While some higher-level researchers, specialized
guards, and containment experts at the SCP Foundation have fixed anomalous projects tailored
to their very particular set of skills, for many lower-level operatives - including junior
researchers, guards, janitorial staff, and even the dreaded D-Classes - every day is
showing up, spinning the wheel of misfortune, and finding out how you might die today. Will you be hacked to pieces by a murder monster? Pulled into a portal? Turned into a doll? Eaten alive? Made into a living nest by bugs? Stretched out and broken? Drowned? Exsanguinated? Set on fire? Beaten to death by a volley of anomalous tomatoes
because you decided to drop a cringeworthy dad joke or a rancid pun? There are perhaps only a handful of anomalies
that not only will not harm you, but will actively enrich your life by getting to spend
time with them. And of course, chief among these is the legendary
SCP-999, also known by its adorable moniker, The Tickle Monster. We don’t need to go into too much detail
in describing this gelatinous ray of sunshine, his anomalous delightfulness has made him
somewhat of a celebrity compared to the murderer’s row of terrifying entities and monsters around
him. The researcher assigned to him today was troubled,
having seen one of his favorite coworkers devoured by SCP-682 the day before. Getting assigned to feeding and checking on
SCP-999 today was exactly what he needed. As he entered the room, several bags of M&Ms
in hand, the creature cooed, perhaps sensing his tension, and approached him. Immediately, the researcher felt a wave of
calm and contentment wash over him. The incredible and rare feeling that perhaps,
everything is going to be alright for once. 999 rubbed up against his leg as he poured
M&Ms into its eager mouth, radiating good vibes the whole time. What an asset. What a gift. And to think, this adorable little goober
was prophesied to someday save the world. That much seemed almost funny. But he was certainly more than capable of
saving the life of someone who hadn’t felt the warmth of internal sunshine in quite some
time, and for that much, the researcher was profoundly grateful. He left 999’s chamber that day with a renewed
sense of hope for the future. That maybe, just maybe, they might be able
to pull through, to make a difference, to push this crazy ball of rock we call our home
in the right direction. Maybe someday, the sun would rise on a perfect
world. Who would have thought that a strange sunrise
could change everything? Emergency sirens went off across the globe,
but in every case, they were drowned out by a terrible and endless chorus of screams. But below all that, you’d hear another gut-wrenching
sound: A low but pervasive sizzling, like an egg on a hot pan, as billions of human
beings started to change their states of matter. The SCP Foundation had fought off and contained
so many seemingly impossible threats. From interdimensional horrors like the Hanged,
Sealed, and Scarlet Kings, to nightmarish mass killers like SCP-106, the Old Man, SCP-096,
the Shy Guy, and SCP-682, The Hard to Destroy Reptile. In their many battles against the anomalous,
they’d developed incredible methodologies and exceedingly advanced technology. But what good would any of it do when the
very center of our solar system decided in an instant that rather than being the lynchpin
of our delicate cradle of life, it would instead be the horrible instrument of all of our demises? This awful hypothetical was answered upon
the emergence of SCP-001 - A terrible day also known as When Day Breaks. In the snap of one’s fingers, half the world
was plunged into terror and death. Rays of stark, red light swept through the
streets. People lucky enough to be in the shade, or
inside buildings with a view to the outside, saw the people in the streets seize up and
begin to shriek in terrible pain. Their skin sagged and their bones liquified. Their bodies dropped down to the ground and
coalesced into gurgling, retching puddles the color of melted flesh. Those who saw this abomination happening would
never forget it. It would stay with them for the rest of their
lives. It would endure, like a stain on their retinas,
an afterimage burned into the plasma of an old TV screen. But here’s a slight consolation: For most
of the human race, “the rest of their lives” wouldn’t be that long. The sudden insanity taking over the world
caused the SCP Foundation to do something drastic: Step out of the shadows. Metaphorically speaking, of course. The legendary Foundation motto had been reversed:
They would die in the light so that humanity could live on in the dark. Thankfully, the very concept of the day gave
them one advantage: While one side of the earth was effectively doomed the second the
process began, the other side had a twelve-hour head-start before the sun turned its terrible
eye to them. Sirens went off in the middle of the night,
waking people up, groggy, rubbing the sleep from their eyes. Every television and radio and internet-enabled
device in their home was playing the same message, direct from the SCP Foundation - Which
had now effectively commandeered the entire US government, along with the rest of the
