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dmitty17: So there is a new Freddy's location, isn't there?
Things are going to get much more interesting now. Anyway, I feel like a big problem with your work is the fact that a lot of it consists of talking, and not much well... anything else.
Oh, I didn't realize that. I'll try to work on that.
The group stepped out of the restaurant after paying. Looking up, they noticed that the sky was considerably darker. There was an orange haze on the horizon where the sun was near. Charlie looked down, and her watch read 5:32. "Time is going by quickly, isn't it?" she asked.
"Yeah," John said, nodding in agreement. He walked over to sit down at one of the tables outside, but something else caught his attention: it was a relatively small building near the other border wall that separated Chica's Party World from the next area of the park. It was made of an off-white material, but there were tan-colored arches that extended out from the corners of the building. It had an L-shape. He shook his head, turning to Charlie, who was talking to Jessica about something. He then turned back, half-expecting the building to disappear. I know that place, he thought to himself. He finally turned to the others. "Hey... do you see that?"
Jessica and Carlton met his gaze, as did Charlie. She tilted her head in confusion. "Do I see what?"
"Come with me," John said. He ran up to the building and to the entrance of it. Indeed, it was much smaller than the restaurant that they were at. When John got to the entrance, the pattern of the building seemed to change. There were two large windows that seemed to overlook a set of tables, with a hedge beneath these windows. However, the most glaring thing to notice was the name of the restaurant which was in large and bold letters: 'FREDBEAR'S FAMILY DINER.'
Charlie took a step back, her eyes widening and bulging. Her body movements froze as she studied the building and its architecture, as well as the fact that it was very clearly the same Fredbear's she went to as a kid. Her eyes then began rapidly blinking as she tried to process what she was looking at. "This is actually... it," she said. "This really is Fredbear's."
John nodded, though still in shock just as much as Charlie was. "Yeah... it's," he began, but he was unable to find the right words. Finally, though, he chose his words. "It's impressive," he said.
"Will you stop treating this like the freaking Rosetta Stone?" Carlton asked as he walked up to the diner. "Dozens of people have gone in and out of this place in just the last hour, so I don't know what the big deal about this is." Jessica's eyes darkened and narrowed and she turned to face Carlton.
"Do you even know what the Rosetta Stone is?" she asked.
"Actually... I don't, I just know that it was one of the oldest tablets ever known," Carlton said.
"Alright," Jessica said. "Well, that doesn't matter. What does matter is this: Fredbear's was the first animatronic restaurant that Charlie and John ever went to, and it is especially important to Charlie because her father was the one who started the business."
Carlton just nodded. "Okay, I get it. Fine, I understand that I'm being annoying."
Jessica chuckled. "You haven't seen annoying yet."
Carlton sighed, turning around to face the diner. Charlie swung both doors open and she walked inside, being greeted with cool air. Carlton and John followed her in, and the last person to enter was Jessica. The door then closed behind them. The floor was a purple kind of carpet, with cyan, magenta, green, yellow, and red stars pockmarked on it. There were two arcade cabinets right next to them, and there was a blond-haired child playing the one on the far right. It seemed to be a game of Pac-Man. Further ahead, there was a kind of stand or prize counter, with a bunch of plushies and other merchandise on display. There was a man in a black suit and a yellow bowtie standing behind the counter.
To the right of them were four tables with eight white chairs surrounding them. The chairs were made of wood, but the tables had legs made of some type of metal. There was a white tablecloth with different colored dots folded around the table, almost reaching down to the floor but stopping at knee-length. There were several people seated at the tables, some kids, and some adults.
The wallpaper was a dark tan—almost green, but one meter up from the floor, the color of the wall has changed to an off-white color. There were also some paintings on the wall. There were two that were portraits of the founders of the original Fredbear's: William Afton and Henry Emily. There was a landscape painting at the top left of the wall on the far right. And, to top it off, a stage in the back of the room, a wooden elevated stage with two large speakers on the front corners, and a piano on the right side of the stage. There were two animatronics performing: a Freddy and a Bonnie, though Freddy was colored in gold and was made of some kind of plush material, and he had a purple top hat and bowtie. The Bonnie, however, was scarily familiar to every single one of them. Bonnie had gold fur as well, as well as a purple bowtie and two purple buttons. However, the exact shape and proportions reminded them of one specific animatronic: Springtrap.
