Item #: SCP-7265
Object Class: Euclid
Special Containment Procedures: Due to its large nature and population, SCP-7265 is impossible to fully evacuate. Containment efforts should therefore focus on instances of SCP-7265-1. Instances of SCP-7265-1 are to be immediately evacuated and surrounded by opaque fencing, under the guise of being a sinkhole, construction zone, or similar industrial hazard. Two (2) watchtowers should also be erected at the site. Two (2) Class 2 personnel should be assigned to guard each instance of SCP-7265 from the watchtowers, and should appear to be police officers. If a civilian approaches, the guards should first issue a verbal warning. If the civilian continues to approach, they should then be amnesticized and moved several kilometers away from the area.
All guards assigned to an instance of SCP-7265 are to be rigorously trained and informed of the anomalous nature of SCP-7265. They are to undergo at least one (1) month of training at Training Site 18, and are to undergo Training Protocol Alpha. This involves, primarily, water-deprivation resistance training. Personnel are only allowed to serve as guards for SCP-7265 sites once they have personally been deemed fit by Location Overseer Landon. All guards for SCP-7265 sites should be given four (4) months of vacation for every one (1) month spent guarding SCP-7265, and are entitled to free counselling.
Description: SCP-7265 is used to connote an approximately 150-kilometer-square area of desert in the southwestern United States of America, encompassing parts of Nevada, Utah, and Arizona. This area is presided over by Location 18, a remote research outpost in the Mojave Desert overseen by James Landon. Within SCP-7265 are an indeterminate number of SCP-7265-1. Currently, nine (9) instances of SCP-7265 have been discovered. SCP-7265-1 presents as a cylindrical area (typically 30 to 50 meters in diameter, with apparently no height limit) in which entities will become unnaturally thirsty, and will remain thirsty even if a large amount of water is consumed.
Multiple D-Class personnel who were placed inside an instance of SCP-7265-1 reported being drawn toward the center of the area and have stated that, at the time, they were firmly convinced they would find water there. Subjects inside an instance of SCP-7265-1 also refused to drink any water offered to them from outside the zone of influence, calling it words like "inferior" and "impure." In instances where personnel were forcefully inundated, they became violently ill and continued moving towards the center of the area.
Upon reaching the center, all entities begin to furiously dig in the sand, and continue doing so until death or forceful removal from the area. Once outside of SCP-7265-1, D-Class personnel reported feeling all signs of thirst fade (except for those that would be deemed normal, considering the environment).
After approximately half an hour of digging, entities in SCP-7265-1 will begin to eat the sand and gravel around them, loudly proclaiming it to be the "milk of the gods," among other things. Death typically follows shortly. Autopsies show that death is invariably caused by extreme organ damage, far worse than what would be expected from the ingestion of sand and small pieces of rock.
Entities who remain within an approximately one (1)-kilometer radius of an instance of SCP-7265-1 for longer than approximately four (4) hours report feelings of intense thirst that do not subside after drinking water. Because of this, guards assigned to an instance of SCP-7265-1 typically undergo extreme mental duress. To date, five (5) guards have willfully entered the instance of SCP-7265-1 they were guarding, despite knowing what would happen if they did so, in what seemed to be apparent suicides. Other guards have requested transfer after experiencing recurring dreams of a large oasis of water located in the center of the instance of SCP-7265-1 they were guarding.
To date, SCP-7265 is believed to have caused the deaths of 39 people, 27 of which were in one cohort. See the Private ████████ Bodycam Video Log.