Chapter Four
The four adults stood in silence for a few minutes as each one tried to come up with some suggestions for keeping the animatronics calm at night, especially since they weren't within their safe boundaries at home. Charlotte had suggested staying up for the first few nights to make sure they at least got used to their surroundings, but Nicole politely reminded her that she wouldn't be able to function after a few days without sleep, even as an animatronic.
"Is there some way to shut them down for the night?" Shaddid offered. "Something that will keep them calm, but at the same time won't affect them the next morning. They run on giant batteries, don't they? Can't you just take the batteries out?"
Charlotte shook her head. "I'd be afraid to try that. Their life sources are tied to the power modules. I'd be afraid of harming them if I took them out."
Lizzie and Nicole were still thinking and after a few minutes, Nicole offered a suggestion. "What if we gave them something that was powerful enough to knock them out for the night? Like a really strong anesthetic."
Shaddid shrugged. "That's a good idea, but no doctor is going to give us enough happy gas for five teens when it's potentially addictive, especially since we don't know how long they're going to be here."
Ideas continued to bounce around. Charlotte remained quiet as she looked around the room at the drawings and paintings hung up in frames around the walls. When the others had paused to think, she asked, "How exactly did we get here in the first place? Shaddid said it was an easy process to get us here. Nicole explained it, but I'm still confused. What happened?"
Lizzie strolled over to her workstation where she pulled up Nicole's list of character descriptions and showed them to Charlotte. "I'm Nicole's primary illustrator. About eighteen years ago, I was illustrating one of her books, and I drew a picture of Shaddid for her. When I touched his picture, I accidentally brought him to life. That's what happened to you guys. I had drawn pictures of all six of you, and Nikki touched the pictures and accidentally brought you here."
Charlotte's eyebrows raised in surprise. "So you never figured out how to get him back?"
Lizzie slipped her hand into her husband's. "Well, I fell in love with him, and he decided to stay. We did figure it out, though. We ended up sending his father and sister back in his place. They had been brought out here too. There was a pendant that could be used as a dimensional portal key, but the pendant isn't here anymore, and there isn't such a thing in your story, so I don't think that would work for you guys."
"What would happen if you drew the medicine for the kids to use?" Nicole suggested. "That way we wouldn't have to deal with medical professionals."
"That could work, I guess. I had already thought of that, but I didn't know if it was the best idea."
Shaddid shrugged. "At this point, it's either do that or potentially get killed by these things. I'd rather just go out of our comfort zone and give them the medicine. I know you could draw it and bring it out without any issues."
"Okay, but Charlotte is their legal guardian, so she gets the final say. What do you think, Charlotte? Are you okay with me drawing up this medicine and giving it to the kids? We just need to give them enough to make them relaxed enough to get the animatronics and the kids to both sleep peacefully through the night. Obviously, going into it, I'm not sure how big of a dose they'll need, but we can adjust it if needed."
With a sigh, Charlotte conceded. "I'm not exactly thrilled with the idea that they could possibly become addicted to it, but if it's the only option to keep you guys safe, I'm open to trying it."
"It's settled then," Shaddid said. "Lizzie can draw it up, and we can give it to them before they go to bed, just to make sure it lasts through the whole night. If they ask what it is, we can tell them it's to help them relax and sleep, which is essentially the truth." He stepped towards the door and grasped the handle. "I'm going to check on the kids."
After Shaddid had stepped out, Lizzie spoke up, "Is there anything else that you can think of that we need to know? I can relay the information to Shaddid later."
"I can't think of anything else," Nicole said with a shake of her head.
"I thought of something," Charlotte spoke up. "They have panic attacks sometimes when they see the color purple. I don't know what it is about the color purple that upsets them so much, but they have had full-blown panic attacks when exposed to it in the past."
"No purple. Got it." Lizzie turned to Nicole. "Does that ring a bell for you?"
Nicole shook her head again. "No, not that I can remember. I'll go through my notes again and let you know if I find anything."
In the living room, Nikki watched the teens around her as they investigated the parts of the house they could see from the living room. The guys especially were really interested in the flat-screen TV and the Wii gaming system. Meanwhile, the girls were taking turns playing levels of Candy Crush on Nikki's iPad.
