If you are squeamish, do not read this story.
...
thank you.
{===}
CRASH!
That was the sound the lightning made as it struck nearby, just her luck that the day she did this on would be the day of a storm. She could see a sign for her destination up ahead, a cracked billboard which proudly read, 'ARE YOU READY FOR FREDDY?' with an arrow pointing towards a turn that she made her way down.
She was heading to Freddy Fazbear's Pizza, and well, Freddy Fazbear's Pizza sucked.
That was an undeniable fact, that, for whatever reason people seemed to always forget, throw into the back of their minds like it was just a suggestion rather than the truth that it was. As she soon pulled into the parking lot of the establishment, she turned off some sports channel playing on the radio that she didn't care about, and shut off the engine.
She checked if she was parked correctly twice, and sure enough she was, thought the brief moment of assurance was ruined by a horribly high-pitched voice squealing from the back seat.
"In school we were talking about this book where everything was weird, and there was this book where this guy found out that he had superpowers and he saved a hostage si..situati...on by cracking the guy's skull open!" her Little Sis yelled like a stupid little...
Child.
She was a child, she didn't know anything, of course she was going to be like that, even if it was something she couldn't deal with. Children were stupid, kind of like how she was stupid for coming here in the first place, honestly.
Her mom had asked her to bring her little six-year-old sister to the Fazbear's establishment, the only one left in the country, if she had to take a guess. As she took a look around, it was apparent the place was run down as all hell, maybe as much as the roads that led here.
The building looked deprecated, maybe more than a few decades old at this point, the sides of the building were a bit overgrown with plants, and the roof, a flat one, had a few broken off pieces like a giant took a few bites out of it.
…
"Safety Hazard in the making." Mandy said, closing her eyes for a moment.
True, she hadn't been here for the last... say, twelve or thirteen years, but this wasn't how she wanted to spend some of her first hours of being a legal adult, stuck taking her Little Sis to a run-down pizza parlor. Her mom called her over from her apartment, and she figured it would be maybe some money or a small gift like a card, but NOPE.
Mandy had forgotten that it was also her Sis' birthday, so when she arrived her mom practically forced her to take her Little Sis to this dump. If she had to guess it was probably payback, considering her mom was a vindictive little...
Whatever.
After she stepped out, she took a look at herself in the passenger mirror, her long black hair beautifully cascading down to her shoulders, a wonderful white blouse that showed off the stunning complexion on her skin, tight fitting black pants which fit like a glove, and wonderful- wonderful sunglasses arched on her forehead.
"Looking good, as per usual." Mandy complimented herself. She went and opened the passenger car door, her Little Sis bursting out like the car was on fire, shame there wasn't an actual fire, as she might have rushed over to the nearest lake to drown herself if that was the case.
"Mandy, Mandy, Mandy!" her Little Sis said, jumping up and down like the ground was a trampoline, her short black hair moving in weird, un-brushed motions. "Thank you so much, I've always wanted to go to Freddy's, but mom is always in bed, and when I try to ask dad, he's at work, and when he's not he tells me to wait until my birthday, and now it's my birthday and it's also your birthda-"
Mandy held a hand out towards her Little Sis, as she knew where this was going.
She didn't want her sisters little quirk of... talking for fifteen minutes straight to extend this event. It was a thing that always happened when she was excited, apparently there was one point where she was at school late and spent an hour talking to the janitor about how much she loved when they showed her favorite cartoon on television.
"Alright, I get it." Mandy acknowledged, and her Little Sis gave a smile, though to be honest, with two of her teeth missing it made her look like one of those homeless crackheads that you'd see in an alley downtown. "Anyways, try not to talk to the Fun Gang for too much, alright?"
"Who?" her Little Sis wondered, tilting her head as they both began to walk across the parking lot, the sounds of her shoes echoing in their diluted manner effortlessly against the concrete.
"It's just a nickname." Mandy explained with a shrug, having quickly made her way across the parking lot and safely onto the sidewalk. She was talking about the animatronics that were housed in the place, but there was no point to explain. "Nothing much."
