A/N: So, remember that promise I made last week about short and concise chapters? Neither do I! No, seriously, the chapters will be in the 2250-2750 words range, roughly, but they will be more concise. By the way, thanks for the views, follows, favs, and comments so far! It really warms my heart.

Something important now: from now on, new chapters will be uploaded each Sunday at 10 PM GMT. If anyone has any serious reasons why this shouldn't happen, please let me know in the comments. But enough of that, enjoy your new chapter :)

Chapter 4: A rude awakening

The first thing I felt was the cold, hard floor I was lying on. "Great," I thought, "rolled of the bed again." Far off in the distance I heard some traffic, and the faint chirping of birds. Still not opening my eyes, I tried to make sense of the flood of images that came upon me. "Hmm…" I growled in my mind, "What a nightmare." It was then that I opened my eyes lazily, and saw that there was a pool of dried blood under me.

I looked around the small, dark room I had never seen; panic slowly taking over. For one moment, I tried to take deep breaths to calm myself down. Then I realized, that I couldn't breathe. Now completely taken over by panic, I tried to stand up, but my body just wouldn't coordinate. I fell down sideways on top of one arm, the other one stretched out behind me.

My body…

Every little piece of me felt clunky and rigid. I tried to breathe a few more times, feeling how my mouth opened and closed robotically. Nothing. After a few moments, my panic turned into a weird curiosity. Deciding to ignore that I hadn't breathed in three minutes, I began to move my free arm behind me. It jerked violently on the floor as I tried to bring it over myself. "Alright Brandon," I thought, "easy does it…" With sudden dexterity, I laid an arm in front of my face. A cold, metallic purple arm and its four-fingered hand that I knew very well.

"No…" I whispered in disbelieve. I could hear my words in my head, but there wasn't any real sound coming out of my mouth.

I had drawn this arm, taken pictures with it, and once got grounded by Mom because I tugged at it.

"It's… no…" I said flatly, shaking my heavy head, feeling how things inside me twisted and turned with a soft screeching noise. "It can't be."

Horrified, I saw how the blood-stained arm obeyed every single command I gave it. But it wasn't my arm.

"NO!" I shrieked without making a sound, covering my eyes with Bonnie's arm.

"Guys, I think he woke up!" I pulled the arm away from my face at the sound of my brother's voice in my head, and looked up to the room's only door, somehow knowing that it came from there. "Don, are you okay? Can you hear me?"

With a hydraulic whir, my bunny ears popped up in excitement. "He's alright." I thought, warm relief flooding my cold body. With a little push of 'my' arms I was sitting against the wall. I looked how the doorknob turned and rattled, followed by a flood of white light as the door opened. "I'm here brother!" I said cheerfully, "Glad to see y-"

Instead of Sean, I was greeted by the dark silhouette of Freddy. Lines of dried blood spotted his whole body and drooped out of his mouth, eyes and joints. His eternal grin was stained red, and his blue eyes seemed to glow as he took some steps towards me. Terrified, I crawled backwards, away from the monster in bow tie and top hat that was gaining on me.

"Don, wait!" I heard my brother's voice call out in my head, as Freddy's jaw moved up and down. "Just hear me out!"

"I-It's a dream, j-just a bad, messed up dream…" I whispered in panic as my back hit the corner of the room. "A really bad, really messed up dream..."

The animatronic bear stood still for a moment, a few feet in front of me. "It is Don, I'm sure it is…" My cloudy mind finally registered that my brother's voice was coming out of Freddy's body, but I couldn't hear it outside my own head. I pulled my knees close to my chest as the terrifying figure took another step towards me. "But until we wake up, I need you to calm down, and focus." The figure stretched out his arm to me.

"No! No!" I screamed, seeing how the dark arm got closer and closer. "Go away!" I curled myself up in a corner, and hiding my face between my arms, whimpered softly. I didn't know what to expect from the blood covered animatronic, but it sure wasn't the reassuring pat on my shoulder that I got.

Quivering in fear, I raised my head along with my ears. "Don, it's okay." whispered my brother's voice, as Freddy tilted his head friendly. "I'm here Don, I'm right here. Just look at me in the eyes; can you see me?"

