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Peace and quiet was all he needed right now.
Five minutes to just block out everything, the stress, the strain this whole ordeal was putting him through and of course, the danger that lurked around every corner. He took a deep breath, held it for a moment, and let it out, although it would be short, he was going to enjoy it.
The older man looked down at the small piece of paper next to him, and the cartoon that resided in it. The little demon, Bendy, was also taking a moment to rest, laying down on the thin black line that Henry had quickly drawn out for him with his hands behind his head, one leg over the other and his eyes closed, he also seemed to be making a strange whistling sound.
Henry chuckled as he realised that the demon was actually snoring, he must have been fast asleep. The man was almost jealous, it had been a while since he had gotten any proper sleep.
Not wanting to wake Bendy up just yet, he simply leaned back and tried to put some of his thoughts together. Wincing slightly, he put a hand to the back of his head and felt a small bump, quickly retracting it back when he touched the tender wound.
What…what had happened again?
His thoughts were still pretty fuzzy, but he could barely put the pieces together. He and Bendy had a bit of a falling out (mostly due to himself by being a bit of an asshole), and then he was attacked, he fell to the ground and all he saw was black. He couldn’t remember much after that but he knew that he wouldn’t have stood a chance if Bendy hadn’t stepped in and fended whatever had attacked them off.
'What the Hell is going on with this place anyway?’ Henry thought as he glanced around the room. The wooden walls were rotting and had ink splattered all over them. The once vibrant and lively animation studio was now a Hellhole with monsters and who knows what else. In a way, it really saddened him, he loved working here. He was fond of the show, the characters, his fellow employees and his boss, Joey Drew.
Which made him wonder: Where was Joey? And for that matter, the rest of the staff?
He had bumped into Sammy Lawrence, who was the director of the Music Department once upon a time, and although his meeting with Sammy had turned pretty ugly, at least it answered his question if anybody else was still here besides Joey (if he even was still here, he really didn’t know at this point). But that was it. He had seen nobody else.
Unless…those ink monsters were…?
He couldn’t bear the thought of it…but Sammy was completely covered in ink, in fact, he even seemed to ooze it. It was hard to imagine how all this was even possible, but it all seemed to focus around one thing: that damned ink machine.
Joey had mentioned something about the blueprints to him, back when he was still working in the studio thirty years ago, rambling on about how it would save the animation studio when it was starting to go under due to budget problems, but the mere idea of it sounded ridiculous and, quite frankly, impossible.
'Boy, was I wrong.’ He bitterly thought to himself.
Of course, he had the bright idea of coming back to the place after getting nothing but a vague letter and decided to switch the contraption on, instead of getting the Hell out of there. It was his fault that the other, more aggressive version of Bendy was out there, roaming the halls right now. But…
He glanced back down at Bendy, who was starting to stir. “Hey bud…” Henry started. “How are you feeling?”
“I should be askin’ you that, you’re the one that took quite the beatin’ from those guys.” The cartoon said as he got up, stretched his arms and yawned, all without even opening his still grinning mouth.
'I really should ask how he even manages to do that, one of these days…’ The grizzled man jokingly thought.
“Getting there… I’ll just take a few more minutes and then we’ll be on the move again.” This earned a rather concerned look from Bendy.
“Ya sure, Henry? I could get out and carry ya, I mean, since your still recovering and all…” Henry quickly shook his head. “No, you were out of the paper for too long, we still don’t really know what your limit is.” Bendy scoffed at this.
“Hey! I’m…eh…” The demon paused for a moment. “…I’m limitless! I can handle it!” He boasted while putting his hands on his hips in a proud manner.
Henry smiled slightly. “As much as I appreciate the offer, Bendy. We just can’t risk it. Besides, I still have my pride…”
The cartoon smirked back. “Well looks like we’re not so different then, huh?”
Henry raised an eyebrow at this, while Bendy shrugged.
“You may act all tough but even you’ve got yer…“
Henry narrowed his eyes. “Don’t you dare…”
Bendy’s grin grew impossibly huge.
“…Limit”
“…”
Henry just gave the small demon an unamused look while he sniggered.
“Aw come on Henry! I still gotta make jokes, don’t I? It was the way I was…created…heh…” His huge smile diminished quickly as he looked down. “Yeah… guess it wasn’t that great, huh? Gotten kinda rusty over the years.”
The older man quickly tried to recover Bendy’s lighter mood. “No, no! It was clever, I really walked right into that one.” He said in a joking manner, chuckling slightly.
Bendy’s grin picked up, but only slightly.
“But since we’re on the subject…I have a few questions. If you don’t mind.” Henry said tentatively.
He didn’t want to make Bendy uncomfortable, but his need for answers was getting too much for him. He had to know what this was all about; the ink machine, where Joey was and how the Hell he even managed to make the cartoon characters into living, breathing…creatures? Could he even call them that? There was also the fact that he had seen two versions of Bendy, were there more?
As much as he liked the Bendy that was helping him, he couldn’t deal with having more versions of that monster that was probably still after his ass.
Bendy nodded. “Shoot.”
“What…” Henry sighed, he didn’t really know how to go about this in a sensitive way, he would just need to be blunt. “What happened? To this place? To you? I mean…how are you…alive?”
Bendy blinked for a moment as he seemed to ponder the question.
“The Ink Machine happened. That’s what brought me…er…us…to life.”
