Chapter 3.

The Night Shift's My Duty, I Just have Company.

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"You're telling me the west hall unit hasn't been on for an entire minute? First off, Rob, you are fired. Jenson, barricade the door and hand me my blunderbuss."

-Writ 3 of Surveillance.

"You make it sound like this... Um... Er, what did you call it?"

"Atomic Fireballs."

"Right, A-tom-ic, Fireballs..." She still struggled with the more original slang speech, yet with a tilted head, Foxy managed the words with a slight musing.

"So, you make it sound like they actually set your mouth on fire-"

"YES! They do!" Phillip laughed, his own words muffled with the cinnamon, spicy jawbreaker in his mouth. "These things will melt your face off!"

"Then why would you EAT it?!" Foxy asked worriedly, angling towards his lips slightly to perceive unseen damage.

Phillip angled away a bit, sniffed awkwardly, and chuckled nervously.

"N-Not literally, Fox'. They don't... HURT you or nothin'..."

"I..." She pouted, rather cutely, and crossed her arms over her chest to raise a brow at him. Shifting weight, she shook her head. "-I don't get it."

"They have a spicy sensation when you eat them... It's not REAL fire, but the flavoring... Um, INVIGORATES, there's the word, it invigorates your taste to give a tingling, hot/crackly sensation. I dunno how else to say it."

He held one of the still wrapped candies out in front of him from the chair.

"Some people like it, others find it uncomfortable. Here, see what you think!"

Foxy frowned, took hold of the little translucent sleeve of plastic, and held it up to her non-patch-covered eye. She blinked and turned the mysterious red orb about, shrugged, and used a single nail to scratch the plastic off.

Phil raised a lower lip, impressed, as she popped it into her maw, clacked it around, and sat there dumbly.

She rolled her jaw a few times.

"No taste buds?" Phillip asked tiredly.

"Nyup." Foxy admitted.

"No point then, right?"

"Nyope."

"Stop that,"

"Why?"

"It's weird."

"So are you."

"Mmmkay, and?"

"I like that."

Phillip's preparation for an act of laughs, an attempt to get smiles going stopped, and he became intrigued with the sudden flush of deeper crimson invading the animatronic's bolted jaw-hinges.

First off, he wasn't aware that the material there could even react that way, that it could... DO that.

Second, she seemed pretty fidgety to it. A disturbed, yet knowing frown on his part, for there was no dramatic, soap-opera-induced bullcrap hiding the creature probably had a bit of a first meeting crush on him. Which, once again, it's his second night in pizza-crusted hell, not only has he made friends with a living, scary-looking robot, but now, said robot was having a pre-teen girl mannerism on him.

Oh yeah, just creepy man. Just creepy.

So in the end, with no better thought of reactions, he just shrugged, grinned.

"Oh, alright, thanks!"

Foxy grew redder, and nursed the hook still hidden to her back.

"A-Are you coming back tomorrow?" She asked suddenly.

The security guard closed his eyes briefly, and decided with Matt's help, his and Foxy's thinking, he would live, the freakshow would be in check.

He shook his head to clear it, and nodded.

"Yeah, I'll uh... I'll be here."

BEEP BEEP BEEP

BEEP

BEEP BEEP BEEP

BEEP

His vision widened, and with a yank to his side, he pulled the blinking tablet to his face to view the flashing indicator above the time, now proudly beaming 6 am.

Taking a glance about, morning light slowly came in outside the office, and Foxy appeared dull, quite saddened, a bit more than he expected. She trudged towards the door, and slid her claw beneath it gingerly.

It swung into the ceiling slot above, and she waved at him.

"I-I'll see you tomorrow then... Um..."

His hand slapped to his forehead.

All of this time, they had been talking and talking and TALKING, she'd fended off quackers, and she still didn't know his damned NAME.

"Phillip! Phillip Linn."

Foxy brightened a tad.

"I'll see you tomorrow night then, Phillip," Taking a further step outside, she stopped briefly, and looked back inside as he stood from the chair to pack his things.

"P-Phillip?"

"Hmmmm?"

"Can you... Make me laugh again, when you come back?"

That was quite a blunt way of putting it, and the evident knowledge of her lack of socializing was made clear with such a query, Phil felt a tang of guilt, and he bobbed his chin with an affirmative.

"Yes... I think I can do that."

