Link to article: fragment:the-wild-hunt-2.
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##purple| Oh that won’t do. ## [[div class="blockquote" style=border-radius: 10px; margin 10px]] **Feed:** Centennial Commons, outdoors, [LATITUDE/LONGITUDE]. Meteorological conditions: heavy rainfall **Annotation:** Tom undergoes ontological Dismissal. Stomach contents voided into grass consist of anomalous material and fluids consistent with [COGNITOHAZARD REMOVED], including the entirety of the iron content of his body. Tom’s skin undergoes rapid cyanosis, then fades into a gray and green color. Never Fades Away rapidly descends from vehicle and initiates OD response procedures, attempting to administer CPR, pausing when fluid from Tom’s mouth fills Fades’ own. Disordered movements and irregular breathing suggest breakdown of related autonomous nervous systems; related gurgling, agonal breathing and swelling of upper chest area suggests inflation of lungs with anomalous fluid. Fades first attempts CPR. Biometrics suggest threshold met for authorization of Compassionate Measures and notification of Next of Kin. //##purple| Oh, that won’t do. ##// ##purple|-- **Annotation:** Tom undergoes ontological Dismissal. Stomach contents voided into grass consist of anomalous material and fluids consistent with [COGNITOHAZARD REMOVED]. Disordered movements and irregular breathing suggest breakdown of related autonomous nervous systems; related agonal breathing and swelling of upper chest area suggests inflation of lungs with anomalous fluid; [REDACTED] -- ## ##purple|**Annotation:** Shout undergoes ontological Reassertion. Life signs anomalously stabilized. Irreversible structural damage mitigated by widespread infusions of ontological denial.## ##purple|//He is about as fine as he could possibly be under the circumstances, which is still very not. Doctor’s recommendation: frequent visits with a licensed professional.//## **Annotation:** Shout remains comatose ##purple|//Get up.//## **Annotation:** Shout twitches on ground; physical jerks and jaw movements consistent with seizure response; high risk of damage to tongue and related choking hazards. Fades initially expresses confusion, identifies onset of seizure symptoms, then uses watch to mark start time before unbuttoning Shout’s shirt. ##purple|//I said: GET UP.//## ##purple|Annotation: T+299 seconds following onset, symptoms cease. Shout rises to huddled standing position, accidentally causing impact between right shoulder and Fades’ jaw. Posture and movement consistent with low-consciousness activity. Fades’ reaction is mixture of pain and relief. Fades looks around surroundings, likely attempting to identify shelter, then wraps arm around Shout’s waist and guides him to walk with her. ## ##purple|//What is this scene missing? Ah.//## **Annotation:** Shout wraps his arm around Fades’ shoulder. Fades seen to smile. ##purple|//Perfection. And who says Life can't imitate Art. Now, take her someplace nice.//## ##purple|**Annotation:** Shout uses pressure on Fades shoulder to guide her in direction of nearby dorm building. --Door is locked-- Door is unlocked. Building is deserted. Shout and Fades enter building and take stairs to fourth floor, and walk down hallway to R432. --Door is locked-- Door is unlocked, lock is replaced by infusion amiable material chemically indistinguishable from the bark of an Alnus glutinosa specimen.## ##purple|//And my work there is done.//## [https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/scp-8082/offset/3 Take good care of him.] [[/div]] [!-- > **Interviewed**: Shout > **Interviewer**: O5-06 > **Foreword**: On 09/27/2027, Shout in Whispers experienced something biologically indistinguishable from death, but ontologically was closer to a severe concussion. His consciousness is now inhabiting the concept his Name maps to, and I am now able to interface with him directly. > > **O5-06:** Greetings, Shout. > > **Shout:** What...who are you? > > **O5-06:** That should be obvious. O5-06. > > **Shout:** Bull //shit//. > > **O5-06:** Your favorite color is purple. Your father shot the tip of your ring finger off in a drunken rage because your mother left him. The first person you remember telling you that they loved you was Never Fades Away. > > **Shout:** Shut the //fuck// up, how do you know any of that? > > **O5-06:** Because I'm an