Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

There it was, Freddy Fazbear’s Mega Pizza Plex, the place looking just as bright and gaudy as the mouthful of a name suggested. Despite the fact that under normal circumstances, you would never step foot into such a place, it was home. The closest thing you’d had to a home in quite some time, in fact. And these were not normal circumstances, this was a return to a place so near and dear to your heart that it had physically hurt being torn away.

But the reason for your transfer was no longer an issue, thankfully, or else you more than likely never would have been allowed back, no matter how good you were at your job. No more ‘Mr. Red Tape.’ No more breathing down your neck. No more remarks about how “someone smart would do it like this!” Turns out that no matter how high up in the company your mom is, big business doesn’t like embezzlement.

You’d easily chosen the best time of day to come back, at least, noting that the crowds were finally thinning as it neared closing time, so you wouldn’t need to crowdsurf through exhausted parents dragging their far too caffeinated children away with loud whines of protest. Even if the volume of these shouts made your ears hurt a bit, it was simply nice to finally be home.

Although, out of everything, you didn’t really miss the smell. An acrid mix of old pizza, Lisol, and oily children permeated every corner of the place, the main lobby included. How it made for a good first impression on guests, you were never sure, but it was hardly a first impression for you.

But besides that, everything was just the same as you’d left it, if a bit older. From the neon lights, to the mirror-polished floors, even the giant Freddy statue still stood proudly, if a bit more tarnished from time. Everything including-

“Take a map.” A monotonous voice called out, shoving a folded piece of paper under your nose.

“Hey, buddy.” You replied, taking the accursed thing even if you didn’t really need it. There was no way things had changed that much while you were away. “Good to see you again, too.”

After a short pat on the head, Map Bot turned around, wheeling their way back over to the front doors and standing to the side so an exasperated father could carry his screaming son out, farmer style.

It was nice to see that they’d stopped trying to give maps to those that were currently leaving, at least.

But now that you’d officially made your return, and set foot back in the Plex, you were getting cold feet. What if your friends didn’t know you were forced to leave and were upset? What if they’d been completely reset and didn’t remember you anymore?

That thought hurt worse than the first one.

Well… you wouldn’t know until you finally sucked it up and talked to them.

So with a renewed vigor, you marched your way to Rockstar Row at the opposite end of the Plex, and retained that enthusiasm until you saw the four faces pasted over the large windows to each room. Noting in the back of your mind that they’d gone through with their decision to replace Bonnie in the band with Monty. Hopefully he was doing alright with that situation.

But then, as you stood there looking at the windows, each with their curtain’s drawn, you paused again. Who would you approach first? Did it matter? Would the others be upset at your choice of who to see first? Why did all of this matter so much all of a sudden? When would-

At that point you were increadibly greatful that it was near closing time as you let out the most undignified squack when two large arms wrapped around your waist and picked you up, holding you in the air and rocking you back and forth. After about three seconds of half-hearted struggling, you realized just who had picked you up.

“It’s true! It’s really and for actually true! You’re back! You’re back!” Screeched your favorite, overly enthusiastic chicken.

“And front, I’m all here!” You laughed at your own joke, hanging in her arms limply.

“Har, har.” She replied monotonously, rolling her eyes. “But for reals, I can’t believe you’re finally back! We have to tell the others! Come on!”

The way she said this would have implied that she bothered to set you down before running down the hall to Freddy’s door, leaving loud thunks to echo across the place and letting anyone that had yet to leave that one of the band members was rapidly approaching. But alas, your feet would long for the ground a bit longer.

Once she purposefully planted two feet in front of the bear’s door, a series of three knocks would ring out, interspersed with his name.

“Freddy.” Knock, knock, knock. “Freddy.” Knock, knock, knock. “Freddy.” Knock, knock, knock. “Freddy.” Knock, knock, knock. “Fred-”

When the door finally slid open, she paused, before smiling innocently and knocking on his check three more times.

“Look what I found!” She squealed, holding you out at arms length, each hand sitting under your armpit like a misbehaving cat.

His expression remained unreadable as he looked down at you, so you took it upon yourself to give him a small wave.

“Hey, Fre-DDY” What little air had been in your lungs for that statement was promptly crushed out by the second man-handling of the day. You know what they say about bear hugs and whatnot.

“So it WAS true! I did not dare hope. I do not think I could take it if it had been a lie.” That stung a little. It wasn’t your fault you’d been forced out, but you couldn’t help but feel like you should/could have done something to stay.

“I missed you too, big guy, but I still have lungs that need air.” you wheezed, trying to be nonchalant. The ground met your feet once again in a torrid love affair, having thought they would never be reunited. There were some soft “sorry”s but you could tell he was still bursting with excitement, barely standing still. Neither of them were. The expressions of emotion you’d had come to miss with your absence. You looped your arms as far around them as you could get, hugging them as hard as you could. “I mean it, I really missed you guys. I’m glad to be back.” They squished you back.

“You HAVE to tell us what you were up to while you were gone! We can have a sleep over! We’ll do nails, and hair, and gossip over movies and popcorn!” Chica said, flapping her hands in barely contained excitement. “Oh and the boys can come too, I guess.” There was only playfulness in her voice.

“That sounds amazing, but there’s still two more that haven’t gotten on the welcome wagon.” The two animatronics exchanged quick glances, hoping you hadn’t noticed. But you did, and were about to say something when the loveliest wolf broke the makeshift circle.

“What’s with the shouting?” Roxanne snapped, pushing the two aside. When she finally looked down to you, her expression didn’t change but her tail began wagging faster than you’d ever seen it. “No way, you really are back, huh?” She leaned back, crossing her arms and trying her damnedest to contain her joy. As per usual.

“Yeahhh, gonna have to get used to me runnin’ around and bugging you all again.” You said with a smirk, you knew this game and liked to think you played it well. She huffed in response, tail still betraying her cool girl attitude.

“Great. Just what we need.” The sarcasm was dripping but there was a genuineness to her words that always shown through. “Nice to have you back, I guess.” Now it was her turn to smirk.

“Good to see you too, Roxy. Now we’ve almost got the whole band back, now where’s Bonnie?” It was like a light turned off. The mirth on their faces gone with the simple utterance of a name. None of them looked at you, trying to find both a spot on the wall they liked and the words to tell you the bad news.

“Maybe we should take this to my room. Let you sit down first.” Freddy finally said, gently guiding you through the door. You really didn’t like where this was going.

Still, you could to nothing but sit on his couch wordlessly, looking from one animatronic to the next but none would meet your gaze. The three stood around, obviously trying to find the words to smooth over the news. But there was no good way to say it.

“He’s gone isn’t he?” You couldn’t help the way your voice choked up. The worst thing you had thought to happen in your absence was them being reset, and not remembering you, you times together, or even themselves. This was much worse.

Freddy nodded, finally looking at you while the girls took to leaning against the walls, avoiding your gaze.

“Freddy, I’m so sorry. I know how much he meant to you.” You got up to give him a hug, he met you halfway. You could tell he was shaking, trying to remain strong in spite of it all. There were so many questions going through your head, it was making the room spin. Freddy took the lead and sat down with you. “Can I ask what happened?”

“Yes, but I am afraid we can not tell you an answer. They wont let us speak of it, only that he is gone and that Monty has taken his place in the band.”

“I kinda figured, what with his sign hanging over Bonnie’s old room. I just hoped that they’d gone with the plan to have Bonnie as the main mascot for his bowling rink.”

You knew the alligator in passing. It wasn’t that you hadn't wanted to get to know him, it was more that he’d been released for audiences about two months before you had been exiled. You remembered the months, almost a year, it had taken for Gator Golf to be completed. There had been payment, material, personnel, and quite a few other issues that had spread the construction time from two months to ten. When it had finally be completed, you got a very surly “I don’t care how ready it is, we’re putting it on the floor now.”

So it was that the day of completion, Monty was revealed to the world. He had been quite static at first, as all the animatronics are upon release. Generic and gruff but affectionate replies to guests, photo signings, and putt putt tournaments. A ‘bad boy’ attitude had been programmed into his personality to appeal to some of the more rambunctious kids. You had guessed it to take a few months for him to ‘wake up.’ Even DJ Music Man had gotten in on the bet with the band on how long it would take. Not a single one of you were even close.

See, along with the swamp theme to his are, they had added water features. Yes, there were guard rails to keep kids from falling in, but those rails weren’t up to snuff when a quarter ton robot bumps in to it. It was a week solid of work to get him working again. That water had been disgusting and it took about half an hour for staff bots to fish him out.

By the time he rebooted, he was different. The same, but off. He didn’t immediately hit the downward spiral of existentialism like you feared. But he knew he was different now, and had no clue what to do about it. He hadn’t really wanted to talk to you about it, and you hadn’t blamed him. There was now a fear of being shut down he didn’t know what to do with. You’d directed him to the band with a subtle ‘they might understand better.’

After that the two of you shared, maybe, a handful of encounters beyond a nod. The band assured that he was handling things well and they’d help him as much as they could. So you’d taken you hands off the reigns. In reference to all of this, there was one specific conversion that had made you shocked about his new status.

He didn’t want to be in the band. Not when you had discussed it anyways. You’d jokingly asked it he was upset he wasn’t in the band, and the second the words left your mouth you wanted to take them back. But to your surprise, he just shook his head softly and said:

“Nah, I’m actually pretty happy where I am. I- don’t do well with too many people. The stage, the lights, the pressure to perform? I don’t think I’d fit in very well.” You’d assured him the gang liked having him around, but he said it wasn’t about that. Then he’d walked off. That was the last time you’d ever really talked to him.

It made sense for them to force him into the band after Bonnie’s… passing. You didn’t have to like it on principal though. “So, how have things been around here? Despite it all…” Apparently you’d been quiet for some time because the three jumped slightly upon your question.

“Not too bad.” Freddy chimed in, but his expression said otherwise.

“You don’t have to lie around me.” You replied, a little hurt that he wouldn’t confide in you. But that wasn’t the case, as his eyes went from you to the camera in the corner you hadn’t caught on your way in. With a wave of your hand disguised as resting your arm over the top of the sofa, the room filled with a fizzle and pop, the camera pointing down in its now off state. “When did they put those in?”

“Not too long after you had to leave, I am afraid. With you no longer around to stand up for us, they began doing whatever they pleased.” Freddy lamented. Rage boiled within you for no more than a second, it only died down because you no longer had to deal with that.

“Well, things are going to be different around here, and for the better. It may take some time, but just bear,” Chica giggled, “with me, yeah?” You piped in, looking at all the figures in the room. All four of them. Wait.

It seems Monty had barged in to join the hub bub not long after the camera was gone. He looked shocked, but more annoyed.

“So no one bothers to tell me when the party starts now, I get it.” The gator said, huffing playfully. You understood the mischievous undertones but someone didn’t.

“We did not mean it like that, Monty. You were at a birthday party the last we heard.” Freddy had gotten up to look him in the eyes, but the gator just shook his head and chuckled.

“Ain’t like that, was just messin’ with ya.” He patted the bear on the shoulder, and looked at you. “So. Movie time?”

The room relaxed and for the first time in over a year, you remembered what peace felt like.

Chapter Text

While the original plan had been to at least stop by and say hello to everyone on your first day back, things quickly got away from you. After retrieving your TV and movies from the service tunnels, both having not moved an inch since you’d been gone, you’d then set everything up in Freddy’s greenroom, still intending on stopping by to see DJ before settling down for the night.

This, obviously, did not go as planned as you were quickly swallowed up in a ten-foot cuddle puddle with the band, refusing to let you go despite the fact that every movie that played on the screen having been, easily, your third re-watch. Chica then had a staff bot bring in a pizza, to your delight and everyone else’s mild frustration, as she tended to make a mess whenever she ate, no matter how careful she tried to be about it. Not having cheeks or lips will do that.

Still, the relative return to normalcy was a more than welcome one. The last 16 months appearing like nothing more than a bad dream when swaddled in the arms of friends.

Besides Bonnie’s absence, of course, no one could deny that it put a relative pin in everything.

Around two AM, Monty and Freddy wandered off to their respective rooms, planning on getting in a good charging cycle before the Plex officially opened at seven. The girls, however, made good on Chica’s promise for a ‘girls night,’ even in you didn’t have a biological gender, it was the thought that counted. It was just a time for them to paint your nails and mess with your hair, all the while going on about things that had happened at the Plex while you were gone.

Then, around five, you could tell they were running out of steam and kindly hinted that maybe they should go charge before they had to get back to work for the day; that you’d all have plenty of more time to hand out later. But as you got up to leave, Chica grabbed your hand, earning her a look of shock as you turned back to her.

“I know it’s silly to ask, but… you promise? That… that you’ll still be here when we get up?”

Roxy would never admit it out loud, but she gave you a look that practically asked the same thing.

“Of course.” You replied simply, leaning down to give both of them one last hug. “Cross… wherever my heart is.”

That sorry attempt at a joke worked in releasing some of the tension in the air, and you were relieved for it. Sure, you understood where that worry came from, but it still bothered the part of you that felt as if you could have tried harder to stay. Even if your old boss had practically threatened you with the idea of something happening to ‘your precious robots.’ As if all of Fazco wouldn’t have reigned the collective power of millions of dollars in legal protections upon his head.

Once you were sure the girls would be okay if left alone, you made your way back out into the rest of the Plex. As silly as it was, it took you a moment to recognize just how empty the place had become. Even at night there were usually, at least, some humans around, getting the place ready for the next day. And while there was a staff bot practically every five feet, there was a distinct lack of humans around to fill in those empty spaces.

Still, it struck you as a bit odd. Fazco had faced a lawsuit not a few years ago about doing this exact thing, replacing human staff with the blank faces that zoomed past you. The judge ruled in favor of the living staff that had been laid off in preparation for this switch, requiring that Faz have at least one person per job title in the building.

Their strict following of those rules seemed to have laxed while you were gone.

At that point, though, it was far too late in the day, or rather, early in the morning, to follow through with you plan to say hello to everyone as DJ would more than likely be charging as the band was. But since you worked nights, there was plenty of time to get some sleep before getting back to it.

Granted you didn’t NEED to sleep, just as you didn’t technically need to breathe, but you learned the hard way that while humans are oblivious to most things, noticing when someone isn’t breathing was an outlier. The sleep thing was more to pass time and that it felt nice. Feelings of exhaustion that might settle in your form throughout the day would pass if you ignored it, but it went far quicker if you just laid down for a bit, a situation that lead you to set up a sort of room in the vents.

Sure, it was a dog bed with eight extension cables hooked up to a plug in the service tunnels to charge your phone and watch, but it was a bedroom to you. One that had exceptional air flow, kept you away from the general public, and was calling your name to its sweet, breezy confines.

The particular vent you usually used was the one next to said plugs, so you checked to make sure they were not only still there, but still plugged in. It had been disturbingly easy to get into a secured area with no badge, but to be fair, most people didn’t know how to hotwire a badge checker. Besides that, the plugs were, so with the mild anxiety over your spot having been found now gone, you pried the cover off, checking to make sure they hadn’t installed any new cameras in the area, before shifting your form.

On the inside, everything was still the same: a heart rather unlike what normal living creatures had, a set of lungs, and the general mash of viscera that composed the rest of your makeup. But on the outside, well, an onlooker might say that it was like a ferret and a Chinese dragon had a kid, long snout and slender body with small legs for easy vent travel, but a thick coat of fur covering the whole thing, keeping your body temp nice and neutral around 90 degrees while you slept. Still, it lacked quite a few key features that would classify you as ‘cute.’ This form was simply for comfort and ease, why bother putting so much effort into something, hopefully, no one else would ever see?

With your tiny little paws on the edge, you wiggled yourself up and inside, making your tail thud loudly against the wall. Then, once in completely, you used that thick tail to grab the vent cover and put it back, ensuring that your spot would remain hidden, despite the fact that there was probally little need given that ninety-eight percent of the human staff had been let go and the staff bots both wouldn’t care, and liked you enough to not ‘say’ anything if they did.

A right, a left, two more rights, a second left and a fourth right. This pattern was drilled into your mind well enough to be able to do it in your sleep. It had never let you down before, and it hadn’t now as your bed came into view, a bit dusty but not having moved an inch since you left.

Shaking it out did nothing, so you shrugged as well as you could and curled up, resting your snout on your paws instead of the fluff that made it up for obvious reasons.

Even if you’d been gone for over a year, and the Plex no longer held its meager amount of human night staff, the sound was a lovely sort of familiar, lulling you to sleep in no time at all.

___________________________________________________________________________________

When you finally roused from your ill-remembered dreamland, you’d guesstimate the time to have been around noon, given that even on weekdays, the Plex was always busiest around then. Having forced to live in a sister location far less popular than the Plex, you’d almost forgotten just how noisy a building a packed children’s fun center could be. Even if you’d wanted to, there was no getting back to sleep with all that noise unless you literally closed off your ears, but you had a better idea: to go bother your DJ friend.

You stretched and twisted, making all sorts of inorganic shapes to shake off the exhaustion before making your way deeper into the vent system, retracing your steps from the night before for a bit, before deciding to take the most direct route to your spider-like friend. Having used many of your free hours to map out the entirety of the ventilation system when the place was first built had never once served you wrong, and then was no different.

Before long, you were staring out of the vent and through a large hole in the wall, opposite several other holes of the same size. While you’d entertained the fictitious idea of a giant worm eating through the Plex, the reality of the situation was that they were simply there for your rather large, spider-like friend to make his way around limited parts of the place. Once sat in the larger area, but still cloaked in darkness, you shifted back to a more socially acceptable form and slid yourself out the rest of the way.

To your right was the back end of the man… spider himself, rocking and bopping to the self-made tunes that you could hear from there, and entirely oblivious to your presence. You tapped your fingers to your lips, mulling over the best way to announce your re-introduction to the Plex’s organic, or semi-organic in your case, staff. Then it dawned on you: long ago, you used to chant his name to the tune of the “DK, Chunky’s dead” bit from the Donkey Kong Rap, a reference that was most likely lost on him and just about every other being in the place, but fun none the less.

With a shit-eating grim, you began to sneak up behind him, starting out quiet, then progressively getting louder as you approached him from his back right. By the time you were next to him you were practically shouting, which was a little necessary due to the loud beats. The kids were just staring at you confused and cringing at the display, as you, in turn, stared up at Music Man, confused. You were right next to him practically screaming and he hadn’t acknowledged you.

Was he upset? Was he ignoring you? Had he taking your exile personally and now didn-

You weren’t doing well on your day to embarrassing noise ratio, if you were being honest. Although a squawk would have been more dignified than the Goofy-esque ‘hi-yuck’ you let out as a giant hand scooped you up, pressing your comparatively small form to his face. The music continued even as the kids began filing away from the scene of PDA going on. You couldn’t help but begin cackling as he gently tossed you in the air, relieved that he wasn’t upset, just messing with you.

“It’s nice to see you too big guy!” You all but shouted, the music still blaring loud enough to give the people there some free hearing damage.

A series of noises was your reply, and while you would normally have to be another animatronic to understand what he was saying, you weren’t exactly normal. It was a mash of ‘You can’t get the drop on me’ and ‘Where have you been. I heard you got back yesterday.’

“Yeah, but you know how the band is. The second they knew I was in the building there was no going anywhere else until they got their time with me.” You replied as he gently set you down. Well, he lowered his hand, but you were still reclining in it. “By the time they finally went to charge, I knew you would be doing the same, and I know you need your beauty sleep.” You said cutely, fluttering your eyelids with your hands clasped under your head. He let out the equivalent of an eye roll as a reply. After that, however, he perked up as if remembering something.

He sent out a signal to another animatronic, but you didn’t know who or to what. You could ‘hear’ certain signals but couldn't really tell what was in them. Like how TV static held remnants of the Big Bang; it was a signal of a sort, but you can’t tell what was in it.

In the interim, you just relaxed on his hand, relishing the things you missed while you were away. The Fazcade still smelled as if someone had burnt a month old pizza slice, and the place made you a little dizzy due to all of the lights and sounds. All of this simply reminded you why you usually visited him after closing as they turned the lights down to conserve power and the smell became less nauseating with the lack of kids.

Eventually, you were pulled out of your thoughts by something sitting on your legs, startling you a bit. It was a tiny DJ! You could help the delighted screech you let out, he was absolutely adorable! Their simple response to your estatic, if overbearing cheek-pinching was a simple clack of their little cymbals, acting as if this sort of thing happened everyday.

“DJ! I didn’t know you were a mother!”

He replied with a record scratch and the most irritated stare of the century.

“Kidding! Kidding. You know I gotta make up for lost time!” The music resumed. “He’s the cutest little guy I’ve seen! How did this happen?”

A series of various DJ noises explained that the little him was a wind-up toy version that a tech finally got around to digging out of storage. Management put them in a glass display case, not realizing they were still active and later escaped. No one had been able to catch him since.

You laughed, assuring him that you weren’t going to turn the little guy in. But before you could say much else, the little guy in question got up and skittered away, as if the devil were on their heels, which startled you to say the least. Before you got a chance to ask the big guy what was up a rather brusque woman in a blue suit walked up to the edge of the stage, clearing her throat.

“Am I to assume you are the recent transferred employee?”

You took a half second to take her all in. Her hair was done up in a tight bun, glasses framed her rounded features, and her attire screamed ‘custom fit tailoring money.’ Overall, well put together and a bit intimidating.

“Yeag.” Came your curt, and incorrect, reply, finally hopping out of DJ’s hand.

Then, once you’d hopped off the stage, you extended yours, simply watching as she looked down at it, then back up to you, refusing to touch the offending thing.

So, it was going to be like that, huh?

Instead of reply to her non-existent greeting, you quickly raised your hand, smoothing back your hair as if that had been the plan the whole time.

“I’m afraid you have the advantage, your name is?”

“Ms. Elanor Dayton, you may refer to me as Ms. Dayton or not at all.” Damn, this lady was ice cold. You could respect that. “Follow me, I’ll get you settled in to your old station and run you through your employment here.”

Both of you walked and talked, her, doing most of the talking as one of her strides took up two of yours to simply keep pace.

Simply put, she was the new regional manager after your old boss was charged with embezzlement and promptly fired. You were to take up your old position as lead mechanic, maintaining your similarly old night shift of twelve hours, five days a week. Rather than hourly, you were now upgraded to salary, with all of the perks and downsides that came with it. No matter what, you were expected to stay as long as it took to finish whatever assignments were given to you, and that if you had any questions, that you needed to direct them to her secretary and your supervisor.

Finally, you needed to finish introducing yourself to the animatronics before going down to Parts and Service and getting settled in.

“Oh, I already talked to the band yesterday.” She whipped around, making you flinch.

“I hope you don’t expect to be paid for that time. You weren’t meant to work until today.” She looked at you over her glasses, inspecting you more than she had when you first met.

“No, no, I just knew it would take up quite some time, so I did it early.”

Nodding, she turned back around.

“Good, now just introduce yourself to the Daycare Attendant and begin your first shift back. We had an incident a week ago with a group of children deciding to pour Fizzy Faz down the exposed wiring of a set of staff robots.”

You grimaced, that was not going to be fun. Wait a minute.

“The Daycare Attendant? When did this place get a daycare?”

She continued walking regardless of your ability to keep up.

“Fourteen months ago we began building a daycare and finished the project three months later. During which, an animatronic was purchased to work the area, as it was more cost effective to use one from an acquired company than to build a new one. The daycare had been running fine until a few months ago when there was an,” she stopped walking causing you to almost run in to her, “accident. That is all I’m at liberty to say. Reference incident report D-21B for further information. Their schematics will be provided and they are overdue for maintenance. Once you have finished settling in, you are to take care of that by any means necessary.”

You half expected her to keep walking, but instead, she gestured to the giant statue on her left. Behind which, was a large room with a ramp leading down to a secondary room, where large oak doors enclosed a large C shaped divider wall, through which you could see a sprawling play-scape with slides, tables, and a ball pit.

It was impressive if you were being honest. A kid would go wild in that place. There was a distinct lack of children, however. The entire place sitting empty and all the more unsettling for it. How did you miss walking into this place?

“Will that be all, Ms. Dayton?” You asked, her face shifting to show just the slightest hint of surprise.

“Yes. My office is in the same location as Mr. Fairchild’s, with my secretary’s desk next door. Should you have any questions or concerns, please consult her first as she will get in touch with me if necessary. No not bother me unless it is a dire emergency.” She turned to go, but grimaced and turned back to face you with the most expression of emotion you would ever see out of her. “And don’t forget to have a Fazz-tastic day.”

With that, you were alone. This place was nice; extremely high ceilings that had stars on them, a sitting area where adults could watch their kids play, and easily accessible ramp. Nerves began to eat at you again, however. You thought you knew all of the animatronics here, you were sort of riding on that knowledge. There had been no discussion of a new one. But then again, if something had happened and they were no longer allowing people in, then it could be understood as to why no one had talked about them.

With a deep, steadying breath, you took your first steps deeper into the daycare lobby. Besides the statue and ramp, there was a small gift shop with sun and moon themed cheap plastic crap, and large posters on the wall advertising Sundrop candies, with a sun-faced character holding them. A similar, Moondrops poster sat next to it, depicting a distinctly familiar face, this time with a lunar theme. It would do well to assume that that was the attendant, then… attendants? You distinctly remember hearing Ms. Dayton say attendant, singular.

Besides that, further in, was a sanctioned off area with a tube, the phrase “Slide into Fun!” plastered over the top with the N having begun to fall off.

There was a sudden, burning need to go down that slide. How often do you get that kind of chance? Plus it was demanding that you slide in to fun, who were you to deny the sign. You checked over your shoulder to see if Ms. Buzzkill was still there, and she was not. A disconcertingly large grin split your face and you gently scooted the barrier to the side with your foot and jumped down the slide.

About half way down, thought, the thought crossed your mind that maybe that sign had been there because something was broken.

How right you were but not about the slide.

At the bottom you slammed feet first in to a ball pit filled up to your ribs, way too many balls for small kids, but just enough for an adult to not smack their ass on the ground below. You couldn’t contain your laughter, throwing balls into the air like splashing water. A bit of movement caught your eye from the other end of the pit, but you passed it off as the effects of your antics.

Shaking your head at the idea, you wadded around, making sure all of the balls were back where they needed to be, still smiling.

Said smile was quickly snatched from your features, along with your dignity, when you were plucked out of the pit and off of your feet for the third time in two days.

“Hello friend! What are you doing here?” Your captor gasped, synthetically. “Did you come to play?! We can make paper pals, or sock puppets, or draw, or run around in circles till our heads pop off!” Holding you at arms length like a rag doll, you finally got a good look at them.

They had a sun-themed faced-plate for a head, like the posters suggested, but this one was far from the cartoonish softness that was detailed. There was a certain charm to be had, but in the back of your mind you wondered why anyone would put them in a daycare of all places, understanding full well that many kids would not see the same charm you did.

Once they got a good look at you, however, you were promptly dropped on your ass, letting out a short ‘oof’ on impact, and looked up to see this animatronic absolutely loosing their shit.

“I am so so so so sosososososo sorry, friend. I didn’t see- I thought you were- I know I’m not supposed to touch-” This shit-loosing show continued for the amount of time it took to get your head out of the clouds. Pun only slightly intended.

They were clutching their face and sun-rays like it owed them money, threatening to hurt themselves if they kept it up.

“Woah, whoah, whoah! Hey! Let’s just, calm down, yeah? Deep brea- I mean lets count to ten together, okay?”

They refused to let go of their face but stopped ranting and nodded a fraction. After a slow countdown, they dropped their hands before bringing them back up to pick at each other.

“Hows about we start over?” You asked, giving them your name before asking the same.

“S-sun. Or Sunny. Or Sunnydrop. Or-” You put your hands up to stop them.

“It’s nice to meet you, Sun. Now… are you okay?”

Your response was a flinch, looking as if you’d punched them.

“Fin-fine. I’m fine. I’m so so so sorry about picking you up. I thought you were a kid, I didn’t get a chance to see you before you went into the ball pit. I-I know I’m not allowed to touch staff or adults. I promise if I had known-”

You really hated interrupting others, but you had a feeling this one could go on for hours like this.

“Hey, its okay. No harm done. I’m not hurt, you’re not hurt. There’s no fire.” You kept your voice low, like trying to placate a wild animal.

“You- you promise? It’s okay?”

This was the second time in two days that someone had asked you to promise something like they couldn’t believe it was true. What the hell had happened while you were gone? Things were looking way worse than you thought, or maybe you’d just hoped it would have been better.

“Yeah, I promise. It’s all good. Plus I don’t really care if you pick me up, Chica does it all the time. Just give me some warning, alright?” They nodded vehemently. After that, you finally got to what you’d been meaning to ask. “Also, what are your pronouns?”

They froze, bewildered.

“We prefer He/Him. Thank… thank you for asking. No ones ever asked before.”

Well that’s just rude on their part.

“Well that’s rude.” You voiced. They were about to apologize again before you interjected. “Not that you’re being rude, that others were being rude to you by not asking.” You clarified, letting them relax just a fraction.

“If you’re not here to play, then why are you here? Sorry.”

“Oh! I’m returning staff. I used to work here before I was transferred, but now I’m back!” You did a little ‘ta-da’ pose, hoping to dispel some of the anxiety in the air. It got a snicker at least, that was some progress.

“So what do you do?” He was still fiddling with his hands, and now that you looked you could see dents and paint chipping from how often he did this.

“Oh, I’m the lead mechanic, I work in Parts & Services.” Any mirth he might have had a second ago was gone, the air so thick with anxiety you could cut it.

He was trembling.

The urge to shake him by his very tall shoulders and scream ‘who did this to you’ was almost overpowering. you resisted, knowing it would more than likely just make things worse for him.

“BUT-!” He flinched again, making you wince. “But, I’m not going to go dragging others by their ankles to P&S. Yes, you are overdue for a checkup, but I’m not the kind to do anything against your will. Within reason, of course.”

You couldn’t tell what was going on in his head, his face-plate having been completely static, the only thing that could move was his eyes.

“Why?” He asked quietly, hoarsely and full of suspicion.

“Why, what?”

“Why wouldn’t you drag us there, it’s your job.”

This was a very specific question. There was only one answer. Anything else and you knew you could say goodbye to ever gaining their trust.

“Because it’s your body and you have a say in what happens to it?”

He laughed at that! Openly gafawing as if it were the funniest joke he’d ever heard. Wiping a fake tear from under his eye, only to still once he saw you weren’t joking.

“Wait, you’re serious?”

“Yes… Look, I don’t know what happened while I was gone. I don’t know how you were treated or by whom, but things will be different now. There are things I will allow and things I wont. And I don’t care what management has to say about it. I treat the animatronics here with respect and autonomy. They have a say, you have a say in what goes on now.” You paused, mulling over your next words. “I don’t expect you to take my word for it. I hope that you’ll give me the time to prove it to you.”

Chapter Text

After a riveting conversion consisting mostly of “sorry,” it was a bit past time to start your shift. Sure, being salary now was nice, but a late start now meant a late end and you’d rather not only get five minutes of sleep. You bid Sun farewell and that you’d see him again later. That just made him more anxious though, like your presence was a bad omen.

The path through the maintenance tunnels was the same as it had always been. With as long as you had been gone though, it felt like something must have changed, like some House of Leaves bullshit. In a way it had, you supposed.

Corridor after corridor, storage room upon storage room. Any before and after difference could easily have been chalked up to the thick layer of dust now coating everything. With the amount of staff bots around, it could have been better. On a similar note; you were now lead mechanic, that implied that there were people you’d be working with, but there wasn’t a soul in sight. Metaphorically speaking, that is. Everything had some kind of soul and Fazzbear establishments had enough ghosts across the board to rival its animatronic count.

As you made your way down the final corridor and to the large doors separating you and your new role, the door opened to meet your hand and subsequently your face. Weird noise number four, racking up the points. This time you didn’t fall on your ass though, nice. It took a moment or two to blink the stars out of your eyes (thankfully not literally this time, that was a pain to try and explain), but when you did green eyes staring awkwardly was your reward.

“Shit; I mean, shoot. I’m real sorry about that.” she was holding a clipboard like a lifeline, obviously searching desperately for what to say next.

“It’s all good,” people here had a guilt issue “no harm done. Besides my pride at least.” you joked. It did not land. She looked up at you like a wet puppy, that face could be a weapon if she put her mind to it.

“Again, I’m real sorry. Oh!” she perked up, if only a bit. “I’m Rachel, erm, Ms. Rachel Emstein. I’m Ms. Dayton’s assistant.” she shuffled the contents of her arms and only now did you realize she was balancing something ON the clipboard. “I believe these now belong to you!” It was a Fazwatch and badge. Your Fazwatch and badge now. You gratefully accepted them from her outstretched hand and put them on.

Now you were able to get a good look at her. She was short with black hair in an angled bob that hit just shy of her shoulders. Fully clad in a dark green suit with pencil skirt, her breast pocket was stuffed full of something but you couldn’t make out what. The suit complimented her eyes very well.

“Oh, thank you!” you could see the faintest blush dust her cheeks. Wait, did you just say that last part out loud, shit.

“Uh, heh, don’t mention it.” change the subject, change the subject. “I am glad I ran into you though, I had some questions before I got settled in. If that would be alright with you, that is.” It was getting later than you’d have liked so you wouldn’t be surprised if she wanted Q&A time to wait till you were done for the day.

“Hm? Oh, that’s fine by me. How long should this take?” there it was, business before pleasure and whatnot.

“A bit of time I’m afraid, I’ve been gone a hot minute and I’d like to get caught up on whats been going on since then.”

“That’s okay, I understand that. Lets go to my office then, much more comfortable than this dingy old place” she jumped a fraction. “I didn’t mean it like that, i-”

“It’s all good, this place is pretty dark and decrepit. I gets it.” You motioned towards the hallway. “Lead the way!”

She trotted past you, the door falling shut behind her. It was far easier to keep up with her than her, well, your boss. Walking back past the same rooms and hallways you’d trekked through to get to P&S in the first place, she tried making small talk.

“So… what brings you back to the Mega Pizza Plex? I’d heard you’d been transferred but you didn’t have to say yes to come back?” She looked to you out the corner of her eye, trying to keep some focus on the poorly lit halls before you.

“If I’m being honest, it’s cause I love it here. I’ve worked at quite a few places, working on more animatronics than I could count, but I like this place the best out of all of them.” you side-stepped a random box in the middle of the path.

“Well that’s good!” she piped up, looking down at her clipboard and flipping through some of the pages. “Heaven knows we could certainly use someone with experience.” For a split second it looked as if she hadn’t ment to say that, but she recovered quickly. You sighed; knowing Faz, there was more than likely a long, long list of things she was and was not allowed to talk about. NDAs and all that jazz.

“I’ll be up front with you. I’m going to ask a lot of questions, and I know that there are some of them that you aren’t allowed to answer. I wont take offense when that comes up.” you could feel some of the tension leave the air. “Just keep in mind that I’ve been around long enough to see some things you wouldn’t begin to believe. All I ask it that you keep an open mind with what I say.” She stopped, looking to you fully with a confused look on her face.

“Like what?” you could tell that she didn’t even believe That statement.

“Ghosts, hostage situations, sentient slime molds, and sapient animatronics just to start.” you tried to be nonchalant, but she wasn’t buying the bit. At first she was incredulous but then looked around to lean in close. You followed her lead, meeting her halfway.

“I’ve seen things around here, too. Things I cant explain. Things I’m not even technically supposed to talk about.” she straightened back up, you followed her lead. “BUT, that’s neither here nor there. We have other matters to discuss.” the long trek up to her office continued. Leaving you to wonder if she was being serious or just humoring you.

It wasn’t long before she was pushing open a door twice her size. You looked down the hall and to the right, where an identical door stood with a placard depicting your boss’s name on it. As you entered the room, it was like walking into a new world. The hallway had been dimly lit and had the same permeating smell that the whole Plex exuded.
This room was well lit and overly inviting. A cork board with overflowing sticky notes sat above an equally overfilled filling cabinet to the right. Her desk sat to the back left, far enough away from the wall to allow for a seat, with a similar one waiting in front. It smelled like a Bath and Body Works, and you had begun to notice a theme. Every single thing not supplied by the company was green. A green frog tape dispenser, green pens, green place mat, even a green novelty drinking bird toy. Hey, the lady knew what she liked; you could respect that.

She sat behind the desk in front of a black computer (there was a green troll doll that peeked over the top) and motioned for you to do the same. It was a nice chair, plush and didn’t hurt your back. There was no way you were ever going to get one of these, so you soaked it in as much as possible. After logging in, she turned away from the computer and back to you, tenting her fingers and resting them on the desk.

“So. You have questions?” she leaned back a bit, this all felt very practiced. “I’m glad you brought it up earlier. But yes, there are some things that we’re not allowed to discuss due to classifications and NDA agreements. If we come across something than I’ll let you know. Now, what can I help you with?”

“To begin, I’d like to know any and all policy changed made in my absence. Wouldn’t want to go breaking any rules I don’t know about.” you chuckled.

“Well, I suppose a good place to start is with security. We had a break-in a while back so we’ve increased the number of cameras, door badging motems, and staff bots patrolling the building at all times.” that sounded like a very convenient explanation to undo some of the liberties you’d painstakingly garnered for the band. “There were some, personnel adjustments to the cast of the band after an incident involving one of the animatronics. A daycare was build and a new, purchased, animatronic along with a small team were set up to staff it. This was a flawless system until an accident involving the night time animatronic caused the area to be shut down for investigation. Until a cause is found, only the day time one is allowed free roam of the daycare.” she was counting these off on her fingers.

“Is that why the moon character wasn’t there? Why has Sun been alone this whole time?” you gave her a second to catch her breath.

“Yes; the lights are to remain on at all times, barring a small portion of the night when the nighttime version goes for security patrols.” Wait, what??

“Why does a daycare animatronic have security patrols? Wouldn’t that conflict with some of the other childcare rules in his programming?”

“This was a cost cutting measure meant to work in tandem with the night security officer to cover more area faster.”

“Officer? Singular? That’s another point I was going to ask. Where did all of the human staff go?” You ran your hand through your hair. Things were starting to make more sense.

“Due to a lawsuit years ago, we were required to have a certain amount of human staff. However, there was a secondary clause that states that we are to have a minimum of one human per job title. Now, we’ve combined several job descriptions to cut back on the amount of human labor.” Ooohh, yeah that checks out. Business practices had always been scummy at best. You nodded along, pretending that you were okay with this.

“Will I be encountering anyone during my shift then? You mentioned a security officer.”

“Yes, we have one security staff on shift during the night. Her name is Vannesa. You may or may not run in to her, however. This place is rather big and her route doesn’t include P&S.” She shifted through some loose papers on her desk, trying to look busy. “Were there any other questions? It’s getting quite late I’m afraid and your shift started an hour ago.”

“No, that will be all for now. Thank you for your time.” You got up to leave, letting her finish talking before opening the door.

“You’re very welcome. You’ll find your desk in one of the repurposed storage closets. Your computer should have everything you need to get started, including tasks for the night, part manifests, and schematics. It was nice to meet you, please have a Fazz-tastic night!” You said a quick ‘you too’ and began to make the long trip back down to the basement.

___________________________________________________________________________________

Your desk was, for all intents and purposes, where she said it would be. She didn’t mention, however, that it was one of the storage closets furthest from the main service area. It wasn’t that big of a deal, it was just annoying. How were you supposed to look over schematics for repairs from down the hall? That was something for later you, at least. As the first on the agenda for the night was those sticky staff bots that your boss had mentioned. You already knew how they worked so there wasn’t really a need to sit by your computer.

All seven of them sat in a room much closer to the repair cylinder, which made you a little jealous. But that made it easier to drag them over and begin disasembly. The cleaning products were in the janitor’s closet and the spare parts were in the same room as the bots. It was monotonous work, for sure, but repetitive tasks was your middle name. You’d started around eight PM, and finished three out of the seven by three AM.

Unlike the band, they weren’t really built to be waterproof so the Fizzy Faz had gotten in to all sorts of nooks and or crannies. The majority of the mess was the fact that it had all hardened and become so sticky that the rag you were using began to get stuck. It was a living. Not that you needed it.

You slept at the plex and spent your days sleeping and your nights working. Taking your weekends to chum it up with the band when they were free, and some of the other staff when they weren’t. But the latter was no longer an option, unfortunately. Maybe you and Vanessa could become friends? Besides that though, you usually spent your money on stuff the band can’t get their hands on. Nail polish for Roxy, magazines for Chica, nick-nacks for Freddy, random crap for Bonnie (he liked getting the weirdest things you could find, like a clock with doll hands), and even some CDs for DJMM. Towards the end you asked Monty if he wanted anything and he said he’d think about it. At that point he was just waking up and didn’t really know what he liked yet. You had bought him new shades the day you were forced to leave. They made you upset so you chunked them. Vowing to get him something better when you came back. The rest of the money sat in a bank account, collecting dust.

Speaking of dust, this place hadn’t seemed to have been cleaned since you left. There were trails between piles where someone had been moving things around, but the edges of counters and whatnot were all coated in a thick layer of the stuff. You’d ask some staff bots to make a detour and help out later. After having sat there, stewing, the time continued to tic by. Freshly cleaned bot four made an exit by the time the sun rose, and you were getting sore from sitting for 10 hours straight. The last three could wait till tomorrow. Right now you wanted to take a look at the schematics for the new(er) arrivals.

Chapter Text

By the time you finished the once over on those blueprints, the clock told you it was now two in the afternoon. How had so much time passed by with you none the wiser? You got up, stretched and popped all your joints before heading back out to the main room to leave and get some food and a drink. Only to find someone else sitting in the spot you had been hours before. An actual human someone at that!

His back was turned to you and he was sitting at the computer to the repair tube working on something. Well, now that you had gotten closer, that “working on something” was actually him scrolling Reddit. Something about r/feetpics, you really didn’t want to know any more than that. It was obvious that he hadn’t noticed you yet so you made the last few footsteps especially loud. He choked on his sip of coffee and started closing browser tabs at a pace that could set world records.

“What the hell are you doing here? Who the hell let you in?” he all but shouted, turning to face you. He was tall, lanky, with a five day stubble that said he didn’t really care about looks. Long loose hair snaked out from under his “Maintenance Staff” cap falling on to his mechanic jumpsuit that sat open to the waist revealing an off white shirt.

“Didn’t mean to sneak up on you like that. I’ve been here since last night. I’m the transfer.” You told him your name and held out your hand. He shook it with that bone crushing strength that was meant to intimidate you into respecting him.

“Right. The new ‘Lead Mechanic.’” he spat those words like it left a bad taste. It was obvious he had some strong opinions about your new role. “What the hell are you doing still hanging around. Your shift ended hours ago.”

“I lost track of time looking over some-”

“Yeah, whatever. Don’t care. Just make sure you’re back on time for your shift to start. I ain’t covering you. Six o’clock hits and I’m out of here, whether you’re back or not.” He sat down, turning his back to you and actually pretending to work this time. When you were younger, this whole exchange would have upset you. But that was eons ago and quite frankly, you didn’t give a shit. He could be blasting rope on company time but so long as he didn’t make your job more difficult, it wasn’t your problem.

You shrugged and left without a word, letting the door fall shut behind you. The sound of car crash compilation Youtube videos getting cut off as it closed. Any other time and you would have considered just using the same elevators the band does to their green rooms, but it was the middle of the day and they were sure to have small guests.

So the long way it was. Instead of taking the route back to Rockstar Row, you turned the other way and headed to the food court. Food wasn’t free for staff, of course, but it was heavily discounted so that worked. You made sure to close the door to the tunnels behind you firmly. Last thing anyone needed was a kid wandering around down there.

It was bright, and loud, and smelly in the atrium, but you’d take it over the overwhelming stench of black mold the other place had going any day. There was the same selection of fast food joints as when you left, bar one. The Bonnie themed restaurant was gone, replaced with an El Chips. Not surprising, but sad none the less. His memory wiped away like it was never there.

You ordered some nachos, or what passed for them there and took one of the few empty tables. Not planning on occupying it for long you started to plow through your fake cheese soaked chips and took a look around. As you thought, most things were exactly the same. You don’t think you’d get over staff bots manning every booth instead of a teenager trying to pay for a car. They hated every second of being there, making it everyone else;s problem, and yet you still missed it.

Once finished you got up to throw away the trash but a staff bot beat you too it. Gently grabbing the trash out of your hands to throw away. You thanked them, earning confused and disgusted stares from the customers. There was no shame to be had on your part for showing a little respect. So you ignored them and started wandering around.

Surfing through the crowds wasn’t easy. It was a Sunday now, and the Plex was always the busiest on the weekends. In your subconscious decision to get to a less populated area, you now found yourself standing at the entrance to the Superstar Daycare, the place completely deserted due to the “Due to Staffing Issues, the Superstar Daycare is Temporarily Closed.” banner in front.

Shrugging you dipped under the lousy attempt to keep people out and walked in. It struck you as odd in a way, that since Fazzco didn’t actually build the Daycare Attendants that there was a giant statue of them in the lobby. Did it come from their previous job, or did the company splurge on a statue? If Fazz didn’t make it, than it was a big coincidence that Freddy had a similar statue in the main entrance.

The place was just as empty as yesterday. Completely desolate save for the earworm-esk music blaring over the speakers on a loop. That had to get annoying fast, how in the world had the two of them lasted this long with it. Or in general really.

You sat at one of the tables lining the walls and pulled out your phone. It wasn’t new, but it wasn’t too old either; planned obsolescence prevented you from just keeping the same one over the years. None of the usual apps could keep your attention for long; your thoughts drifting back to the plans you’d spent a not insignificant amount of time pouring over.

It detailed the original company they worked for, what they were made for, and the general semantics of how they worked. At first it was fascinating to learn that Sun and the moon version inhabited the same body, but the longer you thought about it the worse it got. Not to mention the fact that that wasn’t even their intended state. They had been made to put on plays with the sun and moon motifs paralleling comedy and tragedy. An other setting they had bridging the gap between the two and that was the default of their existence. Now that bridge had been severed and the two islands forced to become their own people.

Did they know? About any of this? Was this information wiped alongside that third character? Which was worse; for them to know and have to live against everything they knew, or for them to not know and live a lie, wondering why nothing ever seemed quite right? Or was every shred of who they were wiped when they were brought here. You looked over to the play area to try and catch a glimpse of them, finding Sun quite easily.

Because he was looking right at you.

Taken aback for a split second, you recovered and sent him a small wave. How long had he been there? Better question, how long had you been sitting there? A quick look back to you phone told you it had been a little under an hour. Damn, no wonder he was just standing there. You’d been staring at space for quite some time now.

He didn’t wave back but that was understandable as he was holding a sort of large cylinder shaped toy. Not well enough however, cause it was slowly falling out of his hands. He finally realized this when it finally slipped out of his grip. His reflexes were fast but they didn’t help much as instead of grabbing it, one hand connected first and sent the thing flying deeper into the daycare. You tried not you laugh, you really did, but you’d been in that same position so many times and knew exactly what was going on in his head at that moment. It wasn’t so much laughing at him as laughing at the shared understanding of this type of situation.

As he dashed out of view to grab it you looked back at your phone, looking up “how to befriend people with severe trust issues.” A lot of it was generic. Take things slow, be honest and open with them, respect their space and boundaries. But one article talked about starting things off small, like making appointments and keeping them to help the other person know you intend to keep promises you make. That might work, or something along those lines. You looked back towards the plexiglass to see if Sun was anywhere in sight, but it seemed after that embarrassment he never came back in to view.

Making up your mind, you made your way over to the large doors separating him from the rest of the world and knocking. It was simple, you thought, trying to convince yourself of it more than anything, you’d see if he wanted some company and if not you’d go away. As the seconds ticked past you were starting to wonder if he really had run off to hide somewhere. You played with your hands, mulling over whether or not to give up, but before much longer the door opened just a crack. Maybe a hand could fit through the space but it was enough for Sun to be able to peek out at you.

“Yes?” he asked tentatively. Only then did it dawn on you that you didn’t know what to say.

“Um, yes, hi.” this was going greeeat. “I was just wondering if you wanted some company?” Your hands were sweating. “You can say no, of course, I just wanted to check in on you. It must get pretty quiet in here all day and-” he was still just staring at you through the crack, no movement or indication as to what he was thinking. “Look, I’ll just get out of your hair.” As you turned to go the door opened way faster than a door that size should, and his hand shot out just shy of grabbing your shoulder.

“Wait- I didn’t- you don’t have to-” the sun themed animatronic seemed like he was trying to start several sentences at the same time, the words overlapping with one another. He quickly took his hand back and gestured inside. “You can come in.” That was progress at least! You walked past, giving him a quick ‘thank you.’

Now that there was a moment inside that wasn’t you trying to calm down the worlds most neurotic AI, you caught glimpses of things you didn’t see the first time you were here. There was a security desk next to the doors, there were two playscapes here connected by a rope bridge, not just one, generators with cables strewn about everywhere (you’d ask about those later), and a… soda machine? In a daycare? That must have been fun. Sugar high three year olds in what was essentially heaven for them. Turning back, Sun was staring at you again, fidgeting with his fingers and waiting for you to say something.

“Uh, nice place. I didn’t get a really good look yesterday,” looking around again, something else stuck out. In contrast to the very dusty security desk, the rest of the place was spotless. Not a paper or crayon out of place. “Do the staff bots come in and clean up still?”

“Still?” he echoed, coming up beside you. Just close enough to be in your bubble but far enough that you couldn’t reach out to touch him. “They never did in the first place. Nope, just me to clean up. Every day.”

“Well, shoot,” you knew from experience not to swear in front of some of the animatronics. Freddy didn’t like it while Monty and Bonnie had found it hilarious; better to test the waters first. “You do an amazing job at it.” He was staring down at you like you’d grown a second head.

“Thank… you?” his head tilted 90 degrees to the left, his eyes adjacent to the floor.

“Oh, that’s cool, can you flip it all the way around?” you hadn’t gotten to that point in the schematics yet.

“Yes, we can!” he perked at the second compliment, rotating his faceplate around and around. It must be on some kind of rail system, but then how do the internal components keep from getting tangled? You’d find out later, for now-

“So what do you usually do around here?” He stopped spinning and took up his previous hunched posture.

“Clean and organize, usually. Rearrange things too. Sometimes by color and then by name.”

“Isn’t there anything else to do? There were kids here, do you have crafts of some kind?” you could see the cubbies for just that from across the room.

“Yes, yes, well, we went through most of them unfortunately. The paper is gone and the crayons are nubs. The glue dried up and the stickers got wet. We’ve read all the books in here way too many times now, hehe.” he let out a synthetic sigh. “Even the cleaning supplies ran out, now I’m wiping things down with a tee shirt from the lost and found.” This was all very fucked up. At least give the guy something to do if you’re going to keep him turned on for all this.

“Well, that I can do something about. What would you like?” there was a janitor’s closet not too far from here, but you might have to buy the art supplies yourself as you doubt management would understand a need for them if there were no kids. “I can get you more cleaning stuff if that’s something you genuinely enjoy doing, but the craft stuff might take a day or two to come in the mail.” He just stared at you some more, hands under his arms like he was trying not to use them. “I mean if you want, that is. Don’t want to go stepping on your toes.” You weren’t sure why he would want to refuse but you were going to let him make his own decisions when you could.

“I don’t want to seem ungrateful, friend, but why go out of your way to do all that?” It was easy to understand, he was trying to see if you had any anterior motives.

“Cause you must be bored as all get out, and all this time alone cannot be good for you.” you looked down to your watch, there was still plenty of time before your shift started. “Do they even let you roam around the lobby?” his avoidant stare told you what you needed to know. “If you want, we can get started on a list today and I’ll get to ordering things as soon as I can.” His eyes lit up, literally, before dimming again.

“Sorry, friend, but we’re out of paper, remember?”

“What about behind the desk?” both sets of eyes looked over the island of filth that was the security desk.

“We’re not allowed to touch that. Safety measures and all that.” he rotated his hand like it was the most obvious thing.

“Well I don’t have that rule.” he stopped moving, making you realize that he hadn’t been still for a single second since you came in. His hands came up to his face and did a little happy flap, which was absolutely adorable.

“I’ll get the crayons!” and with that he was off, a cartoonish cloud of dust occupying the space he once stood in.

With that, you rounded the desk and quickly found the printer sitting underneath. Sun couldn’t have even stretched over the top to try and get some. Squatting eye-level with the counter, you realized just how old these computers were. Late 90’s models that even your computer had beat, and that wasn’t saying much. The one at your desk still had the original Kid Pix art program on it. Shaking your head you grabbed as much as the printer had and walked over to the child sized table Sun was currently setting up at. Even with his legs spread out to either side he still had to hunch over to do anything.

“Here we go.” you said, announcing your arrival and setting the stack down on the table. The thought crossed your mind to grab a chair but the top was so short you doubted it would do any good. He’d brought out two half full tubs of crayons with most of them worn down to a barely usable nub. Just big enough for you to be able to work with, but dwarfed in his giant hands.

He went to grab a sheet off the top and stopped looking at you expectantly. You made a little ‘go ahead’ gesture and he took no time hesitating afterwards. It did seem that he’d forgotten about the list, though. Immediately getting started on a landscape picture, with the real sun in the top right corner and everything. There was still plenty of time, you decided, let him make a few pictures before reminding him. This was the calmest you’d ever seen him, despite the constant movement.

You went to reach for a crayon, before stopping to look to him. He asked first about the paper, it was only fair if you did the same.

“May I?” you asked, hand hovering over one of the tubs. He looked up briefly at your words, before initially going back to his drawing. Then, realizing you’d asked him a question, gave you his full attention.

“Of course!” he replied, his tone chipper than the past two days combined, and slid one of the tubs over to you.

“Many thank,” you replied. He looked like he was about to say something about the grammar of that statement, but decided against it.

By the time you actually got started, he was already halfway done with his first. It was pretty good too, considering how difficult it had to be to maneuver a crayon half the size of one of your finger joints. You didn’t really know what to draw, nothing in the room was particularly inspirational, except maybe…

You used your hand to hide what you were making, taking short breaks to glance up at the other being in the room. It didn’t take him long to notice you hand and for him to do the same, much to both of your amusement. The two of you sat in relative silence, but it wasn’t long before Sun started humming the daycare’s theme with you tapping along. It was an annoying but catchy tune, you had to admit that at least.

Before long, he discarded his first work, flipping the page over and making a stack to the side. As he got started on the second one, you gently reminded him about the list and asking him to put down anything he might want, saying you’d see what you could do about it if it got long.

“Oh, yeah!” he murmured, flipping the page over and writing things on the back. Every other time he’d write something down, he’d make a gesture like tapping a pencil against your mouth but the crayons were so short that it didn’t quite work. That made you laugh a little, his shoulders relaxing just a fraction.

Once he was done, he flipped the page back over and he took up his initial place drawing before you had interrupted. You made sure to look down to your clock every now and then, making sure you weren’t about to miss the start of your shift. But after you finished, this latest look made you realize you had spent several hours here drawing one picture, while Sun was working on his fourth. Your shift started in 30 minutes… well shit. You sighed, making him look up at you.

“I’m really sorry to say this, but I gotta get going. My shift starts soon, I’m afraid.” His shoulders slumped and his rays retracted a bit.

“Aww… you sure you have to go?” just yesterday your presence had been feared, now he didn’t want you to leave. Progress!

“’Fraid so, big guy. BUT, I made you something!” That got him perked up.

“Ooh ooh, let me see! What have you been hiding from me this whole time?” There was a playfulness in his voice that gave you hope that his anxiety might get better with time. He held out his hands and made little grabby gestures. You laughed, handing your drawing over, making him freeze not that you noticed, your attention having been on the doors.

“I hope it’s alright, I’m not exactly a pro with crayons.” You’d done some art over the eons, picking the hobby up again more recently while you were at the Sister Location. It was always a ghost town there and nothing broke down cause nothing got used. They didn’t even power most of the place unless someone came in.

“You drew… me?” the was an ounce of awe, like it was the literal last thing he could have hoped for.

“Yeah! I mean you Are the most interesting thing in here.” Did you really just say that? That could be misconstrued; back-peddle, back-peddle! “Uh, I mean-”

“Thank you.” this was said gently, like it could break in the air on the way to your ears. You gave him a soft smile.

“You’re welcome.” you replied, just as soft. Sun straightened up suddenly, making you flinch a hair.

