Oculus

Entity 458: "Oculus"

Entity 458 is the 458^th discovered entity in the Backrooms. Entity 458 is notorious for giving the Backrooms its famously horrifying atmosphere, as seeing clusters of eyes upon any surface is not especially pleasant.

Description

Entity 458, better known as Oculus, is a non-hostile, apparently hive-mind-like intelligence that manifests throughout the Backrooms. It takes the form of a singular eye (or occasionally cluster thereof) that can be seen on top of surfaces in the Backrooms. For instance, Entity 458 may manifest in Level 1, whereupon one may observe an eye first forming, then opening with the eyelids taking the appearance of the material of the surface it has manifested upon, in this case probably concrete. While it may at first seem apparent that the manifested eye is the true form of the entity, this is not the case. As it happens, Entity 458 is similar to a hive-mind, or decentralized intelligence. This entity simply observes events in the Backrooms with the eyes, while its true form remains in an unknown space. Entity 458 may have more than one manifestation of itself at any given time.

A photo of a level with an infestation of Entity 458. Apparently, the entity has taken a particular interest in this location.

It appears that through rudimentary, universal sign language, it is possible to communicate with Entity 458. Alternatively, one may use any written language, which the entity can apparently understand, answering questions with binary answer structures through sequences of blinking. It is also possible to communicate with Morse code, whether in its universal form or a form based around a language.

It is important to know the identifying features of Entity 458, especially when one is in a darker area, and visibility is poor. Understanding whether the "eyes in the dark" happen to be a Smiler, a specimen of Sanguine Festivus, or some yet unknown horror is obviously very important for any wanderer's survival. While a Smiler's eyes naturally glow, the eyes of Entity 458 are not bioluminescent. This is an important distinction. While Entity 458's eyes have biology exceedingly similar to a human eye, Smilers are, essentially, supernatural beings. With them, biology ceases to matter. And of course, humans infected with Sanguine Festivus move about quite erratically. Entity 458 does not move.

Behaviors

As mentioned before, Entity 458 is non-hostile, and its primary objective seems to be to observe events and people throughout the Backrooms with a passive, serene curiosity. It has said to have a principle of non-interference, that is, to simply observe and learn as much as possible without changing anything itself. For instance, it will not give a wanderer information about a level or information that would help a wanderer survive.

Although Entity 458 can choose where to manifest, it has said that it does not choose where it manifests for a reason. It is, most often, a random choice. It is a unique case in that being able to communicate with Entity 458 makes for a relatively easy method of learning more about the entity. It seems that the entity is quite happy to answer any questions, and it seems to be devoid of impatience. It should be noted that asking about the entity's history in the Backrooms or its origins will be met with "silence".

Examinations by professional psychiatrists have not revealed anything particularly remarkable about the entity's basic psyche, only that it seems to have a basic human-ish psychology. Due to this, there has been speculation that Entity 458 was once somehow human (there have been examples of this in other entities), though, this has been met with a reasonable amount of skepticism.

Entity 458 has expressed an apparent hatred for Level 6.5.

Language Patterns of Entity 458

While Entity 458 is incapable of expressing itself in a verbal language, with the use of Morse code, the entity may craft complex sentence structures to communicate with M.E.G. researchers. This has revealed many things about the psychology and possible origins of the entity. A list of findings is provided below.

• Entity 458 will respond to questions and "speak" in a dry, verbose tone, with a heavy prose. This suggests that the entity is fairly intelligent, able to comprehend metaphors and complex language usage.
• Occasionally, Entity 458 will utter a phrase or word that is used as slang in certain regions, alluding to its extensive knowledge of the language being used.
• As mentioned before, Entity 458 comprehends and fluently uses any language it is confronted with. Knowing this, a pair of M.E.G. scientists created a language with a small vocabulary and communicated with the entity in the newly-created language. The entity responded perfectly.
• When confronted with a written language, Entity 458 has apparent limits on the legibility of what it can read. With sufficiently sloppy handwriting, the entity will not be able to read what is written.
• It seems that Entity 458's knowledge of a language does not extend to words tied to concepts unrelated to the language itself. For instance, when asked to define the word, "calculus", the entity replied with "I apologize, but I do not know what that means."
• When questioned about its origins, Entity 458 refused to respond.

Biology

Unlike most entities in the Backrooms, Entity 458 is an almost purely biological being, in that it has very few supernatural characteristics. The entity's biology is exceedingly similar to a human eye, in fact almost identical. The pupil, lens, iris, and cornea are all present and in their correct places. Strangely, blood vessels are absent, although this is not surprising as they wouldn't have a body to connect to. The optic nerves, while present, seemingly do not connect to anything, instead being directly cut off at the back of the eye. It it theorized that there may be small interdimensional rifts allowing for the connection of nerves from the manifestations to the entity's true form. The color of the pupil varies wildly from eye to eye, with colors present that would not normally be possible for humans.

On a more detailed note, it is evident that Entity 458's manifestations are indeed comprised of human cells, with identical cell membranes, organelles, and mitochondria. ATP is present in the mitochondria, although the source of it is unknown. As the entity has no physically feasible way to receive blood, oxygen, or the biological necessities for cellular life, it instead receives these things from seemingly nowhere, with ATP, enzymes, cellular mass, and oxygen all simply appearing. Biologists and physicists alike have found this most peculiar.

Detailed analysis of the entity's genome reveals two copies of twenty-three chromosomes, exactly the same as a human's. The genetic sequences have been analyzed, and, apart from some obvious differences, most of the gene markers tested are identical. This does support the theory that Entity 458 was indeed once a human.

The visual range of Entity 458 has been confirmed to span across all wavelengths of electromagnetic radiation, including infrared, ultraviolet, gamma rays, X-rays, and radio waves. The latter means that Entity 458 can intercept and decode radio transmissions in real time. This demonstrates a surprising amount of computational intelligence unseen in any other entity in the Backrooms.

Discovery

While first officially encountered in an expedition into Level 4 in 1991, Entity 458 has been alluded to and implicated in several documents as far back as 1937.

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The following is a journal entry written by C. M. Kasey, documenting the 1991 expedition of Level 4.

It was not a difficult journey, per se, but even this safe haven did not do kindly to my mental state. Paranoia was a frequent nuisance. I, along with the rest of my team, began to see numerous clusters of blinking Eyes, on surfaces in our peripheral vision. These collective hallucinations were enough to drive any man insane, until we learned they were not in fact hallucinations, but new specimens of a yet to be discovered entity within the Realm of Nightmares^[1]. It beared great resemblance to certain horrors from the mind of H. P. Lovecraft, and of course this was not surprising. Like everything else, the Eyes gradually faded into the background.

It was not until much, much later that, for the amusement of his overly anxious comrades, one of my team decided to attempt to communicate with the entity. To our greatest surprise, his sign language was apparently coherent for the entity, and, when asked a question, it blinked twice, to signal "ja". After much more experimentation, it was clear that this creature, whatever it was, was well-versed and fluent in the German language, and could answer sensibly to any question asked of it. This was our first contact with the creature now known as Entity 458.

^[1]

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Author: ParallaxAstro