::Sneaker's SnacShak – Kenny and Kyle are Having a Great Night, BTW::

Stan and Wendy had split up once they'd gotten in, looking to cover as much ground as fast as possible before getting the hell out. If he wasn't mistaken, Wendy had seemed tense, taking on this operation with just the two of them. The cynical part of his brain immediately interpreted that as an affront to her confidence in him on their mission, and usually that voice would be the one that dominated his head-space... but a breath later and he could recognize that it probably had just as much to do with the doll in his arms that had the possibility of going off at any moment.

The rush to take pictures and get out, flashlights flickering this way and that way in the dark of the large garage space which was separated somewhat by shelving units in-between each work area, meant they hadn't gotten a chance to skim over each area and prioritize them. Stan was arriving at each makeshift cubical with no idea what he'd see until he shined his beam of light in, reflecting off tools and scrap as his first tries found mundane projects... though the available tools at this particular garage seemed top-notch. Polished, clean, with posted signs all over the place to put away equipment and wear eye protection. Professional was the best description for the feeling he got in this space. More-so than his dad's garage, that was for sure.

That sense actually got him to relax a bit. The smell of machine oil and metals were familiar enough, and he liked working with his hands- one of his few happy places; building stuff was tactile and always had a sense of satisfaction attached.

He really should have known better.

Stepping past an obscuring partition, he turned the beam of his flashlight into the next space... and stopped dead.

Eyes.

It was the first thing his brain interpreted of what he was seeing; big, bulbous, glassy eyes; bright green and too big, staring at him.

Cradled in his other arm, his doll, Aiden, started crying.

Stan swore at first, glancing down at the doll as if it had come to life in a strangely surreal moment, but the moment he glanced away form the eyes he felt the hairs on the back of his neck go up with the certainty that they were still staring at him.

"Stan?" Wendy's voice quested, sounding to be just a few steps down the lane. "Stan, are you alright?"

"Y-yeah-" He answered, faltering and some strange instinct driving him back around the corner of the partition, swallowing hard once he no longer felt the gaze he'd highlighted with his flashlight. The hell was that? He couldn't process it past the shock, not with a mechanical kid screaming in his ears. "I think I found something!" He called out, somewhat dreading to cast his light back in there...

Besides, he needed to take care of his weekend project.

"Coming."

Seconds later, Wendy arrived, her own light giving him a better view of the bottle he'd shoved into his doll's mouth to try and hush it, but that appeared not to be it. Did it need changing? Here? The last thing he wanted was to get some old oil off the floor and stain the doll; that would probably get a grade reduction... or a fine from the school for damaging equipment.

That kind of shit is always happening to me. I don't need that today.

"What's up?" Wendy asked, glancing into the black hole that filled him with a sense of foreboding. "In there?" She asked.

"Yeah, it looked like... glass eyes." He confirmed, nodding a little. "I didn't see much before this guy got upset."

Wendy turned her light into the space without a word of question, leaving Stan's contracted pupils to their useless state as he fumbled about to undress his doll and attempt the changing procedure without putting it down. Was it crying louder over time? Had it always done that? Or was it just because he was spooked that the crying seemed louder?

Maybe it was the high metal ceiling above them; bouncing sound around and deafening him.

"Oh wow- that's... Well, I guess this is the project the owner messaged about on Facebook. That's different."

Cool as can be; must not be as scary as I thought.

Curious, with a half-undressed doll in his arms, Stan came back around the corner to add his circle of light to hers. Peering in once more, the eyes were once again the first thing he caught. They were glass; huge and shiny, with painted irises that were too bright and too detailed, creating an uncanny sense of being watched by something inhuman and unfeeling... but they weren't just sitting on a workbench or something. No, they were affixed at the top of a metal... skeleton? Simpler than a human model, made up of a sectioned spine, simple joints at shoulders, hips, elbows, knees, with blocky shapes for palms and feet and the skull mostly represented by a chrome jaw; made disturbing mostly by the size and number of teeth within it.

Odd, it seemed closer than when he'd first glanced it. The silver skeleton was standing in the center of the work space, independent of any sort of rack or holder... but Stan had been certain he'd seen those eyes from a position further back, where there was a yellow rack that appeared to be made for the purpose of holding something like that upright.

Either way, he didn't like it. The naked bones of something that appeared to be humanoid in shape, with shining eyes that felt like they stared at him-

"Fuck that thing is loud." Wendy commented, glancing over to Aiden. "You need help with the little guy?"

She wasn't kidding; Stan was certain that it had gotten louder since it had started crying. Still, Wendy's offer made him feel protective, hefting the doll higher on his chest. "No way, I got 'em." He assured. "Gotta earn my grade... right?"

That's all. I'm not gonna let this become the eggs again. Just trying to do my work and hopefully not disappoint my girlfriend. Totally not anxious as hell about this whole damn thing.

Goddamnit I need to apologize to Kyle. Or punch him in the face.

Suddenly, the doll went quiet. The silence made both of them blink, Stan lifting the kid away from his chest to stare at it, as if that would give him some kind of answer in the lacking light as to why it suddenly decided to be okay.

In the process, he looked back at the naked skeleton, and instantly backed up three steps.

"What the-!?"

Wendy had looked too, and saw the same thing he did. It had moved- right in front of them, one of its strange hands reaching out, revealing that its only other complex joints were the individual knuckles of its fingers- a five-fingered metal hand having been inches away from touching Wendy before they both looked and backed off.