Jessica turned to face the others, standing in front of them. Her face turned white. "Okay... I really hope that's not William Afton in there," she said. "Otherwise... I would just want to go."
"Relax," Charlie said, of all people. "William Afton got out of his suit, remember? He swore to never wear that thing."
"Oh, right," Jessica said. She then turned around, looking at the two animatronics. Fredbear was singing some kind of tune, while Golden Bonnie was in the corner, playing the piano. They played in perfect sync. "This is... cool?"
"It is," John said. He then motioned Charlie to follow him over to a table that was close to the front. "Hey, want to get a better view?"
"Yeah," Charlie said. She followed him as he sat down, but she stared at just everything in the diner. It's accurate to the letter, she thought to herself. She brushed past the prize counter, but she turned and looked at it anyway. She placed her hand on the counter. The surface felt cold, and eerily familiar, something she couldn't put together. She just stared. John swung around, turning to face her.
"Charlie?" he asked.
"Yeah?" she glanced at him.
"You alright?"
"Yeah, it's just that something feels familiar about this," she said as she turned to face the counter. When she touched the surface again, she felt a different sensation, a very unique sensation that she never felt in her life: the feeling of being stabbed in the torso by a million sharpened knives. She tried to scream out or cry out, but the pain was far too agonizing to do that. She looked down, and she saw her vision begin to blur out, but what she saw terrified her: almost a dozen dark and shadowy arms holding sharpened knives, repeatedly stabbing at her torso, over, and over, and over.
"Charlie?" John asked, though his voice seemed muffled, as it was nearly completely drowned out by the sound of a high-pitched screech, perhaps the screech of a radio. "CHARLIE!" he then shouted, but by then, his voice was gone. Charlie couldn't hear him anymore. Eventually, her vision faded to complete and total darkness.
"Alright, Clay..." Mark began.
The two of them stood in the office room of the west tower. Not the one with the cameras, but the one with the large desk propped against the wall. Mark was sitting down on the steps leading to the security room, while Clay was sitting down in the chair.
"Yeah?" Clay asked. By now, Mark has been hired as the second security guard, the one that was meant to work in the east tower. Both of them had a radio device attached to their belt where they could keep in touch with one another. Clay also had a holster attached to his belt where he had his gun. There was also a baton attached to it. Mark had the same apparatus, except for the gun.
"Look, our shift starts in a few hours. By then, most people will have left the park, leaving us with all the duties. That will also mean that we likely won't be monitored, except by the animatronics. That will give us plenty of time to investigate. A shift is six hours, correct?"
"Yes," Clay said. He glanced at his watch—it was 6:12. "So in six hours, our shift starts. I think we should try to familiarize ourselves with this park before we do our jobs, don't you agree?"
Mark nodded, but then his eyes widened, his head perking up just a little. "Wait, what are our jobs?"
"Security?" Clay pondered. "I mean, what do you think?"
"It isn't security," Mark said. "You see, I knew the security guard that was killed. He was my brother." He then sighed heavily. "Look... I don't know from where to start the story. Jonathan was beginning to study his third year in medical school, and was passing his final exam. He and his friends were planning to do an end-of-the-year celebration, and to join them, he needed to get some extra cash. I tried to offer him my financial help by simply giving him the amount he needed, but my brother... he was quite stubborn."
Clay stared at his face. He looked like he was hiding several things from him, things that he was only beginning to reveal. "Go on."
"Well, he refused my offer. He believed that if he needed something, he should get it or earn it by himself, without the help of others, and I always respected that," Mark said. "Since most of the day time, Jonathan was studying, he needed a job where he would work during the night. And that's when he found the job offer for the position of the night shift security guard here. If only I could persuade him..."