"When we get in, you gotta show me all the cool stuff they got here, Mandy, pleeeease?" her Little Sis pleaded, and Mandy stopped for a moment and looked down at her. Her Sis was wearing a black collared shirt, khaki shorts with no pockets, and the most generic pink tennis shoes that were probably from a thrift store.
"Sis, don't expect too much from me here, alright?" Mandy began, crouching down so her face was around level with her Sis'. "I'm not obligated to do anything for you here." Mandy explained, booping her Little Sis' tiny little nose on the mention of anything.
"Mom said you'd do it, because you're ei... eit... eeen." her Sis sounded out. "Yeah, you're eait-teeeen, and I'm only six!"
"Eighteen." Mandy corrected. "And she was just incorrect, alright?" Mandy explained, placing her hand on her Sis' shoulder. "You'll understand when you're older, or something."
"Like that guy understood not to stand in the road!" her Sis confirmed, and Mandy was a tiny bit confused. "A few days ago, there was this guy me and mom were watching by the window, and he got hit by this truck like the guys in cartoons, and yelled really loud!"
"Well-" Mandy stood back up and brushed off the nothing that got on her shirt. "Don't talk about that to the employees!" she decided, pointing towards her Little Sis before looking towards the door of the establishment.
FREDDY FAZBEAR'S PIZZA
Where kids are #1!
"Alright, let's do this garbage." Mandy sighed, and walked up the short incline towards the front door, pushing it open, and a blast of... grease-smelling air hit her face, and maybe would've sent her flying back into the car if any more powerful. "Wait!"
"Mandy, Mandy, it smells like pizza, it smells like pizza!" her Little Sis exclaimed in the same shrill voice as prior, though Mandy didn't respond to her Sis's outburst, and looked to her side.
"Lemme check my phone..." Mandy excused, opening her phone which was on a nice 23 Percent, though she wasn't just checking for that. She scrolled over to her messaging app which had a single notification from one of her choice political candidates about an upcoming rally.
Other than that, the person who she was eyeing a potential text from was her AMAZING boyfriend, Bryce. It wasn't just any text; no, it was so VERY important. He said he had a surprise for her for today that he would send over text message, probably a video, loving text, or what she hoped most of all, a box!
Well, an image of a box that would probably hold a wedding ring, anyways. It would be so romantic, he'd send a mysterious image of a box, she would wonder what it was and the next time they met he would get down on one knee and ask if she would marry him.
"YES!" Mandy said aloud, and held her phone to her chest. There was a less than likely chance of it happening, but the thought of it made her heart melt into a gooey cheese that you would have to scrape off the bottom of the pan once it was done.
They had been dating for 5 years, since she was in Eight Grade at the age of thirteen, he walked up and sat next to HER at lunch, (IMAGINE THAT) and not a few months after they began dating. Now, as she finally reached the wonderous precipice of adulthood, he would have to ask to marry her!
"Can I go on ahead?" her Little Sis wondered, and Mandy was snapped back to reality, a cold and dark reality where her Little Sis was looking at her with a blank expression, and unfortunately in the same reality she was at Freddy Fazbear's Pizza.
Mandy huffed, "Be patient, you can wait one second."
"I know I can wait, but the place is right there." Iris noted, motioning her hands towards the main room.
"You'll get over it." Mandy excused, walking into the main dining area, or whatever it was called. There were a bunch of long tables with party hats, confetti, and streamers strewn about haphazardly on the checkerboard floors.
The lighting was a bit dim, the main room was lit up well enough, though everything else was a bit... off, off lighting, a bit of a blue-ish, purple hue coming off of the striped tarping on the tables, though greys occasionally spilt in from the floor and roof, a few dirty wrappers and napkins scattered about.
Mandy put a hand to her hip, "It looks like a hurricane went through here..."
"But aren't we in Hurricane...?" her Sis responded, and Mandy shook her head.
"Not what I meant, Einstein..." Mandy sighed, holding a hand up to see if anyone was around. "HEY, ANYONE HERE?"
An odd voice spoke up, one that sounded rather old, "Hang on a second!" the voice yelled from down a hallway just to their left.
A quick glance down showed that it led to some kind of bathroom, the sign at the top being a clear indicator. A rather skinny man came from the bathroom, he was holding what looked to be some sort of toolbox that he swung back and forth with each step, clear dark circles visible around his eyes even from a distance.
