January 1, 1912

There was no wind outside the facility. The sea-breeze itself held its breath, it seemed, as the Foundation prepared to do something it had never done before.

Inside the facility was a reptile. Inside, the reptility was facile.

Doctor Tiberius Plact stood by with a clipboard, beholding the beast in its acid tank.

It was the shape and size of a beached whale, and with its limbs it pressed up against the edges of the tank, staring back at Plact. It flicked its blue tongue in and out, placidly. It was impersonal as death. It felt no fear.

In Tiberius Plact's left hand was the telegram from Overwatch. His hands did not tremor and no wind disturbed it. It authorized the termination of the reptile after nine years' hard bureaucratic wrangling. He had pulled in every favor, fomented unrest amongst the level 3 personnel, and sacrificed his marriage to secure this. People whispered of him as a cautionary tale: Overwatch, like death, did not move from its' purpose lightly.

"Lower the crystal," barked Tiberius. A D-class turned the winch, and the sample of infectious quartz descended into the tank.

Tiberius looked at the two generals and the doctor observing the attempt.

"A damn shame," said the general on the left, "That we can't do this more often."

He continued spouting all the arguments that had echoed in Plact's head for the past nine years, and longer. It would be so much easier, so much cheaper, cause so many fewer deaths, were they to kill all the threats instead of locking them up. Plact's mouth was set in a grim line. The other doctor trembled, fearing to speak ill of the Council, while the other general kept his face rigid with wonder, rapt as he was to witness this moment, unique in the history of the Foundation.

The winch-line's sound became slack, and Tiberius returned his gaze to the reptile. It stared at him still, its' eyes for him alone. The crystal rested on its' carapace.

"Raise," barked Tiberius, and the winch rose again from the acid, its' steel chain dripping.

And all he needed to do was wait.

---

The Overseer stared at the telegram in her hand.

TERMINATION FAILURE STOP REPTILE IMMUNE STOP REQUESTING FURTHER RESOURCES STOP….

Damn, she thought. She had voted against the attempt in the Council meeting, and had hoped it would be simple. A one-off, followed by Plact's demotion. And they could all get back to the business of understanding the magic of the world, rather than destroying it…

But this would give the reptile a higher profile. And the Council would never rescind their order now. They were stubborn to the end.

She could hear the wind outside the site, a light breeze that stirred the crushed leaves of the prior year, and it was in her head as she signed the order releasing the funds to Plact's project. She opened a file folder and wrote a three-digit designation on it, filing away the telegram.

It seemed this reptile was going to be…

tough to keep from existing, in an irrevocable manner? Vocabulary failed her, for the moment. It would come. It always did.

---

January 1, 1914

It screamed its insults and epithets at the crowd of soldiers. Its' heart was full of spiders and its seven limbs each ended in a keratin mace. Its' breath was dandelion seeds, scattering poisons on the breeze.

Its name was SCP-682, and it hated everything that moved.

The soldiers thanked their lucky stars that lethal force was authorized. They fired their howitzers, holding the line against the creature, until their higher-ups sent word that they were to retreat.

Anomalous backup was coming, and they didn't want to be there when it came.

And therefore that windy day, only one soldier looked back at the creature as the plane came in, dropping its payload.

What he saw that day did not strike him as odd immediately, but weeks later, on seeing the record of the incident, he contracted a severe case of shell-shock from which he never fully recovered.

---

January 1, 1920

The wind, fouled still by the ghosts of the weapons of the Great War, blew from the battlefields to the sea, and passed over the Site sunk therein, serviced by ex-German submarines: decommissioned on paper, but only on paper. There were benefits to mastering the arcana of bureaucracy, and Dr. Plact had supreme command of the art.

"They say the world has grown tired of killing," Plact told his protégées, "That this was the war that ends them all."

He waved his cane.

"And I'm sure that the powers that be will be satisfied for a while. But war will never die!"

He breathed in. "As long as there are toy soldiers in different clothing styles, leaders will never tire of smashing them together!" He breathed out. "It doesn't matter that in each battle, the individual soldiers die. There will always be soldiers to fill each uniform. There will always be new weaponry to outclass the last generation, and so on, and so forth."

He fell into a coughing fit.

"All it takes is a little time to regenerate the numbers of the people," he went on, "And soon all the uniforms will be filled."

"The leaders of armies get accolades, fame, and fortune. The leaders of prisons get no parades.

"Soon," he said, "Soon I will die. Soon you will be tasked to take over my work. To take responsibility for 682 and all its termination attempts. And you will have a choice to make.

