Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The first morning lights shine through the buildings. Is early, so early that part of the sky is still painted with brushes of dark, purple and pink. 

Michael closes his eyes and enjoys the rays of the summer. After an entire night in Freadbear's Family Dinner, he needs this bit of light to cast out the shadows that followed him outside the building.

“I’VE GOT BEER!” a voice screams behind him.

Jeremy is climbing the ladder to join him on the roof. His bright enthusiastic smile is all over his face, and the cans of beer are in the pockets of his hoodie. 

“You really found a place open at this hour,” Michael says. Jeremy jumps to the roof and tosses him a beer. 

“You should know that I’m too stubborn to give up, love,” Jeremy confidently says. He sits at his side, his legs hanging and kicking the air in excitement.

Michael rolls his eyes and opens the beer. Only one of them is old enough to legally drink, him being 20 and Jeremy 22, but this is a celebration, and Jeremy seems to know every damn place in this town that sells beer at 6:30 A.M. 

“I can’t believe this is our last shift here,” Jeremy says. He opens his can a few inches apart from him, to make sure that the content doesn’t splash all over him. “Goodbye Fredbear's Family Dinner! You can root in hell!”

“Your enthusiasm would make more sense if we weren’t going to start in a new location next week.”

Now Jeremy is the one who rolls his eyes. He kicks Michael’s legs, and Michael kicks back. 

“You know what I meant. Honestly, I can’t believe it took so long to officially close this place.”

And Michael can’t believe the place is officially being closed. 

It all started a month ago, when a kid, Cassidy, was reported missing during a birthday party in Fredbear’s. There were some witnesses, the place closed for investigation and, after a month, it closed officially. Maybe the company didn’t care so much to close one of his oldest locations because they were going to open the new, improved Freddy Fazbear’s. 

Being security guards, Michael and Jeremy are the last employees to be transferred to the new pizzeria, having to watch over the place until all the old animatronics were moved.

Last night was their last shift before their new jobs. Michael isn’t too excited about it- working at Freddy’s hadn’t been his idea, after all. 

“I hope they catch the one who did it,” Jeremy says those words with spite. 

Michael looks away, uncomfortable about the topic. From the corner of his eyes, he swears he saw the shadows move towards him, getting a bit longer, extending his hands to see if they can catch him. 

“I heard they add face recognition to the new animatronics to make the place more secure,” he informs, but he doesn’t mention where he got the intel from. “That maybe they should pay the new animatronics to look out for the security guards, instead.”

“I knew I should’ve worked for McDonald’s,” Jeremy curses. “Hey, do you remember Adam?”

Michael tries to remember. Apart from Jeremy, he didn’t have a close relationship with any of his coworkers, or any relationship at all, to be honest. However, that name awakens a memory.

“Isn’t that the night guard who was always high during his shifts?”
“So, you remember.”
“I remember the bloody mess he left one night because he was sure that the Fredbear suit appeared in front of him and tried to close the doors of the office with tape,” Michael grows remembering that day. They had the first shift, at 6 A.M, but when they got there they found Adam curled up in a ball under the table. They’ve helped him to clean up the mess so he wouldn’t get fired, but Michael wasn’t fond of the guy.

“I met him the other day,” Michael tilts his head, confused as to why someone would want to stay more than five seconds in that guy’s company. “Don’t look at me like that. He was the one who approached me.”
“I’m not looking at you in any way,” Michael assured, but it is clear that he doesn’t like the course of the conversation. Maybe he doesn’t like Adam because he’s everything he’s not: a 20 year old with zero cares in the world that is going to start college in september. Or maybe because he suspects that Adam’s words aren’t completely made up. 

“My, my, are you jealous?” 

Michael is about to spit his drink. Jeremy laughs, and Michael considers throwing him off the roof. 

“Oh, piss off!” he says instead, because he decides that this building already has too many accidents surrounding it, it doesn’t need one more. “Did he tell you something interesting?”
“Actually, yes. You see, he’s the new night guard of Freddy’s, but he already requested to change to the day shift. His next week is his last week, and I decided to request the night shift.”

Michael doesn’t really know what to say. He hoped that he and Jeremy would still be working together in the new location, but in Freddy’s there’s only one night guard.

Jeremy is waiting for him to say something- Michael isn’t sure about what. He knows that Jeremy is kind of broke, so it’s not like he can ask him to stay in the day shift with him.

“Oh,” he mutters, and buys some time taking a sip. Could Jeremy stop looking at him for five seconds so he can think without worrying about losing the only friend he has? 

“Yeah, oh,” Jeremy concurs. “Eloquent as always, Fritz.”
The name is a callback to reality. 

Michael is so used to Jeremy's presence that he sometimes forgets that, actually, his coworker doesn’t know him at all. Jeremy doesn’t know that his name is Michael Afton, that his father is- was, one of the owners of the company and another bunch of things that Michael had buried in his chest. 

Now, the situation looks kind of ridiculous. They had only met for two months. Michael can’t feel sad about someone that doesn’t even know his name, and that would definitely hate him if he did. 

So, he does what he must: bury that weird feeling that is squeezing him and put it in a box with everything else.

“I’m glad you’ve got the shift,” he says. That’s not what he should say. That’s not what he wants to say; and when Jeremy’s gaze comes back to the sky and he squeezes the can in his hands, Michael bites his lip so the words can’t get out.  

“It’s not official, but I doubt someone else is going to request it.”

“Why did Adam change his shift? I thought he loved the night duties.”

“Something about things getting weird and the animatronics trying to get into the office, to, and I quote: ‘ Stuff me in one of those empty suits like a slice of cheese compressed in a sandwich ’.” 

Michael is about to spit the beer again, but this time for a completely different reason. 

Fuck.

[ONE MONTH LATER]

Michael rubs his eyes and stretches his back. He has been in the office for two hours and a half, and everything is calm- which is usually a bad signal. Balloon Boy tried to get in a couple of times and Toy Bonnie is currently in the middle of his night routine down the corridors, but nothing that he has to worry about.

Usually, Mondays are peaceful days, but not this peaceful . If not for the music box or Balloon Boy bratty laugh the place barely looks haunted. 

Not having to worry about imminent death is a relief, but the relaxing sound of the fan and the dim lights are making him feel a little sleepy, and that is way worse. 

Michael rewinds the music box, takes his lantern and decides to make a round to the end of the hall and back. This isn’t the first time that he leaves the security office, sometimes he needs new batteries because Balloon Boy is being a pain in the ass or, you know, he feels the call of nature. That means running towards the employees lounge, near to Party Room 4, or to the bathroom. 

He had been working in the night guard position for a month, and even though he is still wary and afraid of the animatronics, he also got used to them. 

Michael puts on the Freddy’s head and flashes the lantern to every corner of the hall, just to make sure that there’s nothing lurking in the shadows. He has checked up on every animatronic before leaving, but one could never be too careful. 

Seeing that the place is safe (for now), Michael sighs in relief and turns to the employee’s room. He’s going to take this strike of luck to get himself some midnight snack and another coffee. 

The lounge is the only place in this pizzeria that doesn’t have security cameras, besides the bathroom and the kitchen. The room only has some tables, an old couch, a closet for the uniforms and a minifridge. No windows, or air ducts that let you go from one room to another or places to hide. The animatronics don’t enter unless there is somewhere, and that’s why Michael’s visits to the lounge are short and almost non-existent. 

He quickly puts the coffee machine to work and picks up a cup from the cupboards. He notices that there’s a blanket over the couch and a pair of…shoes? 

Michael stops for a moment and points the lantern there. No, he isn’t wrong. Those are shoes. 

…what the fuck? Did someone from the day shift leave it there? 

Michael is used to killer machines and agglomerations of metal jumping from the roof, but for some reason, this is making him feel uncomfortable. 

The loud noise that suddenly comes from the closet doesn’t help either. Michael doesn’t jump, but he can’t avoid the mild raise of his heartbeat. The only thing that is keeping him from running towards the security office and leaving his coffee behind is the fact that it isn’t a sound he had heard before. 

The noises of the pizzeria are always metallic footsteps, unnatural laughs or haunting songs that, in another situation, could be considered happy, but were transformed by the night and the shadows to sound like nightmares. 

This, on the other hand, is the sound of brooms falling and a body, a human body, hitting something. Michael removes the custom head and goes to the closet. For once, he has to consider the possibility that someone is actually dumb enough to rob this place. 

Whatever it is, it’s not going to be worse than everything I already saw , Michael thinks, and opens the door. 

At the other side, someone is trying to hold a bunch of brooms, but he jumps when the door opens, and everything falls into the ground, making a loud noise. 

The culprit of this mess is no other than Jeremy. His coworker Jeremy. His fucking coworker that is a security guard but has the day shift and Michael had tried to keep him away from night duties so that idiot wouldn’t die. 

That fucking Jeremy that is now looking at Michael in panic and trying to smile like he hadn’t trespassing. 

“Heeeeyyyy, Fritz. I was just wondering if we have enough mops for tomorrow. You can never have enough mops when five years old are around!”

Michael isn’t hearing his lame ass excuses. 

Michael is having a breakdown. 

Jeremy. What is Jeremy doing here? Why is there a blanket on the couch? Is he trying to sleep here? Oh no. No, no, no. Is this why everything had been so quiet? Because they knew Jeremy was here? It's 02:36. It’s too late. No, it’s not. Maybe, if we run fast enough…

“Ok, fine. That’s a lie. I’m not here for the brooms, you got me,” Jeremy starts to fidget, without noticing the panic in his coworkers eyes. “I’m not here for the brooms. I’m sorry. I promise I don’t want to put you in any trouble, but I need to crash here for a couple of nights, if that’s…”

But what door could we use? The front door is the fastest way, but that would mean going through the game area. The workers exit is safer, but for that we have to go near parts and services…

Michael internally nods. The workers exit is the best option. 

The coffee machine whistles. Without giving it a second thought, or even an explanation, Michael grabs Jeremy’s hand and starts to run. 

____________

Jeremy had a plan, you know? 

On the contrary of what other people said, he always has a plan. 

It’s not his fault that those plans didn't work.

The first step in his new plan was to get the night shift- which didn’t happen because Fritz decided to request the same position. And look, Jeremy wouldn’t mind about it if not for the fact that: 

1) Fritz had never told him that he also wanted that position.

2) He had had a crush on Fritz, which made that betrayal even worse.

So, yeah, the first step was a total disaster. 

That’s why he had a Plan B, which consisted of hiding in the closet of the employment room until everyone was gone, praying that Fritz wouldn’t bust him and, if he did, hope that Fritz actually considered him a friend and would let him stay. 

And, if that didn’t work, finally make a move on him and use his charms to avoid any consequence. Jeremy could easily forget about Fritz betraying his trust in exchange of a good fuck. 

You see? Options! 

What he wasn’t expecting was that Fritz wouldn’t react. 

Jeremy is sure that he has been talking for at least three minutes, but Fritz is just looking at him with a deadpan expression.  

“Look, I’m sorry! I swear I’m! Please don’t tell the boss, I promise I had a good reason for this…”
Nothing. Well, Jeremy isn’t going to tell his sad backstory if Fritz isn’t paying attention to him. He is really considering unbuttoning his shirt and give it a try to the ‘use my charms option’ when Fritz grabs his hands and starts to run like his life depends on it, dragging Jeremy along. 

“Hey, what are you-?” Jeremy starts to ask, but Fritz doesn’t look at him or stops to give him some explanation.  “Fritz, Fritz- SHIT MAN COULD YOU STOP FOR A FUCKING-!”

“Shut up!” Fritz yells at him. The indifferent expression has become one of anger. 

Wait, no. 

Jeremy corrects himself. Fritz isn’t mad at him. He is afraid. His coworkers' blue eyes are locked in the space behind him. It’s the first time Jeremy sees him being so expressive- he is used to Fritz's annoyed looks and small smirks, not the tough grip and the wide eyes. 

Fritz drags him all the way to the emergency exit. He lets go of Jeremy’s hand, but when he tries to open the door, he discovers that there’s a lock and chains blocking it. 

“No, no, no, you son of a-” Fritz swears. He kicks the door one last time, but there’s no use. 

Jeremy is confused. Why would someone lock the door with chains ??? Judging by Fritz’s face, it hasn’t been him, so who-

He hears a laugh, and for an instant, the stories of one of his former coworkers, Adam, comes to mind. Stories about animatronics that wonder at night and try to enter the security office. Jeremy quickly scratches that idea; not only Adam was high as fuck during his nigh duties, but those stories are too fantastic to be true. 

The real horror in those restaurants are the low pay and the children that mysteriously had gone missing, not the animatronics. 

Jeremy looks at Fritz, just in time to see the color leave his face. Fritz was always a pale guy, but now he almost looks like a ghost. 

“What was that?” Jeremy asks him, but his question only receives the same silence as before. Now, he can hear footsteps entering the main hall. Jeremy freezes, and his mind wonders about a thousand terrible scenarios. A robbery, a psychopath that wants to murder them, a group of annoying teenagers trying to scare them…“Fritz, I think there’s someone in the restaurant.”

“I know,” Fritz mumbles. 

So, he’s not completely mute. Jeremy opens his mouth to ask what they should do, but Fritz grabs him by the wrist and pulls him to the inside of the Party Room 4. It’s empty, the chairs are placed over the tables and there’s still the faint smell of the eucalyptus floor scrubber that they use. 

There’s a lot of space, but Fritz tosses Jeremy inside the nearest lockers, gets in and shuts the door. 

Now, this is a problem.

The only light comes from the grates of the door, enough to see a bit of the room. The locker is too small, and not dark enough for Jeremy to not see Fritz’s face a few inches from his. His back is against the wall, Fritz has one arm over his head, and Jeremy feels a rush in his chest and his heart starts to do backflips.

“What-” Jeremy starts to ask, but Fritz puts his free hand over his mouth to shut him. 

“Please, be silent for one moment,” Fritz requests, but he has an authoritarian tone that feels more like an order. 

Jeremy can’t do anything but nod, and part of him wishes that his coworker had used another method to shut him up. 

He really is pathetic. Freddy’s is probably being robbed and him and Fritz are in danger but he can’t think because he’s horny.

Just. Great.

The noise grows closer, and Jeremy is about to break his promise of shutting up ( what’s going on??? Shouldn’t we call the cops??? Or at least try to do something??? Can I come back to get my shoes??? Can we kiss after this??? ) when the door of the room opens again. 

This time, Jeremy is the one who claps the hand over his own mouth, so he can’t let out a sound- or a scream. Because the person who enters the room, the one whose heavy footsteps belong too, is not a person at all.

Toy Bonnie moves slowly and, at the same time, faster than Jeremy would imagine. He’s looking around, with his big artificial eyes scrutinizing every inch of the room. 

Jeremy’s body shakes, this time for a completely different reason, and he forgets about Fritz, about his situation, about everything. 

Adam’s words repeat on his head: 

“ Dude, I’m serious! Those things were moving by themselves! It all started when we received those animatronics from the old location, and they just…I don’t know, look at you through the cameras!!! I’m telling you, I’m not staying here one more night!! I don’t know how the last night guard could stand this, but I’m not going to wait until those things decide to kill me!!! ”

Now he wishes he had paid more attention. 

It wasn’t Adam having a bad trip. His stories were real. 

This is real. 

Jeremy’s legs are about to fail him from the sheer terror. When Toy Bonnie’s focus moves from the security camera to the lockers, he thinks that this is it. It’s going to find them, and they’re going to die, and they would become one more note in the missing people of this restaurant. 

Fritz’s fingers search for his hand and, when he finds it, he intertwines his fingers with Jeremy’s in an attempt to anchor him. 

Jeremy forces himself to look away from the party room. Fritz's mouth moves, and he can read: “ It’s going to be fine. ”

Jeremy’s not breathing, but the hold on his hand helps him to stay present. 

This is happening. Toy Bonnie is moving around. The other animatronics too. They probably were the one who locked the exit door. 

And Fritz, who has been working here for a month, knows about it. 

After what feels like ages, Toy Bonnie leaves the room.

“You need to listen to me carefully,” Fritz tells him. He lets go of his hand and takes the lantern from his belt. “The emergency door is closed, so we need to go to the one in the Main Area. If we’re lucky, Toy Bonnie and Chica will be in the vents, but before going there, we have to go back to the security office and check the cameras to make sure that the door is not locked too. Stay by my side, and run. Clear?”
No! It isn’t clear at all! He doesn’t want to leave the locker, the locker is safe! He doesn’t even have shoes! He tries to voice his complains about Fritz’s suicide plan, but the words are stuck in his throat. Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck!!! 

Fritz opens the locker and Jeremy, more afraid about being alone in that place than running through the hall, follows him. The security office is at the end of the corridor, and luckily they reach it in no time. 

“Rewind the music box,” Fritz orders him. Jeremy does, not really understanding why, while his coworker checks the cameras. 

Jeremy is inspecting the Prize Corner and rewinding the music box when the screen starts to glitch. For a second, he can see a golden figure in a corner, but as fast as it appears, it vanishes. 

“The door is not locked,” Michael informs him. Once more, he grabs Jeremy’s hand and starts running.

Passing the Party Rooms as fast as they can, Jeremy sees Toy Bonnie in one of them, near the air ventilation system. 

A chill runs through his spine. The only reason why he keeps moving is because Fritz is leading the way. 

He doesn't know what’s going on, part of him is sure that he’s just sleeping on the couch of the lounge and he’s going to wake up at any moment. 

They enter the Main Area. The laugh of Balloon Boy follows their every step. Jeremy watches the animatronic of the boy in the corner, looking directly at him, with that creepy smile and the sign of BALLOONS in his hand. 

The show stage is empty, besides of Toy Freddy, and he feels his stomach drop when the animatronic slowly turns towards them. 

They’re being watched. They’re being followed.

It’s not the first time he is in one of the restaurants at night- when he worked at Fredbear’s Family Dinner, before the place closed permanently, he had to do a few night shifts, alone in the building but for the shadows and the animatronics. It had been fine, nothing that Jeremy could be scared of. 

He remembers himself coming back to the day shift a few days later, sitting with Fritz and talking about how nice and calm the night duty actually was! That and the payment were the reasons why he requested the night duty when Fredbear’s Family Dinner officially closed and they were moved to Freddy Fazbear’s Pizzeria. 

When they reach the door, Fritz releases his hand to search for the bunch of keys he has in his belt. 

Then, Jeremy sees it, hanging from the roof. 

Mangle. 

Jeremy throws himself over Fritz. Both of them fall to the floor, and the animatronic fails to bite Fritz’s head for a few inches. 

Luckily, Mangle missing gives them the time they need to get out of the building. They run until they reach the other side of the road. 

Fritz stares at him, he has again his deadpan expression from before.

“Do you want to grab something to eat?”

Jeremy looks at Fritz, and finally, finally, regains his ability to speak.

“WHAT THE FUCK!?”

______________

One would think that fighting for your life for six hours would leave a person without appetite, but for Michael Afton is the exact opposite. He’s always hungry after a night shift. Lucky for him, there’s a cafeteria a few blocks from Freddy’s that is open 24h and serves pancakes and fries.

Jeremy, on the other side, isn’t eating at all. He hasn’t said a word since they left the pizzeria, aside from that ‘what the fuck’ and a ‘well, fine! But you pay!’. He followed Michael and didn’t say a word- not even when they reached the cafeteria and the waitress looked at his green socks with orange stars with judgment (it was a miracle that they let Jeremy enter without shoes). 

Now, Jeremy is just staring at the pancakes like they can explain everything that is going on. From time to time he raises his head to look at him, probably expecting some explanation. 

Which, honestly, is a problem, because Michael doesn’t really know how to explain it, or how much he could explain without making Jeremy think that he’s crazy.

“Are you going to say something or do I have to wait until fucking Freddy Fazbear appears to kill me?” Jeremy suddenly asks. 

Michael gives a sip to his milkshake.

“They don’t leave the pizzeria.”

“Well, that information just makes me feel so fucking safe ,” Jeremy is basically fuming. His fingers start to play with the spoon, making it spin over the table. “Definitely not something I’m going to think about when I start my shift in twelve hours.”

“They don’t attack during the day.”

“Now you’re going to tell me that they just want to stretch their legs?”

Michael’s lips twitch, if only for a brief moment. 

“What do you want to know?” he asks, because he decides that is simpler than trying to explain everything. 

Jeremy, finally , gives his pancakes a bite. 

“Did you know that the animatronics were like this before requesting the night shift?” 

“Yes.”

Jeremy nods and takes another bite. 

“When did you find out?”

“When you told me what Adam said. You thought that he was just high and had a crazy dream, but I… I had motives to think that those stories had something true.

“So, you weren’t just being a dick?”

“Believe me, being a night guard wasn’t my plan. I didn’t want someone to get hurt, so yes, it wasn’t because I wanted to steal the position from you.”

Jeremy nods again, but this time, his lips raise in what Michael could consider a smile. It lasts a few seconds, but it’s enough to take some weight off his shoulders. 

“Guess I can’t be mad at you anymore.”
“You were mad at me?” Michael jokes. “I didn’t notice.”

“Asshole, don’t act like I wasn’t your best bud when we were working at Fredbear’s.”
No, Michael could not deny that. 

After the incident in 1983, and everything that happened after, friends were a difficult issue for Michael. 

When he started to work at Fredbear’s Family Dinner, he didn’t know if it was divine justice or his father's cruel attempt at a joke. It could have been both. He had expected to panic when he saw the stage, destined to see everyday the place where he had killed his brother. 

But then he met Jeremy, the security guard and his new partner, and something about him made things easier. Maybe it was the way Jeremy sat by his side and joked during their lunch hours, or how he was so expressive that Michael was able to read him even when they were on opposite sides of a room.

Yes, Jeremy had been a good friend, even if he wasn’t aware of Michael’s real name and his past. Or maybe because of that. 

However, Michael isn’t going to give Jeremy the satisfaction to hear him say all that. 

“Next question.”

“Yeah, this I think is easy to answer. Why the FUCK did you not run away after your first night!?” Jeremy asks, looking at Michael like he is the dumbest person in the world. “Or, at least, why didn’t you say something!?”

“No one would ever believe me, the same way they didn’t believe Adam. And if someone were to investigate it, the most probable outcome is that they end up killed. The same goes for the first question. Resigning meant that someone else would take the position.”
“But then you’re the one who is going to die!”

Michael blinks, surprised by the angry reaction. He couldn’t remember the last time someone was worried about him. 

“I know my way around animatronics-”

“Fuck, Fritz! That you survived for a whole month doesn’t mean that you’re out of danger!” Jeremy points out. “Why are they even able to do all that!? And don’t tell me that shit of ‘they don't have a proper night mode and they’re quirky’!” 

That had been the excuse that their manager gave them after Adam’s ramblings about night terrors. 

Michael is about to say something, but his brain and his mouth are at war about what he can and can’t say, so he stays in silence while searching for an explanation.

He goes over the information in his head. 

Jeremy knows three things: that a kid had gone missing at Fredbear’s Family Dinner two months ago, and that’s why they closed that restaurant; that another four kids went missing in Freddy’s, the pizzeria they were currently working at; and, finally, that the police had arrested someone and were investigating, but the news didn’t gave away names and Fazbear Entertainment had been able to avoid closing the pizzeria- for now. 

Michael sighs. 

“I think the animatronics are possessed by the missing kids.”

Jeremy wasn’t expecting that answer. His mouth opens and shuts over and over again, probably trying to decide if what he says is true or a really dark joke. 

“That’s not possible,” Jeremy utters. His voice is shaking, and he moves the plate of pancakes away from him. “That… How could you even know that?”
“I don’t, it’s just a theory,” Michael quickly adds. A theory he wishes it isn’t true. “But it’s the only one that makes sense.”

“But Adam said that the old animatronics also moved around at night, and that The Puppet appeared in the corridors. That, plus the Toy animatronics, plus Mangle and Balloon Boy, are at least eleven animatronics. It doesn’t add up.”

“I think the old animatronics are the ones being possessed. The first kill was in Fredbear’s, not in the current pizzeria, so it wouldn’t make sense if someone died in that location but his spirit possessed an animatronic in a completely different building.”

“Wait, stop, stop,” Jeremy pinches his nose. “We’re talking about dead kids and possessions like nothing. If what you’re saying it’s true, then those kids are truly, truly…”
He can’t finish the sentences. 

Those kids…the kids that he saw in the missing posters almost every day would never come home. Maybe their bodies would never be found. And Fritz is talking about that like it’s nothing, like this is just a conspiracy about the last tv mystery that he’s about to crack. 

He raises up and runs to the bathroom. He has barely eaten, but he throws up everything. One thing is knowing that the kids are missing, and another one was confirming not only that they were dead, but also they were possessing the animatronics. That they would never grow, or finish high school, or come back to their families. 

Jeremy remembers one of the couples, spreading missing posters of his son even after one man had been arrested, the sorrow on their faces, but the hope still shining in their eyes. 

This isn’t happening. This isn’t happening. This isn’t happening. This-

A hand offers him some paper. Jeremy takes it without looking at Fritz. He can’t look at him right now. 

Jeremy sits on the floor of the bathroom. It’s sticky, but his legs aren’t able to hold him for any longer.

Fritz sits in front of him.

“How are you to accept all this?” he asks in a faint voice. 

Fritz’s eyes are covered by a shadow. 

“I can’t,” Fritz admits. He’s also shaking, and Jeremy thinks that, probably, this is the first time Fritz talks about this to someone else. “That’s another reason why I stay at the pizzeria. I want to know what happened. Why…why everything is happening. And how to fix it. I can’t let them stay like this.”

Maybe it isn’t that Fritz is insensible about what’s going on. Maybe it’s just that Fritz had been dealing with this for a month, and he had desensitized himself so he wouldn’t go crazy. 

But he cares. Jeremy can see it in the way his lips tremble and the fact that he’s still here, determined to risk his life every night. 

“Who are you?” Jeremy suddenly asks. No one would go through all this just because. 

“I’m Michael Afton.”

The name resonates in Jeremy’s head. Of course he knows the surname Afton. He’s one of the owners of Fazbear Entertainment. Or, at least, he was , until his partner, Henry Emily, reduced his place in the company after a gas leak in Baby’s Pizza World. The news said that it was because the bad management of that restaurant cost millions to the company.

However, Jeremy starts to think that that was a lie paid by Fazbear Entertainment. 

“Oh,” is all that Jeremy can say. He leans his legs over Fri- Michael, quietly understanding what’s going on. “Your dad…?”
“I think he did it,” Michael confirms. He bites his lip, so hard that it almost bleeds. 

He seems to be in a predicament, and Jeremy’s questions multiply by ten thousand. He wants to ask about Michael’s father, about if he’s the one the police arrested, about how Michael can be sure, about the scar that Michael has in the right side of his chin. 

But he doesn’t. What he asks, is:
“That’s why you’re doing all this?” 

Michael nods.

“I thought that, maybe, I can find a way to solve all this, or at least uncover the truth,” he explains, but Jeremy feels that there’s something more, something that Michael isn’t telling him. “What were you doing sleeping in the lounge?” 

“I needed a place to sleep. Just for a few nights. And I was hoping that you would feel sorry for me and let me stay on the couch.”

“I would, if not for the killer animatronics,” Michael confirms. Jeremy lets out a loose laugh, almost genuine, but also part of a panic state. “But I can offer you my couch, if you want.”

Jeremy immediately feels his cheeks burn. What? What does that come from!? 

“I…” Jeremy is trying to think about an excuse. It’s not that he doesn’t want a place to stay, it’s that even after all these confessions, his crush on Frit- Michael hasn’t gone away. Taking into account everything that Michael is dealing with, the last thing he needs is Jeremy’s feelings for him growing even more.

“I don’t live in my father’s house,” Michael quickly assures him, assuming that the psychopath dad is the problem. Which, honestly, Jeremy hasn't even considered. He is pretty sure that, after all this revelations, his priorities are fucked up forever. “I have my own apartment, I haven’t had contact with him since he was arrested. I know that it isn’t the best prospect ever, but…just so you know.”

“I don’t want to impose, I’m sure there’s a nice bridge somewhere in this city,” Jeremy tries to joke, but Michael bites his lips again. Shit, he probably thinks that it’s because of the serial killer dad. 

“I understand.”
Shit, Michael is sad. Objectively, Jeremy doesn’t have a reason to deny the offer. The only friend he has apart from Michael and his sister is his friend Bill, who’s currently living on his father’s couch because, again, being a staff member at Freddy’s is the worst. 

“But, on the other hand, it’s summer and I’m sure that all the nice bridges are already occupied, so…yeah, I think I'll take the offer,” Jeremy accepts. Michael’s eyes lighten, and Jeremy has to look away because this boy is so cute that it should be illegal. Then, he remembers something. “Fuck, my things are still in the restaurant.”

“We can go to get them in the morning. They usually stop at six A.M, when the stuff appears, so it shouldn’t be a problem.” 

Jeremy looks at the watch he has on his wrist. It’s almost 4 A.M. The idea of coming back to that place makes him want to puke again, and the idea of spending eight hours in that place, even if he has a day shift, makes him want to hide in that bathroom forever. 

“You’re going to come back tomorrow?” 

“I don’t have another option.”

“You definitely need a raise,” Jeremy mumbles, which makes Michael smirk. All of the sudden, watching his coworker light up, he makes a decision. A horrible, terrible, stupid decision that may be taken by his crush on Michael, his impulse behavior and his lack of survival instinct. “And I guess that I need one, too, because I’m about to make some double-turns that are definitely not worth the 85.50$.”

Michael’s slightly good mood disappears in an instant.

“You don’t have to come back at night, I already offered you my couch.”

“And? Do you think I’m going to finish my turn at 12 P.M, go home and sleep knowing that you’re fighting 6 foot tall machines possessed by kids that are trying to kill you? Holy fuck that sounded weird.” 

“If you stay, you’ll be in danger too.”
“But also you’ll have more possibilities to stay alive,” Jeremy points out. “Things are easier when someone gives you a hand. Let me be your player 2.”

Michael wants to say no. As much as he wants to have someone at his side, he is not going to put Jeremy in danger. 

But Jeremy has his arms crossed, and is smiling in that charming and sly way that means that he’s going to get what he wants. 

“I’m not letting you.”
“You can’t stop me,” Jeremy replies. His head is filled with panic and his stomach protests at the idea, but he’s decided. “You had been doing this on your own for a whole month, and you still don’t know what exactly happened to those kids, or why they’re hunting the animatronics, or how to fix it. Let me help you. I don’t want you to die, Michael.”

Those last words are the nail to the coffin. 

Michael has spent the last years alone, and now someone wants to help him and keep him alive. 

“You’re so bloody stubborn that I want to kick you.”

Jeremy chuckles.

“I take that as a yes.”

Chapter Text

Michael can’t believe he’s actually doing this. 

After finishing the pancakes (or rather, Michael finishing Jeremy’s pancakes), they went back to Freddy Fazbear’s Pizzeria to pick up Jeremy’s things. They obviously waited until 6:00 A.M to enter, when the animatronics came back to his “day mode” and didn’t try to attack them or put them inside a suit. 

The manager and the staff members always came five minutes late to work, so they could hide the evidence of Jeremy crashing the place. 

“What the fuck is that?” Jeremy asked when they went to the parking lot.

“My car.”
Jeremy's mouth hung open for a few seconds. 

“The lame ass gigantic bright green chevrolet?” Jeremy pointed at the car. He didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. “How did you even get a car like that?”

“It was my uncle’s. He hadn’t used it in years, so he told me if I could make it work, it was all mine.”

Jeremy didn’t say a thing. He got into the car, mumbled something about how ugly it was, and Michael drove to his apartment. 

And here they are now. 

“You can sleep on the couch,” Michael says. He feels kind of stupid. This place can barely fit one person, and he’s not even offering Jeremy a bed, just an old cranky couch that he got in a sale. “I know it’s not much, but-”

“Are you kidding?” Jeremy interrupts him. He runs to what he supposes it’s the bathroom’s door and opens it. He looks around in awe. “You have a sink! And your room is separated from the kitchen!” He says it like this is the peak of luxury, which makes Michael worry about the places where Jeremy had been living. “And you don’t have mold in the ceiling! How are you able to afford this place? Because I know that Freddy’s doesn’t pay enough for this.”

Michael bits his tongue for a moment, thinking about how to answer. Finally, he says: 

“My uncle helps me with the rent.”

Which is a significant simplification of the situation. He fears that Jeremy is going to ask the most obvious question: if you’ve got an uncle, why don’t you live with him?

Michael prepares the perfect lie, but luckily, Jeremy doesn’t ask. He hadn’t asked lots of things. Michael doesn’t know if it is because Jeremy is in denial, tired or too horrified at the situation to ask him for more details. 

“I should have empty cups in the cabinet, feel free to make coffee or eat something,” he says. All of the sudden, watching the dirty plates in the sink, his tiny table that barely fits two people with half eaten sandwich on it and the socks drying over the chair, he feels self conscious about the place. At least he took out the trash last night and let the window open so it doesn’t smell of cigarettes. Jeremy looks comfortable enough that he sits on the couch without saying a thing about the mess. “I’ll leave you a clean towel. Do you want something?”

“No, I think I’m fine,” Jeremy assures him. He leaves his backpack on the floor, beside the couch, and lets out a sigh. “How can I be so tired? Like. Fuck. You just told me that the animatronics are possessed by missing children and I only want to lay down and sleep.”

Michael isn’t the best person to answer. He also doesn’t know how he could know what he knows, how he could see what he saw, and just…keep going. 

“Don’t misunderstand me, I think part of it is that the situation is too surreal to be true, so my brain is still processing the information,” Jeremy quickly adds. He crosses his legs, his shoes now on the floor with the rest of his things. Is weird having someone else in his apartment, acting so comfortably, like he had been living there for ages. “I don’t know, man. I want to ask so many things- there’s so much that you didn’t tell me! But I’m so tired that I don’t want to ask but I also feel like an asshole for not asking because this are kids we’re talking about and holy fuck Fritz-”

“Michael,” he reminds him.

That makes Jeremy shut up. He’s staring at him, his eyes watering- because of how tired he’s, because everything is now a mess. No, taking into account that Jeremy was so desperate that he sneaked into Freddy’s and was going to sleep in the lounge, things had probably been a mess before all this. 

“It’s okay to be overwhelmed. You should sleep,” Michael tells him. He sighs and takes a blanket out of the closet. Instead of giving it to Jeremy, he wraps his friend in it, covering his head like a hood on a rainy day. “A lot has happened today, and I’ll need like, half a day to explain everything else. So, yes, sleep is fine.” 

Their eyes meet, and Michael catches a flicker of something in Jeremy’s eyes. Before he can put a name to it, he gives the blanket a thug.

“I’ll tell you everything, but now you can’t even hold yourself,” he tries to sound more harsh to compensate for the warm tone that he had before. “By that I mean that you look like shit.”

“I don’t know if you suck at motivational speeches or you’re just mean by nature,” Jeremy complains. He takes out the blanket, but even if he’s frowning now, Michael notices the brief smile on his lips. “Guess I’m going to sleep for six hours before going back to a death trap.”

“That’s the spirit.”

“Yep, you definitely suck at motivation,” Jeremy decides. Michael rolls his eyes and makes his way to his room. “Michael?”
“Yes?”
“Why did you give me a winter blanket? We’re in the middle of July.”
Michael blinks. He…hadn’t really thought about it. He just wanted to give Jeremy some comfort!
His lack of an appropriate answer must be obvious, because Jeremy chuckles. 

“Shut up or next time I’ll leave you under a bridge,” he threatenes, which only makes his friend smile even more. 

“Michael?”
“What?”

“Nothing. I just wanted to try and say your name,” Jeremy says nonchalantly. “I like it more than Fritz.”
This time, Michael can only mumble something under his breath before closing the door of his room behind him. 

He gets out five minutes later to wash his teeth, and finds Jeremy asleep. 

He can’t help but smile at the sight of his coworker's sleep posture- he’s too tall for the couch, one of his arms is over his chest, and in the time that takes Michael to go to the bathroom and come back, Jeremy is snoring. 

Michael is amazed by this man, and his smile becomes tender when he sees Jeremy’s dumb sleepy face. 

The sun is barely out, but Michael draws the curtains so the light won’t annoy Jeremy or wake him up. Then, he goes to his own room and takes off his security uniform. While searching for his pajamas, he ignores the scar that goes from his back to his right shoulder. He carefully inspects the corners of the room-under the desk, inside the closet, and doesn’t get into the bed (a mattress on the floor so nothing can hide behind it) until he’s sure that he’s alone.

Michael feels stupid when he does this. He knows that nothing is going to appear, but at this point, the fear of the shadows is an intrinsically part of him. 

He tries to sleep, but he spends an hour moving around, two more dozing off and waking up, and another hour watching his ceiling and counting seconds or whatever people do when they’re trying to sleep. 

It’s not the first time he has insomnia, but it is the first time he can’t sleep not because he’s worried about his dad, his past or the animatronics, but for someone else. 

Because, now that he’s in bed, alone, the reality of the situation hits him like a truck. Jeremy is sleeping on his couch.

Jermy knows about the animatronics.

Jeremy is going to get himself killed, and it would be Michael’s fault. 

_____________________

When Jeremy woke up that morning, part of him was sure that the events of the previous nights had been a nightmare. 

However, he WAS in Michael’s apartment, hugging the blanket his coworker had given him and his legs hanging out of the couch. 

So…not a dream. 

…

…

Well, he had an hour before going back to work. No time to think about all the revelations! He took a quick shower and made himself some coffee, trying to not wake Michael in the process. He hadn’t been paying attention last night when Michael told him where things were, so he had to search all the cabinets until he found the cups. 

He was a bit curious about Michael’s home, not gonna lie. He wanted to investigate the other cabinets to know what secrets his friend kept- then Jeremy remembered the situation, and thought that probably Michael’s secrets were something more than a porn magazine hidden under the couch, but police files or something like that. Also, he wasn’t a fifteen year old staying the night in his friend’s house, he was a young adult staying with a friend because he couldn’t pay his last month of rent and had been kicked out of his own apartment. 

The only thing he noticed before leaving to take the bus was a framed picture over one of the selves: a mom, a dad, who has his head removed from the picture, and three kids. Jeremy recognized Michael immediately, he has the same annoyed expressions now as he did when he was fifteen. Honestly, it is kind of funny seeing a teen so salty about taking a family photo. Next to him, there’s a kid with the same brown hair as Michael, but his eyes are green. He looks kind of panicked, like he didn’t know how to pose for the picture. The last one is a little girl with a pink bow and a bright smile. 

There’s no doubt that this is the Afton family. Michael has the same blue eyes as his mom, and he and his siblings share the same nose. Jeremy was kind of curious to see what William Afton looked like, but he doubted Michael had any picture with his father in it. 

He wrote a message for Michael in a posit that he found, and left for work.

How was he able to not think about all that happened? Simple: he got out his walkman, put on the earphones and raised the volume of the music until he couldn’t hear his own thoughts. 

Nevertheless, when he got to Freddy’s and sat in the security office, without music, without distraction, just with the laughs of the kids and the sounds of the animatronics walking around, shit went down. 

Usually, Jeremy does a few rounds around the building every hour, chats with his coworkers and eats some pizza in his 15 minute break. 

Now, he is afraid that the animatronics would decide that no, they weren’t going to wait until the night to kill him. 

He walks around the party rooms, the main hall and the game area, trying to stay away from the Kids Cove and Parts&Services. When he feels that it is too much, he hides in the bathroom or the lounge until his breath becomes normal again and his stomach doesn’t hurt.

He spends the rest of his work time like this: moving around, avoiding the animatronics and ignoring the posters of the missing children. 

Part of him wants to believe that Michael’s theory is wrong, that the kids are still somewhere. Another part of him knows that they had been missing for a whole month by now.

But, if the kids are dead, where are the bodies? Probably the killer (Michael’s father and his former boss, Jeremy tries to not think too much about it) had disposed of the bodies in another place, so no one would find them. 

He shrugs his head, trying to get rid of that idea. At what point did he start to make conspiracy theories about things so sinister? 

At 04:23 P.M, the phone rings.

“Hello? Hello? Jeremy, are you there?” 

Jeremy recognizes the voice of his manager, who he doesn’t remember the name of. He knew the guy had told him his name at some point, but he had forgotten and after a month it was too uncomfortable to admit it out loud. 

“Yes, that’s me.”

“Someone told me you wanted to talk to me. If this is about your concerns for the investigation, I assure you that Freddy Fazbear’s Pizzeria has no relation with the criminal and our security measures are stronger than ever. Also, your contract legally binds you to think so.”

