(Part II)

Chapter 3: Trapped

I felt like myself again the next morning, sitting at Clay's breakfast table, eating pancakes and sipping coffee. Birds chirped in the pines outside, accompanied by the slight rustle of wind. The detective had a peaceful haven for himself here. It was a lot like my old home, or what I thought it was. Now I knew that was a façade like everything else my dad made.

As the detective made his own batch of pancakes, I flipped through a breakfast cookbook that I found on a counter.

"So," Clay asked when we were good and settled, "how was your first day on the job?"

"Harrowing." I skipped over the worst of it and said, "Lots of old memories. Hey, do you know how to poach an egg?"

"Can't say that I do. Why? Do you want eggs?"

"Oh, no thanks, I want to make Eggs Benedict some time. This cookbook says I need poached eggs, but it doesn't say how to poach them. I need to find another book to explain this one. That's okay. It happens with tech manuals all the time."

"Michael… Mike, are you taking this seriously? Do you realize how much danger you could be in?"

"My father's a serial killer, and I'm working in his underground robot lair. I'm aware of the danger." Huh. It was the first time I'd said it out loud. It felt liberating. "Clay, do they have support groups or anything? For relatives of criminals, I mean."

"They do." His "dad" tone softened, and he asked, "Would you like me to get you some contact information for one?"

"Thanks, but I don't think I'll stick around Hurricane for very long after I finish here. I'll look into it when I leave."

"That sounds like a good idea. Just be careful, Mike."

"Will do." He didn't look reassured, but he did drop me back home as promised after breakfast.

For the rest of the day, I ate a minimal amount of food and re-read some robotics textbooks. At 10 p.m., I steeled myself for my next shift by watching a vampire soap opera called The Immortal and the Restless that had been my guilty pleasure for a few years.

Then I returned to the dark elevator that carried me to another "night of intellectual stimulation, pivotal career choices, and self-reflection on past mistakes," as my Hand Unit put it, before glitching again and briefly speaking in an Angsty Teen setting. This should've been more relatable, but was just another kind of awful.

In this setting, it casually informed me that a dead body was found in the vent leading to the Control Room. There were no further details.

The new setting also reveled in an electrocution routine similar to the one from the previous night. Instead of using euphemisms to disguise what we were doing, he simply said, "Let's zap her! That should be fun." It was not.

I squared my shoulders and powered through until the default voice settings were restored and my original companion directed me to return to the Circus Gallery. Would she be there this time?

The answer was "no". At least… not at first.

The lights didn't work. The shocker didn't work. The Hand Unit called it a power malfunction, but it felt more intentional and sinister than that. Maybe I was being paranoid. "Please stand by while I reboot the system," my computer told me. "I will be offline momentarily during this process. Various other systems may be offline as well, such as security doors, vent locks, and oxygen. Commencing system restart."

"What? No! Don't do that! I need all those things!" I whisper-screamed all this as the room was plunged into darkness, too afraid to raise my voice.

Did I need to conserve oxygen? Did I need to get out? Was the elevator working? A proper business would have an alternate stair route, but I didn't have the first idea of where to find one of those, and I couldn't just wander randomly in here. After all, there'd already been one dead body in a vent, and I wouldn't share his fate if I could help it.

As these thoughts swirled in my head, the building's security voice cut through them. At least she was still working. "Motion trigger: entryway vent," she informed me. She'd given similar notices as I crawled through vents, but I definitely wasn't in a vent right now. "Funtime Auditorium maintenance vent opened. Ballora Gallery maintenance vent opened." Distant metal clangs punctuated these announcements.

My eyes started to adjust to the darkness, and I realized there was still a faint light – not bright enough to be called an emergency light, but just enough to make out the silhouettes of the window and control pad and other things around me. I swiveled this way and that, looking for something to grab as a weapon, but everything heavy enough was bolted in place.

More metal clanged, this time closer, and a new voice intruded on my private fear, also piped over the building speakers. "I don't recognize you," she said. The voice was soft and soothing and almost ageless, but it made the hair stand up on the back of my neck. "You are new," she continued. "I remember this… scenario."

