SCP Wish Devouring Thing

Item #: SCP-XXXE

Object Class: Keter

Special Containment Procedures for SCP-XXXE-1:

Under no circumstances is SCP-XXXE-1's nugget to come in direct skin contact with sentient beings, human or otherwise. To reiterate, this includes animals believed reasonably to be potentially sentient such as but not limited to: Canids, Corvids, Suidae, Hominids, Cetaceans, and Cephalopods. Direct skin contact with a sentient being WILL result in containment breach.

SCP-XXXE-1 is to be kept in a remotely monitored containment cylinder 1 km below the San Diego Zoo. No direct method of access to SCP-XXXE-1 should exist at any time aside from one random annual feeding intended to ensure SCP-XXXE-1’s survival. Feeding has been shown to dramatically reduce the violence of SCP-XXXE-1’s interactions with subjects and should follow these procedures. Feeding duration has been reduced from weeks to hours using the following procedure known as Protocol Safari.

+ Open Protocol Safari - Close Protocol Safari 1: In the event of breach or feeding the San Diego Zoo is to be isolated from outside contact. No zoo staff, visitors to the zoo, animals, or any other kind of potentially sentient being is to be released from the zoo. Secure perimeter to be enforced by termination. 2.a: In case of breech: All potentially sentient organisms in the zoo will then be brought to coordinates 33°06'49.7"N 116°58'53.4"W by MTF personnel, alive. Organism should be divided groups according to their species. 2.b: In case of feeding: No less than 30 unique sentient organisms will be prepared in advance for feeding. 3: A temporary rapid deployment containment tent will be constructed over XXXE’s containment cylinder. MTF personnel will then use the Deep Junction Insertion Nanoneedle provided in the containment package to pierce SCP-XXXE’s containment cylinder. Do not retract the nanoneedle before completing step 4. 4.a One member of each available sentient species will be brought to the temporary containment tent, alive and conscious. 4.b The organisms are be restrained or otherwise rendered incapable of escape. 4.c The organisms capable of vocal language are to be asked a series of questions provided in questionnaire. 4.d All Foundation members are to leave the containment tent except the MTF member of lowest rank. 4.e Lowest rank MTF member is to considered KIA until confirmed otherwise upon successful containment being established. Addendum to step 4: Containment nearly failed because an octopus, the last remaining sentient organism in the containment tent, crawled out of it’s tank and attempted to fit itself into the hole bored by the Deep Junction Insertion Nanoneedle. It was returned to its tank and held in place by MTF personnel until XXXE-1 could finish wish extraction with the octopus. Octopus was seen to eat its own tentacles from the tips after containment was restored. Due to this incident, it is not recommended that Giant Pacific Octopi be included in step 4 except when all other cephalopods on site are exhausted. 5. MTF member remaining in the containment tent is to be given the following instructions to maintain the integrity of the tent at all cost, opening the flap only when containment has been reestablished and the nanoneedle replaced in the hole. The MTF member will then set the nanoneedle to reverse and give the all clear. 6. If 2 hours pass with no all clear, an inflatable 3 stage airlock is to be connected to the containment tent and used to introduce new organisms one at a time at 10 minute intervals. To date this has never been necessary. 7. Once containment has been reestablished the San Diego Zoo is to be returned to working order. All humans involved in the breach are to be given class 3 amnesiacs and have memories of a lovely day at the zoo implanted.

Description:

A solid 1 kg nugget of osmium-iridium ore which when touched by a sentient being releases an incorporeal mentally invasive entity labeled SCP-XXXE-1. SCP-XXXE is believed to be the only entity of it’s kind at this time. SCP-XXXE-1 is only one of many SCP-XXXE’s, though it is the oldest encountered to date. SCP-XXXE-1 was recovered by Foundation agents embedded in The Wilderness of Zin Archaeological Survey (1913–1914). Following initial field experimentation and the recognition of the need for specific containment conditions, the Foundation covertly funded and supported the rental of the Wonderland Amusement Park by 1915 Panama-California Exposition. In the time since XXXE-1’s initial containment, 2 additional SCP-XXXE’s have been classified.

