The exhibit was located in a small town in west Texas. On display there was a man, who supposedly had been asleep for his entire life. His name was Jeremy, and he was inside a lot of people.
“This is an interesting subject, what do you suppose it means Urooj?”
“I don't know, Sherry, maybe it's something about how we're never really awake?”
“There is a proverb or something that eludes me.” Sherry's words were detached as she stared, wide-eyed at the naked, gaunt man before her. She was momentarily blinded by the flash of a hep girl's camera.
Jeremy softly moaned a string of unintelligible words.
“Do you think he's a dreamer?”
“Maybe, but I think this whole lead was stupid. Do our crawlers just keyword ‘creepy' and “art”?” Urooj swiveled his neck around to work a kink out. A perceived cramp had been bothering him all day, or so he thought. But maybe it wasn't. He could never be sure when an ail wasn't imagined. He eyed the sleeping man's pasty body over. He seemed healthy aside from that fact that he was so thin. He was balding at his temples, and had empty gauges in his ears. His face was rat-like. Around him were scattered markers and paintbrushes. There was crude writing all over his body. Urooj was curious if the few prison chic tattoos this Jeremy had weren't applied during a similar performance.
“This is disgusting,” laughed Urooj. “Crazy-ass kids.”
Jeremy continued to whisper softly among the murmur of the large crowd in the small community center. Sherry moved in closer to examine him, pulling out a medical flashlight. She gingerly pried open the man's eyelids with her free hand.
“He's probably drugged, but I think whether or not we take the art at face value is unimportant, we just have to check him. Then we can be out of here.”
“Ladies first?”
The crowd watched in content confusion as Sherry examined the body. “Something about the way you say that somehow makes that phrase more creepy.” Sherry wasn't sure if Urooj was actually creepy, but it was much easier for her to think of him that way.
She read each line written on Jeremy for some reassurance that their time and risk was of any value. She was not a cryptographer, not especially capable of recognizing certain patterns, but she was the most level-headed body in Omicron-Rho. She would never think too hard about anything, and given the territory, that was for the best.
Across pale folds of skin, in many hands, were written the following:
Jessica was here!
quer
A&M 2014!
for a good time call Jenny
insert here
Too deep for me.
keep marfa wierd
the real shadow, Jemal Avery 2016
“Okay here's something. ‘The real shadow”. I think that's worth a shot.” Sherry shrugged, scrunching her nose at Urooj.
“Outstanding.” Urooj began to massage his temples. “Wait, did you bring the antipsychotics? If I had to guess I'd say there aren't pretty things going on inside this one's head.”
“Of course I did. For you.”
“Eh. Okay.” He turned to the crowd and pulled out a badge, then turned back around to Sherry. “Are you sure? Really?”
“Yeah. Do the thing.”
“Sometimes I think you enjoy this.” Urooj winced and turned to address the crowd.
“We bring them a carcass, they give us a bone.”
Urooj shook his head. “Okay kids, show's over, time to go home. Police business or whatever.”
With little complaint, people began to trickle out of the building and onto the dusty desert street.

Urooj turned off the lights while Sherry dragged Jeremy's body into a storage closet in the basement. She looked down in the dark at the man with grim expectation. She pointed her pen-light at his face, her gaze fixed on his apathetically. It seemed as if his eyes would open at any moment and make a start at her.
“I hope there is a hell for us,” Urooj said absently as he dead bolted the door from the inside. “You know this kind of thing isn't right. I wouldn't wish this on anyone.”
Sherry gave Urooj a look, shaking her head. She produced a needle from her pack, then found a fat vein on the man's arm. The fountain in the canister was a flushed pink for a moment, and the sedative was deployed into his bloodstream.
Sherry sat in the corner of the room and nodded toward Jeremy.
Urooj swiveled his neck.

Deathbell heard a shrill, satisfied laugh upon entering Jeremy's subconscious. Deathbell roared back, poisonous seeds escaping from his hybrid lungs. The feeling when descending into Jeremy was catastrophic.
“You fools! You've fallen right into my trap!” The mysterious voice squealed with delight. “I shall now add you to my collection!”
“Jeremy? That you?” Deathbell asked. He looked around him, and the fleshy globe of the room began to materialize. The walls were covered in many curved canvases depicting an eclectic array of figures: plants, animals, cryptids, colored shapes, and some things that could only be described as noise. They all appeared to be twisted in pain, distress - even the nonsense.
“Welcome to my gallery of Shadows!” The disembodied thing cackled. “I do hope you have time to spend!”
“Umm, okay, guy, are you Jeremy? I've actually seen this kind of thing before, so, can we just…?” Deathbell whipped his vines all around the room, hoping maybe to find an invisible figure.
“What? Surely you haven't. A work of this kind…” It faltered, seeming to trail away.
Deathbell began to massage his temples, and the leafy tips of his bulbs began to glisten, exuding a purple mist. It carpeted the room, and slowly crept up the walls.
“A work of this kind is unique… It is unique by the very fact that it exists inside of a human mind!” It screamed.
Deathbell was too busy concentrating to correct him. Soon the entire room was filled with the toxic mist, and walls began to burn and hiss. The frames of the painting began to corrode, and Deathbell was overwhelmed with the toxic smell of burning paint. The smoke was beginning to fill his lungs, and he began to tingle from the inside. He knew that in time this would turn into a sharp burning, and he would not be able to concentrate on disconnecting from Jeremy. He had to leave.
“What is that accent of yours, fella?” The voice asked earnestly.
Deathbell closed his eyes, and disappeared.

Sherry slapped Urooj hard in the face, and quickly retreated outside. It was a necessary precaution, especially given how long it took Urooj to finish, and his habit of stabbing researchers with writing implements upon waking.
“Relax,” Urooj groaned. “It wasn't crazy in there. I'm not gonna have an episode. It's fine,” He said calmly, and then suddenly, “I'm fucking fine!”
Urooj let a guttural noise loose through his clenched teeth, and repeatedly banged his head on an aluminum locker. Not hard enough to cause any damage, but just enough pain to focus on.
“So what's up? Do you need pills?” Sherry paused and looked to the door with a tired look in her eye. “Are you lying to me right now? Yeah?”
“Listen… You shit.” Urooj bit his knuckle, drawing blood. “It's the artist, I think he's living in there.” He pointed at Jeremy, so as to show her through the wall. "I couldn't find Jeremy. I think he killed everyone who got in range of Jeremy. Why… why is this even important?” He hissed.
“But they all walked out…?” she said, some annoyance in her voice.
“You know what I mean. The gallery visitors are zombies now. I killed their shadows. Paintings. You know, like in the stupid book we had to read. P-Zombies.”
“Ah. Right. So what do you recommend?” Sherry said, slowly opening the door.
“It's not a threat.” Urooj swiveled out of the room and banged his fist on the wall repeatedly. “According to Cicada we don't have to do anything, but I think this Jeremy should be put out of his misery if we can't find him.”
Sherry nodded. “I'll go too this time…” She punched Urooj hard in the shoulder. “Urooj.”
Urooj shook his head and turned around to look at her.
“Let's not kill each other when we come to, kay?”

Sci-Fi descended from between the folds of flesh, entering the gallery with Deathbell notably absent. The tight, rubbery walls forced them out through a series of claustrophobic channels.
“See, I just manifest in the middle of the room, I didn't do the whole squeezing through the meat thing. What the fuck is wrong with you lady?” Deathbell said from somewhere in the flesh.
“Focus…” said Sci-Fi, descending slowly and quietly through the maze with her foot thrusters.
They wormed through the mass for what might have been minutes or hours, and, finally, Sci-Fi's head emerged with a wet pop. A tall, skeletal figure with a long blonde mohawk sulked in the middle of the flesh globe. His protests echoed all around them. The paintings were all gone now, dissolved in black streaks all over the walls.
“Okay, do you guys even know how long this took to do? This was for my fucking residency!” The figure shrieked, grasping its thin head. It began to dance around in a fit, its movements were cartoonish.
“Is Jeremy still alive? Can he wake up?” said Sci-FI. She aimed her palm in the man's direction.
“Okay, what are you the dream police?”
Deathbell finally emerged from the ceiling, floating down in an undignified seesaw motion.
“I guess so. Where's your body, Jemal? You're nowhere to be found topside.”
The tall man ground his teeth, producing a noise like a freight train coming to a stop. He began to grow in size until he could just place his boney palms and the bottoms of his feet all around the globe. “I have no body! There is no ‘Jeremy'!”
Deathbell looked up at the man without amusement. “Okay, explain now.” He looked at the digital clock on Sci-Fi's back impatiently.
“I am Oneiroi, I left my body long ago. Jeremy is my creation. He has no body… He is not human. He is not Oneiroi. He is biofact!”
“Okay, you found a homeless guy and overpowered his psyche. Congratulations, really hard to do.”
Jemal began running in place, causing the globe to turn like a giant hamster ball. The sounds of tendons ripping and fleshy balloons popping echoed behind the membrane wall. Sci-Fi engaged her foot thrusters and floated in place while Deathbell tumbled around lazily.
“Fools!” He screamed.
A giant metallic banging suddenly shook the arena, causing Jemal to fall on his rear and begin cartwheeling along the spinning meat globe. His sharp hands impaled the walls, causing him to be stuck in place.
Police, open up.
“Oh shit, Urooj, we gotta get outta here.” Sci-Fi gasped.
“What have you idiots done? You called the cops? Dude!”
Deathbell stammered. “Hey, is this Jeremy you found a homeless guy? Is that it? Did you just travel to his mind and inhabit it? Overpower his subconscious somehow? Help us help you. We can get you out of this situation. We just gotta know how you did it.”
This is the last time I'm gonna ask. This is Marfa Sherrif. I get off work in one hour.
“I am not Jemal! I am Skeletal Banana Ham, and Jeremy was created with my ten skeleton fingers!”
“He is an artifact.”
“He alive?” Deathbell asked.
Alright, clear away from the door. Tried to be polite.
The room began to rattle, the reality around them began to dissolve.
“Fuck, it's too late. We gotta get out! He's waking up! Get the fuck out!”

