The Owl in the Abyss - Chapter 20

At first, I thought I was looking at a tree.

A dead one, that towered over thirty meters tall.

True Sight and normal sight told me it was far from dead. Its many limbs could move with the speed and dexterity of a human arm and it tirelessly held its many victims in multi-limbed grips. The only reason I thought it dead, was because of its color - bone white with no leaves in sight.

I made sure to keep myself invisible and intangible before heading closer.

I was wrong, the limbs of the tree were actually human. Just pushed to bizarre proportions with snow white skin, whilst the main structure of the tree, the bark was actually human bone.

The palms of the hands at the ends of these limbs were mostly facing upwards, whilst others held the partygoers firmly in unyielding grips.

Even more disturbingly was that each finger from the hand was tipped with a human eye. It made you think you were looking at some kind of fruit growing from there, but it was a human eyeball, unprotected, just growing from each finger.

With great reluctance I moved even closer to see what this thing was doing to its victims, though I had a very good idea already, given their auras and that some of this SCP tree’s ‘hands’ were cupped around the crotches of the men and women, moving with a very familiar rhythm.

This close I was treated to the sound of an orchestral mass chorus of wet flesh slapping on flesh, the victims held in spread eagle poses, their eyes closed and they made no effort to fight back. In fact, they were humping and pushing into the SCP’s hands with eager abandon, moaning and groaning with pleasure.

Stopping close to a male victim, I finally realized that this was not just a tree getting handsy and jerking them off. Inside the palm of this hand was an actual human vagina, the guy was truly having intercourse.

I rushed to a female victim and sure enough, out of the palm of this hand, a fully erect penis was fucking her.

It finally hit me that I was looking at a tree that was blending the concept of a plant and substituting human parts for its biological functions.

Now all the eyes made sense, since a tree needed light for photosynthesis and the only human organ that was sensitive to that was an eye.

Organs would be underneath the bone bark, the roots in the ground would probably be digestive tracts leading to…

I whirled around, headed closer to the ground and carefully inspected the grass of the massive lawn around the SCP.

The general lack of illumination this far from the pool area was annoying, but eventually I spotted something odd.

I was very thankful I was in misty form because this was nauseating.

A mouth was embedded in the ground here, a long prehensile tongue of nearly two meters in length was snaking out of it and lapping at the wet grass in range, trying to slurp in the water.

I heard the pool suddenly splash behind me.

I zoomed back and when I arrived it was to see another nearby ‘mouth’ in the ground had managed to dump its long tongue into the pool and was carrying back water.

The moment the tongue had taken back the load to the mouth, the water was promptly spat out in a fountain-like burst and I heard the entire thirty meter tree rattle and shake.

Yeah, drinking chlorinated water, not the best idea.

How on earth did this SCP come to be?!

Did some botanist on Foundation Earth have a nightmare or something? Or even more alarmingly, could this SCP have been made on purpose?

To what end? Just because they could? This didn’t really have the feel of AWCY and their SCPs were blatant and over-the-top. They’d have already put a sign with their slogan on the trunk of the tree.

I shook my head to clear it.

Theorize later Taylor, I thought firmly.

There was still more than two dozen people in this thing’s clutches, getting fucked out of their minds by the looks of things.

The problem with doing anything was that a lot of them were being held up at the highest levels of the tree. If I hurt the SCP or disrupted its strength, then they would quite probably fall to their deaths.

Trying to manually free each person would require me to partially materialize and assuredly invite the wrath of the tree, who could attack from multiple angles simultaneously. I knew how I’d react if a guy I was riding was suddenly pulled out from under me.

Could I mist the people to free them?

I had managed it with Simon and that was a bullet dodged. I had intended to experiment on some animals first to see if there were any side-effects.

Sudden bursts of energy drew my attention back to the main trunk of the tree.

The people were starting to orgasm.

I zoomed back to observe and see if there was any opening to perhaps rescue them. Would the SCP let them go?

The first person I found in the upper branches on this side of the tree happened to be Anto.

He was still pumping with abandon into the pussy the SCP had provided, before he abruptly stopped, groaned loudly with pleasure and orgasmed into it with twitches of his hips.

Right above me a tall woman moaned loudly and shuddered. The SCP phallus plunging in and out her sped up briefly before it was buried to the hilt and the attached hand, forearm and limb flexed and shuddered, pumping its semen in.

It was very tempting to just absorb all this energy, but I firmly stopped myself.

I reached out with a misty hand to Anto and only materialized a finger, touching him on his bicep.

I tried to extend my misting effect to him only.

He vanished with a red mist but I saw the effect also began to bleed over to the SCPs limbs that were grabbing him.

I reversed the effect quickly and misted completely.

The SCP suddenly had half a dozen hands swiping through the area I occupied.

I surged backwards in fright, even as those hands went straight through me. It still gave me shudders moving through people in misty form and this was no exception.

My flight halted five meters from the outer reach of the tree limbs.