+ Other Know SCP-XXXE’s - Hide [* XXXE-2: 07MAR1983: A dead whale on the washes up on the shore of Puget Sound (USA) with an elaborately engraved metal box in it’s mouth. A local fisherman touches the metal box and a small crowd around the whale apparently engage in a mass orgy/suicide/homicide. All bodies and the box are recovered and the box is confirmed to be an instance of SCP-XXXE and classified SCP-XXXE-2. It was determined to be a relatively old SCP-XXXE by WishGen 2.0.1a. In an experimental interaction between SCP-XXXE-1 and SCP-XXXE-2, SCP-XXXE-2 was neutralized and presumably consumed by SCP-XXXE-1. This led to a nearly 10 year dormancy in SCP-XXXE-1 even in direct contact with skin indicating the cannibalistic nature of SCP-XXXE's. *XXXE-3: A custodian at The Sparta Teapot Museum of Craft and Design in Sparta, North Carolina (USA) came in contact with a teapot in museum storage on 01NOV2009 and is reported missing 3 days later. The museum was already under covert Foundation surveillance and hidden camera footage confirmed that the custodian picked up the teapot off the ground (presumably to put it back on a shelf it had fallen off of) with his bare hands. The custodian begins to show signs of distress and seems to be unable to release the teapot repeatedly yelling “Get it off!”. Then, clutching the teapot in both hands, the custodian attempts to run from the room, only to be thrown back in by a blurry figure. Three blurry, roughly human sized figures enter the room, throw a bag over the custodian still clutching the teapot. Two of the figures carry him from the room with the third close behind. Foundation recording equipment was replaced at the museum and old equipment was analyzed but no technical explanation for the blurring effect of the three figures was uncovered. They are now believed to be members of a group hostile to Foundation, but to which, if any, known group they belong is still the subject of speculation.

Should containment breach, the only known method of returning an SCP-XXXE to containment is to provide it with a novel wish. The wish only need be novel to that particular SCP-XXXE and the relative difficulty finding a suitably novel wish is considered a reliable method of determining the age of an SCP-XXXE. An electronic method of testing SCP-XXXE’s ages was created called WishGen. WishGen and it’s updated variants analyze wish semantics and determine the relative unlikelihood of that wish existing. The more unlikely the wish extracted by an SCP-XXXE the older it the XXXE is believed to be. SCP-XXXE-1 is very ancient, possibly many hundreds of times older than a humanity. It is exceptionally difficult to find suitable wishes for SCP-XXXE-1 owing to its age. As a method of self preservation it has survived by developing SCP-XXXE-1 two forms of forced wish extraction: intense individual extraction (IIE) and mass hallucination-based extraction (MHE) These two forms have not been seen in the other two SCP-XXXE’s and is believed to be a unique survival stratagy developed by XXXE-1.

IIE involves XXXE-1 causing intense, multisensory, hyper realistic hallucinations in it’s victim. Given enough time in this state of torture a subject will eventually form a sufficiently novel death wish which XXXE-1 then extracts. 100% fatality rate following extraction.

MHE will only occur when XXXE-1 is exposed to groups exceeding 10 sentient beings. XXXE-1 will orginate a mass hallucination causing all sentient beings, starting from those closest to it, to engage in exceptionally unusual acts of violence, presumably to extract suitable unique wishes. The largest observed instance of MHE occurred during early testing of XXXE-1’s abilites and involved 225 D-class personnel. In this event, D-class personnel were put in caged groups of 14 subjects per cage. 4 circles of 4 cages each were placed at at intervals of 10 m, 100 m, 1000m and 2000m the with XXXE-1 osmium-iridum nugget at the center. XXXE-1 is released by the only D-class not caged, who immediately falls into a catatonic state. At 1:40 after the experiment begins the first cages begin to tear each other to pieces with their hands. At 16:40 the second row begin to calmly peel each others skin off, apparently oblivious to the pain. One D-class in each cage braids the skin together and throws the skin rope to an adjacent cage. At 33:20 the third row of cages each split into two groups per cage. One group kneels facing the bars while the other group in unison begins to aggressively sexually assault one another to death. The last remaining member then kneels facing the bars and the other group exhibits the same behavior. The last two subjects in each cell then lay the 12 corpses next to one another, and engage in sexual intercourse on them until both collapse from heart failure. At 66:40 the final group of cages, begin to [Data Expunged] ((Note: Due to a series of suicides by researches accessing this file, the final group’s reaction to SCP-XXXE-1 is deemed a class d cognitohazard and has been expunged to prevent further harm to Foundation personnel)) It is believed that MHE has an unlimited effective range and will only stop when a wish is satisfactory which is extracted. This has led to all XXXE’s being classified Keter even though MHE has not been confirmed in all known XXXE’s.

SCP does not grant wishes, it only extracts them, removing the wish from the person’s mind and rendering them incapable of remembering it or reformulating it. The result of this “wish loss” is very frequently suicide, and in all other cases has results in a dramatic decrease in memetic resistance to kill or control agents of no less that 35 standard Milgrim points. Not all wish loss has been detrimental. Early experiments in 1915 resulted in the accidental production of SCP-XXXE-1-A.

