Final Warning
Susie made a point the next morning of getting ready as quickly as possible before Wendy got out of bed. She hurriedly ran a brush through her hair, threw on her uniform and got out of the house, resolving to get breakfast somewhere on the way.
She hadn't given her girlfriend the chance to say anything after her outburst and she didn't feel like confronting anything to do with it at the moment. On the one hand, she felt completely justified. Wendy had been giving her the cold shoulder for a while now and Susie had been as patient as she could. Instead of talking about it, she kept it to herself and only went off at her on some unrelated trust issue she was having. How could she just assume what was happening and immediately accuse her of something like that?
But the more rational part of Susie, the bit she tried to keep suppressed with her outrage, took a different view. Wendy was right. Susie had lied to her and as much as she wanted to deny it, a part of her knew that on some level, she had enjoyed her interaction with Lidiya in a way that was beyond just getting information from someone. It felt like it had been so long since anyone expressed an interest in her in that way or she'd had any sort of affection. And she hated herself for indulging in those feelings, even for a moment.
Even so, that wasn't important right now. She had something else more important to focus on and the deadline was fast approaching. She still hadn't found out for certain where that tape was and she'd just chased off her only lead for the Parts and Services room. Yes, they knew the synths were in there but they still couldn't get in without the key.
Lidiya's reaction last night had also surprised her. Why was she acting so cagey? Susie imagined that it could be a similar situation to the ex-guards, where she wasn't allowed to talk about what she was doing. If they wanted to keep it secret, then it only stood to reason. If that was the case, then she was really determined to keep that secret. She had quite an important position, so she probably had a lot to lose. It didn't make it any less frustrating though.
All of these things meant that she ended up snapping at Jeremy when he called her with an update.
"Hey, hey, no need to get like that. I can call at a better time later," he said.
"No, Jeremy, it's fine, I just…" She sighed. "I'm dealing with a lot of stuff at the moment. I shouldn't take it out on you."
"Don't worry about it, I get it. What happened anyway?" he asked.
Briefly, she relayed what she had learned from Lidiya and the incident when she'd mentioned the synths.
"Yeah, I'll bet anything she's been told to keep quiet about it," said Jeremy. "I wouldn't worry about it too much, it's done now. If it'll help, you might be in a better mood when I tell you what I managed to do last night."
He proceeded to tell her about his conversation with Balloon Boy and that the synthetic had agreed to help him get the key from Lidiya. If he was successful, he would be passing it off to Susie to make sure it was left for him later that night.
"I gave him one of my spare keys to swap out, so she hopefully won't notice until it's too late," he finished proudly. "We're getting close now, Susie, I can feel it!"
"Jeremy, that's brilliant!" she cheered. "I'll keep an eye out for it today. Now if we can just figure out for certain where that tape is, we'd be sitting pretty."
"It's alright, we've got it pretty much narrowed down. We just need to confirm the location and we're good," he said. "I'm telling you, you'll have caused a stir yesterday with what happened with Daniel and the others. If they didn't call you up yesterday, I bet it's going to be today."
"I hope so. I never thought I would ever hope for a time I'd be called up to the manager's office," she remarked.
Jeremy laughed. "You're telling me. I'm going to go and report to Golden today, update her on my progress and see what she thinks I should do when I go in tonight."
"Sounds like a good idea. I'll probably see her today after work, whether or not I've managed to learn anything new and see where we go from here. We're almost out of time, we might have to just improvise," she said.
"Luckily for you guys, my director always told me I was good at adlib," said Jeremy with confidence. "Don't worry, we'll be fine. You look after yourself, Susie. I'll see you later."
"You, too, Jeremy. See you." The call ended and she was left again with her less pleasant thoughts.
At first, the day continued on as usual. Lidiya came in as she did, resolutely not looking in Susie's direction and making straight for the Parts and Services room. Susie didn't really look at her either. She still felt the guilt in the pit of her stomach just glancing at her. Guests and visitors came in, the performers did their thing and the staff went about their business.
Then came the surprise when the phone next to Susie's desk rang. The one that she usually used to direct people to the offices upstairs. Feeling something of a thrill in her chest, Susie answered it with both anticipation and dread.
"Mr. Smith would like to see you in his office," came Jenny's voice from the other end.
"What for?" Susie asked.
"Didn't say, he just wants to see you. I'll be down to let you in." The line clicked and Susie sat there for a moment, processing what just happened.
She had to really work to keep the smile off her face. It worked. Jeremy's idea actually worked! She'd gotten her ticket upstairs! Now, it was just a matter of narrowing down where the tape could be stored. Of course, there was still the fact that she'd been asked to speak to the manager and in any workplace, that was never a good thing. Even so, the question remained: was this just for what she'd done with the guards or had word gotten back from Lidiya about what she knew?
