Mable: So, you're probably confused to why I'm posting on Wednesday and not Thursday this week, and the truth is that… I still am! On a whim, I decided to post two chapters this week. One today, one tomorrow. ^-^ These weekly uploads gave me just enough buffer zone to get both nearly completed, so I'm going to take advantage of that! I hope you enjoy!

Almost Feels Like Home

Chapter Four

Fritz had to get back to the warehouse. At this point it wasn't like he could sleep anyway, and it was driving him mad that he couldn't figure it all out. William had to have left some sort of opening to hack his way into the programming. He refused to believe that years as a technician had been won out by one man's poorly veiled programming. There had to be a way to crack it. Or if he couldn't, there had to be a way to replace it.

"If I can't get rid of the urge, then I'll replace it with something better," Fritz decided as he continued thrashing in bed. "She used to be built to make ice cream and balloons… If I could replace that urge to grab kids with the need to actually bring them ice cream and balloons, what she should have had, then maybe I could erase the danger… Maybe I can reprogram around what's already there." The man's eyes shot open as he started to climb out of bed. That was it, that was the answer; Fritz couldn't reprogram Baby because he couldn't remove the programming, but perhaps he could work around it, manipulate it, into a pliable state.

"That's it! That's the answer!" Fritz smiled brilliantly, tiredly, as he slipped his jacket on over his night clothes. He hurried out of the bedroom, slipping on his shoes, and then hurried to the front door. He reached for the key hook and then paused, blinking in confusion. All the keys were missing from the hooks. Not just his keys, but also Natalie's keyring and the separate keyring with the van and pizzeria keys on it. "…Huh?" After looking around to make sure he wasn't just not seeing them, he started to head back towards the bedroom.

Hearing Fritz starting back to the room, Natalie reached under her pillow and shoved the keys up until they hit the bedframe, then tried to push them down and back behind the mattress. As the door opened again, she pulled her arm back out and dipped it under the blanket again. She smiled to herself slyly and feigned innocence; this had to work.

Fritz leaned over the bed and lightly shook her arm. "Natalie? Natty?" He continued to nudge and prod desperately. "The keys disappeared."

"They'll turn up by morning. Shouldn't you be in bed?" Natalie asked, faking a half-asleep tone to not tip him off. "Come on, Fritz. It's, like, two in the morning."

"I know, and I don't want to, but I had an idea on how to fix Baby and I need to get started tonight, because I have to be at work tomorrow to help with tweaking the menu," Fritz rambled out. His words were slurring slightly, and it was obvious that, again, the sleep deprivation was getting to him, even if he was ignoring it. "I've got a long day, so I need to get what I can done tonight."

"No dice. Back in bed," Natalie insisted as she pointed a thumb back at the mattress behind her. "Don't make me beg." He leaned down over her with a low chuckle and pressed his lips to her cheek. She could feel the light tickle and knew he hadn't been keeping up with shaving; it was a sort of nice change of pace even if it wasn't exactly a good sign. She hoped that his affection meant he was agreeing to stay. Instead, Fritz drew back and then walked back out of the bedroom to look for the keys. Natalie's eyes opened as she frowned firmly. "Oh no you don't."

Fritz was almost considering trying to hotwire the car. He was capable of doing that much and not exactly thinking straight, so it almost seemed like a rational idea. Currently he was still looking through the drawers underneath the phone table. "Didn't I have a spare?" He sighed, sat upwards, and turned around to search somewhere else. Instead, he came face to face with Natalie, who was now standing behind him with the most disapproving look she could muster. Fritz blinked and stared questioningly, but then slowly realized she had come to get him. "…I can come back sooner."

"Yeah, I think that's a good idea," Natalie agreed. "How about thirty seconds? That should give you long enough to get into the bedroom."

"Natty-."

"No. You're going to bed," Natalie said firmly.

"I need to strike while the iron is hot," Fritz insisted. "I can write animatronic code in my sleep. It won't be that demanding." She looked unconvinced and he had an epiphany. "…You hid the keys."

