A/N: Well, you guys have been waiting for this for a long time, and I'm finally here to deliver! Time for the Rockstars to finally make their appearance. I've got a few fun ideas to play around with them.

On an unrelated note, I actually had a fascinating conversation with Jack0lanterns over what would happen if Mike and the ghost kids stumbled upon Five Nights at Fuckboy's. Now THAT would be a shitshow of epic proportions.

Ari-Dexel13: That actually makes me really happy for reasons that will not be made clear until later. Thanks!

AnOrange: I actually don't really have specific ages in mind for the kids. Charlie was the youngest when she died but she's the oldest in terms of maturity and current form. In relative terms, I would rank the kids in terms of age: Charlie (current) Gabe Fritz (shocking, I know) Jeremy = Liz (I'm pretty sure she died before BV did) Susie Cassidy Charlie (time of death).

Philip: Thanks for catching that! I had to change every Rachel to Cassidy when her name was revealed so I figured I'd missed one somewhere. They live in Utah (in the books the specific location was Hurricane, Utah, but since that town is so small IRL I'm not sure that Mike would live there specifically. They do live in that area though.).

Chapter 58 – Rockstars Assemble!

The topic of birthday parties was one that had been mostly unaddressed in the Schmidt family during the time they had spent together. The ghost kids had just been grateful and happy to enjoy the kindness that Mike had given to them, and the man himself was content with sharing his life with his new family.

So they were all completely blindsided when Alex asked Cassidy a simple question. "When do you guys celebrate your birthdays?"

"Err…what?" the ghost girl's thoughts ground to a halt at that question.

"Your birthdays," Alex repeated. "I have mine in late June and Meghan had hers in February."

"Wait, you didn't invite us?" Susie asked sadly.

"Grandparents came over and insisted on celebrating it as a family, so we couldn't invite anyone." Meghan quickly explained.

"Ah," Charlie nodded in understanding.

"Anyways, when are your birthdays?" Alex pressed. "We can come over and celebrate them whenever you want."

"Uh…" the ghost kids looked at each other uncomfortably. "We…don't really remember when our birthdays were," Gabe finally answered. "It's…been a long time since any of us celebrated one."

"Aww, I'm so sorry to hear that…" Meghan murmured sympathetically, thankfully missing the way the ghosts were trying not to squirm.

After all, what were they supposed to say? "Oh, by the way, the real reason why we didn't celebrate our birthdays is because we would have spent them just like we spent any other day for the past forty years, in a tortured existence as furry robots murdering innocent people for reasons we thought were good but were actually complete and utter garbage."

Yeah, because THAT would have gone over real well.

The Marshalls had quickly dropped the topic once they recognized that their friends were uncomfortable with it, even though they didn't understand why. But the question remained in the ghosts' thoughts long after Alex and Meghan had left, and it was only a matter of time before they finally brought the question up to their father.

"Shit…" was the first thing Mike said when Liz asked him. "All these months I've completely forgotten about celebrating birthdays, haven't I?"

"It's not your fault," Charlie quickly added before he could blame himself. "We didn't think about them any more than you did."

"Oh, I'm not beating myself over it," he assured her. "Considering that one of our goals was trying to forget your god-awful pasts as much as possible whenever we didn't have to take care of business, it doesn't really surprise me that we've skipped over something like that."

"Not like it matters," Fritz muttered. "I don't even remember when my birthday was."

"Do any of you guys remember?" Mike asked. He sighed when seven ghostly heads shook no. "That's…rather depressing, but not surprising. Which in a way makes it even more depressing." He thought for several moments. "Okay…there's three ways we can do this."

"Let's hear them!" Jeremy declared as they got settled.

"Option 1 is I randomly assign seven different days of the year, one for each of you," Mike explained. "Option 2 is I do some research and try to look up your original birth certificates to find out when your original birth dates were. And Option 3 is that we celebrate the day you guys first showed up at my house, all of us together, as one large birthday," he gave a quick glance at Charlie. "I'm including Charlie in that, even though she technically showed up on a different day than you guys did."

The ghosts began chattering and murmuring amongst themselves. "Can we…get back to you on that?" Gabe finally asked.

Mike nodded. "Take as much time as you want," he replied, before he suddenly yawned. "I'm gonna go to bed early, I spent more time in the workshop than usual and I'm beat. Let me know what you guys want tomorrow."

The man got up and left the living room, and the ghosts discussed late into the night over the options he had presented. The next morning, all of them were waiting for Mike after he finished his breakfast.

"You guys came up with a decision?" Mike asked.