What would the SCP tree do now with the people after they had served their purpose? Just drop them?

My heart was in my throat as I saw the limbs begin to manipulate the people who had orgasmed, passing the men and women from limb to limb, moving them down to a lower level.

If it came down to it, how many could I catch?

One, maybe two, with the added complication of the SCP tree possibly attacking me immediately.

The lowest branches were about seven to eight meters off the ground. Its arms were long enough to reach down, as it had to be able to pick up its mesmerized prey, but would it care after having had its way with them?

Time was running out.

The thing could’ve dropped them immediately, but that would risk injury to itself with an insensate human body falling over thirty meters. So there was a self-preservation instinct at least going on here.

What the fuck do I do?!

It was like I was confronted with a bizarre form of that old thought experiment of having people tied to two tracks and an unstoppable train barreling down it, with me standing at the switching gear, having to choose which track to send it down.

The first people were reaching the lowest end of the tree.

It would drop nearly half a dozen of them at once, I could conventionally only save two, that left four people who’d fall eight meters, being critically injured or dying depending on how they hit the ground.

Fuck!

I had no choice but to risk this.

I zoomed forward to bring the main bark of the tree within my range. It was now looming over me, the bizarre limbs, stretched forearms and hands topped with eyes, dicks and pussies spiraling outward over my head.

With every bit of concentration I had, my Mind Web surged outward and washed over every part of the SCP tree it could reach.

I immediately felt my power latching onto a nervous system but I could discern no mind or central brain whatsoever.

Would my power-

I stopped myself asking that question.

Henry had only drilled me on the basics of Ontokinesis as yet. We had yet to find the time to even have the formal first lesson that was given to potential practitioners in the Foundation.

Thoughts, imagination.

I can control a human, men easier than women.

This was a human.

I banished any notion of form.

This was a human.

It had human eyes, arms, bones, muscles and nerves. Ignore its arrangement.

This was a human.

I banished the thought of failure, of what would happen.

This was a human.

I felt my power snag.

As if I had been sliding down a slope and my hand grabbed a hold of a branch at the last minute to stop my fall.

In that moment, my awareness blossomed as my power stretched over the entirety of the tree. It had required so much concentration, that I fell out of my misty form to stand fully materialized under the fleshy boughs of the SCP.

I could give no verbal orders to it, it had no ears and it didn’t understand anything beyond its own existence, instincts and reactions to the environment around it. Even the cognitohazard that pulled people in wasn’t truly under its control, it was simply there as a part of its being, woven into the outer bark, skin and eyes.

The only way I could control this thing was a sympathetic nerve response. I raised and lowered my own arms and in response the SCP tree mimicked me.

In this way I stopped every limb that was handling the trapped people.

At this point I started to experience the feedback of hundreds of sensitive dicks and vaginas lightly being caressed by the wind, including the feeling of those that were brushing against or holding the people aloft.

“Fucking hell,” I gritted my teeth as I felt my own pussy begin dripping with arousal, the feeling of energy being generated in the mind web was enormous.

One person at a time, I began carefully orchestrating the limbs, starting with those who were lowest.

At first I could only manage two limbs of the SCP at a time, but quickly managed three and then four.

Very carefully, I lowered the first person down, in this case a young woman with long curly red hair that hung down. I did not think about how ridiculous I might look, playing charades in front of an SCP tree made of human bits.

One down, many to go.

Next one. Carefully, grabbing hold of a guy this time, ignoring the sensory feedback as much as possible but I sensed it was a losing battle.

I had saved seven people and had them on the ground when the inevitable happened.

“Shit,” I gasped and moaned, falling to my knees as my body was consumed with the pleasure of an orgasm, my pussy squirting a jet of my juices forward that splattered over the grass. My body shuddered, twitched, I gasped and gulped in air and fought the internal battle to regain control.

Afterward, I grimly got up and began again.

These victims were higher and it took me longer to pass them through the many limbs. I only managed to rescue four when my body betrayed me.

I managed to stay standing, the sensitivity of my pussy was nigh overwhelming as I orgasmed again and I felt my nipples swell with the full body arousal. The temptation to clamp my hands onto my breasts and masturbate right there was barely resisted.

“Ghh,” was the only sound that could come out of my mouth.

My arms came up and I began guiding the next victims down.

Time began flowing very slowly for me as I further guided the SCP to safely release its victims.

When I finally lowered the last human in its clutches to the ground, I was on my sixth orgasm and lying on my back twitching as the aftershocks went up and down my body. My control of the SCP was so frayed, that some of the limbs reverted to its natural instincts. Those limbs immediately sought me out, reaching down through those still under my control.

My wits returned just in time to see two large eye-tipped hands with dripping pussies in their palms surge to my shoulders, whilst a third hand with a dick aimed straight to my crotch.

I had never misted so fast in my life.

