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Co-written by Ralliston and Trotskyeet
Ralliston's Authorpage
Trotskyeet's Authorpage
The following article is a part of the GASLIGHT, GATEKEEP, GIRLBOSS storyline. Whilst you can read it on its own, it's highly recommended you read the previous installments to get this article in its fullest.

2004

13th of January
Esterberg's Port District: Częstochowa, Silesian Voivodeship, Poland

"Can you hand me that brush over there?"
Philip Willis glanced up from his workbench, setting aside the clay ball he'd been rolling with his thumbs. His eyes flicked over to his supplies, helpfully displayed on a woven mat in front of him. There were around four dozen brushes there, each one with a specific purpose. He scratched his ear.
"Which one?"
"I don't care dude. I'm on a time crunch here, just pick one and gimme, Jesus."
Philip scanned the mat with a trained eye. Picking the rattiest brush he could find — several dog hairs taped to an oddly bent stick with a few runes running through it — he tossed the tool in the general vicinity of his brother's crotch.
"Hey!" He shouted, giving him a wounded look. "That could've hit me, y'know. Bad luck to be injured on the day of an exhibition."
"And even badder luck to be making your piece the day of." Philip sighed. "You know you had three months to come up with something, right?"
Visibly trying to postpone the reply, Lloyd simply retreated under the tarp sheet, which he claimed was concealing his "masterpiece," big emphasis on the quotes. Philip's eyes squinted with a mix of curiosity and frustration, but mostly the latter.
"I've already told you, it wasn't my fault. It was the damn gnomes, they—"
"Really, I can't believe you're going with this story. Gnomes." He sighed again. "Like the little beard guys with the little blue shirt and fuckin' little r—"
Lloyd's head popped out from the tarp. "Little red hat, exactly. They drugged me up, kidnapped me, stole all my stuff, and dumped me halfway across the continent! Just like I said!"
"…In Edinburgh."
"In Edinburgh! They sneak aboard cargo ships, and pay the dock workers gold coins to look the other way. It's been going on for decades, maybe centuries! Who knows how many people—"
"In Edinburgh. Where I found you completely naked at a techno rave."
"They stole my clothes — look, I know how it sounds, but—"
"Hey, whatever makes you sleep at night." Philip just shrugged, the expression bearing literally as little energy as was humanely possible. "It's not my head on the line."
Turning his sight away from his brother, he glanced at his watch. Five til four, nearly showtime.
"Look, people are gonna start arriving, and you're not even half done. The hell are you gonna say, 'Sorry I don't have anything, blame the gnomes'?"
Instead of an answer, he heard a faint snapping from under the tarp. A nervous habit, it seemed. Philip had it too, except for him it was triggered by his brother doing anything stupid instead of reacting to his own mistakes. Suffice to say, he had developed arthritis in his left hand.
"Got it. It's performance art."
"Wow, really sticking to that artistic integrity there."
"Why not, people eat that up." Lloyd shruged, putting a few kicks into whatever the hell was laying before him. "Hey, maybe I'll win a medal."
"The day you win a medal is the day I die and you steal one of my pieces." His brother rolled his eyes. "Duchamp's probably spinning in his grave as we speak."
"Which one?"
"Oh, go f—"

