Chapter Text
“Hey, move it, numbnuts!”
“Oh, sorry, ma’am!”
“Dickwad!”
“Anybody got a quarter?”
Charlie slumped in her seat, leaning against the long cafeteria-style table with her arms crossed, as she listened to the sounds of kids and adults alike playing arcade games and bickering. The smell of greasy, salty pizza filled the air. Her stomach rumbled as she imagined the bright orange grease dripping off of a slice and running down her chin and fingers, the cheese still so hot taking too big of a bite could pull it all off in one go. Her leg bounced frenetically against the slightly sticky floor, making a slight ‘pop’ each time her foot degummed from the tile. She picked at a loose thread on the sleeve of her striped shirt, then twisted her green rubber VIP bracelet around her wrist again and again while she thought about food.
Her pizza-filled daydream ended when someone collided with her back and spilled their soda all over her shoes. Charlie shot straight up when a stray ice cube touched her ankle, flinching at the sudden cold, and whipped around.
“Oops, sorry.” One of the girls from her class at school- Tina somebody- grinned apologetically, lips curling up at the corners. She giggled. Charlie avoided her eyes and focused on her lips, noticing the kind of gross way pizza grease mingled with her sparkly lipgloss. Her stomach churned. Suddenly food didn’t seem so great.
“Don’t worry about it.” Charlie said automatically. She grabbed a wad of napkins from the dispenser and bent down under the table to mop up the mess, smelling the Mountain Dew already seeping into her shoes. Tina somebody flounced away, not bothering to help clean up the mess she caused. Because who would want to help the weird girl with the robots for best friends, right? She probably thinks I’m like a janitor here or something anyway. Charlie dabbed halfheartedly at her black Chucks. The brown paper napkins her dad and uncle Will stocked at the restaurant were shitty and their absorbent qualities were few. She tossed the napkin wad away in defeat and resigned herself to smelling like lemon-lime toilet cleaner for the whole day, leaning back against the bench.
Charlie found sitting under the table a lot more pleasant than sitting above with the rest of the partygoers. The only other people at her table were on the other end, and she could peek out at the goings-on without having to join in. Freddy’s had been a lot more fun when she was a toddler and could fit into small spaces way more easily, spending time hunting for imaginary treasure in small crawl spaces or wedging herself into the play tubes when her father told her it was time to leave. Henry was a broad-shouldered and soft man and couldn’t fit into the colored tubes to get her out. He’d have to enlist Vanessa to crawl in after her and convince her to come down.
Charlie didn’t fit comfortably in the tubes any more. At ten-going-on-eleven years old, she was growing like a weed and beginning to develop her father’s broad shoulders on top of her lanky frame. She got growing pains sometimes that kept her up at night, staring at the ceiling while her legs ached and her nightlight flickered.
Charlie stretched out her legs now, feeling the burn and ache from her cramped calves. One of her feet unexpectedly kicked something small and soft. She crawled forward until she found the object, then picked it up.
It was a discarded Puppet plush with a forlorn piece of pepperoni stuck to its sad little face. Charlie quickly picked off the pepperoni, leaving an orange ring of grease over its eye. It had clearly just been won, tag still attached to its little hand. Forgotten.
Charlie felt a rush of painful sympathy for the little guy, cradling it to her chest despite it being kind of grody. “Forgotten.” she whispered to it. “Me too.” Bad mood suddenly forgotten, she decided to keep the toy. It was better than spending today with her classmates.
Puppet plush in hand, Charlie crawled out from underneath the table. “The big performance should be happening soon. We can’t miss that.” she told the toy. “You can see your big brother then. The real Puppet.”
She wove through the arcade cabinets on her way to the stage, passing another gaggle of her classmates that her father had invited. They stopped sipping their drinks and gossiping around a Bunbarian cabinet to eyeball her like she had something stuck between her teeth. One of the boys made eye contact with her. “Hey, Charlotte.” he said, and one of the girls elbowed him while the rest snickered.
Charlie gazed coolly at him. “What’s up?” she said, gripping her Puppet plushie defensively.
“Nice toy.”
Charlie toyed at the ground with her sneaker. “Yeah, it is. Did one of you lose this?” She held it out, causing some of the kids to wrinkle their noses in disgust. Charlie shrunk back.
“Yeah, nobody is picking that as their prize. Sorry, Charlie.” the boy said. “Everyone thinks the Puppet is creepy.”
