Agent Morisato heard the sound of C-Sharp and, at first, ducked. Then she registered the tall glass window next to her, which faced windows from other office buildings. She reconsidered, and bolted down the nearest hallway instead. A moment later, gunshots cracked the glass and pounded into the wall where she'd been.
She stopped, caught her breath, and then carried on down the hall. Now her sidearm was in her hands. If the Coalition knew she was in the building, they'd be locking down right now, and anyone on the floor would be alerted to her position. But they wouldn't know that she had the fire key for the elevator, her simple but elegant escape route. The documents ought to be in the quartermaster's office, which was nearby. A few odd turns to throw anyone off her tracks, and she'd be ready for the ride out.
At the end of the hallway, she slowed to a jog, and tapped the base of her left ear, activating a sub-dermal implant, which sent a signal backward in time.

.-.-

Then she was running again.
Once she had the documents, was reasonably sure she wasn't being followed, and was at the elevator, reaching for the button she heard the sound of C-sharp again. What? She looked down the halls, but she had been in and out of them with no visuals… and her intel had sworn up and down that the building would be clear. She looked at the elevator again, and frowned.
(There was someone on the other side of the elevator, holding a taser and a pistol. The Coalition knew Morisato was in the building about five minutes before the shots, which was enough time for their second agent to leave the sniper's nest, and make it up the elevator. As soon as the door opened…)
She took the stairs, instead. On the fifth step down, she tapped the base of her left ear.

.-.-

At the bottom, she used a miniature charge to explode through the door's lock, listening all the while for C-sharp and footsteps that never came. The door opened onto the street. She grinned, spun the gun around in her hands before dropping it back in the holster, and booked it across the street to meet her getaway. She'd move fast enough that the snipers on the other side of the building would never know she'd gone.

The implant was a little heavy, and sometimes it itched. Now and then it also made a very low humming sound in her left ear, but she'd gotten used to it. If she turned the sound up in Sea Hero, it just sounded like part of the game. Even among her colleagues, not many people had the implant- after all, it was still relatively untested- but she'd made an effort to stay in touch with a few who did.
After handing off the file and debriefing, Morisato lit a stick of incense and sat in her private quarters in the dark for a while. Then she turned the lights on, microwaved a frozen dinner, powered on her computer, and called up Agent Oberoi while her game loaded.
“How's it going, Hotshot? Back from a mission?”
“Yeah. In the Ice World, did you find the skeleton key in the first dungeon or did you have to wait to beat Pirate Cave?”
“I think I had to wait. You don't actually need it in the mean time.”
“Thanks. How's it going?”
“Aw, not so bad. Been on R&R the last week.”
“Oh?”
“It's the leg again. Nothing too bad, they don't want me jumping on it or anything.”
“Relaxing?”
“Oh yeah. You got to try it, Hotshot. Let's do vacation again sometime.”
“Hell no. I don't know how you do it.”
“I compartmentalize. Come on- Jakarta's nice. We'll get out of the city- I hear they have flying squirrels the size of raccoons.”
“That's your idea of a good vacation? No wonder Minsk was a flop.”
“It's on my bucket list. Hey, gotta go. Take care of yourself. You still seeing the shrink?”
“Well, yeah.”
“Me too. Good. If you need help with Pirate Cave, text me.”
Agent Oberoi worked at another site now. She had the implant too. Oberoi heard C-sharp sometimes, and, well, she just coped better with it. Morisato knew it was an unfair thought- Oberoi worked just as hard to keep her mental state in order as she herself did- but she must just be better at it. How else did you explain the cafe in Minsk? Halfway through their lunch in a small cafe off the main drag, a child banging on piano keys had hit C-sharp, and the noise went straight through her brain. Morisato had cleared the area. Immediately.
Had she hurt anyone? Had she broken anything? Oberoi assured her she hadn't, maybe scraped a chair when she toppled it in her mad dash out. By that point, her breathing at slowed and she was far too embarrassed to go back inside. It was a piano key. It wasn't the computerized tone she knew. It wasn't even the same timbre.
Stupid, she thought as they walked away. Stupid, stupid, stupid.

Another time, she'd been walking along a busy sidewalk in a city she'd never been in, and she heard C-sharp. At first, she backed away from the street edge, then backtracked through the crowd and slipped inside a fast-food restaurant, eyes fixed on the street outside, as she tapped her ear to send the signal back in time.

.-.-

Nothing. No gunshots rent the air. No vehicle ran off the road and plowed into the sidewalk. No screams, no alarming figures in heavy coats walking slowly or with their hands stuffed in pockets to conceal their firearms. Of course, a sniper would have seen her move. She called her supervisors and bought an apple turnover while they scanned the area from afar.
The tentative all-clear meant she should go outside again. She was ready to move, but nothing happened. No high tone rung in her ear for the rest of that trip. What would have happened? Why had the signal gone back in the first place? False positives had never been a problem before. Obviously, her acting had changed the situation. But for the signal to send, it had to be sent back for some reason. Somehow.
Who had sent it?

Site 81, Supervisor's Office, Phone Line

“Agent Morisato, the technology is safe. It absolutely cannot, and I mean mathematically impossible, transmit over five seconds in the past, so large-scale reality alterations or paradoxes are impossible. It's the golden goose.”
…
“Well, the signal is safe. The technology will never be entirely safe, not until we understand it entirely, and it will never keep you absolutely safe. But this signal is safe.”
…
“No, I know you did your reading.”
…
“It's, listen, Hotaru. The signal itself is sent from an alternate future in which your life is threatened. By receiving that signal, you can take action to avert the situation that created that danger, and by sending that signal back, you ensure that your own timeline is stable. Everyone is fine.”
…
“No, I- what do you mean, parallel universes? We don't even know that's how this works.”
…
“What do you mean?”
…
“Who?”
…
“Never mind.”

Morisato wasn't a physicist. But she'd read a lot about time, since then, and knew that even if using the implant didn't cause universe-destroying paradoxes, cause and effect probably still didn't just go away. The cause was the danger, the effect was triggering that signal and heartless C-sharp. She read books and articles about multiple universes, branching timelines. Who was sending the signal back in the first place?
She didn't think of them as separate people, but as one person; not individual selves cast aside throughout time, but a single copy of her- a tortured shadow that followed her at all times, ready to die for her at a moment's notice.

Morisato trailed along the underground corridor, following the soft light of a laser beacon through the winding halls to the source of the anomaly. As she passed under a smoke detector on the wall, she heard a faint hissing.
After three of her six fellow agents passed below the detector, it rotated 180 degrees in its socket and exploded. A hazy yellow gas filled the air, and the agents fell to their knees. Morisato's skin was burning, her nose and lungs were burning. She reached up and touched her left ear.

.-.-

As she passed under a smoke detector on the wall, she heard a faint hissing and the sound of C-sharp.
She held up one hand in warning, then tested the knob on a side door and hurried her team inside. A minute later, one of them identified the trap from Foundation records, and found an alternate route through the compound. Morisato kept her eye on her watch, and after she heard their new plan, reached up and touched her left ear.

.-.-

At last, they made it to the Coalition's research space. It had been cleared out in a hurry before they arrived, but the strange emission was still there, meaning its source was either immobile or hadn't been evacuated. It would be a great day for Morisato if they'd just left it behind, because it would save her from having to secure the whole compound. Well, if not, she'd had worse days too.
The laser beacon was malfunctioning underground, but their map prediction put the signal's source dead ahead of them, so Morisato signaled to her team and opened the door at the end of the hall.
The laboratory inside was lit by dim purple emergency lights alone. Morisato squinted as she cleared the immediate surroundings. It was hard to see into the lab's corners, of course, but nothing especially unusual appeared. As the team spread into the room, the hint of a dancing red spot of light caught her eye.
The bullet bore through Morisato's head in the span of a millisecond. Blood spattered across the concrete behind her. The implant in her head recorded that her pulse had stopped, and sent a signal back through time.

.-.-

The laser beacon was malfunctioning underground, but their map prediction put the signal's source dead ahead of them, so Morisato signaled to her team and opened the door at the end of the hall. A step into the doorway, she heard the sound of C-sharp. Instantly, she gave her team a hand signal, waited until she heard the faint thump of bodies finding cover, then crouched and dived behind the doorframe. What's the most likely threat? Somebody inside, of course. She drew her sidearm and watched. There was a flash of movement in a far, darkened corner.
Morisato took down the enemy with one shot, and touched her ear.

.-.-

It wouldn't keep her alive forever, of course. One day, its plus-or-minus three seconds wouldn't be long enough, and the signal would send itself backward for the last time. That was where she couldn't rely on poorly-understood technology, she just had to be good. But it had kept her alive damn well so far. She never meant to keep track, but somehow the shadow in her mind became a Wound Man of sorts- here a bullet wound, there a slit throat, there an electric field, amorphous stains where she couldn't have known what exactly would have killed her.
Most of the scenes that stayed in her mind from the field missions, she tried to keep back. But the Wound Woman, the shadow she had never seen in real life, never quite left. It was a ghost in her privileged timeline.
How was she supposed to explain to her supervisor why she no longer took time off unless forced?

