Item #: SCP-712
Object Class: Safe
Special Containment Procedures: A specialized chamber has been provided for experiments involving SCP-712 at Site-14, including lamps, filters, polarizers, and other optical instruments. All requests for custom-built components are to be forwarded to the onsite Engineering Department.
Emergency floodlights have also been installed in the chamber in the event of uncontrollable sample fluorescence.
Foundation elements embedded in academia and the optics industry are to discredit the idea of the existence of extrachromatic elements and suppress relevant discoveries.
Description: SCP-712 refers to an undiscovered property of light that allows it to induce anomalous phenomena under specific conditions. All known instances of SCP-712 are limited to a set of discrete colours that do not exist in the conventional electromagnetic spectrum. SCP-712 was initially discovered by Dr. Rodryg Bouvier, a physics lecturer at the University of Cambridge, while attempting to prepare a practical demonstration of the properties of light and colour.
After further investigation, it was found that the apparatus used to discover the various SCP-712 instances was not anomalous in nature, and could be constructed with some difficulty using equipment typically present in most university science labs.
Attached are Dr. Bouvier's research notes and recordings regarding SCP-712. For ease of documentation, classification of individual SCP-712 instances will follow the nomenclature proposed by Dr. Bouvier.
Addendum 712.01: Gules
I saw a shadow cast on the wall where there should have been none, almost invisible in the light of the lab, and yet, a wave of my hand confirmed it came from the lamps. Light where there should be none. A colour unbeknownst to modern physics, if you will. Let the record note that I was doing quotation marks with my hands for the word colour. Will workshop a better name later.
In the mean time, I have taken the liberty of naming this colour, as is my right as its discoverer. Gules falls at the periphery of the visual spectrum, borderline near-infrared but not quite either? Invisible to humans and infrared cameras, curiously absent in broad-spectrum light.
It would seem that gules will diffuse itself regardless of source. I've tried lasers and the vacuum chamber, but I'll circle back to it later. In the mean time, I have been using myself as a guinea pig and sitting in front of the lamps to see if I could perceive gules as separate from the ambient darkness.
Exposure time: 5 seconds
Results: No effect, recalibrated several times to ensure the machine was working.
Exposure time: 10 seconds
Results: Mild irritation behind eyes. Visual acuity in darkness has increased.
Exposure time: 30 seconds
Results: Dull headache as a consequence of continued eye irritation. Objects have begun to glow brighter regardless of surrounding lighting. I saw my ramen glow behind the microwave window.
It's not regular light, but I suspect I might be on the verge of blinding myself all the same. Suspending gules tests indefinitely.
Further testing with gules was carried out following the recovery of Dr. Bouvier's research notes. The aforementioned results were successfully replicated and subsequently expanded on with longer observation periods. Test subject was exposed to gules at increasingly longer exposure times, alongside a full-spectrum lamp for ease of reference.
Exposure time: 30 seconds
Results: Near-infrared and UVA radiation becomes visible to subject, described as having an extremely hyperbolic shade of red and purple respectively. Subject reports intense pain behind eyes.
Exposure time: 60 seconds
Results: Rapid expansion in the range of wavelengths visible to subject, encompassing ~100μm and Lyman-alpha wavelengths. Biopsy of subject eye reveals a complete absence of cell damage typically sustained when exposed to harmful UV wavelength regimes. However, significant tissue growth observed in the retina is identified as an agglomeration of novel eye cone and rod cells, likely responsible for changes to subject's vision. Cell damage associated with these wavelengths is observed on all exposed areas except the eyes. Protective mask supplied.
Exposure time: 90 seconds
Results: Subject's visual range now includes X-ray and microwave radiation. Bragg diffraction from X-ray photons incident on subject's eye appears to be contained entirely within the eye structure, with no adverse effects on the brain. Subject describes these wavelengths as having novel colors, but is unable to provide an objective description.
Exposure time: 120 seconds
Results: Gamma radiation reported as "jumpy" by subject. Full-spectrum lamp replaced with ultra-high energy pulse graser1 and ELF2 transmitter.
Exposure time: 150 seconds
Results: Subject confirmed to have visual access to the entire range of electromagnetic radiation replicable by Foundation technology. Further testing deemed unnecessary.
Afterword: Subject reported being able to see all sources of electromagnetic radiation outside the baseline region opaque to the eyelid at all times, causing significant psychological distress. Due to the intrinsic value of the subject's broad-spectrum vision, the following requests made by the subject have been taken into consideration in the interest of their long-term psychological stability and cooperation.
- Blackout shielding within personal quarters, Faraday cage inclusive. Denied due to cost of construction.
- Shielding implant for eyes. Denied due to cost of development.
- Double enucleation surgery. Partially granted, recovered eyeball sent for further testing.
- Insomnia medication. Denied due to overdose risk, mixed sedative-soporific drug regime implemented.
