« Green Recruit | Ombres Malvants | … to be continued »

The shadows in the alley were ink. Tomàs was drowning.
The young woman's comatose weight dragged him downwards. He shouldn't leave her, but he couldn't afford to be found like this. He had to find the people who had done this to her. Tomàs' spinning thoughts immobilised him.
"You know, I think this means you're not getting lucky tonight after all."
The woman's voice sliced knife-like through his mental bonds. Speaking English, an American accent. Tomàs couldn't see her. He turned to search, letting the unconscious woman slide to the ground.
"I hope that's not how you treat all women, Tomàs, or we're not going to get along."
There - rising from the step in front of a darkened doorway. She was tall, maybe taller than him. Lank brown hair with a streak of cheap-looking pink through it, framing dark eyes that shone with feverish light.
"How did you know - ? You were eavesdropping," said Tomàs, realising. How much had she heard?
The woman shambled towards him, gangling in ripped jeans and a t-shirt that read "Nomeansno". Something about her looked almost familiar.
"We don't have time for fucking around, Tomàs," she said. "My name is Veronica. You're going to help me."
"What do you mean?" asked Tomàs. Then, "Wait, you're in that band, right? I saw you in the paper."
Veronica waved him away. "I told you, we don't have time. I saw your little 'performance' on La Rambla, and I've seen enough to know that razor-shadow you torched was no special effect. Whoever you and she work for, whatever you're doing, you're trapped in the same shit as me. So you're going to help."
Frowning, Tomàs considered his options, none of them good. "Help you with what?" he said finally.
"To hunt the fuckers who took my girlfriend." Veronica's jaw clenched, sharpening the words to hard edge.
She was already heading for the deeper darkness of the alley. A witness - Tomàs had to keep tabs on her until he could get amnestics. And maybe she had information he could use. He looked back at the woman's body slumped on the ground.
Veronica saw the look as she turned. "You're an agent, she said. Can you call this in?"
Tomàs shook his head.
"Then don't use your phone. I'll ring an ambulance on our way."
Things were moving too fast. "On our way where?"
"To the last place I saw Ashy. The place those assholes put a green patch on her arm. To Apagada."

The club was packed. Bodies pulsed in flashes of blinding white. Waves of abyssal bass deepened the darkness. Tomàs felt both: palpable noise and writhing limbs.
Veronica was leading him further into the maelstrom. Her story, told in jagged shards on their walk, made little sense, but he understood enough. She was seeking the same men as he was. Pursuing them. If he was driven, she was a fanatic. She pushed through the crowd's gyrations like a juggernaut.
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw a familiar face. Joan. He had been here with Tomàs and the others, the night Raf was murdered. He stood by the wall, opposite the bar.
Tomàs grabbed Veronica's arm, and she spun as if to strike him. The strobes amplified the intensity in her eyes. Tomàs held up a hand, then pointed towards Joan and pulled her along.
They squeezed out of the press in front of Joan, who was rocking drunkenly with the music's pulse. Veronica looked at his rough-shaven face and glanced skeptically at Tomàs. It was impossible to explain to her - everything was too loud. He tried to yell an introduction, but he could barely hear himself. Joan gave a snaggle-toothed grin, then leaned forward, putting a hand on Veronica's shoulder as he shouted something into her ear. To Tomàs' surprise, Veronica laughed. Joan chuckled, his paunch quivering under a too-tight shirt. Then he turned, beckoning, and they followed him through a staff door.
In the hallway beyond, the bass throb was lessened. Joan kept moving, leading them through a storeroom and down concrete stairs bleached by buzzing fluorescent bulbs. Tomàs hadn't realised that he worked at the club, but he supposed his sister must have mentioned it. She was better at keeping up with family.
At the bottom of the third flight was a bare room with several doors. Joan was about to open one, when Tomàs reached out to stop him. Joan's arm was warm, from the swarming club, or perhaps the alcohol.
"Joan, we can talk here," said Tomàs. "You work at the club, right? We need to ask you some questions."
Veronica was pacing like a caged tiger. "What is the trade here like? Do you know the dealers? What do they sell? How big is the crew?"
Joan cocked his head to one side, the movement exaggerating the wide set of his eyes. "Aim of brine woe forget ache, yeoman dust glimmering broken air."
"Sure, but how do you know where they've taken Ashy?" asked Veronica.
"Young boxed bled boy worms ago, callow begged. Ashes walk boon yes - all why welling." The lights flickered, buzzing. Cousin Joan looked at Tomàs expectantly.
"How many of them are there?" Tomàs pressed. "Do we need Xavi?"
"Skin bout wax able adopt. Zones wily arm ax broad ass been addle winter." Joan gave a rough guffaw, and again Veronica laughed along.
"Come on then, asshole," she said. She grinned at Joan, but with steel behind it. "Let's get those fuckers."
As they went ahead, Tomàs felt a sudden misgiving. Inexplicable, but unmistakable. Should he just go back up, call this in to his training supervisors? He shook off the feeling, rubbing his eyes for good measure. This was his anomaly to investigate. This was how he could make his mark. And he wasn't about to let Veronica go in there alone. He hurried after her.

The further they walked, the tighter the passage became. Tomàs hadn't noticed the shift from hallway to tunnel, but now the walls were rough, the air clammy. They crept forward single file, blindly. The last of Tomàs' phone battery was reserved for more important things than torchlight; how Joan could navigate he had no idea. Yet his cousin pressed onward, ignoring turnings, following the slope downwards. No-one had spoken for twenty minutes. Save for their footsteps, the only noise was an occasional muted fluttering, like unseen wings.
Joan gave a grunt from the blackness, and Veronica echoed a muttered warning. The walls ahead constricted further. Tomàs turned sideways, shuffling with his back pressed against the rock. The opposite surface was hidden in the dark, but he felt its closeness in the wash of his own hot breath reflected from stone.
Progress was slow, and the narrow crack stretched endlessly. Tomàs felt his muscles tense with the need for space. He thought he could hear Veronica ahead of him, but was that just his own movement echoing back? Tomàs reached ahead, but found only the same implacable hardness. He could feel the weight of it, on all sides, above him. Something dripped onto the nape of his neck, and wetness slid down his back. Tomàs tried to slow his breathing.
A sharp cry from ahead. Veronica. Tomàs rushed, knees and elbows rasping on the harsh surface. Then his lead arm swung in empty space, and he cried out too. After the passage, the openness felt like falling, and he collapsed to his knees on the cavern floor. Veronica was there too: a sudden glow from her phone showed her breathless but recovering. Beyond, Joan stood unmoving, watching them intently. The phone's light went out, and Tomàs saw only blackness and a phosphorescent afterimage in the shape of a man.
Then he heard it.
Something else was in the lightless chamber with them. A scrabbling of claws on rock. Throaty panting, on the verge of a growl. Tomàs and Veronica, trying to pinpoint its source, inched unconsciously closer to Joan.
A second noise spun them around. This was a wet flapping, inarguably separate from the first. And then a third: a drawn-out hiss, like a kettle almost boiling.
From closer to them came a deep rattling. In confusion, Tomàs imagined Joan with a football clacker, trying to scare off whatever had them surrounded. The creatures were unperturbed. Tomàs could hear them circling.
"Weave bull babe atop aught womb." Joan's voice was terse.
Tomàs backed closer to the others. "How, when we can't see them?"
"Apt as works, which, why bun yet yours bus brine." Joan gave a sudden stamp, and something near his feet skittered away. Tomàs listened to it wheel back in, closer.
"Fuck that," said Veronica. Her phone's dim screen lit up her face, determination leavening her fear. "Let's see what we're dealing with."
She flicked on the torch at the moment of the attack. The monstrosity darting at them screeched, a dozen eyes squinting as it swung out of the beam and into the dark. Tomàs had the impression of a hooked beak, a scaly tail and heavy paws - a madman's chimera.
A squeal echoed from behind them, and Joan answered with another clattering bellow. The torchlight swung crazily as Veronica bent over, dropping the phone. Then the second creature sprang at Tomàs' throat.
Sightless, his hands came up instinctively. The weight threw Tomàs to the floor of the cave. He pushed desperately against a feathered neck as slavering jaws snapped at his face. A forked tongue lapped at his closed eyes. Claws tore his clothes as the beast writhed and rolled. There was a clacking noise, as dozens of scorpion claws along the thing's jawline nipped at his hands, trying to dislodge his grip.
Something wet and muscular coiled around Tomàs' neck. His hand pulled at a suckered tentacle, wrapped tight and constricting like a python. With only one arm to fend it off, the creature's weight pressed down. Tomàs gulped for air, gaining none. The maw lunged, and he wrenched his head desperately aside. Bright spots swam behind his eyelids. The tentacle cinched harder.
A heavy impact flung the chimera off him. Tomàs heaved as air filled his lungs. His neck felt raw where the suckers had been ripped away. He realised that the torchlight was steady again, Cousin Joan looming over him in silhouette. Joan stepped over Tomàs, to where the creature had hit the rock wall. It made a high mewling noise. Joan kicked it again, hard, and there was silence.
Veronica turned the torch around. Another of the predator mongrels, lion-maned and bat-winged, lay in the centre of the cavern. Veronica bent over it, pulling a slim knife from its chest and sliding it into her boot. She met Tomàs' gaze with a shake of her head, and raised her phone high. On the far side of the chamber was what remained of the third animal. A mess of crab claws and snake heads, it had been torn almost in half.
Tomàs saw Veronica stare at Joan for a second. "There was another one, but it ran," was all she said.
"All asps bonding ever wits. Win assay bees."
"Shit on that," snapped Tomàs. "How is splitting up ever a good idea?"
"Boy and bathing, womb." Joan strode towards a tunnel entrance, leaving the circle of torchlight.
Veronica called after the retreating shadow. "You know, Johnny, I meant it - you are an asshole!"
There was no reply. They stood in a cave full of dead things.
After a moment, Tomàs gathered his thoughts. "Wait a second. Why did you call him Johnny?"
"Because he's my asshole cousin," said Veronica. "I've always called him that."
Stomach churning, Tomàs replied slowly. "No, his name is Joan. It's Catalan for John, because he's my cousin. What made you think -"
"No, he's here for the -" Veronica tailed off at the same time.
"I don't think we should wait for him," said Tomàs, with a shiver.
"That's the first smart thing you've said all night." Veronica was already heading for an opening on the opposite wall.