Things in the art studio had gotten really quiet, and Nikki wondered what exactly could be so important about midnight and why Aunt Nicole seemed so concerned about it. If she could gauge anything from Charlotte's expression when Aunt Nicole had mentioned it, then it was really important. When the door finally opened, Dad came out and asked if they needed anything. His face was solemn, and Nikki thought she saw her dad cast a suspicious look in the teens' direction, but if he did, he suppressed it as soon as he caught Nikki looking at him. A few minutes later, Mom, Aunt Nicole, and Charlotte all filed out, all baring solemn expressions.
"Looks like you guys are going to be here for a while, so what do you guys want for dinner? Do you guys like pizza?" After enthusiastic responses, Dad went into the kitchen to order it while Mom went back into the art studio, shut the door, and turned on her music to start another drawing session.
Lizzie pulled up the Internet browser on her phone and searched for variations of powerful anesthetics that would be easy for her to draw and pull up quickly. She found examples of Barbiturates, specifically pentobarbital sodium and phenobarbital. Either of those would work in this situation. The dosage could be adjusted if necessary, but if she started with 1,000 mg per teen, that should work.
Quickly she drew up a bottle with a child-safety cap on it, labeled for Phenobarbital containing 500 mg capsules. That way they could crush two capsules and dissolve the medicine in the kids' drinks after dinner. Hopefully, the kids themselves wouldn't experience any negative side-effects from it. After shading and coloring, she swept her fingers over the drawing and picked up the medicine bottle. She popped the lid off to inspect the capsules. Each capsule was white and round and looked like the photos she had seen online.
But in order to see if they really worked, they would have to wait until after dinner when the kids went to bed.
Dinner was tense for the adults that evening. Nikki and the other kids were oblivious to what would be happening in the next couple of hours, but Charlotte was finding it difficult to act normal. Occasionally she would glance over at Lizzie and Shaddid to see when they would decide to give the medicine to the kids. Lizzie had shown her the bottle she had drawn up, and the medication looked harmless enough, but they would have to wait to actually see if there were any negative side effects.
So far everything seemed to be going smoothly. They were all eating dinner in the living room and watching a movie that the kids were familiar with, Disney's Robin Hood, and everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves. Charlotte finished her pizza and tried not to worry about the night ahead. If the medicine didn't work, she would need to keep the animatronics calm enough to stay in their room until the kids could take over again at six o'clock the next morning. The thought in and of itself was exhausting, but she tried to focus on the movie and having a good time instead of worrying about it.
When the movie was close to finishing around 9:45, Lizzie offered to refill drinks. Goldie originally said she was okay, but when Lizzie asked if she was sure, Goldie conceded and asked for some water, much to Charlotte's relief. After the kids told Lizzie what they wanted to drink, Charlotte slipped into the kitchen to help.
"How long should the medicine take to kick in?" she asked quietly as she helped Lizzie crush the pills into a fine powder and dissolve it into the kids' drinks of choice.
Lizzie kept crushing pills while she responded. "Since the pills are crushed, it shouldn't take too long. It should kick in before midnight…I hope. But it should, with the dosage amount."
As they were taking turns crushing pills and mixing them into the drinks, Nikki came into the kitchen to put away the dinner dishes. "What are you guys doing?" she asked while looking over her mom's shoulder.
Across the counter, Charlotte froze up and couldn't think of anything to say. She stumbled through an explanation until Lizzie jumped in and told Nikki that they were giving the kids some sleeping pills to help them relax, since they were in a new place and would most likely have trouble sleeping. Charlotte breathed a sigh of relief and nodded in agreement. Thankfully, Nikki didn't ask any more questions and left the kitchen once she had put the dishes in the dishwasher.
"Almost done?" Shaddid asked. He grabbed two of the cups, both with milk. "Who asked for milk?"
"Felix, Amy, and Frederick wanted milk; Goldie wanted water; and Billy wanted orange juice." Charlotte rattled off the drink requests with ease.
"Honey," Lizzie spoke up just before Shaddid had left the kitchen. He turned around to face her. "Depending on how quickly the medicine kicks in, we may need your help getting the kids upstairs."
He nodded, "Sure," and pointed with the cups. "I'll give these to the boys and come back for the rest."
