Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Item #: SCP-7634

Object Class: Euclid

Special Containment Procedures: SCP-7634 is to be kept in a basic D-Class cell. SCP-7634 does not require a bed, but it may be supplied entertainment, like reading material, if requested (refer to Incident Log 003). If SCP-7634 is observed sleeping or unconscious, the instance must be logged and reported immediately. When transported, SCP-7634 should be properly restrained with basic D-Class equipment. Sedation is ineffective, blindfolds and/or sensory blocking helmets are to be used in circumstances where it is to be transported to secure facilities.

Description: SCP-7634 is a 5’10 Caucasian male humanoid with black hair and green eyes. It is missing its left pinky finger and, at the time of containment, it had a broken leg which has been improperly healed, leaving SCP-7634 with a significant limp. SCP-7634 is pale with large dark circles around its eyes, similar to those in humans with a significant lack of sleep.

SCP-7634 was recovered from a highly anomalous area in ████████, █████ during the investigation of SCP-███. The gas station for which SCP-7634 works does not show up on any maps or satellite imagery, and it appears that SCP-7634 is its only permanent employee. The foundation was unable to contact the proprietors or part-time staff. Further investigation into the business was attempted, but the county clerk of ████████ denied having any official record of a business at that location.

It is unknown if the gas station is anomalous; staff may refer to Document SCP-7634-A for more details. Incident Log 000 with Dr. ██████ ██████ (referred to henceforth as “Marlboro”) details the capture and containment of SCP-7634.

SCP-7634 is unable or unwilling to sleep, and is unable to be sedated via chemical means. Foundation-grade amnestic agents of all classes have no effect, including agents of anomalous origin. However, SCP-7634 can become tired and shows basic physical signs of inadequate sleep, but none of the serious side affects commonly associated with a severe lack of sleep (i.e. hallucinations, high blood pressure). SCP-7634 seems to be unaffected by mind-altering SCPs; however, testing is still ongoing.

Blood work, intensive physical tests, and psychological evaluation show no serious adverse effects from its inability to sleep, however SCP-7634 shows signs of post-traumatic stress disorder due to events from its employment at the gas station.

Incident Log 000:

[BEGIN RECORDING]

Interviewer: Please describe the incident for our records, Marlboro.

Marlboro: Okay, yeah. So, on our way back from the dumb and stupid and [EXPLETIVE]—sorry, I meant the totally warranted and super smart investigation of SCP-████, our [EXPLETIVE] car broke down because ████ forgot to fill up the tank before we left.

Interviewer: The Foundation reminds you to refrain from the use of expletives. According to ████, you were in charge of getting gas before leaving, not ████. Please clarify for documentation purposes.

Marlboro: Whaaat? Nooooo, I definitely would have remembered to fill it, it was definitely ████, he totally seems like he’d lie to throw me under the bus. Not me. I’m too responsible. I wouldn’t do something like that.

Interviewer: Please stay on track, Marlboro.

Marlboro: Alright, fine. Don’t be such an oh-four-nine about it. So, as I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted, we all got out from the truck to go to that gas station a few miles back—

Interviewer: Do you happen to remember any identifying details about the gas station, like the street address or the name?

Marlboro: Nah, I can’t even remember what it looked like. Just seemed like a regular old gas station. Why?

Interviewer: Previous reports from field agents lead us to believe it may be anomalous.

Marlboro: Oh, yeah, that makes sense. So we went in the gas station and the first thing I noticed was the cashier. He looked dead tired. Like ‘I haven’t slept in twelve years’ tired. So we go up and ask him if we can pay for the gas in-store and take some back in a can or something. So he goes and grabs one from behind the counter, yadda, yadda, yadda, we go to wipe his memory because none of us had any cash—don’t look at me like that, ████, I know it’s not ‘standard procedure’.

So, we go to wipe his memory with amnestics but he doesn’t fall asleep or pass out or anything, so we try again, but he just kinda, stood there, I guess? So, I’m like ‘you’re supposed to be falling asleep right now’ and he’s like ‘yeah I don’t do that’, and then I was like, “dude, what”.

We just kinda looked at each other for a second, and then I had to tell him that we have to take him in, but he just shrugged and followed us into the car. Like wow, you ever heard of stranger danger, dude? We talked in the car a little bit and he told me a lot about the gas station. By then I kind of knew we had a situation on our hands, so I had █████ take a few notes on the gas station just in case, because I couldn’t find it on Google Maps or anything.”

