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“You're not afraid of clowns, are you?”
When Victor had been interviewed for a sales rep with MC&D, they had asked him a lot of unusual questions, but for some reason that one had always stuck out as the most non-sequitur. Now he was wondering if they wouldn't have hired him if he had said yes, or just not have sent him here.
As he looked upon the numerous striped tents of Herman Fuller's Circus of the Disquieting, he tried to figure out exactly what it was that was making him so uneasy. Upon casual inspection, nothing was out of the ordinary. The glances he managed to steal of the freaks or the clowns or the attractions as the Circus was set up were never enough for him to explicitly identify anything wrong, but yet he couldn't shake the feeling that they were all deeply abhorrent somehow.
Maybe it was just the pitch-black cotton candy. Everyone knows cotton candy is supposed to be bright pink, baby blue, or maybe snow white on occasion, but never pitch-black. Especially not such a deep, abyssal pitch-black that looked like darkness incarnate on a stick. And why was the calliope playing when they weren't open to customers yet? Something about a calliope being played just for the sake of it seemed so unwholesome.
“You Victor?”
Victor turned his head at the mention of his name. A few yards away from him was a large, muscular man with a moustache, bowler hat and of course…
My God, how is that even possible? Does his throat pass through his brain?
“Yes, I am indeed. Victor Chan, from Marshall, Carter, & Dark's Hong Kong Office,” he greeted, masking his horror at the man's disfigurement as best he could. He did not wish to offend him as Victor was himself a fairly small and slight man, and was painfully aware that his five-figure Italian suit only signified softness in this place. “I spoke with a Mr. Gorham over the phone and he said I was to meet with a gentleman by the name of Manny. Am I correct in assuming that you are him?”
“Never been mistaken for someone else yet,” the Man with the Upside-Down Face replied dryly. “What's this about Emcee D? You got something to sell me, you want another private show?”
“I actually have a proposition I would like to discuss with you regarding some of your former assets that are currently being held by the SCP Foundation,” Victor replied. Manny groaned and muttered something under his breath. It might have been ‘Icky'. “I apologize if I've said anything to upset you, but I was led to believe you may have an interest in reobtaining some of these assets.”
“You, ah, you're going to want to talk to our Ringmaster Veronica. I run back-of-house around here. She runs front-of-house. I have a feeling she's the one behind this,” he grumbled. “Follow me, we'll see if she's in her tent.”
“Thank you, sir.”
Victor stuck as closely behind Manny as he could, not wanting to get lost in the candy coloured labyrinth. As they moved further into the Circus the sickly sweet scent of cotton candy became so overwhelming Victor needed to cover his nose and mouth with a neckerchief. Amidst the unceasing drone of conversation that surrounded them, Victor swore that some of the voices he heard didn't sound Human. Though he had yet to see any animals, he could hear their various calls ringing through the air. Some didn't sound like any creature he was familiar with, and all of them either sounded monstrously vicious or pitifully forlorn. The calliope was still the worst of all. The music felt almost invasive, insidious somehow, as though it was trying to lull him into letting his guard down so that it could do with him as it pleased.
As he surveyed his strange surroundings, he noticed Herman Fuller's name over and over again, over every tent, booth, kiosk and caravan. This struck him as curious as Manny had said the Ringmaster was a woman.
If Victor was in a more mundane line of work he would have simply assumed that Herman was the late founder of the Circus, but if Herman was anything like his own employers it seemed unlikely that he was dead.
"Will Mr. Fuller need to sign off on any deal we might come to?" he coughed through his neckerchief, deciding it would be best to do his due diligence. The mere mention of the name caused a cold glower to spread across Manny's inverted face.
"No."
Victor didn't dare to press the issue any further.
Manny led him into a red and gold striped tent, where he saw two Clowns. One was hideously deformed, a lanky giant with an elongated face, ashen grey skin, and long pointed nose. His eyeless sockets were inky black, as were his oversized lips. The thing smiled at him, revealing a perfect set of dazzling white teeth.
The other Clown was bouncing on a miniature trampoline and laughing uncontrollably. She looked to be a young woman, though her smooth white face made it impossible to tell for sure. She was dressed in mismatched striped stockings and a frilly purple dress, and her auburn hair was held up in twin pigtails that had been curled like ribbons. She was adorned with a red Glasgow smile, a red nose, and sharp red lines through her eyes. Victor wondered if maybe she was just an ordinary human in makeup.
“Lolly!” Manny shouted to get her attention. She somersaulted through the air and landed in her black platform shoes.
“Ta da!” she exclaimed proudly, beaming a smile. He could see now that she had the same perfect, impossibly white teeth as the other.
She was one of them.
“Where's Veronica?” Manny asked.
“In the Menagerie of Mayhem. The Pink Elephant got into the grownup juice and now it's having hallucinations about people,” the Clown snickered.
“I'll go get her. Lolly, would you be so kind as to entertain our guest until we get back?”
“Of course!” she said excitedly, rushing up to shake his hand. “Hi! My name's Lollipop, but you can call me Lolly. Are you running away to join the Circus?”
“No Lolly, he's just here on business. His name's Victor, and he's a salesman with Emcee D.”
“That sounds like a boring job. You should run away to join the Circus. We have so much fun here, and I never even get in trouble because I'm Icky's favourite.” She stuck her tongue out tauntingly at Manny.
“Don't worry kid, I'll be back before you know it,” Manny told Victor, giving him a sympathetic pat on the pack. “And don't mind the big guy. He's just her babysitter.”
“I'm not allowed to be unsupervised,” she smiled mischievously. Manny left the tent, leaving Victor alone with the two Clowns. “Why do you look so scared? Honestly, Mr. Noodles would never hurt anyone. I know we Clowns can look a little strange, but that doesn't mean we're monsters.”
“No, of course not, I just…I'm just nervous. I'm a little out of my element,” Victor said, forcing an uncomfortable laugh. “I don't usually do, ah…field work? If that's what you call this.”
“Why don't you sit down, relax?” Lolly offered, and led him to a large wooden desk on the west side of the tent. She opened a mini bar and pulled out what looked like a traditional milk bottle filled with some viscous black liquid. She sat down beside him and popped off the cap. “Sorry, I just need a fix before we go any further.”
She took a swig from the bottle, and a spasm threw her back against the chair. She cried out in apparent ecstasy and was left breathing heavily as she tried to regain her composure.
“Are you alright?” Victor asked.
“Oh yeah. I'm impossibly happy, literally. When Humdrums drink this stuff their serosomething levels get so high they have a heart attack.”
She smiled at him, her teeth dripping black with the strange liquid. “I'd find that sad if I could stay away from this stuff long enough to feel anything but bliss. You could still have some cotton candy though. I bet you've never gotten high off calliope music before, have you?”
“I'm afraid I'll have to pass. I am here on business, after all,” he declined as politely as he could. Just the smell of the cotton candy was making his teeth hurt.
Lolly took a more modest sip from the bottle, then passed it to Mr. Noodles.
“Have you ever been to our Circus before?” she asked. Victor just shook his head. “I could give you a tour if you want after your meeting. This place, it's just, it's magic. It's really magic! The people, the rides, the games, the prizes, even the food is magic! It's a sanctuary of magic in a shittingly mundane world. When I first saw this place I knew I could never go back to the real world, and I never did.”
“Go back? You mean you weren't always…as you are now?”
“Uh-uh,” she shook her head. “When I was a little girl I was perfectly ordinary. My mom was a cunt and I had a miserable childhood, so when the Circus came to town I took all the money from her purse and had the best day of my life! That was the day I met Icky. She saved me, like she's saved a bunch of kids, but I was special; maybe because I came to her. She was so beautiful and powerful and wonderful and amazing I couldn't help but love her. Wait 'til you see her, you'll love her too. She's a magician you know; a real magician with real magic, and I'm her lovely and beloved assistant.”
“When you…”
“And her playmate,” she added with a naughty smile.
“When you say that she rescued you, you mean she made you perform for the Circus?”
“Not just perform, but she turned me into a Clown! Mr. Noodles here was born a Clown, but I got turned, which is why I'm not as special looking as some of the other Clowns. Icky thinks I'm pretty though. I was so worried that she wouldn't let me stay because I wasn't special like everyone else here, but she asked me if I liked Clowns and I said that I loved Clowns because, duh, everyone loves Clowns and she said I could be a Clown! Oh, do you like candy?"
"I, yes?"
"Well, we Clowns need so much sugar that our diet is basically all candy. That's why we get these special chompers so that our teeth don't rot out on us. I never even brush my teeth. I hated the dentist when I was little, and thanks to Icky I never have to go to one again! Doesn't that make you want to be a Clown?"
"I…don't mind dentists too terribly, actually. At least, not compared to some things," he replied. "Ms. Lollipop…"
"Lolly," she insisted.
"Alright, Lolly, am I understanding you correctly when you say you were a runaway child that Icky subjected to anomalous modifications for the sake of becoming a circus act?" he asked, failing to completely mask the horror in his voice.
"…and I get to eat all the candy I want," she said through her eerily serene smile. "Honestly, it was the best thing that ever happened to me. I love performing. Every time I'm in that ring I get to delight and amaze hundreds of people. I get to show them that there really is such a thing as magic, which is the most uplifting thing anyone could ever do for anyone. You couldn't make me give that up. Icky rescued me from a horrifically mundane life, and I'll always love her for that."
“And she's rescued others, as well?”
“Well she makes us feel like family, but Manny's usually the one who brings 'em in. Every few months or so it seems. They're not safe out there, Freaks in a world of Humdrums, so we bring them here where they're safe and loved and get to be Circus stars!”
“I'm sure it's a great privilege,” Victor said, reminding himself that it was no worse than some of the things MC&D did. "But if you wanted to leave, could you?"
"As a Clown I literally can't live without Milk, so leaving would be a death sentence."
"I see," Victor nodded. "Is there any way you could not be a Clown again?"
"No offence, but I'd rather die from Milk deprivation than be normal again," she replied. "Humdrums can't do stuff like this."
She pulled out a pack of balloons, and inflated one with a single breath. She tied it off effortlessly, and when she let it go it floated like it was inflated with helium instead of air. She filled up several more in rapid succession and then began juggling them. Going both up and down, they seemed to defy physics, floating or falling however she desired as if following a constantly changing invisible track. The balloons appeared to have a life of their own, an effect that was only enhanced by their giggling.
"That is impressive," Victor complimented. “I hope they pay you well."
“We get paid in scrip. It's easier that way since we travel to so many different countries in so many alternate realities, there's just too many types of currencies to keep straight,” Lolly replied, having no difficulty with juggling and talking at the same time. “It's a little bit of a hassle to redeem it for real cash if we ever want to go off site, but I like it anyway. It makes this place feel like it's its own little country, and I'm the princess."
One of the balloons did escape from her grasp and floated over near Mr. Noodles. He popped it with his finger, and it screamed like someone being murdered, scattering confetti across the tent. All the other balloons fell dead silent.
Victor's expression twisted into one of confused horror.
"Oh don't mind that. That's just like when steam escapes from a lobster's shell when you toss them in boiling water," Lolly claimed, letting the balloons float away freely. "Balloons don't have souls. Believe me, I know. One time, we needed this Elder God thing's permission to enter his dimension or whatever, and he demanded a sacrifice. He got so cranky when I tried to give him balloons, so I'm pretty sure if anyone would know if something has a soul, it's a soul-eating Elder God. We ended up going to another dimension with more reasonable lot fees, and they got to see me ride my unicycle upside down.
“I don't want to talk about otherworldly demons though. It's kind of a downer. I wanna talk about fun stuff. You sell magic stuff for Emcee D right? What's the coolest magical thing you've ever sold?”
"I'm afraid I'm not allowed to divulge information about our wares to anyone that's not a potential customer."
"I'm a potential customer. Just because I use a piggy bank instead of a real bank doesn't mean my money's any less good."
"I…have no argument for that. I do happen to have a catalogue with me," he said, opening his briefcase. "I guess it can't hurt for you to look at it, as long as you promise to give it to Manny or the Ringmaster."