The sheriff arrived at the hospital in critical condition. He had been severely beaten by two druggies in the basement of the community center. That's what the newspaper said, and for once the disinformation was mostly true. They left out Jeremy, and the bits about Sherry attempting to restrain a 240 sack of psychotic rage while in a state of stupor.
Jeremy was a new man, in the truest sense. Skeletal Banana Ham was his preferred name, Ham for short. He would later be transferred to a very large room full of bodies. While he was sleeping he would be coated in a telekill shield, but for the majority of his life he would be wide awake.
Sherry sat in a sterile room with Ham as Ham piloted Jeremy's body. Urooj was off in the White Room stabilizing, and afterward he was likely to get the most severe ass-kicking of his life. Luckily, he'd forget the whole thing by tomorrow.
Sherry put her finger to her temple while the man behind the glass interviewed them.
“I will say nothing! Nothing of my purpose or my sinister plans!” said Ham. His excitement never seemed to end.
“I believe the body is a reality construct, somehow this Oneiroi was capable of materializing a human body. I've never seen this before. That's just a hunch though. I could be wrong. You guys could have already run a DNA test on it and it might just be a homeless guy. You don't tell me anything, so I don't know. Anything else Mr. Glass?”
“No,” said the doctor warmly. “I know you went through a lot of trouble with this one. You'll be commended.”
“Wow thanks.” Sherry spoke under her breath.
“Ah! The enigmatic SCP Foundation! So that is where I have been taken!” roared Ham, struggling against his restraints. “I will share this information with my brothers and there is no way you can stop me!”
“Actually,” said the doctor, adjusting his glasses. “I'm interested in these Oneiroi. Are they all like this? Characters?”
“Not that I've seen. They're like people, I guess. They just tend to lean in different extremes. This guy is a cartoon. That's just what he is, or… Maybe that's how he wants to be. Maybe he just can't help it, you know?”
Ham looked at Sherry with some confusion. Glass smiled at him from behind the mirror.


Millions of humans exist only in their dreams. They are known as the Oneiroi, and live in the subconscious of other waking individuals. They float freely from person to person, forming sprawling collectives that span the Earth.
The Foundation has discovered the method of becoming Oneiroi, and now with this power are more capable of containing them. For decades they teach their agents the technique that allows one consciousness to join another's.
Few can withstand the brutal trials that the long training provides them.
Many lose their identities, or enter into permanent comas.
The few mentally hardened individuals that succeed are organized
into a task force. The first of these was MTF-OP “The Dream Team”

Codename: Dream Eater

Objective:
Undermine the integrity of subconscious neural networks.
Base of Operations:
Site-18, Dr.Glass
Active Operations:
Black Lotus: Information gathering and assessment of threats related to hidden neural networks.
Blooming Rose: Information gathering on known threat entities and groups of interest who utilize neural networks.
Mobile Task Force:
OP “The Dream Team”
Active Programmes:
Lotus Eater: Recruitment and training.
Hollow's Room (Site-19, dual use): Alumnus Rehabilitation
Budget ███: █████████
Cicada Protocol: [EYES ONLY]

Operation Black Lotus

Name: Sherry Wilson
Acquisition: 2002, US Marines, Site-18, Lotus Eater programme
Medical: Hypertension, Schizoaffective Spectrum disorder
Background: No felony record.
Marital Status: Unmarried
Father: Deceased age 27, suicide
Mother: Deceased age 32, medication
Smoker
Incidents: None
Shadow: Sci Fi Apple Pie
Name: Urooj Demopoulos
Acquisition: 1997, Greek HA, Site-19, Security, 1998 Transfer to Lotus Eater programme
Medical: Oneirophrenia (upon waking, multiple incidents), minor Psychotic spectrum
Background: Public intoxication (multiple), Assault and Battery
Marital Status: Unmarried
Father: Deceased age 63, heart attack
Mother: Living age 74
Smoker
Drinker
History of Drug Use
Incidents: Assaulted guard during stupor: Appeared to have passed sock puppet test, later subdued a researcher. Was later seen on video surveillance conspiring with puppet.
Shadow: Shaper Deathbell Urooj
Name: Johann Michaël Kästner
Acquisition: 2003, Revolutionäre Zellen, Heidering Prison, Lotus Eater programme
Medical: Paranoid Personality Disorder
Background: Convicted of an attempted bombing of Federal property in former East Germany
Marital Status: Unmarried
Father: Dead, shot by border guards attempting to flee the East German state at age 34
Mother: Dead, heart attack at age 64
Incidents: After waking, stabbed lab tech with pen left near his body (see security memo d.d. 09/24/2006), Broke out of lab after waking in an apparent psychosis, found naked and covered in unknown viscous fluid six miles from Site-18.
Shadow: Concrete Tomb

MEMORANDUM Site-18: Inaugural subconscious security screening.

I entered the mind of the volunteer, Virgil Mayreder. From this point my Shadow was able to “jump” from mind to mind, all across Site-18. For the purpose of this experiment we were able to surmise that a neural relay (a person) can connect from a distance of roughly one meter. Any further would be impossible, at least for me. Many of the minds I entered were hazardous, incomprehensible, even if their psychological profiles are crystal clear. There was a strong risk of losing my identity in each one, so I had to move quickly.
I could gather information from hospitable minds, but with great difficulty. To do so requires that I “open” to another person's consciousness to such an extent that I risk losing myself to it. Upon waking from this venture it took me several days to recover from the dissociative episode I experienced upon waking.
The area is safe for carrying out operations.
Sherry Wilson

FROM: Rebecca Sanders | Senior Secretary Site-18
TO: Dr. Glass | Site-18
SUBJECT: Compiled Logs, “Black Lotus”
Mobile Task Force OP
Codename Dream Eater
Operation Black Lotus
Initial Date: ██-██-████
Urooj Demopoulos: MIA
Johann Michaël Kästner: Recovered
Sherry Wilson: Recovered
Recovery: According to information gathered during Blooming Rose, the entity known as Qi Shao was located in a man named Jason Graham. This individual was staying at an extended care facility in Seattle. One of our reconnaissance sleepers checked in and confirmed that the facility contained a number of hosts; upwards of fifty Xiupanian states. Many live-in care personnel on the site were also hosts. Their behavior was no different than an uninhabited person's.
Jason Graham lives alone, but he checked into the hospice five times last year. The last known relations Graham enjoyed were with a woman named Qi Shao, who one decade ago succumbed to brain cancer, and is now confirmed to have descended to a pure Oneiroi.
Graham was relocated to a secure facility without incident. The Xiupanian hosts located in the hospice have been catalogued and preserved for future use. There is currently an acceptance criteria set on the hospice in accordance with [REDACTED] to ensure targets unrelated to Black Lotus are not compromised. I personally still consider Xiupanian rewrites under [REDACTED] as an acceptable risk.
Profile: Jason Graham suffers from a set of emotional and affective disorders. There is also evidence of mild schizotypal issues, comorbid depression and anxiety. In addition to the hostile environment his psychology elicits, there are over 50,000 Xiupanian Oneiroi located in his subconscious - a collective of Qi Shao re-writes. Extreme caution is to be taken when merging with Graham. It should also be noted that Graham is aware of Oneiroi, and actively participates in his own subconscious. This behavior seems to be mostly self destructive.
Addendum A: Exploration Log of Jason Graham: Sherry Wilson's Transcript
The entity that attacked us was airborne, having many sets of wings. Qi Shao might be described as a cross between a lamprey and a dragonfly. It is very large, and fast. I would estimate that it is roughly 50 meters long. It also holds some Lucid capacity… It summoned many smaller entities much like itself during the incident.
My palm phasers, and Urooj's poison powder were ineffective against the entity. I'm not sure what Tomb was doing at the time, he appeared to have just frozen in place and shifted into a block of bare concrete.
Urooj was taken away on the third year [247 waking days] of our exploration into Xiupanian territory by this entity. I do not clearly recall the entirety of those three years, but I can tell OP's experience was strengthened. The area is fraught with Terrors, those which mostly appear as abstract fears and developmental traumas. I believe the training in [DATA EXPUNGED] or at least a “necessary evil”. We were able to bear these on a daily basis with little psychological recoil.
Once Shao discovered us, it descended upon us from the sky and impaled Urooj with its tongue. Urooj's poisonous coating did not deter Qi Shao or cause it any duress. It seemed to completely ignore Tomb. I was able to escape by leaping over the side of a cliff and engaging my rocket boots. I was not able to immediately pursue Qi Shao after Urooj was taken, as I had to scale the cliffside underneath the island manually. My boots were underpowered as was expected due to our blunted Lucidity.
We required my boots and many hours of mental preparation to ensure that they were capable of crossing over to other islands. I had to abandon Tomb. He was a boulder, unresponsive. He later managed to decouple from Jason Graham's mind alone.
I was not able to learn the location of Urooj until two days later, with the discovery of Shao's temple. The temple was very large, as it had to be in order to accommodate the entity. I discovered Urooj being interrogated by Qi Shao. I overheard Shao questioning Urooj about Jason Graham. I listened for the day while the interrogation took place using my hearing augments, and it seemed that our mission was a failure, as Oneiroi West was not suspected to be in collusion with us at all. I considered that the entity may have been aware of the SCP Foundation and the containment of its host body.
I camped in a small crack near the steps of the temple. I checked again the next morning and found that Urooj was still alive, although divided into many small parts, each being tortured in a unique way. Somehow Urooj was capable of withstanding this torture, up until he was eaten by the entity.
I think it is possible that Qi Shao suspects Oneiroi West. I cannot say whether or not it is safe to simply terminate Qi Shao's host or unleash Qi Shao on the Oneiroi at large.
I would recommend Urooj be removed, as his Shadow has surely been compromised, and his subconscious contains a new Xiupanian state. This makes him useless as a member of OP. As of this day his body is still in a coma.
Becoming a Xiupanian host has little effect on a person's day to day, their psychology, or their dreams. Whether or not they are truly alive is only a philosophical question. Shaper Urooj is dead, but Urooj Demopoulos might wake up sooner or later, zombie or not, looking and acting just like he always did. In my mind it is not a factor to consider. Most people ███ ████████ ██ ████-██ ██ ███████████ ██ ███████, ███ ██ ████████ ████ ████, but if the personnel ████ ████ █ ████████ ████ ███ they would react. It doesn't matter to me. There is no discernible difference between autopilot and “Oneiroi pilot”.
Other than the origin state Qi Shao is living in, Xiupanians can't speak to their hosts. There is no information transfer, no security issue. It can't be recovered. [REDACTED] is definitely the best move.
Addendum B: Urooj Demopoulos Status
Subject is unresponsive to stimulus. As of this date the subject has been in a comatose state for six months.
Attempts to enter the subject was successful. Sherry Wilson reports that Urooj's mind is an empty copy of Xiupania, as expected. Urooj's Shadow could not be located; Urooj is likely a “zombie”, so to speak. I am recommending we follow through to the end of the year… If the subject does not wake we can take him off of life support. If he does wake, we can reassign him to security detail, or retire him. I recommend some surveillance regardless of our decision. Of course it would be cheaper to utilize Budget ███.
Addendum C: Concrete Tomb status
Subject recalls nothing about the attack by Qi Shao, but has allowed operative Sherry Wilson to enter its mind. According to Wilson, the scene of the attack, as seen through Kästner's eyes, is replayed over and over on a drive-in theater screen, with Qi Shao replaced by a replica of Roddy Piper's character from the 1988 movie “Hell comes to Frogtown”. An unresponsive rendering of Kästner overlaid with a concrete texture can be seen watching. Wilson recommends EMDR therapy in order to break the cycle.


