"In here!" Bidy stood on eir toes, attempting to punch in the code for the keypad beside the door handle. Ey put in the first few numbers but couldn't reach the top row.

"I've got it." Baby finished for em. "You know, I certainly didn't expect for you to be taking us to Lori's Gallery…"

"This is good, don't worry!" Bidy sped into the space before Baby even managed to get the door halfway open. It wasn't until she and Ballora followed and it swung shut behind them that they realized what the plan was.

Light was spilling out of the Control Module, cutting into the room like a hot knife. On the floor beside the vent, the technician's flashlight and boot laid. The boot was caught in the corner of the vent cover, preventing it from closing properly. Ballora was audibly discomforted.

"You alright?" Baby asked softly, turning to find her with her eyes almost completely shut.

"I'm fine. I guess this means she died sometime after I left for your Gallery. I'm surprised that the Minireenas haven't come back and noticed yet."

Oh, the girls weren't around, were they? No, because if they were, they would have been all over Ballora the moment she set foot in the room like they always were. An abrupt, sharp stab of panic shot through Baby's system. She spent a moment grasping at the numerous thoughts streaming through her head, trying to find a reasonable one.

"I overheard someone saying a few days ago that they were scheduled for a Parts and Service visit soon. I guess it's tonight. If the technician never made it there, then they're probably still in."

"Oh, alright." Baby hadn't noticed the very slight tension in Ballora's voice until it left then and there. She normally noticed those things. "I'm going to go check."

"Okay."

"So… the body." As she watched the dancer leave, Baby steered the conversation back to why they were in here in the first place. "Bidybabs?"

"We figured that we could stuff it in the Control Module, but we aren't strong enough to open the vent the rest of the way," Babs said.

Ah.

Of course, the covers were tough. However, the same could not be said of the mechanisms that opened and closed them. With something to grab onto, they weren't all too difficult to pry open… for a bigger animatronic, anyway.

"I've got that part covered."

After gingerly placing the body onto the floor, Baby reached down and forced open the vent cover. The gears and gear racks racketed despite her best efforts.

"Take the boot and flashlight with you. And unwrap her. Make it look like she tried to stop her own bleeding." Which, judging by the technician's stained work gloves and the dried blood in thick lines running down her forearms, she had tried to do before she succumbed to her injuries.

The redhead pushed the thought aside.

After a few minutes, the Bidybabs both ducked back out of the Control Module.

Okay. Problem taken care of.

"Nice work, guys." She let the vent close and pulled the smaller animatronics into a hug. "You can head back to the Circus Gallery."

The Circus Gallery felt… off. It wasn't just the effect of whatever had just happened in Ballora's Gallery, the awkward, tense energy they all radiated seeping into the air around them… there was something else.

Lolbit already didn't like any of this.

"So…" Yenndo started after a vast, uncomfortable silence, "I didn't know that there used to be animatronics here before us. Aside from Ballora, I mean."

"Me neither!"

"Really? Am I the only one who knew that?" Lolbit looked around at the others. "Do you guys just like… not ever talk to Bal?"

"Um… maybe not as much as we should," Bonnet admitted.

"Well, I talk to her," Funtime Chica told them loudly, "but she never says much herself."

"That's probably because you—"

"Isn't that weird?!"

"...Never give her the opportunity to." Lolbit sighed. "Anyway, Ballora's said that there used to be eight other animatronics here. Apparently, they all got sent off to the scrapyard."

"That motley clown certainly looks like she's been in a scrapyard. She's quite scary, don't you think? She was staring at you guys when Ballora was trying to make us leave. Looked almost murderous, honestly."

"I think I would have preferred to exist without that knowledge. Thanks for that." Yenndo glanced over his shoulder like the menacing animatronic would suddenly be there.

"Yo, listen to me, she said that they got sent to the scrapyard, and yeah, the clown definitely looks like she has, but I think something else might have happened. I kinda sorta overheard the tail end of their conversation and Bal asked why the clown abandoned her."

"Maybe—" Yenndo stopped short, whipping his head around to look behind himself once again.

The door opened slightly, and Ballora poked her head in. "There you all are," she said quietly, fully stepping into the room with her friend(?) in tow. "So, um, you all want a few answers. This is… Circus Baby."

"Scrap Baby," the clown corrected.

"Sorry. Scrap Baby."

"Oh! You're who this place is named after!" Chica blurted out.

"Yep. That's me. The face of… fun… and entertainment," Scraps said, tone as flat and dead as her derelict voice box probably allowed.

Lolbit supposed that seemed obvious now. Although, at the same time, if you told him that the cartoon clown in the logo that the facility plastered all over stuff was not this animatronic, he would have readily believed that too.

"Who are you recolors supposed to be? Who are you supposed to be?" Scraps pointed at Chica, whose eyes went slightly wide.

Ballora, after moving to stand almost between the two, went ahead and introduced all of them.

Then she moved on to more important matters.

Aside from the name, the information that Ballora gave about Scraps was things Lolbit already knew… and sort of doubted to be true. He half-listened to her in case she did spill something new, but for the most part, he just sort of stared at Scraps, who was hanging on the fringes like he was.

"You're burning a new hole in my head," she commented eventually, quiet enough that the others wouldn't hear. "What's with that unpleasant look?"

For whatever reason, the first thing Lolbit wanted to get out was, "The others are shrinking away from you and you clearly find amusement in it, but despite your earlier attempts, I'm not intimidated by you, Scrapheap. I just want you to know that."

She finally met his gaze, a crooked smile on her lips. "Is that so? Why do you feel the need to tell me that? I feel like you would only do that unprompted if the opposite were true."

The fox decided to ignore her and continue, already having gotten his immediate suspicions together.

"I know Ballora is lying about you and whoever else used be here being sent to the scrapyard, despite how you look like you're cobbled together out of garbage. Whatever actually happened, wherever you actually ended up doesn't matter too much. All that does matter is that it was somewhere other than here and that the employees who dragged you in said they found you. No animatronic that came from here would willingly go anywhere near it again after getting away."

His words did nothing to wipe the clown's stupid grin. If anything, she was grinning harder. It was pretty irritating, honestly. "Oh, wow. And? What are you getting at?"

"You're obviously up to something, ya freak. I don't know what the hell it is, but it's probably really stupid and I'm not going to let you go through with it."

"Aw, that's cute. What is that casing of yours made out of? Plastic?" Scraps flicked Lolbit's forehead with one of her talons. "How cheap. Bet it's used for parts of your frame too. Never stop finding new ways to cut corners at this business, do they? I can snap you in half like a twig. You couldn't stop me from doing anything. But try not to let that worry you because I'm not up to something."

"Baby," Ballora called, "could you come here for a second?"

"Sure thing," the clown replied, the strange malicious undertone in her voice dropped entirely. Or at least, it was before she turned back to Lolbit. "Watch those assertions, Foxy. I'm not going to play nice if you don't."

The fox watched the taller animatronic head over to Ballora and the others. He had no clue what that stupid Foxy nickname was about, but he did know that Scraps was full of it. She wasn't up to something, but she was talking in that baleful tone of voice, being hostile, getting Ballora all upset, and coming back to this Scott-forsaken facility after managing to get away?

Sure. That was likely.