SCP-185 is an old Russian military radio with a keypad and an LCD screen attached to it. Even before anyone uses the keypad, it can pick up encrypted transmissions, and nobody h…

SCP-185 is an old Russian military radio with a keypad and an LCD screen attached to it. Even before anyone uses the keypad, it can pick up encrypted transmissions, and nobody has worked out how it gets through the encryption. It also has much better range than a radio like this should have. The keypad lets someone enter a year and listen to transmissions from that period, provided something was being broadcast on the frequency. They discover that by entering 1939 and hearing Neville Chamberlain announce that Britain is at war with Germany. So there's this old piece of military equipment that can apparently pull broadcasts out of the past. The inside of the radio looks ordinary. The added keypad is sealed inside an unidentified metal box that they can't cut open or take apart. That leaves them able to use the thing without really understanding what they're asking it to do. Entering future years is still being discussed because of the possible consequences of getting information before it exists. Then someone sets the year to -13.73 billion, trying to reach the period when the universe began. The sound is so powerful that their equipment can't measure it. Everyone within 200 meters dies from lung damage. People farther away survive and report a rumbling sound. Part of the site needs repairs, and another SCP is left inoperable. The file doesn't establish exactly what the radio received, only what happened when they tried. The radio itself survives. It stops working because its battery pack has failed, and replacing the batteries gets it running again. Even while the radio is down, the LCD screen stays lit. After all of that, the file still has a warning about employees using it to listen to music at work. A task force also gets permission to use it to intercept communications. They have something they barely understand, with a test that killed everyone nearby, and there are still perfectly ordinary reasons people want to switch it on. https://t.co/MJiBE7NDIr