SCP-6500 Fragment 18

Link to article: SCP-6500 Fragment 18.

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+ CROSSROADS
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A wide, cylindrical room is bathed in relative darkness save for the flashes of tiny indicator lights lining the tall, segmented server banks contained within. Embedded in the ceiling is an enormous black sphere, the most powerful Temporal Sink the Temporal Anomalies Department would ever develop, which hums with electricity as it maintains Temporal Site-01 and its Extratemporal Secure Database. In the room's center sits a smaller cylinder extending upward into the sphere, featuring double doors on its near side. One door is slightly ajar, allowing a strip of bright light to pour out into the server room.

The office within features a wide, old-fashioned chalkboard accompanied by myriad multicolored chalks, likely gathered from a sidewalk kit. The board is covered with calculations and observations, timeline diagrams and symbolic logic. At its center stands Director Ilse Reynders, Temporal Agent and (most) Senior Researcher, as she attempts to cure a mild headache. She sighs in frustration, setting a piece of chalk onto the board's ledge and taking a seat in her desk chair. In her centuries with the Foundation she has learned -- nay, //discovered// -- the extensive interactions undergirding temporal mechanics, and the few rules to which they adhere. Of these, the rule which always holds true is the existence of precisely one Prime Timeline: the most stable of the full set, the trunk from which all doomed branches originate, the key to all the time travel technology the Foundation has ever developed.

And yet, these new timelines have proven her certainty ill-founded. There are no indications that either one is suffering a decline in ontokinetic health or stability, and the timestream seems disinclined to collapse into either state. It's because of this conundrum that she now sits in her office, pushing tousled hair out of bloodshot eyes to stare at her desk terminal. She scrolls through what she's written so far, selecting it and pressing //Backspace// with a huff. //Back to the drawing board.// She re-reads the first of the recovered files carefully, still marveling at the alien format and the even more alien sensibilities behind it.
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[[=image https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/local--files/grigori-karpin-s-author-page/vanguard%20transparent.png width="100px" height="100px"]]

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**Item №**: VNP-6500 – //previously designated as SCP-6500//

**Specifications:** The death of magic and anomalous phenomena due to the containment efforts of the SCP Foundation.

**Normalization Protocols:** The SCP Foundation has been dissolved, and Vanguard will take its place. The people of Earth will be gradually disabused of their Foundation-fostered notions of normalcy, and introduced both conceptually and literally (where possible) to the esoteric realities surrounding them. A full reassessment of the SCP Database will determine which anomalies might be safely released from containment, which can be destroyed, and which must be dealt with more delicately. Vanguard will develop and disseminate comprehensive documentation for all known objects, retaining secrecy where appropriate but generally reversing the Foundation's policy of opacity.

The balance of known anomalies //must not be contained.// The semantic limits of the concept of 'containment' are not presently understood. Instead of securing, we will mitigate; we will continue, however, to protect. This duty falls not only on the shoulders of former Foundation staff, but also on members of what once were called Groups of Interest, oppositional forces to the maintenance of the Veil. There is now no Veil, and there are no longer Groups of Interest. There are allies, and there are, unfortunately, still enemies. This is therefore not the end of our work, but the beginning of a new phase.

It is conceivable that no amount of corrective action will permanently arrest the SCP-6500 effect, which was allowed to worsen despite many decades of persistent warning signs. The task we set ourselves may be impossible.

It is nevertheless Vanguard's responsibility, and most vital purpose, to try.
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She smiles. She's an optimistic woman, in spite of everything, but this is a tall order even for her. She thinks for a moment, then begins to write.
[[/div]]

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Before the Pivot, our lot was difficult. The SCP Foundation had millions of moving parts, and the methods we'd put in place to keep them moving worked. Did they work well? Some, but not all. Did they exact a cost? Absolutely. Even before we realized that we were the cause of the calamity, we knew that what we were doing was not indefinitely sustainable. We kept doing it anyway, in the hopes that some ideal solution would come along and let us keep on keeping on. The O5 Council of TL-001-VG has taken a truly radical step in dissolving the Foundation, setting aside our entire //modus vivendi// in the hopes of finding a better way. It is brave, but it is also a tremendous risk. Protecting the world taxed the Foundation's resources to their limit, and at times only the most draconian of measures kept our heads above water. Can we be both safe //and// free? This entire timeline is a test case for that question.