"We're here for a birthday, you take walk-ins, yeah?" Mandy asked, the man taking a few more seconds to walk fully in front of them before responding. He had sort of messy brown hair, and was wearing what appeared to be a security guard outfit (minus the hat), a fully purple-ish one with a nametag on the chest which read, 'DAVE' in big white letters.
"Yes, we do accept walk-ins." Dave confirmed, shaking his head, a rather foreign sounding English accent creeping in as he spoke. "Whose birthday, is it?"
Before Mandy could speak her Little Sis took the initiative.
"It's me and Mandy's birthday, we share the same birthday, so we can have a double birthday celebration, and because of that she- well mom told me to go with her because she said Mandy has a car and that she could take me to Freddy's!"
"Yeah, that." Mandy confirmed, crossing her arms. She had planned to skip that little detail, the shared birthday, she never enjoyed the idea of celebrating her birthdays in places like this, it never went well, but that was an entirely different story.
"I'm Iris!" her Sis said to the man, holding out a hand to shake, though he didn't reciprocate. "Nice to meet you Mr. Dave sir!"
"A double birthday, eh?" Dave paused for a moment. "Well, come on, let me get you two set up with Freddy and the Gang!" he said, pointing into the main room towards a stage, a stage where three metallic figures stood still, their faces looking forward with blank expressions.
There was one on the left, a baby blue bunny with glowing green eyes glaring ahead, his two ears standing perfectly upright, with an open mouth showing off a bit of its metallic skeleton. Two rosy red cheeks giving it an odd demeanor of friendliness.
In the middle, a rather fat bear, same rosy cheeks as the bunny, wearing a suave top hat stood, having rather dazed eyes, and a microphone in its hand. It looked kinda done with everything, and something about him seemed far more friendly than the bunny, which made sense since he was the mascot.
Lastly, there was the one on the right, a yellow bird with a cupcake and a bib which read, 'LET'S PARTY!' in a soft font, the chick having a rather slender frame. There were three tufts of hair on her head, a pink middle section, and...
Well, it was Chica.
There were the others, the blue one was Bonnie, and the brown one was Freddy, but she certainly knew Chica. The Fun Gang were all here, and Mandy stopped in front of the stage with Dave and Iris, Dave fiddling with a little panel in front of the stage.
"So, how much is the bill?" Mandy asked, moving her hand towards her pants pocket, but Dave waved it away.
"Eh, don't worry about it, I don't want your money." he said in a bit of a rude tone, which he made haste to correct. "Well, most of my resources are being put towards another location, I've put a lot of work into it and accepting funds here would complicate things." Dave responded with a large bit of confidence in his voice.
"You own the place or something?" Mandy asked, and Dave stopped his fiddling for a moment, turning to face her with a wide smile.
"Yeah, I own the brand, though nobody really comes here anymore so I use it as a base for business and the like." he explained, and looked towards Iris afterwards. "Now, which one of them do you like more?"
"The yellow one." Iris responded, and Mandy oddly looked towards the stage once more, seeing the animatronics in the same position as before, nothing having changed about them.
"Gotcha!" Dave confirmed, turning back to the panel and fiddling with it once more. A few moments later he turned towards Mandy with an odd smirk on his face. "Alright, could you do me a favor?"
"Uh..." Mandy shrugged. "Sure."
"It's a really simple process." Dave began, and as if on cue, spotlights began to circle around on the stage, colors of red, green, blue, and pink rolling all around, and soon after a drumroll sounded from the ceiling as the animatronics on stage began to blink. "HAVE FUN!" Dave finished.
Mandy shrugged again, "Uh huh."
"Mandy, Mandy, Mandy, Mandy, Mandy!" Iris yelled, pointing towards the stage as Dave walked presumably towards the kitchen. "They're alive!"
"Not really..." Mandy corrected, peering towards the stage as an odd smile tried to creep up on her face, though she brushed it away.
"Hey there!" Freddy spoke in a rather jolly voice, sounding like the typical 'friend' character you'd see on television. Freddy then turned towards the two other animatronics, "Chica, Bonnie, we got a special occasion here!" Freddy announced.
