Chapter Text
Six was faster than Gregory was, but she couldn’t bring herself to move in front of him as they followed Freddy down the hallways. She had to follow the boys to make sure that they didn't fall behind or get taken. …To make sure that Gregory didn’t lose Mono.
After taking a few turns, they finally walked through some doors and re-emerged back in the huge room again—the atrium. Actually they were right next to the stage. Freddy led the kids up the stairs and onto the platform.
Mono groaned softly from Gregory’s back as he came to again, and Six immediately stepped to his side and his arm in concern, Gregory turning his head towards him.
“You good now, Mono?” The older boy asked.
He nodded in response and slid down to stand on the floor, taking a moment to rub his head. “Yeah. Sorry. I didn’t mean to do that again.”
“It’s not your fault,” Six told him, glaring at the floor. “It’s that rabbit lady. It only happens when she shows up.”
The kids all grimaced in thought.
Freddy glanced between the three, concerned. “So you have all seen her? This rabbit lady?”
“Oh yeah, she’s real,” Gregory confirmed. “I saw her on the cameras chasing Mono and Six before, and in real life too. I’m pretty sure her name is Vanny.”
Freddy blinked at the name. “Vanny… It—“
“Sounds like Vanessa, that one guard lady,” Gregory finished for him. “Yeah, I’m pretty sure it’s her in disguise. I haven’t seen the two of them at the same time, so…”
“That seems wrong,” the bear said warily. “Vanessa is a trusted employee, but…”
He couldn’t defend her more.
“…Well, we can think more on this later,” he continued. “Right now, I need your three’s help. Please, take this.”
Freddy pulled out a small object before handing it to Gregory.
“This is a program disk for the show stage. If you use it in the sound booth on the third floor, you should be able to run a showtime program which will activate the lift. You will need to go there, run the performance program, and come back here.”
“Fine,” Six nodded, already getting ready to leave.
“Wait, Six.”
Six turned back around when Freddy stopped her.
“I… believe that it would be safer if you and Mono stayed by my side.”
“Huh? Why?”
Freddy sighed softly. “You and Mono have both suffered from repeated attacks. You with your hunger, and Mono with his migraines. If that happens again while I am stuck here, I will not be able to help you. Gregory could carry one of you, but what if you both get an attack at the same time? You will both be incapacitated.”
“Inka-what?”
“Unable to move and escape from danger. Please,” Freddy begged. “Let Gregory handle this. Just rest here with me until he gets back.”
Six was stunned for a moment. Then she frowned in irritation. Did he think that they were weak? That Gregory was better than them just because he was older? He had been put in charge, even though he was a bigger target, wasn’t accustomed to using a weapon like Mono, wasn’t fast like Six, and had to wear shoes to keep his feet from hurting.
‘He’s a wimp.’
“No, I’m the fastest,” she argued. “I can get it done quicker than he can.”
“Six, it is too dangerous for you,” Freddy tried to tell her.
That’s it.
“No it’s not!” She declared, loud enough to make her point, but not loud enough to attract unwanted attention. “I’m not weak! I’ve survived worse stuff before! Mono has too! Neither of us are weak! So stop saying that he’s better than us!”
Six snagged the object from Gregory’s hand and ran off the stage towards the back of the atrium and the stairs leading to the second and third floors. She could do this on her own. She wasn’t weak. She refused to be.
“Wait, Six!” Freddy called after the girl.
But she didn’t stop. She just continued her way across the floor. Freddy sighed and put his outstretched and twitching hand down. He wouldn’t be able to stop her in the state he was in now. He hated doing this, but…
He turned towards the elder boy. “Gregory, could you please—?”
“Already on it,” the amber eyed boy replied, now taking off after Six.
Freddy was left with Mono, staring after the other two as they made their way across the atrium in silence. The bear narrowed his eyes in concern. He didn’t have a good feeling about this.
“Six doesn’t like it when people call her weak.”
Freddy faced Mono now, who was staring up at him. Then the boy averted his gaze and turned back towards the atrium.
“I did not call her weak though,” Freddy said.
“It was implied.”
The bear grimaced slightly at the claim. Thinking it over, he did say that it was too dangerous for them to go alone.
“I… suppose so,” he admitted. “But that was not my intent. Do you think that I called you weak?”
Mono shook his head, taking a seat on the floor next to him. “Not really. I know you’re just worried about our attacks. It really is something that could be dangerous.”
Freddy nodded back in understanding. “Do you know why Six may have been offended by what I said?”