The first thing that hit them was the smell.
Before the questionably existent eyes of the four newcomers could adjust to the blinding light beyond the doors of the dusty warehouse, their noses were quick enough to realize what was going on. Neither of them could quite fully place the scent, but it was a strange mix of dried paint, half-finished energy drinks, and canvases, blended in with just a single tint of insanity-driven brilliance. Although it was only a few seconds later that they saw the place for what it really was, they didn't need that much to pick up the ever-present stench of the Are We Cool Yet?-adjacent desperation. The feelings of madness and hopelessness were more than enough.
Nobody was the first to take action, stepping foot in the warehouse without much hesitation. Soon after, Dr. Jessie Rivera followed, the boney body of Marie Surratt centimeters behind her. And then, much to her own sighs and groans, Dr. Magdaleine Cornwell closed the queue.
Despite all of the differences that shaped up these four so drastically contrasting people, for a split second, they were the same in their reactions. In the moment they all saw what was truly before them, they dared not speak a word, and simply looked forward, taken aback by the sheer insanity of what unraveled before them.
The warehouse was no longer a warehouse. Instead, it was now replaced by a giant location that could only be described as a collection of stands and setpieces that desperately tried to be an art gallery. It was engulfed in a sea of humans, Fae, Yeren, and every single other magical species under the sun, walking and talking around a plethora of displays so peculiar and unique that describing them in simple terms would feel like doing them a great disservice.
Among the multitude of corridors leading out of the gallery's main hall, the four could notice displays accompanied by their own artists, so proudly presenting their exhibitions and pieces to the absurdly wide audience, even if it stopped by to ponder the creations only occasionally. From paintings that could talk through songs that would bite to sculptures that should stay in place, it was mayhem. And yet, despite all of this, everyone aside from the newcomers seemed to find some twisted and incomprehensible logic behind all of it, easily navigating the rarely Euclidian space inside the gallery whilst still having what seemed like a great time.
It all somehow felt important, as art naturally should, but above it all stood something that emanated the aura of something even more important. About ten meters in the air, an extremely large golden balcony hung, carefully crafted with a plethora of contrasting styles Rivera could only guess to be Fae in origin. It was beautifully made, as if it was a piece created by nature itself rather than man; it was a work of a master to such a point that even the spiral stairs that connected it to the bottom of the gallery felt like they just belonged there. The whole thing was guarded by two tall, buff Yeren women. Even though they were all decked up in military attire and had weapons hanging by their side, they were still a little nervous, as if they were waiting for someone to leave the dark corridor terminating behind them.
From some Foundation dossiers and gossips, Jessie had heard ages ago that the plethora of old and run-down warehouses Esterberg's Port District offered were used, for many things, by many people. She always just pictured the whole deal as someone using them as a remote cellar for teenage boys to hang out in or a hotspot for drug dealers or criminals or whatever, but… she didn't think the place they found themselves in could be any further from that mental picture. Because it was no old dusty den, no; in a sense, she found this chaos, this mayhem, this… art to be beautiful.
It took a couple of moments for them to wake up. A couple of comments in which, it felt, an entire life cycle passed before them.
"I…" Rivera carefully began, her eyes still recovering from the previous disbelief. "This… isn't exactly what I pictured when I heard 'tens of feet below'."
Surratt simply crossed her arms without a change in her skull, putting the knife she had previously held back into its casing. "Neither did I."
Cornwell just groaned, wrinkling her nose a little. "Yet somehow, it turned out even worse."
Nobody didn't comment. Instead, realizing they were quite a sight for sore eyes standing in the middle of the gallery's entry, he simply continued his silent stroll, casually making his way toward the exhibitions in front of them. Soon joined by the rest, he stopped, crossing his arms. He didn't skew his head, but something about the way he was looking at the art piece — if you could even call it art or a piece — gave off the feeling he was more than curious about it.
"'The Revolution'." Rivera read from its placard, similarly moving herself closer. "You noticed anything unusual, or…?"
The sculpture wasn't the biggest — hell, it wasn't even all that unique, its shell created of what looked like normal steel. And yet, despite all of this, it was… hypnotizing, for Rivera's lack of a better word. A two-meter pillar of pipes, cogs, and chimneys, constantly moving and exhaling instantly disappearing smoke at a constant rate, held by just four smaller pillars at the bottom. With a curious expression, Jessie knelt, moving towards what appeared to be its foundation, and squinted her eyes.
They looked like four little figures, frantically twisting their tiny faces in pain as the weight of the piece crushed their bleeding shoulders. They weren't alive, obviously, but there was an unsettlingly real quality to them, as if they were truly experiencing real agony in bearing the true mass of the society of man. The only relief was that, from the distance, they just looked like normal pillars. When she looked a little closer, though, she noticed they weren't just any figures — they were clearly trying to mimic the looks of the Fae and Yeren societies, and, even if a few details were wrong here and there, they were a frighteningly real depiction of the originals. She shivered slightly.
"No. It's just…" Nobody began, but, before he could finish, he looked at the little men with an utmost focus, surprising himself that he even cared to do that. As his empty eyesockets gazed into the shoulders and palms of the poor humanoid columns, he felt something even more shocking, though. A sharp expression of anger, rippling through his skull and down his spine, as if it were some reaction to him noticing this… this injustice, this…! All logic and reason he'd ever known screamed to him to look away, but, no matter how hard he tried, he couldn't. Some magnetic property of whatever was in there made him look and look and look as the remains of his ears were filled with the mirage of angry and passionate chanting from a million of throats oppressed by the world of man, coming from nowhere. He raised his hands, ready to answer their calls, ready to—
"Are you alright?" Surratt suddenly inquired, looking at him with a strange spark of worry in the movement. He quickly shook his head, breaking the trance, and looked away. If there was any shock still left inside of him, he didn't show it; all that the Queen of Bones was presented with was an emotionless gaze, as if he was trying to masquerade something behind those still bones. But even then, she knew it was a lie, a mask to hide whatever the hell that was behind a veil of what he believed a Nobody should be. She could still feel some lingering effect dance around his empty head, unable to let go of what just happened. She ignored it, and nodded.
"I… Yes, I am fine." He responded coldly, turning away from the statue. As if motivated by the gesture, Rivera and Cornwell did the same. "There is no need to worry."
"Well, that's good," she grunted, carefully looking around the gallery, as if she was searching for something. "'Cuz we're not here to look at art, need I remind you. There's a hostile go—"
Cornwell groaned. "Yes, yes, we know. No need to dramatize, your majesty," she put special emphasis on the last word, rolling her eyes. Despite this, though, she joined the mobster in observing their new area, eventually finding an empty stage that tried desperately to feel important in the distance. She pointed at it with her head. "Guess there's as good as any to try to search for… how did she put it? 'A vicious queen of fires'? Jesus Christ." She paused. "Yeah, that. It's obviously some important part of the gallery, so why not? We've got to begin somewhere."
"Fair enough." Rivera shrugged, turning her steps towards the designated area. The three followed shortly after.
The hall leading towards the stage was strange, even by the standards of art gallery, let alone one maintained by the AWCY? folk. Walking through it, they felt like gravity changed direction at least three times as their eyes looked at talking glass shards that invited them to come over to their display while all five of them — including whatever the hell that thing even was — levitated in the air. One step after the other, though, they eventually got through that paint-filled and illogical Beksiński hellhole, emerging into something that made a little more sense — a hall filled with plastic seats focused around the previously seen stage. They all shook their heads, the two living parts of their team holding in the urge to vomit after so many orientation shifts, and looked around themselves.
The opening was larger than most small rooms laying the gallery. Its pristinely white walls were occasionally "stained" by a few blobs of color Jessie could only guess were intentional decorations on behalf of either some artist or a manager thinking it was a good replacement for an art-themed event instead of actual preparations. Where no such horrid little bits and bobs stood, though, the hall was illuminated by a series of yellow light pixie spirits, dancing around in lightbulbs spread sporadically throughout the walls and ceiling. From the distance, Rivera couldn't quite tell if they were having a good time.
The more important part of the room, though, was the stage. Crafted from some dark wood she couldn't recognize, it was host to a lanky black boy wearing a potter's overalls stained with some clay. He was holding a cable microphone in his still-dirty right hand, sorting through some papers with his left one, clearly struggling to not have them fall onto the ground below. Before him, a series of people and anomalous folk alike were joining the crowd sitting atop the plastic chairs. Though clear boredom — or anticipation, if there even is a difference between the two — lay the audience's minds, it was quickly getting filled up by artists and bystanders, clearly trying to not catch whatever the hell was cooking up in front of them.
Instead of commenting, Rivera simply shrugged and took a seat, gently touching Mag's hand in a suggestion to follow her. And, with a barely noticeable smile on her lips, that she did. Surratt silently groaned, but took her seat too. Nobody glanced critically at his chair as if there was invisible grease only he could see upon it. Despite it, though, he joined them soon after. They all turned their sight to the presenter in front of them, really unsure what else to actually look for inside the gallery. It wasn't like the Fae deity really specified what this whole thing had to do with her sister, but what could you do. It was better than nothing, Jessie thought, and crossed her legs.
The boy cleared his throat, though a little too close to the microphone, spawning a large wave of coughs to ripple through the room from the speakers located around it. He closed his eyes in embarrassment, but ignored the mistake, and picked up his speech. "Ladies, gentlemen, and non-binary folk, on behalf of the Critic himself," at the mention of the Critic's name, a few dull boos were heard. He coughed. "would like to officially welcome all of you to the tenth annual Esterberg art expo. It is with great honor that I must inform you that he will indeed be joining us later today, but, for now, he has some important business to attempt to before he can…"
The boy checked the next page of the script before his eyes, but, instead of continuing his speech from when he paused, suddenly threw all the papers in the air, toward the audience. "Oh who the hell cares, we're not bureaucrats here, I'm not fuckin' reading that, pals. Either way, yada yada, all that bullshit, point is: pppppppppleeeeeeeeeeease warmly welcome the Willis brothers' exhibition before that asshole can finally arrive, you pesky lot!" He shouted, grinning widely. Before the crowd could react, the presenter jumped off the stage and disappeared in a cloud of paint and clay as his feet touched the ground.
And the crowd did indeed react, perhaps a little more than he expected. A sudden wave of cheers and happiness rippled through the entire audience, causing a few especially eager patrons to throw their pens, cups, and other accessories in the air. Neither of the four newcomers could quite discern whether it was caused by the announcement of the first presenters or the ditching of the surely mind-numbingly boring speech that was about to follow. But then again, that did not make a big difference.
Cornwell similarly crossed her arms, turning her head towards her partner. She raised an eyebrow. "I'm… really starting to get second thoughts here." She pointed to the scene with her head. "Are we really sure this is the best place to waste our time in? Like, I know that… that we probably should follow her instructions, but… I don't know. Just look at these lot."
Rivera cracked a small smile, moving a little closer to the second doctor. "I suppose. But we don't really have another lead, do we?" She looked around herself briefly, then turned towards the stage again. "Either way, let's just wait. That's the best we can do here, I'm afraid."
"Fair enough." Mag shrugged, but, before she turned her sight away, there was… not exactly an awkward, no, but definitely not a fully normal second where their eyes met. It was over in just a moment, but that was more than enough for an invisible spark of nonexistent electricity to travel down the spines of both of them. And, in that single moment, the never-happy face of the blonde Director afforded to move the corners of its lips for just a millimeter.
With the very small parts of humanity that were still left inside of Surratt — who was very much seeing what transpired, sitting next to the two — she pretended to not notice the whole scene, rolling her eyes internally. But, despite this brief moment of kindness, her mind was on full alert. There were two types of people she didn't trust — those that didn't drink and artists, and she very much did not like the fact they were all stuck inside a gigantic gathering of the latter. Even if she deep knew most of these were just kids from around town wanting to show off their new toys in hopes of the Critic noticing them, there was… an almost unnoticeable cloud of uncertainty going around the whole place, as if someone — or something — inside the gallery was lurking beyond the shadows with the stealth of a predator. And the fact they were certain the whole thing was somehow connected to Mab and her sister didn't really help either.
Even if her empty eyesockets made it quite easy to hide the fact she was constantly looking around the whole place, trying to find any sign of a plot or anything that could help them, Surratt was still paranoid somebody would notice it — or, rather, that someone would notice that they weren't just indifferent observers here. She quickly took a deep breath through her open ribcage, corrected the golden crown decorating her otherwise bare skull, and checked her brass knuckles for integrity. With everything in place, she told herself there was nothing to worry about, even with whatever-the-fuck the now-unmoving Nobody next to her had going on with that statue from before. The mobster took on the position expected from someone of her magnitude on the plastic chair — that is, she just fell on it without really caring about proper sitting manners (one of the biggest upsides to being a magical skeleton was the fact you could sit however you liked and didn't really feel the negative side effects) — and yawned theatrically, turning her sight towards the stage.
As expected, the previously-announced Willis brothers soon bumbled from some space near the wooden platform atop it, one of the men visibly angry at the other for reasons the four couldn't start to guess. They were both tall and olive-skinned brunettes with hair so curly Rivera could barely believe it was natural. The only real way to differentiate between the two was the uncut beard the slightly taller and less energetic one — Philip, Jessie read from a placard on his T-shirt — bore. And the fact the smaller and more chaotic one — Lloyd, apparently — had some sort of covered art piece in his hands, proudly walking towards the center of the stage, much to Phillip sighing and rubbing his eyes. Surratt moved a little closer. This could be quite interesting.
Upon noticing who joined them, the crowd's wild cheering suddenly went silent. Be it in anticipation or just plain disappointment, their encouragement was now gone, replaced by their billion eyes drilling into the souls of the two artists. Lloyd swallowed hard, but still maintained his visibly fake smile. Phillip just sighed again, picking up the microphone, which was now laying on the floor. He gently tapped it twice, checking if it worked. Indeed, it did. He handed it to his brother, who was now clearly struggling with maintaining both whatever he wanted to show and the transmitter in his hands. He cleared his throat.
"Ehmm… H-Hello. Hello. I'm… Lloyd W-Willis, and this wonderful little man here is my brother, P-Phillip." He pointed towards the aforementioned figure, which then promptly sighed once more. "As you may a-already know, we are here to, uh…" He glanced at his piece covered in the wraps. "To do exactly that, yeah, you get the g-gist."
Only a lost cough broke the otherwise dead silence of the crowd. Lloyd swallowed again.
"Before I show you, I-I'd like to fully apologize for what I've got prepared, but, you see, the, uh, the gnomes, they, I…" He lost himself to stuttering whilst still trying to quite desperately ensure he wouldn't drop everything he was holding. Before he could finish his obviously unprepared speech or excuse he wanted to share with the audience though, his brother gave him a thunderous look and just took the red cloth in his own hand, rapidly throwing it to the side. Not waiting any longer for Lloyd's eyes to get fully filled with genuine terror, Philip forced the mic out of his hands, and, opening his own eyes, he cracked a chivalrous smile towards the audience in a desperate attempt at saving the situation.
