The next morning, I leaned against the restaurant's front door with a sleepy-eyed Anondos and a pissed-off Mike standing at my sides. Neither one wanted to be here this early, but by God I wasn't going to be called crazy in case everything started going downhill today.

"Why the hell are we here, boss?" Mike asked before letting out a big, loud yawn. "Can't you deal with this yourself?"

"Yeah, but I want witnesses." I replied. "I'll buy you breakfast once the guy leaves. Just stay awake."

"It better be good breakfast." Anondos piped up. "Microwaved pizza from here ain't breakfast for everyone. Just you."

"Shut up." I snapped at him. I heard a car turn into the parking lot and turned my head; for an engineer, it wasn't what I expected. It was a beat-up, paint-scratched, possibly previously blue color. After parking, the door opened and a man stepped out: he wore glasses, had thick, black hair, with a white button-up business shirt and black pants. A backpack was held up on his shoulders. I have no idea why he needed to dress so professionally to talk to me about a robot, but I didn't care; at least he showed up.

"Good morning." He greeted us as he approached. "My name's Tyler, I'm from Fazbear Entertainment's engineering department. You're Mr. Anon, correct?" He asked, extending his hand. I shook his hand and nodded.

"Yeah, that would be me." I replied. "Thank you for coming out this early. I'm sorry you had to come out here at all, but the guy they have me working with wasn't too cooperative." I turned to unlock the front door as we continued to talk.

"Mr. A was never much of a people-person." Tyler said. "Maybe it's his age." I opened the door for the other three, allowing them inside.

"Mr. A?" I asked. "He would never tell me his name. Could you?"

"Oh, sure." Tyler said with a smile. "It's Mr. Alder. Bob Alder."

B. Alder. He was bald. What kind of ironic shit is this?

"Thanks." I said. "Anyway, did anyone tell you why you're here?"

"Yeah, something about your Circus Baby acting up?" Tyler said, walking towards Baby's stage. "Mr. A said you were probably just trying to close your store before you had to open it. Is that true?"

"No!" I protested, shaking my head. "I know it sounds crazy, but she started calling me by name. I asked if that was a feature, and Bob wouldn't tell me. He just said she 'probably' could do it. Is it something she's supposed to do?"

"Well, that's a good question." Tyler climbed up on the stage, looking Baby up and down. "I worked on the Funtime line back when Circus Baby here was still in the planning stage. I remember they wanted her to make ice cream and know songs, and I know that made it in. I don't remember anything about names, but let me hook her up here and I'll take a look."

He removed his backpack and unzipped it, pulling out a laptop and a mess of wires. After plugging the wires into Baby's body (I don't even remember seeing ports, so it must have been a developer thing,) he opened his laptop and started typing.

"She seems fine." He said, looking at the screen. "No recent errors, no problems with the power feed, no self-reboots. I'm not seeing anything about a name memory bank, though. Just facial recognition and her song bank. Let me dig a bit." He looked up at Mike, Anondos and I, who were just staring at him from the tables. "Oh, sorry guys. Go ahead and do your thing, this might take a while."

"Uh, okay." I said. "We're just gonna take a seat and watch, then." The three of us sat down at a table. Tyler looked confused.

"No, seriously, go get some breakfast, get ready for the day, whatever. I'm not going anywhere." He said.

"No, seriously, neither am I." I replied. "I'm not falling for that shit. Nothing against you personally, but I'm going to sit here and watch this damn robot. If she so much as blinks funny, she's gone. If I think you're programming weird shit into her, I'm calling the cops."

"You're going to threaten me?" Tyler looked surprised, pausing his work. "I don't have to be here, ya know. You were nice not ten minutes ago."

"I'm a nice person, generally." I replied. "I have no issue with you, I have an issue with the company. Hell, I'll give you a free lunch after this and pay you extra for your time. I just won't have my store be the next headline in the paper."

"I understand that, I guess." Tyler replied. "No harm done, then. Thanks for the food and stuff." He resumed typing. Anondos leaned in close from his seat next to me, holding a hand over his mouth.

"Come on, man. This shit's getting old." He complained in a whisper. "If you're gonna freak out this much, just fucking bail. If you're not gonna quit, open the place. I'm not gonna waste every fucking day here because you won't stop worrying about the past that you weren't even alive for."

"I can agree with that." Mike whispered as well. "No offense, boss, but as much as I like being paid to eat pizza and bullshit with you guys all day, you got a business to eventually run. You need to get somethin' going here."

"Fine, you're all fucking against me." I sighed. "I'll call a few of my cousins and have them bring their kids in. Anondos, get some pizzas in the oven. Mike, go get the costume. We'll have a private test opening today and open the doors tomorrow."

"Tomorrow? Don't you usually have to get the word out for at least a month?" Anondos asked. "You know, advertising and stuff? And when are the other costumes getting here? You sure you didn't get conned and paid four for one? You don't even have any games, and-"

"Do you want this shit done or not!?" I snapped at him, speaking a little too loudly. Tyler looked up from his laptop. "O-Oh, sorry dude! I'm just irritable 'cause I'm tired, that's all!" I tried to assure him. "My bad!" Tyler nodded and resumed typing, looking up at Baby every few seconds.