"Special occasion?" Bonnie asked, turning towards Freddy, speaking in a smooth and suave voice that seemed fit for a rockstar. "What's happening Fred?"
"Yeah Fred, tell us!" Chica spoke in a wholly generic peppy female voice, looking around the room. "What's the big deal?"
Freddy then began, "It's a..." suddenly a banner with 'Double Birthday' came down from the ceiling just above the animatronics, and triumphant fanfare played in the background as confetti rained down. "DOUBLE BIRTHDAY!"
"A double birthday?" Chica gasped, "Who-" Chica turned towards Mandy and Iris in a rather jerky motion, and paused, the confetti still raining down. Chica took a look at Iris, then at Mandy, then back and forth, her eyes moving smoothly between the two with audible clicks at every stop.
"Uh... you alright Chica?" Bonnie asked, tilting his head downwards slightly and looking towards his friend. Chica's eyes were... flashing an odd color, maybe green or blue, but it was a bit hard to tell. Mandy backed up a bit, standing behind Iris, just in case Chica...
Fell over.
"I think Chica's just so surprised at the fact that's it's a double birthday!" Freddy excused with a hand movement upwards, though that didn't stop Chica from her long pause. "Anyways, why don't we-"
Freddy was interrupted by Chica, who turned towards him. "Freddy, not only is this a double birthday, but one of these gals has been here before!" she explained to him, and Freddy leaned back a bit, maybe to simulate some sort of surprise.
"Well, no wonder it took you so long to think back there, and now that you mention it, I think you're right!" Freddy noted, looking towards Mandy, his eyes also flashing that greenish-blue color for a moment. "You were here around 12 years ago, weren't you—S-a-man-th—a." Freddy noted, sputtering out the last word like he had a speech impediment.
Mandy looked towards Freddy who locked eyes with her, probably waiting for some sort of response.
"Yeah." Mandy responded. "Yeah."
"Woah, you were here?!" Iris spoke in an awestruck tone, then looking towards the stage. "My sis is really cool, she brought me here, I'm Iris, I started school recently, and I really like pizza, so mom told me to bring me... she told my sis to bring me to here to go to the pizza place so we could celebrate, so she drove me here in the car down the road to here, and now we're here and you're cool!"
The animatronics paused for a few seconds, seeming to take in that volley of information, and soon after, Bonnie spoke, "Well, nice to meet ya Iris!" he greeted, and Iris waved.
"Well folks, why don't we get this party started with a nice song, how about..." Freddy paused to think, his hand rotating towards his face. "The Happy Birthday song!"
"That sounds like a great idea!" Chica confirmed. "Maybe we should sing it twice for the double birthday?"
"Nah, we'll just sing for Sa-mant-ha and Iris in the same verse!" Bonnie replied, sputtering out her name quite like Freddy, though it was a bit clearer this time. "Alright gang, let's go!" Bonnie declared, his hand moving towards his guitar. Music then began to play in the background.
The three animatronics then spoke in unison, singing a, 'Happy Birthday to you!' with lights blaring in the background. The spotlights from before were moving back and forth as the animatronics rotated their bodies in seemingly random motions, their mouths moving up and down clearly out of sync with their speaking.
"Happy Birthday to you!" the animatronics spoke for the third time. "Happy Birthday, Iris and Sam- an- tha." they said, now lagging a tiny bit behind the music performance. "Happy Birthday to you!"
Then from behind, Mandy felt something being placed on top of her head, and turned around to see Dave recoiling back, holding a crown in his left hand. Mandy looked up, and sure enough one of those plastic crowns that said, 'Birthday Girl!' in bright red text was on her head.
"And many more!" Dave announced, placing a crown on top of Iris' head, though she seemed more transfixed on the animatronics. "Alright, if you all will take a look over there..." Dave pointed towards a table which had a pepperoni pizza on a silver platter and two drinks. "There's your stuff."
"That was fast." Mandy noted, and Dave gave a rather audible laugh.
"Well, all I eat when I'm working nowadays is Pizza, so I've learned how to make it pretty quickly." he bragged, looking to the side for a moment. "Those were the days; those were the days."
