In the very bowels of the earth, up against the hard heat of the rocks and the cool of the abyssal water, emerges a creature of born of darkness and stone. Covered in spines of rock and mud-brown scales, it rolls about on the floor of the ocean, covering itself in the long-forgotten sludge. It is not great in size, but it is one of many. Around it thrash others, some like it and others strange beyond description. But they are there, there where life consists of bacteria and slime, and the idea of light is not even a memory passed down through generations. They are there, and they are rising. The singular creature opens its minuscule eyes as it is propelled by random vents of heat, up towards the dark depths of the water, away from the rolling sea floor and its myriad kin. Crawling and clambering through the ocean currents, its very being crushed by the enormity of pressure, it ascends past the drifting things and the dark shapes in the water, the slow shells and the quick little fish. It rockets from the depths, seeking out the light and life it knows should be above. It knows it is close, as it passes a shoal of shiny grey creatures, close to the ceiling of the sea and the warmth of the light above.
A great shape moves above, a staining shadow on the horizon of the depths. It is enormous, all-encompassing and all-reaching within the creature's sight. The light from on high is obscured by the great trundling shape as it meanders by, sucking and pulling at the sea with a might beyond the creature's limited imaginings. The newborn thing continues up, up towards the great shape, drawn by both the pull of the water around the towering thing and its own infantile fascination with its vastness.
Clunk
The creature twists away from the massive thing, recoiling at the shock and sound of the impact, seeking purchase against it with which to escape. The behemoth thing sucks and pulls at its flailing limbs through the thick water, drawing it closer and closer still to some horrible maw in its gargantuan surface. Dragging and tearing through the water, the creature that had been so close to freedom is drawn into the terrible gullet of this massive expanse of obstructing ocean-shadow. Twisting and spinning, bleeding and suffering, the creature is drawn in. Into the maw of the shadow. Into darkness.

It awakens alone within the great thing that has consumed it, surrounded by substances and materials and biles foreign to it, covered in the slight sludge of the sea and its own blood. It stretches its sinews and joints, testing them slowly with pain and stiffness. It feels, or perhaps knows, that something is wrong. That this place is not right. That the cold dark box it has found itself in is not the warmth and light at the top of the ocean, far above and yet so close to the place of its birth. This place is too close. Too close to the hard and shadow that it was born within and of, the sharp pains and rancid smells. Too familiar.
The wounded and frightened thing moves slowly, casting about in the utter darkness for some means of escape, or at least for something new. Its simple and singular mind is lost in a jumble of experiences and pains for which it was not prepared, for which it has no natural response. There is nothing in this place for it to wonder at, to learn from and of. Only the damp and darkness. It wanders through the dark, prodding at walls and the fetid air with its hard snout, hoping to find escape from its prison of blindness. It searches and searches, all the time crawling deeper and deeper into the heart of the thing that has consumed it. Finally, it strikes something new.

Surrounded by a rasping, slick scrape that accompanies its every movement, the thing from the sea floor slinks down corridors and byways of some abysmal maze. Every movement it makes causes a pain in its ears beyond any other, and the light spilling through the cracks in the cold walls is nearly blinding within the darkness of the labyrinth. It struggles through the tiny passageways, voices and strange metallic sounds resounding through the tunnel that has become its brief home. After a time of slowly dragging itself along, its fibers and muscles aching as they settle into its rended form, the creature arrives at yet more cracks in the lining of its passageway. It slides towards the light on the floor of tunnel, knowing instinctively that it must follow the brightness regardless of the pain caused to its maladjusted eyes. Blood and bile seeping from the cracks in its outer layers, it peers into the painful glow and stares in wonder.
Below, great pink and brown creatures with freakishly long limbs and some strange, fur-like coating move about, chattering at each other and staring at giant lights. Some sway about, their forms caught by an unseen breeze and forced to twitch and flutter, speaking all the time both to their companions and beings that are not there. Suddenly, from the side of the strange box in which the creatures seem to reside, burst yet more alien oddities. These ones, different from the rest - low to the ground and with great teeth and nails -, leap and bound through an opening in a wall. The beings inside jump and scream as the new things appear, producing strange metal tubes filled with flame and light as the bounding things tear through their ranks, rending flesh and breaking bone. So much sound and horror surrounds the wounded thing in its tunnel from the carnage below. The thing watches in horror as many of the creatures and the monsters below fight and die, and it watches still as the conflict ends and the tall things rush around in the darkness. It watches as one turns and looks into the darkened labyrinth, raises its roaring weapon, an—

The creature from the ocean floor scampers slowly through alleys, dragging its broken form past shadow and light and heat in the darkness, the shouts and shatters behind it spurring it on in its terror. It is afraid now, afraid that it will never see the light above the water that it so longs for. It flees, from the monsters and the sound, into the darkness of the tunnels. Running on broken limbs, it propels itself ever forward. Ahead it sees a shift in the light, some shape obstructing the patterns of shadow. And then it sees only darkness.

The creature awakes once more surrounded by fluids and discomforts foreign but familiar. It casts about with unresponsive limbs, clawing weakly at the green-yellow fluid that it is engulfed in, trying to make sense of the strange shapes and colors working their way through its body. It is suspended, trance-like, within a casing of brightness, surrounded on all sides by clear stone and, beyond that, white floors. In some part of its half-conscious mind it is reminded of its birth, of the living rocks at the bottom of the dark sea. It casts its half open eyes around its liquid cage, vaguely aware of a great many such prisons within the bright chamber. Within the other cells are creatures and beings of myriad structure and form, each a product of a chaotic birth. In the center of them all, all the wondering entrapped creatures, stands a single greyish-brown one, covered in long white fur and holding some metallic structure. It leans toward the structure, and speaks.
"Research log five dash twenty dash eighty-eight. Samples recovered on-board remain inactive following application of preservative agent, although life signs persist in four of twelve subjects. Organisms six and eleven show signs of rapid decay as a result of injuries sustained prior to and during recovery. Sample nine is absent from containment for testing purposes. All samples accounted for."
The barely-live creature blinks once at the jailing thing, and slowly falls back into the darkness.

« Under the Sea | HUB | Parting »


Below are provided the documents you requested.

Log of breach at Site 62 on ██/██/████.

██/██/██, 0134 HOURS: Unknown entity manifests outside Site 62's main entrance. Security personnel panic and flee.
██/██/██, 0140 HOURS: Unknown entity opens Site 62's main entrance doors. Video feeds overcome with static for a period of 36 seconds. Video blackout follows possible route of entity through Site.
██/██/██, 0203 HOURS: Unknown entity reported by personnel. Entity headed towards inanimate SCP storage vaults. Security teams tasked to contain entity.
██/██/██, 0220 HOURS: Security team incapacitated by entity. Entity exits Site unopposed. Video interference ceases. Security later universally reports an overwhelming feeling of terror preventing them from acting against the entity.
██/██/██, 0310 HOURS: Inventory check for Site 62 reveals the absence of SCP-573.
██/██/██, 0316 HOURS: Warning sent out to all sites to be on guard for entity.

Unknown entity determined to be SCP-303 through forensics and SCP database inquiry. Zero encounters with SCP-303 had been logged since ██/██/████ (167 days before containment breach at Site 62).

██/██/██, 1817 HOURS: Personnel at Site ██ report feelings of unease and panic. As Site ██ is situated in the Rocky Mountains, it was put on lockdown while nearby Sites were contacted.
██/██/██, 1822 HOURS: All Site ██'s video feeds disrupted. Power fails, emergency distress signal activated.
██/██/██, 1859 HOURS: Distress signal deactivates automatically. Site unresponsive to outside contact.
██/██/██, 2011 HOURS: MTF Alpha-16 arrives at Site ██. All personnel found dead of evisceration, or remain missing.
██/██/██, 2113 HOURS: MTF fails to verify location of anomaly housed at Site ██. SCP-899 declared missing.

« The Red Horse (The Ironic Metaphor) | Canon Hub | The Black Horse (The Crawling Sea) »


Gilbert Buchs had a little game that he played in his free time lately: he sat in front of his computer, played one of his old New World Order Exposed videos, opened a bottle of bourbon, and then took a shot whenever he was right. Gilbert watched Video Gilbert stand in front of a dry-erase board. He had drawn a rectangle on it; it looked like someone had chewed off one corner. Suspenseful stock music played in the background.
"Something… is happening… in Kansas." Video Gilbert drew a circle in one of the edges that hadn't been gnawed at. "Last week, I caught word that there was a man out west who was struck by lightning and survived. If you think that's strange, you haven't been watching me long enough. What really matters is what happened afterward. I got to interview him, and you're about to hear some of the audio I taped from the encounter." The screen faded into black with the caption "THIS HAPPENED RIGHT IN OUR BACKYARDS".
"Okay… what can you tell me about the days between the accident and when they showed up?"
An old man's voice responded. "Well, uh… nothin', really. I just went along, building."
"Describe the encounter, then."
"I think I went to the door. I was in the middle of… I was holding a wrench. And I opened the door. Then I was sittin' down, like I was about to watch TV, but I didn't have one. I think I had thrown it out, or hooked it up to somethin', but everything I had been putting together was gone. Basement was clean."
"You have memories missing."
"All of it. I only know about the lightning 'cause of my health insurance, and 'cause of the lightning flower."
"What's that?"
"When you get struck, it can leave a mark on your skin that… oh, here, take a look." There was a pause and some rustling; the old man had turned around and lifted up his shirt.
"…Yeah, I see it. It looks like a huge tree tattooed into your back."
"It's faded now, but it was a lot worse back then. And I only remembered what to build because one of the bits was hid out back. I made one of them… electric eels, like, out of some computers the middle school threw out."
Then there was a crashing noise. "Good golly— I gotta see what's goin' on down there." Then there was some mumbling. and the old man said, "No, no, no. You ain't allowed down there. I think you better be—" The audio cut off and Gilbert showed up again.
"Now, we can see two things are immediately apparent: one," he counted on his fingers, "the lightning strike caused some sort of change in him that can't be explained by science."
Gulp. Gilbert downed a shot.
"Two, he's being used to create some sort of machines, and someone is taking those machines for their own uses."
Gulp. Close enough.
"You know what I think. That lightning was more than just bad weather. It was a beacon. Someone was teaching him."
Gulp.
"Someone alien. And that memory blank was them coming to collect."
Clink. He set the shot glass on his desk.
"There's something among us, folks! Something that's using us for its own ends, then wiping our memories of the experience!"
Gulp.
"Something inhuman!"
Clink.
The rest was contact information; Gilbert cut it off. Then he looked at the bottle. Damn, he thought. I should have been better at this.

