Link to article: Uncrossed.
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[[include :scp-wiki:theme:penumbra]] [[module CSS]] :root { --accentColor:#D3D3D3 ; } [[/module]] [[include :scp-wiki:info:start]] **Title:** Uncrossed **Author:** [[*user Xypheruins]] ⚠️ **Content warning:** This story contains depictions of execution-style violence, emotional repression, self-destructive behavior, and institutional trauma. [[include :scp-wiki:info:end]] When the operative pulled the trigger on Director X, the gun jammed. A metallic click—then nothing. The operative’s finger twitched on the trigger, her grip tightening reflexively. The air in the office went still. In that suspended moment before the bullet struck, Director X's final thought wasn't of the execution order in her hands, nor of the young MTF operative whose finger trembled on the trigger. She thought about C. C, who had left for Headquarters years ago. C, who had been her deputy, her second-in-command, her— ------ //C.// When C was abruptly transferred to the foundation's headquarters, X developed an unsettling habit: invoking his name in every casual conversation. Even she couldn't determine whether these involuntary mentions were accidental slips or subconscious cries. Yet one truth pierced through her denial — fragmented memories of their interactions coiled around her consciousness like barbed wire, fraying her sanity thread by thread. Following C's departure, X plunged into a self-destructive routine, which she called “the workaholic module”, For five days, her office became a sealed chamber where glowing monitors replaced sunlight and nutritional tablets substituted meals. This was her survival method: burying emotional tremors under relentless to do list, substituting human connection with the task completion rates. The darker the circles under her eyes grew, the tighter she clung to this routine — as if productivity could cauterize the wound left by his absence. The intervention came during a cafeteria confrontation. D, her longtime deputy, watched her push lettuce leaves around a plate with listless precision. "The site needs functional leadership," he said, snapping his chopsticks against the table. "Not a ghost haunting the executive floor." When she shrugged, his voice sharpened, with a harsh question thrown. "Is that because of //him//?" The plastic fork slipped from her fingers. Around them, lunchtime chatter swelled like ocean waves, yet D's words cut through the noise with surgical clarity. "Who?" Her response came half a beat too slow. "C." A bitter laugh escaped her. "Seriously?" She focused on aligning the saltshaker with the pepper dispenser, trying to anchor her swaying thoughts. "He is just a colleague, not……" The sentence dissolved, her throat constricting around unspoken admissions. D slid a medical report across the table. Red warnings glared under the fluorescent lights: 60 hours without REM sleep, cortisol levels rivaling combat veterans. “Whether it's heartbreak or guilt driving this,” he said angrily, "you're hurting yourself. The foundation can replace any executive tomorrow. Who replaces you in your own life?" "Then what the fuck does C have to do with it?" X’s voice suddenly raised, but soon returned to an indifferent tone, "Break is over, you should go back to work." Long after D left, his questions still lingered in her mind. After lunch, X wandered through the site, passing down the corridor. She gazed at the windows of the training room, where their reflections once overlapped again and again during numerous cooperation and competition, until she became the only one who was left behind. Did she miss their silent tacit cooperation only? Or perhaps — her step faltered — she simply couldn't forgive herself for noticing how emptiness expanded in his absence. When did their sight stop converging? In which stage does everything go wrong? All these inquiries just end in silence, like the silent silhouette of C in her memory. In the faint sunset, she finally acknowledged the void, which no amount of caffeine could fill. ------ X had always hated these business trips to headquarters—the way the fluorescent lights hummed like dying insects, the way the air smelled of cold metal. She hated the way every polished surface reflected back a version of herself she didn't recognize. The foundation’s headquarters was a place where anything out of place was quietly erased — and she wasn’t sure if her own messy emotions counted as something that needed fixing. Yet this time, she had volunteered to go. She told them it was for the canteen's terrible coffee, the one thing that tasted exactly as bitter as she remembered. They didn't believe her. No one did. The building hadn't changed. Same brutalist Cold-War style architecture, same flickering lights that made everyone look vaguely ill. By noon, the meetings had bled her dry. She escaped into the hallway — And there he was. C. He was leaning against the pale green wall, talking to some woman from Research Department. Tall, effortless, the kind of person who belonged here. They were laughing at something, their shoulders almost touching. A group of MTF officers passed by, clapping C on the back like old friends. X stood very still. //She wondered if they were partners now.// She could call out. She could pretend this was normal. Then he saw her. For one fractured second, his face did something complicated — a ripple across still water. Then it smoothed over, so fast she might have imagined it. He turned away. His colleague glanced between them, curious, but C just shook his head, smiling that empty, practiced smile she remembered all too well. X walked past without stopping, her stomach tight. //She wondered if he had ever missed her at all.