Jackson was frozen still for what felt like minutes. His eyes were glued to the security camera in front of him. Was he really seeing what he thought he was seeing? Even through the fuzzy static of the camera, he could clearly tell that Bonnie wasn't on the stage alongside his fellow animatronics.
"What the hell…? Did someone break in and steal the damn thing while I was asleep? I knew I should have gotten more sleep before coming in today…" he muttered under his breath.
His mind racing with several possibilities, he decided it would be prudent to take a look around the restaurant to make sure everything else was in order. As he reached across the desk to access the camera system, he saw that his arm was still shaking intensely from the nightmare he had just played a part in.
Attempting to place those sights into the back of his mind, he started flipping through the cameras to see if anything else was damaged or stolen. Maybe he could salvage some of it? He didn't want to be fired on his first day, after all.
As he flipped through the cameras at a rapid pace, he expected to see something else that was out of the ordinary. Would the endoskeleton from the backstage area be missing an arm? Would all of the pizza ingredients be stolen? Of course, the kitchen camera was the only one that wasn't functioning, meaning he had no way of knowing from his tiny, claustrophobic office. Much to his surprise, nothing seemed to catch his eye.
"Could the intruder still be in the building? I did hear that loud thud, after all. It was muffled, so I'm assuming it came from the cameras… Did I wake up in the middle of a robbery?"
The thought of such a thing terrified Jackson. It was only his first day on a job, and there might be a gun-wielding psychopath in a tiny building with him! He may have seemed threatening enough to James, but he wasn't trained for this! Could he really fend off someone like that?
As fear overtook his body, his sweat dripping off his forehead onto the camera controls in front of him, he realized he still had one camera left to check. He had avoided checking it until this point because he found it highly unlikely that anything would be out of order there, but he figured he should probably be thorough.
As he hesitantly clicked on the camera labeled Dining Area, Jackson quickly jumped back in surprise. He was barely able to keep the office chair he was sitting on from falling over as his eyes took in the sight before him. It was there. The missing animatronic was… just standing there? It looked completely lifeless, as it should have been, but how did it get down there? There was no intruder in sight, nobody to pull it off the stage… Besides, those things weighed a ton!
"Alright, let's think this through. Maybe someone did break in, thinking he could sell the animatronics for some fat cash… but he was too weak to carry them, and ended up dropping Bonnie on the floor there. Then he probably gave up and left… That sounds plausible…"
Jackson decided that, as the security guard, he had to at least try to move the giant bunny back onto the stage where it belonged. He reluctantly made his way down the west hallway, wishing he could just go back to sleep. As he trudged along the checkered floor, he noticed that the building had its own sort of presence in the middle of the night. The building had a cold and eerie atmosphere, the feeling of being truly alone. The few arcade cabinets the building had were turned off, there were no kids causing chaos… Except, he wasn't alone. Henry was supposed to stay the night with Jackson, so he could only assume that he was still cooped up in his office. That's some stack of paperwork, alright…
Pulling out the flashlight he had stuffed into his backpack earlier in the day, he scanned the dining area, looking for anything else he thought was out of place that he couldn't see on the cameras. No matter how hard he looked, everything seemed abnormally normal. No signs of a struggle or anything of the sort… The tables and chairs were all in their proper places, nothing seemed to be missing from the prize counter, nothing out of place except for the obvious.
Jackson finally honed in on the one thing that had caught his attention most: the rabbit. It looked exactly as it should, completely stationary and deactivated. Interestingly enough, he noticed that it wasn't holding its signature guitar, but he decided to ignore that for the time being. He scanned the animatronic's giant frame for any sign of damage, and yet he found absolutely nothing. The sound he had heard on the cameras was such a loud thud, and yet nothing happened to this thing?
"The hell are these things made out of?" he muttered, locking eyes with the animatronic. He knew it was just a robot, and yet he almost felt like he could feel it staring back at him.
