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D-CLASS PERSONNEL PROFILE

Designation: D-6831

Description of Character: 173 cm, 59 kg. Shoulder-length black hair, black eyes, pale skin. Of Indonesian heritage. No history of substance abuse.

Background: Born "Annabeth Miz", June 4th, 1988 in Canyon City, Oregon to Indonesian immigrants. Graduated from Green Oaken University with a bachelor's in Ecology. No living relatives. Sentenced to death December 28th 2020, for the murders of three unidentifiable persons. Brought into Foundation custody March 1st, 2022.

Projects Involved in: N/A

Additional Notes: Likely innocent to crimes accused. Foundation investigations lead to little to no evidence of subject involvement with the victims. Additionally, DNA analysis was revealed to be rushed, leading to mismatching of fingerprints and hair. Witness testimony describing D-6831 largely inconsistent with physical appearance.

Jossen Rudestein glanced up from the document to look at the Senior Researcher sitting across from him. Both of his eyes were bloodshot, and every now and again, he would lift a handkerchief up to his eyes to wipe at shed tears. His hands, which were firmly clasped on his lap, were shaking terribly, as if he had just chugged a gallon of coffee (which he wouldn't exactly put past some of the researchers these days).
Jossen clicked his tongue, twirling around a pen in his hand as he briefly pondered whether or not the researcher was serious or not. The situation was so absurd, that it was almost comical. It could have been just one big joke, were it not for the fact that the man sitting in front of him looked about half a week away from suffering a stroke.

"So," Jossen started. "D-class."
"Yes."
"And you want this person to serve as lead researcher for SCP-L900?"
"Yes."
"Right." Jossen nodded and put down his pen. He supposed he could see where the proposal was coming from, given the circumstances. SCP-L900 was a unique anomaly, moreso than the others. Still, it was an odd idea, having a D-Class research an SCP beyond serving as anything other than a test subject. "Dr. Trent, you must be aware of the roadblocks ahead? The Ethics Committee will certainly take interest. D-Class personnel aren't exactly knowledgeable about writing up Foundation documents either."
"Mr. Rudestein, no one wants to work on SCP-L900. It's… unnerving." Trent took off his glasses, which were fogging with perspiration. "Fear of the unknown and all that. Only, we can't even study the damn thing, not properly. It's a Catch-22, not even amnestics work properly. They help, but are much too slow. We need some sort of leeway to crack at it, and when it comes down to it, I'd rather sacrifice a D-Class than one of our own. I've only worked on it for a week or two and I'm already at my limit."
Jossen sighed and leaned back in his chair, looking up to ponder at the ceiling and its fluorescent lights. If anything, the proposal, rejected or accepted, would set new boundaries. Where would the line be drawn in D-Class involvement? Their treatment? What measures, exactly, would the Foundation take to learn of an anomaly that doesn't in itself pose a significant threat?
"Well, better for the issue to come up sooner rather than later," he muttered to himself.
"What was that?"
"Nothing." Jossen straightened himself up. "Send the proposal to me and I'll work out the kinks. It'll take a while, but I think I can get it sent up for consideration. Take it easy for a bit, alright? You look like you're about to pass out. I'll make sure to send another batch of amnestics to your office. Stronger ones."
"Right. Thanks." Trent nodded stiffly and rose from his seat. As he stumbled his way out of Jossen's office, he couldn't help but notice the way he was limping. From his long years as Site Director, Jossen had only ever seen one containment breach, thankfully. It was a bad one though. A real bad one, the type that made him wake up at night sometimes, shivering and in a cold sweat.
It was a humanoid, of course. Somehow managed to get to one of the guards and take his gun and security access. He remembered the details vividly, the deafening reverberations of gunshots, shouting, so much shouting, the blaring of alarms. He was in one of the break rooms, hiding and praying to every deity he knew. Justified cowardice, at least, until he heard someone on the other side of the door.
He felt that tight twist in his chest, felt the deafening sound of hollow knocking that hummed throughout his body, smothering out every other sound. It sucked up all of the air in the room like a vacuum, leaving him breathless.
The knocking stopped, and then there was the telltale beep of the door's electronic lock being opened. He couldn't do anything but sit there on the floor, slack-jawed and staring as he watched what he thought would be his final moments in life unfold.
Thought.
What stood in the doorway wasn't a bloodlusted anomaly wielding a rifle, but rather, a meek, slender woman with a mop of blonde hair that vaguely resembled straws of hay. She had a white coat on, which was stained a rich shade of red which leaked steadily onto the floor below her. Her eyes, fragmented and divided between the shattered lens of a pair of crooked glasses, were jittery, darting all around the room without recognition. Looking at everything, yet perceiving nothing.
She limped into the room, slowly dragging a leg behind her. As she got closer, he could make out a dot on the stiff limb. Or rather, a hole, from which viscous blood slowly flowed out, trailing down her tan-coloured trousers at a snail's pace.
He found himself unable to breathe as the woman, who he later learned was a technical assistant, sat down at one of the tables near the break room's coffee machine. Paralyzed, he could only sit there. Door wide open, gunshots ringing out, and with a bleeding woman no more than a meter away from him.
I wonder how many times she'd been shot, Jossen thought grimly as Trent closed the door behind him. At least once in the leg. At least once in the torso.
By the time that containment had been reestablished, she was dead. He wondered how long the two of them would have sat there if the MTF squad hadn't found them there.

"Help us by researching this anomaly, and you will be exonerated from your service to the Foundation."
Annabeth Miz fidgeted in her seat as the man in front of her stared with red, unblinking eyes, waiting for a response. The words ran through her head over and over again, repeating themselves as a mantra as her mind worked overtime to comprehend them.
"Is…" Annabeth coughed into her fist. "Is that… it? I just help you and I get to go free?"
The man nodded. "There have been… issues, that we don't have the time to address as of late. Time constraints, budget cuts… Simply put, we need extra researchers. Just some help with finding more information on some of the anomalies that have been cropping up. Given your background in natural science, we figured that we could make an offer."
"Okay, um, well… How much time do I have to think about this?"
"We need an answer now," the man deadpanned.
"H-Hey, wait, why now? Why can't I get, like, a day or two to consider it?"
"There's not much to consider. You either help with Foundation research and be given amnestics before being allowed to integrate back into society, or you don't, and spend the rest of your life here as D-6831."
Too good to be true. Annabeth was getting tired of how many times that phrase has popped up in her mind. It was something that she heard nearly every other day when she was growing up. Both of her parents were cynical to a fault, looking at every possible good fortune with a suspicious eye, as if expecting a trap. She didn't think she could ever forget that hollow, sinking pit in her stomach at their reactions to her bachelor's degree. She showed them her diploma, and they could only ask a single question.
"How much debt are you in?"
That's all it was to them. No joy. No pride.
"Will it be dangerous?" she asked.
"Anomalies, by their very nature, are unpredictable. However, no harm has fallen onto any of the personnel who have previously worked on this particular one."
"Previously?"
"Yes. Re-assigned to more important projects. Like I said, we are low on manpower," the man explained to her slowly, as if she were a child.
Annabeth blinked, struck by piercing doubt that cut a hole through her heart as time froze for a split second. Then it was over, and before she knew it, she was nodding her head. "Okay. I accept."
I'll prove them wrong.
The man's cold face morphed into something that vaguely resembled a smile as he extended a hand forwards, a disgusting attempt at showing partnership, gratitude. She had the sudden, insane urge to reach over the table and slap him across the face. It was worrying how often she's been tempted to do that to all of the "Foundation staff".
They were just so bland, impersonal, yet with the slightest hint of smugness below their cold exteriors. Like trying to maintain an air of professionalism while still looking down on them like they were less than human. The D-class, that is. They just swoop in and take people from death row, or from your life sentences or whatever, and then pretend like they're doing a great justice for that.
Except, she wasn't even guilty in the first place. How many times has she mentioned that to them? How many times has she begged for them to reopen her case? And all that came was the same cookie-cutter response. "We have no authority on judicial matters."
She grimaced and reached over, clasping his hand and firmly shaking it.
"Right," the man said as he pulled away from the handshake. "You can start right away. I'll show you to your new living quarters."

