Monday, November 8, 1993
The dim office bulb hardly lit the little security office. More drawings adorned the walls, with a large poster of Freddy, Bonnie, and Chica on stage, ready to play for the children. CELEBRATE, it said. Mike ignored the poster, more concerned with getting one of the many desk monitors to work. He settled into his swivel chair, allowing the desk fan to become dull background noise as he fiddled with the numerous security monitors in his office. Three of them didn't do anything. Three more turned on, but showed nothing on their screens. Mike grew frustrated that out of the seven old monitors sitting on the desk, only one of them worked properly, which meant he could only view one room at a time.
More than a little irritated, Mike got himself familiar with the angles around the building and the lousy camera feed. He noticed a few things, like the prize counter and the front door, had no cameras watching them, the latter more than the former concerning him. Furthermore, the kitchen camera didn't work at all, and he had no view of it - or the manager's office right beside it. Hopefully, no one tried to come in through the kitchen entrance. Not that there was really much to steal here, save for the large, bulky, and quite frankly distinct animatronics.
A few times, the cameras glitched to black, but the feed always came back a few seconds later. Hardly a surprise, given the state of the rest of the place. The lack of cheer showed even more on the cameras, with their muted colors and dark shadows. The animatronics on stage stood soullessly, with the camera angled on their faces in a way that hid their eyes and turned them into empty sockets.
Charming. Glad he took this job.
Mike noted the power gauge in the lower left-hand corner of the monitor.
99%.
Before he could question it, the phone rang.
"The hell?"
At this hour, no one should be calling. Mike picked it up anyway. Maybe his new boss had something he forgot to tell him, or was checking in to make sure he actually arrived.
"Hello," he said. "Mike Schmidt speaking."
"Hello, hello?"
Not a voice he heard before. Mike started to say something else, but the person on the other line kept talking.
"Uh, I wanted to record a message for you to help you get settled in on your first night."
Mike frowned and hit the speaker button. He had work to do. Long, boring work that paid jack all, but it was still work. He settled back in his seat and casually flipped through the camera views as the man on the phone prattled on about the job being overwhelming - what could possibly be overwhelming about watching boring, creepy feeds for six hours? - and going into some sort of company greeting.
A thought entered his mind, of the rumors of this place. That Fazbear Entertainment's track record was far from spotless.
Of the things that had happened before.
That alone made him pay a little more attention, just as the man mentioned something about a missing person's report, and bleaching the carpets. It brought to mind things worth forgetting.
"...Don't," Mike muttered. "Stop fucking with me."
At least, he hoped the man was just fucking with him. After giving himself those stupid scares with his reflection and the weird puppet thing, Mike decided the last thing he needed tonight was something else unnecessarily screwing with his mind.
He listened to the call as he looked over the cameras, morbidly fascinated at where the Phone Guy - not like the caller gave his name - was going with this. Mike shrugged off the bit about the animatronics getting "quirky" at night.
"So, just be aware, the characters do tend to wander a bit…"
"No shit," Mike muttered again. "They've always walked on their own."
Come to think of it...he caught the last of the show after his interview earlier today. Not much about it changed since he last came here, but he specifically recalled from childhood that they came off the stage to interact with the birthday party afterwards. Now they just ended it and the curtains closed.
What changed?
Phone Guy answered his question a moment later.
"...But then there was The Bite of '87. Yeah. I-it's amazing that the human body can live without the frontal lobe, you know?"
Mike winced. His blood chilled. This was not something he took lightly, not when it was still something of a local sore spot. While six years' time dulled public interest, the circumstances and unanswered questions about that incident held a somber place in the hearts of many residents, himself in particular.
"You fucker," he said, darkly. "This better not be a prank."
Phone Guy kept talking, obviously unable to hear Mike.
"Uh, now concerning your safety, the only real risk to you as a night watchman here, if any-"
"Pizza thieves?" Mike asked, sarcastically.
Mostly to keep the building tension at bay.
"-is the fact that these characters, uh, if they happen to see you after hours probably won't recognize you as a person. They'll p-most likely see you as a metal endoskeleton without its costume on. Now since that's against the rules here at Freddy Fazbear's Pizza, they'll probably try to...forcefully stuff you inside a Freddy Fazbear suit."
"All right, points for creativity," Mike said. "I'm not fucking falling for it."
Even if those details put him on edge. Angered him, even. Phone Guy, however, wasn't finished.