"The fact that it took you that long to realize that shows you're not fit to be awake all-night poking at robots. Let alone drive," Natalie insisted, crossing her arms over her chest. "Are we going to do this the easy way or the hard way?" For a moment it almost looked like Fritz was planning to continue protesting, but then all at once he gave in, seemingly realizing that he didn't have a chance.

"Okay. Let me just write this down," Fritz agreed. He started to jot down a note on the pad beside the telephone. He squinted at the paper, vaguely noticing that he was having a little difficulty focusing. "Maybe she's got a point about this no sleeping thing…" Natalie waited with him, suspecting that he would still try to slip away, and got a tiny smile only once he started heading back to the bedroom. She followed behind and gently guided him with a hand on his back.

Once in his bedroom, Fritz removed his jacket and shoes, and then collapsed onto once more. Natalie got back into bed as well and hugged onto the man, as though to hold him in place in case he tried to run away. She had started to miss holding onto him at night.

That night, Fritz slept well.

"So, I don't know what you said to her, but she's not letting me off the hook," Fritz told Mike. "I don't even think she's going to let me go to the warehouse after work. I'm pretty much grounded until I've caught up on my sleep."

They were currently replacing a tablecloth that had gotten drenched after an entire group of soda cups were knocked over onto it. It was just after three o'clock, which was usually the busiest time of the weekday, but the only party of the day had already passed. So regardless of the multiple kids and occasional parent, they still moved to replace the tablecloth before it either got more stained or someone complained about the dirty table. Fritz folded up the stained one as Mike laid out the new one, rushing to do so while Foxy and Marionette had the attention of the children drawn away.

"It was bound to happen eventually with the nights you were pulling, and if I wouldn't have told her then you'd probably still be down there with Baby," Mike said as he wiped the wrinkles out of the tablecloth. "Baby can wait, you know. She's not going anywhere anytime soon."

"Yeah, but I'm not either if I don't do something about that programming," Fritz quipped. He paused a moment, contemplating voicing more, and then leaned further over the table to do so. "It's not even that I really want Baby awake again. I think we can all agree that Baby's a liability, programming or not. If she wanted to, she could find a workaround and do whatever she wanted to." Mike nodded in silent agreement. "But I need to figure out this workaround anyway, in case there's- let's say- something in Foxy that gets activated. I need to be able to fix it."

"You'll figure it out. Afton wasn't some sort of mechanical genius, he just hid everything well," Mike insisted. He refused to give William that amount of power. "You'll get this, Fritz. Baby's just hard to crack. Maybe you'll be able to program that Magic Puppet Box to do something."

"Wait, we're using that?" Fritz asked in confusion. "I thought you were going to buy it for spite."

"Eh, I haven't decided yet. It really depends on what kind of mood I am whenever we get over there to pick it up," Mike excused. In reality, he wanted to find a use for the Puppet doppelganger so that he could use it as a proper excuse and deny the current 'jealousy' belief. Between periods of worry about the children and pretending not to acknowledge it at all, Marionette had decided to continue his light teasing on the topic. Mike would prefer even a poor excuse to admitting to it.

"So, what are we doing with the menu?" Mike asked, deciding to change the subject while he still could. "Pizza, cake, and ice cream is only going to get us so far. We only have like six toppings anyway, so we're not getting much variety out there. Not that the kids care, but considering that we're taking home the leftovers… I think if I have to eat pizza for dinner one more time, I'll be off the stuff for good."

"You know, you don't have to take it home… But yeah, I'm getting tired of it too," Fritz admitted. "I don't know. I was thinking maybe burgers and fries, but then we get to risk the kids dropping tomatoes onto the arcade machines and getting everything greasy…" He sounded disgusted by the thought of wiping down the controls every few hours. "I can imagine it now: me scrubbing at the buttons with a toothbrush."

"They're already eating pizza and that has plenty of grease. I don't know, what about hot dogs? Less prep work." Mike then cut in before Fritz could give his opinion. "What about corndogs? They're on a stick, they aren't going to spill everywhere," Mike said. "And it's not like it's going to stain if it hits the floor. Not if we skimp on ketchup."

"Good idea, but I don't know how I feel about having Tabby around scalding hot batter. I think we all know that she wouldn't be afraid to use it."

