A/N: Hey, I found some time after all, so I was able to get this chapter in faster than I expected! But next month's rotation is emergency medicine, so don't expect this trend to last. I'll be lucky if I'll be able to post a chapter every two weeks, since this is emergency medicine we're talking about…
We're getting closer to the end of the Help Wanted arc (excluding Curse of Dreadbear) stuff, but the most important developments and events are yet to come. The family is starting to put together the pieces of the mystery behind the development of the VR game, and they'll soon realize that the truth is far darker than anything they could have anticipated.
Guest: Unfortunately, I'm 99.99% sure Bon Bon didn't survive the process through which Funtime Freddy became a part of Ennard.
Properman: I can respect the argument that you're proposing, and I can certainly agree that William truly became the monster that is Springtrap the moment he murdered his first child victim. But as to the idea that there's a "split personality" in him with the good side being William Afton and the evil being Springtrap, to say that I have my doubts would be an understatement. Whatever good was in William Afton (if it even existed in the first place) died a long, long time ago, and being in Hell doesn't affect that at all. I will say that there is ONE possible way that I could implement your suggestion in Mike's New Ghostly Family. But even then, that possibility is remote, and it certainly won't be in the way you're probably thinking.
Demoshark115: Yep, that's the idea! 😊
RicAlberquerque: Okay, perhaps I misunderstood your question a bit. However, you are making a very BIG assumption: that Vanny wouldn't have been a game tester for FE. A statement that is by no means necessarily correct. Keep in mind that Mike (and the ghost kids) are testing the VR game VERY LATE into its production, like only a few months at most before it would have been released. There are PLENTY of potential beta testers that could and probably have gone through the game before the Schmidts ever touched it (Jeremy and Tape Girl being two examples), and Vanny could have easily been any one of them.
"But how?" You're probably asking yourself. "How does that make any sense?" And to that I say, I will be answering that question soon enough. But it's a question that cannot logically be answered until the tail end of the arc by necessity.
Jack0Lanterns: She'll be letting out a lot more curses by the end of it, that's for sure. As for Fazbear Entertainment's knowledge, what you suggested does make sense, although I won't be making a big deal out of it in the fic itself. It's also possible that someone saw Scrap Baby or the other alleyway animatronics and reported what they saw to FE, and since FE only made Scrap Plushbabies in the game instead of an actual Scrap Baby they wouldn't need too many details to recreate them.
Sarah Glasner: Thanks! Hope you keep enjoying the fic as you read it more!
Awesomesniper86: That troll jumpscare prize doesn't exist since there's no way Fazbear Entertainment would know about the Nightmares. And I also have to correct you; if you get the Plushtrap Jumpscare Troll Prize for a reward, the level will STILL count as completed and you won't have to redo it to unlock the next segment. I know for a fact that this is true.
AlchemyWriter: You'll just have to wait and see. Events will soon come to a head very, very soon…
FrostTheFrozenFox: Funnily enough, the VR game explicitly refers to Funtime Foxy as Her when HandUnit describes them in their level. Although you're right, there's a bit more evidence to Funtime Foxy is male, even though in all honesty their gender can be he/she/they/yes/whatever-the-fuck-you-want. I've gone back and changed the pronouns regardless.
ThomasTheTank: Well we don't know much about Security Breach right now, so there's not much I can say about that.
Raptor: Thanks! And yes, unfortunately you're correct in that the Funtimes won't be returning. They're dead and gone, and it wouldn't make much sense to bring them back.
MegaMaster78: Sammy was strictly a book canon-only character, so I don't have plans to bring him back in MNGF.
FireFlamerx9z: To be honest, I'm not even 100% sure on that myself lol. It's something that's further down on the list of priorities at the moment.
Ari-Dexel13: I can tell you that nobody's probably going to be showing William Afton-as-Glitchtrap any mercy. Not just because he's every as murderous as ever and doesn't deserve any mercy, but also because he's genuinely too dangerous to be allowed to exist. We've already seen what he's done to Jeremy; just imagine what he could do to a freaking kid playing the game or, God forbid, if the game got released on a massive scale with Glitchtrap unchecked. As for your argument regarding the possibility of a permanent death for Glitchtrap, one can argue that oblivion is a kinder fate than eternal torment in Hell, depending on who you ask. I doubt any of the other characters would give a fuck about William's opinion on the matter, in any case.
Chapter 123 – VR Help Wanted Part 9
"I fucking hate existence," Liz grumbled as she arrived back at the main menu. "I swear, if I somehow end up in Hell, my eternal torment is going to be playing Dark Rooms levels forever and ever and ever and fuck everything!"
