See the end for author's note.
"The fun is starting,
A celebration that lasts eternity,
I'm always watching,
Because somebody purple murdered me!"
Chapter 4. Stage Fright
Circus Baby's Pizza World was not what Danny was expecting.
It wasn't even close to resembling the squat, brightly painted little building that they had just driven from. Freddy Fazbear's Pizzeria seemed eons away, instead of just a couple hundred miles or so. Come to think of it, Danny's entire life seemed out of reach now. All he had was Springtrap, who was at least good company in the form of patience and reliability. Glancing warily up at black windows that stood three levels high, Danny double checked that they had the right address.
"This is…this is it." He said, sounding unsure as ever.
It was large, gray, and had series of windows. It looked like an old warehouse, but one peek through a glassless window showed the place had been mostly gutted of any personality by now. if anything, it could easily be mistaken for a vacant car garage, but there was no one around driving at this hour. Come to think of it, Danny hadn't seen any other cars or pedestrians for a couple of blocks now. That was good, because it was hard to explain Springrap, but it also made the hairs on the back of Fitzgerald's neck stand to attention.
"Erhh…" Suddenly, Danny wondered if he should have just stayed at the hotel he had just gotten, and waited until tomorrow morning.
"The key, day guard." Springtrap was offering the little key ring.
Taking his nervous green gaze from the cloudy night sky, Danny fumbled until he found the right key. The door slid open noiselessly, which struck Danny as odd. He expected anything to do with this cavernous building to be noisy and unkempt.
Danny shut the door behind him, having let Springtrap lurch his way inside first.
"I…remember this place." Springtrap spoke suddenly, in that soft tired tone Danny was getting used to hearing.
"You do?" Danny asked excitedly. Some progress!
"Yes." Springtrap's good ear leaned forward and he followed it. Danny followed him. Their footsteps left paths in the dust, and the lack of light didn't let them see the sneaker pattern they were scuffing up.
"We need to use this elevator." Springtrap stopped walking, having crossed the dimly lit floor, and pointed.
"Uh…and go where?"
But Springtrap just shook his head slowly. Apparently, that was there the memories ended. Still, he had been right about everything else so far, so Danny put his trust in the yellow bunny and tugged on the lever to call the elevator. He was honestly surprised when he heard the whine of a generator and the chug of machinery.
They waited.
Without anything else to do, and too nervous to just stand there in the empty warehouse, Danny flipped through Mike's journal. With driving he hadn't had time to really read through it, and even now he didn't really have a long moment to spare. He settled on the list of rules he had seen earlier, right at the front of the leather bound book. He'd read the first one, so what was the second one?
2. Check your blindspots.
With a frustrated sigh, Danny closed the book and tucked it away. What was that referencing? He felt like there was a reason, that Mike was saying this because he had heard it from someone else or learned the hard way. But…maybe not.
The elevator was here.
"Ready?" He asked Springtrap, but he didn't know why. Of course the animatronic was ready. Springtrap's little look said he was asking the same thing mentally. Still, his new companion nodded, the action smooth but squelchy, and stepped alongside the human into the wide area.
The doors closed and soon, the sensation of sinking hit Danny's stomach as the elevator took them down, down…
Without warning, a loud, cheerful male voice came through the speaker above them.
"Welcome to the first day of your exciting new career!"
Springtrap calmly watched Danny jump and clutch his heart. Decidin the human was alright—just startled—the bunny turned to look back up at the ceiling, his ear trained on the audio coming through it.
"Whether you were approached at a job fair, read our ad in Screws, Bolts, and Hairpins, or if this is the result of a dare, we welcome you. I will be your personal guide to help you get started. I'm a model 5 of the Handyman's Robotics and Unit Repair System. But, you can call me "Handy-Unit"."
Danny shuddered. HandyUnit sounded anything but handy. It sounded crisp, cheerful, and dull. Maybe Danny was already used to Springtrap's calm and human mannerisms, but for some reason this HandyUnit's cheerful male voice just made the hairs on the back of the kid's neck crawl even worse than before.
