A/N: Okay, so I see that a lot of people want me to address the families of the victims of the MCI children during their rampages. I'll address this in a blanket statement so that I don't waste time writing the same stuff over and over again.

Firstly, whenever this topic is addressed, it will not be for another couple of chapters. Mike and the ghost kids still have to deal with Glitchtrap, and to suddenly and randomly abandon that plotline to address a different issue, no matter how many people want me to address it, is just not happening. Not only would it be bad writing, but letting Glitchtrap run around unchecked would be the gravest insult imaginable to everybody who ever suffered because of the Fazbear tragedy, and if anything would mark a failure of redemption, it would be letting Glitchtrap cause chaos in society and do whatever the fuck he wants.

Secondly, there will NOT be a "grand revelation" of the ghost children to many, or even a majority of the families of the murdered night guards. Heaven will not allow that to happen simply because it would violate the sanctity of the afterlife and expose the mundane world to the supernatural on a large scale, which would cause far, FAR too many problems. Let's say that the ghost kids made a public apology to the families of the night guards, or they were somehow exposed in some other way. Some families would forgive them once they heard their story. Some families would not forgive them, and just as the ghost children have every right to not forgive William Afton, those families have every right not to forgive the ghost kids. But you can bet that out of all those family members, there are definitely going to be at least a few who would be spiteful and hateful enough to expose and slander the ghost children in front of the public. And that would be an absolute catastrophe.

Let's ignore the fact that the ghost kids would very likely be harassed continually by people who have nothing to do with the Fazbear tragedy and don't understand it (you can argue all day and night whether or not they deserve it, but that's only a peripheral issue). If the world at large learned that the supernatural is real, then that opens the path for the worst of humanity to commit horrific atrocities that would cause unspeakable harm to not just the body, but also the soul as well. What if the next William Afton decides to murder a bunch of children for shits and giggles, this time actively trying to enslave their souls from the get-go? What if the next Josef Mengele decides to carry out unholy and horrific experiments on a widespread scale, seeking to manipulate and torture the soul for his own twisted designs? Those atrocities would lead to tragedy and horror on a level that would make the Fazbear tragedy look like a joke even if they failed to directly affect the soul, and God only knows what would happen if they somehow succeeded. Monsters wearing human skin can and WILL attempt to abuse knowledge of the supernatural, committing unleashing far more death, torment, and horror than the ghost children or even William Afton ever did, for their own sadistic and corrupt ends. It already happened once, it can happen again. All because a vengeful family member of a murdered night guard wanted to try to "get back" at the ghost kids.

So no, the ghost kids will not have their existence revealed to the public. And yes, that means many families of the night guards will never get closure until they reunite with their loved ones in the afterlife. I can already hear many of you arguing, "That's not fair!" Or perhaps, "Where's the justice for the innocent night guards murdered by the MCI kids?" Unfortunately, the blunt and brutal truth is that life isn't fair. It wasn't fair for the MCI kids to have their lives violently cut short by William Afton. It wasn't fair for Mike to have his entire childhood destroyed by his abusive father. And it isn't fair for the innocent night guards to be killed by the MCI kids when they were still caught up by their rage. But that's just how things are on Earth. And true fairness for all the families of the night guards is simply impossible to achieve without the security problems mentioned above.

And as for justice for the night guards…you guys are forgetting. They HAVE their justice. They presented their case to Heaven, complaining that the ghost kids hadn't done enough to deserve their redemption and welcome into Heaven. And Heaven not only listened to their complaints, but also AGREED with them. That's why they're having the ghost kids take on a more active role in preventing another Fazbear tragedy, a resolution that the night guards agreed with. You might not think their actions in Help Wanted are much, and you're right (although they're more important than you think). But this is just the beginning. The road to redemption is a long quest, and the MCI children's redemption will involve multiple story arcs. Including Special Delivery and Security Breach. Yes, both games WILL be featured in this fic, although the circumstances surrounding them will be altered (significantly in the case of Special Delivery).

Does that mean I'm going to ignore the families of the murdered night guards entirely? Am I unsympathetic to the pain and anguish that they've gone through? No, of course not. I will certainly address this issue at some point in the future, likely during those aforementioned story arcs. I'll also be reducing the number of filler chapters in between more important story arcs, both for this reason and because I won't have as much time once my residency starts. But if you are looking for ALL or even MANY of said families to get closure in the mundane world, then I'm sorry to disappoint you. It simply will not be happening.

