Takes place after "Red Lake" and "Stitched Together".
Note: Contains references to The Cliffs story in the Fazbear Frights series. I have not read this story, it has not been released it, I'm just predicting based off of the premise.

Begin Prompt in 3, 2, 1…

Tag Along

"This thing reeks."

"Yeah, I smell it too."

"...Let's go see if he can smell it too."

Andrew had an especially mischievous tone in his voice. Jake was a little less amused by the idea, but he did agree in showing it to their friend. If anyone would know what this little bear was, and why it had a speaker in its chest, he would.

It was just another toy found in the garbage, but this one seemed a little special somehow. Though they hadn't noticed until they brought it back to the warehouse. It was a small teddy bear soaked in nasty smelling water and spilling moldy cotton out of tears in its body. The metal speaker in its belly showed that it was more than a simple toy though.

The Stitchwraith walked to the back of the warehouse where they found their friend waiting like he always was. They showed the torn-up toy to the much more intact, but equally old, plush toy. Showing no expression, like he usually didn't, he emphasized his feelings through voice alone.

"Ugh. Where did you find that thing?"

"We just bought it from a toy store. Where do you think we got it? The dump."

"Looks like it should've stayed there," he quipped with disgust. "Looooks like a Tag-Along Freddy."

"So, you know what this is." "...THIS is a Tag-Along Freddy?!"

There was a pause as the two voices quieted to process what each other said.

"Wait, you know what this is too?" Jake asked in surprise. "Why didn't you say something earlier?"

"I've never seen one or anything, I just heard about them. Get this: there was this kid who had one and it told him to jump off a cliff, and he did."

There was a doubtful pause between half of the Stitchwraith and the haunted plush.

"Trust me, it happened. It's a long story."

"O-kay... So, what's a Tag-Along Freddy? Just some sort of toy that talks?" Jake asked the plush, more confident in his answers.

"They were just little dolls that lazy parents gave their kids to babysit them. They could talk and had a little camera in them to tattle on what they did. They were connected with those security bracelet things- ask me sometime to tell you about the Puppet. I don't feel like it now."

"They just left this to watch their kids?" Jake lifted up the rancid doll and stared at it with scrutiny. It didn't look like it would be much of a babysitter, even if it was just supposed to sit in a room and record a child's movements. "Huh... Okay."

"Until it all went wrong," Andrew began in a theatrically cryptic voice.

"Andrew..."

"Come on. You know you want to hear this."

Jake expected that he wasn't going to believe the story and from their friend's groan it didn't seem like he was looking forward to it either... Though Andrew was right in the sense that he was curious. He caved. "What's the story?"

"Once there was this kid who got the Tag-Along Freddy doll. He loved this doll and took it everywhere with him, but then one day he disappeared. They looked for him all over but couldn't find him. Days later, they found the Freddy at the bottom of the cliffs outside of town and when they checked the recordings, they could hear Freddy telling the kid to jump off the cliff- and he did!... But they never found the body. All that was left was the doll, and that final recording telling him to jump."

"Oh..." Jake wasn't sure if he believed it. Their friend was surprisingly silent.

"But the weirdest part? The recording wasn't in Freddy's voice..." Andrew's arm took the bear from Jake's and raised it up, slowly inching it towards their shared mask. "It was in the voice... Of his dead grandmother..." The doll sat in front of their view to emphasize the reveal. It was followed by a long pause. "...Or maybe his dead dad. Or mom. I can't remember who, it was just someone dead."

"That still doesn't explain why he would jump. I loved my dad, but I don't think I would've jumped off a cliff unless there was something at the bottom to catch me," Jake rationalized.

"It's because little kids are too dumb to think for themselves. They'd throw themselves off a cliff for a piece of candy- or go with a stranger as long as he was dressed up like their favorite character. They're worthless."

That tone took both sides of the Stitchwraith completely off-guard. It was so cold and aggressive, like it was actually offended by the story. Then a strange feeling of twitching heat started to spread through their body and Jake realized that this was not going to go well.

"Maybe if some of those lazy parents were watching their kids, they wouldn't get a chance to go wandering off with strangers. Or maybe they'd no not to go do stupid things. It's not the kids' fault, it's their worthless parents'," Andrew hissed. It was clear that he was only barely holding back his feelings.

Now, at this point Jake knew exactly why Andrew was upset, what with his past. Unfortunately, this past had not been related to their third friend, who seemed almost oblivious to the shift in mood, and he kept digging that hole.

"I'm not going to argue with you. Parents who think that a little, tiny doll is going to protect their kids deserve to have their kids taken away, but the kids always walk into it. They always walk away and leave themselves open to whatever's out there. They walk themselves off the cliff because they're too stupid to look down."

"I think you're stupid," Andrew said unwittingly. This must've caught their friend off-guard because normally he would've pounced on a comment that childish. Andrew followed up quickly, "If you're going to say some little kid is responsible for itself at all then you're either a complete idiot or you've never seen or been a kid."