“We both know that’s bullshit boss. This place breaks so many regulations that this would be a health inspector's worst nightmare.”

“Uh, that’s not true. That restaurant is the safest place on earth,.”
“Boss, is someone recording these conversations?” Jeremy asks. He gets a bit concerned when his boss doesn’t answer. “Anyway, I wanted to request a position at the night shift.”
“I’m sorry Jeremy, but Fritz Smith is currently our night guard, and he does a pretty good job. There’s no way, unless Fritz wants to change shifts.”
“Oh, no, you misunderstood. I don’t want to change shifts with him, I want to work with him.”

“Uh, well, you can’t do that,” the phone guy says. His voice starts to shake. “There’s only one night guard.” 

“Not always. Fritz and I worked together in Fazbear’s, and with all that’s going on and the lawsuits, wouldn’t it be better to improve the security? To, you know, don’t worry the families. After all, Freddy Fazbear’s Pizzeria it’s all about families.”

“Do you really need that raise so much?” 

The question pierced through Jeremy’s chest. Night guards got paid 15$ more than the day guards, and that difference means a lot to Jeremy. He wants to help Michael, that’s his principal motivation for doing this, but he can’t deny that the money is a plus. 

“Yes.”

There’s silence at the other side of the line. Jeremy fears that his boss is going to hang up, when he finally hears:

“I’ll talk to the owner. Um…that could take a couple of days, he has been a bit evasive this last month, with all that’s going on, y’know? Well, just wait, I’ll see what I can do.”
Jeremy smiles with relief.

“You’re the best boss I’ve had.”

“Sure, sure…hang in there. Bye!”

Jeremy hangs the phone, raises his arms and spins around in his chair. After the emotional rush boils down, he stops, and asks himself why the fuck he’s so happy. Even if he gets the shift, he just signed out to spend the night with evil robots. 

His priorities are truly fucked up. 

Also, he needs to call his sister and give her Michael’s phone number, so she could contact him. He always uses Freddy’s phone to call her, because fuck the company, but if they’re trully recording, he needs to change tactics before he gets fired.

Jeremy inspects the security cameras, then takes the phone and says:
“If someone is hearing this, please know that I love Freddy Fazbear’s Pizzeria.”

_________________

“You’re early,” Jeremy points out. Michael is sitting at the security officer’s desk, reading some files about the internal mechanism of the Toy Animatronics.

“I thought that, if you’re going to stay the night, I should give you a little tour around the place, but first,” Michael gets up and goes to one of the cabinets. Inside, there are three animatronic’s heads. “Pick one.”
“Why?”

“It’s a security protocol. The mask makes them think that you’re an animatronic, so they don’t attack you.”

“That easy?” 

“I wish. This works for the Toy Animatronics, Freddy, Bonnie and Chica, but it doesn’t trick the others. Also, when you put the head on, your vision decreases, so I don’t recommend having it on all the time.”

Jeremy observes the heads and picks one.

“Bonnie?” Michael asks.

“He’s my favorite. Well, he was ,” Jeremy corrects himself. He tries the head on. It smells horrible, he can barely see and he immediately starts to sweat. “I guess that I don’t have a favorite anymore.” He takes the head out and brushes his hair away from his face. “What do we do if someone that isn’t one of the toys, Freddy, Chica or Bonnie comes for us?”

“For Foxy, we flash the light until he goes away. Foxy is fast- the others will stare at you for some time and give you time to react, but Foxy won’t.” He takes one of the folders and gives it to Jeremy. Inside, there’s a map of the building, with a mark for every animatronic and an explanation of their routes. Jeremy is a bit charmed by this. Even if Michael doesn’t want him here, he took the time to write him a little guide (note: this is Jeremy’s crush talking when, in fact, trying to help you to survive is the bare minimum). 

Michael sits over the table and continues his explanation:
“Mangle is…well, a menace. She moves a lot, and can hide from the cameras. If she enters through the main hall, flash your light at her like you do with Foxy. Now, if she’s in the vents, put your mask on as fast as you can, or she will enter the office.”
“And what happens if she enters the office?” Jeremy fears. 

“You die.”
Jeremy is starting to reconsider this idea. 

No, he tells himself, it is too late to back down. Michael has been doing all this for a month. Jeremy is not going to let him spend one more night alone in this place. 

“I understand.”

Michael huffs in disdain, like he was expecting for Jeremy to run away after hearing about Mangle. 

Good luck with that, love. 

Jeremy might be afraid, but he’s also a stubborn idiot with no self preservation skills. 

“For the Puppet, rewind the music box and make sure that the music doesn’t stop, because there’s no way of stopping that thing once it’s free. And finally, Balloon Boy, the worst of all,” Jeremy gulps, ready for the last animatronic. It has to be pretty bad, to make Michael’s gaze so intense. “He doesn’t kill you, but he’s a fucking gremlin that messes with the cameras and the lights. Don’t let him enter the office.”

“What!? He only does that? I was worried shit!! How can he be worse than Mangle or The Puppet?”

Michael smirks, which only adds to Jeremy’s displeasure. 

“Rookie mistake. At the end of the week, if you could tear apart one of the animatronics you would choose Balloon Boy.”

“Isn’t he like 3 feet tall? Because I’m sure that, possessed or not, I could kick his ass.”

“He’s made of metal.”
“Still.”

Michael covers his mouth and looks at the wall, but Jeremy knows he’s laughing. His heart skips a bit, and he tries to distract himself by inspecting the map. 

It’s not a difficult chart. In a corner, Michael has written down the days every animatronic starts to attack. It seems that his coworker has really studied all his movements and patterns. 

He is relieved to read that the old animatronics (except Foxy), usually start to attack on wednesday.

“What about Golden Freddy?” he asks, remembering what he saw in the cameras the day before. 

Michael tilts his head.

“What about him?”
“He’s not on the map.”
“Because he doesn’t move. Golden Freddy is just a suit, no endoskeleton. Even if he’s possessed, he can’t attack us.”
Jeremy frowns. Maybe it was his imagination? He had seen Golden Freddy’s empty suit so many times while he was working at Fredbear’s Family Dinner. Maybe his mind, full of adrenaline and fear, had imagined him on the cameras. 

No. Jeremy isn’t sure if it was his mind playing tricks, but with everything that is going on, better to speak up. 

“Michael, yesterday, when you asked me to rewind the music box, I saw Golden Freddy.”

Michael’s face immediately changes upon hearing that. Before, he was checking the security cameras, probably a habit he developed even if he isn’t in danger. Now, his fingers freeze over the screen, unable to work. 

“Then, I think we’re in more danger than I anticipated,” he finally says. His eyes move from the screens to the hall, then back to the screen. “Shit.”

____________

Michael will never say it out loud, but having Jeremy at his side is making the night easy. 

The first hour, Jeremy had been trembling all the time, and when they heard Balloon Boy’s laugh? Jeremy almost fainted. 

But his coworker was more resourceful than Michael had given him the credit for. Yes, Jeremy is still jumping when an animatronic enters the room and presses the rewind button like his life depends on it (which is actually true), but he is great at multitasking and doesn't let fear win over him. 

“Mangle,” Jeremy announces. 

They both react at the same time and put the big heads on. Michael flashes the light to the hall to make sure that there’s nothing there, while Jeremy checks the cameras once more. He has a good hearing, better than Michael’s, which is proven to be a life saving skill. 

“Positions?” 

“Toy Bonnie is in the Main Area, Toy Freddy hasn’t left the stage and I think Toy Chica is in the kitchen. I can’t find Balloon Boy, but I heard his voice in the Prize Counter,” Jeremy reports. Then, he claps, overjoyed. “Mangle has left the air conduct!”

He raises his hand, asking for a high five. Michael frowns at him.

“Oh, c’mon love! We’re crushing this!”

Michael looks back at the camera. 

“Lame.”

Jeremy pouts and high five himselfs. 

When he’s sure that Jeremy isn’t watching, Michael takes a peer at him. 

Is not that he thinks they’re not doing a good job- because they are, but Michael was hoping for this to be a disaster, that Jeremy would get so scared that he won’t come back the next night. 

But he just had to be so fucking brave! Michael wasn’t counting on that! He thought that one look at Foxy with his hook up would make Jeremy leave forever! What is wrong with Jeremy that he is not only still here, but also is celebrating their victory?

Michael is puzzled, to say the least. 

Jeremy raises Bonnie's head to have a better look at the cameras. He rewinds the music box, his gaze fixated on the screen, and his lips are slightly moving, mumbling a song in a voice so quiet that, if Michael wasn’t looking at him, he wouldn’t notice what he is doing. 

Suddenly, Jeremy looks at him- maybe to ask him something, but he closes his mouth when he catches Michael staring.

A harsh, flushed hue paints Michael’s cheeks, and he shifts his attention to something else. He thanks that he has the head on so Jeremy can’t see him like that. Why is he even reacting like that? 

Michael can feel Jeremy’s smug smile on him. 

“So,” Jeremy clicks his tongue. He has the head on again, but Michael notices the joy in his voice. Asshole. “We just keep doing this for the next three hours?” 

“I can let the Puppet out to make things more interesting, if you want. ” Michael says in a deadpan tone.  

And Jeremy laughs. Michael tries to not gaze at him, focusing on the cameras instead, in the animatronics, in anything that isn't Jeremy’s laugh and the warm rush he feels in his chest. 

“I’m fine, thanks. But I would kill for some pizza. Or fries.”
“You’re taking this situation too well,” Michael points out. Foxy appears in front of them, and Michael quickly flashes the light to him, until he goes away. Jeremy doesn’t even jump this time. “It’s freaking me out.”
“We have been doing this for three hours now. It’s like…when you have anxiety almost every day of your life, but it reaches a point that when you wake up because of an anxiety attack you roll over and keep sleeping? Because you’re so used to it that it becomes normal?”
Michael blinks, dumbfounded.

“What the fuck Jeremy?”

“Oh, suddenly this isn’t a safe space?” 

“This was never a safe space, to begin with,” Michael reminds him, then points at the place.

Jeremy chuckles, and Michael tries really hard to not smile. He’s a bit worried about the anxiety thing- it sounded too personal to not be true, but Jeremy quickly changes the topic. 

“What were you reading when I entered the office?” 

Michael sees Chica moving towards one of the Party Rooms and follows her with the camera. 

“ The Toy Animatronics Manual and Inner System ,” he replies, half focus on the cameras, half focus on the conversation. 

“Wow, that sounds like such a fun lecture,” Jeremy jokes. Michael has the time to kick him under the table. Jeremy kicks back, and Michael kicks back again, and they start a little war between them until they see Chica near the office and Michael puts the head on again. “Aren’t those guides the ones they give us on our first day?”
“A bit different,” Michael answers. On one hand, he doesn’t want to tell Jeremy more, on the other hand, he already knows that his dad is a serial killer and he still sleeps on his couch. “You know that my father was one of the owners. He also built some of these things. Before I left home, I found some boxes full of blueprints and designs for animatronics, so I came back after he was arrested and took them. I thought it could give me a clue, or at least help me understand how they work.”

Toy Chica appears in the main hall, and that’s their clue to stay quiet for a bit. 

Jeremy’s breath under the custom head is heavy, and the palms of his hands start to sweat. Michael could call him a weirdo for getting used to the situation, but the truth is that Jeremy is still terrified. The one that is so calm that is kind of off putting is Michael. Again, maybe that’s because he’s been doing this for a month, but he can’t be sure.
Jeremy doesn’t know a lot about Michael’s life- when they met for the first time, three months ago, they usually talked about movies, rude customers or shared some funny stories. Family was a topic that both of them avoided like the plague. 

Jeremy knows by heart how Michael's lips twitch when he tries to hide a laugh, what things he considers funny and what doesn’t; he knows that Michael is good with kids, but he also has this shadow over his eyes when he talks to them, like he is thinking about someone else. He knows Michael's favorite ice cream, that he likes popcorn with butter and can eat a full pizza in eight minutes. He knows that Michael sucks at playing soccer, even if he spent his early years in London and his mom put him in a team the moment he could walk. He knows that Michael calls soccer football, and when he does, his british accent becomes more noticeable, and Jeremy teases him about it, calling him ‘love’.

However, he didn’t know Michael’s real name until yesterday. Or that his father was one of the owners of Fazbear Entertainment and the one behind the missing children incident. 

He doesn’t know so many things about Michael Afton, but the most scary of them all is that, with every new discovery, Jeremy falls for him a bit more.

Finally, after what felt like an eternity, Chica leaves the room. They take out the heads, and Jeremy welcomes the smell of pizza and plastic that surrounds the pizzeria. 

“Did you find something interesting?” he restarts the conversation from before. He takes the flashlight out of his belt while Michael studies the cameras. “In the boxes, I mean.”
“Blueprints from old animatronics, like Fazbear and Springlock, and a whole notebook about how the springlocks work,” he answers. Jeremy wrinkles his nose, and Michael can almost see the gears on his head. He’s kind of cute when he’s confused. “Springlocks are suits that can function in two modes: costumes and animatronics. There’s a crank that winds up the suit, so the gears surrounding the body of the wearer deactivate.”

“What happens if there’s an error and the suit activates with someone inside?”

“Nothing good. But don’t worry. There was a failure some time ago, but luckily, no one died. The springlocks suits were discontinued after that. Currently, there are only two springlocks suits, one of them being our friend Fredbear, or Golden Freddy as you called him. He is in costume mode, that’s why he doesn’t move around like the others.”

“That doesn’t help me as much as you think,” Jeremy says. He’s still convinced that he saw Golden Freddy yesterday, looking at him through the camera, but if he can’t move, then how was it possible? This is too much for his brain. “Are those manuals what made you think about the ‘animatronics possessed by kids’ theory? Because you have to admit, that seeing all this and immediately going with: ‘oh, yeah, this is totally related to this case of missing children, I think this place is haunted’ is a bit much.”

“Balloon Boy,” Michael announces. Jeremy reluctantly puts the head back on. He’s starting to understand why Michael hates that gremlin, is the third time in an hour that he appears. “I’ve told you it’s a long explanation.”

Jeremy can sense the tiredness in Michael’s voice. He frowns, and bonks his head against him to catch his attention. It works, and he sees Michael’s glare through the mask. 

“We still have some hours ahead of us. Give me the lore, theory boy.”

“Are you going to call me weird if I do?”
“I’ve been calling you weird since that time you spent all our lunch talking about Star Trek. But I don’t mind. I like hearing you talk.”
Jeremy wasn’t intending to sound so love sick when he said that, but he did, and he can only hope that the Bonnie head will distort his voice enough for Michael to not notice it. 

“It’s too much of a coincidence, you know?” Michael mumbles. He takes out the head, but doesn’t look at Jeremy. His gaze is still fixated in the cameras. “Freddy’s has never been a normal place. I suppose you’ve heard the rumors.”

Jeremy nodded. Yeah, Adam’s stories had been the most surreals, but not the only ones. A year ago, Circus Baby’s Pizza World closed because of a gas leak, then the Sister Location place- not to mention the bite of 83.

“Freddy’s doesn’t have a good reputation, no,” Jeremy agrees. Now that he thinks about it, it’s not only a miracle that this place is still open, but also that families keep coming. Or Fazbear has the best attorneys ever or those parents hate their kids. 

“And it gets a bit complicated. Wait, check the cameras, I’m going to get…” Michael searches the cabinets until he finds a pen. He takes one of the guides he was reading and starts to draw in the index. Oh, my. Michael wasn’t lying. He’s really getting into theory mode. This is so geeky and Jeremy is failing to not find it charming. “So, this is Fredbear’s Family Dinner. The original animatronics were here, plus Fredbear and Springbonnie, but these two were not used anymore.”

“Because of the bite of 83, right?” Jeremy asks. He has only heard rumors about what happened, and he knows what everyone knows, that a kid got too close to Fredbear and the animatronic bit his head.

“Yes,” Michael’s voice suddenly sounds…off. Jeremy wants to ask him what’s wrong, but Michael shrugs it off and continues with the explanation. “The first kid, Cassidy, was killed there two months ago. They didn’t catch the killer, and they ended up closing the restaurant. That’s when you and I lost our job and were transferred to Freddy Fazbear’s Pizzeria, along with the old animatronics. But, if you remember, things already were changing in the other location after the murder.”

Jeremy tries to remember, but… no, there were worse things going on in his life at the moment. He was more worried about the idea of how he was going to pay rent. He only remembers the police investigating the place, the missing posters and his calls with his sister. 

“Change, in what sense? I didn’t notice anything weird.”

“It wasn’t weird per se, more like the animatronics started to act quirky. Here comes Adam, who starts to talk about animatronics moving to areas that weren’t supposed to and glaring at security guards. But, the scary thing is that he was telling those stories BEFORE the old animatronics came here. However, once they did, his stories became scarier, he was sure that they were trying to kill him. So, when he said he was quitting, I requested the security night position, and uncle Henry made sure that I got it.”

“Your uncle…oh, right. The other boss,” Jeremy remembers. “You’re a well-connected bastard, love.”

“I was trying to save your life.”

“Details. Go on. And tell me the animatronics positions.”

Michael rolls his eyes, but checks the cameras before continuing. Toy Bonnie and Toy Chica seem to be getting near, but Mangle and Balloon Boy are in their designated areas. 

“As I was saying, the big change started after that kid, Cassidy, died, and things worsened when the old animatronics came here. So, there had to be something in those animatronics. It's just too much of a coincidence.”

“Fine, I understand that. But Adam was telling stories before that, what’s your explanation?”

“The Puppet,” Michael reveals. He draws a quick sketch of the creepy marionette in the corner of the paper, near the square that represents Freddy’s Fazbear Pizzeria. He’s good at drawing. “According to the blueprints, the Puppet is connected to the Toy Animatronics and has access to the cameras and the face recognition system. It’s the only animatronic able to do something like that, but it doesn’t have power over the old animatronics. Now, a month ago, another four kids were killed. Someone used one of the suits, the yellow one, and, if it was my dad, he had to use Springbonnie. That was his costume. And, after that, the other animatronics started to move. Chica, Foxy, Bonnie, Freddy. All of them. The same week those four kids disappeared. Do you understand what I’m getting at?”

“First Cassidy died. The old animatronics were transferred to this place. Things were scary before, but then they get scarier. A week later, four kids go missing, and four of the old animatronics start to move,” Jeremy summarizes the information. “Is that all?”

“Again, you’re taking this too well.”

“That’s because If I start to panic, those things are going to kill me. I’ll panic later, when we’re home and not in mortal danger.” 

Even if that’s the more logical decision, it’s also the most uncommon. Michael sucks at encouraging monologues, so he’s lost about what to say in this situation. 

“What do you want for breakfast?” he asks, because offering food is easier than words. 

“I usually don’t do breakfast, unless coffee counts.” 

Unacceptable.

“Remind me to go grocery shopping tomorrow. I’m going to cook you a good bloody breakfast so at least you have something to eat while you’re panicking.” 

“Oh, thanks love,” Jeremy’s voice is sarcastic, but in reality, he’s panicking. 

He already likes Michael! If that guy makes him breakfast Jeremy swears he’s going to eat him instead. 

Jeremy is not sure how he’s going to survive living with Michael until he finds a new place. His heart is racing almost all the time- on one hand because of the animatronics, on the other hand because everytime that Michael brushes his hair out of his face or looks at him with those blue fucking eyes (because who the hell has such deep blue eyes in real life!? Holy fuck Jeremy was doomed since the moment they met) the only thing he wants to do is jump to Michael’s lap and kiss him senseless. 

He’s in serious trouble. 

He catches Foxy running in the corridors and he takes out his lantern and lights the hall before that thing even appears. 

“Hey, can I ask you something?” Michael nods. “The boss, Mr. Emily I mean, you talk about him like he knows what’s going on in this place. Or, at least, like he suspects that something is going on. Why doesn’t he close the restaurant? Wouldn’t that be easier than all this?”

“Do you know the story of the Five Kittens?”

That isn’t the answer Jeremy was expecting. 

“Does it have a Disney adaptation? Because if not, I think I’m a bit lost,” Michael gives him a judgemental look. “Hey, I have a little sister! She loves disney, and when I had enough money to rent a movie I let her pick. Do you know how many times I’ve seen Sleeping Beauty? Enough to recite it by memory.”

“I understand what you mean. I had a little sister, too. She loved Alice in Wonderland. I haven’t seen the film in a long time, though.”

The moments that Michael shares something from his past are few, but everytime he does it, Jeremy discovers that his life is more fucked up that what he initially thought. 

He can’t relate to having a psychopath serial killer dad, but having a little sister? He understands, and he doesn’t want to imagine how losing her could feel like. 

“It’s a great film. We should watch it someday” Jeremy says, and he’s glad to see that, for once, Michael seems to be remembering something good. 

“Yeah, we should.”

Jeremy’s heart is weak against Michael’s soft smile, and he decides to change the subject before he, as he said, jumps to his friend’s lap and kisses him like a lost man in the desert who finds water after days of dehydration. 

Shit, he’s starting to use cliches to describe his feelings. He better change the subject. 

“Now, what were you saying about five kittens?”
“Oh, yeah. It’s a story about a little boy who has a snake. One day, he finds five kittens, and brings them home, even if he knows the snake might kill them. But, instead of choosing one kitten to satisfy the snake-”
“What!?” Jeremy interrupts him. “That doesn’t make sense! Why would you sacrifice a kitten? Is that kid stupid? There’s no better option than killing?”
“It’s a metaphor, Jeremy.”

“That metaphor can kiss my ass! Also, what does the kid feed his snake with? Because it obviously isn’t enough.”

“What are you talking about?”

“About the proper way to feed a snake?”

“Are you messing with me?”
“Kinda,” Jeremy’s lips raise in the corners and Michael kicks him under the table. “Sorry, sorry, Michael don’t pout! You’re not five! Please, continue.”

“Are you going to behave?” 

“You know I’m not.”
Michael sighs, too tired to try to follow Jeremy’s nonsense, and continues.

“The thing is, the kid can’t choose a kitten to sacrifice, so he does nothing. The next morning, one of the five kittens is dead. After five nights, all the kittens are dead. The kid, full of regrets, kills the snake, puts the pieces of the kittens back together and keeps them in the shoebox.”
Jeremy is waiting for something more, but Michael doesn’t say anything else.

“Wait, that’s it? What shitty metaphor is that?”
“It’s not shitty. It’s about the consequences that you face when you don’t make a decision. I think that Henry feels like that. He and my dad were friends for many years. I think that, because of that friendship, it took some time for him to see the true colors of my father, and the murders happened because of that. So now he’s like the kid in the story, with a snake he used to love but now he hates, and five dead kittens that he can’t save, but keeps them in a box.”
“Do you mean that this pizzeria is like the box from the story?”

“Uncle Henry couldn’t save those kids, but he can give them a place to stay. That’s why I think he fought so hard to keep this place open after the Missing Children Incident. It’s the only way he knows how to help.”

Jeremy wants to protest that that’s still a terrible idea. Michael can’t risk his life every night because Mr. Emily feels responsible for the kids death’s. Hell, this isn’t even about Michael! A night guard can’t stay a whole month working without breaks, less in this job. What would happen if Michael gets sick? Or has an accident? Then, someone else would have to take this shift, and they won’t have the skills or the luck to get out alive. 

Is there really no other way?

“In the story you told me, the kid thinks that, if he chooses a kitten and gives it to the snake, the pet may be satisfied. But it doesn’t.” 

“That’s a good way to describe my father, though,” Michael confirms. His voice is stoic when he says it, and Jeremy remembers the photo on his house, the broken corner of the image.  “He eats, and eats, and eats, until there’s no more food left.”

He feels a chill down his spine. The lights flicker around him. In CAM 06, the one in Parts & Services, Jeremy spots a purple figure with bright eyes and teeth, and what looks like dark tears running down his face. 

Maybe even the building hates the mention of William Afton.

________________

At 6:00 A.M, they leave the pizzeria as fast as they can. The sky's still dark, but they’re not tired. How can they? 

Michael has a void in his stomach and he needs to eat something before trying to sleep, and Jeremy is still full of adrenaline after six hours in mortal danger. 

“Are you sure you don’t wanna come?” 

Jeremy denies the offer. They are in the parking lot of the restaurant, and Jeremy refuses to enter.

“Yesterday they saw me in socks and having a breakdown. I’m not going back there in my life.” 

Michael rolls his eyes and closes the door. He gets two milkshakes, a burger for him and a sandwich for Jeremy. However, there’s no sign of his friend when he comes back to the car. He is going to panic, when he spots him running towards him. He has a bag in his hand, and he has the security jacket tied around his waist. 

“Sorry, sorry, I had to run to the end of the street, but I’ve got something,” he takes a film out of the bag. Is Alice in Wonderland. “I thought we could see it while we ate. Maybe it helps to get our mind out of the animatronic-problem and relax a bit?”

Michael doesn’t answer. His face is a puzzle, one that Jeremy can’t figure out at the moment. 

The seconds pass, and he starts to think that he made a horrible decision, that he’s sending Michael into a spiral of bad memories. 

“Oh, I…shit dude, I’m sorry if I overstepped. I guess that you don’t want to talk about your sister and your family and I get that, but you seemed happy when you mentioned the film and…I don’t know, I like to see you happy? I didn’t want to make you uncomfortable or bring bad memories or-”
“It’s fine,” Michael interrupts him. “I’m-I’m actually excited to see it. I don’t have a lot of good memories with my family, and Elizabeth and I fought a lot. But sometimes, when we were alone, we would make a blanket fort and watch whatever she wanted. She used to say that she was going to stay awake until my parents came back home, but she always fell asleep on my lap. Cute little gremlin, she was. I think I’ve never met a kid as stubborn as her.”
“I’m sure you were also quite stubborn as a kid, love,” Jeremy compliments him, and he swears he can see a blush on his friend’s cheeks. 

“Let’s go home,” Michael shakes his head. 

Jeremy can’t hide the smile on his face. 

“Yeah, let’s go.”
Jeremy’s not someone who likes to think about what’s going to happen. He can’t control the future, no matter how many plans he makes. 

That’s why he doesn’t think about the story about the five kittens, about what Michael could be still hiding from him, or the purple figure he saw in Parts & Services instead of Bonnie.

For now, they’re alive, they’re in Michael’s ugly truck, arguing about music and Jeremy changing the radio station every time his friend isn’t looking, because he’s not going to listen to classical music instead of Guns N’ Roses. 

They survived one more night. 

Jeremy doesn’t want to think about the next.

Chapter Text

Michael is a light sleeper. How could he not be?

He hears a noise coming from the bathroom, and his first instinct is to raise up and take the screwdriver he always has by the bed. His heart is racing, his head is screaming, and his eyes are fixated on the door, fearing the moment something opens it. 

Human or not human, he doesn’t care- whatever comes for him, wants to kill him. He waits, screwdriver in his hand, for the knock to move, for the intruder to make some noise- he even fears that he’s going to hear the voice of his father at the other side of the door, asking him to let him in so they can have a nice father - son chat. 

But nothing happens. 

Then he hears the sound that woke him up again, but there’s nothing threatening about it. It takes a bit to remember that, oh, he has a roommate now, Jeremy is probably in the bathroom. If the situation were different, Michael would try and come back to sleep, but the noise he hears is of someone throwing up. 

He remembers Jeremy two days ago, how the anxiety made him run to the bathroom, and he fears that is happening again, that Jeremy is in this hell of anxiety attacks because of him.

Because he’s too selfish and lets someone get into this whole mess.

He brushes his eyes and looks at the hour. It’s 9 A.M, late for everyone else, but too early for them. 

Michael gets up, leaves the screwdriver in its place, and goes to the bathroom. 

“Jeremy?”

He finds his friend sitting on the floor, in the corner between the bathtub and the toilet. Jeremy’s eyes are humid because of the effort, and a tear runs down his face. Jeremy tries to say something, but his stomach regurgitates, he gags, and then throws up again. 

Quickly, Michael leans by his side and takes his hair away from his face. He rubs his thumb back and forth against Jeremy’s temple- he read somewhere that it helps with anxiety, although right now it seems kind of stupid. 

But when he tries to stop Jeremy leans towards his hand, afraid of losing that contact. Once he finishes, Michael helps him to sit against the wall again and offers him a clean towel. 

“T-thanks,” Jeremy says. He’s not looking at him, and he seems kind of embarrassed that Michael had seen him like this not once, but twice now. 

“Do you want me to leave you alone?”

“No, please,” Jeremy’s answer is quick and desperate. “I mean, I…ugh, sorry. I just don’t want to be alone right now, but I feel like I should manage this on my own and let you sleep.”

Michael doesn’t answer. He sits by his side, with his back against the bathtub, and offers Jeremy his hand. He might not be the best at reading people, but he has seen how anxiety makes Jeremy move around and play with whatever he has at hand. 

Jeremy takes it. Michael’s hands are cold, and his fingers are longer and thinner than Jeremy’s. He likes it- he likes the icy touch against the warm skin, the way his ghostly pale skin contrasts against Jeremy’s tan one. His hands are too different, but when Jeremy intertwines his fingers with Michael’s, they fit perfectly.

“Is this because of the food?” Michael asks. 

“No, don’t worry about that. When I have an anxiety attack as big as this, no matter what I eat, it’s going to be a nightmare for my stomach. Sometimes I throw up, sometimes it’s diarrhea or gastroenteritis. It’s the most fucked up guess game in the world.” 

Jeremy doesn’t know why he’s talking about diarrhea with the guy he likes, but Michael looks far away from uncomfortable. 

“If you need a break, you can stay home tonight.”

“No way. I’m a strong and independent young adult,” he assures. Michael gives him his deadpan expression, that Jeremy had learnt that it actually means ‘I’m worried about you and I don’t want you to get hurt’. Jeremy starts to play with Michael’s hand, drawing circles in his friend's palm, following the silhouette of his hand. It calms him. “ I’ve had anxiety for years. And ok, fine, it’s difficult as fuck, but I’ve learnt to live with it. Sometimes it feels like that desperation and fear is going to be with you forever, but that’s the trick. It's not forever. It’s just a bad day.”

He wants to add something more, but there’s no way of saying ‘ I was feeling pretty lonely until I met you a few months ago and made me laugh with the most simple things ever and help me remember good things in life exist and you were kind of my light in the dark ’ and pass it as a ‘no homo bro’ moment. 

“I had lots of bad days, too,” Michael says. He doesn’t want to talk about them- those days aren’t pretty. When he was a teen, he got into fights- now, the bad days had evolved from anger and fury to anger and insensitivity. Days when Michael would get up and be so disconnected from reality and what was happening around him that he couldn’t feel a thing. He hates those days, because no matter what he does, he feels more like a corpse that is still walking around than a living person.

And yet, when Jeremy leans in and rests his head on his shoulder, those days seem far away, because everytime Jeremy is near he can’t help but feel everything. It’s overwhelming, and confusing, and Michael doesn’t want to put a name to it (he can’t, he can’t drag Jeremy more to this mess, so he’s going to pretend that he doesn’t know). 

“‘ Cause baby I don’t wanna be alone, and we both always know that playing hard to get just ain’t our style, so love me sweetly, you complete me, I can’t get enough… ”

“What are you humming?” Michael asks him. For the last minutes, the bathroom had been silent, except for Jeremy's calm sinning. 

“Is a song from a weird musical that I used to watch when I was down,” Jeremy explains. He draws a star into Michael’s palm. “It helps to calm me down. Do you mind?”
“Not at all.”

There’s something comforting about Jeremy sinning. His friend doesn’t have the best voice ever, and he hums more than sings, but it’s so different from the sounds of the pizzeria. His voice is lively, and messes up the lyrics because he doesn’t remember the words. 

Michael closes his eyes and leans against Jeremy. There’s no space between them, his shoulders are against each other and Jeremy’s messy hair is tickling his cheeks. 

“ Little darlin’, it’s been a long, cold, lonely winter. Little darlin’, it feels like years since it’s been here ,” Jeremy sings the next song, one that, this time, Michael recognizes. “ Here comes the sun. Here comes the sun. ”

“ And I say, it’s alright ,” Michael joins him. He doesn’t see him, but he can swear that Jeremy is smiling. “ Sun, sun, here it comes… ”
“You skipt over a whole verse,” there’s a faint joy in Jeremy’s voice.

“Oh, shut up,” Michael complains, and Jeremy’s humming turns into a chuckle. “Fine, I’ll make the do-do-do-do from the chorus. Happy?”

“Yes,” Jeremy answers, but his tone is too soft to be just talking about the song. 

The second time Jeremy wakes up, he’s in Michael’s bed. It takes a bit to remember what happened- he woke up with an anxiety attack so horrible that he thought he was going to die (note to self: remember that you can’t die from an anxiety attack), went to the bathroom, then Michael appeared and…

Oh. Yeah. Jeremy remembers now. They stayed on the floor until his anxiety lowered down enough for him to get up without thinking that his legs were going to fail him. Michael had let him rest his head on his shoulder, had rubbed his temples to stop the headache, and had sung with him, even if he didn’t know the letters and it ended up with Jeremy making fun of him for not knowing the Beatles, followed by a rant about the group and conspiracy theories surrounding it. 

And Michael had heard every part of it. 

At this point I don’t care about the serial killer dad, I’m marrying that guy.

He’s going to deal with this development later. 

Jeremy remembers getting sleepy and walking towards the couch. How did he end up in Michael’s bed? 

He gets up and goes to search for his friend / coworker / maybe the love of his life. He finds him in the kitchen. 

Jeremy rests against the door frame, watching Michael moving around with ease. His friend wasn’t joking when he said he was going to make him a good breakfast. 

“Good morning,” he says. Michael doesn’t stop, but gives him a gaze that Jeremy suppose is his way of saying ‘good morning’ back. “What’s on the menu?”
“Crumble with apple and corn, fruit salad and coffee.”

Jeremy’s mouth drops.

“How are you even able to afford it!?” 

“Let’s just say that uncle Henry doesn’t really know the market. It’s not so much that I can afford a better place, but it’s enough for these things,” Michael explains. Wow, Jeremy wants an uncle like that. The only ‘uncles’ he ever had were friends of his mother that puked on the floor of their house because they were too drunk. “How do you like your coffee?”

“I think that’s the first time someone asked me that,” Jeremy is dumbfounded. Is this the rich life? Did he accidentally get a sugar daddy? “Black? That’s what I usually get.”

“There’s milk in the fridge and sugar over the table, if you want to add something,” Michael informs him. “Also, it is decaf. I hope you don’t mind.”
“After last night me and decaf are the best of friends.”

Jeremy takes one of the cups and tries his coffee with some milk, and after thinking about it, adds some sugar.

“Do you need help, love?” 

“Last time I saw you cook you tried to microwave a burrito, and you burned it and froze it at the same time. I think I’m fine.”
“That was an accident!” Jeremy complains. Yeah, his cooking abilities weren’t the best, but he had survived all these years on his own. “Fine. I’m going to sit at the table. But I’m taking the fruit salad with me.”

“Oh, no, what shall I do?” 

Jeremy gives him a finger and sits on the table. He can still hear the sounds of the kitchen, and a few minutes later, Michael appears with his cup of coffee and the crumble. 

“It’s okay for you to eat after…?”
“My anxiety attack?” Jeremy finishes for him. “I don’t have much appetite, but I know I have to eat something, and fruit seems like a nice safe food. But maybe I stay a bit away from the crumble. Sorry love, it smells amazing, but I don’t think my stomach can handle sweets in the morning.”
“Good, more for me,” Michael counts it as a victory.

“Did you make all this while I was sleeping?”
“I couldn’t fall asleep again, so I decided to cook something. It helps my nerves.”

Ah, stress baking. 

“That’s why I woke up in your bed?”
Michael’s ears become a bit crimson.

“I wasn’t going to sleep, and I thought that the bed was more comfortable than the couch.” 

Jeremy nods, like this information isn’t making him go crazy in twenty different ways. The voices in his head are screaming at all once to not be a fucking cowards and kiss him because what the fuck this guy cares about you, knows how to cook and stays by your side trough the good moments and the bad moments? The only voice that is against this idea (that little rational shit) reminds him that there’s too much at stake, and it isn’t the moment to give Michael a declaration. 

So, against his better judgment, Jeremy decides to change the subject. 

“So, when are you going to show me the board ?” Jeremy asks.
“The what?”
“You know, the board . The place where you have photos of cases and things joined by red threads and all that.”

“I don’t have one of those.”
“Man, stop lying. Where’s the board ?”
Michael takes a sip to his coffee.

“It’s in my room.”
“I knew it.”

Reluctantly, Michael gets up and brings the board from his room. 

It’s pretty complete, Jeremy has to give Michael that. The blueprints of the pizzerias are in the corners, with information about what happened in each place. Fredbear’s Family Dinner, for example, has bite of 83 writing at its side and the image of Cassidy, the first missing kid. 

There are photos with the missing children, their names, dates of their deaths and the animatronic Michael’s thinks they’re possessing. 

“Should we be worried that there’s a kid named Fritz and another named Jeremy?” 

Michael shrugs his shoulders. 

“I think it’s just a red herring. Don’t mind.”

Jeremy exhales. He already has too much on his plates, he doesn’t want to think about the implications of one of the victims having his name. 

“Why is Cassidy’s name in question marks?” Jeremy points at the kid’s photo. It’s a bit blurry, and it’s obviously an image that someone took at a birthday party and that originally had more people in it. 

“Because there's something weird about Cassidy. He’s the only one of the missing kids that hasn’t been identified by the police. He was at the birthday party, but I checked the records of that day, and there wasn’t a kid named Cassidy in the guest list. I even asked some of our coworkers, but all of them said the same thing: they didn’t know where that kid came from. They all thought he was a last minute addition, and paid no attention to him, until he vanished.” 

Jeremy observes the kid of the image. He’s a bit older than the kid at his side- maybe twelve? His eyes are dark, and his hair it’s blonde, at least that’s what Jeremy can guess from the black and white photography. 

“Isn’t it weird that Cassidy was the first victim, and also the only kid that hasn’t been identified by the police? No one comes asking for him, no one seems to know him, it’s like he had always been a ghost,” Jeremy asks. Michael doesn’t seem to have the answer. “Maybe Cassidy isn’t his real name.”
“I thought about it, but there’s no way of knowing who he is.” 

All the other four kids- Suzie, Jeremy, Gabriel and Fritz, were in a bad place at a bad moment. There was nothing to indicate that they were chosen for a reason, and nothing linked them to other events. But there’s something about Cassidy that’s different. 

“Why would a kid snuck in the pizzeria?” Jeremy asks the million dollar question. It’s not like Fredbear’s was an exclusive place, nothing at all. It’s that family friendly restaurant where you can buy pizza at a family friendly price and watch giant machines play old fashioned songs and some original music, if you were lucky. 

“Maybe he wanted a prize. Or to see the animatronics. There’s a million reasons why a kid could do something as stupid as this,” Michael answers. 

“He’s the one who possesses Golden Freddy, right?” 

“Yes. He seems to be able to appear in the cameras, at least, that what you said, which means that he has some other abilities that we aren’t aware of,” Michael brushes his hair out of his face and pinches his nose. “I don’t understand why, though. The other animatronics can’t appear and disappear like that. In addition to that, he’s able to increase the violence of the other animatronics. If we take what Adam told you about them becoming more violent after he got to the pizzeria as a fact.”

“What if his murder was different?” Jeremy proposes. “You told me the Fredbear and Springbonnie suits had these spring locks things. Maybe he was pushed inside of the suit. If it's a death as bad as it sounds, I would also be incredibly mad. Maybe that’s what makes him different from the others.”

“The more violent the crime is, the more violent the animatronic becomes,” Michael summarizes the idea. 

They look at each other, and they know they’re thinking the same thing: thank god Golden Freddy can’t move or they would be so fucking screwed. 

They talk a bit more about this until Jeremy sees the hour. 

“I’ve gotta go or I’ll lose the bus,” he says. He jumps towards the couch and puts on his shoes, ready to leave to work. He really needs to buy a car, because he’s not going to make Michael drive half an hour to get him to the pizzeria and then come back, when Michael himself has to go to work in a couple of hours. 

“Wait,” Michael says. He goes to the kitchen, and comes back a moment later with a tupperware. It has a posit with Jeremy’s name on it. “It’s not much, just some rice with vegetables and chicken, but I thought it would be better than Freddy’s leftovers.”
Jeremy is…he doesn’t even know what to say. It had been so long since someone cooked for him that the situation doesn’t load in his head. 

And yes, Jeremy swore that if Michael cooked for him he was going to press him against a wall and kiss him until next week, but he didn’t think that Michael would actually cook for him! And he’s not used to this kind of gestures! He’s panicking big time, the seconds are passing, and every moment he doesn’t say something the silence becomes more uncomfortable. 

