BY ORDER OF THE OVERSEER COUNCIL
The following file is Level 4/8493 classified. Unauthorized access is forbidden.
PERSONNEL ARE TO VIEW THE BELOW MEMETIC AGENT BEFORE ACCESSING THIS DOCUMENT
MEMETIC AGENT DEPLOYED
Item#: 8493
Level4
Containment Class:
keter
Secondary Class:
none
Disruption Class:
amida
Risk Class:
critical
The containment chamber for SCP-8493-A, located at Site-170.
Special Containment Procedures: Memetic agent Omicron-15 is to be visually administered to all personnel involved in SCP-8493 research, containment, or other activity that requires knowledge of SCP-8493 or proximity to SCP-8493-A.
The nature of the current SCP-8493-A is not to be known to any member of personnel regardless of external circumstances; SCP-8493-A may or may not be located in a specialised containment chamber at Site-170, be represented by a comprehensible concept, or be existent altogether.
In order to facilitate this, the potential containment chamber for SCP-8493 is designed to forbid any coherent information from exiting itself – multiple layers of semiotically insulating material acting against various methods of information transfer are to be used, including but not limited to:
• Lead for blocking high-frequency electromagnetic transmissions;
• Strategically placed copper mesh to act as a Faraday cage;
• A pair of concrete and fibreglass for sound absorption and obstruction;
• A layer of polyurethane foam for thermal insulation;
• Mu-metal for magnetic field redirection.
This has the dual purpose of preventing any internal information from exiting the chamber, and also logically prohibits attempts to determine an attribute of SCP-8493-A based on information that is known to not be emanating from the chamber.
As a result of the unknown attributes of SCP-8493-A and its anomalous status, the containment chamber for SCP-8493 has been prepared with a significant margin of safety to reduce the likelihood of a containment breach. Such precautions include, but are not limited to:
• A spacious interior to accommodate for the possibility that SCP-8493-A is a large object;
• Structurally reinforced and chemically resistant internal walls in the event that SCP-8493-A can damage its surroundings;
• A completely isolated and maintained internal atmosphere to prepare for the possibility that SCP-8493-A is composed of small, discrete particles.
No attempts are to be made by Foundation personnel to learn the nature of SCP-8493-A or interact with it; monitoring equipment is strictly forbidden to be used with the intention of discovering the attributes of SCP-8493-A and great care must be taken with such equipment used for external on-site purposes to ensure they do not provide an opportunity to learn about SCP-8493-A.
Civilians must likewise be prevented from detecting the contents of the containment chamber for SCP-8493-A; to adhere to this necessity, an extensive perimeter has been established around Site-170, a no-fly zone has been created in the airspace above the site, and Site-170 has been excluded from public maps and geological surveys.
If it is discovered that a sapient being has gained any information about SCP-8493-A, they are to be immediately amnesticised or terminated should amnesticisation prove infeasible. Should an IMPOSITION-Event have occurred during the period where they were aware of an aspect of SCP-8493-A, Protocol 13-MOORE is to be initiated. Information on Protocol 13-MOORE can be found under Addendum 8493.3.
Should SCP-8493 breach containment, failure to efficiently recontain the anomaly has a significant possibility of resulting in a VK-Class Conceptual Invalidation Scenario.
Description: SCP-8493 is a conceptual entity that metaphysically 'inhabits' a single concept at any point in time. This host concept is designated as SCP-8493-A.
Upon a sapient being recognising a known conceptual attribute of the current SCP-8493-A, a frame of reference for a observable relationship between SCP-8493-A and -B, and an external concept that possesses SCP-8493-B, an IMPOSITION-Event may occur. The likelihood of an IMPOSITION-Event transpiring is directly proportional to the degree to which the observer comprehends all four elements of SCP-8493; subconscious recognition of these concepts has a significantly lower probability of triggering an IMPOSITION-Event than active, intentional cognition (although such a possibility is still dangerously high).