// ------ X dreamt last night. When she awoke, a hollow ache overwhelmed her. The pain seized her chest, and it took some time for her to calm. Despite countless rationalizations clawing at her mind, she finally yielded to the truth: she had dreamt. Ironically, the Foundation's medical department had promised eight hours of dreamless, restorative sleep through their patented sleep aids. Though the dream's details had evaporated like morning mist, the lingering void in her heart remained like a phantom, who murmured that she'd let something slip through her fingers. Or rather, someone. Six months into C's relocation, X discovered a crumpled letter buried in the recesses of her office drawer. Only two legible words remained: "Dear Chen." The rest were a battlefield of ink—words written and furiously crossed out; their meaning now drowned by tempestuous stains. The ink blurred together, like a rainstorm. She recalled her early attempts to reach out. Indeed, she had tried to contact C at first. However, each time her pen hovered over the paper, the words stunned at her fingertips. Asking about work felt disingenuous; confessing how she missed him seemed insane. After all, the bitter truth was simpler: any words she drafted would echo with emptiness. He might respond with polite courtesy, or worse— her unchecked emotions could unravel the fragile threads between them. She would never, ever surrender to her emotions, or let them run wild in words. A knock interrupted her. Her deputy, B, stood at the door, his gaze flickering to the envelope in her hands though he said nothing. "Shall I have it mailed?" he offered pleasantly, with a smooth voice. She shook her head, pressing the paper back into the drawer with finality, as if she had made an unchangeable decision. The lock clicked like a verdict. Beyond her office, colleagues buzzed about headquarters' restructuring. C's name sliced through the chatter like a blade. And then — suddenly, the dream returned: In her dream she was at a station platform. It was a snowy night. The snow swirled in the darkness as she sprinted. She was running, with lungs ablaze. Ahead, a train's whistle pierced the night, and its doors began to close. Through the frost-rimmed window, C stood silhouetted against the golden light. She pushed harder, legs screaming, desperate to bridge the impossible distance — to say goodbye, to beg him to stay, to clutch at anything. But the train slid away, leaving only the echo of steel on tracks. Some words, once spoken, become chains, and hers, would remain unuttered forever. ------ X sat in her office, the blue glow of the monitor washing over her face. Data streams flickered across the screen. She rubbed her eyes — the words kept swimming no matter how hard she stared. The door creaked and opened. Her assistant hovered in the doorway, clutching a thick folder to his chest. "Director?" he ventured, voice barely above a whisper. "The Site’s containment breach report…it needs your approval." X reached for the pen without looking up. Her signature slashed across the page, ink bleeding through the cheap Foundation paper. Another incident report. Another containment failure. Just like yesterday. Just like tomorrow. The assistant shifted from foot to foot. "C always…I mean, Protocol says the director should review these personally before — " The pen snapped in X's hand. Black ink oozed between her fingers. "C isn't here," she said, too quietly. "And neither is Protocol. Not really." The assistant's throat worked soundlessly. He backed out of the office, the door clicking shut with finality. X went to the window. For a fleeting moment, she saw C standing there — his pale reflection hovering in the bulletproof glass like a fading afterimage. "You're not who I followed anymore," he might have said. No anger in his voice. Just tired, so tired. The vision dissolved. The glass only showed her own reflection now, wearing the same weary expression. The bitter irony wasn't lost on her — when C actually left, there had been no dramatic confrontation at the window. No final words. He'd simply walked out without speaking to her at all. Not even a goodbye. ------ Indeed, when C left, his terminal had been wiped clean, the monitor removed, leaving only faint outlines in the dust where the equipment had been. It was as if he'd never existed. Except for the deputy director's card, which lay in the center drawer, precisely aligned with the edges. > **Christopher Chen** > Deputy Director The card showed his photo, his name, his clearance level — all rendered meaningless now. The clip was unbent, the lanyard folded into perfect thirds beside it. X picked it up. The plastic was cool against her fingers. She stood there holding his card for a long time, running her thumb over the worn edges where his fingers had rubbed there too. The system showed his resignation processed fourteen days prior. No notice period. No debriefing scheduled. Just a terminated employment record blinking coldly on her screen. She should have noticed. She thought about calling him. But what would she say? What could she say? //Why did you leave?// //What did I miss?// //Was it something I did?// //Was I not good enough?// But the truth was, she already knew. Or at least, she knew enough. The late nights reviewing files alone. The way he'd stopped meeting her eyes in meetings. The silence between them that had grown heavier, until even work talk felt strained. Now the silence between those unspoken moments stretched endlessly in her mind, a gaping void where explanations might have lived. Every "what if" and "if only" circled endlessly in her mind — if she'd pushed harder, if she'd noticed sooner, if she'd been less preoccupied with the damn budget reports, If only she had apologized sooner — she could have apologized earlier — except apology demanded a reason, a recipient, neither of which existed. Instead, she signed off on his termination paperwork. Approved the reassignment of his projects. Authorized the deletion of his system access. After that, she stopped taking lunch breaks. Started pulling triple shifts. Let security logs show her badge scanning into the building at 3:47 AM, out at 11:59 PM, in again at 12:01 AM. The Foundation needed its Director operational, so she swallowed stimulants like candy and let the chemical burn in her veins drown out the quieter, more persistent ache. Sometimes at night, when the fluorescent lights buzzed overhead and her vision blurred from sleep deprivation, she'd catch herself turning toward his old desk to ask a question — Only to find empty space staring back. The work continued. So did she. ------ Years later, X still found herself staring