My will carried me to the pool and I reappeared on one of the lounge chairs, to further recover and glare at the SCP, “Fuck you!” My fist shook at it and I even flipped it the bird. No way was I going to let that thing have its way with me. There was no proper mind there, no personality, no appreciation or two-way street.

It’d just be like a very large organic vibrator then, my stupid brain pointed out.

“Argh, no, shut up,” I said aloud to myself and belatedly realized that I was somewhat emotionally screwed up. Fighting for the lives of the entire party, the fright of so many dying or not because of my actions, combined with constantly getting aroused and orgasming had done a number on me.

Movement from the tree drew my attention and I looked over just in time to see two entirely new people, a middle aged man and woman, throwing off their pajamas and getting scooped up by the SCP.

“Crap!”

Stupid Taylor, I berated myself. The thing was over thirty meters tall, of course it would be visible now beyond the property line. Anyone who looked directly at it would fall under its spell and walk towards it!

I misted immediately and flew to the top of the SCP to get a good look at how far it was potentially visible from.

The good news was that it was rooted on the other side of a hill, given the contours of the city here. That meant it was only visible from a general 180 degrees, in northerly, north-west, west, south-west directions. It still meant a fair chunk of the suburbs here were now in danger of being affected by this cognitohazard. Thank goodness it was night and most people had closed curtains. It also meant that come sunrise, unless this neighborhood was locked down and warned, everyone would spot the tree and mindlessly walk towards it to be fucked.

I flew back down, Mastering the SCP. Just in time to prevent further copulation with these new victims.

The SCP really didn’t like that and it was the first time I began to experience some fightback. I won the mental battle easily though and guided them back to the ground.

Of course, the two victims didn’t like that either and didn’t want to let go of the tree limbs.

“Oh for fuck’s sake,” I grumbled and pulled the middle aged couple into my mind web. Thankfully, this seemed to override the cognitohazard and I materialized in front of them. “You will both forget you were mastered by this tree and me. Run home and make love. You will forget this order afterwards.”

“Yes, mistress,” they chorused at me before running nude back across the expansive lawn towards the distant boundary wall. Clearly they were direct neighbors who were unlucky enough to have caught an eyeful of the SCP.

“Okay, next step, what happens to the victims afterward,” I said to myself and bent down to examine the closest one.

This was a rather beautiful college aged brunette, with a long ponytail, a nice full bosom that was perky even as she laid down on her back. She seemed to be asleep and breathing normally. I felt her neck, her pulse seemed normal as well, if a bit low. I pulled my phone out from ‘15, activated a flashlight app to shine it briefly into her eyes.

“Proper pupil dilation response,” I muttered.

I played the light down her form, finding no obvious injuries and inevitably my eye caught her nether regions.

My nose decided to make its report at this point and the honey nectar smell of semen wafted up to me. Looking closer, yes, there was semen from the SCP slowly leaking out of her pussy.

I looked up and took a deep whiff, which was a stupid mistake.

My mouth watered and I licked my lips as the concept of an entire tree of human dicks hammered into my brain, the potential energy I sensed above me was…

“Not the time, Taylor,” I gritted my teeth and resisted the temptation.

The scope of this was clearly beyond locally containing or even trying to handle it alone with Fortress’ resources only.

My fingers stroked and tapped on my phone’s touchscreen, before it began ringing.

“Escort?” Armsmaster’s voice, which had a clear hint of tiredness came through clearly.

“Coding in, one, one, nine, three, alpha, omega, I am a book monster,” I said flatly and tapped in the other part of the code on the numeric keypad.

“Received and confirmed. Escort, what can I do for you?”

“You need to cordon off the Union Street suburb west of Lord’s Park. No traffic in or out for the moment. There is a cognitohazard at my current location that will master anyone who lays eyes on it. It’s a tree over thirty meters tall that was teleported in similar to how the train was.”

He didn’t hesitate at all. “One moment, I have your GPS position. Escort, is this tree of similar threat level?”

“Depends on your definition of threat, no radiation, but the effect will mesmerize anyone to walk towards the tree. Where… at the moment at least, it wants to have sex with you.”

There was a long silence on the other end.

“Analysis indicated you’re being truthful, Escort, how is that-”

“It’s not an ordinary tree, imagine a tree but made with human parts as analogue for the functions it has. It first popped up at a party I was attending in a professional capacity. It snagged and had sex with thirty-two people so far. I managed to partially master the tree and had it release them.”

Armsmaster was silent again, then, “Escort, would it be safe to photograph this thing?”

That was a good question. If this was a true cognitohazard then I didn’t dare do it. The effect would propagate through everyone who saw it displayed on a screen. They would then do everything in their power to travel to the tree.

“I don’t think so, it’s a cognitohazard. We have to assume the worst case scenario.”

“Am I to assume that you’re immune to it?”

“It’s trying to snag me, but I can fight back. Even if I can master it, no, I can’t turn the mesmeric effect off. The master effect propagates through the visible spectrum.”