The former (and technically still current) Baby inhabitant had finally finished the last two Dark Rooms levels, and they were just as much of a pain in the ass as she had expected. Every single problem that had plagued her during her runs of normal Plushbaby, except somehow even worse. So many times she would look towards a spot where she could have sworn she saw a Scrap Plushbaby, only for a focused look to reveal nothing but regular Plushbabies that did nothing to help her survive. The inverse problem was less frequent but just as annoying, as sometimes she would miss a hidden Scrap Plushbaby that was hidden next to her harmless kin. At best, she would have to waste several battery ticks looking around to find the missing Plushbaby before she finally found it and stopped it. At worst, her run would die at the hands of a screaming Plushbaby that she had no idea how it could even kill in the first place.
In the end, it had taken her even longer to finish Plushbaby Hard Mode than it had the regular Plushbabies, easily over an hour, and she wouldn't even be surprised if her ordeal had lasted two. Not to mention the fact that she would very likely erupt into a psychopathic rage and tear apart the next Plushbaby she came across in real life as her Scrap Baby form, the consequences be damned. At least she had found a Coin hidden close to her location in the room that she had somehow missed during her normal Plushbaby mode run, though that provided small comfort in the face of the immense frustration that Plushbaby Nightmare mode had caused her.
Funtime Foxy's Hard Mode had been easier than the Plushbaby's, but even that had proved to be one of the more challenging levels she had come across in her time playing the game. The previously empty Funtime Auditorium was now filled with multiple copies of Circus Baby, Funtime Freddy, and Funtime Foxy, all of which would instantly kill her if she got too close to them (Ballora had been conspicuously absent). Not to mention the fact that Lolbit, someone who she had barely interacted with in CBEAR but was now the main threat of the level, was much harder to detect at first, being only visible by the glowing white dots they had for eyes.
This time, even her knowledge on how Funtime Foxy operated wasn't enough to guarantee success, and she had been killed twice before she was able to finally succeed on her third try. Her first death had largely been her fault, as she hadn't been paying proper attention to where Lolbit's eyes had been and had walked a little too close to them, ending in a jumpscare from the rather odd animatronic. The second death had been a little more interesting; she had positioned herself poorly and ended up in a situation where she had been surrounded by Funtime animatronic copies and Lolbit. With no way out of the situation, she had decided to just walk into an endoskeleton just for fun, only for it turn into a Withered Bonnie of all things when it killed her. She had no idea how that made any sense at all, but the fact that the endo had transformed into an animatronic she was 100% sure had never even existed in CBEAR was more amusing to her than anything else.
Still, her mood was far from happy after the catastrophe that was the Plushbaby Nightmare level, and she was just happy to get the Funtime Foxy/Lolbit level over with as soon as possible.
"I need a break!" Circus Baby declared as she turned off the headset and took it off. "I literally just did the worst thing I've ever done in a video game ever and if I don't take another nap right now I'm going to punch a hole in this damn wall!"
"Even worse than the Plushbabies?" Rockstar Freddy asked, doing the animatronic equivalent of raising an eyebrow.
"You know how I told you guys how the Plushbaby level sucked?" Baby countered. When everyone nodded, she continued. "Now imagine doing that AGAIN," she ranted, "except that EVERY SINGLE PLUSHIE in the goddamn room is a Plushbaby and that the evil Plushbabies you have to stop are based on you when you were a psychopathic and stupid little bitch who thought a child-killing asshat was a good idea of a role model, and they're hiding in between all the Plushbabies so that it's even harder to tell where they are!"
"Oof…" Rockstar Bonnie muttered.
"Yeah, oof," Baby repeated derisively. "Now I'm going to go take another nap. What's left to do in this game anyway?"
"I think we just have the Vent Repair levels," Rockstar Chica pointed out. "Mangle Hard Mode and…is there anything else?"
Baby rolled her eyes. "There's probably an Ennard Hard Mode too," she muttered. "Okay, I'll do that one after I get a few minutes of rest. Somebody should probably take care of that Mangle Hard Mode level in the meantime."
"I'll do it," Rockstar Chica volunteered.
Rockstar Foxy glanced over at her. "You sure?" he asked, concerned. "I was the one who did the original Mangle Vent Repair. I could probably…"
"I've been waiting a while to play this again," Rockstar Chica countered. "Just tell me what I need to do."
Rockstar Foxy shrugged. "Okay then." He proceeded to provide a brief summary of what he had done when he had completed Mangle's normal Vent Repair level, how there were four different puzzles that he had needed to complete and how to complete them, all while avoiding Mangle's attacks. "I dunno how different the Hard Mode is gonna be though," he warned.