TobiasRieper: That just sounds like you trying to excuse Fazbear Entertainment's incompetence, and it's a pretty terrible defense as well. The atrocious business practices of Fazbear Entertainment existed outside the scope of the MCI and the killings. The existence of the springlock suits, the Bite of 1983 and likely the Bite of 1987 too…those things had NOTHING to do with William Afton's murders or the ghost kids, as far as we know. And given how terribly they've handled the VR game, even making a mockery of the tragedy by pretending it never existed, it's clear that their callousness and idiocy has carried on to the present incarnation.

But Fazbear Entertainment has always been shit even back in 1993. As Mike demonstrated in his backstory, the entire tragedy could have been prevented simply by setting the animatronic AIs to 0. A solution so simple, even Mike, who at the time was just a random teenager with 0 experience in robotics and engineering, was able to do it and stop any future killings. The children are certainly not innocent; they would be the first to tell you that they have blood on their hands. And there's nothing Fazbear Entertainment could have done to stop the first killing or two, sure. But if they gave even the single slightest fuck about their employees, they would have tried to find any solution, ANY AT ALL, such as lowering the animatronics' AIs to 0. Thus preventing any future tragedies from occurring, or at the very least minimizing the chances of any future deaths (because let's be real, if you die to anyone other than maybe Foxy in 0/0/0/0 Custom night in FNaF 1, you're just an idiot, plain and simple). But no. Fazbear Entertainment didn't take ANY steps to minimize the death toll. They didn't even go "oh hey, maybe if we lower the animatronic AIs, they won't be as active and kill as many people", even as a thought experiment. The "fear" you try to excuse Fazbear Entertainment with is cowardice. Too cowardly to try to find ANY kind of actual solution to the problem, FE instead stuck their necks into the sand and freely allowed the killings to continue. And that's the BEST case scenario. At worst? FE just straight up didn't give a shit. And given how they're acting in Help Wanted, I'm hedging my bets on the latter. The ghost kids might have done the killings themselves, but Fazbear Entertainment allowed them to continue without taking any steps, even BASIC steps, to stop them. They are just as guilty as the ghost kids in allowing the tragedy to go on for so long, and unlike the ghost kids, they have shown no remorse or any willingness to change for the better either.

Guest: You're right, Fazbear Entertainment deserves plenty of blame. I'm not claiming the ghost kids are innocent in all this (they'd be the first to tell you otherwise), but they certainly don't deserve all of it.

Guest: You raise some good points regarding the families of the night guards, and I mostly agree with your thought process. The vast majority of them will never know about the existence of the supernatural to begin with, and although they will all certainly want answers in the beginning, 30+ years is a long, LONG time to wait and most of them probably just gave up in the end. The idea of a vengeful guy hunting down Mike and the ghost kids might be satisfying to some, but in the end, it's just not all that realistic. And before you consider this a blanket dismissal of the night guards' families, I already told you guys that I'm going to address this at some point during the Special Delivery and Security Breach arcs.

ThomasTheTank: The ghost kids know that what their past actions were evil and wrong, and letting go of their hatred for William Afton is another major step in their path to completing their redemption. And they're more determined than anyone else could possibly be to prevent another Fazbear tragedy from occurring or at the very least minimize the damage it could cause, being accepted into Heaven or not has nothing to do with their motivations there. Help Wanted is just the beginning of their path to redemption, and they'll be much more active in the future Special Delivery and Security Breach arcs.

Keep in mind, Heaven outright told them to achieve redemption through good deeds to be welcomed into Heaven, and the ghost kids certainly aren't going to argue (especially when the alternative is being damned to Hell). Every human, no matter how good or evil, has some degree of selfishness by his or her very nature, and the ghost children's motivations are primarily altruistic (this will be made more apparent in the aforementioned future arcs).

RicAlberquerque: I have never played Shadow of the Colossus ever :P. And yes, I agree with you that the stance that the ghost children have taken regarding William now is both a solid middle ground and one that is the most realistic. As for Glitchtrap's impact on the real world if he gets to do what he wants…imagine a bunch of normal people suddenly being transformed into deranged, murderous maniacs. On a scale of thousands. Remnant or no, apocalyptic or no, it's still an absolute catastrophe that needs to be stopped at all costs.