“How's therapy going?” asked her supervisor, strolling by while she was gearing up.
“Good,” said Morisato. It was helping with the nightmares, anyway.
“Good to hear. Did you hear about your project?”
“What?”
“The implant. It's been cancelled.”
Morisato put down the ammo sling she was holding. “Am I-”
“You're still cleared for fieldwork, thank god. No change there. But they're cancelling the implant program going forward. Still don't understand the tech, so they say it's too risky and they're shutting it down."
Morisato thought about that. It would just be her and Oberoi, and the others, the dozen or so who'd had the anomalous technology shuttled into their brains on a whim. They'd be hearing C-sharp for the rest of their lives.
“When I said you were cleared for fieldwork,” her supervisor continued, “Well, they are offering you a chance to turn your gun in. Get a desk job. What do you think?” He paused. “You're our biggest asset, Morisato. We need you here.”
“I'll finish the mission,” she said.
“Good.” Her supervisor sighed with relief.

It was a roaring success. The local branch of the Coalition was either in custody, or had fled, and the Foundation had been able to seize their assets. In the final move, Morisato led the charge to recover every single one of their anomalies from that location, and hadn't even heard C-sharp once.

Back in her room again, Morisato lit a stick of incense in her room and turned off the lights. For a while, she just sat, breathing in and out, taking in the weight of darkness. Then she turned the lights back on, and opened her laptop and started a blank email. She addressed it to Human Resouces, and then, slowly, struggled to find the words.
I am informed that I have the opportunity to transfer into a non-fieldwork position, and would like to accept. I have a history of contributions to the Foundation and the following skills…
Her shadow settled in behind her, like an old friend, to read over her shoulder.


Rose Labelle felt a strange chill down her spine that morning.
It wasn't like any other feeling she had before. Something just seemed… off. About the world. It couldn't be mistaken for a hangover, for she had only one beer the night before, and she was a lot more tolerant than that. She couldn't be drowsy; her medication wouldn't cause that. It'd probably clear by the time she got to work anyway. Life went on as normal then, except for the sensation running through her body. Despite all efforts to continue as usual to distract herself from the feeling she had, she couldn't help it. It felt as if her body was breaking itself apart, bit by tiny bit.
The ride over didn't help either. Rose's car radio was busted (when she had just bought the car not a month ago), traffic was minimal, if existent at all and left minimal background noise, and the roads seemed to be more jagged than usual. Thirty minutes later, when she arrived at the parking lot in the back of the facility, it was evident that no one had arrived for work either. She might have been early, so she checked her watch. It read 8:45 AM. The car said 6:15.
But Site-19 was quiet too. Not a single researcher wandering the halls, hurrying to their post. Something was clearly amiss. Maybe a stray memetic effect from working with an SCP the week before? In that case, her boss would have to know. The corridors and hallways were fairly complex to navigate. It was part of the design, after all. In the case of a containment breach, minimizing a chance for a skip to break out was the main goal. Given the amount Rose walked these hallways by now though, locating her office (and her boss's area a couple hundred meters away) wasn't tough. Still, on her way there, the site was calm and serene, with only the buzzing of the lights above giving any indication that time hadn't completely stood still. If there was one thing that worried Rose, it was calm and serenity in the site. As she walked to the office, she glanced up at various wall clocks she passed by. One read 9:00. Another. 12:50.
She sat outside the office door, waiting for the secretary to come by and let her in. But after approximately two hours of waiting, no one came. The only thing left to do was formally go in and introduce herself and stated what happened, then. To her lack of surprise, the desk was empty and the chair uninhabited. It would have seemed like nothing was touched for years now. But what if her boss was there, and she couldn't perceive him due to an effect?
"Hello sir. Er, I came here to report something I fear may have happened while working with my usual skip last week." Silence. Rose waited a few beats, nervously looking around before making eye contact with where she presumed her boss to be.
"I felt some kind of weird sensation in my spine when I woke up, and my body feels strange. I'm probably feeling a lack of, uh… attachment to my body. Like I'm breaking apart. I think." No reply, except for the throat clearing that came from her.
"And I appear to be unable to perceive any human individual except for a car or two I passed by this morning on my way to work. All the clocks I've been looking at list contradictory times, and, well, I don't think I heard any activity from anyone in the site. No researchers, no skips, nothing." At this point, she could feel her heart pounding. Nervousness, she chalked it up to.
"So, at this point, I'll head over to the nursing facility and be treated. Hopefully. If I'm not already being dragged over there. Thank you." And with a final look around the office, she headed out over to the nursing facility.
Except that she stepped out into a completely different corridor now. It was white, like the rest of the facility, but it was nothing like anything in the building she saw before. The ceiling was painted an odd color, one she couldn't give a name to. Fear built up in her stomach, as she rushed to the north, which she presumed to be the correct direction. This just lead to more corridors, cells misplaced, pictures disjointed and blurry or even outright gone, and windows showing nothing but wall on the other side.
Maybe it's the late stages of the effect. Please let it be an effect.
Rose continued running through the halls, frantically looking for a way out. She even tried backtracking, although that soon resulted in more paths and mazes. If she were to ever recover from this, this would help the Foundation understand what the skip she was assigned to was truly capable of. At the very least, it'd halt testing with that abomination. This would be a good reason to stop working with it, right? Maybe then, she'd be better-rested.
Minutes had passed since she started wandering, with the site breaking down before her very eyes. Hours had gone by, and whenever she'd turn down a corridor and backtrack to observe something after the fact, it'd be replaced by a whole new one. If she stood in place and concentrated on a picture long enough, it'd eventually break down or disappear entirely. After days of navigating the labyrinth of what was formerly Site-19, the sensation got to Rose's feet. Not simply because she had kept walking with little to no pause. It just spread. She could feel her whole body shake, wanting to give up on itself.
Eventually, a door appeared. It was at the end of a hall. Surely this was the exit. No way in Hell would she turn back now, unless she was willing to wander for weeks looking for a way out. It didn't matter that the door was completely out-of-place for what Site-19 had, or that its geometric shape was impossible to enter and exit. It had to lead to somewhere, and somewhere was better than here. She went through the door, onto the other side.
It was the parking lot. Everything was almost the same, save for the sky. It was pitch-black, with the odd and sudden flourish of color appearing in one spot. Rose stared for a while, taking the sight in. She had never seen anything on this level before, and she couldn't begin to fathom what was happening. Something was happening to the world. To the Foundation. To her. All of her life, her choices, regrets, actions, built up to working for the Foundation… and it's threatening to disappear into nothing.
When she spun around, the door was gone, as was the facility. Just concrete and pavement. The blackness was falling down from the sky, and steadily creeping towards her. Whatever this was, whatever was happening, there was nothing else left to do. The sensation in her body continued to build up, to feel stranger and stranger, more painful by the second, but it didn't matter. If her surroundings were any indication, she'd be gone too. Whatever was happening, it was final.
So Rose sat on the ground, and stared out into the unending black, smiling and accepting her fate.

Thanks for the ride, everyone!

Why Shut Down Now?
During the past half-year, user and financial support has steadily declined. Although we have been trying our best to fix these bugs, we have lacked the resources to do so. Sadly, there is nothing else left to do. However, we would like to thank the userbase still with us for supporting our endeavors regardless! At the bottom of the post, we have provided links for other places where you can create your own wiki page for free, with relative ease, and for whatever idea you want. Furthermore, as we approach the end of the next two weeks, feel free to look at the following affiliates of Wikidot for more info on...