Interviewer: Do you still have any of the documents or items from the gas station on your person?

Marlboro: Nah, I handed it all over to Dr. ████████ when we got back. Except for, well, the gas. That’s in the car. Oh! ████████ ate some chips we got there, if that matters.

Interviewer: Were you able to secure the location of the site from the anomaly? Or was it able to see the building?

Marlboro: Nah, don’t worry. We used █████’s tie to blindfold him. We’re still secure.

Interviewer: Good. We’re waiving any concerns about misuse of amnestic due to a technicality on the subject’s status as an anomaly, but don’t let it happen again.

Marlboro: Yeah, gotcha.

Interviewer: This concludes the incident log audio recording. Thank you for your time, Marlboro.

[END RECORDING]

—

“So…” said the weird creepy blond guy across from Jack. “You work there for long?”

Jack didn’t respond, and honestly, he felt like it was kind of warranted, considering he’d just been kidnapped for the second time that month. Granted, this group had gotten him further from the gas station than the other guy with the creepy mask, but Jack didn’t want to give them any undue credit. After all, he wasn’t really in the kidnapping business, so he wasn’t at liberty to judge.

“Not much of a talker? Oh, god, I really hope you’re not getting carsick,” he said, concerned. “It costs like, a billion dollars to get these things cleaned so if you’re gonna throw up, lemme know beforehand.”

Jack stayed silent again, pointedly looking out the window of the van. Or, at least, looking in the direction of what he hoped was the window. He had been blindfolded, after all.

“…What are you doing?” the guy asked.

“I’m looking out the window,” Jack snapped.

“That’s Quatrefoil. You’re looking at his chest right now.”

“Oh, sorry Quatrefoil.” He looked away before asking, “Can you tell me which direction the window is? I’m trying to look annoyed.”

“It’s fine. He’s got a pretty good chest, I don’t blame you. Window’s to your left and a little bit upwards,” Blond Guy responded, sounding happy to help.

The man to his left, Quatrefoil, snapped, “Stop talking to this guy, Marlboro. We have no idea who he is.”

The blondie, Marlboro now, scoffed. “I’m sure he’s fine, man. What’s-his-name seems pretty chill to me. Hey, what is your name, anyways?”

“I don’t usually give my name out to kidnappers,” he snapped.

Quatrefoil and Marlboro looked at each other, and both spoke in tandem.

“Aren’t the amnestics supposed to kick in by now?” “Well that was uncalled for.”

Jack coughed awkwardly. “What the hell are amnestics? Is that the peppermint stuff you sprayed at me earlier?”

Before Marlboro had quasi-robbed him, he’d taken out a little pen and sprayed a sweet, minty-smelling chemically-thing at him. Jack had coughed for a second, and then put out his hand for the cash again.

Then they blindfolded him, loaded him into a van, and drove off.

Marlboro sounded sheepish when he said, “Well, it wasn’t actually peppermint. Some people say it feels like battery acid, though.”

“What the fuck?! You sprayed me with the face with acid? I can deal with getting kidnapped just fine, but I draw the line at chemicals to the face like any normal person!” Jack shouted, his zip-tied hands coming up the feel at his face. “Ohhhh my god, my face is going to melt off and I’m going to die in the back of a shitty Nissan murder van next to a fucking idiot—”

Marlboro sputtered, “No—no, no, no! One fucking idiot and a hunk.”

“Shut up, Marlboro.”

“Aww, I know you like it when I call you buff, Quatrefoil.”

He did not, in fact, sound like he liked it.

“Besides,” Marlboro continued. “You’re not going to die; sometimes it just feels like battery acid, but it’s not actually going to hurt you. I think.”

“Oh well that’s soooo much better, isn’t it?” he snarked. “Thank god they haven’t sprayed me with real acid, I’ve only been shoved into a van and taken to an undisclosed second location and no one is gonna know I’m missing until I don’t show up to my shift on Monday!” His voice gradually descended into panicked yelling and hyperventilation as Marlboro tried to calm him.

“Hey, hey, hold on, you’re going to be fine! We just have to take you for some testing. The peppermint-thing is supposed to—”

He was cut off by a warning from Quatrefoil. “Watch it. You’re already on thin ice.”