"Yeah," Gabe had been unofficially chosen as the spokesperson for the kids. "We shot down Option 1 pretty quickly. We want these days to be something really special and choosing a bunch of random days for our birthdays would have kinda cheapened the whole thing."

Mike nodded. "To be honest, I thought that option was the shittiest one out of the three too," he admitted. "But I figured I might as well throw it out there just in case. So we can safely toss that idea in the trash."

"It was a bit harder for us to decide whether we wanted you to find out our individual birthdays or if we wanted to celebrate one day together," Gabe continued, "but in the end…we decided on the last option."

Mike raised an eyebrow. "Oh?" He had figured his kids would've wanted their own birthdays to be discovered.

"The thing is, dad…" Susie picked up where her adoptive brother left off. "We really don't want you to do more work for us than you already have. I know, I know…" she cut him off before he could say anything, "…it's not a problem to you. But it does matter to us."

"And we even know which day we want to celebrate together," Liz added.

"The day that we first showed up at your house," Jeremy finished. "The day that everything finally started turning out for the better."

Mike was silent for several seconds. "Are you sure this is what you want?" he asked once Jeremy had finished.

"We had an entire night to decide what we really wanted," Fritz replied in a half-joking manner. "We're sure."

"Okay then," Mike got up from his chair. "To be honest, this actually works out in a weird way. I already had an idea in mind for the first presents you guys were gonna get, and it would have been a bit awkward to give them out to you one at a time."

"Presents?" Cassidy asked excitedly, and the other ghosts looked just as eager.

"Ah, ah, ah…" Mike wagged his finger. "No hints from me this early. I want it to be a surprise. Now, if you excuse me," he began to walk towards the kitchen, "I have a phone call to make. And no eavesdropping!"

"Aww…" Fritz groaned, having planned on doing exactly that.

Several Weeks Later…

The weeks leading up to the anniversary of the family's creation seemed to pass by in a blur. The ghosts had already been excited at the idea that Mike had planned out their first presents this early, and their excitement had only mounted as the days went by. One major thing they noticed was that Mike seemed to be leaving the house much more frequently than usual, whether it was to work on something in the garage or outright leave the grounds entirely.

Alex and Meghan had been delighted to hear that they had gotten the "birthday issue" sorted out so quickly, even if they were a little disappointed that they wouldn't be able to join in for their first one.

"Sorry you can't come, guys," Cassidy apologized to them over Facebook. "Dad wants us to celebrate out first birthday together just as a family."

"Nah, don't worry about it, you guys," Meghan waved it off. "It's common for families to do that sometimes. Besides, it sounds like your dad has something really big planned."

"Be sure to tell us all about it!" Alex added. "We'll try to join your next one. Who knows? Maybe you'll have met more people who know about who you are by then!"

"Will do!" Charlie replied.

Before any of them new it, the day had finally come. It had been exactly one year since the murdered children had first arrived at Mike's house, and except for Charlie, one year since they had finally found true happiness and the closest thing they could possibly get to a normal life.

Mike called them all to the kitchen table, and each one of them sat down at a chair even though such a gesture was technically useless to ghosts. "So what did you get for our present, dad?" Fritz asked eagerly, unable to keep a lid on his impatience any longer.

"I'll tell you in a second," Mike winked, "but there's something I want to say to you guys first." The ghosts leaned in attentively as he continued. "The funny thing about this present is that, when I first met you guys and before I knew more about you, I would have called this the worst present possible. You were trying your hardest to forget about your shitty past and then I get you something that reminds you about it and represents it? Would've been as stupid as charging dick-first into a metal maze when your bullshit alarms are already going off."

The ghosts smirked at the verbal jab at their murderer, but Charlie's eyes widened. Could Mike have gotten what she was thinking he'd gotten?

"And then we had a little conversation that changed everything," Mike's eyes glazed slightly as he thought back to the night they had shared underneath the stars. "The night after I told you about my past. We were sitting under a beautiful night sky, and you guys told me that you didn't mind being animatronics, and that it was only being enslaved and trapped that made your existences so miserable." He shook his head. "I still don't know if this is the right call, or if you're still gonna feel okay with this present when you actually see it. But there's only one way for us to find out."

Now the ghosts were starting to realize what Mike was saying. "Wait…" Gabe's eyes widened, "…you got us Freddy's animatronic bodies?" he exclaimed.

"Not just any animatronic bodies," Mike answered with a smile, "but the best ones I honestly think I could possibly give you." He got off his chair. "C'mon guys," he beckoned to them, "let's head over to the garage."