"Guys," Jake warned.

"You just told me that lame story about the kid jumping off a cliff because his toy told him to. You can't act like that's a smart kid. That's an especially dense kid."

"That's like a three-year-old! What do you expect?!" Andrew lashed out. "How are they supposed to know better?! It's a talking toy! Those kids still believe in Santa Claus, of course they're going to trust a toy!"

"But they don't just trust toys, do they? They trust anything offering to butter them up with candy. They're greedy, they'll go with a stranger in a heartbeat and then wonder why oh why it hurts so badly when they do."

"What- Where- Where did that even COME from?! You're talking about kidnapped kids- Are you really going to sit there and tell me it's not the maniac who kidnapped them's fault, but it's the kids' fault they died?!"

The Stitchwraith now stood dangerously tall over the unseeing plush toy. Its body, especially its one arm, were twitching violently as it stared down in half-hearted anger. The plush didn't move, but it decided to answer.

For some reason he chose the worst possible answer.

"...Yes."

The Stitchwraith shrieked and Andrew reached for the toy, only for his arm to get caught by Jake, who forcibly turned their body away from the doll. He desperately tried to defuse the situation.

"Would you guys stop? It's just a story! It's not even real!" Jake protested. "Andrew, please-!"

Suddenly Andrew got control and turned them around, snatching up the doll and hoisting it up threateningly. His fingers dug into his neck.

"TAKE THAT BACK!" Andrew yelled. He shook the doll aggressively. "TAKE IT BACK, NOW!"

"I think you're taking this a little too personally. I didn't say you were stupid. You said I was stupid."

"YOU ARE!"

"Guys, would you two just stop?!" Jake yelled. He began to fight Andrew for the plush again. "Andrew, he's not talking about you! He doesn't know about what happened!"

"...This whole thing wasn't a long way of telling me that you were the kid that jumped off the cliff, was it? Because if it was, whoops."

Andrew gave another frustrated cry and threw the plush down on the shelf. He turned his back on it and tightly balled his fist- as much as he could- in steaming anger. Jake patted his arm comfortingly, silently assuring him that he did the right thing. Then, after a moment to calm, he turned his head and spoke.

"You shouldn't say things like that. You don't understand what those kids go through... That's what happened to Andrew."

"Ugh, just don't..." Andrew hissed.

"It wasn't his fault that he was attacked. That wasn't any of those kids' fault. Even if they knew better, who's to say they could've stopped it?"

There was a long and extremely uncomfortable pause. Andrew ran his hand over his side of the mask as Jake stood there awkwardly, feeling the tension in the room. When all of a sudden-

"Was it a man in a rabbit suit?"

The question took them both off guard. The Stitchwraith looked back at the doll, laying on its side with its back facing them. It hadn't budged from where it had fallen, as expected. Though that was the only thing expected by the moment.

"...Uh..." Jake started awkwardly.

"No," Andrew said suspiciously. "...Why?"

There was a long moment of silence where they waited for an answer that never came. Instead, the voice from the plush suddenly changed tone.

"I'm sorry, Andy. You know I don't think you're stupid, or that it's your fault you're. If it makes you feel any better, I don't think you'd ever walk off a cliff on purpose," he assured soothingly, as though talking down a wild animal. "...I just get mad sometimes."

"Mad?"

"At things. Maybe I say things I shouldn't. When you're stuck in a little toy like I am, sometimes you don't have much control over what you say. It just comes out, but I shouldn't take it out on you. You two are my best friends. I don't think you're stupid, I think you're both fascinating."

Jake could feel Andrew calming down a little, but could tell that he was still upset. Which was probably why he kept trying to pull their body's gaze away from the toy.

"Forgive me?"

Now on the spot, less than amused by the pleading tone, Andrew gave a huff- which came out of the Stitchwraith sounding more like sizzling.

"Whatever," he snapped. He then looked down at the bear on the floor and picked it up. "Jake, can we do something about this thing? I'm tired of looking at it."

"Sure. Let's just go put it on the shelf with the others."

Both were glad to get an excuse to walk away from the toy, leaving it to sit there silently in the corner. They headed to their specific shelf for plush toys and laid it down amongst the others, staring at it for a long moment. The lifeless bear stared back blankly. Something about it now made them both uncomfortable in a new way.

"Hey, Andrew?" Jake asked quietly.

"Yeah?"

"It was a toy telephone and his dead grandmother told him to drown himself in the pool."

Andrew paused a long moment before asking in incredulously, "THAT'S his story? Geez, no wonder he's mad."

"No, not that. It's an episode of Twilight Zone. Ring any bells?"

"Oh..." A long moment of realization washed over him. "...Maybe I don't remember things as good as I used to."

"Yeah, maybe," Jake said with a touch of good-natured amusement in his voice. "You good?"

"Just peachy. Let's never talk about this again."

They never did.