An IMPOSITION-Event encompasses the relationship between SCP-8493-D and SCP-8493-B being overwritten by SCP-8493-C; that is, the frame of reference in which the external concept that shares an attribute to the host concept of SCP-8493 relates to such an attribute will be deleted and replaced by the frame of reference describing the relationship between the host concept of SCP-8493 and the common attribute. IMPOSITION-Events appear to occur in the infosphere, operating at a conceptual level and therefore being immune to the effects of Scranton Reality Anchors and similar devices. Due to the conceptually fundamentalist nature of IMPOSITION-Events, impossible or paradoxical scenarios may be ‘outputted’ into the noosphere following their ‘processing’ by the semiosphere, although it remains under debate whether or not SCP-8493 is a true semiohazard due to the inconsistent appearance of such scenarios following an IMPOSITION-Event. After an IMPOSITION-Event occurs, SCP-8493 will be transferred to SCP-8493-D, causing it to become SCP-8493-A.
WARNING FROM THE FOUNDATION MEMETICS AND INFOHAZARDS DEPARTMENT
Though the following entries are safe for comprehension due to their expired status as SCP-8493-A, no efforts should be made to actively track or deduce the current concept that serves as SCP-8493-A.
Addendum 8493.1: Prior IMPOSITION-Events
SCP-8493-A
SCP-8493-B
SCP-8493-C
SCP-8493-D
SAPIENT ENTITY
AFTERMATH
NOTES
A specific instance of the 2020 Toyota Camry.
Complex systems integral to continued function.
Car parts.
A middle-aged male named Jacob Fawcett
An unnamed nearby pedestrian.
Every biological system within Jacob Fawcett was replaced by a functional analogue composed of car parts – limbs were replaced with motile wheels, the mouth was transfigured to a radiator, and the integumentary system was replaced with a metal alloy typical of common cars.
This was the first IMPOSITION-Event and therefore the origin of SCP-8493, believed to be brought about by the observer considering the similarities between biological and mechanical systems whilst walking down a street – Fawcett and the car served as examples, respectively. The transfigured humanoid was later contained at Site-170.
A car-like humanoid (see above).
Intense fear.
Mechanical systems.
Mechanophobia.
Jacob Fawcett.
Mechanophobia is altered to become the intense fear of mechanical systems. Somewhat extensive global amnesticisation efforts and a disinformation campaign were required in those formerly suffering from mechanophobia.
Formerly, “mechanophobia” was colloquially defined as “an instinctive feeling of terror in response to a situation that presented significant perceived danger to the individual”, being derived from the word “mechanical”, of which one definition meant “automatic”. Upon Fawcett’s transfiguration, the subject immediately and subconsciously recognised themselves as undergoing mechanophobia due to their overwhelming sense of terror, triggering an IMPOSITION-Event.
Mechanophobia (see above).
Appearance in Jeanne Bellamy’s metaphysical list of recently experienced emotions.
Spontaneity.
Agony.
A female university student named Jeanne Bellamy.
Bellamy now experiences spontaneous bouts of agony of variable nature.
Shortly before this IMPOSITION-Event, the subject had received news of a low mark on their recent exam compared to their friend’s high achievement; Bellamy became severely distressed upon realising this. A former sufferer of severe malaise, Bellamy immediately recognised the abnormal nature of the sudden replacement of her anxiety with intrusive thoughts about machinery, a result of the above IMPOSITION-Event. She unintentionally compared it to the feeling of agony she experienced prior, thus satisfying the requirements for another IMPOSITION-Event. The subject was contained at Site-170 due to their anomalous condition.
Agony (see above).
Draining.
The state of being in Travis Lancaster’s mind.
A mosquito that had landed on Travis Lancaster’s arm.
A male teenager named Travis Lancaster.
The mosquito disappeared from the subject’s arm and after several minutes Travis Lancaster experienced light-headedness followed by a fatal seizure. Autopsy revealed a deceased, engorged mosquito within Travis Lancaster’s brain that had apparently been extracting his cerebrospinal fluid.
This IMPOSITION-Event was apparently triggered by a more active comparison – permanently put in a wheelchair due to a spinal injury several years prior, Lancaster seems to have observed that his physical condition was “draining” him, as was the mosquito on his arm. After the foreign body was posthumously discovered in Lancaster’s brain, Foundation agents rapidly intercepted the autopsy reports and physically contained the mosquito, believing it to be an anomaly unrelated to the newly recognised SCP-8493.
