The SCP Experience - A God in Your Skull | SCP-2440

Episode Date: September 8, 2023

SCP Foundation KETER class object, SCP-2440: A God in Your Skull This story was derived from https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/scp-2440 and is released under Creative Commons Sharealike 3.0. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/ Author: Matt Doggett Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/MatthewDoggettAuthor/ Website/Newsletter sign up: matthewdoggettauthor.com New Book Releases: https://www.amazon.com/Matthew-G-Doggett/e/B08FD5378Z DISCLAIMER: This episode contains explicit content. Parental guidance is advised for children under the age of 18. Listen at your own discretion. #thescpexperience #scp #scpfoundation #scpencounters #securecontainprotect #scpstories #scpexplained #whatisscp Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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I said, looking at the window of the SUV. This isn't good. What? Landry said from the passenger seat, head swiveling on his skinny neck. Weed just pulled into Willem's lot, a quaint New England town with a population of just

over 10,000 people. And already I knew things weren't looking good. It was a hell of a time to be training a new agent. Especially one is wet behind the ears Landry. At least we were both inoculated. That was one thing to be thankful for in this cruel joke called Life. Look around, I told Landry. What looks off to you? He was called Iqabad by many of the other foundation guys at Site 88 for Iqabad Crane. He certainly was a beanpole, and he had a teacherly

way about him, but not in the sense that he seemed wise or professorial. No. He seemed like the kind of teacher that would have had a hard time controlling a room full of 10-year-olds. After looking around for a few moments as I cruised the streets doing a steady 25, Landry spoke. Looks like they're decorating for Halloween a little early. A little early, I said. It's August, Landry. I'd call that really early. Well, sure, maybe. But the stores are putting that stuff out earlier and earlier every year.

And maybe they like Halloween a lot. I wanted to tell him that he had to stop giving people. the benefit of the doubt. But the truth was, I envied that about him. In a job like this one, you needed as much empathy as you could get. I was certainly running low these days. I don't think that's the case, but we'll check the library, I said. That's where we'll really know what's up. As we cruised past, the nice cottage-style house is bathed in afternoon sunlight. We saw a few people out and about. Many of them waved at us. Landry waved back. While not every house had Halloween decorations up, many of them did.

And as we made it toward the small downtown area, the bad feeling in my gut only grew. If it was this far along already, it wouldn't be so easy to get things under control. Things could get ugly here. Real ugly. We parked outside the library and got out. I pulled my suit jacket over the gun on my hip and buttoned it so it wouldn't be too obvious. Landry did the same, but with a double. dopey smile in his face. As we stepped into the library, Landry inhaled deeply. Ah, love the smell of a library, he said. I did too, but I wasn't about to go around talking

about it. The gray-haired librarian at the desk greeted us with a friendly smile. He asked if we needed any help, and I said we were good. We moved toward the fiction section, but before we even got close, I already knew we had a problem. This is bad, I said. Look at how many horror books they have here. There seems to be a lot of them, Landry said. It was an understatement. The shelves were so packed full of books by Stephen King, Clive Barker, Robert McCammon, and HP Lovecraft,

that there was hardly room for any other genres. This was one of the side effects of the early stages of an SCP 2440 infestation. Horror books and movies seem to make people more successful. susceptible to memetic infection. And the more people became infected, the more powerful 2440 would become. This has been going on for much longer than the Intel suggested, I said, looking around. There were a few teenagers reading at tables. A woman was stalking books from a cart.

Two elderly women were chatting quietly nearby, their arms full of horror novels. Who knows how many are already infected? Maybe all of them. They seem fine to me, Landry said. Did you even read the intel package? I snapped, drawing the attention of everyone in the library. Shit, I said under my breath. Let's go outside.

As we moved toward the door, the two old ladies dropped their books and stepped in our way, their kindly faces twisting into hardened grimaces. The kids stood up and moved toward us, along with a library employee who'd been stocking books. The librarian came around the front desk, and moved toward us. Yeah, this is bad, I said. Out of the corner of my eye,

I saw Landry pull out his sidearm and pointed toward the women. Whoa! I said, slapping his arms down. What are you doing? I glanced at him and saw that he was pale and shaking. He was scared shitless. The two women moved forward, and I no longer had the luxury of trying to deal with Landry.

