning" position. Date of Occurrence: 02/02/2017. Location: Pisa, Italy. Follow-up Actions Taken: All witnesses given Class A amnestics. Hidden cameras placed near tower to monitor it for further anomalous activity. Event Description: An antique telephone switchboard in the ██ ████ █████ Coffeehouse began ringing at 1:55pm local time, at a volume of approximately 20 decibels. This continued for 22 minutes, despite the switchboard not being connected to any power source. During this time, all patrons of the coffee house were observed to be wearing clothing and speaking varieties of English appropriate to the time period circa 1938-1948. At 2:17pm local time, the switchboard stopped ringing, and all patrons returned to normal. Date of Occurrence: 6/26/2017 Location: Longmont, Colorado, United States. Follow-up Actions Taken: All patrons present during the event were given Class B amnestics. Switchboard in question was taken by Foundation agents, but a close examination revealed no anomalous properties. Event Description: Every figure depicting spiritual entities worshipped by Chinese Folk Religions within 12 (twelve) kilometers of █████████ Temple within the municipality of Lugang, Taiwan became independently animated for a period of ██ minutes and 48 seconds. Actions of eating and drinking of offerings and speaking (albeit no noises were observed to have emanated), were noted by Foundation assets. No communication with animated figures within the duration of the anomalous occurrence was achieved. No re-occurence was observed since. Date of Occurrence: 07/██/2017 Location: Lugang, Taiwan. Follow-up Actions Taken: Procedure "Sutra Reading" was taken by the Chinese Foundation branch. Class-B amnestics were administered via Aerosol within places of worship amongst large amounts of witnesses. Media coverup was enacted, stating that all video recordings were a part of a publicity stunt, faked via mass CGI production. Event Description: For 2 hours and 17 minutes, all personnel at Site-54 reported heavy breathing on the back of their necks. Any attempts to view the source had resulted in the breathing cease momentarily, before continuing behind them. Three D-Class vanished at exactly 2:13 before all anomalous breathing ceased. Date of Occurrence: █/██/2017 Location: Site-54, Germany. Follow-up Actions Taken: All personnel administered Class-A amnestics upon request. Event Description: Roughly 21,300 residents of Los Angeles, California received a .mp3 file via an unknown method titled "20170815_002538." The audio consisted of an unknown metallic clanking, a shuffling sound, and breathing. Towards the end, a young, faint female voice proclaims "Hello, [UNINTELLIGIBLE]," before the audio cuts out. The owner of said voice has not been identified. Date of Occurrence: 8/16/2017 Location: Los Angeles, California, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: All copies of the file were deleted remotely besides one, stored in a USB drive in Site-19. Class-A amnestics administered. + Show Audio - Hide Audio Event Description: An open-casket funeral held for Mr. ███████ Milbourne at ██████████ Funeral Home. No anomalous events were viewed or reported during the entire service, but all video recordings of the funeral (two commercial camcorders and three smartphones) viewed after calling hours revealed the body of Mr. Milbourne sitting up in his casket and looking around, angrily belittling and insulting nearby attendees of the funeral, accompanied by rude gestures and noises, such as blowing raspberries. During the eulogy (delivered by Mr. Milbourne's brother-in-law), Mr. Milbourne's body makes several sarcastic comments, the majority of which involve repeating spoken lines in a mocking tone. Date of Occurrence: 8/05/2016 Location: Lexington-Fayette, Kentucky, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: All attendees administered Class-A amnestics. Recording devices seized for study, but were revealed to have no anomalous properties when recording funerals, corpses, or other subject matter related to the event. Past recordings are found to be non-anomalous. Witnesses interviewed before amnestic administration described Mr. Milbourne as a "very polite and soft-spoken man" when he was alive. Event Description: The ambient temperature in Room 332B (a conference room on the campus of the University of ██████) has matched the ambient temperature at that same time in Dasht-e Lut, Iran for an extended period of time. This phenomenon persists without regard to the ambient temperature in the locality surrounding Room 332B. Heating and cooling equipment in Room 332B do not affect the ambient temperature there. Date of Occurrence: Ongoing since 08/25/2017 Location: United States Follow-up Actions Taken: Room taken out of service. Since the temperature in Dasht-e Lut is normally uncomfortably hot, the room is unsuitable for conference room purposes. Event Description: For a period of five minutes, all the students in the dorms of the ██████ ██████ School for Disabled Students became completely cured of their disabilities. They forgot the incident after the five minute period, but had sent texts to each other stating what happened. Date of Occurrence: █/█/████ Location: ███████, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: Class A amnestics administered to all students, staff, and those contacted during the five minute period. All phones involved were wiped of their memory. Two Class Cs posted inside the school. Event Description: Agent ████████ observed a traveling group consisting of one male and seven females carrying large burdens, accompanied by thousands of (primarily juvenile) domestic felines. Date of Occurrence: 02/28/20██ Location: West Cornwall Coast Road, 1.8 km from St. Ives, Cornwall, England. Follow-up Actions Taken: Inquiries conducted among local populace. The ultimate origin and destination of the group remain unknown. Event Description: For a twenty-four hour and forty minute period (equivalent to a single Martian Sol), all data transmitted from active Mars rovers Curiosity and Opportunity showed Mars as having an Earth-like atmosphere. Footage from the respective cameras of the rovers showed the Martian surface covered in a black, moss-like biomass, with free-flowing water. A group of unknown, seemingly amphibian organisms was observed by Curiosity during this time. Neither the ESA's Mars Express or NASA's Mars Odyssey orbiters observed any anomalies during this period. Date of Occurrence: 27-28/5/2016 Location: NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: Foundation assets within NASA seized all data recorded during this period, as well as four hours before and after. Missing data covered up as a signal interruption due to a day-long dust storm, and amnestics administered to those who directly observed the phenomenon. Event Description: Despite continuous motion, the E-Train on the MBTA's Green Line took four hours to travel between Park Street and Boylston station, two consecutive stops with an approximate five-minute travel time. Upon the train's arrival, all speakers within Boylston station broadcasted the words "Poor Charlie", spoken by an unidentified feminine voice. Date of Occurrence: 11/09/2016 Location: Boston, Massachusetts, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: Event was contained in-progress, due to multiple calls to emergency services from passengers on the train; line was shut down for emergency maintenance. Upon the train's arrival, all passengers were administered amnestics, and video recordings of the event were confiscated. Surveillance in the Boston area increased for the next calendar year. Event Description: Almost all individuals who attended the funeral of Roger Kroppermann, a resident of Paradise, Utah, died of asphyxiation within an eight-month period following his internment. The sole survivor suffered severe brain injuries as a result of extended oxygen deprivation. Date of Occurrence: 23/09/2010-29/04/2011 Location: Phenomenon originated in Paradise, Utah; deaths occurred in three other cities in the south-western United States. Follow-up Actions Taken: The last surviving individual of the funeral party died three hours prior to the Foundation being able to establish protective custody. Kroppermann's remains were exhumed, and it was found that both hands were missing from the cadaver, removed post-burial. As of November 2017, the whereabouts of Kroppermann's hands remain unknown. Event Description: After complaining of stomach pains, male student ██████ ████████ vomited up a human infant. The infant was a healthy female and was connected via umbilical cord to ████████'s stomach lining. DNA testing indicated that ████████ was the child's father, but a mother could not be located. Date of Occurrence: 2014-03-11 Location: ██████████████ Realschule, Munich, Bavaria, Germany Follow-up Actions Taken: The child was recovered and moved to Site-06-3 for observation. Class-A amnestics were administered to all witnesses. ████████ was placed under five-year observation period; no new anomalies have been discovered so far. Event Description: A man's salivary glands spontaneously began to produce an estimated 3 liters of saliva per minute. This was sufficient to cause death by drowning within seven minutes, upon which the effects ceased. Date of Occurrence: 2015-09-19 Location: Nishio, Aichi Prefecture, Japan. Follow-up Actions Taken: The body was recovered and placed in cold storage in Site-██ for observation; the death was blamed on a car accident. Class-A amnestics were administered to all witnesses. Event Description: Several thousand Coccinella septempunctata (more commonly known as the seven-spotted ladybug) specimens swarmed and attacked a woman, eventually consuming most of the flesh on her body and leaving only a skeleton. The insects then underwent spontaneous combustion. Date of Occurrence: 2015-07-18 Location: Fairford, Gloucestershire, England. Follow-up Actions Taken: A cover story of a house fire was blamed for the fatality; all witnesses were administered Class-A amnestics. Event Description: All photographs, both digital and physical, were altered to include an image of Bahamian-American actor Sidney Poitier at various stages of his life and participating in the actions depicted in the photographs. Poitier's age corresponded with the age of the youngest depicted person in the photograph. Date of Occurrence: 2016-02-20 Location: Site-17, [REDACTED]. Follow-up Actions Taken: All photographs were confiscated and replaced with altered versions or versions that had been off site during the event. Digital backups of the originals are stored on the Site-17 archives. Event Description: Forty-three humanoid individuals, each one resembling a United States president, poured out of a supply closet in the Joint Security Area of the Korean Demilitarized Zone. All individuals remained silent until they all gathered in the MAC Conference Building, where they stood in an unorganized cluster while loudly repeating the phrase "blah blah blah", all out of sync with one another. These individuals went unnoticed by the guards in the area for seventeen (17) minutes before one guard in the room suddenly screamed and proceeded to open fire on the group in a panic, killing approximately seven (7) of them and sending the rest scattering, none of which bled from their wounds. Other guards rushed into the room, but seemed to take no notice of the anomalous humanoids, instead choosing to restrain the panicked guard. The escaped humanoids all ran back into the same supply closet from which they had previously appeared. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/2017 Location: Demilitarized Zone, Korea. Follow-up Actions Taken: Amnestics administered to all guards involved. Security footage removed with edited versions replaced. Supply closet was found to have no anomalous properties. Corpses of "presidents" removed for study. Autopsies revealed all individuals were biologically human, but were completely lacking blood. DNA failed to match with any others on record, including those of the presidents they resembled (Warren Harding, Calvin Coolidge, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Lyndon B. Johnson, George H.W. Bush, George W. Bush, and Donald Trump). Event Description: -.-. .- -. .- -. -.-- --- -. . .... . .- .-. ..- ... ..--.. - .... .. ... .. ... ... .. - . -.. .. .-. . -.-. - --- .-. -- --- -. ... --- -. --- ..-. ... .. - . -....- ..... ..... --..-- - .... . . -. - .. .-. . ... .. - . .... .- ... ..- -. -.. . .-. --. --- -. . ... . ...- . .-. . ... .--. .- -.-. .. .- .-.. .-. . ... - .-. ..- -.-. - ..- .-. .. -. --. --..-- .- -. -.. .... .- ... - ..- .-. -. . -.. .. -. - --- .- -. --- .-.. -.. ... ..- -... -- .- .-. .. -. . .-.-.- .-- . ' .-. . .- .-.. .-.. ... - ..- -.-. -.- .. -. .... . .-. . --..-- .. -.. --- -. ' - -.- -. --- .-- .... --- .-- .-- . .... .- ...- . -. ' - - ..- .-. -. . -.. .. -. - --- --. --- --- .--. --..-- .. - ' ... ... --- .--. .- -.-. -.- . -.. .-.-.- .. .- -- ... . -. -.. .. -. --. - .... .. ... --- ..- - - .... .-. --- ..- --. .... - .... . ... --- ... ... -.-- ... - . -- --..-- .. - ' ... -.. .. ... .--. .-.. .- -.-- .. -. --. -- .. -.-. .-. --- .-- .- ...- . ... .. --. -. .- .-.. ... - .... .- - ... .... --- ..- .-.. -.. -... . -.. .. ... .--. .-.. .- -.-- .. -. --. -- --- .-. ... . -.-. --- -.. . .-.-.- Date of Occurrence: . -.. --- -. ' - -.- -. --- .-- --..-- - .. -- . -- --- ...- . ... ... .-.. --- .-- .-.. -.-- .... . .-. . .-.-.- Location: ... .. - . -....- ..... ..... --..-- .. - .... .. -. -.- --..-- .. -.. --- -. ' - -.- -. --- .-- .-.-.- Follow-up Actions Taken: .--. .-.. . .- ... . ... . -. -.. .... . .-.. .--. --..-- .-- . .... .- ...- . -. --- ..-. --- --- -.. --- .-. .-- .- - . .-. --..-- .. ... - .... .. ... .--. ..- -. .. ... .... -- . -. - ..-. --- .-. ... --- -- . - .... .. -. --. .-- . ' ...- . -.. --- -. . ..--.. Event Description: ████████ ███-██████, a woman admitted to an emergency room in Slaughter, Louisiana for injuries sustained during a car crash, entered labor despite showing no signs of pregnancy prior to admission. A cesarean section was performed, and the subject's uterus was found to contain a small litter of Siamese kittens. Date of Occurrence: 2/19/1992 Location: Slaughter, Louisiana, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: Reports of the event in the media suppressed as a hoax. ███-██████ and all medical personnel who witnessed the event administered Class-A amnestics. Kittens entered Foundation custody, and have shown a decreased rate of aging, currently possessing biology consistent with a three-year-old cat, despite being over twenty-five years of age as of 2017. Event Description: All writing utensils within the J. Edgar Hoover Building disappeared over a six-hour period. A search of the building the following morning found all missing items embedded point-first in the ceiling of a disused office in the basement, arranged in a long, disk-like shape. Date of Occurrence: 1993-9-10 Location: J. Edgar Hoover Building, Washington, D.C., Maryland, USA. Follow-Up Actions Taken: Items were returned to their respective owners, and the event was written off as an elaborate prank by the janitorial staff. Members of the Unusual Incidents Unit headquartered within the building were instructed to monitor the building for further anomalies for a five-year period. Event Description: A family of three created a rudimentary religion after several cereal boxes developed human legs and arms, with the religion centered around the worship of these cereals. The family developed false names for these cereals based on their contents, such as Narroct, Lord of the Beehive (Honey-Nut Cheerios), The Pirate and the Sea (Captain Crunch) and The Twins of Rock, Coco and Fruity (Cocoa Pebbles and Fruity Pebbles respectively). The family members had no recollection of the event when the limbs demanifested after three days. Date of Occurrence: 9/16/████ - 9/19/████ Location: Mountainair, New Mexico, USA. Follow-Up Actions Taken: All cereal items belonging to the family were confiscated, and Class A amnestics were administered. The cereals have been sent to Site-551 due to potential anomaly. Event Description: Surveillance camera staff at the natural reserve near Puerto Madero, Buenos Aires City, Argentina, saw what appeared to be the same man in two different parts of the park at the same time, apparently mirroring each other's movements despite the lack of line of sight between the two. The individuals then disappeared into the brush. People in the reserve at that time talked about a weird man talking to himself about the '████ing Paraguayans" before walking off-road. Date of Occurrence: 01/██/2018 Location: Natural reserve, Autonomous City of Buenos Aires, Argentine Republic. Follow-up actions taken: Surveillance tapes of the strange men confiscated, and surveillance staff administered Class-B amnestics. Two Foundation agents disguised as birdwatchers have been assigned to the park to watch for possible developments. :: [BACKDOOR UNLOCKED AND OPENED. WELCOME, AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL] :: Event Description: All objects within Dr. Hobbes fell over through unknown means. Three days after the event, all memory of the event occurring was instantly lost from all witnessing personnel. All written documentation regarding the event can only be accessed via extranormal means. Date of Occurrence: 11/3/2018 Location: Dr. Hobbes's Office, Site-10, Japan Follow-up actions taken: A Foundation maintained, anomalous backdoor has been created in order to view said records regarding the event. Event Description: An intestinal tumor located in the body of Grover ███████, a 52-year-old man from Des Moines, Iowa, is found to contain an entire secondary brain, including medulla, pituitary gland, and part of a spinal cord. DNA from the brain does not match that of Mr. ███████, and is currently believed to belong to a twelve year-old girl who vanished from Calgary, Alberta, Canada in 1992. Date of Occurrence: 04/05/2010 Location: Des Moines, Iowa Follow-Up Actions Taken: Doctors involved with the surgery amnesticized. Mr. ███████ died following the surgery. Despite several autopsies and examinations, no definitive cause of death has been determined. His cadaver, as well as the brain excised from his stomach, remain in cold storage. Event Description: $237,981 manifested simultaneously, spread across various countries on flat surfaces at approximately $1.3 per square kilometer. This money changed to a different currency depending on the country it manifested within. Date of Occurrence: 5/9/2014 Location: Worldwide. Follow-Up Actions Taken: None, due to the very obscure nature of the event, and that 87% of all the manifested money was made unusable from external forces. Event Description: The PA system in a Giant Eagle supermarket announced, "Attention Giant Eagle shoppers: the ritual will now commence," whereupon all individuals within the store stopped what they were doing and hummed an intricate series of notes for approximately five minutes. After another tone, the humming ceased and all affected individuals resumed their business as though nothing had occurred. Date of Occurrence: 10/10/2014 Location: Columbus, Ohio Follow-Up Actions Taken: Event would not have come to Foundation attention if not for discovery of security footage during in-store theft investigation. Individuals affected during event have no memory thereof. As such, it has been determined that attempting to identify and interview each person visible on the tape is unfeasible. Videos confiscated, amnestics administered to store staff, and Foundation agents stationed at Giant Eagle supermarkets to monitor for future events or signs of PA system tampering. Update: As of 27/04/2016, surveillance of Giant Eagle stores has produced no further evidence of anomalous activity. Agents recalled. Event Description: Every human on earth simultaneously blinked. During the event ███ people disappeared. Date of Occurrence: 3/5/18 Location: Earth. Follow-Up Actions Taken: Various cover up stories to explain missing persons have been enacted. Blinking resulted in minor containment breaches at various sites relating to SCPs pertaining to sight. Event Description: Between 16:00:04 UST and 19:53:02 UST, black hole Cygnus X-1 underwent a series of rapid fluctuations in registered x-ray flux density, up to 194.2% of the normal value. When converted into Morse Code, the fluctuations spelled out an expanded, 2018 updated version of the 1988 book A Brief History of Time by the recently deceased physicist Stephen William Hawking. Analysis shows the writing style of the updates to be consistent with that of the original author. Date of Occurrence: 3/14/18 Location: Cygnus X-1 Follow-Up Actions Taken: Non-Foundation observers were administered Class-A amnestics, and the observation data in question was covered up. Cygnus X-1 is to be monitored for further anomalies. Whether to release the book under an appropriate cover story is currently under debate. Event Description: All water in the Samur River was converted to human blood for four days. All water which entered the river at its source was converted into blood, and all blood which flowed out of the river was converted into water. Blood collected directly from the river did not change. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/2018-██/██/2018 Location: Samur River, Russia and Azerbaijan Follow-up Actions Taken: Amnestics were dispersed aerially through the nearby village of Samurçay following completion of event. DNA analysis of collected blood compared against the Foundation genetic database identified all blood as originating from one Joshua Havaldar, a 34-year-old Indian-American man living in San Francisco. He was unable to provide information on the event, but did report exhibiting symptoms consistent with hypovolemia in the preceding week. Mr. Havaldar was administered Class-A Amnestics following interview. Both the Samur River and Mr. Havaldar are currently under a standard five-year monitoring period. Event Description: A small canoe in the Mississippi River was consumed whole by a Carcharocles megalodon, along with its two occupants. Carcharocles megalodon has been extinct for 2.6 million years, and the river in question is much too shallow to contain a creature of that size. Date of Occurrence: 02/14/2018 Location: Undisclosed location on the Mississippi River, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: Amnestics were administered to witnesses, and a cover story was circulated claiming the canoe occupants were intoxicated and capsized their vessel accidentally. A task force was sent to locate and capture the anomalous entity, but all attempts to locate the specimen failed. Event Description: Unscheduled subway train passes through 36th Street subway station in Brooklyn at approximately 80mph. Eye witnesses describe the train as purple with Arabic lettering on the side. Train wasn't reported appearing anywhere else. Date of Occurrence: 07/03/2017 Location: 36th Street, Brooklyn New York, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: Witnesses administered Class-A amnestics, and footage of the event was confiscated. Event Description: During a Toys R Us staff meeting, an employee later identified as William J. Horack stood, announced, "Well, guess I won't need these anymore," and removed his lips with one hand. Afterward, he began to consume the remaining flesh around his mouth — described by witnesses as having the appearance of "pulled pork" — as the other employees returned to normal operations. Horack continued to autocannibalize over the course of the day, captured only intermittently by security cameras despite not leaving the meeting room. At 19:05, Horack had been reduced to skeletal remains, which then vanished. Eyewitnesses reported confusion that the event did not strike them at the time as being out of the ordinary. Date of Occurrence: 15/03/2018 Location: Mayfield Heights, Ohio, USA Follow-Up Actions Taken: Amnestics distributed to store employees and customers after interviews conducted. Investigation of security cameras revealed no fault. No personal information about William Horack could be attained, and all documentation involved in his three-year employment at Toys R Us appeared to be an intricate forgery. Lips retrieved from initial event location, determined to be faux lips made of wax. Event Description: Over the course of five days, the entire student population of ██████ ██ Elementary School in Seven Hills, Ohio developed allergies to all nut-based food products. Faculty and individuals not attending ██████ ██ Elementary who enter the building were unaffected. The symptoms ceased if individuals were removed from the premises for sixty-two hours. Notably, a student at the school, Isaac ██████, is currently comatose following a severe allergic reaction as a result of being force-fed a peanut butter sandwich. Date of Occurrence: 02/19-02/23/2018 Location: Seven Hills, Ohio, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: School was shuttered, students were integrated into other elementary schools in the area. Isaac ██████'s condition has shown no improvements. Foundation medical staff are currently attempting to treat and revive him in an attempt to find a link between his current state and the anomaly within ██████ ██ Elementary. Event Description: All canned food sold at Miller's Supermarket in Craig, Iowa was found to contain one or more live specimens of Lampropeltis triangulum (milk snake) in place of their intended contents. X-ray imaging shows that prior to opening, the cans contained their intended contents, and only upon opening do the snakes appear. Date of Occurrence: 4/18/2017 Location: Craig, Iowa, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: Anomaly ceased within twelve hours of its first manifestation. amnestics were administered to all affected, dispatch logs recording emergency calls of the event were scrubbed. All milk snakes contained by the Foundation have yet to show anomalous properties. Event Description: All individuals with the name Jeffery Smith gathered in the same area and greeted one another before departing. All persons involved claimed their arrival was purely coincidental, and that they had simply been "passing through the area". Date of Occurrence: 12/6/1993 Location: New York City, New York, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: Involved individuals were located and amnestized. Event was covered up as a stunt associated with a reality television show. Event Description: A collection of twenty billboards located in the southern region of Florida were anomalously painted over to display an advertisement for "laundry and tan by dado", an establishment located in Two Egg, Florida. The paint of "laundry and tan by dado" anomalously changes color. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/2018 Location: Two Egg, Florida, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: Billboards were replaced with unaltered variations, and the event attributed to ordinary graffiti. Preliminary investigation of laundry and tan by dado initiated under SCP-888-EX designation. Event Description: For three minutes all personnel aboard the USS █████ began screaming the phrase "remember fifty-five" before briefly being confused and returning to normal operations. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/████ Location: The USS ██████ which was located at ███████ ███ █████████ at the time. Follow-up Actions Taken: [FIELD LEFT BLANK] Event Description: This event was transcribed for the Log of Extranormal Events. This event appeared on its own, and wasn't written by anyone. Date of Occurrence: 6/8/2018 Location: The Log of Extranormal Events Follow-up Actions Taken: The Foundation will view this entry, and subsequently delete it. Then, they will write up an actual event description regarding the actual anomalous event. Event Description: An event was transcribed onto the document known as "The Log of Extranormal Events" which described itself and how it came into being. Security footage of all locations capable of accessing the log show no personnel within a 1 meter radius of any device capable of editing the aforementioned log. Edit history of all computers shows that there was no edit. Date of Occurrence: 6/8/2018 Locations: All computers capable of accessing the Log of Extranormal Events and all locations of physical copies. Follow-up Actions Taken: The original text was marked as falsified within all copies of the Log of Extranormal Events and kept for reference. Event Description: Mascot costumes resembling familiar Disney characters spontaneously manifested onto all guests of Disneyland's "Mickey's Toontown" area. Each guest had also anomalously adopted the personality of the character depicted by their respective costume until the costumes demanifested at midnight local time, leaving guests in a wild, confused state. Date of Occurrence: July 7, 2005. Location: Disneyworld, Florida, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: All witnesses and guests were amnesticized. Event Description: Six corpses, visually and genetically identical to former U.S. President Barack Obama, were discovered in a submerged cave by cave divers. All six corpses were wearing animal costumes. Autopsies revealed that all six individuals drowned, and perished two weeks prior to their discovery. Date of Occurrence: August 17th, 2017 Location: A submerged cave in Quintana Roo, Mexico. Follow-up Actions Taken: Corpses moved to Site-17, all witnesses amnesticized. Event Description: Twenty kakapo, representing approximately 24% of the extant members of the species, spontaneously combusted over the course of three minutes. Twenty kakapo chicks were found in the remains, genetically identical to the twenty deceased instances. Date of Occurrence: 9/04/2018 Location: Codfish Island, New Zealand Follow-up Actions Taken: Amnestics administered to all witnesses, and a brood of mature cloned kakapo were released to account for the disparity. Genetic testing of the chicks found them to be a hybrid of a kakapo and an unidentified species of parrot. Event Description: At least 1000 instances of plains zebra (Equus quagga) emerged from the opening of the volcanic cone of Shira, located on Mt. Kilimanjaro. Said instances descended Mt. Kilimanjaro and roamed the Kilimanjaro National Park for 2 hours before subsequently disappearing. Date of Occurrence: 02/23/1988 Location: Kilimanjaro National Park, Tanzania Follow-Up Actions Taken: All witnesses to the event were given Class-A amnestics. Members of the organization known as the "Anomalous Zebra Collective", or "AZC", who attempted to ride the zebras out of the Kilimanjaro National Park, were interviewed for information on the AZC before being given Class-A amnestics. Mt. Kilimanjaro has been put under constant surveillance in case of anomalous activity. Event Description: A door was opened. Date of Occurrence: In a second. Location: Next door. Follow-up Actions Taken: The door was welded shut. Personnel are to be reminded that the entity within the room does not exist. The door is never to be opened. SCP classification is pending. Event Description: All personal within provisional Site-████-█'s life-support maintenance access tunnels reported hearing the voice of Agent ██████ ████ ████ from The █████ Project speak with distortion akin to being played over a speaker several inches from their ears. The content of said speech was calmly requesting staff to not engage in cannibalism despite there being no indication that anybody onsite had considered an act of that nature. The voice at several points attempted to use code phrases to convince staff that it was Agent ██████ ████ ████ but the codes were confirmed to be false codes given to D-███-██ while he was impersonating Agent ██████ ████ ████. Agent ██████ ████ ████ and D-███-██ had both died due to a train crash on the way to the The █████ Project command post before they could become involved in 1963. Date of Occurrence: 11/06/1966 Location: Provisional Site-████-█, █████ lake. Follow-up Actions Taken: SCP-████-█ denied any involvement with the event and as far as can be determined is correct. No unusual circumstances have been discovered in Agent ██████ ████ ████ or D-███-██'s deaths. Event Description: All doors within the University of Wisconsin's Music Hall led to what is currently assumed to be an alternate version of the Music Hall. All students who entered this alternate hall were considered lost when the effect ceased, until all missing students exited the university through the main entrance two months later. According to the students, they had all been absent for an estimated ten or twelve minutes. Date of Occurence: 12/4/1999 Location: University of Wisconsin, Wisconsin, USA Follow-up Actions Taken: Affected students amnestitized, cover story of a class field trip spread. School placed under a ten year monitoring period. Event Description: A ███████ brand washing machine owned by a 54-year-old woman produced the head of her deceased husband after she performed her daily wash-load. Her clothes were not present inside the washing machine, according to the woman's statement. Date of Occurrence: 02/█/2015 Location: Southend-on-Sea, England, UK. Follow-up Actions Taken: The woman in question was given Class-A amnestics and the washing machine was taken into Site-██. On ██/█/2016, the washing machine was destroyed. Event Description: During a snowstorm affecting Staraya Kuban, 50,000 bath duck toys were found along the shore. The ducks were found inside five plastic wire mesh bags and displayed no anomalous qualities. The ducks were taken to Site-██, where they mysteriously disappeared after five days of recovery when line of sight was broken for approximately three minutes. Date of Occurrence: 03/25/18 Location: Lake Staraya Kuban, Krasnodar, Russia. Follow-up Actions Taken: All civilians near Staraya Kuban were administered Class-A amnestics. A small search team has been sent in Krasnodar for any appearance of a similarly looking duck toy. Περιγραφή εκδήλωσης: Για περίπου μία ώρα το ψηφιακό κείμενο σε τυχαίες ιστοσελίδες παγκοσμίως μεταφράζεται στα ελληνικά και όλες οι προσπάθειες υποβολής του εγγράφου στα αγγλικά αποτυγχάνουν. Δεν υπάρχει συσχέτιση μεταξύ των ιστοτόπων που επηρεάζονται. Ημερομηνία: 09/01/18 Τοποθεσία: Διάφορες ιστοσελίδες Παρακολούθηση ενεργειών που έχουν ληφθεί: Καλύψτε την ιστορία μιας αποτυχίας του Μετάφραση Google. Event Description: During the decommissioning and deconstruction of Specialized Laboratory 4389-UC!S-11 in Research Sector 8-Alpha of Site-15, ███████ █████ began to experience what was later determined to be a stroke and died in the site medical ward. At the time no actual anomaly was found and operations proceeded as normal. In 1984, Site-15 underwent a routine casual scan which detected retro-casual ectoentropic interference in the events of his death which was confirmed by further scans. To this day the actual alterations made and the entity responsible are unknown. Date of Occurrence: 06/13/1977 Location: Site-15, Canada. Follow-up Actions Taken: ███████ █████'s family was told that he died in a civilian construction operation. Deconstruction was completed in 1978 despite set-backs. The event was extensively investigated but no more more information has been gained. It is theorized that the Foundation's methods of detecting these events are flawed and simply reading a false negative but similar malfunctions have not been noted. The records of Site-15 were examined but none of the tests run in the Specialized Laboratory 4389-UC!S-11 had any known retro-casual or ectoentropic properties. Event Description: Over a period of 23 minutes, Agent ███████ shrank to 5% her original height, before expiring due to low body temperature. No cause of this anomaly was found. Date of Occurrence. 02/27/2012 Location: Area 52, India. Follow-up Actions Taken: The next of kin was notified, and Agent ███████'s very small body was delivered for burial. Event Description: At 5:34 8:18 3:24 a time, all individuals were unable to deduce the current time for approximately 45 minutes, despite the presence of functional timekeeping devices. All individuals who reference the event, regardless of their involvement, are similarly unable to deduce the time it occurred. Date of Occurrence: 06/12/2010 Location: California, Pennsylvania, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: None. Event Description: Four new species of landfowl, with entire populations including a domestic breed, spontaneously manifested worldwide. Similarly, all members of the species Struthio Camelus Domesticus vanished, alongside all infrastructure related to their breeding and consumption. The memories of roughly 99.7% of the population were simultaneously altered, causing retroactive acceptance. Date of Occurrence. 01/18/2008 Location: Worldwide Follow-up Actions Taken: Distance communication between the 0.3% of the population whose memories were not altered are being intercepted and altered by a Foundation AI. Conspiracy groups are tracked down as they arise and administered amnesiacs. The four new species have been classified under a new Genus known as Gallus. Note: None of you know what you're missing out on. KFO was way better than KFC is or could ever hope to be. Event Description: A male high-school student attending [REDACTED] High School stated "Later nerds!" before entering into a classroom cabinet. After five minutes, an entirely separate student exited the cabinet. Neither the student nor any individuals present acknowledged the change. Date of Occurrence. 12/13/2018 Location: [REDACTED], Utah, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: Witnesses administered Class-A amnestics, both the student and their relatives were administered targeted Class-C amnestics in regards to the student's disappearance. Cabinet was examined and showed no anomalous properties following the event. Event Description: During a prison riot, all pants worn by both inmates and correctional staff suddenly became ambulatory and attempted to free themselves from their wearers. After a period of 21 minutes, all instances proceeded to scale over the facility's wall and run into a nearby river. Date of Occurrence: 03/08/1990 Location: Jakarta, Indonesia. Follow-up Actions Taken: Class-A amnestics administered to all participants and witnesses. Cover story of a prison riot disseminated. Subsequent batches of clothing showed no anomalous properties. As per 01/13/2019 none of the anomalous pants instances have been located. Event Description: All individuals within a buffet restaurant proceeded to dance vigorously for several hours, until the restaurant's standard closing time. Once all individuals ceased dancing, they showed signs of severe lethargy and collectively consumed all food present within the restaurant, including food that was uncooked or otherwise inedible. Date of Occurrence: 01/0█/199█ Location: Bowling Green, Florida, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: All individuals were administered Class-A amnestics. Following the event, three individuals required their stomachs to be pumped, and an additional seven showed signs of food poisoning. The restaurant has since been shut down by Foundation agents acting as health inspectors, and no further anomalous activity has been recorded. Event Description: In the cafeteria of Site-77, a researcher was walking to a table when they suddenly collapsed on the floor. Everyone else in the cafeteria turned their heads and vocalized "Bruh." in an unknown male voice. The researcher in question stood back up and said "That was shit, sorry everyone." Date Of Occurrence: 01/01/2020 Location: Site-77, Australia. Follow-up Actions Taken: All researchers were questioned, everyone who was questioned recognized the abnormality of the event, but could only refer to it as a "bruh moment". It seems only the researchers who were involved in the event were only able to describe it as a "bruh moment". Event Description: From 04:38 to 14:29 GMT the Galapagos Tectonic Microplate, located under the southeastern Pacific Ocean, spontaneously disappeared. Adjacent lithospheric magma anomalously retained pressure and did not liquefy or intrude into the vacuum, nor did the surrounding ocean water. At 14.29 exactly GMT a slight tremor of Magnitude 3 occurred in the area and the Plate returned to its original position. No further anomalous properties have yet been recorded. Date Of Occurrence: 09/10/2018 Location: Pacific Ocean. Follow-up Actions Taken: Seismic data of the event was wiped from global earthquake monitoring facilities. Further public mentions of the event are to be monitored for and acted upon as needed. Event Description: During the closed-casket funeral of 73-year-old Maurice Gibson, the coffin spontaneously opened and an entire Mariachi band climbed out one at a time. They performed a short piece before climbing back into the coffin which shut behind them. When opened by the wife of the deceased, it contained his body and nothing else unusual. Date of Occurrence: 01-07-2019 Location: Sunny Hills Funeral Home, Oklahoma, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: Event passed off as a marketing prank for a local restaurant. Sunny Hills Funeral Home is to be placed under watch until 01-07-202█. Event Description: During a live performance, the skin of the members of the British band Kero Kero Bonito has started to slowly glow pink until reaching the color #FF91A4 (Salmon pink). Despite this the observers did not regard the occurrence as unusual. When later interviewed the observers have reported the hue to feel completely normal and natural. Date of Occurrence: 04-01-2017 Location: Singapore. Follow-up Actions Taken: All witnesses have been administered Class-A amnestics, and all camera footage has been passed off as an editing trick to all professional footage and as a camera glitch to all homemade footage. Event Description: A resident of Cut Bank, Montana was reported to have re-materialized his breakfast at a local Denny's after not being satisfied with the meal. After finishing his meal, he was seen retrieving two seemingly uneaten pieces of toast and scrambled eggs from his mouth, despite eating the meal fifteen minutes prior. He was also observed spitting orange juice back into his glass. He then stormed out of the Denny's, yelling and throwing the meal at staff as he left. Date of Occurrence: 08-31-2008 Location: Cut Bank, Montana, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: CCTV footage depicting the event was taken in for study. The staff, resident, and any other witnesses to the event were administered Class-A amnestics. Further monitoring of the Denny's location revealed no anomalies. Event Description: All 15 employees in a meeting at ███████ Offices began to repeatedly punch themselves in the face for 37 minutes while saying "Why am I punching myself?" again and again until another employee opened the door to the room. Date of Occurrence: 03-20-2019 Location: An office building in Bee Cave, Texas. Follow-up Actions Taken: Class-B Amnestics given to employees. ███████ Offices is to be monitored until 03-20-2023. Event Description: At 07:32 UST, an island appeared approximately 1,600 km off the eastern coast of South America. The island was measured to be 150 km2. The top half consisted of dense rainforest, while the bottom half of the island was a snowy tundra. Many different types of flora and fauna were found inhabiting the island, including several species of animals thought to have been extinct. Four avian anomalies previously in Foundation custody were also found to have been on island, constituting a containment breach. MTF-Lambda-4 ("Birdwatchers") successfully re-contained the entities. At 16:32, media circulated that the South American geologists could no longer locate the island. It was later found to have vanished from all radar and satellite images. The area is to be monitored for any further appearances. Date of Occurrence: 07-24-1966 Location: South Pacific Ocean Follow-up Actions Taken: All members of the South American geology team were administered Class-A amnestics. Amnestics were also administered aerially to any civilians on the east coast of South America who may have witnessed the event. Any photographs or satellite images taken of the island or its wildlife were confiscated by the Foundation for analysis. Information disseminated by the Foundation explained that a tectonic plate shift was responsible for the event. Event Description: All digital viewing of news outlets around a 15 km radius centered on ████████ Comprehensive School suddenly came onto a viewing of the moon landing with commentary from several Hollywood actors. Date of Occurrence: 2/██/2018 Location: Nottingham, England, UK. Follow-up Actions Taken: Class-A amnestic fog applied over entire area affected as well as all digital recordings of the event erased or taken off streaming services. Event Description: All persons within a 30-mile radius of ████ Peters, a resident of Red Bluff, California who had been taken into Foundation custody on multiple prior occasions, manifested green crayola-brand crayons within their nasal cavities. Date of Occurrence: 3/██/2018 Location: Red Bluff, California, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: Class-A aerosol amnestics administered over entire affected area. Continued investigation of ████ Peters is ongoing. Event Description: Foundation agents embedded in the Boise Police Department were alerted to multiple claims of breaking and entering on ███████ Rd. around 6:48 am. At some point during the night prior to this, several neighbors had switched places with one another through unknown means. Upon waking up, affected individuals insisted they lived in the house they woke up in. Date of Occurrence: 1/██/2015 Location: Boise, Idaho, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: Affected individuals administered Class-A amnestics and subsequently regained knowledge of their correct residence. Event Description: A civilian working for █████ ███ Corp. posted on social media concerning their work laptop being present at their desk, despite them taking it home the previous day. Analysis found the two devices were identical, including manufacturer serial numbers, hard disk content, and wear and tear. Date of Occurrence: 2019/02/26 Location: Derby, United Kingdom. Follow-up Actions Taken: All witnesses were administered Class-A amnestics. The duplicate laptop is in non-anomalous electronics storage. Event Description: Multiple humanoid entities holding shovels emerged from underground in an uninhabited area in the Mojave Desert. Upon reaching the surface, the entities claimed that they were personnel working at Site-129. Notably, no Site-129 has been built or is being planned to be built. Upon examination, the entities were shown to be identical to baseline humans in any way, despite not being on any official records. Date of Occurrence: 07/07/2019 Location: [COORDINATES REDACTED] Follow-up Actions Taken: Entities were detained and currently are under examination. Event Description: [DATA EXPUNGED] Date of Occurrence: ██/██/████ Location: 15 kilometers off the west coast of San Francisco, California, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: The city of San Francisco has been amnesticized and given the cover story of a minor earthquake. The SCPS Normalcy and MTF Delta-6 ("Archerfish") has been dispatched to the area under antimemetic shielding. All Foundation personnel are to be reminded that there is no island or other remarkable geological feature between San Francisco and the Farallon Islands. Event Description: 352 persons gained perfect relative pitch and were able to identify a .2 Hz change in frequency. Affected experienced physical pain when exposed to music, and were driven insane, constantly shouting about 'everything sounding wrong'. Date of Occurrence: 04/██/201█ Location: .5 square kilometer area in central Herdecke, Germany. Follow-up Actions Taken: Affected were deafened and amnesticized. Press reported fireworks incident. Event Description: A 4th grade student promptly turned into dust upon grabbing her school's front door's door handle on the first day of the school year. Date of Occurrence: 08/19/2019 Location: ██████████ Elementary in Broken Arrow, Oklahoma. Follow-up Actions Taken: Door determined to be non-anomalous and appropriate cover-story disseminated. Witnesses administered Class-A amnestics. Event Description: A civilian particle accelerator experiment detected several muon neutrinos anomalously exceeding the speed of light, measurements of which were replicated soon after by follow-up testing. The event escaped Foundation notice until a public press conference coinciding with a paper published in Nature several months following the event. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/2010 Date of Public Information Dispersal: ██/██/2011 Location: Acerra, Italy Follow-up Actions Taken: A cover story was created regarding supposed flaws in experimental procedure, and Foundation operatives embedded within physics research institutions published high-profile rebuttals of the Nature paper. By mid-2012, the scientific consensus on the incident was that the measurement was inaccurate and the result of a faulty timing mechanism. Event Description: On the 27th of November, 20██, at 12:34, a large humanoid appeared outside of the city of Athens, Greece. Said humanoid closely resembled a human, with all the physical traits of a Homo Sapiens Sapiens, except for its size that reached 35 meters in height. The humanoid entity proceeded to walk towards the city, before it met with a significant portion of the city's police department, which tried to stop its approach. Date of Occurrence: 27/11/20██ Location: 15km outside of the city of Athens, Greece Follow-up actions taken: Foundation personnel arrived shortly after the entity's manifestation, but at the time of their arrival (12:45) the entity completely disappeared, with no apparent reason or outside stimuli. Class A amnestics administered to all police personnel present, and after an agreement with the Greek prime minister, all accounts of the event were erased from police records. Cover Story A67 ("Manhunt") was applied as an explanation for the Foundation presence on site. Event Description: The sound of rainfall and thunder was reported in Bald Knob, Arkansas, despite having clear weather. Six hours later, a rainstorm occurred that was completely silent. Date Of Occurrence: 9/24/2017 Location: Bald Knob, Arkansas Follow-Up Actions Taken: Footage of the event was confiscated, and social media posts related to the phenomenon were deleted, or else explained as a unique atmospheric and acoustic phenomenon. Samples of rainwater were collected, and meteorological analysis occurred during the next several rainstorms in Bald Knob; no anomalous properties were found. Event Description: All trains within the boundaries of New York disappeared for 3 seconds, before reappearing. All individuals were then teleported to their original destination, believing they waited and got off their stop as normal. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/████ Location: New York City, New York, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: All footage recording the event was wiped. Class-A amnestics were administered to all witnesses of the event. Event Description An anomalously formed electrical storm appears over ███████ High School for 3 minutes. During this time, ████ █████, a local student, was struck by lightning an estimated 830 times. Date of Occurence: 10/3/2011 Location: Dinosaur, Colorado, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: All witnesses administered amnestics. Cover story involving a power line accident disseminated. Event Description: No episodes of the sitcom Friends were made beyond season three. Viewing any episodes aired after "The One at the Beach" when taking mnestics shows that every recording is a single shot of a couch within Monica's apartment, with the six central cast members sobbing loudly. Most vocalizations are incoherent, but "please stop" is heard repeatedly. Date of Occurrence: Unknown, discovered by Dr. ████████ on 10/12/2018 Follow-up Actions Taken: As Friends is too embedded in the cultural consciousness standard information suppression was deemed nonviable. Instead the Foundation took Friends down from all streaming services and is currently recreating seasons four through ten to replace anomalous episodes. Event Description: An incorporeal mother and child wearing 19th century clothes were observed walking down a street. Several cars passed through the pair, although neither the vehicles nor entities were affected. Witnesses reported that the entities conversed with one another inaudibly, and made gestures towards unseen objects. They walked several hundred feet before entering a store front, upon which they both vanished. Date of Occurrence: 10/11/2019 Location: Middleton, Pennsylvania Follow-up Actions Taken: No agents were present for the event. The event was reported in local media with interviews, and has circulated on some internet paranormal sites with a short cell phone video. The video is of poor quality, and inconclusive to most viewers. Assigned agents have found the spectral phenomena to be non-recurring and of no threat to either the populace or Foundation security and secrecy. As such no further actions have been taken. Event Description: All personnel at Site-64 reported feeling a "slight warm pressure" for several seconds at 5:26 PM. This was corroborated by various pressure-sensitive anomalies, as well as thermometers and weight scales being triggered. Forensic teams discovered a tessellation of a small human fingerprint across every open surface within the site. Date of Occurrence: 11/11/2019 Location: Site-64, Oregon, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: Police and Foundation records are being searched for a match to the discovered fingerprint. Personnel who were at Site-64 may take amnestics to erase their memory of the event. Event Description: A shockwave suddenly propagated starting at the geological North pole and followed a path identical to the International Date Line down all the way to the geological South pole over approximately 12 hours, also causing tidal waves that dealt mild damage to islands close to the shockwave; no source could be determined. Date of Occurrence: 11/13-14/2018 Location: Arctic, Pacific, and Southern oceans, as well as Antarctica. Follow-up Actions Taken: All known witnesses of the shockwave administered amnestic. Damage caused by tidal waves explained as an earthquake; restoration of Arctic and Antarctic ice is underway along with information about the cracked ice being suppressed. Event Description: All crosses in the town of ████ █████ levitated and reversed their orientation to be upside-down. Later analysis revealed variations of "Hail Satan" with various misspellings carved into the back of each cross with a short blade. These include "Hale Satan", "Hale Satin", and in one case, "Hyyl Sytyn". Date of Occurrence: 07/31/2008 Location: ████ █████, Iowa, USA Follow-Up Actions Taken: As this event had no witnesses beyond one security camera in the ██████████ family residence, no amnestics were given. The security footage was confiscated for use in Foundation training. The event has been given a cover story of teen vandalism. Event Description: A glowing yellow intangible cube manifested 15 centimeters above the floor of Site-06-3's main kitchen. The cube was tilted at a 13º angle, and maintained an internal temperature of -3º Celsius despite the surrounding air temperature. Further tests with D-class personnel began and showed no other anomalous properties. The cube spontaneously demanifested after 43 minutes. Date of Occurrence: 12/02/2018 Location: Site-06-3, France. Follow-Up Actions Taken: None. It should be noted that three of the eight personnel who were in the main kitchen during the event have since developed skin cancer. It is currently unknown whether this has any connection to the anomalous event. Event Description: For 24 hours, any person entering the █████████ Laundromat would find themselves in a well-furnished Blockbuster video rental store. All reports stated that the titles of the films in the store did not correlate with any known films, some with titles in unknown languages. During the initial exploration of the anomaly, a letter was discovered at the front counter reading "I lost my job for this? They could have at least turned this place into an arcade or something." After 24 hours had passed the spatial anomaly ceased all activity and the █████████ Laundromat could be accessed once again with no signs of anomalous activity. Date of Occurrence: 08/12/2009 Location: █████████ Laundromat, Florida, USA. Follow-Up Actions: Due to the relatively new status of the building all individuals who witnessed the event were informed that the █████████ Laundromat was not complete and was currently being renovated from what was formerly a Blockbuster store. Note: The building in which the anomaly occurred was formerly a Blockbuster store, which was classified as defunct several weeks prior to the current occupation of the █████████ Laundromat. The locations of the previous workers are currently unknown. Event Description: During the 199█ Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, the float featuring the video game character Sonic the Hedgehog was witnessed blinking and wagging its left hand's index finger. Anomalous behavior immediately ceased after 20 seconds of movement. Date of Occurrence: 11-28-199█ Location: New York City, New York, USA. Follow-Up Actions: Class A amnestics were given to everyone present on ████████ Street, where the anomaly occurred. Original footage was archived, and mock footage has been created as a supplement. Event Description: The skeleton of a Tyrannosaurus Rex held in the main lobby of the Natural History Museum began emitting audio from the motion picture Jurassic Park. All 2 hours and 7 minutes of audio from the film was recorded, although all sounds attributed to the dinosaur characters were notably amplified. Very few witnessed the event due to the event occurring outside the museum's hours of operation. Date of Occurrence: ██-██-████ Location: New York City, New York, USA. Follow-Up Actions: Class-A amnestics were administered to the only two witnesses, two security guards. Event Description: At the crater of the Kīlauea volcano, a mass of confetti was launched 3 meters into the air, accompanied by the sound of a party horn. Confetti immediately turned to ash as it hit the ground. Date of Occurrence: 07-██-2017 Location: Island of Hawaii, Hawaii, USA Follow-Up Actions: A Class-A amnestic cloud was released over all cities surrounding the volcano. All recordings of the event have been censored and archived. Event Description: Foundation physicist Lloyd Darwell entered the 2nd-floor northern men's restroom at Site-35 at exactly 11:11:45, and exited two minutes earlier at 11:09:48. Darwell did not notice this at first and did not interact with his past self. The event was only later found due to a review of security footage to find information regarding an unrelated non-anomalous workplace incident. Custodian L█████ S████ was the only other individual in the restroom during the incident and claims to have suffered a large migraine at roughly 11:10 before falling unconscious and later being awoken by another custodian. Date of Occurrence: 12/13/2019 Location: Site-35, Canada. Follow-Up Actions Taken: No personnel are allowed in the restroom until it is determined to either have no anomalous properties, or is contained and given a suitable replacement. Until then, male personnel must use a different restroom. As a reminder, restroom breaks are not to take more than five minutes, including time taken in locating a restroom and traveling to and from it. Event Description: A lightning bolt spontaneously solidified mid-strike. The object immediately toppled due to structural imbalance, and shattered upon contact with ground. Shattered portions of the object were not found during a patrol of the area, and are believed to have dispersed into non-anomalous electricity. Date of Occurrence: 7/29/2015 Location: Altai Mountains, Siberia, Russia. Follow-up Actions Taken: Due to extremely low population density, no civilians are thought to have witnessed the event directly. Captured footage from two border patrol stations was seized, and employees exposed to footage amnesticized. Event Description: A large mass of termites entered a furniture store and proceeded to consume every piece of furniture before exiting. Date of Occurrence: 1/3/2020 Location: Unalaska, Alaska, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: All witnesses were amnestised and the store was cleared of debris. The cover story of a large-scale robbery was implemented, and the area is being monitored for additional manifestations. Event Description: A chest freezer began producing irregularly shaped ice after being disconnected from its power supply. The ice produced took the shape of English words, spelling out the phrase "Please help I am a freezer". Date of Occurrence: 1/13/2020 Location: ███████, New Hampshire, USA Follow-up Actions Taken: The freezer's owners were administered Class-A amnestics, and the freezer itself was confiscated under the guise of requiring repairs. Extensive testing failed to produce similar results, and the freezer was placed within Site-19's cafeteria. Event Description: The four heads on Mount Rushmore had changed to several different expressions before returning to normal state. The expressions had included winking, blowing a raspberry, one eyebrow raised, and a mouth into a screaming position. Date of Occurrence: 28/01/20██ Location: Mount Rushmore, South Dakota, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: All witnesses and guests given Class-A amnestics. All security footage of the event was destroyed. Cellphone(s) which has recorded and photographed the event had been destroyed and had their SIM card removed. Event Description: CCTV footage shows a student absentmindedly tossing a water bottle from hand to hand. Upon overshooting and tossing the bottle behind them, as they attempted to grab the bottle, their arm was noted as extending to approx. twice its original length in order to properly catch the bottle. Body language suggests the sudden increase in length was both unintended and extremely painful. Date of Occurrence 2/4/20 Location: Sandwich, Illinois, USA. Follow-up Actions Taken: Student recovered and arm amputated. Student (and any bystanders during the event) amnesticized, reintegrated into school under the guise of a serious sports wound, and footage erased. Event Description: 37 Foundation custodians with some variation of the name “Howard,“ either as a first name (18), surname (9), or middle name (10), retrocausactively developed a permanent food allergy to eggs and cephalopods. All affected persons in the current baseline reality have now possessed the allergy from an early age, ranging from 0 to 4 years. Date of Occurrence: 02/06/2020 Location: Worldwide, although mostly centered in North America and Europe Follow-up Actions Taken: Allergen precautions have been increased in affected Foundation sites. As the affected employees believe they have always been affected, they are not to be informed of this event. Event Description: At 22:20, all buses within an approximate 230 meters of the London bridge had their exteriors changed to a white coloration. Buses then began to change hue, slowly rotating through the observable color spectrum for 25 minutes before fading back to their original coloration. Date of Occurrence: 07/8/20██ Location: London, England. Follow-Up Actions Taken: Due to the time of occurrence, very few individuals were found to have observed the event. A video taken of the event has been largely regarded as a hoax by the population at large, without need for Foundation intervention. Area is to be monitored for further activity until 8/9/20██. Event Description: For exactly one and a half hours, all staff at Site-97 spontaneously grew a second, far smaller version of their head on their right shoulder that did nothing but whisper cheese or dairy-related puns into their right ear. These heads could not be removed during the allotted time frame, and would only speak over any sort of audio distractions. After the one and a half hours passed, the heads all said in unison "If you wanted more cheese puns, then that's just "swiss"-full thinking! Ha, get it?! It's a cheese pun!" then proceeded to bud off from their original bodies and shrivel into piles of dust. Date of Occurrence: 03-02-2020 Location: Site-97, Alaska, USA. Follow-Up Actions Taken: Entire site cleaned of dust piles created by anomalously formed heads. Cheese and dairy puns have been banned from Site-97 as staff used to be very fond of such jokes, which researchers suspect is what caused such an absurd event. Poster of claymation duo Wallace and Gromit has been removed due to the series' connections with cheese. Site-97 is currently under watch due to this event. Event Description: The pants worn by an unidentified man spontaneously burst into flames. Nearby patrons did not appear startled and instead simply collected available water and hurled it at the man's pants to quench the flames before returning to what they had been doing. Later investigation found that the man in question had been in the middle of a cell phone call with his wife, and had claimed to have been in a restaurant just prior to the event. Date of Occurrence: 3/6/2020 Location: █████ Bar, New Caledonia Follow-Up Actions Taken: Security camera footage from the bar on the night in question was reviewed, although no footage of the man in question could be found. A cover story involving a stunt for an online video series was circulated. Event Description: Two entities resembling humanoid fish were sighted at the base of a lighthouse. Said entities were observed attacking the base of the lighthouse with rudimentary stone weapons, while yelling in an unidentified language. A nearby civilian yelled out to the entities, who panicked and jumped into the ocean. Date of Occurrence: 3/9/1991 Location: █████ Island, Washington, USA. Follow-Up Actions: Witnesses were administered Class-A amnestics. Damage to the lighthouse was determined to be superficial, and did not require repairing. Surveillance of the waters surrounding the lighthouse have proven inconclusive. Event Description: Five emaciated red humanoid figures were spotted at the chain convenience store in ████████. Figures were observed by CCTV surveillance to pass through store aisles, becoming increasingly more distended. Ten minutes after their initial manifestation, entities vanished, and all items within the store were found to have vanished. Date of Occurrence: 8/14/20██ Location: Diamond Bar, California, USA. Follow-Up Actions Taken: Store employees and customers were treated with Class-A amnestics. Store was provided with two members of security who are to watch for additional manifestations until 2028. Event Description CCTV footage shows a two second flash of light being emitted from a single streetlight, eliminating all visibility. Following this, the street occupied by the streetlight underwent immediate congestion. Traffic eventually eased to average levels after three hours. Date of Occurrence: 2/17/20 Location: Palm Springs, Florida Follow-Up Actions taken: Area was to be monitored more closely following the event. No further actions are necessary at the moment. Event Description: Thirty percent of Bethlehem, Connecticut's population had their appearances altered to match that of former U.S. President James A. Garfield. Victim's memories were also altered to reflect this appearance change. The event was initially discovered when all employees at a local supermarket were discovered to all resemble James A. Garfield. Date Of Occurrence: 5/██/████ Location: Bethlehem, Connecticut, USA. Follow-Up Actions Taken: At this time, no follow up actions can be concluded by the local police or the Foundation. No further anomalous activity was reported in the area. Event Description: A subway-train spontaneously vanished shortly after derailment. Several months later, it was discovered by a group of paleontologists buried under several kilometers of rock. The train was severely damaged and no trace of the driver or 30 passengers were found. Date of Occurrence: ██/4/199█ Location: Toronto, Canada Follow-Up Actions: The paleontologists were administered Class-A amnestics, and the train was relocated to a Foundation holding facility. Families of victims were provided cover stories of a standard train derailment. Train debris and track were examined for anomalous properties, although none were present. Event Description: A subway train departed from ██████████████ Station in Los Angeles, California at 8:00. At 8:11 the train vanished from the tunnel and reappeared at ██████████ Station in London, England at 8:16. Upon reappearance, the train's appearance had morphed to match that of a London Underground subway train. Agents embedded in both Los Angeles and London established communications to quickly take control of the situation by establishing a perimeter around the stations and getting all who had originally boarded the train into Foundation custody. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/ 2020 Location: Los Angeles, California and London, England Follow-Up Actions Taken: All who had been aboard the train were interviewed, amnesticized, and taken back to Los Angeles, whereupon they were released. When interviewed, the train operator reported nothing out of the ordinary that could have caused the event. Camera footage from both stations was scrubbed. The train was removed and taken into Foundation custody where it has been monitored and studied for further anomalous properties. As of 4/19/20, none have been shown. Foundation personnel are currently working with UIU agents and British Occult Service officials to keep both stations under a 5 year monitoring period. Event Description: All known humans situated within the general vicinity of a suburb in Seattle, Washington temporarily lost bodily autonomy and invariably maintained their forward velocity for approximately 35 seconds. These bodies were unimpeded by obstructions, with individuals intangibly passing through nearby structures. After the event had subsided, all affected individuals regained autonomy and tangibility, leading to mass cases of suffocation, with exact casualties yet to be accurately determined. Date of Occurrence: 07/16/2006 Location: Redmond, Washington, United States Follow-Up Actions Taken: Widespread amnesticization efforts among affected individuals and families of victims were initiated. Heads of local groups of interest were queried for a potential explanation of the event's origins, to no avail. Notably, during this period, the networks of Microsoft, headquarters located in Redmond, Washington, encountered a brief outage. Event Description: A low-frequency pitch was reported emitting from all ground sewers within a city center. Occasional flashes of light were also observed by civilians. This frequency increased in pitch until all glass constructions within close proximity of sewer entrances suddenly shattered, causing an estimated $████ USD in property damage. Date Of Occurrence: ██/██/2015 Location: Livingston, California, United States Follow-Up Actions Taken: All witnesses were administered Class-B amnestics. Video evidence of the event has been confiscated by the Foundation. CCTV monitors were installed around area to ensure safety of citizens. Event Description: An entire mosasaurus skeleton materialized roughly 8 feet above the floor of █████ ██████████ Middle School, replacing all solid objects in space it occupied, though this was mostly ceiling tiles. The subsequent weight of this added mass and loss of structural integrity quickly led to the collapse of the western roof of the building. Date of Occurrence: 05/06/2020 Location: ████████, Colorado, USA Follow-Up Actions Taken: Due to quarantine measures already in place in ████████, the school was completely unoccupied and only two civilians witnessed the event, both of whom were administered amnestics. All video footage was recovered and replaced to match a cover story of unchecked mold growth and frequent rain leading to a roof collapse. The skeleton was found to have no signs of decay and was covered in fresh, recently-deceased mosasaurus tissue, and was moved to Site-███ for temporal-paleontological research and subsequent storage. The building is to be monitored until 05/31/2025 for future anomalous occurrences. Event Description: One Blatta orientalis (Oriental Cockroach) grew to a length of 1.2 meters within a civilian residence. The specimen displayed frantic behavior before fleeing the home and impacted by a passing pickup truck. The residents of the house then contacted the local authorities while passersby began taking photographs of the insect. Date of Occurrence: 05/06/20██ Location: ██████ ████, Iowa, USA Follow-Up Actions Taken: Foundation agents arrived shortly after the call was made and administered appropriate amnestic dosages after confiscating evidence of the event. Despite the efforts of Foundation entomologists, the cockroach perished due to breathing difficulties. Roughly 22 minutes after the cessation of life, the insect returned to average size while unobserved. The body was monitored for potential anomalous properties before disposed of via Site-██'s industrial incinerator. Event Description: A charred humanoid entity was seen on CCTV records logged in workplaces and industrial areas. Frequently observed to lay in a fetal position next to an indescribable organic mass for approximately five minutes before rousing and subsequently stepping onto the mass. Audio and video footage afterward damaged/deleted; corporate management denied involvement. Date of Occurrence: Unclear. Location: Worldwide Follow-Up Actions Taken: Interrogation attempts unsuccessful. Foundation agents have been embedded within areas of such occurrences posed as civilians. All records containing the event have been confiscated and transferred to Site-██ for further research. Amnestics have been administered accordingly along with regular information suppression tactics. Event Description: On 21/██/20██, A team of 31 researchers, sailing through the Drake passage on an expedition to Antarctica, sighted what seemed to be a surfacing submarine 10km away off the coast of Smith Island. The expedition team, confused as they hadn't been informed of any submarines in the area, attempted to contact via radio but to no avail. A look through binoculars indicated that it was a military submarine, of unknown design, displaying an unknown flag. Not long after, a bright light and thunderous roar were seen and heard as a supposed missile was launched from the distant submarine, and travelled in an easterly direction. The submarine sank back down under the waves and was not seen again. The expedition was called off subsequently. Date of Occurrence: 21/██/20██ Location: 6km NW of Smith Island, Antarctica. Follow-Up Actions Taken: The 31 researchers were interrogated individually and administered Class-A amnestics after. A covert foundation-led search team were deployed to the region to search for the rogue submarine, but found nothing after 14 months of searching. The launched missile, an SLBM, reached space and successfully deployed its stages. A single projectile, supposedly a warhead, was detected entering the atmosphere near Bouvet Island, but didn't detonate. Warhead and missile debris were never recovered. The file of this event remains in Site-██ awaiting further investigation. Event Description: The sky visible from inside Site-19 became pale red for 5 seconds, during which the text "SQUONKIPEDIA" in bold white lettering rapidly moved across the sky. Date of Occurrence: 09/12/2019 Location: Site-19 Follow-Up Actions Taken: None, due to all witnesses being Foundation personnel. The cause of this is under investigation. Note: No known organization or popular media element with the name "Squonkipedia" has been identified. Event Description All doorways and windows to Site-25's northeastern guard tower converted into impermeable opaque barriers and communication with the tower was lost. The event immediately ended upon a drilling attempt successfully breaching the floor. For the duration of the event, muffled shouting and construction noises were heard emanating from the inside, although all personnel rescued from the tower report instead hearing an "unearthly warbling" emanating from the outside. Date of Occurrence: 08/05/2020 Location: Site-25 Follow-Up Actions Taken: Due to security concerns, the tower may not be closed for more than 24 hours. As subsequent investigations found no anomalous items or entities, no changes will be made to guard schedules. Further anomalous events relating to this location are to be reported immediately. Event Description: At 9:32am, an instrumental piece of music, lasting 3 minutes and 52 seconds, and with composition style resembling that of a national anthem, began playing from the geometric center of the ██████████████ Building of the ██████████████ University, prompting every person within hearing range to interrupt their current activities, stand up with their hand over their heart, and passionately sing along in an unknown language for the duration of the piece, after which they proceeded to resume their activities as if nothing had happened. Date of Occurrence: 03/11/2019 Location: Bogotá, Colombia Follow-Up Actions Taken: Security camera footage retrieved and destroyed, mock footage created to replace it. Witnesses interviewed. All witnesses involved retained clear memories of the event, but showed disinterest or outright aversion in discussing it. None of them seemed willing to mention the event unprompted, and when questioned about it either tried to deflect to other topic, claiming disinterest, or outright refused to discuss it. Amnestics proved ineffective in removing memories of the event. However, due to the unlikeliness of them deciding to discuss it on their own accord, and the destruction of the only footage of the event, amnestic treatment has been deemed unnecessary for the time being. Witnesses are to be placed on a 5-year observation period to detect any potential changes in their behavior and/or the self-containing nature of the event. Event Description: An as-yet unidentified woman, dressed in what witnesses described as "steampunk-style" clothing, was seen walking a live thylacine (Thylacinus cynocephalus) down a busy street. When approached, she was heard to warn the approaching person or persons away by saying, "Careful, she bites," in a Boston accent. After walking the animal for twenty-five minutes, she and the animal entered a taxicab, which promptly drove away. It is worthy of note that the thylacine is known to have been extinct since 1936. Date of Occurrence: 4/8/2020 Location: New York City, NY Follow-Up Actions Taken: Cover story of a promotional event for a movie shoot circulated. Through questioning of eyewitnesses, the Foundation was able to trace the woman's starting point to another taxicab at the intersection of [REDACTED]. Neither of the cabs has been identified, despite considerable effort. The cabs in question have not been found to belong to any taxi company in the city. Descriptions of the drivers have not been helpful, largely due to the fact that eyewitnesses were captivated by the strangely-dressed woman and her pet. Event Description: A public telephone outside of an abandoned grocery store began to ring. A young woman picked up the receiver and heard a heavily-distorted voice say, "Everything you thought you knew is wrong." When she asked what the voice meant, it answered by saying, "The world is not what you think it is." Further questions did not elicit answers, only similar phrases. After nearly three minutes, the woman hung up the phone in frustration. Date of Occurrence: 6/8/2020 Location: Miami, FL Follow-Up Actions Taken: Telephone in question examined and discovered not to be connected to any telephone lines. Investigation revealed that the telephone had not been connected since 2002 and is only still in place because of a dispute about who should be responsible for its removal. Interviews with the woman provided no useful details; woman was amnesticized. Telephone placed under observation for 5 years. Event Description: Every human (Homo sapiens) on Earth simultaneously lost consciousness for approximately one second. Recording devices left running during this period show that all affected people abruptly screamed for the entire duration of the event. Date of Occurrence: 7/9/2020, 3:23:42 GMT Location: Worldwide Follow-Up Actions Taken: Published evidence of event removed and edited, hoax websites developed to paint event as conspiracy theory. Event Description: A Western Rock Lobster (Panulirus cygnus) transmuted into a live human infant whilst being boiled alive. Date of Occurrence: 09/9/2019 Location: Geraldton, Western Australia. Follow-up Actions Taken: All witnesses were administered Class-A amnestics. A window at the Jefferson house had to be repaired. Autopsy revealed the DNA of the carcass was identical to that of an ordinary human. Remains of the infant were cremated and buried. Event Description: A team of seven archeologists attempted to open the sarcophagus of Cleopatra. Within the sarcophagus, no body was discovered; however, a single living bee had left the tomb after being opened and proceeded to escape. The location of the specimen is unknown at this time. Date of Occurence: 2/3/2018 Location: Alexandria, Egypt Follow-Up Actions Taken: Archeologists amnesticized. The public perception of Cleopatra's tomb is to be maintained as lost or currently unknown. Event Description: A woman got up from her table at a restaurant and walked directly toward the women's restroom in a straight line, passing through several other tables and diners in the process. Security footage of the event shows the woman appearing to wade as she passes through solid objects, as though walking through deep water. Date of Occurrence: 29/9/2020 Location: New York City, New York Follow-Up Actions Taken: Witnesses interviewed and amnesticized. Security footage copied for Foundation records, original files deleted. The woman was placed under observation for future anomalous abilities, to continue until 2025. Automated Message from the Records and Information Security Administration: A potential cognitohazard has effected this text. Do you wish to access the document anyway? + Yes, Access - Hide Cognitohazard Event Description: A large number of minuscule, intelligent monkeys began moving out of several individuals' orifices. Monkeys lacked fur, with only small amounts of hair, had advanced technology, opposable thumbs, and spoke in a thus far untranslated language. Date of Occurrence: The 12th Cycle, age of Tall ones and Blank things. Location: Sub-strait 42A, on the largest landmass. Follow-up Actions taken: All buildings were amnesticized, but the intelligent monkeys could not be tracked due to interference from a monkey based organisation known as the 'SCP Foundation'. Event Description: A school basketball match between the Marymount School of New York and New Anglia international school. The only anomalous event related to this match was its location and date of occurrence. Date of Occurrence: 20/06/1969 Location: West Crater, Lunar Surface Follow-up Actions taken: Apollo 11 crew provided with Class-A amnestics. Footage of the landing edited and cut to remove all traces of the game. Students involved lost memory of the incident naturally. Event Description: All of the dogs in a local dog park were replaced by Madagascar Hissing Cockroaches (Gromphadorhina portentosa). Roaches were all the same size as the dogs that were replaced, and the effect lasted for about five and a half minutes before the dogs reappeared unfazed. Date of Occurrence: 03/12/2020 Location: Dog park in Revere, Massachusetts. Follow-up Actions Taken: All pet owners were given Class A Amnestics and all camera footage was seized by Foundation personnel. Event Description: Edward Jacobs, age 34, described as a tall and thin Caucasian man with short curly brown hair and pale green eyes, entered a single-occupancy bathroom in an antique store, but did not exit. The man who exited the bathroom was noticeably short and slightly overweight. His identification showed that he was Alex Wong, age 22. Mr. Wong was not in the bathroom at the time Mr. Jacobs entered. Witnesses could not recall ever having seen him before, but did not regard his presence as unusual. Date of Occurrence: 19-1-2021 Location: New York City, NY Follow-up Actions Taken: Alex Wong was detained and questioned. His testimony revealed nothing unusual, and amnestic treatment was deemed unnecessary. Cover story of a missing person enabled Foundation agents to obtain the owner's permission to search the entire store, even the areas customers are not permitted to enter. Edward Jacobs was not located and has been classified as a Person of Interest. Event Description: A young woman visiting an office building for a job interview discovered a male white rhinoceros wearing a security guard's hat. Staff in the building referred to the rhinoceros as "Jake." The young woman made a short video and uploaded it to the popular video hosting site [REDACTED], where it was discovered by Foundation web crawlers, prompting an investigation. Date of Occurrence: 2-4-2021 Location of Occurrence: Seattle, WA Follow-up Actions Taken: After being found to be non-anomalous, the rhinoceros was taken to a nearby zoo. The video was removed from the video hosting site. The young woman who made the video was interviewed, as were staff at the building. All staff assumed that the rhinoceros was a member of security staff and found nothing unusual about this. All involved were given class A amnestics. Event Description: A mannequin in a window display at a women's clothing store became a living woman. She maintained the pose the mannequin had been placed in, merely watching those nearby with mild interest. She remained in this state for 1 minute and 23 seconds before becoming a mannequin again. Date of Occurrence: 3-5-2021 Location of Occurrence: New York City, New York Follow-up Actions Taken: Uploaded photos and videos of the event allowed to remain in place. A cover story regarding a movie promotion was circulated. Staff at the store were interviewed. No member of staff recognized the woman, although most claimed she looked familiar. Event Description: After drinking a full 1-liter bottle of a generic soft drink, a teenage boy was able to belch the entire first verse of the Swedish national anthem in a single breath. Date of Occurrence: 3-10-2021 Location of Occurrence: Chicago, Illinois, USA Follow-up Actions Taken: The boy and all present when the event occurred interviewed and amnesticized. No useful information was gained. Note: No one had any Swedish ancestry, knowledge of Sweden beyond the most basic geographical information, or knowledge of the Swedish national anthem. When the song was played by one of the responding agents, none of those interviewed were able to recognize it. Yet another mystery we'll probably never be able to solve. - Dr. Malkin Event Description: Approximately all flags in Washington D. C. became the now-popular 'Gay Pride' flag. All instances of the US flag in the District disappeared, and were found the following day in the capitol building with a label reading 'Happy Gay Pride month! Sorry for borrowing these.' The object was scanned for fingerprints and video recordings were observed, the person responsible was unable to be located. The following occurred in 2019 on the same date to a similar effect, and the person responsible for the events was still unable to be traced. Date of Occurrence: 06-11-2009 / 06-11-2019 Location of Occurrence: Washington, District of Columbia Follow-up Actions Taken: The President of the US, all American political figures, and all present were given Class-A Amnestics on both occasions. Flags were removed and replaced with the modern incarnation of the flag of the United States before amnestics were administered on both occasions. Note: This happened to have occurred on both the Tenth and Twentieth anniversaries of the US's 'Gay Pride Month' holiday. Whoever did this sure likes the occasion. -Dr. Ypres Event Description: The words WONPON suddenly appeared in the night sky, seemingly made of out flames, for 15 minutes before disappearing. The source of the lights is currently unknown. Date of Occurrence: 7-03-2021 Location of Occurrence: Rama's Bridge, Indian Ocean Follow-up Actions Taken: Significant clean-up efforts deemed unnecessary, as most witnesses mistook the event for fireworks. Any individuals found to be spreading information opposite of this were amnestied, and evidence supporting the idea of fireworks has been dispersed among the population. Event Description: A man sitting on a bench in a subway station was heard to say something about having forgotten his phone. This was presumably in response to a smartphone at the opposite end of the bench. The man remained sitting, but another man completely identical to him stepped out of his body, walked to the opposite end of the bench, retrieved the phone, and returned. When the second man sat down, he appeared to merge into the first. Date of Occurrence: 4-13-2021 Location of Occurrence: Chicago, IL Follow-up Actions Taken: As this event happened very late at night, few witnesses were present. All witnesses described the event accurately, but seemed oddly disinterested, as though nothing out of the ordinary had occurred. As no useful information could be gained, witnesses were given low-level amnestic treatment. The man responsible for the event has been placed under Foundation surveillance until 2026. Event Description: An entry was submitted to the site which described an anomalous item which does not exist. The entry was submitted by a terminal which had ceased functioning several days prior to the entry's creation. Date of Occurrence: 5-23-2022 Location of Occurrence: Site-64 Follow-up Actions Taken: The terminal was removed from the SciPNET intranet connection and efforts to find the culprit are underway. + Show entry - Hide Item #: SCP-1 Object Class: Anomalous Special Containment Procedures: SCP-1 is contained within Room 37-C of Site-64. No further containment procedures are needed. Description: SCP-1 is a clear plastic 7 oz. cup which moves precisely 1 centimeter every 24 hours. Addendum: This article has been removed. Event Description: A number of food items within a local McDonald's restaurant suddenly animated and restructured themselves to resemble a number of animals native to the area. The entities then proceeded to attack the staff before fleeing into the surrounding wilderness and disappearing. Date of Occurrence: 12-5-2020 Location of Occurrence: Blackfoot, ID Follow-up Actions Taken: All customers and staff present were interrogated and given amnestics, with the restaurant's manager going on record saying, "It was Carl's boys, I just know it! They're always pulling crap like this!" An investigation into the neighboring Carl's Jr. restaurant has since been launched. Event Description: An as-yet unidentified man removed his baseball cap, revealing a small purple cloud on top of his head, which had been completely concealed by the hat. The cloud floated away in what witnesses described as an unhurried manner. It has not been located. Date of Occurrence: 4-26-21 Location of Occurrence: Cincinnati, OH Follow-up Actions Taken: As neither the man nor the cloud could be located by the time the Foundation arrived, and there was no way to determine who had seen the event, low-grade amnestics were dispersed over the entire area via aerosol. Event Description: Known person of interest POI-11705 manifested a Glock 19 pistol and began to float in a standing posture. POI passed through the bottom of an elevated freeway as if intangible, emerged out the top and began to travel along the freeway, firing his pistol in the air while still intersecting with the freeway. POI made an abrupt upward motion while "dabbing" before exploding into fireworks. Date of Occurrence: 5/10/2021 Location of Occurrence: Los Angeles, CA Follow-up Actions Taken: Class-A amnestics administered to witnesses. Cover story of an illegal firework show implemented. Event Description: Shortly after one woman entered an elevator in an office building, 13 copies of the same woman exited the elevator. According to witnesses, the women were completely identical in every respect and all answered to the same name. Six minutes and 47 seconds later, all but one of the women demanifested, leaving nothing behind. Date of Occurrence: 5-19-2021 Location of Occurrence: Austin, TX Follow-up Actions Taken: Witnesses interviewed and amnesticized. None of the witnesses regarded the event as unusual in any way, and seemed puzzled by interviewers' suggestions to the contrary. Event Description: For 0.0000002 seconds, the entire population of Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, was teleported to Monrovia, Liberia, before being teleported back; no body was harmed and there were no follow up effects on either Monrovia or Ho Chi Minh. Date of Occurrence: 2-22-1979 Location of Occurrence: Ho Chi Minh City and Monrovia Follow-Up Actions Taken: Due to the fact that it was a very short amount of time and that it was midnight in Vietnam, most of the civilians did not notice. Those who did were given amnestics; a cover up story was spread in Monrovia of chemical smog playing tricks on the mind. Event Description: An abandoned building became a pleasant, well-kept suburban home with obvious signs of habitation. Foundation investigation discovered that it was owned by a man named Edward Jacobs, age 32. He claimed to have lived there alone for 4 years, after his mother moved out to be closer to her ailing sister. When interviewed, neighbors corroborated his story. A search of public records discovered that no one with the last name Jacobs had ever lived in the area and there was no such person as Edward Jacobs. Date of Occurrence: 1-1-2021 Location of Occurrence: Suburb of Cleveland, OH Follow-Up Actions Taken: As the anomalous nature of Edward Jacobs's existence in the region appears to be largely unknown, he was allowed to continue living in his current location. His property has been placed under Foundation surveillance until 2026. At the time of writing, no further anomalous activity has been reported. Note: One of the clerks at the local courthouse spoke kindly of Edward Jacobs, calling him "a nice young man," even after showing us evidence that the property has been vacant since 2018. This kind of thing is above my pay grade. - Agent Walters Event Description: A group of male Eclectus parrots (Eclectus roratus) in a zoo were seen developing humanoid heads and reciting "a song about bananas". Security footage failed to capture the event, although the occurrence was corroborated by multiple witnesses. Anomalous group hallucination assumed. Date of Occurrence: 6/3/2021 Location: Ann Arbor, MI Follow-up Actions Taken: People known to be in the area of the bird enclosure were given low-strength amnestics. Event Description: An adult male western lowland gorilla (gorilla gorilla gorilla) entered a local playground and began to play on the equipment. Multiple children happily interacted with the gorilla as though it were another child, and were seen to be very friendly toward it. Nearby parents were reported to be disinterested in the gorilla's presence. After 7 minutes and 38 seconds, the gorilla entered a nearby public restroom, and did not emerge. No trace of the gorilla was found afterward. Date of Occurrence: 6/3/2021 Location of Occurrence: Cincinnati, OH Follow-up Actions Taken: All witnesses, both children and adults, were interviewed. Children did not appear to find the gorilla's presence unusual. Adults were disbelieving of the event, saying such things as "children have such imaginations." All witnesses were amnesticized, and the playground was placed under Foundation surveillance. Event Description: Two people ran in opposite directions, to see which one their dog would follow. Rather than following one or the other, the dog split into two identical dogs and followed both of them at once. When the two people returned to close proximity, the dogs merged back into one. Date of Occurrence: 6/6/2021 Location of Occurrence: Buffalo, NY Follow-Up Actions Taken: Video of the event had already been posted to social media by the time it was brought to the attention of the Foundation. The video was promptly removed and dismissed as a hoax. Witnesses were located and given amnestic treatment. Event Description: The top three participants in a bodybuilding competition had their muscle mass decreased by roughly 55% each, as they stepped on the podium. The only noted side effects were excess skin, and mental distress. Date of Occurrence: 10/6/2021 Location of Occurrence: Los Angeles, California, USA Follow-Up Actions Taken: Inspection of the locale, the podium, as well as all products (Tanning products, bodybuilding equipment, etc.) used by the competitors revealed no anomalies. Video recordings of the event were taken down, and all witnesses and competitors were administered amnestics. Event Description: Dancers onstage at a concert performed a series of elaborate movements which are anatomically impossible, including several that defied the laws of physics. Date of Occurrence: 21/6/2021 Location of Occurrence: Miami, FL Follow-up Actions Taken: As the event was being broadcast live to local TV stations, large-scale amnestic treatment was deemed useless. Fortunately for the Foundation, no members of the audience seemed to be aware of the anomalous nature of the dance, viewing it as some form of clever trickery. When interviewed, the dancers claimed to have learned the dance from an online video. However, the video in question could not be found. Investigation into the video is still ongoing, and the person responsible for making it has been classified as a Person of Interest. Event Description: During a record-breaking heat wave, a woman was heard to complain about how hot it was. An unidentified man immediately manifested in front of her and began to lecture her on how hot it was where he came from, frequently using the phrase "You don't know what real heat is." After 2 minutes and 17 seconds, the man de-manifested. Date of Occurrence: 2/7/2021 Location of Occurrence: Seattle, WA Follow-up Actions Taken: All witnesses were interviewed and amnesticized. No witnesses were able to identify the man, and no one saw him arrive, leading to the conclusion that he manifested in place. A sketch was created based on the man's description, and he has been labeled a Person of Interest. Event Description: Population within a 2-mile radius of ████████ formed a seemingly temporary hivemind and restrained ██████████████. For the next hour and 37 minutes, they attempt to expose ██████████████ to multiple sources of bright lights ranging from lights from cell phones to 7000 Lumen Halogen lights while restraining and forcibly holding ██████████████ eyes open. Afterwards, the temporary hive mind had subsided, leaving connected members confused and disoriented. Date of Occurrence: 6/7/2021 Location: Noblesville, Indiana Follow-Up actions: All who were involved were interviewed, amnesticized, and taken back to their homes. ██████████████ was both interviewed and evaluated by a medical team, and was noted as being passive, compliant, and having slowed reaction times. Before being amnesticized, ██████████████ was confirmed to have gone colorblind (specifically Deuteranopia). Investigation of the home of ██████████████ is noted have a sizeable amount of sloth paraphernalia. Three members of the defunct MTF Iota-5 have been sent to observe the region for a 4 month time frame to ensure return to normality. Event Description: For a period of 24 hours, all printers and photocopiers located within Site-120 would only print the wikipedia.org webpage for Philosophy, regardless of given printing instruction. Date of Occurrence: 12/20/2018 Location: Site-120, Poland Follow-Up actions: Pages printed during the event disposed of. Event Description: A vending machine began dispensing nothing but SCP-2107, regardless of which button was pressed. After 26 minutes, the machine resumed normal operation. Date of Occurrence: 7-21-2021 Location of Occurrence: Eighth Avenue Station, New York City, New York Follow-Up Actions Taken: Instances of SCP-2107 rounded up and collected. A cover story of the machine being out of order was circulated, and the machine was confiscated. Amnestics were administered as necessary. Event Description: 3 empty plastic bottles began rolling up Monte Lauro at a speed of 2 m/s. 2 minutes later, they accelerated to a speed of 45 m/s. Once they reached the peak, they floated upwards at a speed of 25 m/s. Date of Occurrence: 3-12-2010 Location of Occurrence: Monte Lauro, Italy Follow-Up Actions Taken: Amnestics were administered as necessary. CCTV footage showing the beginning of the bottles' climb was removed and destroyed. Event Description: An as yet unidentified man purchased a bottle of water from a vending machine. Upon landing in the dispensing tray, the bottle became a large swarm of yellow jacket wasps, which violently attacked the man. 1 minute and 23 seconds later, the swarm dispersed. Date of Occurrence: 8-6-2021 Location of Occurrence: Lincoln, NE Follow-Up Actions Taken: Witnesses amnesticized via aerosolized solution. Man treated at a local hospital. Hospital staff provided with a cover story. None of the wasps could be located when the Foundation arrived at the scene. Event Description: A woman named Elizabeth Simmons entered an elevator in a convention center late at night, and was the only occupant of the elevator at the time. However, a completely different woman answering to the name of Jessica Watkins emerged. Date of Occurrence: 9-1-2021 Location of Occurrence: Las Vegas, NV Follow-Up Actions Taken: Hotel searched under the cover story of a missing person. No trace of Elizabeth Simmons could be located. Hotel staff, convention staff, and convention attendees were interviewed, and no one remembered anyone named Elizabeth Simmons. All those interviewed remembered Jessica Watkins having attended the convention instead. Thorough investigation revealed no evidence that Jessica Watkins existed before the event. Note: This particular Jessica Watkins, that is. It's a relatively common name, but none of those found to have existed previously matched the woman's description. - Agent Thompson Event Description: All Foundation personnel viewing their work email accounts from 00:08:08 to 00:09:09 GMT reported observing the presence of several unusual messages from other Foundation staff, all of whom have denied responsibility. Analysis of security footage reveals no obvious discrepancies beyond the reactions of 15 affected personnel, most of whom either contacted technical support or reported a potential cognitohazard and requested immediate amnesticization. Two personnel violated proper procedures and attempted to record the contents of the emails to the best of their ability, though due to its perception-based nature the only extant record is one Post-It Note and its subsequent transcriptions. Remembered email subjects confirmed to possess no infohazardous properties include "Void Duty - Transfer Request", "SCP-2165 Autopsy Report", and several references to rain such as "Blue Rain Memo #004", "Rainfall Increase Data", "D.R.Y.S.N.O. Anti-Rain Cannon", and "Green Rain Memo Due? URGENT". Date of Occurrence: 09/28/2021 Location of Occurrence: Site-40D, Antarctica Follow-Up Actions Taken: All affected personnel amnesticized. Obtained data is currently undergoing testing for infohazardous/cognitohazardous properties. Email systems are online and no software issues have been detected. Event Description: A man appeared with a burst of white light and looked around as if confused. He asked a passerby who was currently the President of the United States, and did not appear to like the answer. He then asked who was King of England. Upon receiving an answer, he produced an item described as "a really fancy-looking phone" from a pocket, tapped on it briefly, and vanished in a burst of white light. Date of Occurrence: 9/30/2021 Location of Occurrence: Times Square, NYC, NY Follow-Up Actions Taken: Witnesses interviewed and amnesticized. Work with Foundation sketch artists produced sketches, but so far no one matching the sketch has been identified. Cover story of a publicity stunt for an upcoming science fiction movie has been circulated. Event Description: All paper documents listing anomalies ranging from SCP-6000 to SCP-6999 had all of its information expunged and replaced with "[ACCESS DENIED]". Date of Occurrence: 10/2/2021 Location of Occurrence: Site-65 Follow-Up Actions Taken: All affected documents have been replaced with backup documents from another Site. Event Description: All pills located in the city of ███████, New Mexico suddenly transformed into live pill bugs. Date of Occurrence: 10/3/2021 Location of Occurrence: ███████, New Mexico Follow-Up Actions Taken: All citizens with prescriptions of any pill medication at any point in time have been amnesticized. All doctors, nurses, and hospital staff have also been amnesticized. Event Description: Students and faculty preformed an entire average school day in reverse. All recordings of the event show any conversation or lecture being in reverse, as well as any physical action. Date of Occurrence: 08/17/2019 Location: ███████████ Community High School, █████ ████, Florida. Follow-up Actions Taken: All witnesses were administered Class A amnestics. All students and faculty appear not to remember the event. ███████████ Community High School is to remain under surveillance until 8/17/2025. Notes: Watching people eat in reverse is unsurprisingly disgusting. I would recommend watching the recordings before eating. -Researcher Vance Event Description: 800 people in ███████ theater screamed at a frequency of 20000 Hz simultaneously, causing glass to shatter and interfered with all electric circuits within a 10 mile radius. Date of Occurrence 9/23/██ Location: Floorsville, Iowa Follow-up actions: Cause of anomaly never determined. Individuals in the theater exhibited no anomalous properties after event. Subjects administered Class-B amnestics. Event Description: A man entered a restroom, looking distressed and acting as though he was being pursued. After approximately 15 seconds, he dissolved into liquid and flowed down a nearby floor drain, leaving only his clothes behind. Date of Occurrence: 23-12-2021 Location of Occurrence: [REDACTED] Hardware, Cincinnati, OH Follow-Up Actions Taken: Witnesses given amnestic treatment. Clothing collected for further study. Testing on the liquid absorbed by the clothing revealed it to be water from Lake Superior. Search of the pockets revealed $1.77 in various coins, one rather faded $2 bill, 6 small shards of obsidian, and a gift card to a clothing store that went out of business in 1996. Event Description: An unidentified man in the uniform of a delivery worker emerged from a solid wall in the restaurant of a five-star hotel. He was empty-handed and was not visibly carrying anything on his person, but insisted he had a package for [12 seconds of unintelligible noises, mostly involving the chattering of dolphins and miscellaneous gurgling]. When this failed to elicit a response from anyone in the vicinity, he repeated himself three times, using the exact same words each time. After no one responded, he shrugged and returned through the wall. Date of Occurrence: 22-2-2022 Location of Occurrence: Miami, FL Follow-Up Actions Taken: All witnesses interviewed and amnesticized. Wall examined, found to be completely solid and non-anomalous. Security camera videos erased under the cover story of a malfunction. Recording of the noises made by the man taken for further analysis. Attempts to discover which business he was working for are ongoing, but made difficult by the fact that the only visible writing on his uniform is in an unknown and as-yet indecipherable script. Event Description: Files containing Foundation training videos had their contents replaced with much more unprofessional, lower-quality videos, consisting of individuals who allegedly are employed by the Foundation reading off virtual slideshows near-verbatim. On average, this quadrupled the duration of each training video. Date of Occurrence: 14/3/2022 Location of Occurrence: Site-79 Follow-Up Actions Taken: Files contained, with new versions of the videos loaded onto Site-79's servers from a backup. However, twenty individuals walked out of the training suite orientation was taking place in, citing frustration at having to watch a two-hour-long video on evacuation procedures (original video was approximately twelve minutes long). Event Description: All writing implements in a school classroom became unaffected by gravity. The effected items resumed their original state after 37 minutes and 24 seconds, when an as-of-yet unidentified woman outside the room sneezed. Date of Occurrence: 17 April 2022 Location of Occurrence: [REDACTED] Elementary, Columbus, OH Follow-Up Actions Taken: Witnesses interviewed and amnesticized; security footage erased. Event Description: A dropped cheeseburger disappeared into the floor as if sinking into some form of viscous liquid. When an attempt to retrieve the cheeseburger was made, the floor was discovered to have resumed normal solidity, making recovery impossible. Date of Occurrence: 5 May 2022 Location of Occurrence: An In-N-Out Burger location in Los Angeles, California Follow-Up Actions Taken: Witnesses amnesticized; security footage erased. Event Description: Culinary staff of the Mercure Hotel began to capture surrounding instances of Rattus Rattus (Black Rat) present around the kitchen, dissected their bodies and incorporated their corpses and organs in various dishes. Customers were naturally horrified when presented with the aforementioned food, while waiters and all other employees were confused to their reaction. Staff eventually regained sanity two (2) hours later. Date of Occurrence: 29-JAN-1987 Location of Occurrence: Mercure Hotel, Lyon, France Follow-Up Actions Taken: Escaping customers tracked and amnesticized. Staff interviewed and tested for cognitive- and mental-disturbances; test results were negative, all employees were amnesticized. Dishes confiscated and incinerated. Establishment was monitored for three (3) years for further anomalies; none reported. Event Description: A telephone in a painting began to ring, with a sound appropriate to the style of the painted telephone. When a night watchman answered, a female voice asked for Tiffany, which happened to be the name of his daughter. When informed that Tiffany wasn't available, the caller announced that she'd call back later and hung up. Date of Occurrence: 22 May 2022 Location of Occurrence: Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City, NY, USA Follow-Up Actions Taken: Since this occurred late at night, very little action was required. The night watchman was interviewed, and seemed to find nothing unusual about having a conversation over a telephone in a painting. Witness was amnesticized following interview and placed under Foundation surveillance in the event of further anomalous activity. Event Description: A plate of spaghetti noodles became animate and attempted to strangle a diner. Witnesses described the animate spaghetti as "absolutely furious", but were unable to articulate what gave them this impression. Despite its best efforts, the spaghetti was unable to do any damage, and became inanimate again shortly afterwards. Date of Occurrence: 16 June 2022 Location of Occurrence: An Italian restaurant in Fresno, CA Follow-Up Actions Taken: Review of security video revealed an unidentified man wearing a stereotypical chef outfit in the kitchen, dusting the spaghetti with an as-of-yet unknown substance. When interviewed, several members of kitchen staff were able to recall seeing him, but were unable to identify either him or the substance. The spaghetti, the tablecloth at the table where the event occurred, and the would-be victim's shirt, were collected for testing in hopes of identifying the substance. Event Description: The heads of all psionic, empathic and emotiokinetic humanoid anomalies within a 50 km radius of Columbus, Ohio, USA simultaneously detonated. As of writing, the total death count is ██, with an additional █ being treated for intense headaches and neurological damage. Investigation into the cause of this is ongoing. Time of Occurrence: May 2nd, 2014 Location of Occurrence: Columbus, Ohio, USA Follow-Up Actions Taken: An investigation of Columbus, Ohio has been launched, examining events that occurred prior to and immediately following the incident, determining potential anomalous activity within the region, and interrogating all citizens of the town. Due to the scale of the incident, large-scale premeditated murder via anomalous means is currently believed to be the most likely cause. UPDATE - 9 May 2014:It was discovered that at 17:20 hours, one John Zimmerman returned to their home after ~10 hours of work at the nearby █████████ Corporation office building. Zimmerman described the work day as having been 'extremely rough'. Once home, Zimmerman proceeded to drop an entire plate of spaghetti on his shoes and subsequently stub his toe during the cleanup. It was determined that Zimmerman stubbing his toe coincided exactly with the deaths of the anomalous individuals. Zimmerman is also noted to have had a history of anger management issues. Zimmerman has been amnestized and enrolled within anger management courses by the Foundation via a front company. Event Description: A human corpse was observed to fall out of the sky. Corpse's appearance is an exact match with person of interest "Dan Cooper" or "D.B. Cooper," a plane hijacker who jumped from a Boeing 727 on November 24, 1971 carrying stolen money and disappeared. Cause of death has been determined as dehydration. Date of Occurrence: 13/08/2022 Location of Occurrence: Tina Bar Beach, Washington, USA Follow-Up Actions Taken: Corpse placed into biological storage. Witnesses amnesticized. Event Description: A drinking fountain dispensed mustard when activated for 7 minutes and 38 seconds, after which it resumed normal operation. Date of Occurrence: 12/8/2022 Location of Occurrence: [REDACTED] Middle School, Rochester, New York Follow-Up Actions Taken: All witnesses were amnesticized. The fountain and attached plumbing were investigated and found to be non-anomalous. Investigation of security video revealed that the only camera with a view of the drinking fountain had suffered some sort of error 10 minutes prior to the event, rendering it temporarily non-functional. Other security videos show nothing of interest at the time of the event. The school has been placed under Foundation surveillance. Event Description: Possible CK-Class Restructuring Scenario have resulted in a total existential erasure of the Sultanate of Mataram, a constitutional monarchy located in the island of Java, Southeast Asia. In its place is the Special Region of Yogyakarta; an autonomous province part of the Republic of Indonesia, while the rest of its former territories become the provinces of Central Java and East Java. Date of Occurrence: 16-12-2021 (Date of discovery, actual event date unknown) Location of Occurrence: Indonesia Follow-Up Actions Taken: One of the major discrepancy noted during annual DEEPWELL catalog audit. All Foundation personnel, assets, and contained objects related to the country have been retroactively subsumed into the Indonesian branch. Discovery of the event by general public or GOIs have been deemed improbable due to the thoroughness of the change resulting in total lack of evidence besides the DEEPWELL documents. Containment deemed unnecessary. Event Description: At around 01:25 AM local time 36 motorists resting in a gas station were awakened and fell into paralysis until 06:00 AM. Eyewitness accounts reported a featherless avian-like entity breaking into the victims' vehicles in succession. The entity enucleated all 36 subjects before escaping into the forest at the conclusion of the event. Date of Occurrence: 29-08-1991 Location of Occurrence: Trans-Sumatra road, Indonesia Follow-Up Actions Taken: All subjects are anomalously resistant to amnestics and are all brought into standard human containment. Cover story of a fatal mass carbon monoxide poisoning followed by a gas station explosion disseminated. Entity is still uncontained. Event Description: Residents of a small town were blocked at local railroad crossing at around 3:20 PM local time lasting approximately 50 minutes to an hour. Lights were seen down the track and a horn was heard but no train ever arrived to cross. Date of Occurrence: ██/12/████ Location: ██████, Colorado Follow-up Actions Taken: All drivers at the location at the time of the event were administered amnestics and crossing barriers were reset. Count of trains running through the area was reduced by 1 to prevent any possible data inaccuracies brought by the false train. Event Description: All red river hogs (Potamochoerus porcus) and depictions thereof were replaced with similar specimens and depictions of an unknown species of hippopotamid called "squonks" or "Realsad boihours" for 38 minutes before reverting back. Squonks engaged solely in loud weeping during this time period, and all tears disappeared following the event. Date of Occurrence: 11/13/2022 Location: Philadelphia Zoo, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA Follow-Up Actions Taken: As this occurred after closing, only █ staff observed the event, all of whom were amnesticized after questioning. Security footage has been confiscated. Event Description: During classes, a brick wall separating two classrooms vertically rotated along its longest horizontal axis over the span of 14 minutes. During this time, the wall was fully intangible. Items overlapping with the wall's spatial position upon it regaining tangibility were spontaneously teleported to the nearest available space. Date of Occurrence: 11/14/2022 Location: ███████ ██ █████ ████ School, Porto Alegre, Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil Follow-Up Actions Taken: ██ schoolchildren and █ staff were amnesticized. All footage of the event, taken on 6 cellular phones, 2 digital cameras, and 1 portable film camera, was seized. No persisting spatial anomalies have been found with the wall or ejected items. Event Description: During the course of a highly classified espionage mission, plainclothes Agent ██ D██████ was approached by an individual who repeatedly and loudly introduced themselves as ████████ D██████-Y███, the supposed future child of Agent D██████. The individual proceeded to make a variety of crass, unlikely, and occasionally contradictory claims of future events, only 05.891% of which will occur, before violently kicking Agent D██████'s crotch with a steel-toed boot. Upon D██████ collapsing to the ground, their attacker spat on the agent and started becoming transluscent while saying "Fuck you, fuck your timeline, and fuck your kids. Sunday morning, December 14th, 2053, mom cries, [REDACTED] pays for your funeral services." The individual then disappeared. Date of Occurrence: 11/14/2022 Location: [REDACTED], Afghanistan Follow-Up Actions Taken: Agent D██████ sustained only minor injuries from his assault and is expected to make a full recovery. Saliva from his shirt has been analyzed and found to bear no close genetic match to D██████ or any high-ranking Foundation staff. As D██████ won't die until ██/██/206█, his attacker is assumed to have been sent by a hostile group of interest with false information to waste Temporal Department or Prognostication Department resources, and D██████ has been informed of this falsehood. Event Description: At the end of ███████████'s final day of business before being shut down, all eight mannequins in the store animated and ran towards the front display window before turning to face the remaining staff and patrons. The mannequins then linked hands and bowed synchronously before deanimating in positions normally impossible for their frames. Date of Occurrence: 22/11/2022 Location: ███████████, a clothing store in █████████, Michoacán, Mexico Follow-Up Actions Taken: Class-A amnestics were dispensed to all staff and patrons and all relevant security footage was seized. The involved mannequins have been contained but have not yet displayed any anomalous properties. Event Description: D-466622 had a dream in which ze interacted with several one-armed, one-legged, vaguely humanoid entities that referred to themselves as "gobs" and was offered a finite supply of free shoes in exchange for hir firstborn son. D-466622 agreed to these terms and immediately awoke under a pile of 73 left-foot Nike shoes of varying size, model, and condition. All dormitory cameras in view of D-466622 show the spontaneous appearance of these shoes between the frames 00:26:48.317 and 00:26:48.333 with minor air disturbances expected from a Type-III translocational mid-air displacement. Date of Occurrence: 05-12-2022 Location: D-Class Dormitory #B-SL401, Bunk C-40 Follow-Up Actions Taken: Testing showed all shoes to be non-anomalous. Due to the lack of matching right shoes and resulting redundancy, all instances were incinerated. D-466622 is sterile, and so is expected to experience no further interaction with the so-called "gobs". Standard Covert Former D-Class Monitoring Procedures will be conducted until 5 years after D-466622's termination of employment. Event Description: Eight individuals with no known similarities experienced grand mal seizures lasting exactly 128 seconds. Upon recovery, all eight reported having experienced roughly two minutes of the lives of random Tanzanian individuals across time periods ranging from 1875 to 2012. Experiences include traveling along the Ruvuma river, celebrating a friend's birthday, entering a refreshingly cool grocery store, giving birth, finishing and beginning to mail a letter to a long uncontacted friend, confessing to an undiscovered crime, purchasing a new vehicle, and tending to an unknown child's wound. Date of Occurrence: 08/12/2022 Location of Occurrence: National Museum of Tanzania, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania Follow-Up Actions Taken: All witnesses amnesticized and footage seized. The eight individuals who directly experienced the event were amnesticized and released following extensive interviews and documentation of the experiences. As of ██/██/2023, four of the eight memories have been confirmed to be mostly if not entirely accurate via testimony from those who originally experienced the memory or various documentation. Event Description: For 26 seconds, all deaf and hearing-impaired individuals in Belo Monte felt an intense sense of paranoia and a feeling as though someone to the Northeast was watching them. Date of Occurrence: 08/12/2022 Location of Occurrence: Belo Monte, São Tomé and Príncipe Follow-Up Actions Taken: All witnesses amnesticized. Relevant seismic data analyzed with inconclusive results. Agent with mild unilateral hearing loss embedded into population in case of future events. Event Description: A falling bowling ball attached to a rope as part of a physics lesson failed to lose any energy until class ended 16 minutes later, thus damaging the ceiling and giving one student in its direct path minor injuries. Date of Occurrence: 13/12/2022 Location of Occurrence: East Lyme High School, East Lyme, Connecticut, USA Follow-Up Actions Taken: Roof repaired and incident misrepresented as a prank. Event Description: An unidentified man was crushed by a fallen piano from unknown origin. Witnesses claim that the individual crawled out from beneath the wreckage, proclaiming "Man, this week can't get any worse!". When said individual tried to leave, a second piano fell on him. No remains were found. Date of Occurrence: 04/11/2021 Location of Occurrence: Outside of █████████ Church, Indiana Follow-Up Actions Taken: All witnesses amnesticized. Debris was found to have no anomalous properties and was incinerated. Area under surveillance for future anomalous events. Event Description: All organisms in the kindom 'fungi' simultaneously ceased the process of decomposition for exactly 15 seconds before resuming their natural processes. Date of Occurrence: 03/03/2021 Location of Occurrence: Earth Follow-Up-Actions Taken: All civilian scientists know to have detect this event were administered Class-G Amnestics. Event Description: All 'Sharpie' brand permanent markers are replaced with nearly identical 'Super Skerple' brand permanent markers within 24 hours of being brought into any SCP Foundation Facility or territory owned by the SCP Foundation. This process occurs through anomalous means. Date of Occurrence: Ongoing since ██/██/████ Location of Occurrence: All Foundation Facilities. Follow-Up-Actions Taken: No action is deemed necessary. + The Following logs are believed to be a linked phenomenon. Access logs? Event Description: A masculine human voice can be heard calling for help in English, French, Russian, and ████ ██████ over the span of two minutes. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/████ Location of Occurrence: Site-██, Level ██, Main Hallway █ Follow-Up-Actions Taken: All personnel who claim to have heard the voice have been amnesticized. No further action is deemed necessary. Event Description: Researcher ████████ trips over what he described as an invisible human body. He tried lifting it, but says that the body wasn't there when he tried to touch it again. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/████ Location of Occurrence: Site-██, Level ██, Unit █, Hallway █ Follow-Up-Actions Taken: Researcher ████████ has been amnesticized. No further action is deemed necessary. Event Description: The lifeless body of an man of undetermined ethnicity wearing a beige-colored trench coat, a beige colored fedora, and a █████ ███ is seen floating in the center of the hallway. All attempts to physically interact with it fail. Use of an NPDN (Non-Physical Displacement Nullifier) had no effect. The apparition disappeared after 6 hours. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/████ Location of Occurrence: Site-██, Level ██, Sector █, Hallway █ Follow-Up-Actions Taken: Hallway quarantined during duration of event. All personnel who may have seen the apparition have been amnesticized. No further action is deemed necessary. Event Description: Two security personnel are found deceased with severe physical trauma. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/████ Location of Occurrence: Site-██, Level █, Utility Room █ Follow-Up-Actions Taken: Personnel replaced. All individuals who interacted with the deceased have been amnesticized. No further action is deemed necessary. - Close logs. Event Description: A woman attempted to jump to her death from the roof of ███████ Manufacturing Plant. She fell upwards into the upper atmosphere where she died due to lack of oxygen and exposure to cold. Date of Occurrence: 1/26/2022 Location of Occurrence: ████████, People's Republic of China. Follow-Up-Actions Taken: Corpse recovered, all witnesses amnesticized. Event Description: The 'Chaos Insurgency March' is broadcast on loop from all speaker and sound systems (electric and analog) within Site-17 for roughly 24 hours straight before ending, with no apparent cause. Many personnel become irritable, and employee morale is notably diminished as a result. Date of Occurrence: 1/20/2022 Location of Occurrence: Site-17 Follow-Up-Actions Taken: Higher broadcast and reception security instituted at Site-17 Event Description: Locations of anomalous objects stored in Storage Site-82 were spontaneously "scrambled," resulting in increased difficulty in locating specific objects. Date of Occurrence: 2/2/2023 Location of Occurrence: Storage Site-82 Follow-Up-Actions Taken: Deployment of multiple Scranton Reality Anchors and increased surveillance. Event Description: 3 lampposts were replaced with Windows 10 error messages saying "Lamppost.STL not found". They subsequently disappeared 3 minutes later. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/████ Location: Boston, Massachusetts, U.S.A Follow-up Actions Taken: All witnesses issued Class A amnestics. Lampposts were replaced. Event Description: ████ ███, a male subway passenger, aged 38, after exiting a train car, suddenly went pale, succumbed to a fit of coughing in which his eyes and nose began bleeding, and collapsed onto the ground in a seizure, before dying at a time of 3:15 PM, February 8th, ████. Autopsy revealed the man to be infected with every known pathogen and infectious disease, as well as several which had yet to be discovered at the time of the event, and several which have still not been identified to this day. Date of Occurrence: 2/8/19██ Location: 145th St. Subway Station, New York City, New York Follow-up Actions Taken: Cover story of a severe allergic reaction produced and disseminated. Area quarantined until all bodily contaminants could be cleaned. Body recovered and preserved for ongoing pathological study. Notes: "It really just raises the question: How… How did he get there?" - Dr. Blackstone Event Description: At 11:17 PM, the sound of a foghorn was heard from an empty room of an art museum. Investigation by the night watchman revealed the sound to have emanated from a display with a maritime theme, including paintings of the sea and various ocean vessels. The watchman also claimed to hear bells ringing and people talking in a language he was unable to identify. When he called out asking if anyone was there, all sounds abruptly ceased. Date of Occurrence: 1/31/2023 Location of Occurrence: Denver, CO Follow-up Actions Taken: As the only witness was the night watchman, very little follow-up was required. The watchman was amnesticized and surveillance camera video was erased. The museum was placed under Foundation surveillance in case of further anomalous activity. Event Description: Edward Jacobsen, age 29, emerged from a restroom in a subway station, claiming to have only been in the restroom for 10 minutes. His cell phone's clock function corroborates this claim. However, he had actually been in the room for nearly thirty-seven hours and his disappearance had been reported to police. Date of Occurrence: 2/13/2023 Location of Occurrence: New York City, New York Follow-up Actions Taken: A cover story of a sudden illness which confined Jacobsen to his bed during the time of the event was produced and disseminated. Subway staff were interviewed, but as no one seems to have been aware of anything out of the ordinary involving Mr. Jacobsen, amnestic treatment was deemed unnecessary. The restroom where the event occurred has been closed under cover of requiring renovation due to structural damage and placed under Foundation investigation. Jacobsen has been placed under Foundation surveillance in case of further anomalous activity. Note: Cases like this give me a headache. Sure hope we don't find he was messing with chronotech or some other nonsense he shouldn't have been. - Agent Harrison There is no evidence that Mr. Jacobsen was involved in anything anomalous. - Dr. Hannigan Event Description: A young woman visited her doctor, complaining of itching and burning sensations in the vicinity of her left shoulder blade. Examination of the area revealed a tattoo of several lines of an unidentified script resembling stylized pictograms of deep-sea creatures (including several that seem to depict creatures unknown to science). The young woman has no memory of acquiring such a tattoo, and no tattoo parlors within 50 miles of her residence has any record of such a design. Date of Occurrence: March 3rd, 2023 Location of Occurrence: Cincinnati, OH Follow-up Actions Taken: Photos of the tattoo were taken as evidence, and responding agents were authorized to use anomalous means to remove it. The woman and her doctor were interviewed and amnesticized. The script is currently being studied by Foundation linguists, in hopes of identifying and potentially translating it. Event Description A man was reported holding a cross and pointing it at a woman, screaming multiple prayers of exorcism in Latin. Upon saying the word "Amen," the woman spontaneously combusted, and nimbostratus clouds began to appear over the town, completely blocking out the sun and causing it to rain blood for 24 hours. The blood has not been identified and de-manifested after cessation of the event, and the man has not been located or identified since. Date of Occurrence 03/07/2023 Location of Occurrence ██████, Texas Follow-up Actions Taken: The town was amnesticized and videos taken during the event were removed from all media. The town has been placed under surveilance for further anomalous activity. Event Description: One Sus domesticus1 slowly transformed into a Megaptera novaeangilae2 over the course of fourteen minutes even after its death six minutes in due to the crushing of its organs under its own weight. Similar transformations simultaneously occurred with ███ kg of pork sourced from the same farm. Date of Occurrence: 2023-03-27 Location of Occurrence: █████████, Missouri, USA Follow-Up Actions Taken: All whale products removed and transferred to Site-25 for analysis. Amnestics distributed to ██ witnesses. Event Description: A non-anomalous specimen of Equus ferus caballus3 manifested behind a child at their birthday party. The aforementioned horse was only noticed by other people as the child turned around and saw it, and several individuals promptly called emergency services, alerting the Foundation to its presence. Date of Occurrence: 12/03/2023 Location of Occurrence: ████████, United Kingdom Follow-up Actions Taken: All witnesses were interviewed and amnesticized. The specimen was put into a nearby ranch, under the pretense that, as park rangers, the group had captured a wild horse. POI-████, who had made the birthday wish, was put under watch for any future developments. Note: Before we amnesticized the group, the birthday girl came up to me and thanked me for the pony. Guess wishes do come true, after all. -FA Thompson Cut the sappy shit, Thompson. Get back to work. I better not see any more notes from you until we get this mess in Vancouver cleaned up. - Senior Researcher Ivan Maddock Event Description: A farmer called the police to report a large and sudden appearance of light, when embedded foundation agents responded to the call and found a 5-year-old girl was found in the middle of a field, surrounded by a group of bright lights. When questioned, the girl said that "The angels saved me." It appears that she was physically incapable of reporting any other information regarding the situation. The angels demanifested shortly after, leaving a note behind. So far, the note has yet to be deciphered, but one of the agents who read it were able to understand it fully, and brought the girl to their wife, who has been able to raise the child. Date of Occurrence: 11/09/22 Location: ██████, Oklahoma Follow-up actions taken: The farmer was amnesticized and the girl was allowed to live with Agent I███ ██████'s wife. The family was offered financial support and are to be monitered 24/7 for potential danger from external forces. Event Description: Approximately [REDACTED] unindentified corpses were found floating in a circular formation in Lake [REDACTED], Central Java, Indonesia. Before the Foundation were able to mount any response, a GOC-Indonesian joint task force bombarded the site with heavy artillery, multiple airstrikes, several eigenweapons, and an orbital kinetic strike for the duration of 3 days. Date of Occurrence: 07/06/2007 Location: [REDACTED], Indonesia Follow-up actions taken: In cooperation with GOC, mass amnesticization and disinformation campaign was conducted after the event. Subsequent testing found no other anomalous event or item in the area. Event Description: All members of Site-19 gained temporary noospheric focus for the period of approximately 777777 microseconds. Date of Occurrence: 07/07/2017 Location: Site-19, [REDACTED] Follow-up actions taken: This event was not noticed until a scan by Foundation noospheric fluctuation detectors showed a massive surge in thought based focus at Site-19. This event is currently under investigation. Event Description: Intercontinental ballistic missile test resulted in the launch of a single firework, which flew out of the silo and exploded in the colors GoI-5869 ("Gamers Against Weed"). Original missile presumed stolen, location unknown. Date of Occurrence: 04/18/2023 Location: Missile Silo, Paektu Mountain, Democratic People's Republic of Korea Follow-up actions taken: Witnesses amnesticized. Event scrubbed from records. Investigation ongoing. Event Description: Whilst being escorted to his quarters, D-5810 suddenly vocalized “I'm just not sure it's worth it anymore.” before spontaneously combusting. D-5810 was reported to seemingly be unaffected by the fire and to have maintained eye contact with all witnesses simultaneously before expiring due to smoke inhalation. Fire continued until remains were reduced to ashes. Date of Occurrence: 04/19/2023 Location: Site-322, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States of America Follow-up actions taken: Remains properly disposed of. No further actions deemed necessary. Event Description: For ten (10) hours and twenty-eight (28) seconds, the town of Zurich, Indiana, became a legal canton of the Swiss Confederation (Switzerland). Inhabitants manifested Swiss passports, reportedly spoke English and Romansch. An Indiana National Guard Armory was replaced with a Swiss Army Depot, protected by a force of Swiss soldiers equipped with Swiss vehicles. A small border checkpoint welcomed "Our American Friends and Neighbors." Foundation monitors reported the anomaly whilst observing a local Indiana television broadcast interviewing "residents of our shared border with Switzerland." Upon cessation of event, all anomalies returned to normal, with no apparent memory of the event in Zurich, Indiana. Notably, however, population of the town had increased by approximately 2.5% - all individuals so manifested were non-anomalous, but claimed to be of Swiss ancestry. The event was not remarked upon nor reported elsewhere in the United States, and the Foundation has found no evidence of Swiss awareness of the event - at least none after cessation of anomaly. Date of Occurrence: ██/██/██ Location: Switzerland County, Indiana, United States Follow-up Actions Taken: Inhabitants of Zurich, Indiana issued amnestics. News program reframed as a "Festive Holiday Prank" by locals of Swiss descent. Population records have been appropriately amended using the cover of an error within a birth certificate database. Event Description: The irises of all six workers at ███ ███████'s Bar and Grill briefly turned bright green as they stated in an undetermined accent "The green door holds, regardless of the storm outside." Affected individuals subsequently forgot this event. Date of Occurrence: 2023-05-26 Location: ██████, Montana, USA Follow-Up Actions Taken: Witnesses amnesticized, relevant footage seized. Investigation found traces of seawater under the floor and in all pipes, the origin of which is unclear. The importance, status, and location of "the green door" remain unknown. Event Description: All visible brains turned a vibrant blue for 289 seconds, with no other effects. Date of Occurrence: 2023-05-26 Location: Irkutsk, Russia Follow-Up Actions Taken: 5 surgeons, 25 schoolchildren, 3 teachers, and 9 members of GoI-███ "█████████ ██████ ████████████" amnesticized, relevant footage seized. A tumor removed from resident ██████ ███████'s brain during this period which has retained its coloration has been contained as AO-10409. Event Description: Meteor of unknown mass transformed into ~3000 kg of multicolored glitter while descending through Earth's atmosphere. Date of Occurrence: 2023-05-26 Location: Over much of the southern half of Lake Kivu and the surrounding area, Democratic Republic of the Congo and Rwanda Follow-Up Actions Taken: Relevant meteor tracking footage seized and replaced, fake meteorite placed appropriately. Cover story 095C "Illegal Waste Dumping" enforced, and actions are underway by local authorities to remove remaining glitter. ███ kg of glitter have been obtained from the scene and show no anomalous properties. Event Description: Upon leaving his place of work for the day, a man made motions that suggested he was grasping and turning a door handle. A seemingly ordinary wooden door manifested in empty air, which he opened and walked past as though entering a room. Upon passing the door, he disappeared, as did the door when he pulled it closed. He was later found at his home, having apparently entered through the front door. Date of Occurrence: 2023-05-29 Location: Cincinnati, OH Follow-Up Actions Taken: Security footage siezed and replaced. Witnesses interviewed and amnesticized. Curiously, no one present seemed to find this unusual. It was generally agreed that he has done this before, but no one was able to specify when or how often it had happened in the past. The man has been placed under Foundation observation. Footnotes 1. Domesticated Pig 2. Humpback Whale 3. Domesticated Horse

