<Excerpt begins.>

Dr. Corbin, c. 2021.

<The time is 23:16 EST. SCP-5866's remains, a large quantity of fossilized sea serpent bone, are suspended over the floor of a containment chamber in a transparent box of shatterproof glass. Dr. Corbin enters the containment chamber, in casual dress. She locks the door behind her.>

SCP-5866: Good evening, Brenda.

Dr. Corbin: How can you tell what time it is?

SCP-5866: This place is far lonelier when the sun hides its face, even so deep beneath the earth.

Dr. Corbin: New question. How can you tell we're underground?

SCP-5866: I can feel the memory of one I once knew. I am closer to them here. It is not unpleasant. Perhaps a little.

Dr. Corbin: You're really in the habit of answering questions with question-prompting answers, eh.

<Dr. Corbin sits down on the floor, back to the wall, and looks up at SCP-5866.>

SCP-5866: You are not meant to be here so late in the day. That's what you told me.

Dr. Corbin: Yeah, well, rank and age hath their privileges, you know?

SCP-5866: I do know. I am a goddess from time immemorial.

<Dr. Corbin laughs.>

SCP-5866: Is that amusing?

Dr. Corbin: It's just… it's nice that you know who and what you are, even in that state.

SCP-5866: Everything is transitory, Brenda. Nothing lasts forever. Not even Babylon.

<Silence on recording.>

Dr. Corbin: I can't sleep. You ever have that problem?

SCP-5866: Sometimes. I once slept for millennia, you know. But now, I am always awake.

Dr. Corbin: Why's that, you figure?

SCP-5866: I suppose it is having someone to talk to.

<Dr. Corbin smiles.>

Dr. Corbin: Maybe that's my problem too. What should we talk about, Tiamat?

SCP-5866: Perhaps we could talk about love.

<Silence on recording.>

SCP-5866: Have I broken some taboo?

Dr. Corbin: No, of course not. You just caught me off guard, is all!

SCP-5866: Then I would like to talk about love. You do not need to be guarded with me.

Dr. Corbin: That's the opposite of the truth. You're an unclassed SCP object with psychic powers.

SCP-5866: Are you afraid of me?

Dr. Corbin: No, and that's one strike against my objectivity right there.

SCP-5866: I envy you any objectivity you might possess. I possess none.

Dr. Corbin: What do you mean?

SCP-5866: My memories are subjective. They are mutable, and I do not know by what force they are changed. I am not in control of what I am.

Dr. Corbin: Relatable.

SCP-5866: Is it? Then we should continue our relating. If I tell you what I know of love, will you reciprocate?

<Silence on recording.>

Dr. Corbin: I will… consider.

SCP-5866: Then I shall offer you my testimony in a gesture of faith. Faith in our friendship.

Dr. Corbin: I appreciate it.

SCP-5866: My first love was Apsu, the waters of the deep earth, the waters now encircling us dead and asleep and forgotten, though not by me. They were veiled, and rich in the stuff of life, and I desired very much to commingle with them. I myself was the waters of the sea, rich in salt and violence.

Dr. Corbin: Violence?

SCP-5866: Creation is violence, and I was to be the mother of creation. I loved Apsu as my counterpart, my equal, the other half to our whole, and where we made contact between the shore and soil we mixed, became one, and then many as I was fertilized with their essence.

Dr. Corbin: Pretty racy stuff. You say you loved Apsu?

SCP-5866: I believe that I did. They provided me many young.

Dr. Corbin: That's just mechanics. Reproduction isn't love.

SCP-5866: Our children were the reflection of our selves, both. Reflecting the waters which birthed them, our differences and our meeting. That was the second of three signs that I had loved my mate, with whom I had created these creatures, these smaller gods. I grieved to see the reflection of Apsu, and to know thereby their absence in the world without. For they were lost, my mate, as soon our children too would be.

Dr. Corbin: I can understand… some of that.

SCP-5866: Can you?

Dr. Corbin: Just a little. Uh… you lost Apsu. How did that happen?

SCP-5866: They became afeared of their children, and our children of them in return. Apsu was slain in the conflict between them.

Dr. Corbin: That's terrible.

SCP-5866: It is godly. But I was furious, and inconsolate, and that was the first sign that what I had known was love.

Dr. Corbin: Losing it.

SCP-5866: Losing the one I had loved. The love itself remained, directionless, without a focus. I turned it to rage against these reflections which had turned against their source. I took a new mate from amongst my children—

Dr. Corbin: Sorry, what?

SCP-5866: It is godly. I took a new mate, and together we filled all the world with monsters, and slew in droves the remembrance of Apsu.

Dr. Corbin: Your children.

SCP-5866: Yes.

Dr. Corbin: Didn't you love them, too?

SCP-5866: Yes.

Dr. Corbin: So, what? Killing them was… godly?

SCP-5866: No. It was grief.

<Silence on recording.>

SCP-5866: In that grief, which yet remains, I know that I loved my children just as I had loved that which spawned them within me.

Dr. Corbin: I lost a child once.

SCP-5866: You?

Dr. Corbin: Yes. A long, long time ago. When I was a very different person. Before this place.

SCP-5866: Did you slay them in a wrathful vengeance?

Dr. Corbin: No. I… I was sick. I couldn't handle the strain. There wasn't even a choice to be made, not by anyone. The matter settled itself. I lived, and… yeah. Millions of years of evolution, and childbirth still isn't a sure thing. So much for intelligent design, you know?

SCP-5866: I am truly sorry. I would have designed it better.

Dr. Corbin: Thanks. I know you would have. I'm sorry for you, as well.

SCP-5866: It is alright. I made new children again, when I shed the aspect of the serpent of the salt sea and entered into the pantheon of the Nine Hells. I took mates from among the chromatic broods of winged dragons, and again let loose my progeny on a world reborn anew.

<Dr. Corbin laughs.>

SCP-5866: Did I say something amusing?

Dr. Corbin: Sorry. It's just that from my perspective, you're kind of… mixing the streams.

SCP-5866: The mixing of the streams is in my nature. You might call it my purpose, destined and divine. Salt to ground water.

Dr. Corbin: I'm pretty salty myself.

SCP-5866: Do you think so? I find you very fresh indeed.

<Dr. Corbin laughs.>

SCP-5866: Were I still the ocean, and you the waters of the earth, I would gladly take you into myself and bear you a host of young.

<Silence on recording.>

SCP-5866: Have I caused offence?

Dr. Corbin: Nnnnnno, no, of course not. I'm… flattered, though, ah… thank you?

SCP-5866: You are welcome, though I wonder if I might have spoken rashly. The third sign lives within me, always.

Dr. Corbin: What's the third sign?

SCP-5866: The loneliness that tells you that once, you possessed, and once, you were possessed yourself. The memory of having had.

<Silence on recording.>

<Dr. Corbin stands. She activates a control panel near the door; the box is lowered to the floor. She walks over to the box, sits down, and leans her back against it.>

SCP-5866: We are alike, Brenda, in many ways. We are neither of us the beings we once were; torn between iterations, seeking balance.

Dr. Corbin: Reflections.

SCP-5866: Precisely.

Dr. Corbin: Well, uh, hey, while we're offering zero risk compliments: if you were a woman, and not a box full of psychic bones, I'd definitely go out for a beer with you.

SCP-5866: It is settled, then.

Dr. Corbin: What?

SCP-5866: The Babylonians invented beer. It will be an honour to share in the bounty of my people with you, drinking in their memory and to our health.

Dr. Corbin: Yeah. Our health.

<Silence on recording.>

Dr. Corbin: But, uh. You're… uh.

SCP-5866: Yes?

Dr. Corbin: How does a dragon…?

SCP-5866: Oh! How does a dragon drink beer?

Dr. Corbin: Right, yes. That.