"Might as well get this over with…"
Jackson bent over to grab the rabbit's legs in an attempt to lift it off of the ground, and yet he could barely get it a few feet into the air. "I guess that makes sense… this thing was probably dropped from on top of the stage, so nobody had to actually pick it up to get it down here…"
Jackson tried to lift the abomination with all his might, but no matter how much he lifted with his legs, there was no way he was going to be able to get this thing onto the stage. Taking a cursory glance at the stage, he wondered if they all weighed as much as this one. "I bet Chica is 50 pounds heavier than the other ones just because of that cupcake alone…"
As he looked up at Bonnie one last time, he cursed under his breath and decided to leave the thing alone. If he was going to move the robot anywhere, he'd need some help, assuming Henry was still in the building.
Out of the corner of his eye, Jackson thought he saw something shiny appear in his vision, but only for a split second. As he turned around to focus on what he saw, the shiny object was gone. He could've sworn he saw it poke out of Pirate's Cove, but he was probably just tired and paranoid at this point, deciding to continue onward.
Before making his way to the office, however, he took a sharp left and made his way toward the entrance, since he had no way of seeing what happened here from his office.
As he made his way to the front doors, a wave of confusion hit him. As he pulled on the doors, he noticed that they were still locked tight, and there wasn't a single sign of a break in. The windows were still intact, the lock wasn't busted, everything was as it should be.
"...what the hell? Wait, so nobody broke in?" Jackson muttered, glancing back toward the dining room where he assumed the bunny was still standing. Then, as if a lightbulb went off in his head, Jackson sprinted across the building to make his way back to Henry's office before busting through the door.
"Henry, what the hell, man?!" Jackson yelled, expecting to see Henry sitting there with a shit-eating grin on his face, but instead, he saw Henry face down on his desk, surrounded by a pile of unfinished paperwork and an empty cup of coffee barely holding onto his hand.
"H-huh?" Henry muttered, slowly lifting his head up to see Jackson towering over him. "Could you not yell so loud, kid? And get that flashlight out of my face…" he gasps, shielding his eyes from the intruder in his room.
"Wait, how long have you been asleep in here?" Jackson asks, realizing that things are only getting more and more confusing the further the night goes on.
"Look, I get it, I'm your boss and here I am, sleeping on the job-"
"No, no, that's not the point! Just answer the question!"
"What's gotten into you, boy? If you must know, I fell asleep around half an hour after you talked to me about that phone call." Henry responds, scratching his head in confusion.
Jackson glances down the hallway toward the dining room, and then back into the office. What did this mean? None of this makes any sense!
"Wait, so… you're not the one who moved Bonnie? You're not just pulling some sort of initiation prank on me?" Jackson stammered. He hoped with all of his being that Henry was lying to him right now, that everything that had happened tonight was some sort of elaborate setup to scare him on his first night, but one look into Henry's eyes revealed everything he needed to know.
Jackson practically dragged Henry out of his office, leading him to the dining room where Bonnie was still standing still, although… was Jackson just crazy, or was the animatronic's positioning slightly different?
"If you didn't do this, then explain to me what on earth could have happened! Nobody broke into the building, and nobody could have moved this thing except for me and you, and yet it somehow finds its way off of the stage at 3 AM. I'm sorry, Mr. Emily, but how the hell is that possible?!" Jackson yells, desperately searching for an answer. Without even trying, Jackson kept finding himself with even more mysteries than he knew how to solve…
"I… I don't know, alright!" Henry snaps back, looking at Jackson and then back to the robot. "This shouldn't be possible… It's not like these things can freely walk, and I would know, since I made the damn things… unless…"
"Unless?"
"Well… I can think of one possibility, although I don't know why it would have happened…" Henry mutters, deeply in thought about something. "There are only three keys to this location; one of them belongs to me, one is given to security guards, and the other is a spare. I gave the spare key to William, just so he could take my place if I couldn't be here… If nobody broke in, but somebody also moved this animatronic, he's the only guy who fits the bill."
Jackson scoffs before looking back at his boss. "That's all fine and dandy, but why the hell would he do this? Is this a prank, or something?"
"Look, I don't know! It's not impossible! He's my best friend, so I keep him updated on what goes on here, and he's always been sort of… out there. When he heard that you got the job, maybe he just wanted to scare you or something, I don't know! If you have anything more logical, I'd love to hear it!" Henry was very clearly worked up at this point. Jackson wondered if he truly believed his own words, or if he was just coming up with some sort of excuse for the unexplainable occurrence before them.