Transcript of Autopsy 3-12-2015AC "All right. This is Dr. Jack Bright, recording autopsy 3-12-2015AC. Subject is a humanoid male, age indeterminate. Subject is believed to be James Halforth, also known as Agent Alto Clef, or <a sharp whistle is heard.>" "At this time, identification is impossible through means of retinal scans, as subject's eyes appear to have melted out of their sockets. Fingerprints are likewise missing due to flame damage. Dental records are conversant with those of Dr. Clef. Several tissue and bone marrow samples have been taken, revealing a DNA match. At this point, I would offer odds that there is a 90 percent probability that this is the corpse of Alto Clef." "External observation shows the subject has received fourth-degree burns over ninety-seven percent of his body. In many places, subject's clothes have melted into his flesh… this is kind of icky. What? Yes, I know I'm supposed to be professional about this, but you're the guys who insisted I do this autopsy! It's not my field, you know…" "…What risk of memetic infection? Oh, fuck you guys. Fuck you guys hard." "Right, cracking him open now. Smells kind of like roast pig. Oooh, yup, he's good and steamy on the inside. All major organs are roasted and black. It appears, hold on, let me make a cut. Yes, it appears as if the subject would have asphyxiated before burn trauma would have killed him. Hold on, whats this?" "There is an anomalous object in the subject's stomach. Object appears to be a metal ball, approximately seven inches in diameter. Hold on, let me, yup, there is a hinge, opening it up. Object is hollow, and contains a sheet of paper, which is addressed to… me. Of course. Letter reads:" "Jack I had to do it this way. I'd heard the rumors. I knew the O5s were going to try and promote me. I couldn't stand the idea of being stuck there, not actually doing anything, weighed down by paperwork. I know it works for you, but it's not me. In the end, I had to go out the way I lived, doing things no one else would think of. In the end, it was obvious. 682 WANTED us to destroy him. He was stuck, and couldn't go on as long as he was in this form. So, I talked to him, and figured it out. The whole lizard thing, it was just a cocoon. I'm sorry about what this will end up doing to 001, but, in the long run, I just don't care. Goodbye Jack, don't let them drag you down. Alto Clef." "…" "…" "No, no, it's just dust or ash or something, in my eye. You know what? I'm done here guys. This was Clef. He was a damned good agent. And I'll miss him. Tell the O5's we're not burying him at Site Omega, there just isn't enough left to be useful. And he deserves to rest."