"Will you be a warrior or a warden?"

---

January 1, 1951

He reclined in his acid tank, forty-three limbs drumming a tuneless rhythm into the ceramic walls. His long, green hair floated to the surface in tresses, dissolving a meter a minute. His name was whispered in awe throughout the Foundation, the beast who had survived everything they threw at it. He didn't care about any of this, naturally; he just hoped he would get to eat some of the funny four-limbed creatures that he loved to eat so, so very much; he loved the squeal they made, that loud joyful sound that marked a meal happy to be eaten.

He just hoped the next meal wouldn't make him have to move his neck much. He loved to close his eyes as he hunted, to heighten the sense of surprise he felt when he caught his meal; but this meant his neck had to move an awful lot, to feel around with his sensitive nose, and that had lately put a huge strain on his neck.

The lid of the tank lifted, and his heart leapt. He scrambled out of the tank to get a first look at his prey.

It looked a lot more like a rock than most things he had eaten, with some metal thrown in for good measure, and it didn't move at all as he looked at it. (He didn't even like rock, normally, but this one smelled a bit of those juices the four-limbed creatures gushed as he ate them.) Oh, well, this hunt was going to be remarkably straightforward.

He closed his eyes anyway, from sheer habit.

His name was SCP-682, and the sensation in his neck he felt in the next moment surprised him.

---

January 1, 1971

The Overseer needed another filing cabinet.

She put in the requisition order with another stroke of a pen, and sighed. Sixty years ago, she had never expected the termination log to get quite this outlandish.

What was worse than the beast itself, however, was what it represented. The Foundation had been founded to contain the anomalous, rather than destroy it. A single exception in the code for a beast they really, really hated was hypocrisy of the highest order, a mockery of all those who died believing that existence in this universe was too sacred to interrupt.

And now it was a toy in the imaginations of all the new recruits, to bash against all the other sacred lives and magicks at their disposal. Could SCP-XXXX, god of toenail fungus, beat 682? What if 682 were first subdued with SCP-YYYY, the Thyme Freezer? It was as though their duty as wardens, as recorders of a billion separate stories, had been reduced to the referees of an underground fighting ring.

In an uncharacteristic display of frustration, she opened the window as wide as it would go and threw stacks upon stacks of the papers of the termination logs outside, where the thunderstorm winds seized and scattered them to the sea.

What was going on with those the Council had put in charge of the reptile? How was a flesh-and-blood beast, not even invulnerable, thwarting the billions of dollars and hundreds of anomalies the Foundation had sent its way?

One of these years, she thought, I'll have to send my proxies to get a more satisfactory answer. We need to get to the bottom of this.

---

March 1, 1972

"Get underground," mumbled the creature to the farmers that had gathered around it, curious why such a large beast was standing quietly in the town square. "There's a hurricane coming in half an hour, get underground."

The skies were clear, but windy. An anomaly had precipitated the hurricane; it would appear suddenly and vanish just as suddenly, and only the creature, so far as it knew, had forewarning.

"Did it just say something?" said one farmer to another.

The beast tried to raise its' voice. "G-g-g-" it started, stuttering.

"I think it's trying to say something," said another. "How adorable."

"Spit it out!" said another.

"Ggg…", said the beast, which then decided to substitute a soft j for a hard g. "Jet u-unnhderg-gground," it said with great effort, trailing into quietness as it reached the last syllables. It was not a better person in its' own eyes for having gotten past that stumbling block; in the eyes of the farmers, this minor success raised their low estimation of it not at all.

The farmers were not stupid. They heard the beast's warning. But who would heed a stuttering prophet?

"Fellas," said one at last, "I think this creature wants us to fly in a jet underground! No, big fella," he pantomimed a jet flying, "Jets fly in the air, like the wind! There's no wind underground."

"hhhurric-cane c-c-cming…" the creature raised its voice desperately.

"Stop lying to us," said another farmer. "We know that's why you're too nervous to talk like a normal person."

"No!" said the beast, its desperation rising into rage. "No, y'must b-b-b-"

"g-g-get uh-uh-uhnderground!" mocked one farmer. The group around him laughed.

"Porky Pig!" shouted one, pointing her finger.

The beast beheld all this, and it was sickened to its core.

There was only one word for this kind of behavior.

And in the eye of its personal hurricane, the beast chewed on that word as hot air rose and convection followed, resulting in dangerous cyclical currents.

"Why did you kill those farmers?" said the lab-coated person, later.

The beast didn't say anything. It didn't like to talk.