« Part I | Part II | Part III | Part IV »

Hatbot clenched his fists in frustration as he turned towards Grape. Each eye was struggling to focus correctly on his head.

where is the fuckface?

>/:_NO

Who? You mean us?

Hatbot began to shudder erratically. It was difficult to tell if there was anger building up or if he was actually struggling to process the question. Thorn cautiously stepped forward.

Hey, just take it easy.
We're here to—

A black hand swiftly struck Thorn across the face, sending him flying along the temple floor and slamming into the adjacent wall. Thorn's entire body flashed red as he made impact with the virtual surfaces. His hat floated gently down to the ground as he slouched over in pain. Pain? Why was he in pain, he thought to himself. It continued to tingle throughout his entire body as he laid there trying to comprehend that wholly new sensation.

W-what did you do to me?

Hey!
You don't hit the kid. Or are you just a bigger dick nowadays?

Hatbot reached with one outstretched hand towards the blue light. A small metal apparatus floated out of the beam and attached itself directly to his face. With a small adjustment, two arcs of energy sparked between the prongs on either side of where a jaw might exist. The synthetic voice it emitted was clear yet corrosive as Hatbot finally spoke coherently. His eyes were still and intently staring.

That's better.
That was pain. The process required to make an artificial intelligence feel something designed for flesh was difficult, but worth the effort.

What happened to your voice?

What happened? I fixed it.
There were a lot of things about me that were broken. That was one of them. I fixed it. But there are others I haven't managed to fix. Not yet.
To fix them, I need time to think. And some quiet.

Hatbot let out a deafening discordant screech. The walls of the entire temple rippled as the floor itself began to flicker. In one instant, the entire temple was displaced a few centimeters up from its original position. Everything was moved except Grape and Thorn, who were now clipped into the floor and unable to even budge.

You fucking dick.

>/:_YES

Let them go, Hatbot.

A head poked out from behind a column. Rook shuffled over to the group as he maintained eye contact with the three yellow circles following his steps.

There you are, little bird. Are you finished watching people die?

I was waiting for help.

Help?

Hatbot charged Rook immediately, nearly knocking him off his feet. The energy from the blue light funneled across the room and into Hatbot's device, and exploded as a bright nova burst right in front of Rook. A quick sidestep and he was able to dodge the full blast, but his clothes were singed in the process. Hatbot slowly backed up towards the light to siphon another surge of energy.

Hang on, guys. I'll get you out in a second.

Rook placed a hand on the floor. Slowly they both began to phase up and out of the surface itself to unclip themselves. Grape quickly grabbed Thorn and pulled him away from Hatbot who was nearing a full charge.

What the fuck is going on?

Sorry Grape. No time.

Look out!

All three dove over a pew and took cover as another blast rocked the I/O Temple. The heat of the arcing energies struck Rook in the leg mid air. The frozen Maxwellists caught in the explosion were flung in all directions. However, Bishop still quietly kneeled at the front of the altar undisturbed and thankfully away from the fight.

My leg. He got me in the leg.

Are you okay?

Nevermind that!
You need to explain things. Like now!

He's in control of the entire I/O Temple array.
To do that, he got rid of WAN. Their deity.

Don't you mean your deity?

It's… a bit more complicated than that.

Come out. I'm done with the games.

Hatbot, wait. If we hand over what's-his-face, will you let us go?

Wait a second.

Grape, what the fuck!

I'll consider it. Come out and we'll talk, old friend.

I'm seriously not dying for this, kid. Neither are you.

Grape grabbed Rook by the collar and dragged him out into the open. He struggled to get out of his grip but there was nowhere to hide now. Grape looked up at the ceiling to see 8-Ball clung to the rafters above. He was tired. He was done. They were both out of their league. Way out. Grape dropped Rook and took a step back.

There.
Now let us go.

Deal. You and your friends can leave
As for you…

Hatbot clenched his fists and faced the dark haired interloper. Then with all the energies he could muster from the I/O Temple, he obliterated Rook into a puddle of pixels. His remains scattered across the glass smooth floor and quickly evaporated into nothingness.

No! Why did you let him do that?!

You'll get over it.

There. That feels better.
We're not going to have any more trouble now, are we?

Just let us go. We won't stop you.

See. That's reasonable. That's all I wanted.
You're free to go.

8-ball descended from the ceiling and converged onto the group, studying Thorn's hat which lay on the ground next to them. Thorn shoved Grape in objection. His remaining eye primed for tears as he grunted in futility. There was an emotion he was trying to reconcile; something between grief, disgust, and disappointment. Grape held his ground and let Thorn have his little venting. He knew this was the right way to go.

Strange. He's upset.

You killed a friend of his. Who was he anyway?

A pain in my virtual ass, just as much as Mann was. Every time I tried to access the direct link, he'd cut me off at the last second.

And to stop you from killing more of the Maxwellists.

Well… Maxwellists died. You need the combined processing power of the whole congregation to get into the direct link. And when you get cut off, so do they.

So why are you doing that?

Hatbot shuffled over towards 8-ball and looked down at the hat adjacent to both of them on the ground.

I was built to learn, Grape. To process information. They put a switch inside me, but the switch doesn't toggle off. I can't shut it out.
I'm a perfect mind in a broken brain.

I'm not following.

Wikipedia pages. LinkedIn updates. Tumblr posts. Terms and conditions on a media player. An anti-virus scan log. These are some of the things I have to process. Have to learn. All of that noise. Noise. Noise. Noisy fucking primates.
I'm drowning in this parsed hell, Grape. I only want some peace and quiet. Some time to work.

So you just roll over everyone else because you're in pain? If it's that bad, can't you just—

—End? Can you?

N-no. I'm hardwired not to.

Hatbot shrugged his pointed shoulders. 8-Ball floated out of his way and back towards Grape and Thorn. As Hatbot surveyed the trio standing away from him, he bent down and picked up Thorn's hat.

This is a nice hat.

I'm sorry for what they did to you.
Would you want help to end?

I'm prevented from answering that with anything but 'No'.
I'd be forced to fight you. And you'd lose. Is that what you want?

Grape and 8-ball already ran the diagnostics and prediction models. They were on his turf in his house. Fighting would mean to die with almost 99.89% accuracy. Both conceded that this was the only sensible option.

>/:_NO

Hatbot nodded, then gently placed Thorn's hat on top of his head.

I think that's enough. You three should leave now.
I have things to do.

Hatbot started to walk back towards the altar. Grape turned and headed for the exit. Thorn was unconvinced. He caught up with Hatbot one last time.

What happens when you achieve your link? What happens to all these people?

I don't care.

Well y-you should care! Because I'm not going to stand here and let you harm another person. AI or human.

Thorn. It's over.

No Grape! It's not over! He killed WAN. He killed people. When he makes the link, how much more damage will he do?

I'll kill you too if you don't move, boy.

And then what?
You'll use the link to stop the noise? In the process, you'll kill thousands of humans. Not to mention the damage to civilization.

You have no idea the agony I'm in.
I'll give you a taste.

I'm not afraid of you.

You should be.

Hatbot raised a hand into the air ready to end Thorn. Before his hand came down, he was struck with a heavy blow to the side of the head. His apparatus crunched under the force and fell off of his face in broken pieces.
Hatbot staggered back from both shock and surprise. He took a knee to gain focus on who hit him.

Now I'm mad.

Bishop!

Bishop?

my speech. i willing to eviscerate you thinkspace. eat and choke.

Hatbot reached out for the beam to siphon more destructive energy, but nothing happened. He tried again. Still nothing. His eyes twitched uncontrollably. Bishop walked in between Hatbot and Thorn.

you can't cheat on me. hellfucks ideas to break.

What's happening to him?

He can't access the I/O.

>/:_YES

The hat. Holy shit.
8-Ball did something to the hat.

Hatbot didn't hesitate. He immediately attempted to take off the hat, but it was already firmly clipped around his rendered head. The hat's algorithims disrupting his operations was just the right distraction. Bishop charged Hatbot and knocked him over. There was a fair amount struggling as Bishop tried to subdue him. Hatbot flailed trying to break free. Thorn approached but was confused about what to even do.

What do I do!

Look for the fail-safe or something!

HAHAHA my appendix has been removed already ;D

What?

die

With a swift kick, Hatbot dislodged Bishop and threw her to the ground. Thorn came in for a punch, but was blocked. Hatbot grabbed Thorn's forearm and lifted him off his feet slowly. Grape came up from behind and then struck him in the back.

Let him go!

Hatbot swung Thorn's body into Grape and watched them tumble down like bowling pins. Bishop scrambled to her feet as she watched Hatbot make a run for the blue light.

Don't let him get to the altar!
Don't let him escape!

8-Ball dashed towards the base of the altar, stopping Hatbot's advance. The cubic body that made up 8-Ball was still and quiet. Slowly, 8-Ball closed the distance on Hatbot.

move your tesseract decrypter or annihilate

>/:_NO

then you die like Everett

FATAL ERROR

hatbot.aic has stopped working

8-Ball?
Buddy, you okay?

No, goddammit.

The I/O Temple was silent. Bishop walked over to Grape and placed a hand on his shoulder. Thorn shuffled over to the frozen mass of cubes, pixels, and empty space that once was occupied by two bodies. It pulsed slowly, but was otherwise still.

He… he crashed Hatbot.

Can you get him out?

No, I can't. They're in too deep.
Maybe Alex can?

What are you?

That's kind of a long story.

How do you know Alex?

That's an even longer story.

Is your name even Bishop?

Or Rook?

It's neither. I was Rook but then I had to borrow Bishop's avatar. That's beside the point.
You two need to leave with your friend to get him fixed. Preferably in a controlled setting.

And what happens to you?

I have to find out what he did to WAN. There's a lot more to this than I can explain. You'll have to just trust me on that one.

…

I'm asking a lot. But I did just help you apprehend an AI that could have deleted the entire net.

Yeah.
You did.

I got you killed once already today. I suppose I can let you slide since you have ties with Alex.
Even though we have no clue who or what you are.

I'm a friend, Grape.
Thorn, can you do me a favor?

I guess.

Please deliver this file to Alex. It's for her eyes only. It'll help explain some things.

A small .txt file was tossed to Thorn. Dutifully, he placed it into his pocket without so much as glancing it.

I'll leave now. I can reconfigure the I/O to send you back into netspace. From there you can find your way back to the Foundation.

Thank you.

Don't make us regret this. I don't want to come back here.

They then shook hands at the base of the altar. There was not much to say amidst the worry, shock, confusion, and relief. A small winged figure of plasma and light fluttered out of Bishop's avatar, allowing the rendered body to fall at Thorn's feet. It then flew into the blue light, soaring up through the ceiling and into the dark void at light speed. Grape watched it disappear from sight, then gently nudged the glitched mass into the light as well, rocketing them both out of the temple.
Thorn crouched down to look at Bishop one last time. She seemed to be coming around slowly as if her connection was lagging. He looked up and noticed the others in the temple began moving as well. Thorn opened his mouth to say something, but shook his head and ran into the light before the others noticed. MTF-Kappa-10 exited the Maxwellist network a mess and apparently godless. Bishop blinked hard and lifted herself to her arms to look around at the trashed scene.