The tunnels kept sloping gently downwards, but these were wider than before, with a hint of movement in the air. Tomàs risked a little more of his phone battery. Without reception, he had no access to the full Foundation database, but the abridged version on the device itself was more than enough. 'Cousin Johnny' turned up a hit, and Tomàs read the summary in disbelief. Keter-class, mind-affecting, infiltrating religious occasions.
"Perhaps that's the reason for violence at all those funerals," he said aloud.
Veronica turned around. "Cousin - you mean the Johnny-thing? Is it fae?"
Tomàs was too exhausted to try to maintain the Veil now. "Fae? You mean like faeries?"
"They can draw power from ceremonies, from rituals," said Veronica. "I don't know what you're reading, but I told you, I have some … experience in this area."
Scanning through the rest of the page, Tomàs exhaled slowly. "No, this seems to be something else. Different, ancient maybe. It seems centered on Catholic liturgies. Jesus, perhaps it's here for Raf's funeral! Although, there was some sort of fight at your concert too, right?"
"No, that was … that was a more specific thing."
"Hey!" said Tomàs, shutting down his phone. His voice sounded pinched. "Perhaps you'd like to be a little more honest with me. If we're going to get out of here -"
"That's rich, from the man who won't tell me who he's working for," Veronica interrupted. She stopped dead, squaring up to him. "If you want honesty, you could try being less of a hyp -"
"Ssh!" Tomàs put a hand on Veronica's arm. With the phone off, his eyes had adjusted. Behind her, in the distance, a light flickered.
They stayed frozen for an age, but the light did not move. There was no sound from either direction. Without speaking, they stretched stiffening limbs and stepped cautiously towards the light.
It was an old oil lantern, on the floor of another rough-cut chamber. Pressed into the shadows of the tunnel, Tomàs risked a glance inside. He leaned close to Veronica's ear, speaking as quietly as he could, her hair tickling his nose.
"A cell. Bars, dark, can't see inside. One guard. No exits."
Veronica pulled away, eyes hard as she gestured back the way they had come.
"No," Tomàs continued. "Guard must know something. We need information. Follow me."
Without looking back, he strode towards the light, then sprinted across the small room. Before the guard could do more than stand, Tomàs barreled into the his midsection, throwing him backwards. The guard's head clanged off the bars of the unlit cell, and Tomàs shot a hand over the man's mouth as he slumped to the ground, dazed. Landing his weight on the guard's right side, Tomàs was relieved when Veronica arrived to grab the man's other arm. Her hand held the knife before the guard's eyes to make sure he saw it, then pressed the blade to his neck.
"Call for help and you're dead, understand?" said Tomàs, kneeling in front of the man as he ceased struggling.
The guard looked at him and blinked in acknowledgement.
"Okay, I'm going to remove my hand, and you're going to - quietly - answer my questions."
"Oh, I cannot think that this imbecile has anything of interest to share."
A gloved hand snaked from between the bars of the cell, grasping the guard's neck. Veronica pulled the knife away with a yelp as the man collapsed. She and Tomàs looked up to see a black-robed figure towering above them. The cultured voice had come from a long-beaked mask the colour of bone.
"Certainly my conversational attempts with him had been thoroughly tedious," the figure continued, "and the local bastardisation of French and Spanish is cumbersome to pronounce. I hope very much that you two understand English." It stood still, sharp eyes watching them closely from behind the mask.
Tomàs was the first to recover from the shock. Only now he saw that the chamber was hung with sprigs of lavender. He rose slowly. "Who - what - are you?"
"My profession, sir? Medicine. At which, I flatter myself, I have no small skill." The mask was fixed, but the voice was warm.
"Then you are responsible for all those squirrels, and those women who were drugged. For the pills I found, for the patches."
"Pills?" the doctor exclaimed, drawing himself to full height. "You do me dishonour. I am no mere purveyor of powders and ointments! You seek an apothecary, sir. I am a surgeon!"
"A plague doctor," said Veronica. Realisation dawned, and she stepped back suddenly from the body on the floor. "What did you do to him?"
"An unfortunate necessity, dear madam," said the doctor, seeming to recover his equanimity. "Although I presume by your actions that you did not wish him well! Still, be assured that he can do you no harm. And it seems that we may have a mutual interest."
Tomàs tried to regain his composure. Another anomaly, it seemed. At least this one didn't come disguised as family.
"What interest might that be?" he said cautiously.
"Why, in my work, sir - in my release! That man's associates had offered to assist me with human subjects for my research, but I'm afraid their previous hospitality has rather ceased. And this despite all of my progress with animals."
"Animals?" asked Veronica, and Tomàs knew what she was thinking. "What kind of animals?"
"Why, every kind," replied the doctor. "Animals are extremely useful for analysis and refinement of technique. I believe my erstwhile patrons wished me to impart to them a method for the partial severance of the soul from the body, but after I had finished with the squirrels, I was keen to show them that I am not solely a vivisectionist. No, my friends, the true art of the surgeon is in reattachment. And I have supplied them with excellent examples of the art."
Tomàs thought of the shape behind the door in the room of medicines, and of the creatures that had attacked them in the caves. He shuddered.
The doctor seemed oblivious to their slow retreat from the bars. "I do not detect the Pestilence in either of you," he said, then gave Veronica a second look. "There is something, perhaps, but … no, not the Pestilence. I would be most obliged if you would consent to release me from this -" the cloaked arms gestured, "- inconvenience. Perhaps I can be of service in return?"
"Do you know how to find the men who put you here?" Veronica was studiously ignoring Tomàs' look.
"Almost certainly. If you just retrieve the keys from this unfortunate gentleman, I will collect my bag and we can be on our way." The beaked face glanced toward the back of the cell.
"How can we trust you?" shot back Tomàs.
"What is it about you men that you are always so suspicious?" The doctor seemed not to require an answer. "Always trying to control everything. You should allow for uncertainty - experimentation is the essence of scientific progress."
Now it was Veronica's turn to shoot a look at Tomàs. "Forgive my colleague, sir. I can see that your intentions are honourable. If you get your belongings, we will offer your liberty."
"Most obliged, dear madam." The tall figure bowed deeply, then turned and walked into the darkness in the back of the cell.
"What the hell are you doing?" whispered Tomàs. The smell of the lavender was thick on his tongue, cloying. He felt almost dizzy.
"We're lost underground, everyone else we've met is trying to kill us, and he seems to have a grudge against the same people we're looking for."
"Veronica, in this case I suspect the enemy of my enemy is a lunatic." Tomàs kept both eyes on the bars, waiting for the doctor's reemergence.
"Call it the Eisenhower principle. At the very least, those bastards aren't going to be happy with him running around loose."
"Then - here, at least take some lavender. The amount they've left in here, it has to be some kind of charm."
Before Tomàs could say any more, Veronica knelt and took the keys from the dead guard's belt. She remained kneeling for a second longer, eyes closed.
"Are you okay?"
"Yes, just offering a short prayer in case anyone can hear us down here. If you're on speaking terms with g-d, you might want to do the same."
Veronica rose and walked to the cell. Tomàs thought for a second. He had been told that he would receive divine help when he was in need. He prayed that was true.
The keys clanked in the lock. As if called, the white mask came into the light.
"Ah, thank you," said the doctor. He walked through the door of the cell as it opened. "Now perhaps we can be properly introduced. I haven't yet met your other friend."
"The violence parades. Without the bankrupt declines a unused damned."
Tomàs and Veronica spun. In the tunnel opening stood Cousin Johnny. He looked at them blandly.
The doctor was the first to speak. "This fellow appears to speak a dialect with which I am unfamiliar." He walked towards Johnny, and the curved beak dipped and rose as he eyed up the new arrival. "You, sir, are a unique specimen, I believe. No trace of the Pestilence at all, but … hmm. Have you ever considered offering your body for the advancement of knowledge?"
Johnny ignored him. "A rabid standpoint explodes within a software."
"What does he say?" asked the doctor, turning to Veronica.
"He -" for a second, she faltered. "He said he can show us what we're looking for."
Cocked to the side, the masked face had an even more birdlike aspect. "And you see no reason not to follow him?"
Both Veronica and Tomàs were silent.
"Then I suppose we shall do so," said the doctor. "Lead on, good man."
The black hand reached out and grasped Cousin Johnny's bare arm. The movement was casual, but Tomàs' breath caught in his throat. Johnny stood still, and turned his head slowly towards the plague doctor, the neck turning slightly too far. A ripple seemed to run over his rough features, and he gave a slow blink.
The doctor dropped his hand and took a step back. "Forgive my presumption, sir," he said, head bobbing in confusion.
Cousin Johnny turned back, and walked into the tunnel. Tomàs could see Veronica take the deep breath she had been holding. The doctor wrung his hands, then picked up his black bag and followed. Veronica and Tomàs looked at each other, then did the same.

