Chapter 16:

Robotic Tiredness

A quick check-up of our fellow Glamrocks animatronics on their first day of the closing week.

Gloomy as usual, nothing major had happened so far. Perhaps, there was a glimmer of hope, somewhere.

The elevator shaft shifted up in a sudden as it slowly regained constant speed when the muffled version of last week's performance of the glamrock animatronics was playing in the back. Ah yes, the generic theme song of Freddy Fazbear's Mega Pizzaplex. How could one not recognize it? And he was no exception. Whenever there was a big show happening in the main atrium, despite not being able to leave the daycare, he could still be able to listen to its vigorous and powerful tunes along with the breath-taking screams of the overexcited audience. Those were the times when he would imagine himself standing somewhere high on the balcony so that he could watch the concert without being distracted by the children.

A few moments later, the door opened, and he was awestruck.

Slowly but rather impatient, the daycare attendant skipped his way through the surrounded haze of violet.

As though beyond this cramped space of the elevator was the entrance to the outside world, the space it beheld was so large and immense that he mistook the ceiling above as the night sky while forgetting the fact that time was yet to reach noon. With purple being the dominant shades and blue being the minor accents, their vibrant and dazzling hues effortlessly engulfed the entire place as no shadow could be seen anywhere else other than his own shadow.

Tables and chairs sat along the decorative floor, stretching as far as tiles could expand until they stopped in front of the steel fences. Behind those fences were the empty spaces and the stage, which were used to keep distance between the animatronic and their obsessive fans from getting too close and receiving unwanted outcomes for both sides.

Talking about the stage, from what he could recall, he remembered the children telling him that when the animatronics were not performing, there were these huge and towering holograms of them moving on the platform. That description alone had delivered quite a forceful blow to his circuit board. It was mind-blogging to him that the humans could achieve such feats in technology that they had created gigantic images reaching sky-high! He would love to learn about the mechanism behind it so that perhaps someday he could give it a try and made his own hologram as well. How cool and awesome would that be?

Also, had it not been for the children, he would have never known what the word "hologram" actually meant. Interacting with them sure gave him interesting knowledge. Guess he ought to ask more questions, they probably wouldn't mind answering their friendly attendant, right? He's Sun, after all.

Filled with uncontrollable overjoy, he went on observing. Being too speechless, he could only wait for the chicken to start speaking so as to disrupt this awkward moment.

"Well, this is the main atrium. Really awesome, right?", asked Chica.

"Indeed! Golly! This is way better than what I anticipated!", he said as he actively bounced up and down while both of his hands were glued to the railings. "It is so huge! Bigger and larger than the daycare sections that is! My, my… if the building was opened right now, I could imagine the number of people moving and walking around this place. So many people that I could even get lost in there! Although, I doubt that would happen since my outfit is very bright and all… Hehe."

The chicken laughed. "I can imagine it. But can you imagine what it would look like when there's a big show on the stage? Like last week."

The attendant scratched his chin. "Hm… I would say somewhere about… one or two thousand people."

"One or two thousand?", rephrased the chicken, to which she received a pair of confused eyes from him. "I mean, not that you are wrong, even I don't know the accurate number. You know, since people literally took all possible spaces, even the upper floors, it's gonna take more than a while to count them all. It was so crowded that you could get stomped on if you're not careful enough, and no one wouldn't even notice."

"O-Oh… That's must have been very painful. Has this happened before?", he mused, mood slowly dying off.

"Well, the last time this happened was two years ago. It was a really big show, bigger than the one performed last weekend. There were so many people that the fences had to be supported by a row of STAFF bots instead so that they wouldn't knock them down and start a chaotic rampage. I tried to ask the workers to reduce the distance between them and the stage so there could be more space for people to stand. You can guess what their response was..."

"They said yes?". Much to his surprise, the answer was a shaking head.

"Then I wouldn't have told you this story now."

"O-Oh… so what happened next?"

"During the first minutes, the show went on as usual. Then, I heard shouting from the crowd. At first, I just thought it was just the people screaming from joy and excitement. Though I had the feeling that it wasn't any ordinary yell from the fans, it was actually a rather genuine scream out of fear."

"Did anybody notice or hear the sound at all? I guess not since you guys were performing and the music was extremely loud.", he probed nervously, half-hoping there wasn't anything bad transpire next despite having agreed to be told about it. Once again, much to his surprise, the answer was a shaking head.

"Freddy didn't seem to notice at all. Roxy and Monty were too busying playing their instrument. Nobody heard the scream."

"So, you're the only one to hear it?"