"Well, that's not very healthy you know." Mandy said, taking the crown off of her head and looking at the bottom, it was a typical paper crown, seemed new enough, with minimal damages upon first inspection. "By the way, when did you get these?"
"Around 5 years ago." Dave responded, like that wasn't an issue. "They've held up quite well in the Freezer if I do say so myself."
"WOAH, A CROWN JUST APPEARED ON MY HEAD!" Iris screamed, maybe a bit too loudly as Dave visibly winced. "This place is magical!" Iris declared, turning towards the table with the pizza on it, placing a hand over her mouth as her eyes locked on.
"I'll be in the Parts and Service room if you two need anything, it's just down the hall behind that door." Dave said, pointing towards a hallway which at the end had a door with red tape over the center. "Just uh... remember to knock," he said, and without explaining why, he walked away down the hall.
"Well, that was an event." Mandy said, snatching the probably virus ridden crown off of Iris' head, Iris not at all reacting. "Come on, let's go sit down."
"Thank you!" Iris yelled to Dave and he gave a nod before he disappeared into the Parts and Service room. Iris sat down at the table and grabbed a slice of pizza, Mandy's eyes glancing towards the animatronics on the stage.
"Well, that was better than expected I guess." Mandy shrugged, quickly sitting down on the rather small seat.
"What did you expect?" Iris wondered, her mouth full of pizza and sputtering out grossness. "WOAH, MY CROWN JUST DISSAPEARED!"
"Stuff." Mandy responded, sitting down across from Iris. "Don't talk with your mouth open." she added. "Anyways, you having fun or whatever?"
"Yeah!" Iris responded; her mouth still full. "This is-"
"Sis." Mandy spoke, holding her hand up once more. "Stop talking with your mouth full, that's disgusting."
"Sorry." Iris said, though instead of following instructions, she continued speaking. "Are you going to eat-"
Mandy had enough and put her hand to Iris' chin, forcing it closed, Iris seeming a bit scared, though it was her fault that it happened, so she had no right to be.
"Eat your food, THEN speak, alright?" Mandy demanded in the same way you'd see an oblivious teacher talk to a preschooler, which was practically what she was doing to be fair.
Iris was about to open her mouth to speak, but Mandy kept her hand there, just waiting for her to swallow the food, Iris clearly getting an idea of what to do. "There you go..." she said, lowering her tone as Iris moved away.
"Sorry." Iris said again, and Mandy shook her head.
"Sure." Mandy responded, waving it away.
"Hey there double birthday girls!" Freddys voice said, and Mandy turned around in her chair to see the trio offstage, walking towards them with rather smooth movements for robots. "Mind if we have a chat?"
"A chat?" Iris wondered, leaning on the table. "Mandy, Mandy, what do they mean?"
"I dunno." Mandy replied, though truth be told she did know. The chat from when she went was... weird, at least she remembered it being weird mainly because of the animatronic that asked her. It was a pink fox-looking thing, and it asked her if anybody had done anything bad to her, whatever that meant.
Of course, she replied that nobody had done anything bad, but it was something about the tone of its voice that irked her. Well, those were past memories that didn't matter, all she cared about right now was the present, a present where hopefully her boyfriend would surprise her with a ring.
Maybe a cake as well...
And a brand-new car, if he was so inclined.
"Where are you looking at?" her sister asked as Mandy's mind wandered around like she was in a corn maize, the kind that her mom used to take her to when she was eight.
"Oh... you know, stuff." Mandy excused, shaking her head back to the real world. The Animatronics were in front of the table and looking at the two with stupid smiles on their mechanical faces.
Freddy spoke first, "So, here at Freddy Fazbear's Pizza, there have been many rumors, that you may have heard of, correct?"
"No, not really, nobody cares enough about the place to spread rumors." Mandy responded, then peered over at Iris.
"I heard that someone got their head bit off, and he had to go to the hos...p...ital, the hospital!" Iris exclaimed with a giggle. "Just like that guy who got hit by the truck outside of my house, there was a guy, and he-"
"Okay, that's enough of that." Mandy spoke, interrupting Iris' utter nonsense. "Sorry, she likes to talk a lot, when she SHOULDN'T." Mandy sighed at Iris' rather annoyed face, her black eyes flailing ineffective daggers in her direction, and looked back towards the animatronics.