O5. Alright, let's try this again. > > **Shout:** What happened to our original names? > > **O5-06:** Before I answer that, let's step into a setting a little more comfortable. [[include :scp-wiki:component:acs-animation]] [[include :scp-wiki:component:anomaly-class-bar-source |item-number= 8000 |clearance= 5 |container-class= esoteric |secondary-class= loptyr |secondary-icon=https://scp-wiki.wdfiles.com/local--files/component%3Aanomaly-class-bar/uncontained-icon.svg |disruption-class= amida |risk-class= critical ]] **Special Containment Procedures**: They told themselves they were doing what they had to do, while enacted a genocide on an entire people and then mutilated them all on a metaphysical level. They were then surprised when those same people returned the favor ##purple| Testing, I am O5-06, testing, one, two, three. Ok, Shout, think something really hard. ## ##green| Something. ## ##purple| Smartass. Let's read you in. You and your wife have become nomenclative entities. You are able to interact with the world on an ontological layer corporeal lifeforms are not usually supposed to. Our species shared this planet with## **##red|entities of stuff and song.##** ##purple| Our Foundation even worked with them, until that Foundation decided to stab them all in the back, kill a lot of them, and redact the rest so thoroughly from the narrative that they are literally unspeakable. Are you familiar with the aphorism 'Existence precedes essence'?## ##green| Yes, that's Existentialism 101 ## ##purple| This is only partly true of humans-we have substance independent of essence, but without essence, that substance becomes incoherent and dies. It is outright the reverse for ##**##red|those that danced when the stars were young##**##purple| To them, names are more than legalities, they are the means by which one existence has any meaning. When ##**##red|those who take names that strike twice##**##purple| lose their Name, they cannot participate in the main 'narrative' of reality. They can subsist in improvised adjacent narratives, but like history or fantasy, or any work derived from reality, it leaves them indistinct, vague, and slowly diffusing, losing their original meaning as the ages pass. I imagine escaping that fate and taking our essence is a motivation for this recent move. Well, that and asymmetrical warfare against the Foundation itself.## ##purple|If you're using your brain, this should suggest something about the fate of those 'disappeared' children.## ##purple| Shout? Do you read me?## ##green| O5-06? I...I feel different again. I feel...like I'm...I'm...flying. Can you see me?## ##purple| You are suffering from an extreme sensory deprivation dysmorphia. When faced with nothing, a human mind, neurons or no, will do everything fill in the void. //Your// mind, still all too human, is trying to make sense of an existence that is part-ideal, part-ontological, and coming up with increasingly creative guesses as to what is happening to it right now. ## ##green| What...what do I do now? How do I stop? ## ##purple| Keep flying, Shout. Try to recall a time you held your breath for a while and then exhaled. Reflect on that memory. And perhaps it may feel the same as taking a deep breath and counting to ten. Let's get you more situated in your new concept. ## **Description:** SCP-8000 is a phenomena where individuals within a particular age range spontaneously disappear without any evidence of intrusion or of abduction. ##purple| As of September 27th, 2024, SCP-8000 was //confirmed// to have affected one hundred and eighty-three thousand five hundred and twelve between the ages of 13 and 23 across the continental United States of America, though the real count is surely higher and ever increasing. I believe the twenty-four hour delta had reached fifteen hundred yesterday. ## **Discovery: ##purple| We need to stop talking about the circumstances, and we need to dicuss the gunpowder trail that led to //you//. ## ##green| Are you saying I exploded? ## ##purple| Nothing so mundane. Now, take a moment, and remember breathing like you did earlier. Close your not-eyes and think about breathing. Can you do that for me?