Foxy smiled, waved again, and was gone in a whoosh of copper red from her dulled fur, padded falls down the hall, and checking his tablet, Phil saw the curtain to the Cove slip shut again

The drive back home was one of unusual silence, though, he was glad no curdling scream was there to pierce his hearing and throat.

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Sleep actually came... Much easier than Phillip thought it would, or SHOULD, have. The darkness still had an impending feel of fluffy death rearing its ugly, children-eating face in his direction, but it also had the sense not all of it was trying to hurt him...

Foxy surely had confused him with an absent mind of dreams that night, so when the alarm clock rang its song to his ears the next afternoon, his eyes smacked open, and his fist performed its routine of cracking the little clock on its roof to silence it.

A quick check of his house again, he growled, shoved another cereal bar in his throat, and cleaned up the dishes from the dinner he'd had upon walking in the door last night.

As he scrubbed a plate, Phillip raised a brow idly to the window in front of the sink.

What was he to do tonight?

Foxy was surely anticipating his arrival, and even though she... Wasn't... HUMAN, in fact, she was a walking, talking, living animatronic creature that'd he'd met a NIGHT ago, he felt some sort of responsibility to not let her slip into the same void the freaky trio had.

Speaking of which, he couldn't rely on her to protect that office from them forever, he figured if they had been in the building THAT long, they probably tested their target's borders before pulling more daring and skilled attacks.

They might rush him all at once, and Foxy's hook wouldn't save them from THREE of the murderous wack-jobs.

Rubbing his chin with the sponge he held, a lightbulb went off in his head.

"Oooooo... I know EXACTLY, what to do."

Finishing his task, he sprinted up the stairs again, changed from his pajamas, adorned his security hat, and yanked a key from a hidden spot beneath his bedpost.

Eyeing the metal object like a godsend, he cleared the zone to his closet, threw it open, and slapped the key into a locked box in the back.

It clicked, and he yanked it open.

"Haha..." He muttered, pushing aside a few wrappings of paper, and retracting with a spray-can of pungent sounding liquid.

Giving it a brief shake, he smiled to the red paint covering it, labeled with bold yellow letters above a growling cartoon bear being struck down with an extended, can-holding human hand.

"I'm gonna go MACE Windu on these jerks..."

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The drive ended with a pull of the ignition to PARK, and Phillip gave a determined, challenging frown to the pizza place as he stepped out of his Ford.

Enwrapped in a usual blanket of inky darkness, and only broken at its front with a single foyer light still on, Freddy's looked as menacing as it always did, and the new security guard adjusted his hat, a bit too dramatically, and nodded to no one in particular.

"Let's do this, boys."

"Mr. Linn? Who are you talking too?"

"AIIIIIIEEEIEIIEEEEEEEE!"

Phillip's bravery was absconded with by the forces of fate in no less than a second of time, and the shrill, feminine shriek that flew from his mouth only allowed his manager to take a step back, and pinch his brow in frustration.

Yet, when his several foot-high bound into the air ended, and Phil's sneakers clacked back onto the pavement below, the young man still felt a gradual padding on his chest, and took a heave of breath to stop it.

Staring daggers at Matt, his boss unclenched his pinched skin, and smiled apologetically.

"Oops." He stated musingly.

"I get that, since, you know," Phillip took another breath to further calm himself. "Woo... Anyway, I get now that I'm super-guard, I take the whole raise on my paycheck to support TEN dudes, but I swear if you scare me like that AGAIN, your adding a weekly iced coffee to that check."

Matt chuckled, and held a hand, which Phillip shook briefly.

"Noted, Mr. Linn. Is there anything I can tell or do to aid your station, tonight?"

Phillip twitched a little, and decided with all the honesty he had told Matt, to keep the improvised defense he had planned, secret. As such, he shoved the can of mace jutting from his back jeans-pocket deeper under his hoody.

"N-Nope, just keep that coffee ready, just in case."

His boss laughed again, and nodded.

"Good luck, Mr. Linn. If things get... Interesting," The old man shoved a tiny post-it into his employee's hand, raised his lower lip, and gestured to the darkened street behind them.

"-Call me for assistance. I'll get here, no matter what."

With that, Matthew trotted over to an old 50's era van parked a little ways from Phillip's Ford, stepped in, and noisily started the engine with an added few bangs and chops of internal machinery. The van gave a tiny honk, and was gone down the road a minute later.

Eyeing the note, he memorized the number, sighed, and stepped inside the deathly quiet, and dark, Freddy's Death-House.

