Chapter Text
Recording begins.
Case #9931112
Statement originally given by Oliver Harris on November 12, 1993 regarding the unusual conditions of his summer job working the night shift at Freddy Fazbear’s Pizza in Hurricane, Utah.
Audio recording by Leanne Michaels, Head Archivist at the Magnus Institute, Washington D.C.
Statement begins.
It was just a summer job! That’s all- i- it was late at night and I was tired and, sure, I like to party a bit with my friends so that must have been it. I imagined it. I fell asleep on the job and had a nightmare…nightmares. I’m fine and got paid so really I shouldn’t be complaining. I did my job and it’s a kid’s place so there’s nothing wrong with it.
I’m sorry.
For rambling that is. I know that I don’t have to tell you guys anything- you were very clear about that when you handed me the paper. But I need to tell somebody - I can’t live the rest of my life not saying anything- thinking I’m insane. You don’t have to believe me. You don’t even have to follow up on this, I know that’s the point but trust me. Whatever it is that you want to do or whatever information you think you can get, it’s not worth it.
It was this past summer. I was looking for a job so I could save up some spending money before going off to college in the fall. My parents had told me that they were willing to chip in for my education itself but any chance of getting an allowance along with it was out of the question.
I live in a pretty small town, you probably haven’t heard of it, but that means that any teenager worth their salt is trying to get a job when summer rolls around. Most of the businesses near me had a waiting list for register or clerking jobs and the only way you’d be able to be a lifeguard was if you killed one of the current ones. What I’m trying to say is that there were pretty slim pickings when it came to jobs which is probably why I was thrilled to get a spot at Freddy’s even if it was the night shift.
You know that feeling when you’re hungry and have no food in the fridge but you keep going back to check until your standards have lowered enough that you can manage to find something edible? That’s the easiest way to explain why I took the job in the first place. I had applied to what felt like hundreds of places in the past couple of weeks so when a call finally came in informing me that I was hired and when to show up for my first shift I didn’t hesitate to accept despite all the rumors that circled around the restaurant.
Freddy’s has been a staple in the crumbling strip mall next to the post office ever since I can remember. Back in elementary school my friends and I would walk there after school and play in the arcade until our parents picked us up. It was a run-down building that smelt of water damage and old greasy pizza but we loved it anyways. The creepiness of the place was one of the factors that made it a cool hangout spot all the way up through middle school when we finally deemed that we were too old for “kid stuff”.
The worst, or best as some of the kids claimed, part of the restaurant was the animatronics. There was a faded purple bunny, ragged brown bear, scrappy red fox, and a grimy yellow chicken. Bonnie, Freddy, Foxy, and Chica were their names though usually just referred to as “that weird purple robot” or “the beat up fox”. The things were supposed to appeal to kids but whoever made them had to have been some sort of psycho serial killer because I’m pretty sure that normal animatronics do not have teeth that sharp.
We avoided them like the plague whenever we would go there and they were certainly scary enough to spawn urban legends about evil robots coming to life. I remember my older sister telling me that Foxy would eat me in my sleep if I snitched on her sneaking out and my best friend, Robbie Smith, would complain that his older brother would hide under his bed to scare him with a Chica mask. That was before the disgusting smell started coming from the bots, bad enough that it had to be some sort of health hazard.
Anyways, I knew all that when I pulled into the parking lot for my first shift. Obviously I dismissed it as spooky kid stories and figured that it was worth staying in a rotten old restaurant until morning for minimum wage. Better than a lot of my other friends had been able to manage.
When I walked in, the first thing that struck me was the smell. It was far worse than I had remembered and the whole place stunk like a dead rat had crawled into the vents and died while smoking a cigarette. I plugged my nose and looked around for an employee or anyone who looked like they might be there to train me, instead I found a note on the counter.
It said something about how there wasn’t enough staff to spare (figures) and the management didn’t have anyone to train me but there were some old tapes in the office that should be able to help me.
I should have left right there. I should have seen all the signs that this was a bad idea and left. The place was clearly falling apart and there was something off about it but at the time I thought I was just being a wimp and whatever this job wanted me to do it couldn’t possibly be that bad.
Well…I’m writing a statement for you now if that tells you anything.
The security office was bathed in dingy white light, a fan loudly buzzing on the desk next to a computer monitor so old it looked like it would collapse at the slightest touch. A bunch of tapes sat in a mildewy cardboard box next to the desk. It took a couple minutes of sifting through all the junk in the office before I was able to dig up the tape-player that went with the box out from behind a stack of rotten crates.
I sat the thing on the desk and grabbed a tape from the box labeled “Night Shift- Night 1 Instructions”. Blowing off the dust, I stuffed it in the player and plopped down in the single shaky office chair available.
The sound of a phone ringing played and it took me a second of wildly looking about for a phone before I realized that the sound was coming from the tape player. I guess they didn’t have a tape recorder so whoever it was figured it would be easier to record messages on an answering machine.
