Chapter 17: Mysterious Call
As Fredi and Ozzie stood silently, G led Vanessa out the door. But just as she stepped outside, G closed the door behind her and ran into the hallway.
"Let's head out the backdoor before she realizes I'm not following her," G instructed Fredi.
"What about Chips and Ozzie?" Fredi asked.
"I'll carry Chips," Ozzie said, picking up the limp Hispanic man who was still leaking clear-colored blood. "But where are we going, G?"
"Take Chips to the basement and stall Vanessa as long as you can," G said. "Fredi and I are going to look for Chicana Gladstone to see if she can tell us who gave her the camera for the so-called test Bernstein the Third ordered."
Ozzie groaned. "You know Ness is going to kill me."
G paused and looked back at Ozzie. "Do you want to get to the bottom of this mystery or not?"
"Yeah," Ozzie mumbled.
"So do as I say! And if we get back alive, I'll let you post about what we uncover as Stitchwraith. Deal?"
"Fine." Ozzie readjusted his grip on Chips and went to an adjacent door that led to the basement.
Unable to sleep in his hospital bed, Detective Larson picked up his phone which was fortunately not confiscated by Chief Jacaré. He checked the news first, and saw a headline about a bunch of young hoodlums being murdered by an unknown killer. Unfortunately, there weren't many clues to go on since all the bodies went missing before forensics could examine them. Being reminded of what happened to Roxana, Larson began to wonder if the hoodlums may have also been animatronics. But he quickly banished the thought due to how crazy that sounded.
"Maybe Jacaré is right," Larson murmured. "I haven't had a good nights' sleep in a long time, and this suspension might be the ticket I need."
"Or you could use that time to get to the bottom of what's really going on."
Surprised by the elderly voice, Larson looked around the room. "Who's there?"
"Call me Phone Guy," said the elderly voice, which came from Larson's phone. "I'm using a secure network to speak to you privately in case anyone might be listening in."
Larson couldn't believe what he was hearing. "Is this a prank call?"
"No, Detective Everette Larson."
"How do you know my name?"
"I have ways of finding information about people."
"Yeah, well the last person who said something like that to me ended up shooting me in the gut with some kind of taser gun."
"That's exactly what I wanted to talk to you about. Was this person who shot you a blonde woman named Vanessa Whit?"
"Why should I tell you?"
"Because I'm the only person who can tell you what you've gotten mixed up in."
"Listen, Phone Guy, or whoever you are! I don't trust guys who don't show their faces to me. So either you get down here and talk, or I'm hanging up right now!"
"Very well. I'll send someone to speak with you in my place."
At that moment, Larson's phone turned off. Then a moment later, it turned back on again. When Larson checked his phone, there was no unknown caller ID listed on his list of calls from the last few minutes. So Larson interpreted this whole situation to be a bad dream and went to bed.
"What is Stitchwraith?" Fredi asked G.
They were several blocks away from the house and standing in front a large mansion that overlooked the downtown section of Endopolis from a hill.
"After Ozzie was fired by Fazbear Entertainment to cover up the debacle that happened with the VR game, he started hacking onto various social media websites under the alias Stitchwraith in order to leak secrets about Fazbear's animatronics to the public," G explained. "It's basically his way of getting revenge at Fazbear for what they did, while my foster mom ended up becoming a Night Watch Repairman and I worked as her assistant."
"Can you tell me why you two had a falling-out?"
G hesitated to answer. "It's a long story, and kind of embarrassing. Besides, we have more important things to focus on like talking to Chicana."
"Right. How should we get in?"
"I'll answer the front door, while you get inside through the back. Just…try not to maim Chicana like you did with Roxy."
Nodding in agreement, Fredi ran around the hill until he was on the other side. Using Roxana's eyes, he was able to see the mansion from behind several houses. This gave him a focus as he leaped over the fences of each house before landing in the backyard of Chicana's mansion. A pair of security cameras immediately focused on him and shot lasers from beneath the lens.
Luckily, Fredi was able to dodge them. But when he tried to open the back glass door, he was jolted by electricity. It didn't keep him down for long as he used his strength to break through the glass door, though he saw the letters 'Low Battery' appear in his vision. The house was completely dark inside, yet Fredi heard the sound of rolling wheels.
"Sounds like Chicana has some STAFF Bots lurking around," Glenn said as he stood next to Fredi. "I guess those mukbang videos of hers make a lot of money."
"No, that can't be it," Fredi said as he knocked down the first STAFF Bot that came rolling toward him. "Someone must be paying her well. Hence why she could afford this mansion and high level of security."
"Maybe Bernstein the Third is paying her to not say anything about the experiment."
"Possibly, though we won't know until we ask her."
"If she even lets us. Though your batteries got drained pretty badly by that electric door."
"I know, but there's nothing I can do about it!"
As Fredi kept punching more STAFF Bots that kept coming, his joints started to stiffen up.
"Why don't you let me take over?" Glenn offered. "I can override your systems and keep you running on emergency power without having you automatically shut down."
"How?" Fredi asked.
"Just trust me on this! Unless you want to get killed."
Fredi wasn't sure whether to trust Glenn's word or not. But just before he could make a decision, a sharp whistle caused the STAFF Bots to stop attacking.
To be continued…