Once all of the kids had gotten their drinks, Shaddid pulled Nikki aside to speak to her in private. "As soon as the kids go to bed, I want you to go to your room, lock the door, and don't come back out of your room until after six o'clock tomorrow morning. Do you understand?"
"Yeah…" Her brow furrowed in confusion. "Why do I need to lock the door? And why can't I come out of my room until after six?"
"Your mom and I will explain later. Just promise me you'll stay in your room."
"Yeah, sure."
"Promise me."
"Okay! I promise."
"Okay." Her promise wasn't too convincing, but he would take her word either way. "This is really important, Nikki."
She nodded. "I get it. We've got a house full of complete strangers that we know nothing about. It's just a safety precaution."
"Yeah, something like that," Shaddid said with a so-so shake of his head. "Thanks, Sweetie. I'll let you know when the kids are heading upstairs for the night. Should be soon."
"Sure, Dad," she said with a smile. She gave him a hug before rejoining everyone else in the living room for the rest of the movie.
Robin Hood was in its final minutes when Frederick started to feel really sleepy. By the time the credits started rolling, his head started nodding, and he could hardly keep his eyes open. "Charlotte," he said, his words slurring lazily, "I think I'm going to head to bed. I can't keep my eyes open.." He yawned and slumped over on the carpet as his eyes drifted shut, pulling him into a dreamless sleep.
Charlotte watched from the couch as each of the kids slowly drifted off to sleep. Amy was the last one to fall asleep, and once her eyes had shut and her breathing had evened out into a heavy lull, Charlotte rose from her place in the living room and went to go get Shaddid.
"They're all asleep," she said quietly to the trio in the kitchen.
"That was quick," Lizzie commented. She looked past Charlotte into the living room and saw all five kids slumped over in the floor. "Shaddid will take them upstairs." With a nod, Shaddid strolled into the living room and scooped each of the kids into his arms individually and took them upstairs one at a time.
Once all of the kids were upstairs and in bed, Shaddid told Nikki, "Go ahead and get ready for bed. Don't forget what I told you."
Nikki nodded, told her parents and Charlotte good-night, and went upstairs to her room. She put her Minions pajamas on and brushed her teeth before heading to her room and locking the door. Once inside her room, Nikki crawled into bed and pulled out Aunt Nicole's newest book, flipping to the back pages where she had found the announcements for her new book in the first place.
She took a closer look at the cover of the book, which featured a picture of who she could only assume was Freddy Fazbear. It was a picture of the head of an animatronic bear, complete with a black top hat and black bowtie. The picture was a bit spooky and something about it was familiar, but Nikki couldn't put her finger on it.
After re-reading the summary of the story that involved the teens sleeping just down the hall from her, she put the book back on her nightstand, turned off the light, and went to sleep.
Nikki's eyes opened in the darkness of her bedroom. She rolled over and looked at her alarm clock, which read 2:57 AM. She wiped the sleep out of her eyes and realized she had forgotten to use the bathroom before going to bed for the night, and that was what had woken her up. Even though Dad had made her promise to stay in her room for the duration of the night, surely he would understand the situation. Quietly, she tiptoed to her bedroom door, unlocked it, and padded down the hallway to the bathroom.
Everything seemed quiet except for a mechanical whirring that sounded like an electrical metal floor fan, paired with something that sounded like a CPAP machine. On her path to the bathroom, she noticed that the guest bedroom door was cracked open. Without even really knowing why, she peeked into the room. It was really dark, and the sounds were definitely coming from there. She stayed for a few seconds too long. From the darkness, she saw a pair of black and white glowing eyes peering at her. As her eyes adjusted to the dark, she thought she saw a tall, skinny figure that almost reminded her of Slenderman.
Her feet refused to move, and the tall figure seemed to hover over the floor in her direction. She didn't want to look anymore, but something kept her eyes glued to the doorway. The figure had nearly made it to the door before Nikki truly saw its form. Like she had suspected, the figure was really tall and really skinny. The eyes continued to watch her for a few seconds before the door finally closed with a quiet click.
Thinking she was either seeing things or dreaming, Nikki shook her head, used the restroom, and then went back to her room. She forgot to lock the door back, but she fell asleep almost immediately.
