A walk in the land of the nameless.

The gentle flapping of wings catapulted her awake.
Her eyes shot open, darting from side to side in the pitch black void she found herself in. It was cold. Her arms instinctively shot up to cover herself as she began to shiver, their movements accentuated by the familiar sound of splashing water. Wherever she was, it was somewhere damp.
When had she fallen asleep? The last thing she remembered was correcting some errors in the anomalous objects log during lunch before everything went dark.
She looked up in desperation, finding only… no… There it was.
A pair of wings, easily identifiable as a Queen Alexandra's, opened and closed a distance ahead. They glowed in the ever-present darkness, beckoning to her. She could almost hear it calling her over.
She got up, weighed down by the liquid. Moving was difficult, as whatever liquid she had found herself in was about knee-deep. Every slosh brought her closer to the winged insect, which became more and more insistent upon her approach.
"Come."
Its voice was like nothing she had ever heard before. It was androgynous and wore an unfamiliar accent. Concluding she must be in a dream, she followed and it led. It led her through caverns made of the night itself. It led her through the bitterest of colds. It led her through time immemorial. It led her to the light.
She emerged, taking a moment to adjust her eyes to the light.
A forest of dead trees greeted her, twisted branches grasping towards the sun without a single bit of green in sight. The grass crunched beneath her feet, its dull orange colors weakly withering before her eyes. Not a single bird was singing. There was no gentle rustling of squirrels in the treetops. Nothing seemed to be alive.
Nothing but herself and the butterfly, which rested on the gnarled fallen trunk.
A cold wind gusted by, revealing a path made of stone. She folded her arms tightly, enduring the bitter cold through chattering teeth and shivers. Her companion fluttered its wings once more, starting along the path. She would follow, just as she had before.
She walked through winding paths dizzying to behold. She walked through tall patches of dark, dead grass. She walked through a patch of pumpkins, all of which looked at her with judgmental eyes. She walked for years, but the orange sun did not move.
She walked until the grass became green.
There, in the distance, she saw a tree. An oasis in the desert, dawn breaking dusk. Its leaves were vibrant and green, its trunk was sturdy and healthy, and there was life surrounding it. Her guide abandoned her, flying towards their destination with haste. She followed suit, only to slow her pace at the sight of what hung from the tree.
Hundreds of men and women, all with their eyes closed were gingerly held aloft by soft vines and branches. Bonnets, caps, kilts, and cheongsam, each was dressed like a painting or picture in a history book. She swallowed.
"Greetings, seeker."
The familiar voice of her companion called her forward.
"Hello? Who are you?"
"A friend of a friend. Would you like some tea, wanderer?"
She hesitated, unsure of what to do. Deciding to err on the side of caution, she slowly approached the base of the tree. A plain table and cover awaited her, alongside a simple chair and cup. The lepidopteran sat opposite to the chair on the table, its wings slowly moving.
"Yes, thank you."
A long and smooth branch moved from behind her, carrying a wooden teapot. It poured the boiling contents of its pot into the wooden cup before a second and third branch approached. They rubbed against one another, dropping a number of nettles in the hot water. The first and third retracted, leaving the second to stir the green liquid. By the time she took a seat, the nettles had been cleaned off the wool cover and the branch had retracted.
"Please drink while it is hot. I insist."
She took the cup into her hands, gently cooling the liquid with her breaths.
"Where are we?"
"The place between places."
"Like, some sort of pocket dimension?"
It laughed. "If you wish to call it such."
She shifted in her chair. The cold air and voice of her winged friend were rendering her uneasy.
"What is your name?"
"I'm afraid such a topic is taboo, inquisitive one."
They sat in silence. She sipped her tea. It was bitter.
"Why… why am I here?"
"You have been selected to carry the torch."
She stared. It sighed. No matter how many times it explained, they never understood.
"A long time ago, when the forests were young, the hunters sealed me and mine away in the woods of darkness. They cut down everything in their path, leaving only this." The luscious tree rustled gently in the wind, the dormant bodies of its offspring's guardians swaying gently with the breeze.
"To enter the green forests again, they need one from the land of trees to hold open the door. Such will be your duty."
She thought of her job. They would not permit such a thing. They would imprison her. She would become like the beings she worked to keep from others. She would not abide that.
"I-I-I'm sorry, but I don't think I can do this. I need to go."
"Please stay. I insist."
The branches of the tree began to close in on her, each bringing one of the previous gatekeepers. She screamed. The branches wrapped around her waist, dragging her up towards a male. He wore a lab coat, similar to hers. He wore a beard. He wore a brown cap.
She stopped screaming.
Her eyes went wide.
"Doctor Kondraki?!"
He turned to her, his eyes and mouth shooting open before erupting into butterflies with black, leathery wings. Again, she screamed. Everything went dark.

"Zyn… Zyn… Zyn! Wake up, sis!"
She was catapulted from her sleep, hyperventilating and spilling papers from her desk everywhere. Mark, her brother, chuckled at her startling. He leaned down to pick up the fallen documents and was quickly joined by his sister.
"Jeez, Zyn. Riven was wondering where you were!"
"Sorry, Mark, I just… I fell asleep and…"
"I know. It's okay, sis. Don't worry about it… But hey, when was the last time you took a vacation?" He got up, dropping the papers onto Zyn's desk in a neat stack. She got up and took a seat on her rolling chair, thinking deeply.
"You know, it's not a good thing if you really need to think about it that long." He chuckled.
"You're probably right. I had the weirdest dream though…"
"You can tell me and Riven about it at lunch. Also, we need to schedule you a day off when we get back."
The two left Kiryu Labs's computer room under the watchful eye of a Queen Alexandra perched atop the internet router.

More From This Author

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Uncle Nicolini's Works

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Abraka David's Proposal •

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Tales/GoI Formats

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Moon Champion's Cinco de Mayo Extravaganza •

Being Dzhey Evervud •

Masquerade's End •

Faeowynn Wilson's First Tamalada •

Zetetic Bulletin: The Myth of the Wu Xing Iris •

The Remains Of The Day •

What Came After •

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Dark was the night, cold was the ground. •

Project Proposal 2014-1221: "Finally Waking Up" •

An Epitaph For SCP-173 •

Who Wants To Live Forever? •

Other

Sciptember 2022 Art Highlights •

Ode To The Unknown Author •

uncle nicolini author page •


Interrogate /ɪnˈtɛrəɡeɪt/
verb
"Ask questions of (someone) closely, formally, or aggressively."

Anterograde /ˈantərəʊɡreɪd/
adjective
"Directed forwards in time."

"We're up out of the pit?
"Yes."
"Good. How are we gonna to be starting this?"
"Level One. As per protocol. There is no pressing need to leave anything out."
"It always ends up the same, though. We might as well jump to Three or hell, even Four, really get 'em motivated to help."
"No. We must give them a chance. And of course do our best to avoid… repercussions. We are not short on time, after all. Ha ha."
"Yes, yes, you're very funny. A little repetitive, but… well, you can't help it, right? No? Alright, fine, we'll stick to One for this now. Won't make a difference, but fine."
"I will prepare the equipment. The Containment staff will likely detect our presence shortly."
"Fine. We'll get 'em to send for the target as soon as they establish communications. Oh, and if this is how we're playing it, please note for the record that Level One Coercion's been started. We'll begin… ooh, fairly momentarily, by internal chronology."
"Noted."
*click*
"…Hello. It's so good to finally meet you. Would you mind asking your friends out there to give us a little more privacy?"

Researcher Gregor Siczybski placed a cup of hot coffee on his desk, sat down, and pressed the well-worn button that would dial up Site-54's management AIC. He'd never quite trusted it — her, rather — but as a data storage solution it was infinitely better than the dozens of stacks of sheaves of paper they had over at 38. Digital anomaly quarantine was all well and good, but the novelty wore thin after no time at all. No, for all the Site's faults and quirks, he'd much rather be here than there. Much rather. Definitely. No doubt about it.
Except…
Except, of course, things were off. He couldn't pretend they weren't, not any more. Things here were objectively, undeniably, weird. Not good, quirky, laugh-about-it-after-work weird. Scary weird. "Things that go bump in the night" weird. "Child found disassembled in crib" weird. And it wasn't even the obvious scary-weird you sometimes get at Sites like this; there was something very subtly awry about the place. Sometimes it would be as little as a creeping déjà vu, slight enough that he could put it out of his mind — other times it would be the noises keeping him up at night, or the endless reports of unrelated anomalies that danced and weaved their way around a few central themes that lurked just outside of his perception. He ran his fingers along the edge of his desk nervously, tracing out patterns in the wood that were still unfamiliar even now, months after his first assignment.
«Good morning, Researcher Sic-sy-be-ski. Today's date is the 22nd of December, and the time is 9:15 a.m. Would you like to view today's schedule?»
"I- Oh! Helen! Right, uh, yes, schedule. Yes please. What fun have I got in store for me today?"
«Your jobs for today start at 10:00 a.m., when you need to supervise the decontamination of Chamber 8; a job which should last up until 12:30 p.m. Following this, a-»
He cuts her off. "Disable conversation mode, please. If it's alright by you." Of course it's alright by her, he remembers. She's a computer. Still… "It's… off-putting when I can't see the person talking to me."
«Noted. Disabling conversational interface. Continue schedule reading?»
"Yes, please."
«12:30 p.m. to 1:30 p.m.: Lunch break. 1:40 p.m. to 3:00 p.m.: Oversee D-Class transfers. Also to complete: Standardise documentation for SCP-7112 and AO-09356, submit resource request forms, submit personnel transfer form for Junior Researcher Randall, investigate auditory peculiarity in Chamber 4, archive documentation for AE-23400, submit approval form for-»
The voice cuts out mid sentence, pausing momentarily before being replaced by an altogether more human one.
«Greg?»
"Y- yes?"
«It's Julie, from Prelim. We've got some people in here demanding to see you.»
"Me? Why the hell do they want me?"
«If I knew, I'd tell you. Get down here as quick as you can. They don't seem to be hostile, or even anomalous beyond the basic weirdness, but I don't want to take chances. You understand, right?»
He understood. Mumbling something vaguely affirmative, Gregor gulped his coffee, spluttered as the far-too-hot far-too-sweet liquid seared the back of his throat, shrugged on his coat, dabbed futilely at his shirt with his sleeve, and sprinted through his office door.

