In all reality, not only was my first experiment with the Carnival of Horrors pretty extreme, I had some close run-ins with some mighty dangerous SCP objects in the initial testing phase. I felt certain I was going to die on more than one occasion. And I sustained minor injuries, was infected with diseases, and even placed under some sort of curse.
For example, the experiment regarding the SCP object SCP-517, Grammie Knows, still made me toss and turn at night with nightmares. Simply thinking of the sequence “SCP-076” or the name “Able” made my flesh crawl. In the end, I couldn’t even get close…SCP-076 was a truly superior being, akin to an almighty god or demon. There was also—actually, there were enough examples to fill several books, so I decided to stop walking down memory lane for the time being and focus on the present.
Those initial experiments were brutal and perilous. But they hadn’t been like that lately, due to the Foundation acknowledging my intrinsic value. That was one thing for which I was genuinely grateful.
Thank goodness I had powers that were beneficial to others! I vaguely knew of some SCP objects who were subjected to extremely inhumane living conditions, under the pretext of “observation” or “isolation.” Compared to them, I was being treated exceptionally well.
“True, you don’t seem to bring the injuries or diseases you pick up in the photo back with you to the real world. But that doesn’t mean we know for sure that you’ll resurrect if I pull your corpse out of the photo, and I don’t want to test it to find out. It would be an irreversible mistake if it didn’t work, and generally, people don’t come back to life.”
As Iris said, I couldn’t bring anything back from the photo-world. It didn’t matter if it was treasure I found in the photo, an SCP object, a plain ol’ diary, or a stationary set. I couldn’t even bring back the air or dirt! Dr. Bright was of the opinion that if I could, it would have been possible to mass produce these rare and invaluable SCP objects. I personally couldn’t understand why they would want to mass produce these freaky anomalies that were so extremely difficult to keep under control.
Sure, there were some insanely useful ones, like SCP-500, also known as Panacea—as implied by the name, a bunch of pills that could cure any disease—but they were still incomprehensible SCP objects. I didn’t really approve of increasing their numbers.
Unable to bring back my injuries, pain, or even my fatigue, I reverted to the state I was in when initially entering the photo (or so we’d surmised based on how not only my injuries, but also the wear and tear on my clothes vanished) the instant Iris pulled me out.
However, this was only a physical reset to my initial state. The one thing I could bring back were my experiences in the photo-world—my memories of what transpired. I didn’t understand exactly how that worked (Dr. Bright was in the middle of figuring that one out), but I understood and accepted that this was the general premise behind my powers. I could enter photos, and only bring back my memories.
“How very poetic,” Iris appraised my offhand comment. She whistled for some reason before laughing happily.
“Furthermore, those memories are unique to you and you alone, ███. No matter what you do in the photo-world, it has no effect on the real world,” she added.
Precisely. We proved as much through the course of countless experiments. Let’s say, hypothetically speaking, I killed someone in the photo-world. Now if that person was alive in the real world, this didn’t mean he would retroactively die or plop over dead. I’d spoken with people in the facility countless times in the photo-world, but none of them here in the real world had any recollection of ever speaking with me. As Iris said, the events in the photo-world were for me alone to remember. They were like dreams cut off from reality.
“In other words, you are not traveling against the flow of time. You are essentially experiencing simulations of past events,” Iris pointed out.
Right. Just because photos displayed contents from the past didn’t mean I was traveling through time when I entered one. No matter what I did in there, it would have no effect on the present—on reality. In other words, I couldn’t prevent a tragedy that already occurred from taking place. My powers didn’t extend that far. Of course, simply going to the past and observing events was extremely useful and beneficial for SCP object research.
“Shame you can’t,” Iris whispered to herself.
The crimson photo, pinned up in her room even now, flashed across my mind. Even if I could go back into the photo and heal the man dying in that blood-covered room with something like Panacea… Even if I could save his life in the photo-world, it wouldn’t change reality out here. I never was told that man’s name, but I knew he meant a great deal to Iris, and I couldn’t save him. The dead remained deceased; history—the past—refused to change.
“Yeah, Dr. Bright theorizes that you’re jumping to temporal parallel worlds and experiencing the events there. Upon leaving the photo, the parallel world vanishes… In which case, it truly would be like waking from a dream.”
As if feeling that she’d come across unintentionally rude, Iris hastily continued, trying to gloss over her words. “Precisely because it’s like a dream, we’re unable to verify the validity of what you claim to perceive in the photos. That’s the troublesome aspect of your ability. You could feed us a bag of lies and we would have no way of knowing one way or the other.”
She was right, although I was honestly reporting the events as I saw them. I didn’t know if the researchers took what I said to be true, and even if they did, it was all from my perspective. There were bound to be misunderstandings and unintentional lies mixed in. But I figured the researchers were pros at this sort of stuff. They could check for errors or falsehoods.
And so far, it was believed—determined—that the information I brought back was most likely accurate. As such, I—or rather, my powers—were put to effective use in the research facility. So long as I continued to prove a valuable asset, my peaceful life was secured.
“Indeed. I’m also glad you’re guaranteed a peaceful life and things have finally settled down for you, but are you really okay with this? Don’t you wish to return to your old life?” Iris asked, somewhat nervously.
I wasn’t able to answer her. When I first wound up in this research facility, I was so freaked out and scared that I was dying to return to my old life—to the world I knew.
But honestly, that desire was growing faint as of late. It wasn’t as if I had any pressing reason to return to my old world right away. If I went back, I’d probably just resume my monotonous bouncing back and forth between home and school…
When I thought about how my parents and that strange upperclassman were probably worried sick about me, I wanted to drop home and let them know I was okay. But the desire to stay with Iris—my new second family—outweighed that. And I honestly wasn’t ready for these excitement-filled days interacting with various SCP objects to come to an end. I guess I already viewed life here at this research site as “normal.” It didn’t matter if everything was an illusion like the events experienced in those photos. I truly believed that I wanted to stay at least a little while longer.