The SCP Experience - The Void Gazes Back | SCP-4827

Episode Date: March 10, 2025

When a deep-space observation mission near a black hole turns into a waking nightmare, a crew’s harmless ghost stories begin manifesting into violent, impossible realities—forcing the lone survivor to question what’s real, what’s supernatural, and what followed them out of the dark. This story was derived from https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/scp-4827 and is released under Creative Commons Sharealike 3.0. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/ Author: Matt Doggett * * * 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 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The call was coming from inside the house. Nazir waggles his fingers from his seat at the round table. Boo! That is the most cliche ghost story ever. Stinson says, shaking her head. You couldn't come up with something better? Yeah, man, Thorpe says. That story sucked. That's commander to you, Nazir says with a smile.

As in, yeah, commander, that story sucked. Besides, I told the crappy story on purpose to set the bar low. This way, whoever goes to go. Because next, we'll automatically have a better story. That's just the kind of commander I am. I roll my eyes dramatically. Yeah, how thoughtful of you. We all have a good laugh.

And after six months on this spaceship, it's just what we need. Laughter has grown less and less frequent, since we arrived to observe a black hole designated X-0620 by NASA. And we're barely halfway through our stint here. Okay, who's next? Commander Nazir says, running a hand over his close-cut salt and pepper hair. The dark circles under his eyes, enhanced by his already dark skin,

have grown more pronounced since the mission started. But he seems in good spirits now, which is a definite change from his normal uptight demeanor. I got one, Stinson says, raising her hand. Shoot! Okay, have you guys ever actually tried saying Bloody Mary three times in front of a mirror in a dark room? Of course!

Thorpe says, absently scraping his dish of meal paste with a spoon. Everyone has. Yeah, but did you actually believe it when you did it? Because I did. I was certain that Bloody Mary would show up and pull me into the mirror or kill me or something. But my older brothers wouldn't let me out of the bathroom until I said it. Those assholes took the light bulbs out so I couldn't turn them on. And it was night out, so the room was pitch black.

After a bunch of crying and banging on the door, I finally convinced myself to just say the words. I told myself it was all fake and that nothing would happen. But deep down, I knew it was real. I knew it. So what happened? I asked. Did she show up? She did, but not in the way you think.

I said the words and my brothers kept me in there until I started screaming and crying like crazy. That was when they knew they'd gone too far. So they let me out. and you know what? I had my eyes closed from when I said the words to when they opened the door. I still think if I had opened my eyes, I would have seen her in the mirror.

But I kept my eyes closed, and I didn't see her until the next night when I went to the bathroom to get ready for bed. I had the lights on and everything, and I was brushing my teeth when suddenly the lights went out, like someone hit the switch, and I saw her in the shower behind me.

She looked, hideous. Her eyes had been scratched out, Her lips removed. Maybe she'd bit them off herself, I don't know. But that's what it looked like. Her neck was sliced open, and blood was pouring down under her white nightgown. She had frizzy red hair that was missing chunks, revealing bloody patches of scalp. She reached out for me, and I felt her fingers on my shoulder as I ran out of the bathroom screaming.

Stinson stops talking. Her already pale face, the color of milk. Her green eyes look haunted in a way I didn't think was possible. It's clear she believes every word of what she just told us. The three of us stare at her for a long time, expecting her to go on, but she doesn't. So what happened? Thorpe asks. Did you see her again? Oh, yes. I kept seeing her whenever I went into the bathroom.

It got to where I couldn't go in there anymore. My parents thought I was losing my mind. My brothers did too. They put me in therapy. Eventually, we had to move. Once we moved, I never saw her again." Are you serious? Thorpe asks.

You really moved because of that? Yes, I'm serious. Damn, that's wild. Storytime took a dark turn, Mazir says. An insistent beeping starts from a speaker in the ceiling. We all know what it means. In unison, we get up from the table and hustle through the ship's artificial gravity to our stations. I get to mine and look at the information on the screen, fed to me by the ship's sensors.

It looks like the black hole is sending out powerful gamma-ray pulses from its accretion disc. We've seen this before, but not at this scale. We're far away from the black hole, but these rays look like they will reach us. Thankfully, the ship is lined with protective metals that will prevent the dangerous radiation from penetrating our bodies. I spend the next three hours analyzing and disseminating information gathered from the sensors. By the time the pulses stop, it's well into our scheduled sleep time. Nazir comes to my station and puts a hand on my shoulder. Get some rest. Yes, sir.