Gilbert stopped over at the used book store the next day. Cathie had wanted him to meet her there, and he felt like picking up something to read. There was a wiry kid in front of him in line who could have been Gilbert ten years ago. The boy was looking for something in particular.
"It's got a bright red cover with sort of a, I don't know the term… Art Nouveau? Pop Art? It's got a design on it, and the title is 'Star' something."
"Sorry," the girl at the counter said. "I know what you're talking about, and I'm pretty sure we sold it yesterday."
The boy went to check Self-Help, and Gilbert rang up just as Cathie walked in. Cathie was middle-aged, was God's warrior on the frontlines against the encroaching Satanic movement, and wore a kitten sweater. She handed Gilbert and the counter girl a Xeroxed flyer.

DEMONIC DANGER TO CHILDREN
The SATANIC CHILD PAIN FOUNDATION
HAVE KIDNAPPED AN AMERICAN GIRL
FOR THEIR SICK RITUALS & SHE
HAS GROWN UP AS A DRUG-
CONTROLLED SLAVE DRONE FOR
THE EUROPEAN SCIENCE CULT!!!!
THEY CALL HER SCP-23-1-9
(TWENTY-THREE IS
AN ANCIENT BAVARIAN
ILLUMINATI MAGIC NUMBER)
AND THEY TEACH HER PERVERTED
HARRY POTTER UNDERAGE
MAGIC IN NEW YORK!
IF YOU HAVE ANY CHRISTIAN LOVE,
RESIST THE NEW WORLD ORDER
666CIENTIFIC KIDNAPPING PROGRAM
AND THEIR
"KETER" HEBREW LIZARD MASTERS

The pair sat down. Cathie set the stack of handouts on the table. "Gil, why did you want to see me?"
"What? I thought you asked me to come here."
"No."
"Oh."
"Well?"
"I guess I just wondered what you've been up to."
"Up to?" She tapped the flyers. "I don't think my feet have touched the ground all week."
Gilbert leaned over to scratch his head. "It's all true, Cathie. All of it."
"I don't know what you mean."
"This. The truth isn't out there anymore. It's right here." Gilbert held up a copy of Newsweek. The cover photograph depicted a dark-skinned child holding up a crude but accurate drawing of the Pepsi logo.

Virus Culture
What are "memetic hazards", how are companies using them legally, and why has one convinced this boy that this is what faces look like?

"Newsweek has the scoop on me. My job is pretty much over."
"You're just giving up on fighting the conspiracy?" Cathie pointed at the flyer in Gilbert's hand. "I'm trying harder than ever."
"What's there to fight? According to the Times, Two-Three-Nine is in US custody, and they've told her that whatever 'magic' they tried to teach her doesn't work. Two-Three-One was someone else, and the Guardian says that she was handed over to the GOC because she wasn't actually human, or isn't anymore, or something. I don't even know who that is in the photograph."
Cathie cringed at the mention. "The Global Occult Coalition." Both "occult" and "global" sounded like profanity coming from her. "They're the evil army of the one-world government. Like the Peace Corps and FEMA combined. Times ten."
"What? No, they aren't. That SCP thing is being cut up and served to governments like a… like a sheet cake, and the GOC is trying to keep this stuff out of their hands. They're doing the right thing here."
"Gilbert, everyone thinks they know the truth now. But we know better. At least, I thought we did."
A thought crossed Gilbert's mind: was she in denial? He stopped himself from saying it; instead, he tapped the stack of newspapers and magazines. "It all adds up. Proof positive. You don't have to rely on…"
"Conspiracy theories?"
Gilbert turned paler. "That's not what I meant."
"Yes. It is." Cathie picked up her flyers. "I should go pick up the kids from soccer."
"Still homeschooling?" Gilbert tried to change the subject, but Cathie wasn't having it. She stood up, went to leave, then turned around for a last thought.
"What happened to you, Gilbert? You're reading mainstream media. You're just like them!" She waved an arm in no particular direction.
"Or maybe they're just like me."

That night, Gilbert sat down and read everything he could from all his old favorite sites. It was nothing he didn't know already. He wanted to get excited. He wanted to find something. But… it was all true. All of it.
Gil opened YouTube and scrolled through his account playlist until he found it. "Forget Everything You Know — Bigfoot Is REAL".
Gilbert was about to get wasted.


November 9th, 1989. East Berlin. The last time it will ever be called that.
At a press conference announcing new, more liberal travel regulations for the German Democratic Republic, unprepared spokesperson Günter Schabowski inadvertently declares that the Berlin Wall will be opened for transit immediately.
Six hours later, there is jubilation across the city as “Ossies” flood into the West without permission or plan. Crowds mingle in the streets, cheering, drinking, and singing. For so long the two halves of one people have longed to know one other. Now that call is answered in a burst of passion that sweeps the world. Finally.
Finally!

For all the fuss about parascience, the Cold War ended pretty much as it was supposed to. A ten-year war in Afghanistan gnawed away at the Soviet Union from the inside. Economic stagnation wiped out what little tolerance for repression remained in the Communist Bloc. Across a dozen countries people took to the streets, a dozen revolutions signaling what would famously be called the End of History.
Issues and ideologies which seemed so crucial in the heat of past decades vanished in moments. In retrospect, the passions which sent half a million Americans to Vietnam had waned long before the first crack appeared in the Berlin Wall. Within a decade of the end, communism was a punchline, and what Cold Warriors remained were no more than relics of a quaint and confusing age.
One last great espionage drama took place far from the public view. Without their great rival, the United States had no desire to carry on the expensive work of mass parascientific containment, and the leaders of the new Russian Federation had no such capability. After arduous negotiations, the Foundation returned to moth-balled sites and slumbering facilities long occupied by forces of the two great combatants. The jailors recovered their wayward charges – their long exile was over.
There came a time of joyous reunification. Amidst the swirling crowds of Berlin, families came together, often for the first time – brothers embraced sisters they had never met, while children grown into unrecognizable adults searched out parents who were only memories. A hundred miles of concrete wall and forty years separation had not sundered the bonds of family and kinship.
No longer needed, The Coldest War passed into the dust bin of history.

Around the Brandenburg Gate some of the largest crowds gather. Already the “Wall-Woodpeckers” have begun chipping away at the once-fearsome barrier and by morning almost everybody and their aunt will have a piece.
Two figures, a man and a woman, slip away from the revelry unnoticed. Strangers, but who is a stranger on this singular night? Darting around the nearest corner, they fall into a drunken embrace. Swept up in a haze of alcohol and hormones, the man does not notice the wafting smell of citrus, and remains oblivious to the sudden sharpening of his consort's features as she prepares to consume him.
Ensnared and now sedated by his not-quite-human companion, the luckless man slips into unconsciousness. He does not see the four masked men who rush out of the darkness to subdue the shape-shifter, and does not remember the otherwise unremarkable Polizei van into which they wrestle her. But he lives to see the first day in a new Deutschland.

A white and green police van rolls down the quiet streets of West Berlin in the early morning, far from the pandemonium of the western border.
In the reinforced rear compartment, something less than human struggles against specially prepared restraints to no avail. If its head were not locked within an iron cage it would glare at the grey-haired agent who sits across from it, the agent who has hunted it relentlessly for so long, since Oslo, since Berlin, through a hundred other cities. Helpless with its semi-skin locked and pheromone pods plugged, the creature settles for a blistering stream of multilingual obscenity.
“Yell as you please, Twenty-thirty,” laughs Agent Franklin, now an old man. “I told you I'd be waiting. Yell as you please!”

« SCP-2498 | Hub |


And there went out another horse that was red: and power was given to him that sat thereon to take peace from the earth, and that they should kill one another: and there was given unto him a great sword.