Agent Strelnikov sat in his office, reading the latest reports on the recent round of tests on SCP-682. Nothing unusual. A few (actually, not so few) D-Class deaths, and a near-escape by that damned lizard. Typical. As he finished reading the section on the proposed use of other Keter SCP's when he heard a single *THUD* on his door. It was too hard to be a knock, but too light to be an attempt at entry. If nobody wanted to see him, and nobody was trying to kill him, what was it? As usual, he answered the door with a loaded Makarov. Nobody stood outside the threshold. But there was a note stuck to his door by a small length of duct tape. Raising an eyebrow, he took the single sheet of 8.5" x 11" paper. What he read made his eyes go wide. Wide with a burning, intense hatred, easily enough to scare even the most threatening SCP. Dear Agent Strelnikov: Exactly one mile north from the site 19 entrance is a cache of exactly 144 bottles of Rodnik Gold Vodka. In case you don't know (which I highly doubt), this is some of the most expensive, authentic Russian Vodka on Earth. Do not use a vehicle to get to it. Do not use an SCP to get to it. I'm watching. You MUST get there on foot. If you DO violate these rules, I will detonate the entire cache using ten whole pounds of C4. Oh, and there's a time limit: 4 minutes from the very second you set foot outside of this facility… or KABOOM. No vodka for you. Happy April Fool's day. Wasting not a second, he snatched his Soviet-era military uniform hat, placed it atop his head, and raced to the main entrance of site 19. He knew that those in Olympic-athlete condition could run a 4-minute mile, and while he was certainly in great shape, he was no olympic athlete. But, knowing what was at stake… he ran as a man on some abominable mixture between cocaine and meth. Rushing straight through the exit's security checkpoint, he drew a small amount of fire, but was sprinting at such speeds, that the guards barely had time to aim. He burst out of the site, the image of a 4-minute countdown glaring in his mind. tick-toc He dashed through the area, going in a nearly impossible straight line. A straight line north. tick-toc Two minutes, twenty-eight seconds. He felt it. He pressed on. tic-toc One minute, four seconds. He felt his legs beginning to succumb to the pain of lactic acid production from the lack of oxygen. But the prize was in sight. A crate with the word 'RODNIK' emblazoned on the side. On top was a relatively small object with a timer on it. tic-toc Sixteen seconds. Only a 120-foot sprint lay between him and his prize. He was going to make it! He was going to- Boom. "No." thought the man. "No! I followed the rules of bullshit! Son of bitch, what did I do wrong?" He began to sob… "What… did… I… do… WRONG!?!?" Then, Dmitri Arkadeyevich Strelnikov fell headlong, unconscious from the massive effort of his mad dash. Two figures watched from a distance through a pair of high-powered spotting scopes. "You have done… well enough." said the first, in a deep, purposefully strained voice. "I got the job done right." said the other, a hooded man, a hint of anger in his voice. "Don't tell me that like it didn't go as planned." "You shouldn't speak to your superiors that way. It could get you terminated." "That's bullshit, and you know it. As strict as Foundation regulations are, I refuse to accept that even the lowest non-D-class personnel are that expendable." "Perhaps you're right… perhaps you aren't. Either way, we have the results we needed to see. Strelnikov can be easily manipulated into acts of greater-than-normal feats of human physical prowess with the promise of valuable alcohol." There was a short pause. "…particularly vodka." "I don't understand why you needed an experiment to know any of this. It's pretty much Foundation-wide knowledge." "Perhaps. But did you really think that he could do this? A mile in under four minutes is nearing super-human." "…to tell you the truth? No. Now I have one question for you." "Shoot." "…why did you detonate the cache before he got to it?" "It was empty. He would have died of pure disappointment, most likely, if he found he put in that much effort for nothing but an empty crate. He's probably extremely disappointed as is, but if he knew there was nothing in the first place…" "You O5's are sick bastards." "It's pretty much a pre-requisite for the job." The hooded man began to walk away. "Don't forget…" called the O5, "…speaking of this to anyone other than an O5 is grounds for termination." The hooded man simply got into a black car, and drove away. The O5 smiled, and walked over to a seemingly-innocuous boulder. "I'm alone.", the now-female voice called. The rock shimmered, and disappeared, the holographic projecting device recognizing the shut-off command. In its place was a crate marked 'RODNIK'. "Ah, yes." cooed the O5. "And now, for some time to myself, alone with my ill-gotten gains. They don't pay us enough for this damn job…" she complained, using a crowbar to pry the top of the crate open. "We're administers for one of the most powerful shadow-organizations to ever exist, and what do we get paid? A measly-" "You are not alone." came a rough, thickly-accented voice. "You are dead." That O5 never reported in to the Foundation the next day. Nor the next day. Nor the next day. Or even the day after that. In fact, she was never heard from again. After a month of searching, the other O5's decided that the Foundation's resources were best spent elsewhere. A new O5 was chosen, and things resumed, more or less, as usual. Nobody asked Agent Strelnikov where he got the massive crate of Vodka that day.

