When an anomaly is first detected by an SCP
Foundation Field Agent, it’s up to the Foundation’s
Mobile Task Forces to tag and bag the impossible
entities before they can do any more harm.
Sometimes these retrievals are uneventful,
other times... not so much - especially when
they’re dealing with brutal forces of nature
like SCP - 096, also known as, The Shy Guy.
A creature that, from its very first interaction
with the Foundation, had a reputation for
being dangerous and needed to be feared.
A series of vague sightings and mysterious
disappearances up in the frosty mountains
of the Yukon first sparked the Foundation’s
interest. When they were certain that they
had an anomaly on their hands, two retrieval
teams - Zulu 9-A and Zulu 9-B - were dispatched
to secure and contain the entity. Zulu 9-A
took the lead in a heavy duty chopper, equipped
with .50 caliber GAU-19 Heavy Machine-Guns
and carrying an AT-4 Anti-Tank launcher. They
were prepared for anything - or so they thought
- as they established a visual on SCP - 096
while two clicks away from the target.
They couldn’t get a clear line of sight
on the creature, but it appeared to be stationary,
docile, and was making no attempt to flee.
Piece of cake, right? Little did they know
that SCP - 096 was just looking away from
them. If it was facing towards them, it’d
be a whole different horror story, as Zulu
9-A were about to find out.
The team landed their helicopter next to the
creature and were shocked to see that it was
completely naked, in spite of the subzero
temperatures all around them. The creature
was unnaturally thin, as though it’d been
starved for weeks, with bone-white skin and
unnaturally long limbs. The team guessed that
the creature’s arms must have been at least
1.5 metres long, but its docile nature and
insubstantial body mass gave the impression
that it wouldn’t prove too difficult to
contain. That is, until they saw its face.
Zulu 9-A’s Captain was the lone survivor
of the incident, as he was lucky enough to
be looking away when the creature turned towards
his team. The rest of the squad ended up staring
eye to eye with SCP - 096, and from that moment
on it wasn’t docile anymore. The creature
began to whimper, then cry, then sob uncontrollably
in a way that sounded eerily human. This sudden
change in temperament startled the rest of
Zulu 9-A and they opened fire on the creature.
Under the hail of gunfire, SCP - 096 entered
a murderous frenzy and began tearing into
the hapless squad of soldiers. While its flesh
and organs did seem to take damage as a result
of the barrage of .50 caliber rounds from
the helicopter mounted machine guns, its skeletal
structure remained intact and it continued
its onslaught, tearing the team limb from
limb even after they’d blown practically
all the flesh from the creature.
The AT-4 Anti-Tank launcher proved equally
ineffective at stopping SCP - 096 while it
was in attack mode, and it was only after
slaughtering the entire team that it returned
to its docile state. Nobody knows exactly
what the creature did to Zulu 9-A after the
gunfire started, but no trace of the team
was left behind.
Zulu 9-B touched down soon after, and with
a grave warning from the Captain not to look
at the creature’s face, they were finally
able to subdue it. A bag was placed over SCP
- 096’s face, which seemed to soothe it
enough to move it to a nearby Foundation facility.
Little did they know, they’d just obtained
one of the deadliest SCPs of all time, and
while it may have been under lock and key
for now, it seems inevitable that it would
get out and cause more violence and chaos.
Research and containment procedures for the
SCP - 096 were put under the command of Dr.
Dan, a senior researcher at the site. It was
his job to find out exactly what this being
was capable of, and the more he tested, the
more he realized that they were dealing with
something truly terrifying.
Disposable D-Class personnel were used to
figure out exactly what it was that caused
the creature to enter its attack mode. Just
as it had during the initial retrieval mission,
SCP - 096 went berserk when any of the attending
personnel saw its face. In this stage, it
would enter a period of considerable and unstoppable
distress for one to two minutes - covering
its face and wailing loudly. When the period
of distress ended, the creature would mercilessly
slaughter every D-Class that had seen its
face, and just like with Zulu 9-A, no trace
of their bodies would be left behind.
Dr. Dan was horrified and intrigued by this
phenomenon. The creature killed anyone that
saw its face directly, but could the same
be said for indirect depictions of the creature’s
face - such as images and videos? Dr. Dan
was desperate to find out.
More D-Class personnel were brought in to
test this, to frightening results. Dr. Dan
found that the creature did indeed still enter
attack mode when people saw pictures and videos
of SCP - 096’s face. The creature seemed
to have an innate sense of when people were
viewing these representations even when it
should have had no conceivable way of knowing.
It didn’t matter how far away or how many
barriers were in place between the viewer
and the creature, the attack mode would still
activate. And once it did, it seemed as though
nothing could stop the creature from hunting
down the one who saw its face.
With all of this new data, special containment
procedures were devised to keep the creature
safely under lock and key. Its cell was a
5 m x 5 m x 5 m airtight steel cube, fitted
with advanced pressure sensors and laser detectors
to ensure that SCP - 096 remained in its cell
without risking anyone having visual contact
with the creature’s face. All cameras and
video equipment were strictly forbidden, and
weekly checks for any cracks or holes in the
containment cell were mandatory. Of course,
none of this would stop the creature if anyone
somehow saw its face. In order to solve that
little problem, Dr. Dan would need to continue
his research.
