It had been so long since Mangle could remember having a body. Having two legs, two arms, a single body to move around, to do what they wanted to do much like their companions. Only a few days ago did the pizzeria decide to change to allow them movement at night, so whoever could move would do so freely. Powering them down for the night drained all of them considerably.
So for a few days Mangle had been dwelling among the streamers, the banners, the beautiful displays of art, hanging down from the ceiling like a serpent, unable to do much more than crawl and slither from place to place. It tired them beyond compare, and it envied them to see the stage trio moving around so effortlessly.
No, this was the final straw.
Mangles problem was the AI setting attached to what used to be their spinal cord, which was still intact due to the fact otherwise Mangle would be reduced to a pile of wires and endoskeleton parts. But the lack of limbs and the destruction on the settings had sent the AI haywire, flipping back and forth between digits and making Mangle switch from dangerous to soft and back again. No one had noticed it before now, not even Mangle themself.
Perhaps it was fate that decidedly switched that dial right up on the very day that Mangles tolerance for lack of movement snapped.
Parents rarely stayed in Kids Cove. There was a guard positioned there to keep an eye on the toddlers, but they tended to drift off a little at their station. Mangle had never been a problem before and so it was unlikely that Mangle would act in a dangerous manner.
Today there were four children in Kids Cove, all young and mindless. The oldest was perhaps around four years old, sat on the floor with Mangles hand clamped in their chubby fists, gnawing at a finger. Usually Mangle expected better from a child at four years old, but with the way the parents were raising kids these days, it probably wasn't surprising to the adults. The other children were stationed around Mangles other limbs, two of them around two years old and one of them at around one and a half years old. Mangle didn't have much knowledge of age in people but they were very small and puny children so it wasn't hard to guess.
Mangles head was left resting on the floor, the endoskeleton tucked behind their neck for safety. The AI container was exposed.
A child clambered over Mangles back to reach for what remained of Mangles leg, putting weight on the container for barely a second before moving away. But it was enough to rattle up the already broken contents, which, for a split second, dipped to zero and shut Mangle off, before whirling around dangerously high. Not high enough to hit 20, but it stopped precisely at 17.
Mangle had never been on a setting higher than 3, or from what they could remember. The staged animatronics usually were higher up, so it was natural to have Mangle built with the same AI system. However, no one knew Mangle would wind up here, and the AI was forgotten for the time being.
But now it was up at a high number, and Mangles body shifted with so much free ease that it was a shock. And then in an automated attempt to get up to perform as was programmed, Mangles head swung up and the shoulder remaining in place pushed backwards, causing Mangle to practically curl up.
The children let go of the limbs, staring at the moving animatronic with childish wonder. Mangle was losing ability to stand, with no firm hips to support the legs anymore. The remaining leg was kicking visciously and the hand that had been in the childs hands was currently scratching at the floor in an attempt to get up. Mangle was programmed to stand due to the potential error of falling over and not being able to get back up, but now it was literally impossible.
But the controls didn't notice Mangles inability to stand up, as it almost expected Mangle to be on their feet by now. The automated endoskeleton inside of Mangle forced the head up, but Mangle was still swinging back and forth in an attempt to stand that it wasn't surprising that the body collapsed again, skull swinging back down.
The endoskeleton began to speak the rehearsed dialogue, and, unfortunately since Mangles head had remained intact unlike the rest of the body, the jaw of the animatronic fox began to move in tow, speaking what attempted to be their characters lines, but now resembled nothing more than static sounds.
The head shifted again, and one of the two year old children made the mistake of shifting closer, still remaining curious and reaching up towards the head excitedly. Tubby fingers curled around the underside of the jaw, but the child didn't realise the error of their movement.
Mangles head jerked into the direction of the child, who had pulled the face closer, and without warning, the dialogue drew to conclude, causing the jaw to swing up again and clamp.
There was no screaming, not from this child or any other, who didn't understand what was going on. It was entirely luck that Mangles teeth hadn't been fully over the infants head at the time, only the front teeth catching. There was still a crunching noise as the front of the skull cracked upon impact, Mangles front teeth slicing into the frontal lobe not deep enough to tear it out but deep enough to cause a dent in it that bloomed vast amounts of blood. It poured down the childs face and swirled around Mangles lower teeth, which were luckily incapable of meeting the front teeth to entirely bite down.
Red stained the floor, Mangles remaining arm, and the pure white paint on Mangles jaw. But the dialogue was then drawing conclusion, and Mangle had to let go and fall back before it entirely stopped, leaving the child collapsed on the floor.
The dent that Mangle had left resembled a line rather than individual toothmarks, and blood filled into it as the crying of the other children finally brought the guard running. Luckily he wasn't the kind to be an idiot on duty and he fled to report the accident quickly, bringing back paramedics and the childs weeping parents.
No one stopped to question Mangles involvement, as the animatronic lay unnoticed on the ground. It was only when the family had left to flee to the hospital quickly did the manager step in, pulling up the broken animatronic and checking the AI, which had fortunately swung back down to 0.
Certainly this would cause business problems, so the manager dismantled Mangles head for the moment in order to bleach and wipe clean the jaw. No one had confirmed Mangles involvement, so it would be best to leave it as rumors and encourage them just as that.
When Mangles head was reassembled, it was fixed to stop the teeth from ever meeting, giving the head a looser jaw, and a parting between the teeth to stop them ever clamping together. Filing had rounded Mangles teeth in order to stop them from looking so threatening, and when the workers were done with fixing it up, it seemed impossible for Mangle to bite again. Mangle brought in more attraction - more mothers to leave toddlers here during work. The staff stationed to keep an eye on Mangle was doubled for a time, and the AI gauge on Mangles back was stiffened so that moving by itself was almost impossible.
And until the nights, Mangle was lifeless in the hands of children, pulled around and played with innocently. The idea of Mangle biting the child now was considered merely a rumor, and the doctors, who claimed that Mangle would have bitten right through, suggested that it wasn't Mangles doing. But Mangle grew unpopular from the lack of fact about what really did cause the damage, and while it remained a mystery, it remained a joke to call it 'The bite' from all the rumors of Mangles part. It reached a point where the staff began to jokingly call Mangle 'The mangle' not only for the broken limbs but for what had happened.
The family never returned, convinced of Mangles part, but their child survived thankfully. From a child it grew up under close monitoring by the hospitals, and the child grew to be more aggressive, with less control of their emotions and with no recall of what had happened. The frontal lobe had been damaged beyond repair.
But for Mangle, suddenly the freedom to move at night didn't seem so bad after all.