Since laying down for the night, Shaddid had found it difficult to sleep. All he could think about was that just across the hall, there were six robots, five of which could potentially come in here and kill them if they wanted to. Around three o'clock he thought maybe one of them had gotten outside of their room and was walking around the hallway, but then the toilet flushed, followed by Nikki's bedroom door creaking open and quietly shutting.
He rolled onto his back and listened to any sounds he could distinguish as different than the normal sounds of their house at night. The only thing different that he noticed was a slight mechanical hum that he couldn't figure out the source of. Nothing else seemed out of the ordinary.
Finally convinced that they were all safe for the night, Shaddid fell into a light sleep, which lasted until the alarm went off at 6:30 the next morning.
Tantalizing smells of sausage and eggs woke Nikki the next morning. As she inhaled deeply through her nose, she jumped out of bed and bounded down the stairs to the kitchen. Initially unfamiliar voices met her in the doorway until she remembered the events of the day before. All six teens were sitting around the dining room table enjoying the breakfast Mom had prepared.
While she pulled out a chair, Nikki smiled at the guests in turn around the table. "Good morning!" Frederick met her gaze and winked at her, a smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth. Billy returned the greeting and rolled his neck side to side.
"My neck feels really stiff. I think that's the hardest I've slept in a while." Billy stretched his arms up over his head and stifled a yawn.
"Yeah, I'm really stiff too," Amy agreed. She was rotating her shoulders. "I do feel really rested, though. I was worried about not sleeping well since we weren't at home, but I fell asleep right away."
Mom set down a plate of eggs and sausage in front of Nikki before going back to the stove. Nikki dug into her breakfast and looked across the dining room at Dad. He was drinking a cup of coffee and reading an article on his phone, but Nikki could see the dark circles under his eyes even from where she sat. He was more quiet than usual this morning, and he seemed really tired. He caught her gaze and smiled at her over his phone.
Next to Goldie, Charlotte thoughtfully stirred creamer into her coffee. She too had remained quiet since Nikki's dining room entrance, and she seemed lost in thought. Nikki noticed that she kept quickly glancing between each teen, almost sizing them up. Finally, Charlotte looked over at Nikki, letting her gaze linger for several seconds. Nikki met her gaze and squirmed under Charlotte's penetrating stare. She hadn't noticed it the night before, but Nikki realized in this moment how dark Charlotte's eyes were. The color wasn't exactly black, but the color was such a deep brown, it was difficult for Nikki to distinguish where Charlotte's pupils ended, and her irises began. Finally, Charlotte snapped out of her daze and pulled her attention back to the teens in front of her.
"We've never been to New York," Felix commented around a mouthful of eggs. "Could we go sightseeing?" he continued after swallowing.
Dad looked up from his article, but Charlotte interrupted before he could respond. "That's out of the question." She kept her eyes on her plate and pushed the remaining pieces of egg around with her fork.
"Aw, come on, Charlotte. You never let us do anything," Amy protested.
"I said no. End of discussion." She excused herself from the table and went upstairs to the room she and the teens were sharing.
Once she had left the room, Frederick muttered an expletive phrase under his breath. He roughly shoved himself away from the table and carried his dishes to the kitchen where he dropped them in the sink. Mom cringed at the sound of clanging ceramic on the bottom of the sink, but she didn't say anything.
The rest of the group finished their breakfast in silence and took their dishes to the kitchen, but unlike Frederick, everyone else took care to carefully set the dishes either by the sink or in the sudsy water that Mom had run to wash with. The last in the kitchen, Amy stayed to help with the dishes, even though Mom insisted she could do them herself. In the end, Mom let Amy wash the dishes while she dried them and put them away.
Quietly, Nikki crept upstairs and stood outside of Charlotte's door, listening. She couldn't hear anything where she was, and she was about to go to her room when a voice jarred her out of her daydreaming and made her jump.
"Nikki, do you need something?" Charlotte spoke softly from the bedroom.
"No, I-I'm fine," Nikki stammered. "Sorry, I was just thinking."
"Was there something you wanted to ask me? About last night?"
Nikki shook her head at first, "No, no, I-" She paused. "Wait. How did you know about that?
Charlotte shrugged it off. "Intuition, I guess. You just looked puzzled about something, and anyway," she quickly continued, "last night was weird for everyone."
