SCP-4540
rating: +82+x

Item #: SCP-4540

Object Class: Hiemal

SCPeople

Historical documentation of the Sea People, the creators of SCP-4540

Special Containment Procedures: Wherever possible, public access to locations designated as SCP-4540 should be restricted. If not possible, non-functional portions of SCP-4540 should be recorded and destroyed to prevent SCP-4540 from potentially becoming public knowledge. Public deep-sea diving in the Mediterranean around the coordinates of SCP-4540 related locations are to be monitored and amnestics applied to divers if necessary.

All materials related to SCP-4540 are stored within Site-77 for further study.

Description: SCP-4540 is an underwater transportation unit composed entirely of sea glass1, situated within the Mediterranean sea and several adjacent bodies of saltwater. Although it is known that other vessels similar to it previously existed, SCP-4540 is the only known object of its kind.

SCP-4540 is made of translucent glass shaped into a cube. The interior contains several hundred buttons, along with several levers and switches. Each of the buttons is labeled with an Ancient Egyptian hieroglyph, cuneiform, Greek or Latin characters. Some keys have icons which do not correspond to any known language or are faded to the point of being indecipherable.

SCP-4540 may be accessed from several circular patterns of rocks, tree stumps, or large sapphire crystals located around the coast of the Mediterranean. If a human subject kneels within the circle for at least one hour, SCP-4540 will surface within 20 meters of them, provided seawater connected to the ocean is present. SCP-4540 does not appear to have an upper limit on how many human subjects can enter it at one time, testing has not pushed this point of the anomaly due to the possibility of accidental neutralization.

Previously, SCP-4540 was capable of traveling to locations along the Mediterranean coast using the keyboard. Due to the lack of instructions, trial-and-error was used to uncover the travel functionality of SCP-4540 and it may have other functions which are not yet known. Following activation, SCP-4540 will submerge and appear to dissolve into coquina2 fragments.

When discovered, SCP-4540 was capable of transporting subjects to multiple locations along the coast of the Mediterranean. Due to several global conflicts between the Great Powers, taking place in and around the European continent, most of the points to which SCP-4540 could travel were destroyed. This has caused SCP-4540's anomalous properties to alter.

Subjects utilizing SCP-4540 report that after submerging, they did not descend from the surface at an accelerated pace but found themselves immediately in deep ocean water. After a brief period of time, the interior compartment begins filling with water, eventually drowning the subject. Following death, subjects will experience vivid hallucinations through the perspective of previous SCP-4540 users.

All test subjects up to the present have surfaced without suffering any apparent ill effects while inside of SCP-4540.

Containment History: The first documented reporting of SCP-4540's phenomenon was by the Ottoman Empire in 1867. In a report to the Sultan, members of the Islamic Artifact Expeditionary Corps spoke of a green glass room which would float upon the surface if an offering was given. In their report, those who entered SCP-4540 did not return, leading to a recommendation that access to the area be closely restricted. In the closing days of World War 1, the military of the United Kingdom came into possession of these documents, however it does not appear that they understood its significance. From there, Foundation agents embedded in the United Kingdom's government were able to acquire the information and allow containment to begin.

Each waypoint has also been shown to have gravestones buried beneath the center of the circle. Due to the destruction of most of these locations, the tablets were able to be recovered in a severely degraded state. Analysis has shown that thousands of words, believed to be names, were engraved on one side each tablet. The other side has always had an icon believed to represent the ocean, a wave of water surrounded by clouds and sharp points.

Addendum 4540-I: Partial list of known SCP-4540 way points, most of which have been lost.

  • Italian Zone A: Located along the southern Italian coast, destroyed during the First World War.
  • Italian Zone B: Five kilometers from the city of Venice, destroyed during the First World War.
  • Italian Zone C: Tuscany coast region, destroyed during the Second World War
  • Croatian Zone A: Dalmatian coast region, destroyed during the Second World War
  • Albanian Zone A: Believed to have been somewhere along the Gjipe Canyon, destroyed during the Second World War.
  • Greek Zone A: Cretan Coast, destroyed during the Second World War.
  • Greek Zone B: Lesbos, destroyed during the Second World War
  • Greek Zone C: Rhodes, destroyed accidentally by amateur archaeologists.
  • Anatolian Zone A: Bosphorous Coast, destroyed during the Turkish Civil War.
  • Syrian Zone A: Not located until after being destroyed during the Syrian Civil War.
  • Israeli Zone A: Located near the Egyptian border, destroyed during the Suez Crisis
  • French Zone A: Only current accessible way point, located along the Corsican coast.