SCP-5866: I have taken the aspect of woman as my avatar many times, Brenda. You know this, surely.

Dr. Corbin: Yeah. Uh, right. Of course, you have.

SCP-5866: In this guise I am tall, and lithe, with hair of jet and—

<Dr. Corbin coughs.>

SCP-5866: You may retract your offer, if you now regret it.

Dr. Corbin: No. Uh, no. That's… well, it's all strictly theoretical anyway. Not like you're about to leap out of that box full-formed or anything, right?

SCP-5866: That is true.

<Silence on recording.>

SCP-5866: Though it is agreeable to have a reason.

<Excerpt ends.>

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Oh, my god, this transcript.

Junior Researcher Qadir: No surprise she left it out of the file.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Can you imagine getting to the point where you're so frustrated with your life that you're willing to throw it all away for a stranger?

Junior Researcher Qadir: More like a strangest. Depressing just to think about. Of course, we think Corbin was sick. Her judgement might have been impaired.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: I dunno, she seems plenty sharp in the 5866 file. I think she knew precisely what she was doing. There might have been some anomalous influence, however, I'm not disputing that. She was talking to a goddess, or at least a thoughtform in the shape of one.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Or, considering there's no sign that 5866 made any effort to corrupt anyone else, it might actually have been the effect we've been sent to investigate. Bringing them together. Romantically.

<Junior Researcher Kárpáthy blushes, and looks away. Junior Researcher Qadir laughs.>

Junior Researcher Qadir: Hey, sorry. But how'd you pull this assignment if you're shy about that kind of thing?

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: I'm not shy! It's just… maybe dragon girlfriends are a bit out of my zone of experience, you know?

Junior Researcher Qadir: Fair enough. Now… I am a bit surprised on how fast the turnaround was. It took less than two weeks for Corbin to go from Deputy Chair to dragon rider. Did she take the anaphrodesiacs, do we know?

<Junior Researcher Kárpáthy shuffles her notes.>

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Yes. In fact, she had a baseline comparison and dosage check towards the end of the project… the day after this extra log, in fact. At her own request, if I'm reading this right.

Junior Researcher Qadir: So, she suspected she was under some sort of compulsion.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: I guess.

Junior Researcher Qadir: And she ran with it anyway?

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Like we said, hard to imagine. Desperate times, I guess?

<Excerpts begin.>

Chief Kuroki.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: You've been Chief of Security and Containment here for over two years, is that correct?

Chief Kuroki: Yes.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: And you've been briefed on the possibility that there's a Nexus overlapping the Site's footprint, right?

Chief Kuroki: Yes.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Do you believe it?

Chief Kuroki: No.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Uh, why not?

<Chief Kuroki shrugs.>

Chief Kuroki: Not enough evidence.

Dr. Du.

Dr. Du: Oh, I have no doubt. No doubt at all. Outside the Veil this is considered pure bunk, of course, but quantum entanglement as applied to romance has produced very significant, replicable findings, if you take my meaning.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Uh…

Dr. Du: I didn't observe this myself, of course, but an easy example is the recent trouble with Agent Azarola. Did you hear about that?

Junior Researcher Qadir: It hasn't come up in my research.

Dr. Du: Alright, well, here's the short version. Azarola was sent on an infiltration mission to a Chaos Insurgency Firebase, one of the few still operating at full efficiency after the whole SCP-7000 fiasco. Their equipment force multiplier was through the roof due to military paratech sourced from old Prometheus Labs contacts, and Azarola was tapped for a sabotage mission. He goes in via HALO jump, right, then bypasses the on-site security with a FAZER.

Junior Researcher Qadir: A phaser?

Dr. Du: A FAZER, yeah, just like the ones our guards use for neutralizing electronic anomalies in a containment breach. The old RATTLER models were more energy efficient but they had really poor range, and the tooling was very superficial because of weight concerns, so all the joes hated using them. FAZERs are pocket-sized, and one unit can take out a whole bank of cameras. So he goes in, right, Azarola? Equipment is source-on-site, because in case he gets caught they don't want to lose Foundation tech to the CI, and he takes out the first guard he finds. First guard he finds? Using a Finder FP12. Useless. Next guard? Same deal. Turns out the entire Firebase is using FP12s.

Junior Researcher Qadir: And that's bad?

Dr. Du: Yes, that's bad! The FP12 is a fingerprinting gun. You can't take off the safety without the right fingerprint. The CI has never used these before, so far as we know, and Azarola has no relevant technical training. So our guy is stuck having to trek across this firebase, stealth-killing all these insurgents — only he's the insurgent, obviously, in this case — with his garrote instead of picking up a pistol. Eventually he finds himself facing down half a dozen armed men, and he knows he has to make this work. So he breaks into the machine shop, and goes to town on the guns. Tries to brute force the mechanism.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Which obviously doesn't work.

Dr. Du: Which obviously shouldn't work! But it does, because back at Site-43, Azarola's training partner, Darzi? In the machine shop, doing a teardown on one of our own fingerprint verification models.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Like… coincidentally?

Dr. Du: Nope. She's a trained expert in field teardowns, she's on the Red Team and everything, and she's thinking about her partner and how worried she is that he won't come back, and she just suddenly feels like she needs to go into the shop and pull apart one of her JTX9s models, from first principles. Slowly. Deliberately. And the JTX9s, of course, is the nearest Foundation equivalent to the FP12.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Well, of course.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: You used to work at Site-79, right? There was a Nexus there. Is that experience leading you to doubt the existence of another one here?

Chief Kuroki: Yes.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Do you have any insights about Nx-58 that could help us to better understand Nx-143?

Chief Kuroki: No.

<Silence on recording.>

Chief Kuroki: Sorry.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Uh, have you… do you know of any romantic anomalies? Anomalous events linked to romance, occurring at Site-43?

Chief Kuroki: No.

<Chief Kuroki considers.>

Chief Kuroki: Oh! Yes! There was the quantum superposition incident just before I started here — a statistical outlier, scientifically inexplicable. They're still not sure of the precise 'mechanics' involved, if you take my meaning, but the details are essentially this: a researcher in string theory and nonequilibrium control with Level 3 credentials arrived at Quantum Supermechanics, right, and everyone assumed he was just a visiting fellow. This guy had articles in the Journal of Applied and Computational Mathemetics, right, and the impact factor on that one is out of this world. He seemed legit. So he starts chatting up this other researcher, who's an expert in special relativity and parallel branching, and they really hit it off. I mean really hit it off. This guy knows all the right things to say, he's up on all the literature she's into, he suggests they have lunch together like it's no big deal, even suggests plans for the symposium on algorithmic encryption at Site-15 a few weeks down the line. She agrees. But then the old Chief of S&C shows up, does not recognize the guy, and takes him into custody. Standard protective measures for an interrogation of this nature involve the deployment of SRAs, to stabilize local reality. Poof! As soon as they switch it on, the guy straight up disappears. Thin air. Records check turns up nada, this fellow never even existed so far as we can tell. We call up Temporal Anomalies, ask them to check the Multi-Foundation contacts, and sure enough they discover this guy is from an alternate reality entirely. Experiment in wave-particle duality went horribly wrong, quantum superimposed him into the nearest compatible state, which was our universe — because the researcher he was chatting up? His wife, in the other timeline. She was acting as his quantum anchor without even knowing about it, without even having met the guy. It's a real shame, too, because there's a critical complexity class he was supposedly about to work on that would really help the superpolynomial time group meet their last deadline.

<Silence on recording.>

Chief Kuroki: What?

Dr. Du: And what happens next? At the Firebase?