"Alright, let's assume your theory is correct." Jackson said. "Mr. Afton should still be in the building. I heard this thing move into the dining room at 3 AM, and I've been looking after the building ever since then. He couldn't have possibly escaped, so I'm going to find him and give him a piece of my mind, because he almost gave me a goddamn heart attack!"
As Jackson stormed off toward the other end of the building, Henry grabbed his arm and stopped him. "Hold on a second, Jackson. We should probably get this thing out of the way first." he said, pointing at Bonnie. "It'll be a nightmare trying to lift it up to the stage, so let's just move it to the backstage area for now. At least then it'll be out of the way."
Jackson sighed and nodded, as he helped Henry pick up the behemoth of a bunny. Carrying it over their shoulders, the two struggled to make it to the backstage room, but eventually managed to shove Bonnie through the door, next to the naked endoskeleton.
"You really couldn't have made these things any cuter? They're meant for kids, but at night, these things are downright creepy." Jackson muttered, staring at Bonnie, who was inches away from his own face.
"People may call me a mechanical genius, but I made these things in the 80's, son. There's only so cute you can make a robot like this look…" Henry sighed.
As the two walked out of the backstage area, closing the door behind them, Jackson left Henry at the door and started walking toward the restrooms at the other end of the building.
"Where are you going? I thought you wanted to look for William?" Henry asked.
Jackson turned around to face his boss with a pained expression on his face. "Where do you think I'm going? It's almost 4 AM and I haven't pissed since a while before I got here, my bladder is about to explode over here!"
Henry shook his head in dismay and started making his way toward his office, but was stopped by Jackson before he could get too close.
"Hey! I got a gift for you! I kind of went all out on the security stuff, since I've never done this before. I got flashlights, protein bars, and all kinds of stuff, but I also bought walkie talkies for some reason… want one?"
"Why would you buy walkie talkies? You're supposed to be working alone, you know…" Henry responded.
"Look, it's whatever, just take this and man the security cameras for me. I don't want the boogeyman coming after me when I'm most vulnerable, you know?"
"Alright, fine, but this is the last time I'll ever do your job for you." Henry sighs, catching the walkie talkie Jackson tossed to him.
As Jackson entered the doorway to the restrooms, he hesitated before entering. When he looked to his left, he suddenly remembered what had happened in his dream earlier that night. He slowly walked up to the wall next to the restrooms and placed his hand against it.
"This is the place… In that dream, something sent me flying through this wall… and then I saw… that…" he whispered.
As he continued feeling the wall, he realized that it wasn't the most sturdy one he had ever felt. It seemed like it could collapse at any minute if you applied the right pressure. It was almost as if the wall was built this way intentionally…
"What are you doing? I thought you were going to the restrooms." Henry's voice rang out through the walkie talkie.
Jackson quickly pulled it out of his pocket and turned it on. "Yeah, yeah, I know. I was just admiring all of the pizza decorations on the wall here. Say, is that real pizza-"
"Just get in there already, I'm not gonna keep doing your job for you if you're dilly dallying like this."
Jackson glanced back at the mysterious wall before making his way into the men's restroom. As he walked up to the sink and looked into the mirror, he realized how truly terrible he looked. His first night on the job was a rather strange one, and it had clearly started to stress him out. Now wasn't the time for that, however. It was time to relax.
He walked into one of the stalls and sat down. Sure, he could have used a urinal, but he wanted to chill out after how hectic his night had been so far. Was that too much to ask? The longer Jackson sat there, the more he wished he had brought his Game Boy into the bathroom with him. In all honesty, he didn't want to return to his office; he just wanted to go home and take a nice nap. While he was lost in thought, Jackson thought he heard some sort of clang sound, but he assumed it was just Henry messing around in the office.
"What the hell…" Henry's voice briefly rang out.
"What? What's going on? Henry, come in! Did you find hi-" Jackson started, but Henry shushed him from the other end of the call.
"Shut up for a second, I thought I saw something." Henry responded, a tiny bit of stress appearing in his voice. "Oh no… That's not good…"
"Henry, you can't just say that. You need to talk to me here!" Jackson whispered.