Yasaka: Thank you! More is sure to come 😊

RDeathClawProductions: That's pretty much what I had in mind with Fritz's foul mouth XD

Guest: I think I might be able to find a way to implement that in a future UCN. And yes, it is definitely possible to have a future UCN chapter without the ghost kids actively hating on William.

Sonic245: I've heard of Joy of Creation Story Mode, but I'm certainly not familiar with the details.

A courier: I agree. It's character development that needs to happen, both for the ghost kids and for Mike himself. Let Nightmare deal with the hideous torture stuff, that's his job anyway.

KAMIKAZE: You'll just have to wait and see 😊 As for Fazbear Frights, I probably won't be including most of them in Mike's New Ghostly Family unless they are DECISIVELY proven to be canon. As for Elizabeth/Baby…a copy or fragment of William's soul formed Glitchtrap. What makes you think that a copy of Elizabeth's soul before her redemption couldn't find its way somewhere?

Jack0lanterns: Yeah…character development's not always fun to go through, but it needs to be done.

SuperDescendant101: Perhaps, possibly in a future UCN chapter.

Guest, FrostTheFrozenFox: I genuinely don't think either Cassidy OR the Bite Victim is "The One You Should Not Have Killed" from UCN. Fazbear Frights, assuming that it is canon or closely tied to canon, seems to point at them being someone entirely different altogether. But that's a discussion for another time.

Guest: I agree with you, both regarding your thoughts on hatred and regarding Strikers. Though the villains are vastly more sympathetic in Strikers and show a genuine desire to atone (unlike the Palace rulers). The Monarchs willingly atone instead of being forced into it, unlike the Palace Rulers. Their changes of heart are actual changes of heart.

MothraRanger: Yeah, Susie really needed some character development. She was the first to be killed in the MCI, and she's the first to convince the others to let go of their hatred. Quite fitting, really…

AlchemyWriter: Thanks! Hopefully I won't fall into another rut for a while.

Properman: OMC might not have given that message directly to the ghost children, but its meaning and validity are absolutely there all the same.

MegaMaster78: I'll try not to invoke Dark!Mike again in a future chapter. Twice is the limit I'm willing to push, any more would be repetitive, deus-ex-machina bullshit. Dark!Mike won't be useful in the future FNaF-related arcs anyway.

Chapter 129 – The Consequences of Hatred, Part 2

"Urrrrgghhhh…" Mike groaned. It took him a few seconds to realize where he was, lying down on the sofa in his basement. "What…how did I…"

His voice trailed off as the memories came crashing back. How Glitchtrap had materialized once he had found the 16th Tape and tried to possess him, and how he had tried to resist and fight back. The sudden rush of power and fury that had coursed through him, and how he had viciously mocked and taunted Glitchtrap before brutalizing him with fire and wrath. How Charlie had stopped him at the last minute, her voice breaking through the haze of bloodthirst and hatred that had blazed through his mind. The last thing he membered was contacting and warning Nightmare of Glitchtrap's presence. "I must have knocked myself out after that," he muttered.

"Dad?" the voice interrupted his thoughts, and Mike turned to see that his ghost children had gathered near the stairway leading up to the main house. For some reason, they weren't rushing to hug him like they always tended to do in situations like this. It almost seemed as though they were hesitating to approach any closer.

In hindsight, that should have been the first warning sign.

"Are you okay?" Susie asked the question, worry and concern in her eyes and voice.

Mike smiled thinly. "Yeah," he breathed. "I'm fine."

"Thank God…" Jeremy breathed a sigh of relief. The ghost kids approached the sofa where Mike was sitting, but they still didn't rush to hug him. "You were passed out for the whole day."

Mike grimaced. "I figured. I remember…dark power surging through me. Just like what happened when I fought the real William Afton in my mind, only this time I wasn't trying to bring it out on purpose."

Charlie nodded. "We think it was that Anathema Curse thing that Nightmare put on you before he left after he threw Afton back into Hell," she explained. "I can't think of anything else that could have affected you like that."

"I think so too," Mike agreed. Then what Charlie said clicked in his mind. His head swiveled up, to face her incredulously. "Wait…how do you know about that?"

The ghosts looked uncertainly at each other. "We…we were able to see you," Gabe confessed. "We were able to see it. We were able to see all of it."

