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English
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Part 1 of Bringer of Peace
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Published:
2025-09-04
Updated:
2025-09-22
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3,636
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2/?
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Peace in the Garten

Summary:

BanBan’s kindergarten closed yesterday, taking all the children inside with it when its doors were locked. However, Irene knows her little sister, Claire, is located somewhere inside, & she won’t stop until her sister is back home-along with anyone else she finds along the way, human or monster.

Notes:

Writer's block has hit me for the work I was supposed to update next, so I decided to work on this story, which has been in the back of my mind ever since Garten of Banban 3, so here you go!

(See the end of the work for more notes.)

Chapter 1: Prologue

Chapter Text

They’re all gone. 

The scientists are all out of our way, & the children, according to the Vision-Shower, are in a safe location. 

There’s no one to stop us.

And no one to free us. 

Despite our new freedom, we’re still caged. 

Trapped. Unable to leave this cursed building. 

The Queen-Guard claims that we’ll be fine, as long as we’re all down here. Out of reach of the humans, & the scientists who’ve hurt us. 

But I know different. 

I’ve been having a picture, stuck in my head for a while now, showing a human girl, holding the Scepter, guiding us to the surface. 

And three words keep rotating through my head. 

Despite the Vision-Shower’s doubt, I have visions sometimes. They show up as images in my head. 

And then I make those images real. 

The last one before…everything…being what happened that day. When they disappeared. 

Those three words, constantly swimming in the back of my head, along with the image. 

Peace frees us.

Chapter 2: BanBan's Kindergarten

Summary:

Irene arrives at BanBan's kindergarten, searching for her sister

Notes:

Hey y'all!
I have a Discord server now! This server is for people who read any of my fics to talk with others who like these universes. You can talk to others, or ask questions about the universes!
(I'm new to using Discord, so I apologize if it's not the most organized)
https://discord.gg/ahVnWdHa

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

Irene stared around the inside of the building that had been a pristine white on the outside.

The walls were the same white as the outside, although there seemed to be some sort of liquid that had stained the walls, despite being cleaned up. 

Colorful mascots sat on the wall she was looking at. Red and white and blue-gray and green and orange and pink. Smiling brightly, as though nothing ominous had happened recently. The name of the building shown above the characters, in the same colors as said mascots. 

BanBan’s Kindergarten.

Irene frowned. What exactly had happened here?

She internally shuddered, remembering what had made her come here. 

It had been only an hour ago, still clear in her mind. She had been sitting with her little brother, Mark, who was only three years younger than her. The two of them had looked up when their father had stormed in, swearing up a storm, holding his phone. 

“They dare not answer anything useful? And then when they finally do answer, it’s some ridiculous crap (she didn’t dare rethink about the word he’d used) about an attack & that the children wouldn’t be allowed to be picked up because of the danger!?!” He’d sworn even more.

Irene had immediately known what he was talking about. They had taken Claire, Irene’s little sister, to a new kindergarten that was offering the first day for free, since it was brand new. Of course, it wasn’t completely trustworthy, since their employees were apparently sworn to silence.

“It’s your own fault!” She’d shouted up at him. “That place wasn’t trustworthy, & you knew that!”

Her father—well, her mind shied away from what had happened after she’d exploded at him. 

“Get out!” He’d roared. “Get out, and don’t come back without your sister!” He’d then stormed out of the room. 

Mark had looked at her with concern. “You’re not leaving, are you?”

She’d looked back at him. “I have to look for Claire anyways,” she’d told him, grabbing her backpack. “We can’t just leave her in that place.”

Mark's concern had turned to panic. “Don’t go!” He’d pleaded. 

“He’s serious,” she’d said. Mark’s face had instantly fallen. He’d known she was telling the truth. 

“Do you think he’ll let me go with you?” Mark had asked hopefully. 

“Probably not,” Irene had admitted. “Besides, I’m the only one who can drive, & I haven’t had my license long enough to drive you around.”

After a promise to return as quickly as she could, and to call her uncle Justin if necessary (Both of her uncles were related to her mom), she’d packed her bag with some necessities: a few changes of clean clothes, her pocket knife, a few plastic Ziploc bags, a flashlight, plenty of batteries, her phone charger, a binder, a climbing rope from when her mother had taken her to lessons, a sleeping bag, plenty of granola bars & protein bars, lots of water bottles, her travel tool kit, headphones, a miniature first aid kit, pain & allergy medicine, a travel water filter (for if she ran out of water bottles), matches, an empty key ring, her video camera, & plenty of film for the camera. 