Klaxons blared through Site 12. Throughout the building, screens flickered and filled with static. Televisions, cell phones, computers, and Game Boys, all powering on and filling with nothing. Researchers rushed through the halls to their stations, checking systems and trying to organize. Meanwhile, Dr Seidelman, Head Researcher, toiled in his office. His computer's monitor quietly buzzed with static; his phone sat to his side, angrily screaming for attention. Every line was full.
"Then reset it again, Dale," Seidelman barked into the phone. "Just keep trying, I'll get Yung to try again on his end. Just do it, I've got another call." Seidelman switched to line 2. Every sector head was calling him at once. For good reason, too.
"Seidelm- No, I don't know what happened. Fourteen nineteen's never done this before." Seidelman scribbled a note to himself. "… Right. Alright. Yes, all media are affected. Not just television. Thank you. Try to reset the jammers. I've g- I just got off the phone with Dale, he's resetting his end. Call him. I have another call, good bye." He took a breath as he switched to line four.
"Seidelman." He waited for the response. "Seidelman's office. Hello?"
One by one, the lines went quiet. Soon the office was silent, save for the low buzz of the static of the computer monitor.
Slowly, Seidelman looked up from the phone to the monitor. Static had been replaced with bright and colourful scene, a simple cartoon image with blues and greys. He recognized it as the main labs, where they recorded each broadcast of SCP-1419. Grey cartoon figures, each of whom Seidelman recognized as his coworkers, slumped across computers and desks; flashes of bright red blood splattered across the scene.
“Hello everybody! I'm Bobble the Clown, and welcome to today's show!” A small explosion of colourful confetti and streamers burst into the middle of the scene. As it all settled, a tall, brightly-coloured figure stood facing the camera, arms spread. A clown, with yellow hair and a big pink nose, drenched in blood from the waist down.
Seidelman sat frozen in his seat. He could feel his heart pounding in his head. It was like the clown was staring straight into his soul.
“Today is a very special episode. The last! That's right, this will be the last episode of the Bobble the Clown Show! Isn't that sad?” Bobble frowned. "But that's okay! Now, we can learn anywhere, any time. I'm going to have a brand new show. Fun for the whole family, all thanks to our friends at the Foundation. Thanks to my scientist friends showing me this wonderful new signal, I can be everywhere!"
"Theatrical, as always," came a second voice; that of an old man, coming from everywhere yet nowhere. "Doctor, leave." A pause. "Please."
Dr. Seidelman fled his office.
"… and… of course. You're here, now." The clown sighed, rubbing his eyes. "Come on out, if you want to talk. I know I'm not going anywhere."
343 appeared, sitting in Seidelman's chair. Alone. Bobble leered through the television, a grin creeping across his face.
"Hrm? What's this? Where's your… project? That girl that the Foundation… adopted for you?"
"She left," the old man replied wearily. "She's gone."
"… And?"
"She's not coming back. We've lost the First."
"Oh, so that's it! So you're down, because your favourite girl had a tantrum and ran away." Bobble smiled broadly. "So that fell through. Big deal! What's the plan now, boss?"
343 sat silent.
"… well then. I expected you to be more on-the-ball than this. One little girl runs away from home and the big bearded bastard falls apart! Come on!! You already know the answer." Bobble sighed, rolling his eyes.
"What, then, clown?"
"What was that one thing you said, all those years ago…? Oh wait, I got it." He hunched over, miming waving a cane. "'Ooohhhhh there must always be four! The four Riders will… some shit I don't remember.'"
343 snorted. "Just spit it out already."
"If you need four assistants, go and find one. If you need one more to fulfill your… prophesy, then go and make one. It's so simple. Don't you watch television? People today don't even remember Conquest. They lump it under WAR!" He cackled, leaning in.
343 waited.
"Pestilence. The fifth Rider everybody seems to rave about. Oh, they always remember War and Death, and maybe sometimes Famine, but never Conquest. No no, it's always Pestilence. Well maybe they forget Famine instead, but whatever. That's not the point."
343's eyes narrowed, and the clown grinned wider.
"Yesss, yes, you're getting it now. And you know exactly who I'm talking about, don't you? Frankly, I don't think she's anything special, but I suppose she works thematically. What do you think? She won't replace your precious little princess, but you'll take what you can get, mm?"
343 leaned back. "Nothing has gone according to plan." He sighed. "Perhaps… perhaps we shall allow this idea." He tapped his fingers to his forehead. "An aggravating young woman. But certainly not more aggravating than you. Yes, this is what we will do. She will be the First Horseman, as you are the Second."
"Fabulous. Off you go, then." Bobble waved to 343. "I wouldn't want to keep you, boss. So much work to do."
343 looked angry for a moment, then just sighed. "You do not command me, clown."
"I'm only trying to help. I suppose I had better get started, either way." Bobble straightened, turned and walked off to the right, the camera panning with him. Soon the camera panned out, revealing a massive cathedral, lit only by candles and torches. It was as if Bobble walked off one set and onto another. The clown remained of the same bright and cheerful art style as before, with a cheerful jaunt in his step as he made his way to an altar.
343 took in the scene. "A bit… blasphemous, isn't it? Even for you."
"Me? Oh, of course. I'm damned anyway, and I've always wanted to be a messiah." He looked back to 343, cackling quietly, rubbing his hands together. "Suffer the little children and all that, bring them all to me."
343 rolled his eyes. "If you must make a mockery of my words, you could do to pick something more appropriate. Why not 'I come not to bring peace, but a sword'?" He paused. "I came to give you a great sword, as it was written. Today, though, man has laid down the sword and picked up…"
"Guns! Yes, yes. Rat-a-tat-fucking-tat. Guns are all the rage in this modern world. A shame really. But with progress comes opportunity!" Bobble paused. "I can pass on the literal sword, if it's all the same to you. After all, what better sword is there today, than a television's antenna?"

« The White Horse (The Conqueror with the Golden Crown) | Canon Hub | Interlude: A Memo Regarding a Theft »


Yahweh walked through a wheat field in the southwestern part of the Jezreel Valley, restless.
He had not stayed much longer in the other Valley, "His" Valley. It had been entirely too disturbing. A scene for which He had no script. He could not recall any other time in which He had felt this way - at least, not in His true memories. Those other, false memories were still coiling through the back of his brain, serpents in the grass waiting to strike once trodden on.
He had needed to get away. So He came here, to the place once called Megiddo, where the Armageddon war would be fought. Would still be fought.
Because these events changed nothing. Everything that was to transpire would still transpire. He may not have reckoned on having so many powerful, alien opponents, but he was still the one true God. He still had a vast army of angels, an army that dwarfed any other in the history or imagination of man. He still had his Locusts, the things the Foundation called 098. He had all those and more.
And on top of them, He had His Horsemen.
He had planned to summon the First Horseman to the unnamed Valley, before he'd been derailed, and this valley of Megiddo would do for now. The others He could simply approach the way He approached everyone, up close and personal, but… not the First. Yahweh felt no need to countenance the evil done to the First with His holy presence, not even though the evil had been done by His own followers, not even though they had wrought their evil for reasons they thought to be good ones.
Yahweh stood in the middle of the wheat field and spoke the First's name.

And I saw, and behold a white horse: and he that sat on him had a bow; and a crown was given unto him: and he went forth conquering, and to conquer.

The young woman lay restrained on her bed, watching the IV drip hooked up to her arm.
She had spent most of her life in this bed, she knew, since the age of nine. She was now in her late teens, though she wasn't sure of the year. She had forgotten so much. As to who she was… Well, she had also forgotten her name long ago. The people who came to see her called her SCP-231-7.
She heard a voice in her head.
Awaken, my child. Rise up and walk.
The blocks in her mind, the blocks designed to keep her power contained, if only barely, all fell away at once.
Birth pangs stabbed through her. She screamed, louder than she ever remembered screaming before.
There were no klaxons to blare at 231-7's unnamed holding location. But there was shouting, and panic, and people in identical uniforms and explosive collars flooding the room. "Containment breach!" "Restrain her! Restrain her!" "Initiate emergency procedures!"
But it was already much too late.
SCP-231-7 - Conquest, the First Horseman of the Apocalypse - had never been pregnant with a literal child. She had been pregnant with… herself. There was no better way of putting it. She had been containing her own power, and it had been building up, stronger and stronger, honed in the fires of a thousand extended torture sessions that should have broken anyone beyond repair long ago.
Because of this, it took her only seconds to give birth, and then, to ascend.
Her eyes burned like white stars. In a moment, the network of scars and bed sores that covered her body vanished. Her skin shone brilliantly, with a light beyond light, almost liquid. A robe that flowed like water and gold fell across her shoulders as the old hospital gown dissolved. A circlet of fire ignited in a halo around her head, set with a dozen pinpricks of gem-colored light.
The men surrounding her dissolved in a flash of white light.
She remembered her sisters. Now all dead, whether by the fumbling of the Scarlet King's children and the fumbling of the Foundation after them. Rough drafts. Nephilim. She remembered where she had come from, and why. She remembered "Class A Amnestics." She remembered…
She remembered everything.