“And III have something for you!” you expected him to hand over the list, which he did, along with the two other finished drawings, not including the one on the back of the list. Your eyes widened as you looked through them. The first one was how you remembered it, an open field with rolling hills and flowers, a bit childish and sketchy. The second was much better, depicting the same things as the first but more refined. The third was out of left field; it was a Cubist-style bird using pretty much all the colors in the box. It took you a second to realize that he had been warming up with the first two, gaining better control and finer the detail as he went. In other words, it was really fucking good.

“Language, please.” fuck, you said that out loud. “But thank you!”

“Sorry, didn’t mean to say it like that. But it is really really good! Can- do you mind if I hang this up in my office?”

“Oh ho! I didn’t know we got ‘on the fridge’ level privileges.” he snickered, but you could tell that he was genuinely surprised. “I don’t see why not. Thank you for asking!” now he was twiddling his fingers together. “Does that mean I can hang yours up, too?”

“Of course! It’s only fair.” you got up to start heading towards the door, but Sun caught your wrist before you got far. When you looked at him, he snatched his hand back like you were a hot stove.

“Sorry, sorry, no touching. But,” he looked around, trying to find his words. “Will you come back at all?” the vibe screamed ‘kicked puppy.’ It made your heart melt a little.

“If you want me to, then sure. I didn’t want to overstay my welcome though.” Before today, you were sure he never wanted to see you again, period. You wondered if he’d forgotten that you were a maintenance tech in favor of having company for once.

“Yes, yes! It was nice… having some company. I think I would like you to visit again.”

“Sounds like a plan. When were you thinking?”

“...Tomorrow? Maybe? I mean- if that’s okay. If not I un-” this rant would continue for as long as you would let it. That was a very important lesson you’d learned yesterday.

“Sounds good, I’ll see you tomorrow and we’ll get to work on those cleaning supplies.” He clapped and did a little dance, having gotten up faster than you could blink.

“Perfect! Perfect! I’ll see you then! You should go though, don’t want to be late, now do ya?” you chuckled a bit looking back to your watch. Well, shit. Your shift started in five minutes, and the walk to P&S was 10 if you took the tunnels. You shouted a quick ‘see ya’ and hurried out the door, hearing them shut loudly behind you.

You could bother one of the band to take the service elevators but a look at one of the cams through your Fazzwatch said that wasn’t really an option. Normal Fazzwatches wouldn’t let you access the servalance feeds but something as small as a firewall wasn’t going to stop the likes of you.

Welp, plan B it was. Swiping your badge you entered the service tunnels and went to one of the darker corners. Facing the wall you grabbed your shirt and opened your chest like a hoodie, gently placing the drawings inside and closing yourself back up. Okay, next step. You took a deep breath and fell to the floor, pooling there against the concrete as a shadow. Pressing two dimensionally against the floor and zooming your way through the halls, under boxes and forklifts, taking detours through vents when needed.

That took a total of three minutes, leaving you to collect yourself just outside the doors. As you went to open them, however, you heard footsteps just on the other side and coming closer. You took two steps back just in time for them to swing open and your day-shift counterpart to come stomping through.

“Well look who finally decided to show up. Don’t make a habit of bein’ late.” he smirked, his arms crossed and leaning against the door frame.

“I’d personally call it ‘you trying to leave early,’ instead.” you crossed your arms, mirroring him.

“It’s only by two minutes.” he spat, his growing distaste for you not even trying to be hidden.

“Exactly, I still have two minutes till I have to start. You’re still on the clock.”

“Whatever.” he replied, pushing past you and bumping shoulders in an attempt to knock you off balance. You weren’t going to play that game, however, and locked your joints, becoming an immovable object. He didn’t account for this and nearly went sprawling on the floor when his left foot connected with your shin. After five seconds of fumbling, he straightened up and walked away like nothing had happened.

Rolling your eyes, you went through the doors and saw everything just the way you had left it. Mostly, anyways. The terminal near the maintenance cylinder had obviously been used, and when you went to your office, the paltry amount of items on your desk had been moved. Not by much, but just enough to be noticeable. Primarily because you still hadn’t had the time to clean up and the moved objects had disturbed the sheet of dust still smothering most things. To top it all off, there was a ladder of sticky notes taped to the side of your monitor with a list of tasks.

Now realizing you had to lock your door as well as your computer, you turned the latter on to check for your actual tasks for the day. The sticky notes had obviously been left by your co-worker who was now trying to get you to do his work as well as your own. The intro video to one of your programs discussed that management would only send you tasks through this system, and that any auto flags from the robots would also come through the system. So if a staff bot got stuck somewhere, they would ping you for help.

You threw away the sticky notes and sorted through the list. There were still three staff bots that had dried soda all over and in them that needed to be taken care of. Then there were two auto tasks but no new ones from management. Those two tasks, however, had several messages each. Indicating that they had been asking for help since just after you left to get food. Pinching the bridge of your nose, you sent copies of the tasks to your watch and grabbed your tool belt.

One was from a staff bot in the kitchen detailing that they “cannot locate solid surface/floor.” Which could mean any number of things. The other was from Roxy, stating that a teenager tried to ‘key her’ after loosing a race. Well Roxy was far closer than the kitchen so that solved the problem of who to help first. But before you forgot and they got all crumpled, you reached inside again and grabbed Sun’s drawings, gently taping them to the wall next to you.

Roxy’s report detailed that her upper thigh had been scratched deep enough to show the solid metal underneath. You couldn’t just use the automotive scratch filler gel so paint it was. As awful as it was, you were kind of glad that that’s where the damage was cause now all you needed was the gray paint. Something like her leg warmers or hell, Chica’s leg warmers, would take a lot more care to match the colors just right.

You went to the main storage closet, finding the three staff bots you needed to get to were still there, and located the paint in the box labeled, well, Roxy’s Paint, along with a set of detail brushes. It dawned on you though, these tasks had been in your inbox for hours. Just how long did Roxy have to go around like that. She took herself VERY seriously and always wanted to look her best. This was not going to be a fun situation to walk in to.

Sucking it up, you walked over to her elevator and hit the up button. Wondering what kind of mess you were about to walk in to.

Chapter Text

When the elevator finally stopped you walked out into the ‘closet’ behind Roxy’s greenroom. Pressing an ear to the door you heard dramatic sobbing and a stressed out chicken trying to help. You sighed, that was kind of your fault. See, the animatronics weren’t actually built to cry. They felt sorrow and anguish, but had no way to relieve that feeling the same way organics did. In your empathy, you’d accidentally bent reality a little, just a little, and kind of gave them the ability to cry. It wasn’t well thought out and so the semantics were sketchy at best. They didn’t cry normal tears, it was a thick black oily substance and you didn’t even know where it came from.

After they found out they could, they were wary at first. It was a change to their bodies they hadn’t agreed to, but they eventually found that the pros outweighed the cons and as long as you tried harder not to do that without consent then it was fine.

You gently knocked on the door and slid it open, just in time for a cup filled with makeup brushes to connect with your face. Roxy’s shout of ‘what took you so long,’ having died in her speakers when she saw who it was. Spluttering makeup powder out of your mouth, you gave them the ‘its fine’ wave when they got up to help.

Rubbing your face on your shirt, you made your way over to the distressed wolf and chicken. Roxy looked a mess, just as you expected, black sludge leaving trails under her eyes with her hair wild and frizzy. “Tear” stained tissues littered the desk she sat at, the same substance coating the tips of her fingers. This was going to take some time. Not just to fix the scratch, but to help with getting her to feeling like herself again.

“Sorry…” she murmured. “Thought it was the other guy, taking his sweet *Fazz* time.” Their programming auto sensors swear words, so most of the time they don’t bother, but it accentuated her upset.

“It’s alright,” you replied gently, kneeling and taking her grubby paw. “I was pretty upset when I saw what happened too.” Roxy hiccuped and smeared more tears with a napkin. “I can take it from here Chica, thank you for the support. But if you could do me one small favor?”

“Yeah?” The chicken in question walked around her friend to get a better look at you. They already dominated you in size, but now you were kneeling and barely came up to her waist.

“There’s a staff bot in the kitchen somewhere who got stuck and can’t register the floor. They probably went to grab something off a tall shelf and wedged themselves stuck. As a thank you, get yourself a pizza, my treat.”

“Can do! Oop, I mean, I supppoooooose I can do it. Since you asked so nicely.” She giggled at her own joke, and went to the door. Taking one last second to send the both of us a pitying look before leaving.

Once she left, the room was silent save for the occasional sniffle. They could cry but they didn’t have noses to get clogged nor lungs to push air with so that was a little lost on you. You didn’t quite know what to say, so you took a gamble.

“Hows about we move over to your couch and while I work on this you can tell me all about it?” She nodded wordlessly, the both of you getting up and heading to the other side of the room while you took off your tool belt as not to scratch her more.

It was an awkward position to say the least. You sat at the end on the right while Roxy sat on the end at the left, her arms crossed on the shoulder while her left leg stayed on the ground and her right leg sat in your lap. Like this you could see the scratch plain as day. It had indeed managed to penetrate all the way through layers of paint and sealant but not so deep as to gouge the metal itself. That would have been a bigger issue. You motioned for her to start talking while you opened up the paint, holding it in one hand and the brush in the other.

“It just happened so fast! One minute I was posing for pictures with the birthday girl and the next there’s a screeching noise and a teenage running away holding a set of keys.” One thing to note is that Roxy’s go cart was built to fit her and a small child, usually no older than 10, that would sit in her lap. This is usually reserved only for the guests that can afford it but every once in a while she’ll do it just cause its the child’s special day. She liked to play the aloof card, but her heart was always with it.

“So some sore looser-ass teen decided to try and get to you because you were being nice and worked hard to let the birthday girl win?” Sometimes people saw her demeanor and thought she was just being a bitch, but they never got to know her very well, or they were already being rude. Roxy nodded, continuing the story.

“Yeah! I mean, I was just trying to make it special for her! I mean, I AM the best and I want people to know that being my fans also makes you the best,” pause for sniffle break. “Not MY fault they were a sore looser.”

“Did you call security?” you were gently laying down thin layer after thin layer onto the scratch so that when you added the sealant it wouldn’t bubble out and be visible in the light as she talked.

“There was already a security bot by the door who caught them and kicked them out.” she still sounded upset about this turn of events, probably didn’t think getting kicked out was enough of a punishment. You were inclined to agree, usually you threaten to make their family pay for the damages and that leads to a punishment that gets enacted at home. Yeah, teenagers need an outlet for their aggression, but taking that out on others isn’t an excuse.

“How did the party go after that?” now it just needed to dry and you could add the top coat.

“Great.” she didn’t sound enthused. “I acted like I wasn’t upset and we went back to the event room to cut the cake and open presents.”

“Did the kid have fun?”

“Yeah.”

“Did she have a good birthday?”

“Yeah. Shouted it was the best birthday ever…”

“Than I think you did an awesome job, girl! I’m proud of you for handling that so well!” her tail began to wag gently, but enough to keep bapping you on the head with it.

“You really think so? You know what? Yeah! It was a great birthday, all because of me!” okay, now the tail was starting to hurt, but you were just glad she was in better spirits. You put on the outer coat and gently put your arm over it so her tail wouldn’t get caught in it.

“Almost done here, and you’ll look good as new. Hows about after it’s dry we get you cleaned up and I’ll brush your hair?” she nodded, the last of the sniffles over with. It was still a hot mess in here though. Dirty napkins and makeup brushes all over the floor.

“I’d like that… thank you. Now I’m kinda glad the other guy never bothered, I trust you way more than him.” Something about the way she said that didn’t sit well with you. You knew he was being an ass to you, but that you could handle. If he was being an ass to your friends, then he had another thing coming.

“Aww, you’re welcome, and thank you!” you patted her leg to signify it was done drying. She took a second to inspect your work before nodding and taking her leg off your lap. You got up, going for the makeup brushes while she made quick work of the tissues, throwing them in the little trashcan next to her desk.

After the room was clean, you asked her to hold up a second while you went to the closest janitors closet for some gentle grease cleaner and some rags. Upon your return she was gathering brushes and combs out from the draws and laying them on the table.

You started with her cheeks, wiping the trails out from under her eyes. It was lucky that whatever it was never actually seemed to get IN their eyes, just leaked out from underneath. Then you got to her hands, cleaning out the nooks and crannies under her nails and between her joints.

All of that didn’t take too long and soon after you were running a brush through her hair followed by a fine toothed comb. Her hair was a sort of metal-like plastic that resisted tangles and pulling. One could be as harsh as they wanted and it wouldn’t do any damage, she wouldn’t like it though. So you were gentle and meticulous, finishing things off with a small braid and bow at the end.

The air was much lighter now, her spirits having raised considerably. You gave each other an ‘all good’ thumbs up and you took your leave, knowing she’d need to recharge soon. After all, every day was a big day for them.

You didn’t go far, just a room down to knock on Chica’s window. A second later, her face peered out from behind the curtain, mouth stuffed absolutely full with pizza. You gave her a ‘well?’ sort of look and she replied with double thumbs up, not bothering to grab a slice that fell out. Chuckling, you waved goodbye and started to head back to the dark dungeon you called a workplace.

Only halfway through the tunnels did it dawn on you that you could have just taken a service elevator. And that you had forgotten your tool bag. Fuck. You’d just go get it tomorrow. You didn’t really need it just to clean up some soda.

Chapter Text

Second verse, same as the first. Drag a sticky staff bot out of the closet, open them up, get to cleaning and replace any broken parts, put them back together and send them on their marry way. At least it was only three and not the seven you’d first walked in to.

You finished a bit early, even with the Roxy incident, and decided to head back to schematics land. After settling down in your office and unlocking your computer, you remembered to go to the tasks program and fill out the completion reports. Time, date, what happened, what did you do to fix it, blah blah.

Part of you wanted to email Ms. Emstein to tell her about the down time between the auto task pop ups and the actual work done, but you knew Fazz well enough to know they would know about it soon if he kept it up.

Pulling up Sun & Moon’s schematics reminded you of the list the former had made. Gently peeling the tape off the wall and flipping it over, you gave it a once over.

“In order of most important to least: -construction paper -crayons -baby wipes(?) -glitter glue -Fingerpaint(now the wipes made sense) -books -puzzle?

You could do those, and looking online you could even get a chunk of them delivered today. Taking in to consideration how the two of them spend just about all of their time alone, you ordered double of everything. They’d probably go through it pretty quick. And after ordering everything, you stuck the picture back on the wall.

Now that Sun was (hopefully) warming up to you, you really wanted to meet the moon character. You weren’t going to assume names nor pronouns yet. Their situation was quite unique and needed to be treated with care on both ends. Chimes rang in your head, reminding you about why they were in the predicament they were in. Sequestered alone, no one to talk or play with, the moon version didn’t even get to do that. Having been reduced to a glorified guard dog.

You pulled up incident reports in regards to the two. As opposed to the cameras, you were actually allowed to view these. Needing to know about previous repairs and temperament issues. Skimming through the list you landed on what you really wanted to see. Incident Report D-21B; the “accident” that earned them the time out corner.

The report was 1/3rd video and 2/3rds actual report. Clicking on the video gave you a bright red pop up asking for credentials to view it. You had doubts that your own log in would let you view it, what with the miles of red tape Fazz uses, but to your surprise, it did work. First try and everything, no ‘password does not match one on file’ bullshit you used to get.

There was no sound with it, the video started with a dark room, the only light came in from the lobby, highlighting the play structures in the daycare. It was pointed towards the door and the desk, and in the right you could see tiny little bodies nestled under blankets. Toys and miscellaneous junk strewn about. There were three adults standing by the open door, two looked like security and one was just a random person in plainclothes. A parent more than likely.

Just in front of them, blocking anyone from reaching the kids, was the moon animatronic. They had the same face as their solar counterpart, but the non-crecent moon portion was dark blue, the eye in that area as well. No rays, instead sporting a sleeping cap that fell to one side, obscuring part of their face. The puffy pants you had drawn just hours before now sported a yellow star pattern with a blue background.

The officers looked like they were pleading with the animatronic. Taking front with the parent behind them. Officer to the left was reaching to their side for something, a taser? A gun? Something was wrong though, the scene was very hostile and the moon was twitching, their eyes purple.

They took a step towards the officers who took one back, bumping into the parent. The parent who, for some unknown reason, pushed past the only protection he had and tried reasoning with them. They took another step forward, which set off the officers, one of which pulled out a taser and fired. The prongs embedded themselves in the animatronics middle, forcing them to spazam harder than they already had been.

In an instant they were on the officer, grabbing the hand with the weapon and- oh, fuck. Arms weren’t supposed to bend that way. You couldn’t hear anything but there was obviously screaming as the children were starting to wake up in a panic. Little bodies flung themselves off of mats and further right, offscreen.

Security guard two was radioing for backup, but the moon was upon them too. Grabbing them by the neck and lifting them up off the ground. They struggled, flailing and kicking, when the parent grabbed a tiny plastic chair and hit the animatronic over the head. This did nothing, but the shock must have… They tightened their grip on the guard, snapping their neck and killing them instantly. He dropped the chair and fell on his ass, trying to crawl backwards and away from the assailant.

The doors flew open, bathing the animatronic in light and causing them to freeze, convulsing. The new guard ran over and flipped the light switch, bathing the room in bright light and sending the moon to the ground. Their colors shifted, the night cap tucking away and rays poking out in its place, now the moon was a very confused and horrified Sun. Shaking like a leaf, looking around at the scene he’d just woken up to. Before he could process much, a very familiar face walked in, grabbed the exposed wires from the back of his head and yanked, turning him offline. Then the video ended, cutting to static.

You let out a breath you didn’t realize you’d been holding, holding your shaking hands in one another. There was no way, you’d met Sun, talked and joked with him. There was no way his counterpart would just do that for no reason. Something must have been drastically wrong. You scrolled down to the text part of the report, your eyes never stopping as you tried to take in as much as possible as quickly as possible.

It was a lot of technical talk. Technical as in legalese. It was, however, confirmed here that their name is Moon, so that was a lot of work for nothing. The only pronouns referenced were ‘it’ and you highly doubted that’s what they wanted to be referred to as.

The jyst was that Moon had malfunctioned, causing them to not recognize the parent registered for pickup. Their protocol stating that only designated adults were aloud to pick up certain children. Which made sense, don’t want some rando walking away with your kids. Their facial recognition did not recognize the security personnel either, causing a fight to break out. Two casualties were sighted, saying one died on scene with the other succumbing to his injuries later. An ‘investigation’ was performed with no abnormalities in Moons code to suggest faulty software. There was, however, hardware damage to both eyes. No parts were replaced (citing cost and manpower issues), staff-inflicted damage was repaired, and the animatronics placed on probation to monitor behavior as faulty vision would not have lead to such severe human damages.

They were right about one thing, there was no way something wasn’t wrong with their code at the time of incident. It would take dozens of failsafes to be bypassed to even lay hands on a human like that. And their eyes, in what world would it make sense to NOT change them, or at least repair them. Cost, whatever, that’s a liability on Fazzco’s part and a major one at that. Maybe one day you’ll have earned enough trust to help them with that. You weren’t going to force it though. The only living things they interacted with right now was you, and they could do whatever they wanted with your form, it wouldn’t do any permanent damage.

All of this explains quite a lot, unfortunately. It didn’t sully your opinion of either of them, just reminded you to be cautious going forward. Ms. Manager had mentioned them having problems you had to fix. But you had no intention of strapping them down and forcing test after test like you assumed she meant.

You wanted to have a… word, with your new coworker, but decided against it for now. That would only stir the already annoying pot. Instead, you decided to just play it off. Sun hadn’t made any mention of it and you weren’t going to bring it up. Same thing when you eventually met Moon.

Looking back in to repair files instead, you brought up the one that was the result of that video. The wires in the back of their head was repaired, of course, and their eyes- ough, taken out and tested for vision issues. You really hoped they were still offline for that. The ‘investigation’ was that they had been plugged in, their general processes allowed to run and for the code to be visible, line by line, to check for abnormalities. It didn’t take a genius to realize that the human eye can’t read that fast. Their advanced processes would be spitting out code like- like- fuck you were too upset to think of an analogy.

Play it off, let it wash right over you and into your past. Now you wanted comfort. But there wasn’t really any one to go to. The band would be charging and besides, all they could really do is commiserate in their unfair treatment. An unwelcome reminder that the world at large views them like objects to be played with and discarded. You laid your head on your desk and looked at your phone. Dick for brains would be back soon, so at least you could sleep on all of this.

Chapter Text

When your shift was over, you shut down your computer, double locked your door (there was a sliding bolt on the inside that you, with your hyperbolic geometry body, could unlock from outside but others would have a harder time) and walked out to the main area. Unsurprisingly, your coworker didn’t show up till 20 after, turning your already bad mood into something fouler.

He waltzed in, coffee in one hand and um… nudie mag in the other, proudly open and on display while he walked and ‘read.’ You were going to give him such a thrashing. No. Such a verbal warning. NO. Such a- fuck you didn’t have the energy to be angry anymore. The events of the day/night finally catching up with you. He stopped five feet away and looked you up and down over the rim of his coffee.

“Well, you look like shit.” Sip. “What, the spouse kick you out of bed?” he laughed at his own joke before taking another sip, walking past you and sitting at the terminal. You were so close to replying that ‘yeah, your wife kicked me out for dicking her down too good.’ But that didn’t make much sense and you didn’t care enough to fix it in to a proper burn.

“Yep, see ya.” and with that you were out the door. You left your phone to charge in your office, having charged your watch last night. You needed to remember to grab your tool belt from Roxy, and some of the stuff for Sun was coming in later, so you needed to go to the mail room and get that.

All you could think of, though, was your vent with that cozy little doggy bed and no one to bother you for a few hours while you slept. Times like this, you didn’t give your form any ears so no loud guests would wake you, only the vibration from your Fazzwatch would rouse you any time soon.

Speaking of; you set your alarm for about four PM. Enough time to grab all your stuff, give things to Sun and spend an hour there before your shift started. That worked. That sounded good. You shifted at the closest air vent, nearly missing the opening before crawling in and making your way back to your favorite spot in the Plex. Upon meeting up with your bed, you spun around twice, taking the time to kneed and fluff it up, before plopping down, curling up, and falling deep asleep by the time your head hit the bed.

___________________________________________________________________________________

Your alarm went off exactly when you’d asked it to, much to your chagrin. It was one of those “five more minute(s)” kind of days that you knew would lead to sleeping in for three more hours in those previously aforementioned five minute bursts. Alas, your bed would have to long for the warm slab that was your body for a bit longer, as there was stuff that needed getting done and you were the only shmuck around to do it.

You made up some new joints to pop before crawling out of bed and using the vents to make your way to the mail room. It was oddly quiet for a Monday, until you realized that you’d forgone ears to get better sleep. Those could wait though. You didn’t really NEED ears right this second and these vents weren’t going to navigate themselves.

If you had a nickle for the amount of times you’d been to the mail room, you’d have two nickles. Which wasn’t a lot and frankly more surprising than the alternative. You rarely, if ever, got mail and usually a staff bot would hunt you down and hand it over personally. This wasn’t a common practice, as most people had to actually track down the mail room to get it. The only reason you were special enough to get personal deliveries was because the staff bots liked you.

They had a weird sort of intelligence. If you had to guess, it would be a sort of hive mind situation. Each one was in constant communication with the others so if something went wrong on one side of the building, all the of the bots filling the rest of the Plex could help or get someone to help. Passing information instantly from one form to the next. It was pretty neat, if a bit unnerving at times. At one point, years ago, you’d asked one for help finding something and another rolled up behind you with said item before you could finish bargaining.

But these were more than a few items and you’d probably grab one of those mail tubs to lug all of it around. As you rounded the last corner you considered just how you were going to get it all the way back to the daycare with a bunch of guests around, but that was a problem for tens minutes later you. Right now, you had a different dilemma. Outside of the vent was less than a handful of people, when your preferred number would have been zero.

See, usually, you’d jump out of the vent and then change back into a human simulacrum. But if even one person saw you, all hell would break loose. It would be slightly less weird for you to change in the vent and then jump out, but still pretty weird. But what were they gonna do, tattle on you? For being a mechanic in the vents? What if you were just fixing something?

That was enough backwards logic for you! Turning around so your legs faced the vent cover, you shifted back into ‘work appropriate attire.’ But you misjudged just how much longer you were as a human and your growth spurt caused your feet to knock the cover off its hinges and clatter to the ground loudly. Well… Fuck.

Swallowing your pride, you shimmied back and out of the vent, landing ungracefully on your feet. Turning to look and- yeah, there were people staring at you. Not a lot, but enough to be self conscious. You gave a quick wave and stuck the now bent cover back on the vent. It would stay as long as no one messed with it.

Head down, you fast walked to the mail room doors, which were sitting wide open for just anyone to go through. That was only weird because a good handful of what went through there was highly confidential. But now that you stood in the door frame you realized two things immediately.

One: there was no door now, and Two: the place was practically deserted. There were no staff bots and very little in the way of mail. Three fairly large boxes sat on one of the counters further in, along with a handful of envelopes sitting on top. There was also, now, a hand on your shoulder, making you jump and whip around fast enough to send the person attached sprawling on the ground and sending papers flying.

“Shit! I am so sorry, dude!” you bent over to give them your hand, and after adjusting his hat, he accepted.

“Dannnggg, man, you’ve got some, like, ninja skills or somethin’. You do karate?” the two of you were rummaging, picking up all the scattered mail and trying to figure out what was for the Plex and what he was just carrying around. “I knew a dude who karate, he could snap through a hundred wood planks in one swing!” now he was making little hand swipes through the air as demonstration.

“Nah, just grew up in an unstable home. Had to fend off older siblings with a fork or they’d steal your food.” Not 100% a lie, just realllly stretching the truth.

He nodded, solemnly. “Yeah, I get it, man. An old pal of mine killed one of her brothers for making a pass on her.” Wat? No, not getting in to that right now.

“Good for her,” was all you could think to say. Probably not the most socially appropriate though.

“Right? But people got all mad and junk. Saying she didn’t need to go that far, or that he was just being mean and wouldn’t actually. But I knew that dude and he would have. Plus, god forbid women do anything, know what I mean?” You did, oddly enough. Now you were a little invested.

“So what happened then, if you don’t mind me asking. I get it if you do, though, it’s not my business.” Did this letter say ‘To Roxy’ or ‘Lu Brandy?’ You didn’t know a Lu here so it was probably the former. You set it on the counter as the mailman rambled some more.

“No biggie. Anyway, she got off scott free cause they found a bunch of… kid pics.. if you know what I’m sayin’.” now you hated the name of that art program on your computer. “He was post mort-em-ly convicted of pedophilia and she got a warning.” He leaned in closer and now you could really smell what he’d been baking with that morning. “Between you and me though, the parents of those kids called her a hero and made her a cake. She was a cop for a week and then quit when she saw all the corruption in the system. Now she’s going to law school. I could give you her number if you want?”

“As cool as she sounds, I don’t think she’d be alright with you giving her number to strangers.” you found five letters to one ‘Iona Trailer,’ okay, that was a pretty funny name.

He stared at you, blankly, for a full minute before responding. “OH! Not like that man, I mean, like, I saw some guy yelling at that bear dude on the way in.” another pause for thought. “Not like, a big hairy man, like that robot dude.”

You paused your sorting to look at him. “Someone was yelling at Freddy?”

“Yeah! That guy! Fred-dude or somethin’.” You really hoped he wasn’t the one driving the mail van.

“Did you happen to see who it was? What he looked like?” You’d have some choice words if they were still in the building. Yelling at Freddy is like yelling at a baby duck.

“Yeah, he was wearing the same get-up as you.” You’d chosen to start wearing a mechanic’s jumpsuit when you changed form a few minutes ago. So of fucking course it was… wow, you still didn’t even know his name. You were gonna have to look that up later, cause just asking him would be a sure way to set him off more.

“Hey, thanks for letting me know. Here,” you reached in to your pocked and grabbed a $5, handing it over.

“Ey, it’s no big deal. And here You go.” he pocketed the money and grabbed a bag out of his other pocket. It was weed. And not an insignificant amount too.

“Woah, hey, I dunno, bud.” you tried handing it back but he was already standing up with arms full of loose mail.

“Oh, I get it, hehe. Wink wink.” he was doing overly exaggerated winks that were more like blinks. “Just keep me in mind if you need more. I gotta get rid of that anyways, not supposed to have it on the job and didn’t realize it was in my pocket.” he laughed like it was the funniest joke he’d heard all day and walked out, a trail of letters falling out of his hands and on to the floor. You left the room behind him (illicit drugs behind your back) and waved down a staff bot, asking them to follow him and pick up anything he dropped. They gave you a thumbs up and went after him.

Well. Today was already interesting. Sighing, you opened your chest and stashed the drugs, trying to think of a good place to get rid of it. It wasn’t that you didn’t want it, its more like you could be arrested for having them on property. Patting your clothes back in to place, you turned and grabbed a mail tub, stashing the boxes and letters in to take to their respective recipients.

There was a handful of letters for each of the band members, even one for the DJ. Even one for Bonnie. Your heart sank, what were you even supposed to do with this? Should you save it in case you can actually bring him back? Or give it to Freddy since they were the closest? You’d figure that out later too, right now he probably didn’t want more sad news after Dipshit yelled at him. You didn’t even care if he deserved it (which was HIGHLY unlikely), that’s not how you discuss issues.

The tub was far to big to balance on your hip, so when you finally arrived at Rockstar Row the bucket had to go on the ground. Freddy was up first, not only cause his room was the closest, but because he might need some support. You knocked gently, not wanting to disturb him if he was already doing something. As you waited, it finally struck you just how easy it was to get to the door. There were no lines of fans in front of anyone’s greenrooms as a matter of fact.

Chewing you lip, you went to knock again only for the door to open at the last second. Instead of a bear chest (heh), you were staring at an alligator’s. You looked in to his eyes as he looked in to yours, and indeed eyes as he wasn’t wearing his signature shades. About to open your mouth, he just shook his head and ushered you in.

Freddy’s room was always immaculate, and this time was no different. The only clutter being the four animatronics in the room, creating very little in the way of free space. It was a familiar sight, but instead of the comforting feeling of a welcome back from just days prior, it was solemn and depressed. The bear in question sat on his couch, looking more deflated than a pool toy in December. Chica was to one side, patting him on the back and Roxy was keeping an eye out through the curtain.

You walked up to Freddy and crouched so you were in his downcast field of view. “Do, you wanna talk about what happened? I heard from an extremely baked mail man that Dickory yelled at you?” He didn’t say anything, just looking from you down to his hands. One of which would not stop twitching and moving, fingers opening and closing spastically. Chica patted his shoulder one last time before looking to you.

“Freddy had an incident on stage today. His hand started acting up and he grabbed the microphone too hard, crushing it. Devon,” oh, so that was his name, “came over and started berating him. Yelling about how expensive those were and how if his hand had been doing this than he should have gone to P&S. BUT, stuff like this has happened before! One time Roxy’s eyes wouldn’t stop twitching so we went down there but he told us it was just cosmetic and that he wasn’t going to waste his time on something like that.” You were starting to get the full picture on just what kind of person ~Devon~ was. Doing stupid shit like looking at porn on shift you could let go, trying to get you to do his work you could also get over, but yelling at your friends over this kind of stuff was unacceptable.

“You can bet that I’ll be having a talk with him about that. His behavior has been bad, but this takes the cake.” you were about to get up when Freddy grabbed your wrist with his good hand.

“You do not need to do that, Superstar.” Wow, he hadn’t called you that since he woke up. It was usually other odd-ball nick names like Butter. That was after an audioclip from one other locations got leaked and someone remixed the part about exotic butters. You played that on a loop for weeks. “We are big animatronics, we can deal with it…” he didn’t exactly sound so sure about that.

“Okay, sure, I understand that yall can handle yourselves if need be. But you’d face larger repercussions that I would. The worst case scenario for you is essentially death, the worst for me is being fired and they wouldn’t dare. Not after the contract I signed.” You weren’t going to go deep in to it, not here, not now. “It’s just- I care about you guys. A lot. And I don’t like to see you have to go through this kind of thing when you shouldn’t have to.” You sighed, rubbing your forehead. “If you really don’t want me to talk to him about it than I wont. I’m not going to go above your head and stick my nose in to your business. But as your friend, I’d really like to do this for you.”

They all looked to each other, gauging the groups reaction. Or maybe they were speaking telepathically, you didn’t know. Weirder shit has happened here.

“Okay, but please do not do something rash.” he didn’t say it, but you heard it anyways. ‘Because your actions could impact us negatively.’

“I promise, cross wherever my heart is.” that always got a chuckle. Just the simple reminder that you were more than you appeared. That a normal person probably couldn’t do much in this world of bureaucracy. That those rules didn’t apply to you, not if you didn’t want them to. “But on a lighter note, hopefully, yall have mail!”

That got a reaction; all heads in the room turned to you with very surprised looks. “Mail?” Roxy replied. “They told us we weren’t getting mail anymore.”

“What? Why not? Kids love you!” you dragged the tub further into the room to dole the letters out.

“They said the letters stopped coming and to stop expecting them. That it didn’t matter cause it’s not like we could care about them.” Fucking Ouch.

“Did they actually say that to your face?” you handed Monty his letter and Chica hers while you got the last two’s separated.
“The first part, yeah. The second part they just said to each other.” Roxy wagged her tail upon receiving hers.

“And who said this?” You handed Freddy his, holding on to Bonnie’s, mulling over whether or not to give it to him.

“Oh, they got fired last Tuesday.” Well that was one thing you didn’t need to take care of at least.

“Good.” First time you’ve been glad that there were less people now.

“Who’s that for?” Monty chimed in, pointing at the last letter and making you freeze. That solves that dilemma then.

“It’s… for Bonnie.” you chewed your lip, the occupants all taking a glance at the bear in the room. “Freddy, do you wan-”

“Yes. Please.” he held his hand out and you slipped him the letter. He opened his chassis and gently placed it in there. The sad air that had returned to the room was promptly sucked right out as Chica squealed.

“OMG! She actually wrote me!” she pulled you close and squeezed you under her arm, holding the letter in front of you. “There was a little girl who’s mom kept bringing her in to Mazercise. She wasn’t being very nice and kept berating her about needing to loose weight. I… kinda stepped in and explained to her how bad that was for her daughter to internalize. I expected to get yelled at but instead she realized that that’s just how she was raised and didn’t know how to handle it any differently. But!” Now the chicken was shaking you. “We all sat down and talked about what she could do instead! They both thanked me and left, but the mom said she’d update me with how things were going after that and she did!”

“That’s great! I’m proud of you for standing up for that girl! I’m also glad that the mom was actually receptive to criticism, that could have gone WAY worse. I’ll also be glad when you stop shaking me!” That got her to stop, an abashed ‘whoops’ leaving her speakers. “Hopefully all of yall got good letters like that, and as much as I’d like to get shaken about like a doll by all of you I do have somewhere I need to be right now.”

“Was wonderin’ what all those boxes were for.” You looked down to see the alligator in the process of trying to get one open without you noticing. Task failed, and you gave him a look. He put the box back in the tub and huffed.

“It’s just stuff for the daycare. The attendants ran through all the craft supplies already so I got them some stuff to do.” you explained, picking up the tub.

“Wait, they are awake?” Freddy interjected.

“Yeah, they’ve been online this whole time.”

“How come we never see them then, huh?” Monty said, still a little huffy about the box.

“They’re not really allowed to leave the daycare proper, except Moon who does security patrols apparently?”

“I’ve seen Moon.” Roxy cut in, looking around at shocked faces. “Yeah, he came and got your tool belt last night.” Wait, what?

“Wait, what?” you vocalized.

“Did you not ask him to come get it for you? I thought you’d met them already.”

“Yeah, I’ve met Sun and interacted with him. But I haven’t even said a word to Moon, I haven’t been around when he’s been active.”

“Then why did he come get your belt?”

“That is a great question.” You mulled the ideas of why in your head before being interrupted.

“I have a question, too. Before you head out.” Freddy piped in.

“What’s up?” You asked turning to face him.

“What does ‘baked’ mean?”

Chapter Text

When you finally got to the daycare it was an hour later than you had intended and only 30 minutes till your shift started. You spotted Sun easily through the plexiglass, laying on his back and flying a paper plane up and letting it land back on his face. The epitome of ‘bored as fuck.’ You knocked on the door and heard crashing and banging as the animatronic got up and ran to the other side.

“Who is iiittt?” He asked, singsongily.

“Come on, you know who.” you replied, trying to find a better way to hold the mail tub.

“You know who, who?” you could hear his faceplate spin through the door.

“Weellll, I suppose you don’t want all this new craft stuff then.” you turned around exaggeratedly to the sound of the door finally opening.

“Wait! I never said that!” his hand darted out to grab the back of your jumpsuit, making you laugh. You used the focal point that was him holding your suit to spin on the ball of your foot to turn back and face him. He let you go and smacked his hands to his cheeks, his rays retracting at the same time under his hands. “Oh my golly gosh! You didn’t need to get all of this! Here, let me help.”

He snagged the tub out of your arms and held it up with one of his hands, motioning you into the daycare with the other.

“Sorry about getting here so late. Stuff happened.” You replied, stretching your arms, now free from lugging that thing around.

“That’s alright. You came back! Like you said you would.” He set the tub down on the same table the two of you used yesterday.

“Yeah, but I’d planned things out so that I could actually spend some time with you, not just come back to drop things off.” You kicked an imaginary can.

“While that would have been nice, you still made time to come by! That’s an A for Effort in my book.” Wait, was he trying to insinuate that Effort starts with A?

“Effort starts with E, or were you talking about grades?” You wandered over to sit with him.

“It does? Then I totally meant grades! I dunno what you’re talking about. Pshh. Of course I know effort starts with C.” He had laid all the boxes out and discarded the tub.

“E. Starts with E.” Now he was just fucking with you.

“C. D. E. LMNOP. The spelling lesson can wait. What didja get? Huh?” This guy sure was wiggly. He’d been still once, maybe twice since you’d met. If you counted him laying on the floor getting a face full of paper plane that is.

“Now why would I tell you when you can just open it?” You asked, pushing one of the boxes under his nose. “Do yall have any scissors?”

“Why?” He already had the box open, the flaps having been torn straight off and flung across the room dramatically.

“Heh, never mind.” You leaned forward, resting your head on your hands while he went wild opening two of the three cardboard containers.

First was the baby wipes, you’d gotten a couple packs just in case. Well, you got two of just about everything just in case, but that was neither here nor there. He set them to the side, you knew he was happy to get them but that was hardly the most exciting. Next was the box with the coloring utensils. Two packs of crayons and one set of nicer colored pencils. He’d only asked for the crayons but you’d imagined that they didn’t really help with the kind of detail he was going for. He just kinda stared from them to you and back again.

“You’ve seen colored pencils, right?”

“Ohh, that’s what that is. No.” He tentatively opened them, oohing and aahing at all the colors. Way more than the packs of crayons had, despite being 24 packs. “They aren’t usually allowed in the daycare since kids can hurt themselves with them.”

“Kids are so good at that though. I’ve seen a kid hurt himself with pudding before!” You understood where the rules came from but still. Plus you had, indeed, seen a kid hurt himself with pudding. Right in the eyes. Was not fun for any party involved. “Well, at least you can put them up in your room when that becomes an issue again.”

“When?” He asked, taking the time to look up at you and away from his new toys.

“Well, yeah. I was hoping at some point that we- no- I could help with whatever happened and eventually the daycare would be open again.” You waved your hands around to emphasize your next point. “BUT, I’m not going to push it. If you want help then you’ll ask for it. I know you aren’t really comfortable around adults, much less someone who works in maintenance.”

“Right.” He sounded like he didn’t quite believe you, didn’t want to hope. Or maybe he didn’t want the kids back at all. You could hardly blame him. Kids weren’t exactly easy to deal with. But it was so hard to get a read on him sometimes. He didn’t even have eyelids!

Or did he?

“Hey, Sun?” He jolted upright.

“Yessss??” He replied tentatively, holding the colors to his chest like you’d take them back.

“Did- do you have eyelids?” The schematics all had diagrams with his eyes open wide so now you were second guessing yourself.

“That’s what you wanted to ask?!” Now he was laughing again, openly gafawing. It was a nice break from the anxiety. “Yeah, we ‘did- do’ have eyelids. But they got stuck when a kid sprayed us in the face with Fizzy Faz. Haven’t been able to close them since!” He tapped his eyes, squicking you out a little. You know it was different for them, but your own, wet eyes with nerve endings didn’t like the idea of being touched.

“Maybe I can help with that some day?” You looked down at your hands, playing with some loose skin above your nails. “Again, not going to push it. Just an offer. We don’t even have to go to Parts & Service if you don’t want. I can bring some stuff up here.”

“Really? You’d go out of your way just for that?” He set the pencils down, giving you his undivided attention.

“Well, yeah. I mean, I literally just bought you stuff, went to the mail room and got it, and came over here just to drop them off. I do stuff for my friends. That’s how it works.” You looked down at your watch. Shit, your shift started really soon. Like sprinting in shadow form would leave you one minute to spare. Distantly you could hear him echo the word ‘friend’ like he couldn’t believe it. “Yeah, but I am sorry, I really got to get going now. I stayed wayy longer than I should have.”

You got up to leave, watching him about to reach for you again before pulling his hand back. “But what about this last box?” Searching for any reason for you to stick around.

“You’re allowed to open it without me if you want.” You offered, making your way to the door and watching him get up through the corner of your eye.

“It- it can wait. I can wait.” He followed you to the door just a step behind. “I’d like to wait, if that’s okay.”

“Well, yeah, it’s your stuff now. How about this: I’ll come over and spend my lunch break with you, hows that sound?” That got him to perk up.

“Yes! I mean, that sounds good! What time is your break?”

“Around eleven. That work?” You turned back for just a second to gauge his reaction.

“Alright. Eleven it is, then.”

___________________________________________________________________________________

You stumbled through the doors to P&S with about 30 seconds to spare. But looking around, you realized that didn’t really matter as Devon had already left. His mug and magazine gone and his chair empty. You’d intended to give him a talk about treating your friends better, but that would wait you supposed. Instead you walked over to your office, happy to find it just as locked as you’d left it.

But there were more sticky notes on the door. Thinking that maybe this time it was something important you actually bothered to read them. Much to your annoyance, they weren’t. Just more tasks he wanted you to do instead of having to do them himself. You peeled them off the door and opened it, stuffing the notes in the bin with the last ones.

You sat at your computer, kind of wishing you had brought a cup of coffee as well. But you didn’t and it would have to wait. The coffee here probably wasn’t any good anyways and you could get some decent stuff on your day off tomorrow.

The ancient computer booted up with a generic chime and you went to the tasks program. Only to find almost nothing in there. Two more auto tasks and again, nothing new from management. Did Ms. Emstien consider fixing Sun and Moon a task that you should already be taking care of or was it something that would be sent eventually when she deigned to care about the issue.

You shook your head, deciding that wasn’t something you could answer for her. Instead you brought your attention to the auto messages. Look at that, only one of them had been waiting since noon. The other had just pinged a few minutes ago, asking you to take a look… at… a vent cover that had a huge dent in it and had come off its hinges… heh, how did that happen?

Citing the bible when Judas said unto Jesus, “whoopsie.” Moving on to the task that had been waiting. It seems that one of the games in the arcade was bugging out. The game would shut off randomly and characters would dart around the screen, some especially miffed teen saying that he was about to get the new high score ‘you stupid robot.’ You knew staff bots could send these reports but you didn’t know they just mashed up the words that other people say.

You looked away from the monitor and to your desk, trying to find a pen and paper to write something down when you noticed the things on your desk had been moved again. There was no trying to hide it this time, things were in completely different places. But your door had been locked. Not just regular locked, but double locked, the bolt still in place when you opened it. The only other way in to the room was a vent, but you highly doubted your coworker would crawl through the vents just to fuck with the stuff on your desk.

You wouldn’t put it past him though. Plus his notes were on the OUTSIDE of the door. If he’d been in your office than he would just put them on the monitor like last time. Or maybe he actually was just trying to mess with your head. No. He didn’t honestly seem well enough put together for that kind of scheme.

Ah well, that could wait. The vent shouldn’t take too long and would probably only need a screwdriver or drill. Both of those you could find here. But the arcade cabinet would require your tool belt, and a certain moon animatronic had that. You really hoped he wasn’t using it to do bad things, like break arcade cabinets, you really wanted him to be better than that.

Aside from that, both would need to get done. Even if you had to use Devon’s tool belt. You’d rather not touch other peoples things but if he wasn’t going to use it to do his job, then, well. Shutting off your computer, your grabbed your phone and headed to the supply closet. The other supply closet. The one that had been housing gross staff bots just a day before. Well it SHOULD have been sans staff bots but now one was back. Sitting in the same powered off state as the others had been.

Did Devon bring one in here? Did it wander in on its own? Who were you asking all of these questions?? You shook your head and walked passed them, grabbing a screwdriver off one of the shelves and making an exit, a little faster than normal.

The tool would fit snugly in your breast pocket, there was a hole in the bottom for pens but now it would hold something else. Versatility! Patting the pocket, you made your way back out the doors you’d just practically sprinted through just to be on time for no body but yourself.

After almost a quarter mile of walking, you came across the problem vent, the cover sitting precariously where you’d left it. It was pretty high off the ground, so you weighed your options. You could stretch up to it and fix it like that, go looking around for a latter like a normal human with short legs, jump up and into the vent and try and fix it from inside, or ask the conveniently close by chicken for help.

You himmed and hawed over your options before realizing what the last one was again. And turning to the side you saw, indeed Chica the chicken. Rummaging through a trash can. That had been a problem not long after she woke up, the stress of now being sapient getting to her. It was weird, however that all Chica the chicken animatronics, from the very beginning to now, had a propensity for eating things. Despite not having stomachs, or even functional mouths.

After what was essentially therapy, you thought she had gotten over the want for trash. You’d even built her a small compactor so food wouldn’t get stuck in her mechanisms. To be fair, she asked about options for not having to give up eating things and you’d recommended that. You didn’t alter reality to do it this time, just built it with already real parts. But now here she was, eating garbage again. Did things get so bad while you were gone that she began stress eating again?

She had her back to you and you silently hoped you wouldn’t scare her by getting her attention. You know she didn’t like others seeing her do this. But when you laid a hand on her shoulder she snapped at you, shrieking in your face and sending you sprawling. She turned around to face you mechanically, stutteringly. But before you had the chance to ask yourself what the fuck was going on with her, she came back. Blinking acouple times like there was dust in her eyes.

“Heya, chickadee! When did you get here? Why are you on the floor?” Concern filled her gaze as she looked in to yours. It took you a moment to recover. Not having experienced fear, or even dread, like that in eons.

“I’ve… been here for a hot minute. Chica, are you feeling alright?” You took her extended hand, an offer to help you get up.

“Oh. I’m good! Well, alright. All things considered.” She pried a piece of a box out of her beak, looking at it disgusted before tossing it over her shoulder.

“What things?” You dusted your butt off.

“Ohh, you know, everything.” She waved her hands about, gesturing to the air. When you didn’t act like you knew what she meant, her voice continued. “Like Freddy getting yelled at and the general understanding that we’re treated like objects. Ya know.”

“Right. Sorry…” Now you felt embarrassed.

“That’s alright, your here now. Maybe things will start to get better? Who knows.” She shrugged, looking from you, to the vent above, and back to you. “Ooh, would you like some help! Always liked watching you do stuff.”

So you were going to pretend like that didn’t just happen, then. Alright, you could play ball. “Yeah, I need to get up there cause someone broke it open and just placed the cover back on.” You kind of hoped there were no cameras pointing in that direction, or else your feigned ignorance could easily be disproven.

“I can do that!” She jogged over to the cover and gently pulled it off the wall before bending out the dent with her hands. The screwdriver was yoinked from your pocket as she reseated the screw still in the hinges back into the wall. “All done!”

“Thanks!” you replied, putting the tool back in your pocket when she handed it to you.

“Anything else to do for the night? Can I tag along?” She looked to you hopefully before deflating. “No, wait, I have to do stupid patrols.”

“Why does management have everyone doing patrols?”

“Cost cutting measures. Plus, in their minds its easy to repair one of us than to pay out a settlement check if a human gets hurt.” She crossed her arms, clearly as unhappy with the situation as you were.

“Well, any consolation I can’t really do much right now. There’s an arcade cabinet that needs fixing but Moon has my tool belt.” Was that footsteps you heard? “I planned to see Sun later and was going to ask if he knew where Moon stashed it.”

“Why not just use Devon’s.” The two of you stared at each other for a second before shivering comically and going ew, giggling like school girls afterwards. Chica then turned her gaze away from you and to a space just over your shoulder. But before you could turn around to see what, an incredibly bright flashlight went right into your eyes.

You let out a short ‘eep’ in response. “What’s going on here?” The light finally left, your retina’s allowed to see another day. “Chica, you’re supposed to be doing your patrols.” The woman holding the light was a stout woman, about your height with bright blonde hair and wearing a security uniform.

“Sorry, Vanessa. I was just trying to help.” The chicken in question gestured to the now fixed vent.

The woman, Vanessa, sighed and pinched her nose. “Alright, fine. But you really need to get back to it.”

“Yes, ma’am.” And with that, she was off. Rounding the corner and disappearing from view. Vanessa looked to you again, thankfully without blinding you this time.

“And you are? You know the building is closed, right?” She crossed her arms.

“Oh, yeah. I do. I was transferred back to be the night time mechanic just a few days ago.” You held out your hand, which she shook.

“Would have been nice for someone to tell ME that there would be another person on the property. I was about to call the police.” She put the now off flashlight under her arm and began to fiddle with something on her Fazzwatch.

“Shit, if I’d known you didn’t know I would have introduced myself sooner, then. Kinda surprised you just believed me at my word, though. Who knows, I could have broken in.” You clasped your hands behind your back and fluttered your eyelashes disarmingly.

“Well, A) Chica was here and knew who you were, B) you have a Fazzwatch and badge, and C) the staff bots would have let me know.” She was unimpressed with the display.

“Ya got me there, good to know they got a smart cookie guarding the place.”

“Don’t patronize me.”

“Sorry, wasn’t trying to. That’s how I act with the band, forgot to adjust for the fact that we aren’t friends yet…” That was a bad habbit you had. Being openly playful with people you didn’t know, who didn’t understand the inside jokes and thus thought you were just being an ass.

“It’s fine. I didn’t mean it like that, I just-” this woman loved to sigh. “I’m used to the other mechanic and his less than innocent remarks.”

“He’s like that with you too? Part of me is glad to know it’s not just me and the other part is pissed you have to put up with that. Have you brought anything up to management?”

“Why bother? Nothing about it is going to change, and if he caught wind I told he’d just get worse.” Fuck you really hated this guy. Did ANYONE have a good thing to say about him. Or even one incident where he wasn’t being a jerk?

“Why not? I get the feeling things are going to start changing now that I’m back.”

“Well, look at Mx. Bigshot here.” She said, smiling before it fell again. “I’d like to see you try, and I mean that honestly. I’ve worked at enough places like this to know that nepotism reigns.”

“Ain’t that the truth.”

“Look, it was nice to meet you, and maybe we can talk again later, but I really need to finish my rounds and get back to the security booth.”

You waved as she left, replying that it had been nice to meet her too as she rounded the same corner Chica had not minutes before. Now what the hell were you supposed to do. It was still only 7:3o and you needed your belt to do anything else.

But as you wandered around, thinking of what to do, it struck you that there wasn’t a report about Freddy’s busted hand. Did Devon actually fix it after you left but before you got back? Well, couldn’t hurt to check on him again anyways. So back to Rockstar Row it was, your feet guiding the way and eyes on the prize, trying to wrap your head around what the incident with Chica had been about and whether or not it was foreshadowing worse to come.

Chapter Text

The trip around the Plex and back to Rockstar Row was uneventful. Maybe two whole events, and both of them were just staff bots doing miscellaneous things. One bumped into a shelf and knocked some stuff over, which you helped them clean, and the other one fell on a patch of wet floor. Yes, there was a sign, and yes they looked at it but did not heed its warning and slipped. It wasn’t even one of the cute (sentient for some reason) ones, just a plastic fold out.

Even dragging your feet it was only 8 when you knocked on his door for the second time that day. There was some muffled movement and the sound of his trashcan falling over before he finally opened. The thing was, any time you knocked on one of their doors, they would open it looking straight ahead, thinking it was another one of the band. Which made the .5 seconds for them to realize they needed to look down pretty funny. Sometimes you’d even knock higher up on the door to make them think that was the case. Monty thought it was funny but Chica didn’t, pouting when you told her it was on purpose so you never did it again (to her at least).

When the bear finally looked down to you it was obvious he was hiding something. Freddy was never good at hiding things and even worse at lying about them. Eyes darting to and fro and looking all around guilty.

“Hi, Butter! How you doing this fine evening? I am doing just fine thank you for asking. You have a good rest of your shift now, bye!” You jammed your foot in the door before he could close it. He tried closing it pretty fast though so now your foot hurt.

“Freddy...” He shrunk in on himself. The sight of your intense stare enough to make him relent and usher you inside, finally showing you what he’d done.

There was a fork stuck up under the casing to his hand, just under the palm. You gave him a withered look, the epitome of ‘what the fuck dude?’

“I thought there was something stuck in my hand, and that that is why it was acting up. I tried to get it out myself so I did not have to bother you again.” He used his other hand to scratch the back of his head.

“Why??” Confusion written all over your face.

“I just explained why. I do not understand the question.” You lead him over to the couch where the two of you sat down.

“Why didn’t you want to come get me? It never bothers me when yall ask for help. And even if it did, friends are meant to bother each other sometimes. Just ask Monty, he just does it for fun.” That got a chuckle out of him.

“You have already done enough for the day. Not only taking the time to check on me but deliver us letters we were not going to receive otherwise.” You were fiddling with the utensil, trying to gauge just how stuck he’d manage to get it. “I suppose it has just been so long, I forgot what it was like to have someone here who cared for us.”

“Of course I care! You guys are my friends! I’d crawl through Hell for you!” It was jammed pretty good, a little impressive, really.

“Hell is real?” They never could tell when you were being metaphoric or literal, having an overwhelming amount of knowledge about life and how the universe worked metaphysically and whatnot.

“Yes, but I was being metaphoric.” He looked a little scared at that. “Don’t worry, you only go there if you want.”

“Who would want that?”

“People who think they deserve it.” You patted him on the cheek before getting up and pulling him with you. Trying to distract him before falling down the existential cistern. “We’re going to need to head down to P&S I’m afraid. I still don’t have my tool belt and if anything is damaged we’d need to replace it.” It was obvious he didn’t want to go, but there wasn’t really anything he could do to argue.

The two of you took his elevator down, instead of the scenic route. You understood why he, and really any of the animatronics, didn’t like going down there. It wasn’t a place of fun memories and candy. It was basically a hospital for them, with a large surgery theater at the center. The amount of times you’d actually used the repair cylinder could be counted on one hand, one finger actually. It was the time Monty fell in the recycled water in Gator Golf. The incident that woke him up.

The damage had been pretty extensive and your old manager was breathing down your neck the whole time. It was also the first and last time he ever personally oversaw your work. You could still smell the corn chips on his breath as he yelled at you to work faster.

You cleared off one of the large steel benches toward the back and patted it for him to sit on. After he sat, you turned his hand over in yours and found the tiny tiny release button. Now you just had to find a paperclip. Just kidding! Imagine not being able to change your finger into a tiny spike to press it. HA!

The casing fell off in two halves, one for the palm and one for the dorsal side. Setting those off to the side you assessed the damage. It wasn’t awful. Not great, but not too bad. The fork had gotten tangled in some wires and just got more wrapped around the longer he had fiddled with it. It wrapped around once or twice, even the part attached to the handle. As far as damage goes, it was impressive.

You let out a whistle looking up at him while he looked at anything but you. The wire wrapped around the handle got pulled so some slack was created and then the rest just slipped off the tongs. You tossed the offending object over your shoulder and got to work smoothing the tangles out. While you were in there, however, something caught your eye.

Wedged under the wires and in part of his endoskeleton was something shiny. After grabbing it and working it out you finally realized what it was. A token! One of the old metals ones from before the company switched over to those cheap plastic cards. What in the world was that doing here, much less wedged in Freddy’s hand. You held it out to him, confused, asking if it jogged any memories as to how it got in there.