Clay got up and met his glance. "Look, there are some things that you can't change. The past is the past, and you've got to remember that," he said.
"I know," Mark said. "Anyway, Jonathan was accepted to his job without any complications. His task was simple: to watch over the park from midnight to six. The same as my brother, I was supposed to work the night shift all week long, and due to that, we got to call each other and chat every night."
"Well that's nice," Clay said. "So... what happened?"
"On the first night, we had a nice talk. He had mostly remained awake with some coffee. The job was very simple, he just had to occasionally check the cameras. During the time in between, he would study, since the environment was perfect. Do you see that desk? The other day, it had a bunch of notebooks and textbooks.
"Nothing special happened on the first night, but on the second night," he began, his voice turning cold. "At five, he called me. He told me that he most likely drank too much coffee since for some time, he noticed some of the animatronics disappear from their stages, and were traveling around the parks. We both had a good laugh on that weird illusion."
"But it wasn't an illusion," Clay realized.
"Chief, look. It wasn't just that one animatronic that attacked my brother," he said firmly as if he just unloaded a heavy weight on the ground. Clay's face was full of shock. "They all went after him. Yes, every single one of them. He noticed that the animatronics started trying to approach him, and he used the gate system to seal off sections of the park, however, they just seemed to find other ways around them, by figuring out how to climb up buildings and hop onto the top of the walls dividing the park."
Clay Burke's face immediately turned pale upon listening to this. "Oh my god," was all he was able to say as he thought about that.
"It's horrifying, isn't it?" Mark asked. "However, Jonathan had figured out a general pattern to the attacks of the animatronics and was able to contain them. If the gates were only closed for a short amount of time, the animatronics wouldn't try to figure out another way out. However... this strategy didn't last long, because on the fifth night, his last shift, all the animatronics came out at once and completely surrounded both of the security towers before going in and butchering both of the guards, shoving their corpses in those damn suits."
He immediately got up and ran up the staircase that led to the security room, and he stared out the window that overlooked the park. By now, it was pretty much twilight, and all the park's lights were on. He just stared down. That's insane, he thought. He tried to come up with every possible explanation for why the animatronics were able to move so easily, but he could only stumble upon one: They must have been designed to be able to do these things. I don't understand how it would be practical for an animatronic to have such advanced mobility and pathfinding skills if they're just meant to play with kids... unless, he thought to himself. He turned around, meeting Mark's gaze. He was already standing up, now on the top floor as well.
"Chief?" Mark asked. "What's going on?"
Clay just released a heavy sigh. "Mark," he began, choosing his words very carefully. "The animatronics... they're designed to hunt us down and kill us. That's the only explanation for any of this."
Mark swallowed hard as he stared at Clay. "But why? Why would this company murder these people? Why spend so much money doing it? Isn't the company making a loss?" He tilted his head, pondering this question, before something finally hit him. "Maybe the guards are supposed to keep track of the park, but are then killed before they can get paid?"
"I think so, but I don't think that's the only explanation," Clay said. He turned around, looking out the large window again and seeing the giant ferris wheel in the middle of the park slowly spinning. "They'd still be making a loss, wouldn't they?"
"Yeah," Mark said. He then sighed. "Look, I don't know anything."
"I don't either," Clay said. He then shook his head. "Look, if the ulterior motive was murder, then why stuff them into suits in the first place? This is an entire fun park, there are a million different places to hide a body. There are dozens of restaurants in this park, and there are just so many better and quicker ways to hide a body even in them: roast the body in an oven, toss the body in the meat grinder, throw one in the trash, or chop the body into a million pieces and dump the remains into the tomato sauce vat." He then shook his head in denial. "No, the bodies weren't stuffed into the suits to hide the bodies."
Mark raised an eyebrow. "So why were the bodies stuffed into the suits?" he asked.