There was an odd sense of loneliness as Annabeth stared at the room she was given. It was more of a laboratory than anything, with sharp, sterlised white covering every inch of the room and a long resin table with several old-fashioned CRT monitors lined up on it as well as a bright red rotary phone. There was a closet tucked away in the corner which held nothing but chemistry equipment such as beakers and tongs, which she was plainly told would most likely be of no use in this situation. Her new bed, an air mattress, had a cardboard box on top of it with an assortment of various supplies. At the center of the room, there was a small wooden box, which apparently contained the anomaly that she was supposed to be studying.
They kept the door locked behind her, though supposedly she could scan her issued identification card to request for the door to open. Security reasons, the security guards who escorted her here had said. They didn't elaborate on that, but then again, she didn't question them any further, did she? The only opening it had was a thin slot, like one of those old door flaps where mail and newspapers were pushed through.
Still, it was an improvement over the shared dorms she had to endure as D-Class. Both her dorm and this room had cameras, but that's where the similarities ended. Back there, all she had for herself was a small dresser and a mattress that hasn't been cleaned in god-knows how long. The lab even had its own separate restroom, which in itself was a gracious luxury.
At first arrival, she couldn't sleep for several days just because of how noisy it was at night, the room filled with a cacophony of several dozen other people snoring away, the occasional grunt or mutters, even the breathing was too much for her. It was much more uncomfortable than an actual prison, where she was given the luxury of having her own cell.
She got used to it eventually, of course. She learned how to filter out the noise as ambience, and despite her fears of being packed so tightly along with so many other convicts, never felt too threatened. In her mind, she knew that these people likely came from the same situation as her; sentenced to death row before being "put to use" by the Foundation. Murderers, outlaws, sociopaths, and yet, she never quite got that feeling from them.
They were… normal. Or rather, about as normal as she could expect, given the circumstances. From what she's seen, they mostly just tried to get by the best they could. She got to know a few of them, even bonded, which in retrospect, was inevitable. They all knew their place here in this Foundation. Powerless, to be used as test subjects or for the dirty work that their wardens deemed unfit for themselves. No one liked it, but it was a harsh reality. They lived together, ate together. So the natural thing to do would be to work together. It was like an extended family, sort of.
Here though? She was alone. A temporary researcher put in charge of an anomaly she knew nothing about, tasked to write a report that she didn't know how to do. All that she had to work with were the Foundation's database, the internet, and the wholly unfinished research of whoever worked on this thing before being re-assigned. Fantastic.
She stood there for a while, awkwardly digging her hands into the pocket of her issued lab coat, not quite sure on where to start. All she had on her was the laminated card that the Foundation gave her, which apparently served as both identification and as the key to the lab. It was cool to the touch, unnervingly so. It felt more like frozen metal than a piece of plastic.
Exhaling, she finally shuffles over to one of the computer terminals, which had been on since she arrived. There was a text document open on it:

| SCP-L900

Tentative sentience, inanimate,

Class Designation: TBD

Description:

Recovery:

"Seriously?" Annabeth mutters to herself as she scans the document over. The entire thing consisted of less than ten worlds, which didn't exactly give her much to work with. She grimaced and walked over to her bed and picked up the cardboard box, setting it down on one end of her table. She rummaged through it until she found a container filled with disposable gloves. She put it on and approached the wooden box which contained the anomaly. Her uncertainty was palpable to the point that it seemed to permeate through her skin, making every movement hesitant and sluggish.
She briefly considered using the rotary phone to call for help. The person who had gotten her in this situation in the first place (who she later learned was a senior researcher by the name of Dr. Trent) provided a phone number that she was supposed to call for any inquiries.
No, no. I just got here. I should at least try it out myself first.
The wooden box, which sat perched on top of a tall stool, stared at her impassively as she extended her trembling hands towards it. The senior researcher said it wasn't dangerous, right? But then again, he also said it was unpredictable. And judging from the notes she had been left, they didn't even know that much about it in the first place.
"Whatever. Just open it already. Just open it," she told herself.
And so she did.
Her hands dug under the lid, lifting it up gently. With a bated breath, she peered inside and found herself both underwhelmed and overwhelmed by what she saw.
It was a stone idol of some kind, a statuette. She tentatively picked it up and turned it over in her hands. It depicted a crudely shaped figure of a person with block limbs and a wide oval head, which was completely featureless. Several different shades of grey made up its surface, but what stood out as odd to her was a single spot, perhaps two centimeters in diameter, at the top of the idol's head, which was a bright shade of purple. For some reason, the stark contrast in colours made her feel a bit nauseous.
Tentatively sentient… Annabeth mused to herself as she placed the idol down at her desk. She brought out a scale and ruler from the cardboard box and without really thinking about it, took a few measurements. What's that even supposed to mean? It's made out of stone. Though I guess it's anomalous for a reason. If it's sentient, is this thing alive?
Experimentally, she poked the idol. Nothing happened. She tried once more, this time pressing on the purple spot. Nothing happened.
"Erm… Can you hear me? Hello?"
Nothing happened.
Despite the fact that there was no one else there, her face started to turn red in embarrassment. She felt like a newly hired employee on her first day at work, coming in only to find that she was the only one there and was expected to do everything by herself, which at the moment, wasn't too inaccurate. Shaking her head, she sat down in front of the monitor and closed out of the file, only to find another text document:

First located during an excavation of an ancient construction fill located within Nicaragua, where it was processed by on-site anthropologists. Acquired by the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Brought into Foundation custody shortly thereafter.

Hints of a headache started to appear as Annabeth read through the short passage. It was all just so vague, as if they were intentionally leaving out information. She would have thought that such an overwhelming entity such as the Foundation would be a bit more thorough with their work. Shaking her head, she copied it over to the SCP file, wondering why it wasn't there in the first place.
Without much else to do, she started to note down her observations, figuring that it was better to have something down than nothing. As she typed, the burning pinprick in her head began to grow, formulating into something of a migraine, which was only worsened by the monitor's harsh glare.

| SCP-L900

Tentative sentience, inanimate,

Class Designation: TBD (Probably safe)

Description: A grey statuette made of some kind of stone. It doesn't have a face or any defining features, aside from a purple dot on its head. It weighs 1.9 kilograms and stands at roughly 18.5 cm tall.

Recovery: First located during an excavation of an ancient construction fill located within Nicaragua, where it was processed by on-site anthropologists. Acquired by the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Brought into Foundation custody shortly thereafter.

Notes: How is it sentient???

Already, she was starting to regret agreeing to all of this. They'd given her a short lesson on the types of observations she was supposed to make, but it mostly went over her head; she had no idea what she was doing. What if she couldn't produce any useful information? Would they just make her a D-Class again? It would be a pitiful outcome, to fail at such a seemingly straight-forward task.
She squeezed her eyes shut, wincing at the soft burning sensation that it produced. She wondered whether or not they'd let her have aspirin. Not even a full day had passed and she was already exhausted, straddled with a ridiculous task and a binding headache to boot. Grumbling to herself, she stumbled to her air mattress and fell onto it, grunting on impact. They hadn't brought in any sort of bedding, but it was still leagues more comfortable than what she was used to.
As she laid there, legs hanging off the side of the bed and with a hand over her head, she came to realise that there was a chance that they wouldn't even honour their end of the deal at all. What's stopping them from just taking one look at her work and then deciding it wasn't good enough? What if they just sent her back to the cells? What if they make her forget that she's ever heard of an SCP-L900? What if-
What if, what if, what if. Enough. This is a chance to get out of here. Doesn't matter about what if's, I just have to do it, Annabeth scolded herself. Despite her newfound resolution echoing in her mind, the weight pressing on her brought with it fatigue, manifesting as their body's plea for rest.
Alright, Annabeth thought as she started to drift.

Cold metal, shining with diffusing light. It was a solid, paper thin sheet of metal, an immaculately cut rectangular card that she held in her hand with awe. And on it, was a delicate carving, lined art of some sort of statue. There was a brilliant sense of importance, of sheer weight, that made her want to protect it at all costs. Shield the precious artefact with her life, her very being. Can't let it die.
The sun burned brightly in the sky, a radiant ball of fire that beamed down an almost unbearable heat, yet without light. It was strange; she could see the baby-blue sky, its wispy white clouds, all of it as clear as day. And yet, it was so dark at the surface. So, so dark. She was on a platform of sorts, a crop of black silt that was surrounded on all sides by murky water. It left her nearly no room to move around. Water was a universal solvent; given enough time, it would corrode nearly anything, including metal.
Including metal.
Couldn't risk falling. Couldn't risk falling and drowning and drowning and dying, couldn't risk having it sink, all the way down. How long would it stay there, at the forgotten depths of these dark waters, that so closely resembled an abyss? A bottomless ocean that gave way to nothingness, it would consume anything that falls into it. Including it. Was such a risk worth it? She thought not. Better to just wait.
So she did, so she would. Cross-legged with the sheet of metal and its picture hugged tightly to her chest. The frigid touch of the metal burned through her shirt and into her skin, sending a pleasant tremor through her spine. It was a jarring reprieve from the sun's deadly heat, but a welcome one. All the more reason to protect it with everything she had.
Forever, if need be.