She’d bid Mark farewell, & had run to her car, using her GPS to find the kindergarten. Now she was inside of the building, the same colorful logo above the doors that was above the mascot characters. 

She scanned the interior. Four cafeteria tables with attached benches were in the room to the right of the entrance door. On the left was what she assumed to be the storage room, since it was locked behind a blue door, some sort of gray electric box with a rectangular light the same color as the door to the door’s left. In front of her was a yellow door with no electric box nearby; only a large red button above the door where she couldn’t reach. To her direct left: the main desk. To her direct right: the mascot characters on the wall. 

Irene went back into the cafeteria area. On one of the tables was a blue keycard, which was probably her way into the left room. On another table was some sort of rectangular device that, upon further inspection, appeared to be some sort of audio player. She ignored it for the time being in favor of grabbing the green keycard & slipping it onto her empty key ring. 

She paused before leaving, looking at the mascot painted on this part of the wall. In front of her was the green character, a humanoid with an oval head, the mouth being the same shape. Its first were large, unusually so. She was certain no creature needed fists the size of an old box tv. 

Its name was written in green above a speech bubble, Jumbo Josh, the quote within also in green lettering: “Eat your vegetables to grow big & strong. LIKE ME!”

He looked strange, like he belonged in the toy factory her uncle Kit used to work at, not a kindergarten. 

Although, I guess they’re pretty much the same, what with both being made for children. She thought. 

She went back to the locked green door, & pressed her newly acquired keycard to the odd electric box. Instantly, the light on the box changed to green, & the door slid open, revealing it was actually two doors that met in the middle, now sliding away into the wall. She also noticed, before they fully disappeared, that there were two triangle shaped holes in the middle of the doors, right where they met, making it so she could partially see into the next room. 

She wandered into the room, & found her guess of a storage room was correct, as brown cardboard boxes were piled into heaps, in a very haphazard way. 

A small object caught her eye. She walked over & discovered it was a black box with two red buttons on it, one set directly above the other. A red antenna stuck out of the top; a red cylinder with a gumdrop attached to the top of it. She grabbed it & turned it over, discovering a panel on the back that she could open. When she did, she found two familiar indents indicating that the device needed batteries, albeit batteries she didn’t have. 

A scuttling noise brought her attention back to the main room. When she poked her head out through the door, there was no one there. She frowned & went back into the main entrance room, looking around warily. She was tempted to call out, to ask if someone was there, but she stopped herself before she could. If there was someone here, she didn’t want to risk giving away her location to them, especially if they weren’t friendly. She’d seen enough horror movies, thank you very much.

It occurred to Irene to wonder why nobody had broken in before her. The building doors had been unlocked, since apparently no one had been able to lock the doors before the workers had all mysteriously disappeared. Even though the building had been in business for only a day, there had to be money in the building somewhere, since they would need change for those people who paid in cash, & also for emergency funds. So why hadn’t burglars targeted this place yet?

When she got back into the cafeteria, she found a pair of batteries on the tables. She looked around in confusion. She definitely wasn’t alone in here. She still didn’t call out though, just to be safe. If she was being followed, she didn’t want to give away her location to her stalker. 

She slipped the batteries into the remote, & a light hidden in the antenna turned on, bright enough to be seen up close, but dim enough not to be noticed from afar, or be used in the dark to see. 

On a whim, Irene pressed the top button, & heard a whirring sound. 

So much for not making noise, she thought ruefully. She pressed the bottom button & heard a strange popping sound. When she turned around, she was shocked to see a drone floating in the air behind her. 

Where the heck did that come from? She wondered. A theory was already bubbling in the back of her head, but she decided to worry about that later. 

 The drone was made of sleek white metal, with four rotating blades branching out from the main body, a ring of metal around the edge of where the metal blades stopped, with enough space for the blades to freely spin & stay intact if the drone bumped something. In fact, it looked like the drone was built with ramming things in mind, the body being much thicker than normal. Yet it somehow was still light enough to continue floating in the air. 

I’m not gonna ask, Irene thought. She pointed the antenna of the remote towards the button above the main door & watched as the drone floated over after giving an adorable “Beep Boop!” The drone bumped into the button, & the border of the metal square that the button sat on turned green. 

I guess that means the button has been activated, she thought as the doors slid open. For a brief moment while the doors were opening, Irene thought she saw a pink shape dart into one of the entrances in the now-revealed hallway. She blinked, but nothing appeared. She shook her head, telling herself it was a hallucination. Too many fried twinkies, as her uncles would say.

There were more mascot pictures in the hallway, these ones of the orange, blue-gray, & white characters on different sections of the wall. 

