Saturday, November 13, 1993
The world faded back into view. Grey tile with white flecks appeared before her, segmented into square metal frames. On either side, shelves towered over her, with blank masks staring ahead.
Vanna blinked a few times, realizing that a rectangle of light brightened some of the tiles, the source coming from right behind her. Like before when she woke up after witnessing a horrific event, she couldn't move. Every nerve remained paralyzed, refusing to obey her panicked thoughts. Her cheeks felt cold and wet. Some cool air from the ventilation system came through her slacks and sweater, and gently teased her skin.
She choked on a breath as her body finally gave her permission to move. Vanna quickly sat up, forcing back a cough as she noticed black slacks and sneakers before her, the ends of a purple sweater. Cool wood supported her body, the beaten down grains rough under her hands from years of use. Only when she massaged her neck and felt nothing over her face did she feel any sort of relief.
Nothing hurt except her head from when she passed out, and even that pain was dull. Vanna wiped her face on her sleeve, then buried her face in her hands just to feel her own smooth flesh.
Bonnie hadn't stuffed her. In fact, he hadn't hurt her at all.
Vanna kicked her legs over the table to hoist herself down. Her hand smacked resin beside her, followed by a hollow clatter. It took a moment to realize she knocked Dulcie to the ground. She pushed herself on the floor, only now noticing the table had been dragged back into place, with the legs precisely where they had been before. Vanna crouched down to pick up Dulcie, before she once more examined herself, trying to determine if this was a dream or not.
Her clothes felt cool, and Dulcie's resin was hard in her hands. Vanna found her flashlight and looked over into the dark corner where she saw the Puppet's box before. Her heart jolted a bit when she saw the endoskeleton staring up at her. Its big brown eyes watched her with a strange, familiar gleam, its metal body shining in the light. Vanna quickly turned away and made her way back into the dining room.
Everything looked normal again, with long, rectangle tables instead of smaller family ones. Any posters in sight showed Freddy, Bonnie, and Chica, the silver stars hung from the ceiling, and the Puppet's box sat in its proper place beside the prize counter.
Not in the back room where she had been oblivious to its existence.
Not in a ghostly vision where she walked in her little sister's footsteps and re-lived her last moments alive.
A muffled voice entered the dining room, the words indecipherable, but fearful.
Right.
Mike.
He had been investigating that strange crashing noise, and now it sounded like he was in trouble.
Vanna ran by the stage, stopping only when she reached the small steps leading up to it. A trickle of fear ran down her spine as she turned to see Freddy still onstage, and now staring down at her. She started to smell vanilla and strawberries.
That alone gave her the incentive to keep moving.
Can't get out...c-can't move. I don't-I don't want to die! I-I'm already-
Someone called his name, a familiar voice echoing from the bathroom tile. He glanced up and pulled his hands down, allowing the internal camera to take in the approaching figure.
It registered the uniform first, the purple shirt and shining gold badge. The light from the flashlight beam blocked their face, granting the internal camera only a silhouette.
Freddy's face glimmered at him from the newcomer's chest, mocking him.
"Jeremy," the guard said. "It's me."
The golden bear on the badge brought to mind the golden suit. And with the thought of that suit came the memory of a cruel smile, of pain that followed not long after. He never noticed the voice recognition software pulled up a file, not that it would have mattered.
Not when all he could think about was the smile, and how he should have gotten the memo.
Jeremy simply froze, finding himself just as unable to move now as he did six years ago, trapped in that last moment of peril as the smiling man's voice taunted him.
...You! he thought, fearfully.
Panic surged through him then, and with it, the ability to move. His attempts to put distance between himself and the night guard sent the old animatronic body careening back into the open stall. The camera blurred as he fell back and smacked the head against the tile, the footage going into white noise for a second before taking in the old ceiling. Footsteps echoed in his microphones, coming closer. Jeremy pushed himself up, trying to gain control of this new body. He fumbled a moment, but soon realized the animatronic parts moved at his command, albeit shaken and unsteady.
He heard the footsteps coming closer.
"Jeremy-"
D-don't-! he begged. St-stay away from me!
The guard froze before him, the bright flashlight beam still hiding his face. With some difficulty, Jeremy rose from the floor, using the stall's walls to get himself back onto his metal feet. In this bigger body, the bathroom stall felt smaller, tighter.