"Your new career promises challenge, intrigue, and endless janitorial opportunities. Please enter your name as seen above the keypad. This cannot be changed later, so, please be careful."
A keypad in the center of the floor jerked up, screen flickering. But that wasn't what was interesting about it. What was interesting about it was the HandyUnit's comment about the name above the keypad.
"Mike!" Danny would recognize that hand writing anywhere. "So he was here, but…what should I do?"
Springtrap was studying the walls, looking for something apparently. "When in Rome…it's best to follow the programming. Try entering Operator's name and see if the AI notices you are not him."
"Uh, right." Easier said than done. Springtrap watched in faint enjoyment as Danny tried—and failed—to enter Mike's name in the glitch keypad.
"It seems that you had some trouble with the keypad. I see what you were trying to type, and I will autocorrect it for you. One moment…
Welcome, Eggs Benedict!"
"That answers our question, then." Springtrap sounded faintly amused and a little smug. Danny realized why; it meant the AI talking to them just wasn't as sharp as Springtrap himself. He supposed, if he were a robot like Spring, he might like to know the competition as well. And it would make him feel good—even as decomposed as he was—to know his mental hardware was still in better condition than the Stepford Wives' HandyUnit creep.
"Eggs, huh?" Danny thought of his easy going boss laughing at HandyUnit, and telling him it was okay, that the AI was trying its best. He was hit with another pang of sadness, wishing the man were here now with them. Mike would know what to do.
Suddenly, the elevator lurched to a stop, and the fans died down. Danny stumbled, while Spring calmly stayed rooted to the spot. Worse than the fans stopping, the lights went out inside the cramped room. Before Danny could ask, Springtrap's silver optics flashed bright, casting illuminated beams of light before them. The left one flickered poorly, before dimming a great deal, but Danny politely said nothing.
Some light was better than none at all, right?
"You can now open the elevator using that bright, red, and obvious button. Let's get to work!"
The doors shot open. The rabbit's optics swung down to stare at the area before them.
Yellow danger tape was stretched over the tops and sides, and below them was an open, gaping crawlspace. It did not appear to have its own light source, so Danny wasn't quite sure where it led to.
One thing was for sure…
"I will not fit." Springtrap's blank tone filled the awkward silence. Danny turned to him, feeling a little bit desperate.
"There has to be another way in—don't you think?"
"Doubtful." Springtrap was looking around. Outside the elevator was a short square of space, directly across from them was the crawlspace. "This place seems…familiar. I think this is all there is, day guard." The rotted rabbit looked around before deciding.
"I can take the elevator back up and look for another way in. Stairs, maybe? Either way; you'll have to go in there by yourself." Springtrap watched him blankly. "Are you afraid?"
"Uh…yeah. A little." See: a lot.
"Fear is natural. It is what you do about your fear that makes you human."
Danny nodded, wondering if he looked as pale as he felt. With a faint goodbye to Spring, the human knelt down and, ignoring the Danger tape, pushed into the cramped crawlspace.
He was relieved when he heard a grinding of gears and servos whining. Light leaked over his shoulders and cast some light. Springtrap wouldn't leave him until he couldn't be of use anymore, and Danny felt a rush of affection for the scary bunny.
Using his elbows and hips, Danny commando-crawled into the unknown.
"Allow me to fill this somewhat frightening silence with some lighthearted banter."
"Ow!" Danny rubbed his head from where he'd banged it against the ceiling. "Loud enough?" HandyUnit either didn't hear him, or was choosing to ignore him.
"Due to the massive success, and, even more so, the unfortunate closing of Freddy Fazbear's Resturant, it was clear that the stage was set (no pun intended) for another contender in children's entertainment. Unlike most entertainment venues, our robotic entertainers are rented out for private parties during the day, and it's your job to get the robots back in proper working order before the following morning."
"The closing…" Danny almost stopped crawling, until he realized where he had stopped.
