CHAPTER SIXTY-SEVEN

"Okay, he's gone. Where are we at?" Bonnie called, closing the door carefully behind him as he turned to face the stage.

Ana's tablet was still there, flickering as it played its terrible monster movie at the ceiling, but Ana was gone.

Bonnie glanced at the camera, which was now pointed at the curtain. Wanting him to find her. Worried about her, maybe. Weird to think of the Purple Man as someone who could have actual human feelings of concern, but then again, now that Bonnie knew exactly who Ana was, it was impossible to imagine that the Purple Man didn't know, too. He'd probably known the moment he first saw her. So maybe it wasn't that surprising that he wanted to make sure she was okay. Bonnie couldn't deny that the Purple Man had shown affection toward his kids, but his love sure wasn't always fatherly. And considering what the Purple Man looked like these days, the fact that Ana was cuddling up under an animatronic rabbit's arm might also make up a large part of his enjoyment as he watched and…did whatever he was doing down there.

Ugh, he didn't want to think about that.

Bonnie tapped on the wall beside the stage and, receiving no answer, pushed the curtain aside and climbed up. The stage where she'd made her room appeared empty, but there were a lot of places to hide. He checked under the blankets of her rumpled bed, behind it, even under it, although he didn't think it was raised up enough for a full-grown human to hide there. Nothing. He walked along the curtain, which had lots of big folds and shadows where the little kids used to like to hide when hiding was a game, but she wasn't there either. He checked the corner space behind the dresser and actually caught himself opening a drawer before he realized how stupid that was. That left only one place.

He opened the prop cabinet, trying not to swear, because of course it was going to be empty, of course she'd gone through it and into the Parts Room, from where she could go to the dining room or the East Hall or, ha, straight into Foxy's cabin in Pirate Cove. Hell, there was a part of him that almost wished he could be there to see Foxy's face when he skulked back into his cabin and found her waiting for him.

But when he flung open the prop cabinet door, there she was, sitting on the floor with her knees drawn up tight to her chest, burying her face in her arms. Her fingers dug into her pale skin and the dark tangles of her hair, bracing herself for capture but not defending herself against it. He could hear her breathing—short, shallow gasps that shivered on the exhale—and he was pretty sure she could hear his cooling system vent, even as smoothly as it ran now. If nothing else, she must have heard the cabinet door swoop open, but she didn't react to it. Maybe she was hoping he'd think she was asleep and leave. He was tempted to play along if it would help, but he didn't want to leave her shut up in the cabinet, especially since she knew the pass-code and could slip out the back, and then Bonnie would have to go find her. Apart from the obvious issues with that, letting the Purple Man watch while he chased her through the building would be too damn close to playing the Game again.

Bonnie sat down, kicking one leg out so the cabinet door couldn't close, and waited.

After a few seconds, he caught her peeking at him through her hair. A few seconds after that, she peeked again. At last, she rubbed her eyes across her arm and raised her head to look at him.

"What are you thinking, baby?" he whispered. Whispering was silly, maybe, but there was light filtering through the curtain, which meant the camera was on and the Purple Man listening.

"Everything," she mumbled and picked at the stitches on her wrist.

He caught her hand and gently pulled it away. "Everything, like what?"

"Everything I did." She tried to shrug at him, stopped with a wince and shook her head instead. "Everything I did wrong. I should go now."

"Maybe later."

"I need to go now. I have to go now. I have to get out of here before he sees me. I don't want him to see me." She wiped at her eyes and looked at her shaking fingers with a pinched, uncomprehending frown. "What am I doing here? I didn't mean to come here."

"Chica would say you had a subconscious imperative."

"Chica would say a lot of shit with big syllables," Ana agreed, "but that doesn't make it true, because I don't want it to be true. I got to get out of here before…before I make it true. I have to go—"

"For a walk?" he gently interrupted.

She stopped, confused, her one good eye blinking rapidly as she struggled to process that. "I don't want to walk all the way home. I have the truck. I can drive."