Mono shrugged. “I think it’s because you’re kinda right. Six isn’t as strong as me, and I think hearing that out loud made her mad.”
“I see.”
Freddy wondered how Mono knew that he was the stronger out of the two. What had they gone through before today? What had they dealt with?
“I assume that you protected her a lot, then?” The bear asked.
Mono nodded again. “I always had to hit the monsters with a weapon, since Six couldn’t carry something that heavy.”
After a moment, the boy hung his head in shame.
“…But I couldn’t protect her all the time… I… I couldn’t stop her from getting taken a few times…”
Freddy’s eyes softened as he watched the boy hold in his tears. He wanted to place a reassuring hand on his shoulder, but he was glitching too much and he was afraid that he would accidentally hit him instead. So the bear reluctantly stayed where he was.
“But you got her back, right?” He said.
Surely that was the case, since the two were here in the Pizza Plex together.
Another small nod. “I did. But… she still got hurt because I didn’t do more to protect her…”
“Mono, no. Do not blame yourself for the actions others took to hurt her. They are the only ones to blame, not you.”
The boy blinked in surprise, then turned his head up to face Freddy in confusion. That just made Freddy feel more pain in his system. Had he never considered that alternative before?
“The reason Six got hurt was because those people chose to hurt her. If they had decided not to, then none of that would have happened to her, or to you. That, and you are children. Protecting others is not something children are accustomed to. You will make mistakes, but that is to be expected. You are not as accustomed to the world as adults are. Thus, the adults should be the ones protecting you. You shouldn’t have to rely on yourselves.”
Mono tilted his head in confusion, like the idea was completely alien to him. “…But all kids rely on themselves. That’s how they survive. Six and I…”
He trailed off, unable to finish his sentence, and looked away.
Freddy leaned down a bit towards him. “Mono?”
The boy fidgeted with the sleeve of his coat anxiously. “…Kids have to look out for themselves. It’s dangerous to rely on someone else. Six and I… we’re… it’s too risky to travel together, but…”
Mono curled in on himself a bit.
“…But I’m too scared to be alone… I don’t want that… But I put Six in danger too many times… We still work together, a-and I think she likes it that way, but… I think I’m being selfish… dragging her everywhere… What if she doesn’t want that? What if she just pities me? Or what if she feels like she owes me a favor for saving her? I… I don’t want her to feel like she has to stay by my side if she doesn’t want that. …But I still don’t want her to leave me…”
The boy was able to minimize his tears surprisingly well for someone his age, only giving a small sniffle and wiping away a single tear.
Freddy couldn’t help but feel bad for the boy. “Well, has Six said anything or acted in a way that would make you believe that she wants to leave?”
Mono shrugged. “I don’t know… Not really, but… Right before coming here, I was sure that she was going to betray me.”
Now Freddy tilted his head in confusion. “What happened?”
“The tower was falling, and Six and I were running to get out. I had to jump across the bridge to escape and Six had to catch me. She’s done that a bunch of times already, but… that time she hesitated, and she had this look in her eyes. I thought… I thought she was going to let go. No, I was sure that she was going to do that. But she didn’t. She pulled me up, and it somehow felt weirder than if she would have dropped me.”
Mono paused for a moment.
“She’s been way more… I don’t know… caring since then, though. It’s like we are even closer than before. And now… Now I feel awful that I thought she would betray me. What kind of a friend thinks like that?”
Freddy had to force himself to gloss over the fact that 1.) they were in a collapsing tower for some unknown reason, and 2.) that they needed to jump and catch each other over large drops several times. The questions about those topics needed to wait. Instead, Freddy had to focus on Mono’s concern instead.
“I am sorry, but I am a bit confused,” the bear started. “You believe that Six may not want to stay with you, but you say that she has been more caring ever since that incident? Why would you believe that she would want to leave then?”
“I don’t know,” Mono admitted, his voice finally cracking with tears. “I just feel like she will. It’s… It’s how things are supposed to be anyway. Kids work alone. But we’re different. We’re not supposed to exist. But we do. But how long will that last?”
…
Ah. Freddy had an idea of what this was. The bear did his best to lean down to the boy without falling due to his shorting-out body, then spoke to him again.
“Mono. That irrational feeling that you have? It has a name. It is referred to as Anxiety.”
Mono gazed up at him confusedly, wiping another tear from his face. “I… I know what anxiety is.”
“You do?”
“Yeah. Like when one of the monsters is nearby and we’re hiding. Or when we’re running from them. Our hearts beat really heavy and fast.”