Mike gave a small smirk, "Like I expect us to make fresh corndogs. I just meant we could get one of those boxes of fifty from the supermarket and nuke them in the microwave." This got an unenthused look from the technician. "Alright, we'll do it less sleazy way. We'll just stick to the hotdogs and eighty-six the corndogs. No batter, still less of a mess. Happy?"

"…I still feel like we're contractually obligated to have a salad somewhere on the menu," Fritz pointed out. "Maybe just get a salad bar and forget the hunks of heavily processed meat."

"Yeah, that's what a kid's pizzeria needs: a salad bar," Mike sarcastically quipped. "Fritz, you know those kids would be wrist deep in ranch dressing before you could even say…" He trailed off for a moment. "…How exactly did we go from talking about robot repair to spending an obscene amount of time discussing whether or not we need a salad bar?"

"You changed the subject because you didn't like me asking about your new puppet," Fritz said bluntly with the slightest smirk. Mike decided that he much preferred the half-asleep Fritz to the awake one.

"…Alright, back to food then." Mike sent a glance over towards Jeremy, who was keeping watch of the Minireenas while a gaggle of kids stood around her. "Think Jeremy would have any say on the subject?"

"Probably, but he's been pretty quiet for the last couple of days. I think the animatronics are wearing him down… I'd ask him about it, but I'm afraid he's going to try and pawn one off on me," Fritz admitted almost sheepishly. "Maybe you could?"

"Because he hasn't already tried getting me to take the Balloon Boy Puppet," Mike sarcastically quipped. He then exhaled wearily and decided to agree. After all, he didn't want Jeremy to suffer in silence. "Yeah, I'll go scout it out."

"Great! Worst case scenario, you get another puppet living with you… Not that I think you'd mind that." Fritz smiled wider at Mike's immediate glare. "Just think of it as you and Mari having a kid," he added, then made a hasty retreat as he toted the tablecloth away. Mike didn't even have time to consider a response and wouldn't risk saying anything loud enough that the children could hear. He instead continued over to Jeremy and waited until he was free to talk.

"So, Jere, what's up? You've been pretty quiet recently," Mike said as he turned to watch the dining room. He couldn't help but be a little paranoid, but it was his job to be. Jeremy didn't seem too surprised or flustered by the questioning and spoke as he worked to straighten the Minireenas' dresses. It was clearly Daisy who he was fussing on now from how eagerly she let him work.

"I've been a little tired. I'm moving soon," Jeremy abruptly revealed without much prodding. Mike was generally surprised that all he needed was to be asked once to open up about what was going on. Then again, it was easy to forget that unlike Mike, Fritz, and possibly both animatronics, Jeremy was much more forthright about what he was feeling. Usually, the blond wouldn't let a problem sit and stagnate for too long. "It's a lot of preparation. I've got to move everything… And everyone too. I didn't really think about that… And I have to find a place to move to too."

As soon as he said 'moving', Foxy, who was standing on the stage, suddenly twisted his head in an unnatural angle to stare in the worker's direction. The children he had been performing for looked startled by the abrupt shift of his head and looked to be on the border between silently staring and outright screaming, as the head was in such a weird angle. Mike was shocked at their silence; just seeing the motion out of the corner of his eyes was uncanny.

"Uh huh…" Mike slowly coaxed. He said nothing about Foxy's miniature episode. "How far are you going?"

"Hopefully closer. I don't want to make the drive any further, but if I have to keep all of us in one house much longer… I think Max might kill me in my sleep just to make sure I don't bring anyone else home…" Jeremy gave an awkward laugh, "So, uh, he's banned Foxy from the house until we either lose some people or get more rooms." Max had the ability to do it too. As silent as he was most of the time, he could screech like a banshee when irritated.

"Ah, got it." Mike saw Foxy's head snap forward again and listened as he continued his routine. The children looked very confused but looked a little less like they were about to cry. Mike resisted the growing urge to flat out laugh at the scenario, or Jeremy would know that he was partially distracted. "If you need help finding a place, I'll keep an eye out."

"That would be great, actually! Just- Just remember I'm not exactly… If I'm going to afford a house, it's either going to be broken, haunted, or someone died in it," Jeremy remarked as he stood and turned towards the security guard.

