Shirley woke up screaming, louder than usual
this time. Bea, Shirley’s wife, sat bolt upright, as
though someone had just run a 20,000-volt charge through her. Her dirty hand clasped over Shirley’s mouth
until the awful sound stopped. She whispered, “Baby, it was a dream, just
a dream!” Shirley fell into a terrified silence, trying
to regulate her breathing. They’d been hiding in an abandoned apartment
block for three days now, waiting for the roads to clear, so they could take the chance
and move forward. Bea, keeping close to the ground, scuttled
over to one of the smashed-out windows. She stared down onto the street, thirty feet
below. Midnight, no stars, cars crashed up against
each other from the initial panic. And thank god, none of those things down there... She breathed a sigh of relief and returned
to Shirley, gathering her up in her arms and giving her a reassuring squeeze. Her body was still trembling. “What happened in this one?” Bea asked. Shirley exhaled and closed her eyes. “We’re close now,” she said. “We’re so close, Bea.” It was the dreams that began this journey. The quest for the last safe place. Initially, Bea had thought it was a fool’s
errand - There were no “Safe” places in this world anymore, nowhere that the sun or
its terrible monsters hadn’t touched. But Shirley insisted otherwise. She’d seen it in her dreams. A place of almost mythical wonder, a vast
and complex facility, away from the light. Shirley and Bea grabbed their backpacks and
shrugged them on. It was best to set off now, get a few hours
of walking under their belts and find some shelter before the sun came back up. In the meantime, all they needed to do was
avoid the monsters lurking out there. It was an interesting trade-off. Once upon a time, years and years ago, when
the sun changed, there had been billions of those things. They were people once, until the new light
touched them and turned them into these slimy abominations. There was a time you couldn’t look out your
window without seeing hundreds of them slithering past you. Then, they started coagulating. Becoming these huge, mountainous masses of
gloopy, melted flesh. It was nice that they were fewer now, made
them easier to avoid, easier to sneak around. But if one of those things found you, you
were dead. Or more likely, you were about to be something
so much worse than dead. The two women trekked down the side of the
road, keeping to the shadows, even in the dark. They were on the edge of the city now, and
it wouldn’t be long until they were in the wilderness. Pro: Being away from a population center meant
lower odds of being attacked by one of those monsters. Con: Fewer places to hide when the sun came
up. In the meantime, all they could do was keep
walking and hope. It was an almost supernatural mixture of luck
and skill that had gotten them this far. They’d known each other for four years when
day broke and everything went to hell, but they’d only been married for about a month
- it’d been a hell of a post-honeymoon wakeup call. So many had been changed in the initial panic,
and so many more had been destroyed by what came after. But these two weren’t just anybody. In fact, it was the specific combination of
skills and knowledge these two possessed that’d kept them alive for this long. In the world that came before, Bea had been
a soldier who’d done two tours abroad and seen active combat multiple times. And Shirley had been a doctor, rising through
the ranks of a local hospital. Between them, they could fight for and heal
one another, despite everything. And in those early years, that’s all it
had been. They were always moving, always avoiding the
terrors outside and the tyranny of the sun. They’d avoided the dangers that’d destroyed
so many others, but they’d never dared to hope. Hope was lofty, impractical, it got people
killed. They’d only ever tried to survive. The immediate avoidance of death was a practical
goal. Anything else was just confetti. Until, of course, Shirley had started having
the dreams. Some were just fragments, like sifting through
a stack of photographs in the middle of a deep fog. Others were full narratives, like movies in
her head, viewed in the first person. But all of them were about the same thing:
She and Bea needed to make it to a place they called “Site-19.” Something about it was familiar, like a thing
she’d heard years ago. Perhaps from those strange broadcasts that
were on every TV screen during the initial chaos. Oh, and of course, there was one more element
in the dream. The one thing that made it seem more like
a nightmare. In this part of the dream, she was already
