Tetsu44

Contest Phase 2

Item Number: SCP-XXXX

Object Class: Keter

Special Containment Procedures: Foundation webcrawler-bot NECRO-7 is to monitor the online records of all funeral homes, mortuaries, cadaver repositories, and other locations with high concentrations of dead bodies/tissue within North America. In the event that any bodies contain symptoms similar or identical to those caused via SCP-XXXX, it is to be investigated immediately. All bodies confirmed to be infected by SCP-XXXX are to be immediately confiscated by a Foundation recovery team equipped with Level-A Hazmat suits and immediately incinerated at a temperature of 900°C via Foundation-issued portable incinerator. All pieces of the body must be incinerated completely, and the entire facility disinfected and investigated for further instances of SCP-XXXX, before the outbreak can be considered contained. All individuals who have come into contact with SCP-XXXX are to be dosed with a Class-C Amnestic, and told cover story Z-9 (Rodent Infestation).

All confirmed instances of SCP-XXXX-1 are to be immediately extracted from infected bodies and placed into Class-B lockboxes. All personnel are to ensure that nonliving biological material does not come into direct contact with SCP-XXXX-1 while handling it. All instances of SCP-XXXX-1 are to be transported to Site-44 via MTF Alpha-4 ("Pony Express") to ensure that packages are not compromised during transport. On arrival, they are to be placed into Containment Vault XX, which is to be sterilized via aerosol compounds on a daily basis.

Description: SCP-XXXX is a rare and anomalous fungal microorganism that lives exclusively within the frontal and limbic lobes of adult humans. Structurally, it resembles Ophiocordyceps daceti¹. SCP-XXXX is functionally indistinguishable within the standard human microbiota, and SCP-XXXX infection produces no known detrimental symptoms within living hosts.

SCP-XXXX anomalously influences living hosts to travel to and permanently inhabit the North American continent. This desire alone is not enough to positively identify SCP-XXXX infection within living hosts, but all living hosts of SCP-XXXX will exhibit this compulsion. Dr. De Luca’s research concludes that this is the only known compulsion induced by SCP-XXXX.

Once a host dies within North America, SCP-XXXX infection becomes visible. Bodies will experience rigor mortis immediately after death, and the stiffening of the corpse will not cease after the standard period of 48 hours. Additionally, the temperature of the corpses rises continuously to the point of combustion over a period of roughly two months. Once the corpse has ignited, temperature rises quickly to approximately 900°C, destroying the corpse.

Once the host has died, the fungal sample begins to colonize the remainder of the host’s intracranial space and reinforce the existing cranial structure, rendering it hermetic. Exposure to temperatures approaching 900°C will cause the cranial structure to become brittle and fall away, revealing a fungal aggregate that has replaced the brain. This structure is referred to as SCP-XXXX-1 and is theorized by Dr. Harris to be a reproductive body. SCP XXXX-1 is a spheroid roughly 6.5 cm in diameter. The aggregate is capable of merging with other SCP-XXXX-1 instances to form a larger SCP-XXXX-1 instance. Research performed by Dr. De Luca posits that this process is critical to maintaining the stability of SCP-XXXX-1.

This aggregate, like O. daceti, is highly susceptible to a hyperparasite. The hyperparasite has only been observationally detected, and has not been conclusively identified. Because of this unknown hyperparasite, only 2-4% of SCP-XXXX-1 aggregates survive contact with dead organic tissues of any kind. Dr. Harris believes that the hyperparasite is a common microorganism present in dead organic tissues, and that it might present a way of neutralizing SCP-XXXX-1 and SCP-XXXX entirely. Dr. De Luca considers this notion absurd, and believes that frequent decontamination of the aggregate is the safest option.

WARNING: This article has automatically been flagged for:
Frequent alterations of Special Containment Procedures.
Frequent conflicts between edits made by different researchers.
Reference to non-existent Containment Vault.

Article is pending manual review.
Dr. De Luca is pending manual review.
Dr. Harris is pending manual review.
Panfungal screening scheduled for personnel assigned to SCP-XXXX.

Contest Phase 1

Item #: SCP-XXXX

Object Class: Euclid

Special Containment Procedures: SCP-XXXX is to be contained within a humanoid containment chamber one of two humanoid containment chambers modified to resemble a motel room. The rooms’ furnishings should not postdate April of 1972.

Devices capable of sending and receiving radio transmissions are not to be brought within 5 meters of SCP-XXXX’s current containment chamber.

Following Incident-XXXX-1, the following procedure has been appended: Once every six months, the vacant chamber is to be remodeled, with the furnishings, decor and wallpaper replaced according to room specifications. At this point SCP-XXXX is to be moved from the current containment chamber into the remodeled chamber until the process is repeated.

Footnotes

1. A subspecies of the “zombie ant fungus”, Ophiocordyceps unilateralis sensu lato.