"Yes. I can assure you that I was not hallucinating. Definitely. Their voice was faint, but still audible. So, I took a quick scan of the crowd to see if they are giving out a signal. It was at that moment, I noticed two pairs of arms waving in strange movement as if they were trying to get my attention. I remember seeing their panicked and terrified eyes as well as their desperate attempt to call us out from the stage."

"What did you do when you saw that? You stopped the show?"

"It's the only thing I could have done. I told the staff to turn off the music. Everyone was confused at first. Seconds later, there were screams, lots of them. People immediately rushed to the escalators to get to the higher floors. That was when I saw… people, including children, being carried out to the elevators. They were injured, unconscious."

Sun's face jerked back upon hearing such dreadful things. He didn't expect to be told an unnerving story right at the beginning of a tour around the Pizzaplex. As far as he understood, this wouldn't be what a guide would tell the guests about if they wanted to show them places around the building. Common sense – people called it so. Then again, it was him who had asked for this. Curiosity killed the cat. And he was its next victim. But how was he supposed to foresee its appalling outcome? It wouldn't be fair to blame all the faults on her as well. He was just asking harmless questions, and Chica was just telling him the truth.

So, whose fault was it, then?

"Oops…", the chicken widened her eyes before closing them shut along and releasing an awkward chuckle to ease the mood. "Sorry, I think I have gone too far. Not really a good first impression of the place's background, huh? I hope this wouldn't affect our tour."

"Oh, it's nothing.", he giggled. "You did well on getting me hooked up with your attractive storytelling, let aside its gruesomeness that is… Hehe! Though, I wonder, how did all of that happen in the first place? Why were the people injured? Why were they unconscious?

"Too many people. Too crowded. Too little space to stand. Each person was tightly squished to the point that they couldn't even breathe… And when you accidentally slip under the crowd, you won't be able to get up since people just won't stop stomping their legs on the floor."

"That is… quite… no, extremely dangerous, to say the least... Were the injured children okay?"

"Everyone was fine. The show was halted that night and everyone started leaving early. After their recovery, the company wanted to make up by hosting a private party with us glamrock animatronics. I remember playing food war with the kids and teenagers, it was wild. Wish you were there, it would have been more exciting to have you in the team!"

"Oh, no no no!", he waved his hands aggressively while speaking in a witty tone. "I don't think I could handle such a disastrous battlefield like that! As you can see, I, the Daycare Attendant, have great pleasure in cleaning and tidying things up. But! It doesn't mean I can handle them for a long period of time. Even a person as careful and hardworking as I am need some resting moments."

The chicken humbly chuckled as she covered her beak with her palm. "My my, if I remember correctly, robots don't get tired, do they? We can do anything without stopping as long as there is power."

"Golly! That might be the case. But I guess everyone will eventually need to take a break…", he mused mindfully. Then, a brief silence. After that, came a question. "Do you get tired, Miss Chica?"

The chicken said nothing. Her eyes were distracted by the shining neon glow of the so bright and radiant hues tinged with a deep yet delicate hue of pink and purple. He couldn't help but turned to look in the direction she was looking in as well. Pink and purple, so many of them. Unlike his daycare section, which coated a thin layer of sky blue in general so that it could give off the feeling of cosiness and calming tranquillity to those who sought for a friend or a companion to play with, the apparent authority of the magenta pallets strangely amidst the distant scrambled noises had given him a rather aesthetic trip of something so otherworldly, yet familiar.

What was this odd feeling? He would ask himself this, and maybe left it unanswered for some time.

"I'm always tired.", the chicken finally spoke as she gave him a weak smile. "Mentally tired, to be precise."

"Oh… Excuse my lack of knowledge, but I have never heard of that term before. Mentally tired? What is that? Is it something similar to the tiredness or exhaustion of a human person?"

"Mhm, something like that. But in my opinion, I think it is much worse than normal."

"How so? What does it feel like to be mentally tired?"

"I feel like I don't have the spirit to do anything anymore. Everything is so boring to the point that I… just don't feel like doing it anymore. You get what I mean? It prevents me from staying focused even when I have nothing to do."

"Oh, dear… G-Golly! You must have been very stressed in the past few days. It must have been very difficult for you to get comfortable with everything, especially after last weekends' chaotic mess…"

"You can say that again.", the chicken dryly giggled.

"But! Worry not! Remember, Sun is by your side. From now on, these pesky little 'stress-lings' would not dare to lay their filthy hands on our gorgeous lady such as you. And I can guarantee that, as long as I am here during our tour around the Pizzaplex, negativity will be a non-existent concept and shall not escape through our lips, not even once!"