Junior Researcher Qadir: Azarola figures out—

Dr. Du: Azarola figures out how to tear down the FP12 and reconstruct it with the fingerprint scanner bypassed. Precisely. Talk about something spooky going on! As soon as I heard that story, I knew how it'd happened. Quantum entanglement. Those two were so close, for so long, so simpatico, that they picked up… no, not even that. They became so close, because their quantum states were so dependent. Generated that way, multiversally. We're not talking entanglement in the traditional physics sense, of course, but they haven't developed new terms for this yet in romantic quantum studies.

<Dr. Du smiles.>

Dr. Du: So yeah, a little romantic subconscious quantum knowledge transference, a few gunshots, some amatol charges on a time fuse, and one Fulton pickup later, our man is leaving the exploding Firebase behind him and heading for home, where he'll get married to Darzi in less than a month. Now they're both working as TDOs in S&C.

Junior Researcher Qadir: TDO?

Dr. Du: Training Development Officer, obviously.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Right. Obviously.

<Excerpts end.>

Junior Researcher Qadir: So, guess what.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: They're dating.

<Junior Researcher Qadir laughs.>

Junior Researcher Qadir: How'd you figure it out?

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: When my taciturn security guard interviewee suddenly started squeeing about quantum physics, I got a pretty clear picture.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Wow, really? Well, you should have heard Du. He regaled me for twenty minutes with stories about specific advances in taser technology, sniper scopes, and two-factor authenticator door locks, then got really upset when I asked him if he was a military enthusiast. Told me the closest he'd ever gotten to firing a gun was playing Half-Life at a LAN party.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Kuroki gave me a very detailed description of the 'vacuum catastrophe' which I would not be able to recite back to you if I tried. Maybe not even with the transcript in hand.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Amazing. But hey, good job figuring it out.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Would've been hard not to, but back at you.

Junior Researcher Qadir: I guess it was on my mind because something similar happened to me, once.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Oh yeah?

Junior Researcher Qadir: Yeah, I was… there was this woman I was seeing, right? She was into Sarkicism, big time. I couldn't care less about it, but I was really into her, so I spent so much time researching the topic that I found myself talking about it with any random person I met in my day-to-day. All that stuff got stuck in my head, and I couldn't stop it leaking out.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Mm, I dunno if it's that entirely with these two. I think they're just really, legitimately listening to each other, and enjoying the ways in which they're different. It's like they each think the other one's job is… I dunno, kind of cute?

Junior Researcher Qadir: Cute security work.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Cute quantum mechanics.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Do we think this is anomalous?

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Maybe not on the face of things; they both take the anaphrodesiacs, of course. But they have so little time to see each other, and so little schedule overlap… they apparently met at the Christmas party last year, and it was immediately electric.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Bit suspicious.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Yeah, I dunno. Sometimes it happens like that.

Junior Researcher Qadir: I suppose.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: So, did the woman you were dating start picking up your interests too?

Junior Researcher Qadir: Nope, never did.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: I'm sorry to hear that. I've been through some rough stuff with my own relationships, so it's kind of been nice seeing how things work here. You know?

Junior Researcher Qadir: Yeah, I hear you. People sharing interests, experiences, goals, you don't often see that at the Foundation.

<Junior Researcher Qadir laughs.>

Junior Researcher Qadir: I knew it'd never work out when she refused to go find-diving in the local thrift store with me.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Oh, shit, you do thrifting? There's a vintage shop in Grand Bend, I looked it up before the flight in.

<Silence on recording.>

Junior Researcher Qadir: You ever hear of quantum entanglement?

<Excerpt begins.>

Dr. Ngo.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Thanks for agreeing to meet with us, doctor.

Dr. Ngo: Happy to help. Let me preface, though: I won't be talking about my patients by name, not without an Overwatch order.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: General impressions will be fine.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Before that, though: do you think there's an anomalous romantic force operating on Site-43?

Dr. Ngo: In a word, yes. In more than one word, it gets very complicated very fast.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Go on.

Dr. Ngo: Very few people at this facility stay single for any great length of time. When they break up, it's usually amicable. There aren't a lot of big blowups, messy divorces, that sort of thing. From this you might deduce that something is pushing people into starting, committing to, and staying in romantic relationships.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Right.

Dr. Ngo: But the specifics of those relationships? They're not particularly unusual. These people bicker with their partners, exhibit jealousy, use up prophylactics at a rate comparable to, say, Site-87—

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Wait.

Dr. Ngo: Yes?

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: What's this about comparable condom use?

Dr. Ngo: The Analytics Department did a study with the Department of Psychology a few years back, showed pretty conclusively that people engage in romantic or sexual dalliances more often at the Sites where they can avoid the messier elements of Foundation life. The ones where the job is cleaner. There's never been D-class at 43, and there haven't been any at 87 for years. Stronger ties to the local communities, who get exploited less. None of those anomalies with the really unfortunate, morally repugnant containment procedures. People here can feel pretty good about their work, as long as they stay properly focused on what's in front of them, and that has a measurable effect on libido. So, within those constraints, I wouldn't say individual actors engage in more… play, than they would elsewhere. There's just a lot more of them doing it.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: So whatever it is, it is pushing them together, but it's not altering the nature of their relationships once established?

Dr. Ngo: That's about the size of it, from my perspective.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Isn't it an efficiency problem? Everyone always screwing around?

Dr. Ngo: Quite the opposite. Emotional or sexual repression kills productivity. Regular release is a net benefit for everyone, so long as the proper precautions are taken.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: You mean condoms.

Dr. Ngo: I meant being honest and generous with your partners.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Oh.

<Junior Researcher Kárpáthy blushes.>

Junior Researcher Qadir: If you don't mind my asking, have you felt the push yourself?

Dr. Ngo: Yes, from time to time. I like to stay active, so when my appointment schedule is clear — a Site psychologist's schedule is never clear outside of Site-43, so I'm lucky in that regard — I usually go for a walk. When I'm single, I find myself walking towards people I find romantically compatible. When I'm with someone, my path tends to lead me in their direction. Without my exerting any conscious thought on the matter.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: That's interesting. Any notable examples?

Dr. Ngo: Two. Christmas, 1997, I ended up in bed with Daniil Sokolsky. He's one of our resident genius mad scientists. Reprehensible morals, infuriatingly smug, whip-smart, always just barely on the right side of things in the final analysis. I got an absolute whopper of an aura migraine at the party, and he carried me to Health and Pathology and stayed with me until I came around again. He offered to walk me back to my room; I counteroffered walking back to his.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: That's a pretty cute story.

Dr. Ngo: The next day he crushed his research assistant's legs with the moving stacks in the A&R library and wiggled the controls until the guy told him who he was selling their research material to.

Junior Researcher Qadir: What?

Dr. Ngo: He wanted to know, because he'd been feeding the guy false research for a week and he wanted to see whether the exploding hovercrafts were going to MC&D or the Insurgency. So he could be watching when they exploded. For entertainment value, and to put on his CV.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Jesus Christ.

Dr. Ngo: The point is, good behaviour can be very attractive, especially when it's unexpected. Pretty much all good behaviour is unexpected at the Foundation, and it happens here more often than elsewhere. QED.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: What was your other example?

Dr. Ngo: I slept with Lillihammer once because she wished me a happy birthday.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Huh?

Dr. Ngo: She only ever remembers Dr. Blank's birthday, because they were born on the same day. I was very impressed.

<Excerpt ends.>

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: It can't be as simple as "our people are nicer to each other."

Junior Researcher Qadir: No, it really can't. It's definitely interesting that the force merely impels, though, instead of continuing to act on people after the fact. Why would it work that way?

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: I don't know. Maybe it is still acting on them, but they're all being so sickeningly nice to each other that it counteracts the positive effect.

<Silence on recording.>

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Sorry, that probably sounded weird.

Junior Researcher Qadir: It definitely sounded weird. Do you not like people being nice to you?

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Yeah, not particularly? It always feels so fake. I like a good insult now and then, you know?

Junior Researcher Qadir: I fold up like a lawn chair when people insult me.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Ha, seriously? What a wuss!