Charlie wanted to protest, but at that moment a whimsical show tune began to warble over the speakers. The animatronic performance was starting in fifteen minutes. “Well, enjoy your party, you guys.” she bit out, before turning on her heel and walking away. She’d barely made it to the end of the aisle before the gaggle burst into whispered giggles. Why did her father have to invite what felt like the entire school? And where was he?
“It doesn’t matter if they think you’re creepy.” Charlie said to her plush. “I think you’re cool because you’re creepy.” She approached the edge of the stage and sat down, kicking an empty soda cup. The cup combined with the lemony scent still coming from her shoes made her realize she was really thirsty. And still hungry. She crossed her arms sullenly, glaring out at the restaurant.
She noticed one of the teenage employees approaching her sheepishly out of the corner of her eye, clearly not thrilled to be approaching his boss’s daughter or having any actual interactions with little kids at his job. He held a piece of folded paper in his hands. “Hi, Charlie…”
Charlie cast a glance over his pimple-studded face. He was nursing one of his hands, which was speckled purple with a bruise shaped like a child’s bite mark. She automatically felt bad for him. It seemed like everyone here was having a bad day.
“Hi. When’s the puppet gonna come out?” Charlie asked, trying to appear more friendly so that he got less nervous and sweaty. The employee- his name tag read Mark- strengthened his grip on the paper. “Bad news, sweetheart.” he said.
“What?”
“Puppet’s not coming out today, he’s, uh, busted. Your father sent me to tell you. Something about the pulley system in his box?” Mark peered at her from under his red visor cap. “But, there’ll be a later show, just without him. Sorry. In the note your dad left, he mentioned that the Puppet was your favorite.” He looked at her pityingly. Charlie felt very small, crouched on the edge of the stage with no friends, shoes soaked through with warm Mountain Dew, and a dirty stuffed animal under her arms. Mark, clearly out of his depth, patted her awkwardly on the shoulder.
Charlie swallowed a lump in her throat. “But my dad, when’s he coming? Maybe he can fix him in time for the later show.” She hated the bratty, pleading whine that crept through her voice.
Mark looked like he wished the carpet would grow a mouth and eat him. “Um, sorry, sweetheart,” he said uncomfortably, then handed her the wrinkled piece of paper, “your dad left you this. And also 10 bucks in quarters.” He reached into the vest pocket of his uniform and held out a small plastic cup of change. “Said you could play with your friends and then take whatever you wanted from the prize counter.”
Charlie unfolded the note with heavy hands.
“To my daughter, I’m so sorry I couldn’t make it to your special day. I’m too busy today, got some stuff I need to clear up with the company. Have fun with your friends. Eat as much pizza as you want. Don’t get sick! I hope you enjoy the special performance your uncle Will and I programmed just for you. I love you, XOXO Dad.”
Charlie’s heart sank. Her chin wobbled, and her eyes stung. Mark, who had been sidling slowly back toward the kitchen doors while she read the note, paled when he saw her about to cry. “Uh-”
“Okay.” Charlie said calmly, breathing deeply, before turning toward Mark with her best cute-little-kid grin. “Thank you for telling me. You can go.”
“Thank you! Oh, and, happy birthday, Charlie.” He booked it out of the dining area like a dead man walking.
Charlie ditched her grin and let the tears roll down her cheeks. She read the note again through rapidly blurring eyes, then crumpled it in a fist and let it drop to the floor. She stomped on it with her sticky shoes, screamed in frustration when it stuck to the sole, and chucked it as hard as she could across the restaurant. It landed dangerously close to the edge of the log ride, teetering over the chlorinated water, but it didn’t fall in like she wanted it to.
He couldn’t even be bothered to show up to her own birthday party. Charlie couldn’t decide between feeling angry or sad. Eventually, everything settled together into a grey wash of apathy. She squeezed the Puppet plushie as hard as she could, venting her frustration into the little toy. It didn’t seem as precious to her now as it had when she first found it. It was lame, and it smelled kind of bad, and it made her look like a baby. Charlie held it up and wound back her fist, intending to send it the way of the note, but a flash of purple satin gave her pause.
William Afton, her father’s business partner, father of her best friend, and her godfather and de facto uncle, walked into the dining area with a stride in his step. Parents stood up to talk to him, and he responded with a dazzling grin and a booming laugh. Charlie watched as the world bent toward her uncle William, people moving out of the way just because he was near them. William nodded and shook hands with a couple of the adults, then pointed at his watch and excused himself. He quickly vanished into the door to the costume room.
