SCP-4374

Item #: SCP-4374

Object Class: Safe

Special Containment Procedures: SCP-4374 is kept in a secure storage locker at Site-15. Foundation personnel are not permitted access without research authorization.

UPDATE, 2018/08/12: Security personnel are to escort any researchers who handle SCP-4374 to ensure prompt re-containment after testing is complete.

Description: SCP-4374 is a pair of unbranded, over-the-ear headphones. It has no wires to connect to audio devices and contains no electronics that would allow for wireless transmission or audio playback.

headphones.jpg

SCP-4374.

When worn, SCP-4374 plays audio of a voice with no discernible qualities (e.g., no clear age, gender, or regional background). The voice will describe a specific scene from the second-person point of view. This scene takes between 30 and 60 seconds to be described in full. At the end of each scene, the voice will say "This is you," and SCP-4374 will go silent unless worn continuously for four hours or until worn by another subject.

Attempts to record or amplify SCP-4374's audio have failed. If two people listen to SCP-4374 by each holding a different headphone, each will report hearing a different scene.

To date, 819 scenes have been recorded via transcription by subjects wearing SCP-4374. No patterns, naming conventions, or other details suggest a clear source or intention behind the audio. Investigations into transcribed scenes have found 12 positive matches to people or places mentioned during playback, but investigators cannot determine whether such matches are coincidental.

Listeners report mild cognitohazardous effects, including intense empathy, dissociation, or disorientation. These effects typically dissipate within one hour after a single use; prolonged usage has unpredictable, and potentially more severe, results (see test logs and the 2018 containment breach report).

A sampling of transcription tests follows.

Sample: SCP-4374-26

Listener: Dr. Hal Reardon, 52, male; Site-15 researcher

Transcription: It is a chilly autumn morning, and you are waiting for the school bus. Your sister has saved a strawberry lollipop from yesterday's visit to the doctor, and she refuses to share. When you tell her that you hate her, you see her face crumble at the thought that you are telling the truth. She laughs a moment later, but the crumbling remains in your mind to this day, deep in the pit of your coward's stomach. This is you.

Notes: Dr. Reardon volunteered for SCP-4374 testing. During his post-sampling interview, Dr. Reardon confirmed that he is an only child, but also stated that he would be able to describe his sister if asked and that her name was Darlene. When interviewed two hours later, Dr. Reardon did not remember saying this and had no such recollection of a description or name.

Sample: SCP-4374-243

Listener: D-616, 42, male

Transcription: Kate had wanted apple pies, but you'd insisted on red velvet, and now, as you press a bite through her lips, the gleam in her eye says that she knows you were right. Then she moves to smear icing on your dress, and you laugh, as a flash from the photographer's camera blinds you both for a perfect instant. You think back to last night's dinner: Mom, retelling the old story of the deer in the backyard. Mom loves you again, you think. After all these years, love has returned. This is you.

Notes: D-616 wept in the containment chamber for 20 minutes before collecting himself for the post-sampling interview. D-616 claimed to have once known a woman named Kate, but eventually confirmed that no other details of the recording meant anything to him.

Sample: SCP-4374-316

Listener: D-7602, 34, female (Note: This was D-7602's seventh test of SCP-4374.)

Transcription: Danny's cheeks puffed red, and you knew at once it was the allergy. The drive to the hospital took ten minutes. It should have taken fifteen, but really you needed it to take you back in time, before the pine nut grazed your baby's esophagus. He asphyxiated in the waiting room alone as you tried to park. What you remember are the blinking hazard lights on your Sonata and someone else's car honking, demanding that you move. All else was dust. This is you.

Notes: D-7602 laughed off her emotional response to this sample and confirmed that no details matched her life experience. Two days later, D-7602 attacked fellow janitorial staffer D-7311, locked herself in a Site-15 broom closet, and was ultimately hospitalized for a psychotic break. Repeated testing of SCP-4374 is no longer permitted except on staff who are already under regular observation or confinement.

Sample: SCP-4374-508

Listener: Dr. Jack Gillespie, 72, male; Site-15 research lead

Transcription: You pull out your travel set of Connect Four, and as the plane hums and rumbles through mild turbulence, you let Jenna win again and again. She knows you're throwing each game, but she grins and gently boasts all the same, and you let her, because the grinning was your goal all along. When she finally grows bored and reaches for her neck pillow, you close your eyes and try to memorize the serotonin high fluttering along your throat. This is you.

Notes: Dr. Gillespie volunteered for SCP-4374 sampling. During the post-sampling interview, Dr. Gillespie noted lightheadedness and giggled unprompted several times.

Sample: SCP-4374-716

Listener: Candace Fields, 28, female; Site-15 research assistant

Transcription: It's the series finale of Hell's Mendicants — nine damn seasons! — so of course you got the old watch party together. Steve and Bran, Jenna, even Kris came by (but not Dan, of course, they broke up so long ago). You got out the popcorn and ginger beer, just like that first night. Everyone laughed and sobbed and gasped all together in front of the television's glow. During the last commercial break, Bran said, "I'm gonna miss the shit out of this stupid show," and you wanted to cry and hug him and say, "I'm gonna miss you, too," even though you see Bran every other week. This is you.

Notes: No television program with the title Hell's Mendicants exists. In her post-sampling interview, Ms. Fields reported a powerful sense of nostalgia, but in relation to a memory of her father taking her camping as a child. She could not explain the connection, but insisted on recounting the latter memory in detail. Further investigation revealed that Ms. Fields' father died when she was 18 months old.

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