For a fraction of a second, Nikki could hear the fuzzy sound of filtered thought, and to her surprise, it matched her own thoughts. She knows. Charlotte's eyes widened slightly before she broke eye contact and looked at the floor, a blush making its way to her cheeks.
Awkwardly, Nikki traced the wood pattern on the floor with her toe. "Anyway, sorry for snooping. Um…I'll leave you alone now."
"You're fine," Charlotte remarked with a crooked smile.
Just before she walked away, Nikki caught a small conversation, which she thought was odd. She recognized one voice as Charlotte's, but the first one sounded much softer and was more of a whisper than an actual voice.
We can trust her. She already knows something's up.
I know, but as long as she only has suspicions, we can still keep her out of the loop. The less she knows, the better.
Darkness. It was something which had become the norm and part of the routine a long time ago. Silence paired nicely with the darkness that seemed sometimes to choke her. But something had awakened her. Something, somehow, had pierced the silence.
She opened her eyes, but not to her surprise, she couldn't see anything. It seemed an eternity since she had seen the sun or even a hint of light. Weakly, she adjusted herself as best as she could in her tight quarters. Claustrophobia stuck hard, and she squeezed her eyes tightly shut and tried to breathe through the panic attack. She could feel screams escaping her throat, but the sound of her own voice never reached her ears.
Sobs wracked her body, and she gasped for breath, forcing air into her tight chest. Slowly her lungs began to open again, and her breathing slowed. Not being able to wipe the tears off her face nearly drove her mad.
There it was again. A thud. She focused all of her attention to the sound and tried to identify what the noise was and where it was coming from.
Recognition widened her eyes to the size of golf balls. Voices! Someone's in here!
"Help!" She screamed. "Please, get me out! I'm in here!"
Again, despite her attempts, the darkness swallowed her voice before even she could hear it. She tried to lift her arms to beat against the wall, but the cramped quarters kept her arms pinned to her sides.
"We shouldn't be here." The first voice sounded so far away and quiet, but it was a voice, nonetheless. She listened despairingly as the conversation continued. "You know we're trespassing."
"Don't be such a baby. This place has been shut down for forever, and no one is brave enough to venture in here. No one's going to find us."
"This place gives me the creeps. I want to get out of here." The second kid didn't reply. "You know a bunch of kids disappeared from here? For all we know, they're buried in the walls."
The voices—two boys by the sounds of it—were getting closer, and she sobbed hopelessly. Despite her containment, it sounded like the people were mere inches from her.
"That's stupid," the second kid finally replied. "You know they never found the bodies. There was nothing to prove that they actually died."
The first kid shuddered. "Please, let's get out of here," he begged.
"Ugh, fine! As long as you promise to stop whining like a baby."
"Promise!" the kid agreed enthusiastically.
Slowly the sound returned to its former silence until it was broken again by the sound of clattering metal followed by a shrill shriek.
"Dude, shut up! It's just a robotic ballerina! It's not going to kill you!"
After a few more minutes, the boys were gone. Ballora's music box sounded a few sour notes before sputtering out.
She gulped in silent heaving sobs until her throat was raw. No one would ever hear her. She would die here in the darkness, silence as her only comfort.
Looking back over the last few weeks, Shaddid was surprised that things had been going as smoothly as they were with Charlotte and the kids. Despite the circumstances, there hadn't been any issues with the animatronics thus far. The sleeping pills seemed to be helping keep the kids sedated through the night. Occasionally, Shaddid had to remind himself that there was the possibility of potential danger. But for the most part, everything was working like clockwork.
The kids themselves had become more accustomed to their new living situation. Charlotte still forbade them to explore outside of the house, but as a whole, they were all feeling more at home and relaxed.
Midway through the month of June, Nikki was getting ready for the day when she thought she smelled something. It was something she had never smelled before, but it was far from pleasant. She tried to ignore it but then decided it would probably be a good idea to maybe let Mom or Dad know about it. In the kitchen, Mom said that Dad was already investigating the smell outside, having woken up and smelled it themselves.
Charlotte came down for breakfast and poured herself a bowl of cereal. She appeared to have slept well, but she was by herself.
"Is everyone else still asleep?" Mom asked.