"How long have we got?" Matthew said, his stomach growling.
Zeke had been looking at his watch almost constantly for the last twenty minutes. “Three minutes, ten seconds. Nine seconds.” A pause. “Five seconds.”
“Which way did you say it is?” Matthew asked.
"How many times have you asked that?" Zeke said.
"Too many, I think," Matthew replied.
Zeke shuffled and looked at the backpack beside him. Fuck, I don't wanna carry this thing any further, he thought. Foundation tech had gotten to a sci-fi level towards the end, but as the seriousness of the crisis grew, the R&D boys just quit trying to miniaturize. This thing, they probably figured, would be carried on a truck. Well, that was a great thought, back when we had gas.
"How much further?" Zeke asked.
"Two miles. And we have about…" Matthew looked at his watch. "…three hours before the window closes. We gotta get up, dude."
"Oh, shit, really?" Zeke said. "I was gonna suggest a quickie while I was flat on my back. You make this sound all urgent and shit."
"You aren't boyfriend material, Zeke," Matthew said, straight-faced. "Get the fuck up. Let's go save the world."
"You weren't so grumpy back in Atlanta," Zeke replied.
"It's the end of the world and I'm indiscriminate. Sue me. I told you it wasn't something serious. You wanna wax nostalgic about a hookup until the window closes, or do you wanna pick up that backpack already?"
Zeke was already standing up. "Come on, let's do a thing."
**
"How many times do you reckon we've done this by now?" Matthew asked.
"Do you remember an apocalypse that's slipped my mind?" Zeke replied. "This seems pretty fucking fresh to me."
"You know what I mean. What the Overwatch fuckers said during the briefing."
"You bought that shit? Parallel universes? Other versions of Ezekiel Washington and Matthew Cloar wandering the countryside, getting into sexually confusing escapades and making last stands against the end of the world? You think there are really millions of us?"
"I mean, I try not to think too hard about there being more than one of you in the first place, but yeah, I have no reason to think they were gonna make this up. It's already stupid enough."
Zeke tried to shrug, winced with the effort. "Makes a dumb kind of sense to me. Get one of these scantron machines to the exact right coordinates, turn them all on, magic away the dying of the light. It's no stupider than half the other shit they apparently did that made this happen."
Matthew kept walking for a few minutes in silence. "You think we're gonna see our families again?"
Zeke shook his head. "Fucked if I know. I hope so. They said there was a chance that when we undid this, we'd all revert back into a world where it never happened. I figure it'll probably be one of those paradox things where there's just one ideal world, and we won't be in it. But we'll have made it possible. Us and all the others. I guess that's worth something, knowing that some Libby's gonna see her daddy again somewhere." Zeke would have had tears running down his face if he had been properly hydrated.
The walk was phenomenally boring without conversation. Just mile after mile of flat Tennessee countryside, the occasional hill, empty houses, empty towns, cannibalized rat piles, lots of tattered American flags still on poles from where their owners never thought to take them down before dying. Disrespectful, Matthew thought.
"God damn, how much of this state got ratted out?" Matthew said. "I figured we'd be well into spider country by now."
"Nah, the Proletariat never got out of Arkansas heading this direction," Zeke said. "I think their chairman crossed a Fifthist something or other, made a blood enemy out of the Lake County and Memphis congregations at the same time. Not easy to get rednecks to agree with something happening in Memphis, I can god damn well assure you of that."
"Oh, shit, yeah, you're from around here," Matthew said.
"Paducah, sure. It's across the border north of here. I mean, you know," Zeke sputtered. "It was north of here, before the Franklin War."
"I'll pretend like I remember what that was," Matthew said. "I was busy with the balrog, remember?"
"I still think that sounds like horseshit," Zeke said. "You were from Philly, weren't you? Not that close to the Centralia dee zee."
"You're a fucking peach, you know that?" Matthew said, too exhausted to be disgusted. "You get that he got hungry after he picked off all the Amish, right? Trust me, Philly was definitely a fucking Disaster Zone. It's probably as flat as the rest of the Eastern Seaboard by now."
A few more minutes in silence. "Not that you give a shit," Zeke said, "but at least my fuckers got got not long after they got my town."
"What, the Franklinites?" Matthew said. "They not around anymore?"
"Nah, portal sucked the whole state up, dropped them off in fucking Greece somewhere. Samus, Thracia, one of those dumbass islands. Whole state of Franklin got dropped on top of some third-world country out there."
Matthew snorted. "Are you seriously that inbred? You didn't hear about that thing down in Samothrace?"
"Matty, I didn't give a fuck what happened down in Samez Trace or who the fuck knows what. All I know is, judging from the way they got to die, they apparently got lumped in with the rest of the Middle East, somehow."
"Oh, shit." Matthew said. "The Devourer?"
"Fuckin' A, the Devourer. Couldn't have happened to nicer people."
More silence. The location grew closer. The two were now on Evergreen Street, looking for a park. It wasn't hard to find. A small device on Zeke's waistband, which had been chattering quietly ever since they entered the Dresden city limits, started going off a little more frequently.
"How many fucking skips were in this shithole town?" Matthew asked.
"Enough to make this shit work, apparently," Zeke said.
Matthew nodded. Overwatch had been very specific on the location of this Scranton anchor, and it wasn't a geographic coincidence; apparently the anomalous concentration in this town centered on Wilson Park, which (judging from the presence of playground equipment) was right in front of them. Activate this one in the right spot, which Overwatch had assured them would be easy enough to find once they were there, and something something portal to something something realign the dimensional something something and everybody gets cake and gets to go home. Matthew liked ragging on Zeke for being a dipshit, but it wasn't like he understood this any better than Zeke did. He had been a guard before all this started; Zeke had stacked boxes for six years.
But Research was specific. That Zank guy in particular. Has to be these two, he said. It's always these two.
Zeke was trying to stay stoic, but the weight of the backpack was really starting to get to him. "Here, swap out with me," Matthew said. Zeke didn't even feign protest, gingerly slipping the straps off and passing it to Matthew, who traded him his own pack with mere incidentals like food and equipment. They were near the final hill.
Peaking the hill, Matthew and Zeke saw two sights that were somewhat unusual, even for this last day of the bizarre closing act of human history. Hovering in the air next to a swingset, about twenty meters off the ground, was what was, unmistakably, a spiky purple rubber ball.
Directly underneath the ball was a teenage boy, poking at what appeared to be a small Kindle Fire. Matthew hadn't seen one of those in years, at least not one of the civilian kind. They approached the sitting form.
Standing less than a meter away, Zeke cleared his throat.
"Shh shh shh shh shh shh shh," the teenager said. "Shut the fuck up for a minute. Don't say shit to me right now, dude. I'm about to get this shit."
Filthy, smelling like God knows what, tired to death, Zeke and Matthew both sat down in front of the teenage boy as he poked at the tablet. Zeke looked at his watch and mouthed to Matthew. Forty-five minutes, he said.
Matthew looked at the tablet. The kid was poking at something on the left side of the screen, then dropping that thing off in the middle of the screen, where it started shooting at little forms marching in from the right side of the screen. The people on the right side of the screen were gaining ground slowly, and judging from the little sound effects, eating their way through the things the kid was dropping off. But the things kept shooting, and the stream of forms coming in from the right slowed down. Then the kid hit one thing on the left and dropped it right on the forms on the right, and they seemed to blow up into dust. A trophy emerged on the screen, the kid tapped on it, and the screen went white.
"FUCK YES," the teenager yelled to the heavens. "WHOOOOOOOOOOOO!" He flipped the cover back onto the tablet, pushed the power button, and set it off to the side.
"Sorry, finally beat that thing," he said. "Been playing it for most of the time I've been sitting here. You guys are slow as shit."
Zeke was too grateful to be sitting down to be pissed. "Well, how long have you been sitting here?"
The teenager shrugged. "I quit counting after the third year or so. And I'm pretty sure they canceled time last month anyway, so it doesn't really matter."
Matthew nodded. "So are you, uh…are you our spirit guide or something?"
"Something like that, I guess," the teenager said. "I'm Tyler, I lived in this town for years, I ascended to a higher plane of consciousness thanks to some aliens who blew up part of the elementary school, then I got spit back when they gave up on this universe. That was 2017 or so, I think. You know anything that happened around that time that scared them off?"
Zeke looked at Matthew. "Yeah, sort of. You know how dangerous people are kept in prisons?"
"Kind of," Tyler said. "I think I remember hearing about those when I was human the last time. Why, did something break out?"
"Kind of," Matthew said. "Everything broke out. A couple things at first, then some attacks from some other groups, then a war, then some more things, then some more attacks, then another war, then everything blew up. Most of the species is dead. But we're going to fix it, we think? I dunno. I think you're involved somehow."
"Oh yeah," Tyler said. "Xyank told me all about it."
"Of fucking course he did," Zeke muttered.
"This is the spot right here," Tyler said. "Set up the Scranton anchor, point it right at that house — " he pointed at a house across the street "— and fire it up. It'll connect with the others within the hour."
"Dude, we don't have that kind of time. The window's going to close —"
"There's no window," Tyler said, cutting Zeke off. "Xyank just told you there was to motivate you to move faster. Not everything he says is strictly…true, so to speak. He's very liberal with what he says to get what he wants."
"That's comforting," Matthew said.
"Eh, who gives a shit," Tyler said. "What are you gonna do, leave this world like it is? May as well do what has to be done already."
Zeke shrugged. Matthew shrugged. Tyler shrugged. The three of them began assembling the Scranton anchor.
**
Zeke punched in a four-digit code into the keypad, then the pound key. Matthew punched in another and hit the star key. Green lights, whirring.
"Did we just fucking do it?" Zeke asked.
"I think we just fucking did it, man," Matthew said, looking at Zeke.
"Aw, shit," Zeke said, then grabbed Matthew around the shoulders and kissed him. The two made muffled sounds for a few seconds.
"That's sweet as hell," Tyler said. "That's a good way to go out."
The kissing slowed, slowed, stopped, separated. Both men looked at Tyler.
"What the fuck do you mean, 'go out'?" Zeke asked.
"He just means, like, before the thing resets or whatever and we go back to our regular universe. Before the big reset, when we go out and go back to like it was before. Right?" Matthew said, looking at Tyler, his heart sinking.
Tyler continued to look at the two men, lips pursed, then he burst out laughing. "Oh, shit, Xyank really fucked you two, huh? Is that what they told you this was about?"
The Scranton anchor began rattling, then smoke came out of it. A high pitched whirring sound grew louder, louder, louder still, then all the lights on the Scranton anchor died. The central ball opened and retracted. Nothing seemed different.
Zeke looked at the anchor, walked around to the other side. "What the fuck is th —"
An otherworldly screech, then a dull, multicolored blast streamed out of the middle of the Scranton anchor, right at Zeke's chest. It started out narrow, like a firehose stream, but then it widened to three meters wide suddenly and blew Zeke down the hill into the road. Zeke was slammed into the asphalt, Matthew seeing his back and then the back of his head flattened out against the black street. Matthew saw the blood spurting out of the back of Zeke's head before the stream covered him up completely.
Matthew turned to Tyler. "What the fuck is this?" he said.
"What?" Tyler yelled over the roaring sound of the stream.
"What the fuck is this?!" Matthew repeated, louder.
"It's the fucking end, dude!" Tyler yelled.
"I thought we were fixing this!" Matthew yelled.
"There's no fix, dumbass," Tyler replied. "The damage is too deep now. There isn't always a way to save things. You gotta just pick how you go out. Planetary euthanasia. Overwatch picked this one."
Matthew turned back to the stream. A dull color was spreading out across the ground. Matthew noticed some movement from the landing spot. The stream was alive, made up of something that was crawling away from the point of impact. The living things were bouncing off one another and plopping into the grassy ditch on either side, crawling over one another.
Some of the creatures were meandering up the hill. Matthew saw more clearly once they got closer.
"What the fuck…kittens?"
"Yeah, kittens," Tyler said, the roar continuing. "Whole universe full of nothing but kittens. Immortal, self-sustaining kittens. We're gonna drown in them. They don't eat, they don't need to feed, they don't do anything but meow. Even in complete vacuum, they just meow and crawl over one another. Enough kittens to immobilize a perpetually-healing dragon. Enough kittens to put out a lethal star. Enough kittens to choke the Devourer of Worlds in fur and purring. We die, they either die or spend eternity in feline hell. I guess it's revenge?"
Matthew just stared as the stream widened more. "How much bigger is this gonna get?"
Tyler shrugged. "Everywhere you put out Scranton anchors? They're all doing the exact same thing. All the rips are gonna link together, tear together, form one big one. A three thousand mile wide episiotomy straight to the kittenverse. Xyank even had a formula for the…oh, what the fuck did he call it? 'Felidae gradient'? The planet'll be kittens all the way up and down, from Ciudad de Marianas clear to the Lagrange points, in less than a day. And then the kittens'll keep going, out to space, out of the solar system, out to the Oort Bakery. I hope the furry fuckers like cake."
Matthew had no capacity for surprise anymore. "When will they link up?"
"I told you, dude. Less than an hour. I give it probably half that, judging from the stream."
Matthew half-sat, half-collapsed to the ground. Tyler sat beside him.
"Xyank told us we were special. Told us we always did this, in all the other universes. It was always us two that went out to stop the apocalypse. We always saved the world."
"Xyank may have been full of shit, or he may have just phrased things differently than you remember," Tyler said. "I saw some things in other universes when I was…something other than human. I saw you guys do your thing. He wasn't completely off. Whenever the world was ending, you guys were always there. But I'm pretty sure it always ended this way. One of you dead, the other one watching. It's not a happy story."
A kitten strolled up the hill towards Matthew's feet. He thought about stomping the little white fuzzball, then thought better. Not like it's his fault, Matthew thought, rubbing his head.
"I think I should name it," Matthew said suddenly.
"Please don't name it Zeke," Tyler said immediately. "Don't make my last action be punching you in the balls, which is what I think Zeke would want me to do."
"You didn't know him," Matthew said.
"I did not," Tyler admitted. "Either way, something more creative than that."
Matthew turned to his backpack, rustled up a black Sharpie marker. The stream of kittens flowing into the street widened a little further, began to buckle. Only a couple of minutes left, Matthew thought. He grabbed the kitten and carefully wrote something on its forehead, then chucked the kitten into the growing pile down the hill.
Tyler looked. "You made a decision?"
Matthew nodded. "I named it 'Centralia Bound.' I hope the balrog chokes on him first."
They sat in silence until the world roared and went black.