Marlboro paused for a moment, then sighed. “It’s supposed to have a… certain effect on people. It didn’t for you, and that’s something we’re required to investigate. We didn’t have the materials to do it there, so we’re taking you with us; it’s the easiest way to do all this. It’s probably just a problem on our end, so as soon as we get it figured out, you can go.”

“We?” Jack questioned. “So you’re some kind of kidnapping collective, then? A whole organization that goes around kidnapping unsuspecting gas station clerks? As soon as I get out of here I’m reporting you guys to—to everyone! I’ve seen your faces!”

“We’re a government organization,” Quatrefoil cut in. “And you’re legally required to comply.”

“Well then, I want your badge numbers! Shouldn’t you guys have company cards or something?” Jack’s head slammed against the headrest as they hit a pothole. “Fucking ouch. Could you guys drive a little worse, please? What are you, anyways? Police? Feds? I can tell you right now I’m not turning anyone in. I don’t even know the names of our part-timers besides Antonio!”

“You’re not at liberty to know that,” he snapped. “And stop moving.”

“Fuck off—ow!” Jack’s already tied hands were yanked up and over him, and attached to the metal bars of the headrest, putting him in a painfully uncomfortable position. “What the hell?”

“Come on,” Marlboro protested. “The guy’s, like, ten pounds soaking in concrete. He’s not going to do anything.”

“And you,” Quatrefoil growled at Marlboro, “need a serious refresher on Foundation security protocol. The higher-ups will have your head when they hear about this. And with your background, I wouldn’t blame them if they decide to realign to a more permanent solution.”

Marlboro went uncharacteristically silent, and the whole van stayed that way for the rest of the ride.

—

Between the blindfold and the slight aching pain in Jack’s arms, he couldn’t really tell how long they were in the car until they finally reached their undisclosed location, but he could feel the change from smooth pavement to rough gravel beneath them, and they finally stopped.

“Ugh, finally,” Marlboro said, and Jack heard the sound of the van door opening. His vision beneath the blindfold lightened as sunlight shone through the fabric.

Jack’s hands were detached from their position and he hissed in slight pain, rolling his shoulders to try and get the aches out as he was shoved from the car. On instinct, we went to bring his hands up to his face to block the sun, but they were quickly yanked back down.

“Don’t touch the blindfold,” ordered Quatrefoil.

“I wasn’t—”

“Be quiet.”

Still unable to see, Jack was taken by the elbow and led forwards. His bad leg stumbled at a curb or a sidewalk, and the hand on his arm tightened, dragging him along. Beneath his worn sneakers, the gravel turned to concrete, and then with the hiss of an automatic door—to smooth linoleum tiles that his shoes squeaked on. The warm sunlight faded to cool fluorescents that hummed in his ears as he heard quiet murmurs and footsteps.

Everything smelled clean and chemical, to the point where it almost stung his nose, and he coughed slightly.

They paused as Marlboro exchanged a hushed conversation with someone, then they continued down what Jack assumed to be a long hallway, with so many twists and turns and doors that Jack lost count. Somewhere along the way, the zip-ties were replaced with what felt like genuine bona-fide handcuffs, but the blindfold stayed on the entire time.

Finally, someone spoke.

“Marlboro, get him set up in observation room 2237-A while I get Manchineel,” Quatrefoil said, quickly handing him off.

As his footsteps faded, Marlboro grumbled an annoyed “Aye-aye, sir.” Then, he said to Jack: “C’mon, we’re almost there.”

His hand was much gentler than Quatrefoil’s, simply leading Jack rather than bodily dragging him along.

Another door hissed, and Marlboro said, “Watch your step, there’s a bit of a drop here.”

Jack responded a hesitant “thanks” as he carefully stepped down and Marlboro led him around something.

“No problem. There’s a chair to your right with a table in front of you, so you can sit down here.”

“Just what I needed after an hours-long car ride,” he muttered sarcastically. “More sitting.”

To his surprise, Marlboro snorted a laugh next to him. “I know, right? You’d think they’d at least get cars with seats that don’t feel like you’re sitting on a pile of PVC pipes.”

The handcuffs on his wrists somehow separated from each other, and Marlboro was able to move them independently to attach loosely to something on the table. Then, finally, the blindfold came off. Jack made a small noise of surprise, blinking as his eyes adjusted to the sudden influx of light.

“Comfortable, dude?” Marlboro asked, as Jack took in his blond hair and rabid blue eyes again.

He nodded, almost surprised to find that he was telling the truth.