"That's how I got mine. It works," Mike quipped. Jeremy noticed his smirking towards Foxy and looked questioningly. The security guard waved it off, "Don't ask. It's not worth it."

While things in the rest of the pizzeria seemed much less tense, Marionette was in a constant state of unease in the Prize Corner. He didn't feel comfortable leaving the room any longer- he managed to get through most of the day before needing to retreat- but he didn't feel comfortable staying still either. He was constantly moving between the box and the counter, circling the miniature track, and giving himself distractions to make it through the day.

Marionette was back in his box but was tempted on getting back out and circling the counter again. It was only then that a child approached the Prize Corner. Marionette was hit with relief when he recognized it as Chrissy who was coming through the door. He could already feel a heavy weight off his shoulders, for he had been waiting for her to arrive.

"Hi, Mari!" Chrissy chirped as she nearly skipped into the prize corner. She was toting a handful of tickets with her, so it was clear that she had been here longer than he expected. He now regretted not checking sooner. "Can you count my tickets? I think I got a bunch."

"It certainly looks like you did!" Marionette said as he took the tickets. He counted them quickly and kept the talking going as he did so. "Are you saving up for something in particular?"

"The big Foxy," Chrissy said. She pointed to the oversized plush hanging from the roof. The giant Foxys had only just come in and there wasn't yet a Marionette counterpart. They were softer than the normal plush toys and, as expected, about five times the size. Naturally they would cost more tickets. "Do I have enough?"

"Just about. You're only twelve short, but I think you could probably win that many in one game," Marionette said. She turned and was about to silently rush right back out of the Prize Corner to earn the rest of the tickets, but he barely managed to stop her. "Oh, wait! Before you go, I have something to show you." He set the tickets down inside of his box and retrieved the bracelet out of the box to show her.

"Is it one of those glow bracelets?" Chrissy asked curiously. Marionette supposed that she meant the ones made of glow sticks. "It's pretty. Can you turn it on?"

"Yes, but it's a little different than a normal glow bracelet. Here, hold out your hand and I'll show you." She did so, and he slipped it onto her wrist. Her wrist was a bit too small to hold the bracelet securely, but he wasn't worried that she would lose it. "Now this is a security bracelet. When you twist the metal like this…" He twisted the metal pieces. "It glows! But that's not all it does. It also tells me where you are. So, you leave it off." He turned it back off. "And if you're ever in trouble, you turn it on, and I'll come find you."

"Really?" Chrissy asked in surprise. She looked closer at the bracelet. "How does it do that?" He chimed at how she now scrutinized the bracelet; as though she thought it couldn't possibly be anything more than a normal one.

"There's something inside of it that signals something inside of me and tells me where you are. So, you can't turn it on unless you're really in trouble. Can I trust you with that? It's a very special bracelet and you'll need to be extra careful with it," Marionette explained. He already did trust her but wanted her to understand the importance of the bracelet's use. Leaving it on twenty-four seven would be maddening to deal with, especially if she was outside the building.

"You can trust me! I promise!" Chrissy insisted with a reignited eagerness. "I'll take really good care of it."

"Wonderful! I knew I could count on you!" Marionette chimed. He affectionately ruffled her curls lovingly and beamed down at her. "Now do you have enough tokens to get the rest of the tickets?" Chrissy nodded and showed the remaining ones from her pocket. There were more than enough to secure that she would get tickets. Marionette wasn't entirely sure how she was getting so many tokens, unless she was using her allowance to buy them in bulk, but she had plenty of games lined up in the future. "Very good! When you get them, come back and I'll give you your Foxy."

As much as Marionette wanted to keep her nearby, he knew he couldn't. It was bad enough that he showed her such blatant favoritism in such a dire situation. "Now Chrissy may be safe, but any other child could be taken in her place," he reminded himself. Yet something felt different. For whatever reason, Marionette felt justified in protecting her, as though he believed she was at a significant risk. "…I could have Mike call her mother, but then what if she doesn't let her come back at all? I suppose that's selfish thinking…"

"Hey." Marionette almost was too lost in his thoughts to notice Mike enter the Prize Corner. He shook off the distraction as the security guard approached his box. "You look how I feel," he jokingly quipped. "Everything going that good?"