And made it more difficult to move.
He panicked again, the metal endoskeleton bashing dents into the stalls and creating so much noise that the microphones crackled, blocking out any other sounds. The guard started to turn away, to run.
And in that moment, Jeremy felt something snap. The suit moved as though under remembered grace, a mechanical instinct that he momentarily became one with. From somewhere deep inside the animatronic, the old voice box crackled to life, before a long, furious scream erupted from the old mechanical body.
"RRRRRRRRRRREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAHHHHH!"
He stumbled out of the stall, his metal feet digging into the tile as he slid forward, narrowing his sights on the retreating night guard.
It only took another step to right himself and regain some semblance of balance.
It took one more to catch up to his prey before he could get to the door, to slam his new robotic arms on either side of the night guard and keep him in place. Startled, the night guard dropped the flashlight. It clacked to the floor, the bright beam flickering a bit as it settled down.
This murderer got away before.
He wouldn't escape justice again.
The night guard had turned mid-run to face him, but now held his arms over his head to protect it from the animatronic's wrath.
"J-Jeremy!" he begged. "It's me! Mike!"
Upon hearing that name, the animatronic body stalled. Jeremy glanced down at the guard he had trapped against the wall. The bright flashlight no longer blocked his face. The light from the floor illuminated the wall with its cracked plaster, the night guard trapped between his metal arms. Realizing that no harm had come to him yet, the night guard barely dared to lower his hands, giving Jeremy a proper glance at his face.
Mike looked back at him, pale as a ghost and with terrified eyes that almost glowed from under the brim of his hat. Jeremy started to say something when a loud THWACK! echoed in the bathroom, followed shortly by the internal camera flickering and sputtering from something flying into it.
A hollow object rolled by, then gently came to a stop. As the video feed settled down again, Jeremy turned toward the sound to see pink frosting and one blue eye staring up at him.
"Leave him alone!"
He turned to the door to see who had thrown it, but he knew from the voice clip that came up before he saw her.
The young woman from earlier stood with her flashlight raised above her head, ready to either throw it or hit him with it. Her golden skin turned pale red from anger and dripped with sweat. Black streaks crawled down her face. The smeared mascara around her eyes became the warpaint of an Amazon. Her nostrils flared above her gritted teeth, an angry hiss sliding through them with each furious breath.
Jeremy froze, taking her in as he gradually comprehended the situation. He slowly turned back to Mike, who remained pressed against the wall, the only way he could put any further distance between himself and the animatronic. Jeremy tried to blink, the old eyelids stalling as they always did. As he started to pull away, the cameras suddenly went to white noise with a loud CLONK! as something smacked into his head again.
He stumbled away from Mike, his large metal body falling flat on his rump. The video feed sputtered again as the young woman grabbed the night guard's arm to lead him out.
Vanna watched as Spring Bonnie collapsed, before her fingers tightly gripped Mike's arm.
"Hurry!" she said, pulling him towards the door. "Before it recovers!"
Mike stalled for a second, still in shock from the robotic rabbit being right up in his face, then suddenly knocked away from him. When he registered Vanna's grip, he pulled away.
"Vanna, wait! He wasn't going to hurt me!"
The cameras blacked out for a second, flickered a bit of code, then returned to normal. Spring Bonnie stayed down as the two humans argued.
"Mike, are you fucking crazy?" Vanna screamed. "He had you cornered! He could have-!"
"It's not his fault!" Mike shouted back, quickly positioning himself between Vanna and the animatronic. "He thought I was-!"
Spring Bonnie had since crawled to the nearest corner, but turned in time to see Mike looking at him, the guard's expression suddenly somber and hesitant. Mike took a moment to gather his bearings, before he turned back to Vanna, his voice dropping as he finished his sentence.
"...Someone else."
Vanna kept the flashlight raised with her eyes still honed in on Spring Bonnie. The large golden rabbit trembling in fear from two humans half its size might have been almost comical if they both hadn't been on edge all night. Spring Bonnie held his hands over his face, and kept his large metal body as curled in as he possibly could. Slowly, Vanna's breathing steadied. Her features softened as she lowered her flashlight, trusting that at least for the moment, the animatronic wouldn't attack.