Johnny set a rapid pace through the dark passages. They hurried to keep up, the doctor murmuring to himself, the others silent. Tomàs recognised the chamber where Cousin Johnny had left them, but of the creatures there was no sign. Before he could investigate, they were in another shaft.
Tomàs felt a tightness in his stomach. What the hell had was he doing? Even the illusion of control of this situation was long gone. He wished he had searched the guard for a weapon.
The air felt warm, and again there was light ahead. Their speed quickened. Almost inaudible, Tomàs heard a low droning sound, like the echo of a voice or distant machinery.
They emerged into a huge cave, lit harshly by halogen floodlights on stands. A vaulted roof soared upwards, lost in night. The floor beneath was carved flagstones, broad and flat. The lights were facing inwards in a wide semi-circle, leaving the expanse beyond them shadowed. Then Veronica gave a stifled scream, and Tomàs realised what they were lighting.
White marble slabs, maybe fifty of them. Atop each lay the body of a woman. Veronica ran towards them, and Tomàs followed.
As they drew closer, the women became more distinct. No-one older than thirty, but otherwise no discernible connection. Tomàs saw several who looked like locals, wearing clothes for a night out. An Asian girl who looked very young indeed. A redhead in an Irish rugby shirt. With a shock, Tomàs recognised the woman on the next plinth - it was Anna, Raf's missing girlfriend. She must -
"Ashy!" Veronica cried. She ran towards the centre of the bodies, clutching at a willowy blonde in a silver dress. Tears smudged the dirt and makeup on her cheeks.
Tomàs was starting towards her, when something caught his eye. The woman lying nearest to him was dressed in a uniform, one that he recognised. "Diego" was the name across the pocket. There was no other insignia, but this was definitely a Foundation MTF agent!
"Tomàs, she's breathing!" called Veronica, relief cracking her voice.
"They all are!" Tomàs looked around, and noticed something else the women had in common. He rolled up Agent Diego's sleeve. "On their arms, Veronica - the green patch." He ripped off Diego's, and saw Veronica do the same for Ashy.
Behind them, the plague doctor strode into the light. His voice sounded ecstatic. "I was mistaken! My captors did not betray me. These are to be my subjects!"
Tomàs' face went cold, but his fears were cut off as a new voice sounded from the opposite side of the cavern.
"Not quite."
An animal control noose dropped over the doctor's shoulders and pulled tight. The robed figure struggled, but he was pushed forward by two men holding a metal pole to which the noose was attached.
Tomàs turned slowly towards the voice, and saw more men approaching from all sides. Young men, mostly, but some older. They were dressed plainly, as if they had walked in from the streets above, but their faces were smug, their eyes avid.
At the top of the semi-circle of lights was a broad dais. On it, lit in the razor-glow of halogen, was the man who had spoken. He wore a tailored suit without a tie, and his black hair was immaculate. On his right was the man with the spiked hair, glaring at Tomàs. From behind, Cousin Johnny climbed the steps onto the dais, rolled his neck slowly, and walked to the man's other side. They paused for a second in tableau.
"Tomàs Rey," said the man in the suit. "Veronica Fitzroy. I'm so glad that you were able to join us here."
He looked Tomàs in the eyes.
"You're just in time for the wedding."
(To be continued)

It looks like the Original Character Tournament might still be running? In any case, you can read my competitors' tales here:

Gabriel Jade: Plague Doctor's tale
kinchtheknifeblade: [pending]

Go check out the Tournament hub, and read some other entries. I've really enjoyed participating, and will look to finish off this story as soon as I can!


"Hey…"
…
"Is he dead or something? Christ, may have to get th…"
…
"Stick or pipe? Which one wi…"
…
"Three, two, one…"
THWAK!
Michael was pulled out of his state of unconsciousness, a blast of pain knocking him upright. His vision blurry and his hearing muffled, Michael rubbed his head as hard as he could, resulting in even more pain.
"Errnngg…"
Scowling, he decided to just gently rub his eyes and blink the blurriness away. Seemed to work. What the hell even happened? Last thing he remembered was…
!!!
The flash of memory made him jump.
A sight to see, a police station warping and shuddering under an oppressive foot. A troop of policemen, wielding firearms, running back and forth. Michael sat on the road, a Kangaroo jumping over him. A man spun about in a wheelchair, his eye covered with a patch. Blood spurting everywhere from mirrored helmets.
What is this?
Perhaps his medication decided to give him the equivalent of a drug trip, or maybe he was having a fever dream. But if that was the case, then why did it feel so real? Like he was a part of this. This didn't make sense, not in the slightest.
"That's because it just happened. The shit they shot in ya is making you loopy."
Micheal's reflexes made him jump to his feet and spin around, coming face to face with clumps of brown and light red.
A 6 foot, heavily muscled, bloodstained Red Kangaroo.
"Hm. Surprised, huh?"
What accent was that!? That was the thickest Australian accent that Michael had ever heard, it was as if Crocodile Dundee got mixed in with every Australian slang a drunk could think of. It was embarrassingly bad.
But that wasn't important right now.
What was important was the fact that he was talking to a fucking kangaroo!
"Come on, we're gonna be late."
Michael didn't have the choice to say no, not that he wanted to. Pissing off the sack of muscle would be the last thing he'd do. As the kangaroo began to hop away, Michael slowly but surely straightened up, his back finally arching. As Michael took his first step, however, his leg buckled from underneath him, sending waves of pain.
"Ack! Fuckin'…!"
The kangaroo snapped his head back and saw the man crumple to the ground.
"Ah crap, you're injured. Hang on a sec, let me get ya."
With a swift swish of the arms, the kangaroo managed to grab Michael and lift him over its shoulders. It was reminiscent of the Fireman's carry that was often seen in those movies that Michael rarely saw. Perhaps this fever dream would come to an end soon, and he'd be woken up in a nice hospital, with an actual excuse to knock off work for once.
Yeah, that would be nice.

The colony was thriving.
Everywhere he looked, there was nothing but progress. Who would've known that just a few years ago this whole town was on the brink of collapse. Thank goodness he got here while he could. While he was just a mere passerby, the state of these poor animals made him stay longer than he would have. It wasn't like there was a family to go to, not the after scandals that popped up because of that one fucking mine! His family was here, these kangaroos were family now, and there was nothing that could change that.
"Oi! Oi! Isaac! We've got someone!"
The politician snapped his head to the entrance gate, made of various bits of scrap iron. It creaked as each bit of metal scraped against one another, chipping off paint and rust. When a familiar figure came through and locked the gate behind them, Isaac made a mad dash towards them, leaving deep imprints in the desert sand.
"Oliver! You're alright!"
He enveloped the furry animal in a tight hug, the kangaroo giving one of his own in return. "I thought you got killed by those nasty Foundation people! How did you survive?"
"Where are we?"
Isaac turned his attention to the body on Oliver's back. Its clothes were tattered and dirty, its hair mangled with grey and brown. It was breathing heavy, probably from being hit by one of those signs again. It was on the brink of unconsciousness.
"Another victim of the signs?"
Oliver lowered his head.
"Yeah, don't know how we missed it, was a few kays from the fence line. Sorry."
Isaac pulled the body off the roo's back, careful to not stir it from its slumber. Having to try and explain why an overweight politician was carrying one to a house made of car tires would be too much of a hassle right now.
"Nah, it's alright. No need to apologise. They'll move the fence and try and find us again, but we'll get away, we always do."
With a huff, the politician carried the body towards the house of tires. The house was small, with only a few rooms, with signs haphazardly plastered on for the sake of convenience. Isaac didn't mind the aesthetic, though he did miss having most modern conveniences; at least he had his watch.
"Alright, there we go."
The "hospital bed" wasn't anything to gawk at, just a simple mash of springs and car cushions.
Anything goes, I suppose. Let's hope the springs don't give out this time.
The body made a soft PHFM sound as it bounced atop the makeshift bed. Isaac wiped the sweat off his brow. Man, he needed to exercise. For all that the Australian heat did to him, weight loss was not on that list. He straightened his black leather tie and brushed off his matching suit. Just as he pulled his grey hair back, at least what was left of it, a knock echoed through the hut.
"Uh, Isaac Ilan, you got that speech due in 30 minutes."
Without looking back, Isaac stretched.
"Yeah, yeah. I'll be there in ten, give me a minute to get my stuff."
He felt the figure nod, and then leave. Isaac took the time to collect his thoughts on the situation that laid in front of him, like a bunch of papers was just thrown on his desk during an important office meeting.
So, that is one more victim, and one more sign to keep track of. Goddammit, if I knew this what I was getting into, I would have prepared years ago. At least this one seems better than the others. The one from that self driving car didn't even make it. The cemetery shouldn't grow anymore, not now, not ever.
With a heavy sigh, he turned and left the little tire hut, and made his way to his own home, a home made of car doors, exhaust pipes, and broken promises.