Seeing him gave her an idea. Uncle Will wasn’t as good with the inner workings of the animatronics as her dad was, but he was smart enough to know how to repair one. Even though the Puppet was Henry’s brainchild, it got stuck often enough to need fixing from one of the two partners.
Charlie tucked her plushie back under her arm and set off at a jog toward the costume room, dodging waiters and little kids underfoot. If she could explain everything to uncle Will, he’d understand. He’d give her a hug and a sympathetic frown and get his toolkit to fix the Puppet. Then he’d call her dad and tell him to get his A-S-S over here, censoring himself in front of the kids, before getting her a slice of cake.
Charlie didn’t even notice one of her classmates sticking out their foot to trip her, maybe as an accident, maybe not, but she went sprawling anyway. Her chin hit the floor hard and she tasted blood. One of the nearby moms cast a look at her, a look that said ‘sorry, but not my kid, not my problem’. Charlie bit back tears. She curled up on the floor before forcing herself to get back up. Her Puppet plush had bounced away from her in the fall. It landed in the log ride. Charlie watched it float away into the tunnel. A toddler in one of the logs burbled happily at it, grabbing for it with chunky fingers.
Charlie pulled herself back to her feet, feeling something warm trickle down her chin. She wiped at it. Blood, red and sticky. When she looked up, she immediately tried to find the costume room.
The door was just swinging shut as she found it. Charlie looked around for William, bouncing on her toes.
She spotted the fuzzy yellow tips of a pair of ears walking away from the door behind a bluster of balloons. Weird. Uncle Will was in his Spring Bonnie suit. Charlie loved those old yellow suits, had fond memories of being cuddled by her father inside the Fredbear costume, getting long strands of silky yellow fur on her shirt and looking past Fredbear’s flat blue eyes to catch a glimpse of her dad’s warm brown ones. She used to watch Spring Bonnie juggle random objects and do pratfalls just to make her laugh. Some of the resentment toward her father faded. Maybe the old suits were part of the ‘special performance’ her father had promised in his note. At least he’d remembered how to make her birthday special.
Charlie wobbled on her feet, but picked her way toward where Spring Bonnie’s ears bobbed up and down, holding one sleeve to her chin to stop the bleeding. Come on Charlie, you’re so close.
She reached out to Spring Bonnie, and opened her mouth to shout, to get him to turn around and see her. But she choked on her words before they left her mouth. Something was very wrong.
Spring Bonnie had his hand locked around the upper arm of a boy about her age. The suit clicked as he took a step toward the back hallway of the restaurant and tugged the boy with him. His other hand was clamped over the boy’s mouth, forcing his head toward the ground.
Charlie’s already thirsty mouth went bone dry. There was something off with the body language of the usually boisterous Spring Bonnie. It felt like she had taken a step and fallen into an alternate dimension, one where everything was just slightly tilted to the left. Was it William in the suit? Or had something else taken his place?
As if to confirm his identity, Spring Bonnie’s head whirred mechanically around as he pushed the door open with a shoulder, locking pinprick eyes with Charlie. He let go of the boy’s arm, squeezing him close to his body, and raised a finger to the suit’s mouth. Shhh.
Charlie trembled. In a blink, Bonnie pulled the boy into the back hallway.
All the sounds in the restaurant rushed over Charlie’s head in a wave, bowling her over until she was crouched on the floor on her hands and knees. She tried to rationalize what she saw. Maybe the kid needed medical attention. Maybe the kid was someone uncle Will knew. Maybe the kid broke some rule and Will was just scaring him, that’s all.
But the look of sheer terror on the boy’s face was not something that came from just playing around. That was real. That was danger.
Charlie’s breaths hit the back of her throat in punches. She had to get help. She stumbled to her feet and caught herself on the edge of a table as she fell again. When she opened her mouth to scream, no sound came out, like a bad dream.
Thankfully, her feet managed to move on their own, piloting her back toward the crowd. Charlie snapped back to reality halfway to the stage, opened her mouth, and screamed.
She felt the prickle of dozens of eyes on her and slowly pivoted on one foot. Parents sitting at tables set down their drinks. Throngs of kids peered at her with goggling eyes. Charlie felt her throat closing up under the weight of so many staring faces. “Help me.” she whispered. “Help. Help me.” The sound got drowned out under the pop music blaring over the sound system. “Please help me.”
One parent- a father, curly hair, smile lines- approached her. “Hey, kiddo. You okay?”
