Dead bodies litter the streets. Their skin burned and lesioned, their lips
crusted with dry vomit. Their eyes milky and white. This isn’t the aftermath of a fight, it’s
the aftermath of a massacre. Nobody here stood a chance against the monster
they died fighting, And the monster isn’t done. An unnatural shadow moves between the houses,
skittering on pointed legs like death itself in the night. Perhaps what the elder said was true - Only
an even more dangerous monster could stop a monster such as this. The survivors all converge in one building,
shaking with fear and following the single instruction the elder gave them: Keep your
eyes closed at all costs. And to think, the village was so peaceful
until the demon arrived. It is a small, picturesque place nestled in
the lush mountains of Chile, hundreds of years before the world became the connected whole
it is today. It is a world where that which exists beyond
your borders ought not to exist at all. The people there live quiet and simple lives
- herding goats and alpacas, growing crops in the hills, tanning, dyeing, and weaving. They are hardy people, acclimated to the often
rough and unforgiving life on the slopes. Like most in their time, the people here are
ruled by superstition, a firm belief in the existence of Gods and Monsters beyond the
veil. Some would scoff at their faith, call them
“primitive”, but the reality is, an open mind will often catch more truth than a closed
one. Because we all know the truth: There are indeed
monsters out there, haunting the dark - Always have been, always will be. The main difference is that now we have an
organization on our side. A group prepared to die in that dark so we
can live in the light. The people of back then weren’t so lucky. They were forced to confront the gaping jaws
and burning eyes of the unknown with no aid. The same eyes that would soon be turning to
the innocent people of this rural, isolated Chilean village. It all began with a missing teenager. The boy was out hunting for game in the forest,
when his parents realized it had been hours since they’d seen him. As the shadows grow longer and the sky begins
to darken, a rescue party forms and ventures out into the wilderness to search for him,
armed with clubs, bows, and arrows. The mountains can be a treacherous place,
between the harsh terrain and the many dangerous predators who hunt out there, too. Little do they know, the boy they are searching
for has fallen prey to a new type of predator, one that none of the villagers has ever encountered
before. It’s another few hours before they find
him. One of the men in the search party remarks
that the boy seemed to have gone far further than he should when hunting. Another replies that perhaps he didn’t venture
out here at all; maybe he was dragged. No one honors that with an answer. They keep their heads down and keep searching
- The possibility is too frightening to truly consider. If a dangerous creature has made its home
in the forests surrounding the village, then all of them are in trouble. Not long after that, they find the missing
teenager, injured and unconscious. He looks pale and sickly, with three ragged
claw marks cut into his chest. The silent thought passes between them: What
animal has three claws? No animal that they know of. But now is not the time to think of that. They need to wrap the injured boy in blankets
before he freezes to death out here or succumbs to his injuries. First, they need to ensure that he survives
this. Then, they need to find out what did this
to him. Soon, the boy is lying in the home of the
town’s medicine man, a rudimentary scientific figure with a wide knowledge of herbs and
plant-based medicine. But he cannot diagnose the sickness that the
boy seems to be experiencing. He has nausea, dizziness, a rattling cough
that sometimes produces blood, and his skin is taking on an odd, unnatural hue. This can’t be the result of his injury,
the medicine man concludes. The wounds are actually relatively shallow. This malady must have another source... The villagers pray for the boy, and leave
offerings and sacrifices at their altars for his recovery. But it does no good. Later that same night, he splutters blood
and passes away. His dying words, heard only by the medicine
man, is that there is a monster in the forest. And the most frightening thing of all is that
he’s right. Over the next few days, it gets worse. Far, far worse. The same mysterious affliction that killed
the teenage boy starts to spread across the village, infecting the vulnerable and infirm
with deathly sickness. Livestock begins to go missing, or are found
dead when the sun rises, cleaved with the same three deadly, razor-sharp claw marks. And if this wasn’t all horrific enough,
soon, the crops begin to die off, as though the same sickness that’s hurting the people
and the animals is doing the same for them. It’s impossible to ignore the reality of
the situation now: There is a demon in their midst, and if they don’t kill it, it will
kill all of them. The town holds a meeting in their square,
where it quickly becomes apparent how drastically the town’s numbers have dwindled. They are a shadow of their former glory. Some men suggest forming a hunting party to
rampage through the forest, find this monster, and kill it. Others wisely bring up that this might leave
the village’s women and children undefended - What if the creature were to attack while
they were all in the forest? It would mean certain doom. Frightened discourse soon gives way to a heated
argument. People can become violent when they’re afraid,
and when the thing causing their fear is nowhere to be seen, that violence is inevitably channeled