“Good. You might be here for a bit while they rip me a new asshole for this whole thing. Hopefully, you should be out by tomorrow morning—oh! It’s about seven-fifteen in the evening, by the way. Since you couldn’t see the clock. Hey, put in a good word for me, will ya? Tell them I was professional and all that jazz.” He made a noncommittal hand gesture, walking to the door. “If you need anything, I’d say let me know, but I won’t be here.”

“Wait, hold on—who’s ‘them’?” But the door had already closed and sealed itself.

Jack looked around while he waited. The room was entirely white, and walled with some padded material he’d never seen before, except for a thick metal door with a big electronic lock. On the opposite wall was another, smaller door and a mirror that spanned across the room and up to the ceiling.

He’d seen enough crime shows to know that it was probably one of those mirrors you could look through from the other side, so he glared at his reflection with the meanest evil eye he could muster to let whoever was there know that he hadn’t forgotten the whole kidnapping thing.

Somewhere along the line, the mirror stopped being a mirror and turned into a screen. Or a window, maybe? Whatever it was, it showed an elderly, rail-thin man with a shock of white hair and a face like a bird of prey.

“Uh, hello?” Jack stuttered.

He stepped across the screen-room and out the door into the room with Jack, giving no reaction besides leveling him with a look halfway between unimpressed and annoyed. Standing, he was tall, a little taller than Jerry, and clad in a white lab coat that hung off his bony frame like a death shroud. He held only a clipboard with some papers and a black pen.

“Name?” His voice was low and raspy like a smoker’s.

“Shouldn’t you know already if you’re some government agency like Marlboro says? What am I doing here? All I was told was that I needed to be tested, and that you guys work for the government.”

The man nodded. “We are a government agency, of sorts, but we’re not omniscient. You came in with no identification, and we can’t seem to find any trace of your place of work. I’m told you refused to give your name to our agents.”

He sat down across from him and produced the same thing that Marlboro had attacked him with earlier that day, spraying more.

Jack only coughed and said, “God, not that stuff again. I hate peppermint.”

Immediately, the man’s expression took on a tone of intrigue.

“Did Marlboro and Quatrefoil explain to you what this is?” he asked. When Jack shook his head, he continued. “That was a near-lethal dose of Class F amnestic. It should have wiped enough of your memories to cause any normal person to essentially go back to the mental state of an infant. On you, however, it does nothing. Why is that?”

He put his clipboard down on the table and looked Jack in the eye with unsettling intensity.

“I—I don’t know?” He somehow found himself missing Marlboro.

“Are you in any way related to the Chaos Insurgency, the Children of the Scarlet King, the Serpent’s Hand, or been exposed to any anomalous mnestics?”

Jack blinked. “Huh?”

The doctor blinked back. “Is there anything strange about you?”

“I… don’t sleep, I guess,” he shrugged. “I’ve been told that’s a little strange.”

“So, you have insomnia?”

“No, I’ve never slept. Like, never.”

He wrote something on the clipboard. “When was the last time you slept?”

“As far as I know, never. Even when I was a baby.”

“Has anyone else in your family had this issue?”

“No.”

He wrote something else. “Have you ever gotten an official diagnosis on this?”

“If I wasn’t dead or dying, my parents never really saw a reason to spend money on a doctor.”

Jack could swear than man’s lips quirked into a smile, but when he looked up, it was gone.

“Well, I’m sorry to say this, but we’re going to have to keep you here under observation for a while, and we’ll look into your ID in the meantime.” He didn’t sound remotely apologetic. “I’ll take some of your blood, and we’ll do the tests tomorrow. Until we get to the bottom of this, you’ll be staying here overnight. I’ll have Marlboro show you to your room for the time being.”

The man was quick with the blood draw, at least. He seemed fairly practiced, and the whole thing took less than three minutes.

After that, he left without another word through the same door he came in from, and the window-screen turned back into a mirror.

When Marlboro came back, Jack was almost relieved.

“Manchineel says I’m supposed to show you to the D-Class quarters,” he said. “That’s where you’ll be staying tonight.”

“That’s the guy who was here earlier?” Jack questioned as Marlboro detached the cuffs from the table and linked them back together. “About yea high, looks pissed?”

Marlboro laughed. “Yep, that’s him. Come on, I wanna get some sleep already.”

“Long drive home in the murder van?” As they stepped out, two security guards clad in white armor flanked them.