"Jesus, it's dark in here. What do you mean 'out of sync?'"
"Spatially. We seem to be accurate temporally."
"How far?"
"Twelve metres. Perhaps fourteen. Decreased displacement in the vertical axis, terra relative."
"Vertical a- Oh! Ohohoho! Oh, that's nice; I daresay we can use this to our advantage. Can have been using. Will have been able to have used? I dunno. We'll get it out of him eventually?"
"Yes. It will not take long. Relatively speaking. And it would not perceptibly matter if it did. We are not short on time, after all. Ha ha."
"Hah! I didn't know you could tell jokes! This little job might even be bearable. Alright, kick us up and back a little. Up into the chamber, I mean. Back to the landing time."
"Huuuurgh. Hggghhnnnnn."
"Yeah yeah. Heard it a thousand times before. We'll be back soon for answers, don't you worry."

Ten minutes later, breathless and sweating in spite of the snowdrifts outside, Researcher Siczybski is standing stock-still on the wrong side of a containment chamber's airlock, staring at the wrong end of a short black tube.
There is a certain undefinable property of such tubes that has, throughout history, come to suggest that they are capable of taking a small and inoffensive object and burying it deep in the flesh of anyone unfortunate enough to be in front of it. The thing facing Gregor now was far too angular and thin to be recognisable as a normal firearm, but nevertheless, when the tall grey-faced stranger gestured nonchalantly towards the Researcher's forehead, the rest of the interview team had filed out. None of them had seen it during the initial checks, they swore. God only knows how he (they? It?) smuggled it in.
Regardless of how they (Gregor mentally settled for the neutral pronoun) did it, they had it now, which meant normal protocol was out of the window. He knew what to do; keep them talking until backup arrives, and — if possible — find out what they want. They always want something, even if it's just attention. If that failed, there was always the dropout system: eight heavy metal chains, ready to release at a moment's notice and send the chamber and its contents smashing down a thirty-foot-deep shaft, followed by several tonnes of fast-drying concrete. A crude, but altogether effective system.
Gregor makes the mistake of absentmindedly adjusting his spectacles, and feels the hair on his neck sizzle as a rosette of soot blossoms on the wall behind him. He looks up, and the grey-faced stranger's partner smiles.
"Hello. It's so good to finally meet you. Would you mind asking your friends out there to give us a little more privacy?"
He looks like a cross between a hobbit and Frankenstein's monster — a huge, livid scar ran down his neck, chasing his jugular, and his eyes are mismatched black and blue. Gregor blinks. "I- I don't-"
"Oh, please, don't be nervous. We're not going to hurt you. We just want to talk. Everybody's after something, and we're after- oh, come on. That's hardly the most surprising thing we've done, is it?"
"How did you know-"
"You say the strangest things when you're asleep, my friend. When you're unconscious, anyway. Totally 'out of it', as the kids say. And is sleep really anything more than voluntary unconsciousness? I'm sure I'd be able to cite that viewpoint, but Webster won't return my calls." He pauses. "Would you agree?"
"I… suppose."
"Wonderful! Then, if sleep's self-inflicted unconsciousness, you were asleep, and it is ever so slightly less intimidating that I know your private musings — although no less creepy, I must admit. Now. Privacy, please?"
Gregor looks up to the chamber's security camera, hesitates momentarily, and nods. Almost immediately he hears someone outside swear loudly, and watches as the flashing green light on the microphone blinks off.
"Thank you. Far too often people try to be clever and get their pals involved, and that's just more clean-up for us."
"What do you want."
"Ooh, straight to the point. I like that in a man." He grins lecherously, revealing a set of brass-plated teeth, the left half of which are filed to needle-sharp points. He runs his tongue over them, visibly drawing blood, and Gregor feels himself retch internally. "My name is Mr. Sharp. I work for people not too far removed from your employers. My partner, who I believe you have mentally catalogued as the grey-faced stranger, is… Blunt. In every sense. Especially in the sense of 'Blunt instrument', or 'Blunt force trauma', although I suppose 'gunshot wound' would be more accurate in the latter sense. You don't like to get your hands too dirty, do you my friend?"
"I am willing to resort to other methods should the situation require it. Firearms are simply the quickest means to an end."
"See what I mean? Blunt as ever."
"You didn't answer my question, Mr. Sharp."
"Greg — can I call you Greg? I'd love to consider us friends — you are far too eager to cast suspicion. We simply wish to acquire information."
"About?"
Instead of answering, Sharp pulls a stuffed yellow bear from the bag on his shoulder. "Do you recognise this?"
Gregor stiffens. "It's a bear."
"Astute, my dear, but not entirely accurate. This is a probe, as you very well know. And I believe you know the whereabouts of many more like them. You are Level 4, correct? The only such staff member at this facility?"
"I… can't help you."
"Are you sure?"
He stiffens further, and finds his eyes wandering to the not-gun. He whispers something.
"I'm sorry, what was that?"
He gulps. "Y- yes. Yes, I'm sure. I can't help you."
"Oh." Sharp looks genuinely hurt, tears brimming in his eyes. "Well, I'm sorry for wasting your time. Come on, Blunt."
Their partner nods, pulls a square of twisted metal from their suit pocket, and presses a long finger deep into the centre: deeper than should be possible given that it was only a few centimetres thick. There's an awful surge of energy, Gregor feels his hair stand on end, a small fragment of the universe turns inside out, and suddenly

everything

is

not

"Level 2?"
"Indeed."
"Goody. Let him remember us partially. No names, no motives… just that we exist, and we have the capability to blow his brains out. Oh, and the hobbit comparison was good. Keep that. I've always fancied myself a bit of a Martin Freeman type."
"Micheal."
"What?"
"He was named Micheal Freeman."
"Since when?"
"Eleventh correction before we left, first divergence. Unintended collateral damage. Too minor to try to resolve."
"Hmph. Guess it doesn't matter. You could've told me though."
"We-"
"I said it doesn't matter! God, you're incessant sometimes. Anyway. Level 2 Coercion. Beginning… now."
*click*

Ten minutes later, breathless and sweating in spite of the snowdrifts outside, Researcher Siczybski is standing stock-still on the wrong side of a containment chamber's airlock, staring at the wrong end of a horribly familiar device.
He couldn't pinpoint where he knew it from, but his heart was weighed down by the sickening certainty that, if he made any sudden movements, he'd experience the rest of his life from the perspective of a thin black scorch-mark.
"Hello, Greg. It's so good to see you again. Would you mind asking your friends out there to give us a little more privacy?"
"Have- have we met before?"
"Not before, no. But it would be accurate, I suppose, to say we are… acquainted with each other's presence. Now, make them leave, otherwise my partner here will vaporise you from the waist down."
"Who are you?"
The man chuckles, revealing a mouth half-full of razor-sharp teeth. Blood trickles from the left-hand corner of his mouth, and Gregor retches internally.
"Don't be cocky, friend. I'd much rather we talk in private. Getting rid of witnesses is so tiresome."
Gregor nods hesitantly towards the security camera, and someone outside swears loudly. Not long after, the hum of the chamber's monitoring devices is replaced by a throttling silence.
"Good. Now, to answer your question, my name is Mr. Sharp. My partner is Flat, in the sense of being featureless, dull, and… absolute. Incredibly unimaginative, but very good at what they do. Realistically speaking they could get the information we want entirely on their own; I'm only here because of my sparkling personality."
"You want information then."
"Of course, my dear! We want to know the whereabouts of…" Sharp pulls a yellow stuffed bear from their satchel and tosses it through the air. Gregor catches it instinctively. "These. And don't lie to us. We already have firsthand verification that you know where they are."
"That's… impossible. I'm the only one here who knows about them, besides Hogue and Randall. Pao took the easy way out two months ago and returned to civilian life. Hogue-"
"Is incredibly loyal, yes. And of course Randall thinks the world of you. He's looking after your darling baby boy as we speak." The colour drains from Gregor's face, and Sharp laughs brightly. "Oh, don't worry. They're safe. Unlike some people, we don't tamper with children unless absolutely necessary. Their brains are so malleable, and temporal rewriting can be so tricky, can't it?"
"You're… you're time-travellers, then. Fine. I- I should have expected this. Are you with Xyank?"
Sharp laughs. "That hack? No, we've got most of him locked up two millennia from now."
"They were very interested to learn of our existence. I imagine the novelty has worn off by now."
Both men turn in surprise to Flat, who smiles faintly, as if revisiting a pleasant memory. "Picking their brains has been quite educational."
"Yes. Yes, I can imagine. Anyway." Sharp gestures towards the bear in Gregor's arms. "Are you going to tell us?"
"Do I have a choice?"
"Yes! Yes, of course you have a damned choice! Jesus Christ! We'd hardly be going through this charade if you didn't!"
"Then… then no. No, of course I'm not going to tell you."
Sharp wrenches the not-gun from Flat's hands and lets loose a blast of energy in Gregor's direction. He feels a stinging sensation in his leg which quickly blossoms into a horrendous, roaring pain. He falls forwards as his vision blurs, and, as he turns, briefly sees fragments of what looks like bone embedded in the wall behind him. Above him, Sharp grins.
"What about now?"
"Ngggh."
"Can I take that as a no?"
"Hnnnghhhaaaaah."
"Moan once if it's a no."
"Aaaaahhhgggh."
"Good enough, Flat?"
"It will be satisfactory." They glance at a square of metal in their palm. "We can start Coercion Level 3 immediately, if you would prefer."
"That's the best thing I've heard all cycle." He clears his throat. "Noting for the record, Level 3, etcetera etcetera. Let 'er rip."
The last thing Gregor sees before the world turns inside out again is Sharp's boot pressing down on his head. His skull buckles, his vision turns dark, and suddenly

again

and for the first time

everything

is

not

"Take out that last bit. I don't want a disciplinary on my hands."
"…The last thirty seconds of his consciousness have been removed. We will overwrite the confrontation again shortly. His physical injuries will be reverted as per protocol."
"Excellent."
"Additionally, I think you will be pleased to know that the actor is Martin Freeman once more. The vote carried to undo the relevant change."
"They cared that much about an actor's name?"
"I am led to believe the deciding factor was the .79 probability of stratospheric combustion within three branches."
"Well, I'm not complaining. Send us back, if you would be so kind? I've been looking forward to this."
*click*