"Cross my heart, hope to die, stick a needle in my eye," she swore dutifully before eagerly snatching the catalogue. "Wow, this is a lot fancier looking than Wondertainment's catalogue."
"There is a section for Wondertainment's products that we carry, starting on page 33, however a great many of our offerings are handcrafted by some of the most skilled anartists known to…"
"120 bucks for a bubblebath bonbon! Are you nuts?"
"We are Wondertainment's exclusive distributors for that product, so without any competition the market value is rather high."
"We give better stuff than this away for prizes. People actually pay over a hundred dollars for one piece of magic candy?"
"Well as you yourself said, magic's depressingly hard to come by outside of your, lovely, circus. Our clients are normally more than willing to pay our prices."
"You know, Icky got me Ragamuffin from Emcee D," she said as she casually flipped through the slender catalogue.
"…Ragamuffin?"
"Oh my god! You have to meet my dolly!" she shouted excitedly, throwing the catalogue on the desk and running over to what appeared to be a Tim Burtonesque dollhouse and pulled out a purple haired rag doll with button eyes dressed in a similar manner to herself.
“This is my dolly Ragamuffin. She's a magic dolly and a lot of bad things could have happened to her if she had ended up in the hands of the Essie P or any of the other bad people who kill or lock up freaks,” she said as she sat back down beside him. “That's why she's normally very shy around strangers and just acts like an ordinary doll, but she's not. It's a bit of a shame because I'd like to do some acts with her, but I love her the way she is. Icky got her for me. I had come here with nothing but the clothes on my back and some cash in my pocket, and she said a girl needed a doll, and I deserved the most special dolly she could find. Her contact at Emcee D was who she called to get me that doll.
“I know you probably didn't care about giving her a loving home and would have sold her to whoever offered first, but I'm grateful that you were the ones that found her since you're probably the only group out there that would have sold her in the first place.
“My point is, even though you charge way too much for candy, I'm glad we're business partners. Ragamuffin, don't you agree?” She held the doll to her ear as if it was whispering to her. Victor would have been a little unnerved by a grown woman pretending to talk to a doll, but was more unnerved by the indistinct murmurs that seemed to emanate from the toy. “Ragamuffin says that your people treated her very well and she's very thankful that she ended up with me in the Circus instead of being experimented on at the Essie P, but she's still too shy to talk to you.”
“Another time perhaps,” Victor smiled. He became aware that voices were approaching the tent.
“Manny, if you won't get rid of the elephant then we'll have to stop having booze on site because no matter what we do she always gets into it,” he heard a woman say.
“I'll send the damn thing to AA if I have to, but so long as she brings in more than she costs, she stays,” he heard Manny reply. “After all, she…
“Don't say it!”
“…works for peanuts.”
The woman sighed, and then walked into the tent alongside Manny. She was quite obviously the Ringmaster, dressed in a long-tailed red velvet coat and tall high heeled boots. She wore a top hat upon her long black hair, though for some reason it reminded Victor more of a magician's hat than a Ringmaster's. Her skin was the same porcelain white as the Clowns', but her elaborate violet makeup was closer to Cirque du Soleil than the Ringling Bros. aesthetic the rest of the Circus seemed to follow. Victor also couldn't help but note that she had a very pronounced, almost cartoonish hourglass figure. He glanced over at Mr. Noodles and his numerous exaggerated features, and figured they had both been shaped the way they were for the enjoyment of others.
“Icky!” Lolly cried excitedly, leaping from her chair and throwing herself into the Ringmaster's arms.
“Easy there little Lollipop. I see someone's had her serving of Milk for the day. Good girl,” she praised her. “How's our guest?”
“He's still a little bit nervous, but that's to be expected for a Humdrum. He's really nice though. Come say hello."
“There he is, straight from the Deathless Merchant of London,” the Ringmaster said as she approached her desk.
“I've been told never to call him that, but yes, I am from Marshall, Carter, & Dark,” Victor said, standing up to shake her hand. The Ringmaster instead grabbed his face and seemed to inspect him, a manic gleam in her bright purple eyes. She smiled, her perfect white teeth confirming that she was indeed a Clown.
“Excellent. Very pretty. I see your bosses got the memo that I like 'em young. So much cuter than that old fart from the London Office. What's his name, Bourgeois?”
“Burgess,” Manny replied.
“Close enough,” the Ringmaster shrugged.
“Icky, I think you're scaring him,” Lolly said.
“You're right. I'm sorry,” the Ringmaster said, releasing Victor from her unnaturally strong clutches. “I should be more professional. You may address me as Ms. Ringmaster, young man. That sounds very professional, I think. Of course, when you hear people talking about Icky they're talking me. Icky the Magic Clown was my act before I was the Ringmaster. And of course, Manny here insists on calling me Veronica, my boring Humdrum name. I don't know why. Do I look normal to you?”
“Don't go asking questions that are liable to start a fight,” Manny objected. “We're both busy and you called this boy here for a reason, so let's get to it.”
“You're right. Sit back down young man,” the Ringmaster said. Victor quickly obliged, and the Ringmaster sat across from him. She poured herself a tumbler of Milk from the bottle and drank it in one gulp, shouting and slamming her palm on the desktop. She poured herself a second glass, but proceeded to sip it normally. Lolly sat herself on the Ringmaster's lap, placing her arm over her shoulder like she was visiting Santa Claus. Manny stood to their right, while Mr. Noodles stood right behind Victor, ready to intervene should he start any funny business with his employers.
“Whenever you're ready,” the Ringmaster said. Victor began fumbling with his briefcase and pulled out a manila folder.
“As per your request, I have compiled a dossier containing the SCP files of all your Circus's former assets that, to our knowledge, are currently being held by the SCP Foundation,” he said, sliding the folder over to her. “If there are any there you would like to retrieve, our contacts within the Foundation can provide additional intelligence regarding the containment facilities and personnel or arrange for security system failures. The price for our assistance will be that during your recovery operation you also retrieve for us an SCP object of our choosing from that same facility.”
“We are not antagonizing the Essie P!” Manny growled through his teeth.
“Yeah, I don't like the Essie P. They're mean,” Lolly said. “They lock up freaks just for being freaks. That's not right. Clowns are meant to make people happy, and I can't do that if they lock me up.”
“You have nothing to worry about darling,” the Ringmaster claimed. “With the Kaleidoscope, we can travel through any door we want, and with Emcee D's operatives we won't even have to worry about being caught on camera. They'll never know it was us, especially since we'll be stealing something else while we're at it. Perfect prestidigitation, which as a magician I'm pretty good at.”
“I know what you're doing,” Manny claimed. “You think that if you spring a freak or two from the Essie P and bring them home the rest of the freaks will love you as much as the Clowns do, and then you won't need me anymore to keep them in line.”
“Manny, I'm not Herman,” the Ringmaster assured him. “I'm not trying to get rid of you. You've been with the Circus longer than anyone; you know it better than anyone. This Circus couldn't exist without you, and no one here wants it to, especially me. Herman may not have meant it when he said that the Circus was family, but I do. You're my family Manny, along with everyone else here, and that's why I want to do this. Sure, it will be good for morale, but we owe it to our Little Acts Lost to at least make sure they're okay, and to help them if they're not. The Circus is a family, and family stays together.”
Manny made a gesture which Victor guessed was a face-palm, but due to his upside-down face it looked more like he was stroking his chin.
“If I may interject something, the Ringmaster is right that there's no danger in antagonizing the Foundation in this manner,” Victor said. “Marshall, Carter, & Dark has been pinching items for decades without any consequence. The Foundation has actual world-ending threats they must contain. They can't be bothered to chase down every anomalous trinket that goes missing. They are already aware of both our organizations but do very little besides espionage. Besides, if all goes as planned, they'll never even know that either of us was involved.”
“Manny, we don't need to be afraid of the Essie P. We have the Kaleidoscope for quick getaways, and the Fortune Teller as an early warning system,” the Ringmaster said. “Essie can't touch us. What do we have to lose?”
Manny let out a long sigh.
“Open the file at least. We might as well have a look at it."
The Ringmaster squealed with delight and greedily snatched the file from the desk. Victor noticed that her eyes moved rapidly over each page, and he guessed that she was speed reading.
“Let's see…No, too stinky, too grabby, a lawsuit waiting to happen. Hmm…Motormouth.”
“Oh, I liked Motormouth. He taught me to juggle,” Lolly said.
“Everyone liked Motormouth,” the Ringmaster said wistfully.
“Not him. He's not coming back, not after that stunt he pulled,” Manny said firmly.
“I know,” the Ringmaster agreed, despondently turning the page. “Though maybe you should have taken the machine gun out of his mouth before turning him over.”
“Ooh, can we get Meaty the Meatworm back? That was so much fun!” Lolly asked. "It went so fast and so high and so many loopty loops and upside down and sideways and backwards like schoom schoom schoom schoom! Also it was sticky."
“We can't operate the machine safely without Charley,” Manny said. “He's not still kicking around, is he?”
“No, he…blew himself up. Huh,” the Ringmaster said. “Moving on. Viscera and confetti? What a mess. Can't blame him for being pissed. Cancer? That sucks. We should send him a card or something."
She turned to the next page, and her eyes went wide.
“Virtuoso,” she said softly. “They have Virtuoso.”
“Who's that Icky?” Lolly asked.
“He was a creation of Fuller's. He had the most beautiful voice. Well, lots of voices actually. He sang constantly, it was what he lived for. I would sit by his cage for hours, just listening to him sing. I spoke to him too, I spoke to him like he couldn't understand me because I didn't think he could. But one night I came to him after Herman had caned me, I don't even remember what for, but I do remember I was still crying. Virtuoso finished his song, but instead of going straight to the next one as usual he looked straight at me and said two words: 'Any requests?'. I was stunned and just muttered if he knew any Gilbert and Sullivan. He nodded, and sang the entire score of the H.M.S Pinafore for me.
"From then on when I talked to him he would listen, humming as quietly as he could, and speak back if he felt he had something worth saying. He'd sing silly songs for me, I'd sing duets with him, bring him flowers. I was his number one fan, and he was my friend."
The Ringmaster inhaled sharply as tears began rolling down her face. Lolly offered her more Milk, but she pushed the glass away.
"I thought he was dead," she continued. "I thought Herman had burned him alive. There was an accident. Virtuoso's covering was pierced during a performance and all his voices deafened most of the audience. After that Herman decided he was a liability to be disposed of. I cried myself to sleep for weeks after that. But he's alive! He survived the fire and ended up with the Essie P! He's been locked up all this time. He was made to sing, he was meant to be heard, and those bastards have him locked in a soundproof room singing to himself! We can't let him live like that Manny.”
“Do whatever you want. I won't stop you,” he replied. “Just be sure to shut down the Kaleidoscope afterwards. I don't want a mobile task force to come storming through one of those doors.”
“Thank you,” she said. She handed the SCP report over to Victor. “This is the one we want Emcee D. Essie P number 1860. I want literally every last scrap of information you have on the place they're holding him.”
“Excellent. I will inform my superiors and contact you once we have decided what items we would consider acceptable payment for our services and proceed from there,” he said, gathering his briefcase. “If there's nothing further?”
“One more thing,” the Ringmaster said, pulling out a VIP pass from her pocket and holding it out to him. “I want you to come here off the clock sometime, our treat. You need to really experience the Circus if you're going to be our Emcee D rep. Wear a cheaper suit though. Some of our acts can get a bit messy.”
“…Right. Yes, I, it's just that my schedule with Marshall, Carter, & Dark isn't exactly 9-5, and your Circus doesn't publish its tour schedule so I don't know how we would…”
“You have Gary's number. Just give him a ring whenever you're free and he'll send someone through the doorway to pick you up,” she said firmly.
Victor errred and ahhhed for a moment trying to think of a way to refuse, when Ragamuffin became animate. She took the ticket from the Ringmaster and walked it across the desk to him, waving it enthusiastically. Her button eyes were spinning slowly, and her stitched mouth gradually opened in a black smile that unleashed faint and otherworldly screams.
“Awwww, she likes you!" Lolly cooed. "Now you have to come back, or you'll hurt her feelings.”
“I wouldn't want to do that,” he replied, gingerly accepting the ticket.
Why didn't I just say I was afraid of clowns?