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"Office doors, check. Buttons, check. Pringles chip-canister, check. Coca-Cola-" A rushing sound of plastic, sloshing of liquid, and a growl on his end. "-Scratch that, PEPSI, ugh, check."

Sifting about the room more, Phillip examined the desk with sweeping hands, noting the breach on the dust-covered surface where the rusty fan used to sit.

"Filthy, antiquity-era desk, check. Light bulb," Standing straight upwards, he flicked the little wire-hung fixture with his finger, noted how it flickered, and returned to his normal stance. "-Debatably checked. Now,"

Phillip grew a devious grin, and placed the can of mace on the desk with a clunk of motion.

"Ultimate anti-freakshow and monstrosity blinding agent with a side of ass-kick, CHECK."

A proud demeanor allowed itself to take over as he observed his little office, arms folded at his chest. Phillip hummed a tune from yet another Xbox game, and sat in the swivel chair noisily, before taking out and activating the tablet at his side.

He connected to the cameras, chuckled with appreciation with his battery life being just a green bar with no limited number on it, and idly flipped through the views. Despite how after a mere few days, he was already a tad more... USED, if that was even plausible on the borderlines of insanity, to the shifting positions of the bird and hare, they still made him shiver when they popped up.

Bonnie seemed over-active throughout the next few minutes, he changed rooms every time Phil took his camera view elsewhere, and without thought really, he scratched an itch on his shoulder, keeping his eyes glued to the tablet, his thumb jabbed out and shut the left door.

As if on cue, the metal gave out a light THUD as Bonnie practically batted the door in futile frustration. He hadn't even been assaulted by the damned killer rabbit, and old purples was having a hissy-

Phillip's musings were cut short when he saw movement to the right.

"Frigging ostrich doesn't know manners very well, does she- OHMYCHRIST!"

Phillip jumped backwards in his chair with the purple sigil of untimely demise hanging his ugly, ragged ears out of the doorway, a big, triumphant smile plastered on his fat face. The young man shook violently, and chanced a look at the mace can on the desk.

Phil could almost hear his favorite Star Wars characters telling him to 'USE THE FORCE!' to get to the only thing that would save him. How could he go MACE Windu on this clown WITHOUT the MACE?

He bit his lip, and drew blood suddenly when Bonnie's paw clenched on the rim of the doorway, his fake, animatronic eyes snapped to look dead at the human.

Lightly, he put the tablet down on the chair, and made to stand.

This wasn't going to be easy... Not at all.

Especially when the freak could move that fast-

"ohmygodohmygodohmygodOHMYFRIGGINGHOLYGOD." Phillip muttered incomprehensibly as his eyes left the insane monster before him for a split second, only to return to a fully purple-fur filled vision, Bonnie's mere PRESENCE tickled the hair on his skin.

The security guard squeaked, and zipped away as Bonnie swept a paw at him in a toying motion.

The rabbit gurgled, and emitted a noise akin to lowly, rumbled jubilations of laughter. In such a mocking sound of unimaginably self-descriptive sadism, Phillip would have just been dead right there had he been an average security guard...

But, for the lord's sake, HELL NO, he wasn't gonna be bunny-chow because a situation that HE braved on HIS choice, became a tad more dangerous than it already was. A bump in the long road of many more to come, he expected, his goal was set.

Get the fragging mace, man.

His eyes darted from the can to Bonnie, who, much to the poor human's chagrin, began to clench an angry paw by his left side. Unknown, until now of course, to Phillip, Bonnie had more than just brute strength on his side...

His purple-furred fingers almost rang like chimes when a raggedy, sharp nail unsheathed from each tip, and the rabbit reared back, and swung in one swift motion.

Phillip screamed like a cheerleader whose panties fell in a bad breeze, but miraculously bent backwards enough too, indeed, frankly topple over his swivel chair like a stupid goon, and also avoid the air-whizzing claws that sliced the space he vacated.

The chair made a final clack, and Phillip rolled over the toppled seat in another clumsy, flailing motion, Bonnie of course, was right behind with a frustrated gurgle.

Phil cursed when a heavy weight pressed on his shoulder, and claws tore the hood from his sweatshirt in a stretching noise of ruined fabric, though, he paid no mind, and used it to continue moving as the murderer rabbit tossed the decoy away.

He stumbled to a stand, and just saw the can in his vision, on his knees, Phil managed to feel the aluminum in a wrapped palm, he HELD it, before more of a tightened grip on the base of his neck, the can zoomed away as his vision swirled.

