Item #: SCP-2981
Object Class: Safe
Laconic Containment Procedures: Keep it in a freezer. Put fresh mashed potatoes next to it every few days. Replace the container every 4 days. No one is allowed to take it with them.
Laconic Description: SCP-2981 is a big bowl of mashed potatoes which makes one person at a time think it's another person. If someone else is near it, they will only see a bowl of mashed potatoes. At some point, they will see it as another person and the first person will see it as a bowl of mashed potatoes. Sometimes more than one person will see SCP-2981 as a person, but this has never happened in more than 3 people at a time.
Putting SCP-2981 one to three meters near normal mashed potatoes causes the normal mashed potatoes to become more of SCP-2981. This only happens with mashed potatoes; all other types of potatoes, cooked or uncooked, are fine.
Laconic Discovery: SCP-2981 was found at a university where someone was putting up missing persons flyers for a person named "Alan". A professor was found to have put them up and said they had no idea who "Alan" was. Several days later, they called police saying they found Alan's "remains" and directed them to a bowl of mashed potatoes.
The police and security guards didn't understand, and one security guard offered to take SCP-2981 home with them. It is unknown what happened until around 7pm when a student in the cafeteria yelled at another student then stole their bowl of mashed potatoes and ran away.
Around 3 in the morning, the student rushed to the clinic with SCP-2981 claiming they were bleeding profusely. The student became belligerent as they took the mashed potatoes away from her. A nurse took the mashed potatoes next and brought them to a patient, thinking they were a visitor for the patient.
Around 2 in the afternoon, police were called as a patient claimed SCP-2981 was spying on them. Officers identified the mashed potatoes as [REDACTED] and placed them under arrest. The Foundation was alerted after an Officer Jackson suddenly saw SCP-2981 as a relative suffering from cancer named "Jean" and got into a fistfight with another officer. They then took the mashed potatoes and ran. At some point they fainted and dropped the mashed potatoes. The Foundation scooped up the mashed potatoes and contained it.
The Foundation took Officer Jackson in for questioning, not initially realizing the mashed potatoes were anomalous.
Transcript of interview between Dr. Marlowe and Officer Jackson.
<Log starts at 9:04pm, 15 minutes in>
Dr. Marlowe: How long before you realized they arrested "Jean"?
Jackson: Right away. She was bloody but alive. I said get her to a hospital. They said it was not Jean but a bowl of potato salad. Everyone started yelling.
Dr. Marlowe: Then what?
Jackson: Officer ███ put their fingers in her mouth so I shoved him and we fought.
Dr. Marlowe: Who else fought?
Jackson: Just us
Dr. Marlowe: Then what?
Jackson: We stopped. I picked up Jean and ran off. Then you all picked us up.
Dr. Marlowe: This is her here?
Jackson: Yes [Officer Jackson puts his hand in the potatoes]
Dr. Marlowe: Why do you think they arrested Jean?
Jackson: I don't know. She's been on medication, maybe she was in a fugue state.
Dr. Marlowe: What about Officer ███?
Jackson: He freaked out at me and I was legitimately scared.
Dr. Marlowe: Did he threaten her?
Jackson: Who?
Dr. Marlowe: Jean.
Jackson: No, he threatened me. Am I in trouble?
Dr. Marlowe: No. Anything else Dr. Watts?
Jackson: Who?
Dr. Marlowe: Dr. Watts here.
Jackson: The mashed potatoes?
Dr. Marlowe: What potatoes?
Jackson: I came in with these mashed potatoes.
Dr. Marlowe: [Long pause] Uh oh.