“You make me lunch?” he asks, his voice a bit higher than usual. 

Eloquent as fuck, Jeremy, he reprimands himself. First, you talk to your crush about diarrhea, and now you sound like Kermit. You’re definitely winning his heart, champ!

“It’s easier to cook for two than for one,” Michael replies nonchalantly. For him, it doesn’t seem like a big deal, but Jeremy is about to tear up. “It's the least I can do.”

No, it’s not. 

Michael doesn’t have to cook for him, or hear his rants, or keep him company during his anxiety attacks or worry about him getting enough sleep and eating well. 

“Thank you.”
The corner of Michael’s lips rise a bit, and Jeremy's heart stops.

Jeremy can’t understand how someone who cares so much about others can have such a bad image of himself. It makes him mad. It makes him hate William Afton even more.

Freddy’s is different. 

The dark violet clouds of the twilight are visible through the windows, although the lights are off and the corridors are full of silence, even if at this hour the kids should be running around. 

Until he hears a laugh and catches the legs of a figure running. 

Jeremy tightens the grip on the lantern, but decides to follow the figure. It’s a stupid decision, and he knows it, the same way he knows that coming back to the pizzeria at night is a death sentence, but does it anyway. 

If you ask him, maybe he would blame his crush on Michael, or that he’s too curious for his own good, but the truth is something simpler. 

He can’t leave and forget everything that he knows. 

He turns to the main hall, and discovers that he has been following the Puppet, who is still running towards the Main Area. 

There’s no trace of the Toy Animatronics. Instead, the old animatronics, except Golden Freddy, are sitting in the corners. Freddy, Chica, Bonnie and Foxy. Their eyes are dark, and they’re not looking at Jeremy, they almost seem…dead. As weird as it sounds. 

But Jeremy isn’t worried about the empty animatronics- he can’t be. There are three kids in the room, and they’re the ones staring at him, observing his every movement. 

At least, two of them are. 

The girl who seems to be the youngest of the three is sitting beside the door. She doesn’t seem aware of her surroundings, and the corners of her silhouette are diffused, although she looks more alive than the other two. Her red pigtails are decorated with pink laces, and her eyes are vividly green, so intense that it doesn’t look like a real color anymore, just another trick of the pizzeria. She’s wearing a crimson skirt and bells of her shoes, and it reminds Jeremy of the clothes of a Jester. 

The other two are in the center of the room. 

One is on the left. His dark eyes are glaring at him, and his features are clear and at the same time surreal. Is a face made to forget the moment you see it, leaving you with the lonely memory of menacing eyes and the golden tone of his t-shirt. He looks the oldest, and his golden hair is actually dyed. 

The girl on the right has short black hair, with his cheeks painted in red and blue tears tattooed on her face. She seems more aware than the other two, and Jeremy catches the glimpse of a bright green bracelet in her wrist. 

“Who are you?” 

“You already know who we are,” the girl with the green bracelet replies. 

He doesn’t know who the jester girl is, but he recognizes the other two. 

Fredbear. The Puppet. 

Cassidy. That’s the name of the boy. 

Jeremy observes them, and they wait to see what he does. Maybe they’re expecting him to run away, to tremble, even to yell, but he doesn’t do any of that. 

When the reality of the situation finally kicks in, he says in the brokest voice ever: 

“You really are just kids.”

The phrase seems to shock both of them. Cassidy’s confused expression quickly turns into one of fury, but the Puppet just…stares. Jeremy is unable to interpret that glance and he’s growing a bit uncomfortable with every second. 

“We were kids,” Cassidy corrects him. “We’re not anymore. He’s trying to release us, he’s trying to keep him away from us, but I won’t let that happen.”  

“Who? Michael?” Jeremy asks. Both souls twitch at that name, and the world around Jeremy glitches, like he’s in a videogame that is starting to break.

“Don’t say that name,” the Puppet advises him. Suddenly, she’s in front of him, his dark eyes studying him. “I don’t hate you, but you have to stay out of our way. The others are under my protection. I won’t let them get hurt again. Not anymore.”

“We don’t want to hurt you. We want to help you,” Jeremy assures her. The Puppet gives him a skeptic look and goes back to Cassidy’s side. “I…I understand that you are afraid, and you want to protect them, but we can-”

“ He is not welcome here! ” Cassidy interrupts him. “And you aren’t either. Do you think you can save them? ”

Them. Jeremy looks at his surroundings, at the other four animatronics in the rooms. The rain is pouring against the window, and for a second, he swears he sees a little girl crying outside of the building. 

The Puppet gets between him and the door.

“ Can you save them? ” she repeats. 

“I want to. Let me try.”

He hears…a kid crying? It’s a background sound that almost gets eclipsed by the rain. But Jeremy had spent too many years listening to the most insignificant of noises, and it’s impossible for him to not notice it. 

First, he thinks those are the cries of the kid outside, but when he tries to take a look, the kid has been replaced by a dark car who drives away. 

No, the crying comes from the inside. 

“What’s that?” he asks. He turns towards the noise, to the corridor that leads to the Parts & Services area. 

“ Ignore it, ” Cassidy threatens him. 

If you happen to get trapped inside of a weird hallucination where the angry ghosts that are trying to kill you give you an order, the best way to survive is to follow that order.

Then again, Jeremy and authority or common sense aren’t the best of friends. 

Ignoring Cassidy’s orders, he flashes the light towards the main hall and walks towards it. At every step he takes, the sobs become louder, stronger, until he’s in front of the door of Parts & Services and is the only thing he can hear. 

“ Do you think you can save him? ” Cassidy’s voice rungs in his ear.

Jeremy reaches towards the door.

“ You can’t. ”

The third time Jeremy wakes up he’s in Freddy’s, in the normal, lighten up Freddy’s. Michael is at his side, giving him the judgemental look that Jeremy loves so much.

“You’re drooling over the table,” Michael tells him.

Yes. He is. The clock says it’s 11:47. Thirteen minutes until the night shift. 

“I don’t know if you notice, but I didn’t sleep a lot today,” Jeremy reminds him. He sits properly at the security table and rubs his eyes. He barely can recall the dream he just had. He remembers Freddy’s, and that there was someone crying, but that’s all. It’s like someone erased his memories after he woke up. 

Michael takes another chair and sits at his side. 

“How was work?” he asks him. 

Jeremy stretches his arms. 

“Fine. I think. This last hour is a bit fuzzy. For being asleep and all that.”

“How are you even able to fall asleep?” Michael’s pretty confused. What kind of weirdo gets a nap in a place like this? 

“Relax, man. It was the day shift, you told me they don’t attack during those hours.”

Michael knows, but he’s still worried, nonetheless. Jeremy needs to sleep, but the idea of him snoring while those machines are near him with no one to watch his back… He doesn’t want to think about it. 

He’s already trying to cope with the fact that he’s putting Jeremy’s life on the line, and that he’s making Jeremy’s anxiety worse, if he adds something else to his list of worries he’s the one who isn’t going to sleep for the rest of his life. 

In a matter of minutes, the last staff members leave the restaurant. Luke, a friend of Jeremy and one of the waiters, takes a short visit to the office before leaving. He’s a bit surprised at first when Jeremy tells him that he’s staying, but then his eyes go from him to Michael, and he smiles like he knows something. 

“Oh, I see…”

Michael doesn’t understand what he sees, but Jeremy’s cheeks are burning and he kicks Luke out of the pizzeria before his friend can say something else.

“It’s almost midnight,” he tries to excuse his weird behavior. 

Michael doesn’t believe him, but he doesn’t have time to ask. The moment the last worker leaves the place and the clock strikes midnight, Balloon Boy’s laugh breaks the silence.

“I really hate that bloody bastard,” Michael complains. Jeremy nods in agreement. 

The third night is the one when things start to get complicated. Old animatronics start to wander around, Mangle moves quicker and Balloon Boy walks around the place like it’s his own amusement park. 

They barely have time for quick chats or congratulate each other for their surviving skills. 

Until, at 3:19, a new problem arises. 

“Michael…”
“Yes?”
“What happens if you’ve got to go to the bathroom?”

Michael hopes this is a joke. 

“In that case, you have to run to the bathroom.”

“Do you think I can survive?”

“Why didn’t you go to the bathroom before the shift started?”

“I didn’t want to go at that moment!” Jeremy explains. “Mangle in CAM 06.”
They put the heads on and are able to drive away Mangle before she enters the office.

“You have five minutes to go and come back,” Michael informs him. “Foxy is in the Game Area, so be careful. I’ll give you instructions through the walkie talkie so you don’t encounter one of them. And next time you’re not going to drink all day to make sure that this doesn’t happen.” 

“Thank God you have a plan because I can’t stay like this for two more hours.”

Michael hates the plan, it’s the worst plan ever, as much as Jeremy promises him that he’s going to be okay. 

Jeremy takes the lantern, the walkie talkie and winks at Michael before leaving. He’s still wearing his headphones around his neck, even with the big Bonnie head on. He’s not leaving his walkman behind, if he dies, they are going to bury this thing with him. 

Following Michael’s orders, he reaches the bathroom without problem. 

Then, the worst thing happens: he hears the door open.

For the love of- Can’t he go to the bathroom in peace!?

He can’t take this anymore. Everyone has its limits, and apparently his limit is not being able to pee in peace.

“LISTEN. I’M IN THE MIDDLE OF SOMETHING HERE, AND IF YOU TRY TO KILL ME NOW THIS IS GOING TO BE PRETTY FUCKING UNCOMFORTABLE FOR BOTH OF US, SO WHY DON’T YOU BETTER WAIT OUTSIDE!?”

His yells are followed by a tense silence. 

One. Two. Three. Four. Five seconds.

And Jeremy hears the door closing again. There’s no sound of metallic footsteps or a big shadow. 

Oh. It worked. 

This is weird.

“SORRY THAT I SAID THE WORD FUCK. PLEASE DO NOT IMITATE THAT,” Jeremy screams again. After all, those spirits are still kids, no? He doesn’t know if they’ve got a ‘no swear protocol’ in their code, but better safe than sorry. The last thing he wants is being the responsible of teaching Freddy Fazbear, hero of the kids, to say ‘fuck’. 

As fun as that would be. 

He washes his hands before going out and takes out the lantern of his belt. 

The hall is silent, which only makes Jeremy more aware of the danger. He’s about to take the walkie out and ask Michael about the situation of the animatronics, when he hears heavy, fast footsteps running towards him. 

He barely has a moment to recognize Foxy and avoid him at the last minute before the animatronic cuts him in half. 

His walkman drops to the floor from his pocket, and the music starts to play. The volume is high enough that he could hear the melody through the earphones. 

“ There’s nothing to fear. ‘Cause baby I’m here, and you oughta knoooowww…BABY I LOVE YOU (Baby I love ya), YOU’RE SO FINE… ”

Foxy tilts his giant head towards the source of the music. Jeremy hopes he’s not going to step on his walkman and shatter it in a million pieces, because he’s not sure that he’s not going to do something stupid like put himself between the animatronic and his walkman. 

He waits, and waits, the music keeps playing, and…nothing. 

Foxy is not attacking him- instead, he’s focused on the walkman over the floor, almost as if he recognizes the song. 

“I’ve played the game and I’ve been hurt before, and each time I swore, then I would never trust my heart again. Could it be that you can fix a broken freak like me?”

Michael is doing his best to not panic, but Jeremy has been gone for at least fifteen minutes. His head is pondering all the possible deaths that his friend could have encountered. 

Breathe. Breathe. Breathe.

You need to breathe.

Jeremy isn’t going to die. He just went to the bathroom. That’s in the main hall, and they checked the cameras before he went. 

It’s fine. Jeremy isn’t going to die. 

He can’t. Just. He can’t. He isn’t. He’s not going to let that happen. 

Breathe. Breathe. Breathe. 

Michael goes from camera to camera, making sure that nothing is out of the ordinary. 

In cam 07, Michael sees Foxy move towards the bathroom. 

“Foxy is going your way,” he waits, but there’s no answer. He tries again. “Jeremy, Foxy is going to the bathroom,” nothing. It’s fine. He didn’t hear it. That’s all. “Jeremy, are you there?” It’s fine. It’s fine. He didn’t hear it. Try again. “Jeremy, please answer…” It’s fine. It’s fine. It’s fine. It’s fine. “Jeremy?”

Foxy disappears into a blank spot, and he hears a metallic scream at the other side of the line. 

The yell pierces through his ears. His whole body tenses, his hands tremble in fear, and the walkie talkie falls to the floor when he gets up and runs towards Jeremy. 

Memories from the past assault him in the form of shadows, extending his hands at him to slow him down. 

Why did Michael think that he could protect Jeremy? Is he really so desperate for company that he doesn’t mind putting others in danger? 

He now realizes that it was a mistake.

But he has to try. He can’t sit and wait for Jeremy to die, even if that’s what he’s been doing all along. 

Hypocrite. 

Balloon Boy is in Party Room 1, and when he sees Michael, he quickly moves towards him. 

“FUCK OFF!”

Micheal kicks that fucking gremlin in the head with all he’s got. His feet hurt, but he has enough strength to make Balloon Boy fall backwards, and Michael closes the door without thinking twice and keeps running. 

Jeremy was right- Balloon Boy may be an animatronic, but he’s small enough to be kicked. 

Luckily, his route isn’t hindered by another of those creatures, and he gets to the bathroom's doors in a few seconds. 

Jeremy is there, in a corner that the camera can’t catch. Foxy is in front of him, his hook raised towards the night guard.

Michael doesn’t stop to analyze the situation, so he’s unable to see that, for some reason, the animatronic isn’t attacking Jeremy. His heart is beating so fast that he can’t hear the melody, either. 

The only thought inside his head is Jeremy. 

Michael throws himself towards Foxy, hoping that the weight of his body is enough to at least make the animatronic lose balance a little. 

But it isn’t. Foxy only moves an inch, because he’s 5.9 feet tall and 290 lbs and that’s a lot .

“Michael! What are you-” 

Jeremy scream is cut by Foxy raising his hook again. 

Michael is able to dodge it, but the animatronic is too fast. He tries to take Jeremy’s hand, who’s still stunned by his sudden apparition, Foxy’s hook gets in the way. 

The pain on his hand is sudden and quick. He doesn’t stop to see the scratch on his hand, he doesn’t even flicker or get paralyzed by the ache that travels from the palm to the rest of his body. 

He only cares about Jeremy.

Before Foxy can move again, Michael gets the light out of his belt. It’s not much, but the sudden light gives them a few seconds. They search for each other's hand, and only when they’re sure that they got the other, they run away from the animatronic. 

The lounge is their best option at the moment, taking into account that Balloon Boy in the Party Rooms. 

Michael closes the door behind them and locks it, leaving a handprint of blood in the knob. 

Jeremy is at his side, still holding his hand- rather, he’s grabbing it like it’s the only thing keeping him sane. 

They stay like that, hearing, waiting for music or heavy steps that indicate that an animatronic is near, but after two minutes of silence, they exhale in relief.

“Oh my…Michael, your hand,” Jeremy says. He quickly goes to one of the cabinets and takes out the first aid kit, “Come, sit here, I’ll try to clean the blood…”
Jeremy reaches for his hands, but Michael tosses him away with disdain.

“Michael?”
“WHAT THE FUCK WERE YOU DOING!?” Michael yells at him. The blood is slipping from the palm of his hand to his fingers and drips to the floor, but he doesn’t care. He isn’t feeling pain at the moment, he isn’t thinking, he’s just…he’s just… “FUCK JEREMY! YOU HAD YOUR LANTERN WITH YOU, YOU KNOW WHAT TO DO WHEN FOXY APPEARS!”

“Do you think I was just standing there!?”
“That’s what I saw! I know the first time you find yourself face to face with one of those things is terrifying, but you don’t have the luxury to freeze when your life's on the line!”

“I know that! But Michael, he didn’t attack me ,” Jeremy points out, and Michael can’t believe what he’s hearing. “It sounds weird, but he had the time to do it, and he didn’t! He just listened to the music, he even started to hum!”

Michael glares at him, his eyes so cold that no trace of emotion is left in them. Jeremy always thought that anger was an emotion full of fire- that the eyes lit up and the emotions were on the sleeve of the person yelling. 

For Jeremy, anger is always a hot headed scream and a gaze that burns your skin, without logic or rationality behind the words of the other person. 

But Michael’s anger is different.

He’s silent, until he laughs, and there’s something so wrong with that laugh. It’s too close to panic, and Jeremy doesn't shiver or prepare himself for trouble, like he’s used to. He just stares at Michael and his big smile, at the laughter that leaves his mouth but sounds like a cry for help. 

“You can’t come back tomorrow,” when he finally speaks, Michal’s voice is monotonous, almost as metallic as the one from the animatronics that are trying to get them.

“Why?”
“Because you’re not taking this seriously. Do you really think that he wasn’t going to kill you? That, suddenly, they were okay with you being here? Maybe the souls inside those things are kids, and maybe they had the right to be angry and mad after they were murdered by the monster that my father is, but those things are no longer them,” Michael states it as a fact, as the only explanation possible. “They are trying to kill us.”

“How can you be so sure? How can you know that there’s nothing more here?”
“Do you really think that I didn’t already try!?” Michael raises his voice a bit. His blue eyes flicker under the artificial light, and his mouth twitches. “What do you think I’ve been doing this month? Just reading about animatronics and checking cameras? How do you think I’ve got this scar!? I can’t have you here because you’re naive.”
“I’m not,” Jeremy splits out. “And if you would just listen to me…”

“I don’t want you here anymore!”

“Just because of this !?”
“Because I don’t want you to die!” Michael states. His voice is still colder than one would think, with that stubborn look and his ‘this is a fact’ tone that makes Jeremy go crazy in the bad way. He’s not having a fit of rage- he’s having a panic attack. “This isn’t your problem, you’re not the one with the crazy psychopath dad, but I let you in all this mess, when I should’ve just offered you a place to sleep or money to spend the night at a motel. But I can’t do it anymore. I can’t put your life in danger like this, because you’re going to die, and that can’t happen. I don’t want to check a camera and see your remains inside of a suit. I don’t want to kill you, Jeremy. Please, don’t die. Not you too.”

Michael’s eyes water, but he doesn’t cry. He’s still holding so much information…How many things does he have over his shoulders? How much time would it take until Michael breaks completely? 

Jeremy makes Michael sit on the couch. Carefully, he holds Michael’s right hand, and this time the other man doesn’t take it away. 

Michael is looking at the floor, his body rigid like a statue and all of him screams that he doesn’t want to be there. Bit by bit, he’s learning to read Michael’s better than himself. 

His friend doesn’t move a muscle when he gets a clean cloth from the botequim, soaks it with antibacterial and starts to clean his wound. 

“Did they do this to you?” he asks, pointing at the scar on Michael’s face. 

His friends nods.

“I thought that maybe, if I fixed them, they wouldn’t be so aggressive. I had plans to rebuilt Bonnie’s face and clean them a bit, but the moment I turned my back on them Foxy tried to attack. Luckily, it was just superficial, but it was pretty clear that they didn’t want any kind of truce.” 

Jeremy tries to be as gentle as possible, but something tells him that he could be a complete brute and Michael would not complain, that he would endure the pain without letting out a mere sound. 

“There was this time, when I was little, that my sister Coraline cut her hand like this,” Jeremy starts to tell. He’s not sure why. At least, not at that moment. He just wants to share it with Michael, fill the void of silence that is ruling over the room. Or, maybe, he’s just tired, and Michael calling him naive is his limit. “It wasn’t done by an animatronic with a hook, obviously. There was a broken bottle on the couch, and she wasn’t paying attention. She was only 4, so she cried a lot. I tried to wake up my mom, but well, she didn’t like mornings, less when she had a few friends over the night before. That wasn’t unusual in our house- my mom appeared with a couple of friends and had a party or didn’t appear until the next day. I thought…for years, I thought she was a good mom, y’know? She cared about us, and she kissed our heads, and she didn’t make us go to school every morning, and sometimes she gave us candies. For a kid, that’s all you need. That cut on my sister’s hand was the first time I’ve gotten mad at her. I was 8, I didn’t know what I was doing, and Coraline was crying so much. It’s a miracle that the wound didn’t get infected. “Jeremy presses the cloth against Michael’s palm to stop the bleeding. He’s trying to not look at him at the moment, because then he’ll watch Michael’s scar in the left corner of his face, and will remember the one on his back, and will lose focus on what he’s saying. This is important. He wants Michael to understand. Even if it is hard remembering all that happened. “We were a little family, just me, Coraline and my mom. We moved all the time, from this boyfriend’s house to another boyfriend's house. My mother- she had a horrible taste in men, by the way. Worse than mine. Until she met my step-father, and I discovered that, holy shit, those men weren’t horrible, this one is horrible. He wasn’t like the others- they usually didn’t have a stable job or were trustworthy, but they never raised a hand against us, some of them actually tried to help my mom and took care of us when she wasn’t home, and I think that some really loved her. But this one? He was a fine man. He had hair, and a job, and a house, and he married my mother as fast as he could. But he was as bad as her, because he saved her, but he also let her treat us like we were shit. When she had bad days, she always said that we were the reason why her previous relationships couldn’t work, why she didn’t have the life she wanted, why she didn’t have the love and admiration she deserved. This guy was the only one who understood her, so he also treated us like shit, like we were the reason for all my mom’s bad behavior.”
The wound stops bleeding, and Jeremy searches for some kind of antibacterial ointment in the botequim. He doesn’t realize that Michael is looking at him now- or he does, but he tries to not let that be a distraction. 

He doesn’t want to see compassion in Michael’s eyes- he already spent too many years like that, with people watching him and her sister and saying ‘poor little things, how can they live like this?’, but forgetting about them the moment they have something better to do. A problem they could fix. 

“That’s why you left?” Michaels asks, his voice barely a whisper. This time, he lets out a brief groan when Jeremy applies the ointment to the wound. 

“Yes. Well, that and the fact that they were two homophobic assholes. They didn’t want me around, and I wasn’t going to live as they wanted anymore,” Jeremy finishes with the ointments and starts to bandage Michael’s wound. “What I’m trying to say is that I spent my life listening for footsteps, learning when I could move and when I couldn’t and guessing if my mom had a good day or a bad day. I know how bad things can get, but I’m not naive. I’ve seen too much shit to have that luxury. So don’t mistake my kindness with ignorance. Don’t say that I’m ‘too good’ as if it’s a bad thing. I know how it feels to be so angry that you just want to hurt, destroy everything you have near you. And why wouldn't you? Justice is just an illusion, so if they are not going to suffer for what they’ve done, why can’t you make them suffer? Maybe, that way, they can understand how much they hurt you, how much they took from you,” Jeremy bites his lips. Michael once said that he had “bad years” when he was a teen, but he didn’t know that Jeremy had those too. Years full of problems that left him a record in his resume that made it difficult to get a scholarship or a job anywhere else other than fast food companies. “My parents were never good, but that doesn’t mean that there are people who aren’t. My sister, she’s good. She never lost contact with me, she called and came to visit and she’s now in collage because she’s smart as fuck and got a scholarship and she’s still calling every week. The boss is good. He got a cake for my birthday, one from a bakery, not the lame-ass cakes we have here, and is always checking on me and making sure that I’m eating well. Greg, one of my moms boyfriend, was good. He gifted me my walkman and always took me and Coraline to the public theater and tried to call social services on one occasion. He was so sad all the time, but he never yelled at us and tried as best as he could. My grandma was good, the time I spent in her house as a kid were the best moments I remember. And you, Michael,” Jeremy brushes his fingers against Michael’s. The bandage is ready, but he doesn’t want to let Michael go for now. “You’re good.”
“I’m not,” Michael immediately says. Jeremy can’t be saying this, not when he doesn’t know the truth, not when…

“You’re,” Jeremy assures him. Now he’s the one with the authoritarian tone. “It’s been four years since I’ve left that house, but it’s still difficult. The things they said are still craved in my mind, and even if I’m better now, I was lonely. My sister is living in the dorms, and I don’t have many friends. And then you came, you weirdo with that ugly as fuck truck that sat by my side in a lunch break, asked me if I knew Star Trek and when I said no started to give me a pitch about the show.”

Michael can feel his cheeks burning. It wasn’t exactly like Jeremy was telling, but then, Michael would tell the story in a different way. For him, Jeremy was the one who approached first, even if, in fact, their interactions were only small talk and a brief smile. But Michael wasn’t used to either of those things, and in his eyes, Jeremy was the one who took the first step to become friends. 

“That’s just being decent. Also, you can’t tell me I’m good and insult me at the same time.”
“I can. And it’s not only for the Star Trek thing-which, you know, I actually found adorable. You dislike Adam-”
“I kind of hate him.”
“You kind of hate Adam,” Jeremy corrected himself. “But it was your idea to clean the place when he made a mess so he wouldn’t get fired. You always helped the kids to get plushies from the machines and were the best at calming them. Don’t you remember that horrible kid that had to stay until his parents came back and you insisted in waiting with him, even if he was a gremlin and it wasn’t our shift anymore? And what about the fact that you’ve been here, for a month, surviving those things and trying to find a way to free the souls?”
“That’s not being good. That’s…” Michael doesn’t know how to explain. Those acts were the result of his culpability and his fears, a way to compensate for the past, not acts of kindness as his coworker described.

Jeremy’s hands reach for Michael’s face, brushing aside his hair, caressing the little scar on his chin, then his cheeks, like he’s trying to memorize his face forever. 

“My parents were never good, but I want to be. I want to be kind, even if they never taught me how to. So I’m more like the people I care about than I’ll ever be like them,” Jeremy presses his forehead against Michael’s and closes his eyes. It’s nice. It’s comfortable. “I know how monsters look, Michael Afton. And you’re not one of them.”

There are moments in life that, no matter how much time passes, you’ll remember them. This is one of those moments for Michael- an instant when he doesn’t know whether to laugh or cry, that makes him remember that he’s still alive, that he’s there, and he has a life beyond all this.

Or, at least, when he stares at Jeremy and his heart races so fast that he can’t keep ignoring the feeling, he wants to have one. 

He doesn’t like what Jeremy is doing to him. Until he came, Michael had accepted that he didn’t deserve a life. Then Jeremy, that stubborn, selfless idiot, came and hit him with the idea that, maybe, he deserves something more than this. Than scares and frights and nightmares.

And the worst thing is that Michael doesn’t actually hate it. The problem is that he likes it too much.

Michael had spent so many times surrounded by death that he’s surprised to remember that he’s, in fact, alive.

However, these kinds of moments are destined to be as short as they’re important. 

Unfortunately, Michael remembers where he is, what are they doing, and, instead of leaning closer to Jeremy, he whispers:

“The music box.”
Jeremy blinks, not understanding what he means at the beginning. Then, his brain comes back to reality, the fantasy of the moment disappears, and he panics. 

“The music box!” he repeats. 

They run out of the lounge and come back to the security office. They’re lucky enough to not find any animatronic, maybe Balloon Boy already told the others that they kicked him. 

Michael throws himself to the panel control, but before he could change the camera, the melody stops. 

Both night guards freeze at the lack of music. Michael’s palms start to sweat, but his body reacts before he can think and puts himself in front of Jeremy. If the Puppet is going to get someone, that will be him. 

But the Puppet never appears. 

“I can’t believe it worked,” Jeremy suddenly says. He lets out a brief, and for some reason, he’s smiling.

Michael frowns. 

“What did you do?”

“Only if you promise me you’re not going to get mad.”

That only makes Michael grumpier.

“What did you do Jeremy?”

“I put the Puppet’s box upside down.”

Michael doesn’t know how to respond to this. 

“You’re joking.”

“I’m not.”

“You’re joking.”

“I also put some rocks on top of the box.”

“You didn’t.”

Michael is sure that Jeremy is lying, because how is not going to? But the music isn’t playing, the Puppet doesn’t come, and Jeremy is biting his lip. 

Michael turns to the panel control and selects the camera of the Prize Counter. The alarm notice is on the screen, but there’s also the noise of something hitting a wall, and if Michael focuses, he can see the box slightly moving, without opening, and the rocks over it. 

It can’t be.

It…it can’t be.

He stares at Jeremy, dumbfounded. 

“Ok, listen, I didn’t think it was going to work, but maybe!! Maybe it could work as a last resource, or at least give us some minutes, but I never thought that…Michael?”

Michael’s lips are twitching. He tries to hold it at the beginning, covering his mouth and biting his lower lip, but it doesn’t work, and he bursts into laughter. 

Is the first time Jeremy sees him laugh like this, with his eyes closed and the hands over his stomach, his smile bright and full and his laugh loud. 

Michael’s laughter sends a tingle down his spine. His cheeks are burning, his heart stops beating and the corner of his lips tremble. In a matter of seconds, he finds himself laughing with Michael. 

Because is stupid. Is so stupid. Jeremy just stopped the Puppet turning the box upside down and with some rocks. And it worked. 

They’re in the middle of hell, fighting for their lives, but Michael hasn’t laughed like this in years. 

No one in Freddy’s has probably laughed like this in years. 

For a few seconds, it doesn’t look like a haunted place ruled by the shadows. They’re just two people that don’t know what they’re doing, but, against all the odds, found comfort and peace in each other.

They’re so focused on each other that they don’t realize that it’s been some time since an animatronic appeared- that, even if they are in the third night and things are supposed to be more difficult, it isn’t. At that moment, the shadows look weaker, and the threatening noises are drowned by their laughs, their relief. 

Freddy’s isn’t a normal place. Souls are trapped and twisted by the nightmares and the agony, and those creatures are in every wall, hearing, waiting, watching. 

But now, they’re seeing something they shouldn’t have. 

Something that reminds them who they’re. Who they used to be. 

“Until I met you, I forgot how easy it is to laugh,” Jeremy’s eyes crink in the corners, and Michael can’t lie to himself anymore. 

Oh. 

I’m in love with him. 

Chapter Text

Michael is dreaming.

He’s in a graveyard, with a shovel in his hand and three graves in front of him.

Charlie Emily. 

Elizabeth Afton.

Evan Afton. 

He stares at the third one.

You could say that this is not a dream- this is a nightmare, a screaming meemie. Any other person would call it that.

But not Michael.

He doesn’t have good dreams. Not since he was sixteen, and saw his brother get smashed  by the animatronic’s teeth. 

He digs the shovel in the mud, as he always does, and starts to dig his brother’s grave. What changes is that, this time, he doesn’t find Evan buried there. 

Jeremy is the one who lies under the ground, with his head open in half. 

“ Do not pretend that you didn’t know this was coming, ” a voice whispers behind him. A familiar voice. A terrific voice. A voice that makes Michael’s skin itch and his body tremble like he’s a kid alone in the night. “ Don’t be a fool, Michael. You created this- we created this ,” a hand over his shoulder. A shadow leaning over him, taking him back where he belongs. “ Why aren’t you proud of our work? We can put them back together. I can put you back together. I can fix you, like I did with the others. ”

The hand grip moves towards his neck, the fingers wrapping around with the threat of breaking it. 

And he fears that that’s not a nightmare, a screaming meemie, but a premonition. 

Michael wakes up in an empty bed, trembling and feeling like his body is trying to tear itself apart. His breath is harsh, he can’t feel his limbs, but at the same time he is terribly aware of the discomfort of his body.

Maybe it is the light of the sun, casting shadows all over his room; or the noise of the door, that make him come back to horrible memories of the pizzeria. He isn’t sure, but something is making him go mad.

He senses a hand over his shoulder, and Michael's first instinct is to throw it away. Who is touching him? No one should touch him. 

"Michael. Hey, Michael" the voice calls. “Michael…Michael you need to breathe.”
“I can’t. They’re here. They’re here. He’s going to come,” he repeats. He doesn’t feel safe in his own house, in his own room. “I can’t escape.” 

“No one is here. It's just us. We’re okay. Michael, please, look at me.”

Jeremy tries to touch him again, but remembering how Michael reacted, he retreats his hand at the last minute, leaving it a few inches away from his fingers. 

Michael is in a state of panic, but he moves his hand until two of his fingers brush Jeremy’s. It’s warm- not cold, it’s not made of metal.

Slowly, he raises his head, to find Jeremy’s worried look. 

“See? There’s only you and me here.”
“I thought that…I was sure that I saw him. I…I think I can’t trust my own head.”

“You were dreaming. Sometimes, when you wake up in a rush, your brain takes some bad images to the real world, because it’s not fully awake.”

It didn’t feel like sleep paralysis. Michael can still feel a pair of eyes in his neck, watching all his movements from a hiding spot, waiting for Michael to get his guard down.

“No. I know that he’s going to get out,” he insists. “He always does. He’s going to come back, and he’s going to find me.”

“Who?”
“My father.”
“He has been arrested, Michael. You told me yourself. He’s going to spend the rest of his life in jail.”
“He’s not. I know it. They can’t link him to the murders, they only have…” Michael stomps on his own words. “If he gets out, I’m the next.”

“Why? Why are you so sure?”
“Because I was the one who got him arrested,” Michael confesses. He still remembers the expression on his father's face when the police appeared in their house- how he immediately looked at Michael, because he knew, he knew that his own son had been the one to confess, even if Michael didn’t have all the clues. “I told the police that my father had been one of the owners, that he still had a copy of the keys, that the yellow bunny suit used to be his. I told them how he made me work at Fredbear’s Family Dinner and how he always asked me about birthdays, about the security protocols, about everything . So, if he gets out, he’s going to come after me.”

He says this like it’s common knowledge, like there’s nothing he can do to avoid that fate. His father is a monster, one he tried to ignore for too long, even if they lived under the same roof.

Michael thought that would be the best- live his life like his father was like any other father. Don’t interact with him more than necessary, don’t question things, and stay out of your house as much as you can. He didn’t have money to run away from home, his mother had left a year ago and his uncle Henry could barely look at him, because he looked too much like the man that destroyed his life.

He thought that he could survive. Follow those three rules, and everything would be fine. 

But…but…

“It’s my fault,” Michael says. He tries to sound as objectively as possible, but his voice breaks with those words. Even if this is a fact, something that he had known for years, it’s the first time that he’s able to say it out loud to another person. “He made me work a Fredbear’s Family Dinner for a reason, to have access to the building again,  he was always…fuck, I knew he made a copy of the keys, and I didn’t do anything . I thought I could ignore it, the same way I’ve been ignoring everything for years, because if it was true, then what?”

“It’s not your fault” Jeremy quickly answers. He takes Michael by the shoulders, and make him raise his head. “It isn’t. What your father did has nothing to do with you.”
“But it does.” Michael shuts his mouth, unable to bring himself to remember that day. What he thinks it was the start of everything, because the alternative is that his father had never been the person he knew, that he had been pretending all his life. “My siblings, Evan and Elizabeth. I told you about her. She died a year ago, during the gas leak in Baby’s Pizza World. A month after that, Charlie, my uncle’s daughter, also died. Well, she was actually murdered. They found her in an alley, with the Puppet at her side.”

Then, Jeremy understands. Or, at least, he starts to understand what Michael meant about ignoring everything, how his brain could distort the narrative until Michael saw himself as the culprit. That’s what trauma does- it changes reality to fit the lies the abusers tell. 

He also starts to understand how Michael got to his conclusions. During his monologue the second night, he had mentioned the Puppet, but the number of kids didn’t match with the number of animatronics. Now, it did. 

“I didn’t know what happened to her. They buried the real story and said that it had been a car accident, and they did something similar with Elizabeth, too, so no one would discover the truth. And I was so stupid that I believed it for a year. It makes sense now, why Henry helps me pay rent, but does everything he can to stay away from me.”

“Stop saying that. You’re not stupid, and you’re not the real culprit under all these atrocities. You were trying to survive . And you made it. God, I’m so glad you made it.”

Michael lets his head fall over Jeremy’s shoulder. 

Part of him wants to push Jeremy away, aware that he doesn’t deserve such a gentle touch from someone whose life he’s ruining.  

The other part remembers last night, how Jeremy had cuddled him, had laughed with him, and it’s horrible, because he feels so good between Jeremy’s arms that he isn’t able to let go. 

Jeremy brushes his hair, tangling the locks between his fingers. Michael can hear Jeremy’s heart, and the slow beat is calming him. 

“What time is it?” he asks. 

“Almost nine.”
So, they had only been sleeping for a couple of hours. 

“Did I wake you up?”

“I’m a light sleeper,” Jeremy dowplays the situation, but Michael knows it isn’t true. Jeremy is able to sleep no matter what. He had to be screaming a lot, if he got to wake him up.

“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t. I know how horrible nightmares can be.”

“We have a couple of hours before the alarm rings. You should try and sleep a bit more.”
“Only if you do the same.”

Jeremy caresses his hand one more time before getting up. Something takes control over Michael, and he grabs his friend by the wrist before he can leave.

“Michael…?”
“Can you stay?”

Jeremy bats his eyes at him, and his ears turn red in a matter of seconds, but he ends up nodding. 

Michael moves towards the wall to let him more space. What is he doing? What is he doing? He asked without thinking, and now he’s panicking like a fifteen year old with a crush. 

However, the panic wears down once Jeremy lies down by his side and brushes his fingers against his again. Jeremy’s body is always warm as a stove (he jokes that it’s precisely so he can be used as a stove by his friends), and Michael welcomes it, even if they’re in the middle of summer. 

He doesn’t remember the last time someone held him like he really cared about him.

But he likes the change.

That day, Jeremy wakes up with Michael snuggled against him. Michael’s head is resting over his shoulder, and his left arm is around his torso. His hair is a mess, with locks falling over his eyes, although, for once, he looks calm, instead of having his usual “i’m half dead” look. 

Jeremy has an hour and a half before his shift starts, so he closes his eyes, leans against Michael and enjoys the moment. No animatronics, no conspiracy theories, no nightmares. 

He could wake up like this for the rest of his life. 

A bit later, Michael opens his eyes, and Jeremy pretends that he had just woken up, too. 

At the beginning, Michael tilts his head and blinks, processing the situation. His sleepy face is adorable, and Jeremy restrains himself from kissing his cheek or making fun of him. 

The seconds pass, and Michael cheeks start to get red, and his eyes are wide open, remembering last night. 

At this point it’s too obvious that he has the biggest crush ever, and Michael is not stupid enough to not notice.

“I’m glad to see that you didn’t have another nightmare,” Jeremy says as a way to break the ice.

Michael’s face is red, and he’s still leaning over Jeremy’s chest, when he nods and says: “Thank you for staying.”

“Always.”
Then, Michael seems to grow aware of their situation- that his palm is still over Jeremy’s chest, that their face a few inches close and that, probably, if he doesn’t move in the next few seconds Jeremy is going to say ‘fuck it’ and kiss him.

So Michael gets up and says something about making breakfast and that Jeremy should take a shower before work.

Oh. This is pretty disappointing to be honest. 

Apparently, Michael is directly avoiding the situation. 

He’s not gonna lie, his heart is a bit broken, like that time a month ago, when they were sitting on the roof and he told Michael that he wanted the night shift. He had waited for his coworker, to say something more, to give him a bit of hope that, maybe, he wasn’t delusional and Michael felt the same way. 

Jeremy looks at the ceiling, blinks, and covers his head with the pillow. 

After a little panic moment, he decides to take a shower to calm himself down. 

When he gets out, already in his security uniform, Michael is sitting at the table, the breakfast ready. He’s reading one of the documents from the boxes. 

“Whatcha you doin’?” Jeremy asks. He jumps to the chair and Michael gives him his morning coffee. He thought the situation could be uncomfortable after, literally, sleeping together, but it’s not. “I thought you already read all the files of the Toy and original animatronics like, five times.”

“These are different,” Michael shows him the front page, and Jeremy reads ‘FUNTIME ANIMATRONICS PROJECT’, but he has no idea what that means. Also, most of the text is covered by dark lines. “Do you remember that they told us that Freddy’s has some type of animatronic rental?”
“You should know by now that I didn’t pay attention to the information tapes, love,” Jeremy says. Is his usual tone, their usual banter, but when Michael hears the nickname his face gets a bit red. Oh?

“But do you remember the gas leak that happened one year ago?”
“Your father’s solitary project, right? He lost a lot of money, and that’s why Mr. Emily tried to take his part of the company.”

“That’s the official version,” Michael explains. He had been eighteen at that time, enough to know that something was happening, but too far from the truth to understand. Elizabeth had died during that incident, and Charlie died a bit after. He was still grieving his brother, worrying about his mother leaving and not taking him with her, he hadn’t stopped to think that maybe there was something more. “All the animatronics from Baby’s Pizza World are now there. He spent hours in that place. I think that, if there’s a clue about what he did, or what really happened, it has to be there.”

