An instance of SCP-4854-A, on display in Wilkins's Occult Books, Westminster, London.
Item #: SCP-4854
Object Class: Euclid
Special Containment Procedures: SCP-4854 instances are to be stored in Reliquary Site-06's Climate-Controlled Library when not in use. No more than ten copies of each instance are permitted to be within Foundation containment at a time; further copies are to be destroyed via incineration, with priority given to the most damaged instances.
Foundation personnel are to monitor occult/esoteric bookstores in the United States, Canada and Europe for copies of SCP-4854. The method by which SCP-4854 instances are acquired are up to personnel discretion, and financial compensation will be provided in the event that the instance proves legitimate. All other items sold in the store, including and especially homeopathic remedies, are not to be purchased as they have repeatedly proven to be non-anomalous.
Description: SCP-4854 refers to several volumes of occult theory and method which claim to be based on works found in the writings of H.P. Lovecraft and other contributors to the Cthulhu mythos. These writings are uniformly flawed in several areas, and are often entirely non-functional. The functional rites, rituals and spells detailed within pose a danger almost solely to the individual or individuals performing them, or else simulate anomalous effects through the presence of non-anomalous psychoactive components.
SCP-4854-A refers to a specific subgroup of SCP-4854, which are uniformly styled after the "Necronomicon", which is the most notable volume from the Cthulhu mythos. As the name may suggest, SCP-4854-A instances typically have several rituals pertaining to necromancy as understood by popular culture. At least twenty different SCP-4854-A instances are known to exist.
SCP-4854-A instances are universally said to be translated from the 'original al-Azif' by Abdul Alhazred (sic), who is said to be the author of the Necronomicon in the Cthulhu mythos; however, several editions include words and concepts that would not have been known to an individual living in the Arabian peninsula circa the 8th century, such as the Great Wall of China, Mesopotamia, America, the planets Uranus and Neptune, the Kama Sutra, kangaroos, and cacti.
The source of all SCP-4854 instances was a publisher located in Maryland known as Uncommonplace Books. Through a combination of flagrant plagiarism of papers on occult study, brief access to the Wanderer's Library at some point in 2005, correlation of thaumaturgical elements present in the Cthulhu mythos to actual occult theory and practice, and the creation of a small cult, Uncommonplace Books was able to produce at least fifty books claiming to be legitimate recreations of works present in the Cthulhu mythos, which were then sold to occult and esoteric bookstores throughout the United States, Canada, and Europe.
Addendum: Record of Extended Study of an SCP-4854-A Instance: The following are the research notes of Dr. Katherine Sinclair, a thaumatologist at Site-87. Dr. Sinclair was allowed to study an SCP-4854-A instance (particularly SCP-4854-A12) for a period of two months, and recorded her findings as such.
I don't understand the motive of the publishers, here. Make some bad books with good occult theory in them, see what happens? This thing still had the price sticker in it— it's from Wilkins's in London. Fifty fucking pounds! That's over sixty dollars American!
It's about four-hundred pages long, and is just printed on plain paper. Two pages in and I'm already discouraged. The treatise at the front was convincing, talking about how dread powers exist beyond the scope of imagination and how they must be stopped, and to be stopped they must be controlled, but then it mentions aconite. A plant which doesn't grow in the Arabian peninsula.
This is going to be a long two months.
Page fifteen, and I'm seeing more troubles. 'Xau-Tak' and the 'Queen of Ashes' are mentioned. They're fictional gods. From fucking Runescape. Monty1 didn't believe it until I showed him some lore books in the game. This couldn't have been written earlier than 2015!
Part of me wonders if they were even trying for authenticity at this point.
I'm typing this through dicto dicta backspace fuck dictatorial software that doesn't work because this book is evil.
I opened it up to page twenty-nine, and suddenly, my hands are bleeding all over. Monti— no, Monti with a Why god dammit Mr. Reynolds says that the pages are designed in such a way that they give nasty papercuts, something about the way they were printed? It's not anomalous, he doesn't think. The blood at least adds a nice authenticity to the book.
Page 30 somehow gets even worse. There's a note quote handwritten unquote in the margin that is signed 'Jurgen Lietner'. Monty pointed out that it's from some podcast he listens to, and it's clearly printed as part of the book. The amount of not caring on display here is astounding.