Oh no. "But…how?" Mike asked incredulously. "Glitchtrap and I were in our own little world. There's no way you should've been able to…"

"We focused our sight so that we could truly see what was going on," Liz explained. She couldn't suppress the shudder that went through her body. "We got what we asked for, I guess…"

"You weren't supposed to see that…" Mike mumbled. "I never wanted you to see any of that." No matter how much he might have hated William Afton, he had tried his hardest to conceal the darkest aspects of his personality. He would have been perfectly happy if his children never saw his dark side for the entirety of his life save for the barest traces, naïve as that wish might have been. The closest thing that they had seen to his dark side before now was the broken corpse-spirit of William Afton after he had gotten his revenge all those months ago, but even then the children had never explicitly seen Mike engage in his spree of violence and torment.

But now…now they had seen his dark side in a full, horrific display. An exhibition of his capacity for hatred and cruelty that they would never be able to unsee. Something that no decent parent would ever show in front of their children.

Seeing his discomfort and guilt, Cassidy tried to shift the topic. "I'm just glad you're okay, Dad…" she murmured. "We were so scared that Glitchtrap would invade your mind."

"That almost would have been preferable," Mike thought grimly to himself. If he could defeat a demonically empowered William Afton in his mind, he could easily beat some glitchy bunny…at least in theory. And at least, then the children wouldn't have been able to see the violent display that would have followed. He smiled thinly at her. "You guys know I never would've given in to William Afton, no matter what he looks like."

"No way in Hell," Fritz agreed. Mike noticed that he was shuffling around in the air, almost as though he was agitated.

"Is there something you guys haven't told me yet?" he asked with a raised eyebrow, glad for the distraction.

The ghosts looked at each other uncomfortably. After a few seconds, Gabe decided to step forward to speak for all of them. "We've…made a very important decision while you were knocked out," he announced. Mike didn't speak, merely nodding his head as a gesture for him to continue. "We've decided to let go of actively hating William Afton," he declared.

Mike's eyes widened in shock. Whatever he had been expecting, it certainly wasn't that.

"We're not forgiving him," Gabe clarified. "We've learned over and over again that William Afton doesn't feel any remorse or even any kind of guilt for his crimes, and that if he had the chance he'll just keep trying to ruin our afterlives." The former Freddy inhabitant sighed. "But…hating him, wanting to make him suffer…it's not doing us any good."

His father was impressed with how Gabe's words made him sound much more mature than he had been even yesterday. He'd always known that the ghost children, even the younger and more rambunctious ones, had been forced into maturity through the horrible experiences they had suffered, even if they tried not to show it nowadays. But this was a different kind of maturity. The right kind of maturity, the kind needed to grow and improve oneself.

"We've been so happy ever since we came here," Gabe continued. "The only times we've felt dark, miserable, hateful, anything like our old selves…was whenever we thought about William Afton. And how we wanted to make him suffer for everything he's done to us. It's the one thing that can still drag us down and stop us from fully enjoying our new lives…and it's something that we need to get rid of if we ever want to move forward."

Mike listened silently to Gabe's declaration. He was proud of the ghost children for making this important decision for themselves, one that could only make them happier and separate them further from their bloody pasts in the long term. But there was something that greatly bothered him about it.

None of the children had expressed this kind of mentality before today. As far as Mike was aware, they had been perfectly content to despise their murderer without regret, and none of them (apart from perhaps Charlie) had shown all that much hesitation with coming up with different challenges to torment Afton in Nightmare's Ultimate Custom Night. Given the sudden shift in their behavior, Mike could only presume that something momentous, something dramatic, had compelled them to follow this new path.

He had a sinking feeling in his stomach that he knew what that "something" was. And as much as he didn't want to, he knew he had to ask the question.

"I'm impressed that you made this decision, guys," he offered, trying to keep his tone light. "But if you don't mind me asking, what brought this about?"

The answer was exactly what he had dreaded. "…you did, Dad," Susie admitted.

"We saw you set Glitchtrap on fire and nearly beat him out of existence," Jeremy commented morosely. "It was a complete 180 of what you're normally like. I knew in my head that you could be like that if push really came to shove, after seeing the actual Afton's soul. But it never actually sunk in until yesterday."

"It was one of the most terrifying things I've ever seen," Cassidy mumbled. And given the kind of death and afterlife that the ghost children had experienced for several years, Mike knew that this was not a statement spoken lightly.

Mike shook his head in growing dismay. "I shouldn't have exposed you to that," he muttered. "Doesn't matter what was going on, or who I was doing. I had no right to show you any kind of violence. Especially not something like that."