“Nah, I stay here.”

Marlboro didn’t bother blindfolding him, but it didn’t matter, since Jack truly had no idea where they were. The place was like one huge maze; every corridor looked exactly the same. No windows, no decoration, just empty white walls and silver metal doors.

The longer they walked, the larger Jack’s looming sense of dread became. It was a sinking feeling in his chest, constricting his lungs, and the methodical synchronized thud of the guards’ boots made him feel more like a death row prisoner than anything else.

Eventually, they arrived at something different: rows and rows of doors with small windows, labeled with numerical titles all starting with “D-”. Marlboro stopped them in front of the closest door—unlabeled—and one of the guards used a keycard to open it.

Inside was a bed with thin white sheets that he knew he wouldn’t use, a chair and desk which were bolted to the floor and the wall, respectively, and a small bathroom with a curtain.

After Marlboro removed the cuffs, Jack rubbed at the raw, red skin of his wrists. He looked… tired.

“Is there anyone I should call?” he asked. “Friends, family… I can’t give them any details or anything, but I can, uh… I can tell them dick jokes,” he quipped.

Jack tried to run some options through his head, but then came to a realization.

“There’s… no one,” he said, tone quiet and weak.

Marlboro cocked his head in confusion. “You’re sure? No parents? Siblings?”

“Nope. I wasn’t kidding when I said no one would realize I was gone until Monday. If I’m here until then, you could call my boss, I guess.”

“Sure,” he shrugged, keeping his tone light. “If you’re not out Sunday night, give me the number and I’ll talk to them.”

Jack only nodded, and Marlboro’s facade of ease faded and gave way to something more akin to concern.

“Well, g’night, I guess. Oh, and dude?”

He looked up as Marlboro paused in the doorway.

“I really am sorry about all this.”

With that, he left, and Jack was alone in the cell, listening as the lights shut down one by one, until his room was finally in darkness, and he sat down on the bed.

Chapter Text

Incident Log 001:

On 8/20/20██, SCP-7634 escaped containment while being transported after an interrogation by taking Marlboro’s access card and fleeing down Wing █. SCP-7634 seemed to have chosen a door at random and was exposed to an active instance of SCP-2656 for approximately 17.56 seconds before being forcibly removed from the room by Marlboro. SCP-7634 reported hearing painful low-pitched hum and was in visible pain, but it seemed unaffected by SCP-2656 and remained sentient and unharmed. While removing SCP-7634 from the effect vicinity of SCP-2656, Marlboro was exposed to its effects for 3.32 seconds and fell unconscious for about 7 hours as a result.

Following this incident, SCP-7634 will now be considered Euclid, and will be transported sparingly. 

On request of Dr. ████████, SCP-7634 was exposed to SCP-859 as a follow-up. When SCP-7634, showed no signs of its common effect, the joint decision was made between Dr. ██████ and Dr. ████████ to keep the subject at Site ██ for further testing and experimentation based on hypotheses about its lack of reaction to mind-altering anomalies and instances.

Addendum:

SCP-7634 refuses to share its name with researchers, and all attempts to locate any form of identification or records have failed. The gas station at which SCP-7634 claims to work is not labeled on any map, has no internet presence, and no records at local offices. A conversation with Marlboro revealed that SCP-7634 has no immediate contacts in ████████, where it was first located, but an interview with Dr. ████████ revealed that SCP-7634 does have family members, although their whereabouts are unknown.

Blood taken from SCP-7634 showed a profile of an average man in his early twenties with a slight iron deficiency. Blood used for a DNA test revealed no matches or connections registered in government systems.

—

Jack found early on in his life that people underestimate how boring life can get when sleep isn’t an option. There’s a whole six-to-eight hours in a day that normal people never get to experience, but he did.

He found the world pretty peaceful at night, though. With no one out and about on the streets at four in the morning, it felt like a time just for him where he didn’t have to worry about judgmental looks or annoyingly obtuse small talk.

Back at his apartment, he’d usually spend his time reading, watching shitty cable TV dramas, or, in dire circumstances of financial peril, working twenty-four hour long shifts at the gas station.

He found the world pretty peaceful at night, though. With no one out and about on the streets at four in the morning, it felt like a time just for him where he didn’t have to worry about judgmental looks or annoyingly obtuse small talk.

