Right, it's been a while. Hope you like this… even if it ain't about the end of the world. ❤
Big thanks to the SCP-ES people and Mortos, whom have reviewed the original, unposted Spanish draft and the current one, respectively.
Right, it's been a while. Hope you like this… even if it ain't about the end of the world. ❤
Big thanks to the SCP-ES people and Mortos, whom have reviewed the original, unposted Spanish draft and the current one, respectively.
This is lovely. I have a feeling this one will get shared a lot around Valentine's day—dark implications notwithstanding.
Really liked this one. But shouldn't
a fear to be separated from their couple.
be 'separated from their partner'?
Without a doubt, this is the most wholesome SCP to ever exist, and potentially the greatest foil against the ultra-nihilistic monstrous things like the Heart of Darkness commonly found in the SCP universe.
❤ But I hope it isn't the most wholesome one… I mean, we're nearing the five thousand skips. I really hope it gets better than "my feet don't touch the ground cause we really like each other."
… then again.
Although, I do have one question. If this is just a thing that happens, how was the Foundation even able to contain it originally? As far as I can tell, humans have been in affectionate relationships for as long as as they've been around. In contrast, the Foundation has been around for a couple hundred years. Why would the Foundation even think it's anomalous in the first place, if it happened all the time before they became active? It'd be like the Foundation capturing everyone who ever had a stroke.
Well, this phenomenon has been happening for a very long time, but it defies conventional scientific models of physics and natural law. It stands to reason that the Foundation chose to enact its containment to avoid the worst consequences of information breaches.
Also, here is a quote from Sunless Sea that sums up what I assume are the Foundation's feelings as it tries to contain something like this or, indeed, anything in a fundamentally deranged universe:
To record the Republic's events - it's like trying to sing wax or believe water. You do what you can. The third paragraph buds eyes. The date is fundamentally wrong. The full-stops bite. You do what you can.
I upvoted for the warm fuzzies this gave me, but it definitely does break my suspension of disbelief a little. With all the pda in the world this would be publicly visible and on YouTube constantly. Plus less than 9000 observed cases and an average of 3 per human doesn’t really jive. That’s 21 billion from the current crop of humans, at least half of which will have occurred already. You should make this a much rarer occurrence in order to make the math and containment more believable.
Take into consideration that most cases have occurred in relatively secluded (intimate) environments. Then, consider than a proportion of these cases simply kiss for a short time and ascend at a very slow speed, if they ascend at all. A major number of them are never seen to levitate. The samples in studied populations are closely screened and every case, including the ones that are discreet, are detected by Foundation personnel; the rest are mostly not detected by anybody.
But your points are well-made. I'll rethink the numbers. Thanks for your feedback, Erasmus. ❤
The concept here is nice, but the execution overplays the impact and notability, IMO. The quotebox in the containment procedures is formatted in a way that just doesn't do the tone any favors; why have a first-person note in the containment procedures when the information could be conveyed with "In accordance with the O5 Council's standing executive order, [information]" in a standard manner?
The note at the end doesn't do much for me either, and two Serious Announcement Notes From Higher-Ups in one article just left me wondering if I was missing something about how impactful or threatening this anomaly is. Unless (in reading it twice) I'm missing a key element here, I can't figure out if that end note is directed toward the personnel involved in the 85 documented occasions, or all personnel. It says "to all concerned Foundation personnel", which makes me think it's going to affected persons only, but then it talks about those affected people as if they are a different group than the recipient of the message. I can't see the Foundation allowing a message that calls attention to a specific anomaly to be sent to all personnel simply because several dozen people in an organization with thousands of employees were affected. Not when the concern is just that these people think they missed out on true love. That sounds like a personal problem that employees' individual counselors and psychs would deal with.
And yes, most of those eighty-five affected people became aware of SCP-3479 before they joined
If there were 85 cases of two people kissing, then it's 170 people.
Overall, I don't mind the concept at all but because of the execution I'm novoting.
formatted in a way that just doesn't do the tone any favors
It was a stylistic choice, but it may be changed with little consequence. I'll mull it over.
how impactful or threatening this anomaly is
There are millions of cases annually, the Foundation may very well be about to fail in its containment due to the advent of the Smartphone Age and it is not actually threatening. It's just about to become commonplace knowledge.
The note at the end is a reminder; no matter what your feelings are about the anomaly, it is still an anomaly, and you can ask and wonder but as a scientist you should not (you cannot) lose yourself to the question. It'll bring you nothing but distractions.
several dozen people in an organization with thousands of employees were affected
Thousands of employees didn't know whether they had been amnestized or not to shelter them from the anomaly. This note became necessary when literal hundreds of them asked about it, knowing that procedure and common sense should prevent them from actually getting an answer from the higher-ups; but there is something to be said about that sour discontent that comes from people who don't feel satisfied or fear they have lost a chance and think it over and over. I can see Foundation personnel obsessing over that.
If there were 85 cases of two people kissing, then it's 170 people.
A few of these people kissed each other. Most kissed people that were not hired by the Foundation.
You raise valid points. I'll think about all of them. Thanks, Cyan! :3
This is a very original and interesting concept for an SCP, not for what it is, but for the way people might react to learning about it. Really interesting angle. +1.
Hmm. I like the anomaly and the simplicity of the premise, but I agree with the statement above that the execution kind of limits the enjoyment of the article. It does feel very professional, but that might not do it many favors for flash fiction. The bits about percentages and all the footnotes kind of make the piece dryer and the anomaly more difficult to visualize. Maybe it would work better if there were some logs giving examples of the manifestation and the reaction of those affected, so there's more focus on the anomaly rather than the minutiae detail?
I mean, still a +1 from me because it's short(er) and sweet, but it did feel pretty dry at parts.