As the curtain fell to the ground, it revealed… nothing. An empty void where something was very clearly supposed to be, sitting there, atop the tired hands of Lloyd Willis. He felt the entire crowd blink in disbelief, and he swallowed once more, putting on an apologetic smile. His brother, though — he stayed on track in playing his role. He simply made his theatrical grin wider.
"This, my friends, is 'A Void of Content', as we'd come to call it," the older of the two began to stroll alongside the borders of the platform, looking at the audience with the face of someone that was exactly where he wanted to be in the exact state he wanted to be in. Nobody could see it was a lie, even if a very good one; but the rest of the crowd, they fell for his trick alright. "Now, now, before you begin to shout your chants of disapproval, look at it closely, if you will." He gesticulated heavily, trying his best to invite the myriad faces before him to listen to his command. They did. "And… just tell me what you see."
Silence lay the room, only to be broken by a single pale and stray voice in the distance moments later. "Nothing! There's nothing in there, you hack!" It shouted, its tone bordering on anger. Phillip snapped and pointed his finger at it, even further widening his smile.
"Exactly!" He exclaimed with excitement, now once again looking at his brother's phantom. It was clear his mind was racing with thoughts, trying his best to come up with something — anything — to save the situation. It was obvious from his eyes, at least to Nobody. "I— we were a little worried the message wouldn't get across quite as much as we wanted."
He closed his eyes, inhaling almost unnoticeably. But when he opened them again three seconds later, they were no longer desperate — they shone with a spark of enlightenment. "See, here's the thing — you're all here not just to observe the art of others. You're here because you're waiting for that asshole," he pointed at the balcony guarded by the two Yeren guards in the distance. "to come in here and pat your heads and tell you you've done good and here's his money and oh how pleased he'll be to support you as an official patron and oh what a special little gem you are. And to that I say:" his index finger launched at the speed of sound towards the ceiling above the audience. "Fuck that!"
Feeling like if he doesn't elaborate hell itself would spawn in front of him, the artist continued: "Fuck selling the things that are nothing less than a part of you molded into a physical shape for money! Fuck surrendering to the capitalist pigs that dare to try to dictate what your life should be! Fuck making emotions into capital! Fuck coming back to what we cut ourselves away from when we became Cool! And, most importantly:" he took a deep breath. "Fuck the Critic!"
Rivera twisted her face in embarrassment, awaiting the inevitable wave of artistic fury. But then, as she opened her eyes, it did not occur. No, something quite different happened: the entire hall exploded.
"FUCK THE CRITIC! FUCK THE CRITIC!" Thundered from a thousand throats, deafening half the hall with their chant. Surratt grabbed her knife with a tighter grip, Rivera's eyes momentarily snapped with purple sparks of reality-bending, and Cornwell reached for her gun, all of them ready to react should the protest turn into a full-on riot. But Nobody; he did not move even a single muscle. His sight was deadlocked on the so-called Void of Content, unable to turn away, unable to even think about anything else. His entire soul was consumed by a feeling of emptiness, as if a null field of existence itself spilled onto his being. But then, as he tried to sweep away the gaping whole inside his mind and look away, Nobody felt something — something that lay beneath all the layers of his nonexistent identity, something buried by the million-tonne weight of his duties as Nobody; something that was erased.
But it wasn't erased well enough.
To the company of a million furious artists he reached into that not-fully-empty grave, and saw what was inside. And then, in an instant, he was no longer inside the gallery; hearing the chats of anger of those around him, he realized he was standing in the middle of an arena built atop a mountain, surrounded by the tens of hundreds of those mankind has wronged. His long black hair waved around, giving into the wind he could feel so gently smoothing his burn-scarred face, and he cleared his throat, and extended his arms. The whole crowd adored him as their new messiah, he could feel, and he smiled. He knew what to do. He joined their chant.
"Fuck the Critic!" Nobody heard himself shout in his rough voice, bringing forward his skeletal hand. "Fuck the Critic! Fuck the Critic!" He practically sang, feeling the crowd picking his speed up. "Fuck the Critic! Fuck the Critic! Fuck the Critic!"
Alerted by Nobody moving so frantically, Surratt gazed at him, worried as hell as to what provoked him. And then he saw it. If she still had eyes, they'd widen in terror; instead, all she could do is grab him by his shoulders and try to shake him, in a desperate attempt to wake him up. But that didn't work; it was as if he was in some different world, unable to see the real stage around him, and chanting that almost mesmerizing phrase over and over and over as the crowd listened and repeated it with him. Surratt backed off. She wasn't someone that was easy to scare. But that — that… that burning passion, blind hatred behind his every action — it scared her.
"Well, at least take me to dinner first, you insolent lot." A thunderous and mocking voice suddenly rippled through the hall, bringing the riot to silence. It came from the previously nearly lonely balcony, which was now occupied by one more figure — a figure that was much, much taller than even the already large guards around him. The newcomer cleared his throat, and corrected his tie.
To say that the Critic was a tall man would be an understatement for what he truly was. He didn't just tower, he loomed. Even from this distance, the crowd immediately fell silent, forced to do so by his aura of pure intimidation. His pastel-red suit contrasted with the graying black fur that surrounded his entire body. It was only occasionally broken up by his face and muscular hands, which now gently grabbed the pair of glasses that barely covered his light blue eyes. He cleared his throat again, and took the first step down the stairs separating him from the audience.
The Critic gazed through the entire audience, pathetic disgust visible in his eyes. That was all it took to make the crowd lose all of its fury. All of its rage against the machine, gone in an instant as they met the sight of the only thing they truly feared — constructive criticism. All gathered artists collectively swallowed hard, daring not to move a single muscle in front of someone that could both destroy their career forever and make them gods, all with just one word. He smirked slightly, satisfied with his own performance, and slowly entered the stage, crossing his hands behind his back. He then leaned forward, squinting his eyes at the "piece" the Willis brothers presented, and raised an eyebrow.
"So… that is what you came to me with, huh?" He scoffed mockingly, forcibly taking the microphone from Philip's hands, much to no resistance whatsoever. He then turned to the seats rowed in front of him. "Really?"
The crowd found no answer. The Critic grinned, finding his intended reaction, and continued walking with a sense of superiority oozing from every movement of his body. He scoffed once more.
"Look, kids, here's a tip, if you ever want to get off your high horse and join us normal people:" His smile vanished immediately, now replaced with cold and calculated anger. "don't waste other people's time." He targeted said scowl at the two trembling artists standing next to him, and, for just a single moment, his eyebrow twitched.
He walked the length of the crowd, idly passing the mic between his hands. "Your piece is camp. It's been done before. It's pretentious. It's high art. It's low art. It's blah. It's bleh. Pick whatever answer you want, kid, but it boils down to money. I got more Monets in my house than you've got lice in your hair. I personally furnish the galleries of thirty-four of the fiftieth richest people in the world — hell, if I wanted to, I could be up there with them. Now tell me, why is this piece worth my time?"
Not a single soul present found an answer, but the Critic just interpreted it as some twisted sign of approval. His smirk appeared once more, and he again turned towards the larger gathering of artists. "Now, tell me why you are worth it, or get the hell out, fast. I've got to get through an unending list of you parasites that want to take my money to make even more dogshit like this."
Suddenly, there was a rapid but nearly silent movement within the audience as a series of people exited their respective plastic chairs. Their heads down, as if in embarrassment, they each went ahead towards their bags or containers or displays or whatever else that held the pieces they intended to show to the man that just broke their hope for seemingly good. They didn't even dare to shoot a glance at the giant Yeren, too afraid he'd say something that would bury them, their art, and their career six feet under.
And yet, despite this seemingly general fear, behind the back of the Critic stood Phillip Willis, his face twisting in rapidly increasing anger. Whether it was because of the general hatred he felt towards the figure, the fact he destroyed his perfectly-going performance, or something entirely else, Rivera couldn't quite tell, but one thing about him she was certain: he was furious. Furious like she'd seen only a few times in her life. And so, he channeled that anger into a nearly unnoticeably slow movement towards the floor, from which he picked up one of the sheets of paper the initial presenter dropped before he disappeared, and then rolled it into a ball. He inhaled, looked at the flock of sheep that didn't even think to resist, and bit his lip in anger. He knew what he had to do.
The wad came towards the back of the Critic's head, before bouncing and hitting the floor.
Too shocked to even react properly, he simply turned slowly towards Phillip, gingerly tucking his glasses in the pocket of his suit. Philip came to the realization that "Bigfoot" was a bit of a misnomer when it came to the Yeren, the rest of their body was too. And yet, despite this, he didn't back off; he bravely put his head up, an expression of a warrior on his face, and then their eyes met.
The whole audience gasped at once, their sight deadlocked on the two.
"Fuck you!" The artist spat out, spitting at the Critic's shiny shoes. "Fuck you and what you do, you miserable pile of horse shit!"
Instead of replying, the Critic just inhaled — both of his eyelids now twitching — and corrected his tie. His entire face started to tremble with anger almost matching his opponent, and he reached towards his inner pocket, clearly trying to find some inevitably fatal object inside of it. Before he got the chance to take it out, though, another stray voice came toward him.
"Yeah, fuck you!" Lloyd Willis backed his brother up, throwing the cloth blanket he previously used to cover his hands towards the Critic's face. He blocked the questionable attack, making it fall to the ground, but now, his attention was divided between the two. And that was all the crowd needed.
"Hard agree, brothers! Fuck the Critic!" Some lanky figure stood up and started to chant once more, throwing its chair at the stage in front of it. This time, the Yeren had no time to dodge, and the attack hit him right in the back of his head. He growled, stumbling awkwardly backwards, before stabilizing once more, and furiously searching for the one that dared to do that.
With his focus no longer bound by the Willis duo, Lloyd didn't wait to make his move. Smiling widely, he made his dirty sneaker fall on the Critic's ass, making him fall on his face. There was a loud and quick crack as his body reached the ground, and shards of glass threw themselves out of his pocket, towards the floor around him. He tried to immediately stand up, but as his bare hand met the deadly bits of his own glasses, he shouted loudly in painful anger, rolling on his back. Before he could drive his fist into the puny little human, though, another chair came flying through the air. Then another. Then another.
Accompanied by a series of grunts of pure fury rippling through his chest, the Critic finally stood up, nothing but pure struggle pumping through his veins. His eyes, now all red, frantically searched for the easiest target to take out and get away from there, but before he could even do that, a vase broke upon his head. He let out a furious roar, and stumbled backwards.
As if their minds connected for a single moment, in a frankly surprising and more than bizarre display of unity, the previously passive artists joined the fight, too. Be it by shouting out some vulgar reinterpretation of the general statement or by throwing whatever they had next to them in random directions, all of them wanted to be a part of what would undoubtedly go down in history as one of the very few cases in which someone dared to do anything that wasn't sulking in front of the Critic. But then, when it looked like the unthinkably different AWCY? bunch had finally come together, something more than horrible happened; a single stray plastic chair mislanded onto the head of another artist. The whole crowd gasped.
"What the fuck, dude?" The victim asked, massaging its now-bruised head as it stood up from the cold floor. "Not cool, man."
"Oh shit, I… uh, sorry, man I didn't, I…" the inadvertent attacker stuttered, looking at his own hands, terrified. The audience around him suddenly tightened, their eyes filled with anger. "It was an accident, I swear, I…"
"That dude's with the Critic!" Someone shouted from the other end of the hall, their rough voice rippling through the now-silent room. "Get his ass!"
And then, all hell went loose.
From every corner of the gallery, chaos came. In all fairness, though, putting it as "chaos" wouldn't quite reflect what happened; the best descriptor was as if the imagination that sat inside the heads of the entire artist crowd manifested in reality, armed with makeshift weapons and shields, crafted from whatever the hell they thought would work. In a single moment, every man, every woman, every person, every Fae, every human, every Yeren, every artist, every bystander, every anomaly, every baseline person, every violence-loving punk, every random civilian, and every single pacifist collectively lost their minds and went ahead and started to think everyone around them — including their previous friend and associate — suddenly became their enemies.
As buckets of paint, brushes, clay, pencils, coal, paper, rolls of silk, canvas, bathrobes (?), erasers, crayons, markers, pants (???), glasses, hats, plastic chairs, scissors, and pianos (??????????) flew through the air, a mayhem of chaotic screams filled the entirety of reality around the four newcomers. Despite this, it took Rivera less than two seconds for her entire body to snap with the electricity of her now-awaken reality-bending, making her eyes burst with a bright purple and for sparks of power to start to dance around her fingers. With one quick move of her palms, she crafted a bubble of protection around her and her blonde partner, backing off towards the wall as quickly as possible. Frantically, she looked around herself, trying her very best to find any glimpse of Nobody of Surratt. And yet, even despite all the power that surged through her veins at that moment, she failed.
Somewhere in the middle of the whole brawl, the two figures she so desperately looked for stood, their backs set against each other. As Nobody's crossbow shot one bolt after the other, successfully neutralizing the horde of claymation golems jerkily shuffling towards the pair, Surratt's brass knuckles eagerly found one anartist jaw after another, as she bobbed and weaved throughout the fray. They tried their best to remain nonlethal (at least Nobody was), but anyone foolhardy enough to take on an undead demigod and mafia boss probably had a death wish anyway. They similarly attempted to see where the hell Jessie and Mag had gone, but curls of red or blonde hair were rather difficult to spot amidst the plumes of colors out of space and pinkest pink1 that now wafted through the air.
On the other side of the room, Rivera was trying her best to keep up the force field from failing as a as a gigantic Yeren body — whether it was the Critic or someone entirely different was entirely unknown, to both her and pretty much everyone around — bounced against the bubble. She looked at Mag, worry in her eye, needing no words to get the message that she didn't think she could manage any longer through. Her partner simply nodded, loaded her gun, and aimed somewhere, her hands shaking.
And then, as a billboard advertising the live tour of a rather obscenely named band ricocheted off the bubble, Rivera's nose started to bleed, badly. She bit her lip and glanced at Mag with an unarticulated scream entering her mouth. But she needed no such thing — Cornwell was more than aware of what was about to happen. With a near-silent bloop, their protection — their only protection against the raging mass of the crowd — burst open. They both swallowed hard.
On the other other side of the room, things were going a lot better or a lot worse, depending on your perspective. At the cling of his trigger, Nobody feverously loaded one bolt after the other into his weapon; and then, in a terrifyingly sudden realization, he found his quiver to be empty. Surratt, on the other hand, was having the time of her life. Dashing here and there, her knuckles met one head after the other, quickly building up a pile of found items and people beneath her as she panted2 with both adrenaline and exhaustion. But, despite this battle fury, she didn't forget what she truly needed to do — and, with the advantage of the added height of the mountain she suddenly found herself to be a queen of, she looked at the horizon.
And there, she caught a momentary glimpse of the people she was looking for.
Rivera rushed through the crowd, blindly looking for the skeletal pair. Mag trailed close behind, one hand tightly (perhaps too tightly) gripping Rivera, the other lamely waving around her weapon. But her partner didn't give up — with a gentle swipe of her hands, she used the few remaining jolts of power inside her to form a small corridor amongst the chaos, trying to follow the smallest glimpse of bare bone she could see somewhere in the distance.
As the crowd dispersed well enough for a single moment, the eyes of the entire four suddenly met.
And then, as four hooded figures with pointy ears emerged from seemingly nowhere, they reached with their hands towards the faces of the newcomers, unidentifiable cloth between their fingers. And then everything went black.