“Good, I was starting to get bored of fighting the same animatronics everyday. This way, we can spice things up a bit,” Jeremy jokes. Michael glares at him. “Oh, don’t give me that , love. You know I’m going and there’s nothing you can’t do to stop me.”
“I can chain you to a wall.”

“I’d rather you chain me to the bed.”
…

…Jeremy didn’t mean to say that. He really, really , didn’t mean to say that .

But oh God.

He had said it out loud, hasn’t he?

He fucked up, but it wasn’t his fault! Michael was giving him the softest of looks since they woke up and he looks so relaxed in his pajamas and bed hair that Jeremy wasn’t thinking straight! Not like he ever thinks straight but that’s not the point!

“When are we going?” he decides to change the subject. 

“Maybe tomorrow. I think there’s a copy of the keys somewhere in this box, but I still have to find them.”
“Fine. Perfect. So, I’ll see you at midnight.”

“Your lunch,” Michael reminds him.

There’s a lunch box over the table of the front door, waiting for Jeremy. 

Oh, fuck it. 

Jeremy is a weak man tired of pretending that he wouldn’t fight all the animatronics in the world for Michael Afton. 

Because he would. 

He takes a step forward Michael to grab his lunch, but when he’s near enough, he holds Michael by the wrist and pushes his friend towards him. 

Michael loses a bit of balance, but he’s now a few inches from him, and Jeremy takes this opportunity to kiss him on the cheek.

The excitement for finally making a move is fighting his anxiety for what Michael's reaction would be, but he doesn’t let the former ruin the moment. He might not be brave to try something more, but this is a good first step.

Besides, seeing Michael’s confused red face is enough to give him the burst of confidence he needs of the day.

“Thank you!” he says, his voice so high that is embarrassing.

He runs towards the door as fast as he can, leaving a disoriented and lost Michael behind.

If tonight he has to sleep under a bridge…well, it was worth it!

Jeremy really, really needs to stop falling asleep in the pizzeria.

This time, he doesn’t appear in the security office, but in Kid’s Cove. He can see the Game Area from here, and the Toy Animatronics of Chica, Bonnie and Freddy are on the stage, singing the same song they sing when there’s a birthday party. The Mangle is on her corner, ready for the kids to come and break her over and over again. 

If not for the lack of light and the faint sounds of a kid crying, one could think this was the pizzeria a few minutes before opening hours. 

“ You shouldn’t be here. ”
The ghost of the Puppet is sitting over her box. Knowing her name, who she is, only makes the situation worse.

“I have a bad habit of being where I shouldn’t,” Jeremy answers. Charlie tilts her head, like she’s confused why he would try to joke in a moment like that. She has a point- Jeremy should probably be more scared than he is. Someone once said that, if you understand how horror works and the logic behind what’s going on, the situation turns from scary to sorrowful. Maybe that’s what he’s experiencing. “Why can't I remember these dreams?”

“ What’s the point of you remembering if you’re not going to change anything? ” Charlie asks back. She doesn’t sound like a kid- her voice is that of a little girl, but her tone is too serious.

“How am I going to change anything if I don’t remember vital information?” 

Charlie is even more confused by that answer.

Jeremy decides to change his strategy to approach her.

“I’m sorry that I locked you in there last night.”

Charlie lowers her head, like the floor is the most interesting thing ever.

“ You’re supposed to be scared. To run away, ” she explains. She plays with her green bracelet, nervous. “ I can’t let you get near them, I have to be their protector, but no matter what I do, you two keep coming. And you…you laughed. Last night ,” she says it in a quiet, lost voice. “ You two don’t make sense .”

“I agree with you, we really don’t,” Jeremy chuckles. Charlie’s attention comes back to him, attracted by the soft laugh. “Although, part of it has an explanation. I don’t want Michael to die, and I can’t leave now that I know what happened to you. Not until we discover how to help.”

“Michael… He looks a lot like his father. Too much. I’m not scared of him, but the others are, and I can’t stop them.”

“Is there a way to be on their good sides?”
“ Last night they remembered something they shouldn’t. Some of them don’t remember who they are, and others let the worst memories take control of them ,” Jeremy doesn’t need to hear the name to know that she’s talking about Cassidy. “ To remember that life, to remember the good things…maybe that’s the trick. ”

Jeremy walks towards the Prize Corner and offers her his hand to help her get down from the box. He doesn’t know if Charlie is going to take it- she’s giving him a puzzled look that he doesn’t know how to interpret. 

After what seems like hours, she takes it.

“You’re a smart and brave girl, do you know it?”

Jeremy tries to give her his best smile. Charlie is shocked, probably it’s been too long since someone complimented her. To Jeremy’s surprise, she gives him a little smile in return. 

“We’ll find a way to free you, I promise.”

Jeremy is going to keep looking for a way to get out of the dreamscape, when Charlie grabs his hand.

“ You need to know something. You and Michael. There’s one more thing, the reason why all this is happening. There’s someone hiding in here-”
Charlie’s words are cut by a scream that pierces both of their ears. When Jeremy opens his eyes again, she’s gone, and he’s no longer in Prize Corner, but in a maze of halls. 

Golden Freddy it’s at the end, the suit as withered as the last time.

“ I told you you’re not welcome here, ” Cassidy’s furious voice rings in his ears. 

The crying is louder here than in the Game Area, and Jeremy decides to follow it.

He runs around the pizzeria with the flashlight flickering in his hand. Every corner he turns around, he sees one of the old animatronics sitting against the wall, their limbs fallen over their bodies like puppets with no strings. 

But the worst part isn’t the dead looking suits, the sobs full of desperation and fear that fill the pizzeria or the lack of light that makes the shadows bigger and more threatening. 

The worst part is that, the moment Jeremy blinks, the animatronics are exchanged for a kid with empty eyes staring at him.

Is it true that they don’t remember? Who they are, what they used to be? 

He ends up in front of the doors of Parts & Service, and he opens it. 

In a corner, instead of the shadow version of Freddy, there’s a little kid embracing himself. He’s crying in the dark, like he’s trying to hide from the world. 

He makes a quick recap in his brain while remembering the board in Michael’s apartment.

Suzie. Chica.

Jeremy. Bonnie. 

Fritz. Foxy.

Gabriel. Freddy. 

Cassidy. Golden Freddy.

And then, despite himself, he adds:

Charlie. The Puppet.

Elizabeth. Unidentified- probably something in Circus Baby Entertainment & Rental.

There are no more animatronics.  

No more spirits that could possess one of the suits. 

Who is this child? What is he doing here?

Jeremy tries to take a better look at the kid, but the moment he notices someone else in the room, he disappears, like a character in a videogame that is not supposed to be there.

But Jeremy is not alone. The door behind him disappears, and now there’s two doors, one at his left and the other at his right. 

He can hear noises behind those doors- footsteps and breathings that make him wonder what’s at the other side. 

What is trying to catch him.

The terror is, bit by bit, taking control over his body, forcing arms to tremble, his breath to stop, his mind to panic. 

The light is the only thing keeping him sane, so he tightens the grip over his lantern to make sure that he’s not going to drop it. 

“Who are you?”

He doesn’t know where he gets the courage to ask. He’s fighting the urge to run away and never come back, but he has to stay.

He promised Michael and Charlie he was going to stay. 

“ I’m a fearful reflection of what they created, ” the voice answers behind him. It’s too metallic, too artificial, but the spite and resentment that Jeremy hears in it are real and human. “ A nightmare they wouldn’t be able to wake up from. ”

“Who are ‘they’?” Jeremy asks. A chill runs down his spine when he feels something behind him. He swallows, before asking. “William Afton?”

The moment he says the name, Jeremy realizes it was a mistake. 

The entity is not furious like Cassidy. 

Instead, it’s silent, to the point that Jeremy doesn’t know if it’s behind him or if it has moved to another corner of the room, and he’s too afraid to discover it by himself. 

Cassidy is rage and fury, the personification of the kind of vengeance that is painted with blood. 

But this entity is cold. Is smart. Is something able to wait in shadows and play with its victims in a calculated way to infuse them with terror. 

It’s a nightmare. 

“ Get out of this place before you forget how to wake up .”

This time, what wakes Jeremy up is not Michael, but the phone ringing in his ear. It’s so loud that, for a moment, he fears that one of the animatronics had entered the office and was playing his irritating music before killing him. 

“Hello? Hello?”

“Hi boss, Jeremy speaking,” he answers, rubbing his eyes. He has to stop sleeping in the office. Is not only bad for his back and neck, but he also wakes up with a headache and the feeling that he’s forgetting something important. “Do you have news about the change of shift?”

“Uh, that’s why I’m calling. You see, I talked to the owner, and he was…very persistent about having just one night guard.” 

Jeremy isn’t surprised. If Mr. Emily knows about the animatronics, it’s only normal that he doesn’t want anyone else involved. Well, the normal thing would be closing the place down, but he guesses that guilt and regret are stronger than common sense, in this case. 

“Is there a possibility that I talk to the owner?” Jeremy asks. Maybe, if he explains to Mr. Emily the situation, he would change his mind. He can’t keep the two shifts things for much longer. He’s been doing it for three days and he’s never been more tired in his life. And he’s doing it for free!

“That…um, is not a good idea. I mean, his number is somewhere around the office, if there’s an emergency- which, to be honest, is kind of ridiculous. There should be no reason to call him,” bullshit. Jeremy asks himself how his boss got so brainwashed by this company. Maybe that’s the result of the instruction tapes? He’s so glad he didn’t pay attention to those things. “But Mr. Emily has a lot on his plate right now, and well, he hasn’t been the most talkative person since…”

“Since when?” 

“You know…there are some rumors…about his divorce,” oh, this is new information. He’s so glad his boss is a gossip.

“I didn’t know he was married,” it’s not a lie, per se. He knows he had a daughter, but he doesn’t know if he married the woman.

“Yeah, his wife, uh…nice lady, but she left him like…three, four years ago? It crushed him. Took the son with him…man, I think that’s what broke him…”
“Wait,” Jeremy straightens his back, his eyes finally clear of the tiredness. “The wife took his son with her?”

“I-I’m not sure. I only know about what I heard, I…I was working in Fredbear’s Family Dinner at that time, and I remember seeing him with two kids…a girl and a boy, twins I think. Now, I don’t know the names. Uh, hey, maybe my memory is failing me, so don’t take it as a fact. So, scratch that. It has nothing to do with this. Just…don’t call him.”
“No, wait, boss, you were working in Fredbear’s in 1983? Then, can you tell me-”
“I have to go. I’ll leave you to it. See you on the flip side!”

And with that, he hung up. 

Jeremy groans. Why could no one give him full information about what is going on!!?? It’s really so difficult!!??

If the boss really knows something about Charlie…

Wait.

Jeremy raises his head. 

He remembers. 

Not everything, the last part of his dream is still blurry, but he remembers the beginning.

He remembers Charlie, and what she told him.

Jeremy dials Michael’s number and waits.

Michael is in his home, looking at the board, when the phone rings.

“Hello?”

“Hey, Michael,” he hears Jeremy’s voice at the other side. He sounds nervous. “We need to talk.”

Michael is glad that this is a phone call so Jeremy can’t see how messed up he’s by those four words. He’s trying really hard to run away from his feelings, could Jeremy lend him a hand instead of making him lose his composure and forget how breathing works? It would be lovely, thank you very much.

“About what?” he manages to ask in a nonchalant tone, like he doesn’t know exactly what Jeremy means.

“I had another dream. And before you reprimand me for falling asleep again, let me explain, because this is way too important. In my dream, I talked to Charlie. Not the Puppet. Charlie.”

It’s amazing how quickly Michael can go from a normal twenty year old in love to a twenty year old tormented by his past that tries really hard not to feel a thing, good or bad. 

He loses a bit of composure, and has to sit down on his couch.

“That’s not possible.”

“It is. Michael, I know it sounds crazy, but it’s not as weird as the other twenty things that are going on right now.”

Jeremy makes a good point, but Michael can’t believe it. The words are stuck in his throat and are strangling him. 

He had tried to lock his memories with Charlie in the back of his mind, but now they’re coming back stronger. 

Charlie and Elizabeth having a princess party in their house, unaware of the monster on the other side of the walls.

They would put on makeup with lots of glitter and puffy dresses from halloween costumes. Elizabeth was usually the one behind all that, Charlie wasn’t as much of a fan of princesses, but she would always complain, raising her pinky finger while drinking imaginary tea.

In summer, they would go to the forest of the city and create a map of the place, marking every important spot like the lake or the fort that Michael helped them to build, and make a route to go from their house to Charlie’s house.

Michael’s look at Charlie’s photo on the board, the one near the date of her death, just a month after Elizabeth. 

“How…how is that possible?”

“I think it is because of the dreams. She told me that the other kids can’t remember what happened to them, Cassidy being the only exception. But there are some things that can help them remember and get out of the ‘killer - mode’.”

“Foxy,” Michael suddenly remembers. “You said that Foxy didn’t attack you. Are you sure?”

“Pretty much. He stayed there for a while, but he seemed more interested in my walkman. Speaking of which, you’re glad I’ve got it back and it’s in a good state, or I would have burned this place down.”
“I wouldn’t have stopped you.”

“That’s the most beautiful thing someone had said to me,” Jeremy smiles, and he notices too late that his voice isn’t using the ‘we’re friends’ tone and rather the ‘i’m flirting with you please notice my attempts’ tone. He has to stop before he says something stupid like ‘ if you keep being so sweet to me I’m going to think that you’re in love with me or something ’.

Michael also notices the change of tone, but coughs to bring his friend back to the topic and ignores the situation. Again.

“Why do you sound like you have a crazy plan that is going to get us killed?”
“Because you’re going to make an equally crazy plan but that will help us survive.”

Michael frowns. He doesn’t like the light tone in Jeremy’s voice, not when he’s talking about his surviving.

“Jeremy, I don’t think you notice, but if you die because of this, I’ll be the one burning that place to the ground,” maybe this is a bit too much, but it’s also the honest truth. He wants to correct his father’s mistakes, but not in exchange of Jeremy’s life. 

“They’re just kids,” Jeremy says after some time. They’re aware of this fact, they had been aware of it during all these nights, but Jeremy had been so busy trying to not think about it that he never stopped to consider how horrible the situation really is. “They’re possessing those animatronics, and they’re angry and mad and…scared. I think they’re scared, Michael. Truly, horribly scared.”

And suddenly, Michael is in 1983, he’s sixteen again, he’s wearing the Foxy mask, and he’s laughing watching his brother get scared of the animatronics and cry for help. Until he puts Evan too close, his tiny head between Fredbear’s teeth, and the animatronic makes a horrible noise when he bites down, a sound that drowns his laughter and his little brother’s cries.

He has the bite of 83 marked on the board, at the beginning of the timeline, but lucky for him, Evan didn’t die in the pizzeria, but in the hospital, too far away from that place to catch his soul. 

At least, that’s what he likes to think. That the incident was the reason why his father’s mask, the one he tried to build during those years, started to crack, releasing his true nature. 

He thinks about those five kids, probably as scared as his brother, trapped in the place where they died, with no good memories that help them pass the time or give them some comfort. 

“What’s the plan?”

This is a bad idea. Michael knows is a bad idea, but fuck, he can’t keep going to that place, survive the night and read the blueprints like nothing. 

“Wait, seriously?”
“As much as I think we have a 90% chance of dying, I’m on board. That doesn’t mean that we’re not taking some precautions,” Michael quickly adds. He’s not willing to get another scar from Foxy. “We’re not leaving the security office until we’re sure that they’re not attacking. Neither of us is dying.”

He can’t see Jeremy, but knows his friend is smiling.

“Come to Freddy’s at least an hour before your shift. I’ll need you to bring some things,” Michael takes notes in the corner of the paper. He has two hours before going to the pizzeria. Jeremy tells him what his plan is, and Michael adds some notes and information about the building, the animatronics and how they work to make sure that their plan is as safe as possible. “Oh, and Michael? I would also burn every Fazbear Entertainment establishment to the ground, if you died. Not only for my walkman.”
Fuck. That’s the most romantic thing someone has ever said to him.

That’s concerning. 

“I’ll see you in a couple of hours,” Michael hangs up, before Jeremy could notice how fucked up that statement had left him. 

Michael is so sure that this is going to fail that he puts the Freddy costume over his head the moment the clock reaches midnight. 

At his side, Jeremy does the same thing, but before he winks and gives him a confident smile. 

Michael is glad that he has this head over his face. 

“Do you see any movement?” Jeremy asks, snapping him out of his mind.

Michael, who was pretending to check the cameras, reprimands himself. This is how you get killed in these places, by letting your mind wander around instead of doing your fucking job. He can’t allow himself to be distracted. 

‘ Keep it together, Michael ’, he tells himself. He inhales, pushes all his feelings and worries to the darkest corner of his mind and starts to work. 

“The toy animatronics are on the stage. Balloon Boy has already left his position...”
“Fucker.”

“...and Bonnie is in the Main Hall. He’s not moving, but he’s probably going to enter Party Room 1 soon.”

“Or maybe not,” Jeremy hopes. Michael doesn’t want to disappoint him, so he keeps his mouth shut. 

It only takes a couple of minutes to know the answer. 

The animatronics, at least the old ones, are in the Game Area, watching the cake and the globes like is something new. Technically, it is: it’s still the usual decorations of the pizzeria, but Jeremy and Michael had gone an extra mile to make it look like the biggest birthday party ever. Michael had made the cake that evening, in part because he needed to do something while he was thinking, and he had run out of empty pages in his sketchbook.

In addition to that, Jeremy had filled the room with streamers, changed the same five songs that were always playing between performances with new music (right now, the song playing is Baby I love you because hey, it worked the first time!) and he had even put a blanket over one of the walls and made the projector work again. 

Now, the game area looks like a birthday party perfect for a kid. 

“I can’t believe this,” Michael is out of words. This doesn’t mean that they’re out of trouble, but this is only the first step of their plan.

The second is the real deal. 

“What did you bring?” Jeremy asks. Michael gives him a copy of The Goonies. “Seriously?”
“It’s a kids movie, I thought they would like it. Also, Charlie wanted to see it.”

When Charlie and Elizabeth watched the trailer of The Goonies, they were like crazy, because they also loved going around places they shouldn’t to see what they could find. But Elizabeth died before the film got to the cinema of their city, and without her, Charlie didn’t want to see it. 

“Then it’s perfect,” Jeremy says. He takes the film and puts it in the videocassette. 

The film starts to play on the wall.

The animatronics seem confused about what’s going on, but the film catches their attention enough that they don’t move to other areas or look at the cameras in a threatening way.

One by one, they sit on the floor to watch the movie, the same way kids would do.

The third step is the most risky, because it requires them to let the Puppet out.

The song of the music box keeps playing, and playing, everytime quicker and louder, until it stops. 

They hold their breath, his eyes going from the hall in front of them and the security cameras that show the box. 

Jeremy, unable to calm down, takes Michael’s hand and interwinds their fingers together. His friend gives him a side eye, but doesn’t mention it. 

They can only wait, and hope that this wasn’t a mistake.

Suddenly, the security cameras glitch.

The Puppet box is open, and the animatronic is no longer in Prize Corner. She’s in the Game Area, sitting with the rest, watching the film.

They can’t believe it.

Jeremy raises his free hand in celebration.

“I told you this was a two game situation! High five!”
Michael rolls his eyes, but this time, he high fives Jeremy. Then, he looks at the screen, and a soft smile is drawn on his face.

“I hope you enjoy the film, Charlie.”

It’s 5:00 A.M, they’re sitting in the security office eating cake and, instead of trying to kill them, the animatronics are now watching The Princess Bride.

Michael is speechless, to say the least. 

“You’ve been obsessively looking at the cameras for almost half an hour,” Jeremy points out. 

“Excuse me if I’m still a bit preoccupied with all this. Maybe I’m worrying too much, but we hadn’t seen Golden Freddy all night. He hadn’t even appeared in the cameras. I don’t like it. Didn’t you see him in your dream?”
“I told you I don’t remember everything. I think that Charlie let me stay with the memories of her, but she was…she said that there’s something hiding here. She probably didn’t mean it as a physical presence, but whatever she alluded to, maybe it has as much power as her or Cassidy.”

Michael doesn’t know how to react to that. The fact that there’s something else that they don’t know about is making him go crazy. 

He doesn’t want to think anymore. If he tries to put together one more clue, his head is going to explode. 

“I need to ask you something,” Jeremy suddenly says. He finishes the cake and leaves the empty plate over the table. “You see, the boss called today. Mr. Emily doesn’t want me working the night shift, shocking news- but he told me something interesting. And please don’t tell him I told you, and I understand if you don’t want to talk about it, but…did Mr. Emily have two kids?”

Michael lets out a breath he didn’t know he was holding. He was expecting something worse, but this isn’t so bad. 

“Yes, he did, Charlie and Sammy.  After the bite of 83, Henry’s wife, Sara, decided to move to Montana. It was a pretty messy divorce, and at the end, they hated each other, to the point that they decided that Charlie would stay with Henry, and Sammy with her. I hadn’t seen him in years, though.”

“Do you miss him?” 

“I don’t really remember him that much. Lots of things happened that year. I didn’t like to see Charlie down, but now I’m so glad they moved so far away that my father couldn’t ruin their lifes too. Sammy can have a good life, so I can’t be sad about not seeing him again.”

Jeremy nods. He thought that maybe there was something more about Sammy, but he’s relieved to be wrong. 

“Does he know about his sister?”

“I’m not sure. I didn’t go to Charlie’s funeral. It’s stupid- I didn’t know at that time that my father was the one who killed…” Michael is unable to say it. Not because of his father, but because he can’t understand how someone could do something like this, approach the daughter of your best friend, the kid you know since she was a baby, and murder her. “I didn’t know, but with my father getting expelled from the company, I feel like it was wrong to be there.”

Michael’s plate trembles in his hands, and he lets it above the table. 

“I can’t blame Charlie if she saw us as a menace. If she saw me as a menace. But it’s unfair,” he says. The cameras show the animatronic sitting on the floor. The screen flickers, and for an instant, instead of big machines, Michael sees five kids. “They are just kids. Charlie, she’s only eleven. She would be twelve by now. She shouldn’t be the one trying to protect them from us. She shouldn’t be so afraid of her friends getting hurt that she’s ready to kill any adult who gets close. She is the one who needs protection, but we failed her. And now she’s trapped in here, and it’s so unfair.”

“She’s having fun now,” Jeremy reminds him. He moves his chair until he’s at his side, his shoulders barely touching. “I don’t know what’s going to happen tomorrow, but she’s having fun now. She’s being a kid. Thanks to you.”

Michael looks again to the cameras, at the kids watching the movie. It's not much, but it’s a start. It’s a first step, and he’s surprised to discover that, for once, the future doesn’t look so obscure. Maybe, they can do it, they can put a stop to all this.

“This is thanks to you. You were the one who suggested this. Without you, this wouldn't have happened.”

“Without you, I wouldn’t have survived the first night,” Jeremy points out. He touches Michael’s forehead with his finger, and smiles. It’s a smile so bright that all the shadows disappear, that it transforms the pizzeria into something new, something where maybe, good things can happen too. “Not to mention that you were the one who stopped your father. No matter what happens, you’re so fucking stubborn that you keep going. It’s like you don’t know what defeat means. I’m sure that not even death could stop you,” Jeremy reaches to Michael’s chest and puts his hand over his heart. If he can sense how hard it is beating, he doesn’t comment on it. “I said it the first night, and I repeat it now. This is too much for one person, a game for two players. And no matter how hard you try, Michael, you’re not getting rid of me.”

Michael can’t keep lying. Now that his mind isn’t obsessed with imminent death, he can’t run away anymore.

He’s not sure if he wants to run away. 

Michael grabs Jeremy by the collar of the uniform and brings him close enough to press his mouth against Jeremy’s. 

It’s not franatic, or at least it doesn’t start that way. Michael is too afraid of making a wrong move to try something more than a mere kiss.

Until Jeremy inhales sharply through his nose, and he quickly responds by pulling Michael even closer, to the point that the only thing between them are the hand rests of the chairs. Jeremy has been waiting for this for at least three months, and now that is finally happening, he’s not going to let a fucking chair keep him an inch away from Michael.

“This is getting in the way,” he complains, then moves to sit in Michael’s lap before continuing the kiss.

They don’t know if Freddy’s chairs are strong enough to hold two people making out, but they’re not going to let that stop them.

Michael’s fingers are still in Jeremy’s shirt, holding on so tightly that he fears he’s going to rip the fabric, but then Jeremy’s tongue strokes against his and he can’t care less about Freddy’s security uniform or any other thing that isn’t Jeremy. 

It’s intoxicating, how close you can be to a person and still need more. Jeremy’s right hand is tangled around his hair, while the other is on his shoulder to steady himself. 

Michael could stay like this forever. An animatronic could come and kill him and he would die happy. 

That’s why he doesn’t expect that, of the two of them, Jeremy is the one who breaks apart first.

“Wait, we can’t,” he says. His cheeks are burning and his lips are red and Michael wants to kiss him again. “It’s not because I don’t want to, believe me. Some days ago my plan was to fuck you in the lounge’s couch. But now that I know that the animatronics are possessed by kids we can’t risk being caught. Like, what if they see something they shouldn’t? They’re like, ten or something.”

“That is really your only concern? Not the fact they could’ve murder us?”
“A man has his priorities, Michael.”

This is unbelievable. 

“Then get out of my lap.”

Jeremy chuckles at his displeasure and gives him a quick kiss to calm him down.

“Don’t give me that face, love. In an hour, I’m all yours.”
Michael never wanted so bad for a shift to end. 

Hours later, the moment they get through the door of his house, Michael presses Jeremy against the wall and kisses him again.

This time, there’s nothing stopping them.

The phone rings, and Michael considers getting up just to throw it against a wall. 

At his side, Jeremy is sleeping with his mouth open, unaware of the sound. He really could sleep through a hurricane. 

Michael brushes aside one of Jeremy’s locks, a happy stupid smile all over his face. He wants to ignore the phone, but the only person who could call him is Henry, and if Henry calls, then it’s usually something important. 

Now that Jeremy is probably going to stay in the apartment. At least, Michael hopes that his now boyfriend (he still can’t believe that) is going to stay there.

So he kisses Jeremy in the forehead and gets up. But before, he has to search for a pair of pants, because he’s not answering the phone naked.

When he’s more properly dressed, he leaves the room and goes answer the phone, rubbing his eyes. He hopes this is a quick conversation.

“Hello?” 

Usually, Henry answers immediately with a ‘I’m sorry to bother you, Michael’.

But there’s no answer. The person at the other side of the line is silent, and that’s all that Michael needs to know who is calling.

He has to hang up. He has to hang up. He has to hang up!

But he doesn’t. 

He waits, hearing the breath at the other side, until he hears the voice that he hoped to never hear again.

“Hello, son.”

Chapter Text

Michael is unable to answer his father.  He’s still hoping that this is a nightmare, a bad dream, and he’s going to wake up any minute to discover that he’s still in bed, hugging Jeremy. 

But William Afton keeps talking, and with every word, reality starts to kick in.

“What? Aren’t you going to say hello to your old man? I thought I raised you better than that.”

“How? How did you get out?” is the question that comes to mind. 

“Do you really think that a bunch of insubstantial evidence and your bonkers testimony was enough to keep me in jail?” William doesn’t laugh, but Michael can imagine his smile- that bloody smile that means that he was prepared, that he was one step ahead. “No bodies. No witnesses. No crime weapon. I was always going to get out.”
And that was Michael’s mistake. He tried to play his father, to betray him, and lock him away forever, but William is smarter than him and he has money to hire the best lawyer around and bribe a couple of cops. 

At the end, the only thing Michael had won with his confession was a month of peace, before the storm came back to end him. 

Michael takes the bus and sits in the back, waiting for his stop. He decided to take public transport for one single reason: it’s cheaper. 

He loves his car, but Jeremy is right in one thing: is too big, something that he adores with all his heart, but man, it eats the gasoline as fast as he eats pancakes. 

The worst part of not driving is that he now has one hour to think, and, as you probably know by now, Michael hated to be alone with his thoughts.

“I guess you’re asking yourself why I’m calling you,” his father continues, like he didn’t just basically admit that he, in fact, committed all those crimes. 

Something that Michael already knows, but damn. Hearing your own dad talk so easy about how he got absolved for something he did was shocking in a way he wasn’t expecting. 

“I think the answer is pretty obvious,” Michael answers with a dry mouth.

William Afton never was the best father or husband, but Michael grew up believing that, even if he was a bit cold sometimes, he loved them the same way a father should love their children.

That reality is now shaking and cracking in a million pieces. Michael realizes that this the first genuine conversation he has ever had with his father, one where William doesn’t hide his true nature. 

“Wrong again. I’m not calling to give you a warning, or some other intimidation tactic that your sorry little head thought about. I’m calling because I know what you’re looking for, and I’ll tell you exactly where to find it.”

Michael rests his head against the window and tries to fill his mind with nothingness. Listen to the conversations around him. Watch the landscape. Play with the lonely coin that he has in one of his pockets. 

Anything except thinking about Jeremy. About what he is about to do. About how stupid he is. 

The phone almost drops from Michael’s hand. With just that, William had completely taken over the conversation, and now he has Michael on the palm of his hand.

“I noticed that there were some boxes missing when I came back home. I guess you took them and, being my son, I know curiosity took the best of you. What a disappointment that the files are not complete, right? Especially the ones about the funtimes animatronics.”

The bus stops, and after an hour of traveling, Michael is finally here. There’s enough advertisements around the city to find the place, and he only stops to eat a sandwich in a local cafeteria and ask the waitress for some directions. 

“You’re on the right track hon’, just keep walking for fifteen minutes until you reach the limits of the town,” she explains. She also tells him that, without a car, it could be a bit difficult to reach, but Michael doesn’t mind walking. The waitress shrugs her shoulders, like she’s saying ‘kids these days..’. “Are you the new security guard?” Michael makes a quick decision and nods in agreement. “Hope you have a better time than the last one. Man, the animatronics of that place are creepy. My kids love the ones in Freddy’s, do you know about that place? We go at least once per week…”
She keeps talking about her kids and how they’re afraid of the Funtime Animatronics, about how big and threatening they look and how now her little Jimmy has nightmares.

Great. Just what Michael needed.

He orders a piece of cake for dessert, and when he’s full and ready to face the horrors he leaves a generous tip and keeps walking.

“What the fuck did you do to Elizabeth?” Michael suddenly burst out. He should calm himself down, ask the questions in order, or at least try to pretend that he’s not so worked up by his father’s words. But he can’t. He has completely lost perspective, and he has become again the fifteen year old after the death of his brother- confused and angry and lost at his father’s mercy.

“Why don’t you go to Circus Baby’s and discover it yourself?” 

The waitress was right, it’s a bit tricky to get to the building walking, basically because there’s barely any pedestrian path. 

But he makes it with no major problem, and he’s now in front of Circus Baby’s Entertainment & Rental. 

“I’ll let the back door open for you,” William gives him the instructions. “That’s the workers entrance, so you won’t have problems finding it. I’ll make sure that the outside cameras are off, too. You only have to enter, go to the elevator, and get to the control module. From there, go to the left, to the Funtime auditorium, and turn right to get to my office. The answers you’re looking for are there.”

“What’s the catch?”

“Nothing. You just have to do one thing: get in, and get out.”

“That’s two things.”

Michael knows this is a trap, but he opens the door anyway. 

As his father had said, it is unlocked, and in the hall near the door there’s a wardrobe with the security uniforms and a flashlight. He takes the former, leaving behind the purple shirts and vests. 

The elevator is working, the panel of buttons that’s usually behind a security glass unlocked, so he can use it. 

This is a trap that isn’t even trying to hide his malevolent nature. 

“What are you getting out of this?” Michael asks. He raises his voice a bit. He doesn’t remember Jeremy is sleeping in the bedroom. The happiness he felt last night when they finally kissed. The light sense of joy and purpose when he saw Charlie sitting with the rest of the kids, watching the movie. A night without scarejumps, without running from his life, without screaming meemies. “If you want to kill me, wouldn’t it be more satisfying if I don’t discover anything? If you make sure that everything that I have been doing this past month means nothing?”

“It surprised me too,” William says. “At first, what got me through jail was imagining how I would kill you. Oh, Michael, I had so many ideas…” Michael has a knot in his stomach. This is twisted. Why isn’t he hanging up? What’s so wrong with him that he’s listening to his father talk about killing him like this is normal? “But then, it occurred to me: if he’s so obsessed with fixing ‘kids’, to the point that he would rather shut up about the bodies than tell the police and condemn me to a life or prison, maybe he’s not as damaged as I thought. Maybe, if he knows the truth, he will finally understand what I’m trying to do.”

“You’re mistaken. I don’t know where the bodies are. If I knew, I assure you you would be in jail.”
“That’s it? That’s the lie you tell yourself?” William laughs. “Michael, Michael. You know where those bodies are. The police may be naive enough to not think about it, but not you. You know exactly where I put them.”

He guesses that, in the most twisted part of his mind, he knew, the same way he knew that something was wrong with his father before the missing children incident, or that something was off with Elizabeth and Charlie’s deaths. But he had done what he does best: silence that part of his mind and keep going, because if he let those kinds of thoughts go loose in his head he could never close that door again. 

Michael calls the elevator and waits. It’s late enough that any other employee has left the building some hours ago. 

He’s alone. He misses having someone by his side, a cheery and obnoxious presence able to smile in the middle of hell, and make him smile in return. 

He had underestimated how difficult it is to keep hope when you’re alone in the middle of the dark.

“I have a question for you,” William changes the subject before can answer. “Something that, no matter how much I think about, I’m unable to figure out. I thought you were too scared of me to snitch to the police, so tell me. What did I do to break that fear?”

Michael’s words are bitter when he says:

“I saw what you did to Evan.”

This time, his father doesn’t answer immediately. 

“Would you believe me if I told you that I didn’t want to hurt Elizabeth?”

“Yes,” Michael answers, because that’s not difficult to believe. Elizabeth was his father’s little princess, his favorite, the wonderful kid that played with the beta version of Mangle and loved the animatronics his father built. Michael is sure that, whatever his father had  planned, it didn’t involve Elizabeth’s death. “But that doesn’t change anything.”

William sights, and Michael guesses that he’s now bored with the conversation. 

“I’ll see you soon, son.”

The elevator opens and Michael gets in.

I’m not good with words, drawings have always been my forte. Writing is difficult, because I try to not dwell on things. Otherwise, I would’ve lost my mind months ago. 

My father is out of prison.

I really, really hoped that he wouldn’t get out. You made me believe it was possible, that maybe I could start to live a life without worrying about him coming back. But my father always loved to disappoint the people he loves, and I fear that I’ve got that from him.

He told me that the answers I’m looking for are in Circus Baby’s. I know it’s a trap, but I have to go, and that’s why I have to go alone.

I hope I come back before you read this, that you sleep until tomorrow, and when you wake up I’m at your side, with enough food to compensate you for what I’ve done.

I trust you, but this is too dangerous, and I’m too afraid of what’s in that place and that you won’t make it out alive.

You’re going to hate me for this, but that’s okay, if it means that you’re still here another day. 

I’m sorry, Jeremy, but I’m going to come back to you, I promise. 

So, if it’s not much to ask, can you wait for me a bit longer?

This is not supposed to go like this. 

Usually, it goes: you finally kiss the guy you like, he says that, surprise, he likes you too, then you go home to have pretty good sex for being your first time together. You wake up with your partner in your arms and you share a nice moment, say something sappy and the movie ends. 

That’s it.

Jeremy doesn’t know who the writer of his life is, but they are obviously failing at the structure.

The clock says it’s 8 P.M, too late- any other day, Jeremy would be already working. The bed is too cold, the apartment too silent, and there’s no trace of Michael, except for this note.

This…this…this fucking half of an excuse note!!!! 

Michael Afton is the biggest, most stubborn and infuriating idiot that has ever walked on this earth, and he’s going to die in the most stupid way ever, leaving him alone with a broken heart, and he still has the audacity to ask him to sit and wait!!????

THE NERVE OF THIS MAN!!

Jeremy really has the worst taste in man ever!! 

He remembers his mom, lying down on the couch of his new boyfriend’s house while telling him and Coraline how perfect and beautiful this man is, how he’s going to take care of them and visualizes him as a superhero, just for her to get disappointed a few weeks later when he doesn’t come back. 

That’s what she did. Waiting for things to get better. Waiting for her love to return to her. Expecting that her kids would magically be perfect and educate themselves. Waiting and waiting and waiting and waiting.

Jeremy squeezes the note between his hands and throws it against the wall. 

He’s not going to fucking wait for Michael. He’s unable to do it. 

You could say that’s another one of the mistakes Michael made , he thinks while he’s searching for his pants, that he thought that I would stay still . 

HA!

“I’m going to save him and then I’m going to kill him with my own hands,” he mumbles. He’s dressed now, and he’s ready to go out and save his boyfriend when he notices a tiny, little detail. “I don’t fucking know where Circus Baby’s is.”

Ok, maybe that’s not a tiny, little detail. 

THAT’S A HUGE FUCKING PROBLEM!! 

He searches around the apartment, but he can’t find anything. There’s nothing on the board about the location of the building, and all the files about Circus Baby’s had disappeared. Probably, Michael took it with him. 

That idiot. That bastard. 

The only thing he finds are Michael’s car keys. Now he knows that he had to take the bus, which doesn’t help at all!! Also, why the fuck did he leave his car here?? Was he afraid that it would be too recognizable and Jeremy would go around searching for an ugly green car that saw itself as a truck???

Then, it hit him.

Jeremy didn’t know where Circus Baby’s was located, but there was someone that knew, because he had been, at least at some point, involved in the project. 

And he had that person’s number in the office of Freddy Fazbear’s Pizzeria. 

“Welcome back to another pivotal night of your thriving new career, where you get to really ask yourself, what am I doing with my life? What would my friends say, and most importantly, will I ever see my family again? We understand the stresses of a new job, and we’re here for you. To help you reach a more stable and relaxing frame of mind, we offer several musical selections to help make this elevator ride as relaxing-”

“This has to be fucking joke,” Michael swears while listening to whatever hand unit is saying. Is he actually descending to hell? He tries to select a type of music using the keypad, or at least get the hand unit to shut up, but the screen is a disaster and he can’t type anything.

“It seems you had some trouble with the keypad. I see what you were trying to type, and I will auto-correct it for you. Thank you for selecting: Casual Bongos.”

The casual bongos start to play.

This is truly hell.

He waits for the elevator to stop and presses the bright, red and ominous button, only to discover that he has to crawl his way to the control module. Imagine his father having to do this every time he wants to get to his office puts a smile on his face.

“You are now in the Primary Control Module. It’s actually a crawlspace between the two front showrooms. Now, let’s get started with your daily tasks…”

That he’s not going to do. There are two windows, one at his left and the other at his right, and he can see Ballora and Funtime Foxy’s Galleries. 

Is the first time Michael sees Ballora with his own eyes, and part of him is amazed about how elegant the animatronic is. The other part is sick that the animatronic has some similarities with his mother. She has the same necklace with three pearls that his father had gifted her on their first anniversary. He remembers the notes in Ballora’s files:

‘She has more range of movement so she can perform, and has the ability to balance and be stable properly. There’s a sensor that activates when she’s near a wall or an object so she doesn’t crash. I’m sure she’ll be perfect to dance to your songs, my love.’

Michael’s mother was the one who composed the music for the pizzerias, including the music boxes and some of the songs of the animatronics. It’s not strange that she would also compose Ballora’s music, but the fact that his father designed an animatronic that could perfectly dance her compositions was another contradiction in William’s character. 

Why spent so much time creating Ballora? Why design Circus Baby to look like Elizabeth?

Michael shrugs his head, trying to keep those questions out. 

William told him that, once in the control module, he has to go to the left, to the Funtime Auditorium. 

Then, he notices the passage in front of him, and he decides to take a look at the circus module. He knows what he’s going to find there, but once he reaches the module, there’s no trace of Circus Baby. 

“I don’t recognise you. You are new.”

Michael stops the moment he hears that voice. It doesn’t sound like Elizabeth at all, but he’s convinced that the one talking to him is Circus Baby.

He looks around, turns on the lights, but he can’t see her. 

“It’s a strange thing to want to do, to come here. I’m curious what events would lead a person to want to spend their nights, in a place like this. Willingly. Maybe curiosity? Maybe ignorance?”

