Simple, well executed, and, for a claustrophobe like myself, fairly unnerving. Nice work. +1
Simple effect that doesn't drag its feet, and doesn't overstay its welcome. The consequences of the effect are both apparent and frightening, and there is a lot of narrative wiggle room for future tales of what kind of situation would warrant a humanoid SCP to be contained by this object.
Also, bonus points for showing the Foundation taking care of their own.
+1.
An excellent idea, scary to think that one day you sit down in your apartment only to find yourself stuck in that spot for the rest of your life.
One question, have you got an idea for some way they could identify the areas of these spaces without someone being inside them? You made the point of allowing people to attempt to live the rest of their lives as normally as possible, however you also state that D-Class personnel are used to find the dimensions… While D personnel are subject to monthly termination I just feel like its a little off. Perhaps I am just overthinking it.
A good read though, interesting idea that these could be used to trap an SCP, if the foundation could move 076's cube into one you may be able to solve some problems. Or 682… Or both in the same one. I wonder how SCP entities that can teleport or create pocket dimensions would be influenced.
I do actually have a very clear idea of what Document 2449-1 describes. But the process is so simple and low-cost that I did not find a way to make it sound appropriate. Here's the secret:
You hold a long stick toward the presumed location of the anomaly… and then you wiggle it back and forth until it doesn't move back anymore, only further in. Then you get another stick and repeat.
Upvoted in large part for this explanation:
You have made "poke it with a stick" an actual, reasonable, containment procedure.
prevent living things
remain permeable to nonliving matter
Unfortunately, it looks like a stick won't cut it. Unless "living" simply means organic, as opposed to actually alive. Lab rats are probably more cost-effective than D-Class, though, if not.
So what? Throw lab rats in all directions and see when they hit the wall?
Cause that sounds kind of hilarious.
They get pot plants and just wave them back and forth with long poles, obviously.
pot plants
It took me a second to remember that this means "potted plant" in some parts of the world and not a Cannabis sp organism specifically.
Whatever a living person is touching becomes an extension of the effect. That is why people from inside have to throw their belongings out, and why I made sure to specify a 5g minimum. Otherwise the fridge horror of this SCP would quickly devolve into the story of people who slowly but surely get buried in insects and poop.
I enjoyed it, and I want to hit that big juicy + button, but I just can't….yet. The one thing that lets me down is that the appearance of the boxes is purely random (as far as anyone can tell). Yes, that leads to "It could happen anywhere, even to you!" but I actually think it would be more interesting if the Foundation started to pick up on some kind of pattern, maybe something only super subtle, but enough to increase the layer of "uh oh". If it's purely random, then that's all there is to the story. If there is a method, then that's freakier in many ways. Just my opinion, and overall it was a good read.
I would argue that having a pattern limits the spook factor: because if there's a consistent pattern, it can be extrapolated upon. If it can be extrapolated upon, then you can start making predictions. If you can predict where the boxes appear, even only partially accurately, then you have essentially boxed in the boxes and turned them into anomalous fishbowls. The unpredictability of the spaces is what helps make this so horrifying.
My original idea for this was to have an article that was short that could be rated "safe" and that would be an easy case for Foundation employees. Something that would make whoever gets assigned to 2449 think "Whew, glad THAT's my job now". I also wanted it to be just a phenomenon, with no indication that anyone is doing this or that any intent is behind it.
I basically had to make it Keter because of the random element. The alternative path would be that someone means to do this and there is a pattern, but that would of course change the whole idea a lot. I feel like the wiki has a lot of stories where the ending implies that we are on the brink of this all spilling over (like 1231 or 035). For my first article I wanted to go the other way.
Definite creep factor here. Especially considering that there could be other places like this just waiting to be found. Is there any limit to where they can occur? If one were for instance occur in the sky, it could interfere with air traffic and conceivably trigger mass casualty events.
I upvoted it. This is one of my favorite ones from Series 3 to date.
That was horrifying… and then I got to the last sentence.
People say this site makes them jaded about the things the Foundation feels it has to do. I don't seem to have developed that tolerance, and sometimes I would really appreciate it…
So, would this be an effective way to contain 682? Like, this could finally be the chance to do it.
682 has been noted in logs to have the ability to become inorganic.