"Maybe later. You want to go for a walk in the meantime?"

She thought about it, picking at the bandages close to her stitches, and finally nodded.

Bonnie got up and offered his hand. She took it and let him lift her out of her huddle onto her feet. She stumbled beside him, holding onto his hand with both of hers until she found some kind of balance, and by the time they reached the dining room, she was almost walking normally. Almost.

He tried to lead her toward the East Hall, thinking to take her through the maze of activity rooms, around the arcade, then loop her around and back without having to go through either Pirate Cove or the storage room and kitchen, but Ana had other ideas, towing him insistently toward the South Hall.

"Where are we going?" Bonnie asked, slowing down but not stopping. In the unpredictable mood she was in, he didn't want to do anything that might provoke her to fight, and if all she wanted to do was walk around the gym, he guessed that was fine, but—

"Outside," she mumbled, now tugging him toward the playground.

"Come on, baby, it's cold out there."

"You don't feel it."

"You do."

"No, I don't. I don't feel anything. Look." She turned around, pulling her hand from his before he knew she was doing it, and took her shirt off.

The camera had followed them from the Party Room to the West Hall and from there to the wall of the show stage, something Bonnie had been aware of in the back of his mind, being far more concerned with keeping Ana on her feet than anything the Purple Man was doing from his prison in the basement, right up until that spotlight drew itself into tight focus on her bloodstained bra. Bonnie moved to block it, but Ana just backed up, patting the tattoo on her chest—three jagged 'openings' that framed intricate inner workings of inked cogs and gears and wires.

"Got nothing in me," she said proudly. "No heart. I killed her."

"I know." Bonnie picked up her shirt and tried to give it to her.

She backed up again, still smiling even as her eyes filled up with tears. "I killed him, too."

"Who?"

"You."

Okay, more of this. Awesome.

"I'm right here, baby," he said patiently. "I'm fine."

"You are, but he's not. I killed him. He didn't know." She looked down at herself, pulling at her bra to expose herself even more while the camera zoomed in. "He thought I had a heart. So do you," she said, looking intently up at him. "You said you could write your name on it. Where? Huh? Where? There's nothing here!" she cried, slapping at her chest.

Then she turned and staggered out, falling against the playground door and then through it into the wintery night.

Bonnie vented his cooling system and went after her.

She hadn't gone far, just a few steps, not even out from under the overhang, where she was at least partially protected from the wind. Bonnie's thermal sensors, online again for the first time in forever, weren't much help. They were intended for checking fevered foreheads, not the weather. The number that popped up had no real context for him, but there was ice everywhere, so it was effing cold, whether Bonnie could feel it or not.

Ana could feel it.

Bonnie put his ears down to keep the wind out of them and went over to where she stood frozen (not literally, although she would be if they were out here much longer). She did not resist when he put her shirt back on for her, folding her arms through the sleeves the same way he'd done hundreds of times for all the squirmy toddler-aged exhibitionists who used to run riot through the halls of the various pizzerias Bonnie called home, but the instant that was done, she pulled away from him and moved further out into the play-yard.

"What happened here?" she asked, shivering.

"I don't—whoa," he blurted. His ears went up, immediately deafened by the wind blowing into his mics, so if she said anything else, he missed it. He might have missed it even if there'd been no wind at all. There was so much to see, it was hard to spare any processing power for the things he heard.

The playground was…well, not 'gone.' Not trashed either, or at least, not the way he was used to things being trashed. It was actually pretty clean. Nothing had been thrown around, just clawed, torn apart, chewed up…mangled.

He should have known. If he'd been in the right state of mind when he'd been standing out on the dock earlier, he would have recognized pieces of the playground in the wreckage of Mangle's body—that sea monster was pretty distinctive—and he wouldn't be so surprised now, but he hadn't, and seeing it now was like…like walking into the gym after Ana first opened it and finding a jungle instead.

"It was her, wasn't it?" Ana reached out, letting her fingertips trace the grooves left by an animatronic's claws in the wall.

