Chapter 2 - Constant peril

Against all expectations, the animatronics did not succeed in capturing their quarry on the sixth night, nor for an entire week after that. The left-side door sported a few new dents and gashes as testament to Foxy's persistence, but his programming prevented even him from doing any real damage; on top of that, the night guard obstinately refused to check cam 2B, having grown into a routine of flicking the video feed between Pirate Cove and wherever Freddy happened to be at the moment. Despite his friend's warnings, the bear was becoming more and more tempted to simply smash his way into the office through the dining hall wall – it must have been the same person in there, because no newbie would have kept them out this efficiently, not when they were already in full hunting swing. This, of course, only cemented his conviction that their killer had finally returned to face justice, and as the nights trickled on he found it increasingly hard to hold on to any sense of identity. Why was he here? Why did he keep coming back? Was he laughing at them, even now, mocking their crazed efforts to get well-earned revenge? Freddy wanted to break, to maim, to kill, to-

"IT'S ME."

He shook himself, regaining his grasp on reality. He was the leader, he couldn't afford to get carried away like that. He'd failed the others one too many times as it was. Especially... him...

He couldn't let this guard get away, certainly; in the case of their murder, he was the prime suspect right now. At the same time, Freddy couldn't allow himself, or the others, to succumb to their blood-lust. If their target turned out to be innocent... The thought was unacceptable. They weren't murderers.

...were they?

[ooo]

After his fourth night on the job, when the animatronic bear finally joined the party, Mike had thought the robots would no longer hold any fear for him. He'd been wrong.

"They can think, they can communicate, they... why me? What on Earth have I ever done to them?"

This, he asked himself for the thousandth time, as he quickly performed his routine. Left light – right light – Cove – stage.

"Maybe I'm being paranoid. Maybe they don't actually want to kill me."

Right light – left light - "Bonnie, out!" - show stage – Cove.

"Nope. No, they definitely want to kill me."

Loud bangs from the still-closed left door – that's Foxy out for a while.

"Just me? Or did they kill all the night-guards before me too?"

Right light – left light - "Freddy, where are you?" - west hall – Cove.

"Management isn't telling anything. Can't say I blame them. But, why?"

As usual, the answer failed to present itself on a silver platter, leaving Mike to continue his frantic rote. If he'd thought the slow, ponderous motions the animatronics usually exhibited were excessively creepy, it was nothing compared to what he'd seen that night on the dining hall camera. The way Bonnie had moved... jerkily, yes, but freakishly fast, like something out of a horror movie. He shuddered in involuntary remembrance, and forcibly pushed his thoughts and questions aside to focus on his survival. There would be a time for spelunking, but later. Right now, he had to make sure there would even be a "later" at all.

[ooo]

Foxy knew that killing people was bad. He knew that the others had been devastated to realize their gruesome mistake, what their unchecked fury had pushed them to do, and he, of course, shared the sentiment. He was after the new night-guard for the same reason as everyone else, for the chance to finally put an end to their quest for revenge; he certainly wasn't doing it because he liked it. So what if he had certain... urges? Urges that disgusted him, made him sick with himself? So what if, even as the others had been horrified, he still enjoyed the crunch of a breaking skull, or the fine spray of blood as his hook sliced an artery? He was different from him. Even if, in a sick, twisted way, he enjoyed it, he had never taken an innocent life... on purpose, at least.

Foxy knew that he was a monster. But, even if he couldn't be changed, he could at least help the others find peace. He owed them as much. For a moment, his yellow gaze flickered to the sign in front of his Cove.

IT'S ME.

He'd written the words to remind himself who he was, a mantra that they all had adopted to carry them through the darkness of their endless night. He mentally sighed. It wasn't really doing its job at the moment. His eyes returned to the camera, momentarily switched off. Monster or not, he still had a mission to carry out – for his friends...

Thus sufficiently emboldened, he charged down the hallway. It was no small amount of fortune that Mike had left the door closed from his earlier meeting with Bonnie, and no great surprise that the sound of metal violently pounding on metal scared him half to death.

