Some vacuums clean all
| Item #: SCP-9779 | Object Class: Neutralized |
| Classified: Level 1 |
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Special Containment Procedures: As no other organizations are known to have successfully received SCP-9779 and future broadcasts will be blocked by the effects of Project Chelone, no containment procedures are necessary. Research is to instead focus on explaining the consequences of Project Chelone to the public.
Description: SCP-9779 was an anomalous broadcast received by the Foundation on 21/10/2026. This broadcast could be received even if the laws of physics are radically different between the sending location and the receiving one. These properties also prevented it from being detected by non-anomalous equipment, thus preventing civilian access to the broadcast. A translation of the first part of the message is provided below.
Translation of SCP-9779 contents
You are not the first iteration of this universe, and will likely not be the last. We were not the first to send this message. You are in grave danger. The foundations of the universe are not stable and can change without notice. This will change the laws of nature to something incompatible with life as you know it, in a sphere expanding as fast as your laws of nature allow. Once this reaches your planet, you and all you know will be destroyed. You might have already calculated that the risk of this happening is negligible, but if you have received this message, you probably already know not everything in the universe can be calculated so easily. Some things cannot be explained in any system of physics, and these things can make the astronomically improbable vastly more likely. We have compiled everything we and our predecessors have tried to stop this cycle. We can only hope you are in [UNTRANSLATABLE]'s1 favor and will be the ones to break the cycle and find a working solution.
The dot represents a field in a state of false vacuum, where E is the total energy level. Should this field bypass the "hill", false vacuum decay will occur.
The Foundation's Department of Theoretical Physics has identified the phenomenon described in the broadcast as false vacuum decay, a nonanomalous process that occurs when a quantum field2 randomly reaches a lower, more stable energy state. This produces a knockon effect where the change spreads throughout the field, and thus the universe, at the speed of light, producing an expanding bubble whose interior has completely different laws of physics to the outside universe. As described in the message, the risk of this happening is believed to be negligible, but the contents of the message strongly imply the existence of anomalies increases the chance of a decay event occurring.
The rest of the broadcast is split into three parts. The first describes what these previous civilizations have tried to avert their destruction, such as isolating the decay event in a pocket dimension, injecting large amounts of matter into the affected region of space to collapse it into a black hole or using [REDACTED] to reverse the flow of time in the affected region. No evidence has been discovered that any of these attempts have succeeded.
The second contains information on the culture and history of several previous civilizations, including several audio and video recordings. Translations of two of these recordings are included below.
The final part of the broadcast contains instructions for creating two anomalous machines. The first is a device capable of sending messages regardless of differences in the laws of physics, with instructions to use it to pass on the message with the addition of anything tried by the current civilization to ensure their survival. The other is capable of detecting instances of vacuum decay instantly, regardless of distance from the device.
Addendum: On 2/11/2026, the O5 Council granted permission to build the devices described in SCP-9779 , designated SCP-9779-Alpha and SCP-9779-Beta respectively. Construction was completed on 17/12/2026 and SCP-9779-Beta was activated for the first time on 19/12/2026. A decay event was detected approximately one lightyear from Earth.
NOTICE FROM THE O5 COUNCIL
SCP-9779-Beta has revealed an existential risk to humanity's continued existence in the form of the false vacuum decay event detected on 19/12/2026. Any Foundation staff with suggestions on how to counter this event are encouraged to come forward.
| Proposed solution | Outcome | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Use of eigenweapons to retroactively erase decay event from existence |
Failure |
While some of the bubble was successfully erased, no Foundation eigenweapon is powerful enough to erase the entire event in the time available. It has been theorized erasing the origin point of the event would completely erase it, but this point has yet to be located. |
| Use of [REDACTED] to retroactively erase the concept of decay events from existence |
N/A |
Rejected by the O5 Council. The contents of SCP-9779 strongly imply the current iteration of the universe only exists due to a decay event in a previous one. Attempting to retroactively erase this would likely destroy humanity. |
| Teleport Earth a large distance from the event |
N/A |
This would require at minimum teleporting the Sun and Earth and all the space in between. The Foundation does not possess any means of safely teleporting such a large volume. [REDACTED] could teleport the required amount, but has been calculated to have a 73% chance of destroying Earth and/or the Sun in the process and has thus been designated a last resort option. |
| Temporally displace decay event into the distant future |
Failure |
No visible effect. It has been suggested this means time behaves differently inside the bubble. |
To: O5Reception
From: JohnathanChambers
RE: Proposed solution to decay event
Date: 6/2/2027
Greetings.