Clay turned around once more, glancing out the window. The ferris wheel had stopped spinning. He then glanced back at Mark, finally sure of himself. "Because," he began, feeling his heart pound harder and harder against his chest like a timpani or bass drum. "They wanted to make the animatronics alive."
"Hey! Look at this!"
The dampened sound of children screaming, cheering, and giggling woke Charlie up. She groaned, rubbing her still-closed eyes. The sound of cars closely down a road startled her, and her eyes jolted open. She felt a cold breeze blowing on her. She looked around: she was sitting back against a tree. There was a sidewalk right in front of her, with a short lamp post about twice the height of her glowing brightly in the dark.
She shivered; it was raining heavily, the wind howling. Another car flew by, its engine roaring. She finally got to her feet, and she instinctively called out her friend's name: "John!"
"JOHN!" she screamed out. But unfortunately, there seemed to be no response. She sighed, walking onto the sidewalk. She didn't have a coat on or anything, just her light jacket that didn't have a hood, meaning that when she finally walked out from beneath the tree, the rain poured over her, drenching her clothes. "I hate this!" she said, knowing her words would fall on deaf ears.
She seemed to be in the middle of nowhere in the darkness. She stood next to a road, sure, and she was on a sidewalk, but there were no buildings nearby, and the thick fog made it incredibly difficult to see past anything a hundred feet away. She exhaled deeply, turning to her left. Though there was no indication, she felt as if there would be something that way, so she began walking through the rain. She passed by several tall lamp posts and trees before she stopped, looking down at the ground. How did I even get here? I was in the park, right?
She felt her heart pounding heavily against her chest. She didn't even know how she got here. The last thing she knew was that she had the hallucination of being stabbed. Is any of this real? she wondered. Is anything I've ever lived through real? she wondered too. However, everything was too vivid for her to be an illusion. It was absolutely real to her.
She just continued walking down the sidewalk, the rain continuing to drench her clothes. She passed by several trees and lamp posts before the sounds of the screaming and cheering became louder. Eventually, she approached a small parking lot, and by that parking lot was a familiar building, the shape of which Charlie immediately recognized: Fredbear's Family Diner.
Why is this here? she wondered. No, why is any of this here? Wasn't the fun park built around Fredbear's? Why can't I see it? She sighed, before slowly walking up to the entrance and opening the door. Inside, Fredbear and Spring Bonnie were performing on their stage. Kids and adults were eating, sat down at the tables, and some were playing. The floor was just a gray carpet, and the prize counter was as bland as ever, however, instead of a man in a black suit wearing a yellow bowtie serving prizes, there was instead a Freddy-like animatronic with black-colored fur standing behind the counter. It had a microphone in its left hand and nothing in the right. It wore a red bowtie and top hat, as well as a yellow star just below the bowtie. It also had red kneecaps, and the microphone it was holding was yellow. I don't remember you.
Then, it dawned on her: that the animatronic was old. Its motions resembled the original animatronics she and the others found at Freddy's three years ago. The motions seemed mechanical and robotic, not fluid like the new animatronics. She then turned and walked over to someone who got up from their table. "Hey, sorry to bother you, but where in the fun park am I? I think I'm lost, and I need to find a way to get back to the entrance."
The customer grimaced, tilting his head. "Sorry? What park?"
"You know, the fun park? Fredbear's Fun Park?" she asked. She felt her heart drumming against her chest as she spoke.
The customer shook his head. "Look, there ain't no fun park here. This is just a diner in the middle of New Harmony," the customer said. "You might need brain surgery."
Charlie chuckled at that, but then she stopped herself. No, she thought. There's no fun park? But I was with John, and Carlton, and Jessica. Where are they?
But then, something else stumbled up in her mind, something that she had kept hidden ever since she first woke up, as she didn't want to confront the possibility of it being true. When am I? She then turned and tapped the shoulder of that customer, who turned around and met her gaze. "Can I help you with something?"
"Yeah," Charlie said. She felt her heart pounding hard against her chest, and she felt an icy chill travel down her back. "What's the date?"