"Well, we just want to say that here at Freddy Fazbear's Pizza, we value safety above all else, and we would like to make it known that nothing happened, and any attempt to insinuate so will be met with legal action by either Fazbear Entertainment, OR- thank you!" Freddy finished with a nod, and he and Bonnie walked back over to the stage.
"Hello." Iris said to Chica, who gave a quaint wave. "Today's my birthday!" she added.
"Congratulations, Iris!" Chica said, then turned towards Mandy for a moment before walking away. "You too, Sam!"
"Uh huh." Mandy responded, not really digging the nickname at all. "Cool."
Iris huffed in a rather noticeable manner, "You could at least try to pretend you care." she muttered in an extremely apparent fashion. "It's my birthday."
"Yeah, well it's my birthday as well but I don't really want to be here." Mandy shrugged, examining her nails. "You'd understand if you were in my situation, really."
"What do you mean?" Iris wondered, her tone seeming more curious than usual.
"Sis, lemme put it this way." Mandy turned to face Iris fully and moved her hands in extenuation of each word. "I'm an adult," Mandy began with a wave of her wrist. "You are not," she continued, pointing towards Iris. "Ergo, you cannot understand the situation I'm in, until you're an adult."
Iris' expression changed to a mix of genuine anger, but also abject sadness. Despite this, her gaze didn't go anywhere. "But that's not fair..."
"Yeah, well life isn't fair, I mean, I'm stuck here with you." Mandy noted, turning away from Iris and looking towards her phone. It was on 20 Percent, she needed to get home to her charger or risk her phone going dead and missing out on any texts from her boyfriend.
None had come in, but she could just imagine that he was waiting, probably chilling in his pickup truck at the side of his dad's house thinking of the right time to send the message. He probably just got the ring and was setting up the camera for the perfect shot of the box, maybe buying studio lights so it would look like a real production!
"YES, PLEASE!" Mandy yelled out loud once again, though nobody who would actually be bothered by it was around. She felt her face heat up red, and quickly turned her phone off so she could preserve the battery.
"Can we do something else here?" Iris asked, and Mandy was once again snapped out of her fantasies to see Iris still looking her in the eyes. "I'm bored."
"Not my problem really." Mandy shooed away. "Just go do whatever." Mandy asked, and she looked way from Iris for a moment, attempting to recapture what she had found in her daydreams, but not finding an easy entrance back into that world.
"I want to go home." Iris suddenly spoke, and Mandy turned to see Iris poking the half-eaten piece of pizza in front of her. "I don't think there's much to do here, you know?"
"Alright, dang." Mandy muttered at the sudden change of attitude. "Well, that's perfectly fine by me, you ready?"
"Let's tell Mr. Dave that we're leaving." Iris suggested, and she stood up from her seat, making her way towards the Parts & Service room with rather haste, Mandy quickly scrambling up from her seat.
"Pfft, okay." she said, stifling a laugh once more. Iris clearly acting; and it was so blatantly fake that it was a refreshing type of funny. "Make sure to knock though."
"Okay." Iris responded, being a way ahead, promptly knocking on the door with loud and boisterous locks like she had the most important meeting in the universe. Mandy made her way over, and by the time she did so, the door opened, and Dave was standing there with a confused expression on her face.
"We're leaving." Mandy responded, though Iris had something to say, as per usual.
"Can I talk to you for a second, Mr. Dave?" Iris asked, and Dave looked confused. He looked towards Mandy who shrugged, and then invited Iris into the Parts and Service room to speak, Mandy opting to wait outside.
It was weird how abruptly her tone shifted, but then again, children were weird creatures who had no sense of how to appropriately assess a situation, Iris being an example of this if you multiplied the idea by twenty. Not to say she was mentally challenged, even though that would be a good guess, but she couldn't take a hint, not like the other children around her age level.
Other than the Janitor Story, there was one point where a teacher told her to write longer for a short story her class was making, so Iris literally elongated every letter, and turned it in, the exact same wording as before but quite literally stretched out to be longer. Thinking about it, she was always a bit strange, though all children were strange things, not many were strange to the extent that Iris was.