So it was with dread outweighing the anticipation that Susie called somebody over to cover the front desk and made her way into the Games Room. She caught sight of Gordon from across the room, giving her a very hostile sort of look. She just gave a little smile back and waited by the door.
While she waited, she happened a glance over at the Prize Corner. The regular attendant was there, looking like he was wishing he was anywhere else. The plushies of the characters were staring out with their blank eyes as excited kids ran up with tickets to claim them. The big box next to it was closed, as it usually was whenever she looked over.
Except it wasn't. The lid was open, just a little bit. There was something inside. She couldn't quite make it out, but there were what could only be a pair of eyes. Two, tiny white pinpricks against the encroaching darkness. And they were looking right at Susie.
A chill ran up her spine. She looked at the thing in the box and it looked back at her. Even over the clamours of the children and the noise of the band, she could hear it. A tinkling, musical box rendition of Pop Goes the Weasel.
Then it ended. The eyes vanished. The box snapped shut and the music stopped. Before Susie could dwell on what just happened, the door opened and Jenny was letting her in, telling her to follow. Oddly enough, Susie didn't feel as much dread as she did before. She'd rather have a sit-down with the manager any day than face whatever was in that box.
Jenny sat down back at her desk and buzzed the intercom she had set up.
"Susie Thompson, here to see you, sir," she said.
"Send her in," a voice said gruffly.
"Yes, sir." She buzzed it off and looked at Susie. "Address him as 'Mr. Smith' or 'sir.' Nod when you need to, get it over with and get out."
"Got it," said Susie. "Wish me luck."
"You're going to need it." She looked sympathetically at her. "I'm sorry about this, really. But you had to have known this was coming."
"I did. In fact, I was counting on it." She smiled mysteriously to Jenny's confused look and opened the door.
The room was what you might expect from a manager's office. A desk was set up in front of her with all sorts of papers arranged on it and a computer at the centre. A simple chair was set in front of it. To the left was a coffee table and some comfier looking black couches arranged like a horseshoe. The decoration comprised of different bobbleheads and imagery of different cartoon characters, including the restaurant's and a big photograph of the man himself, smiling in front of one of his other restaurants on the right. The walls were a deep blue, a colour which matched a very rich looking carpet.
Fritz Smith looked up from his work as she came in. So, he was a literal fat cat. His suit looked just as pricey as his office, velvet and tailored black with the only dash of colour being his red tie. The toupee he wore as far removed from real hair as she was from being in the same position as he was. There was no friendliness or warmth on his face, only the kind of assurance and confidence that years of success and money would bring to a person.
"Ah, Miss Thompson. Have a seat. It seems we have some things we need to discuss," he said.
Susie nodded mutely and quickly took her seat. Even though it was her intention to be up here, she didn't want to push her luck. She didn't want to cheese off a potential accomplice to kidnap and murder any more than she already had.
They sat in silence for a very uncomfortable few seconds. This was no doubt deliberate, to unnerve her. Susie sat as still as she could and did her best to keep her face blank.
"So, Miss Thompson," he began, looking down at a sheet of paper, "you joined us from Freddy Fazbear's Pizza, correct?"
"Yes, I did."
He glanced up at her. "Yes, you did…?"
"I-I did, Mr. Smith," she said hastily.
"Hmph." He went back to the sheet. "I'm sure I don't need to tell you that this establishment has done a great favour to you, Miss Thompson. We could have left you to try your luck in the current job market, but we didn't. We offered you gainful employment with the Fun Palace. A fresh start from the horrible things you were put through, tied to that godawful place. And what is your repayment of this great favour? Harassment of your fellow restaurant employees and offsite staff. Do you think that's a fair way to look at it?"
"I um…" She gulped. "Yes, sir."
"At least you own up to your wrongdoings. Let's have a little review of them." He picked up another piece of paper. "The first one I have here was filed by my driver, Daniel Fairchild. Interesting that, very briefly, you and those he were associated with were colleagues back at Fazbear's. An interesting way to treat them. You not only continued to broach the five of them on an uncomfortable subject, but you also accused Daniel himself of some very serious things. You accused him of 'pulling a knife on you', implicated him for the murders of those children at Freddy's and physically assaulted his person."
"I didn't assault him," she said before she could stop herself.
He set down the paper and looked at her coldly. "I'm sorry, are you contradicting me? Are you saying that Daniel was lying?"