Ten minutes later, breathless and sweating in spite of the snowdrifts outside, Researcher Siczybski is standing stock-still on the wrong side of a containment chamber's airlock, feeling a coarse, unwashed hand press into his neck.
"Don't move, or I'll blow your brains out and keep what's left as a decorative vase. Comprende?"
Gregor shuts his eyes. It was a dream. A nightmare. A terrible nightmare brought on by too little sleep and too many reports on too many deaths. It had to be.
"My name's Sharp. This is my partner. We were going to go with Blurred as a continuation of the gimmick, but now I can't be bothered. You can know them as my partner, and that'll be good enough."
The hand releases Gregor and he sprawls on the floor, gasping.
"W-"
"Don't talk. Don't even think about talking unless I ask you a direct question." Sharp pulls out a yellow stuffed bear and tosses it on the floor in front of the terrified researcher. "You know what this is."
"…Yeah."
"That wasn't a question. This thing's a probe, a monitoring device. You know where the rest of them are located, and we would very much like to know too."
"I can't tell you."
"What part of 'do not talk' do you not understand!? You've had a chance to talk. You've had two chances, with a calculated and escalating risk-reward system each time. This is chance number three."
Silence.
"Good. You're learning." He turns to his partner, who is tapping away on a small square of metal. "If you please?"
The bear begins to vibrate, and a small metal filament extends from deep within its furry bulk. Gregor begins to crawl away as it edges towards him.
"We've read your files. You've noticed strange happenings. Some of them were us, some of them weren't. A lot of them were you. Screams in the night, right?"
The wire pierces Gregor's shoe, and he cries out as it slices into his foot.
"You brought this on yourself, my friend. You could've just told us, and… well, we'd probably have killed you, or at least wiped enough of your mind that you were basically vegetative. Standard procedure, not much we can do. Still, it would have been quick."
'Blurred' points the not-gun at the chamber wall. Behind it, Gregor knows, is a chain. If his assumptions are correct, it's one of only two holding the chamber in place. Sharp smiles his brass, toothy smile once more, and places a hand on the researcher's shoulder.
"We'll see you again in a couple of months, Greg. Hopefully you'll be more cooperative then."
One chain is not enough to hold even a small containment chamber in place, and so when the grey-faced stranger pulls the trigger the whole assembly falls thirty feet directly downwards. As the concrete cube hits the bottom there's a flash of purple light, and he feels the gut-wrenching sensation of being thrust back through time.
He lands with a sickening thud.
Nobody ever cleaned beneath the chambers, so he finds himself sprawled in a pile of silt, dust, and what could charitably be called mud. Paralysed from the waist down by the surgical tools inside him, he drags himself upright against a corner, and looks around.
Darkness. Complete and utter stifling darkness. The kind of darkness you get in places that light's forgotten even exist. Above him…
«Good evening, Researcher Sic-sy-be-ski.»
An AIC access point, lodged in the wall and long disused. Probably used during the Site's construction.
"Helen?"
«I can't hear you, Researcher Sic-sy-be-ski. Today's date is the 19th of January.»
"Helen, please… message Julie… Randall… fuck it, Pao, anyone."
«I can't hear you, Researcher Sic-sy-be-ski.»
"Did… did they do this to you? Is this a sick joke?"
«I can't hear you, Researcher Sic-sy-be-ski. The sharp man will return.»
"Oh…"
Another stab of pain as the wires surge upwards. They've reached his thigh now, worming through his veins like little metal parasites. Did he hear something before he was… sent back? Could have been his imagination. Probably was his imagination. He wasn't in a good position to be making cold, calculated observations.
Still, though. It had sounded an awful lot like a scream.

"So, what do we do now?"
"Leave. Return when necessary to retrieve the information. Recover the probes."
"Can't we stick around for a little bit? I'd like to see him squirm. Sadism's no fun if you can't stay and enjoy it."
"No. We will follow the mission brief."
"Fine, fine."
"…"
"I was right though, wasn't I? Level 3 worked best?"
"Although I find it difficult to believe you were operating under anything other than your own motivations, you were correct."
"What was that last bit?"
"…You were correct."
"Good. That's what I like to hear."

Gregor moans deeply as the wires shift and change within him, tearing and re-stitching his organs. Above him, Helen chirps away oblivious. He throws his head back and howls, preparing himself to once more face the-
Wait. He hears something. Something different, something new. With a lurch that tears his jaw in two and almost knocks him unconscious with the pain, he stares imploringly at…
Sharp, and his partner, appearing in a flicker of purple light. They're discussing something in a loud whisper. Gregor knows they can see him, but if they care, they don't show it. Below him, the bear continues to stare up at him, unnaturally grinning. It was almost definitely his imagination, but he could have sworn he'd heard it laughing to itself.
«Investigate auditory irregularity in chamber 4, Standardise documentation for SCP-7112 and AO-09356, submit resource request forms…»
"Huuuurgh. Hggghhnnnnn."
Sharp turns to him and makes deliberate eye contact.
"Yeah yeah. Heard it a thousand times before. We'll be back soon for answers, don't you worry."
As the wires fuse his skull back together, Gregor starts to scream. He focuses his mind on a singular hope, a lone thought floating calmly through an ocean of screaming, nerve-blazing pain.
He hopes against hope that, when the chamber comes crashing down again (for the first time), they'll take him out from under it first.


close

Info

X

New Jersey State Police: Case 102-9381-23
Author Page: The Rounderpage™

From:
Alejandro Marquez

To:
Mathias Dean

Subject:
Case 102-9381-23

Date:
07-03-2010

Hello Officer Dean,
I'm Alejandro Marquez with Internal Affairs. I'm contacting you about Case 102-9381-23, the breaking and entering at Stephen Crane's Pub and Brewery. During a standard review of all closed cases, we noticed that this case was shelved despite having no clear conclusion or arrest. I'm sure this is likely a clerical error, but I'd like to ask you about it, given the fact you were the one directly involved in the incident. It would be highly appreciated if you could reply to me with an email with your recollection of the case. Thank you.

Regards,
Alejandro Marquez
New Jersey State Police, Internal Affairs

From:
Mathias Dean

To:
Alejandro Marquez

Subject:
RE: Case 102-9381-23

Date:
07-05-2010

Hello Mr. Marquez,
To be honest, I don't remember a ton from the case. It was a while ago, and I've always had a poor memory. But I'll try to put down what I can grasp.
Me and my partner, Officer Jameson, were about a block or two away from the place when we received the report. Standard public disturbance, some loud noises. Call was put in from the little coffee shop across the street. I was sure it was just some kids boozed out of their minds and making fools out of themselves.
We booked it to the pub. I've been there a couple times, nice place. Had my retirement party there, actually. But yes, we raced to the scene of the crime. Springfield is a small town and we don't get much action, which makes it all the more exciting when we finally do get something interesting. We parked across the street, and moved in. I vaguely recall seeing some weird lights in the place.
When we went in, we found the perps already down. Two men and a woman, all adults, all dressed in suits. Some lady was there, cuffing them. No clue who that was. We ordered her to throw her hands up and we cuffed her. I ordered Jameson to call another squad car to get the three goons to the hospital. They must've had a bit too much to drink, could smell the booze on him from a couple feet away.
My memory just sort of fades out there. I vaguely remember handing over the perps and woman to the drunk tank at the station, but not much past that.
Hope this helps.

Regards,
Mathias Dean
Springfield NJ Police Department

From:
Alejandro Marquez

To:
Jeremiah Thompson

Subject:
Case 102-9381-23

Date:
07-06-2010

Hello Sgt. Thompson,
I'm with Internal Affairs, and we're contacting you about an old shelved case, Case 102-9381-23, a public disturbance at Stephen Crane's Pub and Brewery. I've been informed that the arresting officer, one Mathias Dean, handed over the suspects to you in Precinct 15 for processing. However, the records lose track of them after that. Could you perhaps give me some insight onto what happened that night so we can tie up this case for good?

Regards,
Alejandro Marquez
New Jersey State Police Internal Affairs

From:
Jeremiah Thompson

To:
Alejandro Marquez

Subject:
RE: Case 102-9381-23

Date:
07-07-2010

Howdy Mr. Marquez,
I do believe I remember what you are referring to. I had booked them into the drunk tank and was waiting for them to sober up. One of the women kept insisting she wasn't drunk, but then, that's exactly what most drunk people say. Not a ton happened, to be honest. But, I went ahead and checked the system to confirm, and it said they were all bailed out by one Samuel Chris Parker at about 2:00 AM, which is weird because I was on shift until 5:00 AM and don't remember that at all. I'd appreciate it if you could search through the state records for this (since our local records are rather limited) and get back to me soon. I'd hate to find out a clerical error lead to that much inconvenience for us.

Regards,
Jeremiah Thompson
Springfield NJ Police Department

From:
Jeremiah Thompson

To:
Alejandro Marquez

Subject:
RE: Case 102-9381-23

Date:
07-14-2010

Howdy Mr. Marquez,
Did you ever get the opportunity to search up those records? It's been about two weeks, and I'd hate to delay this any longer than is unnecessary. It's already a shame that it's gotten this far. Please get back to me whenever possible.

Regards,
Jeremiah Thompson
Springfield NJ Police Department

111H43
AMNESTICIZATION REPORT
DATE: 07-11-2010
SUBJECT: Alejandro Felipe Marquez, Officer of Internal Affairs, New Jersey State Police
REASON: Attempted to investigate records improperly sealed by the Foundation following Incident 2253.1.
SUMMARY: MTF Iota-10 ("Damn Feds") operatives were dispatched to Marquez's home in Jersey City to administer Class-C amnestics and remove evidence of contact from Marquez to Thompson and Dean.
RESULT: Success, amnestics dispensed and evidence destroyed. Records properly sealed.
NOTES: Sgt. Diana G█████████ and Mr. A█████ K██████ S██████ disciplined for incorrect sealing of police records.