I’ve attached the tape to this statement if you feel like listening to it. It was the only thing from that place that I managed to grab and wanted to keep.
Archivist Note:
The tape is indeed attached to the statement. I had the researchers take a look at it before listening but apparently they didn’t think it was important enough to go to Artifact Storage. The recording is as follows.
"Hello, hello? Uh, I wanted to record a message for you to help you get settled in on your first night. Um, I actually worked in that office before you. I'm finishing up my last week now, as a matter of fact. So, I know it can be a bit overwhelming, but I'm here to tell you there's nothing to worry about. Uh, you'll do fine. So, let's just focus on getting you through your first week. Okay?
Uh, let's see, first there's an introductory greeting from the company that I'm supposed to read. Uh, it's kind of a legal thing, you know. Um, "Welcome to Freddy Fazbear's Pizza. A magical place for kids and grown-ups alike, where fantasy and fun come to life. Fazbear Entertainment is not responsible for damage to property or person. Upon discovering that damage or death has occurred, a missing person report will be filed within 90 days, or as soon as property and premises have been thoroughly cleaned and bleached, and the carpets have been replaced."
Blah blah blah, now that might sound bad, I know, but there's really nothing to worry about. Uh, the animatronic characters here do get a bit quirky at night, but do I blame them? No.
If I were forced to sing those same stupid songs for twenty years and I never got a bath? I'd probably be a bit irritable at night too.
So, remember, these characters hold a special place in the hearts of children and we need to show them a little respect, right? Okay.
So, just be aware, the characters do tend to wander a bit. Uh, they're left in some kind of free roaming mode at night.
Uh... Something about their servos locking up if they get turned off for too long. Uh, they used to be allowed to walk around during the day too. But then there was The Bite of '87. Yeah. I-It's amazing that the human body can live without the frontal lobe, you know?
Uh, now concerning your safety, the only real risk to you as a night watchman here, if any, is the fact that these characters, uh, if they happen to see you after hours probably won't recognize you as a person. They'll pr- they'll most likely see you as a metal endoskeleton
without its costume on. Now since that's against the rules here at Freddy Fazbear's Pizza, they'll probably try to...forcefully stuff you inside a Freddy Fazbear suit…
Um, now, that wouldn't be so bad if the suits themselves weren't filled with crossbeams, wires, and animatronic devices, especially around the facial area. So, you could imagine how having your head forcefully pressed inside one of those could cause a bit of discomfort...and death. Uh, the only parts of you that would likely see the light of day again would be your eyeballs and teeth when they pop out the front of the mask, heh.
Y-Yeah, they don't tell you these things when you sign up. But hey, first day should be a breeze
I'll chat with you tomorrow. Uh, check those cameras, and remember to close the doors only if absolutely necessary. Gotta conserve power. Alright, good night."
Tape ends.
So…yeah. If you listened to it you should have a better picture of what I got myself into. When I first heard it I assumed that it was the old guard deciding to haze whatever new kid showed up. I’ve listened to that tape hundreds of times since I quit- practically have the thing memorized at this point- and every time I pick up on something new- the guy was serious when he said “concerning your safety”. Or was it when he said that bit about damage and death? It doesn’t matter anymore, at least to me.
I sat in the chair for a bit while I processed the instructions. It took me longer than I would like to admit to learn how to work the security system. I apparently had to actually use the ancient computer to look at the cameras but since the building ran on some sort of generator at night I only had so much power. There were buttons next to both entrances to the office that closed a reinforced steel door and flashed a light in the hallway but both used up more power. Why anyone would go to the effort to rob Freddy’s much less break down a steel door, was beyond me.
After bringing my power levels down to 80% by messing around with the controls, I settled down for a long and boring night. There wasn’t really much point to constantly looking at the cameras, like I said, nobody in their right mind would want to rob Freddy’s, so I popped in an Aerosmith tape I found in the instruction box and zoned out.
Two hours went by and everything was still quiet. I didn’t expect any trouble but I was relieved to find that the phone guy must have been joking. The steel doors did nothing to soothe the slight itch in the back of my mind that I was missing the point of the job. How could a restaurant on the verge of collapse afford an automatic mechanism like something out of Star Trek? And on the off chance something was dangerous, why would they go to such lengths to protect a very replaceable security guard?
I had finished the Aerosmith tape and was rifling through the box for another one when I heard it. A long, low, chuckle.
Now, I like haunted houses as much as the next guy. Being scared is exhilarating, if you let yourself indulge in the idea that something else is out there life suddenly becomes much more interesting. That was all in theory. Hearing stories about things that go bump in the night is different than actually being in one. And this entire job was beginning to feel like one big ironic joke.
I checked the security cameras; I’m not a complete idiot, and flicked quickly back and forth between each one. It took three times flipping through all of them before I noticed that the animatronics weren’t on the stage.
