"That's a nice shotgun, by the way," Clef said to Tali as they neared the facility entrance.

"Thanks. Are you going to tell me about your brilliant plan, or do I have to guess?"

"It's not so much a plan as it is a 'let's throw a monkey wrench in the works and see what happens.' Lots of variables, lots of pieces to put into play, and not a lot of time to get it done." He grabbed her wrist and started punching in coordinates and codes to her omnitool, downloading a map of the interior and marking out all the major checkpoints. "We're here," he said, indicating the pulsing orange dot at the western edge of the schematic, "and John is here, in the south near the research wing. I've put out an advisory that all personnel should remain in or near their quarters—we do random checks here all the time, they won't question it." He shot his cuffs and checked his watch. "You'll have three or four minutes to find John before everything starts, and then another ten to get him and Cain and get out. Any longer than that, and you'll risk being caught out when the containment teams arrive."

"Containment teams? What exactly do you plan on doing, Clef?"

"Nothing much," he said with a grin that was disconcertingly wide. Tali thought for a minute that his lips would just keep stretching to his ears until they split his head in half. "Just gonna raise a little hell."


"John . . . this doesn't have to be difficult," Gears was saying. Cain stood with his hands clasped loosely in front of him, watching the exchange.

"If it was just you and me, I'd tell you the whole story. Hell, I'd fill you in on all the crazy shit I've been through these past couple years, but you're with the Foundation."

"I've been with the Foundation longer than most of the staff, and that's really saying something."

"But when you and I were acquainted, you were a skip like me. At least, everyone thought you were. Now, though . . ." John tsked and shook his head. "Now, you're working for them. Shiny new badge and everything."

The Doctor sighed and stood, beckoning to Cain. "Come on, then. I don't think we'll be getting anything out of him tonight. Maybe we'll give him some time to think about his predicament." Cain gave a little bow and followed Gears from the room. The door clanged shut and the bolt slid into place with a whispery brush of metal against metal. The silence that descended filled his head and he looked around, clocking all the minute details he might have missed during his imprisonment. It didn't matter any more now than it did then—he was locked in, and there would be no getting out again until someone let him out. He tried not to think about what Tali was doing right now; the panic that closed in on his heart would be of no use to him when his chance at freedom presented itself.

His eyes landed on the folder on the floor beside the folding chair Gears had been sitting in—John's file. As he flipped through the thick sheaf of pages, moments from his past jumped up at him. The entries read a bit like Mordin's stilted speech.

"Subject appears to be able to regrow any flesh removed during death state."

"Relationship between 4762 and 076 progressing well. Appears that there may be some truth to Dr. Alto Clef's claims that 4762 may be a type green, or 'reality shifter'."

"Analysis of flesh taken from subject indicates rapid cell regeneration. May be something marketable here."

"O5s have begun looking into Taskforce Omega-7, and possible reasons for its failure. Control of Able has been impossible in the past; perhaps the inclusion of 4762 would be the key."

He'd suspected they were trying to militarize his abilities, and that Able had to fit into that somehow, but to see it all written out in black and white was another matter entirely. For twelve years, he'd been manipulated, used, and tortured by the Foundation. Gears had said that they didn't always operate with such brutality, that at one time they had been a much more compassionate research facility interested merely in containment of dangerous SCPs. In those days, John might have been released under observation, but for some reason the Foundation's objectives had become skewed. Maybe there was a change in human behavior along the line, maybe there was someone up the chain of command who had gone a little screwy. All John knew was that the way he'd been treated had been monstrous, and that part of his nature could be chalked up to growing up within these four walls. He had become the Butcher of Torfan, after all. Him and Jane, both.

About midway through the file he stopped, convinced that his eyes had to be deceiving him. He was tired and worried about Tali and there was no way—

But there it was, clear as day in the corner of one of the older documents: a golden hexagon flanked on either side with half-outlines of the same shape. The Cerberus logo, right there on a twenty-year-old medical report. Before he could begin to wonder at the implications of this find, the lights went out.


"What in the actual fuck . . ."