Killian "Cosmic" Kremer walked into the Nameless Saloon (oddly enough, that was its name) in the middle of some nameless town (that wasn't). Actually, in the center of town was a well, so the saloon must have been somewhere a little off to the side of the center of the town. Either way, the inside was dry, and just about as sandy as the outside. A few patrons sat around the place, drinking and playing spades. Cosmic had seen this scene one too many times to find it interesting anymore. They just wanted water and some kind of meat.
These western saloons were never held to any real high standards, but Cosmic had been craving beef jerky for the last thirty miles.
Cosmic walked up to the bar, and smiled at the bartender.
"Thirsty?"
"I am, but also, d'you serve jerky perhaps?"
The bartender nodded and smiled. "Perhaps we do. Coming right up."
Cosmic fondled their cross necklace, and waited patiently for the bartender to ring up their drink. Soon enough, the bartender slid a water onto the bar in front of Cosmic, followed shortly after by a small plate of jerky. They picked up the water, and swigged the whole thing down in one gulp. After experiencing the immense satisfaction of such an action, they were ready for the dry, salty jerky.
Cosmic ripped off a piece of jerky, and…
Uh…
It wasn't salted, as was usual. But that was alright, Cosmic could get a salt shaker and…
Well that wasn't around either.
"Hey, bartender," Cosmic cautiously called. The bartender edged his way over. "I don't mean to be rude or nothing, but d'you have any salt?"
The bartender's smile slowly faded.
Cosmic immediately felt sorry they asked. "Didn't mean to intrude or nothin', I just usually have a pinch of salt on my jerky." The silence only grew, as Cosmic imagined that the other patrons had tuned into their conversation. Cosmic tried to chuckle and lighten the mood, and followed it with, "what, there some kind of salt shortage?"
"No, there ain't." A little guy, no more than 5'8", set down his hand of cards and turned to the bar. "We just can't afford to have salt around these parts."
Some of the men around the bar grunted in agreement, or else silently and slowly nodded.
"Can't afford it? What kind of answer is that?"
"That's the only answer we got." A woman sitting at the bar, next to who was clearly her man, chimed in. "Salt never done us any good around here. We got rid of it all. Tossed it to the wind. Don't want nothing to do with it anymore."
Two men sitting by one of the glassless windows got up and silently made their way out the door.
Cosmic eyed the room, feeling the fear and discomfort excreting from every pore of every person. "I'm afraid to ask. What misfortune did it bring?"
"Val," the boy at the cards game nodded to the bartender, "tell it like it is."
Cosmic did a double take. "Wait, before we proceed, Val? What's your last name?"
Val took a deep breath. "LaFerrier. Val LaFerrier. We've met. The stargazing Killian Cosmic?"
"Heavens to Betsy, I met you down in San Diego! We were on the same boat when old Ryan caught that massive fish from just off the pier! You remember that?"
"I do, all too well." The Frenchman curled his lips up. "In fact, it happened right after that… I was riding back up here, to deliver, let's say, something precious that I had gotten from San Diego. Here was the meeting place, and I was headed this way from down south. The third day on the open road, I noticed it following me some miles back."
"It?"
"It. I couldn't figure out what it was. Didn't walk like any animal I've ever seen. Had fingers for legs, that much I could tell from far away. Big, oval head. Nothing but trouble. Tried to scare it off with blanks. Thought it worked at first. Kept on my path." Val looked out the window, and put down the mug he was holding. "Arrived here, delivered the thing, got my money, and was prepared to leave. When I saw it. The thing, up on the hillside over there."
Val pointed to a hilltop, southwest.
Val: "It had followed me here all the way from San Diego. But this time, I saw. It had friends. A whole pack of them. Disappeared behind that hillside just as I saw them. Maybe they thought they were being sneaky. I figured I couldn't leave town, so I stayed." Val bowed his head. "I didn't know the pain I was bringing to this town. I should have left and died myself."
"Hey hey hey," the kid leaped from his seat to a position right beside Cosmic, "you couldn't have known. Wasn't your fault." The kid attempted to comfort Val with a hand on the shoulder, but Val shrugged it off.
"Thank you, Jamie, but I know full well what I did, and I can live with my regrets without sinking into depression and mania. If I were a braver man, I would have gone out there instead of shacking up with one of y'all."
Cosmic: "Where did you shack up?"
Val: "Here, actually. I had always had an affinity for bartending. Me and the previous bartender had actually met before, in Austin. Apparently he had a room to rent out, but he refused to be paid when I asked to pay. I stayed there many nights. Each day, I saw them on the hillside. I was too afraid to leave town. I was too afraid to point them out to others. Each day, their numbers grew. I knew a ride out into the desert would be my last. Maybe I thought they were only after me. Maybe that's why I told no one, and just tried to stay and get a job. A day or two turned into a week, but one day, the pattern changed."
Val took a deep breath.
Val: "At first I was relieved. They were gone. None of them. I had been lucky enough — or, lucky isn't the word, but, the previous bartender had fallen ill and I had taken up his job. It gave me something to do, and took my mind off of the… things. But they were gone. Well and truly gone. But that's when…" Val's mouth hung open, and he looked to a nonexistent object somewhere in the middle of the room. "That's when The Cowboy arrived."
Cosmic: "The cowboy? Which one?"
"No, honey," the woman interjected, "you don't get it. Not a cowboy, The Cowboy."
"Well, that's not so helpful. He must have had some other name you caught?"
Val just shook his head. "It's not that I didn't catch his name. That was his name. And he wandered into our saloon here, looking like he had just crawled out of the sand. His skin was dry and flaking, his mouth wasn't much better, his eyes were sunken and he was caked sand head to toe. He sat at the bar, and said a single word. 'Water'. Without hesitation, I whipped him up a glass of the coolest water we have, thinking this man was going to die in minutes without it. I shouldn't have given him anything."
Val furrowed his brow.
Val: "He smiled at me, and said, 'thank you, mister, now tell me, are you in need of steeds around here?'. I asked him what he meant, and he just said, 'that's all I needed to hear', and walked out. Didn't even finish his water. Outside, I… I…"
Val went wide-eyed.
Val: "I have no clue how I didn't notice it before. That thing. One of them that was following me, he climbed onto its back and rode away. I seized up, then and there, and breathed deeper than hell's canyons. I tried to hold back a scream but it just wriggled its way out of me. I couldn't keep myself from hollering, and soon enough the whole saloon was on me, asking what had happened. Well, I just couldn't keep it inside any longer."
Jamie nodded, knowingly, offering physical consolation which Val turned down once more.
Val: "I had to tell them what those things were, and I asked if they saw it, riding out. Nobody had. They hadn't seen no Cowboy either. It was like I hallucinated it all. Some bad dream. No Cowboy, no steeds, no nothing. All in my head. It was almost comforting."
Cosmic: "How d'you know you didn't just hallucinate the whole thing?"
Val swallowed, and began taking shallower breaths. Jamie, presumably feeling the need to let Val recover, took over the conversation.
Jamie: "Ahh, well, I was here around this time, and I can finish it in stead of our blessed barkeep. I had just arrived, y'see, big dispute with my brother Ardan pushed me west and away from family and I ended up here. Hadn't thought of settling down but it seemed I was destined to call this place home for at least a few days. Val here's incident had scared the town half out of their wits, and nobody wanted to venture out. Everyone prepared guns and watched the hillside. After a day or two of nothing, someone got the wise idea to convince everyone our dear Val was crazy. People believed it. Bad decision."
The woman and her man nodded.
Jamie: "It happened less than a year ago. I only heard about it. It was a quiet night, not much happening in town central, and… I just… I was up late, making love to my girl at the time, when I happened to glance out the window. My girl yelped, I had dug my nails into her shoulder too hard, and she asked 'what's wrong?', and all I could do was point out the window. They were almost too dark to make out. At first I thought they might be large dogs, 'cause of the snout and all, but with brief glimpses of light, I could see the things were some — something that crawled straight out of the throat of Satan himself."
Jamie hurriedly downed a shot that Val had wordlessly set in front of him.
Jamie: "They were coming right up the center of town, the lot of them, and one came into view around the corner there, carrying some man on its back. Looked like your everyday cowboy, 'cept he was hunched over and something came out of him with every wretched, crow-ish cough. Could barely see it in the dark, but you could hear it hit the ground. Like a bunch uh sand. I got off the bed and rushed to my clothes, rummaging through to find my pistol, but when I went back to the window they were gone. Girl still asked 'what's wrong', like she hadn't heard that unholy hacking and wheezing. I couldn't explain it to her. I know I'd sound crazy. I didn't know what to do. But that's not the only thing that happened that night." Jamie emphatically shook his head. "No, no it wasn't. But I ain't the one to tell it. That's a story for our resident candy shop owner Percy and her husband Thomas."
Percy had already made her way out of her darling's arms and towards the bar crew, seemingly expecting this hand off, like this story had been rehearsed a hundred times before.
Percy: "I was next door. I heard it all going down. The first thing you could hear was the screaming. But it was muffled, like it was far away. Thomas is a heavy sleeper, so I couldn't shake him awake. Not that I think it would have done much good, now that it's all said and done. Nothing on earth or in heaven could have stopped it. We live right next to the big farm where Tommy Two-words lives, but he used to live with his aspiring writer brother, Nelson. I… I almost can't describe what I saw. I don't know if I believe it myself. I just know that in the morning, something must have happened, 'cause Nelson was gone."
Percy looked off to her right.
Percy: "It looked like the house was leaking. Like a big puddle was forming around it. Some black, impenetrable liquid, reflecting all the stars and moon. Then came the neighing."
Cosmic: "There were horses?"
Percy: "It weren't the neigh of any horse I have ever had the displeasure of coming across. No, it was some… indescribable, blood freezing approximation. Like what someone who'd never met a wild animal would think they sounded like. That's the best I can describe it. It caught my eye about then, I think. The crystals forming around the corner of the house that I now know was Nelson's room. They grew faster than anything I had ever seen, not plant nor animal, and they were rocks, just sprouting out of the wall. I was frozen in place."
Percy made her way back to Thomas.
Percy: "That's about when the screaming and neighing stopped. They walked out of that house like it was a parade. The lot of them. The human, dog, fish things. And, like a king, The Cowboy rode atop the front-most one. He was holding up something big and metal, and I can't say I noticed him coughing like Jamie did. From the little the moonlight gave me, he looked plump and healthy, almost chubby. As soon as they were out of sight, I snapped out of it and roused Thomas. I was too scared to go into the house myself, but I figured Thomas was the bravest man I've ever known. I wanted him to check it out."
Percy looked at Thomas, waiting for him to pick up the rest of it.
Thomas: "To be frank, I didn't believe her. But if she was so worried, I was going to make sure nothing bad had happened. Grabbed a rifle, walked out, walked over, and made my way in the door. First thing I noticed was the long line of salt. In fact, it extended out the door quite a ways. In the morning we saw that it headed all the way out of the road, to the hills. But I didn't know that at the time. Now more worried and believing, I followed the trail of salt to the older brother's room. Nelson's. When I got in there, I wasn't quite sure what I was looking at."
Thomas looked as if he was trying to picture it again, to see if there was some other way to look at it.
Thomas: "As best I can figure, the whole room was coated in salt. Some crystals were bigger than others. Got bigger and worse the closer to the far corner. You couldn't barely see Nelson's bed under all the crystals. There were some pieces of something around the room. Looked like fingers, only larger, and with more fingernails. Looked like they had been cut off uh something, but weren't bleeding. Worst of all, there was a hole in the ground. And I mean a hole. Massive, cavernous. The opening wasn't much to look at, but peering down, you could see that it widened, and widened, and… I'll be frank, I couldn't stare into it very long before my very soul started quivering. Thing was covered in salt top to bottom, and I thought I could hear… neighing. From deep within it."
Thomas, still outwardly calm, paused.
Thomas: "My next instinct was to check on Tommy. He wasn't Tommy Two-words yet. He was just Tommy. He had a reputation as an exceptionally quick shot, but he was a recluse until then, no one but his brother Nelson had ever heard him talk. I found him in his room, flaked with salt himself. He looked dry, shriveled even. I picked him up and carried him out. He was too weak, or scared, or both, to resist. I needed to get him to the doctor. When I carried him out the front door, he said the only two words anyone has ever heard him say."
Cosmic leaned in expectantly.
Thomas: "'No salt.' Like a warning. Clearly he got better, but he still hasn't said anything since. In the fallout, we found that all his horses had been replaced with those 'steeds'. We burned the stables and the house. After the rubble was removed, the salt was all there, but the fingers and the hole weren't. For the better, I think. We took his warning to heart. 'No salt'. We cleaned the town of salt the week after. The things haven't been back, and we aren't willing to test if it was clearing out the salt or not that did it. We just know that whatever we're doing right now, it hasn't called those things back."
Val came back into the conversation: "And I know what made them follow me. I had just come from a boating trip. I had fell in the ocean, hadn't changed my clothes. I smelled of the sea." Val swallowed again. "I smelled of salt."
Cosmic was taken aback at the information that had just been loaded onto them. They couldn't think of a good response. They did still wonder one thing, though, and they couldn't help but ask: "What did Tommy Two-words see?"
"Ask him yourself," suggested Jamie, as he motioned to a particularly shaded corner of the saloon.
There, a man wearing only white made eye contact with Cosmic. Soon after, his eyes made their way back to his drink.
All he did was shake his head, but it said all it needed to.