As she lowered her hand, Mike disappeared as the bathroom became shadows. In the midst of them, Spring Bonnie sat before her, no longer trembling. It slumped forward with the hands dangling at its sides, the creature as still as a photograph. She saw the silhouette of a bow around its now-complete right ear, with long lashes poking from its eyelids.
Shiny and new, with no life in the empty shell.
The smell of frosting entered her nose, along with...something else.
Something warm and alive and metallic.
"...Bunny?" she whispered.
The animatronic suddenly vanished into the dark. Vanna blinked in surprise, and the bathroom returned to how it was before, with the one beat down stall, the cracked plaster above the sinks, the broken glass shards in their piles on the floor, and Mike once more standing in front of her. Behind him, Spring Bonnie trembled again with its hands covering its face, its right ear broken once more. Only this time, she heard a new sound among the creaking and rattling metal.
...I'm sorry. I c-can't...I didn't a-ask for this.
The voice was broken with bitter sobs - a young man with an accent of some kind that his fractured voice made difficult to pick out.
Vanna nearly dropped the flashlight when the new voice rang through her thoughts.
"...Vanna?" Mike asked.
Behind him, Spring Bonnie sputtered a bit, the voice she heard in her mind replaced with robotic static for a second. Vanna found herself pulled back into reality at the jarring noise, before the sobbing voice came back. She shook her head, trying to get the voice to go away, and when it didn't, she turned to Mike.
"That...that voice…"
Mike nodded.
"I know," he whispered. "I can hear it too."
Vanna found herself glancing down at Spring Bonnie again. She grabbed Mike's hand to ensure his presence if the shadows came back. Gentle, quiet sobs mingled as an undertone with the rattling metal, and occasionally, she picked out a few words of sorrow and regret.
"...Can he hear us?" she whispered.
"Yes."
Mike turned back to Spring Bonnie for a moment, his expression somber again, but pondering. He pulled his hand from Vanna's and reached up to his neck to undo his tie.
"Mike, what are you doing?"
She watched him throw the tie to the floor, his hat following it a second later.
"I'm looking more like myself," Mike said, quietly.
He grabbed for the badge and slipped it from his breast pocket. It gently clattered to the floor beside the hat. Mike then reached up to undo his collar and unbuttoned it, making his way down the purple cloth until his white undershirt was visible.
He needed to not look like that man.
To be a friend instead of a security guard.
When he felt properly dishevelled, Mike carefully stepped towards the trembling rabbit. Vanna reached to grab his arm again, but found her fingers simply brushing it instead. Mike turned to her for a second.
"Trust me," he said. "He won't hurt me."
He turned back to Spring Bonnie, taking careful steps until he stood right before him. Vanna carefully followed, her flashlight shaking a bit as she kept it on the animatronic. Mike slowly lowered himself onto one knee to better level himself with the rabbit.
"Jeremy," he whispered. "It's not your fault."
"Jeremy…?" Vanna asked.
I-I-I almost...god, if sh-she hadn't...I almost h-hurt you.
As Vanna listened, she felt her blood chill.
"Your friend, Jeremy?" she whispered. "The one who…?"
Her voice trailed off as she watched the pathetic, trembling shell before them, and listened to the soft, terrified voice that accompanied it. Thoughts of Bonnie Wickes' tragedy came to mind as Mike gave a slow nod to confirm. Vanna inched closer, then crouched down beside him. She gently placed a hand on Mike's shoulder.
"...I'm sorry," she said. "For both of you."
Mike's hand found hers. He gave it a quick squeeze of acknowledgement before he reached for the large, plush hands still covering Spring Bonnie's face. With a calming breath, he tried to urge them away. The metal endoskeleton remained locked in position.
"...Please," he whispered. "Look at me?"
It took a moment, but slowly, the metal joints creaked as the old hands lowered. The animatronic carefully glanced up at Mike, with white pinpricks of life shining behind the silver discs.
Without the glare of the flashlight, Jeremy better took Mike in. He'd changed in the last six years, with a chalky overtone to his already pale skin, dark purple bags under his haunted and weary eyes, and marks of stress starting to etch themselves into his forlorn face.
