SCP-4666 - The Yule Man

It's the holiday season. Outside, it's cold and there's snow blanketing the ground. But inside, you're warm, and gathered around the light of a roaring fireplace and a glowing Christmas tree. This is what Christmas is all about – warmth, joy, and togetherness. But just because you're comfortable doesn't mean you're safe.

You were so busy opening presents and stuffing yourself at dinner that you didn't notice the face pressed up against the window. That long, gaunt face, with the staring eyes, the wide mouth full of yellow teeth, and the scraggly, white beard. You don't know it yet, but within a few days, you'll be dead.

You might be able to avert this horrible fate, if only you knew what exactly you were dealing with: SCP – 4666, also known as The Yule Man. A Keter-Class Christmas monster so violent, sadistic, and terrifying, he makes Krampus look like jolly Saint Nick. And this year, just like every other, he's planning on being very, very naughty.

The SCP Foundation began cataloguing the Yule Man in 1974 after a string of violent and eerily similar home invasions during the holiday season, but they have reason to believe that this entity has been around for a whole lot longer. Over 2000 years in fact.

Stories that describe what look to be Yule Man massacres date as far back as the First Century BC in Scandinavia, and there have been reports of similar clusters of events happening around the same time every year since.

This monster is prolific, and may have one of the highest body counts of any creature under observation by the Foundation. The Yule Man's trail of destruction became clearer in the eighteenth century, as accounts of the carnage it leaves became more detailed.

Later still, authorities even managed to find physical evidence like the Yule Man's fingerprints – which are similar to human fingerprints, but display a distinct double-whorl pattern not seen in human fingerprints.

Much about the anomalous nature of the Yule Man is still unknown though, and the Foundation has yet to discover an effective way to contain it. Their only hope is intercepting it before it can get its long, gnarled fingers on its intended prey.

Maybe you're feeling worried, or that you're being watched. You have a good reason to be afraid, because during his yearly active period – the twelve days between December 21st and January 2nd – he's always searching for prey.

Nowhere is safe, because while it was initially believed that he only appeared to those who lived north of 40 degrees latitude, it's now believed that much like Santa Claus, the Yule Man operates worldwide. Anyone could be in his sights right now, blissfully unaware of the nightmare coming down the tracks towards them. Thankfully, the SCP Foundation, through analysis of these attacks which are known as Weissnacht Events, they've been able to find certain patterns.

But first, what does the creature known as The Yule Man even look like? Much like SCP – 096, the Yule Man is a long and lanky humanoid standing about two meters tall, who resembles an emaciated human of European descent, and never wears any clothes or other coverings despite the frigid temperatures he operates in.

You might be sad if you're spending Christmas alone, but it at least guarantees you safety from the Yule Man, as he only appears at the homes of families with a child under the age of eight present.

He also seems to favor isolated and rural locations, and Weissnacht Events only occur when there's a healthy covering of snow on the ground during the event – hence the name which means "White Night" in English. It's also vital that you recognize the three distinct stages of a Weissnacht Event, too, or you won't be seeing much of the New Year.

The first stage occurs during the space of a week. Children in the home might start to seem worried or afraid. They might tell you that they see something strange in the distance. The figure of a man they don't recognize, standing just far enough away that you can't fully make him out, except that he's really tall.

Of course, you probably won't see anything, and your instinct will be to tell them there's nothing to be afraid of. Even when they tell you, through tears, that there's a man pressing his face up against their bedroom window at night. But they are right to be afraid, and you should be, too.

Already at this point, your only hope is to try and spread the word as soon as possible: Report the incident to the local police, write about it on Facebook, tweet about it. Whatever it takes. The SCP Foundation has operatives trawling the internet and monitoring police reports constantly during this period, especially for reports of mysterious men in the snow watching homes from a distance.

Getting the Foundation's attention is your best hope of stopping this thing. And if you don't? Next comes stage two, taking place between nights eight and eleven of the active period. No longer will the Yule Man just be lurking on the periphery. Now he's getting closer. You'll start to hear strange noises in your attic or on the roof, noises that sound almost like footsteps. That's crazy, you think, it's probably just an animal.

But then, the smell starts. An awful, rotten stench that fills the house, but no matter how hard you look, you can't find the source. Finally, on the last night of December, you tell yourself that you'll take this matter to the police. But of course, it's already too late. The Yule Man is here for the twelfth night. The Weissnacht is finally upon you. At this point, one of two scenarios will happen.

In the first, you and your entire family will be tortured and murdered, except the youngest child, who the Yule Man will kidnap. The SCP Foundation keeps files on a number of notable instances of this kind of Weissnacht, and the details are truly gruesome. Reports of incidents have involved crucifixion, the removal of tongues, burning, dismemberment, post mortem bitemarks, and decapitation.

In all instances though, the entire family was killed except the youngest child, who simply disappeared. The Yule Man is a merciless and sadistic beast. You're now probably wondering: If that's the first of two Weissnacht possibilities, what's the second? In the second, if you're tremendously lucky, you and your family will survive – but that doesn't mean you won't face a grisly experience.

In this scenario, which occurs during about fifteen percent of Weissnacht Events, you'll hear footsteps throughout the night, but thankfully, you wake up alive. And when you do so, there are gifts waiting for you. The problem is, all these gifts are made out of human body parts. For example, in 1976 in Canada, one family received the gift of a ball made from a severed human head wrapped in skin.

In Kazakhstan in 1903, a family received a flute made from a hollowed out human femur. And in the Netherlands in 2003, a family received a wooden hairbrush, covered in human teeth ranging from 400 years old to a mere few days. These gruesome gifts are referred to as SCP – 4666 – A, and it was one of these gifts that gave us the best insight yet available into the true nature of the Yule Man.

Several gifts were dropped off at a family's residence in Hoonah, Alaska, in 2018, but most notable among them was the horrific SCP-4666-A-0960 – a life-sized doll made from a human body, with its eyes removed and mouth sewn shut. Worst of all though, was that the girl was still alive. The family who received this twisted gift was given amnestics by the Foundation, and the living doll was taken for medical treatment.

Before succumbing to her extensive injuries, the girl was able to deliver some insights into what exactly happened to the children who were abducted during Weissnacht Events. The children taken by the Yule Man are forced into a large sack that seems much bigger on the inside than it appears as he makes his rounds, travelling from house to house, murdering and kidnapping.

His victims are taken to a kind of underground grotto and workshop filled with bones, like a twisted Santa's workshop, where they're forced to make toys out of the bodies of their fellow victims. During this time, the Yule Man will continue to torture and torment his victims.

He'll even take some of them away to cook and eat whenever he feels like it. When asked how she was turned into this human doll, the girl told Foundation personnel that her fellow victims were forced to turn her into this by the Yule Man when she became too weak to continue making toys herself.

Her chilling last words were, "When you can't make the toys, you become the toys." So if strange things happen to you and your family between the 21st of December and the 1st of January, don't ignore it. After all, you never know who's watching. But if it is the Yule Man's grinning face pressed up against your window, it may already be too late.