He held it up against the light. “I am not entirely sure.” Now you asked him to wiggle his fingers and turn his hand over a couple times to which he obliged. “Maybe a child found it under one of the arcade cabinets and it fell out his pocket when I held them for a photo?” Occam’s razor states the simplest answer is most often correct, and it made enough sense for you. He handed it back and you dropped it in your leg pocket. You had been about to put it in the breast pocket when you remembered the hole in it, as well as the screwdriver.

You took the latter out and tightened some screw while you already had his hand cracked open. He didn’t voice any displeasure but once you were done you caught him staring at the repair cylinder. After popping the casing back on his hand, you patted his arm.

“Everything alright there, bud?” He snapped out of whatever he was thinking and looked back to you.

“Yes, thank you for the assistance.” He got up and wiggled his fingers a bit more before letting his hand drop to his side. “I am sorry I did not come to you for help sooner.” You let him lead the way back to the elevator.

“And I’m sorry for draggin’ you all the way down here for nothing. We can all be sorry!” You opened your arms wide like it was a big accomplishment. He smiled at you, wiggling his ears. “But for reals, please let me know when something is bothering you guys. I know it’s a different situation when Devon is here, but I really do care about you and how you’re feeling. Whether it’s emotional or physical.” The both of you took the elevator back up in silence. He was obviously mulling something over, like he wanted to say it but was afraid.

“I know it is a silly question, but do you really mean that? That if we are upset we can still come to you?”

“Of course, big guy! I could be saving babies from a fire and still take some time to talk to you.” He smiled again, laying a hand on your head.

“I would prefer you save the babies first, but thank you.” He ruffled your hair, watching as its frizzy state sunk back into your normal haircut. “I… I would like to talk about Bonnie, then. When you have a moment.” You had to keep from looking happy to hear that. It’s not that you were happy to hear he was gone, but no one had told you anything about his disappearance. Even if he didn’t/couldn’t mention anything about the circumstances surrounding his death, you were pleased he was being mentioned at all. Any old trace of him having been removed from the Plex, period.

“I’ve got some time now, if you’d like.” The elevator stopped, the doors opened and the two of you stepped out and walked towards Freddy’s greenroom. You sat him back down on the couch where he looked around and up at the camera you’d destroyed a few days ago. He stared at you for a moment, asking you with his eyes.

You began to let out a frequency that messed with microphones, any recorded audio would just be a high pitched whine and it worked out fine because the animatronics used a strange work around to gather audio. You hadn’t had to use this since you first started, when the band were treated like objects and acted like them too. Freddy was the first to wake up and the awareness he gained left him with a LOT of questions. Remembering the first real conversation the two of you had fondly. In this same room you popped an edible and let him ask whatever. Going on flowing and colorful tangents about life and the meaning behind it all.

But that was then, and this was now. And right now, it was his turn to talk.

“The last place I saw him was in that tube.” His voice was already trembling. This was not going to be easy. You leaned back and patted your chest, letting him lay his head there, rubbing his back as he talked. “I am still not allowed to say what happened. Not straighforwardly, anyways. But it involved an incident at ‘Shmator Shmalf.’ Something happened. We still do not know what he was doing up in the rafters, but they found him in a pile underneath one. Nothing was attached anymore. The cameras in the area had been water damaged and nothing helpful was recorded. The old manager ranted and raved about getting him fixed. Demanding that it got done and that he didn’t care how long it took. At that moment, it almost seemed like he was on our side. But when executives told him that getting Bonnie repaired would cost more than they were willing to pay, he folded, forcing Monty to take his spot in the band.” Something warm was soaking into your jumpsuit. You knew what it was and didn’t care, holding his head closer to your chest. “I did not know what I would do without him. He had always been by my side, no matter what. I know I still have Chica, and Roxy, and Monty, but it is not the same without him around.” He opened his chassis and pulled out the now open letter. “It is from a little girl named Melony. She wrote to ask where he went and if he will be back soon. That she and her brother miss him a lot. That- that I do not look as happy anymore, with him gone.” He let it fall to the ground and buried his face in your jumpsuit. “I can not even find it in myself to argue with her.”

Your heart ached and tears ran freely from your eyes, trying not to sob with him. You needed to stay strong for him, like Bonnie would have wanted.

“I’m so sorry you had to go through this. I’m even more sorry that I wasn’t here to help. To help you, or him. And I promise, if I can’t bring him back, which I will never stop trying to do, that I will see to it that something like this never happens again. It was offensive to let costs get in the way of repairing him, but it was just an insult to try and strip away his memory.” You pet his head, letting him cry as long as he needed to. There was nowhere you’d rather be in that moment.

___________________________________________________________________________________

It was around 10:30 when he began to stop. It was convenient, but you weren’t going to say you had somewhere else to be, ever. If it had run over, you’d explain to Sun why you were late and you know he’d understand. The two of you laid there for some time longer before he began to get up, thanking you for letting him grieve. You let him know that anytime, and you meant any time, he needed you, you’d be there for him. Him and the rest of the band.

You helped him get cleaned up, his face was smeared with oily tears, and to his charging station. The two and a half hours of crying straight had worn him out. It had worn you out as well, but you’d never tell him that. He bid you farewell with another thank you and you began making your way to the daycare. There was even time to stop by the janitors station and grab some of those cleaning supplies he’d asked for originally. Maybe something in there would help with the torso-sized oil stain on your jumpsuit. It was technically part of your skin, but until you changed form it would stay there.

You grabbed some generic cleaning spray, glass cleaner, a bunch of rags and paper towels, and anything else you could think of. This would be the second time today you knocked on the daycare doors with overly full arms. Sun was already opening the doors by the time you knocking and was just as surprised as the last time to see you with gifts to bear.

“Let me!” He said enthusiastically, scooping the lot out of your arms once again. Before he turned away to start putting them up, he saw the absolutely massive stain on your clothes. “What in the world happened? Did something explode?”

“Something like that, I suppose.” You replied softly, sitting down. A little sad you didn’t laugh at his joke, he motioned to say something before catching a glimpse of your red-eyed, tear streaked face and dropped it. Scurrying to quickly put away the supplies you gave him so he could start trying to help you feel better. But upon returning, he still didn’t know what to say. Looking around for conversation pieces before his eyes landed on the unopened box from earlier.

“Ooh! We still have that last box to open?!” He offered, sliding down to sit next to you at the table.

“Yeah? I’m kinda glad you waited, there’s something in there I hope you’ll like.” You thought it would have been in the box with the colors, but were now glad it wasn’t. You could use some cheering up now too.

He tore into it slower than the previous two, whether because he was savoring the moment or cause he felt weird about how fast he went through the last two, you didn’t know. Inside were four total reams of paper; one all white, two multicolored, with the last being square instead of rectangle and in all sorts of patterns. Along with a small book; a book on origami.

“Do you know about origami?” You asked, scooting closer to him and sitting shoulder to shoulder while he looked through the first few pages. You pointed out how the diagrams should be read and the different folds, explaining how it worked and all the fun stuff he could make. “It’s very delicate work, and folding things even slightly wrong can mess up the way it looks. I think you’d be really good at it with some practice. And it would give you some stuff to do besides draw and clean.”

He hadn’t said anything but it was obvious from his body language that he was invested. Flipping through the pages delicately and oohing about all the different designs. While he did that you grabbed the paper you’d gotten just for this and flipped it over. Showing him on the back all the different patterns in the set, and explaining there were going to be multiples of each so if he liked a pattern but messed it up, that he could try again.

You were already sitting pressed against him, but he reached around you and hugged you tighter. It was only a second before he flinched as was about to pull back, having forgotten the no touching staff rule for a second, but you grabbed his arm and put it back, relaxing. After realizing you were okay with the contact he relaxed too.

“I- we really appreciate all of this. You put a lot of thought into this and it really shows.” He released you and you took some time to try and wipe the tear tracks from you cheeks, unsuccessfully.

“You guys are welcome. I just hope you’ll actually enjoy it. The book has different things from easy to hard so you can go at whatever pace you want.” You sat back at the other end of the table while he was flipping through the book again, then you waited watching him do so until he found one he liked.

“Can we do this one?” He laid the book down and showed you a ladybug diagram.

“Of course, we can do any one of them you’d like. It’s your book now.” He clapped and opened the pack of paper, going through them until he found the one he wanted to use. You just grabbed on off the top. The book sat open in the middle and the two of you glanced at it occasionally while you worked. The task was a little more difficult for him since he had much larger hands, but after you saw him work with the tiny crayons, it was obvious he could handle it.

Time ticked on and the two of you made one thing after the next. After around the eighth, you chuckled and asked him to let you know when he needed more. That he could also just make the other paper into squares if he really wanted. You yawned and looked down at your watch, it was almost midnight, but you got an hour and a half for your break so you weren’t in a hurry.

Sun looked over at you asking how late it was, but jolted when you told him. “Oh, shoot, you probably need to head back to work now, huh?”

“Nah, I still got thirty minutes. I can stick around.” You went back to folding your crow while he continued to look distressed.

“Oh. B-but you still haven’t actually eaten anything yet, right? Maybe you should go get some food before your break is over, yeah?” He got up and rounded the table, gently tugging you up and onto your feet.

“Is something wrong? Did I upset you somehow?” This was concerning. You thought everything was going so well too, but here he was, pushing you towards the door. Before you got to there, you dug your heels in causing the two of you to nearly loose balance. “Look, I’m sorry if I did, but at least tell me what it was?”

“Oh nononononononono, friend, I’m not upset! I just really think you should go get some food before midnight- I mean before your break is over!” You looked up at him, confused.

“Why? What happens at midnight?” He raised a finger to interject, but never got the chance.

The lights cut off, and the two of you were bathed in darkness.

Chapter Text

As the room disappeared and was replaced with darkness, the only noise to be heard was Sun struggling frantically. You felt around to try and find him while your eyes adjusted but he was no longer in arms reach. The struggling stopped soon enough and was replaced with the sound of clicking and gears turning. When your eyes finished adjusting just seconds later and the daycare came back in to view, you were alone.

You looked up and down and all around and there was no Sun OR Moon to be found. Unless this was the worlds greatest disappearing act, then one of them had to be around here somewhere. You wandered over to and went behind the security desk, remembering that there had been a small lamp there and turned it on. The night vision you had was alright, but your eyes were still functionally human and they couldn’t see well in the dark.

The small lamp lit up very little, but just enough to cast some clarity across the general vicinity. You now realized that Sun was trying to keep you from meeting Moon, but you were a big *something or other* and you could handle yourself. The chair here was old and rickety but would serve just fine while you glanced around looking for backlit eyes in the dark.

“Moon?” You called out hesitantly. Distantly, you could hear the sound of bells and clicking, giving only hints to the animatronic’s location. “I’d like to finally get to meet you if that’s okay.” The noise stopped.

You looked down to your hands to see them, and the desk in front of you, bathed in red light. But looking above you and around, there was nothing. Were they just messing with you? The sound of giggling filled your ears just before something fell from the ceiling and landed just in front of the desk.

One hand peeked over the edge, followed by the other. First a nightcap, then eyes finally showing. That was all they would let you see for now.

“Well, hiya.” You said cheerfully, laying your head on your arms which tented off the counter. “Nice to finally get to see you.” They said nothing, offering no indication as to what was running through their head. “Not much of a talker, huh?”

Instead of replying, a tool bag appeared, having been set gently on the counter before towards the edge and falling off, landing on its side on the level below. A quick arm jutted over the top, righting the bag and putting the tools back inside and disappearing.

“So you DID have my bag!” They flinched, eyes vanishing behind the ledge once again. “I’m not upset! I was just surprised when Roxy told me you’d gone to get it.” Their eyes appeared again, studying you while you counted and sorted tools. Everything was still here, and in the same condition you’d left them. The only difference was that a flat head screwdriver you’d accidentally bent years ago was now straightened out. “Thank you for fixing this.” You held up the aforementioned tool, seeing them perk up just a little, eyes glowing brighter.

“Welcome.” You jolted at the sound. They sounded a bit like Sun, just lower and gravely. Like they had a sore throat.

“What pronouns do you go by, Moon?” You put everything back and propped your head up with one arm.

“He.” He responded after a few moments of silence.

“Just he?” You smiled, seeing how he would react to poking a little fun.

“Him.” His faceplate rotated with his voice full of mirth. Once the spinning stopped, he showed his whole head and placed it on the upper portion of the desk.

He obviously had the same face as Sun, but like you’d seen in the video, anything but the moon portion was darkened. It was cute, and kind of an ingenious design. A cloth sleeping cap sat atop his head, leaving you to wonder where it went when not in use. In the video it had looked like it slipped between the plates that made up the front and back portions of their face, but now you weren’t so sure.

“Mind if I ask why you went and got my tool bag?” You tilted your head to match his.

“Wanted… wanted to meet you.” He replied, looking away. Now THIS was the kind of behavior your had been expecting from him. Not what you’d seen in the video.

“I still would have gone out of my way to meet you, Moon.” He looked back to you, surprised. “It’s not fair for me to just visit Sun when you’re by yourself too.”

“Why?” He shuffled, bringing his hands to the front of his face. “No one else wants to visit Moon.” His voice was so resigned, like he felt he deserved this fate. Should you tell him you knew? That you saw him kill someone and still thought he was worthy of company and affection? Or was that too much, too soon. You reached out to grab his hand but he flinched at the contact. Hard.

“Sorry! Sorry. Didn’t know you-” Before you could pull your hand back the rest of the way, he grabbed your wrist. His grip was tight, but not uncomfortably so, and he gently guided your hand back to lay on top of his.

How long had he been alone? You knew it was a while. Months. But could he and Sun talk to one another? Some kind of internal communication? Or were the two of them completely isolated now, no one but the dust bunnies to keep them company. It was obvious that Sun was a very touchy feely kind of guy but Moon was still an unknown quantity.

The room was quiet for a long time, the only sound in the room being your breath. As time went on, you gently ran your thumb over his hand, watching the light in his eyes dim before shutting off completely. At first you thought he ran out of power, but it quickly became apparent he was ‘shutting his eyes.’

More questions ran through your mind. Given that Sun was the ‘daytime’ version of the two, and that Moon only came out when the lights were off. How much time did Moon actually get to not only be fronting, but able to interact with anyone. Nap time couldn’t have been more than a couple of hours total, from story time to sleeping. And given that the kids would be asleep for most of it, how much did he get to be around others.

After a bit, his eyes lit back up and he gently pulled his hands back. Disappearing from view momentarily just to reappear with a box and a sheet of paper. Both were gently pushed your way, stopping just shy of falling off the top portion of the desk. You grabbed both things being offered and looked at him quizzically. He didn’t say anything, just looked from the paper, to you, and back.

It took longer than you would have liked to realize what he was asking. “You want a drawing too.” Less of a question and more of a statement.

“Yes.” He nodded enthusiastically. “Please.”

“Well I can’t really draw you if I can’t see all of you.” He looked a little sad, but didn’t move out from behind the desk. “How about this. I’ll draw you a picture now, and when you feel more comfortable around me I can draw you. How’s that sound?” He nodded, clapping.

So you got to work. An idea of what to draw hitting you almost immediately. He was the moon, and the daycare had glowing stars on the ceiling. So you began to draw the night sky, Milky Way and all. Well, the view from somewhere without light pollution at least. The most you could see in town was a handful of the brightest starts on a good night. You were so focused you didn’t notice him wander away and hit the off button on the light switch. Insuring that when the power came back on, that the daycare would still be dark.

Drawing didn’t take too long, and before you knew it you were handing the picture over to Moon who was overjoyed to receive it. After his little happy dance, you set the box of crayons back to where he could grab them. He did so, raising the box above his head and waddling away happily to put them up.

As he came back up to the desk, the lights outside the daycare came back on blinding you a bit after looking in that direction. He raised a finger as if about to speak but was cut off as it curled and his body began to shake and stutter. You got up out of your chair and rounded the desk as he fell to the ground. The sight you met on the other side was… strange, to say the least.

It was like someone splashed a bunch or random paint on them. Blotches of Sun’s red and yellow striped pants bleeding into Moon’s blue and yellow star pattern. Their chassis kaleidoscoping between the two animatronic’s color palette. Moon was gripping the sides of his head making choking noises, and only from here could you see Sun’s rays peeking out.

They were fighting for control of their shared body. Sun must have realized it was past time for the lights to come back on and started struggling when he didn’t automatically start fronting again. You didn’t know what to do. It hurt just to watch.

“STOP.” Movement ceased and they looked up at you. It was a strange state of being and you could tell it was uncomfortable even if they weren’t struggling. “Just stop you two.” You said gently, crouching down and grabbing one of their hands. As you pulled it away from their face, Sun’s rays shot out. “Sun, I understand you’re worried but it’s not fair to Moon to try and pull the rug out from under him. Moon, I know you wanted to spend a little more time in control but you need to let Sun know what you’re doing, we can always spend more time together later if that’s what you’d like. Just stop fighting like this, please. I’m sure there’s some kind of agreement we can come to.”

Sun stopped trying to barge in and his rays retracted along with the bright colors. Now it was just you and Moon again, who was curled in on himself looking ashamed. “M’m sorry…” He pulled his night cap over his eyes, hugging his knees. You rested a hand on his shoulder and he peeked up at you.

“I’m not upset, Moon. Just… That was scary. I didn’t know what was happening and it sounded like you were in pain.” He avoided your gaze but his body language told you all you needed to know. It was painful. You sighed and sat on the floor next to him, opening one arm as an invitation to lean against you, which he took. You didn’t know if they’d actually gotten along together before the incident, but it was clear that now things were tense. And that was a nice way of putting it.

“Didn’t mean to scare you.” He mumbled, still curled up tightly. “Sun… doesn’t share anymore. I’m only allowed out for patrols and then I go back in the dark.” If he could get any smaller, he would. “S’ not fair.” Your heart ached for the second time that night.

“I see things aren’t great between you two anymore. But there’s still a chance for the two of you to connect again?” You glided your fingers along the side of his face plate, feeling the space where Sun’s rays would come out. Slowly, ever so slowly he began to unfurl and eventually-

“Are you purring?” He startled, pulling his hat over his eyes in embarrassment.

“No!” He chuffed.

“Yeah, huh.” You laughed breathlessly, seeing him release the stranglehold on his hat and peek out at you. “Sorry, that’s adorable.” After taking a moment to catch your breath, you remembered the situation at hand. “Is there anyway for you to talk to each other? Maybe help understand what the other is going through?”

He looked at the ground, defeated. “Not anymore. I- I cut him out after the accident.” He was staring at his hands. “There’s something wrong with me… he doesn’t deserve it to happen to him too.”

Anytime you’d read or heard about what happened, it was always an ‘incident.’ Moon was calling it an accident. Like he didn’t mean to do it. Like he deeply regretted what happened.

“I just… wanted to meet you at least once.” He got up and headed towards the light switch. You weren’t fast enough to stop him. “It was at least nice to meet you. I know you’ll treat him the way he deserves.”

And with that, the lights were on and Moon was gone.

Chapter Text

It took the same amount of time for you to get off the floor as it took Moon to change back into Sun. Leaving you with a pit in your stomach. Sun didn’t come into awareness immediately, instead taking a few seconds to catch up with reality. The first thing he saw was your devastated face.

“I’m SO so sorry, friend! I didn’t mean for any of that to happen! Moon was just being- ugh. Are you okay? Did he hurt you?” Sun was on you in an instant, lifting your arms and spinning you around, assessing for damage.

“It’s okay, I’m okay. Just… shaken, is all.” You shook your head, trying to clear the daze. It didn’t work.

“It’s not okay! Do you know how much danger you were in?! You could have gotten hurt! He could have kill-” He stopped himself, grabbing his rays, feeling a panic attack brew in his circuits.

“Take it easy there, big guy. It IS okay. No one got hurt. Everything’s fine.” You took a tentative step towards him.

“No noononono! He’s done it before. Horrible, unforgivable things! I can’t let him out- what if he does it again?” Sun began gesturing wildly, spreading his arms out in emphasis but smacking you in the ribs in the process. You bent over, trying to get the wind back in your lungs while he watched on in horror, shaking like a leaf. “I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I’m- oof!”

When you finally caught your breath you charged at him, slamming into him for a hug. Still shaking he closed him arms around you loosely before falling to his knees, burying his face in your chest. He was forcing you to pull out the big guns. You began radiating calm, letting the change in energy roll off of you and into him. As much as you hated doing this, there was no way he was going to come down on his own. It worked a little TOO well.

“Mmm srry. Jus don… wannany thngta hapenntu.” He sighed dizzily, drunkenly, arms falling to his sides when he could no longer keep them up. He tried to raise his head to look at you only for it to roll back. You caught it and pressed it back to you.

You might have gone just a little overboard.

“Come on big guy. Let’s get you to your room.” You gathered him up in your arms and slung him over your shoulder. It was awkward because of the height difference, his face was practically dragging on the floor. You looked up to the balcony and in a blink you were standing on it. Sun let out a little ‘weeee!’ before growing quiet again.

Upon entering the curtained off area you noticed several things. One: this was hardly a room, like it was a room in the literal sense but there was no familiar ambiance like the band’s greenrooms. And two: they had practically nothing to their names. There wasn’t even one of the charging tubes that most of the other animatronics used (bar DJMM since he was too big), just a cord that plugged into the wall. You laid him out on the sparse pile of pillows and dragged the cord to him.

Pressing the buttons on his chest in a certain order caused the case to pop open, exposing his innards. A small plug sitting to the bottom left corner of his chest. You plugged him in, making sure he was comfortable before you turned to leave. As they seemed want to do, he grabbed your wrist.

“Mm soory today suckk’d.” He sounded genuinely upset. You sighed and turned back to him, crouching to be eye level.

“Today didn’t suck, Sun. It was a bit chaotic, but it didn’t suck. No time spent with my friends is wasted time.”

“Aam I reallly yur friend?” He slurred, head falling back against the wall.

“Both of you are my friends.”

“Btt hehart peopllle!” You shushed him.

“I know what happened. What he’s done. But you’re both STILL my friends. And you’re both STILL worthy of having someone care for you.” He looked at you with as much shock as he could muster.

“Uu know? Nd yuh stll?” He didn’t have the energy to finish that question, his head falling to his shoulder.

“I do. And I stand by what I said.” You patted his face and got back up.

“Thnk yuu. E don deservv…” And with that he went slack, the lights in his eyes going out. The only indication he was still on was the steady whirring of his fans. You wondered how much, if any of this he would remember when he booted back up. That was a problem for later you. For now, there was still an arcade cabinet to fix before you could rest.

___________________________________________________________________________________

Well, there should have been an arcade cabinet for you to fix, but the damned thing was gone. You checked both arcades, looking up, down, all around and STILL not finding it. Part of you thought the thought about the night getting any more frustrating, but didn’t want to tempt fate.

The place the game should have been in was just sitting empty. The idea that Devon might have moved it just to fuck with you crossed your mind, but he wasn’t incentivized enough for that. Lugging a several hundred pound cabinet around just to mess with you? That was far too much credit. You were about to give it up for the night when an idea struck. What about the closet? What if staff bots removed it from the floor so no one would try to play it? It made more sense to just leave it and tape an ‘Out of Order’ sign on the screen but things didn’t make sense around here.

Lo and behold, when you opened the door, there it sat. Taunting you. Literally. It was playing soundbites like “There’s no way you can defeat THE UNYIELDING HORROR!” Like okay little cabinet, you’ve had a job in retail before. This was nothing comparatively.

What struck you as odd was that it was plugged in at all. If it was moved so no one would play it than it should be unplugged. Looking at the back of the thing made less sense. It WAS unplugged. But still playing the Start screen like it had full power. Some of these things came with power banks that stored some energy when not in use because it used too much power than a plug strip could provide but still. This was weird.

Fuck your stupid baka life.

You pulled the side panel off and took a look at the mechanisms. Some of the wires were stripped bare and chewed through. It looked like rats had gotten to it but you’d never seen one around the Plex. And you lived in the vents!

Reaching in, you went to disconnect the power bank so you could work on it safely. But upon disconnect, the damn thing shocked you! Pretty bad too!

“FUCK!” You pulled your hand back and instinctively kicked the machine. The burn was dark, and the smell of burning flesh hit your nose. That fucker got you good. You set out to heal it, and it did. Slower than you’d usually expect though. It stung, and would hurt worse as the nerves regenerated but you could deal with that. It was just pain and you’d been through worse.

No, what worried you was how weird you felt. Cold and wobbly. That was strange. You’d been electrocuted before but you still felt like the floor had turned into the deck of a ship. You braced your arm against the wall and wandered back into the arcade proper.

You just needed to sit down was all, you’d be fine after you took a break. Man, the ground was getting real close now. Shit.

You were out before your face hit the floor.

Chapter Text

To say that the world came back in to focus slowly would imply that focus was regained at all. No, the world was there and your mind deigned to collect itself much later than was usual. The first thing that came to your attention was that it wasn’t normal to feel the planet’s rotation, or at least for it to have this sort of effect. If you had a proper stomach you would have hurled. As of then all you could manage was a groan.
“There you are. Take it slow, chickadee.” Slow was all you could take it, if you were being honest. Everything moved oppressively slowly, to the point that you could count the syllables of Chica’s words before she finished saying them.
While your vision refused to come into focus, your sense of smell was fine. The room smelled of disinfectants, dampness, and a smokey scent you couldn’t yet place. Frankly, it was an awful combination and Richardly, it wasn’t helping the nausea. You grunted in response.
“Take your time, you’ve been in a coma for three years.” She added nonchalantly.
“What?!” You bolted upright which proved to be a horrid decision as the next thing you knew the entirety of your body weight was being supported by the chicken in question.
“Woah!” She pretended to struggle to sit you back on the cot you just realized you’d been resting on. “Just kidding! Sorry, should have guessed it wouldn’t be funny right now… couldn’t pass up the opportunity though. So, yes: sorry, but would do it again.” You huffed a laugh and did your best attempt to roll your eyes.
“Har har, much funny, very laugh.” You laid back on the cot and let your senses adjust on their own terms. While the room had stopped spinning, your eyesight was still too blurry to make out definitive shapes. All your attempts to recall the events leading up to now were met with static. “What happened?”
“I found you passed out in the Fazzcade and brought you down to the med station in the service tunnels so it wouldn’t be on record.” You mumbled something about that being a smart move while she continued. “I was kind of hoping that you could fill me in on that. It really freaked me out! I’ve never seen you unconscious before, only sleeping. Thought it was a prank until you wouldn’t get up.”
“Sorry, Chica. Didn’t mean to scare you.” It took a solid minute of doing your best to think to finally recall a scrap of memory. “I remember… trying to work on an arcade machine and… it shocked me? But that’s never been a problem before, I’m not sure what the blacking-out thing was.”
“That makes sense. I tried my best to bandage your hand but um…” you peeked out the corner of your eye to see her wiggling her fingers on one hand and holding a comically small roll of bandages in the other. At that, you brought the offending appendiges up to your eyes and were met with essentially a cotton bud for a hand, making you laugh. Within the time it took you to stop, the room came back into focus more and more.
It was indeed one of the sequestered corners of the service tunnels, just as dark and dank as the rest. There wasn’t much in there past a medical booth and a tower of boxes. Well, those and a concerned looking animatronic, insofar as was possible for her limited facial expression.
You spend more time thinking about the days events, searching for the point of no recollection. After waking up you went to go get the mail, there was something else important about that moment but you’d come back to that in a second. Then you talked to the band and gave them their letters, and off to Sun to give him those packages. Devon was already gone when you got to Parts and Service so you got to work. Which was… OH, the vent cover and the cabinet. Chica helped out with the vent and you met the night guard. You went to go check on Freddy and the two of you talked.
Looking down at your jumpsuit confirmed that the stain was still there and that you hadn’t imagined that. But past that things started to get muddy. You know for a fact that you went to see Sun during your lunch break, but… something happened. Something important… Moon! You finally met Moon! And he was just as sweet as you’d imagined. Things weren’t just muddy after that, they were gone. A giant hole in your memory that was really starting to get on your nerves.
Speaking of important things; what was it about the mail that was important? It was something you needed to do. Okay, step by step.
Go to mail room: check
Get packages: check
Help mailman gather mail off the floor: cheeeec-hey now.
It was the mailman! You gave him back the mail and a fiver for letting you know about Freddy and he gave youuuu… oh.
With what little motor control you had, you sat up and opened your chest to retrieve what was left of what the mailman gave you. The bag of weed was now only shreds of plastic and the zip lock at the top. You groaned and threw the remnants at the wall, missing by a few feet.
“What’s wrong?” Chica asked, startling you just a fraction, having been so out of it you forgot she was still there.
“That high mailman might have given me some drugs and I might have stored them in my chest until I could get rid of them. Only to completely forget they were in there. Seems I ended up digesting them.” After a five second pause the two of you burst out laughing.
See, you could store things in your chest will little issue. It wasn’t like a pocket dimension or anything, just stuffing an object in the facsimile of your guts. That works out fine short term, but the longer something sat the more time your body had to try and break it down. You could technically eat like that but where the fun? The only reason Sun’s drawings survived earlier was because they were in there for ten minutes max. A thin plastic bag full of organic material sitting in there for ten hours on the other hand.
After taking a moment to calm down from the giggle party, she got your attention again.
“So how are you feeling?” She sat forward and helped you take the bandages off once she saw you trying to with one hand.
“Better?” You extended your hand to her so she wouldn’t have to get up. There was something in the back of your mind, bugging you, but without a clue as to what it would have to wait. “Still dizzy, but not nauseous anymore. In fact, I’m actually pretty hungry. You wanna go get a pizza?”
She gasped and clapped her hands. “Yes! Do you ever have to ask?” And with that she helped you stand straight and the two of you walked slowly to the atrium to get some food. Whatever it was would have to wait, you finally had some quality time with a dear friend you missed.
___________________________________________________________________________________

You had barely finished your order when the staff bot turned around and headed back into the kitchen. Shrugging, you walked away from the counter and met Chica at one of the slightly larger tables that actually fit her. The pizza would take a minute so the two of you had time to talk.
But neither of you knew what to say. You wanted to ask about what the band had gotten up to while you were away but you doubted that anything she had to say about it would be good, and she’d been riled up enough for one night. It seemed that great minds thunk alike and she spoke first.
“Soooo, what did you get up to while you were gone? You haven’t said a thing about the other location since you got back, what gives?” She folded her arms and laid her head down. In the still of this moment you could finally see the generic (and nongeneric) wear she’d suffered in your absence. Small dents and scratches, faded colors and paint chips missing. They really had had no one taking care of them while you were gone, huh?
“Cause there isn’t really a whole lot to talk about. The place was a ghost town most of the time, maybe one or two families came in a day. A handful of birthday parties total. Heck, they didn’t even keep the lights on until a customer walked in. I was the only mechanic and quite frankly it’s cause they only needed one. Nothing broke because nothing was used. I also doubled as the night security for a month.” You shrugged, matching her posture and leaning your forehead against hers.
Over time you came to realize that many of the animatronics, that were awake at least, enjoyed physical contact. They didn’t have nerves like organic things have nerves, you’d imagined it more like how sensations feel in a dream. There but not quite. None the less it was something they craved and you were more than happy to supply. It was completely platonic, despite what the general public might believe. Physical affection didn’t have to be a strictly romantic gesture and the beings you cared about understood that.
“Must have been pretty boring.” She replied, closing her eyes.
“That’s an understatement. Heh.” Your eyes closed for only a moment before shooting open at her next sentence.
“Must have been pretty lonely.” That stung a bit. The drugs were to blame for your intense emotions lately, that must be it. It definitely wasn’t something that had been bottled up for nearly a year and had the very real possibility of breaking open at any time. Nope.
“Yeah… I worked from noon to midnight so I was only around anyone else for a few hours. Almost no one there was awake either.”
“Almost?” The two of you sat up and back into your own spaces.
“Well, one of them woke up a bit after I got there. She was really sweet, curious. I think the two of you would have gotten along given the chance. It started off nondescript. Once all the people went home and the diner went dark the place was dead quiet so I started playing music on my phone to pass the time. It was the same playlist over and over, you know me.” The two of you smiled. “I thought I’d hear someone talking once in a while but when I paused the song there was nothing, so I ignored it. Then one night I wasn’t feeling great and wanted to wallow so I skipped one of the happier songs. Then I heard the voice again, this time clear as day.” Chica was on the edge of her seat, wiggling around at the pause for tension. “Go back, please. I like that song.”
“Awww!” She flapped her hands and giggled. “Then what happened?”
“Well I went back to that song and let it play like she asked, but then I opened a conversation. It took some time but she finally opened up to me, telling me about the time she’s spent trying to understand the branching out of her little world. I answered her many many questions as well as I could and in turn we became friends.” It was then that the staff bot came out of the kitchen and set the pizza on the table. You both thanked them and they scooted off. After Chica grabbed her slice and you yours, and she started talking as you were about to take a bite.
“At least you made a friend! So it wasn’t all bad!” The look that formed on your face told her all she needed to know. “Oh… this doesn’t end well, does it?” You shook your head, setting the food down and trying not to reminisce on where things went wrong. No matter how many times you tried to think about how you could have done something differently, you knew better. It was her choice and you had to respect that. “You don’t have to talk about it now if you don’t want to, chickadee.”
“Thank you… maybe eventually, just- not tonight.” The two of you ate in silence for about five minutes before she tried making conversation again.
“So, can you remember anything more about what happened earlier?” She was already on her third slice and you were finding it hard to keep up despite the hunger gnawing at you. After swallowing your bite you mulled it over.
Let’s see. You had that talk with Freddy, then you went to go see Sun. Things were going fine until the lights went off and you got to meet Moon, who was sweet. Then the lights were supposed to come back on and the two fought for control. Moon turned the lights on himself after implying that you two wouldn’t see each other again, which hurt. Sun came back and freaked out worse than ever.
Ough, you essentially drugged him by forcing all his processes to a crawl and brought him back to his room to charge. He was gonna be so mad when you talked next. Of course he had every right to be and you relayed all this to Chica as it crossed your mind. She huffed at the knowledge that you’d forceably manipulated someone again, which she had every right to.
“I panicked! I’m sorry!” You put your face in your hands. “It’s been a really long night. It’s not an excuse I know-”
“First off, I’m not the one you need to apologize to. Second, it’s alright! You’re acting like you set him on fire. He might be upset, sure, but I’m sure it will all work out!” She pat the back of your head and slid another slice of pizza into your hand.
“You’re right… I don’t know what’s wrong with me today.”
“You’re incredibly high right now. You do remember that, yes?” She roller her eyes playfully at your ‘oh, yeah’ face. “Someone very intelligent once told me that very few things in this world can’t ever be fixed. So just talk to him and apologize, I’m sure he’ll get over it eventually. Just don’t make him feel like he has to.”
“You’re so right, sensei.” The two of you shared another laugh and started cleaning up. Chica would need ample time to charge before the Plex opened in a bit so the two of you started making your way back to Rockstar Row, talking about nothing in particular.
____________________________________________________

“So those videos of people wearing the color-blind glasses are just faking the results. It’s not a change in physically reality that could make them see those colors because they’re missing a type of cone in their eyes to perceive that color.” You replied, gesturing to nothing.
“Does that mean that other colors we don’t know about exist too? We just can’t see them?” She asked, stepping over a wet floor bot.
“Yes! In fact no one human sees the exact same color as another. Each one has their own perceived range of colors and they just decide to agree on what to call it. Heck, you might even see colors we can’t. If we watched a recording of what you see, all we would perceive are the colors we’re biologically able to.” She hummed at that as the two of you came to a stop in front of her greenroom door.
“Does that apply to anything else? You used to say that ‘perception dictates reality’ but if no one can perceive things the way anyone else does, what does that mean for everything else?”
“Good question, but I wouldn’t worry about it. Physical reality is the garbage dump for emergent property byproducts of different dimensions. Time is how the fourth dimension interacts with matter, heat is the byproduct of the friction between different molecules, and how life emerges from the interaction of lifeless proteins. It was all never meant to make total sense. Heck, atoms have a quantifiable effect from just being watched. Things are far less serious than what it’s made out to be.” She had a look on her face like she kept up with half of that. Not that she didn’t understand, more that it was a lot at once. “TLDR, you’re right, perception does change between perceivers and reality as we know it is just an agreed upon set of input from our senses. Don’t worry about it too hard, just enjoy what time we have.”
“That I can do!” She ruffled your hair and walked through her door. “Get some sleep, chickadee. I’ll see ya later!” And with that, you were alone once again, the usual silence of the Plex starting to wear at you. This was getting old, you were going to have to find something new to blame if things kept hurting like this.

Chapter Text

After dropping Chica off at her greenroom you were left to your own devices. The Plex would be “open” soon, it’s 6 o’clock lockdown was more for human staff to get ready and start setting up for the day. A moot point now that there were only a handful of actual employees. One of whom would be Devon when he’d take over P&S for the day.

Today was Tuesday, however, meaning you had the night off. Your actual schedule was wonky: Tuesdays and Thursdays off, working nights the rest of the week, and technically on call any other time. Even in the middle of your days off but you were hoping it wouldn’t come to that any time soon.

Long ago you’d gotten Monty some new sunglasses, but never got the chance to give them to him so you trashed them. Leaving them with you constantly was just a reminder of what you’d lost and you’d vowed to get him something better when you saw each other again. And your first day off after returning to the Plex was the perfect time to do some shopping. You needed snacks for your desk anyways, pizza and fake nachos were nice sometimes but not literally every day.

So it was decided. Once you were off, you’d head down to the shower rooms and bathe, head out and shop to your hearts content (or as much as could be physically carried back), and spend some time with your friends once the Plex closed again.

Now all you had to do was wait, and you could kill that time by filling out the paperwork that corresponded with your tasks for the night. You’d have to let management know that the arcade machine was unsafe to work on at this time, leaving out the nasty shock you got with the implication that you’d have had enough foresight to not work on a still powered arcade cabinet.

By the time you made it down to P&S (having taken the long way around once again), it was already about five AM so you wouldn’t be forced to waste time for too long. The place was just as dark and dusty as ever and you made a mental note to ask some of the staff bots to help clean on Wednesday when you got back to work. It’s not like they’d be doing anything else. Wednesday was the only day of the week that the Plex was closed to the public. They used it as a general maintenance day, basically anything that couldn’t be fixed/done in the hours they were closed would be done then. Cleaning grease traps, restocking food, AC maintenance, etc.

You logged in and got to work on those reports but found your thoughts drifting more than usual, which was often. A bit of it was beating yourself up for how you handled certain incidents throughout the night but the rest was just back to the Daycare Attendants. That whole thing could have gone much, much better and you were hoping that they wouldn’t be too mad. But would understand if they were.

You’d planned on getting everyone something when you went out today, but would returning to Sun and Moon with gifts make them feel like they had to forgive you? It wasn’t meant as a bargaining chip, it was more that you felt bad they had almost nothing to their names. At least the band got their greenrooms, and DJMM wasn’t a big fan of having random junk laying around. Instead you’d gotten him an audio book subscription and an app that allowed him to listen whenever he wanted. There was no need for a hand held device when you were the device itself. Plus they would be way to small for him to grab anyways.

After reviewing what you wrote (half of it needed to be deleted since it was just you typing your thoughts), you hit send and sat back in your chair. It squeaked a warning so you tried not to put too much weight on it, but even that slipped your mind as you got to thinking again.

The more you thought about it the less confident you were about the day’s plans. You thought you knew what the band liked but what if their tastes had changed while you were gone? Plus it’s not like you’d gotten much chance to get to know Monty, much less what he likes. So you sat up, much to your chair’s chagrin, and sent an IM to each animatronic asking each of them to send you a list of things they might like from town. While they could send and receive messages, it was only from devices set up through the Plex’s private network. Somewhere deep you felt like that was a security liability but it didn’t really matter what you thought about it.

When you went to send one to Sun and Moon you found that they weren’t connected, anymore at least. Their profiles are listed but are faded out and unresponsive, a note popped up when you hovered over them stating that they’d been taken off the network after the incident in case of a virus. A small part of you felt that was a bit silly, as if their self awareness afforded them some sort of defense against such things. But if humans could get possessed then it wasn’t too out of left field.

It was probably for the best if they were still upset. You’d just grab whatever jumped out and give it to them once things blew over. They’d forgive you eventually. Right?

Before you had time to mull it over, there was a loud crash from the main room. While you were out of your chair and to the door before you knew it, there was still enough sense in your brain to be cautious. You weren’t sure what you’d be met with, but once more and more of the room came into view you realized that both the caution and the apprehension were unnecessary.

It was Monty. His back turned to you and digging through random boxes like they owed him money. The last couple of footsteps were made extra loud to alert him to your presence without startling him. He whipped around with an annoyed huff, but any malice in his expression left when he saw you.

“Oh. Uh…” He set the box he was riffling through down gently. “Sorry ‘bout that. Didn’t think you’d still be ‘round.”

“What do you mean? It’s only,” you looked down to your Fazwatch that told you it was now 6:45AM. “oh. Yeah, fair nuff. I try and stick around till Devon shows up in case I need to pass anything down, but he’s rather late today.”

“Today?” He barked a laugh and tried leaning against one of the tables. “Try always. I can count the times that guy’s been on time with one hand. I’d say I don’t know how he keeps gettin’ away with it but we both know.” Your defeated sigh wall all the response to that he needed.

“Anywho, whatcha doing down here anyway? Parts and Service isn’t exactly America’s next top tourist destination.”

He snickered, “nah, but my bass broke and I needed to grab the parts to fix it before he got here. Last time he tried to fix the *darn*, it wouldn’t tune right even with the repair cylinder.”

“Yeesh. I’d be happy to help find the parts for you but I’m also willing to just fix it since he’s not here.” The gator mulled things over for a moment.

You understood the indecision, out of the entire band, you knew each other the least. It didn’t mean you weren’t friends, it just meant it would be harder to get back to the place of understanding you had before everything went to shit. Nearly a year of poor treatment wasn’t unlearned overnight.

He shrugged and handed the instrument over from its resting place against the counter.

“So what seems to be the issue?” You asked, turning it this way and that, inspecting for damage.

“Sound keeps cutting out. I’ve tried replacin’ the cables and the amp but neither of those worked so I’m guessin’ it’s the output jack. Was lookin’ for a new one when you walked in.”

“Gotcha.” The two of you walked into the parts room around the corner. All sorts of spare gizmos were lined up in columns for each animatronic with the parts for their instruments at the top. That lone staff bot was still standing inert in the middle of the room, facing away from the door. With no clue as to what it was doing in there, much less still in there, you turned you attention to Monty’s column.

A good chunk of the parts were small non-descript mechanisms that would never see the light of day once installed, and some were just uncanny to look at. Like the box of spare eyes that had no lids and thus would just stare out into nothing for eternity. Not a fun vay-cay spot indeed. Ignoring that, you turned your attention to the instrument box sitting on the top row. The top row that was about eight feet high and thus neigh impossible to reach without a step stool.

That is, unless, you were a nearly seven foot animatronic.

You turned to Monty and fluttered your eyelashes with your best ‘pretty please’ look. He scoffed and rolled his eyes, but you knew he thought it was funny, too. It took no real effort on his part to grab the box and hold it out to you. Each spare part was sitting pretty in individually labeled plastic containers. Despite having been gone for ten months, it was nice to see that some of the organization you’d worked hard on was still in tact.

After grabbing the replacement part and some new cables, Monty went back to the main room and you ran to grab your toolbelt. As you were walking back, you started trying to think of conversation starters. You had the feeling he wouldn’t be leaving till his bass was fixed and/or Devon showed up, and doing the work in silence would be uncomfortable.

It wasn’t moments after you sat down that Monty accidentally interrupted your space filler of a sentence.

“So… how’ve you been?” He asked, scratching the back of his head. Seemed you weren’t the only one who didn’t know where to take this conversation.

You tried to hide the laugh in your reply. “I’ve been alright. Been a little tough settling back in, but happy to be back none the less. What about you?” This type of mechanical work was second nature at this point so you started swapping out the part on autopilot while you talked.

“You actually care, or are ya’ just workin’ with pleasantries?” That made you stop for a second and look up at him.

“I do actually care, Monty. I’ve always cared about how ya’ll were doing, every day I was gone. I’m just sorry it took this long for me to come back.”

“Aww, shucks, ya don’t gotta get all sentimental on me, now.” He replied softly, looking anywhere but you. “It’s been… well let’s just say it’s been.”

“That good, huh?”

“Fraid so. Don’t really know how much I should get into it.” A fly on the wall continued to be more entertaining than your face.

“You can say you don’t know how much you can trust me with that.” His focus snapped to you like you’d shocked him.

“It ain’t like that! I just-” He paused like he didn’t know where to go.

“I don’t mean it in a rude way. I look at it from your perspective. Before I left we barely got to know each other. One day you were doing nothing but your job and the next you were waking up with feelings you didn’t understand. The fear of decommissioning became very real and you knew that that wasn’t ‘normal.’ I sent you to the band cause, yes, they would understand the process better, but also cause it would be easier to trust them. But when Freddy woke up, there was no one else to go to, so he talked to me.” You paused again to look him in the eyes. He was visibly conflicted. “Trusting someone who could be your downfall isn’t something that comes easily, and I’m sure your time with Devon has ingrained that even more. But I always make it my mission to take care of ya’ll. I’ll fight tooth and nail when it comes to defending ya and I’d do some non-Fazzco approved stuff to make sure you stay safe. I don’t expect you to take me at my word, but at least give me the time to prove it to you?”

He stood still a moment, taking it all in before finally asking, “there any cameras in here?”

“Just the one in the corner and I think Devon broke it on purpose so no one could record him slacking off.”

“Right… right. It’s- things have been rough, I’ll admit. I never really wanted any of this. The spotlight, the pressure- don’t get me wrong, I love hangin’ out with the kids and junk, but it’s a lot all at once.” Monty cleared off some space and sat on the counter, and while it was well supported it still groaned under the weight. “Plus the fact that Bonnie… got hurt in MY area. It makes me feel like I could have done somethin’, ya know?” You nodded.

“While I don’t really know all the fact surrounding the accident, I do know that if you could have done something, you would have. There’s no use beating yourself up about it.” You were almost done putting everything back together. “I know that doesn’t really help, but internalizing that IF you could have done something, than it would have gotten done, might. You aren’t the guilty party here. Fazzco dug itself a hole when they disregarded safety measures, it’s not your job to lie down in it.”

He nodded back and feigned a sigh. “I know. I know. It’s just that sometimes… sometimes I feel like the rest of the band kinda blames me for it.” He mumbled the last part in hopes you wouldn’t hear.

“Come on, you know that isn’t true. Freddy loved Bonnie the most and I know for a fact he doesn’t blame you. Not even a little.” The bass was reassembled, now the gator just had to go test it, but that was for later.

“Yeah? And how’s that?” He huffed, sounding defeated.

“Because we just talked about this earlier tonight. Monty,” you rolled your chair over to him and stuck your head in view of his vision, “he misses Bonnie dearly. But he does not blame you. I don’t even think he blames Fazzco. It isn’t in him to point fingers while he mourns. You shouldn’t carry a burden no one wants you to. We care about you, all of us, and we’re here for you. We know you would be too.”

You slid over and handed him his instrument for him to fiddle with while he thought.

“Thanks for listenin’. I ain’t really good with this kind of stuff.” He mumbled, plucking a single note over and over.

“You’re welcome… You know, usually I’d threaten to beat up anyone that makes my friends upset, but it looks like you’ve beat me to it.” Sometimes jokes worked to help someone cheer up, and while you were sure the joke would fall flat the second it left your mouth, to your surprise he laughed a little. Just a sarcastic ‘har har,’ but you saw the smile in his eyes.

“Least I could beat someone up, you still got scrawny little arms in this form. Use you like a toothpick.”

“Oof! Arg! My pride!” You grabbed your chest and feigned injury. “How ever will I recover from this. Tell my bed, I love them.” With that you collapsed onto your desk, dramatically. Monty’s real laugh was a sort of roaring bark that ended in a wheeze, a welcome sound compared to the earlier conversation. He wiped a nonexistent tear from his eye and started pulling you up off the counter.

“All right, all right, it wasn’t that good and you know it.” Once you got to your feet you could see him still smiling.

For all of about three seconds when the double doors slammed open with a bang, revealing a very frazzled Devon. Who was now about an hour and a half late for his shift. Monty’s smile vanished in a flash and he thanked you again before heading over to his greenroom elevator and quickly making an exit.

While you were the one who had one hell of a night, it seemed that Devon was the one looking worse for wear. His hair was a mess, with his hat on sideways and his sweaty jumpsuit open to the hip and the sleeves tied around his waist. It seemed like he’d run all the way here with how hard he was panting. And while very tempting to make a similar remark to the one he’d made days prior, you weren’t really that type of being.

“Yeah, yeah, shut up. I know I’m late.” Great choice of first words to the person who hadn’t said a thing. He grabbed the chair and wrenched it over to his usual spot before plopping down and logging in with one hand while trying to fix his hair with the other. All the while muttering about his ‘fucking alarm’ and ‘friggin car.’

If you were going to have the energy to go shopping later then this wasn’t something you could spend the spoons on dealing with.

“Literally just one thing and I’ll get out of your hair.” He didn’t look at you but made a ‘get on with it’ gesture. “On my tasks list tonight there was one to fix a broken arcade cabinet in the Fazzcade. It’s in the storage room to the side but don’t touch it. The backup powerbox still has some juice and would be really dangerous to try and work on. I already sent an email to management about it so don’t worry about it.” Once again, without looking, he motioned for you to get out of here and you were more than happy to oblige. With that you turned away and left Parts and Service without the worry about what you’d be coming back to.

Chapter Text

After that titillating one sided conversation with Devon, you decided to go down to the locker rooms and take a shower. While you thought it was perfectly fine to go out looking like you’d ridden on a motor oil slip n slide, you understood it was generally frowned upon. It was a bit of a trip so while you walked you whistled off key. Not like there were any customers there just yet, in about half an hour they’d come charging in.

When you finally got to the lockers it struck you once again at just how empty the place was. You were used to the lack of customer, due to working nights. That was its default state for you. But back when the Plex was fully staffed, the locker room would be swarming with employees getting ready for their next soul-crushing shift. Chatting and dark humor would fill the room along with the crashing of metal doors and the occasional person actually using the showers.

But now it was completely barren. The room was so empty you could hear a pencil drop and it made some part of you ache. Sure you’d never really been able to relate to most people. A handful of human friends and one sort of lover, but while you may look like them, you’d stand out in a room due to a myriad of reasons. A part of you even missed the embarrassment of your jokes not landing on a group of people who had been up since dawn just to get here on time.

You shook your head, trying to clear the thoughts and went over to where your locker used to be. Upon inspection, however, it seemed it was STILL your locker. The lock was in tact and when you got it open, all your stuff was still in there. Well, all one of your stuff. As the only thing you’d left here when they forced you out was a plush of himself that Bonnie had given you a week after he’d woken up.

He didn’t feel like it was an appropriate thank you for having been there for him, but it was all he had to his name. This one had been his favorite due to the minimal amount of factory defects. He’d even signed it. You knew it had only been a few days since you got the news, but it felt like the gap in your chest he left behind would never heal. No matter how many eons passed it never seemed to get easier to loose the ones you cared about. But then again, what is love without the inevitable mourning.

The two of you had been close. Not nearly as close as he and Freddy were, but still close. He was proud and brash and boastful, but never mean. One time, at the bowling alley, a snooty mom was complaining that you’d had more time with him than any of the kids there. Technically, your job had been to sit with him and monitor his motor controls after a repair, but of course she didn’t know that and you didn’t care to correct her. And what did he do?

He kicked over a chair, lifted you above his head, and shouted that she was just jealous that she didn’t have any friends as cool as you were. It bit him in the butt later when one of the handlers caught wind and berated him for yelling at a customer, but he didn’t care. He’d always amp you up, telling you that you were the coolest thing he’d ever known. He knew what you were, what you could do, and the fact that you wanted to be friends with him and the rest of the band was something he’d never let go.

You sighed, placing the last memory of him in the Plex back into your locker and shutting it. While the plush meant a lot to you, you knew someone who would appreciate it a lot more. But that would wait till later, the Plex would be opening soon and it didn’t seem like a good idea to try and crowd surf with what was now a collectors item.

Instead you emptied out your pockets (phone, wallet, Fazzwatch, and that coin Freddy had given you earlier) and went over to the showers. On the way you spotted a bottle of soap sitting on one of the lockers, covered in months worth of dust. Well, you didn’t have any with you and it didn’t seem like whoever’s this was was coming back any time soon so no use in letting it go to waste. It was even one of those fancy ones from one overpriced boutique or another.

The temperature of the water usually depended on what mood you were in, but there was no middle ground. It was either freezing cold or blisteringly hot, and today felt like a hot shower day. With the amount of dust and grime you were covered in, definitely a hot shower.

Getting undressed was really just phasing your clothes back into your body and converting them back into the goop that made up your form. It wasn’t often that you wore actual clothes since it was easier to make your skin look like clothes. That did technically mean you walked around naked but who cares.

You washed your outsides, then your insides, then hair. The hair was different compared to you skin so it needed additional care. Once free of suds, you realized that you hadn’t brought a towel. Usually you could ask one of the people mulling around but….

It wasn’t even half a second after you stuck your head out from behind the curtain that a staff bot unceremoniously shoved a towel in your face. After sputtering for a moment you thanked them and then they were gone. Were they waiting for you the whole time? You’d been singing pretty loud in there and that would be kind of embarrassing.

The towel was soft, but it was the kind of soft that didn’t actually dry things very well so you still left the shower damp. You chose a nondescript outfit of jeans and a shirt, nothing fancy so as not to stand out. Well, anymore than usual. And after grabbing your things out of the locker, you turned your sights to the places in town you wanted to visit and set off.

______________________________________________________

What started off as a few ‘quick’ stops turned into a far longer adventure than planned. In retrospect, stopping at the bookstore first probably hadn’t been the best idea. While 10 pounds worth of novels wasn’t a lot, the bag’s handles dig into your skin. That on top of the fact that you were just adding more weight with the more stores you visited didn’t help.

By the time you’d gotten back to the Plex and made your way around to the loading docks it was already 3pm. Not late-late, but considering that you’d left the front doors around 7am, it was a bit of a trip. The idea of just staying till after closing so that you could drop everything off at your desk straight away did cross your mind. But you couldn’t really think of anywhere that didn’t mind you bringing in an absolute crap ton of random shopping bags, many of which had food in them.

So instead you used your badge, clamped between your teeth, to open the metal garage door. The sound of the steel scraping against itself made your teeth rattle. Just as it had been when you’d left, there wasn’t another staff member in sight, so it was all too easy to sneak through the doc and back to the shower room for the second time that day.

As you divided up the bags (what was going to your desk, what was going to your friends, and what staid in the locker) you mused that it was almost a good thing that you hadn’t been given time to grab what little you had from here. While a rational-minded you would never, the freshly booted you that was not only torn from your home but ripped away from your friends might have tossed Bonnie’s plushie in grief. Instead, it was added to the bag of gifts you were going to distribute later.

The band’s gifts would need to wait till after closing but you knew of a certain someone’s who (probably) wouldn’t be busy. But it did mean working through what was going to be a very uncomfortable conversation. It seemed no matter how many eons you spent in one reality or another, there were certain constants: darkness, radiation, and among sophont species, uncomfortable conversations.

You heaved a sigh and closed your locker, cringing at the sound of something falling over inside. The daycare wasn’t super far from the shower room, but getting there while holding random, non-Fazz, shopping bags and without drawing too much attention wasn’t going to be easy. The again, you could just tell anyone that asked that you were restocking something. Very few things you did were actually risky, but past experience from this dimension left lasting impressions. You still couldn’t listen to Never Love an Anchor by The Crane Wives without sobbing.

Fingers ghosted over your chest, across the only scar you’d ever had, before shaking your head, trying to dislodge those thoughts. That was all in the past. She’d lived a long happy life after all of that mess, even if it was without you.

Making your way up several flights of stairs just to meander over to another stairwell and back down was a chore, but it ensured that no one would see you. Plus, it’s not like it winded you, it was just annoying. The need to be stealthy just to give an animatronic some gifts. Then again, you were fully ready for them to be upset at you, even enough to not want to see you again. Disappointing, sure, but well within their right.