"I'll deal with it," Rockstar Chica replied. "Thanks for the help." Rockstar Foxy nodded as Rockstar Chica took the VR Headset and put it on. When she was back in the game, Susie spared a glance over to the Spring Bonnie figure and nearly did a double-take. The figure was definitely MUCH larger and closer than it had been originally back when she had played the game more extensively towards the beginning, and now she could hear some of the garbled mumblings that Liz had mentioned.
"I think Jeremy was right," Susie thought. "We've been putting this thing back together with the Tapes. And I still have no clue if doing that was the right thing or not." Regardless, she had absolutely no intention of picking up the last tape that would presumably free the Spring Bonnie figure from whatever limitations bound it at the moment. She was about to pick the Mangle Vent Repair Hard Mode level, but at the last minute she decided to check the Prize Corner instead to see if there was anything new first.
There wasn't anything new in terms of Tapes or Coins to be discovered, but Susie WAS surprised to discover that the rest of the prizes that required coins had all been unlocked. Her favorite by far was the Helpy that had been unlocked with 25 coins, a count that the family had collectively gathered exactly. "Ooh, I want to see Helpy looks like in the game!" Susie declared excitedly as she pressed it on the menu screen. The large claw came down, and the former Chica inhabitant was shocked by just how large the bear animatronic really was. "We really haven't been paying much attention to Helpy at all, have we?" she thought a bit morosely as she picked up the bear, Helpy staring back at her innocently with a huge smile on her face. She put it back on the counter and made a mental note to start paying more attention to Helpy as soon as they were done going through this game.
Afterwards, Susie decided to quickly check on the Tape Room to see how many Tapes were left. A quick scan confirmed that they had collected 13 out of the 16 Tapes. "Just gotta make sure we don't collect that Tape number 16," she thought as she returned to the main menu. There wasn't anything left that she needed to do at this point, so Susie pressed on the Mangle Vent Repair Hard Mode level. "I hope Fritz actually gave me enough info to actually work with," she thought as she entered the level.
Although Susie had no idea what the original Mangle level looked like, the shaft that she found herself in was now bathed with a distinctive indigo light that seemed unnatural. Susie reached out to press the button, and HandUnit immediately glitched out instead of giving her an introduction like he had Fritz. The abrupt change took her by surprise, but what really worried her was the fact that the shaft had suddenly plunged into darkness…
…and all three vent doors opened at once.
"Oh, God…" Susie breathed, realizing that unlike Fritz, who only had to take care of one vent shaft at a time, she would be vulnerable to all of Mangle's possible directions of attack AND have to deal with all of the puzzles at the same time. Deciding to take care of the easiest part first, Susie pressed the glowing button in the middle vent shaft in front of her and turned up the switch that it corresponded to, restoring the functionality of the vent. Her headlamp immediately flickered on to life and bathed an area in front of her with the same indigo glow, providing her with something of a relief.
"What do I do?" Susie wondered. Fritz's directions had surprisingly been clear enough that she knew how to follow them in theory, but she wasn't sure in which order she should do them. She didn't have time to think, however, as she heard loud banging noises coming from the vent to her left. Susie focused her attention on it, and the light revealed Mangle stopping and fleeing back into the darkness of the shaft. The former Chica inhabitant didn't have any time to relax, however, as she heard a second set of footprints coming from the middle. When she turned her attention on it this time, the light revealed a shadowy Mangle with a body covered in darkness, save for two glowing white eyes and glowing white fangs in its jaw. This new form of Mangle also retreated into the darkness, but it was little comfort to Susie as she realized the implications.
"Oh, you've got to be kidding me…" Susie groaned. "There's TWO of them now? How am I supposed to deal with two of them attacking me from all sides at the same time?" Grumbling, she decided to take care of the hardest one first. She leaned over into the left shaft and peered into alcove, hoping to see the colored light pattern that would unlock and restore the left shaft. The button-like light glowed green…red…orange…
She faintly heard banging sounds growing louder and louder behind her. With a panic, Susie turned around to deal with them…and stared right into the face of Shadow Mangle. "Agghhh!" Susie exclaimed in shock as the shadow animatronic let out a loud, ferocious roar. Shadow Mangle chomped down on Susie's head with her glowing white jaws, killing her and ending her run. "Are you kidding me?" she complained as she found herself back on the Game Over screen. "I couldn't hear Shadow Mangle get closer to me because the stupid steam was too loud for me to hear anything! Dammit!"
