Chapter Text
"Her name is Circus Baby," the man scanned through the files he'd been sent as he walked into the building. There was an earpiece attached to his head, wirelessly connected to the phone in his pocket. "The other three are Ballora, Funtime Freddy, and Funtime Foxy. Looks like there's also some secondary animatronics, smaller ones."
"Any clue as ta what's goin' on inside?"
"No, just says something about them being hired out for birthdays instead of performing all together at once. Each one gets hired individually, think there might have been an example set. Those in charge didn't like it, I guess," he shrugged, looking around the lobby he'd arrived in. "Are there supposed to be people here? It looks completely empty."
A few clicking noises sounded through the speaker as he waited for an answer. "Looks like you're alone fer yer shift."
"Doesn't that seem familiar..." the man sighed as he tucked the tablet into his bag. "Too familiar. I don't like too familiar, not in this situation. Familiar means ghosts, death, corpses shoved into walls."
"We just need ta know what's happenin' in there."
"I know."
"I'm still not the biggest fan o' you goin' in there, lovely. Ain't anythin' other than dangerous. Feels like danger down to me wires and I don't want ye hurt. Already went through that, canno' do it again."
The man laughed as he pressed the button for the elevator. "Don't worry, I'm going to be okay."
"Ye don't know that."
"I know I'm a lot better prepared than another poor schmuck they'd get to do this job. I've got more than two decades worth of experience with this sort of thing, I dealt with you guys when you were all possessed."
The elevator was talking at him but he paid barely any attention to it as he continued to speak to his boyfriend. "I'm not going to let them trap any more sentient animatronics, not after what was done the last time. You were hard to free, I don't want something harder to fight against to free others."
"Just...Be careful."
"I will be."
He tried to type his name when prompted, the screen flickering and unsteady. It autocorrected to something entirely wrong and he sighed. "At least we know one thing," he ran a hand down his face.
"What's that?"
"They're taking care of the tech just as well here as they did when I first signed up."
"Ouch, that's damning, lad."
"I know. That's kind of why I said it. The system is glitching and not letting me type my name in the right way to sign in," he looked up, his eyes going wide as he stared at something above his head. "Holy shit."
"What?"
"There's a creepy clown mask mounted between the two screens that are probably supposed to be showing some view of the halls or something."
"Supposed to be?"
He shook his head slowly, both his eyebrows raised. "They're showing static. Not even a blacked out screen, just static. Like some of the transmitting equipment is broken down."
"Yikes," came the voice of his boyfriend over the line. "That ain't good."
"No," he reached into his pocket and pulled out a nametag. As he attached it to his chest, he grinned a little too wide for it to be actually happy. "It's not," he smoothed down the collar of his work shirt, the elevator going dark except for a red-lit button that shone onto the stark black and white of his badge, revealing his name.
M. Schmidt.
"Wish me luck," he almost laughed as he said the words. "I'm going in."
"Don't die, Mike. Got some stuff to do back at home."
"Already died once," Mike brushed his hair out of his eyes. "Not going to do it again if I can help it."