Mable: Here we are! Enjoy!
Almost Feels Like Home
Chapter Ninety-Three
Baby watched Charlie climb further into the vent over the door and fought every urge to yank her back down. It wasn't long until she no longer had the chance to do so and could only watch the last glimpse of her disappear into the shaft. Now she was alone out here, unable to follow the Security Puppet to wherever she was going. She almost envied her but didn't know why. It wasn't like she wanted to follow them.
"Well, time for us to get moving! Scott's gotta be here somewhere." Ennard's inappropriately peppy voice snapped her out of her trance. She turned back to see him looking over the security door. He knocked on it and listened for a response from inside but didn't receive one. "Probably not in here. Heh, guess it would be too easy to find him in the first place we checked, wouldn't it?"
"I wouldn't be disappointed. The sooner we find him, the sooner we can leave," Baby grumbled. Ennard tilted his head and slightly 'narrowed' his gaze, getting a doubtful sort of look.
"Are you sure about that? Cause I've got a feeling you'd have a hard time walking out of here without your best buddy safe and sound," he said playfully. She hated that smug look he was giving her.
"I'm not that dependent on Charlie. She was the one who needed my help to get in there," Baby dismissed as she rolled towards the corner by the office. She crossed her arm over her claw and looked down both hallways before giving a small, mechanical huff. "It will take forever to check every room. Try the radio again, maybe it will work now that we're inside," she said.
He agreed and had pressed the button to call through when he suddenly heard a mechanical rumbling nearby. He raised his head and listened closely, then his eyes fixated on a different set of doors nearby.
"That's the elevator," Ennard warned. If not for the chance that it might've been Scott, he would've immediately got him and Baby out of the hallway, but since there was, he instead nudged her back towards the corner. Baby didn't protest this and wheeled back behind it, with the amalgam following suit. Hunching down and watching the elevator with full attention.
Much to his confusion, the elevator doors opened and revealed only part of a lift inside. Almost like it had stopped before it reached the landing. Ennard started to lean out a little more when he heard a voice.
"You've got to be kidding me!"
He perked and looked back to his companion. "Sounds like Mike," he whispered. He cautiously stepped out into the hall and started to walk towards the doors, making sure on the way that Mike was alone. Seeing all those people coming in had only made him more paranoid. He caught a glimpse of the man's hands as he tried to climb up before dropping back inside.
There was another call. "Hey! A little help over here?"
Almost immediately afterwards, Ennard dropped down beside the lift and looked inside. There was Mike standing inside looking disgruntled, understandable considering he was trapped in an elevator.
"Ha ha, hey buddy! What the heck are you doing down there?" Ennard asked, like he didn't already know. The security guard wasn't enthused by the question.
"Isn't it obvious? I'm having a pizza party and everyone's invited," Mike said flatly.
"But in an elevator? Gee, Mike, I don't know if that's a good place for it. There's not enough room!"
"Sure there is. We just line everyone up like sardines and pass the pizza box overhead. It'll work like a charm." Finished with the joke, he grew more serious. "Can you help me out here?"
To answer, Ennard reached a hand down into the elevator and Mike grabbed ahold to get pulled out. The clown slightly leaned on the top of the lift as he started to pull the man out when suddenly the lift shifted down. It was only about an inch, but both tensed up at it. Ennard removed his hand from the top of the lift immediately.
"…Ooookay, let's try this again. Heh… Just don't touch anything," Ennard said as he cautiously reached in with his other arm. He began to pull Mike up quickly before stopping when he realized how close he would be to the top. His wires twisted as he paused and then pulled a little slower. "Okay, easy. Keep your head down and don't move…" Right when Mike's shoulders started to pass the opening the elevator dropped slightly. "I said don't move."
"I didn't move," Mike insisted. He hadn't brushed the top of the lift at all and yet it was still falling. It started to slowly slide down further, and both realized it was soon going to pin him, and that his body wouldn't withstand the weight of the lift. "Quick, pull me out!" Mike blurted in panic.
Ennard instead suddenly shoved him back. The man landed on his feet with a stagger but the sudden shift in weight caused the elevator to shift down until there was only a thin crack left of the landing.
Seeing that his only means of escape had just vanished right before his eyes, Mike was both dumbstruck and horrified by the thought of the lift losing its brakes altogether. He hid both under a frustrated cry of, "Why'd you push me back in?!"
