Long and important A/N: Well, what can I say? Once again, I couldn't finish the next chapter when I told you I would. Guys, believe me, if you feel bad when you don't see me update on time, I feel much worse. I've begun to realize that since I'm living alone, started college and have many more responsibilities I simply can't keep up the rhythm I had. So, I wanted to share a few things with you

After a lot of thinking, I've decided to get rid of the fixed times that I've been keeping so far. Why? Well, instead of making a promise to you and breaking it (again), I decided to stop making promises. You see, the Sunday deadline kept me writing constantly back when I could still afford to do that, but now I simply can't. Since I started college I have to rush my writing and my planning to try to finish the next chap on time, and I still can't always do that. Honestly, these last few chapters felt more like homework than leisure, and that's not the idea. When I was writing Ch. 23 under the pressure of time, I was stuck. But once I missed that Sunday it actually felt liberating to not have a deadline, the words flowed much better, and I enjoyed it more. Writing is fun. Writing under pressure... not so much.

I know that some of you are guest users who don't get mail notifications when I update, so I decided that I'll still update on weekends only, but not on every weekend. That way, you'll at least have an idea of when you can check to see if a new chapter is up.

TL;DR: To improve the story's quality, regain the enjoyment of writing and not let you down by making false promises I decided to get rid of fixed update times. From now on, I'll update either on Friday, Saturday or Sunday when and if I can. If a weekend passes and there is no new chapter, please be patient and wait till the next one. I'm not dropping this, going on hiatus or losing interest: I'll just stop chaining myself to deadlines I can no longer keep and instead focus on doing it right. Thanks for understanding :)

But there is another, far more exciting news that I wanted to share with you, and I'll do it after this chapter. Until then, happy reading!

Chapter 24: Illusions

I woke up lying face down on the floor, feeling like I had just run a marathon. As my eyes adjusted to the available light, I realized that I was in Party Room 1. For one second nothing made sense. Then, I remembered.

The Toys left their spots first while we waited in Parts and Service for them to bring us Jeremy; they seemed pretty giddy to be the ones to catch the new night guard. After an hour or two we left the service room and slowly circled around the office, using the cover of darkness to hide ourselves from the cameras while we looked at the action from a distance. The Toys were regularly going into Jeremy's office, but he always managed to spot them and put on his mask right on time.

The night was ending, and we were starting to get impatient. I was the first one to try and catch him off guard by sneaking through the left vent of his office. Jeremy was frantically watching the monitors with his tired and scared eyes, so much in fact that he didn't notice me crawling out of the vent and into the office. Laughing darkly to myself, I stood up and sneaked towards him until I was a few feet away, but then he turned around and quickly put his head inside the mask. He watched me with horrified eyes as I walked around him for a few seconds, before turning around and going back into the darkness of the Party Room corridor.

Chica tried her luck, but ended up having the outcome as me. When there were a few minutes left, I snuck inside Party Room 1, hoping to crawl into the vents and get into his office again. I was about to do just that, when the sound of a beeping alarm came to my ears. Right before everything went black, I cursed myself for being so easy on the guard.

Then, there was nothing.

"But we won't hesitate next time." I whispered involuntarily, "I won't stop hunting him until his warm blood stains my hands. It's gonna be… fantastic." A rush of excitement coursed through my body before I realized with horror what I just said.

"NO!" I shook my head erratically, hoping to clear my mind from that bloody desire. "What's wrong with you Brandon," I muttered, "you're not like this." My weak voice trembled with regret and disgust as I repeated desperately "I'm not a killer. I'm not a killer. I'm not a killer. I'm not…"

"Don?" Sean was standing at the door, looking down at me with compassion and pain in his eyes. "Please, don't talk like that." he whispered softly, kneeling by my side. "He's alright, remember? We didn't do anything to him, it's okay."

"It's not okay!" I blurted out, "I'm not okay brother!" Panting, I let my head fall down. "I told TB that the only monster is the one that forces us to kill, but now… now I'm not so sure."

"Don't talk like that private." I felt a hand lay itself down on my armless shoulder. "You shouldn't feel guilty about something that's not your fault."

"But still. I tried to kill our cousin!"

"And you failed." I raised my head to see my brother smiling smugly at me. "See? You'd make a terrible killer!"

I chuckled at his words. "Just like you."

With a smile on his face, Sean stretched his arm out to me. "C'mon, everyone is waiting for us."

"Brother, do you think Jeremy will return after what happened?" I asked as we walked out of the room.

"Don't worry about that Don." answered Sean, "He must be crazy if he's coming back tonight."

Stepping into the Game Area, I was greeted by the sight of all five Toys sleeping peacefully on the floor. Sarah and Ferny themselves were yawning next to the Show Stage, whilst Jack sat in a corner, tracing circles on the floor.

