B18 – THE PERSONAL DIARY OF DETECTIVE PETERSON, LEAD INVESTIGATOR OF THE FAZBEAR MURDERS

[The camera focuses on Jane Peterson, leaning back in a chair with her hands steepled against her chin. She is obviously deep in thought. A faintly accented male voice issues from behind the camera.]

"What's your verdict, Detective?"

"I'm piecing together a timeline. Either some of these people we just interrogated are lying, or these latest events happened very close together." [She massages her temple, as though willing the four conflicting testimonies to sort themselves out.] "Let's think about Antonio first. He claims he'd only been working there for a few weeks, yet Kate Hudson, who had worked there for two months, recognized him from a staff meeting."

"Not inconceivable. Those timelines could overlap."

"Yes, but here's the problem. If we assume that both of these people are honest, we therefore assume that the timelines align leftwise, and Antonio and Kate were hired very close together, with Kate leaving her job a few weeks after Antonio did – she says she stayed for two months, while he only stayed about one. That means the roles of day and night guard were vacated very suddenly and around the same time, necessitating two quick, impulsive replacement hires. Why else would you hire a man with such a pronounced difficulty in managing everyday life and a young college student with no experience whatsoever? Quincey must have needed fast substitutes while he sought out real candidates to fill the void."

"And maybe the same person was working both the day and night shifts, and quit, leaving them both open. So Quincey decided to hire two different people this time, to keep it from happening again."

"I think we're onto something here. We need to figure out why these security positions were so important to Quincey, why they needed immediate filling when there was a vacancy. Look into who worked the day and night shift before Kate and Antonio. Maybe we can pull them in for questioning."

"On it." [Typing is heard.] "Do we know who took on the day shift after Antonio left?"

"Presumably Quincey did it himself. We'll have to ask him to be sure. If he can be trusted, at any rate."

"What about the, er – discovery? The one that started all this in the first place?"

"The coroner placed their time of death around a few weeks ago, which is our window of action. Our problem is that we have so many people either at or around the restaurant during that time, and all of them seem to be mentally unstable, lying about something, or both." [Jane presses her fingers to her forehead.] "I need to think about this. There's got to be an answer that makes all these pieces fit together."

"Mull it over, Sherlock. I'll look up those employment records for you."

[Jane smiles.] "How have you been, Eddie?"

"Just fine." [He chuckles.] "Kids are good. Devon started walking today, and Lily made me a finger painting that can only be described as a smashed tomato fighting another tomato to the death. Obviously I told her she was a Picasso in the making."

"Oh, that's so cute. You'll have to let me come over and see them sometime. I haven't seen them since Christmas."

"They'd love to see you." [Eddie whistles.] "Bingo."

"Did you find our night guard?"

"Yes I did." [He types rapidly.] "His name is Dresden Lockwood. Twenty-four, recent college graduate at the time he took the job."

"No direction, so he went for the first place that would take him," Jane surmised. "Why did he leave?"

"This is interesting. He didn't quit – he was fired. Hygiene concerns."

"What does that mean?" Jane frowned. "We just hypothesized that the security job was important to Quincey, and he desperately needed someone to fill it. Seems odd that he'd fire a security guard over something as trivial as hygiene concerns. Do we have an address? Let's see if we can bring him in."

"Looking that up now." [More typing.] "He lives downtown. We could send a car over."

"Good idea. And in the meantime…" [Jane closes her eyes.] "Do you think Jason Quincey is the killer?"

"I have two theories. Either he's the killer, and he's a bumbling fool who showed us his whole hand from the start and doesn't know what the hell he's doing – or he's not the killer, but a shady man who's got a lot to hide but no motive to murder. He's just covering up for someone else."

"Do you believe that nonsense about haunted animatronics?"

[Eddie laughs.] "Judging from the derision in your tone, you obviously don't."

"Well, I usually entertain paranormal explanations as amusing sub-theories, but in this case… children are dead. They're dead, Eddie, and right under our noses, with more on the way if we're not quick to stop whoever's killing them. Why are we talking about ghosts when there's a real, dangerous psychopath out there who targets our most vulnerable, innocent population? It's just not the time or place for conspiracy theories."

[Eddie sobers.] "You're right. Of course you're right. I'm sorry. I'm trying to find some humor in this, because otherwise I might start crying."

"Me too, Eddie." [Jane leans back in her chair, sighing heavily.] "Me too."

C3 – INCIDENT FILE #842909

Location: Freddy Fazbear's Pizza, Location #42, franchisee Jason Quincey

Date: August 3rd, 19XX

Description: Animatronic "Bonnie" malfunctioned and grabbed the arm of a five-year-old male child during the child's birthday party. When child struggled, the animatronic tightened its grip, bruising child's arm. Required manual turning off of the animatronic to release the child. Child suffered minor abrasions.

Verdict: Fault of franchisee Jason Quincey for inadequate inspection and maintenance of animatronics. Regular inspections will be performed monthly starting in September as part of liability deal to avoid major legal action. Franchisee was charged for one count of negligence, but charge was dropped after franchisee settled with victim for physical and emotional damage out of court for an undisclosed sum.

Reported and signed by: Chief Inspector Markus Diekever

Date of signing: August 18th, 19XX

Incident status: Closed