The orange character was a jellyfish with a single eye in the center of its body, the name Stinger Flynn written in orange above his quote, “Having many arms allows me to help a lot more people!.” Not far from him was a creature with a rectangular body, its face on its chest, no neck or head as far as she could tell. “Captain Fiddles” was written in blue-gray  above his quote, which was simply “Ooga Booga, Booga Ooga,” whatever that meant. Then there was the white mascot. A slim humanoid, with soft looking horns on top of her head, a pink bow around her right horn. Pink letters revealed her name was “Banbaleena,” and her quote was, “Kindness is free, so sprinkle it everywhere.”

Irene ignored them in favor of searching for a light switch of some sort, which she found across the hall from a classroom bearing the words “The end is here,” on the whiteboard, with Banban, the mascot of the place, watching from his image on the wall, his quote, weirdly enough, being, “Sharing is caring. Your pancreas is mine!” next to him. Despite being able to use her drone (which could apparently teleport) to break the yellow glass blocking the button in the Naughty Corner, she needed a yellow keycard for it. Thankfully, the light switch required her blue keycard. She used the keycard, watching as the lights turned on, revealing the play area, which was filled with playground equipment (swings, climbing structures, slides, picnic tables, etc.), fake trees, a red boat sitting on a fake river, and an enormous pink bird. 

The bird appeared to be an oversized toucan, with pink feathers covering its body. Its wings & three feathers on its head were purple, & paint handprints were here and there on its body in different colors. Its legs and beak were yellow, & its eyes, upon one walking up to the bird for closer inspection, were a startlingly realistic blue color.

Irene looked past the pink bird, whose head reached up to her solar plexus, & saw a shape that reminded her of when a character in a comic book or manga was shouting out or exclaiming something. Within the strange green shape was dark blue text. 

Opila Bird’s mission:

Opila Bird is hungry! 

Find 6 eggs & feed them to Opila Bird

to collect your prize!!

Irene blinked. “Isn’t that cannibalism? What kind of kindergarten is this?” 

Was it her imagination, or did Opila Bird twitch slightly?

Irene looked around, feeling like a little girl during Easter. This was an easy task to complete! Five minutes later, she had found all six eggs. Or, rather, she had found seven. For some reason, there was an extra egg. Irene set the eggs in front of Opila Bird & turned, heading back into the hallway to see if there was anything she’d missed. As soon as she was in the hallway, she heard an odd whirring sound. When she turned around, she saw a keycard & a flat disk on the ground next to the eggs. 

Huh. I didn’t expect that to work. Irene stared at Opila Bird. Was she…sitting differently? Irene shook herself & grabbed the items, along with a paper she had seen & headed back into the main area. 

She placed the disk into the audio player & listened. She was unsurprised to hear the sounds of children laughing, only for her emotions to instantly swivel to shock when she heard screaming. The audio abruptly cut off, leaving her with a sense of dread. 

“Holy fried twinkies,” she muttered, quoting both of her uncles. She remembered her Uncle Kit mentioning that all of his coworkers had disappeared nearly ten years ago, with not even the security cameras having any answers. 

She shook her head. This wasn't the time to worry about another company’s problems. She had a sister to find.

Irene went back to the classroom, her newly acquired yellow keycard hanging on the key ring. She used it on the scanner in the Naughty Corner, activating the button above the chair. After directing her drone at the button, she heard a door of some sort swing open. She turned toward the desk and saw the storage door behind it was now open, revealing a claw hammer. Irene grabbed it, then made her way over to the closed off ball pit she had noticed earlier. Wooden planks closed it off from the public, but her newly acquired hammer solved that issue easily.

A few loosened nails later, and Irene was in what was supposed to be a ball pit. Instead, all she found was a very big, very deep, and very much empty pit.

Now she understood why this place had been blocked off.

Irene took a deep breath in to calm herself, then stepped into the room, flashlight in hand. It thankfully wasn’t that dark, but Irene had seen enough horror movies and read enough stories to know that anything could hide in the shadows, no matter how few or how small.

A contraption that was very much like a ski lift (the bench version, not the one that was just a pole) sat at the edge of the abyss in front of her, ready to take people to the other side. After a few seconds of investigation, Irene found the quote for Opila Bird, “Laughter is the best medicine, so make sure to SMILE!”, and she also found that she needed to use her keycards to activate the contraption. She used the yellow keycard for the scanner by the entrance, where she could see Opila Bird was still sitting, which lowered the bench, and then she used her yellow keycard again to start it up.

Once she was on the bench, it immediately started moving, which made Irene guess that the benches were sensitive to pressure, and would start when they reached a certain weight.