"Sorry, panicked!" Ennard called back. "You just sit tight and I'm gonna find a way to get you out."
"You better…" Mike thought. Because if he didn't, then the outcome of this would either be a sudden death or emergency services having to pry him out. Considering the circumstances, the latter would probably end with him immediately getting stuck in the back of a cop car. Before he could dwell too long, the lift suddenly shifted and slid down another foot, and he grabbed onto the side to steady himself.
There was a creaking and clumping noise as something moved atop the elevator. It was slow, careful, and obviously Ennard climbing on the top of the elevator. Mike was shocked it didn't completely fall at the addition of the animatronic's weight, but he guessed it was because of how carefully the clown was moving.
There was some tapping at a hatch on the roof, some squeaking and twisting, and then suddenly it swung open. Ennard leaned down to stick his head in. "Heh, fast enough?"
"Thank God," Mike muttered under his breath.
"I would, but I think he's pretty much banned from all Freddy Fazbear establishments," Ennard replied as he offered down his hands. "…Don't tell Scott I made that joke. He takes his Sunday stuff seriously."
"My lips are sealed." With that, Mike cautiously walked up to him and grabbed his hands, letting the clown take all the strain in pulling him out. Once he was atop the elevator, he could see what kind of situation they were still in. They were slowly inching down further from the landing where Baby was standing and watching. "I can't even tell if this was rigged or just faulty brakes."
"From what I'm seeing it doesn't look like the breaks are failing. It looks like something's causing 'em to be real soft. Worst case scenario, we slide to the bottom and get stuck down there."
"That's not all that comforting if you knew what I climbed in this lift to get away from," Mike said. He began to take careful steps over the roof of the lift, trying to keep his feet on the more stable looking beams. Even as he did the lift continued to struggle with its own weight and shift downwards. He hoped that Ennard was right and that the real risk was just getting trapped. Just like in the office.
Mike got to the other side without much trouble and began to climb up. Unexpectedly, Baby offered her hand and helped pull him up. Ennard waited until he was up before making his way across as his weight caused it to react more. He crawled over the roof and then crawled up the wall without little change in transition. By now the lift was down so far that the doors kept trying to close and Baby kept having to nudge them open, much to her annoyance.
Once out, Mike looked down the shaft at the elevator. "Either that was supposed to kill me or it was just supposed to feel like it was going to. Could've stopped me from trying to get out on my own if I thought any movement was going to make it freefall," Mike thought. "Why would someone go through the trouble and then make a trap that only looks dangerous? The pipe one was fatal… But the pipe trap took a long time to activate… Was it the computer or moving the office chair that did it?"
"Done and done!" Ennard chirped as he 'brushed off' his hands. "Now you get to tell us where Scott is."
"He's down in the basement with Mari. Some deformed looking Chica chased him off and I had my leg stuck so we got separated."
"WHAT?!" The amalgam stared at him in shock. "Why didn't you tell me?!"
"I couldn't risk you running off and ditching me in the elevator. That's where we're going anyway, right? Let's go, I'll show you the door to the stairs." By now Mike expected that Marionette and Scott had outran Chica considering that he outmaneuvered Freddy so easily. They were big and threatening, but they didn't seem to be nearly as agile or intelligent as even the non-sentient animatronics they ran across before. As he led the way, he dared to ask, "Did you tell Charlie you were coming in?"
"We followed Charlie in," Baby clarified. The man paused mid-step at the comment. "She's in here right now, climbing through the vents, following her friends." Mike spun around and sent her a look of disbelief. Baby would've been amused if not for the circumstances surrounding everything. "I told her it was a bad idea, but she wouldn't listen. At that point it's out of my hand."
"Wait, you're saying she's in the vents? What vents?!" Mike asked. Ennard pointed a thumb back towards the door with the vent open above it. "And her friends are here too?! How many of them?!"
"Too many of them," Baby dismissed. When he started to head back towards the door, she raised her arm to block him. "Don't bother, the door locked behind them when they went through."
"And you were going to tell me this when?" Mike asked with annoyance in place of his concern.
"Now. The moment you stopped long enough for me to speak," Baby retorted. She saw him getting distracted and reiterated, "We need to find Scott first. Charlie can take care of herself."