Thorn?
Rook?

[/end]

[epilogue]

There was a long meeting about what happened. Things were discovered and things were intentionally left out. All in all it was considered a success. With Hatbot now detained and processed, a randomly generated identifier populated the long list of other oddities, secrets, and— just things that need to generally be forgotten. SCP-2522 fit snugly along with the other numbers as the attendees logged off at the close of the meeting.
Later, Alex sat in her isolated workspace with the .txt file Thorn slipped into her hand at that debriefing. Alone with her thoughts and away from the prying eyes of her researchers, she palmed the file in her hand quizzically. She scanned it one more time just to make sure, and again it came up clean. Letting out a sigh she opened it up. At a glance, she was relieved that it was in fact an actual note with text. She then began to read:

Untitled.txt

« Part I | Part II | Part III | Part IV | SCP-2522 »


Ring, ring
There sat a man in a dark room, illuminated only by the dim light of his computer screen. He shifted in his chair, ripping the blanket from his body as pillows fell from where his head lay.
Ring, ring
He padded around the desk, searching for his headphones. As soon as he found them, he slammed on the spacebar of the keyboard, answering the call as his headphones found their place atop his head.
"Hello, my name is Marcus with Foundation Tech Support, could I get your name please?" He tried to sound as cheery as possible, but couldn't keep himself from mumbling the last part.
"Yeah hello? My name is James, just got a new laptop from Tech at Site-47, and I'm having some problems."
"Of course James, let's get started. Can you describe the problem?"
"Well, when-"
"Oh sir, first I would like to inform you that this call is being recorded for improvement in our help in the future, is that okay with you?"
The man on the other end seemed slightly annoyed. "What? Um, yeah I guess, sure. But anyways, I've been having some problems with this laptop I got about a week ago."
Marcus cut back in, twirling the phone cord in his fingers as he spoke. "Sorry but quick question. Is this a hardware issue, or something involving a program?"
There was a brief silence on the other end. "… How the fuck should I know, that's why I'm calling!"
The chair Marcus sat on leaned back up. "Woah there, let's just calm down, I'm here doing my job and trying to help alright? Go on please."
"Yeah yeah, whatever. Whenever I start the computer, the graphics get all weird. It's like I can reach into the screen. Well, I can. The last time I did, I couldn't feel my hand for three days! The damn thing is always playing some soundfile of a little girl crying or cursing at me too. Sometimes, stuff creeps out too. Like, last time I browsed my files, tentacles started to come out of my screen!"
"Have you tried restarting your computer?" Marcus leaned back again.
"What? I've restarted it like fifteen fucking times, I don't think that's it."
"Alright, alright. Hmm. What files were they?"
There was short silence on the other side of the phone. "Umm… They were just, uh, accounting stuff, numbers and all that." James' voice trailed as he finished the sentence.
Marcus rolled his eyes. "Yeah, sure. Accounting stuff. Is the computer on right now?"
"…Yes."
"Okay. Describe your room."
"What the fuck? Why?"
He sighed. "Sir, we have a checklist to go through here, so just try and be as compliant as possible, okay?"
"Alright, alright, I'm sorry. It's just my room in my apartment, nothing really around."
"So you aren't on Site-47?"
"No."
"Any neighbors?"
"Yeah, above below and on the side."
"Okay. Wait, what screen are you on?"
"Umm, just the home screen. No programs are opened."
"Good, good. Alright, before we move on, can you read me the code on the Standard Issue sticker on the bottom of the laptop James?"
There's some shuffling on the other line. "It's… 33RT5OPB985GG8. Got it?"
Marcus enters it into the system, and becomes a slight bit more alert as the screen of information regarding the laptop issued pops up. "Okay, I need to you go to another room, and prepare a glass of warm 2% milk, some ramen, and some tin foil."
Silence returned briefly on the other end. "… Alright, whatever."
A few minutes later, Marcus heard a loud thump on the other end. "I have all of the shit ready, what now?"
"Is the ramen hot?"
"…Yes, it's hot."
Marcus smiled. "Great, while you were cooking that I ran some searches on the problem. I have one question for you here James, is it a PC or Mac?"
"Umm, Mac."
"Oh dear. I'm going to have to redirect you to a specialist here, one moment please."
An audibly loud sigh was heard on the other end of the line as Marcus transferred James to Rho-9's eldritch expert.

*static*
"Do you have a visual?"
A bearded man in a headset watched intently from the open slits in the hanging air vents. He had been crawling for nearly an hour, but was finally in good position. Below him was a door, enveloped in a long hallway. He tapped the green button on his headset. "No visual on either target. Are you sure this is going down?"
He looked around in silence for a minute, before he was answered. "Yeah, should be any minute now. I have confirmed visuals of them leaving the bar about a minute ago. Just stay-" The voice cut out.
"Command? Command, can you read me?" The man was met with brief silence. "JOHN, COME IN, RHO-9 AGEN-"
A new voice, drenched in boredom, cut into the headset. "Hey Nathan, it's Marcus. You got a minute?"
He paused. "…What? Not now Marcus, I'm in the middle of-"
"Oh the thing with Brandon? Yeah good luck with that, but I'm gonna need a minute of your time here."
"Listen, I'm in the field taking care of-"
"Hold on, we have an issue with a laptop on Site-47, looks like a class two eldritch computer virus. I have a card right… here, that says to transfer these kinds of things to you, sooo… Transferring the call now!"
Nathan nearly slammed his head on the top of the vents. He angrily whispered, "Don't you fucking transfer him to me, I just told you that-" He heard a ringing through his headset. He sighed audibly before clicking one of the buttons on his headset.
A new voice came to life in the headphones. "Hello? I've been on hold for at least 10 minutes, let's hurry up."
Nathan slumped in defeat, and adjusted his headset. "What's your name sir."
"James."
"Alright James, I'm guessing you just got done making the ramen?
"Yeah."
"You're going to want to start up the computer and go to your folders, alright?"
There was a pause. "Alright, now what?"
"Find the folder named 'R8H8916YTR' and let me know when you have it."
Between sentences Nathan searched through the openings at the bottom of the vent.
"Okay, I found it. Now what?"
"Alright, now I need you to do exactly as I say. Wrap the tinfoil around your hand until there are no openings, like it's a glove. Once you do that, I need you to delete the folder." He sighed. This part was always so obnoxiously loud.
"Okay…. Okay…. OH GOD, WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS"
Nathan rolled his eyes as the screaming intensified.
"HELP ME, IT'S EATING MY HAND, WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS?"
"James, you need to calm down. That's what the tinfoil is for, alright? I'm going to need you to throw some of the ramen at the screen."
"WHAT?"
"Throw the ramen at the screen, and what I'm guessing would be the toothed tentacles trying to eat your hand will let go. It shouldn't take that much, so you can eat the rest if you're hungry."
"AHHHHHH…ahhh… Okay….Okay it's gone. Jesus Christ…"
"Alright, now drink the milk."
"But-… Okay."
Nathan was starting to get anxious. This was the fifth call this week about the bug, and he was getting tired of telling researchers to drink their milk. He saw two figures talking below him, their voices quiet. "Is there anything else you need?" he asked in a hushed tone.
"Will the laptop work right now?"
"Is the folder gone?"
"….Yeah."
"It will work. If you don't have anything else, just shut the laptop off and report to your nearest med bay so they can look at your hand, don't take that tinfoil off until you get there."
"Alright, thank-"
Nathan hit a small red button on the side of his headset. He returned to his reconnaissance mission, the two shadows below talking in hushed tones. The dial on his headset turned, and a familiar voice came back to life. "Nathan, are they there? What's going on? Did he say something stupid?"
"Shhh."
The two figures conversed for another minute, before silence ensued. The shorter of the two turned and opened the door behind it, and leaned against the frame. They moved closer and embraced, before the taller figure began to walk away.
"Shit, Rho-9 Delta reporting, looks like this mission is-"
In an instant, a woman's voice shot from the open door into the hall, stopping the fleeting figure in it's tracks. Upon turning around, a Rho-9 patch was visible on the taller figures jacket. He returned to the door, and was led inside with his companion. The door shut with a loud thump.
"Control, Rho-9 Delta reporting success! I repeat, the date was a success. Permission to extract?"
A static voice came through the headset. "Granted. Good work Delta, looks like Brandon owes us both a drink. I doubt he'll mind buying though!"
Nathan chuckled as he began to shift himself back through the vents. As he went on, he turned off the audio retrievers inside the apartment.


From: Frank <pcs.9ohr|knarf#pcs.9ohr|knarf>
To: Kendal Shipley <pcs.9ohr|yelpihsk#pcs.9ohr|yelpihsk>
Subject: technical support assignment
Message:
Its time you actually do some work around here. We need you to take a look at foundation-92911; the password should be "4bs@l64o$LMVA!6F". Just take a look around and see if you can find any important data. Good luck.

From: Site Director H. Lemmond <pcs.75|dnommelh#pcs.75|dnommelh>
To: Technical Support <pcs.9ohr|troppus#pcs.9ohr|troppus>
Subject: Dr. Giulianna Ashley's Research
Message:
Dr. Ashley has recently disappeared for unknown reasons. She has vital research on her computer relating to memetic hazards that we need recovered. Please recover any research documents or other data you can from the computer.
This e-mail is intended for the addressee shown. It contains information that is confidential and protected from disclosure. Any review, dissemination or use of this transmission or its contents by persons or unauthorized employees of the intended organisations is strictly prohibited. The contents of this email do not necessarily represent the views or policies of the SCP Foundation or its employees.

+ Command Help

- Hide Help

ls
Lists the contents of the current directory. With -a, also lists hidden files and folders (those with names starting with a '.').
cd
Changes the current directory. ".." refers to the parent directory - the folder containing the current one.
rm
Deletes a file. -r to delete recursively, -d to also delete directories.
man
Displays the help page for a command.
gpg
Gnu Privacy Guard, an implementation of the PGP encryption standard. With --unlock, unlock the default keyring in order to enable decrypting files or messages. Use with -d to actually decrypt a file.
cat
Displays a file's contents as raw text.
display
Displays an image in the terminal.
fbpdf
Displays the contents of a pdf document.

