The plague doctors hand gripped down on Michaels shoulder tightly and...he didn’t die?
The plague doctor cocked its head in confusion, but Michael reacted quickly, grabbing the doctor by the beak and grappling him to the ground. The man may be immortal, but he sure as hell wasn’t very strong.
The doctor struggled.
“Why did the cure not settle within you? Why is the pestilence within you growing stronger? You are an abomination, to reject science such as this is blasphemy!” The doctor shouted.
“Will you just shut the fuck up already!” Michael yelled back.
“I simply wish to heal you, how do you not see that!” The doctor screamed, squirming in Michael's grip.
Michael quickly tried to pin the plague doctor to the floor, and it worked well enough.
The two tumbled on the ground, the doctor pulling on Michael's hair and Michael gripping him in a headlock.
Amidst the struggling, the faint sound of the emergency containment door opening could be heard, but it didn’t register to Michael.
Michael was pissed, Alex didn’t deserve to die like that and he sure as hell didn’t.
Their desperate struggle continued as the sounds of footsteps approached and walkie talkie chatter echoed down the corridor, and a dozen men wearing foundation gear and gasmasks rounded the corner.
“MTF, stop moving right now and stay on the ground!” The leading guard ordered.
The plague doctor didn’t respond to their call, still violently grappling with Michael.
It didn’t matter though, because before Michael could even respond a feeling of weightlessness began to overtake him as space folded around both him and the plague doctor he struggled with, and then he was gone.
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Michael reappeared in a break room of the facility, still holding the plague doctor as he struggled in his grip. Several nearby scientists seemed to recognize the doctor and immediately fled the room. One pulling a lever on the wall that set off a siren.
The monster frantically looked around in Michael’s grip, clearly confused over what’s happened to it.
Michael used this opportunity to pin the doctor to the floor, where it proceeded to complain and squirm.
“What manner of sorcery is this? You abomination, you vile being of pestilence, where have you taken me!” The doctor yelled, frantic.
“Just shut up!” Michael yelled, adrenaline still flooding his system from nearly getting killed.
Michael slammed the doctor's face into the tile floor, over and over again. It wasn’t hurting the doctor, but it did make him feel a bit better.
A few minutes later a team of guards arrived in the break room, carrying with them a small squirt bottle which they proceeded to spray on the plague doctor.
Michael sniffed the air.
“Is that lavender”, he asked, perplexed.
The second the liquid hit the doctor he almost immediately stopped resisting, going into a trance of sorts.
One of the guards walked up and put a hand on Michael’s shoulder, “Get off the plague doctor 507, it needs to be taken to a temporary containment cell.”
Michael reluctantly got off the doctor, who was then escorted away, not resisting in the slightest.
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Once the plague doctor was taken away Michael was immediately brought to the showers. According to the guards he both looked and smelled terrible .
Not necessarily an incorrect assessment, but still a bit rude to point out. He was covered in dried blood and strange black liquid from the zombies, the shower was extremely needed.
Once he’d stripped down, he noticed the jade ring still attached to his finger. It didn’t have any intricate designs and had fit itself perfectly to his finger.
“So it stops diseases, huh”, Michael muttered. “Neat.”
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After the shower, Michael was ushered back to his cell where he was given the chance to rest briefly before Dr. Hearthgrieve inevitably barged in.
“First,” Hearthgrieve loudly said as entered the room, causing Michael's eyes to shoot open from where he’d been sleeping. “Michael I must congratulate you on your return to us. I’m told you came back a little worse for wear this time so I’m going to need to know everything about this dimensional shift. The tether brought D-3621 with you, which opens up a lot of doors for you assuming he survived the initial shift, so I’m going to need to know what happened to D-3621 afterwards, as well as why you brought the plague doctor back with you.”
Michael stared at Hearthgrieve. He didn’t feel like doing this right now, he was sore and now that the adrenalin had left his system he just wanted to go back to sleep, but he could see in Hearthgrieve’s eyes that he wasn’t going to leave until he’d told him everything.
Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.
So with a sigh Michael began to retell the events of the shift to Dr. Hearthgrieve, sparing no detail.
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Dr. Heathgrieve stroked his beard in thought and hummed, “You’re incredibly lucky, that ring you scavenged saved your life. It gives immunity to the plague doctors touch, as well as disease, poison and acid. What I’m curious about however is why you're immune to its side effects.”
“You don't know why then?” Michael asked.
“Well, if I had to guess,” Hearthgrieve said, not sounding especially confident. “I’d say your crown is somehow negating the negative effects of the ring. I suspect it could have purposes besides storing your soul. It wouldn’t be the first SCP to have traits we didn’t know about at first glance.”
Michel considered this while Hearthgrieve continued talking.
“Regardless, the 05 council are ecstatic to hear about your ability to take people to other dimensions from a distance.”
Michael turned in interest, “What’s the 05 council?”
“Not important for you to know, but what is important is the deal that they proposed for you.”
Michael leaned forward, listening closely.
“They have agreed to allow you to continue using anomalous items you find during your dimensional shifts, such as your ring, to allow you to more safely explore the various worlds you come across. This is of course under the condition that the anomalous items don't cause any issues for staff and the like.”