Mike was just about to argue when he realized he was fighting a losing battle. He knew he would probably need Marionette's help if a circumstance came where he needed to go find Charlie. As for her friends they had to avoid them and get the incriminating forms of Baby and Ennard as far away as possible. He turned back towards the stairway door and quickened his pace.
"But while we're talking about Charlie's friends… Do you know them?" Baby asked curiously as she wheeled after him. "You would have met them, wouldn't you? I'm sure she had a funeral or a death party."
"Death party… Yeah, I guess a funeral is a death party," Mike agreed. At this point he was so distracted with the many issues surrounding him that he had no desire to clarify. Death party would work. "I've met a few of them. I might've met all of them, but I wouldn't go so far to say I know them all by name." He expected her to either ask about Charlie's ex-love interest or her former best friend, but she didn't.
"What about that redheaded one? Do you know him?" Baby asked. Ennard instantly turned to her, still behind Mike, and crossed his arms in a desperate, silent 'no'. "Because he seemed strange to me," she added.
"You mean Carlton? About this tall, red hair, dark clothes? He's here?" Mike scoffed. "What am I saying? Course he's here. That's Detective Burke's son, he probably knows what's going on and came to watch."
Baby stared at the back of his head for a moment as she recognized the name. That redheaded guy, the one who saw Ennard, was a direct relative of the detective threatening to arrest Scott. She instantly swiveled to face Ennard and hissed at him like a snake. Said clown just looked utterly dumbstruck.
"Ha. No, you're kidding…" Ennard anxiously denied.
"I wish I was. All that him being here tells me is that the chances of Burke himself showing up have probably just skyrocketed," Mike muttered. He opened the door to the stairs before looking back and seeing the two behind him. Ennard still staring, left eye slightly twitching, and Baby sending him a look that could cause an ice sculpture to burst into flames. He looked between the two. "…Why? What happened?"
"Nothing! No- Didn't you hear? Heh, Lottie went after them. That's all! She's got us all worried, you know?" Ennard brushed past the man and into the stairwell, where he then hurried down the stairs with an ease that wouldn't be expected from an animatronic. "It's a heck of a thing, really," he could be heard mumbling.
Mike wasn't oblivious but he also wasn't in the position to get into it. Instead he started down the stairs after him when he was stopped by a voice from behind.
"Wait…" He looked back to see Baby standing at the top of the stairs. She looked down them hesitantly before looking to him. "I can't risk making noise, and if I go down by myself…" She trailed off.
He raised his hand. "Say no more." Then offered it to her. It was clear from how reluctant she was that she was embarrassed by this, and yet she still took his hand with hers and started to sidestep down the stairs.
"Easy. There you go, we're almost there," Mike coaxed. Then he got a small smirk and added, "Just take baby steps."
Her eyes flashed onto him and his playful smugness. "If I wanted bad jokes like that, I would've made him come back up and help me," she remarked, gesturing her claw down at Ennard. She tried and failed to cover how embarrassed she really was. Mike only chuckled, which didn't help, and continued helping her down.
It was right when they were near the bottom that Ennard tried to radio Scott again. "Scott? You there?"
This time he finally got a response.
Marionette and Scott had been searching the basement relentlessly. They had been checking every room, even waiting for the Puppet to unlock the locked ones in case Mike had gone inside and the door shut behind him. Unfortunately, these all led to dead ends, and Marionette was becoming more restless with every passing moment.
When he had gotten back into the Furnace Room, he had found both doors shut tightly and Mike nowhere to be seen. Now he clutched Mike's abandoned shoe like he would a plush and continued searching.
Then, without warning, the radio came to life. "Scott? You there?" It was so sudden and loud that Marionette jumped and Scott gave a yelp. He fought to get under the suit he was still wearing and got the radio out.
"Ennard! It's me, I'm here!" Scott eagerly answered.
"There you are! Finally! Heh, you had me worried there for a while! I've been calling to you for a while now, but I wasn't getting anything back," Ennard said, sounding relieved to hear the man's voice.
"Same. I think something's wrong with the connection down here. Anyways, listen, I'm down in the basement with Mari and there's animatronics in here. Dangerous ones, and we can't find Mike."