As she chewed, Charlotte nodded. "I'm not sure why they're sleeping in so late. Usually they're all up and ready to go by seven." She checked the clock on the stove. "And it's almost eight. I'm going to go check and see if they're still asleep." Shaddid came back inside after she had stood up from the table.
"Any luck?" Mom set a bowl down on the table for Nikki.
Dad shook his head. "I don't know where it's coming from. I don't see anything under the house or anywhere outside." He cautiously breathed in through his nose, wrinkling it in disgust. "Obviously, me looking outside didn't help anything, and it seems like it's gotten worse." He grimaced. "I can still smell it."
Charlotte tuned in to the conversation. "What's going on? Is something wrong?"
"Can you not smell that?" Dad gawked at her.
"No," Charlotte admitted after focusing intently on her sense of smell. "You guys must have really sensitive noses. I don't smell anything." She stopped by the sink to rinse out her bowl.
On the other hand, the smell had caused Nikki to lose her appetite. She put away the bowl Mom had set out for her and went back upstairs.
"I hope Shaddid finds out what that smell is soon," Lizzie commented absentmindedly as she poured herself a cup of coffee. "Consider yourself lucky that you can't smell it," she told Charlotte with a laugh. "It's pretty bad." She took a sip from her mug before adding, "Honestly, it smells like something crawled under the house and died."
Charlotte's head shot up. "What?"
Lizzie shrugged. "I just said it smells like something died under the house."
After shooting a look towards the stairs, Charlotte asked, "What's today's date?"
"June…" She checked her watch, "sixteenth. Why?"
The bowl Charlotte was holding slipped from her grasp and shattered on the floor. "Lizzie, I'm so sorry!" she groaned. She bent down to help pick up the pieces until she heard footsteps upstairs.
"Don't worry about it, Sweetie. Sounds like the kids are up." She dumped the broken glass pieces in the trash. "I guess I'll wait until they—"
A scream from upstairs cut her off mid-sentence. Charlotte and Lizzie locked eyes. "Nikki?" Lizzie ventured, concerned.
Silence ensued for a few seconds until running footsteps pounded down the stairs followed by Nikki screaming Charlotte's name.
While Nikki was still downstairs deciding what to eat for breakfast, Felix stirred and slowly sat up. He grimaced and held his stomach as he swung his legs over the edge of the bed and sat there. His stomach was killing him, and he had a splitting headache. His right eye was throbbing in time with his pulse. At the back of his head, his hair was matted and sticky.
In the bed next to him, he could hear Amy choking on something.
"Hey, Ames, you okay?"
Her response was a hoarse grunt as she continued to cough, followed by rattling, hoarse breathing.
Across the room, Frederick was sitting up on his bed, rubbing his knee. "My stomach is killing me," he groaned.
"Must've been something we ate. My stomach is hurting, too," Felix admitted. He stood up with a grunt and stretched, his spine popping in protest. The two boys stumbled to the door and started to head downstairs.
Halfway up the stairs, Nikki thought she heard Frederick and Felix talking behind their closed bedroom door. She was debating on whether or not she should just wait for them to come outside or if she should knock on their door. It did seem odd that they had slept in this late because, like Charlotte said, they were all up and ready to go by seven every morning, and they all woke up at six every morning, like they all had some kind of crazy internal alarm clock.
Right before she had a chance to knock, the door opened, and Frederick and Felix stepped out into the hallway together. What Nikki noticed before she even could process what she was seeing was that she had found the source of the smell. Whatever it was, it was coming from the kids' room.
"Oh, hey, Nikki," Frederick mumbled sleepily.
A scream froze itself in Nikki's throat. In front of her, Felix and Frederick were both covered in blood. Frederick's mouth stretched open into a crooked smile as he greeted her. He paused and covered his mouth as he coughed and gagged, finally spitting something into his palm. Nikki watched in horror as Frederick filtered through the blood in his hand and pulled out two teeth.
"Huh…that's weird." He dropped the teeth onto the floor and wiped his bloody palm on his already blood-stained pants.
Nikki turned to Felix, and immediately recoiled. Felix's right eye was completely gone, replaced by a gaping hole in his face and skull. Dried blood clung to the remains of his face. To Nikki's dismay, Felix limped towards her with a toothy smile stretching his exposed tendons.