Before long, the large gold statues of the Daycare Attendants stood in front of you. No sign of them through the acrylic glass upon entry. Even the oppressive song they play on a loop here was muted to the heartbeat in your ears. You set the bags down in front of the wooden doors to the play area and hesitated to knock, your hand just inches away.

How could you prepare for this? Think; the worst case scenario is that they yell at you and tell you to leave. You could handle that.

Then why couldn’t you bring yourself to actually knock?

Maybe you should come back later. Maybe with more time they’d have cooled off and you’d have time to think about an approach. Yeah, that sounded good. Just come back later.

You turned around to pick the bags back up, not noticing one of the doors wrenched open before two arms wrapped around your waist and hiked you far into the air with a loud, “Jinkies!” All the air that had previously been occupying your ‘lungs’ was squeezed out as you gripped the yellow metal arms enveloping you.

“You’re Back!” Despite Sun’s face-plate pressed up against your back, his words shrill to your eardrums. He was… happy to see you? Delighted, even! You were prepared to be berated but now you were just left with emotional whiplash.

“Y-yes? That’s… good?” You wheezed. His grip loosened but not enough to let you go.

“Yes! A million times, yes! You were so upset last night after… Moon,” He almost spat out his counterpart’s name.

“I was upset?” You tried to turn and look at him to no avail. “You were the one-”

“But you’re back! And you’re okay! And that’s all that matters!” There was a tremble in his voice; he was shaking ever so slightly. Something about the way he said it rubbed you the wrong way. It was almost like he felt… guilty. Did he spend the whole day thinking he did something bad? That he hurt you?

“Sun…” An aggressive flinch shook his frame, like you were about to berate him. “Sunny.” You awkwardly reached around to place a hand on the back of his face-plate. He hugged you tighter before acquiescing and setting you down.

Now that you could get a better look at him, it seemed at first that nothing was different. He looked as guiltier than a kid caught in the cookie jar, but when he wouldn’t meet your gaze you gently grabbed his hands, and that’s when you paled.

When the two of you first met, you’d noticed some dents and chipping on his hands, like he’d been picking and fussing with them. That damage was far worse now. There was almost no paint left past the knuckles and his fingertips were the equivalent of a chewed pencil. How had he managed that, he doesn’t even have a functioning mouth?

“Sunny, I’m fine. It’s you I’m worried about.” You angled your face to be in his line of sight but he still wouldn’t look at you.

“ME? I’m great! All good here! No frowns when Sun’s around!” He gesticulated like he was entertaining the kids that used to be under his charge. “You’re good! I’m good! We can put this little hiccup behind us and never have to look back because you’re okay!” That last word was strained, the equivalent of putting his foot down. You raised a finger to speak but the small twitch of his features told you there was no more talking about this.

“Right.” You thought that the worst case scenario was them saying they never wanted to see you, but this outright dismissal, this refusal to even talk about it felt downright awful. “Well… besides ‘all that,’ I brought the two of you some stuff.” If this whole situation hadn’t given you whiplash, his 180 from strained and stressed to perky and happy certainly did.

“Ooh, more gifts? Keep this up and I might just have to find a way to pay you back.” You were already holding one of the bags out to him when his words made your brain grind to a halt. He probably meant make you something, like a craft of some sort. That was it, you perv, just an innocent gesture of thanks.

Your brain finally decided to start working again at the same time as Sun’s hand resting on your lower back and guiding you further into the daycare. That was nothing too. A harmless motion to get you to move when you were standing as if trying to catch flies. Come on, you barely knew each other! It wasn’t anything like that. You’ve just been lonely is all. Need to spend more time with friends.

“What’s this for?” Blinking back surprise, you found yourself sitting almost shoulder-to-shoulder with Sun at your usual table. Seems you’d been stuck longer than you thought. In his hand was a red journal with a shiny velvet cloth cover.

“Uh. Right- right.” You shook yourself out of your trance, taking the journal and opening it on the table. “It’s just an empty journal; I figured you could use it to write out how you feel.”

“We don’t feel things, silly!” He interjected, fiddling with the frills on his hips. You couldn’t hide the ‘are you actually being serious right now’ look but he was avoiding your face so it didn’t really matter. “That would mean something is very wrong with that animatronic, but not us!”

“Mm-hm. Then you can use it to write whatever you want; what you did that day, off-hand things you think of, even just stuff you might want for the daycare at some point. It’s yours to do with that you please, no one else’s.”

“Not even you?” He asked quietly, with a hint of confusion.

“Not even me. No one else has to see it, you can hide it if you’d like but I’m not going to go looking for it.” You pulled his bag closer and started laying things out while he just hugged the journal and stared at the table for a minute. “This is just a book on art tutorials with some references, and these,” The last two things in the bag were some cardboard boxes, the number 3,000 in bold on the sides. Both displayed the puzzles insides, one being a grassy field at sunset and the other a mountain range and lake, reflecting the sky.

It wasn’t lost on you that they might never get to see the real thing in person, but you were gonna try, damnit. The first step was getting permission to let the animatronics have roof access to see things outside the Plex, like you used to. Before dick-for-brains took over and put a stop to it (as far as he knew).

Sun ghosted his damaged fingers over each item, as if they’d crumble in his hands. “Thank you.” He said it so quietly that you almost missed it. “You didn’t have to do all of this, really.”

“Pshh, it’s nothin. I-”

“No.” He interjected, finally looking you in the eyes. “It’s something. Way more than anyone else has ever done for us. So… thank you.”

“You’re welcome Sun. You deserve to have things you can call your own, both of you. I got Moon some stuff too, so you don’t even have to share if you really don’t want to.” He sat disconcertingly still, the only movement being his hand shifting towards you slightly before being pulled back. It took a moment for your brain to catch on, but when it did you opened your arms in invitation.

His reaction was immediate, arms wrapping around you securely. You were about to get comfortable like that when he picked you up and sat you in his lap. For once you were glad he wasn’t looking at you, his face-plate pressed into your back once again as a bruised-looking blush crept across your features. The two of you sat like that for longer than what would be considered normal, but neither of you cared.

That ever present ache that both of you unknowingly shared sat silent, if only for awhile.

Chapter Text

What felt like minutes was actually hours, the announcement of the Plex’s closing being the thing that had you part. Instead of addressing or even mentioning the impromptu cuddle sesh, Sun picked up the sunset puzzle and asked if you wanted to join. Of course you agreed, the two of you moving from the small table and out to the play-mat floor. 3,000 pieces was a lot, sure, but you knew that if he really wanted to, he’d have it done within an hour.

Instead, you both took turns dividing the pieces up into organized piles: edge pieces in this one, the sky pieces in this, field in that pile, etc. While you didn’t mind the silence that had fallen over the daycare, Sun was fidgeting far more than usual and you had a feeling as to why. It didn’t feel right talking about the places you’ve been and the things you’ve seen, knowing full well they were stuck here. The same four walls day after day. The same music. Wait-

You shifted to one elbow and pulled out your phone, Sun eyeing you curiously from the side. As you were want to do, you clicked on the first and most repeated playlist. First on the list being Golden Boy by Bryce Fox. For the first time ever, you were glad for the foresight of adding the censored versions of songs to your work playlist. All it took was being chewed out for listening to the originals on shift once to not make the same mistake again.

“Wind up, watch me go, get your tickets to the show. Maybe I should take it slow, but that's not how the money rolls. I wanna know what you're thinkin,’ I got a couple secrets too…” The time it took for Sun to place a piece stretched between turns, not that you really noticed, your focus glued to figuring out what border each piece was on.

“I wanna be your golden boy, but I got a past you can’t avoid. Nobody’s perfect anymore, so why can’t I be your golden boy?” At this point he might as well not have been doing the puzzle, instead just staring straight ahead but glancing at you out of the corner of his eye.

“You alright, Sunny?” The sound of your voice shook him out of his trance, making him scramble to try and pretend he wasn’t gawking. “It’s the fake swearing, isn’t it? Sorry, I can change it if you want.”

“No! I mean- it’s not- that’s fine I just…” Sun tapped his fingers against his lips, looking around like something in the room would save him from this floundering. There was a persistent grinding noise coming from the animatronic that danced to the tune of his glancing about. Something was stuck in his sockets that made it sound like metal against metal; that could not be comfortable.

Before you knew it, you were standing over his sitting form, looking far more uncomfortable than moments ago and shrinking under your gaze. You reached a hand out and under his face-plate, giving him ample time to pull away before making contact, tilting his chin up. Despite having no pupils, you could see the faint light behind his iris, illuminating the fact that he was staring straight into you.

Sat pressed up against the roof of his socket were, indeed, a set of eyelids. Metal shutters that were meant to blink, but also to tilt from right to left to act as facial expressions. The tracks for which were packed with sticky dust and debris, the same gunk packed up against the eyelid too.

It finally dawned on you just how ‘all up in’ his personal space you were, leaving you to wonder what part of your brain thought that was an appropriate thing to do. You cleared your throat, letting go of his chin and stepping back.

“Sorry- didn’t mean to… I don’t know what- why…” you fiddled with the end of your ‘shirt.’ “Can I clean your eyes for you? Not like take them out, but like use some cotton buds to help get out some of that gunk? It can’t be comfortable…”

“O-oh, oh! Well, I don’t know… I’m not really supposed to leave the daycare…” You knew that wasn’t the real reason.

“We don’t have to go anywhere, I can bring the stuff up here! I’d go at your pace. You can tell me to stop at any time. You can say no, I just… think you’d feel better with full function of your eyes again.” You looked to the ground, kicking an imaginary can. After a long pause, Sun finally spoke.

“Promise you’ll stop if I ask?” Excitement bubbled up in you as you looked him in the eye.

“Yes! I even pinkie promise.” Sun wrapped his pinkie around your extended one.

“Those are no joke, you know?” There was a playful seriousness in his tone.

“I do; I promise you wont regret it.” With the pact sealed, you skipped off to a nearby supply closet for cleaner and to a med bay for cotton buds. After all the supplies were gathered in your shirt, you waddled back to the daycare to find an anxious Sun (but what was new).

“Okay, I figured I’d pull the chair out from the security desk while you just kinda… kneel, so I can get more precision.” The chair was out within seconds, wheeling it over to the table where you’d set the supplies down. It was then that you figured out how Sun was damaging his hands so badly, humans chew their nails, but since he doesn’t have a functional mouth, he’d been pinching the tips of his fingers, denting them and stripping the paint. You walked over to him, gently grabbing his hands and leading him over to the impromptu cleaning set up.

“Remember, you call the shots. If at any point you want me to stop, just let me know, okay?” He nodded shakily.

“Will it hurt?” It was barely a whisper, but it sent such a shock through your system he might as well have yelled it.

“No- no! Sun, I wouldn’t have suggested it if I thought it might hurt you. That is, literally, the last thing I want to do.” You sat down and he kneeled between your legs, looking up at you with his hands around your calves. (The feeling that bubbled up from this could be dealt with later.) After wetting the cotton buds with the cleaner, you turned back to him. This would be easiest if he basically laid his face-plate on your lap, and despite any awkwardness, that’s what you did. “Remember, you can tell me to stop at any point and I will, okay.”

He made a noise of confirmation, the grip on your legs tightening as the offending cleaning supply got closer to his eye. Only after you started actually working on the rotation track on his left socket did his grip loosen. The fact that it wasn’t going to hurt finally sinking in. A small voice in the back of your mind nagged about the kind of person that would work on an animatronic if they knew it would be painful, but you already faced that kind of person.

That was to say, you didn’t hold it against them if they didn’t know, thought. The mechanic before you would work on them willy-nilly. It’s not that she ignored their discomfort, more that she didn’t understand how that could be a thing. To her, they were just robots, no different from a Roomba, so she felt conflicted. By the time you came into the picture, all it took was for you to explain the whole ‘nerves’ thing for her to understand. And subsequently feel horrible about it. She quit about a month later. Not a moment too soon, either, since THAT boss started not long after.

Distantly, the sound of music from you phone played, having been left on the mat where you set it down earlier. Lyrics to a song older than 90% of the customers coming through the front doors floating on by. Maybe singing would help Sun’s nerves? Worth a shot. Worst case scenario the two of you could laugh at how bad it was.

“~Let’s go in the garden, you’ll find something waiting,” you sang along quietly, the lights in Sun’s eyes shining just a touch brighter. “Right there where you left it, lying upside down. When you finally find it, you’ll see how it’s faded. The other side is lighter, when you turn it around.” By now you’d gone through about half the cotton buds and were squeezing a wet rag between his lid and socket, trying to dislodge enough gunk for him to close it. “Everything stays, right where you left it. Everything stays, but it still changes. Ever so slightly, daily and nightly. In little ways, when everything stays.”

“You have a very nice voice.” Sun pipped up, shocking you just a touch. He’d been so uncharacteristically still and quiet, if his face hadn’t been in your lap you might have forgotten he was there.

“Well- I don’t know about all that, but thank you.” With the rag in hand you pulled back from your spontaneous staring contest. “Okay, try and blink your eye, now.”

It took a moment and some effort on his part, but eventually his left lid did close with a faint clink. The room sat still for a moment before he shot up out of his sitting position, flapping his hands and dancing from one foot to the other in barely contained excitement. You were out of the chair in an instant and held aloft for the second time that afternoon. At some point, the regular air jail visits were sure to get old, but not quite yet.

“Wow! Wow! Wow! I didn’t think we’d ever get to use those again! Thank you! With Fizzy Fazz and sprinkles on top!” You didn’t have the heart to tell him that sounded awful, the sprinkles would just dissolve into a paste at the bottom.

“You’re very welcome, Sunny, but we’ve still got your other eye to do.”

“Right!” He set you back in the seat and got back into position. Now instead of gripping your legs, he just had his arms gently wrapped around them. Even what little work it felt like you’d done, it already made a world of difference. After running the cleaning rag over his closed lid one more time, it still maintained a squint in the corner, like he was genuinely smiling.

At the start of working on the second lid, he was just as animated as usual, only for it to slow as time went on. If you didn’t know any better, it was almost like he was enjoying it. Eventually, what got him to stop completely was the remix of Exotic Butters to start playing. Funnily enough, his one functional eyelid made it look like he was raising an eyebrow at you.

“What??” You snickered, adding another cotton bud to the dirty pile. “I think the idea of something like butter being considered ‘exotic’ pretty funny.”

“But to make it a song? The only words are ‘exotic’ and ‘butters.” That got you to cackle in a manner very unbecoming of an eldritch entity, but earning you a fond look.

“Exactly! It’s so dumb!” You wiped a fake tear from your cheek and sighed. “From what I could see from the promotional material, they weren’t even refrigerated.”

“That’s not very sanitary.” Sun muttered, if he could stick his tongue out, he would.

“No, not particularly. Like you can, but it’ll go bad much quicker. Some people swear by it though.” It took some effort but you used the stick end of the swab to hook around something stuck between his lid and eye, and pulled it forward into your hand. It was a thick piece of mesh, like the kind you’d find strung up in P&S to hold tools and spare parts. Given the last time the two had any eye maintenance, you had a good idea as to how it got there. Or rather, who put it there.

After grumbling, you shoved it into your pocket and got back to work. Despite how uncomfortable that must have been, it made the rest of the job easier since taking that out pulled a good portion of the debris with it.

Once done, you asked him to repeat the same song and dance of trying to close it. To no ones surprise, but both of your delight, each eyelid could now blink and rotate from side to side. Sun and Moon now officially had full eye functionality back.

While you got up to throw things away, Sun simply sat where you left him, rocking happily and blinking one eye at a time while saying the word ‘blink.’ A small smile crept onto your face, you wondered briefly when the last time they might have had this kind of relief had been. Not any time recently, but hopefully at SOME point they’d had help. Right?

A yawn broke out across your features, pulling Sun’s attention away from his new game of ‘how many times can I blink in 5 seconds.’ You pulled up your Fazzwatch, checking the time and shocked to see that it was already 10pm. Sure, you didn’t have to sleep, but given the event of the past 24 hours, the exhaustion wasn’t surprising. Before you had the chance to turn around and say anything, Sun was already at your back, leaving very little in the way of personal space.

“How about we play a game?” He chirped, craning over and resting his forehead against yours.

“What’cha got in mind?” Some hmm-ing and haw-ing later, he finally supplied.

“Candyland?” You hadn’t heard that name in years, so-

“Sounds good!”

___________________________________________________________________________________

It was in fact, not good. To be fair, after you won the first two games you DID tell him to stop taking it easy on you. But you didn’t realize just how easy on you he was playing until the next four rounds were won by him. Not that the two of you were playing for prizes, but at this point it was just getting silly. Candyland wasn’t even a strategy game for Pete's sake.

“Annnd you win again.” You huffed, helping Sun set up the next round.

“W-we can play something else if you want? I have other games?” His tone got you to realize the face you’d been making the whole time.

“No- I mean, I’m good. If you want to try something else I’m all for it, but I’m not upset about it.” He was already looking towards the open closet, taking note of any other games that might be suitable for just two players.

You looked down to your watch. It was a quick board game but after six rounds it should have been close to midnight right about-

“Head’s up, Sun, it’s 11:56.” His eyes widened and he jumped to his feet.

“You should probably start heading out then, I don’t-”

“Sun.” You cut into his rambling, making him flinch. “I know you’re worried about me, but I’ll be fine. I can take care of myself.”

“It’s not you I don’t trust, it’s him.” He replied, arms wrapped tight around himself. It seemed that things between them were worse than you thought.

“Then trust my judgment?” You offered, gently grabbing his arm.

“Mmmmhhhh… alright, but at least sit behind the desk. We can’t go back there.” He replied after much deliberation, already having grabbed the chair and sat you in it, wheeling you back to the edge of the counter. It wasn’t the ideal situation, but if it made Sun feel better about leaving the two of you alone then so be it.

All you could do was wait, watching from behind the desk as Sun got to putting the board game away, only for the lights to go out as he was getting up, dropping the box and making a mess again. You heard the pieces clatter to the floor and the sound of gears turning, but it took longer for your eyes to adjust. Going from the rest of the Plex into a darkened daycare probably wouldn’t have been as bad, but it was always so bright and colorful when the lights were on that it took longer to adjust.

By the time you could see again, there was obviously no sign of Sun, but Moon was missing too. The space in the room once occupied, now stood empty, the only sign of life having been the mess. Occasionally you’d hear the sound of bells and a flash of red LED's dart across the room. It all very much reminded you of a cat with the zoomies. If lights out was truly the only time each day that Moon actually got to do anything then it made sense.

Maybe if you did that thing where you pretended to ignore him, he might be more inclined to come out of hiding. Or would he think you didn’t want to see him? You felt like you had a good understanding of the kind of being Sun was, but you didn’t want to compare one to the other. They might be two sides to the same coin, but they weren’t the same person… anymore.

But what if?

“Psst, psst, psst…” You could see the lights stop towards the back of the play-scape and look towards you, only to disappear moments later. Alright, maybe not so cat-like. Instead you picked one of the pens out of a cup on the desk and rolled it back and forth. Sun might have wanted to forget about yesterday, but maybe Moon was upset.

“Why?” You spluttered at the sound of Moon’s voice. His gravely tone sounded like it was inches away from your ear, when in reality you could just see the tip of his nightcap behind the desk in front of you.

“You’re gonna have to be more specific, I’m afraid.” You placed your head in one hand and used the other to start doing pen tricks.

“Why’d you come back?” One red eye peeked over the edge now. “Dangerous. Naughty. Warned you to stay away.”

“What if I said you deserve to have someone in your life willing to take that risk?” You mused, only for him to reply with an incorrect buzzer noise.

“Wrong. Don’t know. Don’t know the bad things I’ve done.” Now you could finally see his face as he laid it on the top of the desk, his tone suggested that he’d gotten you, somehow. Like he’d won an argument. “Then you wouldn’t say so.”

“And what if I told you I did know. That I still think you deserve the chance.” His eyes went from looking at your pen straight to your face, scanning for any sign of insincerity. A myriad of eye expressions flitted across his face before landing on shock, a tentative hand reaching up to his eyes. “I hope you don’t mind, I should have asked both of you first but Sun let me clean your sockets.” He eyed you warily but his gaze softened as you continued. “We went at his pace, no fuss, didn’t even go to Parts and Service. I told him to let me know at any time if he wanted to stop, but he never did. In fact, I think towards the end he was enjoying it; the lights in his eyes got really dim.”

There was a look he gave you, like he didn’t believe you. No, like he was afraid to believe you. Like the idea of you telling the truth was so far fetched that he didn’t dare hope. He could scan your face, your body language all he wanted, you weren’t going to lie to him. Especially not about this.

“Thank you.” He sat in a deep squat, forcing you to crane over the desk to see him. “Wanted to fix it sooner. Sun doesn’t like it there. Don’t blame him. They wont work on me.”

“Maybe that’s a good thing, though?” His eyes shot to your face, your hands raised in verbal defense. “I mean- do you really want Devon working on Sun?” He shut his eyes and shook his head vigorously.

“Good point.” A finger started tracing patterns on the mats before he saw the damage to his hands and tried his best to grimace. Silence stretched between you as you chose your next words meticulously.

“You care about him a lot, don’t you?” He flinched, arms held tight to his chest.

“He’s alone. It’s all my fault.” You looked from the desk, to him and back, before making a decision Sun wouldn’t like. Rounding the counter, you took up the same pose, giving him the space to move closer or away, should he choose.

“But you didn’t mean to do it, did you?”

“No!” He shouted, looking to you but quickly away. “Yes? I don’t know!” Face-plate now obscured by his hands, you didn’t know if he could get any smaller. “He wasn’t on the pick-up list, kept shouting during nap time. Then two others came in and I- I couldn’t recognize them. They were yelling and everything in me demanded I protect the children and they had weapons and i- I just…” You could hear how hard he was shaking, metal plates clacking against each other. The display made your chest hurt, he could have said he enjoyed every second and you still would have pitied him at that moment. You got to your knees and opened your arms, an offering of comfort he didn’t feel he deserved.

“I’m dangerous…” he whined. When you didn’t rescind the offer, he all but fell into your arms. His face-plate shoved into your shirt, arms loosely wrapped around your legs, but the rest of him curled into a ball on his knees. “When the lights came on, for a moment I finally recognized them. Before Sun took over. Before he got the brunt of the punishment. Thought I was doing the right thing…”

Every part of you ached for him, a distress and need to comfort older than time itself settling in your bones. Empathy wasn’t a common trait among things like you, as outlandish to them as they were to humans. When you first came to this dimension, you hurled, feeling the pain and suffering of everything on the planet nearly tore your form apart. Knowing you couldn’t actually do anything about it hurt worse, though. Like trying to mend a sweater but your thread is acid.

But you could help within the confines of this reality, donating to good causes and whatnot. Making a difference to those around you, your friend’s lives.

“See? You didn’t know-”

“But I should have! If I can’t even recognize faces than what use am I?” You flinched slightly as his hands balled your ‘shirt.’ The physical pain was nothing compared to the fact that you didn’t know what to say. Anyone else and you could say that they don’t have to be useful to be worthy. But that wasn’t the case, their continued existence very much relies on being of use. It’s not like saying ‘oh, I can fix you, I can go into your code and potentially change you fundamentally,’ was good either.

“Well… I like having you around. Is that worth something at least?” You finally replied, tracing small patterns onto the back of his head.

“Don’t even know me. Probably just cause Sun can’t exist without me…” he mumbled. You pulled his head back gently, still holding him but with enough distance to look him in the eyes.

“I’m not holding Sun right now. I’m not comforting Sun right now. I’m not obligated to stick around when the lights go off, I choose to. Because I want to be YOUR friend, Moon. My friendship isn’t conditional, especially not because you share a body. I’ll be there for you, Moon, if you’ll let me.” He red lights in his eyes dimmed the longer you ranted, eventually going out before being replaced by a pleasant blue.

His face-plate found your chest again as he mumbled a ‘thank you’ soaked in relief. The two of you stayed like that for far longer than was comfortable, at least for your joints. Whether or not you intended it, the time slowed and stretched to match your desire to spend more time with the lunar themed animatronic. The one hour of lights out drawing out to what should have been two.

“Hey, real quick, I got some things for you.” You carefully pulled away, his body following yours for just a moment, but long enough to show that he didn’t want to part.

“Didn’t need to…” He was torn. On one hand, he’d never gotten a gift that wasn’t a child’s drawing before, the other was still soaked with guilt and self loathing. ‘They didn’t feel things,’ your ass.

“No, but I wanted to.” You got up and walked back to the bag sitting at the table were you’d left it, making sure not to ruin the unfinished puzzle on the way. “It’s not anything major, just a journal and this.” In the bag was in fact a journal; a blue sequined mess that was fun to play with, along with a medium sized box with ‘Star Projector’ in bold on the side. “This projects an accurate version of the night sky and comes with a book on all the constellations. We didn’t really have enough time for you to put in a request, so I hope you like it.”

The earlier work done on their eyelids might as well have never happened with how wide his eyes got, hands holding his presents like a baby bird. Like he was sure it was a dream and that he’d wake up any moment, not that they could really dream.

“Didn’t need to…” he repeated, a voice in the back of his head telling him he didn’t deserve any of this.

“Moon, I wanted to. Gonna have to fight me on that, cause I ain’t stopping.” You stuck your tongue out, earning a raspy chuckle.

“Thank you. We- I don’t deserve-” Cutting him off, your put both your hands on his mouth, like that would stop him talking.

“Ehh, wrong, yes you do. Incorrect buzzer.” His eyes squinted as a genuine smile. “Go ahead and take them up to your room, I’ll still be here.”

And you were, even as his form disappeared behind the curtain and the lights came on a minute later.

Chapter Text

There was going to be violence at this rate. If the lights interrupted your time with Moon again, there was going to be bits of glass and wire everywhere cause you were gonna blow them up. Part of you swore that if this happened again you were going to… walk into the desert and become a tumbleweed.

A familiar sickly sweet taste coated you tongue, forcing you to realize you’d been chewing on your hands again in frustration. Teeth marks and ichor covered your fists, creating further upset through your system. What was wrong with you? The last time you did this was around the fourteenth century(?), almost 30 years after… her.

You quickly healed your wounds and licked the blood off, drying your now clean hands on your shirt. Anything left would blend in just fine. Plus, it dawned on you that Sun walking in on you kneeling on the floor with bloody, chewed hands wouldn’t be the most comforting sight. Instead you sighed, picked yourself up, and walked back behind the security desk where Sun had left you. If he asked, you’d tell him the truth about not staying put. But if not, it’s not like you promised.

To be fair, it’s not like you favored one of them over the other, more-so the fact that you got to spend hours upon hours with Sun and Moon got MAYBE an hour a night. Part of you wanted to play the petulant child, bemoaning that it wasn’t fair. But what ever was?

A few minutes passed as you ran your fingers over the now healed injuries. That was uncalled for, you knew better than that. You’d promised to find better ways to cope after she passed. The old memory of her barging into your hut to find you a barely formed mess on the floor. It was so long ago that you couldn’t remember what exactly set you off, only that it had been so overwhelming you didn’t recognize her on entry. But you’d never forget the look on her face as she helped clean you up.

You tried unsuccessfully to shake out the tension. She was dead. She’d been dead for centuries now and you needed to get over it. There were people in your life who needed you to be present, not a nostalgic mess.

Maybe practicing your pen tricks would help take your mind off of things? It wasn’t on the desk anymore so you looked in the cup from earlier only to find a paintbrush, two crayons, and a stick of gum. Since none of those would work you began searching under the counter. Of course it had rolled all the way to the back, where you’d have to fold yourself over just to get it.

As your fingers gripped ball point, the incredibly jarring sound of a metal pipe hitting concrete rang out, earning you a new bruise on the back of your head. Upon coming back up from the desk you saw two things: your phone ringing, the cacophonous sound playing on repeat, and Sun balanced on the back of one of the little chairs like a scared cat, arched back and all. It was a rather graceful display, if he didn’t look like a Halloween decoration.

Out of the noises in the room, the phone was easily the loudest, but you were sure to win the consolation prize with your cackling. Sun huffed, having gotten off the chair and pretended to dust himself off. He crossed his arms, annoyed, but the crinkle in his eyes betrayed the truth. The two of you met halfway after he’d gone and picked up the offending object, looking at you like he’d just realized how unusual your tastes were. As if your heavy metal lightning ‘chicken tendies’ shirt wasn’t enough.

“ Why?” You were thrown off in the middle of a laugh by this. Not that the question was unexpected, more the way he said it. The same tone and inflection that Moon had introduced himself with not an hour before. Despite their forced separation, some things never change.

“ Heh- I just… um. I think it’s funny.” The feigned exasperation in his gaze changed to concern, he raised a finger to speak only for you to quickly hit accept and press the phone against your ear. An overwhelmingly fake cheerful robotic voice blasting your eardrums to smithereens.

“Hello, *insert employee name here,*” wow, they didn’t even pretend to care enough to actually put your name down in that system. “(Glamrock Chica) has put in a request for (as many nail polish colors you can find. Oh, and a pair of wire strippers). Request status: urgent. Please ensure that the task is completed in a timely manner and don’t forget to have a Fazz-tastic day!” A breathy laugh escaped as you rolled your eyes. Sun tilted his head in your direction, curiosity burning in his gaze.

“Chica put in an urgent request in the system, it’s nothing serious. Twenty bucks says she doesn’t know that if the ticket is labeled as urgent than it send a message to the ‘on call’ personnel for that day, which is me.” You sighed again, tucking your nearly dead phone into your pocket and checking the time. Only 1:12, weird, it felt way later than that. “And on my first day off no less.”

When you finally looked back up at Sun he was unusually still.

“It’s your day off?” He asked bewildered, lightly playing with his fingers.

“I mean, yeah. I’d be on the clock right now if it wasn’t, wouldn’t really have been able to spend the whole day with yall, now could I?”

“Well now I feel bad, don’t you have other things you could be doing? More fun things with other people?” You blew a raspberry at him in response, crossing your arms.

“Umm, excusez-moi. Spending time with my friends IS the better thing to be doing.” He grumbled in acknowledgement, picking at his fingers. You uncrossed your arms and put your hands on his to make him stop. “Are you ready to admit that you’re awake now?”

“Awake?” He echoed, tilting his head.

“Yeah, awake, like thinking and feeling?” You could hear something in him grind together as he yanked his hands away like you’d burned them.

“Whaaaatt? No. No! Definitely not us, nope!” His rays were practically non-existant as he looked around for something to help change the subject. Finally landing on a stack of cylinder toys that had fallen over at some point, muttering about cleaning up.

“Sunny, it’s not a bad thing-”

“Maybe not for you!” His face-plate whipped around to face you while the rest of his body faced away. “We’re not supposed to feel! We’re not supposed to think! Feeling and thinking robots get reset or decommissioned or… or…” You were shocked by his volume, this was the first time you’d ever heard him shout, and at you no less. All the same, you walked up to his crouched form, the sound of his exoskeleton clattering against itself filled your ears.

“Sun, I’m not going to try to reset or decommission you. And I don’t intend on telling anyone else, but I’d rather you not lie to me.” He wouldn’t unfurl himself from his huddled position, quietly reiterating that he wasn’t lying. Yes, he wasn’t lying… to you at least.

Chica’s request would have to wait a bit longer, it seemed. Instead you sprawled out on the floor in front of him, your face in view of his from its position between his knees.

“It was all really simple at one point, wasn’t it?” His eyes flicked to you and the muttering stopped. “You’d boot up, entertain the kids, clean up and go back to charge. You knew exactly what to do without a second thought. It all came naturally, no muss, no fuss. But something happened, didn’t it? I haven’t looked into your file since I found out about the… incident. For your privacy.” He was slowly untangling himself as you spoke.

“But something DID happen, and then everything changed. Nothing came to you like before, each movement and action had to be thought about before being done. It wasn’t all bad, though. Suddenly you had feelings about things, opinions on the stuff you’d see everyday. The kids found it easier to be around you too, huh?” If you had to guess, his eyelids were sitting as retracted as they could with how wide his eyes got. “Here’s the secret, Sunny. Everyone is awake. Freddy, Chica, even DJ, they’re all awake too and I’m the one who helped them through it. You’re just the last one to know about it.”

He was quiet for a time, looking to you confused. “Wouldn’t it just be easier to reset us and get it over with? No messy opinions or feelings?” You let out a breathless laugh, raising a hand to run your fingers along the edge of his face-plate.

“No, Sunny, it wouldn’t. And I wouldn’t. There’s only one instance I’d do it, and that’s if you asked me to.”

“Who would ever…” you knew he was trying to joke, but it died in his speakers when he saw the look on your face. “Who would…”

“When I was exiled, I worked at a small sister location, one subsidiary of Fazz-co or another. One of the older animatronics there woke up without me knowing. When she made herself known we got along great! But over time I could see it wear on her. Being alone most of the time. Looking at your friends as they puppet around, oblivious to the wider world around them. She knew what she was, that she’d never get to go anywhere, that she wouldn’t want to without her friends. So about two months before I came back, she asked me to do the unthinkable.” You shuddered, using an arm to wipe your eyes. “I quadruple checked that she knew what she was asking, and she did. I’d say I regret what I did but it was never my decision to make.” Two months of torture, looking your lobotomy victim in the eyes practically every day. But it was what she wanted. Who were you to say no.

“I’m so sorry, sunshine.” Now it was his turn to hold your face. The urge to chew on your hands again fluttered across your mind, but you shoved it down, instead choosing to concentrate on Sun.

“I still don’t know if I did the right thing. But it doesn’t really matter, does it. I’m trying to focus on my friends here, the ones I can still help. I digress. Everyone else is awake too. I don’t mean to say go shouting it from the rooftops, but with me and them, you’re amongst those who understand.”

It was easy to tell with the way he looked at his hands that he was thinking of the blood that stained them. You wanted to reiterate that you understood that feeling, but that would lead to more questions he was better off not knowing the answer to. Instead, the two of you met halfway, bumping your foreheads against one another.

“Thank you.”

___________________________________________________________________________________

It wasn’t an easy goodbye, but none of them thus far really had been. But you had a job to do and Sun wanted some time to think. Understandable given that just thirty minutes ago he thought you’d have him reset because he could form opinions. Silly when you boiled it down like that, but still very real.

The trek back to Parts and Service was uneventful, thankfully. The last 36 hours was enough drama to last a human’ s lifetime at this point. Staff bots mopped and patrolled the area with calculated certainty. Well, the floors were well mopped but the routes the patrols ran on could easily be dodged if you knew what you were doing. Maybe you should tell someone about that. Did Vanessa have control of the security routes? Better question; would she care?

It did cross your mind as a bit ironic, since at the other location you would have given anything to happen. That place would make a ghost town jealous. Very few memories stood out from the monotony. One of them being that at one point you and the only other conscious being there made a bet to see how many styrofoam cups you could eat without feeling sick. The answer was way too many.

That dingy cellar of a workplace was the same as you’d left it. Dusty and stuffy in a way that would send an asthmatic to the hospital. You were never shocked when mechanics quit, the place was a dungeon with mediocre pay and long hours. At this point the only reason you’d stuck around this long was because your friends were here, and somebody had to stand up for them.

Speaking of… you rounded the corner to the parts closet, prepared to gather the requested ‘many nail polish colors.’ Last you’d checked, Roxy had a good amount of them in a wide variety, u nless she’ d r u n out. Which was always a possibility given that her last restock was more than likely some time before you’d been forced out.

Prepared, past tense, as when you walked in there were now three staff bots. All shut down, but standing in a triangle facing each other. Were you walking in on a secret meeting or something? Was Devon playing a prank on you? That seemed more likely than the first, but still out of character. Whatever it was, it would have to wait.

You snuck around and grabbed the large box of animatronic safe paints. They weren’t just for nails but the function was the same. After tossing any repeating colors into a separate box, you looked through what was left. Just about everyone’s palette were in there if needed for touch ups and such. Even Bonnie’s were still in there, shockingly. It quickly became apparent that there were some missing still, Sun and Moon’s. Probably a special proprietary blend of photosensitive whatevers. But the Plex really ought to have some on hand just in case.

Once that was tucked into the ‘think about later’ file, you made your way out of the closet, only remembering at the last second to grab the wire strippers and heading towards Chica’s service elevator. What she would need them for was none of your business, you trusted her to know what she was doing.

Thankfully the elevator didn’t get stuck like that one time. Your hand paused inches away from her greenroom door. Inside you could hear clunking and scraping, leaving you with far more question.

After finally knocking, Roxy greeted you, taking up as much of the doorway as was physically possible. She cocked an eyebrow at you and you did the same.

“Chicken tendies?” Her eyes glanced from your shirt and back to you before her entire form was pushed to the side by an overly enthusiastic chicken.

“What? Where? I want some!” Chica looked happy but confused to see you standing there instead of food and/or a staff bot. Part of you wanted to make a comment about cannibalism, but chickens totally would… viscous little birds. “Heya, Chickadee! What are you doin’ here?”

“Your ‘urgent’ nail polishes, m’lady.” She took the box from your hands and gawking at the colors . “Oh, plus this.” At the sight of wire strippers, Roxy’s fan kicked on high as she looked from them, to you, to Chica, into the room behind them, and back again, trying once again to take up as much of the doorway as possible.

“Thank you very much!” She chirped, plucking them from your hand and chucking it into the room without looking. During the throw, just enough of the room was revealed as to see a Twister mat laid out and the small toolbox you loaned Freddy and Bonnie for special occasion nnsss- oh, shit.

“Anyway! You two have fun! Be safe and I have user manuals if you need them.” You rushed, turning on your heel and slowly walking away. Chica thanked you again, either oblivious to your knowledge or completely comfortable talking about that sort of thing, and after the door shut you could hear Roxy bemoan how embarrassing that was.

You’d bring up how the ‘urgency’ tags for tickets worked literally any other time. It was nice to see them getting together, though. If that’s what they wanted to call the relationship. Could just be a friends with benefits thing, but either way, it was absolutely none of your business unless they chose to bring you up to speed.

Once the ticket was labelled complete, you yawned and signed off the work done section from your Fazzwatch. While you still didn’t NEED to sleep, you’d gotten so into the habit of doing so that it felt wrong not to. The siren song of your bed calling to you from beyond Rockstar Row. Once assured there were no cameras, you shifted and hopped into the nearest vent, navigating its maze-like tunnels until your soft, dog sized mat came into view. Unconsciousness took longer to overtake you than usual, but still came none the less . Whether a good or bad thing, retrospect would only tell.

___________________________________________________________________________________

Most of the time, you’d dream of home. If you dreamt at all, that is. Spiraling fractals of what could loosely be described as consciousness. The flow of an absence of all things material or understood. A physical form in a set reality could not comprehend such a state, so you would often not remember what it was about. A glimpse into the experience of your actual being, not just this fraction of a fraction you’d condensed into a physical form.

In the times that you would dream of this reality, you couldn’t recall ever having a nightmare. Tonight was different.

Realities similar but different flew by like a flip book, most telling the same story. There was arcing electricity and pain, bared teeth and fear, but not for yourself. None of them made any sense. None were glimpsed long enough to get your barrings.

It was a warning you would not remember upon waking.

Chapter Text

In contrast to how long it took to fall asleep, waking up was an instant shock. The memory of your insides no longer being in their designated location quickly fading. Ironic in a way, considering the state you woke up in.

No more cuddly ferret form, having been replaced by your most comfortable shape. A writhing amalgam of blackish purple goo with protrusions of chitin, mouths, eyes, and just about any known formation of organic tissue. Gentle lights danced across the skin covering your hyperbolic geometry insides. While none of that particularly bothered you, what did was the tense, stretched out sensation that came with spreading yourself throughout a substantial portion of the ventilation system. Veins of your being snaked up and around the confines of your space, stopping fans in some areas and completely blocking off others. You assumed you hadn’t been like this for long since someone would have noticed the rising temperatures caused by the vents malfunctioning.

The retraction towards your center was slow going, it seemed as if sleeping you covered quite a lot of ground. While it wasn’t out of your power to do so quickly, it would result in some rather unfavorable consequences, that much you knew from experience. But the time would pass anyway, and once you figured out where your Fazzwatch had gone, you could check the time. Hop efully it wasn’t too late in the day already.

Today was Wednesday, which meant that the Plex was closed to visitors, and only contractors from various companies were stomping around outside your makeshift bedroom. That explained why no one had complained yet, at least.

Five minutes had passed and while you still weren’t all in one place, you did end up finding your watch in one of the branches near the atrium. Having grown an eye to check the time told you it was about 3pm. Perfect. You still had time to give the band their gifts and clock in on time. Not that the Plex had a time card system, they just scanned your face on the camera at your work station to see if you were there or not. Made the early days here a bit tricky, as it was common for your features to slip just a little over time.

Eventually, everything made it back to it’s designated spot in your body, a few small pieces having taken far longer than it should have. The idea of changing form didn’t really cross your mind so you just went to the locker rooms as is, making sure your bed didn’t get stuck in you on the way out.

When you got to your goal, you changed, opening the vent cover with your feet and hopping out.

Hopping out into a room actually occupied by people. Just a group of three plumbers, one of them actually doing the work and two standing around pretending to help. Those two sets of eyes were now trained on you, while the one working shouted at one of them to hand him a wrench. It wasn’t until he kicked the closest one to his prone position on the floor that they finally stopped staring, giving you the chance to pull your badge out from where your liver would have been and clipping it to your jumpsuit.

“Rodney! Ya dipshit! When I say pass me the wrench I fuckin’ mean it!” The man being yelled at did eventually hand him the wrench, getting chewed out on it having being the wrong one. That was about on par with what you remembered the job being like. You’d worked construction for a few years in the most recent 90s, only to find their new unspoken social rules too much hassle and quitting not long after.

The look in the other standing person’s eyes asked many unspoken questions, all directed at you. Hopefully the word ‘mechanic’ emblazoned on the back of your clothes would answer some of them and she wouldn’t try and strike up a conversation.

“Hey, you!” Fuck. Well, hopes shattered. She trotted over to you, the last two preoccupied with a shouting match. You shut your locker before she could see its contents and turned to face her.

“What can I help you with?” You asked in the most customer service voice you could manage.

“Now don’t be like that. Just wanted to ask if you were with the company.” She waved her hand at the ceiling to emphasize which company she meant.

“Well… yeah.” You gestured at the bright neon beacon that was your outfit. “Something wrong? I can get you my manager.”

“Nothing like that, just wanted to know how you like it. My cousin used to work here and she hated ever minute of it.” She laughed like it was an inside joke she was letting you in on. Which in a way she was. “How long you been here?”

“Oh- uh- pretty much since this place opened, but I’ve worked with the company for about 25 years now.” You half expected the usual ‘you don’t look a day over blank’ reply, but it thankfully never came.

“And?”

“I like it well enough. I’ve made some good friends and am doing something I love so that’s got to be worth something I suppose. Who’s your cousin ?”

“Oh! Delilah, she used to work at-”

“Bonnie Bowling! I remember her! Very goth, scoffed and groaned any time you tried making conversation. Her and Bonnie got along great.”

“That’s her all right! I’m surprised you’d know her, this place is pretty big.”

“Yeah, but I work first hand with the animatronics here and they do talk about the people that they interact with a lot.” You rolled the sleeves up on your suit, trying to find something to do with your hands and hoping the conversation was almost over. She was nice and all, but there was always this pervasive dread of being found out that followed you into every conversation with a human, especially ones you didn’t know. Which was most, if not all of them. “I hope she’d doing alright, they laid off a lot of staff not too long ago. I only found out when I came back.”

“Came back?” There was something wrong about her tone, like hidden beneath layers of polite social commentary was something else.

“I got transferred to a different location for about ten months, only came back when the old manager got fired.”

“Really, what for?” And again, that tone. Almost prying. Accusatory.

“I uh… probably shouldn’t say, NDAs and all that.” What was her game? “Why? Did you know him?”

“Know him? Nah. But Delilah did. Kept saying something was going on before there was this big hub-bub here. Something about a fight in the staff cafeteria.” She crossed her arms, more hugging herself than seeming aggressive. “No one’s seen her since.”

Your heart sank, literally and metaphorically. No one had said anything about their being an incident like that. Did Rachel lie about the break-in and this was the real instigating factor for the increased security ? Why has nobody said anything? Never mind, you knew exactly why.

“I’m genuinely sorry to hear that, you and her family have my condolences.” She nodded mutely before the guy working shouted at her to get back to work, making you both flinch.

“Sorry for prodding you, I just…”

“I get it. I really do hope yall find her safe and sound.” She nodded again, mumbling a thanks under her breath and walking back over to the others.

You were used to humans saying the most random things, any one working customer service could tell you that, but this was certainly up there. Was she trying to see if you were in on it? Probably. It was upsetting to hear but you needed to know more about it . First Bonnie being scrubbed from the place and now this?

What the hell was going on here?

___________________________________________________________________________________

It took a couple tries but you eventually filed that away for later, choosing to focus on the path ahead. You’d give the band their gifts and head down for your shift. Easy, simple, not hing to do with Fazzco covering up what could very well be MORE murders. If they had any more skeletons they could build a haunted house and get paid to show them off. Which sounded like something they would do if they could get away with it.

Sure, the locker room was practically across the entire Plex, but with no customers today, all you had to do was pretend you didn’t see every contractor you walked past look at you in the same welcoming manner of a homeowner breathing down their necks. Which was still pretty on par with what you remembered.

Chica was the first stop. You knocked on her door, fishing out the guitar picks, box of Boston Cream Rolls, and a packet of wet wipes. The cakes were a very rare treat and for good reason. She loved them, and you knew this, but they were an absolute pain in ass to try and clean off of her. Wet wipes were more of a bandage on that problem than anything truly helpful since it would still require an hour or so of time dedicated to just cleaning, but it cut that time down from four hours so you were happy.

“Monty’s room is the next one dow- oh heya, chickadee!” The whiplash from bored monotony to perky and happy to see you was something new.

“I got stuff,” you replied succinctly, smiling at her happy dance.

“I like stuff! Come on in!” She stepped out of the doorway and you did just that, taking a look around the room. Everything had been cleaned up from last night; no more Twister mat or tool box. “I was actually hoping to catch you at some point today… I wanted to talk about this morning?” The look on her face was akin to getting caught eating trash, her version of a cookie jar. So you sat on the couch and patted the seat next to you, trying not to fall against her when the whole thing dipped from the weight.

“Be e ka, it’s none of my business what you decide to do. You don’t have to tell me anything if you don’t want to.” She smiled at that, her gaze softening.

“We appreciate that about you, but Roxy and I talked about it and we want you to know. Just didn’t want it to come out like that.”

“Yeah…” you chuckled. “I was going to let you know that if you file a ticket as ‘urgent’ then it messages the on call staff for the night… which was me.” She put her head in her hands and groaned.

“I should have known that…” You put a hand on her back, rubbing it.

“You’re not in trouble, hun. The two of you would let me know when you were ready.”

“It’s not that, it’s that if it had been anyone else we would have gotten caught.” You sighed, understanding the weight of that implication more than most.

“Well… if that had happened I would have stepped in before things got out of hand.” There was a playful malicious undertone that she caught, bumping you with her shoulder and laughing quietly.

“Silly. But thank you.” She twiddled her fingers, considering her next words carefully. “Roxy and I are going out now. When it’s just the gang and I, I’d like you to refer to us as such. I- if it’s not too much trouble.”

“Of course, Chica. I’m really happy for the two of you. Can I ask for how long?”

“About a month before you came back. We never really did anything but hold hands when we were alone. After Bonnie we didn’t really feel right bringing it up with the others. We felt like it would just remind Freddy of what he lost. But he was happy for us too! So much so that he gave us the kit you gave them awhile back. Didn’t really feel safe enough to use it till now, though. You kinda walked in on us trying to figure out how to make it work…” You could hear her fan kick up a few notches, making you laugh.

“I wasn’t lying when I said I had a user manual for that. Freddy and Bonnie had the same problem at first. Bonnie was the one who finally came to me and asked what they could actually do about that. So I wrote up a general guide and gave them both a copy along with the kit. All of you run on the same endo’s so while a few things might be different, most of it is the same. I told those two to get rid of the pa mph lets when they got it down. Don’t really want anyone else to find them, especially not a nosy kid poking around yall’s greenrooms, ya know?” She nodded, still playing with her hands, an unspoken request hanging in the air. “I work tonight, so it’ll be just me and maybe Vanessa roaming around. I’ll go ahead and print off some copies, just in case one of you decides to swing by. And maybe just so happen to grab them off my desk in the back of Parts and Service.”

“Thanks, chickadee. We really appreciate it.” She looked relieved at not having to bother you about it.

“You’re more than welcome. Anytime you have questions, about anything, I’ll be there. And I really am happy for you two. Remember, if you have a wedding I call brides maid.” She barked out a laugh and shoved you gently.

“Stooopppp! Wait, which brides maid, we’re both-”

“Yes.” There was a pause before the two of you burst out laughing, only calming down when you smacked the bags on accident having meant to hit your knee. “Oh, yeah. And while i t’s not a lot, it i s something at least. Plus it’s been awhile since I got to spoil all of you so…” You opened one of the bags, handing her the picks first, enjoying watching her ooh and aah over all of the colors and styles. Second was the wipes, confusion quickly replaced by barely contained excitement when she remembered the last time you gave her those. Last was the aforementioned rolls, placing them in her open palms as she wiggled in her seat, making the whole couch move. Only to place them on the floor out of the way, much to your confusion, before she yanked you out of your seat and into a bear hug and screeching in delight.

“OH MY GOSH, THANKYOUSOMUCH! SEETHISISWHYYOU’REMYFAVORITE! NOONEELSECOULDCOMECLOSETOTHEAMOUNTILOVEYOU! NOONEWANTEDTOTALKABOUTITWHILEYOUWEREAWAYCAUSEWEWEREAFRAIDITWOULDJINXITANDYOUWOULDN’TCOMEBACK-” This rant continued for some time, you just swinging there limply while she continued. It very quickly went from thanking you profusely to things it seemed like she just needed to get off her chest and now was apparently the perfect time. None of it really bothered you, at a certain point dangling there was actually kind of nice, her constant swaying inevitably making you a bit tired. After what was more than likely a few full minutes of non-stop talking finally ended and she set you gently back on the couch and clearing her throat in embarrassment. “Anyways, what I mean to say is I appreciate it.”

“No problem, Chica. Like I said, it’s been awhile since I spoiled all of you.”

“Look at you Mx. Sugar…. Parent? Is there a neutral term?” You knew what she meant but…

“G lucose guardian? Money honey? Sucrose spouse? I could really keep going if you let me.” She had a good laugh at that, finally sitting back down next to you.

“What’d you get for everyone else? Lemme see!” You relented and pulled the other bags over to the middle of the couch. Some new studded cuffs for Monty, a new holo nail polish and hair clips for Roxy, and for Freddy-

“Where did you get this?” Chica asked breathlessly, holding up your old Bonnie plush and gently moving it around.

“It was still in my old locker from before, it’s the one Bonnie gave me all those years ago.” Her eyes widened, twisting the doll around to see his signature scrawled across the butt, like he always did.

“I think he’ll really like this.” Neither of you needed to say who it was for. “It’s probably the only thing left of him here that’s not locked in the bowling rink.”

“I’d say I’m surprised Fazz hasn’t transferred it all to other locations. But they can make way more money by selling it off as collectors items.” You grumbled, mostly to yourself. The memory of a close friend being sold off for profit. She laid a hand on your shoulder, pulling you out of your thoughts.

“We all miss him, but I think you ought to go ahead and give it to the one who needs it most.” Nodding, the two of you got up and made your way to the door, intent on going down the hall and heading to Monty’s room next. Only for something from earlier to pop into you mind again.

“When I came in, you thought I was a contractor looking for Monty’s room. What happened?”

“Hmm? Oh- apparently he broke a thing or two in there and need them fixed. They were supposed to be there by now, but I haven’t heard anything through the wall so iunno.” She shrugged, the very symbol of ‘whatcha gonna do?’ You shrugged back and the two of you said your goodbyes as you watched her do another happy dance before making a bee line for the snacks. Hopefully, she wouldn’t try to eat the wipes like last time. That had kinda defeated the point of trying to save time.

Monty’s room was next down the line but when you got to the door, it was already open, revealing a darkened interior and no sign of the gator or any contractors. You poked your head into the room and called out his name to no reply. While the idea of coming back later didn’t bother you, he should have been in there. Wednesday was their only do nothing day each week, and while he could have just been doing something elsewhere, his door shouldn’t be open. It only opened when-

“I told yall not to go in if I’m not-” His tone was deep, angry, with his face displaying the same. Only to turn to shock when you whipped around and it was not some random person like he thought. “Oh. Sorry ‘bout that. Thought you were- never mind. What’s up?” He slipped past you and into the room, the light finally coming on after flickering a few times. Weirdly, his room looked fine. Nothing stood out as being broken and everything was in it’s place. Maybe they’d already come by? But then who was he expecting?

"I uh… got you and the band some stuff while I was out yesterday. Before I was forced to leave I got you some sunglasses but they didn’t give me enough time to actually give them to you. I promised myself to get you something better at some point and when I heard I was being transferred back I put in an order for…” You set everything down on the floor after following him in and rummaged around for his stuff, finally pulling out a set of custom studded leather cuffs actually big enough to fit around his wrists and went halfway up the forearm. He looked at them and you wide-eyed, sparing a glance to the raggedy bracelets he wore before holding his hands out.

“This had to have costed a pretty penny.” He looked them up and down, checking the craftsmanship. “You had these made… for me?”

“Yeah! Don’t worry about the cost, I live here so it’s not like I have rent to worry about. The real question is do you like them?”

“Well, yeah! These are great but… wont Fazz notice the difference between me and the toys?”

“They can suck me through my jorts.” He roared a laugh, unclipping his old bracelets and holding his arms out to you to attach the new ones. “I mean, they’re good friends now, but have you seen the merch for the daycare attendants? It looks almost nothing like them. Fazz can’t even pick an eye color for Sun’s promotional posters.”

“Never met them. Gonna just take your word for it.” Once done, he rotated his wrists, getting a feel for the new bracers and checking them out on himself.

“Basically, if anyone tries to give you flak for them, I’m more than happy to take the blame.” He nodded in approval of both the present and your attitude.

“Thanks.”

“No problem, I’m just glad you like them.” With two out of four done, you said your goodbyes and headed over to the next in line, Roxy.

The wolf in question was in her room when you got there, her curtain open and lazily playing her key-tar while relaxed on her couch. Discordant notes filtered through the glass as you tapped on it, shaking her out of whatever she was thinking. You held up your bags and pointed towards the door where the two of you met.

This was probably the most ‘tail between her legs’ you’d ever seen her. She looked around the room awkwardly and scratched her head.

“So- uh… about last night…” She murmured.

“Literally, don’t worry about it. Chica filled me in.” You waved it off, digging through the remaining stuff.

“Right…” That made you pause.

“Did… you not want her to say anything?”

“No! I mean- ugh! We wanted to tell you- I wanted to tell you, just… not like THAT.” She put a hand over her eyes and groaned.

“It’s really not that big of a deal. I’ve been alive a LONG time and conscious even longer, seen and done far more embarrassing things. It happens. Honestly, I’m just glad the two of you are together now. Those across the room glances weren’t as sneaky as yall thought they were .” She groaned again before finally looking to you, your expression understanding and free of any judgment. Her posture eventually softened and her tail started to shallowly wag.

“Thanks… I guess.” Flippancy lacing her tone.

“And here.” You held up the now open bag, letting her sift through its contents. She oohed at the hair clips, each one just as intricate and gaudy as the last. Every time she pulled one out, it would immediately get clipped to one portion of her hair or another, like she couldn’t decide which one so all of them would do. About six in total before she pulled out a decently sized container of nail polish, rainbow halo glittering In the light. “I made sure it was metal and paint safe first. Just in case. It’s one of the sizes salons use so it should last awhile. If not I can get more.”

“ Thanks, Butter.” She ruffled your hair, leaving it a mess you didn’t feel like trying to clean. “For everything. We’re all really glad you’re back.”

“Me too.”

With Roxy placated, you wandered over to the last greenroom in line, Freddy’s. It shouldn’t have surprised you that they can open their doors remotely, but after knocking and finding no one standing in the doorway was still a shock. You found him further into the room, staring at his couch covered in plushes of himself. He’d walk forward and grab one, adjust it a fraction, and step back to assess the work.

“Hello, I have a question.” He said without looking at you. So you walked up beside him and took the same ‘hand on chin’ pose he’d been standing in. “Would they look better on the right, or the left side of the couch?”