Here, however, the room was completely empty, and there was only so long Jack could stand laying in bed with his eyes open before his thoughts became too wild. He’d done the math before in his spare time: the average person lived for twenty-nine-thousand days, but only spent about twenty-thousand days total awake. Through the course of one week, Jack would have essentially a full forty hour work week extra of time to think, and by the end of his life—if he lived to eighty, he’d have spent an extra ten-thousand days awake and aware compared to the normal person.

The curtain let him shower in private, god knows he needed it—the smell of gasoline mixed with the chemical-clean of the building wasn’t a pleasant one. It felt good to wash the grime of the day off, and the warm water eased the aching in his bad leg. He blended in now, at least, after using some of the soap that was already in the room, and afterwards he put on the grey jumpsuit that was resting on the bed. It fit better than he thought it would, but he still had to roll up the sleeves a bit.

The room has no clocks or windows, so he had to make his best guess about the time until the lights finally turned back on with what he assumed was morning.

Jack got up in tune with the sounds of the other people on the cell block—for lack of better word—as they got up and started their day with small thuds and clunks and other noises of life.

Soon enough, the lock on his door beeped cheerfully and slid open to reveal Marlboro and another pair of guards. Jack didn’t know if they were the same people as yesterday; the visors obscured their faces enough that he couldn’t really see what they looked like.

“Today’s the day!” he chirped, way too cheery for whatever is was in the morning, and tucked his keycard back into his front pocket. “We’re gonna get those amnestics working so we can get you out of here and you can go back to doing nothing at your shitty gas station and I can go back to getting my pay fucked up.”

One of the guards approached Jack with a pair of cuffs, and he put his hands out willingly, not wanting to give them any more reason to keep him there. He also noticed the guns holstered at their hips, and the batons resting on the other side of their belts. Thanks to Spencer, he knew what a beating with a blunt object felt like, and wasn’t keen on a repeat. It was better to bide his time.

Jack shrugged. “The sooner I’m able to get back, the better. I already have enough trouble with bills as is—I was planning on picking up a few shifts over the weekend for one of the part-timers, can’t remember which one. They quit so fast, y’know?”

Marlboro nodded like he knew exactly what Jack was talking about as they were escorted out of the room and down the hall.

“I mean, working here is about the same. Up and about all day with all these stupid security protocols and they can’t even let me have one cigarette. Hell, they call me Marlboro for a reason,” he complained, leading Jack up a set of stairs. “Careful, these are slippery sometimes.”

“Seems annoying,” Jack agreed halfheartedly. “All the protocols and security, that is.”

“Oh, they are. I mean, every single door in this place is built to withstand a pipe bomb and there’s more security checks than an airport in October of 2001. But… you do what you have to do, I guess.”

It felt like there was some kind of undertone to that sentence, but Jack didn’t care enough to prod. He’d already distracted Marlboro enough to slip the keycard from his pocket and into his own.

They’d finally climbed the steps up to another door, and the guard in front of them went to unlock it as the guard in the back stayed a couple of steps down.

“Hey, Marlboro?” he said, catching his attention.

“Yeah, what’s up?”

Jack wasn’t stupid. The jumpsuit, the keycards, the cells, the ID checks… it was clear to Jack that even if they did let him out, that didn’t mean he’d be alive, much less mentally capable. If those amnestics were meant to erase so much of his memory that there was nothing of him left, then he didn’t want to be here when they made it work.

He looked at him, and echoed the words spoken to his yesterday. “I really am sorry about this.”

The realization of what was happening came to Marlboro’s eyes a moment too late.

Jack grabbed him by the shoulder and shoved him backwards down the stairs.

Marlboro caught the guard standing behind him, and they both fell to the landing. The one in front turned just in time for Jack to steal his baton and whip it across his face, pushing him back and buying himself just enough time to slip through the door, sliding the baton into the handle to jam it shut.

Marlboro cursed, his voice already fading, “Shit! Fuck, fuck, fuck! You’re gonna get hurt, you don’t know what you’re getting into!”

Paying him little attention, Jack started running as fast as his bad leg would allow. He wasn’t lying, though; he did feel bad about pushing him down the stairs. Marlboro had been nothing but nice to him, but Jack valued his life more than some guy who he’d met a day ago and stolen him from his hometown.

He skidded around corners, using Marlboro’s keycard to open any doors in his way until he was sure he’d lost them. Every hall looked the same as the one before it; he had no clue how far he’d actually run, but he hoped it was far enough.