“Ah, yes, that is true, however anxiety comes in many forms. The kind you feel towards an imposing threat is more of a fight or flight response, which helps you either fight the danger, or run from it. However, the anxiety I am talking about could be best classified as Generalized Anxiety Disorder.”
Mono narrowed his eyes in confusion.
“It refers to the feeling of ‘excessive, unrealistic worry and tension with little or no reason’. Kind of like how you have no reason to believe that Six wants to leave you behind.”
“B-but I’ve always relied on my gut feelings before,” the boy said.
“And that can be a good way to judge danger, but unfortunately a gut feeling is not always true, especially when it comes to a non-physical threat. Please, think about it. I have seen Six acting nothing but caring towards you. She is looking out for your well-being at every turn. She was incredibly distraught when you received your migraines. I have seen no evidence of her wanting to separate from you indefinitely.”
Mono blinked, then looked down in thought. “…I guess so…”
“I know so.”
Freddy wanted to tell Gregory about how distraught Six was when he had to catch Mono. It was horrible to see the true terror in her eyes as he fell and she reached after him desperately. It hurt when Freddy caught her and set her down next to Mono, and she immediately pulled him into a hug and tried to stop herself from crying. But he forced himself not to. Six didn’t like to show her feelings, he had come to learn, and she could get upset if she found out that Freddy had spoken about her behind her back.
“Six is your friend,” Freddy told the boy. “And you are hers. I can tell. I have seen many children come through this place, but I have never seen any who are closer than you two.”
The bear smiled softly when he saw Mono’s face brighten, his cheeks dusting with red.
“Six! What are you doing?” Gregory whisper-yelled as he caught up to the girl.
Six was currently hiding behind one of the photo booths on the main floor, keeping out of sight of the STAFF bots and the other patrolling animatronics nearby.
“What does it look like?” The girl whispered back. “I’m putting the thing where it’s supposed to be.”
“Freddy told you to hang back.”
“And I’m telling you that I’m faster.”
She then snuck over to the next booth, and Gregory sighed as he followed behind her.
‘And I thought I was stubborn.’
He decided that trying to argue with her wouldn’t do any good, so he instead just followed to keep an eye on her. Unfortunately she still seemed annoyed by his presence, but fortunately didn’t voice it. Instead she focused on the matter at hand, scanning the floor and sneaking around.
Gregory followed her lead, acting as another set of eyes. He glanced up slightly and noticed that Montgomery was on top of some kind of perch, and was moving a light around on the floor, most definitely searching for them.
“We better avoid that spotlight,” he said to Six.
She turned to face him slowly, with a rye look. “Nooooo, really? I was just going to go in and get turned into stone, but I guess that’s a dumb idea.”
Gregory sighed again at her sarcasm—though he didn’t really get what she meant by ‘turn into stone’. “Look, I’m just trying to help.”
“Well you’re not. I can do this on my own.”
She got up again and started sneaking past where Montgomery was perched, and Gregory once again followed close behind. As they started making their way to the escalators, Gregory tried to figure this whole thing out.
‘She’s pretty closed off. I guess it’s not too surprising. I am too. But with her and Mono I’m not as much, since I know we’re in a similar situation. Does she not think that I’m like her? I guess that’s why she doesn’t trust me, but what I really don’t get is…’
As they snuck up the escalators, Gregory whispered to her, “Hey Six?”
She refused to look at him, and just gave a small hum in question.
‘Wow, not even talking to me now, huh?’ He sighed. “Are you doing this alone because you can? Or because you need to?”
Suddenly the girl stopped, then turned around to look down at him with a confused expression. “What’s that mean?”
Gregory resisted the urge to roll his eyes. “We both know that it’s safer to move as a team. So why are you insisting on doing this alone? What’s the point you’re trying to make?”
She stared at him for a moment, furrowing her brows. “What do you mean? It’s safer to be alone. One person is less likely to be spotted than two.”
“In that sense, you’re right. But it’s easier to fight back if there’s more of us.”
“We don’t fight back. We run. Running is the only way to survive from adults.”
Now it was time for Gregory to furrow his brows in confusion. “Have you never tried fighting back?”
He certainly had when he was on the streets. Granted, it usually wasn’t too much, since adults were in fact stronger than kids, and running always was a safer option, but when he needed to, Gregory would fight. But Six hadn’t ever tried?
Six frowned, then turned back around and started crawling up the escalators again, and Gregory followed.
“Not really. Not on my own anyway,” she admitted. “Usually we lure them into a trap, but that’s the best we can do. We can’t fight back against them directly.”