Still afraid, I looked into Freddy's glowing eyes. But there was more than just light coming out of them. The animatronics' eyes were always… empty, and lifeless. Now, staring into the glowing blue orbs, I saw happiness, worry, relief, and the whole spectra of human emotion. But above all; I saw love.

I saw my brother.

"Sean…" I whispered. With rigid mechanical movements the animatronic stood tall and straight, and saluted me.

"Took you a while private!" said my brother playfully, dropping the salute and holding out his hand in front of me. I grabbed it eagerly, feeling my fingers close around his as he pulled me up to my feet, holding me by my armpit.

"Small steps Don, just take your time." I threw my arm around his unfamiliar shoulder, taking a few steps along with him. With each movement, I felt little things all over my body twist, pull, and spin. Somehow, it felt natural. In fact, after a few minutes of aided walking, I was feeling quite at ease in my new body.

"Okay Don, I'm gonna let you go, you ready?" I nodded with confidence, when my eyes suddenly spotted something looking at me from across the room. The moment my brother pulled away his hands I lost my balance. Stumbling and flailing, I ended up hitting the wall quite hard; but I didn't fall down. I was leaning against it, cringing, paralyzed by fear.

"Don! Are you alright?!" called out my worried brother as he rushed to me, his bear ears popping up in alarm. He grabbed me by my shoulders, his eyes reflecting his concern. "What happened? You were doing great."

But I couldn't look at him. All I could look at was the pale face with rosy cheeks and purple tear lines behind him, laughing a mischievous hollow laugh.

"P-P-P-P…" I stammered, pointing a trembling finger at the horror.

"Yes?" sighed Sean patiently.

"P-P-Puppet!"

Unfazed by my reaction, my brother turned around to look at the white head with noodle-like arms and neck popping out of a wooden box in the far corner of the room. Then, he laughed. A lot.

"Ha ha ha! Oh… oh… I'm sorry…" he wheezed, putting his hand on his bear belly. "It's just… hehe… your reaction…" He bent over under the onslaught of another wave of loud laughs. "Ha ha! Just fantastic!"

I stood baffled in my corner, looking at how my brother, still laughing, walked over to the box with the inert figure. "B-Be careful brother," I hushed.

My brother grabbed one of the long, limp arms stretching out of the box. He pulled it up, and looked at the needle like fingers for a few moments. He shook his head.

"Really Don, really?" he said smugly. "You do know it's just a prop, right? It's not even an animatronic; just a bunch of fabric with a clown mask on top." He looked down at the pale face. "I'm actually quite surprise you remember this guy."

"What do you mean?" I pushed myself off the wall, standing on my own two rabbit feet for the first time.

"Don't you remember? You were four, I was eight…" Sean slowly laid down the arm inside the box. "So, this thing used to be a part of the show, and for some reason, you were terrified of it. And apparently you still are." He chuckled a bit.

"C'mon man, it's not funny." I said, trying to sound more offended than I was.

"Wait, it does get funny." He took a few steps towards me. "The only thing the puppet did in the show was rise from a present box; I think they pulled him up with strings. So Dad was with us, and out comes this thing. You start screaming, and as soon as its whole body is up, you throw Dad's slice of pizza right at it, from all the way in the back."

My brother did a little arc with his hand, whistling. "And the slice hits it right in the face, and actually sticks to the mask! Long story short: we get kicked out, some kids start clapping, Mom is furious, and Dad is laughing his head off, saying that his four year old son in a better shot than him: a war vet and current cop. I think they scrapped the puppet from the show shortly after that."

My brother walked up to me, and tapped my shoulder. "Anyways, Ferny and Sarah are waiting. They woke up before us, and have some things to tell you."

My ears popped up at the names of my friends. "They're here as well?"

Sean nodded, his bloody grin and blue eyes meeting me as he exited the room. "Yup, and you can imagine what they look like."

As he walked down the hall, I threw a last glance at the white mask popping out of the box, and shivered. Stepping out of the gloomy room, I took a good look at my body. The cartoonish hands, the whirring joints, the purple exoskeleton drenched in blood.

