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He laid back on his chair, feeling the surrounding area begin to heat up as he uttered the finale of his speech ‘End communication.’
He knew it was for the best. Everything that started this was caused by him and William and it needed to be erased, gone, to never be remembered, so everyone could be at peace, so everything could be forgotten and left to die. So that he could move on, and stop being held down in chains by his and William’s past mistakes. Though it was planned, he never imagined how good it felt to finally be at peace. He was going to be okay. What he was worried about was the damage this whole situation would bring in the future. If only he could go back and stop it. Stop himself from knowing his former best friend.
The pain was horrible. So much he couldn’t bear to live. He had tried many times to rid himself of said pain, by taking his life. However, it didn’t work. And he couldn’t even look himself in the mirror, all he could see was what a failure he was. He failed to protect her, he failed to stop him and this is where he ended up, burning everything to the ground, him, Michael, all their creations, and most importantly, the man who brought all this together.
The man who destroyed everything he worked so hard for. Henry knew that in no way he, himself, was perfect, he knew that he had made plenty of mistakes that contributed to this mess. But the core cause was William. And so, as he relaxed into the warmth of the roaring fire, he was surprised to see the door burst open and a rotten animatronic collapsed onto the floor, seemingly glaring at him. It was him. But also not him. Ever since Michael had salvaged the broken, green bunny rabbit, Henry knew who it truly was, and tried to ‘avoid’ it as best he could, as if it was a real person again. Looked like it was searching for him. It crawled towards him, metal clunking onto the ground as it struggled to make a small way over. Looks like the metal in the animatronic legs wasn’t strong enough and had completely snapped. It was a pathetic display.
Henry looked down at it, not angrily, not annoyed, just a blank stare.
It stopped crawling once closer enough and tilted its head up, and a strained voice that was hard to understand, but Henry could make out what it was saying, spoke.
“You.”
One word, it was better than none. Henry nodded, eyes glancing all over the mess of the animatronic that used to be Spring Bonnie. His eyes darted to the monitor displaying the cameras and the temperature. They would soon all burn to dust, so was there any harm in having one last talk with it?
“Me.” He acknowledged, saying it in a slightly angry voice now. He was letting his emotions take hold, for they were all going to die soon, so why not? “Why come to the room I'm in of all places? To kill me? What is it.” He raised an eyebrow, glancing at the monitors again before back at the rotten animatronic. He was genuinely curious. He would have thought William would have wanted to stay as far as he could away from his ex… ex-partner. Ex-business partner. But then again, he probably wanted to hurt him, after all, Henry was erasing all his ‘hard work’ and putting everyone to rest.
“Why.” It replied, in that same cracked-up strained voice, but it was still recognizable to be his. That is an interesting question to ask Henry of all people.
“Why what? Why did I set the place on fire? Why am I still alive? Be specific, ‘old friend’.” He said that completely with malice, then calmed himself. He wouldn’t allow William to see his true emotions, he knew how he worked and even in his state as a decaying piece of rotten metal, he would find a way to use them against him, and if he was going to die, he wanted to die peacefully.
The scrapped animatronic stopped slightly twitching and stared up at Henry, suddenly moving with a massive clank to prop itself against the wall, and the animatronic also happened to be right by Henry’s foot. It did what only could be assumed as a nod, but it looked like something had malfunctioned in the machinery, that was clearly not present, or working, in the suit anymore.
“If you had listened to what I said, you may have figured it out. But then again, you were always ‘independent’. You never listened.” Henry glanced back at the monitor yet again, seeing the temperature start to rise quickly. “I’m doing it to end what you started. And for why I'm still alive, trust me, I didn't intend to be. But, looks like it was for a good reason. If this is the last thing I get to do, it's amazing for it to be finally getting rid of you.”
“Now it's time for me to ask a question if you even can answer. Why did you do this? Don’t bullshit me with ‘It was for remnant’. I saw your diary, I saw the blueprints, I know you did this for remnant. But that's not the full answer. Why the fuck did you think it would be okay to kill children?! I mean, you were always sick in the head but I never thought you would go that far. I have so so much anger toward you. I just don’t get it.”
It twitched at that, making a horrible screeching noise, and quickly turning its head up to the monitor, seeing the rising temperature, and then turning its head back down to the floor. Henry could feel the heat rise even more, approaching the point where the skin would start to melt.
“Fun.”
Bang.
Henry gave up on trying to hide his emotions and kicked the rotten bunny suit hard, bits of rust and metal shattering off the suit. He felt drops of sweat start to emerge on his face, but it wasn't sweat, it was tears.
