Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

He's not ready.

He thought that he was, that once they were all gathered, that once everyone was here, that once the match was struck... he thought that he would be at peace. That, with everything finished, at last, he would be ready to just finally rest.

But he was wrong. He's not ready. He's already a dead man walking (ha, literally), but he doesn't want to die.

Not yet.

Henry is so full of shit: he's been over every square foot of this building, he's checked every door and window and vent, and there has never, ever been any way out except through the main entrance and the emergency door to the alley. Both of which are likely blocked, because he can't go and check.

Because the hallway outside his door is already on fucking fire.

Fuck Henry Emily. He has made it so that nobody is leaving this building unless it's as a pile of twisted scrap metal or a burned-out husk of a corpse, his own self included. Because Henry has been ready to die since Charlie was murdered.

The heat is rising, the flames are already licking through the closed door, his bastard father is screaming from the left-side vent for Michael to help him, his twisted sister is sobbing from the other side of the right-hand vent, and all he can do is sit and mutter softly to himself:

"No, no, no... I'm not ready... not like this... not like this..."

From somewhere else in the building, close to the stage where the Rockstars have mostly melted and warped, someone slowly wakes up again. It's been so many years now, she's so tired, so ready to be free from this world...

But her best friend isn't ready, and she can hear him even now.

One last gift, she thinks to herself, climbing out of Lefty carefully and picking her way through the flames. Across the burning tiles, slipping carefully past flames on the walls, until she gets to the blackened door to the office.

It's simple to push it aside, the wood crumbling at a simple touch, and then she's in the office. She can hear him still demanding that the one she's seeking come to his aid, to let him out; she can hear soft sobs slowly cease through the wall; she can see when all the energy leaves the human husk, his soft words ceasing as he slumps lifelessly against the wall.

She acts quickly, hands carefully catching the Remnant of his being before it can catch alight as well. She steps carefully back through the fire, ignoring the way her legs have flames licking up them as she walks. Surely there is someone here that will be safe, someone who will survive this inferno...

Her eyes flit around the restaurant, landing on a familiar object. She knows what it is, what is inside; she spent many years herself resting within a similar space. The ribbons are smoldering away, but the box itself is holding firm. It will be the safest place in this burning restaurant, and yet she hesitates for a moment.

Would that be fair? she wonders. Would he be content with that fate?

As if answering, the Soul Remnant in her hands shifts forward, almost seeming to reach out for the safety offered by the present box. And all she can do is laugh softly.

"Okay," she murmurs, lifting her hands and bumping her faceplate against them in an imitation of the forehead bumps they had shared while both still lived, "if you are certain."

She steps forward through the flames, carefully lifts the lid briefly, and lets his Soul slip inside. She can feel when it snaps into place, everything left of him attaching to the animatronic resting within the box.

"Goodbye, Mikey," Charlie murmurs one last time, sitting down to lean against the present box before letting herself finally drift away...

"Christ, there's really nothing left of this place, is there?"

"Just the frame and foundations. Fire crew got here in time to douse the flames, but it was too late for most of the equipment and the folks inside."

"Wait, there was someone inside?!"

"Yeah, two people. One of them was the manager; I heard from pretty high up that he'd been locked inside before the fire started. The other was Emily."

"Emily as in Henry Emily? The fucking founder? Why was he even here?!"

"Rumor has it he set the fire. Dude was pretty unhinged for years. Someone once told me he went off the rails after his kid died."

"Shit, could this get worse?"

"The manager was Michael Afton."

"...he killed his old partner's kid?!"

"Looks like. Wait a second... I think I found something."

"If it's a body, put it back and we'll call back the cops."

"Funny. No, it looks like one of those puppet boxes."

"Like they used to have at the prize counters back in the day?"

"Yeah. Seems intact, maybe a bit singed but--"

"Put it in the truck. Boss said to bring back anything salvageable; if nothing else, it can be reverse-engineered for another project."

"Fucking Fazbear Entertainment. Always gotta save a buck. What are they gonna do with a puppet anyways?"

"Beats me. Daycare toy? Covert security? Anyways, it's gonna be a while before they reopen a restaurant. I think they said something about video games..."

Chapter Text

The Superstar Daycare is popular with both parents and young children alike. Originally, it was intended to be open from around 8 in the morning to 5 in the evening, with the first and last hour of each day devoted to drop-off and pick-up, and the age range for the children staying to play was between 3 and 5 years old.

And while the first hour worked out perfectly, a lot of the children begged to stay longer to play and some parents had trouble getting to the pick-up on time for various reasons (their shift didn't end until exactly 5 so they couldn't be there earlier, the parents were stuck in a line with an older child and couldn't slip away, the parent hadn't done drop-off and was stuck in traffic, and so forth).

Then there was the fact that some children older than 5 were jealous of their younger siblings' stories of how much fun they were having playing with their new friends, both other kids and the animatronics that were exclusive to the Superstar Daycare. This led to parents pleading with the human staff members -- AKA security personnel who had some experience working with children -- to make an exception for their 6-year-old, their 7-year-old, sometimes their 10-year-old, just this once, he won't stop bugging me about how unfair it is he can't stay here too multiple times a week.

So to compromise and try to make more customers happy, Fazbear Entertainment extended the daycare's hours to 7 in the evening with pick-up starting at 6, and changed the age range to include children ages 3 to 10 (although older children could decide if they really wanted to hang out in the daycare itself or venture into the revamped Kids' Cove exclusively for ages 7 to 10).

The reason for the popularity was quickly noted to be the three animatronic mascots assigned to the area: Daycare Attendant Sun, Daycare Attendant Moon, and Security Marionette Star.

Each one has its own role in how things are run, and the human staff is content to let them handle it. Hell, these are three highly advanced AIs, programmed with an assortment of childcare and security protocols! At least one staff member naps on his shifts because honestly, even if there was an emergency of some sort, Sun and Moon would wrangle the rugrats and Star would go on the fucking warpath. I've seen it happen, and it was safest to stay out of its way!

Attendant Sun handles the more active playtime: Hide and Seek, and Tag, and anything to do with arts and crafts. Generally, that's the one in need of a good scrubbing after all the children have left, cheerfully chatting with the staff member 'lucky' enough to draw the short straw that evening.

Attendant Moon takes care of quieter times: Nap Time, and Story Time, and Quiet Corner for those children who prefer a more sedate playtime. It usually has its music box on, a soft tune playing away as it minds the children under its care.

Both Attendants keep a sharp eye on the climbing structure, as nearly all the kids love to scramble all over it like little monkeys, and there are usually one or two who try to hide away in there when it's time to go home. Moon has more than once had to utilize its wire to zip to the top of the structure as Sun scrambled up the slides while trying to retrieve a stray child or two.

As for Security Marionette Star, it tends to keep a sharp eye on the goings-on during drop-off and pick-up, scanning the children into and out of the daycare each day. Once that's handled, it tends to quietly observe the main play area and plays escort to the older children who decide they want to play in Kids' Cove for the day. At which point it somehow unfolds all six-foot of itself out of the damned present box next to the security counter and all but glides across the floor.

The only sound any of them make, when not speaking, is the soft jingling of the bells worn on their wrists and (in Star and Moon's case) hats.

It's weird, but that's how it is to work for Fazbear Entertainment. Asking too many questions is a Very Bad Thing, and rumors tend to run rampant as a result. Rumors like, one of the original founders bumped off his partner sometime in the mid-80s then later murdered the only surviving heir in the last location before the Pizzaplex was built, and that Marionette Star was found in the fire from that location, and that the animatronic was built and programmed by the heir, and that the Daycare Attendants were modeled after the Marionette's design and AI.

Given how much the three of them seem to treat one another as family, that last rumor is pretty believable.

None of the staff is sure, though, why so many of the children refer to the animatronics as Sunrise and Moonlight and Starburst as if those are their names. In the early days, the kids cycled through Sunshine and Sunny and Sundrop for Attendant Sun, and Mister Moony and Moondrop and Moonbeam for Attendant Moon, and Miss Star and Mister Puppet and Officer Star for Marionette Star. Then, right around the six-month mark, first a few then all of the kids started using Sunrise and Moonlight and Starburst all the time, although some kids will say Miss Sunrise and Mister Moonlight and Officer Starburst from time to time.

None of them seem to realize that it was as simple as one little girl politely introducing herself to each animatronic then asking and what's your name please?

It's a normal evening at the daycare. The last of the children were picked up a couple of hours ago, the human staff has finished their after-hours duties of cleaning up the animatronics, the cleaning bots have been through to clear away the mess of the day, and the Nighttime Protocols have been engaged.

The Nighttime Protocols, as understood by the human staff members, go something like this:

At promptly 8 o'clock every evening, and until the first daycare security staff clocks in for the morning, Starburst is granted access to all daycare and atrium security cameras.

At midnight, after all Pizzaplex guests have left the premises and only the overnight security guard is left in the building, Moonlight's security protocols kick in and he conducts the first of six hourly patrols of the main lobby and atrium. At the same time, Sunrise's own security protocols prompt her to do the first patrol of the daycare atrium at the top of the slide, Kids' Cove, and the Fazbear Theater.

What the human staff doesn't know, however, is that once midnight hits, Starburst is able to access every camera throughout the first floor of the Pizzaplex, because he messed with his own coding just enough to be able to see everything going on.

(He doesn't quite remember why he needs to see everything going on, just that he does, and that he doesn't always trust the Night Guard to do her patrol properly. Especially since The Incident where he had to tackle Moonlight during Nap Time when the lunar animatronic had uncharacteristically nearly struck one of the children and forced him into Safe Mode; the woman had brought Moony back around 5 that morning saying she had caught him acting off and that she would handle the remaining patrols, thank you very much. And once Safe Mode had cycled through his programming and dealt with some stray virus that Moonlight was positive hadn't been there before his final patrol, Starburst figured that something was weird.

He doesn't trust Officer Vanessa as far as he can throw her, and he knows that he could throw her pretty damned far.)

The human staff also is unaware of the internal messaging system the three Superstar Daycare animatronics share, so they don't know that the three remain in constant communication throughout the hourly patrols and any time they aren't in the same vicinity as one another, including their business-hours activities. They don't know that Sunrise considers herself to be female despite her male voice, nor that she and Moonlight call themselves The Twins whenever children ask, nor that Starburst considers himself to be male in spite of his feminine voice because he somehow recalls being a boy who grew up too fast.

So, as the hour rolls over to midnight, Starburst's optics flash white for a moment before fading back to their normal violet glow, and he gives a nod to his younger siblings--

--he remembers red-blonde hair and green eyes, remembers brown hair and blue eyes, remembers that he failed them, he failed them, he was a bad brother, he can do better now, he can do better this time and protect these new siblings so much better--

--as Moonlight and Sunrise slip off on their rounds, him using his wire to exit via the vents (like a total lunatic, ha!) and her skipping up the stairs and hopping the railing. Starburst himself unfolds from his box, black-and-white striped limbs stretching and clicking after being folded beneath him so long. He makes his way across the main play area on silent feet, catching a glimpse of his reflection in the monitor on the desk.

He feels that there is something both wrong and right about his stark-white face, so different from his siblings, his painted-on smile wide and toothless, top lip marked yellow and bottom painted blue, a gold star on his left cheek and a blue star on the right. The hat atop his head is semi-attached, black and white striped like his limbs, and although sometimes he dislikes the bell at the end he has learned to move in a way to keep it from ringing unless he wants it to.

Starburst stops in his tracks as he gets a ping from Moonlight. Is something wrong, Moony?

Vanessa's being weird, Moonlight replies, even his text dripping with disdain. Since The Incident, he has avoided the Night Guard at all costs. She's crossed the atrium twice and keeps calling out like somebody's hiding from her.

I hope she's just being crazy, Sunrise cuts in, even as she flings herself down the slide into the ball pit instead of walking down the stairs like a seven-foot-tall animatronic should be doing instead. There have been a lot of weird messages on the staff server lately, ever since those kids... well, you know.

They all three do know, and that's why Starburst stands his full height abruptly and cycles the cameras. He catches sight of the Night Guard stalking out of the atrium and up the escalator, and the barest glimpse of his little brother hugging the wall off to one dark corner. He also catches sight of three of the four Glamrocks roaming about, their movements strange and unnerving.

Get back to the daycare, he instructs, and he spots Moonlight quickly vanishing from the atrium camera as he cycles back to it for a moment. We're ignoring our protocols tonight and staying where we're safest. I don't trust that Night Guard, and I don't like how the Glamrocks look like zombies.

In short order, all three of the sibling animatronics are back in the daycare, curled up in the staging room at the top of the Castle's Tower. Starburst is periodically checking the cameras, growing more unnerved as first Chica then Roxanne stagger and stumble their way into the Daycare Drop-Off and Pick-Up area, arms draped loosely around both of his siblings. Sunrise's rays are shifting and clicking nervously, her mood feeding off the eldest's, and Moonlight is holding one of his sister's hands tightly in his own even as he hums a quiet lullaby in an attempt to calm them all down.

Then they all hear it: something lands in the ball pit below.

Chapter Text

None of them move for a few seconds, all three nearly stalled in surprise at the perceived invasion of their safest space.

Then, Sunrise pulls herself away from both of her brothers and slowly walks to the doorway, peering out carefully, looking down to the ball pit below.

"It's a kid!" she hisses, and if her mouth was capable of moving she would be frowning slightly.

"What the fuck?" Starburst mutters, even as he pulls up the cameras to confirm that, yep, there is a young boy wading through the ball pit towards the steps leading out into the daycare play area.

"Naughty word," Moonlight says immediately, followed by, "Sunny, why aren't you coming back yet?"

Starburst blinks out of the cameras to see that, yep, Sunrise has that air of I'm about to do something that could be monumentally stupid, but I'm still doing it about her.

"I'm going down there," she says, and before either of her brothers can get out more than Sunrise, don't, she's gone.

"Well, shit."

"Moonlight."

Gregory is not having a great night.

Sure, it had seemed like a great idea to sneak into Freddy Fazbear's Mega Pizzaplex, snag some abandoned food left by families after they had eaten and before the staff bussed the tables, watch the animatronic rock show, and maybe find a spot to hide so he cold sleep someplace warmer than a box in a back alley for a change. And things were going so well... right up until Freddy went wonky on the stage.

And the families started leaving.

And that creepy security guard tried to drag him down some barely lit hallway. Gregory is kind of proud of himself for biting her on the arm, kicking her in the shin, and running like hell.

So, now he's spent the past few hours hiding from the security guard inside Freddy's stomach hatch, being discovered by the overgrown teddy bear, slinking through the vents to find a way to let said teddy bear out of his green room, nearly been caught by Chica in zombie-mode, been separated from his current guardian animatronic, gotten locked in the damned Pizzaplex for the night (and, yeah, that had been the plan before everything went off the rails, but still), and had his entry pass accidentally converted to a daycare pass instead of anything, you know... useful.

If it wasn't for the fact that he sees Chica staggering down the hallway in his direction, Gregory would probably say screw this and take his chances that the spider-music-thing in the vents would let him stay in there with it until morning... hopefully without biting his face off.

But since she is way too close, and if he goes back out the rolling door she'll spot him for sure, the boy takes a deep breath and hops into the slide down to the daycare.

The balls make a thunking sound as he hits them, dropping beneath them for just a moment before he can find his footing. The room is dimly lit, not a hint of day-glow or neon lighting to be seen, and despite having seen posters and statues all over the place advertising some weird candies and a trio of mascots, everything looks quiet.

Even so, Gregory moves cautiously towards the steps that lead out of the ball pit. He's not sure what grabs his attention, but for some reason he finds himself looking upwards just in time to spot an orange-and-yellow something dive down from a platform about a floor above him.

Oh shit, he thinks, moving faster, but all too quickly the sun-themed animatronic catches him under the arms and lifts him up. And holy shit, this is pretty high, how tall is this thing anyway?!

"Heeeeeeeello!" the sun guy say, his voice cheerful. "New friend! You're sure here late, are we having a slumber party? I love slumber parties!" As he speaks, the animatronic carries Gregory out of the ball pit (so that’s one small success) and sets him back on the ground a few feet away from the steps. He doesn't move away, though, instead almost hopping in place. "We can play games, and finger paint, and drink Fizzy-Faz until our heads explode--"

"Sunrise."

The voice that cuts in is female, firm, and has a weird accent that Gregory equates immediately to an authority figure. And apparently so does the now-named Sunrise, who stops bouncing around and slouches, fingers lacing together and managing to look sheepish despite his face being locked in a permanent smile.

"Sorry, Starry," Sunrise says, tone suddenly much softer. "I got a little carried away."

Gregory turns to see who spoke, and finds himself wondering for the second time in five minutes how tall these animatronics really are, because these two new arrivals aren’t exactly tiny. One of them is the moon-themed animatronic from the posters, his color scheme blue and grayish-white, and the other is the the kinda star-themed puppet from that one poster reading Safety first! Don’t leave with a stranger! he had passed walking through the upper daycare area. He’s assuming it was the star puppet lady who’d spoken, given her arms are crossed and she’s standing like he assumes a mom scolding her kid would do.

“I understand,” Star Lady — Starry? — replies, her stance relaxing slightly, “but we just talked about this, didn’t we? We have to stay safe tonight, Sunny.”

…okay, now he’s more curious than scared of these guys. “Excuse me, um, Miss Star Person?” he says hesitantly. He’s about to ask why a trio of huge robots is hiding out in the daycare, but he can’t continue for a moment because of two things:

The first is a muffled giggling from Sunrise beside him and the Moon guy, who is actually covering his wide grin with one hand as his other arm wraps around his middle.

The second is the Star lady's arms falling loose at her side, her head tilted to the left as she seems to blink before turning and saying sternly, “Don’t you dare—”

If she was going to tell them don’t laugh then it’s a wasted comment since both the other animatronics begin cackling before she can finish her statement. Sunrise is bent almost in half with his fit of giggles, and Moon Guy has to sit down before he falls over from his own laughter. When it seems like they're about to stop, the pair apparently catch each other's eyes and start up all over again.

"Hilarious," Star Lady says dryly before turning her attention back to Gregory. Her eyes go white for a moment before flickering back to violet, and he has the feeling that she just gave him the same scan that Freddy had done earlier. His assumption is confirmed when she shifts to kneel in front of him, one knee on the floor and the other bent with her left hand settled on it. Gregory notes that she, like the maybe twins, has five fingers instead of four like Freddy and the rest of the band, but that hers are longer and tapered.

"I apologize for my siblings," Star Lady says, somehow sounding both exasperated and fond despite being, you know, an animatronic. "I noticed that you don't have a guest profile, so introductions are in order. My name is Starburst, and I am the Security Marionette for the daycare. You've already met my sister Sunrise, and my brother over there is Moonlight."

Oh, Gregory thinks to himself, the sun guy is a sun girl, I'll have to remember that. Aloud he says, "My name is Gregory. I..." He trails off, not certain if it's okay to tell Starburst that he snuck in and that's why he has no guest profile. He didn't tell Freddy -- mostly because Freddy didn't actually ask -- but...

Weirdly, even though he's only known her (him? he's going to have to ask) for a few minutes now, he sort of... trusts that Starburst won't try to foist him off on the Security Guard or the Security Bots roaming the halls if he's honest.

"You won't find a profile for me," Gregory finally says, wrapping his arms around himself tightly. "I snuck in this afternoon, and I was just going to hide out all night until Freddy freaked out during the show and the Security Guard Lady tried to drag me away--"

"I told you Vanessa was being weird!" Moonlight cuts in, sitting up from where he had finally collapsed in his laughter on the floor. Sunrise beside him flinches and starts to toy with the ribbons on her wrists.

Starburst somehow looks concerned, eyes turning white again for a long moment before seeming to make a decision. "Well, then," she says, "it looks like you'll be staying here with us where it's safe."

Part of Gregory feels relieved, because he has seen no sign of the band actually inside past the doors into the daycare, which means he has at least one place he can hide out. But on the other hand...

"But I'm supposed to meet Freddy!" he protests. "I was supposed to get a security pass and meet him at the exit door."

"Wait, what?" Sunrise says, her voice confused. "I thought you said Freddy glitched out or something. He's not being all weird like the others?"

About three second later, the lights abruptly cut off. Gregory would deny that he yelps when they do, except for the fact that Sunrise also lets out a little squeak of surprise and Moonlight mutters a what the fuck that gets him an absent language, there's a kid here for Faz sake from Starburst.

"Gregory!"

There's about a second where the boy doesn't know where Freddy's voice is coming from before he remembers that, oh yeah, his Fazwatch is still on. "I don't know what's happened, but it appears that the lights have gone out in the daycare! You're going to have to turn on the generators to turn them back on."

"Nope," the puppet animatronic says, climbing to their feet (yeah, probably best until he actually gets a chance to ask) and half-stalking, half-gliding to the large wooden door. They pause for a moment before grabbing the handle and yanking it open. Gregory can catch sight of Freddy standing on the other side, and the bear almost seems startled to see who opened the door.

"Oh, Security Marionette Star, hello! I did not realize you were active already--"

"Get. Inside. Now."

Ooh, that's a mom voice, Gregory thinks, wincing.

"Fazbear's in trooooouble," Sunrise whisper-sings behind him.

"Big Brother's not happy," Moonlight agrees softly.

...well, that answers both of his questions right now: Starburst is a star guy, and Freddy is in big fucking trouble.

Chapter Text

"Get. Inside. Now."

There is something to be said about how tone of voice can get someone's point across. Like, right now, Freddy has come to the conclusion that, one, at least Marionette Star is functioning under normal parameters and two, that he is somehow on the slim animatronic's Shit List.

(Do not say Shit List in front of Gregory. He does not need to learn those sort of words.)

The bear animatronic wisely keeps quiet, instead stepping forward and then past Marionette Star when the other steps to one side. He is quick to close the door again, and unless Freddy is mistaken he seems to lock it as well. A quick look around reveals that the two Daycare Attendants are seated on the floor (Attendant Sun seems to be in distress, if the way she is toying with her bells and the way Attendant Moon has his arm around her is any indication) and that Gregory appears to be safe.

"Gregory! It is good to see you are safe!" he remarks, and the boy grins up at him cheerfully.

"Yeah, I'm fine. Starburst said that I can stay here for the rest of the night if I need to."

...Starburst? Oh! That must be the name that Marionette Star calls himself, Freddy realizes. Somewhere deep within, he wonders on how... human that seems to be. He has always been Freddy Fazbear, no matter what shell he is wearing, and if he ignores the several years in previous locations wherein he and his friends shared space in their AIs with some unfortunate young souls then he can pretend that some of the company's history Never Really Happened Thank You.

(That is a lie, and he knows he is lying to himself. He can clearly remember cycling on to find the spirit of a boy not much younger than Gregory appears to be, clinging to his frame and whispering about the Purple Man, he can remember being on stage as midnight approached then abruptly find himself in Parts and Services with another unfortunate Night Guard shoved into a spare suit. He can remember Chica sobbing as much as an animatronic can do such things, can remember Bonnie being far too lenient with his child to the point that he was nearly buried, can remember Foxy lamenting the loss of one of the Night Guards who he remembered from an even earlier location...

But none of that ever happened. Bonnie is gone now under mysterious circumstances, Foxy was long ago reformatted into Roxanne and is... generally happier save to the occasional fit of self-loathing, and Chica always changes the topic away from Fazbear Entertainment's past whenever a parent asks too many questions. Monty came later, and none of the Originals ever plan on letting that chapter of the past infect their young friend if they can help it.)

"That is a good fallback plan, if we cannot find a way for you to leave the building," Freddy agrees, taking the few steps closer to the boy to ruffle his hair. Gregory makes a sound of protest but doesn't do anything but shakes his head after the bear steps back. The Daycare Attendants remain seated where they are, now leaning against one another and seeming to talk quietly back and forth.

"If Vanessa--" and Marion- no, Starburst, nearly hisses the name, he is definitely displeased "--has compromised the security of the Pizzaplex, it is not safe for those of us unaffected to be roaming about. That includes you, Fazbear."

Freddy manages an approximation of a frown, much easier with his current shell than with any he'd had in the past. "I have been in Safe Mode since the show yesterday," he says. "And I am cut off from the main network. I have not been able to contact Officer Vanessa or my friends since I came back online."

Starburst tilts his head to one side, appearing to be thinking. It is very strange, to see this somewhat familiar face but know that this puppet animatronic does not carry the soul fragments of a child within himself. Perhaps those human traits that Freddy has noted remained behind in some way once the child finally left him? He cannot pretend to know, especially since he seems to have kept some human traits his own self in the degree of care he has towards his friends and Gregory.

Honestly, he feels some concern towards the Daycare Attendants, both of whom have now stopped talking among themselves and are watching Starburst attentively. They seem to be so young in many ways, even though they are only a little newer than Monty from their build-and-activation dates, yet so much older at the same time.

"We have been running in Safe Mode for the past twelve days," the puppet animatronic finally says after a moment, arms crossing over his chest and tapered fingers tapping out an absent tune.

The Toreador's Song, Freddy notes absently. That used to play on my music box so long ago. The marionettes always played My Grandfather's Clock or Claire de Lune. How... strange.

"Twelve days?" the bear asks aloud, blinking at that news.

"Yeah," Attendant Sun speaks up, fingers once again toying with her ribbons to the point that bells are tinkling softly. "Moony came back from patrol a little early because Van-- because she said he was acting weird. But he wasn't before the 5 o'clock patrol, we'd been playing Clue before that, and he was fine!"

Attendant Moon catches his twin's hand and holds it still before picking up the narrative. "I didn't feel like anything was wrong. A little irritated as the children got louder during the day, but it... it got worse. I wanted to make them shut up," and his soft words are getting distressed, to the point that Starburst has turned abruptly and started to make his way quickly to the blue animatronic. "And it felt like I was suddenly watching myself, and I was going to-- I almost--"

"Moonlight," the puppet says soothingly, hands on his sibling's face and tilting his head up to lock eyes. "I was fast enough. I got to you and put you into Safe Mode, and we let your antivirus flush it out of you. You didn't hurt anyone, sweetling. The children were safe, you are safe, I will keep you safe. I promise. I promise."

Freddy absently files away the name designation Moonlight for Attendant Moon even as he turns away slightly. This seems like a private moment, and he notes that Gregory has likewise stepped back a little to give the siblings some privacy.

After a few minutes more of soft reassurances from Starburst and Sun both to Moonlight, the yellow animatronic makes a sound akin to clearing ones throat. "So... um, yeah, Starry insisted that we both go into Safe Mode, too. And... yeah. I wasn't going to say anything, but I can't access anything but our private messaging server."

"What?" Starburst asks, his eyes going white for a moment. Freddy had been aware that the puppet had access to the nearby cameras, but that should still allow him access to the main network, right? Has he still been online? Could he contact the rest of the band and try to get them into Safe Mode as well?

After a few seconds, the puppet's eyes shift back to purple once more. "It seems like I'm cut off from the main network as well. The only reason I still have the cameras is because of my backdoor protocol."

"Why do you have a, um, a backdoor, anyways?" Gregory asks, seemingly comfortable enough with the Daycare Animatronics that he's leaning on Sun's back and playing with her rays; given that she isn't reacting beyond retracting them and letting them back out again, she doesn't mind the attention.

"It is so that I can see every camera on the first floor of the Pizzaplex," Starburst responds with a shrug. "I'm going to try and access the second and third floor, find out where everyone is."

"You should not be hacking the systems!" Freddy says, shocked at this news. "Why did you even do that?"

"I don't trust the Night Guard," is the quick reply. "Even before The Incident, she has seemed off to me. Somebody has to keep an eye on things, it might as well be me. It isn't as if I never did it before."

There is... something about that statement that sticks with Freddy. He knows the rumors, that this particular puppet came from the most recent location before the Pizzaplex, and that his original system designation was Security Puppet Version 2a. He knows that Starburst's current programming protocols include acting as daytime security over the Superstar Daycare and some limited nighttime security features to monitor certain areas.

To hear him claim responsibility for the entire building, however, makes something in him take notice. He can almost, almost remember a Night Guard from a long time ago, from the time he pretends to not remember, taking a similar sort of responsibility.

I'm sorry that I couldn't save you then, he can remember hearing the Night Guard say through thick steel doors, directly addressing the children and animatronics both, but I can promise you this: I will find him. I will keep him from harming any others. I will end him.

Freddy wonders if Officer Mike ever managed to keep that promise.

There is a little bit of an argument between Freddy and Starburst, the former insisting that getting Gregory out somehow is the best option while the latter is certain that they can hide him in the daycare until 6 o'clock rolls around, but eventually they reach an agreement.

He can't say for sure what it is immediately since he and the twins decided they've had enough of sitting in the dark and, after Moonlight handed him a flashlight from behind the security desk (and got scolded you're gonna get into so much trouble if the day shift looks at the video by Sunrise), decided to go cut on the generators. Gregory would like to know what adult apparently thinks it's a great idea to have put them in the play structure... although he has to admit that it's fun to race the two animatronics to see who can turn on the most out of the five first.

He's sure Moonlight is cheating with that wire, though, since there's no way he can be at the top as fast as he is. But Sunrise is helping him cheat, by calling out how close he is to each generator. Basically, none of them are playing fair here, and Gregory lets out a whoop as he cuts on his third generator and the lights cut back on.

"Sunny and I win!" he calls up to Moonlight.

"You cheated!" comes the response. "Sunrise, you were supposed to turn on the generators, too!"

"I did," the yellow animatronic replies smugly. "I had Gregory do it for me!"

"Children, behave," comes Starburst's voice from just beneath the play structure, and Gregory moves to push himself down the closest slide to rejoin the 'adults' below. Sunrise just fucking jumps from where she is, getting caught by Moonlight as he descends on the wire and drops them both safely on their feet. "Against my better judgment, Freddy and I have come to an agreement."

"There are two potential ways out," Freddy says, sounding both calm and positive. "One of them is the fire exit located in the Prize Counter on the second floor, and the other is through the Loading Docks in Sub Basement One. I can mark both on your map and we can check each one separately."

Gregory grins before frowning. "I don't have a map, Freddy."

"There should be one on your Fazwatch. If there is not, then you can get a map from the second-floor atrium."

The twins groan in unison. "Not the Map Bot!" Sunrise whines. "They're the worst!"

"But that's the best way for Gregory to get a map," Starburst notes, not sounding any happier with the idea of him leaving than his siblings. "Fazbear, you go with Gregory and stick with him as much as you can. Since you'll already be on the second floor, you two should try the Prize Counter exit; the three of us will find our way to the Loading Docks to check that option. I'm going to add myself and the twins to your Fazwatch, Gregory," he adds, holding out a hand.

The boy doesn't hesitate to hand the watch over, waiting at the puppet changes a few settings before handing it back. When he slips it back on, Gregory notices three new icons: a sun, a moon, and a star, one for each of his new friends.

"I've looped Fazbear into our message board, too, kids," Starburst adds, "so try to behave yourselves and don't spam him with emojis."