"Chica… she isn't on the stage…"
"Alright, so maybe our theory was correct! Mr. Afton is still here and he's still moving the animatronics, for whatever reason." Jackson exclaimed.
"Well… er, maybe… I could have sworn I saw something else that caught my eye though… Where the hell did that thing go, anyway? It isn't in the dining room…"
As Jackson prepared to open the stall door to return to his office, he thought he heard something outside of the restrooms. It sounded like… footsteps? It couldn't have been Henry, he was looking at the cameras right now… The footsteps were heavier than anything a human would be able to produce, almost as if they were coming from something made out of metal.
"Oh my god… That-that isn't possible… What the hell is going on?!" Henry yelled.
"H-henry? You're freaking me out right now, what-"
"Shut up. Now. Don't make a single sound." Henry said sternly. Jackson had never heard his boss sound so serious in the single day he had known him. "It's right outside the restrooms. I don't know what's going on here, but keep your mouth shut."
Jackson peered over the top of the stall door to see if there was anything in the doorway, but he didn't see anything there. Was this some sick joke? No, Henry sounded dead serious… Jackson decided to turn off the walkie talkie to make sure he was making the least noise he possibly could.
Then, he heard it. The resounding footsteps were once again echoing through his ears, except they were much louder this time. It almost felt as if something was stomping on his ear drum, that was how forceful the footsteps were. Jackson was starting to regret choosing the furthest stall from the door…
He felt paralyzed with fear as the footsteps got closer and closer to his stall. He was scared to even breathe in case he alerted whatever this thing was. Then, the footsteps stopped and he saw something through the gap at the bottom of the stall door. Two, giant, yellow legs were positioned directly in front of the door. Jackson didn't know what this thing wanted, but he knew he had to do something.
He quickly got onto the disgusting bathroom floor and managed to slide his entire body underneath the divider between his stall and the next one, placing him in a new stall. The moment he did, he heard the door to his previous stall slam open. No human had that amount of force; if this thing wanted to, it could probably break every bone in his body.
He didn't know how smart his assailant was, but he knew that it was apparently sentient, meaning he couldn't just sit in his new stall and wait. It had probably already figured out what his plan was, so he had to act fast. Jackson continued sliding through the stalls, a terrible smell entering his nose in one of them, until he finally made it to the stall closest to the door. He couldn't hesitate. If he did, he was dead. With every fiber in his being, Jackson pushed open the stall door and ran out of the bathroom, but before he made it all the way out, he glanced back inside.
There it was. The giant chicken animatronic was at the edge of the bathroom, turning its head around to stare at him. Jackson was mesmerized. This couldn't be possible… and yet, this thing… was alive?! However, he soon realized that he couldn't stand there forever, as the robot started walking toward him once again with its heavy footsteps. It was clearly slow, but that didn't mean it wasn't dangerous.
Jackson started running as fast as his legs could take him. He considered running toward the entrance so he could leave this nightmare, but he realized that Henry was still in the building. He had to make sure he was okay… plus, for the time being, that security office was probably the safest place, what with those giant metal doors and all.
Jackson sprinted through the dining area and made his way through the east hallway before taking a sharp turn into his office. There, he found Henry, leaning on the desk. As his boss looked up at him, Jackson saw that Henry seemed just as stressed, if not more stressed, than he was.
"Well, I guess the Afton theory is a bust, huh? Henry, can you do anything to explain what just happened? That thing… it was moving on its own… it opened the stall door and tried to get at me…"
Henry was staring intensely at the cameras, trying to keep tabs on all of the animatronics. "I don't know… They shouldn't be able to walk around, not these ones… I didn't build them to be able to walk around, those days have been gone for years. Those legs shouldn't even be able to function, in all reality, so I don't know…"
Jackson looked at the two sides of the room, and considered shutting both doors right now, but he didn't want to use up all of his power and end up defenseless against the animatronics.
"Look, I don't want to jump to any conclusions, but I've seen horror movies before. Objects that shouldn't be able to move suddenly moving? That sounds pretty haunted to me!" Jackson yelled.
