Chapter 60
Anxious
Author's Note
Sorry the chapter is a day late. If I messed this one up it would cause problems later, so needed to take my time. Hope you enjoy it. A bit of the history of Freddy's that I'm using gets revealed in this one. I'm not going to be able to follow the lore that theorists like MatPat have figured out since its been planned off ideas I had long ago. So a lot will be surprising in future chapters since this is my 'universe' in FNAF I guess. I use most characters in the lore but in different roles. I wonder how many of you will figure out what each character is like before they show up?
Oh, before I forget, I'm not using the names of the kids from the lore either. Since when they were created I didn't know them yet. Enjoy!
The bots were stressing, she could tell. Ruby watched them go about their normal daytime business, entertaining the kids and keeping the place popular like usual. She could see the little behaviors that gave them away though.
Foxy couldn't stand still and he wasn't sticking to Pirate's Cove like he usually did. He also tended to check on Bonnie a lot. Understandable considering Bonnie was the one more prone to panic. He hadn't put down his guitar in ages, like a security blanket. Freddy kept reorganizing things which was driving the employees nuts since they couldn't find anything anymore. They didn't complain out loud of course. Chica, in contrast to Foxy, barely left the kitchen and cooked way more than was needed. There was a pile of pizzas stacked on the counters.
She hadn't seen Goldy at all, not even when she stopped by the office. The ghost bear only came out at night now.
Even the Toys were acting off. (And it annoyed her that she noticed.) Toby hadn't started a fight with Bonnie in days. Chi was unusually quiet and Teddy was obsessively straightening things, usually after Freddy had been through reorganizing it. Mangle seemed to be handling things the best but then again, she was very good at dealing with stress after being pulled apart several times.
BB was still BB at least. And she hadn't seen the Puppet in days, not even during her shift.
The weird behaviour had even spread to the ghosts. Ruby saw them more often, which did explain why Hedy tended to stick to one room a night. She was still dealing with the whole, 'dead friends are murderous ghosts' thing. Seeing them couldn't be easy.
Of course every time Ruby saw them she just got annoyed. Which then put her on edge. Great. She hadn't seen the sixth ghost kid either, which meant that particular mystery was driving her absolutely mad.
She hated not having answers.
With a frustrated sigh she waved at the bots on her way to the manager's office. The building of the new area was coming along quickly so she expected this to be about Springtrap.
She wasn't disappointed.
"Ah Ruby!" the manager plastered his usual 'please don't kill me night guard' expression on his face. "Thank you for coming in early."
"Sure, whatever." The teen sat in the chair in front of his desk, not in the mood for pleasantries.
"Um, well, I just wanted to let you know that the new area will be up and running in a few days. The new animatronic will be arriving the night it's completed."
Ruby nodded, looking appropriately bored. After all, as far as he knew, this wasn't anything special. One new animatronic compared to two full sets? He probably wasn't even mildly concerned this time.
"They found a lot of items in storage with it which they're starting to ship already."
That made her perk up and take notice.
"Items?"
"Yeah, you know, stuff from the last, uh, location." He looked highly uncomfortable suddenly.
"What happened to the place again? This, Halloween attraction thing?"
"Oh, well, Fazbear's Fright never opened." Yeah, he looked really uncomfortable. Good, stupid moron, did everything the higher ups asked without question. "It burned down, faulty wiring."
Sure, faulty wiring. That was believable.
"What about before that?" she pushed.
"Before?"
"Before Fazbear's Fright. The bot was already repurchased right?"
"Oh, yes. It's from one of the very first locations I believe. Lots of history there." He looked both relieved that the topic changed from Fazbear's Fright and uncomfortable that it had moved to the company's less than stellar history.
"Any of the stuff arrived yet?"
"I believe a few boxes were dropped off this morning. Some members of staff were going to look through it for decorations you see."
"I'm going to check them out." It wasn't a question or request. "Where are they?"
"Storage room, the new one they just built." He didn't bother to argue.