“Right. Cause you have the big one on the left.” You replied after much deliberation. “You’re amassing quite the army, huh?”

“I appreciate the children’s gifts, but I do not understand why they think I would want a plush of myself. Well… at least not so many.”

“I can get a shelf installed if you’d like your couch back.” He nodded in agreement but his gaze was distant. “But it’s not really about that, is it?”

“Hmm? Oh… I… suppose not.” He sighed and walked back up to the couch, knocking all of the plushes to the floor and sitting down. “I… wanted to talk about my outburst the other night. It was inappropriate of me to trouble you with my burdens as of late.”

“Pardon my French, but that’s stupid.” He looked up at you, dumbfounded, as you sat next to him. “Freddy, friends are meant to be there for each other, through good and bad. If your friend isn’t a burden at least some of the time, then they aren’t showing all of themselves. There are bad days, frustrating inconveniences, helping them move, it’s all disruptive. But it’s life. I would be upset if we shared our joy but you cried alone.”

“Until you came back, I believe I was in denial about what happened. Some part of me hoping he would pop out from behind the prize counter and declare it all a joke. A horrible, horrible joke.” He leaned forward, putting his face in his hands as you rubbed his back. “But then you came back, and I felt his absence more because you could come back, but he didn’t. I am not upset at you, I do not want you to think I am, it is just… he adored you, I hope you know.”

“It wasn’t a fraction of how much he loved you, though. Never forget that. I understand you don’t blame me, I know these feelings are complicated and messy, but I want you to know that I won’t stop trying to bring him back and that I want you to know you can always come to me about this stuff. Heck, you could blame me and yell it in my face and I’d still be there for you, Freddy.”

He shot up to look at you, “I would never!”

“I know, big guy, I know. I’m just saying, it’s a hypothetical.” That got him to settle back down. He was still visibly upset, but even just this short conversation seemed to have helped.

“I do not like to go near Bonnie Bowl, but it saddens me that there is nothing left of him elsewhere.” You understood that. It was like they were trying to get people to forget about him in favor of the animatronics they could still flaunt about. This would either go poorly or it might help him grieve, either way…

“I… don’t know if this will help or you’d want it far away from you, but…” You reached towards the bags, all now empty save for one. His eyes shot open as you pulled out the old plush, setting it in his hands for him to gently cradle. “It was-”

“His favorite one…”

“How did you know that?” 99% of all the plushes looked the same, how had he known it was that one specifically.

“The bottom is bigger. The factory added too much stuffing.” You could see him reminiscing fondly, but containing the giggle fit that followed that statement was a bit too much to handle. It wasn’t long before he was laughing too, the previous tension in the air evaporating just like that.

After settling down, he looked from you back to the doll. “Are you sure?”

“I don’t have a room so he was sitting in a locker for years, and I know someone who could use him more.” He nodded, holding it close.

“Could you stay? For just a bit longer? I know your shift will start soon, but…” You looked at your watch, 5:15pm.

“Yeah, I can stay, big guy.” The two of you leaned against each other, recounting some of the fonder memories of your late companion.

Chapter Text

Six o’clock rolled around a lot faster than you would have liked, but by then it seemed that Freddy was in much better spirits as compared to earlier. Your trip was shortened since Freddy let you use his elevator, but b y the time you got down to P&S, Devon was already gone, not that you were shocked.

But it did surprise you a bit to find a note taped to the screen of his usual work station explaining that he needed to go home early to pick up his daughter. You didn’t know he had any kids… not that the two of you really talked for more than a few seconds at a time. Hopefully he was a nicer dad than a co-worker, but that was not really any of your business.

The note was set in the bottom drawer of your desk along with some of the other sticky notes from previous attempts to get you to do his work . When you booted up your computer, some new task notifications popped up ; a photo booth wasn’t spitting out pictures despite having paper, the flashlight recharge station near the security center was on the fritz, and… oh. T hat arcade cabinet from days ago still needed repairs. Great.

Hopefully the actual repairs weren’t that intensive. Getting knocked out from an arcade machine wasn’t exactly boasting material . Besides that, the other two seemed simple enough… maybe. Either way, they weren’t going to get done with you sitting there, so you plugged your phone in and left it at your desk. The thing had gone dead at some point while you were sleeping so it was useless to bring along. Thankfully your watch still had plenty of charge .

You put on your tool belt and made your way back out to the main room, passing by the storage closet revealed it to be finally be empty . Whether or not that was a good thing, you didn’t know yet, and didn’t really care to go investigating if it was harmless. Maybe you did walk in on a secret meeting the other day.

The security room was closest… okay, no it wasn’t but that friggin’ arcade machine could wait till you had more patience to deal with it. You knew it would be something stupid easy to fix once it was actually powered down, but the idea of addressing that right now left a sour taste in your mouth.

So the flashlight charger was first and the walk was fairly quick. A large glass pane greeted you, the lights behind it were dark but the outline of empty chairs and computer monitors could be seen. No sign of Vanessa. It was obvious from your previous conversation that she worked nights, but was she the only night shift secutiry officer? As in, did she work every day each week? Was that legal? Either way, you didn’t need access to the room itself, the charger was sitting pretty outside the door. You were just a bit nosey about the only other human staff you’d seen so far.

After removing the case and unhooking the power, you got to work. The wiring and connections looked fine, the actual charging platform too. Maybe one of the sensors went bad? You hooked the power back up and grabbed your voltage meter, checking every nook and or cranny you could find. Everything was still showing green across the board. Was it one of those things the stupid Faz wrenches would fix? Like a reboot?

“Hey.” Fuck- you weren’t a fan of this ongoing bit of smacking the back of your head against things when caught off guard. Grumbling, you excised yourself from your spot arms deep in wiring and looked up to the security guard in question, who was biting her knuckle in sympathy for your poor head. “Didn’t mean to startle you that bad. Sheesh.”

“It’s fine, I’m usually jumpy.” You replied rubbing the new sore spot.

“You guys finally getting to this old thing?”

“What do you mean finally? This just popped up on the to do list today.” She sighed exasperatedly and roller her eyes.

“I guess Chris is the one I should be annoyed with. It’s been broken for nearly a month and he just now gets around to sending in a ticket . And before you ask, the system kept deleting mine for some reason. Besides, t he guy does practically nothing all day.” You groaned in sympathy.

“Ough, I know how you feel. Devon doesn’t do much either.”

“Really? He used to.” She paused to scrape something off of her jacket sleeve. “Do stuff, I mean.”

“Are we talking about the same Devon? Day shift mechanic, Devon?”

“Yeah.” She leaned up against the wall behind you as you got back to work. “Only guy I knew who would actually walk in with a smile each day.” Where was this version? Had you actually seen him smile at all yet?

“Has anything happened? Like at home?” You finally found the issue, the sensor that registered that there was a flashlight in it wasn’t connected anymore. So you unplugged the power again and set to replacing the cable s .

“How should I know? It’s not like we’re friends.” She snipped, before cringing at her tone.

“Oh… sorry.” You muttered. See, this was why you weren’t good with humans. It always seems like the conclusions you make are wrong in a way that pisses them off.

“Don’t be. I just…” she sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose. “It gets rough working nights by yourself. I don’t know how many times I’ve asked management for more help, even just one other person so the night isn’t so… oppressive. But they keep telling me the staff bots and that moon character do the job just fine. But he’s not even out most of the night and the staff bots are shitty at security detail. They have so many blind spots it’s not even funny.” Nice to know her tone wasn’t really about you. Moreso just the accumulation of things she needed to get off her chest.

“I was wondering if you knew about that… or cared.” You stuffed the old wire away and grabbed the new spool from your ba g , making sure it was the same or better grade before replacing it.

“Of course I care. I mean, what if a kid gets lost or we have an intruder? I’m the only person for the entire Plex and they could get in, do whatever they want, and get out before I even get to that side of the building!” Once done, you turned to face her, your attention no longer diverted. “Weird shit happens here and I’m I can’t be in four places at once .”

“Like what?” She’d had your attention before , but now she had your interest.

“Like… I keep hearing cymbals from the vents and by the time I get the cover off there’s nothing there. And this one time I was in the gift shop and heard a crash outside it. There was nothing there when I went to look but when I walked back in all the dolls were staring at me! Every single one was pointing at the entrance when I KNOW they weren’t like that before.” Well t he first was just the escaped mini DJ, but you weren’t about to rat them out. The second, though.

“That is… pretty weird, I gotta admit. Any consolation, not long after it was built, I heard a commotion coming from Roxy Raceway , so I went to go look. Only to find all of the go carts, sans rider, driving around the track. They don’t have the programming to do that. They don’t have a computer to be programmed to do that. Jokes on me, though, cause the second I turn away to grab my phone and video it, I look back up and they’re all sitting pretty at the starting line, completely off.” She stared at you wide eyed as you put all your tools back on your belt. “Even checked the gas tanks and all of them were completely full. Like ‘haven’t been driven at all yet’ full.”

“That’s nuts…” She muttered, checking her watch and wincing.

“Speaking of nuts! One time-”

“I’m really sorry but I do kinda have to be doing my rounds.” She looked genuinely apologetic, gesturing to the office door behind you.

“Oh! Right! Cause we’re on the clock!” It was easy caught up in someone actually listening to your weird stories for once. Even Chica would get bored after a while, and she loved talking.

Vanessa walked past you and into the security room, cycled through the cameras while standing, and walked right back out, waving bye as she wandered off. Now just to put the case back on and- SHIT . You’d meant to ask her to test it since she actually had a flashlight that it worked with; you just had a keychain rubber duck that lit up when you squeezed it. Well, you’d find out soon enough if it popped back up on your to do list by Friday.

The photo booth was next, sitting pretty on the second story of the atrium with an ‘out of order’ sign covering the curtain. You kneeled and unscrewed the side panel, making sure all the cables were properly connected to the card slots for payment and that the photo dispenser was still attached. And with the two most common issues ruled out, you go to testing the connections the same as the last job.

Through the rather dull work you could feel your thoughts starting to drift , not bothering to collect them if they kept you entertained. Among the notions that popped up was what you would do tomorrow with your only other night off of the week. Maybe another movie night with the band? They might have other things planned, though.

You could visit the Daycare Attendants, but they had to be getting bored of just hanging out with you by now. If you introduced them, w ould they get along with the band, or even DJ for that matter? Oh! What about a movie night with them! That’s something different, at least.

What about the plumber from earlier? It wouldn’t surprise you to find Fazco hiding something else , but an entire cafeteria’s worth of people missing? Or was it just her cousin? Either way t hat had to have raised some suspicion. You felt a bit silly, but you’d never actually gone to the staff cafe. Out of all the years living in the Plex, you had never felt the need or want to be there. A big room full of humans you worked with all being loud and eating, where you were expected to dance along with fluctuating social expectations you didn’t quite understand? No thanks.

It still didn’t make any sense, though. That many people can’t just vanish from the public eye and not have a huge investigation about it. Or was there an investigation but Faz paid to have it covered up? All of this was very on brand for them, but it didn’t mean you had to like it. What would they even do with that many people?

And what about Vanessa? She was working then too, right? There’s no way she just started working here. She knew the layout in a way that no rookie could. Did she know about this and also kept it from you, or did she think you knew already?

It was times like this that you wished realities weren’t so fragile. Tearing back a layer or two to get the answers you want was easy as pie, but it also meant picking at the seams that hold everything together which was kinda the opposite reason you came here in the first place.

You thought back to your first time considering realities as anything more than passing entertainment. F̸̭͠ḽ̶̻̲̤̰̼͒̄͛͒̔͝ȉ̴̤͇͎̅ͅͅͅs̶͈͒̄̎̚͝ḥ̷̆̍̋̿A̶͙̓̏n̷͖͈̘͒̈́͠ pointed out how in many of them, life sprouted from lifeless proteins that became more complex as they travelled through their one way understanding of time. How so many of the things you took for granted, the sophont among them spent generations trying desperately to figure out.

The one thing you couldn’t understand with your infinite being was why they tried so hard. But you valued that in them none the less. Countless missions to these realities gave you no new information in that regard. It wasn’t until you finally decided to try it out for yourself did you finally get it. The fraction you sent down to a planet knew about as much as anyone around them. It spent it’s whole life under the impression it was the same as the others. Upon death you finally got the knowledge you’d been seeking, but instead of being satisfied, you wanted more.

Between missions you would occasionally send down a version of yourself. These trips were very rare, but you almost always enjoyed your time there. This one was no different. Your delight upon seeing that these animatronics could feel the same as the humans that created them, the horror when you saw how they were treated, those feelings didn’t really exist in your true being. There was f̴̝̤̹̀l̶͉͓̜̒͐̽̚i̶͙̦̪̠̯̥̍s̴̢̯̏̆̐̓̈́̆h̶̡̞͌a̸̜̮̝͈͕͓̓͆̈͂̽ and b̴̟̺̅̔̋̃y̵̻̆͊͒ǒ̴̯̆̎̀͆͘r̸̤̮͔̿̐̈́ṅ̶̢̪̩͉͍̒̏k̶̘̘̼̝͍̟͆̂͑͂͝, but they weren’t the same. Barely comparable, really.

Being important in the grand scheme of things was never a thing you pursued, but you hoped you made a difference in some lives at least. Not that keeping each dimension you visited from being destroyed or otherwise imploding wasn’t important. Just not the same, like with the emotions. The only transferable feeling between this version of you and your true self was empathy, and that was so rare it might as well not be a thing there. If only-

Suddenly a bag was dropped into your lap, pulling you out of your thoughts and causing the stack of plushes that had been neatly balanced on your head to fall to the ground around you. You blinked numbly a few times, trying to clear the sluggishness that had settled into your non-existent bones before picking up the bag labelled… Disappointment.

After rotating it in your hand you looked around to see the culprit. Moon. Who was not only very much outside the daycare, but standing hunched over you tilting his face-plate from side to side with a click.

“Thanks?” Your attention was drawn to the six plushes that now littered the floor, not sure quite yet where they came from.

“Eat.” Right, it was probably pretty late by now. When was the last time you ate? You detachedly popped open the bag and ate the chips within. Moon hadn’t stopped staring. “ Was disassociation time fun ?” He deep squatted to be eye level with you, his arms flopping lazily to the ground.

“What do you mean? I was working on the photo booth.” You gestured at the wiring and components scattered between the dolls.

“Nuh-uh.” His face-plate did a full rotation without breaking eye contact. “Just been sitting there doing nothing since I found you. Thirty minutes ago. Tried to get your attention by stacking, but got nothing.”

Thirty minutes? That can’t be right, you just started-

Your ichor ran cold, your brain finally catching up with the fact that it was Moon next to you. The same Moon that only came out at midnight. A chip covered hand shot up to check the time, your Fazwatch relaying the confusing time of 12:45am to you. He was wrong about one thing. You hadn’t been disassociat ing for thirty minutes. You’d been doing nothing but staring blankly for almost five hours .

What the actual fuck was your major malfunction? This was definitely a first, and an unwelcome one at that. Moon’s face clicked again as you groaned and ran a chip crumb covered hand over your face . Not only had you been doing fuck all for five hours, you’d meant to visit them by now .

“Sorry, Moon. I meant to come say hi to yall during my break. I very much did not mean to zone out that long.” He hmm’ed, having grabbed two of the toys and was pretending they were having a conversation.

“Still can.” He replied, turning his attention to you. “Haven’t taken one yet. Doesn’t have to be at eleven.” That was true, you just took it at 11 to cut through the long shift.

“But that would still only leave like fifteen minutes with you.”

“Nop e. Lights go out every other hour now. I’m out two more times tonight. Sun’s not very happy about that.” Moon snickered then , holding a hand to his mouth like that would dampen the sound.

“When did they start doing that?” You got up and dusted the chips off your jumpsuit before helping him gather the toys to put back in their most likely home, the Prize Corner.

“Yesterday. Got an email.” Devon was probably supp osed to have told you about this but seeing as he conveniently left early… to be fair, y ou probably ought to check your emails more often rather than just going for the task lists.

“Wish I’d known before now but I’m happy you get to spend more time out and about. Even if it is just for security detail.” It took you a few steps to realize he’d stopped following you. He was staring at you wide eyed, his grip loosened enough to drop a toy which he proceeded to punt at you by trying to catch it mid-air. You offered it back to him and he took it, but not before you could hear his fans kick up.

“You’re… happy? To see me?” You wanted to be like ‘nah, I’m talking to the Freddy doll’ but you didn’t imagine it would come out how you meant it.

“Well… yeah! I mean, look … I know what happened. The reason w hy yall are in the position you’re in. But it’s not right that you don’t get some time fronting too. We’re friends, right? I like to see my friends.” You gestured for him to keep up as you got to the counter and started putting the toys back on the shelves, missing the fond look in his eyes and how he hugged the plushes closer.

“Friends… right.” He sighed wistfully, the sound barely audible.

Chapter Text

Moon escorted you to the daycare, giggling to himself behind you and feigning ignorance when you turned to look at him. Maybe you had chip crumbs on your ass and didn’t know? It didn’t sound malicious, like he was laughing at your expense, but he still wouldn’t let you in on it even after asking. He had a nice titter, with a bit of a snort that made you less self conscious about your own laugh.

Once the two of you arrived, the large doors to the play area clos ed just in time for the lights to come back on and Sun to come out. Thankfully you were prepared for it this time and no lights would be harmed… for now.

Sun looked dazed for a moment after the switch was complete. Leaving you to wonder how it must feel. Your first impression made it look like it hurt, but now it seemed that was only the case if they fought for control. Still couldn’t have been comfortable. In the time it took form him to recover , his face went from disoriented to happy to see you.

“Sunshine!” He didn’t hesitate to scoop you up into a hug, your heart fluttering at the realization that he wasn’t afraid to initiate contact anymore. Now that was progress!

“It’s good to see you too, Sunny. Sorry I didn’t stop by earlier. I- uh, got caught up in something and forgot what time it was.” He didn’t need to know (and subsequently worry) about your episode earlier.

“Water under the bridge.” He waved it off but still hadn’t set you down from your perch straddling his hips. “You’re here now! What do you wanna do? There’s board games, or we could do origami or color or-” You knew he would list every single activity possible if given enough time.

“Whatever you wanna do. Go ahead and pick whatever.”

“Well… I finished the puzzle already.” As you knew he would. There was no way he wasn’t going slow yesterday for your benefit. “And I kind of want to draw, but I don’t want you to be bored.”

“Sun, I’m more than content doing parallel play. I’m not a customer, y ou don’t have to entertain me.”

“Right. Okay!” Instead of letting you walk all the way to the table, he continued to carry you before finally setting you down opposite him. A small voice in the back of you mind lamented the loss of contact, it was kinda nice being pressed against him like that…

Wait- where did that come from?

“I’ve been working on this while you were gone!” He slid his drawing across the table to you, completely yanking you out of your train of thought. In front of you was a negative rendition of Van Gogh’s ‘Starry Night,’ the pallet swapped so that if you inverted the colors, it was the right way around. Some credit was due to the fact that he was an animatronic with one of the most complex and fast learning AI’s in the world, but that was a stupid thought because he obviously put in a lot of effort to get it right. Some of the colors in the top corner weren’t right, a clear sign that he’d actually messed up and fixed it as he went on.

“This is really good, dude! Are you internally applying an inversion filter or just eyeballing it?” He wiggled in his seat, lightly clapping his hands at your praise.

“All me!” You chuckled and leaned forward to boop his nose.

“It would still be you if it was a filter, but I get what you mean.” He smiled and rubbed his face, sliding the colors and some paper to the middle of the table for you to grab. Now that you weren’t distracted by… other things, you could see the book you’d given him earlier propped open as well as the colored pencils sitting open and obviously used, but still in the correct order. Distantly, you realized you hadn’t given him a sharpener for them, and given the ‘no pencils for kids’ rule, you wondered how he was doing it.

The two of you worked in relative silence, the ever present daycare theme still blasting over the speakers. Nothing immediately came to mind to draw, so you started doodling things backwards. Like if plants had flowers for roots and roots for flowers, cows slithered across the ground on their backs with leg-like protrusions in the air, upside-down barns, etc. You caught Sun’s rather confused gaze every once in a while, but he made no attempts to interject.

“I’d offer to play some music but my phone is charging in my office.” Your voice cut through the air despite your attempts.

“That’s okay, I’m used to this by now.” He quickly pretended as if he wasn’t just caught staring at your drawing.

“Do you… like it at all?” You gestured to the song playing overhead. A strained look crossed his features before he minutely shook his head, whispering ‘no.’

“ The s ilence is worse, though. One time the speakers broke for two days and I thought I was going to go crazy! So I’ll live with it .”

“I could get you guys a radio, or maybe an MP3 player?”

“You really don’t have to do that, Sunshine! You’ve already gotten us so much stuff.” He swept out his arms, gesturing to the table’s contents before looking back at you.

“ Sun, it’s like… a handful of things. I get stuff for the band too, even DJ has an audiobook subscription.” He gave you a blank stare. “He doesn’t like having stuff strewn about so it’s a thing I pay for so he can listen to as many books as he wants.”

“But what about things for you? You should be spending your money on stuff you enjoy!”

“And I enjoy spending my money on my friends.” You stuck your tongue at him, watching him scramble for an excuse not to spend more on him.

“What about rent?”

“Don’t have any.”

“What about bills?”

“Still no.”

“What about…”

“Sunny, I still get stuff I like or need, money is a non-issue, here . If you really don’t want me to get you more stuff then I wont, but just know it’s something I enjoy doing. It’s not like I’m choosing between gifts and food.” It took him a moment, but he finally acquiesced. Only to perk up at having thought of a way to change the topic.

“Speaking of. What did you have for lunch?”

“Disappointment.” While the only expressions he and Moon could make were through eyelid contortions, the confusion radiated off of him to such a degree that it was palpable. Despite that, it still took you a moment to figure out why he was staring at you so intently. You barked a laugh before clarifying. “Like the chips. The name of the chip brand is Disappointment.”

“ Why? ”

“Dunno. Maybe cause they’re just salted potato chips? Like no special flavors or anything?” You pulled the empty package out of your pocket and slid it across the table. He flipped it over in his hands, the package looking comically small in comparison, when his eyes went wide.

“Sunshine, these went bad a month ago!”

“They’re just chips, not milk. Plus, the best by date on those sort of things is just a suggestion for the ‘best possible freshness’ and so you can’t sue them if you get sick. They’re usually fine to eat for a few months afterwards.” He hmm’ed, frowning as much as he could with a static face.

“Okay, and what else?”

“Ummm…” You r eyes widened, caught like a deer in the headlights, hid ing your face under a hand to avoid his gaze.

“And what else?” He pressed, making you try harder to hide your face. “Sunshine…”

“I have snacks in my desk! I could have those any time…” The attempt to defend yourself wasn’t working very well. “Plus I work at a place that literally makes food. I could ask a staff bot to make me something whenever I want.”

“Okay, and when was the last time you did that?”

“I had some pizza with Chica Monday night.”

“That was two days ago!”

“Look, I’ll get something to eat before I get back to work later, okay?” He grumbled before relenting with a dramatic sigh, rolling his head back like just is eyes wouldn't be enough .

“Alright. But I expect grand tales of your hunt when you come back.” The two of you chuckled before you remembered something.

“Speaking of. I have tomorrow off and wanted to know if you and Moon wanted to have a sleep over? I can bring my portable TV in here and we can watch some movies that aren’t Fazco related.” He stared at you stunned, his expression semi-unreadable and his body eerily still . “O-or not! I mean, it’s just an option. I can do other stuff if you’ve got plans or-”

“No! I mean- we’d love to, Sunshine! I-I just didn’t think- wouldn’t staying home be more fun? Or comfortable?”

“I’d just get bored and sleep way too much. Plus I thought it’d be fun! I have a bunch of movies I think you and Moon would like, and we could do crafts or art or-”

“I- we’d like that a lot.” He slid his hands over your fidgeting ones, the roles reversed for once. You still weren’t sure is that fluttering in your chest was a welcome feeling or not, b ut you weren’t given much time to think about it before the lights went off.

Sun turned to Moon slower than the opposite switch just an hour before. If Sun was fighting the change, it didn’t last long. But d espite the time difference, Moon seemed to recover faster than his counterpart.

“Fancy meeting you here, Starlight.” He put his left hand under his chin in an attempt to look as nonchalant as possible, but tone was soft, the kind you’d imagined countless kids to hear just before falling asleep at nap time. But you still snorted at the joke, ruining the calmness that had settled over the room.

“Har har.” You replied flatly, trying to ignore the way that nickname made you feel. What was with that, anyways? You hadn’t even known them a week and were getting butterflies like a school kid? “Good to see you again, Moonbeam.” His fan sped up in response. As his hands went to wring his nightcap, the pencil Sun had been using fell out of his grip, falling onto the table and drawing his attention to the picture there.

There was hesitation. His hand kept moving to pick it up before retracting just shy of his goal. You thought back to all of the times you’d seen them switch, and every time one wouldn’t touch anything the other had been working on beforehand. Like the strain between them was so tight that they wouldn’t even interact with the others crafts, much less communicate.

“He’s getting really good, huh?” The sound of your voice snapped him out of his ruminations.

“Yeah…” He sounded so broken. It was strange to think that since they were two sides of the same coin, that one of them cared deeply for the other, but the opposite was far from reciprocated. Was it fair to think of it like that, if the divide between them was so large?

“Have you tried talking with him?” Only t he vague outline of his form curling up could be seen through the dark, the light from his eyes didn’t do much to help .

“Cut off internal connection. Don’t want him to get sick, too .”

“What about leaving letters?”

“He doesn’t need me, Moonbeam.” That couldn’t be true. How long had he spent trying to convince himself that was the case?

“Nobody needs someone, want is a much more potent driver.” You crawled over to his side of the table, putting your face in line with his eyes. “You want him in your life, how would you know he doesn’t feel the same if you haven’t talked in so long?” He wouldn’t meet your gaze. “Think about it, at least. He might be upset at first, but there are very few things in life that can’t be fixed. But I’m not gonna try and make you do anything you don’t want to.” Seems like you got through to him with that, as he sprawled his limbs out letting them droop to the sides. The silence seemed to stretch on between you, minutes pass ing of you just kneeling there awkwardly before he finally spoke.

“Want to play shadow puppets?”

___________________________________________________________________________________

That game was far more fun than it had any right to be, at least while playing with Moon. Not only was it fascinating how his the paint on his hands was photosensitive to the point that Sun’s colors would show, but it wasn’t enough to actually activate him. His usual tone was very gravely, but he could change it a bit to create different voices for all of the characters, and while you could do the same, you didn’t want to freak him out with it. You knew, distantly, that this was a common game children played, unremarkable in every sense of the word, but you’d never actually had a childhood much less someone to play with.

Maybe you ought to just relax more. You were always so tense about one thing or another, maybe you should step back from the ‘serious eldritch entity’ thing and just chill. The mission was done before this planet had water, all of this was just for fun so why not lean into that for once?

“Faz-token for your thoughts?” Moon’s voice cut through your thoughts, his face-plate at a 90 degree angle with the ground.

“Hmm? Nothing important, really.” You dismissed, only to pull up your watch and wince. “But the lights are gonna come back on soon. Just a heads up.”

“Thank you.” He nodded, picking up the flashlights and toys the two of you had picked out as characters.

“Any time.” While he had more than enough arm space to gather all of the stuff and make it back to their storage bins, you followed close behind. For moral support if nothing else. “Oh! And I asked Sun, but wanted to ask you too. Do you want to have a sleepover tomorrow? I’m off then and-”

“Yes.” He might have cut you off, but there was only excitement in his voice. You didn’t miss how he hugged the toys tighter and hopped from foot to foot.

“Nice! I can bring my TV in and we can watch movies and junk.” After all the dolls were back in their spot you could see him flap his hands past the high-beams that were his eyes. “For now, though, I should probably get back to work.” He slumped at that. “But you can come see me during your rounds if you want.” That got him to perk back up as you looked at your watch again. 2:59am. “See you later Moonbeam.”

“See you soon, Starlight.”

Chapter Text

Saying goodbye to Sun was easier this go around with the knowledge that all three of you would have ample time together tomorrow. Though it s till made the trip back to the atrium boring as hell. Without Moon to escort you, the walk felt longer and far too quiet, with only the buzz of neon lights to keep you company.

Why did you need company anyway? You’d spent time immemorial alone, why was it bothering you now? You justified that by thinking maybe it was because you’d become complacent, maybe even a bit greedy with your wants . Definitely not because you were getting far too attached. No way.

As the photo booth came back in to view, you attempted to shake the random thought trains away. All of your attention was on this repair. Nothing else. Your mind certainly wasn’t drifting to the myriad of weird happenings and pressures that have been piling up since you got back. Certainly not about Fazco.’s coverups, or the girls’ new relationship, or getting to spend more time with the daycare attendants, or how you could feel the Earth’s rotation slow for .00000001 second, and how that was definitely not concerning.

FOCUS.

Once down on a knee, you could see the booth’s guts on display. The dispenser was fine. The card readers were fine. All the circuitry, the camera and spider assemblies were working. It was only w hen you started messing with the control panel that it became clear. Pressed between the panel’s casing and the far wall of the booth were at least thirty used photo strips with pictures of random customers on them. Somewhere between the printer and the dispenser was a misaligned clearance, causing the photos to get jammed, and as it spit out the rest of the strip, it was shoved through that crack.

Now, t hat was an easy fix.

Once everything was aligned correctly and back in its place, you screwed the panel shut and stood, taking the time to double check that none of your tools were missing. Finally s atisfied, you lifted the ‘out of order’ sign off the curtain and stepped inside.

A bright LED screen and the friendly face of Helpy greeted you with a bubble pop-up asking if you needed any help with all the grace that a Clippy knock-off could give. You ignored him and pressed the corner icon in the top right for three seconds, which brought up a keypad where you entered your employee ID.

Certain you weren’t a customer it could funnel money out of, the system lead you through the diagnostics pages and then the process of taking a photo. Y ou happily took your time picking out all sorts of silly stickers and borders for it . Did you need to? Hell no, but it was a fun goof you p retty much only got to do when they broke down.

After some clicks and flashes, the booth successfully spit out your photos, greeting you with your usual anomalousness. The first one was pretty much blank, akin to a flash against black satin, it usually took a moment for the machines to figure out the depth of field it needed . The last three were actual photos , y our body sitting in the middle of the images with varying degrees of distortion and obscurity. Incorrect proportions and features coupled with a thick shimmering haze that permeated the air around you. Which was also normal. But the kawaii stamps and borders turned the shock and horror of your form into the same reaction someone would get from a really bad B-rated movie.

You snorted, but when you went to pocket the strip, something caught your eye. In the very last photo, there was a purple blob resting on the back of the seat. It could almost be mistaken for a hand reaching over the edge, b ut there was physically no space behind you , and it could very well just be a kind of distortion you hadn’t seen before. Not like you took enough photos of yourself for reference. So you ignored it.

Instead the idea of what was to come made you groan . Sure, most of you was thankful that 2/3 of the jobs for the night were finished, but the knowledge that you still had to work on that arcade cabinet ruined any ounce of satisfaction. O nce that was done though , you could chill until morning . Unless something else popped up, which wouldn’t surprise you at that point .

During the trip over to the Fazcade, you saw a couple instances of staff bots running into things or each other, which set off alarms in your head . Something was definitely wrong with them, something that they all had in common . The only thing that came to mind was the internal connection they all shared, but what exactly illuded you. Turning your attention to the DJ’s stage, you saw a peculiar sight that only deepened your concern.

The main entrance’s m ap bot was pestering a still very much awake DJMM, who looked less than thrilled to be putting up with this. The giant spider disk jockey perked up when you walked into the room, gently placing a hand on the bot’s back and scooting them over in your direction, much to your delight and successfully getting a laugh out of you .

“Yeah, I got this, big guy.” H e h eaved a synth heavy sigh and turned back into his tunnel to charge, while you took the bot’s hand and lead them back to the front entrance.

“Take a map.”

“Nice to see you too, bud.”

“Take a map.”

“I am doing well, thank you. How about you? How’s the wife?”

“Take a map.”

“Yeah, I hear that.”

“Take a map.”

“Well, I hope she starts feeling better.”

“ Will you be ready for what’s to come ?” You almost tripped with how fast you skidded to a halt, whipping around to the bot in question.

“What?” That voice was the same they usually used, and when you looked around, there was no one else there.

“Take a map.”

“That’s what I thought.”

Once map bot was back at their post, you wandered back to the arcade slowly, the more interruptions that popped up decreased your tolerance for bullshit . DJMM was already in sleep mode and charging by the time you got back, Mini M M curled up under his chin, nearly invisible in the low light. It was interesting to see the arcade empty like this, now that you’d actually taken the time to look around. No matter how long you’d been at the Plex, seeing its halls empty and silent still gave you a weird sense of nostalgia.

The cabinet in question was still in the closet where you’d left it, thankfully. You’d had enough weirdness for one night and if it had moved you would have called in then and there. It was off now, no start screen or sound bytes playing, with the side panel still sitting on the floor from the last time you’ d looked at it.

Getting down to your knees, you started the process of cutting, stripping, and rewiring the exposed mechanics, wracking your brain as to what could have caused this sort of damage. As far as you were concerned, the Plex still didn’t have rodent problems but what else could chew through cables like that. And they were definitely chewed, bite marks scarred the rubber coating and the exposed wiring was frayed.

When you went to reach for the diags you’d just set down, your hand simply came into contact with cold concrete. Palming around the dusty floor let you know the other tools you’d set down were still there, but the one required were gone. They weren’t in your tool belt, or anywhere on the floor, or in the cabinet, or anywhere else you frantically searched.

Calm down. You don’t technically need them to do this, it was just… frustrating. Of course working on this thing wouldn’t be easy.

You grew out your thumbnail and pinched a wire, cutting through it with ease. After retracting your new sharpened instrument , you reached back for the wire strippers only to find them gone from their designated spot on the floor, too . This was just stupid, you knew exactly where you’d set these down so it wasn’t as if they were getting up to walk away. No, that was just silly…

Wait a minute.

You took a random tool off your belt and pretended to fiddle with something in the machine, making sure not to look suspicious and waiting just a few moments before reaching your hand out to grab the air behind you, only to make contact with the rim of a metal disk.

Said metal disk let out a quiet ‘yipe’ as you turned to look the thief in his face.

“Hi, Moon.” He snorted, dropping your tools on the ground and giggling madly, his spinning face-plate just added to the absurdity of the situation .

“Got you!” Seemed like he had some affinity for your tools as t his is the second time he’d absconded with them in a week.

“Yeah, you got me.” You smiled fondly, grabbing the tool you needed with fake aggression. “Silly.”

He kept giggling as you got to work, the sound easing the tension from just a moment ago . Eventually , you felt him rest his face-plate on your head, watching intently as you worked. The practised repetition creating a momentum he found relaxing. Maybe he felt warmer from the idea of you working that delicately on their internal mechanic, or maybe it was just hot in that closet. Where just the two of you resided. Alone. No one to see if something happened.

Moon quickly tore his attention away from your hands and chose to focus on one of the small basketballs left on a shelf from the now defunct hoop games. You’d heard his fans speed up and a tremble cascade throughout his chasis before his speedy retreat. It was easier to ignore… whatever that was in favour of finally finishing up your job for the night. Sitting back on your heels, you sighed in satisfaction from a job well done. You had been right about it being a simple fix, but a simple job was not the same as an easy one, and you were more than happy to leave it in the past once the paperwork was done.

After screwing the side panel back into place, you gathered up your tools and the mess of wires, placing all of it in your tool bag before dusting yourself off.

“Done?” Moon’s eyes shone at you from across the room where he’d been ogling all of the random junk that had accumulated here over the years.

“Yerp. All done. That was my last thing for the night… besides paperwork.” Once you finally met up with him, you saw what was so interesting.

He held out a small dusty Polaroid photo, the picture underneath still clearly visible despite its age. It was you. Well, you and a few of the old human employees. The background was the staff breakroom with a large ‘Happy Birthday Martin’ banner shimmering in the back. Memories flooded back from that day as you took the photo from him and dusted it off with your sleeve .

“ Man, this feels like ages ago! It was after hours one night, and Roxy’s handler made me go to her friends party. Martin was Freddy’s handler at the time but all four of the bands attendants were really close. Apparently they knew each other outside the Plex, but wanted to hold a small party here so a few other co-workers could join in. She all but dragged me out of Parts and Service to go with her, but she’d been drinking a bit by then and someone had to make sure no one tried to drive home.

I don’t really drink and didn’t then , despite their attempts, but they had an ice cream cake so it all evened out so it wasn’t like there was no reason to go . And before you ask, no, you’re not really supposed to have alcohol on the premises, but they didn’t really care. There were games and most went home after an hour, but the four wanted to commemorate the occasion so we all took a photo. I offered to take it for them but they’d grown drunkenly attached to my sitting quietly in a corner antics and demanded I be in it too.

Around 4am I called them a cab and sent them home, but I staid behind to help the staff bots clean up. Totally not to just eat the rest of the cake. Plus , they were so hungover the next day, it was pretty funny to watch them try and pry five year-olds off the band .” He remained quiet when you handed it back to him, his eyes tracing over every detail the 4” by 3” photo had to offer. The sparkly banner, the beer pong and SOLO cup pyramid, the traditional red reflection in everyone’s eyes.

Everyone’s except yours, that was. Instead, the black void of your pupils stared back at him, looking far darker and abyssal than should have been possible.

“ You can have it if you want. I wasn’t that close with them if I’m honest. We stopped talking when I was transferred, so definitely more of an acquaintance thing.”

“Thank.” He slipped it under his night cap without hesitation, an ounce of distance in his voice that you didn’t catch , only leaving you to wonder if he had anything else in there.

“Welp.” You clapped once and rocked on your heels. “It’s only… 4:30, want me to walk with you while you do your rounds?”

“Yes!” Again, no hesitation, only a happy bouncing as the two of you meandered out the door and around the Plex.

You didn’t realize that their cable from the daycare also worked in other areas until Moon chose to float next to you instead of walk. He’d do swimming motions and cartwheels to keep you entertained while you went on and on about one stupid thing or another . The fact that he was supposed to be doing security rounds had easily got ten lost on the two of you at some point.

“And he’s just yelling at the girl behind the counter, over and over, ‘I want my corn!’ And she keeps trying to tell him that he has his corn. But I ended up finishing my food and it was still going on, the people in line behind him had just gone to different restaurants at that point. She asks if he just wants another one and he yells no, that he wants the one he ordered. And I’m internally loosing it at this, like I’m glad it was one of the girls that just does NOT give a shii…z.” You looked up at him and saw no change at the almost swear, so you kept going. “So I walk up to them and hop over the counter. Lock eyes with the dude so he’s staring at my face , pick the corn up off his tray, put it behind my back for a second, and then back on the tray. And it worked!” You folded over cackling as Moon giggled along. “He was finally satisfied that he got his corn, said something stupid about ‘finally getting good service,’ and left. The cashier was okay, just bewildered, which- I mean fair. Like, there’s no way she was paid enough to deal with that.” You looked at your watch and winced, making Moon go limp when he realized what you were about to say.

“That time?” He asked, looking down at you like a rag doll.

“Fraid so.” You replied sympathetically, but still earning you a raspberry noise. “I’ll see you tomorrow, though!”

The two of you said your goodbyes and he repelled up to the ceiling, out of view. It just then dawned on you how quiet he could be. Sun was noisy with the bells plus the sound of his rays moving and him swaying, but when Moon moved there was barely any sound despite being in the same body . You supposed h e was used to being around sleeping children and old habits died hard.

___________________________________________________________________________________

By the time you looked at the clock again, over an hour had passed of you just typing up reports and closing repair tickets. Lots of converting regular speak into corporate jargon and the wish of a cup of coffee, even if you knew it would keep you up later. But luckily, your shift was over in about 45 minutes, you could last that long.

After hitting submit on your final form, you leaned, yawned, and reclined in your chair, much to its noisy protest. For the fourth time in as many hours, you counted the discolored spots on the ceiling and played the game ‘is it mold, soot tags, or water stains?’ No prize to the winner though, just more counting.

By forty eight, you were in the zone, thus making the jarring sound of a phone ringing startle you so bad you weren’t sure what you hit your head on this time. The expensive rectangle practically laughed at you from its place between the wall and your computer. A metal pipe hitting the floor sounded a lot like mocking when you had a concussion.

You had intended to just let it ring, since the caller ID read ‘unknown number’ and not something you needed to pretend to care about. But looking back at your notifications revealed this number had called five different times throughout the night and thus left the impression they wouldn’t stop until you picked up.

With a deep sigh and as much mental preparation you could muster, you hit accept and pressed the phone to your ear.

“Yellow?”

“Hey sadsack…” Your ichor ran both cold and boiled, the sensations blurring together almost immediately.

“No.” You knew that voice.

“Come now, don’t be like that.” He certainly had the gall.

“What am I supposed to say? ‘Thank the stars, Chadley fucking Goodman, the boss that made my life a living hell, is calling me out of the blue on an unknown number when he has a court order to not contact any Fazco. employees?’”

“Come onnn, it wasn’t that bad.” He was slurring his words pretty heavily.

“You’re drunk.”

“And you’re a pain.”

“Great talk! Glad we had the chance to catch up.” You were millimeters away from hanging up when he shouted ‘Wait’ loud enough to make your phone vibrate. “What could you possibly want?”

“Hey! You fucking need me! There’s stuff Farzca. isn’t telling you! Big stuff! Horrible stuff!”

“No shit, Sherlock. Faz has ghosts older than you. That’s nothing new. And what, you wanna be some savior by letting me in on it?”

“You watch your tongue, I was your fucking boss, remember?”

“Oh, I remember. Every grueling shift I had to work for you. I remember.” You could hear the sound of liquid tipping in a bottle and loud swallowing.

“Fuckin’… thas not what I wanned to talk about. I wanted to say ‘I forgive you.’” Enough of this shit. You quickly stood from your desk, your chair falling to the floor.

“What the actual fuck do I have to be sorry for? Wasting my time working for you?”

“Hey! I know you’re the one who ratted me out about the money! If you hadn’t-”

“Out of all the shit I know about you, of all the drunken confessions and divulgent emails, you think I’d turn you in about the embezzlement? With the affairs and under the table hush money, the nepotism and harassment, you think I’d go for the money angle? I know enough about you to drag your narcissistic carcass through the dirt and bury you six feet under. But the truth is you both had power over me and my friends and you quite frankly, just weren’t worth the fucking trouble or worth my time. Sober up. Get your shit together, and maybe then we can have an adult conversation. But we both know we’d be better off if you never contacted me again.” Hanging up after an argument wasn’t nearly as satisfying as it had been with handheld modems, but it was still cathartic.

It took some time for you to calm down, that spiteful voice in your head you’d developed over the last few centuries chiding that you could have handled that better. And you could have, but he didn’t deserve nice, didn’t deserve an easily digestible version of you. Eventually you settled, picking your chair back up. After sitting back down and running a hand through your hair, there was a small knock at your door.

“You alright in here, chickadee?” Chica asked, peeking her head in the door when the rest of her wouldn’t quite fit. Right, she was there for the… user manuals.

“Yeah. Yeah. Just uh… got a call from someone I’d rather not have heard from.” She looked at you concerned and squeezed her way in despite the space limitations.

“Wanna talk about it?” Even if she had to contort her way into a semi-comfortable position, you could always count on her to ask after you.

“Thanks, but it’s nothing big… well I suppose legally it could be.” Now she just looked confused. “Chadley called me.” He eyes went wide and she put a hand over her beak.

“But I thought…?”

“Yeah, no, he’s not supposed to do that, but since when have laws ever mattered to people who could just buy their way out of any fine.” You sighed and attempted to distract yourself by emailing your computer the file she wanted to print it out.

“What did he want?”

“Tried to convince me I needed him cause he knows something terrible about Fazco.” She gave you a look that yelled ‘duh,’ and you were inclined to agree. “Plus tried blaming me for him getting caught with the embezzlement thing.” Now she was looking anywhere but you while playing with her hands.

“What?”

“Nothing…”

“Chica?”

“Hmmmmm- OKAY! It’s just… that was what everyone was saying when he got caught. The human staff were spreading around the rumor that you turned him in cause you were mad you got transferred…”

“First off, thank you for telling me. Second… what??” You took the pages off the printer and stapled the two leaflets in order. “Like I told him; of all the dirt I know about him and that’s the route I’d take? Pu-lease!”

“That’s what I wanted to say… but… you know.” She excitedly held her hands out and you placed the papers in them, watching her flip through them.

You did know. If anyone had actually believed her, then the higher ups might catch on that the animatronics knew more than they thought. And if they were even a little afraid the animatronics had dirt on them… well.

“I get it. The love is there. We can talk again later, but you might wanna skedaddle before Devon shows up.” Startling at the name, she nodded and spent the next minute carefully extracting herself from your cramped office. You could hear her trot along back to her elevator… or Roxy’s.

It was a bit shocking to see your day-shift coworker actually show up on time, early even. 5:53 rolled around and he slammed open the doors with enough colorful swears to be welcomed on any ship. Today was a bit different, though. Instead of wearing a hat, it was tucked under his arm while both hands messed with something in his long hair.

He sat in his chair, paid you no mind despite walking right past you, and slapped his cap on the desk beside him. Still mumbling and muttering while messing with his hair. You said nothing, waiting on the day he would acknowledge your existence, but it never came.

Intrigued and annoyed, you looked closer at whatever was in his hair that he was so engrossed with that he would straight up ignore you rather than cuss you out. From across the room where you stood, it looked like gum. And your suspicions were confirmed when you got closer, the bright pink of bubble gum stood out against his hair, finally intervening when all he was doing was spreading it around.

You might regret this later, but…

“Do you need help, dude?” The glare he shot you could make puppies cry, but you stood firm long enough to see vulnerability seep through.

“If you’re just gonna tell me to cut it, don’t bother.” Sigh.

“I wasn’t. I’m offering because kids put gum in Roxy’s hair sometimes and I’m the one that gets it out.” He made a grand show of bitching before accepting your help.

“Fine.” That was probably going to be the best you’d get. You did offer… even if you’d hoped he’d cuss you out and say no.

“Let me get some stuff.” Now it was your turn to grumble as you speed walked over to the Glamrock Beauty Salon to get what you needed, and to continue to gripe through the trip back with your arms full, only stopping once you pushed open the door to P&S.

He begrudgingly accepted the wet wipes to get the gum off his hands as you set the package on the table along with hair mousse and a comb. After grabbing the back of his chair and spinning him around to get to the clump, you got to work, methodically massaging mousse into the gum to slowly dissolve it.

“Friggin’ kid on the bus behind me thought it’d be real funny to put gum in my hair.” That’s why he was early, then. Not that you’d asked. But he kept talking none the less. “And my car broke down the other day so it’s in the shop. That’s why I had to leave early yesterday, to grab the buss in time to pick my daughter up from school.” You still hadn’t asked, but as long as he wasn’t spitting on the ground you walked… well?

“I didn’t know you had a daughter?” The change in his tone from thinly-veiled rage to kitten soft left you reeling.

“Yeah. Delilah, my pride and joy.” He pulled out his wallet, uncaring if it messed with your work, and held up a photo of his daughter, held aloft on his shoulders. She looked around 5, 6 at most, her hair all done up and a look of unbridled joy across her face. She seemed happy, at least. Hopefully it wasn’t a one off instance.

“She’s adorable.”

“Yeah…” He sighed wistfully, obviously caught in memory lane. “I finally got custody of her not to long ago.” Was this how people normally talked? With zero context and just dropping bombs like that willy nilly?

“Oh, shit dude, good for you!” Almost done, just gotta comb it through and wipe the hair and your hands off.

“My ex and I have been trying to switch custody for months now but it finally went through. So there’s that at least. But…”

“But?”

“It’s nothing, forget about it.” Welp, there goes all that progress. Couldn’t say you didn’t try at least.

“Alright. Well, I’m done now, so.” You gathered up the stuff and set it in a random box while he inspected your handy work. The area was a bit crunchy, but that just how mousse works. By the time you turned around, he was logging into his computer, back to ignoring you. “I finished all my stuff for the night so I got nothing to pass down.” He nodded and waved you off.

“Hey.” You stopped just shy of the doors and turned around to him. “Thanks…” That was something… progress, if you wanted to call it that.

“You’re welcome.”

Chapter Text

As the doors to Parts and Service closed, you were caught by the realization that you had no real ideas on how to kill time until your sleep over later that night. All that time musing and mulling over what to do with you day off and you’d only successfully planned half of it. The idea of just sleeping had crossed your mind, but even if you couldn’t remember your dream from last night, the sour taste of it still lingered enough to bury that idea.

So you’d resigned yourself to wander the Plex aimlessly until enough guests showed up that you felt too uncomfortable to stay. But as you wandered past a n unfamiliar section of the service tunnels, something came to mind. Besides a few doors that hadn’t been there before you were transferred, there were other places in the Plex you hadn’t visited since coming back. Or ever, really .

Like maybe a certain staff cafeteria.

With a new (or any) goal in mind, you changed direction and headed up a floor to the kitchen area, bobbing and weaving past staff bots just trying to get ready for the inevitable rush of hungry guests. A few stopped to look at you, others paid no mind, but one stopped right in front of you and refused to budge. That would have been fine had they not decided to do so in the middle of a doorway.

“Come on, bud. I really need to get past there.” Yet they didn’t look at you, or give any other indication they were even aware of your presence. They just continued to stare into the middle distance and do nothing. “Hello? Earth to staff bot?”

“Try our new formula for ‘Not Meat!’ A new Fazco family blend rich in not-meaty goodness!” Was their only reply. A simple recording jingle of some shmuck what wasn’t paid enough for Faz to own their voice, but in the moment you would have sworn there was something else in there, under the layers of speech and music, a distortion that didn’t sit right.

“What?” You asked, hoping they might repeat the same sound byte. To your mild dismay, they simply straightened up and wheeled out of your way as if called by another bot elsewhere in the area . Just add that to your growing list of weird things and pack it away for later.

After passing through more rooms and down more hallways, you were finally at the doors to the staff cafe. Large, intimidating doors with b right red tape s cross the threshold simply stating that only authorized personnel were allowed through, as if a guest would make it this far through the staff only area s and give up at th is particular warning.

Disregarding that message, you dipped under the tape and swung the door open. Upon entering you finally realized it hadn’t been a warning for wandering guest s , it was for someone like you. A low rung on the Faz ladder who wasn’t meant to see the evidence of a horrible incident like this. Besides the fact that the room was fucking huge, it was a mess… like a crime scene that was never tended to . A room frozen in the aftermath of some unspoken tragedy.

You shook your head to try and clear it . You didn’t know that for sure! Maybe it was just a normal riot. Cause that was totally something that could be normal. Not because it would be another cloth covered example that the ones holding your friend’s leashes were capable of getting away with far worse than you thought. Definitely not that.

The facts in front of you only spoke of a large scale fight having took place in this room. Tables, chairs, and even vending machines littered the floor, having been knocked over at some point. Random debris could be found in every nook and cranny, heavy crates blocked most of the exits , and panels were missing from the ceiling.

Shards of glass crunched under foot and you tried not to wince at both the pain and how the sound echoed in such a quiet room. Vending machines and menus were the only light source until you pulled out your phone camera, trying to shine some light (literally) on what could have happened here. Something screamed in the back of your mind, but you couldn’t understand what it was saying.

Still i t wasn’t as if you wanted Faz to be better than this. Better than mass murder. You knew deep down they weren’t above doing horrible things in the name of whatever their agenda was . History told that story better than any words could. It was more that they had your friends lives in their greedy hands. Even m ore so that, despite all of your power, there was little you could do about it without universe-wide repercussions. Save a few, but burn a planet . That little nagging voice te as ed again that if you couldn’t save them, couldn’t save anyone, then what good were you. No better than a god who is either blind to the plight of its creation, to o powerless to do anything about it, or so apathetic as to not care.

The floor felt and sounded different upon your next step. It was still tile underfoot, but the ground was covered in a dark brown, powdery film. You wanted it to be old food. You knew it wasn’t.

Next to what used to be a puddle was an old cell phone, vintage even by your standards. An old LG flip phone with a built in keyboard. It smelled heavily of iron and had to have been 3 0 years old at that point, definitely looking its age . Either dirt cheap or a collectors item, you weren’t sure. But if the same dark brown flakes across the keyboard indicated the owner had been typing before whatever happened, happened. Then maybe it could tell you something the train wreck of a room didn’t.

Once it found a safe spot in your pocket, you looked around some more. Throughout the room was more of the same; overturned tables, piles upon piles of crates, and the same creepy posters spaced across the walls. A cartoon version of Freddy’s mouth with “never stop smiling, the customer is always right” scrawled at the top and bottom. Nothing got people hungry like the constant reminder of the horrors of customer service, huh?

The more you looked, the more you found similar dark brown patches spaced sporadically across the floor. Some were tucked away in small spaces or under furniture, others out in the open. Even hiding hadn’t seem to help.

You were starting to get sick of being there. Finding more evidence wasn’t getting you any closer to the ‘why’ of it all, just more upset. But as you turned to leave, something caught under your shoe and scraped loudly across the ground as you attempted to balance. Flailing wildly didn’t work and you fell face-first against the floor. Could you get a concussion if you didn’t have a brain? Why hadn’t that crossed your mind before?

Probably because of the no brain thing.

Imbedded into the treads of your boot/foot was a heart shaped locket, the chain broken to the point of being almost non-existent, and the outside was deeply dented and scuffed. Even if there was no one in the room to catch you, it still felt wrong to open it up and peep its contents. Y et you did it anyway. In your defence, it might hold a clue to whom it’s owner was… or maybe their next of kin.

Inside were two photos, on one half were two people standing side by side with their faces pressed together like they were trying to playfully push the other out of the way. On the other was a formal portrait of three people, two adult women stood over a young girl. But no so young that you wouldn’t recognize the adult she grew into. What was her name again ? It was a flower…

Azalea. That was right, she was one of the janitors. Her name was Azalea. An incredibl y sweet, shy woman who had no issues standing her ground. Lovely one second, but god help you if you got on her bad side. You’d seen her wrestle a grown man to the ground when he tried to touch her. Fucker never saw it coming.

Neither did she, you supposed.

That locket went in the same pocket as the old phone and you made a bee-line for the door you’d entered through, more than ready to get the hell out of there. The paranoia in you almost expected someone to be on the other side of the door, berating that you weren’t allowed in there. But no one met you. No one saw you.

Staff bots wheeled around the room and dodged you with ease, again paying no mind to your antics . Even the kitchen cameras were preoccupied with the day to day happening s more than your adventure to the cafe. That should have put you at ease. Of course the world didn’t revolve around you, what a silly thing to think… but it didn’t. That fact m ade it a bit worse if anything. Like a secret just waiting to be found out. But then again, how was that different than anything else in your life.

Your entire existence was a secret.

Once you were in the relative safety of the shower rooms, you took a quick second to check what kind of charger the phone would need before shoving your loot into your locker behind the overflowing amount of snacks. At least you had an idea as to what you’d spend the rest of the day doing. Going out twice in one week was different for you, but a store somewhere had to have a compatible charger.

Right?

___________________________________________________________________________________

Turned out, the answer to that was very close to being ‘no.’ The quest for a charger was far harder than you would have liked to admit. Not only was the phone it went to older than most of the people that came through the Plex, but everyone kept looking at you like you were on drug s before you even said a word . You asked if something was wrong on several occasions, but none of them would tell you , one even went so far as to insinuate you knew and were just being difficult, no matter how much you denied it.

After 15 phone stores, 7 electronics stores, and 1 shady ‘lemonade’ stand, you were a proud owner of a micro USB that should NOT have been that convoluted a search. Heck, o ne of the phone stores kept trying to get you to buy cured meats? Like pepperoni? Insisted it was the best you could get outside of Italy, but you still gave it a hard pass. Instead you tried to focus on the phone’s potential contents and not the fact that ten hours had passed from that one trip. You’ d left the Plex just after sunrise and made it back just as the sun was beginning to set .

Speaking of Suns, when should you head over to the daycare? What was an appropriate time for a sleepover to start. It wasn’t as if you had experience with that sort of thing. And should you do it before or after looking looking into the phone. It s contents would more than likely just upset you, and there probably wasn’t anything on it that couldn’t wait another day.

Investigating the murders wouldn’t bring them back.