"Hey Brandon!" greeted Sarah as she and Fer stood up and walked to me, before she stopped in front of me and looked at me in the eyes. "Are you okay? You seem a bit… down."

"I wasn't feeling very happy when I woke up, but I'm alright now. Don't worry." I dismissed casually. The sound of Junior turning around in his sleep made me turn my head towards the knocked-out Toys. "Are they alright?"

"Yeah, they're just really tired." answered Ferny, "Between the shows and what happened this morning, they've been awake since we opened up yesterday morning." He turned around and looked at our counterparts. "They're just little kids after all."

Something about the way he said the last sentence saddened me. They looked so peaceful there, on top of the tiled floor, twisting and turning slightly with their eyes shut. How could children so sweet become blood-thirsty killers at night? I shook my head in disbelieve; they didn't deserve any of this, perhaps even less so than us. They should be outside, playing tag, rolling down hills and getting their parents' comfort when they inevitably got themselves bruised.

Outside…

"Brandon?" Ferny's voice brought me back to reality. "What are you thinking about?"

"Umm, nothing." was my reply, "Just a random thought. By the way," I looked at the golden figure who was still silently and idly tracing his circles, "thanks for taking Jack out of the hidden room.

My friend looked at me with puzzled yellow eyes. "Umm, we didn't do anything."

Jumping to a conclusion, I walked over to Jack and sat beside him. "Hey buddy," I greeted, "you're alright?" He looked up at me and nodded quickly. "Great. Nothing happened to Jeremy, thankfully." I cleared my throat and lowered my tone. "Umm, I know you don't like that room. But please be careful when you push that shelf alone, it's very heavy."

Jack stopped doing the circles and raised his head; there was confusion in his eyes. "I… I d-don't remember p-pushing it after I entered." he mumbled, "I j-just wanted to leave the room, a-and I was outside."

"So you just appeared outside without touching the shelf?" I questioned sarcastically, walking into the kitchen. Jack stood up and followed me. "C'mon, you know as well as me that what you just told me is imposs-"

The kitchen shelf was perfectly in place. I shook my head to make sure I wasn't seeing things, but there was no question about it; the heavy piece of furniture hadn't been moved.

"Well..." I mumbled, scratching the back of my head, "Maybe you just fell asleep outside of the room."

Jack shook his head energetically. "I r-remember going in there l-last night."

"Guys?" I called out once I had run out of possible-sounding ideas, "Could you come here for a while?"

My brother, Sarah and Ferny stepped into the kitchen. All three seemed as puzzled as me when I retold them Jack's story. We easily managed to push the heavy wooden shelf between the four of us, only to freeze in shock by when we saw what was in there.

Slumped down lifelessly against a close wall, without any light in his eyes, was the golden mechanical bear suit that had been Jack's body for nearly a year and four months. We turned our heads simultaneously to look at the exact copy standing beside us, watching us with confused pinpoint eyes.

"Umm..." we chorused dumbly, our four heads turning left and right to look at the two clones like we were watching a tennis match.

"How?" started Fer.

"But… but…" stuttered Sarah.

"What?" whispered Sean.

"No way." I gasped. "Uh, Jack, you should see this."

The golden figure walked to us, then leaped up from pure surprise at the sight of himself sitting inertly on the floor.

"Alright, let's calm down." suggested Ferny with a shaky voice, tapping his foot nervously, "I'm sure that there is a perfectly logical explanation!"

"Professor," huffed back Sarah, "we were killed by a maniac dressed in purple and now we're seven foot tall robotic animals. Sometimes there just isn't a logical explanation."

"An illogical explanation is good enough for me." confessed my brother.

"Well, that's interesting." said a familiar juvenile voice behind us. We turned around to see Marionette leaning against a wall with his thin and long arms crossed smartly. "I mean, I knew that the third special blood seal was something else, but this is a bit freaky."

Jack -the one that was standing next to us- glared at and walked away slowly from the slender dark figure as it approached the opened secret room. "You see," resumed the puppet, "your friend here managed to somehow separate his soul from his body and basically teleport outside of the hidden room."

Sarah looked at my brother with amusement. "There is your illogical explanation." she whispered.

"I don't understand." I interrupted, "He didn't do it on purpose." Jack looked at me, and nodded shyly and silently in agreement.

"Here's the thing," replied Marionette, "it's really hard to learn how to use those… let's call them perks. But if he can do something like this, well, who knows what else he can do."

"How do you feel Jack?" asked a thrilled Sarah, "Excited for what you can do?"

His reply was a mumbled "N-no." and an X on the floor. It was then that the golden image in front of us started to flicker ever so slightly, like Shadow Bonnie in the two times I'd seen it.