Gears, after maybe thirty minutes of unproductive back-and-forth, had gone and left the file he'd been carrying. At first she hadn't wanted to look at it, but as the silence stretched out, curiosity got the better of her and she started flipping through it. The Cerberus logo jumped out at her almost immediately and she stopped cold, staring at the paper. Another thread added to the tapestry spooling out before her and behind her that encompassed everyone she knew, and she couldn't help but feel as though she were caught in a web while a giant spider waited to wrap her up in it.

She ran the tip of her finger over the gold-printed symbol, tracing the slightly raised edges, when the room suddenly went pitch-black. Her heart jumped into her throat as she flipped through her mental directory of what might have the capability to do something like this. But if anything had broken free, there should be—

"Alert: level three containment breach. Lockdown initiated. Ten minutes to code blue."

She wasn't familiar with all of the Foundation's containment protocols, but she knew what a code blue meant—something had escaped from the Keter wing. If it wasn't returned to its cell within ten minutes, the spec ops teams would arrive to handle the situation.

In the blackness of the interrogation room, she could hear the lock sliding back followed by the thick door swinging open. Jane stood up as silently as she could and started backing toward the wall, straining to see anything in the darkness. She could hear it breathing, whatever it was. There was a tiny click and suddenly the room exploded with light and she cried out, shielding her eyes. The thing laughed and the light shifted to the floor, and she looked up to see the intruder.

"Hello, Jane," Clef said. "Fancy meeting you here."

Her hands clenched into fists seemingly of their own volition, and she hurled a punch at the traitorous bastard's face. She hadn't really expected it to connect, but there was a muffled crack when it did and Clef reeled back, blood pouring from his split lip.

"Well, that was uncalled for."

"You sold us out, you fucking—"

"I got you in, as promised. And now," he said, tossing a flashlight and a loaded Kessler her way, "I'm here to get you out."

She checked the weapon over and saw that it was one of hers. "And Garrus."

"What was that?"

"You heard me. We're taking Garrus, too." Never hurt to clarify where Clef was concerned.

"Yes, yes, of course we are. Now come on and stay close—there are some nasty things about, as I'm sure you've heard." He started out into the hallway and Jane followed.

"You mean that wasn't just a false alarm?" she asked. If there were Keter-class SCPs between them and the exit—

Clef looked back over his shoulder with a raised eyebrow. "Well, yeah. False alarms aren't nearly as much fun as the real thing."

Jane shook her head and started working on the lock to the adjacent room where she thought Garrus had to be. "You're insane, do you know that?"

"Nobody's perfect. Now hurry up before we all get eaten."

Shepard unlocked the door—a relatively easy feat since these rooms were meant to keep people in rather than out—and called out to Garrus to prevent being surprised by a talon in the face. It was a good thing, too; he was poised for combat just inside the door. She handed him her gun and he raised a brow plate at her.

"Don't shoot anything unless you absolutely have to," she instructed him, calling over her shoulder as she went back into the other room to retrieve her file. She rolled it up and tucked it into her waistband for safe-keeping. "I mean it. Keep the safety on and don't fire at anything that isn't actively trying to kill you."

"Yes, ma'am." He aimed the pistol at the floor and started to take the flank like he usually did, but she repositioned him between herself and Clef before moving out into the corridor. She felt so naked without her armor on and missed the weight of her guns at her back, but this wasn't going to be a firefight. If it came to the point where they needed guns, it would be too late for them anyway. The lack of protection was making Garrus, who looked so much less substantial without all that bulky metal, very antsy as well.

Caged lights in the walls strobed red and the overhead fluorescents threw everything into stark relief, illuminating every corner. Jane heard the pounding of boots in an adjacent hallway heading off into the Keter wing followed by a man shouting orders at his team then, a few seconds later, terrified screams punctuated by loud cracking sounds. Garrus tried to look everywhere at once for the source of the threat, but the long unbroken stretch of hallway gave no sign.

Their luck held until they reached the first turn when Jane was suddenly frozen to the spot. Her blood felt like it had been replaced with ice water and her mind went blank with gibbering panic, but there was no threat to be seen. Behind her, Garrus had stopped as well and was making a low sustained moan. Jane pushed against the wall, trying to melt into it and get away from the horrible twisting in her guts, and fumbled back toward Garrus. He took her hand in his, his fingers cold even through his gloves.