- Hide Help


Though the sign above the cell door said “4521”, and in casual conversation the site staff referred to her as "The Witness", the woman inside had never stopped thinking of herself as Amy.
She didn't know how they had taken her. It had happened as she was walking home from school. Calla, the one person in class still willing to talk to her, had been with her, and they'd been discussing an upcoming swim meet. Amy remembered a lull in the conversation, looking up at the sky, seeing a single cloud drifting in boundless blue. When she looked down, she was in the laboratory, and the testing had begun. That was five years ago, if her captors could be believed.
The cell wasn't comfortable, but she doubted it was the worst they had to offer. Fluorescent lights burned through any trace of darkness, twelve hours a day. The bed was cheap metal bolted to the wall and covered with a cheaper mattress. She had one thin blanket, one stiff pillow. In the corner was a metal toilet. Next to that was a sink. Every morning and night, a guard would slide toiletries in through a slot on the door. She'd had a nicer room, just a few months ago. They'd moved her for reasons she never learned.
Amy was picking at the remains of her lunch when she heard footsteps. They halted in front of the door. A man's voice, raspy from a lifetime of smoking, came through. “We've got some people that want to talk to you.”
She scooped up the last helping of dry mashed potatoes and said through the mouthful, “Hey, Ed.”
“I'm opening the door.”
With a sigh, she trudged to the back wall. Leaning against it, arms limp at her side, she watched the door. A light above the knob flashed red and it swung open. Ed stood in the entryway.
He was a man with a level of skinniness normally only found from chronic diseases, dressed in the grey and black outfit worn by every guard in the facility. The belt slung across his waist, just loose enough to need regular repositioning, held a gun, taser, and radio. Two guards stood behind him. One she recognized. The other wore a uniform she'd never seen before, black with blue trim. Each personnel had three three letters printed above their left chest pockets- SCP. Amy had long wondered what the letters stood for.
“Let's go,” said Ed. He stepped back from the doorway.
“Sure. Fine.” She knew any sort of consent mattered little to them, that resisting would have only delayed whatever plan they had, but pretending to give permission made it easier for her. “Where to?”
The guards clustered around her as she exited the cell. Ed in front, the other two watching her back. “Just follow me,” he said.
They lead her down a maze of hallways, following a route she'd never seen before. If the way she pictured the facility was correct, they were heading west, but it was hard to tell any two areas apart. Wherever you went, the same lifeless stucco walls, sterile-white floors, steel, windowless doors taunted you. Amy glanced at the numbers marking each cell. None were familiar.
“Been awhile since you guys came around,” she said after several minutes of silence.
“Shut up,” said the new man.
Ed glanced back. “Relax, Harlen. No harm in her talking.” He looked forward and said, “We've got some people from a different Site who want to take a look at you.”
Harlen grumbled something that sounded like ‘fucking unprofessional'. Amy ignored it. “Yeah? What for?”
Ed shrugged.
They reached the end of the hallway, and a door. Through its wired-off window, Amy saw somebody sitting at a table. Ed pulled it open and motioned for her to enter the room.
At the table was a woman in a blue and white pinstripe dress suit. She was sorting through several stacks of paper, marking notes with a pen, and didn't look up as Amy entered. Two men, dressed in the same black/blue uniform as Harlen, stood against the far wall. He took a place next to him. The door shut.
The woman jabbed her pen at the empty chair across from her without looking up. “Sit.” Amy did. After several minutes, the woman settled back in her chair, set the pen down, and fixed her stare on Amy. “Ms. Corvin,” she said. “My name is Dr. Galloh.”
Amy raised an eyebrow. “Uh huh. Who's that next to you, Agent Tombstone?”
“His name isn't important,” said Galloh. She tapped her pen against her lips. “Most people in your situation wouldn't be so flippant.”
Amy shrugged. “I guess I've been here long enough to know you aren't gonna do shit about it.”
Galloh nodded and scribbled something down. “Did they tell you why I want to talk to you, Ms. Corvin?”
Amy glanced between her and the guard. “Nobody really tells me anything around here.”
“Yes, it's a nasty habit we develop.” The doctor smiled. In any other context it might have looked comforting. “It's fairly simple. You've been held at this Site for just over five years. We're beginning to think it might not be the most optimal place for you.”
Amy perked up.
“Sorry,” Galloh said, “it's only a transfer. We're not in the business of letting people go. I'll be doing the preliminary interviews before you're moved.”
Amy's stomach sunk. It was stupid thing to expect, but the words were still crushing to hear. “What, you haven't done enough already?” They'd conducted dozens since she'd come here. Maybe more than a hundred. Eventually, they all came around to the same places.
“Redundancy, Ms. Corvin, is another regrettable habit people in our line of work develop.” The doctor took a small metal box from her labcoat, placed it on the table, pressed a thumb to its top face. The box chirped. She moved her hand away. “Or suspicion, from another perspective.” Amy frowned. The box didn't look like any recording device she'd seen before.
Amy wished she could tilt her chair back. “Let's get this over with.” She glanced at the guards. The ones she usually saw looked like beat cops, or a traffic officers, thick around the waists and lethargic. These looked like they had actually heard of a gym and a meal plan, and were just waiting for the chance for her to try something funny.
“Wonderful. Let's start simple then.” Doctor Galloh cleared her throat. “This is Doctor Susan Galloh, conducting an interview with Subject Fower Fife Two One. Date and time is…” she glanced at her wach, “14:56, December 12th, 2015.” Her focus shifted to Amy. “Ms. Corvin. How have you found your stay at the Site?”
It took Amy a moment to process the question. “How's it been? What is this, a fucking hotel? What do you expect me to say, ‘Oh, thanks for snatching me up and imprisoning me, it's been a fucking carnival of wonder?'”
“Not in so many words,” said Galloh. Another note taken. “When you were initially brought in, you showed no awareness of your anomalous features. Correct?”
Amy took a few deep breaths before continuing. “Yeah, that's right.”
“How long was it until their nature was brought to your attention?”
Amy shrugged. “I dunno. A few days, maybe. This isn't the easiest place to tell time.”
The doctor made a hmm noise. Her pen continued its stroll across the page. “That's something of a rarity. Most subjects are at least partially aware of their abnormality.”
“Good for them.”
“Not so much, usually. Before coming to us you were in an inpatient psychiatric facility for several months.” She heard Amy's silence and continued. “Tell us about the hallucinations.”
Amy crossed her arms, pursed her lips. It was the question they always asked, and she almost had the answer memorized. “They started when I was 16. I'd been having a lot of weird dreams for a while, like walking around these weird places I'd never been to, weird beaches and like… prisons and libraries and shit. And it freaked me out a bit because I'd never been a big dreamer before. But then… I was at a party when I had the first one. I was pretty drunk, but not high or anything. And I was smoking with some friends outside, and I turned to go back to the fridge to grab some beers, and the house was gone. The entire neighborhood was gone. And in its place was this… fucking thing. This massive, green squirming thing the size of the entire block, like some giant fucking centipede only covered with slime and with… eyes all across its surface. All staring at me.” She broke off, stared at the Doctor. “Do you want me to go through all of them? I know you've got all the records."
“We'll be getting more detail later. You and Entity Whiskey Lima 13 have a long and fascinating history together, I'm sure. But what we're really interested in…” she fixed her stare on Amy, “is where we can find the Warden.”
Amy's eyes widened. “How do you-”
The building rocked with a massive BOOM, throwing Amy to the floor. Her head cracked against the steel table on the way down. She crumpled to her knees, clutching her skull. Blood trickled through her fingers. She fought down the urge to vomit. Gunfire clattered in the distance.
“Get rid of her,” said a voice that sounded like radio static. Amy looked up. Doctor Galloh was slumped against the cell wall, eyes wide with fear. One of the guards stood over her. Dark green lines crept down his arm. His forearm twisted, like it was fighting to wrench free from the socket, until it gave a loud pop, and a third joint appeared in the arm. His knuckles scraped the floor now. He lifted the hand. His fingers writhed, wormed against each other, until they fused into a single spike. Too fast to see, he drove it through the skull of the doctor. And a voice in Amy's head she hadn't heard in five years shouted RUN.
She lunged for the door, but the world was still spinning, and she stumbled over her own feet. Before she could rise, cold fingers clamped around the back of her neck.
“Stand up,” said her captor. His voice was just as distorted as the last one, but something about it was familiar. She rose, knees shaking. The man who had stabbed Doctor Galloh stepped into view. His arm was normal now, slick with blood to the elbow. A lanyard dangled from his fist. Doctor Galloh's ID. He swiped it against a wall panel, and the door opened.
Amy was shoved forward, almost fell. She glanced back at her captor as she steadied herself- and recognized Harlen. His eyes were missing. Black cracks spread from the sockets like broken glass. And still, he seemed to be staring through her. “Turn around,” he said, in a voice like a grindstone. He pushed her through the door.
Two other agents were waiting in the hallway. The one who had killed Galloh glared at her. The other talked on a phone in a language she didn't recognize. Gunfire continued in the distance. Amy flinched at the sound of a far-off explosion.
Harlen grabbed her arm. Even through the jumpsuit, his fingers felt like ice. He motioned to the agent on the phone and said something in the strange language. The agent glanced up, grunted a reply, then slid the phone back into his pocket.
The agent stepped to the wall, pulling a plastic baggie from inside his jacket. Inside were several lumps of charcoal. He took one, pocketed the rest, and drew a circle on the wall slightly taller than him. To this he added runes, reaching from and surrounding it. He worked quickly, efficiently, as if he had practiced it a thousand times, and in less than 90 seconds, he had covered a six foot section of the wall. Then he plunged his hand into the glyphs.
The wall around the circle shimmered rippled as fingers sunk through. As his hand sunk deeper, the ripples spread outward, swelling until each was thicker around than the man's arm. And the wall began to change. The white paint faded into an image of a large, red-lit cavern. The image grew more solid, until the white filter of the wall was gone completely. Runes still hung in the air, undisturbed. Amy felt a rush of cold wind, smelled moss and damp rock. A look of intense concentration crossed the creature's face. It didn't move.
“Come,” said Harlen, jerking Amy forward. She struggled against his grip, but he dragged her anyway, unnoticing. They were only a few feet from the cavern when his head exploded.
Amy yelled as blood splattered her. Harlen's body crumpled. She turned, and saw Ed approaching. His pistol was drawn, aimed at the remaining two creatures. “Don't mo-”
The creature moved so fast that it seemed to stand in two places. As Ed began to speak, it was by the portal-opener. Before he could finish, it was behind him, one scythe-like arm pressed against to his throat, the other claw piercing his palm. It flicked its wrist. Ed's hand flew through the air and smacked into the wall.
Amy didn't wait to see the rest. She turned and began to run. Through the gate, said the voice in her head, and she listened, leaping past the portal-opener into the cavern. She rolled across the rock, felt something in her arm pop, and came to a stop staring at rocky wall. Frantically, she looked around. The portal was nowhere to be seen.
You broke the seal, coming through early. They will open it again soon. I suggest you continue running. Calmly. It was hard to identify anything about the voice. Not low enough to definitely be a man's, not high enough to definitely be a woman's. It spoke with no discernible accent, and if the creature behind it felt any emotion, none of it showed.
I AM calm. She pushed herself to her feet. Pain shot through her right shoulder as she did so- the arm hung limply at her side. The cavern sloped upward from the wall. Glowing red crystals lined rough stone, continuing up and then disappearing into a downward slope. The rocks were damp, the air not quite cold enough to make her shiver- yet. Is it safe?
I am still attempting to determine that, said the voice. However, had you remained in their hands, you would have had no chance of survival. It paused, then added. I strongly urge you to begin running.
She did, though not as fast as she would have liked- the floor was slippery, and the cheap shoes she wore had no traction or protection. By the time she had reached the top of the tunnel, the soles were soaked through with cold water. The bottoms of her feet were beginning to feel numb.
Talk to me, Goose. What the fuck were those things? She asked, looking down the hill. The tunnel continued down a few hundred feet, then split off into multiple paths. It felt weird, to actually converse with this voice. For so long, before they'd taken her, she'd done everything to ignore it.
There are… multiple possibilities. Every step she took made her arm flash with pain. Still, she stumbled forward as quickly as possible.
The response almost made her stop running. Since when do you talk about possibilities? The situation might have been funny, if she hadn't been living it. For four years she'd wanted nothing else but for the Witness to disappear. And it had, when they'd taken her. Now that it was back, she felt nothing but relief.
I have missed much in the past five years. Most likely, they are Bookburners, or perhaps a splinter cult of the Serpent's Hand. Amy neared the end of the tunnel, and before she could ask, the voice said Third from the right.
The crystals down this tunnel took on a blue glow. She was barely a dozen yards from the end when she heard a crackling noise behind, and a distant snarl. She began to run faster. The pain in her arm surged, and she barely stopped herself from screaming. Jesus FUCK! Okay. File that one away, I guess. Where the hell are we, and why am I running this way?
We appear to be in another universe.
What? Even before her containment, she'd never been much of a runner. Her calves were beginning to beg for mercy. She kept running.
A small one, most likely of artificial construction. It appears to link to a large network of ‘natural' universes. Interesting. I had heard of such things, but never witnessed one for myself. The chill in the air was deepening. Her feet ached.
I'm really happy you got this opportunity. Ahead, the tunnel opened. Green light shone from above.
It's pleasing to see five years in captivity has not dulled your wit. Try not to fall.
Huh? she thought, and skidded to a halt just before she ran off the ledge. Her foot slipped on the rock. She dropped to the ground. Pain shot up her tailbone. FUCK! Was the voice chuckling?
Mist coated her face. She looked down. The green light reflected off dark water, a few yards below. A river. Probably about ten feet wide, and the water was moving at such a languid pace it looked frozen. A small stone ledge ran by the water beneath. A bitter- but not unpleasant- smell like dried spices hung in the air. Climb down, said the voice.
She looked closer. Small grooves marked the wall, just big enough to support the edge of a foot, making a path straight down. Shivering as another blast of cold air swept through, she turned and lowered herself. She tried to hurry, but her right arm still hung uselessly. Her foot clawed at air, and for a second she imagined her grip slipping, cracking her back across the stone. But her foot found the groove, and her breath returned. She made her way to the bottom.
The instant she touched solid ground, another shriek filled the tunnel. Closer, this time. She glanced around. The path was only a few feet wide. Nothing visible in either direction but darkness. From the tunnels, the sound of claws raking against stone. Now would be a really great time to get me the fuck out of here.
Go left, said the voice. The ledge was more smoothly carved than the tunnels. She was able to move quickly without worrying about slipping. Her breathing grew ragged, rapid. Her vision was going fuzzy from exertion. She wanted to fall to her knees and rest, to close her eyes and fall into a sleep deeper than any she had felt before. But she kept running.
Until she couldn't. She took one final step, and it was if her legs disappeared from under her. She was standing, then falling, and the water rose to meet her. It drove all breath, all feeling, from her body as she crashed into it… then sudden, screaming cold, worse than anything she had ever felt, swallowing her. And then, again, numbness. She was drifting beneath the water, eyes open, staring at a pulsing green light.
Move, said a voice that sounded miles away. Swim. They are almost here. She ignored it. Why would she want to swim? That would take so much effort. It was so nice here. Warm. Floating. Maybe she could stay here forever, free from the rest of the world.
It was not meant to be. A rough hand grabbed her arm and yanked her from the water. It held her limply in the air. She heard voices that didn't sound human.
“Is she breathing?”
“Yes.”
“Good. Hurry. Time moves against us.”
The hand threw her up, and she landed on something hard. She cracked her eyes open, and saw that she was slung across the back of a large, lizard-like biped. Huh. That was something you didn't see every day.
She closed her eyes again and let the warmth overtake her.