"Nikki, do you see anything in my eye? I can't see anything out of it, and it hurts really bad."
Before Nikki could reply, Amy pushed her way between the guys, coughing and gasping hoarsely as she made her way to the bathroom. There were purple finger marks around her throat, and her eyes were bloodshot and bugged out. Nikki heard the toilet lid clang, followed by Amy coughing and retching into the now-open toilet.
Nikki's throat finally opened, and she screamed. She spun on the balls of her feet and ran as quickly as she could down the stairs, screaming for Charlotte as she went. Behind her, she could hear Frederick and Felix limping down the stairs, following her.
Charlotte met her in the foyer and quickly got between Nikki and the boys.
"What the hell is wrong with them?" Nikki shrieked. She hid herself behind Charlotte and used her as a shield. "I'm sorry for swearing, but why do they look like that?" Frederick took another step closer to her, and she pushed Charlotte towards him. "Stay away from me!" she screamed around Charlotte.
Slowly, Charlotte turned around to face Nikki and took Nikki's hands in her own. "I know you weren't there when I filled your parents in on everything," she whispered under her breath, "but they can't see what we see."
"Are they…dead?" Nikki squeaked.
"Shh. I'll explain everything later. For now, just try not to stare. It makes them nervous."
Behind Charlotte, Frederick tried to butt into the conversation. "What's wrong with her?" He tried to see around Charlotte as he wiped blood from his mouth, finally giving up when Charlotte didn't answer and kept a protective arm around Nikki, who was still hiding behind her. "Could I have some Ginger Ale or something? Felix and I both woke up with a stomachache this morning. And both of us might need some pain killers. He has a really bad headache, and my knee is killing me."
"Sure," Charlotte replied calmly. "First things first, Nikki, how about you go back to the kitchen. Tell your mom that Frederick and Felix don't feel well and need some pain killers and something to settle their stomachs."
With a whimper, Nikki scurried backwards into the dining room and attached kitchen.
"Charlotte, could you take a look at my eye? It really hurts." Felix touched the remains of his right eye socket.
Charlotte nodded silently, took a deep breath, and leaned forward to look deeper into the crevice in Felix's face. From this close proximity, she could finally smell what she could only assume everyone else had been smelling this morning: the smell of rot and death. After ten years, she had grown accustomed to the stench and hardly noticed it anymore. Even the wounds, which indeed became more and more gruesome as the years progressed, no longer phased her.
A stoic expression pasted itself onto her face as she gently probed the remains of Felix's cracked eye socket with her thumb. She knew she wouldn't find anything—not even bullet remains—not only from years of probing but also from seeing the nasty exit wound on the back of his head.
While she was finishing up, Shaddid came into the foyer with two cans of Ginger Ale and four Ibuprofen tablets. He avoided eye contact with the guys—or rather, partial eye contact with Felix and full-on eye contact with Frederick—and handed the cans and pills to Charlotte. As he did so, he stifled a gag and muttered, "Holy crap!" under his breath.
"Thank you," Charlotte said softly as she divvied the drinks and medicine between the boys. "Take these. You both should be feeling better soon." She glanced behind the guys and continued, "Good morning, Amy. Are you feeling under the weather today, too?"
Shaddid's eyes widened, matching Amy's, and he tried not to stare.
Amy nodded and tried to talk, but all she could manage was a weak, raspy grunt. She shook her head and touched her throat.
"It's okay, don't try to talk. You've probably just lost your voice. Head to the kitchen and see if Lizzie can make you some hot tea with some honey. That should help. But try to avoid talking. We don't want to make it worse."
Shaddid fidgeted from foot to foot. "So, obviously there's something we haven't talked about yet. How, uh," he cleared his throat, "how often does this happen?"
"Just one day a year," Charlotte muttered absentmindedly. "It's the anniversary today, and it's Frederick's birthday."
Next to her, Frederick's glassed-over eyes lit up. "It's my birthday!" He grinned, exposing bloody gums and gaps where his rotten teeth had fallen out. As he laughed, blood hung from his lip in a congealed spit ball. "Can we make a birthday cake?" In an instant, he had wrapped what was left of his fingers around Charlotte's forearm. Quickly he spun her around in a dizzying circle, laughing like a giddy child.
