If he was going to quit, it would have been after Mike Schmidt had freed him from the animatronic suit that the other animatronics had stuffed him into. But that would be admitting defeat. He had not spent years at this job training guards, managing schedules and avoiding killer robots just to leave after one incident, no matter how traumatic said incident was. No, he was going to do something about it, something he should have done quite a long time ago. He spent days searching through all the companies records and making phone calls until he finally got in touch with the one person who should be able to do something about the animatronics.
He gave the security guard the night off and waited outside the pizzeria for his visitor. At ten o'clock on the dot a black car pulled up and a man exited the vehicle. The man extended his hand in greeting.
"Mark," he introduced himself. "You are Scott? Pleased to meet you."
Scott did a double take at the man's appearance. He was tall and had reddish brown hair that came down to his chin. He had a longish nose and gorgeous cheekbones. If one used their imagination, they would say he looked like a human version of-
"Foxy?" Scott uttered, then shook his head and apologized.
"No, no, you are quite right if you think Foxy and I look similar, after a fashion," Mark beamed. "I designed the animatronics after myself and my three co-workers. We also recorded our voices for them. It might be hard to tell since I'm not using pirate speech, but I did indeed voice Foxy."
"Yes, I can hear it," Scott assured him. He felt his cheeks start to flush slightly. After all, he had always had a thing for Foxy, and here was the very man he was modeled after!
"So tell me more about the problems you are having with the animatronics," Mark asked.
"Well, you are probably not going to believe me but " Scott began and then proceeded to tell how the animatronics roamed the pizzeria at night, looking for "endoskeletons" that needed to be stuffed into suits. He also recounted his own ordeal at the hands of the four.
"Oh no " Mark sounded terribly distressed. "I have no idea how that could even happen...Do you think I could go into the pizzeria to observe their movement?"
"Sure," Scott replied, "but you have to stay in the security room with me. You can't inspect them up close until the morning when they have stopped roaming or they will attack you."
"I understand."
Scott and Mark went into the pizzeria and the small security room. They sat right next to one another and Scott felt flush again as he leaned in close so Mark could watch the monitor with him. Mark gasped when he saw the animatronics leave the stage and go through the various rooms of the pizzeria. He ended up clutching at Scott's arm when Chica peeked in through a window and had the door shut on her.
"I can't believe it!" Mark exclaimed. "I'll have to dismantle at least one of them and take a look at the motherboard. This is unprecedented."
"I'm not sure if the owners will let you do that. I kind of called you on my own, without their knowledge," Scott explained.
"Do they know what's been going on?" Mark asked.
"I...I think...maybe yes. But it doesn't seem like they care " Scott admitted.
"Don't care! What kind of people are they?! I don't care what they say, I'm going to look at one of them at least. I'll need to stay at a hotel though as I don't know how long this will take me. Do you know of one close by?"
Scott suddenly had a wonderful idea. "There's nothing really close by. You could stay at my apartment though, if you don't mind sharing a room. I can sleep on the floor."
"No, I wouldn't ask you to do that. You can have the bed. I appreciate the use of your apartment," Mark replied.
"Great, as soon as it's 6 am you can look at one of the animatronics. You'll have some time before the other staff members start arriving. Then we'll go to my apartment," Scott said with a smile as he reached over and shut the door on Bonnie.
The night shift seemed to go by quicker than usual for Scott, thanks to having Mark there to converse with. Mark was utterly fascinated, albeit disturbed, as he watched the animatronics roam through the pizzeria and make several attempts to get into the security room. Once 6 am rolled around, the two were finally able to safely leave the room and they headed to Pirate's Cove. Mark had requested to take Foxy's motherboard, since the fox was deemed 'out of order' and it was unlikely that anyone would notice that he had been tampered with.
They pulled aside the purple curtain to Pirate's Cove and Mark pulled out some tools from his bag. As he unscrewed a panel at the back of Foxy's head, Scott once again could not help but notice the similarities between Mark and Foxy. He had to secretly admit to himself that he found Mark to be quite attractive. It was going to be a bit of a struggle to remain professional once they reached his apartment, but Scott reminded himself how important it was that Mark be able to try and figure out what was going on with the animatronics.
"All done," Mark announced as he finished screwing the panel back onto Foxy. He tucked the motherboard into his bag and gave Scott a hopeful smile. "Let's hope this can shed some light on things."
Scott nodded and gave Mark directions so he could drive back to his apartment. "I'll be home in about fifteen minutes, I just have to wait until one of the morning staff show up."
"Alright, see you soon," Mark said as he headed out the door. It was only about a five minute wait before someone arrived and Scott was free to go. The ride back to his apartment was fast, as he lived nearby. He saw Mark's car parked on the street and he pulled up behind him. Mark was sitting on the front steps to the apartment building, looking at Foxy's motherboard as if it could give him some answers just by staring at it. He looked up as Scott approached and smiled.
"Welcome home," Mark said. "Now let's see if we can find out what the hell is going on."
The two men headed up to Scott's apartment. Once inside, Mark pulled out a laptop from his bag and set it down on the kitchen table. He attached a wire to Foxy's motherboard and plugged it into his laptop.
"I am going to run a diagnostic program first," Mark explained. "It may take a little while to finish. Then I'll do some manual searching through the files. I should be able to discover any anomalies in the coding."
"Would you like some coffee?" Scott asked and Mark accepted. Scott made two cups and then sat down in a chair close to Mark. He peeked over to look at the laptop screen and saw the lines of code scrolling across the screen. Scott started to feel a little nervous being so close to Mark. The man was gorgeous and smart and right here in his apartment. He decided to do something that always seemed to calm him.
"Would you like to talk while we wait?" Scott asked with a smile.
"I'd love to," Mark replied and smiled back.