Peyton's brain shook her body awake for one last effort at escape. Springtrap advanced on her wordlessly, a wolf closing in on his doe. She scrambled down the vent shaft, but it was dark and she didn't know the lay out. Springtrap's heavy body banged in the metal casing, but he was sure footed and Peyton knew she couldn't run forever. In her escape, her blood ran cold. The vent shaft she would exit from, needed the face to be unscrewed. She didn't have that time. Peyton silently sobbed and banged her fist on the floor. She turned around in the vent and faced her reaper.

"I can't get out. You already know that you've won." She spoke to him in a somber, apathetic tone. He was close enough now that his eyes illuminated his face. He gave her a slight nod.

"I know. Come, dove." His tone was full of respect and admiration, and he gently wrapped his fingers around her ankle and tugged her like she was a sheet of paper. Peyton tried to keep composure, but soon her body was under the rabbit's, his silver eyes burning a hole into her soul. He held himself up on top of her, brushing the hair out of her face. Her face was clammy and cold with sweat and fear, and she was the most beautiful goddess he had ever seen. He could not imagine a more perfect prize.

Peyton tried to hold his gaze but her eyes stung from tears and eventually she broke down completely. She shook her head fiercely, her hands on his tattered chest, grasping it like a child clinging to their mother.

"S-Sp-Springtrap please… Please don't hurt me." She sobbed into his chest, almost hugging him in desperation.

Springtrap wrapped his free under her waist and pulled her into him.

"Shhh… Shhh. Don't cry, dove. You know that I love you."

He allowed her to weep into his body while he nuzzled into her neck and cooed to her soft words. After she calmed, he looked at her with smoldering emotion. He rested his smiling mouth on her forehead as if it he was kissing it, and set her back down on the vent floor. He crawled backwards, down her body and once again gently grabbed her ankle. She didn't fight as much after his comforting, but she was still tense.

"Can't I crawl out myself?" She asked with the voice of a mouse.

Springtrap was facing the exit, turned away from her. He didn't speak, but gave her ankle a little squeeze as his response. She gave up and just laid there, accepting her fate. When they exited the vent, Springtrap stood up while Peyton remained on the ground, not wanting to provoke him. He extended his hand and she took it feebly. She looked to him and his eyes still held that emotion in them, enough to make her calm. No one had looked at her with such importance and it made her body confused. He leaned down and picked her up in his strong arms. She shivered, suddenly aware that he cut the power an hour ago and the chill of winter was creeping into the building. He carried her through the halls like she was his new bride, and she enjoyed the warm hum of his chest. He turned into one of the rooms near the back of the attraction and opened a hidden door, one you couldn't see if you weren't looking.

Inside was a small room, with a single light, chair and a workshop table. There were some animatronic parts in boxes but it was mostly neat and in order. Springtrap must retreat here, she thought to herself. The inner wall was covered in tally marks and scratched out notes. He set her down on the chair, reached for a chain before pausing and looking over at her. His ear twitched and he growled,

"Don't move."

She nodded, not feeling as a rebellious as she did earlier in the night. He leaned over for the chain and return to kneeling in front of her. She looked at him once more, and spoke into the empty air,

"Do I have to be chained? You've caught me and I'm not going anywhere. It's very cold." She looked at the ground as she spoke, small and feeling outspoken.

Springtrap hummed at this, truly considering her escape and the hassle it would be chase her down. "You can stay free while I'm here with you, if I leave, you're strapped down." Peyton once again nodded and stood up to examine the room in freedom. Springtrap rested his weight against the door and watched her silently, allowing her this small mercy without a second thought.

"Springtrap?"

"Hm?"

"Why me?"

"What?"

"Why did you pick me for this? Isn't that selfish of you? Why don't I have a choice?"