Scenario? Was she talking about other employees working here, or the power outage? I didn't have to wonder long.

I didn't interrupt, so she went on. "However, it's a strange thing to want to do, to come here. I'm curious what events will lead a person to want to spend their nights in a place like this. Willingly. Maybe curiosity, maybe ignorance." Did I imagine the faint, threatening hiss that curled around her words? Or a note of disdain? Whatever her motives, this faceless voice offered me a lifeline without missing a beat. "There is a space under the desk, someone before you crafted it into a hiding place and it worked for him. I recommend that you hurry though. You will be safe there, just try not to make eye contact. It will be over soon. They will lose interest."

"The desk?" I bumped into it quickly enough then ducked into the hollowed-out space in the back. I dropped my Hand Unit and groped around for some kind of shield to hide me. I found a metal plate that slid shut in front of me, completely enclosing me. It was curved in an odd way that gave me little purchase, and it seemed intent on slipping open again. The surface had a few holes, but I didn't want to stick my fingers through them, so I pawed at the metal with all my strength, and miraculously, it stayed in place.

As I crouched in the desk, actively working to stay hidden, a childlike voice called, "Hello in there…" in the way someone would taunt a playmate in hide and seek. Or a particularly malicious version of it where the seeker meant to attack the hider. The voice dropped to a whisper. "Someone is inside."

My new "friend" had said "they" will lose interest. I didn't know who she was or they were. Were they humans or AI? If they were computers, the voices were flawless, but my Hand Unit voices and the security computer sounded just as smooth. I had no way to tell, but I stayed firm and quiet.

My body was too large for this space, and it threatened to burst out, but I wasn't going to give anyone the satisfaction.

"Is it the same person?" This time, the voice seemed to have jumped to the other side of the Circus Gallery, but it was identical to the first. That settled it – they were the voices of animatronics. Either that, or my dad had trapped some small, evil twins down here.

Dad. Did they think I was him? They asked if I was the same person as… someone who had been here before me. Facial recognition scanners in the building could easily confuse to two of us.

Metal clanged just outside the desk. I was trapped – surrounded by animatronics.

What were they programed to do? Could they even hurt me? If Evan was right, Circus Baby had killed Elizabeth.

Evan.

Was this how he felt when I locked him in his room or in that endoskeleton closet? Did he curl in on himself as the air grew thin around him? Did he wait and watch for an attack from a metal, uncaring monster?

His attack came, alright. How did he feel with his face pressed against the thing he feared most in the world?

It was probably the same way I felt when a big blue eye appeared at one of the holes. It belonged to a small, doll-like head that I could only partly make out before ducking my head away. "Knock, knock," the robot babydoll said, as it tugged at my door from the outside.

I bit down on my shoulder to stifle a scream and threw my weight against the door panel. The door ground along, first open, then shut. It was a game of inches. The robot gave up for a moment then came back to try again. "We always find a way inside," it said. I clenched my teeth tighter and punctured the skin, but I didn't let up.

My fingers clawed desperately at the door, cracking my nails and probably leaving more streaks of blood against the metal. Could the robot dolls smell my blood? Or my sweat? That was probably impossible.

The door closed all the way again, with a sudden jerk. "She's watching us," the voice gasped suddenly. "We have to leave now. We will see you again soon."

Something scampered away, but I didn't believe that they were really gone, not until the Mystery Voice from earlier spoke again. "When your guide comes back online, he is going to tell you that he was unsuccessful, that you must restart the system manually." I was getting really tired of disembodied voices, and I wondered if maybe I should've been investing in human contact over the past few years. "He will then tell you to crawl through Ballora Gallery as fast as you can to reach the Breaker Room."

"Ballora?" I asked, and my already-heaving chest tightened more, so that my body was taking in oxygen in short spasms. But my interjection didn't break the monologue.

"If you follow his instructions, you will die."

"Ballora…"

"Ballora will not return to her stage anymore. She will catch you. The power will be restored shortly. When you crawl through Ballora Gallery, go slowly. She can not see you and can only listen for your movement. When you hear her music become louder, she is growing near, listening for you. Wait and be still."