She reset the level and returned back to where she had started. She still did the middle vent puzzle first, since it seemed like completing that task would be what turned on her headlight, but instead she turned to face up and to the right, where steam was blasting out of the pipe on top of the right vent. She turned the wheel to deactivate the steam, and as she did so she heard one of the Mangles approach from in front of her. Susie focused her light on the middle vent to drive off the regular Mangle, and did the same to Shadow Mangle on her right side a few seconds later.
"Wait, I have an idea," Susie realized as she turned the wheel on the pipe to her left. "Maybe if I just widely scan the vents from side to side whenever I hear footprints, I can keep an eye on all three vents at the same time AND deal with the Mangles too!" She waited for more footprints to approach closer, and then scanned her head from left to right to left again, keeping enough control over her movements for the light to actually shine in the vents properly for a flee. Her action was rewarded, as she was able to block off Mangle immediately and Shadow Mangle a few seconds later. Susie reached up to push the button on the panel above the middle vent and flicked the switch that appeared in the shaft itself, completing and restoring the third vent.
Now that there was no longer any steam, Susie could focus on the last two vents without the loud hissing sound distracting her. There were two vents left to take care of, the left and the right, and she already knew that the left vent would be much harder to take care of even without Fritz making that point abundantly clear in his descriptions of Mangle's normal mode. Since the right vent only required her to flick two switches, Susie opted to do that first, and she was able to fix the right vent even before the next set of Mangle attacks started. Once she had fended them off, the former Chica inhabitant only had the left vent left to go. She peered into the alcove to see the button light, which glowed blue…green…
…her viewing was interrupted by the clanging of another Mangle attack, and Susie quickly did another scan of the vents to block them off with her light. Once both Mangles were gone, she looked back into the alcove. "Red…blue…green…"
Feeling a sense of danger, Susie stopped looking at the lights to do another pre-emptive scan of the vents. Her paranoia was rewarded as she was soon attacked by the Mangles, and since she didn't have to waste time looking up from the vent it was easy to block them off once more. She only knew the sequence for three of the colored lights…but that was enough. The orange light could only be either the first or the last in the sequence, and Susie could simply input both combinations in the panel of colored buttons to determine which one was correct. She first punched in orange, red, blue, green, which proved to be incorrect. Then, she quickly punched in red, blue, green, orange.
"Yes!" she cheered as the yellow panel above the colored buttons opened up and revealed the switch hidden within. Susie quickly flipped the switch and sighed in relief as the vent doors closed and the lights turned back on, signaling the completion of the level. "Whew…" she breathed a sigh of relief as HandUnit congratulated her for achieving a perfect 72 degrees. "A little tough, but nothing too crazy over there. I should thank Fritz for telling me what to do, it made figuring this level out a lot easier." She turned the crank of the prize giftbox and was rewarded with, amusingly enough, a Funtime Foxy plushie. "Huh…" Susie snickered, "I think that's the wrong Foxy, but I'll take it at least." She couldn't help but notice the similarities between Mangle and Funtime Foxy with regards to their appearance and coloration. "Was Funtime Foxy based off of Mangle, or was it the other way around?" she wondered. It was ironic, really, how the mangled and broken Toy Foxy with so many exposed metal parts sticking out proved to be the safer animatronic for children, while the pristine and undamaged Funtime Foxy was a tool for William Afton's twisted and murderous ambitions.
Back in the main level hub, the Spring Bonnie figure was gone. Susie honestly didn't know what to think about that, considering its erratic behavior when interacting with her other siblings. She certainly wasn't going to go out of her way to try and interact with it directly, especially given how the Tapes implied that the glitch was more dangerous than it seemed. "Wait, before I go, I want to try something out first," Susie muttered. She switched the levels over to the FNaF 3 section and picked Night 1, the one level that she knew would not have Springtrap or anything else dangerous. Once the level had loaded, she looked around to see if there were any open wall spaces. The former Chica inhabitant had played a bit of FNaF 3 a few days ago before they had gotten the VR game, and had wanted to see if there was a similar secret hidden here.
"I don't see anything…wait a minute!" Susie exclaimed as Phone Dude's voice echoed throughout the Fazbear's Fright office. The wall to the right, where the vent camera control panel and TV were located, was suspiciously empty and open. Susie began to randomly push the tiles on the wall, and eventually she was able to isolate a 3x3 grid of wall tiles directly above the vent control panel. "3…9...5…2…4…8…" she typed it into the wall like she would on a phone. "YES!" the blonde-haired ghost girl cheered as a Coin appeared in front of her. "I knew it! I knew there was a hidden secret in this level. Kinda wish it was more than just a coin, though…" Susie eyed the golden coin, critically, then shrugged and collected it, watching nonchalantly as it disappeared with a cheer and a shower of sparks. "Okay, let's get out of here," she paused the game and returned to the main menu, not interested in wasting time waiting for the level to end even if it would net her a free prize.