A deceased mosquito filled with cerebrospinal fluid (see above).
Dead.
Biology.
Dr. Karsyn Sloane’s laptop battery.
Foundation researcher Dr. Karsyn Sloane.
Dr. Sloane’s laptop had died as she began digitally cataloguing the anomalous mosquito, moments before the IMPOSITION-Event. No attempts to recharge the laptop succeed. Taking it to specialised Foundation technicians, an examination of the internal mechanisms of the laptops revealed that the battery had been transfigured piecewise to a biological equivalent – the battery casing was transmuted into a clear organic membrane, and the internal separator was discovered to have become a porous gel filled with an electrolyte.
Due to the correlation of this event with the analysis of the mosquito found in the brain of Travis Lancaster, the discovery of which coincided with an apparent temporary cessation of SCP-8493 activity, Dr. Sloane correctly suspected the battery to act as an SCP-8493-A instance, leading to initial containment efforts.
An organic “battery” (see above).
Disruption of the Veil.
Logical anomaly.
SCP-8493.
Dr. Karsyn Sloane.
[UNKNOWN]
This IMPOSITION-Event was accidentally caused during Dr. Sloane’s recognition of the biological battery as an SCP-8493-A instance. It is unknown what the consequences of this incident, if any, were – other researchers have suggested it may have caused SCP-8493 to develop semiohazardous properties, as none were displayed before this IMPOSITION-Event, although it remains unknown whether SCP-8493 represents a genuine semiohazard or alters entities at a less intrinsic scale. Regardless, Foundation personnel aware of SCP-8493 are to exercise extreme precaution in the event of a containment breach to decrease the likelihood of such a self-referential occurrence transpiring again, as the results could be catastrophic were SCP-8493 to augment itself.
The remaining entries are hidden due to their close relationship with the current SCP-8493-A.
Addendum 8493.2: Note from Head Researcher, Dr. Karsyn Sloane
Cliché as the expression is, the fact remains: it is nothing short of a miracle that I am able to sit at my desk and write this.
Or, perhaps more pertinently, that any of you are here in the office reading this update to the SCP-8493 file. Or that the rest of Site-170 is alive and well. Hell, we could go a step further and be grateful that the entire freaking world hasn’t gone VK.
Did you notice those three red bars at the beginning? Keter, Amida, Critical? Well that’s what me and my colleagues at Site-170 like to (understatedly) call a “triple-threat” – a more severe hazard to the Veil, containment, and the functioning of humanity than a lit candle is to a curtain placed above it. Now some of my fellow researchers disagree with this classification, saying we should lower the Disruption and Risk classes to, say, Ekhi and Danger. But I can assure each and every one of you that we must treat this anomaly with more heed than it appears to require.
Let me explain.
SCP-8493 can be described as a “contagious analogy”. The analogy lies dormant in its host concept, waiting for someone or something to designate a similarity between itself and another entity – such a target could be a concrete idea, or more worryingly, an abstract one – based on a known shared attribute. Once such a comparison has been made, SCP-8493 transfers itself to the new concept. The kicker? The relationship between its former host and the commonality now replaces the association between the newly inhabited concept and the shared quality.
Following? Great.
“So why is this a problem, Dr. Sloane?” You might ask. “Just don’t compare SCP-8493-A with something else, then it can’t mess things up!” Well, my friend, comparisons or analogies or whatever you want to call them are a fundamental aspect of human psychology. They are integral to how we understand the world – if we can comprehend concept X but not Y, but we recognise a third concept Z that the two have in common, we can use Z as a sort of “mental bridge” between X and Y. If we know what a dog is but we don’t quite get the idea of a cat, we can use the fact that the dog is an animal and the cat is too – the way the cat relates to an animal will be similar to the way the dog does and therefore we have partially defined what the cat is (of course, since “animal” isn’t the only attribute that the pair has, we haven’t learned everything there is to know about the cat). SCP-8493 is a twisted analogy – rather than helping our understanding match the world around us, it makes the world around us match our understanding.