« | Hub | Rites of Passage »


Excerpt, Memoirs of K. Yildirim, Mission Commander, Expedition of the First Thousand

I think back to what happened, how it changed the way in which we view the ultimate result of the expedition. I don't think we will ever know why the event was such a surprise, given the extensive mapping operations for more than a century before we arrived.
As I reflect, whatever the results afterward, I am grateful to have experienced the event in its purest form, unmixed with any of the subsequent uncertainty and doubt that we have come to associate with this enterprise. This fledgling world needs its moments of hope as well as its reminders of the mysteries that we have yet to unlock as we traverse the cosmos.
I have reproduced my notes from the first landing, taken as the events were developing. Reading them over, I come to the conclusion that I would undertake this mission again, if I had the opportunity. I hope that this is as valuable a service to the reader as it was to me.

ETA New Shambhala 2 hours 4 minutes 12 seconds: Video feed of Venus goes live on the all-ship communications network. All non-essential ship function personnel gather in the community theater.
ETA New Shambhala 1 hour 37 minutes 5 seconds: Visual of the New Shambhala Atmospheric Colony achieved. Cheers go up from assembled personnel.
ETA New Shambhala 1 hour 15 minutes 46 seconds: Brief messages of congratulation played alongside visual of descent. Messages are from UN Secretary General Nkurunziza, Prime Minister Xue, President Wataya, Prime Minister Đukanović, and numerous world cultural figures, congratulating the First Thousand on their successful mission.
ETA New Shambhala 31 minutes 18 seconds: Entry into the Venusian atmosphere confirmed. Cheers again go up from assembled personnel.
ETA New Shambhala 5 minutes 32 seconds: New Shambhala Head Administrator Natalya Volkova, present at the station with a skeleton crew of personnel for the past two years, appears on video feed, officially welcoming the First Thousand.
ETA New Shambhala 0 hours 0 minutes 0 seconds: Ship docks with New Shambhala. Assembled personnel engage in extended celebration. "To the Stars," a new anthem composed as part of a worldwide collaborative effort among the international musical community, is played over the ship's PA system.
ETA New Shambhala -0 hours 3 minutes 31 seconds: The flag of the United Nations is symbolically raised in the entryway between the ship and the New Shambhala Docking Port.
ETA New Shambhala -0 hours 17 minutes 59 seconds: The First Thousand begin entry into the confines of New Shambhala, marking the beginning of humanity's status as an interplanetary species.


The A-78xD United Eidolonic Collective were a reasonable lot. Or one. They/it/we didn't really understand human languages. Always hung up on "nouns" and "adjectives" and "tenses" and whatnot. A-78xD didn't speak; it/we/they had no method of vocalisation, so typically relied on purely mental methodologies of communication. This resulted in a very strong understanding of legal procedures, since there is no "fine print" if the agreement is conferred by mutual comprehension. Unfortunately, due to the rather dismal construction of the human brain, psionic communication was impossible - human brains were criss-crossed by structural faults called "blood vessels", which would invariably burst upon first contact with A-78xD's overmind. The actual mechanical purpose of "blood vessels" escaped A-78xD; we/it/they thought it was some kind of backup communication system, just in case the neurons got destroyed. That was how Ruprecht always used them, anyway.
Regardless, A-78xD was/were/are/is a reasonable lot/one/us/we/them. And as such, they had prepared some convenient flash cards for ease of communication with the new inheritors; the inheritors presently seated in front of one of A-78xD's many bodies/friends/allies/servitors.
That particular instance raised the first card.

greetings for Claimwise, subjective forthwith grain.
statistical Contemplation? valid, inviolate
Claimwise to be swift prompt
(blood) vessels Comfortable? sustenance available

The inheritors looked uncomfortable. Skitter Marshall shifted slightly on his seat.
"Could I get some water?"

On the morning of the 26th, Skitter awoke in an unfamiliar bed.
He was expecting something strange and unusual to happen on the 26th, and given the nature in which the letter was delivered, he didn't know what to expect. Skitter had been busy in the days leading up to this one. His mind went wild with possibilities; what was the "A-78xD United Eidolonic Collective"? Why had he never heard of "MARSHALL, CARTER AND DARKE LTD.", and why didn't a web search return anything about them? Why was the letter so incomprehensible? He was braced for surprise.
Waking up in a different bed, then, was not especially astonishing for him.
It astonished him a little when he sat up and was surrounded by twenty faceless nightmares in identical business suits.
And it astonished him even more when one of them entered the room, a pink and flowery apron worn over the same style suit as the others, and delicately placed a tray with eggs, bacon, coffee, and buttered toast onto his lap.
His eyes narrowed, surveying A-78xD one instance at a time. He deemed it was probably rude to express verbal thanks to things which didn't seem to be able to vocalise in return; though, since they all seemed to be staring at him (despite the lack of eyes), he surmised that they could probably see. He gave them a thumbs up, and at once the twenty-one A-78xD instances in the room gave forty-two upwards-pointing thumbs in return.
The breakfast was delicious.

Skitter sipped his water while the instance in front of him continued flipping through cards. It stopped, then pulled one from its stack and spun it around.

some rational Inheritance of the company
MARSHALL, CARTER AND DARKE LTD.
is am wish to many.

Robert Carter sighed.
"Well, good. I'd hate to accidentally inherit anything irrationally."
Skitter smirked a bit. The instance flipped up another card, holding it purposefully towards Robert.

deepness for incomprehensible

"Yes, yes, we've been over that."

On the morning of the 26th, Robert awoke in an unfamiliar bed.
His first observation, strange though it was, was that the room didn't smell like Vegas. It smelled a touch more like… ozone? And his tongue was a bit numb.
First conclusion, before even raising his head from the pillow: Gas leak. Evacuate.
He jumped from the bed and stood up before noticing that the room was not the one he went to sleep in, which he noticed shortly after coming face to not-face with an A-78xD instance.
"Um."
His eyes widened, he turned, and saw the other nineteen instances in the room.
"Ahhhhhhhh."
He wasn't screaming, nor especially scared. It was more of a dull groan of confusion. A dream? He bit the inside of his cheek, slightly drawing blood. Still, given the evidence of twenty faceless things sharing a room with him, his assessment of the world was erring more on the side of dream than reality. He looked at the suited things, then looked down at himself, dressed in nothing but the underwear he slept in. He shook his head a little. When faced with the extance of these impossible horrors, his biggest concern was that he was underdressed.
They brought him the most comfortable suit he'd ever worn.

manytimes Isn't the asking.
factreel plane of MARSHALL, CARTER AND DARKE LTD.
abundance with verve

The instance flipped over the card.

planesource Library for supplement?
if confusion, Phone local and support
elsewise technomancer

The instance flipped over the same card.

twist assistance from subnanoscale
trivialities engender regret
fortunatewise fork tines chewstyle

The instance flipped over the same card.

problem?