Yet he was still the same young man he knew before he disappeared. He had the same short, slicked back black hair, with parts of it now falling into his face. The same intense blue eyes, with a grim line for a mouth. The same determination to get through whatever he had to in order to survive and feel like everything in the world was right again, even if only for a moment.
Jeremy's robotic fingers shifted and coiled in uncertainty. One plush hand stalled, before the old, worn tips touched human flesh. He felt no warmth or pulsating blood, only the soft springiness of Mike's cheek faintly giving way under his metal fingers. He slowly moved to his hair, a few strands catching on the broken metal tips. Some gentle pushes at his neck, a careful run under his chin.
Mike held still as the plush fingers moved over his skin. He tried not to wince when some of the broken tips scratched and tangled. Vanna's grip tightened on his shoulder for a moment, eased only when no harm came to him.
But each gentle touch, each curious exploration of his face, quelled Jeremy's torment a little more. The old eyelids stalled in a blink, giving the crooked smile a less frightening appearance. His voice quieted to whispers, then gentle silence. The old robotic ears twitched, the whole one drooping a bit first, then slowly straightening up to its proper height.
Mike…
His name held a note of regained hope. Mike tried to speak, to even smile. His lips tightened as the words struggled to leave his tongue. His smile cracked before it began.
All he could do was nod.
Plush thumbs ran over his cheeks. Uneven fingertips lined against his jaw.
I-I can't...you're real.
Mike swallowed hard as he nodded again. His head swam as his vision blurred.
"...Jeremy," he managed. "I couldn't..."
Several thoughts crowded his mind.
An empty bedroom across from his own. A warm mug in his hands, with warmer words to accompany it. Long, lonely Novembers spent wondering what happened. A parking lot with flashing lights. His own face never looking like his own the moment he buttoned his shirt, pulled on his hat, and adjusted his badge.
Mike collapsed, with old, soft plush breaking his fall. Dust tickled his nose. He breathed in rust and rot as his arms weakly wrapped around the animatronic torso. Old servos gently hummed in his ear. His fingers dug into the old casing, giving into the need to hold on tightly and never let go.
"...Please," he whispered, "don't...don't disappear again."
Metal creaked. Servos hissed. Large, plush hands found his back, with broken fingertips catching onto his shirt.
I didn't want to leave you behind.
Mike's grip loosened after a moment. He pulled away from the metal hands, reaching up to wipe his eyes.
"I couldn't handle it," he confessed. "I came to find you, and you weren't-"
A choked breath cut him off. Another bitter sob tried to worm its way from his throat.
And warm arms pulled him into them, his back now resting against something soft.
Vanna held Mike to her, trying to still her own lips as her gaze met Jeremy's. Her flashlight sat beside her, the beam still shining on the golden rabbit before her. The plush hands hung awkwardly in front of Spring Bonnie's chest, his uneven fingers occasionally twitching with the urge to grip. The life lights flickered in their sockets, little flames that danced with uncertainty.
"...It seems we all found someone we lost," Vanna whispered.
Yes, came a new voice. It is why the strings brought you here.
Jeremy looked up first. Vanna let go of Mike and grabbed her flashlight, turning around to see which one of them got in. Mike followed her lead.
The Puppet hung before them, its arms bent, yet limp, on strings that no one in the room could see. The beam from Mike's fallen flashlight reflected off the mirror shards, creating strange patterns of light over the thin body.
Vanna felt her vision start to fade again. A familiar giggle entered her mind, a clack of little shoes on tile.
And then the faint whimpers of a crying child echoed off the walls.
"...Vesper…?"
She is here, the Puppet said, and she has been waiting.
The marionette suddenly collapsed to the floor, its mask landing hard against the cold tile. The crying grew louder, ricocheting from the walls to the shards on the floor. The glass pieces winked with pale blue light, creating a small, gray form.
Mike's breath hitched, having seen it the night before.
Only this time, it reached towards the group, forming a small hand, winks of a blue skirt, and brief flutters of long black pigtails.
Vanna's heartbeat stilled as her blood slowed its pace. Empty sockets with only white pinpricks to fill them brimmed with tears, and black Mary Janes took a single step forward.
Vanna, it said, take me home.
As soon as the last word left its lips, the ghostly little figure was gone.