“I came to see you,” Michael answers. He tries not to sutter and keep the composure, but the task is almost impossible when he can only think about Elizabeth. “Where are you?”

“I’m hiding, ” Circus Baby’s admits. “ Something bad is going to happen. Something bad always happens. I don’t want it to happen again, but I can’t fix what’s inside of me. ”
A noise from the other side of the door startles Michael.

“They’re coming for you. Quick, there’s a space under the desk. You’ll be safe there, just try not to make eye contact. They’ll lose interest soon, I promise. ”
For once, Michael follows the instructions by heart. The hideout is big enough for him, but also pretty claustrophobic. There are marks in the walls, probably made by the one who created this space.

“Is this the bad thing that happens?” Michael whispers. He doesn’t know if Baby can hear him, but he tries anyway. “People getting killed?”
“ That’s how we’re created, ” Baby says. She has a melancholic voice. “ No matter how many times they try to fix us, it’s not going to fix what’s wrong with me. What is bad is always left behind.”

“How can I help?”

“There’s a place, in Funtime Auditorium, called the Scooping Room,” Michael remembers that file. The room where the Scoop is. “There, you can destroy my body. And maybe, we can destroy the others, too. ”
Michael bites his lips so he doesn’t say anything. He hears steps at the other side of the little door that’s keeping him hidden, and his heart starts to race. This time, he doesn’t have a security camera to check on the animatronics, only Baby’s instructions. 

He thinks about what she just said- destroy the animatronics so they can’t hurt people anymore. He came all this way to find Elizabeth and get some answers. Was this the end he was looking for? 

Michael is so lost in his thoughts that he doesn’t realize that hand unit has stopped talking some time ago. 

“They’re gone, ” Baby announces to him. “ I told you they would lose interest. ”
“What you said about the Scooping Room, do you think we can do it? Would that help?”
“ Yes.” 

That’s all that Michael needs to hear. 

“Then I’ll do it.”

“Thank you. Thank you so much. I can guide you through the Funtime Auditorium, to make sure that others don't catch you.”

Michael goes back to the control module. There are some creepy robot heads watching him, and he feels a pair of eyes in his neck, studying his every movement. Maybe they’re Baby’s. 

“Ballora is going to follow you. She will try to catch you. I will help you avoid her. She will not follow you inside The Scooping Room. She is afraid.”

Michael enters the auditorium and follows Baby’s structions. Ballora’s song is playing, and he can see some of the movements of the ballerina dancing in the dark. 

“Go forward.”

He advances. Baby’s voice resonates around him. His father gave the animatronic a nice warm voice, but he can’t link it back to Elizabeth. 

“Stop. ”
Michael makes a mental note about what he knows about the funtimes and this place:

1. A new place opened and closed the same day, rumors say because of a gas leak.
2. Elizabeth wanted to see Circus Baby, but his father ordered her to stay away from the animatronic.
3. Elizabeth died that day.

Inadvertently, Michael had reached the logical conclusion that, whatever happened there, Elizabeth should be the one possessing Circus Baby.

“Go forward and left.”

And, even if he’s sure of that fact, there’s something about the familiarity of the animatronic and how she welcomed his presence in the building that is just…weird. 

“Keep going.”

He has known Charlie since she was a baby, and she didn’t think twice before attacking him. 

The ghosts of the Missing Children barely have memories from when they were alive, and still, they’re so full of anger that they attack the moment a night guard is in the building. 

What makes Circus Baby different? She seems more aware than others, but she hadn’t said anything to indicate that she remembered Michael. Elizabeth had always been so full of energy and curious about her surroundings, asking questions and going where she wasn’t supposed to go. 

“Stop. Be silent.”

Baby is too calm. Too nice. 

Too in control of her own emotions and her words. 

His father’s office is on the right side. He’s close enough that he can see the door. 

¿Is he really going to gamble his life like this? 

Jeremy. 

Jeremy is waiting for him.

“Go forward and left. ”
Michael goes to the right. 

The music grows louder in his ears, but the door is unlocked, and he’s able to enter without problem. There are three monitors in the room, a fan and…a Golden Freddy plushie. 

Michael freezes in place.

He hadn’t seen it in years. Evan’s plushie, the one he’ll always carry everywhere. 

“What are you doing? ” Baby’s voice brings him back to reality. “ Why didn’t you trust me? We don’t want to hurt anyone, but we need you. I thought I did everything right.”

There’s a red button near the door. Michael presses it,  and the door closes just in time for him to see Circus Baby standing in the middle of the auditorium.

She’s bigger than any animatronic he had seen before, but what gives Michael goosebumps is not the threatening image or the now cold voice, but her green eyes.

They’re the same as Elizabeth’s.

“Isn’t this why you came here? To be with me again?” 

That voice, that voice coming from Circus Baby is also the same as Elizabeth’s. 

To say that Jeremy is losing his mind is a misconception. 

He had already lost his mind, and now he’s letting that craziness and desperation make every decision. 

That’s the only way he can explain how he ends up in Freddy’s.

“Fucking finally!” Luke, his coworker, exclaims when he sees Jeremy enter. He is sitting in the security office and is holding a baseball bat like his life depends on it. “Where is Fritz!? Neither of you came to your shift, and they made me stay until one of you finally came. Dude, something is wrong with this place! I swear that Balloon Boy had been trying to get-”
“Luke, leave, now. And give me your bat,” Jeremy orders. 

Luke doesn’t need to be told twice. 

Jeremy searches the security office, the lounge, every place where he can find some sort of clue to where Circus Baby Entertainment & Rental could be or Mr. Emily’s number.

He’s not even aware of the animatronics around the corner, spying on him, but not close enough. At least, not for now. 

Hopeless, he gives up in trying to find the direction, and finally dials the number.

“Hello, this is Henry Emily,” he hears at the other end of the line. 

Jeremy swallows. This could go pretty good, or horribly wrong. 

Whatever. 

“Hi, Mr. Emily? I’m Jeremy Fitzgerald. I’m one of the security guards at Freddy’s…”

“Ah, yes, I know you,” Henry interrupts. He sounds apologetic about it. “They told me that you wanted to change to the night shift. I’m…I’m sorry to tell you this, but right now, we can only pay one night guard, and we already have Mr. Smith with us, so-”

“I’m not calling about the night shift, I couldn’t care less about that,” Jeremy interrupts him. He pinches his nose, trying to stop the headache. “I’m calling because of Michael. Michael Afton. Yes, I know his name is not Fritz. He went to Circus Baby’s Entertainment & Rental, and I need to know where it is so I can carry his sorry ass out of that place before he gets killed.”

There’s silence at the other end of the line. Maybe Jeremy should’ve thought of a better plan, or at least explain the situation in a less aggressive way, but he had run out of patience a few hours ago.

“I’m sorry, but I’m not going to do that. Or rather, I can’t do that. You should stay away. It’s not safe to be around that place, less with an Afton.”

“I don’t care!” Jeremy states. His impatience is growing by the second, because every minute he loses, is a minute that Michael is in danger. “I know almost everything , Mr. Emily. About the missing children, the animatronics, about what Michael’s father did. Why do you think I requested the night guard position along with Michael? Just because I thought that it was worth the 15 extra dollars!?”

“Young man, if you really know what’s going on, I don’t understand why you put yourself through that, and it’s obvious that you are not aware of the danger you’re in.”
“Why did I put myself through this?” Jeremy repeats the question, dumbfounded. Surely, this must be a joke. “Because I don’t want Michael to die ! Maybe I’m putting myself in danger, and yeah, that’s not the best idea ever. I understand, Mr. Emily, but when someone I care about is risking his life, I’m not going to sit down until I come to work one morning to find him inside of a suit. That’s why I need to go.”

“If Michael went to that place without telling you, there must be a reason. We can only wait for him to come back.”
“FUCK THAT!” Jeremy suddenly screams. He’s tired, he’s mad, if he has to hear ‘it’s for your own good’ one more time he’s going to be the next to kill someone. “William Afton destroyed your life, and I guess it’s pretty difficult to see someone who looks so much like him, to the point that you would rather help Michael pay rent that let him live with you because, fuck, his father did something horrible to you. But Michael is not him . And I’m pretty sure that, if we don’t do something, he’s not going to come out alive. You’re the only family he has left. I don’t want to sound cruel, but he’s still alive . And you’re telling me you're going to let him die because of what? Is there a good reason to justify that!? Tell me, Mr. Emily, because I must be too dumb to not understand that reasoning.”

This time, the silence is so charged that Jeremy fears that he has overstepped. He isn’t trying to make Mr. Emily feel guilty, but he’s so damn tired about these people not talking to each other and blaming themselves and taking the worst decisions ever…and that’s coming from someone who was ready to sleep in this place less than a week ago!!!

But, apparently, his horrible motivational speech had worked, because the next thing Henry says is:

“I’ll go for Michael as quickly as possible. You’re right, I can’t…I don’t want that. But I’m sorry, I’m not telling you the location. It’s obvious that, the way you talk about Michael, you’re pretty fond of him, and I’m sure he’s pretty fond of you, too. If he survives, he’s never going to forgive me for putting your life at risk.”
“No, NO! You understood the message but you did not reach to the right conclusion!” 

“I’ll bring him back. I promise. Just, keep yourself safe in the meantime.” 

“NO! MR. EMILY, DON’T HANG UP ON…FUCK!” 

He’s not feeling reassured with Henry’s promise. What can a fifty year old hermit do against some animatronics? Jeremy had seen images of those things, and they’re a few inches bigger than the ones in Freddy’s. 

Fine. Plan C.

He gets up and walks towards the Game Area. The building is obviously empty, and he is thankful that Luke had gone away without asking twice. 

“I know you can hear me,” he says. Obviously, there’s no answer, but Jeremy knows the kids are listening. They always are. “You might not even know the answer, but please, I need to reach Circus Baby’s Entertainment & Rental,” silence. Jeremy looks at the Price Corner, hoping at least for Charlie to get up and give him a hand. He hopes that he doesn’t need to be asleep to talk to them, because unless he uses chloroform or hits himself in the head, he doubts he would be able to take a nap. “I’m aware that Michael isn’t your favorite person, but please, I need…I need help. He wants to help you, he always wanted to help you, and I want too, but I can’t do it. Not without him. I don’t want to do it without him,” he corrects himself. He’s been so focused on how angry he’s at Michael that he hadn’t had the chance to be worried. To think that, yeah, Michael isn’t probably going to come back. Is enough to make his eyes water, his heart shrink. Michael is always the one who makes them survive. How is he supposed to do it, if he’s not here? “I’m…I’m so angry at him. I want to kick his ass, but I'm also scared. I don’t know what to do, I don’t really know what’s going on, but please, I can’t lose him. I can’t…”

“Are you really crying for someone like him?”

Jeremy wipes out the tears and turns around. Cassidy is in front of him, situated near the stage, but instead of the Toy Animatronics, Golden Freddy is the one sitting there. He looks angry, as always, and his eyes are as empty as two black holes. Charlie is by his side, her eyes locked in the floor, like she feels guilty for something. 

“Do you know where Circus Baby’s is?” Jeremy asks instead of answering. He can’t stop to look at Charlie. It seemed that something had happened in the last few hours. 

“Why would we help you? If Michael is stupid enough to go there, that’s not our problem.”

“Charlie…”

“Don’t talk to her, ” Cassidy interrupts him. He gets between the girl and Jeremy, and takes a step closer to him. “ I don’t know how you convinced her to lower her guard, but you won’t trick me. No matter how much you try to pretend that you’re on our side.”

This is going terribly wrong. Cassidy is not attending to reasons, and Charlie is not going to intervene. Why?

Something more is going on. Something that Jeremy still doesn’t understand. 

“Please, Cassidy-”

Using his name was a mistake. Cassidy’s silhouette becomes bigger, the shadows move around him and he turns towards Jeremy. When his mouth opens, his teeth are pointy enough to cut through someone’s head. 

“DON’T CALL ME THAT!” he screams. One of Golden Freddy’s eyes light up. The suit is old, dirty and messed up, with scratches all over him and his limbs numb. 

Charlie takes a step towards him, but she quickly stops and retreats her hand.

“Do you want to know why I won’t help you? Why I won't help him? ” Cassidy is closer, his steps don't make a sound around the floor. “ Because it was his fault. ”
“That’s not true,” Jeremy refutes. It only makes Cassidy’s fury grow, his presence taking over the Game Area.

“Do you know how Evan died? ” Jeremy bites his lip. Cassidy sees this and takes a step closer, smiling. “ Oh, wow. And you didn’t ask? Why he told you about his dead sister, but not his brother?”

Yes, Jeremy has asked that to himself a million times, but when he tried to talk about Evan, or at least ask about him, he remembered the sad look Michael had while talking about Elizabeth, and it was enough to make his curiosity die. 

“That’s Michael’s decision to make, not mine. When he’s ready, he can tell me the story himself.”

The smile drops of Cassidy’s face. The reaction makes Charlie chuckle in amused. Cassidy turns around at her, but he doesn’t seem angry when he looks at Charlie, he only has this ‘why do you have to laugh at my misery look’. 

“You have to really love him to say that kind of nonsense. He’s not going to tell you, not if he can avoid the truth. That’s all the Aftons do. They lie. But don’t worry. I’m not like them. I’ll tell you the truth ,” Cassidy appears in front of him. Jeremy jumps and trips on his own feet. He tries to keep composure, even when Cassidy rises above him and smiles like this is a fun game. He’s about to crush Jeremy under his feet, tell him the horrible truth, and he’s happy about it, because he’s convinced that, once he does, Jeremy will see Michael for how he really is. “ You know the bite of 83. How to forget it? A kid that is stupid enough to get bit by an animatronic. They could’ve at least thought of a more credible lie. The truth is that, that day, it was Evan Afton’s birthday. And his dear big brother and his friends, wanting to prank him, took him in their arms and carried him towards the animatronic’s mouth, so he could give Fredbear a kiss, ” Cassidy gets closer, the smile in his face is wicked, twisted. Is not a smile a twelve year old should have. Jeremy guesses what he’s going to say next, there’s only one possible end to that story, but that doesn’t make it easier when Cassidy whispers: “ Michael killed his brother.”

Jeremy closes his eyes. He knew there is a reason why Michael never mentions Evan, and that Michael had been involved in the death of his brother some way or another, but he never thought about the bite of 83. 

Now he understands Michael better- why he thinks this is all his fault, and why he’s ready to risk his life trying to fix it. 

“And that wasn’t the end, but only the beginning. How a monster that was hidden decided to stop pretending and start to give into his nature. Maybe Michael didn’t kill us, but he took a very important role in the creation of that monster ” Cassidy continues, with no remorse for Jeremy or time to let him process what he just said. “He killed us. He killed all of us, and it’s still free. I won’t accept it. I’m going to kill him, and I’ll never let him leave. I’ll make him feel what he did to us once and again, and again, and again, and again. I’ll never let him rest. I’ll make him fear me. I’ll make him regret all he did. Maybe the other’s can rest after that, but I won’t. I’m the one he should not have killed.”

“You won’t get what you’re looking for. You’ll become his tormentor, but you’ll condemn yourself to do that for the rest of your life. You’ll just destroy yourself.”

“I don’t have a life to fight for, so why should I be afraid?” Cassidy says. He gives his back to Jeremy, suddenly bored with the conversation. In his mind, Jeremy is the one with the shitty monologue about vengeance and retaliation. 

And that’s what makes Jeremy remember that the terrorizing ghost he has in front of him is nothing more than a kid. A scared, angry kid that had been ripped away from existence in the most cruel way possible. 

But there’s also something personal about the kid’s rage. 

Is a rage that Jeremy can identify, because he has felt it millions of times. Towards his mom, his step-dad, towards anyone who had contributed to ruin his life. 

And suddenly, the pieces fit perfectly, and Jeremy understands why he sees his younger self in Cassidy. 

The kid that had been hurt so many times by people who he trusted, people who were supposed to protect him. The memories are like an arrow in his heart- he’s at peace with that part of himself, he learnt how to let that hate vanish, at least some part of it, but it doesn’t mean that they’re harmless. 

The time that Coraline cut her hand, and she was crying, and he yelled at his mom, but she was tired, and didn’t care about his sister’s wound, and Jeremy called her and called and called and called…until his mother hit him, and he went away like a silent street dog. He was crying, but under the tears, he was furious. He hated his mom. 

She was supposed to protect them, and she didn’t. 

And sometimes, that’s the biggest hate- because, if a kid can love and enjoy things in a more intense way than adults, that also means that they can also hate them as strongly. 

The kid in front of him hated like that, and he finally understood why. 

“You don’t need to do it. You can destroy him, without condemning yourself for eternity. You deserve something better, Sammy.”

The ghost suddenly stops. The shadows disappear, the light in Golden Freddy vanishes, and when he turns his head over Jeremy, his eyes are not two pits of black, but the terrified look of a kid who just remembered something that he wanted to forget. 

“That’s why you got so angry when I called you Cassidy. Sam’s your real name, right? Sam Emily.” Jeremy looks at the Puppet, the little girl with the same almond eyes. She has a sad smile on her lips.“You’re Henry’s son. And William Afton, he… you trusted him, and he tricked you-”
“ HE MURDERED ME! ” Sammy screams. This time, he’s not in control of his emotions. His eyes are watering, his hands are trembling, and he’s remembering something horrible. He had been just a kid searching for his sister. His mother had been sad for months, his father didn’t answer the phone, and no one was telling him what’s going on. So he had taken a bus to go back to Hurricane and discover the truth himself. He didn’t remember his father’s address, but he knew how to find Fazbear’s Family Diner. He gave a fake name to the employees, he had even dyed his hair so no one would recognize him, until he found himself in front of William Afton, who took him to the back room and told him that he was going to tell him the truth. But he didn’t say a thing. “ Don’t say his name! DO NOT SAY HIS NAME! He killed Elizabeth! He killed my sister! Evan is dead because of him! He deserves an eternity in hell, and if no ones going to do it, then I’ll be his jailor.” 

“He does,” Jeremy says. Sammy blinks, confused for a moment, probably because he was not expecting for Jeremy to give him the reason. “ He deserves all of that. But you don’t.”

“Are you going to give me the speech about how if I kill him I become as bad as him?”

“Oh, God, no. No, no, no. When the time comes, you’re free to go and murder him. But let it end there. You’re not going to get what you want, because people like him will always have an excuse to tell themselves.”

That’s the hard truth, isn’t it? 

Jeremy takes a step closer to Sam, and the ghost takes a step back. 

He reaches the border of the stage, and Charlie grabs his hand. Sam raises his head and looks at her, to his sister, and the fury disappears as fast as it comes, replaced by regret. 

“I shouldn’t have left you, ” Sam apologizes, squeezing his sister’s hand. “ I should’ve been there on our birthday. But I was still angry at dad for the divorce, because he chose to stay here to make ugly toys instead of coming with us.”

“It wasn’t your fault,” Charlie says. She’s not breaking, like Sam, and Jeremy thinks that she’s still trying to carry too much for being a kid. 

“She’s right, it wasn’t,” Jeremy confirms. He gets closer to the twins, but keeps some distance to make sure that he doesn’t scare Sam. He kneels down to their level, and continues: “You are not responsible for your parents actions. Neither of you,” he says this last thing looking at Charlie. “I know you want to protect them, the same way your dad is trying to give them a place to stay, but it’s too much. For both of you. Me and Michael, on the other hand, are adults, let us handle this.”

“You repeat all the time that we’re just kids, but we aren’t.”
“Sammy!”
“What? It’s true.”

“You’re twelve. Dead or not, you’re still a kid. Shut up or I’ll ground you.”

Sam frowns at him, but the comment makes Charlie laugh. Apparently, her favorite kind of humor is the one that makes fun of his brother. 

Jeremy gets up, but when he looks around, he finds out the other four original animatronics around him. This time, however, they don’t seem concerned by his presence, just curious.

“Did you tell them to come here?” he asks Sam.

He shakes his head. He can influence the animatronics to make them more aggressive, the same way Charlie can control the toy animatronics because she has access to the security protocols, but apart from that, the souls of the kids are the ones taking the decisions. 

“I think you should know this. Last month, William Afton was arrested by the police as a suspect, but he’s free now,” they take the news as well as Jeremy was expecting. Which means that they take it horrible. Even the shadows around Charlie become bigger. 

The old animatronics, on the other hand, seem more confused than before. Jeremy reminds himself that they don’t have memories about the murder, about William Afton, but he can see a hint of recognition in their eyes. 

Maybe they don’t remember, but the fear and the hate is still there. 

“He’s going to come for us…” Charlie mumbles.

“We can stop him, but not without Michael. He’s the one who testified against him, because he cared more about you than feared him. And he knows this place better than anyone, like, did you know that there’s a door that leads to a basement? And about the old ball pit from the other location that, supposedly, makes you travel in time? Because I didn’t! But Michael does know shit like that!”

Charlie and Sam exchange a look. Maybe they’re communicating through some weird twin connection, maybe not, but when their attention comes back at him, Charlie nods in agreement.

“There should be a map of the cities that are nearby in the office. Take it, we’ll point you to where Circus Baby’s is.”

Jeremy immediately runs towards the office, takes the map and comes back to the Game Area. 

Instead of Charlie, the Puppet is out of her box, sitting on the floor and waiting. Sam and the other four animatronics are at her side.

Jeremy opens the map on the floor so everyone can see. 

The Puppet’s movements and the way her arms and legs move remind Jeremy of a snake. She leans over the map and points at one of the cities that is only an hour from here. 

“Thank you, Charlie,” Jeremy smiles. He hopes that, once he’s in the city, finding a big building from Fazbear Entertainment it’s easy. 

“She wants to ask you if you’re sure about this,” Sam says. Apparently, they’re not able to touch things when they’re ghosts, but they can’t talk when they possess the animatronic.

“What I’m going to find once I’m there?”

“Elizabeth, ” Sam answers, and Jeremy’s stomach aches as a complaint. “ She’s a pain in the ass. And the funtimes are worse. They’re not possessed, but that only means that lame monologues and kids films are not going to work on them.”

Charlie tilts her head in agreement.

“I’ll bring Michael back. I promise. And I’ll let you give him a little scare as a punishment for being an idiot. But no killing,” he adds, and he swears he could almost see a glimpse of fun in her eyes.

Jeremy takes the map with one hand and the bat with the other, but when he gets out of the building, he hears four metallic steps following him. He turns around, to see Freddy, Bonnie, Chica and Foxy. 

Jeremy leans to the right to see the door behind the animatronic. Charlie, still as the Puppet, and Cassidy, are looking at him.

“I can’t move and her legs are too thin to be useful against the funtimes,” he explains.

Jeremy gets out the car keys.

“Do you…wanna come?” he asks, and can’t help but be surprised when fucking Freddy Fazbear himself nods. “Fine. Why not? Get in.”

Jeremy sits in the driver’s seat, and waits for the animatronics to get in. Freddy takes the co-driver seat, and he tries really hard not to laugh. Thank God Michael’s car is almost a truck, because he doesn’t know how else the car would fit four animatronics. 

“Bring them back before 6 A.M or I’ll kill you,” he hears Charlie’s voice from the pizzeria. 

“ROGER THAT!” 

He hopes she’s joking.

Michael can’t believe how difficult this is.

He thought that, with all the time he spent in Freddy’s in this exact scenario, this would be easier.

It isn’t. 

He’s running out of power, he has to look at the three monitors at the same time and there’s a vent that can let the smaller animatronics enter the office. 

And that’s not counting the psychological torture.

For some reason, his father decided that it was a great idea to give every animatronic a voice box. Funtime Freddy is yelling around the building like a crazy maniac with an ax, the Bidybaps don’t shut up and Ballora is sinning with his mother’s voice, which makes it ten times worse. And, as if this isn’t enough, Elizabeth’s voice is constantly asking him to let her in.

“I don’t understand! Everything is okay. I’m still here!”

Michael tries to ignore all these voices. 

He needs to find the uncensored documents, his father’s notes, anything. There’s a panel to write a code near the cameras, but Michael had tried some combinations and nothing worked. 

There’s a drawer of the desk that isn’t opening. He needs to find something…

Ballora’s music is getting closer, and he closes both doors, too afraid to let one of them open. It’s a mistake, but he needs to block the sound somehow. He can’t hear one of those voices anymore. 

“Screwdriver…screwdriver…fuck, he has to had something to open this!” he curses. He feels like he’s descending into madness. 

“Hey Bon-Bon, I think-think that’s the birthday boy over there-ere. We should go give him a surprise!”

Wait. Michael remembers the notes in the censored files. His father had written down that every funtime had a design based on a member of his family. Circus Baby for Elizabeth. Ballora for his mom. Funtime Foxy for him. Funtime Freddy for Evan. It was going to be a surprise for his birthday, one that Evan would probably have hated.

He reaches the panel and tries 1983. There’s a noise coming from the drawer, and the cameras change.

Now, instead of the interior of the building, they’re showing his home.

Not the apartment he’s been living in for the past month. His childhood home. 

There’s a camera in the living room, another in the hall, one more in Evan’s old bedroom…

“Sometimes I don’t understand why people do the things they do.”

Michael can’t keep looking at the screens. This is…this is…

No. Don’t think about it. It’s too much. It’s too much. Go to the drawer. The files are inside.

Michael puts the documents over the desk and opens the one about the funtimes. This time, he can read everything, and there’s extra pages with blueprints that he hadn’t seen before. 

‘Parental Voice Sync & Replay: Has the ability to synchronize with any parent's voice and replay it in order to fool and lure a victim in. Funtime Foxy is the right one for this function.’

Ballora had a similar function that let her lure victims (kids) to empty rooms.

‘Baby is perfect. She can dance. She can sing. She can make ice cream. The kids will love her.’

Circus Baby and Funtime Freddy have stomach hatches, and Michael is about to vomit when he sees what looks like the silhouette of a kid inside them.

‘The Funtime Project has to be rebuilt for the new plan. I think I can still use these designs, but they need some arrangements to make it possible. Still, it is better than starting from zero.’

The date of that last note is from 1984, a couple of months after Evan’s death. So, this plan started after that incident. Should Michael feel relieved by this or even more guilty?

“I know it was an accident!”

Michael finds at the bottom of the drawer what looks like a more personal notebook. It’s written in his father's handwriting, and the first date is September 13th of 1985. 

‘Elizabeth is dead. That was not the intention- she was the only one who still played her part perfectly. I spent so many years interpreting my role, just to see my family fall out of it the moment they think is convenient. 

The FUNTIME’S PROJECT was supposed to fix things, not break them even more. Michael keeps running away, and Clarisse is about to ask for the divorce. She hasn’t said it, but I know. She can’t look me in the face, she thinks I’m responsible for our kids' deaths. 

Henry wants to kick me out of the company. If I told him, would he understand why I had to do it? Why do I need this project to work? I thought he was the only one who understood me, but now I feel like I can’t trust him anymore. Why is he doing this? 

I’m going to fix things. I’ll put my kids back together. Whatever it takes.’

Next entry is in October. It’s brief.

‘Circus Baby’s eyes are now green. Like my Elizabeth’s. It’s not possible. I think I discovered something important. The piece I needed for this to work, if I’m lucky. 

Clarissa is gone. Fine. I still have her songs. No matter how far she goes, she can’t take them with her. Her creations are going to keep company to mine, whether she likes it or not.’

Then, William doesn’t write until October 16. Charlie’s death. The note is erratic and it’s full of studs, like the words of a man who had too much to drink. 

‘Henry didn’t leave me any other option. He tried to get rid of me. After everything we did, after everything I lost these last years, he turns his back on me like I’m just one of his old and disappointing designs. 

I’ll not let that happen. I’m never going to let him forget about what he did. I wanted to make him regret it. That’s why I had to do it. Who laughs now, old friend? I’m forever in your mind.’

Next date. December 2nd.

‘After a month of research, I finally found it, the missing piece: Remnant.

Who would have thought that Elizabeth’s death would be the one who led me to this discovery? That’s the reason why the animatronics are acting strange. Elizabeth is not gone, she’s still in Circus Baby.  I’ve been looking at this from the wrong angle this whole time!
I thought that the animatronics parts were the answer to bring someone back- replace what’s not working with new, improved parts, but it’s the opposite. You need their soul, their memories: the remnant. That’s what gives them life.”

Next entry. February, 8th. 

‘There are some problems that keep me from experimenting with Remnant. I’ve built a new location in an old building to study Circus Baby: she seems to be aware of her condition, but not about her true identity. 

I need more test subjects to reach further conclusions, but I can't use the Funtimes without arising suspicion. 

I’m not going to lie: the thought of it is enough to excite me. To think that I found a new way to give life to my creations! A real, human, perfect life. The old animatronics will be the perfect subjects.’

One of the last entries, in Abril 9. A bit after Cassidy’s death, the first of the Missing Children.

‘I thought that Remnant was the only life force that I could use, but it isn’t. As every element in this world, it has its contrary, its balance. 

Night and Day. Creation and Destruction. Remnant and Agony. 

If the Remnant comes from the memories and the soul, Agony comes from the feelings, the hate and the pain. It’s amazing what an animatronic lead by Agony can achieve. 

Now I understand why Circus Baby looks weak in comparison to him or The Puppet.

Circus Baby has an equal amount of both, but it turns out to be too little. The lack of memories doesn't let her reach her full potential. 

And, on top of all, I’ve got the best subject ever for agony! Oh, Henry is going to love when he finds out!  If you think about it, I gave you what you wanted. They’re together again, and this time, no one is able to take them away from you. Tell me, old friend, are you still going to hide and ignore me, after I killed both of your children?’

Michael drops the notebook. 

That.. that last thing… that can’t be true. 

He remembers Cassidy’s photo and tries to match it with Sammy’s face, but he hasn’t seen the kid in so long that he can’t be sure anymore. 

His father is a monster. 

William Afton is a monster.

And he has always been, but all this time, all those years, he was just pretending that he wasn’t. A good family, a best friend, a company that made kids happy- he had the perfect elements to build a mask to hide behind. 

Until Michael killed Evan and broke the illusion. 

“Did you know that I was on stage once?” Baby’s voice asks him. He doesn’t want to hear it. Michael is curled up in a ball on the floor, barely breathing, barely alive, barely able to process what he just read. “ It wasn’t for very long, only one day. What a wonderful day though. I was in a small room with balloons and a few tables. The children would run in and out. Music was always coming from somewhere else. Down a hall.”

He has the door closed, so why can he hear Baby’s voice? What does he have to do to make it stop?

“I would always count the children; I’m not sure why. I was always acutely aware of how many there were in the room with me. Two, then three, then two, then three, then four, then two, then none.”

Michael covers his ears. 

Shut up. Shut up. Shut up. Shut up.

“I can do something special, did you know that? I can make ice cream! Although I only did it once. There were four, then three, then two…then one.”

The power level is decreasing, but Michael isn’t aware of it, the same way he isn’t aware about the animatronics getting closer.

He just wants silence. For this to stop.

He wants to come back home.

“Something happened when there was one. A little girl, standing by herself. I was no longer…myself; and I stopped singing. My stomach opened, and there was ice cream. I couldn’t move, at least, not until she stepped closer.”

Please, shut up.

“There was screaming for a moment; but only for a moment. The same is going to happen to you. It only hurts for a moment.”

The building is out of energy. 

The system turns down.

The doors open.

The last thing Michael sees is Circus Baby’s stomach hatch opening.

Finding the building had been way too easy. 

So much that Jeremy is speculating that this town had been bought by William Afton and he put enough announcements in the streets to lead people to his mortal trap. Which may sound like a cartoon villain’s plan, but after all Jeremy knows about that guy, paying people to lead others to Circus Baby’s isn’t the most unbelievable thing. 

…or maybe everyone was so nice to him because he has four giant animatronics in the car who narrow their eyes to everyone. 

“Kids, when we come back we’re going to have a talk about not scaring the shit out of people.”

Freddy and Chica have the decency to look a bit ashamed, but Foxy and Bonnie don't seem to regret scaring that poor woman in the middle of the night.

But anyway, Jeremy can’t worry about giving that stranger nightmares for the rest of her life (lucky she’ll think this is some weird advertisement…actually Jeremy should have told her that) when he’s on a mission to save Michael. 

He parks near the building, takes Michael’s cap and hoodie from the trunk and waits for the animatronics to get out.

“We don’t have keys, so we’re going to try and force the back door,” he adjusts Michael’s cap over his head and, to make sure that the cameras don’t catch his face, he puts on Michael’s hoodie. How can his boyfriend wear so many layers in summer? “Or maybe we can find a window…”
Bonnie seems to have a better idea than breaking a window with a bat. He just charges towards the poor door that obviously can’t take the force of an animatronic. 

The others look at him in disbelief, but Jeremy can’t help but smile.

“Fine, that works for me!” He gives Bonnie a pat on the shoulder, a difficult task taking into account how tall he’s, but the animatronic seems happy. “Now, I’ll usually prefer if you were nice and don’t try to kill or fight anyone, but, just for once, you can kick the other animatronics.”

They don’t answer, but Jeremy hopes that they’re okay with the idea and this isn’t a convoluted plan to get him killed. 

They enter the building, Jeremy armed with his stolen bat and with four animatronics at his side, ready to get his stupid boyfriend back.

The first that Michael notices when he wakes up is the pain. 

An horrible, sharp pain that runs over his left arm. He tries to give it a look, but he can barely move, and the only thing he sees is his shattered shirt and the blood dripping from his fingers.

That’s when he notices the second thing: he’s tied up to a chair with his wrists and ankles locked. Michael tries to break free from his restraints, but there’s no use.

“You finally woke up, ” Circus Baby is on the door. Her figure can barely fit through it. “ Welcome to the Scooping Room.”

“Why didn't you kill me when you took me in the office?” Michael asks. He tries to shrink his right hand to see if it can fit through the bracelets. It’s impossible.

“Because, dummy, you’re no use to us if we destroy your body, ” she explains it like it’s obvious, but only lets Michael even more confused. “ We’re trapped here with no way out. There’s no-where to go, when we look like this. But if we looked like you, then we could hide.”

Suddenly, Michael gets it. 

His father didn’t send him here so he could discover the truth, to see if his son could understand his efforts to bring his siblings back to life and the amazing discoveries he made along the way. 

William Afton doesn’t want that- he doesn’t want pity or love or a family. He wants admiration and company, but the kind of company where the other person is at his mercy and thinks of him as a genius and will never leave him, no matter what.

That’s why Michael serves no purpose to him. 

His father sent him here because he knew that Michael was so desperate to fix what he destroyed that he would follow Circus Baby to the Scooping Room. And what better ending for him than his own sister killing him? 

“It won’t work,” Michael warns Baby. “Do you think that five animatronics in a human body won’t be suspicious?” 

“We had no other option. I have no other option. I need to leave this place.”

Michael senses a bit of desperation on her perfect melodic voice. His father’s notes said that Baby can’t remember a lot from her life, but she remembers that day, how she died. 

‘They’re just kids.’

“We can find another way out of this. Please, let me help you, Elizabeth.”

The name makes Circus Baby react. She tilts her head, like she recognizes that name, but shrugs her head, trying to forget it.

“I know it was an accident. That she wasn’t supposed to be there, ” she says. She’s still talking in third person, but Michael thinks that’s not because she doesn’t remember, but because it’s easier. “ But someone was supposed to look after her. She was so little…she shouldn’t have been alone. I can’t keep remembering what happened day after day after day, pretending that everything is fine, that there’s not something horrible inside of me.”

Michael is about to cry, but the fear keeps the tears from dropping. The Scoop is leaning above him, ready to empty him completely.

“I’m sorry! I should’ve looked more after you! You were my sister, and I let you alone in that place. We only had each other after Evan died, and I still let you alone in there. I…I was so worried about fighting my own monsters that I didn’t see the one we had in our own home. And I’ll never forgive myself for that. I’m sorry, Eli.”

Circus Baby turns around, ignoring his pleads. There’s a noise coming from the other side of the hall, but neither of them pay attention to it. 

“Don’t worry, Mickey. As I said, the Scoop only hurts for a moment.”

Mickey. Elizabeth was the only one who called him Mickey.

“Wait, Eli… ELI WAIT!”

But she’s still pretending. And she’s gone.

The Scoop gets activated. 

For a second, Michael’s body doesn’t move. He can’t do this anymore. Elizabeth is the last string. 

Doesn’t he deserve to die? He always thought that he'd be ready to die in one of these places. After all, isn’t he kind of dead already?

He has spent the last years of his life surrounded by corpses and ghosts, by shadows and nightmares. Trying not to feel, trying not to think, disassociating himself from reality.

Michael Afton had been dead for years.

That’s why he’s so surprised when he starts to move and find a way out, even if he knows it’s impossible. His left arm is still bleeding, he can barely move it, he’s tired, but he has to keep going.

And the weirdest part is that he’s not thinking about Jeremy or the promise he made to Charlie or fixing his father’s mistakes. 

He just wants to live. 

He wants to keep eating the pancakes from the dinning. He wants to see the next Star Trek show and finish The Immortal & the Restless. He wants to buy a new sketch notebook.

The reasons may not seem a lot, but those are things that make him happy, that make him who he is, and he keeps adding more while trying to escape.

He wants to see his mother again. He wants to cook his uncle Henry a recipe he saw some time ago. He wants to wake up next to Jeremy every morning. 

There’s a misconception about wishes and how they work. One would think that, seconds before his death, Michael would wish to live another day to fix his mistakes, but people are more than their errors. 

In his last moments, Michael’s wishes are for himself. If a person can’t be a bit selfish before his death, then when? 

Michael is not a corpse. 

Michael is alive.

The Scooper looms over him, getting closer, and Michael closes his eyes. 

But the impact never comes. 

“Michael, Michael! Please answer! Please don’t be dead!”

He opens his eyes, part of him fearing that this is just an illusion created by his mind. But it isn’t.

Jeremy is there, trying to free him from the chair. 

He’s too confused to ask, but the laugh comes easily to his lips, the same as the tears.

Of course Jeremy wouldn’t stay at home waiting for him. How could he think otherwise? Hadn’t he been complaining about how Jeremy doesn’t have survival instinct for the whole week?

“Oh god, please say something.”

“You’re an idiot,” it’s the only thing Michael can say that makes sense. The tears are now running down his face. Jeremy stops for a moment to look at Michael. He brushes his cheek, like he hasn’t seen him in ages, and wipes out some of the tears. 

“For a moment, I thought I lost you,” Jeremy breaths in relief. 

Michael leans to the contact. 

“Thank you. Thank you for coming for me.”

“You don’t need to thank me, love,” Jeremy says, and god, this is not helping Michael to stop crying. 

“How did you find me?”

“It wasn’t easy, that’s for sure. It took me some time, being annoying as fuck and I couldn’t type what gift basket I wanted so now the company is going to send us exotic butter.”
“I like butter.”

Michael would blame this out of hand comment on the blood loss and the near death experience. 

Jeremy gets him out of the chair, but has to hold him so Michael won’t end on the floor. After all the adventures he had tonight, his legs aren’t working anymore. He’s not even sure how he’s still awake, taking into account the horrible pain. Also, he’s sure he has a contusion. 

“Don’t worry. I’ve got this,” Jeremy kisses his forehead, and Michael believes him.

They start to walk, and until that moment, Michael hadn’t noticed that what stopped the Scoop was that Bonnie had literally stopped the machine with his bare hands. His first instinct is to run away from the animatronic, but Jeremy seems to have no problem walking towards him.

“We have to go, now,” he tells Bonnie, and the animatronics nods.

…

…what the fuck is going on?

They get out of the Scooping Room, only for Michael to see that a war had broken out in the auditorium. 

The lights are on, and the old animatronics are…fighting the funtimes? Yep, that’s what it looks like. He asks himself if he is not actually dead, because this is too difficult to understand.

One of the Bidybab tries to catch them, but Jeremy, who for some reason has a bat, hits it in the head and sends it flying to the other side of the room.

Oh, he’s angry. When Michael recovers from this, he’s in big trouble.

“Kids, we’re leaving!” Jeremy yells them. 

To Michael’s surprise, the animatronics follow them towards the exit, making sure that no funtime is able to catch them. It would be pretty difficult, taking into account that Ballora has lost a leg, Funtime Foxy is face down on the floor with his head smashed and someone put BonBon inside of Freddy’s mouth.

…Yeah, Michael is going to assume this is a scene caused by the blood loss and not think about it at all. 

They reach the elevator and Jeremy presses the button with ease. 

When they finally get out, with four animatronics behind them, Michael can’t believe they did it. 

They…they really did it. 

He rests his head against Jeremy’s shoulder, and he’s about to tell him something when a new voice interrupts the scene.