“What the fuck do you mean fun!? Is life a game to you? Did you not care for everything we did?! Everything meant nothing to you, right?! Speak God dammit!” He screamed, breathing heavily. Mike could probably hear the one-sided fight right now, but Henry didn’t want him to come. He let out a mix between a sigh and a cry and shook his head, “I regret everything since meeting you.” He sat back on his chair, glaring at the ground and knowing he was about to die, in his own fire. But he was going to die unhappy because the piece of shit before him decided to interrupt his peaceful departure. Great.
“Look, I get you love to mess things up, but just leave, okay?! Go to another room and fucking destroy it, I don't care. Just let me die peacefully.” He spun the chair so he was facing back at his monitor and rested his head in his hand, the other one clawing aimlessly at the wooden desk. It had scratch marks from when he would sit here deep in thought about how he would execute his plan. Now he was not deep in thought, in fact, there were barely any thoughts in his head. He just needed something to distract him from the heap of metal slung against the wall, twitching from the heat.
He knew this was right, he had for a long time. Finally, he would free the souls, his daughter, and everyone. And better yet, he’d get rid of him finally. But something in the back of his mind echoed a thought he had been considering from the very beginning, and it scared him.
‘What if this isn’t the end?’
This was a good question. A very probable one. Although Henry had gone to lengths to ensure that wouldn’t happen, who knows? He had made sure to set up legal laws against ever bringing the company back, and in any case that the souls don't get freed, which they most definitely should, those laws would keep the animatronics under Henry’s name, even after dying. But, after all, there's always the worry of people disregarding those rules, or the souls escaping the animatronics somehow, or something else that would throw his plan out the window. There was nothing he knew to stop that, so he’d just have to hope for the best.
The estimate of time now would have been around three minutes, so he sat back in his chair and rested his head against the wall, eyes trailing down to him. He must not be able to move. Oh well, he supposed at least it wasn’t too close, he could just ignore it. Although that really wasn’t easy. He was about to die, sacrificing his life to save all the others that the hunk of metal in the same room as him had cursed. But that doesn't mean he wanted his life.
Over the years, he had tried to kill himself twice, clearly failing both times. Number one was a normal way, an overdose. That, however, did not work. One of his neighbors noticed his absence [although he never really came out of his house anyway] and the fact all the lights were off except for the bathroom one. He was saved at the hospital the next day. The second was more creative; a suicide animatronic. Nearly worked, but he had met Mike again by this point and had managed to save him yet again. He did not like life, so they decided to create a plan that gave Henry a reason to live, and, when the time came, a reason to die.
And here it was.
Clearly, the animatronic either couldn’t move or didn't want to, so Henry just glared at it. The heat was beginning to rapidly injure him. His wooden desk was turning ash black, and he closed his eyes, just wanting this to end quickly. The next few minutes felt as if he was just not there. The pain was horrible, but it almost went away. That was until he heard scuffling and opened his eyes to see his skin horribly burning off, and the old bunny animatronic laying against his chair.
Fine, He thought, One last dance.
.
.
.
POWERING ON.
ANOMALY DETECTED.
“That's strange, Jack, come ‘ave a look at this.”
One of the animatronic mechanics called out to another, who made their way over to him and Glamrock Freddy, who had just randomly shut down in the middle of a show.
“Anomaly…fuck that supposed to mean?”
“Dunno. Maybe a fault in the programming, ask Ness later, she’ll know somein’.” Sam, the other mechanic replied, shutting the hatch in Freddy’s stomach and turning back to the computer that displayed the strange results.
“Fair. Just hand me the wires, yeah? Then we can leave.”
“Aight, the red ones, right?”
“Yep. Jeeze I hate this job, it's fuckin’ boring”
“Yeah but it gets ‘em bills paid, so who cares if we just messin’ around.”
It was then given to Vanessa to sort out the animatronic, only then reporting to the higher-ups that something with Freddy’s programming had caused a whole system to shut down, causing the strange results. However, that was not the case. Vanessa knew, just like he knew.
There was something trapped, something that could not escape. A soul, one that had wished for the end, and who was just met with eternal suffering.
His plan had failed. It must just be him, why else would the universe hurt him like this? Why else would he be punished for attempting to save everyone? Maybe he should have just let everything go. It wouldn’t have made much difference considering no one was free. Everyone was still chained, like him.
But, it didn’t matter, all he wanted now was to escape.