There's a kind of tiredness that needed a good night's sleep, and another that needed so much more. For him, one became the other, starting out as the "one-night kind" until one day it was ever-present - like it once was a heavy jacket but became heavy bones. It was then he knew that being tired could be a wearing of the emotions too, that it could come together with a tired body, and became an ingrained part of a life that wasn't lived, but survived, endured.

When was the time for dancing, for play, laughter and long evenings of happy chatter? Because that was the medicine we all need: fun, friendship, good times.

How long had it been since the last time he recalled being filled with endless energy and enthusiasm? Because he understood it too well – that he might have been experiencing right now – and that it was still happening at this very moment. The so-called "mentally tired".

Chica's soft chuckled brought him the gift of delight – a reward for a person whose purpose was to deliver joy and happiness to those who were in need of it. To him, a laugh was as though it was the peeking sunlight of the dappled woodland, bright and playful, as though it was a soul elevator for anyone blessed enough to hear it. "Laughter is the best medicine", they said. And he took that personally and wholeheartedly. It was what he was built for. How could he dare to defy it, let alone lack the capability to do it in the first place?

"Come on, there's so much for you to see!", announced the chicken as she grabbed his arm all of a sudden and started dragging him to the nearby escalator.

"A-Ah! Yes! Let us continue!"

[Later that afternoon…]

It was silence whom she had befriended thus far.

Not really though, for she could still hear the faint humming noises of the neon lights fixed from above. They echoed within walls, between hallways, and expanded at a steady pace throughout the entire building. Despite not having advanced audio receivers, she felt as though she could hear them ringing inside her mind, or something similar to that of a "mind". It made her wonder: What am I listening to? What kind of phenomenon is this that I am experiencing? Such as these abstract questions, the ones responsible for her sake of mentality, seemed to remind her of something familiar… so familiar that she recalled having heard about them before.

It was quietness whom she had befriended thus far.

Desk littered with all sorts of cosmetics, for beauty had become the inseparable aspect in her everyday life. In fact, without them, she would look like a cursed abomination that was more likely to cause the children to have nightmares than them seeing monsters under their bed… or so she thought. The mechanics and technicians said she looked fine without the excessive makeup and that she was just too nervous about her appearance. At first, she thought they lacked experience in cosmetic beauty, as all of them were men anyways, so listening to their advice wouldn't do much of a thing.

There was Vanessa, the only female human she used to spend time hanging around back in the day, but it seemed the woman didn't really care that much as well, and her opinion was the same as the guys. It was when she decided that it was enough. Damn, what was wrong with people? Either nobody in this facility had any sense of aesthetic art or they just tried to be polite for form's sake, which indirectly implied that she really was ugly without those makeup. As much as she had rooted for the former, the fact that the latter sounded more plausible was highly alarming, to say the least. Then again, she could have just been overreacting.

Much to her surprise, those staff were actually being honest and sincere. Well, not that she did all the realization by herself, but rather, thanks to the chicken, a good friend of her, whom she had been told to be confident with her in-built look, she no longer had to use them in unnecessary amounts. In the end, nobody asked why she didn't do makeup anymore, nobody was disgusted by her "usual appearance", nobody cared, and they still loved her as always. Perhaps, she should be more grateful for her own body and stop covering that inherent attractiveness with those thin powder layers of artificially-made beauty.

It was boredom whom she had befriended thus far.

Such a bad play coming from the CEO of Fazbear Entertainment that the building had to be closed for an entire week. Thanks to last weekend's incident, she had to went through even more maintenance procedures, especially the "fluffy" part according to the mechanic. Yup, that's how they call her hair – fluffy. Having to run and chase for a long amount of time without a single break had dealt quite a blow to her appearance. Smears and tints and smudges and stains and tarnishes… using her limited knowledge of the English vocabulary, those were the words she had come up with so as to describe her desperate situation back then. Yikes! Who would have known that the Pizzaplex was this foul after the guests had all left?