The customer chuckled. "It's January sixth," he said. "I think you need to have your ears chewed out."
Charlie backed away upon hearing this. January? I thought it was July! She felt her veins pulsating faster than before, becoming more stressed-out than ever. She finally had the courage to ask one last thing. "And what year is it?"
"It's nineteen eighty-three," the customer said. Charlie felt her blood turn to ice at those words. 1983? That was before-
She felt her heart stop at the realization.
I was a kid. She turned around and immediately ran out of the restaurant, but before she got out the exit, she bumped into someone—a little girl. She fell back, but before she hit her head, Charlie grabbed her by the hand, pulling her back up. "Hey, you alright? Sorry about that."
The child looked past Charlie and at a young man, likely her father. She then turned to Charlie. "Yeah... I'm okay. Thanks for helping me up."
"You're welcome," she said. She expected the child to just walk off or go back outside, but she didn't, she just continued to stare at Charlie. "Um... is something wrong?" she asked.
"It's just that I feel like I know you," the child said. "Something seems familiar about you."
Charlie's heart skipped a beat, and her face went pale. How could she see me as familiar? I'm from the future! she thought, finally accepting her fate. She took a deep breath before speaking again. "What do you mean?"
"Just come outside and I'll tell you!" the child exclaimed. The child then ran outside into the rain. Charlie just shook her head, following the child outside and swinging the door closed behind her. The child then sat down on the ledge of the window. Charlie didn't sit down there, she just watched.
"So what's your name, anyway? I don't think I caught it," she said.
The child smiled. "Oh, I'm Charlie!" the child finally said. Charlie immediately took a couple of steps back, her eyes bulging, feeling an inability to blink. She felt an icy chill travel down her entire body, and she felt her heart pound against her chest harder than a jackhammer. She felt her hands twitch, and she backed away by a couple of steps more.
"What?" Charlie asked. "What did you say?"
"I said my name is Charlie! What's yours?" the other Charlie asked.
"I'm... also Charlie," the real Charlie said. By now, her head was spinning. If I'm in the past, then I'm talking to myself. However, she was beginning to doubt even that. Even when she went to Fredbear's more than a decade ago, she never recalled seeing that black Freddy animatronic. If that was the cast, then there was only one explanation that made sense: she was talking to the Charlie that was her father's actual daughter, the one that William Afton took away and murdered before she was created.
"That's silly," the other Charlie said. "I mean, you can't seriously have the same name as me, can you?"
Charlie immediately looked away, staring at the road, and watching as cars drove down it. "I don't understand anything... one moment I was in the fun park, and another moment I'm talking to my past self. What, is this back to the future?" she asked.
"Huh? Back to the future?" the other Charlie asked in confusion.
"Sorry," she said. "It's a movie that was made in the future about someone who traveled back in time and met their past self. Sorry," she corrected herself again.
The other Charlie giggled, but she was confused. "What is a time traveler?"
"Hmm.." Charlie began. "So think of this. I can travel to yesterday and do something different," she said.
"Oh, I think I understand," the other Charlie said. She rested her head back against the window, staring at Charlie. "So you're a time traveler?"
"I guess so," Charlie said. She sighed, sitting down on the ledge of the window where the rain did not pour on her. "What about you? Are you a time traveler?"
"No," the other Charlie said. "I don't travel through time. This is my Dad's diner though, and we often come here a lot."
Charlie smiled. "That's actually cool. Hey, where is your dad, anyway?" she asked.
"He's inside! Come with me!" the other Charlie said. She got up and ran over to the door, trying to open it, but it wouldn't budge. "Huh? Why is it locked?" She then banged on the door. "Come on! Someone help!"
But nothing happened. Charlie got up and walked over to her. "Hey, want me to help you there?"
"Yes, please!" the other Charlie said. Charlie nodded, trying the door, but it seemed stuck, locked on the other side. "Huh, that seems strange. Well, there is a back exit that I know of. Come on!" Charlie said, grabbing the other Charlie's hand. She then ran around the diner until she got to the other size, where it was raining heavily. She stood near a dumpster.
