“What’s so funny? This is a very impressive, mysterious SCP object in its own right! It’s extremely convenient. Not just me, but all of the on-site personnel love it!” For whatever reason, Iris seemed pretty keen to defend the virtues of the box. She jutted out her lips in a pout.
“Well, I guess it isn’t surprising, after all of the intimidating things I said. There are also harmless or amusing SCP objects that are more like parlor tricks than anything dangerous. But just because the Foundation deems them harmless doesn’t mean they aren’t incomprehensible anomalies, so never take them lightly.”
As if an afterthought, she began rattling off another slew of technical terms. “For the record, SCP objects are divided into the three classes. ‘Safe,’ ‘Euclid,’ and ‘Keter,’ based on how difficult they are to contain. In many cases, the containment difficulty is directly proportional to the SCP object’s level of danger.”
Iris swung her finger around as she offered a detailed explanation. Almost too detailed, really. “Let’s say we were going to contain an SCP object in a box. If we could put it in the box and everything was okay, it’s Safe. If we could put it in the box, but who knows what would happen if we did, it’s Euclid. If it wouldn’t go, we couldn’t get it in, or it popped out after we put in the box, it’s Keter. I believe that sums it up.”
I wasn’t quite sure whether or not I understood the analogy.
“The Never-Ending Pizza Box is Object Class: Safe. It is considered particularly harmless. On top of that, it is terribly handy to have around,” Iris said. Smiling like a mischievous child, she pointed at the perfectly ordinary-looking pizza box and urged, “Go ahead and open it. I’m sure you’ll be in for a surprise.”
Although a bit flabbergasted, I did as I was told. I opened The Never-Ending Pizza Box. True to her prediction, my eyes nearly popped out of my head. Nestled in the box was what appeared to be a hot pizza, fresh out of the oven.
But that was impossible! Iris had just grabbed one herself! But then she closed the lid, only for me to open it and find another pizza in the box, a box that should by all rights have been empty. To top it off, this was even a different type of pizza from the one she got. Bigger than hers, thick crusted, it was heavily loaded with seafood and broccoli.
What the heck? This didn’t make any sense!
“Didn’t I tell you? It defies all logic; hence, it’s an SCP object.” Iris tilted her head back. It felt like she was gloating, for some reason.
She cheerfully pulled a folded sheet of paper out of her pocket. Unfolding it, she looked down, and hummed contemplatively as she read over the note. Curious what it said, I tried to sneak a peek only for Iris to snap, “No!” in a surprisingly stern voice.
“You aren’t allowed to look. In a sense, I am allowed some personnel privileges, so I’ve got authorization. This is a report documenting details pertaining to this SCP object. Or to be more precise, a copy of the report. Technically, it’s explicitly prohibited to make copies, but I had to cheat a bit since I can’t remember every little detail.” Iris left me mystified, once again setting her eyes on the piece of paper, or report, I guess.
She began to read aloud. “SCP-458 is a large-sized pizza box from the pizza chain [Little Caesars], of their [HOT-N-READY] variety. It is made of simple cardboard, measuring 25.4cm by 25.4cm by 2.54cm.”
Although the string of numbers meant nothing to me, I figured this meant it was a normal pizza box.
“What makes SCP-458 an oddity is that, while appearing to be an ordinary pizza box, when it comes into contact with human hands, it instantaneously replicates the holder’s subconsciously preferred choice of pizza, down to the favorite sauce, cheese, crust, and topping.”
If that was true, this really was a bizarre phenomenon. Or rather, it was like something out of a fairy tale. It seemed like tales of boxes or bags that produced an infinite supply of stuff appeared frequently around the world. I could swear I’d heard stories like that somewhere before. But the pizza aspect had a strangely modern edge that detracted from the fairy tale vibe.
“Although merely conjecture, it is believed The Never-Ending Pizza Box could create a near infinite supply of pizza. It is a miraculous item that could save countries suffering from food shortages. But even though test results deemed it Safe, its classification as an SCP object prevents us from being able to take it to the outside world,” Iris said with a dry smile, her eyes looking off into the distance.
“After all, the Foundation’s goal is strictly to Secure, Contain, and Protect. They don’t care if it’s something wondrous that could help better mankind. As a rule of thumb, it will stay locked up forever under their close observation, never getting to see the light of day. The Foundation owns you until the day you—” she suddenly cut herself off and blatantly changed the topic. “So that’s the type of pizza it makes for you, huh? I can see you’re a seafood lover! May I have a bite?”
Having already gobbled up her own pizza, Iris was going after mine. Jeez, she didn’t need to steal my food. Wasn’t this thing supposed to spit out an infinite quantity of pizza? Why not just pop the lid again?
“Hee hee! Well, actually, it seems this thing isn’t horribly flexible. When it does its thing, it always makes a whole new pizza! I don’t have enough room to eat that much,” she said sadly.
Feeling a bit bad for her, I gave her just one slice of my pizza. Beaming with happiness, she gobbled it down.
“Huh, so this is your favorite type of pizza… One of the interesting features about this box is that it appears to possess a form of telepathy. It uses that ability to ensure it creates the perfect pizza for its holder.” Iris spoke cheerfully, but then her face suddenly twisted into a frown. “That darn Dr. Bright—uh, there’s a person by that name, someone you might even call a mad scientist—he experimented on SCP-458 by having a bunch of people and sentient SCP objects pop it open just for the fun of it. Supposedly, he was curious to see what he could learn from tracking what kinds of pizza would appear.”
Dr. Bright… When she mentioned his name, her expression changed entirely. It was a meaningful scowl, seething with hatred—but at the same time, etched with understated terror.
“As a result of those tests, we’ve found that the box cannot produce toppings indigestible to humans. So these are, overall, perfect pizzas—safe to eat, delicious, and healthy! But since pizza is high in calories, be careful not to pig out on them.”
Apparently, she was inclined to bring things to an end, now that we were done eating. Iris stood up. She wiped her mouth with the paper napkin and shot me a smile.
“At any rate, the world is full of strange things—SCP objects—like this. We have quite a few here in this facility,” she said.
I got the feeling that the pizza box was no accident. Iris had brought me in contact with an SCP object that would serve as a concrete example to support her explanation of the basics. Ever since we first met, she’d been nothing but nice to me. It was surprising, honestly, for her to be so nice. We weren’t family or anything. I was a complete stranger. Someone she’d just met.
…Why was she going out of her way for me?
I received my answer sooner than I expected.
“By the way, I mentioned that I am referred to as SCP-105 earlier, didn’t I? I am also contained in this facility as an SCP object, since I have a somewhat special ability.” So said that perfectly ordinary-looking foreign girl, self-deprecatingly, standing there with her hands on her chest.
Then she pointed at me. “The Foundation has decided to call you SCP-105-C. As you can probably tell from the name, they believe you are either an accessory or somehow related to me as SCP-105,” the Girl in the Photos said cryptically. “We aren’t just strangers.”