Charlie gaped at him like a fish, trying to come up with the right words to tell him what she saw. Instead, she wailed. Her head was pounding. Someone in the crowd asked, “Isn’t that the birthday girl?”
The dad who had come up to her patted her on the shoulder. “Chin up, sweetheart. I’m sure everything’s fine.”
“No reason to scream like that.” A mom in the crowd groused. “Sounded like someone was getting murdered.”
At that moment, Charlie found her voice. “There’s a boy- a little boy- Bonnie took him into the back rooms. He’s in danger! Someone go help him!” Please believe me please believe me please please please.
A couple of parents exchanged glances with the man in front of Charlie. He turned to her, face molding into polite condescension. “Bonnie isn’t real, sweetheart. He’s just a robot. He can’t do things like walk around and kidnap people.”
Charlie swallowed a surge of hysterics. “But- but- it wasn’t- it was someone in the suit, not regular Bonnie! You have to believe me! I swear I saw it!” She fought back the words It was William Afton because they didn’t even feel real. She didn’t want to believe it was true.
“Didn’t she throw a total hissy fit earlier because her dad couldn’t make it to her birthday party?” Charlie turned to look at whoever said that. It was Tina somebody, from her fifth grade class. “Charlie has an overactive imagination. She’s always telling crazy stories at school.” A couple of other kids nodded, smiling at the adults. “She’s probably just making it up for attention.” the boy from earlier added.
Most of the watching adults turned back to their meals and conversations. Charlie smacked her fist against the floor. “I’m not lying. Please.”
But the dad in front of her clapped her shoulder. “Come on, kid. Have some fun. I know it sucks that your dad isn’t here, but there’s no reason to make up stories and ruin it for everyone else. You could get someone hurt.”
Everything around Charlie felt paper-thin and she slipped back into that sinister dimension where she had just watched a kid disappear in front of her eyes, except then there had been the overwhelming notion that everything would be fine if she could just tell someone, like she might have just been having a nightmare, and now, there was nothing keeping this from being reality.
Her feet moved on their own again, and she was running, tripping over her own feet in her effort to get to the stage. She pulled back the curtain and dove inside, tucking herself into the darkness of the small space between Bonnie, Freddy, and the brick wall. When she was panicking, scared, or upset, Charlie liked the pressure of an enclosed space. While adults found the places she liked to hide claustrophobic, Charlie found it comforting, like a hug from a pair of arms so much bigger than herself.
She wrapped her own arms around herself, squishing herself into the corner as hard as she could. The dark silhouettes of Toy Bonnie and Freddy towered over her, and Charlie felt safe. She needed to think of a way to help the little boy. She needed to calm down. She needed to get help. But nobody would help her.
Charlie’s panicked spiral was interrupted by someone pulling back the edge of the curtain. Something slid across the stage floor to her, coming to a rest against her foot. It was a paper fast-food cup with a straw poked through the lid, and the button for the letter ‘P’ already pressed in.
Charlie picked it up and took a sip. Root beer, her favorite. She smiled in spite of the situation. Only one person she knew always pressed the letter P down on all the drinks she got. An inside joke, starting when they were both small and thought potty humor was the funniest thing ever invented. She could still hear a littler Vanessa’s voice now, giggling as she pointed to each of the plastic buttons. “Diet soda, Pepsi, tea, and that one is pee!”
Real-life, physical, tangible Vanessa clambered onto the stage, swinging her legs over the edge. She clutched another soft drink in her hand. Her flowery cardigan was woven with sparkly threads and her pin-straightened blonde hair was loose around her face instead of held back in its usual braids or headband. Charlie exhaled hard at the sight of her.
Before she said anything, she set her drink down and pulled Charlie into a tight hug. “I’m so sorry about your dad.” she murmured. “This stinks.”
Charlie leaned into her best friend’s shoulder, about to sob with relief. “You have no idea how glad I am that you showed up, Nessa.”
“I was begging Dad to hurry up the entire time he was getting ready.” Vanessa said. “I wouldn’t miss your birthday for anything, you know that.” She took a sip of her own drink- pink lemonade- and smiled.
Charlie grimaced and took another long gulp of her soda. It tasted so good, and she felt guilty for enjoying it while Vanessa was smiling obliviously in front of her, unaware of what was happening behind the stage right now, at the hands of her own father.