"Well, here is the back door," Charlie said. She let go of the other Charlie and went to open the other door, but suddenly, she heard a loud childish scream. She turned around, and the other Charlie was gone. "Charlie!" she yelled.
"Help me! Help-"
"Shut up!" a young but grumpy voice said. A chill traveled down Charlie's spine. She's being kidnapped. I have to help her! She then turned around the corner and ran across the length of the building. Time seemed to take forever. Come on, I know you're there! She jumped over the hedge and she was then in front of the entrance of the diner. The door was slowly swinging closed, indicating that the kidnapper had just entered the building, who had the keys to the diner. She slipped inside and saw a shadowy figure open two doors in the back of the main area, entering a hallway. He was clutching the other Charlie by her throat, who was kicking and screaming. A man in a tan suit got up from his seat and pursued the figure, and so did Charlie.
She ran into the hallway and the figure and the child was gone. Then, he heard a man shout behind her: "Charlie!"
Charlie swung around to face the man, and while the man was very young, he still recognized him: Father? The man just ran past her, stopping at a dead end in the hallway.
"Come on, check the other bathroom!" Henry shouted. He then opened the door to the restroom in the back. Charlie nodded, opening the door to the female restroom which was closer. She searched through all the stalls, but there was nothing in any of them. She sighed, walking back and running out, meeting Henry's gaze again.
"Nothing?" Henry asked.
"No," Charlie said, her heart pounding hard against her chest. Then, she heard the sound of what sounded like firecrackers going off in another room—the kitchen, which was just ahead of the bathrooms. She ran inside the kitchen but not before the door slammed shut behind her, blocking Henry off. She spotted that black Freddy animatronic on the cutting table, slumped over in the fetal position, with a thick pool of blood beneath it. Charlie's eyes widened as she immediately realized what happened: the other Charlie had been stuffed. The shadowy figure simply laughed maniacally. "YOU ARE A MONSTER!" Charlie shouted at him. "YOU JUST MURDERED A CHILD!"
"You are so foolishly stupid," the shadowy man said, brandishing a knife, in a voice that was unmistakable: the voice of William Afton, having a deep Australian accent. "I'm not taking away, I'm creating. This is just a minor setback, revenge, if you will, for my business partner not holding up his end of the bargain."
"What?" Charlie asked, completely dumbfounded. "What the hell are you talking about? You just MURDERED A CHILD!" she shouted at him. William Afton simply smiled, approaching her, and then, she felt a sharp pain in her chest. She looked down, seeing the knife embedded in her chest, right where her heart was. She then felt that her blood was no longer circulating, and she started having trouble breathing. She fell against the wall, and her eyes started to tear up as she realized that she was about to die. She rested motionless against the wall, watching, unable to stop. I'm going to die, she realized. I just got here and I'm already going to die!
William Afton picked up the animatronic, using a crank to open it up and dump the corpse of the other Charlie onto the table, before ripping his knife out of Charlie's chest and using it to mutilate the other Charlie's corpse. He then picked up the animatronic and ran out the back door, and then, the engine of a car roared to life. Charlie could only watch in fear, unable to move and unable to speak.
Eventually, the door to the kitchen was kicked open by Henry, who ran inside and stared at the almost-dead Charlie. "Oh my god," he said. He then turned to the table in the center of the room, and his face turned cold as he ran over, picking up the other Charlie, seeing her mutilated corpse. "No! Charlie!" he shouted, grabbing the body and clutching it in his hands, and then he fell forward, sobbing uncontrollably onto the corpse.
Charlie could only watch, and soon after, her vision faded to complete darkness.
"Charlie, you can't be dead! You bastard! You are going to go to hell for this, you monster! Whoever you are, I am going to hunt you down to the end of the earth."
"DO YOU HEAR ME?" Henry shouted.
However, William Afton was long gone.