"No, sir," she said quickly. "What I meant was that I only placed my finger on his shoulder. And he shoved me, too."
"So you admit to laying hands on his person, then?"
"Yes, but not-"
"So you're trying to downplay what you've done. Are you attempting to lie to me then?"
"No, sir, but-"
"Shut up, girl," he snapped. "You know what you did and you're here to answer for it. Own up to your mistakes, like an adult."
Susie opened her mouth again, but quickly closed it. She was playing a dangerous game here and this wasn't helping her situation. She bit her tongue and silently nodded.
He gave a very unpleasant smile. "That's better. Regardless of the fact that they were convicted criminals, they have paid their debt to society and are trying to start afresh. They can't do that if they're being reminded of their past crimes and accused of completely fictional ones, too. I expect you to apologise to them and know that if this is ever mentioned again, you can consider yourself out that door. Are we clear? Speak up, girl," he added when she only nodded.
"Yes, Mr. Smith," she said as neutrally as she could.
"Good. Now, onto the next order of business," he said, going to pick up another piece of paper.
The buzzer on his desk sounded, making Susie jump. Smith muttered in irritation and pressed the button for the intercom.
"Just got the financial reports to put away, sir," said Jenny.
"Fine, but be quick about it. I'm in a meeting as you well know, Jenny," he said tersely.
"Of course, sir. Be through in a moment."
The door opened and in came Jenny. She didn't spare a glance at Susie while she walked to the right side of the room, out of her line of sight. Susie kept her gaze locked on the desk for the moment. She didn't want to look suspiciously curious. She heard the sound of something being taken down, no doubt the painting.
She looked up from her spot at Smith who was still glowering at her. He was clearly impatient to continue and kept looking across to where Jenny was. Susie heard another sound, digital beeping. A code being inputted for a safe? There was a click and a squeaking noise. Taking a chance, Susie dared to look in the direction.
She only had the chance to look for a couple of seconds but it was enough. It was definitely a safe. She caught sight of some documents, wads of cash…and a black, rectangular object nestled on the bottom. What was unmistakably the security tape. Finally!
"What are you smirking at?" demanded Smith.
Susie quickly put on a straight face. "Nothing, sir. Sorry, sir."
"Is something about this funny to you?" he growled.
"Not at all, sir. I was thinking about something else, I'm sorry," she said levelly.
"Then you'd best keep your mind on what's important right now, girl," he said. "Jenny, hurry up there and get out."
"Yes, Mr. Smith. Just wrapping up now." With a clank, the safe shut and the picture was put back in place. "Thank you, sir." Jenny walked out and shut the door without another word.
"Now, where was I? Ah yes," he said, picking up the paper. "I had another report from one of our engineers, lovely lady by the name of Lidiya. I believe the two of you are acquainted?" Susie didn't respond to the question. "According to her, you were trying to worm company secrets out of her. Taking advantage of her unique position to do a little more digging. Care to comment?"
"I wouldn't really know, sir. We were just out and talking about work, not much more than that," she said evenly.
"Is that so? So the phrase 'synthetic', that doesn't mean anything to you, does it?" he asked.
"No, sir. Aside from its meaning of an artificial substance mimicking something organic, if that's what you mean?" she asked.
"No, it isn't and don't get clever with me, girl," he warned. "Because given this and what Daniel has told me, you're starting to come across to me as someone who likes to stir up trouble. Are you, Miss Thompson?"
Susie shook her head, not trusting her mouth at this point.
"I should hope not. Because I don't like troublemakers in my restaurant." He looked her right in the eye from across the desk. "I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt, Miss Thompson. I'm a generous man like that, as I'm sure you've gathered. But this will be your only chance. If I hear anything like this again, you'll be fired. Are we clear?"
"Like crystal, sir," she said.
"I'll hold you to that. Now, get out," he ordered, pointing to the door.
Susie nodded and headed out of the door, feeling his eyes on the back of her head the whole time. Jenny got up to lead her back downstairs while Susie tried to process everything that had just happened.
"What did you mean before?" Jenny asked when they were in the middle of the stairs. "When you said that you were hoping to get called up to the office. Why would you say that?"
"I guess you could say that I was curious," shrugged Susie.
"What does that even mean?" Jenny folded her arms. "What's your game here, Susie?"
"You already know the answer to that, Jenny. I told you as much yesterday," she replied. "Please, if there's anything that you know, tell me. I think you know that there's something not quite right about this whole setup."
Jenny appeared to be considering whether or not she thought Susie was serious or just insane. If Susie were in her shoes, she would be the same.