« A Real Humdinger | Dread & Circuses Hub | Fuller Than Full! »


In the hours of morning that still flirted with night, as Doctor Edith Spencer combed through layers of data from another world, she reflected on the pathways of life. If someone had asked herself a year ago about her future plans, she would have described a rapid ascent through the ranks of the Foundation, with the goal of becoming senior researcher at Site 81. Five years before that, she would have talked about her doctoral research, and her bright future career in academia. And ten years before that, the idea that she would even complete college seemed as laughable as an all-powerful organization suppressing the existence of things that went bump in the night. But somehow, the twists and turns of her life had led her here, with a metaphorical gun to the head of the Foundation and her finger on the trigger.
A sequence of events totally unpredictable yet fully inevitable.
It was six months ago that the Watchers had approached her. It had been a still June night, one of the many where she was the only one left in the lab long after the end of testing. She didn't mind her coworkers. Many of them she genuinely liked. But it was these times, secluded away with only her notes and her data, that she felt she could truly think. She always did her best work here. And her senior researchers' surprise at seeing a new batch of analysis and conclusions when he arrived in the morning didn't hurt. But most of all she just liked the feel of the lab at night. The silence of the normal busy equipment. The solitary light at her desk, like a shield between her and the outside world. The idea that anything happening during these hours was hers alone to keep.
So she instantly felt the presence of another person in the room. She pushed back from her desking, spinning to face the intruder. She hadn't heard the door open, but he stood there still. A pale-skinned, balding man clutching the edge of desk in the same way her grandfather clutched his cane. A wrinkled tattoo of an eye was on the back of his hand. He smiled at her. The expression was warm and terrifying.
"How did you get in here?" said Spencer. The only people with access to the lab were researchers and select administration. She didn't recognize him as one from the site. From a different area then? Someone even higher up?
The man stepped towards her, still gripping the edge of the table. He swayed slightly as he walked. Almost unconsciously, Spencer stepped back with him. As if his presence were a physical force pushing her away. "You're better than this, Edith."
"That's what I've been trying to tell my supervisor, but he just doesn't seem to listen." Stupid. Wisecracking to cover up the fear. As if that would make it less obvious.
"They say this is about protecting the world. Keeping the peace. But you know better than that. You've already felt the doubt, haven't you?" He pulled a manilla folder from inside his coat. "You've seen the signs."
"Should I call security? I'm beginning to think I should call security."
He placed the folder on the table in front of her. "Read this. Then you'll understand." And with that, he left.
When she got home, she opened the envelope. Inside was a stack of papers, perhaps 30 in all. The story they told seemed ridiculous. This was not the first Foundation to exist. Reality was not what it appeared to be. The world had ended once, and the founders had rebuilt it. Reshaped it. Put it under their thumb and squeezed until it screamed.
It was a ridiculous story. One that went against everything she knew. And yet. something about it tugged at her. She should have just dismissed the report outright. Instead she began to search. And the more she searched, the more discrepancies she found. The more incongruities. The more warnings.
She never saw the man again. A different Watcher returned to her two weeks later. By then she'd read the contents of the envelope so many times that she had them memorized to the punctuation, and she hadn't been able to get more than three hours of sleep at a time. The new man asked her if she understood what needed to happen. She said she did. He asked if she was ready. She told him to lead the way.
And now, six months later, she sat in her office watching the blip that was Dr. Clef wander through the map of Site 2000 and disappear. She smiled, more out of reflex than happiness. Good. He was doing his part. Time to do hers. Grabbing her backpack, she left her lab and stepped into the bowels of Site 81.
Entering the containment wing was sickeningly easy. The guards only gave her the most cursory examination as she walked through the check point. After all, what was there to worry about? Just Dr. Spencer doing some night research, like she had almost every day for the past year. A small thread of guilt tugged at the back of her mind, but she brushed it aside. She could wallow in guilt later. Now there was work to do.
She shouldn't have had access to most of the containment areas. As a recently promoted full-researcher, the only scip on site she was allowed to even know about was whatever one currently fell under her study. But having two O5 council members and a site director on her side meant doors didn't stay locked for long. She flashed her badge over the door to L-wing and stepped through.
Aside from a few echoing growls and hisses, the biological containment wing of Site 81 was silent. Dim lights highlighted the specks of dust drifting through the air. It felt more like a tomb than research station. Her footsteps echoed as she routed through the hallways. Around her dozens of anomalies held in only by a few feet of steel and glass moved. Most of them could easily kill her. Many would do even worse. It was a thought she'd become strangely comfortable with. Spend long enough dancing on the knife's edge, and you forget that it cuts.
The door to the creature's containment sat on the eastern edge of the wing. Normally, it was impenetrable except by using enough explosives to destroy half the building it was in. All it took Spencer to get in was a 7 digit key, provided by the O5. The door slid open without a noise. Exactly the same way it would for anyone else accessing the chamber. But she wasn't anyone else.
Her stomach clenched as she stepped through the door. She'd read all the documentation on the scip. Every testing log, every data collection, every recovery file. Each boiled down to the same conclusion- we don't know. We don't know where it came from. We don't know what it wants. We don't know why it does what it does, and half the time we don't even know what it's doing. Even putting it in the biological wing had been a guess, a symbolic shrug of the shoulders accompanied by a "hey, at least it looks alive."
The crystals grew in rough, uneven formations that didn't seem to have any underlying pattern. They had covered every centimeter of the 120 meters of surface area within the cell, and when that was done it had begun to cover itself. There were spheres, jagged pyramids, deformed pyramids, stalactites. Each crystal flashed with its own color and rhythm, reds and purples and yellows and teals that seemed to form a pattern just out of reach of full comprehension. As Spencer walked further into the room, the rhythms slowed. The colors deepened. A slow murmur built in the room. The whispers of thousands of inhuman intelligences, reawakening.
In the documentation, beneath the careful layers of clinical language, Spencer had read fear. It wasn't because they didn't understand the creatures. The Foundation thrived in the realms of mystery. There was nothing more pleasurable to it than dissecting an enemy and examining it molecule by molecule. It was because they understood just enough. They understood that there was no observed limit to its replication. They understood that it warped the laws of physics around it. That it was communicating with something beyond the scope of this reality. But they didn't know what.
The Watchers did. And they wanted to meet it. Spencer withdrew the tools from her backpack- a jar and chisel. Simple enough. She began to chip off the crystals. The lights seized as she struck the rocks, and the whispers intensified, but there was no other reaction from the creatures. As the chips fell into the jar, their light faded to a dim glow. Once it was finished she replaced the jar in her bag, took a final look at the room, and left the room. She didn't close the door.
Behind her, too small for human eyes to see, luminous crystals sprouted along the corridor walls.

