SCP-198: Cup of Joe

SCP-198: Cup of Joe SCP-198 can look like a coffee mug, a water bottle, a soda can, or another ordinary drink container. It has changed appearance dozens of times, and whatever form it takes appears to contain the drink you'd expect. The current file describes a white mug with blue stripes. Picking it up is enough to get trapped. Touching it with a finger doesn't trigger the effect. Gripping it does. Within two to five seconds, it painfully bonds to the person's hand, or both hands if they're holding it that way. Gloves don't protect them. The bond appears to happen at the molecular level, and attempts to remove fingers or the hand fail because wounds below the wrist heal immediately. The researchers haven't established how far up the arm that effect extends. Whatever drink was inside disappears. The container fills itself with human bodily fluids or waste instead. The substance varies between victims, including blood, saliva, mucus, urine, feces, and mixtures. Pouring it away doesn't help because it keeps refilling. At the same time, the person begins rapidly dehydrating or wasting away. Ordinary food, water, and intravenous nutrients can't slow it down. The only nourishment that works comes from consuming the container's contents, and even that doesn't stop the ongoing loss. Staying alive means drinking from it almost constantly. People who don't generally die within twenty-four hours. The longest recorded survival is seventy hours, ending when exhaustion or refusal makes continuing impossible. The Foundation found it after construction workers uncovered a bunker in Germany. There were severely emaciated bodies inside, some recent and some much older. The first responding agent secured the location, then picked up what looked like an unopened bottle of water while waiting for backup. He became another victim before the Foundation understood what it was dealing with. When a victim dies, the bond finally releases. In roughly three-quarters of the tests, the object then vanishes and reappears in a new form, usually on a nearby table or shelf. Sometimes it reaches another room. That already makes recovering it dangerous, but the later incidents establish an even bigger problem: it can leave containment without somebody dying first. A researcher reached for his iced tea and found himself holding SCP-198 after at least three months without testing. A security guard later encountered it disguised as dairy creamer in a break-room refrigerator three floors below its containment room and two hallways away. The locked case was empty in both incidents. Nobody had deliberately taken it out for an experiment. That is why its case sits on a digital scale with an alarm and backup power. If the weight changes, the facility locks down and everyone is ordered to avoid drink containers and evacuate until it's found. Staff are also told not to bring beverages or containers within a hundred meters of its room. Recognizing the striped mug isn't enough when the next person could find it in the refrigerator, looking like something they use every day. Original Entry: https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/scp-198