Incident 2161-BETA
Beginning on 2018/12/02 and ending on 2018/12/15, the rate at which SCP-2161-1 produced blank sheets of paper sharply increased. In addition, SCP-2161-2 affected several files on the Foundation database, producing a high amount of whitespace in essential containment documents. Measures were implemented to combat this: additional space was installed in SCP-2161-1's warehouse, and TSATPWTCOTTTADC.aic was commissioned to identify unauthorized file modifications and remove any whitespace.
At the conclusion of the incident, several sheets of paper were identified to contain typed text, apparently a series of journal entries detailing "Dr. Harper"'s investigations into an alien planet. The full text of this journal has been transcribed below, with all excess whitespace expunged.

After all of this time searching, I have finally found a planet. A future home for humanity, perhaps. Given the apocalyptic events the Earth is battered with on a nearly monthly basis, and I wish to find a new planet to reside on. After all of this time, I have found one.
I am observing it from a distance, as I have kept the engines in low-power mode, and it takes some time for them to return to full power. It is about the same size as Earth, and appears to be within the "Goldilocks Zone." With the tools available to me, I was able to determine that the planet has the same climates as Earth, and shares a temperature range comparable to that of Earth's.
I will update this journal when I am able to get closer to this planet, which I have named, perhaps out of my own ego, "Harper's Planet."

T Minus 7
I have now brought my craft within range of Harper's Planet, and my scanners can function properly.
Apparently, there is already sapient life here, and they have colonized the entirety of this planet's surface. In fact, I daresay that this life is almost as advanced as humans on Earth; they have a large amount of satellites, and, from what I am able to see from above, their technology is quite advanced.
I will stay within range of Harper's Planet for a week before I dock there, in order to let my scanners finish their work.

T Minus 6
I sent a radio message to Harper's Planet consisting of a simple greetings, in all of languages available on my ship's database. To my surprise, they sent back a long message, which my ship identified as Dutch. I was able to translate it; it mostly amounted to "what are you doing here?"
In Dutch, I sent back a message stating that I was simply a traveler from a distant world, exploring to find a new home for my people. I asserted that I had taken interest in their planet, and I wanted to come down to investigate their culture, or, at the very least, exchange some technological discoveries.
After a period of deliberation, they sent me another transmission. It entailed directions to an airport where I could land my spaceship safely, and a series of customs that would be expected of me as a visitor under their culture. I thanked them for their speedy response, and said that I would spend some time to familiarize myself with their rules.
In order to cover that lie, I changed my scanning system from active to passive, in order to make my analysis undetectable. However, in order to not offend them, I shall make use of this time to become knowledgeable in this planet's culture.

T Minus 1
As I have concluded my analysis, I have made the following conclusions about life on this planet:
1). It is human, or at least, genetically close to human. I was unable to get an accurate count of the lifeforms on the planet, but I know that they are human.
2). Their society is different from ours. Their code of law is thin, and there is little mention of thievery, deceit, or other slights. However, they do consistently mention "deviancy," which I am afraid to inquire about directly.
3). This society involves some object or animal that is referred to as a name that my ship has no translation for: "Marce."
Tomorrow, I will go down to this planet for myself in order to experience their society. Hopefully I will gain insight into another possible place of salvation for humanity, or at least walk away with some new technology.

T Equals 0
I have now landed on the planet. When I touched down at the airport, I was greeted by an introductory party of five natives. Two stayed behind, saying that they would keep my spaceship safe. Three other natives offered to take me to a local hotel while they requested a suitable transport.
Once I was escorted out of the airport and into the city, I saw their city. It was magnificent at a scale of magnitude that was not apparent from space. Beautiful skyscrapers jetted out of the ground and grazed, and even penetrated, the clouds. They do not have roads; rather, they have what I can best describe as "conveyor belt sidewalks." I did not see a single car, or any other vehicle; I asked one of my escort about this, and they remarked that they had an underground train system that had rendered most vehicles obsolete.
The most peculiar thing by far here, however, are the natives. They physically appear similar to humans. However, they are much larger; even the smaller children are about three fourths of my height. I feel like a dwarf among men in this world. In addition, they seem more organized, more structured. From what I saw, there were no conflicts in terms of movement; people would simply move out of the way for someone walked past. It was almost like they had a hive mind.
Eventually, as the sun set, we came to the hotel: a towering metal colossus that reminded me somewhat of the Eiffel Tower. They took me to a room, and asked me to sleep.
Even now, as I am writing this down, I have noticed several oddities. Firstly, the bed is much more firm than I remember of Earth's. Secondly, this hotel room is somewhat bare; it has a bed, a nightstand, a bathroom, and not much else. Thirdly, it is decorated in paraphernalia of what I presume to be beetles. Beetle paintings, beetle sculptures, even the bedsheet had beetle pictures integrated into it.

T Plus 1
Today, I played witness to a horrifying phenomenon.
I woke up early in the morning. The days here are longer than that of Earth's. In order to preoccupy myself, I looked out the window, at the number of people on the roads below on their way to an early commute. While I was looking out and daydreaming, I saw signs of a struggle. In contrast to the order I had seen so far, there was a native frantically trying to push through others. Shortly afterwards, I saw what I presumed to be law enforcement, who somehow stopped the conveyor belt and cornered the man in front of the building.
First, they used some kind of energy weapon to either stun or kill the man. Then they took out bonesaws, and they began to saw the man open. They took out his organs, and took apart some of his appendages. I could not stomach this, and I forced myself to turn away. Once I steeled myself to look back out to the window, the only remnant of the man was a bloodstain on the conveyor belt that disappeared soon after it activated.
Even while I am inside of the transport vehicle on the way to the capital of their Science Committee (as they call it), I remember this incident. The driver asked me what I was doing, and I replied that I was simply chronicling my time on this planet for safekeeping. It's not entirely a lie.

T Plus 2
Another oddity I have noticed of this world is that lack of wildlife. The only animal life I've seen here, come to think of it, are the native humans and beetles. I didn't notice it until recently; rather than pigeons and rats and the occasional stray dog, the large city I was in only had beetles. Out in the fields that we drove by, there were only beetles, flying in flocks. I even once saw a man with a leash, walking a pet beetle.
I met with the representative of the Science Committee today. It appears that this planet's technology is actually far, far more advanced than even my own ideas. The representative was able to provide diagrams of working quantum computers, zero-emission cars, and even artificial intelligence. It appears they simply aren't using those technologies. When I inquired why, the representative dodged the question.
Of my own technologies, the representative seemed especially interested in my Harper Engine. I explained how it was powered by whitespace, and how it allowed me to travel. Unfortunately, I'd left the journals of the process of invention in my residence on Earth.
After our exchange, we parted ways. I said, almost as an accident, that I did not know what the "Marce" really were. The representative seemed almost surprised by this, then he chuckled and explained that almost everyone on the planet assumed that everybody knew what the "Marce" were. He said that he couldn't exactly "show" me, but he could take me to a hospital where it would become apparent.

T Plus 3
I am now in imminent danger. I currently fear for my life, or at least, my sanity. If I do not chronicle in this journal again, it would be best to assume that I am lost.
The representative and I arrived at a hospital shortly after I awoke. It was not what I was expecting; the exterior of the hospital did not share the elegant architecture of the other buildings I'd seen, and reminded me somewhat of a warehouse. We were brought inside through an unused entrance, where a secretary at a desk asked for authorization. The representative flashed a badge at her, and said that I was a guest. Even after this show of credentials, four armed guards still followed us into the interior of the hospital.
We got into an elevator that brought us up to a panopticon. Once I was brought up their and brought to the glass, I saw sights that made the incident of the dismemberment seem tame in comparison. There were hundred, if not thousands, of hospital beds, with none unoccupied. They were all being cut open, and having beetles shoved inside of them. I remember seeing the beetles earlier; flocks of them flying about, the paintings of them in my hotel rooms. However, I did not suspect that this was their true significance.
Even now, as I am thinking of it, it makes me nauseous. I saw children, no older than 2 years, being held down by their parents as they screamed and had a beetle fed into their bodies. I saw men being cut open with no anesthetic, and having up to seven beetles and once crawl into their abdomens. The floor was littered with chunks of flesh and rotting meat, making the floor smell something like a slaughterhouse.
I'm not a squeamish man, nor do I consider myself someone who shies away from gore. But at the sight of the visceral, almost mass-produced violence there on the hospital floor, I found myself retching onto the floor.
On the contrary, the representative simply walked up to the window and smiled, as if he was looking at a painting. Once I was done expelling my innards onto the floor, he called over the guards, and one of them knocked me out with what I presume was a taser weapon. As my vision faded out, I heard him say: "We don't need him anymore."
They stripped me of my clothes, my tools, and my weapons. I would not doubt that they would have taken this journal too, had I not integrated it into my body.
They took my translator, so I am unable to understand what my guards are saying, but I know that they keep speaking of the "Marce," and I believe they intend to put one of the damned beetles into my being as well.

[Data Expunged. Symbol has been identified as a Class-III Lethal Cognitohazard, and viewing without proper inoculation results in seizures and coma.]