"You were right, about the robots," she admitted. "They didn't act like how they should. They were too… human. It was more like a person in a costume than a machine. Especially that one you talked about, Chica. She actually did seem, well, nice."
"She really is," said Susie.
"Yeah," she said awkwardly. "And… you were right about Daniel, too. I still think 'monster' is too far but there were times that night, when I couldn't believe what he almost did. What he threatened to do. He never mentioned anything about that, I swear. We only wanted to get the truth."
"I believe you," she said, moving a little closer. "What happened, when you were let out?"
"We didn't get most of the details. Smith only really talked with Daniel. He told us that all we had to do was say the robots were dangerous and we'd be let out with new jobs. We were so thankful for our luck, we didn't really question it. Trust me, in that situation, you wouldn't. It's sort of been on my mind for a while but after you've bought it up, I can't get it out of my head." She paused. "Since it happened though, Daniel started acting a lot more distant with us. Gordon, too."
"It didn't seem that way before," noted Susie.
"What you saw represented the most contact we've had with them in the past month. Stuart, Ernie and me, we kept talking to each other because we were pretty much all we had starting here and because of how everyone else looked at us. But those two, they pretty much closed themselves off."
"Gordon too?" she asked.
She nodded. "Yeah. From what I gather, those two were always close. Childhood friends, I think. Helped each other through some rough patches. I don't know the details, they never really talked about it. For one thing, one of them can't. I only know that Daniel was there when '87 happened. That's a pretty rough thing for any kid to see."
"What about Gordon?" asked Susie. "I noticed something on his neck, like a patch of red."
"I'm not really sure. All Daniel would say was that it was some kind of damage done to his neck when he was younger, left him without a voice. Some other kid was apparently the cause of it but he wouldn't say much more than that," she said.
Susie was about to ask more when they both heard the intercom buzz from upstairs.
"Sorry, I'd better get back before he notices I've been gone too long," she said. "Whatever it is you're trying to do, I hope it works out." She pulled out her phone and passed it to Susie. "There's my number. If you need anything else, just let me know."
"Thank you." Susie noted it down in her own phone. "What changed, then? Why are you helping me all of a sudden?"
"Like I said, what you told us yesterday got me thinking about a few things. I thought this really would be a fresh new start after we tried to achieve what we set out to do. But if there's something else going on, if this place is covering something up like Freddy's was, I don't want to be a part of that. I've made enough mistakes." She started upstairs again, then turned. "I'm sorry about what happened to your friend, Mike. For the record, I don't think he could have killed those kids either."
"It's good I'm not the only one," said Susie. "I'll be in touch."
With that, Susie returned to the hustle and bustle of the main restaurant, her feeling of triumph doubled thanks to what had happened. It had taken a while and she'd ended up cutting it a little close but she'd done it! Not only had she figured out where the tape was, but she'd gotten herself another ally. She'd had a feeling about Jenny and was very happy to see that it hadn't been misplaced.
What she'd told Susie had got her thinking. Daniel had a vendetta against Freddy's, according to what Jenny said yesterday, because of the Bite. Be the hero by bringing down the corrupt kid's restaurant. Had something similar happened to Gordon? To her knowledge, the Bite was the most infamous thing that had happened with Freddy's, until the murders had supplanted that. As much as she enjoyed her work at Freddy's, Susie would be an idiot not to admit the place didn't have the best history. Was there something else, further back in the restaurant's past? She knew vaguely of a place that had become before Freddy's…
"Excuse me, miss?" She looked up and was surprised to see Balloon Boy standing by the desk. "I think somebody lost this."
He held out a familiar silver key with a Darth Vader keyring. In all that was happening, Susie had almost forgotten about Jeremy's message. She took the key from him.
"How did you get this?" she asked quietly.
"I told you, somebody lost it. I just found it," he replied happily. "You better hand it in to the security guard so he can put it back where it belongs."
"I'll be sure to do that. Thank you, Balloon Boy," she said.
"That's okay and you can call me Billy, if you want," he offered.
"Okay. Well, thank you, Billy." She smiled softly at him. "I used to know somebody else called Billy. He was a… a very sweet boy."
"I hope you think I am too," he said.
"Yes, Billy, I think that you are," she replied.
He beamed. "Thank you. You still have a really nice smile."
Susie stared in shock. "What did you just-?"
"Okay, gotta go now, bye!" he said quickly and walked off back into the crowd.
Susie looked after him for a moment, struck by an urge to follow him. The way he had said that, about her smile, it sounded exactly like… but that couldn't be possible. Surely, he was just complimenting her on her smile. It wasn't an unusual thing for somebody to do.
And yet, she couldn't shake the feeling that there was more to it than that…
