CODE NAME: ████ ███ - The Truth

What is the easiest way to hide the identity of SCP-001?

This would have been a perplexing question for the Administrator who had conceived General Notice 001-Alpha. How do you hide the most important anomaly the Foundation ever has, and ever will, come across? How do you hide the creator of the two thousand anomalies to follow? How do you hide the ultimate weapon? How do you hide the universe itself? How do you hide something worse? Like the identity of the Administrator, the circumstances surrounding how they came to their final decision is shrouded in mystery and known by a select few.

Regardless of whether the process was arduous or came in an epiphany, the outcome is evident for all to see and functioned precisely as planned. Several completely different files are present in the entry, preceded by a foreword stating that none, one, several or all of these files were the true SCP-001. The tactic worked as intended, with a myriad of conflicting explanations erupting and battling to prove that they were correct, but never having enough evidence to disprove the others. The simplest conclusions were the most common; that there was no true 001, that it was simply a ploy utilised by the O5 Council to instil a sense of purpose into the staff of the Foundation, hiding the truth that these anomalies had no source or explanation; or, that all the files were the true 001, that by some twist of fate they had devised a method of co-existing somehow.

Through all of this, a reoccurring theme emerged – very, very few thought outside of the box. Very few were able to realise the truth.

Transcript of audio logs recovered from [DATA EXPUNGED]

<Begin Log, ██:██, ██/██/████> Frank ██████: Alright this is Frank ██████ aboard the… uhh… what’re we calling this thing David? David ██████ (Distant): S-C-P-S [DATA EXPUNGED]. Frank ██████: SCPS [DATA EXPUNGED]? Alright. This is… wait, really? They named it [DATA EXPUNGED] and we’re going to… Ah whatever. This is Frank ██████ aboard the SCPS [DATA EXPUNGED], current time is [DATA REDACTED] and we’re about an hour from launch. The Overseers have been getting these ships made for quite a while now, and it seems they’ve decided to send us out to take a looksee at those bits of the universe we can’t see yet. I’m uhh, just a record keeper for this trip so I figured it’d be handy to start my keeping prior to departure. Y’know, in case something happens. Anyway, might as well start with system reports. Reactor is fully functioning, weapons look good…

<Begin Log, ██:██, ██/██/████> Frank ██████: Frank again. We’re about to launch, and seeing as nobody’s ever done this before I figured some like, uhh fitting words would be a good idea. <Frank pauses for three seconds.> I got nothing. Ah shoot, I should’ve thought of this before… <Frank pauses for seven seconds.> Oh! ‘Now we travel t-’ <A loud whining sound is heard, promptly followed by several objects colliding about the room. Frank produces heavily distorted vocalisations until the whining noise subsides.> Frank ██████, (Muffled): Fucking asshats could’ve given us a warning before we left at least. Fucking ruined my speech. Fucking fuck… <End Log, ██:██>

<Begin Log, 04:18, 18/00/00> Frank ██████: First and foremost: Since we don’t really know what the actual date is on Earth, we’ve adjusted all the clocks and dates and such so that we’re counting up from when we launched. It’s currently been… eighteen days, four hours aaaand… nineteen minutes, since we launched. We’re still traveling at max throttle so there’s not much to see outside other than darkness, since we’re going faster than the speed of light. Much faster. But erm, yeah. We recently passed… Hey David, whats the name of that place we just went past? Messy-something? Yeah but like, the closest one. Pardon? David ██████ (Distant): Messier Eighty-three! Frank ██████: Oh, right! We’ve just gone past Messier Eighty-Three, which is about fifteen million light-years from Earth. Talk about being far from home, heh heh. David ██████ (Distant): You know the oh-fives probably won’t appreciate your stupid jokes! Frank ██████: This is just notekeeping, not the finished logs! Sheesh, David can be a real hard-ass sometimes. Though considering he spends most of his time fixing machines, it’s kind of understandable. I’ll make another log once something more significant happens. <End Log, ██:██>

<Begin Log, 23:18, 24/02/00> Frank ██████: Frank here. It’s been something like two months. Not much has happened, other than that we’ve now passed GN-Z11 so we’re officially beyond the view of Earth's telescopes. Oh, and of course we’ve been taking photos as we went past. There’s not much out here, but we can see a few small galaxies spread out here and there. The higher-up researchers keep using the word ‘gigaparsec’ so that should give a fair idea of the distance between these things. They’ve also been mumbling about something seeming off about them, but other than that I can’t find out much. There’s been quite a few cases of homesickness from the crew on board, but nothing that won't subside over time. Any whom, everything’s holding together quite nicely, excluding the automatic cafeteria. Oy David, you’re gonna fix the cafeteria, right? David ██████ (Distant): No, because there’s nothing wrong with it! Frank ██████: But the paste tastes like shit! David ██████ (Distant): It’s fucking nutrient paste, IT'S SUPPOSED TO TASTE LIKE SHIT!