"Yeah, looks like."

"I want to see her," Ana said and took a few steps toward the gap where a section of fence had been torn off its posts (he couldn't blame Mangle for that one; he'd done that one himself). When he put a hand on her shoulder, she smacked it off, yelling, "I have to see her!" as her words turned to steam and blew away in the wind.

"She's not there anymore," he told her. "Foxy took care of it."

"Foxy?" She looked at him, stricken. "No. Oh no. Not him."

"It's okay—"

"It's not okay! He knows it was me now! He knows! And now he hates me!"

"No, he doesn't," Bonnie said, thinking how funny things worked out sometimes…one minute, you're threatening to gouge a guy's eyes out and the next minute, you're defending him to the girl who replaced you with him, and in between, of course, you lectured him on subtle ironies. Ha. "He doesn't hate you, baby. He…" The L-word stuck in his speaker. "He's worried about you. We all are."

"He's not worried," she said with singular scorn. "He doesn't worry. He's a pirate. Pirates don't worry. They just drink and fight dragons and go wenching and sail away with the tide, and they don't worry and they don't plan and they don't…hope or wonder or…care. When every day is the day you die, you never have to care."

"He's not a real pirate," Bonnie reminded her.

"I know," she said and looked over at the decaying playground ship, filmed in frost and strung up with icicles that sparkled in the intermittent moonlight like Christmas lights. "I thought he was, once. When I was just a dumb kid. But I knew better when I came back. He's never even seen the sea. He's just a…a shiny, shiny hook. And I bit."

"Ana—"

"It hurts. How…How am I supposed to stand here and tell you that? I knew it was a fucking hook when I bit it. I don't get to cry about it now. Why am I crying?" she asked with plaintive confusion, brushing at her face and peering at her fingertips, where her tears froze into chips of ice before their eyes. "I knew…everything. All the time. I knew it was never going to be anything but a…a stupid…stupid little game we played where we'd pretend…there was something there. Something…here." Her hands, bright pink and turning purple, closed into shaking fists and knocked on her chest, a little too hard. Red color seeped up through the bandages wrapping her arms and shoulder, blooming like roses in snow. She didn't notice, still staring at the ship. "I know you think that I thought it was going to be the same, but I never thought that. I knew it wouldn't. That was the whole point. You wouldn't let it be just a game, but he would and of course he fucking would, he knew he'd win it! He wins everything! You'd think I'd know that. I know how all his stories go."

"Baby, come on, it's too cold for this. You're freezing out here."

"Why do you care?" she asked, turning on him with the same look, the same haunted imploring tone. "Why do you still care? Haven't I done everything right to make it all go wrong? Why are you still here?"

He didn't have an answer for her. 'Because I love you,' was true but pathetic. 'I don't know,' was almost as true and twice as pathetic. A hundred thousand things tumbled through his head, but none of them were words and in the end, all he could do was hold out his hand and say, "Ana, please come back inside with me."

She came back to him, stumbling and shivering, ignoring his outstretched hand to come right up against him, her arms tucked under his, wearing him like a coat against the cold. "You're so warm," she said, voice low and muffled against his chest.

"My battery puts out a lot of heat," he said inanely, watching her slide her hands up his body and around his neck, stepping up onto his big bunny feet and onto her tiptoes as she pulled him closer and pressed her blue lips to his unfeeling muzzle.

Except he could feel it. He could feel her kiss and her hands and her breath and even his. God, he could feel it all. Almost.

"You're with Foxy now," he reminded her, reminded both of them.

"No, I'm not. I'm not with anyone. I don't have anyone. I'm…there and he's there, and we wind each other up. Like the mermaid. You remember her? You turned the crank and she swam out of the spiderwebs and right up to the glass like she could see you, but she doesn't see you. He doesn't see me. He fucks me sometimes," she said, looking out at the pirate ship again like she was watching it sail away. "I guess that's good enough. But it'll never be like it was with us. You were good."