toward one another. However, before things can get out of hand,
the brewing calamity is quickly ended by the sound of three firm taps against the ground. They all turn and see the village elder - an
old blind man who uses a gnarled walking cane. The crowd falls silent. This man commands ultimate respect among the
villagers, and for many, his presence has an immediate calming effect. Perhaps he would finally have a solution to
this problem. “There is a way...” he says with a slow,
rattling voice. “What is the way, elder?” asks a younger villager. “An ancient guardian spirit that lives in
the mountains. I can bring it here, and it may be able to
help us, but there is one condition, one rule which must be followed at the cost of all
others: None of you may gaze upon this spirit. You must keep your eyes closed. If you see it, a horror far worse than the
ones we’ve experienced here will fall upon this village.” With the approval of the rest of the village,
the Elder makes a rough pilgrimage up into the mountains, made even rougher by his age
and infirmity. But the safety of his village is at stake,
and there is nothing he won’t sacrifice to see that its existence will be maintained. The only thing he carries, other than his
walking stick, is a length of rope. Soon, he reaches the mouth of a cave - An
Ancient cavern cut deep into the flesh of the mountain. He enters - as a blind man, the darkness means
nothing to him. The cave is silent at first, but soon, he
hears something: A quiet, pitiful weeping. That is how he knows he’s close to the legendary
guardian spirit. The old man has never seen his supposed spirit,
but if he did, he would know that it is a long, pale humanoid, with grasping hands and
a terrible face. He knows the beast is capable of great violence,
but he also knows that the beast is not evil, for it takes no pleasure in that violence. The elder’s knowledge of the guardian spirit
in the cave had been passed down for generations in his family. He had been told throughout his childhood
about how the guardian spirit defended their village in dangerous and desperate times. When bands of raiders had invaded almost a
century ago, the guardian spirit destroyed them. When beasts emerged from the woods, the fear
of the guardian spirit warded them off. And here and now, the elder is certain that
the guardian spirit would be able to defeat the demon terrorizing them. He takes the rope and ties it around the weeping
monster’s neck, forming a makeshift leash. He spoke a soothing incantation and exhaled. “It is time for you to serve us once again,
great spirit,” he said. And so begins the treacherous journey back
down the side of the mountain. But in his absence, back at the village, the
situation is deteriorating. Hours have passed, and night is about to fall. The demon only attacks at night, when they’re
most vulnerable. Fear has already poisoned the hearts of many
of the village’s men. They sequester most of the remaining population
away in the village’s largest home, and arm themselves. They have no faith in the Elder’s mystic
solution. They will find this abomination and kill it
themselves. There is no other way. But as they gather in the village square and
prepare to lead an assault on the forest, they never would have expected the monster
they’re hunting to come to them. And in an almighty flash, it appears in front
of them. It is even more horrible than they’d ever
imagined: A large, spindly beast with black spikes for legs, an emaciated body, the same
three black claws that had left those terrible marks on all of its victims. But worst of all is the face: A featureless,
tooth-lined maw with a huge, glowing eye inside. It is a monster worse than what even their
nightmares could conjure. Before they can even attack it, it unleashes
a blast of energy that blows back the ones closest to it, leaving them dead or dying,
their skin horrifically burnt. Those further back run in to attack the monster,
screaming with a fury that they hope will hide their terror. But the monster is far faster than them. It whips out its claws and slashes at them,
hitting each one with a deadly kill strike. They aren’t able to land a single hit on
the beast. As the bodies hit the floor, some try to run,
but it’s already too late. One person attempting to run suddenly feels
a pain in his chest. He freezes in place, and then, is simply sucked
into himself - Screaming, crumpling away, and disappearing entirely. While the language to understand how this
man died would not be developed for centuries, we today would be able to say that the monster
- today known as SCP-001, the Prototype - created a singularity within the man’s body, absorbing
him into himself. The people cowering inside can hear the screams
and the terrible sounds of their fellow villagers - their friends, sometimes even their families
- being massacred outside. They believe in the elder and follow his teachings,
despite their fear. They keep their eyes forced closed. Some of their strongest men have gone out
there to face the monster, and been slain. There is truly nothing they can do except
wait and hope. Outside, the creature - the demon that had
been the ruin of their village - is the only thing still alive. The many bodies of those slaughtered lay twisted
on the ground around it. Then, it begins to hunt. It wants to find the others. It gurgles and chitters, its legs making a
tak tak tak sound on the ground beneath its sharpened points. The surviving villagers do all they can to
remain silent as they hear it getting closer. Death itself draws near. Then, someone and something else enter the
village. The demon hears them arrive, and skitters