I head to my bunk with a strange sense of foreboding, weighing me down. I can't stop thinking about Stinson's Bloody Mary story. I try to shake it off as I change into my bedclothes and brush my teeth. But by the time I'm in bed, I'm sick to my stomach with worry. Something awful is going to happen. I'm sure of it. As sure as Stinson was about Bloody Mary. He wasn't a very nice guy at the end.

It wasn't really my fault. I mean, he'd always been a bit ornery, but the dementia just made him cruel. He would often hit his nurse. And even me whenever I was there to help, he'd just be lying there in bed while I was doing something, changing his IV or putting a blanket on him, and he would just crack me in the head without any warning. I mean, he was pretty weak at

that point, but it's still hurt. I'm barely listening to Thorpe's story, staring down at my half-eaten meal. It has been about 24 hours since Nazir had the great idea to tell each other ghost stories. But it seems like it has been 24 days. I'm beginning to think something is wrong with me. Maybe it's all the time up here in the sunless vacuum of space. I can't seem to slow my mind down. It's always racing, focusing only on all the awful things that might happen to us. So as Thorpe continues his story, which is really more of a therapy session, I try not to listen. Anyway, he died. Killed himself, actually. I never understood why he did it the way he did. I mean, he had all kinds of pills he could have taken. He would have just gone to sleep,

but instead, he used his IV needle to open up his veins. It must have taken. He must have taken. He must have taken him at least half an hour to do it, digging at his arms with that tiny needle. I was the one who discovered him when I went to check on him in the morning, after learning that the nurse had quit on us. There was blood everywhere. Just everywhere, it was awful. Thorpe pauses, gathering his thoughts. But the worst part wasn't even the blood. It was his eyes. They were still wide open when I stepped into the room. And for a moment, despite all the blood, and the gouges in his arms. I thought he was still alive. He was staring right at me when I came to the door. But his eyes had changed. The pupils were huge, and the corneas had clouded. Then there

were the dark spots and the whites of his eyes. Altogether, it looked like some kind of demon or something had taken over his body, and he was looking at me with his eyes. Only later did I learn that it's pretty normal for those changes to happen to a person's eyes after they're dead. But at the time, when I was just a teenager, it really freaked me out. I kept seeing my grandpa staring at me from dark corners of rooms at night, and in my nightmares. It really took a toll on me until I grew out of it in my late teens. I keep my eyes fixed on my dish as the silence stretches out. As usual, it's Nazir who breaks the uncomfortable pause. Damn, I thought we were going to tell fun ghost stories, he says, chuckling.

You guys got all serious on me. What about you, Beltran? You have any fun ghost stories? I feel all eyes turned to me. I shake my head. No. Come on. I bet you have one. Even if it's one we've all heard before. Let us have it. No. I see. I see. I see. I see. I say, lurching up from my seat. I don't want to tell any ghost stories. I don't want to hear any more either. I hustle out of the tiny kitchen and down toward my quarters, ignoring the apologetic calls for me to come back.

I step into my cabin, shut the door, and sit on my bunk with my head clasped between my hands. Flashes of Bloody Mary and Grandpa Thorpe erupt in my mind, or how I imagine them anyway. I never saw Bloody Mary for myself, and I never met Thor. grandpa, but their images are all too real in my mind's eye. I try to stop these gruesome flashes, clenching my teeth and shutting my eyes. I'm not sure how much time has passed when I hear a voice

come through the ship's communication system on my cabin's wall. It's Nasir. Beltrane, please come to the flight deck immediately. I repeat, Beltran, to the flight deck immediately. Takes me a moment to pull myself together before I head out of my cabin and to the flight deck. which is at the front of the ship, whereas the kitchen is at the back. But when I reach the deck, I find it empty. The cramped space is coated wall-to-wall with instrument panels. Our four seats sit empty. However, this also doubles as Nazir's research station,