"Alright. See ya around manager." She jumped back to her feet. "Oh, and I want to be here when the bot arrives. If I'm not, I could just introduce you to my new jelly bombs. I'm sure the cleaning staff told you about them the other day?"
He shuddered.
"Uh, of course Ruby." He forced a smile again.
She smirked to herself as she left. Intimidating the man was always so much fun.
It didn't take her long before she found the new storage room. She'd memorized the new layout after snatching a copy of the building plans. There were a few boxes stacked at the back of the otherwise empty room.
"Let's see what we've got." She muttered to herself as she started digging around in the first one.
There wasn't much in the beginning, mostly just plastic masks and cheap looking 'supposedly spooky' decorations.
"Geez, I know the company's cheap but did they really expect this stuff to scare anyone?" she shook her head as she studied a Toy Bonnie mask.
The second box wasn't much better since it was filled with drawings for the most part.
"I'm feeling distinctly disappointed here." She sighed as she reached for the last box. "Oh. What's this? Tapes?"
Curiosity spiked, she carried the box of tapes back to her office.
"Brings back memories of Steve." She mused as she studied the tape labeled 'Night One'. "Oh well, how about a sneak peek into what's coming?"
She stuck the tape in and hit play.
"Hey hey, glad you came back for another night!"
"That's definitely not Steve." She sighed in disappointment. "No offense new phone person, but Steve and I, we had a special relationship. I just don't think anyone can replace him."
"I promise, it'll be a lot more interesting this time! We found some, some great new relics over the weekend, and we're out tracking down a new lead, right now! So, uhhh, lemme just update you real quick, then you can get to work. Like, the attraction opens in like, a week, so we have to make sure everything works, and nothing catches on fire!"
"Fire? How is a new place that's not even open yet at risk of fire already? Oh new phone person who isn't Steve. What is wrong with this company?"
"Uh, when the place opens, people will come in at the opposite end of the building, and work their way toward you, then past you and out the exit. Uh, yeah you've officially become part of the attraction. Uh, you'll be starring as…the security guard!"
Ruby had to laugh. "Ten points for enthusiasm dude. But security guards don't have much luck in this franchise you know. Except me of course."
"So not only will you be monitoring the people on the camera as they pass through – you know, to make sure no one steals anything or makes out in the corner – but you'll also be a part of the show. It'll make it feel really authentic, I think."
"No buddy. It'll save them money since they don't need to hire separate people to play the role and be an actual security guard." Ruby rolled her eyes. "What's to bet you're just a Freddy's urban legend fanatic?"
"Uh, now lemme tell you about what's new. We found another set of drawings, always nice, and a Foxy head! Which we think could be authentic!"
"SOMEONE DECAPITATED FOXY!?" Ruby yelled before remembering that Foxy was perfectly fine and working at that moment. "Never mind. Hey, did they add sound insulation into these walls? That kind of scream would have usually had everyone running… Hmm, either Murphy's Law is trying to make this round more difficult, or the company actually thought of muffling the sound of screams from the fright attraction so the kiddies don't get scared… My money's on Murphy to be honest."
"Then again, it might just be another crappy cosplay. And we found a desk fan. Very old-school. Metal though. Watch the fingers, uh, ha."
"You guys really hit a gold mine huh?" she asked sarcastically.
"Uh, right now the place is basically just, you know, flashing lights and spooky props. Uh, I honestly thought we'd have more by now. Uh, if we don't have something really cool by next week, we may have to suit you up in a furry suit and make you walk around saying "boo!". Heh-heh."
She face palmed. "Oh geez. Are you trying to do the ghosts' work FOR them?"
"Uh, but you know, like I said, we're trying to track down a good lead right now. Uh, some guy who helped design one of the buildings says there was like an extra room that got boarded up, or, uh, something like that. So we're gonna take a peek and see what we can find. Uh, for now just get comfortable with the new set up."
"Extra room?" she frowned. "Why would someone board up an extra room?"