The problem is, our subconscious thought keeps making comparisons between different entities based on contextual information we have stored about them. Take my first encounter with SCP-8493 for instance – “my brain” knew that mosquito was dead, and so was my crappy laptop’s battery. Throw in a bit of probability and boom. Instant IMPOSITION-Event: my battery became biologically dead, just as the mosquito was biologically dead.
The time it took from the first IMPOSITION-Event occurring to the initial containment of SCP-8493 was an hour. Disaster could have occurred in seconds of not being contained alone! A single intrusive thought and it’s all over – what if an observer notices the similarities between the current SCP-8493-A and the state of being alive? Or the structure of the atom? Perhaps the SCP Foundation – the organisation keeping every other anomaly at bay? And to make matters worse, we have ironic-process theory to worry about – the fact that attempting to avoid thinking about something will have the opposite effect. Omicron-15 is effective but not foolproof.
So please, next time you want to revise the containment procedures for SCP-8493 and lower it to a Danger, think to yourself: “would it kill me to do this?”
Because the answer is yes, it would. Or worse.
– Dr. Karsyn Sloane
SCP-8493 Research Head
Addendum 8493.3: Protocol 13-MOORE
WARNING FROM THE FOUNDATION MEMETICS AND INFOHAZARDS DEPARTMENT
THE FOLLOWING ADDENDUM REPRESENTS AN INFOHAZARD DUE TO INFORMATION REGARDING THE NATURE OF THE CURRENT SCP-8493-A AND SHOULD NOT BE ACCESSED OUTSIDE OF PERFORMING PROTOCOL 13-MOORE
▽ Close Protocol 13-MOORE
PROTOCOL 13-MOORE
- Two members of personnel are to locate each other to form a pair; it is preferable that one member has experience with administering amnestics – this member will be designated Personnel-A and the other member Personnel-B. Failing this, Protocol 13-MOORE is to be completed with the single individual reading this document; they may be designated -A or -B depending on their familiarity with amnestic application. If a total of two Foundation personnel are participants in Protocol 13-MOORE, Personnel-A is not to read this document further and is to follow the instructions of -B.
- Amnestics are to be located and obtained; failing this, a suitable weapon is to be located.
- The involved personnel are to make their way to Site-170’s containment chamber for SCP-8493 and access the interior; the emergency override code for the entry changes with each activation and is currently: H24FI-009EX-12AD3.
- Personnel-B is to enter the containment chamber and record an expression for an extremely large number “x” with the format: x = (a^b^c)! where a, b, and c are arbitrarily chosen integers greater than 1. This expression is to be legibly recorded on a surface on the inside of the chamber or introduced to the interior of the containment unit through an external medium with the expression for the number recorded in or on it. Personnel-A should not be informed of the actions of Personnel-B and should wait outside the chamber.
- The remainder of the instructions for performing Protocol 13-MOORE are to be memorised and the document is to be closed.
- An IMPOSITION-Event is to be intentionally triggered by Personnel-B between the current SCP-8493-A and the concept of the number now expressed within the chamber, NOT with regards to the physical representation of the number. The IMPOSITION-Event should recognise SCP-8493-B as an attribute as specific as possible that SCP-8493-A and the number share in common, and SCP-8493-C should be idealised so as to result in minimal conceptual damage to the chosen number where possible.
- Immediately afterwards, Personnel-B is to exit the containment chamber, sealing the entrance behind them, and amnestics are to be administered by Personnel-A to -B. No information regarding the actions of Personnel-B within the chamber is to be disseminated to Personnel-A. In the event that amnestics were unable to be obtained, Personnel-B is expected to seal themselves within the chamber and self-terminate with the weapon within a minimal timeframe to prevent SCP-8493 breaching containment due to their presence.
- If any remaining members of personnel have not been amnesticised and have not been exposed to information regarding the new nature of SCP-8493-A, they are to inform other Foundation personnel of the success of Protocol 13-MOORE and the subsequent recontainment of SCP-8493.