“Understood, my armor’s visor has visual filters that should be able to protect me. I need to know what form this human tree takes, can you give me the species type?”

I shook my head, “Sorry, I’m not that knowledgeable about plants. Hang on.”

I put him on hold and dialed Henry.

“Taylor? Status?”

“I’m all right, so are the people. How long until you arrive?”

“Eight minutes roughly.”

“Tell your driver to keep his eyes low, don’t look up. He might be snagged by the hazard before you even get here. Henry, I’m going to take a number of pictures of the tree and send them to you. I need to know what species I’m looking at. Armsmaster might be able to program his visor to filter it out.”

“That’s very risky, Taylor. If anyone happens to intercept the pics and see it after the fact. The disaster it could provoke would be very difficult to handle.”

“Then what do I do?”

“Tell Armsmaster to wait, when I arrive I’ll do the identification.”

I huffed in annoyance, “Fine. Hurry.” I tapped the other line, “Armsmaster?”

“Yes?”

“A partner of mine who’s nature makes him immune will be arriving shortly, he’s much more knowledgeable.”

The hero audibly sighed, “You’re not giving me much to work with here, Escort.”

“I’m sorry. I literally can’t send proof or intel to you. The best I can do is photograph the victims and the house. Will that suffice?”

“Yes, do it… please.”

I switched over to my camera app and got busy. Misting my lower half let me get higher and better angles. That done, I sent them over to the Protectorate hero. A long few minutes passed and I could hear the loud engine of a speeding truck in the distance, fast approaching.

“Armsmaster?”

“Yes, I’m still here. Alerts have been sent out. Dragon will also be responding as soon as we can find a workaround for the cognitohazard, she has a suit in the Bay currently.”

I breathed a sigh of relief, that Dragon Suit was one that was currently stationed here for helping and monitoring the TQZ. It seemed the world’s premiere Tinker was about to get another task. A large horn honked at the house’s gate.

“I need to go, my partner’s arrived.”

“Is he going to debut to the public any time soon? Professional curiosity.”

“In time, see you hopefully soon, Armsmaster.”

“Stay safe.”

I secured my phone to ‘15s pouch and flew to the front gate.

Henry was already out of the truck’s rear and gazing with a scowl at the tree. He also had a headset stuck to the side of his head, with the small radio unit strapped around his relatively massive waist with an expertly tied rope.

A rather jury-rigged solution to speak to his FTF driver. A glance at the driver showed another very simple solution to the cognitohazard; he was blindfolded.

“You managed to be the eyes of the driver, talked him through it.”

Henry nodded, “Keep that blindfold tight, corporal.”

“Yes sir,” the trooper responded. He kept a professional exterior, but his aura was flaring with relief and the vestiges of dissipating fear. Not that I blamed him, driving an eleven ton truck blindfolded at any speed was no small feat.

“So familiar with this one?” I asked hopefully, now hovering so I was at Henry’s eye level.

His mouth twitched in amusement as he looked at my semi-mist form, “Yes, certain SCPs tend to really stick in the memory because of their nature, and SCP-401 is definitely one of those. Corporal Harris, please get out of the truck. We’re not leaving you alone in this situation.”

“Yes boss, thank you.”

Henry stepped over as Harris got out and guided the trooper to keep contact with his left leg. “Can you open the gate, Escort?”

I nodded and zoomed away to Ryan’s SUV, phased through it and used the remote fixed to the overhead sunscreen.

“Okay, what can you tell me?” I asked after returning.

We moved slowly, step by step through the front yard. “Well, we have the bad luck to be catching 401 in its full Spring bloom cycle. It only manifests the sexual organs during this period. It’s still technically winter here, but that changes next month.”

“So we can expect the blooming to continue, for the whole season?”

“No, it only happens for 18 days at the start of spring. However,” he raised a finger for emphasis, “401, as far as I know, did not have this cognitohazard. Therefore, it has clearly been ontokinetically modified.”

“That is disturbing, it would mean even if you could recognize a SCP, we could be dealing with inaccurate information.”

“Which would be deadly and even apocalyptic in the wrong circumstances.” We came to a stop a few feet from the small field of merrily snoozing nude partygoers, clustered around the tree. “Well, at least that hasn’t changed, it’s a Eucalyptus Myrtaceae.”

I nodded and quickly texted that to Armsmaster, though I struggled a bit with the spelling of the latter Latin name.

I gestured to the snoozing people, “When will they wake up?”

“I don’t know, Escort. I recall that the Foundation did controlled breeding experiments with 401 using D-class personnel, but nothing of their condition immediately afterwards.”

I felt horror and my spine wanted to crawl out of my skin at the mere thought. “Wait a sec, this thing can…” I couldn’t say it.

Henry looked around and nodded, “Yes, it can successfully impregnate women. We must hope that the eleven young ladies here are all making use of pill contraception.”

I so didn’t want to ask but my curiosity couldn’t be helped. “The children from these experiments, were they… normal?”