world. It gave them directions to the nearest Foundation
containment site and told them that if they didn’t immediately comply and find their
way to safety, they would experience a terrible death by sunrise. And if you’re at all familiar with human
beings, you’ve probably already predicted that they didn’t just calmly wrap themselves
up, make their way to their cars, and form an orderly line to the various Foundation
containment sites located around them. It was, in fact, total pandemonium. As the solar clock ticked down, slowly marking
off the seconds that anyone outside had left to live, the only human beings with a meaningful
head start began to go insane in a number of varied and interesting ways. Some who took the situation seriously, and
acknowledged that the sun was indeed going to wipe out most of humanity, simply cracked
under the pressure. There were those who went into totally catatonic
states, rocking back and forth in the corner and refusing to respond to any stimuli. Some became erratic and violent, with unpredictable
behavior that harmed themselves and others. After all, what was the point in acting normally
anymore when the complete crumbling of human civilization was imminent, and their only
hope was some shadowy organization they’d never heard of? Some, not heeding the warnings seriously enough,
and prompted by greed and opportunism, tried to take advantage of the situation financially. Some smashed windows of local stores and looted,
or broke into the homes of neighbors who had already fled in hopes of purloining their
property. Others were a little more creative: Setting
up short-term, everything must go, nighttime fire sales for their brands of essential oils,
nootropics, and nutriceuticals, claiming all of them have the power to ward off or cure
the new effects of the sun. Others completely denied the possibility that
any of this was real, and claimed that the messages from this so-called “SCP Foundation”
were actually just a front to take away their freedoms and trap them in underground government
camps. They staunchly refused to follow any of the
safety guidelines that the SCP Foundation put out, claiming, “If you try to take away
my first amendment rights, you’re gonna taste my second amendment rights!” While riding around in their pick-up trucks
and SUVs, blasting Kid Rock’s “Don’t Tell Me How To Live” at earsplitting volumes. Naturally, they had all melted into screeching
puddles of liquid flesh by sunrise. Some were not victims of their own bizarre
choices but were doomed by the sudden terrible fear and panic of the circumstances themselves. The highways were gridlocked, cars stuck as
far as the eye could see. So many had rushed to escape during the initial
wave that means of transport soon became choke points, like clogged arteries in a dying man. People do irrational things when they’re
scared: Riots broke out on the streets. Fighting, killing, burning. Everyone hoping for some means of meager control
over a situation that had long been out of any of their hands. Some were too far away with not enough time
to close the distance. What could they really do but just sit around
and wait to die? The hours marched on as the earth made its
slow turn towards the sun, leaving one decimated half in darkness and the other a sitting duck
for its terrible effects. Hundreds of thousands had made their way to
the containment sites and safely gotten inside, but still, so many millions were left outside. It was a slaughterhouse. One great, big global meat grinder, and every
moment that passed, the handle turned, and any humans left outside got just that little
bit closer to the grinding, gnashing gears below. Site-19, being the largest containment site
on the Foundation’s books, also became humanity’s only bastion. It was the greatest hope of escape from the
horrors going on outside. The Foundation had figured out so many ways
of counteracting deadly anomalous forces before, given enough time and enough personnel, surely
they could figure out a solution to even this? This was, however, when the most startling
realization yet swept over all the survivors: Those who were melted by the sudden hostile
sun weren’t dead. They were very much alive, in fact, but they’d
been changed - In both body and mind. What had once been humans now became terrible
beasts. Half-melted gelatinous nightmares that coagulated
into even bigger beasts. They got it into their head that they were
grateful for the transformation. That they had been liberated from their old
forms in the old world. They were something so much more now... And they wanted everyone else to join them
in their liberation. Survivors outside the Foundation containment
sites were systematically hunted by these great masses of altered flesh. Even those smart enough to cover every inch
of their bodies with clothes to protect from the sun, to only move at night, to carry weapons,
were dragged out by meaty tendrils from their refuges in basements and the lightless hearts
of buildings. Dragged into the searing gaze of the sun. To melt, to change, to coalesce into something
greater. It was the inevitable fate of all of humanity. When most of the stragglers were dragged out
and changed, the flesh masses started turning their attention to the Foundation containment