"Look, the specifics don't matter right now. These things are moving and quite possibly want to make an attempt on our lives. When we get out of here, I'm going to talk to the higher-ups and figure out what the hell is going on here, but for now, we have to survive."
"God, this is some nightmare… Could you man the doors for me? It's time for me to actually do my job…" Jackson commands, walking over to the camera controls. Henry still had the bathroom camera pulled up, but Jackson didn't see Chica anywhere in that area.
"This camera is conveniently pointed away from that weird wall… maybe there's a lot more to that dream than I could know…"
Jackson pulled up the Show Stage camera and saw that Freddy was thankfully still on stage. There were already two animatronics moving around, a third one would just be an extra pain. Jackson gave the bear a quick middle finger before switching to the Backstage camera to check on Bonnie.
"Oh, great… Why am I not surprised?" Jackson muttered. As he looked over the room, Bonnie was nowhere to be seen, and the door was wide open. "Next thing I know, that metal endoskeleton is gonna start moving…"
Before he had a chance to think, Jackson heard a loud crashing sound from the east side of the building. As he flipped through the cameras to find the source, he eventually found that the sound was loudest on the kitchen camera. He could only describe the sound as pots and pans being thrown around by a child throwing a tantrum.
"You know, Henry, I think I'm starting to get an idea of how that kitchen camera got broken…"
Henry looked at the camera and scoffed. "That camera has been broken for a few years, too. If you're right, then that means this isn't a recent thing. The animatronics have been doing this for a while, and I was none the wiser…"
Jackson leaned out the east doorway to see if anything was in the hallway while continuing his conversation with Henry. "You're telling me that nobody ever complained about the camera being out for this many years?"
"Well, of course not. Most of them quit pretty early on. Considering what we're seeing right now, though, it's not too far out there to assume that some of them didn't quit after all." Henry muttered. These animatronics were his proudest accomplishments, and they were doing stuff like this behind his back the whole time?
"Oh, shit!" Henry yelled.
"What's wrong?"
"Bonnie. He's in the west hallway. I'm gonna shut the do-" Henry started, but Jackson grabbed his arm to stop him.
"Don't do that. Not yet, anyways."
"What do you mean?! If it acts anything like Chica did for you, we don't want it in here!" Henry yelled.
"That's not the point. You told me yourself; we only have so much power, and using the cameras as much as we are is draining it pretty fast. These things move pretty slow, so if we wait for them to get right up to the door, we should be able to shut them out fast enough. This way, we won't use up all the power and have no doors at all."
Henry continued leaning out the doorway to stare at the rabbit, and eventually sighed, taking his hand off of the door button.
"When did you get so calm and collected? You're thinking logically, while I'm terrified of what's going on here…"
Jackson chuckled before looking back at his boss. "You think I'm not scared? I'm practically shitting my pants over here. Look, we have to think smart, or we probably die. That's all there is to it. There's no time to be making sloppy mistakes. The guy who worked before me probably understood that as well, since he survived a pretty long time."
"Daniel was a valuable employee. Most of the other night guards were gone by the third night, but Dan made it an entire month. Now that I see what he had to deal with every night, I don't know how he did it…" Henry sighed.
As Jackson listened to Henry ramble on, he saw something out of the corner of his eye. Through the window next to the door, he could barely make out the silhouette of a bunny in the darkness. Henry seemed completely unaware as he looked back at Jackson.
"Henry! Shut it, now!"
Henry was startled by Jackson's yelling and turned around to see Bonnie mere inches away from the door. Before he could even think about reaching for the door button, he fell backwards in surprise, hitting his back against the wall. Jackson couldn't blame him for such a reaction. He felt nearly petrified himself, but he couldn't stand still now. There was more at stake than his own life…
Jackson leaped across the room, kicking the office chair out of the way, and reached for the door button. His finger had barely pressed against it when he saw Bonnie reaching his hand toward him. His eyes looked the same as they did when he was on stage, and yet he could feel a new, menacing presence behind them.
In a flash, a huge metal door smashed toward the ground, thwarting Bonnie's attempt to make it inside. Jackson fell down next to Henry, sweat pouring from everywhere a man could sweat. The adrenaline rushing through his body was like something he had never felt before. He could see Bonnie staring through the window, not averting his sight from the two men for an instant.
