"Lea, wake up!"

"H-Hunh?" Lea jolted awake at the sound of her sister's voice and looked around. "W-What? What happened?"

Alex scoffed and rolled her eyes. "A lot of things happened, and you're the main reason for it all. But that's not the point. It's time to go soon. Get up and help me make sure everything is one-hundred percent ready."

"Mm, okay…" Lea regrettably uncovered herself from her blanket and got up from the sofa. Much to her relief, Alex had already started the RV and the heater had already warmed the interior.

"I'm so excited!" Chica was practically vibrating. "I love road trips!"

"This isn't just some road trip," Bonnie told her. "We're running away from something you know."

She did not seem to hear him. "And we have windows to look out of!"

"Yeah," Alex said. "I closed the blinds in a way that we can see out them but anyone outside won't see us."

Lea yawned as she passed them and exited the RV. She shivered and shook herself as the icy air hit her.

Freddy, who followed her outside, handed her a fuzzy white jacket. "J-J-Ja…"

She looked at him, surprised. "Jacket?"

"Ja – et-t."

"That's progress," she smiled and happily accepted the jacket. After putting it on and buttoning it closed, she made her way around the RV, checking the tires and overall condition of the exterior. "Looks good to me," she told Freddy. "Let's get back inside."

Inside, Lea walked to the back of the RV and stopped below the storage compartment in the ceiling. "Charlie?"

Silently, the face of the Puppet appeared and stared down at her.

She smiled and nodded before turning back to Alex. "The RV seems to be fine and everyone's inside. We're good to go."

"Charlie?" Bonnie echoed and looked up at the Puppet. "Is that your name?"

Charlie nodded.

"No fair!" Chica said. "How come you never told us?!"

"I could not remember before…"

"Oh! That reminds me," Lea said. "Alex, I need to talk to you. It's important."

Alex eyed her suspiciously for a moment before following her outside. They walked away from the RV and stopped near the open garage door. "Halloween hasn't even passed yet and there's already talk of snowfall. Great…"

Lea looked out at the gray sky above. "…Alex, I have to tell you something about the others."

"Is it about your 'research' at the library?"

She nodded. "That place we found them; it was like some kind of party place for kids. The robots were the main attractions."

"Well, I figured that much…"

Lea ignored her sister's attitude. "Apparently, over the years, lots of kids that went there started mysteriously disappearing, never to be seen again."

Alex listened silently to the rest of her sister's tale.

"…So," Alex said when Lea had finished, "let me make sure I got all of that. Some guys called William Afton and Henry Emily opened a pizzeria for kids with a bunch of creepy giant robot animals, the William guy's youngest son died after his brother shoved his head in a robot, he went crazy, killed Henry's kid, who then possessed that Puppet thing…"

Lea was nodding.

"They shut down the place, opened another one, more than six kids started mysteriously vanishing there, he was arrested, and somehow got out of it all?"

"Yeah," Lea said. "And according to Charlie, the Puppet, William murdered them all, stuffed their bodies in the animatronics, was trying to get some stuff called remnant, which made the robots come to life with the souls of the kids, so he could try to bring back his own kid. Then, he started making robots designed to collect remnant, but one of them killed his own daughter, so he went back, tried to destroy the old robots, got attacked by Cassidy and the other ghosts, hid inside the springlock suit, it locked and killed him, but because he had been messing around with that remnant stuff he didn't die so now he's some kind of zombie-ghost animatronic trying to get us!" She gasped for air.

Alex stared at her with an odd expression on her face. "…Do have any idea how crazy you sound right now?"

"I'm serious! I even met Cassidy!"

"What?"

"I… I didn't tell anyone before now, but before we left, back at home, I saw this…apparition. It was like Freddy, but it was yellow and all broken and collapsed. There was this horrible ringing sound in my head and this angry voice. It was her – Cassidy. Last night, I talked to her."

"…"

"She said that William Afton's got her trapped, and he wants the others so he can use their remnant to bring himself back. And maybe his kids too, I'm not so sure about that part anymore he's kinda gone loony."

"…"

"Anyways, Cassidy said she has a plan, but she didn't get the chance to tell me. She said that the further we are from him, the harder it is for her to talk to me. But she wants us to go to that old farmhouse that Westin told us about."

"…Are you done?"

"Yes."

Alex sighed heavily. "Why can't I just have a normal life? Okay, so who the heck is that guy in the blue shirt we kept seeing?"