"Um, now, that wouldn't be so bad if the suits themselves weren't filled with cross-beams, wires, and animatronic devices, especially around the facial area. So, you could imagine how having your head forcefully pressed inside one of those could cause a bit of discomfort...and death. Uh, the only parts of you that would likely see the light of day again would be your eyeballs and teeth when they pop out the front of the mask, heh."
Mike looked at the phone, actually impressed. This guy was really rolling with it. And it might have worked on someone who wasn't local, hadn't grown up with the restaurant, and hadn't had any knowledge of the very real tragedies that surrounded Freddy Fazbear's Pizza.
"Y-Yeah, they don't tell you these things when you sign up," Phone Guy said a bit somberly, before perking right back up. "But hey, first day should be a breeze. I'll chat with you tomorrow. Uh, check those cameras, and remember to close the doors only if absolutely necessary. Gotta conserve power. Alright, good night."
"Night, jackass."
The phone recording stopped. Mike vaguely recalled the janitor and his cryptic belief that he'd be out by the end of the week. He wondered if that screwy phone call had anything to do with other people not sticking around. Knowing the rumors, that weird stint with the Puppet, and now this phone call...was it a prank? A way to freak out the new guy and see if he turned tail and fled like the rest?
Or was it truly a warning?
And then that last bit, about saving power. Mike turned back to the camera, looking at the power gauge again.
Still at 99%.
And the doors...what doors?
Mike glanced over to the left entryway, and for the first time, noticed the door and light switches in the dingy light. Just to test them, he hit the buttons. The dark hallway lit up. The flickering fluorescents above messed with his vision. Hitting the door button brought down a large steel door, effectively locking him inside. Mike hit the switch again to release the magnetic locks, then turned back to the monitors. He checked the stage in time to notice Bonnie no longer stood in his place.
Mike's heart skipped a beat, but he found the large purple bunny a few seconds later, wandering around the dining room. Just a robot, he told himself. Just a machine programmed to entertain children and wander around the building after hours. Between the Puppet and the phone call, this place and its eeriness gradually burrowed under his skin.
The power gauge caught his attention, and it already dropped to 97%.
"That can't be right," Mike said, tapping at the glass screen in hopes of correcting a glitch. "I barely did anything!"
But the display remained the same.
Mike scowled a bit, thinking of Phone Guy's last bit of advice to close the doors only if necessary. Needed to save power and all that. But what was there to be afraid of? Overgrown children's toys?
The images of blood came back, and it took another moment to push the memory away.
Only an accident, he told himself. Only a one-time thing that became fodder for the rumors.
He adjusted the dial on the monitor to quickly check every room, before he settled back on the dining area. Bonnie still wandered aimlessly and wove around the tables. Occasionally, he stopped. His mechanical ears twitched not unlike a real rabbit's, as if he was listening for something, before dismissing it and continuing on his way. Sometimes, Bonnie nudged the party hats on the table, moving them just slightly more to the center. A glitch? Or was he making it perfect for the children when they arrived? Either way, without cheering children surrounding the animatronic, the whole scene looked...wrong.
Unnatural.
Mike began to understand Phone Guy's statement about the job being overwhelming. Watching these things in a quiet building, out of their entertainment context all night - this place had a way of messing with his head after a while. He hit a small button on the monitor to turn it off for a moment. Just needed to look away, let his eyes rest a few seconds. Clear his thoughts, then get back to it.
The dining room came back into view as he flipped the monitor back on, with Bonnie still wandering about aimlessly.
Over the next two hours, only Bonnie left his spot and remained in the dining room. In that time, Mike noticed that turning the monitor off here and there kept the power gauge from dropping too drastically. In those moments, he sipped at his coffee or listened to the droll sounds of the building: the buzz of the light overhead, the quiet droning of the fan, the faint metallic tinks and tings he swore came from Bonnie, a strange sort of lurching sound from somewhere in the building.
He also took a look around the office, at the drawings sitting in front of him, at a duplicate of Chica's cupcake sitting on top of the broken monitor pile, at the little windows on either side of him. Mike found he had just enough space behind him to kick the desk chair against the wall and stretch his legs. Both of the back corners in the halls were as empty as the space under the desk. Even more children's drawings were tacked on the walls, along with a rules poster and professional posters of the Fazbear band.
Mike turned the monitor back on to his heart thudding at the sight of the empty dining room.
Don't panic, he told himself. Stay calm. There weren't many rooms connecting the dining room; Bonnie couldn't have gone far.