Bonnie gave off a cackling drum of wet vocals, and Phillip met the wall in the back of the office with a loud, deafening, and quite painful WHUMP as dust and a poster fell alongside his toppled body.

He just sat there on the concrete and groaned.

"Who the hell knew he lifted WEIGHTS?" He muffled into the floor.

A dirty footfall in front of his face, and Phil became aware of three things, all at once.

One, Bonnie's dirty, blade-like nails were coming down to the base of his head, so, impending spinal separation was ahead, so, you know, REALLY BAD.

Second, there was another presence that had just rushed into the office beside his soon-to-be killer, so, he guessed Chica would share his remains with her deviant little demon-friend here...

Third, he still held something metal...

And as his hands clasped the object tighter for a split-second, he was relieved to find he hadn't dropped his mace after all.

Bonnie managed another grunt of laughter, and from that day on, Phil swore on his saved life that he felt those nails TAP against his flesh before he stopped their descent.

As such, the mace can whipped up in a spring of his arm, a finger pumping down on the nozzle with a click, and a virulent cone of orange-reddish mist careened from the spout and sizzled onto Bonnie's overly satanic, ugly-smacked, and ridiculously nightmare inducing growth on his head he claimed his FACE.

The rabbit gave off a raspy, sharp gurgling, and his paws smacked upwards to rub at the invasive chemical on his eyes and brow, swiping madly, more hacks and grunts from his throat.

Yet a second later, the OTHER animatronic in the room acted.

A slash of rusty metal, and Bonnie's chest drew another ragged-looking wound across its matted fur, a balled fist clocked his head hard enough for a dislodged spring to fly out of his jerked neck with a SPROIIING! of a reverberating slinky-like noise.

Phillip stood to his full height, shook his head, and took in the quite angry Foxy hauling Bonnie's leant-over form to her right shoulder, and hauling him in a single-armed toss out into the hall. The rabbit thudded into the wall there, knocked a nearby poster down in a fluttering motion, and slumped tiredly to the floor, heaving slowly.

"Asshole..." Foxy growled, receiving a final, not-so prim OR proper for that matter, raised digit of Bonnie's extended hand from his sitting daze. The poster finished its floating, peaceful descent, and rested quietly between his ears, but Foxy didn't watch long enough to see anyway.

The door slammed, and she went to smack her palms in a up-down motion for a job well done, remembered the hook, blushed, and stowed it at her side as usual.

"Hot-damn, lady..." Phillip staggered to stand to his full height. "-Like I said, don't let ME piss you off-"

"Phillip!" She hurried over, and leaned closer to examine his head, which, despite a bruise on the back, it and the rest of him seemed okay. Of course, she refrained from physical contact, and for the moment, he preferred such. "-A-Are you alright...?"

"Yep... I'm good." He muttered, giving a thumbs up while rubbing his head with his right hand.

"How did you DISTRACT him like that? Bonnie's a schmuck, but he's fast..."

Phillip giggled and held aloft the can of mace, which, she read, reread, and shrugged.

"What is it? Acid or something?"

"Humans use this to ward off BEARS, Fox'."

She blinked, raised a brow, thought and thought again, smiled, and nodded her head in an impressed fashion.

"I like it. Good move..."

"I needed a good move for the likes of them..." He said, leaning down to retrieve his fallen swivel chair, which, surprisingly had remained unbroken through now TWO topples of his panicked survival efforts, stood it upright, and went to get the fallen tablet too.

Phil's hand touched the top, and he noted how fur also got on his palm, which, when looking up, he saw Foxy's surprised, albeit flushed expression to his contact of her attempted movements to help him.

Quickly, she slipped her paw from under his hand, and coughed into it awkwardly, he blinked, and snatched up the tablet.

"So, uh... Hi!" He greeted belatedly. "I'm back!"

Foxy smiled and laughed quietly beneath her paw.

"That's good..." She said, shifting on her feet, and casting a quick glance out the right-hand window of the office quickly. "So... How... Are, you?" She tried with an innocent smile.

"I'm just peachy! Got a first-degree concussion, soiled underwear and twenty broken bones! I can run a marathon with NOOO problem."

Of course, she laughed, and the office became another only source of said material within miles of even outside the building, and Phillip just grinned, and spiraled the chair to face his new animatronic friend.

"I said I'd make you laugh, right?" He chuckled.

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