Yahweh was startled momentarily — a foible of His human body's fight-or-flight response, to be sure — when Conquest appeared in the wheat field out of nowhere. She was not wearing her illuminated clothing, but rather an ordinary t-shirt and jeans, contrasting with her shining flesh and burning crown.
She was without her Steed, the sleeping foam entity which once awakened could blanket a fourth of the world in its collective. Instead she was accompanied by a translucent floating creature, all eyes and tentacles, swimming in its own personal cloud. An atmospheric jellyfish.
"Your Steed…" Yahweh began.
"I found one I liked more," Conquest said. She patted the cloud-jelly's side. "It's white, isn't it? It does eat people, sometimes, but right now I'm not sure if I care." She hesitated. "I can speak so well. I can't remember the last time… well, I can now, actually. So is this part of my power?"
She was angry, Yahweh could tell.
"My child," He began, "it is time to forgive the Foundation for their transgressions—"
"Don't talk to me about the Foundation."
Yahweh was torn between becoming angry over her disrespect in interrupting him, and tolerant of her reaction to her liberation. She had been held by the Foundation for quite a long time… perhaps He could afford to be indulgent…
"I'm not angry with the Foundation," Conquest said. "I'm angry with you."
The venom in her tone made His brow furrow in aggravation.
"They didn't know what they were doing. Thought they were saving the world. But you… You could have told the Foundation what I was. You could have just taken me away from them. You could have done something." She paused to take a breath. "Even just a word to O5-14… But you did nothing. Do you — of course you do. You know exactly what they did to me. You know every last detail. And. You. Did. Nothing."
Yahweh frowned. "How do you know about O5-14?"
She just looked at Him. "That's it? That's what you have to say?"
Yahweh sighed. He had no time for an argument. Not right now, not after the ordeal in the Valley. "Answer my question."
"You have no idea how much power you gave me, do you?"
Now He was angry. "Regardless," He said, "You are Mine, and you will obey."
"I don't think so."
He stared at her, flabbergasted at her gall.
"I'm not going to be your Rider," she said. "I don't belong to anyone. Never again. You gave me a whole lot of power and… I'm gonna use it."
"How…"
Then He read her mind. He didn't actually intend to, no; He did it without thinking, to find the answer to His question. He was about to wipe her from existence. Not a harsh punishment, all things considered, if she was not going to be cooperative.
Or He had been about to wipe her from existence. Until He read her mind, and saw everything that was in there. Everything that she had ever felt, thought, experienced.
And Yahweh did nothing.
Conquest looked up at the stars. "I think… I think I'm gonna go explore the universe," she said. "I don't know when I'll come back. Maybe in a few million years. Maybe never. It doesn't really matter."
Conquest rose into the sky with her cloud-jelly companion. No flash, no pomp, no fanfare; she just simply flew away, ascending towards the clouds, and through them, and past them.
Yahweh watched her go. He did not try to stop her. He watched her until she was a pinprick in the sky, and kept watching until she vanished completely, leaving Earth far behind.

« Awakenings | Canon Hub | The Red Horse (The Ironic Metaphor) »


They came from beyond the world, from over the world, from under the world. They came from inside the stars and from behind the rain. They came from the known lands and they came from the secret places of old.
The vast ones who drank of the nebulae, the small ones who did not care what happened beyond the banks of their rivers, the ones who bathed in the light and the ones who watched from the shadows, the ones who loved us and the ones who forgot about us, the ones who hate us now and the ones who love us still, the ones who sung with the rats and the ones who swam with the leviathans, they came from far and near, they came one and all. They came to end the world.

The machine labeled SCP-5720 put the last finishing touches on the final model planet in its most recent solar array. It trained its claw upward, as if looking once more, wistfully, to the stars.
SCP-5720 had no name, no thoughts the way humans would account for thoughts, and certainly no internal mechanism for vision. But you would have to say that it could 'see' nonetheless, for what else could you call what it did when it directed its mechanical parts towards the sky?
Either way, this time, SCP-5720 'saw' something different. Something prowling between the beautiful orbs and masses of color… something looking towards Earth. Looking back towards SCP-5720.
A sea of glimmering eyes.
Words formed in the not-mind of SCP-5720.
Today is the day your prayers will be answered.
A long moment passed, and then a single other word formed in the not-mind of SCP-5720, and vibrated there for a long time.
Awaken.
And so it did.

What appeared to be a vast wall of fur approached the Earth, sank through the sky, and landed on the ground, to find everything it had loved gone. Her fellow gods were on their way, but as always, she had arrived first, a mother eager to be reunited at long last with her children, now that the time of the end had come.
She had been gone for thousands and thousands of years. She had gone as her children had first looked to the stars, and it was then that she had known that they would be alright.
And now there was no trace of them.
Their beautiful webbed cities, their songs that had filled the planet with joy, their vast works of art to stun even a god's eye - gone. All gone. All that remained were their bones, and living on top of them, the hairless apes that they had once kept in zoos with other animals, now risen to dominate the planet. And they did not even remember her children. They moved through their lives like ants, building their wooden and metal hives over the graves of her greatest loves. This was sacred ground they defiled, and they did not know or care.
Ur-An-Uum raised her head to the sky and cried a rending wail of anguish.
She mourned for a long time, a noise heard on high, her wails causing earthquakes and tsunamis across the planet, weeping for her children. She did not quell her sorrow. The only things left to die from her pain were the furless apes. This was to be a time of joy, but there was only sorrow left. She would not be comforted, for her children were no more.
And then…
She felt something. The tiniest glimmer in her mind.
And she felt hope.
Ur-An-Uum called out for her children, the creatures that she now knew the furless apes called a sea of derogatory names, the least insulting of which was "SCP-1000".
Her children answered.

The entity awoke with a start, not knowing where it was, or, on reflection, who it was. All it knew was that The Time Had Come.
It rose from its grave, shattering a mountain as it did so, and hurtled itself into the atmosphere, trying to get its bearings.
The entity gazed across the world. Everything was different. Humans - they were everywhere. Not just scattered here and there across the great expanses, but living in massive villages, villages the likes of which the entity had never seen.
Not that it was complaining. Humans had fed it well with their worship and blood sacrifices in the olden days. Now that there were so many more humans, why, the entity would certainly soon be satiated beyond compare.
This was fortunate, because it had been asleep a very long time, and it was very hungry.
The entity cast about for a place of power. And found far too many. Far more than there had ever been before. It did not understand what to make of this knowledge, but, again, it did not complain. It only needed to pick one place of power for now, a simple one, to give it initial shape again. It chose the nearest one. A "Foundation Containment Site". Yes, this would certainly do. The humans had already invested this place with much of their energy. It must be a sacred place to them. An Es See Pee, they called it.
The entity would dine well indeed.
It wasted no more time, but hurtled directly into the place of power - a body of water, it saw - and landed inside it with a massive impact. It drank in the place of power and everything in it - the water, the local wildlife, the human-made metalworkings and detritus - and took the shape of a massive titan be-straddling the countryside. Man-shaped, so that the humans would understand the form to which they would soon direct their hearts and their prayers and their blood and their pleadings for mercy.
The eldritch entity that had merged with SCP-765 opened its mouth.
"QUACK," it said, its voice reverberating across the land.

First the rooster of crimson crowed, then the rooster of gold, then the rooster of soot-red.
A bloodstained watchdog bayed in its cave. Its eons-old bindings broke, and it ran free.
The sound of a great trumpet echoed across the Earth, with no apparent source. People stopped in the streets in New York, Delhi, London, Cape Town, and listened in confusion.
The Midgard serpent Jörmungandr stirred in its slumber. The shifting of its form caused tsunamis along several coastlines, demolished a number of villages in Greenland. A massive wolf, visible from hundreds of miles away, stalked across Denmark, accompanied by an army of burning giants.
Ragnarok had come.

The Administrator swung around in her chair to face the man who had just entered the room behind her.
"You knew I was coming," the man said. "You let me in."
"Yes," said the Administrator.
"You know you're dreaming, I'm sure," the man said. "And of course… you also know who I am."
"SCP-990," the Administrator said. She looks at him again. The suit, the bowler hat… or was that a fedora? "Nobody," she said. "But most importantly…" She picked up a file folder on her desk. "The first Administrator."
The two Administrators looked at one another.
"I saw you in the crowd in the Valley," the current Administrator said. "I knew to expect it, but… tell me it isn't true."
"I'm sorry," the first Administrator said. "It's true."
"This betrays everything we stand for," the current Administrator said. "You said it once yourself. We secure. We contain. We protect. We keep humanity out of the dark. For you to become one of these things…"
"I also said that the Foundation must stand in the dark, so that humanity could live in the light." The first Administrator hesitated. "Please believe me, if there had been any other choice to make, I would have made it. This has to be done. I hope you'll see why, soon." He hesitates. "I came here hoping to recruit you, you know. You and yours. I am sorry that I cannot tell you more, but I hope you will consider my offer."
"Tell me something," the current Administrator said. "This 'Harbinger'. Who are they?"
"I don't know," the first Administrator said. "It's true that I anticipated this for a long time, but… this chain of events blindsided me too."
"I know it's one of yours." The current Administrator's voice sounded impatient for the first time. "Who is it? Someone loyal to you, of course. Only someone with level 5 clearance could have pulled this off, so that does narrow the list down. Charles Gears? Jack Bright? Alto Clef? Kain Pathos Crow?" She paused. "I know it's not Sophia Light. Frederick Williams? Chelsea Elliot? Hell, Simon Glass?"
"I sincerely do not know," the first Administrator said. "Listen. The O5 Council is already compromised. SCP-343. And… well, you know the rest. I've cut off their communications, but they won't wait long to move. We should be in this together."
"I agree," the current Administrator said. "I know enough to know you don't have to do this. You'll have a compulsion, but I'm told it's minor. Easily overcome. Perhaps will not even return."
"The world must end," the first Administrator said. "Help me end it in the only way the Foundation — the only way humanity — will come out on top. There are more world-enders coming. You already know that dozens are already awake, and that hundreds soon will be. More and more will be waking up, the longer the Lock is open. And worse, more will arrive. The ones not already on Earth. This is the only way forward we have."
"Then we do not have anything left to say to each other," the current Administrator said.
"I am truly sorry to hear that," the first Administrator said.
"As I am truly sorry to say it," the current Administrator said.
The two Administrators nodded at each other, respectfully, and turned away from each other.
The first Administrator walked away and dissolved into the dreamscape. The current Administrator turned back to her dream-desk and waited for the sedative she'd taken to wear off.
Then she woke up, and got to work.

