The SCP Experience - The Puppet Master | SCP-2657

Episode Date: July 18, 2022

SCP Foundation EUCLID class object, SCP-2657: The Puppet Master This story was derived from https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/scp-2657, 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. #drscp #scp #scpfoundation #doctorscp #scpencounters #securecontainprotect #scpstories #scpexplained #whatisscp Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Clutching the bottle of cheap bourbon in one hand, I listened to the cries for help. They echo through the abandoned factory and bounce around inside my head, stirring up memories I thought I'd drowned in booze long ago. That sounds like a little girl, Roger says, watery eyes gazing into the dark interior of the hulking factory. A swift summer breeze stirs his scraggly gray beard, but isn't strong enough to agitate his dirty, matted hair. The breeze brings with it the familiar tang of his body odor. Or maybe that's mine. It's hard to tell at this point. We've been traveling together for so long, eating and drinking the same things. We probably smell the same. Help, please, help me. The voice calls again

from the old factory, where it hunches against the night. We ought to go in and help her, Roger says, looking down at me. I sit in the weeds, my back, propped against a large rusting pipe, abandoned in the factory yard. I bring the bottle of cheap bourbon up to my lips and take a long pull. As the fiery liquid scratches its way down my throat, I return the bottle to the protective shell made by my pulled-up thighs and my abdomen. I don't want to go in there, miss A say. She sounds just like her. This second sentence, I don't really mean to say out loud.

But sometimes I say the things I shouldn't. The things that I'm thinking. Just like who? Roger asks. I didn't say anything. I say. Roger drops it. He knows me well.

Returning his gaze to the factory door. His eyes narrow. It's the middle of the night in this small southern town. I don't even know the name of it. I don't know the names of most towns along this stretch of railroad track. We jumped off the train and headed into town to find some food and booze. We didn't find no food, but we had enough change scrounged for a bottle of bourbon, so that's what we got.

We'd seen the factory as we headed away from the train yard and toward town, and at that time, we thought it would be a good place to stay the night. But as soon as we came back, we heard the voice from in. inside. The little girl's voice. The sound of it makes my stomach convulse. It makes me want to vomit. It ain't no ghost, Roger says to me after thinking for a long moment. I can hear it too, so it ain't no ghost come back to haunt you, if that's what you're thinking. He pauses, waiting to see if I'll answer. I don't. That's an honest-to-god little girl in there, he says. She must be hurt. We got to help.

"'We're the only ones around.' "'Don't go in there, Roger,' I say to him. "'Some things's wrong.' "'Rogger sucks his teeth and strokes his raggedy beard, "'which almost goes down to his belly button. "'Help me, please!' "'The girl's voice sends chills down my spine. "'I take another greedy swig from the bottle,

"'as if it will help quell my quaking stomach.' "'Ah, hell!' Roger says, "'putting his hand out for the bottle. Give me some of that. I'll go in and get her my damn self. I hand the bottle up to him. He tilts his grimy head back and drinks, his prominent Adam's apple bouncing in his throat. You just watch your stuff, he says, handing the bottle back to me. Our threadbare backpacks are leaning against the pipe next to me. Wait, I say, standing up on cracking knees.

Wait, I guess. I'll go to the door with you and watch your back. watch your back. As much as I don't want to go in there, as much as I feel there's something bad lurking in the darkness. I can't let Roger go alone. He's my partner. We watch each other's backs. It's the only way to survive, living the way we do. Roger smiles through his beard. Hell, I knew we was friends for a reason. I twist the gap back onto the bottle of bourbon, but I don't leave it with our bags. I keep it in my right hand. I have a feeling I'll want it. Roger takes the lead, walking through weeds in the weak moonlight.

I take a breath and follow. We had a flashlight, but Roger broke it when we were behind the eight ball just outside of Fort Worth. A man was trying to rob us of our bottle at knife point, but Roger bashed him in the head with the flashlight. We haven't made enough money yet to buy another one. Roger slows as he comes to the wide doorway, peering inside. I step up beside him and do the same. There's not much to be seen, just a bunch of shapes.

I look to the windows. I can clearly see them from outside, but there's no moonlight coming through them. It's too dark to see why, but I assume they've been boarded up for some reason. Help me, please. It's my leg. The little girl cries. We're coming. Just hold on while we'll find you.

Roger shouts. It sounds like she's all the way in the back, I say. Sure does. We stand for a few long moments. I can tell Roger doesn't want to go into the dark. I can tell he's suddenly uneasy. But when the girl calls out again, he seems to snap out of it.