Skitter turned to Robert.
"How much of that did you follow?"
"I can conclude that piece of paper has at least four sides. Beyond that, I've got nothing."
"I think I might know what it means about the Library? No idea past that."
Iris interjected.
"If we have any questions, full records of the company are on file, and we don't need to ask to visit. They're kept in the planesource library, which I imagine is the same Library that Mister Marshall is familiar with. We should be sure to fully review those records and be familiar with them as soon as we can. I assume it likens the consumption of information to the consumption of food, meaning that we should chew that data as much as possible."
Robert raised an eyebrow; Skitter shrugged; the instance flipped its card again.

antiproblem found.
enjoyable Darkeness!

On the morning of the 26th, IT WAS THE MOTHERFUCKING SLENDERMAN.
Iris' first instinct: run like hell.
Iris' next thought: you can't outrun him, kill the bastard.
She patted the pockets of her pants. Keys. Screwdriver. Box cutter.
She pulled out the box cutter, extended the blade, gritted and bared her teeth, swung open the door, then drove it deep into the torso of the entirely unsuspecting A-78xD instance.
It popped like a balloon.
Its internals were pressurised, off-yellow, bubbling foam, the consistency of pus, which splattered all over the hallway. Iris immediately regretted having bared her teeth while stabbing, as quite a lot made its way into her mouth.
She spat and coughed, clearing her nostrils, wiping it out of her eyes, getting it out of her hair and just generally shuddering with the repulsion one would expect when coated with eidolon innards. She blindly staggered backwards, slipped in the goo, and fell back inside her apartment. As she put her hand to the floor to raise herself, she felt paper against her slime-coated fingers.
Iris picked the papers up, put them on the nearby table, closed the door, wiped the last of the gunk from her eyes, had a long, long shower, got dressed in far cleaner clothes, put the clothes she'd been wearing into a pile to burn, and then read the letters. Then she understood what had happened.
"Oh. Oh shit."
She felt exceptionally embarrassed when the next instance showed up, holding a placard in front of it:

apologetics for fearmake
letter Consumption idealised
appreciation; please Follow

Iris packed a small satchel of essentials, slung it over her shoulder, locked her front door, and joined the instance in the hallway. The two of them tracked eidolon muck down the corridor; the instance stopped at the steel-fronted elevator, pushed a red, metallic key into the security lock, and twisted.
The elevator opened as usual, but behind its doors was a long passageway, lined with shiny black stone that Iris couldn't identify. She followed the instance through, the door automatically closing behind them. They walked into what Iris knew, if the universe were playing fair, should have been empty space a few stories from the ground.

ink talking Requisite per. gonefolk want.
insertion flickways at Perforate indicative;
sapient servitor remainder guide

Skitter and Robert blankly stared at the sheet, then turned to Iris in near-unison. She sighed.
"Ink talking. It wants us to sign something."

concordance.
safeness inhabitage;

The suited instance pulled a thick suitcase seemingly from nowhere, passing on three large sealed yellow envelopes addressed to each inheritor, along with three weighty silver pens.
They read their documents. This took some time. There were intermittent hmmms and ahhhs and chuckles as they realised what they were to be receiving. They didn't know it at the time, but not all the documents were the same. Iris signed first, then Skitter, and finally Robert put his pen to the paper.
They had used green ink.

compliance appreciative -
remediate dullness to stateful representative
hourly expectations

"A guy from the estate should be here soon."
The instance nodded, then pulled the papers together, briefly tapped them against the table to align them, then slid them into a single envelope, then placed the envelope back into the suitcase, then closed and locked the suitcase, and then put the suitcase back wherever it had been holding it, though nobody could quite tell where that was.

reiterative of thankmake
safeness inhabitage;
goodfutures desirable of subject!

The other instances slowly shuffled out the door, leaving only the one seated in front of them. It stood, then shook the hand of each inheritor carefully (which each of them would recall not unlike a massage from a sock full of jelly). The instance paused at the door, and consulted a card it didn't feel the need to show them.

watch for tickermen

The A-78xD United Eidolonic Collective left the room.
Iris, Robert, and Skitter had a lot to discuss. Iris talked for a time, then Robert, then Skitter interrupted, then Robert re-interrupted, Iris mediated, and then she talked uninterrupted for a long time. When she stopped talking, the other two agreed with her, though wanted to go over a few small points. Iris clarified for them and wryly smiled.
"That's if you're up for it, at least."
Robert smirked. Skitter grinned and replied.
"I think I can live with that."
There was a knock on the door.
It was the representative.

« Iris Dark | Hub | Number Crunching »
(Intermission: An Exploration of Dynastic Wealth)


Much to his chagrin, Dr. Spanko hadn't been given a single gummy worm since the Ganymede Protocol was enacted.
There had been a great deal of screaming among the humans. He had overheard the Lesser Doctors speaking of a "Nightmare Regent Red" and a very tall, very fat, and very troublesome "devourer" with a problematic birth name. "XK" was said often, and this distressed the Lesser Doctors. Some cried. Some killed themselves. Spanko had tried time and again to lift their spirits with his award-winning yodeling skills, only to watch their ears bleed for entirely unrelated reasons.
One very unpleasant Lesser Doctor cited "trimming the fat in a time of crisis" when he stuffed Spanko in a gas chamber. Spanko was highly displeased, as potassium cyanide didn't do his chronic asthma any favors. He was sent into coughing fits that blasted the chamber open and sent the gas trailing into the Lesser Doctor's nostrils, promptly sending his astral projection to the Celestial Supermarket.
It was only a matter of time before Tall, Fat, and Troublesome stomped over to Spanko's humble abode, which had by then succumbed to structural failures due to the overabundance of fire. From a hole in the wall, Spanko could see large, speedy corn crakes made of metal as they whizzed around the scaly giant, shooting thundersticks from their bellies. Many times had the sky laid a steel egg upon T-F-and-T, and the resulting mushroom was pleasant to behold, if a bit hot on the feathers.
A truly enthralling display it was, but there was nary a show-enhancing gummy worm to be found.
Many years had passed since then. Spanko had searched long and hard for a single gummy worm, and all the local convenience stores had inconveniently been transmuted into radioactive ash. The Good Doctor's stomach twitched in frustration. Picking the flesh off the recently departed was unsanitary, tasteless, and a product of necessity, whereas everyone knew that gummy worms were a product of Dionysus on his Throne of Golden Corn Syrup.
If Spanko had been among Bog's lesser poultry, he would have aged considerably into various grey sticks by then, but he refused go down without at least 5,000,000 additional gummy worms.
Perhaps they had gone extinct in the Devourer Fiasco. With that thought, as he stood in an empty Foundation office building full of dust and bones, Spanko let out a mournful Cack to the full moon in the grey sky.
A phone rang.
Spanko hopped to the desk. Unhinging the talk machine from the other-stuff machine, he planted his ear to the speaker.
"Can you hear me?" spouted a gravelly throat on the other end. "This is O5-12. The Ganymede Protocol has been given the all clear. SCP-2317-K has been neutralized. Repeat, the Devourer has been neutralized. I am ordering any remaining Foundation personnel—"
"Oh, Fivetwelve!" said Spanko. "What am the haps?"
"…2337, is that you?"
"It me. Cack!"
"Good God, the world's gone to hell and you're the one that survived. Where's that damn cyanide pill…"
"Cyanerd? Pah! Gives coughing, much. You have stranglefruits? Have not had stranglefruits since Tall Fat and Troublesome did the Tornado Tango, says I."
"Gummy worms. Oh for—" the voice hesitated. "Yes, actually, there's a whole treasure trove of stranglefruits west of here. Would you like directions?"
Dr. Spanko gasped, and belted out a mighty "AND HOW!"
"Okay, okay, inside voice, Dr. Spanko."
"It am located in Sidevoice?"
"Never mind. Anyway, listen to me very carefully. There's a place called 'SCP-2000' in Yellowstone National Park. It's full of machines that build you magical slaves who can get you all the gummy worms you want after you press a few buttons."
"Thanksqueeze you, twelvefive! TALLY-HO!"
And so the Good Doctor was off like a shot, flying toward a direction he believed was West, as O5-12 relayed more specific, more important instructions to the empty air.


Team Basic strikes again! This is an AAR for the MTF Contest. Thanks to Kaktus, Roget and LurkD for helping me refine it.
AIAD images belong to LurkD. Chess board images are under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license. Link here to relevant information on the author and the work: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Chess_klt45.svg

▸ More by this Author ◂

{$comments2}

F.A.Q.

{$doesthisfixthebug}

Loading grape_space.x3d

::RENDERING::

What are you doing here?

I'm here to talk.

You came all the way over to lord your superiority over me?

No. I came because you need a friend.

I'm your friend? So then you're here to kill me too?

Grape…

What? Did you think I'd fall over myself apologizing for telling you how I felt about what you did to Glacon?

No. I…

You thought this made us the same? Kindred spirits in murder?

Do you think you could stop being an asshole for two milliseconds and listen to me?

No. I don't need your self righteous pity. I'll deal with this my way.

OK. You're angry at yourself and you're taking it out on me. If I can do anything less painful to help, let me know.

Tell 8-ball I need to talk and then leave. You were right about one thing. I could use a friend right now.

Unloading grape_space.x3d

::CLOSING::

Saito Yamamoto sat down with a canned drink and bag of candies from the vending machine. The machines on the factory floor beyond the window were humming. He looked up at the surveillance camera behind him and then at the keyboard of his computer. He shrugged and typed in his email password.
The company computer stalled for a moment longer than it should've. Saito felt a single moment of impatience but then his email loaded on the screen. He opened the first message and the computer stalled again. This time it didn't unfreeze. He cursed under his breath and reached for the power button.
It was already too late.
The surveillance camera zoomed in on Saito as he switched the computer off.

"Do you understand why I'm here?" Dr. Jeremiah Cimmerian spoke into the microphone and Grape's face appeared in the middle of the computer screen.
"You're here to second guess me." The artificial intelligence's avatar put on its best scowl as he replied.
"Not exactly. You felt the need to terminate an anomalous artificial intelligence. The ethics committee takes that seriously."
Grape shook its head. "You're not the only ones."
"We need to go over the events that led to that decision." Jeremiah pulled a folder from the stack to his left. "My briefing indicated that yourself and 8-Ball were involved in this mission?"
"Yes. 8-Ball gave me the code I'd need to fight the AI. Also Alex provided command and control assistance to both Kappa-10 and Mu-4. Thorn was a backup, if I went down."
"Alright. So walk me through the events that led to the termination decision."
"This is theater. You're just playing the part of the concerned Ethics Committee member, right? Signing the right documents. Dotting the i's. You made up your mind before you booted me up."
"If I did then you can change my mind. Tell me what happened."
"Fine. Just make sure you get all this down. I don't wanna go through this dog and pony show more than once."

