Glossary

The following Glossary provides summary definitions for SCP-related terminology as used in this book.

Broken Masquerade

Organizations like the Foundation, U.I.U., G.O.C., and others work to maintain a veil of normalcy within the world at large in order to prevent widespread knowledge of the anomalous. These normalcy organizations have described the failure to complete this mission as a "broken masquerade" event, and many if not all have contingency plans in place for these sort of situations.

Global Occult Coalition

The Global Occult Coalition (G.O.C.), known to frequenters and assosciates of the Wanderer's Library as 'Bookburners', are a normalcy organization operated as a secretive function of the United Nations. They have at times cooperated alongside the Foundation and other normalcy orgs, and at other times directly clashed with those same groups. The most frequent and defining differentiation of the G.O.C. from the Foundation is in their approach to the anomalous. Where the foundation generally does not 'neutralize' anomalous entities and objects, preferring often to house and research them; the G.O.C. tends to have much more of a "shoot first, ask questions later" attitude. Their penchant for destroying or killing the anomalies they encounter has earned them a number of enemies within the larger fiction of the SCP multiverse.

SCP Foundation

The SCP Foundation is a secretive, non-government organization dedicated to the maintenance of 'the veil'. Their core missions are to Secure and house (Contain) anomalous entities and objects, and Protect the world at large from the dangers and knowledge of the anomalous (thus leading to the source of the SCP initialism, standing for 'Secure, Contain, Protect'). Known by a number of names to various different groups of interest, the Foundation operates in methodical, often clinical ways to further their mission. Stories about the foundation paint pictures of shadowy antiheros, unknown heros saving the world, and beauracratic insanity, as well as so much else. The foundation looks a little bit different in every author's conception of them, but some elements remain more-or-less the same across the board. Secrecy, the O5 governing council, and a penchant for at time questionable ethics tend to be quite common within the landscape of available fiction.

Unusual Incidents Unit

The Unusual Incidents Unit, or U.I.U., are a secretive branch within the FBI, dedicated to the investigation of crimes committed by or involving the paranormal and anomalous. Depictions of the U.I.U. within the SCP 'multiverse' run the gamut from a bunch of bumbling and underfunded, to scrappy and perservering-against-all-odds cops. Occasionally, the U.I.U. may cooperate with groups like the SCP Foundation, the G.O.C., and others in the interest of handling a case, but often operate on their own and often armed with not much more than their own knowledge and cunning. Unlike employees of the Foundation, for instance, agents of the U.I.U. often have an easier time or a degree of begrudging acceptance within anomalous spaces such as Three Portlands or the Wanderer's Library.