"Wait, did you call it the restaurant?" The restaurant. Something about it being called that—and not the pizzeria—wiggled in the back of Danny's brain. Quickly, he hurried on, but filed away that interesting tid-bit for later. If Circus Baby's had only opened after the pizzeria closed, Mike wouldn't have known about it until then. But if it had opened during the restaurant's era—when his dad worked there—then why hadn't Mike known about it? Of course, Danny often felt his former boss had a sixth sense of this sort of stuff. He might have known about it all along and just not done anything about it. Briefly, Danny realized he forgot to ask how long Springtrap had been online.
The bunny must know more than he was letting on.
His journey through the vents left him feeling lightheaded, claustrophobic and a bit like a rat. He and Springtrap were trespassing but Danny hadn't seen a living thing so far, and HandyUnit wasn't asking questions. It just seemed to expect a job to be done.
What that job was, though…
Well, Danny was hoping it would be something he was used to. He was wrong.
"You are now in the primary Control Module; it's actually a crawlspace between the two front showrooms. Now, let's get started with your daily tasks. View the window to your left. This is the Ballora Gallery: Party Room and Dance Studio, encouraging kids to get fit and enjoy pizza! Let's turn on the light and see if Ballora is onstage. Press the blue button on the elevated keypad to your left."
Danny glanced warily around the shadowed, cramped circular Module room and fought a shiver. The weird white face of a puppet-thing smiled emptily across the area. Animatronic heads on sticks were blinking every so often. He turned his attention toward the window on his left, but didn't see anything. Obviously it was a room of some sort, apparently a party room and dance studio. What the hell?
"Press the blue button on the elevated keypad to your left." HandyUnit suddenly repeated in its friendly, 1950's tone. Danny did so.
HandyUnit seemed to have eyes everywhere, because no sooner had a stage far across the party room illuminated when the AI spoke up.
"Uh oh! It looks like Ballora doesn't feel like dancing. Let's give her some motivation. Press the red button now to administer a controlled shock. Maybe that will put the spring back in her step."
"Give her a what!?" Danny yelped, drawing back in horror. Granted, he didn't know if these robots were anything like his friends—like Bonnie—but something still felt wrong about this. Most likely, it was because he had spent a month under Mike's tutelage. Machines, even the lifeless ones like the arcade games, could be sweet-talked and spoken to so they might want to work better. Danny saw other guys in the factory that spit and kick at the mechanical workers beside them, but he could never quite bring himself to do the same.
"I don't want to shock it, what the hell man—"
But HandyUnit did not respond. Danny turned and saw that behind him…the vent door had closed without so much as a sound. Oh, okay. That was fine. He turned back to the control panel and saw the little bolt of lightning on the bottom red button.
"Christ…" Taking a deep breath, Danny leaned forward and touched the bottom square section of the pad. He quickly removed his finger when he heard the sound of thousands of volts being shoved somewhere. Briefly, Danny apologized to whatever it was he'd just electrocuted, and also Mike.
"Let's check the light again." Now, Danny could see a slender, human-shaped figure jerking from one ballet pose to the next. She was either elevated on her stage or she was insanely tall, he couldn't tell which. Ballora, it had said? Well, this Ballora didn't look too worse for wear. Hopefully the HandyUnit would leave her alone now…
"Excellent. Ballora's feeling like her old self again and will be ready to perform again tomorrow."
"Fuck you man." Danny whispered under his breath, but HandyUnit went on cheerfully.
"Now, view the window to your right. This is the Funtime auditorium where Funtime Foxy encourages kids to play and share. Try the light! Let's see what Funtime Foxy is up to."
"Funtime Fox—Foxy?" At last, a familiar name, but that made it that much harder to suddenly press that damn button. Danny thought back to the Foxy he knew, and winced. One volt of electricity would have sent the old sea captain to pieces, he was in that bad shape. Danny couldn't imagine he had gotten any better over the course of a decade, even with Mike repairing him.