The mechanists were rather taken aback upon witnessing such an uncommon sight that not all humans ever got a chance to behold. Well, couldn't blame them for their shocked expression when she was but a total mess – hair that exaggeratedly tousled beyond recognition, shells that unevenly decked with a handful amount of dark and brown stains, and… my, foot that looked like they could house a large number of insects and moulds. As a matter of fact, it's been a long time since the last time she got to taste the feeling of utter shame and absolute embarrassment. Truthfully speaking, how could one keep their mind sane when they are being made fun of by their biggest nemesis? It was one of those moments she would never forget…

Anyhow, as if one maintenance check wasn't enough, the company decided to change the schedule and add even more of them. Normally, weekly maintenance checks were all right to her and all. But every, single, day!? "Too much of a good thing is harmful", said the humans – an interesting idiom she learnt from listening to other people's gossip and whispers. Surely, having daily maintenance checks wouldn't affect that much of her mentality, right? Even as a robot, the feeling of tiredness wasn't anything like an abstract concept. She too, felt tired. Besides, they could give her multiples fixes and upgrades that helped deliver decent advantages and benefit on certain aspects which had been neglected for a while. So… a win-win?

It was loneliness whom she had befriended thus far.

The wolf sat in front of the mirror, for she could only do so much as stare at it in silence. There it was, a still and static image, or rather an imprint of the mirrored reality. Neither lying nor cherry-picking what stood out the most, it was the ultimate reflection made visible only by the light, of her true self and the current state of her emotional mentality. The mirror was the original instant photograph, one that demanded her to value the passing moment. It asked her to see her recently polished shell and the condition of her hard drive, to look past physical features: How do you look?

What a useless freak, can't even catch a child…

Words mumbled so that only her could be there and listen to what was spoken. Even with her "all-seeing" eyes, a gaze so powerful that albeit the thickest wall or the faintest twitch, nothing could escape nor from it. Such an overpowered ability that one might find it only possible in science fiction. And if it were to be legit, then either the bearer wasn't experienced enough to use them, or the so-called "all-seeing" eyes were no more than a failure. Surprisingly, both statements actually spoke truths to themselves. The evidence? Here she was, doing nothing but tediously staring at herself through the reflective looking glass, while Freddy was nowhere to be seen or he had followed the boy outside the Pizzaplex.

Talking about the bear…

"You didn't even give a damn about him, Roxy! You didn't even care to ask about his safety, his whereabouts, his current state. Not even a single thing! Instead, you started a fight with Monty, scrambling over what - a fucking leader spot?!"

How foolish and idiotic she was to be blinded by her own selfish desires. How laughable and ridiculous she was to be tempted by the sinful fame. How cold and emotionless she was when she gave nothing but a blank face towards a missing bandmate, or rather, a friend of her. Oh… how wrong she was to say that her relationship with the bear was no more than a thin and loosened string that was barely visible. It was true that she rarely be the one to strike a conversation. For he was always the most talkative and open to everyone, it wasn't surprising when he was responsible for the initiation of most of the talking.

And when a conversation emerged, they didn't tend to last long. You might guess the reason as to why - she didn't really enjoy chit-chatting with the bear. Not that she had an aversion towards him, (who on Earth would do that?), it was just that she didn't like it, that's all…

Then again, one would ask why she was indifferent to him, but not her best friend, Chica. Well, knows? Maybe she only enjoyed talking to people who would understand and relate themselves to her situations best, or simply, women in general, like Chica and Vanessa. Maybe she had a certain limited number of people in her circle of relationship, since the fewer people she spent time with, the more bond and close she was to each of them. Or maybe she simply just didn't enjoy talking to the bear, that's all… Huh, interesting… Maybe she should change that old-fashioned view and expand the circle wider so she could befriend more and more people.

Perhaps, it's time to reconsider some choices and start evaluating friendship.

Before standing up, came a long and tiresome sigh of hers. Although it was unusual for a robot to do such a thing, she found it rather relaxing. Her eyes then landed on the cosmetics littered on the table, with the comb being in direct line of sight.

Not now, maybe later… She shook her head, shaking off the tempting thoughts. There's still a whole week left for her to fix her hair, so… time to shrug it off and relax. Yeah…

She turned to look at the wall opposite the entrance door. Using her "all-seeing" eyes, she saw a green outline resembling the body of the giant robot alligator lounging on the couch. Looks like Monty was having a mood, best not to disrupt his peaceful moments. She stared at the animatronic for a few solid seconds as she gave out a disgruntled groan before narrowing her eyes to focus beyond him. Tried as hard as she might, no outline indicating the body of her friend was to be seen. Strange, since when the chicken had gone out of her green room?

Chica must have been taking a stride around the building by now, for how long that she knew not. But then, how was she going to find her? The Pizzaplex was an enormous place with many floors. Even with her upgraded eyes, she was still limited thanks to its not-so-unstoppable capability. That was, she could only see through as far as twenty meters maximum, anything beyond that radius was undetectable and perfectly hidden from her next-level perception.