so I'm half surprised to not find him here. As I step over to the communications panel, I hear a scream from back toward the cabin section of the ship. It's Dinson, screaming like she's being a... attacked. I spin around and run back the way I came. The lights in the ship flicker as I reach my cabin, finding the door open. It's pitch dark inside, despite the fact that there's clearly someone in my quarters. The motion sensor lights should have automatically come on. Another scream sounds, and I realize Stinson is in my cabin for some reason. I rush inside, desperate to see what's

happening. And in the flickering light from the hallway, I see that Stinson isn't alone in my room. Someone else is in here. I catch a glimpse of the person, a glimpse of frizzy red hair and gaping bloody eye sockets and a ragged, lipless mouth. Bloody Mary is clawing at Stinson's face, ripping her flesh open with sharp, claw-like nails. Stinson thrashes on the floor, the impossible nightmare figure, straddling her as she rips at her eyes and nose and mouth. After a crucial moment of shocked hesitation, I rush forward and grabbed for Stinson's attacker. But the moment I do, my hands close on nothing but air. Suddenly the lights are coming on, and I find myself kneeling over a still screaming and badly bleeding Stinson,

just as Nazir and Thorpe rush into the cabin. Stinson can't see. Her eyes have been gouged out, so she bats at my arms, thinking Bloody Mary is still attacking her. I open my mouth to tell her it's okay, to tell her and the other two what I saw. But the accusatory look on their faces stops the words in my throat. Get away from her! Thorpe shouts, tackling me against the wall.

I put up no resistance. even managing to say, I didn't do it several times. The words sound feeble because of their sheer impossibility. I'm the only one that could have done it. What I saw when I came in was impossible. I can only hope that Stinson will tell them it wasn't me. But as Thorpe gets me face down on my bed with his knee in my back,

Stinson screams only continue. I'm afraid she may have been blinded permanently. Blinded by Bloody Mary. Since no one ever anticipated having to hold someone against their wish, on the spaceship. There's nothing approaching a brig or a jail cell. But there is an airlock with an override code that only Nazir knows. That's where they put me so they can deal with Stinson without worrying about me attacking them. They don't believe me as I tell them what I saw. I hardly believe it myself. Even as the words come out of my mouth, I'm doubting their veracity.

Surely I was hallucinating. Maybe I have a brain tumor or something, and I really did attack Stinson, and I saw what I wanted to see. Then again, my fingers aren't caked in blood. My nails don't show any evidence that they've just been used to scratch a person's eyes out. They're barely even nails. I keep them neatly trimmed. So as I sit in the airlock, waiting for whatever comes next, I get to thinking. Although this mission is a joint effort between NASA and some secret government agency referred to only as the foundation, we know very little about what the foundation actually does. I get the feeling that Nazir knows more than the rest of us,

but that's to be expected because he's the commander. What if this is some kind of messed up experiment to test us? But that idea doesn't hold water for long. The U.S. government has spent hundreds of millions of dollars training the four of us. They wouldn't throw away all the investment on some strange experiment, would they? I've heard rumors about the foundation. Everyone involved with the project has. Rumors about paranormal happenings.

About strange creatures and impossible dimensions. Could that stuff be true? My scientific background revolts against the notion. While I'm still going around in circles, I see Nazir's head appear on the other side of the inner airlock window. He peers at me, and hits the transmit button on the communication panel. Stinson backs up your story. She says it wasn't you who attacked her. Is she okay?

No, she's not okay. If she doesn't get surgery soon, she'll probably lose sight in both eyes. Oh God, what the hell is happening? Did she say what her attacker looked like? Did she say it was Bloody Mary? Nazeer shakes his head in distress, as if he can't believe the words he's about to speak. She said something to that effect, yeah. But, there are some things about this mission that the rest of you aren't supposed to know. Things that I know. Things that I hardly believed when I heard them. Like what?

You knowing them is not going to change anything. I've already requested emergency help, and Thorpe is already setting a course to meet the rescue craft they're sending. But we're going to have to follow certain protocols from now on. We will be working in different sections, and we will not be communicating in public. be communicating in person. I will be the only one who can approve the opening of hatches in any given section, okay? You still think we're a threat to each other? There's something else going on here,

Commander. You need to tell us what you know. I can't, God damn it. You just need to be steady in your faith in me as the commander of this mission. As soon as we get out of range of the radiation emitted by the black hole, we should be safe. Should be? How long is that going to take? Before He hears something that doesn't make it through the communication panel. A frightened expression transforms his normally stoic features as he looks over his shoulder. What? What is it? Thor. Nizir says distractedly.