[ooo]

Silence. Silvery moonlight streamed from high, narrow windows and onto soot-blackened tables still stained with sauce and powdered with flour from yesterday's orders. Then, a loud clang, followed by heavy footsteps – Chica had entered the kitchen, shoulders slouched and half-lidded robotic eyes looking about in disinterest. She wasn't in the mood to mess with the guard for tonight, and one could only stare at a closed door for so long before it became boring. She wanted to get vengeance as much as the others, to be sure, but she had no compulsion to go chasing it if she didn't feel up for the task. The others, they got... odd, when the night drew on and the shadows started invading their minds. Chica had felt it too, the pull towards senseless violence, but she had long since dismissed it as an undead thing and ignored it. And though she never said anything, it still broke her heart to watch her friends slowly wither away into beasts, hollowed out by their quest for justice of no avail. Even Goldy – it happened rarely, but when she snapped, people dropped dead... or worse. Didn't they realize this all wasn't worth it?

No, she suddenly understood, they did not. They didn't see their resurrection as a second chance, like she did; for them, their new lives were just a means to an end, and that scared her.

"Chica?"

The quiet, wheezing whisper startled her from her musings, and as she spun round she was met with a sight that seemed ripped from the depths of a nightmare: a limp, rotting golden Freddy suit stared up at her with dark, empty sockets, its mouth twisted into a ghastly gape.

She smiled inwardly, seeing nothing disturbing about her best friend's appearance. "Hey, speak of the devil! How've you been? Haven't really seen you around for these past few nights."

"He he, yeah. I've been hanging around that poster in the west hall, for the most part – though, I guess you wouldn't have seen me. Bonnie said we were trying to get to a new guard...? But it doesn't seem to be working."

The animatronic chicken frowned slightly, noting how distorted Goldy's voice had become. "That's cool and all, but don't push yourself, 'kay? You sound tired."

"I'll be careful," the apparition assured. Then, even more quietly than before: "Hey, Chica? Could you check on the others for me, please? They seem rather upset."

"Will do. Uh, see you around, I guess?"

For a brief moment, the mascot's mouth appeared to quirk up in a smile. "Sure thing." The hallucination faded away into nothingness, as though it had never even been there at all.

Chica turned to leave, and was yet again surprised by a bear that had snuck up on her, this one brown and in considerably better shape appearance-wise.

"Freddy! Just the Fazbear I wanted to see."

"Eh? Why is that?" he asked, warily. The chicken was not above pulling pranks every now and again, and he had often found himself on the receiving end of her inane shenanigans.

She narrowed her eyes at him, leaning forward and taking on her most serious tone. "Care to take a guess, Mr. Leader?" Then, threateningly: "I know the little secret that you've been hiding from us."

"Wh- what?" he stammered. (She- she can't have found out, there's no way...)

"Oh, don't play dumb with me. You never were good at bluffing, Freddy. I found out."

"What are you even talking about?!"

"That. You -" She leaned even closer, forcing him to take a step back, punctuating her every word with a burst of audible static. Then, before Freddy could even react, she rushed forward and bopped him hard on the nose, which against all odds produced a loud honking noise. "-are secretly a ghost-robot-trumpet!" she finished, laughing.

The bear grunted in annoyance, rubbing at his muzzle even though he couldn't actually feel any pain.

"Was there any point to that? Or did you just feel like embarrassing me for no reason?"

"Yeah, as a matter of fact," the avian robot responded, her seriousness this time genuine. "Goldy dropped by a minute ago, and she told me you looked upset. Anything that you'd want to share?"

Freddy relaxed, even chuckled a bit. "Is that what this is about?"

"You're worrying her, Freddy. Me too, for that matter."

The bear waved her off. "Nonsense. Look, I'm fine, see?" To demonstrate, he pressed a finger to his nose, causing it to squeak once again.

"If you say so.." she answered, unconvinced. "So hey, where's Bonnie?"

"Backstage. Why?"

"Gonna have a word with him, too."