Of course, this Funtime Foxy probably wasn't the one Danny remembered, but still. Begging silently, Danny hit the blue button, hoping that Foxy was on his stage.
It was empty.
"Looks like Funtime Foxy is taking the day off. Let's motivate Funtime Foxy with a controlled shock."
"Foxy? Can you hear me?" Danny tried to see through the glass, because the light button was no longer working. "If you can, you gotta go to your stage…Foxy?"
"Let's motivate Funtime Foxy with a controlled shock."
"Oh, god…" Danny was suddenly glad the vent was too small for Springtrap. Unfortunately, the AI seemed to have caught on when Danny quickly tapped the lightning button swiftly. The shock was definitely shorter and smaller than the last one Ballora had to endure. Danny hoped he could sneak by just with this.
"Let's try another controlled shock."
"Kidding me…" Danny moaned, covered his eyes and hit the button again. Had Mike just let this happen?
The horrific sound of electrocution reverberated through the small round room. A second later,
"Looks like Funtime Foxy is in perfect working order. Great job! In front of you is another vent shaft. Crawl through it to reach the Circus Gallery Control Module."
"Circus Gallery, huh?" Danny parroted, half to himself. A few deep breaths later, and a silent wish to whoever was listening he didn't die tonight; Fitzgerald got down on his hands and knees and crawled forward.
"Motion trigger. Circus Gallery Vent." Said a robotic female voice. Danny jumped, heart pounding in his chest until he realized it most likely was talking about him. Spooky, but less spooky than he initially thought.
The room that the vent path opened into was even smaller than the one he had come from. The only remarkable thing was the wide gaping glass windows and the flashing lights and buttons. Somewhere above him fans pushed in oxygen, even giving a bit of a soothing, nice breeze from their force. Danny waited, wondering if HandyUnit was going to speak up.
He wasn't disappointed.
"On the other side of the glass is Circus Baby's auditorium. Let's check the light and see what Baby is up to."
Inwardly, Danny wondered this animatronic looked like. Since he had seen both humanoid and animal shaped trons, he could only guess. When Danny hit the light button, there was a click and nothing happened.
"Looks like a few of the lights are out, but we can fix that later. Let's encourage Baby to cheer up with a controlled shock."
"What? But I can't even see—what if she is there and you don't know it?" Danny didn't know why he was reasoning with an AI like HandyUnit. Clearly, the damn thing wasn't anything like the Fazgang he was used to.
As Danny delivered the shock of electricity, he wondered again how long Mike had put up with this.
"Let's try another controlled shock."
"Oh, man…" Danny closed his eyes for this one. He didn't even reach for the light switch before HandyUnit started up again.
"Great job, Circus Baby. We knew we could count on you!"
"God, you're condescending." Danny muttered sullenly.
"That concludes your duties for your first night on the job. We don't want you to leave overwhelmed; otherwise, you might not come back. Please leave using the vent behind you, and we'll see you again tomorrow."
But Danny did not leave right away. Mostly because he was still terrified to move, because he thought for sure he was being watched from the other side of that glass. Mostly, because before him was a desk. Well, sort of. The control panel was filled with a litany of buttons and switches and Danny couldn't even begin to tell you what one third of them did. But at least, it was the most 'desk-like' thing he had seen so far down here.
Maybe, just maybe, Mike had left something under this desk for him.
He dropped to rest on his knees and quickly stuck the working flashlight into the darkness. There was, miraculously, a little folded up piece of paper in the front corner. Quickly, he snatched it and read it right there. It was the same handwriting as before.
If anything happens to me look in the rule book page two eight zero. -M
"Rule book, page 280. Got it." Eagerly, Danny clicked the flashlight down to search the underside of the desk a second time. Assuming he had over looked a big rule book or something, he leaned in a bit. The light met a rusty wall, but that was it. Nothing.
"So where is the rule book, Mike?" Danny whispered, as if his boss was going to pop up out of the darkness and answer him. He wasn't that lucky, but he did get an answer from someone.