Vanessa- Of course Vanessa would help her. Her best friend since they were too small to speak, the person she knew she could trust with anything. Surely she would understand what needed to be done. Charlie clasped Vanessa’s hands in her own, weaving their fingers together and forcing Vanessa’s attention on her. “Vanessa. I need you to listen to me about something.”
Vanessa held Charlie’s hands with the same intensity, staring into her with flat grey eyes. “Of course.”
Charlie leaned towards Vanessa. “I need your help. There’s a kid in danger. If we don’t save him, he could die.”
Vanessa smiled, but it didn’t reach her eyes. It was the same smile her father had, Charlie realized with a shudder. “What do you mean, Chuck?”
“I know it sounds crazy, but I saw Spring Bonnie- your dad- with a little boy, and he took him into a back room somewhere, and it looked like he was going to hurt him but nobody believes me and we need to go after him before it’s too late-”
“Charlie.” Vanessa interrupted. Her inflection was off, and Charlie shut up. “You didn’t see anything.”
Charlie’s heart sank. Not Vanessa, too. “No, you don’t understand-”
“You don’t understand!” Vanessa hissed, pulling Charlie close to her face. Charlie looked into her friend’s eyes. They were hard, and dark, and unnaturally dilated. The blood in Vanessa’s face had drained away. She looked scary. Charlie tried to pull away, but Vanessa’s vice grip pulled her back down. “You. Didn’t. See. Anything.”
Charlie felt ice crawl down to the tips of her toes. “No-”
“Stay. Quiet.” Vanessa said, enunciating each word threateningly. “I swear, Charlie. You made it up. There was no little boy. There was no Dad, there was no Bonnie. You just have an overactive imagination, like Tina said.”
Charlie’s protests died in her throat. “Not you too.” was all she managed. “I thought you would believe me.” Her voice broke on the last syllable, and the tears she’d been suppressing finally spilled. Vanessa let go of her hands to cup her face, but Charlie shoved her hard. “I thought you, of all people, would believe me!” Vanessa fell backward hard into Bonnie’s legs. Her hand got caught in the pinch point between the mechanical joints and she screamed as it snagged one of her fingers.
Charlie sobbed out of shock. “Nessa, please. I’m sorry.” She offered Vanessa a hand up, already feeling bad about hurting her. But Vanessa got up herself, cradling her hand and stepping back from Charlie.
“I want to believe you, Charlie, I really do.” Vanessa said. “But some things are just better off not believing in.”
“I’m not making it up!” Charlie whined. “Please. I think your dad is going to do something bad to that kid.” She took Vanessa’s hands, silently begging her to give in.
Vanessa’s silence was all the answer Charlie could bear. “No way.” She let go of Vanessa and broke into a run, pulling back the curtain. Vanessa grabbed her wrist and tugged her back with all of her strength. “No, Charlie, wait!”
“Let go of me!” Charlie yanked her arm away from Vanessa.
“It’s for your own good!” Vanessa cried. Charlie didn’t hear. She fled, running to the door where she had seen the boy disappear. It wasn’t locked. She pushed it in, bolted into the hallway, and held it shut, listening for the sounds of Vanessa’s fists on the other side, but they didn’t come.
Feeding off of the rush of adrenaline that had propelled her across the stage and through the door, Charlie jogged down the hallway. Her damp shoes squeaked against the tile, making her wince. She hesitated before crossing any intersecting corridors or open doorways, pausing every few steps to listen for any sign of life. It was down the kitchen hallway that she finally heard something- the sound of running water, flowing through a tap- coming from the double doors a few footsteps away.
Then, low whistling peppered with breathy humming blended with the white noise from the sink. She recognized the voice. It was definitely William.
Gulping, Charlie dropped into a crouch and carefully swung one of the double doors open just wide enough for her to fit through, moving it back into place carefully instead of letting it swing shut. She was in one of the kitchens. Silver sinks lined the walls, and the massive island in the center housed cabinets and ovens in neat rows. She couldn’t see the sink that was running from her angle on the ground, but she could hear it running, along with William’s looping whistle.
Charlie crawled forward until her back was pressed against the nearest cabinet, then let out a breath as silently as she could. Once she was sure she hadn’t been heard, she peeked out around the corner of the cabinet to try and catch a glimpse of William. Instead, she saw a pair of legs half-obscured by the open door of another cabinet, clad in red sneakers. It was the little boy, lying on the floor. Dead or alive? She couldn’t tell.