Annabeth woke up drenched in sweat, panting with a mouth that was as dry as sand. It felt like her entire body was burning, save for an unsettling numbness in her chest, right over her heart. She jolted up from her bed, wincing as several of her joints cracked at the sudden movement. Deliriously, she stumbled around the room for a bit before she remembered where she was.
Groaning, she slapped a hand to the back of the neck and winced as it pulled away, covered in her warm sweat. There was a lingering sense of terror in her chest, raking the inside of her lungs with every breath she took; remnants of some sort of dream, a nightmare, though with every passing second, her memory only dissipated further and further. All she could recall was that coldness in her chest, as if the blood in her heart had frozen.
Blinking rapidly, she wiped her mouth with the back of her hand and staggered towards the lab's restroom. Water. She needed water, more than anything in the world she needed water. Her tongue was shriveled up, a warm piece of fabric that stuck to the insides of her mouth. It felt like every ounce of water in her body had been used up in producing sweat. She wandered blindly, dragging herself through the thick layers of fog obscuring her vision. That headache that had brought her to her bed in the first place was back, content in chipping away at her skull with relentless persistence.
Eventually, she managed to find her way to the restroom. She grasped at the sink's faucet and pulled, tilting her head and opening her mouth under it to catch the small stream of water that poured out. It was lukewarm, room temperature, and yet it was nothing short of paradise. She closed her eyes and swished the water around with her tongue, shuddering at the cool, crisp taste.
After a minute or two of constant drinking, she finally pulled away from the counter. Her legs were too weak to support her body, crumpling as she fell down on her back, spread eagled and panting. Her skin stuck to the cold bathroom tiles, clinging onto it whenever she moved. Am I sick? What happened to me?
At the very least, she felt marginally better; her head was still stuffed to the brim with fuzz, and that damned headache refused to fade, but she didn't feel like she was about to die of dehydration anymore. With a grunt, she pulled herself off of the floor and stood up, wincing at the sharp creaks of protest coming from her legs. Walking back into the lab, her eyes caught SCP-L900, which was still sitting on her desk, as inconspicuous as ever.
Something flickered in the back of her mind. Wasn't that what her dream was about? It was faint, very faint, but she thought that she could just barely recall… No, the moment passed. Most likely, she was just stressed out, which compounded with her headache to create an unpleasant night's rest, if it even was night when she slept.
Speaking of which, that headache of hers was really starting to irritate her. She couldn't produce a single thought without it being disrupted by that awful thudding in her temples. Grimacing, she sat down in front of the statuette and picked it up, not bothering to wear gloves this time. She couldn't help but feel a sense of disdain for it. How could the Foundation be so sure that it was anomalous? It hasn't even done anything so far.
Exhaling, she leaned over to grab the receiver of the rotary phone, which sat on the other end of her desk. After a moment's hesitation, she dialed the number that the senior researcher gave to her. Surprisingly enough, it picked up after only two rings.
"Dr. Trent speaking."
"Hi, uh, this is Annabeth. Annabeth Miz. I'm the one who's supposed to research the anomaly. Erm, yeah, SCP-L900. I was just wondering, the document you gave me didn't really have much info on it, and… well, I-I couldn't really find any, well, anything anomalous about it. It's just a weird statue thing, and-"
"I'm going to have to stop you right there," Trent interrupted. "First of all, due to current concerns about regulations and security, you are not to disclose information about SCP-L900's properties to anyone who isn't directly involved in the project, which includes me. Under no circumstances, understand?"
"H-Huh?" Annabeth stammered, caught off-balance. "But, aren't you the one who-"
"I don't have anything to do with SCP-L900. I was only the one who recruited you to assist with the research. It's mostly bureaucratic, but it's still something that's enforced strictly. So, I'll ask again, do you understand?"
"Ok, yes, yes. I get it. It would have been nice to know about this earlier, but I get it." Annabeth sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose. The headache was starting to get a little worse now. "I just… Am I seriously alone with this? Because I'm really not getting that much headway with this thing."
"Second, everything we have on SCP-L900 is stored within the terminal in your room," Trent continued, clearly unconcerned about her worries. "Look, we don't expect you to write a full, complete report of the anomaly, so just keep working at it, alright? We don't have an exact deadline set or anything, but we'll let you know in advance when we need it done. Now, will that be all?"
"Um, yeah. I guess so."
"Alright then. You know what to do."
*click*
Annabeth sat still, receiver still pressed against her ear as the line went dead. She wasn't allowed to tell anyone about the anomaly, huh? She supposed that explained why they had to keep her locked in here.
That other thing he said. Everything. Everything they had on this anomaly was on the computer. With slow, deliberate movements, she placed the receiver down and turned back to the terminal. She backed out of the text document and navigated through its documents, only to find that there was only a total of three. The short discovery log, the SCP-L900 file itself, and a document simply entitled "Archivist Report". With nothing else to do, she opened it.

| INCOMPLETE REPORT BY ARCHIVISTS AT THE METROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF ART
XXX
SUBJECT APPEARS AS CARVED WOODEN IDOL. RELATIVE DATING TO NEARBY MARKINGS AND SITE OF DISCOVERY SUGGESTS DATE OF ORIGIN AS 900-600 BCE. DEPICTION OF FIGURE WITH BLOCK LIMBS. NO DEFINING FEATURES.

Annabeth frowned and looked back at the idol. It was most definitely not wood, at least from what she could tell. She knew that wood was quick to decay, at least relative to other materials such as stone or terracotta, and yet, the statuette seemed to be free of damage or even any sort of wear. Not to mention that it literally looked like it was made from some type of rock, with its rough, grey surface, dotted with sediments.
But why? But why? That was quickly turning out to be the single most repetitive question she's ever asked herself. None of it made any sense. Maybe its anomalous trait was being able to change its make? Turn into different materials, and such.
She winced as the constant headache in her skull flared up. It was only getting worse by the minute, evolving from a nail being pounded into her brain into a metal drill that screeched as it worked, filling her ears with the irritating, borderline painful ringing of tinnitus. Maybe she really should try to find the pharmacy, wherever that was. Clutching at her head with one hand, she navigated back to SCP-L900's file and started typing. Each and every time she pressed on the keyboard, the ringing in her ears only got louder and louder. If she closed her eyes, she could almost see the drill, an oversized, ribbed bolt that rotated as it drilled holes into her skull.
Round and round and round it went, through the solid white bone and onto the soft, malleable tissue inside. Tearing up brain matter, twisting and pulling at the stuff without mercy. She once heard that there weren't any pain receptors in the brain. One could do as they pleased in there, poking and prodding at the insides, and the person would be none the wiser.
It was an interesting, yet morbid thought. Just how would it feel? The brain was quite literally a person's self. If she let someone mess around with the inside of her skull, some sadistic sociopath with nothing but a wicked sense of curiosity and a scalpel, just how long would it take for her to go insane? She wondered if she would be able to recognize deterioration in her mental state. How many crucial neurons would die, how many bits of tissue would be severed, until she would simply die? Pass out? Go into a seizure?
I wonder if it would be fast. Or slow, all gradual-like. To go from perfectly lucid to unconscious in less than a second, with no pain whatsoever. Or would it take a while? I would be afraid, I think. Afraid as my brain is dissected, diving deeper and deeper into fear and a sense of the unknown. Things would probably become unrecognizable. Afraid for no reason. That would be worse, I'm sure. To be so afraid, but of nothing at all, of not even knowing why or for what reason or where…
Annabeth pressed enter, and the file saved.

| SCP-L900

Tentative sentience, inanimate.

Class Designation: TBD (Probably safe)

Description: A grey statuette made of some kind of stone. It doesn't have a face or any defining features, aside from a purple dot on its head. It weighs 1.9 kilograms and stands at roughly 18.5 cm tall. Relative Dating suggests that it's from 900-600 BCE.

Recovery: First located during an excavation of an ancient construction fill located within Nicaragua, where it was processed by on-site anthropologists. Acquired by the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Initial analysis by their Archivists say that it's made out of carved wood, which contradicts its appearance as of now. They also didn't note any distinguishing features, despite the obviously out of place bright purple spot it has.

Notes: How is it sentient???