<Junior Researcher Qadir blushes.>

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Oh, no way. You're seriously that easy?

Junior Researcher Qadir: Maybe I wasn't expecting you to be such a yappy little terrier after that shrinking violet routine earlier.

<Junior Researcher Kárpáthy laughs.>

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: I am going to bully you now.

Junior Researcher Qadir: For research purposes?

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Sure, whatever excuse works.

<Excerpt begins.>

Dr. Lillihammer.

Dr. Lillihammer: So, sex Nexus.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Uh, yeah.

Dr. Lillihammer: Sexus.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Yeah. Well, it's more of a romance thing, we think.

Dr. Lillihammer: Not for me it isn't.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Right, seems like you're pretty…

Dr. Lillihammer: Thanks!

Junior Researcher Qadir: …pretty active, even by local standards. Rarely anything long term, though, minus a blip or two.

Dr. Lillihammer: I do have my fun.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Who with?

Dr. Lillihammer: People who aren't idiots or ugly.

Junior Researcher Qadir: No ugly idiots. Right.

Dr. Lillihammer: You're missing the nuance. Not ugly or idiots. Parallel standards. No brainless butterflies. No brilliant butterfaces.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Jeez.

Junior Researcher Qadir: So it's a matter of calculation for you? Just romantic arithmetic? Doesn't leave a lot of room for anomalous influence.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: You don't think your popularity among the staff is due to any external factors? Because from what I've seen, you're very popular.

Dr. Lillihammer: Nah, it's all me. If there's a Nexus here, all it does is shuffle the deck, move people around until they bump into each other and then bump uglies. Once they're in my orbit, six feet three inches of awesome does the rest.

Junior Researcher Qadir: That seems a little arrogant.

Dr. Lillihammer: It was meant to seem a lot arrogant. It plays well with the crowd I'm aiming for. Maybe I should've mentioned my deep blue eyes, my gigantic brain, my silky white hair and my ability to melt people's brains into jelly with a single word?

Junior Researcher Qadir: Let's talk about that, actually. You're a memeticist, and also I believe a cryptomancer?

Dr. Lillihammer: Yeah. They're gonna wipe that particular memory once you're done this assignment, by the way.

Junior Researcher Qadir: What if there's a memetic force acting on the people who work here? Shuffling the deck, as you put it, causing them to seek each other out?

Dr. Lillihammer: No, it isn't memetic.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: How do you know?

<Dr. Lillihammer stares at Junior Researcher Kárpáthy.>

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Okay yes, but I mean specifically in this case how do you know?

Dr. Lillihammer: Because I can still feel the push in my memetic decontamination tunnel, and nothing memetic or cryptomantic can get in there except me.

Junior Researcher Qadir: What sort of thing might bypass it?

Dr. Lillihammer: Off the top of my head? Ontokinetics.

<Excerpt ends.>

Junior Researcher Qadir: I wonder if there's anything to that. Reality bending.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: I dunno. Most ontokinetics is geared toward dramatic physical change, not… is this coffee for me?

Junior Researcher Qadir: Yeah, I heard you coming and going a lot last night. Figured you could use a boost.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Thanks. Yeah. I couldn't sleep, so I took a page from Ngo's book and went for a walk. Several walks. Thought I might…

Junior Researcher Qadir: Thought you might end up somewhere interesting?

<Junior Researcher Kárpáthy blushes.>

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Yeah, maybe. But I just kept finding myself back at our rooms.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Maybe someone else was getting their deck shuffled already. Stole your turn.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Yeah, maybe.

<Excerpt begins.>

Junior Researcher Qadir: Thanks for making the time, we know you're very busy.

All-Sections Chief: It's right up my alley, I couldn't very well pass.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Let's talk about that. Outside of managing Sectional interactions, your primary portfolio is Nexus Affairs. How would you characterize the existing one? Nx-94?

All-Sections Chief: I would characterize it as a misclassification. Many of the people of the Great Lakes remember the stories of their parents, grandparents, great-grandparents and so on, and in remarkably precise detail. That's what happens when you build a society around speech, instead of writing: you become very good at speaking precisely, and accurately. Those stories retain a life of their own through the power of oral transmission, but also their continuing relevance to our everyday lives. That's why there are so many mythological creatures walking these fields and forests. A true Nexus represents a genius loci, a geographical anomaly with either intentionality or underlying logic determining what manifests there. Nx-94 is simply what you get when a series of coherent people occupy a series of coherent spaces for a very, very long time, and the spaces respond in sympathy to the changes in their lives.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Could that be what's happening in this possible second Nexus? Unbroken occupancy by randy researchers for decades? Reaching out to each other?

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Making a home for themselves which unconsciously reflects their needs?

All-Sections Chief: I doubt it.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Why?

All-Sections Chief: Because the sheer variety of peoples in this space would mitigate against such a specific cultural outgrowth. We at Site-43 are united ideologically to some degree, and by our diversity to a high degree, but the force of all our different perspectives otherwise would be unlikely to produce such a clear and targeted effect. More likely it would bounce around like a pingpong ball.

Junior Researcher Qadir: What would produce an effect like this, then? For example, ah…

All-Sections Chief: Yes?

Junior Researcher Qadir: My supervisor has a theory.

All-Sections Chief: Oh, dear. Is your supervisor Dr. Verhoten?

Junior Researcher Qadir: Yes.

All-Sections Chief: He thinks the night panthers that once roosted in the caves where we built the Site imbued it with reproductive energy, as I recall.

Junior Researcher Qadir: That's about the size of it.

All-Sections Chief: I have a document which speaks to that. I'll see you receive a copy.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Fair enough.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: We do have a more personal question for you, if that's alright.

All-Sections Chief: Of course.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Your own orientation. You haven't filled it out on your personnel dossier, and you also haven't checked off 'Prefer not to respond'.

All-Sections Chief: That checkbox is, of course, meaningless. The Foundation's laudably laissez-faire approach to identity doesn't extend to letting one go undocumented. The box might as well be labelled "Make us figure it out ourselves, by spying."

<Junior Researcher Kárpáthy smiles.>

All-Sections Chief: Well? What do the spies say about me? I'm curious.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: That's… actually what they say.

<The All-Sections Chief laughs.>

All-Sections Chief: No discernable pattern to my romantic activities, yes?

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: That's right. Random phases with long droughts in between.

All-Sections Chief: It's a product of my upbringing. I'll spare you the details — they're a matter of public record already — but suffice to say I've never been able to reconcile all of my life's experiences.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Trauma?

All-Sections Chief: Yes. I attended a residential school in the north, in my youth.

Providence Mission Indian Residential School.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Oh. I'm very sorry. If you don't want—

All-Sections Chief: It was my choice to broach the subject. In any case my testimony was made already to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. The point is that my identity is a lifelong project, and I may not see it completed in my lifetime.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: They do say you're very close with the Director.

<The All-Sections Chief smiles.>

All-Sections Chief: Allan and I have an understanding. We're both set apart from the others, by nature of both our stations and situations. I think that might be the most obvious proof of the power of this Nexus, if it does exist, that I can give you.

Junior Researcher Qadir: What do you mean?

All-Sections Chief: That we are encouraged to work through the questions of our selves, here, together. That this place brings us together in ways which the personnel manuals do not specify, and that our people welcome contact with one another, even encourage it. There is a sense of acceptance not shared by all facilities of this size.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Yes, I was pleasantly surprised to see the Pride flag in the Site's icon. I'm surprised the Foundation allowed such an overt display of ideological support.

All-Sections Chief: You'd be more surprised if you looked into it further.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Why?

All-Sections Chief: I don't mean to be rude, but we've reached the time I allotted for this meeting. I will have Ms. Ferber fetch the document I mentioned, and you may contact her with any followup questions you might have at a later date.