Commander, let me out of here. Please, let me out now. And I can help us get the hell out of here. Nazir shakes his head. I'll be right back. Wait, just a minute. Something has been bothering me. Right before Stinson was attacked, you called me to the flight tech, but you weren't even there.

Why did you do that? He gives me a puzzled look. I didn't call you to the flight deck. At least not then. I was still in the kitchen. No. You called me in my cabin and asked me to come to the flight deck. It was your voice.

Nazir shakes his head and looks over his shoulder again. Something's going on with Thor. I'll be right back. He turns and heads away as I bang on the door, yelling for him to let me out. Soon, he's gone from sight. I'm stuck in the airlock, unable to hear anything.

The only thing I can do is stare through the window. Several minutes pass before anything happens. The lights in the section abutting the airlock suddenly go out. Unlike the cabin lights, which are motion-activated, these lights are supposed to be on all the time. I moved to the communication panel and broadcast to the whole ship. Nasir? Thorpe, what's going on? Taking my finger off the button,

I wait for a reply before trying again and again. Finally, a familiar voice comes over the line. You might want to check on Stinson, Nizir says, sounding strange, almost gleeful. Then he gives me the code to get out of the airlock. The code works, opening the airlock door. The lights remain off. Looking around, I find a slender fire extinguisher just outside the airlock which I pick up and heft as a weapon. The ship is eerily quiet as I work my way down the dark passage.

down the dark passage, heading toward the Met Bay. As I move, Nazir's phrasing strikes me as oddly familiar. You might want to check on Stinson. Or not as much the phrasing as the way he said it. Then I realize why. It's from the ghost story Nazir told us the other day, the one about the babysitter and the man who was tormenting her from inside the house. It's the same phrasing he used yesterday, just with different words. You might want to check on the children. In his version of the story, the children were dead when the babysitter reached them. The story ended with her on the phone, with the 911 operator who had traced the call and said it was coming from inside the house. My pulse is going crazy as I reached the Medbay door and look through.

I can't see anything. The lights are off in there. I try to open the door, but it prompts me for a code. So I punch in the one Nazir gave me. It works. I step into the dark room, hoping the automatic lights come on. Something squelches under my foot, and I look down to see that I'm standing in a puddle of blood. The various instrument lights on the medical equipment provide just enough illumination for me to see that it's blood. Freezing, I peer around the dark room, just staring to discern shapes that make my stomach lurch. Done the lights come on.

A high-pitched shriek escapes my mouth as I see what's left of Stinson. It's as if she's been exploded. Her rib cage is exposed on one of the two Medbay gurneys, ripped open, and devoid of any internal organs. The rest of her is spread all over the room. A leg here, an arm there. Her insides coat the walls, and her blood drips from the ceiling. Her head sits atop a crash cart,

still intact aside from the injuries she sustained earlier. Only now there's something written on her forehead in blood. It's one word, a name. Mary. The lights go off, and as I'm plunged back into darkness, a figure blinks into existence, sitting cross-legged in the middle of the bloody floor. Her head hangs down, frizzy red hair obscuring her face,

but she slowly lifts her head up to look at me. Bloody Mary. Her eyes are gone, lips ripped off, neck, a bloody gash. I take a step back, and she explodes into action, crawling across the floor toward the door. I get the door closed just a moment before she reaches it. I run, at least as much one can run in a cramped spaceship. As I go, I shout for Thorpe and Nazir, but I receive no answer.

I don't see either of them until I reach the section of the ship that houses our cabins. Thorpe's cabin door is open, and the light inside flickers, illuminating two people. Thorpe is one of them, lying face up on his bed. The other is an old man I've never seen before. His back is to me, and he's leaning over Thorpe, palming the flight engineer's face and holding it to the pillow with his left hand while he makes violent stabbing motions with his other hand. I can't see his right hand because it's blocked by the old man's torso.