over to investigate. The elder has arrived - He knows what happened,
he can hear the demon, he can smell the burning flesh of the dead - and he has brought another
monster on the end of a rope. A guardian spirit. A thing that, centuries later, would become
to be known as SCP-096, the Shy Guy. And the demon had made the terrible mistake
of looking at its face. The monster began to cry and wail. “You have defiled and profaned my village,
demon,” the Elder said, speaking over the guardian spirit’s wailing. “This is your divine punishment. You will be removed from the face of the earth
for your crimes.” The demon releases a blast of radioactive
energy, striking the Elder directly and killing him instantly. But despite the residual burns from the attack,
the guardian spirit is unaffected. It continues to bawl loudly, then, with the
fury and speed of a bullet train, it roars and gallops towards the demon, its clawed
hands extended. With one strike of the back of the guardian
spirit’s hand, the demon’s body is thrown through a nearby empty house, tearing through
the brickwork and sending it skidding across the ground on the other side. The demon rises shakily to its feet, dazed
and hurt. It doesn’t understand - How had that creature
resisted the radiation poisoning? It only showed minor burns, it didn’t make
sense. It makes even less sense to the demon when
the guardian spirit comes bounding through the wreckage of the house, its burns already
somehow completely healed. There is no hesitation from the guardian spirit. It leaps towards the demon, and the demon
only narrowly dodges the spirit’s grasp. It rakes its claws along the spirit’s back
as it glides past, leaving another three distinctive scars. But by the time the creature lands on all
four spindly limbs, the wounds are already seamlessly healing. This is nothing like fighting a mere human
being. Perhaps the Elder was right - this creature
is a divine punishment, and it really is here to wipe out the demon once and for all. But if that is the case, then this demon won’t
be going down without a fight. It creates a singularity within the guardian
spirit’s chest. The spirit doubles over in pain, howling and
clawing at the dirt beneath it. But, to the demon’s surprise, the guardian
spirit doesn’t crumble like the humans did - The massive amount of radiation being caused
as a side effect of the singularity barely seems to phase the beast. The demon strains to increase the power of
the singularity within the guardian spirit, but other than causing it to wail and bellow
louder, it seems to have no meaningful effect. The demon, on some level, thinks: It’s as
if the creature is held together by an invincible skeleton. No matter what it does, it only seems to be
able to leave superficial damage. The monster is unbreakable. The guardian spirit flails and lunges, breaking
the demon’s concentration and causing the singularity to collapse. Taking advantage of the sudden respite, the
guardian strikes the demon on its disgusting, bulbous head, causing it to stumble backwards,
dizzied. The demon steadies itself and gives a defensive
screech, but the guardian spirit ignores it. Instead, it leaps onto the demon and grabs
it. Shocked by the sudden ferocity of its attacker,
the demon clawed at the guardian spirit’s face, wounding it, but not deterring it. The guardian spirit has a grip that would
put iron to shame, and despite trying to wriggle free, the demon couldn’t seem to escape. As the guardian spirit roars and stretches
open its jaws, the demon activates its emergency escape feature: It creates another miniature
singularity around itself, a wormhole, and vanishes. The demon reappears in the woods, feeling,
for the first time in its wretched existence, a pang of mortal fear. At least it was able to escape back into the
woods, where it could steal away into the night and fight again another day. It understands its enemy now - It could figure
out weaknesses, it could plan, strategize… But its thoughts are interrupted by a familiar
horrific wailing. Shocked, the Demon looks up - It sees the
guardian spirit, bounding towards it across the forest, barging through trees and splintering
them into wood chips. How!? How had this creature gotten here already? It’s like it has an innate sense of the
demon’s location. The demon steels itself and summoned all of
its power. It would need to annihilate the guardian spirit
now, or it would be done for. It opens its freakish head, and the eye in
its mouth glows, releasing a wave of radioactive heat that bakes earth and disintegrates trees
in its path. It catches the guardian spirit in the blinding
blast and wipes it out. When the smoke clears, there is nothing left
of the guardian spirit but a charred skeleton. The demon approaches, perhaps to investigate
the kill, perhaps to take in the victory. But suddenly, the skeleton rears up, already
beginning to regrow its flesh, and closes its clawed hand around the demon’s throat. The demon screams… But not for long. When silence falls over the forest once again,
the surviving villagers open their eyes at long last. They leave the home that had been their temporary
refuge to see the devastation, the wreckage of what their village once was. The mutilated and the dead laying across their
streets. But at least the worst has passed - The demon
is gone. The scars will never fade, but they can rebuild. Rebuild and carry on. Meanwhile, miles away, up a treacherous mountain
pass that may never be walked again, there is a dark and lonely cave - With a quiet weeping
within. Check out the Dr. Bob Patreon and become a
junior researcher today! Now go and watch another entry from the files
of Dr. Bob, like SCP-001 The Prototype.