I'm in a crowd, in front of a stage. Not sure where, but it doesn't matter, just that it's dark. Up on the stage I can tell there's a band. Just noodling a bit, sounds like, till the drummer counts off, and that familiar bass line kicks in. The lights slowly go up over the band, punctuated by a spotlight on the harmonica player at his entrance. The crowd is grooving, but I'm transfixed by the harmonica player. An odd sense of familiarity about him. It couldn't be, but…. He reaches the front of the stage, where a microphone stand is waiting for him. "All… my… friends… know the low rider…." That voice… it's unmistakable…. "Low… Ri… der… is a little higher!" And he goes back to the harmonica. Who knew Fernand could play the harp too? Suddenly it's the second verse, and he's looking straight at me. Like he's serenading me, and grinning the whole time. "Low… Ri… der… drives a little slower…. Low… Ri… der… is a real goer!" Then, by God, he winks at me. … And usually, by this point, I wake up in a cold sweat, and swear off deep-fried butter with bacon. Again.

Dr. Iceberg wove his way down the hall on a makeshift I.V. crutch, with Dr. Gears limping alongside. Most of the security teams and cleaning crews had already passed, so they had the hall to themselves, which was probably for the best as neither was too stable. Iceberg had his hand clamped over his chest, and wheezed every few steps, flecks of blood dotting his tattered clothes. Gears stood straighter, but tipped hard to the right with each step, a slow, steady stream of blood leaking from a wound in his thigh on his tattered, scorched left side. They walked, two scorched, broken, bleeding men in an empty hallway, stumbling and weaving to the Infirmary and leaving small patches of blood and burnt material behind. The officer on the security cameras for that area took almost no notice, logging only “Doctors passed, injured.” The request form read “Application testing for possible military/decommissioning via thermal and H.E. materials”. It should have read “Dr. Iceberg throws bombs at things”. Being as explosives, triplicate oversight reports, and chocolate bars were his three major passions, this shouldn't have been as bad an idea as it was. Things were going well while the conventional explosives were still being used, but when Dr. Iceberg started using his “home brew” devices, things rapidly started to go less well. Several explosions were forceful enough to receive complaints from Site Security, while the second-to-last device caused some major damage to the outside walls of the test chamber. However, much like throwing a football in the house next to a breakable vase, “blow things up” is a game that is fun right until the last time it's played. The last toss was an item labeled on the test manifest as a “Slowbomb”. It seemed to be a dud at first, the wire-wrapped cube sliding harmlessly to a stop at the far end of the chamber. As the two men watched from what they felt was a point of safety, the device slowly started to distort, then rip apart, showing a white-hot mass of roiling plasma inside its structure. It expanded like a flower opening in a dream, moving an inch every ten or twenty seconds, a slow-motion explosion. It was as the rapidly swelling wall of flame started to march past the “safe beyond this point” line that Iceberg's manic grin started to fade. The next slice of time was hazy to both men. Dr. Gears was able to recall slightly more details, but most of it boiled down to flames, alarms, men in containment suits, and the strong smell of frying pork. Both were funneled out to triage, made capable of walking, then sent down to the infirmary under their own power. The Walk of Shame is a very different thing inside The Foundation, and Iceberg was especially glad that the hall was empty. Gears, as always, was impassive, and except for the bodily damage and limp, appeared basically unchanged from when he entered the testing room. As they approached the infirmary Iceberg wondered, for the thousandth time, if he really was some kind of robot. The infirmary admitted them with a minimum of notice, as they were dealing with the after-effects of a light bulb that, when powered up, emitted light that caused most bones to start to liquefy and extrude through the sweat glands. Neither of the two doctors were overly injured (by Foundation standards), so they quickly found themselves in hospital beds and nearly forgotten as the team rushed to deal with newer and stranger injuries. As Iceberg fingered at the cool gel patch covering a nasty burn on his right arm, he looked over at Dr. Gears. Impassive as always, his leg was wrapped in a soft cast and elevated, with several small gauze patches on his face, neck, and arms in varying shades of red, pink, and black. Iceberg winced a bit, feeling something mildly fractured shift in his chest, and nodded to Dr. Gears. “Ahh…sorry about that, again. I…really didn't expect it to get that out of hand, honestly.” Gears nodded slightly, still facing the ceiling. “There is no need. Accidents happen.” Iceberg leaned back, sighing as the pain killers started to pull him down in to deep, dreamless rest. He woke with a groan to the sound of tapping. Gingerly shaking his head to clear it, he turned to see Dr. Gears tapping with a stylus at the screen of a tablet laptop. He seemed ignorant of Iceberg, or at least uncaring, so Iceberg decided to try and see how sitting up would go. The first flex of his abdomen brought a lancing comet of pain arcing through his chest, so he rapidly decided to postpone any testing and fell back with a groan. Gears finished, carefully placing the computer on a side table and nodding to Iceberg. “You were asleep when they changed your wrappings. You won't be able to move in any serious way for two days. I will be unable to walk for four days, and have had to reassign our schedules to others.” Iceberg sighed, closing his eyes as he eased back on the pillow. Two days of hospital food and company with a man who's been accused of being a robot multiple times, rarely in jest. Lovely. He passed some time daydreaming, mentally working out the kinks on the Slowbomb until he started feeling restless again. He turned again to Gears, watching him stare at the ceiling, arms crossed, breathing regularly. “Hey Gears…are you awake?” he asked, hoping he wasn't sleeping with his eyes open again. He knew it was just a trick you could learn, but with Gears, it was just creepy. The tall, thin man turned his head slowly to look at Iceberg, face nearly immobile but for his mouth. “Yes, Dr. Iceberg, I am. What is it?” Faced now with the older man's full attention, Iceberg suddenly felt oddly uncomfortable and unprepared, as if he'd suddenly been called on to answer a question while he'd been daydreaming. “Uh…well, I was wondering…why do Kain, Agent Fritz and that one tubby janitor always call you Cog?” Dr. Gears stared a few moments, blinking slowly. “Your last name is not Dr. Iceberg, correct?” Iceberg blinked, taken off-guard, before stammering, “Y-yeah…I mean no…or, I mean, yes, that's not my last name.” Gears nodded, making a small gesture with his hand. “It is an alternate identification designation assigned by Site Security. Policy on this topic has been in a near-constant state of flux, both due to alterations in administrative staff, and planned security cycling. Most of the identification designations are picked at random, with some following a set assigning protocol. Some also appear to have been chosen as a form of 'gag' or 'inside joke'. However, this was not always the case.” He paused, taking a breath, and Iceberg kept totally silent. This was the longest non-work or survival related conversation Gears had ever engaged in with Iceberg, and he didn't want to break the spell. “During my intake, the security protocols were still being derived from old military designations and acronyms. My initial designation was 'C.O.G.', derived from the initials of my name. Later, when a determination was made that this was too much of a security weakness, my designation was altered to 'Gears', most likely due to my extensive work on SCP-882 and the similarity to my previous designation.” Iceberg sat, processing a moment before speaking. “Wait…so…Cog is your initials? So what is your actual name?” Gears blinked several times slowly, still watching Iceberg, and the young man knew that no answer was forthcoming. He changed tactics, hoping to probe for more information, the exercise taking his mind off the pulsing pain in his side. “Alright, so…Gears, honestly, are you a robot? Or like…a Vulcan or something? You have to admit you're not really…ah…normal.” Dr. Gears laid back, resting his hands on his chest. Iceberg was expecting silence, or his methodical, mechanical “I am not a robot.” reply that really did nothing to help. Instead, Gears drew in a breath slowly, and explained. “My mental peculiarities are somewhat sedate when compared to the various emergent coping mechanisms developed by other staff members. However, I can understand how mine are particularly noticeable. No, I am not a 'robot' or any other form of altered human, or non-human.” He paused, blinking several times, before continuing. “I simply…adapted too well.” Iceberg watched the older man reclining in the hospital bed, confused. He could almost swear that Gears seemed…conflicted, or even depressed. He was about to ask, when Dr. Gears started up again. “I am not an emotionless robot. I feel. I feel pain and sadness at the loss of a friend. I feel joy when achieving a positive goal, and regret when falling short. I feel fear, even horror, when faced with things capable of great harm, or worse. It is not that I can not feel. It is that I can not respond to it. Much like the feeling you have when on powerful narcotic pain killers, I am aware of my feelings, and what I am supposed to do with them, but they feel distant…disconnected. Like seeing someone crying, and feeling a slight empathy for their plight, but not being moved to tears yourself.” Iceberg sat, slightly stunned. His damned imagination ran off almost instantly, trying to conceive of going through everything he had already been pushed through…but this time, unable to react. Feeling all the pain, and joy, and fear, but being locked away with it, like a lunatic in a rubber room. Observed, logged, then forgotten. Iceberg shuddered, unable to look directly at Gears for a time. When he finally looked back, Gears was still staring, and Iceberg had to repress another involuntary shudder. He was about to ask another question when a nurse came in and carted him off for some blood tests. He was also informed that an oversight committee would be looking in to his explosive research at the end of the month. By the time he made it back, Dr. Gears was already asleep. The next day Iceberg woke up late, and to his great joy was able to move with a minimum of blinding pain. The bed next to him was empty, and Iceberg looked at it thoughtfully. Since being recruited by The Foundation (fresh from college, no less), he'd been paired up with Dr. Gears almost constantly. He'd been very scared at first. Many of the new recruits reacted with varying degrees of fear, awe, and pity when he told them his new assignment, which did nothing for his already limited confidence. What's more, it took months to realize that Gears didn't actually hate him, that it was just his default setting of total indifference. Even worse, they kept getting assigned to the worst jobs…he still shivered to think about his first run-in with an SCP-882 breach. Still, after all this time, he knew next to nothing about Dr. Gears. Many of the other staff were pretty vocal about who they used to be, and some even were allowed a semi-normal life outside the site. Gears, however, was a black box. No idle conversation of the past, no hidden tokens or photos in the desk (he'd checked), no…anything, really. Never leaves the site except for Foundation business, never takes any time off, never engages in any non-work activity unless forced to. What was even stranger was that NOBODY knew anything about him. Even the classic busybodies around the site had no real clue who he was, and the database became a large, password-encrusted tower of doom when asked about Dr. Gears. The sharp click of the door brought Iceberg back to reality quickly. Gears hobbled slightly as he worked his way to the bed, laying down and adjusting a bandage at his side. He spoke to the ceiling, not a gesture or look for the man he was addressing. “I am being released early. You will need to remain here for another day, but I expect you to be ready to resume your duties as soon as you are released.” Iceberg sighed, shaking his head and looking away. Silence drew out for long moments before Iceberg turned, looked pointedly at Gears, and said “What the hell happened to you? I mean…what the fuck, man? You're goddamn Spock but without those little lapses of human feeling…did they experiment on you, did you have a breakdown, what the hell?” As Gears stared at him, Iceberg became acutely aware of the fact that what he had just said may amount to insubordination or “unauthorized security probing” of a level where “large men with guns” is the most comforting portion of the disciplinary measure. The two men stared for what felt like a long time, Iceberg almost unwilling to blink, feeling a creeping measure of fear on par with reviewing security tapes of SCP-173. After a time, Gears blinked, slowly, and nodded. “What happened. I have been asked that multiple times, and I know of many more theories to this effect. What happened…was nothing unique. Nothing that is impossible to repeat, or hasn't happened to others. It is easy to assume that there was a single 'defining moment' in the transition to my current state, but I do not believe this to be so. It is… gradual. Like a sickness. After a time, you simply wake up… different.” Iceberg shook his head, processing this new tidbit. “Okay…so you just… declined, I guess? Jesus… I mean… how the hell does something like that happen? You still haven't said what actually happened, what started this…” He trailed off as Gears turned to stare at the younger man again. “Are you loyal to The Foundation, Doctor Iceberg? I assume you will reply in the positive, but think before you respond. I am loyal, but not because of a sense of duty or empowerment. I believe, fully, in the work being done here. I believe that, without The Foundation, humanity as we know it would crumble in a very short time. I believe that we, the few with the resources and means to do so, have the direct obligation to insulate others from all that we are containing.” The door to the room opened with a small, poorly-oiled and annoying squeal that went totally unnoticed by Iceberg. Even as a young-ish doctor entered and started reading off discharge information in the general direction of Dr. Gears, Iceberg still heard little. Unsettling ideas were bumping around, unpleasant recollections of tests ordered and observed… of instances where the “greater good” overwhelmed normal human decency. Moments where he knew, for a fact, that he should be repulsed… or frightened… or at least unsettled, but felt only mild interest, at best. He snapped back from the increasingly stormy seas of his mind when Gears started to leave the hospital bed, aided by an arm from the doctor. “…why are you telling me this?” he asked. Doctor Gears turned slightly and spoke to Iceberg over his shoulder, his voice carrying that odd toneless quality again. “In regards to your request in relation to our future work, you may find the literature I mentioned enlightening. In addition, there is an epitaph in Tasmania, Australia that may prove useful as a motto or guide stone. I will expect you to report in for new assignments as soon as you are discharged.” The young-ish medical doctor looked between the two others, slightly confused and wary, but continued to help Gears from the room. Iceberg was left alone in seconds, both unsettled and deeply confused. It wasn't until days later that Iceberg got the chance to try and investigate the rather cryptic message. Gears had mentioned nothing more about anything he had said in the hospital, and Iceberg had found himself deluged with paperwork and solo testing. He had barely spoken to or seen anyone for nearly two days, and finally decided a little investigation might break up the tedium. It took only a little prodding to find what he was looking for, but it took more time to process: "As you are now, so once was I As I am now, soon you shall be - Prepare yourself to follow me." Iceberg sat alone in the deepest bowels of the underground site, surrounded by mounds of neatly typed records of horrors and atrocities, and tried very hard not to feel cold.