"It's that obvious?" Marionette asked. He rubbed the side of his mask and tried to reset himself to a default smile once more. "I gave Chrissy the bracelet, so I have some things on my mind."

"Yeah, I saw her wearing it when she came out," Mike said. He seemed a bit concerned, but he covered it much better than Marionette did. If he didn't know better, he would've believed that Mike was acting as calm as normal. "Maybe you need a little air. Want to come out and walk around a bit? It'll give me an excuse to puppeteer you for a couple of minutes."

"Very tempting… Alright," Marionette agreed. He slid out of his box and connected his strings to the track. "But not too long. I have to be here to exchange the rest of Chrissy's tickets. She wants a Foxy."

"Great, because he's barred from Jeremy's house for a while. He ought to find someone willing to take him," Mike joked as he guided the Puppet out. His hand rested on Marionette's back and he affectionately kept him close. Light comfort, but comfort he needed regardless. It was just enough to make him feel a slight bit better.

The rest of the afternoon went surprisingly well. Both Mike and Marionette kept their eyes out and there was nothing amiss. No missing children, no strange people, everything was fine. They had everything under control for now.

But it wasn't the fifth day.

The Puppet was slightly surprised to see that the lights were still on in Magictime Theater. He hovered to the fogged glass windows and wiped away a spot to see with his hands. This is what he got for coming while it was raining. He leaned in and looked through the cleaned glass, and only then did he see the horrors of what rested inside.

Unlike what Mike had said before, there were dozens of puppets that looked just like him. They were all propped up like mannequins all around the arcade, posed as though they were normal humans, and only had slight differences from himself. Some had the wrong paint or unpainted faces, some were too long or shaped oddly, but they were all very similar looking to Marionette himself. He was totally aghast and looked back towards the car with a sharp look.

"Mike, you said there was one!" Marionette called. "You didn't tell me that the entire restaurant was full of puppets!" Mike didn't give much of an answer as he was still getting out of the car. Rolling his eyes, Marionette turned to look back through the window. To his surprise, he now realized that Chrissy was standing inside the window, looking up at him. "What on Earth?" He was only more confused, but he somehow assumed that she must have followed them there. "Chrissy, you were supposed to go home! What are you doing here?"

Chrissy stared up at him with wide eyes and a look of horror. She was frightened of something certainly, and tears were beginning to well and roll down her cheeks. Only now did Marionette notice something serious was happening. He looked around but couldn't find the front door, meaning that he couldn't reach the little girl. "Mike, Chrissy's trapped inside!" But Mike was still stuck in the car and Marionette was still stuck outside the theater.

"Don't panic, Sweetheart. I'm going to get you out of there and take you home," the Puppet called through and attempted to comfort. "You're such a brave girl!" Chrissy was only crying harder when a sudden look of horror overtook her. Her mouth turned slightly into a gritted scowl as her eyes widened at something behind him. There was a peculiar squealing noise as Marionette turned around quickly-.

And proceeded to plummet heavily onto the floor. It was only once his mask thumped against the carpet that Marionette realized he had fallen out of bed and that the whole display had been a vivid dream. For a moment he simply laid there, almost entirely blanketed by the comforter, and inwardly scolded himself at such an embarrassing accident. It was only worse when the bed creaked with weight and he knew Mike was awake.

Mike silently stared down through the darkness for a few seconds before flicking on the light. He then continued to stare at the facedown animatronic as he slowly arched a brow. "You planning on staying down there for the rest of the night?" he asked. Marionette didn't make even the smallest movement as he replied.

"…It would save me the trip back down," Marionette murmured dryly. Mike gave a chuckle and pushed the comforter down before getting out of bed. The animatronic, meanwhile, finally tried to get himself off the floor and looked over in time to watch Mike sit down beside him. "You didn't have to come down here," he quietly pointed out.

"You made it sound so tempting that I couldn't resist," Mike said as he leaned back against the clumped comforter. He looked over the striped one and watched as he moved to sit beside him. It was obvious that whatever the dream was about bothered him, but he didn't want to be too quick to push him. "You really started thrashing for a while there. I had a feeling you were going to go over."