“Yes, though they suffered from extreme myopia. The SCP uses all those eyes for catching sunlight, eyes and the sun don’t mix well. So its eyes do not see detail well at all. That trait is passed on to its offspring.”

“What about the… sex it had with men? Was that tried?”

My imagination brought forth this entire tree blossoming with human fetuses contained in the arms.

“Yes it was and this is another example of ontokinetic tampering. 401 had a distinct female phase and a male phase, it did not exhibit these autogamic traits. What should happen is that every arm with an inseminated female reproductive organ will begin to bulge in size within twelve hours from now. This continues to grow for two weeks at which point it will ‘give birth’ to a uterine sac that contains a fetus that would be the equivalent of two months old. 401 will then throw this sac away where it will hit any fertile ground. If this is then planted it will turn into a seedling of 401 in its eucalyptus form.”

My brain did not want to compute that biological process or even how it was possible. My phone also had a notification from Armsmaster at this point.

“Okay, Armsmaster thinks he can create a filter for his visor which will prevent him from seeing 401.”

“It’ll be an interesting experiment at least. If it fails you may have to Master him in turn to prevent him copulating with this thing.”

I held up my hands, “I’ll cross that bridge if it’s necessary. Let’s turn to the people. What can we do?”

Henry thought for a moment, then clicked his stone tongue, which sounded somewhat like a suppressed gun firing, “Pick one male and female, then one at a time, move them in greater increments away from 401. We will observe its reaction and any reaction from the victim.”

“This is going to take a while.”

“All science does, Escort. We can’t get this wrong. Corporal Harris, I think we better get you inside the house for the moment. You can remove the blindfold then.”

“Yes, sir.” The FTF member sighed with relief.

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Our experimentation was quickly interrupted though when another group of mesmerized people began climbing the property fence.

Henry kept going whilst I flew out to intercept.

It turned out to be a family of five. The mother, father and two teenage sons were all staring blankly at the tree, then started stripping off their clothes. The lone exception was a young girl who looked roughly eight or nine years old, who was frantically trying to stop her seemingly crazy family.

She barely made it over the fence and was shrieking in anger at them, with tears running down her face.

I mastered those who were in 401’s grip and demisted in front of them with ‘15 held out horizontally in front of me. “Stop.”

They obeyed and the girl gasped in fright, falling backward on her pajama clad butt. My attention was instantly drawn to the fact that she wasn’t affected by the cognitohazard.

I lowered ‘15 and smiled at her in what I hoped was a friendly and warm manner. “Hello there. My name is Escort, I’m a hero. What’s your name?”

The poor thing just kept staring with big astonished eyes, her mouth gaping. For a very long few seconds she was silent, until her eyes started to roam downward then shot back up to my face.

She gulped nervously and her young aura burned with many emotions; embarrassment and awe being chief among them.

“Uh, uh,” she furiously wiped his eyes to clear them of more tears. “I’m… Th- Thea.”

“Nice to meet you, Thea. Look, there’s something very nasty that’s taken over your family’s minds, you see that big tree behind me?” She nodded and thankfully from this angle and due to the poor lighting, it was very difficult to make out details. 401 from here did look like just a big tree, if a little odd. “That is not a normal tree. An evil person made it and dumped it here so it could hurt people. If anyone looks at it, they become like your family.”

A little theory that was probably false, but spun for the girl’s benefit.

“Oh, so, uh, how did you stop my family? I tried everything! And why am I not like them?”

“That’s one of my powers. As for why you’re not affected, I don’t know.  Perhaps it only works on people above a certain age.” More than likely the delineating line was whether the human was capable of proper sexual reproduction, but I was not about to tell an eight year old girl that. “Now, you must be quiet for a moment. I have to hypnotize them so they’ll forget having seen the tree and go home. Please don’t do or say anything to remind them of it and make sure the curtains of your home are closed in this direction. Understand?”

She frowned for a moment, biting her lip and eventually nodded.

I snapped a finger for effect and pulled the remaining family deep into the mind web. “You will forget you saw something that looked like a eucalyptus tree.”

“We will forget, mistress,” the family chorused.

“You will make sure your blinds and curtains are closed until you are advised otherwise by local officials, PRT or the Protectorate.”

“We will, mistress.”

I smiled mischievously and beckoned Thea over to me.

She frowned then slowly got up to stand uncertainly next to me, her aura becoming almost painfully shy.

“Thea, what is your favorite sweet treat?” I whispered into her ear.

“Uh, caramel milkshake,” she answered.

“You will make Thea the very best caramel milkshake you can, in apology for scaring her so much.”

“We’ll make her a milkshake.”

“Good, now turn around.” They did so. “You will now walk home through the front gates of this property and go home. Keep your eyes from looking higher than the horizon until you get through your front door. Understand?”

“Yes, mistress.”

“Go.”