« "Thieves!" Screamed the Ghost | Hub | Home Is Where The Hatred Is »


Voices pulled him from the blankness of unconsciousness.
“-unless you want your boss melting your badge for scrap before the end of your fucking shift.” A woman's snarl. It occurred to Alarath that he hadn't talked to a woman since waking up in this new world. He opened his eyes.
The walls around him were sterile white, lit brightly enough to eliminate any shadows. He lifted his head, wincing as the movement sent a spasm of pain up his chest. Thick blue covers were draped over him. Wires snaked from beneath. He traced their path to a mass of machines hanging next to his bed. Grey displays of numbers indicated statistics unknown to him. As he watched, one of the machines whirred, and a spurt of liquid traveled down the tube towards his chest.
Alarath jerked his arm back, a silver restraint on his wrist held fast. He could only watch as the fluid slithered into his vein. Wriggling his other limbs confirmed they were similarly restrained. A prisoner, then. Unsurprising. But what were these machines, and liquid? Poison? A sedative? He felt no less healthy or aware than he had before. White bandages covered his chest and arm. Medical treatment? Who would provide such aid to a prisoner?
The door burst in and a tall woman who looked like she would have fit right at home in a Daevite army strode into the room. Two men entered behind her. She paused when she saw him looking at her. Her grey eyes matched gazes with his and didn't flinch. “That's a problem,” she said.
“Who are you?” Alarath said. His throat strained with each word.
The woman ignored him. She turned to one of the men, a short, red-headed man with the kind of bulk that only came from a lifetime of war. “Get him back under.”
The man nodded and strode forward. He drew a clear cylinder tipped by a long blade from his coat pocket. Alarath lashed his limbs out, trying to escape, but he couldn't stop the blade from slipping between his muscles, and unconsciousness stealing him again.

He woke strapped down in near-darkness. A small light above him illuminated a small room. The red haired man sat next to him, holding a long black weapon. The bed jostled. They were in a carriage, then? Going where? Alarath supposed he would find out. He doubted there would be any point in asking. The ride passed in silence, outside of the occasional noise from the outside world or grunt when the vehicle ran over a rough bump. After what could have been only an hour or half a day, he felt them sliding to a stop. The back of the door slid open.
“Awake again? Tough fucker.” He couldn't see the source of the voice, but recognized it as the woman from before. “What are you people standing around for?” He felt hands dragging the slab he was strapped to back, and flinched as the noon sun flooded his eyes. He found himself staring at the woman upside down.
“So,” she said, “this is how it works. We don't know who you are or where you come from. But we're going to find out. And it'll be a lot less of a pain in my ass if you cooperate.”
“If I do, you'll release me?” he said. He didn't particularly care what the answer was. But it was what she expected.
“Fuck no,” she said. “But you'll get a nice cage, and we won't have to hit you as much.”
Alarath struggled to look around from his position on the slab. Four men with weapons stood around the woman. The red headed man was still in the vehicle, watching silently. His weapon just raised enough to be prepared for violence. “Well,” he said, grinning. “How could I refuse?”

« No Rain | Hub | War Within A Breath »