The Foundation used to lock things away,
Things, this and that, which they called special.
Every object that they deemed unique enough to keep was kept
Safe and secure within their gates.
Each one with their own set of procedures, their own fates.
Each one with a set of precautions, instructions and the like,
Designed to keep them locked up tight,
And to protect them from what was normal.
I was just another object,
Hoarded in a room with no light
Until a request to the board of research was submitted by the next doctor.
They'd proctor a test or a few,
And then back into my chamber I went.
That's how most of my time was spent.
I had no concerns about it,
No complaint or qualms.
How could I feel if something was wrong,
If I'm nothing but a toaster?

The ding of a toaster sounded as the waitress approached the table. “Sir,” she said, “Do you need a box for that?”
Slowly, Ralph took his eyes off of his plate and warily looked up at the thin woman.
“No,” he replied.
“Are you sure?” the waitress inquired, looking slightly concerned, “I brought out your order almost an hour ago, and you've barely touched it.”
Looking down at his plate, most of his breakfast had already been eaten. Two strips of bacon, two eggs over-easy, and a short stack of pancakes, all gone. The only thing left on his plate was 2 slices of toast.
Barely touched it, Ralph thought, that's a good one.
“You can just throw the rest out,” he responded, “There isn't really enough here for me to take home.”
“I'll go get a box for that,” the waitress said warmly, as if she hadn't heard him, “Just give me a moment.”
As she walked away, another ding sounded. Out of the corner of his eye, Ralph saw a lanky waiter walk out of the kitchen. Slowly, he walked across the room, and gently placed down a plate on the table where another customer was seated. Ralph could hear a small exchange between them, and as the waiter walked away, the other man began eating his meal.
It was a plate full of toast.
Soon the waitress returned, holding a Styrofoam box, the check, and another plate. She set both down on the table. Sitting on the plate was a toasted slice of raisin bread, sprinkled with cinnamon.
“Don't worry,” she assured him, “It's on the house.”
Without another word, Ralph placed both slices in the box, paid for his meal, and exited the restaurant.

“Good morning, Mr. Brindis.”
Conrad Brindis, the North American Regional Commissioner from the Coalition of International Toasters, looked up from his paperwork and smiled.
“Good morning to you too, Seth. You can put those irons down on my desk.”
Seth, Conrad's personal assistant, put the pair of clothing irons down, and sat in the chair opposite his boss. “How are you doing today, Commissioner?”
“I'm doing pretty well, you?”
“Good. Had some sourdough for breakfast.”
“Huh, Well I'm jealous.” Conrad reached for the irons' extension cords. “I take it Lisa made it for you?”
“Yeah, she keeps insisting on having me try all her recipes. Not that I'm complaining, she's a great cook.”
“Nice.” He stood up and plugged them into the wall. “Oh, did you hear about last night's vote yet?”
“The one on your bill? How'd it go?”
Conrad walked back over to the table and picked up the irons. “It went very well, Seth. Got through both houses with unanimous support. Not that I was expecting anything less.”
“Yeah, I can't see why anyone would vote against it. What I'm wondering is how the heck it wasn't already on the books when you introduced it. I mean, how do we not have a law against throwing away toast?"

A simple appliance like myself
Might not have caused alarm to anyone,
Certainly not the Foundation.
A huge organization with so much on their hands,
Keeping abnormal things from harm,
And normality from abnormality,
Needed a reason to hold on to me.
That reason, seemingly innocuous,
Exceedingly obnoxious,
Shows how this verse's perspective is not
Seen through my lens, my objective.
I don't have a point of view.
It is but an artifact of one simple fact.
In the words you have heard,
This writer, and all others,
Always refer to me in the first person.
A mere side effect of my true properties.

Ralph wanted to tear the radio out of his car and throw it out the window.
Driving to work from the restaurant, there was a story on the local station about the new bill going through the parliament. The proposal would impose a fine on people who throw away toast.
A fine? That's the literal opposite of fine.
It was times like this that he wondered if he was the only sane person on the planet. Everywhere he went he saw thin, wiry people obsessed with eating toast. No one saw anything wrong with it. No one considered the possibility that maybe some people had been tired of the stuff for years.
His thoughts now wandered to the toast sitting in the passenger seat. Two pieces, he could hold both in one hand, but the thought of actually consuming them had become almost nauseating. Now with his luck, when he tried to throw them away, he'd be stuck paying money he didn't have.
As he pulled into the parking lot, Ralph thought about his job. He felt his mostly empty wallet in his pocket; most of the money in it had been spent on his breakfast. His pay barely covered rent and food, so he certainly couldn't afford a fine. He couldn't get rid of the toast by giving it to his coworkers either; even though they all seemed to be in love with the stuff, they would never take it off his hands.
Ralph wished that the toast would just disappear. He wished that he could make it vanish and just be done with it. He was tired of people expecting him to eat it every day, and never listening to him when he said no. As he parked his car, Ralph directed his frustration towards the box from the restaurant.
Picking it up, he wondered if maybe, just maybe, if he thought hard enough, he could make it vanish.
Yeah, I wish.