I believe I may have discovered a way to stop the decay event. If we surround the bubble with dark energy8, space will expand faster than the bubble can spread and effectively trap it.
In order to accomplish this, I will need access to SCP-████ to produce and store the dark energy. I will also need SCP-9779-Beta's schematics. I can have a research team can reverse engineer its ability to interact with distant objects in order to make a device that can deliver the dark energy.
Regards,
Dr. Chambers
To: JohnathanChambers
From: O5Reception
Date: 12/2/2027
To Doctor Chambers,
Your suggestions, designated Project Chelone, have been approved. Expect SCP-████ to arrive at your Site in 2-3 working days.
Yours sincerely,
O5 Council
Dr. Chambers' research notes have been included below.
| Date | Dark energy production | Notes |
| 12/2/2027 | 0% | Project Chelone approved. |
| 12/3/2027 | 20% | We are on track to complete the project with several months to spare. Excellent work, team! |
| 12/4/2027 | 40% | The other team has completed the delivery mechanism. Great job, everyone! |
| 12/5/2027 | 50% | Production has slowed somewhat, but Project Chelone is still running well ahead of schedule. |
| 12/6/2027 | 55% | SCP-████ appears to be slowing down more. Hopefully we'll be able to fix it soon. |
| 12/7/2027 | 57% | SCP-████'s production rate continues to degrade at an alarming pace. Higher-ups have been alerted. |
| 12/8/2027 | 59% | …at least it's not slowing down more? |
| 12/9/2027 | 59% | Production has stopped completely. Not good. |
| 12/10/2027 | 59% | Another month, another round of failed bug fixes. |
| 12/11/2027 | 59% | This is serious. We only have one more month to finish this. |
| 30/11/2027 | 59% | All this work and for what? |
Note: The following is taken from Dr. Chambers' video diary, included with his permission.
[BEGIN RECORDING]
[Chambers sets up the camera. His computer monitor can be seen behind him, turned off.]
Chambers: [Sighs] Uh.. first of December, 2027. So, the O5s have called a meeting on Chelone for tomorrow. What am I even going to say to them? They're going to hate me…
[The computer monitor turns itself on. Chambers does not notice.]
Chambers: Either I let humanity die as so many others have, or I bring up the backup plan… but is that even better? Maybe it's just a choice between a quick death and a drawn-out one… why couldn't I have just found a nice clean solut-
Unknown: Stop beating yourself up.
Chambers: W-who's there?!
[Chambers turns around, revealing an image of Moon on the monitor.]
Moon: We wouldn't be in this situation in the first place if I had phrased my wish better. I still have nightmares about Snow's niblings and all the other children who never got to grow up because I screwed up. But we aren't going to change anything by thinking about what could have been, are we?
Chambers: Y-you're the guy from the log! Moon, or…
Moon: Moon's fine. You wouldn't be able to pronounce my real name anyway. At least you know what a moon is, the last guys didn't have one so they ended up calling me Rock. I mean, I like my rocks, but-
Chambers: How are you speaking English? How are you even here?!
Moon: Just before we were wiped out, I got my hands on another Artefact, I don't remember the number, that let me upload my mind into the broadcast… SCP-9779 you called it, right?
Chambers: Correct.
Moon: From there, I was able to get into your computer network. While I was poking around in there, I found your translation software and that's how we're speaking right now. I also found your "Internet". We had nothing like that on our world. Although given some of the… stuff on there, that might have been for the best. But that's not what I'm here to talk about. I found something interesting on there.
Chambers: Which is?
Moon: The "perfect solution" fallacy. Rejecting a solution because it is imperfect, even if it's better than doing nothing. I had a look at your backup plan, if you'll forgive my snooping, and it doesn't seem that bad in the grand scheme of things. It's certainly less risky than the Foundation's current backup plan.
Chambers: But is it really better? Eventually we'd use up all our resources and then-
Moon: You don't know that. Maybe something will be invented in the future to take care of that. I mean, think about it, you've already got infinite power at your disposal if you just set up a waterwheel and stick that statue on top-
Chambers: We are not presenting that to the O5s.