In the end, all she had to do was call in and ask.
Annabeth sat on the floor with her back against a wall as she cradled a bottle of aspirin in her hands. After a short call to Dr. Trent, he had allowed for a package of medication to be shipped to her room. It had arrived through the door's one-sided drop slot, the same place where they delivered food to her.
She had already dry-swallowed two tablets and while she was somewhat tempted to take a third, she knew that she should probably wait for the stuff to work through her system first.
SCP-L900 sat next to her, of course. She'd been keeping it close to her, almost always in line of sight. It was quickly becoming an ever-present object in her life. It was just a simple matter of observation. The more she kept it around, the more she got used to it, the better she would be able to provide information about it, or notice if something out of the ordinary happened.
Speaking of which, something did happen, or so she thought. Whenever she held the idol in her hands, she could almost think that the thing was getting colder. It was subtle, subtle enough to just be a product of her imagination, but she could have sworn that its surface was cool to the touch. She made note of it regardless, just in case it turned out to be important.
It struck her suddenly that this was the first and only time that SCP-L900 would exhibit even a single anomalous property. Even then, it could be chalked up to her mind playing tricks on her, or even something as mundane as being left in the room with the air conditioning on.
I can see why they didn't bother assigning any actual researchers to work on this thing, Annabeth thought glumly as she prodded at the idol with her pointer finger. It was just so boring. Above all, it was just a boring object. They could probably have just thrown it in the trash and the world would be none the wiser. In fact, that idea was getting more tempting by the minute.
In a sudden fit of childish pettiness, she tilted SCP-L900 over, letting it fall on its side against the floor. It hit the ground with a dull thud, and nothing happened. She glared at it, daring for it to act up. To grow a set of limbs and strangle her. To snap her neck as soon as she blinked. To spontaneously combust, to start talking, anything at all.
Instead, it only continued to lay there, staring back at her with its non-existent face.

The aspirin was helping, a little.
She scowled at the computer terminal in front of her, which taunted her with its blinking display. A roadblock, she's spent the last thirty minutes sitting in front of the monitor, and every single word that she's typed was subsequently removed not soon after. She could hear every thump of her heartbeat, a metronome of pain that echoed in her head at an agonizing rate.
You know what? Fuck it.
Even if the initial notes said that SCP-L900 was carved from wood, it was clearly stone now. It was also getting colder. She was sure of it, the damn thing was getting colder. It didn't make for much substance, but it was something, so to hell with it all, she needed to feel like she was making progress, any progress at all, even if that progress could end up being nothing but falsehoods.

| SCP-L900

Tentative sentience, inanimate.

Class Designation: TBD (Probably safe)

Description: A grey statuette made of some kind of stone. It doesn't have a face or any defining features, aside from a purple dot on its head. It weighs 1.9 kilograms and stands at roughly 18.5 cm tall. Relative Dating suggests that it's from 900-600 BCE.
It has the ability to alter its physical state, in one recorded instance transforming from being made out of a wooden material, into stone. It was also observed to noticeably drop in temperature despite a lack of change in regards to its environment.

Recovery: First located during an excavation of an ancient construction fill located within Nicaragua, where it was processed by on-site anthropologists. Acquired by the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Initial analysis by their Archivists say that it's made out of carved wood, which contradicts its appearance as of now. They also didn't note any distinguishing features, despite the obviously out of place bright purple spot it has. Probably because of its anomalous properties.

Notes: How is it sentient??? I hate this thing.

"Shit." Annabeth winced, warm tears springing up to her eyes as a sharp jolt stabbed through her brain. She stood from the chair, knocking it backwards onto the floor. She coughed roughly and stared at her hands, which were trembling to the point that she was seeing double. A moan rose from her lips as she stumbled over to her bed and collapsed, eyes squeezing shut in a meager attempt to filter out the thick blot of agony pushing against the insides of her skull.
It hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts
She slammed her head into her pillow and brought her hands up to wring at her hair. A well of sickness opened within her stomach and she was struck with the sudden urge to vomit. She hiccuped and held her breath, bringing her knees up to her chest as she tried to quell the stream of bile rising up to her esophagus. It brought with it trails of acid, stinging her throat as it rose and rose and rose and her mouth began to fill with warm saliva and all at once it just compounded into an ache, a horrible ache that wracked through her body in burning waves.
Yet she held it back. She grit her teeth and squeezed her stomach and held it back, held back her screams as the iron vice held her head in its tight grip. She cried and whimpered and trembled and whispered all of the prayers she could muster.
Minutes turned into hours, into days, into years, but time passed, and with each creeping second, the tension lessened slightly. She opened her eyes, using the back of her hand to wipe at the pool of stinging tears that had gathered. She could see then, the layers of grey skin under her nails, gathered like layers of debris speckled with dark spots of dry, gritty blood. Strands of black hair were stuck, caught between the dead skin.
Gingerly, she picked at the hairs, pulling them out from the insides of her nails. They came out with slight resistance, bringing with them large flakes of clumped, oily skin that immediately began to crumble away.
"Disgusting," she muttered. She wanted to clean herself up; there was a shower in the lab's restroom. But her body refused to meet those simple commands. Every time she tried to move, she would break out in a cold sweat and the pressure in her head would double. "What's wrong with me?"
She closed her eyes again and wrapped her lab coat around herself, using it in lieu of a blanket, which hadn't been provided. Tiredness gave way to exhaustion, and her body welcomed the reprieve from consciousness with open arms.
She did not care to think about SCP-L900.

Annabeth stood in front of the crowd, illuminated by a glaring stage light as she held the piece of paper in her hands. She held it out, letting the audience take a look at its contents, consisting of a crude drawing of a statue. There was some light applause, which prompted Annabeth to look out from behind the drawing, which had shielded her blushing face from the peering eyes of the crowd.
She wished she could see them better. In stark contrast to the stage where she stood, the audience had little to no illumination. In fact, what little was visible could only be seen due to the harsh white lights that called so much attention to her in the first place. She could only make out the shifting figures of shadows, barely silhouettes in the veil of darkness that seemed to morph and distort in a grotesque fashion. There was a physical, solid aura that emanated from their presence, feelings of hate and malice.
But that couldn't be true, could it? They were clapping. Some of them even whistled as she continued to hold out her drawing to them. She wished she could take another look at the paper. She didn't think her artistic skills were all that great. Maybe it had transformed into something else, had become beautiful in wake of such a grand crowd gathered to admire it.
She smiled abashedly to the crowd and pulled the paper back, though she soon regretted doing so. Her heart jolted as the jovial audience turned sour, mood shifting to something much more akin to resentment. She could feel them, all of them, hundreds of pairs of eyes staring at her as she stood exposed under the stage lights. In a panic, she tried to hold out the drawing again, but felt something was off. It was lighter, somehow. Like holding onto a manifestation of air.
Annabeth flipped the paper over and looked at it. It was blank.