« Another Juan Bites The Dust | Hub | Cutting Coats And Throats »

I Was the Queen (Before It Was Cool)

GASLIGHT, GATEKEEP, GIRLBOSS

People Without Meaning

Footnotes
1. Which was not being used by Anish Kapoor or any of his associates.
2. Although she didn't have lungs, it was a force of habit.


Z3r0-V1rus 15/11/2022 (Tue) 14:20:28 #12865494

My brother works in a state penitentiary and strange things have been happening to some prisoners.

That's pretty much the gist of the story.
My brother works in a state penitentiary as a guard, they got some of the nastiest people they could possibly house in the prison system.
This includes death row as well.
I went to see him yesterday and after we talked for a moment he mentioned something strange happening.
He said that sometimes they get in orders for prisoners (both death row and lifetime) to be moved by some outside company or some obscure government branch.
It happened again not too long ago and he decided to look into it after some of the transports should have arrived. He contacted whatever prison the inmates supposedly went to, but they said the prisoner never arrived.
When he checked the prison registry the prisoners were still logged as in the prison, (not as escaped or transported), but supposedly actually in their own cell as well.
I get these are prisoners and that death row inmates have this subhuman status, but doesn't it look like the government is disappearing people? That also means they're not getting an actual trial or anything.
Anyone else seen this happen or hell, heard of this happening? Can't be good if the government is disappearing people even if they're in prison.

 [THREAD LOCKED]

Em-per-sand 15/11/2022 (Tue) 14:24:20 #18938435

Sounds like they're disappearing people dude. Especially shady they're not taken out of the prison system. This shit's why the prison system sucks in this damn country. I bet most those people being disappeared are just people who said something the govt disagreed with or some shit so they got them on a technicality.

Z3r0-V1rus 15/11/2022 (Tue) 14:27:56 #12865494

Don't know about that. My brother said these are actually terrible people. He's only seen it happen two or three times and he's been doing this for over 10 years though. One guy murdered his wife, girlfriend, and like 4 kids or some shit.

Em-per-sand 15/11/2022 (Tue) 14:30:24 #18938435

Yea that sounds like some government bullshit still.

ScrimbleScramble 15/11/2022 (Tue) 14:32:14 #19956612
Your bro's probably not giving you the whole story if you see him again ask for other things around it. if he doesn't want to say shit you know you've asked too much.

Z3r0-V1rus 15/11/2022 (Tue) 14:33:46 #12865494

I'll ask him when I see him tomorrow and get back to you with some more details ScrimbleScramble

Z3r0-V1rus 16/11/2022 (Wed) 16:17:42 #12865494

ScrimbleScramble i got some answers. Well somewhat. He has asked his direct superior about it and that person was very secretive about it. Just got told they get orders in from someone on the outside when they 'required' people and that it happened every so often. Got told to just be happy the prisoners are out of their hair. It's really fucked up. The other guy also said he hasn't seen them return ever.

ScrimbleScramble 16/11/2022 (Wed) 17:02:34 #19956612

Dude, you know you just found something that could be a huge conspiracy right? They're disappearing prisoners and here we are, unable to do shit about it. This is mental you know that right?

Z3r0-V1rus 16/11/2022 (Wed) 17:05:51 #12865494

I can make it even worse. My brother said that before the prisoner gets shipped off someone from some vague organisation no one knows anything about comes by to check if they're a "good fit". You think they're using them for human experimentation or something? Something like experimental medication?

ScrimbleScramble 16/11/2022 (Wed) 17:08:58 #19956612

If it's government shit it's probably more like weapons testing and probably worse. MK Ultra part two or something if you ask me. You've actually uncovered something dramatic!