in Site-19, and walking down a long, dark hallway, somewhere far away from the sun. There are a series of heavy reinforced doors
along the wall next to her. Each one had a number on them, advancing as
she got further down the hall: 029, 030, 031, 032... That’s when she’d hear the voice. That awful, terrible voice. “Shirley... Oh, Shirley... Come closer... Don’t you want to see my face? I’m Smiling, Shirley. I’d like you to see it...” She’d reach the door marked 035, at which
point, the next door slowly creaked open. Even after all the terrifying things they’d
seen in the new world, this somehow paralyzed her with fear every time. It was a kind of dread she’d never experienced
before. Something that looked like black water would
start seeping out from the opening door, then footsteps, getting closer. A shambling figure would emerge from the open
door. It was hard to make it out fully in the dark,
but somehow, she just intuitively knew what was coming toward her. It had a stark-white face, like a mask, with
nothing but darkness where the eyes should be. Down below, the body, seemingly heavily injured
and dripping with that same black water, was one she recognized. Her own. She couldn’t move. The masked figure, this masked version of
her, kept getting closer, dripping with more and more of that black water. It was shaking, almost vibrating. Then she realized, it was laughing. ”See you soon, Shirley,” it said. “Can’t wait for you and Bea to visit...” And that was when she woke up screaming. Somehow, despite the grim ending, some part
of Shirley knew that she and Bea needed to get to Site-19. Only there would she be safe, and perhaps
even find the answers to how all this horror had even transpired. They were already risking their lives out
here every day, wouldn’t it be worth it to find the truth? The duo continued to trudge through the night. It was, they thanked their lucky stars, a
relatively uneventful journey. They encountered one of the flesh beasts on
the edge of town, but they were able to hide inside a nearby bus depot until it slithered
on, gibbering incoherent madness. After waiting to make sure it was gone, the
duo left the city and ventured out into the badlands, Shirley continuing to insist that
the legendary Site-19 from her dreams was definitely close by now. Bea looked up at the sky and chimed in, “I
hope you’re right, honey, or you and me are fried eggs.” Shirley and Bea walked for another several
hours, each becoming more silently anxious that the sun would rise before they reached
ample cover, and everything they worked for would be taken away from them. This terror persisted until, against all odds,
a huge, black shape started to emerge along the horizon. The sight of it made Shirley’s eyes widen
in amazement. “That’s it, Bea,” she said. “Site-19. Just like it was in my dreams...” They passed the chain-link fence around the
perimeter, approaching this large, seemingly abandoned building like it was the Lost City
Of El Dorado. Bea was astonished. She loved Shirley, of course, and had faith
in her beliefs, but something about a place prophesied in a dream actually being real
was honestly nothing short of a miracle. The two of them approached the fortified front
door and heaved it open together. Against all odds, they could see light inside
the building. They still had power here!? Nowhere had power anymore! Maybe this place really was salvation, after
all... As the two closed the door behind them, they
noticed that the windows all around them were shuttered. It must have been some precautionary measure
against the new sun. Smart. Whoever these people were, they’d thought
ahead. They’d had some kind of preparation for
all this. So, Bea couldn’t help but wonder, where
had they all gone now? As the two ventured deeper into the building,
Bea unholstered a handgun that she’d been keeping in her jacket. It was no good against the flesh monsters,
but it was a worthwhile deterrent against other desperate people out on the road. Lucky for them, she hadn’t needed to fire
it. Yet. Other than the power being on somehow, the
place seemed abandoned. They traveled from room to room - offices,
filing areas, what seemed like laboratories, libraries, rest areas. There was no real indication of what these
people, whoever they were, actually did around here. After searching through a few different files,
all written in almost incomprehensible short-hand and code, Shirley at least found a name to
put to these people: The SCP Foundation. Was it some kind of charity? They ventured deeper until they found a hall
marked “D-Class Bunks.” Inside, they found bunk beds stacked on top