<Begin Log, 14:37, 20/03/00> Frank ██████: Well, we’ve erm… we’ve found out what the researchers were uneased about. We’re close enough to get a proper look at the nearest galaxy and, uhh… Well, it’s a copy of the Milky Way. Not a perfect copy mind you, there’s a few stars absent but the major identifying bodies are there. We’re uh, planning on taking a look to see if Earth is there, and if it is, look for inhabitants. Ample to say though, this might end up getting classified as an anomaly – maybe not as a full-on SCP, but at least as an E-dash. The chances of a replica galaxy forming are… well, slim to say the least. <End Log>

<Begin Log, 06:48, 02/04/00> Frank ██████: This place is definitely an anomaly. First it was suspicion because of how similar it was to our home, but like… far out, this is a whole new level of unnatural. On our way to the analogue of Earth we passed by a few of the “missing” stars and found out they were actually there, just messed up beyond belief. How messed up? Try Epsilon Boötis… prime? Alpha? Whatever, the big one? It’s made of ice cream. We took a sample – tastes like avocados and cigarette smoke, apparently. The smaller one is a ball of liquid chlorophyll, somehow managing to keep itself together. Antares is just solid iodine. No fire, no iron, nothing. Just a colossal, cold ball of iodine. Proxima Centauri is made of charcoal too. Then of course, we actually got to ‘Earth’ – Most of us have taken to calling it ‘Sub-Prime’. It’s just a giant ball of fuck-ups and errors. You can see it’s Earth, all the continents are there and shaped right, but they’re made of the wrong stuff. Australia’s a solid block of gold, the oceans glow blue, the whole American continent is made of maple syrup… We’re collecting as much information as we can, then we’re shoving off to the next galaxy. This is just… too freaky. In other news, it’s come to light that Marie ████ is pregnant. Nobody’s asking many questions about it, especially ‘coz we aren’t entirely sure it’s her husband’s child. Sooo… yeah. <End Log>

<Begin Log, 07:48, 02/05/00> Frank ██████: What the actual, flying, fuck. We’ve arrived at the next closest galaxy, and it’s the same thing. Another screwed-up copy of the Milky Way. Screwed up in different ways, mind you, but still basically the same thing as before. Mercury is made of ice, Jupiter is made of edible jelly. Earth looks like a Sarkic utopia – all of it’s flesh, bone and blood. We’ve decided it’s probably not best to approach, in case it doesn’t like machinery. But nonetheless… We’re hoping it’s just these two, but we’re doubtful. What the hell is happening out here? <End Log>

<Begin Log, 12:01, 17/05/00> Frank ██████: Note to self. Bring more puzzles and toys on next trip. I’ve run out. <Frank pauses for four seconds.> Bagh, I’d better put something worthwhile here. Ahh… Crew are ok. We’re coming to terms with the fact the third galaxy we’re going to arrive at looks like a repeat of the first two. There’s nothing major about it, it’s just freaky to think this same anomaly repeats itself as far as we can see. Oh, there was an incident last week. Johnathan was fixing some strange mechanical fault lower down when somethin’ came loose and broke his arm. It’s been fixed now though, and the doctors said he’d be fine in a few weeks. He swears it shouldn’t have happened, so there’s some investigations happening. Nothing further I can think of. You remember anything I ‘aint? <It is assumed that Frank ██████ was speaking to David ██████, who responded with an inaudible or nonverbal response.> Alright. Ending log. <End Log>

<Begin Log, 01:59, 07/06/00> Frank ██████: Another copy of the Milky Way. Not big surprise. Is this all that there is out here? Just endless copies of home, each more messed up than the previous? <Frank pauses for three seconds.> Earth was made of some sort of glass this time. Mars was made of dry ice. Uranus was horrifically magnetic – we almost got severely screwed over. Nothing to do but keep going. <End Log>