So the doctor threatened it. And though it knew the attempt was unlikely to get through, it tried to speak. "Because they were making fun of my speech, they were-"

"Pardon?" the lab-coated person said.

"They were mocking me, calling me less than a person, saying my impediment made me-"

"Speak up," said the lab-coated person, motioning to the orange-suited person to bring the black stick closer to the beast's mouth.

The beast was embarrassed. The beast was weary. The beast was so very sick of it all.

"They were going to die because they didn't believe me, they were laughing at me, they were-" it said, the first two syllables coming out comprehensible to even its own surprise.

Once again, the lab-coated person told the person in orange to get closer to the beast, so that the black stick could better hear it. The orange-clothed person protested. The orange clothed person told the lab-coated person that the beast was not talking at all.

And the beast could take no more of it.

And the beast leaned in to the orange-clothed person and it clawed for access to the black stick and it pulled the stick away from the callous person and it spoke into the stick three words, bouncing the consonants from obscurity to hearing range, and easing into the onset of the vowels, techniques used instinctually in the heat of the moment without speech therapy to prolong their use to everyday life, and the wind of its words heaved around the room, asserting the beast's sapience and right to exist, until the lab-coated person fled and the orange-suited person dropped to the floor.

---

April 7, 1972

Personnel are forbidden to speak to SCP-682, for fear of provoking a rage-state. All unauthorized personnel attempting to communicate to SCP-682 will be restrained and removed by force.

"That's a weird phrase, isn't it?" said Leah Way, furrowing her brow as she held up the containment procedures for Dr. Claudia Raleigh to see. "'Rage-state' isn't a scientific or psychological term, is it?"

"I suppose not," admitted Dr. Raleigh. "This thing has been here for decades longer than I've been alive. It's possible they were real lax about that kind of thing in the early years."

"So the prohibition is of ancient vintage, is it?" asked Way. "I suppose that interview log posted in the file is of similar age, then?"

"No, that interview was last month."

"So you prohibit talking to it, but get a D-class close with a microphone to ask it why it kills? Surely that's been established in the prior decades."

"Maybe the answer changes as its' body does. It did grow back in that one test from a slurry of its' component cells; maybe its' neurons reconnected in a different way."

"Then why put only that interview and that one reason? Put them all on record and maybe we could get a clearer picture of whatever stays the same."

"No point, Researcher," said Raleigh. "Omnicidal maniacs are omnicidal maniacs, however they express themselves."

The answers were changing. Raleigh could see Guest Researcher Leah Way growing more suspicious.

"Tell you what," Raleigh said at last. "You interview it, and see if you get anything useful; maybe we'll put it in the file."

"All right," said Way. "I've just got a few questions for it. By the way, have there been any termination attempts since the interview?"

"No, not yet," said Raleigh. "We're trying to get clearance for Dr. Clef to come and see what he can do."

"What could Clef possibly do?"

"Far more than you might expect, Guest Researcher W. Far, far more."

And the interview went well, if a bit messy from Way's entrails.

---

June 9, 1974

Raleigh turned in her seat to see an old woman she didn't know smiling at her. "Excuse me," said the woman, "Do you have a second?"

"Of course," said Raleigh, standing up quickly. "Can I see your identification?"

"Certainly," said the woman. "Ask me the code-phrase."

"Does the Black Moon howl?" asked Raleigh.

"No, it doesn't," said the woman, tilting her head. "But the wind is so loud as to fool everyone."

Raleigh gasped.

"Yes," said the woman. "You know who I am."

"W-why are you here?"

"Because I hear there was a bit of an irregularity with SCP-682 two years ago," said the Overseer. "You fed the creature children, and I want to know why you let such a thing happen."

"It wasn't us!" said Raleigh. "It was Guest Researcher W., acting without any of our knowledge or approval!"

"Quite the security breach," said the Overseer. "What did you do with her once you found out?"

"It was all out of our hands," said Raleigh. "Dr. Clef had been adamant that he could kill the creature, so we invited him to the base at the time. It was a complete waste of time, of course, but somehow he managed to discover Guest Researcher W.'s actions and he himself fed her to the beast."

"That does sound like something he would do," agreed the Overseer. "Except for one small detail."

"Which is?"

"Dr. Alto Clef doesn't exist, and never has."

"What?"

"Oh, come on, Doctor," said the Overseer. "Surely you yourself didn't believe all the tales about him? He's God, he's the Devil, he's Adam; He has a third eye and cameras capture an animal head instead of his face." She laughed. "The only way he's ever going to be any semblance of real is if some impressionable reality bender gets a nightmare about him."