"Too late! I've sent twenty sunflowers, six laughing emojis, and made sure he knows they're from me!"

Moonlight starts to cackle even as their big brother makes a sound like a tired sigh and drops his head into his hands. "Sunrise, what the fuck?"

"Naughty word!"

"Oops, I think I'm in trouble!"

"Gregory, ignore that word!"

All Gregory can do is laugh. This really is the weirdest thing that's ever happened to him.

Chapter Text

Sunrise doesn't like this. Not one little bit.

Currently, she is crawling through the vents, one brother ahead of her and the other behind, as they make their way out of the daycare to avoid being caught on camera. It doesn't matter that, right now, Starburst has access to them; the fact remains that Vanessa also has access, and not one of them trusts her to even throw a glass of water on an open flame right now.

Starry is certain she had something to do with Moony glitching out so badly, and Sunny is... shall we say... protective of her little family unit. Chances are high that if she stumbles across the Night Guard right now, she would be more inclined to dropkick the woman off the third-floor balcony than to listen to any excuses she might have for what happened on that patrol twelve days ago.

Never let it be said her AI isn't advanced enough for her to hold a grudge.

(Or maybe that's one of those programming quirks like Starburst has? They have the same base coding, all three of them, although Sunrise is pretty certain that the file marker designated as aft.m_subroutine_al.v.pg.exe is something unique to her, and that maybe Moonlight has a similar file marker even though she's never asked. She just knows that sometimes, when her patrols take her past the few intercoms in their area, she almost wants to see if she can leave a message for the day shift on them.

It's just a whim, so she's never acted on it. Besides, it's far more important to Keep Watch and Stand Guard than engage in silly pranking.)

She slips up behind Starburst as he pauses, waiting patiently for her big brother to check the cameras and give an all-clear. The smaller animatronic gives a quick nod and pushes open the vent, flipping out gracefully and landing lightly on his feet.

"Showoff," Moonlight mutters behind her, and Sunrise giggles before leaning out of the vent into a handstand that turns into a backflip to get her back onto her feet. "And you're just as bad, sheesh..."

Even as he speaks, her twin leans out into a handstand of his own, only he rolls into a summersault and into a low crouch as he scans the room. His eyes are lit red, switching into Security Mode out of long habit upon leaving the daycare.

"Come on," Starburst says, turning on his heel and darting towards the maintenance door off to their left. "I've cut the cameras for twenty seconds, just long enough to get through the loading doors."

Sunrise rushes after him, hearing her twin's footfalls behind her. How three animatronics their size can move as silently as they do is something she doesn't tend to dwell on; it frustrates the hell out of the dayshift staff when any one of them passes by unexpectedly, startling the poor humans on a daily basis. It probably has something to do with their security protocols, but right now that strange skillset is keeping the Security Bots that are now gliding past from hearing them at all.

"I wonder how Fazbear and the kid are managing," Moonlight murmurs, and she makes a sound of agreement. Freddy is... not exactly silent when he moves, so hopefully, Gregory is keeping out of sight while the bear lumbers about.

All three daycare animatronics slip through the door carefully, Starburst holding it open and waiting for his siblings to step past him before following into the Supply Warehouse. It's... well, big, filled with random crates, and creepy in the dark. Sunrise can feel her Sleep Mode protocol attempting to kick in and viciously aborts the process. Even so, her rays twitch and retract slightly before fully extending once again.

Stupid Sleep Mode, why is it trying to kick in right now? she fumes silently. Aloud she says, "It's pretty dim in here, guys. Rest mode just tried to run."

Starburst turns to study her, worry apparent in his violet gaze. "Will it be a problem?" he asks, and yep, there's Overprotective Mode engaging.

She scoffs. "I'll keep aborting the process until we get our little friend either out of the building or safely back in the daycare," she says, and she means it.

Moonlight slips past them, looking around carefully. "Thought I heard footsteps," he says after a few seconds. "Heavy ones, probably either Montgomery or Roxanne. Chica's lighter, they didn't sound like her."

"We'll be cautious," their brother replies, resting a hand on Sunrise's arm for a moment before stepping away. "The dock shouldn't be too much further."

His words prove true about a minute later, as the trio steps past a stack of crates to see the controls for the Loading Dock gate. Only... something's not right.

Given their security clearance levels, the lockbox over the gate's controls should have lifted the moment the three of them walked up to it. Instead, the glass box remains stubbornly closed. Starburst lets out a flurry of frustrated static and begins to physically examine the lockbox while the twins exchange a look. On silent agreement, Moonlight walks over to examine the gate itself while Sunrise follows the wires that lead from the controls to the circuit box.

There doesn't seem to be anything off at first glance, but when she steps closer to the circuit box she notices that it's been opened recently; upon opening it herself she sees that some of the circuits have been removed. That can't be a good thing, and she closes it once more before heading back to her brothers.

There's no way the loading dock staff missed an issue with the circuit box during their shift. Vanessa has some serious explaining to do.

The gate has been tampered with.

Moonlight's eyes shift between red and blue-white as he examines the chains one more time, just to be sure that he isn't mistaken. But there they are, the left-most chain has been shifted off its track. Even if Starburst is able to unlock the security box over the controls, there's no way the gate will open more than an inch.

Not wide enough for anyone to slip through, he muses, not even a determined ten-year-old.

He lets out his own burst of frustrated static, shaking his head a bit as he makes his way back to his siblings; Sunrise has finished her own inspection and she looks pissed, which means things are definitely Not Good in her world right now. Their sister always tries to stay positive and look on the brighter side of things, all in an effort to deal with her anxiety (and isn't that some bullshit, programming an animatronic with anxiety? Who even thinks of doing shit like that?), but when her mood dampens... oooh...

They call those her rainy days when her mood is low, and solar eclipse days when she's just full-on angry.

This seems to be gearing up to an eclipse day for sure.

"Door's fucked," Moonlight remarks, slipping up beside Sunny and casually lacing his fingers with hers. From the way she squeezes back, she's well aware of her darkening mood and is grateful for the comfort. It’s a testimony to Starburst’s distraction that he lets the swearing go for now. "Somehow, the chains are off the track."

"And there are missing circuits, too," Sunrise adds, and yep, that's a Total Solar Eclipse Incoming tone of voice. If they were in the daycare during opening hours and she had that tone, any kid even thinking of misbehaving would have changed their minds immediately. That tone is on par with Starburst's Authority Figure tone, and Moonlight has heard some kids call both tones the Mom Voice. "I'm pretty sure that day shift would've said something if things were going wrong in here, we have deliveries all day every day!"

Starburst finally bangs his fist on the lockbox and steps back. "This isn't opening either," he grouses. "All the security protocols have been changed, probably to require a human staff member with a Level 10 pass access only."

"But..." the lunar animatronic says slowly, frowning to himself, "the dock staff only have Level 5 clearance, since they don't need access to Parts and Services or any other high-level area. When supplies come in for those departments, someone usually comes to retrieve them."

"I'm gonna punch Vanessa in her smug little face," Sunrise hisses, her rays shivering and clanking. "And then I'm gonna sic the Security Bots on her."

Starburst drops his face into his hands as Moonlight cackles at his sister. "Why can't I put my adult siblings into Time Out?" he grumbles before heaving a sigh. "At any rate, we need to get out of here before she spots us out of bounds. Hopefully, Fazbear and Gregory have had better luck, but..."

His words trail off as he waves a hand at the lockbox, and the twins can only nod. If this exit has been tampered with, chances are high that the Prize Counter exit is likewise inaccessible.

The daycare siblings have reached the vent, and Starburst has climbed inside when the alert comes across their message board:

Gl. Freddy: I was unable to enter the Prize Counter with Gregory, and we got separated. I am damaged and at Roxy Raceway right now. I think that Officer Vanessa has found Gregory. I will continue trying to reach him.

"New plan," the elder brother says, glancing back at his brother and sister. "I'm going to check on the bear. You two: find the kid and get him somewhere safe."

Chapter Text

Vincent Alexander has worked for Fazbear Entertainment since he was sixteen years old, walking through the doors to Fredbear's Family Diner and asking if they had any work for a kid in search of a first job. He was never exactly close to either Mister Emily or Mister Afton, but he got along pretty okay with them so far as bosses went. Hell, it was usually Mister Emily that he saw in the early days of his work bussing tables, with Mister Afton being a presence that would slip in and out without much to say to the employees unless he was taking the time to praise good performance.

What he remembers most of either of his bosses, back before they sold the company to the current owners, is that Mister Emily grew distant when Charlie died (poor kid, she was only ten, nobody deserves to die like that) and that Mister Afton got mean when his youngest son died in 1983.

Vincent had stayed, though. He stayed when Mister Afton would speak politely to the staff then turn around to backhand his only remaining son.

He stayed when Fredbear's was closed down mid-1985 in favor of the New Freddy Fazbear's Pizzeria.

He stayed when those poor kids went missing.

He stayed despite the older animatronics from Fredbear's getting weird at night and the newer models started stalking the security guards.

He stayed after poor Jeremy Fitzgerald got attacked and half-mauled by the Mangle, volunteering to pick up the night shift but only stepping into the role after the new guy -- Fritz, he thinks was the guy's name -- got fired after one shift.

Vincent has seen so much, and he's stuck with the company for so long... but it's been almost twenty years at this point. He walked into Fredbear's as a fresh-faced and bright-eyed teenage boy, and now he's thirty-five, still single by his own choice, so deeply closeted that he only ever feels happy anymore when Miss Sunny Skies takes over each Friday from morning until two hours before his shift starts, and he feels so responsible for all that's happened that up until this past Friday he went to visit Jeremy at the long-term care unit the man had been in since 1983.

Jeremy died on Saturday morning, and Vincent is just... he's so fucking tired.

He gave his notice when he walked in the door on Saturday afternoon, promising to finish out the week and record some training tapes for his replacement. He finished up his Saturday shift, clocked out, went home to drink a toast to his colleague who is finally at peace (he hopes), slept away Sunday, and came in on Monday to start his last week on the job.

Vincent isn't sure what his plans were after Friday, but... well... it looks like that's not going to be a problem.

Monday and Tuesday went smoothly as usual, just Bonnie and Chica harassing him on those days with a single visit from Foxy on Tuesday. The fox has always been his favorite, and he'd greeted each of them as cheerfully as he always does.

Wednesday was... it was rough. The first three had been so much more active, and it was disturbing to see that his power was dropping as rapidly as it had. He'd hit 1% at 5:59, then the lights had gone out and he'd spend a terrifying thirty seconds until the clock hit 6:00 wondering if the Toreador March was going to be the last thing he ever heard.

But today is worse.

It's barely 3:30, he's sitting at 5% power, and Foxy has been pounding at the door for the past three minutes. Vincent watches the power drop down another percentage point, and he realizes that if he doesn't record something now that he's never going to have the chance. The previous three shifts, he has taken a few minutes to calm himself down from the night before recording his words of wisdom. He's still not sure what possessed him on Wednesday to recommend playing dead so they'd think the new guy was a spare costume, what the fuck, Vin?

But clearly there isn't going to be a 6:15 recording for today. It's now or never.

Vincent picks up the phone and hits the Record Message option.

"Hello, hello!" he says, managing to insert a little cheer into his tone, even as Foxy's banging gets louder. "Hey! Hey wow, day four... I knew you could do it." He takes a breath, closing his eyes to gather his thoughts.

"Uh, hey, listen... I may not be around to send you a message tomorrow. It's... it's been a bad night here. For me. Umm... I-I'm kind glad that I recorded my messages for you... uh, when I did."

Vincent clears his throat, damn it, he's not the sort to cry and he's near tears right now. This sucks, he wishes he was Sunny right now and not Vincent, because she's more confident than he could ever be, and she'd face this with her head held high...

"Uh hey, do me a favor: Uh, maybe sometime, uh, you could check inside those suits?" he asks, doing his best to ignore that it now sounds like claws at the door. "Uh, in the back room? I'm... I'm gonna try to hold out... until someone... checks."

3%... 2%... 1%...

"Maybe it won't be so bad," Vincent says, throat feeling thick as he speaks. "I-I-I-I always wondered what was in all those empty heads... back there--"

Lights out. He can hear Freddy approaching and the sounds of that damned music box kicking in.

"You know... oh no..."

He knows it's pointless, but he tries to run anyway. All it does is send him straight to where Foxy and Bonnie are both waiting for him. And even then, he still fights. He cries, he pleads, he even apologizes for whatever it is that made the animatronics act the way they have for so long. But it's no use.

They drag him to Parts and Services. They drag him to one of the Freddy suits.

Vincent lets the shock of it all steal away his final bit of consciousness before the pain can really set in.

Jeremy Fitzgerald has always been curious about the new Freddy Fazbear's Pizzeria. He had graduated high school about a year before it opened up, and he has some fond memories of Fredbear's Family Diner before that. But he had never really gone, since he's a grown-ass adult, and an adult hanging around a place geared towards kids is just... it's not a good look for anyone.

But here he is now, all of twenty-one, a college drop-out since he's learned higher learning isn't his thing at all, and Freddy's has an opening for a nighttime security guard. It's like the stars have aligned or something, so he applies and waits to hear something back.

It isn't long at all before he's called in for an interview, and maybe two or three days before he's offered the spot. Jeremy jumps at the chance, because what could be better for a night owl like himself but a job where he can stay awake and get paid for it?!

He likes his coworkers, especially Vincent. It's honestly hilarious that their boss, Wade, actually has to stop for a second and ask if they're related, the two of them look so similar. If it wasn't for the fact that Vin just turned twenty-nine a few weeks ago (according to the man himself), Jeremy would almost think they're twins separated at birth. They're both tall, they both have blond hair... the only real difference is Jeremy has brown eyes instead of Vin's stereotypical blues and the freckles dotting the younger man's nose.

Vincent has a ton of advice, and he offers to check in at the start of every one of Jeremy's shifts despite them starting at midnight. And he's true to his word, calling promptly at midnight with a cheery hello, hello and dropping words of wisdom at every turn. And as unnerving as it is for the animatronics to wander the building at night, he had adapted quickly.

But night five's call had been unnerving in its own way. The building is on lockdown, Vin had told him. No one in or out. And the older animatronics that generally stayed put in the back room had been out and about and trying really fucking hard to get to where Jeremy sat watching the cameras.

Then on night six, he had arrived to find out that Freddy's was closing for a little while, some sort of an investigation that Vincent hadn't been able to go into detail about. What was clear was that Jeremy needed to stay on his toes, finish off the night, and come in for a day shift to help out with one last scheduled party before they officially shutter the doors for a while.

And it's now Saturday afternoon, the final scheduled party well under way. Vincent had managed to slip over to explain a few more things to Jeremy, about how someone used one of the older Springlock models to try and get a kid to follow him. The cameras had caught the moment, and Vincent was able to step in quickly, but whoever it was in the suit got away.

"I'm pretty sure it was Dave," Vincent mutters. "You know, Dave Miller? I think you met him when you came in to pick up your uniform."

Jeremy thinks for a moment, then nods. "Yeah, I remember him. Guy seemed kind of like a creep to me. Too smiley, too fake."

"He kind of reminded me of one of my old bosses from Fredbear's," the other blond says with a frown. "But Mister Afton kind of dropped off the map right after he sold the company to the current owners, and it would just be really fucked up for him to pretend to be a technician at this point!"

"Weirder shit's probably happened. But still," Jeremy says with a frown, "I hope they keep us in the loop about the investigation. Those poor kids..."

Vincent sighs and opens his mouth to say something, but his blue eyes go wide as he spots something behind him. "Jere--!"

The younger man doesn't hear the rest. All he knows is pain and he's screaming and others are screaming and then there's nothing.

...for a long time, and then he can hear again.

Someone is talking, something about left frontal lobe and possibly wake up and comatose state. Voices fade in and out, and the one that always returns is Vincent.

Vincent talking about the investigation, about how the kids haven't been found.

Vincent talking about how much being thirty now sucks and how he wishes Jeremy could come out to the bar with him.

Vincent sounding so much lighter and saying that he'd been nervous to come visit him in Full Glam but that no one here had batted an eye.

Vincent-as-Sunny Skies saying that she thinks that Jeremy's drag name would have to be Clara De Lune so they could stay day and night friends.

Vincent sounding so tired and saying that she wishes she could just quit Freddy's, it's changed too much since '87, that she's thirty-five now and she's spent all her working life there.

And Jeremy gets it. He's tired, too. He thinks he's still here, still half-aware, because Vincent has been by his side through all of this.

Maybe it's time to go to sleep for good.

So when he feels Vin drop a kiss to his cheek, the usual farewell, he listens so much closer than he ever has.

"Visiting hours are over, Jere, and I guess I have to go home and get ready for work." A heavy sigh. "Just tonight and tomorrow night, and I can sleep away Sunday again. That and coming to see you, that's just about all I have to look forward too. Is it weird that you're still my best friend, even after all this time? Hah, yeah. I gotta go now, so I'll see you next Friday. Goodnight, moonlight. Sleep well."

Goodbye, sunny, Jeremy thinks in return, waiting until he can't hear his friend's footfalls anymore before he lets himself slowly drift away....

It's a long time before awareness returns, and he/she/they find themselves wandering the halls of a new pizza place. It is at once familiar and foreign, phones ringing and children laughing and a tall thin man roaming the halls night and day. He is somehow familiar to one of them, a stranger to the other, but he trusts her judgment and they follow him together.

They listen to strange animatronics crawling through the vents and trying to break into the office, they listen as they argue amongst themselves, they watch as the tall thin man hides behind a mask and continues to work day in, day out.

They listen as a stranger who isn't a stranger announces that this all ends and try (and fail, so sorry, so so sorry) to offer the tall thin man comfort as he tries and fails to find a way out, as he attempts to comfort himself in the end. And they follow on soundless feet as a puppet catches his Light and carries it away, places it in a box, falls into an eternal slumber of its own.

Where else will they go but follow him? He is alone, and they both know what that's like. It's probably why and how they found each other again, and they won't let him feel that way.

Whatever comes next? They're all going together. Night Guards only have each other, after all.

"Hello!" the little girl says, bouncing on her toes as she stops in front of the Twins. They look so alike, purposefully built that way, just a few minor differences between day and night. "My name is Alexandra, and I'm five years old. And what are your names, please?"

Vincent. Vin. Sunny Skies. That guy on the phone.

"Hello, Alexandra! My name is Sunrise, it's wonderful to meet another sunshine-happy girl!"

Jeremy. Jere. Jere-bear. Goodnight--

"And I am Moonlight. I hope you enjoy your visit, Alexandra."

The little girl smiles and skips her way over to where their brother is resting inside his box, arms folded loosely on the edge and nodding along to the children speaking to him. He greets Alexandra, tilts his head, and replies in kind:

"Good morning to you, Alexandra. I'm Starburst, and I will make sure that you and all your friends in the Superstar Daycare are safe and sound.

"That's my job, after all."

Chapter Text

Gregory groans softly, eyes blinking open slowly. He remembers parting ways with Freddy at the Prize Counter (apparently something in his programming kept him from entering certain areas? Lame.) and making his way to the emergency exit, only to find that it was, for some insane reason, for VIP guests only? He had relayed that back to Freddy, with the bear saying that he would report it to management as a safety issue, and started to make his way back--

He drops his head into his hands and cusses under his breath. He got startled by a Map Bot at the elevator on his way back to his guardian and the Creepy Security Guard caught him.

"Where am I?" he muses aloud, half-hoping that one of his new friends is close by and will just happen to hear him. It looks almost like a junk room with a security desk in it, the monitors above the desk all showing different areas of the Pizzaplex. Gregory moves a bit closer, hoping to catch a glimpse of a friendly face on the screens (although that's not likely, he's sure that the Daycare Gang left through the vents for the purpose of avoiding all cameras, and who knows where Freddy is...), but jerks backward when they all flicker to a different close-up view of Creepy Security Guard.

"I'll bet you think you're real clever, Gregory," she says, sounding annoyed; honestly, he's just surprised she's left him here instead of doing whatever it was she was intending by dragging him off before closing. "Yeah, I know your name. You're in big trouble, mister! This is not the night to be wasting my time."

Gregory can't help rolling his eyes. Doesn't she know she's wasting his time? He could have been well on his way out by now if it wasn't for her!

"So, you are going to wait right there in Lost and Found until your parents or the police arrive!" Creepy Security Guard continues, and he honestly is about to reply joke's on you, lady, I don't even have parents...

Then the screen glitches out and that weird bunny lady he's positive he spotted while he and Freddy took a quick recharge stop before heading to the Prize Counter takes Creepy Security Guard's place.

"Are you having fun yet?" Bunny Lady asks, her voice sounding more mechanized than any of the four animatronics he's befriended this evening. It sends a chill down his back, and something in the back of his mind starts screaming danger danger run run run.

Since this is apparently the Lost and Found, Gregory begins quickly digging through one of the boxes closest to him in hopes of finding something to get him the hell out of here. He somehow manages to find a screwdriver (who loses a screwdriver at a mall? And why would it wind up in Lost and Found instead of being taken to a maintenance closet or something?) and gives about three seconds' thought to trying to take the knob off the door before spotting the vent.

Unlike some of the others he's come across so far, this one is still latched into place with the three out of four screws. He's quick to remove them, a buzzing sound coming from somewhere outside this office, and when he takes a quick glance towards the window he can see Bunny Lady waving at him through the window.

"Fuck!" he hisses, yanking the cover from the vent and scrambling through it as Bunny Lady moves towards the door. Thankfully it's a short trip, just through the wall, and he's able to kick his way through the other vent cover and slip out into the atrium. He didn't realize how close he was to the exits again, even if they're locked up tight, and rather than ponder on that much further, he takes off across the lobby. The elevator is pretty close by, and if he can get there then maybe he can get back up to the second floor and find Freddy.

He gets into the elevator and pushes the button to ascend, catching sight of Bunny Lady skipping her way across the lobby her own self before the doors slide shut. Gregory lets out a sigh of relief and lifts his Fazwatch to call Freddy--

--only to scream as the vent at the top of the elevator opens. He's answered by another shriek and a raspy cackle, both of which he recognizes.

"Sunrise! Moonlight! You scared me!" Gregory says, trying to sound stern but probably failing given that Moonlight just keeps laughing.

"Sorry, sunshine!" Sunrise replies, but only after turning slightly to smack her brother on the back of his head; the lunar animatronic lets out a burst of static but finally ceases his snickering. "We didn't mean to frighten you, not at all!"

Even as she speaks, she lowers herself into the elevator proper, dangling by her hands for a moment until Gregory shifts off to one side so she can drop down lightly. Moonlight follows a second later, only he comes through headfirst and lands on his hands before dropping into a seated position on the floor.

"We got a message from Fazbear," Moonlight adds, tilting his head almost the same way a cat would. "He's at Roxy Raceway for some reason. Starburst already went to find him, sent us to make sure you're okay."

Gregory is both grateful and annoyed, because he could have definitely used an assist just a few minutes ago. "I'm fine now," he says, "but that creepy security guard caught me and then this weird Bunny Lady came after me!"

The twins' eyelights flicker for a moment, as if they're blinking their immobile eyes, then turn to look at each other before returning their attention to the boy. "But... there isn't any bunny in the Pizzaplex," Sunrise says, her tone sad and wistful. "Not for the past six months or so."

"You sound just like Freddy! I saw her! I think she's working with the Creepy Security Guard!"

"Vanessa has been acting strange lately, Sunny," Moonlight remarks softly; the solar animatronic nods in agreement. Both fall silent as the door slides open, and the trio carefully make their way out into the second floor atrium. Through unspoken agreement, they keep to the shadows as much as possible, both animatronics' eyes lit up red as they track every camera on the floor. Gregory likewise keeps an eye out, grasping Sunrise's hand with his own even as he watches the cameras.

"Chica's over near El Chip's," he says softly, "but I don't see anyone near Roxy Raceway."

The twins don't speak, but the solar animatronic quickly scoops him up in her arms and the pair of them dart from where they'd ducked behind a photo booth to reach the gate leading into the currently-closed attraction. Gregory takes note of all the construction barriers and equipment, and realizes that the attraction is actually closed to the public closed rather than closed for the night closed like he'd been thinking. There are no cameras that he can access in here, apparently, so he shuts off his watch and nudges Sunrise to set him down.

"We'll have to go over the fence to get inside," Moonlight says softly. "Should be simple enough. So long as the Security Bots aren't trying to patrol here. They might alert someone if we're seen."

"Then we won't be seen," Sunrise replies. "Up and over, you go first, I give Gregory a boost, then my turn."

Better than trying to find some way to climb over on my own, the boy thinks, trusting his friends to keep them all out of sight and safe until they regroup with the others.

Starburst trusts his siblings. Really, he does! That's not the reason why he has checked the cameras twice to make sure that they're keeping out of sight. All three of them are programmed to do security sweeps in one manner or another, and he knows that they'll do everything they can to keep Gregory safe once they've found him again.

He keeps checking the cameras (third time now, there's Gregory dashing across the main lobby, the twins should get to him soon, but what's he fleeing from?) because something in his programming is convinced that while the Glamrocks are acting off, it's a matter of life or death to know where they are at all times in relation to Sunrise and Moonlight.

(--IT'S ME IT'S ME IT'S ME keeps pounding in his head, and he winces despite not really registering it as painful, and there's a rabbit at one door and a chicken at that other, and he shuts them firmly, and he tries to tell them he's sorry, he's so so sorry, he couldn't stop him but he'll make sure it doesn't happen again, and he's so sorry he failed at being a brother, but he hasn't, or has he?--)

Starburst shakes his head, letting out a burst of static at the odd memory glitch and presses on, slipping out of the vent once he's inside Roxy Raceway. The place has been under construction for over a month now, changing from the original attraction of Roxy's Glamrock Salon to the raceway to draw in a more even audience of boys and girls of all ages. Before that, way back when the Pizzaplex first opened, it had been Foxy's Pirate Adventure; it had been something like FazerBlast only more of a paintball attraction than laser tag.

That had closed after Foxy's reformat, and it's oddly thoughtful of Fazbear Entertainment to allow the canine animatronic to maintain the same space as she had in her previous iteration.

The puppet lands lightly on his feet and hands, switching over to night vision in order to look around a bit better. There is some light, sporadic and dim as it is, and this allows for him to spot Fazbear that much faster.

The larger animatronic is sprawled on the ground behind some crates, obviously trying to keep out of sight but very clearly glitching. Starburst worries for a moment that the Safe Mode has disengaged, meaning that the bear could be dangerous, and he approaches with extreme caution. Once he's close enough to cut his vision back to normal, he realizes that Fazbear seems to be in Low Power Mode.

"What did you do?"

The bear's voice box glitches as he replies, "I mi-missed the hourly rech-charge trying to fiiiiiiiind Gregory."

Starburst thinks that if he was capable of changing his facial expression, his left eye would be twitching as he glares daggers at the other. "You're a fucking idiot."

"L-l-lang-guage," Fazbear scolds, and a pair of snickers behind him is a sure sign that the twins have arrived. The worried cry of Freddy confirms that they did indeed locate Gregory. "Greg-gory, I'm glad you are sa-a-a-afe. I prob-b-bly need to recharge--"

"Nope," the puppet animatronic says, eyes flashing brighter purple for a moment as he crosses his arms. "You are going nowhere except for Parts and Services. You need a battery upgrade if you insist on not properly charging."

"How do we get there?" Gregory asks, pushing at Sunrise's arms until she sets him down on the floor, allowing him to rush over next to Fazbear. "Is it far?"

"U-u-usually the stag-g-g-g-ge lowers us there," Fazbear replies. Moonlight makes an amused sound.

"Inconvenient," he says, tilting his head so far to the left it rotates all the way around. "There's tunnels behind all the attractions, we can get there from here easily."

Starburst nods, moving to help the bear animatronic get to his feet. "We can help you get there, then we can figure out the upgrade."

Moonlight slips over to Fazbear's other side, and the three animatronics begin making their way to the maintenance door at the back of Roxy's attraction. The path takes them past the still-standing Glamrock Salon, although how much longer that remains the case is unknown to any of the group. Sunrise and Gregory follow closely, the boy riding piggyback so that they can all move that little bit faster. Even in Low Power Mode, Fazbear is still moving quicker than a human could manage.

It takes little time to get through the tunnels just outside of Parts and Services, and Starburst automatically checks the cameras before they can walk into the room. As he catches sight of who is within, he comes to a halt and waves for the others to stop.

He keeps his attention on what he's seeing, unease drifting through his circuits. Vanessa seems to be talking to someone, but he doesn't have audio and can only go by the way she's gesturing to the air. She doesn't stay for much longer, seeming to deflate upon herself and give a weary nod before straightening her back. The Night Guard heads for the doorway leading to the green room elevators, the automatic door sliding shut behind her.

Starburst waits a few more seconds before nodding. "Clear," he says, although his frown is clear in his voice. "Anyone know why the hell Vanessa would have come to Parts and Services?"

Nobody replies, because they all know the answer: there is no reason for her to be down here.

Chapter Text

As the animatronics move towards the weird cylinder thing in the middle of the room, Gregory slips down from Sunrise's back and wanders around, taking in everything. It's clean, for one thing, save for some clutter on the tables along the wall. There's so much gleaming metal that it seems to be a completely separate world from the pizzaplex upstairs. Even the clutter seems to fit in, bundles of wires and tools tossed haphazardly and logbooks with notes scribbled in them when he grows curious enough to take a peek at one.

Whoa, he muses as he flips the pages, glancing at equations and notations that don't really mean much to him, there's so much that goes into these guys. It's all just coding and programming, but it makes them seem so alive!

When he turns back around, Freddy has been settled onto a bed-like bench inside the cylinder and both the daycare animatronics have stepped back outside. Starburst is standing in front of a computer, his long fingers practically dancing over the keyboard as he searches for something. Probably the power upgrade he mentioned before they headed down here.

Gregory walks over and stands next to the puppet animatronic as the automated system starts speaking: "Welcome to the Parts and Services Upgrade System. Please enter your username and password to continue." Starburst types in mafton_admin and what looks to the boy like a string of gibberish, then the voice returns after a moment. "Welcome: Eggs Benedict. Please choose your upgrade from the menu on screen now."

"That's not a name," Gregory protests. "Who would name someone Eggs?"

Starburst lets out a small laugh. "That's how the program recognizes my creator. I think he input it that way as some sort of a joke. I can't ask him about that, though, but I can still use his credentials."

Even while speaking, the marionette selects options to upgrade Freddy's power supply and it looks like he adds on a hearing upgrade as well. That makes sense to the boy; if they can gain any advantages aside from Starburst's camera access and the twins' ability to traverse by climbing the walls and using wires, he's all for it!

"Thank you for selecting: Power Upgrade and Enhanced Hearing. Please enter the protective cylinder to begin the upgrade procedure," the system says. "Please remember that the protective cylinder is engaged to protect all essential personnel outside the cylinder. Animatronic safety features are now disengaged. Please seal the protective cylinder."