Addendum 712.02: Sable
I found sable by process of elimination. Filtering out everything does not nothing make. It is barely visible, like discerning the colour of a painting in a darkened room. Not quite like gules, which is in actuality completely indistinguishable in darkness. Once again, I have sat myself in front of the lamps and exposed my naked eyes to this new light.
Results:
Ran a single test. Sable has removed my ability to see black and white, to put plainly. In the dark, everything becomes the colour of sable, retaining its brightness to a degree at which I may operate as effectively as under normal lighting conditions. Almost all returns to normal when the lights come back on. Sable has effectively granted me night vision.
Furthermore, I have been able to isolate gules when operating the emitter in the dark, by looking where the light is not in the hue of sable.
One side effect, however. All white objects — pale, alabaster, off-white, eggshell white, extremely light grey, et cetera — also appear in the hue of sable regardless of lighting conditions. I do not believe there are any words capable of objectively describing this shade.
It has come to my attention that the effects of sable are not permanent. It slowly fades. I estimate that a minute of exposure translates to 12, maybe 13 hours of progressively diminishing effects.
Results of Foundation testing on sable agree with Dr. Bouvier's notes. Notably, the effects of sable do not persist when a subject closes their eyes. Sable inoculation is currently being tested for future use in operations and containment procedures in low light conditions.
Addendum 712.03: Azure
I didn't discover azure so much as it discovered me. While fiddling with some parameters that I hypothesized would contain more impossible colours, I found a hue that literally called out to me from the light projected on the wall. It appeared that this one was not only sentient, but was somehow able to speak.
It carried itself with a charismatic and jovial tone, of indeterminate gender but with a very distinct accent. Introducing itself as azure, we had a rather enlightening exchange about the nature of light and consciousness before I had to turn off the lamp to cool it down. I will prepare some recordings of these exchanges shortly.
In recordings obtained from Dr. Bouvier's lab, he is the only party present. No other sounds are audible beyond his voice and the monotonous drone of the apparatus lamp. Foundation tests using azure have produced similar results, with affected subjects hallucinating the presence of a sapient entity identified as the SCP-712 instance itself.
In recent tests, objects illuminated by azure were observed to have been manipulated by an unseen force, identified as the SCP-712 instance by inoculated subjects. Further research is currently in progress.
Addendum 712.04: Vert
I shall preface this section by stating that the use of vert should be done with great care and caution, such as to not illuminate that which cannot be unilluminated.
As I have done for my previous tests, it was originally my intention to expose my eyes to vert, but upon initial illumination, I have taken a greater interest in observing the effects it has on the wall instead.
Results:
Vert appears to have a kaleidoscopic effect on whatever surface it reflects off of. At a glance, it appears as if it illuminates the wall, and reveals whatever is beyond it, but not behind it. I can still see the wall, but I also see the same wall in another direction.
My doctorate isn't in topology, but I have played with it enough to understand that this seems to be a projection of a higher spatial dimension onto my wall.
Update:
It's not a projection. I have been able to move in the aforementioned direction and touch the wall, but only when I am standing in vert. The light bends around and through my body, I can see within my hand. The longer I shine light in vert the more clearer the picture becomes. Strands and spheres come and go, vanishing back into nothing when I try to reach out. I suspect vert may reach beyond four spatial dimensions.
Update:
Vert testing has been suspended indefinitely. I'm afraid the fourth dimension is full of spiders. At least, I think they're spiders. They have begun crawling out of the peripherals of vert light and into the lab. Wrong number of legs, though. Can't usually see all of them at once but I think they might have five pairs? Unsure.
The good news is, they can be easily squished all the same. The bad news? There's still one or two hiding in the room somewhere, and their webs are getting everywhere, in every sense of the word. I keep running into the issue of them phasing through me when I least expect it, and it's very ticklish in the worst way possible.
Proposals to develop a quadridimensionally secure cell to study vert are currently under consideration.
Addendum 712.05: Purpure
Purpure is the first colour I have noted to not originate from my tinkering with the machine. I went to an aquarium while under the effects of sable, as an experiment in observing its effects through water. At the touch pool, I noticed that starfish hiding under crevices seemed to have a hue distinct from sable in darkness. All of them did, if I looked at them from the correct angle and lighting.
I purchased a live one from a specialty pet shop later, and brought it to the lab to see if I could try to analyse and replicate the colour on the machine.
Results:
Took a considerable amount of effort, but I have managed to reveal purpure by reflecting a certain quality of light off of the starfish. It would not be incorrect to suggest that purpure is the colour of starfish.
The colour of all starfish?
Ah.
Purpure is the colour of the Starfish.
No further recordings were made by Dr. Bouvier, who was discovered dead in his lab by his assistants several days later. His autopsy was performed by civilian institutions, having taken place shortly prior to Foundation awareness of SCP-712 and his experiments.
While the official cause of death was declared to be asphyxiation consistent with grand mal seizure, later Foundation investigations discovered that Dr. Bouvier's cerebrum had partially liquified into a saltwater mixture.
Foundation research on purpure has been suspended indefinitely.