"Guess I beat you to it then, cause he's right here!" Marionette, who had been keeping an eye out, spun around to face Scott and listen. "Just pulled him out of a sliding elevator, so I guess I'm the big hero of the day this time. Maybe I deserve a reward for my valiant effort. I could reeeaally go for a pizza party right now.~ Whaddya think about you, me, and a pepperoni pizza?"
"Ennard…" For a second it almost sounded like Scott was going to be exasperated, but then he began to smile a little more. "It's good to hear your voice." Ennard gave a contented hum instead of a boisterous response, showing without words that he agreed. "Where are you two?" Scott asked.
"Three, Baby's here too. We're just coming down the stairs now," Ennard explained. There was a creaking noise through the radio as he headed through a door and into the hall outside the stairwell.
It was just at that moment that the man heard something further down the halls. He blinked and listened closer, and sure enough he could hear footsteps.
"I think I hear you!" Scott exclaimed in relief. If he listened closely, he could still hear the footsteps through the crowded hallways. "Are you walking around now?"
"Yeah, that's me! I'm comin' to find you, just stay put!"
"Scott, I don't think we're that close to the stairs…" Marionette warned warily. He couldn't tell from this distance, but he thought the footsteps didn't sound entirely like Ennard's. "I don't think that's him."
But Scott was desperate to get out of the basement and to the safety that Ennard and Baby would provide. He knew they would be safe once they got back together. He continued to follow the light thumping through the hallways, the echoing sound of footsteps, and raised the radio again. "Still walking around? You're sure?"
"I'm pretty sure I'm walking, ha ha! Can you hear this?" There was a dull knocking and Scott couldn't tell if he heard it in the distance or just through the radio.
Scott was starting to become convinced that the footsteps were Ennard's, especially once he thought he could hear his laugh from outside the radio. He quickened down the hallway, ignoring Marionette's pleads to wait, and circled around the corner only to stop on the spot when he found himself staring at a familiar, yellow, tumor ridden back.
It was the twisted Chica taking labored steps down the hallway, not Ennard. Scott's eyes widened in shock and he went completely still. Marionette came up behind him and stopped short too, just as silent, but that silence wouldn't last. The radio in Scott's hand was a ticking timebomb and he knew at any second Ennard could chatter through and lure Chica right to him. He began to slowly back down the hall in the hopes that he could just barely squeeze out of the hall and avoid a confrontation.
Except that silence was broken abruptly when Scott's suit covered elbow thumped against a rattling shelf. He backed right into it and immediately the mutated chicken straightened and started to turn her head.
Marionette grabbed Scott by the other hand and nearly dragged him back around the corner before looking for an escape. He had just focused his eyes on a nearby door they had passed earlier when he started to hear the chicken's thumping footsteps coming down the hall. Slow and heavy, definitely not Ennard's, but he couldn't blame Scott when he hadn't been sure enough to stop him. He tried the door and when he found that it was unlocked, he outright shoved the older man through and shut the door behind them.
The room was even smaller than the storage room they had been stuck in earlier and almost entirely emptied out. The only furniture was a few shelves and a metal table jammed into the front corner by the door. It was a dead end if Chica followed them in here, but Marionette wasn't ready to accept that. He started to circle the room and searched desperately for a way out. Meanwhile, Scott whispered into the radio.
"Enna-Ennard, you have to stay quiet. We- I ran up on Chica- there's a Chica down here- and it's… It's coming this way…" Scott's voice fell silence and his blood ran cold as he heard the footsteps outside the door.
"What?!" While blurted out in exclamation, Ennard's volume had been lowered to a faint whisper. "I'm coming to get you! Where are you?!"
"I can't-!" With Chica getting too close, Scott was forced to make the decision to shut the radio off. He then looked to Marionette who he noticed had found a vent towards the back corner and was now trying to get it open. He tried to pat himself down for his wallet, but it was trapped under layers of suit, but thankfully he found a quick replacement on the shelf and hurriedly handed it to the Puppet. "Here, try this."
A box cutter. Marionette slid out the blade and realized it could work in unscrewing the vent better than his fingers could alone. He nodded and began to work. By now Chica was right outside the door and it sounded like she was listening in. Marionette and Scott both went still and waited to see what it would do.