"What do you mean, why you? Who else was coming through here, dove?" Peyton tried not to be offended by this, as stupid as that was. "I suppose you could call it selfish… But who chose for me to live this life? Didn't He who made the lamb," he eyed her up and down, "make me? Walking the fleeting line between alive and inanimate. I will never be able to truly feel anything. I will never feel the breeze, or have a wife or children. I will never eat, or fall asleep in a bed. I can't even feel when something is touching me."

"What do you mean, you can't feel something touching you? Like at all?" Peyton asked.

"Not at all." Springtrap grumbled back.

Peyton walked over to him, intensely curious about his dilemma. She held out her hand, and he put his up to hers. They locked eyes for a moment before she looked back down at their hands.

"Can… Can you feel that?" She asked softly.

"Mmm... No. Well, yes and no. I know something is there, that my body is touching another object. I can feel how warm you are, but I can't appreciate it how I remember he did in his memories. It's not real sensory information, it's just… information. Kind of like touching everything around you, but with gardening gloves on."

"It sounds like to me, that you want humanity at the end of all of this. Like you crave to be human." Peyton answered, confident on her reading of him.

He scoffed. "Human? No, not a chance, you're very… breakable." He drew the last word out like it was a delicacy, clearly it was pleasurable. "But humanity? I guess certain elements. I want to be loved, I want to love. I want to experience companionship," he saw Peyton open her mouth with hope in her eyes, like she would utter everything he needed to hear not to be the big bad wolf anymore. Like she could fix him. "But I'm selfish, dove. I know what I need, and I know how to get it. Don't worry yourself about things you have no way of fixing."

"I used to feel the same way, sometimes…" Peyton uttered, causing Springtrap's ears rise to attention. "I used to feel like I was selfish in my love, that my heart was incapable of letting anyone in. That had to be why no one tried to get in, no one seemed to notice me. My mom died giving birth to me, and my father never forgave me for it. He shipped me off to living with my grandmother, who died a few years back. After that, it seemed like I disappeared off my family's radar. It's hard to find a sense of identity when the only person you exist to is yourself."

"You exist to me… Very much so." Springtrap answered her.

She smiled in sadness at him, thankful for his response. "What's one thing, you've always wanted to experience about humanity?"

He thought long and hard, unsure what to pick out of the thousands of desires he had acquired over the 3 decades he'd been alone with the mind of that human. After a moment, he finally decided on an answer, completely sure of himself.

"I've always wanted to watch a movie." He answered, full of passion.

Peyton tried to stop it before it started, but she couldn't. She threw her head back in laughter, completely taken aback by such an innocent answer by such a menacing creature. Springtrap's ear twitched, and he shifted his weight, feeling something akin to embarrassment.

"I'll tell you what, Springtrap," she replied, smiling at him, "if you let me go tonight, I'll bring you a bunch of movies tomorrow and we can eat popcorn and have a movie night."

Springtrap mulled over the thought. She could be lying. She could be trying to leave and never come back, why would anyone come back after tonight? That would be the smart thing to do. He looked over at her wide smile, it seemed so believable. It was the first time a human had treated him kindly since his days with the children. He was playing a dangerous game allowing himself to associate her with any kind of fondness. But he could allow himself this one indulgence right? He could use her as a way to experience some of the small things he had always wanted to, that was within her means. And once she couldn't deliver, that would be the end of it. Yeah, that made sense.

"Okay, dove, deal… But you WILL come back, right?" He asked her with bare emotion and concern. She looked at him for a long time, her smiling fading and somberness replacing it. She was so caught up in having someone care about her, she forgot who she was talking to. The machine that came to spill her blood, to rip her life away. He seemed so much like her in his aloneness though, if she could feel this kind of happiness after one REAL conversation with him, maybe he could feel this same? And if he did decide to end things, who would care more than he did?

With a twisted sense of confidence, she nodded. "I will be here bright and early at midnight, DVD's in hand." Springtrap nodded, both of them highly aware of the weight of this deal, the shift in the relationship of predator and prey.

As the night raced towards 6 am, they talked more of what humanity meant, lost in their conversation till they heard someone fighting to get the exit door open from the outside.