Well, let's get this over with, he says. He steps over the threshold and takes a couple of short strides before looking over his shoulder at me. You coming? My legs refuse to work. Fearful memory stymie my ability to think. clearly. That little girl sounds so much like her. I open my mouth to speak, but nothing comes out. It's okay, Benny, Roger says. I got this. You just stay there and keep a lookout. If I get in trouble, you hear us both calling out for help. He says this chuckling, trying to ease the tension.

I stand and watch helplessly as Roger fades slowly from view into the darkness of the factory. Where are you? Hear him call. Help me. I'm coming, I'm coming. Just keep talking. All I can hear is the soft movement of footsteps for several long moments. Then Roger speaks again. There you are.

I see. His words are suddenly snubbed with a surprised noise. Roger? I call out. Roger, what happened? There's nothing but a muffled sound. Like Roger is trying to speak with a hand over his mouth. Roger, talk to me.

I say stepping across the threshold without even realizing it. without even realizing it. There's only silence. I stepped further into the factory, bottle of bourbon still in my right hand. HAL! Roger calls. Help, Pini!

What happened? Is the little girl there with you? Hell, Beanie! Roger calls again. I'm coming! I say, moving deeper into the darkness. Soon I see only vague shapes ahead of me. I step over debris and around abandoned machinery,

moving slowly and with a pounding. heart. The bourbon in my stomach feels like wet concrete weighing me down. Squinting my eyes, I see what looks like billowy white curtains toward the back of the wide factory. They seem to cover nearly every surface. But before I can think why there would be curtains set up in an old factory, I see movement ahead. Roger says from somewhere ahead, near the movement. Is that you? I say, craning my neck forward, trying to see clearly despite the lack of night. The shape of a little girl comes into view, albeit darkly.

She's standing amid the curtains, facing me. I can't make out the colors, but it looks like she's wearing a summer dress. As I get closer, the girl moves away, disappearing behind a large, dark shape, draped in curtains. There's something strange about her movements, almost like she's floating. I realize as I come to the place where she was just standing that I didn't. here any footsteps as she moved. Something is terribly wrong here. Without thinking, I raised the bourbon bottle and unscrew the cap. I tilt my head back to take a swig. Suddenly seeing a massive spider descending on me, I jerk away on reflex, feeling one of its long legs scrape along my back

as I move. I turn around after two steps, not quite believing what I've just seen. The man-sized spider rears up toward me, hitting me with its two front legs and knocking me onto my back. As I hit the ground. The mouth full of bourbon I haven't yet swallowed spews out of my mouth and right into four of the spider's eight eyes. The creature shrieks and backs away, twitching angrily. I scramble up, realizing that I've lost the cap, but I've managed to protect the bottle, something that has become second nature to me over the years. I make it four steps before I trip over something and go crashing to the floor. This time, the bottle comes out of my hand and slides along the floor, unbroken, but emptying its contents. The skittering of limbs causes me

to turn around. The spider rushes forward, coming in for a second attack. I can see its savage fangs, dark against the slightly lighter color of its body. The thing is too fast. I have no chance, so I don't move. I wait for my fate, thinking about my poor, dead daughter, and about the poor little girl who's stuck in here. But the spider doesn't attack me. It runs up to the thing I tripped over and starts rolling it away from me with its front legs. As it goes, I realize that the thing it's rolling away is Roger, wrapped up in spider webs. I can just see his face through a thin layer of webs. I suddenly realize that what I thought was curtains is actually webbing. Moving quickly, I grabbed the bottle of bourbon, which has about a third left inside, and pour my

mouth full of this stuff. I stepped forward and spew it into the spider's eyes again. As soon as the spider scampers away, I set the bottle aside and grab Roger's feet. There's a corner nearby, and I drag him over to it. I'd then run back and grab the bottle, taking it with me to the corner. Roger, wake up, I say, shaking him and clearing the sticky spider webs from his face. Wake up! He doesn't move. I press my fingers to his neck to check for a pulse. His skin gives way, and my fingers plunge into his neck like it's made of jello. I cry out, pulling my fingers back, and looking at the bloody goo that coats them. My stomach convulses, and I resist the urge to vomit.

The spider injected him with something, and it's turning his insides into liquid. I wipe my fingers on Roger, afraid it'll eat through my skin. My jaw is clenched tight, a wave of seething anger pulsing through me. I take the last of the bourbon into my mouth and smash the bottle against the wall, creating a weapon. It doesn't take long for the spider to show up again. It appears out of the darkness like a freight train, bearing down on me and Roger. Its front two legs slam me into the wall, piercing the skin of my shoulders and sending brilliant webs of pain through me. The impact is so surprising and painful that I opened my mouth to cry out, the bourbon draining out and down my chin.