But I can see the left hand, and there's something strange about it, as if he's wearing a metal glove. I rush into the room, hefting the fire extinguisher. The old man gets turned around, and I catch a glimpse of his eyes. They're exactly as I imagined from Thorpe's description of his grandpa's eyes after he died. Part of me wants to freeze, or to turn and run away. Those eyes seem to bore into me like twin drills, but I resist the urge to flee. I smash the butt of the fire extinguisher into the old man's face.

He lashes out with his other hand, and I see that it's coated in tiny medical needles, like those you'd find on an IV line. There are thousands of them, all jutting out from the surface of his hand in all directions, and they're bloody. The sharp needles ripped through my jumpsuit and tear painful gouges in my skin. I hit him again and his face deforms oddly, like he's not made of flesh and bone, but of clay and brick. He goes down, and I hit him again.

When I turn my attention to Thorpe, I see the damage the old man is done. He not only ripped open both of Thorpe's forearms, but he also dug a massive pit into the man's stomach, shredding his organs. Thorpe's face is a mess of small holes from where the old man was holding his head down with his needle-shrouted left hand. But it looks like the old man paid particular attention to his eyes. Their horrid caves of ruined flesh and the formerly complex structures that made up his eyes

are now beyond recognition. Thorpe is dead, or if he's not, he will be shortly. Looking down at the old man, I see his face rebuilding itself. Taking the fire extinguisher with me, I run out of the room toward the flight deck. When I reach the deck, Nazir is standing next to the pilot's seat. His back to me as he peers out the small, reinforced windows separating us from the vacuum of space. Why are we moving?

I shout, pausing to shut and lock the door to the flight deck. Not that I'm sure it will keep those things out for long. When I turn back around to head for the co-pilot's chair, Nazir has half turned toward me, and I see that he's grinning. That's not all I see. Now that he's turned, he's revealed someone sitting in the pilot's chair,

someone that looks exactly like him, a doppelganger. The grinning Nazeer reaches out and grabs the sitting Nazir's head, tilting it toward me. One of the lightweight but hardy plastic sporks from the galley is sticking out of Nazir's right eye socket. His left eyeball dangles from its optic nerve, as though it has been scooped out of his head. Blood dribbles down his cheeks, soaking into his jumpsuit. What is it with the eyes? Why are they taking our eyes?

Is it because we're not supposed to see the black hole? By definition, we can't see it anyway. That's why it's called a black hole. It doesn't emit light. We can only see its effects on space and matter, like its accretion disk, the one from which the gamma rays came. The radiation that started this all,

if my hypothesis is correct. The grinning Nazir, the interloper, lets go of my dead commander's skull and takes a step toward me. The call was coming from inside the house. He waggles his fingers, even as he steps toward me. I throwed the extinguisher out of it, and then spin around to unlock the door. hoping it's enough of a distraction.

His fingers brush my back as I lurched through the doorway and toward the cabins. As I get to my cabin, all I can think of is closing the door. But the keypad only blinks a red light, indicating that someone has blocked my access. The light in my room isn't working either, and the passageway outside is dark. But I can still see them coming. Bloody Mary comes from the direction of the Medbay. Thorpe's grandfather comes stiff-leggedly out of the flight engineer's cabin. And Nazir, the clone, comes from the flight deck.

They're closing from every direction. I have nowhere else to run. I collapse onto my bunk and pull my knees to my chest. Like a frightened child, I shut my eyes and hope the monsters will go away. But I can still hear them. I can hear the blood dripping from Mary's wounds. I can hear the faint tinkling of metal on metal as the needles work against each other while Thorpe's grandfather flexes his hands.

And I can hear Nazir whispering gleefully, The call was coming from inside the house. Unable to help myself, I opened my eyes one last time, seeing the three of them looming over my bunk. OS-13, come in. This is MTF, new nine. We have visual. Is anyone there? I can't see the communication panel. I can't see anything. But I can hear the man's voice just fine. If I could see, I could probably look out the window and see the approaching rescue ship as a small dot in all that blackness. Come in, OS-13. Come in. A gentle hand guides my finger to the transmit button.

I push it down and speak with a voice that I haven't used in weeks. This is Flight Engineer Beltran on OS 13. Jesus, we thought you guys were dead. Glad to hear your voice. We'll be docking in less than an hour. Are there other survivors? I pause for a moment as a smile comes across my face. I barely register the pain the movement causes,

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