Prelude
Ref.: U-0055 • Cat.: ε0/—
Containment protocol: U-0055 is kept in building 67, vault 3011A at the UO Primary Archive Facility at Black River. This containment unit is a 5.00 × 5.00 × 2.50m cuboidal room clad in layers of cement and electromagnetic interference shielding. Security personnel are not to be posted outside U-0055’s containment unit.
Description: U-0055 is a “self-keeping secret” or “antimeme.” Information about U-0055’s physical appearance as well as its nature, behavior, and origins is self-classifying. To clarify:
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How the Organization originally acquired U-0055 is unknown.
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U-0055’s physical appearance is unknown. It is not indescribable, nor invisible; individuals are perfectly capable of entering U-0055’s containment unit and observing it, taking mental or written notes, making sketches, taking photographs, and even making audio/video recordings. An extensive log of such observations is on file. However, information about U-0055’s physical appearance “leaks” out of a human mind soon after such an observation. Individuals tasked with describing U-0055 afterward find their minds wandering and lose interest in the task; individuals tasked with sketching a copy of a photograph of U-0055 are unable to remember what the photograph looks like, as are researchers overseeing these tests. Security personnel who have observed U-0055 via closed-circuit television cameras emerge after a full shift exhausted and effectively amnesiac about the events of the previous hours.
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Who authorized the construction of U-0055’s containment unit, why it was constructed in this way, and what the purpose of the described containment protocol may be are all unknown.
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Despite U-0055’s containment unit being easily accessible, personnel at Black River uniformly claim no knowledge of U-0055’s existence when challenged.
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███ ███ U-0055.
All of these facts are periodically rediscovered, usually by chance readers of this file, causing considerable alarm. This state of concern lasts minutes at most, before the matter is simply forgotten about.
A great deal of scientific data has been recorded from U-0055, but cannot be studied. U-0055 may present a major physical threat and indeed may have killed hundreds of personnel, and we would not know it. Certainly, it presents a major memetic/mental threat, hence its (tentative) ε categorization.
At least two attempts have been made to destroy U-0055, or possibly to move it from containment at Black River to another UO Archive Facility, meeting failure for reasons unknown.
Addendum, 2008-11-10: It is hypothesized that U-0055 was never formally acquired by the Organization and is in fact an autonomous or remotely controlled agent, inserted at Black River by an unidentified third party for the purpose of silently observing or interfering with other Unknowns, the Organization itself, or ███ ████████████ ████████.
No action to counter this potential threat is suggested, or indeed theoretically possible.
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- Free Epilogue May 23, 2026 33
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MANGA DISCUSSION