T Plus 4
On this day, I must count my blessings.
My first blessing is that my memetic inoculations are still functional. I was able to draw a cognitohazard in this journal, one that causes coma. I got my guards attention by making my jail cell dirty using excretion-related methods I am not proud of. When one of them entered the room to punish me, I showed him the cognitohazard, causing him to fall. I did the same to his colleague shortly after, and I was able to escape my cell.
My second blessing is that the prison I was kept in was actually sparsely guarded. As far as I know, my cell was the only one with armed guards. There were guards on each floor, but they fell easily to my cognitohazard. Aside from myself, I noticed that the prisoners seemed pacified. Maybe a side effect of the beetles?
One of the guards' outfits fit well, so I managed to go outside. I can see the airport from here, but it's still a long walk away without any kind of vehicle. My third blessing, I guess, is that, although there is a police presence here, there are enough natives crowding around that I can hide quite easily.
I am currently writing from what I consider my fourth blessing: a supply cabinet I found in an unsupervised building. My plan is to rest here, regain my strength, then see if I can make my way back to my starship. I may require a fifth blessing.

T Plus 5
I arrived at the airport shortly after the sun rose. I had acquired a janitor's outfit from the supply closet in which I slept, and, as apparently each individual profession in this world has their own designated uniform, I was allowed info the airport. However, once I had entered the lauchpad where I was allowed to park my ship, I found its engine half-disassembled, and the door padlocked.
I found a bolt cutter that allowed me to remove the padlock. However, it took me some time to reassemble the engine, from finding the appropriate tools, to reverse-engineering my surroundings, to actually assembling the parts. Three times, one of the natives walked in on me. Twice, I was able to use my primitive cognitohazard to render them comatose. However, I theorize that the third had a high enough mental resistance level to only walk away with a headache. They alerted security.
And there I was, piloting my hastily repaired spaceship through the skies, barely functional, through skyscrapers and satellites, all the while being fired at with a manner of assorted energy weapons, gunfire, and missiles. I consider it a miracle that I was able to escape the atmosphere. However, as I left their stratosphere, one of their missiles struck true, destroying my fragile engine.
Given the fact that I was drifting in space, I decided to assess my inventory. Fortunately, my computer says that we will intercept another planet at the edge of this solar system shortly. They didn't find my supply closet, and I should be able to mine enough material to repair my engine. In addition, who I guess is a native engineer left a cache of reverse-engineering supplies aboard. Among these is what I presume to be a computer, that contains a list of planets that the Science Committee has identified for "future terraforming efforts." I feel that these planets could be candidates for a future home for humanity; if nothing else, I can warn any life on them of the Beetles, and prepare them for a future attack.
And so, for whatever injuries I did incur upon myself in this expedition, it looks like I made it out alive.

Several description of "Harper's Planet" within this journal align with that of SCP-3003. It is of note that SCP-3003-3 closed all wormholes between SCP-3003 and Earth from 2018/12/09 to 2018/12/17, and has refused to answer Foundation inquiries regarding these events. However, SCP-3003-3's Ruling Committee has announced the invention of a "Quantic Pull Drive" that will allow them to advance to space travel, and has announced that their terraforming efforts will begin in as little as ten years.

More by notgull

More by notgull

SCPs

notgull's Proposal

SCP-3733

SCP-3095

SCP-4800

SCP-4804

SCP-2785

SCP-4348

SCP-4048

SCP-4688

SCP-3362

SCP-579-J

SCP-4785

SCP-3339

SCP-5800

SCP-4248

SCP-3747

SCP-4948

SCP-3296

SCP-4800-J

SCP-4799

SCP-199

SCP-3485

SCP-5981

SCP-7234

SCP-4808

SCP-3833

SCP-3748

SCP-4148

SCP-5054

SCP-5025

SCP-1037

SCP-093-J

SCP-5680

SCP-1684

SCP-4872

SCP-3248

SCP-6904

SCP-5483

SCP-6785

SCP-4397

Tales

The Little Robot that Could

Join the Flock

The Siege of Site-19

Tales of the Automaton: The Big Birdocalypse

Footage Recovered From a Private Server

Avian Anthology I

My Empire of Birds

Moose on the Loose

Document recovered from a Parallel Universe

Katz and Dogs

Joey Fucknuts Steals The Declaration of Independence

Your Guard

Vacation Opportunity

The Scent of a Toaster

Burn, Baby, Burn

Chasing Suns

Wind in the Sails

Three Feet Under I

The Shape of Water is Humanoid

Dead Reckoning

Three Feet Under II

Three Feet Under III

Into the Beetle Black Yonder

Forgotten Shrine

Down Through

Hyperfine

Don't Knock on Strange Doors

Other

Researcher Calvin's Personnel File

Incident Report ████/████

"Sphere" Incursion Log

Initial Incursion Log

"Cube" Incursion Log #1

"Cube" Incursion Log #2

SCP-093-J Blue Test

SCP-093-J Recovered Documents

SCP-093-J Green Test

SCP-093-J Purple Test

Exploration Log 4480-1

See my Author Page for more information. If you like reading my stuff, consider checking out my YouTube Channel for SCP-inspired animations, among other things.


Godhood
Divinity
Ascension
Regardless of the term, there is a cardinal truth strived for.
It is not earned, but rather, it is a pedigree.
It infuses one's entire being, permeating substance and body.
Its manifestation denies the sublime in favor of splendor.
The Heavens are made for those who possess this holy claim.
The gods are a golden cohort.

O king, storm of majestic splendour, peerless Ninurta, possessing superior strength; who pillages the mountains all alone; deluge, indefatigable serpent hurling yourself at the rebel land; hero striding formidably into battle; lord whose powerful arm is fit to bear the mace, reaping like barley the necks of the insubordinate. Ninurta, king, son in whose strength his father rejoices; hero whose awesomeness covers the mountains like a south storm. Ninurta, who makes the good tiara, the rainbow, flash like lightning; grandly begotten by him who wears the princely beard; dragon who turns on himself; lion snarling at a snake. Ninurta, king whom Enlil has exalted above himself; hero, great battle-net flung over the foe. Ninurta, with the awesomeness of your shadow extending over the Land; releasing fury on the rebel lands, overwhelming their assemblies! Ninurta, king, son who has forced homage to his father far and wide! Inspiring great numinous power, he had taken his place on the throne, the August Dais.

A lone figure sits on its gilded throne, suspended on the edge of the horizon. Its electrum wings shimmer in the solar breeze. Before it lies an orb of flowing blue and swirling white.
The Firmament. The entirety of creation, from end to end, was within its purview. Innumerable rivers, boundless deserts, and abundant valleys filled its gaze. A boundless ocean, with islands of pure sky lazily floating over it, gives the land both boundary and profundity.
Behind the king, the aether. A million burning lights serving as a backdrop for royalty. A field of stellar jewels crowned by radiant Suen.
The Heavens and The Earth were within order.

The lord's battle-mace looked towards the mountains, the Šar-ur cried out aloud to its master: "Lord of lofty station, foremost one, who presides over all lords from the throne dais, Ninurta, whose orders are unalterable, whose allotted fates are faithfully executed; my master! Heaven copulated with the verdant Earth, Ninurta: she has born him a warrior who knows no fear — the Asag, a child who sucked the power of milk without ever staying with a wet-nurse, a foster-child, O my master — knowing no father, a murderer from the mountains, whose face knows no shame; impudent of eye, an arrogant male, rejoicing in his stature."

Dr. William Pall sat in his office, and crunched numbers. His cubicle was not too sparse and not too tidy. Here and there were handwritten equations on loose papers. False-color nebulae were plastered on the walls, a reminder of the beauty of space that was otherwise inaccessible amidst the dense spreadsheets and low-poly simulations.
Pall furrowed his eyebrows,

paused his typing,

took a sip of coffee,

and resumed inputting numbers into the formulae.

His was one of the most mundane jobs in the Foundation. You'd think a job with the title of "Astrodynamicist" would entail some excitement, but no. It entailed sitting at a computer and calculating the orbital trajectories of satellites months away from launching. Fact of the matter was that space, even in the relative stone's throw of Earth's orbit, was big and empty. In addition to the standard civilian and military and not-so-top-secret-military menagerie, he had a shortlist of potential collisions to worry about. These ranged from the relatively mundane, to the downright absurd.
…
It's funny. The higher ups always fretted over unintentional collisions, but here he was, having trouble with an intentional collision.

"It has sired offspring in the mountains, and spread its seeds far and wide. The plants have unanimously named it king over them; like a great wild bull, it tosses its horns amongst them. The šu, saĝkal, esi, usium, kagena, and the heroic nu stones, its warriors, constantly come raiding the cities. For them a shark's tooth has grown up in the mountains; it has stripped the trees. Before its might the gods of those cities bow towards it. My master, this same creature has erected a throne dais: it is not lying idle. Ninurta, lord, it actually decides the Land's lawsuits, just as you do. Who can compass the Asag's dread glory? Who can counteract the severity of its frown? People are terrified, fear makes the flesh creep; their eyes are fixed upon it. My master, the mountains have taken their offerings to it."

Sighing, Roger Blanco scrubbed the whiteboard, taking care to preserve the equations around the doomed diagram. He was quite possibly the most mathematically inclined interior designer on the planet. As a counterbalance, he was probably the worst artist among the lot.
With how things have been lately, "on the planet" might not be applicable for much longer.
He was an interior designer in much the opposite way a janitor was a sanitation engineer on their resume. He was actually a cross between a mechanical engineer and a… well, the other position in this metaphor might not actually exist, atleast not in the mundane world. "Geometrist" would be the best fit. He worked with non-Euclidean geometry, using special engines to make a lot of use out of a little space. He was presently designing the interior of FOS19.
"Foundation Orbital-Site 19". Made it sound all important-like, as if it were a full blown space station.
It was a cubesat. Small, cube-composed satellites, mainly used for research by universities and fledgling space programs. The innocuous design is a remnant from when the Foundation had to maintain secrecy and plausible deniability. Not that anyone remembers those days.
The satellite was to be delivered by a multistage rocket. Thankfully, this meant that an entire team was at work on the other components. Even so, that left Roger with the difficulties of cramming in:

The Spatial Contortion Drive itself
The Reaction Control System
The Fuel Tank for the above
Two robotic appendages
Enough spare space to accommodate a six-by-two-by-one solid-gold statue.

Roger grabbed a dry-erase marker and got back to work.

"Hero! Since you are strong, my master, they are calling for your help, saying, Ninurta, that not a single warrior counts except for you! Ninurta, it is confident that it can lay hands on the powers received by you in the abzu. Its face is deformed, its location is continually changing; day by day, the Asag adds territories to its domain. Ninurta, lord, son of Enlil. Who has so far been able to resist its assault? The besetting Asag is beyond all control, its weight is too heavy."