Once she was back in the main level hub, the Spring Bonnie figure had returned, and Susie forced herself to wave at it and smile while pretending that nothing was wrong. It seemed satisfied at her action, which by itself was immensely suspicious to the former Chica inhabitant. The glitch almost seemed alive and intelligent in how it behaved, and from what she and the others had heard from the Tapes she doubted that it had good intentions. Since Liz was still probably taking her nap, Susie decided to go into the Tape Room and listen to the Tapes one more time, just to make sure that she understood the full picture and hadn't missed any important details.
"Okay…" Susie murmured once she had finished Tape 13. "I didn't really get anything new out of that, but at least it was good for me to hear Tape Girl's full story and confirm what we already know." With nothing left to do at the moment, she turned off the game and took off the VR headset.
"All right," Rockstar Chica reported, "I took care of the Mangle Hard Mode level and found another Coin in the FNaF 3 levels we missed earlier. I also took the time to listen to all the Tapes just to hear it for myself and make sure we hadn't missed anything."
"Good job on the Coin," Rockstar Freddy praised, causing the chicken animatronic to grin appreciatively. "Where'd you find it? And did you find any Tapes?"
Rockstar Chica's smile faded a bit at the mention of the Tapes. "Didn't find any tapes," she replied. "And for the missing FNaF 3 coin I typed that code from the original FNaF 3 in the wall above the vent control panel. You know, the one from that part where we're trying to free our souls?"
Rockstar Freddy groaned and smacked his head. "I knew there was something off with how empty that wall is." He glanced over at the still sleeping Circus Baby. "Think Liz'll be ready for Ennard Hard Mode or should we wait a few more minutes?"
"It'll probably be fine," Rockstar Foxy brushed off his brother's concern. "From what it sounded like, Ennard's level was the easiest one that she had to deal with."
"It could be harder than what she had to deal with last time though," Rockstar Golden Freddy pointed out.
Rockstar Foxy simply raised his eyepatch. "Harder than Plushbaby Nightmare, with how much she's complained about it?" he retorted. Rockstar Golden Freddy didn't have an answer to that, so he simply conceded with a nod and watched as Rockstar Foxy tapped Circus Baby's head likely with his hand.
"Hey, Liz," the animatronic fox called at her. "Wake up."
Circus Baby's green eyes fluttered open and flashed green, signaling that she had activated. "Huh?" she mumbled. "What happened?"
"Susie took care of Mangle's Hard Mode level in Vent Repair," Rockstar Bonnie explained. "It's your turn now to do Ennard's Hard Mode, unless you want someone else to do it instead."
"No, I'll do it," Baby answered as she got up and picked up the VR Headset. "This is the only level left before that one level in Night Terrors opens up, right?"
"Right," Mike confirmed. "That's what I've been told. But don't start it yet when you unlock it, though. You've done a lot more than I'd originally planned and I think it would be best if one of your siblings who got murdered in the MCI did it instead. You know, for their atonement and all."
"Gotcha," Baby affirmed. "Just the Ennard Hard Mode level. I'll take care of that and come back afterwards. I don't think it'll take too long." She put the headset on and turned on the game, taking her back to the main level hub. The Spring Bonnie figure was to her right as always, and by now Liz had slowly grown accustomed to its presence, even though she still did not like or trust it one bit.
"All right," Liz declared as she moved over to the Ennard Hard Mode Vent Repair level. "Let's get this out of the way now." She had no idea how Hard Mode differed from Normal Mode, but if the Dark Rooms levels were of any indication she wouldn't be surprised if a large chunk of the gameplay itself was different.
When the level loaded, Liz nearly jolted in shock. "What the hell?" she exclaimed, looking at her surroundings in disbelief. The environment had certainly changed dramatically from Ennard's normal mode. The room she was starting in, which had previously been mostly empty, was now filled with various animatronic parts. She could see a Toy Bonnie head, a Toy Foxy arm, and a bare endoskeleton with a fuse in front of her. To her left was a Freddy with a missing head, and to her right was a badly assembled endoskeleton with one eye and a head randomly coming out of its mangled body. But by far the most dramatic change was the fact that the entire level was now completely upside-down. "Oh, no…" Liz groaned. "This is going to be such a headache to deal with isn't it?" With a sigh, she pressed the button on the now-right side of the elevator to activate the level. HandUnit's intro was still the same as before, but this time when the elevator started to descend it began moving up from her warped perspective. Immediately, Liz could see a Fredbear head embedded in the elevator shaft with the familiar purple rectangle of the Tape. She reached out and grabbed it, barely managing to claim it in time before the Fredbear head disappeared.