The kids eagerly got up from the table and followed their father out of the house and to the garage. As they flew alongside them, it suddenly occurred to all of them that none of them had actually entered the garage once in recent memory. It would certainly explain why Mike was able to hide that many animatronics from them so well. Mike opened the garage door and flipped on the lights.

And there, standing at the far end of the building, were seven Freddy Fazbear animatronics. But even though most of them were fundamentally the same mascot characters as the ones that were once the cornerstone of Freddy Fazbear's Pizzeria, these animatronics were very different from the originals that they had once adored. Every single one of the new animatronics looked polished and made with the highest quality materials, with all of them except for Chica and the Security Puppet decorated with a golden star somewhere on their bodies. Even though Lefty had looked quite similar to Rockstar Freddy, they were still completely taken by surprise at the fresh and modern appearance of animatronics that had had their heyday more than 30 years ago.

"You actually got them," Charlie breathed, her mouth gaping open. "You got the Rockstars."

The other ghosts immediately turned to her. "Wait, you KNEW about these?" Liz spluttered.

"I knew about their existence," Charlie clarified, "but I didn't know this was what Dad had planned for the past few weeks. Although…this does explain the many phone calls and garage outings that Mike's been doing recently."

"Nelson and I have been working to prepare them for you guys to wear, so to speak," Mike added. "But as I was saying…yes, these are the Rockstar Animatronics. The newest versions of the Freddy Fazbear animatronics. Henry built these to make his trap look as real as possible, but he never actually brought them into the trap so they were never destroyed. And because of this, they are the only animatronics that I know of that are untainted by all the shit surrounding the Freddy's franchise. William Afton never came anywhere near them, which can only be a good thing as far as I'm concerned."

Jeremy squinted at the motionless form of Rockstar Bonnie. "What kind of work did you do on them?" he asked.

"Well, one of the major things is that the endoskeletons for these animatronics have NO A.I. whatsoever," Mike explained. "The idea is that when you're not possessing them, they're basically just fancy-looking metal statues. We already know for a fact that fucked up programming can drive a ghost insane," he gave a sympathetic look to Liz, who barely repressed a shudder, "and I don't want glitchy programming doing the same thing. So, I got rid of the problem by making sure there's no way it can happen in the first place."

"That is COMPLETELY fine by me," Fritz declared and the other ghosts nodded their agreement. After learning what Liz had gone through, nobody wanted the same thing to happen to them.

"Another thing is that despite having no programming, they all have their own independent rechargeable generators," Mike continued. "So instead of using your own energy to move about and do things in these animatronics, you'll be able to use the energy stored in the generators instead until it runs out."

"I really appreciate that, dad!" Gabe answered gratefully. Even though he knew that Mike had set the AIs to 0, running out of energy and being forced to move Freddy's body with his own strength had been incredibly tiring and frustrating, and he was glad that his dad had taken steps to try and circumvent that problem.

"The only thing remotely resembling programming is that the animatronics have a small song database on them that can connect to iTunes on a computer, which will let the animatronics play that song," Mike smiled. "Nelson had this really cool theory that by possessing the animatronics, you would be able to supposedly call on the song database and actually be able to play the songs themselves. I don't know if that's true or not, but I'm eager to find out!"

"Me too!" Susie exclaimed. One of the very few highlights of being an animatronic for her had been playing what had once been her favorite songs in front of an audience of happy, innocent children. She didn't know if she would ever get the opportunity again as Rockstar Chica, but she definitely wanted to at least do it for her dad.

"The most important thing for me is that these animatronics were never touched by Remnant. Ever. So, at least in theory, you guys should be able to enter and exit them however you want," Mike concluded. "But that's only in theory. Before I give these animatronics over to you guys, I want to make sure that that's actually the case." He sighed. "I'm going to need one of you guys to test the Rockstars to make sure shit doesn't hit the fan. Because if you get stuck in these animatronics then I'm sending them to the Incinerator as soon as possible."

The ghosts looked at each other before Charlie floated forward. "I'll be your guinea pig," she volunteered. "I'll make sure they're safe to wear." She started to move towards the Security Puppet, but stopped when Mike shook his head.

"Freddy Fazbear Puppets have always been kinda…weird…as far as possessions go," Mike explained. "I think it's better if you possess one of the more regular Rockstars first to test things out."

"I see your point," Charlie acknowledged, but was interrupted as Gabe floated up next to her.

"I want to test Freddy," he offered. Charlie looked like she wanted to argue, but at the last moment decided not to. Gabe floated up to Rockstar Freddy and disappeared. A few seconds later, Rockstar Freddy flickered to life. The bear animatronic's eyes opened and it immediately straightened its posture.