<Begin Log, 00:00, 30/08/00> Frank ██████: Two more. There’s no way these places aren’t part of the same anomaly somehow. Speaking of anomalies, there’s shittons of them out here. There’s a whole galaxy we can’t approach, always seeming distant, another that the computers won’t pick up at all but we can rather clearly see. There’s even been a few times when space itself has been talking to us. I’m not insane, we picked it up and narrowed it to certain pockets of space. There’s other times when we suddenly don’t have enough power an we’ll drift for quite a distance before everything kicks back up again like nothing happened. Is the universe flat? Are we falling off the edge or something? <Frank pauses for four seconds.> Before I forget, Marie’s been quarantined for some reason. We aren’t able to get much from security, but it seems she’s accidentally smuggled some disease onto the ship. Hope the baby is alright. <End Log>

<Begin Log, 05:14, 10/10/00> Frank ██████: The most recent Earth, err… Sub-Prime-Ten I think, it’s got signs of human civilization. Specifically, ours. There’s like… Las Vegas is there, made entirely of stacked poker chips and playing cards. New York is this one, huge piece of obsidian that looks like it’s rather conveniently eroded to be identical to the New York back home. There’s no humans, mind you. No signs of life at all, and considering the oceans are pure hydrogen cyanide it’s probably best that nothing evolved to survive that. Why aren’t we being copied if our homes are too? <End Log>

<Begin Log, 16:05, 18/11/00> Frank ██████: Tokyo is made of seaweed and is located at the north pole. America is made of a solid block of gunpowder, with Chicago being made of a giant, carved mango. The sun is encompassed in a shell of chitin, and is colonised by vast hordes of stone that shift and move whenever we stop looking at them. Mars is made of camel leather and a single raging immortal walks its surface. Uranus is nothing but a silent lattice of turning gears. There is nothing out here but chaos and anarchy. We’re doing a loop to head back home. Security around Marie has been beefed up. Twenty guards all armed to the teeth with assault rifles and grenades? What sort of disease has she contracted? <End Log>

<Begin Log, 23:17, 23/12/00> David ██████: -ck fuck fuck fuck fuck… This is David. Frank is dead, along with most of the crew. Marie gave birth to some fucked-up eldritch horror that’s been running around and killing everyone it can. I…fuck, I don’t think security can handle it. Of all the fucking times for something like this… fuck! Whatever this place is, keep away. It’s a cesspool of anomalies, there’s nothing out here but shit replicas of our galaxy, and it just keeps going and going and going. Whatever this place is made of, it sure as hell isn’t reality. It just keeps expanding, growing more and more fl- <David pauses for two seconds.> Of course. Why wouldn’t it with [DATA EXPUNGED] outside. Did the Overseers already know what we would find? Or did they just want it confirmed? <End Log>

<Begin Log, 02:02, 14/03/01> David ██████: Cafeteria is busted, only spits out rat poison. We’re not going to make it, but the ship will. I don’t think we went far enough for the ship to get warped too badly. We haven’t seen any other anomalies on board, other than the cafeteria fault. < David pauses for four seconds. > At least tell my family I loved them. <End Log>

<Begin Log, 00:00, 00/00/00> < The audio in the log is assumed to be automated as it is entirely comprised of fragments of audio used in previous logs. Changes in audio are denoted by line breaks. > Frank ██████: This is Frank ██████ aboard the SCPS [DATA EXPUNGED],

we’ve adjusted all the clocks and dates and such so that we’re counting up from

now,

Since we don’t really know what the actual date is on Earth, First and foremost:

the crew on board is fully functioning,

we’re going faster than

max throttle

Much faster.

everything’s holding together quite nicely, There’s been quite a few cases of homesickness from the crew on board,

We’re doing a loop to head back home. There’s not much out here,

Just endless copies of home, each more messed up than the previous?

There’s no humans, mind you. You remember anything I ‘aint?

Oh, right!

Oh, there was an incident last week.

It’s been fixed now though

Crew are ok.

nothing that wont subside over time. Any whom, everything’s

ok.

everything’s

Alright

I’m not insane,

right? David ██████: Of course. David ██████ (Distant): there’s nothing wrong Frank ██████: Anyway,

we’re

coming to

Messier Eighty-Three, Talk about being far from home, heh heh.

Sooo… yeah. <End Log>

The information collected and the names listed would never see the light of day. It would have been sent directly to the highest echelons of the Foundation, who listened, considered and acted. It wouldn’t have taken a genius to connect the implications between the facts and the records, so every bit of it was expunged or redacted so that the Administrator’s efforts would not be in vain. It would have been as though the expedition never happened, as though it was simply an anomaly that appeared unexpectedly. The information would never be seen by a human eye again until it was once more unveiled by fate, buried simply to hide the truth.

What is the easiest way to hide the identity of SCP-001, the architect of the universe and its infinite hordes of flaws?

Don’t classify it as SCP-001.