My hands are fine, but dam did it sting. I'm going to see if I can get IT to fix the dictation software on this computer.
Still using dictation software, but some that works now, and… well, Monty and I are kind of flabbergasted. Page fifty-one has anomlang2 in it. We think it's a variant of the so-called 'Secret Script' developed by Queen Victoria's Mystery Cult. Probably learned about it from the Library. I'm kind of afraid to read it, to be honest. But I wouldn't be surprised if it just said 'Be sure to drink your Ovaltine'.
Okay, further analysis reveals that it is, in fact, a legitimate summoning ritual. We tried it out, and… well, I wouldn't quite call it a 'shoggoth'. 'Shoggette', if anything. Just a moderately-sized mass of eyes and flesh and teeth. It's not even animate. Between the stench and the startling, it did make me lose my dinner.
Addendum: Biopsy got back. It is literally just medical waste teleported from the nearest hospital. They could tell by the fact that there was a patient's bracelet in one of its stomachs.
Still feeling ill. The book's getting to me, too— after so much pouring through passages trying to find legitimate occult theory, I'm starting to have dreams about it. Monolithic spires and cities with impossible angles and octopus-faces. Ahhhhh. That was sarcastic. I'm still using dictation software.
The dreams are weird, but not that weird. I just see typical bullshit from the Cthulhu mythos, nothing that scary. Managed to hit page 100 and find another legitimate spell that makes you void your own blood. All of it. At once. Needless to say, we're not testing it.
Katherine what are you doing?3
What do you mean?
You slept down here last night? Look at yourself. Have you eaten anything?
I'm fine.
There's something off about that book.
You've read the same shit I have. I probably just got a stomach bug from the rancid Mac and Cheese. God knows a good part of the task force is AWOL with it.
If you say so. What are we working on today?
Page… 142. Fire magic. Joy.
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More Secret Script, mixed in with Lovecraft's nonsense language. 'Ia ia Cthulhu fahtagan'. Pages 150 to 203 were blank. As far as Monty can tell, there's invisible text there that can be best seen when the page is bled upon, something about a special ink. How about no.
Addendum: I bled on it. The text is in my dreams.
Katherine are there rats in the lab?
No I don't think so why?
Some of the pages look chewed on. I'm going to call maintenance and see if I can get some traps from them.
Make sure they're no-kill traps, we need live sacrifices for at least a few of these.
Time stamps on the following entries indicate that they occurred within a twelve-hour time span. It is believed that Dr. Sinclair was experiencing a distended sense of time.
I dream of a city, I am in a city where the angles are wrong and the architecture is impossible. Rooms are larger inside than out by a magnitude of a universe. A bowl breaks and an ocean spills forth. All the while, in the dreams, I am awake, but I am dreaming, but I am awake. I am devoured by a white fox. It is ecstasy.
Ia. Ia. Ia.
Page three-hundred. We're almost done, thank fucking god.
I found bits of paper in my vomit last night. The medics can't figure out what's wrong with me until the tests get back. They don't know about the dreams. Should I have told them?
No. Keep them to yourself. Keep them to yourself. Nobody else must suffer his gaze. Ia. Ia. Ia. Ia. [INDECIPHERABLE WORD]. Ia.
You're finally looking better, Katherine.
Guess it got out of my system. Had some weird dreams. I— motherfucker!
Jesus!
Same places I cut the last time, too, shit, what the fuck is with this book?
I'm putting it in the safe. We're getting you to the infirmary, now. Never seen paper cuts this bad.
[INDECIPHERABLE WORD] [INDECIPHERABLE WORD]. Ia [INDECIPHERABLE WORD]! Ia the Black Pharaoh! [INDECIPHERABLE WORD] [INDECIPHERABLE WORD] [ANOMALOUS LINGUISTICS DETECTED. ALERTING LOCAL TASK FORCE]
Dr. Sinclair was discovered in the process of consuming SCP-4854-A12 six weeks into its loan. A previous inspection of the volume had failed to detect that its pages had been laced with an organic psychoactive substance (believed to be ergotamine or a similar alkaloid), which had adversely affected Dr. Sinclair. Several other editions of SCP-4854-A were found to have similar properties. Chemical treatment of the pages has not removed this compound, suggesting that the alkaloid was in the paper as it was originally pulped. Dr. Sinclair is expected to make a full recovery.
Containment procedures are undergoing review.