The afternoon sun shone relentlessly on a remote corner of the Arizona desert, a flat plain dotted with little more than scrub, rolling hills on the horizon. No cloud served to mitigate the heat and light everywhere. It was the sort of place you could see for miles and miles. You could see because there was nothing to see. A little shack right here, a dusty rental car nearby. Nothing.
El Conserje had walked here, having hopped off a pickup traversing a lonely stretch of highway a couple miles away. He came prepared for the trek across the scorching landscape: plenty of water, space blanket for the night, protein bars for focus, and a bandolier of magazines for his pistols. He tensed, fully expecting his quarry to see him approach from miles away. He came, knowing death would meet him on this path. He gave thanks to Jesus and Mary as he pistol-whipped the first person he saw at the shack entrance, unaccountably blind to his approach.
Then he asked them for deliverance upon viewing the carnage within. The shack and its occupants had already been vandalized. Beakers, glass tubes, flasks had been shoved wherever they would fit (for loose definitions of “fit”) and shattered. One man looked like he had burned from the inside out. He realized he only once before seen a pipe made from a human skull, but at least that one had been long dead beforehand.
Needing answers, he handcuffed his captive and cracked open some smelling salts. The other man gagged and returned to consciousness with a start and a pounding headache.
“Hey, muchacho, did you do this?” he demanded.
The man rolled his head uneasily around and slowly registered the scene through a bloodshot haze. He blearily answered, “Uh… No. Did you?”
The hitman cursed and pulled out a water bottle, opening it and letting his captive take a sip. Indicating the scene with his pistol, he explained the situation. “No. Yeah, I'm here to hit them. But I ain't no sick fuck.”
He grabbed his target by the chin, looked over his dark stubble, his stained button-down shirt. He looked over the pistol and radio he had carried, the small case emblazoned with some weird three-arrow symbol he'd never seen before. “Nah,” he continued, pushing his face away. “You didn't kill them. But you gotta help me. I ain't here to kill you, but I gotta know who you are, before I change my mind.”
Cognizance reentered his hostage with the sip of water and he made a quick assessment. Captor clearly intelligent, keeping control. Good. Equipment on the table, behind his captor. Good. The meth lab's inhabitants, still dead. Good. Body sore, hands cuffed, head pounding, but still intact. Good. The sun peeking through the slats in the shack wall, low in the sky.
Shit. “Quick, what time is it?”
Hector backhanded him. “Nuh uh. Name first. Who are you with?”
"Agent Rashaun Washington. DOD. You're on federal land, and I have to evacuate everyone before a nuclear test tonight."
His captor rolled his eyes and chuckled. "Gonna be nuked, huh? I'm sent out here just to end some desert rat who's gonna just get nuked anyway? That's good. I should be honored." His grin fell off instantly as he pointed his pistol at Rashaun's head. "I ain't no fool, and you ain't no fed. Now, tell me what's going on before I gotta kill you."
Agent Washington looked past the gun in his face to his belongings. The seal on the case remained intact. Good. Amnestics still available. “Okay, yes, I'm with a group called the SCP Foundation. Friend. Not here for the law or the drugs. Take what you want, but we need to get out of here now.” Urgent.
No way was this guy going to steer the situation. He grabbed Agent Washington by the shirt. “I ain't never heard of the SCP Foundation. Why are you here?”
“I was here to evacuate the people using this shack. This is a Class 4 containment zone, and we need everyone out for their safety before nightfall. What time is it?”
El Conserje squinted, looking first at this strange “agent,” then at the twisted body pile. Suddenly, he recognized that if this guy before him hadn't killed them… “Madre de Dios…” He twisted Agent Washington around and undid his cuffs.
In turn, Rashaun jumped forward and grabbed the radio and switched it on. “Control, this is Mr. President. Mr. President calling in.”
The radio emitted a static burst and a woman spoke. “Prez, where have you been? You missed the check in window. Status?”
“Alive, with one other. Requesting evac.”
“Negative, Prez. We'd get to you after sunset. Hold position and come back in the morning. Do not drive out. I repeat, do not drive out. Stay away from any vehicle or road.”
“Acknowledged. Staying put.”
“…Stay safe. 973 only manifests on the road. Y-You should be fine.” The radio went silent.
Rashaun's companion watched the exchange in confusion. “What's 973?”
The agent swallowed and gestured towards the festering heap. "The thing that did that."
"I know that, but what did that?"
Rashaun sighed. "There's a legend of a crooked cop that lives out here. Died forty-plus years ago. Full of hatred. And during the night, he patrols this section of highway, just waiting for someone to speed, drive drunk, something. Waiting for someone to screw up. Then, he comes out of nowhere, chases them down, and," he points towards the former occupants, "does that."
The hitman grimaced. "A ghost? A ghost did all that? I ain't never heard of a ghost that violent. That's, like, pure hate. I mean, I've killed plenty. I've seen the sick shit the lords will do to make sure no one fucks with them. But this? That's so… useless."
"Yeah."
The hitman extended his hand. "Hector. Hector Ochoa. Let's get through the night."
The sun had set, and darkness fell rapidly. The sky was clear, and the full moon lit the landscape across the dust and rocks to the horizon. All still, punctuated occasionally by a coyote's howl. In the clarity of the dark, a pair of headlights appeared on the distant road. Hector tapped Rashaun's shoulder and pointed it out. The agent looked out at the vehicle and reached for his radio.
"Control, this is Mr. President. I see a car on the highway. Reporting possible civilian breach."
"Negative, Prez. No civilians have attempted to access the containment area tonight."
"Vehicle is approaching our location. Has an evac been sent?"
"Uh… Negative, all our cars are accounted for. Aren't you a >static< ways from the road, though?"
"Affirmative. Hard to tell how far away the car is, but it's heading in this direction."
"Oh god… Prez, that's none of us. >static< Probable >static< cover. Repeat, you have to >static< RUN FUCKER"
Rashaun dropped the radio and stared at it as he tried to get his breathing under control. It kept broadcasting, as a man's voice, cocky and cracking, cut through heavy static to say, again and again, RUN FUCKER.
Hector pointed urgently at the dropped radio. "That's the ghost?" His face hardened as Rashaun nodded. The hitman swallowed a prayer and replied, "Listen, I knew going into this that it was designed as a death sentence for me. First, I was going to get all shot up by some meth heads just walking to this lousy shack. Then, you tell me this whole place is gonna get nuked. That was good. I coulda taken being nuked. But now, the only reason I'm still alive is because we're being hunted by a dead crooked cop who got to my target first? No. That makes no sense. Not gonna happen."
The agent stooped to pick the radio back up. "A lot of things don't make sense. My whole job is all about things that don't make sense." He looked out at the approaching car. Still over a mile away, its lights flashed red and blue across the desert plain as it veered off the road and started across the flat, rocky terrain.
The radio crackled, "DON'T THINK I DON'T SEE YOU."
Hector grabbed Rashaun by the collar. "What are you doing? We gotta do something. You say you know this guy? How we supposed to fight a ghost?"
Agent Washington seemed to withdraw into himself. "There are few accounts of someone surviving an encounter with SCP-973. 973 keeps to the road and punishes all offenses found by the target."
"Keeps to the road, my ass! That fucker's coming right here!" Pointing to the bodies, he added, "He was here yesterday!"
"We should be safe as long as we don't break any laws…" Rashaun wasn't sure he was convincing himself.
Hector snorted as the cop car approached. "Don't break any fucking laws? You might be some fucking angel, Mr. President, but I kill people for a living. I ain't licensed for this gun. I'm an illegal. I'm a fucking walking crime who's about to have a meter of broken glass shoved up his ass. No."
Rashaun snapped out of his adrenaline-addled reverie. "I gotta get you out of here. Quick, in the car."
Hector rushed into following him out of the shack, arguing, "But you said speeding won't help!"
Sirens pierced the air as the aged police car sped the last distance towards the two men. Rashaun pulled out his key fob, and watched confusedly as it slipped from his grasp and flew forward while he suddenly sprawled out on the dirt, Hector tackling him. A second later, the police car, swerved slightly to ram the other car at full speed. The night exploded with the sounds of crunching metal and shattering glass. The rental rolled and bounced with the energy from the now stopped and only partly dented police car.
The radio crackled, "YOU WON'T BE NEEDING THAT WHERE YOU'RE GOING, BOY."
The pair scrambled up from their place in the dirt while the white late-70s Ford Mustang's door opened. A sleek black boot trod firmly on the ground. A tall figure stood up. His outfit was khaki, blending slightly with the landscape. He adjusted his belt and stretched out a crick in his neck. A faint red light appeared to glow behind his Aviators. He pulled a baton from his belt as he swaggered forward. His mouth, topped with a handlebar mustache, curled up in a sneer to reveal pitch blackness within.
The radio reported, "NOW, ARE WE GOING TO DO THIS THE EASY WAY, OR THE HARD WAY?"
"The hard way, pinche poli!"
Two shots struck the cop. One in the shoulder, one in the jaw. Hector squatted tensely, coiled like a spring, a smoking pistol in each hand. A step past him, Rashaun turned slightly, one eye on the door to the shack, one on his erstwhile partner.
The cop did not so much flinch as flicker. Like a flame's twist, like a line of static on a frame of film, his wounds glowed red and adjusted out of focus, two spots of patchy uncertainty on his otherwise crisp, diabolic countenance. He grinned broadly and continued his approach, baton slowly twirling in his hand.
Rashaun grabbed Hector by the shoulder and pulled him back into the shack. He upended a table and barricaded the door. "What do you think you're doing?" he chided. "It's a Class 3 apparitional entity! Its physicality only shows minor degradation to integrity from attack!"
Hector stared lost at the agent. "It what?"
"It - It's a ghost. You can't shoot a ghost."
"I kinda just did."
"Yeah, but it didn't slow it down or anything."
"I did something. What about you?"
The shack rang out like a bell, as the corrugated metal wall dented inward. The blows struck again and again, until the tip of the baton, looking raw and fraying bits of red glow, poked through a hole where the wall buckled.
The radio crackled, "YOU SHOULD'VE RUN, FUCKER."
Hector squeaked, "What? How? This guy don't give up!"
Rashaun replied, panic and the autopilot of urgency encroaching on his voice, "Initial containment attempt resulted in the death of nine personnel but determined that the SCP was not invulnerable and could be damaged. Night ended in successful dissipation of entity with a nine day lag time between apparitions. Entity preferably attacked personnel with a criminal record… especially those with violent felonies and moving violations…"
Hector pulled up a pair of closed paint buckets from under the bodies. "So if you're the goody two-shoes you act like, it's only after me, got it. Serves me right. I know, you try to do the right thing, but time comes, you gotta break the rules to follow them, and bam, they got you."
The wall groaned and shrieked as SCP-973 slowly tore it away. His hands grasped and bent the sheet metal like stiff cardboard.
Rashaun looked at Hector's activities. "What's this?"
"Maybe we can't shoot him, so how about we blow him up?"
"…Maybe we can." Rashaun looked around the debris and bodies, moved some plywood boards and found a gas generator. He checked the fuel gauge, and hauled it up by the buckets. "This has got to be the worst meth lab ever. An accident waiting to happen. My chem teacher would have my hide if I tried anything like this."
"I need a wick or a fuse or something, something to get the fire out fast," Hector commented. He winced, made the sign of the cross, and reached for what he needed, pulled deep into one of the corpses. A long cotton towel was extracted, slick and sticky with putrefying body fat. Stuffing one end of it into the generator's gas tank, he stuck the other end in one of the buckets and Rashaun revved the engine to start burning.
The shack's wall gave way and SCP-973 stepped through the breach. The generator sputtered and smoked and rumbled. The two men picked up a large piece of plywood and bull rushed the cop, barreling him over as they scrambled back out past him. The apparition punched through a section of the plywood and grasped Hector's ankle as he passed. The hitman cried out as he kicked against the vice grip, pulling his body free not so much through his own strength but as his foot slid out of a section of a layer of his skin, suddenly burnt and decaying from the policeman's touch. Rashaun hefted his partner's weight on his shoulder as Hector hobbled as fast as he could from the shack.
Not waiting for safety, Hector fired at the bucket through the hole in the wall. SCP-973 stood to stare at the two men as the bucket punctured, its contents splattered, the towel caught fire, and the entire shack, coated in unvented grime, exploded.
Hector and Rashaun flattened against the ground as the flames from the shack lit the landscape. Bits of shrapnel cut into their backs, leaving a collection of searing slices in their wake. They rested, pulling themselves up slowly, looking back at the wreckage.
"That looks like it did it," Rashaun said, helping Hector up on his feet. "We did it!" Rashaun and Hector hugged, ignoring the shards of agony in their backs.
The radio replied, "ASSAULTING A POLICE OFFICER GETS YOU BIG TIME, FUCKERS."
From the wreckage shambled a distorted, flaming form, glowing like an ember and dissociating like static. It moved slow, walking, swaggering. It swung a baton, glowing red and wavering, in whatever its hand was now, as it approached.
"I can't outrun him!" Hector called, limping painedly. "Just go! It's me he wants anyway! I'm supposed to die tonight? Okay."
Rashaun snarled. "Hell no. My job is protecting people from things like that. I'm getting you out of here!"
"How? I can't run. You can't carry me all the rest of the night with that on our tail."
"I'm stealing his car."
Rashaun dragged Hector to the passenger side of the police car, its flashers and engine still running, and jumped into the driver's seat as Hector got himself seated. The car smelled of death and cigar smoke and semen, like dread stabbing their nostrils. In the rearview mirror, the eldritch being broke into a run, closing the gap between them. Without waiting to shut the doors, Rashaun stomped the gas pedal. The car belched a sulfurous cloud of caustic exhaust, and dashed forward. The doors pulled themselves shut with the sudden acceleration, and its occupants held on tight as they pulled it out away from the shack, toward the road.
The crimson broken glow shrank in the rear view mirror. The car's police radio came alive. "RUN FUCKER. RUN FUCKER. RUN FUCKER."
Hector pointed at the radio and laughed through the pain. "That's all he can say, now. I think we beat him. How long we gotta outrun him?"
Rashaun, focused on the drive, replied, "He's gone during the day. Probably sunrise and we'll be fine. Or if we get out of the range of the effect. We should just drive out of here, now."
The car felt horribly dilapidated, as if it should break down or explode at any moment. The police lights continued to flash, painting the night desert in reds and blues. Rashaun kept to the task of getting as much distance between him and the shack, and out of the range of 973's effect.
"Hope you didn't lose anything important back there," Hector mused.
"What do you mean?"
"You had that locked case. Left it back there when we blew up the shack."
Agent Washington felt an automatic response, a sudden rise of bile that he just ignored and swallowed back down. The amnestics were lost. Hector would know after tonight. "No. Not important." He wasn't so sure. Policy in this case was simple. Remove all witnesses. Hector was weak, in pain. It would be easy to overpower him. He's supposed to die tonight. He said so.
Rashaun wasn't sure what the car would do at the boundary of the effect. Evidence to date indicated that the vehicle dematerialized during the day. Maybe the car crashed. Maybe it burned. Maybe it simply disappeared or returned to whatever dimension or circle of hell or whatever it came from. He pressed down on the accelerator, watching the gauge read 70 MPH, 80, 90.
He heard a pistol cock. "You know," Hector suggested, "if I'm going to die tonight, I'd rather know it was from you, than some thing out there."
"W - what?"
"I can see what you're thinking, compadre. I spent my whole life killing people. I know when a guy needs to kill. You never had it on your face before. That's why I let you live back at the shack. But now, if I do what I'm supposed to, you're dead. And let me guess, if you do what you're supposed to, I'm dead."
"Something like that."
"So what's stopping you?"
"It ain't right. My role is protecting humanity and now I have to kill you."
"Right, ain't right… Funny talk coming from a guy who just stole a cop car."
"Maintaining secrecy of the Foundation and its mission is paramount to the protection of normalcy," Agent Washington recited. "Revealing oneself is acceptable in order to prevent containment breach, as long as amnestic treatment is delivered immediately afterward. Knowledge of the Foundation's purpose must remain solely for personnel…" Sweat started beading and trickling down his brow.
"What, is all this what you learn in the Foundation?"
"Personnel."
"¿Que? You wanna make sense?"
"I gotta turn you in."
"Yeah, to get sent to prison by the feds and get killed there? Same thing, muchacho. Just be a man and do what you gotta."
Rashaun started wondering when the inside of the car got so hot. "No, wait. What you do is tell the officer you volunteer for D-class. I'll pull some strings, get you janitorial duty. You'd still be officially a prisoner, but you'll be working for the Foundation and no one has to die tonight."
Hector wiped his eyes with his shirt and lowered his pistol. "You serious? What, you gonna have me cleaning up after things like this?"
Rashaun nodded and replied, "Sometimes you gotta -"
Hector finished with him: "- break the rules to follow them!"
Rashaun shifted. "Is this car getting hot?"
The dashboard started to crack and splinter before them. Faint ember-red light started leaking through. The steering wheel was crumbling beneath Rashaun's fingers, and the windshield cracked and split.
The radio called out, "TIME FOR YOU GIRLS TO COME WITH ME."
Rashaun looked up, and saw the orange and white boards of the road barricade ahead. He slammed on the brakes. "We gotta get out of the car now!" The two men opened the doors and dove from the car. They struck the ground hard, and rolled, scraping themselves up further and reminding themselves that there was still more pain that could be felt.
The car careened toward the barricade. It buckled, imploded, and crushed itself into a scarlet smear of static before disappearing.
Hector lay in agony, scraped, flensed, and burned. He hazily watched other people approach, also bearing the same insignia his new friend had. He lost consciousness before sunrise, but offered a prayer to Jesus and Mary, knowing that dawn would still come for him, after all.