"Um, I don't know. I don't think he's a bad guy, but he gave me this…weird feeling."

"Well, I sure don't trust him. So, we've got a mysterious stalker, a deranged and murderous zombie hunting for us, a bunch of possessed robots who can't remember who they even are, and our only thing to go on is to find some old abandoned farmhouse near an old factory of some kind somewhere that we don't know where."

"Yeah…"

They stared at each other for a long time before Alex suddenly turned to walk back to the RV. "Well, sounds like we're too deep in it to turn back now. Let's go and get this over with already."

Lea was a tad surprised but smiled and hurried after her.

"If we get through all of this without dying, I'm totally going to punch you," Alex told her as she caught up.

"Hey, wait." They stopped. "Do you think I should tell them?"

"Well, they deserve to know, don't they?"

"Yeah, of course, but… What if it makes them…worse?"

Alex thought for a moment. "Hm. Well, put it this way: do you think it's better to remember who you are and what happened to you, even if it was something terrible, or do you think it's better to not remember, know that you can't remember, and never figure out why?"

Lea did not answer.

Alex shrugged. "I'll leave the decision to you. Now come on. Let's get inside. It's freaking cold out here."

"Is everything okay?" Bonnie asked Lea as she entered.

"Yeah. You ready to go?"

He smiled and nodded.

She nodded too, then sat in the front passenger seat. Alex took the diver's seat, released the parking break, and slowly moved the RV out of the garage. After, she stopped, and Lea hurried out to move the van into the garage. As she left the garage, she closed the door and locked it, shoving the large key into her jacket pocket before hurrying back to the RV.

Alex looked back at everyone while Lea sat down and buckled her seatbelt. "Everyone find a place to sit and stay sitting. Don't walk around too much while we're moving." She then took her foot off the break and maneuvered the RV through the storage units and out the front gate.

Lea listened faintly to the radio as she stared out the windshield at the world outside. She felt such a strange feeling, one that she had no idea how to describe. It was like excitement or anticipation mixed with anxiety and a small hint of…nostalgia maybe? It was all so surreal. She began to wonder what the others felt and were thinking about.

She looked over at her sister, who was focused on the road. Alex did not seem irritated or outwardly worried, but perhaps her older sister was simply using the driving to distract herself. Lea then turned in her seat to look at the animatronics. They were all looking through the windows with mingled excitement and curiosity.

Lea began to wonder if any of the names she had discovered belonged to any of them. Should she say them aloud to see if any of them reacted in a particular way? Perhaps hearing their names would trigger memories of their past, like it had done with Charlie. Which brought another question to her mind… Would it be okay to tell them about their dark pasts, or would it be better for them to remember on their own? If someone tells you who you are and what you did when you can't remember, will you actually remember it, or will it just be something they told you that you accept as truth? She turned back around, leaned her head back against the seat, and sighed. It was too complicated.

"I think you should tell them," Alex said suddenly.

"Huh?" Lea looked at her.

Alex did not take her eyes away from the road. "I think you should tell them," she repeated. "I was thinking about it, and I think it's better for them to know."

Lea stared at her for a moment, glanced back to see if the others were listening, then, upon determining that they were still distracted, turned back to her sister. "Why's that?"

"Think about it, Lea… If they're really souls trapped inside of those…things, then shouldn't we help them to, I don't know, move on?"

"Move on? Like, to the afterlife?" They were speaking very quietly.

"Yeah. They're…dead, Lea. They don't belong here. Not like that. Maybe knowing the truth of who they are and what happened will help them move on."

"Maybe…" Lea felt a knot in her stomach. She did not particularly like the idea of them 'moving on'. She selfishly wanted them to stay, but she knew that Alex was right. They had been dead for a long time and did not belong in her time. "When should I tell them?"

"I don't know. Definitely before we get to where we're going, I'd say. I don't know what's going to happen there, but I have a feeling it'll be –"

"The end," Lea finished.

Alex shot her a quick glance. "…Yeah. Isn't that what Ms. Westin said or something?"

"Mm."

"Can I color?" Chica's voice ended their conversation.

"It's all in the purple bag under the table," Lea told her.

"Only color on the coloring book pages!" Alex warned.

"Okie doo!" Chica sang.

To be continued…

Lea is conflicted. Sorry for the long wait and tiny chapter, but things will pick up from here.