"Just hang tight, it'll pass," Clef whispered, high and pinched, his breath coming fast and shallow. Just before the overheads flickered and went out, dousing the facility in darkness except for the strobing red emergency lighting, a shape appeared at the small square window of the cell door across from them. It was an emaciated skin-covered skull with a mouth so large it would have been comical were it not grinning a horrific Cheshire cat grin through the reinforced glass. It made a high-pitched wheezing noise that shouldn't have been audible through the thick door, but Jane could hear it anyway.

The thing wormed its way into her head and she could see it, the reddish-brown mummified skin wrapped tightly over its misshapen skeleton. She tried to move away, but her feet were rooted to the spot. It might have been minutes or hours later that the thing finally retreated and the terror lifted from them enough that they could start moving again. Garrus stayed so close to her after that she worried he might trip over her heels.

They turned right and went carefully down the next hall, this one broken by cell doors on either side. According to the map Clef sent her, they'd have to pass right by the Keter wing to get to Cain's cell and then make a break for the exit.

Seven minutes to go.


Tali knelt by the cell door, indistinguishable from the others on this hall except for a placard with the label "SCP-073" in raised letters. The locks were of the old-fashioned variety with bolts and tumblers, but she was the mechanical genius who kept the Normandy running; picking a lock was a pain in the ass compared to hacking, but she managed the task in record time despite her shaking hands.

"John?" she called as she pushed the door open. "Are you in here?" She heard him exhale and he came around the door holding a metal chair, folded flat, by the legs.

"Tali," he said, touching the side of her helmet. "I'm glad you're okay."

"Were you expecting company?" she asked, indicating the chair.

"Yeah, well, you know . . . have to use what you've got." It fell to the floor with a bang and he followed her out into the hall. She drew her shotgun and handed him a pistol, which he took gratefully. "Try not to shoot unless you have to. We need to get out undetected; no unnecessary noise."

"Got it."

John took point and Tali kept a watch on their flank as they moved, straining their ears for any sign of something closing in on them. "How did you know where to find me?" he asked.

"Doctor Clef gave me your coordinates, and a map of the facility."

"You met Clef? Did he say what he was planning to do?"

"I believe his words were, 'raise a little hell'."

"Crap. This could be really bad." They reached the first turn and Tali pointed to the right, and the fluorescents went black just as they reached an intersection. There was a snuffling sound coming from the corridor on the left and they inched down the wall with their weapons at the ready. John leaned around the corner and saw a pale white creature with freakishly long limbs crouched in the corner with its hands over its face. It was rocking back and forth, sniffing wetly as though it was crying. He leaned back against the wall and was just gearing up to pass the thing by when he heard booted feet thudding, dangerously close. He pushed Tali back a few feet and put his finger over his lips. She nodded and they waited for the guards to pass.

Flashlight beams bounced like will-o-the-wisps on the walls as the guards came closer and John was just about to tell Tali to start running when someone yelled, "Oh shit! Don't look at it, guys, don't look at its face!"

"What is th—"

"Fuck, fuck, fuck!"

From around the corner came an echoing wail of despair. The guards' panicked shouts were drowned out by an inhuman screech from the creature, and a white blur was all John saw before gunfire rattled through the enclosed space and punched holes in the wall near John's shoulder, little puffs of disintegrated plaster filling the air. He motioned to Tali and they ran across the hall as silently as possible, averting their eyes from the thing's face. They'd made it a good distance toward the Keter wing when Tali's shriek stopped John in his tracks. He wheeled around to see her standing in front of an open cell, a thick glistening rope wrapped around her neck. Her shotgun hung from limp fingers and she was making sounds that were trying to be petrified screams, but in her fear she couldn't get enough air into her lungs.

The rope went slack as a severed head with a tangled mass of internal organs depending from the bloodless stump of its neck floated into the hall. The rope was a prehensile length of small intestine that coiled around Tali's neck, digging into her veil. Long black hair flowed from its head and it snaked its grotesquely long tongue out to lap at the air. Its eyes were black and dead and empty.

John raced back to her and reached out to unwind the intestine from her, but it turned suddenly and hissed at him, showing off its (her, oh god, it's female) needle-like fangs. He aimed his gun at its temple but Tali raised her hand to stop him.