Moon: …moving on, let's say you're right and humanity eventually gives in to infighting. Are you to blame for sapient nature?
Chambers: Well, considering resource conflicts are something that predates my birth I logically cannot be. But still, wouldn't the backup plan just be delaying the inevit-
Moon: I personally think it's worth it if even a few more generations get to live. Look, I've been around for a few cycles, and you're the one closest to a working solution. Well, at least a working solution that doesn't rely on wish-granting artefacts or anomalies, but considering most of yours seem to be actively malicious- sorry, I'm getting off track. You have a plan with the potential to save your species, and who knows how many future ones. Do you really want to throw all that away because of what might happen?
Chambers: I suppose not.
Moon: At least your superiors aren't actively hiding your best option. Well, at least that we know of, but I'll save my theories for later. You should go ahead and present your backup plan. Even if they do hate you for it, does it matter? Either they do it and you're responsible for saving humanity, at least for a while, or they don't in which case the end result is the same as if you said nothing.
Chambers: …you're not wrong. I'm still not too sure about any of this, but you're right. I don't really have anything to lose by presenting it.
[Chambers signs off and Moon waves at the camera.]
[RECORDING END]
Meeting on status of Project Chelone, 2/12/2027
Participants: Dr. Chambers, O5-1, O5-3, O5-6
<Begin Log>
O5-1: Dr. Chambers, is it?
Chambers: That's me.
O5-1: I'm not going to mince words, Doctor. Project Chelone has stalled and we have no time to fix it. I can only hope this backup plan you mentioned is better than a 73% chance of wiping out the human race.
Chambers: It has some… side effects but none that risk the destruction of the planet.
O5-3: What exactly do you mean by that?
Chambers: Well, you see-
O5-6: Spit it out already!
O5-3: Calm down, 6.
O5-6: Forgive me if I'm a bit on edge staring down the end of the world.
O5-3: Everyone is stressed, understandably so given we are so close to a potential CK-Class-
O5-6: Well, maybe we wouldn't be this close if everyone would stop beating around the bush-
O5-1: Let the doctor speak!
Chambers: Without "beating around the bush", so to speak, if we cannot prevent the decay event from reaching the rest of the universe, we can prevent the rest of the universe from reaching us.
O5-3: Go on.
Chambers: While the primary objective of Project Chelone is no longer possible, we still have a large supply of dark energy already produced.
O5-6: Get to the point.
Chambers: The point is that while isolating the decay event from the wider universe is no longer possible, isolating ourselves from the wider universe is easily doable with the dark energy already at our disposal.
[There is a pause of several seconds]
O5-1: So we survive, but with the side effect of never being able to leave our solar system or interact with the outside universe ever again.
Chambers: Essentially, yes.
O5-6: …well, I suppose it is better than being destroyed.
O5-3: I suppose. It's not like we have a whole lot in the way of better options. You can go now, Doctor.
<End Log>
Closing Statement: On 3/12/2027, Dr. Chambers' proposal was put to vote by the O5 Council. The measure was passed unanimously. SCP-9779-Alpha was then used to pass on SCP-9779 as instructed. Moon requested a copy of themself be uploaded to the broadcast before it was sent, claiming they wanted to "give pep talks to any future scientists who need it". This was permitted as they have been cooperative with Foundation interests.
By 12/12/2027, the delivery of dark energy around the solar system was complete. Shortly after, civilians began noticing stars disappearing from the sky as their light could no longer pass the expanding space between them and Earth. The Foundation's additions to the message can be viewed below.
Foundation additions to SCP-9779-Alpha
We believe we have discovered a solution to this threat. We have included the schematics of the devices used at the end of this message. We used one to produce dark energy to hasten the expansion of the universe and the other to deliver it. Our intended goal was to isolate the bubble that threatened us from the wider universe, but we could not produce sufficient dark energy in time. Instead, we isolated ourselves, preventing the bubble from reaching us but at the cost of forever cutting ourselves off from the rest of the universe. Whatever gods you may believe in willing, you may have better luck than we did. Godspeed.
Photograph of night sky on 10/12/2027.
Photograph of night sky on 13/12/2027.