## ##green| I'm trying. What's that? ## ##purple| Don't touch it. ## [[collapsible show="Memorandum 02450: Ultimatum DO NOT OPEN ON PAIN OF SUMMARY TERMINATION" hide="To the asshole who couldn't finish the job."]] This is for the record. I did this knowing it would cost me everything. Shout in Whispers had no such options. I want this whole message for the record. I want these memories to pierce every layer of the Foundation adjacent Noosphere. If it's a prayer circle in the break-room at RAISA, I want them to //feel// the full extent of my contempt for what the Foundation's become in general, and the feckless son-killing donkey //fuck// in particular who didn't have the balls to explain to his son why he was killing him, or even //that// he was. You couldn't even betray your own flesh and blood properly. And now I have to clean up after you, you //shit Abraham//. Enjoy the show. [[/collapsible]] ##green| //Fuck!// ## ##purple| I //told// you not to touch it. I haven't cleared you to see that. I did, however, clear you to see...//this//## <INITIATING MEMORY IMMERSION> This is O5-06. Testing, one, two, three-turning on God mode. It never gets old being in the driver's seat. Nothing makes conceptual apotheosis feel more rich and satisfying than having oneself a captive audience, and Shout is certainly captive. I am his narrator now. The room I've ^^brought^^ him to was spacious and grand; approximately thirty five feet long by twenty nine feet wide. The ceiling height is about eighteen feet. Shout sat behind a large desk, dressed in a black blazer, slacks, designer Gucci shoes with a white "visitors" pin affixed to his lapel. Behind him, the South Wall curved in its distinctive way. This place felt, like it always does, both surprisingly small and surprisingly extra. Chalk it up to my generous height at six feet two inches, or my ego, or perhaps the objective truth that my job was infinitely more relevant to the continued beating of the world than the man who normally sits behind that desk. This was Shout as I remembered him the day before. The scars of anomaly integration absent from his body. His face almost looked bloodless with the pallor of weeks without sunlight. His bright green eyes had perfectly normal white sclera, albeit saddled with bags from excessive night-time reading. His slender hands were the same color as his facial complexion, with long and dextrous fingers with slender tips, albeit missing a knuckle from his ring finger. Those hands nervously trembled against the hard wood table. He lifted the hand with the missing knuckle and pointed at the blue carpet emblazoned with the Presidential seal. "Is that what I think it is?" He asked. I nod. "How did we get into the Oval Office?" He reached for his lips, and felt his not-quite-actual mouth for the first time in what likely felt like too long. "Woah!" He covered his mouth with his hand. "What the hell?" I smiled and tilted my head to one side. "Feel better? That's how things can work between us. If you pay attention and show me an adequate level of respect, you can enjoy comfort and even novelty, courtesy of my own conceptual-architecture." **And, of course, the other benefit is I can filter our intentional communication from our introspection, so no more talking to ourselves.** My words fill the room while my mouth is closed in a toothy Cheshire grin. Shout stared up in the ceiling and looked around while searching for the source of the voice. **I imagine Moses felt similarly.** "I thought we were ontological," Shout said, "This is either a memory or a recording." "Memories, media, experience; they're the smoke. The ideas are the light." I said, "And we're currently holding court in the sun. This is an experience shared by three memory-sources in conceptual space. I am surprised the resolution isn't even clearer." "So we're not actually in the Oval Office." I shook my head. "Not as such, no Shall we continue?" I asked. He nods. I looked at my watch. "August Fifth, quarter-past four in the morning. President Biden is currently having a tête-à-tète with the head-of-state of Burkina Faso in Paris right around now." "Why the hell does that matter?" Shout asked. "It doesn't," I said, "but it's his plausible deniability for not being here for //this// conversation-" The double doors at the north west of the room slam open so swiftly and loudly Shout literally jumps out of his chair in shock and crumbles onto the ground. Of course, I thought, we just went from absolute sensory deprivation to a random bang. Fortunately, Shout regained his senses