of each other. Enough to hold hundreds of people. Bea wondered aloud whether this was some kind
of secret paramilitary outfit. It was the one thing that might explain everything
they’d seen here today. And in all fairness, she was at least partially
right. “Okay, ladies, hold it right there!” Shirley and Bea turned around to see a man
in an orange jumpsuit standing a few feet behind them. He was carrying an assault rifle, and training
it on both of them. He was a tall, imposing man, and yet, he was
shaking. Bea lowered her gun. Neither she nor Shirley said a word. “You’re human, right?” he said, voice
trembling slightly. “What?” Shirley replied. “Just answer the damn question!” There was a tense pause, where nobody there
seemed to know what might happen to them next. The stranger’s finger started curling around
the trigger. It was Bea who broke the silence. “We look human, don’t we?” she said. Another moment passed. The gun rattled in the stranger’s hands. He exhaled and lowered the barrel, taking
a more relaxed stance. “Sorry,” he said. “Can’t be too careful, the kind of stuff
they used to keep in here. It’d give you nightmares. I’m Mike, by the way.” He approached, tentatively shaking Shirley
and Bea’s hands, just to prove to them that he wasn’t the kind of guy who liked to gun
down random women. He asked them whether they were hungry, and
when they told him they hadn’t eaten anything but protein bars in over a week, he told them
he was about to show them something incredible: The Site-19 Break Room. Not long after that, Shirley, Bea, and Mike
were all sitting around, enjoying some defrosted hot pockets. At that moment, no three-course meal cooked
up by a five-star chef could ever even compare. As they ate together, Mike told his story. “The people who used to run this place,
believe me, they were nutjobs. Sure, back in the day, I wasn’t such a nice
guy. Me and some other knuckleheads, we needed
the money, so we robbed a few places. People got caught in the crossfire, next thing
I know, I’m on death row. Then these men in white coats, they came and
told me I could get a commuted sentence if I came and took part in some experiments for
them. That’s how they got me into their house
of horrors right here...” If Shirley and Bea hadn’t lived through
the apocalyptic hell of When Day Breaks, they might not have believed Mike. He told them about how this “SCP Foundation”
used to use humans in experiments, subjecting them to all the monsters they had locked up
down here. There was this giant reptile that couldn’t
be killed. Some freaky statue that’d snap your neck
if you stopped looking at it. But the one that’d frightened him the most,
the one that’d haunted his dreams, ever since he got here... “The Mask,” Shirley said aloud, lost in
thought. Mike was taken aback. How had she known what was he going to say? It did nothing to reduce his fear when she
told him that she’d been dreaming about the Mask for over a month now. Stark white, with black water dripping from
it. Everyone was silent for a moment. Bea and Mike just stared at Shirley, equal
parts amazed and frightened. Mike cleared his throat and told Shirley that
in the years that had passed since day broke, the population of Site-19 had slowly dwindled. Monsters had escaped, the flesh beasts had
slithered in and taken others. Over time, most of the staff had either died,
changed, or left. All that was left here was him. Him, and the Mask. Luckily for him, he’d never been directly
“cross-tested” with it. Because those who got tested with the Mask
never came back. Sometimes, he could hear it whispering in
his dreams, trying to leak itself into his mind, drip by drip, poisoning his soul. The one saving grace was that, being a mask,
it couldn’t exactly walk up and tap you on the shoulder. All you needed to do was stay away from it,
and you’d be fine. The Mask couldn’t hurt you on its own. The three of them carried on talking for the
last hours of the morning. Night had become day and day had become night,
it was the easiest way to survive these days. Or at least, survive as yourself. Bea and Shirley told Mike how they’d met
in college, all those years ago. Mike told them the story of how he managed
to survive by hiding in a broom closet while some gangly, white monstrosity chased down
and slaughtered the rest of his bunkmates. The tiredness took them all again, and they
decided to bed down in the D-Class Bunks. They were more comfortable than the bedrolls
that Shirley and Bea had been sleeping on in abandoned buildings for the last year or
so. To Mike, this place had been a living Hell
once upon a time. But now, for a brief period in this terrifying
new world, it could be Heaven. Shirley drifted off to uneasy sleep, trying
