[One hour later]
Mike had been staring out of the doorways since the tablet was no longer of use. Since he now needed to go from side to side, he took a flashlight (unbelievably, there was a secret trap with enough room for a few objects, and there was nearly a dozen of these lamps). The human was starting to feel more and more anxious, during the last hour, nothing happened.
As he was looking in the East hall, he heard a slight "pssst" sound. Turning around, he saw the fox making him a sign to come closer.
From the beginning, everything had been strange, well, stranger than the last five nights. What more could happen?
- What do you want, Foxy? You've brought the suit with you or you're going to stare at me until one of the others come and kill me?
Surprisingly, the animatronic shook his head, left and right, slowly. This clear negation and the calm, posed behaviour of the creature made Mike decide to step a little bit closer to him.
A boy's voice, grave, seemingly nearly an adult, went out from his throat.
- If… if what you said is true, then prove it, and maybe I would be willing to help you.
"At least there's someone here with a functioning brain", thought the night guard.
- What kind of proof do you want?
- Uh… well, you see, your line about us "being all silent and just trying to kill you", it made me doubt of what Chris and the others may think of you. That's not something this guy would've said, I think.
Mike looked questioningly at Foxy, who nodded.
- Golden Freddy, as you named him. My name is, or at least was, Arnold. You may call me either this or Foxy, I don't care. A name is just made to design something, after all.
- Arnold, Chris, okay, and the others?
The human was surprised as laughing sounds came out of Arnold's throat. He slowly got up, before taking the chair for himself.
- That's exactly the proof I needed! Wanna know something about the killer? You agree that it would only be logical for him to earn our thrust, right? Well, at some point, we all told him our names, which he would not easily forget. After all, he killed us, and he surely had to know if we had family or friends he would have to avoid, cause after that, surely he was in BIG troubles.
Now, the man was just plain annoyed.
- What does it have to do with me?
The fox stopped his rambling, before looking down, like a child caught searching in others belonging.
- You see, at first, we thought you were… him, back to finish the work, to dismantle us or something. *sigh* We… we were blinded by rage, and you, all this time, you were just trying to survive. But now… I wonder…
The animatronic had a hesitation.
- Go on, urged the guard.
A last moment passed, before the fox answered.
- I… I want to know, how much time has passed since we were taken away.
He took the chair, and the human sat on the ground, explaining what the spirits missed.
[2 uneventful hours of explanations later]
Arnold sat straight up in a rapid move.
- WE'VE BEEN DEAD FOR WHAT?!
Mike glared at him.
- So you listened to me, just to then repeat what I said about an hour ago, and then scream it out loud? Talk about a slow brain.
- Hey, not our fault if our corpses are decomposing. We may be dead, but thanks to… these, he lifted his hand, we can feel just like when we were still alive.
The human shifted uncomfortably on the ground.
- So, each time I closed the door…
A low growl accompanied the robot's words.
- Don't talk to me about these doors, I almost broke my nose on night four.
- Sorry. At least your nose is still in place.
- Yeah, he simply acknowledged the fact.
- … Sooo?
The fox looked back at Mike.
- Sooo what? You wonder "what next"? Next, it's currently near to 5 AM, we've been after you all week, I'm somehow exhausted, and sadly, we can't sleep. How I wish I could just be in a bed and get at least one hour of sleep. Guess that's how it works when your body is not even made of organic materials.
The guard simply nodded.
- And I guess you wonder if I'll help you now. Well, good news for you, buddy, you can count on me, but we'll have to convince the others.
That made Mike wonder about something.
- About the others, as you mentioned them, do you know their names?
The robot looked at him, as if to say "are you stupid or what?"
- Alright, so I already told you for me and Chris. So… the chicken is housing Sarah, a little seven years old girl. In Freddy, there's Gabriel, who's a real nerd sometimes, about 14. Bonnie, her real name is Jane, I think she is ten or eleven. Chris is… well, he never told us, but I think he would've been around 13 at the time the kidnapping took place. Myself, I was going to celebrate my 17th anniversary a month after the date of the tragedy. So yeah, they said "kids" in the newspaper, but in fact they should've said "minors".
Mike was simply trying to get all of this working in a normal way for his brain. That was beginning to be a bit too much information there.
- Woah Arnold please slow down, I'm not a computer on which you can start a Word document, type some random things and then save like you want, I've got a brain!