Eyes.
Annabeth stared into SCP-L900's eyes, not quite sure what to make of it. She was most certain of the fact that it previously had no facial features. And yet here it was, staring back at her with a pair of eyes, carved into it with thin, intricate lines. They were empty, dead, as dead as the rock that the statuette was made of, and yet she couldn't help but feel unnerved as she continued to stare at it.
Well. I guess this confirms that SCP-L900 can change itself like that. I wonder if it can see me.
She shuddered and closed her eyes as another bout of pain strangled her breath, forcing her to stop and focus. Try to breathe, in and out, just try to breathe. Relax, she should ignore the way that the thick veins running up her neck seemed to grow taut, bulging against her skin as if it yearned for escape. Ignore the way her muscles seized up at every throb, ignore the overwhelming spell of dizziness that made it hard to stand upright. Just ignore it all.
She had woken up moments earlier to the deafening sound of her heart thumping in her ears that drowned out the fading memories of her dream. With each pump of blood, she could practically feel her heart hit her ribcage, threatening to break through her chest. It was loud, louder than anything she's ever heard, and for a long while she simply laid there, afraid to move for fears that her heart would simply explode, and she would die right then and there.
It must have been hours before it finally started to calm. Hours spent with two fingers up at her neck as she stared into the distance with glazed, unblinking eyes, simultaneously terrified and fascinated with the strong, rapid pulse that pumped blood through her veins. The thought of cardiac arrest crossed her mind many times, and though there was a massive, almost painful pressure on her chest, like something was expanding and wouldn't stop, it never came. Right on the verge, a step away from death, and then she backed away.
Once again, once she rose from the bed, she found herself soaked in her own sweat.
And now, that thing is staring at me. Its grown eyes, and it won't stop staring at me, Annabeth thought numbly, slowly walking backwards towards the restroom. She had long since gotten out of sight of the cursed idol, but she still held that sane fear, suspicion, that it would at any moment come alive and start moving around. It was possible. Far, far too possible for her to handle.
She opened the door to the restroom behind her and slowly backed in, closing the door in front of her as quietly as she could. Maybe that's what they meant by sentient. Maybe the people who found this thing went through the very same experiences that she was living through right now.
Her stream of thought was interrupted by another wave of pain, except this time, it didn't hurt so much; it was more of a shock. It was a heavy impact, far bigger than anything she's ever experienced, like an earthquake localized entirely within her body. The harsh taste of copper filled her mouth as she fell to her knees, gasping for air that she suddenly couldn't get enough of. Thin lines of spittle fell from her mouth and onto the floor; she expected blood, but it was completely clear. Normal.
Am I dead?
It certainly felt like it. Her body had been struck so hard that it was a wonder that she hadn't simply fallen apart on impact. She knew, of course. She knew that it was just a particularly bad migraine, and that she wasn't really dead, but a larger, irrational part of her thought otherwise. There was little pain, only the scared suspicion that something within her broke. Snapped. If nothing else, she shouldn't be alive right now.
She sat up from the floor, limbs buzzing with static as she moved. There was a sense of fragility to her limbs as she moved, suddenly brittle bones threatening to snap as she stood. She braced, waiting for something to break, but nothing happened. Just that pressure at her joints, swelling as if it were about to explode.
She turned to look at herself in the bathroom mirror. As she stared at the gaunt, pale face before her, with bloodshot red eyes and matted hair that stuck to her sweat-covered forehead, a thought struck her.
That thing is doing this to me.
As if confirming her suspicions, the metallic taste swelled to the point of numbness, stealing all sensation from her mouth other than the taste. Spittle began to dribble down her lips as the taste rose up to her nostrils, stinging them with its copper scent. A sickening mixture of disgust and indignation rose in her chest as she turned back and marched into the lab. It didn't surprise her at all when she saw that SCP-L900 had moved so that it was facing her directly.
Sentient. It's alive. Probably fucks with people more the longer they stay near it or something.
The pressure increased ever so slightly. It brought her joints to the cusp of popping, of snapping. She didn't care, brought herself in front of SCP-L900 and grabbed it with both of her hands. She lifted it up and glared at it. Her red eyes stared into the statuette's own, searching for any sign of life, any sign of intelligence or knowledge of what it was doing. But all she found was stone. Blank, lifeless stone.
"But you're alive. I know you are, so stop pretending already." Annabeth slammed the idol back down onto the table, cringing at the loud explosion of sound it produced. "I have to get out of here. I can't… I can't stay near you."
She backed away from it and turned to exit the lab, but of course, the door wouldn't open. The doorknob was locked firmly in place, refusing to budge an inch as she twisted it back and forth with vigor. Because of course it was. She was a prisoner, that never changed. She fumbled through her coat pockets and produced her identification card, slamming it into the scanner next to the door. Nothing happened.
"Come on," Annabeth breathed, "can't you let me out? God damn it, someone let me out!"
She slammed her fist onto the metal door over and over again. Nothing happened. She pulled down at the knob with her entire body weight. Nothing happened. She screamed at it. Nothing happened. She scratched at the card reader. Nothing happened. She took one of the chairs sitting at her desk and heaved it at the door with all of her might. Nothing happened. She put the rotary phone's earpiece to her ear and dialed the number of Dr. Trent. Nothing happened. She dialed nine-one-one. Nothing happened. She threw the phone at the door. Nothing happened.
She picked up SCP-L900 and threw it at the door. Nothing happened.
It bounced off and landed on the floor with a soft thud. Annabeth, panting with exhaustion, finally collapsed onto the floor. It felt like an iron pike was being driven through her head, and tipped with a burning poison that traveled through her veins, scorching every part of her body in the process. It was too much. All of it, all of it was too much.
Head buzzing, she crawled over to the door and picked up SCP-L900.
She wondered if she could destroy it.

She tried a few more times to use the phone. Nothing came of it though. She had to wonder whether the Foundation themselves had cut her phone line, or if it was the SCP. Considering everything, she was leaning more towards the former.
For its part, the statuette didn't do much of anything to resist her efforts of attack. She slammed it against the walls, soaked it in water from the tap, even ground it against the edges of her table. All the while, it just stared at her with its empty eyes as it passively resisted any of her efforts to damage it.
It's invincible. Annabeth watched, unamused as she threw it against the wall once more only for it to fall flatly onto the floor. Indestructible. I haven't even managed to chip the thing. It's totally, completely indestructible.
An awfully large jump to conclusion, and yet as she sat on her bed, head being split into two and with every one of her nerves being overloaded with an unstable concoction of heavy fatigue and an overbearing, dragging numbness that made it hard to feel anything save for hollow pain, it made perfect sense. It was indestructible, and that was that.
Something sharp jabbed up both her nostrils. Blinking, she put her hand up to her nose and pulled away to find that she had a nosebleed. Her blood was a thin, off-pink colour, polluted with black specks of hardened snot and black coagulation. She groaned and stood from her bed. In response, her legs began to scream in protest; despite the withered state of her frail body, thinned over days without food, her kneecaps creaked and shook under her weight.
They'd stop sending her food, because of course they would. If they did, then they'd have to interact with her. And who'd want that? No, better to just let her starve here. Starve, locked in with this SCP, and with nothing to do but die.
Stumbling, she manage to catch herself on her desk, where the blinking monitor looked at her with indifference. She scowled, but reached out to type into the terminal regardless. Her job to document the SCP was of the least priority to her right now, but she did it anyway. Why? Perhaps self-satisfaction, or some sort of weak attempt at retaliation against it.
Or maybe I just feel like it. And because there's nothing else for me to do, Annabeth thought bitterly as she typed away, leaving behind red fingerprints in the process.

| SCP-L900

Class Designation: TBD (Probably safe)

Description: A grey statuette made of some kind of stone. It doesn't have a face or any defining features, aside from a purple dot on its head. It weighs 1.9 kilograms and stands at roughly 18.5 cm tall. Relative Dating suggests that it's from 900-600 BCE.
It has the ability to alter its physical state, in one recorded instance transforming from being made out of a wooden material, into stone. It was also observed to noticeably drop in temperature despite a lack of change in regards to its environment. It can also MOVE. It's sentient and it makes you feel like shit. That's all it does. It moves. I know it moves, because it turned even though it's just a statue and I just put it down on a table it can still move and that means it's alive.
It's also invincible. Why? Because it is, that's why. Fuck.

Recovery: First located during an excavation of an ancient construction fill located within Nicaragua, where it was processed by on-site anthropologists. Acquired by the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Initial analysis by their Archivists say that it's made out of carved wood, which contradicts its appearance as of now. They also didn't note any distinguishing features, despite the obviously out of place bright purple spot it has. Probably because of its anomalous properties.

Annabeth laid naked under the shower head with SCP-L900 in her hands. Liquid ice rained upon her shivering body, providing soothing comfort to her boiling blood. Just outside of the shower's glass sliding door, her filthy clothes, stained with sweat and blood, laid in a crumpled pile. On top of it was an empty bottle of aspirin.
She stared, unblinking at the statuette in her hands. The pitter-patter of the water falling upon the porcelain floors did well to drown out the slight whispering that lingered in her ears.
It wasn't stone anymore. Rather, it seemed to be made of some sort of metal, with a reflective surface and a sheen of silver. It was much heavier and cold to the touch, almost unbearably so. She could see herself on its surface. A living corpse, with prominent ribs and poked through her thin skin and sunken eyes that could hardly blink. It was almost fascinating, how much she had changed since she was assigned to this little project.
"Harmless," she croaked. "No harm here."
Funnily enough, that purple spot on its head was still there. In fact, it might have grown a bit, though it could have been her imaginat-
She gasped as the statuette fell from her hands. She couldn't feel them anymore. God, she couldn't feel her hands. It wasn't just numb, they weren't there. She lifted her arms and saw a pair of limp, stark-white hands, but they weren't hers. They were prosthetic, plastic prosthetics covered in chalk dust.
Can't feel. Can't touch. Annabeth curled up into a ball and closed her eyes as uncomfortable warmth enveloped her body. It's not harmless. It's killing me. The thing is killing me.
She couldn't see it, but as she drifted into unconsciousness, SCP-L900 blinked.