Thea watched her family walk away with bowed heads and shook her head in amazement. “That was awesome! Can you please tell them to give me something cool for my birthday?”

I couldn’t help but laugh as she tried throwing her best puppy dog eyes at me. “You’d need to be more specific than that. Hurry along now, your family is-”

She waved my concern off, “I know the way home, I’m big enough. There’s this awesome LEGO Friends construction set. I asked mom and she said no.”

“Did she give a reason for her decision?” It was really quite fascinating studying the aura of the young. It was like watching a disco ball of emotion and feelings. That in turn made it quite hard to discern where those emotions would carry them.

“No, well,” She scuffed her sandals on the grass and guilt took center stage. “It’s just that I might not always clean up too well after I play with my LEGO blocks.”

“Then perhaps if you resolved and showed your mother that you properly pick up your blocks from now on, she might eventually reconsider.”

“That’ll take too long, my birthday is next week.” The girl barely resisted pouting.

“Unfortunately Thea, as a hero, I can’t use my power that way. That would make me more of a villain.”

Gosh, was I ever this young? It felt like an eternity ago.

“‘S’pose,” she mumbled, there was a surge of… courage?... and impulsiveness in her aura. “Wh- why are you naked?” she blurted out.

I’d had this conversation quite a few times, but having to moderate it for such a young girl put an odd spin on it. I took a step back, turned to face her properly and dropped to a single knee to bring me to her eye level. She was thoroughly embarrassed now.

“Answer me this, Thea. Why do you wear clothes?”

“Uh, it’s cold and it protects my private places.”

“Exactly, so what would happen if, when you became a hero and got powers, you didn’t need to worry about being cold or hot or having to protect those private places?”

Her face frowned cutely as she considered that. “But isn’t it also decent to wear clothes?”

“It is, I suppose, but in my line of work, you could say that clothes or a costume would just get in the way and is more trouble than it’s worth.”

“Oh.”

The whine of jet engines suddenly erupted around me and Thea.

In pure reflex I grabbed her around the shoulders and misted us both.

It was only as I came to a hovering stop a few meters above ground that I realized what had happened.

A Dragon suit was now coming to a stop above the property, swiveling its VTOL engines forward then tilting them back to move into a landing phase.

The armor suit itself was roughly the size of two SUVs slapped together and had the typical quadrupedal draconic design the tinker was known for. This one had a more Eastern dragon aesthetic, with a sinuous appearance, long neck ending in a triangular draconic ‘face’. Its armored hull plates interlocked and weaved with breathtaking complexity and it shifted from a flight mode to a grounded ‘walking’ mode. The only visible weapons I could see on the suit was a back mounted box launcher for missiles.

My True Sight held me captive though as I was definitely seeing something new here.

There was a distinct aura around this suit. An aura that you would normally see from any human being or something with a consciousness. Yet it was different in a way that, again I didn’t have words for. The best I could come up with was… It was like looking at humans, they were a yellow sun, but looking at this suit… at Dragon… was like a blue sun.

What the fuck did that even mean?

Dragon was supposed to be a Canadian tinker with agoraphobia, who sent her suits out into the world to do the heroic thing under the aegis of the Guild; a Canadian based superhero team that focused on international threats, usually A-class and S. A minority considered her to actually be the most powerful parahuman on the planet. Not because of any superior ability to reduce cities or neighborhoods to ashes with a blast of exotic power, but because of her sheer utility and the actual impact she had on the world, from street level all the way up to Endbringer fights.

This suit was not just a dead, remote controlled robot.

I shook off my fascination and got to the ground, remisting with Thea.

“Sorry about that, are you okay?”

“Wow,” she said. “You took me flying! That was so cool, I could see and I was a … ghost? And-” She stopped herself, her face blushing furiously. “You’re very pretty, Escort. I wish that when I grow up I’ll look like you.”

“That’s nice of you to say,” I chuckled, feeling slightly uncomfortable at getting praised like that. “Now, off you go. I need to speak to Dragon.”

“Okay, bye Escort. Thank you for saving my family from the evil tree.” She abruptly hugged me around the waist, burying her face briefly on my abs, before rushing off in the direction of the gate.

“Bye,” I said lamely.

“You have a new fan.” The amused electronic voice suddenly being behind me did not cause me to jump. How did something that big move so silently?

I turned around and leaned on ‘15 as casually as possible. “Dragon, a pleasure to meet you.”

“Escort, the pleasure is mine. As much as I would like for a chance for a friendly chat, I’ve been briefed by Armsmaster, though he did not brief me that your heroic partner would be the other half of the Civil War plinth mystery.”

I winced, of course Dragon would’ve spotted Henry on the way down, he was rather hard to miss.

“Yeah, that’s Henry. Despite appearances, he’s a fully sentient being, very intelligent and can speak for himself. Given that you’re here, I trust you’ve protected yourself against the cognitohazard sufficiently.”