her best to ignore the whispers. In what only felt like a few moments, her
eyes fluttered back open. She was in a new place, but one that felt
oddly familiar. A long, dark hallway, bordered on one side
by a series of iron doors. She turned her head slightly, eyes still adjusting
to the darkness. The number on the door next to her read, “027.” Further down the hall, Shirley saw a dark
figure, standing tall, shoulders broad and back erect as a ballet dancer. As her vision came back into focus, she saw
the shock of orange. It was Mike, wearing that same orange jumpsuit. He was standing about ten or fifteen feet
away, staring in the opposite direction. “Mike?” Shirley said, operating on the foggy half-logic
of a dream. He didn’t respond. With growing concern, she started stepping
closer. “Mike?” That’s when she noticed something else:
Black water, pooled around Mike’s feet. The sight of it stopped her in her tracks
and froze the breath in her throat. With an almost audible creak, Mike turned
around. A grinning, white mask covered up his face. “Hello, Shirley,” it said. “So lovely to finally meet, face to face,
eh? I bet you’re so glad you ran into me. After all, sleepwalking can be dangerous...” Shirley screamed and ran in the other direction,
wasting no time at all. She heard the slow, measured footsteps of
Mike, wearing the Mask, behind her. It was in no rush; it walked like a masked
killer in a horror movie. “Why run?” the voice said, “I’ve got all day, and
I know you can’t leave while the sun’s up, darling. You and your beloved are all mine, it’s
only a matter of time...” Somehow, despite her being so far ahead, the
voice sounded like it was right next to her ear. Like it wasn’t speaking out of its mouth,
it was just talking directly into her brain. With every syllable, her mind started to slow,
like the Mask’s voice was tar seeping in between the gears. Soon enough, her legs stopped working. Shirley was frozen in place, hearing the footsteps
of the Masked Mike behind her. Her brain was flooding with dark thoughts:
Death, pain, torture, grief, the final smothering of all hope and happiness. There was really nothing like it, like every
nightmare she’d ever experienced being collected into one terrible elixir and poured onto her
mind. So this was what that horrible mask could
do… Soon enough, the Masked Mike had passed her
and turned to look directly at her face. There was an awful smell, like chemicals and
burning flesh. She turned her gaze downwards, seeing that
it looked like Mike’s body was somehow melting away from all that black water. It was like acid. “Mike was a weak host,” the Mask said,
as if it was replying to her thoughts. “He won’t last much longer, but that’s
fine, I’m looking forward to taking you for a whirl, Dear Shirley. And when your hands are mine, you can only
imagine the terrible things I’m going to do to your beloved Bea with them.” Shirley, with all her willpower, was able
to move her mouth enough to force out the words, “Don’t you dare touch her...” The monster laughed, just like it always did
in her dream. “That’s not your choice to make, anymore,”
it said. The Mask reached for her with Mike’s melting
fingers, fizzling away with all that black slime, getting so close to caressing her tender
cheek. All that awful silence was only broken by
the sound of a soft clicking behind it, then a gunshot passing through the back of its
stolen head. The Mask turned, more shocked than anything,
to see Bea standing there, wielding Mike’s old assault rifle and aiming it with deadly
accuracy. Before the Mask could breathe another poisonous
word, Bea opened fire, releasing a volley of bullets into the last of its melting body
as it staggered back into the darkened hallway. Shirley watched in astonishment as the creature
fell, Mike’s body splattering into a puddle, and sending the Mask itself skidding down
the hallway. Maybe it was just a trick of the mind, but
she could swear the Mask was frowning now, not smiling. Bea breathed a sigh of relief and said, “I’m
thinking it’s probably better if this place stays abandoned.” Shirley, who hadn’t quite regained her speech
yet, just smiled, nodded, and embraced Bea. They shared a kiss, just happy to still be
together and alive, despite it all. Come nightfall, they left again, in search
of another place. The Possessive Mask remained there, laying
on the floor of some anonymous Site-19 Hallway. Just waiting for some unlucky, weak-minded
survivor to wander in, and try it on... Now go check out “SCP-035 - The Possessive
Mask” and “When Day Breaks SCP-096” to learn more about today’s terrifying anomalies!