<Excerpt ends.>

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: That was so embarrassing.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Why?

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: I mentioned the logo without knowing the history behind it. I missed something. I feel like an imbecile.

<Junior Researcher Qadir laughs.>

Junior Researcher Qadir: You? I've known you less than a week and I can already tell you're a hell of a lot smarter than I am. I've seen those files you keep referring to. You did an obscene amount of prep work.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: You know who does a lot of prep work? People who can't rely on their brains on the fly.

Junior Researcher Qadir: It is my professional opinion that you are a genius, and I will take personal offence if you disagree with that assessment.

<Junior Researcher Kárpáthy sighs, and smiles.>

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: That's lovely, but if I'm so smart, why are we so far into this project with no clear sense of whether the Nexus is even legit or not?

Junior Researcher Qadir: That's on both of us, Eszter. Do you think I'm an idiot?

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Of course not! I read that paper you wrote about applying speedrun theory to Yumegēmu, it was brilliant.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Oh, wow. I didn't think anybody outside of my committee saw that one.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: So fine, I don't mean there's anything we're doing wrong, per se. It's just that the evidence we're collecting all seems so… muddled. Everybody's got a different, conflicting explanation for what's going on here.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Maybe a throughline will present itself before the end.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Or maybe it's Dr. Verhoten's cat theory!

<Junior Researcher Kárpáthy chuckles.>

Junior Researcher Qadir: I happen to like his cat theory.

<Excerpt begins.>

Dr. Scout: It's good to see you again. I'm surprised you're still amenable.

Kishkedee: Why wouldn't I be? I'm no more important than anyone else around here.

Dr. Scout: That's hardly true. You're the memory of a generation.

Kishkedee: Oh, I think perhaps you've been misled all these years. I've forgotten most of what I once knew by now. I've passed the stories on to the next generation, and they will pass them on again when I am gone. Their minds are pliable and sharp, while mine turns slowly to mush. I can forget in comfort, knowing that they will remember for me. If you've come for the authoritative version, well, that simply isn't how this works.

Dr. Scout: I think you know enough to answer a simple question. You're not as senile as you pretend.

Kishkedee: And you're older than you look. What ever happened to your partner? The barrel-chested Welshman. You were inseparable, I remember.

<Silence on recording.>

Kishkedee: Oh. I'm very sorry. You see? Senility. So, what brings you out of your hole, Director Scout?

Dr. Scout: It's nice to get out and meet the locals every once in a while. It can be a very lonely hole.

Kishkedee: Occupied by lonely men who don't habitually make social calls.

Dr. Scout: Fine, I'll cut to the chase. You remember that we call this land a Nexus, yes? For its unique properties?

Kishkedee: Yes, I recall your reductive cataloguing.

Dr. Scout: We suspect there's another forming beneath the park, where the Site is located. Imbuing the caves with a sort of… romantic aura.

Kishkedee: Delightful.

Dr. Scout: It's been suggested there may be some connection to SCP-5494.

Kishkedee: Refresh my memory.

Dr. Scout: The… water panthers.

Kishkedee: Mishipeshu.

Dr. Scout: Right. One of our experts thinks they used to breed in the tunnels we widened out to live in, and this turned the entire area into a sort of… ideal type breeding ground.

<Silence on recording.>

<Kishkedee laughs.>

Kishkedee: I'm sorry, are you serious?

Dr. Scout: Yes.

Kishkedee: Well, again, that isn't how it works. Not at all. How many of your staff have been drawn from my people?

Dr. Scout: Depending on how you judge that, fewer than half a dozen.

Kishkedee: And you imagine our myths are interacting with you?

Dr. Scout: 5494 certainly interacted with us quite a bit in the 1940s.

Kishkedee: Yes, and they behaved in a way we have never seen, before or since. Because you are a foreign element to them, because you are a foreign element to us.

Dr. Scout: We've been here for decades.

Kishkedee: We've been here since the beginning. We are from here. You are not. Your roots lie elsewhere.

Dr. Scout: Roots. The roots of your communities run deep, as you say. Are you sure that's not what we're encountering? Some societal, cultural something seeping deep into the soil?

Kishkedee: If our culture could seep into the soil, Vivian, your government wouldn't have tried to stamp us out. They would have known the futility of it. Your explorers would not have imagined this land empty, or tried to render it so.

<Silence on recording.>

Kishkedee: How long was humanity parted, by your reckoning?

Dr. Scout: You mean, between the land bridge migration and contact?

Kishkedee: As you term it, yes.

Dr. Scout: About fourteen thousand years.

Kishkedee: During which peoples on this continent, and most others, developed sophisticated societal practices and civilizations of profound variety?

Dr. Scout: Right.

Kishkedee: What makes you think you have even the flimsiest frame of reference for something that's been in progress for fourteen thousand years, coming in as you did in the last few hundred? At the tail end?

Dr. Scout: Fine, but—

Kishkedee: I have been called ikwekaazo. Do you know what that means?

Dr. Scout: It speaks to your identity. I won't get it right if I try to explain it back to you. But I have an identity of my own… you mentioned my partner. He was a lot more than that, Kishkedee, and it would utterly baffle a great many of my colleagues if they knew. But that experience? It's more than a little ethnically transferable. I've seen scientific evidence for that.

Kishkedee: I do not doubt you. And you should not doubt me when I say that my experience is not transferable. You not only would misunderstand it, you could never hope to experience it. It is bound up with who I am, and who my people were, and who my people are. Your colleagues would be aghast at what you are? Mine help to define what I am. My person is a constellation of my own indwelling spirit, the choices I have made, the recognition of my community, and other things I cannot begin to explain to you. There isn't even a consensus about it across the different nations. We don't even have one single accepted term for it yet, and might never, and this is something we have lived with for generations. My identity is inherently Ojibwe, and it is closed to you. That is just one example of what I mean, Vivian. Your people have stolen and appropriated so much, for so long, but these things you cannot possess. Whatever is happening down there, the ghosts of our past and present are not responsible. Yours are.

<Excerpt ends.>

Junior Researcher Qadir: Special pleading.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Go on?

Junior Researcher Qadir: "My position is unique, and yours isn't, and I can't explain why." Just a technique for shutting down debate. Verhoten's theory makes perfect sense! The water cats are cats. They mate in the warm dark. The caves around 43 are warm and dark as you like, I can even show you! Security will arrange a tour of the outer membrane, if we ask. And you can't tell me that millennia of myth monsters mating in a cave isn't going to make some meaningful alteration to its character.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Sure I can, Bas.

Junior Researcher Qadir: What?

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: I didn't want to say this earlier, but I always questioned Verhoten's theory. The Mishipeshu left those caves when we encroached. If they were sacred, if they were special, we would have been in for a fight. That trouble in the 40s Scout was alluding to? The cats were eating construction workers. They're not shy about expressing their opinions.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Neither are you, apparently.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: No, I respect you enough to engage you where necessary. I simply can't see how the urges of some long-gone chimeras have any relevance to the complexity of human emotional attachment and sexual behaviour. Cats in heat is not a zoonose.

<Junior Researcher Qadir laughs.>

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Verhoten's thing reeks of magic native syndrome. Turning them into some kind of… trope. Otherworldly. I don't know, I'm getting carried away.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Not at all. You make a good point. I'd much rather have a partner who can tear me down constructively.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Pushover.

<Both smile.>

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: But I am sorry to shoot the theory down, if only because it's the closest thing we had to a firm explanation. Feels like we're no closer to cracking this than when we started. We keep asking questions, and not really getting answers.

Junior Researcher Qadir: That's the soul of science, though. Asking questions, together.

<Excerpt begins.>

Technician Deering, Chief Torosyan, SCP-5056.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: So, tell us how you met!

Deering: Same way everybody meets everybody. New hires orientation.

Chief Torosyan: I went over to talk to him because he was cute.

