What’s in a name? Ancient folklore and fairy tales sometimes
tell of the importance of names, that they can hold the power to summon or banish. Whether you buy into the superstition or not,
you’d be unwise to ignore the power a name can have, especially if you ever dare to venture
into SCP-4000. Why? Use your own name too many times in this extradimensional
forest, and you may find that what walks out of it isn’t you at all. At least once a year, the Foundation leads
an expedition into SCP-4000, to explore this Keter-class dimension. But if you go down to those woods today, then
you’d better follow the rules. Remember, the Foundation has implemented these
strict guidelines for your own safety, and it’s in your best interest to follow them. First and foremost, when referencing anything
inside SCP-4000, be it a person, place or thing, you cannot under any circumstances
use names or titles. Communication is key when exploring SCP-4000,
and making use of specific descriptors will deter any adverse effects on your journey. For example, you may want to refer to the
location of SCP-4000 as “the woods where you need to speak carefully”, an apt description
for such a place. Of course, there’s a reason the Foundation
doesn’t provide a handy flashcard of alternative descriptors for any personnel taking part
in the annual mission into SCP-4000. Nothing found there can be referred to with
any consistent name, so it is perhaps advisable to look over a thesaurus and expand your vocabulary
before visiting SCP-4000, as you’ll need to come up with a lot of different ways to
refer to the people and creatures around you. But don’t worry, the Foundation will be
able to train you how to properly refer to SCP-4000 in both written and verbal communication. In a similar vein, the second rule states
that no personnel member should respond to their own name while in SCP-4000. Naturally, you and your fellow expedition
team will not be alone in the forest you find yourselves in. The denizens of SCP-4000 are perpetually-mutating
creatures, some appearing to be trustworthy while others are hostile. It is for personnel members’ own safety
that no consistent names or titles are used to refer to each other in conversation. This has been known to cause personnel returning
from SCP-4000 to experience vivid hallucinations, and in some instances has led to appearances
of creatures found in SCP-4000 in our world. Thirdly, when interacting with the lifeforms
residing in SCP-4000, personnel are advised to accept any gifts that they are offered,
but are warned to, under no circumstances, consume anything that is given to them while
inside the forest. Finally, and above all, do not divulge any
name, nickname, codename, alias, or any other personal designation when interacting with
any native entities, and disregard any designator that an inhabitant of SCP-4000 attempts to
assign to you. Personnel must, however, remain courteous
in the presence of any native creature of SCP-4000, and treat these entities with respect
and formality. Access to SCP-4000 can only be achieved by
performing Procedure 4000-Halloway, a ritual requiring a steady flame in an indoor fireplace,
fuelled by only organic kindling. Personnel are required to combine the powdered
bones of one male lion, one male red fox and a baleen whale, and cast these into the fire
with a personal possession holding strong sentimental value to the staff member performing
4000-Halloway. Next, personnel are to add three feathers
of a bird such as a raven, or crow, and must respond with the correct counter phrases once
the fire begins to emit a voice. If these conditions are met, and the correct
responses given, Foundation personnel will gain access to the entry point of SCP-4000. If any error is made during the course of
performing Procedure 4000-Halloway, then under no circumstances should this ritual be repeated. Staff are urged to apologise for any incorrect
actions, then refrain from engaging in this procedure in the future. Should Procedure 4000-Halloway be completed
successfully, Foundation personnel will find themselves arriving in the access point to
SCP-4000, emerging from the mouth of an old well in the center of the forest. Exploration teams sent into SCP-4000 are advised
that this dimension does not adhere to the laws of physical space that personnel will
be accustomed to. There is a single, confirmed-safe route that
must be used when traversing the forest of SCP-4000, a dirt path leading in a circuit
both beginning and terminating at the entry point. Previous attempts to map the landscape of
SCP-4000 all confirm that the only way to safely exit this dimension is to follow the
entire length of this path in one direction, until eventually returning to the well. You have been warned, any attempt to travel
back the direction you came will result in a loss of contact with the rest of the expedition
team. As mentioned, SCP-4000 is home to a number
of entities, often noted to be undergoing continuous and dramatic changes in form. These physiological mutations appear to occur
whenever these creatures are unobserved, making distinguishing between them difficult. When questioned about the exact nature of
these changes, the inhabitants of SCP-4000 claim to have no control over them, and express
distress and dissatisfaction when said changes occur. Guidelines have been put in place by the Foundation
regarding the interactions between personnel and creatures found in the forest, and adhering
