Ahhh! It's back! All this time I made you guys wait just for such a tiny chapter! Not that the chapters are usually long... But hey! I have NOT forgotten about Free!

Lea let out a loud yawn and leaned back to stretch her arms in the air then rubbed her eyes. She hadn't slept the rest of the night and was still awake as the early morning light made its attempt to warm the world outside. She had stayed up trying to fix the Puppet while also trying to make sure that Foxy didn't suffer any more damage as well. There was so much water in Puppet that the towels she had placed under it were now dampening the carpet.

"Is there anything we can do to help?" Chica was leaning over her with a worried expression on her face.

"I don't know," Lea was trying to rub the knots out of her neck. "There are some frayed wires and fried circuits inside. And a lot of these screws and bolts are rusted."

"Ooh! I can give you a shoulder rub!" Chica smiled and carefully rubbed Lea's shoulders.

She laughed a little. "Heh, thanks Chica. I'm going to make a list for myself then head over to the mechanics shop to get some parts. When I go, you and Bonnie can look after these two. Go ask Alex for her hairdryer, please."

"Okay." Bonnie got up and left to find Alex.

Once he had returned, Lea showed them how to use the dryer to dry certain areas and parts of both Foxy and Puppet. "Alternate a few minutes between the two of them," she said. "And don't hold it too close. It'll get hot. Here." She handed Bonnie some cotton swabs, cotton balls, and a pair of tweezers. "Use these to dry between the small tight spaces, but don't leave any of this stuff inside of them. Alex! I'm going to the shop for parts!"

Alex was sitting in her room with the door open. "Okay!" She called. She was sitting on the floor and looking through old photos she had found in a box in the closet. Sitting beside her was Freddy, who appeared very interested when she would stop to show him one and tell the story behind it.

"You leave too much," Chica pouted.

Lea smiled sadly. "I know. But I always come back to you guys, don't I?"

"Mm… yes."

"Exactly," she nodded. "Besides, I'm only leaving to get stuff to fix Foxy and Puppet. I'll pick up some stuff for you guys, too."

"Gummy worms?!"

"Eh, heh, sure. Okay, I'll stop somewhere for those, too." Lea had had a look inside of Chica the other day. Amazingly, there was no food or anything that didn't belong inside of her. Aside from a tiny pink shoe, that is… "All right, I'll see you guys later."

"Hurry back!"

"We'll be waiting," Bonnie added.

Lea knew the owner and most of the workers of the mechanics shop quite well, as her father had worked with them for years. In fact, she and her sister had known them since they were babies. The shop wasn't too far off from their home, located just on the corner of the first street between the subdivisions and the city. It consisted of a medium-sized, one-story building with a garage connected to it that they drove vehicles into that needed to be worked on. Outside was a small parking lot of sorts where vehicles too large or that were waiting for their turn sat silently, all of which was surrounded by a chain-link fence.

She passed through the big open gate and into the lot, memories flooding her mind at the loud sounds of the machinery coming from the open garage. Inside, there was an old Impala that was being held above the ground by mechanical arms so that the people below could more easily examine the car's underbelly. There were machines, tools, and parts all along the walls, on the floor, and on tables. It looked like an absolute mess, but she knew it was more of an organized chaos as her father would always put it.

"Lea!" She was greeted heartily by the owner of the shop, a heavy-set man whose gray button-up shirt was stained with oil and sweat. He used his sleeve to wipe beads of sweat from his forehead. "Haven't seen you in a little while, huh? How's your sister?"

"Same as always."

"Motherly?"

"Yep."

His laugh stood out over the loud noises of the tools and machinery. "You looking for parts?"

"Yes, sir."

"Well, we've got plenty!" He led her over to a corner where the table was piled with different mechanical pieces and parts. "You can take any of these for free, but if you need something new that's not here, you just let us know."

"Thank you, Mr. Laurence."

"Anytime!"

Lea looked over her list as she rummaged through the parts. Some of the pieces she needed were so old that she had sketched little drawings of them to remember what she was looking for. It was hot in the garage, but thankfully there were large fans set up and blowing in different places, including the corner where she was. Lea spent the better part of an hour looking through the pile of scrap and pieces, steadily finding matches that she would drop into the backpack she had brought with her. She even collected a few extras or useful-looking things just in case.