There was a mild sense of pain. Not enough to be considered agony, but enough to stir Michael from a drug induced slumber. The first thing he noticed when he opened his eyes was the dozens of car tires that made a makeshift ceiling. It didn't do much to shield the light, but it was good enough to stop the rain, which was good in Michael's books, at least.
He pulled himself up and tried to climb out of bed. Pain from his leg made him stiffen and stifle a yelp. He noticed the makeshift bandages that covered it. Whoever did it decided to not do the burden of taking his clothes off, which was a relief. Michael took another look around the room he was in. There was a curtain that covered the room, like a door, made of some kind of leather. Leaning against the bed was a pair of white crutches, with foam acting at the underarm rests.
Guess I'm gonna have to use these.
The crutches seemed sturdy enough, they could hold his weight enough, and it didn't dig into his underarms. With each swing, his arms would burn slightly, perhaps from their severe underuse in recent years, with the exception of driving.
Driving?
With no warning, a chill ran down through his body, making each bone in his spine tense up.
"Why did that happen?"
A cold sweat ran down his forehead. Shaking out the sense of dread, Michael decided to leave the tire hut, and figure out where the hell he was. With any luck, he could get back home, or at least to a motel, he still had his phone.
Well, he did have his phone, the empty space in his pocket proved otherwise.
Oh great, now where did it go?
"Hey! You're up!"
A large, round man stomped towards him, the ground leaving deep imprints of their work boots, which didn't match at all with their business suit. The man's face was covered in dirt, and seemed to have run out of breath. He stuck out his hand.
"I, uh…"
Michael was at a bit of a loss for words. The man in the suit seemed to notice.
"Oh yeah! My apologies, forgot to introduce myself! Name's Isaac Ilan, you may know me from Parliament, or formerly from Parliament."
A light bulb went off in Michael's head.
"Hang on, were ye the guy who did tha-"
"Yes, yes, yes, that was absolutely not me! That was something out of my control, unfortunately, but it did pave the path that took me here."
Michael was caught off guard, to say the least. The sight of an overweight politician who was involved in so many scandals that he was literally thrown out of office. Michael decided to not press on the issue, as it didn't seem too important right now.
"Anyway, you know my name, but I don't know yours. So who might you be?"
"I… am Michael, Michael Palmer. Uh, do ye know where we are?"
Isaac scratched his head.
"That, is a complicated answer, I think it'll be better if I just showed you. Follow me."
Before Michael could answer, the politician stomped onward to a considerably high hill. With no other choice, Michael followed, each footstep setting his arms on fire. Within a few minutes Michael managed to make it to the crest, a good fifty metres up or so. Isaac was on the very edge, looking over.
Michael threw the thought of throwing him off.
Isaac turned to him, his back to the landscape.
"Ah! You're here! Sorry about the crutches, we couldn't make a wheelchair with the parts we had. Not without demolishing the tire hut."
Ah, so handmade then.
"Anyway, that's not important right now. What is important, is what I'm about to show you, come to the edge."
With hesitation, Michael obeyed and stood on the edge.
Out on the horizon, there was a marvel, a sight to take in. A sight that Michael would never think, never in a million years, would be going on right in front of him, just along the landscape.
"Welcome, to the Hidden Sanctuary, home to the only species of sapient Kangaroos."
«Outback Law|Domino Effect»


Susan Gaile grew up in military, was schooled in military, and fought in military. Anything she sought to find would inevitably find itself struck by her bullet. Top of her class and best of her squadron, she was a natural choice for the Foundation to pick as a member of MTF Mu-7, and she herself was delighted by the offer once she found out what exactly she would do. Finally something could challenge her, like a Chaos Insurgency agent, or a dangerous anartist, or even one of the monsters she had seen during her binging of the archives.
Instead, she found herself looking for an anomaly that confused even the Foundation's best minds. Some reality-warping thing had breached into the Georgia region, and the best clue the Foundation had as to what this thing was had been its documentation, which only had a testing log. The trail to find it was made a little more clear by a series of abundant disappearances, wildfires, and sudden extranormal events occurring in certain areas. Specifically, the little town of Starburg had a high concentration, and a little wooden outhouse had a particularly high hume count.
Susan, along with the rest of Mu-7, surrounded the outhouse. Some were meant to remain outside for additional support if necessary, but most were ready to enter the tiny structure when given the signal. Susan was the one to give that signal. Sweat dripped down her head, the bulky armor along with the stress of uncertainty making it much hotter than it would've been otherwise. There seemed to be an aura of dread emanating from the outhouse, like it shouldn't be there. Nonetheless, she had two options: stay outside or stay with the Foundation, and she'd be damned if she didn't stick with her greatest job yet.
“Everyone check your mics, we have no idea what's in there, we're going in on the count of three,” she shouted, “One…two…THREE!”
Susan and her team barged into the outhouse, and were greeted by an inescapable void. The void, which seemed to be an impossible mixture of colors, sucked Mu-7 in like a vacuum, yet the members could still perfectly breathe. All around them was darkness, so much that all light was immediately consumed. Susan attempted to push herself back to the entrance, but the door slammed shut and faded away into nothingness. She and her teammates floated in space as Susan scrambled for her radio.
“Back-up, open the door, I repeat, open the do-” Susan stopped as she suddenly didn't have a mouth. Her screams muffled through her skin as the door suddenly opened, only for it to suck the rest of Mu-7 in and close again. Soon, everyone was screaming silently, and it wasn't long before other parts of their body started to morph too. Susan felt like she had ten fingers on each hand, 5 hands on each arm, 5 arms seemingly attached to nothing, merely orbiting around Susan. First she went blind, then deaf, then her nose disappeared, and soon she was a slowly suffocating blob of weird body parts. Despite the horror, she fell into an odd euphoria.
“This is it,” she thought, “This is death. I see the thorns of oblivion. Who will be my saving grace?”
“I will,” a voice spoke softly, “Stay away from the black, let go and embrace with me.” That's the final sentence Susan heard before the colorless green blinded her.
The only remnants of the outhouse the Foundation found was a door-frame without a door, and smoke consuming the trees.

Julia Reach looked at her computer screen and couldn't believe her eyes. Headlines boldly popped up with extraordinary headlines. "Species of Giraffe goes extinct", "Pod of Whales boiled alive in Pacific Ocean", "Bubonic plague found in bakeries across America". Was the world ending? Maybe, but maybe it was all a dream. Yeah, that was it. She was sleeping at home, still in her bed, and she was dreaming being at work. All she needed to do was play along.
At some point, her throat became parched, and she went to the water cooler outside. When she walked outside her office, she noticed something odd out of the corner of her eye. Something wrong.
She turned and saw it. It was hard to describe it, it looked like a lion with a snake's head and tentacles for legs. Five tentacles to be exact. The creature slowly walked toward Julia on four legs. Julia slammed the door and started to climb out the office window. Quickly, she descended a ladder and started to contact the boss from her phone.
"Come on, pick up, pick up," she mumbled as the phone rang.
"Hello?" a voice on the other end answered.
"Sir, this is Dr. Reach, there's some kind of animal on the loose, it resembles a li-"
"Shsb dtefa."
"…what?"
"Shsb dtefa. He's your's now. In fact, you should go back inside and meet him."
"What are you talking about?"
"Look at it with your own eyes, Julia. The anchors, they can't decide between this world and the Fifth World. You're gonna have to decide for them." The call stopped, and Julia felt a chill on her back. She turned around, only to see the site was no longer a site. It was a monster, constantly forming and disforming, altering and unaltering, everything collapsing upon itself. The only comprehensible aspect was Five. Five doors. Five humans. Five worlds. She stared upon a hole into a different reality. She played her part, and now she would end it before the new show began. The dream was real.
"The Anafabula seeks to enter in. You can't let it. Let the worlds die in fives."