"They tried to lock him away." A soft voice said behind her.
"Hey kiddo." Ruby didn't turn to look, she knew it was the sixth kid.
"Umm, you can check the security cameras over to your right with a click of that blue button. Uh, you can toggle between the hall cams and the vent cam. Uh, then over to your far left, uh, you can flip up your maintenance panel. You know, use this to reboot any systems that may go offline. Uh-heh. Uh in trying to make the place feel vintage we may have overdone it a bit, heh-heh. Some of this equipment is barely functional. Yeah, I-I wasn't joking about the fire that's-that's-that's a real risk. Uh, the most important thing you want to watch for is the ventilation."
"Were you there? At this place?" she asked while listening to the phone as well.
"We all were. It was supposed to end. But it didn't. He wouldn't leave. He got away from the fire before…"
"Ah. Fire can cleanse the spirits that don't want to leave, force them to move on?"
She took his silence as confirmation.
"Look, this place will give you the spooks, man, and if you let that ventilation go offline then you'll start seeing some crazy stuff, man. Keep that air flowing! Okay, keep an eye on things, and we'll try to have something new for you tomorrow night!"
The phone went dead and she turned to look at the ghost.
"Who locked him up? In the extra room?" she asked gently, once again noticing the tear tracks down his cheeks.
"The grownups. They just wanted the story to go away. He didn't leave."
"He possessed Spring." Ruby nodded and noticed that the kid looked even more upset. "Did you know Spring, before?"
He nodded, wiping away at the tears running down his face.
"Then the company found him again, and put him in Fazbear's Fright?"
He nodded, hiccupping.
"But it wasn't Spring anymore, the bad man was in control. All the time?" she kept her voice low and soothing, wishing she could just hug this poor kid.
"He made Spring disappear. I miss Spring. And Goldy."
"Goldy? But she's here." She hid her surprise.
"She doesn't know I'm here. I don't want her to know, please?" he pleaded and her heart ached a little. She'd always had a soft spot for non-murderous kids.
"Okay, I'll let you tell her when you're ready. What happened at Fazbear's Fright?"
"They tried to burn him out." He whispered, looking around nervously.
"The other kids?"
He nodded again.
"But it didn't work?"
A shake of the head this time.
"Springtrap got away." He whispered. "But I'm glad… If…If it worked, they'd kill Spring too…Please…please don't do that."
Ah, that's why he was talking to her. Forcing himself to overcome his shyness and fear.
"Of course I won't. I'm going to send that ghost packing and get Spring back for Goldy, and for you. Okay?"
For the first time since she'd seen him, he looked hopeful.
"He likes games…" he whispered very softly. "Dangerous games."
"And I'll beat him."
He looked up and studied her for a long moment. "Promise?"
"Promise." She nodded firmly.
"Thank you miss." He managed a tiny smile before he faded away again.
Ruby leaned back and stared at the phone, digesting all the information she'd gathered.
"Darn, I forgot to ask him his name." she muttered before she stood up and stretched. "Ah well, I've got another reason to win now. I've got a feeling that kid isn't hanging around for vengeance. He wants to fix things. But still… he wasn't part of the group that got killed. So why is he here? What happened to him? If he knew Spring and Goldy then he's from way back isn't he?"
She glanced at the box of tapes again. Better leave them for the game. It was nice to keep in routine.
"I should put these in the new office when they finish it." She murmured before pausing. "They had better not go for the 'authentic malfunctioning systems' thing."
She frowned to herself before cursing softly. "They're going for the 'authentic malfunctioning systems' thing aren't they? Idiots! Morons! Brain dead sea slugs!"
She continued muttering insults as she stormed out of the building, throwing a few of her new slime bombs into the room the construction workers were using and ignoring the outraged screaming as she locked the door.
It didn't fix anything, but it did make her feel better.
Author's Note
And finally, Springtrap will arrive in the next chapter and FNAF 3 will officially begin.