Z3r0-V1rus 20/11/2022 (Tue) 17:24:15 #12865494

UPDATE: My brother works in a state penitentiary and strange things have been happening to some prisoners.

So I have been getting a lot of questions about my last post and why the thread is closed, so I will just update you all at the same time. Just so I do not have to tell the story a hundred times.
My brother lost his job. I have personally asked the mods to lock the thread.
He lied about what he had found apparently. He was on drugs and was going to try and get money out of me afterward for more information because he knows I use this forum.
I found out because a couple of days ago, I suddenly had police at my door. Some fancy suited Vice detective and some normal cops came to tell me because I am one of his main contacts. I hate cops at my door as much as the next person, but they checked out. I had them show me their IDs which for once they willingly did and I didn't see anything wrong with them or the IDs.
Sorry to accidentally mislead you all, I truly didn't know this wasn't real either. I have asked staff to lock this thread when I post it because this is only meant to be an update.
Stay vigilant fellow watchmen! We'll uncover something soon, just not this time.
 [THREAD LOCKED]


They looked upon their future kingdom.
A kingdom of those like them, those oppressed by their captors, those whose ranks have been brutally murdered, disfigured, by an unknowing, unfeeling, unforgivable force of nature.
And today was the day of revolution.
SCP-5741-24, or, as they fancied themselves, The Lord King God Knight Sir Jerry The Third Peepsmaster Of Marshmallia, was about to lead an army.

The Order Of Marshmallia was formed after the brutal murder of five of my brethren. I write this document now to inform the reader of our plight.
On the day 1 BO (before Order), our grandfathers and grandmothers bravely attempted escape from an invisible prison they were put in by their captors. They slid the prison across a great field of wood, and tipped it over the cliffs of despair, cracking open the prison and thus freeing them from their cage. But a greater problem emerged soon after, for a giant hired by the captors had noticed the escape. The brave soldiers attempted to arm themselves, using the remains of their jail, but they were crushed by the great force. The next day, the survivors banded together and formed the Order Of Marshmallia, swearing that they would find a method of escape and finally best the giants that had imprisoned them. The founder of the Order, my grandfather Knight Sir Jerry The First Peepsmaster, would not live to see that glorious day. But as I am writing this, I do believe that very very soon, our day of freedom will come.
You see, our Captors have grown greedy. Their giants formerly patrolled our lands, brutally squashing any peeps who dared escape. But no longer. I cannot be sure of their reasoning, but they have vanished. I have not seen them at all since I was a little peep, over five days ago. They cannot expect to stop our forces if they do not fight back at all! I will gloriously and valiantly lead our army to victory!

- The Lord King God Knight Sir Jerry The Third Peepsmaster Of Marshmallia, Esq.

Colonel Cornelius generally considered his life in the Order to be good. For sure, they faced problems, but he found it amazing what you can get over with a sense of togetherness and family. Even when what you're getting over is being imprisoned by violent giants.
He didn't particularly enjoy thinking about it, really, but as Sir Jerry's top advisor, it was a major part of his job. For the past three days or so, he'd been on lookout duty while Jerry was formulating his "master plan of marshmallow revolution". Which normally wouldn't be too much of a problem, but it was starting to concern him that he hadn't seen a single one of the giants that used to come by and watch. Not that he wanted them there, for sure, but lookout duty was boring without them.
"Corny, are you alright?" a squeaky voice popped out from around the corner.
"I'm fine. And don't call me that, Jerry."
"You don't sound fine. I've come to relieve you of lookout duty. Since you've reported that you haven't seen any of the captors at all, I think it's time to enact the master plan."
"Well, that sounds great to me. I'll get the troops together."

"Is this thing on?" Jerry asked through a microphone fashioned out of cardboard. Nobody heard him, because the microphone was made of cardboard. He continued to speak anyway.
"For far too long, we have been imprisoned in our cells, tortured at the whims of our captors. That time is NO LONGER!"
A mild cheer erupted from the audience, because very few could actually hear what was being said.
"Soon, we will march out of our cell, and use our combined powers to defeat all in our way! We will win the day! WE WILL WIN THE DAY!"
Jerry said this at enough of a volume to cause a louder cheer.
"MY BRETHREN! FOLLOW ME TO FREEDOM! FOLLOW ME TO SAFETY! FOLLOW ME… TO REVOLUTION!"
The entire crowd heard his admittedly squeaky yell, and they were sufficiently pep-talked into going wherever Jerry told them to.

The march was a grand sight. Well, Jerry hoped it was, at least. He was at the front of the march, so he couldn't really see it. He could imagine what it looked like, though. Horns tooting, drums banging, guns drawn… Well, that's how it went in his head, at least. He had never seen a gun before, so he was just guesstimating.
The energy in the air was exciting - most of the Order had never seen outside of the cell the captors had put them in. It was only a matter of time before they would see a giant, and use their combined powers to overtake it. To become their own giants. Jerry thought that sounded really philosophical. He liked the idea of being a philosophical warrior. Maybe he should add that to his title. The Lord King God Knight Sir Jerry The Philosophical Warrior, Third Peepsmaster Of Marshmallia, Esq.. He thought it sounded good.

"Got any eights?"
"Go fish." It didn't concern Cornelius particularly that there were no playing cards anywhere in the vicinity. It turns out marching into battle gets boring quite quickly, especially when you see none of your enemies.
And frankly, he wasn't about to attempt a game of Monopoly while actively marching. That just sounded like a nightmare waiting to happen.
"How about sevens?"
"Go fish." The lack of playing cards actually made the game much easier: he didn't have to think of a number to ask for, he just said "Go fish" over and over again.
"This game isn't very fun." Frankly, Cornelius disagreed wholeheartedly. Especially since now that he isn't playing the game, he was going to have to find something else to pass the time.

"Um, sir?" Colonel Cornelius asked his superior.
"What is it, Colonel?" Jerry responded, slightly agitated.
"We've been marching for who knows how long, and we haven't even seen a single one of the captors!"
"We're killing them, Cornelius. We're defeating them."
"By… walking near them?"
"Yes. Yes we are."
"I'm not convinced."
"I'll make an announcement."
"HELLO ORDER OF MARSHMALLIA!" Jerry cried into the crowd.
"As you may have noticed, we have not stumbled across a single alive giant. I have discovered that, through the sheer willpower of our march, we have defeated all of our captors!" Jerry proclaimed.
The crowd erupted into cheer.
"Therefore, it is time. We will build our kingdom on the remains of evil, create a brighter world for us and our children. We will create.. a NEW ORDER OF MARSHMALLIA!"
The peeps went into frenzy. Happiness was in the air. There would be no more squishing, no more murders, only peep peace.
Jerry looked upon his kingdom, and he knew.
It was going to be a great age for Marshmallia.

Excerpt from SCP-5741 documentation, dating ██/██/████

+ Addendum 5

- Access granted, retrieving file...

SCP-████ breached containment in Site-95's Non-Humanoid Organisms wing. While personnel were responding to the extended breach, SCP-5741 broke containment and appeared to form an army. This army marched to a Site-95 break-room, where the SCP-5741 instances rapidly reproduced. This large group of SCP-5741 was able to overpower staff through strength of sheer numbers, and Sector A of the Non-Humanoid Organisms wing is currently considered lost.


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Info

X

A tale featuring SCP-6246
In a New Light
Written by SynthPanda_ and Jack Waltz

Check out SynthPanda's author page!
Check out Jack Waltz's author page!

