Title: For Fire, We'll Pray
" … high above, we'll stay." Father Jacob mumbled, as he held up the golden chalice above his head, so all the people in the chapel could see it. The air he forced through his nostrils was cold, foul and reeked of sin.
He lowered his arms and took a few steps back into the shadows. Two of his disciples stood next to him, dressed in most peculiar vestments. Scorched and moldy they seemed, but also well looked after and cared for. One of these disciples, a women with short, black hair and pleasant facial features, went forward and lit a white candle on the brittle, stone altar, which seemed way older than the rest of the shabby chapel. The chapel itself was little more than a glorified shack. It was dirty, with small windows and an integrity that wasn't there. Afterwards, the woman quickly returned to her place in the shadows and kept her chin low.
Jacob looked into the gross, piggish mass of people before him. They had sqeezed themselves into this little shack of his God, just to listen to his revelations. And together with the disciples, they celebrated and sung for the one above all. The one who will save them all.
He smiled, exhausted. It wouldn't be an easy task to guide them to the question, but his god never told him that it would be an easy task. In fact, He never told Jacob anything. But since the day he saw one of his god's angels come down on his land, he wanted to preach, and preach he did. Father Jacob even watched the angels from afar, until those godless men in black suits came to his town. They told him, that his land and his life was endangered; deep in his ground, some old bombs were sleeping, waiting to greet the world anew with, malicious intent. Nonsense, he thought back then, but the authorities stood by the godless ones, not by him and his church.
Worries started to flood his brain like a great wave. He would never meet the angels. He had no chances of meeting the god he was a prophet for. He would fail. The dirty and greasy pews creaked as the people stood up, waiting for their great Prophet's next action.
Jacob suddenly felt the burden of his faith on his shoulders with every step he took. He walked towards the cold altar and took the candle that rested on it. He grimaced, knowing what had to be done. He had to see his benevolent god. He had to lead his little pigs to him. He could not allow himself to fail. The prophet turned to a dusty, wooden beam on his right side and set it ablaze. The cleansing fire spread quickly, voracious and wonderful, terrible and awesome. It reflected in the eyes of the many believers, the glimmer like hope, the ash like promises told. They all started to chant together. It was a maddening chant of screams and pain, deafening loud with voices that haunted even the strongest mind. Only the zealous disciples burned with righteous torment and kept silent. At once, the beams that supported the chapels roof collapsed with a roar akin to thunder, and the pigs saw their god.
SCP-4604-2, circa 19██. Notice, that all SCP-4604 instances have been observed to leave footprints and trails, despite lacking legs. (Hover to enlarge image.)
Item #: SCP-4604
Object Class: Euclid
Special Containment Procedures: A secure perimeter of two (2) kilometers is to be maintained around the territories of SCP-4604 instances. Said entities haven’t been observed to leave their territories. (UPDATE: SEE INCIDENT-4604-A) Civilians found inside of or attempting to get inside the perimeter are to be questioned in Provisional Site-4604, amnesticized, and released.
Description: SCP-4604 is the designation for at least four (4) humanoid entities located near the woods of [REDACTED], Siberia. Each instance is respectively named SCP-4604-1 through -4.
While every instance of SCP-4604 is mostly unique to the others in appearance, what they all have in common is that they lack legs and have smoke coming out of their lower body. All instances are constantly floating in mid-air.
SCP-4604 instances are not considered hostile unless attacked. For the most part, the entities wander within their territory. Animals have been observed to flee on sight, it is currently unknown if this is a simple instinct or an anomalous effect. They do not appear to require nutrients, water, or warmth to sustain themselves.
If a human, hereafter named the 'subject' for clarification, moves closer than five (5) meters to an instance of SCP-4604, the instance will engage in conversation with said subject. If the subject is unable to converse in any way or tries to disengage, the subject's heart will stop, killing them instantly. In most cases, the subject and SCP-4604 instance converse using vocalization. The voice of SCP-4604 instances shows traits of both male and female speech and cannot be identified as one or the other. Conversations between subjects untrained in cognitohazards and SCP-4604 entities have ranged from five (5) to ten (10) minutes.