Architectural Zoologist
Next slide, Gertrude.
Living buildings are surprisingly rare in this day and age, but there are some buildings that the uneducated consider 'alive'. These structures are, more likely, possessed by some thaumaturgical, demonic, or spiritual force.
How does one find a building that is truly alive? Next slide, Gertrude. Firstly, most living buildings, particularly houses, are very old, run down, and usually abandoned. Look for more modern neighborhoods- post-1950s especially- that have buildings in them that seem to date back to before 1900. If you see Beaver Cleaver's house next to the Addams Family's, there's a good chance the latter is alive.
Next, they are going to generate waste. That means that it is going to smell squalid. This is a picture of the basement of a specimen of Colonialis gigantis from Louisiana; as you can see, the dung resembles that of an elephant, but with- Gertrude, next slide-
But with inclusions of human bone and what we believe to be a small dog—
Oh, god dammit. There's a reason we provide the bags, you know. No matter, happens at least once a year. Next slide, Gertrude.

Post-Mortem Assurance Specialist
Your job isn't to kill them if they get back up. Your job is to make sure they can't get back up. You're a vital part of the medical culture of the Foundation, and nobody should tell you otherwise. Now, if you'll direct your attention to the screen…
After the preliminary exam but before the autopsy, the first course of action is to, naturally, remove the extremities. You start with the head; firstly, you drive the Collins Device- the "Spike" as the lab techs term it- into the brain stem and remove it. Then, you remove the head. Unfortunately, the easiest way to do this is with a guillotine, as you'll see now.
Now, for the removal of the limbs. The hands and feet are removed individually, and stored separately from the forearms and upper arms, and the calves and thighs respectively. Yes, we are that thorough.
You there, in the orange shirt. Question? Yes, there have been cases where we have found that the cadaver was, in fact, still alive as he was being dismembered.
That's why we remove the head first.

Anomalous Game Tester
This is one of the riskiest jobs in the Foundation.
Don't laugh. I've had people have heart attacks from being sucked into a game and trying to figure out how to beat it and possibly neutralize the anomaly. Ever see someone die while playing a Galaga knockoff that won't let you stop playing until you've put in twenty dollars in change for continues? I have.
Arcade games are easily the most dangerous; back when they were popular, unscrupulous designers would do anything to get an extra buck. About 200 of the original Gauntlet cabinets were co-designed by Prometheus Labs and embedded with a cognitocompulsive message that made people withdraw half their bank accounts to beat it.
Hell, even some of the original Breakout cabinets have an inherent anomaly in them. There's a bar in England that was destroyed after the ball escaped from the cabinet's screen and bounced around the room, killing twenty people. The ball itself is currently somewhere in the Oort cloud.
And that's not even starting on the weird shit Nintendo got up to in the 1990s. Three words: living fucking Pokémon.

Containment Cell Maintenance Specialist
And that is what happens when the power grid isn't properly maintained, and why you should always be protected against electrical surges when you work at Site-44.
One of the most common problems we get in maintenance- especially in bio-sites- is flesh or other biomatter spreading into the air ducts. Thankfully, it's well-filtered enough that it doesn't spread to the rest of the site, but it means that air can't come in. That's a problem.
What you do is this. Take out your plasma torch, and burn the mother. It'll reek to high heaven, probably release some carcinogens, but in case it isn't clear, I'll say this again:
Wear protection, you idiots.
That's half this seminar right there. That. Wear protection. Don't snicker, you know what I mean.

Computational Epidemiologist
Computer viruses spread much faster than a virus among humans. This is especially true of viruses that are anomalous, and it is very difficult to distinguish between an anomalous computer virus and a mundane one. Both of them give your computer the digital equivalent of herpes, but more often than not, an anomalous computer virus is usually just a Trojan that can interface with a human covertly. Your fingers on the keyboard are the agent of infection. I've seen entire companies have their databases destroyed by the spread of unchecked Organic Interface Viruses.
Some of the more famous computer incidents you know about were caused- or almost caused- by OIVs. The Y2K bug wasn't so much a 'bug' in the computer sense, but more of a 'bug' in the 'achoo' sense. Script kiddy in Iowa made it, and it's one of the earliest examples of an OIV. Harmless to humans, can make a computer commit sepukku. If anyone here is from Kansas or Iowa and your internet sucks, now you know why.
Do OIVs mutate to infect humans? They can, but rarely do. When they do… imagine the data structure of a computer trying to impose itself on a human brain. It's… not pretty. Imagine your brain, replaced with a can of Campbell's chunky soup. Now imagine that can being dumped into the Marianas Trench, and bursting under the pressure.
It's not at all like that. It's worse, because a soup can in your head will kill you. Most victims of mutated OIVs actually survive. But, that's why we have Computational Virologists. That seminar is in this room at 4:00, in case any of you want to stay and see that.

Practical Demonologist
Contrary to popular belief, some demons do, in fact, have some remains that they leave behind once they've expired. Most of them amount to piles of ash with some teeth and horns, but in some cases- specifically if they're eliminated in extreme cold- they leave behind more intact specimens.
This one, for instance, is- yes, I know, it's mostly made up of phalluses. Quit laughing. This is what an incubus looks like without any glamour on it. We managed to dissect it, and found that its structure was not carbon-based, silicon-based, or even sulfur-based. This is an arsenic-based organism. You may have heard about the discovery of arsenic-based bacteria by Felisa Wolfe-Simon's team in 2010? Unfortunately, that was discredited, but this… this gave new light onto the shores of hell.
Incubi, of course, take on more attractive forms than this in order to seduce and damn innocent women. This one, when it was alive, took the form of a fifty-year-old man wearing a rather tatty wolf costume in the middle of a convention hall. Naturally, nobody would be alone with him, and he was booted out by the staff.
In case this point hasn't been made clear: the forces of hell are not the most intelligent. The Devil Inside is, honestly, the most accurate portrayal of demonic possession we've seen put to film.

Oneirologist
This is a dream diary. It is the most useful tool in your arsenal. Despite the fact that we study dreams, we take this very seriously. There are entire imaginary countries in the dreamscape, social networks, an entire private internet only accessible in your sleep. But, dreams being dreams, it's almost impossible to remember them. Hence, the dream diary.
You all know about lucid dreaming, and that is an incredibly useful skill, one which keeping a dream diary will help you train. There is a second skill you need to learn, which is both difficult, and rewarding. The ability to fall asleep and wake up on command.
We'll go over that in the next bit, but for now, I'd like to give a practical demonstration. I will fall asleep, and record my dreams in my dream diary. It'll be a minute, at most.
Observe.

"Is she okay?"
"Medic!"
"In hindsight, she probably shouldn't have done that standing up."

Counter-Forensic Accountant
Now, the Foundation runs, at any given time, about five-to-six-thousand shell companies that it uses to launder their money. I know that we've been trained to stop this kind of thing, but what would you rather have: a million dollars go missing from the profits of a tech firm in Kansas, or a nuclear warhead going off because the Foundation couldn't hire enough guards for the third quarter? That's what I thought.
Every now and then we get the IRS or another tax agency on our backs, and it's your job to shake them off. One of the easiest ways is to confound the paper trail. You can make an ouroboros of shell companies, feeding off of each other. For instance, S & C Plastics is a shell company for Soy-Corn Produce, which in turn is a shell company for Samson and Cooper Pharmaceuticals, and that is a parent company of South Coast Publishing, which is a shell for Spicy Crust Pizzeria, which loops back to S & C Plastics. They're all legitimate businesses; we do actually deliver pizza, make pharmaceuticals, and produce plastics. They just all fund us, and we can't have ourselves discovered. Of course, failing this, there's destruction of the documents.
Excellent question! Shredding is an incredibly inefficient method, anyway. If a document needs to be lost, you burn it, and shred some decoys. There's an incinerator in literally every location you'll work. And if it's down, just ask someone in the morgue; they've got three for burning body parts per site, at least.