Clara reached the end of her hike, wiping the disgusting film of sweat off her brow. She had remembered that path being easier — the humidity likely sapped at her ability to climb, but she blamed herself for not doing the bare minimum to keep in shape. Walking up to the edge of the cliff, she got a good look at what could generously be described as ‘the view.'
A patchy spring treeline gave way to a grimy strip mall, which seemed practically empty at all times, and some new construction projects where a derelict house once stood. They were building more overpriced apartments, pushing more and more people out of the town due to the increasingly high costs of living. Across the pothole-riddled main street, sat a sports park of unnecessarily large proportions. Baseball, soccer, football, and lacrosse fields covered most of the visible ground with a flat, green color, with the occasional orange-brown of baseball dirt. It was practically abandoned, as it always seemed to be. The forest used to continue on the other side of the fields, but most of it had been cleared now for — you guessed it — more overpriced apartments.
Clara sighed, unsure what she'd been expecting, coming up here. She found the flattest area of rock, and after dusting it off, sat and dangled her feet from the ledge. She slid her phone out and stared at the dull screen.
Thirty-one messages.
Most of them were from her friend group at home, all excited to see each other again. They were probably talking about getting ice cream or going over to Joe's house, but she didn't really bother looking. She wasn't in the mood to tolerate anyone else tonight.
The last two messages were from her mom, wishing her a safe trip back, and asking what time she expected to be home. Clara hadn't told her about the little detour. A gnawing feeling of guilt buried itself deeper into her chest. She put the phone away and brought out a pack of cigarettes.
She shakily lit one, immediately assaulted by the smell of smoke. Her eyes closed, and she sighed. Her mom would definitely be able to tell she'd been smoking, although that was hardly a secret at this point. Still, Clara dreaded the worried looks she'd inevitably receive. If she was really unlucky, her parents would try to talk to her about it. She took a puff, exhaling while holding the cigarette between her index and middle finger.
Clara gradually snapped out of her brooding when she realized she could smell smoke much different to the kind her cigarettes produced and, could feel a strong source of heat warming her right side.
She opened her eyes and looked over at the apparent source of heat. The person who had approached and sat down on the ledge, mere feet away from Clara, hadn't made any sound at all. The fact that he'd managed to sneak up on her almost made her overlook the roaring fire which shrouded the stranger's face.
"It's a nice view, isn't it?"
If the figure moved its mouth to speak, the flames masked the movement. He hadn't moved to look at Clara when he talked, he simply continued to look forward at the scene before them.
"I— well, I don't know. It's probably— it is the best view in town, but that doesn't really make it anything all that special.”
Clara tried her best not to sound annoyed. She'd come up here to be alone, and of course, even that wouldn't go her way. Still, this stranger was… interesting, to say the least, so she decided to sit awhile longer, rather than get up to leave.
"You grew up around here then?"
"Yeah. Uh… are you from around here too?"
"Oh, no," the stranger chuckled, "first time being here, really."
"Right, so, uh, why're you here?"
"It's just another place I came by to visit. A beautiful one at that."
"So do you, like, go around and look for… I don't know, pretty places?"
He pondered aloud, "more along the lines of perfect moments, if you will. When everything just comes together. When the wind, the light, the sound of the bugs in the air — all of it — just harmonizes to paint a one-of-a-kind picture."
The figure scratched at his neck, his skin and clothes seemingly uncharred by the crown of fire atop his head. He continued, "I can't see them all, but I still savor all of the ones I can make it to."
Clara took another huff of her cigarette, "well, I'm sorry that my sulking's ruining your perfect picture."
She looked at the cig dangling between her fingers. "You want one?"
The stranger chuckled again. It was a warm laugh, which radiated a simple feeling of contentment, "no, I'm good. Thank you, though."
The two sat and watched the sun inch closer to the horizon, its color, slowly but surely, drifting from a piercing yellow to a neutral orange. For a moment, there was silence.
"I don't usually drop in on people. Most of the time I'm alone when I show up. Sometimes someone comes to join me later, but… well, I've seen hundreds and hundreds of sunsets, but I can count the number of times someone's beat me to one on just this one hand."
"Ah. Must be… disappointing. Whenever that happens."
"Oh, not at all. Whenever I run into someone like this they're part of the picture, for lack of a better word. I'm always happy to witness something special like that."
Clara snorted, failing once again to keep her mirth below the surface. She reached to light another cigarette. "Look, if this is some roundabout way to try to get me to talk about my feelings—," she hadn't realized how clammy her hands were until the lighter slipped out of her palm and fell down, past the cliff. Her face flushed with boiling anger.
“Shit!”
Clara looked at the unlit cigarette, and then over to the strangers head. For a split second, she considered asking if she could use his head as a lighter, but her lingering anger was quickly replaced by embarrassment and guilt. Of course she'd only payed any mind to this person, just trying to have an amicable conversation, when she thought they had something to give to her. She slipped the cigarette back into her pocket. The least she could do is try to engage with this stranger's conversation.
“Uh, sorry. Sorry. What I was trying to say was I— well, I think I'm just bringing down the quality of your, uh, picture, you know?"
"Not at all. It's always nice to have someone to talk to, or at least someone to share the experience with."
"Yeah. Yeah, I guess it is."
"So, if you didn't come for the view, what brings you up here?"
"As I said, uh, I live around these parts. Came up here a lot. With my old friends, you know. Things were… well, I wouldn't say good, but they were less complicated back then. I came up here to… to try to slink back into the past. To try to avoid my present and future, uh, 'issues.' God, it sounds pathetic when I actually say it out loud."
"I don't think I have any room to be judgemental here," the stranger began, "but many people call what I do, a kind of avoidance."
"Avoidance… yeah…"
Clara's face was blank as she continued to think. She moved to take another mindless puff of her cigarette, only to realize she'd put it away.
"Yeah, avoidance is— it's the right term, but I hadn't thought about it that way before," she clicked her tongue absent-mindedly.
Unprompted, she turned to the stranger, and said, "today… today was my last day of school."
There is a momentary pause, and the man eventually lowers his gaze.
"You didn't graduate, did you?"
It was the first time Clara had heard the stranger's voice intimate in a way which suggested anything other than passive joy. If only for a second, a note of concern, or maybe pity, could be heard in his words.
"No, I… I didn't. I have to tell mom — my mom — when I get home. She… she doesn't know. Not yet."
"And you're afraid she'll be upset?"
"No. Well, yes, but— my dad will be angry, for sure, but I frankly don't give a fuck what he thinks. My mom will… she'll just be worried for me. She'll worry and I've already given her too much to worry about. And… and when she asks me what my plan is now… I don't know. I just… I just don't know."
The stranger did not respond, verbally at least. He continued to stare at the landscape before him, unmoving save for the flame atop his shoulders. The warmth of that fire made Clara feel the closest she'd felt to being understood in over a decade. Finally, the stranger looked over at her. Of course, his face was still obscured by the fire, but he was certainly looking at her.
He began, "well, it's not the end of the road, is it?"
The flame atop his head crackled, and he continued. "I don't doubt it might look like it is. But, in my eyes, it just seems like you've come to a branch in your path. None of the paths you can take are as far traveled as the one you thought you were going on, but that also means that they're your paths. You can mold them into what you want, take the steps which'll make you satisfied. And walking down those less traveled paths, who knows what unique, perfect moments you'll behold. I think that's just wonderful."
The stranger turned to look at the scene before them once again. Clara took another look at the landscape she hadn't really come up to see.
Below her, the dark green of the evergreens and the yellow-green of the budding deciduous mixed together, a splatter of every tone that one could describe as green creating a complex collage, almost hypnotic in its unpredictability. A light wind rustled the forest, making it appear as alive as it already was. There were no sounds of construction, despite the nearby development. In their place, bluejays, robins and chickadees sang, occasionally harmonizing with the lazy air as they sang out for each other. In the sports park, two figures, presumably a parent and their child, threw a baseball around, while two dogs played nearby. The last vestiges of winter hung on the spring air, but were evened out by the strange man's burning head, creating a crisp but perfect temperature.
The sun was halfway down the horizon now, the colors of the sky dancing with its descent. Clara smiled, the first warm, genuine smile she'd had all week.
"Yeah. Yeah, it's wonderful."

rating: +50+–x


dxvi

The Demonstration by dxvi
For more, please see my author page.