sites that were keeping all these poor, deluded people from salvation. They mounted offensives against the bases,
which the Foundation, with what remained of their manpower and advanced weaponry, did
what they could to repel the attacks. But every single day, it got harder. Thankfully, for the people holed up at Site-19,
there was one consolation out there to help: SCP-999. The Foundation was at war with the sun and
its terrible disciples, and contrary to many people’s beliefs, it takes more than men,
equipment, and bullets to win a war. 999 provided the essential element that brought
it all together: Morale, hope, the will to go on, even when it seemed like all could
be lost. After a long day of battling the fleshy abominations
at the gates, Foundation guards, Mobile Task Force members, and even civilian volunteers
were drained and traumatized by the horrors that they’d seen. Once a day was over, 999 would move among
their ranks, cuddling up to them, warding off the despair that was easy to set in during
the downswing of a terrible apocalypse like this. Without his presence, there would be no hope
of fighting that good fight. So many of them would have given up, walked
into the sun, and joined the monstrous force they were fighting. After all, they seemed happy enough, and it
would certainly be easier. 999 had become, once again, an indispensable
asset to the SCP Foundation. The solar betrayal may not have been the Scarlet
King’s doing - Well, as far as our current intel suggests, anyway - but he was playing
a crucial part in saving the world, exactly as predicted. 999 didn’t fully understand what was going
on outside sometimes, why there seemed to be fewer people as the weeks went on, and
why the people there seemed so sad all the time whenever he wasn’t helping them, but
he was more than happy to help, whatever the case. Many of the humanoid and some even non-humanoid
anomalies which realistically posed no harm to people inside the site were released from
their containment chambers. They needed everyone and everything they could
get in what seemed like a hopelessly one-sided fight against the very concept of being outside. Many of the larger, vacated chambers were
now filled with refugees from the outside, many of whom had lost everything and everyone
they’d ever known to the horrors out there. 999 made the rounds in these areas regularly,
and through the D-Class cots, which had been repurposed into more sleeping areas for the
thousands of desperate and terrified refugees. The adjustment to this new life - and to the
knowledge of all the secrets that had been kept from them for all these years - wasn’t
exactly easy on their psyches, but spending time with that soft, yellow blob that seemed
to smell exactly like their favorite scent from the old world made everything better. He was a savior in dark times, slithering
from person to person, giving hope where there was none. People opened up about their problems and
their fears - which, these days, were remarkably similar - and though 999 couldn’t reply,
for many it was enough just to feel like they were being listened to. He was a soft, blobby shoulder to cry on,
and after day broke, everyone needed a good, old-fashioned cry. However, one day, while wandering the long,
dark corridors of Site-19, he saw a different kind of crying. It was a woman with an unfamiliar face - probably
one of the rare new refugees - bawling her eyes out to a Foundation Senior Researcher
and an accompanying guard with an assault rifle. Hot, fat tears were rolling down her dirty
cheeks, her shaking hands clasped in prayer. She was begging the researcher and the guard
to let her go outside. She said that her son was still out there,
hiding away in the back room of a bank where she used to work. They got separated. She needed to go back and find him. Sadly, the researcher and the guard told her
that this was out of the question. Official orders stated that anyone outside
the base at this time was to be considered lost. Letting her out there to find her son would
essentially be condemning her to death. No human could go out there safely. But of course, SCP-999 isn’t, by any definition,
a human. When night fell, and everyone else was hunkered
down inside, 999 found a small crack in the wall and slithered out of it. It may not have been communicative in the
way most humans were, but 999 was indeed an intelligent being, and knew intuitively that
if it left through a more obvious route, its human caretakers here at the SCP Foundation
might try to stop it. And when it came to saving this little boy,
999 refused to let anyone stop it. 999 slithered out and through the broken streets. There were no bodies, of course. It seemed even the dead could be revived and
assimilated through the power of the sun. Talk about a mixed miracle. But the broken-down world outside Site-19
undeniably reflected the pandemonium that took place here. 999 would need to do his best to find the
little boy trapped out here before the sun rose. He lost a few hours even finding his way to
the nearest town, where it was safe to assume that the little boy was trapped. He saw some of those... Things... on the way there. Those moving, wailing mountains of melted