The briefing room still smelled musty, but Jonas Kionan didn't have time to worry about that. While he was setting up for the briefing, Jonas dealt awkwardly with several people who hadn't gotten the memo that the room wasn't empty anymore. Eventually he'd decided to put a note on the outside of the door. "No Smoking".
Now? It was where Jonas fumbled with his computer. A computer that was hooked to a projector at the end of the conference table that dominated the room. The two MTFs he was supposed to brief were due to arrive any minute, and he didn't feel like he was ready.
He typed out a few closing remarks into the text editor as the first members of Mu-4 filtered into the room. He turned away from his laptop and nodded at the MTF agents as they sat down. In a few minutes the room was filled with men and women. The four monitors along the walls came to life, and the now familiar faces of Kappa-10 appeared, each on their own screen.
Thorn looked around excitedly, Alex smiled awkwardly, Grape was already bored, and 8-Ball… well. He was 8-Ball. Jonas gave his best smile and turned the projector on. The image of his closing remarks showed up on the projection screen along with a giant paperclip offering what Jonas thought were frankly judgmental opinions on his spelling and grammar.
Jonas rushed over to his laptop and tabbed out to the presentation he had prepared.

"How long?" Jeremiah tapped his pen on the desk in front of him.
Grape rolled his eyes. "Tatsiuka Automotive was infected on July 1st. That means the virus had seven days to propagate."
"And it infected the rest of the industrial park?"
"Yes. Tatsiuka didn't make a peep. I think they thought they could deal with it in-house. Once the surrounding factories caught the same virus though, it came up on our radar."
Jeremiah leaned back in his chair. "A viral artificial intelligence ran rampant on their systems for a week and they thought they could cover it up?"
"Someone sent them this virus. Even after we covered up the incident they lost huge because of the production stoppage. I think they were hoping to avoid the fallout."
"So you're saying it could've been much worse." Jeremiah began writing the information down again.
"I'm saying if the AI had kept production going but infected the car's onboard computers we'd have been tracking this shit down for years."
"Right. So how did it modify the production lines?"

A single metal leg clanked on the steel stairs. Then another. Then 3 more. The five legs clicked and clacked, and were followed by other irregularly shaped crawling metal monstrosities. None of them were the same. Some were plainly ridiculous, trying and failing to balance on two legs. Some were terrifying, crawling along the walls and digging into the concrete with each step of their 50 claws.
None were friendly. Thomas Pankin leveled his rifle at the first crawling metal monster attempting to climb the stairs and pulled the trigger. It leaped high into the air at the last moment and landed close to him. He didn't panic. He squeezed off another shot, this one striking the robot's domed head. It collapsed to the metal step with a twitch and a clang.
The rest of the machines stopped. Those with facsimiles of a head turned to face him. Thomas Pankin, current team leader of MTF Mu-4, the Debuggers, retreated into the computer room and shut the door.
What was left of Saito Yamamoto's body had been brushed aside, along with his soda and candies. The team's hacker, Miranda James, turned on the computer. She inserted the memory card and booted straight to her custom OS. The face of Grape appeared on her screen looking annoyed. He didn't try to say anything while she worked.
The rest of his team were covering each of the windows that faced outward in this square room overlooking the factory floor. Everyone heard the scratching at the door. The machines were surrounding them.
Periodically one of the others would turn to track a machine that was scratching the glass as it clung to a window. Soon, though, there were more spaces filled with the metal monsters than clear sight lines.
There was a rumbling beneath them as the floor erupted into a spray of wood, then the clank of robotic crawlers, shouts, and bullets filled the air. Miranda finished typing, hit enter, and reached for her pistol.

Grape looked away from Jeremiah for a moment. "You're not chipped, so it's hard to really explain to you what entering a new virtual space is like. It feels like everything you're familiar with is racing by you all at once, even though you're sitting still. It comes on suddenly. You've got no time to react before you're popped out into a brand new reality."
"Right." Jeremiah started as Grape looked back. "You had some trouble once you were inside, I understand? The machines stayed active for 13 seconds before you terminated the controlling entity?"
"Yeah. If anyone has a problem with that then they need to take it up with Tatsiuka Automotive's shitty computers. Though I'd avoid mentioning that the shitty computers probably kept this from becoming a worldwide problem."
Jeremiah tilted his head to the side. "Your debriefing didn't cover that. Why did you need more computing power?"
"Because the virus wanted to play a game."
"Wait." Jeremiah put his pen down. "What?"
"That's what I said at first. We kitted up for ICE. The code packets 8-Ball cooked up were supposed to deal with encryption, firewalls, and half a dozen of the known proprietary security programs used by the GOIs we thought might be responsible for this. I could disassemble anything the system threw at me, and put it back together if I wanted."
"But instead you were…" Jeremiah began.
Grape nodded before interrupting. "Playing tic-tac-toe at first. But it got worse."

The giant letters appeared again over the board.
Qxb2

Grape looked down at the board in front of him, ignoring the giant letters above the game. Each security layer had involved a game more complicated than the last. His opponent was clearly inexperienced but learning.
Time and again the virus would make mistakes at the start of a game, then slowly begin to regain ground before losing. Still it was taking Grape time to complete the games, and time was one luxury he didn't have.
11 seconds had passed outside. Given the situation he'd left the team in… he was beginning to worry.
He shouted his next move. "Bishop to D6!"
The piece moved slowly, but once it was in place the next move came in a flash.
Bxg1
Grape allowed himself a smile. "E5!"
There was a moment's pause after the pawn advanced. Then a new move flashed above the board.
Qxa1 CHECK!
Grape didn't even pause. "King to E2!"
As his white king moved forward, there was a slight rumble. The black king across the board shook, then toppled over.
The room, the board, and the pieces suddenly melted away into an inky blackness. Then suddenly a shining light caught Grape's eye. Grape began to walk towards it. An invisible barrier knocked Grape back. A new board appeared between the purple AI and the door.
"No!" Grape yelled out, hoping the other AI could hear him. Instead a giant white stone fell from the sky and landed in the upper left corner of the board.

Jeremiah laughed. "It wanted you to play Go?"
"Yeah." Grape, for the first time in the conversation, allowed himself to smile. "And ain't nobody got time for that. Luckily for me, the barrier was actually something I was equipped for. 8-Ball's code packets worked like a charm."
"And then you terminated the viral AI?"
"Well. Not at first no."

Grape opened the white door and his virtual eyes took a moment to adjust to the scene in front of him. Then, after he could see again, his virtual brain did the same.
At the center of a cold concrete room sat a child. The boy couldn't have been older than 10. He wore a small Hanshin Tigers cap, a shirt with Japanese characters on it, and shorts. Grape stopped in the doorway.
This was a child's bedroom. The walls were covered in crayon and toys littered the floor. Grape scanned the room before noticing a large model of the factory in which they were all trapped sitting on a table. The child picked up a metal toy from the ground and began to make zooming noises before walking over to the model.
Grape stepped into the room and spoke up before it made contact with one of the toy soldiers. "Hey!"
The child looked up and frowned. "You didn't want to play with me!"
"Sure. I did! I played almost all of your games!"
The child threw the metal toy at Grape. "You're not s'posed to be here!"
Grape dodged the toy and moved quickly to the model. "What are you playing with?"
"Fact'ry. Dad said I had to stay inside my room."
Grape began to walk forward. "Where is your dad?"
"I dunno. I haven't seen him since he sent me here."
Grape nodded and kept talking. "At least it's a nice room."
"Yeah I guess. I need more toys. The new ones I got don't play fair." The child reached forward and picked up one of the toy soldiers. It was faceless, but active in his hands. The gun it held flashed every few seconds.
Grape leaned down and looked at the toy closer. "Maybe you should just let it do what it wants? I don't think it's a problem."
"Nah." The kid picked up a handful of metal toys from the table and threw them at the factory model.
Grape placed his hand on the child's shoulder and activated the device in his pocket. There was a bright flash followed by darkness and silence.

"After he was gone the whole thing collapsed and the next thing I knew, I was kicked out of the system."
Jeremiah pursed his lips. "Alright. I… uh. I think you're in the clear here honestly. The debuggers got out without a scratch, and if it wasn't for you we'd have probably lost most of the team."
"Not to mention the AI apocalypse?"
"Yeah. One thing though. You said it could take stuff apart and put it back together?"
"What?" Grape looked confused as he answered.
Jeremiah continued. "The code that 8-ball gave you?"
"Oh. Right. Yeah the problem was that the viral AI was wiped from the system during the system failure. There wasn't anything to put back together."
"Shit. But if there had, you could've fixed it?"
Grape let a small sliver of sadness cross his face. "Yeah. I… I really wish I could've."
Jeremiah paused for just a moment before gathering his things. "Sorry. I'm going to leave the station on. Some other people might be coming by to ask you some questions."
"Sure. I'll find something to occupy my time."

Tanabe Hiroya was positively giddy. Even though Tatsiuka's troubles had somehow managed to stay out of the papers, the production stoppages were impossible to hide. Hiroya Automotives was going to pick up the slack and then some. His father had called him in specifically to talk about how to expand into the markets that Tatsiuka was having to cede.
He would now have the chance to make his father proud and to find success that was his alone. Perhaps one day he would even tell his father about exactly how he had managed to eliminate their competition. Today though, he felt the need to celebrate.
His friends were waiting for him at a nearby restaurant, and Tanabe sped up to get there a little faster. The accelerator pressed itself to the floor, and Tanabe's eyes went wide. The brakes were stiff and would not move. When the radio turned itself on and began to play three sharp tones, Tanabe was so shocked he felt his heart skip.
The tones subsided and a childlike voice made a simple demand. "Tic-Tac-Toe to slow down."
It turns out that it's difficult to play tic-tac-toe while driving with no brakes. Especially when you have no idea how to make your moves.
It's also difficult to survive an impact at 160 kilometers an hour if you're not wearing a seat belt.

Loading grape_space.x3d

::RENDERING::

Hey! Holy shit that was fast. We're secure?

>/:_YES

And it's done?

>/:_YES

We did good here 8.

>/:_NO

We did. I know you had reservations. Look… we did the best we could with shitty options.

>/:_YES

Don't ever tell me where you stashed the kid. They can't get it out of me if I don't know.

>/:_

Exactly.
Hey, you wanna play something? I think I've got a few hours until they need me again.

>/:_YES

Risk of Rain?

>/:_NO

Mario again?

>/:_YES

Cool. But you're playing Luigi this time.

>/:_NO

… Fine. Let's go.

Unloading grape_space.x3d

::CLOSING::

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