Another SCP Idea: The Deceased's Favorite Book

Summary:

A kind of odd attempt at immortality

Another SCP Idea: The Deceased's Favorite Book

Anaxagoras 22 Jul 2011 19:08

http://scpsandboxwiki.wikidot.com/anaxagoras

This is currently floating around my sandbox. I think I have all the components I'll want for this, unless anyone suggests a really good addendum of some sort. But I'm not too happy with the writing, particularly for the interview. Seems a bit cliched, but I'm unsure how else to convey what I want to. Also, I'm slightly concerned this is too close to SCP-963, though I don't think that's too much of an issue.

More generally, how does this look to people?

Re: Another SCP Idea: The Deceased's Favorite Book

thedeadlymoose 22 Jul 2011 20:47

I'm not entirely sure what's going on with that SCP, so it's difficult to comment. For me, at least, it's too confusing right now.

Re: Another SCP Idea: The Deceased's Favorite Book

Anaxagoras 22 Jul 2011 21:01

Well that's a comment right there. What are you confused about?

Re: Another SCP Idea: The Deceased's Favorite Book

thedeadlymoose 22 Jul 2011 21:15

Nitpicker :P

I don't understand how the SCP works, I don't understand the immortality references, and I don't understand what's going on with Mr. Blackboxes. Something is clearly being hinted at - some kind of reconstruction of Mr. Blackboxes going on? Dunno.

Re: Another SCP Idea: The Deceased's Favorite Book

Anaxagoras 22 Jul 2011 21:17

Not nitpicking, saying it's confusing is a pretty important comment.

That's exactly it. The implication is that they've figured out a way to use this to reconstruct Mr. Blackboxes. And they've done it at least three times. And that's all a part of his plan.

How do you think I can communicate this better? Is this idea good enough to be worth communicating?

Re: Another SCP Idea: The Deceased's Favorite Book

thedeadlymoose 22 Jul 2011 21:25

I think you should just tell us that that's what's happened. It's more interesting than horrifying and I can't see any reason to leave the information out.

The reconstruction, to me, is the main draw of this idea. Though I don't see why Mr. Blackboxes thinks this gets him immortality. The Foundation just has to kill his current bodies and shut the book up in a box and never look at it again. Or destroy it (they wouldn't, but they could bluff). Some immortality.

Re: Another SCP Idea: The Deceased's Favorite Book

Anaxagoras 22 Jul 2011 21:50

Presumably, he bets that they won't destroy the book. The book will eventually get out again, and someone more reasonable will figure out that it reconstructs him. Or maybe he's holding out for a better offer. He may know that the Foundation has the Fountain of Youth, and will gladly tell them how to key the book to someone else if they offer him a different sort of immortality. Or maybe he's cocky and wrong. Or, just maybe, that element isn't a good idea and I should omit it. I'm not really sure, though I feel option two might work well.

So you feel I need to be a bit more explicit about what happens? The reason I'm not is that I can't really see the Foundation cracking how the reading isn't random, and how to keep someone alive long enough, and how to get them to read the book a bunch of times in any reasonably compact way, so I left it out in the hopes that the readers would draw the intended conclusion from the fact that I have an interview with Mr. Blackboxes-3. You don't feel that works?

Re: Another SCP Idea: The Deceased's Favorite Book

AdminBright 23 Jul 2011 06:17

it does read rather a lot like 963.

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Admin, SCP Wiki

Re: Another SCP Idea: The Deceased's Favorite Book

Anaxagoras 23 Jul 2011 15:23

Hm. Just reread 963 and you're right. The same rich old guy tries to be immortal, the same general idea of overwriting the victim. I mean, they're not identical, and this one goes in a somewhat different direction, but still. I wasn't setting out to rip off another article. Do you think the similarity is inherently fatal? If not, what do you recommend I do?

Re: Another SCP Idea: The Deceased's Favorite Book

Anaxagoras 23 Jul 2011 04:33

Okay, so I've made this a bit clearer about what happens, though I still haven't made it explicit that they reconstructed him multiple times. I've also made it so he has a somewhat better plan. I'm not sure what I think of the interview now. Is this an improvement? Is this decent?

Re: Another SCP Idea: The Deceased's Favorite Book

Anaxagoras 23 Jul 2011 05:10

Yet another modification. The tone isn't very clinical in the interview, but I don't think an agent, especially one trying to intimidate someone, would necessarily be as formal as a researcher.

Re: Another SCP Idea: The Deceased's Favorite Book

thedeadlymoose 25 Jul 2011 20:48

I think it's better now. The dialogue is passable, and I like the threat. The use of [DATA EXPUNGED] seems kind of lazy at this point, though.

Re: Another SCP Idea: The Deceased's Favorite Book

Anaxagoras 27 Jul 2011 19:50

It is kind of lazy, I'll admit. It's just that whatever pattern it follows just seems irrelevant to the article. It's probably something weird with page numbers and time of day and whatnot. Nothing anyone who isn't Mr. Blackboxes would care about. Maybe make it instead refer to another addendum that I don't write. I'll tweak this to fix that, and try make it a bit less similar to 963, though that may be unavoidable (sorry, Bright, really).

Re: Another SCP Idea: The Deceased's Favorite Book

Anaxagoras 15 Aug 2011 05:39

Okay, had some thoughts for a revival of this.

First off, have the book belong not to Mr. Blackboxes but to MC&D. Which is why the Foundation thinks this can be keyed to other people. It also explains something of how they found it. They had figured out that Mr. Blackboxes was a member of MC&D, and it was a raid for those purposes.

The Foundation has figured out how to do the replacement for certain organs, and has the original Mr. Blackboxes present. They still don't know how to do it for a whole person, to key it to someone else, or to not have the organs be from someone as old as Mr. Blackboxes really is. They're instead threatening him with some line more like: "Mr. Blackboxes, we don't know how to use the book very well. But we can use it to replace someone's brain. They don't last long, but they last long enough to suffer. With your mind, Mr. Blackboxes."

Would this be an improvement?