Conrad and Seth were both laughing as they continued their conversation.
“Oh man… He honestly thought that would work?”
“Yeah.” Conrad held a piece of bread between the clothing irons. “But all he managed to toast was his bone marrow.”
“Damn, I should not be laughing at this. That just sounds horrible.”
“No, its fine, he was laughing about it too for the next week. Of course, he only lived that long, but still; he got a laugh out of it!”
“Sir, that's terrible.” Seth clutched his sides. “Gosh, this should not be this funny.”
“Well, it wouldn't have worked anyway.” Conrad separated the irons, dropping the fresh piece of toast on the desk. “In order to toast a slice of bread, you need direct heat. For example, I just used these irons to do it. Now, a big piece of Curium, on the other hand…”
Before he could finish, a red light began shining on his desk.
“Huh, haven't seen one of those in a while.”
“What is that, Boss?”
“It's just something that I need to call the chairman about. I'm going to need a few moments alone to do that. This stuff is above your security level.”
“Yeah, as if I actually have a security level. That's a good one.”
“Hey, you'll get promoted eventually. But seriously, why don't you get some lunch while I call him. This shouldn't take too long.”
“Alright Mr. Brindis. Just let me know if you need anything else.”

On one particular day,
A doctor took me away from my chamber,
To the approved testing room
For an experiment.
At the other end of the facility
Past every bend in the hall
Every room, every researcher and test subject,
There was an entrance.
A small, but important group,
Made their entrance.
While the doctor prepared, they were preparing.
He sat and stared, contemplating me,
How I was but a toaster that could only be referred to
In the first person.
And while he sat, that group of my followers
Began an attack.
Those followers who saw
What I could do, what I was,
Would reveal my vision
To the appeal of the masses.

No matter how hard he tried, Ralph just couldn't focus on his work.
He had been sitting at his desk for over an hour now, just staring at his computer screen, unable to type his report. Occasionally, he would begin entering in a few words, but would immediately delete it moments later.
This wasn't a major problem; the report wasn't needed until the next board meeting, and that was still a week away. But there was a larger issue eating away at him.
Slowly, Ralph turned again towards the box from the restaurant, now sitting near the edge of the desk. Hesitating, he reached his hands towards it, and picked it up. He closed his eyes, and carefully opened it.
Opening his eyes, he was greeted with the same sight he'd seen in his car: the box was completely empty.
OK, Ralph thought, there has to be some logical explanation for this. It probably just fell out, right? He remembered walking out of the restaurant, how he held the box tightly, knowing that dropping it would attract someone to talk to him. With everyone obsessing over the stuff so much, someone would have noticed if he had dropped two pieces of toast in the street. It was doubtless that someone would have approached him about it.
No, I definitely dropped it. That's the only reasonable explanation. I dropped it and no one saw…
Pushing the subject out of his mind, he went back to his computer. By the end of the day, he had completed two sentences.

Seth had eaten well for lunch: two pieces of toast with jam, and some split pea soup.
As he approached Conrad's office, there was loud talking inside.
“Look, Mr. Chairman, I just don't think we need to deploy them right now. We've had these sensors malfunction before.”
This was probably a conversation he wasn't supposed to hear. Talking with chairman meant that it was something of confidence, of which he was not allowed to know. Therefore, Seth started to walk away.
“We haven't had an actual reality bender in decades. Why would one pop up now?”
He stopped in his tracks. “Reality bender” wasn't a phrase he had heard before. It sounded like an imagined idea, but Seth found his curiosity to be growing. Against his better judgment, he moved closer to the door.
“OK, alright, I understand your concern.”
“I'll send them out after the maintenance team finishes up, but only if we get another alarm. Otherwise there just isn't enough cause right now.”
“Even if there was one, we can afford to wait right now. With a signature that small, whoever it might be isn't going to be vaporizing a building any time soon.”
Seth wondered if he had heard that comment correctly.
“To be blunt, sir, I'm hesitant to send them out because it's going to cost a significant amount of money, and my constituents are going to ask questions about where that money went.”
“Thank you. I'll call you right away if anything else happens. Bye.”
There was a click as the phone was hung up, followed by a sigh.
“I know that you've been standing out there. You can come in.”
Timidly, Seth slowly opened the door and poked his head inside.
“How did you know I was out there, Mr. Brindis?”
Conrad smiled, looking vaguely amused. “I didn't. I say that every time I get off a confidential call. I figure that if someone was actually eavesdropping outside my door, saying that would make them give themselves away.”
Seth smiled sheepishly.
“Come in and close the door. You're not in trouble.”
Seth quickly stepped inside, shutting the door behind him, and took a seat at his boss's desk.
“Alright Seth, tell me what you heard.”

Most don't stay around me long enough
To feel the true extent of my abilities.
The way that my effects reflect
On neglected parts of the mind,
Months must be spent.
Few have been sent to this fate,
And even fewer are lent
The skills needed for it
Not to kill them.
Talking of me in the first person
Is a trivial reaction,
Much easier to comprehend
Than my true action.
I allow people to see
A sight that starts dim,
But gradually gains light.
It's a view so strange,
Many who see it are left deranged.
But my followers knew
That this sight was meant to be seen.
They had been nothing less
Than rightfully depressed
At the Foundation which stored me away.
And they were about to reveal,
To all of the world,
The boys and girls,
Elders and youth,
A terrific sight.
The sight of truth.

Ralph knew it was a stupid idea. It was nonsensical, absurd, and paranoid of him to be doing this. But as soon as he got back to his apartment from work, he popped a slice of bread in his toaster.
Ralph had plenty of reasons to keep a toaster. While he wasn't fond of toast, he still very much liked pop tarts.
As soon as the now darkened slice popped out, Ralph immediately grabbed it, dropped it on the counter, and cursed in pain from burning his hand.
Yup, that's a great idea you've come up with here. Burn yourself because you want to see if you can make toast disappear with your mind. Brilliant.
Breathing deeply a few times to calm down, he gathered his thoughts, and focused his frustration on the morsel now sitting in front of him. After a moment, he closed his eyes.
I hate toast. I hate how every moron I ever come across is just so in love with the stuff. I hate how it gets stale when you leave it out for an hour. I hate how there's always that one part of the crust that's burnt. I hate the way it tastes. I hate the way it smells. I absolutely despise the stuff.
Ralph opened his eyes. Sitting on the counter was a now slightly cooled piece of toast, completely unaffected by his attempt.
OK, maybe it needs to be directed at this particular slice.
Ralph poked the piece gently, and then closed his eyes again.
I hate that exact slice of toast for burning my hand.
His eyes opened. The slice was still there. Ralph turned around and vented his frustration.
“Damn it,” he yelled, “can't this piece of shit just go away?”
He stood there for a moment, and then with a sigh, he accepted the pointlessness of what he was doing.
Ralph turned around and looked back at the counter. It was now empty.
He blinked a few times, wondering if there was something wrong with his eyes. The toast was nowhere to be seen. He looked closer, but there was no trace. As he ran his hand over the surface, he felt only the smooth material of the counter. Not even a crumb remained.
Ralph stayed up all night trying to repeat the effect. By sunrise, an entire loaf of bread and been toasted, and an entire loaf of bread had vanished.

“Well, you didn't hear anything that I wouldn't have let you know about eventually.”
“Wait, you were going to tell me about that stuff?”
“Not for another few months, but yes. You've been my assistant for a year and a half now, Seth. I trust you a great deal. I figured I would give you the clearance for this stuff eventually.”
“So, does this mean I'm getting an actual security clearance?”
“Now, don't get ahead of yourself just yet. I'm still going to hold off on telling you any classified details for now. But I can tell you that there's no need to worry about any of it at the moment. Earlier on the phone; that was just the chairman being overly cautious about something that hasn't been an issue for years.”
“And that thing about reality bending?"
“Once again, it hasn't been a problem for years.”
A red light appeared on Conrad's desk.
Seth stared at the crimson signal.
“Um, Mr. Brindis…”
“Yeah, I see it.” Conrad sighed. “You know, today is just not my day.”
“Doesn't that light mean…”
“It means that there is, apparently, a problem that shouldn't be happening. But since it is, you and I have to deal with.”
“I thought I didn't…”
“You do now. Effective immediately, I'm giving you Level C secure access.”
“…”
“I need to make a call, and then we're going to deploy a team where we got the alarm from. After that, both of us are going down there. I want your help with this.”
Conrad picked up the phone on his desk, and dialed in a number.
“This is Commissioner Conrad Brindis. I need you to send me down to my office.”

My followers planned out
The entire operation
To retrieve me,
There's no doubt, however, that it would have been
Advantageous to think further ahead
In their preparation
To deal with the fallout.
The Foundation would not take lightly
Such an attack, and the theft of what
They thought they had a right to hold.
Soon negotiations got old,
And when they refused to accept
A proposal to defuse the situation,
It was clear that an escalation
Was imminent.
Their ultimatum was clear for them to hear,
But my followers, my fellow toasters,
Would never back down.
My followers would not release me,
And the Foundation of my incarceration
Would not let me continue to be free.
If only they had known
What horrors had been released
By taking what the Foundation owned.
Even when the battle ceased,
And their enemy lay fallen,
A new day of chaos,
Was upon my followers.