“What the…?”
Henry Emily is in front of them. 

His mouth is open, and his eyes go from looking at the four giant animatronics behind them. to Jeremy and Michael, and repeat. He’s out of words, but that’s fair. 

This scene is bizarre, to say the least.

“Took you long enough!” Jeremy screams at Henry. Wait, do they know each other?
“I don’t have a car. I had to call a taxi.”

The six of them look behind Henry, where the taxi driver, with his eyes wide open and the look of trauma on his eyes, slowly rises the window of his seat and drives away before someone asks for a ride back to town. 

“We can explain,” Michael assures Henry.

And then, he finally passes out. 

Chapter Text

Michael sits in the co-pilot seat, recently awoken. 

Jeremy is driving, his knuckles are white from grabbing the steering wheel. Henry is in the backseat, squeezed between Freddy and Bonnie, and Foxy and Chica are sitting on the cargo of the truck. 

Michael is confused for a moment, until he remembers the bizarre rescue missing and how, for some reason, Jeremy came to save him with four animatronic and they kicked the funtimes asses.

And then Henry appeared. 

“Where are we going?” is the first thing he asks, which apparently is the first thing someone said in this whole journey. He sees Henry slightly jump at the sound of his voice.

“Mr. Emily’s house. I was going to drive to the hospital, but he said that he’s friends with a doctor that can take a look at your arm,” Jeremy quickly explains. He bites his lips, and Michael doesn’t know if he’s frustrated by him, Henry or the situation in general. “I guess it is not so bad. We afford the hospital bill and don’t have to explain why the heck your arm looks like that.”

Oh, yeah, that’ll be great. Michael doesn’t want to say to the doctors: ‘ You see, the spirit of my sister is now possessing a 6 foot tall animatronic with a claw in her stomach and she grabbed me by the arm ’. 

Jeremy doesn’t say anything else, and that’s how Michael knows that he’s truly, incredibly mad at him. 

For once, the silence is suffocating. The pain in his left arm doesn’t make it easier. 

He’s slowly coming back to reality, and with it, the pain gets stronger and the memories of what happened more vivid. 

Michael closes his eyes, bites the interior of his mouth and tries not to think about it. 

Elizabeth didn’t try to kill him. That didn’t happen. That didn’t…

“Turn left at the next intersection,” Henry indicates. 

Michael looks at him using the rearview mirror. His uncle looks so uncomfortable, but anyone would be if you’re stuck between two animatronics possessed by kids. Michael can’t help but grin at Jeremy. 

“My car can hold four animatronics,” he says, still a bit delirious. Is his arm still bleeding? He looks down, and finds that someone used one of his hoodies, the one Jeremy was wearing, to wrap his arm. 

“Is still ugly as shit,” Jeremy mutters. 

“It is not,” Michael and Henry say, as the owner and former owner of this truck. 

“Whatever you say, love.”

He’s not getting more from Jeremy.

“Why is he calling you love?” Henry asks.

“How about we stop talking for a while?” Jeremy proposes. 

Bonnie leans in, making Henry jump again, and he turns on the radio. ‘Baby I love you’, which must be the new song of the summer or something, starts to play. Foxy hums along to the song, turning, somehow, the situation even more bizarre and uncomfortable. 

Half an hour later, they finally reach Henry’s house. 

“I have to bring the kids back to the pizzeria or Charlie is going to kill me. I’ll come back after I’ve dropped them,” Jeremy says, as if referring to the animatronics as ‘kids’ or the Puppet as ‘Charlie’ wasn’t rocking Henry’s world. “I’ll also make a stop to take some clean clothes.”

“Thanks,” Michael responds. He wants to add something more, but Jeremy nods and closes the door. 

“Did he just say Charlie?” Henry asks him once Jeremy is gone. He’s trying to open the door of the house, but his hands are trembling so much that it’s a difficult task. 

“I have a lot to tell you,” Michael summarizes the situation. He doesn’t know where to start, and the pain in his left arm is starting to kill him. “Since when you’re friends with a doctor?”

Henry finally opens the door and looks at Michael. He seems to catch the brief grin of pain on his lips. Henry’s face softness, when he says:

“After Evan’s incident, Charlie didn’t like hospitals, so I started to take her to a local clinic,” he explains. Michael tries to not remember Charlie, only six years old, waiting in the hospital room to get some news from Evan. She had insisted on going there because Elizabeth was there, and she had sat by his sister’s side, taking her hand, until a doctor came and told them that Evan wasn’t going to make it. “Why don’t I call him so he takes care of those injuries while I make some tea and then you tell me what’s going on?” 

Michael nods in agreement, trying to not show how much he likes the idea. 

They enter the house, and it is like coming back to a childhood that he thought was long lost. The walls have the same ochre color, and the red rug that Michael hated so much as a kid because it always made him trip was still there. 

There was a piano in a corner, with photos of Charlie and Sam at different points of their childhood. 

Henry makes the call, while Michael stays in the middle of the living room, holding his left arm in fear. He doesn’t want to stain the floor with blood, and he doesn’t know where to sit. 

When Henry finishes, he guides Michael towards the dining table, which is full of what seems like lawsuits and legal contracts and shit like that.

“Sorry, it’s been a while since I had any visits,” Henry apologizes, but Michael couldn’t care less about the mess. 

Ten minutes later, they hear the doorbell.

Honestly, Michael didn’t know that Henry had friends. It’s not that Henry is an unfriendly guy- on the contrary, Henry is someone that, despite everything, is still able to show the same warmth and friendliness to anyone who needs it. But he’s also pretty weird, in the sense that he has a bit of an obsession with animatronics, isn’t the best at social clues and, until a year ago, his best friend was a serial killer. 

He is pretty surprised when at the other side of the door there’s a man in his fifties with an annoyed look.

“It’s 6 A.M,” it’s the only thing he says before entering the house like he lives there. Okay, fine, he’s Henry’s friend. Only a friend would complain like that but actually appear at 6 A.M to help with whatever was necessary.

Henry awkwardly apologizes, and they exchange some words that Michael doesn’t try to catch. Then, the doctor looks at him, then at Henry, then he pinches his nose. 

“Michael, this is Dr. Wilson.”
Michael nods in response, because if he tries to talk he’s sure he’s going to scream. He’s out of adrenaline and the pain is growing every second. 

“Hello, Michael. I’ve heard a lot from you,” Wilson says. He sits in front of him, and leaves the bag at his side. He looks tired, and there are bags under his eyes, but the sour face he had with Henry has been replaced with a friendly demeanor. “Let’s take a look, shall we?”

He starts by taking out from his botequim a pair of scissors and cutting Michael’s bloody shirt. 

Dr. Wilson is pretty good at keeping a poker face, so much that Michael doesn’t know if the injuries are not that bad or if he’s about to lose an arm. He questions him about the pain, confirms that there’s no broken bones and asks Henry to bring him towels and water. 

Michael has to bite his tongue so he doesn’t scream when Dr. Wilson starts to clean his injuries. The skin around his bruises is starting to get purple and it reaches a point when he can’t feel his fingers. 

In reality, as bad time as Michael is having, his face barely flinches when the cloth brushes against his skin, to the point that Henry fears that  Michael isn’t feeling anything.

Before Dr. Wilson starts to stitch him up (“ What the hell have you been doing kid this wound almost reaches the bone is a miracle that your arm is still working jesus christ ”), he asks Michael:

“Do you drink?”
“No,” Michael answers between his teeth. He had seen his father drunk too many times, so if he drinks, it is only one beer. He wishes he had something stronger right now, thought, something that would make this more bearable.

“The pain relievers are going to take some time to take effect and, I’m not gonna lie, this is going to hurt.”

Michael nods again, trying to stop his right hand from trembling. 

He wishes Jermey was here. 

Henry takes his hand, and Michael holds it like it is the only thing keeping him sane. 

It hurts, it hurts, it hurts.

Why did Michael have to go to Circus Baby’s? Is he stupid? God, if he only hung up to his father and stayed in bed with Jeremy he wouldn’t be here right now! 

When Dr. Wilson finishes and gives Michael the pain killers, he takes them without second doubt. After that, he binds up Michael’s arm in clean bandages and puts it in a cast. 

“Change the bandages once per day. Come back to my clinic in three days. If you call tomorrow morning we’ll give you an appointment,” he seems unsure about the next, but he finally gives Michael a tiny orange bottle. “Take one when you wake up and another one before sleep. If you’re still in pain, call the clinic and we’ll change the medication.”

Michael nods again. He doesn’t know how much this is going to cost, but he hopes Henry’s the one taking care of the bill, because his salary at Freddy’s does not cover this. 

Henry accompanies his friend to the door, but before leaving, Wilson turns towards his friend and says:

“I’m not even going to ask what happened, because you’re probably not going to answer, but this better be the last time I find that boy in that condition,” Wilson makes it clear. “I know you aren’t going to change, but I ask you to be better than this and don’t drag him to your self destructive party. You’re the only thing he has.”

Henry doesn’t know how to take that. Wilson is aware that Henry is nothing more than a tragedy waiting to happen, but he said that he’ll make him company until that moment. 

“I’ll take care of him. I don’t want him to get hurt, either,” Henry assures.

Wilson’s gaze relaxes a bit.

“I know you don’t. But be careful, Henry.”

Wilson leaves, and Henry closes the door, not sure about what to do now. 

Michael is sitting at the table, staring at it with a gone look. 

“Do you want some hot chocolate?” Henry proposes. Michael nods, but he doesn’t seem to register what he’s saying.

Henry goes to the kitchen and prepares some chocolate for the two of them. What is he supposed to say now? He wants an explanation for tonight, but he’s not sure about how to start the conversation. 

The clock ticks, the chocolate is ready, and Henry is still thinking about what to say when he comes back to the living room and sees something that he isn’t expecting.

Michael is crying. 

Henry has only seen him cry once before- four years ago, when he received a phone call about an incident in Fazbear’s and, when he got there, Michael was sitting on the stage, the Foxy mask still on his face, with blood on his hands and the police going around.

Later, Henry would discover that, after the initial shock, Michael tried to get Evan out of Fredbear’s mouth.

“I don’t even know what to say” Michael utters, and there’s something about his voice, about how broken and lost it sounds, that makes him feel even more guilty. “All this time I thought that my father ended up like this because of what I’ve done, but it’s not true. If not me, I’m sure he would’ve used something else as his excuse to do what he did. And I thought that, once I knew this, I’ll finally stop feeling guilty. But it’s still there. The fact that my father is a monster doesn’t change that I killed Evan. And it hurts so much, I...I…”

Feeling, sometimes, is the worst of curses. 

If you detach yourself from reality, you’re closing the door to the good things, but it also means that the bad things can catch you in their trap. 

Michael is now assaulted by everything that he had been ignoring for the past years: his feelings for Jeremy, the happiness when he saw Charlie the other night, the pride when he finishes a drawing- but he’s also feeling all that he has been ignoring, those shadows that sometimes sneak out through the cracks of the door, a door that’s now open. 

“I want my brother back. I want my sister back. I miss them. I miss my mom. I don’t want to be alone anymore, but I feel like I don’t deserve it. Why, after all I did, I’m still alive, and they’re dead?”

Henry sits by his side and leaves the chocolate over the table. 

“I’ve been asking myself a similar question. Why didn’t he kill me, instead of them?” he admits. Every day, he wakes up wishing that he was the one dead, instead of his kids. He’s never going to recover from that feeling, the same way he’s never going to be able to heal that wound. “Unfortunately, that’s how life works. As much as we want to think that it’s fair and moral, the truth is that it is arbitrary and chaotic. There’s not a deep meaning under what happened that day, it was not a divine punishment for your actions- but there’s meaning in what you do after that,” Henry puts a hand over Michael’s shoulder and tries to smile. This poor boy has been through way too much, and he’s not making the most positive speech ever, but that’s because he’s dealing with the same sentiment. If he could do it, Henry would end himself to fix his mistakes, to stop what William did, and he senses that Michael is the same. After what happened tonight, Henry’s afraid for Michael, because he doesn’t want him to end like that. He tries to remember what Wilson told him one time, a life advice that Henry didn’t apply to himself, but he wishes Michael would take. “There’s not such a thing as poetic death. It’s a tragedy, no matter with how many beautiful colors you want to paint it with. Death doesn’t atone your sins, but life does. Staying alive, so you can be better, try better- that’s change, that’s meaningful.”

Michael sobs become louder, and Henry does something he should’ve done a while ago. He hugs Michael, and lets the kid hold onto him and hide in his shoulder from all the horrors of their reality. 

Is this how a father should hug his son? Michael can count with one hand the times he hugged William, and he never felt the same level of comfort or tranquility that Henry’s hug gives him.

Maybe because it’s been too long since an adult in his life showed that he cared about him, or maybe it's just that Henry is able to love his family unconditionally and would gladly protect them from the monsters under the bed.

“I’m…”

“Don’t say you’re sorry,” Henry interrupts him, guessing what Michael is going to say. “You didn’t do anything to me. I’m the one who should apologize. I was so centered in my own grief and guilt that I didn’t see what you were going through. I’m sorry if you thought I didn’t care, because I do..”

“I thought you hated me,” Michael admits between sobs. That makes Henry hold him even tighter. 

“I don’t. I will never hate you.”

When he saw Michael, he didn’t remember William- father and son looked a lot alike, but he knew Michael since he was a kid, so for him they were completely different. 

William liked to present himself impeccably, with his ironed shirts and purple ties and short manageable hair. He wanted people to pay attention to him, to see him as a charismatic guy able to charm his way with people.

Michael couldn’t be more different. This boy hadn’t had a hair cut in a while, and he never cared about his messy look. He hated ties, to the point that Henry had only seen him wearing one at Evan’s funeral, and he didn’t care about what people thought about him. 

No matter that they had the same blue eyes, angular face or brown hair, they were too different. 

What Henry saw when he looked at Michael was a lonely kid that had lost his family, a loss that, maybe, if he had done something earlier, he could’ve avoided. And that guilt was the reason why he couldn’t stand to be in the same room with him.

A mistake that now he’s trying to correct, before is too late. 

He breaks the hug, just a bit, enough to look at this lost kid when he says, with all the conviction he’s able to gather:

“Listen to me, Michael. No matter what, I’m glad you’re still alive. You’re the only good thing that’s left.”

Michael isn’t ready to hear those words- not now, not never. Part of him is so convinced that he doesn’t deserve forgiveness that he doesn't believe Henry, but for once, that part of him is losing. 

The same feeling he had during those brief moments under the Scoop come back. 

He wants to have a life. Something that he can build and his father can’t destroy. 

“ My parents were never good, but I want to be. I want to be kind, even if they never taught me how to. So I’m more like the people I care about than I’ll ever be like them, ” Michael remembers what Jeremy told him a few days ago.

He wants to be kind. His father never taught him about forgiveness or trust, but he can learn. So he’s more like the people he loves than he’ll ever be like him. 

After the tearful conversation, Michael is ready to talk about what happened.

He grabs the cup with his right hand and brings it to his lips. He always thought that being hungry before his shifts was some type of anxiety response to everything that’s happening. Now that he thinks about it, maybe it was his subconscious trying to anchor him to reality, his way of remembering him, after spending six hours in that hell, that he’s still alive and needs to eat like any other human being. 

“It all started on Monday…”
Michael spends the next half an hour telling Henry about his and Jeremy’s discoveries. 

When he mentions Charlie, the shadow over Henry’s eyes only deepens. Then, Michael reaches to the fourth night, and Henry raises his head.

“You what!?” he asks, and Michael doesn’t know if he’s too surprised about this development or worried about his and Jeremy’s lack of survival instinct. 

“Yeah, I was also confused at the beginning,” Michael adds. The painkillers are starting to take effect, so he doesn’t feel like he wants to tear his arm apart anymore. That’s nice.

Under his uncle’s perplexed look, Michael tells him about the film night. 

And yet, the brief relief that Henry feels hearing that part of the story is shattered when Michael starts to talk about Circus Baby’s: the animatronics, the cameras, Elizabeth, his father’s notes…

They stay in silence for a while after that. 

“Did you know about…”

“Sammy? Yes, I did,” Henry interrupts him, and Michael is glad, because he didn’t want to finish that question. “Sara called me two months ago, telling me that Sam had run away. She suspected he wanted to come to see Charlie, we…we didn’t tell him that she was dead. We didn’t know how to. The next thing I knew, the police were in Fazbear’s, making a report on a missing kid. Cassidy,” Henry makes a pause. A solitary tear runs down his cheek, and he closes his eyes, trying to keep the pain away. It’s impossible. “That was how we were going to name him. But Sara’s dad passed away, and we named the kid after him. The moment I heard that name, I knew it was my son, and that he was dead.”

He will never forget the smile on William’s face when he asked him about what happened. How the man who for so long he thought was his best friend looked at him, without any guilt, and told him it was a gift. 

“They’re one with your creations now. You don’t have to worry about custody agreements or them growing up and being a disappointment. They’re yours. And they’re perfect.”

His stomach twists in agony. 

“My father is going to pay for what he did.”

Henry doesn’t feel better after those words. 

“Is your arm better?” he asks. Michael nods. “Great. Now, can you explain to me how that guy ended up with four animatronics saving you from the Scoop?”

“I honestly don’t know,” Michael answers. His ears get a bit red with the mention of Jeremy. “I know that he talked with the animatronics when he fell asleep in Freddy’s, but I think I missed a major development.”

Henry shakes his head, but the corners of his lip raise an inch. 

“He called me and gave me a full speech about how I was acting like an idiot, but I didn’t tell him where Circus Baby’s was. I’m glad he ignored my warnings and went anyway, though.”
“Yeah, he’s really bad at the whole ‘follow instructions and wait’ thing.”

Michael can’t help but smile. He was an idiot for asking Jeremy to stay behind. He wants to keep him safe, but Jeremy has shown him more than once that he can take care of himself. 

“He means a lot to you, right?”

Michael nods, too lost in his own thoughts to try and hide the stupid lovesick smile on his face when he talks about Jeremy. When he notices that, well, this is too obvious, he glances at Henry’s reaction, a bit afraid of what his uncle would say. 

But Henry only gives a sip to his cup and smiles back at him.

“I’m glad you found someone who cares so much about you,” he says, and Michael doesn’t need any more words to see that Henry understands, and that there’s no judgment in his words, only honesty and joy. 

“I’m not sure if he wants to stay with me, after what I did,” Michael fears. He taps in the cup with his good hand, nervous. “When I heard my father’s voice all my fears came back. I was so scared that I left him behind and betrayed his trust. I told myself it was to protect him.”

“We always tell ourselves that,” Henry mutters. He and Sara used the same excuse to not tell Sammy about Charlie. ‘ It would be the best for him, it’s not the right time, we know better’ . But those were just excuses created because, the ones who weren’t ready to deal with reality, were them. “It’s easier to make a bad decision when you tell yourself that you’re doing it to protect others. But partnership is about staying at each other's side, through the bad and the good.”

“I trust him,” Michael assures him. Because it’s true. He trusts Jeremy. “But how can I say that I love him, if I let him get into this whole mess?”

“I think that that’s his decision to make, not yours.” 

Michael bites the interior of his mouth. For years, he had been telling himself that he’s the reason why everyone he loves is dead, and if Jeremy stays by his side, he’ll meet the same destiny.

He doesn’t want to think like that anymore, but it’s hard, when it is basically engraved in his brain. 

“Why don’t you get a bit of sleep?” Henry proposes. “The guest's room is at the end of the hallway. You can rest there.”

“But Jeremy…”
“I’ll wake you up when he comes back. You lost a lot of blood, and the painkillers are going to make you sleepy. We all need a bit of rest after what happened.”

Michael isn’t aware of how tired he is until Henry mentions the word “sleep”. He wants to talk to Jeremy, but his eyelids are closing against his will, and he fears that he’s going to fall asleep in the chair. 

Michael finishes his cocoa and takes his uncle’s offer. The room is almost empty, with only a bed, a closet and a work desk. 

Henry assures him that he’s going to stay awake until Jeremy comes back, and Michael falls into the bed and closes his eyes, trying to get some sleep.

His body is not working anymore, sinking in the comfort of the bed like is the only thing he needs, but his mind is still active. 

This bed is not his usual mattress on the floor, the space behind it’s a perfect hiding spot. He tries to sleep, but his instincts are still on edge, and Baby’s green eyes haunt him everytime he closes his eyes. 

He doesn’t know how long he’s like this- sweating even if he took out his bloodied shirt and trembling thinking about what hides in the shadows. 

Then, he hears the doorbell, someone enters the house, and the relief washes his panic away. 

Jeremy is here. 

He can hear his and Henry’s voices, but they’re too far away to understand what they’re saying. Silence comes a bit after, and the next moment the door opens and Jeremy is in the room. 

He doesn’t turn on the lights, and he keeps his mouth shut, probably thinking that Michael is asleep. Jeremy leans against the door, closes his eyes and inhales and exhales, trying to calm down his own anxiety.

This is what makes Michael able to order his body around again and, despite the aching and the complaining, he sits up. 

“You okay?”

“Sorry, I didn’t want to wake you up,” the truth is that he wanted to make sure that Michael was alive. Stupid, he knows- he is the one who took Michael out of that place, but the paranoia doesn’t leave his head. 

“I can’t sleep. I thought I could, but I can’t stop thinking about…” Michael’s words trade off. 

“I don’t think I can sleep, either,” Jeremy says. He sits on the edge of the bed.

The silence it’s too heavy, and neither of them know how to start the conversation. Jeremy had been ranting to the animatronics all the way to Circus Baby’s about how mad he was Michael, but the anger had died down the moment he saw him half dead in that chair. 

He isn’t sure how he’s feeling right now. 

He’s still angry, and frustrated, but also sad, and afraid, and his heart is still beating so fast when he sees Michael, even after all that, and it doesn’t make sense and is stupid and is too much. 

Jeremy, who’s known for not shutting up, doesn’t have words. 

And Michael, bless his moment of understanding, sees the conflict in his brown eyes and decides to take the first step. 

“I shouldn’t have gone alone to Circus Baby’s.”
It’s not the best start, but it is enough to make Jeremy sigh.

“That was the most stupid thing you’ve ever done.”
“I know,” Michael agrees. He wants to take Jeremy’s hand, but he’s afraid that he’s going to reject it or make the situation more uncomfortable, so he keeps it to himself. “But not because I went there. That’s just stupid. The real stupid big mistake was leaving you behind and asking you to wait.”
“I’m not good at waiting,” Jeremy says. “Michael, I can’t continue like this. I can’t see you running towards the danger but leaving me behind because you want to protect me. How do you think I felt when I read that letter? I was lost, and angry, and I kept thinking that you were going to die. Don’t you think I want to protect you too? Sometimes I would love to tie you to a chair to make sure that you can’t go back to the pizzeria, because I’m so terrified that sometimes I feel like I’m going crazy.”

“I messed up,” Michael utters. He grows the strength necessary to take Jeremy’s hand between his and look him in the eyes when he continues. His mouth is dry, he’s not sure about anything, except for one thing. “And I can’t promise I won’t mess up again. I’m…I’m still working on it. But I’ll try. Everyday. Because I want you to stay, Jeremy. I feel bad just asking you about it, but I’ll try and make you happy, and stay by your side, and come back to Circus Baby’s and burn down that location, if you ask me to do it,” Jeremy starts to think that this is not an example and Michael is actually a bit of an arsonist. Michael leans closer and brushes his hair away, then caresses his cheek. “I want you to stay, and I’ll do the same thing. If you want.”

Jeremy closes his eyes. 

This fucking man. He can’t just say things like this, because Jeremy can’t even pretend to be mad at him anymore. 

He can’t change Michael, and he doesn’t want to do it. As much as he wants to change their circumstances, wishes that they were just two normal boys meeting in a summer job and falling in love, that is not their reality. 

He can just back away and leave, or accept Michael and stay by his side. 

And he wants to stay. 

“But before you make a decision, I need to tell you something more,” Michael adds, and his voice gets weaker. “It’s about Evan.”

“I know,” Jeremy admits, so quickly that he almost interrupts him. Michael tilts his head in confusion, and then the blood drains from his face. “I know about the bite of 83’.”

“And you still came for me?” Jeremy looks at him like he’s the most stupid person on this planet. Which, at this point, Michael is fairly sure that he is. “I was sure you’ll hate me.”
“It’s…difficult to process, I’ll give you that. But I don’t hate you. That’s impossible. In any case, I’m mad at Sam for telling me. He didn’t have the right to.”

“Wait, Sam?” Michael repeats. Did Jeremy also talk with Sam!? How many dead kids was Jeremy communicating with!? “Sam told you?”

Thank god Henry made Jeremy a brief summary about Michael’s discoveries before going to bed or this conversation would have so many “wait you know about this?”.
“He was trying to pull the ‘oh, you wouldn’t care about him if you knew what he did’, and then snitched. His plan failed, of course, but still. That kid has to work in his anger.”

This explanation only makes Michael more confused. Henry told him that it was Jeremy the one who called him, but holy shit, what exactly happened during the day Michael was away?

“How did you find me?” he finally asks. He’s still sweating, but at least he’s not trembling anymore. 

“Charlie told me where Circus Baby’s was. And about Cassidy’s real identity, that was on me. What I didn’t expect was that the kids would want to help, although it wasn’t a bad surprise. The bat wouldn’t have been enough.”

“You went to Freddy’s, alone, at night, and were able to convince the kids to help you come and save me?”

“Well, duh,” Jeremy answers, again, like what Michael is asking doesn’t make sense. 

After he read in his father's journal, the idea sounds almost impossible. The two energies that make a posesion possible, Agony and Remnant, didn’t act like that. Remnant was the power of the memories of the soul, but usually it kept bad memories that made the animatronics be on edge- while Agony was the power of the emotions and the pain, which would also make an animatronic attack. 

“There’s something more,” Michael continues. He never told anyone about it, because it’s so twisted that, after seeing it, he tried his best to forget it. He could, for the most part, but those memories would resurface in his sleep, becoming the nightmare he was so afraid of. “When I talked to my father, he asked me what made me snitch to the police. I told him I found out about Evan. By that I don’t mean that there’s something more about his death, that, unfortunately, is on me. But it didn’t end there.”
“You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to,” Jeremy assures him. “But I promise that, whatever it is, I won’t run away. I won’t, Michael.”
And he believes him. That’s why he’s doing it. 

He’s tired of hiding details from Jeremy and giving him information bit by bit. If Jeremy knows the whole story, things could be easier. Things are always easier when Jeremy is there.

“At the beginning, I didn’t think too much about it. My father was always a workaholic, so after Evan’s death, it wasn’t weird that he spent so much time working. I wasn’t able to stay home, either- any excuse was good to go out, and I thought that my father was doing something similar,” Michael starts to explain. “I sometimes went to the cemetery to visit Evan. And there was this time that I saw that the earth had been removed. I didn’t give it a second thought at the time. Not until Elizabeth and Charlie’s deaths. I was searching through some of the files he had in his study at home, and I found blueprints for a head. I thought it was for an animatronic, it sure seemed like it was a rough design for Balloon Boy, but it looked too human. Then, kids started to go missing in Freddy’s, and one night, when I came back to the cemetery, the earth had been removed again,” Jeremy suspects where the story is going, and if he’s right, twisted is not the word he would use to describe it. He doesn’t think there’s a world morbid enough for it. Michael tries to blink to keep the tears away, he had already cried enough for one day, but it’s impossible. He cleans his eyes and continues. “Hell, I’m not even sure why I did it. There was not an irrefutable clue pointing at it. But I did it anyway. Evan’s body was there, but it was wrong . He had been dead for four years, but it was…”
Michael holds his stomach, unable to continue. 

At that moment, he wasn’t sure about what his father was trying to do. The journal was the confirmation he needed. 

William Afton tried, indeed, to put his son back together, in the most horrible, psychopathic way Michael could think of: experimenting with his son’s body and animatronics parts to fix what was broken and bring him back.

Suddenly, Jeremy embraces him in a strong hug that is enough to make Michael start to cry again. 

Jeremy has nothing to say- there’s nothing to say to that story. He just wants to hold Michael. 

Hold him so tight that he could make him forget all that he saw, drive away the nightmares and the memories and every trace of William Afton that is still in this world. 

Michael lies his head in the space between Jeremy’s neck and his shoulder, grabbing his boyfriend by the shirt. 

As always, he welcomes Jeremy’s warmth. 

They stay like that for what feels like hours. Little by little, Michael’s breath comes back to normal, and with the panic gone and Jeremy’s heart beating so near him, the shadows don't seem as threatening as before. 

“Are you sure you don’t want to leave?”

“I’m sure. You already warned me about what could happen, and I decided to stay,” he reminds Michael. He takes his boyfriend’s hand and puts it around his waist, so Michael can hold him even closer. “And I never regretted it. Not when I ran into Foxy in the hall or when those funtimes freaks tried to kill me. Because I love you more than I fear whatever could happen.”

That’s it. Jeremy has said it, and there’s no turning back. 

Michael’s lips fall open. He quickly seals them shut again, and his ears and face are flushing red. He seems so lost with that declaration, even more than when Jeremy turns the Puppet’s box upside down. 

“Say it again,” Michael requests, and the sudden petition not only makes Jeremy chuckle, but also gets Michael embarrassed, like the words have left his mouth without his permission. 

Jeremy accommodates himself between Michael’s legs, making sure that he’s not crushing his left arm, and holds his face with his hands like he’s holding the whole world.

“I love you, Michael.”

Michael leans in and kisses him, his heart racing and at the same time not. They had kissed the day before, but he feels like that was ages ago. 

They stay like that for what feels like hours, until they lie down in the bed, Michael face up to not crush his bad arm, and Jeremy snuggled up at his right and with an arm resting over his wrist. 

His eyelids start to fade, and he plays a bit with Jeremy’s hair, until he finally falls into a deep sleep.

Chapter Text

It’s easy to forget about reality when you are in bed, with the person you love holding you like you’re the most precious thing in the world and the painkillers are doing a good job to keep the ache on your left arm at minimum. 

Michael can’t pretend that he has another life, easier than all this, because he doesn’t really know what a normal life for someone of his age feels. How would it be to have the usual worries like college or finding his place in the world and all that, without a psychopath dad or dead kids trapped in animatronics or accidentally killing your little brother? 

Awesome, probably. 

Michael closes his eyes and snuggles against Jeremy, his boyfriend sleeping deeply with his mouth open.

How he got such a perfect man is a mystery for Michael. 

Jeremy shakes and gets closer to him, his head now resting against his torso. Michael chuckles, and Jeremy shakes again. This time he doesn’t move as much as before, but he closes his mouth and his eyes slowly open. 

“Good morning,” Michael smiles at him, but Jeremy is half asleep and he only gets a tiny ‘thank god your body is a freezer’ before snuggling against him. 

Michael gives him a few minutes, until Jeremy is unable to keep his eyes closed anymore and opens one to see if Michael is looking at him. Michael cups Jeremy’s face with his right hand and leans in to kiss him, which makes his boyfriend grumble.

“Morning breath,” he complains, but he doesn’t retreat or tries to stop Michael from kissing him again. Jeremy rolls his eyes and puts a hand over his chest. “You really have to be head over heels in love with me.”

“What have I ever done to suggest that I’m not?” Michael asks back, because seriously, he’s surprised that his boyfriend didn’t see earlier how much he likes him. Even when he wasn’t ready to accept his feelings, the way he looked at Jeremy like an enamored idiot should have been enough to trigger all the alarms. 

But apparently, Jeremy hasn’t caught up to that information, at least not to the full extent of his feelings, because his eyes are wide open and his mouth is hanging in shock. That’s when Michael remembers that, oh, wait, Jeremy had been the only one who confesed last night. He had been too perplexed at the idea of someone being able to love him, and excited because that person was Jeremy, that he hadn’t said almost anything. 

Michael wants to bury himself five feet underground.

“Did you just…?” 

“Yes,” Michael interrupts his boyfriend’s stupid question and kisses him again to shut him up. 

This time, Jeremy doesn’t complain or talks back, but puts his hands over Michael’s neck and drowns in the kiss.

Michael is a bit of a sloppy kisser, but what he lacks in technique and experience he compensates with enthusiasm. Plus, Michael is a quick learner, and Jeremy can’t help but get on top of his boyfriend and deepens the kiss.

Michael moans against his mouth, and Jeremy gets a bit happy to be able to surprise him like this. 

The only thing stopping Jeremy from unzipping Michael’s pants is the fact that Henry is upstairs and they have to confront a serial killer who happens to be his boyfriend’s dad.

But, his mind thinks as he moves down Michael’s neck, shouldn’t they enjoy this moment?

Unfortunately, his boyfriend stops him the moment he teases with the end of his shirt.

“Don’t be rude, love” Jeremy complains in his ear, and Michael has to use all his strength to keep himself calm. 

“God, you’re horny.”

Jeremy frowns and bites his neck in retaliation.

“I know we have to get up, but I don’t want to,” Jeremy groans. The clock says it’s almost seven, and they need to…Jeremy isn’t even sure what they’re going to do, but they have to do something .

Michael brushes the hair off his face.

“I don’t want to either, darling. But hey, we made it to this point. We’re almost at the end.”

“I’m not used to seeing you be the hopeful one,” Jeremy says. He takes Michael’s hand and interwinds their fingers together. “It’s scary.”

“Fuck you.”

“That’s better,” Jeremy chuckles, playing with his boyfriend’s fingers.

Michael wishes they could stay like this forever. His father already ruined lots of things for him- his mental stability, his family and his childhood. If he also ruins his love and sex life Michael is going to send him to hell himself.

“After tonight, I promise we’re going to take some vacations.”
Jeremy chuckles. 

“Michael, we’re poor. ”

“Until we kill my dad and I get my inheritance. Then, we can go wherever you want.”

“You’re still on the will?”

Michael opens his mouth, then closes it, thinking about it. Jeremy laughs, and Michael glares at him.

“Shut up.”

Jeremy doesn’t stop laughing, and Michael considers kicking him out of the bed. 

Unfortunately, they have to get up, eventually. 

Henry is already in the kitchen, drinking coffee like it’s 7 AM and not almost 8 PM. They all have the schedules pretty fucked up, after this week. 

“How is your arm?” Henry asks him. 

“I think the painkillers are starting to lose effect,” Michael answers. He goes to make himself some coffee, but when he tries to open the cabinet to take a mug Jeremy steals it from him.

“You’re injured. Go sit, I’ll make breakfast for once.”
Michael complains, but Henry, that traitor, says:
“He’s right. You need to rest.”

Michael would think that Henry is worried about his well being if not for the smirk Jeremy and him are sharing.

He’s not sure he likes this new dynamic between them. 

Michael sits, pouting like a five year old kid, while his boyfriend uncovers the mystery of how to make a toast without burning it. When Jeremy burns the fourth one, Henry seems to regret his decision to let him cook. 

“Why don’t you let me do it?” he proposes, taking Jeremy’s place in breakfast duty. 

Jeremy sits by his boyfriend’s side, mad that he wasn’t able to make a miserable toast, and Michael laughs at his frowned eyebrows and murder look. He asks himself if this is what a normal life should be- bicker over stupid things and eat breakfast together.

A couple of minutes later, Henry leaves a plate full of toast on the table, and Michael and Jeremy have their coffees. 

The meal is…nice, taking into account the circumstances. Michael and Henry are more awkward, but Jeremy does a great job carrying the conversation and making them comfortable enough to interact at some points, especially Michael.

For half an hour, they don’t mention animatronics or William Afton- their conversation goes around the last episodes of The Immortal and the Restless (Michael is pretty sad that he missed them), Jeremy’s inability to cook and some anecdote about how Michael threw his shoe in Henry’s pool and ruined it.

“Those shoes were new. Clarissa almost kills me,” Henry explains. “Why did you hate shoes so much?”

“I don’t know I was seven!” 

Jeremy is laughing so hard that he has to hold his stomach. 

Michael can’t help but smile through his embarrassment. 

This is nice. 

As with all the things in Michael Afton’s life, nice moments are short and rare. 

Henry receives a call, and when he comes back to the kitchen, he has bad news.

“It was the insurance company. Apparently, they’ve been trying to contact me since last night. Someone broke into Freddy’s at three AM. Nothing was stolen, but…”
He doesn’t need to finish. They all know who was the one who broke into the pizzeria. 

The room falls into an intense silence. Henry bites his thumb, the nail almost non - existent because of the stress and anxiety. Not even Jeremy, who had been talking a lot a few minutes earlier, is able to start the conversation. Michael supposes it’s his turn to start.

They have to talk about it now. No more avoiding the subject. 

“It makes sense that he came back.  There's something more that he needs to do. The bodies…the bodies of the missing kids are in the animatronics,” he tells them. Jeremy and Henry look at him, horrified. There’s no other kind of reaction. “I should’ve figured it out sooner. He sends me, the security guard, to Circus Baby’s, so he has free access to the animatronics. Then, he goes to Freddy’s and gets rid of the evidence. He wasn’t expecting that the old models wouldn’t be there.”

Because who would take 6 foot tall killer machines on a road trip? Michael imagines his father’s face when he entered Parts & Service and discovered that, except for Golden Freddy, it was empty. 

Not even William Afton is ready for the wild card that is Jeremy Fitzgerald. 

“So he’s going to try and come back tonight,” Henry supposes. Even if he had closed the restaurant, there’s still people going around the pizzeria, like deliveries and the day guard (who, remember, is Jeremy, but he guesses that he’s not going to get in trouble for not making it to his shift).  “And we’ll be waiting for him.”

Neither of them like the idea of facing the monster that is William Afton, basically because, even if they’re three against one, William has experience and a lack of morals  that they don’t. 

They had, in total, a guy with only one good arm full of trauma, a fifty going to sixty year old man who’s also full of trauma, and Jeremy, who has a bat and also trauma, but for completely different reasons than the other two. 

“Not to be negative, but does someone else thinks that we’re a bit fucked?” Michael asks the other two. 

“It depends. The animatronics…are on our side, or on his side?” Henry questions. Both of them look at Jeremy, the one who has more information about the kids.

“I like to think that they’re on our side,” Jeremy answers. He crosses his arms, unsure. “But I don’t know how they would react if William Afton is in the building. Charlie has access to the animatronics that are not possessed, and Sam is capable of influencing the other souls to make them more violent, but they’re also afraid of William. If they didn’t kill him the moment he went to the building, then maybe he has a trick under his sleeve that we don’t.”
So, Michael is right. They’re fucked. 

“We need a plan,” Michael says. He brushes his hair off his face, frustrated with all this situation. “And we’re not going to solve anything by sitting here and repeating what we already know.”

“Then, we’re lucky I’ve got to finish this on time,” Henry says and, in a dramatic gesture that makes Jeremy understand where Sam got his theatrical antics, he takes out what looks like little chips. “I’ve been working on these for a while now. They’re for the Toy Animatronics, and it cuts off their access to the criminal database and other external influences. Think about it as a new Night Mode. The Puppet wouldn’t be able to control them, but neither would William.”

Michael takes one of the chips between his fingers. He knows a lot about the internal mechanisms of the animatronics and how to repair missing parts, but this is something no security manual could teach him. 

“Are you sure you could install this?” 

Henry sighs and cleans his glasses with his shirt. 

“Yeah. It wouldn’t work with the others, but it could give us an advantage if the Puppet loses control.” 

Michael doesn’t miss how Henry always says ‘the Puppet’ and not ‘Charlie’. His uncle probably is still processing the information. 

“So, that’s the plan?” Jeremy asks. “Install those things and pray that William Afton doesn’t kill us?”

“We need to get the bodies out,” Michael suddenly says. Henry and Jeremy look at him like he’s gone crazy. “Or, at least, we have to get the animatronics out. If they’re the evidence we need to get my father in prison, we can’t let him destroy them.”

“This is starting to sound like a ‘let’s split’ plan and I don’t like it,” Jeremy complains. He’s seen horror movies, he knows what happens when people split! 

“We can communicate with each other using the walkie talkies. Also, we need someone in the security cameras to inform us if something moves or weird things start to happen.”

Jeremy doesn’t need to see his boyfriend’s look to know that that person is him.

Just. Great.

“I’m starting to doubt your abilities to make plans, love.”

Michael takes his hand, and Jeremy can’t help but intertwine their fingers together. What are they exactly doing? God, this is barely a plan, this is a suicide mission! 

“There’s something more I need to say,” Michael seems nervous. He takes a deep breath, before saying: “I think that Evan’s soul is also in the pizzeria.”