"Please leave using the vent behind you, and we'll see you again tomorrow." HandyUnit's voice rang a little louder than usual above him, as if the human it was speaking to had gone deaf and was loitering by accident. Danny jumped and clutched his heart, exhaling slowly as he pocketed the little note.
"Jesus, HandyUnit…" The day guard turned the way he had come and started through. Again, the female voice sounded a movement through the vent he was in. He poked out into the control module room, purposefully ignoring the blinking eyes of the heads just…sitting around smiling at nothing. Fighting a shiver, Danny swept his gaze around the room, looking for anything he might have missed.
There was in fact something. Sitting in front of a closed vent door—one that looked suspiciously like it could be opened—was a small paper back. It was sitting in front of the side of the room that led to the Dance Studio, if Danny remembered correctly. And, if he was going to be correct again, he was pretty sure it hadn't been here before. He swiped it quickly, but was hesitant to linger any longer, especially in this room. At least in Circus Baby's it was darker and by association, felt a bit safer.
Danny was already halfway through the last vent system when he heard it. A dull thud was coming along behind him, fainter at first but growing in volume. By the second series of thuda-thuda-thuda, Danny was shimmying faster. The dull scuffing of noise continued, following him all the way down the vent and getting closer and closer until Danny looked up and saw both light and metal feet.
"S-Springtrap!" He called.
At the sound of his name, Springtrap bent down and peered into the darkness of the tunnel, illuminating the area around Danny. The human was almost dizzying grateful for the sudden light. Interestingly, the only sounds of movement now were the ones he was making. There was nothing behind him at all. At least, there wasn't any more.
"How did it go?" Springtrap asked calmly as he watched the human clamber gracelessly out. The bunny had the decency to wait until Danny had caught his breath and didn't feel so lightheaded.
"First off," Danny said between gasps. "I don't think…they pump a lot of oxygen…down here."
"Most likely not." Spring agreed. He followed Danny into the elevator, and hit the button.
"Second…oh god, Spring. It's so weird what they do to them, to their animatronics I mean."
Springtrap listened to Danny tell about his 'first night on the job.' If the bunny had any reaction at all, he showed little of it. While Spring did give a slow half blink when Danny mentioned the controlled shocking, the rotted rabbit didn't comment or react to anything else. Instead, he waited until they were walking across the empty warehouse to comment.
"Did you find the night guard, then?"
"What? Oh, uh…no, but…"
Which jogged Danny's memory of finding the note and the rule book. He pulled the rule book out, and flicked to the correct page. The page itself wasn't anything interesting, just the glossary. But along the inner spine was something that caught Danny's attention.
Three can keep a secret, if two of them are dead. –M
Along the bottom of the page, someone, presumably Mike, had written three names.
Hazel A.
Michael A.
The Marionette
The last name was the only one crossed out. When Danny read it out loud, Springtrap's ears creaked downward more than usual. The rotted rabbit looked away.
"Arthur." Springtrap said in low, almost guilty, tone. Springtrap didn't say a word the rest of the way back to the hotel.
LINEBREAK
There was a typo that had chapter 3 being labeled as chapter 4. That's fixed now.
I'm not gunna lie, I'd LOVE to get into the routine of uploading once every two weeks. Hell, I wish I could promise once a month at that, but I can't right now. The one thing I AM considering doing is a series of episodic chapters. There wouldn't be an over-arching plot, it would literally be me in the sandbox playing, just goofing around with the FNAF characters as I saw fit. In other words, you know those special chapters that are in Devil's Spine and Ghost Strings? It'd be like those, just those. I could explore themes I wanted in the knight guard au but that I never got around to doing because of Time and Plot and etc.
I dunno, it's a thought. It's also a way of getting to write about Mike and the gang more, in less dramatic situations. /glances at the drama that was Ghost Strings
Tonight's song is 'Join Us for a Bite' by JT Machinima.