SCP-XXXE-1-A was a human female class-D known as the “The Witch of El Cajon”. It’s heinous acts of pedophelia and cannablism in the wilderness surrounding El Cajon California (USA) from 1909-1914 first brought it to the attention of the Foundation. (Note: The Witch of El Cajon is not believed to possess any anomalous or preternatural abilities and the term “witch” is merely a euphemism))) At the time, researchers were tracking stories of serial killers, serial rapists and other criminals who would likely be given death sentences upon their eventual capture and conviction. The Witch of El Cajon was arrested in June of 1914 following a wave of particularly gruesome acts of infanticides at a local hospital nursery. SCP-XXXE-1-A was transfered to Wonderland Amusement Park, the temporary containment site for SCP-XXXE-1, for experentation. She was placed in a sealed tent with SCP-XXXE-1 and containment was released allowing free between with SCP-XXXE-1 and (then D-class) SCP-XXXE-1-A. Most encounters between subjects and SCP-XXXE-1 up to this point lasted a minimum of 18 hours, in one case extended for a full week (6 days 22 hours). The Witch of El Cajon’s interaction lasted just under 30 minutes.

+ Final entry SCP-XXXE primary researcher's lab journal, Dr. Nyquist. Relating to SCP-XXXE-1-A - Hide D-class subject "The Witch of El Cajon" encounter with XXXE-1 was nearly 34 hours ago and I still can’t sleep. Her encounter in addition to being 17.5 hours shorter than any previously known encounter, it was one of the least violent encounters. The Witch does claim to have experienced wish loss, but, the team and I are at a loss for how to proceed. With most wish loss the subject begs to be terminated after the encounter citing intense existential uncertainty and lack of will to live. This is why we’ve been using D-classes, because we just terminate them when they ask for it. You can see it on their faces as soon as the containment tent is opened, the sunken eyes, sullen face, flat emotion affect and slumped posture universally mark their wish loss. The Witch, however, was smiling when we opened the tent. Smiling. We didn’t even have to ask her to lay down for containment, (previously she often had to be sedated with morphine during any transfer from her cell) she just smiled at us, laid down, placed her hands on her head and said “I’m feeling much better Doctor Nyquist.” We decided to skip the standard cooling off period and proceed directly to post experiment debriefing in the tent. It was a breech of protocol for which I took full personal responsibility with site director. During the debriefing, the Witch was calm and polite and always spoke with a precise but pleasant tone. She indicated that she was experiencing wish loss. When asked what her wish was and why XXXE-1 had returned to containment so quickly she stated that she had simply told it her deepest truest wish, which she said she had compulsively fantasized and had repeated to her by auditory hallucinations. The wish’s specifics had been lost, as with all wish loss, but since the wish was stated out loud it was captured by our stenographer. When showed a copy of the wish the Witch simply chuckled and said that the paper was blank. The Witch then stated that she would be willing to assist in feeding XXXE-1 and was willing to join Foundation unconditionally. She further cited that XXXE-1 had ‘saved’ her and she feels that she owes it a debt of gratitude, as well as owing the Foundation that same debt. The junior researchers and I talked about it and I’m not sure it’s an entirely bad idea to let her help. The Witch asked about her termination as we were leaving the tent. I told her we would wait until admin. decided yes or no on her proposal to join Foundation. In 13 years of paranormal research I have never been so conflicted. On one hand the Witch represents the worst class of person imaginable, an abomination that few could justify a stay of execution for. On the other hand perhaps the woman I debriefed in that tent wasn’t the Witch anymore and furthermore it could reduce further danger of containment breech and save lives. I presented this idea to O-5 council member [Redacted] personally and she agrees that the Witch should not be terminated but would have to confer with the council on her induction into the Foundation. Honestly, I can’t fucking get my head on straight about this shit. I never believed in good and evil but I know you can’t keep leave a rotten apple in the bunch or they’ll all rot. What if every D-class I’ve ever terminated was curable? If one could just reverse the rot in the apple one should, shouldn’t they? And these aren’t fucking fruit we’re talking about they’re living human beings and I’m a doctor. I should have tried harder to save more of them, but I was ignorant. I officially requested to be removed from the project, even in this emotional state I know I’m too compromised to continue objectively. This will be my last entry in the lab journals, even if they don’t transfer me I’m refusing to continue research on XXXE-1, I know I can’t be objective anymore after all this.} ]

XXXE-1-A was request to join Foundation was denied. She was instead classified as a part of the general XXXE-1 anomoly. XXXE-1-A is to be contained in a comfortable cell, and to be allowed 1 hour of supervised exercise at the on site gym per day. XXXE-1-A will participate in all XXXE-1 containment procedures according to XXXE-1 containment procedure. To date SCP-XXXE-1-A has exhibited only calm complicity and is deemed to be a critical element of SCP-XXXE-1-A containment Note: XXXE-1-A status is updated to neutralized on 15AUG1955 following its death. Cause of death was determined to be natural causes. Foundation had anticipated this eventuality and SCP-XXXE-1 was then transferred to a new containment site where it is currently secured.