The cabinet door swung shut, and Charlie shrank back immediately as William straightened up from where he had been rifling through the shelves. His Bonnie head was gone, but he was still wearing the rest of the suit from the neck down. In his hand was what he had withdrawn from the cabinet- a long butchers’ knife. Charlie shivered at the sight of it, and her shoulder bumped the island, shaking one of the overhead racks of pans. It clattered quietly, but not quietly enough to avoid attracting William’s attention. He turned around quickly, and Charlie could hear the sound of the suit’s paws clomping on the floor toward her. “Who’s there?” he barked.
Thinking quickly, Charlie backed up on all fours just as William rounded the corner where she had just been, circling around the kitchen island to where the little boy was lying. In a stroke of luck, William didn’t turn back around toward her. Instead, he walked right through the double doors, tsk-ing softly under his breath. “I know you’re out there!” he called. Charlie wanted to cry in relief.
She waited until his footsteps retreated down the hallway before crawling to the boy and pulling his head into her lap. There was a bruise at his hairline, and blood trickled down the side of his head. Charlie watched for the rise and fall of his chest with bated breath, assuming the worst when he finally took a deep breath in. He was just unconscious.
Charlie grabbed his jaw, pinching both his cheeks. “Wake up!” Please.
He grumbled, and his eyelids fluttered. He must have been a couple of years younger than her, with dark brown hair and tanned skin. Charlie patted the side of his face. “You have to wake up!”
Finally, his eyes opened and focused on her. Charlie sighed in relief. “Can you stand up? We have to go. Now.”
The boy looked at her with fear in his eyes, confused and still coming around from his head injury. Charlie shook her head. “Never mind.” She grabbed the boy’s arms and lifted him up on his feet, catching him when he caught himself on a grate in the floor. Letting one of his arms flop around her shoulders, Charlie began to take small, shuffling steps. “Come on, you got this.” she said, dragging him toward the door. The boy was waking up more every second, and his feet started to move with Charlie’s. “What’s going on?” he slurred.
“Don’t you remember?”
He frowned. “I think maybe something hit me on the head, and then I fell asleep.”
Charlie was about to respond when the double doors burst inward, revealing William Afton, now wearing the Bonnie head. One of his paws still clutched the butcher knife. Charlie took a step back, keeping the boy behind her. Her face felt heated with the guilt of being caught doing something bad.
“Oh, Charlotte.” William rasped.
“Uncle Will?” Charlie said, voice shaking.
“And here I thought you were a big girl who knew when to keep her mouth shut.” William said threateningly, shaking his head sorrowfully so that the suit’s ears bounced. “Guess I was wrong.” He took two mechanical steps toward her, then stopped and tilted his head, waiting for her next move.
Charlie circled the boy’s waist with her arm. William leaned forward, eagerly anticipating her making a break for it.
She whispered, “Keep your head down.” to the boy, and he ducked obediently. Then Charlie ran straight at William, charging him and catching him off guard. The suit creaked as he sidestepped her in surprise, and Charlie managed to throw herself and the boy past him and through the double doors before he recovered. The boy screamed.
She took off blindly at a much slower pace than she could have managed on her own and began turning each corner she came to, weighed down by the boy leaning into her shoulder. Behind them, she heard William slam into the swinging double doors and take up pursuit.
The little boy was sobbing into her shoulder in fear. Charlie shushed him once she thought they were far enough away from danger. “It’ll be okay. You just need to stay quiet and I promise I will get you out of here.” she whispered.
The boy hiccuped, tears and snot running down his face. “You’re- You’re bleeding.” He pointed to her arm with a shaking finger. Charlie looked down. There was a neat tear in the sleeve of her striped shirt that was blossoming with blood. She probed it with her free hand and hissed. It went deep, maybe deep enough to need stitches. She didn’t remember how it happened. William must have swung at her with the knife as she ran past him.
“I’ll be fine. We just need to get back to everyone.” Charlie looked around trying to get her bearings. To her dismay, in her panic she had taken them deeper into the maze of back rooms than she had intended. She tried to recall the map of Freddy’s her father had made her memorize. The nearest exit would lead them onto the stage, and it would have to do.
“This way.” she said, trying to project a confidence with her tone that she didn’t actually feel.
Countless hallways turned before them as Charlie let her muscle memory take her to the stage. Her arm screamed at her every heartbeat. She couldn’t bring herself to force the boy to stifle his sobbing, but it seemed like the loudest sound in the world to her.
