Gary Franklin stood happily behind his mother as she checked into Freddy Fazbear's Pizza with his slightly older brother, Fred. It was Gary's birthday; he had even been dressed up for the occasion in a suit and bow tie, to match the aesthetic of his favorite animatronic mascot at the restaurant, Freddy Fazbear. He had always loved the restaurant. It was his favorite of all time. It may not have had the best food, but it had something much better - animatronic characters. At the time, his brain hadn't fully processed that the robots were, in fact, robots; he had always considered them people in his mind.
He ran ahead of his mother through the two large glass front doors that led into the main part of the restaurant, and was greeted by his three other friends that his mother had invited. He was actually the youngest person of his friend group. He was turning 7 years old on that day. His friends ranged from anywhere between a few months older than Gary, or a little over a year older. He got teased quite a bit for his young age. He had been looking forward to his birthday for this reason.
The names of Gary's friends were Fred, Bernie, Charlie, and Finn. They had known each other for all their lives, as all their parents became close friends during their time in kindergarten. Even though Gary and Fred were the only true family in the group, they were all like siblings to each other.
"Hey man!" greeted Bernie. "Happy birthday!"
"Yeah!" said Charlie.
"Good to see ya again, mate," said Finn, imitating the pirate accent of his favorite animatronic, Foxy.
"Thanks, guys," said Gary happily. Fred grinned, he always loved his brother's birthdays because his parents had always considered him too old to be taken to Freddy's on his own.
While the group's parents set up their own table, Gary and his friends played with each other, waiting for the animatronics to begin their show. Gary vaguely recalled watching a worker creep into an employees-only room fairly close by.
While the animatronics were being prepared for their show, the Freddy Fazbear animatronic clumsily strolled over to Gary and his friends and said loudly, "Are you kids having fun?"
"Yeah!" yelled Gary and his friends.
"That's GREAT! Who's the birthday boy or girl?" asked the giant bear. Without waiting for a response, he bent down and his head rotated to face Gary. "Happy birthday, kiddo! Are you ready for the SHOW?"
Gary gave the bear a big smile and nodded. He noticed from the corner of his eye that his brother, Fred, was admiring the bear from a few feet away. He almost looked jealous that the bear wasn't talking to him. He always loved that he and the bear had such similar names. It made him feel connected to the animatronic.
"That's GREAT!" said Freddy again. His eyes lit up and he looked directly at the group's parents, and yelled, "And remember, you can win $5 coupons from the arcade machine over in the corner! One quarter for every try! Don't forget!" He rotated his body around and greeted the other customers as the animatronics were being readied for the show. Finally, Freddy stepped back onto the stage, and had a short conversation with Bonnie the Bunny, Chica the Chicken, the other two animatronics up on the stage.
"Hey, guys! Are you r-ready for the show?" said Freddy to his friends.
"Yeah! I can't wait to finally try out my new guitar!" said Bonnie, holding up his guitar, which noticeably wasn't actually new.
"I hope you children have something to eat while watching this show!" said Chica. "Remember, you can get coupons from the arcade in the corner over t-there! One quarter for every try!" she said.
"Remember to eat your vegetables, kids!" said Bonnie. "Stay healthy!"
"And don't forget to find Foxy the Pirate Fox over at the Pirate Cove after the show!" said Freddy, pointing over at a small stage hidden behind curtains. Foxy's hook hand waved dismissively from behind the curtain.
"Alright gang…in three…two…one…"
Freddy and the band began to sing, much to the delight of the children. Most of the children had their own favorite animatronic. Fred's favorite animatronic was Freddy because the two had very similar names. Bernie's favorite was Bonnie because he's the coolest and most chill of the robots. Charlie's favorite was Chica merely because both were female. Finn's favorite was Foxy because he loved pirates.
Gary, however? Gary loved all the animatronics. To him, they were all important, they were all his friends.
While the adults weren't paying attention to the show, Finn pointed over to the employees-only room near the show stage.
"Hey guys, check it out! The door's open!" Finn said.
"I wanna see in there," said Charlie excitedly. Bernie nodded in agreement.
"Me too!" Fred chimed in.
Gary's friends looked over at him. "Come on bro," said Fred.
"Yeah, man," said Bernie.
"It'll be awesome!" said Charlie.
"You ain't scared, are ya?" said Finn.
"Ok, ok! Let's just go already!" said Gary. He couldn't help but feel that going into the room would be a bad idea. It was employees-only for a reason, right?
The five of them snuck through the door into the room. It was dark and cramped. Finn felt the wall until he found a light switch and he flicked it on.
They were all surrounding a table with a metal endoskeleton sitting on it, jaw hanging wide open, blank expression on its face. Surrounding the children were shelves filled with empty masks of the animatronic characters.
Gary and his friends stared around in horror, and began to pile outside of the room, clutching their chests. Freddy and the band were still singing, apparently having not noticed the children entering the backstage room.
"W-what was that?" stuttered Charlie.