The rabbit didn't go back to the stage, the bathroom hall was empty...god, was he in one of the two halls just outside his office? Mike bit back the sudden feeling of paranoia as he pulled up the west hall on the camera. He watched the flickering emergency lights for a moment and tried to determine if something stood in the shadows.
All he picked out were ten children's drawings clustered together, the open hall closet door, and the light above. The only weird thing that got his attention was that hidden among the drawings of smiling families, balloons, animatronics, and cake, there was a headshot of Bonnie colored in with yellow instead of purple. It left his mind as he continued his search for the real one.
Mike further cursed the cameras' tendency to glitch out now and again, having to turn the monitor off for a few seconds, then on again in an attempt to fix it. After determining he was just seeing things, he tried again to find the robot. Mike gave a quick glance at the east hall before he finally remembered the back room with all the creepy masks.
Sure enough, Bonnie wandered in there. The sight of the robotic rabbit startled him a little. The shadows silhouetted the animatronic save for his eyes, teeth, and metal joints between the suit pieces. God, as if that room wasn't creepy enough.
Bonnie just kept walking. He circled the table a few times, then looked over the shelves. At one point, he stood in front of one, his arms moving, but Mike couldn't tell what he was doing. When Bonnie turned away, a mask that had fallen to its side now sat upright again. The rabbit examined the endoskeleton after, then left without issue.
Mike blinked a few times, then breathed a sigh of relief. The dining room felt...well, as close to normal as tonight could be.
Back to wandering. Back to the little routine Bonnie liked to walk in. Back to the feeling of relative safety, knowing that the weird robot was far away from him.
There's nothing to fear, Mike reminded himself. It's just the shadows and the shitty camera feed.
But damn did that freak him out for a moment. Everything in the back room looked too...surreal, and he half-hoped Bonnie stayed in the dining room.
Stayed in the light, where he could watch the animatronic without the dark distortion of shadows.
Another small break from the monitors. Another moment to calm himself down, sip at his coffee, get back to it. Mike glanced to the halls at either side of him. He briefly considered leaving the office to explore a little more, but nixed the idea when he realized that aside from the back room, nothing here was worth exploring.
Maybe the manager's office, but he suspected it was locked.
Mike checked the cameras again. Freddy and Chica still stood in their places onstage. The curtains at Pirate Cove remained closed, which made Mike wonder - did Foxy even work? Was that camera simply a remnant from his working days, and now just served to make sure no one broke in and messed with him?
He had to admit, he kind of hoped that was the case. Bonnie looked creepy enough in the dark, and just imagining Foxy in that back room, looking like some of sort of robotic animal zombie…
Cologne and cigarettes under his nose.
Glowing eyes staring back.
Mike quickly shoved the thought back. He made a quick check of the time and the power gauge before he turned the monitor off.
2:41am and 72%.
Not even halfway through the night, and with more than half the power. Mike tried not to think about that weird phone call again. About needing to conserve power. About how he may need to close the doors. About what the animatronics would do if they caught him.
Mike scoffed. No need to give that stupid story any credence. No need to freak himself out again.
He turned the monitor back on and noted Bonnie disappeared again. Damn, that old robot was quick! He didn't waste time checking around, just immediately flipped to the back room...and jumped in his seat as the behemoth bunny stared right up into the camera.
"Oh, Jesus fuck! Why?!"
The shadows in the back room turned Bonnie's normally smiling face into a demonic visage straight from his nightmares. The plastic red eyes disappeared in the shadows, showing only dark sockets with two tiny white pinpricks that stared right into his soul. The open jaws looked less like he was about to sing and more...like he was groaning.
...Or trying to call for help.
Mike turned off the monitor solely to stop looking at Bonnie's distorted face.
God, it felt like the rabbit looked right at him. Like…
...Like Bonnie knew he was there.
That's fucking crazy, Mike thought. They're big robots. He probably just wandered in the camera view, and the shadows did the rest.
The night's phone call came to mind.
So, I know it can be a bit overwhelming, Phone Guy said before. I'm here to tell you there's nothing to worry about. Uh, you'll do fine. So, let's just focus on getting you through your first week. Okay?
"I'm starting to see what he meant," Mike whispered. "How long did this guy last before?"
Did he get used to it? Learn how the animatronics moved, and how to pick them out from the shadows?
Mike turned the monitor back on, relieved to find Bonnie no longer lurked in that room, though the empty heads with their emptier eyes chilled his blood.