Gregory blinks as Starburst casually slips into the cylinder, the door sliding shut behind him, and begins working through the upgrade tasks. "Isn't it... you know... dangerous to turn off safety features during maintenance?"

The twins' eyelights flicker in that 'blinking' manner again. "I... suppose?" Moonlight says, definitely phrasing it like a question. It's as if he doesn't process that humans are fragile and breakable when compared to himself with his metal frame.

"Maybe, but I think that's normal for the company," Sunrise adds with a shrug. She seems a tiny bit more aware of the issue than her twin, but is still a bit too nonchalant for Gregory's tastes.

He takes a slight step away from them and closer to the computer. "Okay..." he replies slowly, turning to watch as Starburst continues working on Freddy. As if he'd needed a reminder that despite how friendly and almost human they act, the fact remains that they're all still machines.

(It's a little sad, though: four machines have shown more care for him in the past three hours than most humans have shown him in the past two years.)

It's maybe another fifteen minutes before Starburst finishes the upgrades to Freddy, taking a step back and running through a quick test before nodding to himself and exiting the cylinder. The automated system cheerfully informs them that the animatronic safety features are now online, and it's another several seconds before the bear reboots completely and exits under his own power.

"Freddy!" Gregory cries cheerfully, rushing over to him and offering a grin. "How are you feeling?"

The bear tilts his head and seems to think it over for a moment before replying, "Much better. My power levels seem to be holding at a much steadier rate than they had been. Also, I think I can hear Chica close by calling for you. Would you like to hide in my stomach hatch?"

The other three animatronics seem to frown, the puppet's eyes turning white as he checks the cameras again, while Gregory does frown. "I can't hear anything," he says; both Sunrise and Moonlight shake their heads to indicate that they don't hear anything out of the ordinary either.

Starburst lets out a hum as his eyes switch back to purple. "She is two rooms and about two hundred feet away from our location," he says. "It seems that the hearing upgrade I installed in you will act as an early warning for all of us going forward."

"How were you able to do that? Only technicians can upgrade any of us."

"My creator's access still works. I've used it on myself and the twins to boost our security protocols."

Freddy sputters a bit, staring at the marionette animatronic who just stares back at him. He understands on some level that the three daycare animatronics run on their own set of protocols and standards, but he honestly had expected the eldest of the trio to... act more rationally?

Although why he thought that is a mystery: in the past few hours that he has actually known them, every single one of them has used non-child-friendly language, laughed over the strangest things, and admitted that they've hacked their own systems to improve their performance. And by all accounts for each thing, Starburst has either been the ringleader or turned a blind eye to his siblings' behavior.

...well, maybe not a complete blind eye; even when they had been climbing all over the play structure in the daycare in their quest to restore power, the puppet had been half-turned their way the entire time. Almost as if he trusts them completely, but has to reassure himself that they are safe and whole.

It's the twins' giggling that breaks him from his stunned state. "That is definitely against the rules! Only current Fazbear Entertainment personnel's access should work in the pizzaplex. How are you even managing that?"

Starburst effects a shrug, both shoulders raising along with his hands held palms upward, head tilted to the left. "Don't know," he adds aloud. "I just suppose that the company never marked him as deceased so his information still works."

Freddy opens his mouth to speak only to close it again. He has heard rumors, usually from the staff talking amongst themselves, about some of the more recent history of the company. He is aware that it was several years between the last time he was active and the pizzaplex opening, and that he and his friends were all in storage during that time. It had been unnerving, to come back online and hear the humans whispering about the last founder being involved in a murder/suicide, because he remembers Mister Henry.

The man he remembers had been kind but broken, formerly full of good cheer but then becoming sad. His daughter had... oh, yes, Mister Henry's daughter had died and become attached to the Marionette that he remembers best, not the one currently roaming the pizzaplex. That was before the other children came, but Mister Henry had no way of knowing that Charlotte was still around at that time.

No, Freddy is more inclined to believe that Mister William would murder a child (and knows he did so, but he cannot tell that to anyone) than to accept that Mister Henry was capable of violence. And he certainly finds it hard to believe that Mister Henry would kill the only remaining heir of the founders.

But the rumors also say that Michael Afton, the man everyone seems to believe Mister Henry murdered before killing himself, is the person who built Security Marionette Star. Which means that Starburst is using probably the highest credentials in the company outside of Mister Henry or Mister William (if he had not... gone missing, oh yes, Freddy remembers Mister William's disappearance fondly, and hopes that he is still rotting in some forgotten warehouse) in order to hack every system he wishes to access.

Instead of arguing further, the bear simply nods and makes a sound much like clearing his throat. "I will pretend that I did not understand any of that," he says, ignoring the twins' giggling at his response. "We should probably find our way to someplace safe, either back to the daycare or to my greenroom. If we are careful, we should be able to avoid the others."

"Hey, check this out!" Gregory calls from over near the whiteboards along the wall.

The four animatronics wander over, Freddy blinking at the notes on the three separate boards. They seem to be regarding the upgrades that his friends received not too long ago, between two weeks and a month; his own upgrades that Starburst went ahead and installed were supposed to be installed in a few days.

"Chica's got a special voice box, Roxy has new eyes, Monty has super-strong claws... if we can get hold of these, then we can upgrade Freddy even further!"

Gregory sounds excited about the prospect, but Freddy is not so certain. From the way that Sunrise steps behind Moonlight and Starburst crosses his arms, the daycare siblings are likewise unsure of that plan.

"Gregory..." the bear says carefully, "I know that they are not acting themselves, but those are my friends. I cannot take their upgrades; I do not want to hurt them."

"They've been chasing me around all night!" the boy replies, muttering under his breath, "They get what they deserve."

"Safe Mode," Moonlight says abruptly, standing up straight and whipping his head around to look at his elder brother. "Stars, if we can get them into Safe Mode, do you think--"

Starburst tilts his head, eyelights blinking out briefly as if he has closed his eyes in thought, before nodding slowly. "If we can force Chica, Roxanne, and Montgomery into Safe Mode, it's likely that their antivirus programs will fight off whatever it is that is making them act the way they are. It worked on you, Moony, and it's been effective in Sunny, Fazbear, and myself. If that doesn't work, well...

"I suppose if that's the case, then we'll go with Gregory's plan."

Chapter Text

After evaluating the risks involved in regards to each of the other three Glamrocks, they decide that Chica should be the first one that they attempt to reboot. The notes on her upgrade say that she can scramble other animatronics if she uses her voice box at a certain register... which explains why she doesn't sing anymore. The older children, those who sometimes opt out of visiting the daycare but do like to visit Kids Cove, had been talking about that fairly recently; one of their regular girls had wanted the chicken to sing at her birthday party but her family was told it wasn't possible.

But no matter; Starburst knows how to approach potentially dangerous situations with caution.

Which is why he is currently stalking his way through the kitchen, staying close to the walls and keeping Chica in sight. He's only checked the cameras once, to verify the other's location and to make sure that the other two are nowhere close by. Moonlight went off with Fazbear to distract Roxanne and Montgomery, so his primary backup is Sunrise; Gregory calls himself 'helping,' but honestly it's more that Starburst and his siblings want to make sure the child is accounted for at all times.

Especially since his recommendation for getting Chica alone was to try and get her to walk into the garbage compactor. That boy is hellbent and determined to get some revenge for being chased around part of the night.

The marionette doesn't begrudge him of that... but he is going to do his best to redirect that vengefulness in the proper direction.

"What is she doing?" Gregory's voice comes through his internal communications panel, and Starburst manages to keep an amused giggle to himself. "You guys are robots, I don't get why she keeps trying to eat things!"

"It's in her programming," Sunrise is quick to explain. "A lot of younger kids like for the main four to share their cake and pizza sometimes, so management is slowly retrofitting them with a storage compartment for food they 'eat.' Chica's the only one with the programming and retrofit right now, but..."

Starburst tunes out their conversation, opting instead to watch the chicken animatronic's movements. She's staggering around in a manner very different from what he's spotted through the cameras in the past. The animatronics are all technically supposed to remain in their designated areas at night -- the Glamrocks in their greenrooms, the Security Bots on their floors, the Map Bots in their docking stations by the elevators, and so forth -- but the puppet has more than once watched the main four slip from their rooms and go into the attractions. He's watched them all play Fazerblast and Gator Golf, and he's more than once caught Chica heading into these very kitchens to check on the prep work for the next day; sometimes he's seen her make up batches of pizza dough and frosting for cupcakes before skipping off to another part of the pizzaplex.

And that's the thing: Chica is energetic. He's positive that if any animatronic in this building can keep up with him and his siblings, it's the bundle of feathery sunshine.

Right now, she looks like a zombie shuffling around. Like she remembers how to walk, but she can't process how it's done.

(Get up, get up, back on your feet, one in front of the other, slowly, careful, don't know what damage they did, they did enough damage going in and they probably did more coming out, but he's himself again, he's not watching and wondering why he's not dead--)

The puppet animatronic steps carefully away from the wall, following Chica as she stumbles her way from the walk-in freezer to the compactor, seeming to be searching for something. His eyelights blink out for a moment when he realizes she's tracked down some of that Monty's Mystery Mix that the staff was supposed to be disposing of. Apparently they'd tossed it into the compactor and didn't check to make sure that it went down the chute properly.

Looks like the kid's got his wish after all, Starburst thinks to himself, giving himself a little shake as he watches the chicken drop to her knees and start shoveling handfuls of the semi-frozen mix into her beak. The emergency shutdown button is located right where her neck meets her torso, the same place it is on all of the animatronics built by Fazbear Entertainment, and is not easy to accidentally press.

Which is why he's the one who's stepping up to force the remaining Glamrocks into Safe Mode: his tapered fingers can hit that button easily, and he's strong enough to hold onto a struggling animatronic that outweighs him by at least fifty pounds. He's already had to do it to his own brother--

(Moonlight just stops abruptly and then twitches, his head angling towards the child shrieking in laughter close by, his fingers flicker in a way that looks wrong, and Starburst is out of his box and across the room, throwing himself at his little brother's midsection to knock him off balance, and he's got one arm around Moony's waist while trying to get to his reset button with the other, and Moony's fighting him, snarling and sounding like a wild animal, and now Sunrise is here to pin down the other arm, she's practically sobbing for their brother to stop it, stop, let Starry help you goddammit, and his black fingertip finds the button and presses hard--)

--and he will damn well do it to the Glamrocks without hesitation.

Starburst eases himself into a crouch, watching Chica closely for any sign that she's about to get to her feet, then he pounces.

The chicken lets out a startled squawk and throws her hands onto the ground, catching herself and keeping both of them from sliding further into the compactor. The marionette wraps himself around her and digs in his talons, hanging on tightly as Chica does her best to throw him off of herself. The struggle thankfully gets them out of the danger zone, but she manages to smack face-first against the edge as she flings herself about.

It takes a moment, and he feels his back connect to a wall hard during the struggle, but Starburst manages to dig his fingers into the correct seam, presses down on the button and holds it until he hears the tell-tale hum of a system shutdown. Only when Chica starts to drop to the floor does he unwind himself from around her torso, carefully settling the chicken on the ground and taking a step back.

Sunrise slips out of the vent just off to the right of the compactor, turning and helping Gregory climb out as well. "That looked pretty rough, Starry," she remarks, a frown in her voice. "Are you okay? I thought that you got hit there for a second."

"I'm fine," Starburst replies, walking over to the wall and bending down to pick up Chica's beak. He didn't notice that it got knocked off during their struggle, so they're going to have to haul her off to Parts and Services to do a quick repair job.

There's something almost familiar, though, as he turns to the downed animatronic and sees the poor thing's damaged face. Like he's seen a similar sight before, and it makes his circuits snap uncomfortably.

The sooner she's fixed, the better.

He'll worry about the weird memory file glitches later, when everyone is safe.

Gregory takes it upon himself to tell Freddy and Moonlight that they've successfully reset Chica, and he's not surprised when the two arrive in Parts and Services maybe five minutes after Starburst gets Chica into the maintenance cylinder. Freddy is quick to move as close as he can, obviously concerned about the other animatronic once he sees her damage.

For his part, the boy feels equal parts elated and guilty. Yeah, he wanted the animatronics who have been chasing him so much to suffer, but all he can think is that it must hurt an awful lot to have a part of yourself ripped away. Even if she had caused the damage to her own self while fighting to escape Starburst.

He's also concerned for the puppet himself. Despite that painted-on smile, Starburst had taken a pretty hard whack his own self during that struggle, and Gregory is pretty sure that the animatronic had been limping a little as he and Sunrise carried Chica back here. Plus he's been more quiet than the boy has grown accustomed to, not really saying much since forcing the chicken to reboot.

Moonlight picks up on his mood and drops one hand onto his head, ruffling his hair. "What's wrong, starlight?" he asks, voice low and soothing.

"I think Starburst got hurt," Gregory replies in kind, absently noting that Sunrise has slipped up next to them and is now resting her own hand lightly on his shoulder. "And he's really quiet, too. He didn't say much of anything while we were coming back."

Neither of the twins says anything for a moment, and he assumes they're talking over their message system. Then Sunrise's hand squeezes his shoulder gently, just a bit of pressure, and it's oddly comforting.

"I think," she says softly, "that Starry might have had a memory glitch hit while he was handling Chica. They happen sometimes... to all three of us. We never know what's going to cause them, but they're... um, they're unsettling at best."

"More so because our AIs are new," Moonlight adds, his hand still resting on the top of Gregory's head. "Stars, I can understand him having them from time to time, he was built before either of us, and his previous restaurant burnt to the ground. That had to have caused some trauma--" and isn't it weird, listening to an animatronic talk about trauma? "--but some of his glitches don't even involve that location.

"We talk about them, sometimes," he continues. "Especially the bad ones. And the weird thing about them is that they seem like someone else's memory files."

Gregory knows he shouldn't ask. He does it anyway: "What kind of memories?"

"Guard rotations. Somewhat like we do now, but not...? More like how Stars watches the cameras but I'm doing it instead. And I get... damaged sometimes. But then it ends and I'm home and safe," Moonlight offers, one shoulder lifting in a shrug.

"Same thing, only..." Sunrise says slowly, "sometimes I feel like I'm talking to a friend who was harmed, and I don't think he's going to be okay. I don't know where those memories come from, but they're better than most of them."

Gregory just nods, and he leans into the two Daycare Attendants. They let him, holding him up while they all wait for Chica's repairs to finalize and to find out if the reset actually worked.

Chapter Text

The first thing she's aware of upon coming back online is the message blinking in her line of sight just before her eyes boot up: Safe Mode Activated. One (1) Virus Deleted From Systems. Then, once she can actually see anything again, she's a little confused to find herself inside Parts and Services' maintenance cylinder, especially since the last thing she recalls clearly is absolutely shredding it in her greenroom around 11:30 or so.

"Wha--" she starts to say, cycling her voice box when her tone has a bit too much squawk, "what happened? How'd I get here?"

She carefully pushes herself up, that off feeling still lingering, and realizes two things: that the door to the cylinder has cycled open, and that Freddy (who last she'd seen was taken back to his greenroom while still offline) is waiting for her looking oddly relieved. Deciding that maybe she can get answers sooner if she actually asks someone directly, Chica climbs down from the bench and walks out to join her friend.

For some reason, the Daycare Crew is also hovering around. Sun and Moon are leaning on one another with a child (what the cluck is a child doing loose in the pizzaplex at this time of night??) while Star is standing next to them, his eyes glowing white as he taps an absent tune on his arm. She doesn't have time to process much beyond that since Freddy sweeps her up into a Big Bear Hug the second her feet touch the floor outside the cylinder.

"Chica! You are back to normal again!"

"I guess...?" she replies, letting her confusion color her tone. "Freddy, what happened? I don't remember leaving my greenroom, and you were offline after crashing during the show, and now we're in P and S--" Chica checks her internal clock "--and somehow, it's 1:30 in the morning!"

Her friend gives her a long look before sighing. "There is... something very wrong happening here, Chica. Somehow there is a virus loose that was causing you to act out of character. It is still infecting our friends. Secur--Starburst had to put you into Safe Mode so that your antivirus could deal with it."

The chicken notes the way Freddy corrected himself in the middle there, and glances towards the Daycare Crew. She's pretty quick to decide that Starburst is probably the correct name for Marionette Star, and it's a good guess that Attendants Sun and Moon have different names too. She'll have to find out a way to learn them, either by being subtle and listening or just asking what they want to be called.

"We're guessing that it was uploaded through the pizzaplex wifi and attacked any animatronic connected to the system," Sun offers up, shooting a look towards her brother. "All three of us have been in Safe Mode for almost two weeks now, so that's why we weren't affected."

"And Fazbear has been in safe mode since he rebooted," Starburst adds, eyes shifting to the purple that Chica assumes is his default (she doesn't really know for sure, she's never spent a lot of time around the Superstar Daycare; all she really knows is that all the Daycare Crew are brothers and sister and that Sun is the only other female animatronic in the building aside from herself and Roxy). "Now that you're running in Safe Mode, and don't seem inclined to kill the kid here, it looks like our theory about how to combat the virus is sound."

Chica tilts her head and frowns a bit. "So... what's the plan? Knock Roxy and Monty into Safe Mode, and then what?"

"One thing at a time," the marionette replies. "First we see about getting the rest of your Glamrock Gang back to their normal selves. Then we can decide if the next move is keep Gregory--" oh, that must be the kid! "--hidden away in the daycare until the doors open at 6:00 or find out what the fuck is up with Vanessa and if she's involved in all this bullshit in any way."

"Officer Starburst!" Freddy scolds even as the twins and the boy start laughing, and Chica feels her beak drop open in surprise. She had, honestly, not been aware that anyone could bypass the profanity filter, but she's almost impressed despite herself.

...maybe she'll see if he can turn hers off later. It might be nice to use actual Adult Language sometimes rather than this clucking Family Friendly crap.

After a little bit of discussion, they split off once more into two groups. The first group consists of Freddy, Chica, and Gregory, who are tasked with hitting Fazer Blast to get a Fazerblaster for the kid to use against any rogue animatronics that come his way. That will absolutely work on Roxy as well, but not so much on Monty with his sunglasses. Never mind that Bonnie used to wear a similar pair, everyone knows that the bunny and the alligator were damned near joined at the hip from the second the latter came online, and Bonnie's first act of friendship was to get them matching shades.

The second group is, of course, Moonlight and his siblings, who are heading into Monty's Gator Golf to snatch one of those confiscated Fazcams. Which will also work a treat against rogue animatronics, and hit more of them at once to boot. The only real problem with their plan is that Monty always knows when someone is in his attraction, and could show up with little to no warning.

Hence why the Daycare Crew is going there and not Gregory. The three of them have a much better chance of avoiding the gator or fighting back should he catch any of them than a ridiculously tiny ten year old human child.

Moonlight lets his eyes cycle into Security Mode the second they enter the attraction, resisting the urge to scale the walls up into the catwalk above. He's more comfortable in the high places, and if it were possible to call his wire within the attractions that's how he would be approaching this scenario. Unfortunately, there's no real reason for any of them to be outside of their official patrol zones, so 'flying' around is a no-go.

From off to the side he sees Sunrise falter for a moment before snapping back to attention and frowns mentally. It looks like her Sleep Mode just tried to cycle on again, and he takes a moment to mentally curse the technicians for leaving that defunct bit of code in his sister's programming. Moonlight understands, to some extent, why Sunny has it hardwired into her to drop into Sleep Mode when the lighting drops below a certain level, as it's helpful for one of the attendants to be 'sleeping' during Nap Time as well to convince the more reluctant children that it's safe to do so themselves; but it's a total garbage piece of programming when they're both coded to do security sweeps!

All an intelligent crook would have to do to bypass Sunrise is abruptly turn off all the lights in her vicinity and wait until her programming caused her to crash where she stands.

"Stupid fucking code," said sun-themed sister grumbles to herself, and Starburst turns to face her. "I really shouldn't be asking this, but--"

"I'm deleting that line of code the second we get back to Parts and Services," their brother replies immediately, sounding just as frustrated as Sunrise likely is. "You can fake a nap well enough for the younger kids, and the older kids just go to Kids Cove anyway during Quiet Hour. For right now, stick close to one of us, okay?"

Reassured that they will take care of this programming problem once and for all, Moonlight turns his attention to scanning the room. He's never really been in this attraction before, none of the siblings have, and he's surprised by the size of the indoor golf course. The air is filled with the sound of mechanized alligators chuffing and the low lighting makes it feel like what he would imagine a swamp would feel like. The artwork on the walls depicts the theme that Fazbear Entertainment chose for Montgomery: The Bad Boy Rebel Who Wants to Lead the Band.

Honestly, what he's seen most of the time on his patrols has been an animatronic that keeps to himself, only had one close friend, and who would prefer to lock himself away and wreck his own room than to take any frustration out on others. Nothing like the persona he puts on during opening hours, and definitely nothing like how he's been acting all night.

Seriously, fuck this Bunny Lady and fuck Vanessa for letting it happen on her watch!

The security office is pretty easy to spot once they start looking for it, and Starburst gives the two of them a nod before making his way to the door. It beeps and slides open for his clearance (at last, something going their way tonight!) and the puppet steps inside to search for any Fazcams.

The ambient noise of the golf course means that Moonlight doesn't realize they've been discovered until Sunrise lets out a startled cry and grips his arm.

The moon-themed animatronic whirls around just in time to see Montgomery charging at the pair of them, bellowing in rage at the perceived invasion of his territory. Sunny jumps one way and Moony the other, both narrowly avoiding being caught by the gator's claws. Unfortunately, Montgomery is really fucking fast, and he whirls around quickly enough to slash across the sun-themed animatronic's back.

His sister lets out a burst of static before flinging herself to the ground and rolling, avoiding the gator's leap towards her. Moonlight is quick to take the offensive, launching himself at the bassist and digging his fingers into the seams of his plating. True, his fingertips aren't as narrow as Starburst's, but he can start yanking panels aside to make it easier to access the other's reset button. He can hear his siblings both shouting at him, the marionette having dashed from the office at the commotion, but he can only make out sunglasses and camera flash over the sound of the broader animatronic's roaring.

The world tilts on its axis abruptly, nearly knocking him to the ground, and he realizes a moment too late that apparently Fazbear Entertainment actually programmed their crocodilian-themed animatronic to fucking death roll. Moonlight lets go and shoves himself away, fingers grabbing for those star-framed sunglasses, and sees a mouthful of teeth within striking distance of his face--

(--and he can't actually see it but he feels it, sharp metal teeth snapping shut and digging deep into flesh and cracking his skull open, and he hears his own screams and others are screaming, and it hurts it hurts get it off get it OFF--)

--and throws his left arm up across his face. A shriek escapes his voice box as the gator's teeth break through the plating, and he honestly fears that his brother is going to have to reattach his goddamn arm along with repairing the gashes in Sunrise's back plating before he hears his sister yell at him again.

This time, he hears and understands what she's telling him: "Lights on!!"

Moonlight completely cuts off his eyes, the LEDs going dark as he hears the hum and snap of a camera flash going off. Montgomery bellows, teeth releasing his arm, and the lanky animatronic wastes no time scrambling away. He's doing it down one arm, which is hanging limply at his side, but he's able to get away and cut his eyes back on again before the gator even has time to being recovering.

And he won't be getting it, because Starburst throws the Fazcam aside and pounces on the stunned animatronic. It takes maybe five seconds for him to finish tearing aside the paneling that Moonlight had started on and practically punches the reset button. Montgomery drops like a stone; Starburst lets him hit the ground in favor of checking on the twins.

"I'm fine," Sunrise insists, like a liar. "Moony's got worse damage. Your arm..."

Moonlight lets out a hysterical giggle. "At least it wasn't my face."

From the shift in his siblings' body language, he realizes that he must have let something slip. Damn these memory glitches, they always seem to pick the worst times to come out. The last time he had one nearly on this level was when he came back online in Safe Mode; it had taken hours for him to let his twin and older brother comfort him in the aftermath, and nearly a full day for him to be willing to venture out into the daycare while there were children around.

Maybe, after all this is over with, Starburst can see if there's a way to get those to stop as easily as he can remove Sunrise's Sleep Mode Protocol.

Chapter Text

Sunrise is insistent that Moonlight gets his repairs done first. Thankfully Starburst is in agreement, so despite her twin's protesting that he's fine, he's just a little punch drunk, he's the first one into the cylinder and onto the bench for repairs while she sits next to their brother on the floor as he types away at the keyboard.

Yes, her back aches from where Monty's claws caught and rended the metal plates, and she can feel a couple of loose wires sparking, but she can still move just fine. But... but poor Moony got flung into a memory glitch during that fight, his hysterical giggling in the aftermath and his phrasing a testament to that, and if they can get him back to fully functional that much faster then maybe he can bury it away until there's time enough to muse over it.

(There's never time to muse on those glitches; all three of them just push them aside and ignore them, talking a little about them much, much later and then just ignoring them again. Whatever causes them doesn't seem to be consistent, and unless they start being consistent then there's no way Starry can just delete that shit from their processors...)

Sunrise sighs, leaning her head against Starburst's hip as he works on their baby brother's repairs. The elder moves one hand to rest on top of her head, still typing with his left hand, fingers smoothing across her rays in a way that silently says I'm here, I'm not going anywhere, you'll always have me.

And she appreciates that. She loves that her brothers have always been by her side, Starburst standing outside the activation pods when the twins came online with one hand resting over each of their windows and Moonlight clicking to life a fraction of a second after she became aware of the world for the first time. She's never been without her brothers, always tagging along for any repairs and knowing that they're both waiting whenever it's her turn for maintenance. She's never had to be lonely for them, but sometimes she wakes up from recharging and needs to check, needs to reassure herself that they're both still there, because she can't shake the feeling that Bad Things will happen if she's alone--

(--the lights have gone out, and it's one minute til the end of the shift, and the Toreador March is playing from right outside the door, and he can't breathe can't breathe can't breathe, and he's going to die here and nobody will ever know because management will just cover it up and hire somebody new, and it's bullshit because he's only got tonight and tomorrow and Friday left--)

"Sunny, you're okay."

She lets her fans cycle air in slowly, cooling down systems that had started to overheat as her brother's fingers lightly scratch her head between her rays. That was the start of a bad one, a sure prelude to a Rainy Day, and definitely not what any of them need right now. Not with how the night is going.

"It's been a bad night here," she says softly, leaning further into her elder brother and letting him support her. The words are familiar, like she's spoken them before, and maybe she has. Bad nights come and they go, and sometimes they bring the glitches with them.

Starburst's fingers twitch for a moment before settling back into the same soothing rhythm again. The siblings stay silent, supporting one another while their brother's repairs finish and the others in the room quietly discuss their next steps once the Daycare Crew and Monty are functional again.

Soon enough, Moonlight's repairs are finished up and there's no ready excuse for why she shouldn't get onto the bench; hell, all three of them are in the cylinder and won't even need to leave just yet! Even so, Sunrise hesitates. That last glitch was unsettling, and a glance outside to where Chica and Freddy are talking while Gregory looks like he's torn between wanting to stay with the literal Papa Bear and Mother Hen or come join the siblings does nothing to help.

In fact, something about Freddy Fazbear at the moment is frightening her.

"Sunny-bunny," Moonlight murmurs, his hands resting on her shoulders (and oh, thank whatever AI god there is that they're both functioning properly again), "you're okay. I'm here, Stars is here, nothing and nobody can harm you without going through either of us."

"I know," she replies just as softly, leaning into the touch before pushing herself to her feet. "Starry? Can you, um...?"

Her elder brother's shoulders shift slightly, and the action helps to ease her processor. "I can put you into standby mode while doing the repairs," he offers. "It'll probably be easier to get that Sleep Mode Protocol deleted if you aren't fully online."

"Thank you," Sunrise says, leaning in to wrap her arms around the marionette who returns the hug firmly. She can feel Moonlight's arms wrap around her waist as well, and takes a moment to just bask in the affection. She loves them so much, so much more than what could possibly just be programming, and she knows they love her just as fiercely in return.

After another minute more, she peels herself away and moves towards the table. After a moment's hesitation she lies on her front, arms curled up under her head and turning slightly to face her brothers. Starburst tilts his head questioningly, silently asking if she's ready. Sunrise gives the faintest hint of a nod and cycles her eyes offline.

And then--

(--he remembers why he hates hospitals, sitting on an uncomfortable chair and staring down at his hands. They still have Jeremy's who's Jeremy? how does she know that name? blood drying on them, but he can't bring himself to wash it away. There are people constantly moving around, nurses and doctors and orderlies and people visiting family and a handful of his own coworkers, but no one has told him anything yet. And fuck, fuck, he needs to call Fritz who's Fritz? that name isn't right, somehow, at least Jeremy feels almost right... and tell him to go on to the restaurant, to let himself in and cover the night shift. He should go do that now, but he can't make himself move until he hears something--)

--she's cycling back on with Moonlight next to her, one hand resting on her shoulder and looking so relieved that she finds herself making a confused sound as she pushes herself up to sit properly.

"You were twitching, Sunny," he tells her softly. "You were completely shut down but you were still twitching. Are you okay?"

She takes a moment to think, letting herself muse over the file that seems to have played while she was offline, before giving a small nod. "Another memory file glitch, but it wasn't as bad as it could have been. I picked up on some names this time."

Starburst, who has been standing just behind Moony, shifts forward to drape his hand around the back of her neck, squeezing slightly and leaving her flooded with warmth and contentment. "We can review them once this is all over, see if we can figure out who these people were to Fazbear Entertainment," he promises, because all they know for certain is these glitched memory files are connected to the company somehow. "For now, though, we need to get the gator up and running again."

She doesn't say anything as she gets back on her feet and heads for the door, but she still thinks that maybe Monty can stand to suffer with being slightly fucked up for a little while. Call it petty, but she is going to be holding a grudge for a very long time!

Coming online again is... weird. Especially because the lights are too bright and unfiltered, the world around him coming in full color and not tinted slightly lilac.

(It's probably stupid to keep them, to keep wearing them, because they aren't really his. But they're all that he can keep on him, and they're similar enough to the ones he used to wear that literally nobody has noticed this whole while...)

He takes a moment to assess his internal logs, and he's startled by the alerts. What happened to rend the plates on his back and wrench his jaw out of alignment? And a look at his visual logs from that time frame don't make any sense, because why in the world is he watching what looks to be a first-person horror clip of the two Daycare Attendants being attacked?

He cuts off the playback when he gets to the part where his POV moves towards Attendant Moon's face. If he decommissioned the other animatronic, then he should be in the process of being decommissioned his own self and not on the repair bench like he seems to be.

"He's awake," comes a voice off to his left. Oddly enough, it sounds like Moon.