It felt like ages before Chica started to continue down the hallway. Scott breathed a sigh of relief and reached under the Freddy head to wipe the sweat off his brow. His heart was pounding so hard that it felt like it would burst from his chest and it was by sheer luck that he took his medicine today or he knew the shakes would've started up. The last thing he needed was to try and escape Chica while dealing with shooting pain.
He noticed that the Puppet was continuing to unscrew the vent. "I think she's far enough that we can leave. We could try that door she was down by," he offered. Marionette shook his head.
"I don't want to risk it. If that door's locked or any beyond it are locked, we'll be cornered again. This way we might lose her for good," he said. It wasn't long after that before he got the vent off and set it aside. He looked at Mike's shoe before passing it back to Scott. "Can you put this in your suit so we don't drop it?"
"Y-Yeah, it'll fit," Scott said as he fumbled with the costume. He managed to loosen the back enough that he could stick the shoe down into the roomier fabric around his chest. "Do you think I'll fit?"
"Absolutely. This vent's wider than the last one." Marionette started to lean into the dark vent and looked around. It was a little bigger than the other one but that wasn't the only difference. He noticed it was colder and the metal paneling on the inside was smoother. Almost like this wasn't designed to be an air duct, but what else it was supposed to be he didn't have the foggiest idea. Regardless, Chica wouldn't fit inside.
Once Scott was in, the two started down the shaft which immediately took a sharp left. The air was still stale but didn't hold that plastic smell from the other one. In hindsight, that might've been the smell of the heater, and he took care to watch for snares and traps. There didn't seem to be any in this shaft, but he was still on guard and too paranoid to let it drop.
They were just about to come up on another corner when Marionette heard a thumping noise from higher up. He stopped to listen and could hear the vents creak, scraping, and it all but confirmed his fears.
"There's something else in the vents with us," he whispered back to Scott. He straightened. "Not Chica. Not Ennard."
"Should we go back?" the man asked. The Puppet didn't answer and instead listened closer. Looking ahead he could see that at the turn there was an open shaft above it, possibly where the noise was coming from. "Mari, what should we do?" Scott asked a little more desperately.
"Shh…" Marionette kept his eyes ahead as he heard the movement above. At first it seemed like it was getting further away, but now he realized it was coming closer to that vertical shaft. Realizing this, he knew they were about to face something worse than Chica. "Scott," he said quietly but commandingly. "Start going back."
Scott didn't need to be told twice. He began to slowly crawl backwards down the vent. The bulkiness of the suit made it difficult to do it, but he made it work if only out of sheer desperation. Marionette stayed crouched in the vent, staring dead ahead, and waited to see what was coming. He thought maybe it wouldn't fit down the vent.
Until a mass of rotten copper-brown fabric and sharp metal came crashing down from above. Most of it was still stuck up in the vent but it clearly had a slimmer form than Chica did, along with a telltale reddish hue to its fabric. Marionette stared in horror and disgust as it twisted its head around with a sickening crack and revealed rows of sharp teeth and reddish-orange eyes. It was a nightmarish Foxy doppelganger, a twisted version of his own brother.
It saw them and spread its eager jaws wide, revealing layers of teeth. Unlike Chica, Marionette couldn't tell if it was looking at Scott or him, but it began to crawl towards them. Its long, sharp hook scraping at the bottom of the vent as it dragged its contorted body, cracking its joints as it moved.
Marionette scuttled back as fast as he could until he ran into Scott. Then he turned over and without a word of warning began to shove the Phone Guy down the vent shaft. All the while they could hear the hideous thing closing in on them, with the only advantage they had being that it took corners just as slow as they did. Every time Marionette looked back; the maw of sharp teeth was closer.
Finally, Scott reached the open hatch and struggled to back himself out. He stumbled back from it and barely regained his footing under the weight of the suit's head. Marionette rolled out of the vent and quickly slid the hatch back into place. He fumbled with the screws and box cutter for only a second before beginning to screw them back into place. As fast as he was working, he could still hear the twisted Foxy closing in.
But he wasn't the only one. Either they made more noise than they thought or Chica hadn't gone very far, because Scott could hear its heavy footsteps bringing it back. His throat ran dry as he turned to Marionette. "Chica's coming back! We have to go!"
"I can't let it get out," Marionette said firmly as he started to screw in the third bolt.
