The walls of the Council Chamber at Site-01 were pitch black and seamless, devoid of doors, windows, or any recognizable features. A low hum from the air system buzzed faintly overhead, echoing through the otherwise dead silence. In the middle of the room stood a massive circular table, illuminated by a sterile white ring of light from above. Eleven high-backed chairs formed a ring around the table, each one occupied by a figure shrouded in darkness.
Dr. Amalia Van Leeuwen stood in the center of that ring, lit from above like a specimen under examination. Ash and soot still clung to her coat from the fallout at Site-17. Her hair was tied back, her face calm, but tension lingered in her shoulders and the faint narrowing of her eyes.
A voice played over a hidden speaker in the wall—a recording of her own words.
"Asher. Get Amber and any remaining survivors out. Now."
A beat of silence followed. Then the crackle of a reply.
"Copy that," Asher's voice responded. The sounds of ruin and chaos from the living area leaked into the audio just before it cut off.
The loop ended.
The voice of O5-1 broke the silence, smooth and clipped. "This Asher Cruz—an impressive specimen. Adaptable, agile, and, from what we've seen, deadly when cornered. An excellent recruitment on your part."
He paused.
"Pity you've just lost control of the hunt."
Amalia raised her chin. "Cain and Abel were taken by SCP-106. The breach escalated past projected thresholds. We are adapting."
"Adapting," O5-4 repeated with a dry chuckle. "A quaint way to describe flailing in the dark."
Fingers drummed on the table. A breath exhaled—sharp, impatient.
"You've been effective until now," said O5-7. "But this might finally be beyond your reach. SCP-076-2 is no longer within your control. How will you fare now that your most dangerous asset is out of sight?"
Amalia's tone cooled to steel. "He may be out of sight. But he is not off his leash."
O5-2 leaned forward, voice laced with gravity. "Doctor Van Leeuwen, we now have a situation where SCP-076-2 is trapped in a pocket dimension we cannot access. With SCP-106. A being that—"
"—must not be destroyed," O5-1 finished coldly. "That was clear from the start. Or have you forgotten?"
"Can you guarantee he won't try?" asked O5-5.
Amalia met the question with honesty—and edge. "At this moment? No. But Abel is still operating under my orders. He's volatile, not mindless."
A pause. Stillness.
Then O5-3 spoke, almost incredulously. "We're to trust in your faith that two anomalies—one thirsts for blood, the other allergic to it—will remember their orders while inside this unknown dimension?"
Amalia took a deliberate step forward. "You assigned me monsters and told me to make them tools. I did you one better. I turned them into soldiers. And soldiers don't forget their mission."
She let the words settle.
"Statistically speaking…Abel is likely to lose control, yes. But he knows what killing 106 would cost. The mission parameters were clear."
O5-1's voice dropped an octave. "You're gambling, doctor."
"Not quite," Amalia replied sharply. "I'm merely placing a bet I've already rigged."
That earned silence. Calculated. Measured.
"So hope is your strategy now?" O5-1 asked.
Amalia offered a thin smile. "To put it simply," she said, adjusting her glasses with a calm push of her fingers. "We're already in the fire. Statistically, the next move is either checkmate or a miracle. I'm betting on the miracle. A little faith, gentlemen—preferably before the smoke clears."
She let her gaze sweep the circle. "I appreciate your skepticism. Truly. But unless any of you intend to revoke my clearance, Chairman and all—"
She turned slightly, eyes back on the flickering screens behind her. "—I'd like to get back to my work."
The light above her dimmed. The table faded into darkness. The Council remained silent.
And Amalia stood, alone, her face now lit up by the screens as she began brooding over them.
MEANWHILE—
Inside the pitch black void, Abel floated helplessly, utterly exposed. His power—legendary, unstoppable—was meaningless here. The darkness swallowed everything, even the promise of resistance.
It stretched endlessly in every direction, silent and deafening at once. There was no floor beneath him, no sky above—only a thick, oppressive nothingness. In its center, Abel hung suspended as if crucified, arms spread wide, his body limp but rigid with unseen strain.
