Entrant 29: Falco

The night before accepting the job offer

12 AM

Ace pilot. Daredevil. Gangster. He had many titles throughout his career as a bounty hunter, but security guard? Why, Falco wondered, besides being strapped for cash did he even consider the job? Compared to the life he once lived, standing watch and guarding a bunch of animatronics seemed like a snorefest. Rumors abounded of an employee gone rogue, luring five children to their deaths with an animatronic suit, but Falco dismissed them as little more than cheap gossip.

But tonight, he wasn't at the infamous pizzeria; he was in a child's bedroom.

"This ain't right," he thought as he tapped his scouter to find that it wasn't working.

He heard faint, evil laughter coming from the right door of the room. To the left was another door, identical in every way except the way it opened and closed. Ahead of him lay a closet with two fence-like folding doors. Two dressers flanked either side of the closet. One had seven drawers and was crowned with a purple fan, alarm clock, and lava lamp. The other had three drawers and housed a shaded lamp atop itself.

He reached for his blaster but instead found an old security guard's flashlight. Deciding that it would have to do, he dismounted it from his hip and flicked it on.

"I guess this'll have to do," he grumbled.

He paced to the right door and shone the flashlight down the hallway, barely in time to see a pair of warped eyeballs slink away at the far end. Soon, he heard menacing breathing coming from the closet nearby. But that mattered little to him as he swiveled around to see three nightmarish teddy bears scatter from atop the bed.

Finally, he looked into the closet, from wherein the decayed face of a monstrous crimson fox animatronic peered back at him.

"Geez!" he yelped as he closed the closet.

No, now wasn't the time to run around like a chicken missing its head. He had to find a way out of the house, somehow. But with no weapons and no way to communicate with his teammates, he had to rely on his wits to survive.

He detested the thought.

1 AM

He sneaked out of the bedroom and hid underneath a small table in the left hallway, waiting for the ominous footprints echoing down the hallway to pass. In the all but nonexistent light, he could've sworn he saw the tattered lavender feet of a bunny animatronic plodding along the carpet. He reached for his flashlight as he heard metallic buzzing nearby.

When he shone the light down the hallway, he spotted a tiny golden bunny doll not unlike the teddy bear in the bedroom he had left behind. Its large googly eyes stared lifelessly at the far end, where Falco redirected the light to see the lavender bunny animatronic slink back away.

2 AM

As he crept down the stairs, he stopped to ponder where all the light switches had gone in the house.

"Okay," he thought aloud. "This has gotta be a dream. I mean come on. Freaky deeky animatronics, no lights anywhere in the house, and all I've got is this flashlight from who knows where?"

He kept his eyes and ears peeled for danger, ducking and dodging behind and beneath all manner of furniture he could find along the way.

3 AM

Eventually, he stumbled into an all but blackened room and felt around, resting his wingtips on what he thought was the handle of a huge oven. At once, he realized that he was in the kitchen. From somewhere therein, an antiquated phone rang.

"Hello? Hello?" the message began. "A-Are you safe? Oh, good... You had me worried throughout all day!"

Falco tilted his head in confusion. "Hold on," he thought. "How'd this guy get the number to this house?"

"So, where are you located? The kitchen huh? I see... That's a good choice there! As you probably already know this is very dark tonight. It's cloudy and the moon is small, yeah... I'm not sure if you're able to see very much in there. But luckily, this is the kitchen we're talking about. You have an oven, or should we say, a free light source, kinda. I doubt any of those electrical ovens work but there's an old oven behind the desk there! If you put some fuel in, it should light up the room for a little while! However, be very careful. Ghosts can sense the light from very far away! And since you only have a limited supply of fuel, you should only use it when you know someone is standing in your room. Got it? This is where you must use your security cameras, effectively."

"Hang on a sec. Security cameras? What security cameras?"

"The scary thing is if you light up your room while someone is in there with you, they will for sure go away, that's a fact! However, if no one is there, they will most likely come rushing towards you and you must just... hope for the best! *chuckles* So only use your fuel when you absolutely need to. Keep at it, stay safe, stay calm. Good night."

A ring on his scouter later, he heard ominous footsteps headed his way. Quickly, he deactivated his scouter, dove inside the oven, and held his breath. In the dark, he could swear that he saw the feet of an animatronic pace by. Eventually, the animatronic moved on, and Falco crept out of the oven and slunk out of the kitchen...

4 AM

...until at last, the front door was in sight. He looked left, then right, and finally behind him to see nothing there. But he knew that this eerie calm wouldn't last, so he had to be quick. He raced for the front door and grabbed for the knob, when suddenly, the terrifying face of a golden monster bear animatronic with a top hat and a pink bowtie filled his vision.

"KRRHHHAAAAOOOORRR" it roared as it lunged at his face.

"NO, OFFICER! I SWEAR!" he screamed as he flung himself awake.

He jerked his head from side to side to find himself in the sleeping quarters of the Great Fox. In a lower bunk across the hall, he saw Fox and Krystal cuddled together beneath the empty upper bunk, gawking at him. From the bunk directly beneath his own, Slippy slipped out in a daze, rubbed his eyes, and stood up to face him.

"Oh, sorry, guys. Must'a had a bad dream."

"Go back to sleep," grumbled Slippy as he slunk back into his bunk.

Falco plopped his head back into his pillow, trying to drift back to sleep.

6 AM

The alarm clock blared the coming of dawn. Falco rejected the job offer from Freddy Fazbear's Pizza, stating that the animatronics gave him nightmares.


Next time on Fazbear's Gauntlet...

After all he had been through with AVALANCHE and beyond, this seemed like a cakewalk to him...