He was only halfway through when a heavy blow struck the vent. The Puppet paused his mission in favor of pressing his back firmly against the grate to hold it closed. That full weight on two screws would only succeed in damaging them and risk breaking the vent open for good. His legs tried to get footing on the floor as he twisted his right arm enough to continue turning the screw.
It was right then that with a loud clatter of metal that the hideous fox's hook broke through the vent, bending the slates as it did so, and hooked around Marionette. The sharp point came right down on his chest as it slammed the puppet back against the vent. If not for Marionette catching the hook with his good hand, it would've speared straight through to his music box.
Scott ran forwards and grabbed at the hook with the costume's thickened fingers and between them they barely started to pull it back. They were starting to get the upper hand, but at that moment Chica finally arrived at the door and started to grapple at the doorknob. Its clawed fingers clattered on the metal as it tried to let itself inside. Marionette looked to Scott and realized that he was intending on staying with him, continuing to fight the hook, but this would soon make him a target. Marionette grabbed his wrist with the boxcutter holding hand.
"Scott, go get in the corner and go still!" he commanded. Scott looked at him and hesitated, and even without seeing his face Marionette knew what he was thinking. "I'll be fine, just please! Please!"
While Scott wasn't entirely convinced, he was out of options and fear made it easy to obey. He released the door and backed towards the corner, dropping down heavily nearly the second the door was finally thrown open. Chica's tumorous girth was so wide that it barely fit through. It stopped inside the door and turned its head slowly to take in the full scope of the room. Its glowing eyes passed right over Scott but failed to recognize that it was the same suit from earlier.
It was then that it noticed the rattling from the vent and looked in that direction. Its eyes were still unfocused, and it only seemed drawn by the sound, as though it didn't even see Marionette and somehow thought the sound of Foxy trying to get through was its human target. It began to slowly close in on the puppet, who was still fighting in his own predicament.
Scott couldn't foresee this going well. Marionette was about to have both animatronics closing in on him and he couldn't escape, elsewise he would've teleported out by now. It was almost like the hook was keeping him grounded in place, and once Chica got involved it was sure to sink deeper. In a moment of panic and protectiveness, Scott realized he had to do something. He climbed to his feet in a few clumsy steps, grabbed the first thing he could see that looked like a weapon- a two-by-four on the floor- and swung at the back of Chica's head.
The wooden object snapped in two as the chicken's head lurched. It did no visible damage, but it stopped Chica's steady pace on the spot. It was as though the beast suddenly woke out of a trance as it turned back to look at the suited human behind it. The pink eyes glowed with lifeless interest and Scott knew that the disguise no longer fooled it.
Scott turned and ran out of the room, knowing that the twisted Chica would be on his heels. Which it was, trudging out of the room and quickening its speed to a light jog as it tailed him. Marionette felt a surge of panic as he knew that if that door at the end of the hall was locked then the man would be cornered. He had to get away from Twisted Foxy, especially since the point was stabbing further into his chest. He worked quickly to finish screwing in the third bolt and hoped that much would hold.
Now he had to get out from under the hook. First Marionette tried to twist out while pulling the hook back, which only barely loosened the grip but not enough to free himself. Forcing himself at this rate would gouge into his fabric. Behind the grate he could hear its heavy body moving and could imagine the outline of it, and then realized that he could use that idea of where it was to his advantage. He struggled a little more, waiting until Twisted Foxy slid closer to the hatch, and then balled his hand into a fist and slammed it back against the vent.
The blow did little more than rattle the hatch. It was the telekinetic strike it directed that knocked the beast aside. It gave just enough give that Marionette spun out of its hook, sprung off the floor, and took off after Scott and Chica.
Meanwhile, Scott was running for his life, which unfortunately was going a lot slower than he wanted. Chica had knocked down boxes from the shelves and it left the hall like an obstacle course, one that would've been hard enough without the bear suit and a steadily loosening prosthetic leg. Soon he was grappling the shelves and pushing past them like he was swimming; he felt like he was treading water. It was a relief when he arrived at the door and found it unlocked, staggering through and continuing to run.
It was then that he finally got the radio on again and called through. "Hello?! Hello, can anyone hear me?!"