Now I had a couple of old women trying to attack me. I elbowed one in the side of the head, trying not to hit her too hard. This gave the other one an opening to scratch my face with her nails. I jerked back and then kicked her in the chest, sending her flying into the kids behind her. Move! I shouted at Landry,

jumping over the downed people and bowling over the female library employee. Next came the librarian. He was standing between me and the exit, and suddenly he burst into flames while simultaneously growing several feet. His face elongated into that of a demon, Orne sprouting from his head as he laughed in a rumbling voice. I pulled up short, momentarily taken aback by the scene, even though I knew what was happening.

A few feet behind me, Landry screamed and fired his gun, shooting the librarian five times in quick succession. The fiery demon disappeared as the elderly librarian stumbled back and collapsed to the ground, several bullet holes in his chest. Moving quickly, I swiped Landry's gun and then pulled him toward the door by his collar. He stared down at the dead man as we passed. Get in the goddamn SUV! I said, shoving him toward it. He did as he was told, and we were soon tearing down the street. I pulled the radio and spoke into it.

Hey, LT, we're going to need a task force here as fast as you can get him. I don't know how our guys missed it, but SCP 2440 has spread to more than 1,500 people. It could be approaching 10,000 for all I know. By the looks of this town, I wouldn't doubt it. Copy that, LT said. I called in the Goddogs as soon as I saw your heart rate go up. Figured if you were that freaked, things were getting serious.

Now, I'll ask out of there. We'll meet you two miles outside of town on the 84. We're going to take over the Denny's restaurant there for our base of operations. Copy, I said, setting the radio down. What the hell just happened? Did I just kill an innocent man? Landry asked. Yes, you did, I said.

No more sugar-coating this. He fucked up, and he needed to know it. Now buckle up. But he was going to hurt us, right? He was going to kill us. I shook my head. You really didn't read the intel package, did you? What happened back there was nothing but shape-shifting,

reality-bending, like a special effects show. Underneath the scary exterior was just an old librarian with a memetic god in his skull. He wouldn't have been able to hurt us. At least, not bad. Now buckle the hell up. While I spoke, I looked into the rearview mirror at the scrapes down my face from the old lady.

They weren't bad. It was about the extent of what the old man could have done to us without any weapons. He didn't need to die for it. Retracing our route, I guided the SUV around a corner. Up ahead in the street was a small crowd of people, and they were armed with guns. Shit, I said, slamming the brakes and throwing the vehicle into reverse. It has spread to over 10,000 people. Every person in the town must be infected.

That's not a reality-bending trick? Those guns are real? This is small-town America. Of course the guns are real, I said, whipping the vehicle around to head a different way. It wasn't lost on me that we were the only vehicle on the road. Not good. Blandry still hadn't buckled up, but I wasn't about to tell him a third time. I had bigger things to worry about.

I hit the gas, recalling the map of the town I'd studied. I figured we could bypass the crowd by turning onto an adjacent street and going past the town hall. As I took the left onto Carey Street, bringing the town hall into view, I knew we were pretty much screwed. The crowd, blocking the street ahead, was even larger than the one we'd just run from. Before I could even get the vehicle into reverse again, a glance in my rearview mirror told me it wasn't going to be so easy this time. Several cars had pulled up, and we were blocking the street behind us.

Oh, shit, I said. This is bad. What the fuck is that? Landry shouted, pointing through the windshield at the sky. I followed his gaze seeing what looked like a hole made of pure black sitting in the sky. Although it was hard to tell the scale, I figured the onyx hole was probably a few hundred feet in diameter. Keeping my gaze fixed on that hole, I reached for the radio and brought it to my mouth. But before I depressed the button to talk, something emerged from the hole in the sky.

An elaborate display of massive, blue-glowing antlers came slowly through the hole. It looked like the skull of some ancient beast, spikes of all sizes, extending up and down, filling the portal between dimensions. But then the skull split, and a humanoid shape, brilliant white but still glowing blue, emerged from within. There was only a blood-red oval where the face should have been. It raised its four human-like arms, spreading them out as it surveyed all the people under its control.