"I'm not that good," he said dryly, intensely aware of her body against his.

"Yes, you are! You're everything good I never got. You made me feel like I could be good, too." Her hands moved through his fur, wandering in no particular hurry or direction up his chest, over his shoulder, along the back of his neck. "We were a we. For the first time in my life, I could stop being me and could just…be…we with you." She turned her face up to his. "And I never knew…how dead I was…until you brought me to life."

She kissed him again and he, damn him, let her do it.

"No," he said, a good ten seconds too late. He caught her wrists, but did not pull them off his neck and he easily could have. "Baby, you need to stop. Okay? You're drunk and I'm…I'm not as good as you think I am."

"I know what I'm doing."

"But will you remember doing it tomorrow?"

Her face clouded, losing some of its heat and somehow only becoming more desirable. "I don't want to remember. That's the point. I need you…to make me forget. Make me feel good and make me forget. Nothing…Nothing makes me feel good but you. Make me feel good tonight, Bonnie," she begged, pressing herself urgently against him, her fingers hunting along the hidden seams of his casing, trying to open him up. "Take me into the dark and fuck me until I can't feel anything anymore."

Damn it.

With effort—so much effort—he put his hand firmly over the latch to his loin plate before she could find it and said, "No. Baby…Ana, listen to me. We're not doing this. You need to stop."

She was so close and so quiet, he couldn't help but hear it when she started crying. It wasn't much, just a shiver in her shallow breaths, so soft and lost and broke that he almost changed his mind. He knew it was a bad idea, for a lot of reasons, not the least of which being that he had no sensors down there so he was practically guaranteed to hurt her…which might actually be what she was going for, and he knew that and he still almost gave in. He guessed he was purple for a reason. A lighter shade, maybe, but still purple, through and through.

"Come on," he said, shaking his head at himself in disgust. "Talk to me."

"I killed her," she whispered. "I killed her! I killed Foxanne! I killed her!"

"Oh. Oh baby." He hugged her carefully tight, too aware of how she fit in his arms and hating himself for even thinking of that when she needed him so much. "Baby girl, you couldn't stop her. You're brave and you're strong, but these endoskeletons are tungsten carbide and when she bites—"

"You don't understand. I killed her," she said again. Her voice, already frayed, began to break. "I did. I knew what she was. I knew what had been done to her. I knew all that…and I killed her anyway."

"Baby—"

"No! It's not all right! She's a victim! She was hurt! I didn't even try to talk to her! Maybe all she wanted was just to come home. She was blind and alone and falling apart and I really think that was all she maybe wanted, but she came at me and I killed her!" And then she was sobbing, limp in his embrace, hugging onto his arms and crying so hard, but making hardly any sound at all. "She's not a monster!" she whispered. "I don't believe that! I don't!"

"I know you don't, baby girl. I know it."

"Someone loved her. Someone lost her."

"I know," he said, but he wasn't sure he did, really. He'd killed a lot of people over the years. Except for the kids, when was the last time he'd ever thought about them? What kind of people had they been, when they weren't just 'the night guard' or 'the trespasser?' Who was waiting for them at home when they'd gone into the quarry? Who was maybe still waiting, still hoping someday they'd walk back in through the door?

"I know," he said again, "but listen, baby, you weren't the one who took her away from them. Someone did, sure, but it wasn't you."

"Foxy lost her," Ana whispered. "I took her away from him."

He had no good answer for that.

"She called out for him. She was hurt and in pieces and she didn't know who she was anymore! She didn't know I was there! She died alone right in front of me! All she wanted was Foxy and I killed her!"

"Baby—"

"I see her!" she moaned into his heart. "I see her every time I close my eyes…her teeth…biting…but I see her how she used to be, too, and I see her how she never was and she's just scared, Bonnie! She's scared and lost and hurt and I don't know what to think! I don't want to think! Please, please, please make me stop thinking!"