She was so focused on making it out that when she finally spotted the door with the glowing Exit sign above it, she didn’t even notice Spring Bonnie lunging at them from the hallway to their left until the boy screamed and pulled her backward in his haste to get away, bringing both of them crashing down to the floor.
Charlie reeled and her vision went blurry as she stared up at the hulking man in front of her. William grinned at her through the open mouth of the Bonnie suit.
She shoved the boy hard. “Get up. Go.” Blood from her arm dripped onto the floor. The boy, eyes wider than saucers, scrambled backward and onto his feet. William spared a brief look in his direction before turning his attention back to Charlie. Charlie got to her feet, panting, and looked the boy in the eyes, then nodded once at him. It’s okay. It’ll be okay.
He turned tail and ran toward the distant Exit sign as Charlie broke into a run in the opposite direction. The sound of metal against tile got closer with each breath. Like she had thought, William had followed her instead. “Oh, little rabbit.” he called after her. “Run away, why don’t you?”
Charlie ran even faster, damp shoes squeaking on the floor. But William was faster than she realized, and bigger than her, and he easily outpaced her even in the heavy Spring Bonnie costume. Soon she was slowing down and he was coming closer.
The first cut landed just below her ribcage, and she shrieked. It glanced off without doing major damage. But no matter how hard she pushed herself, she couldn’t go any faster.
The second cut found its mark, lodging between two of her ribs. Charlie tried to scream again, but only a wheeze came out. The pain this time was excruciating, each movement made harder by the scrape of the metal on bone. She reached behind her, feeling the knife stuck in her back. Her fingers slipped over the handle, slick with her own blood. She finally got a grip on it and pulled it out while still stumbling forward and threw it behind her. The tips of animatronic fingers pinched the back of her shirt for just a second before she got a lifesaving burst of adrenaline and fell back into a run. She pulled open the first door she came to and locked it behind her, nearly tumbling down a flight of stairs in the process. Her heart sank. She’d locked herself into the basement.
Half-walking, half–crawling down the stairs to come to a rest on the bottom one, Charlie finally slumped against the wall. She had to work extra hard to draw breath, and each rise and fall of her chest made a weird rasping sound and sent more blood down her back.
I am going to die, she thought. It scared her, but at the same time, the idea of the absolute sureness of death comforted her. Today had been terrible in so many confusing ways. She hated to give up on life, but-
But what? Charlie stared down at the green rubber bracelet on her wrist. What about today being shitty made it okay to give up? If you give up, he wins, a little voice in her head whispered. She wasn’t sure if it meant William or her father.
You have to live, Charlie.
But I’m all alone.
You won’t be alone forever, I promise.
I have no friends. I am about to die because I am bleeding out. I am bleeding out because my dad’s best friend stabbed me and I thought I could trust him.
You will have more friends and they will help you and you can make him pay pay pay
Charlie breathed in one more time, trying to use as much breath as she could to keep her head clear. She twisted her fingers around her bracelet and pulled it back, letting it snap against her skin. It stung, and some of the fog around her brain lifted.
She thought hard, snapping the bracelet against her wrist each time she felt herself slipping. There was more than one exit to the basement. There was a ladder underneath the stage for technicians to use. She wasn’t in any shape to climb, but she had to try.
The stage was far from where she was, almost half the restaurant’s length away. But she told herself it was just one last time, one last escape. She got to her feet and nearly blacked out from the blood loss, but she snapped the bracelet against her skin again, focused on the sting and started moving.
The shadows in the corner of her vision were getting bigger as she walked. Spare animatronic heads leered at her from boxes along the shelves. She ignored their blank buggy eyes and kept walking, trailing her hand along the wall and challenging herself to keep following the seam in the bricks at her shoulder level.
The dim yellow light next to the ladder under the stage appeared at the end of the corridor. At first, Charlie wasn’t even sure she was really seeing it. But it got stronger the closer she got to it, and she clung to it as her lifeline even as her vision got worse and a cold sweat broke out across her body.
And then she saw him.
Standing just outside the ring of yellow light, Spring Bonnie’s teeth glowing white in the darkness were the only thing that gave him away. If she concentrated, she could hear his labored breathing. He was waiting for her. He knew she would head to the ladder. Above him, the trapdoor to the stage was open.
Charlie tripped over her own shoes in her haste to get to the ladder, her arms and legs getting in her way. She was so determined to reach the light above her. Live live live live
She had just wrapped one hand around the first rung when she felt him grab her, barely even pulling before she let go. Charlie didn’t even feel the knife the third time, just the spill of warm blood when it slid into her stomach. She rolled onto her back.