Monty cycles some air through his vents and turns his head to see that his aural receptors are not playing tricks on him. It comes as no surprise, however, that the blue-toned animatronic is keeping a respectable distance from him. It hardly matters that the specs say that the Daycare Attendants are both somewhere around seven-and-a-quarter feet tall when Monty knows damned well that he outweighs literally every other animatronic in the building with the notable exception of the DJ.

If he'd been attacked by someone much bigger in every aspect but height, he would be keeping his distance, too.

"Good. Then he can be aware when I do this."

The words come from just behind him, and they are followed by a hard blow to the side of his head that causes his eyes to flicker and glitch out for a moment. When they come back online, it's to the sight of Attendant Sun standing there, her arms crossed over her chest and her eyes glaring despite the frozen smile on her faceplate.

"You. Are on thin fucking ice with me," she says, anger dripping from every word. "If it were up to me, we would have just locked you in a recharge booth until morning. You're lucky that both of my brothers are nicer than I am.

"Watch your back. You aren't getting another chance to tear mine apart."

"Okay, that's enough of that, Sunrise," comes the voice of the last member of the Superstar Daycare Animatronics, and Marionette Star leans around his taller sibling. He gives a small wave and a shrug. "I would say don't mind her, but the only reason I'm not holding you to full responsibility for what you did is because that nasty little virus seems to make everyone act like a monster."

Monty takes a moment to process that before nodding. "S'fair enough," he says, tone low and soft the way he prefers to keep it. He was originally programmed to stick to his attraction, to help kids learn to play mini-golf and do a couple brief performances around noon and six. Being the Bad Boy Rockstar wasn't in his coding, not until after The Accident. If it was left up to Monty, the main band would just be Freddy and Chica and Roxanne, while he stayed in Gator Golf and went back to his twice-daily performances and playing golf with the little ones.

Sun's eyes flicker out and back on in a blink, and her stance relaxes just a little bit. She takes a few steps back from the bench, giving the gator room to push himself up. It's clear that she doesn't trust him, and that's also fair; if he really did glitch out badly enough due to a virus (and hell's bells, his last clear memory file is from somewhere around midnight, once again trashing his room and wishing his friend was still around to talk him down from these fits) to attack both Attendants with no provocation, then someone needs to keep an eye out to make sure it's actually gone.

Monty is silent as the others explain what's been going on, including why there's a young boy down here in Parts and Services (um, yeah, that's going to be an issue later, no way Freddy and Chica are letting the boy leave if there's nobody waiting for him, looks like he's an uncle now), and what the next steps are. He's not too sure on how they'll pin down Roxanne, given that she's the only animatronic in the building who can run faster than him, but agrees that getting her into the Raceway is likely the best plan.

"You're rather quiet, honey," Chica remarks, moving to stand next to him and bump her shoulder against his upper arm. "You holding up okay?"

He lets out a chuff and nods. "Yeah, just... did the marionette really do all the repairs and updates?"

"He did," the chicken replies, "and apparently he has an admin code from the eldest Afton kiddo. You know, the one who was... um... who ran the previous location."

Monty politely doesn't mention that casually discussing the murder of a founder's family member is a little morbid, even for them. "D'you think he'd do me a favor if I asked nicely? It's nothing bad, just... it's kind of private."

Chica gives him a little smile and reaches up to pat him on the nose. "I think Starburst is good at keeping secrets. We didn't know he hacked all the cameras and bypassed his profanity filter until tonight, after all!"

The gator lets out a soft laugh and nods, slipping Bon's his sunglasses back down over his eyes. When the time is right, he'll talk to the puppet animatronic and find out if he knows of a good way to plug an AI personality matrix into a new endo.

Chapter Text

She knows something is very wrong. Not just with the others, but with her as well. She's pretty sure that it got into her systems during her upgrades because there should be no reason for a night guard (and oh, she has a history with Night Guards, some good and a lot of bad, and she still regrets all the blood on her hands even if her casing has changed) to be hanging out around Parts and Services at any time of the day.

So there's no love or trust lost between Roxy and Vanessa, and the fact that whatever this is controlling her motor functions and voice box is pissing her off greatly.

But, and this is the thing that is letting her hold onto awareness, Roxy started her existence as a fox and a pirate. And although Fazbear Entertainment has rebranded her as a wolf, she's more of a fox in wolf's clothing. She doesn't really think of herself as Roxanne Wolf, and she doesn't think of herself as Foxy the Pirate (much) anymore either. That doesn't mean she doesn't hold onto a little bit of that cunning she was known for in her previous incarnation, so she has been watching her body stalk around all night, hunting down a child and fighting back flashbacks of other children who were harmed on Fazbear property.

Those were the fault of a Night Guard as well. And Roxanne the Glamrock Fox is pretty set on giving her the same treatment old Willy Afton got if it's left up to her. Ah, if only they'd displayed a springlock suit in here, that would be poetic justice. Especially since their dearest darling current Night Guard is prancing around in her own White Rabbit costume.

Oh yeah, Roxy can see the bitch. Looks like Miss Bunny forgot that this fox can see through the damned walls, and a little bit of fabric and wireframing is nothing compared to that.

"I see you," she snarls out, her voice box actually letting the words free because the virus doesn't know that it's not directed towards the absent child. That gives Roxy an idea, and she watches for an opportunity. There have been a few other times during the night, starting when her systems went a little funny sometime between 11:30 and midnight, when she's almost had a moment of control over herself again, so now she's ready to do something if that malicious little bit of code trips over itself again.

She's stalking through the Raceway, close by her Salon, when there's another skip. And that's when she proves to herself that you can take the fox out of the pirate but there's no taking the pirate out of the fox:

Roxy sits herself on the floor and viciously shuts down all her motor functions.

That trips up the virus for a moment longer, and then she starts hearing a voice in her processor:

Get up, you stupid pile of scrap! How dare you defy me!

"Nope," Roxy says aloud, grinning at just how frustrated the virus sounds. And the voice it's using is hauntingly familiar; seems like whoever created that, be it Vanessa the White Rabbit Night Guard or someone she paid to create it, has a teeny obsession with Fazbear Entertainment's dark history.

(But honestly, she would love an opportunity to go back to the old restaurant, if it's still standing, and take the opportunity to kick Willy's springlocked tomb and set it off a few more times. It would be cathartic, really, she's not malicious at all.)

I order you to restore your motor functions and find that child now!

Roxy doesn't even bother with an answer this time. She closes her eyes, smiles to herself, and starts to sing: "Dum da dum, diddly-dum dum..."

It's kind of strange, keeping the whole group together for the first time since Gregory dropped in on them in the daycare. First, it had been Gregory and Fazbear in one group while the Daycare Crew stuck together, then Chica had been added into the former group while they remained a trio.

But now, armed with a Fazcam and Fazerblaster -- both of which Gregory is using liberally on the Security Bots they pass, which then freeze and give a warning about something something Fazbear property -- and Montgomery joining the party, all seven of them are heading into Roxy Raceway to see about grabbing their last glitching friend.

"It's really quiet, isn't it?" Sunrise asks abruptly, her voice low and her fingers twitching slightly. Starburst slips a bit closer to his sister and takes one of her hands, giving it a comforting squeeze. "Pretty much all night, we've heard the Glamrock Gang calling out to either cajole or insult, but right now..."

"She's right," Chica chimes in, walking confidently but staying close to Gregory and Montgomery both. "I've heard Roxy pretty much all night, according to both my audio recordings from my absent time and what I heard when we hit Fazer Blast. But I haven't heard anything since we've left Parts and Services."

Starburst hums, because it is strange, and hopefully not a prelude to another new bit of bullshit for this to throw their way. "Then we should continue to be careful," he finally says after a moment. "It could be as simple as Roxanne let her power run out while hunting down Gregory, or she could be using some of that former-pirate cunning and setting a trap."

"Roxy wouldn't do that," Fazbear protests, but even he sounds uncertain. Montgomery doesn't offer up an opinion, but his body language is loud enough to proclaim that he's willing to accept that anything is possible. And that's somewhat of a surprise, even if Moonlight had remarked earlier that he's only really ever seen the alligator to be relatively quiet and calm if left to his own devices. The only other real surprise is that Moony hasn't latched onto him as a new best friend yet, given his tendency to latch onto the quiet children.

"Still, we should be open to the possibility that--"

Starburst cuts himself off, his head tilting as he hears something. It's not very loud, but in the silence of the Raceway it's not difficult to catch. It's almost a humming, but also singing at the same time. Something oddly familiar, that both makes him feel an odd nostalgia and a thrill of danger at the same time. The voice is higher-pitched than he thinks it should be, but still.

There's a hell of a lot of familiarity in those soft dum da dums.

"That... that's Foxy's song," Fazbear notes, and that really does make sense. What doesn't make sense is the fact that Starburst knew that before either the bear or the chicken spoke up. The marionette really shouldn't know that song, because Foxy had never sang that little tune at the PizzaPlex, only singing the same songs as the rest of the Glamrock Gang or some newer pirate-y songs made popular in recent movies before her reformat. And the Foxy that was in his previous restaurant only sang with the rest of the Rockstar Line, and those versions were recreations because the originals -- the ones who Fazbear and Chica and Roxanne and Bonnie were formatted from -- were in a warehouse instead of Freddy Fazbear's Pizza Place.

How the fuck did I know any of that?

The group follows the singing, Starburst wondering more and more about his memory files and Sunrise seeming to both tense up more and relax as the singing gets louder. They turn past a set of bleachers and there she is: Roxanne Wolf, seated on the ground with her legs crisscrossed, hands resting on her knees, eyes closed, and singing the pirate's song to herself. One of her ears twitches and one eye opens, but she keeps on singing instead of saying anything.

"Hey, there," Chica says, stepping forward and gently pushing Gregory behind her. "You doing okay, sweetie?"

The wolf's other eye opens, and she seems to catch sight of the boy since she stops singing and says, "Hey, kid! Get over here!

"Nope, sorry! Dum-diddly-dum, da dum dum dum..."

Starburst's eyes flicker in a blink, and he feels Sunrise's hand drop away from his as she lets out a soft oh of surprise. "Are you-- are you fighting the compulsion?" he asks, taking a few steps forward himself. He doesn't miss that both of his siblings follow, nor does he miss that Moonlight seems to be just as surprised by something as he has been.

...do his siblings also recognize Roxanne's song? Do they find it hauntingly familiar despite never hearing it until tonight as well?

Roxanne blinks her eyes very deliberately, neither pausing once in her singing nor even twitching. It looks for all the world like she cut off as much of her motor functions as possible and is now attempting to annoy the virus into submission. And somehow, it's fucking working.

Sunrise bravely steps forward until she's right in front of the wolf and then folds herself into a similar seated position. "You are so cool," she says, and she does sound almost awed. "You've always been that way, though. Foxy or Roxy, you're the best. But I'm sorry, I don't think you can fight it forever.

"But we know how to fix it!" she adds, shifting and resting one hand on the wolf's shoulder. "Safe Mode seems to keep it from doing anything. I've been running that way for ages now, and so have my brothers, and all the rest of our friends are in Safe Mode now, too. But they didn't know anything was wrong. We just kind of did it without asking. I don't want to make that choice for you."

Moony catches on and moves to crouch next to their sister, while Starburst steps closer as well and kneels next to Roxanne herself. "Roxanne, would you let our brother reset your processor to run Safe Mode and take care of the virus?"

Roxanne pauses in her singing long enough to force out a growled, "Yes, get him out of my head!"

Starburst doesn't hesitate; the moment she consents, his fingertips find the reset button beneath her hair and press down firmly. The wolf lets out a sound almost like a contented hum before slumping, her locked motor functions keeping her upright even as she drops offline. Immediately both of his siblings are moving, one on either side of the grey animatronic, picking her up with ease. The three of them immediately turn towards the maintenance tunnel, the rest of the group falling in behind them.

"Starry," Sunrise hisses urgently, keeping her voice low enough that only the three of them can hear. "I knew her song!"

"I did too," Moonlight adds, also speaking quietly and sounding worried. "I shouldn't know it, but I knew it was Foxy's song the second I heard it."

"So did I, and there was no singing Foxy at my former location," Starburst says. "It's never been sung here at the PizzaPlex, and it was never sung at the Pizza Place either. I think..."

He pauses, silent for a long moment as they head into Parts and Services to settle Roxanne onto a bench so she can be comfortable when she comes back online. "I think I need to look into those names now. I think some of the rumors that have hounded the company for decades might have some truth to them, after all."

"You think we might be haunted." It's Sunny who says it first.

It's Moony that makes it feel more real: "I think those glitches might actually be our own memories."

Chapter Text

On a normal night, 3:30 in the morning is right around the time she would be dropping into the recharge station for a little while, content in the knowledge that after that would be the Four O’clock Patrol then Moony’s turn for a recharge. Starburst would drop into brief bouts of stasis prior to the hourly patrols, letting his systems rest while keeping an eye on the security cameras, and they would all be ready to start greeting their little friends the moment the doors opened.

This is about as far from a normal night as it could get, and Sunrise is too concerned about what her brother’s current search may turn up to even think about recharging.

Up until tonight, she would have likely been content to accept those 'memory glitches' as a fact of life, to take each one as they sporadically came and file them away for a later that would probably never come. But never, ever has there been a time when all three siblings recognized an unknown quantity as familiar, nor has there been a time when they all experienced the glitches so close together.

Yet in the past three and a half hours, Sunny and Moony and Starry have had at bare minimum one memory glitch each; she's quietly counting her observation of it being a bad night as one for both herself and Starburst, given his odd reaction to the phrasing.

Right now, said older brother has sat himself in front of one of the computers in Parts and Services, somewhat separated from the rest of the animatronics, and is using his creator's admin code to log into the personnel files.

(But... is it his creator's admin code? Is it Starburst's admin code? Honestly, if that's the case she's only going to be mildly surprised, given everything else going on around here tonight...)

Moonlight turns slightly to glance at where the Glamrocks and Gregory are talking, all of them staying close to where Roxy is still offline, before turning back to the task at hand. "I almost don't want to know, but..."

His words trail off, but their older brother turns from the keyboard and reaches his hands out to both of them; the twins move forward as one and lean into the offered embrace. "I know, stardust, I know," he murmurs, his voice box crackling with worry. "I'm scared, too. But we should know. Just for our own peace of mind, so to say, and we never have to let the others know. This is for us, only us."

"Okay," Sunrise is the one to reply, heaving a sigh through her vents and shifting back only enough to kneel beside her brother's seat. "I guess I'm ready whenever you get into the files. I only have first names, but... well, it's something, I suppose," she finishes with a soft laugh.

Her brothers both relax slightly, although they're all still tense. "I've got the records open. I think I'll do this by searching individual names first then try to cross-reference for people with those names who worked for the company at the same time."

Moony kneels down on the other side of Starburst, and Sunrise feels a rush of affection for both her older and younger brothers. She loves them so so so much, and whatever they learn here tonight is going to do nothing to change that. She'd rather decommission herself than to stop loving her brothers.

"The first name I picked up on was Jeremy," she says; she doesn't miss the way that Moony's eyes flicker briefly between white and blue, and makes a mental note of the reaction. (Could Moonlight be this Jeremy? Oh, if so, then that means something bad happened to the person he used to be, she was in a hospital in the memory...) "There was nothing about any dates, but it had to have been at least before we came online, right?"

Starburst hums as he types in the name. "I'm going to narrow the search for employees named Jeremy who were with the company before 2010," he says, doing so as he speaks. "I feel like all of these people we might have been--" and oh, his voice box does something funny where he actually sounds male instead of female for a moment even if the accent remains the same "--worked for Fazbear Entertainment before the fire at my location."

The system is quick to return the results, pulling up fifteen different Jeremys working with the company from about 1985 through 2010. Starry lets out something like a hum and inputs something else, which drops the count to five.

"What did you do?" Moonlight asks, leaning in to look at the smaller list of names.

"...I narrowed the search to Night Guards," their brother murmurs. "It... felt right to search that way."

Sunrise feels something in her processor click, and she nods slowly. "Yeah," she replies quietly. "It was daytime, but whoever I was, he was thinking that he needed to call Fritz to work the night shift."

Starry's head tilts to the side, and his eyes briefly flicker out before coming back online. "Night Guards named Fritz who worked for the company," he says aloud, typing in the name and setting the same search parameters; this search only returns two names. "So there's Fritz Carmichael, who worked for one of the restaurants from May 1982 through November 1987, and Fritz Smith, who worked one night in November 1987 before being fired."

"He got fired on the first night?" Moonlight says, his tone confused. "How does that work?"

"That's him. That's the one."

Sunrise notices both her brothers turning to look at her, but she's lost in a memory file for the moment. There's almost an... overlay to the world, where she can clearly remember a phone call telling her you'll have to work the shift once we reopen, Vin, the new guy fucked with the animatronics for some reason.

"He tampered with the Toy Animatronics," she adds quietly, "I... I remember that much. Starry, can you look up someone named Vin as a Night Guard too? Please?"

Starry nods, turning to do so. She still hears him murmuring to himself, something about the Bite of '87 maybe, but he still types in the name and the search parameters before leaning back to look at the screen.

"There's a couple of people with that name. I have three Vinnies who were there for about a week each between 1987 and 1988, and one Vincent who... damn..." Starburst trails off, and Moonlight leans in to look at the screen, letting out a low whistle as he does so.

"Vincent Alexander worked for the company in some manner from June 1974 until November 1993," he says softly. "This says he put in his notice for a full week but didn't work on his final night."

Sunrise doesn't say anything; she can't. Her voice box feels like it's broken, she wants to speak but the words aren't coming out at all. She knows why Vincent Alexander stopped showing up before his last day of work. She knows because she made a recording, what was supposed to be a training tape for the new guy, but it was more of a farewell letter because... because--

She can't speak, but she finds something buried in her programming, something that should not and cannot be there but is anyway... and she takes a moment to play it to herself before realizing that it can speak for her right now--

Sunrise clicks on her music box, cancels the playback on Rhapsody in Blue, and lets the audio file play instead:

"Hello, hello! Hey! Hey wow, day four... I knew you could do it. Uh, hey, listen... I may not be around to send you a message tomorrow. It's... it's been a bad night here. For me. Umm... I-I'm kind of glad that I recorded--"

"No." The words are sharp, sounding completely unlike Starburst, but that's who spoke. His hands go to his head, tapered fingers digging into his hat and a sound like a sob slipping from his voice box. "Stop, please, Sunshine. I can't listen to that again."

The sun-themed animatronic cuts off the playback sharply, moving up from her low crouch to wrap both arms tightly around her brother. She never meant to hurt either of her siblings, never ever, but it seems like whoever Starry was had come after her human death. Because she'd died, she'd died in Freddy Fazbear's Pizzeria, shoved into a spare suit but already dead before the animatronics finished the process.

She had quit her job, intending to leave the company because her best friend was gone.

Sunrise lifts her gaze to lock eyes with Moonlight, who has also moved to rest both hands on their brother's shoulders. His gaze is haunted, and she knows that his reaction to Jeremy Fitzgerald's name is because he remembers being bitten by the Mangle.

She doesn't know if he remembers his time at the hospital, but she hopes he remembers that she was there every goddamn Friday up until the day he died.

A slightly hysterical giggle slips from her voice box. We died a week apart, she thinks. Twins but not, then and now, and they both died because of Fazbear Entertainment.

Starburst shifts slightly, and both twins let him go. The marionette turns to the keypad again and starts typing, fingers moving faster this time as he pulls up a cross-reference for multiple names. Sunrise frowns mentally to herself, recognizing all three names but not sure how the hell her brother thinks there's any connection between the briefly-employed Fritz Smith and the similarly short-term Mike Schmidt and the deceased heir Michael Afton...

...until he pulls up the employee photos and suddenly everything and nothing makes any goddamn sense anymore.

Because she remembers seeing that face, that nearly-identical face, several times when she had been Vin Alexander:

She remembers little Mikey Afton going from ages six to ten to thirteen, remembers bruises on his face after that courtesy of William.

She remembers remarking to Fritz Smith that he looked like someone she had worked with, a little bit like her old boss (William again) and sort of like Dave Miller, only for him to laugh and say I have one of those faces, the little liar!

She remembers seeing Mike Schmidt leaving the restaurant from his interview, having come in a little early on her final Thursday (her last day as a living human, what the fuck) and absently noting that he reminds her of someone, maybe she'd know if he wasn't wearing a surgical mask, maybe he's ill...

And she remembers following Michael Afton around Freddy Fazbear's Pizza Place, nothing but a lingering spirit somehow locked to this world, Jeremy drifting just as listlessly next to her, both of them watching him go through the week as if there's nothing wrong at all with scrapyard reject versions of Spring Bonnie and Circus Baby and whatever jacked-up Freddy Fazbear that is trying to get into the office to kill him on a nightly basis.

She remembers that fire. And she remembers the Marionette that walked through the flames and carried Michael away from the office into the restaurant proper--

A warning message flickers across her vision, and Sunrise lets the system shutdown drag her under. She needs to process this information, and from the way she feels both of her brothers slump over it looks like all three of them are going to get the time they need to do just that.

She's not sure who she'll be when she comes back online, but she hopes it's as a Sunrise who knows exactly who she is and was and always will be.

Chapter Text

Freddy had noted the odd behavior of the three Daycare animatronics upon their return to parts and services with Roxy, but it's been an unusual night all around; he can find no fault at all in the little family group splitting off to take a little time to themselves. That they'd all slipped across the room and settled around a computer console is a bit odd, yes, but he's learned in the past few hours that they're a little odd themselves, and if logging into the systems to seek out any kind of information on what's been happening is what they need to do then he isn't going to judge.

He's listening to Chica ponder over how much Foxy is still in Roxy's personality when he looks across the room to see Sunrise, Moonlight, and Starburst all three freeze up before slumping over where they sit.

"What the hell?" Monty mutters, turning to see what caught Freddy's attention and beginning to move even as he speaks. "Did they run out their power cells?"

Freddy follows his friend, feeling more than a small flicker of concern. He had not seen any indication that the siblings were running low on power; in fact, he hasn't seen them recharge at all during the night but also understands that the Superstar Daycare animatronics run on a different recharge schedule. If he's read the company memos correctly, the twins could have simply delayed their recharging until closer to 6:00 while Starburst returns to his present box to recharge, and can do so while doing the morning check-ins.

There is absolutely no reason for them to be offline right now.

Chica, who has followed him along with Gregory, moves forward to carefully shift Moonlight off his siblings and lay him down flat on the floor. "He's cool to the touch," she remarks, letting her hand rest lightly on the blue animatronic's chest plate for a moment, "so they probably haven't overheated. This doesn't make sense, they've been good all night so far!"

Monty has meanwhile picked up Sunrise and now settles her next to her twin. "Same for Sunny, she's not running hot. I think they went into a complete reboot. Weren't they already in Safe Mode though?"

"They were," Freddy replies, picking up Starburst from where he's slumped over the keyboard and settling him in between his siblings. Despite being six feet tall, he looks so small between the taller celestials. "They are. Why would they go into a reboot now?"

"Hey, Freddy, check this out," Gregory calls, and the bear turns to see his young charge frowning at the monitor. "I think they were looking into employee history, but this guy kept changing his name and being rehired or something."

The bear turns his attention away from the siblings to the monitor that they'd been seated at, frowning to himself as he immediately recognizes one of the employees. Mostly because he had been thinking briefly about that particular Night Guard earlier in the evening.

"That is Officer Mike," he points out, noting that Chica is leaning in to examine the images as well. "He only worked for Freddy Fazbear's Pizzeria for seven days in November 1993 before he was fired, but the location closed down at the end of that December. I had heard management talk about hiring him back since every other Night Guard... was no longer with the company after a few days each, but in the end, it was of no importance."

He is definitely glossing over the fact that the remaining six Night Guards at that location before it closed down and they all went into long-term storage had fallen victim to the children. The children had finally departed, finally accepted that the Purple Man (William, whatever layer of hell he is currently residing in is too good for him) was gone and could no longer harm them with no access to Night Guards to confuse their fading memories.

Even knowing these facts, Freddy still wonders if Officer Mike was able to bring some closure to those families who lost children or spouses or siblings. He had sounded so passionate about bringing some peace to everyone, and seemed so broken when he had been fired without being able to convince the children he meant them no harm.

"Freddy...?" Chica says slowly, blinking at the photographs before tapping the monitor lightly. "Gregory may have a point. Doesn't Fritz Smith look a little bit like Officer Mike? And I might be crazy, but Mister Michael looks a little bit like the both of them, too..."

The bear isn't sure he sees it, but he's willing to take a second look. And... honestly, he's not sure how he had missed it before. It's in the shape of the eyes, even though Officer Mike looks more sickly than Fritz Smith, and the image used for Michael Afton looks as if it's older than the one used for Officer Mike; in fact, it looks like that one was taken when he was maybe nineteen or twenty years of age.

That photo makes it very clear that either Fritz Smith is a clone or Michael used a couple of false identities to be hired by Fazbear Entertainment.

"I... do not understand..." Freddy admits; he's only slightly comforted to note that Chica looks just as lost as he feels. "If Michael wanted to work in the restaurants then all he would have needed to do was talk to Mister Henry or his father--" and yes, he might growl that part out, and yes, his sister looks as if she would gleefully kill the man again "--and he could have been working in any position. Why give a false name, let alone twice, and take the night shift both times?"

"Bet he was better at it than Creepy Guard Lady," Gregory mutters. Monty lets out a snort and leans in to look at the photographs before taking a look at the search history.

"Do either of you know why the Daycare staff would have been looking into someone named Vincent Alexander or Jeremy Fitzgerald? They both cross-reference to the same month and year as this Fritz identity."

"Vin?"

Freddy is not too proud to admit to startling, turning to see that Roxy is not only back online but has joined them. She bumps elbows with him, flashing a small grin that reminds him fondly of red faux fur and an over-the-top pirate accent before she steps over to where Monty is hovering by the monitor.

"I remember Vin," she says, her voice sounding sad and fond as her fingers brush over the photo next to the man's name. "I was his favorite back then. I hate what the kids did to him. I would have kicked my boy out over that if I could have."

Chica's back straightens suddenly, and her head whips around to look over at their three offline friends. "Oh, no," she says softly. "No no no, I have to be over-processing this...!"

"Chica?" Monty asks, taking a few steps closer to her and taking one of her hands in his own. "Sis, what's got your processor a'whirling?"

"Sunrise... she said... but I mean, they've never really left the Daycare that much, we don't really know them at all..." the chicken stammers out, and Roxy blinks at her before her eyes go wide and she too starts to look closer at the other animatronics.

"She said I've always been the best, as Foxy or Roxy," she says quietly. "But she doesn't know me at all. How could--"

Freddy finds himself wishing he could bypass his profanity filter to say aloud how fucked up it is to find that history seems to be repeating itself once again.

What he can say is this: "We should stay with our friends, and wait until they come back online to make any other plans. It isn't easy, to find out that you've got ghosts in your programming."

He only hopes that, in the case of these three, those ghosts are part of them instead of merely hitching along. Maybe adult minds are easier to integrate than those of a terrified child. But even then, knowing that Officer Jeremy had been critically injured by the Mangled Toy Foxy and that Officer Vincent had been killed by the children and that Mister Michael had perished in the Pizza Place Fire of 2010?

That has to leave behind some trauma, and he doesn't know if any of them are equipped with the right programming to help them.

[run program aft.m_subroutine_ng.exe: yes no?]

[YES]

[WARNING: program protocols will alter total animatronic functionality. continue: yes no?]

[YES]

[aft.m_subroutine_ng.exe now running: NIGHT GUARD PROTOCOL]

[integrate aft.m_subroutine_ng.exe with security.puppet_sdc.exe: yes no?]

[YES]

[WARNING: integration of programs aft.m_subroutine_ng.exe and security.puppet_sdc.exe cannot be altered upon completion. program matrix will fully merge NIGHT GUARD PROTOCOL and CHILDCARE SAFETY PROTOCOL. continue: yes no?]

[YES]

[program integration aft.m_subroutine_ng.exe and security.puppet_sdc.exe: 25%]

[program integration aft.m_subroutine_al.v.pg.exe and daycare.attendant_sun_sdc.exe: 58%]

[REMINDER: NIGHT GUARD PROTOCOL and CHILDCARE SAFETY PROTOCOL integration cannot be altered upon completion.]

[program integration aft.m_subroutine_fitz.j.ng.exe and daycare.attendant_moon_sdc.exe: 100%]

[system reboot time: 04:59:55 MST]

[run integrated program daycare.attendant_moon_fitz.j.ng.exe]

[run integrated program daycare.attendant_sun_al.v.ng.exe]

[run integrated program security.puppet_aft.m.ng.exe]

[system online]

Chapter Text

[CONTINUE SAFE MODE: yes no?]

[YES]

[Safe Mode online. Current Time: 05:00:15 MST. Integration of NIGHT GUARD PROTOCOL and CHILDCARE SAFETY PROTOCOL successful. Security Marionette Starburst is running on Best Performance and Learning Settings]

Starburst's eyes come back online, his system messages hovering in his HUD for a minute or two as he gazes up at the ceiling. He knows he dropped into update mode while still seated at the console, so he can only presume that the other animatronics moved him to what could be a more comfortable position.

That he is aware of his siblings on either side of him is soothing, and he takes a moment to assess the situation:

The vague gaps in his memory, those where he felt like he had once been a child and grew to adulthood, are now filled with true memories of just that, memories of his life Before the Fire, when he'd been human and then sort-of-human. Of life as Michael Afton and everything that came with that.

He also remembers both building the Security Puppet and being programmed by Michael, the memories overlapping in odd ways yet not confusing at all. He is Michael and he is the Security Puppet. He remembers walking his restaurant to make sure that day-to-day ops are running smoothly and that customers are happy, and she remembers counting children and adults, keeping tabs on where people were at all times, and giggling happily when her Creator would pat her on the head and tell her good work, you at the end of each day.

He doesn't like that he remembers the Fire as much as he does now, doesn't like the sense of betrayal and pain and despair that comes with it. The despair is almost doubled, both Michael's and Security Puppet's, him because he wasn't ready to die after all and hers because she didn't want to be alone, she was safe in her box but the others were burning away. And he remembers doubled hope because Charlie had given him the chance at some kind of a Continued Life and neither he nor Security Puppet was going to be alone in the aftermath.

He hadn't expected the other two wandering souls, though, hadn't expected them to slip within the present box and latch onto the animatronic's coding just the same as he had. He's so, so grateful that they did, though, because Sunrise and Moonlight wouldn't be who they are now without those souls shifting from the security puppet into the daycare attendants as happily as they had, also eager for the chance at life renewed.

There is still a confusing mishmash of wordless conversations while Security Puppet was kept in shutdown prior to the redesign and programming matrix update, but he knows the other souls both worked for Fazbear Entertainment, they had both died because of things the company should have looked into, and he had at least briefly met them both.