So, with you mind made up, the charger went into your locker next to the phone. All of your loot hidden behind the box of Snowballs. But why hide it at all? There was such an air of suspicion around you, it was starting to make sense that people had been looking at you weird.

After a deep breath, you closed your locker and leaned against it. No one was after you. No one was just waiting for you to slip up. Everything was fine… besides the potential murders of over a hundred employees.

Grrr! Focus! Sun and Moon didn’t need you to bring all this heavy shit with you into what is supposed to be a relaxing time. Maybe you’d calm down when there was something else to focus on.

Maybe it was time to start the sleepover, no matter how early it felt.

After explaining the situation, Roxy was more than happy to let you take a shortcut through her room to get your TV, letting you know they’d all be getting ready for the last show of the night so the amount of guests in Rockstar Row was near zero when you hauled the TV and accessories across the Plex. You couldn’t tell if the strange looks were because of the bulky equipment or if the issue from earlier was still present.

But besides all that, you made it to the Superstar Daycare entrance in no time. The timing still bothered you, given that it was only around 6pm, but all the anxiety that had biting at you over the last day disappeared when you saw Sun, his face-plate pressed against the acrylic glass just waiting for you.

Maybe you weren’t too early after all.

You watched him perk up and do a little dance as you crested the ramp before racing off to the giant doors and not a foot further. He met you with little grabby motions and a squee of excitement as you handed him the DVD player and movie case. The two of you set the equipment on a table other than the usual one, minus the movie case which Sun refused to put down. Instead, he flipped through each page and asked you what each and every one was about.

“And this one?” The folder was set between you, as you had your head propped up on one arm, patiently answering every inquiry.

“The Sixth Sense? It’s a horror movie about a child psychologist who tries to help a boy with his paranormal issues. I don’t know if you’d like it.”

“Hmm… I didn’t know children could be psychologists.” He’d said it so seriously that it successfully got a laugh out of you, much to his delight.

“Ha! Right, I like your words, funny man.” You could hear his fans speed up just a bit, reminding you that they really needed a good clean at some point. Maybe you’d bring it up later tonight?

“Oh! What about this one?”

“Event Horizon? I really like that one. It’s where a space crew is tasked with investigating a different ship that went missing seven years prior. I really like… how…” Sun was staring at you intently, like he’d just seen your face for the first time since you walked in, even if that had been five minutes ago. “Okay, is something wrong with my face?”

“Yes.” Finally a straight answer! Did you accidentally change something like the shape of your nose? No, strangers wouldn’t notice something like that. Was-

In your mini spiral, you hadn’t noticed him hop over the table and get in your face until he was inches away. As you stared into each others eyes, one of you far more concerned about proximity than the other, there was a faint click from behind him and a wet wipe was quickly pressed to your face. After a moment of spluttering and being wiped down like a messy child, he sat back on his side of the table, personal space having been quickly reestablished.

When you sat there dumbly, trying to wrap your head around what just happened, he held out the now very dirty wipe, the dampness of which had turned what must have been dried blood on your face a rusty shade. With how vigorously he scrubbed it must have been a lot, and all over your face. Yeah, that would explain some things. You must have fallen on a crusty patch when you tripped in the cafe.

“Uhh… Thanks.” Your hand ghosted over a cheek, the re-hydrated blood now overpowered your nostrils with the smell of metal.

“No problem! Sorry I didn’t notice before, I’m so excited!” He wiggled in his seat and pointed to another movie, pretending like that intense invasion of space hadn’t just happened. “What’s this one about?”

“Um- oh! The Shape of Water? I think you’d like that one, actually. It’s got some… adult themes I should say, but it’s a romance about a young mute woman who finds love in the arms of a humanoid fish-man.” He stared at you blankly, just a subtle difference from a moment ago. “I-it’s more complicated than that, but the fish-man helps her learn to there was never anything wrong with her and that love can be found in the most unexpected places.” You watched him nod before tearing the edge off a random piece of paper to slot it in front of the DVD.

The two of you looked over half the case, Sun marking certain movies as he went, before you realized that not only could this go on for some time, but that you’d need to do all of this over again for Moon. If he wanted to watch movies at all, that was, he might want to do something else with his limited time fronting.

“You’ve marked off quite a few movies already. You know they’re pretty long, right. Like a few hours each? I’m not sure we’ll get to watch all of them at this rate.” You said it as gently as you could, fully expecting him to be upset at that fact. Instead he continued to shock you.

“Oh, I know! I’m putting a piece of paper on the right for the ones I want to see and on the left for ones I think Moony will like.” He was actually considering his counterpart? Not a week ago- no, not even two days ago he didn’t want to even think about Moon. And now he was picking out movies his other might like? What changed?

“Well… right after the incident, he blocked off our internal connection. I-i know why he did it, but he didn’t stop to consider if that was what I wanted too. I wrote him a couple letters trying to get him to talk to me, but he never wrote back. B-but last night he finally left me a letter! It was really, really long but I was just so happy to hear from him! I was beginning to think… well, I thought that maybe he didn’t need me anymore.” Shit, you hadn’t meant to say that out loud.

“That’s silly, Sunny. He cares about you a lot. He thought YOU would be better off without HIM! I asked him last night to consider writing to you, I’m just glad he listened.”

“Me too.” He murmured, running his fingers along the edge of the movie case. “Plus, I was nervous at first, about you meeting him, but you’re not hurt- o-or upset! He’s been on his best behavior and maybe… well, maybe it means he can get better… maybe we can get better.” He whispered that last part so low you almost didn’t hear it.

“What was-”

“Ooh! This one looks spooky! What’s it about?” You were gonna have to give him an award for deflection at this rate.

“Nightmare Before Christmas?” You reminisced about the days spent watching it over and over. “Kinda complicated plot. All the western cultural holidays have towns that embody the spirit of that day. So the de facto leader of Halloween town gets bored of just doing Halloween stuff and finds the gateways to other holidays. He end up trying to take over Christmas and antics ensue.” He tore off another piece of paper and put it in the middle of the sleeve. Apparently they both might like it.

“How do you know all these movies?” You glanced up from your watch, having finally realized the two of you had been at this for over an hour.

“I’ve seen all of them at least a couple times by now. It’s not really that many, maybe a hundred or so? That’s nothing compared to all the TV shows and movies I don’t have. A drop in the sea of mindless media. I prefer the older ones. I think the last newer movie I saw was about a family dog that was forced to get an accounting job due to economic inflation making it impossible for the family to make ends meet on their own… It wasn’t good.” He nodded and flipped through the movies some more, staying silent instead of asking what each one of them was about. “What’s wrong?”

“What- nothing! Nothing’s wrong! Everything is a-okay here!” Right. And you were an English Monarch.

“Sunny, you don’t have to-”

“Freddy Fazbear’s Mega PizzaPlex will soon be closing to the public. Please conclude any games, exchange any tickets for prizes, finish your gift shop or food purchases and begin making your way to the exits. Thank you for your visit and do come again soon.” The usual monotonous voice blasted over the speakers throughout the Plex, sounding a bit muffled as it filtered down the hallway to the daycare.

“As I was saying. You don’t have to-”

“Hello!” You groaned at having been cut off again, the singsong voice of some mystery person traveling throughout the room at a similar volume to the announcement just a moment ago. Sun tensed and looked to you, worry written across his features. You waved in assurance and made your way out of the play area and towards the voice.

Standing in the daycare lobby was a customer, if you had to guess from her outfit and the soda cup in her hand. Her clothes said ‘I’m trying to look casual but still conventionally attractive,’ but her posture screamed ‘middle manager at a very important company.’ You could already hear the ‘do you know who I am’ bit as you approached. As outdated as the term was, she looked like a Karen.

Customer service was never your selling point but it was bound to happen at a place like this, no matter what your job title was. With your most convincing fake smile you caught her attention.

“Hi, thank you for your visit, but I’m afraid the Superstar Daycare is closed to guests right now.” Already you wanted to bring up the giant sign out front that said the same thing, but the multitude of clogs in an out of service restroom told you people didn’t read them.

“Yeah, I know. But I lost my little angel, Timmy, and he used to love this place for some reason, so I was hoping he might be here.” The words ‘little angel’ were already a huge red flag.

“I understand your concern, but I assure you there are no children here as of now. I would be happy to direct you to the help desk in the lobby. He may have gone there on his own or one of our state of the art staff bots could have escorted him there if they found him unattended.”

“Are you saying you know my son better than me? And how would you know? This place is huge! He might have slipped by without you noticing!” It would be so easy to just have her escorted out, she was already breaking the rules and getting more and more in your face as the conversation progressed. You were finding it a bit hard to care as you pulled up your watch, dialed the help desk, and waited for a staff bot to pick up the line.

“Hello. This is the Freddy Fazbear Mega Pizzaplex’s help center, how may I assist you today? Can I interest you in-”

“Not right now, dude.” The glare this mom was giving you could cause a fire… if you could muster up enough to pretend to be upset by it. “Are there any lost kids there right now?”

“…Yes. Unfortunately, children do sometimes get lost in our total of three square miles of fun filled entertainment experiences. There are currently… four… lost children at the help center.” It was pretty common for kids to get lost, four wasn’t that many compared to a weekend.

“What’s he look like?” You whispered, before she just grabbed your wrist and pulled it closer to her mouth.

“Timmy? Are you there? Say something, baby.” It took every ounce of strength not to show your annoyance.

“It’s an internal connection, the staff bot isn’t speaking into a phone, all the dialogue is from in their head. Just tell them what your kid looks like.”

“Hmph! Timmy has brown hair and eyes, lots of freckles, and he should be wearing the nice Monty shirt we got him. And he better not have traded it for a cupcake again!”

“There is… one… child that matches your description. Guest profile: Timmothy Cromwell. Age 7, height 3 feet 8 inches; favorite Pizzaplex attraction: Superstar Daycare. Timmothy has been waiting at the help desk for… two… hours.”

“See! I told you he liked this place! No idea why. Those jester characters are creepy as hell.” You could hear your jaw pop from grinding your teeth. People could talk shit about you all they wanted, but you drew the line at your friends.

“Thanks for the help. Mrs. Cromwell will be there shortly to collect her child.” You ended the connection and looked at her. “I understand there could be misconceptions about the Daycare Attendants, but I assure you they are a joy to be around and perform above our highest standards. Your son would be lucky to have someone like them watch over him.”

Maybe then he wouldn’t have gotten lost for two hours.

“How dare you!” Fuck! You have GOT to stop saying the quiet part out loud! Not that it mattered much as you were now the proud owner of a soggy and sticky jumpsuit as she took the lid off her cup and threw its contents in your face. “I demand to speak to your manager! Do you know who I am?” There it was…

“I AM the manager of my area, and you have done more than enough to be banned from this location already. Please go collect your child and leave, or I will have you escorted out.” She gawked for a moment before puffing out her chest, turning, and marching back through the lobby doors. “Oh. And have a Faztastic day!” You shouted at her retreating form.

You could see Sun’s face pressed against the windows again as you walked down the ramp. When you got back through the giant wooden doors to the play area, Sun was already waiting for you again, doting over you in a way you were sure Timmy could sympathize with.

“Sunshine! What happened? Why are you sticky?” He pressed a finger to your cheek only for it to stick and pull away from your face when he retracted.

“That woman was looking for her kid, and after I showed her he was at the help desk she might have called you creepy and I might have said something a little rude back.” You winced, fully expecting the Freddy treatment and subsequent chastising about customer service, but it never came. When you finally opened your eyes to look at him, he was just standing there with a hands clasped in front of his chest.

“You… defended us? Even if it meant getting soda thrown at you?”

“Well- yeah! I mean, I’ve been punched before from defending my friends. Soda is nothing. I’m annoyed and sticky, but I’d do it again.”

“…But we are kinda creepy, Sunshine…”

“Well I think you two are adorable!” You could hear his fans speed up as you were left thinking that you didn’t mean for it to come out the way it did. But how had you meant it to come out. It was true, but still.

“W-well, thank you! B-but you’re still covered in soda. We have some spare shirts left over as backups if a child got messy, a-and I’m sure I could find some pants around here somewhere!” Sun bounded off to the other side of the room and started pulling out cubbies.

Did you think they were adorable? Like, was that the appropriate word? They were cute with their little idiosyncrasies and quirks. The way they’d always try and keep you entertained, and didn’t like to be away from you for long. A puppy or kitten so excited for their human to come home. You know the band and DJ missed you, but none of them ever waited at the edge of their boundaries just waiting for you to show up… It hadn’t even been a week, what were you talking about? There was no way it was anything more. They were just lonely and really excited to have company.

Even if- big if- there was anything there, it wouldn’t be fair to them if you were their ONLY option.

“Found some!” Sun shouted across the room, yanking you out of your thoughts. He skipped back to you and held out an adult pajama shirt and shorts. More like boxers really, as there was no way they went far past your thighs. But it was better than sticky.

“Thanks, Sunny.” You held them up to the light. The shirt was a soft, light blue with the daycare logo across the front, and the shorts were half Sun’s pants pattern and half Moon’s. “Why are these adult sizes if they were meant for kids?”

“Oh! Well the shorts are from the lost and found. But adult shirts fit all sized children!” He got you there.

“I’ll be right back. Ima go change in the customer bathroom.” He looked almost disappointed, before quickly trying to hide it.

“Right! Makes sense- t-the bathroom that is. I’ll be here!” He was probably just sad cause you had to leave for a moment.

“I’ll be right back, don’t you worry. Why don’t you start making a pillow pile and we can set up the TV when I get back?” He nodded seriously and saluted before breaking down into giggles and waddled off to grab anything plushy.

Maybe cute was a better word.

Chapter Text

It wasn’t until the door to the bathroom shut that you realized just how much changing in a different room saved your bacon. Sure, it would have been weird to pretend you were just wearing undergarments, but you’d then have to be both a dirty jumpsuit laying on the floor AND a person at the same time. And that was, quite frankly, far more than you wanted to put up with. Plus it took quite a bit of water from the sink to wash all the soda off, and you were still a bit sticky by the time you got sick of washing.

Wearing actual clothes didn’t feel quite right. The way it sat against your skin, the constant scratchiness of the fibres. They weren’t uncomfortable, really, just different in a way you weren’t sure about yet. And as you started to walk back to the play area, the shirt kept brushing against your only scars, sending a tingling sensation across your body. Just ignore it. It’s a shirt, not a straight jacket.

Luckily, as you walked back into the play room, Sun’s antics quickly distracted you from all the new tactile sensations.

“I told you I could set the TV up, you know?” The animatronic in question sat bolt upright at your announced entrance, having been tangled comically in the only three cables the appliances came with. He was caught pretty good, too, with his arms pinned to his chest and only a couple fingers free to wave at you.

“I know, but I wanted to surprise you!”

“You always surprise me, Sunny.” You replied, grabbing his nose to wiggle his face-plate before starting the task of untangling the world’s most fidgety animatronic. He looked crossed-eyed to his nose before settling on you. There was no upset about this clumsiness, no scornful looks or berating that ‘he should be more careful.’ Only a delighted exasperation graced your features as your hands work ed patiently to fix his latest accident.

“Is… that a good thing?” He finally mumbled as he tried to play with his hands but found them still quite stuck.

“Hm?” You mulled over his question and looked up at him from your kneeling position. From this angle they looked even taller compared to you than usual . “Yeah, I’d like to think so. Monotony doesn’t bother me, quite the opposite, but I like little surprises here and there. Keeps me on my toes.”

He didn’t speak again, letting the near silence of the daycare lull you into a rhythm, and after about five minutes, Sun was finally free, stretching his joints as if he’d been like that for hours.

“Don’t you have a high wire? Ever gotten tangled in that?”

“I plead the fifth and demand my lawyer.” You laughed as he pretended to be offended by your question. He wouldn’t admit it… yet, but he loved the sound of your laugh almost as much as you enjoyed the sound of theirs.

“How do you know about that?” You asked over your shoulder, finally able to set up the TV and movie player now that the cords weren’t a mess.

“We were in theatre, remember?” Even if he hadn’t just been trapped in those wires and thus more than happy not to get near them again, he was more than content to watch you work. No matter what it was, you always moved with a fluid precision he liked but envied at the same time. They hadn’t had that sort of confidence since before they woke up.

“Right! Duh!” You lightly smacked your forehead. The conversation became a bit awkward on your part, then. There were so many questions you wanted to ask them about what all they remember from their time before, but there was no way it wouldn’t just bring up some old wounds. Maybe you’d ask another time. Instead you just sat hunched over the open movie case and pawed through the pages, looking at all the little specks of paper stuck in the sleeves. “ So which one did you want to watch fi-”

A hand ghosted over the prominent scar between your shoulder blades causing you to bolt upright. Before you knew what happened, you had whipped around to grab Sun’s wrist in a death grip, his joint lightly creaking. The air stood still as you tried to calm your heartbeat, bot of you looked at each other with shock, , each just as surprised as the other at how quickly you’d moved. After a moment, you realized just how hard you’d been holding his wrist and let go.

“Sorry… sorry. Don’t touch- just not there.” Proper grammar had yet to settle back into your form as you pulled your arms closer.

“No, I-I’m sorry, Sunshine. Should have asked first, I just thought something was caught under your shirt.” He looked like a kicked puppy; his hands held close to his chest with his rays practically non-existent. Guilt settled in your gut like way too many styrofoam cups.

“I’m not mad, I just… It’s a scar. I don’t really want to talk about it, though.” He nodded and the two of you sat there uncomfortably for a moment. “So… w- w hat did you wanna watch?”

Thankfully, it wasn’t even two minutes before the air cleared from that scar incident, and e ventually the two of you settled on Everything Everywhere All at Once after some playful deliberation. Once you settled comfortably into the pillow pile, of which Sun did an amazing job, y ou mused that you hadn’t thought there were that many plushes in the whole Plex, minus gift shops and whatnot.

The movie played without incident, with Sun on the edge of his metaphorical seat the whole time. Distantly, you wondered if they’d even seen a movie or show before, or at least anything that wasn’t by Fazco. By the Everything Bagel scene played, his awe and enthusiasm hadn’t decreased even a little. He’d let out little gasps and cover his eyes at certain parts before inevitably peeking through his fingers not a second later. Heck, he was just as entertaining to watch as the movie at that point.

But your mind inexorably wandered back to the scar incident. You’d assured him you were over it, but while you certainly weren’t mad, it still lingered on your mind. It didn’t seem fair that you knew so much about them, even so far as to have a literal manual about their function and past, but they knew nothing about you.

Still, it wasn’t like you could just come out and say ‘by the way, the scar is from when I got stabbed by the love of my life at the time and I carry it with me as a symbol of what both could have been and as a reminder that love always ends in hurt .’ No! That would be absolutely bonkers! Maybe it was better they don’t know much about you… for the time being, at least.

“Oh my stars!” Sun exclaimed, bringing your attention back to the present. The movie was nearly over at that point, having hit the heartfelt conclusion. At least he liked it, maybe you could leave the TV and stuff in the daycare so he had the option to watch what he wanted when you weren’t around.

Once the credits started to roll, you scooted towards the DVD player and popped the movie out.

“So what next?” You asked, flopping the movie case open and putting the old one back.

“Hmmm… I don’t know. What do you watch, Sunshine?” He looked to you with those wide eyes and tilted face-plate , his hand lightly tapped his smile.

“Me? I’ve seen all these like a million times.”

“Exactly! So you know what’s good!”

“I never said my tastes were good !” You lamented, “plus, I don’t know if we’d like the same kinds of movies. I’m a big horror fan, sooo…” He huffed jokingly before making grabby hands for the case.

“Alright… I suppose I’ll pick again.”

“Hey! I recommended the last one.”

“Yeah, but I picked it!” You stuck your tongue out at him and he giggled. “What about… this one?”

“ The Shape of Water ? It’s good but remember that I said it has adult themes. ”

“ We know what sex is, Sunshine.” You didn’t think he hadn’t, but both the way he said it and hearing that word come from him left your mind reeling for a moment. Somewhere deep, you were pretty sure they weren’t supposed to be able to say that. It should have been filed along with swears in their filter.

“I don’t- I didn’t- how did you say that?” You watched him sit bolt upright at having caught his slip up, like he’d blurted the sentence without thinking .

“W-with our speakers?” He tried to deflect with a joke, but he could tell it didn’t land. “I’m sorry, Sunshine, please don’t tell-”

You waved your hands wildly to cut him off.

“I’m not telling anyone! You, Moon, the band, and DJ- all of your secrets are safe with me. I don’t want to tell anyone else about these things so I don’t. Even if they tried to fire me I still wouldn’t talk. I just wanted to know how you did that if it was supposed to be behind a filter.” You didn’t tell him how knowing this might help diagnose what was wrong with them. But the idea did cross your mind that maybe they’d never had one.

“Oh…… w-well… we remember that we’re not supposed to be able to- and I don’t like swearing, so I don’t- but after we ‘woke up,” he did little air quotes to emphasis his point, “we figured out we could when a child asked what the F-word was.”

“Did- did you say fuck in front of a room of toddlers?” You tried desperately to contain your laugh, to little avail.

“NO! And language- we just figured out we could say it.” He pouted dramatically. “Moon on the other hand…” You scooted closer, gesturing for him to continue. “Well, he spent the day doing nothing but swearing in our head-space, knowing full well I don’t like it and that I was still working with the children.”

Sun tried to keep up the sulking, but couldn’t fight the warmth that spread through his circuits at your cackling. His features softened as he watched you ben d over, pounding the floor mat with your fist at the image of Moon belting out all the swears he knew just to piss Sun off. Your shirt draped over your form in such a way that made the keloid scar between your shoulder blades pop out against the fabric. Little bells in his motherboard urged him to touch it, both out of fascination and the want to comfort you. Whatever it was about, whatever happened, he knew it still impacted you a lot.

Finally, you sat on your ankles and came up for breath, trying not to think about Moon making up a song of swears just so they would get stuck in his counterparts head. Wiping the tears from your eyes, you motioned for him to hand you the DVD so you could put it in the player and get back to what the two of you were originally doing.

Sun snapped out of his thoughts and with all the delicacy he could muster, pulled the disc out of its sleeve and handed it over. The gentleness of which was more appropriate for a baby duck and not a two dollar hunk of plastic. Still, you appreciated the tenderness he treated your possessions with. It brought up that time Bonnie and Chica played baseball (more like guitar-disc) with your copy of The Fast and the Furious 18. While hilarious, but he hadn’t asked, just looked around the room to see five disgusted faces and decided that movie didn’t have a place in your collection. Which you did agree with… but he still hadn’t asked.

Once the movie was slotted into the player, you scooted back to sit next to Sun again, your spot having gone cold at that point much to your disappointment. He caught your very slight sigh and spoke up.

“What’s wrong?” It hadn’t been that loud, so you were surprised he caught it.

“Oh, nothing big, don’t worry. My spot is just cold.” You waved it off, but before you could say another word, you were unceremoniously scooped up and placed in his lap with a quiet ‘yip’ .

“Better?” He chirped. After a moment for your brain to buffer, you realized that despite the awkwardness, his lap was indeed warmer, and rather comfortable even if he was metal.

“Y-yeah. Thanks…” Oblivious to the dark purple blush dusting your cheeks, he gently grabbed the remote from your hands and hit play on the movie start screen .

It was rather pleasant once your heartbeat calmed and you finally relaxed against the form behind you. At some point he’d wrapped his arms across your chest and you’d have sworn you’d heard his rays retract as he set his head on yours. Two things rose to the front of your mind simultaneously.

The first was the realization you’d never been held like this. You’d been in Sun’s place for your only relationship in this form, and the memories of past lives tended to fade quickly once returned to your real being. So as far as you could recall, you’d never been cocooned in someone’s arms like this.

It was nice…

The second was just how soon nudity came up in this particular movie, and sex in general for that matter. In the first five minutes the main character was naked getting into the tub. You’d glanced up at the face on your head, but saw no reaction at these parts. If anything, he ignored them in favour of asking questions about other random things.

“How can she whistle if she’s mute?” He asked, pointing at the screen like you weren’t watching the same thing.

“Did you never have mute kids here?”

“We did, once, but she never whistled. Just carried a little button with her that made noise if she needed something.”

“Hmm… fair nuff. But to answer your question, a whistling noise is made by hollowing out your cheeks and pushing air past your lips. No larynx needed. See?” He pulled his head back to watch you pucker your mouth and mimic a bird’s call, tweeting lightly before lowering the sound to an almost train-like noise.

You could hear mechanisms inside of him whir as he processed this, and could see his hand twitch out the corner of your eye. Rather than make any noise of confirmation, he simply nodded and went back to his perch on your noggin to watch the movie. He didn’t ask another question until the creature was shown in full.

“Do you think something like that could really exist?” There was a bit of awe in his question and you felt his arms tighten a bit.

“Probably. If not here than in another universe, everything exists even if we don’t know where.” You mused, taking the time to inspect the delicate structure of his hands sitting in your lap .

“Like an alien?” Not what you’d meant but-

“I don’t see why not. Human’s haven’t investigated even a fraction of a fraction of the night sky, there’s bound to be something like that out there.” You hadn’t really been concerned when you got here about what the rest of the galaxies held. It was hard enough not to vomit at the pain of being constrained to a physical form.

But after that, he stopped asking things for the most part, instead he chose to exclaim random things at the screen like he could change the outcome if they could just hear him. They may be animatronics, but there are still many traits in them that were very human-like. It was hard not to get engrossed in the film with his expressive interest. You’d been afraid he wouldn’t like it because of the gore or the nudity but he seemed to have been handling it rather well. Maybe you’d underestimated him.

On the reverse side, Sun had been watching the movie, sure, and enjoying it very much. But what he liked more was the feeling of you pressed against him. The way your back would tense at the distressing scenes, or the way your diaphragm would move almost like you were hiccuping when you were giddy, your ceaseless wiggling when the story was getting good. He could feel your heart race and get calm as the movie progressed and the feeling of it was becoming addicting. This was the first time he’d seen a person naked, but try as he might, he couldn’t get the curiosity out of his circuits at what you might look like under the clothes he gave you.

“Oh, gosh! The water damage! Ough, that’s gonna make the floor warp so bad!” He exclaimed, clutching his rays in an attempt to get his mind out of the gutter, instead it was thrust back at the sound of your laughter.

“Cause I’m sure she’s super concerned about the water damage.” You giggled, before leaning back against him with a sigh.

Ideas he didn’t welcome flitted across his mind slowly. The movie was great, but it left him with thoughts he didn’t know how to process. It WAS just a movie, but maybe it was actually possible for a human to fall for a monster. Maybe it was possible for one to like a robot?

No- he didn’t dare hope, didn’t dare ruin the first real friendship he’d had with anyone but his counterpart. Plus, it wouldn’t be fair to you. You just wanted to be their friend and they were lucky to have even that. No other human ever looked at them the way you did, like they were worthy of your time and affection. Even if it meant never getting what he really wanted, Sun was more than happy to just have you in his life.

“We have about an hour before the lights go out, none of the movies I have are that long but is there something you’d like to start? We can watch the rest when the lights come back on, o r we could do something else? Your choice, Sunny.” Your voice pulled him out of his ruminations. He’d only been half watching the movie at that point and completely missed that it had ended.

“Uh…” He murmured as he scrambled to play catch up. “What about the other movie by the same guy? Pam’s Maze?”

“Hah! It’s called Pan’s Labyrinth, but that sounds good, lemme just…” His grip around you didn’t budge. “Um, Sun? I need you to let go if I’m gonna change the disks.” It was only then he realized he was still holding on to you, his arms flew up and out of the way in an instant.

“Whoops!” You eyed him warily, but passed it off as if the end of the movie got to him and that was why he’d been acting strangely. It was a quick switch as you’d packed those two movies next to one another, and with the next film spinning in the player you shuffled on your knees back to the pillow pile and plopped right back in Sun’s lap without a second thought, who in turn, wrapped his arms back in their rightful place around you.

The two of you spent the next hour lost in your own worlds, thinking of the same thing but trying to convince yourselves it was wrong. That you were content where things were. That it wouldn’t be fair to the other. That it was far too soon to be catching feelings and that it would certainly pass with time.

That you could keep this up, prepared for a future of this as long as nothing changed.

Chapter Text

While you were both very aware of midnight’s steady app roach, it didn’t stop the fact that the lights going out made you jump. Or maybe it had been Sun’s grip around your middle tightening significantly as he switched over to Moon, since it knocked the air out of your lungs. You recovered quickly but just as soon realized that his counterpart might not be as comfortable with the current proximity you shared.

It was too late to tag out by then as red LEDs flickered across the room and Moon tried to clear the dizziness left over from his change. The TV was bright against the darkness of the room , but not so bright as to prevent your friend’s lunar counterpart from appearing at all. You could see him look around confused, from the playscape, to the television, and finally to you sitting patiently in his lap.

“Having fun without me, Starlight?” He purred playfully as he pulled you closer to his chest. Neither of them needed to speak to each other to know certain things intrinsically. Like the irresistible feeling of you r speeding heartbeat against their chassis.

“Had no intention of leaving you out of it, Moonbeam.” You shot back, turning the tables on his attempt to fluster you. Not as if you could blame him, it was rather entertaining to watch him melt at your words. That spiteful voice snapped at you for playing that game, knowing full well it wouldn’t lead to anything but hurt. So you tried your best to back-peddle. “We- uh, we were just watching movies. Do you wanna see any of them? Sun picked some out that he thought you might like.”

He paused at your words, eyes wide in shock.

“Movies… for me? That I’d like?”

“Yeah.” You replied softly. “He said you left him a letter?”

“Yes…” It looked like he was on the verge of clamming up.

“H- h e didn’t tell me what was it in- just that he was really really happy to hear from you.”

“Really?” He was relaxing, but still confused. “Thought he…”

“He doesn’t hate you, Moon. He said he understood why you cut off the connection, but it wasn’t what he wanted. HE was starting to think you didn’t need HIM. Said he left you notes at the beginning but you never wrote back?” Moon just sat there looking uncomfortable. “What?”

“Sun can’t spell…” he muttered under his simulated breath.

“I can’t hear you, dude.”

“Sun can’t spell! Tried to read his notes, they made no sense.” He whined, before reaching a hand up into his night cap to pull out a few sheets of torn and wrinkled paper.

Once his arms were wrapped back around you and the papers set in your lap, you could see his predicament. Besides the fact they were written in bright yellow crayon and on white craft paper, the low light of the daycare made it practically impossible to read. That wasn’t even addressing the handwriting and spelling issues.

“Dreag Mon, hi reagly wash uowd talq twu mi.” That was just the first sentence, and it was already giving you an aneurysm. How the actual fuck was he in charge of teaching children if he didn’t even know how to spell?

“Was never great, but wasn’t always this bad at it.” Moon replied while you mentally smacked yourself for thinking out loud again. “After the accident… when HE damaged us.” You could see him gently run a hand over the exposed wires on the back of their head. “I was okay. Sun, not so much.”

That made sense, unfortunately. Thinking back to the video feed from that day, it cut out after Devon ripped the wires out the back of Sun’s face-plate, forcing him offline. If he was still recovering from the forced switch from Moon to him , it no doubt damaged some of his booting code, if not the connected hardware. Like shutting down a game console during an update.

“I’m sorry boys, neither of you deserved that.”

“ Sun didn’t deserve that…” Moon lamented, burying his face in your hair.

You wanted to argue. You were willing to go on for hours about how he didn’t deserve the treatment either of them were getting, but you knew it wouldn’t go anywhere. He was so deep in the self loathing trenches that showering him in praise would just make him dig in deeper. All you could do was be there for him, to gently remind him that he was worthy of kindness and compassion, despite past mistakes. That they both deserved friends.

“Well, I’M not going to let that happen again.” You reached up to run your fingers along the edge of his face-plate. “But we don’t need to worry about that right now. Tonight is our sleepover, so what would you like to do?”

He hummed and played with your hair while he thought.

“ Movie’s okay. Stay here.” The way he said it made your heart ache, there was a hint of desperation in his voice, like he needed to soak up any affection you could give. Like he was afraid you’d leave and take your kindness with you.

“Alright, Moonbeam. I’m not going anywhere.”

Neither of you bothered to pick a new movie, or even restart the one currently in the player. The two of you sat together in a tangled pile of limbs as Moon pressed himself against you as much as was possible. His arms and legs wrapped around you r body and his face pressed into the crook of your neck.

You didn’t want to deny them the affection they sorely needed, it wouldn’t be fair since you didn’t do that with the band or DJ. But you could feel yourself growing far to attached to them. These jesters- your jesters had wormed their way into your heart whether you liked it or not. It wouldn’t be right to pull away from them just because of your selfish feelings.

Just pretend the feeling weren’t there. Humans did that all the time! So there was no reason you couldn’t.

That noise from days ago came back, a gentle hum that reverberated throughout Moon’s chassis, just the same as the night you two met. Almost a purr, but not quite. This shallow rumbling worked its way into your form, loosening what could graciously be called muscles and very nearly lulling you to sleep.

Time ceased to have meaning, but you could still feel it’s passage. Five minutes turned to ten, to thirty, and eventually you could hear the end credits to the movie role by. Some distant part of you was aware the lights would come on soon, but you couldn’t bring yourself to move. How long had it been since you’d felt this comfortable… felt this safe?

“See you soon, Starlight.” You felt Moon say this more than heard it, the words sounded muddled through the haze of your exhaustion.

Just as he started to pull his head away from your shoulder, the lights came on, forcing him to switch back to Sun. The same Sun who’s rays were far sharper than you thought, as one cut your cheek from the force at which they sprung out from behind his face. This successfully woke you up, as you set out to heal the wound before said animatronic found out and got upset. A small rivulet of ichor ran down your face so you quickly licked your thumb and wiped it off, rubbing the access on the inside of your shorts-leg.

The two of you blinked at the sudden change in brightness before finally settling. Sun came back to reality first and ‘hmm’ed at the awkward position your legs were in, picking up your ankles to set them back between his instead of hooked over his knees.

“What did you two get up to?” He asked, his chipper tone just barely covered the hint of jealousy underneath.

“Just ended up watching the rest of the movie, really. He was a little sad, so we just relaxed. Why?” You replied innocently, having completely missed the underlying tone of his question.

“Oh.” He said flatly, shame crept into his circuits as he realized just how far he’d been jumping to conclusions. “Well… is he okay?”

“Yeah, I’d like to think so. I let him know what you told me about the letters and whatnot. He did see them, but…” Shit, he was going to ask why Moon didn’t write back. How the hell were you supposed to say lightly that his spelling is atrocious?

“And?”

“Sunny, I adore you and you’re a great friend, but-”

“It’s the spelling… isn’t it?” You sucked air through your teeth and looked away, to which his reply was an exasperated groan. “I know. I know it’s bad, but I’m trying to get better at it! I just- GAH!” He threw his hands up in frustration before crossing them.

“I didn’t say you weren’t, Sunny. I get that this is frustrating but the fact that you’re trying to improve means a lot more than you think.”

“Really?” He looked over to you from under sad eyelids, your words held more implications than you knew . “You mean that?”

“Yeah! Do you know how many people I’ve met over the years that don’t even try? It’s nuts! Like people think the disappointment of failure is worse than the stagnation of never attempting to improve things, but if you don’t try then you already know where you’ll end up. Yes, trying is hard and failure feels bad, but hope alone wont change things. Transformation requires effort, even if it’s just a little.” That rant went on longer than you’d intended, but the subepochs you’d lived on this planet alone gave rise to your detest of learned helplessness that decided to come out then and there.

He nodded along to this and you could see him process your words, the weight they carried. After a minute he perked up, not because your words finally got to him, but because sitting on the floor next to the two of you were his old letters. Moon had set them to the side not too long ago and must have forgotten to put them back before the switch.

Trembling hands picked them up, all the stains, tears, and wrinkles now on display in the full light of the daycare.

“H-he… kept them?” Sun mumbled, trying to wipe the dirt off the corner of one of the pages. “Even though he couldn’t read them?”

“Yeah. They were in his hat apparently.” You shuffled around to face Sun . “He really does care about you. I don’t think he ever meant for you to be hurt, he thought he was doing the right thing by cutting you off. Didn’t want whatever was up with him to get to you too.”

Words formed in his mind but he didn’t have the strength to say them. Even if you weren’t upset at Moon for what he did, there was no guarantee you’d want to be around him if he told you the truth.

That he was infected first. That HE gave this… virus to Moon by not severing their bridge before it got worse. It was only then that he was thankful neither of you could read his letters, his desperate apologies and long winded pleading that he’d do better.

All because of that stupid arcade machine.

But all he had to do was look into your eyes to feel better. That kind and understanding expression that eased his aches and worries, let him hope that things would be okay. He wouldn’t let anyone take that away from him, even if he had to-

“Sunny? You alright there, bud?” It wasn’t your words that snapped him out of his spiral, it was your gentle calloused hands resting over his in an attempt to stop his destructive fidgeting.

“Y-yeah, sorry. Di-did you say something there? I was just caught in my thoughts.” He asked in an attempt to change the conversation.

“I asked if you wanted to finish that movie or do something else?” It didn’t sit right with him that he was the cause of that worried look on your face.

“Right! H-how about a board game?” The spot he was once in was empty in a flash as he got up to speed walk over to the game cabinet, leaving you to wonder what that had been about. What was he not telling you?

But that was hypocritical. The amount of things you hadn’t told them was akin to the library of Alexandria, but the important one was out of the way, right? There was no way they didn’t know you weren’t human. Every animatronic in the Plex knew that much, even the staff bots . You weren’t going to bring it up, though. If they hadn’t asked about it by then it had to be that they were uncomfortable with the idea. So you’d let them bring it up first, when they were ready.

“We have… ‘Guess Who,’ ‘Connect Four,’ ‘Candy Land’ but you know that… um.” Of course the one thing these all had in common, besides being a board game, stood out.

“Basically games that don’t have pieces small enough to be eaten, huh?” You asked, having gotten up to clear space at your usual table.

“Yeahhhh… Never kept the children from trying, though!” He happily skipped back over to you, holding all three boxes in one hand before setting them on the floor. Was that the new game? Pretending like what just happened five minutes ago wasn’t real?

You sighed internally and reminded yourself that they’d talk about certain things when they were ready. It wasn’t your place to push the subject.

“How about ‘Guess Who?’” You asked and pull ed the box off the top of the stack before opening it up.

“That’s fine, but some of the people are missing…” He winced as you pulled out the two trays. A couple of the character flaps were indeed gone, but not enough to make the game unplayable.

“Well, we can just sort through the cards and pull out the missing characters.”

“Smart!” After a small clap of excitement, he started to meticulously sort through the deck, each card look comically small in his hands, but a ny offers to help were playfully swatted away as he insisted he could do it.

“Alright, don’t need my help, I get it. But I’M the one who’s gonna shuffle the deck before we start.”

“What?! Why?”

“Don’t act like you couldn’t count the cards if you wanted to.” You shot back jokingly, much to his mock offence.

“Well, I never!” If it weren’t for the crease in his eyes, you’d have thought he was actually upset. “I see how it is. You don’t trust me! After all we’ve been through! We fought in the war together, does that mean nothing to you now?”

Time for a game within a game then, huh?

“Don’t pretend I didn’t see the way my wife looks at you. When I was drafted first, you promised you’d take care of her while I was gone, but I didn’t mean like that!”

“Well, maybe if you treated her right she never would have come to me!”

“I don’t care about that ! What about us? All those years of school, going pro for the football team, those nights spent out at Sugarlane fields watching the stars. Does that mean nothing to you ?!”

“Wait, don’t go! ”

“No, I get it. I do. I just… hope the two of you will be happy together.”

The room sat silent for a full minute while the two of you just stared at each other.

“I think we might have gone overboard with that one.” You muttered, twiddling your thumbs.

“Y-yeah, maybe.” He handed you the deck so you could shuffle it under the table.

“That was good acting, though.”

“Really?”

“Yeah! I mean, you really got into it.” With the deck set between you, both of you pulled a card and set it in the sleeve at the front of the tray.

“Well, thank you. You’re not too bad, yourself,” he smirked. “Could use some work, though.” You gasped in irritation, not bothering to hide the smile that crept across your face. After blowing a raspberry at him, the two of you started the game, letting Sun go first .

It was lots of back and forth. Asking about hair colors, glasses, nose shapes and more. Your defeat at Candy Land was definitely bad luck, but it seemed as if you were coming back around, with the game nearly won at 32 to 15. In fact, it was starting to worry you with how bad his facial recognition seemed to be. A part of you hoped he was just taking it easy on you, but the frustration in his fidgeting said otherwise.

“Does he look like he’d judge your taste in music and say that freeform jazz is the only true expression of art?” You asked, the two of you had long abandoned asking the easy questions in favour of personal opinions on that character. If that had been the reason he was having a hard time, you would have gone back to the correct way of playing, but Sun had been having problems since the start.

“Yeah…” A wistful sigh escaped his speakers, all his attempts to focus on anything but the unbearable heat building in his endo were failing miserably.

“Is it Eclipse ?” You watched him straighten upright like he’d been burned and the plastic table cracked from his tightened grip.

“WHAT?!” His volume made you flinch.

“I asked if it was Eric- Sunny, are you feeling okay?” Pieces of plastic came away with his hand as he tried to play it off.

“Fine! Fine. I’m fine. Nothing’s wrong here. Just super.” He pretended not to notice you eyeing him warily as he picked shards out of his finger joints. “H-hey, it’s getting pretty late. Why don’t you go to the atrium and get some food? You haven’t eaten in at least… seven hours, golly that’s a lot. I’ll be right here when you get back, but you should really head out. I heard the staff bots make the best food at one in the morning!”

Before you knew it you were pulled up to your feet and rushed to the doors. The last time he’d done this he was trying to prevent you from meeting Moon, but there was no excuse this time. Unlike last time, however, any attempts to dig your heels into the play mats failed when you couldn’t get traction.

“Sunny, what’s this about? Did I do something wrong? I’m sorry if I did, just-”

“Please!” The two of you came to a stop at the doorway, where you could finally get a good look at the animatronic trying to force you out.

He didn’t look good. One eyelid was twitching non-stop, and three of his rays were trying to do the wave but weren’t getting very far. You could hear the wood door splinter under his grip, just barely audible over his fans working overtime in an attempt to cool his mechanisms off.

“Please, go get food. I’m just- worried that you haven’t eaten in a while. O-or had a drink. I-I-i’ll be right here, Sunshine.”

Even if it was left unspoken, you heard it loud and clear. ‘I need a moment alone.’

“Alright, Sunny. Just… don’t do anything drastic.” There was visible relief in his movements as you turned to leave, the door clicking shut quietly behind you. While food did sound good, there was a more pressing question in your mind.

What the FUCK was that all about?

___________________________________________________________________________________

Next thing you knew, you were sat in the atrium, playing with your unappetizing enchiladas. They’d either long gone cold or were cold when you got them, but it didn’t really matter when you didn’t plan on eating them, the last fifteen minutes played on repeat in your mind.

Everything had been going fine! Until it didn’t… Was it something you did? He’d been getting frustrated at the game, but it was just a game! Maybe he just wasn’t used to being around someone for so long? Months of isolation could easily decrease one’s tolerance for company, but that theory didn’t sit right either. Did he want to call it quits for the whole night or did he just need a bit of time to himself? It was obvious he’d wanted to say something when the two of you were talking about the glitches, but was that it?

Ough, why was communication so difficult?!

You felt your forehead hit the table before you realized what you were doing. The coolness of which pulled the heat out of your face an a relaxing way. When had you gotten so warm?

Once you felt that the table had drained away enough of your body heat, you got up and binned the food. Setting out for the daycare, once again. A quick glance at your watch said you had about eight minutes to get there and ask what the hell had happened.

‘They’ll talk about it when they want to’ an obnoxious voice in the back of your head screeched. But this was different! He’d all but kicked you out with no explanation! You at least deserved to know if it was your fault.

Even fast walking, it took longer than you would have liked to get back to the wooden doors. After the second knock, a very perky Sun greeted you, the angst from just a bit ago had completely vanished.

“There you are, Sunshine! I’ve been looking all over for you!” Now your brain was reeling from emotional whiplash and just general confusion.

“What do you mean? You sent me to go get some food, remember?” His face-plate tilted to the side to show his confusion.

“Hmm… can’t say that I do! Ah well, you’re here now and we can get back to watching that movie!” Before you knew it he’d taken your hand to drag you deeper into the play area.

“Sun, we were playing ‘Guess Who’ before I left.” This was really starting to creep you out. Hell, the game trays were still sitting out on the table where you’d left them! You pointed to the evidence and his gaze followed your finger. He stared at the table for a solid thirty seconds before finally speaking.

“Well that’s boring, why don’t we-”

The lights turned off before he could finish his sentence, the sound of his voice drowned out by the cacophony of their shared body hitting the floor.

Chapter Text

Time froze then. Quite literally, as the daycare attendants half collapsed form hovered in place above the play mats, and you just stared, your feet unwilling to move from their position cemented to the floor. You’d felt panic before, it was a semi-regular emotion due to the consequences of your physical form, but this was different. This was a deep dread that you only recognized from one other occasion.

When time started to move again, you were just a foot away from boy’s collapsed form. When a human fell, their muscles and ligaments forced a sort of predictable form. Like how elbows couldn’t bend backwards unless broken , for example. This did not apply to the daycare attendants.

Moon ( if it was him, their colors flickered back and forth between their individual patterns for a moment) had collapsed limply into a pile, joints pointed the wrong way and it took far longer than it should have for Sun’s rays to retract and his hat to pop out. His face sat twitching on the top of the pile with his fans on overdrive somewhere beneath. Eventually his eyelids slid open, revealing that one of his lights was blinking rapidly in an attempt to turn on.

“Sssiit florti-me?” He gurgled as you gently laid hi m out, placing his head in your lap. All your years of training and maintenance had never prepared you for something like this! How the hell does an animatronic pass out anyways?!

“ Y- yeah , it’s floor time. Just relax, Moon . I-I’m here. ” You whispered , gently running your fingers over his features. After some time passed, he looked to be slowly regaining some ability to function. There was less twitching and fluid movement settled back in as he tested his fingers. “Do you know what day it is, Moonbeam?”

“42-th.” His voice was still static heavy and try as he might, his eyes wouldn’t focus on you.

“Not quite, try again.” You watched him blink hard, trying to clear the stars from his vision only to remember they were supposed to be there, and that he was staring up at the ceiling, staring at your concerned face.

“24 ^th .” A shaky sigh escaped as you set your forehead on his.

“That’s better.” He raised a hand to pet your hair, like you were the one that needed consoling… well, maybe you did. You hadn’t felt that kind of dread since being stabbed . “I know it’s a long shot, but do you have any idea what just happened?”

“Sun forced a restart.” His tone was flat with annoyance, evidence enough that this hadn’t been the first time his counterpart had done this. “Supposed to wait twenty minutes between power on and switching places.”

“He’s done this before?” The two of you wobbled as he used you as balance to sit up.

“Yes. When he’s getting upset or overstimulated he just runs a reset code to power down and back up. Like a nap.” You watched him rub his head and sit forward. Could they get headaches? They could feel something like pain, so you didn’t see why not.

Still, it didn’t escape your notice that he was using longer sentences. You prayed to yourself that Sun’s actions didn’t have long term repercussions on their personalities.

“ Needs to wait twenty minutes before we change or I come online wrong. Our system is still trying to boot up Sun, and that’s after it takes five minutes to look for a file that isn’t there. Twenty minutes was the agreed upon time, I don’t know-”

“It was cause of me, Moonbeam. He kept trying to get me to leave but wouldn’t explain why, so I stalled.” He caught your hand as you went to hug yourself and just let it sit there between the two of you.

“Don’t blame yourself, Starlight. He very well could have said what he was going to do, but chose not to.” The long sentences and difference in tone were starting to freak you out. It was Moon sitting in front of you, but he wasn’t acting like it.

“I don’t mean to be like that, but should I be worried that you aren’t acting like yourself?” You’d had to restart Freddy before but he didn’t suddenly change afterwards, he was just a bit dazed.

“I’ll be okay. And so will Sun. Like I said, our system is still trying to boot two separate programs, and keep s looking for the third. It runs line by line and then splits, this,” he gestured to himself, “is more of a placeholder until everything is where it should be. That’s probably why he asked you to leave.” That typical gravely tone was finally settling back in as opposed to just static warbling.

“Would restarting like that cause memory loss for you?” You asked, finally helping Moon to his feet.

“Me? No. Him? Yes.” He spun his torso around to look for something, before finally landing on his slipper a few feet away. “I’m asleep. He’s cutting puppet strings, hoping for the best.”

That was more like the Moon you knew, causing you to release a breath you didn’t know you’d been holding. He was just kicking his slipper around trying to get the thing upright without touching it. Once he got it, he looked to you with a rotating face-plate .

“Worried about us, Starlight?” He teased, only for him to realize his mistake when you buried your face in your hands.

“YES! Yes I was worried! I still am! I thought things were going great tonight but then he goes and does that ! The two of you still aren’t comfortable around me enough to let me try and help work on you; and I’m fine with that but what am I supposed to do when shit like this happens? Either I hope it works itself out and get fired for not doing my job, or I root around inside against yall’s consent!

That’s not even bringing up the fact that I’m still not technically doing what I’m supposed to! The manager wants me to do whatever it takes to ‘fix’ you two, but I’d rather be on the street than force you to do something you’re not comfortable with! It’s not that I don’t want to be your friend but I’m always afraid you’d think I’m just doing it to get your guard down.

FUCK- do you know how long it took to get DJ to trust me enough to let me get near him?! Three years! Three years of Chadley breathing down my neck trying to get me to work on him whether he wanted it or not but I refused! I KNOW the only reason I wasn’t fired was because he was legally required to have a day and night mechanic, and I was too good to replace!” You felt like you were going to be sick, the nausea stemming from your organs actually thrashing about from your distress.

When did you start shaking this hard?

“I don’t know why I thought things would be simple when I got back. Of course things went to shit while I was gone. Just this week- no, just today, I’ve had to deal with a customer throwing her soda on me, all the weird shit the staff bots have been doing, and I don’t know what happened in the employee cafe but it was really bad, and why didn’t those phone stores have a stupid micro-USB, and why was one of them selling pepperoni, and I know that lemonade stand was a drug front , and- and-” It wasn’t until you felt Moon wrap his arms around you that you noticed he’d gotten closer.

The whole time you’d been ranting, he’d been taking small steps closer, unsure what to do about your little breakdown. You always seemed so calm, so well put together, but now he was finally realizing they weren’t alone in their overwhelming mountain of issues. While not happy that you were distraught, your shaking and hiccuping state put him at ease. Now he could see the cracks in the foundation, he could see that you weren’t a marble statue set above their petty issues.

You were far more human to them now then ever before.

Swaddled in a tight hug, you could hear him gently shush you, a single hand running through your hair. After a moment of standing there limply, you finally returned the embrace. Any and all energy you had was spent putting your organs back in their correct place subtly, and trying to get your breath back under control.

Fear was the most primal of emotions for creatures on this planet, and since parts of your body’s goop was based after them, a small part of that genetically pre-disposed anxiety slipped through. While it was an incalculably tiny portion, these emotions weren’t something you were ever meant to experience. So everything was ten times as loud or bright, ten times as stressful or joy inducing, there was no middle ground for these things. It was simply hold on for the ride or leave, and you were far to stubborn in this iteration for that.

But things had seemed to be worse in that regard as of late. Since you got back, your emotions felt far more intense and you couldn’t really blame the drugs from a few days ago anymore.

“Better?” Moon’s normal, rumbly pitch and two word sentence structure had finally settled back into place and the last of your fake muscles finally relaxed.

“Yeah. Thanks, Moonbeam.”

“ Sorry we scared you. Didn’t mean to…” He mumbled, rubbing small circles into the small your back. Occasionally he’d brush over your scar, but rather than hurt like it used to (that time you accidentally punched Freddy for clapping you on the back came to mind) it sent tingles up and down your form in a way you weren’t sure you hated yet.

Near silence stretched between you, just the sound of his internal mechanism and your steady breathing. Moon was still unsure about things. There were times he’d have to console the children, but they had simple problems… mostly. Another child stole their toy or they didn’t want to take a nap, but you weren’t a child and he didn’t know how to address it. You’d comforted them just about every day since you’d met, and you were really good at it! But they on the other hand, only knew a few ways to help, or at least try to.

“Wanna play a game?” He giggled, trying to lighten the mood. It was small, simple, but he hoped it would take your mind off of things for a least a bit. Maybe it would be enough to tire you out and he could help you get some sleep! That was something he could do well, at least.

“Sure, whatcha got in mind?” You mumbled as the two of you pulled apart. There was already exhaustion in your eyes, and while he chided himself that you weren’t a kid, he was hoping what little interpersonal skills he had could transfer to an adult like yourself. Still, he tapped his smile as if thinking hard , even if he’d already picked one.

“Hide and seek?” Had you ever played that? Did being hunted for sport count as just a high stakes version of hide and seek? Maybe it would help to shake the lingering anxiety in your gut, so-

“Why not? You’re it!” You poked his face and bolted deeper into the play area, trying not to trip on the various cords scattered throughout. Even if you weren’t looking, you could practically hear Moons shock at your sudden change of mood. They really didn’t need to see you like that, they had their own issues without worrying about yours as well. Just pretend you were fine for a bit longer and maybe your mood would actually change?

An idea struck as you ran past the ball pit so you scooped up a couple and finally entered the playscape. Moon’s voice rang out, counting down from thirty but already past twenty, each number interrupted with giggles. Giggles that were rather contagious, as you pressed a hand to your mouth in an attempt to be quieter.

Eventually the clock ran down and you heard bells for only a moment before your heartbeat rang in your ears. You’d climbed up to one of the highest sections, out of view from the ground but with enough open space for you to toss a ball or two in opposite directions.

There was scuttling in the distance as Moon climbed up the slide to the other playscape, and it took everything in you not to give away your position from laughing. It was true that kids generally played this game in a far larger group, and with far more space to hide, but this one just between the two of you was all you could have hoped for.

When you heard him cross the bridge, it was time for your plan. With one of the balls in hand you wiggled your wrist past the checkerboard straps that kept kids from falling off, and let go, where it hit the ground with a soft thud four levels below. The scuttling stopped getting closer as he turned around in search of the sound. If you pressed your face against the straps you could see him wander around on the first floor, eventually having found the ball and caught on to your little trick.

“Naughty. Naughty trickster.” He giggled before he tossed the ball back into its rightful place in the ball pit across the room . You knew he’d find you sooner rather than later, he was smart enough to figure out the places you had to have been to do that trick . But while he may have the home field advantage, it didn’t feel right to use your powers just to cheat at a game of hide and seek.

The plastic walls shook as Moon got closer and you scrunched up in a corner hoping to delay the end of this round just a bit longer. But soon enough, bright red lights were cast over your form spinning along with his face-plate and accompanied by giggles.

“Found you! Naughty trick! So mean. You wound me.” He then proceeded to flip onto his back and play dead, the last straw on your attempts to keep your laughter in. It took a few minutes for you to calm back down.

“Phew, okay, okay, I’m done. Ough, you’re silly.” You’ d crawled over to his prone form to lightly pat his cheek. “Alright, my turn to be it. Better hide well, I’m a master at hunting.” And it was true… to an extent.

You’d spent a good chuck of your time on Earth as random animals throughout the prehistoric eras, and as unfortunate as it was, your physical form did need to eat every so often. But you were efficient and made their end quick. The real question was whether or not you could hunt quietly on plastic. Luckily you’d stopped wearing shoes during your trip to change in the bathroom. There was little difference between your foot and your foot while pretending to be a boot, so why bother?

Once you took a nearby slide to the first floor, you stood in out in the open and started to count down from thirty. Despite his best attempts to be quiet, you could hear Moon scuttling between the play structures as his metal scraped against plastic, but still no sound of bells. You’d have to ask how he did that one night.

“Five. Four. Three. Two. One! You better be hidden, Moonbeam!” You shouted, ensuring every corner of the daycare could have heard.

The first place you checked what your old hiding spot, thinking that maybe he thought you wouldn’t suspect him to reuse places. After that, it was just a bit time consuming to crawl across and through the structures made for kids. But old habits died hard, and your quiet prowling hunting instincts were just as fresh as you’d hoped. Millions of years worth of habits didn’t leave quickly.