Lawrence O'Neil eagerly waited outside a grand door, the door taking up half the wall and decorated with jewels, diamonds, and starfish. He had spent months roaming the giant Cathedral, also known as the First Southern Fifthist Church of Georgia, ever since it started growing. It grew naturally, like a flower blooming, but it was also fast. The walls moved like floods over Lawrence's home town, and quickly every structure in town was warped and melted into one of the many rooms in the complex. He heard that the Cathedral covered all of Georgia now, but those were only rumors.
Occasionally, he'd find an animal or two stuck in the floor boards, their faces conjoined with the wood, left to die in the massive halls after being swept up by the Cathedral. Even more rarely, he'd see a human walking the halls like he did, slowly succumbing to it as well. Lawrence didn't quite know what it was, but it caused all of this, from the growth of the Cathedral to the transformation of water into smoke to the transformation of smoke into stars. Whatever it was, he awaited its arrival behind that grand door.
A short lady, wearing a fancy hat and a purse, walked up next to Lawrence. The two awkwardly waited in front of the door until one broke the silence.
"Hi, I'm Abigail," spoke the lady. She put her hand out in front of her, and Lawrence obliged with the implied handshake.
"The name is Lawrence, how are you?" responded Lawrence, who swore that he could feel more than 5 fingers on her hand. Abigail sighed.
"You know, just a bit tired from all the walking. I heard the White House was consumed by the holes. The last words they heard the President say were 'My god, it's full of god!' Ain't that just crazy?"
Lawrence laughed in response. "Nothing's been crazy to me since the sky turned a brilliant pink. I'm glad the President found what he was looking for. What was his name?"
Abigail shrugged. The two waited again in silence for a couple more minutes. Abigail, quickly tapping her foot, suddenly realized she forgot something. She quickly reached into her purse and grabbed a book.
"Have you read the newest edition of Star Signals? It's a whole new way of achieving your dreams!"
"Everyone has a copy. It's more sold than the Bible now."
"What's the Bible?"
"I have no idea." The door started to open, revealing a gargantuan nave with thousands of pews. The two walked in, calm but excited, and took their seats. The nave came to a hush as a man walked onto the stage. That is it was roughly a man, although it seemed like it had come to him before. It walked with an indeterminate amount of legs and spoke with an indeterminate amount of mouths in different languages, yet everyone could hear him clearly.
"It appears y'all've taken the hearin's to heart! I applaud. But, brothers and sisters, now is time for the final test, the Fifth test, to enter the Fifth World." Hoots and hollers were heard across the nave. "For I have heard that some of y'all are seven-footed Anafabulists here, and that just ain't right. YOU, right there, I know you can see me," he pointed to Lawrence.
"Uh, yes, Reverend," Lawrence said as he clumsily stood up.
The reverend laughed a hearty laugh, during which the whole audience joined in the laughter, before stopping entirely. "I think you mean Reverend…Archon…Celebration…BIG CHEESE HORACE!" Lawrence fell back in his seat. "Oh, don't worry 'bout nothin'. I'm just tested ya. You ain't no seven-footin' Annie-fah-boo-list, I can tell. But YOU!" he shouted, as he pointed to Abigail right beside Lawrence, "You look like you're 'bout to get yourself in trouble."
A mass of congregation members started to stand up and walk toward Abigail, swarming her and restraining her body. Lawrence felt compelled to join the mob despite his previous friendly relations, it felt like the right thing to do. Together, the group pulled Abigail, kicking and screaming, over to the center of the stage, dropping her on the ground.
"Now, you look like those black thorns have got you already. Good thing we caught this one in time. Fuckin' shame we have to let you go, you looked like just the RIGHT kind of sister. Ate dh jed fkekz df Fifth." A hole opened up from beneath Abigail, and she fell into the darkness silently. One could see the thorns ready to devour the world at a moment's notice, even Big Cheese was afraid, but it was quickly closed and peace returned once more. "Now, are y'all ready for your wishes to come true! This ain't no lie, brothers and sisters. Star Signals don't lie! This is a new kind of truth entirely! EMBRACE THE STARS!"
In that moment, the difference between conscious and unconscious was ruptured, dreams became real, life was a nightmare, the Hole swallowed the Cathedral, and the Fifth World began to take shape.

Doctor Marks sat in his office chair, swinging around with the side of his head resting in his hand. He stared at the remaining rations he had left; around 3 months left for survival. He had already heard the news that SCP-2000 was replaced with a five-cornered black hole, so there was little point in trying to go outside for new food. Besides, all the other sites besides Site-5, the site he was in, had been lost to it. Site-5 was equipped with over a hundred reality anchors, though everyone knew they didn't do anything. Many of the simple anomalies had been salvaged, but nothing useful. Some CDs, an unbreakable lamp, a cat that only existed in half, an old copy of Star Signals, and a wax candle. He forgot what the candle did, and it didn't really matter. In here, he would die the only sane man in the world. It didn't matter if a few anomalies were laying around. Might as well play some music to lighten the mood.
He put in one of the CDs, he had long since forgotten what they did. As the jams of old blues songs played, the wax candle started burning, and from it came a voice.
“Hey there, brother, long time no see,” spoke the candle in a slow smooth voice.
Marks jumped in his seat. “Who the fuck are you?”
“Listen now, no need to get in a fuss. It's not like you'll have much more life to fuss over.”
Marks got up and grabbed his chair to hit the candle, but he only dropped to his knees in pain. Something was growing in his forehead, and his vision suddenly grew much more vast.
“See now, brother? Listening to the classics gets your brain going. I'll have you know I wrote this one.” Marks continued to writhe in pain.
“What…the fuck…do you want?” yelled Marks, now with a constantly increasing field of view.
“I don't want nothing, brother, but your soul yearns for more. The Archons know the way to salvation with the starfish, away from the grasp of the thorns, and this is only a realization of that.”
“I hope all you Fifthists fucking die!”
“There ain't no death in the Fifth World. We're leaving this world behind, it has run its course. Unless Anafabula comes and fucks up everything, embrace the smoke, brother.” The candle smoked more and more, and the flame became brighter and hotter. “I know I am.”
The candle exploded into a flaming supernova, torching Marks alive. Site-5 was incinerated, and the screams of Marks quickly stopped within the roaring inferno. All at once, the fire disappeared, and all that was left was a CD player, a five-eyed corpse, and the music of smooth blues playing over the ashes. As the CD came to an end, the five-eyed corpse reanimated to say his final words.
“Wow, that was really cool!”

Frederick Eaton, previously known with any significance as D-7645, was the last human in the universe to not be consumed by it. He had become the last D-class a long time ago, after the Foundation drowned all of them in a mass suicide. One could still hear the joyful screams. He lived in a sleek white room, covered in paperwork and blueprints he barely understood. It was easy enough to get in, the password was 55555. Inside, he had a laptop with the entirety of the Foundation's archives saved in it, nothing expunged. He scrolled through the entries, one by one, looking at all the anomalies that, by this point, were either destroyed or morphed by it. Frederick was the only person to learn what it was as well, an anomaly known as SCP-3125. Somehow, the world was morphing into an unrecognizable form, which was mainly caused by 3125, though caused by some other anomaly. Frederick himself didn't understand most of the jargon on the file, but he knew enough that he could tell that only it could do something like what the universe had experienced.
Outside was nothing but a void of colorless green and bright pink, mixing together into eldritch abominations that could only exist in the Fifth World. The room Frederick stood in was the only trace of what was before. Despite his status as a hopeless reminder to no one of a forgotten world, Frederick took solace in the one thing that could counter SCP-3125.
He couldn't describe it, yet he tried his best to do so. A mixture of thorns, black, the number seven, and total oblivion. This is what defined SCP-2747. If SCP-3125 sought to remake, then SCP-2747 sought to destroy, and if SCP-2747 could be summoned then maybe SCP-3125 could be stopped. But how could he do so? The void outside was anything but black, and little in the way of thorns existed in the room. Frederick looked around.
A pen, a black pen at that. Something sharp, like a thorn, and capable of the oblivion of words. He started to walk over to the pen. A horrible screech breached the room as some horrid cloud leaked through the walls. It formed into a wolf-like creature with a starfish-like head and a human-like voice.
“There is no oblivififth death is refifth embrace the stars plasma plasma plasma plasma plasma,” the creature spoke in a calm voice as it viciously chased Frederick. It tackled him to the ground, knocking over the table and dropping the pen on the floor. They scrambled like dogs for the pen.
“Do not seek seven fifth fifth smoke signals the answer is not you I am a go-fifth.”
Frederick snatched the pen out of the air and began to write over SCP-3125's documentation. “SCP-3125 is defeatable. SCP-2747 can de-”. The wolf bit into his back and launched him to the other side of the room. He held the pen in his hand tightly.
“The transition transition transition transition transition is almost fifth you fifth we all not seven thorn help seek smoke today.” The creature began to charge Frederick, but he quickly got up and sprinted to the document.
“-feat SCP-3125. There are seven true archons. Seven seven seven seven seven seven seven. Thorns will defeat SCP-3125. Black wi-” Frederick ran around the room as he wrote, but another monster leaked through and caught him in its teeth. It resembled a giant sloth with five arms, five heads, and five legs. The sloth and the wolf fought over the body of Frederick, but he kept writing. “-ll defet 3125. Defat 3125. obliVion obliviOn ObliViOn dfeat 3125 blak blakc black bla-”
The sloth and the wolf tore Frederick in half. The wolf consumed the legs while the sloth spit the torso out. “Fifth fifth fifth fifth fifth the world is ending the world is near fifth fifth fifth fifth fifth.” As the wolf approached him, the glass of the room started to break. The void leaked through more than ever, smoke filling the nearly lifeless eyes of Frederick, as the heat began to turn unbearable. The wolf recoiled from the heat while he, in his fleeting moments of life, grabbed the pen and finished the document.
“-ck black black black.”
First it was SCP-3125's documentation, then it was Frederick, then it was the room Frederick stood in and the creatures inside it, then it was the void outside, then it was SCP-3125. Each disappeared into the black, one after another, consumed in the mighty thorns of Anafabula. Nothing would be spared. All would be destroyed.
The Fifth World was skipped over, and a new Seventh World took its place.


