Like Area-13 for reality benders and Site-17 for humanoid anomalies, Site-33 was a sanctuary for memetic threats.
But why were Luoshu's memories of it so vague?
The answer was simple: Because these were memes.
Memes were insidious. Knowing of their existence often meant you were already infected—a victim and vector in one. Take the text-message meme "God" had used against Luoshu: unavoidable, undefendable.
It made sense, then, that Site-33's contents remained a mystery even to him. Had he known too much earlier, he'd have been dead long before gaining his current strength.
The Lobotomy Ward
That night, Luoshu infiltrated Site-33—and immediately noticed something off.
The atmosphere was wrong.
The staff moved with zombielike detachment, their faces eerily blank. Compared to them, the wax figures at Madame Tussauds felt more alive.
Luoshu knew the cause: Frontal lobotomies.
Popularized in the 1930s–50s as a "cure" for mental illness, the procedure involved drilling into the skull and severing prefrontal lobe connections. Post-op patients became docile, emotionless—perfect for handling memetic hazards without spreading them.
By the 1950s, studies proved lobotomies ineffective and inhumane:
⅓ of patients unchanged.
⅓ worsened.
Only ⅓ showed any "improvement."
Yet the Foundation still used them here.
"Of course 'God' would approve this," Luoshu thought. "Typical meme-side brutality."
The Analog Fortress
Luoshu's usual tactic—converting the site's AI into an ally—failed. Site-33 had no AI, just air-gapped servers.
Data transfers required manual vetting to ensure no memetic contamination. A wise precaution: an infected AI would be catastrophic.
Forced to improvise, Luoshu used Silicon-Based Intelligence to animate the servers directly. The result was dumber than an AI—just a data dump of all files, no analysis.
(He could've made it smarter, but risking a memetic leak wasn't worth it.)
Thirty minutes later, he had the archives:
Notable Memetic Anomalies:
Anomalous Item-013: "Blue Lady Cigarettes"
Anomalous Item-701: "The Hanged King's Tragedy"
Anomalous Item-1026: "Someone You Know"
Strangely, W-Class mnestics should've preserved these memories—yet he recalled none. Clearly, the Anomaly Index was protecting him.
No matter. He'd study the files now.
The Hanged King's Curse
Reading the documents was a psychological warzone. Even text descriptions triggered memetic assaults:
AI-701: "The Hanged King's Tragedy"
A Caroline-era revenge play (1625–1649) published by "William Cooke"—a name suspiciously close to Shakespeare's (d. 1616).
Effect: Viewers/performers succumb to psychosis and die by suicide.
Containment: Banning performances failed. The script compels stagings, now spreading online.
Just reading the script gave Luoshu the urge to act a role. Only his fortified psyche resisted.
Next Steps
Memetic Vaccination: Luoshu would record these memes into the Anomaly Index—turning the enemy's weapons against "God."
Site-67: After mastering Site-33's threats, he'd move to Yorkshire's Site-67.
But first, he reclaimed Workaholic's Coffee from the labs.
As dawn approached, Luoshu left Site-33, documents in tow. The memetic war had just escalated—and he was arming himself for the counterattack.