On 12/5/2008 D-4604-2 was equipped with audiovisual recording gear, and instructed to look for, and converse with an instance of SCP-4604. Below is a transcript of D-4604-2’s recording equipment.
<BEGIN OF TRANSCRIPT>
D-4604-2: Guys, it’s freezing cold and I haven’t seen no fucked up humans around yet.
Control: Just keep searching D-4604-2, we’re certain that they’ll be there.
<Approximately 30 minutes of radio silence.>
D-4604-2: God I swear, if I’m ever going to be out of this hellhole I’ll kill the one who sent me —
<An instance of SCP-4604 comes into D-4604-2’s field of view.>
SCP-4604-3: The last flame is the highest reward for those who speak in true riddles, my lost child.
D-4604-2: <surprised> Excuse me?
SCP-4604-3: When the question is wrong, it is as much worth as its answer.
<At this point, Control notices the lack of response from D-4604-2. This is presumed to be an anomalous effect of SCP-4604>
<Only white noise is audible for 3 minutes, after which the audio feed returns.>
D-4604-2: <growing desperate> I’m sorry, I don’t understand what you mean, man!
SCP-4604-3: When you marched through the snow that is life, your heart looked into the cold abyss.
D-4604-2: Why can’t you just let me go?!
SCP-4604-3: The heart of the freezing child was dark, as it had engulfed their sin in the shadows. But as they screamed now, begging and pleading to be allowed to walk along the unjust path, they realized that one answer will always be out of question, for it is true.
<SCP-4604-3 is seen holding a matchstick. D-4604-2 grabs it, and sets himself on fire.>
D-4604-2: Where is the sun burning?
SCP-4604-3: In the hearts of those who speak in true riddles.
<END OF TRANSCRIPT>
Two (2) days after the events of Conversation Log 4604, Researcher Winestein made a proposal to use a drone to collect items located in the vicinity of SCP-4604 instances to gain more insight about SCP-4604's anomalous nature. Below is a table showing the items recovered by said drone.
| ITEM RECOVERED |
DESCRIPTION |
NOTES |
| Camera |
A russian camera, which appears to be out of the late 1950's. |
The only picture on the camera's film is of SCP-4604-2. |
| Match |
A match. Its head glows red, this phenomenon can be described, as if a flame would shine through its inside. |
Analysis of the wood that the match is made out of revealed that it is at least ████ years old. |
| [REDACTED] |
[REDACTED] |
[FOR MORE INFORMATION, PLEASE ACCESS ADDENDUM SCP-4604-F] |
| Bible |
When opened, Researchers were exposed to a previously unknown infohazard. A squad consisting of four (4) Foundation Agents was sent to Provisional Site-4604. They successfully contained the infohazard through the use of amnestics and the deletion of security camera footage. |
Further study into items associated with SCP-4604 has been halted until further notice. Researcher Winestein is still being interrogated at time of record. |
The "Chelyabinsk Meteoroid". The image was taken by a security camera near the outskirts of [REDACTED].
On February 15th 2013, a celestial body (the "Chelyabinsk Meteoroid") struck Siberia with an equivalent of roughly five-hundred (500) kilotons of TNT. The meteorite wasn’t spotted by asteroid detection telescopes, because it traveled to Earth on a trajectory that was close to the Sun.
In a height of roughly thirty (30) km above sea level, the meteorite broke up into several more pieces. As a celestial body that impacts Earth is an event of great interest, the Foundation ensured that personnel arrived at the impact sites in short time. A roughly two (2) by two (2) meters fragment landed in the territory of SCP-4604-1. A drone that was controlled by Technician Holdren captured the event by coincident. Below is a transcript of visual logs recorded by the drone.