Randy Bragg's arms still hurt from the morning pushups he had recently resumed. He had to do something, after all. Even if it meant that his food might not last as long, that the precious, life-giving fat around his belly and thighs might burn away a little faster, he had to do something. It had been at least a week since he'd fired the last few rounds out of his rifle, killing the last of the invaders he'd found lurking around the door to his basement. Their yellow faces and black eyes stared at him still, every time he looked through the tiny slit in the wall. There were no bacteria left to eat their dying bodies; no crows to feast on their eyes. The world was dead and sterile, as far as he could tell. Bragg knew that the United States had been victorious, though. The few stragglers left behind were those who managed to survive the initial bombs, hiding in their victims homes and shelters, only venturing out when they had depleted the supplies that those visionary few Americans had stocked and supplied for so long, so hard. It wasn't fair that these yellow bastards had come here. It wasn't fair that they had killed his wife and his children, that they had killed his friends and their families with their “clean” bomb. “Oh yes, very clean,” thought Bragg. It had dropped almost directly into their suburb, thousands of air based antiseptics. Those who breathed it died quickly, while those who ate food it landed on killed their digestive bacteria. A bomb that starved you to death! Bragg spat at the ground, letting go of the precious little water that remained. He knew for sure that- “Hello, there!” Bragg nearly jumped out of his skin. In the hundreds of times he'd paced the basement, his opinions rolling through his mind, he'd never seen anyone with him. He was supposed to die down here, the food running out, starving. A post-modern tear jerker. But now… “I'm Dr. Fredrickson,” said the man, extending his hand. “And I'm offering you a chance to save the world.” “What are you talking about?” sneered Bragg. “The world is over. It's all dead out there. The clean kind of dead, where nothing rots and you live with their eyes always watchi- “I know they're all dead ‘out there,'” interrupted Fredrickson, pointing at the door. “I'm talking about further away than that. " For a moment, Bragg harbored hope. Washington? New York? Did they escape? Fredrickson dashed them quickly. "Past the pages, into the real world. I'm going to need as much help as I can get, and you're the only one alive in this book.” The blithe comment had utterly shattered Bragg's composure. You were never, EVER, supposed to break character, not where they could read you. He rushed forward, grasping Fredrickson's… he wasn't sure what. He didn't know that it had ever been described. “It's my lab coat,” said Fredrickson, seemingly understanding Bragg's problem. “Listen, I'm very sorry to break your fourth wall, but it's kind of an emergency. Will you please come?” He didn't know what to say. Other than the occasional flashback, this was all he'd ever known. He had the history of his character: the Korean War, the family and kids, the quickly lost jobs. And the bomb. Of course, the bomb was the focal point of his history. But this place, this abandoned basement, was all he'd ever really experienced. That was all that was within the pages. Bragg shrugged. What else could he do? Sit here and die? He regretfully looked up at the doctor. “The whole world?” he asked. “Oh yes,” said Fredrickson. “Very likely, the whole world.” ‘The whole world,' thought Bragg. ‘So much more than Maple Street…' “I'm in.” Cardiforce was listening, with delight. The chants of the faithful filled the air around him, exacting in their beauty and cadence. "We are His Clockwork Servants! We do the work of His hand! Those who oppose will forgive us when they are made to understand!"1 Their chants filled him with the shriven perfunctory of a man of faith. He watched gleefully as they raised the arc-welders to the wall of the hanger and struck them against the metal. Bragg was staggered by the sight. In front of him, two men who looked almost exactly like Rommel and Patton were talking with each other, describing the different points of entry they might expect and the different prospects for armament they could hope for. Upon seeing Fredrickson, the two men smiled and walked forward. “Who do we have here, Fred?” asked Patton, his white teeth glinting and the ghost of an American flag waving behind him. “Randy Bragg,” said Fredrickson, motioning to the still stunned man. “He should be the last of the ones we can use. He fought in Korea, so he should work out well for you.” “Korea?” asked Rommel. “Why would he fight in that little backwater? Don't the Japanese know how to keep order in their own country?” Fredrickson put one arm around Bragg and whispered in his ear. “Ohnay orldway arway Ootay, got it?” Bragg nodded, turning to ask Fredrickson what might be a good topic, when he found himself suddenly alone. He allowed himself to be shepherded off by the two men, asking him of guns and models from the next few years. "Tell me," asked Rommel. "Who makes the better gun, from your time? The Germans or the Americans?" Patton seemed patently interested in the same question. Bragg stood for a moment, looking from one to the other, unable to really answer much of anything. So he lied. "The British," he said, calmly. Both men looked surprised, looked at each other for a moment, and then broke into laughter. "This one is funnier than the others, Rommy!" roared Patton. "Yes," agreed Rommel, "though he would almost have to be!" The two men laughed loudly, turning away from Bragg. As they walked away, planning the different points at which they expected assault to arrive from, Bragg turned and walked around the battlefield, trying to shake off the haunting almost memories of Korea, trying to ignore the tickling fear than now began to gnaw at him. The door to the large hanger was glowing bright orange now, having shifted from the earlier red. The heat could be felt even at the other side, where the two Foundation Agents were working as quickly as possible, going through every book they could find in their small site, leafing and discarding them with a speed only seen in those who had grown efficient at being panicked. “He's moving quickly,” said Dodridge. “We've gone from two wounded platoons to a full squad of rangers, a Cavalry, and three post-apocalyptic survivors. Are there any left?” “Nothing of use, I don't think,” said Lament. “We've just about run ourselves dry. Let's hope this actually works, huh?” “It had better, or I'm pretty sure we won't be around to care,” said Dodridge, hefting and placing the two dragon-shaped bookends on a small table, sliding the book between them and turning, both men running at breakneck speed. Bragg sat in the dirt, next to one of the other men. He looked, Bragg thought, like he might have been a banker at one time. When the man saw him looking, he turned and smiled at Bragg. "You're one of us, aren't you?" he asked. "One of what?" replied Bragg. "The post-apocers. You look like you've survived the end of the world once or twice." The man smiled at Bragg. "My name's Darren Palanger. I'm from Fallen Monuments, Fallen Gods. Five atomic bombs, one city; which… will… survive!" Palanger laughed, hollowly. "How about you?" "Randy Bragg, from Maple Street. The clean bomb." "Clean bomb?" "Kills all the bacteria, including the ones that keep you alive." "Does that work?" Bragg shrugged. "My author thought so." "And do you?" asked another voice. Bragg turned around and saw Fredrickson standing there. "Do you believe it works?" "I guess I must," said Bragg. "It destroyed everything I ever remember loving." Fredrickson smiled. "Then I have a job for you." “We are his Clockwork servants!” sounded the cry. “We do the work of his hands!” The men in the front were the luckiest, thought Cardiforce, looking toward them with envy. “They will be the first. The first to touch His heart. The first to become one with His body.” He was regretful that he would not be allowed to join them, join in their sacrifice to the true god. With a crack and snap, he saw the door give way, breaking and bucking under its own weight as the flames of His servants blasted through it at last. And then came the gun fire. “Mow them all down!” shouted the Sergeant, yelling through the snapping of shells on metal and flesh. “Kill all the bastards you can!” Bragg found it difficult to concentrate, to remake, as Fredrickson was telling him, the description from the book. The sky had fallen away on one side, with the grim sunlight of earlier being replaced by night. Beyond the opening, glinting and turning, he saw their foe marching forward. He heard their clicking and turning as the bullets scattered some of them backward. He had no gun, though. Only a piece of paper. Fredrickson was looking at him desperately. “Faster, Bragg. FASTER. You must try to remember before the pages. Read into what is implied!” Bragg looked up at him, angry and desperate. “It's not exactly EASY, ya know?” He returned, trying to recall the moments in his author's mind when he'd been crafted, the implication of the device. He was slow, deliberate, in explaining its fall. Methodical in the detonation. Only the range had to be changed, the duration of the effect. Fredrickson had explained this carefully, making sure to mention the several different outcomes of Bragg not being careful. It could mean, after all, no more readers. That didn't make it any easier. Cardiforce ordered his men forward, charging into the room. It was bigger on the inside than the outside, he noted, dismissing the Foundation's trickery as nothing more than an idle illusion. While they hadn't expected any real resistance, they were more than capable of handling anything the tiny outpost could possibly muster. The penitent rushed them, bringing both guns and swords to bear on their attackers. The first lines fell away quickly, but there was no way to anticipate the horses. They charged down on the exposed flank from beyond the building's sides, cutting through the primary force with ease. “For the glory of Gondor!” shouted the lead man, his sword held brazenly aloft. Cardiforce instructed a sniper to shoot him. Bragg finished and looked up, but Fredrickson was already gone. He looked back down to his page, and noted the sudden appearance of Super Fred, the hero of a thousand worlds, catching the falling bomb and vanishing with a dash— A young man was cutting his way through the crowd with a sword much too big, much too sharp to be real. Cardiforce heard it moving through the air, whistling, snicker-snack. However, when the men the boy had beheaded did not stop moving, he was easily removed from the equation. But the whistling did not stop. Cardiforce looked up. There was a man there, plummeting, a white lab coat fluttering in the wind like a cape. Cardiforce assumed, for a moment, that it must have been one of the reinforcements the Foundation was expecting, his entry gone awry. A moment before the man hit the ground, he looked up at Cardiforce, smiling an evil grin. And vanished. Bragg coughed, breathing the noxious purifying gas, feeling it eat away at his lungs. All around him, men were dying, gagging on the weapon he had created. The thing he made from a time before text, when it was only an implied threat and not a real one. He struggled to stand, trying to run away from the deadly, impossible fallout, but he could not. As his eyes finally clouded over, he knew that his body would remain here forever, unchanging, the rot unable to take hold in a place where the bomb had been. Just as he had so many times before, he felt the darkness overtaking him, felt the little lights at the corners of his vision explode inward in a burst of adrenalin, glimpsed for a moment his wife and child standing among those golden refractions. Then, he died. Cardiforce vomited, throwing up a mass of cogs and skin. He could feel them within him, turning slower and slower as His divine grace fled his body. He, like all those around him, had failed. Never before had the church been so close to a goal of this magnitude, and now it was taken away from them. He had decided. Their punishment was severe, their death assured. He reached down and touched some of the metal cogs that had moments ago been his lungs or stomach, crying as they broke into pieces. Then, he died. Fred was in trouble, he knew. He probably shouldn't have let them know he could carry people around, because now they'd be asking for it all the time. Sooner or later, someone would try to write something really helpful or valuable into the book, not realizing that it would lose more than they could imagine outside the confines of the storyland. Everything was much more beautiful in here, much more perfect. Even that silly bomb. But Fred knew that, for a moment, he'd been someone really important. At least, for a short while, he'd been something that mattered. More than just words on a page or casual addenda, more than a footnote. He'd been a savior to the world. Then, he died. Well, not really. Wouldn't that just be a terrible way to end it? Agent Lament smiled as he read the final chapter and closed the book, throwing it into the pile that had been building up at his feet. The far side of the hangar was still a ruined lump of burning metal, but everything else had returned to normal. He opened up his phone and pressed a few buttons, popping his neck as he leaned it over. “Situation?” came the voice from the other side. “Success, Doctor. 423 is capable of exactly what you expected and is apparently highly motivating to those he encounters. Kind of a nice guy, too, once you get past the attitude. We'll have to update its file.” “I'll take care of that personally. Tell him that the copy of the Vatsayana he requested will be delivered shortly.” “Yes, sir.” With a click, he closed his phone and got out the notepad Fred was currently occupying. "You got your book," wrote Lament. "You ever get tired of living vicariously?" He flipped back a couple of pages, looking through his notes intently for new addenda. He saw it, finally, at the bottom of the first page he'd written on. 'Not when that's the only living you get.' Lament picked back through the books 423 had run through, noting how the stories seemed to fall apart. One of them, less than a quarter of the way through, quickly vanished into cursory descriptions of an unchanging room where no one ever lived, and then suddenly fell away into blank pages. He turned it over and looked at it again: The Man from Maple Street. He shrugged and threw it into the pile. Dodridge struck a match, and they were ablaze. Footnotes 1. His Clockwork Servants With Apologies to Yoric

The weather that afternoon was unabashedly foul. The sky was heavy with clouds, the dark grey wetness oozing into everything until nothing was dry. Patches of skeletal, leafless trees stood guard over the miles upon miles of sodden, empty cornfields. The wind blew mercilessly, beating fat raindrops to earth in a miserable drizzle. The winter snows were gone, but spring had yet to appear in its blaze of green glory, leaving the world dull and dead. A dented red pickup truck trundled along the gravel road, splashing through puddles and potholes alike. Inside, a talk show fought waves of static for dominion of the radio. The man who drove smoked a cigarette. The woman riding beside him was loading a pistol. The truck turned off the desolate road onto an even more pitiful driveway, little more than a winding dirt path that crept off into the woods. The trees formed a leaning, claustrophobic tunnel with their gnarled branches, reaching down as if to ensnare the unsuspecting in their grasp. The truck slowed to a stop at the very end of the path. There stood the decaying shell of what had once been a nice, two-story home, now reduced to a pile of creaking, rotting timber and filthy windows. The man turned off the truck's engine, and the two stepped out into the drizzle. Both the man and the woman were wearing blue jeans and camouflage-pattern jackets, nothing unusual for the place and time. The man crushed his spent cigarette under his boot. He was in his late forties, with a neat brown beard, thick eyebrows, and a fluorescent orange hunter's cap on his head. He had gone through many names in his life: currently, he was known as Scarborough. The woman was younger, with green eyes and blonde hair tied into a short ponytail. Her face was sharp and slender, giving it an almost hawk-like, predatory look. “So, this is the place?” the woman asked. “I'll answer that with another question, Montgomery. How often are we wrong?” Scarborough stepped up onto the porch, the boards groaning underfoot. He reached for the tarnished knob and found the door open. Scarborough brandished his pistol in front of him as he stepped into house. The living room was dim and filthy: what furniture there was ancient and moldy, buried under piles of trash and a thick layer of dust and cobwebs. Leaning monoliths of black and white supermarket tabloids stood among the black plastic trash bags, empty beer bottles, and overflowing tobacco spittoons. The stench was easily comparable either to a dead animal, bad plumbing, or a combination of the two. Montgomery's hand shot up to cover her mouth and nose. Scarborough had lost his sense of smell long before. With a silent hand gesture, the two waded through the refuse towards what was presumably the kitchen. The kitchen was hardly better than the living room, though now most of the garbage consisted of old fast food wrappers and beer cans. None of the appliances were younger than twenty-five years old, and none looked to have been actively used in at least that long. The only thing of note was the basement door, which hung open at a crooked angle. A comically large number of extra locks had been installed, up to a heavy-duty deadbolt, though at the moment they were hardly fulfilling their intended purpose. The stairs beyond were a black pit. Scarborough felt the hairs on the back of his neck stick up. It took a second for him to realize the cause of his goosebumps was not any anomaly, but something far more mundane. “Please close that window.” He motioned to the stained window above the trash-filled sink, which was open just enough to let a breeze ruffle the mildewed curtains. Montgomery shut the window, with only minor difficulty in moving it from its stuck position. The ceiling above them creaked loudly. The next ten seconds were breathless, torturous, and silent. When no other sound was heard from upstairs, Scarborough quietly pushed the basement door fully open and felt for the light switch. The two moved into the basement with haste. The stairs were exceptionally rickety, and creaked even under the trained steps of Scarborough and Montgomery. The basement itself was hardly better: a bare pit of concrete lit by two bare light bulbs. Much of it was filled with the omnipresent trash, along with a dented hot water heater, and some everyday piping and exposed insulation. One corner of the basement, however, had been repurposed into what could only be described as the workstation of a rather unhealthy mind. The old wooden desk seemed to sag under the weight atop it. Disorganized mountains of stained manila file folders and worn paperbacks with broken spines cluttered its surface and spilled out onto the floor, all the while hiding a laughably old computer and printer behind their summits. Three corkboards had been set up on the walls: the first was a map of the continental United States with colored push pins stuck in it in numerous locations. From the condition of the map, there had been many removed and re-positioned pins over the course of at least a decade. The second board was filled with plain sheets of paper, all of which were covered edge to edge in either miniscule handwriting or poorly-formatted computer print. The third board was the most notable, filled with tacked-up photographs and sketches. Most of the photos looked as if they belonged in the tabloids sitting upstairs: blurry, unfocused images of ghosts and UFOs and Bigfeet, schematics for free-energy machines and hidden government facilities. Some others were not as easily glanced over: the severed head with a scaly arm sprouting from its mouth. A hazy shot of a massive creature with matted red fur, holding a crushed car over its head. A beached whale, its stomach burst open to reveal a mass of bloated bodies that had begun to crawl across the sand. A man offering a box of chocolates, his face blacked out and a dozen screaming mouths in the background. A blank white room labeled only as “NOTHING”. “Busy fella,” Montgomery said, picking up a file folder and flipping through the magazine clippings inside. “How much do you think is legit?” “Outside of what command verified, I can't say. Most looks to be garbage, but there might be a few bits worth looking into.” “We still have to go through everything when we get back, though.” “Opus semper tecum est.” “Thanks. I thought I was done with high-school Latin.” “You're never done with high-school Latin, Montgomery.” The investigation was interrupted but moments later by a thunderous bang. Scarborough and Montgomery dived to the side, just avoiding the spray of buckshot. At the top of the stair stood an overweight, disheveled man, wearing a stained undershirt and ragged pajama pants. His wild hair was a sharp grey, and he held a smoking nine-gauge shotgun in his hands. “Ha! You think you could break into my house and walk away with my property?!” The man stepped down the stairs, reloading the shotgun. “You can't get past me that easily! Now, I'm going to give you to three to get the hell out of my house…” He was answered by a bullet tearing through his right shin. The man tumbled down the rest of the stairs, landing flat on his back at the bottom with a thud. Scarborough holstered his pistol and walked over to the, gasping, wounded man. “You little shits!” the old man screamed. “I'll have you in chains for this!” “Mr. Malone, you are being extremely unprofessional,” Scarborough said, showing neither excitement nor anger. “I am aware you've had to make some drastic changes in the past, but I would think a man such as you would hold himself in a more reasonable manner than this.” Malone's eyes grew wider, were it possible. The fear behind them was clear and potent. “You're not getting it…you're not getting all my research.” “That's secondary to our purpose here, Mr. Malone. We are primarily concerned with the simple fact that you're sticking your nose into places it doesn't belong, and given your previous connections, that does not bode well with us.” “You…you won't get me to talk. I won't talk.” “Mr. Malone, we did not come here to listen to you: Your little website already told us you've been investigating several items that we've been keeping an eye on. You may have traded in your glass card years ago, but no one ever leaves it all behind, and we just can't afford a slip, Mr. Malone. It's as simple as that.” Malone's mouth worked silently for a few moments. “Foundation bastards…” he wheezed. Scarborough shrugged. “Indeed we are.” BANG —- The beaten red pickup truck rumbled down the road. The rain had stopped, for the time being, leaving wet roads and puddles in its wake. Far behind in the distance, a plume of smoke rose above the trees. Just a wiring problem, in the wrong place, at the wrong time. Nothing unusual in the country home of Mr. Martin Malone, just some faulty wiring. Mr. Malone himself was, thankfully, elsewhere when it occurred, and would not be back for quite some time. The inside of the truck was silent, all save the old, coughing engine and the crackling radio. In the cargo compartment beneath the floor sat several plastic bins, filled to the brim with the recovery efforts. Even working fast, it would take nearly a week for a thorough examination. Montgomery hit the ‘off' button on the radio, interrupting the used car salesman assuring the public that “everything must go!” She brushed a strand of hair out her face. “Well, that went about as well as expected.” “That it did, Montgomery, that it did. The site's down, the hole's plugged, the body's hid, and it looks like there was quite a bit he was keeping for himself. All in all, a job well done.” “I almost feel sorry for the guy, y'know? He went from being a full member of Marshall, Carter and Dark to some nutty backwoods hick.” “He couldn't take the heat, so he left the kitchen. A smart move on his part, though it didn't do him much good in the end. Tene memoria, Malone, mortes hominum causam scientiae, et cautelam omne progredi saepe serviunt.” Montgomery shook her head and smiled. “Now you're just being pretentious.”

Sgt. Mansell looked into the room one last time, his eyes already red from the dust and tears that now streaked his cheeks. The smell of vomit lingered on his clothes with the blood and rot. He felt the clicking and whirring, the turning and buzzing of the device as its cranks and gears began to merge and shift, meshing regretfully. He had, he knew, just completed a monster. He walked outdoors, his body feeling oddly out of sorts. He chalked it up to the surroundings. Trying to ignore the persistently echoing click as he walked, he went back outside to rejoin his unit and help bury the dead. The tests had gone remarkably well. Dr. Sankt was pleased. Very, very pleased. Ever since they'd brought him the first specimen, all screaming and grinding, his work had consumed him. The platoon to first discover the ruins had been searching fruitlessly for another of the Fuehrer's missing artifacts. In spite of the Bloody Spear and the Vestments of the Christ, the tiny madman was dissatisfied and sent squad after squad deep into the deserts of northern Africa, searching. At one time, Sankt had viewed these as futile quests by an arrogant man. But that was before. Before the clockwork man, who had once simply been a creature of flawed flesh, was brought to him. He was one of two to return; the other had, regretfully, been damaged beyond repair by the harsh desert sand. But the other… Sankt didn't have the kind of clearance necessary to know the circumstances which brought the young man to his current state, only that he had been on one of the Fuehrer's missions. The young man had been given to him when the metal began to push through his body and the gears began to tear through his flesh, twisting and flaying. It was, Sankt thought, almost beautiful to watch. Sankt stripped away the remains of its skin with more delicacy than was required, placing each piece in its own sterile container. Long after the screams had turned to bloodless clicking, Sankt labored, until eventually, freed of its prison, the bones of molded copper and the muscles of counterbalances stood on their own. It did only the simplest tasks. Sankt knew after only a short time that it would be mostly useless, incapable of anything more complex than the man that it had once been. So he set it to work pacing, carrying a rifle, back and forth in front of his door, letting it pretend it was still a soldier. It made him feel more secure, at least. Then, Sankt reexamined the flesh he removed from the gears and realized his mistake. The mounds of gristle and skin were metallic, some of them desperately interconnected in a feverish attempt to turn and move. “Of course!” thought Sankt. “How foolish of me. This must be amended.” He contacted his superiors and told them what he needed. Much space would be required, as well as subjects for the testing, and soldiers willing to serve their country. His old friend, Dr. Rascher, had been carrying out his own experiments, and upon hearing what Sankt had discovered, cried out with joy. “Finally!” said Rascher. “We will have our answer.” It was an answer Sankt was more than willing to provide. The first were failures. Sankt knew they would be, so he used his least important subjects: the mentally deficient. They were vivisected, studied, and disposed of in the furnaces. Sankt knew their fates would have been much the same no matter the circumstances. It was the fate of those imperfect. It was the destiny of those not members of the master race. And so the cutting, screwing, and disinfecting did not concern him. After he felt that he understood enough, he brought in the next batch: the Romani. From one of them, he would remove a clockwork liver. From another, a living one. Laying them next to each other, he studied for hours, listening as their previous owners slowly died—one dripping blood, the other oil. When he finally comprehended their relation, he tried transplanting the organs back and forth from body to body. These experiments often failed, but the occasional success kept his spirits up. He knew that soon, he would be ready. It was mid-1944 when he felt confident enough to send for the pianists and violinists. He would, of course, need their hands. So delicate and slender were the gears that his heart nearly broke as he removed them. Then, the artists. Their eyes would be invaluable. The singers he nearly forgot, only remembering them as he carefully screwed in the spinning lips of a poet. There would be no need for a voice, of course, but there was always a need for beauty. After all, Sankt was making a masterpiece; leaving part out would be like cutting the smile from the Mona Lisa—unfathomable. But he knew that his delicate pieces were just that: delicate. He stewed over this for some time, thinking his work lost, until it suddenly came to him. Watching his clockwork guard march back and forth in front of his door, the epiphany appeared—the ditch diggers, the miners, the street sweepers. They could also be a part! He almost felt foolish, thinking back how perturbed he'd been when he almost forgot the singers. How could he make a true masterpiece without everything? Their arms and legs transferred the power down to the smaller gears, carried items along the internal paths, and made it possible for a single man, a single crank, to operate everything! But powerful, skilled hands meant nothing without a mind to drive them. So Sankt sent for the scientists and doctors, teachers and researchers. Their minds were a necessary component and could not be excluded. He struggled with the first subject, not fully seeing how the different parts were truly interconnected, but he persevered. The next was far easier. Eventually, the different parts were laced into the whole, guiding the hands and muscles in perfect, indomitable precision. Close to completion, so near his final, beautiful goal, Sankt was finally confident enough to invite the entirety of the German leadership to his laboratory and show them what his labors had wrought. It was a nervous group who crowded through the halls of the dank, almost claustrophobic bunker under Chelmno. Only one of the German high command had shown up, the others being far more concerned with the war knocking at the front door. However, Sankt had the answer to all their problems. With his device, Germany would be fully capable of defending itself into the unforeseeable future. While the onlookers watched, he placed a pistol into the intake, turning the dial and moving his hand to the crank. He turned it slowly, listening to the perfect rhythm for the first time. He'd known that it would work, known innately that the device would perform perfectly. Each click was the turn of a ballerina, the pluck of a chord, the swing of a mattock, the hypothesis of a dream. Sankt felt as close to love as he ever had. When he stopped, he turned and picked up the gun, rotating it in his hands, examining how its nickel and steel had become gold and copper. He proffered it to one of the senior officers present, who examined it with distaste and laid it aside. “Is that all it does?” the man asked. “What do you mean?” replied Sankt. “Is that all it does? Turn steel to bronze?” “Of course not,” replied Sankt, taken aback. “They do much more, so much more. This is only the first step in a long journey. Now, they can only manage a single kind of transformation, making that which is one thing into another of the same. But soon, very soon, they will be making things better. Improving them in ways we can't even imagine yet! Rewriting literature, correcting mistakes in complicated equations, making new bombs and new religions with equal skill!” The men looked at him, and then to the mass of clockworks behind him. The officer peered at him intensely, painfully. “Then finish it. We need a new god right now.” Sankt labored ceaselessly. There were only a few people left to him, now. His research staff were the first he used, then the last of the emaciated, flawed prisoners. Finally, he began taking the more clever soldiers, interweaving them as best he could. He could no longer afford to be picky. Eventually, he turned to his loyal guardian. He took the gun from its hands, carefully guided it over to the table, and thanked it for the loyal service it had provided before unfastening its still beating clockwork heart. When the Americans finally came, he knew he was almost done. He could feel them approach through the smoke, the fires burning brightly in the furnaces even though most of the guards had either fled or been used. Even though Germany might fall, her labors could still be appreciated. He approached the front guard, smiling and waving his hands. He welcomed them in halting English, asking them for stories of the seemingly distant war. He warned them of the conditions in the camp, tried to explain what the commanders were doing, how they had to contain the infections he had been transferring. They killed him slowly—first cutting off his hands, then his eyes, then his lips. Sgt. Mansell looked at the huge device. He'd seen Big Ben in London before he'd been sent over, and he liked to think its insides were similar. The other soldiers were outside, burying the dead between hoarse, racking vomits. He looked down at the dial in the front, the brass covering around it spelling out rudimentary instructions in English. Laying on the ground, directly below it, was a single cog. Mansell looked at the piece, and then at the device, licking his lips. The place was obvious, it seemed, almost glaring in its inconsistency. Picking up the brass fitting, he lowered the final cog into place and saw the machine shudder slightly, almost in ecstasy. It was finally, terribly complete. As he slept that night, he dreamed of a young woman, beautiful and bright. Sometime in the early morning, he rose, took out his pistol, and walked mechanically into the woods. The shot echoed through the trees, ringing with blood and iron.

Tonight would be the last night of the siege. Gaius Marius Quartius, the Centurion in charge of the fort, had said that for the last three nights, but Titus knew that they couldn't hold out any longer. The Gauls, cursed Gauls, had been at the walls for two weeks, and the simple wooden palisade was scorched and tattered. No, tonight would be the end of it. Titus and the Centurion were perched in the simple wooden watchtower at the north end of the fort, looking out over the sea of Gaul tents. They rarely spoke, the bleakness of their situation. Back when the siege had started, they would make jokes about the Gauls, cursed Gauls. Claim they worshiped black, abominable gods. Tell stories of cannibalism and human sacrifice, anything to dehumanize the enemy, but that had all stopped four nights before. At midnight, or as near as they could tell, when the moon was at its apex, the Gaul chief had ridden forth, screaming a horrible, bone-chilling scream. The guards on duty had fired arrows at him, but they bounced off his flesh. When he got to the palisades, he had climbed them like a ladder, leaving a trail of smoldering wood wherever his feet touched them, and he went into the Roman tents and he killed a dozen men. Exactly a dozen, and he took their heads, and he left, not harming a soul except the dozen headless men and anyone who tried to stop him. The screaming didn't stop till he was back over the wall, back into the camp of the Gauls. Cursed Gauls. Gaius hadn't known what to do that first night, but he tried to keep his men calm, claimed it was a fluke and trying to keep the camp from panicking, but to Titus, he showed a different face. Gaius was afraid. He tried to explain, using words that didn't quite work together and the vaguest of terms. “There were things in this world that are greater than man, and they want us dead, and somebody might be able to stop that from happening, but it isn't us. Tonight will be the last night of this siege.” he said. So the chief came back again, screaming that terrible scream. Nobody got in his way this time as he effortlessly got over the fence, taking another dozen heads and leaving another twelve dead men. And it happened again, and once more. Titus looked out over the sleeping army of the Gauls, cursed Gauls, and he looked up at the moon, which was just about full, and he knew the blackest and most terrible fear. The worst thing about it wasn't the screaming, or the fire, or the blood red rage that soaked his eyes. It was his sword. You see, it wasn't the chief screaming at all. His mouth was stitched shut with brambles. No, it was his sword screaming. A blade made of flesh and bone, with a dozen horrible mouths that screamed to one awful, dissonant chorus. The cuts it made wouldn't heal, and bled unnaturally for days. So much as a scratch… That scream went up, and Titus ducked down, trying not to be seen, trying not to cry, but it was different this time. There were more horses than just the one. Fearing the worst, Titus stood, and saw them. A dozen men, Romans, riding black horses were racing towards the chieftain. Each man wore a white tunic with the head of the Gorgon Medusa in dark red, and they carried swords and spears. Two at the back carried an ornate wooden box between their two horses, inscribed with golden text. The Roman horsemen were upon the chieftain now. Where their swords touched flesh lightning arced, and their spears were sheathed in fire. He fought hard, long after an ordinary man would be dead a dozen times over, but they took him apart. First his legs, and then his arms, and then head. Titus was overjoyed, and stood to shout to the rest of the legion, but he caught sight of one of the Roman horsemen's face, and he stopped. The man, moving the severed leg of the chieftain to the ornate golden box. He looked Titus straight in the eyes for a fraction of a second, then looked away in shame. Minutes after they arrived, the Roman horsemen took the boxed remains of the Gaul chief and rode away, and Titus was aware of another scream. Not the terrible scream of that horrible blade, but the scream of ten thousand angry men. “They weren't here for us. Steel yourself, child.” Gaius Marius Quartius said, readying his bow. The Gauls, cursed Gauls, rose up like a giant wave and crashed against the walls of the fort. Tonight would be the last night of the siege.