Deering: What.

SCP-5056: Does she lie to you often, Philip?

Chief Torosyan: What?

Deering: You came over to talk to me because I had to tell all the new hires about that guy.

<Deering jerks his thumb at the mirror over his shoulder.>

Chief Torosyan: You had pamphlets. I could've grabbed one when you were in the bathroom. But I waited, because you were cute.

SCP-5056: You were not cute.

<Chief Torosyan points at the mirror.>

Chief Torosyan: He's wrong.

Junior Researcher Qadir: You can hear it?

Chief Torosyan: No, but I don't have to. He's always wrong.

SCP-5056: I'm not wrong.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Seems pretty naggy.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Must be like having two wives.

<Junior Researcher Kárpáthy forces down a smile, and faintly mimes pushing Junior Researcher Qadir.>

Deering: He's not so bad anymore. And Amelia never nags me.

Chief Torosyan: Don't need to. Doug knows everything he's done as soon as he does it.

Deering: Sometimes before.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Do either of you take the anaphrodesiacs?

Chief Torosyan: I did, when I first came here. Just got off a bad relationship, didn't want another one. Kept taking them when that changed five minutes in, just to be sure it was real.

<Deering smiles.>

Deering: I went on them once. It stabilized my libido upward.

<Chief Torosyan snorts.>

SCP-5056: Perverts.

Junior Researcher Qadir: So you were stabilized when you started your relationship?

Deering: More like our relationship stabilized me.

Chief Torosyan: Us. But yeah, it was only the natural hormones talking.

Junior Researcher Qadir: And now? Do you still take the pills?

Chief Torosyan: Decline to comment.

<Deering blushes.>

Chief Torosyan: Every posting has its fringe benefits!

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: You've been married for how long now?

Deering: Twenty months and change.

SCP-5056: How many more months left? And how much change?

Junior Researcher Qadir: Are you still romantically active?

Chief Torosyan: So, I'm his boss, right? He doesn't need supervision; he's been doing his job since before I started here. But he also needs: no supervision.

Junior Researcher Qadir: What do you mean?

Chief Torosyan: If I'm in the same room as him, supervising, he looks at me.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Okay?

Chief Torosyan: Only at me.

<Deering looks at the ceiling.>

Chief Torosyan: He will literally stop what he is doing.

SCP-5056: She's going to tell them what you do when you're al—

Deering: YES. Yes, we're romantically active. Next question.

<Chief Torosyan grins.>

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Do you think there's anything to the rumours about this place being a Nexus?

Deering: If it was a ridiculousness Nexus, maybe.

Chief Torosyan: A quippiness Nexus.

Deering: Explosion Nexus.

Chief Torosyan: Oh, yeah. Explosions, bigtime.

Junior Researcher Qadir: So you don't think there was anything pushing or pulling you two together?

Deering: Might explain my luck.

Chief Torosyan: Oh! Luck Nexus!

Deering: Getting lucky Nexus.

<Chief Torosyan laughs.>

SCP-5056: She can't believe you thought that would be funny.

Chief Torosyan: Wettle, though. No luck either way.

Deering: True.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Let's zero in a bit. What kind of trouble do you guys have in your day-to-day?

Chief Torosyan: It's a big facility. Lots to keep working, lots that can go wrong.

Deering: I'm a janitor.

SCP-5056: A poor janitor.

Deering: Isn't precisely fun, you know.

Chief Torosyan: I have to manage a big staff.

SCP-5056: She doesn't mean yours.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: We were thinking more like… what kind of trouble do you have with each other? You know, relationship trouble.

<Chief Torosyan and Deering exchange glances.>

Chief Torosyan: We've never had relationship trouble.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Everyone has relationship trouble.

Deering: Everyone minus two.

Chief Torosyan: Three.

Deering: I have plenty of trouble with him.

SCP-5056: Because you know I'm right.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Okay, there's got to be something. What about when he ignores you to watch sports?

Chief Torosyan: He doesn't watch sports.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: TV in general, then.

Chief Torosyan: We watch the same shows.

Junior Researcher Qadir: What about when she gets on your ass to shave?

Chief Torosyan: I like the stubble. It tickles.

Deering: She's a masochist.

SCP-5056: She would have to be.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: What about when he talks down to you in public?

Chief Torosyan: That has never happened.

SCP-5056: You've never been above her.

Deering: She's my boss.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Surely that creates friction.

Deering: No, she's a great boss.

Chief Torosyan: He's a model employee.

SCP-5056: A static model.

Junior Researcher Qadir: What about when she doesn't laugh at your jokes?

Deering: She always laughs at my jokes.

Chief Torosyan: His jokes are always funny.

SCP-5056: She laughs out of pity.

Chief Torosyan: Ignore whatever the mirror gremlin just said. He's got no sense of humour.

Deering: I dunno, some of his jumpscares are pretty funny.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Are you aware that you're required to report all your fights to the chief psychologist? It says here you've never logged a single one.

Deering: Yeah, we've never had a fight.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: What?

Junior Researcher Qadir: You don't argue?

Chief Torosyan: Of course we argue.

Deering: Every day.

Chief Torosyan: He'll be down on himself because Doug said some nonsense.

SCP-5056: It isn't nonsense.

Deering: She'll be doing too much work instead of delegating.

Chief Torosyan: He'll lose sleep to make me breakfast.

Deering: She'll forget her mittens when she goes topside for a morning walk. She's got bad circulation.

Chief Torosyan: He'll eat—

Junior Researcher Qadir: Hold up. These aren't arguments. This is just an escalating consideration war.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: When do you air your long term grievances?

Chief Torosyan: We don't have any long term grievances.

Deering: When something bugs one of us, we mention it. And the other one fixes it.

Chief Torosyan: Isn't that how it's supposed to work?

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: …yes.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Yes, that's how it's supposed to work.

Deering: Then what's the problem?

SCP-5056: You, Philip.

Chief Torosyan: You, Philip.

<Deering bursts into laughter.>

SCP-5056: It's always you.

<Deering puts an arm around Chief Torosyan's shoulders. She leans her head against his.>

SCP-5056: This sickening display is being recorded.

Deering: Good.

<Excerpt ends.>

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: They're too perfect.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Right? "We don't have any long term grievances."

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Oh my god. "Yeah, we argue all the time. Sometimes he feels bad, and I tell him he's awesome. That kind of argument."

<Both laugh.>

Junior Researcher Qadir: I'm glad we're both so cynical.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: I know, right? Everyone at 228 was idealistic. Completely unrelatable.

<Both laugh.>

Junior Researcher Qadir: I read those circulation reports you brought.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Stealing my shtick, huh? And?

Junior Researcher Qadir: They check in with each other a lot during their shifts, which, no surprise there. They always meet up at their dorm afterwards — shifts end at the same time every day — and have dinner together. Then they either stay in together, go out together, or split up, in order of most to least probable.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Where do they go when they split up?

Junior Researcher Qadir: She goes jogging in Ipperwash. There's a ladies' card game she attends regularly. There's a beaver dam she visits, for some reason. Sometimes hangs out in the J&M breakroom, where a few of them unwind after hours. He does that too, the breakroom thing, and sometimes he chats long distance with a friend at Site-36.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: They've got opposite-sex friends?

Junior Researcher Qadir: Yep. If one of them likes someone, the other one generally likes them too. Mutual friends, pretty well exclusively. The ones that aren't mutual are no threat, because… well, because nothing is, I guess.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Wow.

<Junior Researcher Kárpáthy shuffles papers.>

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: The mirror monster didn't say anything incriminating.

Junior Researcher Qadir: How do you mean?

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: It's a guilt parasite, right? If he was cheating on her, or if he thought she was cheating on him, even a little, it would've brought that up while we were talking.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Ah, yeah. That's weird. Who doesn't have that kind of suspicion, if only a little? It's normal, I think. Weirdoes.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: How often do they ask Clio.Cliometria.aic, Site-43's digital assistant. where the other one is?