at the empty space where C's desk used to be. She had long since stopped pretending she didn’t know why he left. The truth was there, buried beneath every decision she had made since taking the Director's chair— every compromised principle, every expedient lie, every life weighed against efficiency reports and deemed expendable. She could have been different. Once. But power had a way of sanding down the edges of people until they fit neatly into the machine. And the Foundation’s machine never stopped grinding. Some nights, when the stimulants wore off and the silence of her office pressed too close, she imagined C standing in the doorway, arms crossed, watching her with that same quiet disappointment. "Was it worth it?" he might have asked. She never answered. Because the truth was, it didn’t matter. The next Director would sit at this same desk, stare at the same reports, make the same calculations. The cycle didn’t end. It just replaced its parts. X turned back to her work. Another file. Another signature. Another day. ------ until the day, the day when the muzzle flash illuminated the office for a fraction of a second. A man stood in the doorway, flanked by two MTF operatives. He was younger than she expected. Clean-cut. Determined. There was a familiar fire in his eyes — the kind she once had. "Director X," he said, voice steady. "You're relieved of duty." X leaned back in her chair, studying him. The way his grip tightened on his sidearm. The barely suppressed tension in his shoulders. The conviction in his voice. She knew that look. She had worn it once, years ago, standing where he stood now. Few years ago, when she was still an agent, not a Site Director, the order came down to remove the old Site Director, and X led the operation herself. She and C had served together in the same team — she was his captain. The coup was quick, efficient. Too efficient, C thought afterward. The Director's security team surrendered without firing a shot. X shot that bullet directly in the head of the old one, accepted their resignations with the same clinical detachment she'd once reserved for enemy combatants. "You didn't even question them," C said later, watching her sign the termination papers. X didn't look up. "We had our orders." "That's never stopped you before." This time it had. The day X accepted the promotion to Site Director, C stood by the window in her new office, staring at the concrete courtyard below. "You don't have to do this," he said. X adjusted the nameplate on her desk — Site director — her name, her title. "Someone has to." C turned. The fluorescent lights made the shadows under his eyes deeper. "Not like this. " X shrugged, opening the first file on her desk. Standard personnel reassignments. The first page listed C's name under "Deputy Director." "You're staying?" she asked. "For now." She didn't understand him at that time, she never did. But the same word echoed back after so many years when the boy holding the gun towards her head. Time seemed to stretch. What should she remember in the last minute of her life? What on earth was the final answer to all these fucking stuff? She thought of C. Of the flicker of emotion in his eyes when they met at Headquarters. Of the complicated expression on D's face when asked, "Do you love him?" She thought of that dream. Of the empty desk he'd left behind. Of all the nights she'd told herself it was necessary. She thought of the word of him, for now, she wanted to scream, to fight back, to call the security, but she just stood still, accepted her fate in silence. and the bullet struck. In that final, splintered second, she understood. Not just about C. Not just about herself. But about the terrible machinery they'd all served - how it sanded down each of them in turn, replacing idealists with realists, rebels with bureaucrats, until even the revolutions became routine. C had seen the same pattern too many times—the way power reshaped people, the way each new Director started with promises and ended with compromises. The doubts had started years ago, during the coup. Back then, he'd told himself it was necessary. The old Director had been corrupt. The system needed cleansing. But when X took that office, something shifted. The woman who'd once argued for preserving human test subjects now approved termination orders without comment. The captain who'd risked court——martial to extract wounded teammates now quoted operational efficiency statistics when denying medical leave requests. And he stayed as long as he could. He filed the objections, raised the concerns, played the loyal deputy. But each time X overruled him with that detached, bureaucratic tone, he heard the echo of every compromised officer they'd ever removed. The day he left, he didn't say goodbye. Just deactivated his card and walked out. Somewhere, the idealistic MTF officer he'd followed was still buried under layers of policy memos and security clearances. But that woman wouldn't have recognized the Director X had become. And neither could he. Yet in the future, the new Director would sit at this desk. He would stare at the bloodstain on the carpet. He would tell himself it was necessary and he'd do better. And so it would go. As the struck of the bullet, the young man hesitated——just for a second. Long enough for her to see it. The doubt. The second-guessing. The first crack in the facade. Then his expression hardened. X smiled. Somewhere in the headquarter, would C even look up when her termination notice crossed his desk? Would his eyes linger on her name for half a breath, or would he toss it aside like another routine disposal? Would he remember her as she was, behind the title, not "Director X", but Agent Xander, or would she just be another name in the endless cycle of replacements? **//If I die//**, she thought, **//would you remember me as I was?//** This was the last unanswered question in X's mind. Somewhere, in another office, in another facility, another Director was signing another order. And so it went. Somewhere, in another facility, another C was watching another X sign another order. The cycle continued. The Foundation endured. The operative shot again, and the second shot didn’t misfire.