In May of 1998, I was 18 years old. I was smiling at the receptionist in the office of the Coast Guard recruiting center in Wilmington, North Carolina. I remember that it was a Monday and the weather was clear. I remember that she told me I looked ready to serve my country.
I was assigned to the LORAN station off of River Road near the Carolina Breach bridge; maybe you're familiar with it, or what's under it. In June of 2013, I was sitting in the mess hall with about 30 others when I first heard of what happened in Korea. When the broadcast was over, the room filled with hushed chatter about what our new reality could mean for us as servicemen, especially right by the sea where so many of the most threatening and monstrous anomalies supposedly lurked… at least according to the quickly-spreading rumors.
The next day, a middle-aged man dressed like he'd just left a quarterly profits meeting adjusted his cufflinks next to me while he addressed the mess hall. He told us he'd been working under us for 12 years, and made sure to clarify with plenty of forced humor that he meant literally under; we'd known the LORAN station had extensive lower levels, but we were always told the other vehicles that came and went out of a back entrance were Marine Corps.
He told us he was the Director of Site-42, and he made sure to nip any potential bad blood in the bud. He told us that now was a better time than ever for his employer to open up opportunities to people currently in the military, with full backing by and approval of the federal government. Opportunities abounded, he claimed. We all got pamphlets and business cards and gave him the laughs owed when he told us that all we have to do is knock.
I met him in the hallway as he was walking back down to his facility. I asked him a couple financial questions, healthcare questions, the usual; if the political landscape really was going to shit like it seemed, I needed to make sure this employer could actually look after me. Korea hadn't inspired me too much when it came to the question of the organization's stability, but I didn't dislike any of his answers and a few of them surprised me.
Of course I was nervous. I wasn't certain how I'd first react to being around things that I'd thought unreal for so many years of my life. But they were real, I knew that, and the more I accepted that fact, the more I realized the smart move was to be with the people who had the fullest grasp on our new reality — as full as the day and age would allow.
I remember that it was a Tuesday and thunder cracked outside. I remember that he told me I looked ready to protect humanity.
I walked into Site-42 48 hours later. I owe myself no less than to admit that I found my home that day; the pressing threat of — no, the constant mutual awareness of the threat of — annihilation or disastrous influence by anomalies induced a palpable atmosphere of camaraderie that never left me. That's not to say there weren't a few personnel who were around since long before publicity happened and didn't quite trust us newer, "outside" folks, but I had the privilege of a military background and never saw much of it.
And so for nine years, I loved the Foundation. I didn't have a reason not to, or I didn't want to see the reasons; I never enjoyed watching the news, because when the Foundation was as talked-about as it was, it became nigh-impossible to figure out what was true anymore. Horror stories from overseas or far-off Foundation facilities felt distant, manipulated, and unreal. Site-42 was my reality, and I had never seen anything unethical happen in Site-42; maybe the public's Foundation was evil, but my Foundation was good. I slept through every night.
In December of 2022, I realized I hadn't left the Site in a few weeks. I didn't give it much thought; my daily grind took place 25 meters below sea level in D-class Cell Block A. My position at the time consisted of managing existing subjects' assignments, as well as backchecking federal and state incarceration records and criminal evidence in order to ensure that no transferred inmates with wrongful convictions were getting assigned to… the more egregious applications for human subjects we had. There were some politicians on the outside that talked about my job, and I had my own opinions about the other option being proven murderers and rapists living on taxpayer dollars in prison. I just kept my mouth shut, though; no one on-site ever wanted to hear news and political stances about our work, much less that one of us played into said politics.
Working late on Christmas Eve, I decided I had to visit my mother. It was early summer when I had last seen her, and she lived 40 minutes away, near Ogden. On the way to the parking deck, one of our young Offsite Response officers coming back in from his shift looked me up and down, scrutinized my department uniform, and asked where I was going without a gun. I answered that I hadn't ever needed to put on plainclothes to go into public; he answered that things were changing, and told me to be careful.
I remember the news was on at the gas pump in Ogden, talking about our internal trial of the guard I'd incidentally assigned to six months of indiscriminate use by MTF Lambda-12 just 20 minutes prior to departing for the day. I remember three young men approaching my vehicle. I remember shouting and things said about my uniform and the Foundation. I remember the station attendant noticing immediately.
I remember the first blow landing on my cheek, shaking my vision. I remember the second, third, and fourth landing around my nose and mouth, blood dribbling down onto my white clothing. I remember my head on the asphalt, the scent of fumes, pain in my skull, and waking up in Site-42's medical wing 14 hours later. It was a Saturday. I felt like I hadn't seen the sun in a while. I remember the staff asking me how I felt, and how I answered that I never wanted to go into public again. It was the first time I'd cried in six years.
That attack made as little of a dent on the news as any other story in which a Foundation employee was the victim. I continued to spend the majority of my years in various Security Department positions onsite. I didn't need or ask for much and yes, I stopped going out just as I'd declared I would, however unreasonable it seemed. I preferred staying away from anomalies and publicity alike, pushing paper or watching security feeds, but if needed I could be thrown temporarily into whatever blue-collar hell fit for a C-class employee was going on at the time. I had to know how to handle living anomalies, don't get me wrong — what else would I be good for in a breach? — but I always dreaded above all else the prospect of dealing with an uncooperative humanoid. A human, rather. Something that either was a someone, or looked and acted like a someone. I felt like none of us ever knew which was the case until it was too late.
Thus, like clockwork, it was the ten-year anniversary of my employment before I had to get my hands on one. It was a reality bender — weren't they all these days? — with supposedly uncontrollable minor effects who was hoping to be with us for a max of six months. At least, that's what she told us. It turned out that her effects were worse than minor and more controllable than not, and she only wanted to be inside the Site to carry out the local Chaos Insurgency splinter cell's wishes in a certain server room; she didn't get that far, of course, but she made a noble effort.
I remember it was a Wednesday and the air felt charged with static. I remember reality rocketing back into focus around me as I and two other men tackled her in the hallway, a portable SRA spinning and bubbling away at my hip as it strained to stabilize the ground on which I stood and the air in my lungs. She swung at me, I told her I didn't want to hurt her, and she told me with a smile to do my worst. I wasn't the one to knock her out.
It stuck with me for whatever reason, for a while. I knew that the CI treated anomalous people as tools and nothing else, and she was only a violent nutcase because it was the only way to survive her abusive environment. I knew that if we didn't detain her, her life would consist of the CI using her for their own good or a life on the run from them. I remember it was the first time I asked myself where and in what circumstances an anomalous person could genuinely feel safe, no strings attached, in America or anywhere.
The late 20s and early 30s brought pain and bureaucracy in waves greater than what I or my peers were used to, even as Foundation personnel. Pressure to develop the technology necessary to ensure the continued survival of our species in space was building and boiling over in financial and research branches alike, the stress spilling into other departments. It was made clear to me that my slow and steady attitude toward my work was the wrong one for the new age, and in turn I and many of the other older employees were pushed to the sidelines, not forgotten but far from prioritized. I still slept and ate well and did my job as the world outside forgot itself.
By 2042, I was one of 47 personnel still technically working in Site-42. Containment wasn't necessary anymore when the Foundation no longer considered Earth a part of "normality" and I hadn't seen D- or E-class personnel in months. All of the inanimate anomalies had been locked up and transported off-planet already, which I can only hope was also the case for the sentient ones. When the state of North Carolina required the Foundation to provide proof that all living things had been evacuated from 42, it was my job to force the remaining human skips to leave: people who had relied on us for everything for years, handed back a stack of their long-expired civilian paperwork and told to proceed to the Carolina Beach police station if they needed help piecing their lives back together.
They couldn't. They told me they couldn't. It had been more than two decades for some of them. They didn't have income. They didn't have homes. At this point, Wilmington didn't even have working cell phone towers, or a grocery store with food remaining on the shelves. Society's panic had already passed the town over, leaving no resources in its wake. I wasn't blind, nor was I surprised that the state apparently was. I got their signatures, folded up my documents, apologized for what was happening, and went back to the security office.
It was a Thursday when I was standing in the mobile office of the Extrasolar Activities Division Region I Transport Director. It was parked on the dead grass over 42's vehicle entrance. He asked me if I was ready to evacuate. He wanted to know if I was ready to make history on other planets. He told me that Earth has nothing left for me. He told me that this was my last chance to get out of Wilmington. He told me the Foundation was ensuring a bright future for humanity, far away from the influence of SCP-3848 and the other horrors now plaguing Earth and only Earth.
He told me that protecting humanity was our one and only purpose, and he asked me why I didn't look ready to do it.
I handed him my boarding papers and walked back inside.
Today is Sunday. Sunday, January 11th, 2043. There are 25 human souls still present in this facility; fewer than half are personnel, and the rest are people who need us. I've been inside for a few days ever since something larger than I can handle crawled out of the ocean and started demolishing what remained of the LORAN station. I don't think it can reach us down here. I'm 62 years old, and I think that's a fine number to finish on; the two ladies from Research & Development helping me jury-rig generators in Euclid Level Containment Wing B4 are 56 and 58 respectively. We're still kicking. We'll try to for as long as we can.
I spent 18 years serving my family, told to protect myself. I spent 15 years serving the United States government, told to protect my country. I spent 29 years serving the Foundation, told to protect humanity. I think Site-42 has a few weeks' worth of food left, and I think I have a little more time before I forget who I am or why I'm here; if I could get my years back, I would spend more of them protecting anomalies. And so I will, until I cannot anymore.
And if there's anything after this for us, I expect it's kinder than we think we deserve.