His head bowed low, strands of his black hair adrift in the void like sluggish tendrils of smoke. His eyes remained closed, his jaw locked tight in grim defiance. Something—or someone—gnawed at the edges of his mind, peeling back memories like pages of a burning book.
A flicker.
Sunlight.
Laughter.
A grassy field stretched before him, vibrant and lush, swaying under a gentle breeze. Two boys circled each other barefoot on the grass, sparring sticks in hand. One dark-haired, wild-eyed and confident. The other calm, golden-haired, carrying the weight of reluctance behind his movements.
Cain and Abel.
They were no older than sixteen, muscles lean and raw with youth. Their sticks clacked and clattered in a dance too fluid to be learned, too natural to be taught. Cain lunged. Abel parried. Back and forth, push and pull, a duel of brothers.
Abel struck first—an elegant sweep against Cain's legs, followed by a shoulder check that sent him sprawling onto the ground. A sharp grunt escaped Cain's lips as he hit the earth, dust puffing up around him.
Abel dropped his stick and knelt beside him. "Sorry! Are you alright?"
Cain didn't respond immediately. His hand shot up to cover the right side of his face, blood seeping between his fingers, pattering softly onto the grass. Way too much for a simple injury.
"Cain—let me see. Please."
Cain chuckled—a light, almost musical sound. Abel gently pulled Cain's hand away.
What he revealed turned the dream rancid.
Cain's right cheek had rotted grotesquely. Flesh sloughed away from bone, his jaw gnarled and exposed, one eye sagging in its socket, weeping something black and foul. And yet Cain smiled—brightly, almost lovingly.
"It's alright, brother," he said, voice unnervingly warm. "I know you didn't mean it."
Abel recoiled, horrified.
Cain leaned in closer, his foul breath thick with rot.
"But I mean it when I say that I… hate you."
A flash of silver.
Pain blossomed white-hot as Cain drove a blade deep into Abel's gut, twisting cruelly. Blood fountained over Cain's grinning face.
Then—
REALITY.
A far deeper, more agonizing pain roared through Abel's abdomen. He gasped, his body lurching against invisible bonds.
A blade—no, fingers. Clawed, corroded, dripping amber acid—ripped through his torso with slow, sadistic precision.
Abel's eyes remained sealed against the darkness. His body convulsed. Entrails slipped from the wound, drifting through the void like spectral ribbons.
Standing inches away, savoring the moment, was the Old Man.
SCP-106.
His body was a grotesque ruin, fused with rot and rust, his skin hanging in tattered sheets from exposed bone. His fingers—long, cracked, and coated in sizzling acid—twitched with glee as they worked deeper into Abel's abdomen.
A smile, wide and predatory, split the Old Man's ruined face nearly ear to ear.
"Such a beautiful mess," he whispered, his voice slick with mock affection. "Do you think if I dig deep enough, I'll find what else you're so desperate to bury?"Abel's eyelids quivered, but did not open. His fists clenched tight enough to draw blood from his own palms. He did not scream. Not even a whimper escaped him—only the silent shudder of unbearable suffering.
The Old Man's fingers flexed again, sinking deeper, savoring every inch.
Abel's silence was his only act of rebellion. He was under strict orders not to engage 106 until the victims could be rescued. For now, all he could do was endure. But even monsters had their limits. And the Old Man intended to find his.
MEANWHILE—
Inside the suffocating void, Cain drifted alone, his body slack, suspended by forces unseen. The darkness here was not passive—it pressed against him, squeezing like a great invisible hand, seeping into his pores, whispering doubts he dared not name. His breath came shallow, cold sweat slicking his skin, as unseen tendrils gnawed at the edges of his consciousness.
A flicker.
Then, light.
A grassy field unfurled before him, golden in the sun, warm wind rustling through wildflowers. In the middle of it, two boys crouched, breathless and laughing, sticks in hand. Cain and Abel.