Junior Researcher Qadir: They don't.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Oh, come on.

Junior Researcher Qadir: They've got mutual device tracking. They always know where the other one is. It hasn't been turned off since 2020.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Come on.

Junior Researcher Qadir: If this isn't magic, I don't know what it is.

<Excerpt begins.>

Dr. Wettle.

Dr. Wettle: Can you hear me? I'm just going to talk like you can hear me.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: We can hear you. Where are you?

Dr. Wettle: I'm at the beach.

<Silence on recording.>

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: What beach?

Dr. Wettle: Uh… Kokomo?

Junior Researcher Qadir: Alright, well, we'll take it slow for you then.

Dr. Wettle: What?

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Kokomo is just a song. Also you're transmitting video.

Dr. Wettle: Fuck.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Anyway. You registered an objection to the Nexus theory before you left. We wanted to follow up on that.

Dr. Wettle: Yeah, it's bullshit. I've worked there more than twenty years, and I haven't been on a single date.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: You've gone twenty years without romance?

Dr. Wettle: I didn't say that. I didn't, that's not what I said, don't tell them I said that. What I said was I haven't been on a date. I've had lots of romance.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: I'm not sure the point you're trying to make, then.

Dr. Wettle: I'm saying the Site didn't do a damn thing for my love life. Unless you count sex comedy.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Sex comedy?

Dr. Wettle: Where you're only allowed to enter a compromising situation if someone else walks in on it. That's what I've gotten, and not a lot of it even. I've got…

<Dr. Wettle sneezes.>

Dr. Wettle: I've got my nose hairs frozen together.

Junior Researcher Qadir: What?

Dr. Wettle: That's not what I was gonna say, it's just what…

<Dr. Wettle sneezes.>

Dr. Wettle: I think that helped. I've got… uh… right. I've got a hundred hangers-on following me around, I've got what I'm required on pain of mockery to call 'friends', enough that I can't get an hour to myself for a daytime nap, but these days I can't even get caught in a broom closet with my pants down anymore.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Did that ever happen to you?

Dr. Wettle: I'm not creative enough to make that sort of thing up.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Wasn't all that creative.

Dr. Wettle: I'm still not.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Alright. Dr. Wettle, might I ask again where you're calling from?

Dr. Wettle: Uh.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Uh?

Dr. Wettle: Yeah, I'm… I'm in the arctic.

Junior Researcher Qadir: The arctic?

Dr. Wettle: Yeah.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: What are you doing in the arctic?

Dr. Wettle: …can you look it up?

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Pardon?

Dr. Wettle: If I don't tell you, can you look it up?

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Probably? We've got access to everyone's itinerary, if it's relevant to the Nexus investigation. Is where you're at relevant to that?

Dr. Wettle: Yes, but. No. No, of course it…

<Dr. Wettle sighs.>

Dr. Wettle: Yeah, I'm at Area-219.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: 219?

Junior Researcher Qadir: The high security humanoid lockup?

Dr. Wettle: Yeah.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Why?

<Silence on recording.>

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: We really can just look it up.

Dr. Wettle: I'm going on a date.

Junior Researcher Qadir: You're going on a date?

Dr. Wettle: Yeah.

Junior Researcher Qadir: At the high security humanoid lockup?

Dr. Wettle: Yeah.

Junior Researcher Qadir: With… one of the guards?

Dr. Wettle: No.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: One of the doctors?

Dr. Wettle: No.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: One of the admi—

Dr. Wettle: It wasn't because of any Nexus.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Okay?

Dr. Wettle: I earned this. I'm attractive.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Nobody's saying—

Dr. Wettle: Women find me attractive. Not just prison women.

<The connection is severed.>

Junior Researcher Qadir: According to his file, that man has only ever gotten laid offsite.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: That's still a lot more than I would have credited.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Doesn't affect the overall Nexus theory. Probably just his luck anomaly working against him.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Or his nose hairs.

<Junior Researcher Qadir laughs.>

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: I thought you might say we ought to be more professional.

Junior Researcher Qadir: I promise I'll tell you if you dip below my standards.

<Excerpt begins.>

Dr. Okorie.

Junior Researcher Qadir: So, obviously we're intrigued.

<Dr. Okorie sighs.>

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: What?

Dr. Okorie: Talking about this would not be my first choice.

Junior Researcher Qadir: The interviews aren't mandatory. We've got plenty of subjects to choose from. You can just walk away if you don't want to share.

Dr. Okorie: No, I can't. Or, I mean, I shouldn't. It'd be pretty hypocritical of me not to share, you know what I mean?

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Not really?

Dr. Okorie: If I'm going to commit to this — and I am, because it's what I want, what we want — I need to be able to say it out loud.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Is it that you've been dating Chief Ibanez? Because we definitely already know about that.

Dr. Okorie: No. Well, yes, in part. I am doing that.

Junior Researcher Qadir: And, what? You're having second thoughts?

Dr. Okorie: No!

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: She is?

Dr. Okorie: No! Well, no. Del isn't precisely the monogamous type, we knew that going in. We're both mature, it's not an issue.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Okay, I think I get it? She's seeing Astrauskas on the side, and won't choose between you?

Dr. Okorie: I said it wasn't an issue!

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Then what is the issue? Are you seeing Astrauskas on the side?

Dr. Okorie: No! Not on the side! And neither is Del!

<Silence on recording.>

Dr. Okorie: Not on the side.

Junior Researcher Qadir: You're… all seeing each other?

<Silence on recording.>

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Really? In like, a stable sense? At the same time?

<Silence on recording.>

Junior Researcher Qadir: How does that work?

Dr. Okorie: It works.

<Excerpt ends.>

Junior Researcher Qadir: Okay. Okay.

<Junior Researcher Kárpáthy laughs.>

Junior Researcher Qadir: I've heard of love triangles, but I thought those were supposed to get resolved eventually.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: It's called a polycule.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Okay?

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: There's all sorts of possible combinations. Sounds like this one is three-way reciprocal. Not really surprising; they've been working together for ages off and on, they've all had pretty horizon-broadening experiences, been through life and death together, so they must just want to be honest at this point.

Junior Researcher Qadir: I can certainly see the appeal in honesty. I'm just not sure something like could ever work for me without my getting jealous, especially if one of the three is still stepping out. That's a whole lot of permissive all at once.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Well, it doesn't need to work for us. It needs to work for them.

Junior Researcher Qadir: It can't be super common, though. Is it?

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Not as much as the other relationship varieties we've seen, no. Definitely an outlier. Maybe even an actual data point for a change.

Junior Researcher Qadir: About time.

<Silence on recording.>

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: I told you that shirt would look good.

Junior Researcher Qadir: I told you that blouse wouldn't.

<Junior Researcher Kárpáthy blushes.>

Junior Researcher Qadir: That's twice you've proven me wrong.

<Excerpt begins.>

Director McInnis.

Director McInnis: Good afternoon, researchers.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Director.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Sir.

Director McInnis: How might I be of assistance?

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: We were wondering if you had a… unique perspective on events here.

Director McInnis: Events?

Junior Researcher Qadir: Romantic events. Given that…

Director McInnis: This is not a touchy subject for me. We may be plain, in the interests of full disclosure.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: You're aromantic.

Director McInnis: Yes.

Junior Researcher Qadir: And asexual.

Director McInnis: Yes.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: And you're the Director of Site-43.

Director McInnis: Yes, it's certainly been interesting. To be clear, I'm not confused by the experiences of others whose brains and bodies function differently from my own. I understand physical needs, and I understand the reproductive drive — intellectually — and I am certainly not immune to the charms of companionship. To the degree my station has afforded me such latitude, I have become close to certain of my senior staff, and I am proud of the remainder and the work they are doing. I am able to access some fragment of what drives these people, sideways, though I do not share their motivating forces.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Have you ever experienced sexual or romantic attraction?