"Testing, testing!" Rockstar Freddy said in a loud voice. "One, two, three!" He looked over at the rest of the family and waved. "Can you guys hear me?"

"Yeah, we can!" Jeremy replied excitedly. "How's it feel?"

Rockstar Freddy laughed. "I feel amazing!" he declared. "I can't believe how natural and comfortable this body feels! I can't wait to see if this Nelson guy's theory about the songs really works!"

"But can you get out?" Mike asked in a guarded tone. "How good or bad the animatronic feels doesn't mean shit if you get stuck and we get a repeat of the Fazbear tragedy on our hands."

Rockstar Freddy closed his eyes, and a few seconds later, Gabe floated out of his body. "I had to concentrate a tiny bit," he reported, "but otherwise I didn't have any problems."

Just to be certain, Mike ordered Gabe to possess Rockstar Freddy again. Only when Gabe was able to repeat his test without any problems did the man relax. "All right, guys, I think you can try them out for yourselves now."

Cassidy wrapped her father in a tight hug and all the ghosts followed suit. "Thank you so much for putting in all this work, dad!" she murmured gratefully. "It must have been really hard."

"I know you were worried about how we'd feel about this," Jeremy added, "but I'm really happy with this gift!"

"We'll try and make the best of what you've given us," Susie assured her father, "with all the love that went into these, I'd feel terrible if I didn't."

The ghosts of the original 5 murdered children broke off and, one by one, they entered the animatronics they had possessed so many years ago. Gabe entered Freddy, Jeremy Bonnie, Susie Chica, Fritz Foxy, and Cassidy Golden Freddy. One by one, the animatronics flickered to life and began to move around various parts of their body.

"You were right, Gabe!" Rockstar Bonnie exclaimed. "This is nothing like being trapped in the old crew. This feels so amazing!"

"I know, right?" Rockstar Foxy added. "And this parrot is the coolest thing ever! Though I don't know why I'm carrying a freaking accordion of all things…"

Rockstar Golden Freddy looked over at Mike and a laugh escaped his (her?) mouth. Unlike the main four, Golden Freddy didn't have his own voice box, so it was Cassidy's voice that came out of his mouth instead. "I just realized something!" he exclaimed. "We can finally hug you for real, dad!"

Mike's eyes widened in panic. "Wait, wait, wait!" he frantically stopped him. "You do realize you'll crush me to death if you do it too quickly, right?"

Rockstar Golden Freddy stopped and sighed. "Oops…yeah, that would be pretty bad," he admitted. He approached Mike much more carefully and wrapped him in a gentle hug, making sure to use as little force as possible. One by one, the other animatronics did the same, reveling in the fact that they could actually make physical contact with their father even if it was through a filter of steel.

"This is such an amazing gift, dad!" Rockstar Chica declared. "I'm so happy you got these for us! We can actually feel like we're alive again!"

The only two ghosts who hadn't possessed an animatronic were Charlie and Liz. As the others were checking out their new animatronic bodies, Mike knelt to look Liz in the eye. The girl looked incredibly conflicted. On the one hand, she still felt some lingering fear about how badly her life as Circus Baby had gone. But on the other hand, there was some envy in her green eyes as she looked over at how happy and relaxed her siblings were in their new forms.

"Liz…" Mike's voice snapped her out of her thoughts. "I haven't forgotten about you. I have plans for an animatronic body for you too. It's just that Henry never had any animatronic designed that would really fit you, so I have to build yours from scratch. But I WILL get it done, no matter how long it takes."

Liz fought down her disappointment and smiled at him. She had complete faith that her father wouldn't let her down. "I know you will, dad," she answered, "but I can't help but wonder how. The plans for all the Funtime animatronics were destroyed when we torched CBEAR."

"A…friend of mine happened to have a spare copy of Baby's blueprints a couple of weeks back, and he was kind enough to drop that copy off at my garage," Mike answered mysteriously. "It's been taking me a while to edit out all the bad shit, especially with my other project and everything else that's been going on, but I'm almost done. I'm going to make a new set of blueprints for Baby without all the fucked-up nonsense that William Afton put in, and as a temporary substitute birthday present, how'd you like to burn the old set after I'm done?"

Liz perked up. "With a blowtorch or the incinerator?" she asked with a grin.

Mike grinned. "However the hell you want to do it."