and climbed back into the chair as White House Chief of Staff Jeff Zients stormed into the room with Site Director Dr. Gregory Hardstark ("That's not his name." Shout said. "It's for convenience's sake." I replied.) and O5-03 (I scrambled him so Shout couldn't hear what O5-03 promised the Chief of Staff to mollify him). "Shut that door." Jeff said to Dr. Hardstark, and when O5-03 nodded at him, he obliged. At the click of the doors closing, Mr. Zients immediately rounded on O5-03, brandishing a sheaf of papers. "We've cut you and your people a //lot// of slack these past few years. Actually, I pulled some strings and got the unofficial records. We've let you get away with //too much//. Dr. Hardstark's eyes widened as he heard facts a civilian was most definitely not supposed to hear, and he looked at O5-03. The blur briefly buzzed reassuringly before Mr. Zients cut him off, "I do //not// particularly care about your RAISA policies right about now. //We// sold this country's soul to the Foundation, and we were supposed to get reality in return." The Chief of Staff walked behind where Shout was seated-unaware of Shout's non-presence in this simulated memory-and ripped each curtain open. Smoke rose past the window and on the beautiful Rose Lawn was encamped dozens of parents and tents with a golden candle-lit vigil illuminating the twilit trees with flickering orange. As Dr. Gregor approached the window, Shout could hear the birds chirp their morning-song by his ear. "Is //this// what you call reality? The President almost fought his own security detail to allow parents of the victims to set up a vigil right under his office. He wanted them to know that as long as those kids were still missing, they'd always be his priority and under his eyes. So tell //me// what your people are doing to make that happen?" O5-03 seemed to angle his blur away from the window, while Dr. Hardstark leaned against a pillar and drank in the sight of the desperate throng. Shout could now hear someone leading a song he couldn't quite make out. "As you know, Mr. Zients," Dr. Hardstark said, "We can't go into those sorts of details." "//Then why are you here//?!" Mr. Zients screamed. O5-03 said something. Dr. Hardstark voice cracked as he said, "Sir, on my honor I am doing everything I can to get those kids back-" "I appreciate your sincerity, Greg," Mr. Zients said, "But we are well past honor. The President is reconsidering his existing accommodations with the Foundation. This caps off a year of other incidents that have had America foot the bill for Foundation incompetence, not to mention sanctioning the widespread euthanasia-" O5-03 said something and Mr. Zients shouted back, "I //don't care// if I'm being recorded right now. Wipe the tapes yourselves if you gotta! We have a number of proposals about developing our own in-house anomaly-control program. We have a lot of fascinatingly accurate guesses about who you are being sent to the President by frustrated parents who think someone is doing this behind the scenes. Do //not// give us a reason to throw you under the bus. Fix this. //Now.//" Mr. Zients leaned against the Resolute Desk and crossed his arms. "You gentlemen can show yourselves out. You were never here, after all." The two left the Oval Office in a hurry, Shout's father dutifully trotting behind the censored shape of O5-03. "Hey Greg," the Chief of Staff said, his voice getting softer as Dr. Hardstark moved away from him, "Mind getting the doors, buddy?" Greg humbly shut the double doors behind him. The Chief of Staff vanished, and the skies behind the window of the Oval Office reverted to a dusty periwinkle blue. Shout's mouth was wide open for a moment before he started laughing hysterically. "Oh my God," he shouted. "That fucking asshole got //punked// by the President. By //proxy//." I couldn't help it; I started chuckling myself. "I rather liked the part," I said, "where he made your father close the doors behind them both times." "Right?!" Shout said, "What a //bitch//. You won't tell him I said that, will you?" "Shout," I said, my smile suddenly feeling strained, "I would //never//." ##purple| Shout? Shout? Where did you go? Shout? ## ##purple| I lost him. And just before I could tell him why his soul belongs to me. ## [https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/scp-8082/offset/3 Oh fuck.] --]