Director Melissa Cooper took her seat at the Mission Control Center.
"T-minus 10"
Some people have this eternal, childlike wonder when it relates to space. You can see it by the glow on their faces as they walk into work.
"T-minus 9"
Melissa envies some people.
"T-minus 8"
These launches have become routine. She briefly muses if this is a good thing or a bad thing.
"T-minus 7"
You know, in a general sense. For her it meant a lot more work. More drawn out email exchanges, more poorly lit meetings, more financial finagling to make the budget work.
"T-minus 6"
This whole process was much more cumbersome with the Veil intact. The Foundation had to piggyback off of legitimate Space Agencies, or else borrow the spaceports of former Soviet Satellite (hah) States.
"T-minus 5"
The director was just grateful she didn't have to give a speech after this was over. The Foundation PR department didn't have to justify its expenses to a tax-paying public, nor to a board of shareholders.
"T-minus 4"
As a trade-off, it did have to regularly cover up human rights abuses.
"T-minus 3"
Somewhere in the bored director's mind, she thought about the mission at hand.
"T-minus 2"
It was a retrieval. Send the probe to intercept a gold-and-silver statue of some Middle-Eastern farmer-healing-law god, and drag it down for actual containment. The thing moved erratically between Low and Middle Earth Orbit, but they finally cracked its movement pattern after years of study. At present moment, the thing was a sitting duck.
"T-minus 1"
It never occurred to her that this mission could fail.
"T-plus 0"
The steel rod is fired into the sky on a plume of flame, an arrow aimed at the heart of a warrior god.

"Rumours of its armies constantly arrive, before ever its soldiers are seen. This thing's strength is massive, no weapon has been able to overturn it. Ninurta, neither the axe nor the all-powerful spear can penetrate its flesh, no warrior like it has ever been created against you. Lord, you who reach out towards the august divine powers, splendour, jewel of the gods, you bull with the features of a wild bull, with a prominent backbone, this fellow is clever! My Ninurta, whose form Enki contemplates with favour, my lord, son of Enlil, what is to be done?"

Creeping over the ends of the Land, sailing above the azure plains, a dark monolith enters the god's view. An invader. A blight upon its domain.
An idol is the image of perfection. It traces the contours of a god's divine form, anchors its visage to the world of mortals.
This thing of rigidity does not reflect beauty. It has no mouth to feed, no eyes to oversee, no hands to craft, no voice to ordain.
The Heavens are a place of the gods, and this is an intruder.

"Hero, whatever further awaits you, do not on any account meddle with the hurricane of the mountains. Ninurta, son of Enlil, I tell you again, it is a blister whose smell is foul, like mucus which comes from the nose it is unpleasant. Lord, its words are devious, it will not obey you. My master, it has been created against you as a god. Hero, it falls on the land as a whirlwind, it scrubs it as if with saltwort. It chases the onagers before it in the mountains. Its terrifying splendour sends the dust into clouds, it causes a downpour of potsherds. In the rebel lands it is a lion striking with savage teeth. After reducing everything to nothing in the north wind, that one will batter you. It has dried up the waters in the ground. In the whirlwind storm, the people are finished, they have no solution. From an implacable enemy, great hero, lord, turn away."

Ninurta opened his mouth to speak to the mace. He aimed the lance at the mountains. The lord stretched out an arm towards the clouds. Day became a dark night. He yelled like a storm.

A panel retracts, two iron arms emerge from the pit, grasping at the wings of divinity.
A burst of 50,000 kelvin plasma destroys the false idol. Its molten slag expands itself as the onboard space distorter boils offline, non-euclidean space straightening out at 9.80665 meters per seconds-squared freefall.
Peace is restored to the heavens.

In the mountains, the day came to an end. The sun bade it farewell. Enlil's mighty lord, Ninurta, great son of the E-kur, heroic one of the father who bore him: it is good to praise you.


The world was suddenly full of monsters back then. Even though the world had indeed become a lot harder to understand, it was a pleasant reminder that not everything was as scary as the horrors the SCP Foundation kept locked up. Being able to take your mind off of them by watching a video of a cute and weird animal was a valued comfort, a comfort that the Wilson Center was able to provide.
It started with a simple video of Tim Wilson playing with a blurry dog posted to the group's webpage. The site was relatively obscure, mostly visited by the citizens of Boring, Portlands, and the Site-64 GoI liaison Roger Tarpan. Someone, probably a Deer College cryptozoology major, found the video and shared it on social media. Within days it received hundreds of thousands of echoes and found itself mirrored on various websites, eventually reaching mainstream news.
In desperate need for better public relations, the Foundation urged Tim to become a public figure. They wanted him to gush about the Center and how much of an impact the group had on the lives of the animals. They wanted him to do a talk show tour, bringing along the most camera-friendly critters he had to captivate audiences. But most importantly, they wanted him to talk about how none of what he did would be possible without the SCP Foundation.
A few talk shows and events later, the Wilsons and their animals became media darlings. What was once a humble set of buildings and enclosures in a sleepy town a few miles outside of Portlands became a media circus. A couple dozen volunteers became hundreds. Less than ten operating staff members became twenty. The Center grew, and it grew fast, all the while the Foundation was able to soften its image thanks to their association.
Soon enough, the Wilson Center, its employees, volunteers, and animals found themselves the stars of a new reality show: "Wilson's Weird and Wild Critters." It was, of course, funded and produced in large part by the Foundation, ever eager to be seen as an amicable and friendly organization. Many a young zoologist and biologist were born from the sense of wonder and awe they felt when watching Tim and his daughter, Faeowynn, interact with invisible snakes and flame-spitting tarantulas.
All in all, it was a pretty good time to be an anomalous critter I think.
Well, for the most part. With the rise of the anomalous critter community came an interest in their presence within the home. And as one might expect, where there's money to be made, there exist parties chasing said money.
Marshall, Carter, and Dark had been in the business of exotic pets for years. They already owned facilities for breeding their items, which facilitated their plunge into the public market. A few litters of failures and thaumaturgic rituals later, the very first 'Blur-Dog' was registered by the American Kennel Club. A single puppy was available for the price of $20,000, a modest sum considering the exquisite catalog of MCD. A menagerie of other such pets premiered over the years, including fish, cats, pigs, and birds.
The exorbitant prices of these designer anomalous pets created a black market for their sale and creation. No other group was as prevalent in the dealings of exotic designer pets than the shady 'Accelerate the Future.' ATF members were known scammers, con-men, and overall undesirables interested only in turning a quick buck. The animals they sold were often non-anomalous pets marketed as outlandish, and the few that truly were anomalous were unstable and likely a result of shoddy thaumaturgy.
I remember one other group rising to provenance at this time.
They had already been around for some time, and they had a location in Portlands. Ambrose Restaurant, owned by Chaz Ambrose. Without having to worry about the Foundation stopping them from expanding anymore and finding anomalous livestock easier than ever, they blew up. A few locations here and there, then in Europe, then Asia, even Australia. I remember when they were super expensive too, before they turned into the Texas Roadhouse-like joint they are now.
Chaz was everywhere back then. Recipe books, talk shows, cooking shows, etc. He leaned into the whole 'celebrity' thing a bit too hard in my opinion. One hell of a showman, thou- Hmm? What is it?
…
Why am I telling you this?
I don't know. I just think it's funny how a single tweet of mine all those years ago started… this.
…
No, I am not shitting you.
…
Alright, whatever, Norman.

More From This Author

More From This Author

Uncle Nicolini's Works

SCPs

SCP-6467 •

SCP-5057 •

SCP-7266 •

SCP-6938 •

SCP-371-J •

SCP-1799 •

SCP-3867 •

SCP-ES-101-J •

SCP-MYSTERY-J •

SCP-4206 •

SCP-2983 •

SCP-3863 •

SCP-7833 •

SCP-654 •

SCP-7726 •

Tales/GoI Formats

GRANT REQUEST FOR THE RE-CREATION OF AN ADVANCED POSTMORTEM NEURAL PRESERVATION SYSTEM •

Gluttony Is Impossible •

I Don't Get It, But I'll Figure It Out. •

The Hermit, Death, and The Devil •

SCP Wiki Discussion Page Simulator •

Parawatch Intro Thread •

What Came After •

The Remains Of The Day •

SCP-049-ΩK •

Fanfa •

Nico's Proposal •

Two Minutes To Midnight •

La Persistencia De La Memoria •

'Para-Pedigrees' PED464/CAN33/LUP22 •

Fifteenth Anonymous Donation •

Other

uncle nicolini author page •

Ode To The Unknown Author •

Sciptember 2022 Art Highlights •


Anomalous item KY-2018-DW was neutralized on 08/27/18. Embedded Foundation agents with the Lexington, Kentucky police department intercepted a call from Diane Wharton, who reported "a strange man in a black uniform" exiting her home through a hole in the wall of her finished basement. The containment team positively identified the individual as Foundation personnel from an alternate reality, and cooperated with their counterpart in ensuring the aperture was sealed. A request to establish operational communications is pending review with both Foundations.
The video embedded below was uploaded to YouTube on 12/23/2018. Analysis determined that its creator (Delphinia Wharton, 16) had prolonged, previously unrecorded contact with KY-2018-DW. The item facilitated interaction between Ms. Wharton and a human inhabitant of the alternate reality. Due to the lengthy and otherwise unexceptional nature of this contact, de-realization of the affected memories is considered to be sufficient. Foundation agents generated a false report of a medical problem which required brief inpatient treatment, and administered class G amnestics to Ms. Wharton during her hospital stay.
Relevant entry from the Log of Anomalous Items:

Item Description: An opening in a basement wall which connected to an alternate but largely similar version of reality. The homeowner contacted local authorities after witnessing a person from the other reality exit through the wall. Local Foundation agents intercepted the call and dispatched a containment team.
Date of Recovery: 08/27/18
Location of Recovery: A single-family home in Lexington, Kentucky
Current Status: Neutralized

View transcribed lyrics

Close lyrics

jumped up and down
the day he came
his eyes are brown
he's good at games
the door that no one
else can see
has brought a new friend
just for me
he makes me feel so tall
the boy inside my wall
mom says he's fake
I say she's wrong
imagination
ain't that strong
his town and school
are just like ours
he's sweet and cool
he brings me flowers
but my phone still can't call
the boy inside my wall
my sophomore year
I got so scared
he dried my tears
I knew he cared
I never want
to let him go
all our love needs
is room to grow
it feels so right to fall
for the boy inside my wall
his father saw me leave
he yelled, his face was red
I said, calm down, it's only me
he called the cops instead
they came all dressed in black
and now I can't go back
my breaking heart, it knows
this wall will never close