to the rules regarding the use of consistent names and titles remains vitally important. The native creatures appear semi-humanoid,
and are reported to be highly temperamental. Should any staff member happen to offend one
of these natives, they may be subjected to anything from verbal assault, to acts of extreme
physical violence from the SCP-4000 resident. If any Foundation personnel further question
why there are so many rules when visiting SCP-4000, then they need look no further than
the discoveries and fate of Dr Eugene Japers, who during his initial expedition to SCP-4000
in 2005, encountered a humanoid native entity whose head resembled a rabbit’s. As the pair shared a polite conversation,
the rabbit-like creature made an enquiry regarding Dr Japers’ name, asking:
“How is your name?” Keeping to the rules, Dr Japers did not divulge
any name or other form of title to the creature, at this time. However, Japers remained courteous and polite
during this interaction. The rabbit responded with the following:
“Are you simple? I'm merely asking how your name is. My name has smelt of raspberries lately, I
think - or snapdragons, perhaps. It's so hard to tell these days, but one makes
an effort.” In his reply, Dr Japers made reference to
his own name as having ‘tasted rather tart as of late’, before concluding the conversation
with the rabbit entity. Upon returning to the SCP-4000 forest three
years later, Dr Japers was met with the same creature, and once again engaged in conversation
with it. After briefly discussing their previous encounter,
Dr Japers was able to turn their exchange towards something the rabbit had mentioned
before, about finding it difficult to describe its own name. When asked to clarify this point, the rabbit
replied: “I can only assume it's because of how long
we've been apart - my name and I, that is. It was a good name, a proud name, I'm fairly
sure. By this point, though, it's probably decayed
from its former grandeur, if it even still exists.” After this mention of its relationship with
its own name, it should be noted that the rabbit referred to Dr Japers by the title
‘fellow scholar’. The third and final encounter between Dr Japers
and this entity came in 2013, after the doctor was sent into SCP-4000 with instructions to
conduct a more thorough interview with the subject. It was during their third conversation that
the rabbit-man revealed details of a long-forgotten war between human beings and the residents
of SCP-4000. Apparently these creatures, the ‘Fae’,
do not originate from the forest in which they now reside, and – according to the
rabbit-man’s claims – were born in our world. “Much as it grieves me to say it, we were
betrayed,” the rabbit explained. “We had fought side-by-side, you know, in
the war against that factory. We had done nothing but help them, and what
did they do? They destroyed us. They took so many of our lives, and all of
our names. Some of us fled here when the war was just
beginning, but not many. Not many. Still, though, I don't hate them.” It has been assumed by some that the Foundation
was directly involved in whatever may have wiped out the Fae, causing them to either
retreat or be banished to the forest of SCP-4000. An additional assumption has been made that
whatever weapons were used on these creatures is directly responsible for their constantly-shifting
state, rendering them without their own names or identities. Whatever the case may be, it was during their
conversation that Dr Japers, in reference to their second encounter, referred to himself
as a ‘fellow scholar’ to the rabbit, in order to coax information from him. However, in doing so, the doctor had unwittingly
accepted the title that the native entity had given him. By mistakenly responding to the name ‘fellow
scholar’, the doctor had broken the rules of interacting with the creatures of SCP-4000;
an easy mistake, but a costly one. The doctor would later leave SCP-4000, traversing
the safe path back to the well. Dr Japers vanished shortly after his exit
from SCP-4000, and his whereabouts are currently unknown. The Foundation has made several attempts to
investigate his untimely disappearance, but to this day he remains missing and the fur
left on the inside of his expedition gear displayed no strange properties. The single goal, it would seem, of the creatures
residing in SCP-4000, is the theft of names. However, this naturally extends far beyond
this dimension’s definition of identity theft. Through an unfortunate blunder, Dr Japers
allowed the friendly nature and demeanour of the rabbit-entity to trick him into accepting
the name ‘fellow scholar’. By giving Dr Japers a name, the rabbit was
free to steal, not only his name, but his very identity. While it is unclear how this transference
is achieved by the creatures, it is due to the risk of this that the Foundation employs
such strict rules for any research team tasked with travelling to the forest of SCP-4000. Make no mistake, names have more power than
we realize, and this is evident in few places more so than SCP-4000, a pocket dimension
where ever-changing survivors of a forgotten massacre exist as identities alone. Remember, a name is a powerful thing whichever
side of the well you find yourself on. Your name binds you to who you are, but if
your name becomes someone else’s, then what else of yours becomes theirs too? Now go check out “SCP – 106 – The Old
Man” and “SCP – 049 – The Plague Doctor Escapes” for more of the Foundation’s
journeys into the strange and unknown.