Mandy put her back to the wall and closed her eyes waiting for the probably loud shriek of Iris' voice to sound as signal for her to bounce. She waited, but as time dragged on and it had been around a minute, Mandy went over to knock on the door of the Parts and Service room.
...
"Hello?" Mandy asked, and there was no response, there was probably a noise dampening thing so that Dave didn't get distracted from his work, if she had to take a guess. Iris couldn't have gone outside the confines of the room, so Mandy went over to the wall and leaned against it, taking out her phone.
There was a notification!
"OH." Mandy held her free hand to her chest, feeling her heart beat like a bored High Schooler on their desk. She mentally prepared herself for it, it had to be Bryce, it just had to be! Mandy took a deep breath, pressed the app with a quick tap, and-
…
It was her mom.
CRASH!
Suddenly, all the lights in the location began to flash, and Mandy looked around in confusion as she heard the sound of multiple lightbulbs bursting. There was a sort of... well, the noise of something slowing down, and it was readily apparent that the power went out, leaving only few lights on, probably by some sort of generator.
There was a light directly above the Parts and Service room that lit up her surroundings rather well, so she didn't fret too much about the situation. There were no screams in the room, so Iris was fine, probably.
…
Mandy waited outside the door for Iris to finish whatever stupid stuff she was doing in there, probably just talking about utter nonsense to Dave if she had to take a guess. She'd be done soon, hopefully, and then they could leave this hellhole.
Mandy looked at the text from her mom, 'Are you two alright?' the message asked, and Mandy groaned, shoving her phone back into her pocket. She looked towards the Parts and Service room once more. The lights were flickering, it was only a slight dim in the brightness but it was still rather noticeable.
She turned away and instead down the hall she hadn't put much attention towards before. Down there, there seemed to be some sort of desk, though it was barely visible with a single flimsy light dangling above illuminating its outline. Mandy quickly turned her attention back to the main room, though it was only for a quick second.
It was dark there as well, a single lightbulb illuminating it despite the place being rather large.
"Hm, budget I guess." Mandy muttered, placing a hand to her face. Though, once she did this, she heard something. Something quick, it was the creak of a door, and Mandy turned to see the Parts and Service room slowly coming open, though despite light not being there, she couldn't see inside.
Also, maybe it was a trick of the light, but something about... well, the light, it seemed a bit more pinkish... maybe reddish in hue. Mandy brushed the odd thought off, and waited for Iris to walk out of the room, but it became quickly apparent that it wasn't going to happen.
"Iris, come on." Mandy sighed, walking into the door of the Parts and Service room to find herself face to face with the dim silhouette of a curtain. The curtain seemed to separate something, though Mandy didn't particularly catch... well, anything on the entrance side of the room, so to speak.
"Okay." Iris' voice spoke from behind the curtain, though there was no movement afterwards, and Mandy sighed. She walked towards the curtain and began to push it to the side, though it took a surprising amount of force to move.
As she moved the curtain, she felt something odd, it was around her stomach though a bit above it, sort of an odd cramp, something she could easily push off. She continued pulling the curtain, and oddly... her vision began to darken, she wasn't sure whether the light had turned off behind her, or if it was something else.
It was odd.
And odd... THE, the odd tugging kept, it felt like a cramp in her stomach, like her very insides were beginning to twist, at least that's what it seemed... what it seemed like; her- her organs were wrapping around each other like multiple snakes coiling around a pole to reach a single mouse at the top.
It felt wretched, she could feel each minor touch, things which were never meant to collide being forcibly sloshed together in a disgusting stew of disassembly, and yet with a glance down she could see her body was fine. Her body was fine, but it shouldn't be, it really shouldn't have been.
Mandy tried to speak, but her mouth wouldn't, it was like she didn't have the ability to. It was odd, even though she could feel her muscles attempt to move her jaw up and down, said muscles feeling oddly numb as they attempted to retract and expand. All she could do was pull the curtain...
Pull the curtain.
Mandy felt wrong, everything felt wrong, and with one sudden gasp of strength, she pushed the curtain fully aside, and came face to face with something. It was dark, and she could barely make out its outline, but it was something big, maybe... maybe a brown-ish color, it was hard to tell. It was in the shape of a box and had odd wire protruding out in the darkness.