Henry looks at the table, a shadow looming over his eyes. He’s not surprised by this fact, just hopeless. Michael repeats what he told Jeremy last night, about what his father had done to Evan. Henry’s horror and disgust towards his former friend grows with every new detail, until there’s no compassion or good memories- it’s all tainted and broken. 

“I…I remember something,” Jeremy says. He massages his forehead, like he’s trying really hard to remember and is going to make his head explode. “In one of the dreams, Charlie…I think, she told me that there was someone else hiding in the pizzeria. That part of the conversation is pretty blurry, like I…fuck, I can’t remember exactly what happened. I think I went to Parts & Services, and there was something there, but I…fuck, I can’t.”
“It’s fine, don’t press yourself,” Michael tells him.

He rests his hand over Jeremy’s shoulder and Jeremy smiles at him. They have to be really obvious, because when he remembers that they’re not alone in the room and looks at Henry, his uncle is drinking his coffee like this is not his business, but has a happy smile on his face that Michael interprets as: “ ah, young love ”. 

Michael coughs, his cheeks a bit red.

“We have a plan, then.”

A shitty plan, but a plan.

The first thing Jeremy does when he enters the pizzeria, is look around for the kids.

“Charlie? Sam?” he asks, but there’s no answer. He looks around, worried. Everything seems normal- the lights are working, the toy animatronics are in their usual place on the stage, but everything is too quiet. “Fritz? Gabriel? Suzie? Other Jeremy?” he tries, with no results. “I don’t like this.”

Michael agrees with him. 

Henry cleans his glasses again, trying to calm his nerves. Part of him is glad that he doesn’t have to face the ghost of his kids right away, especially Sam- the other part of him, the most mature and rational, is worried sick. 

“Maybe they don’t want to come out because I’m here,” he guesses. It’s not such an impossible idea. 

It took a bit for Jeremy to not be attacked by the animatronics, and he has nothing to do with the pizzerias or the Aftons. The miracle is that Henry doesn’t get killed in that precise instant by one of his creations. 

He wants to say something more, but he catches a figure in the corner of his eye and…

“Why is he looking at us like that?” 

Jeremy and Michael look at where he’s pointing. 

“Oh, that’s just Balloon Boy. He’s like that,” Michael answers.

“A pain in the ass,” Jeremy adds. 

Both seem really tired of that animatronic. Henry admits that it has a disturbing look. Why did he think that it was a good design? This is what happens when he lets William do whatever he wants!

He shrugs his head, trying to erase that line of thought. 

“I’m going to start with the toy animatronics,” he announces, tightening the grip over his bag. He hopes the plan works. 

Michael decides to make a quick stop in the Kid’s Cove, before heading towards Parts & Services. Whatever he does, it only takes a few minutes, and then he and Jeremy part towards the other side of the building.

“Are you sure you’re fine on your own?” Michael asks his uncle.

Henry had already opened the plate on Toy Bonnie’s back to start with the reprogramming. It seems safe, by now. The animatronics are not moving, and it should take him fifteen minutes with each one of them. 

“Don’t worry, Michael, I can take care of myself,” Henry assures him, but Michael doesn’t seem to believe him. “Even if you stayed, there’s nothing you can do to help, and I doubt we can fight three animatronics if they decide to wake up and attack.”

“I have a bat,” Jeremy reminds them. He already kicked one mini ballerina with it, he is ready to kick another animatronic if necessary. 

Henry appreciates the effort. 

“Go. I’ll be fine.”

Michael is still unsure, but he finally nods, letting him do his job. Jeremy approaches Henry, and with a serious look, says:
“Don’t die,” the serious tone makes the words seem like a threat. Jeremy stares at Henry, and he seems really mad. “You’re the only family Michael has left, and he needs you. Do not sacrifice yourself to pay for your mistakes or shit like that. You hear me?”

Henry doesn’t know what to answer, so he slowly nods. 

Jeremy nods back, and then he follows Michael down the left hall. There’s not a soul in the building, and taking into account that this is Freddy’s, the place where souls seem to be trapped for all eternity, it’s saying a lot. 

When they get to the door in Parts & Services, Michael's hands start to tremble.

“Jeremy, if something goes wrong, you need to know that-”

Jeremy grabs Michael’s face and presses his lips against his, not letting him finish. It’s a kiss a bit brute, at least at the beginning, and it doesn’t calm down. 

Michael puts his right hand over Jeremy’s wrist and brings him closer, if that possible, extending this moment all he can.

Jeremy doesn’t want to let go, either.

Not now. Not yet.

Fuck, they just started dating. They barely had two days to kiss each other, to memorize every corner or their bodies, to see the other smile like an idiot without having to hide their feelings. 

And, as much as they want to be optimistic, they know that there’s a chance of one of them not coming back. 

“Tell me what you were about to say when this is over,” Jeremy requests against Michael’s mouth. They’re leaning against each other, their foreheads touching. Jeremy caresses Michael’s cheeks, brushing his fingers against the scar on the chin. 

They kiss one more time before they split. 

Jeremy gets to the security office in record time and sits in his chair. His job is the easier of the three- he just has to check the cameras and make sure that everything is fine. 

“I’m in the office. How are you two?” he asks. He just left Michael, but he can’t help but go from one camera to the other, anxious. 

“ Fine, ” it’s Henry’s short answer. 

“I’m going to enter Parts & Services, ” Michael says. His voice is as stoic as ever, but Jeremy notices the little panic in his words. 

He’s the only one who doesn’t know shit about the inner mechanism of the animatronics, and he’s kind of regretting not paying attention to the orientation tapes. Not too much, because not giving a fuck saved him from getting brainwashed by the company, just enough to regret that he can’t assist Michael instead of sulking in the office. 

He changes to cam 09 to check on Henry, then to 12, then to 11, then to the one in Prize Corner, looking for the Puppet. The music box isn’t playing, but the giant gift is closed. He approaches the screen to take a better look at what’s going on. 

Where’s Charlie? Even if Henry is convinced that his kids are avoiding him, they need a helping hand.

Suddenly, Jeremy notices something. Something horrible that he should have seen before, but he was too focused on the Puppet to notice.

“Shit. SHIT!”. 

Jeremy reaches towards the walkie talkie.

“Balloon Boy isn’t-”

A childish laugh can be heard at the other side of the radio, then silence. Jeremy tries to contact Michael or Henry again, but the walkie talkie isn’t working, for some reason. He opens it, to discover that, somehow, the batteries are gone. 

The laugh returns, louder, but this time it comes from the office.

Jeremy raises his head and sees Balloon Boy in the corner of the room, his mocking smile making fun of him. In his right hand, instead of his usual sign, he has two batteries. 

“You stupid motherfucker-”

Jeremy takes his bat, but before he can do something, the lights on Freddy’s go out.

It’s been some time since Henry had to work with animatronics, and his hands aren’t moving as fast as they were supposed to. He thanks his muscle memory for balancing that out.

He’s so used to this kind of mechanical work that he even forgets about his surroundings. Not entirely, there’s a part in him that checks the other two animatronics every once in a while, but enough to calm his mind.

And then the lights are out, the dark swallows him whole, and all that stability is replaced by fear.

Henry stays still, not daring to move one inch. He hears footsteps around him, the animatronics moving from one place to another. 

They don’t approach him, which makes him even more uncomfortable and on edge. He tightens the grip on his screwdriver, even if he knows that, if the animatronics decide to attack, it won’t help him.

“He’s here.”
The voice resonates in his ears. It’s not the sudden words or their meaning what makes Henry lose the little control he had over his panic. It’s the fact that the one who’s warning him, is Charlie. 

He has to cover his mouth to hide his sobs. He can’t see, and he feels like he’s in the pit of hell. 

“I can’t control them when he’s here. We can’t reason with them. They don’t remember, they think that the yellow rabbit is a friend. Not even Sammy can stop them.”

The yellow rabbit. The Springbonnie suit. William.

He still can’t move. He doesn’t know where he would go, if he could. This is too much. 

“Where are you? Where’s your brother? I need to talk to you. I need to tell you…”

“ Sammy can’t move, ” Charlie interrupts him. “ They put him in suit mode. And I’m trapped in the box. He knew you were coming. You need to leave, now. Before- ”

The lights turn on, and Henry blinks until he gets used to the light. He’s in the middle of the stage (when did he get there?) and there’s no sight of the toy animatronics. 

Instead of them, the old, withered animatronics, the ones he created by William’s side, are on the stage. They are staring at him.

And, in spite of that- of the chill that runs down his spine, of the hateful and threatening way the animatronics look at him, Henry only has eyes for the person that stands in the middle of the Main Area. 

Someone who’s wearing a yellow rabbit suit. 

“Hello, old friend.”

No matter how much time passed or if his face was hidden, Henry will spot William in the middle of a multitude. They’ve been friends for too long, spent countless hours together, and Henry hates to admit that he once considered the person in front of him his partner. 

“No need to use disguises around me, William. You owe me that, at least.”

“Let’s not start to talk about what we owe each other, partner,” William says, but he takes off the SpringBonnie head. “Or we would be here for a long time.”

Henry is not afraid of making eye contact with William. His former friend may think that he’s scared, but he isn’t. 

He wants to kill William with his own hands. That’s what he wants.

“What have you done to my kids?”
“I had to lock them away,” William answers. As always, he can’t help but brag. “The Puppet and Fredbear are definitely one of my greatest creations, but they’re a bit more uncontrollable than the others. I didn’t want to take any risk.”

“They are not your creations, they are my children!” Henry spits at him. He takes a step closer, which makes the animatronics around him react. He doesn’t care. He’s not being stopped, so he takes another step. “They were already perfect. And you took them away.”

“Your ex wife was the one who took Sammy away. I gave it back to you, a gift that you don’t seem to appreciate.”

“You killed him!” Henry screams. That statement seems to make the animatronics tilt their head. 

William smiles vanishes, and the animatronics look back at Henry, now staring at him with menace.

“Are you going to make them kill me, too?”

William’s eyes are fixated in him, like he’s studying Henry and deciding which is the best way to proceed. 

“If I was in your place, I would start to run, old friend.”

The animatronics are ready to attack him, to tear him apart.

So Henry, as much as he hates it, does what his former partner proposes.

He runs.

He’s not sure where, but he uses his knowledge of the building to enter one of the corridors behind a staff door. If he’s correct, the corridor goes around the stage and the main hall and would lead him to the Prize Corner room. Maybe there he could find somewhere to hide while he thinks of a better plan.

“Dum, dum, dum, dum, dum.”

Foxy’s calm voice follows him while he runs. William had sent the fastest of the four to catch him, but he forgot that Henry also built these things. 

He turns back and blinds Foxy with the flashlight. The animatronic stops sinning, and he covers his eyes with his hand, giving Henry a few seconds of advantage. 

Henry gets to the Prize Corner and hides behind the giant gift where the Puppet is supposed to be. 

He remembers how Foxy sang in the car a few days ago- his jaw prevented him from sinning the words accurately, but he was able to hum. 

It’s only now that he understands the depth of the depravity of William, of this…monster he helped to create. How he found a new way to desecrate, to humiliate, to destroy those kids. 

Small souls trapped in prisons of his making, of their making, used in ways no one could ever imagine. 

It isn’t a life - changing discovery. 

This is just the delusions of a monster. 

He bites his lip, the worlds stuck in his throat, until he’s able to mutter:

“My daughter, my Charlie, if you can hear me, I know you tried to protect the souls. It’s in your nature to protect the innocent. You took that from your mother,” He should’ve come here earlier. He should’ve said this earlier. “I’m sorry that on that day, the day you were shut out and left to die, no one was there to lift you in your arms.”

A solitary tear runs down Henry’s face. God, if he doesn’t stop crying, they’re going to find him. But he can’t. His daughter, his baby…

“She can’t answer when she’s controlling the Puppet. But I think she liked the speech.”

Henry looks at his side, to see a ghost sitting there.

Sam. Sammy. He dyed his hair blonde, he’s a bit taller than the last time he saw him, and dark tears are running down his cheeks. 

Henry can’t contain himself. Instinctively, he tries to reach him, to hug him, but Sammy moves a few inches away. Henry doesn’t know that he’s angry or in panic. Maybe both. 

“ I’m a ghost, old man. No matter how much you try, you can’t touch me.”

Henry is staring at him, which makes Sam a bit uncomfortable. He tries to avoid the look his father is giving him. He’s not even sure why he’s here, instead of doing whatever he can to make the Fredbear suit work again. He hates his father. And his father is probably going to hate him, too, when he remembers what he had done. 

Charlie may have attacked the security guards because she was trying to protect the souls, but Sam had influenced them to attack because he wanted them to die. 

He can’t trust adults- that’s what he got from his short experience being alive. They lie, and let each other down, and hide the truth, and break your trust, and take everything away from you. 

He had even influenced…

Sam shakes his head. Enough with this! He isn’t in the wrong. His father, Michael and Jeremy coming back to help them is just messing with his head!!

“What!? Do you know everything, right!? So, aren’t you fucking  going to say something!?” he yells. He dares to look at his father, but he regrets it immediately.

Henry hadn’t said anything because he’s crying- the tears are coming down his face and he’s pressing his lips so his sobs won’t get out. But his mouth opens, and he says:
“Language.”
Sam can’t believe it. This is pathetic. This is…

“ A bit late to worry about shit like that. I did way worse.”

“You didn’t,” Henry quickly answers. And now, he’s smiling. Smiling! Sam wants to kill him. “I did way worse that you could’ve even done.”

“If that’s true, what gives you the right to lecture me if I say ‘fuck’?”

“Because I’m your father. No matter how much time passes, dads have the horrible tendency of trying to educate their children, so they don’t make the same mistake they did.”

Sam looks away. This is a lie. If his dad truly cared, he and his mom would’ve created a better arrangement for their custody. And Sam wouldn’t live in another state, away from his friends and his sister and him.

“I couldn’t save you then, but let me save you now.”

“Aren’t you tired of always failing?”

That’s what his father did. Fail at his marriage. Fail his children. Fail to see the true colors of the man he called his partner, his best friend. Fail to protect everyone he loved.

“It keeps me awake at night,” Henry starts. Sam is still not looking at him. “And I thought about making myself sleep, but I can’t do that. He overpowered all you, robbed you of all good things you could do. I won’t stop. Not until I undo all he did. You may not believe me, but that’s fine. But I won’t rest until you’re safe, Sammy.”

That last bit is true. Henry doesn’t need Sam to believe him, he wouldn’t believe himself, either, but that won’t change his actions. 

He needs to stop William, once and for all.

“Mr. Emily…Fuck please work…Mr. Emily, can you hear me?” 

Henry takes out the walkie talkie. When he raises his head, Sammy is gone.

“William is here.”

“ Yeah, I guessed !” Henry hears Jeremy scream ‘LEAVE ME ALONE YOU LAME ASS GREMLIN!’ and then the sound of something heavy falling down. “ Sorry, Balloon Boy is really persistent. It took me a while to get the batteries back, and the cameras are not working. ”
Henry wants to ask one hundred questions, but he supposes he has, at least, time for a few words before the animatronics find him. 

“List to me, Fitzgerald. There’s a reset button in the office. If you press it, the cameras should work again.”
“ Why didn’t you say it earlier!? ” Jeremy screams at him. Henry wishes he were less loud. “ Do you know where it is? ”

“It should be on the wall, near the door to the storage room.”

Henry may have designed the animatronics, but he knew zero about interior design or where that button should be. 

“ Can you manage William Afton on your own? ”

“Don’t worry, I have an idea. Just reset the system.”

Henry gets up and looks around one more time. He can’t open the gift and free Charlie until the system gets reseted. He puts a hand over it.

“I’ll come and free you, my daughter,” he promises. “And you, my son, if you’re still listening, I’m sorry that I wasn’t able to protect you, too. But I love you both. I’m going to fix this.”

Henry leaves the Prize Corner as sneaky as he can, and opens the door that leads to the main area. The animatronics are searching for him, and William looks a bit impatient.

“Henry, stop hiding! At least come here and face me! Stop being such a coward!”

He just needs to wait for the perfect time. 

The lights go down again. Jeremy must have found the button.

Henry breathes in and out, preparing himself, and when the lights come back, he gets out of his hiding spot and marches towards William. His friend may have the suit on, but Henry had convinced him to take out the mask, and no matter if you were a monster, a screwdriver in the eye could kill anyone.

Henry has the element of surprise and the fact that William doesn’t think he is able to attack him by his side. Unfortunately, he should have taken some other things into consideration, like the fact that he hasn’t done exercise in almost five years, or William being taller than him.

In the end, William just needs one punch in the stomach to stop him and take the screwdriver away from him.

William grabs him by the throat, the extra strength the Springbonnie suit gives him being enough to lift Henry a few inches from the floor. 

Henry tries to fight him, but it’s an useless attempt. 

“I don’t want to kill you, Henry,” he finally answers the question Henry asked him at the beginning of this conversation. “That’s too easy. I want you to watch how I destroy everything you love. Then, I’ll kill you. It’s the least I can do to pay you back for all those years of friendship.”

William throws Henry against the nearest wall.

Henry can’t breath, his vision is going numb and his world is now a bunch of spots. He tries to move, to do something.

Michael…He promised he would survive. He can’t leave Michael alone. 

But his body is not answering his commands, his head is screaming in pain, and he collapses. 

Some minutes before, Jeremy was in the security office, watching as Balloon Boy mocked him with the batteries in his hand. 

He’s pointing at him with his flashlight, that thank God keeps working, and in the few seconds that it takes him to grab his bat, he makes the decision to take the batteries back by brute force.

Jeremy knows that’s not the most intelligent reaction, and if Michael was here, his boyfriend would totally stop him from fighting an animatronic. 

But this animatronic is just a few inches tall. It’s not like he’s fighting one of the big ones!! Jeremy had faced the funtime animatronics, this is nothing!!!

So, he charges towards the little gremlin, too full of anger to stop and make a better plan. 

Balloon Boy, who was definitely not expecting this kind of behavior, panics a bit. He makes an attempt to dodge, but the security guard is faster and hits him in the head. 

The bat isn’t strong enough to break the animatronic, but it makes Balloon Boy lose balance. 

“Give me back those batteries!!!!” Jeremy screams. He’s tired, and angry, and worried sick, and has the power of all the gay people who died in horror movies by his side. This is what you get when you go for the wrong security guard!! 

Balloon Boy is able to react in time and doesn’t fall to the ground, but Jeremy doesn’t lose time and attacks him again. Not even the light coming back makes him stop. Hit after hit, Balloon Boy falls to the ground, and Jeremy takes the batteries of his hand.

There’s no victorious or snarky comment. He quickly takes the walkie talkie and puts the batteries back on. 

“Michael, are you okay? Michael!” he calls, but his boyfriend doesn’t answer. Jeremy curses and tries cam 08, but the monitor is malfunctioning. All the cameras seem to be down. “Mr. Emily…Fuck please work…Mr. Emily, can you hear me?” 

“ William is here, ” Henry says, which isn’t a surprising answer. 

“Yeah, I guessed!” 

Balloon Boy, who had apparently crawled under the table, grabs him by the ankle. Jeremy screams in horror, takes the fan of the table and hits him in the arm with it.

“LEAVE ME ALONE YOU LAME ASS GREMLIN!” he screams once more, and then he lets the fan fall over the animatronic head. This seems to be enough to make him stop and crawl back to the vents. Maybe Jeremy hit something important in his mechanism, or maybe he’s tired of being bullied. Who knows? “Sorry, Balloon Boy is really persistent. It took me a while to get the batteries back, and the cameras are not working.”
Henry proceeds to tell him about the reset button, and Jeremy wants to curse at him. Really, wasn’t it so difficult to tell them about it a few hours ago? It could’ve been really helpful! 

He searches around, staring at the left air vent everytime he hears something, just to see Balloon Boy’s head peek over, look at him, and retreat in fear. 

Jeremy feels kind of bad.

Nevertheless, he doesn’t have time to take a deep perspective in the morals of kicking an animatronic who isn’t possessed by a dead kid, and runs to the wall. There’s a closet where the button should be. 

This is starting to get truly stressful. He sees a gap between the wall and the closet and, indeed, there’s the button. Just, fuck this place and everyone in charge. 

When this is over I’m going to demand the company , he thinks while he moves the closet. It doesn’t weigh too much, and in a matter of seconds he has enough space to press the button. The lights are out for a few seconds, but they quickly come back.

“Michael, William Afton is here. Do you hear me?” he asks through the walkie talkie. He sits again on his chair. “Please, please. Answer me, love.”

One. Two. Three. Four. Five. No answer. Great. 

Jeremy inspect the security cameras, trying once and again to see what’s going on in Parts & Services, but the screen is still glitching in that area. 

Suddenly, he hears a noise coming from the hall. He checks the cameras and, indeed, it’s not his imagination. The toy animatronics have left the stage, and they’re coming for him.

Perfect. Just what he needed. The night is already bad enough he doesn’t need this!!!

All that he and Michael have done for the past five nights are engraved in his head. 

Check the air conducts for sounds. Put the head on the moment you see one of the animatronics enter the area. Lucky for him, only the toy animatronics are trying to kill him. It’s more difficult without Michael by his side, but he’s got this. 

Jeremy doesn’t know how much time he spends doing this. Check the cameras. Flash the lights to the hall. Put the head on. 

The difficulty increases every minute, until Jeremy has no time to double check anything, and just hopes that he doesn’t miss anything important. 

“WATCH OUT!”

Charlie’s voice rings in his ears. 

Jeremy turns around to see Mangle hanging above him, her limbs torn in an impossible way to hold herself in there without falling. If not for the fox's face, Jeremy would think that she was a spider.

Jeremy opens his mouth, just to discover that there’s nothing he can say. Mangle isn’t possessed by a dead kid, and Charlie isn’t in control of the animatronic.

From an outsider’s perspective, this moment, with Jeremy and Mangle staring at each other, one in fear, the other ready to attack, only lasts three seconds.

For Jeremy, nonetheless, it’s an eternity where he doesn't know how to move or what to do or even if he has time to try something.

And then it happens, so fast that he can’t even dodge. Mangle opens her fauces, and jumps towards his head.

The animatronics are not in Parts & Service. Michael looks around, but except for Fredbear’s suit and the usual shelves with spare parts, manuals and maintenance instruments, there’s nothing. 

But he doesn’t feel alone in the room. There’s someone else here, with him.

“Sam?” he asks, but there’s no light in Golden Freddy’s dismembered head. He doesn’t know how far Sam can go from the animatronic he possesses, to be honest he doesn’t even know how he can appear and disappear, but, whatever ghost is here, is not Sam. He thighs the grip on the flashlight, and the name is out before he can even think. “Evan?”

He hears something crack behind him, and the faint sound of cries fills the room. It comes from the other side of the wall that divides space.

Michael is unable to move, at least for a few moments. He stops breathing, and there’s a chill running down his spine that makes him want to run away.

He moves slowly, unsure if he’s still alive or dreaming. It feels like a dream, a nightmare.

At the other side of the wall, instead of Bonnie, there’s a shadow. An animatronic that could be confused with Freddy of Fredbear, but it’s purple, his eyes and teeth are bright and there’s tears running down his face. 

Is the first time Michael sees this animatronic, but there’s a familiar feeling about him and the way the shadows lean over the silhouette, as if trying to hide it from the rest of the world. And Michael makes the mistake of directing the flashlight there to cast out the dark, because under the light, the animatronic fades, and there’s only a little kid with a gray shirt, crying. 

Michael’s world stops at that moment.

“Evan.” 

Evan raises his head and looks at him. His eyes are dark, and the tears are falling down his cheeks constantly. His little body presses against the wall, scared of this new person. Evan blinks. The more he looks at Michael, the more he starts to recognize him. The fear grows in the dark pitch that is his glaze, but also the wrath. 

The shadows around Evan’s ghost dance around him, forming silhouettes, until they become something that stands between him and his brother.

These are not animatronics. These are monsters, shaped and designed based on Evan’s nightmares. 

Michael remembers falling asleep, one day, when he was still working and Fredbear’s Family Dinner, and these animatronics had appeared in his dreams to haunt him. At that moment, he thought that they were nothing more than a simple nightmare, his conscience manifesting his guilt using the same thing he tormented Evan with. 

But that was not a simple nightmare. It had been Evan’s doing- what he saw every night, and he made his big brother live the same experience. 

“You’re not welcome here,” a conglomeration of voices say to him. “We know who my friends are and you’re not one of them.”

These animatronics can’t hurt him, they’re just manifestations of Evan’s wrath, the same way the shadow version of Freddy is a manifestation of his fear. 

And he has no doubt that the thing hiding in the pizzeria is his brother. 

He stares at Evan, then at the animatronics that surrounds him, and his heart breaks. He remembers his brother: the genuine smile he had on his face when he was happy, the way he always tuck Elizabeth in the cradle when she was a baby to make sure that she would be warm during the night, how, even after all Michael did, Evan still tried to cover for him when he skipped class or got into a fight. 

“Evan, this is not you.”
“This is what you made of me!” the voices yell. “Or, better to say, this is what he helped me become.”
“You saw what he did?” Michael asks, and the terror grows inside of him. “Our father, he…”
“ I saw ,” the voices confirm. They are cornering Michael, but he doesn’t back down. “ I’ve been here from the beginning. I saw you, and dad, and Sam, and Charlie, and every other kid. But I wasn’t remade by him, but by the one he should not have killed. ”

That title is familiar. Jeremy had told him something about that, about how the spirit in Golden Freddy said that line, in one of his dreams. 

“Sam?” Michael asks. “What…what did Sam do?”

“He helped me. Until Sam appeared, we didn’t know what to do. We let him influence the other animatronics, and in exchange, they keep the peace. They protect us. He wasn’t supposed to let you enter. Nor you, not the other security guard. You don’t belong here.”

Evan is broken into a million pieces, but who wouldn’t, in his place? Not only had his brother tormented him until he killed him, or his mother neglected to watch over him on his own birthday, but he also saw everything his father did to his body after he died. Every cut, every new experiment, every crazy monologue about how he was doing this for the good of his family. And he had been trapped in the pizzerias, screaming and crying without no one hearing him, all alone, for four years. 

Elizabeth was killed in Circus Baby, and Evan could see her, but couldn’t talk to her, his sister was too involved in her own farce, pretending that she didn’t remember her life, that she could never see him. 

Charlie had lent him a helping hand, but she was too trusting. She wanted to protect him, that’s the thing that The Puppet and her had in common- they both always tried to protect the people they loved. But, for some reason, Henry was still in the list of people that Charlie wanted to protect, and Evan won’t accept it. Henry had built the animatronics, too. Not only that, but he had also neglected his kids.

But Sam? Sam was angry, a force that wanted to destroy every security guard or adult that stepped into the pizzeria. That had woken up something more than fear- the wrath inside of Evan, giving him the other half he had been missing. 

Evan was a powerful soul, the perfect balance, full of Renment and Agony, shadows and nightmares.

“You made them to protect you?” Michael asks, pointing at the nightmares.

“We’re the only ones who can do it.”

“Evan-”

“What? Are you going to scare us again? This time, it’s not going to work.”

Michael forces himself to look at the silhouettes in front of him, with their terrific designs, withered bodies and pointy teeth. 

This is fucked up. So fucked up that Michael can’t help but let out a desesperate laugh.

“Yeah, you’re right,” he admits. God, who is he trying to fool? He’s not going to convince Evan with a moralizing monologue about his mistakes and how sorry he’s. Even if he did, and his brother believes it, that doesn’t change anything. He already said sorry, when Evan was in the hospital, taking his last breath. He already cried his eyes out and apologized once and again. Saying it again won’t change anything. Michael blinks to keep the tears away. “Do they take good care of you?”

Evan-not the animatronics, Evan, is confused about the question. He’s still hiding, but Michael can see his head pop up by the side, just a bit.

“What are you playing at?”

He wishes that Jeremy was here to give him a hand with this- his boyfriend is the empathetic one, not him. But he guesses they can exchange their roles. Jeremy has saved him from dying, and now is Michael’s turn to be the empathetic one.

“I’m not playing. I’m too tired to play. You deserve to feel safe, and that’s why I’m asking. Are they good friends?”

“They don’t mess with me,” Evan says after some time, and Michael can hear his brother’s voice under the metallic ones. “The others are nice, too. Good friends. They don’t play games I don’t like. They don’t scare me.”

Michael is about to ask if their father still scares him, but he bites his tongue. Taking into account Evan’s reaction when he mentioned William, it’s obvious that his brother is still afraid of him.

“I’m glad.”

It only takes a few seconds for him to realize that maybe Evan is the one in charge, or at least the most powerful soul. 

After all, this started with his death. He’s the one who’s been here the longest, he also can see what’s in other pizzerias, and he seems to have more power over the animatronics and the souls than Charlie and Sam.

Maybe all Freddy’s became his safe space, a place where no one could ever hurt him again. 

“That’s why you tried to kill us? And the other night guards? Do Jeremy and I scare you?”

“I’m not scared of you,” Evan quickly assures. Asking that was a mistake. “No one can hurt me now. But you have to ruin it. That…that birthday party. You tried to make them remember, you made Charlie believe your lies, even Sam lowered his guard. Remembering a life they can’t go back to won’t help them. Being aware is a curse.”

“So they should keep living being influenced by others?” Michael asks. “That’s why our father, or you, or even Sam can still control them, right? Because they don’t remember.”

“I’m trying to keep them safe!”

“This is not how you do it! You know I’m right! You could’ve killed me or Jeremy at any point the fourth night, or the third, when I was hurt, but you didn’t. Because no matter how afraid or angry you feel, at the end of the day, you’re still you,” Michael takes a step towards him. The animatronics are staring at his every move, but he doesn’t let the fear stop him. He’s tired of it. Evan’s eyes are wide open and the dark tears are engraved in his face. Michael kneels in front of him, and tries to give him a reassuring smile. “Our father tried to take that away from you, but he couldn’t. You never needed fixing, Evan.”

Evan opens his mouth, maybe to send Michael to hell, to scream at him, but before he can utter a word, he senses something. Evan looks around, alarmed.

“There’s someone else here.” 

Michael barely has time to process the words before something hits him in the torso so hard that it feels like all his ribs are broken and falls to the floor. 

Being empathetic obviously doesn’t work! This is the last time he tries something like that! After today, Jeremy is the one giving the speeches to the dead kids. 

Seriously, what the fuck? In the past two days, Michael had his right hand cut by Foxy, his left arm is in shambles and he almost gets scooped and used as a bodysuit. Part of him just wants to give up and stay on the floor because man, if he has to get stitches again he’s going to tear his own arm apart.

“Don’t be so dramatic. I didn’t punch you that hard.”

Michael opens his eyes and looks at the one who hit him. 

Elizabeth. 

What is she doing here!? Should she be in Circus Baby Entertainment & Rental? How did she even get here?

Michael has so many questions that he can’t help but look at Evan in confusion. His brother shrugs his shoulders, as shocked as him by this development.

“Did you say you could watch everything?”

“ I do, but I… ” Evan stumbles with his own words. The anger is slowly being replaced by panic. “ ...things…things don’t work as they should when he’s involved .”

“Great,” Michael mumbles. His father has already joined the party. He should be worried, but he’s sure his organs are upside down and his mind can only take one thought at the time. Right now, he’s only thinking ‘it hurts it hurts it hurts’. This is too much for the painkillers to handle.

Baby, who, by the way, doesn’t seem to like being ignored like this, crosses her arms.

“Aren’t you going to ask how I got here?”

“I assume it's dad's doing,” Michael answers while trying to get up. “Glad to see you join the family reunion, Eli. Wouldn’t be the same without you.”

Elizabeth hits him right in the left side of his torso, making him lose his balance and fall to the floor. Evan facepalms himself. What the hell is his brother doing?

With some effort, Michael tries to get up, but he is unable to make his legs move. He’s trembling too much, but somehow, he gets the strength to look at Circus Baby and smirk.

“I thought I teached you how to punch better than that.”

“What are you doing?” Baby seems confused, which is kind of fair. Michael’s confidence is not the one of a person who just got his ass kicked. 

Eventually, Michael is able to breathe again, and with this important ability back he gets to stand on his own two feet again. 

“I’m the big brother, Elizabeth, remember? It’s my job to stop my siblings from fighting.”

“We weren’t even fighting!” Baby reminds him. “ Also, you’re trying to play big good brother now? ” she yells at him. It’s still Baby’s voice, but the facade is starting to fall down. “Did you really think that could save you? You fell right into our trap, and I can do what I was designed to do. No more running or trying to escape. I’ll make daddy proud, and I’ll finally be complete!”

“Don’t you remember what he did!?” Michael asks her. If Elizabeth remembers their father, and how she died, then she should know. She has to know. “You were a victim, Elizabeth. His victim.”

“ He’s the only one that hasn't left me ,” she snaps back. She raises her arm, but before she can attack, Michael throws himself towards the animatronic and…hughs her. Michael’s arms are around Baby’s, holding tight, the same way he did when Elizabeth was a little kid and cried because she missed Evan. 

“I won’t leave you,” Michael promises. Elizabeth doesn’t move for a few seconds, too perplexed at this development to do anything. 

“ Liar, ” she mumbles. Her voice is breaking, and she tries to break free. “ You’re a liar, Mickey! ”

Baby hits Michael in the ribs, but he’s not giving up. He’s not letting Elizabeth go, no matter how much she tries.

“You won’t have to go back to that place. You won’t have to be alone. I let you down once, I’m not doing it again. I’m not  giving up on you.”

Michael feels Baby’s arm grabbing him by the left arm. His body screams the moment she makes contact, and he’s sure that the stitches reopen, but he doesn’t let go.

“YOU IDIOT-”

But she’s not using all her strength to get rid of him.

“Please, Elizabeth, come back.”

If she wanted, Elizabeth could use her claw to get rid of him permanently. But she’s not, and despite the pain and the fact that his left arm is probably now broken, he keeps hugging her.

Michael hears a voice screaming behind him. It’s not a conglomerate, but just one.

When he opens his eyes, he’s on the top of a hill, one that he recognizes as the last place where his family had a happy day together. He can see the lake at the bottom and the big trees that surround it. 

The sun is hiding, and everything is covered by a warm orange light. 

Evan stares at him, his green eyes open wide. He’s at the brink of tears, but Michael can’t blame him- he’s about to cry too. Fuck, it’s a miracle that he isn’t crying. 

Is this a dream? Is this even real? Michael doesn’t know, and he’s too afraid to ask, to go towards his siblings and discover that they don't exist, that this is only a good dream that he’s having before he dies at Baby’s hands.

Elizabeth is at brother’s side. She’s looking around, confused, and stressed.
Michael takes a step towards them, but Elizabeth is too caught up dealing with her own head to pay attention to him, and Evan instinctively takes a step back. 

Michael kneels on the floor. He doesn’t want to scare Evan, so he waits, until his brother has made up his mind. Evan takes a step in his direction, still afraid, and worried, but Michael patiently waits. 

Until Evan is in front of him, with a look that Michael doesn’t know how to read in his face. Michael offers his brother his hand, and tries again to give him a reassuring smile. It’s a bit broken, Michael is not used to being the one giving comforting smiles, but it’s enough to make Evan take his hand. 

Evan sobs and puts his arms around his neck. Michel’s arm doesn’t hurt anymore, so he hugs them with all his strength. Evan is holding him tight, his head hiding in Michael’s arm. 

Elizabeth stares at them a few inches away. She has her hand over her heart. She doesn’t seem to be able to pretend anymore, and she doesn't feel like she deserves to be part of the hug, to be forgiven. 

The memories are now fresh in her head, all the things she pushed to the back of her mind to not go crazy, only to get manipulated by their father. And she almost…she almost…

Elizabeth breaks down.

“I almost kill you,” her voice is full of horror, of recognition about his actions, and Michael forgives her the moment he listens to it. “Mickey, I…”
She’s sobbing so hard that she can’t talk. Michael opens one of his arms to her, he’s holding Evan with the other. Elizabeth cleans away her tears and runs to them. 

Finally, after all they’ve been through, the three siblings are able to reunite.

Elizabeth is grabbing Michael’s shirt, crying loudly and apologizing between sobs. 

Michael breaks the hug enough so he can look at his siblings. He wipes out Elizabeth’s tears, and a chuckle of happiness escapes from his lips. 

He shifts his attention towards Evan, who’s still crying like there’s no tomorrow. Michael is the same- the three of them could probably fill a fountain with their tears. 

They’re his siblings. Not a shadow hiding behind a bunch of nightmares. Not Circus Baby. They’re here. They remember. 

Coming back to reality from a dream is a painful process, not only because that means that Michael can’t hug his brothers, or even touch them, but also because all the pain comes back to him. 

This time, Elizabeth helps him to get up, grabbing him by the right arm and being really careful to not hurt him by accident. She’s still possessing the animatronic, but her expression is…Michael doesn’t know how to describe it. 

More human, maybe.

“Shit, Mickey, your arm.”
“It’s fine.”
“No it’s not you dummy! You need to go to the doctor!”

Michael needs a lot of things, and yeah, a doctor is one of them, but it’s not in the top priorities. He wants to pat Elizabeth on the head to make her calm down, but she’s too tall and Michael doesn’t think it’s going to work.

“Where’s Evan?” He changes the subject.

Instead of the big animatronics, or the nightmares, there’s a little purple Fredbear plushie in the corner. Is similar to the one Evan had when he was a kid, but this had its teeth and eyes in a bright white, and Michael sees dark tears running down the cheeks.

Michael takes the plushie from the floor, and it tilts his head while looking at him.

“Evan?” he asks. Elizabeth leans over him to see better. 

“Why is he like this?”

“I don’t have an animatronic to possess, like you do,” he answers, which honestly scares the shit out of Michael. Elizabeth can talk thanks to Baby’s voice box, but this plushie doesn’t seem to have one. “This is the only physical form I can take.”

“Wait, the plushie in Entertainment & Rental, was that you?” Michael remembers. 

Evan nods.

“I told you I see everything that happens. I tried to interact, but it’s more…difficult. Moreover if it’s so far away.”

Evan looks at Elizabeth. He probably tried to talk to her on multiple occasions.

“You’re kind of cute like this,” Elizabeth says, deciding to ignore the topic. 

Michael puts the plushie over his shoulder and Evan holds onto his shirt to not fall off. 

“What’s the plan?” Elizabeth asks. She looks ready to go and kick something. Michael is just glad that this time he’s not the one receiving that anger. “Do you even have a plan?”
“We had one, but I think it went to shi…it isn’t working,” Michael corrects his words. His siblings look at him like asking ‘seriously? After all we saw, are you worried about that? “Do you know something about our father’s plan? Where he is? Anything?”

“ I know someone cut down the system, and it’s been malfunctioning for a while. But it already came back to normal. Probably your boyfriend’s doing. ”

Michael is about to ask how in the world Evan knows that Jeremy is his boyfriend, but then remembers what his brother said. He can see everything. 

He suddenly so glad that they didn’t fuck in the office, or he would probably end himself because of the embarrassment. 

“Oh yeah, that blonde guy,” Elizabeth remembers him. “I don’t know what daddy planned for him, but I don’t think it’s pretty.”

Michael's body freezes. 

Oh, oh no. His mind is starting to work again after that statement. If his father is in the pizzeria, that means that Jeremy and Henry are in danger. 

He takes out the walkie talkie to contact them, but there’s no answer. 

“We need to…we need to go…” where? Where? To the security office? To the main stage? No, calm down. They took some precautions. Jeremy is fine. He has to be fine. They’re going to survive. Tonight, he’ll get rid of his father, whatever it takes. “The animatronics are not here. Evan, can you tell me…?”

“ The central stage. Dad is also there. ” 

Michael nods. Then, that’s their first stop. 

They are going to get out of there, when he remembers the Fredbear suit at the other side of the room. 

“What happened to Sam?” he asks.

“Sam!?” Elizabeth yells back. Oh, right. She was the second to die, and she was in a different building. There’s no way she knows. Michael bits his lip, feeling sorry for her. Realization starts to kick in. “Did dad…did he do it?”

There’s no answer. 

“What about Charlie?”

“She’s inside the Puppet.” 

Circus Baby is not designed to cry, but if she could, she would be in tears right now. 

“The other animatronics put Sam in the suit mode. It’s not enough to stop him completely, but it makes apparition more difficult,” Evan explains.
Michael nods, goes to the suit and searches for the button to change the mood of the custom, trying carefully to not touch one of the springlockers. 

When the three siblings get to the main area, with Evan still on Michael’s shoulder and Elizabeth running just behind him, the first thing they see is Henry’s body lying on the floor. 

Michael runs towards him, fearing that his father had already killed him, but he calms himself when he notices that Henry is still breathing.