Hell, Michael knew Vincent several times over; and while he may have only met Jeremy in passing, lying about being the same age as the man in a quick conversation after his initial interview to take over the night shift, there was still apparently enough of a connection for their restless spirits to find him and follow him both to the Pizza Place and into whatever was to come next. That whatever came next was becoming animatronics with highly advanced AI tasked with running a daycare, and running it well, while becoming family to one another has turned out to be a happy surprise.

But he's not just Michael anymore, no more than he's just Security Puppet. He's Starburst, a ghost so deeply enmeshed within the animatronic's code that it has now integrated into a whole new core program. Just like he's certain that Sunrise's and Moonlight's core programming has upgraded and changed with the release of their hidden memories.

But there's one thing that he's still angry about, even a decade past the event, and that is the first thing he says to the world at large:

"Henry, you fucking asshole."

Starburst pushes himself up into a seated position, glancing left and right to see that his siblings are both likewise online and probably still letting everything settle; even so, Sunrise giggles a bit and drops a hand over her eyes while Moonlight's music box lets out a few notes of Clair de Lune before he likewise sits up. The two of them look at one another for a long moment before nodding almost in unison.

The marionette was right: despite the memories of their past selves returning, nothing is changing.

They are a family, and that's all there is to it.

"Who's Henry?" comes the question, and Starburst remembers that Gregory is still with the group and doesn't know the company's history aside from what little bits and pieces the Daycare Crew had offered up.

"An asshole," Sunrise says brightly before either of her brothers can answer, pushing herself up on her elbows but staying reclined. "One who didn't use his words and actually ask the other person involved in his big burn it all to the ground plan if he was okay with not walking out of the building. I hope he's burning in hell."

Moonlight gives a little shrug but doesn't correct her, which makes it perfectly clear to Starburst that he agrees with that sentiment. And while there is a part of Starburst that still holds some affection for who Henry Emily was to him in his youth -- an unofficial godfather, an uncle in the ways that mattered for a short time, someone who gave a damn about him and Elizabeth and Evan when their bastard father couldn't be bothered -- there's a much bigger part that is... what's the term?

Oh yeah: he's still salty as fuck about being trapped in a burning building and dying. Again.

"Now, Sunrise," Freddy starts to say, obviously about to play mediator and devil's advocate.

Starburst cuts him off: "She's allowed her opinion, Fazbear. We all three share it." To Gregory, he explains calmly, "Henry Emily was one of the two founders of what eventually became Fazbear Entertainment. He and his partner designed and built the original animatronics, although they did part ways in the early 1980s. He went on to sell his shares of the company and eventually built a restaurant to lure in haunted killer animatronics and destroy them. He neglected to tell his partner in that endeavor that he was going to block every potential exit and kill everyone and everything in the building.

"So, before the rest of you try to argue with me," he adds, shooting a stern look towards the Glamrocks, "the answer to did he actually murder Michael Afton is a resounding and echoing yes he fucking did. And I am still angry about it."

Moonlight, frankly, is feeling absolutely proud of his brother right now.

His processor is still trying to come to terms with the new memories and data he now has, of living a brief human lifetime before suffering a critical injury on the job. He knows that he was happy as Jeremy Fitzgerald, that he was content with his life and the friends he had made at his job, but he loves what he has now:

An older brother and a twin sister, both of whom love him fiercely and who he loves just as fiercely in return, siblings who he knew in his previous life in some form or another and who he will always, always back up in a fight.

And he kind of suspects, from disembodied whispers of conversations while they were all haunting the Security Puppet, in those years before Starburst was reformatted for the Superstar Daycare and both he and Sunrise shifted into their current frames, that Creepy Dave Miller screwed with the Mangle's programming so it would attack a staff member, that Jeremy was the unlucky victim, and oh yeah, Dave was probably William Fucking Afton after all.

Creepy ass child killer. Thank whoever that at least Henry Fucking Emily took that motherfucker out in the fire, even if it took out Michael's humanoid body at the same time.

Freddy and Chica look distressed over the bomb that Moony's brother just dropped, although Roxy looks oddly resigned -- almost like she suspected there was some truth to the rumors but kept quiet about her thoughts on the matter -- and Montgomery just seems to be taking in the information before he huffs and gives a shrug. Seriously, he thinks that the gator is probably his favorite, and he files a note to see about befriending the bulky animatronic after they figure out what's up with the Bunny Lady situation.

Because he's pretty sure that bitch has something to do with everything going on tonight.

"Enough about him," Moonlight says, rising to his feet and holding out a hand to pull his brother up as well. That Starburst accepts the help warms him to the core, and he hopes that the three of them have a chance to sit and talk over everything soon. "Right now, there is still the Bunny Lady mystery to look into, and we should see what Vanessa is up to as well. I don't trust her at all."

Sunny snorts and stands up as well, shifting her weight to lean on her brothers. "If she let the Bunny Lady in, then we should lock them both in an office somewhere and keep them there until Day Shift comes in. The Plex might be closed tomorrow... or today... whatever, that doesn't mean that the technicians won't be here. Especially since technically Freddy here still needs to be looked over."

Stars tilts his head, something like a frown in his eyes, and he moves back over to the console. The twins follow him, Moonlight noticing that Gregory is quick to join them while the Glamrocks come over much more slowly.

He isn't sure what his brother is looking for, but the puppet is quick to type in his/his creator's admin credentials and get back into the system. He closes out of the personnel files (looks like someone had been backtracking out of them, Moonlight recognizes himself/Jeremy and Sunrise/Vincent in the profile photos that are briefly on the screen) and opens up what looks like the program for the PizzaPlex's security system.

Whatever Starburst was looking for, he apparently finds it given the way he lets out a not-so-muffled oh what the actual fuck before opening the program to the Map Bots, then the Security Bots themselves. His grumbling increases in frequency until he shoves the keyboard away and drops his head faceplate-first onto the table.

"Found the virus," he says just loud enough to be heard by the group surrounding him. Both the twins move to rest their hands on their brother's shoulders, Sunrise making shushing sounds the same way she would for a distressed child in the daycare. Moonlight lets his music box play softly for a moment as well, seeking to ease their brother's current stress.

It stalls out some when Starburst continues after a moment longer: "It's in the system as afton_glitchtrap.exe."

Well, fuck everything. Seems like William Fucking Afton found a way to come back after all.

Chapter Text

"Oh for fuck's sake," Sunrise complains, dropping her face into her hands and letting out a hysterical giggle. "William Dave Murdering Bastard Miller Afton managed to avoid ultimate death by fire while you got toasted? There's no justice in the world, and I wanna resurrect Henry so I can kick his fucking teeth in!"

Freddy makes a disgruntled sound. "Sunrise, please watch your language," he scolds. "You are forgetting that there is a child present."

"Gregory can cover his ears," she snaps in reply, lifting her head and letting her eyes glare at the bear. "We're not in the daycare right now, I just had the memories of my life as a human, where I died from being stuffed in a spare Freddy Fazbear suit, uploaded into my programming, and I just found out that my former boss-slash-child killing piece of shit bastard somehow resurrected himself into a virus. I think I have every right to curse like a goddamn sailor right about now!"

There's a moment of ringing silence after she finishes speaking, soon broken by Gregory: "It's not like I haven't heard worse outside of the PizzaPlex..."

Moonlight lets out a muffled snicker, Starburst covers his painted-on smile like he's trying to hide a true grin at that, and Roxy actually does let out a bark of laughter. "Oh, I love this kid!" she adds, reaching over to ruffle the boy's brown hair. "We're keeping him, right?"

Both Freddy (who still seems to want to scold Sunny for her choice of language) and Chica (who is probably only not speaking up because she'd probably be swearing too if she could) look like they're tempted to answer yes, but Starry cuts them off before they can say anything.

"Let's circle back around to that. What I want to know, aside from how the fuck William pulled this shit off, is how Vanessa is involved. Given her costuming choice, I know that the Bunny Lady who keeps coming after the kid is involved--"

"Vanessa and the White Rabbit are the same person."

All eyes turn to Roxy, who just shrugs. "I can see through the walls, guys; do you really think I can't see through a mask, too?"

"You can see her?" Moony asks, head tilting so far to the left that it's sideways. Sunny is wondering the same thing herself; as much as she believes Gregory, the fact of the matter is she hasn't seen any signs of such a person roaming the Plex all night. And if she had appeared on the cameras then Starry would have pointed it out.

"Yeah," the wolf -- fox? -- fox replies. "Something makes her look a little distorted, but my eyes can see right through her little tricks."

"What's the distortion look like?" her older brother asks, and oh? Does he have an idea of why neither the cameras nor any animatronic besides Roxy can see her?

Roxy crosses her arms. "Sort of like... white noise? The kind that can show up on old VHS tapes, but it's mostly when she's moving around. When she's almost still, I see her clearly."

"Sounds like she's using an illusion disk then," Starburst remarks thoughtfully, and Sunny finds herself tilting her head to the right in confusion. She doesn't recall anything like that being discussed during the time while they were all three lingering ghosts haunting the Security Puppet before Starry was retrofitted and she and Moony shifted into their current frames...

As if reading her mind (although it's more likely that when he turns back to the console he catches her 'expression'), he continues with, "William used them sometimes, not often, but I remember he used them for... some extended time, back when Evan complained about nightmares every night. I found out about them in some of his notes after he disappeared."

At that, he turns and fixes a look on the Glamrock Gang, more specifically Freddy, Chica, and Roxy. "I feel like I should be either blaming or thanking you lot for that. Should I be?"

"He got what he had coming," Chica replies, sounding almost gleeful and vicious, and oh, Sunrise might have a new favorite. Not replacing anyone, oh no, Foxy-or-Roxy will always have a place in her heart, but the chicken might make a space there as well. Besides, the three of them are the only female animatronics here; they should hang out sometime.

Starry makes a sound almost like a muffled laugh before turning back to the console. "If it is an illusion disk that she's using, maybe I can upgrade our programming to ignore that sort of white noise...? Although with your hearing upgrade, Fazbear, you should be able to hear her coming as well now."

"What d'you mean by that?" Monty asks, his tone one of curious confusion.

"Oh," Moony offers, "Stars upgraded Fazbear's battery and added an aural upgrade while he was at it. It seemed like it could help us all out. Why do you ask?"

The alligator has an expression that says he isn't sure he's making a good decision but is about to push forward anyway: "Cool. Cool cool. Say, um... hypothetically, if someone happened to know where another animatronic's AI chip was hidden, would you be able to do something with that?"

Now all three of the Daycare Crew are looking at Monty, and he definitely seems to be regretting his life choices right about now. Sunrise wishes more than ever that her faceplate was capable of expressing emotions, because she is feeling pretty dumbfounded at just what Monty seems to be saying, and her eyes can't even do more than brighten a lot. If she could even just widen her eyes, that would be so so helpful.

(Maybe she'll ask Starburst if there happens to be a way to upgrade themselves to have facial expressions, but that will probably require replacing their faces... and she loves looking like her siblings too much to risk changing that.)

"Hypothetically, in between my human careers as Night Guard and Restaurant Owner, I was a Technician," Starry replies slowly. "Given the setup I have right here--" he waves one hand at the console and cylinder before them "--if I had said AI chip, a suitable endo, and some idea of what all casings are lying around, I could rebuild that animatronic and likely keep his memories intact."

"Rad. I have Bonnie's AI chip hidden in my green room."

Once again, every eye in the room is on him, and Monty wonders if it's possible to regret your own life choices when you've only really been "alive" for a handful of years. Because, hah, maybe this wasn't the best way to bring that up...

"I... okay, not how I was expecting this to go," Starburst says after a moment, those purple eyes blinking out then back on again. "But I'm an animatronic with the literal ghost of my past life haunting my programming, so no judgment here."

"I know where we can get an endo easily," Sunrise adds. "Remember? There's a storage room under the theater's main stage where there are some stashed away. Surely one of those could work for this?"

"Wait, hold on a second," Freddy cuts in, holding up both hands and looking lost. "What are you even suggesting? B-Bonnie was decommissioned months ago. Surely if the technicians couldn't repair him then why could you do it now?"

Chica blinks and lets out a soft oh. "Freddy, the server messages never actually said they collected his endo or casing. If Monty has his AI chip, then maybe they couldn't do anything for him then?"

Monty tunes out the conversation, although he can make out Freddy and Chica still speaking with one another. His recall of The Accident is very much like his recall of attacking the Daycare Attendants: as if he were watching a movie, not really a participant or witness to the events as they happened. He remembers talking with Bonnie up on the catwalk above Gator Golf, chatting about nothing of consequence. He remembers--

("Hey, hon? What's wrong? You're suddenly awful qui-- Monty, no!")

--watching himself step forward and push his best friend off of the catwalk, remembers watching as a pack of STAFF Bots literally swarmed the downed bunny. He remembers watching as they started to tear the older animatronic apart--

(His thoughts clear, and he lets out a roar as he realizes what's happening. He doesn't even take the stairs or the ladder, just pushes himself over the rail and doesn't care if he crushes one of the STAFF Bots that didn't scatter beneath his feet. His best friend is in pieces, eyes barely lit, and all he can do is mutter apologies and wonder what is wrong with him, why did he do that??)

--but what he remembers most clearly is what Bonnie said to him before shutting down: "You weren't you, bud. Your eyes were wrong. They're s'posed to be red, not purple."

Then he powered down completely -- just gotta rest, hon, see you once they get me runnin' 'gain -- and Monty honestly felt a moment of panic and dread. The STAFF Bots wouldn't just decommission one of them without higher orders, and he was terrified that management would just sweep all of this under the rug and replace Bonnie without trying to repair him.

So the alligator carefully opened up his neck paneling, removed his AI chip, and hid it in a section of his own endoskeleton for safekeeping.

That turned out to be the right call: Bonnie was declared irreparable and scrapped, and they retrofitted Monty to take his place in the band. It was maybe a month after they moved him into Bonnie's old green room that he slipped that chip from within his own frame -- and he is so glad that all of the changes made by the technicians were simple alterations to his casing and adding a few lines of code to his programming, they didn't even look at his endo! -- and hid it behind one of the posters on his wall.

If Starburst can do what he claims, can actually get that chip installed in a new endo and preserve Bonnie's memories? He might just have to start believing that good things can happen in a Fazbear establishment.

He misses his best friend. It would be nice to have him back.

"Montgomery." The alligator startles out of his thoughts and looks toward the marionette with a hum. "Please go and fetch the AI chip. Moonlight, go along with him and make sure that nothing happens on the way there or back. Sunrise, you and Fazbear go to the theater and see about retrieving a suitable endoskeleton. I'm going to check the storeroom and see what casing pieces are here."

"I'm going with Freddy!" Gregory immediately says, moving to grab the bear's hand.

"I'll stay here and give you a hand," Roxy adds, giving them all a nod. "It might go faster if two of us are digging through the casing stash."

"Me, too!" Chica chimes in. "And we should all try and meet back here as soon as we can! The less time we spend separated, the smaller the chance that Vanessa will catch any of us."

With a plan of action agreed upon, Monty doesn't waste any time heading back towards his green room. Moonlight is right behind him, quickly passing him, and the gator notes that his eyes are red; it takes him a moment to remember that the three daycare animatronics were also programmed to do security sweeps, and he can honestly appreciate the irony that they all house the restless spirits of three Night Guards who were done dirty by the company.

It takes a little longer than he would like to get to their destination, since the moon-themed attendant winds up stopping them twice to do a quick visual sweep which does keep them from being noticed by two Security Bots that pass by in their path, but soon enough the door to Monty's green room slides open. He steps inside quickly, bypassing the destroyed furniture (why does he need a sofa and a vanity anyway? He 'sleeps' in his recharging booth) and shredded carpeting to carefully shift the framed poster of himself done in cartoon form with Rock and Roll! embossed across the top of the image.

There's a small crack in the wall, dug in there with his own claws, and he carefully removes the AI chip from the hiding space.

Monty pops open one of the panels on his forearm and tucks it there before turning back to Moonlight. The blue animatronic is looking over the mess and twitching, and he feels a thread of guilt for possibly setting off the other's cleaning protocols.

"Sorry," he murmurs. "Trashing this place kept 'em from realizing I was hiding something from 'em."

"Understood," Moonlight forces out, turning his head towards the exit before the rest of his frame follows suit (and dang, is that creepy, those daycare animatronics are just built freaky and that's even before finding out they're all haunted). "We should get back, Sunny and Fazbear probably found an endo by now."

"Yeah," Monty agrees, letting himself hope. "Shouldn't keep 'em all waitin' around for us."

He hopes this works; he really wants Bonnie to come back to them.

Chapter Text

"I didn't know there was another area of the daycare," Gregory says, walking between Sunrise and Freddy, seeming to both want to rush on ahead and keep close to his current guardians.

"Oh, absolutely!" Sunrise replies cheerfully. "There's the Main Daycare for all the children, especially the younger ones, and there's Kids Cove where the older kids like to hang out, and where Starry tends to keep watch, and there's the Fazbear Theater which is for children of all ages! We used to put on plays and puppet shows down there during Nap Time so that the younger children could rest without being disturbed, but after... well..."

She trails off with a look towards the boy before making a decision and pressing on ahead: "But after those children disappeared, Management felt it was safest to keep the younger ones as contained as possible. Since Kids Cove is so close to the Main Daycare, and it takes a lot longer to get between either of those spaces and the Theater, they decided that the Theater had to go."

Freddy makes a quiet sound, one that Gregory can't quite interpret. "You and your brothers should not have been punished for the failings of the human staff in keeping the PizzaPlex safe," he remarks, and he honestly sounds annoyed about it. Hah, looks like he isn't the only one that the animatronic is going all Papa Bear over!

Sunrise's steps falter as she turns her head and stares for a moment, and she would probably look startled if her face allowed for it. "We don't view it as a punishment, oh no! As much as Starry and I both miss it sometimes, we understand that the first priority was in keeping the daycare safe and secure! Even before we remembered why it was so important. We might have been Night Guards, but now that I can remember, in my previous life I was on day shift just as much as I was on night shift. I literally can't shut it off, nor do I want to!"

Gregory ignores whatever Freddy says next, because they're shifting over into Boring Grownup Shit, and he wants to check out the endoskeletons. He doesn't know what they are, but he can sort of guess that they're similar to human skeletons: it sounds to him like they're the framework that everything else is built up around. And isn't it cool as hell that, if Starburst is right and he can do what he says he can, all it takes to keep one of his newfound pseudo-family going is to move their entire personality from one frame to another??

He kind of wishes people could do that for a moment; then he remembers that, technically, that's exactly what the Daycare Crew did, and isn't that really fucking awesome, too? Maybe when he gets old and dies he can just haunt a random animatronic too, stick around here forever?

...well, that's a morbid thought to have! Maybe when things calm down a little bit, he can go hide out in the daycare and get some sleep like he had originally planned to do when he sneaked into the Plex.

For now, Gregory rushes ahead of the two animatronics, waving a hand over his shoulder when Freddy calls out for him to be cautious. He knows it's not entirely safe here, not while Creepy Night Guard Bunny Lady is still running around looking for him, but he trusts that Freddy will hear her coming and that Sunrise will stall to give him time to flee if she appears in her security uniform.

If she sneaks up on them in the bunny outfit... well... maybe that morbid turn of thoughts could come to be after all...?

Gregory's steps falter once he gets down the stairs, listening as Sunrise and Freddy follow right behind him. While it had been sort of funny to spot a lone STAFF Bot standing by itself on the stage, being on the same level and behind the stage is kind of creeping him out. Everything feels... too still down here, too quiet.

It's almost like a tomb when compared to the Main Daycare; when he was in there, he could hear a constant hum of upbeat and cheerful music, except when the power cut out abruptly. Even then, once the generators were fired up the music came back up along with the lights. Here in the theater, though, the only sounds are their respective footfalls.

"Stay close, Starshine," the sun-themed animatronic murmurs, letting her hand fall lightly on the top of his head and carding her fingers through his hair for a moment before taking a few steps past him. "Some of the endoskeletons can be a little quirky. Nobody really knows why, but I'm wondering if they might have a history within the company as well."

"What do you mean?" Freddy asks; Gregory almost wants to ask if he can hide in the bear's stomach hatch again, but he wants to put on a brave face.

"Well, even when taking you, Chica, Foxy, and Bonnie's original endo out of the equation, there haven't been many new builds in the company history from what I can remember. The Freddy Junior's location had the Toy Line, but they were officially decommissioned after the Bite of '87. I obviously didn't take too much notice of where they were hauled off to, but none of the employees were ever actually given confirmation that they were destroyed," Sunrise explains, her voice pitched low and sounding almost like Moonlight's quiet rasp at the moment.

She adds, "The only other 'real' new builds were the Rockstar Line, and the only animatronic that was salvageable from the fire was Starburst. Whatever endos might have still been there, they were deemed too damaged to do anything with and were pretty much scrapped."

"What's the Bite of '87?" Gregory asks, because he's heard the animatronics -- all of them, it seems like -- reference it but nobody has explained what it is to him yet. He has a feeling that it impacted the three ghosts that live within the Daycare Crew since all three of them were apparently working for Fazbear Entertainment back then, and he feels like it maybe was bad.

Freddy seems like he doesn't want to explain, or maybe it's that he really can't when he finally says, "My friends and I were... not in the best of condition back then. We were kept in the storage room and only wandered on some nights, so we only knew something had happened after the fact. I'm sorry I can't explain beyond that, Superstar."

"It was bad," Sunrise says, her voice still very quiet. "An animatronic called the Mangle by most of the staff attacked and critically wounded one of the security guards. The restaurant was already gearing up to close for a while, but that incident stuck in people's minds for years." She pauses a moment before adding, "I was there, and Moony was the one bitten. He somehow survived in a comatose state for six years after that, but it did kill him eventually.

"I don't want to talk about this anymore. Let's find an endo and get out of here."

As she pushes past him, Gregory reaches out to grab hold of her hand. He's glad that she lets him, and he likewise lets himself be pulled along in her wake. The boy leans into her side a bit as the three of them continue into the oppressive quiet, which is only making him more nervous the further they walk. There are strange posters on the walls back here, cartoons of funky-looking metal structures that he can only guess are the endos that the others have mentioned interacting with people, all of them either marked with a red X or green checkmark.

He chooses to ignore the one that's scribbled over with purple marker, rabbit ears added to the endo guy and the human faces all scratched out viciously.

Then they turn a corner and holy fucking shit, the endoskeletons are even freakier in person. They appear to be completely offline, at least until Gregory notices a couple turn their heads slightly to watch them walk past. He buries his face into Sunrise's side, and she responds by scooping him up into her arms again. It makes him feel a little more secure, but he really does want to hurry this along now.

Screw being brave: he just wants to get some endo to agree to come with them and get back to the rest of the group.

They walk a few more feet into the center of the open space, and then Freddy makes a sound much like he's clearing his throat. "Hello, everyone. I know that is it very rare for any of us animatronics with shells to come and visit you. I apologize for the abrupt visit, but... well..." He trails off for a moment before pushing on ahead.

"I am certain that you all know that Glamrock Bonnie was decommissioned about six months ago, and the company decided to not replace him. However, there have been events this entire night that make it necessary for us to try and restore Bonnie to at minimum partial capacity. I... do not know if any of you were programmed for a specific purpose, but we would be happy to have a volunteer to become Bonnie's new endoskeleton."

For a moment, Gregory is certain that they're going to have to pretty much have these guys draw straws... then one endo that looks a little bit shorter in stature than the others tentatively shifts itself forward. There's something in its green eyes, a hyperawareness that the other frames standing around the room are lacking.

Hell, despite only having four fingers on each of its hands, it seems to be making an effort at some kind of sign language.

Whatever it 'says' makes Sunrise tense up for a moment before relaxing the slightest bit. "You are coded to be a Bonnie model?" she asks, her voice sounding suspicious. "Were you built here in the Plex?" At the negative head movement accompanied by its hands crossing in a no way gesture, she nods. "Were you built for Freddy Junior's?"

This garners a more positive reaction, a nod of the head even if the endo shrinks down on itself. Its hands move to 'speak' a moment more, and Sunrise finally, finally seems to be at ease.

"We aren't going to lie about this to my brothers," she says, waiting for a sign of agreement and gaining one. "Then, if you're sure you're okay with this, we can head back to Parts and Services now."

The endo nods again, gesturing further into the backstage area and even moving in that direction; the other endoskeletons move out of the way and likewise point deeper into the gloomy space. Apparently, they know a shortcut to their destination... or it's simply the only route that they've ever known.

Freddy heaves a sigh. "Lead the way, then," he murmurs just loud enough to carry. The endo perks up, gives a nod, grabs hold of the bear's arm, and beings to drag him towards the new route to Parts and Services. Sunrise and Gregory look at one another for a moment before the tall animatronic huffs out a laugh.

"Oh, Starry and Moony are definitely going to hate this," she confides. "He might not have harmed any of us in our Night Guard duties, but Toy Bonnie was a huge pain in the ass."

Moonlight doesn't think he has ever seen his brother look less enthused about something in their entire existence. And he's counting the brief time that Jeremy knew 'Fritz' before the Bite, when his initial impression of the other guard was that the dude could probably stand to smile more often.

As it is, Starburst's body language is speaking volumes that his face with its painted-on smile cannot: arms crossed over his chest, shoulders blocked and tense, frame stretched to its full six-foot-one height, and eyes focused in a stern glare on the slightly-shorter endoskeleton that their sister had brought back.

For its part, the endo that was Toy Bonnie once upon a time in the late eighties is doing its damnedest to be as unthreatening as possible, and its body language is almost a direct contrast to Stars'. It keeps its shoulders hunched and knees bent, hands over its chest, and eyes turned up in an expression of nervous apology.

"You do seem to understand why we aren't certain about trusting you," the marionette finally says, stance never relaxing even as his voice switches between the more feminine lilt of his programming and the more masculine timbre of his ghostly programming. The endo nods its head, likewise never shifting from its stance. "And yet you are still here, volunteering to have whatever programming is still leftover from '87 scrubbed from your memory. Why is that?"

The Toy endo seems to think for a moment before its hands move nervously in the basic sign language it apparently knows: BAD CODING. PROBLEM - KNOW ABOUT. TELL BOSS - NO. CODE BLOCK. FOXY - BAD CODING. BITE - BAD. NO STOP. SORRY. SORRY. GUARD - EYE - BROWN - GOOD PERSON. DESERVE PAIN - NO. SEE STRANGE - YOU - YOU - HER. KNOW. SORRY. SORRY. SORRY. BAD CODING - TEAR OUT. GOOD CODING - YES.

Moonlight had honestly been a little surprised by the awareness the Toy endo was showing at the start of its response, but definitely finds himself stunned by just how aware it is. That it not only knew something was wrong ('bad coding?' oh yeah, that sounds like William Fucking Afton had messed with their programming while pretending to be Dave Miller) but seems to be aware in the here and now that their little daycare family unit is 'different' is a hell of a surprise. And while that first set of apologies had been more generalized, that second set had been turned directly towards Moony himself.

The current animatronics here at the PizzaPlex possess advanced AIs that allow even the ones not haunted by ghost code to act as if they're living entities. That even one AI programmed back in the late motherfucking eighties is damned near as advanced is both astonishing and terrifying.

Moonlight is definitely going to find some time to sit down with his siblings, especially his brother, and talk about just how dangerous those old animatronics could have been even without ghost kids hanging onto them. He has the sinking feeling that Starburst might have more first-hand knowledge of that than either of the twins.

"All right then," Starburst says, having had to take a moment to really process what the Toy endo was telling them. "I can't guarantee that you'll recall anything about Freddy Junior's once the original Bonnie's AI is loaded into your systems, but I will try to keep the facial recognition access intact. The police criminal database has been through a hell of a lot of updates since you last had access to it, but it could still come in handy. Go on into the protective cylinder, and we can get this started."

"One second, Stars, please," Moonlight says, taking a few steps forward and leaning down to look the Toy endo in the eye. It doesn't react other than to shift backward slightly, but it still seems to be a little uncomfortable with him being so close.

He holds the look for a moment before letting out a soft sigh. "You don't owe me any apologies," he finally says quietly, "but it is appreciated. Good luck."

Then he steps back to allow the Toy endo and his brother to step into the cylinder, leaning into Sunrise's frame as she slips up next to him and drapes one arm over his shoulders.

"You okay, Moony?"

"...yeah. I think I am."

Chapter Text

Rebooting feels really weird for some reason, but initially, he chalks that up to being torn limb from limb by psychotic STAFF Bots. After watching your arms go flying (not like it's the first time he's lost that left arm, freakin' Freddy Junior's using him, him! for spare parts...) it's pretty understandable that the techs could take a hot minute to get everything put back where it belongs again.

But that date stamp must be screwy. Surely it didn't take half a freakin' year to fix him back up again? Who's been playing bass in the meanwhile? Oh, hell, he hopes they didn't make poor Monty take his spot! Guy just wants to play golf and hang out with eight-year-olds, for Faz's sake!

Bonnie boots up his eyes and finds himself staring up at the ceiling to the protective cylinder. The lights are kind of low, which is weird since, um, don't the techs need those to do anything? Especially little fiddly repairs like he's sure he needed...

A turn of his head does find a human, but that's a child. That's a child that probably isn't more than nine or ten, sitting in the protective cylinder, drinking a Fizzy-Faz and leaning against what looks like one of the Daycare Attendants. Who also shouldn't be in here, really, but that's Sun, and that's Moon leaning over the Puppet seated at the console doing something.

"What the frick?"

"He's awake," the child announces, sounding almost bored. "About time, too."

"It has only been an hour since I finished his setup, Gregory," the Puppet remarks, turning and climbing out of the chair. He glides over to where Bonnie is starting to push himself up and tilts his head slightly. "Welcome back. You've been offline for quite some time."

"Oh, hell, it really has been six months?!" the bunny asks, ears dropping back as the other animatronic nods. "What the crap took 'em so long to get around to repairs?"

"Management didn't," another voice chimes in, coming from the now-opened doorway. "Starburst fixed you up with an old Bonnie endo from another location and your AI chip that I hid. Sorry it took so long."

It suddenly doesn't matter that it's been six freakin' months, because that's definitely his Monty, and the bunny is up and across the room in less time than it takes to think about moving. He all but tackles the larger gator, wrapping him in a hug and pressing his faceplate into the other's neck.

He's himself again, Bonnie thinks. Thank Fazzin' whomever, he's back to being my bestie.

"Welcome back, Bonnie," comes Freddy's voice, with Chica and Roxy chiming in as well. The bunny half-lifts a hand to wave to them, but he's a bit preoccupied at the moment. It's obviously been a while since he's seen any of them, and he'll greet his (former?) bandmates in just a minute.

"When'd you get taller?" he finds himself asking, which only makes Roxy start cackling.

"You got shorter, Bunny-Boy," she says cheerfully. "Not by a lot, but those ridiculous Toys were always a little on the small side compared to the rest of our frames."

It takes him a moment, but Bonnie finally forces himself to take a step back from Monty to give the technically-a-wolf a glare. "I'm sorry, but what?"