To find a method of subverting the creature’s
deadly glance, they needed to know exactly
what they were dealing with - but how could
they, when even a glance at a photo or video
of the being meant certain death? A potential
solution was proposed - creating an artistic
representation of the creature’s face, something
that hadn’t yet been attempted. But how
would they achieve such a feat? Simple - they’d
procure a D-Class prisoner with some artistic
talent, and they found one who had been a
tattoo artist before becoming a Foundation
guinea pig.
Dr. Dan formulated an ingenious plan for keeping
this D-Class alive for long enough to accurately
draw an image of SCP - 096’s face: He would
be placed in a Bathysphere diving bell several
kilometers underwater, and tens of kilometers
away from the containment cell where the SCP
was being held. The D-Class was made to look
at a photograph of the creature’s face,
and then replicate that image in a pencil
sketch. Dr. Dan first confirmed that the creature’s
attack mode is only activated by the creature’s
face by having the D-Class look at a series
of photos of the SCP’s body parts one by
one, finally finishing with its face. The
D-Class began drawing and even remarked on
how creepy the SCP’s facial features were,
despite not knowing the deadly context.
Meanwhile, back in its containment cell SCP
- 096 sensed someone viewing its face, and
entered its inconsolable crying state followed
by its attack mode. It broke out of containment
easily, and began making a beeline for the
D-Class, traversing the miles between it and
its prey. The D-Class didn’t know it as
he locked the finished drawing into a separate,
autonomous submersible, but he was already
dead. As the drawing made its way up to a
researcher on the surface, SCP - 096 dived
into the water, and started swimming down
towards the artist. Minutes later, the bathysphere
was breached, and the D-Class was torn to
shreds.
SCP - 096 was recaptured without issue by
surface recovery team Foxtrot-303-A, and further
testing on the drawing showed that artistic
representations of SCP - 096’s face were
in fact harmless. From this experience, we
now know that the creature has a gaunt face
with totally white eyes, possibly indicating
blindness, and a grossly extended jaw. Nevertheless,
Dr. Dan was adamant that SCP - 096 was too
dangerous to be left alive, and requested
permission from the upper echelons of the
Foundation to terminate the creature by any
means necessary. However, the doctor’s request
would fall on deaf ears, until...
It all started with a seemingly innocent image.
(Use this image: http://scp-wiki.wdfiles.com/local--files/incident-096-1-a/G9zmJ.jpg)
While it’s now been redacted for your safety,
the black spec inside the yellow circle was
once a minuscule image of SCP - 096, taken
unknowingly in the 1990s by a semi-professional
mountaineer. One day, they were looking at
old photographs when his eyes passed over
the tiny spec without even noticing he had
seen anything. But SCP - 096 noticed, and
began entering its attack mode.
It tore through its steel containment unit
like tissue paper, causing the release of
a nerve agent that killed a number of attending
Foundation staff. The monster then fled the
base and began pursuing its prey, with Mobile
Task Force Tau-1 in hot pursuit. Dr. Oleksei,
who was helping to manage the site where the
SCP was contained, was in dismay over the
situation. Dr. Dan was out of the country
at the time, trying to discover more about
the creature’s origins. However, he did
leave the Mobile Task Force with a new secret
weapon against the rampaging Shy Guy… Project
SCRAMBLE.
SCRAMBLE were state of the art goggles featuring
a new technology created by Dr. Dan, which
- using artistic renditions of 096’s facial
features - could detect and scramble the features
of SCP - 096 into an unrecognizable form,
preventing the normally deadly effect of gazing
upon on its face. In theory, this would allow
MTF Tau-1 to engage safely with 096 once its
prey had been eliminated and bring it back
into containment. But disaster struck on two
fronts. First, the prey in question was located
in a population center, creating the potential
for a huge loss of life.
And the second bigger problem was that the
SCRAMBLE technology didn’t work, as stray
pixels of the creature’s face would reach
the eyes of the task force before the internal
microprocessor had time to scramble them.
The mission turned into a death sentence,
as SCP - 096 slaughtered almost the entire
task force, as well as a number of civilians
in town - including an infant and its entire
family. It was a monumental disaster, made
even worse by a final revelation: Dr. Dan
and Dr. Oleksei had themselves facilitated
the entire containment breach and allowed
the resulting massacre to happen, with Dr.
Dan hoping it would be enough motivation for
Foundation Command to green-light his research
into destroying the creature.
Anything that would give him the opportunity
to kill this thing would be worth the bloodshed.
His plan worked and the SCP Foundation saw
it his way, approving his request to neutralize
SCP - 096. However, success comes at a cost
for Dr. Dan. Once he figures out a way to
finally kill the creature, though done in
the line of duty, he himself will be terminated
by the Foundation for his crimes against humanity.
But considering how much damage SCP - 096
is capable of causing if it ever got to a
major population center, or - even worse - was
ever caught on camera and broadcast to a worldwide
audience, the doctor himself would likely
deem his own death a justifiable cost. To
this day, the Foundation is researching ways
to kill the creature, and they’re still
looking for their silver bullet. And the pressure
is on. They hadn’t known about the seemingly
innocent picture that sparked the last containment
breach. The one taken decades ago, in which
the Shy Guy had only occupied four tiny pixels.
Four tiny pixels that resulted in multiple
innocent lives lost.
So be careful where you look because who knows
how many other photos of the creature are
lurking out there, photos with an innocent
dot in the background. Your eyes glance over
it, not even noticing the little blip, until
you hear a distant wailing that seems to be
getting closer, and closer, and closer. And
then... it’s already too late.