If I were to describe what I remember from before I was born, it would be “chaos”. The colors were chaos, the sounds were chaos, the shapes were chaos. Even my integrity as a being of time and space was in chaotic jeopardy at that time. The only vaguely non-chaotic thing I can recall are two words, spoken in a soft and seemingly sad voice. “Goodbye, Sampson”. And then I was born.
I awoke in an unknown land with an unknown body, and I startled myself awake. Like magic, however, I regained my senses immediately, or at least somewhat. My vision was like staring through a foggy window, and somehow I knew what a foggy window looked like. I also knew I was in the middle of a vast field, with what looked like trees dotting the surface occasionally, and I knew two things for certain. My name is Sampson and I am a dog with a purpose.
What that purpose was I had no clue. My first action was to look for it directly, something in my immediate vision to pursue. Sadly, my isolated situation along with my lackluster eyesight led that goal nowhere. I figured I could find my purpose with a sound, so I mustered up all of my energy and let out a strong BARK! The noise echoed across the plain, ringing in my ears, and shook the ground I stood on. My fearful instinct was to yelp more, which only continued the problem. Afraid of my own abilities, I ran away without making a sound.
I must've ran for hours before I collapsed on the ground, exhausted. To my surprise, I stumbled in front of a massive spotted creature, with what looked like much smaller creatures crawling out of holes from it. Too tired to move, I stood still in front of the beast until it let out a horrendous call, something like a “moo”. I barked in response, which made the monster run away as far as its little legs could take it. Realizing my power, I continued to chase the beast with my earth-quaking barks, the shaking ground no longer affecting me. The only thing I had going for me was the feeling of tall grass brushing against my legs, but it was enough energy to fuel me.
At some point, I found more spotted monsters which started running with the original one I had scared. Eventually, after much chasing and barking, I stopped. As the beasts went away, I thought about my purpose once again. Was this really it, just chasing monsters for no reason? Surely a life mission couldn't be that simple. I gave the things one last final bark when, out of the blue, the world around me disappeared, and I reemerged in a different place.
The sky became a brown ceiling, and I realized that I was inside a room with many other dogs like me. In fact, I was much smaller, and not only that, but my vision was much clearer. A tall pale creature with two legs stood over me, grinning. They picked me up, and I saw their attire: a bright green vest with the letters "WWS" written in a wholesome brown. I yelped, and he started to chuckle. It was then that I reemerged in the world I was at before. I entered with new knowledge; the two-legged pale creatures were humans.
I continued to walk the plain, sometimes barking at things that came close to me, until I saw two silhouettes in the distance. They looked like humans. I barked at them to go away, yet they continued to get closer and closer. Eventually, the two men stood still, and as I basked in my glory I heard a sudden noise, and a sharp pain hit my side. My movement became clumsy, my vision somehow became more foggy, and I fell into deep sleep.
I awoke once again in a small cage, the outside of the cage hot and dingy. The lights were low, the air conditioner barely blew, and I could hear the muffled voices of two humans from outside. Suddenly, they entered, and I could hear them clearly.
“I'm telling you, we've found ourselves the perfect guard dog! I think Mr. Dark will be very pleased,” spoke one of the humans, wearing a purple waistcoat with the letters "MC&D" written on ornately.
The other human, balding and wearing glasses, raised an eyebrow. “Who is to say this Doberman doesn't go against our demands? If it possesses such power, than surely it could use it against us.”
The purple-suited human guffawed. “My good sir, have you gone mad? This is a dog, they'll do anything we tell them to do.”
“Say that in two weeks time.”
“Ha! Extend that to when this boy dies.” The balding human exited the room, and all that was left was me and the purple-suited man. “So, would you like to get out for a bit?” I couldn't say I was too pleased with my current conditions, but I didn't trust this human at all, so I struggled against his hands. “Blasted thing, can't follow simple instructions!” He yanked me out of the cage.
With more than a bit of struggle, the purple-suited man led me through the facility, passing many packed hollering rooms. The people in the rooms all seemed extraordinarily dressed, waving around green slips of paper, but they all blended together with my poor eyesight. After many twists and turns through the corridors, I finally emerged outside. Ready to finally escape, I jumped about and was about to bark only for my lips to be restricted. Some funny contraption was placed on my nose, and I could no longer utter a yelp. Not only that, but I was latched onto a pole that stuck out from the ground, and I could only move a bit away from my position. The purple-suited human looked at me sternly.
“Now listen, you stay here and guard this building behind me. Got it? Good boy.” He went away, and I was left alone with a bowl of kibble and water. The next two weeks of my life were absolute torture. Whether in pouring rain, blistering sun, or any other weather, I lived outside, just laying down. I slept and soaked in all that came onto me, yet no one cared. There weren't just a few that entered either, there were dozens. Some walked in with twirly mustaches and stuffed pockets, others weren't humans at all but rather tentacle monsters or antlered bipeds. All had that same aura of arrogance as the purple-suited man, laughing maniacally as they walked in.
By the end of the second week, I had enough. I couldn't do my job; I had become tired, weak, nearly blind anyways, and I hadn't used my bark at all. I watched as those same humans and others walked in loaded with money, and I couldn't take it any longer. This couldn't be my purpose. I couldn't live under the rule of someone who barely even knew my appearance. My anger culminated in a bark unlike any other. The ground went up and down like mad, my muzzle broke, my chain snapped, and all those people fell down. In that instant, I had another vision, my world snapping back to another time, another place.
I sat on a soft cushion on the floor, two men chatting across from me. They both wore that same bright green vest, but this time they had name tags. I could barely read them from the cushion. “Daniel” and “Jonathan”. My vision snapped back. I remembered those two humans from before, Daniel and Jonathan. They were brothers until something happened. I couldn't remember what.
“Stop right there, dog!” yelled a voice from behind me. I turned around and, as I expected, it was the purple-suited man. Knowing he'd get me sometime if I just stood there, I booked it away, and though he chased after me he wasn't at all fast enough to catch me. I ran far away into the plains, and I found myself in a situation much like I had been in before. I still had no clue what my purpose was, other than it had to do with Daniel and Jonathan, whoever they were.
Soon enough, I found myself near a large red house, which wouldn't have been too notable if there hadn't been the same massive spotted creatures as there were when I first became a thing! Not only that, but in massive quantities too! I must've barked a thousand times at them, because if there was one thing I knew I enjoyed, it was barking. But it couldn't have been my purpose. There must've been something deeper. And that's when the Wilsons found me.
They approached me cautiously, each one of them. One was a bearded human, a camera in hand and a sun hat. Another was a young woman, writing in a notebook and staring intently at what she had written. There was one human in particular that I recognized the most, a young man with a turkey sandwich. He was oddly familiar, really familiar, and he clearly had good tastes. I decided to go with the human, although the others didn't seem half-bad either.
He gave me his sandwich and put me in the back of a van. As we drove away, I heard the woman and the sandwich human talk with each other.
“Good job on getting the dog in here. He's a Doberman, you know? At least that's what he looks like from what I can tell.”
“He is a bit blurry, isn't he? He seems like a friendly fella, however. Not like Ringo.”
“Heh, we didn't know Ringo would even do that stuff. We still have to take good care of him, we don't want him running off anywhere. I think you have a good handle on him. Any ideas for names?”
“I was thinking…Sampson?”
“That sounds good, Daniel.”
Daniel, this man was Daniel. And somehow he gave me a name I already had? I didn't question it, he seemed more welcoming than the purple-suited man. He brought me to an enclosure with a wide field, sticks, balls, and no poles. To say it was an improvement from my previous situation is an understatement. I spent my life running around, eating turkey sandwiches, and interacting with Daniel. Despite my time of luxury, my life still seemed meaningless.
Was I supposed to stay with Daniel? What would I do with him? Nothing seemed clear, yet I was so comfortable. It seemed wrong. One day, when I bit into a piece of turkey, my vision went away again, and I was back in the clearer land of a different time.
I found myself normal size, but I sat across from the woman from earlier and another person, the person who was there with Daniel in my earlier vision. Jonathan. They both sat in an office room, the fan spinning above.
“Fae, I d-don't know what I'm gonna do,” stumbled Jonathan, “With Daniel gone, I just…I just don't know.” He started tearing up, and Fae placed her hand around his shoulder.
“Listen, I know it's tough, it's tough for all of us, but there's no way to get to the past.”
Jonathan turned to face her. “But what if we could? What if we could go to another time, another place? There's gotta be a way, with the tools we have available.”
“You know the Supervisors won't allow you to use their super-tech. Come on, let's get some sandwiches.” They left the room, and as the door shut, my vision went back to its usual fogginess at my regular shelter. Daniel's gone? But Daniel was still there, unless that wasn't my reality. Perhaps it was a different reality entirely. But, if that was the case, why would I view it? Things seemed weird enough that it could've just been a coincidence. My thoughts were interrupted by a conversation behind me.
“Hey Daniel, you should see this,” said Fae, as she walked into the same room as Daniel. She held a piece of paper in her hand, which read “LOST DOG: Sampson, Owner: Jonathan Stanford, $50 Dollar Reward”. Jonathan? But he wasn't of this world, and if Daniel's reaction was anything to go by, he didn't expect this either.
“Jonathan? But…how?”
“I know, that's why I brought it to you. You know that temporal displacement thing one of the Supervisors was talking about? We're thinking this has something to do with it.” Daniel started to mumble.
“I…how…are there any ideas about how or why?”
“The supervisors have the guy at wherever they do things. They say he has some kind of Foundation tech that allowed him to get here. We don't have the details though.”
“What'll happen to Sampson?”
“I'm not su-”. Fae stopped mid-sentence as the intercom went off over Wilson's HQ.
“Attention! There is an anomaly loose in HQ. Do not make contact! I repeat, do not make contact! Have a nice day!”
I stood there shocked. Was Jonathan here? The most important question was why, but there was no time to think as Fae and Daniel entered my enclosure. “Come on, buddy,” said Fae, “we gotta go to the shelter. It's around here somewhe-”
The door clicked open to the enclosure from behind them. There was a white silhouette in view, walking toward us, but slowly it became clearer and clearer. It started at the head, and spread to the body. It was a human with a bright green vest with the letters “WWS”. Memories started flooding back.
I remembered him with the weird tech in his hands. I remembered him saying Daniel's name over and over. I remembered him touch my head, strap something to my body, and say “Goodbye Sampson”. There was a piercing feeling in the back of my mind. It all made sense now. My purpose was simple; my purpose was to find Daniel. I stayed by Daniel as Jonathan walked closer.
“Good boy, Sampson, good boy,” spoke Jonathan, as he patted me on the head. He turned his attention toward Daniel. “I'm glad to see you again, brother.” Jonathan hugged Daniel, and it appeared as if Daniel hugged him back, even if he wasn't entirely there.
“B-but, how?” Daniel asked back.
Jonathan shrugged. “Those supervisors have some interesting stuff in their abandoned closets. I'm not even sure how it works. I'm just glad I found you.” He put his hand on Daniel's shoulder and looked back towards me. “Come on, old boy, let's go home as a family.”
And then I went back into the aether.