My Night At Freddy's

Chapter Three: 12:00 AM

Making my way down the dark and shadowy hallway, I was thankful that the owner hadn't shut off the light in my office along with the others as I sat down on the creaky old chair behind the desk. I had yet to read the New Employee Manual, and I had six hours to kill, so I picked it up and read the first page. It said:

To all new employees:

Welcome to Freddy Fazbear's Pizza; a magical place for kids and grown-ups alike, where fantasy and fun come to life. Fazbear Entertainment is not responsible for damage to property or to person. Upon discovering that damage or death has occurred, a missing person report will be filed within 90 days, or as soon as property and premises have been thoroughly cleaned and bleached, and the carpets have been replaced.

Well, that certainly wasn't the kind of welcome that I expected after how cheerful and welcoming the owner had been. This threw up a major red-flag for me, but then I remembered the accident that happened back in 87', and after that the opening statement started to make sense. I mean, that kid's father was hurt really bad by those teeth, so it was only natural that the company would add such an oddly specific disclaimer. So I read on:

Notice to all night employees:

Be aware that during non-operating hours, Freddy Fazbear and other animatronic characters will be left in a free-roaming mode in order to prevent their servos from locking up from being off for too long. There was a time when the free roaming mode was active during operating hours as well, but past incidents have called for a more restrictive policy. Please remember that these characters hold a special place in the hearts of children, so please take care not to damage them.

I had never heard of a free roaming mode for animatronic characters before, but if that was that the company wanted, that's what they wanted. It also explained the accident that happened back when I was a kid, because if there wasn't actually a person inside the Bonnie Rabbit costume, the kid's father would've become frustrated at being ignored. He probably just knocked it off balance, and the teeth came together when they hit the floor. Well, I was satisfied by this explanation, and I was also hungry, so I used making my rounds as an excuse to snag some leftovers from the kitchen.

Taking a quick look at the monitors, I saw that all of the characters were still in their places, and then I left the office. My flashlight plus the security monitors made it easy for me to see, so I went down the hall and into the kitchen where the leftover pizza slices from the buffet were stacked in the fridge. No one would've noticed a few slices missing, so I put a bunch of them onto a paper plate, and was about to go leave the kitchen, when I heard a sound.

It was coming from the dining area, so I looked out over the serving counter and saw Chica Chick start to move. I was well aware of the free roaming mode, but it was still a little disturbing to see a large animatronic character start to move without being told to. I watched as the bird slowly waddled across the stage, and then she started down the stairs. I thought for a moment that she was going to come toward me, but instead she turned right and headed for the back stage area.

The character also carefully avoided all of the tables and chairs on its way, so I started to wonder about just how advanced their programming was. If they could see and avoid objects, was the same true with people? I couldn't remember much about how interactive the characters had been with people when I was a kid, and it would've been interesting to see what they would do with a person who wasn't trying to get into a fight with them. But on the other hand, I was really hungry, so such scientific experiments were forced to wait.

Moving back to the office and sitting down in the chair, I looked at the monitors while starting to eat my dinner. The pizza was just as low quality then as I remembered it from back in the 80's, and I wasn't worried about eating it cold, since this place had never heated up anything properly. At least they still used canned soda, which was impossible to mess up, and I had used my free hand to grab a six pack of whatever generic brand of orange soda it was in the fridge.

On the monitor I watched Chica as she slowly wandered around the back stage area, and I didn't think anything of this until she stopped and slowly turned toward the camera. I had always thought it was funny how they put a large bib on her that said LET'S EAT!,but now this as well as the fact that her beak was full of teeth for some reason, was pretty disturbing. The character just stood there, staring blankly into the camera. It wasn't enough to stop me from eating, but it did disturb me enough to look at another camera where Bonnie Rabbit was starting to wander around on the stage.

Freddy Fazbear remained motionless, and the curtains on Pirate Cove stayed closed, which left Chica and Bonnie as the only things moving in the restaurant at the time besides myself. Eventually Bonnie left the stage as well, negotiating the stairs and then avoiding the tables just as well as Chica had done. I almost expected the character to hop around like an actual bunny, but instead it waddled a bit just like the other one as he turned left and headed toward the restroom hallway. The next screen showed Bonnie entering the hallway, and I thought he was just going to pass through, when suddenly he turned and walked into the girls' restroom.

To be fair, there was no one in the restaurant, so there was no need to rush down there and shoo the large rabbit out of the stalls, but still it bothered me that it was programed to go in there in the first place. Maybe it was just an oversight made by the programmer, but still the idea of one of them wandering into the bathrooms during daylight hours was disturbing. But that was for management to deal with, and I was just part-time security, so what did I know?

Eventually Bonnie came back out of the girls' restroom, and as I expected, immediately went into the boys. He spent just about the same amount of time in there as he had in the girls' room, and came out just like before. Now he started moving through the rest of the hallway, but stopped and looked into the camera once he got closer. Just like Chica, Bonnie stared blankly into the monitor in a way that it almost felt like the character knew I was watching him. Chica was also still staring into the camera in the back stage area, and it honestly felt like they were looking at me, but that was ridiculous.

Animatronic characters could avoid objects and even interact with people, but they couldn't understand how security monitors worked. Could they?