The fox seemed surprised, but started to chuckle right after it.
- Ha ha, guess you're right, it's been way too long since I've talked to somebody… normal, to say the least.
Then a question went through the human's head.
- Wait, it's nearly 5 AM at the moment, and none of your "friends" came back, what's going on?
Not prepared to such question, the robot was slightly startled and visibly wiggled in place, trying not to let the man see his surprise, just why was the guard asking this question now?
- Uh, well, you see, we can only stay in free roaming for such long amount of time, which is during the week. During the weekend, we have to shut down one or two hours earlier, as being active this long deplete the batteries, and makes us feel fatigue, without any way to recover.
All he got was a strange look from the human.
- I mean, technically, when we shut down, we should be able to quote on quote "sleep", right? Turns out, being a human spirit stuck in a robot is shit, no kidding. The robotic body can recharge, get repaired and all, but our spirits can't get any sleep. Heck, if I was still human, I would surely get a mention in the Guinness record for the worst dark circles in history. Since we've been brought back to life in these new bodies, which ironically hosts our decomposing old ones, yerk, we've never slept again.
Mike felt kind of sorry after hearing that.
- Uh, you might be really tired then.
The only thing he got from the animatronic was a little nod, and a strange yawn, during which the unnatural movement made the mechanism creak a bit.
- Owch, exclaimed Arnold.
The other stood up, and quickly checked what was wrong.
[After a dozen of minutes and failed attempts to solve the problem]
- Damn, looks like your jaw locked up from an insane amount of… actually I can't declare whether it's rust, filth, dirt, past blood having dried off, or just a mix of all of these.
- Uh-uh, agreed the fox, his jaw still stuck by the old metal pieces.
Mike was back in his rambling.
- You guys really need to get repaired, and also a good cleaning wouldn't be luxury, to be honest. In fact, I don't understand how any of you hasn't got something like a shut down just to be thrown in the garbage, why did they even kept you for so long?!
All the creature was able to do was to shrug to say "I don't know".
A sigh escaped the human's lips.
- Well, I could fix you if I had any cleaning stuff nearby, but the things at my disposal here either are too strong and would damage some softer parts, like the fur and the most used wires, or wouldn't do much for cleaning. The best for me to repair you should be to take you to where I live, that is if first, the boss's okay with it, and two, if you promise you really won't attempt to kill me, how does that sound?
- O'ay, I a'hee. Hust do so'hin.
It took a few seconds to realize what the robot meant.
- Oh. Well, that's settled then, I'll talk with the boss tomorrow. You can go now.
Just before the robot left in the hallway, however.
- I forgot! I have one more question for you Arnold!
The fox turned toward Mike, still ridiculously stuck with his muzzle wide open.
- I'll help you with whatever problem you have as long as you behave, for sure. However, we agreed that you'd help me to convince the others, and with tomorrow being Sunday, we should be able to come up with a plan, alright?
As if he would forget something he promised just a few hours ago!
The robot made a positive sign, to mean he understood, and went back to the Pirate Cove.
Mike, on his side, simply got back in his chair, and relaxed for once, managing to sleep through the rest of the last hour.
[Some time later]
The sound of the clock woke him up, and for the first time since he started to work here, he was happy.
"Finally, maybe this will all come out okay? Man, that sure was some unexpected help Arnold offered to me, surely together we will be able to reason the others."
He had one worry, however, which he said out loud.
- But what about Chris, he seemed to old a deep grudge against the murderer, mumbled the night guard, walking to the front doors.
The sun was, for once, shining to greet the new day, and birds could be heard chirping all around. The employees for the day were starting to arrive, greeting Mike as he crossed them, until he found who he was searching for.
His boss.
Yeah no I was really tired when I wrote this, and this seems like a good place to end the chapter here, cliffhanger for now, it was past the freakin 1 AM, I had to wake up at damn 6 hour in the morning, so, in all honesty, fuck the full chapter, next might be short, that's all. Damn, I don't even have the force to feel sorry for saying something harsh, I guess I really need to get more sleep -.-' Whatever, been stalling some of my stories for some time, I'll try to get something done after this thing is posted… I swear I don't know how to prioritize… *Author's brain implodes from lack of intelligence*
Ps : Something went wrong when first trying to post this.
[What happened at 1:30 in the morning]
*Goes to upload chapter*
…
*realize the network is currently gone* Me : Unholy screech from Hell's depth.