"What the hell happened to this place?" Liz muttered. The Fredbear head was the largest thing stuck in the corners and alcoves of the elevator shaft, but it was by no means the only one. As the elevator "ascended," the former Baby inhabitant could see a disfigured toy caterpillar with its head falling off, the lower jaw of a Bonnie head, and many different damaged plushies and lone animatronics arms and legs with small sparks flying out of wires, as though they had been violently attacked and torn to pieces by some unseen force. The new additions to the environment turned the elevator shaft from merely creepy to outright disturbing, although there was nothing Liz had seen that was actually dangerous yet.
It was almost a relief when the elevator stopped at the Breaker Room, entering into more familiar territory. Remembering how the elevator was upside-down, Liz turned her attention to the right vent door as it opened. The small room was largely the same as before, except there was now a Foxy head with a single glowing eye, two fuses scattered on the ground, and a bare endo head that looked as though it was grimacing. However, the wire puzzle itself appeared to be unchanged even though the buttons were now connected to the "ceiling" instead of the floor, and Liz had little trouble identifying which buttons connected to which electric box.
"Maybe this won't be so bad after all," Liz thought as HandUnit congratulated her and the right vent door closed. When the left vent door opened, it took all of her willpower not to let out a curse. The hallway-like room, which had been empty in the normal mode, now had Springtrap crawling towards her. The decayed rabbit animatronic that had once been her old father was moving slowly, but it had a frenzied look in its glowing yellow eyes, and Liz had little doubt as to what would happen if she allowed Springtrap to catch her.
"I knew there was something fishy about this room," Liz muttered. Her suspicions from back then had been correct, even if it had only been for this specific incarnation of the level. Forcing herself to ignore Springtrap, Liz focused on the electric boxes. Thanks to the upside-down perspective, the near left box connected to the new button 1, the far left box connected to button 4, the far right box connected to button 3, and the near right button connected to button 2. Springtrap got uncomfortably close by the time Liz finished pressing the buttons, but when she pressed the final button correctly, Springtrap abruptly stopped crawling and started retreating as the vent door started closing. "Go back to the hole you crawled out of," Liz thought viciously at the being that had almost destroyed her morality.
The middle door opened, and Liz grimaced at what she found inside. Ennard was still there, but there were several other animatronics now in the room that, while harmless, were obscuring the wire patterns. She could see a Balloon Boy, a Withered Bonnie, Chica's cupcake, more Endo heads, and even a Circus Baby with its head missing scattered throughout the room. "Why are there even regular Fazbear Entertainment animatronics here to begin with?" Liz wondered incredulously. "I know that there's some connection between the two, but pretty much NONE of these animatronics were actually IN CBEAR when I was there. Did Fazbear Entertainment just toss in their own animatronics inside the level just to make things more quickly? Actually…" she shook her head in bemusement. "That's probably it, isn't it?"
Since the wire puzzle was too difficult with all the new animatronics blocking them, Liz instead decided to rely on her memory of the normal level to finish this challenge and invert it. The task was harder than it sounded since the upside-down orientation and the obstacles were confusing, but eventually she was able to identify the correct wire placements. The near left electric box next to Withered Bonnie's head connected to the new button 4, the far left box connected to button 2, the far right box connected button 1, and the near right box connected to button 3. Thankfully, just like in the other two rooms, the wire placement and orientation of the boxes hadn't changed, or else Liz was fairly certain she wouldn't have a chance in hell of figuring it all out before Ennard jumpscared her.
The elevator door started to close, but just like last time Ennard rushed towards it and tried to force it open. Having already seen this before, Liz merely stared unimpressed as the vent door slammed in Ennard's face. "I've already seen this before," she deadpanned as the elevator started to "ascend" again. "It's not scary when you know it's coming."
As the elevator moved "up" towards the second part, Liz paid attention to her surroundings, trying to see what else she could find that was unique to the Hard Mode version of the level. Her vigilance paid off early with a broken Bonnet toy that had one of her eyes missing, replaced with a Coin. Liz was only barely able to reach out and grab the coin in time before the Bonnet disappeared out of sight, but there were plenty of other remnants of Fazbear Entertainment's past to see. The former Baby inhabitant could see a Springtrap arm, a Mangle head, a Funtime Freddy plushie, and a Bonnie head, amongst other dismembered animatronic limbs that had been scattered in the elevator shaft and left to rot. Combined with the darkened atmosphere of the level, it made CBEAR look less like a facility and more like a prison for animatronics that some had tried and failed to crawl out of to escape. "Yeeeeeeeesh…" Liz thought with a shudder. "That last thought was a little too real."