As soon as he saw a door that looked remotely like an exit, he went for it. It looked like it was reinforced with fucking steel, and had a glowing red light above it, so just maybe it went outside? Fuck it, it was worth a shot.

Using the stolen keycard, he unlocked and yanked open the door, only having a few seconds to register the old, staticky television in the center of the room before he was blindsided by the noise.

It was loud, louder than anything he’d ever heard before, crackling and hissing in his head like a static screech that seemed to pierce right between his eyes, through his skull, and into his brain.

It was so loud it was almost silent.

The world pitched as he collapsed onto the tile floor, trying and failing to break the cuffs and cover his ears, but it was no use. His hands pulsed uselessly in front of his face like he was praying, shaking and curled, desperately trying to break apart to block the sound.

He realized from the feel of his throat that he was screaming. He couldn’t hear it, completely overpowered by the noisenoisenoiseNOISE—but he could feel the vocal chords in his throat just like he could feel the liquid dripping from his ears and taste the copper in his mouth and his brain was filled with so much static that he couldn’t even think—

And then, as suddenly as it started, it stopped.

Jack was on the floor, flat on his back, heaving as the world slowly came back into focus.

He looked up to see Marlboro swaying on his feet, his hand still on the handle of the now shut door that Jack had just tried to go through. His eyes were glazed and it seemed like the door handle was the only thing still keeping him upright.

He slurred something that Jack could barely hear through the ringing in his ears.

“Are you okay?”

He coughed and nodded weakly, unable to trust his voice.

“Okay… good. I think— I think I’m gonna lay down for… a bit.”

He watched as Marlboro took all of two shaky steps before crumpling into a heap on the white tile. Immediately, Jack rolled over, propping himself up with one arm to lean towards the now-unconscious man next to him.

“Marlboro?” Jack’s voice was hoarse and more than a little panicked, and he winced at the pain that came with speaking. “Marlboro!”

Through the ringing of his ears and the swimming of his head, he heard another voice behind him shout, “We need a medical team on subfloor six, Testing Wing B, now! We have a researcher down from a radioactive, electromagnetic anomaly who needs to be taken to medbay!”

A group skidded around the corner, white lab coats flaring out as they ran to surround Marlboro. The one leading the charge, a woman with flashes of silver hair, began delegating tasks.

“Mensa, Adams, check to make sure he’s still breathing! Thorne, radio the wing security and let them know the situation; tell them to block off the corridor except for medical staff.” Then, she whirled on Jack. “And you! What were you thinking, going into an active testing room? Do you have any idea how dangerous that was? You shouldn’t even be conscious right now!”

“I— I didn’t—” he cut himself off with a harsh coughing fit.

“Someone find me a handler for the D-Class!” she shouted.

“Calm down, Greylocke,” said a familiar voice: the white-haired doctor from yesterday’s tests. He was flanked by a group of guards wielding large guns and metallic riot shields. His eyes settled on Jack. “I’ll be handling this one.”

“Manchineel,” greeted the woman, apparently called Greylocke. Her voice was thin and impatient. “I appreciate the help, but this is my floor. You should focus on controlling your D-Class personnel; this one clearly needs more training on safety procedures.”

“This isn’t a D-Class.” He looked at the scientists with a strange kind of smile; the impersonality was gone, his face was painted with an intrigue seemed almost predatory. “I was just about to run a few precursory tests on it, but it looks like you’ve already done half my job.”

“Oh, thank fuck,” Jack interrupted, still unable to stand. “I think Marlboro might have a concussion, he ran in after me and then he just—collapsed! Please, he needs help, when I pushed him— I didn’t mean to—! I don’t—”

Manchineel ignored Jack like he hadn’t even heard him and turned to the armored guards. “Take it to containment. We can’t have it roaming the halls like this.”

Two of them stepped forward and hauled Jack to his feet as he protested, straining his already broken voice even more. “What? You can’t just leave him like that, he might be dead because of me!”

The handcuffs around his wrists were replaced with a heavier set that covered his hands entirely up to the wrist, and a thick metal collar was placed around his neck

“What is happening? Please, just tell me what’s going on!” he begged. “I have a right to know!”

“Shut that thing up,” Manchineel ordered. “We don’t know what it can do yet.”

“Thing!?” he pushed against the hold of the guards as best he could, “I am not a thing, I’m a person! I deserve to know what’s happening and I’m so fucking done with not knowing shit!”

