Meh.
*Also the references to SCP-███-EX seem entirely pointless, they don't really add anything to the article and could be removed without changing anything of importance.
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This is the discussion related to the wiki page SCP-1351.
WNS is actually real, and those are the actual containment procedures used in the real world put out by the government. The Foundation might leave it up to more mundane authorities to handle, but they'd follow procedures like that, same as Foundation medical doctors would wash their hands before doing examinations. Just because a containment protocol is mundane doesn't mean the Foundation wouldn't follow it.
I figured it was actually real given the -EX, it still just feels like a pointless addition.
You're allowed to think that. But one does not enter caves in the eastern US or Canada without observing those protocols - the Foundation would be remiss if it didn't include it.
Does it need to be an -EX, though?
Yes, exactly what I was thinking, since nothing about SCP-1351 indicates that a bat disease would ever have been considered an SCP. Unless the Foundation is in the habit of considering all newly discovered diseases/syndromes to be an SCP until they're proven non-anomalous.
I felt the added procedures - and especially blending in the actual spelunkin' protocols - gave added depth to the whole entry. The piece feels very thorough, and the hints provided by the temporal anomalies make the spatial anomalies seem even more sinister, at least potentially so.
No, no, no. Keeping the references to the real-world bat disease is fine, I'm just saying that it should always be referred to simply as WNS instead of SCP-███-EX, since I see no reason the Foundation would have ever have considered WNS anomalous. However, if someone were to write up an -EX article explaining why, at one point in time, the Foundation did think WNS was anomalous, then this article could link to that article.
since I see no reason the Foundation would have ever have considered WNS anomalous.
If any SCP were ever explained, fully understood, and accepted as ordinary (or "ordinary enough") by society at large, it too would no longer be considered anomalous. I was amused enough at the implication that what was once thought SCP-worthy is now just another "thing" out and about in the world.
I think the issue is that the disease itself wouldn't be anomalous in the FIRST place; fungal infections which are prominent among a type of animal are nothing new, this one's just surprisingly fast in its growth and spread.
Seconded, the real world procedures for spelunking virgin caves are exacting, and justifiably so. To my mind the inclusion of them is very appropriate for the Foundation, as you can't assume that all spacialtemporal anomalists(?) investigating it would be trained cavers.
I have to agree. While it does help flesh out the article, suggesting that this is an SCP itself seems a little odd.
Consider how it looked before it was identified as a fungal disease.
I remember reading something about this once upon a time, and it was a big mystery with all sorts of unrelated theories from well-respected experts competing for research money. Some of the more out-there ideas included radio broadcasts interfering with echolocation and a meta-periodic mass hibernation (the idea being that the bats weren't dead, they were just going into a vegetative state because -insert science here-)
I find it entirely plausible that then-Foundation had some reason to think it was anomalous. Remember, everything is reasonable once you know the reason.
That sounds like an interesting hook for an SCP. An unknown fungus putting bats into a stasis state while forming a scaffold or chrysalis around the body with the intent of becoming a meta-organism flying fungal abomination.
hmm, could be done well, but it would be hard to top similar real-world infections.
For example, there is a parasite (flukes, maybe?) that infects ants. A mushroom grows out of their head and makes them perch on the tips of blades of grass. The purpose being that sheep/cows/etc. will then eat the infected ant and the parasite can continue with the portion of its life-cycle that requires the intestines of grazing animals.
Still, could be worth a shot for someone with a better biology background.
+1. This and the fact that there's still so much freaky about WNS that we don't know makes it prime for -EX status, IMHO.
Piffy is an SCP Foundation Moderator, Lv. 9001 Squishy Wizard, and Knight of the Red Pen.
Personally, I love the real-world integration of research protocols. It gives the entry a great deal of verisimilitude, and "feels" a lot more like a scientific document than most entries.
I like it, personally. Gives it a nice touch. And WNS is more than nightmarish enough for SCP status, even if it's an -EX.
Piffy is an SCP Foundation Moderator, Lv. 9001 Squishy Wizard, and Knight of the Red Pen.
First, it is accessible through a dome in the ceiling of an otherwise unremarkable section of cavern 125 meters underground (see Fig. 3), but this dome's height (~750 meters) would require SCP-1351 to be well above surface level. In spite of the inconsistency, SCP-1351 seems to be subterranean; Foundation speleologists have not yet determined a satisfactory explanation for this phenomenon.
Rather than saying "Foundation speleologists have not yet determined a satisfactory explanation for this phenomenon", I think it would say something along the lines of "due to a spatial anomaly", since the Foundation has plenty of experience with spatial anomalies
I would disagree. The phenomenon could have any number of explanations besides "spatial anomaly". It could be a memetic effect, making people assume that the dome is higher than it really is. The people inside may have been shrunk, making the dome look huge, from their viewpoint. A wizard could have done it.
They simply don't know why this is happening. It's part of the reason that it's an SCP.
I deeply approve of the distinction between 'REDACTED' for things we don't get to see, and 'DATA EXPUNGED' for the thing that could cause a time loop.
This is fantastic. The amount of work put into this is amazing, with all the images. I especially love that third addendum.
One question: to get into the cave, you have to go up from another cave, to a height that suggests it would be about 600 meters above ground, right? I just wasn't quite clear on that.
One question: to get into the cave, you have to go up from another cave, to a height that suggests it would be about 600 meters above ground, right? I just wasn't quite clear on that.
Yep. To get in, one enters a seemly normal cave through a natural entrance in a hillside. One then goes in for a ways, until there is a dome in the ceiling (a dome is the counterpart formation in a cave to a pit - pit goes down, dome up; both are carved out by falling water and often appear under where there is a sinkhole on the surface). One then goes up that dome, which is taller than physically possible, and one arrives in SCP-1351.
The blacked-out number for the -EX seems out of place. Given that it's been -EX'd, there's no reason to classify it any longer. I would say, though this is just personal opinion, to just go ahead and whip up a -EX article for WNS, and reference an actual number.
This article has a realism to it that a lot of the site lacks. I like it.
Proud to give this SCP its 100 rating.
Personally, I really just want to know what happened to that woman's head?!
Edit: 3 days later and this is still bothering me. Seriously, did it grow legs and walk away, ala John Carpenter's The Thing?
I know this comment is old, but this is exactly what I clicked on the comments to look for: an explanation for that woman's missing head!
What in the actual what-the-heck is going on here? The general idea of a "mobius cave" is pretty straightforward, and then I'm hit with an out-of-time, no-cause-of-death headless body right at the end.
Help me, Obi-Wan Kenobi: you're my only hope! Use The Force and tell me what's happening here!
Edited because I can't format.
/forum/t-473141/scp-1351#post-
page revision: 2, last edited: 15 Jan 2023 15:06