Flip back to the dining room. That's where he went, right?
Yes, there's his ears up in front of the camera. He's back in his routine, but this time, he's not alone.
Another one finally decided to move.
Chica's wide purple eyes and open beak caught him off-guard for a moment, but Mike sniggered when he fully took her in. The expression, while distorted in the dark, looked almost goofy, with an exaggerated, over-the-top, "HI THERE!" seemingly coming from her beak.
Admittedly, he needed the laugh.
Mike watched the robots for a moment. Bonnie kept his same pattern, but Chica seemed to step in time with him, keeping mostly to the other side of the room, her beak loosely hanging open as she walked. Now that she decided to join in, the wandering didn't bother him as much. They kept pace, weaving around the tables and stepping in time almost in a kind of dance.
Probably a part of their programming.
A quick glance to the others showed Freddy remained in position. The curtains at Pirate Cove stayed still. Only two of them wandered the building right now, and he accounted for both.
Turn the monitor off again. Save power. Try to be prepared if the damn things wander too close to the cameras.
And hope the shadows in the building don't make them look like demons.
Mike heard footsteps approaching. He turned the monitor on to find both the rabbit and the chicken left the dining room. Instinctively, he checked the back room, and let out a small breath of relief to find it empty. No creepy silhouettes or stares here, but he needed to find them. A flip through the cameras showed Chica wandered near the bathrooms, her face almost in profile as she walked away from the camera view. The light glinted from her purple eyes, giving that same dead-eyed effect he caught in Bonnie earlier, only this time, he could still somewhat make out her plastic eyes.
Mike tried to decide if this was more or less creepy.
Fine, he told himself. She's accounted for. Find Bonnie.
After another few camera changes, he found him in the backstage area. Bonnie barely stood in the left of the camera view, and from his posture, appeared to be looking at the masks again. Mike glanced down at the power level.
65%. A glance to his watch told him it was 3:04am.
Fucking rabbit made him paranoid. Mike turned off the monitor again, and sipped from his coffee.
Just three more hours, he thought. Halfway there, with still more than half the power.
Another two hours passed, and remained more or less uneventful, save for the lights flickering on occasion. As Mike predicted, Bonnie headed back into the dining room when he got tired of the backstage area. Freddy remained onstage, and Chica circled around the bathrooms and dining room, sometimes joining Bonnie in their routine and sometimes wandering around at her leisure. Neither of the animatronics seemed to leave the main area for very long; so far as he could tell, they seemed to prefer the dining room, and only occasionally wandered to adjoining areas.
Mike wondered if it was programming or a glitch, but Bonnie seemed to prefer going into the back room, and only went near the bathrooms once. Chica completely stayed on the right side of the restaurant save for when she patrolled the tables with Bonnie. Maybe when they were allowed to walk during the day, it was their "job" to check those areas for stray children? Keep them safe?
He shrugged and settled back in his seat.
It seemed as good an explanation as any, and with only one hour left and no movement from the other two, he doubted much change from the routine. Might as well just shut the monitor off and be done for the night.
Mike settled back in his seat to finish off his coffee. He grimaced at the taste now that it went cold. The more he watched the animatronics and got used to them, the more he felt like cursing Phone Guy out, though the bastard was probably long gone by now. The jerk freaked him out for no reason; not a single one of the animatronics got anywhere near his office in the five hours he had been here. Mike literally spent most of the night watching Bonnie and Chica "dance" in the dining room, with an occasional scare that came because the cameras glitched out, or one of the robots happened to be in just the right spot to make him nearly piss himself.
Speaking of…
The manager told him not to leave the office after midnight. And the Phone Guy's warning about what they might do if he got caught came to mind.
Dare he risk it? Just run down to the bathrooms and run back?
They're just rumors, Mike thought. Stories.
But his gut knotted, giving him the clear message to stay put. Particularly when the sudden thoughts of blood on the checkered floor crossed his mind.
Mike shoved the memories back into their dark cage where he could ignore them again and shook his head. Things changed since then.
...Hadn't they?
Fuck it, Mike thought.
He glanced at the cameras, watching the animatronics. Bonnie dipped off towards the back room again. Chica walked alone in the dining room. With as good as an opportunity as any, Mike slipped out into the east hall. He kept his footsteps quiet and careful to not attract attention as he passed the kitchen, then the tiny manager's office.
Mike reached the end of the hall and carefully peered around the corner into the dining room. Chica marched on the other side of the room.
