Marlene didn't know why she was here, in front of what remained of the burned-down Pizzaplex. Maybe it was because the sun was peeking over the horizon and, if it were a normal day, she'd be clocking in for her shift as one of the managers.

Old habits are hard to break, and she had been working for Fazbear Entertainment since she was sixteen. Marlene had moved locations over the years as other places would mysteriously close down, always working during their day shifts. It wasn't anything glamorous, but she had been coming up on 15 years with the company in a few months.

Fazbear Entertainment didn't shift her to a new location this time.

Now Marlene was 31, out of the job she thought she'd have for the rest of her life with a new house mortgage and a baby on the way. She wasn't heavily pregnant yet, only three months or so along, but that wasn't much time to get her life together again.

Perhaps emotional sentiment brought her there.

Maybe she came for answers to the questions she had been asking since she got laid off.

Why me? Why now? How did this even happen?

Why did they throw me away? What did I do wrong?

Marlene shakes off the thoughts, deciding to pack them away for now when she notices a yellow, humanoid shape to the far back of the building. Curious and admittedly a little scared that it was an unreported dead body, Marlene shuffles quietly towards the figure. As she gets close, she makes out the singed orange points and a face with unblinking white eyes.

It was the daycare attendant, the sun one. Sunnydrop, was it? Sundrop? Something drop she believed. Marlene never had a reason to stray to that area of the Pizzaplex, so she wasn't too sure. He looked a bit worse for wear. His clothes were sooty and some of the orange points that jutted from its head had become warped from the heat. Had he gotten out of the Pizzaplex only for his battery to fail him?

Her heart tightens the longer she looks at the animatronic. Perhaps her empathy was a bit misplaced, but she felt the machine resembled her in a way.

"Poor thing," Marlene mutters, crouching down, "they didn't even look for you, did they?"

'Abandoned…You're just like me…'

She studies the robot for a moment before impulsively heaving it up, supporting it by holding one of the arms over her shoulder. The robot was a bit bigger than she thought it would be, their feet dragging behind her as she walked to her car. "Well, shame on them then," She mutters, partially to herself, partially to the robot, "They lost two great employees, didn't they?"

Did the robot count as an employee? She thought so. Then again, who really cared. They couldn't get their jobs back.

She slides the brightly colored animatronic into the car seat and buckles them in. As the robot slumps against her, Marlene is vaguely reminded of the days years ago when she was taking care of her drunk friends after parties. She never particularly liked the taste of alcohol, so she was always on babysitting duty.

"We'll find a way to get through this," Marlene whispers as she takes the driver's seat, locking the doors with a click. Pulling away from the Pizzaplex, she keeps peeking at her rearview mirror every few seconds, watching the building get smaller and smaller. The slumped robot didn't make her feel any better. A bit worse actually as its dead white eyes stare into the passenger console.

The drive home wasn't particularly relaxing either. Each stoplight made her wish that she had stuffed the robot in the trunk like she was kidnapping it. Marlene thanks her lucky stars that it was absurdly early in the morning and no sane person was driving for any reason other than for work. No one who was up this early cared to look closely at another's car.

Still, she couldn't bring herself to regret her choice. Something about the robot made her feel sentimental. It was a part of a job that took up most of her life.

A part that is gone now.

Maybe it was strange to hold so strongly onto a piece of work but Marlene didn't care too much. In a sense, the robot was one thing she could keep aside from the memories. Even if it was a strange-looking piece of machinery, the permanent grin sticking out in particular.

Marlene wondered if she could find a way to make his face more expressive in passing before shaking her head. She had been a manager, not a mechanic, and doubted there was any work that she could feasibly and safely do on the robot.

A funny thing about the Fazbear Entertainment machines that they kept from the public: they were quite hazardous to work on. Marlene never heard much about the stories since Fazbear Entertainment liked to keep those sorts of talks hush hush but the stories she did hear were enough to deter her passing thought.

The one about Monty popping a mechanic's arm out of their socket was just the tip of the iceberg. There was a reason more safety precautions were taken in dealing with the robots.

"Well, I suppose I'll have to get used to that mug then." Marlene laughs, trying to shrug off her nerves as she drives further into the countryside and pulls into her driveway. The gravel pops and crackles under her wheels before she has the car stopped and parked.

Her home was a pretty small farmhouse with chips in the white paint. It was a bit old and would likely need work in the coming years - again, something that hadn't been much of a concern until she lost her job.

After making a quick jog to unlock the front door, Marlene lugged the yellow animatronic inside and dumped it on the sofa. Panting, she sits next to the robot to catch her breath.

After a moment, Marlene leans closer to the robot, looking for an alternative charging spot because there was no way she was going to find a charging station in the alleyway. That would be too easy. Much to her relief, there was a plug-in spot hidden in the bottom of the robot's foot.

"Of course it's the last place I look," Marlene huffs, trashing her storage closet before digging up a long, orange extension cord. Keeping an eye on the animatronic, she plugs one side into the foot and drags the rest over to the wall, where Marlene makes a discovery.

She needed two to plug it into the wall.

With a frustrated sigh, Marlene trudges back to the closet and begins searching for another cord. This search eventually produces a blue extension cord and a mess flowing out of her closet.

Kicking a box behind her, Marlene finally connects the cords and plugs the robot into the wall.

Marlene expected the charging process to take a bit to take hold - like how a phone takes a good five minutes or so to boot up after running the battery to zero.

It took everything in Marlene's power not to let out a screech as the robot jolted awake.