Cain's stick shook in his sweaty grip. He lunged, slow and sloppy. Abel dodged easily, countered with a flick of his wrist, and sent Cain sprawling onto the dirt. Dust and laughter exploded into the air.
Cain gritted his teeth, pushing up from the ground. But Abel was already there, standing over him, a smirk carved into his face.
"You're pathetic," Abel said, tapping Cain's forehead with his stick.
Cain froze.
"Forever runner up, it seems," Abel added, voice dripping with condescension. "No matter how hard you try."
Laughter, cruel and echoing.
Cain's heart pounded. He staggered to his feet, chest heaving, but Abel just turned his back.
Then another flicker.
Another Abel. Older now. In armor, sneering.
"Still chasing my shadow, little brother? Still falling short?"
The scene blurred, then shifted to another moment. They both now stood before God. The figure was unknowable, his presence shaped only by a gleaming light.
They knelt, placing their offerings before him. When Abel's received favor over his, it felt all too familiar. But this was different. Abel turned him, face betraying his sense of superiority. He tilted his head mockingly.
"Surely you didn't think…you would be chosen."
The Abel before him oozed demonic aura. The light that represented God had warped into something dark and malicious. It lurched out, smothering Abel who stood unflinching, never taking his glare off of Cain.
Suddenly, he multiplied. More Abels. Hundreds. Surrounding Cain in a tightening circle, all laughing, all pointing, all mocking in a rising, unbearable chorus.
Cain clutched his head, nails digging into his scalp. The noise grew—mocking, jeering, screaming his failures back at him. His vision blurred. His breath came in ragged gasps.
Then he saw it.
A dagger.
It lay in the grass at his feet, gleaming silver, beckoning for him to free himself.
He dropped to his knees, hands over his ears, but the voices crashed against him like a tidal wave. Abel's face twisted, melting, splitting, revealing a gnarled, decaying mockery of itself, sneering and grotesque.
"Pick it up," the voices hissed. "End the noise."
Cain reached for the dagger, hand trembling.
Abel's monstrous face leaned close, whispering in his ear, "Or have you finally accepted…that you'll always be less?"
Cain's scream tore free—raw, broken—as he clutched the knife in both hands, the metal biting into his palms. He staggered to his feet, steps heavy, dragging himself toward the twisted specter of his brother.
Closer. Closer.
But somewhere, buried deep, a memory surfaced.
Abel's real face. Smiling warmly. Extending a hand to him, not to hurt—but to help.
Abel had never belittled him.
*This isn't what happened. This is what I fooled myself into believing.*
Cain stumbled, dropping the dagger with a clatter that echoed unnaturally across the field.
"NO!" he roared, voice shaking the fabricated world.
The field trembled, warped, cracked like shattered glass.
Cain's eyes snapped open. Sweat drenched him, his body convulsing with the effort of resistance. He hung in the void, heart hammering against his ribs.
Ahead of him, the Old Man lingered in the darkness, watching.
SCP-106 tilted his head in grotesque curiosity, as if surprised that Cain had broken free. His body twitched, dissolving at the edges, then retreating into the mist.
But his voice remained, slithering through the air.
"You can't resist me forever... not in this place."
Then came laughter—wet, rotten, twisted—before vanishing into the ether.
Cain panted, dragging air into his lungs, each breath a battle. He forced himself upright, feet landing with a muted thud on an invisible surface beneath him.
The mist parted just slightly.
And he saw them.
Bodies.
Hundreds, maybe thousands, hanging limply in the void. Some lifeless, others twitching weakly, their suffering a silent scream across the darkness. Some victims stared at him with hollow eyes. Others wept soundlessly. None spoke. They couldn't.
Cain's fists clenched. His vision sharpened.
He had found the victims.
Now he had to find a way to save them.
The void was faltering.
The darkness no longer pressed against his skin with the same suffocating intent. The voices had thinned, like radio static slipping out of range. Whatever engine powered this place—this pocket dimension—was failing.
He stood among the hanging bodies, eyes darting between each one. Some groaned softly. Others twitched, caught in a looping rhythm of pain. Most were silent--the kind of silence only the dead could achieve.