Addendum 4540-II:

All expeditions within SCP-4540 were undertaken by Foundation historians, due to the necessary experience in identifying historical phenomena. All individuals within SCP-4540 were fully briefed on its effects and volunteered. Based on these hallucinations, if accurate, it is believed there may have once been more than one instance of SCP-4540, or other similar crafts in existence. Each log documents the hallucinations experienced by the occupant of SCP-4540 following their drowning.

Hallucinatory documentation log.
Bronze Age Collapse "We left the elevator, and we could see the beaches. I swam as hard as I could. My muscles were cold and I felt so strong. When I got to the beach, I turned around. There were so many jewels floating in the ocean. I felt something like kinship with the ones that were green, but there were red and blue and orange and pink.
When enough of us had reached the shore, we started marching for miles and miles. Then, we saw columns. Through this desert, hundreds of men, and chariot archers, flooding over the hills at us. I raised my sword, then there was a spear in my chest, and I died.
"3
Greek Dark Ages "I was alone. Nobody could see me. I felt awful inside, in all the ways you can feel awfulness. My body was freezing cold, I felt like there were lungs in my skin screaming for air and there was a horrible tightness all around me. There were people in front of me, a lot of them. I don't know where they came from but they knew to be here.
They were scared of me but they came forward anyways. I could see myself in their eyes. Gigantic and armored, with spines poking out of my joints. Once they had all squeezed themselves in, it seemed like we were always about to run out of room but never did, we started going under.
"4
Ancient Carthage "It felt like I wasn't wearing anything. Just a flowing white robe. that seemed to always be ready to be flung away by the wind. There were some men with me, five of them carrying chests made of big oyster shells. I thought they were wearing turtle shells on their backs, but I think those were just what their backs looked like.
There was a desert and we walked the whole time. There was a city there, Carthage. Caravans were pumping into the heart of commerce from everywhere. We were escorted inside. We received a gift. They didn't know what they had, and it frightened them. I never saw it but they showed us men turned to hair. They still lived, but what was living then? We never said a word to them and walked all the way back. There were other chests like that in the elevator, SCP-4540. This wasn't the first place we had visited on this journey.
"
Probable Classical Era. "We came down from on high and there was this glowing vein in the seafloor. A city mended from the broken wrecks of ships. There were these amazing, huge green domes. Sea glass, it looked like they had sea foam lapping it from the outside, waves on a beach from the sky.
I saw people, or parts of people, with tentacles, fins, scales, gills, eyes on tentacles and wider than dinner plates. I saw one little boy hugging a mutant girl. Lots more of touching and hugging between the standard people. Maybe they were checking each other. Making sure there was still some normal here. We were carrying a column, pulling it out. It fell too far, and toppled onto me. That was the last thing I saw
"
Roman Empire, Severan Dynasty "My god, there he was. The Young Lion, the Emperor, and guards positioned so smartly, so poised. I carried a man in a sharktooth crown out of the slick glass cage, I'll tell you, it wasn't easy. Nothing was easy. Hard to focus, seeing everything through those wide eyes. Slippery grip, my hands, they were tentacles, some holding the litter sharktooth sat on and some swatting at my own angler-fish forehead. They had a gift for us, from their barbarians. A hammer that could strike through mountains. A demonstration was requested. That, was when I died."
Roman Empire, Crisis Of The Third Century "Another Emperor. He was a baby this time. He died the first time when we went under. But when we got to his stop, he knew he was going to die again. Had to. That's why he gave us the star. Last I saw he was waiting on the beach, for something to happen.5"
Byzantine|Ottoman Empires, Fall of Constantinople(1453) "Everything shook when the bombards boomed. Blinding fires and the crackling of combat. Stale masonry hanging in the air. I could see the Turks scaling the walls. They were looting. But they were giving me something too. They gave me a camera obscura to take the images home. I took notes. I remembered. We went back under to tell of what we saw."
Napoleonic Expedition to Egypt and Syria "There were so many bodies to pick out of what we wanted. This was what we wanted. Nobody could tell us not to take it. The piece without which war could not be waged. I was tired of collecting. My arms were heavy with scale weight, weight of my family, whom were dead. If we didn't go up soon we would all be like them. If anyone said we were brothers now they could have it.
We picked through every broken ship plunging into the void, until we found it. A jar with a bird's eye, darting and quivering. I can count down the days until we are no longer preserving the dustbin of history. We can show them what they are missing. We took everything else, too. The city would need to be bigger for what we had to do.
"
Late World War 1 "Everyone has been angry. I stepped out of the elevator and something wet and hot splattered on my face. There had been brotherly bonds in this place, once. Familial ties. But who leaves family behind? I wiped my face and looked up. They were building the way now, out of the rivets and iron they had blown out of the surface.
Periscopes, smokestacks and bulkheads welded together with glowing red gel. I look down. A young man and a mutant women are running, fleeing from a gang of men with knives. Lovers. I clench my fist. My vision went red. Fraternal love could only go so far. How could man care for a beast?
"
World War 2, Battle of Crete "They fell like rain. Little clouds each holding one little raindrop. They fell faster sometimes. Falling so far away, you couldn't tell how hard they hit the ground until you found them. They all had their manuals with them, guns and ammunition. We moved when it was almost time.
Everything was almost ready. One of the men in our cadre, third in command, had started to show signs of mutation. He needed this more than any of us. To get out of this pit at the bottom of the world, and leave those who belonged behind.
"
Unknown, believed to be post-war Croatian coast. "This wasn't the first expulsion. When the others heard of the coming ascension, they flooded out of their nests and the cracks in the ground. They poured out to remind us that they were here too. But if they wanted to ascend, that was fine too. Time to learn their place. They belong down there.
We can forget about them as we ourselves have been forgotten. Mostly turtleheads here. They could snap at me, but I had a machine-gun. Once we reached the surface, one turned to look at me. I cracked one of his eyes open with the butt of my weapon. The rest of them fell over themselves to leave. I do not know what became of them after, but the last thing I heard before going under was that wretched gasping…
"