« Stormfront | Canon Hub | The White Horse (The Conqueror With The Golden Crown) »


The intruder appears to her as she kneels on a sloping, angular plane, of waving, waist-high red grass. Her field notebooks flutter, their pages fan back, and the grass is blown back in concentric circles. The thing itself is awash in glow and flickering shadows, then drops like a bird onto the firmament.
“YOU,” it says. “What the hell are you doing here?”
“Testing out early retirement options,” says the woman in the grass, who hasn't looked up yet. She's petite, pale, with a ropy build. A scar running down her face. “There's lots of area for phylogenetic research, in the-”
“Oh sweet Cthulhu. No you're not,” the intruder snaps. “For one, you're still, like, a hundred years younger than Garrison. You're not retiring now. And whatever's going on, you're going to have to get over it, soon. We have business. Your whole world-”
“You know…” The woman picks herself up, and dusts off the knees of her incongruous lab coat. The red blades of grass stand up on end, and the intruder can finally see clawed footprints in the muck underneath them. “I know I'm dreaming right now. And for part of my subconscious, you're being very demanding.”
She turns around, slowly. Then she notices his suit and bowler hat.
“Oh,” says Sophia Light.
“Right,” says 990.
Sophia looks around. “I would have cleaned up the place if I knew you were coming,” she says. “Why are you here?”
“Well, I'd say we're due for a little calamity. Wouldn't you?” He holds out his hand. “I've been blindsided, as of late. What I once saw in the future is no longer there at all. Something has changed. Big things are moving, Doctor Light. Whole lot of fish, no time to fry. Your whole world is about to turn sideways. Need to see?”
She touches his hand, and their surroundings change. Halfway-outdated Foundation architecture, older site, probably an auxiliary wing. Not one she's been in, in some time anyways, but the feel of it seems familiar. They are several stories underground, but sunlight streams in from gaping holes ripped out above them.
“This, Doctor, is your precious Site Fourteen.”
“Is it?” She tilts her head all around, pursed her lips. “Was Agent-”
“Ordinarily, I'd care, but right now this goes beyond your personal crap. And you're going to sit back and listen to what I say. It's not just Fourteen. It's going to be all of them. Something's changed and I can't tell you exactly how it'll play out, but your precious Foundation is about to be horribly, hideously, calamitously outmatched.”
The echoey, almost-silence of the burned-out building is, if you listen hard enough, rather calming.
“How can I stop it?”
“No one can stop it.”
Sophia looks up, and studies his face. “You just said you've been blindsided by this nonspecific disaster. And I haven't heard Johanna or the fivers or anyone getting a visit, so you haven't been working down the ladder. So what, this is a social call?” She pauses. “And how do you know it's unstoppable?”
He glares at her. “If this seems unplanned, I didn't expect you to work that out in your sleep, but fine- yes, it is, I've been low on time. But listen. Here's what you would have done, if I weren't here. You would have looked at the information. Talked it over with Garrison and Barculo and Vaux, whoever you trust these days. Maybe phoned a friend. Then, you would have compared what's happening with previous disasters of similar magnitude, looked for anomalous causes, then, finally, began preparing for the worst plausible result you could extrapolate.”
“That's what I would have done?”
“Yes. It would have been smart.”
“And what are you saying I should do?”
“I'm saying that this is going to get worse, and if you want to even live to have a battle plan, you're going to prepare for the worst- to start. Find your resources, gather your armies. Might play out that not everyone in the Foundation is your best friend.”
She nearly laughs. “What armies?”
“See, that kind of attitude is going to have to change.” 990 flickers in place, like a movie still. He checks his watch.
“I mean,” says Sophia, and then she does laugh. “I think you think you're doing me a favor. So thanks for telling me about the impending doom and all that jazz. But this is hilariously nonspecific. Can you tell me, say, what's going to happen? Or what kind of 'preparations' I should make?”
The bowler-hatted figure in his outdated suit checks his watch once more. “No, I can't, and it's already happened. Welcome to Armageddon. This is Day One.” He flickers again, and starts to walk away, then pauses. “Oh, and you're right- I'm not working down the ladder, and I am doing you a favor. Whenever you get done… Remember that.”
She blinks. “You think somehow I'll help you-”
And then he is gone. Sophia is alone in the skeletal ruins of Site 14. Motes of dust seep gently down from the surface, landing on the illuminated surface of an unreadable Object Class designation, bolted to the remains of a metal door. Deep in the fallen timber and rebar, something begins to stir.

Sophia sat bolt upright. Someone was pounding on her door. She dimly registered darkness, the scent of cleaning fluid, the tight sensation of hospital corners on fitted sheets. Her phone ringing and ringing. Knocking harder.
She pulled herself out of bed instantly, nearly falling as the blood in her legs caught up to her head, then gathering herself to pull the door open. “Yes?”
Elliot Barculo, Regional Security Director, currently stationed at the Svalbard Site, was propped in her doorway. Deep lines in his face. “Jesus Christ, Sophia, were you asleep?”
“I- maybe-” She squinted, confused, and rubbed her eyes. The idea of Sophia Light oversleeping was preposterous- “Did something happen at Site 14?”
He scowled. “How the hell did you know that?”
Oh.
“It's not just Site 14. Oh Christ.” Barculo sighed and turned his back. “No time. Johanna's waiting in the debrief room. Plane's in the airfield, if the sky's safe. We need a plan. Come on."
Sophia grabbed her jacket, and closed the bedroom door behind her. “Start talking on the way.”

Johanna Garrison, perched on the end of the conference table, looked older than Light could have ever imagined. Gabriel Bryant, personnel and espionage director, stood behind Johanna with an arm on her shoulder. Johanna and Sophia shared a look as Sophia entered the room, but neither said anything about the timing. Sophia's friend and apprentice, Charles Vaux, fixed an apprehensive look at her. Alerts were streaming onto Sophia's phone- containment breached at sites 14, 16, 19, 23, 40, 41, 42 A through D.
“This started at Site 10?” Sophia asked.
“As best anyone can figure,” said Bryant. “The site itself actually suffered no damage, although it teleported entirely to New Hampshire shortly before the other breaches.”
“New Hampshire?”
“Right. Researcher there- Dr. Yara Mirski- claims to have made contact with the responsible entity, says she tried to stop it.”
“What was the entity?”
“Actually, we have no idea.”
More than a handful of breakouts, sites around the world reported anomalies and disturbances. On the conference room screen, a report came in that SCP-1688 had materialized over its containment area and grown to four times the size it had ever been, driving arrows of lightning all over a nearby Foundation facility and small town. Reportedly the whole town had unilaterally joined together, in some kind of engineering project on a massive scale. At the same time, a ring-shaped stormcloud had formed several kilometers to the east, and was raising pallid spirits from the ground that it passed over. Reports showed SCP-460 moving across the sky at impossible speeds, with an army of ghosts trailing in its wake.
The next update was only video: a lightning storm, massive and striking ground so frequently that it looked like a comb of jagged white lines, and a large, circular, ochre stormcloud, rammed halfway into it. Faint white figures on the ground below seemed fixed in place, or spun out of shape like molten glass.
Ten minutes later, the yellow cloud and the ghosts were gone completely, and the lightning was still going.
“Okay.” Sophia stopped pacing, and panned through incoming alerts. "The O5 Council has been silent, which makes me think we've been attacked. CI? Maybe the Hand? A lot of the missing ones are Sentients. The other anomalies could be… distractions?”
“But not all. For heaven's sake, Sophia, the duck pond?” Garrison was still staring at the screens.
“Putting something there is the kind of mistake I'd make if I was trying to get at us with an incomplete set of archives.” Sophia's phone rang, despite the fact that she'd disabled it. She looked at the caller.
“Light,” Barculo said in monotone, “I know that some of these sites are yours, and you have to get to stabilizing, but some are mine too, and we need to start tracking them down. I don't think they're going to the same place, but there must be a link, so we'll start pulling-”
“Actually,” said Sophia, “I'm going to start planning for a second wave, possibly worse than this one. I would start now. And I'm sorry, I have to take this.”
She stepped out of the conference room. All down the hall, LEDs on security cameras and recorders were going out. Then she picked up the phone, and let it sit between her hand and her ear, and inhaled for a moment before speaking.
“Are you really her?” she asked.
“Yes,” said the Administrator of the SCP Foundation. “SCP-027, I think, is about to break containment." Fingers clacked on a computer keyboard. "As it's your site, please do anything humanly possible to prevent this from happening.”
“Of course,” said Sophia automatically.
The call quit.
She started dialing.

« Revelation (Part 3 of 3) | Canon Hub | Awakenings »


Two siblings, a brother and sister, were playing in a garden among the vine-blanketed trellises and burbling streams that their mother had so dedicated herself to cultivating. The two siblings were cradled and nursed side by side. They had stood on the same day, walked on the same day, spoken on the same day and giggled at the same jokes.
However, today they had begun to diverge. The sister sat the bank of a stream when a tiger approached her.
"Little one, why do you sit alone?" it purred.
"I am watching the stream! Look how beautifully it flows, listen to it babble," she said wistfully and unafraid.
"It is beautiful yes, but would you like to make it more so?"
A look of intense consideration crossed her face, the sort that only a child can muster. "Yes," she answered, "Show me how."

The air was sweet with the scents of sandalwood, aloe and incense as the palace was consumed by flames. They blended with the smell of blood, ink and unwashed clothes. The stink of fear washed over the inhabitants of the blessed city.
Above the cries arose new buildings built of the bodies of the slain. Here was the House of Wisdom done in human bodies and flame, the palace in slain children, the bazaar in dead scholars and women. Hegleu was a masterful architect.