Liz giggled happily at the idea of destroying yet more of William Afton's evil handiwork, not noticing the confused expression on Charlie's face. She didn't recall Nelson ever having a detailed set of blueprints for Circus Baby when they had visited her old home…so how had Mike gotten his hands on them? Especially since he'd never had the time to pick them up while they had been hard at work destroying CBEAR…

She shook her head, dismissing it as unimportant for the time being. "Hey, Liz…" she called out, attracting the orange-haired girl's attention. "Since Dad's working on making an animatronic for you like he did for the rest of us, why don't you borrow Lefty until he gets everything sorted out?"

Liz's eyes widened. "You're…you're letting me borrow Lefty?" she asked incredulously. "But…he's yours! He's your father's last gift to you!"

Charlie smirked. "Technically, ALL of the Rockstar animatronics could count as Father's last gift," she put the last three words in air quotes, "but to me…" her smirk faded and a wistful look entered her eyes. "The Puppet is the greatest thing he ever gave me. And this Security Puppet is the closest thing there is to the original Marionette now that it's been destroyed. Lefty just doesn't have that same level of importance, and I'm happy to let you have him for the time being."

Liz hugged her sister. "Thank you, Charlie…" she murmured. "I feel so much better knowing that I'm not being left behind."

"There's not a chance in Hell that that will ever happen," Charlie answered firmly as they separated. Taking a deep breath, the most mature ghost of the family entered the animatronic's body. Golden eyelights flickered in the Security Puppet's mask and she raised her head.

"Wow…" was the first thing that came out of her mouth, "…after not being in a Puppet for so long, this feels kind of disorienting."

"Disorienting for you?" Rockstar Chica asked jokingly. "We haven't been in an actual body for literal years!"

"It'll be really cool to walk around the house and actually be able to hold and touch things for a change!" Rockstar Bonnie commented. "I know we can manipulate things with our ghostly powers, but it just isn't the same."

"Speak for yourself," Rockstar Foxy dryly retorted. "I'm still holding a freaking accordion over here! And even if I didn't, I still have a hook for a hand!"

"Which I'm getting rid of," Mike interrupted, "as soon as possible. Just like I got rid of the peg leg and replaced it with a normal leg while I was working on Rockstar Foxy with Nelson."

"Wait, what?" Rockstar Foxy protested, suddenly much more defensive of his hook than he was seconds ago. "But it's my hook! I'm Foxy the Pirate! I've always had a hook! And what's this about a peg leg?"

"Because with that thing you're a walking safety hazard!" Rockstar Freddy exclaimed. "You'd probably trip and fall over every other second if you had a peg leg on. And don't get me started on that hook! What if you poked someone's eye out? It's bad enough that we have to worry about you breaking one of our eyes, but God forbid you accidentally poke out dad's eye with that thing! We're lucky Foxy didn't cause any hook-related accidents back when he was still active at Pirate's Cove!"

Rockstar Foxy looked like he desperately wanted to counter his brother's argument, but he couldn't deny the point. "Ah, well…" he sighed, "at least I'll still have the eyepatch and the parrot."

"We should really do something with these new bodies!" Rockstar Golden Freddy suggested excitedly. "Something special to celebrate our first official family birthday!"

"Okay, but what exactly can we do?" the Security Puppet wondered. "Dad just got us these bodies, and it's not like he can make a giant birthday cake for us to eat!"

"Maybe we can perform a little concert for dad?" Rockstar Bonnie suggested. "I like Susie's idea that she brought up earlier – playing some music would be really fun, especially with all the cool songs that have come out over the past couple of years."

None of them noticed the mischievous smirk that crossed Mike's face for a brief second. Half of him had wanted to upload "Despacito" into the Rockstars as a prank…while the other half had cringed hard at the thought of invoking a meme that had already been run into the ground over and over again.

"There aren't any songs uploaded in these bodies yet," Rockstar Freddy countered, "and it might take a bit of time for us to get used to syncing everything up and getting everything sorted out."

"I have an idea…"

All the Rockstars stopped to turn towards Mike, who had a calculating glint in his eyes. "I have an idea," he repeated. "This is either the best idea or the worst idea ever. But I just can't resist."

The children did their best to project their curiosity and confusion through the eyes of the animatronics. "What do you have in mind, dad?" Rockstar Chica asked.

A grin that was just a tad unsettling began to stretch across Mike's face. "Well…"

/

A/N: A cliffhanger because I'm an asshole :D

Sorry if this chapter was very exposition-y, but as we all know by now, the kids have had OBSCENELY bad experiences with possessing animatronics the last time around, and Mike understandably wants to make sure that any chances of shit hitting the fan are as minimal as possible.

Some of you might be wondering why I seemingly forgot to have Liz possess Lefty. I didn't forget. The answer to that question will be made clear next chapter.

Anyways, hope you guys enjoyed!