“He stood his ground when facing an entity forty times his size. I can respect that.” “He died.” “Yes.” James nodded. “That's why I respect his decision.” Said entity had devoured Oates without pause, but it had lasted about eight seconds when it encountered James. It had swallowed the man in a mass of slithering sinew and fanged orifices… and then began to expel high-speed projectile organs as it collapsed in on itself. It was as if someone had activated a gigantic blender from inside it- chunks of squid-creature had rained down for quite some time afterwards. Corporal McSteward glanced at her traveling companion. “You're a lot mellower than your reports suggest.” “These are very different circumstances when compared to my usual excursions,” James said flatly, still painted with cephalopod innards. “You're telling me,” Corporal McSteward muttered. “I don't even have a gun.” “We can compensate for that.” James sheathed his sword. “I must have lost it during the evacuation.” “Indeed.” The nearest town was several miles away, but at least that limited the project's exposure. A forced march through the scrubland was fatiguing at best and torturous at worst, but the weather and terrain didn't bother James. She got the feeling nothing did. The things had crawled out of the base camp's walls, coming from shadow, coming from the areas where peripheral vision failed even trained soldiers. Bullets did nothing, and flesh and Kevlar offered little resistance to their grasping tentacles and rending teeth. And neither did bravery, as Oates found out to his cost. She suppressed a shudder. James had already killed seven- that was reassuring- but it meant there'd likely be far more out there. Freakish beings of all shapes and sizes, exploring the wilderness and heading towards civilian areas. “Are there any potential survivors unaccounted for?” That same disinterested tone, as if exchanging small talk and not discussing the potential of an apocalyptic surge of otherworldly things. “I saw Hill reach the Jeep but I don't know where he got to,” McSteward sighed. “I think they got to him first. Him, Oates, the whole goddamned regiment. I think it's just you and me now James.” The base camp's armoured division had proved just as fragile as the infantry; metal panels and engine parts were twisted and torn as easily as the bodies had been. Hill had reached a car in time, but as the corporal arrived he'd been racing towards the horizon as the other vehicles burned. “I still do not understand why you call me James. That is not my name.” “Just a pun.” She smiled slightly. “The whole oh-seven thing, you know?” “I do not.” “It just sounds like something Fleming cooked up…” she trailed off. There was little point in trying to explain. 076-2 was definitely part of the project, she just didn't understand how he fit in exactly, or how he'd even got there. It wasn't like the military could've just picked him up on lease. But if he hadn't been there… “McSteward! Corporal! Corporal!” She looked up towards the voice. In the distance was a crumpled Jeep, crushed between two jutting stones. A figure was stumbling over the tufts of grass and uneven rocks- but making good time regardless, eagerly closing the distance. “Hill?” “I figured it out! I figured it out,” he repeated, finally reaching her and panting. “You're alive?” The corporal beamed, flooded with relief. “And you managed to crash the Jeep,” she added, slightly reproachfully. “Forget about the damn car! I've worked it all out…. uh… Corporal.” She grabbed him by the shoulders. “What are you talking about, Private?” “I'm saying this isn't actually happening.” She paused, but only for a moment. “What?” “It's a large-scale psychological affecter-” “I know what you mean, dammit, but that doesn't make any sense! If this is memetic, or neurological, or any kind of psychosomatic threat… how did it completely beat our conditioning? We've been facing that kind of thing for years!” “It's because you were expe-” 076-2 cleaved the man in twain. It was a very clean cut. “What the fuck are you doing?” she screamed. “He was one of them. Look.” McSteward stared at the body. It wasn't Hill, it was another of the tentacled creatures. How could she have been so naïve- No. Think for a second. It wasn't a clean cut. Hill was on the floor but he was unmarked. The sword hadn't actually hit, no matter what her mind was telling her. She'd automatically expected a clean cut because it was 076-2 doing the cutting, but from that angle? With an overarm, vertical sweep? Impossible, whether Hill was a freakish abomination or not. The sheer forces required would've practically made the target explode. Hill was right, this wasn't happening. She'd corrected herself, and the illusion had failed to compensate for her realisation. 076-2 was shifting in and out of focus, shivering like static on an old television. One moment the sword was slick with Hill's bodily fluids, the next it was spotless. A katana, a broadsword, a saif, distorting between forms. One moment 076-2 was there, the next… nothing but a warped silhouette. But the leer always remained, an unmoving smirk in the chaotic facade. “You're not 076-2.” The corporal took a step back. He grinned. “What, aren't you desperate to bring us home and show us off to your superiors? We were so looking forward to meeting them.” “How about you come clean.” “Fine.” The grin expanded and carried on expanding. His eyes retreated back into his skull until they were pinpricks of puckered flesh glaring from out of a mass of wrinkles. The clothes unravelled into translucent spines, wetly pulsing and vibrating. The face degenerated into razor-edged bone and twitching viscera, the body became a conglomerate of engorged tentacles and jagged teeth. “We are not the ohseven. We would all love to know what you're GOING TO DO ABOUT IT She shot it. It shrieked in a pitch no human could hear. “Ever wonder,” she said quietly, “why a soldier would have the slightest knowledge of 076-2 in the first place?” The thing writhed around in agony, spitting blood and threats in a dead language. “And ‘lost' my gun? You bought that?” She shot it again. And again. When the magazine finally ran dry the “corporal” produced her combat knife and hacked away at the spasmodic heap of gore until both her hands were numb. Incident ██ Report Summary: Corporal McSteward of the Adjutant General's Corps (Royal Military Police) of the ██████ Base, cover identity of Agent ████, brought in the body of SCP-███ for study. Further investigation into the British military's acquirement of subject required. Suggest further development of existing cover story in order for Agent ████ to maintain her position within their internal security division. Private Hill, cover identity of Agent █████, shall remain in observation until further notice. Projected recovery time estimated to be six months due to severe mental trauma. ██ of the base's support staff were killed and ██ wounded. No visible damage to the bodies. Suggest extreme force from outset if further evidence of weaponisation attempts are uncovered. Covert operations successful in this instance, not likely to succeed in future. Recommend neutralisation of ██████ Base to imply a catastrophic accident in their munitions dump. Addendum ███-1.0: SCP-███'s file requires amendment. Confirmed that SCP-███ capable of psychological projection and sensory overwrite via manipulation of existing neuron connections in the brain. Attempts to exploit the memories and expectations of potential victims. Not capable of perpetual regeneration. Not impervious to harm. Decomposes rapidly.

His scarred chin had a single line of saliva running down it, clinging to the indented flesh, and I reached forward with my tissue to wipe it off. The scar ran from his right cheekbone downwards, just touching the corner of his mouth. He was wrapped in a red plaid blanket, asleep sitting up. He slept a lot, but at his age, it was normal. I could see the wrinkles on the skin around his eyes stretch and contract as he tried to squeeze them shut, even in his dreams. I work as a caretaker for those elderly that we have decided to keep around. Usually something unusual happened to them, or they were part of some event and have firsthand knowledge that we want to hold on to. Usually they need to stay near whatever caused it, for the purpose of research. I live at research site 21. We deal in containment of the ones who don't need to. It's pleasant. It has to be. I was sent here after I got on someone's nerves. Who doesn't matter. There's a lot of land between us now, and an ocean. I did the same thing there. People willing to do this job are limited in number. He woke with a start when the tissue touched him, eyes wide in an instant. He tried to strike out with his fist, but lacked the strength, and was caught by the blanket. I'm used to that by now. "Oh… I'm sorry." he said, and he meant it."I was… having a bad dream." I served him extra soup and soft bread for dinner, because he had slept through lunch. It was getting worse. His body had decided that a century was enough, and that isn't something we can help with. The doctors had said six months to a year. We haven't told him that yet, and probably never will. I turned on the radio, and the Beatles came on. That's a luxury I get when I'm helping him. He is very hard of hearing, nearly deaf, so I can listen to what I want. He ate quietly, lost in thought, until he finished. As I moved to take away the dishes, he at last spoke. "You remind me of…" he said, pausing with what sounded like confusion towards the end."Of…" he repeated, and after a second's pause, let out a breath that wheezed like wind in the sails of an old wooden boat. "Of my nurse. Her name… I can't remember her name. She was… pretty. She looked like you. She…" He seemed to be searching for something- her name, perhaps. Perhaps not. I turned down the music to listen. That's part of the job, listening. Many of the old ones like it, like to feel noticed, especially when so may have spent so long here. They always seem to talk about their families, their childhoods- never about the reasons that they're here. "It was on my second day, I, I… I was hit by a shell. Shrapnel, I mean. In the leg, just a cut. But it wasn't healing right. It wasn't… I was never in the front lines, I was meant to look ahead for places we could use. Places we could defend near the beach." He seemed focused for the first time I could remember, staring straight at me with steel eyes and that glaring scar. He was not telling me anything I did not already know, and he knew it. He knew that I knew why the cut wouldn't heal, and what that meant. "They… the Turks had us pinned. They were tossing bombs and bullets at anyone who got close, and no one knew what to do but keep throwing ourselves back in and hope. Cally and Jenkers… they were the boys I'd come with. We were in the 6th Dublins. They got put in the trenches then they got put on top afterward. I didn't find out 'till later, of course." We hadn't taken sides in that battle. There was something we had to keep them away from. It was a chaotic time for everyone, I've learned. The reins had slipped out of our hands, and the idiots once off their leashes were much harder to steer. So, they went for Gaillipoli. They went because it would make a clear route to Russia, and the Turks who owned the peninsula rallied to keep it. We were caught in the middle, trying to keep anyone from finding us in our underground bunker, there underneath a rock that they called the "Sphinx." It was a biohazard containment site. "I only had to spend one day there, before that little cut got so bad that they pulled me back out. I was lucky, of course. We weren't near the heavy fighting. That's when I met the nurse. She really did look just like you." We didn't have much to work with. HQ was trying to get through, but it was a war zone. What were we supposed to do? We had a few guns and bombs we'd gotten from an agent with the Turks. Our orders were to keep ourselves hidden at all costs. Things were crazy back then. We'd lost two of our best researchers when they defected to Germany, and when the gas started spraying out in panicked clouds over the trenches, it was all we could do to keep it explained. One small site out of many, we were. "She seemed to know what was happening. At least, she seemed… confident. Took off my leg at the knee, opened up the bottom half and took something out, something that looked like a mouse with fur made of fucking veins, veins and little squirming things with fishhooks and, and she stabbed me with something when I tried to scream, and… and… and then I woke up." He paused, and then seemed to relax, eyes unfocused. I took his bowl. "Bad dream," I said. "Yeah," he said. What was I supposed to do? Back there, with shells falling like glass and nails every day and people dying at your doorstep because that's what you had to do…no matter what, that was what you had to do… All we had was a little food and a couple guns and a couple shells and one Petri dish, and when it broke it changed things in us so what am I supposed to do? The others didn't live like I did, like I keep doing. I knew that I couldn't leave him, not with that thing inside, and HQ still couldn't get through with pickup, and he couldn't… I couldn't let him remember either because that might give us away. When they got to us two days later, he was so fucked up in the head that he couldn't remember who he was because that's what I had to do, and that scar, and… and no matter what… After HQ finally got itself picked up and decided who should win and what should happen to the assholes who tried to leave us, they tried to fix him up, but I had done too much. He didn't know what was real and what wasn't, and he doesn't, and I do, and I can't tell him because he already knows even if he… No matter what. Six months to a year. Six months to a year.

"Sergeant Thomas Allenby. Serial number nine four two—" The butt of the revolver cracked against his jaw, hard. Sergeant Allenby laughed bitterly as he spat out a broken tooth onto the packed dirt floor. "If you break my jaw, I won't be able to tell you anything," he sneered. The man cocked the hammer of the revolver and placed the cold steel muzzle against the Marine's forehead. "You will tell me everything!" the man growled. "Starting with how your little patrol managed to find this place!" "Sergeant Thomas Allenby, serial number—" The gun fired. Allenby screamed in pain, then laughed out loud, his voice shaky with pain and manic shock. "FUCK!" he screamed. "The fucking LEG!? Are you crazy? Hit the femoral artery and you'll kill me in seconds, then you'll never get anything out of me!" "You will tell me what I want to know, or the next bullet goes in your brain!" screamed the man. "FUCK you!" Allenby shouted. "You fucked up! You shouldn't'a shot me! Now I know you're fucking bluffing! You can't kill me, I'm the only one who knows what you want to know, you slopehead gook motherfuck—" The revolver was cocked again. The muzzle was placed back against Allenby's forehead. The man took up the slack on the trigger. Allenby knew that he should be afraid, but pain, shock, and adrenaline were conspiring against him. All he could do was laugh. "Dai Ta?!" someone shouted. A newcomer. He was jabbering something in Vietnamese, too fast for Allenby to understand. The colonel chuckled in response. Something exchanged hands. "It seems," smirked the colonel, "That I have a reason to keep you alive a little longer." He thrust a manila envelope into Allenby's face. "What is this?" "I… I don't know," Allenby said, staring past the envelope into the colonel's eyes. "I've never seen it before in my life." "Lies!" growled the colonel. "It was in your backpack! And more…" He turned the envelope around. "Do you see this? This is the symbol of your Central Intelligence Agency!" Oh shit. For the first time since the Viet Cong had captured him, Allenby was afraid. "I have… I don't know what you mean," Allenby protested. "More lies! You are no soldier, you are an American spy!" He struck Allenby across the face with the packet of papers in frustration. "I ask you again. How did you find these tunnels?" "A map…" Allenby said, then immediately bit his tongue in frustration. "A map… Ah… I see." The colonel laughed cruelly. "Very clever of you Americans." He shuffled the papers together. "Doubtless, if I line up this triangle with this…" His voice stopped abruptly. Allenby smiled. "Sir?" one of the guards asked. "Tuan," the colonel said slowly, then something in Vietnamese. Probably, "Come take a look at this." After that, things got a bit chaotic. Allenby didn't see what happened next. He could barely even hear it through the heavy cell door. He didn't have to. He already knew. He knew that the confused murmuring that turned into panicked shouts were the colonel and the guard forcing some poor sap to view The Image. He knew that the scratching sounds were an infected individual scratching The Image into a wall, with a knife or a key. He knew, when the screaming started, that the infection had gone terminal. It was half an hour after the dying started when the colonel burst back into the room. He was waving the packet of papers in Allenby's face. "LOOK AT THIS!" he screamed. "LOOK AT THIS, PLEASE!" Allenby just closed his eyes and smiled. "Sergeant Allenby, ser—" "LOOK, DAMN YOU, LOOK!" The colonel forced Allenby's eye open with his fingers and pushed the image into his face. "LOOK, PLEASE, for the love of GOD!" Allenby smirked. The smirk became a low giggle. "You never noticed," he said, shaking his head. "You never noticed…" Then the colonel did notice. Both Allenby's eyes were glass. Allenby heard the colonel go for his gun, heard him try to cock the revolver, but the man's palsied hands were shaking too hard for that. He heard the gun clatter to the floor. It took the man a long time to die. Allenby enjoyed hearing every moment of it. Some time had passed. The underground tunnel complex was now a charnel house. The dead and dying lay everywhere. Allenby staggered through the tunnels, the manila envelope with the two halves of The Image (carefully realigned to the "safe" configuration) tucked into his belt. He was using a discarded enemy AK-47 as a makeshift walking stick. Every once in a while, he paused to listen and to feel for air currents. It took him a long time to find the exit. He emerged from the stuffy dankness of the tunnels into the oppressive humidity of the Vietnamese jungle. He sighed happily, feeling the sun on his face. There was a rustling in the undergrowth. He turned. "Nolan?" he asked, expecting to hear the calm voice of his pick-up. Instead, there were two sharp clicks, like a typewriter. Two silenced .22 caliber bullets ended his life. "Sorry." "… what is this?" "I believe you already know what this is." "Looks like a bunch of lines." "It does. But if you place this plastic overlay over—" "WAIT! STOP!" "… it's a fake. So you do know what this is." "…" "I do have to admit, your delivery method is diabolically clever. A blind operative, trained to compensate for his disability, used to handle a dangerous object that kills when seen. My higher-ups were fascinated by this. We may adapt this idea for our own purposes." "… damn you…" "Allow me to repeat the warning I gave you when you first assumed this position, Mister Schlesinger. Do not meddle with what you don't understand. Otherwise, there is a high probability you will find your tenure here short, and unpopular." "… damn it, you people don't get it, do you? We're fighting for the sake of the free world here! If the damned Reds take over Indochina, that'll collapse the entire Pacific…" "Ah, yes, your vaunted domino theory. I will be blunt, sir. An ideological conflict between two mere nations, even two as powerful as yours, is of no consequence to us. We have little interest in saving the ''free world'' at the cost of the actual world." "…" "Here is my ultimatum: cease and desist all of your efforts towards PROJECT OMEGA immediately. We want it all shut down and disavowed. MK Ultra. Groom Lake. Even that little project in Philadelphia. An auditor from our Foundation will come by in a few weeks to check on your progress. Good day." <click> "… holy shit. Miss Jones, could you please hop down to the corner store and buy me a carton of cigarettes and a fifth of bourbon, please… oh, and contact Building Security. I want a camera set up outside my office door… oh. To watch out for vandals…" "What have you got there?" Crow asked. The young researcher looked up from his newspaper, where he was circling various stories with a red pen. So far, he seemed most interested in rumors of an artist's project gone bad. Apparently the statue had come to life and started killing people… "Not much," Cog said. The young man hung up his trilby hat and jacket on the coat-tree. Unlike Crow, whose desk was a complete pigsty, his side of the small office they shared was clean and neat, almost mechanical in its precision. "I took a trip up to Langley to give the CIA Director a message from The Administrator. I believe it went well." "Did you bring me back a souvenir?" Crow asked, grinning. "My travel budget included no allowances for personal purchases," Cog pointed out. "You've got no heart," Crow sighed. "Oh yeah. Xav called. He wants your complete report on The Pattern on his desk by tomorrow morning." "Have you started a file for it yet?" Cog asked. "Not yet. Was going to let you do it." Cog walked to the large file cabinet that took up half the office, filling up the entire back wall. Each drawer contained file folders with the original reports and mimeograph masters for every anomalous object in containment by their Foundation: all but one, which was labeled "Unassigned Numbers." He reached into the drawer, pulled out a random manila envelope from the stack, and opened it up, looking at the number typed onto the file folder within. "571," he read. "Good number," Crow yawned. Cog sat down at his desk and undid the brads on the file folder, releasing the Special Containment Procedures Form. He slid the triplicate form with its carbon-paper intermediate layers into his typewriter, carefully aligned the guides with the proper box, and began to type. Item #: SCP-571 Object Class: Euclid Special Containment Procedures: A single piece of paper containing an instance of SCP-571 should be kept inside an opaque, sealed container of any kind, at the center of any high security containment room… END

The squad split to opposite sides of the street at the head of the block. Private Scott followed two others and the sergeant into a bombed out church. The four soldiers sifted between the pews, calmly but rapidly assuming position. They scrambled over chunks of concrete and stone littering the floor with early morning irritation. Scott turned his gaze up to the broken rafters of the roof and tripped clumsily over his own feet. It seemed funny to him that the cathedral in this little French town was larger than any back in Trenton. Clambering over a cracked slab of the wall, the four men set up at a pair of tall stained-glass windows. The intermittent missing diamond panes offered a fine view of the road below while providing a modest visual obstruction to anyone approaching. They had to take it in good faith, Scott supposed, that the other five men had found a position on the other side of the street. The sergeant lay prone and silent, the barrel of his rifle poking slightly past the sill. Scott stood awkwardly by, looking over his shoulder at the beams of light coming down through the roof. It was almost angelic. “Get the fuck down, jackass,” said Private McKenzie jovially, tugging on the edge of Scott's coat. Scott scrambled down, weapon bouncing loudly off the stone. Then they waited, tensely. A full platoon of German soldiers was scheduled to come through sometime that morning, though they didn't know when. They had three squads behind them, thankfully, but Private Scott's squad would be at the front. They fidgeted. McKenzie and Scott flicked pebbles at each other, and Jacobsen smoked. The sergeant just lay there. He could have been asleep. After a long while they became aware of other sounds under the songbirds and the light creek of the broken ceiling slats. There was movement, and slight hints of “s” sounds drifting from voices at the far rear of the cathedral. “You hear that, sarge?” asked Private Jacobsen, inching over on his elbows. “Yup,” the NCO responded. “None of our boys are up this far.” “Maybe two of us should go check it out-” Jacobsen added, eager to get up. “Jerry ain't up this far either,” the sergeant continued, not listening. He peered far off down the road. “We're all going,” he decided. “Get up.” The four stood and began moving to the back of the church, Private Scott in tow. The light disoriented them, shifting from bright to dark as they walked beneath the gashes in the great ceiling. The sergeant lifted a finger to his lips. A spent cartridge jangled underfoot, and Scott jumped a little. Behind the altar and to the left was a wooden door, slightly ajar. Voices echoed from within, up a long stone staircase. And there was another noise, something subtler, and higher pitched, barely audible. Suddenly the sound of gunfire erupted up from below. The soldiers sprang from inaction and pressed themselves against the wall. There were shouts from the basement, and more shots. The sergeant motioned quickly with two fingers, looking markedly at Private Scott. Scott turned from the wall to the door, rifle outstretched, and felt aching pangs of adrenaline up the back of his neck. He pushed into the stairwell gingerly. The three other men followed him slowly down the moist, dark passage. The gunfire had stopped, but there were still loud cries emanating from below, and a strange, shrill chittering, as if from rats. They came to the bottom of the steps, and Scott leaned quickly around the edge of the threshold. It was a long basement room with a low ceiling, poorly lit by flickering torches in wall brackets. At the end of the room was an altar, hung with a white cloth. Upon it sat an ornate golden goblet. It shone strangely in the relative darkness, giving off a bluish shimmer. In the center of the basement was a wooden table, upon which stood two figures. They were a man and a woman, and they wore odd khaki jumpsuits. The man was frantically fiddling with a flamethrower, cursing loudly in an accent that sounded German. The woman stood at his back, brandishing an ugly machete. There was a third khaki figure below them on the floor, body partially obscured by a dark, flowing mass. As Scott looked closer, he saw that the mass was in fact a swarm of thousands of vermin. They were nothing he had ever seen before – grapefruit sized, skittering with perverted rapidity on spindly legs, screeching incessantly. Most of them pressed at the table, crawling over each other in ravenous eagerness to get up to the two figures. The woman swept the machete low, angrily slicing back the creatures that managed to mount the table. The man was cursing in German, and whacking at the flamethrower with his fists. Private Scott stood agape at the base of the stair. “What the hell is going on in there?” asked the sergeant impatiently, pushing Scott aside and stepping down to the basement floor. “Oh fuck-” he managed. The rushing mass of creatures on the floor turned simultaneously from the table to look at the four soldiers. The little nightmares grinned with hundreds of thousands of unnaturally needle-like teeth. After a moment's hesitation, they sprinted for the men. The sergeant was paralyzed. Scott hysterically squeezed off a clip of shots while a screaming McKenzie attempted to pull himself back up the staircase. The four soldiers were quickly over-swept. A tide of tiny, searing pinpricks attacked their bodies, ripping little chunks out of their flesh. They were pulled down to the floor. Their ears were filled with the incessant screeching. Scott blacked out when they began tearing at his face. Private Scott awoke on the stone floor, his sight blurry, spluttering blood. He turned his head, and the dead eyes of the sergeant stared back at him. Jacobsen was slumped in the corner, also dead. McKenzie was face down on the stairs. He didn't know how much time had passed, but he was sticky all over with his own blood. An excruciating pain suddenly expressed itself throughout his body. He gurgled, arching his back. There was an acrid smell in the air, like burning, and the myriad little bodies of the needle-toothed creatures lay blackened and legs-up on the floor all around. The man and the woman in the khaki suits were standing over their fallen comrade at the other end of the basement. “I'm sorry, Marty,” said the German one, folding the man's arms over his chest. “We should have been more cautious,” said the woman, distraught. “Look, we got the goblet,” the German replied, “and he died doing his duty, in the field. We couldn't have foreseen the flamethrower malfunctioning.” “I know…” said the woman, dejectedly. Scott coughed again, and she looked over to the staircase. “One of those bastards is alive!” she exclaimed. The woman ran over, feet crunching on the small bodies littering the floor. She bent down and put a finger to the side of Scott's neck. “Alexandra! We don't have time for this!” chastised her companion. “I know,” she replied, exasperated, “the Germans are going to be here soon.” “The Nazis are going to be here soon,” the man said sharply. “This kid is barely alive,” she said, ignoring him. “Leave him. An unfortunate casualty.” “We can save him,” she said, after a pause. “How? He's fatally wounded…what, do you mean to use…?” the German asked incredulously. “Yes!” the woman exclaimed. “No way,” her companion cried, waving his hands. “Leave him. Even if you did what you're thinking, you'd be giving him no choice.” “He has no choice. He's dying.” “How would we ever get away with it, Alexandra?” the man pleaded. “We'll take him with us,” she said firmly. There was a long silence between them. Private Scott spluttered weakly, blood soaking through his uniform. He felt his feet growing cold. “He'll be stuck, he'll be imprisoned for the rest of his life,” said the German. “I know – I know,” said the woman. “But at least we'll have given him life. We owe him that.” “He's not our burden…,” the German said, but his tone revealed that he had given way. “If anyone ever finds out about this, it will be both of our heads,” he stressed, conceding. Scott was aware of someone crouching down beside him. He sensed something cold and metal being pressed to his lips. And suddenly his body was filled with a warm, dense liquid. The pain was forgotten, like a dream slipping away, and he felt the ragged tears across in his flesh sealing and knitting together. And he was better. SCP-1451 is a Caucasian male of indeterminate age…

The seat that was provided was a harsh gunmetal black edifice, warped enough that it was effectively impossible to place all four legs on the floor at once. It made an obnoxious clacking sound when Dr. Johannes Sorts shifted his weight, the noise echoing through the unnecessarily large concrete room. Row upon row of harsh florescent lights buzzed overhead, the sound only momentarily drowned out when Dr. Sorts shifted his weight back again. Clack. Agent Schaffer cast an irritated glance over the top of a manila folder. He closed it and clasped his hands atop the blank cover, leaning forward across the scarred and pitted old cafeteria table between himself and the doctor. Apart from the comfortable padded folding chair he occupied, the doctor and the table were the only other things in the stadium sized chamber. "You do, of course, know where we are and why we are here?" Schaffer asked, the first he had spoken since security had escorted the twitchy little doctor into the room. Dr. Sorts rolled his eyes in open contempt but cast his gaze towards the unfinished floor and mumbled, "I'm not stupid. I also know you stuck me in this chair to make me feel uncomfortable. I know what this room was used for before it was re-purposed to contain th—that… goddamn thing." Schaffer watched the doctor very carefully, noting the difficulty with which the other man spoke. He opened the folder again, noting that the enclosed psychological profile had indicated a marked increase in the subject's paranoia in the past months. "Doctor, that was the only other chair in the room. We did not bring it in here to torment you. It's not like we entertain guests here." "Yeah, t-two chairs in the room, and you got the good one. Call it what you will," Sorts grumbled, shifting his weight again to send a clacking sound to bounce about the distant walls. "The floors in here are rough and dirty, only worn smooth in tracks where the forklifts moved the pallets around. How much manpower did it take to yank up all the old shelves that used to be in this storage room just so it could be a glorified lobby for you… I mean that… that fu—goddamn thing…" "Would you like to trade seats?" the agent offered calmly. "I think I'm fine where I am, annoying you with this unbalanced chair." Sorts squirmed back and forth until his chair made a squealing noise on the concrete. "Doctor Sorts, you are a level 2 researcher. Given that you lack the clearance, could you explain exactly how you learned about me?" Sorts gripped the edge of the table with pudgy hands and finally met the Agent's eyes with a contemptuous glare. "Don't talk like that. You and I both know wh-what…" The doctor licked his dry lips and swallowed before continuing. "You and I both know what we're talking about. But I'm the only person who can speak honestly here. You lack the capability." "You didn't answer my question. This is a grave security breach. Given your own specialized research into memetics, you understand the severity of this leak and how your very knowledge of me is a dangerous liability." "So what, you're going to terminate me?" Sorts screeched. "The only person who can deal with… that goddamn thing?" "Your open discussion of…" Agent Schaffer paused to consider his words carefully. "…this matter caused a memetic containment breach that infected the entire breakroom at site 19." "Memetics is bullshit!" Sorts interjected. "A meme is when I say 'Knock, knock' and you say 'Who's there?' It's not a virus, it's not a weapon. It's not a compulsion. The other researchers in the breakroom are not sick—any more than they already were, anyway." "Doctor…" Sorts laughed. "Meme is a fucking stupid word to fancy up the concept of a running joke, one of the more irritating concepts that mouth-breathing crap-flinger Richard Dawkins has inflicted upon an undeserving world. I hate the very word. 'Mmmmeeeeeeem.' I pronounce it 'maim' every time I can because I hate it so much." "I thought it was pronounced that way." Schaffer frowned. "You thought, you thought, you thought eight things tonight!" Sorts laughed, then rubbed his forehead. "Oh god. There I go. That's an obscure one, I don't expect you'd know the reference. But see? A meme is only as good as the amount of people that understand its context. Context is the key to unlocking these things. I learned about that goddamn thing by paying attention to the context. I talked to the people who were rotated out of working containment in here. I noticed the peculiar pattern in their speech. I deduced the rest." Schaffer raised his eyebrows. "You'd never seen me before now?" Sorts just narrowed his eyes. "I know enough about that goddamn thing to know this is a ridiculous waste of resources. Where is it right now? That old supply closet over there? The one that has a fancy electric lock and the old faded 'fertilizer' sign that was obviously recently added? All the other doors in this room are either sealed off or specifically go somewhere. Seriously pathetic misdirection there." Schaffer had heard enough, he stood up from his seat and gestured to the aforementioned door. "Yes, that's where they keep me. Would you like a look at the room? Perhaps, since you have learned so much about me, you can offer some insight into future containment procedures." The two men strode towards the old closet, which Schaffer opened with a wave of his unique key card. Schaffer picked up a clipboard from the reverse side of the door and read the introductory language that had been carefully prepared to make otherwise straightforward containment procedures sensible. Schaffer cleared his throat and recited the lines he had spoken only a few times before, when he was first assigned to security for this containment chamber and during scheduled testing: "Hello, I am SCP-426. I must be introduced this way in order to prevent ambiguity. I am an ordinary toaster, able to toast bread when supplied with electricity. However, when any human being mentions me, they inadvertently refer to me in the first person. Despite all attempts, there is yet to be a way to speak or write about me in the third person." Sorts made a derisive sound and waved towards the object sitting on the middle of a shelf in the otherwise empty closet. "That goddamn thing. That goddamn thing is a goddamn toaster." "No one else has ever been able to refer to me in that way before, Doctor Sorts. How did you do it? Your file said you had a talent for defusing memetic effects." "That goddamn toaster is not a meme! It's a goddamn toaster!" Sorts snatched the containment papers from Schaffer's hands and read through them with a scowl. "We have no cultural references to that goddamn toaster. People who never heard about that goddamn toaster refer to… to it as if it was themselves. Memetics has absolutely no application here. Maybe I'm the normal one and you are all just goddamn idiots." "I notice that you have great difficulty referring to me. When you do, you only do so to damn me… to speak of me derisively. Do you suppose that it is your intense dislike of me that allows you to avoid my effect?" "I didn't say that goddamn toaster had no effect on me. Sure, it's hard for me - that's me, as in Johannes, I can use that word properly - to talk about that goddamn toaster any way I want. Clearly the mere concept of that goddamn toaster has the property of defining itself in the psyche of the individual who thinks of it. It's a glitch in logic. Where you can only refer to that goddamn toaster as yourself, I choose to refer to it as th—" "Yes, I get the picture, Doctor Sorts. Are you aware of my secondary properties?" "I don't care about your goddamn properties! Secondary, tertiary or otherwise!" Sorts flipped through the attached test logs. "You're doing a piss poor job of containing that goddamn toaster though, I tell you what. I could keep this goddamn thing in a box under my desk and do a better job. I sure wouldn't start thinking of myself as a goddamn toaster. I'm not replacing my concept of self with it." Schaffer hadn't thought much of the pudgy doctor before he started ranting, and he had to fight to keep his voice level when he replied. "Doctor, please calm down, you're becoming very agitated. This presents a unique opportunity for us to work together, to do some tests regarding our interactions and your ability to avoid my effect." "I don't want to work with a goddamn toaster!" Sorts hung the clipboard back up on the door and reached for the handle. Schaffer put a hand on the Doctor's arm. "I meant me. I want you to work with me." Sorts whirled upon the agent with a furious grunt, shoving the larger man square in the chest with all his might. "That goddamn toaster should just stay locked up! I'm clearly not immune to the influence of that goddamn toaster. I don't want to have anything to do with … with that goddamn…" Schaffer stumbled backwards for a moment but regained control of the situation as his training took over. He redirected the smaller man's momentum and whirled the doctor face first into one of the closet's bare walls with a metallic clack. "That's quite enough, Doctor Sorts. You don't really have a choice in the matter." The agent leaned in and growled with a sharp twist of the doctor's arm, "Do you really want to do this?" Sorts rolled his eyes back up at Schaffer over his shoulder. "Alright, alright." His words were slurred by the way his lips were rammed against the dirty wall. "I'm sorry. I get the picture." "Okay. I'm going to let you go now and you're going to deal with me like a rational adult." Schaffer released the doctor and took a step back, running his hands down the front of his black uniform. Something tickled the back of his mind, perhaps it was the way Sorts' eyes cleared of panic too quickly, or perhaps it was the absence of a familiar weight at his hip. Sorts whirled around, revealing the pistol he had yanked out of the agent's belt on his short trip to kiss the wall. Schaffer stepped forward and put out his hands but the doctor slid away, keeping himself out of reach. Sorts held the pistol low, aiming at the agent's unprotected groin and legs. "Doctor Sorts, that is my sidearm." "Listen to you! It can't have a sidearm. It's a goddamn toaster!" Beads of sweat were thick on the doctor's brow. "You're talking crazy because you can't tell the difference between you and a stupid inanimate object. That goddamn toaster needs to stay in here and it would be better if everyone forgot about it." "If you do not stand down and return my sidearm immediately-" The toaster hit the ground after two shots, and the doctor kicked it into the corner of the closet for good measure. After using Schaffer's key card to lock the door to the goddamn toaster's containment chamber behind him, Sorts dropped the pistol into the pocket of his coat and wiped his brow. Taking a deep breath, he strode out of the empty storehouse, past the ever-present security cameras, and returned to his office to file a report on the incident.