“He’s alive.”
“And you’re also alive, for some reason.”
It’s been a month since Michael had to confront his dad face to face. He isn’t sure what he was expecting. To see a crazy look on his face, the eyes of a maniac, some evidence that he had missed during all these years that shows the true nature of his father.

But William Afton is the same as ever, and looks like any other regular man with a confident smile. 

Michael is a bit confused by the Spring Bonnie suit, though. Or the giant knife his father has with him.

The old animatronics are there too, following his father’s orders. 

“What can I say? This family has the bad habit of coming back.”
William glances at his side, to where Circus Baby is. 

“Elizabeth, what are you doing?” he asks, like his daughter just committed a horrible crime. Elizabeth doesn’t move a muscle. Well, theoretically speaking. “I see. I should’ve known I couldn’t trust you. But don’t worry, I can fix you.”

Michael guesses the three of them are out of the will now.

“Lay down your arm,” he says to his sister. Elizabeth opens his mouth to protest, but Michael adds: “There’s already enough violence. They’re still kids, and you are one, too. Let me handle it.”

“But Mickey…”

“What is all this ‘they’re kids’ nonsense?” William cuts in. He doesn’t look mad, just extremely disappointed. Michael is used to it. “Do you think the power of love or shit like that is going to save you?”

“At least I have someone who loves me,” Michael says back. If Elizabeth could chuckle, she would probably do it. She’s happy that there are some things about Michael that haven't changed.

William sighs.

“God, you remind me so much of your mother when you’re like this.”

“No wonder why she left you.”
“Just so you know, being a killer had nothing to do with our divorce.”
“That only shows that you have a shit personality, too.”

“Maybe if you didn’t kill your own brother-”

“That’s not a reason to murder children and stuff them into animatronics!” Michael yells back. Saying it out loud only reminds him how fucked up the situation is. 

“They’re machines , Michael,” William reminds him. He points with his knife at the animatronics, showing them off. “They’re human enough to express emotion, hold memories and have conversations. But if they change, or break your rules, you can just rewrite their code. That’s why they’re perfect. They’re my perfect creations, and you don’t have the right to come and hide them from me because you feel guilty.”

The animatronics advance towards them, and Michael takes a step back. 

“THIS IS NOT YOUR PLACE!” a voice screams through the hallway. 

Golden Freddy appears at Michael’s left side. The suit is sitting down, unable to stand still, but Sam’s ghost is in front of it, staring at William with all the hate in the world. The animatronics seem to doubt for a moment, maybe recognizing Sam. His influence is powerful, but not enough to surpass William’s. 

At Golden Freddy’s side, just near Elizabeth, there’s the Puppet. Her eyes are narrowed, and she can’t talk, but Michael just knows that Charlie is also pissed. 

William doesn’t seem impressed by this congregation. Charlie and Sam have no power, the same as Evan. The only one who could do something is Elizabeth, but they are not sure if she could reach their father before the animatronics get to her. 

In the end, William can only laugh at this pathetic attempt.

“Lovely,” he smirks. “Should I wait for someone more to appear?”

“FANCY A SPOT ‘O’ TEA YE OLD BASTARD?”

Michael barely has time to register those words before Jeremy comes out of the darkness and hits his father in the head with the baseball bat. 

It doesn’t seem to do a lot of damage, but the head of the suit rotates a few inches.

After losing the surprise effect, and seeing the knife in William’s hand, Jeremy takes a few steps back and raises the bat again, ready to attack if William gets a bit closer.

His chest is breathing heavily, and his hands are trembling while holding the bat, but that barely registers in Michael’s mind.

When he sees Jeremy under the light, his heart skips a beat.

Jeremy’s left half of the face is covered in blood. His eye is closed, the blood is dripping from a bunch of different wounds, and his blonde hair is soaked in a dirty crimson. 

“Jeremy, your eye…” he says, forgetting momentarily that his father is a few steps away. He wants to reach towards Jeremy’s face, check the injury and give him an eyepatch or something. 

“Don’t worry, Michael. Is not as bad as it seems,” he downgrades the situation. The injuries aren’t actually that horrible, they just look horrible, except for his eye. Jeremy hasn't been able to open it, and he isn’t sure if he wants to try. This is not the moment to panic and have a crisis, they could do that later in the hospital. Now, they need to finish this. “You were right about Mangle’s teeth though. If not for the changes you did at the last minute, I would’ve lost more than an eye.”

Michael presses his lips, trying not to feel guilty.

“What the…” William curses. He stares at Jeremy, as confused as one would be in this situation. “You should be dead.”

“I’m pretty stubborn,” Jeremy yells back. He seems pretty confident for someone who’s bleeding like that. God, Michael wants to kiss him. “You see, your son made some arrangements before you came. One of them being put some cork on Mangle’s teeth.”

William is logically having problems understanding what Jeremy just said, because, again, who in the world would think about something like that?

“You did what ?” William repeats. Michael doesn’t know if he’s incredibly surprised or amazingly disappointed. Probably both.

He can sense that Evan, Elizabeth, Sam and Charlie are also having a really good time with this development. 

Michael and Jeremy are in front of them. They both look like shit, they’re bleeding, but Michael extends his right arm to protect the kids, and Jeremy raises his bat again, ready for a second round. 

“Yeah. He read all your stupid manuals and memorized them by heart. You have a pretty smart son, british boy.”

“Could you tell him to stop !?” William asks his son. Apparently, killing kids is not a big deal, but someone making fun of his accent? That’s a reason to get mad. “Who are you even!? Who’s him!?”

Right. This is the first time William sees Jeremy, and he has no idea about who he is or what he is doing here. 

“He’s my boyfriend,” Michael just casually says. It’s not like his father can be more disappointed in him, at this point. 

William blinks, processing those words.

“I think you can do better.”
“I beg your pardon?” Michael answers while Jeremy screams ‘THE FUCK?’. 

And they charge towards William. 

Michael is not sure what they’re going to do, and it turns out that, well, attacking someone in an animatronic suit is not a good idea. Michael takes some seconds to let Evan in Elizabeth’s hand, so Jeremy is the first one to reach William. 

William hits Jeremy with enough force to send him flying, Jeremy’s body hitting one of the tables and falling down to the floor. 

That only makes Michael even angrier, but the second he gets near his father, William grabs him by the throat. 

“Honestly, I don’t know how you were able to change so much in a month,” he says. Michael tries to attack his father and free himself, but William has a grip on him and he’s not letting go. It’s the same type of feeling he always had near his father, the fear consuming every fiber of his being until he’s not able to breathe. The difference is that, this time, it’s not a feeling or a bad dream. It’s real. “I’m kind of intrigued, but I can live with the mystery.”

Jeremy, with a hand in his stomach and a new bruise on his cheek, gets up as fast as he can, but Bonnie and Chica are in his way, and he knows that if he takes one more step, the animatronics are going to tear him apart. 

The other kids are in a similar situation. They want to help Michael, but Freddy and Foxy are a threat bigger than they can manage. 

Michael feels like he’s going to lose conscience, when something lunges towards William, causing him to free Michael. 

He falls to the floor and instinctively crawls away from his dad. He still can’t breathe. He is free, but he can’t breathe. He strokes his neck, in the place where the suit’s fingers had choked him. 

“Michael, Michael are you okay?” Jeremy asks. He doesn’t know when Jeremy got to his side. 

He can’t answer, but he takes Jeremy’s hand and lets his head fall on his boyfriend’s shoulder.

When he looks up, he sees that the one who attacked William is Henry. 

No one had noticed that he was awake, and he had taken that opportunity to attack without being seen. 

William grabs Henry by the neck of his sweater and pushes him away from him. 

“Don’t do it, old friend. We both know you’re not the kind of guy who stands up.”
“Maybe you don’t know me so well, then,” Henry mumbles. Surprisingly, he punches William in the face, breaking his nose in the process. 

This is probably the best thing Michael had seen in his life.

William, however, isn’t so eager about his development. 

Henry tries to punch him again, but this time, William isn’t playing around. With a quick move, he stabs Henry in the stomach, sinking the knife as far as he can into one of the few people in this world that, at one point, truly cared about him. 

“DAD!” Sam screams. 

Charlie is as horrified as him, even if the Puppet’s face doesn’t leave much room for emotions. 

Michael lets out a pathetic imitation of a scream, which makes his throat hurt like he rate a bunch of needles. Jeremy has to hold him so he doesn’t run to Henry and gets himself in danger.

Sam turns towards William, the silhouette of his body transforming into something more terrifying. 

“I’m going to kill you.”

The threat is enough to bring William back to reality. He had been staring at nothing, but now he blinks, and cleans the blood of his broken nose.

“This is what happens when you betray me. What’s going to happen to ALL OF YOU!”

William looks at them, the smile on his face bigger than it should. 

However, nothing happens.

“What’s going on?” 

Michael looks at the animatronics, at the way his eyes are fixated on William and the knife he holds. 

On the floor, Henry laughs. He doesn’t say a word, but suddenly, Michael understands. 

“They can… see you… now,” he’s able to murmur with a hoarse voice.
Unintentionally, William had remembered the kids something that they should’ve never remembered. 

How he murdered them. 

Hiding as one of them is not enough. He has lost control.

“Stay back,” William orders them, but the animatronics don’t obey him anymore. “STAY BACK I SAID!”

No matter how much he screams, how hard he yells, the animatronics surround him and are not going to let him go. 

But the first one to attack is not one of the four old models.

It’s Elizabeth. 

Her stomach hatch opens, and the claw grabs the Spring Bonnie suit by the wrist, squeezing it so tight that she causes a springlock failure. 

The suit breaks in that place, pieces of the suit falling down and showing the damage the locks are doing into William’s body. They’re nailed into his stomach, blood dripping from the injuries.

William is kneeling on the floor, mad with rage.

“What do you think you’re doing?”

“Did I catch you off guard?” Elizabeth smiles back at him.

“Let’s see how many times you can be pulled apart,” Evan continues.

The animatronics make a circle around William, one  formed not only by Baby and the old models, but also by the Puppet and Sam’s ghost.

Except the last one, who doesn’t have a body, they all take turns to kick William Afton and cause all the springlocks to activate. 

A new kick, a new metallic sound, a new scream of agony. Again…and again…and again. 

Michael can’t stop them. He isn’t sure he wants to. 

Jeremy is pressing his jacket over Henry’s injury to stop the bleeding, but if he keeps losing blood…

“He needs a doctor. Michael,” he calls him. Michael finally reacts, and looks back at them. 

Michael nods, and between the two of them, they’re able to lift up Henry from the floor. 

Henry is conscious enough to see what’s going on, the agony on the face of his former friend. Their eyes meet, probably, hopefully, for the last time.

“The darkest pit of Hell has opened to swallow you whole,” he manages to say. He knows that William is listening to him. He always did. That’s one more good memory tainted by the true colors of this monster. “So, don’t keep the Devil waiting, old friend.”

The lights flicker. Michael and Jeremy carry Henry out of the building, leaving William Afton behind, dying by the hand of his own demons.

Chapter Text

Michael remembers driving frantically towards the nearest hospital, ignoring the pain on his arm, the left side of his torso and his throat. 

He remembers Jeremy in the passenger's seat, how he fell unconscious the moment the adrenaline stopped doing its job. 

He remembers the blood dripping from his fingers, the stains all over the car. 

He doesn’t remember anything else.

But when he wakes up, he’s in the hospital. He’s lying in a bed and has some of those things attached to his arm and he doesn’t know where Jeremy or Henry are and doesn’t remember how he got there and everything is blurry…

“Michael, don’t worry, everything’s fine,” a voice tells him. It takes him a few moments to recognize Henry’s friend, Dr. Wilson. 

“What happened?” Michael asks. He’s happy to discover that his voice is working again. It hurts, but it’s no longer the aching pain of a nail against his throat. He can manage this amount of pain. This amount of pain is easy, almost a relief. 

“I think that should be my line,” Dr. Wilson says. He sits in the chair beside the table. Only then Michael notices that he’s not in an individual room, and that there’s someone laying on the bed at his side.

Jeremy. 

Michael tries to sit up, but the moment he does a shoot of pain travels across his chest. He’s so tired that he can’t hold the complaint that leaves his lips. 

The fuck fuckity fuck. 

“Stop,” Dr. Wilson orders him, and forces him to lean back. “Your friend is fine. He’s under the effects of the analgesics, but fine, nonetheless. He’s pretty lucky. The three of you are,” he adds, which almost makes Michael laugh. 

Could they be qualified as lucky? They apparently survived, which, not gonna lie, Michael is more than thankful for that, but he doesn’t think luck has anything to do with it. Otherwise, Jeremy wouldn’t have half of his face covered in bandages and his head shaved so they could stitch him up.

Surviving doesn’t mean they’re lucky, it means that, for once, they weren’t utterly and horribly unlucky. There’s a difference. 

“You said the three of us survived. Henry, is he okay?”

“Yes. He had surgery a few hours ago. He’s in a coma, but stable,” Dr. Wilson answers, and then he tells Michael about his own injuries. Two broken ribs, a broken arm and a bruised neck. 

“It could be worse,” is Michael’s answer, because really, holy fuck, it could really be worse. 

Flashes of last night come back to him. His father grabbed him by the throat, ready to snap his neck in two. Jeremy was bleeding from the left side of his face. Henry being stabbed by the man who once was his best friend. 

“Can I ask you what happened?” Dr. Wilson questions him. 

“We were in Freddy’s when someone tried to rob the place,” he lies. He’s not even trying to make a convincing story- he’s too worried about Jeremy and Henry to invent something better. 

Dr. Wilson doesn’t seem to care. At least, he doesn’t pressure Michael to tell him the truth.

“Is he…” Michael starts. He has to pause for a moment. “...Jeremy, his eye. He’s covered in bandages, is…?”

He trails off, not able to finish the question.

“As I said, he’s really lucky,” Dr. Wilson repeats. He explains to Michael that, whatever attacked Jeremy, didn’t sink low enough in his skull to cause brain damage. The only heavy injury had been Jeremy’s left eye. 

Michael asks when he can get out of the hospital. Wilson says that tomorrow. He also tells him that, due to Henry’s condition, visits are not allowed for now. Then he walks away, leaving Michael alone with his thoughts. 

Except for the beeps of the machines and Jeremy’s snoring, the room is silent. For once, Michael welcomes it, and he closes his eyes and holds back his desire of jumping out of the bed and taking Jeremy’s hand or running to Henry’s room.

He’s constantly gazing towards his boyfriend, and even if Dr. Wilson had told him that Jeremy is okay, that he’s out of danger, the terror of losing him is alive and well inside of Michael’s chest, the anxiety squeezing his heart tight until Jeremy wakes up. 

He considers calling Dr. Wilson or a nurse just to ask for some type of drug that makes him sleep until tomorrow, because as nice as being calm and in silence was at the beginning, now he feels like a rabid dog trapped in a cage. 

And then, he remembers some important things.

He promised his siblings that he was going to come back. 

William Afton’s body is still in the pizzeria.

They…they did it. Well, the animatronics did it. 

The Missing Kids.

Charlie. Sam.

His siblings. 

Elizabeth and Evan. He hugged them. He…fuck, even if it was only a dream space created by Evan, he hugged them. He had them in his arms one last time. 

Oh, oh fuck wait. 

It’s monday.

The pizzeria is supposed to be open.

Now he calls a nurse, but for a completely different reason. He needs a phone right now. The nurse, seeing that Michael if Michael doesn’t get a phone he’ll probably get up and walk towards the nearest phone cabin (and after consulting with Dr. Wilson), gives him a phone. 

Michael quickly dials the number, happy with himself for memorizing it. 

“Uh, hello? Hello?”

“This is Fritz Smith,” he answers out of habit. 

“Fritz?” his manager repeats before he can correct himself. “Where are you? Celeste went to open the restaurant at 6 A.M and you were gone. The door was open, the place was a mess…”
“That’s all?” Michael interrupts him. Taking into account all that happened, he thought that ‘the place is a mess’ and ‘the door was open’ would be the last of their problems. 

“That’s all!? Balloon Boy and Mangle were in shambles! We had to close the place for today and call the technician to do some repairs. You know how many birthdays we have to cancel? Two!”

That’s not the number Michael was expecting. 

“Well, then cancel the ones for the rest of the week. And cancel the technician, too. We’re not going to need him anymore.”

There are more complaints from the manager’s part.

“You’re fired,” he finally says. Understandable. “And, uh, not to insult you or anything, but who do you think you are to take those kinds of decisions?”
Michael takes a deep breath before saying:
“Michael Afton.”
His answer is received with silence and what Michael supposes is disbelief. But he decides to continue:
“Last night, Mr. Emily, Jeremy Fitzgerald and I were attacked by some robbers in the pizzeria, at 2 A.M. The animatronics are pretty damaged and we’re in the hospital, and my uncle is, unfortunately, in a coma, but I’m sure he would agree to close the restaurant.”

“And, uh, how do I…know you’re telling the truth?” 

“You can come to the hospital and see it for yourself,” Michael proposes. He doesn’t know what he’s doing, to be honest. He’s just the son of the former boss, he’s pretty sure that that doesn’t give him the right to make these kinds of decisions. He gazes at Jeremy and rolls up the wire of the phone on his finger. “You can do whatever you want, but with everything that happened last month with the missing kids, opening Freddy’s this week will only cause more problems for the company. But do what you want. I’m not the one who’ll have to deal with the amount of lawsuits the restaurant can get if the kids discover blood in the ballpit.”

The silence continues, but Michael believes that the idea of multiple lawsuits is enough to make his former boss panic a bit. He hopes it does, Michael doesn’t have another plan under his sleeve and talking for this long is making him sleepy. He’s too tired, too in pain, too everything to think properly. 

“I, uh…I’ll check with the hospital if what you’re saying is true, but…yeah, we’ll stay closed for a few days, at least until Mr. Emily contacts us,” he says. Michael tightens the grip on the telephone, trying to not think about his uncle's condition or when he’s going to wake up. “You’re still fired, tough.”

“Fair.”
A bit later, Michael hangs up.

He’s going to return it, when he decides to make one more call. This time, to Freddy Fazbear’s Security Office.

Someone picks up, but they stay silent. 

“Evan?” Michael asks with the last strength he has. The fatigue is slowly taking control over his body, and the pain becomes difficult to ignore. “No one noticed what happened last night. They said the restaurant was a mess, but no one said anything about dad. Did you have something to do with it?”
“Yes,” a voice answers at the other side. Michael’s eyes start to water. Evan. Is Evan’s voice. Not an amalgamation, not a nightmare. Evan. “We took care of everything. Are you okay?”
“We’re alive. The three of us. We’re at the hospital.”

“Mickey, are you crying!?” he hears Elizabeth mock him.

“Shut up you clown,” Michael mumbles. “I’ll go when Jeremy can leave the hospital. We’ll take care of everything. Just, don’t kill anyone until that. Tell Sam that goes specially for him, and…” Michael looks around to make sure that no one can hear him and whispers. “...make sure that no one finds dad’s body for now.”
“We locked him in the basement,” Evan answers. Something about him saying ‘we locked him’ makes Michael worry, but you know what? He’s almost asleep and doesn’t give enough fucks to care. That’s a problem for tomorrow. 

“Tell Charlie and Sam that Henry is fine. I’ll see you soon.”
He heard his siblings little “goodbyes” before he hung up. Michael lets his body collapse over the bed, and falls asleep with a faint smile on his lips. 

The next day, he feels a bit better.

Enough for standing up and eating the tasteless breakfast the hospital gives him. Michael, however, enjoys it like he hasn’t eaten in weeks. He always enjoyed food after an almost death experience, and now he’s starting to suspect that it may be because the hunger and the desire to eat reminds him that he’s, in fact, alive.

One of the nurses does some more checkups on him and they send him to different areas of the hospital (which, actually, isn’t exactly a hospital, they’re at Dr. Wilson’s clinic, but Michael is going to still refer to this place as that) and make him see a doctor (that unfortunately is not Henry’s friend) before concluding that he’s well enough to get his clothes back and go home.

And, the thing is, he doesn’t want to go home, not when Jeremy is still sleeping in the bed (according to the sensor, he woke up around 4 A.M last night, but he went back to sleep almost immediately), but his clothes are full of blood and he smells horrible. 

Dr. Wilson offers him a ride home and back, and also to get something better to eat on the way, which convinces Michael to accept it. The hospital is twenty minutes away from his house, and Henry’s friend is not a talkative person, which makes the little trip more comfortable. 

Michael only needs half an hour to take a shower (after wrapping his left arm in a plastic bag) and grab clean clothes and some more things to stay a couple of days at the hospital. 

They’re back in no time, and even if Wilson and him only say a few sentences to each other ( ‘Just so you know, I’m going to kill your uncle after he wakes up’ / ‘Go ahead’ ), it’s nice. Michael appreciates that Wilson doesn’t try to do small talk or asks him questions that he can’t answer. 

There are clean sheets in the now empty bed of the room, like Michael had never been there. 

He sits in a chair next to Jeremy and takes his boyfriend's hand. Is at that moment, with clean clothes, an empty stomach and feeling Jeremy’s heartbeat, that realization finally kicks Michael.

He’s…he’s alive. 

Henry is alive. Jeremy is alive. 

I mean, he’s been awake and breathing for the past two days, so it should be obvious. But he had been feeling like a dead person for so long that the most simple of things are difficult to process.

He has to repeat that sentence to himself once and again, because he can’t believe it. He squeezes Jeremy’s hand and cries. 

He’s not sure why. He’s not sure if he feels guilty, or relieved, or sad, or happy, or all those things at once. 

But he’s alive. That’s the most unbelievable thing about all this, and if this hurricane of feelings is how living is, then Michael is more than welcome to the confused storm inside his chest.

“We did it,” he says in a soft voice. Michael leaves a chaste kiss in his boyfriend’s hand.

Jeremy wakes up a few hours later. Michael is still holding his hand, and he has fallen asleep with his head over the bed, in a pretty uncomfortable position that would give him back pain. 

Michael gets up when he senses his boyfriend's movement, and he calls a nurse so he can check on Jeremy. 

The nurse tells Jeremy what Dr. Wilson told him some hours ago. Jeremy seems to accept it pretty fast, but Michael knows him and the turmoil that he must be feeling inside.

“Well, let me tell you something about Mangle: that bitch can bite,” Jeremy tries to joke to make the situation easier, but Michael is not having any of it.

A sob escapes him, and he chews his lips trying to stop it, but in no time the tears come back. He wants to curse himself, because why is he crying when Jeremy, the one who lost his eye, is not? 

“Why are you making that face, love? It’s not like someone died,” Jeremy smiles at him like he always does (but Michael can see his chin tremble and his lips shake, and how he’s also resisting to cry). Then, Jeremy realizes what he said, and adds. “Shit, wait, please tell me nobody died.”

“No, no. Henry is in a coma, but his condition is stable and doctor Wilson is sure that he’s going to wake up soon.”

“Mr. Emily is a difficult bastard to kill,” Jeremy sighs in relief. He brushes Michael’s cheek, avoiding the place where he has the bruises to not hurt him. “Then, why are you crying like this? I’m not that ugly now, right?”

“You’re beautiful,” Michael answers immediately, with so much honesty that Jeremy blushes like a teenager being complimented for the first time.

“You’re only flattering me.” 

“I’m not. You are.”

God, Jeremy is about to have a heart attack. He’s so embarrassed that he covers his face with his free shaky hand. His right eye is burning, his vision is blurry.

Michael kisses his knuckles, then his palm, and slowly grabs Jeremy’s hand to take it out of his face. An involuntary whimper escapes Jeremy’s lips, and a solitary tear runs down his face in resignation. His eyes are closed, and he’s shaking like Michael had never seen him before. 

Michael leaves a soft kiss in his right cheek, then in his nose- his forehead, where one of the stitches is showing, and then on the left side, where his eye used to be.

“I love you,” Michael feels one of Jeremy’s hands moving towards his chest, and he kisses his boyfriend on the forehead, again. “That’s what I was going to say when we split up. I’m glad I can tell you now.”

Jeremy opens his arms and embraces him with the little strength he has left. 

More than a hug, Jeremy is holding onto him, his face pressing against his shoulder and his hands grabbing Michael’s shirt like he’s a lifeboat, and Michael carries him like this is the most important thing he has ever done in his life. 

Michael doesn’t know how much time he spends hugging Jeremy, but when his boyfriend finally let go, he seems a bit more put together. His right eye is red from all the crying and he has a runny nose. 

During the next hour, Michael updates Jeremy about Henry’s health and the kids covering the murder in Freddy’s. A bit after that, the door of the room opens and a woman enters.

Her golden hair is picked up in a long braid and she has baggy brown eyes that shows that sleep is not one of her priorities.

Michael hasn’t seen this girl in his life, but Jeremy’s eye lit up.

“Coraline!” he cheers, so excited that he wants to get up from the bed. 

Fortunately, Coraline seems to have more common sense than her big brother, so she approaches the bed and hugs him before Jeremy can even try to sit up. 

“What are you doing here?”

“What I’m…are you an idiot or something!?” Coraline yells at him. She doesn’t break apart, still hugging Jeremy like her life depends on it, but somehow she manages to sound angry. “The doctors called me yesterday saying that you were here! I’ve got into the first fly I found!”

“But you were working in that cafeteria, I thought you couldn’t afford missing a day.”
“Like I care!” 

Michael decides to give the siblings some space, and waits outside of the room. Jeremy had told him a lot about Coraline, but it’s the first time he can see him.

He sits in one of the benches. Half an hour later, Coraline leaves the room.

“How is he?”

“He fell asleep.”
Of course he did. Jeremy is able to sleep anywhere. The true miracle is that he was awake for more than an hour after all the analgesics. 

Coraline sits by his side, and Michael immediately tenses. 

“So, you’re the famous Michael? Formerly known as Fritz? Currently my brother’s boyfriend?”

Michael tries to keep his composure, but Coraline’s gaze is so intense that he can’t help but look down. Yeah, Michael, that’s perfect. The only member of Jeremy’s family that he cares about and you are looking at the floor. 

“That’s me.”

Coraline doesn’t talk for a few seconds, and Michael feels like a test subject or a student in his final exam. 

“I know it’s now my place, but can I…can I ask you about what happened? Jeremy told me that someone tried to rob the place, but I…I fear he’s not telling me the truth. He’s been weird this last week, more than usual, and I’m afraid that he…I don’t know how much he told you, but I want him to stay safe. Just, please tell me he’s not in trouble again.”

“He’s not into any kind of trouble. I can’t tell you what happened, but let me assure you that Jeremy had nothing to do with it. He was only trying to help- and he did. He…he saved us, because that’s the kind of person your brother is. I’m sorry that I couldn’t protect him better.”

Coraline looks relieved to hear those words, but that relief doesn’t last long. 

“Fuck, it’s unfair to seem him like this,” she swears, and wipes out the tear of her eyes. She’s trying so hard to keep her composure. “My brother has a terrible taste in men. He always falls head over heels for people who are nothing but trouble. But you don't look like them.”

“You think so?” 

“He always sounds happy when he talks about you,” Coraline continues. “Even now. He said something like ‘that idiot, I wanted you two to officially meet but his introvert ass just had to leave’, with this big grin on his face.”

“That sounds like him,” Michael can’t help but smile. Not even at the brink of unconsciousness Jeremy would pass the opportunity to make fun of him. 

“I can’t say that I’m not worried, and that I don’t have my doubts about you, especially because of the fake names. But my brother loves you. So, instead of me threatening you to protect him and reaching my own conclusion about you, why don’t we get something to eat?”

Michael is thankful that Coraline is as upfront as Jeremy, because he really, really likes what she’s proposing. 

“Fine by me.”

Jeremy gets out of the hospital three days later. 

Michael and Coraline take him back home. 

Home. 

Michael never thought that he would refer to his little apartment as home, but now that Jeremy is back, there is no other word he could use for that place.

This is Coraline’s last day in the city (she can only take a few days off), so they let her sleep on the couch that his brother had previously occupied.

The next day, they come back to Freddy’s Fazbear Pizzeria. 

Michael is a bit afraid of the reaction his siblings may have, now that everything is over, but the kids receive them with joy and some guilt. 

Elizabeth feels terrible for breaking his brother’s arm, and he has to assure her once and again that he forgives her. 

Henry wakes up from the coma a day later.

Michael is not there when it occurs- the first time Henry opens his eyes it’s the middle of the night, and he falls asleep almost immediately. 

The second time Henry wakes up is at 6 A.M, and Dr. Wilson calls Michael immediately. Going to the places is more difficult now that neither he or Jeremy can drive (he because of the arm, Jeremy because now that he lost an eye, he has to get his driver license again). 

Even if they want to let him rest and Dr. Wilson gives Michael the worst of looks when he mentions it, they need his uncle to get in contact with the manager at Freddy’s to confirm that yes, Fritz is Michael Afton, and yes, he’s the one taking the decisions until he gets out of the hospital.

Trying to explain the sudden closing of the restaurant to the employees is difficult, but they are not surprised at all. Hell, the employees are even more surprised to discover that the looming guy who avoided interacting with other human beings that were not Jeremy is actually the son of their former boss. 

That definitely is going to start some rumors. Nothing that Michael cares about at that point.

Five nights after being closed for ‘an incident with the boiling room’, Freddy Fazbear’s Pizzeria definitely shuts down. 

Another reason to shut down the pizzeria, besides the dead kids, is the fact that William Afton is still screaming in the basement, because apparently his father can’t just die, no, he has to go and posses the fucking Springbonnie suit. 

Michael, Jeremy, and all the kids do their best to avoid that room, which is pretty easy, taking into account that Michael made sure to lock that door with three padlocks and a whole ass shelf. 

Now that he’s dead (at least, his body is), William’s influence over the ghost has disappeared. Or maybe that’s the result of the kids remembering their own deaths. Michael isn’t sure. 

What he’s sure about is that no matter how much his father screams, no one is going to let him out. The kids completely ignore that room (apparently it doesn’t even exist in the maps of the building), except for Sam, who seems to be enjoying this too much. 

Michael and Jeremy had to ask themselves if they could take a twelve year old ghost to therapy to treat his angry issues. 

They wait until Henry can get out of the hospital to decide what to do.

No, decide isn’t the right word. 

They already know what they’re going to do- what they have to discover is how to be at peace with it. 

Surprisingly, the first ones who accept the end are the dead kids, whose existence would be permanently changed by this action, instead of the living adults.

Michael's way to be at peace with it is spending time with his siblings. After all, he promised that he wasn’t going to leave them alone.

Jeremy’s way of making peace with the situation it’s making plans. 

One of them is centered on the past. He’s trying to help the missing kids to remember more about their lives than how they died.

He starts by calling them by their names. Gabriel, Fritz, Suzie and little Jeremy, to the kid that possesses Bonnie’s annoyance. He wants these kids to leave knowing who they are, the identity that William Afton stripped away from them. 

It’s not always easy. Michael helps as much as he can, searching the security data and the files of Freddy’s clients to discover things about them: their birthday, their favorite type of cake, which song they wanted to be played by the animatronics- little things that they can use to make them remember. 

Fritz likes musicals, and Jeremy organizes a film night so the kid can watch the ones he always wanted to see, but didn’t have time to. 

Suzie had been searching for her dog when she went missing. There’s not much they can do about it, apart from using Michael’s ability to draw to get a nice picture of her with her dog, and alternative reality where she found it and everything was fine. She liked it so much that she stuck it to one of the walls in Parts & Service,

Little Jeremy used to go camping with his big sister, Ramona, so they spend an evening creating the biggest fort they can, which turns out to be pretty big.

Gabriel was angry that he missed the match of his favorite basketball team (and apparently Jeremy is also a fan of that team), so they watched the last matches together.

They were happier during these days. More like little kids, more conscious about who they are. 

But the memories also came with sorrow. 

So they wrote letters. Rather, Jeremy wrote the letters, what the kids wanted to say to their parents, their sisters, their brothers, their friends. 

Their loved ones might never receive those last words, it would be pretty difficult to explain how they’ve got them, and mailing them anonymously would make the families think that it was a sick joke. 

But it helped. At least a bit. 

The other plan Jeremy had was centered around the future. 

For now, they were living at Henry’s expenses, with him assuring them that money was not a problem, but they couldn’t keep like this for the rest of their lives. 

Michael, as always, isn’t thinking a lot about what’s going to happen when Henry leaves the hospital. 

One day, he wakes up to find out that Jeremy has woken up before him, something that, in the two weeks that they had been dating, never happened. 

When he finds Jeremy he’s in the kitchen, trying to make breakfast for god knows how long and failing completely, Michael guesses that this abnormal behavior is due to something.

“It’s not my fault, ok? Exotics butters may be delicious, but cooking with them it’s a nightmare,” Jeremy complains. The basket with exotic butters that Circus Baby’s Entertainment & Rental had sent them is sitting at the table. 

Michael tries not to laugh at his boyfriend’s despair, but he can’t help it when Jeremy burns what looks like his fifth attempt at an omelet. If he keeps going, they’re going to run out of eggs or tomatoes. 

“The heat is too high, and you’re adding too many toppings. No wonder why you’re having problems,” Michael tells him. He rests his head over Jeremy’s shoulder and lowers the heat of the stove. “Also, I don’t cook with butter.”
“AH!?” Jeremy screams. He was ready to melt another piece of butter and start over again, but he stops when he hears him. “How in the world do you cook then?”
“I use olive oil.”
“WHAT!?”

Michael explains to Jeremy step by step how to cook the omelet, and Jeremy is asking himself how much of his money his boyfriend spends on food, because apparently he can buy olive oil to cook his meals like he’s rich. No wonder why Michael is broke, with tastes like this. 

Thanks to Michael’s help, Jeremy is able to almost nail his next omelet, and he does the next one all by himself while his boyfriend makes some coffee. 

For once, they sit and have breakfast at a normal hour. They don’t miss the night schedules at all.

“Is it okay if I stay here?” Jeremy suddenly asks. Michael chokes. “God, sorry, sorry! Please Michael breathe.”
“I’m fine, I’m fine, I just wasn’t expecting that question?” Michael says as he cleans the coffee from his shirt. At this point, they’ve been living together for almost a month, so he assumed that Jeremy was staying with him. 

“Well, I’ve never actually asked if I could live here, so…” Jeremy tries to explain. “I was afraid that I was moving like, too fast? I mean, it’s a bit different to offer a coworker a place to sleep for a few days and live with your boyfriend.”
“Are you afraid I’ve gotten cold feet?” Michael asks. He takes his boyfriend’s hand between his. “You’re such an idiot.”
“Hey, I’m trying to be open about my insecurities here!”

“Sorry, I…” Michael bites his lip, trying to contain his smile. He can’t help but kiss him, even if Jeremy’s breath smells like coffee and half cooked omelet. “I’m just happy.”

He’s not used to being this carefree. He’s not used to thinking about the future, about long term relationships, about what he’s going to do next month. It’s a lot to take in, and a bit scary, but also exciting.

“I know we talked about taking a vacation after everything is over, and we have a plan to get your dad’s money,” a plan that consists in finally kill him, let the police discover the body inside the suit and hope that Michael gets some money from the inheritance, “...but it’s okay if we postpone it a bit? I wanted to…please don’t laugh, but I wanted to get a HiSET diploma.”

“Are you sure?”
“Pretty sure. I’m sick of working for the minimum wage and now I get financial aid to help me pay for it,” Jeremy adds, pointing at his eye. Michael doesn’t know what to say, not because he has something against his boyfriend finishing high school, but because he’s worried that the half blind jokes are now a common occurrence in his life.

“I think you’ll ace that test,” Michael finally tells him, brushing Jeremy’s hair off his face. The scars left by Mangle’s teeth are never going to heal, but he’s as beautiful as when Michael met him, all those months ago. 

“Michael, it’s been five years since I did my last math problem. It’s going to be horrible, you don’t have to lie just because you love me and you have me on this amazing pedestal.”

“I do love you, darling, but I also saw you eating burnt mac and cheese from the pan in Fazbear’s parking lot at 2 A.M.
“You’re mocking me like you didn’t join me.”

“Details.”

Jeremy laughs, and Michael can’t help but laugh with him.

The day after Henry gets out of the hospital, a month after the accident, they decide to throw a birthday party. 

It seems a bit stupid- they already organized a birthday party for the kids weeks ago, that first night that Jeremy and Michael didn’t have to fight for their lives.

But this time is different, because they know who they are celebrating with, and what they’re celebrating for.

Sam and Charlie can spend their twelve birthdays together, with Henry by their side. 

Evan can have a nice party with his actual friends, without pranks and scares. 

Elizabeth didn’t die on her birthday, but she wanted to have one too, so Michael made her a pink cake. 

It’s a goodbye. The most sweet and sorrowful goodbye they’ll ever live.

One that they don’t want to waste with tears or regrets, so there’s no more ‘I’m sorry’ or ‘I wish I could’ve saved you’, because it would be useless. 

Time is not something they can get back. 

The kids possessing the main animatronics sing for the last time their main theme. 

Henry is in a wheelchair, but he and Charlie follow the rhythm the best they can, while Sam is a few steps away, rolling his eyes seeing his sister and dad, with a faint smile on his lips. 

Michael tries to dance with Elizabeth, but Baby is a head taller than him, so it ends up being his sister, the one that leads the dance, with Evan as a miniature Shadow Freddy sitting on her shoulder. 

They spend the night dancing and blowing candles and Jeremy tries to teach the animatronics how to play poker. 

They ignore the person locked in the basement- they are too far away to hear him. 

When the clock strikes 5 A.M, Michael leaves the group and goes downstairs. 

He needs to do something, before everything ends. 

At the other side of the door, William begs him to get him out, the same way he had been begging for the last month.

“MICHAEL! EVAN! ELIZABETH!” he calls in desperation, hoping that one of his kids will finally come to him and free him. Michael knocks in the door, and his father’s screams grow even louder. “Michael, MICHAEL! Let me out! We can fix it, Michael. Everything is okay, we can be okay, just let me out…”

“Was it worth it?” Michael asks, loud enough for his father to hear him at the other side.

He doesn’t know if the silence is because William is really thinking about it, about if it was actually worth it, and having a hard time thinking about the answer- or if he doesn’t want to say “no, it wasn’t” because it would be too obvious that he’s lying, and then all the possibilities of Michael open the door would banish. 

Michael nods, like this is enough, then sighs and goes back with the rest.

He’s tired of his father, of everything about him. He’s never going to know the answer to his question, but he’s fine with it. 

It’s the first step to leave William Afton, and all that he did, behind, until he’s just a harmless memory of an irredeemable pathetic man, abandoned by everyone he ever loved.

In no time, it’s 6 A.M. 

The hour the sun starts to rise and the night dies. 

And they know that it’s time. 

They fill the restaurant with gasoline, every Party Room, every corner of the Game Area, the lounge, the office….

“Are you sure about this?” Michael asks. The ghosts of the kids are in front of him. They’re smiling. Michael doesn’t understand how they can smile in a moment like this.

“Fire is the only way to destroy remnants,” Evan reminds him.

“That’s not what I’m asking.”
The kids look at each other. It’s Charlie the one who speaks next:

“We can’t stay here forever.”
“Thank you for giving us some good last days,” Gabriel adds.

They don’t know what to say, what to add, what to do to prolong this moment a bit longer.

“Mickey,” Elizabeth calls him. Michael raises his head and looks at his sister. She’s giving him a sweet smile. “You need to let go.”
“And you too, dad,” Sam comments, gazing at Henry. “Don’t you dare come to us before it’s your time, or I’ll make sure to make your eternity hell.”

“I promise,” Henry says, his smile as big and warm as ever, accompanied by unstoppable tears.

Slowly, the three men leave the pizzeria. 

Michael stares back at them one more time, at the ghost of his siblings, Charlie, Sam, the kids that didn’t deserve this fate. 

And he turns on his lighter and lets it fall. 

The fire starts when the three are already in the parking lot. The flames surround the pizzeria in no time- the windows crack and the fire grows and they hear the pillars of the building falling down. 

They hear a scream, a painful horrible scream that confirms that William Afton is finally dead, that his soul had been consumed by the flames, and whenever he goes no, he can’t hurt them again. 

There are no more yells, no sobs in agony or regret. They see the animatronics inside the building, burning, but their eyes are empty- they’re become what they should’ve ever been, empty shells. 

Michael takes Jeremy’s hand and squeezes it. Jeremy squeezes back, comforting his boyfriend. 

And, while Freddys Fazbear’s Pizzeria burns in front of them, ending at last this story of horrors and nightmares, Michael Afton’s lips raise slightly, wondering for excitement, for the first time, what future awaits for him.