Anart Historian
Good evening, ladies and gents, and welcome to—
Are you fucking kidding?
Three years. Three years in a row, and no audience. My department makes botany and occult studies look well funded.
There's not even a projectionist. Fucks' sake, I'm just talking to myself, aren't I? I could talk in gibberish for the next hour and still get paid.
…I wonder how much trouble I'd get in if I put Anomalisa on.


The steel collar was just loose enough to keep from choking Cipher, yet tight enough that she had to stop herself from clawing at the metal around her throat. Every five seconds, a small red light blinked, accompanied by a shrill chirp. She shifted her neck. The feeling of the metal squeezing her windpipe remained. According to their captors (or “partners”, as the woman had referred to herself), a small device inside it would detonate if it detected any variance in local Hume levels. Or if Cipher tried to escape. Or if her captors got bored and decided to press the button just to see what happened.
The car grumbled as it rolled across the gravel road. They'd been driving for hours now. Cipher had no idea where they were going, or where they were. So far they'd only caught glimpses of civilization- an old house here, a distant farm there. But between that it felt like they had somehow entered a different, empty world.
Cipher and Kantos sat next to each other, facing the woman across from them. The fake O5-4 was asleep next to her. Their captors hadn't handcuffed them. The woman had said she wanted to start their relationship “friendly”. She tapped a message into a small black phone of a make Cipher didn't recognized. Since getting in the car, she hadn't looked up from it. Once Cipher had tried to discreetly lean forward to see what she was typing. The woman had just shifted position slightly to hand the screen, as casually as crossing her legs.
Cipher glanced at Kantos. He sat with his hands balled into fists on his thighs. His eyes were unfocused, staring at the car floor. She wondered what he was feeling right now. They barely knew each other- she'd only arrived at the assignment two weeks ago. Still, she'd felt a strong friendship developing with the man. The thought that he was being targeted for… whatever this was solely because of her made her stomach ache. She glanced out the window. The sun was beginning to set, dying the sky orange. The clouds had fled the sky, as if they too could sense what was coming and were preparing for it.
“When will this be over?” Though Kantos' voice was near-whisper, the sudden breaking of the silence made Cipher jump. She looked over at the man. He sat hunched over, glaring at the woman.
Her eyes flicked up from the phone. She held her gaze on him for a moment before returning to whatever she was typing. “Soon.”
“Not good enough.” Kantos' voice sounded like the warning growl of a hungry dog.
The woman sighed and put the phone down. “Is there something about this situation that makes you think you're in a position to make demands?” The fake O5-4 cracked open one eye and watched the conversation.
“You said we were not your captives. That the bomb on my partner's neck was simply a safety precaution. If we are your ‘partners', tell us where we are going.”
The woman looked at the false O5-4. The imposter shrugged. The woman looked back at Kantos and sighed. “We're going to Site-19.”
“Bullshit,” said Kantos. “There is no Site-19.”
“It's funny how much information they're willing to keep from the bodyguard of an O5,” said the woman. “Yes, there is a 19. The rumors about computer error “skipping it” in the numbering sequence are just that. And we're going to it.”
“I've seen maps. There is no secure facility in this area.”
“Correct. It takes a rather… unorthodox route to access.” She glanced at her phone. “We should arrive in 20 minutes. Now be a dear and shut up.”
Kantos sat back, scowling. The sun had sunk completely, casting the sky into night. Cipher frowned. It shouldn't have gone down that quickly, especially not at this time of year. Through the darkness, she could just barely make out the silhouettes of passing trees. The only light seemed to be coming from the car itself. There were no stars, no visible moon. No noise could be heard except the rumble of the engine. The car slowed. Cipher felt the gravel road change into asphalt. She glanced out the front window and her eyes went wide.
The largest building she'd ever seen loomed over the horizon. It looked more like a mountain than a construction. Even leaning forward and craning her head, she couldn't see the top of it. She glanced out the sides of the window, but there seemed to be no end to it- it stretched to the edge of the horizon and beyond. The walls were black and reflective, like the surface of spilled oil. Patterns of rainbow light rippled across it as the car drew closer. Small drones and planes buzzed around the surface.
The woman turned to Kantos. “Still think it's just a rumor?”
Kanto frowned and said nothing.
“How have I never heard of this place?” said Cipher.
“The Foundation isn't a fond of airing out their dirty laundry,” said the woman. “Of it all, this might be the dirtiest. Don't worry. It'll all make sense soon."

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Other works by S D Locke!

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F.A.Q.

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Mr. Bear woke up, on the evening of July 19th, 1937, and was utterly stunned by the fact he had done so. As far as he knew, toys weren't typically alive, and having consciousness thrust upon oneself spontaneously took a short time to fully adjust to. So there he sat, among several of his inanimate brethren, and pondered for awhile his purpose in the world - the reason for his existence.
It was awfully difficult to contemplate the meaning of life while everyone around him was crying, though. Not the other stuffed animals (they weren't doing very much at all, in fact… layabouts), but the people. Lots of tiny, little people in their own little beds, with the occasional big people in matching uniforms flitting about and tending to them. Two of the big people - whose names appeared to be Sir and Doctor - were standing a few feet away from perhaps the littlest people in the room, a teeny pink one snoozing away in a tiny windowed chamber.
Sir had a lot of questions for Doctor, and Doctor seemed hesitant to answer them definitively. From what Mr. Bear could gather, the pink people wasn't supposed to have been born yet, and that Doctor and his (Collies? Did he hear that right?) had done all they could, but it was 'out of their hands'.
Doctor used quite a few large words to describe all the health issues Pinky was dealing with, and when he began talking about odds and chances Sir cried louder than all the little people put together.
Mr. Bear felt terrible for Sir. He very much wanted to give him a big hug, because that seemed like the right thing to do, but he figured the stress from seeing an animate toy wouldn't do him very good at all, and so he stayed put. Doctor ushered Sir out of the room for some time to compose himself (Mr. Bear thought it was rather silly for Sir to be making music at a time like this, but he didn't say so).
Sir came back a short time later with Honey, who seemed just as distraught as Sir was earlier. They sat and watched Pinky for awhile, and Mr. Bear came to learn Pinky's real name was Micheal. Mr. Bear chanced a downward glance and found that the tag affixed to his paw had the name 'Micheal' scrawled onto it. He figured that this must be his purpose: to help teeny Micheal in any way he could, if indeed a stuffed bear was capable of such a thing.
That night, Mr. Bear left his post, shimmied up the leg of Micheal's chamber, and peered through the glass. He was struck by a sudden understanding, an innate sense of all the imperfections in the infant's underdeveloped system - his heart beat erratically, his brain wasn't receiving the proper amount of oxygen, his bones were brittle and frail, and his lungs were barely functioning. Mr. Bear was terrified. There wasn't a part of him that wasn't failing!
He had to act fast, but wasn't sure what needed doing - until of course he vomited a small pair of scissors and a length of string. Now, this may have been a shock to some; but hey, Mr. Bear was a sapient stuffed animal, so it didn't seem very odd to him. Instinct kicked in and guided his actions.
He worked underneath the table. Mrs. Nurse and some similarly-dressed people came and went, so he made sure he was out of sight as he fashioned all the necessary bobs and bits for the child. Mr. Giraffe was the first casualty, followed by misters Lion and Tiger (they didn't seem to mind the sacrifice all that much). Little by little, he'd construct a replacement organ from the velveteen flesh of his comrades. Upon completion, all he had to do was concentrate, and it would manifest in his patient.
His task complete, Mr. Bear hurried up to his spot on the table (it was a bit lonelier there than before), and played dead.

Mr. Bear looked on in horror at the inferno his residence had become. He had been lying outside in the wet grass (Michael had abandoned him for a shiny red ball the other day, and neglected to return for him) when it started, and now all he could do was watch the blaze eat its way through the house.
He wondered what they would do now, where would they live? He and Micheal had become fast friends (though, Micheal would get cross whenever the adults looked over, and Mr. Bear acted as if he was a normal stuffed bear), over the past two years, and he couldn't imagine himself anywhere else outside the place he'd come to think of as home. This line of thought was shattered by a scream coming from within the house. Micheal was still inside.
Mr. Bear was off as fast as his stubby legs would carry him. He squirmed his way in through an open window and plopped into the kitchen. Smoke clouded his vision, and the hungry flames made traversing the collapsing house safely a nigh-impossible feat - but traverse he did. He followed the sound of Micheal screams, making it through the lower floor and into the furnace of a living room. He could make out a small shape at the bottom of the stairs, barely moving.
He rushed forward, falling to his knees at the boy's side. Micheal was coated head-to-toe in burns, his hair had been singed off, and what was left of his clothes had fused to his flesh in places. Mr. Bear frantically looked about, searching for something he could use to repair him, anything, but it was all going up in flames.
Mr. Bear panicked, there was no way he could help him here, they had to get out. He tried and he tried to move him, to drag him to safety, but he could barely lift the boy's arm, let alone the weight of his whole body. Mr. Bear sat down, trying with all his might to think up a way to make him well again. He sat and cried and hugged the child, as the floor quaked, and the ceiling gave. Together, they plummeted into the Earth.