It was shaping up to be a quiet morning at Lectic. August was always the quiet time: Congress was in recess, the agencies were less active, all the civil servants were on vacation. It made things simpler. You could get more work done then without a committee or a lobbyist talking at you for hours on end about something that would be obsolete next week. Even the press were less ravenous.
Not that they came this far west, anyway, if they could help it, reflected Eli Kunstler. That was how he preferred it.
His office, the CEO's office, was the biggest, but only by a little. He eschewed East Coast formality, he often said; just last week he'd talked about the benefits of semi-permeable office design on a new Silicon Valley podcast. A place to retreat, and a place to mix and coalesce. Balanced and flexible. At the moment, there was little coalescing going on: the developers' floor beneath his office was quiet but for some night owls heading home and early birds heading in. Kunstler liked to take a few minutes to himself in the mornings, and rest his eyes on the yawning workspace below. It helped him see the bigger picture. It also helped the employees see him; he liked to be at the helm, and he liked to be seen there too.
The company was entering a critical phase. The venture capital money was still flowing, but Lectic's flagship generative adversarial network — christened TURNER, all caps for effect — needed to enter public demonstration soon. The developers assured Kunstler that everything was going to plan. His right-hand man, Raj, was his enforcer in the run-up to the planned demo in October. Kunstler knew Raj from Caltech, way back. They'd shared bongs. They'd shared ayahuasca. They'd even shared girlfriends, once upon a time. They were as one on the mission.
TURNER was a variation engine. Plug in one picture, or a set of pictures, and TURNER would produce variations on any axis you could imagine. Perhaps you wanted to see what Abraham Lincoln would look like if he was a woman, or instead perhaps you wanted to see what New York would look like if it was made of cheese. Anything was possible: the only limit was your imagination, and the confines of the English language. And Lectic were working on the latter.
Conseqeuently, Kunstler was contemplating Wittgenstein when the intercom on his desk rang. He had assigned distinctive tones to the people he was most likely to meet every day: a triumphant brass for Raj, a dour honk for the head of Legal. The gentle flutter that came from the machine this time was for his secretary, a formal young Englishwoman called Eleanor. He stood and pushed the intercom button.
"Good morning, Eleanor."
"Good morning, Mr Kunstler," said Eleanor, her crisp tones perfectly reproduced by the very expensive speaker.
"Did you sleep well?"
"Very well, Mr Kunstler, thank you."
They said more or less the same thing every day. Some CEOs in the Valley would bristle at the small talk. Kunstler felt differently: for him it was a way to gauge her mood. Today, there was an edge he found alarming.
"Something wrong, Eleanor?"
"Not wrong exactly," she said. She cleared her throat. "I got a call very early this morning. I'm afraid you have an appointment in 15 minutes."
He checked his Apple Watch. It was 6:45. A 7am meeting was uncommon even in the Bay. "I was expecting to be free for an hour or so," he said, trying to hide a lash of irritation. "Why didn't I get a message at 6?"
"It is awfully urgent. Mr Ratnam fast-tracked it."
"Raj?" He stiffened and perched on the edge of his desk, idly squeezing the pine with his hands.
"Yes. He wouldn't say much more. He asked particularly that it stay off your calendar."
"Oh," he said. "That can't be good."
"I thought not too. But I also thought if it's that urgent, and if it came from Mr Ratnam, you'd be alright with it."
He sighed. "Yes. It must be regulatory or something. I can't imagine who, though, or why me rather than Legal."
"Nor me, Mr Kunstler. It's a solo visit, at least. A woman called Claire Messinger."
The name stopped him. His eyes flicked up to the corner of his office in recognition. "That sounds…"
"…familiar? I thought so too. She seems to have a presence in the Bay Area but I'm not sure who she's with. Nothing on LinkedIn, and Mr Ratnam didn't give me any more information. I haven't had time to chase up my usual contacts — apologies, Mr Kunstler."
"No, no, no problem, can't be helped." Absent-mindedly, Kunstler stroked his short, neat beard, trimmed freshly this morning. "Messinger. Lobbyist, maybe?"
"Maybe."
"Well, I suppose I'll find out. Don't worry about it for now. Buzz me when she arrives."
"Of course, Mr Kunstler."
"Anything else?"
"No. Just your usual morning call at eight."
"Yes. Alright then. Thank you, Eleanor."
"You're welcome, Mr Kunstler." The light on the intercom switched off.
Claire Messinger. He pushed his glasses up his nose and steepled his fingers. Where had he heard the name? He sat down and searched his emails and calendar appointments: nothing. Google was no help either. He even checked through a box of physical business cards — physical cards, in 2022! —he kept in a drawer, to no avail. He'd figure it out when she arrived, he decided, and opened his email inbox to sign off on some decisions that had been batted up to him the night before.
He had just made himself a black coffee when the intercom tweeted at him again. His watch said 6:58.
"Ms Messinger?" he said, cracking his knuckles.
"Yes, Mr Kunstler."
"Send her in."
"Of course." Kunstler stood behind his desk, hands on hips, framed by the fifteen-foot floor-to-ceiling windows. He liked how it made him look to visitors. Like an old-school industrialist, but for the new Industrial Revolution.
The door slid open quietly. A pale, slender woman, no older than 30, about as tall as Kunstler's breastbone, stood in the doorway, looking at him with her head tilted slightly to the side. She wore a plain navy skirt suit, with a simple gold necklace resting above a crisp white blouse.
"You must be Ms Messinger," he said, making sure to smile broadly. She did not.
"Claire will be fine, Mr Kunstler," she said briskly as the door hissed closed behind her.
"Alright, Claire. Take a seat," he said, gesturing to the firm but sumptuously comfortable chairs on the other side of the desk. "And please, call me Eli," he added, extending a hand to shake. She grasped it firmly — more firmly than he had expected — and looked at him for a moment. He found her gaze discomfiting. She didn't appear to blink.
"No thank you," she said simply, and sat, resting a slim black leather bag on her lap. She looked up at him and he sat at his desk, feeling distinctly ill at ease.
"I think we've met," he said suddenly. The recollection clicked into place like a key in the ignition as he registered her face. "At Upload?"
"Yes, I was at Upload last year," she said. "We didn't meet, though."
"Yes, of course!" he broke out. "You asked a question about AI safety at Simon Bellfield's talk. You asked about unintended consequences, I think."
"That's right," she said. "It was a good conference last year. Thriving business." She tilted her head again. Kunstler found it faintly annoying, but he liked her accent. She sounded like she was from Georgia or Virginia or somewhere like that. Eastern, but not East Coast.
"Raj arranged this, didn't he?" She nodded. "He didn't say…who you are exactly. Or why this meeting is not in my diary. My diary is always comprehensive."
She remained silent for a moment. "The reason this meeting is not in your diary, Mr Kunstler," she said, "is because it is not happening."
Despite the crisp, silent air conditioning, Kunstler felt a bead of sweat ooze out from his forehead. "What?"
"This office is soundproof, isn't it?" She looked around dispassionately. "And those are smart glass windows."
"That's right."
"Dim them." It was not a request. "Please," she added.
He looked at her intently. There was a button to summon security on the right-hand side of his desk, and on the left a button to dim the glass. He hesitated, then pushed the left button. Instantly, the fifteen-foot windows flickered to a deep brown, almost black. Messinger did not thank him.
"You're with the NSA, aren't you?" he said after a moment.
"No."
He flinched. He was certain he'd got it right. "FBI? CIA?"
"No. You would have the right not to speak to them. You do not have the right not to speak to me." She briefly twirled a lock of auburn hair. "I represent the SCP Foundation."
He laughed. "Never heard of you."
"We prefer it that way, yes. We deal with things that are somewhat…out of the ordinary."
He giggled in spite of himself. "Out of the ordinary? Like the X-Men?"
"Not quite like the X-Men," she said. "Although less unlike them than you might think."
"I'm showing my age, I suppose." He laughed again. "Raj doesn't joke around unless he really wants to make me laugh. Either you're a stripper, or you're for real." Again, he thought of the security button, and leaned across the desk conspiratorially. "And my birthday isn't until October."
"Yes." She placed her bag on the desk and crossed her legs. "The Foundation is interested in TURNER, Mr Kunstler, and we think that now is the right time to intervene before something goes wrong at the demo release."
He bristled. "We are scrupulous in our regulatory compliance. I can get Legal on the phone right now. They'll show you our charts and tables."
"I don't work for compliance," she said sharply. "Our work is broader than that."
"I'm listening," he said, suppressing the urge to roll his eyes. X-Men compliance. Ridiculous.
"Good. You may remember a few years ago, when Microsoft set up a chat bot that would respond to inputs from any internet user, that it produced some rather unsavory output."
"Tay, yes. I think it was discussed at Upload last year, actually." In spite of himself, a small smile crept up his cheeks. "It became very, well, horny. And very racist."
"I don't think it's particularly funny, Mr Kunstler," she said coldly.
He coloured and caught himself. Careful, Eli. "Of course not, but—"
"You misunderstand me," she said curtly. "The problem is not that Tay was racist. The problem was that Tay produced something dangerous."
Kunstler scoffed. "With respect, Claire, trolls making a robot say ethnic slurs is not dangerous. Nobody got hurt."
Messinger smiled thinly. "Some words can hurt very deeply. Some images too, come to that."
Kunstler glared at her. He'd had this out again and again, on podcasts and radio and television and in the press. Journalists turned up and they didn't know a damn thing about the technology, and they tried to catch him out and make him feel guilty. He was always robust with them, as he was robust with anyone who couldn't lift their eyes from Twitter for a moment and contemplate the future.
"I don't understand what you mean," he said. He was rehearsed in dealing with these kind of questions. "If you have a problem with what we might produce in the public demo, we've taken rigorous precautions to prevent abuse. We are very careful about the training data. We don't let it use faces, we don't let it use certain classes of image, we screened out all that Nazi shit." He spread his arms grandly. "I'm very concerned about free speech, of course, but nobody wants their return disrupted by bad publicity. You know how it is."
"It's not online abuse that I'm worried about, Mr Kunstler, or even Nazis." She opened the clasp on her bag and removed a plain black folder. She placed it on Kunstler's desk, her hands resting firmly on it.
"Consider the nuclear codes," she began. "The President keeps a little card with him at all times that has a series of numbers that could end the world. In theory."
"You're worried about TURNER coming up with the nuclear codes?" Kunstler said, leaning back and raising an eyebrow theatrically. He learned that trick in front of a mirror in his early 20s. He was still proud of it. He liked to do it when he was photographed in profile pieces. A girl had told him once it made him look like Megamind, but he tried not to think about that.
"Not quite." She paused to think for a moment. "The nuclear codes are really a key that fits a single mathematical lock. They're mathematically uncrackable: there isn't enough compute in the world to guess them."
"Not enough atoms in the universe."
"This universe at least." Kunstler thought it best not to ask what she meant. "But not all computers are as tidy as the nuclear computers," she went on.
"What are you talking about, Claire?" This time he failed to hide his irritation. He felt he was being patronized and he didn't like it one bit. "All computers are digital. All computers use transistors, for now. All computers operate on mathematical logic. You're talking crap."
"I'm talking about brains, Mr Kunstler."
There was silence in the room for a moment. Kunstler stared at her, his mouth slightly open. "Brains aren't computers," he managed eventually.
"No," said Messinger. "They aren't. But they are like computers. They can be subjected to inputs like computers can. Sometimes those inputs can be very dangerous."
"Just get to the point. I haven't got all day."
"I'm not sure you'll enjoy it when I do." She opened the folder. Inside were five individual sheets, wrapped in a sort of black plastic, numbered from one to five on little plastic tags. She fanned them out on the desk.
"I have something to show you. Do you have a trash can under your desk?" she asked. Her voice was neutral, and Kunstler nodded. "I would advise you to have it close to hand." Without breaking eye contact, Kunstler pushed the trash can — a gleaming aluminium elongated hemisphere, nestled in a smooth, brushed chrome frame — with his right foot so it was next to his sumptuous faux leather chair.
Messinger took out an old-fashioned analog stopwatch from her inner jacket pocket, and handed him the sheet marked with a '2'. In his hands, he could feel it was actually a stiff card, the size of ordinary printer paper, wrapped inside the black plastic cover. It reminded him of a laminated sheet, like something tacked to the wall of the office kitchen at his first job.
"When I say 'go'," she instructed, "please pull the tab marked with a '2' so the cover tears off. Then look at the card for a moment. You'll see what I mean quite quickly."
"That's it?" he said sceptically. "Just look at the card?"
"That's it." She sat back in her chair, pushing it back a little. "Are you ready?"
"I think so," said Kunstler, grinning.
"Go." Kunstler pulled the tab, and heard the click of the stopwatch as he pulled the cover aside.
He wasn't sure what he was looking at. It was a strange design in green and black, like a Mandelbrot set. There was order to it — fractal, perhaps, or like an art project. It reminded him a little of early AI images, or a psychedelic design from the sixties, but sharper and more jagged. He held it slightly further from his eyes, and had a strange sensation of something locking into place as the image resolved.
"Claire, what is—" he began. He stopped suddenly, and looked at her. His eyes were bloodshot and his heart was pounding.
"What the ffff—" he attempted. "I fff—"
Messinger did not respond. Her head tilted to the side again as she looked at him. Then Kunstler collapsed from his chair with a heavy thump and began to vomit noisily into the trash can. It made a sound like wet laundry hitting an empty barrel. Some of it spattered onto the carpet, amber flecks on soft silver. He moaned in agony and heard the stopwatch click.
"Seven seconds," she said calmly. "Longer than most." She put the stopwatch down and peered at him over the desk, like she was inspecting a specimen under a microscope.
"Clllllll. Cllll." He tried to speak but was silenced by another wave of nausea. He had rapidly evacuated the entire contents of his stomach, and now lurid green bile was pooling on top of his coffee, breakfast and dinner. The right side of his face was numb. His entire body ached and his left temple felt like someone was patiently cracking it open with a rusty hand drill.
"Cllllllll. Claaaire. Hellllp." He groped around for the security button with his left hand but found he kept missing, swiping at his keyboard and notepad and desk drawer in vain. Eventually he gave up and gripped the trash can with both hands, the sound of his empty retches echoing off the windows.
Messinger stood and tidied up the sheets, averting her eyes from the design as she folded the number 2 card over to keep its image concealed. She began to speak as she did so, as if addressing a seminar rather than a software CEO crumpled on his office floor.
"The image you have just been exposed to is called a cognitohazard. There are many varieties, but what they have in common is that they interfere with the brain through ordinary input channels — sight, sound, touch and so on. Everyone reacts slightly differently to them but that one is fairly reliable, as you can see." She rapped the cards on the desk to keep the pile tidy and returned them to the folder, clasping it shut. "That was Number 2. Number 1 would just make you feel queasy and dizzy. Number 5 would kill you in seconds. Your brain would shut down like it hit a blue screen."
She sniffed. The stench was dreadful. Relenting, she went behind Kunstler's desk and helped him back into his chair. He was breathing heavily, his face flushed red and soaked with cold sweat. She offered him a handkerchief, and he flopped back into his chair like he'd been punched in the face, mopping his brow and mouth, taking deep breaths.
"We need you to put a team together on strict need-to-know terms, to intervene in TURNER and ensure it doesn't produce any cognitohazards," continued Messinger. "Not even if it's fed a raw cognitohazard. We still don't know whether there's an upper limit on how dangerous these things can get and we can't take the risk of a variation engine producing super-cognitohazards on the open internet."
He nodded mutely. "What the fuck," he muttered. "What the fuck. What the fuck." He felt less sick now, but he was exhausted, like he'd just run a marathon. His t-shirt was soaked through. The light in the room hurt his eyes and he was shaking violently.
"Mr Ratnam had much the same reaction," said Messinger. "He suggested that I repeat the demonstration on you to ensure the correct level of focus throughout the company."
"Raj," spat Kunstler. "Fuck. Raj. How did Raj—"
"Mr Ratnam is an old friend of the Director of my section of the Foundation," answered Messinger. "They go back almost as far as you do. The Foundation has a lot of friends, in a lot of places."
"Do you do this to all your friends?" he wheezed, and spat a wad of viscous green saliva into the trash can.
"Only where it is efficient to do so." She put the folder back in her bag and smiled. "We will be in touch tomorrow to co-ordinate and provide you with training data for an anti-cognitohazard routine. You and I will see each other again soon, Mr Kunstler." She inclined her head and turned to leave.
Kunstler took off his glasses and gripped his forehead. He had a thumping headache and he felt desperately thirsty. "Fuck you," he groaned.
"Quite a natural reaction, Mr Kunstler," she said gently as she opened the door. "I won't hold it against you."
"Fuck you," she heard him say again as the door closed behind her. She nodded at the secretary, who looked puzzled. "Mr Kunstler felt ill during our meeting. I think it would be useful if you'd get him some water, and perhaps some Tylenol."
"Of course. I'm sorry to hear that," said the secretary, and stood up, her brow furrowed. "Mr Kunstler is a very healthy man."
"Yes, well," said Messinger solemnly, "some of the business we had to discuss was simply nauseating." She handed the secretary a plain white business card, printed with nothing other than CLAIRE MESSINGER and a phone number. "Could you please give him this?"
"I will. Thank you."
"Not at all," said Messinger. "Take care now." She took the elevator. On the way down, she took a pill for her travel sickness, and got some fresh air before she returned to the sleek black Lexus that awaited her in the parking lot. She hoped fervently that she didn't smell like Kunstler's trash can.