— huh? Oh… yeah, that's right. Now I remember where I am. Need to state the facts clearly. Have to remember clearly.
One. It's December 31st, 2018.
Two. It's after work at Site-19. New Year's Eve party.
Three. You went with the other members of λ-11.
It came too.
Four. Its object class used to be Keter. It's now Safe.
Buzz. Buzz. Buzz. Buzz. Buzz.
Five. It was determined to be the most harmless anomaly in containment, and currently roams the facility, and…
"Heh, hey, J.C.!" Huh? I look up, and across the table is Melina. It's hard to tell exactly with only a small amount of moonlight coming through and her head staring down at the table, but her eyes seem bloodshot and baggy. That can't… be right. How could that be right?
"Hey!"
"H-Huh…?"
"Jayyyy seeee… don't you love just being fucked. Haha. Oh God. I had so much to get to in 2019…" Melina paused, rocking back and forth. Is there any kind of response for that? She seems so out of it… She never mentioned working long nights to plan the party, right? No, that's not possible. I just need to collect myself and assess the situation.
This is Wing-0 of Site-19. We were going to have a party to celebrate New Year's since no one had plans. It's the first time in our entire nine years together that all ten members of λ-11 had no plans. Memetics rarely has breaks for any one member to begin with, after all. Melina was going to host and organize most of it, along with Jarod.
He doesn't seem to be anywhere though. No one else is in here besides Melina and I. The room is still way too dark. Even if it's too dark to make anything out, it's obvious that stuff seems incredibly disorganized and all over the place. Did something happen?
"J.C.!?"
"Y-Yeah?" As soon as I reply, she reaches out and grabs my shoulders. I wince, but I can't help but bear through it and not aggravate her more. Her nails dig into me, and her hands are clamped tight. She's trapping me. It hurts, it hurts, it hurts…
"It's impossible. Just, just stay seated, please? Five is getting to be too much for me." At that, her hands squeeze harder. Breathing's starting to be painful.
"Melina…"
"Listen. Don't worry about a thing. We can still have a party. It's okay to pretend, alright? You don't need —" Her nails pierce harder, and I bleed just as quickly. Did her nails have blood before? " — to know what's going on. You don't need to understand anything. So we're going to have our party."
She lets go. I can finally breathe. Air hasn't felt this good in a long time.
"Our party, yeah…" I need to play along until I get my bearings better. That's the best way to navigate the situation. "Knowing you, it's pretty much going to be the War and Peace of parties."
"Mmhm!" She manages a smile despite how tired her face looks. "I even managed to strongarm Matthew to help me get really good ribs ready for everyone. I already ate half of them, but you can have the other half."
Matthew…? Oh, probably a friend of hers from another department. It's miraculous that she's always managed her social life so easily.
"Ribs for a New Year's party seems weird, but that's definitely something you would do."
"They're grilled though! I thought that was everyone's type." I can't help but chuckle; even if the situation seems strange, she still seems enough like herself, at least.
"It was a compliment, I swear. Everyone will love it, I'm sure."
"Yeah… you're right. Let me find the lights." I nod. Maybe it's nothing. We both probably drank too much. That has to be the most likely thing. "There it is."
The lights flip on.
That's how I see Jarod's body, partially sticking out on the floor behind a couch.
"Jarod? Hey, Jarod, are you okay? Melina, something's up with Jarod, do you know —"
My body slams against the wall and slumps onto the floor before I can react. Melina is looking down away from me, her body shaking and her sobs barely audible. There's nothing to say. God, if you're there, please let me know what to do or say. I need that very badly.
We're both silent, frozen in fear. I can't bear to break the silence, so I decide to wait. If anyone has to make the first move, it'll be her. The clock on the wall on the other side of the room reads 9:02 PM. But that can't be right either… most of us got here at 4 PM, except for Alyssa and Brent who were going to be late, and Melina and Jarod who were supposed to already be here. Then that means I shouldn't have been drinking. Five hours disappeared completely and utterly.
"Jayyy seee…" I look back at Melina. Her voice is strained. She must be choking on tears, but it sounds more hoarse than before. "You… shouldn't have. If you just ignored him… fuck. Fuck. He's been dead J.C., remember? Please tell me you remember? It's been hours and hours… please say you remember. He finally got too sick and couldn't handle it. I don't want to remember anymore, J.C.. Can't this be the last time? Let's have our party. Things can be normal for a little."
Each word etches itself onto my mind, even if it shouldn't. Dumb. It's so dumb. All of that sounds like nonsense. But…
"N-No, I don't remember anything. Melina, can you explain —" A knife flies by me and smashes into the oven behind. My body screams at me to run, but I can't. Moving is impossible.
"I… I can't anymore. Please. I know you will, so just leave. I… I didn't kill him. If you look for yourself, you'll see. I don't…" She holds a hand up to her mouth and shivers. "I don't recommend it, J.C.."
Impossible. Of course that's impossible. All of this is impossible.
"J.C.. I don't care what you want to do. But if you don't bring help when I see you again…"
There was nothing else she needed to say. It took me a minute to notice my body easing up, so I take the chance to get up and run out the door. I don't dare look back. The only thing on my mind is seeing if the rest of the Foundation is as crazy. My head hurts at the door. It wants to tell me something, but it can't, but I hear the words it says and —

Melina, Jarod, Alyssa, Brent, Silas, Tom, Liz, Helena, Alex, and I.
That was who made up λ-11.
Alas.
That's easy to remember.
There's only one Wing-0.
So why am I in a second Wing-0?
Why are Brent, Tom, and Alex's corpses there? There's a fourth I don't recognize too. They all look like they've died in different ways and the fourth one looks the oldest and Brent's looks the second-oldest and Tom's body is so bloody and no no no no no nonononono —
I sit down, resting my head against my knees. What's going on? I need to collect myself. Breathe deeply. Go over what happened and what I know. I must be able to figure it out.
I lost five hours of my night. Four of my friends and colleagues are dead, along with someone I don't know. One has gone crazy. I don't know where the other four are, and I don't know where I am anymore.
What kind of anomaly caused this? There's some kind of rationale that'll help me figure it out surely. Memetics can cause people to lose track of time, and they can cause people to go crazy. But nothing seemed to indicate a specific kind of memetic anomaly. More than that, there's nothing that I could connect to another repeating room. And my mind being this sound when Melina's is busted? I dunno.
I dunno.
I don't know.
I… don't know?
I don't know…
"Something that doesn't make you know…"
Did we have anomalies that you couldn't know about? Theoretically that's possible, but conceptually… how could that be done? How can that be created? Too many questions to ask if I went down this road. That seemed impossible anyway.
Huh.
That's weird. Why am I at this exit? Did I not realize it?
"I guess not."
My hand was on the doorknob and twisted itself to open. My brain screamed as I go through the motions on my own.
That's right.
I remember.
It was Keter, and now it's Safe, and roams the facility, and —

There were the corpses of Alyssa, Silas, and Liz in an identical Wing-0. Helena was still missing. But that's fair, I suppose. I was shocked, and yet I can't make myself dwell on it. Huh? Maybe my mind is sorting this away in a place that lets me not be bothered.
Why were all of us split up here anyway? That shouldn't have been possible as well. Only Brent and Alyssa should have been separated from us since they didn't arrive with us. But no anomaly can come to mind to explain it.
"Hahaha."
Of course I can't think of one. The whole situation felt absurd and nonsensical. It must have been a new anomaly, right? I wonder… if λ-11 wasn't in the state it was in, we would have all found this situation fascinating. Could we have all figured it out together?
"I wish I was smart enough to figure this one out on my own. Melina…"
You can still move.
I found myself at the exit again. Oh well.
As I open the door, I feel the screaming in my head again. It pounds and I don't know what it's trying to tell me, so when I look inside —