<BEGIN OF TRANSCRIPT>
0920: <During standard exploration mission, Technician Holdren notices celestial body on collision course with territory of SCP-4604, and tries to capture the event with the drones visual recording systems, as retrieval of the drone seems impossible>
0921: <Fragment of the original meteorite comes into sight traveling with approximately ten (10) km/s>
0921: <Impact is expected in under a minute>
0922: <Object slows down considerably and hovers roughly one (1) meter above ground>
0923: <Object starts emitting light at -260 mag, roughly as bright as 10 Suns>
0924: <Object breaks apart while still hovering. Humanoid entity is seen rising from the remains of the object, it bears a strong similarity to the SCP-4604 instances, although a burning halo floats above its head>
0925: <SCP-4604-1 comes into view, it starts conversing with the entity (See ADDENDUM-4604-D)>
1005: <SCP-4604-1 as well as the entity grow wings on their backs, seemingly out of white fire>
1006: <Both rise up into the sky and are not visible anymore>
<END OF TRANSCRIPT>
On the same date that Incident-4604-A happened, SCP-4604-1 conversed with PoI-4604-a, code-named "Gabriel". Below is a snippet from an audio transcript captured by a drone, which was operated by Technician Holdren. For the full transcript, please contact the Site Administration of Provisional Site-4604. Technician Holdren was interrogated, treated with weak amnestics and released for further work at Provisional Site-4604. Personnel under clearance level 4 are to be told that the drone didn’t possess audio recording systems.
<BEGIN OF TRANSCRIPT>
Gabriel: The bell which should not ring at noon has been corrupted, by the one who once was our sibling - the false bringer of light. His unright fire must be extinguished before the young ones grow up to find the question.
SCP-4604-1: For the father of the highest skies would rather eat his smallest children, than he would let them be cold and alone in the dark.
Gabriel: So he requires the sword and light to be wielded by a soul, that is protecting the weak ones.
SCP-4604-1: The brother spoke, for he loved talking, albeit he already knew the answer his sibling would give.
<END OF TRANSCRIPT>
In October 2017, a celestial body ("Oumuamua") coming from a solar system other than ours, passed by the earth by roughly twenty-three (23) million kilometers at its nearest point. To prevent knowledge of the anomalous phenomena that occurred alongside this event, false information has been spread by the Foundation in order to masquerade said phenomena. On the 14th of October 2017, the object in question stopped it’s course by anomalous means and broke up into pieces, revealing a humanoid entity that has been designated PoI-4604-b, code-named "Belial".
Approximately fifteen (15) minutes after Foundation Researchers noticed the presence of PoI-4604-b, SCP-4604-1 and PoI-4604-a appeared in front of PoI-4604-b. All three entities were seemingly conversing by vocalization, it is currently unknown how the entities were capable of this in the vacuum of space. After their conversation ended, SCP-4604-1 pulled a sword out of its chest cavity and struck PoI-4604-b. After SCP-4604-1 had struck them, all entities vanished. The celestial body put itself together and continued on it’s course. SCP-4604-1 has been noted to have returned to their territory. PoI-4604-a and PoI-4604-b haven’t been observed ever since. PoI-4604-b is assumed neutralized.
On the 15th of October 2017, linguist personnel was given the task of writing a transcript of the conversation that took place by using lip-reading. Below is a snippet of said transcript. For the full transcript, please contact the Site Administration of Provisional Site-4604.
<BEGIN OF TRANSCRIPT>
Belial: All your words are worthless, when your ears cannot hear the screams of our tortured brothers, sealed deep below the cruel mistake of our creator.
Gabriel: The sibling that speaks with six split tongues through the six mouths on his six wings will be banished, for they hate the little ones and thus, the one above all.
Belial: He, who lives high up in the clouds thinks he can lock his older children up, for in his eyes we misbehaved. But we will rise like the tide above all that is wrong, and when we do, we will do that, which is right. Tell our father we still love him, despite his creation of the selfish abominations, for we will undo them soon, and balance will be restored.
SCP-4604-1: Judgement has been served. My deed is done.
<END OF TRANSCRIPT>
During the recovery of items from SCP-4604's territories by drone, a single handwritten note was collected. It is thought that the note was written by Foundation Agent D. Kusnezow, who was declared KIA after his helicopter crashed into SCP-4604-4's territory on 08/01/2008. The note is believed to contain important information regarding the nature of SCP-4604, additionally no info- or cognitohazards have been found. Below is a transcript of the found note.
This is probably my last letter.
I don't know what SCP this is, but
don’t listen to the
four angels
demons, their voice is
beautiful
dangerous
Follow the clues, find the question
Oh my god what is happening
We can | truth
I can’t bear the pain
I mastered
I have no control over my mind now
Follow
Kill me
Per 