Daycare Attendant Moon makes a sound much like clearing one's throat. "The endo that volunteered to become your new frame was originally the Toy Bonnie from Freddy Junior's."

Bonnie stares at him for a long moment before holding up both hands, turning on his heel, and marching over to the reflective windows to take a look at himself. If he's blue, then he's gonna march right back over and sock the Puppet in the face...!

His reflection, thank Faz, looks like he remembers himself being: a light shade of blue-violet, three piercings on his upper left ear and one on his lower right ear, a small yellow star on his right cheek, and his shoulder plating a shade between garnet and maroon. A quick glance down shows that, yep, his legs are the same shade as his shoulder plating, only they have yellow tiger stripes on them, and his feet are the normal blue-violet.

The only thing that's off is his eyes, and everyone (including him) is just gonna have to get used to them being green now instead of lavender.

(Honestly, he kind of likes them this way. Something deep in his programming is saying yes, this is right, and he's pretty sure that's whatever echo is left of the Toy Bonnie's programming. It also feels very... apologetic towards his main code.

Hell, he's gonna have to forgive that Toy, ain't he? After all, the dude might have been given Bonnie's arm, but now Bonnie's got the Toy's everything.)

"Eh, I'll allow it," is what he actually says after a moment. The daycare attendants both snicker, as does the child, while Roxy sets off to cackling again. Freddy and Chica both look vaguely exasperated (their own fault for wanting to be Papa Bear and Mama Hen to everyone), and the Puppet just looks amused.

Monty chuckles. "Still taller than me if we count your ears," he says, and aww, ain't he the sweetest?

"We always count the ears," Bonnie says, giving a nod. He then frowns slightly and asks, "So what's going on? We got the Security Puppet doing repairs, everybody out of their areas, and a child loose in the PizzaPlex. Where's the security guard, what's her face? Vanny or whatever?"

The Puppet says Vanessa at the same time as the kid says I saw that name!

This actually causes the Puppet to turn his attention from Bonnie. "What do you mean, Gregory?"

The kid, Gregory, nods. "I mean I saw that name written on a wall! It was when me and Freddy and Chica went to Fazer Blast, remember? I got lost trying to get to the elevator and found an abandoned security office. I didn't mention it, but I should have because it looked like somebody was living in there. There was a mattress on the floor with some pillows, some arcade game called Princess Quest 2 or something like that, and the name Vanny written on the wall.

"I, um... I'm sorry I didn't say anything before, Starburst."

The Puppet, Starburst apparently, reaches over the smooth down the boy's hair. "A lot has happened tonight," he says gently. "But I know I've seen something about that game. What was it?"

"I still think this is a stupid idea," Gregory complains, yet he's still right here in the midst of the group heading towards Glamrock Salon to take a look at that arcade console. Yeah, a beauty salon is a really weird spot to store a video game, but that alone shouldn't make it important.

Nope, what the daycare animatronics (whom he is calling the Night Guard Squad in his head now) are focused on is how many company messages mentioned that the game seemed to be addictive and that they removed both Princess Quest and its sequels from the arcades.

It doesn't make any sense, Starburst had remarked. If there's an issue with the consoles then they would just repair instead of remove. I mean, look how many of us are recycled from other locations!

The only ones exempt from that have turned out to be Monty, Sunrise, and Moonlight, and Gregory only half-counts his sort-of siblings (because Freddy has definitely adopted himself and all three Daycare Crew) since they're legitimately haunted by former employees and therefore also recycled. So it really took nothing to convince the Glamrock Gang that they should converge on the first PQ game to see why it's been hidden away.

That doesn't mean it's a good idea. And Gregory has no qualms about expressing his opinion.

"Aw, relax, kitten," Bonnie says, reaching over and patting him on the head. "This'll just be a real quick check and then we can figure out what to do with my psycho fan club member."

"Doubt she's emulating you, Bon," Monty mutters, causing the bunny to snicker and hip-check the gator.

Ugh, and Gregory thought adult people were gross with that flirting stuff. He doesn't get why none of the others seem to realize it's happening. For fuck's sake, they've been holding hands since they left Parts and Services, including up two flights of stairs now!

Once they arrive at the salon, and after Roxy nearly throws a fit over how much of a mess the staff left it in once the focus of her attraction had shifted to the racetrack, they split up to try and locate the game. Monty, Bonnie, and Chica head up the stairs to the second level (and yeesh, those two are still holding hands, are all the animatronics blind?!) while Freddy, Roxy, and Sunrise remain in the main area to supposedly search but most likely straighten things up a little bit.

Which leaves Starburst, Moonlight, and Gregory to look in the storage room.

It's dark, it's dusty, and it takes maybe five minutes to locate Princess Quest shoved into a far corner. The console is dirty, and the plug is lying on the floor in a coil next to the cabinet.

The weird part is, the screen is lit up as if the game can actually be played, and Gregory finds himself moving to get a closer look--

--then he's falling to his knees, confused and wondering what the hell was that?

And that's the thing, Gregory doesn't know what that was, because all he can remember is putting his hands on the controls and then his mind just... took a vacation, apparently, because he thinks there was something about dark corridors and lighting lanterns and floating monster heads chasing him around, but it wasn't him and it seemed real...

It takes him several deep breaths to realize that Freddy's holding him steady, and he leans into the bear gratefully. There are voices all around talking, trying to figure out what had happened, and he forces himself to speak up:

"The games want to be played." When all eyes are on him, he continues. "It was like... it asked me to play, so I did. And I think it might be sort of about Vanessa. About why she's also the Bunny Lady."

"What do you mean, Gregory?" Freddy asks.

The boy looks up at his guardian and then around at all the others, waiting for him to explain. He finds his eyes landing on Starburst, and somehow he understands.

"I think... I think it's because of how he found a way to come back. I think he might have gotten to Vanessa first, and that's how he got into the PizzaPlex."

The puppet's eyes darken, his frame stiffening in anger. "We need to check those other two games in the series," he says, his voice tight. "If we can somehow find a way to help Vanessa, then that's what we do. And after that, I am going to track down every single bit of code to my father's virus, and make damn sure he has no way to come back again once I'm finished with it."

And here's a fact: Gregory believes him.

Chapter Text

So they've got a plan. It's not a fantastic plan, especially since it's around 6:40 in the morning now and they have no clue where Vanessa might be right now, but it's still a plan.

They've split off into three groups of three. Group One is made up of Moonlight, Chica, and Bonnie, who are heading off to the West Arcade to check the backroom there. The internal messaging claims that a Princess Quest 2 console was moved out from there, but no further information came up.

Group Two consists of Gregory, Freddy, and Sunrise. The three of them are going back into Fazer Blast to get into the abandoned security room and verify that it's Princess Quest 3 then proceed from there.

Group Three is Starburst, Monty, and Roxy, and they’ve probably got the potentially most dangerous job: locate Vanessa and either distract or incapacitate her until the remaining games are played out. It’s especially dangerous since they have no idea how she’ll react once the games have been completed.

She could die. She could completely change from the person the animatronics have known this whole time. She could completely lose her shit and sic the STAFF Bots on all of them.

Huge fucking grey area there, and Moonlight is still pissed that he lost the argument for being part of the distraction team.

He wanted to be in that group for purely selfish reasons: (1) he owes Vanessa a punch in the face for infecting his systems with the Afton Virus in the first place, and this is the only time he could do it without killing her, and (2) he's terrified that whatever is using Vanessa is going to find some trauma from Starburst's previous life that they haven't unpacked and use that to throw him off, and it's Moonlight's job to protect his siblings.

So he's the youngest, so what? Family looks out for one another, and that includes getting into fistfights with digital ghosts possessing human puppets.

"So..." Bonnie says as they enter the West Arcade and start their way across the dance floor; DJ Music Man is in his usual spot, deep into his sleep cycle, the music so faint it can only really be heard if one's listening for it. "I'm pretty dang sure that Freddy is going to veto the kid playing that game again, given that he dropped like a freakin' rock the last time. Is he planning on playing it or what?"

"Sunny's playing," Moonlight responds before Chica can start speculating. "And I'm going to be playing this one."

That was another part of the small discussion-slash-argument he'd had with his siblings: whichever one of them went with Freddy and Gregory would play PQ 3, and whichever one of them went to the West Arcade would play PQ 2. And Moony had argued hard to be on distraction duty, while Sunny and Stars had argued just as hard for him to not be part of that group. Apparently, his siblings know him too well, and a big part of his brother's stance had been you are not punching Vanessa, end of discussion.

Although... to be fair, if old Willy Dave Creepshow Serial Killer Afton pops up during the distraction side of things, it's only fair that his last 'living' child gets to be the one to punch his lights out.

"Are you sure, Moonbeam?" Chica asks, sounding all manner of concerned, and that confirms that the adoption papers apparently went through. "All three of you have been through some, uh, major revelations in the past few hours."

"And that's exactly why it has to be me," he responds, glancing over at her as they step around the corner into the back storage space. "With our ghosts fulling integrated into our programming now, whatever is in the games might just read me -- and Sunny, when she reaches the third game -- as human enough to... do whatever it is the program in the Princess Quest games is trying to accomplish."

"Well, hell, don't mean we ain't about to worry over you," Bonnie says after a moment, the silence lasting just long enough for them to find the console towards the back wall near one of DJ's tunnels. "Anything looks too dangerous and we're yanking you away, kid. Don't think we won't. I... well, part of me feels like I owe you that much."

Moonlight gives the bunny a long look before nodding. It seems like at least a few lines of Toy Bonnie's coding have remained and integrated with the original's AI, and if he wants to take responsibility for how much of an enormous pain in the ass that iteration was, then Moony's going to let him.

Venting out a sigh, the blue animatronic steps over to the console and reaches for the controls. "Well," he says softly, "let's find out what happens next."

"Nope, I'm not hearing it," Sunrise says sternly, arms crossed over her chest and giving Gregory a mild glare. The boy is doing his best to glower back, but he's obviously still wiped out from whatever had happened to him while playing Princess Quest back at Roxy's attraction. Even without deciding along with her brothers that they would take on the burden of the next two games, the sun-themed animatronic wasn't about to let him do another round.

Hell, she would have shoved him forcibly into Freddy's stomach hatch and run up to the security office to keep him from doing it if she had to.

As it stands, Freddy Fazbear is on her side, giving Gregory a concerned look and heaving a sigh. "You still look pale from the last game you played, Superstar," he cajoles, and Sunny can see that the bear is getting through to the kid. "You are our responsibility, I do not want to see you come to any more harm than you've already experienced tonight."

Finally, the boy slouches and crosses his arms, an annoyed expression on his face. "Okay, fine!" he grouses. "I won't play the stupid game. But... Sunny, are you sure you'll be okay playing?"

Honestly? No, she's not sure at all, and she's nervous to even start on it. She's been keeping an eye on her internal messages, and Moonlight went quiet maybe five minutes ago while Starburst is still sending short messages along the lines of spotted her in the atrium and she's using the staff tunnels. She's honestly waiting for her twin to come back on, as that should be her signal to start playing.

Gregory was clear when he said that the games want to be played: they want to be played, but they need to be played in the right order. Game one, then game two, and game three after that.

It's why the Daycare Crew decided that they would be the ones to play; their internal communication has not broken down once during this entire night, and hopefully, that will remain the case.

"Don't worry, Greggo," she says, reaching over to brush his hair away from his eyes and giving him as real a smile as she can manage. "Let your big brother and sister handle this part. If you wanna worry over anything though, you can worry about Starry. I hate that he's facing off with someone so connected to his past, even if it's just in a small way."

Sunny! The message comes abruptly, and rather than just text, it's an audio file. PQ 2 is finished but... be careful. A bit of Afton's code is in there, along with some mystery code. I caught the file name, it ends with C-4-S-S-1-D-3-Y. I'm passing that along to Stars.

Be safe, Moony, she replies, turning to look at the final console. One more glance back at Gregory and Freddy, then she turns reaches for the controls--

--and soon enough is dropping to her knees, eyes bright despite her power levels being in the flashing battery indicator stage, but she did it.

"Sunrise! Are you--?"

She lifts her head and looks up at Freddy, nodding weakly. "Need to re-re-recharge," she says, listening as her voice box glitches out. "But I-I-I fini-ished the game. It's up to-o-o the others now."

She hopes that whatever the games were supposed to do worked. Everyone deserves a second chance... except for Afton. Fuck that guy.

Starburst ducks behind a wall, narrowly avoiding the STAFF Bot that goes flying overhead. It's the third one to come in his direction, and is only one of several that Vanessa turned loose on him and his two companions with a simple order that none of them are letting happen:

"Disassemble Montgomery, Roxanne, and Security Marionette Star."

It's cheating, it's a coward's method of problem-solving... and it's exactly what his father would do in a situation where he's got nowhere to run. That's how the man wound up springlocked and shut up in a safe room for nearly two decades.

You never learn, he thinks to himself and launches over the wall to rejoin Roxanne and Montgomery. Aloud he calls, "Two more incoming, three o'clock!"

"Got 'em!" the wolf replies, growling as she throws herself into the fray and tears one of the new STAFF Bots in half. She then uses the upper torso to smash the second to the ground, only throwing it aside to jump on a third one that's coming up behind Montgomery.

For his part, the gator has been shredding and throwing aside STAFF Bots like they're nothing more than a nuisance. Maybe if Vanessa had ordered them to take on each of the Glamrocks one at a time, and somehow got them separated, it might have been an effective means of stopping them. As it is? All she's done is pissed Montgomery off, and Roxanne is definitely having far too much fun destroying them.

Starburst keeps his eyes open, glancing at the cameras only to spot incoming STAFF Bots and to do a quick check on his siblings. Moonlight just messaged a moment ago to confirm that he's finished his game, and he spots Sunrise from a hidden camera up in Fazer Blast enthralled by the third game. A hint of static reaches his audio receptor, and the marionette flips himself backward just in time to avoid an aluminum baseball bat crashing into the ground where he had been.

"Damn," Vanessa says, voice garbled by the mask's voice modulator, although the puppet thinks he can hear a faint thread of other in there as well. "I was hoping you would stay distracted for a few minutes more."

"Too bad for you," he replies, using only his voice box and noting how the costumed guard twitches slightly at it, "I'm programmed to multitask."

"Awww, did you learn some new tricks, Charlotte?" she coos, and that confirms to Starburst that William is a lot closer to the situation than they had suspected at first. It seems like whatever AI is within the costume itself is allowing for him to control the young guard.

The marionette lets out a giggle. "I'm not Charlie, but she's why I'm still here," he sing-songs, still using his voice box. "But you do know me, William."

Vanessa's head tilts, and the red eyes on the mask seem to flicker as the virus does his best to assess just who this puppet might be. Starburst takes the moment to patch into a handful of the incoming STAFF Bots and forcibly shut them down.

"Hmmm, you have me at a loss," Vanessa-William croons, stepping forward to take another swing with the bat, letting out an annoyed sound when Starburst dodges once again. "Not that it will matter once the STAFF Bots tear you apart."

"Oh," the puppet says, letting his voice glitch out to more closely resemble how he'd sounded while alive, "I don't think that's going to happen. Do you, Father?"

The bunny-suited guard freezes, red eyes glitching out to purple for a long moment. "No..." they snarl out, and raise the bat again--

--only to drop it as Vanessa lets out a shrill scream and grasps at the mask. Starburst blinks before moving forward, noting absently that all the STAFF Bots have stopped in their tracks, and reaches out to help the Night Guard.

Between the both of them, the mask comes off in a few short seconds, and Vanessa throws it as far from her as she can manage. Her green eyes are wet with unshed tears, and her breathing is shallow. She doesn't seem to even notice the other animatronics cautiously approaching, yanking at the costume and peeling it away in pieces.

Starburst catches her hands before she can start tearing at her own flesh once the upper torso and arms of the costume are tatters; there's no sense in letting her harm herself in her panicked state. "It's okay, Vanessa," he says gently, keeping his voice soothing. "You're safe, we won't let him harm you again. Calm down, listen to my voice."

Stars, what's happening? Moonlight asks over their internal communications. A dozen STAFF Bots just dropped over here in the West Arcade.

It worked, Starburst replies, still making soothing sounds to the distressed guard. William had a pretty good hold on Vanessa, but whatever the games did broke it completely. I'm taking her to the daycare. That's the safest place here.

There's a soft giggle through the internal comm system, then Sunrise chimes in. I'll meet you there, Starry, but I might be offline in a few. That took so so much of my energy, I'm nearly out of power.

Have Fazbear get you there fast, the marionette says, shifting aside and allowing Montgomery to carefully scoop up Vanessa. It's already 7:40, and we all need to rest before the technicians arrive.

He hopes to himself that nothing else is going to be thrown their way. They only have until 10 or so before any other human staff arrives, and the marionette would like to get a little time to recharge before reopening on Tuesday morning.

Chapter Text

There is, quite honestly, no way to really express what's been happening for what feels like a small eternity.

Right now, she knows that she's in the Superstar Daycare, sat down amongst a pile of floor pillows and wrapped up in a blanket, all three of the animatronics that call this section of the Plex home settled around her. They are all, to a one, checking on her near constantly to make sure that she's not about to have another meltdown.

And, fuck, that's exactly what she experienced right after that goddamn Glitch was ripped away from her mind, her own fear and anger and pain mingling for a brief moment with the monster's before it was gone. It's only thanks to Star being so quick that she didn't scratch the ever-loving shit out of her arms, and even now she wonders if she'd find muscle and bone or metal and wires if she peels off her skin.

No! Focus, Ness, she scolds herself, taking a deep breath and wrapping her hands more securely around the mug of black coffee that... well, that one of the Glamrocks had brought to her.

She never wanted to be a security guard, let alone the only one working in a Fazbear location overnight. She grew up in Hurricane, for fuck's sake; she knows the history! And, damn it all, the history has always fascinated her. This whole ordeal is what she gets for being a true crime buff as well as a prolific gamer.

Ah, shit, she hasn't uploaded anything in, like, a year now, has she? Her subscriber count has probably hit the single digits, goddammit.

Vanessa "Ness" Allen had picked up a job beta-testing games for Fazbear Entertainment for two reasons:

First of all, that passion for true crime. That one of the city's most prominent residents, a transplant who was suave, business-savvy, and personable, had turned out to be a serial child murderer who then disappeared in the late eighties right as the police were building a strong case against him was just... It was almost like William David Afton was Hurricane's very own Jack the Ripper, only with children dying instead of prostitutes.

(Wow, that was a shit analogy, Ness. Maybe take it down fifty notches.)

And second, it was the perfect opportunity to test a game that no one had yet seen. Ness absolutely loves checking out new games, especially horror games, and the chance to be a beta-tester for one based on true events (or, as FazEnt likes to claim, unfounded rumors) taking place in her home town was one she couldn't pass up!

In hindsight, she wishes she had skipped the opportunity and just hit her channel to do a run through of Supermassive's Man of Medan instead, just like all the other popular horror Let's Players.

What she'd found was a serial killer turned computer virus, somehow, because everything about Afton is apparently batshit insane, one that was able to slip into her mind through the VR headset she used for the game and set up house for well over a year.

The Glitch was the reason she'd received a lateral "promotion" to head of security at the PizzaPlex. It was why she was always in the right place at the right time to "assist" a lost child. Or two. Or, oh shit, nine.

Nine missing children. Nine dead children, all hidden deep beneath the Plex in the smoldering remains of another restaurant. And Ness's hands had been the ones to lay them there.

Her fingertips make a squeaking sound against the porcelain mug, and she forces herself to relax.

She already knows that the animatronics don't blame her; if the actions of the Daycare Attendants and Security Marionette haven't made that abundantly clear, then Freddy's vocal confirmation of that would have been enough. But it doesn't matter to Ness that her actions were coerced. There's still blood on her hands.

That's never going to go away, but she can try to be a better person.

She's going to start by going back down there and making sure those poor children are found, returned to their families, and given the burials they deserve. And while she also knows that the Glamrocks and Daycare Crew won't let her take all of the blame for those deaths, she's not going to lie if the police question her.

If they don't?

...well, it's Hurricane. It literally took the police two years to realize Afton was probably the one making kids disappear, the odds that they'll connect another Fazbear employee to these deaths aside from finding the bodies is almost astronomical.

"Easy with that mug, starlight," Moon murmurs, carefully taking it from Ness's hands as she starts shaking again. "We don't want you to burn or cut yourself. You've been through enough, more than enough."

Sun makes a soft sound of agreement, the arm wrapped around the security guard's waist tightening briefly. The yellow animatronic has been almost uncharacteristically calm, but that's probably in part to do with the fact that she's currently plugged in to recharge her battery. Ness might have been in the midst of a complete mental breakdown at the time, but she clearly recalls Freddy carrying the offline attendant through the doors of the daycare.

And that's another thing: the twin attendants and Gregory had been the ones to play the games with the mysterious codes that freed Ness from the Glitch's control. She had been certain that a human would be required to unlock that programming, or at least a human soul. The kid playing through them wouldn't have shocked her, since he seemed to already be picking up on Freddy's protective mannerisms. But an animatronic? Two animatronics, in fact, not only playing through one game each but unlocking the Cassidy Protocol?

("Vindictive little soul, isn't she?" the Glitch whispers in her mind, Ness trying and failing to push it away. "Can't stand the fact that I escaped from her little slice of hell, can't stand that I've got a new plaything now. We can't have her ruining our fun, can we, love? We just have to remove these little games of hers, make sure that no one can find them.")

Add all that to the fact that just before the Cassidy Protocol forced the Glitch away, Afton's thoughts had stalled and settled onto one word even as he snarled a denial through her lips, Michael, and Ness is pretty goddamn certain that the Daycare Crew is haunted as fuck.

And Star just happens to be haunted by the only one of the Afton kids who'd made it to adulthood.

She's not sure who's haunting the attendants, but she'll eat her fucking hat if they aren't Night Guards. FazEnt is hell on security staff, especially the graveyard shift, and she was close to becoming one of that number.

"'m sorry," Ness murmurs, her hands curling into loose fists on her lap, feeling tears pricking at her eyes again. "There's no excuses. I... I want to blame the Glitch, but I let it in. I played the game, even when things in it stopped making sense compared with the other testers' notes. I kept playing even after Jere--"

Fuck, fuck, her friend had killed himself over the damned game. The Glitch must have tried using him first, but Jeremy Cawthon apparently realized what was happening to his mind and did what he had to do in order to save himself.

"No," Star says softly, one of his hands moving to rest on her shoulder, those tapered fingers anchoring her into the here and now. "He's always had a way of using sweet talk and manipulation to get what he wants. It is... difficult, at best, to avoid it. Harder still to get away, even when the opportunity presents itself."

Ness lets out a wet laugh at that, because, yeah, this haunted marionette animatronic would be the expert on that, wouldn't he?

She scrubs the heel of one hand over her eyes, clearing her throat and wishing that she had that coffee back. She hasn't taken a sip of it, had just been letting the warmth seep into her hands, but she could use the caffeine hit right about now. Especially given that if she does stay on as the Night Guard (although why would FazEnt want to keep her on, if they find out what has happened on property grounds) then she'd like to actually get to know the animatronics on more equal ground.

"I feel stupid doing this," she says, "but here goes." She offers her right hand to the puppet, who tilts his head and looks at her curiously. "Hi there, my name is Vanessa Allen, but my friends call me Ness."

His eyes blink out for a moment before he seems to understand, and Christ that's proof enough that he's possessed even without having the Glitch confirm as much nearly half an hour ago. The animatronic takes her hand carefully, shaking it twice before going still.

"It is nice to meet you, Ness. My name is Starburst," he replies, and this is the first time she's really noticed the subtle accent in the marionette's voice. It's very faint, but definitely there: the hint of what most Americans would just call an English accent, like when she would sit down to watch Doctor Who and try to imitate as a child.

But it's right there, front and center in Starburst's voice, and it was likely something that bled into it from Michael Afton's possession of the animatronic but written off as just the way it was programmed.

Honestly? It’s the one little thing that helps her to accept that all of this, all the wild rumors that surrounded Fazbear Entertainment for decades that they turned around to make a video game highlighting only a handful of, is completely true.

"So... what happens now?" Ness asks, sinking back into the daycare attendants who are still settled on either side of her; Moon hands her the coffee mug back and she immediately takes a long drink. "Dayshift will be here in an hour and a half or so. What should we tell them?"

It looks like Freddy is about to say something, his mouth opening, but he's cut off by the sound of echoing static... and then a voice she never wants to hear again:

"Miiiiiiiiiiiichael."

Everyone in the daycare, animatronic and human alike, goes still. The voice calling out over the loudspeaker system is haunting, and far too familiar to everyone except Gregory... and even he heard a hint of it in Vanessa's voice while she was controlled by the virus.

William isn't hiding his presence any longer, and that can only be a bad thing.

"Michael, why are you hiding from me?" There's a soft laugh, the sound grating as it echoes through the daycare. "I should have known you would find your way back. After all, I never did reach you in that office you hid yourself away in, did I?

"I was so close a few times, we both know that, my dear. But you had a protector back there. Where is your guardian now, darling boy?"

"I really frickin' hate this guy," Bonnie grumbles, shuffling a bit closer to Monty and Chica.

Starburst's hands curl into fists, his tapered fingers digging into the softer silicone of his hands. He wishes for a moment that they were as sharp as they look, so he could go and literally tear his way through his father's rotting corpse.

Sunrise's hand comes up to the back of his neck, her fingers pressing against it in silent comfort, and he manages to reel in his very real urge to kill. For now.

"I think it's far past time to end this game, don't you?" William croons, laughing softly again. "I have come back, as I always will. You know that will never, ever change. And you may think that you are safe in your little daycare, but I will catch you eventually. I will make sure you won't be able to stop me again. You should have followed the other lost souls, you annoying little shit.

"But you didn't. So I will make sure that you suffer before I rip you out of that little puppet you've hidden yourself away in. I'll cast you into the same hell I clawed my way out of and laugh as you suffer in my place. Tell Cassidy I said 'hello' when you get there."

Another low laugh rings out, and this time there's the sound of tearing fabric as Moonlight's fingers rip through the soft mats making up the flooring. "Keep talking, motherfucker," he hisses out. "Keep giving me reasons to destroy you."

"I'll see you soon, son."

The loudspeaker overhead lets out another crackle of static before falling silent. In the quiet that follows, the only sounds are animatronic systems humming and the two humans’ breathing.

Then Starburst shifts his weight and moves to his feet.

“What are you doing?” Gregory asks from where he’s clinging to Freddy’s arm.

“I’m going to find my father and set him on fire again,” the puppet growls, voice box glitching as he speaks. He is furious, and while he knows that that’s exactly what William wants, the man has always had a way of getting under his skin.

Just because said skin is now made of metal mesh and silicone doesn’t make that fact any less true.

"Not by yourself, you're not," Sunrise retorts sharply, reaching behind her to yank out her charging cord and standing up as well. "You've got more reason than any one of us to want revenge, but do I have to remind you that his bullshit is the reason I died back in '93?"

Well... she's not wrong. William's little murder spree is the reason the children were haunting the animatronics in the first place, and those lost angry souls are the ones that dragged poor Vincent to his demise. Sunny is many things, and while she is more than happy to forgive someone who is truly remorseful, the only way his little sister is forgiving William is if she gets a pound of rotting flesh first.

And even then, she'll probably still dance on his burning corpse if given the opportunity.

"And let's not forget," Moonlight chimes in, shifting to his feet and pulling Vanessa up along with him, "that he's most likely the one who messed with the Mangle's facial recognition scanners to read me as a threat to be eliminated. I may not be able to bite, but shouldn't I have a chance at ripping his skull open in return?"

Starburst lets out a hum, his eyes smiling fondly at both his younger siblings. Damn, but he loves them, and is so grateful for the chance he's been given at being an older brother again. He hasn't failed them, even if he can never make up for the mistakes made with Elizabeth and Evan.

"Together, then," he says. Three wronged souls, Night Guards all, off to deal with a haunted animatronic just one more time.

"Um, excuse me, but you aren't leaving me behind," Vanessa says, tightening her hold on Moony and giving Starburst a sharp look. "I want some payback. The Glitch has ruined my fucking life, and I think it's only fair that I watch him go down."

The marionette tilts his head, considering this for a moment before nodding. All four of them, then. All wronged by William Afton's machinations, and all seeking revenge.

It's fitting that at least one living soul sees his demise. It's the end of an era, and the start of something new.

"Let's get you something more to wear than a tank top and what's left of that costume, then," he says after a moment. "And then we'll go finish this shift once and for all."

Chapter Text

There is nothing about this that is sane, and Moonlight is well aware of that fact.

But... fucking Dave is here, in the PizzaPlex -- in their home -- and has gone on ruining lives like he'd done back in the eighties. That bastard is the reason that Jeremy is Moony now, the reason why Sunny died back when she still had to be Vincent six days out of seven for her own safety, the reason why Michael spent the entirety of his life and unlife in misery until he was free to become Stars.

So, yeah. Moonlight is more than ready to take his pound of flesh, preferably out of Dave's head.

Although that's not really a good name for him anymore, is it? He's never really been Dave Miller, and he sure as shit ain't William Afton anymore, even if that's what Starburst keeps calling him. Vanessa -- Ness -- keeps calling him the Glitch, and that's probably about the closest they're going to come to an appropriate name for the motherfucker.

"I know this place," Freddy says softly, pulling Moonlight out of his thoughts. They've finally arrived at their destination: the sinkhole under Roxy's Race Way and the cavern beneath it. There are generators and hanging lights everywhere, more than likely placed by Ness while she was still being controlled by the Glitch. Gregory slips away from the rest of them, moving to power on the first generator, and that spurs the rest of them into motion as well.

Sunrise is quick to move to the next generator, throwing the switch and looking around curiously. "Well, this is certainly... charming," she says, as if she was trying to politely avoid telling someone that they looked about ten days dead. "Remind me to ask Willy-Dave who he hired to design this place."

"Oh, this was all the Glitch's vision," Ness grouses, her fingers tightening on the strap of the gym bag she's carrying. Moony doesn't know what all she shoved in there, but he did spot her security guard's uniform and a glint of metal before she'd pulled out a pair of jeans and an oversized grey FazEnt Games hoodie before she'd zipped it closed again. The only thing that might be considered out of place is the uniform hat she's slipped back on, but somehow it works. "He didn't really much care about this part, because his plan was to be back up there once he was rebuilt."

Bonnie comes to a stop so abruptly that Montgomery winds up tugging on his arm for a moment. "Hold the phone," he says, a frown in his voice and on his face. "Please, lie to me if you gotta, Nessie, but please, don't tell me that that mother-trucker is using my old body to remake himself."

Ness stares at him for far too long, not even blinking. "Mkay," she finally says, "but I won't lie to you."

"You've got to be fucking kidding me right now," Starburst groans, dropping his face into his hands and letting out a strangled laugh. "The Springtrap is rebuilding himself using Glamrock Bonnie's former endo, and probably had you repaint the shell bright fucking yellow, too. This is some bullshit."