The elevator stopped again at the familiar gear configurations. Remembering that the level was upside-down, Liz turned to the right gear configuration, which was largely the same except for the giant endoskeleton looming right behind it and the Phantom Freddy lumbering laboriously in the background. The actual solution to the puzzle was pretty simple since she already knew it, with the major difference being having to work from right to left instead of left to right. As she started moving the gears around, she saw Ennard peeking in at her from behind the middle configuration, and immediately turned her head aside. "Oh no, not this time," she thought snidely. "I'm not making the same mistake again!" Liz proceeded to quickly arrange the gears so that all three of them were in their appropriate positions in the left gear configuration, making sure to avoid looking at Ennard whenever he lurked in the background.
"Huh, this is easier than I thought it would be," Liz remarked as the elevator "ascended" into the Boiler Room. As it moved towards its destination, she saw still more animatronic parts scattered across the chasm beyond the elevator, including a Chica head, a Baby head, and a Springtrap head. One feature that especially stood out was a Plushbaby that had her head violently ripped off, a sight that gave Liz a sense of vindictive pleasure after all the torture she had suffered at their hands. "You got what you deserved, you stupid Plushbaby…" she taunted with a smirk. "I'll never have to deal with your bullshit ever again!"
The sense of euphoria quickly faded as the elevator reached its final destination, the Boiler Room. Once again, the right vent door opened, and once again the illumination provided by the headlight flickered and went dead. The Pipe puzzle was similar to how Liz remembered it, though the Pipes and buttons now glowed orange and the flames that burst out of the Pipes had an unnatural orange glow that made them appear downright hellish. She could also faintly see the endoskeleton of an unknown Funtime animatronic in the background, along with Ennard hanging on the pipes.
"The solution should be the same as before, just upside down, right?" Liz mused. She rearranged the pipes so that the 3 Pipe was now pointing right and down, the 1 Pipe was pointing up and left, and the 2 Pipe was oriented horizontally. To her relief, the electric LEDs on both ends flickered green and HandUnit complimented her for her success. "Thank God," she thought with a sigh of relief. "The actual solution is the same as before. This shouldn't be too hard to figure out then."
The right vent door closed and the middle vent door opened. Liz stared at the pipes for a bit longer this time, having discovered the solution to this puzzle in the Normal Mode by complete accident and needing a bit more time to figure it out. "Okay, so when I did this in the Normal Mode, the 1 Pipe was on the bottom left and the 2 Pipe was on the top right," she reasoned. "So I just need to make it so that the 1 Pipe is now on the top right and the 2 Pipe is on the bottom left." She rotated the pipe configuration so that it matched what she was thinking. "And then make it so that the 1 Pipe is horizontal and the 2 Pipe is pointing down and left." She reoriented the two Pipes so that they were positioned according to her plan. "Yes!" Liz cheered, pumping a fist in the air as HandUnit complimented her again.
"Now let's finish this up so I can get out of here," Liz muttered, pushing the button to activate the boiler. The Boiler was largely the same as she remembered, except that it contained what looked like a Mangle with glowing red eyes in its belly. Still, it didn't change the fact that the flames began to burn in the Boiler just as she expected…nor did it change the shrill, inhuman scream of pain from Ennard as the flames reached his body.
"A perfect 72 degrees," HandUnit declared. "Good job! See you next time."
"That was easier than I thought it would…OH MY GOD!" Liz exclaimed, staring in stunned disbelief as Ennard suddenly leapt at the elevator from the depths of the Boiler Room. The impact of the collision seemingly broke some vital component of the elevator, causing it to dislodge and fall crazily. Even as gravity forced the elevator to fall "upwards" faster and faster, the amalgamation that Liz had eventually become a part of tried to crawl into the elevator itself, his clown mask's mouth opening like a snarling animal, all while Liz was helpless to watch. But before Ennard could complete his attack, the screen faded to back, and Liz found herself at the victory room.
"Oh my God…" Liz repeated, still recovering from the shock of Ennard's final, unexpected attack. "That was one of the scariest things I've seen in this entire VR game! I didn't see that coming at all!" Out of all the changes that the developers could have made to the Hard Mode of Ennard's level, she couldn't have possibly expected them to change the very ending of the level itself to showcase Ennard's triumph instead of his defeat. The way Ennard had savagely attacked her at the end of the level disturbingly reminded Liz of the vision Nightmare had shown her of the alternate timeline in CBEAR, where Michael had chosen to flee from Ennard and to take refuge in the Private Room instead of offering himself as a sacrifice. Ennard had abandoned all subtlety and engaged in a desperate all-out attack, just like he had done here.