"Finding everything?"

With the noise, she had thought that Mr. Laurence was the one asking her the question, so she was incredibly startled when she turned to see the man called Michael smiling sadly down at her. She hated how visibly startled she was and quickly recollected herself and took two steps away from him.

"Sorry," he said over the noise. "Didn't mean to scare you again. Are you collecting pieces for those frightening toys that were with you?"

She didn't respond, only watched him closely as she closed her bag and moved away from him. He remained where he was, watching coolly as she left the garage and hurried away.

Why does that guy keep showing up? She thought. She risked a glance back over her shoulder. After seeing that he wasn't following, she shot a glance up the street before bolting across and slipping around the corner towards a nearby convenience store. She entered the store, the little bell chiming as the door opened and closed, then stared out the glass door for a minute as she caught her breath.

"Hello," the cashier greeted her. "How are you today?"

"Fine," she lied and briskly walked over to the candy section. She grabbed several bags of gummy worms, regular and sour, then carried them over to the counter. She kept glancing out the door as the woman scanned the items.

"Seven-fifty-two."

Lea opened a smaller part of her bag to retrieve a five-dollar bill and three ones and handed them over to the cashier. "Keep the change," she said as she slid the bags of candy into her backpack.

"Have a good day."

"Thanks." Lea paused with her hand on the door, peering through it one more time before exiting the store. The whole way home, she was feeling anxious and kept glancing over her shoulder to make sure that she wasn't being followed. She even decided to take a longer route home, just in case. Finally, she returned to her house, stopping to examine the now boarded-up window that Foxy had broken through the previous night. If that didn't look suspicious, then she didn't know what did. "I'm back," she called as she entered the house.

"Yay!" Chica was immediately at her side. "Did you find the stuff you needed to fix them?"

"I did. I also got this." She handed her a bag of sour gummies, purposefully keeping the rest a secret so that she wouldn't eat them all at once.

Chica squealed excitedly. "You remembered! Thanks!"

Lea smiled as she watched her take the bag and run back into the living room to sit on the couch. Alex was sitting on the floor with Bonnie, helping to dry out the interiors of Foxy and Puppet. Foxy was looking a bit more active, sitting up on his rear instead of laying down, but Puppet was still laying in the same unmoving position.

"You really found everything?" Alex looked up at her. She was using a cotton swap to clean out a space in the open chest of the Puppet. "Some of these pieces look really old."

"Yeah. Well, more or less. I found most, but I grabbed some other stuff that I think will work better. Or at least work. I was hoping to get some more extras, but I got kind of cut short."

"What do you mean?"

"Remember that guy we saw standing at the alley entrance the one night?"

"Yeah?"

"Well, last night I ran into him while trying to get those two back. He was asking me questions and trying to figure out what I had with me. I don't know. Something about him seems…off. Anyways, I ran into him again today. He just appeared right next to me while I was looking through the parts and asked me if I was getting them for my 'frightening toys'."

"What does he know?" Alex jumped to her feet.

"Well…I'm not sure, but Foxy did jump out and scare the hell out of him so that we could run away. He was almost blocking us. He gives me a bad vibe."

"No kidding! Why didn't you mention it sooner?!" Alex ran over to the window and peered through the blinds. "What if he followed you?!"

"I was making sure he didn't! That's why I took so long!"

"Oh," Bonnie's ears folded down. "Please, don't yell at each other…"

"Sorry," Lea said.

"Me too," Alex closed the curtains. "We need to be more careful now. We can't have that guy figure out where we live. He already knows about them…"

"Our window doesn't exactly help…"

"It's the best I could do," Alex told her.

"I know. I'm just saying." Lea carried her bag over and sat between Puppet and Foxy. Foxy's tail swished and he leaned forward curiously to see what she had.

As Alex left the room, Lea heard a very faint familiar voice. "He'll come…"

She quickly looked over at Puppet. "What?"

"The man in blue… He's being used by the purple man… He won't stop until he gets them…but I won't let him."

She glanced around to see if the others had heard. They certainly seemed to. Chica had stopped to stare worriedly at the Puppet while Bonnie looked startled and Foxy made an odd clicking growling sound. Lea turned back to stare at him, unsure of what to say. "Neither will I," was all she could come up with.

To be continued…