"Don't," she whispered. "I think it . . ." She cut off when another appendage, this one not as easily recognizable, stretched out and prodded Tali's abdomen. With another hiss, this one sounding suspiciously like frustration, the fleshy rope loosened and fell away from her and the disembodied head floated away, its hanging organs dragging along the wall.

Tali collapsed to her knees and clutched her chest. "Keelah, Shepard, what was that thing?"

"I don't know, but I don't want to be here if it comes back. Come on, let's get the hell out of here." He helped her to her feet and they rounded the corner toward the door marked "Authorized Personnel Only."

Six minutes.


They cut through the rooms set aside for the staff—break rooms, offices, dormitories, and rooms full of surveillance equipment. In here, there were no red strobe lights so they had to rely solely on their flashlights, the thin beams cutting through the darkness. Everyone was out trying to secure the escaped SCPs, so it seemed they had the place to themselves. Jane hurried over to a terminal under a bank of vid screens showing various parts of the facility. She pulled up a map of their route and started checking the feeds for any obstacles in their way while Garrus looked on over her shoulder.

"I'm beginning to see how you can handle yourself in stressful situations," he said.

"What do you mean?" The route they'd originally planned to take wasn't going to work anymore; one whole hallway was covered in a fleshy, pulsating substance and was spreading to cover all uninfected surfaces. There were some lumps on the floor that looked vaguely human, along with a rifle that was being covered by long tendrils of the flesh as she watched.

"You grew up here, in this place, surrounded by these . . . things. You must have been scared a lot of the time, and gotten used to it."

She sighed and shook her head. "You never really get used to being afraid all the time, but I developed certain coping mechanisms that help me work through it. If I didn't, I'd have spent most of my day curled up in the fetal position."

"But you didn't. That kind of resilience isn't exactly typical, Shepard."

"You're holding up fine, considering the circumstances."

"That's the thing. I'm not." She turned around and started to say something but Clef chose that moment to step up next to her.

"So, find anything yet?"

"I'm working on it. You know, this would have been a lot easier if you'd, say, just set off the fire alarms or something."

"We're still alive, aren't we? Oh, we can't go that way."

"Why not?"

"That's the viral ward. Don't want to get free just to unleash the zombie plague on the galaxy, do we?"

Jane's hands ached to hold a gun, preferably to jam it into Clef's ear. "Wanna remind me again why releasing the Keters was a good idea? Because I'm having a really hard time seeing it right now."

"You're a Euclid-class skip, Jane, and so is Cain. I had to get the guards aiming at things more dangerous than you until we get out of here, and nothing short of 682 was going to get that done. They're very serious about their jobs, but with everything that's out there, they'll likely just write us off and let us go."

"I'm sensing an ulterior motive."

Clef just smiled a secretive smile and watched the flickering images on the screens. "I thrive on chaos, and the fact that this makes the Foundation head look really bad isn't exactly small potatoes, either."

"Aren't they going to bring the hammer down on you, too? They have to know you were involved."

"No, all I had to do was put a little nick in the Old Man's container which will never show up in an investigation, given what he can do. It won't be traced back to me, but they've suspected I'm involved with the GOC for a while now. My time here may be over, at least for now."

The feed changed again to show a room in the eastern part of the facility. There was a thin old woman in a long gray shift standing in the middle with thin hair-like strands, like webbing, extending from her body to every corner of the room. Her mouth and the front of her gown was covered in blood; it dripped thickly from her fingers.

"What's the GOC?" Garrus asked.

"Global Occult Coalition. They're sort of like the SCP Foundation, but more concerned with destruction rather than containment of anomalous artifacts."

"Can't say I disagree with that," said Jane. "So, are you?"

"Sometimes," he said softly, his eyes far away.

"Wait a minute," Jane said, her eyes widening. "You said you broke the Old Man out of containment?"

"Yep. Don't worry, though, he's not very fast."