At the time he called, Mike and the clowns had just arrived in an open room with a mock show stage in it. Between the stage and all the props littered around, it looked like this was just a staging area to put together shows before they shipped them out of the factory. There were two different halls leading off from this room, not counting the one they had just come through, and were trying to figure out which way to go to get to their missing companions. Scott's sudden call caught them off-guard.
"Scott?!" Mike answered quickly. He had gotten the radio from Ennard after Scott had been cut off. "Yeah, Scott, we're down here! Where are you?!"
"Running down a hall- Chica's behind me- I don't know where I'm going-!"
But it was then that Mike noticed Ennard perking up. The clown had been listening to the radio call but then, as soon as Scott began rambling, turned his head towards one of the hallways and stared down it like he heard something. Listening closely, Mike realized that he too could hear what sounded like distant footsteps.
"I think I hear you! Wherever you are, keep going!" Mike said before pointing the radio past Ennard and down the hallway. "That's got to be him and he's going to have Chica right behind him!" He braced himself for both to come running around the corner.
What he wasn't braced for was for Ennard to suddenly climb one of the sturdier metal shelves and onto the ceiling like a spider, hanging onto the pipes on the roof. "The hell?" Mike asked in disbelief. Though that thought was short lived when he looked down in time to see a plush looking, humanoid shaped Freddy Fazbear running down the hall towards him. "The hell?!"
"Freddy" ran through the door and threw himself to the side of the door just as the twisted Chica came into view. Upon seeing it, Baby yanked Mike out of the way and took his place in staring down the door, raising her claw and preparing to tear Chica's cupcakes right off its body. Not that she had a chance. The second Twisted Chica squeezed itself through the door and turned herself towards "Freddy", whom she was still fixated on, Ennard dropped down from the ceiling on top of her.
As bulky and large as Twisted Chica was, it was also moderately clumsy, and the addition of that much weight capsized it instantly. Ennard sprung up, standing over it while holding it down, and grappled for the neck. He grabbed it like he was trying to strangle it from behind, but then delivered a heavy shock into its body instead. The results were instantaneous- the hideous creature couldn't handle the electricity and the lights left its eyes the moment it stopped being electrocuted.
Scott waited a second to make sure it wasn't going to suddenly rouse again and once he was sure it wasn't, he finally stepped closer. Both Ennard and Baby turned on him, but not with open arms.
Ennard's recoiled his hands from Twisted Chica with his fingers still sparking like live wires. He stared at the suit with the same aggression he would've sent Chica and it only occurred to Scott then that they didn't recognize it was him- not aware that Mike had told them of another, more dangerous Freddy running around. He raised his hands in defense.
"Wait! Wait, it's me!" Scott choked out He quickly reached up and lifted the Freddy head enough to reveal his face. "I was- I just had to hide from Chica and this was all I had, and it worked for a while… Heh, uh, maybe a little too well…"
"Oh…" Baby seemed a little surprised by it, but she got over it quickly. "Silly Scott; tricks are for rabbits."
Ennard was off Chica and over to Scott's side in a moment's notice. "Yeesh, you could've said something sooner! Sorry Scottie but there is another Freddy running around down here, ya know," he said. He then snatched the suit into an apologetic hug, barely able to feel the man underneath the layers of fabric. Scott tried to hug back but it was awkward in the bulk.
It was then that Mike noticed something out of the corner of his eye and looked over to see something black and white literally fly over Chica. He only had a moment to brace himself enough to catch it, getting spun around by it. Marionette clung to him with eager trills and nuzzled into his shoulder happily. Scott saw the scene and was relieved to see that the puppet was alright. He gave a tired sigh as he drew back from Ennard.
"I'm so glad we found you! It's- This whole place- There's something wrong here… Well, I guess you've already figured that out on your own," Scott said.
"Hmm, I just assumed all Freddy's were like this…" Baby remarked as she looked down at Chica. She then began to scan the room and listen, obviously still on guard. Ennard was the exact opposite.
"You look perfect! Just like a real Freddy Fazbear! Wait, wait, I've gotta check something!" Ennard reached up to the top of the bear's head and tapped the nose. It gave a squeak much to his amusement. He crackled as Scott kept his small smile of relief, which stayed even when the clown pulled him into a tight hug again. Except then Ennard slid his mouth close to his ear and lowered his voice. "It didn't touch you, did it?"
In a heartbeat his tone had changed from happy-go-lucky to something much more protective and sobered. Scott shook his head. "No, it just chased me around. The usual."