"I dunno," said Bernie. "But let's not do that ever again, ok, guys?"
Fred and Finn nodded. None of them understood what they had just seen, although they were noticeably less comfortable around the robots after that.
After the children went back to their table, Gary noticed something from the corner of his eye. It was a giant yellow rabbit waving at him from the restrooms, and gesturing for him to come closer. Gary looked back at his parents from the other table. They were deep in discussion and not paying attention to their children. Gary looked back at the rabbit, who was still waving.
"Guys," whispered Gary. All four of his friends turned to watch as the rabbit disappeared behind the wall, still gesturing to them to follow him. He got up, and began to follow the rabbit.
"Gary, are you sure this is a good idea?" asked Finn.
"Yeah, I dunno who that is," said Bernie. "Maybe we should just stay here."
"I want to meet him!" said Gary. "I've never seen him before! I wonder if he's friends with Freddy and the others?"
Freddy and the band were still performing. "Better not interrupt them," said Fred. "Well, c'mon guys, let's go!"
The five of them went over to the restrooms, and found the giant bunny standing in front of a rectangular hole in the wall, which appeared to lead to another room. It looked as though it had set aside a false wall.
"Come help my friend," it whispered, once again gesturing for the children to come closer. The bunny let all the children file into the room, and set the false wall back in place. At the other end of the room, a yellow animatronic suit lay limp against the wall.
"Who's that?" asked Gary. All the other children looked around the room, unsettled.
"That's my best friend Fredbear, come take a closer look," the bunny whispered.
Gary took a step closer to the suit, and saw that it was empty, like the masks in the backroom. It appeared to be a golden colored version of Freddy Fazbear, whose singing he could no longer hear from this strange room.
"What can we do to help him?" whispered Gary. He heard a loud clunk behind him, and turned around just in time to watch the bunny suit fall to the ground. In its place was a man dressed in a purple employee outfit. Gary watched in awe and took a step back, and saw the glimmer of a strange tool in the man's hand.
"W-what are you doing?" asked Charlie, backing up.
The man had a wide smile on his face, and thrashed Charlie with the tool, beating her down with it. Bernie ran over to try and take down the man, but was knocked to the ground.
"Gary, hide," whispered Fred, hiding in the dark.
Finn attempted to run away and break down the false wall, but to no avail. Gary watched in horror; his hearing was beginning to give way due to Charlie's screaming. His vision began to go darker, and darker. Time began to slow down. He remembered watching Charlie fall to the ground, bleeding, presumably no longer alive. When the man decided he was done beating on Charlie's corpse, which he took a little extra time with, he whirled around and picked up Bernie by the throat, strangling him, crushing his windpipe. At this point, Finn had begun to cry and scream, still trying to break down the wall, calling for help.
"Gary," whispered Fred, trembling in the corner. "Hide."
Gary was unable to move.
The next to go was Finn, whose life was taken with a few stabs through the abdomen. When he fell to the floor, the man in purple began to stomp the poor child, as he lay bleeding on the floor, choking for air through his blood and tears.
Fred at this point had backed as far into the corner as possible, trying to remain calm. He knew he couldn't save his brother. He sat back, closed his eyes, and covered his ears.
The man in purple looked at Gary, but seemed to realize that there was one more he hadn't found. He instinctively looked back at where the false wall was, but it was still in position. He realized immediately what Fred was doing, and walked over to him. Fred looked up slowly, just as the man drove the strange tool into Fred's head. The man turned around, and looked at Gary evilly.
Gary backed away from the man and fell onto the Fredbear suit, and looked around one last time at his dead brother and dead friends. He slipped into the Fredbear suit, and put it on, and closed his eyes. The man stepped back, grinning. Gary suddenly felt springs and spikes crush his body from the inside of the suit. He lost the feeling in his legs. He lost the feeling in his arms. He could feel the pool of blood forming beneath his costume. The dim light in the room finally gave out, and the last thing he ever saw was the man in purple slipping back into his smiling bunny costume, and staring at him.
He woke up, the next day, in the same dark room. Unable to move. Unable to see, or hear. He felt nothing. He could barely think, and he felt dead. He wondered why he was still conscious.
A/N: Hey everybody! It's been a while since I last did anything on this site. I sort of abandoned my two other projects here, and the reasoning for that is because I got caught up in some other stuff in real life and didn't have time to write. Anyway, I don't really know what to do with my other two stories right now. Remains will probably get rewritten and expanded upon sometime in the future, and Forgotten and Replaced might continue eventually? Who knows, I might even start working on this story and FaR at the same time. Anyhow, this story is the priority for now. Apologies about the rather dark first chapter, the rest of the story should be a little more light-hearted.
And as per usual with my FNAF stories, the timeline of this one is FNAF 1 FNAF 2. No other game is canon, although I might use some story elements or characters from the later games in this story. This is based off of old FNAF theories and stuff like that. This isn't because I dislike the later games, I just have a ton of nostalgia for 2014 FNAF.
This story is not connected to my other two projects.