"Then you could've woken me up." Marionette's slightly annoyed tone attempted to cover his embarrassment. It didn't do so. Mike gave him a slight smirk in response.

"And risk taking a punch to the face? I think I'd pass. Besides, I just assumed that you would eventually either wake yourself up or calm back down," the human said with a hint of smugness. Marionette dropped his head onto his knees and Mike snickered again. He put an arm around him and tugged him closer, switching slowly from playfulness to preparing to comfort. "You want to talk about what it was about?" It was only now that the Puppet realized Mike figured out that it was a nightmare on his own. He almost had the urge to shake his head and call it a night, because the continued embarrassment was assured.

"What's there to talk about? Magictime was full of dozens of copies of myself, Chrissy was trapped inside, I think you might've accidently hit me with the car while trying to get out, I might've gotten rugburn on my mask," Marionette quickly rambled, "…And for some reason you refused to get out of the car."

"Sounds eerily similar to real life," Mike noted. Seeing that Marionette didn't seem too upset by the nightmare and was more frustrated with it, he decided to keep the less serious tone. It tended to work better in these situations. Making too big of a deal out of it could only make the Puppet more anxious. Especially since it was clearly some sort of twisted conglomerate of recent stress rather than a premonition of something to come. Instead, he decided to work with the more physical problems. "Here, let me see," he coaxed. He lifted his puppet's chin to look over his mask.

"No scrapes, no smears, no scratches; you look perfect, Doll… Except that sour look, but I think I can fix that," Mike lightly teased. He leaned in to gently kiss him and was rewarded with a low trill as the Puppet nearly melted into putty. He drew back slowly. "There. Much better."

It certainly did make it better. Marionette might've been ashamed of plummeting off the bed, but he wasn't ashamed in faltering to the affection. He didn't even try to resist the warbling from inside and merely accepted it as a respite from the recent stressors. There was too much on his mind, too much going on, and too much that he couldn't control; he needed a few moments without any of it. As Mike cupped his mask in his warm hands, Marionette was beginning to forget the importance of the dream. Or at least was letting it slip into his subconscious mind instead.

"Let's get back in bed. We can wall you in with some pillows to make sure you stay on this time," Mike offered. Marionette nodded with continuing chiming. He liked the idea of getting off the unfavorable floor and back into bed. He rose and glanced over the bed and noticed something was missing.

"Did you see where Moppet went off to?" Marionette asked. He was certain that the young cat had been laying on the foot of the bed, but now she was nowhere to be seen. "I hope I didn't knock her off."

"No, I felt her run off afterwards. I think the thump spooked her… Oh wait, there she is." Mike squinted in the direction of the laundry basket, which the cat was now sitting in. She was still awake and looked to them lazily but didn't look like she planned on returning to the bed. "I'm going to love getting dressed tomorrow and being covered in an inch of cat hair," Mike sarcastically remarked. He then made busy with pulling the comforter back up and laying down the extra pillows on the edge of the bed.

"There we go. This way if you do fall off, the pillows will probably fall first, and you'll have something to land on," Mike suggested. Marionette slipped back into bed and looked to the makeshift border. It seemed like it would be enough. Unless he sprung out of the bed, but if that happened he would just prefer to hit something hard enough to knock himself out than dealing with the full force of humiliation. He had enough of that for tonight.

"It's perfect. Thank you." The optimistic approach felt a little better, though he nervously fumbled with a string from his wrist. "I'm sorry I woke you up…"

"Don't be sorry; that's what I'm here for," Mike assured as he got back in bed. "Besides, it gives me an excuse to hold you close, right?" He flicked off the light and did just that. He wrapped his arms around his Puppet and held him securely to his chest. It was already working like a charm; Marionette could feel himself relax once more. "…But if you do hit me in the face, I'll invoke my right to roll over."

Marionette chimed in amused laughter and turned towards Mike, so that he could hold onto him. Within moments, the dream had gone completely forgotten, along with most of his worries for the evening. Tonight, was a relief.

But tomorrow would come whether he liked it or not.

Mable: And tomorrow we return for another post! Tomorrow, we return to the story! Tomorrow, we get to remember what we wanted to forget.