A possible future… Jack Bright pushed his way past the holo-sign reading "Closed to Visitors" and made his way up the polished carbonate stairs to the monorail. There was a single car waiting for him. A large red button on the control panel read, "Press this." He did so, and the sleek silver conveyance whispered up the side of the mountain. The view out of the diamond-glass windows was spectacular: the vermillion hues of the setting sun reflecting off the hair-thin lines of the orbital elevator leading to Sunlight One, the world's first permanent launching station to the deep space colonies. A zeppelin ghosted past the mountainside, one of the new superheavy models that could convey two thousand passengers across the Atlantic in comfort. It was the dawn of a new age. But it was the past that he had come here to meet, not the future. He disembarked the monorail, then followed the instructions from the e-mail up the craggy mountain path, to where a waterfall cascaded down into a clear alpine pool. There was an old man standing on a ledge overlooking the falls, looking down at a brass plate, now encased in diamond-glass to protect it from the elements. His hair was white, and his back hunched with age, but the eyes that turned to regard Jack were still as stark and intelligent as the day they had first met. "Hello, Alto," Jack said. "Alto… Alto Clef. Now there's a name I haven't heard in a long time," Clef scoffed. He laughed, a long, hard laugh, and then he coughed hard into a handkerchief, hacking and wheezing. The white cloth came away speckled with blood. "New body? Looks good on you." Jack Bright nodded in reply, then came to stand next to his old friend. He looked down at the plaque. "At this fearful place, Sherlock Holmes vanquished Professor Moriarty, on 4 May 1891," he read. "Funny, huh? The man didn't even exist, and here they've put a memorial to him. Reichenbach Falls, the setting of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's last great swan song. The final tale of Sherlock Holmes… until his fans and editors made him write more stories, the whining fucks." He pointed down at the churning white water, far below. "Imagine, Holmes and Moriarty, the master detective and the Napoleon of crime, struggling to the last breath, clawing and pummeling each other as they plummet to their dooms. Such a fitting end for two great men." "Is that supposed to mean something?" Bright asked. He put his hand in his coat pocket, felt the small-caliber handgun he'd secreted there. The note had said to come unarmed, but he hadn't survived this long by being stupid. Clef reached into his coat pocket. He pulled out a grubby piece of pink paper and handed it to Jack. The younger man read it carefully, then nodded. "How long do you have?" "Two months at most," Clef said. "We still have several doses of Five Hundred left," Jack said. "I could authorize to have one lost and recovered by the GOC. As a favor to an old friend." "I think not," Clef replied sternly. "There comes a time when a man realizes it's time to die. For me… that realization came last week. That was when I got a report that young Kroger took down a Tier 4 Type Green on his lonesome. Took it down in a way I never would have thought of: smart as hell. That kid wasn't even born yet when I started this job. And then it hit me: I've done all I can. All I can do from now on is take up space and get in the way of the younger kids who will carry the work forward." He smiled. "So. Time to die." "I sense… a personal indictment… in those words," Bright replied slowly. "Yes," Clef said. "You think that I, being immortal, will hold the Foundation back, and stop it from moving forward." "I am afraid," Clef said, "of what it will imply when the most powerful and influential member of the Foundation is an SCP himself. I worry that… not now… not a hundred years from now… but someday, you will have lived so long and become so strange that you are no longer human. And by then, you may be too powerful to stop. So that threat must be nipped in the bud now." "What if I never become a threat?" "You will," Clef said firmly. "No one who lives as long as you will can stay human." "And so you've come to try to kill me," Jack Bright concluded. "I've come here to kill you," Clef corrected. "Not to try." "And how did you plan to do that? They've been trying to kill me for over a hundred years. I don't think even you've found a way." "I didn't. Kroger did," Clef smiled. "Like I said. The young man's smart as hell." "I see… and your plan?" Clef told him. He explained, step by step, Kroger's plan for killing Jack Bright. He left out no details. He told him exactly how and why it would work, why the plan was foolproof, and in the end, Bright had to admit that Clef was right. This plan would work. It would kill him. "It's a good plan," he said. "But there's one problem with it." "And what's tha—" Before Clef could finish his sentence, Jack drew his gun and shot him, twice in the chest, once in the head. A perfect Mozambique. The old man slumped and plummeted off the ledge into the water. Jack put his gun back in his coat. "Bye, Alto," he said. He turned and walked back to the monorail, wiping his face. It was certainly spray from the waterfall, but although Reichenbach Falls was freshwater, it still tasted a bit like seaspray. He was on his way down the monorail when the implications of Clef's words hit him. "I didn't. Kroger did." Someone else knew how to kill Jack Bright. The realization chilled his borrowed heart. He gripped the armrest on the monorail seat hard, in a white knuckle grip. No… not just someone else. If he knew Clef, possibly the entire GOC knew how to kill Jack Bright. An entire worldwide organization with the backing of the goddamn United Nations, thousands of highly trained agents dedicated to finding and killing him… Suddenly he was very aware of just how vulnerable he was in this monorail car. This small, enclosed space, bound to the monorail tracks… a perfect killing ground. He closed his eyes and waited for the killing blow. It never came. Instead, the monorail made its way down to the bottom of the mountain, and the doors opened. His driver was waiting there for him, with his armored limousine. "Director Bright?" Lyn put his hand on Jack's shoulder, concerned at the Director's pale face and trembling hands. "Are you all right?" "Yes," Jack said. He looked up at the mountainside, at the distant cascade of falling water. "Perfectly fine." As the driver pulled away, something else occurred to Jack Bright, something that made him laugh out loud at the bitter irony of it all. Jack Bright also knew how to kill SCP-963. Somewhere else… "Mister Kroger?" the man in the black uniform asked. "Speaking," Kroger said. "No," the man in the black uniform said. He handed Kroger a card. It was pure white, except for a single, swirling symbol on the front in stark black ink. Kroger understood. "Mister Treble Clef?" the man in the black uniform asked. "Speaking," Clef replied. "Better." The man in the black uniform nodded. "I have a request…"

"Your ID, sir?" You nervously present your ID badge to the heavily-armed guard, who scans the barcode with a handheld reader, checks the display, and hands it back to you with a nod. Whatever this meeting is, it must be more important than you had thought. You're under no illusions that the Foundation considers your research to be of any particular significance, so it was hardly a surprise that you received such a sudden summons, but this level of security says that you may be getting in over your head. Inside, it's a standard teleconference-enabled meeting room - a long table with chairs along one side, facing a wall-sized display screen. You spot your name in front of the chair at the near end of the table, and quickly take a seat, docking your laptop and engaging the normal e-meeting software. While that loads, you take the opportunity to glance down the table at your fellow attendees, and have to fight an urge to run for the door. Many of the men and women (and the dog, especially in the Egg Walker) at this table are instantly recognizable to anyone in the Foundation, names that junior researchers speak only in hushed tones, for fear of summoning their owners like some sort of old-world demon. That feeling of being in over your head increases by several orders of magnitude - what do some of the top researchers in the Foundation need with a lowly geophysicist? In the table's center seat, Dr. Gears looks down the table at you, then back to the laptop in front of him. "If everyone is here, I believe it is time we begin." With this, he enters a brief command, and the wall display flashes to life, showing a similar room elsewhere, with twelve seated figures, all of whose faces are being digitally obscured, and whose seats are labeled not with names but with numbers. You begin to wonder if someone spiked your coffee with some new SCP-grade hallucinogen, when O5-03 speaks up. "Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. I'm sure you're all wondering why you've been pulled off your respective projects for an emergency meeting. Since some of my colleagues here haven't yet finished reading up on the situation, I think a brief summary is in order. Doctor Gears, if you would?" Gears nods. "Thank you, sir. Approximately one month ago, several civilian observatories noted what appeared to be an asteroid whose orbit placed it on a trajectory that could lead to an impact with Earth in the near future. We picked up on this discovery through the usual channels, and have since confirmed that the object is a rocky asteroid that will impact Earth in nine days' time." With this, several folders appear on your desktop, including photos, reports, pages of calculations, and various other data. "I took the liberty of borrowing Doctor Philbert's geophysical modeling setup," so that's why you couldn't log on yesterday, "and if my interpretation of the results is correct, we are facing an IK-class natural disaster, with casualties estimated at approximately three billion over the next ten years. Doctor Philbert, do you concur?" Well, now you know why they wanted you here. You quickly scan through the log you've been provided of Dr. Gears's run on GeoMod, and everything seems to check out. "I, er… Yes sir, I concur, pending a more thorough review of the data," you stammer. You quickly log onto GeoMod and begin crunching numbers like there's no tomorrow. "If this is a natural object," interjects O5-10, "why are we talking about it? It may be tragic, but we are busy dealing with objects and creatures far more dangerous than some rock." "Given the rather unique resources at our disposal, we are particularly well-positioned to avert this disaster. In addition, the entire purpose behind the Foundation's acquisition and study of anomalous objects and entities is the protection of humanity. Failing to use our resources to at least mitigate an event of this scale would be contrary to that core purpose." It's impossible to read what Dr. Gears is thinking, but you could swear he just lectured an Overseer. Apparently the top brass really do play by different rules. It's at about this time that GeoMod returns the results of your new inquiries. "Um… Sirs?" you nervously butt in, and every head in the room swivels in unison to face you. "I've been going over Doctor Gears's projections, and just checked the data against Foundation records. According to the model, if we don't do something, the geological effects of the impact have at least a 40% chance of breaching containment at Area 4." THAT got their attention. You don't have nearly high enough clearance to know what they actually keep in Area 4, but you know that in all likelihood any single SCP there could kill millions if released. If all of them got out… There's a few seconds of hushed conversation at both ends of the conference, then O5-07 speaks up. "If Doctor Philbert's calculations are correct, then we have no choice but to act against this asteroid. All that remains is to determine how. Suggestions?" What follows could be politely described as a "spirited debate", and impolitely described as a "verbal clusterfuck". The various researchers propose ideas, only to have them rejected by others. Ask 343 to get rid of it? Already tried, he said no. Shoot it with 044? No way to boost its range or get it into orbit fast enough. The only idea everyone agrees would work is the use of the armament of the Mare Imbrium facility. Unfortunately, using a warhead powerful enough to deflect the asteroid onto a safe trajectory would also produce a flash bright enough to be seen even in daylight, with half the planet as witnesses. Given how close the object is already, and the time needed to prep the missile, there's really only time for one shot. The argument shifts to whether it's worth effectively announcing the Foundation's existence to civilians worldwide, and neither side appears much inclined to change their opinion. As the shouting match continues, an idea occurs to you, and you promptly get to work running the numbers to see if it's practical. Orbital mechanics aren't your specialty, but compared to modeling shockwaves traveling through variable-composition rock strata, some basic calculations on a ballistic trajectory are a walk in the park. Finally, you have your answer. It could work. "We could drop it in the ocean," you blurt out. The senior staff relax their grip on the various weapons they were fingering, and turn to you, with expressions ranging from mild surprise to "what did I just step in and why is it talking?". "A low-yield strike could deflect the asteroid enough that it'll fall in the ocean instead of hitting land, without producing a flash that could be seen from Earth without a telescope. It's not a perfect solution, given the size of the tsunami it would generate, but at least we'd maintain containment. We wouldn't even need to modify the astronomers' memories - an ocean impact is well within their margin of uncertainty, since they don't have access to our data, so they wouldn't even know anything was amiss." The looks of surprise fade into contemplation. "Might work," says one researcher. "Can't use the Atlantic, don't want to risk waking up 169," says another, leaving you to wonder what SCP-169 is and how an asteroid strike would only wake it up. "I believe," says Dr. Gears, "that taking SCP-169 into consideration, either the Indian Ocean or the northern Pacific Ocean would be the safest areas to bring down the asteroid. Doctor Johns should be able to model the tsunami well enough to give us a more precise target location. In the meantime, we should have Mare Imbrium begin preparing a missile, and send word to the Demeter and the Guardian to prepare for emergency relocation, and direct them to the safest locations they can reach by time of impact. Is this plan acceptable?" After most of the researchers present nod their assent, O5-03 speaks up. "We will need some time to review your recommendation, but it would be best if you began preparations as soon as possible. The relevant personnel will receive the final order to proceed or abort as soon as we have made our decision." With that, the display goes dark, marking the official end of the meeting. As you close the meeting software and disconnect your laptop, you realize that you may have just personally sent a tsunami towards some of the most densely-populated coastal areas in the world. Is this what dealing with Keter-level threats is like? The senior staff must handle this kind of thing constantly - you can't even imagine the kind of emotional baggage - you are cut off mid-thought by a simian voice behind you. "So, who wants lunch?"

"And so," Dr. Samet continued from his wheelchair, his right foot still in a cast after that terrible, accidental firearm discharge, "We must now proceed with the application of-" He stopped, staring at Dr. Bright in some kind of horror. "What is that?" Bright smiled calmly, as his assistants continued to aide him in the final calibrations. Laying on the table before him, in pieces at the moment, were the three pieces of a rather ugly looking metal staff. Wires and cables trailed off at odd angles, and continued to look more bizarre the more the Lucky Bunch fiddled with it. "It's a staff, Samet." "I can see that much, 963," the doctor, without a clue, snarled. "But why do you have it here?" Firmly grasping the now assembled staff, Bright turned on Samet with a scowl. "My name is Dr. Bright. And this is to attract 682's attention. How were you planning on getting SCP-963 onto 682?" "Well, ah, a launcher, and, ah, hmmm…" "Exactly. With this prototype, I shall endeavor to anger it, to the point which it comes for me. From there it will be child's play to get 963 inside it." Samet nodded. "Of course, of course, 963 - but what does it do?" Some people never learn. And other people continually insult a vengeful immortal who holds no regard for human life. The really stupid people feed Bright straight lines. "This." He raised the cane to point in a vaguely Samet direction, and pressed a button. Immediately, a purplish arc of electricity arched through the air, grounding itself in Samet's injured foot. The doctor screamed, desperately rolling his wheelchair backwards, even as the bandages caught fire. "Hmm, Dr. Samet, it appears as if you have some sort of metal in your cast. Wonder how that happened." As Samet's lackeys hurried to put their boss out, Bright turned to Dr. Light and nodded. "All right, Sophia, we know what we're doing. What're the current odds?" Dr. Light checked her clipboard, frowning. "2-1 it doesn't work. 5-1 you get in it and rampage across the site. Side bet on that one, even odds are that you use said rampage to kill Samet over there. 10-1 says something goes wrong, and you get stuck inside 682. 20-1 odds say that this goes bottoms up, and we all end up as you, somehow." "I like those odds." "963!" Samet yelled, as his foot smoldered. "You! You, I! You-!" "Dr. Samet. Understand this." Bright stalked over to tower over the other researcher. "I am about to be put in the most dangerous SCP we've ever discovered. I will offer you this deal then. If you cover your feet in barbecue sauce, I will stop at them." And with that, Bright turned, and stalked down to the staging floor. Jack Bright awoke with a headache, his memories fuzzy. There had been something… Barbecue sauce, maybe? No, something else… Oh yes, the memories came flooding back to him, him standing there with his staff, the beast charging, lightning and teeth, blood and pain, and that horrible indescribable feeling as he jumped hosts. But now- Things weren't right. He could feel cold stone beneath his back, which implied that he was lying down. And he could hear other people moving around him, so there was a good chance he was still in the Foundation. And there was always barbecue sauce. Wait, what? "Jack? We really need you right now sir." A familiar voice called from above. Slowly, Jack opened his eyes, his face fixed in a pre-emptive frown. Standing over him, in a rather strange looking chain mail hauberk, was a familiar looking Mexican man. Something about him- "I know you, don't I?" The other man leaned down, helping Jack to his feet. "Not really sir. Please, you have to come with me." His grip on Jack's arm was firm, his other hand holding firmly to a long staff. Jack stopped, suddenly, watching the other people moving past. All of them were dressed the same, a chain mail hauberk with gold rings in a circle over the heart, surrounding a ring of red rings. All of them held the same staff. "You're D-113. You're the first, aren't you?" Jack couldn't help but stare. It had been a long time since that first one. "Well, the answer to that is yes and no. And yes. But not really. Uhm. Right, we do it your way, stupidly blunt. You see sir, none of this is real." As he gestured at the castle walls, and the people around him. "Well, duh. Credit me with a little sense." "Oh, okay, right, that makes things, uhm, easier. See, your mind, it isn't ready for this. It can't, uhm, really deal with how 682 sees things. So, it came up with this as a defense. Only, it's not just your mind. 963 is involved, and somehow, bits and pieces of the leftovers of those you've taken over are being animated, to help. Only, it's still part of you. Uhm. Does that make sense?" "Not even a little bit." As they pushed through a great wooden door. "But I do understand where you're com…ing… from." Jack stared upwards at the sky, for once, without a voice. Above him was the thing, the creature, what we in our limited scope called SCP-682. And it was glorious. A beautiful, nightmarish, disturbing yet intriguing creature, spread across the sky, the ground, the horizon, hell, everything that wasn't Jack and his castle. Barbecue Sauce. "I, well, then, whoo." Jack frowned more deeply, as several armored people suddenly ran up beside him. Even the old man was there, although he shouldn't have been. He could feel the impact lessen even as they stood there. "Right, sharing the load, got it." He wrenched his eyes away from the… thing, turning to his own ramparts. A twisted, mangled castle that Escher would be proud of loomed above and below him, and from every corner, pieces of him stood, staffs in hand, striking out against the barbecue sauce creature. Purple lightning arched here and there, playing across the surface of the beast, carving inroads, yoking it to his command. "We're stuck, aren't we?" "Encaged, sir." "Have to figure out a way to get out. We have some barbecue sauce to serve up." "Pardon?" "Figure of speech. Look, I need…" Bright racked his memories, oh so many of them. The answer would be there, somewhere. And then it was there, standing in front of him. Researcher Class 2 Damon Smith, promoted to Dr. Bright in the line of duty. Damon had always had a fear of being enclosed. And that would get them out of here. "Come on, Damon, take that staff, and link up! Remember how it feels, to be in small spaces. Locked in, no one to hear you, how to get out…" The apparition before Jack raised its staff, as his limbs trembled in fear. A line of energy lashed out from the staff, scoring a long line in the creature above them. And it began to change. From the inside, the effects were hard to tell, but everyone there could feel it. Something different was happening. The Dragon was moving. Jack couldn't help but laugh. "BARBECUE SAUCE!" he called out - one of the absolute worst battle cries ever spoken. He wrenched the staff from Damon's hands, not even noticing as he pushed the poor researcher over the edge, not caring as a mouth of the beast snapped up the helpless researcher. Lines of energy, a mental projection of Jack's control over 682, lashed out in force from the castle construct. He could feel that it was doing his will, doing what he told it to do. He knew some part of his brain was actually inside the creature, controlling it, seeing through its eyes, but he also knew he could never hope to understand how it saw the world. So, down here, he fought a pitched battle, using metaphor and simile to act in his stead. But it wasn't to last. Even as he found himself filled with the knowledge that he had done what he wanted to do, the dragon fought back. Its ferocious claws ripped into the castle, shattering walls. Its foul breath played along the walls, sending body-forms reeling, tumbling back into the safety of 963. Jack knew he could not last. With the last of his mental will, he set the creature back, commanded it to return, and then he too retreated to the safety of his nightmares. Bright could feel the soft texture of a bed beneath him. Cotton sheets from the feel of it, so not his own bed. Thin mattress, the smell of disinfectant, the leather straps on his wrists, neck, chest and feet… Yes, he must be in Medical. "Subject is waking up, Overseer." Bright opened his eyes slowly, aware of the feel of cold metal pressed against his temple. His eyes flicked first to the figure holding the gun, one of the Overseer's goon squad, none of them actually worth remembering. Then, to the sound of the voice, the lovely Dr. Light doing her medical duties. Finally, to the last remaining space by his bed, filled with a monitor screen, on which a black outline of a person could be seen. A mechanical voice, carefully filtered to remove any identifying markers, spoke to him. "Please identify yourself." With or without identifying markers, Bright still knew who was behind the outline. "Dr. Jack Bright, Level five Researcher, Personnel Director of far too many sites, yada yada yada." "Who is your sister?" The voice continued. Bright knew it was the questions that needed to be asked, to make sure he was himself. "Claire Pierce. And, in answer to your next three questions, 31-20-35, the Ebola virus, and purple monkey dishwasher." "Identity confirmed. Dr. Bright, what is your last memory?" Bright thought hard for a long moment, then spoke. "I was… going up against 682, wasn't I? Yeah, I had the staff and everything! Guess he didn't snap up 963, huh?" "Dr. Bright, SCP-963 was in contact with SCP-682 for the better part of a week. For the first 36 hours, SCP-682 remained in a comatose state. Shortly thereafter, it proceeded to grow large claws, and tunnel its way through its containment, causing a massive breach. Incredibly, SCP-682 only injured one researcher, and then allowed itself to be meekly shepherded back to its containment. 682 paced its room for another 24 hours, at which point it again went comatose. 10 hours ago, SCP-963 was excreted from SCP-682's brow. A team retrieved it, and immediately placed it upon the body you now wear. You have not stirred since. Can you add anything to this?" "Sorry Six, I got nothing. Although…" Bright frowned, and licked his lips. "Why do I taste barbecue sauce?" Someplace else entirely, the dragon curled around its newest acquisition. Such a tiny little man thing. It had never thought that the foul creatures could possibly teach it anything. But one of them had. The beast circled around the memories of Damon Smith, absorbed them, made them its own. And, in learning how to fear, it added one more tool to its vast arsenal, one more way that it could change itself, and finally eliminate the scourge it called man. Coming (Relatively) Soon! Chapter Three: Confessions of a Teenage SCP

<< Back to Interference I heard white noise, unbearably loud against ears so used to silence. I turned around, my heart racing, but it was just Cyrus messing with the radio. "There won't be anything," I said, approaching him. "Just static…" He switched to AM and spun the little tuning dial very slowly towards the left end. No flickers of human voices or music, just the hiss of white noise. It hurt to listen to. At the very left end, he stopped, and there was sound, an unidentifiable one—I had never heard anything like it before. The pulsating of an alien's thoughts, the sound of the very farthest reaches of space. I felt Rob the snake suddenly wind tighter around my shoulders. "What is that?" Cyrus yanked the radio's electrical cord out of the wall socket; Rob immediately relaxed. "Unholy." I guess I should have pegged him for weirdly religious, he carried a Bible around all the time, but I never really noticed until now. It was probably the only thing keeping him from completely losing it like the others. I wondered for a second why I hadn't gone insane, but I tried not to think about it too much. We left the classroom at the sound of hundreds of running footsteps, fleeing down the stairs to the ground floor. I was about to throw open the door to the office to hide, but Cyrus dragged me into a janitors' closet instead. "Don't go in there," he said, almost inaudible over the footsteps and screaming. "Don't ever go in there." I almost asked why, but I stopped myself, not wanting to know. I opened the closet door just a crack and looked through into the hall. They weren't after us, I quickly realized, they were running towards the edge. They jumped. All of them, too many for me to get a count. None of them were afraid. Their running steps were utterly drowned out by a great roar like the sound the ocean makes during a storm, but much larger, more terrible than any ocean or any storm or any tangible thing on Earth. They all tumbled into the whiteness. I had known some of them. I had known all of them. I heard their monstrous sound tear out of their throats, it came from the fog and the air. The roar grew to a deafening volume. I felt like perhaps I should jump too, but when I stood to do it, Cyrus pulled me back. "Wednesday," he said, almost breathless with panic. "Wednesday." I woke up. Above me were a few people wearing gas masks and talking amongst themselves. I couldn't hear them, their voices were only a murmur, at least until my head cleared itself a little. I rubbed my eyes. "She's coming around," said one of them. I tried to speak to them. I knew I spoke their language but I didn't completely understand what they were saying. "Hmmh," I mumbled, attempting to sit up. Everything felt heavy. "What do you remember last?" said another gas mask, but one of his fellows swatted him. "Don't ask her now, dipshit. Wait until she's at least lucid enough to speak properly." "Sorry." "C'mon." One of them scooped me up and threw me over his shoulder. Another yelled in surprise. "Snake!" "Well don't scream about it! Where?" "On her shoulder…" "Is it alive?" "Yeah - " "Don't worry about it - " "Can we focus for two seconds and leave? Dunford, Barnes, stay here, we'll come back." I felt like I was falling from a great height. Had I jumped? If I did jump, then the other kids who jumped must have been around there somewhere too… Had I just dreamed the whole thing? "Where…?" I said, my mouth not working right. "Don't talk yet, you'll have plenty of time for that later." They took me outside, and I heard many voices. They took my clothes and undid my hair and pushed me into a tent where I was soaped and hosed down by a cranky-looking woman in a white coat. I stumbled into a different tent, and the woman directed me to a metal chair. Cyrus was there too, looking far more alert than I felt. One of the gas masks handed me Rob, who was pretty wet and maybe a little stunned from the shower. He promptly curled up in my lap. All of the people in the tent were adults - none of my classmates in sight. The gas masks who had carried me out were not there either, but there were what looked like doctors and nurses and people who looked maybe they might be in the military, though something was off about them. Each had some sort of symbol on their shoulders or their chests, something I didn't recognize. They conducted their business with lowered voices just barely above a whisper. A man wearing a white coat and small round glasses was speaking to Cyrus too quietly for me to hear. Cyrus seemed to listen, I guess, but wasn't responding. The man grew frustrated with Cyrus's silence and approached me carrying a tape recorder. "My name is Dr. Krell," he said in a cool voice. "We represent the SCP Foundation." >>

<< Back to part three Agent Erika Sarin sighed for a moment before raising her megaphone once more. "Okay, ladies and gentlemen," she said, her voice booming over the school parking lot. "I need you to follow the men in labcoats, please, for decontamination and testing. Boys go to this tent, girls to that one." Sarin gestured like an airline stewardess pointing out those incredibly convenient exits everyone hopes they'll never need to use, then walked briskly to Dr. Krell in the basketball courts, pushing aside gaggles of confused students and teachers. "At approximately 9 AM this morning," said the dispassionate voice of Dr. Alan Krell, "a burst of noise on all radio bands came from this location, somewhere inside Eastwood High School. We were able to triangulate the source, but the noise is still unidentified. Arriving here, you may or may not have noticed that half of the student body - about 800 students - disappeared, by which I mean the north half of the school went completely empty." "That would usually mean a day off for us," said Agent Dunford. "Pieholes shut during briefings, please," Dr. Krell said without missing a beat. "Questions from local law enforcement and civilians have been quelled for the moment by Agent Young. We're from a poison control center, you got that? Type three chemical grenades have been detonated for deniability, so keep your gas masks on if you want your blood to continue staying inside your body." He turned for a moment to look at the building. It looked, aside from the Foundation personnel milling about, like an utterly normal high school. "How many casualties have we got so far?" said Dr. Krell. "Eleven students, aaaand…" Agent Jacobsen scanned his clipboard. "Two faculty." "Alright then. All of you get inside. Make sure your walkie-talkies are on channel 4. Take note of any and all anomalies." Continued in part four >>

I need to write this down, because I forget things sometimes, and I think what I heard today was important. Not to me, the time for me or almost anyone else alive on Earth today to make a difference has passed, but someone, somewhere might be able to make something of this, or at least find it helpful, or something. Once I'm done, I'm going to seal it up in a pipe, coat it in wax, and chuck it into the ravine. Maybe someday someone will read this, and try to put things together. If they're allowed to. I'd love to start at the beginning, but I'm honestly not sure when the world started to end. Could have been years and years before the final bits, or it could have been all at once. Everything was so grim, what with warmer air, cooler seas, too little gas and too many people, things could have been unraveling for ages before things bubbled up to the public eye. What I and others remember most was when the Disney Magic sank. It was then, I think, that most people started to think that things might be worse than they seemed. The Disney Magic was a big cruise ship, one of those liner jobs that tools around islands and stuff. One day, the news was all screaming about how it suddenly just went down when it was trying to put in to port. The weird thing about it was how there was no video of it for a long time. Some still pictures of it floating fine, but none of it actually going down. Then, somehow, a tape showed up, and the news started playing it. I have to imagine they didn't review it first. The ship was puffing along, strong and fast, little boats bobbing around it, looking like every vacation lover's dream, when suddenly it stopped. I mean stopped, just a dead halt like it had just slammed into a mountain. You could see people go lurching forward all over the deck, a bunch of junk fall off the sides, a real mess. It's all still for a few seconds, then suddenly there's this foaming behind the ship. Most people assumed it was the engine trying to fire up again… then the arm came up. I'm not sure if it actually was an arm, but it was some kind of limb, and it must have been a hundred feet long at least. It reached up along the side of the boat and… just ripped it open, I mean unzipped it like a coat, and you could see all the people inside screaming and running… it was awful. Then you saw something lurch up, a big, spiny shape pushing against that gap, shoving in… then there was an explosion on its back, and the camera whipped up to show a couple of jets whizzing by… then it ended. I remember just sitting there, stunned, looking at the TV, barely noticing the president coming on to declare a state of emergency. I think it was two or three days later when the TV went under full government control, but it may have been a week, I'm not sure. Internet got clamped later, but soon all you could hear, read or see was “remain calm, everything is under control”. The oddest thing was that life really didn't change much for a while. Bills still came, still had to work, go to school, all that. Just a lot more scared faces, and a lot more weird talk. Pretty soon we were getting told that whole towns were being evacuated, that there was a plague, or a riot, or a terrorist bomb, or some other nightmare. My brother down south said that they got moved because of a huge wildfire. The weird thing was, he said, that the fire moved oddly… seemed to shoot right for gas or brush, and didn't travel evenly. That after a while, he swore he saw what looked like a twenty foot tall man of fire walking and eating everything. The call got dropped right after he said that. I haven't talked to him since. So things got worse, little by little. People kept being moved, and there was no real way to communicate with each other anymore that was really reliable, so it was hard to say just how bad things were. Still, word of mouth was still going strong, and it was creepy. Crazy shit, really, stuff about zombies in the north, killing frenzies in the east, a place near the ocean where the ground was alive and eating people, a cult screaming about the second coming and killing people to buy off god… I started pulling more and more away from people, just to get some ignorant peace of mind. Looking back, that probably saved my life. Finally, one day, I woke up and there was blood on my window. It was outside, and I could hear some insane shit going down outside… screaming, clanking, gunshots, and a smell like burning wires. I hid. I'm not ashamed to admit it, I left my fellow man to rot, and hid inside for almost a full week, long after the noise stopped. After the fifth day, the electricity and gas gave out, along with the running water. When I finally got hard up for supplies, I poked my nose out, and saw that the whole west side of the world was gone. Now, I don't know for sure if it actually is gone, but there is a cliff that starts thirty feet to the west of my house, and I cannot see the bottom of it. I also can't see the other side of this ravine, so for all intents and purposes, that part of the world is gone for me. The suburb I was in looked like a war zone, blood and broken stuff everywhere, houses carved up… no bodies though, which I still think was weird. I scrounged up some food and stuff from some of the houses, then went back home. I've been doing that for a while now. I'm not sure how long, really. Might have been years and years, or just a few months, it's hard to say. Sometimes the sun just sticks in one spot for what feels like days… other times these clouds roll in, and you can't see two feet. There's… things around, too. I run at the first noise, but I think they're about man-sized, and they seem to like metal. Other, little things scramble around in the rubble sometimes, so I try and keep clear. One time, a thing that looked like a pill bug the size of a cat crawled out, looked at me, and screamed “STOP!” in perfect English. I hid inside for days. There are also these big blimp-things that float around sometimes. They have little bug legs on their undersides, and they look kinda like maggots, but with eyes all over. They eat everything when they land, but most of the time they stay high up. One of these had just passed when I found the hurt guy. He was all ripped up, and looked like one of those S.W.A.T. Team guys you see on tv sometimes, but his combat suit thing was all ripped to hell. I dragged him back home, and then we talked. He said that he had been hunting the blimp-thing, but had gotten attacked. He wouldn't say by what, but he looked like he was on his last legs. I fed him some canned beans and some water, and he seemed to come around a little. Asked me who I was, if I was alright and all that. He seemed kinda shocked when I said he was the first person I'd seen since the rest of the world vanished. He told me it wasn't gone, just relocated, but wouldn't say what that meant. I helped heal him up, and kept asking who he was, but he wouldn't say. Finally, he said screw it, that his orders were probably no good anymore anyway, and told me. He said he worked for a foundation or something, and that they were like a combination jail and research center. He said that he was one of the agents who went around trying to find strange stuff and keep it from hurting people. I said he was doing a hell of a job so far, and he laughed pretty hard. He said something had happened, and that a bunch of these things had gotten loose at the same time, and caused this foundation place to lose control. He said it became a “GH-0 'Dead Greenhouse' scenario”. I asked him what that meant, and he looked at me for awhile before going on. He said that's what they call a situation where everybody on earth dies, but the earth itself is still ok and can support life. I asked what did that matter if everybody's dead, and he smiled strangely. I asked him if anyone else on earth was still alive, and he said yes, but carefully spread out and contained. After that, I just sorta sat and digested things for a bit, and the man started stretching and checking his cuts. He was starting to pull his boots on when I asked what happens now. He said that they have to “reboot” things. Said they have the technology to recreate almost anything, and that making people is actually pretty easy. Said that they would clean out and contain things, rebuild the broken cities, and repopulate them. It would take a long, long time, but he said they would eventually get things back to the way they were before. Even said they could recreate memories and stuff. I just sat, kinda stunned, and watched him as he just kept going along, getting dressed like this was all no big deal. I told him he was nuts, that there was no way people could just forget, that this could all be just swept away. He stopped, looked at me, smiled, then said “Why not? It's been done before.” I don't know if that man was crazy or not, but I think he was sane. As he was leaving, he said something about putting my house underwater. Please, don't let them brush me away. Don't let them hide us. Try and find more, I know there's got to be more people who tried to leave something behind. Don't let the world die in vain. Remember us.