“Yes, I helped refine the AI that filters the perceptions of this suit and Armsmaster’s visor. He’s currently thirteen minutes out. This suit can perceive no plant life at all at the moment.”

“Well, I hope the AI itself won’t be corrupted, some cognitohazards will do that,” I said, thinking of SCP-096. “Let’s go. Henry has been seeing if we can safely move the victims.”

I walked alongside the suit, again marveling how fluently it moved and even how Dragon was limiting herself to normal human pace with no problems and it didn’t look awkward at all. It seemed as natural to move like this as it would screaming through the air at supersonic speeds.

We arrived at the tree and the small sea of nude people around it.

Henry had already moved four people out of reach of the tree's various limbs and was looking thoughtfully down at them, whilst occasionally scanning the tree itself for any reaction.

“Ah, Dragon, a pleasure. Henry Hawkins, at your service,” he smiled and bowed. “I’d normally shake a hand, but I wouldn’t know where to begin with all your limbs at the moment.”

Dragon had the odd experience of looking up at someone with an armor suit and had to actually articulate it higher to match Henry’s height, before a panel opened up with a fully dextrous mechanical human-analogue arm.

Henry laughed and shook it.

“I’m very curious about you, Henry, but that can all wait. What’s the condition of the people here?”

“Stable and sleeping, so far the tree hasn’t reacted to me moving them.”

“It sounds like you expected something different?”

“Whoever can make a tree like this is not someone I’d imagine having the characteristic of benevolence.”

“True, this is something I’d almost imagine to be the work of Bonesaw. She definitely has the skills and ability to create something like what you’re describing.” Dragon turned the suit’s head to look at the tree. I assumed she could only infer its position from the arrangement of the victims.

“She could,” Henry confirmed with a nod. “Yet the tree lacks any ability of showing visible suffering or pain. It lacks vocal cords despite the many mouth-roots around it. There’s no intelligence, only basic instincts here, that of a tree in bloom and wanting to reproduce.”

I shuddered even thinking about that supervillain.

Bonesaw was a girl of about twelve years old who was generally considered the most dangerous tinker on the planet, because of her incredible versatility in the field of biology, anatomical and physiological sciences. She could’ve been the greatest tinker, hero and would’ve  revolutionized the human condition and healthcare, but like everything on Earth Bet which had that potential for good, she was instead corrupted into becoming Bonesaw. The little monster of the Slaughterhouse 9, the tinker largely responsible for making the supervillain group very difficult to kill conventionally. She had engineered herself and the others to high levels of transhumanism, including many safeguards that discouraged most people and heroes from even trying to kill the group.

It didn’t help that you killed a Slaughterhouse member only for an engineered plague to spread out of the body that would go on to kill millions. It was generally accepted that Bonesaw carried many deadly strains of engineered viruses and bacteria within her body, something she happily pronounced during her encounters with heroes who had the misfortune to encounter her.

“In that respect, yes, it does not seem like this is the work of Bonesaw,” Dragon’s electronic sigh was quite pronounced. “The cognitohazard effect also seems to fall outside the scope of what she should be capable of. However, we can’t rule out that the Nine hasn’t picked up a new member. We keep a watch on their position as much as possible, but they are very adept at hiding and covering their tracks. Their last known position was near Albuquerque.”

“Teleporting their creations in and seeing them work from afar is not their style, Dragon.”

“Yes, whether it is them or someone new is academic though. Protectorate policy regarding biological creations like this, that has the capacity to reproduce, means we have to destroy the tree as soon as possible. Only consideration for the lives of the victims is what’s preventing an incineration bomb from being dropped on this position as soon as that can be arranged.”

Henry looked at her and nodded in understanding, clearly unhappy. “As a priority, we need this tree shielded from view. Escort can ‘deprogram’ the cognitohazard effect in people but when day breaks, we’ll be swamped by mesmerized people from this part of the city.”

“We have extra supplies from building the TQZ dome nearby. For such a smaller volume, it could be built in less than a day. However, I think we can improvise a faster build, by simply using structural membranes and canvas.”

Dragon’s odd aura suddenly flared in agitation and… alarm?

The draconic suit whined and turned around on the spot, facing its head up into the sky and to the west.

“Oh no.”

I turned to look in that direction and spotted the oddest thing in the night sky. My first stupid thought was that it was a rather bright star, but quickly dismissed that notion because it was way too close. Then my eyes adjusted and I realized what or rather who I was looking at.

“Escort, you need to master her, now!” Dragon said urgently.

My brain took a few very long seconds to kick into gear because I was raging that our luck was just that bad, combined with a healthy dose of fear.

What the fuck was she doing flying past here and now of all places?

I dared anyone not to look like a deer caught in headlights when they were within range, on the ground and a sitting duck for the strongest Blaster and ‘flying artillery’ cape in the city, who was just a few degrees less dangerous than Legend himself.

“Dragon, there’s a problem with that. I need to be within a twenty foot range and I have a caveat when it comes to mastering women,” I winced and shook my head.