After all four levels of one side was cleared, you thought about using the bridge to cross to the other one, but if Moon was clever, he’d have an eye on it to see you coming. So instead you made your way back down to the first floor silently and made your way back up from the ground floor . To give him credit, he had turned his fan down as low as was possible and shut the light in his eyes off, but he still made just a hint of noise. Tiny clicks and whirs from the slightest movements.

It wasn’t even five minutes before he was in your sights. You found him down the cramped hall on the top floor and tucked into a corner. His face was pressed against the straps of the playscape just as yours had been a bit ago, trying to catch a glimpse of you on the first floor . But you weren’t down there, you were just a few feet away. Every muscle was tensed and ready to pounce, heart pounding and your mouth salivat ing a bit as you bared your teeth. He not only didn’t he see you as you jumped him, he didn’t even have the time to turn his head before you were knocking him to the ground . A quick ‘yipe’ and next thing either of you knew, you were kneeling over his prone form, one of his forearms in your mouth as you came down from the high of a successful hunt. The sound of your panting filled the space, drowning out how his fans kicked into overdrive.

A few breaths passed and the red lights of his eyes turned on before you actually realized you were clamped down on his arm. Not hard, mind you, but strong enough that he couldn’t pull away without damaging either party. After you quickly let go, you tried to ignore the string of drool that came away and used the hem of your shirt to wipe the spit off.

“Sorry! Sorry, got carried away there.” You mumbled, soaking your shirt with more drool than you thought possible from one mouth.

“You bit me.” He replied, his tone miles away.

“Right, right … sorry again. I- uh, don’t know what came over me.” Liar.

“That’s… okay.” If you didn’t know better, he almost sounded wistful. His eyes half lidded, and a hand rested on his cheek.

“D id-d o you… wanna play again? I totally get it if you don’t! I mean, that was pretty weird but I was having fun and- ” You stumbled over your words and your attempts to get off of Moon in such an enclosed space.

“Yes.” The rest of your nerves finally relaxed at the mirth in his voice. “Go hide.” He poked your nose and skittered off down the playscape past you.

After a quick excitement wiggle, you looked around. There weren’t as many hiding spots in the daycare as you’d initially thought, but maybe… All the slides were big enough, but the once closest to you spiralled in a cork screw and didn’t have the see-through plastic windows like the others. With a dastardly smile, you quietly slid down, stopping just shy of the last turn so that either entrance he looked through , he couldn’t see you. Was it possible you’d find out the hard way as to why a several hundred pound animatronic sliding into you was a bad idea? Yeah, probably. But it would be fun up until that point!

One minute turned to five, and five to ten. Not only were your hands getting sweaty, but you could actually hear Moon grumbling outside the slide, his attempts to be quiet having gone out the window. You actually heard him climb up one of the other slides, but he had yet to catch you.

The grumbling was getting louder and more persistent. Phrases like ‘h idey hide’ and that it was past your bedtime played on a loop, interjected with growling and giggling. Maybe your spot was too good… You’d wanted to pick a smart one, but not if it would just make Moon upset the longer the game dragged on.

At the same time you noticed the daycare had gone quiet, a pair of hands grabbed your ankles and yanked you down the slide. You let him drag you out the bottom, arms up and eyes closed from cackling. But because of this, you missed the way your friend twitched. His eyes a neon purple you couldn’t see from behind your eyelids, or the way his clawed hand was just inches away from your throat.

It was the sound of your laughter that pulled him out of it, that familiar fuzziness he felt around you overpowered the cloudiness that had gripped him . A wave of dizziness settled over as the virus took a back seat, left with no memory as to when or how he found you, but happy about it none the less. You were still guffawing when he got a grip, his eyes looked from your exposed midriff to his extended hand and back only to quickly shove it behind hi m before you finally looked up at him.

“Got me!” You huffed , still trying to catch your breath and letting your arms falling limply over the rims of the slide.

“Got you.” He sighed, trying not to let you see him scramble to recall the last few minutes. Maybe Sun’s restart fiasco had given him some memory issues. “Movie time?”

“Yeah! Alright, that sounds good! Whatcha wanna watch?” With an extended hand, he helped you to your feet and the two of you made your way back over to the pillow pile.

Moon plopped down while you fished out a random movie as he never actually replied to your question. Something goofy since you were still in a giggly mood. You were about to give up hope after several pages of primarily horror films when you spotted it, a classic and easily one of your favorites.

“How about ‘Who Framed Roger Rabbit?’ Its about a world where cartoons and regular people live side by side. One of the famous cartoons gets framed for murder and the main character spends the first half trying not to get involved.” If he was being honest, he hadn’t really been listening to any of that, just the look of excitement on your face was enough to make him to concede. Your little fist bump was adorable, as was the little hops to get over to the movie player, the way your hair framed your face just right in the low light of the daycare. Every time he saw you, there were butterflies fluttering about his circuits, an intense longing for you not to leave, even if it was him that left every time the lights came back on.

Your intent had been to sit next to him on the pile, to give him space in case he hadn’t actually liked waking up with you in his lap, but that idea flew right out of your head as he scooped you up and plopped you between his legs. So, maybe he did like waking up with you in his lap. That was good, yeah? Definitely wasn’t a sign that you were getting too comfortable with them. Nope. Not even a little.

With the best mental barrier you could muster against those thought s , you hit play and settled back against the moon themed animatronic just as he set his master plan into motion. You were surprised at first when you felt his fingertips lightly scrape across your scalp, but any remaining inhibitions and coherent thoughts flew out of your mind.

Those tingles from earlier came back and you were beginning to understand why Roxy liked it when you did her makeup. She’d talk about how the brush gave her a pleasant tingling, something about ASMR? It was getting harder and harder to focus on your train of thought, or anything else for that matter.

The final nail in the coffin was when Moon started to purr again, the vibrations of which echoed through your body. He smiled to himself when he caught you gently kneading his pant legs. If he was cat-like, then what were you?

Crashes and bangs played through the TV speakers, but neither of you were even watching the movie. They hadn’t even gotten to the murder before you’d fallen into a deep sleep. You didn’t even stir when he moved you around to lay back and let you curl up on his chest, nor when he snagged a piece of paper and pencil from the table nearby, setting it on the most stable surface to write another letter to his counterpart.

He never wanted to be the reason you were that upset ever again.

Chapter Text

This rocking motion was familiar in many ways. A self soothing behaviour that you had no control of this time around. Anxiety, disappointment, annoyance, all emotions you’d grown used to from your time in a physical reality . But none of what you were feeling was actually yours.

This is all your fault.

Moon? That was his voice, but he sounded wrong, like a growl and not a sentence. The air of dissociation had yet to leave, and all you could see was ceaseless black .

I know, I know. Moon, please…

Okay, that was definitely Sun, just a very distressed version. What was going on? Why did they sound like they were down different ends of a hallway?

If you hadn’t meddled with it , we wouldn’t be in this mess .

Why was Moon being so mean? He didn’t normally act like this… and why was everything still dark?

You felt a pair of eyes open, but they still weren’t yours. There was no thought before the action, they simply did. A single bright light nearly blinded you, but this body didn’t react. They simply stared down at broken mechanical hands, shaking from the overwhelming stew of emotions coursing through them. In spite of your intense confusion and the damage done to this form, you could still recognize Sun’s shredded pants and what was left of the daycare.

You were inside the daycare attendant’s body.

Everything was a mess of dirt and soot, with the ceiling having caved in just enough to litter broken tiles all over the place. Their body, you supposed Sun was currently in control, looked back to his hands and your heart ached.

Almost all of his finger casings had come off, revealing the delicate mechanisms underneath. But his hands weren’t the only damaged pieces. The frame that held his pants away from his calves was exposed, and he looked to be missing a foot. You didn’t need to see his face to know that half of the plate was missing, the exposed structures stung in the stale air.

This was a dream. It had to be. You really, really wanted it to be. B ut you knew it wasn’t. Everything here was far too real, even if you felt distant from it all. There was more at play than what this version of you could do, not without breaking something at least.

If you had to guess, and you had no choice but to , this was an alternate timeline from the one you were currently residing in. Another guess would say that a major component of this reality was that you did not exist here . That much was obvious, but it still hurt to think that this was the boy’s life if you weren’t in it.

Something horrible had happened, t hat was also obvious, what with the extreme fire damage to both the room and the boy’s body. So a fire occurred. But why wasn’t Fazco rebuilding the Plex? This place had been collecting dust for months, if not a year or two by the looks of it.

The boys were still talking in the background, if you could call it that. The vitriol in Moons voice acted as the opposite scale to Sun’s whimpering. Their relationship would have turned out like this if you hadn’t stepped in? Your heart ached for them, but this place had a very familiar air to it. This was specifically your reality if you hadn’t come here, just a different time.

Later. Much later then where you were currently. These events would happen without intervention, that was why you were being shown this. But why bother at all? You’d guessed the rest of you sitting pretty in the void was the instigator of your current predicament, and you liked your toys. Even though you liked this itteration in particular, it still wasn’t reason enough to step in.

No, t his was a bargaining chip. You were being shown this as half of a deal, letting you know something would happen and that you could stop it. So what were you bringing to the table? It was damn near impossible for anything in a physical reality to have large enough repercussion to be worth this trouble. Something about this would be very important later.

Now if you could actually remember any of this upon waking, that was a different story.

Suddenly you were hit with an intense wave of guilt. Still not yours, but Sun’s, as he whined and curled up into himself more. You seemed to know why far sooner than Moon did.

What are you doing?

“I’m sorry, Moony. It’s for the best. I- i t’s safer this way…” Sun replied verbally.

If you had a stomach, it would be in the Earth’s core. You wanted to scream, to beg, anything but this… please. But they couldn’t hear you, they had no idea you were even there, watching. Helpless to do anything but.

You could feel Sun grip the wires connected to the back of his head, Moon screaming at him the whole time. Why now? Why not a day earlier, a week, literally any time but the instance right before they… before he…

There was a flash of pain as he gave a sharp tug, ripping said wires out of their sockets, but the instant after left nothing but a hollow ache in your gut. You could feel yourself leave that instance and slowly filter back into your actual body, the familiar sensation of waking up greeted you.

Why was it this one you needed to remember?

___________________________________________________________________________________

Pain was the last thing you could recall and the first sensation to come back as you gained consciousness. Your lungs burned, your bones ached, and all your senses were on overdrive. Even your gasping and coughing sounded like gunshots. An unfortunate consequence of transferring a chunk of this iteration to an unlinked point in space-time.

A rather large hand was patting your back as you curled up into as tight a ball you could manage, agonizing coughs wracking your frame. Everything felt hot and you could feel yourself trembling as you slowly regained control of your body.

“Easy there, Sunshine. Deep breaths…” You were trying, you really were, but it felt like daggers stabbing you with every lung-full. It finally dawned on you after a self scan that your body was just doing random shit while unattended.

Eventually, agonizingly slowly, everything settled back where it needed to be and you could finally relax, still panting from the exertion. Memories were slower to return , though.

You were in the Superstar Daycare, you’d fallen asleep after staying overnight . It was Sun leaning over you, rubbing circles on the small of your back. You’d had a ‘dream’ about something bad that was going to happen… but they sort of stopped there. The last thing you could recall was…

Sun.

The overly bright lights of the daycare practically flash-banged you as your eyes shot open and you flipped over to see the animatronic in question on his knees, looking back at you rather concerned. Despite the fact that your bones had been virtually replaced with gelatin, you wobbled over to him and threw your arms around his neck, and dipped your head under his face to bury yours in his ruffles.

That just made him more concerned, his rays retracting a bit so as to not scratch you. But his hands hesitated, hovering over your back for just a moment before finally hugging you back.

“Bad dream?” He murmured, gently resting his face-plate on your shoulder.

“You don’t know the half of it…” You whispered back, shoving your face deeper into his frills. Just a few more seconds, you needed to commit their scent to memory. Anger, fear, guilt, it was almost like you’d never woken up. You wanted to demand that he never actually try what he’d done in the dream, but even if you tried to explain, he wouldn’t understand. It was just…

They were yours , damnit. No one else’s. Not even thems-

What the hell were you thinking? You didn’t own them! You didn’t want to ‘own’ them! When the fuck had you gotten so possessive? It hadn’t even been a week since you’d met!

With an imperceptible shake of the head, you pulled back from Sun, relishing in the fact that he wasn’t that damaged. That he was just the way you remembered him… right?

No, something was off. Not wrong, just off. His rays were still the same, his face and arms. Maybe it was the little tips on the ends of his fingers? Almost like baby claws. But, no, those had to have already been there. You remembered Moon using his claws to scratch your scalp and lull you to sleep earlier.

Whatever. It didn’t matter. What did matter was that they were safe… ish, but- still, not sitting alone yelling at each other in a burnt and abandoned Pizzaplex.

“Do you want to talk about it?” He asked, leaning back to look you over, concern still in his eyes.

“N-no, no. I think I’d rather try and forget about it.” But you couldn’t. There was something important buried in the disjointed mess of memories you were calling a dream. He didn’t need to worry about it though. This was a you problem.

“A-alright, Sunshine. But I’m always here if you need me.” You smiled at him, your shoulders finally coming away from your ears.

“I know… thanks, Sunny.” It was useless to try and contain the fondness in your eyes, just as he didn’t try and hide his.

“Are you feeling okay? You didn’t look so good for a bit there…” He pressed the back of his hand to your forehead.

“I’m alright, thanks though. My body just acts weird when I get a nightmare.” All of your two nightmares in unrecorded history having been back to back did leave you on edge, though. Yesterday, your guts had been all over the place and you were just glad that didn’t happen here.

That would have just been embarrassing.

“ I don’t think that’s normal…”

“Normal for me.” You shrugged in an attempt to play it off. He looked upset still, but not at you. “What’s wrong?”

“N-nothing!” He shot up straight, hands to his chest.

“Sunny…” If he could shrink out of existence under your gaze, he would have, instead all he could do was wither and give in.

“A-are you still mad at me?” What?

“What? For what reason?”

“Last night…” Then it started coming back. Him freaking out and shoving you out the door, not actually finishing your lunch, Moon’s episode.

“Oh… a little.” He flinched like you punched him. “But only because you didn’t explain what was going on. All you had to say was that you needed a moment to yourself cause you were overstimulated and I would have understood!”

“Really?” A bewildered look fell over his face.

“Well, yeah! I get overwhelmed too. Plus it would have given you the twenty minutes the two of you needed.” Panic instantly took the place of that bewilderment as he grabbed his rays in a death grip.

“Nononononono! Twenty minutes! I forgot about the twenty minutes! How could I do that! Stupid! Stupid! Stupid!” You sprang into action and peeled his hands away from his rays, wincing as one of them was already bent. It was clear he needed something to grip onto hard, so you swapped your hands out for a pillow which he proceeded to rip in half. After you quickly grabbed the rim of his face, you forced him to look at you.

“You’re not stupid! I’ve met stupid beings, and you’re not that. Now, c ount with me. One…”

“One…”

“Two.”

“Two.”

“Three, good job. Keep going.” When counting to ten wasn’t enough, the two of you counted to twenty, then thirty. He finally calmed down around forty five. “Look at me. You’re not stupid. I don’t want you calling yourself that. You’re a fun guy and an amazing friend, and I only want nice things about yourself to come out of those speakers. Ya hear me?” Sun nodded as much as he could in your grip. You’d felt a bit bad about ordering him around like that, but on the contrary, it would have been impossible for him to have any more stars in his eyes. It wasn’t just the fact that it was you belting out commands, anyone else and he would have had some choice words, but that you did it only to assert how much you cared about him. “Sorry… sorry.”

“It’s alright, Sunshine.” He sighed dreamily, rubbing the sides of his face you’d been holding on to. “Y- y ou really think all that?”

“I don’t need to think it, Sunny. I know it.” The moment he tore his eyes away from you, his gaze landed on the table sitting just behind as a certain letter fell off and drifted to the floor. That guilt from earlier set back in.

“Is- was he okay? Moony, I mean.”

“Uh, yeah. Yeah. He had a bit of an episode but he’s alright.” Panic flashed in him again as you said ‘episode,’ as the word meant something far different to him than it did to you, b ut the calmness in your tone and body language filled in the gaps.

Y-you should probably get ready for work…” He mumbled, looking to the floor and picking at a stray piece of the mat.

“What? It’s only- 5:25pm?! Sunny, why didn’t you wake me up?” You shot up and started looking around for your stuff.

“You just looked so peaceful! A- a nd Moony said you needed the rest! And… I was afraid you’d still be mad at me…”

“ But that was fourteen hours, Sunny! I didn’t need that much sleep.”

“Well apparently you did.” You pursed your lips at him, if it was possible for a stagnant smile to be smug, that was the definition you’d use. Still, it was good to see him joking around again.

“Har-har. Well, I need to get going. I’ll stop by for my break later, alright?” He nodded enthusiastically, hoping you wouldn’t notice his frequent glances to the letter on the ground.

You hugged him goodbye and jogged out the wooden doors, unaware that the moment they closed, Sun face-planted on the mat and groaned. After a moment to wallow, he knee-walked back to his table and picked the papers up off the floor. Many of his craft supplies had been tossed around when you started hacking up a lung and he’ d rushed to your side.

Once everything was upright and back in it’s spot , he looked at the blank paper in front of him and over to Moon’s letter on his left. It was well written and his handwriting was immaculate, but that wasn’t the issue, it was the contents of said letter.

He’d spent months being mad at his counterpart, was this what he felt like that whole time? No wonder things were so strained between them. This felt awful, and worse, he didn’t know what to write to try and smooth things over. It was so unnatural for him to be in the hot seat, but that ‘episode’ that was the consequence of his actions left his counterpart very upset. Not so much that it happened, but because of how it effected you .

Sun whined and let his face fall to the table, the way his arms splayed out once again knocked Moon’s letter to the floor. The last line was written in bold, like he’d been pressing the pencil to the page hard, and underlined for the whole daycare to see.

If you ever make them upset like that again, I will make sure the lights STAY off.

___________________________________________________________________________________

After a quick sink bath , you stashed the clothes Sun gave you in a vent so you could just grab them again later, and hurried down to Parts and Service. Devon was gone again, unsurprisingly. A similar note to the one from Wednesday was tapped to his computer monitor. You had mixed feelings about the guy, but if he kept this up then Fazco would just fire him. They’d fired people for less, but you supposed the few humans actually here counted as a skeleton crew so they might get in legal trouble if they didn’t have enough. Still, it wasn’t really your problem.

Plus, why did you care? The guy opens up once and that’s supposed to make up for all the bullshit you’d put up with? Nah. Hell, that might not have even been a picture of his daughter, that could have been a niece or something.

The note went in the same drawer as the last one and you booted up your computer. For once, you’d actually bothered to look at your emails instead of just moving on to the tasks for the day. There were a lot of unread messages, but only some of them were recent. A few were even from when you’d been transferred, Chica’s handler emailed you about a month after that fateful day just to say the band missed you.

Awww… you’d have to give them all hugs when you saw them next.

About eighteen of them were from last night, which might have been a lot if they weren’t all from the same asshole and spaced two minutes apart. The ‘from’ address was simply- ough…

[email protected]

Fuck, that was tacky.

“Email me back.” “Answer your phone.” “I need to talk to you.” “Can’t we be civilized about this?” It just went on and on, finally ending the list with “Answer.” “Youre.” “Phone.” all three separate emails. That wasn’t even the right ‘your,’ and half the emails were empty with just a subject line. Only one was an exception to his abrasiveness . Email number nine just had “Watch This” as a subject and a video attached.

The thought that it could have been a virus left the second you clicked play and the words “Sandwhich Queen foot lettuce” blasted through your speakers. Your fist hovered just inches away from the noise machines, just enough wherewithal left in you to simply turn them down instead of sending the thing flying. It was probably too much to ask that he’d just sent the wrong video but you wouldn’t put it past him to do stupid shit like that just to piss you off.

Once they were all deleted, you turned your attention to the meat of your job. The task list only had one thing on it, but it was a rather tall order simply titled: Fix whatever is wrong with the staff bots. Sent from the computer of Ms. Dayton, herself. It detailed all the things you’d been growing concerned about over the last few days.

They were running into things or each other, incomplete security routes, incorrect food orders and more were listed. Apparently one of them dumped a food tray on a customer and demanded they pay again if they wanted a replacement ? This was bound to happen at some point, in your opinion. When you run over a hundred bots on the same, collective code all it takes is one problem and it spreads like a virus. Fuck, it could actually be a virus for all you knew . So you could either drag one of them in here and plug it in to watch code scroll by all night or you could do that same thing with their source code… decision, decisions. They were both so tempting.

“ Hello?” A light, breathy voice called out through the main area, much to your confusion. It was almost 6, shouldn’t everyone be at home? Minus Vanessa, but that didn’t sound like her. Still, it was familiar. “Is anyone still down here?”

“Ms. Emstein?” You called out, hoping your voice would carry to the main area. There was a small ‘oop’ as the stout, green obsessed secretary poked her head around the corner.

“Yes! Oh, I’m so glad to see you!” After looking at the wall behind your and back to her, you pointed to your chest in confusion. “Yes, you. Silly.”

“ What’s up?” You asked, having gotten up from your chair to meet the red-faced woman half way. S he looked sweaty and winded, messy strands of hair pok ing up at different angels all over her head.

“I was- hoo, one moment, I ran down here. I was hoping you could help me with a small problem.” Nah, you thought she was down here for the ambiance.

“That is?”

“One of those creepy robots is in my office and wont leave.” You’d never heard the band described as creepy, Sun couldn’t leave the daycare, DJ was WAY too big, and she didn’t call them a spider music man, soooo…

“There’s a staff bot that wont leave?”

“ Yeah, i t’s the weird one, with a hat? Ough, you don’t happen to have water down here do you?” You shook your head as she continued to gasp for breath. “This place is a prison, I don’t know how you stand it.”

“Not enough green?” The second those words left your lips you were afraid she’d take it the wrong way, but she simply smiled and nodded.

“Definitely not enough green.” The two of you chuckled as she continued to suck in air like it was going out of style.

“Do you need to sit? Are you good? I can get you some water.” She nodded and fanned her face.

“That would be lovely, thank you.” You led her back out to the main area and sat her down in one of the extra chairs there. Specifically not Devon’s. You didn’t want to know what he did on it.

After a few quick taps on your Fazwatch, you requested a staff bot bring down a cup of drinking water. You had a feeling that if you didn’t specify they would bring something weird like mop water or a bowl.

“Why did you run down here?” That bit was particularly bugging you.

“I didn’t run the whole way. Everything was fine until I got to the service tunnels. Then I kept hearing weird stuff and I might have gotten a bit freaked out.” She was still fanning herself and you were starting to get a bit worried.

“ Weird how?” You pried, hoping that staff bot would get here sooner rather than later.

“Like- voices? I’d swear I even recognized some of them! But I’m probably just imagining things, I’ve been under a lot of stress lately.”

“I can commiserate.” You sighed as the bot finally arrived with the water. They brought it to you since you were the one that called them in, but it was a bit awkward to grab it from them just to give to her when she was sitting right in their path .

“Oh my gosh, thank you!” Her sigh was of relief as she chugged half the cup in one go.

“But, yeah- I’m not gonna lie and say there aren’t voices down here.” She looked at you wide-eyed over the rim of her glass. “An endo might get out, but it’s rare. Other times it might just be music filtering in from the atrium above us, or a pre-recorded line from a staff bot. One of them gave me an ad for ‘not meat’ the other day.” She let out a very bird-like laugh that you found a bit charming, it suited her.

“What even is ‘not meat?”

“I don’t know and quite frankly, I don’t think I want to. The actual meat barely qualifies as meat, and I know for a fact the cheese doesn’t. If you look real close on the dispenser in the kitchen, its got one of those little star signs that says ‘cheese-like product.” Another laugh, but it was cut short as she went quiet and looked down into her cup. She was humming to herself in a thinking way, and you knew she was about to ask-

“Would you say we’re friends?” Where did that come from? The strained look on her face told her what she needed to know. “Okay, better question. If I vented a little, could you keep it between us?”

“That is a better question, and the answer is yes.” But since when did you become the on shift guidance counsellor? You just had that kind of face, you supposed. Too late to change it now.

“If you had to choose between your friend and your job, which would it be?” She knew it was an awkward thing to ask, her eyes never left the cup. “Nobody will give me a straight answer, so I’m hoping someone divorced from the situation could tell me.”

“ Wouldn’t this be a better question for HR?”

“I am HR now. All of the job titles for it are just my name over and over again.”

Oh.

“Well… all my friends are at my job, so I’m not really the best one to ask. But since you did, I’d say that anyone asking you to choose between your source of income and them, probably isn’t really your friend. That’s not the whole story, though. Is it?”

“No… she’s been my friend since childhood, a-and we were thinking of going steady but she says I spend too much time at work and that it’s affecting my health.” You leaned against the counter behind you and mulled over her words.

“ I mean … while your health is a valid concern, an ultimatum is not the solution. If she’s actually alarmed , sit down with her and brainstorm things you could do to help with it. Like maybe take a vacation, or ask for reduced hours, look into professional help to mitigate stress. But forcing you to change one stressful situation (ie. your job) for another (being unemployed) isn’t going to help. I’m probably overstepping here, but if she’s not interested in looking for a mutually beneficial solution, then you might not want to start dating.” She sighed heavily and rested her forehead against the glass, making you wince.

“No, you’re right. Plus I did ask. It’s just- I feel like she’s the only friend I have left…” You frowned and chewed the inside of your mouth hard enough to draw ichor. Since when were you qualified to solve human problems, you weren’t even one of them. But you did have lifetimes of experience…

“Please don’t take this the wrong way, but is she the only friend you have left, or is she just making you feel that way? Like, is she saying your other friends are talking behind your back, or that they don’t like you. Putting words in their mouth without you actually hearing it from them.” The way her face went ashen spoke volumes. “Maybe give them a text, ask what’s up and explain what’s been going on. Worst case scenario, my previous statements still stand.”

Without a word she nodded and whipped her phone out, furiously typing before copy/pasting the same message to multiple contacts. Even when she was done, she closed her phone and continued to stare blankly at a black screen.

“You good?”

“Yeah, yeah… thank you, by the way.”

“No problem… but speaking of problems …”

“Oh, my gosh!” She smacked her forehead before setting the now empty cup on the counter next to her. “Right! Can’t believe I forgot. I still can’t get that bot’s stupid voice out of my head.”

“Why? What were they saying?” The expression she gave you spoke volumes to just how long she’d been trying to get them to leave.

“Take a map.”

Chapter Text

“Please, take a map.” You felt there was no choice but to gawk at the scene before you. Ms. Emstein said it was a small issue, this was not small. A quick glance down to the woman in question revealed nothing but a helpless shrug.

Her office wasn’t a mess, per-say, but it wasn’t as clean as the last time you’d seen it. Everything was still tidy, set up or put away where it all needed to be, expect the easily hundred plus maps sitting on every available surface. On her desk, in coffee cups, sticking out of each door to the filing cabinet. Each, singular object had gotten its own map from the overly enthusiastic staff bot, who was currently trying to get her wall calendar to accept one, except every time they gave it one, the paper would fall to the floor and they would try again.

How did map bot even have this many?

“Heya there, bud.” They perked up and rolled over to you faster than you could blink, shocking you and the secretary.

“Take a map.” You could practically hear the desperation in their voice.

“Alright, alright. I will. Better?” It seemed so, as after you took one out of their hand, they simply stood there, staring at you blankly. You leaned to the side and whispered, “you didn’t take one when they offered, did you?”

“No? I-i don’t need one.” She replied, confused.

“Yeah, they aren’t supposed to try and force people to take one, much less staff, but the bots have been acting weird… still…”

“What?”

“Well, map bot is one of the few outliers when it comes to the staff bots. Their programming is vaguely separated from the others since they were made for a specific job. The rest of them can do all the jobs interchangeably.”

“ Why?”

“Cause they have a hat.” It took you a moment to realize that wasn’t the answer she was actually looking for, but if you were being honest, you didn’t think there was a real one. The inner machinations of the Fazco robotics design department was an enigma. Like why an 80’s theme? That was over 60 years ago, even the adults here weren’t nostalgic for it.

“Okayyyy, so why is it here ?”

“That is a great question. I have no clue. I caught them bothering DJ Music Man the other day too, don’t know how they managed to get to the Fazcade in the first place. I’ll take a look while I’m working on the others tonight.” She nodded and started to make her way back to her desk, trying not to step on maps along the way. “I can call in another staff bot to help clean if you want.”

“No! N-no, I’m okay. But thank you. I think I’ve had enough of them for now.” You smiled in acknowledgement and took map bots hand, leading them back through the twists and turn called hallways, back to P&S.

“I just think that it’s a bit much, is all! It’s not my place to judge, though. I mean look at me.” You gestured to your now oil covered jumpsuit before setting your wrench back down and turning to the bot who was currently plugged into the central computer terminal.

“Take a map.” They were still on, but the staff bots were incapable of feeling pain or discomfort so that wasn’t an issue. If anything, they just looked bored.

“Yeah, yeah. I just wish it wasn’t a quality vs options split, cause they used to be good.” This was just general bullshitting as you spent the last hour or so just watching code fly by, too fast for a human to understand, but no problem for you.

“Take a map.”

“Yeah, but anything for that bottom line, right?” You laughed humorlessly and rested your head on a hand, trying not to fall asleep.

This was definitely one of the downsides to your job. Coding wasn’t your strong suit, actual mechanics were. It had taken you way to long to learn just one language much less a coding version, b ut it was a pattern, just like everything else. Fazco’s shitty version of Python would pause, populate, pause, populate, all faster than just about anyone could track. Mostly filler like moving servo A to X position and whatnot, and every once in awhile it would go through the motions to output sound from their speakers. None of this would go any easier if you’d just been looking at all the staff bot’s source code , either. It would be the same song and dance, just with far more inputs.

At some point you jerked as your head fell off its perch, and you refocused on the task at hand. Still nothing new.

“Why do you keep leaving the front doors?” You muttered out loud, only intending for yourself to hear. But strangely enough, the coding pattern changed. Map bot made no noise or movement, but their code spit out:

# Internal conditions not met

# Necessary component not found

# FFMPP/LM: File corrupted

Holy shit. No- absolutely no fucking way.

Map bot had no internal map anymore.

You were sure to get questions from the band later about what that insane cackling had been. The sound of which was sure to have traveled down the halls, up the elevator shafts, and into their greenrooms. If you were in any state of mind to have realized it, map bot might have even looked a bit ashamed about their predicament. Minutes later, it still hadn’t stopped being funny, but your throat was raw and you’d calmed down enough to just giggl e every few seconds.

“Sorry, sorry. I- haHA! Ough, I know it must be upsetting to not know where you are, but you have to understand the irony of this.” You patted them on the shoulder and they simply stared at you, but they got the message. “Okay, so the map file is an easy fix. But why are you trying to give maps to other animatronics… or inanimate objects?” They couldn’t talk but apparently they could make notes in their code outputs.

# Optical input: invalid registry

# Non-Fazco. approved component detected

# Camera input: offline

“What tha…” You got up, screwdriver in hand and stopped just an inch or two away from their face casing. “May I?” They didn’t say anything, but a glance over to the monitor told you ‘# Yes.’

With their face shell popped off and set on the counter, you still couldn’t see the issue. The cameras and surrounding areas were Faz approved items, but there were purple wires connecting from them to something deeper in their torso. Once that was cracked open too you could see the small box they connected to, lodged somewhere that you would have missed if you hadn’t been looking for it .

It was a video converter, or at least that was what it looked like. The thing came out with a small tug and the casing to it cracked open just as easily. Inside was a port with a thin flash drive inserted, which was also purple and had a kinda shitty drawing of a cartoon rabbit on one side. After everything was disconnected properly, the computer read out:

# Unapproved component disconnected

# Camera input: booting

# Camera input: online

Alright, so that was an easy fix at least, but what the hell was that thing. You looked the removed assembly over before setting it on the counter as well. It was another quick fix to re-upload a copy of the Pizzaplex’s map and have them delete the corrupted file .

“Okayyy, so is anything else wrong? Like something that might cause you and everyone else to run in to things or ignore orders?” It was a long shot, but it worked just a second ago.

# Issuing debug report

Holy shit, it was that easy! An incredibly large file was sent over to the computer, and some very surface level skimming let you know that there were sections of their programming glitching or just straight up being replaced. Your mind screamed virus, but the sample codes provided weren’t really… doing anything, much less something malicious.

Like one replaced section was just a change in proximity tolerances, from no less than four feet apart from objects down to six inches. And another section about when to change mop water was just removed completely. This all seemed more like a prank than a real threat.

You wanted to be happy it was an easy fix, but it also felt too easy, like you found what you were supposed to find and not what the real issue was. Well, until this hypothetical ‘real’ problem emerged, there wasn’t anything you could really do about it. So you re-attached map bot’s casings, got a thumbs up for your effort, and sent them on their way.

If all the staff bots were having this same issue than all you needed to do was freeze their current states, delete any incoming directions, and re-upload the original copy of their directives. They’d all still have any knowledge they’d gained so far, but you could assert that they were to follow the upload and not any commands that went against it.

But you made sure to double check their safety and security protocols first. You still didn’t really know what went on in the staff kitchen that day, but you were starting to get an idea.

___________________________________________________________________________________

The idea of leaving your post bothered you for all of maybe five minutes, but your Fazwatch would let you know if anything new came up and it wasn’t like you’d been buried in tasks. Once that thumb drive was packed away in one of the empty drawers to your desk, you set off to the shower rooms, determined to at least see if that old phone still worked.

It was where you’d left it, hiding behind the brownies and sitting next to the locket you still weren’t sure what to do with (not like you had the woman’s home address you could send it to.) While it only took a second to find a working wall outlet and plug the thing in, it took far less time for the thing to start warming up.

You’d planned on waiting a bit before trying to turn the thing on, but you’d come to a bit of a bump in the road… if that bump was a mountain.

The initial warmth didn’t raise any alarms, that strange crunching noise raised a few, and the phone bulging in your hands raised far more. In an incredibly stupid move, you’d lifted the thing to your face once it started making noise, and the time it took for the thing to go from warm to hot and a normal shape to phone balloon was practically non-existent.

There hadn’t been enough time to look away, much less unplug the damn thing before it exploded in your hand, sending shrapnel flying and breaking a few of your fingers in the process. You kind of wanted to be mad, or even a little upset, but instead you just stood there depressingly with a shredded hand and phone bits lodged in your face.

That hadn’t been the worst, nor the strangest thing to have happened in the last week and you were getting a bit numb to it all. Like, of course it would explode, that was obviously the most reasonable thing to have happened with your track record. It was on you at that point for not expecting it, really.

Five minutes had easily passed without you having moved an inch. You just stared at the gore that was once a hand with your singularly functioning eyeball. The other had popped when a piece of the glass screen had embedded itself in there… because of course it had.

Ichor dripped to the floor in viscous chunks and you could see exposed bone where the blast had snapped the joints in your fingers backwards. Yeah, there was pain, borderline agony, but inside you sat a sack of resignation you’d yet to make pay rent. The words ‘of course’ just repeated on a loop in your mind as you half-heartedly assessed the damages.

Your eye was busted, most definitely, as there was a distinct lack of input from it. Not seeing black, that still required having some sort of function. There was just nothing. A familiar nothing, but still vaguely distressing, regardless.

The mildly disgusting part were the strips of flesh still clinging to you with all they had… which wasn’t much. Simply putting any pressure on these bits lead them to simply fall off. When you healed these sections, you knew they wouldn’t reattach, so rather than let them go to waste, you simply ripped them off and popped them in your mouth. No reason to let perfectly good bodily components go to waste.

The battery acid and ichor looked practically the same against the beige tiles of the shower room, and could be dealt with in a similar manor. Once your hand was healed enough to be presentable, you wandered around some of the connecting rooms, hoping to spot a janitor cart.

For this, it seemed luck was finally on your side as not to far from the blast site was a bright yellow cart loaded to maximum capacity with a wide variety of cleaning supplied. All you needed was that box of off brand baking soda and you could be on your way. Leave it up to Fazco to skimp on name brands but buy out a crap ton of what was essentially the same thing.

There were two boxes there and while you’d imagined you only needed one, it was better safe than sorry and you were lucky no one or thing had seen you with a damaged and actively bleeding eye socket and a tattered hand.

The powder went in a bucket along with some water, and the mop older than the Plex sitting next to it would do just fine. It was difficult maneuvering a pole and bucket around with one hand, but you’d make due.

Your hand healed slower than you would have liked up still faster than any human could dream of, but your eye was holding out on you. By the time every smear of ichor and acid was cleaned, every phone shard not currently stuck in your eye picked up, it still hadn’t healed, or even spit that piece out yet. It didn’t matter how many rags you went through, if that shard didn’t come out than your eye wouldn’t stop spitting out ichor like that was its job.

Finally, five rags and ten minutes later, you heard the tale-tell sound of plastic hitting the floor and a simultaneous release of pressure from inside your head. You let out a relieved groan and let the remaining vitreous humor drain from the exit wound. The remaining shard went into your pocket and the, now six, rags went in the garbage since you weren’t bleeding anymore… finally.

There really was nothing to do at that point besides pick up where you’d left off. A full net zero information gain, an incredibly tedious trip, and gory wounds that would have just plain killed a human! Hurray! Who doesn’t love doing a shit ton of work and getting less than nothing from it!

But still, as you moped your way back to P&S, you didn’t feel much of anything emotionally. Just a bit dizzy and nauseous if you were being honest with yourself. While t hat could easily have just been explained away as stress, it was getting harder to focus on anything of consequence, and this overall malaise had been getting steadily worse over the last few days.

It was probably just stress, it had to be, it was impossible for you to be sick and parasites wouldn’t last in your body, so it was definitely stress. Things just weren’t as simple as you’d hoped they’d be upon your return to the Plex. You’d adapt with time and everything would be fine, just get over the hump and everything would be okay.

It had to be.

___________________________________________________________________________________

While you’d never heard of a ‘cash piano,’ much less a mismatched on e , the joke still made you laugh as your head bobbed up from its place on your desk momentarily. After helping Ms. Emstein, fixing the staff bots, having a phone blow up in your hand AND taking the time to clean it up , it still wasn’t time for lunch. The clock on your locked computer simply laughed at you to the tune of 9:48pm. Sure, the phone thing had been a twenty minute adventure, but the other two had felt like way longer than that.

So there you were, laying your head on your desk in P&S, watching an animated series on your phone until something else happened. It was a really good show, but you felt weird having literally nothing to do, and you knew the second you’d think to leave and go do something else, the most inconvenient thing would pop up. That’s how it usually went, anyway.

As time passed and the credits rolled, you r mind wandered trying to figure out what else to do to fill out the time. Eventually, you remembered that flash drive from earlier and set out to grab it. Without looking, you opened the drawer you’d set it in and started pawing around, only to find nothing.

The entire drawer was empty now. Yeah, the drive was gone, but so was some of the other crap you’d put in there like that flamingo pen you’d found on the side-walk. It wasn’t on, in, or around your desk no matter how long you scurried around trying to find it. You hadn’t been gone for long and there was a short list of beings that could have taken it, and an even shorter list of those with a motive to do so. Unless a different staff bot had come in to grab it.

Were they modifying themselves? Could they even do that? Not successfully, it seemed, since map bot was so incompatible with the tech that their system shut down their cameras.

At what point does something go from just being weird to being downright stupid? This extra layer to the recent madness just made your stomach turn, and yours barely counted as an organ to begin with .

Things had to settle down soon. You were reaching the end of what you could actually do to help in this form. The fractionated snippets of your nightmare that morning would blink in and out of your thoughts. There wasn’t a whole lot of information to gather from them. All that came through was that something was going to happen and that it was bad, but literally nothing else. No context, no background info, just that phantom pain of Sun doing… what he did.

Things just needed to settle down soon…

Chapter Text

With a swear, you held your eye as a familiar pain laced itself throughout your head. It had been, what, three weeks since that phone exploded, but the wound had never healed correctly. Full vision never returned and it would occasionally start leaking a thin, oily substance that your body used as tears. Still, you bit your tongue and bared through it, just like all your other steadily worsening symptoms over the last few days.

Even just lifting your arm up to knock on the daycare doors felt like an arduous task. A good chunk of your remaining strength went into just producing a loud enough sound to get Sun’s attention. Nothing had gotten simpler as time went on, like you’d hoped they would. There was no new information to be had about the cafe incident, you still had to deal with human coworkers acting strangely, and if anything, the boy’s relationship with each other had become more strained.

They still wrote to one another, it was hard not to notice the growing stack of papers left on one of the kiddie tables, but they seemed to have flipped the script on how they felt about one another. Moon had been growing more protective of you, but emotionally distant at the same time, and Sun had initially tried taking a step back from your closeness, but quickly fell deeper into the need for assurance that you wanted to be around him. Neither of them would tell you anything about this dynamic switch and even went so far as to pretend it wasn’t a thing at all, or at least that you didn’t need to worry about it.

That was before you stopped noticing things in general. Far more recently, just keeping a solid train of thought took up all your energy. You were always exhausted and caffeine stopped working about a week and a half ago. Both eyes were having issues reading small print and your hands wouldn’t stop shaking. Even just the realization of where you were eluded you until the sun themed animatronic opened the doors in a wide sweeping motion.

“Sunshine!” He shouted, but winced a little when you did at his volume. Just the acceleration of him gently pulling you into the room was enough to make that persistent nausea rise in the back of your throat.

Everyone had noticed your decline in health, but the daycare attendants were easily the most worried out of the bunch. The band and DJ took you at your word when you were adamant about not being able to get sick, and understood that if you didn’t want to see the facts then they wouldn’t be able to change your mind. But the boys never stopped asking after you and trying to convince you to take some time off.

It was starting to get annoying how everyone was starting to treat you like a ceramic vase just waiting to fall off the counter. The band had been doing a rather good job of trying to hide that fact, but the boys could ironically use some acting lessons. That was a bit mean, but even as he tried leaning back against the security desk and next to you, his overall demeanor was that of a dog waiting to be yelled at for eating out of the trash again.

But they’d been acting differently regardless of your proximity. That dynamic switch bled into everything they did, but you could only notice when you were nearby. Both of them blamed themselves for your decline in health ever since they realized that night Moon collapsed had been the start. It wasn’t actually, but it became noticeable then, and while it was more of a case for correlation and not causation, they found it easier to blame themselves over the idea that no one knew what was actually wrong.

“So…” Sun started, wrapping his tail around your ankle and causing the bells on the tip to sound out in worry for him. “Hear me out.”

You already knew where that was going. “Sun I can’t just not show up, we talked about this.”

“I-i know! But what about tomorrow? You could take it off and then have it and Tuesday to recover!” He walked his fingers across the desk, trying his best to nonchalantly wrap his arm around you and pulled you to his chest. “You could spend the night with us! O-or go home and just rest… or just do anything but work…”

Fuck, he was really warm. It took nearly everything you had not to melt into him and just spend forever there. Even if you’d been sweating a lot recently, you still felt cold all the time and this was a welcome reprieve. Before you could give in and fall asleep then and there, you gently extracted yourself from Sun’s arms, where he whined in protest for you.

“Sunny…” You warned, trying not to look at his absolute wet dog of an expression.

“At least this, Sunshine! We don’t even like the idea of you working tonight, much less two more!” A mischievous smile split across his features. “Or we could just keep you here! Tie you up in ribbons as our little present! We’d get you soup and watch all your favorite movies…”

They’d been doing that a lot more, that thinly veiled flirting (if you could call it that) but you kept pushing the idea away as them simply not understanding the potential connotations of their words. Even still, with how hard it had gotten to focus on the fact he was even speaking made the idea of dissecting his words for their undertones a non-issue.

“Not showing up has worse repercussions than calling in half way through. How about this, if I’m not feeling better by lunch, I’ll go to bed. Deal?”

“Mmmhhh… what about tomorrow night?” Fuck he was hard to please when you were like this. Just trying to figure out what he said was difficult enough without the need to bargain.

“Fine!” You sighed, trying your best to read the text on your Fazwatch and put in for the next night off. “ There, happy now?”

“Yes!” The sound of bells filled the air as the end of his tail began to wag while still wrapped around your ankle. “But we’ll be really happy when you’re feeling better, Sunshine.”

He moved his hand towards you head and if he hadn’t tried the same thing several times over at that point, you’d think he was going to ruffle your hair. No, he was trying for the eighty second time in three days to stealthily check your temperature. You gently batted his hand away and squinted at your watch, trying to check the time.

“It’s 5:49,” he murmured, looking away in an attempt to act like he had no clue you couldn’t see well.

“Thanks. I should start heading that way, I’ll see you at lunch.” You moved to leave but his tail had yet to release your ankle.

“Oooorrrr we’ll see you in a few days cause you should go home and sleep!” He slowly gave you a hug, his usual need to scoop you up and toss you around was repressed for obvious reasons.

“Right, well see. If I do end up calling in the rest of the night, tell Moon I said hi.” You watched him closely as you said this, hoping to get some sort of reaction out of him that might give away why they’d been acting so strangely about one another. But all that happened was that he gave you a strained smile and started ushering you out the doors.

“Right… will do- but you should definitely just head home ‘if’ you’re not feeling well.”

“Don’t push it, mister.” You did what you could to muster a smile, but he could see right through it.

That worried look never left, even after he lost sight of you up the ramp and out the main lobby. His loosing sight was a lucky break as it was then that your feet decided to trip over thin air and send you face-planting onto carpet. Even worse is that you didn’t bother trying to get up for about three minutes, and then getting up was only mildly successful.

You didn’t really want to see if that ribbon threat was an actual possibility.

___________________________________________________________________________________

Once your tool belt was readjusted, you bit the bullet and stepped foot into the Fazcade, proud to admit you only filched a little at the lights and noise. The place might have been pretty much empty, but the neon lights and cacophony of arcade start screens filled in any potential for silence. You were already nauseous without the overstimulation, but to make matters worse you didn’t make it three feet before the sound of deep drum beats assaulted your ears.

“DJ- volume- please!” The spider-like animatronic did as you asked and lowered his volume. After you were sure the noise level was semi-tolerable again, your hands lowered from their place over your ears. Unexpected black smears came off on your palms, the sickly sweet scent of ichor permeated the air. That was just another thing to go in the ‘try and ignore it’ box, but the thing was getting awfully full at that point.

All that you had for the night that couldn’t be done in P&S was a quick fix on one of those air hockey tables. It wasn’t dispensing the pucks correctly anymore and Devon had continued his habit of leaving early up to this point so this fix was a you problem.

Once you’d managed to stumble your way over to it, you slowly got to your knees and went to work. Even from across the room you could feel DJ’s eyes on you the whole time.

“What’s up, big guy?” You rasped; even a cough to clear your throat did nothing to help.

If understanding what Sun was saying using english was hard, then interpreting what the noises DJ made was ten times as difficult. But if you had to guess, it was something along the lines of what Sun had already tried to get through your skull.

“M’ not sick. That’s physically impossible. Stuff like germs can’t survive in my body much less propagate.”

“… viruses?” You didn’t catch that first part, but it was a good question.

“Viruses aren’t technically alive but I don’t think so anyway. It’s still a thing that requires the host’s body to act a certain way that mine definitely does not.” Even just those short sentences made you out of breath, so you took a moment to lean your head against the side of the metal table. “Before you ask, I don’t know about computer viruses.”

A computer virus made far less sense for a biological being, but it wouldn’t be the first time you’d ever heard of something like that happening. In the early days of the internet, you’d heard rumor of a man who successfully managed to contain his soul on a computer but with horrible consequences. He was forced to relive his death over and over again, and the virus caused people to see that on every screen they came across.

As much as you wanted to be a petulant child about it, that could very well have been a possibility. The idea that you weren’t sick was just drilled so deeply into your head that it was hard to entertain the idea of anything else. On top of the fact that it was hard to entertain any ideas at all.

You put the dispenser assembly back into the table and started putting everything back together. There was no memory of having actually done any of the work, much less that you’d done it correctly, so you’d just have to wait and hope you’d successfully fixed it.

It took a good minute of hyping yourself just to stand up, and for good reason as the world dipped beneath you and stars irrupted in your vision, or what was left of it. With your arms braced against the table, you took a moment to steady yourself before dragging yourself over to one side of the rink. You pressed the little plastic card Fazco gave you to test games against the reader and something must have been watching over you as the tale-tell clunk of a puck hitting the dispenser rang out.

But you weren’t really paying attention to that, your focus was solely on keeping your non-existent lunch down as nausea threatened to overtake you once again.

It wasn’t working, and your body decided at the same time that an empty trashcan came into view that it was tired of holding on. You managed to rush over to it just in time for a sizeable portion of your body’s mass to come up through the easiest route. As you’d already known, it wasn’t food since you hadn’t actually eaten anything for some time now, having realized it wasn’t worth the effort. Instead it was the black goo that made up your body’s insides, now a dull grey and the consistency of chewed gum.

After the main event, your body still decided to give its best impression of a hairball and force you to dry heave for several minutes. You were so out of it you didn’t bother spitting out what was left in your mouth, instead choosing to let it drip past your lips as you set your head on the rim.

The fact that it had been getting harder to breathe, you tried to blame on the strain your form just went through, but the wet gurgling that signaled something far worse was accompanied by a fog filtering throughout your vision. For a moment you thought you’d just closed your eyes, but you realized that you could still see just the top of your line of sight and dread started to seep in.

You really hoped what you thought was happening was not the case, but as a final test, you grabbed a section of hair on your scalp and gave it a swift tug. That dread turned to something far worse as that piece came away completely, skin and all, leaving a sizeable portion of what could loosely be described as a skull exposed. On top of that horror, you couldn’t feel it. You couldn’t feel a thing; not your fingers and toes, not the gaping (and unbleeding) head wound, not the liquid pooling in your lungs. Things were getting bad and fast.

Your body was actively decaying.

You felt stupid, like you should have seen this coming. If your body couldn’t heal it, expel it, or otherwise get rid of it…

“ Fucking tits… DJ!” He was already standing over you before you’d uttered a word. Having grown concerned at your puking just a moment ago, he abandoned his stage in favor of checking on you. The air around you shifted as he set a massive hand on the ground for you to climb up on, and even that took a few moments.

“I need-” every other word was cut up by your gasping for breath. That hadn’t been liquid pooling in them, they were just dissolving, and while that cut out your need for air, it made it significantly harder to speak. “I need you to take me somewhere as far away from people as you can manage. My body is throwing a fit and pulling some phoenix bullshit. In about t-” you looked down at your watch, but quickly realized it had fallen off somewhere due to the speedy shrinkage of your limbs . “Shit, two minutes I’m going to be a quickly spreading pile of gunk and I need to make sure no one sees me.”

He’d been giving you affirmative beeps and whistles while carrying you into the bowels of the tunnels he uses to get around limited sections of the Plex, but you’d long since stopped being able to hear things. The remnants of your eardrums simply leaked out of your ears, just about completely cut off from the world.

“If anyone asks, and I mean anyone, I called in and went to bed. I don’t need the band or the daycare attendants worrying about me, I’m already sorry you got dragged into this.” He set you down just in time for the skin on your legs to start sloughing off in chunks.

What little awareness you had through your senses left as your body fell unconscious and subsequently died. You were booted out to and maintained a fixed perspective of the room and its contents, capable of doing nothing more than waiting and watching as your body finished decomposing and started to rebuild itself from the ground up.

___________________________________________________________________________________

Having a limited yet omniscious view of the local area was definitely disorienting after having been in a body for so long. It was still far off the mark, but the closest anything in this reality would get to understanding what the void was like. But the one thing they don’t tell you about it is just how fucking boring it gets.

When one goes from their free trial for physical senses expiring to inherently knowing that there are 87,420,269 particles of dust in the room, it’s a bit jarring. You’d spend some time ‘watching’ your body heal, its lichtenberg-esk tendrils slowly engulfing more and more space as time went on. It had gone from a mass the side of… well… a human body, to covering most of a twelve foot wall. The reasoning for this was that due to its caustic nature, it could break down surrounding materials and incorporate them into itself. Food did the same thing, but it wasn’t really in the state to ask for a pizza.

It had already been twelve hours, and it would be another twenty six more before it would be in a good enough state to hold your consciousness. In that time all you could really do is watch and wait, unable to see anything outside the confines of that tunnel.

Yet outside, things had certainly been happening. While sad he didn’t get to see you, Sun was delighted that you’d kept your promise to go home if you hadn’t felt well, he assumed. Since he couldn’t really leave the daycare to go check. It wasn’t really a lie as the Plex was your home, but you’d have preferred to actually sleep rather than everything that had happened.

Moon was the second to notice your absence but very much had the ability to ask around. His first stop was to ask Chica since the two of you were seen together the most and she was easy to get along with. But when she didn’t know, he moved on to DJ. Not that he thought the Music Man would know anymore than the band would, but they actually talked outside of this conversation. When Moon had first been put on patrols, the spider-like animatronic upped his detection sensitivity so that if anyone entered the arcade, he would be woken up. If it wasn’t Moon, it was generally you and both were good company, so he didn’t really mind.

When said lunar-themed animatronic came swooping in about six hours after your… incident, he was visibly relieved when DJ told him you’d gone to bed. He’d felt a bit bad about not telling the daycare attendant the whole truth, but he’d promised you and he intended to keep it.

Not just that, but as the two talked, he was getting the impression that neither of the boys knew about your non-human status. Just the small things, like how your temperature had been unusually low, or how he feared how fragile you could be. Both incorrect statements if they actually knew.

It made sense. If he hadn’t told them and you hadn’t brought it up, then they would have no way of knowing. And he wasn’t about to go telling your secrets to others. But the reassurance on his face easily betrayed the feelings they had for you, or at the very least they considered you a very close friend.

Still, There was a dread that settled across DJ’s circuits. The daycare attendants were going to find out about you one day, and he had the feeling it was not going to be pretty.

Chapter Text

It would have been so easy to just hop back into the drivers seat the second your body could maintain a single form for an extended period of time, but you knew better. You’d waited that long , you could wait one more hour . The urge to give in was strong, though, as your form now resembled what it once was and you could tell the last of its mock organs were finally settling into place.

Thirty-eight and a half hours. That was how long you’d been stuck doing literally nothing. Just waiting, watching the seconds tick by one after the other. While you had a vested interest in the state of your body, watching paint dry might have been more entertaining. But i t had been smart to remove yourself from anywhere near the general public due to your healing form’s natural spread. While nothing interesting had happened besides some property damage, the sight would still freak out the most stalwart of people .

Hour thirty-nine ticked by and had you as apprehensive as was possible in your current state. Under a technicality, your body was dead. No pulse, no brain activity, and yet cellular (or the closest you could get) regeneration persisted. By jumping back in, you’d be restarting all of your necessary functions and it would not be comfortable.

Actively decaying and melting hadn’t hurt, it felt like nothing simply because your nerves had gone dead before the worst of it. But this, though. This would be painful and overall simply uncomfortable. Brand new nerves, flesh, sensory organs all unaccustomed to any feeling what so ever. Like the pins of a sleeping limb only over your entire form, all while trying to get used to seeing, smelling, even just feeling in general. But it had to be done.

Anyone in the tunnel at the time would have felt the pressure drop dramatically alongside the temperature, but aside from that there was no difference after your reintroduction . You’d been a floating consciousness for thirty-nine hours and now it was time to deal with the consequences of your inaction .

You were right that it would be painful.

Agonizing. Disorienting. Like every cell in your body was screaming in your stead when you couldn’t muster up the voice. Your naked form writhed on the dusty floor in your attempts to hold on for the ride. The pain of digging your fingernails into the concrete and returning a bloody mess was nothing compared to the rest of you.

If every second outside your body felt like a minute, these seconds were more like hours. Even as certain sensations died down as you got used to them, others persisted from one unmet need or another. Hunger and your inability to breathe properly were the most pertinent, having sat themselves in the forefront of your mind.

Once you could get your body to listen, nothing could stop the over-the-top gasping that wracked your frame. You knew it was loud and that it might draw attention, but there wasn’t a single corner of you that could be diverted from the pain to caring at all.

The tunnels in your vision slowly cleared and just a few thoughts were able to slip past between the torment. Mostly that you were equally exhausted and hungry, but it was a start. Your body might have been in a healing state that whole time, but it wasn’t resting. It had been diverting all of its power into breaking down and reforming from the ground up… literally.

So on top of the regenerating, it hadn’t had a break from the constant work in over forty hours. And while under normal circumstances, you didn’t need to sleep, this was not an ordinary situation. The food issue would have to wait, unfortunately, as the second everything stopped hurting long enough, you r body fell unconscious .