human flesh, each talking and chattering to themselves in a hundred different dead voices. 999 had been cross-tested with SCP-682, and
still, those monsters frightened him. He decided it would be best to stay away from
them and make sure that they never saw him out here. Eventually, 999 reached the town: Similarly
dilapidated and broken down in the months since the world as we had all known it disappeared
in a ray of terrible sunshine. More great, gibbering blobs of flesh patrolled
the streets, looking for converts to integrate into their biomass. 999 could only hope it
wasn’t already too late for the little boy. 999 discretely slithered from building to
building, until it could identify one as this “bank” that the boy’s distraught mother
had been mentioning. It thankfully had some awareness of what a
bank actually was, from the years of stressed Foundation employees telling it about the
money troubles they were suffering outside of work. It was another great example of it paying
to listen. Eventually, it did slither into the correct
building, and it heard the extremely quiet whimpering of the little boy inside. It could feel the sadness and the fear radiating
off of him, as it was the creature’s natural instinct to help the needy, and it used those
signals like homing beams to find the scared little boy. He’d hidden inside a broom closet and was
quietly weeping into his hands. He hadn’t eaten in days, and was only surviving
by drinking the filthy water from the mop bucket sitting next to him. 999 immediately embraced the boy, covering
him in its healing energy until the tears on the boy’s face eventually dried. 999 cooed and chirped pleasantly until the
little boy was laughing again. But this momentary joy was soon interrupted. A great, heaving weight dragged itself down
the hall outside. Both 999 and the boy could sense its monstrous
presence. As it got closer, they could hear all of those
chattering voices, those poisonous whispers. When it passed the door, they heard it speaking,
its voice practically vibrating with the hum of malicious lunacy. “Turn, pretty flowers, turn towards the
sun. Feel it on your face. Feel yourself change and sluice and mix into
us. Become one with our army of one. It must be so lonely to be you, little flower. Walk into the sun and be us...” 999 and the boy remained silent in the broom
closet for hours as the great shape patrolled the bank outside, searching for converts,
for victims. At times, it seemed too frightening to even
breathe, fearing that would be enough to make the monster detect them. It felt like an eternity until the monster
eventually did slope off, and leave them in the comforting quiet and darkness of the closet. Now, they might be free. 999 could escort the boy safely back to the
containment site and into the arms of his terrified mother. But when they opened the door, they saw a
terrible sight: Light, in the distance, pouring through the windows and the glass double doors. It wouldn’t be safe to go out that way. Upon seeing this, and putting together what
it meant, the boy began to cry. He couldn’t take another night in the closet. It was all going to whither from here... Until 999 had a wonderful idea. Hours later, when the Foundation’s guards
manned the turrets at the entrance of Site-19, waiting for the inevitable onslaught of the
melted flesh creatures, they tensed up, seeing a bobbing gelatinous form slithering towards
them in the distance. The guards, who’d learned the hard way from
too many lost men that it was better to be safe than sorry, drew a bead on the distant
shape and prepared to fire - When suddenly, their superior raised a hand and said: “Wait! Hold fire! Is that...999?” And it was. They all stared in astonishment as 999, chipper
as ever, came towards them through the sun. It looked as though the opacity of its yellow
cytoplasm had increased, but other than that, it was unaffected. Turns out, the sun couldn’t melt what was
already melted. The guards parted to allow 999 safe passage
into the facility, watching in amazement, and once it was inside, 999’s slime parted,
releasing its contents: One very relieved little boy. It seemed through turning up its own opacity,
999 had given the boy safe passage through the sun and back into the facility. The boy was saved. It had won. Not long after that, there was a tearful reunion
between mother and child, and a brief flash of hope in this dark and terrible time. 999 didn’t stop to bask, of course - It
returned to its duties, keeping up staff morale and helping the refugees heal from the horrors
they’d seen. In its own little way, and for a lot of people,
SCP-999 really was saving the world. Or what was left of it, anyway. Oh, and of course, if SCP-999 has won your
hearts just like it’s won ours, you’ll be pleased to know that you can purchase your
own adorable, high-quality SCP-999 plushie at scpswag.com. Check the link in the description to get your
own. Trust us, having a 999 to cuddle really does
make any apocalypse a whole lot easier. Now go check out “SCP-001 - When Day Breaks”
and “SCP-999 Tickle Monster VS. the Most Evil SCPs” for more of the two
incredibly contrasting anomalies from today’s episode!