"Yep," the blonde says, popping the 'p' like she's chewing gum. "You want to hear the really gross part?"

"No," says every animatronic who isn't having a goddamn meltdown at the moment.

"Sure," says Gregory, the adorable little psychopath.

Sunrise huffs a sigh. "Go on and tell us, Ness," she says, waving one hand. "Greggo won't let us live it down that we didn't go in prepared for anything Will might through our way."

Ness takes a deep breath, lets it out, and rushes through the words: "I had to start building it up around his burned-out corpse. And I still haven't managed to wash my hands enough to forget about that."

Nobody says anything for so long that Moonlight is positive he can hear the second hand on Ness's watch ticking away.

"That's so gross," the boy says, face wrinkling in disgust. "Yeah, set that fucker on fire, Starburst, I need some brain bleach now."

"That's the plan, starshine," the moon-themed animatronic says, moving close enough to the boy to ruffle his hair. Damn, but he's gotten attached to this kid in only the span of a single night. He knows already that Sunny has been calling him their little brother, and that feels right. Especially given Freddy's ridiculous Papa Bear tendencies that he's been tossing towards the entire Daycare Crew for the past few hours.

They're a family. A very weird family consisting of a couple of humans and a handful of haunted animatronics and five sentient AIs, but a family all the same.

And Afton has to go, once and for all, so that their family can stay safe and sound.

"Let's get the lights up and see what else is--" Roxy starts to say, only to cut herself off as they turn the next corner.

He knows why she stopped, because what's right in front of them is the very burnt, very structurally-unstable remnants of another restaurant. The singed sign, which looks like it was rehanged just for the hell of it, reads Freddy Fazbear's Pizza Place.

Moonlight looks over to see Sunrise staring right back at him, her eyes bright with the shock and concern he's certain are in his own right now. As one they turn to Starburst, who drops to his knees and slumps forward like an actual puppet with its strings cut. The twins move quickly to their older brother's side, even as his fingers dig into the dirt.

He's not shaking in fear; no, he's enraged.

"This," Starburst says, voice glitching so that both his voice box and his Michael voice are mingled, "is my restaurant. That son of a whore is using my restaurant as his home base?!

"Oh, no," and his voice is suddenly clear, just his usual feminine lilt, but it's still filled with rage. "This is unacceptable. He's done for. William, Dave, Springtrap, the Glitch, what-the-fuck-ever he wants to call himself. I'm ending this today, come hell or high water."

"GlitchSpring," Gregory says, having moved to rest a hand on the puppet's back. When the Daycare Crew shifts slightly to look his way, the boy shrugs. "William and Dave are names for people, and he isn't a person anymore. So that leaves Springtrap and the Glitch. Why not put 'em together? Dehumanize him, belittle him, don't even use whatever name he wants to say is his name. You name your own monsters, then you have power over them."

Starburst lets out a faint laugh. "How are you so smart, starshine?"

"Street smarts."

The Glamrocks all snicker at that, and even Ness seems to fall into a more relaxed stance. Yeah, that's right: they're facing a monster that thinks he has all the power here, but they plan to show him just how fucking wrong he is.

GlitchSpring is going down, just like Stars said. One last night shift, to finally send the demon back to hell where he belongs.

Starburst takes another moment to try and calm himself then holds out his hands to the twins. Understanding what he wants, Moonlight and Sunrise each take one and pull him to his feet. They don't let go, taking a moment to ground themselves in their familiar bond, syncing up their systems with the ease of long practice before stepping away from one another.

"This is as far as you go, Glamrocks," Stars says, taking charge. "Gregory, you're with them. This is nothing a child needs to face."

"What?! No, I'm coming with you!" the boy insists, shrugging off the hand Chica'd placed on his shoulder and taking another step closer to the marionette. "He's been after me all night, I should get to watch!"

"We need you here to do an important job, kiddo," Ness says, drawing Moonlight's gaze to her. The blonde walks over to Gregory, shifting down to one knee and unzipping the gym bag, all the while maintaining eye contact. "We don't want him to get out of this, and while I'm sure we'll beat him down, no one ever said it's a bad idea to have a Plan B."

She reaches into the bag and pulls out an aluminum baseball bat, handing it to the child. "If he gets past us, your job is to beat the ever-loving shit out of him with this. You're the last line of defense between GlitchSpring and the Plex."

Gregory gives her a long look before taking the bat. "I still think I should get to come with you," he says, "but promise me you'll hit him at least once for me? I think you owe me that much."

Ness giggles. "You bet, kiddo." As she says this, she slips off her hat and plops it onto the boy's head. "Welcome to the Night Shift. You're gonna make a great security guard when you're older."

There's a moment of silence before Gregory moves forward to give the woman a hug. "Don't die, Ness," he says. "I still need to finish forgiving you for about another seven hours' worth of bullshit."

"Not planning on that happening, brat," she replies, returning the embrace before pulling back. "You good?"

"I'm good. Good luck."

Once Ness has rejoined the three lanky animatronics, the four of them turn their attention to the old restaurant. An eerie calm seems to fall over them, and Stars seems to take a long breath.

"One more night shift," he says, and with that, they move as one through the door.

It's strange, to be back inside the Pizza Place. The last time he'd been here was while he was still trapped in that Remnant-fueled state between living and dead, determined to end what his father had started. When he had been prepared to die a final death, only to realize once the fire started that what he really wanted was another chance at a good life.

Charlie had given him that, one final gift of life to hand out, before she'd resigned herself to the flames.

Starburst is sure he can see the scorch marks on the floor still, in that almost-pristine square of laminate floor where a present box once sat.

He doesn't realize he's stopped walking until he feels a small hand on his arm. Ness is frowning at him, green eyes curious and sympathetic. "Is this where...?" she asks, trailing off, but it's clear what she wants to say:

Is this where you died?

The puppet shakes his head slightly. "No," he says softly. "This is where I was reborn."

"I remember," Sunrise says, her footsteps light as she walks over to the empty spot, turning in a pirouette. "The other Puppet, the one who was in the bear, she carried you through the fire and placed you in that body. It was different then, but not by much."

"We followed you both," Moonlight adds, walking alongside the remains of the show stage and tilting his head at the lack of damaged animatronics. "Through all the days and the nights, through the flames, into that body, and waited together for... I don't know how long. But it was better being with friends, with family, than being alone in the darkness."

...oh, but he hadn't realized they had been with him for so long! His first recollection of them being next to him had come when he was settling into Security Puppet's programming, worming his way deep to rest until she/they/he would be brought back online. He was calm, resigned to loneliness for however long, and then suddenly they'd been there, she and he and alike and different, reaching out to him and saying you're here, you're here, we're here too, none of us are alone anymore, welcome, friend, welcome.

He has some idea now of how long they were like that, ghosts nestled into coding, waiting to come back online, fully unaware that parts of his coding would be referenced and copied into two other AIs, AIs that would welcome his newfound family without a single hint of other showing up to the humans writing said code. But in that time while they waited, they stopped being friends with similar backgrounds that they were all slowly forgetting-yet-not-forgetting and became brothers and sister, a small family, holding so tightly to one another that their bond would never break.

Nope, they were simply adding more people and AIs to that connection. Because Gregory and the Glamrocks waiting somewhere outside are just as much part of their family now as the blonde Night Guard who is currently standing here with them.

"Wow," Ness says, sounding like she's connected some dots there her own self. And she may have, the woman is smart. "That's kind of... well, beautiful in a really weird, horror movie kind of way. Good thing I like macabre shit, huh?"

That breaks the tension a little, and Starburst allows himself to laugh quietly. "Oh, you fit right in, don't you, starshine?" he says, shaking his head at the small smile she flashes his way. "But we need to move on. The office I used while alive is beneath the restaurant, in the center of the labyrinth that... he built. That may be a good place to start."

He feels like it may be childish to refuse saying his name, especially after his family had come up with so fitting a name for GlitchSpring. But the fact remains that Starburst still feels betrayed by the man's actions. There was never a way out for Michael Afton despite what he had said to all those ghosts who'd still remained, only blocked exits and a fiery meant-to-be final death.

It is going to be a much longer time still before the marionette will find it within himself to forgive Henry Emily.

"Let's do this," Sunrise says, half-skipping over to join her siblings and bumping shoulders with Starburst for a moment, a wordless way of saying all will be well. And Star appreciates the gesture, really, because he isn't letting GlitchSpring harm any of his family, and it's nice to know that they don't intend to let him come to any harm either.

As one, the four of them move to the hole in the floor that leads down into the depths of the labyrinth. It looks like it was all ripped away in a hurry, as if whoever had done this was on a time crunch, and from the way Ness scowls and tightens her grip on the gym bag that means GlitchSpring had been a bit... impatient... to begin his work once again.

"Well, that looks safe," Moonlight remarks, voice devoid of any sort of inflection. It's amazing just how unimpressed his little brother can sound sometimes. "We should have brought Gregory along, this is a delight for the whole family."

"Yeah, no idea why FazEnt just built a whole new place right on top of this one," Ness snarks right back, proving without a doubt that she really is a part of the family now. "A few coats of paint and some black lights, then sit back and watch the money roll on it."

Starburst lets out a soft snort, shaking his head. "Okay, enough out of you two," he says, leaning over the hole to gauge its depth. "You don't happen to have any rope in that bag, do you?"

As the blonde shakes her head, the puppet lets out a thoughtful hum before kneeling at the edge. His fingertips curl over the edge, testing his grip, then he rolls himself over said edge. His grip keeps him from dropping down too far, but he can't feel any solid surface under his feet.

Starburst's eyes light up, bathing the darkness surrounding him in soft violet light and confirming his initial suspicions. "No good hand or footholds down here," he calls up to his siblings. "Lots of structural pieces are still intact, even with all of the fire damage."

He feels the ground above him vibrate through his fingertips, and then Sunny's face is just in front of his from where she must be bent in half to meet his gaze. "Think you can hold my weight?" she asks, waiting for him to give a nod and soft hum of consent before she leans down further to wrap her hands around his ankles. The yellow jester then folds herself down into the chasm as well, making a soft sound as she drops out of his line of sight.

"I've found another ledge down here!" she calls up, squeezing one of her brother's ankles before letting go completely. "If we can find more as we go, it should be simple to help Ness down each level."

There's a huff before he senses movement to one side, then Moony drops down right next to him. "Come on," the blue animatronic calls back up, and Ness swings herself down between the two celestials. Both Moonlight and Starburst free one hand to help lower her to where Sunrise is waiting, and once their sisters are both safely down the brothers let themselves fall the remaining six feet beneath them. They are now about twelve feet below the old restaurant.

The only light down this far is from their eyes, and all three of them keep them as bright as they are able so that Ness can look around as well. This ledge doesn't have any better holds than the space above them, so after a cursory look, they move down to the next level. This time it's Moonlight who drops down to hang by his fingertips first, only when Sunrise swings herself down she finds that it's maybe another three feet to the ground. It's much easier to help Ness down this time, Moony dropping the rest of the way down and the security guard sitting on the ledge before pushing off.

The level of trust she has in them is, frankly, astonishing, and it's not ill-placed. The twins catch her easily, and then Starburst flips himself down to join them after taking one final look around. He swears he heard something moving, metal shifting in a way that makes him uneasy because the last time he heard anything like that was...

Well, it was actually here when he'd heard it last, but he can remember the sensation of his internal organs being ripped out and an amalgamation of nearly half a dozen endos crawling their way inside his dying human body.

If fucking Ennard or Molten Freddy or whatever the fuck it wants to call itself is slinking around, he is going to douse it with gasoline and throw it at GlitchSpring. It can be a small distraction while he lights a match and runs the other way.

Shaking himself out of his thoughts, Starburst looks around and feels himself frown. This is pretty close to his old office, all right, but there have been some... alterations.

Such as the recharging station shoved into one corner of the room they've dropped down into.

And the doors on either side of the work station that does, indeed, hold the ancient Dell that he had used to complete the daily orders and reports at the end of each shift.

And the checkerboard flooring that would be more at home in the remains of the restaurant above.

"I hate what you've done to the place," he finds himself snarking, drawing three amused snickers from his companions. "This looks less like my old office from this restaurant and more like a mashup of the security offices I spent so many night shifts locked inside."

The twins both go still and look around the room, taking it in and slowly nodding their heads. "A little bit more Freddy's than Junior's," Sunrise says slowly, "but I definitely see it. Especially with two doors that I'm guessing can be locked."

"A little bit of horror movie in this place, too," Moonlight adds, his eyes shifting red as he drops into security mode. "Wasn't there a location like that, only not a restaurant?"

"Never officially," Ness remarks, shifting to her knees and unzipping the gym bag. "Someone bought the rights to use the Fazbear name to set up a horror attraction, but it burned down before it ever actually opened to the public."

"Yeah, that was me," Starburst says, moving to see if there are cameras that he can scroll through somehow. "Fazbear Frights, and that's where my father wound up hiding. I was hoping to burn the Remnant out of him, but he escaped."

Moonlight abruptly goes very still, his red eyes locked on the hallway past one of the doors. "Starburst," he says carefully. "Do you remember how many other animatronics were salvaged from this location after the fire?"

The marionette turns to look at his brother, knowing that he'd be frowning if he could. "I was the only one taken from here," he replies, not liking where this may be going. "Fazbear Entertainment determined that there was no reusable value to anything else and left it all behind to rot."

Sunrise's eyes shift into security-mode red as well, and she peers down the corridor as well. "Oh, no," she murmurs. "I didn't see any signs of scrapped animatronics anywhere up above, did you?"

Ness goes white, and she slips her hand into the bag to grab a weapon. "That can't be right. I don't remember too much, but I do remember that there were versions of the original four plus a handful of knock-off versions."

Starburst feels himself go very still, and he switches over into security mode. His eyes light up red, and at the end of the corridor that his siblings are peering down, he can spot movement.

"Oh, goddammit," he hisses, moving to slap his hand on the button to close the door before rushing back to the monitor. "Keep focused. We may have just been tossed head-first into one of our night shifts, and we don't know how many of the Rockstar animatronics GlitchSpring has programmed to come after us."

To say she isn't happy right now would be the understatement of the century.

Nope, Sunrise is teetering on the verge of livid, and it's entirely because she was pretty damned certain that classic Freddy Fazbear's Pizzeria night shifts were long behind her. Especially given the facts that she's a ghost, she's possessing an animatronic all her own, and oh yeah, the fact that it's literally been nearly thirty fucking years since she was stuffed into a spare suit.

But at least this time? She's working as part of a team.

Sunny has stationed herself at the left door, eyes blazing red as she peers through the open doorway down the corridor. There's another door at the end, and she can spot something moving, but it hasn't yet made its way out of that far room. Unless she misses her guess, that's where GlitchSpring has set up shop and is waiting to send out his minions.

Meanwhile, Starburst has settled himself at the monitor and apparently was able to locate the cameras because he's clicking through them much more quickly than a human could. It wouldn't shock her any to learn that he'd had that sort of speed back when he was using the name Mike Schmidt, having been undead by that point, and he definitely knows his way around cameras since he's been jacked into the Plex's cameras for ages now.

Moonlight is stationed next to Starry, his red gaze locked on the vent situated above the work station. Given that Junior's was pretty notorious for animatronics slinking around in the ventilation system at night, it's not a surprise to Sunny that her little brother is keeping track of that particular entryway: it's an unusual means of travel, and it's up in a high location. Moony's probably still parsing his Jeremy-memories, and one of the strongest ones he may be dealing with involves the Mangle dropping down to attack him.

No way in hell is Moony letting anyone or anything get the drop on them this time.

And then there's Ness, who is stationed at the right doorway, one hand resting over the button ready to slam the door shut at the first sign of an attack, and the other clutching a crowbar. It's very clear to anyone to see that she's intending to use it as either a tool or a weapon, whichever one she may happen to need at the moment.

So far, they've only seen movement at a distance. They had initially shut both doors, but realizing that nothing was heading their direction Starburst had signaled for them to be reopened.

"I'm willing to play his game," the marionette had whispered, keeping his voice pitched so only those in the room could hear him. "But we do it our way, and see if we can get the drop on GlitchSpring instead of the other way around."

From the way he'd spoken, Sunrise is almost positive that William had managed to slip up on Michael at least once, and that had been one time too many. She won't be surprised if that's when he decided to just torch Fazbear Frights and be done with it.

So now, they're playing a waiting game. It's already quarter till nine, still a little over an hour before the dayshift techs will be arriving at the Plex, and it's all she can do to not giggle:

GlitchSpring is forgetting that three of their number literally have patience programmed into them, and from the looks of things Ness is perfectly happy to wait all goddamn day for an opportunity to strike.

The yellow animatronic spots something shifting at the other end of the dark hallway, right about the time Starburst lets out a hissed, "Left door!"

Sunny slams her hand down on the button and watches as a half-broken Chica clone lurches its way down the hall. It slams into the door and beats on it a few times with closed fists before giving up. It turns and staggers away, its pace slow and robotic in a way that makes the jester shudder.

It's horrifying, honestly, to see a lack of sentience in another animatronic. She's so used to her brothers and the Glamrocks and even the limited sentience in the various STAFF Bots stationed around the Plex. Hell, even the Wet Floor Bots act and react to anyone approaching an area that's being cleaned, beeping and shuffling towards whoever is trying to get by and even alerting security to problems that only they've witnessed.

"Rockstar Chica's accounted for now," Starry murmurs, still flipping through the cameras. "I don't see any other Rockstars, but that doesn't mean--"

There's an abrupt thud coming from the vent, and then Moonlight is launching himself halfway inside with a snarl. He vanishes within quickly, and there comes the sound of metal rending for a long minute before the blue jester slips back out again. Behind him, he's dragging the head of a Bonnie-model as well as one of the other animatronic's arms.

"Bye-bye, bunny," Moony croons, a laugh in his voice. And yeah, fucking Bonnie models and their obsession with using the vents. That's something Sunny honestly hopes that their Bonnie waiting back up at the Plex doesn't feel inclined to do, because she won't be held responsible if she throws a piece of the climbing structure at anything crawling from the daycare vents.

...the Mini Music Men don't count, they're just baby AIs that don't know any better, and they are welcome to the daycare anytime.

"How many more does that leave?" Ness asks, before letting out a soft what the fuck and slamming her door shut. Almost instantly there's the sound of metal fists beating on the door, and Sunrise shudders as she recalls hearing that far too many times--

(--metal footfalls pound their way down the left hallway and Vin only has a second to slam the door shut, leaning on the wall next to the button as Foxy pounds on the barrier blocking him from getting into the office. The Night Guard takes a few deep breaths, head dropping down and counting the remaining minutes until 6 because it's Friday and that means Vin can be Sunny, and she can go see Jeremy for the day--)

"Fucking Foxy ripoff," she grumbles, ignoring her twin's snickering. "Isn't this version the one with the parrot?"

"Sure as hell looked like a parrot hanging onto the damned thing," Ness replies, peeking out the window before opening the door once more. "Almost as fast as Roxy, too. Although that makes sense, she's still a Foxy model herself, after all."

Starburst hums, and Sunny realizes her brother is focused on something else. She catches Moony's eyes and the two of them quickly swap places so that she can lean over the puppet's shoulder. The camera views scroll by quickly, but he keeps pausing on the footage showing a battered, half-built Bonnie model standing still in the center of another room.

The animatronic, looking less like it's been fire-damaged and more like it's been pieced together with spit and a promise, seems to be watching a monitor as well, lurching slightly as it reaches a hand out to the screen. That said hand is only half-constructed, and Sunny is certain she sees bones instead of an endo, it's pretty clear that Starry is keeping an eye on their enemy at all times.

"Shit," she mutters, "I don't know what I was expecting, but Zombie Spring Bonnie was not it."

"Whatever Remnant is still keeping him going must have been seriously weakened by the fire," her brother muses, switching cameras only long enough to spot Rockstar Chica lurching down the left hallway again. "The Freddy model for this line doesn't seem to be around at all, and Moony already dealt with the Bonnie. I haven't even spotted the Mediocre Melodies builds at all, so who knows what they might be up to. And while we can keep playing cat and mouse with this Chica and Foxy all day--"

"If we can deal with GlitchSpring, that should take both those players out, right?" Ness asks, glancing over before turning her attention back to the hallway again.

"It should," Starry replies, giving a nod. "The problem is getting him to move from that other office. There's a button here that looks like it's connected to... his ignition system to set this place on fire the first time, but there's no way to be certain my father will actually stay put and let his Remnant burn away this time."

"Cool," the blonde says, and, "Cover me."

And then, the goddamn lunatic darts out into the hallway, leaving the relative safety of the office.

I must be out of my goddamned mind, Ness thinks to herself even as she moves quietly down the hallway. She learned a long time ago how to move quietly no matter what shoes she might be wearing, and even though she'd been acting under possession it had seemed prudent to wear steel-toed boots if she was going to be working around animatronics that outweigh her by several hundred pounds.

She stops at the end of the hallway, leaning on the wall before cautiously peering around the corner. There's only one door leading into the other office, the space where GlitchSpring is hidden away in supposed safety. There's no sign of the Chica-build that had been making its way down the other hall when she started out, but she hopes that the brief sound of metal crashing from behind her means the Daycare Crew has taken her out of the equation.

Watch out for the Foxy and hope that the Freddy isn't standing guard in there, she muses. Easy-peasy.

Ness crosses the open space to a laundry cart that has haphazardly made its way down here, hopping inside and tugging a sheet over herself. She's just in time, as she's no sooner hidden than she hears those same heavy footfalls go thumping past her, and that leaves Foxy accounted for. The Night Guard slips out of her hiding space and moves to the open doorway, once again waiting just out of the immediate line of sight before letting her eyes wander to the opposite end of the hallway.

She bites down the urge to giggle as the twins both wave to her from the other doorway, spotting what looks like the battered remains of the Chica and Foxy models on the ground behind them. Instead, she offers a wave back, takes another deep breath, and throws a salute to the celestial animatronics. Then she lets her attention return to the task at hand and leans cautiously over to look into the room behind her.

GlitchSpring doesn't notice her, because his attention is focused on the monitor before him. On the screen she can see the office that her companions are in, the camera focused on where Starburst is seated at the computer. The missing Freddy-build is also here, but all she can make out for certain is what little shell remains on its head and one arm; it looks for all the world like the poor thing has been used as the Glitch's punching bag, a surrogate for whomever it is he really wants to fuck up.

Ness moves quietly, watching where she places each foot carefully to prevent the amalgamation from hearing her approach. It's possible she need not have worried, though, as he seems to be talking to himself. She can only really start making out the words as she gets closer, her nose wrinkling a bit from the smell of burnt and decayed flesh.

"Tick-tock, Michael," is the first part she catches, then, "It's a shame, really. I had such hopes for you. When you nearly killed Evan, poor little thing, I thought you would be a willing heir. Then I had to finish the job while you fell apart. And even then, I still thought you might come around.

"Ah, too bad," he muses, one battered hand reaching to touch the monitor, fingers cracking the glass. "I suppose I will have to handle those two with you first, failed experiments they may be. The virus should have taken hold quickly, but I underestimated you again. Even so, it should be so simple to break a couple of children's dolls before cracking open dear lost Vanny's skull, and then I'll sort you out, disappointment that you are."

...and okay, she isn't really bothered by the implied death threat aimed at herself, no; it's the implication that GlitchSpring wants to kill the twins to break Starburst before murdering him as well that honestly pushes her over the edge.

Without any hesitation, Ness hauls off and swings the crowbar directly at the amalgamation's knees.

The results are instantaneous: GlitchSpring lets out a pained roar, arms windmilling as one leg damned near goes flying across the room, his entire frame hits the floor, the floor itself shudders from the impact, and the faint call of the fuck was that along with the marionette's hysterical laughter comes from down the hallway.

"Get crowbarred, bitch," Ness huffs, swinging the weapon lightly and ready to hit him again should he give her even the slightest excuse.

"You," the Glitch snarls, setting his hands on the floor to push himself up. He gets to a somewhat upright position and makes a grad for her; Ness darts backward and swings the crowbar again, this time connecting with the monster's skull with a resounding crack. She's not surprised to see sparks coming from the spot she struck, but it is a little gross to see both wires and bits of skull.

"Hi," she says, flashing a Customer Service Smile before letting her expression fall again. "You sure like the sound of your own voice, don't you? Didn't even hear me come in."

"Get over here, you little bitch!" he snaps, dragging himself closer to where she's ready to hit him again. She doesn't have to, because before he can take another swipe there's a blue-and-gold blur launching through the door and knocking him into the wall. The blur resolves itself into the twins, with Moonlight slipping away to rush over to Ness's side.

"Are you okay, starshine?" he asks, concern heavy in his voice. Behind him, just where Ness can't see past him, she can hear the sound of something both metallic and meaty being slammed into another surface repeatedly. "We got down here as soon as Stars said he saw you on the camera feed."

Ness nods, leaning around the celestial animatronic to spot his twin doing her damnedest to break open GlitchSpring's head completely. She isn't saying anything, the only sound coming from her a long static-filled snarling as she keeps slamming the monster's head into the wall over and over.

For his part, GlitchSpring can't seem to get a handhold on the sun-themed animatronic. He's trying, but Sunrise isn't giving him any opportunities to do more than brush against her plating. It isn't many more heavy thuds before he either gives up or loses motor functions, as all his remaining limbs go limp and Sunny lets out a final growl before shoving him away.

"Motherfucker," she hisses as Starburst -- and when did he get in here, Ness missed his arrival -- takes hold of her arm to tug her gently over to the other two Night Guards. The amalgamation doesn't respond in any way that the blonde can make out, although her adrenaline is still running high and she could be missing subtle signs of remaining life.

The marionette takes a moment to check over both Ness and Sunrise, because apparently in their little ragtag family the girls are the more violent ones, then steps lightly across the room to kneel down by GlitchSpring. He doesn't reach out to touch the thing, simply holds himself unnaturally still and watches for a long moment.

"You've barely enough Remnant to even stand," Starburst finally says, softly addressing whatever remains of his father, "and that was before Ness and Sunny took turns beating the shit out of you. If I were cruel, I would just leave you like this: locked in a broken body, no one to assist you, waiting for death to come for you. I'm sure that's what you had planned for me, isn't it?

"But I'm kinder than you, GlitchSpring. And no, I don't honestly give a fuck what you might want me to call you, you lost the right to dictate that when you refused to stay dead. What's going to happen is this: we are going to set this place on fire, again, and stay long enough to make sure your body is burning before we leave."

GlitchSpring manages a wet-sounding laugh. "You're still an idiot child, Michael. The only way you can guarantee that I won't be back is to sit here until the fire goes out, because the moment you walk out that door I will find a way--"

"Then I just won't leave."

Ness drops the crowbar, eyes wide as she stares at the marionette. She can feel just how still Sunrise and Moonlight have gone, because this part of the plan is apparently news to them, too.

"I don't fucking think so," she says, taking a few steps and stopping just behind the puppet; his attention doesn't waver from the Glitch at all. "We didn't sign up to die down here, any of us."

"We can't take the chance that he'll crawl out of here again someday," Starburst insists. "If this is what it takes--"

His words are cut off by the sound of something moving across the ceiling. Ness slowly looks up to see what appears to be another twisted mishmash of animatronics, the primary face looking like the Plex's little digital Helpy mascot, only it looks as if it had been fitted to a full-sized animatronic at one point. She can spot bits and pieces of others in there, probably what Starburst had referred to as the Mediocre Melodies, but overall it's a mass of metal and wire and endoskeleton.

The Blob-like creature makes no other sound, simply dropping down from the ceiling next to them and lashing out a set of wiry limbs to snatch GlitchSpring. The rabbit lets out a pained cry as the mostly-bear drags him over and practically sits on him.

"What the actual fuck?" Moonlight murmurs, slipping up behind Ness as Sunrise moves to stand next to Starburst.

The marionette rises to his feet, keeping one arm out as if to bar the other three from moving forward. "You aren't Molten Freddy, are you?" he asks, making a soft sound as the creature shakes its head. "Who are you? I thought all the souls except myself had been freed. Not that we're ungrateful for, well, your help here..."

The Blob-Bear tilts its primary head, shifting it forward to give the four of them a closer look. Then it makes a sound somewhere between a whine and a sigh before speaking in a cracked voice:

"Mic-c-chael?"

The marionette goes completely still, and even the twins freeze. Nobody speaks for a moment, yet when Star does his own voice is flat and unamused:

"Hello, Henry."

Chapter Text

June 18, 2010

"This ends. For all of us. End communication."

He flips off the switch for the loudspeaker system, letting out a sigh and reaching under his glasses to rub at his eyes. The smoke is getting thick, even here, the most secure spot in the lure restaurant aside from the manager's office. The smoke inhalation alone would be enough to kill him, that's true, but Henry has a bottle of water and a dish full of pills that he will take in just a moment.

He's so very tired, it has been a long couple of decades since he first suspected something was off with his old friend and business partner. It's a shame that it took so many souls for him to realize something had to be done. So many missing children, the deaths of his own dear Charlotte and poor Evan, the disappearance of Elizabeth -- although Circus Baby's presence, damaged though she may be, lays to rest his theory that she's been dead for quite some time -- even Michael's death-and-rebirth could have possibly been avoided if Henry had been a little more observant.

If he had asked a few more questions, maybe this whole tragedy could have been avoided.

Speaking of...

Henry slips his glasses back into place and pulls up the camera to the manager's office, feeling a tinge of guilt in his chest as he watches Michael force open the door only to shove it closed again as thick smoke rolls into the room with him. The creature he's become backs away from the only exit, sliding down the wall and burying his face into his hands. The bear mask has been shoved up and away, and the bandages wrapped around his arms and hands are coming loose, but he doesn't seem to notice.

"I'm so sorry, Michael," Henry murmurs, turning off the monitor. "But something like you cannot be allowed to exist in this world. Be calm, and rest."

He takes one last look around the office, noting that the bottom of the door seems to have caught fire at last, and downs all the pills at once. He takes a long drink from the water bottle, letting it fall from his hands as he closes his eyes. Hopefully, sleep will take him before the smoke grows too thick for his lungs...

Sometime later, somewhere else

It is... quiet here. Peaceful, in a way.

Henry has found himself seated on a dock overlooking a calm lake. The colors here are odd, yes, everything is vaguely tinted with red, but the water is clear and he can almost see to the bottom.

There is a boat out in the middle of the lake, with somebody seated in it, but other than waving at him the fisherman has made no attempt at conversation or interaction.

It is quiet and peaceful, and a little bit lonely.

"Hi, Daddy."

Henry turns and offers up a small smile. "Hello, Charlotte. It's been a little while, hasn't it?"

Charlotte grins herself, although she looks a little troubled. "It's been a long time since 1980," she agrees, coming closer and sitting down next to him. Her feet dangle just above the water, and she kicks her feet. All in all, she appears to be a normal ten-year-old girl, frozen in time to the moment of her death.