She gripped the pole to keep herself from falling off the bench, then carefully stepped off when she reached the other side. On the wall sat outlines of each of the mascots she had seen images of so far, as well as a lit up button beneath each. Text below read, “What was my color?”

“If the goal was to keep little kids from being able to get whatever is in this door here,” she said, gesturing to her right, then this is probably the worst puzzle to do so. Any little kid could easily remember the colors and match them.” She rolled her eyes. “No wonder Claire thought this was stupid,” she muttered. That, along with the fact she’s a bit old for a kindergarten, despite their advertising as also being an after-school care facility.

Irene finished matching the colors (it was obvious, honestly), and was grateful that the door next to the buttons opened up. Inside was an orange keycard and a piece of paper. Irene placed the keycard on her keyring, then read what was on the paper.

I alone

I want to play with the hole bird but everyone left me :(

Everyone have party without meeeeeeee

Miss Mason see me but go

I am scared becauz hole is loud and my friends scream in it but bird is funny

Irene stared at the paper. “What in the deities does that mean?” She asked.

She sighed, stuffing the paper carefully into her bag. She turned and went back to the ski lift thing.

Only to find Opila Bird sitting on it, making her way over.

Oh. They’re alive, Irene thought. Her heart started to pound, but she remained calm.

Opila Bird jumped off when the lift reached the side Irene was on, and slowly approached. Irene lowered herself onto her knee, attempting to make herself smaller. 

“Hello,” she said gently. “You are Opila Bird, right?”

The large pink bird tilted her head, her behavior asking, Why aren’t you running?

Irene smiled gently, and held her free hand out to Opila Bird, slowly putting down the remote. “My name is Irene. I mean you no harm. I’m just looking for my sister, Claire. Do you happen to know who that is?” 

Opila Bird, to Irene’s surprise, took a step back, as if she hadn’t been expecting Irene’s kindness. The large pink bird spun around, but her speed and momentum, along with being right next to the ledge, sent Opila Bird’s foot off the edge, eliciting a squawk from Opila Bird.

“Hold on!” Irene lunged for Opila Bird, barely grabbing her wing. “I’ve got you!”

Unfortunately, Irene did not have her, as her own momentum was starting to send her off the edge as well. If she didn’t get her footing soon, she would fall off the edge too. 

Irene gripped the floor with her free hand, trying to keep herself and Opila Bird from falling. Her heart was racing. She couldn’t hold both of them up for much longer. She was still slipping towards the empty ball pit.

I can’t hold on much longer, she thought. She refused to give up, though. She was determined, though, and she refused to–

Pain flared in her forearm, and she saw that Opila Bird was pecking her. She pecked again, and the pain forced her to let go. She watched in horror as the pink bird fell into the abyss below. She stared for at least a minute, her arm bleeding, before she finally got to her feet and picked up the drone remote she had set down while trying to interact with Opila Bird.

Irene sighed quietly, then rode the ski lift back over to the other side, her heart filled with regret that she hadn’t been able to help Opila Bird back onto the ground.

She made her way back to the hallway from earlier, and found a door for the orange keycard she had obtained from the puzzle. As it turned out, it led to a button for a button…for a button. 

“Why would someone make a button for a button for a button? That’s just bad design.” She shook her head, summoning her drone to her side. To her surprise, the floor gave way, leading to a few boxes floating…for some reason. Her guess as to why was that the boxes were glued to the floor Ava walls, that way they wouldn’t have to retrieve the boxes every time they fell. 

Another surprising thing was the platform that came up, railings around the edge. It was an elevator. With no better plan, Irene got on, using the keycard to activate it. 

The elevator slowly went down, and it was only then that Irene noticed that one of the two gates was bent badly, which was concerning enough, and wasn’t helped by the fact that the elevator stopped suddenly. 

“Oh dear,” Irene said quietly.

Alarms started blaring, forcing Irene to cover one ear with her free hand, still gripping the drone remote. 

A rumble came from below, and a large green creature pulled itself up, smiling at her, its left fist covered in what looked like blood. 

Jumbo Josh. 

“Hi?” Irene tried, waving at him. 

Before either side could try anything else, the elevator buckled from the combined weight of the two beings, sending them into the darkness below.

Notes:

Chapter 1 is complete! I don’t expect chapter 2 to be too many more chapters than 1, since the game isn’t that long. 

Hope you enjoyed, and I give everyone in the comments permission to send me fanart at my email: [email protected], or to post it in my new Discord server!
https://discord.gg/ahVnWdHa

Notes:

Have at it with guessing whose POV this is.

Series this work belongs to: