A/N: Hey guys, here's chapter 3 a bit early. I nearly have chapter 4 done for Wednesday or tomorrow night, but I'm fighting against a low fever to get it done so that's why you're getting this early. I don't want to fuss getting it posted early in the morning before work if I'm feeling any worse. Anyway, have a nightmare!
Chapter 3
Crying. He heard crying, but he also heard commotion and children all around him...what was going on? Where was the crying coming from?
Looking around Mike slowly realized he was in a very small diner with what looked like a birthday party going on, and a large familiar brown bear running around serving cake, though it looked much different compared to all the other versions he had seen.
Ignoring the screaming, fussy children Mike walked around, still hearing the crying ringing in his ears until he saw a young boy sitting outside the restaurant on the steps all alone. Promptly he walked out the door and crouched down and asked, "Hey, are you ok?" but gained no response.
The boy seemed to be maybe 7 or 8 and was dressed rather poorly in worn out filthy shoes, a holey sweatshirt and top, and shorts that seemed far too large on him. Clearly the child was either homeless or from a very hard off family, but when Mike reached out to touch the boy he found his hand went right through the child's shoulder.
"Wh-what?" Mike muttered stepping back but stopped when he saw someone walking toward the boy and immediately felt on edge.
He couldn't make out the mans face no matter how much he focused, and when they spoke their voice was all garbled in his ears though he could make out what was being said.
"Hey there sport, you ok?"
Sniffling and looking up the little dark haired boy shook his head. "Mom kicked me out until tonight a-and didn't give me any food…"
"Aw...poor thing. I can get ya some food if you want." The stranger offered.
"R-really?" the boy perked up.
"Yeah! There's a good sandwich place just down the block we can get ya something."
"O-ok!"
Mike shook his head, suddenly rooted to the ground unable to do anything as the boy ran off with the man down the block and the scene around him changed. He could tell what was going to happen, and he didn't want to see, he wanted to wake up.
Gradually everything changed in a blur until Mike saw the stranger guiding the boy back down the block and he could easily see something was already very wrong. The child was nearly stumbling and seemed to be fighting not to simply fall asleep standing until the stranger picked him up. Glancing around the man ducked into a side street and Mike jumped when the same boy suddenly appeared next to him as the two walked out of his sight.
This boy was different though, and made the guard skitter away in fright when glazed dead yet furious eyes looked directly up at him. The boys lips were tinged blue and dark bruises wrapped around his neck with his pallid cheeks stained with tears.
Silently the boy just stared at Mike as everything around them slowly bled into black and still Mike could not wake up until it was nothing but darkness, the lone child and himself.
Though, moments later the boy began to subtly change, his deadened eyes becoming dark red only to fade and change so the iris was glowing bright white and the pupils had a definite circle of white in the center. As this happened the boy began to tremble and tipped his head with a twisted smile, shadows swirling around the two until the guard could just barely make out five other child like forms with the same haunting eyes as the boy before him.
Then, all at once the children jumped at him, clawing at his clothing and screaming so loudly the man felt his ears begin to bleed.
"Stop! Stop, let me go!" The guard yelled, pitching and trying to get away.
No matter how much he tried to pry or throw the children off they clung to him tightly, nails digging into his flesh, small hands always going for his neck and eyes until he felt a sharp kick at his knees and he was dragged to the ground.
Finally as this happened Mike jolted awake vaguely aware he had been thrashing around and screaming in his sleep, his throat felt raw and he was hopelessly tangled in the sheets. Letting out a long sigh the blonde sat up and tried to calm down until a strip of light ran across the carpet and he saw his wife peek into the room.
"Mikey? Are you ok?"
Glancing over the man nodded slightly and looked over at the clock. 10 o' clock, looks like he was going into work with less sleep than usual…
"Yeah, I just had a nightmare again." He murmured.
"Oh...the usual?" Jenny frowned slightly.
"Yeah, mostly." The guard lied. He knew his wife was already worried about him working at the park, so he didn't want to concern her even more saying he'd seen a kid get killed. "I think I'm just gonna stay up until work now…"
"Are you sure honey? You had to stay up until almost five to get Abby from band practice…"
"Yeah I'll be fine. I got some stuff I can do to keep busy until then." Mike nodded, crawling out of bed.
"Ok then." Jenny nodded slightly in return.
Slowly the remaining hour passed and Mike idly did a little more computer research about the old chain. He didn't find anything new he hadn't already read of course, so with a sigh he reluctantly got ready for work once again and grabbed a bit of food and coffee before leaving for his 3rd night of the week.
His 3rd night...30 years ago that night had been a battle to keep anything out, and he remembered all too well that was the one night he'd suffered the worse hallucination he'd ever gotten.
He'd been fighting to keep track of Bonnie and Foxy had already charged his door once that night, banging and scratching at the metal slab with his hook savagely. Chika had surprisingly not been too active, keeping to the kitchen and dining hall, but Freddy insisted on freaking Mike out by laughing every 20 minutes closer and closer to his door. At one point after suffering an auditory hallucination with that strange demonic chattering Mike haphazardly started checking the cameras until he heard what sounded like a little girl giggling right in his ear.
Damn near dropping his tablet the guard had looked up and found a large golden Freddy suit slumped on the floor in front of him that slowly lifted its head with jerky motions and looked directly at him before letting out a demonic scream.
The thing had nearly given the man a heart attack before he realized it wasn't real...mainly because when he fell back his shoe flew off and went right through the suit…
Shaking his head as he eventually pulled into the theme parks lot, Mike gathered his thoughts back together and trudged to the haunted house, though on his way he paused hearing something strange as he walked by the mini-coaster. No one was meant to be posted at that attraction accept for outdoor guards doing an hourly sweep, so glancing at his watch he wandered toward the gates and flashed his light around.