"Okay. Call clean-up to get in there and retrieve the object. The body as well of course, but SCP-L900 is the priority."
Jossen watched as the lab intern nodded and talked into a handheld radio. A promising one. The intern had shown nothing but diligence during the short time she's served as a lab assistant, with a natural proficiency for lab work and a curious but restrained mind that hungered for knowledge. He was sure that in a few years or so, she would become one of the site's top researchers. A lot of promise, that one.
Sighing, he turned back to look at the display of monitors that showed live feeds of D-6831's temporary lab. For the past four hours, D-6831 had been laying motionless on the shower's floor. That, coupled with her body's poor state, was enough to convince him that it would be alright to intervene.
During the week that D-6831 had to work, he'd been more than tempted to take a look, just a quick peek at SCP-L900's file. Of course, it was just a natural curiosity. He knew better than to read the file, just as Trent knew to install those filters that censored SCP-L900 from the video feeds. Judging from the file size, he could tell that there was quite a bit of content, more so than he expected. Most of it would have to be pruned, but still, he was sure that useful information could be gleaned from it.
He really took every precaution. Even installed an independent terminal to ensure that none of SCP-L900's files were accessible, not to any clearance level.
"That's that, I suppose," Jossen muttered.
"Yes," Jossen looked behind him to see Trent nodding to himself with a satisfied look on his face. "I'd say this went well. Good, even."
"Still, it's unfortunate. D-6831 was innocent, you know that," Jossen said as he looked back at the camera feed. Two personnel wearing yellow hazmat suits unlocked and entered D-6831's lab, heading straight towards the restroom. "Had a degree. Young."
"You approved the proposal. In the end, so did the Ethics Committee, though from what I heard, it was only by a slim margin. The transcript of their arguments is long enough to fill a book. I've never seen the word 'precedent' tossed around so much in my life."
"Yes, I know. Doesn't mean I can't feel bad about it."
"She was the best pick. Besides, in the end, she was just a D-Class. She was bound to die sooner or later. Better for her to die for a good cause, rather than a senseless death to fill out another spot in a test log, or to be caught in the crossfire of a containment breach."
Mouth suddenly dry, Jossen picked up his mug and took a long drink from it, relishing the hot, bitter coffee as it went down his throat. It was scalding, but that was fine. Perfectly fine.
"I suppose you're right."


A medium shot of a congregation of maybe seven or eight hundred people. Dissolve to a close up of the people in the front row, the camera panning left across their number. Heavy noise and banding, horizontal lines of color distort the features of the congregants. Bold yellow letters in curling typeface splash across the screen.
"The Father Sunday Hour"
Crowd shot again, this one from 3/4 view. Zoom in to single out a man on stage, tailored green suit, coifed hair. He is bathed in white light. Tall white cross behind him. Something about the cross isn't right, although banding makes it hard to see. The video quality is too low to see anything of his face beyond a broad smile with immaculate teeth, everything else being washed out in a thin tan fuzz.

Marlin cursed at the television set, rising slightly from the couch. He was wearing a pair of grey trousers – the clothes from earlier were gone, followed by a forty minute shower. In his right hand he held the remote, in the left, the evening's second vodka tonic.
The new Panasonic VCR was supposed to stop this sort of stuff – Paul had explained something about double analog tracking. But it seemed as though the $900 machine had been a total waste. It was even a struggle to push the cassette into the supposedly top-of-the-line VCR, with the machine spitting it out each time until finally relenting. And now it seemed like it wasn't even playing the right tape.

Man, presumably Father Sunday: “Welcome, friends. It is so good to have you with us! From Macon, across Georgia, and soon broadcast across the world, we welcome you here.”
Zoom into his face. A burst of static reduces his features to a flurry of black and white lines.

“Fuck!” Marlin shouted, hurling the remote onto the couch. It bounced on the cushion before clattering to the floor. He would have it out with Paul tomorrow for hooking him up with a piece of trash like this.

Sunday: “Friends, how many of you here today have lost something? A loved one, struck down by illness, a car, a house, your job? How many?” He paces along the stage.
A murmur of agreement ripples through the congregation. The angle changes from a close up to a wide-angle shot of the congregation. A few seconds later, the static clears up.
Sunday: “Sometimes, it feels as though each of these individual burdens, these pains that we carry inside and out, it feels as though they are too much for a single soul to bear, isn't that right? But we want that, we want to share in it!"
Another murmur of the crowd, this time soaked in static as the screen flickers.
Sunday: “Well, friends, I have some good news for you. You are not alone. You will have us and we will have you. We are a community of love, and we can overcome anything. The Sarkic word is life. It's about getting rid of the things that hold us back! Destroy them, if you have to!”

Since returning to his apartment in Buckhead, Marlin had formed a working theory of what had happened in that dingy, empty apartment. Some combination of stress, overwork, and nerves had led to some sort of lucid dream. Him being drugged was probably involved. Everything prior to his waking had been a dream, of that he was certain. The watch, the door, the trash – all were some sort of Freudian images that peppered dreams. The roaring had been the aftereffects of the drugs finally wearing off.

The flickering grows worse until the screen is entirely obscured by static. Close up of the altar, still difficult to make out. Sunday steps into the frame, his face blocked again by the video error.
A young black woman in a blue dress at the side of the stage. Sunday motions to her. Medium shot of the her joining him onstage. An offscreen organ plays a deep melody.

All the tape had to do was be normal – some standard broadcast of a church or whatever a “sarkic sermon” was. Even torture or murder would do.
So long as Marlin could process it, it would be confirmation enough that whatever had happened was in his head. But the video was refusing to play along. It drug back and forth, like a child telling a story. Leaving out details, hyperfocusing on others. He couldn't get a handle on what it was supposed to be. It seemed to be dragging the VCR down with it.
Marlin felt vaguely nauseous. On his lap, he had a pad of paper and a pencil. So far, all he had written was "Father Sunday" and "shitty video." Now he added "faith healing hoodoo bullshit" in scratchy letters.
His grandfather had once taken him to a tent revival like this, somewhere outside Dothan. The preacher wore a bad toupee and a screaming woman had tried to grab him as she rolled on the floor. He had been a staunch atheist ever since.

The video is banded once again. Triple images of green, red, and blue separate, then converge, only to separate again. The congregant stands nervously.
Sunday: "What's your name, brother?"
Congregant: "Marlin Wexler." She speaks in Marlin's voice.

Marlin choked on his vodka tonic. As he doubled over, coughing, the glass slipped from his fingers and shattered on the floor. He sputtered, feeling the tears flood his eyes.

It's the young woman, her eyes brimming with tears. She is no longer addressing the preacher, but facing the camera. Looking directly out.
Congregant: "I said, my name is Marlin Wexler."
Sunday: "And what do you have to confess, brother Marlin?" His face is still out of focus.
Congregant: "I've got a sickness inside of me, padre." The edges of her face warp as the video quality falls apart once again.
Sunday: "What's the sickness, brother?"
The video stops warping. Marlin stands onstage, wearing grey trousers and no top.
Marlin: "I pump poison into the world and tell myself it's not my fault, that if I didn't someone else would. Because I thought the reason I used to be unhappy was because I didn't have the things I wanted. And I'm too much a coward to ever stop. To ever confront what I've done. And now I am sitting alone in this empty apartment full of art I hate and hi-tech crap I never use. I hate my life and I hate myself."
Cut to the preacher, his face bathed in static.
Sunday: "Brother Marlin, we can help you." In the background, the voices of the audience echo his words. The video quality begins to degrade with each word until it was nearly unintelligible.
Sunday: "But first, you need to let us in. There's always room for you here. Just let us in."
Cut to black. Silence.

Marlin stared at the screen, feeling a pit opening inside of his chest. The television shifted, becoming a featureless grey box, then shifted back to a television again.
He shook his head. No, he decided. No, he had not seen that. It wasn't actually real. Another momentary break. Caused by too many pills or too much booze or stress or something. That was what had happened.
He would rewind the video and watch it from the start. Grabbing the remote, he hit stop. His thumb hovered over the rewind button.

Bloom into a field of colors. Silence replaced with the roar of static. Beneath the static come voices, several hundred thousand strong.
"Let us in!"

Marlin hurled the remote at the television. The plastic bounced off the the screen. He rushed forward, and with both hands grabbed the VCR. There was a popping sound as he yanked the device out from beneath the television, wires and all. The television tottered, then fell backwards, perching against the wall, static shining out to the ceiling.
Marlin smashed the VCR into the static. A loud as the glass shattered beneath the metal. For a split second, the static maintained even as the glass broke. Then, the screen was black and all was silent.
He looked at the VCR and hurled it to the floor. The video tape popped out, skidding across the tile. Marlin brought his foot down, crushing into the black plastic with a crunch. He raised his foot and stomped again. And again and again and again.
After a few seconds, the video was nothing but scattered shards of plastic and two spools of magnetic tape.
In the vastness of his empty apartment, Marlin was overcome with a wave of nausea.