Michael raised an eyebrow. That was a lot more generous than he was expecting.
”Alright, now what’s the catch?”
Hearthgrieve smiled, “It’s nothing too crazy. Just that in exchange you’d be required to assist with the disposal of certain SCPs.”
“What, like take them with me during a shift and leave them there?” Michael asked.
“Precisely,” Hearthgrieve answered, clapping his hands together.
Michael stared at him inquisitively, “How dangerous would they be?”
“We wouldn't send anything with you that you couldn’t just walk away from.”
Michael thought it over for a moment.
“Throw in a basic summary of each SCP that your foundation knows about and you have yourself a deal. If I'm going to be running into them I need to know what they're capable of.”
Hearthgrieve stopped to think for a moment and then answered, “I’ll need to talk to the higher ups, but that seems somewhat doable. However some SCP’s will be exempt due to their sensitive nature, and a lot of the information is going to be redacted.”
“Fair enough, now get out. I’m going to bed.”
With that Hearthgrieve turned to leave and as he did Michael stared daggers at his back.
'They didn't even care that Alex died,' Michael thought, anger growing. 'Just that he'd made it through to the other side. What a bunch of scheming amoral little weasels.
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The next morning when Michael woke up he was sore all over.
The plague doctor may have been physically weak, but he'd sure as hell put up a fight.
So Michael spent the next couple days resting and recovering, before diving back into his exercising routine.
It'd been going well, already he could see his gut slowly diminishing in size and his performance on all the workout equipment ever so slowly increasing. He’d recently put in a request for a couple new items and gotten their approval.
1. Zip Ties (Approved)
2. Flash Bangs (Approved)
3. List of SCPs (Semi Approved)
4. Replacement of All Lost Equipment (Approved)
The list of SCP’s had been given to him on a small laptop, with a surprisingly in-depth description of each one. He assumed it was in-depth at least, because he couldn't quite tell when a third of every goddamn page had been blotched out in black ink. Lines and keywords had been marked off, making those sections completely illegible. Several of the ones that had less redactions and he could read however were, quite frankly, disturbing. If knowing was half the battle, then studying them was his top priority.
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Just like this a week passed before Dr. Hearthgrieve showed up in Michael's room once again.
“Congratulations Mr. Stevens, you get to keep your ring, but I have been instructed to bring you to your first assignment before your two week safety window is up. The SCP you will be disposing of is kept in a separate facility, so we’ll need to transport you. Follow me please.”
Michael stood up to leave, grabbing all of his equipment with a slight frown on his face.
'Would it kill them to give me some forewarning,' he thought.
Instead of voicing that thought he asked the obvious, “Which SCP will I be disposing of?”
“Ah, that would be SCP 096, designated as ‘The Shy Guy’,” Hearthgrieve answered in a chipper tone.
Michael stopped walking, he’d read about that one. It had pale white skin, with long bony arms and thin legs. The precarious part of this SCP was that anyone who saw its face would be hunted down and killed by it. It didn't matter where you were or even if you only looked at a picture of it, it knew your exact location from the second you laid eyes on it and would run towards you with the speed of a fighter jet. Breaking through stone, metal and pretty much anything between you and him.
“That one’s pretty dangerous you know, this won’t backfire on me will it?” Michael tried to ask calmly.
“Oh no, you should be fine. We had a D-Class cover its face in a bag, and we’ll be using the same tethering technique as before. Simply bring it to a new dimension, release the tether and walk away. What could go wrong?”
"Ok first, why would you say that, shut up." Michael said. "Second, this right here is a big favor. There are extreme risks to my safety involved. your foundation better not forget about me doing this.”
“Believe me Mr. Stevens, we won’t,” Hearthgrieve answered in a tone that Michael didn't quite like.
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They moved Michael to the back of a secure truck, before locking him inside. Apparently it was the standard procedure when moving a ‘safe’ humanoid SCP. It was bullshit is what it was, they didn’t even give him a seat. A small, barred window connected Michael to the front of the truck, where two foundation guards were driving. That small window was the only source of light he had.
So Michael sat down and pulled out his laptop, intent on making the best out of a bad situation and learning as much about ‘The Shy Guy’ as he could.
Finding a file labeled ‘Termination Attempts’ Michael clicked it. What he found was somewhat grotesque, the foundation seemed to have pitted it against several other SCP’s in the hopes of destroying it, failing every time.
One somewhat interesting occurrence was when they had it fight ‘The Hard to Destroy Reptile'. A giant lizard-like creature that adapted to essentially everything that was thrown at it. The creature was essentially immortal.
The document said that once the giant lizard saw Shy Guy’s face, Shy Guy attacked it for twenty seven continuous hours, tearing out large pieces of the lizard's flesh and shattering its bone, before eventually deciding the lizard was indeed too ‘hard to kill’ and giving up.
That’s when it proceeded to sit down and tear away at its own face in an attempt to hide itself, sobbing the whole time.
Michael popped a piece of strawberry gum in his mouth.
“And I’m going to be tethered to this thing? Yikes.”