By this point, I assumed that my supposed rescuer was another animatronic. Did Dad send her to help me? It was hard to say.

Now I had to choose between trusting my Hand Unit computer or trusting the Mystery Voice. It wasn't much of a choice, though. The Hand Unit was constantly malfunctioning, and the Mystery Voice appeared to have saved me once already. "Fine," I said. "Okay." I didn't trust her entirely, but I trusted her slightly more than the alternative.

When the building power and the Hand Unit came back online and directed me to the Breaker Room on the other side of Ballora Gallery, I glared down at the useless hunk of metal. I took it with me to keep my options open, but I was prepared to fling it across the room if it endangered me again.

After all, the lights were on, but the damage was already done. Some, if not all, of the animatronics were roaming free in here with me. I half-expected those robot dolls to pop out of the shadows at me at any moment, or something bigger than them.

I reached Ballora Gallery and was relieved when the Hand Unit announced that it would shut itself off to avoid making any noise. It and the Mystery Voice seemed to agree that Ballora couldn't see and only tracked movement by sound. However, the Hand Unit told me to hurry, just like the Mystery Voice said, and I had no intention of following its advice.

"Ballora," I said one more time. It was the last sound I intended to make until I got to the other side.

I tip-toed in, wielding my Afton-issued flashlight. It barely let me see two feet in front of me, and it advertised my presence to any animatronic with working eyes, but I couldn't get through that room without it. I couldn't afford to crash into anything.

Music played, and I slowed. It got closer, and I stopped. It sounded like a wind-up doll playing a familiar melody. I think it had words once.

"It seems you are taking a long time," the Hand Unit said, louder than it had been before. I pitched it across the room. As it sailed ahead of me, its words echoed in the hard, empty room. "Please proceed as quickly and as quietly as possible." It clattered to the ground. The music approached it then moved away again.

I kept going until I reached the other side, playing Red-Light-Green-Light with the music and the probably-deadly ballerina animatronic. For some reason, I scooped up the Hand Unit again as I entered the Breaker Room and shut myself inside.

Dull, flashing lights revealed an animatronic in the corner, and I skittered back. Funtime Freddy stood there – pink and white like Foxy and wearing a blue bunny hand puppet. Freddy didn't move, and I wondered if he was active or not. My hopes fell when my Hand Unit offered a "Mascot Response Audio" feature.

Freddy's articulated limbs slowly mobilized. I licked dry lips and poked at the audio button. I didn't know if that would make things better or worse until an overly-cutsy voice said, "Calm down, and go back to sleep. No one is here."

Funtime Freddy cackled in a way that could only be described as maniacal. Only my dad could've designed something like that for children. "Oh, well, hello again!" he said, sounding just as deranged when he talked. However, he didn't move apart from that.

I crossed my fingers and got to work. I played the audio intermittently, whenever Freddy seemed to be activating. It spewed out a rotation of calming phrases. He had his own voice cues, and he even took a step or two a few times, but the tapes kept him mostly in place.

While I kept an eye on him, I restarted the building systems one at a time. It was agonizingly slow, but the bear stayed put. It was almost an anticlimactic way to end the night, except that I got one final scare on the return trip through Ballora's Gallery. "Is someone there?" my mother's voice asked. I got a lump in my throat. "I can hear someone creeping through my room…" She trailed off as I held still. I knew this game now. "Perhaps not."

I wanted to see her. I needed to see her. But I didn't dare.

I fled the building and went through the motions of real life until I could return again. I called Detective Burke. I slept. I ate. I watched TV. I raced to the purple shed for Night 3. My Hand Unit played some casual bongos on the ride down and criticized my "lackluster performance" from yesterday, and I didn't even bat an eye. It was just being passive-aggressive about the way I ignored its advice.

I didn't care about anything until I arrived at my destination and checked on Ballora. I flashed on the light, to reveal the ballerina in pieces. Her tiny dancing troupe held them aloft, as if they were being lifted as part of a dance. I whirled away from the sight, not sure how to feel about it.

This way, she wasn't a danger anymore, but it was hard seeing her like that.