I thrust up with the broken bottle, stabbing at its belly or abdomen, or whatever it's called on a spider. But the spider's body is tough, and the bottle breaks even further on it, like I'm stabbing a rock. Its black fangs drip liquid as the spider eases them down toward me. I raised my left hand up underneath the fangs, just out of their reach, and pushed back. It's no use. I'm not strong enough.

I think about my daughter, trapped in the rubble of our house after that long ago earthquake, calling to me for help. I lost her and my wife that day. Both my legs had been pinned and broken in the rubble, and I could do nothing but listen to my daughter's calls, telling her I was there for her. But I wasn't. I couldn't get to her, and she died before the rescue workers could get to us. My stomach convulses again. Automatically, I resist the urge to vomit. The fangs are close now. I dropped the jagged bottleneck, which clatters at my feet. I use both arms to push the thing away, but it's too strong.

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free on the machine assuble, basque deposit conditions apply. And something occurs to me. I think of my daughter. I remember the anger,

sorrow and sickness I felt when I was unable to help her. And I remember how it felt as my fingers pressed through Roger's neck. I feel the bourbon sitting heavy in my gut. My stomach convulses again. And this time I let it reject. let it reject the bourbon.

The vomit spews out of my mouth and into the spider's eyes. The creature shrieks, an almost human sound, and yanks its legs out of my shoulders. I fall to my knees as the spider backs away, shaking itself to clear the bourbon vomit from its eyes. The broken bottleneck is within reach, still sharp enough to do some damage if I use it right. Swiping up the bottleneck, I lunge forward,

jumping over Roger's body and slamming the thick piece of broken glass down into one of the spider's eyes. eyes. It shrieks again and pulls away, but I run with it, slamming it down seven more times into the thing's other eyes. By the time I'm done, the spider is no longer moving. I've killed it. Breathing hard, I walk on shaky legs over toward where I saw the girl go earlier. I see a pile of what at first looks like bodies. But as I get closer, I see that they're not bodies at all. They're puppets made of spider webs and other items that were probably found. around the factory. The lowest puppets in the pile are crude approximations of humans,

but they get better and better the higher on the pile I look. The top puppet on the pile is a life-sized model of a little girl in a dress. The dress is made from raggedy old curtains, the hair made of long yellowed grass. In the dark, it looked just like a real person. The puppet has a couple of thick web strands attached to it, running up toward the ceiling. That's why it seemed like the girl was floating when I saw her. She was. The damn spider was controlling the puppet from up above, luring me in. I recall the human-sounding shriek the spider made when I stabbed it. The girl was never real. The spider was somehow making her voice, imitating something it had heard before, and it had done the same thing with Roger's voice. All the words it used were ones

it heard Roger use when we were nearby. I head back over to Roger's body and drag him out out of the factory for a proper burial. It takes me a long time to get him out, but I do. And as I'm moving him through the weeds toward the pipe, three words come to me from deep inside the factory. A little girl's words. Please help me. SCP 2657 is an arachnid closely resembling an orb weaving spider.

It has a leg span of almost nine feet, a body length of three feet and weighs 62. It has a pair of jackknife shellaceae, or fangs, that are capable of delivering a potent neuromuscular blocking venom. After injection of the venom, SCP 2657 further immobilizes its prey with swathing bands and will proceed to saturate its prey with digestive enzymes. Once organic material dissolves into a semi-consumable state, SCP 2657 further breaks the material down and ingests the resulting soup. SCP-2657 utilizes several hunting strategies, including silk bollas and web traps.

The most common hunting strategy is vocal mimicry of intended prey, coupled with allure. It can imitate a variety of animals, including human speech patterns in the English language. Dissections and vivisections of the spawn of SCP 2657 have revealed no manner of articulation or other anatomical features capable of producing such vocalizations, and the presence of book lungs further support an anomalous origin. The corresponding lure is manufactured by SCP 2657 out of silk and available detritus, and typically forms a simulacrum of the species being vocally imitated. In order to attract prey,

SCP 2657 will conceal itself while manipulating the lure via silk threads, and engage in vocal mimicry. The most common lure produced is that of a distressed human child, approximately six years of age. This hunting behavior has only been observed at night or during low-light conditions.