My mind immediately went to a robbery but it was impossible for anyone to get into the place without me noticing and I was positive that I was the only person in the place. I slowly examined each live feed, looking for anything out of the ordinary, and I’m not ashamed to admit that I screamed when I flipped to the camera in the supply closet and saw Chica staring directly at me.
I slammed the button to close both steel doors and started to barricade them with every piece of junk I could find. Chica’s beady eyes glared up at me from the monitor. I didn’t know what to do. There wasn’t a phone in the office and whatever I told the police I knew they wouldn’t believe me.
Once I ensured that the doors were locked and barred and that it was impossible for anything to get in or out I just…sat back down and gawped at the monitor. I remember from my psych class that there’s three responses to a stressful situation: fight, flight, or freeze. I froze. After a couple minutes the screen glitched out and Chica was gone. I didn’t want to know if she had reappeared on the stage.
A red light flickered above the doors and an announcement played informing me that my power had run down to 50%. No matter how terrified I was at the moment, if there was only one consistent rule and that rule was to not run out of power then by God I was going to follow it.
I closed my eyes and opened the doors.
Death has never really been one of my big fears in life. I’m not suicidal or anything it’s more that I see it as closure. An end to the miniscule blip that was our time on this planet. If everything went to hell and society as we knew it collapsed there would still be the all-encompassing fact that everyone dies.
I had never even considered the possibility that death was just an option.
The thing that came through the door wasn’t alive but it certainly wasn’t dead. A hoarse rattle pushed its way past what might have been it’s throat, if it was alive which it wasn’t . It was wearing the skin of one of the decaying animatronic suits- might have been any of them, I didn’t care- as it reached out to me. Right as it’s clawed hand was positioned over my head it stopped.
A deep-seated terror began eating at my mind like hundreds of maggots on a bloated corpse. I might have gone a little insane right then. A childhood nightmare comes to life and is ready to scoop out my brains. I almost wanted to laugh. It was so cliché to the point of being absolutely ridiculous.
I couldn’t scream. Couldn’t run. There was nowhere to go, no one to hear me. The only thing I could do was hope it would be merciful and end it soon. I didn’t fear death but I did fear whatever force that was preventing it.
Music played. A slow jingling tune of a jack-in-the box being wound up by a child who dreaded the clown inside. As the song reached a climax I prepared myself for the thing to finally move. In the anticipated silence before a, sure to be painful, death I held my breath.
The ticking of a clock. And…
Cheers?
Bright light seared my eyes, making them water. I blinked rapidly and the dilapidated office came into focus. I hadn’t even noticed the lights going out. There was no putrid animatronic. No razor sharp claw to crush my head. The security feed was still playing on the monitor and showed all four robots in their designated spots on the stage.
Another teenager poked their head into the security office and I almost decked him. He, I think his name was Andy, asked if I was alright. He said I looked a little sick. I nodded and he patted me on the back sympathetically. I asked who he was and he said he was there for the day shift, pointing to a clock hanging on the wall. The clock read six in the morning.
I don’t think I said anything else. I just walked out into the parking lot and drove off. Later I remember calling and telling whoever was at the desk that I quit. My parents weren’t happy, they said quitting showed a lack of responsibility. I didn’t care.
Maybe a braver man would try to destroy the restaurant- rid the world of an unspeakable evil. All I could do was curl up on the couch for a week before vowing to never go there again. I heard that some other guy got hired to replace me. He’d start on Monday. I don’t know if he lasted all five days.
I do know that something was trapped in those suits and I sincerely hope that whatever it was wasn’t human. Because if it was…well…that means that there are fates worse than death. Much worse.
Statement ends.
At first I am inclined to dismiss this statement as a nightmare after Mr. Harris fell asleep on the job but unfortunately I cannot be so kind. This is not the first time we have heard of the Fazbear establishment.
I had Ryan do some digging and he discovered that Freddy Fazbear’s Pizza was forced to close its doors soon after Mr. Harris left due to repeated complaints of a “bad smell” coming from the animatronics. No mention of what was done with the animatronics can be found in the, granted, very limited press coverage of the incident.
Both Mr. Harris and the friend he had mentioned by the name of Robbie Smith declined further questioning and I do not think it would be wise to send agents to investigate the ruins of the old pizzeria.
Perhaps the most interesting, and most concerning, information from this account is not technically from the account itself. The tape attached to the statement was in shockingly good shape and was extremely helpful in providing a lead.
This “phone guy” appears to be a guard who used to work the night shift at Freddy’s and didn’t seem phased by the robots that had a mind of their own. Either he was entirely indifferent to life as a whole or he was somehow behind the incident. If the latter is true, this is worth following up on.
Maybe he can give more insight on what the “Bite of ‘87” is though I dread to think there is another Fazbear location out there.
Recording ends.