"A..." Mandy felt her mouth move a tiny bit, she sputtered out a single vowel as something worse began to stir. She could feel her bones, all around her body shake, she could make out every little touch against her skin and muscle, and it made her want to throw up. She felt the tingling of her skin, skin which felt as if it could burst at any moment, skin that she wanted to tear off but she couldn't find the will to move her hands.
She nearly collapsed to the ground, but kept her footing, looking for something to pull herself up with.
She placed her hand on the box, and as she did so, the rest of her body collapsed to the ground, the only thing above her being her hand clasping onto the box like it was the edge of a cliff. She couldn't feel the ground beneath her, like she was floating in an endless abyss of nothingness, yet she could see the checkered floor below in a faint glow.
Her vision began to move upwards, though her head wasn't doing it. She saw a mask of darkness begin to sweep in, and in those moments as the darkness claimed her vision, she felt like her stomach had burst open, and all of that tension from before released, and she felt it all come out before all sensations went away, and she fell into world of darkness.
Darkness.
…
Darkness.
…
She couldn't feel anything.
…
Was she even thinking?
…
Was she even?
…
The sounds of a sort of wind rushed all around her, and for a moment she could feel something, like her body that wasn't there contorted inwards, being squashed and stretched despite not actually feeling much. It was at that moment, that-
…
Mandy felt vision, touch, feeling, and she opened her eyes and shot up into an upright position. She was in some sort of room, it was small- no it was big kind of like a living room or a kitchen really, some kind of mixture between the both in size perhaps? On the floor, checkers, kind of like the chessboard she'd occasionally see at the park when Bryce took her on a date, and in the middle, there was a table with confetti spread all around.
Her mind was racing, buzzing, and she quickly picked herself up from the floor, oddly her vision made it look like she was almost... sitting? Though it was probably her being disorientated, she wasn't sitting, she knew she was standing.
"Okay, where's my phone..." Mandy said, though she paused herself. Her voice sounded different, a bit higher pitched, like the type you'd hear on a cartoon love interest in a kids show. Once again, this was probably just her being disorientated, and nothing more.
She checked her pockets, and...
She had no pockets.
"Huh?" Mandy asked, peering down towards her outfit.
…
"HUH?" she asked once more, taking a better look at it. Something was off, she was wearing a black shirt, an ugly collared black shirt that was like some sort of school uniform. Below she could make out tacky khaki shorts and disgusting pink tennis shoes that made a horrible outfit combination.
She was confused, she didn't and would NEVER pick such a horrible outfit, someone must have put these on her as a prank or something, though there was nobody around the... pizzeria...
THE PIZZERIA.
She was in the pizzeria, Iris was still here, in the Parts and Service room with Dave. Mandy had entered the room, hadn't she? Iris had to still be in there, probably talking still, and wasting time that- time that BRYCE COULD BE USING TO TEXT HER.
She had probably dropped her phone in the Parts and Service room, and then ended up where she is now... somehow. She didn't think of the details for now, and exited the room, seeing the door to Parts & Service down the hall she rushed towards it, though she paused halfway down as the door opened.
Someone walked out of the Parts and Service room.
It was a woman, one with long black hair that swayed behind her as she walked. The woman was wearing a wonderful white blouse, rather nice looking right black pants, dress shoes which matched her pants, and a nice pair of sunglasses on her head.
The woman held a phone in her hand, and she looked towards Mandy.
That's when it hit her, the woman, the beautiful woman standing in front of her was... well, it was HER, or a damn good replica at the very least. Mandy held a finger up, but quickly put it down as the replica walked towards her, her confidence seeming to fill the very hallway.
"Oh, hello there..." Mandy's voice said though it held an almost... childlike demeanor. The replica crouched down in front of her, and obnoxiously booped Mandy's nose, an unimaginably cocky grin on her face. "Iris."
Mandy stepped back, "I..."
…
Mandy looked down at her clothes again, and felt her heart sink to the bottom of the biggest hole imaginable. Her hands were visibly shaking, and with her mouth slightly quivering, she looked up at her own face, and screamed.