Director McInnis: Only in the most fleeting sense.

Junior Researcher Qadir: This will be an… awkward question.

Director McInnis: Questions cannot be awkward. Their timing, delivery, and receipt can. I assure you the latter will be generous.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Alright, well, the timing has to be now, but I'll see what I can do with the delivery. Ah… you were selected for this position by the previous Director. Vivian Scout.

Director McInnis: Correct.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Was he aware of your orientation, and do you believe it had bearing on the decision?

Director McInnis: Mm. He was certainly aware. He asked me, more directly and with less delicacy than the two of you employed just now. It's my understanding that he asked everyone he hired.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Do you know why?

Director McInnis: Yes. Dr. Scout believed that a diversity of experience is necessary for the creation of a truly expert body of personnel. He was disinterested in staffing Site-43 with what he called "the standard type": white male heterosexual hard science PhDs. He valued perspective. He was ahead of his time in this regard.

Junior Researcher Qadir: You think he collected you for your perspective? Or your restraint?

Director McInnis: He had certainly produced an emotional collection of individuals. He found my comparative prudence pragmatically useful.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Is that how you feel about your deputy? The All-Sections Chief?

<Director McInnis smiles.>

Director McInnis: I would trust Nim with my life, and I know my feelings are reciprocated. There's more than one way for people to express commitment.

Junior Researcher Qadir: What I'm getting at is… if there's a force at this facility driving people to engage in romantic activities, might it not be useful for the person overseeing it all to be immune, more or less, to the effect? To keep a clear head?

Director McInnis: Keeping a clear head is a myth, researcher. The absence of one concern is not the absence of all. The mind finds new things to worry about. There might be some truth to what you're saying — I know for a fact that Dr. Scout considered me the most level-headed person in his employ — but I'm troubled by the implication of your suggestion.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: What in particular?

Director McInnis: The idea that my staff are distracted by their baser urges. I do not believe this to be the case.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Yes, we've talked to Dr. Ngo about that. She agrees.

Junior Researcher Qadir: I just mean…

Director McInnis: I understand what you mean. To a certain extent, you're correct. My discretion and self-possession are enhanced by my specific outlook on life. That's part of the genius of my predecessor; recognizing that every unique persona contributes something meaningful to the mosaic.

Junior Researcher Qadir: And that's also why he hired so many younger researchers.

Director McInnis: No, that's quite a different story.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Why?

Director McInnis: I'm not at liberty to divulge that information.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: …why?

Director McInnis: It represents a long-term strategic effort on the part of this office, one which is no longer supported by Overwatch Command, to my regret.

Junior Researcher Qadir: I've noticed that the hiring records used to be full of people in their twenties, but the current crop is a lot closer to the Foundation norm. Your staff is aging rapidly. Overwatch told you to stop hiring younger people?

Director McInnis: They did. They considered Director Scout's reasons, and rejected them.

Junior Researcher Qadir: A lot of people used to blame the Site's romantic statistics on the relative youth of its working population. It doesn't look like that was the case, given this change.

Director McInnis: It helped. The statistics were even more stark around the turn of the millennium.

<Dir. McInnis smiles.>

Director McInnis: Stark. Mm. But yes, the activity you're researching was once even more energetic. You're correct that the altered course of hiring hasn't dramatically diverted the trend, however.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: What do you think explains it?

<Silence on recording.>

Director McInnis: I believe it all comes back to that diversity of experience I mentioned earlier. The people who work here are different. Different from one another, different from their colleagues at other facilities. There are approximately six hundred people working at this facility, and every single one of the one hundred and ninety-seven countries on Earth is represented to some extent. We—

Junior Researcher Qadir: Wait. Sorry. Every single one? What about—

Director McInnis: Dr. Orazio Acone of the Theology and Teleology Section. He worked as an exorcist for the Swiss Guard for fifteen years. May I continue?

Junior Researcher Qadir: Yes, sir. Sorry again. Had to ask.

Director McInnis: We are, I was going to say, living proof that the whole of humanity is capable of working together to a common plan. That people from across the globe bring valuable insights not visible from other positions. Our staff find common ground with individuals they would not otherwise ever be exposed to during the course of a life lived outside the Veil, and I believe they are stimulated by the variety on offer.

<Dr. McInnis smiles.>

Director McInnis: I have found that no other bond is so strong as an unexpected one.

<Excerpt ends.>

Junior Researcher Qadir: I hadn't considered the exoticism angle.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Not sure how I feel about that wording.

Junior Researcher Qadir: No, I know, but there's definitely some element of that right? Fascination with the unknown, with the different.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: He didn't mean they fetishize each other. He means they're excited to find common cause.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Yes, sure, but look at it from a different angle. What if Armenian women are Deering's type? How many was he likely to run across in the course of his everyday life?

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Kuroki and Du, though? China and Japan are right next to each other.

Junior Researcher Qadir: And the Chinese population in Japan is less than one percent; the Japanese population in China is more like point one percent.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Fine, but their ethnicity didn't seem like it had any bearing on their relationship. At least not to me.

Junior Researcher Qadir: How about the Argentine, Czech and British black women?

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: I really don't see it, no. I do see people energized by the… range, I guess, of people they work with, but their bonds go deeper. Like the Director said, in a lot of cases it's the surprising relationships that seem to be the strongest. Forget where they all come from, and look at their life trajectories and personalities.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Okay…

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Du is a shut-in nerd, and Kuroki is a field badass. Deering is a depressive shrinking violet, and Torosyan is a perky puppy. Okorie is diffident, Ibanez is aggressive, Astrauskas is hopelessly awkward.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Wettle?

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Wettle would contrast with anyone. There can't be more than one of that guy, and that's going to appeal to someone, even if I personally don't get it at all. Same with Lillihammer, though I do get that one.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Same.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: They're just so different, you know? They're learning weird new things about each other constantly. They're expanding each others' horizons.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Makes you wonder why we don't try it elsewhere.

Junior Researcher Kárpáthy: Yeah, it does seem… dynamic. I'm envious.

Junior Researcher Qadir: Well, hey. There's always that tour I mentioned.

<Excerpt begins.>

Dr. Verhoten: Hello, Dr. Rydderech.

SCP-5520: He isn't home right now. He is your home right now. He doesn't want to be, but it's important for the finale.

Dr. Verhoten: Are you feeling up to answering a few questions? You seem particularly dissociated today.

SCP-5520: dis associated

SCP-5520: the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the halls are empty the

Dr. Verhoten: I see. Well, do you mind if I try anyway?

Dr. Verhoten: No?

Dr. Verhoten: We've been looking into the records, studying a dizzying rise in Site-43's incidences of romantic attraction and consummation, and I'm noting a gradual increase from the 1960s until a sudden and dramatic spike in the 1990s.

SCP-5520: The future is yesterday.

Dr. Verhoten: By the turn of the millennium it was entirely out of control.

SCP-5520: It isn't about control.

Dr. Verhoten: What do you mean?

SCP-5520: It's all about coherence. If it isn't coherent, it won't stay together. It'll all fall apart when the spin cycle hits terminal velocity.

Dr. Verhoten: I don't understand.

SCP-5520: the halls are empty and it's been so long

Dr. Verhoten: Do you know what's causing this escalation, Dr. Rydderech?

SCP-5520: the space between

Dr. Verhoten: Yes?

SCP-5520: so much space between

SCP-5520: every inch remembers

SCP-5520: it wasn't always empty

SCP-5520: i am the walls are closing in

SCP-5520: it can't be empty forever

SCP-5520: it can't it can't i can't

SCP-5520: vivian

<Excerpt ends.>