Addendum 4540-III: On 09/18/1989, Foundation underwater archaeologists were able to locate the apparent settlement serving as the source of the civilization which created SCP-4540. Using new sonar technology, combined with triangulating the locations of the former way points, led to the discovery an abandoned ruin, appearing to have been destroyed at some point between 40-60 years prior to Foundation reaching it. The initial log of exploration follows:

Addendum 4540-V: Last known writing of Dr. Howard Gibbon, lead researcher and historian during the excavation of Atlantia. All Foundation personnel known to have entered SCP-4540 are to be quarantined for study until further notice.

We have discovered a great many historical treasures over the past thirty years of excavation. A few loose ends still trouble us, and probably shall for quite some time. The first being that there are not nearly enough skeletons present inside of Atlantia to account for the entire population, even given that we may not have found a fraction of those present in the city if some unknown compartment is found.

They're still out there. I know it. I literally can feel it in my bones. Going through SCP-4540… you don't remember death. But Howard Gibbon died on that ride. A few years ago, I noticed that the bottom of my foot was growing soft. Now, most of my toes look like jelly. I can't wriggle them anymore.

I don't belong here anymore. All the histories I've studied, everything I ever knew and dreamed of, maybe I always belonged with them. The collectors. The ones trying to keep everything from going away. Hoarders. Too many of my father's tendencies.

The Foundation is not going to be changed from how it operates. We're like them, but up here we keep the things nobody has ever known about. The man still trying to be living up to her, a toothy mother living somewhere underneath those lapping waves.

I don't know where your journeys are going to take you, I wish everyone the best of luck. Sophia, don't miss me too much, we may meet again. Please remember to feed Tiger Lily twice every day.

As for myself, I depart tomorrow for an unknown destination.

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