She walked to the door; hand hesitated to open it. And she wondered: Do I want to see her yet?

She was not ready. She was nervous. She was worried. She feared that her friend would not accept her apology. Maybe… not now, not at this moment. Maybe, she should use the precious time which the company had given her and relax like what she was told to do. She got all week, but that didn't mean she was going to have another. The concept of having a day off remained uncommon to everybody working in this facility. As time is precious, and that time waits for no one, it is the unchangeable, for it is there at the end as it was at the start.

With that in mind, she opened the door, stepped out of the room, and headed to… whatever she felt like going to while hoping that she wouldn't encounter the chicken during the walk. Feeling remorseful, yes. She's a coward, anyway. How much worse could she be?

The dark room was like a place out of time, a place to rest without consequence. The darkness in that way was a sanctuary, a place to recharge and forget the things the world said had to be done. Darkness came like the thick velvet curtains of the theatre. It was as if the daytime had been one part of a play and the rest was to come after this intermission of night. In that dark room, even the ticking had a relaxed feeling, as if it was a heartbeat at rest. In that dark room, there were shapes in monochrome, of course, the daylight could bring brilliant fuchsia or deepest scarlet, but for now, it could be a scene from a black and white movie.

Monty let his eyes wander the furniture, their outline was smothered by the darkened shades of black that had entirely engulfed this room - the wretched-beyond-recognition room of his. It seemed that the staff had yet to come and clean the mess up. Well, he couldn't blame them so. He's not that lost in touch with morality… or whatever the humans called it. He just couldn't care less. Why? For one simple reason: he's a robot. Robots calculate and make choices rationally, not emotionally. It was what he had still remembered up until this day.

Or not until they implanted a personality chip into him, that was…

It was when he felt as though the world had just flipped a one hundred and eighty degrees turn.

And now, here he was, lounging on the couch, having absolutely nothing to kill the mind-numbing passing time. Time sure flew fast. He still couldn't believe he had been staying like this for hours straight. His perception of time must have been greatly varied between moments so many times that he had stopped reacting to their changes. Crazy how that worked, no?

There was a sigh, another one escaping his non-existent lungs. As a matter of fact, he could have just simply chosen to go in rest mode and let the time do its job in moving forward without his acknowledgement. But that's not how one would spend their day-offs, was it? Going to a deep slumber and cared not about the surrounding world – What kind of person was capable of doing that? Even he himself knew how idiotic such an idea was. But then again, what was he supposed to do? His mind was as blank as a white paper lacking its letters. When he came up with something amusing, the apathetic side immediately moved in between and proceeded to ruthlessly disassemble it without mercy.

Wicked! Such boredoms that tiredness that had drained all of his remaining enthusiasm, which was supposed to be limitless by then. It was rather odd, as he had finally achieved the big dream of his – becoming the leader of the glamrocks band – surely, he should have been filled with eternal happiness instead of mindlessly staring at the ceiling above right now. Seriously, though, what was going on with his processor? Should he be worried about it? Maybe not, the mechanics would do their job.

As this week's main reason for the temporary closure of the Pizzaplex was for the extra-careful maintenance of the animatronics including him and the search for the missing Freddy Fazbear, whom he couldn't care less, he expected to have his voice box modified to have a better and more charming voice in order not to accidentally deafen the audience. He couldn't just accept the fact that he had "worked" so hard for the leader spot only to have it dumped down effortlessly merely because of his "horrendous" voice. He had high hopes, or optimism, if he wanted to refer them so.

But still, how was he going to cope with this sudden and unprecedented devoid of energy, as mentally speaking? He felt as though the world have given up on him and just let him do whatever he desired to, with the cost was taking away the soul and spirit of the once so powerful and mighty of his. At first, he thought it was the personality chip's common effect whenever his processor encountered new sensations, like adaptation, in simpler terms. Soon enough, he realized that's not the way it worked… or at least, that's not how it was supposed to happen.

The longer he let it consume the last bit of his own mental self, the more he felt like he was going to commit shut down and never wake up again. He hated it. He hated it so badly. It made him want to bolt up and release the accumulating amount of wrath he had been building up for the past couple of hours. That's how uncomfortable it was to him. As much as he did not want to move the massive metallic "tank" body of his, the only way to get rid of this troublesome feeling was to get on with something and start doing it with intense and deep focus.

Well, when it came to smashing stuff, he always paid focus and knew what he was doing.

That could help…

"Physical tiredness – a non-existent concept of my own.

Mental tiredness - as though I have lost all my purpose."