He didn’t even Jack the dignity of a response, just turning around and walking back down the hall as the guards escorted Jack away.

“Get back here!” he screamed, his voice echoing off the concrete walls. “You bastard, you fucking bastard!”

—

Jack was hauled back to the room with the mirror where he’d originally met Dr. Manchineel, although he knew it probably wasn’t the same one. With how big this maze of a place was, he had no doubt there were dozens of rooms exactly like this one.

He counted the grey bricks on the wall in an attempt to calm himself down—the guards didn’t look like they’d be very tolerant of anything that indicated a second attempt at escape, and seeing as he’d already used up all his luck for the day, he wasn’t willing to test his odds.

His ears still rang.

So far, Jack had counted seven uneven paint lines while trying not to think about Marlboro laying still and silent on the ground.

He liked to think that he’d developed somewhat of a thick skin in regards to violence, blood, guts, and all that from his time at the gas station, but there were very few occasions where he was the one causing the violence. Usually he was just cleaning up afterward.

He didn’t mean to actually hurt anyone, he just wanted to slow them down enough to give himself a head start—

When the mirror went transparent again, Jack could hardly say he was surprised.

The doctor stood behind the glass this time, speaking into a microphone that relayed his voice into the room after a barely noticeable delay, like he was watching a video with a bad connection. It made Jack feel a little dizzy.

“I am required to tell you that this session will be recorded. I’m afraid I didn’t get the chance to introduce myself yesterday. I’m sure Marlboro has already told you all of this, but I cannot tell you my name for security reasons. I am Dr. Manchineel, the head of the Thaumiel Wing.”

Jack glared at him.

“I seem to be unable to find any of your official records of employment at this gas station where you were discovered, so I’ll have to ask again for your name. It would be in your best interest to answer.”

He glared harder. “You don’t tell me yours, I don’t tell you mine.”

He seemed nonplussed by the response, and simply said into his microphone, “SCP-7634 refuses to provide a means of identification, and will henceforth be referred to by its designation.”

“Sorry, what?”

“Its anomalous properties became clear after an agent attempted the use of an amnestic, which had no effect. SCP-7634 was then retrieved for further testing, and the anomaly revealed that it did not sleep. This is believed to extend to anomalous means, as it was just exposed to the active area of effect for SCP-2656, which causes subjects to instantly lose consciousness. However, SCP-7634 remained fully aware. Further testing is needed.”

Jack rolled his eyes. “Are you just gonna stand there with your microphone and look menacing or are you going to tell me what’s happening? ‘Cause if this is supposed to be some kind of intimidation technique, it’s not working.”

“You are currently at the SCP Foundation.” It took Jack a moment to realize he was actually talking to him, since he didn’t bother looking up from any of his work.

He waited for a continuation, but none came. “And what is that, exactly?”

“Secure. Contain. Protect,” he stated. “That is our job. We house the things that no government in the world can understand; we take them and we learn. We keep them at places like these, away from humanity. We use them when we can. And if we need to—” Manchineel’s hawkish eyes met Jack’s “—we destroy them.”

The look made Jack feel somewhat like how he imagined a rabbit did when seeing the shadow of a bird of prey.

“So… I’m not leaving by Monday?” It felt like a stupid question now.

“No,” came the answer that Jack expected, with much more finality than he thought.” “You are not. You’re an anomaly, and anomalies are dangerous. Therefore, you are to be removed from the human population.”

A normal person would probably have felt scared, or angry, or any other combination of emotion, but all Jack felt was… nothing. Acceptance, at best. Maybe it was some fucked up side effect of whatever cocktail of issues he had going for him, or maybe he’d simply jut given up. He wasn’t quite sure.

The owners would assume he’d quit, or maybe died, and Jack doubted any of the part-timers would question his disappearance, either. He hadn’t talked to his parents for years and thank god for that, but still a part of him wondered if they’d go looking for him if they knew. Tom might question it, but he wasn’t dedicated enough to make more work for himself by reporting him missing.

“Oh,” he murmured.

Manchineel continued, “For the time being, you’re under my supervision, but I’ll be relegating most tasks to Marlboro, considering the two of you are already acquainted. You’ve been permitted to stay in the D-Class quarters until better containment procedures are made, so if I were you, I’d count myself lucky.”

He left, after that.

Jack was escorted back to his room.