In and out, he reminded himself.
He dared to take a few steps into the room.
And heard a sharp metal creak.
Mike turned to see Chica looking right at him. Her old black eyelids lowered in a slow blink, then shot back up as she stared. She stepped towards him, her large, padded feet hitting the floor with more grace and gentleness than he expected from a machine of her size.
He ran back down the hall, daring to look back only once.
Chica's purple eyes glowed at the end of it, illuminating her rounded beak, bright bib, and open maw. Mike slid back into the office and fumbled for the door switch. Only when the door slid down in place and clicked shut did he even attempt to relax.
You knew better, he chided himself. Trust your instincts.
Mike looked over at the monitor. A big yellow form now wandered the dining room again. Safe again, he hit the door switch, then carefully moved to take his seat.
Already, his mind attempted to explain what he just saw, that Chica appeared to follow him. And more than that, looked right at him.
Maybe...maybe the robots didn't have night vision and relied on their programming to guide them? That she didn't actually see him, but heard something there? Yes, that made some sense; the only items he saw any of them directly interact with were the party hats, and those were lit up by the dining room's emergency lights. The animatronics were also big, and, as both of them proved, quick. They could accidentally trample him if he wasn't careful, and it'd be his own damn fault.
Just a safety concern, was all. Probably better to just play it safe and stay here like the manager told him to do. Just...fuck. Could he wait another hour?
Mike glanced around the office, and noticed an empty soda cup on the desk.
...No, he decided. He wasn't that desperate. Just...try not think about it.
Turn the monitor back on.
Watch Bonnie and Chica do their silly little dance.
This is normal.
Things are fine.
Stay calm.
But no matter what he told himself, Mike couldn't bite back the unnerving feeling that stayed with him all night. That Chica really did follow him. That something about this place just felt...wrong.
The last hour dragged on longer than the rest of the night. Bonnie and Chica each took a turn leaving to go backstage or the bathrooms, respectively. Of them, only Chica managed to freak him out again. Just like he caught Bonnie with that dead-eyed stare in the back room, Chica walked toward the camera from the bathrooms, her face angled up to it, her loose jaw hanging open.
That shocked him more than seeing Bonnie backstage. With Bonnie, he easily brushed it off as the animatronic simply walking too close. With Chica, he noticed her purple eyes actually tilted up to look directly at him, and her smiling beak opened menacingly.
Ready to bite.
Mike changed the camera again. Her face combined with her "LET'S EAT!" bib were too much to take in at the moment, particularly after his near-miss.
The relief at seeing her in the normal dining room light with Bonnie, her smile looking friendly and goofy again, almost felt like gratitude. The minutes ticked by slowly after that, each one stretching by with wound tension.
The rest of his coffee sat on his desk, ignored. Other needs took a backseat as he watched the cameras, turned the monitor off and on, tried not to freak out when the cameras glitched, and located the two animatronics when they wandered off. He no longer even thought about Pirate Cove or the stage show with nothing going on in either camera view. The dining room, backstage, and bathrooms all took greater priority.
A loud beeping sound made him jolt. It took a moment to realize the sound came from his watch, alerting him to the end of his shift. On the camera, he watched Bonnie and Chica stop their little dance and immediately head back for the stage.
For a moment, Mike just stared in silence, not even noticing the shuddering breath of relief. Flipping to the stage camera, he saw Bonnie stood in his place to Freddy's stage right with his retrieved guitar, Chica at his left with her cupcake. The morning light from the front windows shone on the trio, banishing some of the shadows from their faces to make them look normal and cheery again.
Mike stared at them for a long, silent moment. A nervous laugh worked its way up his throat, until it became relieved joy as he laughed at himself at how stupid the whole thing felt. Maybe the rumors he heard were just a prank played on new employees that simply got out of hand. A prank where the only true credence came from how creepy everything looked at night and the local lore mixed in with a few horrible truths. And everything that happened earlier, with his reflection and the Puppet? Just his mind believing those stupid rumors for even a moment.
The only part Mike found no humor in was the Bite of '87. That actually happened, and he still found it to be in extremely poor taste for a prank.
He sipped his coffee and shut off the monitor, suddenly feeling a lot better about this.
What happened before...Mike decided not to worry about it. He grabbed his thermos, and, finally free to do so, made a mad dash for the bathrooms. So long as he learned to get used to this place's weirdness at night, he could handle it.
He hoped.