"But then, why do people think he exists?"

"We have an actor to play him, Francis Wojciechoski. Simply speaking, it's good for morale to have a legendary character in your ranks; and of course, he's a convenient scapegoat to deploy whenever someone actually important misuses resources."

She stepped closer. "And, of course, if someone outside the Council says Clef was involved in something, we know they were using him for the same purpose."

"What are you saying?"

"Leah Way wasn't fed to the lizard by Clef. And she didn't feed kids to it, either."

The Overseer stepped closer still. "She got her interview after all," she whispered in Raleigh's ear. "All she needed was one question."

April 7, 1972

Leah closed the door and turned in to the chamber. It smelled in the chamber, and she began spraying the walls with a lemon-scented aerosol. The beast regarded her with suspicion and disapproval.

"Hello, 682," Leah said.

The beast remained silent.

"I've, uh, got a question for you," Leah continued, "And I don't mind waiting."

The beast looked at her.

"I stutter, too, you know," she said. "I won't judge you for it."

The beast regarded her.

The air was still.

"So, 682," asked Leah, "How long have you been here?"

The lizard began to answer.

"A ma-" it started, and stopped quickly.

Go on, encouraged Leah with her body language. Take your time.

"A ma- a ma- a mamamamamonth!" it finished.

"That short of a time?" asked Leah.

The beast nodded.

"S- ssss- six dz-dzays more."

"Thank you, 682," Leah bowed. "You've been most helpful."

"Th-thanks-" said the beast as a rain of bullets fell on Leah, taking her to the ground, and a bucket of Worcestershire sauce dumped on her remains.

Her body was delicious to the beast, though its' conscience was a bit muddied by the source of the meal.

June 9, 1974

"Well, as I said at the time," said Raleigh, "Who knows how its' brain works in its' strange regeneration. It's sense of time could be warped in any number of ways-"

"When Way entered the room," said the Overseer, "The spray she used seeded the chamber with a large number of minuscule spy-cameras. Though their battery lives were short, they stayed long enough to document the interview and the actual cause of her death, and radio them straight to me."

"Maybe we just wanted to placate the beast after the interview had riled it up," said Raleigh. "Prevent another containment breach, and a greater loss of life than just one guest researcher."

"Perhaps," said the Overseer, "But Way's murder is only one factor in a large constellation of clues to the real issue here."

"Which is?"

"SCP-682 as we know it does not and has never existed."

January 1, 1951

And the beast's neck snapped like a twig in the statue's grip. It died instantly.

January 1, 1949

And the terrified child watches as the beast, mid-attack, is caught in the throes of a fatal seizure.

January 1, 1948

And the chainsaw split its' heart open until all its blood left its body.

January 1, 1947

And the hail of bullets

January 1, 1946

And the god of toenail fungus

January 1, 1937

And the corn

December 19, 1933

And the

August 8, 1922

And

January 1, 1912

The group watched as the reptile, placid as ever, finally crystallized in totality.

They stared at each other.

"We…" said the other scientist, "We… we did it."

"Or did we?" asked Dr. Plact in a small voice.

"What do you mean? SCP-682 is deader than a doornail. Deader than a coffin-nail, to misquote Dickens!"

"No," said Dr. Plact, slowly. "I think it stopped converting into crystal, let's say, 62 percent of the way. I think it's immune to the crystal's effects now. I think we have to keep trying."

He raised his voice and made eye contact with the generals, each in turn. "I think it's just lucky we already have permission to kill it, otherwise we'd need to go through no end of trouble to kill it again! Generals, your troops are troubled by frequently escaping monsters; do you think they could help move the existing SCP-682 into a new location every once in a while?"

"Of… of course," said one general, catching on. "It would need to be clear to everyone, though, that it was the same creature…"

"We don't need to bother with that," said the other general. "Why, it adapted to those crystals; it can probably adapt into any number of forms. The creature could look like anything!"

"Of course, the records will all have to be under strict control, or misplaced," said Dr. Plact. "We'll need to redact any identifying information, and doctor the records so each of the frequently escaping monsters will appear never to have existed. Record-keeping is scattered amongst the sites for now; it will be comparatively easy to burn the appropriate records and reassign the affected personnel. By the time the Foundation develops a more secure system, we'll be in on the ground floor. And if we play our cards right…."

He took a sip of whiskey. The wind began to blow outside. A storm was in the air.

"SCP-682 will never be destroyed."