Cain stepped forward and reached up toward a man suspended by black threads that writhed like veins. With a grunt, he grabbed the threads and pulled—hard. They resisted, squealing against the air, until Cain's robotic arms flared. A pulse of heat and defiance surged from his hands, and the bindings snapped like brittle cords.
The man collapsed into Cain's arms, unconscious but alive. Cain laid him gently onto the invisible floor.
He looked around. Dozens more. Maybe hundreds.
No time to be gentle.
He moved from one to the next, slicing, yanking, dragging. With each freed victim, the dimension shuddered—ripples of instability cracking through the blackness. In the distance, he could hear something groan. Not a voice. Not a structure. The dimension itself.
He was at it for hours, but it was working. He was undoing it.
Then he heard something behind him—a flicker in the void.
"Asher?"
A rift opened like torn film, and Asher stepped through. His body flickered like bad signal, his eyes darting quickly to Cain.
"Damn," he muttered. "Thought I was here to save you guys. Looks like you had it handled."
Cain blinked. "How the hell—"
"Don't ask. Won't happen twice." He raised a small, palm-sized device pulsing faint blue light. "This is temporary. Whatever you've been doin' in here is weakening this place. Amalia was able to get a feint trace of your location, but we have to leave sooner than later."
Cain glanced back at the victims. "We're not leaving them."
Asher smirked, already pulling someone down. "Didn't say we were."
Together, they worked. Two shadows in the dark, undoing the Old Man's kingdom one thread at a time.
Eventually, the last of the surviving victims had been cut down. Some were able to stand, others barely conscious, their bodies ruined by time and torment. Cain dragged them into a loose cluster, forming a protective ring while Asher crouched beside his comms device.
"Command, this is Cruz," he said, voice sharp. "We've got survivors. They're weak, some can't walk. We're near the tear. I need med teams and containment staff ready to pull them out—now."
A beat of static.
Then a reply: "Copy that. Teams inbound. Tear is stable for extraction."
Cain exhaled, chest heaving. Asher stood and gave a curt nod.
"Help's coming. We just need to hold the gap open."
The void trembled, walls cracking, distant shapes dissolving into mist. The fear was dying.
In another part of the void—
The sound of flesh being split echoed. The Old Man was desperately tearing into Abel's body, trying to grow the fear.
Nothing.
Then came a tiny sound, sharp and artificial, echoing through the black. Abel's collar was beeping, the light on it now green. An artificial voice spoke.
"Safety parameters met. Power usage Authorized."
Abel's eyes snapped open.
His lip curled.
"Finally."
Rage ignited inside him—not just at the pain, or the humiliation—but at himself. For waiting. For obeying. For letting that crawling little bastard think he'd won. It was more painful than anything the Old Man had done to him.
He looked up at the figure looming over him. SCP-106, claws already poised for another cut.
The Old Man hesitated.
Too late.
A burst of energy exploded from Abel's body, launching the Old Man backward through the void. The acidic claws clattered to the invisible floor.
Abel rose.
Eyes blazing. Power bleeding from every pore.
"Disgusting little roach. You think this makes you powerful—attacking your enemies cloaked in their fears."
106 growled back in response. Confusion and frustration riddled the SCP's face. His victims should be weakened in this place. After all the torture, the gutting, the trauma--how was he still moving?
Abel stepped closer. The old man nervously crawls back, looking around at the fading walls of his dimension.
"I think I know the secret now…to your little trick." Abel smiles, standing ominously still. "Want me to demonstrate?"
The old man grew more fearful and desperate. He tried to slink back into the darkness, clambering at an invisible wall hoping for an opening.
Abel spoke again, and this time his voice warped into something unnatural—low, thunderous, omnipresent. It didn't come from his throat, but from the very walls of the dimension itself. It echoed from the air, the floor, the crumbling corners of the void—as though reality itself were speaking through him.
"Pocket Dimension….Shadowed Valley of Death."
—TO BE CONTINUED—