"Maybe it was Nightmare's curse thingy?" Fritz asked hopefully. "Maybe it messed with your mind a bit and caused you to go nuts?"

"No," Mike shook his head. "That wasn't it. Because back when Afton attacked our house for the first time, I did far worse to him in the world of my mind before Nightmare ever gave me that dark blessing of his. No…" he sighed. "That's part of my personality…the worst part, but still a part."

"Seeing you act like that…it really got us thinking about ourselves," Gabe continued. "We might not be killing innocents anymore, but at the end of the day we were still making the same mistake, the same sin, that stopped us from getting into Heaven in the first place. And it was seeing you as this…dark version of you…doing things to Glitchtrap far more horrible than anything we ever did, that really hammered the message in our heads, Dad."

Mike could only sigh, feeling both pride in his son's words and disappointment with himself. Ever since he had brought the ghost kids into his family, he had sworn to himself that he would never make the same mistakes that his father had. That he would lead by example, and not by showing the children what NOT to do (foul language notwithstanding). And now, it seemed as though he had failed to keep that particular promise.

"I still don't know if I agree with this," Fritz grumbled, crossing his arms and sulking. "The bastard deserves everything shitty that happens to him."

"Maybe he does," Charlie conceded, "but we shouldn't be the ones doing that anymore. Like I said before, let Nightmare deal with him. That's his job, after all."

As she spoke, her father noticed something odd. The former Marionette inhabitant was positioned somewhat oddly. More specifically, she was holding her hands behind her back, as though she were trying to hide them. With a growing feeling of dread, Mike took a deep breath and confronted the issue immediately. "Why are you hiding your hands like that?" he asked.

"N-no reason!" Charlie answered a little too quickly.

Mike continued to stare at Charlie wordlessly. Grimacing, the girl presented her hands…and the burns that had been on them. The injuries had improved remarkably quickly, as Charlie had been focusing her energy on healing herself with the hopes that she would be able to hide the fact that Mike had unintentionally burned her with the unholy aura he had been unknowingly unleashing. But they hadn't healed entirely, and Mike could still see that the spectral skin was still somewhat red, burned, and raw.

The cold grip of horror clenched around his heart. "No…" he murmured, falling back onto the sofa in disbelief.

"Dad, it's not a big…" Charlie quickly tried to reassure her.

"Yes, it is," Mike cut her off, burying his face in his hands. He didn't weep or cry, but the kids could all hear the sheer, overwhelming guilt and regret in how broken his voice sounded. "I…hurt you. Because I couldn't think about anything other than how much I wanted to make that stupid glitchy bunny pay, I hurt one of you. What I did was…" he struggled to find the right words, "…inexcusable."

"Dad…" Charlie's voice trailed off, unable to find the right words to say.

Mike was similarly silent, but although he might have seemed outwardly calm, his emotions and thoughts were roiling. Charlie's hands might have appeared fine now, but if the heat of the flames around his "spiritual" body had blazed as hotly in the real world as they had when he had been burning Glitchtrap to a crisp, who knows how badly he had hurt Charlie in that particular moment? Accidentally showing off the darkest and cruelest parts of his personality in full display to the ghost kids had already been his first failure as a father in a major way.

But outright harming his own daughter? This wasn't just a failure. This was a catastrophic failure of grand proportions. Because of his hatred and desire for vengeance against William, he had allowed an innocent to get caught in the crossfire. The same mistake that William's victims had made when they had been trapped in the bodies of the animatronics. He now understood Gabe and the rest of his family's new perspective more than ever before. It was a lesson that needed to be learned not just by them, but by him as well.

"YOU THOUGHT YOU WERE ABOVE THE CONSEQUENCES," a dark voice taunted inside Mike's mind, mocking him and his failures. "YOU THOUGHT YOU COULD INDULGE YOUR HATRED AND CRUELTY AGAINST AFTON, EVEN IF HIS SOUL WAS ROTTEN TO THE CORE, AND GET AWAY WITH IT SCOT-FREE. BUT YOU WERE WRONG, WEREN'T YOU?"

The voice sounded disturbingly like Nightmare's, and Mike couldn't tell whether it really was the demon lord or his own conscience condemning him instead. To be honest, it didn't really matter either way…because the voice was speaking the truth.