“We?” Gregory questioned, now up on the third floor. “I thought I saw Mono fighting back against the animatronics.”
“He’s different. Mono’s way stronger than other kids. Probably way stronger than you too.”
“Really? He looks way younger than me.”
The girl groaned. She pulled Gregory into one of the photo booths and slid the curtains shut to hide.
“Why is everyone so focused on our ages?” She demanded. “Like, because we’re young, we’re weaker and stupider than everyone else?”
Gregory blinked at her question, then raised an eyebrow. “I don’t know if you know this, Six, but that’s kinda what kids are.”
Her face started turning red with anger.
“Hey, I fall under that too!” Gregory defended. “You think I like being this small and not knowing what a normal eleven year old should know in school by now? I’d rather be a grown up and not have people telling me what to do, and I’d love to beat up the guys who could try to rob me. But I can’t right now. That’s just life.”
“Why would you want to be an adult?” She asked with a disgusted look.
“Because they can do whatever they want, and I’d rather have that now than waiting for ten years to get it.”
Now she looked even more confused. “Wait ten years? What’ll that do?”
“…I’ll grow up and become an adult?”
“Oh yeah? How would that even work?“
…
Wait… Did she actually not know that adults used to be kids? Gregory put his head in his hand. Great. How the heck was he supposed to explain this. Should he even try? No, they needed to get this job done.
“Look, just forget it. My question to begin with was why you need to do this alone?”
“Because kids need to be self reliant to survive.”
“Okay, then why are you traveling with Mono?”
She froze for a moment, then slowly hung her head down. “… Because… We… I…”
She fell silent for a moment as she thought it over. Then she frowned and got angry again.
“Ugh, I don’t know! We just do!” She whisper-yelled.
Gregory once again resisted the urge to roll his eyes. “Because you’re friends?“
She opened her mouth to say something, but nothing came out. She closed it again, her face turning red as she looked away, crossed her arms and sat down.
“…Yeah. We’re friends…”
“… You don’t seem too happy to say that.”
She scoffed. “It’s not that I don’t care about him! I do! I really do! And…”
She averted her gazed once more.
“…and that’s the problem.”
…
Gregory was so lost here. He tried to think it over, then just sat down next to her.
“It’s a problem that you care about him?”
She gave a small nod.
“Why?
She thought for a moment. “…Because… Because I… I almost…”
Six bit her lip.
“…I almost betrayed him.”
The boy blinked in surprise. Betrayed? But almost? He glanced her over, and judging by her closed off posture and her pained expression, she didn’t want to get into specifics.
“But you didn’t,” he finished for her.
She nodded. “It was the best decision I made, but… it shouldn’t have been a decision to begin with. I-I was just so mad, and in that moment I really wanted to let go. I was going to, too. But I thought about it long enough to realize… and I knew I shouldn’t, and that I’d regret it. And now? It only took me two minutes to realize how much Mono meant to me.”
She hung her head again, her voice going tight.
“…and I’m a horrible person for even thinking about betraying him like that…”
Gregory’s eyes softened. Oh.
“But then what does that say about me that I have to stay with someone to survive?” Six went on. “I… I am weak, but I don’t want to be. But I don’t want Mono to leave either.”
So that was why she needed to do this on her own. To prove that she was strong enough.
“That’s not a bad thing to want,” Gregory admitted. “I know you don’t think so, but it’s good to have someone to rely on. I can’t tell you how much I wished to have a loyal friend.”
Six glanced up at him.
“They could’ve helped me through a lot of stuff. Like getting food, or clothes, or helping me bandage injuries, and talking me through tough times. I’m…”
He averted his gaze in embarrassment, and scratched his cheek with his finger awkwardly.
“I’m actually a bit jealous of you and Mono. I wish I had someone like that by my side.”
Silence followed after that. Gregory gazed back at Six again to see her staring at him with wonder in her green eyes.
“…Jealous of us?”
He stared for a moment, unsure how to react. “…Yeah. Of your friendship, at least. It… It’s embarrassing to say, but I really want a friend.”
Six blinked, then looked down in thought. She stood back up and dusted off her raincoat. “I guess… we’re not as different as I thought. And yeah, having Mono with me feels way better than when I was alone before. But. That doesn’t mean that you’re our friend yet. We’re just working together right now.”
Gregory chuckled. He supposed it was fair. He knew not to trust strangers, and Six likely knew that as well. He’d wait, and he’d work towards letting her trust him. For now, they were just business partners.
“Yeah, okay. Now let’s set up that program thingy.”