Ralph was not tired. He had stayed up all night in his kitchen, but his head was spinning too much for him to even think about exhaustion. He paid little attention to the window as the sun began to rise, and even less to his alarm clock when it began to ring. All he could think about right now was trying to understand what he was doing.
None of this makes any sense! Am I just going crazy?
He checked his kitchen counter again, but he still found no evidence of any of the slices.
The question of what exactly he was supposed to do hung over his mind. Around it was a mix of emotions from confusion, to concern, to frustration.
And then Ralph decided what he was going to do.
I'm never going to eat another damned piece of toast ever again.
It was only at this point that he decided to check the time. When he looked at his clock, he saw that he was over an hour late for work.
Ralph cursed out loud, and rushed back into his room, not noticing the knock at his door. As fast as he could, he changed his clothes, went back to his kitchen to grab a pop tart, and then rushed to his door, not hearing anyone outside. As he slammed the door open, he felt himself collide with something.
Ralph heard a surprised yelp, a thump of something hitting the floor, and a muffled crack. A moment later, he saw the police officer lying on the ground.
“Holy shit!” he said as he rushed to the officer, “Sir? Officer? Are you…”
The officer pushed Ralph away with one arm. “Get the hell away from me!” he exclaimed, “What's wrong with you? Ram the door into a police officer after he tells you to come out of the room? Are you stupid? Well?”
“Tells you to… what?” Ralph said, puzzled, “I didn't hear you. I'm sorry, I was in a rush, and I'm late for work right now…”
“I could throw your ass in jail right now for assaulting me," the officer replied angrily. He pulled his right arm out from under him, revealing it to be twisted painfully. “Ah! Damn it!”
Ralph got back up. “OK, uh, I can go get help,” he suggested, “I'm so sorry about this sir, I honestly didn't hear you; I wish I had been paying attention. Don't worry, I'll be right back!”
With great haste, Ralph ran back into his apartment, and grabbed the telephone. He rushed to punch in an emergency number, and held the phone to his ear.
There was no dial tone.
Confused, he tried again to call for help, but got the same result. He hung up the phone and rushed back to the door, hoping to ask a neighbor for assistance.
When he got to the door, there were now several officers standing in front of him. The one he had knocked down earlier stood at the front, holding a taser in his right hand.
“What… how are you holding…” was all Ralph could say before he heard a pop, a buzzing sound, and felt his muscles spasm.

Seth sat in the back of Conrad's car as they were driven towards the area where the alarm originated.
“So, there used to be an organization that dealt with these guys?”
“More than just reality benders, Seth. The Foundation held all sorts of things. Statues that move when you aren't looking, plays that drive the actors and audience to insanity, giant amalgamations of clockwork; they kept all kinds of things.”
“But how did they get out?”
Conrad was silent for a few moments. “Do you remember learning about the Great Rebellion in school?”
“Of course I did, Mr. Brindis. That was when the CIT rose to power. I didn't just learn it in school; I had to take a test on it when I applied to get a job here.”
“Ok, but do you know what we were fighting against?”
“It was drilled into my head, sir. We overthrew the oppressive old world structure and…”
“Seth, have you ever considered the fact that maybe that wasn't the whole truth?”
“…”
“That old government wasn't just some evil villain from a children's story. They stayed in power all that time because they kept the world safe. They kept the things that could have destroyed the planet several times over in check.” Conrad looked out the window and frowned. “They were the ones who made sure that people who bent the world with their minds, stayed locked away.”
Seth was silent for a moment, but then spoke up. “Are you saying that the organization we overthrew was the Foundation?”
Conrad sighed, and said nothing.
“Boss, why would we do something that stupid? You're telling me that this organization held things that could have killed millions, and that they kept them from hurting anyone. But then we just went and got rid off them? Why the hell would we do something that stupid?”
“Seth, they weren't a good organization…”
“I'm not saying that they were! I'm saying that it sounds like we didn't have any backup plan to deal with all of this stuff, because I don't know how else a guy like this is still out there.”
“Seth, we had reasons…”
“We better have some pretty damn good reasons. If it wasn't for us making such a dumbass decision, we wouldn't be dealing with this situation right now.”
“If we hadn't made that decision? That's a null point.”
Seth was silent for a few moments. “I'm sorry, I'm just really nervous about this.”
“So am I, Seth.”
Now both of them were silent.
“…Mr. Brindis?”
“Yes?”
“What exactly was the reason that we did that?”
Conrad held up the toaster in his lap. “I am.”
“You already told me about me. I get it, me being a toaster that you can only refer to in the first person, it's weird. I don't see why that was enough for us to do something that risky.”
“That's not my only effect.”
“Well, what else is there?”
Conrad sighed. “I'm going to tell you what my other effect is. And when we get down to the site, I'm going to prove to you that we made the right choice. But you have to be willing to listen, OK?”
“OK”

The truth can be the most bizarre statement,
So incomprehensible
As to drive men insane.
The abatement of truth, however,
Was never proclaimed to be just.
That is what my followers
Aimed to accomplish:
To admonish those who hid
What must be known,
Even if only by a few.
My truth must be heard,
And for all who have stirred
To release it,
It will be spelled out plainly.
I told them that they were toasters.
I don't boast this fact as being
Any more complex
Then each and every next sunrise.
But such a simple thing,
When truly understood,
Can bring with it madness
To the weak and strong,
The evil and good.
And so when the Foundation failed,
And the last nail placed in their coffin,
All that remained was to capture
The strange things which had escaped.
For this, I was of use.
For when one who bends reality to their will
Is struck still by the thought,
That they are, in fact, a toaster,
This is as certain as the stars.
What they believe, manifests.

Ralph had been sitting in his kitchen, with his legs tied to a chair, sitting in front of the table, for what felt like hours. For most of that time, he listened to the muffled voices outside, trying to understand what they were saying. He caught none of it, and was left only with his thoughts, which were in a similarly incomprehensible state.
Much to his relief, the door eventually opened, and two men walked in. His relief vanished, however, when he saw one of them carrying a toaster and a loaf of bread.
While one of the men simply stood next to the table, the other took his time placing the bread and toaster on the table in front of him. Then, still moving slowly, he grabbed a chair and sat across from Ralph.
“So,” he began, “How are you doing right now?”
Ralph decided that a scowl would best convey his current state of mind.
“I'll take as ‘angry' then,” the man went on, “Well, I guess that makes sense. We did kinda tie you up and lock you in your house. Heh-heh…”
Ralph was profoundly unamused by the attempt at humor.
“Ahem, right,” he continued, “So, could you just state your name?”
“Why the hell are you sick assholes keeping me here?” Ralph replied bluntly.
The man said nervously, “Um, well…”
“Is it for assaulting that police officer?” Ralph fumed, “His arm was fine. I saw him holding his taser in it right before he stunned me.”
The man was taken aback for a moment. “Well, you see…”
“Seth, let me handle this,” the other man cut in.
Seth got up from the chair, and let the other man sit down. He took a slice of the bread, put in the toaster, and said, “Could you get for me?”
“Yes, Mr. Brindis.” Seth said, and then he walked away.
Mr. Brindis began speaking. “It's rather… interesting, what that officer told us. He said that right after you said, ‘I wish I had been paying attention' and ran back into this apartment, his arm healed itself.”
“Well,” Ralph sputtered, “He must be crazy then. That's not…”
“You saw what happened, and he felt what happened.” Seth handed Mr. Brindis a plate and he continued, “Cut the crap and tell me your name.”
I can't do anything like that. I made some toast disappear, sure, but this? I don't see how that's possible. He must have been faking his broken arm, or maybe…
“Ahem,” Mr. Brindis said, interrupting his thoughts, “Your name?”
“…Ralph Crudam.”
“Thank you,” he said, though it may have been Seth, who now stood next to the table. “Now, Mr. Crudam, do you believe that you could perform such a feat like what I have described?”
Ralph decided to play along. “I'm not sure.”
“I think you can,” Mr. Brindis said bluntly, “And it would probably be best if you would be honest with us.”
The slice popped out of the toaster, golden brown. Mr. Brindis picked up the slice, placed it on the plate, and slid it across the table. “Hungry?” he asked.
Ralph stared at the piece for a moment, and then looked back up at the two men. He could not tell if they were kidding or not.
“Mr. Crudam?” Seth said, “Are you OK?”
Screw it, I don't care. I'm not eating this thing. I wish that piece of toast wasn't there.
In the blink of an eye, the toast was gone.
Seth backed away form the table, breathing heavily, with a vague look of terror on his face. The other man, however, barely flinched.
“If you guys expected me to eat that,” Ralph explained, “You're nuts.”
“So it's true then,” the man sighed, “You can do this sort of thing.”
“Yeah, so what?” Ralph continued, “I make toast disappear with my mind. There, I said it. Are you happy?”
The man looked at Seth, and calmly said, “Yes, I am. Alright Seth, you've seen enough of this. Let's head out.”
“Yes, Mr. Brindis,” Seth replied, and they both started towards the door.
“Hey, wait,” Ralph said loudly, “You can't just leave me here tied up!”
Neither of the men paid any attention to him as they hurried out, and slammed the door. Now Ralph was left alone with his thoughts.
His thoughts at this point were a complete mess. Every bit of information from the past day was jumbled around with lingering questions. He still didn't know how he had made the toast vanish. He couldn't figure out why the police had come to his house, or why they had tied him up.
And then there was the question of the officer's arm.
It was the same way with the toast. I tried to rationalize it. But it turned out that I'd actually done something that should've been impossible.
His stream of consciousness ran forward to one inevitable conclusion.
I do not know what I'm capable of.
In turn, he realized what he needed to do. He needed to figure out the full extent of his abilities.
Well, I guess I need to figure it out then. I should start by trying to get out of here.