“Us?” Henry questioned. Bendy shuffled slightly.
“Well, yeah. Me and the… other 'me’, I guess. Not to mention those other guys we saw earlier.”
That’s right, the ink monsters, whatever they were or…whoever.
“Do you know what they are? Are they…employees?”
Bendy scratched his head. “Now that I don’t know. They just sorta popped up when the machine kicked in, kinda like that musician guy.”
“Alright…” He wasn’t completely satisfied with the answers he was getting, but in a way he was sort of grateful that Bendy seemed to be nearly as confused as he was. But there was one thing the cartoon was bound to know.
“Joey did this, right? He built the machine and brought you to life?”
Bendy’s expression grew dark.
“I don’t wanna talk about him.”
Henry grew slightly nervous, he wasn’t used to seeing the usually cheerful demon so…serious, but he had to press on.
“Well, do you know where he is? If we can find him then maybe we can sort this whole mess out.” The man tried to coax him, but to no avail.
“I don’t know where he is and I don’t want to know.” Bendy gave him a sympathetic smile. “Look, I know your tryin’ to help but we sure as heck don’t need him, trust me.”
“Alright, fair enough.” Henry replied. He needed to drop it there, he knew his questions were starting to upset Bendy, his urge for answers would just need to wait. They needed to get going anyway.
“I think we’ve taken a big enough break, we should get moving.” He said as he picked up the piece of paper and slowly got up, his body ached in protest but he pushed past the pain, they couldn’t afford to waste any more time.
Besides, he really needed to find that axe.
He couldn’t remember where it had gotten to during the scuffle with the ink creatures, but he was completely defenceless without it and he couldn’t keep relying on Bendy for help. It couldn’t have gone far, right?
“Hey, you didn’t happen to see where my axe went during that last fight, did you?” He asked, glancing down at the paper, Bendy shrugged his shoulders.
“Sorry Henry but I was pretty uh… preoccupied. But let’s try…this way?” The little demon pointed over to a random hallway with flickering lights, sounding unsure.
Well, at least it was a start.
As they searched around, the pipes above them groaned slightly, as if something was wearing them down. This caught Henry’s attention as he suddenly looked up.
“…Did you hear that?”
Bendy tilted his head. “Hear what?”
He squinted his eyes slightly, listening for any other sounds. “…Nothing. It’s alright.” Maybe his army days were starting to catch up with him again…
They continued to search but nothing came up, Henry even resorted to getting on his hands and knees to feel around for it in the darker areas of the corridor, the dim lights were barely helping and he was starting to get nervous. That weapon was his only line of defence and without it, he wasn’t going to last long.
“We’ve been searchin’ for this thing for a while, Henry. There’s probably more deeper in the workshop, we oughta get movin’.” Bendy urged.
“But what if something decides to attack us again? I can’t risk not being able to find another one, if there’s any more at all for that matter.” He replied, still feeling around the wooden floor. It was weird that he even found an axe in the first place. That kind of weapon wasn’t necessary for the studio…well, until now, of course.
God, why did it have to be so damn dark?
“But stayin’ here’s only gonna put us in more danger. Besides, if worst comes to worst, I’ll protect ya. I won’t let those things get ya again.” Bendy said as he gave Henry a determined look.
“But we already talked about this…y'know…the whole limit thing…”
He stopped as he felt something wet drip down his head and onto his face, reaching up to touch it, he suddenly got a chill down his spine as he looked at his fingertips, which were now smeared with black.
“Oh cripes…”
He looked down at Bendy, who was now looking up at something with an extremely nervous expression on his face.
The groaning noise he had heard from the pipes before was now deafening.
Henry looked up to see the pipes above practically overflowing with ink now. Screws were popping loose as the black gloopy substance drooped, sprayed and fell onto the floor at an alarming speed. Henry quickly took a few steps back as the ink formed a large puddle.
'Shit…’ Henry thought as he wiped off any excess ink that had managed to drip onto him, his eyes searched around frantically for anything that he could use as a weapon, there was a small table to the right of him, he doubted it would do much damage but Hell, at least it was something.
“Henry…look!” Bendy interrupted his thoughts he pointed up at the pipes, which had now stopped leaking.
“It’s stopped…” The older man murmured as he looked up. Glancing back down to the puddle, he noticed that it wasn’t moving. No monsters. Nothing. It just…laid there, seeping into the wood.
Henry sighed in relief. It must have just been a leak of some sort.
“Heh…guess we finally got a lucky break, huh?” He grinned slightly at the paper, but this soon turned into a confused look when he didn’t get a response.
“Bendy?”
The small demon was frowning down at the black puddle.
“…Bendy? You alright?” Henry waved his hand in front of the page, snapping the cartoon out of his trance, suddenly having a panicked look on his face.
“Henry, you gotta get movin’. It’s him!”
“Wait. Wha-?”
The puddle starting bubbling, startling them both. The ink was gaining height, and a pair of deformed, droopy horns took shape, as well as an enormously large grin.
Henry’s eyes widened in fear. Not now…he couldn’t deal with this now.
“Move it Henry! Run!” Bendy exclaimed as he waved his arms around frantically to get Henry’s attention. It worked, as the man shook his head and quickly turned to run down the dark hallway, an ear piercing screech sounding off not that far behind him.
He really did need to find that axe.