The priests looked up in horror as there was a great, deep growl from above them. Somewhere, in the vast impenetrable body of their World and their God… metal ground to a halt. It was a horrifying noise that set the entire city on edge. It was not particularly loud, no, nor was it high pitched or rumbling or annoying. But it meant bad things to come. Very bad, indeed. Although nobody spoke about it, the beats of the gears and their world were slowing down year after year, after beating steadily for millennia. Everyone was horrified. The smaller mechanics, for which they used to modify themselves over time, were unaffected, but the great gears, including the massive golden mountain on which their city was built, were turning a little slower, and sometimes unevenly. The high priestess even halted her studies on ectogenesis in an attempt to consult with the God, although the great God and World never answered. So she organized a group to set out in adventure, to seek out the source of this slowing, this unevenness. They chose a group of children, as of yet unchanged by the gears and mechanics that would become part of their bodies come puberty, or when young legs were inevitably crushed between gears in a moment of carelessness. After all, children were small and fast, and expendable, capable of getting into the smallest places. There were five of them. They set off through the gardens, first, the ever-shifting irrigated gears, each one almost as large as their city alone, where earth- real earth- filtered in from somewhere above, unseen by gears, and where crystalline growths provided brilliant golden light that made the brass, turning walls of the world glow. They collected food to carry with them in their knapsacks of spun, silken silver, and left for places unknown to the city. One of them found a way to climb the gears up, seeking out where the earth and water that filtered into the gardens came from, suspecting that perhaps the earth had jammed a gear, or the water had rusted somewhere (although he knew the World and God never rusted). He was a tall child, with dusky hair and pale eyes, who dreamed of one day becoming such as the high priestess, a being of pure metal and energy, instead of his fleshy, tainted birth-body. Another set off northwards, where magnetized needles always swung to point, deciding that perhaps somewhere the God and World had become a simpler metal, one that could be swayed by magnetism, and that the source of the northern magnetic field could be obstructing it. She was a smart girl, with dark hair and eyes and a strong ambition to perhaps be a priestess herself someday. The third left the group when they encountered a place so dark that no light could be seen, and had become separated from the group- as he was always a little hard of hearing and clumsy, a poor trait amidst the World and God, where the clicking and groaning of a gear was one of the only ways to tell if one was going to trap and pin you. He wandered into the darkness, afraid and disoriented, until he emerged to the west, although he didn't know that direction. The last two decided that it was a poor idea to split up, being siblings, twins, an extreme rarity, and being very much connected on a deep, needy level. They found a tunnel that lead down, down, spiraling down into a staircase of pistons and tubing amidst the churning cogs. And they continued as such, down, down, into darkness and towards a light more pure and white than any they had seen before in the distance. Many years passed before they returned. And in those years, the high priestess found that their God would no longer convert the children who reached adulthood, to her utter horror. Gears ground to a halt in some places, while others spun wildly or broke lose, now and then. She feared that her five had truly been sent to their deaths, and wept tearlessly for them, her crystalline diopter eyes having no fluid in them. Their city was ruined, their population diminished. The gardens swelled with fruit unseen before, and sometimes whole plants or strange dead creatures fell from above with the earth and water. A flood had ravaged the city streets, one year, and another year random storms of static and lightening flashed through a neighborhood, burning flesh and stopping gears where they stood, and causing many of the eternally-glowing crystals to shatter and fall dark. And then he came. A tall man, with skin tanned darker than any the city had seen, an earthy bonze, his hair golden as the gears and pale eyes harsh and squinting to see in the dim light of the city. His flesh was windburned and lined with hard work and scars, and he carried with him heavy boots laden with dirt and a staff of wood- and a device made of a dark blackened metal, which he used to dispatch a priest who had gone mad and attempted to attack him, bursting his copper-plated skull and scattering wired brains everywhere. He spoke of another World above, one that was not the God and World, where earth covered everything and plant life grew abundant, and people who never changed into machinations lived and worked, and had believed the world below them populated by monsters and demons that had been locked away to squander out of the view of the sun, a massive light so brilliant it illuminated the entirety of the World. A World that was much bigger than the God and World, that lead all the way to a place, land where the God and World was nowhere below, and nowhere near. The high priestess claimed blasphemy and had him chased from the city, but in her ticking heart, winding down, she knew and feared he spoke the truth. Shortly after he left, the woman arrived, her dark hair elaborately braided, her dark eyes smart and sharp with intense knowledge. At first the priestess thought that she had been changed and was to accept her as one of their own, but her shined skin was not metal, but some sort of material that was both hard and flexible and did not break, shattering the points of spears when the guards tried to force her out. Her insides, visible through opalescent and translucent panels here and there, were formed of electricity and wires, such small unmoving mechanics sickening to the priestess. She spoke of another World to the north, where the unmodified and newly modified lived together in synchronicity, where the entire horizon was blanketed with frozen water in many different forms- both white and granular and sheer, where the sky was endless and black and the sun- an eternal light- rose only once per year and set once per year. And of people who knew such horrible things about the God and World. The high priestess screamed blasphemy, and bade her to take her leave. The woman refused, and took up residence in an abandoned home, working with information projected of pure light and silver-and-white technology unseen. From the west came another. His skin was burned and scarred heavily, his hair fallen out, his teeth rotten, but his body muscular and strong. He carried a knife made out of white bone and a sack of dead creatures he called fish, preserved in glass jars, nothing the city had seen before. He heard nothing, but could still read and speak just fine, although he reacted to any movement near him with an animal shout and a swing of the knife. He gibbered and claimed to have come from a World of water, endless water, where small groups of people and other creatures clung to life on drifting cities and small floating homes. And of creatures, some so massive they could swallow a thousand people whole, and others that were small and so vicious a dozen of them would strip one to the bone in seconds. The water was bottomless, he claimed, and he spoke of seeing the World and God from the outside, and that it was not endless, that it ended where the endless water dropped into falls so high that the people spoke that there was no bottom to it. The high priestess relaxed the city's vast discomfort by claiming that the boy must have gone crazy in his long years of isolation, and bade that he be rejoined with the God and World, although the metallic woman with dark hair and eyes shielded him with a bubble of pure light and energy before they could herd him into the crushing gears, and they let the two of them be out of fear. Then the fourth arrived, quite surprisingly alone and detached. She spoke little, and wore only scraps of clothing underneath crude scrapped armor made out of curious shells and a heavy cloak, constantly complaining of the cold. In all, she was quite benign compared to the others, peacefully accepting food and watching the priestess distrustfully. One could have even thought she was entirely unmodified until, in a moment of carelessness, another set of arms reached out from under the cloak to adjust her armor. It was not until pressured that she spoke of a world below, where she, and she truly, had found the source of the God and World's ails. Water poured in on all sides of this world, salty and rich, bringing creatures and refuse plants with it. Above, a layer of crystals so pure and white and brilliant it was impossible to see the God and World, and in the swampy, still waters down below, pillars supported the God's weight and rocky spires and masses of soggy land that collected around either of these formed small islands. And it was there that the natives of this land, curious and intelligent, but still shy, and very very strange if medically skilled, had led her to the source of the god's problems. Although she hadn't said much before, she described what she had seen in vivid, triumphant detail. There was another God, one who lurked below in the swampy waters, and was locked into battle with the God and World. The natives had bade her to dive into the waters, and in the deep, she saw them, trapped under heavy waters- the God of Flesh, whose massive limbs and tendrils and all other appendages she could not even find words to explain had crawled up through the water and the pillars and rock spires and had jammed themselves deep into the heart of the God and World. But the God and World had responded in kind, a massive mechanical weapon poised over the God of Flesh's heart ready to drop the moment its unending mechanical heart stopped. They were locked in a stalemate, neither one willing to destroy the other for knowledge of it's own destruction. At this, she had burst out into hysterical laughter, and the priestess looked into her eyes and saw pain and madness…but also honesty. The priestess, in a rare moment of humanity, asked of the woman what had become of her twin. The woman responded with a confused stare, before removing her cloak, revealing the extra set of arms was not where her strangeness ended, as another set of eyes rested above her ears, and her skull arced back in such a way that there would have been two minds crammed into it. Her back was hunched, slightly, but she smiled, and explained that they were both here. There was nothing to worry about. And the high priestess finally relented, and simply howled her frustrations. The woman left before the priestess could collect herself enough to reach a decision, and the mechanical woman, the leader of her people…retired to her private labs and collapsed. Her heart, in all it's whirring, ticking glory…could not take any more of this. And unknown to her and the city, five (or perhaps four, depending upon your beliefs) met in an abandoned home on the edge of the city, drawn together perhaps by fate, or luck, or some greater planning. “They released the anti-virus into the soil and water long before we ever saw the effects. By now, every inch of the Gods have to be affected.” Said the tall man, shining his weapon. “No more converting anything for either of them.” “All studies at the polar stations show that the infection rate of both entities have been completely neutralized to 0%.” The mechanical, dark-haired woman nodded, the glowing screens that emanated from her own body flickering the words as she spoke. “Unfortunately, the longer they survive, the greater the chance of either entity overcoming the affects of your Foundation's antivirus.” “S-so weh hab to keel dem, righ?” The deaf man inquired, shaking and shrugging, the scarred skin on his back stretching as he sat. “Easier said than done. My people- the people below- worship the Flesh God, of course they do, just as we worshiped the Gear God, but…even they know that killing the Gear God will bring it crashing down upon them.” The two-in-one chuckled, pacing back and forth, all four hands wringing. “…but…both Gods…to be buried together.” “They won't do it.” The first man grunted, standing from his seat and brushing the golden hair from his eyes, a determined glint to his smirk. “These things ain't real Gods. They're just beings, and they're afraid of dying same as you and me. So we're gonna have to nudge them one way or another. Everything above the God and World's been evacuated, so nobody needs to worry up above.” “I propose we attack both at once. There is a high probability that they will attack each other simultaneously.” The glowing screens of light displayed the possibility in a simplified animation. “I have already informed the polar stations of this idea, and they predict similarly.” “Wuh we waitin' foh?” “…Good question.” The two-in-one chuckled, then laughed, and then cackled with an exhausted sort of delight. It was no more than a few days later that the high priestess sat in her chamber, and heard something that made her cold metal heart skip a beat. Silence. The ticking of the God and World stopped, suddenly, eternally, and instantly she knew in every fiber of her metallic being that it was the end of the World. Before the gear under the city gave way, and everything began to crumbled and fall. The high priestess, in reality, was one of the lucky ones, desperate and strong enough to scamper through the ruins as they tumbled and collapsed in on themselves, falling seemingly endlessly, until she finally reached a point where the gears gave way to crumbling earth. Her sharpened needlepoint fingers grasped at grass and tree roots for purchase, and her crystal eyes looked up. She saw the sun, a ball of fire so bright yet far away she could hardly comprehend the very notion of it, much less fully accept what she was seeing, and then something came over her head, a carriage hoisted into the air by blades moving so rapidly they flowed into one. And with the last tic of her heart, she saw four faces (but ten pair of eyes) looking down from the bizarre vehicle, smiling in triumph. Her heart went still and she fell into the gaping crevasse where once two gods fell to sleep and battle. And the ocean quickly filled what was left of the hole, as if it had never been there in the first place.

The end of the world starts with a song. You wake up, still hopped up on the pain pills they pass out like candy here. Someone changed the radio station while you were out, instead of sports scores there's singing. Your head is clearing quickly, not leaving the usual headache behind it, for once. You reach to change the radio station, and stop. It doesn't hurt. You look at your arm, at the tubes stabbing into it, and see the sagging skin pull back, tighten, heal. You sit up, and the song grows louder, and you realize that you're sitting up for the first time in months. You wonder if you're dead, if you're dreaming. You aren't. One minute has passed since the song started playing. You try to get up just to see if you can, and you can, and it doesn't hurt. You walk awkwardly, legs still stiff, steps still unsure after so long without use. Your bare feet tingle as they touch the carpet. There is a small cactus perched on the windowsill, and you could swear that it twitches slightly, thorns growing imperceptibly. Well, you decide, it's a dream. Might as well enjoy it. You step outside into the hallway, and hear the song being broadcast from every speaker in the building Other doors are opening, all down the cancer ward, and pale people in sky blue hospital shifts are stumbling slightly as they remember what walking is like. You see that some of them still have tumors, those for whom you can tell, and you run a hand over your neck. There's still that small lump. You aren't cured? You feel cured, though… The small potted trees, placed to give some feeling of life, are rustling as if in a light breeze. You pinch yourself suddenly, automatically, perhaps even unwillingly… it is, after all, a very nice dream. It hurts, but it stops hurting quickly. You walk for the main desk of this, the top floor, the hospital's hospice. The receptionist is standing and staring, and you laugh when you think of how she's been put out of a job. Is this real? Probably not. It seems real, though, and feels real, and by now that's enough. You stroke the lump on your neck again, and it somehow feels bigger. Two minutes in, and the song plays on. You need to see the sky. Three minutes. You stand on the roof, and hear the song being played from every direction. The grass is green, and trees that had lost their leaves to the sinking heat of autumn are growing new ones, bigger and thicker. People are there, too, just standing and listening. You laugh, loud and without care, and try to sing along, but the song is in words that you do not recognize. It seems as if everything that can play the song is piping it to the heavens, a song of genesis, of life. Life responds. A dull ache is there in your neck, you realize. It feels heavier, too, as if padding were being placed on the tumor. You reach your hand up, and feel a mass of flesh twice the size that it used to be. And all the trees put forth flowers at once. And everything begins to go wrong. Four minutes have passed since it started. You see someone down below keel over, suddenly. She vomits, and a sapling shoots up out of the mess. Others begin to clutch at their stomachs, some fall over, many throw up or suddenly vent their bowels. Small plants grow from the waste. You feel nothing but the steadily growing tumor. You stand, transfixed, until Five minutes have passed since you first heard the radio sing. Things are moving faster, now. The grass seems to double in height in a matter of seconds, though from the roof it's hard to tell. New branches are sprouting forth from every tree you can see. Most of the people down below have stopped moving, and you watch as they bleed green that rises towards the sun. It's life, you realize, feeling detached. The hospital was sanitary. You've been fed through tubes for months, but there's bound to be something inside you waiting to grow. You don't care. You've been dying for too long now to care. You sit down, legs dangling over a rising forest. Six minutes. You feel something slip down your side and hit the roof. You feel when it hits the roof. The tumor is spreading, and you watch it bubble outwards, putting forth a tendril here and there, feeling its way. It spreads like living molasses, but full of veins and prickling as it slips over bumps in the surface. There's something gray in the distance, but coming closer. It's covering the trees, releasing smoke-like clouds as it does. Seven minutes. You must be the only one left. The tumor is spreading outwards still, coating the whole roof. It's almost like a gigantic cape. You wonder why you're still alive. The gray has solidified into a mountain of fungus, and you wonder if it will reach the clouds. It's stopped coming closer, though- the trees in front of it have become covered by what look like spider webs, connecting them all together, catching the gray spores and keeping the trees safe. Below you, the roads are no longer visible. The grass has taken over, with an occasional tree poking up from the tangle. The grass , as far as you can tell, is sprouting out and growing connections to nearby stalks. How can the song still be playing? There can't be electricity, the speakers have surely been in most cases overgrown. It still seems to be coming from everywhere, though not like before. Before, it came from electronics. Now you can feel the voices as if the choir were standing right behind you. Eight minutes, and you wonder how long the song can be. The grass below has cut down the trees, joined together and lacerated the trunks, absorbed them and grown taller. The spider webs in the distance begin to cover the mountain of fungus, which fights back with irregular bulges and stick-like protrusions. You have covered the entire roof, and are working your way down the walls, entering windows as you reach them. The people inside have disappeared as far as you can tell. You can tell because the tumor can tell, not with eyes, but you can feel every minute difference in warmth that reaches it, every vibration that passes through the air and the building. Nine minutes have passed, and you return to your room, slipping in through the window. Something stabs you when you do. A spike rips through the leathery folds of flesh that were once a tumor. The cactus. Your skin contracts around the spines, but more keep growing. They impale you, sent into a frenzy of growth by the touch. Spikes erupt from the top floor of the hospital, too fast to be stopped, too fast to be believed. It's odd. You realize, still detached, that you can see it happen. You can see every side of the building at once. The cactus throws quickly growing green balls of itself outward, seeming to double or triple in size before they hit the ground and tear into the grass. It hurts, of course, but that's nothing new. You try to laugh as you think of a cactus growing here , in autumn no less, but you have no mouth anymore. It's grown over. The cactus spreads furiously, each mine-like spike ball exploding into maturity in a matter of seconds. They begin to throw their own children outwards as well, and the grass acts as a single being, flowing like water to ice to solidify beneath the baby cacti, not letting them touch the ground. It doesn't matter. The spikes go down and somehow take root. They come up, as well. Ten minutes, and it's time to die. Twenty minutes later, and the song abruptly stops. Not that you're there to hear it. Not really. Something survived, though your brain was impaled by a thousand miniature barbs, your body torn from the tumor and used for its nutrients. Some of the flesh survived, carpeting the roof. It may live forever. It's not a wasteland that you left behind. When the song stopped, so did the changes. At least, so did the speed of the changes. They'll always be happening. They always have been, really. Where the hospital once stood is a world of spikes and thorns, the grass grown together with your cactus to give a clear message to whatever animals may come. Whatever animals there are. You would not recognize them, anyway. The fungus still stands like a mountain, and will continue to do so, forever. The spider webs grow thick, but no insects will ever be caught. There are no humans left. In some strange spots there are things that were once human. A tower of bone, with eyes peeking out. A hair-covered family of four-armed and legless things, who will continue to etch meaningless inscriptions on crumbling masonry until they at last die out. A cloth-like, almost fluid mass of flesh that wisps through the miles of cacti, parting and reforming around each individual spear. And the world began with a song.

The page does not (yet) exist. The page scp-169 you want to access does not exist. • create page “That's funny,” you think. “I could have sworn…” You click on the Recent posts link. Maybe there's something in there about it. No, there's no explanation. It doesn't look like there's been much activity tonight, either. You hit View categories, then announcements. Forum Category Requested forum category does not exist. “Now that's odd,” you begin to think. “Maybe they're doing some major site maintenance.” You tap the red link in the upper left hand corner of the page. The page does not (yet) exist. The page main you want to access does not exist. • create page Now your fingers are getting a little jittery. You click SCP series, and a thousand copies of [ACCESS DENIED] are staring back at you. You open them over and over. 008, gone. 212, gone. 914, 682, 173, gone. You frantically press refresh again and again. The page scp-series you want to access does not exist. And then, with no prompting, your screen jumps, and there's a white page with grey text. Wikidot.com – professional Wiki collaboration tools. No Site exists for this address Click to create scp-wiki.wikidot.com now! You're completely dumbstruck. But the little clock on the computer screen says 3:47 AM, and it suddenly hits you how late it is. You have to get up tomorrow. And in the morning we'll probably all get a PM from Gears about how the server crashed or something. So you turn off the monitor, and snuggle into bed. Maybe it's the low rumble of vehicles on the street outside your window, or a faint creak down the hallway. You stir a little awake, and squint at the clock by your bedside. You pull the sheets up over your shoulder and groan lightly, dozing back to sleep. And then there's a smash at your bedroom door, rocketing you upright. You throw your hand up over your face at the blinding light. Arms reach out and grab you, dragging you bodily from the bed. Your hands are wrenched behind your back, and you struggle against the limbs pinning you to the floor. As a black bag is pulled over your head and the cord is tightened around your neck, you scream and scream into the dark muffling cloth.

He cautiously made his way through the ruins. He had a name, but it had long since been forgotten. His name was now a word that had been written under a drawing in the margin of a journal he didn't remember keeping. His life had become one of service to the Foundation. Now the Foundation was no more, and he had returned to the site of his greatest failure. Just what was the agent's greatest failure, he wasn't entirely sure. Perhaps it had been leaving the site without making sure everyone understood his instructions. Perhaps it had been failing to ensure that the robots had all of their moving parts protected. Perhaps it had been allowing his paranoia that the containment procedures on 359 weren't sufficient, and he had to see for himself, to get the better of him, which had been his reason for leaving in the first place. But whatever it was, within a day of his leaving the site, there was no longer a site to return to. The news had come from one of the Level 1 personnel who arrived at 359's roost. The vine had somehow hitched a ride on one of the robots, he claimed, and had killed anyone who saw it. People had been sent to the lab with flamethrowers to attempt to contain it with minimal collateral damage, but to no avail. The more people it killed, the faster it spread. By the time the situation had reached the point where activating the on-site warhead would have been a viable option, anyone who had the security clearance to do so was already dead. The agent had called in an airstrike on the former site, but the vine had already spread far beyond the site by the time it was cleared. Within a week, the entire American Midwest was overgrown. He and the remaining survivors had erected a shelter, a massive steel dome with a glass roof to let sunlight in. He knew the plant couldn't put down roots in metal or glass, and the glass was too high for any vine to reach without roots for support. He had thought they would be safe in there. He had forgotten the ingenuity of the plant. He had lost track of the time the survivors had spent inside the dome when the attack came. The vines had crept over the glass window and smashed it with the rocks held in their roots. Next had come the Great Rain of Mice. Dead mice began to fall through the broken skylight, erupting with vines the instant they hit the ground. The survivors had been caught completely off-guard. Within hours, the dome had been completely overrun. So now, dressed in a thermal insulation suit specifically designed to shield his heat signature from the plant, he returned to where it all began. He wanted to understand where everything had gone wrong. He had already seen that the plant had stacked various porous objects against the dome to reach the skylight. As he climbed over the numerous skeletons, humans and otherwise, entwined in the mass of vines, he saw something sitting in the middle of the room. It was one of the robots that had been used to maintain the plant after Incident 307 had killed a D-class personnel. One of its arms had long since rusted and fallen off. As he approached, he could see a plant growing out of it, with its roots set into the rubber casing on one of its hydraulic tubes. He prepared to turn back, when something at the other end of the room caught his eye. It appeared to be a light, but the sun had set hours ago. Against his better judgment, he made his way through the vine-strewn door. He immediately recognized the room he was in. It was the plant's containment cell, and the light, which was somehow still lit, was the hydroponic chamber where the original specimen had been contained. But now, there was something different underneath it. The hydroponic station had been replaced by a table, with several glass terrariums on it. Inside each terrarium was a sizable colony of mice. As he watched, a vine snaked forward, lifted the lid off of one of the terrariums, and touched one of the mice, which froze on the spot. The vine wrapped around the mouse and removed it from the terrarium. So that's how it's survived all this time, he thought. The damn thing is farming hosts! He turned to leave, but felt something tug at his leg. One of the seams on his suit had become caught on a thorn. Before he could decide the best way to disengage himself, the vine began to move towards the mice, pulling the seam out of the suit completely. Instantly, the vines homed in on his heat signature and grabbed the suit with their thorns. He could hear them tearing at his clothes, as a particularly large vine wrapped around each limb and forced him to his knees. As he looked up, a single vine crept up to his face. It was a plant. It didn't have a mouth. It didn't have a face. It didn't even have a head. And yet, for just a second, he almost swore it was grinning at him.

The cleric stepped over the corpse of the treasure hunter, shaking his head sadly. Such a waste of life. And those others they had found in the ruins, they would have been a welcome addition to the fold, had they not let their desire for treasure overcome their wisdom. They had attacked as soon as the Protectorate had arrived, and had quickly been killed by the Crusadori: Knives and clubs were no match against powder and shot. The wind whipped at the cleric's white and red robes. The painted mask he wore under his hood filtered the dust from the air with each breath, as well as signifying him as a full priest of the Third Order of the Protectorate. On his back he bore the symbol of the Protectorate: two rings, one inside the other, with three arrows pointing inward. A sign of eternity, of strength, a sign that could not be broken. The cleric motioned for a nearby grey-robed acolyte to follow him. Around them, the rest of the group searched through the ruin grounds, lorekeepers recording what they could recover, crusadori on guard against the savages that lived in the Dust. The gaping mouth of the ruins loomed before the cleric, broken and decaying. Hardened, gnarled trees plunged their roots deep into the ground, though their leaves bore little shade from the sun and the burning clouds. Within the gate's dark depths sat horrible secrets, secrets he had been sent to retrieve. In his heart, he felt fear: the High Council did not often convene, and when it called one to duty, it called with the authority of all eight Orders of the Protectorate. Failure would not be appreciated. Underneath the ruins, there was much more intact than on the surface. Most of the rooms and passages still stood, though the contents were well on their way to joining the dust that had fallen in a blanket on the floor and walls. That was a job for the lorekeepers. Lower and lower the cleric went, guided by the flickering light of his lantern. The place was a tomb, but not one of choice: even now the burns scarred the walls, as did the holes of age-old gunfire. Occasionally, a blackened skeleton could be found, dissolving into sand. Some passages had collapsed completely; others were lined with the worn carved messages of those who died there, or the faint stain of preserved blood splattered on the walls. The cleric could read the dying testimony of these men and women, and he felt an involuntary shudder up his spine. Even lower they went, until they reached a level filled with great vaults. Some were still sealed, even after all these years. Most were open, empty: many of the relics were destroyed in the Shattering, or lost amongst the chaos afterward. The cleric stopped in front of one vault. The door had been forcibly torn out of the wall, laying dented on the floor. A small metal sign was on the wall. The cleric brushed off the dust and read the inscription. This was what he sought. “Speak nothing upon entering, and do not look away until I begin the ritual,” he said to the acolyte. Stepping into the barren room, the cleric held up his lantern. On the opposite side of the vault stood a thing, a statute. It was the size of a man, with an oversized head and grotesque, haunting features. It was made of something like stone, with some bits of iron bar sticking out of its yellowed skin. Like statues were wont, it did not move. The cleric locked eyes with the statue. He knew this demon from the holy books: the Sightless Idol, Oon-Shiveen Thar'ie. The Shattering of the World had been wrought by this fallen god. The ancients had been taken unaware, concerned with other affairs, and it was in that moment of weakness that the Sightless Idol wrought its destruction. The gods of old, both benevolent and fallen, were cast out from the world by Oon-Shiven Thar'ie during the Shattering, now existing in a plane far removed from the world that was broken. The cleric kept his eyes on the statue. Reaching into his pack, he took out a small glass jar. Inside was a single human eye, floating in a clear liquid, attached to a few floating chunks of graying flesh. A few nerves wrapped around a palm-sized ruby pendant. Holding the remains of the god Barat between him and the Sightless Idol, the cleric blinked. He opened his eyes unharmed: the unblinking Eye of Barat the Still-Living had protected him. He handed the jar to the acolyte and took up a thick tome from his pack. The cleric began to read. “By S-Cepie and Gōc, by Barat and Alcleph, by Ritez and Khan Py Tharosk-ro, and by all the gods of old, submit to the holy will of the Protectorate and the Third Order of priests, demon who is the Sightless Idol. You are hereby bound by the holy will, and shall know no mercy in repayment for the evil that has been wrought in your path. Never more shall you corrupt and destroy. Never more shall men die at your hands. By order of the Protectorate, you shall be contained within the foundations of the world in the vaults of the temple at Par-Daril, until time itself ends, and the All-Maker returns to creation and delivers judgment upon you.” The cleric closed the book and took the Eye of Barat back from the acolyte. “Bring me ten crusadori, loyal men with unbending will. They shall be the guardians of Oon-Shiven Thar'ie until the end of their days. Let it be said that they died in glory against the dark forces. No others are to know of this. When this is done, I will send for you, and you will leave your life to gain a new one in the Order.” The acolyte bowed and hurriedly left. The cleric looked back at the statue, holding the Eye. In his mind, fear returned. What had happened before may happen again. The circle of fate may very well awake the other fallen gods the ancients had fought. The cleric brushed away the thought: such things were for the Council. Inside the jar, a few old synapses sparked in the remains of the ancient brain. A single thought shot across the nerves, tinged with weary cynicism: “Here we go again…”

“I'd think it would be warmer.” “Huh?” “The end of the world. I mean, think about it. When somebody says post-apocalyptic wasteland, you picture a desert, right?” “Mm. I guess so.” “Instead of the snowglobe we've got goin' here.” Joe didn't reply to the last one, and Emma glanced at him. Joe's attention was focused elsewhere, eyes squinting against the bitterly cold wind that was whipping small, delicate flakes to and fro. It was a delicate snow that formed a haze in the distance, the light of sundown turning everything a rich shade of blue. The street was not terribly different from how it had been five years ago, when it all happened, but there were…differences. Awnings had torn away from shop fronts and flapped in the wind. Windows were broken in, the stores raided. And Joe crouched on top of the semi-trailer he called home, eyes narrowed. He actually had lived fairly close to here, although he didn't think about it anymore. After all, five years ago…thing were very different for him. He had a job and a girlfriend, and two dogs. A nice apartment walking distance from the office. Of course, that was before it happened. It was hard to piece together what had all happened, things had truly happened so quickly. In a matter of hours, chaos broke out that took months to calm. Bombs had gone off somewhere, a dozen countries declared war, and then they were silenced when the…things emerged. Joe had only seen the monsters a few times, and he counted his blessings for that. It was best to hide when they were around, no matter what they were. Joe liked to think that he had been a pretty nice guy, before all hell rose up, but it didn't matter now. He fidgeted slightly, having sworn that he saw movement far down the street through the haze of snow, but when it didn't return…he was forced to relent, turning and climbing down the narrow ladder on the side of the semi-trailer. They had initially taken up residence in an abandoned home, then an abandoned shop, but in the end…the massive, heavy metal box turned out to be the safest of them all. Emma waited for him at the bottom. “Anything?” She asked. “No. We should get inside before nightfall.” They hurried into the semi-trailer through the small door on the side, pushing their way through several layers of hanging blankets as they shut and locked the opening, before emerging into the warm interior. Joe nodded to David, who doused the fire and shut the chimney slides, sealing the warmth in. The trailer was all but airtight, and they'd wake up chilly, but it was preferable to waking up with something with too many limbs and too many mouths crawling in, attracted by the scent of a fire. Or to never waking up again, carbon monoxide filling the box. Joe lay back on one of the mattresses, sandwiched between Emma- who nestled against him, and Adam, who faced away and curled up alone. There was little room, and there were fifteen people to share it between them. Joe wrapped his arms around Emma, and glanced up. Emmet was on watch duty tonight, he knew, looking at the young man to make sure he was awake and alert before looking down. Emma's face was barely illuminated by the faintest light, Emmet's dim watch lantern cast it over the trailer, and she was asleep the moment she closed her eyes. Probably for the better, Joe thought, as the young woman had been out foraging all day, and this life of survival left for little time to stop and think, and only time to eat, sleep, and hope to eat. They had decent food stores, sure, but this winter had come in hard and faster than any before. The summers were hotter, he noted, and the winters colder these past five years, or perhaps it was some illusion caused by the lack of central heating or air conditioning. He didn't know, pulling Emma close to his chest. Four years ago, when their little group had formed in a town filled with dead, dying, and things unspeakable, she had been a portly teenager, often short of breath and easily tired, but the years had carved her into a fine young woman, although her hips were still wide and she never lost all the girth of her upper arms, or thighs. She reminded Joe of his girlfriend, who had been lost when she left town to try and find her parents. Joe suddenly thought about his girlfriend, briefly, and then held Emma tighter. On second thought, maybe their food stores were better off than he had the impression of, musing that she was a little thicker around the waist than she had been at the end of fall. Then, he was abruptly and deeply asleep. He hadn't dreamt once in the past five years, curiously enough, none of them had. He thought nothing of it. Then he was awake, silently, eyes wide and glancing about. Emmet was standing, holding the small pistol he carried warily, looking up at the roof of the trailer. Something scratched along. Joe glanced around, everybody else was awake as well, the faint sound of scrabbling hands and claws having aroused everybody's attention. They stayed awake, until it passed, whatever had been there, tapping at the metal, losing interest, before falling back to sleep until morning. They didn't dare leave the trailer until the sun was up, stepping out under a clear blue sky and a world freshly covered with pure, pristine, untouched snow. Well, perhaps almost untouched. When they collected snow to heat for washwater that morning, Joe and Tina, the oldest woman in the group, a stern woman pushing forty-five, silently looked at footprints that led from the distance up on top of the trailer, where they circled about, then left, heading deeper into town. Joe pointed out the elongated toes and paw-pad like impressions. Tina pointed out the long marks in the snow where it had scratched at the metal. “What do you think it was?” Emma asked, that afternoon. She had spent a lot of time, lately, Joe thought, rummaging through old drug stores and corner shops. “I don't know. Footprints reminded me of my dogs, but with toes like a monkey.” Joe muttered, going about the messy work of cleaning a deer, a small doe, that they had managed to get. Of course, they only cleaned their fresh kills far away from the trailer that was home. “Do you think it'll come back?” He shrugged, and glanced up at her. She had something hidden in her pockets. “…Dan's been talking about leaving.” “To where?” “I don't know. He said that he just feels stir-crazy, and thinks he can walk to the next town, see if anybody's there.” “Why?” “Because. I don't know.” Emma frowned, neither of them knew anybody who left town that came back. They had seen a group of travelers, once, and observed them curiously, but they had left the second they stumbled across Joe's own footprints, hastening away. Perhaps worried about contact, and frankly, Joe's group wasn't too keen on it either. “I'm gonna go back to the trailer. Ana wanted help mending some old clothes.” Joe grunted and continued his work with the deer, until Emma, dissatisfied with the lack of response, turned and left. Joe watched her walk away, and paused when he saw the corner of a box sticking out of her pocket, just barely able to make out a few letters, part of a logo. FIRST RESPO He paused, then, and for the first time in a long time, truly thought, deeply, about something beyond survival and the here and now. Then he turned back to the deer, a small smile on his lips even in the bitter cold, and went back to work. He would talk with Dan tonight, and perhaps…they could find a doctor in the next town. Yes, that would be good.

<< Back to part two I almost screamed at the sudden thud. Cyrus threw open the little kitchen window and pushed me into the cupboard below the sink. "What are you d—?" "Shh," he said, shutting the cupboard. I heard some shuffling and another cupboard closing. It was a long while before the thudding gave way to a horrible splintering sound like several femurs snapping, followed shortly by shouting and innumerable footsteps. I could see the feet of the monsters through the tiny gap between the cupboard's doors, and I held my breath, afraid it would give away my hiding place. I heard them tear open the pantry, talking amongst themselves. "That girl must have gutted these guys," said one of them disbelievingly, probably referring to the dead kitchen workers. He snickered. "Bitch." "And then jumped, maybe," said another. The fridge door opened, the pantry, one of them turned on the sink presumably for a drink of water. Most of them left—as far as I could tell, there were a few lingering, picking through the room for whatever food they could find. The first cupboard opened, then the second. Almost the third, where Cyrus hid. I rattled the doors of my cupboard gently. Whoever it was out there paused and was still, no rustling of clothes against skin or the thump of sneakers on tiles. They slowly opened the cupboard right next to mine, and presumably seeing nothing, straightened up and left. Cyrus opened my cupboard. "They broke the door," he whispered. "Is that what that noise was?" "Yeah. Come on. It's not safe here." Was it really safe anywhere? I wanted to say. We stepped over the remains of the door. The handle looked as if it had been bashed with something, and someone must have elected to use something heavy to just break the whole door open like balsa wood. I made a mental note to stay away from anyone carrying heavy things in case they would break me like balsa wood too. The cafeteria was empty, and the hallway was no different, but we took a detour towards the lab on the second floor just in case. Almost half of the lab had been torn away during the sleep. To my relief, the biology class's pet snake, Rob, was intact and sleeping in his tank, though it was a little too close to the edge for comfort. I pulled him out and draped him around my shoulders. He squirmed a little, but soon settled down and went back to sleep, his head somewhere in the vicinity of my jacket's hood. I observed the fog at the edge of the lab—I assumed the nothingness looped. I felt like if I jumped, I'd fall forever, occasionally seeing the school fly past me while tumbling through the air at terminal velocity, the bottom of the cliffs sort of dissolving into the fog at some point before the school appeared again. That was stupid, of course, we were still on Earth. If we weren't, we wouldn't be able to breathe. "We are still on Earth," I said, turning to look at Cyrus, "aren't we?" He just shrugged and scratched the back of his head with the switchblade. "We'll find a way down, right?" I said. "We'll be okay?" "I don't know." Continued in Interference >>