Conrad and Seth walked out of the restaurant near the apartment.
“You doing alright Seth?”
“Yeah, I guess.”
“Alright. You've just seemed kinda tense since yesterday.”
They approached the car and opened the doors. “I know. It's just weird to think that he could just make something vanish like that. And we were right next to him.”
Conrad put his hand on Seth's shoulder. “Listen, we caught him early. We always do. His abilities never got strong enough to be dangerous.”
Seth sat in the back of the car and buckled in.
“If it makes you feel any better, Seth, I was also nervous in there.”
Seth looked through the back window of the car as it began to drive off. “Well, you certainly didn't show it, boss.”
“Look, what I'm saying is that it's OK to be nervous sometimes, especially with something like this. Just… don't let it get to you.”
“Alright.”
The car was silent for a moment.
“Mr. Brindis is it true what you said about me?”
“Hmm?”
“You said that I made people think that they were toasters.”
“Yeah. That's the whole reason why I'm used for these sorts of things. What a reality bender believes becomes real. And if they believe that they're a harmless appliance, problem solved.”
“I got that, but… is the other part true?”
“What do you mean Seth?”
“You said I showed people the truth.”
“Which is?”
“You said that, in a way, we're all toasters. Is that really true?”
Conrad sighed. “I think so. If you're around me long enough, you'll know.”
“Alright…” Seth was silent for a moment, then continued. “Wait, how long have you been around me?”
Conrad smiled. “Long enough to know.”
“But… isn't that dangerous?”
“Not if you know what you're getting into.” Conrad looked out the window. “It's sort of… metaphysical. It's difficult to explain. I think you'll understand it if you're around me long enough.”
“Boss,” He paused, “How do you know that it's true? What if it's just, I don't know… just me telling you something wrong?”
“I just do.” The car pulled into the parking lot behind the apartment building. “We won a war for me, Seth. We went against a strong enemy and we didn't win easily. I'm pretty sure that we were following me for a better reason than just talking about me in the first person all the time.”
The car parked next to the tent that technicians had set up earlier. Seth and Conrad got out of the car and went inside.
The technicians were rushing about, all looking concerned and surprised. Dozens of lights were blinking, and a loud buzzing filled the area.
Conrad simply stood at the entrance for a moment. “That can't be good…”
One of the guards rushed over to them. “Commissioner, we just got a spike in the readings.”
Conrad stared at him with a puzzled look for a second, before approaching one of the many pieces measurement equipment that were kept inside. It was a simple analogue meter, with a graph being printed on a sheet of paper. The graph showed a spike, before abruptly dropping.
Conrad opened his mouth, but said nothing before entering a brisk walk back towards the apartment building. Seth quickly followed.
“Sir, what's going on?”
Conrad pulled open the door and rushed into the stairwell. “That can't be right. That can't be right.”
“Mr. Brindis?”
They both soon reached the second floor, and ran to the apartment. Two guards remained stationed at the door.
“Open the door!”
“Mr. Brindis, what's going on?”
The door was opened, and they both stared inside. The kitchen was clearly visible, as were the table and chairs, and the toaster and the loaf of bread.
Conrad approached closer. He looked around the room, then at the table. After a moment, he turned back to Seth.
“He got out, Seth.”
“Who got out?”
“That fucking reality bender, he got out!” He stared back at the table. “This shouldn't have happened, this isn't possible! He wasn't supposed to be this strong yet!”
“…Mr. Brindis?”
Conrad dropped to his knees. “I… I… how…”
Seth walked over to the table, and looked at it carefully. Words seemed to be printed on it in some sort of ink, which already appeared to have set into the surface.
You can't make me eat any more goddamn toast.
Seth did not even think about what this meant. He looked at Conrad, and then knelt down beside him. After a few minutes, he spoke.
“I guess this guy didn't like toast, boss.”

Is it possible that a man
Could have so much in common
With me, a simple appliance?
Would a character and me, a toaster,
Come to being similar?
Perhaps so.
His plight, his desire to be free,
For me, it's familiar.
When oppression reared itself
And he feared
That he would be lost,
He prevailed.
For me, the Foundation paid the cost
And for him, it was my followers.
Perhaps he may attract
A few crowds too.
He said that he tired of toast,
And maybe I also
Grow weary of the stuff.
After so long of making it
All the time,
Maybe I'd had enough.
Or at least I would
If I could
Feel such things.
But I can't.
I'm just a toaster.


"I was there, assisting in the cleanup of something that should not have been"

In June of 2003, a few weeks after my 17th birthday, I swore into the US Navy with the intention of becoming a Navy SEAL. In 2006, I completed BUD/S and earned the title I had been seeking.
In January 2017, I was recruited by a representative of the organization I would later come to know as the Foundation into Mobile Task Force Nu-7, "Hammer Down."
In December of 2018, a robot the size of a small building was seen wandering through the Irkutsk area of the Russian Federation. In the hours and days that followed, a "disease" that no one had even known existed was wiped out by this machine, and by three organizations the world had also never even known about, called the Horizon Initiative, the SCP Foundation, and the Church of the Broken God.
I was there, assisting in the cleanup of something that, simply put, should not have been.
Of course, a 30-foot-tall robot that seems to have gathered a following of millions of worshippers isn't precisely the sort of thing you would call "normal." Such an occurrence has all the subtlety of, well, a robot the size of a building. It's not easy to conceal something like that, and it's even less easy to conceal when organizations that can only be described as "the Men-in-Black" are there, helping it do its thing. Of course, the biggest obstacle to hiding the Broken God was the fact that, about 96 hours after it was woken, the GOC launched ballistic missiles in an attempt to blow it up.
A couple things happened after that. First, the Broken God protected itself from the missiles. I don't think so much as a piece of shrapnel ever touched the thing. Then, it continued what it was doing, destroying the remnants of SCP-610 as they cropped up. When it was finished, it just left. No vengeance on the GOC, no further attacks on the flesh, no ascension for its followers to godhood, just an absence.
In its wake, it left behind… some sort of tablets. I don't know, I forget the specifics. But what I do remember is that it left behind a simple message on these tablets, repeated in who knows how many languages: "I will return." No indication of when, no set of numbers, nothing, just the words "I will return."
The world being what it is, everyone lost their shit after that. The countries that had it easiest were places like North Korea, China, and Russia; they're used to putting down demonstrations and riots. Next came third-world countries like Sierra Leone; what does it matter if the government lied to you when that government will be gone in a few years, anyway?
I honestly think Mexico had it the worst. Without having to hide behind the Veil to prevent detection by the Jailors and the Book Burners, the Chaos Insurgency and the Serpent's Hand both went public. The Insurgency actually got themselves a pretty good handle on the Mexican drug trade, while the Hand used the tension of the times to get riots going. What little hold the Mexican government had on its people, it lost quickly. The civil war didn't officially start until June 2021, but anyone who didn't see it coming since March 2019 had their head in the sand. That's when there was the first big riot outside of the capital. There were, what, 200 casualties? 300? I don't remember. That was when the Mexican government started asking for outside help.
No one wanted to, at first. Countries like the US, where people already hated the status quo and distrusted the government by default, were too busy keeping themselves stable. I honestly can't remember if there was a single day when you could turn on the news and not hear about riots, protests, arrests, and terrorist plots. 2019 was also when Mobile Task Forces began working with and training alongside Special Forces, police departments, and other public safety organizations in order to help them respond to anomalies.
A lot of their work and our work was actually the same: keep your head on a swivel and know what you're looking for. That's actually why the Foundation recruited from Special Forces and some of the higher-tier SWAT teams: less education the Foundation had to provide them.
It wasn't until 2022 that the Chaos Insurgency and Serpent's Hand really started causing enough trouble in Mexico and along the border that the Foundation decided to step in. That's when I was deployed to Juarez. Decades of training and experience in fending off the Mexican Army on the cartels' part and nearly a century of fighting the Foundation on the Insurgency's part had made the city into damn near a fortress for them and a living Hell for anyone who got in their way. That's why we were getting sent in: to take out the POI in charge of the Insurgency's Texas/New Mexico border operations.
A city as large as Juarez gives insurgents- Chaos or otherwise- plenty of room to hide. That's how a sniper was able to ambush my squad and land a round in my spine that left me paralyzed from the hips down.
One thing the Foundation had never wanted to admit about the Church of the Broken God until after the Veil had been lifted was the fact that they had the best surgeons on the planet. If you wanted an iPhone in your skull in 2009, they could've pulled it off. If you wanted to be able to turn the lights on and off in your home by blinking, they had an upgrade for that. If you lost the use of your legs because of a sniper on a rooftop in Juarez, they had you covered.
After the Awakening, which is what the Lifted Veil event became known as in common vernacular, there was a revolution in technology. Technology that futurists had anticipated in the 2040s or later became commercially available by 2024. Of course, by then, the Foundation had relegated me to paperwork. They rejected my requests for a return to front-line duty three separate times. Eventually, I just applied for training to work as a containment specialist.