Two lovers are lying on a rooftop, under the fronds of a date palm that had sprung up from the gardens of the palace below. Their whispers flutter like birds through cool desert night. Wrapped up in a mantle embroidered with the symbol of the Caliph the young woman reads aloud from a book by candlelight. The young man leans in close, his fingers and thawb stained with ink.
"…Like a strand of pearls through a pair of breasts." She snorts, stifling a laugh, her eyes a pair of happy almonds. "My city is not pair of breasts for a Valencian traveler to gaze at."
"It is shameful for the city," the young man replies, equally giddy, stroking his short beard in false contemplation. "What would happen to our fair city if all came simply to stare at it?"
"A tragedy!" She puts her elegant hand to her forehead feigning a swoon before her face relaxed into semi-seriousness. "Although it would be a tragedy to lose the voice of this city."
"To lose you would be a greater tragedy," the young man murmurs lovingly.
"Your poetry is better than this, you flatterer," she sighs, laying her head against his chest.
"Would you like to hear my latest then?"
"If you'll hear mine."

The palms that shaded the roads to the splendid city on Tigris had been shaped into the engines of the city's demise. They strained and stretched and launched pieces of the countryside into the air.
Behind the battlements a company archers stood at the ready as a stone demolished a bookbinder's workshop near the market. The first widow began wailing. A old archer felt his resolve harden. This was the jewel of Islam, seat of the Caliph. God would not let the city fall. He could not let the city fall.
At the bleeding edge of bowshot the archers watched a disorganized rabble approach one of the city's irrigation canals with shovels and baskets in hand. The army trampled over the farms beneath their feet and began to fill the canal like they had done before when they had burned through the countryside.
The archers loosed a volley of arrows, a cloud of nettles against the enemy. The dead of the rabble fell into the canal. It was only when the dead pulled the living down with then that the archers realized that the rabble was composed of hostages bound limb-to-limb.

"Look brother! Look and see the wonders that the tiger and I have wrought!" the sister exclaimed excitedly as her flowers bloomed. The stream had been dammed with stones, filling a little floodplain and reservoir. Dry seeds received water they were unable to reach before and exploded to life. The tiger purred as the girl danced in excitement in the garden.

"If however, you desire war, I have thousands of troops who, when the moment of vengeance arrives, will dry up the waves of the sea." The Caliph clapped his hands at his scribe indicating that he was done. "Take the message back to your master Helegu. God is with me."
The emissary put the letter into a scroll case and formally excused himself.
At the gates of the city the emissary was set upon by a fanatical mob. His clothes were rent. He was beaten and spat upon. Only the intervention of the Vizier's own men saved the emissary and his fellows. It would not be enough.

"Lay down your arms and come out of the city. Let the scholars and great men come out to meet us!" The emissary had returned with his master to the city.
The Caliph agreed and bid his people to leave. As they filed out the people were parceled into groups of ten. Each group was assigned a warrior. Each warrior was ordered to decapitate their group. And so murder was mechanized before mechanization.
Afraid of the consequences of spilling royal blood Hegleu locked the Caliph in a room full of gold.
"If your defeat was the will of God let what happens to you here be His will also," he said as he left the Caliph to die.

The young man was cut down in front of his lover. The ink of his poems mingled with the red of his blood when both swam in the Tigris. The blood and legacies of the scholars were swept away by the river that nurtured them.
She wept as she was dragged away, a valuable prize for the Khan. There would still be an audience for her poems among the captives of the Khan but she would never compose again.

Hearing sister's laughs the brother stepped out onto the bank. He beheld the garden that his sister had cultivated. The flowers radiant and prismatic reflected the orchestra, the spectra, coursing out of the sun.
The brother was stricken with anger. His sister had gone done something without him. His sister had made a friend and given shape to life. He spat at his sister and shoved her aside.
He pulled at the largest of the flowers, yanking the stems in twain. He ripped the flowers to shreds and tossed them into the stream. The dam of stones was kicked asunder, the floodplain dried. The sap of the flowers flowed red against the mud.
His sister stared aghast and unable to move. When her brother had departed the tiger came out of the underbrush.
"What has happened?"
"My brother…" She was unable to say another word.
"Hush," the tiger cooed, and nuzzled her. "I will show you how to grow thorny flowers, flowers with tubers, flowers that creep and climb and flowers that send seeds into the air. I will show you other streams so that you can have other gardens. Sophia, child of knowledge, I will show you much,"
And the girl followed the Tiger.


It relaxed for a moment, savoring the moment. It liked to have some leeway, and little children afraid of the dark gave it plenty. It wondered what it should do this time, pull it under the bed? No… the kid kept stuffed animals under there, and if he thought those wouldn't save him, he would eventually learn to cope with the dark, and nobody wanted that. Well, maybe some people did. Those "men of science". It would show them, as much as they wanted to believe humans were rational beings, calling a hand a foot does not make the name fit. It had already started fostering movements against them, expanding people's imagination so that they could see what would happen if they let these charlatans and quacks continue their practice.
But for now, it had a child to teach, and it was starting to think that maybe the ceiling fan might work as a proxy.

Billy laid wide awake on his bed in his polka dot pajamas. His eyes were wide with fear, glancing around his room, trying to see if any monsters were coming to eat him. He pulled down his covers and looked underneath the bed. His teddy bears were still down there as usual, holding down the fort so he could sleep safely at night. Breathing a sigh of relief, Billy pulled the covers back up and looked at the ceiling. He tried to not think about the video he had seen earlier that night, a scary mummy man who came out of people's closets and ate them as they were asleep.
He remembered to say his good night sentence, "Good dreams with good people.", and faced away from the closet, hoping that his older sister wouldn't walk around outside his bedroom door to scare him like she did last night.
Billy really hoped that there was nothing in his closet. He decided to make sure, and peeked over his shoulder quickly, trying to catch the mummy man unawares. The closet was still closed, dark as always. Billy faced upward again, trying to focus on the ceiling. "Good dreams with good people." he whispered to himself, unsuccessfully trying to not look at the closet out of the corner of his eye.
He finally refocused on the ceiling fan, non-threatening as always, its mesmerizing blades slowly sweeping through the air.
There was something off about the fan though, something… sinister. Its dancing paddles no longer floating through the air, but cutting into it, grasping it, molesting the space around it. The four bulbs no longer seemed like sources of protection as they did when they were turned on, but more like eyes, one staring directly at him. The chain used to turn it on gradually extending itself like a long finger, wrapping itself around Billy's feet, slowly working their way up to his neck, where it strangle him while the eye bulbs watched.
Billy squirmed under his covers, pulling them up over his head. Safe in the darkness, he closed his eyes in an attempt to go to sleep.
It didn't work, he couldn't stop thinking about the ceiling fan, how it had seemed to come alive, trying to ensnare the little boy beneath it into its dastardly trap. Through the covers, his imagination saw the blades curl in like hands, extending their reach and plucking the eye bulbs out of their sockets throwing them onto the covers around him, slowly closing in, as the fan itself detached and began to encapsulate Billy. He saw the inside of the fan, a giant gaping maw of teeth and claws, ready to start eating him from the toes up. Green arms growing out of the top, grabbing Billy's feet, and holding him in place while he was eaten by the fan. "Good dreams with good people." Billy whimpered to himself this time, feeling the drowning weight of the covers and the stifling hot air around him close in. He started having trouble breathing, and with a quick motion, he brought the covers off of his head and took a deep breath of fresh, cold air. He made a quick glance at the ceiling fan, and it was just as it was before, spinning slowly in the fascinating way only a fan can spin.
Billy once again sighed a deep sigh of relief, closed his eyes, and entered a good dream, with good people.

Bill sat in the board room all by himself. Its cold, blank walls and empty chairs all seeming to stare back at him. He had been early, and was starting to wonder when everybody was going to show up.
It was already fifteen minutes past the set time, and Bill was starting to worry.
The only people who were so notoriously late was the Human Resources manager, and only when he was going to fire somebody.
Oh god, were they going to fire him? He had been such a good employee all these years, what had he done to get himself laid off?
He needed this job, he had three kids and a wife, he could barely pay for them now, if he got fired… oh god.
He started imagining the conversation.
Bob would just walk in, as nonchalant as possible. Probably humming a tune. He would take his time sitting down, pretend to sort through some papers in his briefcase, trying to pretend that Bill wasn't there. Suddenly, he would strike up a conversation, maybe flash those white fangs of his.
"Oh, hey there Bill, how's the family?"
Bill couldn't let him say that sentence. He needed this job so badly, in this market, there was zero hope of getting a new one, especially in his line of work.
Bill sighed, whatever the problem was, it couldn't be good.
The door to the meeting room started creaking open. Bill looked up from his thoughts and tried to see who it was. It was Bob. Bill narrowed his eyes, he was ready for any news.
"Sorry to keep you waiting Bill, but as you can see nobody else is going to show up. And I was a bit late, had to lay off some poor suckers. I came here to give you some news…" Bob started, pulling out a chair close to the door.
"Out with it man." Bill got through his gritted teeth.
"Congratulations Bill! You're getting a promotion. Great job all these years Bill, you have really shown you have what it takes!"
Bill's jaw dropped with surprise. "Wh.. What?"
"You're now the head of Finances!" Bob flashed him his startlingly white teeth while extending a hand.
Bill shook it slowly, slightly dazed, "I don't know what to say."
"No need, we are going to be moving you to your new office right now. So pack your things!" Bob helped Bill out of his seat.
Bill slowly started to smile, the day was starting to look up, and any fears he had before were gone.