The whispering of a hundred thousand voices crashed into my head, rocking me back in the seat. I was vaguely aware of Landry, grabbing his head and grunting, doubling over in his seat. For a moment that seemed like an eternity, I thought my brain was going to explode. All those voices tried to rip me apart from the inside, but I held against them, despite the pain and the Herculane effort that drained my energy in little more than an instant. It wasn't me that was fending the voices off, though.

It was Class X amnestics I'd been dosed with before this job. Landry also had the drugs coursing through his system, but they wouldn't work forever. If 2440 grew much more powerful, there would be no stopping it from invasion. our heads. In my hand, the radio crackled, bringing me back to myself as the whispers faded to a dull roar. Denbro, you there? L.T. asked. Are you seeing this? Gasp, I answered. Yes, I'm seeing it. Next to me, Landry had straightened and was looking at me, terror contorting his features. You know what to do, LT said. Copy that. I'll put the radio back. God damn it! I slammed my hand into the wheel. What are we supposed to do? What is he talking?

about. 2440 gets its power from the number of people it infects, I told Landry, leaving the rest for him to figure out. As if they knew what was about to happen, the crowd of people up ahead started firing their weapons at us. Bullets thumped into the bulletproof windshield and the vehicle's armored body. But you said they were innocent, Landry managed. They are, I said, flipping down the control panel in the middle of the steering wheel and pressing a button. I heard the whirring of motors as the mini gun extended from the roof. The camera feed came up on a screen in the middle of the dashboard. I pressed the red button on the control panel.

The SUV shook as the minigone fired 7.62 millimeter NATO rounds at a rate of 4,000 rounds per minute. The bullets tore through the crowd, blasting through flesh and ending lives almost too fast to comprehend. Still, people fired on us. Rounds hitting the vehicle on all sides now, steadily breaking down the integrity of the bullet-proof glass. But there was a clear patch of windshield,

through which I could still see the sealed god floating in the sky. It wasn't enough. More had to die. Shifting to a different control panel, I hit a button. There was a loud sound, and a projectile art out from the vehicle, exploding amid the crowd. Bodies flew like dolls. Arms, legs, and heads tumbled through the air. Still, the sealed god was there in the sky. I had killed so many already. How many had it infected?

How many more had to die to protect the human race? Danger close, LT said over the radio. His words barely broke through my stupor as I kept firing the minigun and shooting projectiles into the crowd. What did break through my stupor was the whooshing sound of a jet coming low over the SUV. On the camera feed in the dashboard, I watched as the jet streak toward the crowd, dropping missiles before it turned, staying well away from 2440 as it made its ascent. The missiles exploded, obliterating the crowd.

The shockwave lifted the SUV off the car, the road, Landry screamed as we tumbled through the air. I stumbled away from the smoldering, upturned SUV, looking over my shoulder into the sky. The sealed god was gone. Between the bullets, the grenades, and the missiles, we'd killed enough people to reduce its power. For now, an SUV came to a screeching halt next to me as I appeared at the carnage that had once been a crowd of American citizens. It was a damn war zone. LT hopped out of the vehicle, along with several others from Site 88. He stood next to me, surveying the scene.

Ichabod dead? He asked. Landry's dead, yeah, I told him. He should have buckled up. I looked out at the carnage for a long moment before turning my back on it and limping away. We'd done what we had to do, but that didn't make things any easier. In this business, it can be hard to tell the successes from the failures. SCP 2440 is an extra-dimensional entity whose power increases proportionally to the number of people who are aware of it.

SCP 2440 uses a memetic agent that can be inserted into virtually any source of information, including text, images, verbal phrases, and auditory stimuli. Conscious recognition of said memetic agent is not necessary. A simple visual recognition is capable of infecting individuals. Individuals display varying degrees of self-control that can differ based on the number of people who are currently infected. In addition, if SCP 2440 reaches a certain degree of awareness, it is capable of overtaking the body of an infected individual and controlling it. The entity is capable of controlling the actions of multiple infected individuals to some degree, but can extend its influence past infected individuals if it reaches a certain degree of awareness in the world.