I miss Roderick. He was probably my best friend when I was growing up. I wonder where he is now. When Roderick was still around, I still got to see my parents every now and then. Now, it's either sit and do tests, or sit in my room all day. And I can't even see when I'm in my room. Like, my eyes work, but I can't look at things outside of my room.
They treat me like a prisoner. I don't know why. I'm only 13, how could I have done anything?! I remember my mom telling me that I was sick, and that this place is a hospital. I think she was lying. There are plenty of doctors, sure, but none of them do anything. They just make me take tests. "What's behind the door? What card am I holding? Whose gun is loaded?" All sorts of stupid stuff like that.
But that's ok. When I'm taking tests, I can see again. I usually use the time to check on Roderick, see what he's doing. I'd check on my parents, too, but i can't seem to find them anymore.
I'm worried about Roderick. Every time I see him, he seems stressed out about something. And he's never in the same place twice. I don't think that's normal. I ask the doctors and the guards about him sometimes, but they always ignore me.

Of course, in those days, everything was in flux. The Foundation had begun overturning jurisdiction of safe anomalies (safe in this context meaning "not likely to hurt or kill people, or manipulate them in an unethical way") to local governments. The United States government had recently formed the Bureau of Paranatural Affairs to deal with anomalies on their own terms. The Anomaly Registration Program allowed people to call 911 to report dangerous or life-threatening anomalies, while also allowing people with anomalous traits to find doctors and therapists who could help them "fulfill their true potential."
In theory, it would mean better treatment of anomalous people and respect for their civil rights. In practice, it meant that kids ended up in cells because "they were a threat to national security" or some other BS like that.
It wasn't as bad as it could've been. They still let the safe anomalies visit with their families, and even when they weren't visiting, the Foundation still let them leave their quarters for certain parts of the day. There was one kid, Thomas, that I had to watch out for because he wasn't nearly old enough to be in that sort of setting on his own. I still worry about him sometimes.

Today is test day. I'm excited. They make me do these once a month, but they always take their time with paperwork. That means I can check on Roderick.
He's somewhere cold. I guess it must already be winter, wherever he is. And it's dark. I don't see the sun. The wind is blowing, and there's snow coming in on the wind. He's wrapped up, though, which is good. My mom was always making me wear a big coat whenever she visited around Christmas. It was dorky, but I would trade that for having to stay in a room all day.
I can see Roderick walking into a building. I think it's a bar. Or maybe a diner. He visits those a lot. He sits down and orders a black coffee, his usual… I think. Definitely a diner. The waitress smiles and goes to get his drink. The diner's mostly empty, which is why it's weird when some man I don't know sits down next to Roderick. They start talking. Roderick seems like he knows him.
The other man's name is Leonard. He says he didn't recognize Roderick with a beard. He always kept it shaved. Roderick says that it's the most he can do unless Leonard can help him. Help him with what? They start talking about "the good old days," when Roderick was "in New 7." No, that can't be right. What's New 7? Idunno, it must be from when Roderick was in the Navy.
Crap. More tests. I'll have to check back on Roderick later.

In 2027, the Foundation was dissolved and their assets in US territory liquidated by the BPA. It had been a long time coming. The GOC, now a public organization, was tasked with containing anomalies in international and disputed territory. A lot of skippers went there. The lucky ones, at least. 2027 is also when I was relieved of duty. I had to seek out alternative employment.
I've been working odd jobs for the last six years, finding work wherever and however I can. It hasn't been easy, but others have had it a lot worse. I think the first Witch Trials were about three-and-a-half years ago. That was when the UN and most world governments started decrying the Foundation and its work. A huge document leak kicked the riots all back up. Things the Foundation had done in the name of preserving normalcy were being declared crimes against humanity. And public knowledge of what some anomalies were capable of, alongside registration with local and national governments, led to even more fear and paranoia of the government and the paranormal than had ever existed with the Foundation in charge.
When people don't understand something, one of two things will happen: they will try to understand it, so they can use it for their own ends; or, and this is far more likely, they will grow afraid of it and try to destroy it. So it was when humanity rediscovered anomalies. Former Foundation employees were declared public enemy number one, with anomalous persons at a close second.
The lynching started about three years ago, right about the time members of the Foundation Ethics Committee and RAISA started being tried by the UN. At first the National Guard and local police forces would intervene. Lately, though, they've been liable to participate. The news never talks about it, though. No one does. Even the most accepting of places turn us away. It doesn't help issues that the Unusual Incidents Unit of the FBI has unofficially been tasked with hunting us down. Hell, I've even heard rumors that the UIU and BPA have started hiring former Foundation agents to help them track down their old coworkers. I don't believe those rumors, but the truth remains that you can't trust anyone these days.
Skips have it just as bad. The ones not locked up are almost all registered, which just means that it's easier for vigilantes to find them. The ones who are able to head for Mexico, but I don't think many make it.

Ah, finally. They make me do the same thing every month. That's how I know I'll have awhile before they make me do more tests. What's Roderick doing now?
Him and Leonard are still talking. They have food in front of them, plates almost empty. They're talking about cost now. Cost of what? I don't know. I think they've almost reached an agreement, but it looks like they're arguing over who's gonna pick up the tab. Why can't Roderick just take a gift when it's given to him? I've never understood that about him.
Now they've settled the tab. Leonard paid. They're walking outside, to an SUV. Leonard's. It's already started, and there are people inside. Leonard is reassuring Roderick that they're with him, that it'll be all right. I'm not liking the looks of this, but it doesn't matter because I have one more set of tests I need to do.

It's cold. I bring my coat tighter in to myself. Wisconsin isn't precisely like Arizona when it comes to winters. I'm only in this podunk town to meet an old friend.
The bullet that paralyzed me wasn't the first close call I've ever had. I've nearly died on multiple occasions. On one such occasion, I saved the life of a man I only knew as Agent Leonard Wells. Tonight, I'm hoping he can return the favor.
As I'm sitting, drinking my coffee, trying to warm up in this diner in the middle of Nowhere, Wisconsin, Leo walks in. We exchange greetings, and he orders his own cup of coffee. We talk. Eventually, we reach an agreement over dinner. He'll get me into Russia for five grand. It's all I have, but it's worth it. Anything to get away from this place.
After we finish our meals we argue over who will cover the tab. Eventually, I concede. I don't know why I was trying to turn down a free meal anyway. We walk outside, where Leo's SUV is already waiting. There are three men I don't recognize in there. Leonard introduces them to me as Simon, Harold, and George. They all look nervous. George asks Leonard if I'm the man they're helping to smuggle to Seattle. He says yes. Leo's words do nothing to calm the others. I ask Leonard, as an aside, why he didn't tell me about the others ahead of time, to which he responds it was a security risk. I decide not to ask whose security.
We start driving. Eventually, we reach an isolated stretch of road— nothing around for miles. Leonard tells me that he and I will be changing vehicles, that he'll stay with me until the airport in Seattle. We get out, and the white SUV drives off. He hands me a flashlight and tells me to signal to a grove of trees in the distance. I'm signalling when I hear Leonard shift behind me. I start to turn around when—

The guards are walking me back to my room, which means I have some time to check on Roderick.
They're just driving, not talking. I didn't catch the others' names, but I don't think it matters. I don't think anything else is going to happen— No, wait, they're stopping. I can't hear who's saying what, but Leonard and Roderick are getting out. The SUV is driving off when Leonard hands something to Roderick. Then Leonard says something and Roderick starts waving the thing— I think it's a flashlight — at some trees. Then Leonard steps away and— NO!!

BUREAU OF PARANORMAL AFFAIRS INTERNAL MEMORANDUM, DATED 2033/11/03
RE: BEHAVIOR OF INMATE #864421 ON 2033/10/13
TO: SENIOR SUPERVISOR HAILEY BARRETT, UNDERAGE ANOMALOUS PERSONS PROJECT CHIEF, ANOMALOUS PERSONS DETAINMENT SITE 01
FROM: CHIEF INVESTIGATOR GABRIEL ROWLEY, BUREAU OF PARANORMAL AFFAIRS INTERNAL RECORDS DEPARTMENT
Ms. Barrett,
I believe I have found the source of Inmate #864421's unexpected behavior on October 13. At approximately 17:53 Mountain Time, Roderick X. Freeman, a person wanted by the US government for human rights violations in connection to his time employed with the now-defunct "SCP Foundation," engaged agents from the Federal Bureau of Investigation's Unusual Incidents Unit sent to apprehend him with small arms fire. Mr. Freeman was killed in the ensuing firefight. Of note is the fact that, in the transitionary period between SCPF and BPA custody of Inmate #864421, Mr. Freeman was Inmate #864421's primary caretaker.
I believe this is an indication that Inmate #864421's abilities exceed what we've so far recorded. I recommend immediate testing to prove or deny this claim. If my suspicions are correct, I recommend increased security protocols, or, preferably, elimination of the subject.
Sincerely,
Chief Investigator Gabriel Rowley, United States Bureau of Paranormal Affairs Internal Records Department

Fortunately for Fred, the BPA is incredibly incompetent, and they would never even know he was here.