Anomaly O-9283
File no. MFA-O.9283-████
Description: The item is an antique, bronze-stamped Victorian door knob. Its rose is emblazoned with a pair of wings carved to appear as if exiting the temples of a man’s head, which forms the doorknob itself. When installed into a door and opened, the doorway will no longer connect to the room beyond, but will instead open into a dark, misty expanse. This expanse plays host to innumerable objects, entities, and phenomena that change each time the door is opened. Some observed phenomena include:
A being seemingly made of darkness and shadow which immediately subsumed the test subject, leaving nothing behind. Entity dissolved upon exiting into the antechamber, upon being exposed to the fluorescent lights.
An unnaturally tall, lanky man with wiry hair and a wide-brimmed hat. Though it did not appear to move, staying within the mist, the test subject was slowly dragged via invisible force toward the man. The door shut of its own accord.
A horde of insects and squirming creatures poured endlessly from within the mist, quickly coating all surfaces within the test chamber, as well as the test subject. Insects faded into mist upon closing the door. The subject was treated for several stings.
A rush of water was forcibly expelled into the chamber, rapidly coming to fill it to bursting. The subject perished in the chamber, and the sublevel was evacuated in the resulting flood. While a Recovery Team was able to shut the door, a single unit was lost when a massive tendril exited the threshold and ensnared him, pulling him out of sight.
An interview with the sole surviving subject would reveal they had possessed lifelong entomophobia, and suffered from recurring nightmares of being buried alive and consumed by insects. Repeat tests with this subject would lead to producing a swarm of biting insects.
—-
Notice from Research Lead Weatherly:
I am hereby calling for an end to human testing of the anomaly. It has been made abundantly clear through our control subject that O-9283 makes real a subject’s fears. That the item itself seems to present a depiction of Hypnos, an ancient sleep deity, is not lost on the research team. We are incredibly lucky to have learned this lesson with so little loss of life. I shudder to think of what could have happened if one of our test subjects had a fear of Armageddon, or of nuclear war.
Truly, the prospect of O-9283 breaching containment through frivolous testing is terrifying. How close were we to catastrophe? I’ve awoken with a start the last several nights haunted by the possibility.
O-9283 will be moved into storage. Given that no man may open the door it is attached to without triggering its effects, I’ve requisitioned an ROV from R&D to perform the task of uninstalling it. I will personally control the ROV from the safety of the Observation Chamber to ensure the mission is a success.
Incident Log:
On ████/08/19, Researcher Weatherly piloted an ROV into the testing chamber holding O-9283. Using the robot to open the door, it swung open to reveal an empty frame, and the ROV worked to begin dismantling the anomaly.
As it worked, surveillance footage shows that a light mist began to pour beneath the doorframe of the Observation Chamber. This goes unnoticed by Weatherly, as his focus is on controlling the ROV. Footage throughout the site depicts a mist beginning to seep through several doorframes on the floor holding O-9283, before affecting the floors above and below.
On the 2nd floor, five researchers can be seen in a door-lined hallway, walking while discussing financial reports.
Suddenly the door they’re passing by bursts open. A massive, skeletal hand reaches from beyond the door, grabbing and taking a researcher along with it. As the remaining four jump back in alarm, the door immediately across from the first opens inward. A large, jelly thing filling the entirety of the doorframe oozes into the hallway, ensnaring the lower half of another researcher; he falls limp as he sinks into the muck as he is dissolved.
All about the site, the situation is the same. Every doorway opens to reveal or let loose a menagerie of beasts and horrors. None can make it out of the site, but a security officer is able to sound the site alarm before perishing.
In the Observation Chamber, Weatherly wheels around at the sound of the alarm. He sees the mist pouring in under the doorway. It opens slowly.
Beyond its frame, there is no dark expanse.
Beyond it is the rest of the site, the blaring of klaxons, and the sound of screams.
[END LOG]
——
Since the establishment of a perimiter, only a single entity was able to breach the Exclusion Zone after engagement with personnel. It was able to reach within .3km of the nearby town of ███████ before suddenly becoming wholly transparent and subsequently demanifesting. Furthermore, an instance captured for study similarly vanished during transport to a nearby site.
While the discovery of a limited area in which entities spawned by O-9283 may exist precludes the anomaly from initiating an apocalyptic scenario, the entities spawned remain unpredictable and continue to be produced endlessly. Plans are currently being made to infiltrate the site and shut the door holding O-9283.
Sources:
S D Locke