With the pair of them staring at it, it froze, as if transfixed by the flashlight.

The eyes looked different to Stan now. Not brighter- but... somehow more alive. Less like a doll, more like a person.

He didn't like it any better than before.

"The... fuck?" He asked, unwilling to take his eyes off of it while his heart beat in his throat. He felt as if blinking would allow it to move again.

"It's an endoskeleton; the the kind that go inside the mechanical mascots at-" Wendy gasped. "Sneaker's! The new pizzeria- the owners must have set up maintenance for their mascots here while they were still building the restaurant!" She let out a laugh, as if they were being incredibly silly about a machine that was made to entertain children, simply made horrific by it's apparent nudity... but the laugh had a nervous shake in it.

"Then why the hell did it move like it's fucking possessed?" Stan demanded. He still wasn't going to look away from it. He was clutching Aiden to his chest again, training his flashlight on the thing.

"... maybe it's malfunctioning- there's been a performer wearing the Sneaker suit around town for the promotions. People have been commenting about how creepy it is because the eyes are missing, so they're just dark holes- I've seen it all over social media, with pictures. It's... an effect. Not pleasant. If the endoskeleton isn't working properly, they must have been forced to put someone in the costume instead."

"Wendy, it moved when we looked away! This is bad horror movie territory, and we're the first kids to see the monster!"

Stan had been in too many of these situations. Some kind of cliched movie trope or even entire plot getting grafted onto some bullshit chapter of his life; episodes he'd been unable to escape from despite all attempts... usually shitty sports movies. This was fucking new, but he was too aware of what usually happened to the smart kids who knew what was going on too soon.

"We need to get out of here, now!"

He wanted to look at her, to convey how certain he was of that fact, but he couldn't drag his eyes away.

"- but we haven't finished with the pictures-"

"Fuck the pictures, that thing is going to fucking kill us the second we stop staring at it."

A beat of silence. Did Wendy think he was being paranoid? Was she going to tell him he was being uptight and crazy?

Already, he was thinking to just reach out, grab her hand, and yank her along as he made a break for the nearest exit. There's no way I'm just going to leave her here-

He swallowed as he felt her hand slip into his, voluntarily.

"Exit is your way, all the way on the end... just tell me when."

Relief would have to be expressed later. Right now, his heart was in his throat. For now, he just squeezed her palm in his.

"On three." He told her. Despite the endoskeleton having not moved for as long as they'd been staring at it, he was sure he perceived some kind of... understanding in the thing. It knew they were going to run.

It was going to chase them.

"One... two..."

The garage Dee had slipped into wasn't in a state of complete darkness- there was actually skylights in the roof, no doubt to let in natural light during the day. As luck would have it, tonight had moonlight, strong enough to cast silver-gray shafts into the space below and creating islands of visibility... as well as gulfs between them of distinct dark.

Her first calculation was to listen to where the steps were going. They clacked along with purpose, but they weren't heading directly for the doors from whence Dee had come. Was there another entrance into the garage? She hadn't seen one from the outside, minus the emergency exit or the big bay doors that let cars in.

The bay doors- emergency exits have alarms on them.

Her intent was to intercept, ducking between bulky objects in the dark that she didn't have the knowledge nor time to guess at, spacial awareness making her certain that she was heading the right way to get to where she'd seen the bay doors on the outside of the building. They'd been securely closed, of course, no doubt part of the alarm net she'd disabled upon breaking in. The person who was here had to know that alarm system- enough to be here after hours and not piss it off.

Or be the person it sent alerts to.

Supposition wasn't helping right now. It was just winding that spring between her shoulders again, the one that tightened the muscles around her spine and made her feel like she was going to implode, all while her pulse thudded in her ears.

All at once, she pulled to a halt- ducked low next to some kind of rolling tool chest and breathing silently through her nose while her teeth grit together. In front of her, one of the skylights gave her just enough illumination to confirm her feeling; a white, nondescript truck was parked just in front of the big bay doors built into the tall walls of the workshop. There was... something in the back bed, but she couldn't immediately make heads or tails of it.

She could still hear the footsteps; getting closer, but not yet upon her.

Just long enough.

Her phone came out, hurriedly getting into her camera to snap a photo in the seconds she had...

The flash went off.

The steps abruptly stopped.

Oh fuck me.

A heart that had been thundering inside her skull had dropped into her shoes- she hadn't thought to change the automatic settings in the heat of the moment.

In the dark, the stranger chuckled. The amused sound was of a feminine voice; low, mature.

"Should have known... but you're early, little Lyssie."

The words were measured. Icy. Clearly enunciated and intoned as if they knew exactly they effect they'd have- namely to freeze Dee's blood in her veins as she heard a stranger call her by a too-familiar pet name. Something that made her hands shake, only having barely shoved her stupid phone back into her pocket, swallowing hard as wide eyes strained against the dark.

"It's a special surprise, and you nearly ruined it- but that's okay. I have a treat for you."

In the dark, there was another sound that wasn't so unfamiliar. In fact, Dee was getting just a little too used to that one.

The sound of a gun hammer cocking back.

::The Author's Corner::

WELP I BANGED THAT ONE OUT IN TWO HOURS

HELLO FRIENDS I LOVE YOU TOO

ONWARDS!

-Buttlord