"That's not good." warned Marionette, "A soul can't stay out of a body for too long without something or someone to protect it."

"What do we do then?" I asked nervously, seeing how Jack seemed to be visibly thinning out in front of us.

"I… I don't know!" replied the puppet hastily, "I don't have the soul seal, how am I supposed to know?"

"Uh…" hummed Jack nervously, seeing how his chest started to glow in a soft red, "I f-feel a bit weir-"

And just like that, he disappeared. Baffled, we stared at the spot where he had been a moment ago; there had been no dramatic flash of light or cliché flickering of lamps. One second he was there, the next he was gone.

I managed to compose myself from what I had just seen, and called out in a panicked voice "Jack?! Buddy, can you hear me?!"

No answer. Sarah and Sean repeated Jack's name, before we heard the sound of moving metal coming from the dark secret room. I turned around to see the previously lifeless mechanical suit twitch slightly for one second before its black eyes filled with a familiar, human light.

Back in his golden prison and shelter, Jack shook his head tiredly as he looked in bewilderment at his huge hands. "Wh… what happened?" he moaned weakly.

I was the first one to rush into the room, followed closely by Sean. "Are you alright buddy?" I asked, stretching out my arm to help him get up.

"J-just tired." he replied sleepily as I pulled him on his feet. My brother grabbed his other arm and slowly helped him walk out of the dark room. Jack let himself slide down against a wall before Sarah and Fer helped us put the shelf back in place.

After that was done, Ferny hummed thoughtfully, putting his hook under his chin. "Apparently he can't stay out of that body for too long." he stated, right before we heard some footsteps approach the kitchen.

Yawning, TB stretched himself to wake up as he peered into the kitchen. "Uh, hello." he greeted sleepily before staring at us with curiosity. It was obvious that he noticed that something unusual was going on. "Did anything weird happen?"

"No." we chorused immediately, like a group of rowdy kids when a grown-up asks if they've been up to trouble.

"Alright…" The light-blue figure once again stretched his arms up as he yawned deeply, and then walked up to me in a cheery, fast way. "Hey Mr. Bonnie," he beamed, "the guard is alright, isn't he?"

"Yeah, don't worry about anything." I replied casually before ruffling his ears, making his smile widen. "We still have an hour left. Say, how does a little game of Pac-Man sound?"

My counterpart nodded eagerly. "But before that," he opened his chest and handled me over the rose, "It's your turn today."

The day went by fast, and soon it was night time again. We rested and played with the Toys after closing time, like nothing had happened or would happen. Just like we did before the place opened we ran behind each other, watched TV, drew and played arcades. Not for one second did I dare to think that Jeremy would come back; after all, why would he? He wasn't poor at all; his parents had always been much better off than ours. He told us more than once that as much as he loved the pizzeria and seeing us there, it wasn't his life call.

It was an afternoon, and looking back now it feels like it happened a million years ago. "Sean, Brandon, I want to travel the world one day." he told us in confidence as Freddy's was closing for the day. "Someday, when I finish college, I'll just grab a backpack and leave."

My brother and I looked at him, puzzled. "And what will you do Jerry?" asked a ten year old Sean.

"Walk." Our cousin replied flatly, staring into the distance. There were no dark rings around his eyes nor tiredness on his face, just hopeful illusion. "I'll go to London, or New York, or Paris or Rio or Tokyo or Delhi… I don't care. And I'll just walk until I get lost. Or my legs give out. Whatever happens first."

We then asked him if we could go with him. He smiled warmly. "Off course, when you're old enough!" was his playful reply.

So when midnight was near and the close sound of a car engine shattered the peace, I didn't want to believe that it was Jeremy. We told the Toys to just go to the stage, that it couldn't be a night guard, and to stay still. Jack hid in the secret room though, saying that he had a bad feeling. A minute later Sean, Ferny, Sarah and I entered Parts and Service. Though it was hard to believe, we realized with dread that the worn-out man in purple walking to the security office was our cousin. We knew what would happen next; nobody said anything.

After a while Freddy, Foxy, Chica and I left the dark corner of the building; overjoyed to see that the same person who had escaped us once had willingly returned to our claws.

A/N: So, I said that I'd wait till I finished this story before doing anything else, and again, I didn't keep my word :)

FNaF 4 came, broke my mind, and I couldn't help myself. It might seem contradictory that I'm announcing a new story after what I just said in the beginning, but this short fic will share the same loose update times as this one and I managed to scrape together enough time over the last month to have the first chapter done by now. Please guys, just have faith in me; I'm not letting you down this time.

And so, I can announce that the first chapter of The one that was broken will most likely be up this Friday. Remember guys, there are 4 days left until the party, and you're all kindly invited...