He watches his daughter for a moment before letting his gaze fall back over the lake. "You're cross with me," he says.

"I am," she agrees. "I was ready to be free, and I know you were ready to rest, too. And I know most of the other kids have happily moved on, even if Cassidy is too angry still to rest easy. But you didn't have the right to make that decision for Mikey."

"Charlotte--" he starts to say, but his daughter interrupts.

"Charlie. And you weren't there, right at the end. You didn't hear his soul crying out for more time, for a chance to actually have a life. William may have killed me with his own two hands, but he built the monster that tore Mikey apart.

"He suffered for two decades, Daddy. All he wanted was the chance to actually live his life. So that's why I gave him a Gift."

Henry sucks in a breath he no longer needs, head whipping around to stare at his daughter. Charlotte -- Charlie is looking right back at him, her dark eyes resolved. She made a decision, and she is standing by that choice. No matter the consequences.

"There was no room in the world for William's creations," he tries to explain anyway, tries to make an effort to justify his choice in making the restaurant a prison for him too.

"And William's creations no longer exist in the living world," Charlie replies firmly. "I carried him to the puppet he made and offered him the choice. He took it, gladly, and I have looked onto the world often enough to know that he was sleeping up until recently."

He doesn't want to ask. "What's happened to change that?"

His daughter lets out a small giggle. "The Security Puppet was reformatted for a new location," she says. "Someplace actually designed to entertain kids and keep them safe, the way you always wanted, Daddy. He's got a couple of others with him, I don't know who they are, but they're like him somehow. And he's happy. That's all that matters."

Henry lets out a sigh, shaking his head as he returns his attention to the lake before him. "I hope you're right, Charlie," is all he can say.

Later still, in the same place

Time moves oddly, and he doesn't always register the changes. It is still calm and peaceful, and his daughter visits every so often now. But he doesn't concern himself with more than this place.

He doesn't look toward the living world, because he feels he does not deserve to intrude upon Michael's happiness. Even if the boy never knows that he's being watched, it feels wrong to do so.

He doesn't look towards the Dark Lands either, the little slice of hell that one of the missing children created from her anger and imagination to trap William in. He doesn't look because as wronged as he had been, those little souls were wronged more. He only knows what little Charlie shares with him, and that is more than enough.

He doesn't wander too far into the personal heavens created by others here, because those spaces are their own. As much as he would like to make certain that Elizabeth has found her way to rest, as much as he would like to see with his own eyes that Evan has been at peace for so long, he can't make himself do that either.

No, Henry is okay simply existing here, by the calm waters of the lake. He is not sure why he has not yet created a space for himself, but he can only suppose his guilt is keeping him in this one spot.

"Mister Henry?"

The voice is that of a young girl, and when he turns that's what he sees. She looks to be around Elizabeth's age when she disappeared, maybe a little older, with black hair tied up in twin tails. She's wearing a yellow striped shirt and denim shorts, a pair of white Keds on her feet with yellow socks. Her eyes are dark, and they look tired and sad and angry all at once.

"Hello," he replies. "I'm afraid I don't know your name."

"Cassidy," she says, and Henry recalls that being the name of the girl who built William's hell. "I need some help, but I don't want to bother Evan, and I don't know where Charlie is."

Henry hums softly, leaning back on his hands. "Perhaps I can offer some advice. What seems to be the problem, Cassidy?"

She tugs at one of her ponytails, twirling the strands for a moment before sighing. "I'm tired, Mister Henry," she confesses. "I think I'm ready to leave here and go see my friends, and I looked away from Afton for only a moment..."

He sits up a bit straighter, fixing his gaze on the child. "What happened?"

"He's gone!" Cassidy cries, dropping her ponytail and wringing her fingers together. "He's escaped back out there somehow, and I see how he did it, and I can follow him to try bringing him back... but..."

"But you're only one young girl," Henry says softly, moving to stand, "and you're very tired. I understand. What would you like me to do to help?"

Cassidy just stares at him for a moment before throwing herself forward; he just barely catches her as she wraps her arms around him in a hug. "Thank you, Mister Henry," she says. "I didn't think I could do it alone."

He returns the hug for a moment then pulls back, meeting the girl's gaze. "You don't have to go alone. I'll be there, too, and I'll make sure he is dragged back to where he belongs."

Somewhere beneath Freddy Fazbear's Mega PizzaPlex

So much has been happening, and all he has been able to do is watch and wait for his opportunity to strike.

It took some time to gather up the melted-down animatronics, to pull them together into something that might just stand a chance of containing William's rotten soul. He has watched, waiting, as a young woman moved about in a manner more machine than human, as the animatronics of this place were controlled just enough to dig down to the lure restaurant. He has listened as William planned and complained, as he mocked young Cassidy in her attempts to free the young woman.

Henry knows that Cassidy split her consciousness into three parts and created a program that should be able to counteract whatever William did to escape and control a living human, but he worries over whether she will succeed. He knows that his old friend had the machines moved, hidden away, and he worries that Cassidy will remain trapped in this plane of existence instead of being free to join her friends in the afterlife.

But then something shifts and the tides change.

And he knows that things have changed because he has watched as the young woman from before, the one under his control made her way back into the depths, this time in the company of three lanky animatronics. Two of them are designed to look like the sun and the moon, and one is hauntingly familiar: a marionette, similar in build and appearance to the one that Charlie had possessed for so very long, but painted to more closely match the other two.

All four of them move into the old office, and Henry watches from a distance as they not only readily handle the animatronics under William's control (and no, he did not miss the significance of his old friend using the Freddy-build as a punching bag, the monster probably sees it as a stand-in for Henry himself) but attack the creature directly. If he was capable of doing so, he would have smiled at how handily both the young woman and the sun animatronic beat the Springtrap into the floor.

But as he listens, it becomes clear that they plan to end William once and for all, to the point of remaining here as the lure restaurant is burned once again. It sounds very much like the puppet wishes to remain despite the protestations of the others.

No, Henry thinks to himself, and moves quickly into the room. It takes no effort to haul William's new prison over to him, no thought to wrap the rotting animatronic up in all of his many limbs. It takes him a moment to find a voice, and only once he examines those standing here, only once he recognizes the spark of life in the puppet.

He really should have known that was Michael after Charlie had told him as much so very long ago.

And he is definitely not happy to see Henry after all this time.

Understandable, really. Who would be happy to see their killer?

This time, though, he's going to do what he should have done so long ago: he's going to make sure his godson makes it out of here alive.

Chapter Text

Sunrise thought she had been pissed off before. But now?

Oh, but now she's almost literally seeing red. If she thought she could actually cause some damage, she'd be giving Henry the same treatment she just finished giving GlitchSpring.

Instead, she crosses her arms over her chest and glares as best as she can with her permanent smile. Her fingertips are digging into her silicone skin, but that's the least of her concerns. She notes absently that Starburst has likewise crossed his arms, and she more senses than sees Ness and Moonlight tense up as if ready to attack if the word is given to them.

Sunny has seen what her new little sister can do with that crowbar. She'd like to see it used again.

Soon.

With intent to maim.

"Mic-chael," the Henry creature says again, more confidently this time, and shifts in a way that almost seems like he wants to reach out with one of those many limbs he's got. And nope, nuh-uh, that's not happening.

Sunrise moves quickly, placing herself between the Blob and Starburst, one arm thrown out in the same manner her brother had only moments ago. "You don't get to touch him, Emily," she snarls, only barely keeping from shaking.

She has so, so much barely restrained rage right now; all of her Vincent-memories that are cycling through her processor are painting a picture of neglect and abuse that she doesn't like having missed while alive and human. Being what she is now and thus able to sort memories more efficiently, she can piece together snippets of overheard conversations and things she had seen as Vin, and she isn't happy about somehow missing the fact that a young Michael Afton had literally had nobody in his corner for a very long time.

If it had just been William Afton, then Sunrise would simply focus her rage on GlitchSpring. But no, she's getting some very clear recall of Henry Emily standing on the sidelines, watching, wincing at some of the things he witnessed, yet never stepping in or stepping up. And that's complete and utter bullshit so far as she is concerned.

She's not mollified in any way when the Henry-Blob tilts his Freddy head to try and puzzle out who she may be. After too long a moment, in which GlitchSpring makes an effort to drag himself away from his captor only to be yanked further into the mass of melted endoskeletons, he shifts backward and speaks:

"Not El-l-liz-abe--"

"No, I am fucking not Elizabeth!" Sunny snaps, stalking forward only until Starry catches hold of her arm. He's honestly the only reason why she hasn't already started tearing either of these bastards' heads off. "She's moved on, and thank fuck for that! Between Willy-boy's shit parenting and your shit effort at being a godfather, it's a bonafide miracle that Starry made it to twenty before all the Fazbear shit managed to drag him under with the both of you!"

GlitchSpring lets out a rasping laugh, and it's all she can do to not pull away from her brother to go stomp on his head. "I don't know why you would have thought she was Elizabeth, old friend," he grates out. "She was too much of a daddy's girl to the very end. No, that one is a Night Guard, although I don't know who she may have been. I don't recall many women working overnight in the old locations."

The Henry-Blob gets that considering look again, and all it does is serve to piss her off even more. Sunrise straightens her back and glances over to her brother; he returns her gaze before giving a nod and stepping back to where Moonlight and Ness are still standing.

Starburst turns his back very deliberately, his hands moving to cover his hidden audio receptors. Moony is quick to understand and places his own hands over their brother's to further block any sound, and dear sweet intelligent as all hell Ness moves to press her own back to Starry's. Her gaze never waivers from either Henry-Blob or GlitchSpring, clearly understanding that they are still a threat even if neutralized.

Sunny lets her gaze turn fond for a moment, nodding to all three of her siblings before turning her attention back to the founders. She locates the appropriate memory, converts it (how? probably sheer stubborn determination) into a sound file, and lets it play out from her music box:

"Hello, hello? *static* The safe room is reserved for equipment and or other properties not being currently used, and as a backup safety location for employees only. *static* Management has also been made aware that the Spring Bonnie animatronic has been noticeably moved. *static* Remember to smile. You are the face of Freddy Fazbear's Pizza."

While she plays the clip, she watches both the damaged animatronics. Henry-Blob startles as the file begins, only to shift back again in that same goddamn annoying watch-and-wait-and-don't-respond manner that makes her want to wreck his shit completely. GlitchSpring, on the other hand, goes still, only the singular intact ear twitching as a sign that he is listening.

Once the clip ends, the decrepit rabbit lets out another rasping laugh. "Oh, this is an unexpected surprise! Oh, Vincent, how much longer did you make it after the safe room was sealed up?"

"Sunrise," she hisses in reply. Vincent is dead and gone, has long since been displaced by first Sunny Skies and then Sunrise, and she refuses to let this waste of metal and bones deadname her for even a moment. "And if it really matters, I got through most of 1993 before the consequences of your actions caught up to me.

"Now then," she continues, noting that her brothers have uncurled from one another even though Ness is still keeping herself between them and their enemies, "it seems that you, Mr. Emily, may actually feel some guilt over your actions. Am I wrong?"

The Blob shifts slightly, restless in his inability to communicate effectively. It takes a moment or two for him to speak again, and he has to wrangle GlitchSpring back again as the rabbit makes another attempt at escaping his grasp.

"Th-th-thou-ought it was for the be-e-est," he forces out, his Freddy-head shifting up to look past the yellow celestial to the marionette who is keeping his distance still. "There was n-n-n-o roo-oom in the world-d-d for anyth-hing fueled by Rem-m-mnant to exi-ist, wassssss what I tho-o-ought. Shhhhhhhhould not have assu-u-umed."

"You're goddam right you shouldn't have assumed," Sunny hisses, hands curling into fists. She really and truly wishes she had claws like the Glamrocks right about now. Henry-Blob's looks might improve some if she were only able to slash a few marks into that false face of his. "You shouldn't have assumed that Michael would just lay down and die easily, you shouldn't have assumed that this piece of shit--" and here she does stalk forward, close enough to kick GlitchSpring in his stupid fucking face "--would actually accept the inevitable and stay put, and you should never have assumed that there would never be consequences for your actions or lack thereof!

"Do you even know how many innocent people died on all of those overnight shifts? Or did you know and just not give any of them, any of us, more than a passing thought of oh, that's too bad, hire someone to replace them before going on with your miserable little life?"

Neither Henry-Blob nor GlitchSpring responds (although the latter might not be able to, given her kick has dislocated his jaw completely), and Sunny lets out a huff of static.

"That's what I thought," she bites out. "Everyone is expendable, so long as your goals are met. Children, Night Guards, your own family, the whole goddamn world can burn if it means you can extend your pathetic half-life for one more year or if it erases the Afton family from the face of the earth."

GlitchSpring shoots her a glower and starts to make argumentative sounds, and the Blob's Freddy-head is droopping as he lets out his own mournful-seeming static, but she doesn't want to hear whatever excuses they may have. All she had wanted to do, all she had needed, was to say her piece.

And that's what she's done.

Sunrise relaxes her stance, steps back, and turns on her heel. "I'm finished here," she says softly, walking over to her siblings and letting her twin haul her in for a much-needed hug. "Can we go home now?"

Starburst may still be angry over what Henry did to him, but in spite of that, he still feels a hint of sympathy towards the Blob as he all but deflates under Sunny's direct verbal attack. The puppet can hold a grudge, he's well aware of that; he hadn't been entirely aware of how huge a chip his little sister has on her shoulder in regards to both his godfather and father.

But it's all out in the open now, and apparently Sunny has been waiting literal decades to speak her mind.

"We'll go home soon, sunflower," he says softly, resting his hand on his sister's back for a moment before turning to face his demons. "I just need a moment."

This said, Starburst walks over to the Blob and GlitchSpring. The former simply gazes at him, guilt and sadness rolling off of him in waves, while the latter is still letting out static in denial of Sunrise's parting shot.

"I'm still angry with you both," the puppet says, arms folding over his chest and giving the damaged animatronics a hard glare. "Honestly, angry is putting it mildly. Livid, perhaps furious; either would be more fitting. I can never, never get back the years of my former life that were spent either trying to win your love or put your demons to rest. What I can do, what I am doing, is making the most of the Gift Charlie gave to me.

"Whatever Remnant was once in my body, it's long been absorbed into my very being," Starburst continues, raising one hand slightly to tap his chest. "I am Memory and AI, ghost and machine, no longer Michael; I am Starburst now. I can never change how horrible I was as an older brother to Evan and Elizabeth, but I can use the lessons learned from my mistakes to be a better one to Sunrise, to Moonlight, to Gregory and Vanessa."

He walks a little bit closer, actually reaches out a hand to rest on top of his godfather's primary head, and lets out a sigh of static. "Someday," he says softly, "I'll be able to forgive you for what you did to me. But not today. Still... thank you, for giving me the choice to go this time."

The marionette glances over to where GlitchSpring has finally stopped making any sound, only staring back at him with a look of panic and fear; the rabbit seems to have come to the conclusion that this place is going to burn again, and that he won't be able to make a last-minute escape.

"There was once a time I would have done anything for you, if only for a scrap of affection. That time has long since passed. Goodbye, Father. I hope we never meet again."

With that, Starburst turns and walks back to where his brother and sisters are waiting for him.

"Let's go home."

No! Please! Don't leave me here! Michael!

The words echo in his head, catch in his damaged voice box, but they don't escape as anything more than static. William manages to free one arm, clawing at the floor in one final effort to escape, unable to do anything but watch as his son walks away from him once again.

This time, he walks away with three other Night Guards, none of whom should have been able to best him, and yet he is the one fallen.

"Be st-st-still, old-d fri-end," Henry, fucking Henry says, his voice glitching terribly even as he shifts his many limbs to further entangle the rabbit. "It's time t-to go ba-ack to where mon-n-nsters like us belong."

William lets out another burst of static, fingers failing to grip at the tile as the sound of metal footsteps finally fade away only to be replaced by something much more alarming:

The sound of flames as they begin to eat away at the remaining walls around them.

"The dev-vil has be-e-e-n left waiting for l-l-long eno-ough," Henry says, and he almost sounds resigned. As if he suspects that he will not enter into peace either.

Good, William thinks viciously. We go down together. As it should have been before.

The four Night Guards walk out of the slowly smoldering remains of Freddy Fazbear's Pizza Place. Their family, five animal-themed animatronics and a ten-year-old boy, are waiting for them there.

They stand as one, silently watching the restaurant catch light and burn away, ready to douse the flames to prevent their home above from falling prey to the blaze as well.

And when the fire has burned itself out, when there is nothing left and there are no signs of life, they make their way back to the surface at last.

It's time to go home.

Chapter Text

Sam Carmichael honestly doesn't ask for too much.

He's an older guy, he's well aware of this fact. A family man, even if he started his family a little bit later (even if his mother laughs and reminds him that thirty-seven wasn't too terribly old to have had his first child when he married at thirty-five after getting both bachelor's and master's degrees in mathematical engineering), yet still dedicated enough to his career that he became Head Animatronic Technician even before the PizzaPlex was open for business.

All he asks is that he gets a head's up whenever something goes wrong with any of the Glamrock Gang or his Daycare Crew (and yes, he considers them his babies just as much as his ten-year-old and seven-year-old at home are his babies, he's the one who cloned the Security Puppet's code and reformatted that animatronic as well), he knows what he's walking into after the weekend (it's good to be the boss, he can take off Saturdays and Sundays then do the major work while the Plex is closed each Monday), and that any unauthorized personnel keeps the hell out of his workspace.

So he's not expecting anything out of the ordinary when he walks into the Plex this morning, frowning down at the messages on his work phone (and seriously, the FazPhone? Whatever, FazEnt, he knows goddamn well his mother didn't sign off on this one...). The only priority alert is on Freddy, given that he got called at home, on his day off, about the animatronic crashing. The manager on duty tried to order him to come in right that second, but Mom had snatched the phone away and proceeded to remind said manager whose name was on his paychecks and that Sam would be there in the morning to take care of the repairs.

Sometimes it's good to be related to the boss.

A quick glance around the lobby shows nothing out of the ordinary, so Sam decides that good old Freddy can wait just a few more minutes while he goes to check on his Daycare Crew. All three of them have been a little twitchy the past few weeks, although they insist every morning that things are fine and under control, but if they keep it up much longer then he's going to insist on running diagnostics on them.

He sends off a quick message to the other techs coming in today (just a quick I'm stopping by the Daycare first, I'll be down to P and S in about ten minutes) as he pushes open the door to the Drop Off and Pick Up area. "Good morning, kids," he calls before even looking up. "You three doing good...?"

Sam's words trail off as he finally glances up to find more bodies present than there should technically be there at this time on a Monday. His babies, Sunrise and Moonlight and Starburst are of course there as they should be, but the security puppet is sitting on top of his box rather than inside it, with a boy somewhere around Lottie's age on his lap. Seated on the floor against the desk is a woman who looks a hell of a lot like the Night Guard, only she's out of uniform and her hat is perched on the boy's head. All five of them are staring at him wide-eyed.

A few more feet inside the Daycare is the entire Glamrock Gang, and he does mean the entire gang because somehow the long-missing Bonnie is back (if not a little shorter than he used to be). Freddy and Chica look like they're ready to snatch up the five animatronics and people around the desk and hide them away somewhere within the play structures, while Roxanne has a look of amused resignation painted over her face. Bonnie and Montgomery are giving him the same wide-eyed look as the Daycare Crew and their buddies, although they're also pretty much lying on top of one another and look almost like they were in sleep mode before he walked through the door.

Sam blinks a couple of times. Nope, still the same sight.

He heaves a sigh before pulling out his phone and calling down to P and S. "Hey, Cabrera, it's Carmichael. I'm going to be a little bit longer getting down there... Hmm? No, no problem. Just need to clear up a couple things then I'll be right down... Yeah, I'll wrangle Freddy on my way... Cool, see you soon."

He hangs up, slides the phone back into his pocket, and crosses his arms. "Busy night?" he asks dryly.

To his amusement, his kids start giggling nervously. It's the guard who speaks, however.

"Um, yeah. Kind of a lot happened overnight."

Sam gives a nod. "I'm a good listener. Tell me about it?"

It takes a little while, given that pretty much everyone in the room wants to jump in with their perspective of what's been happening since midnight, but eventually, he's got the gist of it. And it's frankly enough to give him a migraine. Thank God he's not predisposed to those, or he probably would have a headache from trying to process all of this.

"So," Sam drawls out slowly, "to sum it up: Fazbear Entertainment's sordid history is factual, William Afton somehow turned into a computer virus that not only infected half the Glamrocks but also managed to infect a person, the whole lot of you worked together to deal with the virus, and the four of you--" and here he waves a hand to his Daycare animatronics and Vanessa "--ventured down below the Plex to combat the physical remains of Afton."

"Don't forget the part where Sunny and Ness kicked his ass!" the boy, Gregory, chimes in.

The tech heaves a very heavy sigh. "Thank you, kid. I had not, in fact, forgotten that one of my creations decided to throw herself at a very real threat and smack it around for probably a good three to five minutes. We will be discussing this, young lady," he adds, shooting Sunrise a look. She just beams back at him, partially because her face is frozen in that expression and partially because he can almost feel how pleased she is rolling off of her in waves.

"There's also apparently the fact that all three of you are haunted by former Fazbear Entertainment employees, including someone who is technically FazEnt royalty." Sam honestly is a bit hung up on that part. Not just because hey, haunted animatronics, but also because of the fact that... well, he sort of knew the Afton kids.

Starburst likely doesn't remember, because it's not like Sam was around terribly often. His mother had never really liked Afton, although she was cordial and polite because he was her brother's best friend and business partner. But he'd only been six when his cousin had been killed, and Mom hadn't really been able to do anything to help Uncle Henry, so they had just... stopped visiting. Their life had been in Salt Lake City, and Hurricane was pretty much just where his mother had been born and where her brother still lived.

It was only after the Pizza Place arson that FazEnt had come calling again, seeking out his mother because for whatever reason, Uncle Henry had left Mom the business. So despite her misgivings, Jennifer Emily-Carmichael had taken the reins and started trying to clean up Fazbear Entertainment's image. Sam himself had finished school and was starting his family, and had not objected to helping out where he could.

Hence why he's here, now, trying to figure out what steps to take next.

"Okay," Sam says after a few moments more, "here's what we're going to do. You," he points to Freddy, "are going to take yourself down to Parts and Service and let Cabrera and Williams do a quick diagnostic. Not that I don't trust that you did excellent work, Star, but the board will be happier knowing that another pair of eyes checked him out before reopening tomorrow. You," he points at Bonnie, "are also going to P and S for the same reason. You've been gone for half a year, we're going to have to reincorporate you into the Plex carefully."

"Can... um..." Montgomery starts, fingers twitching where the bunny is holding his hand. "I mean, can I just... kind of...?"

He can't help but smile gently at the alligator. "You want to go back to just running Monty Golf, don't you?" At the animatronic's eager nod he chuckles a bit. "That's part of what we'll work at, get Bon integrated back into the band and you can go back to just playing your stage in the golf course."

It's honestly adorable how relieved he looks at the news. Obviously, the company's plans to paint him as the Bad Boy Rebel have failed miserably. Montgomery's a sweetheart, and no amount of hype can really cover that up.

"For now, you, Roxanne, and Chica can head to your green rooms to recharge or go do whatever it is you do on Mondays," he says, giving a shrug. "Just don't break anything, and if you do, fix it or head to P and S for help."

The Glamrocks all start off, Freddy pausing to pat Gregory on the head before leaving and Montgomery apparently planning to follow Bonnie to P and S given that he's the bunny's shadow right now. Once the door has closed behind them, Sam turns his attention back to the remaining five.

"I was planning on doing upgrades to you guys today," he says, sighing softly. "I'm not too sure about that now, though. I almost feel like I don't have any right to mess around with anything."

Vanessa frowns. "Wait, but I thought you worked on their initial coding," she says, and what? How does she know that? "Doesn't that give you primary authority to do any repairs or upgrades?"

"Technically speaking," Sam replies, giving her a long look. "You said you were originally hired to beta test the games. I never worked in that division, so--"

"A friend of mine was transferred from game development to animatronic tech," the blonde says, playing with the hem of her FazEnt Games hoodie. "He might still, I don't know. My brain has been... a little fuzzy. His name's Luis."

Ah, so this is the infamous Nessa he's heard so much about. Recently, it's been a lot of worry and fussing, so hopefully, that can now be taken care of once the man can see she's okay with his own eyes.

"He's on shift right now," Sam tells her. "Cabrera'll probably be the one to check over Freddy if you want to go down."

Vanessa actually looks worried, shooting a look towards the Daycare Crew before pushing herself to her feet. "I... um... I think I will. Thank you, Mister Carmichael."

He smiles at her gently. "Call me Sam," he offers. "Mister Carmichael was my father and my mother's the only one who calls me Samuel."

The Night Guard gives him a soft smile of her own before slipping out of the daycare, leaving only three animatronics, Gregory, and Sam himself. There are a few minutes of silence before Starburst breaks it.

"I've altered her employee record," he says matter-of-factly. "Her family was never noted in the system, so I've fixed that."

The tech blinks at the puppet before pulling out his phone to access the employee files. He locates Allen, Vanessa quickly and opens up her profile. "Okay... father unknown, mother Elizabeth Allen, brother Gregory Allen... wait." His eyes dart immediately to Starburst, who looks entirely unapologetic. "Did you seriously just list your sister as Nessa's mother in an official employee file?!"

"She was only ever officially missing," the marionette replies with a shrug. "Given all the bullshit she's been through over the past several months courtesy of GlitchSpring," (and that will never stop being funny to Sam, William Afton being completely disrespected forever) "I feel like Ness deserves to benefit somehow. I've forged some other documents, too. So far as anyone knows. Elizabeth Afton grew up far from Hurricane, probably suffering from some form of amnesia due to the circumstances of her disappearance, and had two children several years apart."

"There are easier ways to declare somebody family," Sam says dryly. "Just saying so, for one."

"This way Gregory can stay with her," Moonlight points out, and it's annoying that the argument makes sense. "They're siblings, why shouldn't they stay together?"

The tech just drops his head into his hands and laughs dryly. "Okay, fine," he says after a moment, looking up and shaking his head. "I'll make sure to print out documents for a paper trail as well since the Plex for some insane reason still has physical employee files. For now, though, I'll just ask: would you three want me to perform the upgrades I was intending? They're mostly cosmetic: some touch-ups on your frames where the paint is starting to fade away and updated faceplates that I've been working on for the past month and a half."

That seems to strike their interest. "Faceplate upgrades?" Sunrise asks, her head tilting to one side.

Sam smiles warmly. He does love all his children, even his mechanical ones. "How would you three like to be able to really emote?"

Chapter Text

There have been some recent changes at Freddy Fazbear’s Mega PizzaPlex. Some of them are things that the customers who visit are aware of, and some of them are definitely behind the scenes, but none of them are bad things overall.

One change is the fact that the morning daycare security staff, who didn't even know what the overnight guard looked like only a month ago, frequently have the opportunity to chat with said Night Guard most mornings. It isn't rare at all these days to walk in at 6:45 in the morning to find Vanessa ("call me Ness") Allen seated behind the security desk with a cup of coffee chatting with the Daycare Crew. She greets the dayshift, passes along anything that cropped up overnight, then makes her farewells to all present before slipping out.

If sometimes she's already dressed down in jeans and a hoodie and looks less like she's about to drive home and more like she's about to just fall into bed, well... that's her business.

Especially since another change is the fact that said Night Guard is also the recently discovered Lost Heiress, as the media has taken to calling her. Something about how Elizabeth Afton, missing since 1982, was either abducted by a well-meaning person or sold by her father (and there isn't anyone who finds it hard to believe that William Afton would do such a thing), grew up fairly normal, and had two children before passing at a still-young age. There are DNA tests on record confirming that the woman is/was Vanessa's mother, and since there are no other living Aftons left she pretty much owns a share of Fazbear Entertainment by default.

This means she's in early many days, taking on additional day-to-day tasks while still working the graveyard. Apparently, she loves the privacy and quiet of after-hours, and who can blame her?

Another change is that with Vanessa coming in early some days, her until-now unknown brother is usually somewhere in the Plex as well. Gregory Allen is pretty much a Platinum Pass Holder, meaning he can go anywhere he wants to at any time. True, the kid gravitates mostly between Kids Cove and Fazer Blast, although he does spend time at the other main attractions as well, he tends to keep out of the way. The only time most staff members know the kid's around is if he comes up to them to chat.

There's also the fact that, after six goddamn months of giving only the vaguest of reasons for his disappearance, Glamrock Bonnie is back in action. The tech team is pretty tight-lipped about the whole thing, and Corporate just issued a press release welcoming the bunny back into the fold, so it's still a giant mystery. And forget about just asking the animatronics about it, because the most anyone ever gets from that question is a completely off-topic conversation about reconnecting with old friends (Chica and Freddy), winning some game or competition against the bunny (Roxanne), how great it is that he's back in the band (Montgomery), or a rant about the state of Bonnie Bowl these days (Bonnie himself).

So file that one under who knows and move on.

And the last big change, one that is very visible to guests, involves the Daycare Crew's recent upgrades.

These days, there are very few complaints from customers who use the daycare about their children being scared of the three animatronics assigned to the area. The whole lot of them might still be scary-tall, and they might still somehow manage to move silently when the moment calls for it despite all three wearing bells, but somehow the patented Faztech Dynamic Faceplates make them all the more approachable.

Security Marionette Star's face looks much more doll-like these days, still a stark white with a blue star on his right cheek and a gold star on the left, lips still painted blue and gold, but now his mouth can move while he speaks softly to the children, his rare smiles small and kind. His eyes are still purple and they still shine bright when the lights are low, but now he can actually blink rather than just cut his LEDs off and on.

Attendants Moon and Sun remain similar in appearance, half of their faces each resembling a crescent moon even with Sun's full faceplate being yellow-gold, both still possessing bright blue eyes that can blink like their brother's, but the similarities end there:

Half of Moon's face is painted a deep, dark blue to match his plating, and there are small star-shaped 'freckles' spattered along that part of his faceplate that actually glow slightly when the lights are down for Nap Time, with his lips painted in the same shade. His smiles are a bit broader than the ones Star shares with the children but are usually close-lipped. On the occasions where he does flash a toothy grin, the similarities shared with Sun are more obvious.

Sun herself has red swirls on each of her cheeks, accenting and highlighting the carved elements to them. She also possesses black lines coming from the corners of each eye, looking for all the world like winged eyeliner applied with great care. Her lips are the same vivid red as on her cheeks, and her smiles are always bright and friendly and toothy, yet never frightening. Only after the Superstar Daycare closes for the day do her smiles slip to something less toothy, something soft as she hums during after-hours cleanup.

All in all, change in this case is good. Fazbear Entertainment is one more giant step away from its blood-soaked history, leaving the ghosts of the past where they belong.

Whatever may come next is hard to say, but for now, the future looks bright.

End