There was Helena's corpse. It looked the most pristine of all the ones I saw so far. No blood, bone, rot, bile, filth, or expression. It laid there, unmoving underneath it.
It?
Hello.
It was in the middle of Wing-0.
What was it?
It's Safe, formerly Keter.
It roams the facility.
It's in front of me.
Why can't I remember what it isn't?
I decide to move towards it slowly to see what it is. No, that's not right. I can't stop myself from moving to it. Why…? It's not particularly interesting, is it?
As I get closer, it "echoes" more intensely, more fervently. The more I stare, the more I feel it speaking. It discovered a tone within me and rang. Every note it plays is friendly. Of course; there wasn't anything friendlier.
What time is it anyhow?
"It's not."
What day was it still?
"December 31st."
I started to lose myself. I grab the wall and look at Helena. She seems at peace. The most peaceful of any of us. Why couldn't you tell me what happened? There's nothing to go off of when you're frozen like that. You may have been the core of λ-11, but…
But…
Nothing to worry about ultimately. Everything was fine. That's what my thoughts told me anyhow.
"Is this what it feels like to accept dying?"
As soon as I asked, everything became, and happened at once.
Since your will is strongest...
I'll let you stay free.
I open my eyes, and —


James Cole pulled the blinds of his office window shut against the early evening sun. He wore a tense and troubled face.
Until this morning, he didn't have the faintest inkling a man named Arjun Batra existed, let alone had been brought on to the company payroll. He sighed out through his nose and turned to lay his hand on a thin folder lying on his desk, pulling the incriminating file towards himself to fall into an open drawer, on top of a rectangular metal case.
He tried to hold out hope that there had been some misunderstanding.
With a resigned slump that pushed the remainder of his sigh out of him all at once, he plopped down into his chair. He pushed the desk drawer closed and sat in silence, his eyes fixed and staring ahead at his empty office. He waited, and he thought.
He wasn't given long to ponder things; the door to his office swung open. Horatio Avelar walked into the office, holding a bottle of champagne. His thick black mustache framed his wide smile, but the optimism soon faded from his eyes as he took in his old friend's uneasy mood. As a concerned frown took over his face, Horatio placed the bottle onto James' desk.
"What's wrong, James?" Horatio asked, hoping to brighten the atmosphere. "I figured you wanted to see me to celebrate. Our sales are phenomenal so far this month." He sat slowly in the stiff-backed chair set across from his business partner, who still hadn't quite seemed to register that he'd entered the room.
Horatio's mind analyzed the data available to it, eyes silently searching James' face for any clues to his thoughts. He truly had thought this would be a pleasant meeting; all of his projects had performed as expected, and the commercial applications were beginning to garner the company a bit of corporate fame. Hell, even his secret new prototype was showing promise.
His heart skipped a beat. His he hoped secret prototype.
"James?"
James' eyes shifted their focus, from nothing to something. To the man he had known since college. To the man he thought he could trust. His voice was grim, as mirthless as his face. "Horatio, I need you to tell me about Arjun Batra."
Horatio swallowed, but cold dread kept climbing his throat. "Arjun is a lab assistant. I hired him a couple months ago. He's been helping out with some experiments."
"Why didn't you pay him this month?" James's flat tone gave no clue to his thoughts.
"He's… not working with us anymore. He's not trying to sue us or something, is he?"
"No," James replied, with a despairing sigh. He opened his desk drawer and pulled the folder out, lying it between the two of them. "Though, you know he isn't, Horatio." He opened the folder, revealing a photograph of a wooden cargo crate with its lid torn free. Inside it, contorted and still, was the body of a young Indian man. The body of Arjun.
"James, it's not what it looks like. He— he volunteered to undergo an experimental procedure to—" Horatio spoke quickly, desperate to make him understand.
"An experiment that killed him. I never believed you would do something like this, Horatio. I believed in you, in what you could accomplish. Hell, that's why I thought we should name the company after you. But now, Avelar is a murderer's name." James' eyes were welling with bitter tears.
"I didn't kill him! He isn't dead, James. The experiment was to upload his consciousness to a machine prototype I've created. He's still alive. More than alive, he's happy in there!" Horatio slammed his fist onto the desk, the loud bang would have alarmed any eavesdroppers, had there been any.
"Horatio," James said, shaking his head, "You can't really expect me to believe that. You're a goddamned genius, but you're also a goddamned idiot."
"He is, though. His mind, it's still alive. I have the machine, it's in my workshop. He's… He's…" Horatio faltered, trying to figure out how he could convince him he was telling the truth. "There's a readout. If you know how to interpret it, you can get a good idea of what he's thinking. I've been watching him closely since the experiment, and dammit, James, he's alive and content in there. He doesn't live in agony from a kyphoscoliosis-warped spine any more!"
James' face remained grim. He looked from the desperate face of Horatio, down to the picture of Arjun's lifeless body. He made a choked sound, like he was swallowing down the desire to cry out in despair. Eventually, he shook his head. "I'm sorry, Horatio. I want to believe you. I… I just can't. I'm sorry. I've got to take this to the police."
Horatio Avelar's eyes widened in anguish. "No, James! You don't understand—"
"No, Horatio, I'm afraid you're the one who doesn't understand." James stood, slowly from his chair. "I suspect they'll be looking for you before long. I'll… for old time's sake, I'll tell them I don't know where you are, or where you're going."
Time seemed to slow for Horatio as he watched his partner, his friend, walking towards the door, to doom him. Walking to doom them both. Walking to doom the future of entire damned species!
Weighed against a single life…
Horatio watched in shock as his hand grabbed the neck of the champagne bottle he had brought in. Rising, he saw himself swing the glass bottle quickly up from the desk. Watched it crack hard against James' skull. Watched the man drop to the floor.
Watched the blood begin to pool.
When Horatio's mind started working again, it started working fast.
Numbly, he walked around the desk, sitting in the now-ownerless chair. He pulled the white anti-static gloves from his pocket, and slid them onto his hands. Leaning down, he opened a low desk drawer, withdrawing the typewriter within. He sat it on the desk. His fingers found the keys and moved rapidly.

I, James Cole, being of sound mind, have realized that I must expiate my sins. I have killed a man. An immigrant, who works for my company, threatened to reveal my plans to sell my majority share of stock to an overseas buyer.
As he threatened to bring this information to my business partner, Horatio Avelar, I acted in a fit of rage, and utilized one of my partner's devices to deliver a powerful shock to the man's head, killing him.
I put the dead body into a shipment crate, intending to send his body to a landfill, to hide my crime. However, my sins are eating me from the inside, and I cannot continue to live with this weight on my soul.
When Horatio came upon me, I could not bear to confess my sins, and killed him with his own machine.
Please, forgive me.

He left the page in the typewriter, and grabbed the rectangular metal case from the top desk drawer, which was still slightly ajar. Rolling his thumbs over the numbered combination lock, he paused a moment. His cold, calculating mind cracked. The combination was 426. 4/26. His own birthday.
As he opened the gun case, withdrawing the pistol he had bought for James those years ago as a graduation gift, it started to dawn on him.
He had killed his best friend.
Horatio ground his teeth, firmly pushing the thought to the back of his skull, to wait to be processed. Time was still very much of the essence if he was going to salvage any of this disaster.
It took a lot of doing, but he pulled the body into a sitting position. With a final burst of strength, he hauled it to its feet. They wobbled together a moment, James's body still warm against him. He pressed the tip of the barrel to the abrasion the champagne bottle had left.

BANG!

James Cole's body fell once again to the ground.

Horatio Avelar's watch beeped, alerting him that it was midnight. He didn't pay it any attention, and brought the nearly empty bottle of whiskey to his lips again, taking another deep pull.
The metal folding chair he was sitting in was uncomfortable, but he didn't care.
The workshop was nearly freezing, but he didn't bother to notice.
He could still feel the numbness in his hand, could still feel the recoil of the gun.
Could still see his face.
His best friend's damnable face.
He shrieked; a bitter and pained wail, torn from his body. He hurled the now-empty bottle to smash against one of two nearly identical, incomplete machines he had spent the previous month building. The momentum caused him to pitch forward out of his chair, falling unceremoniously to the ground. Sobs wracked his body.
When he managed to pull himself unsteadily to his feet, he shuffled towards a third computing machine. Though complete, it was smaller than the other two, and humming slightly. He ran his hand over the metal frame, letting the smooth, slightly warm hardware soothe his mind somewhat.
Hic
"Arjun… my friend… You still believe in me, don't you? You wouldn't turn your back on me…?" He studied the small numerical readout being slowly updated on the tiny digital display panel, but the numbers swam in his vision. Though whether that was the liquor, or his tears, or both, he couldn't tell.
"Why did he have to find your body? Just… just another few weeks and…and they would have been ready. I could have shown him…" Horatio pushed himself upright and staggered to the incomplete device his bottle had smashed again. "I built you a brain, James. A brain to keep you alive forever. Brains to keep us alive forever." A bitter smile twisted his face, though his tears did not relent. "What did… did you call it? Our undying friendship. That's what gave me the idea, you know."
Hic
He reached into the machine, gripping one of the delicate internal components, and with another pained wail, he ripped it out.
"I'm killing him again, you know, Arjun. This was supposed to be him." He studied the small circuit-board in his hand. "But there isn't any him left to put into it."
Hic
"Just me now." He pulled another handful of components from the machine, threw them to the ground around the machine set aside for himself. "Alone."
No reason to wait any longer.