I almost didn't care when I checked on Funtime Foxy and found his stage empty. Maybe he was in pieces, too, or maybe he was wandering free. I had too many animatronics to think about without worrying about him. "Where's Ballora?" I asked the myriad of voices that had talked to me down here. None responded, so I tried another question. "Where's Circus Baby?" She still hadn't appeared yet, and she was the one I needed to find most.

Ballora might look like Mum, but Circus Baby might have a part of Elizabeth in her. I needed to find her to help Elizabeth reach some kind of peace. Maybe I would fix Circus Baby. Maybe I would destroy her. It didn't matter. I only needed to find her, but there was still no answer.

My orders were to go to parts and services to deactivate Funtime Freddy and his bunny puppet. Instead, I crept back to the Circus Gallery to look for Baby again.

"Did you know that I was on stage once?" the Mystery Voice asked. "It wasn't for very long, only one day. What a wonderful day, though. I was in a small room with balloons and a few tables. No-one sat at the tables, though, but children would run in and out. Some were afraid of me; others enjoyed my songs."

I remembered that day. It was the grand opening for Circus Baby's Pizza World. At last, I was able to put a face to the voice. "You're Circus Baby," I whispered, maybe too softly for her to hear. The voice sounded too old to be a baby, but what did that matter?

I closed my eyes and saw a white-skinned animatronic with red pigtails, dress, shoes, and microphone. She even had two round red spots on her cheeks.

Baby rambled on about counting the children in her room. She talked about music and glitter and birthday cakes and how she could make ice cream in her stomach. I could see the colorful children and the glitter, hear the upbeat tunes, and taste the moist vanilla cake. I was one of the guests of honor. Evan stuffed his face beside me, and it was smeared with multi-colored frosting. Elizabeth was… Well, she was with Baby.

No sooner had I looped back around to this than Baby addressed the elephant in the room. "…a little girl standing by herself. I was no longer… myself. And I stopped singing. My stomach opened, and there was ice cream. I couldn't move, at least not until she stepped closer. There was screaming for a moment, but only for a moment. Then other children rushed in again, but they couldn't hear her over the sounds of their own excitement. I still hear her sometimes. Why did that happen?"

"You're a monster." Tears stung my eyes. I knew all this going in, at least on some level, but this was so real, so visceral. Circus Baby was able to think for herself, at least to some extent, and here she was telling me that she murdered my sister. She was asking me to explain it to her. I had no other explanation to give.

I left her there and made for parts and services. I was numb all over as I passed through Funtime Auditorium to get there. My Hand Unit told me that Funtime Foxy was triggered by light, not sound, so I listened to him because I had nothing else to go off of.

Was my computer trying to kill me? Maybe. Should I get out of there? Definitely.

Instead, I made my way past Foxy, occasionally flashing my light, and then removed the power module from Funtime Freddy and his puppet, just like I was told to do. "You're a monster," I said again, this time to the powerless bear, slipping the power modules into my pocket.

That was all for the night, so I retraced my steps back the way I came. I shouldn't have walked out so carelessly. I know that. But I couldn't care about anything other than Baby's confession at that moment. Or so I thought.

A scream like static and rage flew at me, along with an animatronic fox. I screamed back.

Its face plates popped open, flashing its endoskeleton. It tackled me to the ground, but I only had a second to register this fact.

My back hit the checkered tile floor, the weight of metal pinning me down. Momentum carried me the rest of the way, and my head struck the ground next.

I don't know what the fox did after that. I don't know if I was aware of anything. I don't know if I dreamed anything.

I only know that I woke up a long time later, my head throbbing, my mouth dry, and my entire body constricted. I blinked my bleary eyes and stared at the metal plate over my face. My peripheral vision could just make out some pins around what was surely the mask of an animatronic suit. I couldn't see much beyond that.

"No, no, no, no, no."

Every part of me ached to wrench my arms free from their confinement, but I resisted the urge. I couldn't break free. I didn't dare try.

For the second time that week, I was trapped, but this time I was in something far more dangerous than a desk. I was trapped inside a springlock suit.