"Good… I'm… I'm sorry." Ennard's voice completely changed. "I know you didn't want me to co-ome in."
"It's okay. I'm glad you did… I wouldn't have last much longer at this rate," Scott assured him. He was pretty sure it was the truth too.
On the other side of the room, Mike and Marionette were having a similar moment of their own. "I'm so glad you're alright! When I came back and found you gone… I knew you must've got away, but it scares me to lose track of you in a place like this," Marionette admitted as he drew back. His smile became more strained. "You don't want to know what we found in the vents…"
"It'd take more than some overstuffed Dry Rot Freddy to take me out. Or Chica," Mike assured. He then sent a sideways glance towards Chica. "Especially now that we know they can't take a controlled shock."
Baby looked between the two couples and started to become impatient. "This is all very sweet, but we still have a problem. Five problems. Five of Charlie's problems." Marionette looked confused at the comment. "Charlie's friends are here, upstairs, and she's following them. And evidently one of them is the son of the detective whose following us…" She gave a slow leer back at Ennard.
"She wouldn't-." Marionette's thoughts cut off there. As much as he didn't like the sound of that, he knew Charlie. "She wouldn't," he mentally affirmed. He looked to Mike who was pinching the bridge of his nose.
"Yeah, that's still our problem…" he muttered. He gave an exhausted huff and pointed to both Ennard and Baby. "You two are going to have to get out of here before they see you. We'll keep looking around and find Charlie." Mike looked to Marionette with a defeated look, "As for finding anything to clear my name that's going to have to wait." Marionette nodded in agreement, just as disappointed.
"Then you're going to need this and this," Scott said as he handed over his radio and Mike's shoe. "Not sure if the radio's going to do much in here, but if you're out of the basement it should work." Scott then replaced the Freddy head and looked to Ennard to lead him to the stairs. Baby started to follow before stopping and turning back again.
"What did you find in the vents?" she inquired. Mike also looked curious as he slipped on his shoe and retied it.
"A deformed version of Foxy. Very much like this one, but a little faster and a little more aggressive," Marionette explained. He looked down at the Chica body still unmoving on the floor. In hindsight, she had just been a walking obstacle, but the Foxy one was a threat. "And if there's a Freddy as well then that means there's a Bonnie one here too somewhere. I don't know if they'll be more like this one or that one."
"…That changes things." Baby's tone was unreadable but was enough that Scott stopped and looked back at her. She did the same and addressed her two companions, "I'm going with them. I have to find Charlie."
"Baby, she'll be okay," Scott reminded sympathetically. "Mike and Mari will get her. It's better if you're not seen."
"I'll tell you the same thing I told her: if I collapsed on the floor, I would look like I was abandoned… Not nearly as vile as whatever is already down here, but convincing enough," she added, sending a look of distaste at Chica. "Charlie is the one that will stand out and so will you, Marion. If they don't recognize you then they will notice your clean paint… And everyone knows who you are," she pointedly said to Mike.
"Good point. Doesn't exactly explain why you want to come along," Mike countered.
"You have a taser?" she asked. Mike tapped on it on his belt. "Will you be able to get it onto a vulnerable area as easily as Ennard did? Fabric doesn't conduct electricity." He clicked his tongue; she had a point. "Then you need me. We will go together." To which Mike and Marionette both agreed. If she could reign herself in, she would be vital.
"Just be careful, Baby. Please, we don't want you getting hurt down here. We'll, uh… I guess we'll look around upstairs just in case they're still up there," Scott offered as he looked to Ennard, who nodded. "Just don't get yourselves cornered with that Foxy. He's got a hook on him like a scythe."
They watched as the three turned to the other hall that nobody had ventured through yet. They would have to check the rest of the basement first, just to make sure. They started ahead.
"And watch out for the redhead!" Ennard called after them. He then tried to ignore the look Scott- or in this case Freddy- was giving him. Maybe he could put off that awkward confession until later.
For now, there were more important things to be worried about. Things that made even Chica look small in comparison.
Mable: I decided to spare you the cliffhanger that begged to be put at the end of this chapter. XD… Which means that this victory in defeating Chica might not last long. Let's just hope our two groups of lost souls watch where they step. Anyway, until next week!