It was like a scene out of a bad horror movie; as soon as the words left his mouth, there was a bang from behind them and the door dented inward. Garrus aimed into the darkened crack that had opened up but couldn't see anything to shoot. The metal started to corrode as rust bloomed over its warped surface and the hinges disintegrated. Garrus went to shove a desk in front of the doorway, but Clef grabbed him by the back of his cowl and yanked him back just before the tiled floor turned yellow and cracked, the edges peeling up from the floor. The foundation beneath began to crumble and collapse, and the decay spread toward them at an alarming rate.

"Shepard, we need to go."

"Hang on, I need to find a clear route." She flipped through the feeds and found a path that was relatively hazard-free except for one thing—a figure that stood still as a statue about halfway down the hall. It had a huge rounded head and stunted limbs attached to a doll-like body. Its face looked like it was covered in spray paint and its huge bulging green eyes stared unseeing at the wall. It was the one skip that everyone knew, the first one ever contained by the Foundation.

SCP-173, standing right between them and the exit.

Crap.

"Shepard!" Garrus shouted and pulled her away from the screens just as the floor gave out and the furniture followed the chucks of crumbling concrete into the void below. They ran out the door and into the Keter wing with the Old Man at their backs and monsters in front of them.

Four minutes.


"Where are they?" Able asked no one. His voice echoed in the vast space, as did his muffled footsteps as he paced. "They should have been back hours ago."

"The Commander routinely goes on long missions," said EDI, startling him out of his ruminating. "This one is no exception."

"Listen, machine, I know the man they are with very well. Believe me when I say that if the 'mission' has run over its projected time, it does not bode well for your intrepid commander."

"Your concern has been noted, and your comments forwarded to XO Lawson."

"And while you are doing that, they may all be dead."

"Given recent updates on the commander's biology, it is safe to say that death is only a temporary setback."

"You may believe you are amusing, machine, but I have much invested in their success." Perhaps all, in truth, he thought, and felt a pang of unease. He'd never cared much for humans in all his long life; he had always viewed them as little more than convenient cannon fodder or obstacles, and only very rarely as beings worthy of exchanging words. The little Shepard, though . . . never before had he felt this way about anyone. He understood emotions (inasmuch as he could take advantage of them, that was) and thought he could name the one currently residing in what passed for his heart.

Worry. He was actually worried about whether Shepard was all right. He was certainly worried about what that might mean for him when this was all over.

A thought occurred to him and he stopped pacing. "Machine? . . . EDI?"

"Yes, Able?"

"How high are we?"

"We are approximately 37 kilometers above the surface of Milwaukee, over the SCP facility."

He did some quick calculations and nodded to himself. "Open the doors."

"I cannot do that. Venting of the hangar is an emergency countermeasure reserved for—"

"Just do it," Able growled.

"Is it your intention to rescue the commander?" EDI asked.

"It is."

There was a pause as EDI did some calculations of her own, and then she replied, "If you recall, Commander Shepard ordered me to jettison you from the ship if you damaged it in any way."

Able grinned and rammed his fist into the side of the turbine closest to him and tore out a handful of wiring, leaving a gaping hole spitting sparks at his feet. An alarm blared and the bay doors hummed with a hydraulic whine.

"Warning: emergency venting in progress. All personnel please exit the hangar and prepare for de-pressurization." In a much smaller voice, EDI said, "Good luck."

"I will need it." Because this is really going to hurt. The doors cracked open and Able clung to the busted turbine until they had opened wide enough, then let go and was hurled into space. As he fell through the atmosphere, he closed his eyes and went over his calculations again. He wouldn't hit the clearing, but he'd land close enough; he could run fast when the need arose, and there was a very pressing need indeed to get both Shepard and Cain out safely. It was a strange thing; where once he would have thought only of the prize that awaited if the mission succeeded, something had changed. Now he had something to fight for, and he wasn't entirely sure he hated the idea.

Three minutes.


AN-SCPs and documents referenced in this part in order of their appearance:

Taskforce Omega-7 (an addendum to 076's entry); 303, the Doorman; 096, the Shy Guy; 1060, Penanngalan; 610, The Flesh that Hates; 008, the Zombie Plague; 106, the Old Man; 352, Baba Yaga; the Global Occult Coalition, under groups of interest in the wiki; Incident 239-B and the supplemental report 23-B-192; and 173, the Sculpture (the original SCP). Whoo, that's a lot. :)