There is reason to be hopeful, however. I have read enough VNP files -- the replacement for the old SCP format -- to see the new 'Normalization Protocols' at work... and they //do// work, in most cases, as though the anomalous was only as prejudicial to the mundane as the mundane was to the anomalous. This goes against all our organizational logic since the formation of the old Foundation, but I can't argue with the results. Furthermore, Vanguard no longer has to defend itself and its mission against the people it aims to protect -- so those people can actually //help// with said defense. It is perhaps this change from individual to collective responsibility, and the holistic approach to normal and paranormal relationships, which has ensured the stability of TL-001-VG.
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It sounds bad, it //is// bad, but she finds she's still smiling when she finishes. "Change," she says aloud. The Vanguard timeline summed up in one simple, powerful word. She opens up the second file, and stops smiling.
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[[span class="bt"]]__SPECIAL CONTAINMENT PROCEDURES:__[[/span]] SCP-6500 has ended. No further Foundation action on this matter is required. Should SCP-6500 recur, the O5 Council will disseminate information on the proper use of esoteric artifacts to once again ameliorate it.

[[span class="bt"]]__DESCRIPTION:__[[/span]] SCP-6500 was a dramatic short-term alteration in the sustainability of anomalous life and phenomena on Earth, and linked multiversal planes. The resultant waning of thaumaturgical effects and the failure of esoteric physics resulted in the neutralization of a sizable portion of the SCP database, and a significant die-off of anomalous species and monotypes. The Records and Information Security Administration is preparing an exhaustive catalogue of these losses, and the database will be adjusted accordingly.

The cause of SCP-6500 is unknown. Groups of Interest opposed to the Foundation have engaged in disinformation campaigns painting our actions as the trigger for the event; there is no evidential basis supporting these claims.
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She grimaces. One timeline of pie-in-the-sky dreamers, and one full of denial. The arrogance of that final paragraph makes her head spin; she can't imagine that anyone on the Foundation's payroll is stupid enough to believe that they had nothing to do with the Impasse. From the moment she first heard the rumour that containment was the issue, she's known it to be true. Anyone who doesn't believe at this point must be very badly brainwashed, or disinclined to care.

Still...
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There were two options on the ballot for Administrative Proposal 6500-Ω, and neither was really a commitment to inaction. There was good reason to believe that stop-gap measures would be __temporarily__ effective at managing the effects of the Finis-class event. The four artifacts recovered during the latter days of the crisis have seemingly halted the mass die-offs and disappearances, and restored something vaguely like equilibrium to the anomalous world. There is, however, no reason to believe that these actions did anything but defer a more definite solution to a later date. Although the Foundation remains intact, it has nevertheless been dragged out of the shadows and into something resembling the light. Various Groups of Interest in TL-001-TH are fully aware of the Foundation's complicity, and they are not happy. The daily grind can only become more difficult as inaction becomes less and less acceptable.

Additional artifacts are still being discovered, however, and the O5 Council have seemingly pinned their hopes on this approach. They rely on individual ingenuity, and the possibility that their planet is packed with unlikely solutions to a thoroughly unmanageable organizational lifestyle. In the shadows, however, there are stronger trends towards change even in this less changeable timeline; signs that covert action is being taken by certain Foundation staff members to ensure that there is always someone trying to turn the tide, even when organizational change has been thoroughly stymied. Though I have doubts that it will be tenable in the long term, I credit the present stability of TL-001-TH to this final element alone rather than the ongoing search for panacea.
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"Panacea," she mutters. There's a simpler way to say it: miracle cures.

She looks away from the screen, and shakes her head. It's clear why these timelines have survived, why they can never again collapse back to baseline. There //is// no baseline, not anymore.
[[/div]]

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[[div class="paper"]]
The decisions made by the O5 Council, and the final vote of the Mediator, have defined these two timelines in such perfect opposition that they can no longer be reconciled.