"THERE IS ALWAYS A PRICE FOR SIN," the voice pressed ruthlessly. "LOOK AT YOUR DAUGHTER'S HANDS. BURNED AND INJURED BECAUSE OF YOU. IMAGINE THE PAIN SHE WOULD HAVE FELT IF SHE HAD TRIED TO FULLY EMBRACE YOU WHILE YOU WERE CONSUMED BY THE FIRES OF YOUR RAGE."

Mike shuddered, trying not to imagine the horrible scenario that could have potentially unfolded. Especially since it was one that could have been all too real.

"THIS WASN'T THE FIRST TIME, WAS IT?" the voice questioned with mocking glee. "YOU ALMOST DID EVEN WORSE, ENTIRELY BY YOUR OWN WILL. AND THIS TIME SOMEONE YOU LOVE SUFFERED BECAUSE OF IT."

Mike felt a gnawing sensation in his throat. Could he really have damned himself? Whether he could have or not, it didn't change the fact that Charlie had burned her hands trying to stop him. What is his mom had hurt herself in a similar way trying to stop him, all the way back then? He was suddenly feeling very grateful for whatever measures Heaven took to safeguarding the souls of the righteous who had already proved their worth.

"YOU MAY HAVE BEEN SAVED TWICE BY THE POWER OF LOVE, BUT REMEMBER THIS," the voice concluded with a menacing hiss. "YOUR HATRED CAN STILL DAMN YOU. JUST AS IT ALMOST DAMNED YOUR CHILDREN."

Mike forced himself to swallow the lump in his throat. He couldn't run from the truth, even if he wanted to. The circumstances might be dramatically different, but in the end he was guilty of the same fundamental crime that his children were. He couldn't even claim that he had only harmed the guilty. Charlie's burned hands were proof that this statement was a lie.

"You're right…" he finally spoke, slightly startling the kids. He hadn't realized just how long he had remained silent. "I hate to admit it, but…you're right. We all need to move on from our hatred. Me just as much as you guys." He gave Charlie a look of regret. "I can't let something like this happen to you ever again. No matter how much William Afton might deserve it."

The ghost kids broke into smiles. Here was the father that they all knew and loved. Liz's smile faded, however, as a worrying thought suddenly entered her mind. "What about that Anathema curse thing?" she questioned aloud. "What if another Glitchtrap sets it off again?"

Now they were all frowning. Liz had a valid point. And their new perspective didn't change the fact that Glitchtrap was still a dangerous enemy that needed to be stopped, unless they wanted to risk some poor shmuck without Mike's significant advantages stumbling across a Glitchtrap waiting to possess him. "Hopefully I won't have to deal with another Glitchtrap again," Mike finally answered. "But if I do…I don't want to get rid of the Anathema Curse outright. It's an effective failsafe that will make sure the chance of Glitchtrap successfully taking me over goes from low to flat zero. I'll just make it quick. No drawn-out torture or suffering. Just beat him down as fast as possible and move on."

It was honestly the best solution he could come up with to make sure he didn't commit the same sins again while at the same time actually dealing with the problem of Glitchtrap, and from the looks on his kid's faces he could tell that they couldn't come up with anything better.

"What about Nightmare?" Jeremy wondered. "Should we still be working with…?

"Yes," Mike answered immediately, taking them slightly by surprise with how suddenly and assertively he gave his answer. "This isn't Nightmare's fault. There's no way he could have possibly known about the existence of Glitchtrap when he gave me that Anathema Curse thing. Hell, I'm not even sure Glitchtrap even existed at that point. And if I try to blame Nightmare, then that just means I'm trying to run away from taking responsibility for my own actions like a coward. Dark blessing or not, I did what I did to William Afton entirely of my own free will. Twice."

He shook his head and sighed. "Besides, there's practical reasons too. Like it or not, Glitchtrap is a massive problem that we have absolutely no way of realistically solving by ourselves, at least right now. Nightmare's the most powerful supernatural ally we have, and while I'm still not sure how much I trust him, I DO trust his hatred of Afton."

"What do you think he can do?" Jeremy wondered.

"I don't know," Mike admitted. "But it's probably a hell of a lot more than we can… no pun intended."

His response elicited a few snickers from his children, but they quickly died down. "When should we call him again?" Susie asked, looking down at Mike's phone.

"I still can't believe you have a fucking demon lord's number on your phone," Fritz muttered.

"Might as well do it today," Mike answered.

The kids looked at him in surprise. "Is that a good idea?" Cassidy wondered. "You just got up from a nap that lasted an entire day!"