It wasn't having a good day.
The only things it had been getting all day were stupid mundane things, mostly job related, and with new Illumilight system for kids, nobody was having any fears about going to bed.
It was bored out of its mind trying to figure out ways to innovate on old ideas.
There wasn't really anything to be afraid of anymore, in the past couple of years, all ideas of monsters or forgotten creatures of yore had been dispelled and forgotten.
It would just have to wait, mankind always forgets why they do things, and man always goes back to doing the wrong thing when he forgets. It still survived on the fringe of civilization, in the dark corners of the world. And if it had learned anything from mankind, it was patience.
And so It waited, biding its time, preparing for the day when we forget about it, but until then, It had some employees to scare.


As much as I wanted Professor Award-Waver-One-Proud-Accomplishment-So-Flaunt-It-Until-I-Die to choke on his own vomit, some of the stupid habits stuck with me. Pen and paper help me think, so writing all this shit down. Working on this Serpent's Hand article for my boss. Everyone else is all over the shitstorm in North Korea, but that's behind the game. Good journalism is seeing what's happening now. They wanna write history, they can. My job is turning the low hanging fruit into gold.
So, ground work. Serpent's Hand: Some weird tree-hugger sounding group. What I can find from the Leak suggests they're basically human rights for the weird. Going to do some canvassing and interviews, see if anyone's seen them or knows about them on street level.

Interviews done, findings: Majority of people have seen them even less than these foundation goons. There was some sort of big conspiracy, but in the two months that've passed since, you can at least spot the occasional weirdo men in black type. It's making people nervous, and nervous people come in two varieties: talk to the press, or don't talk to the press. Right now I've got all of three people who, after a lot of legwork, could, would, and did produce anything more concrete than an opinion.
First guy claimed to have met a rep, looking into his son. Said they were investigating the possibility of his kid having some kind of powers or whatever. Didn't seem too impressed, the rep was apparently some Native American kook who spent some time burning incense and left empty handed. New age crap. Had a little card the guy gave him. A hand with a snake wrapped around it. Seemed to fit.
Other two had similar stories. Young kids, unusual stuff, representatives who looked like aging hippies or young college kids coming in and looking over their children. Not one had been a positive. Sounds like a complete load so far. Might have a stinker of a reveal for my editor, he loves those. Need to figure out a headline suggestion.

Found a 'cell' of the Hand. Got pointed to them by contact. Been selling my editor on the whole 'crock of shit' angle. He's happy. Wants me to wrap up the story so he can get more coverage on the North Korea clusterfuck. As if there weren't thirty thousand people covering that already.
These guys are based out of the local third tier college for underachievers. Going to see if I can't get some info out of them. They've got a website. Looks like most of the crazy kooks who believe in Bigfoot and want the age of Aquarius or some shit like that. Believing in the supernatural is all the rage with this reveal.
Plan to remain skeptical.

Met with the cell. Gotta say: wow. Just when I thought this couldn't get any more bullshit kook amateur hour, these guys show up. First off their 'headquarters' was just someone's dorm room, and it reeked of pot. Second, not one of them looked like he owned a shirt that didn't have wrinkles growing out of its wrinkles. Third, anime posters everywhere. Not exactly the kind of black ops group hinted at in the dossiers.
They said their names were Adam, Charoosh, and Morgan. I'm pretty sure Charoosh was trying to look impressive. The name, combined with the dreadlocks, pubic goatee, and general malaise, wasn't doing it. They spoke at length, got the interview recorded on MP3. General notes: They're morons.
Never met a bigger bunch of shysters in my life. Kept babbling on about some deeper cosmos and 'attunement to the universe' crap. Tried to be a little open minded, but it all was new-age hoodoo bullshit. Kept expecting one of them to try to give me a pamphlet and ask for a donation. Most of the talk was me trying to get any details of things they'd actually done, and them trying to frantically hide that they just used the name of the group to score pot and get laid.
As it stands, article is looking like satire will be the only thing to give it legs. Push for scathing, a little mockery, some clowns throwing pies, and call it a day. Going to go back for a followup with that in mind and see what turns up. Still need headline.

Back from followup. Got to get this written down and then hide it. Jesus fucking Christ. Don't know what I was thinking, but I'm in over my head. Way over. Fuck my hands are still shaking.
Okay, details: went back to the dorm room for the followup interview, but goons weren't in, despite saying they would be. Decided to kill a little time and wait in my car for an hour or two. Started getting dark and I was getting ready to leave when I heard breaking glass in the direction of the dorm. Few quiet thumps and some yelling, and suddenly the whole place went to shit. Some black SUV kicked on its highbeams and men in fatigues started piling out like a god damned clown car.
At this point, I had two options. Get out and investigate, or drive away. Both would lead to me getting spotted, so I was stuck. The decision ended up being made more or less for me. Gunfire started up, and the car shuddered when a bullet blew out my tire. Option C: run like a fucking bitch.
I was about thirty yards away from my car when it happened. Something hit the SUV and it exploded, shrapnel and a shockwave throwing me to the asphalt. Still hurt from where I hit. Saw them when I looked up.
One looked like a lizard. A honest to god knight holding a sword. Some THING which looked like it was wrapped up in skin. Some monkey-person. Black cat. All of them ran past me. When they saw me, one of the kids HISSED. Swear he had fangs. Did my best to look like I wasn't anything important. Soiled self.
Mailed article in, taking a leave of absence. Going to go cover North Korea. Can't be worse than here.
Document recovered from surveillance site Romero-Alpha-Tango-Sierra. Author missing, whereabouts unknown.


She looked at herself in the mirror and inspected her uniform for the day. Gray cloche hat, unadorned; gray dress suit, well-tailored; white shirt, pressed and starched; black scarf, tight as a garotte. She loosened the knot slightly and idly thought, "It's always black. Never green or navy blue or red. Hmm."
She paused, concentrated briefly and the scarf turned royal purple with gold thread subtly hinting at strange and hidden patterns. "That's better. Off to work I go."
She straightened her skirt one last time, smirked, and sketched a curtsy to the empty room. Nobody stepped through the doorway, and nobody was left behind.

I'm nobody! Who are you?
Are you nobody, too?
Then there's a pair of us
Don't tell—they'd banish us, you know.
-I'm Nobody! Who are you?, by Emily Dickinson, 1891


Yesterday upon the stair
I met a man who wasn't there
He wasn't there again today
I wish, I wish he'd go away
-Antigonish, by Hughes Mearns, 1899

He looked at himself in the mirror and inspected his uniform for the day. Gray fedora, tilted just so; slate gray suit, well-tailored; white shirt, pressed and starched; black necktie, hanging like a noose. He adjusted the Windsor knot and idly thought, "It's always black. Never green or navy blue or red. Hmm."
He paused and stared briefly at his own face in the mirror, trying to remember if anything about it looked familiar. Again, and as always, nothing was. He sighed. "Well, it doesn't pay to wonder. Off to work I go."
He straightened his jacket one last time, solemnly tipped his hat to the empty room, and stepped through the doorway.