"I... see." Freddy watched her leave, then shook is head slowly. She had good intentions, and he cared about her a lot... but she really didn't understand, not like him. They needed revenge. Lived for it.

[ooo]

Chica found Bonnie staring at the camera with wide, hollow eyes, his head twitching occasionally as his broken voice-box let out a low, steady growl. Struggling to stay out of view of the surveillance device, she called out to him. "Hey, big guy, d'you have a moment?"

It took unnaturally long for him to respond, but when he did, his eyes had reverted to their usual crimson hue and the growl had died out. "Wassup, sis?" he called back, barely stopping himself from waving at her as well. "Uh, I mean, not that I'm not glad for the chatter or anything, but can it wait for a bit? This thing is still on."

"A quick word?" she pleaded, making her best impression of a puppy at him (which, given the limitations of her robotic body, consisted of ducking her head down and looking up blandly).

The rabbit glanced at the camera, nodding in relief when he saw its security light turning off.

"What happened? Did you set fire to the kitchen? ...again?"

The chicken rolled her eyes, but did not rise to it. "I just wanted to check up on you, make sure you're alright."

"...did Goldy send you?"

"What if she did?"

Bonnie looked down, and shrugged. "Look, I'm fine, okay? There's no need to fuss."

"Whatever you say, o brother o'mine. I'll just assume your spastic head-spazzing is your new theme-dance."

"Uh-huh. It's called 'really none of your business, baby-sis'. Just... let it be, will you? You don't need to worry about me, and neither does Goldy. All I need is a little alone time, okay?"

Chica still had her doubts, but decided to let the matter drop for the moment. She wanted to talk to Foxy as well, but he was being his usual grumpy self and hiding away in his Cove – it annoyed her, but she knew better than to press the issue. As she crossed the dining hall on her way back to the kitchen, she spared a brief glance to the faint light at the end of the eastern hallway, where the night-guard was hiding behind his bulkhead doors. It was tempting to pay him a visit, if nothing else then because he was ultimately the source of all her friends' woe, but she doubted she'd have any more success than on previous nights. Still...

She waited until the camera was offline before dashing; her body jerked forward, and she cleared the distance to the security office in a couple of bounds, only to find the metal door predictably closed. She peered in through the window, not even bothering to try smashing it, and squinted her eyes at the person inside. Even from this distance, his face was indistinguishable to her from that of any other security guard. It really did make them all look the same, and she involuntarily shuddered as the purple-clad figure shooed her off apathetically.

"Whatever, weirdo. We'll get you someday."

[ooo]

Mike was beginning to panic. Left light – right light - "No time, Chica, shoo," - stage – Pirate Cove – east hall – west hall...

"Where the hell are you, Freddy?" The bear seemed to have dropped off the face of the world. The only place he could've been at was the kitchen, since the camera there was broken, but the audio feed was dead-silent. Wait, did Freddy even make any noise when he was in the kitchen? Or was that always just Chica? Without thinking, his finger slipped on the tablet, changing the feed – Cam 2B.

"Wait a second, wasn't that poster- "

Mike put the camera down, intending to check the door-lights, and his senses were assaulted by the stench of mold and... something else, rancid, that made his eyes water and bile rise up in his throat. Before him, partially hidden in shadow, was the slumped form of a golden Freddy suit. Frozen in place, the night-guard felt shivers of terror run up his spine as his gaze was sucked away into the black abyss of the suit's empty sockets. Suddenly, his head jerked back with tremendous force, hitting the back of his chair; his eyes rolled over, showing their whites, and he fell to the ground, unconscious.

A/N: DUN - DUN - DUN! Yeah, sorry to leave you on a cliffhanger like this, except there wasn't really any better place to break up the chapter, and it was getting a bit on the long side. On a side note, I still don't understand this site's formatting thingumbob. Oh well, whatever. So hey, until next chapter!

"I have forgotten what it's like
To hold the hand of someone dear
Throughout our endless undead plight,
Kind whispers never assuaged my fears.
I am afraid
But I haven't changed
It's still me,
It's still me,
IT'S ME!"