Charlie…
“Charlie…” William said. “Oh, poor Charlie.” He bent down and slid one arm under her legs, the other around her back. Charlie tried to scream as her murderer- she really was dying now, she could feel it- picked her up, but William only held a felted finger to her lips as he cradled her against his chest. Live.
“I’m sorry your birthday wasn’t what you expected it to be, Charlie.” William said sympathetically as he began to walk away from the ladder with her in his arms. “It must be terrible, spending your birthday without your father or any real friends. At least you have me.” He laughed. Charlie’s head lolled against his shoulder. She tried to focus on his face, on his words, on anything that could tether her to life. Live.
“I’ll tell you what.” William loomed over her. “I’ll make it up to you.” He tightened his grip on her. “How does that sound?” I want to live.
She couldn’t respond, but William took it as an answer anyway. “I’ll take you to see your favorite animatronic before you die. I am sorry, you know. I wasn’t expecting to have to deal with you so soon, but you surprised me.”
I hope that the little boy made it out okay, Charlie thought. I hope he forgets all about me and has a good life.
“The Puppet always was so finicky. Your father worked so hard on him, as a present just for you, but let’s face it, he never quite had the same star quality as Freddy or the others. So creepy. So… unpopular. I don’t think anybody would miss him if he just didn’t come back.”
I forgive you, Dad. I’m sorry I thought all that mean stuff about you. I love you.
“In fact, I doubt anybody would go looking for him.” William shifted her in his arms so he could unlock a door and slipped inside. Charlie could smell damp concrete and rot.
Please don’t be sad when I’m gone.
They had stopped walking.
William lifted her head up to show her where he had brought her. The Puppet’s gift box, the one it sat in before getting lifted up onstage and the one it occupied at the prize counter, stood in the middle of a dais. Its lid was cracked open, and Charlie could see a silky black hand draped over the corner of the box. William stepped up to the dais.
“I hope this makes up for everything, I really do.” William said sadly as he lifted her up. Charlie wriggled in his arms, but her strength was fading too fast and she couldn’t do anything but watch as he placed her inside the Puppet’s box. I’m so tired.
“Go to sleep, then.” William said. He pressed a button on the wall and the mechanism holding the box’s lid open began to turn. Charlie watched the last light she would ever see go from the width of her forearm to a shoe to a pencil to a needle-thin sliver.
I don’t want to be alone, she thought, and wove her fingers into her green bracelet.
You will not be alone.
The last touch Charlie felt was not William’s death grip but the movement of velvety limbs against her own, wrapping around her and growing stronger the more she slipped away.
You will not be alone.
For long.
Charlie died, and something else woke up.
And it screamed.
-
The audience heard it.
It wasn’t just a scream from one kid, or even multiple children. It raged over the speakers in a feedback loop. The lights strobed in time with the sound. It happened right at the swell of the song, blending a happy show tune into a sustained cry of unmistakable anger.
Under the stage, in the dark, the Puppet’s eyes glowed.
Above, the trapdoor yawned inward like a hungry mouth.
William Afton rejoined the crowd without anybody noticing, finding his daughter and holding her close, ignoring her when she held up her injured finger.
The Puppet’s winch began to wind, and the scream faded into an energetic refrain of Pop Goes The Weasel.
The Puppet’s head crowned the lip of the trapdoor, glowing luminous blue under the stage lights. It moved slower than it normally did, and its strings got stuck several times straining under an unseen weight, before overcoming its burden and reaching full height on the stage, holding something in its arms.
A child screamed.
Charlie Emily’s brown pigtails obscured her face, but didn’t cover the three wounds-so deep they were almost black- displayed starkly against her white shirt. They had stopped bleeding already. So little blood in such a small body.
The arm supporting her head went limp, letting her head droop back just enough for her hair to fall out of her face, revealing her to the audience.
For the longest second, nobody moved or made a sound. The only noise was the music box, frantically playing Pop Goes The Weasel faster and faster.
Then somebody else screamed, and screamed as Charlie hung in the Puppet’s arms, its head angled toward her like a parent holding a child.
In the panic, nobody noticed that its eyes weren’t their normal, unseeing black. Pinpricks of white light danced inside the sockets, watching the body in their arms.
I’m awake. They trailed their long fingers lightly through her hair as the curtains fell and the animatronics continued to dance to a chipper beat. You can rest. I’m awake now.