“What is it?” she asked urgently.

“There’s no guarantee I’ll succeed. In short, when I try, it begins a contest of emotional dominance. Normally, it's quite easy for me to win that. However, I know I won’t win against Purity.”

This wasn’t just my instincts speaking. I just needed one look at arguably the most powerful E88 villain’s distant flaring aura to know that there would be no dominating this psyche.

“What happens if you lose?”

“I’ve never lost since I gained powers, so I can’t tell you exactly,” I said grimly as a mesmerized Purity flew closer and closer, staying in an upright casual posture. “Best case scenario, I just fail and I lose her mind. Worst case, she dominates me and I become submissive, unable to resist anything she tells me to do.”

Even as I explained, it felt like a gong was going off in my head and I just knew… it was the latter, it was one of my ‘SCP rules’.

Henry looked at me, his granite gray face staring with intense eyes. It was amazing how well he could emote sometimes, despite being an animated statue.

“It’s not worth the risk, Dragon,” he declared. “Right now, we have one powerful cape enthralled to the tree. If we try to physically restrain or stop her with force, she will do everything in her power to fulfill the cognitohazard’s programming, including destroying or killing us. If Escort loses to Purity whilst trying to master her-”

“You can’t be suggesting that we allow this tree to have enthralled sex with a villain of Purity’s destructive potential,” Dragon objected strongly. “When she regains her wits and learns of this… All my psychological models indicate she’d want retribution and the E88 will march along with her in full force. We’ll be lucky to have Brockton Bay still standing before we can counter with help from the Triumvirate - which is what we’ll need to counter the full unleashed force of the E88 roster.”

“Any battle we have here will assuredly endanger the lives of the victims and those in the surrounding neighborhood, Dragon,” Henry pointed out.

“Wait, I can master the tree itself partially, then I just grab a hold of Purity, prevent the sex, wait out the enthrallment,” I suggested desperately.

“An nice idea Escort, but you lack the skill as yet to see and analyze this cognitohazard properly or have experience with them. Think of it as a computer algorithm that has been placed on the fabric of reality itself. If you stop or prevent the ‘program’ from executing this function halfway, all you’ll be doing is trapping yourself in an effective limbo of always having to maintain control of the tree.”

“Henry, what you’re describing is… very unlikely,” Dragon said skeptically.

“Your disbelief, Dragon, is unfortunately not going to affect the reality of this situation. The cognitohazard, the program that has landed on Purity, preventing its fulfillment will leave her in a similar limbo. If Escort masters the tree and you take Purity away, then destroy the tree - you’ll effectively be condemning her to a lifetime of this enthralled state, awaiting the fulfillment of the program - to have sex with the tree. All these people are simply sleeping now, the cognitohazard programming has been fulfilled, they’ll wake up and move on dealing with the consequences of this.”

Dragon’s suit remained still for a long few seconds. “I have a database of every power on record, Henry. Yet what you’re describing might as well be magic.”

“As a wise man once said, any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. Just because you’ve not yet seen the power yet that can do this… does not mean it doesn’t exist.”

“But what of the people that Escort mastered and sent away?”

“Escort effectively put her own ‘program’ in place to overwrite the tree’s cognitohazard, but she can’t do that with Purity.”

Purity was now flying over the property fence, her radiance lighting up the dark yard as if an omnidirectional white light had just been switched on. It was difficult to look at her directly, but I could see that her eyes and hair were the brightest source of light, whilst the rest of her was just a touch dimmer.

A pair of white gloves fell from her onto the grass. I could also just about make out from how her limbs were moving now that she was…

A white bodysuit fell, followed by a bra and panties.

“Henry, Escort, is this the result of your Thinker powers? That the cognitohazard must be fulfilled lest Purity fall into a coma?” Dragon asked in an oddly formal voice.

“Yes,” Henry said immediately.

I could only nod, totally at a loss. There was no good path to take here.

An armored compartment on Dragon’s side opened, a PC tablet emerged, which she took with one of her fine manipulation arms and handed it out to me. “This will interface with a number of drones I have flying overhead, its programs are monitoring for anyone heading towards here. Stop them.”

The moment the tablet was in my hand it’s screen lit up with an impressively detailed yet easy to understand real time, isometric map of the entire area.

Dragon turned to Henry, “Can I count on your help and discretion, Henry?”

“Of course.”

“Escort, please go.”

It was a polite request but in the circumstances, it might as well have been a direct order.

I didn’t want to go, I could’ve told her to shove her order… but this was Dragon.

I tucked the tablet under my arm, tightened my grip on ‘15 and misted my lower body.

With a twist of will I shot into the sky, the air blasting through my hair.

‘I hope you know what you’re doing, Dragon.’

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SCP/s in this chapter:

"SCP-401" by Flah, from the SCP Wiki. Source: https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/scp-401. Licensed under CC-BY-SA.

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A/N: Have a great weekend folks, stay awesome.