Long after the blaze had been snuffed, long after the thick, black plumes finally thinned and dissipated, long after the looky-loos and the gawkers had their fill of excitement, Thomas and Amelia Farris sat waiting on the edge of their property. Much like the firefighters and construction personnel, they operated in shifts. One would rest at the motel, while the other remained vigilant. The hope that they would be reunited with their child had left days ago, (a fantasy they had momentarily entertained before the structure collapsed) so now all that was left to do was to wait for whatever remained, so that they may lay him to rest.
At the moment, they were both present. Almost all of the debris had been cleared, and they were expecting the find within the hour.
"Mr. and Mrs. Farris?"
Kyle Mitchell, a local boy and firefighter-trainee who had been assisting in the cleanup, approached. He had been perhaps the most resolute of his company, diligently working sunrise to sunset with the others, and late into the night by himself to help find their boy.
"Yes? Did you," Amelia looked hopeful, "find him?"
The boy shook his head, "We'll keep looking, but there's practically nothing left to look through. I'm just— well, we found this."
He produced a stuffed bear. A small brown one that Thomas had picked up for his son when he was born. The thing was horribly filthy - having been caked in dirt and ash and absolutely soaking wet.
"I'm really, very sorry. I don't expect this to even be a slight consolation," he spoke carefully, as if each word carried with it the weight of the world, "but I really do hope it helps."
They took it from Kyle, and despite the stench and the grime, held the last piece of their son close between them. If Thomas hadn't known better, he would've sworn the bear was hugging them back. They nodded a silent thanks, both afraid their grief would taint any words of appreciation, and Kyle trekked back to his work.
Kyle Mitchell strode away from the scene that night, as the final truck hauled away the last remnants of the Farris' house, quietly tucking a stray tuft of stuffing into his pocket.

As strange and as unfamiliar as Life had been, Mr. Bear was completely bewildered by whatever Un-life he was experiencing. The final shred of himself, a wisp of cotton falling through the aether. He existed (if one could call it that) in this state for an eternity, unable to see or hear or move or act.
A strange sensation arose - which was odd, because he didn't think he'd ever feel anything ever again. It started as a numb tingling, then gave way to full proprioceptive awareness. He could feel himself inside his body - or at least, he thought so at first. He wiggled his limbs a bit, realizing the proportions were all wrong (he didn't remember being so tall), and he was missing his fuzzy hair.
When the rest of his senses returned, he found himself face to face with his reflection; in a mirror propped up upon a table in the kitchen of a small apartment. He was composed of a colorful blend of patterned textiles - not at all like the drab brown of his old body. Seams ran every which way, holding all. Gone was his shiny plastic nose. The one he wore now was embroidered right into the fabric, along with a brand-new smile (didn't have one of those before, neat!) and a pair of eyes. An anatomically-correct pin of a heart was stuck right to his chest.
"How are you feeling?"
Mr. Bear would have been startled by the voice, had it not been so soft and gentle and tinged with genuine concern. A big people stood over his shoulder. Seeing the stranger's face, and the kindness in his eyes, gave Mr. Bear the impression that he really was an old friend that he'd somehow forgotten.
"It isn't perfect, and I'm not sure you'll ever really be right again, but it's the best I could do."
Mr. Bear wasn't exactly able to articulate his gratefulness, given the lack of a functioning mouth; so he simply turned and hugged his newfound-friend.
"Ha! Glad you like it."
The man broke the embrace, and knelt down to retrieve a small, empty gift-box up off the floor. Its exterior shined with a glossy patchwork of designs that matched Mr. Bear's new fabric. He placed it on the table, whipped out a small card and began jotting something down onto it.
"Everything you've done, everything you're capable of doing - can't go to waste. There are more out there who are going to need you." He finished the note, and turned it around for Mr. Bear to see. On the card, in a neat, blue, cursive script:

Hello! My name is Kairos!

Mr. Bear tilted his head at the name, and looked back and forth between it and his benefactor.
"It's ancient Greek, roughly meaning 'right or opportune moment'; I figured it suited you." He answered with a polite smile." Just as you've already done, you're going to find that perfect, opportune moment to swoop in and be there for others where none else can."
Kairos nodded gleefully, clapping his chubby little bear arms in excitement. The mysterious altruist lifted him up, nestled him affectionately in the box, and tucked the note alongside him. He waved 'goodbye' to the bear, and reached down for the lid.
The last thing Kairos saw before the lid shut and he was sent off to places unknown, was a loving smile, and a pair of kind eyes.

Micheal sat on the observation table, doodling away at a picture of his family at their old house and kicking his bear-legs to and fro. After putting the finishing touches on Mr. Bear, he threw the crayon to the ground and leaped up to show the researchers.
He tried to point to himself, his human self, but he couldn't specify very well without actual fingers. Everyone simply smiled and nodded or giggled and sent him on his beary way. Walking through the halls of Site-27, Micheal silently huffed. None of them understood him, like, really understood him like Mr. Bear did. If only Mr. Bear was still around, he'd know what to do…
Micheal stopped mid-stride. Why didn't he think of it before? If he needed a new Mr. Bear, well, he could just make one!


Site-19
Dr. Magnus sat in his office, leaning back in the office chair. Across from him sat Dr. Kensington, flipping through some comic he'd picked up on his last run to town.
"So what should I get her?" he asked, frowning down at his desktop calendar, his eyes alighting on the date.
"What, you mean you haven't gotten her anything yet?" Kensington looked up, eyebrow raising. He'd listened to Magnus circle on and on about this girl he'd been dating, and had grown tired of his constant chattering about it.
"Nope." Magnus' eyes drifted to a couple of magazines in front of him, advertising all kinds of sparkly, heart-themed brick-a-brack. He was bad with gifts. Something just never quite clicked with what people want, and getting it for them. It was an incredible frustration, especially considering who it was supposed to be for.
"Well, why not? You like this girl, right?" Kensington put the comic down, and propped his feet up on the desk. The brightly colored pages landed on the desk, as Kensington settled in for the conversation.
Magnus shifted, his body language agitated. "Love her. We've been dating for a couple years almost." He didn't like talking about her, especially at work. The Foundation had a way of ruining any romantic involvements outside of staff.
Kensington squinted his eyes, "Wait, didn't you just…I thought you came back like seven months ago."
Magnus grunted, "Did."
Silence hung between them, until it was obvious Magnus wasn't going to volunteer anything more. Kensington raised an eyebrow further, "So she's…from wherever the hell you were all this time? Where was that, by the way?" He tried to disguise his interest. Wherever Magnus had gone, he wasn't telling anyone, and for some reason the higher ups were alright with it.
Magnus shifted uncomfortably, and twirled the pen in his right hand a few times, "I've already told you how that went. I was kidnapped by—"
Kensington slashed his hand across the intervening space, "I know you've fed me half a dozen bullshit stories about what happened, but none of it adds up. Goddammit Magnus, I'm your friend, and the only fucking one you've got if your social calendar, and my inbox are any indication. You owe me the truth."
Magnus leaned back, his eyes closing. He pushed the pen idly across his calendar, as he removed his glasses with his free hand. "I know, Kens. And I do owe it to you, I really do. I've told you twice now, and I shouldn't have even told you this much, that it's classified. I shouldn't even acknowledge anything, the only thing I can tell you is that Legends Never—"
Kens threw his hands up, frustrated with the deflection, "Whatever! Jesus Christ, you can quote the Big Bambino all day, doesn't explain how you're not dead. Or the lack of scarring. Or who this girl is—"
Magnus' eyes snapped open, "Hey. She's important to me, and she's not a threat to the Foundation. That's all that matters!" His voice had escalated until by the end it left the office ringing.
Kensington's jaw clenched for a moment. Magnus wasn't usually this tense. Sure, he'd scream at Kensington for various bits of dickery, but this was real anger. This gift thing must be important to him. Kensington tensed further for a minute, considering snapping back, before relaxing. "Alright. Fine. Sorry I asked. So why haven't you gotten anything?"
Magnus sighed heavily, the anger and emotion leaking out him like a balloon, "I'm broke."
Kensington blinked a few times, incredulously. "Wait, that's it? You're broke?"
Magnus turned away, staring out the window of his office, the concrete still drying after last week's containment breach. "I spent all my money."
"Well, no shit, jackass. What did you spend it all on?" His eyes shifted around the office, looking for any obvious nonsense that he could have splurged on. It was still the same, relatively spartan office. A couple of terminals for research, some random rock samples that he claimed were for "Metaphysics Experiments" which obviously hadn't been touched since he put them there.
"Normal stuff. It's not like I went on some crazy Amazon spree." He turned to face Kensington again, his eyes weary. "Sometimes, people just make bad decisions. Rent, insurance, whatever…I'm still on level 2 Researcher pay grade, I'm not exactly raking it in. And there's other expenses I never expected. I don't make the best financial decisions sometimes."
Kensington's mouth quirked up at the corner, "I thought your seventy or whatever years of life would have prepared you for this."
Magnus' eyes rolled, and he waved a hand dismissively, "Oh please, we both know that story was nonsense. I'm turning 29 this year, and you know it. Not that you'll remember the day."
Kensington grinned, turning to face the desk, "I only remember important days. So what are you gonna do, do you have any money at all?"
Magnus grimaced, "Nothing worth mentioning. We get paid the day after."
"So you're going to be the literal worst boyfriend ever on Valentine's Day?"
Magnus stood, shaking his head. "Apparently. At least I'm paid up for lunch on my cafeteria card till Wednesday. Maybe they'll have something decent to eat. Maybe we can think of something together. Or they've got some dried macaroni I can glue to a piece of construction paper."
Kensington stood with him, his eyes locked with Magnus', "Magnus. Michael. Forget gifts. They're just things. What proves you care is what you do. So do something for her, not for the holiday."
Magnus stood transfixed. Kensington rarely used his given name, and never in a context like this, "What's that supposed to mean?"
Kensington snapped his fingers, "Remember that letter you wrote Dr. Rights?"
Magnus' eyes went a bit distant, the maelstrom of pain and destruction surrounding the days just after his apparent death flashing before his eyes. His voice croaked out, strained, "Yes."
Kensington pointed at him, shaking a finger. "Rights slapped an O5 for that letter, and spent the next year getting us all the memetic counter agent. So write something. You're decent at that. Or at least decent at pissing off women with it. That or your existence pisses them off, which is more likely." He started to slip out the door as Magnus processed what he said.
"I…she what? I didn't realize—" His eyes went distant once more, remembering the days before everything happened. He hadn't seen Rights in a long time. He began to reminisce, before Kensington's last statement finally passed through his brain,"Hey, wait, you fucker, I do NOT PISS WOMEN OFF BY EXISTING," He charged after Kensington, stomping in to the hallway after a quickly fleeing Kensington, "GET BACK HERE YOU LITTLE SHIT."

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