The few days, Marlin was sitting alone in his office, waiting for Vadasz. He had barked at Paul to fix the shattered cassette, which he had done without question or comment, only a slight look of concern.
Jeanine had contacted Vadasz asking him to find any videos of a "sarkic" or "Father Sunday." Earlier Vadasz had called and said he had something. Marlin had told him they were meeting in his office, and if Vadasz didn't like it, he could fuck himself.
Marlin placed the repaired cassette into the VCR. It lay there, half in, half out, not yet pulled into the gears of the machine. He hadn't yet watched it again.
The seat was familiar, every angle and every point of pressure known from memory. But Marlin felt no relief in his leather chair behind the mahogany desk. All he could think about was the rolling feeling in his guts. Without thinking, he began to scratch at his neck.
He tried to remember that this too would pass. Either his television spoke to him, or he was insane. There was a comfort in the binary.
Finally, Vadasz entered. "You're late," Marlin grumbled.
"I'm well, thanks," Vadasz said, a tight smile on his face. "Anyway, for this guy, you should be grateful I showed up at all. This Sunday guy was - it's like he never existed."
"Did you find anything?" Marlin asked.
Vadasz shook his head. "Nothing," he said, "Even went door to door 'round Cabbagetown asking if anyone had recordings. Bupkis."
Marlin slumped in his chair. Vadasz leaned forward.
"No videos, but I can at least fill you in on some details. Free of charge, even."
"Oh?" Marlin asked. Vadasz had never offered any information for free. Something about this must have caught his attention.
"Yeah, guy owned a television station, little small-time deal out in Macon, but used to it broadcast his sermons he did here."
"Couldn't you get names, addresses, something from there, then?"
"Burned down three years ago," Vadasz said with a shrug, "And the silverfish already got to the records."
Marlin grunted noncommittally.
"But the big thing, the big thing with this Father Sunday character, it's how he vanished."
"Yeah?"
"In '79, he straight-up disappears. From what I can tell, there was another preacher - Randal Deloach - who decided to attempt an honest-to-god exorcism of Sunday and his entire congregation during a Sunday service. Things got ugly, four people were hospitalized, one died. Sunday hasn't been seen since then. Ministry collapsed. Apparently he was cooking the books - in way that was, hm, unbecoming even for a small-time televangelist. There's something like five warrants out for his arrest."
Marlin paused a moment. "Is that it?"
Vadasz chuckled, "'Wow, thanks Vadasz! I appreciate the effort that it took to acquire this information and the fact that you offered it up to me for free.'"
Marlin stared. "Is that it?"
Vadasz's smile vanished. "You want my advice?"
Marlin shook his head. "Of course not," he said.
"Stay away from this," Vadasz began, ignoring Marlin, "I've found a lot of things for a lot of people, a lot of awful things. With this one, I have a feeling, and it's one I've had before. And when I had this feeling, those times ended very badly for the people who hired me to look."
"So, the information's gratis, but the advice is what costs you?"
"Marlin," Vadasz said, "I'm serious. Just walk away from this. I get a bad feeling. I've got some stuff that'll be ready in two or three weeks. Gruesome stuff. You'll love it." There was a note in his voice that Marlin had never heard before. Almost like pleading.
For a moment, they sat together in silence.
"I need you to watch something with me," Marlin said.
Vadasz sighed. "I don't watch the tapes."
"No," Marlin said, "You're watching this with me. You're f-" He felt a tremor in his chest, but shook it off. Nothing would stop this moment. "You're watching with me, end of discussion. Now put it in."
Vadasz shrugged. He moved to the VCR and pushed the tape in before slumping back into the small chair opposite Marlin's own. "I refuse to watch," he mumbled, turning his head. Marlin could see that he was peeking from the side of his face.

The church from earlier. Same young woman sobbing, same preacher comforting her. She speaks in her own voice. There's something else different, though. The cadence is off. Shots change from Marlin's memory.
The healing is done. Next up is an Asian teenager walking with a limp.

Marlin stared at the screen.
"That's wrong," he said.
"Marlin," Vadasz said, rising from the chair, "Have you considered maybe taking some vacation time? Or seeing a therapist? You're a good client, and I'd hate to see you crack."
"No, goddamit!" Marlin started, "This isn't-"
Vadasz cut him off.
"I'll see myself out," he said, making his way to the door.
Marlin made to stand up, to intercept him. Suddenly, he felt like throwing up. He feel back down in his chair.
After Vadasz closed the door behind him, Marlin fell to his knees and vomited into his trashcan.
As he laid there on his knees, the sound of the service continued from the TV, interrupted only by Marlin's rattling breath. He stayed on the floor.

It had been three weeks since the meeting with Vadasz. A few new tapes, mostly from freelancers and junkies had come through. It wasn't anything that would blaze trails, but it would provide content to keep his subscribers happy. The meeting next week with the investors seemed impossibly remote.
The rattling in Marlin's breath had gotten worse. After a week, was a hacking cough. Jeannine had insisted that he see a doctor. The tests had come back negative for bronchitis, TB, any of the standard suspects.
After another round of tests, the doctors had found the issue. Marlin couldn't pronounce the bacteria, but apparently it was quite rare, normally only found in people with severely compromised immune systems.
The doctor had lowered his voice when he mentioned it, quickly recommending a third battery of tests to see if - his voice had trailed off.
Marlin had refused, point blank. He wasn't a junkie, and he sure as shit wasn't a degenerate. He was a man who came from nothing and built himself a god-damn empire. He told the doctor where and how he could shove his implications.
Storming out of the office had made him feel in control for the first time since that kid's video.
Two days later, the sores started to show up on his arms, just below the wrist. Then they started to appear on his torso.
He wasn't a degenerate, he reminded himself.

Marlin rewound the video.

Father Sunday places the sickness back in the man, who goes from standing on two legs to sitting in a wheelchair. The tears zoom back into his eyes. The smile on Sunday's washed-out face is replaced with a concerned frown.

Every time, there was something different. People changed, colors changed, words changed. Whenever he watched it with others, the video would always revert to its basics, unchanged. Nothing strange. No Marlin, no murders. Just a staticky preacher healing the gullible.
Over the past four weeks, he had begun watching the tape over and over and over again during his free time. The demands from investors became distant as he watched the familiar scenes over and over again, trying to unlock their secret.
Vadasz had stopped returning his calls. Searching about the word "sarkic" had only turned up a few references to an early Christian heresy that seemed to have little relation to the manic holy rollers that flickered across his screen. Even Paul and Jeanine had begun looking at him sideways.
Marlin hit play.

Father Sunday: Brothers and sisters, we are gathered-
Close up of Sunday, his face hidden behind a flurry of static. His voice, too, completely unintelligible. In the background, congregants nod and jerk spasmodically.
Shot of congregants. The static lessens then fades altogether.

So here he was. Scouring the video of an Elmer Gantry type for clues about, well, something. Trying to even establish the outline of he was looking for. Seeing if the changes in each playthrough meant anything. If the video would speak to him again. If he could see himself in the flickering glow of the television once again.

Sunday: - and to remind us that we are not these bodies that imprison us! We are all radiant souls, untouched and untouchable by sin!

Over the past weeks, Marlin had memorized every contour of the video. The "miraculous" "healings", the hymns he did not recognize, the sermon with the allegory of the prophet who dressed in rags. He had tried to read meaning into the changes that each viewing wrought. There was no consistency he could tell of.
The video refused to divulge its secrets. So he watched it, again and again and again, scouring it for clues. He had lost track of the notebooks, filled first with notes, then abbreviations, then symbols of his own devising, then finally scribbles intelligible only to him.

Sunday: Join me in communion, won't you, brothers? Won't you, sisters?

Marlin did the final rail off the small hand mirror. It had been what? Three days since he slept? Possibly four. There was research to be done.
As the cocaine flowed into his veins, he felt more distant from sleep than ever. More distant from the nightmares of the static-voiced kid, of himself wearing a rubber mask, of the rattling cough that kept getting worse.

A closeup shot of Sunday's face. It's clear this time, but Marlin can't make out the details, somehow. It is warm and flowing with light.
Sunday: Won't you join us, Marlin?
Marlin looks up from the mirror. He lets the remote slide from his hand as he crawls on his knees towards the television set.
Sunday: We love you, Marlin. All of us do. But you have to let us in.
Marlin is in front of the television. Sunday reaches out from the set, his hand glowing glass. He holds forth a small piece of static, no bigger than a gumball. It seems to pulse and shimmer.
With a hunger he didn't know he had, Marlin stuffs the ball in his mouth. Once, when he was a teenager, he had been lost in the woods around Sand Mountain for a week. He had managed to catch a rabbit in a crude snare. Half-remembering some advice from his grandfather, he had eaten its liver first. The taste is the same.
Sunday: We give you all that we are, in bodily sickness and death. So that you may move past yourself and join us here. This is what the sarkic blessing can provide. Complete freedom. Overwhelming love.
Sunday: We love you, Marlin.
Marlin: I love you too.