He couldn't see anything directly outside so hopping the turnstile Mike trotted up the steps to look inside, it almost sounded like someone had left a radio on, or some sort of interference was coming through the intercom. Once inside the guard looked around and froze when he saw two glowing gold eyes looking around the room as well, hanging very close to the ceiling. Directing his flashlight toward it Mike found a twisted animatronic hanging from the girders that he faintly remembered seeing as a child. Vixen? Was that the things original name? He couldn't remember, all that he knew was that it had accurately been renamed Mangle after it kept getting torn apart by curious kids.
The animatronic had originally been meant to be a female counterpart for Foxy, but at the moment had barely half its original suit, its head, a hand, a foot, that was about all that remained. The rest was a hopeless mess of animatronic parts to the point you could barely even begin to guess what the whole thing would have looked like at one time, accept that it had a second head that presumably was some sort of puppet at one point. Each head also had only one eye and wires hanging out all over the place.
Accept Mike didn't' remember anyone saying they were going to get a robotic recreation of the thing for the attraction… Either way, it shouldn't be on at this hour, so walking over Mike looked up at the white fox warily until he saw it was definitely on a preset pattern of looking around. Then walking under it he reached up under the back of the mask and felt around for the switch to power it down. After a few tries he eventually found the switch and Mangle stuttered to a halt, the eyes going dark and the head dropping, though it remained affixed to the ceiling.
"There. Now that, that's settled, off to hell." Mike huffed, satisfied that the static had stopped.
Walking back out and hopping the turnstile again Mike jogged to his post and was about to bolt to the office but as he opened the security door he had to quickly slam it shut with an involuntary yelp.
"Fuck!" he hissed as a loud series of bangs answered him from the other side.
The damn robot had been waiting for him at the exit! It couldn't leave thanks to the programming it held, but it could certainly camp out at the doors as long as it liked…
Waiting a minute Mike glanced at his watch and shook his head seeing it was already quarter after 12. If Jake had left him any sort of call he'd certainly missed it, so with a huff the guard cracked open the door again, only to have to throw himself back against it when Golden Bonnie swiped at him with a hiss.
"You've got to be kidding me!" the blonde cried in frustration. "As if Freddy trying to fuck my shit up before wasn't bad enough!"
Crossing his arms and leaning against the door Mike waited another 10 minutes before checking again, and this time the animatronic was thankfully not in sight. Quickly Mike ran to his office and the first thing he did was set off a sound in a neighboring room before resetting the vents.
Godamn this is not a good way to start the night…" The guard grumbled, sitting back and scanning through the cameras and began to lead Golden Bonnie as far away from the office as he possibly could. Though, after about an hour of going between the cameras and the systems after the cameras crashed the blonde went back to keep leading the animatronic away, but suddenly couldn't find it.
"What?! Where the hell…" Mike hissed, flipping through all the cameras and finding absolutely nothing.
After a second he flipped to the vent cameras and let out a aggravated scream finding the yellow rabbit on Camera 11 inside the vent, squirming and army crawling through the duct.
"Really?! Really!? Why the fuck would they allow that!?" The guard cried, blocking off the vent so the thing couldn't get any further.
But that rose the question, if he could block off sections of the vent, what the hell would that do to the air coming into the office?
Grinding his teeth in agitation Mike waited to see where the animatronic was going to go next, but after a few minutes he heard a scraping noise far too close for his liking. Looking up the blonde froze seeing the hulking form of what he could swear was Golden Freddy slowly shuffling past the window, accept this one was in far worse condition that what he remembered. It looked more like a golden version of the 70's costume with an ear missing and just as burnt as the Balloon boy from the previous night was.
Though as Mike watched the thing it suddenly ducked below the line of the window and Mike let out a frightened scream as it appeared right next to him, screeching and lunging for his face. Lurching back the guard slammed into the back wall and spit a string of profanities through his teeth when he realized it was just another hallucination. Kicking off from the wall the blonde slid back to the desk and rebooted the vents, setting back to finding the Golden Bonnie before it got too close.
Gradually another hour or two passed and Mike fought to keep the real animatronic away from the vents until he heard a familiar singing close by.
"What? No, no no no, that thing can't be here!" the guard whined, trying to find the source of the little tune.
A second later though, a flicker of movement to his left made the blonde instinctively look up, only to meet a familiar but much older and blackened Pirate fox just as it leapt for him with that same raspy scream. Once more Mike fell back, unable to ignore his natural reflexes yet, and this time payed for it.
Cracking his head against the dusty floor the guards vision swam and he lay there for a moment trying to gather his wits before attempting to rise. He felt sick to his stomach and it was barely even 5 o'clock. This fucking job was going to kill him, he could just tell.
Not even bothering to get back onto his chair Mike fished the tablet off the desk once again and tried to reset everything as his vision began to darken at the edges. After about another 5 minutes everything was back online and the blonde climbed back onto his chair and looked around for the Golden Bonnie once again.
The next few hours absolutely dragged by, Mike warring with his stomach the entire time as Golden Bonnie went back and forth between the halls and vents and the vents going down two other times. At one point Mike swore he saw the animatronic on three different cameras at once.
The split second his watch struck 6 the guard threw the tablet back onto the desk and ran outside. Promptly stopping at the nearest trash bin Mike surrendered to his stomach needs, emptying its contents then letting out a weary groan once the nausea passed.
"This job sucks…"