"I have to agree with Dad," Gabe interrupted. "The longer we wait, the less time we have to deal with Glitchtrap. We need to take care of this now."

"I agree," Jeremy added. "I wouldn't put it past Fazbear Entertainment to screw over its agreement with Dad, and if that game gets released to the public BEFORE we deal with Glitchtrap, then it's game over, we failed."

"Let's not mention the details around what happened with Glitchtrap, though," Charlie warned. "Or what we've decided as a family because of it. If Nightmare calls us out on it, tell the truth, but don't spill the beans if he doesn't comment," she gave a pointed look at Fritz.

"The hell are you looking at me, for?" the former Foxy inhabitant spluttered, earning a couple more snickers from the family. "I'm not THAT dumb."

"Debatable…" Liz muttered, earning more splutters of outrage from Fritz as the tension in the room defused somewhat.

Once they had all calmed down, Mike picked up his phone. "Let's not put this off any longer," he declared. "I'll be able to relax more once I'm sure that we at the very least have a game plan for dealing with Glitchtrap."

"Same with us!" Gabe exclamied, with various expressions of agreement from his siblings. Mike nodded and put in the same number that he had put in earlier to summon Nightmare the first time. He immediately put the phone down on the floor, and just like before, it began to shake and rumble before releasing a plume of fire into the air. This time, the children weren't surprised by the sight, having already witnessed it once before.

The fiery portal formed in the air, and Nightmare's black and terrifying silhouette loomed in its depths, his scarlet eyes glowing with interest. "AH, SCHMIDT…" the demon lord greeted him coolly. "I'VE BEEN EXPECTING A CALL FROM YOU."

"Hey there, Nightmare…" Mike's tone was friendly enough but otherwise gave nothing away. "We need to talk. More specifically…we need to talk about what the fuck we're going to do about Glitchtrap."

"INDEED…" Nightmare agreed. "HOWEVER, GIVEN THE CURRENT TOPIC OF CONVERSATION AND THE GRAVITY OF OUR SITUATION, MERELY SPEAKING THROUGH LONG-DISTANCE COMMUNICATION WOULD BE RATHER…INADEQUATE. I BELIEVE THIS DISCUSSION WOULD BE BEST HANDLED FACE-TO-FACE."

"Wait, what?" Mike gaped at the demon lord, who was looking at him with amusement. "But wouldn't it take you days to get here from Hell?"

"NORMALLY, YES," Nightmare acknowledged. "HOWEVER, I REPORTED THE SITUATION TO BEINGS GREATER THAN MYSELF IN POWER AND AUTHORITY, AND THEY HAVE SEEN FIT TO GRANT ME SPECIAL PERMISSIONS AND PRIVILEGES, SO LONG AS GLITCHTRAP CONTINUES TO BE A PROBLEM. ONE OF THOSE BEING THAT I CAN NOW TRANSPORT MYSELF FROM HELL TO EARTH AND BACK ALMOST INSTANTLY."

"That would be convenient," Mike agreed.

"I WILL BE THERE SHORTLY," Nightmare declared. Before Mike could either agree or disagree, the flaming portal fizzled out and vanished. A few seconds later, there was a knock on the door. Mike and the ghost kids quickly rushed out of the basement to the first floor, where they made their way over to the front door and pulled it open. Sure enough, Nightmare was there, smirking at how easily he could access the mortal world for the time being.

"I really hope nobody saw you, or else there's going to be a lot of questions," Mike commented dryly as he stepped aside to let Nightmare in.

"EVEN IF THEY DID, I CAN EASILY ALTER THEIR MINDS TO MAKE THEM FORGET MY APPEARANCE," the demon lord shrugged off his concern as he entered the house and shut the door behind him. "NOW THEN…" his mouth stretched into the grin that the children were so familiar with by now.

"…LET US DISCUSS HOW WE ARE GOING TO DEAL WITH THE PROBLEM OF GLITCHTRAP."

/

A/N: I think that's a good place to stop for now.

Learning to let go of their hatred of William Afton wasn't just a lesson that the ghost kids needed to learn. It was a lesson that Mike needed to learn, too. They still need to tackle the problem of Glitchtrap, but it won't be with their negative emotions getting the better of them.

And speaking of Glitchtrap, Nightmare's finally arrived to help the Schmidts deal with him. They're going to need all the help they can get, given just how utterly impossible it would be to stop Glitchtrap by themselves.

Hope you guys enjoyed!