Marlin started awake. The television set roared with static. This time, though, it felt calm. Sated.
He switched off the TV and went to bed. For the first time in weeks, he dreamt of nothing.

"As you, ah, as you can see from the handouts, CIVIL-TV has seen multiple periods of sustained growth over the past three years," Marlin said. It took all of his concentration to keep from shaking. Cold sweat plastered his shirt to his back.
In front of him sat a conference table's worth of bland men in suits. Opposite Marlin was a large screen TV playing a short informational package.

Yellow numbers across a blue background. The numbers are not technically lying. There had been bumps in subscribers after scandalous or salacious programming had made the news. However, they are carefully selected to avoid showing the numbers as they stagnated or declined between each bump.

One of the investors leaned back in his chair. "Marlin, in all honesty," he said, "if you're not smart enough to make money with porn and murder, why should any of us take a chance with you?"
Marlin nodded for a second or two before answering. "Well, ah, your investment will allow, uhm," he began.

The numbers vanish. Text across black background. The words are all of the colors.
"Let us in."
The words grow larger until they move past the confines of the screen.

None of the investors looked at the screen. Their eyes were fixed on Marlin as he quaked and began to retch.
"Your, uhrm, your investment will allow us to, hm, expand into commercial markets across Europe and Asia, which, ah, is the real, is the real profit center for programming, -gramming like, uhm, CIVIL-TV's."

Marlin leans forward and vomits on the conference table. Thick chunks of dark-red viscera pour from his mouth, connected to his lips with strands of viscous drool. He tries to scream for help, make some motion for the men to save him, but they don't see him as they leaf through the projections.
As they read, they shake their heads and, as one, get up to leave.

Marlin clambered over the table, the slick flesh pulverized beneath his knees and hands. He grabbed the nearest investor by the necktie and pulled the man's face close to his. With a wet growl, he jammed his thumb into the boring man's eye.
For a split second, there was pure stillness as he pulped the investor's eyeball.
Then, the man screamed. And the room exploded.
Shouting, clamoring, wrestling Marlin to the ground. Punches and kicks came from all directions. The weight of one of the chairs slammed onto his neck again and again as the men's blows stopped being about defense and became a frenzy.
Marlin could taste nothing but blood. He animal screams, trying to fight the men off to inflict more violence.
As the shadows crowded his vision, he looked up at the big screen television mounted to the wall.

Marlin stands before the investors, swaying slightly. He looks dazed, his eyes glassy.

One of the investors waved a hand. "For chrissakes," the man muttered, "What a waste of time." He stood up to leave. After a moment, the other investors followed him.
As the last chance for solvency filed out of the room, all Marlin could do was stare at the static of the big screen, watching himself be beaten to death again and again and again.

The next week was an ellipse. Autopilot on old habits that had seen Marlin through the end of his world before. Coke. Booze. Hookers. Pills. Debasing himself, paying others to debase themselves.
It had never made him feel better, but it had at least distracted. Now, though, his mind kept replaying the past month. Sunday, the kid, the video, his own death on tape. Over and over and over again.
He had smashed all three of his televisions. Refused to go out to bars or even liquor stores, just ordered everything delivered. For fear that he might see another screen, see himself bleeding out, laughing with a mouth full of his own blood.
The coughing never stopped. The chills and fever got worse. The two times he had slept, he awoke to find a few more teeth rocking in their gums, ready to be plucked out. The sores had spread and seemed to become infected. He had covered the mirrors in his apartment as well.
Jeanine and Paul had tried to get him to come down to the office, sober up and get things worked out. He had turned them down again and again, spitting every vileness he could compose.
This evening, Vadasz had tried to visit him and talk him down. He said Jeanine and Paul had asked him to visit. Marlin had let him in, but just stared at the freelancer. After a few minutes of awkward stammering, Vadasz had excused himself.
When he left, the freelancer paused at the door. "I'm sorry, Marlin," he said as he shut the door.
The alleyway was dark. Marlin couldn't remember the last three hours at all, but every part of his body hurt. His consciousness had a gloss of some obscure combination of booze and pills.
He tried to lift himself to his feet, only to feel agony bloom in his left arm. With a grunt, he collapsed.
Looking down at his torn sleeve, he saw the wrist bent at an unnatural angle. He gave a stupid laugh.
"Took a lil' fall, I think," he said to the empty alleyway, trying to sound like he was amused. He pushed himself up with his right arm and staggered to his feet.
Lurching towards the street, all Marlin could do was try to remain upright. Perhaps a passing wino would take pity and stab him to death. Otherwise, there was only more to do.
At once, the dark alleyway was awash with a thin blue light. Marlin started and looked at the source. A small portable television, its screen shattered, laid on its side. Inside of it, he could see the scene of his own death once again.
He made it about three yards at a dead sprint towards the mouth of the alley before he tripped. He slammed facefirst into the asphalt.
The taste of blood was overtaken by the sensation of a loose tooth in his mouth. Without thinking, he spat it out, even as his vision still thrummed with pain.
For a moment, he simply laid on the ground. Then, slowly, he opened his eyes. A blue light, but not like the illumination of a television. Something brighter. Purer. More real.
He looked up.

The man is dressed in a simple suit and jacket. Marlin cannot make his face out, but he can feel the man smiling. The hairs on Marlin's arms stand up in the man's presence.
"Hello, Marlin," the man says, "I am Father Sunday. I have been looking for you."
As Marlin hears Father Sunday's voice, all staticky sweet, it's like a door unlocks. He can see Father Sunday's face now. It is not the face of a man. It is beauty and truth and in its infinite radiance, Marlin shrinks before it.
Sunday's face is visible for only a split second, but in that face, he sees the truth that red-faced revivalists and street crazies had grasped at. Once, he did not believe in such things, but now he knows it to be true.
This man, this god, was the way.

Some part of Marlin wanted to hate the thing before him. This thing that had sent him tumbling down to his world of ulcers and lesions and blood tests and doctors looking pensively at results. He wanted to be repelled by its unnatural beauty, by the way it should not exist in a world of schedules and deadlines and content.
But he could only feel warmth, the kind that sheared away flesh and reached to the bone. A deep and abiding love of something simple and pure and for him but shared with thousands or millions. He felt himself transcend his own desiccated and diseased flesh.

Closeup of the face of Father Sunday, veiled in static once more.
Sunday: I love you, Marlin. And for that, you are the one who will spread my word. My love will become known to the whole world through your works.
His voice is warm, but with an underlying electric hiss. The world seems to knit itself together around him.
Marlin tries to respond, to say something, but his voice fails him. He mouths half-formed prayers, silent and bloody, before the light-colored thing before him.

"I- I," he finally managed.
"Freeze, creep!" came a voice. The alleyway was flooded with light. Marlin looked to Father Sunday. The man was gone, along with the blue light of the screen.
An unseen pair of hands grabbed Marlin by the collar and dragged him roughly to his feet. An unexpected billyclub to the midsection knocked the air out of him, making the world bright with pain.
An unseen voice asked, "Is the guy?"
The voice of the hands around his collar responded. "Yeah, at least it looks like him. Under all the crap."
They shoved Marlin against a wall and his world opened into a new bloom of agony as the cuffs snapped around his broken wrists. He waited for them to read him his rights, to say him he's going down. Instead, they shoved him into an unmarked car.
In the car, he got a look at the two men. Both large and interchangeable, dressed in nondescript black suits. He wonders when they try to get him to confess.
One of the men pulled out a blocky cell phone. "Tell 'em we got the POI," he said.
"So, what am I being charged with?" Marlin croaked.
The men didn't respond.
It was a short drive before they stopped in an office in Vine City. They parked in an underground garage and dragged Marlin out.
It suddenly dawned on him that these men aren't police. He felt like he should care, should be surprised, but can't manage it.
A guard in a rent-a-cop suit sat in a small booth just next to a door. Next to the guard was a military rifle. He nodded at the two men and let them through.

Marlin doesn't see this. All of his attention is on the portable television behind the guard.
Ronald Reagan speaks on the television, his words muted by the glass of the guard station. Closeup of his opponent, Mondale. A chyron appears onscreen beneath his head. "Tonight - 8PM. Only on ABN!"
But in the light between the images, Marlin sees something more. He sees Father Sunday looking from behind the glass. Sunday no longer needs to appear before Marlin on the screen for Marlin to see him.
With him, Marlin can feel the gaze of Sunday's saints, all those congregants who dwell in perfection with him. He wants to join them. God, he wants to join them.
Marlin can tell Sunday had not abandoned him. He loved Marlin. And Marlin loved him.

The door slammed shut behind Marlin, but he could still feel Father Sunday's warm glass gaze upon him.

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