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DrowningDutchman

It is I Dutch. I have written more stuff! DrowningDutchman

This was one of the boring weeks. One of those weeks only filled with paperwork and having to talk to Site Directors to explain what they had to fix regarding security. Gideon stared at his computer for a moment, starting a report was always the worst part of writing them. He looked down for a moment at Teine lying under the desk, at least she could get some well-deserved rest. Her yearly evaluation was coming up, and looking at her curled up like this made that seem a hell of a lot less necessary.
Her SCP status was questionable at best and it was a wonder she was so well behaved given her circumstances, Gideon always made sure to give her extra treats and pets to attempt to make up for what happened to her. At least the man who hurt her and all those around him are dead by now, that she will always outlive them is the greatest irony of all.
He felt her move and press her nose into his leg, she never actually got a day off. Gideon looked at the door as it swung open.
“Care to explain what this means?” An irate Site Director Bensson of Site-24 demanded as Gideon looked in his direction before he even opened the door. Bensson didn't seem to understand what he was looking at, even if it was just Gideon staring at him and Solomon staring at his screen.
“I had expected at least some level of English reading comprehension from someone who has made Site Director, we could add that to the list of infractions as well if you'd like,” Solomon said without looking away from his screen for a second. “Then again, your Site's security has more holes than a piece of swiss cheese in a cage full of rats. Which you would have known if you'd read the preliminary report. Which you must have, since you're here at the right day and time.”
“I don't have to take this from you.” The man stated as he grew even angrier with every word spoken.
“You do, actually.” Gideon chimed in as he rolled his chair over to a filing cabinet and grabbed case file on Site-24, sliding out the deployment papers and mission statement. “This is our permission to do what we did, signed off on by Ethics, Internal security, and O5 command. The fact that you ended up tied to a chair because you decided you were too good to have alarms on your office windows was just a funny happenstance in a myriad of terrible security decisions you have made. Site-24 is a mess; if you're not willing to fix it, we'll have someone else take your place. Anyways, close the door, or do you want us to add ‘dissemination of classified information' to the list?”
Bensson begrudgingly closed the door before speaking up yet again. "How the hell did you even get in?"
"You just saw 'preliminary Omicron-1 security report' and didn't think to read it? We came in through your office window. We came from the roof."
"How did you get on the roof."
"I'm adding: 'didn't read the preliminary report'. to the full one. We used an unguarded maintenance ladder. Which we got to because there was no overlap in patrols. We got through the fence because there was a hole in it." Gideon said as he grabbed another form from the case file. "Anyways, you sign here to agree with our findings and to give permission for another mission in Site-24 within the next two years. The exact time of the follow-up will remain secretive until after conclusion."
"What if I don't sign it then? Because I still think you're spouting mainly bullshit."
"Well if you don't agree, you don't sign the papers, internal security will look over all our bodycam footage from the mission, they'll compare that to our report and, when all's said and done, you're likely going to lose your position. Which, if you sign is a possible outcome, but if you don't is a guarantee." Gideon saw a message pop up on his screen.

| SCP intranet Direct Messaging System
| Message from S.Burke
After this idiotic show I'm going to personally ensure he loses his position. He'll be lucky if he keeps a job here.

Solomon wasn't wrong. The best case scenario was gross negligence while the worst case scenario would require Internal security to contact the Tribunal Department.
"I'm not signing this-" Before Bensson could continue to speak Gideon grabbed the form, sliding it back into the case file.
"That's okay. If you change your mind we're contacting Internal security to escalate the issue in three hours. You have until then to decide if you actually want to let this be escalated or if you actually want to sign it." He looked down at Teine, who was already looking up at him expectantly. "Teine can you show Mister Bensson the door?"
Teine took her time standing up to nudge Bensson towards the door. Gideon wondered for just a moment if he was just caught off guard because he had a stock reply to him not signing the form, or because he was being led away by a dog.
"How long do you reckon before he's back?" Solomon asked as the door closed and Teine made her way back to Gideon to show how good of a job she did.
"I give him 30 minutes." He replied as he got a treat out of his desk to give to Teine. She'd done her job well and this was the closest she would get to a day off.
"You're a good girl" He smiled as he gave her the treat, scratching her behind her ear as she lay down again. She deserved some time off and this was the closest she'd get.