You awoke to something poking your side a few hours later, but you didn’t know how many. Distantly, you were happy that your body could indeed make noise again, even if it was just a deep, pitiful groan. When your eyes opened to the view of the mini Music Man right in your face, there wasn’t enough energy in your body to act on your surprise. They gently clapped their cymbals, so gently you’d been afraid your ears didn’t work as there was no sound from the action. But a single deep beat let you rest assure that wasn’t the case. It took just about everything you had to flip from your side and onto your back, allowing you to take in the concerned DJ in full.

Everything was so bright and vivid, what little sound there was became amplified in your ears, even just the feeling of cold cement on your back was almost too much. He let out another beat when your eyes started to drift closed and it was finally enough to wake you.

“Mrpsohdu…” You frowned and took a moment to unscramble your thoughts. “’m okay now… and I mean it this time .” It was barely a whisper at that point. He replied something along the lines of ‘clothes’ but you didn’t catch all of it.

That had been enough to get you to look down at yourself, though. There were no attributes to speak of; nipples, genitals, even secondary sexual characteristics in general were all non-existent. What was the point if you didn’t need them? And any features you actually desired could just be put back once you could think better. But you could understand why DJ would be put off by your state, you were actually naked now instead of just technically.

Even just making convincing clothes took quite the chunk of any existing energy you had. You would actually kill for some food right about then, but you could use what litt le reserve you had to go down to the atrium and get something. Before you had the chance to ask, your stuff was slowly lowered down next to you placed in the palm of a giant hand.

“Thank yyyooouuu.” Came your reply as you sat up slowly and grabbed your Fazwatch, badge, and wallet. Luckily, it seemed as if your stuff had escaped any contact with your ichor, so there were no black stains or corrosion. Unluckily, your watch now read out the time of 1pm on Tuesday, meaning the Plex would be swarming with people. The DJ saw your grimace and asked what the issue was, in his own way.

“Nothing big, I’m just hungry but it’s the middle of the day.” Some rave whistles and a car horn told you to just call in some food from the daycare, since it would be empty.

“Fuck, you’re so smart, dude!” He appreciated the praise, but the smile you’d been wearing quickly fell as certain realizations came back to the forefront . “Hey, and… I’m sorry again. About all of this. Not just dismissing everyone’s worry but that I let it get so bad, and that you had to see me like that.”

A quick dismissal was your reply, that he accepted your apology but that you both needed to get going. And he was right, of course. His presence would be missed from the Fazcade and you needed to both get out of there and get to the daycare before your tiny burst of energy ran out.

You left your toolbelt with him and the two of you walked back the way you’d come and out to the neon light emporium that was the arcade. The noise and lights were almost painful, and a s you’d suspected, there were kids running around everywhere, carrying food and getting all the games oily. Less parents than you would have thought, though , maybe it was the general consensus that if they could play a video game then they could be unsupervised? Fuck if you knew, social standards changed all the time and you’d never raise a kid. Still, i t was weird how quick people were to forget the early days of Fazco Entertainment. Then again, Freddy couldn’t really fit a kid in his mouth now, soo…

No one spared you a glance, and for that you were thankful. Your usual pick of any employee jumpsuit would have made you stand out, so it was simple plain-clothes this time. No graphic tee, just the most nondescript outfit you could think of.

The daycare was on the ground floor so you started running through the best routes to get there. While the security tunnels would be the easiest, you didn’t want to run the risk of Devon or any of the few other human personnel catching you. But as you reached the public stairwell, you remembered that most people wouldn’t use the stairs unless they had no other choice, so the whole thing was empty.

Mostly anyway, as when you reached said ground floor, there was a pack of three teenagers vaping and filling the confined space with a disgusting mix of smells. They gave you a look and you sent it right back, the disappointment on your face was enough to make one of them put the cancer box behind his back and look away.

“Look, I really don’t have the energy to tattle, nor do I care about you enough to . I know for a fact that there isn’t a single thing I could say that might convince all, or any of you, to stop doing that. But look at me and understand when I tell you that there are far, far worse things than death out there. Things that would make you beg for its sweet release, and your family wont allow that. They’d love you so much they’d make you stay alive through the agony and suffering just to spend what little time you have left with them. And that-” all the kids looked when you pointed at the sitting one’s vape, “is your one way ticket.”

Two of them simply rolled their eyes at you, as you’d expected, but the one that actually looked ashamed earlier was just pale staring the box down like he was actually thinking. Even that little moment of hesitation was enough for you to be glad you’d stopped. That speech had mostly just been so you could feel like you tried, and that would have been enough, but if you’d actually managed to reach that kid, then maybe there was hope for the coming generations.

Once you’d left and made your way past the waves of people trying to get through the foyer, the paths to the daycare stood empty and you could finally breathe again. You’d started making your way through them, but hesitated. Something felt off and you wanted to blame the new body, or even the fact that you’d need to apologize to the boys for ignoring their worry too. It could have been either of those, or a mix of both, and you were content to leave it at that for the time being.

Looking down the ramp, you could see Sun behind the clear walls, creating a large card pyramid on one of the mats. The thing had to have been the total of three full decks and you distantly wondered where they’d come from. His face was all twisted up in concentration as he delicately set up some of the last cards. That whole tower was about as tall as him and he’d been hanging limply from their aerial wire trying to get it right.

You hadn’t meant to ruin it, you just walked down the ramp with the intent of letting him see you first to know you were there. But just as he was setting the last ones down, he glanced up momentarily before getting back to it, only for him to realize it was you, raise his arms in joy, and knock the whole thing down in the process. You’d winced, clamping your eyes shut in sympathy, but when you went to look, he was gone. Confusion momentarily flooded you, until the sound of giant wooden doors brought you back to reality.

This had to have been a game because Sun wasn’t at the doors either. They sat open, revealing an empty daycare and you figured he’d gone to hide so that you would catch him, but instead he caught you. Lanky arms wrapped around your middle from above and pulled you off the ground. It wasn’t high, but just enough so that you’d be caught off guard.

“Sunshine! You’re back! We missed you!” You hung there limply, looking at Sun’s expression of barely contained excitement. It was contagious, but while you were overjoyed to see him too, you were still feeling a bit guilty .

“Missed you guys too, Sunny-rays.” That was a new nickname you’d just made up, unable to stop staring at his rays rotating around his face faster than you’d ever seen before . Once you both were back on the ground, he wasted no time looking you over.

“We’re glad you got some rest, and you’re looking much, much better if I do say so, myself.”

Right… You gently grabbed his hands from their place cupping your cheeks.

“About that. I’m really sorry I didn’t listen to you… any of you. I was so convinced it was just the stress and that I could just power through it. That I just wasn’t trying hard enough. But you were all right, I was sick, and I promise to stop ignoring things when I think I know better. I’m just… I’m sorry.”

You’d never really been good with eye contact, much less while being so vulnerable, but in your attempt to maintain that laser focus, you missed Sun’s shocked expression, missed how his tail dropped to the floor, his rapid blinking in attempts to wake up from this dream. There was a full five second pause that was just getting more uncomfortable as it stretched on, before he finally snapped out of it and looked down to you.

“You… apologized?”

“Well… yeah. I was in the wrong and you were right. I shouldn’t have brushed everyone off like that, and I’m sorry.” He finally realized that his question had come across like it hadn’t been enough, and scrambled to try and get that worry off your face.

“No- I mean yes- I mean-” You watched him huff and try and get his word salad under control. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome? Sunny, you don’t have to accept my apology if you don’t wan-” You were rather quickly shushed with a hand over your mouth. The two of you looked just surprised as the other at this and he quickly pulled his hand back to his chest.

“That’s not it. It’s just… no one’s ever apologized to us before, not without someone making them, anyway.” You’d spent so much time with them at this point, you’d started to forget just how bad people had treated them in the past .

“That’s stupid. You deserve apologies, Sunny.”

“A lot of people don’t seem to think so, but thank you Sunshine.”

It had to be the new body that was making things feel weird, then. With the apology out of the way, that was the only reasonable explanation. But you knew better at this point to only consider the ‘realistic’ options.

“Soooo… it’s Tuesday. I’m off tonight. Wanna have another sleepover?”

“You know me, my answer every week never changes!”

___________________________________________________________________________________

“-and so she’s screaming that moose are falling from the sky! But her wife turns to her and you know what she says?”

The two of you had just been ‘yes, and’ing each other for about an hour at that point. Exclusively shitty puns phrased like a conversation. It was currently Sun’s turn, and even though your sides hurt from laughing so much, you still awaited his punchline with bated breath.

“No- snk- what did she say?” Between bits the two of you had been drawing, the one not it drew while the other thought up a pun and how to make it a regular sentence.

“She looks to her wife and replies, ‘it’s just rein-deer.” He’d mostly just been chuckling at that point, the absurdity of the bit having worn off, but he kept going just to hear your laughter and see the way your eyes crinkled when you did so. It didn’t matter that you knew the jokes were horrendous, , but it still took you a full minute to calm down at that one.

“Pheww. Okay. My turn.” You passed the mostly filled page back to him. This next one wasn’t good, but none of these really had been, just a fun time between friends. “That just reminds me of the time me and my friend Joey went down to the lake. We get on the boat and set off, but this guy pulls out his guitar instead of his fishing-pole and tries to convince me it’s just as good as anything we could catch out there. I ask him how that is and he just says that a guy at the bar told him it’s the same thing. I look to him and I say, ‘Come on man, everybody knows they ain’t the same! Everybody knows that you can tune a guitar, but you can’t tune a fish!”

You were fully aware he was just humoring you at that point, but you couldn’t help it. Everything felt so fresh, so vivid. Every mildly funny thing had you cackling, every color on the page was so intense, the moment you saw Sun’s excited face celebrating what had to be your fifth sleepover at that point, everything else flew out the window.

In fact, you’d completely forgotten about wanting to get food, only to be loudly reminded of that fact when your stomach growled. While a good reminder, it wasn’t supposed to do that, and it left you just as confused as you were hungry.

“Hungry, Sunshine?” He knew the answer and that grin on his face let you know that fact.

“Yeah, I completely forgot I’d meant to order food when I got here.” He said nothing and just watched you press a few buttons on your Fazwatch.

Once done, you realized just how full the page had gotten and subsequently just how long the two of you had been at this. The front was completely covered in doodles with not even an inch uncolored. When you’d handed the page to him there had been just enough space for one more and that was it, it seemed.

At that point you were starting to feel bad at the idea that maybe the two of you had done everything you could do in the daycare. You had a couple of new ideas, but they’d have to wait until the Plex closed. Until then…

“ Wanna watch a movie while I eat?”

The TV was still set up from a week ago. It had only left the daycare once since it had been first set up almost a month before . You’d scheduled a movie night at some point with the band and brought it over to Freddy’s room. The daycare attendants knew about it, but declined the offer to join even after you pouted about it. Their excuses had been a jumble of different ‘extremely important’ reasons, of course, but you weren’t about to drag them around to go do something they weren’t comfortable with. That much was obvious by then.

You’d spend at least one of your days off each week with the boys and tried to spend the other with the band. It would have been nice to just be able to do both, but it seemed that they weren’t really comfortable around anyone but you, and maybe DJ in Moon’s case. The two of them didn’t speak much, so they had that in common.

The intro song to Coraline started the same time your pizza came, you thanked the delivery bot for all the crowd surfing and took the food back inside. Out of all the amazing technological advancements hidden in the boys casing, you were a little surprised they couldn’t detect scent patterns. Sure, they hadn’t been built specifically for a daycare full of messy children, but they hadn’t been built to run security protocols either and there Moon was. Did Sun get any of it too? Like to protect the kids?

The food smelled… no different than usual, but the hunger aching in your gut made it smell amazing. You didn’t even sit down before cracking the box open and grabbing a slice. In the moment, you didn’t notice the moan you let out or the way your eyes rolled back when the slice hit your tongue, but Sun certainly did. His face whipped over to you with wide eyes and an almost unreadable expression, the only tell having been the death grip he had on the pillows beneath him.

At first he thought he misheard, but when that wasn’t the case h e wanted to hear you again. And again. And maybe even a third time. His circuits buzzed with an unknown feeling and y ou had no idea what you were doing to them. Every time t hey saw you, they wanted you close, wanted you to never walk out those doors again, and it was getting harder not to let that show. Just those few days apart while you were away was torture. But t hey would do anything to stay friends, stay close to you, even if it meant never letting you know how they really felt.

“Oh my gosh. I’m sorry you guys can’t eat anything, and I mean this isn’t even great pizza but it tastes amazing right now. You know that saying about pizza and sex?”

If he could grow pale, he would have then. Did you know what he’d been thinking somehow? No… no, you had that look of sincere obliviousness on your face that let him know he was just overreacting.

“C-can’t say I do, Sunshine. Wh-what is it?”

“Something like ‘pizza is like sex, even when it’s bad, it’s good’… Y’know, now that I say it out loud I don’t think I get it. Those are two very different things, but people make weird connections like that all the time. Like I’ve heard one about comparing boats with bowling balls but I think that one is about how different they are, so I got nothin.” You’d mostly been talking to fill out the time it took you to get back to the pillow pile. That thing had actually remained untouched from the first night.

Once you’d plopped down next to him, the box went on your tented knees while you watched the movie, w ay more than Sun did. Even if you’d seen this one far more than the rest and he hadn’t gotten to yet, all of his attention was focused on you out the corner of his eyes.

He really had been making an attempt to pay attention since you actually liked this one quite a bit, but you kept making these noises that would have driven him to violence if it had been anyone else. This small panting and lip smacking that should have triggered his misophonia, but instead sent shivers throughout his servos and he didn’t know what to do with that feeling. So he just sat there, more ridged than a May pole, trying desperately to focus on anything but what he wanted to do with you. Frankly, he wasn’t even sure what that would have been, just that he knew it would ruin the friendship between you.

“You good, Sun?” The question was muffled by your sixth slice of pizza, damn near the whole box was gone by the time you’d noticed his fans running on overdrive and drowning out the movie. Upon your asking, he’d become so tense that his chassis was clattering from the strain.

“Yes! Fine!” He really needed to calm down, you couldn’t know. Not now, not ever. They’d loose you and it would all be his fault and they couldn’t just-

“Do you, like, need a minute ?” That first incident weeks ago had made you upset, but now all three of you knew that the others were on the same page when it came to just taking a time out. Yet in those minutes, that had completely flown out of his mind.

“Yes! I-I mean, yeah. O-one second, I’ll be back.”

“Okey dokey. I’ll be here.” There was no sarcasm in your voice, just a simple statement of fact as you paused the movie and took out your phone to surf while he did his thing. The simple fact that he was allowed to take that time without you getting upset just brought all of those feeling back to the surface. So as quickly as he could, he called down their tether and rappelled up to their room.

And it didn’t bother you when either of them needed some space, heck you’d tagged out once or twice as well, but you did want to know if there was a specific trigger for them . Yours was usually just overstimulation, but theirs came at seemingly the most random times. Like just then. Was it cause of your eating this time? You knew you were being a bit loud, but the pizza was just so friggin good… sorta.

It wouldn’t do to make assumptions like that, anyway. If it was a consistent issue and they were genuinely upset about, then you’d hoped they would just tell you. Behavior can’t change if that person doesn’t know what it is.

You’d been scrolling through your phone’s saved images at that point, having grown immediately tired of the same four apps. The camera folder was just a bunch of you with your favorite animatronics. Selfies with the band, DJ, the boys, even mini MM, others were just random candid photos that you’d taken when the subject wasn’t looking.

One was last week when Monty dared Chica to roll up and eat an entire pizza in one go. She’d been up to it and demanded no one try to stop her, but it had gotten stuck about half way down so you had to swoop in to help her out. Despite the resulting panic, e veryone was in good spirits about it.

There were a couple after that of Roxy helping her girlfriend clean up all the oil left on her face afterwards. Monty had been making gagging faces at the display of PDA and Freddy lightly budded shoulders to get him to stop. The girls didn’t take it seriously and the gator gave a half hearted apology later, but still, no one was truly upset at his antics.

Earlier in the reel were some shots of the boys, you were only in them if they knew about the picture. Other times you’d been able to sneak in a couple shots when they were doing other things. Like one was of Sun engrossed in painting that he didn’t notice you pull out your phone, another was of Moon stacking those cylinder pillow toys when he’d knocked them down during a game of tag. You found it a bit ironic that Sun was usually the one that wanted to sit and do something, like art or a board game, and Moon preferred to run around and play a physical game. He was over… well… himself, you supposed, when you told him you had no idea how to jump rope because it meant he finally got to teach you something.

This one was of Sun trying to climb the outside of one of the playscapes when his paper plane veered off course during your contest to see who could make the best one. He was distant and high up, as he’d told you to stay put while he went to grab it. Weirdly, though, you couldn’t see his tail from this angle. It would usually have been pointed straight out in a comical way for him to try and balance but maybe he’d been using it to hold on to something. Kinda sad though, it was a cute photo and you liked the boy’s tail.

If felt like the literal moment you finished the last slice of pizza that Sun poked his head out from their balcony curtain and started making his way back down. So it had been the food thing. Good to know.

“Phew! All better, thank you, Sunshine.” You smiled back and him and set the empty box to the side.

“No problem, Sunny. Like I said, any time either of you need a minute, just let me know.”

“Will do! Now, where were we?” He asked just as he plopped down next to you, gesturing to the TV.

“Coraline just found the little door.” The blank stare he gave you spoke volumes. “Orrr we can just restart it?”

“Y-yeah, that sounds good. I like that idea.” With a small snort, you rewound the movie, letting it play from the start even if only, maybe, fifteen minutes had passed.

For those first few sleep overs, neither of the boys would hesitate to pull you into their lap and just spend hours sitting back like that. But more and more recently, it seemed like they’d been pulling back when it came to physical affection. Part of you’d hoped it had to do with the way they’d been treating you like glass due to your illness ha ving taken hold, but even after you’d shown him you were doing better, Sun still didn’t initiate contact like he used to.

Neither of the boys had told you, or even attempted to let on that they’d been having more disagreements lately. Mostly on how they ought to treat you, but other, more simple things as well. After Moon’s initial threat weeks ago, Sun had been tiptoeing around certain subjects so as not to upset you like that again. Whereas Moon would just change the subject if he had even an ounce if a thought that you’d be upset about it. This distance was, ironically, the reason you’d actually been bothered.

There was something they weren’t telling you and it was getting on your nerves, not that you had any room to talk. You’d still had yet to open up about your past what so ever, they still didn’t know the story behind your only scars and they never brought it back up for obvious reasons.

“Hey, Sunny…” He peeled his gaze away from the movie to look at you.

“Did I-”

“Hellooo! Anyone in here?” Your eyes widened and your face went ashen at that voice coming from the lobby. Easily recognizable but kind of unwelcome at the current moment.

“Stay here.” You whispered, gesturing for him to cover up the TV. A quick sprint out the doors and up the ramp later and you were face to face with your favorite  green obsessed secretary.

“H-hey, hi, Ms. Emstein! What… uh… what are you doing here?” You stumbled over your words, leaning against a wall in hopes of blocking any direct sight she had to the daycare proper.

“Oh, just wanted to make sure you were doing alright! When you called in the other day, I was a bit concerned, but I saw your Fazwatch order food so I thought I’d come down and check on you!” She left her real question unasked, but you heard it loud and clear.

“I’m good! Thank you for checking up on me. Yeah, I don’t like calling in but I’d gotten pretty sick and didn’t want to get germs everywhere.” You could see her trying to find a polite way of asking-

“So… I couldn’t help but notice it’s your day off.” There it was. “I was just wondering… what you’re doing here.”

Think fast.

“I’ve been using my days off to tend to the social aspects of the animatronic’s programming. There isn’t enough time during my shifts to ensure everyone is running correctly, so by spending time with them outside of my schedule I can ensure they’re interactions with guests and other staff members are up to standards and tweak them accordingly.” Smooth.

“Oh! Well, are they?” She looked genuinely curious at your bullshitting.

“The band and DJ, absolutely. I’m not quite sure about the daycare attendants, I’m going to need more time with them to make sure. Before it’s suggested, rebooting them would create far more problems than it would fix.”

“I wasn’t going to suggest it, but thank you for letting me know.” She pushed her glasses up her nose. “And I’m obligated to tell you that you won’t receive overtime pay for this extra work, I’m afraid.”

“Not an issue.”

“Great! So… how are they treating you?” She leaned over a bit in an attempt to get a look into the daycare, but you subtly moved in the way.

“Good! They’re good!”

“They’re not, I don’t know, being a bit abrasive with you?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, when the daycare was open, we had human staff posted there as mandated by the state and there were some reports about… testy behavior towards the adults.”

Really… that was interesting.

“No… no, they’ve been super sweet with me. In fact, I’m having a hard time recreating the sort of issues that might have lead to that incident with Moon. Not that I’m trying to get attacked, but I wouldn’t feel right saying that they’re ready for the daycare to reopen if I’m not one hundred percent sure.” She nodded in understanding, again, she wanted to say something else, but felt awkward doing so.

“I don’t feel right lying. Job-wise I don’t really care that you’re down here. I did want to check up on you, but I am on the clock and… you know.” You motioned for her to continue. “I just… wanted to thank you, for what you said awhile back. About the friends thing?”

Oh yeah, you’d completely forgotten about that.

“No problem. Did, uh… did things work out?”

“Not with that particular friend, no.” She took her glasses off and pulled a cleaning cloth out of her chest pocket, getting to work polishing off any fingerprints. “But she did confess to making those things she said about my other friends up. Her excuse was something about how she felt they were bad for me, but it’s not her say, you know?”

“I do.” You nodded.

“So, we don’t talk anymore, but my real friends were really happy to hear from me! They even said they were getting worried I wasn’t talking to them anymore. I found out the hard way she’d gone into my phone and blocked their numbers. But- uh, anyway, I’m just rambling now. Just… thank you, for the insight.”

“You’re very welcome. I’m sorry I was right, but also glad you got out of that situation. Can you… uh… not tell Ms. Dayton I’m here? She didn’t seem too pleased the time I told her I’d come back early just to say hi to the band.”

She mimed zipping her lips and tossing the key. “I have no clue what you’re talking about. In fact, I’m talking to open air right now. Thanks again, open air, and have a good rest of your night.”

The two of you waved goodbye and you watched her walk off. That paranoid part of you was screaming not to be too friendly with people that could get you fired, but you wanted to believe she was actually a good person. Even if most of the people here just weren’t… including you.

The things you’d done over time, to help others just survive, weren’t worth repeating. It wasn’t need to know information. You looked down at the daycare, at Sun happily coloring at a table while you were gone and felt that guilt overtake the pervasive wrongness that permeated the air. How did that old cartoon put it?

‘I barely know you.’

‘That’s a good thing.’

Chapter Text

“Soooo, what was that about?” Sun asked from across the daycare as you gently shut the large wooden doors behind you.

“Hm? Oh, Ms. Emstein was checking up on me after I called in the other day and thanked me for some advice a while back. Nothing big.”

“She’s not going to…”

“Tell anyone I was here on a day off? No. Well, I asked her not to and gave her a bo logna answer about testing yall’s ‘social interactions.’ To quell your inevitable worry, no, I’m not testing you or anyone else on anything. I simply enjoying hanging out with you guys and am lying to cover my tracks.” At this point you understood that he was of the mind that ‘if (I) can worry about it, ( I ) will,’ so it was just easier at that point to nip it in the bud.

While he appreciated your understanding, he felt a bit strange that he was either that predictable, or you just knew him that well… or both . If it was the former, that was a him issue, but the latter just reminded him that the two of them knew next to nothing about you.

You plopped yourself back down next to him after pulling the blanket he had used off the TV and hit play. Now that he was finally able to actually pay attention, he kinda liked the movie so far. The back of his mind grumbled that Coraline was a brat, but you enjoyed it so he would too.

On the flip side, you weren’t paying attention at all, instead, inevitably focusing on your interaction just minutes ago. Ms. Emstein said she wouldn’t tell and you wanted to take her word on that, but it still set off alarm bells in your mind at how the situation looked from the outside. It was weird that you liked spending time with the animatronics to anyone who didn’t understand their capabilities for sapience. They were their own people under all that metal and circuitry, but no one else seemed to understand that and frankly, it would put your friends existences in danger if they did. So you’d rather she think you were weird (or a pervert ) than entertain the idea they w ould be reset.

“What do you think the Other Mother actually is?” Sun’s question snapped you back to reality, and you looked up at the movie, having been staring at your hands for most of it.

“Umm… well, they allude to the idea that she’s like a spider a lot, so probably something like that. If I had to guess, she’s a creature that coexists with a pocket dimension and requires the souls of children to perpetuate its lifespan. But she can only directly control the place and the puppets in it have the potential to become their own people depending on proximity to the child they’re made for . Fun fact, Wybie doesn’t exist in the book.” He looked down at you surprised. “Yeah! It makes the story ten times as creepy knowing she’s alone in both places.”

The conversation died there as his attention was drawn back to the film. You were starting to get bored, and that exhaustion from recent events was creeping back in. It was still rather early, and you had the rest of the night off… even if that wasn’t his job, he might not mind it. Couldn’t hurt to ask.

“Hey, would it be cool if I took a nap?” His gaze snapped back to you and it took a moment for him to figure out what you’d asked.

“No- I mean, yes, that’s fine!”

“Cool.” Without another word you scooted away from him and flopped over so your head was resting on his thigh. In his shock, he didn’t seem to know what to do with that hand so you grabbed it an placed it on your head. If they were going to tip toe around affection, that was their prerogative, didn’t mean you had to go along with it. You’d spent far too long denying yourself because you were afraid of getting too close. But as long as you never acted on it, things were fine! You could pretend nothing was there!

It felt like the moment his hand hit your scalp, you were out. That overwhelming safety of their proximity was hard to find, and you’d just spend almost two days as a pile of goop sitting in a tunnel even the Plex’s ghosts would have forgotten about.

The action made his coolant pump melt… metaphorically, of course. It was the closest they had to a heart and the feeling you induced was the same. A whisper of Moon’s voice had joined teams with the little voice in his head that chastised that he didn’t deserve you. That it would inevitably be his fault you were driven away, and why they would be alone once again.

But he shook his head and tried to put a lid on it. Worrying about that in particular wouldn’t end well, and watching your peacefully sleeping form made them easier to ignore. As gently as he could, he ran the back of his fingers over your cheek, taking in the way your lips unconsciously curled at the edges and how the furrow in your brows relaxed.

He wanted to just come out and ask for the reassurance he needed, to know that you’d never leave them, but he wouldn’t get very far without just admitting everything. The want for a deeper connection, their feelings for you, the secrets he’d been keeping. That would easily be the nail in the coffin, the antithesis of his reason for asking in the first place.

No, if he could just pretend the feelings weren’t there, just try to make it through that day and keep that up for the rest of time, then everything would turn out all right. He just had to pretend… unknowingly, the exact same way you were.

___________________________________________________________________________________

You woke some time later to a finger poking your face. The first few jabs had been enough to make you stir and try to bat it away, but after that you were finally awake enough to pry your eyes open. Sun was bent down to your level, one hand supporting him and the other held to his chest when you tried to grab it.

“Sorry, Sunshine. But you got upset when I let you sleep too long last time.” You heard about every other word he said.

“So you thought poking my face was the best route?” A tired smile graced your lips in an attempt to let him know you weren’t actually upset.

“I tried shaking your shoulder first, but that didn’t do anything.” He sat back on his heels as you got up, rubbing the sleep out of your eyes with both fists.

“That didn’t get me up, and instead of freak out about it you decided poking my face was the second best idea?”

“Oh no! I can worry and poke, don’t doubt that!” You let out a small laugh and stretched your arms over your head, and he tried very unsuccessfully not to stare at your exposed midriff.

“You just got an answer for everything, huh?”

“Not everything…” He mumbled, taking the moment you yawned to express at least a bit of his grief.

“Hm?”

“Nothing! I was… uh… asking what you wanted to do now that you were up!”

“What time is it?” You asked, smacking your dry mouth.

“Around 10pm.” He pointed a finger at your startled look. “Come on now, seven hours is an appropriate amount of time to sleep!”

“Yeah, yeah.” You muttered, pushing his hand out of your face playfully. “I just meant for it to be a nap, though. Kinda dug into our time together, ya know?” Even your mild frustration at not getting to spend enough time with him brought those strange feelings back to the surface.

“Sooooo, what did you want to do?” He asked, and y ou brought a hand to your chin as a mischievous grin spread across your face.

“I dunno, what do you wanna do today?” He caught on to the bit almost immediately.

“I don’t know, what do you want to do today?”

“I dunno, what do you wanna do today?”

“I don’t know, what do you want to do today?”

“I dunno, what do you wanna do today?”

This bit continued for a full minute before you finally cut in.

“Okay, okay, how about one more movie? While we think of stuff. Have you seen all of them yet?”

“Not all of them. I tried a horror movie one time and did NOT have any fun.”

“Oh? Which one?” You asked, as he sat in your now vacated spot and you crawled over to the movie cases, of which there were now three.

That week after the phone explosion, you’d still been feeling like shit, but used a day off to wander around town for more junk to gift everyone, and came across a yard sale. Said sale had two completely full DVD cases that you just had to bring back with you. Most of them were crap, old B-movies or stuff meant for kids, but that didn’t mean you had to watch those. Hell, half the kid’s stuff was scratched to shit and were unplayable anyways .

“The Thing.”

“Oh, yeah! I actually like that one, but I can see why you might not. An alien creature taking the form of people and turning into a body horror nightmare? Yeah, I can… I can see that…” The longer you spoke the more you realized how much you had in common with it. You tried not to let him see the face you made at that realization, and the subsequent one that it was probably a hint not to talk about the whole ‘eldritch’ thing. If they weren’t comfortable with your non-human status then you could take that hint. “Uh… how about… this one?”

You pulled out a disc and showed Sun the art on the top. In the attempt to put your feelings aside, you’d missed the way his face tilted to the side in confusion, or the way he was about to reach out and ask if you were okay. Instead, he focused on the DVD and tried to gauge what it might be about from just the art and title.

“Corpse Bride?” He echoed the name and looked to you confused. “Is it scary?”

“Not reeeaaallyy, it’s a gothic setting, but the horror aspects of it are almost non-existent. Like, I’d be comfortable showing this to a five year old, levels of scary. It’s super cute, I promise, and there’s singing in it!” You wiggled the disc and his head perked up at the prospect of songs. He’d expressed a distaste for a good chunk of Disney movies for one reason or another, but if anything, he did enjoy the singing.

Once the new disk was inserted, you knee-crawled your way back over to him and plopped down for the second time that day. While skipping the pre-movie ads, Sun looked over to you.

“So what is it about?”

“Do you want me to tell you, or do you want to find out on your own?” You watched him wiggle in his seat at the choices, while he did so, a patch of dirt on his face made you squint forward, and then lean back to take him all in. During your mental check out th ose last few weeks, you’d completely forgotten about that plan to clean them up , and their filth level had just been increasing since then.

He’d been about to answer when you gently grabbed his arm, licked your thumb, and used it to scrub off the top layer of dirt. To your shock and horror, you realized they were a completely different color than you’d originally thought. The grey tinted yellows and beige gave way to their vibrant variations. Sun’s expression was practically unreadable while his motherboard spewed out the equivalent of keyboard smashing, and yours was of barely contained disgust at his current state.

“Sooo… um. I’m not gonna make you two do anything you don’t want to, bu uuuuu t do you mind if I give you two a good clean? I mean, the rest of the daycare is spotless , great job by the way , so it’s only fair you get to feel the same!” Your quick bullshitting worked when he finally came back to the present.

“Y-yeah… I mean, sure.”

“Yes! You won’t regret it! But we can totally watch the movie first. I’ll play some music when we get to it.” He’d only been half listening, his code still reeling from your actions. When the children drooled on him, there was nothing but disgust, so your impromptu spit shine lighting up his circuits in adoration left him rather confused.

You’d stopped paying attention to him or the mess on his chassis in favor of keeping up with the film. This would be the second in a row Sun hadn’t really been paying attention to, and you’d expressed an interest in both so he felt a bit bad about his dissociation. But you always had the two of them feeling such strange things. Each and every time their wires trailed butterfly touches, it became harder to conceal and neither knew what would happen if they ever stopped being able to.

“ OH! This is my favorite song of the movie!” Sun came crashing back to the present at your outburst. Playing on the screen was what could only really be described as a bunch of skeletons dancing and using each other as instruments. As contrast to the bright colors and uplifting atmosphere was a group of dead people singing about just that fact.

A rather macabre theme for a kids movie, but it wasn’t addressed like that, more like an uplifting way to introduce the inevitable concept to a younger audience. At first it stuck him as odd that anyone would actually like that, but then he looked down at you; all your quirks and stims, and then it made sense. You were just like that, and they wouldn’t have you any other way.

___________________________________________________________________________________

“So, what did you think?” You finally came to realize that every time you showed them a film you liked, they never remarked on if they enjoyed it or not.

He paused for a moment. “…I can see why you like it.”

“But you don’t.” It was more a statement than a question.

“I-I didn’t say that, Sunshine. I-”

“Sunny, you don’t have to like it.” It seemed like any time you’d made progress on Sun’s fawning habit, something else popped up.

“I… don’t?” You were gonna blow something up one of these days.

“No! Sun, you could tell me to my face that you hated it and I’d be fine. We’re allowed to like different things. As long as you don’t rag on someone for enjoying something you don’t, it’s fine.”

“Oh… well… six out of ten, then?” He still winced in preparation to be yelled at.

“Okay. So not a zero out of ten! W hat did you like about it?” You kept your face neutral and got up, taking a moment to hold out your hands to ‘help’ him up.

“Th-the songs were nice… and the character s .” Once standing, you walked over to the security desk and pulled the chair out from behind it, rolling it over to more stable ground on the foam pads near the playscapes.

“That’s good! And what didn’t you like?” It might be slow going, but you wanted him to get more comfortable expressing ‘negative’ emotions, at least around you.

When you were sure the chair wouldn’t roll everywhere or fall over, you directed him to sit in it with a dramatic flourish. A special throne of sorts, all for him. With butt in chair, you wandered over to the various cubbies that usually housed children’s shoes and other possessions, but was now filled with the cleaning and art supplies you’d given him over time.

You could hear him make various sounds of discomfort from across , followed by the creak of a chair no longer occupied .

“Umm… w-what all do you need, Sunshine? I could-” A finger was pointed in his general direction as your attention was still on gathering supplies that would work on them.

“Sit.” He did so without a word, hands to his chest. “What did you not like?”

“All the dying… a-and the ending.”

Very few of the cleaning agents were safe to use on their paint or their sensitive mechanics in general, so you grabbed what was and waddled your way back over to the animatronic currently wiggling uncomfortably in the spotlight. After setting everything down around you but within reach, you sat on the blue dividing wall and pulled his chair closer with your foot .

“Where would you like to start?” A single, shaking hand was mutely placed in your lap . “So, what about the ending did you not like?”

Y ou got started by spraying one of th ose few safe cleaners all over said hand, but from a distance, dampening it, but not leaving so much that it would drip off, before going in with a toothbrush you’d found. While you weren’t entirely sure why the daycare had them, it was sitting in an unopened pack so you figured they were good enough to use.

“Well… I, uh- I feel bad for Emily. All that time waiting for the man that… killed her. B ut I didn’t want Victor to die either! I just… I don’t know what I wanted.” His words were broken up occasionally with twitches anytime you slid the brush over his exposed joints.

“I can see that. You start to root for her as the movie goes on, and turning into butterflies doesn’t really feel like a satisfying conclusion.” You never ceased to amaze him. That you not only, really, understood what he meant, but that you’d kept your promise to not be mad as his opinions. There was always a small panicky animal in him that was simply waiting for you reveal that you’d been faking everything this whole time.

But even then, that wasn’t what his mind was truly focused on.

“So, what do YOU like- AHAH! Sorry, that tickles. -Like about it?” His attempt to be serious and pull any sort of background information from you failed miserably at his giggles. You really were trying to be gentle, but his reaction never stopped being funny.

“I like how it addresses death as a concept. Not as something to be feared, but as a way to celebrate a life well lived. How they contrast the color schemes as bland and grey in the land of the living, but bright and colorful in the land of the dead.”

That inevitable question came to the forefront of his mind, that simple ‘what do you think happens when you die?’ But you were currently working on his constant reminder that it didn’t really matter for things like him. That even if you stayed with them, they would still loose you one day.

It didn’t escape your notice that he’d been going quite far more often recently. Of course it was a good thing to think about things before you said them, or just in general really, but his quiet spells were never just a thought. You could recognize a spiral anywhere, even if you wouldn’t admit to yourself just how you could .

Being upbeat and noisey and fidgety was something he had in common with Chica, and you’d imagine they’d get along if given the chance to get to know one another. A more rational part of you wanted the attendants to have other friends besides just you simply because they deserved to have more individuals to talk to, and in the not simple way, maybe you’d have less hangups about acting a bit more on your feelings.

But as things stood, it didn’t feel right.

So to push those thoughts down once again, you pulled out your phone with a clean hand and set it up to play a random song from your play list. It seemed as thought luck was on your side when a light and poppy tune started blaring through the speakers, yanking Sun out of whatever he’d been torturing himself with. His gaze turned to you, and you pretended not to notice the way his features softened at your thoughtfulness, nor the way it made your nerves flutter.

By the time you were finished with the first hand, that song had finished and was replaced with another light tune. Any time the song changed you’d been holding your breath, fully aware that there were some rather strange or downright depressing ones on there. Some of them were older in your memory than others, so occasionally one would pop up and you wouldn’t recognize it until halfway through .

Sun’s rays would dance in time with the beat and his face-plate would spin as this was his attempt to not rock and bounce around so you could work. Every once in a while, though, he’d get lost in the act of just watching you. The fact that you’d come in on a day off just to spend time with them. That you’d go out of your way to do what was essentially unpaid labour just to clean them up. The little faces you’d make when working on a tough stain, or the feeling of your breath on their mechanisms.

At which point he would begin to twitch in a mildly alarming way, only to snap out of it when you looked up at his face. The twitching was a tad concerning, but you’d leave it up to his discretion on whether or not it was a real issue. Both of you unaware of the fog slowly encroaching over his thoughts. Finally, towards the last half of his other hand, a song you knew quite well came on, so you decided to sing along.

“-I promise I’m not lyin.’ Go ahead, ask anybody who has seen me tryin’.” You started out quietly, only gaining enough courage to sing louder when Sun started beaming brighter than his namesake. “I'm not goin'. If it seems like I did, I'm probably waitin' outside-”

Out the corner of your eye you could see his free hand flapping slightly in excitement, making your heart soar.

“-hissin' while she scratched me. What she was tryin' to say was ‘Ogie, come and catch me.’ I learned quickly, that perseverance stood between a cat and her new best friend, me !” The little emphasis you put on the last word, arms raised like it was actually you singing the song to an invisible audience got a laugh out of him. Unbeknownst to you, he’d been recording this whole thing, simply adding it to the countless other videos that he could play while you were gone.

Seemed you weren’t the only one sneaking candid keepsakes .

Once both hands were done, casings and all, you got up and motioned for him to turn to the side in the chair so you could work on his back. It was definitely out of order from how you’d usually do it, but you had decided to watch the movie before getting to work for a reason.

Th at song ended and Sun clapped a little as you took an over the top bow. After spraying a rag and getting back to it, the next song came up and you frowned a bit. It was familiar in a distant way, surfacing an emotion you couldn’t quite place. This happened from time to time, though, once the lyrics came up you’d remember.

The first thirty-ish seconds was just instrumentals and vocals that evoked such a melancholy that it became uncomfortable. Regardless, you began to sing along, hoping to either find its place in the timeline of your life, or figure out whether you wanted to skip it or not .

“On some level I think I always understood. That these hands of mine were clumsy, not clever. And I tried to do the best that I could, but try as I might I couldn't bring myself to hold you.”

That feeling just intensified as the song went on, a tight pain in your chest that seemed so out of place. Something was coming into focus but it was distant still, just out of reach.

“It’s a secret I keep tucked inside my chest, with this heart of mine that's guilty not remorseful. There is love that doesn't have a place to rest, but it would have buried you if it had settled on your shoulders.”

Everything finally came to you in a suffocating wave . The reason you’d saved it, at what time it had connected the distant threads of your psyche. Why your chest hurt so much that that pain had begun to spread.

It was her .

Of course it was because of her. That was what everything boiled down to at some point, wasn’t it?

“It’s a secret I keep tucked inside my chest, with this heart of mine that's guilty not remorseful. There is love that doesn't have a place to rest, but it would have buried you if it had settled on your shoulders.”

Your hands were soggy with chemicals and you didn’t want Sun to catch on that you were upset, that was the reason you didn’t leap over and change the song. Definitely not because your body had frozen in place, unable to do anything more than tremor as oily tears collected in your eyes.

“On some level I think I always understood, that a ship could never really love an anchor. So, I did the only thing that I could, and severed the rope to set you sailing from my harbor.”

Instead of the daycare, you saw flashes of red hair and untouched forests. The scent of pressed flowers and tanned leather followed . Bu t was a short song, you could bear through it. The last thing you needed was him freaking out that you were upset over something so simple… again.

“There are times when I still wonder about you. Y ou are someone I have loved but never known, a nd you’ll never see the reasons I had f or keeping my claws away when they were close enough to hurt you.”

Your voice continued to ring out in the same tone and pace it had before, as it ran on autopilot, betraying nothing about your internal conflict.

Why the fuck had you kept this song! Just had to think something about the good luck on your shuffle.

“I am selfish, I am broken, I am cruel. I am all the things they might have said to you. Do you ever think of me and my two hands a nd wonder why they never soothed your fevers…”

The heavily blurred daycare faded completely, replaced by the same scene you had no choice but to replay time and again, as if the ending would ever change. On your back in an open field, with warm rain pelting your face despite having been shielded from the storm by the woman straddling your lap. She was shaking and trembling in spite of the cold. Her face was the only clear thing you could see, as everything else had blurred with time. Even the ornate dagger you’d gotten her, that was currently poised above your chest, was nothing more than background haze.

Ironic that your gift would be your end.

Then came the howl of dogs and the steady beat of hooves growing ever nearer. An agonized face tore away from yours and towards the noise, a harbinger of the inevitable conclusion the two of you must act out. Your gentle hand was placed on top of her trembling fists, clutching the hilt as a stand-in when she couldn’t hold you instead. She looked back to you, rain dripping off of her curls and mixing with the trails of tears.

While the sound of the hunters closing in could reveal just how much time the two of you had left, you would be left guessing as your heartbeat became so loud it blocked out everything else. Your mouth moved, and you could feel the vibrations in your chest as you’d said something, but the exact words had been lost to time. Her face screwed up in despair and she violently shook her head.

She replied then, and what you would give to know what those words were. Years had been spent learning to read lips and reliving your torment over and over, but it wasn’t any language you could recognize. Some old dialect that had been erased from history for one reason or another.

With a steady hand over hers, you helped push the blade closer, just enough to pierce the skin, and you refused to show any pain. The dogs must have been closing in at that point, as she looked off into the distance again. Her lip trembled as she turned to you, gave you one last kiss and whispered something in your ear. Again, y ou didn’t know what she said, and never would. A s she raised the dagger above her head and screamed before plunging it into you.

It was pain and blackness for a long time, then-

“Sunshine?” With all the grace of a cat in zero-G, Sun’s voice snapped you back to the present. Your immediate reaction was to take a deep, shaky breath, and it took a moment more to realize you hadn’t been doing so that whole time.

But that whole time was more like ten seconds as you heard the end of the same song still playing. Blessedly, Sun hadn’t turned around yet, still facing the way you’d asked him to, so you took that opportunity to hastily wipe away any lingering tears with the sleeve of your ‘shirt.’

“Ye-” you cleared your throat, having winced at the raggedness there . “Yeah? What’s up?”

“Are you okay? You… you got real quiet there… and stopped moving .”

The the knee-jerk reaction was to lie and say you were fine, to deny anything had happened, it would be far easier than to try and explain the whole story in the state you were in, much less without brining up the topics they were uncomfortable with. It felt wrong, but you were backed into a corner.

The less they knew, the better.

“’m fine, Sunny.” You murmured, trying valiantly to steady your heartbeat. “It’s- uh, just a sad song, is all.”

“Oh, um. Do you- do you want to talk about it?” The quiet sound of crinkling metal rang out as you peeked over his shoulder to find him fidgeting with his hands again, denting the casing s . He squeaked when you tossed the now dirty rag over them and got a new one.

“Fidget with that instead, please.”

“R-right! Right…” It didn’t escape his notice that you’d dodged the question, and while he knew he had no right to pry, it didn’t feel fair when you got to … even if it was just about movie preferences and not something that had happened in the past that was bad enough to elicit such a reaction from you.

The second you’d stopped working on his back, he knew something was wrong. That sort of pole-like stillness suited a corpse better than you. Then you stopped singing, then you’d gone completely silent, not even the sound of your breath could be heard. Alarm bells finally caught up with him when he’d felt a single warm drip hit his chassis, but he when he spoke up, it successfully pulled you out of it. Thus, giving you the perfect opportunity to pretend that nothing had happened.

Did you not trust them? Had they done something to prove that they weren’t worth that sort of vulnerability?

Another poppy song filled the silence that followed, as neither of you had really recovered from the sour mood that lingered in the air from your… fit. They didn’t need to be around for that. What was wrong with you?

Akin to your spiral, Sun, too, was having a rather difficult time. That pressing, prying request burned through his circuit. Just to ask you to open up to them a bit. Just a little. But as he repressed it, another strange feeling was overtaking his circuits . Not the overstimulated one that was an easy fix with some alone time . No, it was that one that buzzed through his form and pulled the rug out from under any train of thought he tried desperately to cling on to.

That familiar feeling that he needed to reset to get rid of , that had caused Moon’s collapse and your health to decline. But midnight was just around the corner, he knew this, so it was a war between recreating that incident or hoping Moon would have enough wherewithal to power through it. This was the only feeling that transferred between the two of them, and the last time this had happened… well…

Sun didn’t have the time nor the focus to act out a plan as the lights finally went off, shocking you only because you had to catch his body as he sagged backwards and off the chair .

Chapter Text

The daycare attendant’s weight pressing against you was no issue, the boys were only about 350lbs, and while that was a bit suspect if they’re meant to be around toddlers, it was more like a holding a grape for you. No, the issue was that they were still currently half sitting in a rolling chair that was slowly drifting away. Anyone who walked in at that point would have been in for a treat at your incredibly awkward pose of holding the attendants nearly limp body and trying to hook your foot under the chair’s wheels.

Luckily, Moon came to his sensed fast enough to not worry about that. Unluckily, instead of getting up and relieving you of this weight, he just stared up at you blankly, like he didn’t quite recognize you, or anything really. What was that phrase?

A ‘mile-long stare?’

“Uh, Moonbeam? Think you could sit up for me?” After a pause, h e finally did as you asked, but as you popped your joints and shook out the stiffness in your arms, you missed the increasingly confused look on his face. Only the sound of the bells on his tail slowly whipping back and forth gave any indication as to his true mood.

Distantly, he knew this feeling that had blanketed itself over his mind, he knew that something about it was important, but not exactly what. Every time he tried to put the pieces together, something would come up behind him and steal them away. It was jittery, and annoying, and he wanted it to stop.

Like an itch that needed scratching or someone calling his name from the other room, just out of earshot. It buzzed and twisted in his mechanisms, creating a sensation that couldn’t be ignored but that he didn’t know what to do about.

There was someone he trusted, someone who worked here even, maybe they could help? But even the idea of getting help was pulled out from under him as he tried for the umpteenth time to figure out what he’d been doing.

Eventually, after having been waving in his face for a solid thirty seconds, Moon’s attention finally turned back to you.

Whoever you were.

“There he is. Sheesh, I was starting to wonder if you needed a nap.” You chuckled to yourself at the joke, and that laugh sparked a grain of recognition deep inside, only for it to be snuffed out a moment later.

Naps… that was his job, right? He was supposed to put the kids down for naps. But where were the kids? The only person around was the one standing in front of him. But that made some sense , it was late. Really late.

“Moonbeam?” He knew someone who called him that, you even sounded similar, but there wasn’t supposed to be concern in that voice. “Are you feeling alright?”

He wanted to tell you to stop talking. That tone stoked a fire deep inside, he’d do anything to snuff it out, to get these alarms and notifications to silence.

“-ould sleep. It’s late.” The words came out without his input, his mind simply defaulting to what it knew. It took him longer than he would have like to realize he’d even said something, much less what that sentence had been. Even the full body twitching that rattled through him was lost somewhere in the ever deepening sand trap of his mind.

“I’m good for now, maybe once we’re done, though.” Now you were just hiding that concern, your heartbeat picking up at his increasingly concerning shudders. He could feel your pulse race, just another pop-up alert that pushed itself to the forefront, adding to the overstimulation.

Something was very, very wrong. And this sudden (to you anyway) change in behavior was setting off alarms of your own. While you’d never seen him act like this first hand, it did remind you of a certain video you’d watched almost a month ago.

This had only been a matter of time, but while it was still worrisome. A t least it was just you in the room .

“ Done?” He tilted his head in a manor that would have been endearing at any other time.

“Yeah, I was cleaning your chassis while Sun was out. Saved half the job so you wouldn’t feel left out, but we don’t have to if you aren’t feeling well.” You said this slowly, like trying to gauge if this tensed animal was about to bite.

But to him, there was no way that was correct. Sun never let anyone work on him. It was always Moon that had to take the brunt of it. The painful repairs, the torture just for the sake of it; but then something happened, something he was having a hard time recalling, and then they never got repairs again. Then it was up to himself to fix anything that broke. How many staff bots had been torn apart simply because he needed the parts.

It was always Moon that had to fix his counterparts fuck mess ups.

“Liar.”

“What?” You heartbeat quickened, as you looked back over your shoulder from your kneeling position, having been looking for that cleaner from earlier in an overly darkened daycare. The animatronic in question already sounded as if he smoked a pack a day, so needless to say that his voice’s ability to go lower and more gravely shocked you.

The next thing you knew, stars were exploding throughout your vision as your head knocked against the play mats hard enough for the padding to not matter. When they died down, you were greeting with the sight of Moon above you, hands on either side of your head and his legs pressing into yours with enough force to feel the bones within groan from the strain.

“L-liar!” He was twitching hard enough to jostle the both of you, his face-plate twisted with anger and eyes casting purple lights across your form. “No one touches Sun. You lie! And liars must be punished.” His sort of tittering giggle was usually a source of comfort that was completely lost in that moment.

Part of you was sure he’d just meant to adjust himself, as a hand was placed on your shoulder with a frightening softness, but it was quickly followed with his claws digging into your flesh and wrapping around your collarbone, cracking that as well. In the white hot pain that followed, your body reacted without your input and grabbed his side, forcefully fl i ng ing him across the room. The sound of Moon’s body hitting the security desk with a loud crunch made you wince more than the pain of him having taken a good chunk of your flesh with him.

You needed to be more careful. Even if he tore you apart, you’d be fine in the long run , but they would be much harder to repair. But you’d been ‘alive’ long enough for your body to have developed certain reflexes of its own volition . Those instincts were screaming at you now to just let go, dig in and do what came naturally. After all, everything you touched always seemed to end in ruin.

And y ou would absolutely tear them apart if you didn’t hold back.

It took the same amount of time for your injuries to heal, black tendrils sprouting and folding in on themselves, as it took Moon to recover from his flight. A whine escaped your throat when you watched him slowly pick himself up, his right arm having been dislodged from its socket and just limply hung there, with bits of chassis and metal clinking to the floor in an unsettlingly gentle way.

“ Moon, please. I promise I’m not lying, just let me help.”

No reply. D espite the injury, your friend still wasn’t back; purple eyes staring through you from across the distance, tail whipping all the while . That wasn’t really the best time to get lost in the thought that forced itself to the front of your mind.

The realization that his eyes w ere the same color as that dinky thumb drive that you’d pulled out of map bot some time ago.

He, or whatever was currently in the drivers seat, took advantage of your momentary pause, rushing to pounce on your detracted form . The two of you rolled across the floor, finally stopping when you hit a wall and Moon happened to be on top. His good hand tried to find purchase as he sunk his claws deep into your arm . When the subsequent pain bloomed there, your body jerked and threw a left hook hard enough to whip his face-plate to the side, and used the momentum to roll him to the ground with you on top.

Usually the taste of metal in one’s mouth meant blood, but this time it was from your teeth having wrapped around the side panel on his forearm and crushed it when he moved to shield his face. The thing groaned with the pressure you put on it, tearing through the metal and wires underneath with ease.

It had felt so good , too. Giving in to that overwhelming need to rip and tear, just a little.

Resisting those urges hurt worse than him flinging you across the room, taking the panel with you but leaving a few teeth in him. It hurt worse than subsequently being wrapped backwards around the corner of a playscape and snapping your spine at a ninety degree angle before rolling face first onto the mat.

Now you were twitching, more like trembling. At the pain. At the need to resist what came most naturally to you.

At the realization that you were hurting them.

It didn’t matter that you couldn’t move, frozen there in the overwhelming sensations that plagued your consciousness. Even if you hadn’t been fighting your body’s instincts, you still would have let Moon do what came next.

When you finally opened your eyes again, it was because sharp claws dug gouges into your back deep enough to reveal the black bones that supported you r body , using that leverage to drag you to the middle of the room and leaving a trail of tears in the mat where your useless nails sunk in . You were flipped onto those wounds and you could only give a soundless cry at the agony that encompassed your form. Even then you could feel the way the skin there split off, forming tendrils that immediately set to closing the wounds from the inside out, conveniently hidden from sight.

His still functioning hand wrapped tightly around your throat. Claws digging in to the flesh there. Tighter and tighter.

You couldn’t breathe. His grip so tight that the only thing to make it into your lungs was ichor as your airways collapsed .

The tearing of flesh and gurgling overshadowed his attempt to say something at you, and in the moment, neither of you noticed how the chunk of flesh in his hand turned to webs, wrapping around his fingers and joints.

All of your remaining energy was spent resisting your overwhelming need to attack. To use what you had left to reduce him to nothing but shrapnel on the floor.

But then t he pain was finally fading, along with that remaining fight. Your quickly darkening vision was met with a satisfied Moon towering over you, still holding the writhing gore that was your throat in his hand.

This wouldn’t be the first time you died, not even the first time you’d met your end at the hands of someone you… cared about. But this was easily the worst, at the least it was the most violent. And the only thought you could form before everything went dark was that you hoped you came back to your senses before he did.

Then, darkness.

That darkness was immediately followed by that familiar proximal omniscience that came with getting booted out of your body. If there was a comparable sensation, it would be like having ice water thrown on you while you stubbed your toe on something.

Shocking, but closely followed by the inability to feel anything.

Here, all you could do was watch the scene play out before you. An impartial judge to the play that was your life. Your near-lifeless body lay strewn out across the floor with Moon still standing above it, purple light still cast over the mass. His twitching was mirrored by yours as your body attempted to heal itself, having done the equivalent of slamming the door in your face telling you to get out of its room while it healed.

There was the knowledge that you wanted it to hurry up, but the actual urgency that should have been there was noticeably absent. Instead there was a distinct disconnect between what was and what should have been.

You should have been upset that your body was in more locations than it was supposed to be . That the play mats would be soaked through with ichor that would be impossible to get out. That despite his current position, almost satisfied at your demise, Moon was still heavily injured.

And it was all your fault.

Th o se thoughts overwrote your awareness of the area, the weight of them pressing against your consciousness with enough force to smother the finer details of the scene before you. Maybe if you hadn’t been attempting to create any sort of guilt or anger, you would later be able to recall something that would have far worse repercussions later.

The ichor strewn about dripped to the floor and seeped into cracks the way any semi-thick liquid would, save for the smears covering the attendant’s frame, nor the gore in his one good hand. Instead of falling away when he released his grip, it turned to an almost non-newtonian fluid and reversed direction, forcing its way under his chassis and into his mechanisms in such a way that he gave a full body shiver.

This trembling finally pulled your attention away from the guilt you were trying to superimpose on a consciousness unable to comply. He groaned and curled into himself, clutching his head as it felt like his processes where put through a blender. By the time the sensation passed and he looked back up, his eye color had returned to its usual red, and while you still weren’t actually capable of feeling alarm, you knew your time was running out.