"Sure, Frederick, sure. We can make a cake. What kind do you want?"
Shaddid's stomach lurched when Frederick's eyes rolled up into the back of his head in thought.
"Umm…vanilla cake with…vanilla frosting." Slowly, his tongue ran along the inside of his mouth, seemingly looking for something. After several seconds, he mumbled something about wanting rainbow sprinkles around something in his mouth. A blood- and mucous-filled cough rattled in his lungs until he hacked up another blood clot and held it in his mouth.
"Do—do you need something to spit into?"
Frederick grimaced and nodded. "Mm-hmm." After Shaddid found a plastic cup for him, Frederick spilled the contents of his mouth into the Solo cup and smiled up at Shaddid. "Thanks," he said, blood smeared across his gums and teeth.
Charlotte tried to explain. "The program that allows us to look like normal, functioning humans has to shut down and do a system restart, of sorts, and do updates so it can make our physical appearances 'age' each year. While it's updating, the program shuts down for about twenty-four hours, and we look like...this. It happens to me too. I usually just keep to myself on my update day. But you don't have to worry about seeing mine. My update already happened this year."
"Frederick, are you behaving yourself?" Billy made his first appearance of the day. His appearance wasn't as gruesome as the other boys, but he had a gaping bullet wound in his chest with dried blood plastering his shirt to his body. Behind him on the landing, Goldie was crawling along the floor on her stomach, using her arms to pull her paralyzed legs. The visual reminded Shaddid of a zombie crawling towards its next meal.
"Billy, help your sister," Charlotte reprimanded as Goldie started trying to descend the stairs head-first.
"Eh, she's fine." He turned his attention to Frederick below him. "Happy Birthday, man. The big two-oh. Nice!"
Shaddid decided to leave the guys to their conversations and check on Nikki. No one had anticipated anything like this happening, so up until this point, they had all kept her in the dark about the kids and what had happened, but now seemed like a good a time as any to tell her.
In the kitchen, Nikki was sitting at the table, keeping a reasonable distance from Amy at the bar, trying to follow Charlotte's advice and not stare. Shaddid pulled her into the dining room away from everyone and explained the situation and what was going on as Nicole and Charlotte had told him and Lizzie.
"So who killed them?" Nikki finally asked at the end.
"We don't know," Shaddid admitted with a shrug. "That's what Charlotte's been trying to figure out for the last several years, and it's really bothering her that she doesn't know who did it. She knows that her dad instigated it, but as far as who actually carried out the murders, that's what we don't know."
From the inside of his prison cell, William fondly studied photos of his children: Charlotte, Danny, and Elizabeth. He didn't have very many, and he had even fewer of Danny and Elizabeth seeing as how they were killed at such young ages.
One picture in particular kept catching his attention. It was a picture taken just short of Elizabeth's sixth birthday, not long before she died. In the picture, Elizabeth was holding a plushie of Chica and standing next to Henry's worktable, grinning. If he remembered correctly, Elizabeth had just seen plans for the new animatronic that she had specially requested for her birthday. Baby would have been Henry's most valuable creation, and the greatest creation of William's psyche, if Henry hadn't screwed everything up by being sloppy and careless.
But being locked up for ten years really makes a person think. The person he had hired to carry out the murders of Frederick and his four friends had said he took care of everything, but there had been some things that William had noticed that didn't add up. First of all, the animatronics had seemed more aggressive, and although he hadn't seen any solid proof of this, there was a small possibility that somehow Charlotte had found the bodies and brought them back. Having been brought back from the dead herself, she would definitely have the knowledge needed to make that possible.
If it was true that Charlotte had brought the kids back, which with such limited information had as much of a probability as the flip of a coin, they only had a few options to get rid of the kids for good. And seeing as how trying to split a child's soul from the animatronic had yet to be done, the plans he had laid out were a shot in the dark at best.
The best hope they had would be to bring Baby back. If she somehow survived, she certainly wouldn't appreciate having been locked up for fifteen years. But if his thought process were correct, they wouldn't be able to get rid of the kids without her help.
He would have to contact the right person and convince him to help out. Maybe even offer to pay him if it came to that. If the guy had screwed things up the first time, then he owed it to William to at least go and try to find Baby. Next time he got released out of his cell, he would give him a call.