It is tempting to speculate on the motives of the voters in each case, of course. TL-001-VG was seemingly born in a flash of hope for the future, not for some improbable happy ending but for a world that //would not end.// Maintaining the //status quo// would eventually doom our anomalous Earth to death, tear apart the interconnected web of life. All those long years of turning a cynical eye on every offer of aid, every cry for help, every damaged or dying thing, of refusing to change our methods to suit our circumstances, of fighting a thousand battles on every possible front must have weighed heavily on their consciences in the end. Did O5-13 see the writing on the wall?

On the other hand, TL-001-TH may have been born from caution, apathy, or something in between. Perhaps the cost of change had been deemed too great, the solution too difficult to put into place; perhaps the threat hadn't seemed severe enough to make it worthwhile. There could have been doubts about the Pariah's proposal, about their motives, about the advisability of taking rash action on a sensitive issue. Not everything in the database was a murder monster, after all, and the clinical language of each file often masked a very human relationship between the researchers and the researched. Their cries for change could have sounded like appeals to emotion to the Mediator's presumably impartial ear. Did O5-13 judge the Foundation the lesser of two evils?
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She rubs her temples and sighs. //You're overthinking things.// It doesn't matter why they did what they did, what matters is the result...

"No." No, that isn't what matters at all. What matters is that they did //something.//
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[[div class="paper"]]
In both realities, there were six votes for change and six votes against. One overseer broke the tie, and broke the timestream too. They made a decision, and became the Pivot-point. Whatever their reasons, whether they were right or wrong, what happens next is the immediate result of their inclination to //act.// There will be consequences either way; Vanguard will face the Herculean task of remaking human society to fit the facts of paranormal life, while the SCP Foundation will find it harder every day to pretend that the matter is under control, that their beds aren't burning.
[[/div]]

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[[div class="notation" style="border: none;"]]
Her prose is getting florid, and she feels her face colouring to match. There's still one more file to review, one she hasn't had the guts to look at yet. It isn't long, and there's no time like the present...

She rolls her eyes at that particular turn of mental phrase, and reads.
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[[div class="jotting"]]
[[span class="bt"]]__DESCRIPTION:__[[/span]] No single definition of SCP-6500 has been accepted by the O5 Council. No Special Containment Procedures have been enacted as, without a clear understanding of the event's nature, it is impossible to act upon it. Recommendations for further study have been placed before the Council, which remains deadlocked in indefinite deliberation. This file will be updated when a verdict is reached.
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It never did get updated, that file from TL-001-O5. They never got the chance. She'd expected this to become the new baseline, the middle course, the center that could hold. She'd been wrong. The world where O5-13 chose not to enact the stop-gap measures of waving magic wands, but also chose not to take a chance on the kindness of strangers and the resilience of those they'd looked down on for decades... well, that world simply didn't exist anymore. The timeline had run out. Why?

"Why?"

And suddenly, she knew.
[[/div]]

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[[div class="paper"]]
It isn't a Pivot if nobody moves.

That simple fact, so pithy and so literal, is the only possible explanation for the persistence of these two new baseline realities and the collapse of the static alternative. One world will grow and the other will stagnate, but the only other option was simple oblivion. Whatever their policies and politics and personal preferences, neither version of O5-13 whose reality survived refused to take responsibility for what happened next. One judged continuity paramount, and trusted that the problem could be solved without changing the system. One judged the system the problem, and promised to do better. Two irreconcilable poles, two causes forever separating the worlds which are their effects.

I theorize that timelines, like civilizations, need momentum to stay the course. This may sound unscientific, and it may sound unprofessional, but it's what the evidence supports.

I choose to believe that choice, that //action,// is the key.
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She taps out the last few words, then activates the thaumaturgic countermeasures which start the count to Revenant Immersion shutdown. That's enough for one day. 

There'll be more to do tomorrow, in every world that still spins on.
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+ SUBMISSION COMPLETE
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||= //You did not fade, you did not fail// _
//But made a choice, and tipped the scale// _
//Two journeys out of joint// _
//Diverge beyond the point// _
//Of [[span class="bt"]][[[no-return-hub | No Return]]].[[/span]]// ||

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SCP-6500 Fragment 18

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