"What a weird nightmare." I muttered, following Freddy's figure to an open door.

"So, he has done nothing since he woke up," explained Ferny to my brother, pointing his hook at the slumped down golden figure of Bucky, "but trace and retrace a circle on the floor. He hasn't talked or moved. We tried to speak to him, but it's like he's not here at all."

I looked around the little break room of the pizzeria. Sarah was sitting on a table, looking at her orange chicken feet stained with blood as she swung them. My brother and Ferny were arguing by the door, raising their hands and tilting their heads. I looked at the miserable figure of Jack, balling my fists in anger and guilt. I promised to keep him safe, to make sure nothing would happen to him, to make him smile. If I hadn't been so stupid and stubborn three days ago, he would be together with his brother right now.

"I still don't understand how we talk to each other." said my brother, "I can hear you, and you can hear me, but I don't feel like we're making any sounds."

"Actually, we are." answered Ferny quickly, his yellow eyes darting up to meet my brother's. "Before you woke up, Sarah and I decided to test this with the karaoke machine. While we were recording, we heard our voices loud and clear in our heads, our mouths mechanically moving along. But when we played it back, all we could hear were painful moans and groans; that's the sound we make when we speak, only we can't hear it ourselves."

Sarah pushed herself of the table, and walked around for a moment.

"But others can't hear what we're actually saying, can they?" resumed my brother.

"No, and we can't read each other's minds; we can only hear what others want us to hear." Ferny stood quiet for a moment. "For example, I just thought about something, but you didn't notice, did you?"

My brother crossed his arms, his eyes shining sternly. "Alright, what did you call me?"

Ferny's eyes shone mockingly "Oh, just an idiot." he said innocently.

"Guys, I'm gonna watch some TV." interrupted Sarah, "Wanna come?"

"Later." grumbled my brother. "Also, do you have any idea why we're covered in blood…" he tilted his head defiantly "… you little nerd?"

"Aww, thanks man!" said Ferny, putting his hook on his chest, and faking a sniff. "But I don't think there's a reason. I mean, this is just a nightmare! We're supposed to be afraid and what not."

"Except that we're not." I thought to myself, as my bunny ears drooped down smartly.

Something that was bugging me was how calm and logical everyone was being, including me. Supposedly, we were murdered three days ago, and now we possess our beloved, blood-bathed animatronics. Even if this was just a dream, we should be horrified, afraid, incapable of thinking, let alone make jokes like we've done. Sure, I was terrified the first few minutes, and that was it.

"Umm, guys, I think you should come." called out Sarah from across the room, but we shushed her up with some low mumbles.

Actually… no. Seeing the puppet terrified me. So I wasn't incapable of feeling fear, I was just incapable of feeling fear because of my current state, as was everybody else. Something was blocking this fear. I immediately thought of the way our murderer blocked our bodies, and the faint red light that came from his chest before he killed me. Could he do the same with our minds?

"Seriously guys, stop it and get over here." interrupted an irritated Sarah. But we shushed her up again with some gestures and more mumbling.

No; that doesn't make sense. Blocking our fear was helping us. If there was someone doing this, he was trying to make us feel better, safer, more comfortable in our situation. He was fighting against our murderer.

"WE'RE ON THE FREAKING NEWS!" shouted Sarah, pointing a yellow finger at the TV screen. We turned around, and saw five black and white pictures of us, the real us, on the screen. A reporter then began telling the world about the five missing children presumably murdered at Freddy Fazbear's Pizza, and their killer, now in custody along with his accomplice: Jeremy Fitzgerald.

A/N: Now Brandon, our narrator, will keep referring to his friends by their human names. So just in case it wasn't clear for anyone:

Brandon/Don = Bonnie; Sean = Freddy; Ferny = Foxy; Sarah = Chica; Jack = Golden Freddy/Bucky.

Okay guys, see you next week Sunday, at 10 PM GMT. Also, don't be afraid to hit that Follow/Fav button if you want to know what happens next. Take care, be good, and eat your vegetables. See ya!