 Item Number – SCP-165 Object Class – Keter Special Containment Procedures – Housed in a facility at armed biocontainment area 14, SCP-165 is to be treated as a contagious pathological organism. The highest sterilization and quarantine procedures are to be followed. Five field generators around SCP-165's area are in place to restrict movement of its dune within its containment area. Once every nine days, SCP-165 is fed live cattle, weighing at least 750 kilograms. Description – The organic component of SCP-165 resembles that of typical parasitic mites, 750 micrometers in length, with eight legs, and a genetic structure similar to the house dust mite. The main difference is the hermit crab-like behavior of attaching grains of sand to its back. It is unknown what purpose the sand serves, but the massive colony of SCP-165 numbers into hundreds of billions, to possibly trillions, creating a rather large dune. The similarities between Data Expunged and SCP-165 are only superficial. Data Expunged's colony is protozoan in nature, and apparently shows a collective intelligence and awareness that is not understood. SCP-165's colony is made up of individual acari who don't show cooperation, but rather competition in the hunt for food. Like mosquitoes, they rely on chemical detection of carbon dioxide and sugars in the air to detect prey. The acari mites roll and bound over one another toward prey, only using their legs to climb over one another. When in contact with the flesh of animals, they release a numbing chemical toxin in their bite, similar in makeup to that of mosquito and flea bite toxins. Subjects are typically unaware that millions of mites are taking turns at grabbing mouthfuls of its flesh as they swarm around their victim. A typical swarm resembles a swirling vortex around a victim or victim's appendage. The SCP-165 colony is efficient enough in their competitive swarming that most animals appendages can be defleshed and reduced to bone within minutes. The numbing toxin is so effective that sleeping victims may not wake up as their limbs are being eaten away. The acari mites are resistant to all but the most dangerous of pesticides. They retreat from heat and will often seek shade when available, being the most active during the night, hunting for large sleeping prey. Their vulnerability to heat is the most preferable technique for containment. Addendum Acquisition It is apparent that the US government has been aware of dunes of SCP-165 for some 80 years. The area where SCP-165 was found is a now forgotten German immigrant ghost town of Fredericksburg, Arizona, in the tool desert near the Goldwater Air Force bombing range. The remote town of Fredericksburg was founded sometime in the late 1800s and by 1908 had become a ghost town. A passing cavalry troop reported that the inhabitants had disappeared and that the buildings were empty. They attempted to stay one night in the abandoned hotel, only to have seven of their horses reduced to piles of bone. All but four of the soldiers fled in the middle of the night, saying that sand was filling the building like a flood of water. Those four were never seen again. During the late 1950s, the US military attempted to exterminate SCP-165 by turning the area into a bombing range. It was successful in reducing the numbers of SCP-165, but in the late 1980s it became apparent that a ground cleanup and extraction was needed to remove the presence of SCP-165. Mobile Task Force Epsilon-9, aka fire eaters, were dispatched for containment and extraction of SCP-165. Upon entering the town of Fredericksburg, an upturned sign was found, reading, Beware the creeping hungry sands. The flame accelerators of MTF Epsilon-9 proved highly successful in glassing the sand of SCP-165 and reducing its number to a manageable size. A living dune of nearly four metric tons of SCP-165 was contained and transported to ABC Area-14, where it is monitored and contained. Lesson complete. If you missed the previous orientation, go watch SCP-164, Squid Tumors, right now. Or for the complete course, watch this playlist.