"And the worst part is, that's still better than what we eventually became," Liz muttered, feeling the faint traces of her old depression stir up within her. She quickly crushed them, for she was now confident in the fact that her true family, new and old, still loved her despite everything she had done, and there was no need to wallow in her guilt anymore so long as she didn't forget the lessons she had learned.
"Hopefully that's the last I'll ever see of Ennard," she thought as she claimed her prize. When the gift box opened up, it revealed… "A stick of butter?" Liz asked incredulously as she held it in the palm of her hand. "Really? That's all I get?" She shook her head in bemusement. "I swear this game hates me."
Once she was back in the main level hub, Liz noticed that the Spring Bonnie figure was gone. She scratched her head in confusion. As far as the former Baby inhabitant could recall, this was the first time that the Spring Bonnie had disappeared, although given that her memory was a blur from dealing with the fucking Plushbabies, she honestly wasn't sure if that was actually true or not. "Did I unlock that last Night Terrors level yet?" she wondered, flicking the menu to the end. Her eyes fell on the level screen, where the third level had indeed been finally unlocked. A level called Pizza Party that offered absolutely nothing in terms of more specific details.
"Okay, I unlocked it," Liz confirmed. "And since I'm not going to be the one to do this level, I should probably listen to that last Tape I found." She reached out towards the Tape Recorder and found herself in the empty black void of the Tape Room. She took out Tape 14 and put it into the recorder.
"I ran a fragmentation program on the area of memory that was storing these logs for you. I effectively broke the file into pieces, and broke the anomaly along with it," Tape Girl explained. "That means that you won't have my warnings to guide you. But hopefully, it also means that this anomaly, this virus, or whatever it is, will remain broken and unable to do more damage."
"Well, this confirms what Jeremy found earlier," Liz murmured. "The Tape Girl tried to stop the Spring Bonnie thing by breaking the Tapes into separate pieces, and breaking the anomaly along with it." By now, Liz was practically certain that the Spring Bonnie thing was the anomaly, as there was nothing else that she or anyone else had seen in the game that could possibly match what the Tape Girl was describing. She took a breath and sighed. "And it looks like Jeremy was right about us piecing it back together by collecting the Tapes," she muttered. Even though she had suspected as much, part of her had hoped that Tape Girl had been entirely successful, and had carried out a solution that had permanently trapped the anomaly and rendered it harmless.
But her and her family's luck regarding Fazbear Entertainment and CBEAR had always been awful, and Liz wasn't foolish enough to believe otherwise.
"Well, I've done my part," Liz mused. To be honest, she had probably done way more than her fair share (especially where those goddamn Plushbabies were concerned), but her siblings had never interacted with any of the Funtime animatronics the way she had, and it felt good to have some closure since the closest thing she had to a final meeting with them was when they were in the raving lunatic that had once been Molten Freddy. "Whoever we decide to do the Pizza Party, it's up to them now," she thought as she turned off the video game.
Their playthrough and testing of Fazbear Entertainment's VR game had almost reached its conclusion. But somehow, that fact didn't provide Liz Schmidt with any comfort in the slightest.
/
A/N: We've finally reached the end of the VR game. But don't think that we're done with Help Wanted just yet. In fact, I can tell you right now that the most important events of the arc are yet to come.
I deliberately chose Susie to do Mangle Hard Mode even though Fritz might have seemed like the more natural choice. A couple of readers have rightfully pointed out that Jeremy and Susie have kinda gotten the short end of the stick when it came to focus in the story compared to some of the other ghost kids. I wanted to give them a bit more of the spotlight and a second chance to feature in the Help Wanted arc, especially since their roles in their original VR chapters were kinda small compared to the other ghost kids. Susie will have the first half of this chapter, and Jeremy…
…Jeremy gets Pizza Party, and (hopefully) the character development that he has been somewhat lacking in up to this point.
The Coin that Liz collected in the Plushbaby level doesn't actually exist in the game. I had to put an extra one in to replace the one that would normally be found in the Plushtrap/Nightmare BB levels, which don't exist in MNGF's version of the VR game. Yeah, funnily enough, despite how big the Plushbaby room is and how easy it would be to hide a coin there, there aren't actually any Coins in the level. Just the Tape I mentioned earlier…and a bunch of fucking Plushbabies. Joy.
The Vent Repair levels are honestly some of the easier ones to deal with if you know what to do. After dealing with the fucking Plushbabies and Lolbit, Ennard Hard Mode was practically a piece of cake for Liz since she remembered the patterns and solutions, and the only thing she really needed to do was flip them upside-down.
That's all I have for now. Hope you guys enjoyed!