"Ana, baby girl, don't do this to yourself. You didn't—"

"Don't tell me I didn't have a choice! I had a choice! I made the choice! I killed her! And maybe she didn't understand but he does! How am I supposed to face him after that? I'm supposed to like him! At the very fucking least, I'm supposed to like him and I killed his friend. I killed her when he couldn't even be there to let her go! He hates me. He has to hate me and he never wants to see me again."

Her last words disintegrated into sobs and he had to hold her and tell her it wasn't true, Foxy loved her, Foxy wanted to see her, Foxy wanted to be here right now.

"I don't need you to lie to me. I need you to fuck me." She groped at his loin panel, too close to him now to open it, fumbling and cursing and crying harder. "Fuck me until it stops hurting! And it's wrong and it's wrong and it's wrong and that's okay, because it's something, isn't it? Don't I get something? You don't have to mean it in the morning, just let me have it tonight!"

He wanted to. It was so damn easy to lie to himself and say this was what she needed and pretend to believe it, at least for one night.

"Please," she moaned, weakly pulling at his hip panel. "It doesn't have to mean anything!"

"Yeah," he said and would have sighed if he could have breathed. "Yeah, it does. Come on, now. Don't do that. I'm not going to hurt you, baby girl. Not even if you ask."

She cried. He hushed her, or tried to. His shhhh-ing sound just sounded like static through his speakers, so he hummed instead. He was several bars in before he realized what he was humming. Damn, that was insidious.

"—and I'll be your man," Ana mumbled and sighed. "But you don't mean it. And I guess I don't blame you. I wish I never met you. I wish I never knew how close I got to good, before I got what I fucking deserve."

She pulled free of him, turned around and nearly pitched over into the wall. He caught her before she could fall all the way over, and in the same movement, picked her all the way up and carried her back inside. Her weak protests turned to sullen mutters turned to snores while he stood in the shadows of the South Hall, holding her and looking at the light of the camera in the dining room reflecting off the drinking fountains ahead of him, patiently waiting for them to come back and continue the show.

He tried to tell himself he didn't know what to do, but he knew. He knew and he hated it, and hated himself for doing it, but no matter how hard he tried to talk himself out of it, it felt like the right thing to do. Steeling himself for the camera's gleeful attention, Bonnie walked out of the hall and into the spotlight. He ignored it and kept going, out of the dining room into the West Hall…past the Party Room…and on to Pirate Cove.

Foxy must have been on the deck of his ship and not in his cabin, because when Bonnie came through the curtain, he jumped over the rails and hit the stage in front of him, hook up and ready for a fight. Seeing all that aggression thrown so completely into reverse at the sight of Ana in his arms was coldly satisfying to Bonnie's senses.

He didn't explain. He didn't apologize. He said, "If you're her man, then…then come get your girl. She needs you. She's pretty messed up, so don't let her sleep on her back and don't leave her alone, not for one second. And talk to her, even if you don't think she can hear you. And if you love her, if you really love her…then keep your goddamn hands off her for one night, no matter what she says or does. Just be there for her. She needs to know you're there."

Foxy stood there another second or two, then awkwardly straightened out of his attack crouch and came to collect her. Ana didn't quite wake up in the transfer, but she did sleepily reach back to grab a fistful of Bonnie's fur at the thick ruff of his chest. Bonnie gave her hand a pat, then gently broke her grip and watched as she rolled away and put that same hand around Foxy's neck. She snuggled in, resumed snoring.

Foxy looked at him a little longer, but never said anything. Then he carried Ana up the gangplank, nudged open the door to his cabin and took her away.

Bonnie stood alone before the empty stage for a while, waiting to feel either better or worse. He didn't. He felt nothing. The camera was waiting for him in the West Hall when he finally left. It followed him to the dining room and lit up the show stage expectantly.

Why not?

He got his guitar and sat down in the corner. He opened his wrist, plugged in the amp and began to play. One night only, the musical stylings of Bonnie the Bunny, playing the Homecoming set. Welcome back.