"Henry… you alright…?" Jackson gasped, looking over at his boss. He had clearly never seen something like this before. His legs were trembling as he looked back at the rabbit through the window.
"I-I'm fine…" he grunts as Jackson pulls him back up. "I still can't believe this… I mean, I never really believed that bogus theory I spouted about why the night guards quit, but I never thought the truth would have been something as terrible as this…"
Jackson chuckles as he stares at Bonnie glaring at the two of them through the window. "Yeah, I'm with you there. We just have to make it until si-" he begins, but just before he can finish his sentence, the sound of the building's lights coming to life fill the building, finally illuminating the rabbit animatronic outside of the door.
Glancing down at his watch, he finds the numbers 6:00 displayed on the screen. At long last, he was homebound… Was it really worth it to go through five nights of this hell for a measly 120 dollars?
"Well, son. We should probably get out of here. These things have never attacked anyone during the day, or at least, not here. We should be safe to leave without getting harmed." Henry says, still staring at Bonnie. It didn't look as terrifying during the day, but unluckily, Jackson wasn't here during the day…
"I don't care whether that's true or not, I'm not going out the left door." Jackson mutters, walking out into the east hallway. Looking at the corner of the hallway, he sees the rules for safety posted on the wall.
Don't run.
Don't yell.
Don't scream.
Don't poop on floor.
Stay close to mom.
Don't touch Freddy.
Don't hit.
Leave before dark.
"Great, good to know that I broke almost every one of these rules tonight, and got damn well close to breaking number four…" Jackson sighs.
"I see now that this list should probably be a lot longer… Nothing seems safe here anymore…" Henry says.
"Say, did you make these rules?" Jackson asks.
"Kid, I might be the manager, but almost nothing in this place is of my own doing. The higher ups at Fazbear Entertainment have the real control over what goes on here. They tell me what to do, and they don't tell me why, it's been like this for years. So, as it happens, they're the ones who made those rules. Why do you ask?"
"Well… on the surface, these rules would make perfect sense to anyone. But knowing what we know now, some of them seem to imply something… deeper. Don't touch Freddy? Leave before dark? That insinuates something pretty weird to me. Henry, you don't think…?"
A million thoughts were racing through Jackson's head. If his theory was correct, and there really was a deeper meaning behind these rules… did that mean that Fazbear Entertainment was aware of what went on here at night? If so, why hasn't the truth ever been brought to light? What would they stand to gain by covering this up?
"We can talk about that later. If what you're thinking is true, we probably shouldn't talk about it here, just to be safe." Henry whispers before walking down the east hallway to keep tabs on the locations of the animatronics.
As Jackson followed him into the dining area, he saw that Chica was standing in the middle of the room, completely inactive. He could no longer feel the presence he had felt before when he encountered her in the bathrooms. "Huh, I guess Henry was right after all…"
Freddy was still standing at his rightful place on the stage, and Bonnie was still stuck at the west door. However, something else caught Jackson's eyes as he continued searching the dining area. As he approached Pirate's Cove, he noticed that the curtains were slightly ajar. With a little hesitation, Jackson decided to fully open the curtains, revealing the fourth animatronic that was out of order. As he looked it up and down, he could clearly tell it wasn't in the greatest state of repair; it was clearly a red, pirate fox, but its endoskeleton legs were exposed, unlike the others.
"Hey, Henry? What was this one called again?"
"Ah, that's Foxy the Pirate. He's been out of commission for some time now. The damn thing kept malfunctioning and I couldn't for the life of me figure out why, so we decided to retire him for a bit. It's a mighty shame, my boy. He had his own special, solo show that the kids loved, and he was a sort of antagonist for the main three fellows." Henry rambled on. It almost seemed like he had forgotten the events of the night, his old, robotics loving self shining through.
"I'm sure glad he didn't decide to mess with us tonight as well… could you imagine being attacked by that hook?"