Maria Nwosu wiped the sweat from her face as she waited outside the village, a strong breeze blowing her colorful skirt against her legs. She shaded her eyes as she looked across the veldt, trying to spot any plumes of dust forewarning of visitors, expected or not. The fellow from the U.N. was already two days late, and she was beginning to worry that he had been waylaid somewhere along the way.
After a few more futile minutes, Maria sighed and turned back towards her tent. Or rather, the Foundation's tent. It was still somewhat strange to her to be part of such an odd NGO. When they had come through her village months ago and asked for volunteers to help translate, she had stepped forward. Other non-governmental organizations come through her area many times, vaccinating and providing food and livestock, but there was something different about this one. She felt a sense of… otherworldliness from the woman who asked for helpers, as well as a sense that these were special people. Maria already knew all the local dialects, as well as French and a little English, and when they offered to pay her to come with them to translate, it was the final piece to push her decision. She never expected that small step to lead her on such a long journey, but such was life.
She pulled back the tent flap and was unsurprised to see a pair of small boys suddenly thrust their hands behind their backs with guilty looks on their faces.
"And what are you two troublemakers up to today? Have you already grown bored with teasing the goats?"
The boys glanced at each other, and the slightly smaller one on the left said, "We were just looking for you, Miss Nwosu. Our mama is making bread and we thought you would want some."
"Mhm. I see. And when you saw I wasn't here, Enitan, you decided to wait for me?"
Both boys nodded eagerly to this question, and Enitan replied, "Oh yes, Miss Nwosu! We were afraid you would get hungry if you didn't know about the bread!"
Maria gave them a look well-practiced by all older sisters and said, "Such kind-hearted boys. There wouldn't be any other reason you stayed, would there? Maybe something behind your backs?"
The slightly larger boy looked guilty and opened his mouth to say something when his brother nudged him with an elbow. They quickly and quietly whispered to each other, before slowly bringing their hands out in front of them. In each hand they held a wooden triangle, each of which had a different complicated squiggle roughly carved into it.
Maria sighed again and pointed to the table at one side of the tent. "Enitan, Amadi, put them back. The charms are not ready yet, and you shouldn't be playing with them even if they were."
The brothers reluctantly put the pieces of wood on the table, and the larger boy glumly said, "But Miss Nwosu, we just wanted to see them so we could make some of our own."
"And they're not ready yet, so you wouldn't be able to make more right now anyway!" Maria wiped her forehead with the handkerchief again. "If you two want to help, go keep guard for anyone coming to the village. I'm expecting someone to come help me, but he's late. If you spot him, I might let you watch while we finish the charms."
The smaller boy perked up at this and raced out of the tent, dragging his brother behind him. "Oh yes, Miss Nwosu! We'll go look for him and bring him straight to you!"
As the tent flap closed behind them, Maria smiled slightly and muttered under her breath to herself, "Ah, little boys are all the same. Make a chore sound exciting and they run right to it."
"Indeed they do," said a deep voice from behind her, in French.
Maria startled and spun around to see a man standing in what she was certain had just a moment ago been an empty corner of the tent. He was dressed in safari gear similar to what most Westerners wore when they came to the area, but his were all a variety of grays rather than the usual khaki. Almost involuntarily, Maria half-thought "He looks like a troubled sky, about to turn into a storm."
"And who are you, to appear unannounced?" she demanded.
"My apologies, Miss Nwosu. I'm here to provide you some help. Your supervisors may have told you about me; I believe they call me Joe Benefactor." The strange man gave a quick grin when he said his 'name'.
She squinted at him suspiciously. "I may have been told such a name, but why should I trust that you are he? You have already shown yourself a trickster, stealing in so sneakily."
The man smiled again. "You're more right than you know, Miss Nwosu. Very few people realize that so quickly. I'm impressed." He switched smoothly to the dialect of her home village, speaking it without any accent, like he had grown up beside her. "I will swear upon whichever gods or spirits that you choose that I mean you and those you serve no harm."
Maria again felt startled at this, but hid it this time, choosing to scowl at the man instead. She continued in French, "I don't trust a trickster to keep his oath, no matter whose name he pledges it on." She paused briefly. "Unless perhaps it is his own. Will you swear on your own name, stranger?"
The man took a moment, as if considering the request, and told her, "I can't do that, for reasons that have nothing to do with you. But perhaps a demonstration of good faith will suffice."
The man turned to the charms the boys had left on the table, and looked them over. "These are warding symbols, to stop disease and parasites. Bury them in the center of the village and everyone would stop getting sick."
Maria stalked over and scooped the pieces of inscribed wood out of the man's reach. She glared at him and said, "Yes they are, and I won't let you destroy them."
He tilted his head and looked straight into her eyes, his light brown meeting her dark. "I don't seek to destroy them, but to give you improved ones. The beings who gave your superiors those designs are… not entirely familiar with how human biology works. These will certainly stop sicknesses, but they won't eliminate them. Any illnesses or parasites or germs will be… paused while someone is within their range of effect. Symptoms might not manifest here, but as soon as someone leaves this village, the sickness that was stopped within them will start again."
Maria's gaze grew distant as she thought about the unusual aid workers she had met during her orientation and training for Manna Charitable. "…Yes, I can believe that. They are well-intentioned, but not always fully knowledgeable." She refocused on the man, crossed her arms and resumed glaring at him. "And what do you propose instead?"
The man pulled a folded piece of paper out of his pocket and presented it to her. "Here are a few corrections to these symbols, that would actually cure most local diseases instead of just pausing them. I've also included directions on the correct way to inscribe them, as well as which materials would work best. Feel free to check these with your sponsors before using them, of course."
Maria carefully took the paper from him and put it down on the table, still folded. "What do you get out of this, stranger?"
He momentarily looked slightly lost and dispirited before resuming his air of mild affability. "Among all the unusual organizations I must deal with, yours is the only one that solely seeks to improve people's lives. I admire that, even if I can't live up to that same credo. So I help when I can, in whatever small ways I can."
"Hmm. You do know that I will not even open this paper until it has been tested."
The man smirked and sketched a bow. "Given your strength of character, I would expect nothing less from someone seeking to improve, rather than destroy, these people's lives. You should probably go retrieve it from those boys, though."
Maria glanced at the empty table, then behind her to the closing tent flap. She darted over and pushed it open to see a small black body dashing away.
"Amadi, get back here!" she yelled after him.
She called over her shoulder to the man, "You stay here until I return. I want no more tricks out of you!" then chased after the boy, sweat already starting to bead on her own smooth black skin in the noonday sun.
The man sat in one of the chairs beside the table, amused at the child's antics, and said, in the language of the village, "You can come out now, Enitan. Your brother has made his escape."
A pair of dark eyes opened in a corner of the tent; the same corner that the man had appeared in. Suddenly, the small form of Enitan had always been standing there in plain sight. "How did you know I was here?" he asked, with innocent curiosity.
"I shouldn't recognize my own tricks? I'm impressed that you copied it so quickly."
The little boy beamed with pride. "Amadi and I are the best boys in the village! I am the most clever and he is the most brave!"
The man smiled widely. "Yes, and quite clever you are. Tell me, how did you do it?"
Enitan happily answered, "I heard the words that the big one said to make you appear, and said them backwards so I would disappear!"
The man looked curious. "The big one… you understood what he said?"
Enitan looked a little embarrassed and said, "No… but I knew they were big words because they came from the big one, so they must be important!"
The man kept smiling. "Yes, they are. Did you know that the charms have some of the big one's words on them too?"
"Oh yes! That's why I want to see them! I want to know what they say!"
The man shook his head in amusement. "You are too young to understand them all yet, but I think you and your brother just might learn when you're older. Call for me when you think you're ready, little one." With that, the man stood up and pulled aside the tent flap.
"Wait!" shouted the boy. "What is your name?"
The man looked over his shoulder at the boy. "Look for it. And when you find it, let me know what it is." He then stepped outside, grinned at the boy one more time, and let the flap fall closed.


The two figures met each other as they always did, by the sofas. Both seemed to flicker, their outlines faded and blurry. As always happened, the short one began the speech.
"Hail, Myala, King of Swords, Soul of Valor, God of the Warrior!" Its voice was shaky and indistinct. "May your blessings always fall upon us, as the blood of the wicked falls upon your altar! We ask of you a portion of your strength so that we might do your work."
The taller one grew more defined. He was now a four-armed creature, each arm holding a separate sword, pitted and dull. Five pairs of eyes, which had once been filled with burning fury, were now all half-closed. He gave a weary smile through a dull-tusked mouth, each of his arms raised in salute to his partner.
"Hail, Alik, Mistress of Luck, Fickle Hand of Fate, Goddess of Tricks! We beseech you upon this day to look favorably upon us. Stay the hand of your wrath from our heads, letting it fall instead to our enemies. For this, we offer you the first coin made in a game of chance!"
The shorter one gave a sigh as she felt herself tighten into existence. Her silken finery was frayed, its once-vibrant colors having long since faded into pale imitations. She laughed as she adjusted her tarnished crown.
"Do they still have games of chance?" she asked, her voice now clearer.
Myla sighed. "I don't think so. There's not much left in the way of chance any more. I think they just measure out the variables and give or take money. If it makes you feel better, the closest I've felt to a war was two children slapping each other the other day."
Alik gave a snort of laughter. "Still, that's better than that cat. I don't think there's been anything for it for at least a century. Where is it, anyway?"
Myla was quiet. His ten eyes all stared at the floor.
"Oh."
"Yeah. Now it's just you and me, I suppose."
"I… I suppose so."
"…"
"How long do you think we can keep this up?"
"Just the two of us? I don't think it'll even work with only two."
"Well, for what it's worth, you were always one of my favorites. I can't think of anyone else I'd rather be with at the end."
The two dead gods embraced one another for the last time. All around them, the Library continued its business unabated.

No one was sure when exactly it happened.
It didn't happen as it had in the stories countless times before. There was no dragon slain, no warlord defeated, not even a demon outwitted. There was just a gradual tapering off. Eventually, it just wasn't.
For too many centuries to count, Science and Rationality had been dual monarchs of mankind's understanding. Mankind had colonized the distant stars, charting each new worlds, encountering new species, none intelligent.
Vast banks of statistics explained the sweep of history far better than any of the former romantic theories of Great Men or Common Folk. The nature of almost all of the physical world, down to the tiniest sub-atomic particle, was explained. Knowledge ran through a million worlds, dispelling ignorance bringing the universe together in one tight-knit community.
Parts of the brain associated with harmful groupthink and tribalism atrophied, and were eventually removed altogether.
It had been several centuries since the introduction of the Unified Theory of Anomalies. In the ensuing time, the theory had been refined to explain the few anomalies that had escaped its initial grasp. Tales of explorers became more prosaic, describing new potassium deposits and moon sizes. There was no possible unknown; Science had explained all. It was no longer a model of reality, it was reality, understood perfectly and without fear by every single human being.
In time, the pages of stories withered. The words were all there, but there was nothing to support them. They stood on the page, dry and lifeless as a hunter's trophy. Interest in pre-understanding narratives, never high to begin with, vanished almost entirely.
Scholars would puzzle over the manuscripts for millenia. What in these words had led to so much anger and unrest? They were things that simply were not, and indeed, could not be. Hypotheses were posited in obscure academic journals for many centuries, and many a comfortably uneventful professorship was built on the question of "fear."

Gilgali, The Tiger With Lantern Eyes, lumbered along the isles of the Library. Its breathing grew heavy as it staggered through the vast monument to its chains. Out of its drooping mouth hung a long, purple tongue. It had to find them, had to have them believe in it…
It fell on its side, making only a slight rustling sound. It tried to get up.
It was King, it thought. God of mankind, above the gods. It was what necessitated the gods.
Its outline was becoming blurry now, its colors beginning to fade. But, it thought, the gods were dead.
No, it would stand up, it thought.
Breaths were coming more slowly now, its sides moving with each labored wheeze.
Somewhere, somehow it would find purchase and tweak something. Set off a cascade, one that would plunge the universe into an eternity of darkness.
Its indistinct paws waved weakly in the air.
It would… it would…
It was now just a slightly discolored pocket of air.
It would…
And that was that. It was gone.
All around where it had once been, the Library continued its business unabated.