"Okay guys, don't panic or anything, she's gonna turn on." Tyler said. "She still has a charge because no one's unplugged her from her charging source to let her run down on her own." It was probably best that he warned us, because if Baby started dancing around out of nowhere I'd probably piss myself. With a few more keystrokes, Tyler looked over at Baby and just as he promised, she started to move. Her big, green eyes started to flicker on, and she began to wave her arms and microphone around as her pigtails bobbed.

"Good morning, everyone!" Baby greeted us. "Welcome to Freddy Fazbear's Pizza! My name is Circus Baby, and it's always time for fun at Freddy's! How about some tasty pizza for breakfast?"

"She knows the time of day?" I asked. Tyler nodded.

"Yeah, the whole Funtime line has a bunch of extra features that you have to manually turn on. You had Baby in a default mode, so she only had recognition and songs. Now she'll know the time of day, she'll know when fresh pizza is coming out of the kitchen, and she'll be able to know if the room volume is really loud and comment on it. It's supposed to help quiet kids down."

"You didn't ask me before you added all that stuff?" I stood up from the table, walking to the stage. "What the fuck did I just say about you programming shit in?"

"It's features for your store, SIR!" Tyler snapped at me. "It's not like this lets her walk off stage! I just thought it would be a nice gesture! Almost none of the animatronics at any stores use the aroma recognizer, and before you flip out on that, she only knows that pizza is out if the air around her gets a little steamy from hot food. Or are you going to be angry about that, too?"

"Pizza better be the only damn smell coming from or into this robot." I said, crossing my arms. After Tyler's glare met my own, I sighed. "Look, I'm sorry. I just know all of the past about Freddy's, with the kid getting bit and all that, and I'm worried. My uncle had no issues keeping this place closed until just a little while ago."

"Yeah, I get it." Tyler said, standing up. "Listen, I'm sorry too. They don't pay me enough to drive everywhere, especially when the gas is on my dime."

"I'll pay you back for it." I replied. I reached into my wallet and handed him some cash, which he pocketed with a smile. "Hang around, Anondos is making some pizza. I'll wait to call the kids in until we're all done here."

Wait a minute!

"Hey, hang on!" I stopped him as he walked past me. "You didn't even answer me for the reason you're here! Why is Baby saying names? It's cool that you gave her little upgrades, but that doesn't explain why she knows me!"

"I'm not supposed to go into this with people outside of corporate." Tyler confessed. "I was supposed to just do this extra stuff and try to distract you. Just keep this between us, God knows Mr. Alder couldn't fucking care less at this point. Man's just waiting to die."

I snickered. Tyler sat down at a table and set down his laptop, showing me a diagnosis screen about Baby's insides.

"Look here." He pointed. "These options here are things I'm allowed to change because you would be allowed to change them. The time, song list, pre-programmed shows, that stuff." I took note that I could do those things myself-they'd make handling the show during busy times a lot easier. "But if you see here ..." He pointed down to an 'Advanced' option, and moved the cursor down to click it-a 'Not accessible with current authority' message popped up.

"You worked on the damn thing. You're an engineer." I said. "What other authority do you need to change her?"

"I worked on her, but I didn't design her. I didn't write her advanced code, either. It wasn't a one-man team." He said, looking at me with a raised eyebrow. "Do you even know what an engineer does?"

"... Yeah." I replied.

No. But I wasn't letting him know that.

"I don't know who locked me out, or when, or anything." He explained. "For all I know, it could've been the guy who actually designed her to start with. I don't even know who it is, by the time I joined up those guys were long out of the game."

"You mean dead?" I asked. "I would think they're all old if they designed the original robots."

"Hell if I know. I just know I've never met them." Tyler replied. "But about Baby's name thing. You have my word, man-to-man, that it's seriously nothing to you need to worry about. I'll tell you what: watch her for the rest of the week. If things start getting a bit too funny for your tastes, call me. I'll come in, shut her down, and get her out of here." He reached into his pocket and handed me a business card with Fazbear Entertainment's logo and his cell phone number.

"Why do all of you insist I keep waiting?" I asked. "Is she just going to stop doing this stuff after she gets used to the place, or after she meets kids?"

"That second one's very possible." Tyler said. "She knows your name likely because there's no one else in her memory to remember. Once she sees kids every day, your name will probably be thrown out. Kids are more important to the animatronics."

"I guess." I said, looking up at Baby, who was idly looking around. As her eyes flickered, I noticed something-they changed color. Her green eyes were now a bright, beautiful shade of blue. "Did you change her eye color, too?" I asked. "Why?"

"Well, her eyes are meant to be blue to begin with." Tyler said. "I just assumed the lights were dimming out or something and was gonna ask if you wanted me to change them before I left. I think having color-changing eyes is kinda cool, don't you?"

"They definitely are more eye-catching." I replied. "They look more ... I dunno, kinder this way? Like they fit her smile better. I like them." I said with a nod. "It looks like all I needed was someone who gave a shit to get this whole thing going. Think you can get me a discount on Fruity Maze while you're at it?"

"No chance." Tyler laughed. "Do you want me to change her eye lights, or let them stay?"

"Nah, I like the blue." I said. "Keep it." I reached into my pocket, grabbing my cell phone. "I'd better make sure my cousins are actually home before I plan all this stuff for today." As I started to dial, Anondos sat a large pepperoni pizza on the table in front of us, and a costumed Mike as Freddy Fazbear sat down across from us. Tyler and I both snickered as Mike tried to be in-character, straightening his bow tie and pretending to smell the pizza.