Jackson's stomach churned at the thought, and then he realized that he was stuck in the same predicament he found himself in earlier in the night; how would he get the animatronics back onto the stage? He couldn't just leave them standing around…
"I know what you're thinking, Jackson. The higher ups usually send over a guy who's supposedly a technician. Apparently, they send him shortly after the night guard's shift, but I'm not sure he actually does anything, considering the broken camera and Foxy…"
"So, you're saying that he's the guy who has to clean up the messes left behind after innocent security guards die? Henry, you're a genius robotics engineer, and yet they send some random guy to do stuff you could easily do yourself. That doesn't seem odd to you? I'm really starting to think that Fazbear Entertainment knows-" Jackson begins, but Henry shushes him.
"I told you not to talk about that. Follow me outside for a minute."
The wind outside was rather chilly, but Jackson thought it was a lot better than dealing with murderous animatronics… He watches as Henry pulls out a cigarette before turning to face him.
"Look, kid. After tonight, of course I think they're up to something. That's why I said I'd get to the bottom of this. I never should have sold the business… I'm starting to think it was one of the worst mistakes of my life."
"But… how did nobody notice? This place has been open for, like, five years! Was nobody concerned when their loved ones went missing and nobody explained why? How could they cover this up for so long?" Jackson asks.
Henry threw his cigarette to the ground and sighed. "You're missing a crucial detail there. They didn't have anyone who cared about them like that. If you're taking a job where you get paid 120 bucks a week, you're obviously at a dead end of some sort. The previous night guards had no loved ones and nobody to support them, so they took whatever they could get. As sad as it is, there's nobody that'll miss people like that."
Jackson stared at the autumn leaves falling off of the trees in the distance, deep in thought about the state of this restaurant. It wasn't like he had any obligation to figure out what was really happening underneath the surface, and yet, he felt like he had to know, no matter what.
He began walking toward his dad's car before turning around to face Henry once again. "I'll be back later today. I'm gonna go home and catch some z's, then you'll see me back here tonight."
Henry looked back at Jackson with a baffled face. "You don't have to do that, kid. You can leave this place behind and never think about what happened here ever again. You know this place's secret now-"
"And that's exactly why I have to stay. If I keep working here a little longer, I might be able to blow the lid on this whole conspiracy, and I need you to respect that, sir. I've already made one promise to find the truth, and now I'm making one with myself. Besides, this place is shrouded in a lot more mysteries than just tonight's, mysteries that I've been directly involved in. It's my duty to see my five nights to the end, and you won't stop me."
Henry looked at the ground in disbelief, and then back to the night guard before him. Never before had a Freddy's night guard showed so much dedication in the face of 120 bucks, and yet, here he was.
"Alright, fine. Go get some rest. I'm going to stay here for a bit and see if I can have a chat with this 'technician' when he finally shows his face. Now go home and steel yourself for whatever the rest of the week holds for you… employee of the month."
A/N: Sorry for the longer wait on this chapter, I was away from home for a few days and then when I finally got to work on this chapter, I kept having trouble figuring out how to proceed with it. I was constantly thinking to myself, "Is this good enough? Will people be satisfied with this?"
Just a little tip for fellow writers (or even YouTubers, as I've faced this same problem while creating videos): assuming it isn't your entire livelihood, don't try to write if you have no motivation to do so at the moment. That will just lead to a worse product overall, and that's coming from experience.
Anyway, about the actual chapter! It ended up being longer than planned, but it felt wrong to split it into two parts, so I hope you enjoyed the longest chapter so far! Something I really enjoyed about writing this one is being able to portray Henry actually learning about the animatronics being haunted. We have no clue when this happens in the games but we know he becomes aware eventually, so I thought it'd be neat to kickstart Henry's narrative by having him witness these living animatronics firsthand!
This chapter also has a pretty glaring deviation from the source material. In the first game, Phone Guy says that the animatronics have a free-roaming mode that is only activated at night so the servos don't lock up, which we can assume is pretty factual since he corroborates this with the fact that they used to be able to walk around during the day until the Bite of '87. For the purposes of this story, I'll just pass this off as Phone Guy spouting misinformation, similarly to how the animatronics kill you because "you look like a metal endoskeleton." I just feel like their haunted nature is a bit more impactful if no free-roaming mode exists, if that makes sense. Anyway, that's all I wanted to talk about! Next chapter coming sometime soon! Also, this chapter is exactly 6,666 words long. That's neat.