A/N: Yeeeesh, last week was such a pain in the ass. I had to deal with 3 7:30-3:30 days in a row of straight lectures. Glad that's over, and at least I got paid for it. I deserve 800 dollars for going through the torture of last week lmao XD

Anyways, back to the fic! We are now going to be entering Curse of Dreadbear territory, but the first 2 chapters or so actually won't be about Curse of Dreadbear directly. Instead, we have to first tackle all of the things in the actual Help Wanted game that was missed in the in-universe VR game. Things that have now been re-introduced, thanks to a certain demon lord.

Wall: Thank you! And I'm not sure how many chapters, but I can imagine at least 5. There's one chapter that I know will all be a single minigame out of necessity.

LittleGhostCat: Thanks! Glad you're enjoying the story 😊

Engineer gaming: A warning that might get ignored by most of the general population, but one that needs to be told regardless.

SuperDescendant101: The "true" William Afton will probably be left to rot in Hell. His story is done, and it's Glitchtrap that's the main threat now. And speaking of Glitchtrap, I consider him to be either a "fragment" or a "copy" of William Afton's spirit that got merged with programming to become half evil spirit, half computer virus. While I consider them separate entities, there's enough of William Afton in Glitchtrap that it's basically a distinction without a difference. Functionally, Glitchtrap might as well be William Afton coming back.

MothraRanger: There's a lot to cover, that's for sure!

Jack0Lanterns: Gabe and Cassidy were likely either doing that or were busy being frustrated over the lack of knowledge they're getting from Fazbear Entertainment XD. And Nightmare made many additions to the game, not just in the Curse of Dreadbear DLC or even just the Nightmares.

Also…I'm not sure if the Plushtrap/Nightmare B.B. levels actually happened in my version of FNaF 4. I mean…they probably did, but I never explicitly touched on that subject back when I wrote about the Nightmares tormenting Michael. Huh.

Fnaffan418: I don't think Liz would really say that, that was more Funtime Freddy's thing.

Thanatos D.E.M.: You can play the game on Flat Mode (basically buy it off Steam), even though some elements change between Flat Mode and VR mode. It's definitely worth the 30 bucks either way, imo. And yeah, a Glitchtrap plushie to kick around and use as an anti-stress tool would be amazing XD

MegaMaster78: RIP Liz I guess XD

TobiasRieper: Even if most people dismiss Glitchtrap as just part of the story of the video game, some people will take it seriously. And ANY awareness, even if it's presented as a fictional narrative, is better than no awareness at all.

AlchemyWriter: We can only hope that Scott passes the torch to someone who handles the series responsibly and faithfully.

FireFlamerx9z: It's only fitting, considering how high the stakes could be. And I'm probably going to be cutting down on the filler chapters in general, due to my limited time compared to before.

Awesomesniper86: Liz is gonna have a fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuun time if those horrors come back, that's for sure :P

Chapter 137 – Blacklights and Withereds

One could say many things about Nightmare, but when it came to getting important work done, the demon lord certainly didn't half-ass the job.

Once Mike and Jeremy had returned from their second excursion into the VR game world and had explained what they had seen, the ghost kids had been eager to try out some of the new levels that Nightmare had brought into the game. The knowledge about the "secret corner" of the game world had disturbed them all with its potential implications, but the Schmidt family decided to quickly dismiss it from their minds. The various Glitchtraps hidden in the VR games hadn't actually managed to trap anyone in there before Nightmare's ritual had destroyed them, and the one Glitchtrap that had escaped had done so through a different method. With Nightmare having already repurposed that isolated area to make it completely harmless, there was no point to dwell on it further when doing so would serve literally no purpose apart from needlessly troubling their minds.

"There's a ton of new levels already!" Jeremy had eagerly reported. "New levels in Dark Rooms, new levels in Night Terrors, a whole bunch of Hard Mode levels for all of our animatronics in Parts and Services. I think I even saw a new level in the FNaF 2 section!"

"Oooh, that sounds like so much fun!" Cassidy gushed. "I want to play them now!"

"Hold on," Mike raised a hand warningly. "I think some of those new levels are ones that have some of the Nightmares in them. You know, the demons from Hell? I know Nightmare's our ally, and I actually do trust him to a degree now, but I want to check out some of those levels first just to make 100% sure they're safe. Why don't you tackle some of the other, non-Nightmare levels first for now?" he suggested.

"Then let's do the new Parts and Services levels first," Gabe decided. "Those usually don't take too long anyway." He looked around at his siblings. "Let's do the same ones we did in normal mode since we already know how they work." It was good advice, advice that Jeremy, Susie, and Fritz gladly accepted as they took their turns with the levels.

Bonnie's level was the first one, and despite the new features introduced to embellish the level it was also the most straightforward. Instead of the silent and largely mundane (if grim) backroom, Jeremy found himself hurled into a world of chaotic sensations. The natural light of the room itself had been extinguished, instead replaced by a cascade of colored lights thrown chaotically across the darkness as though a thousand colored strobe lights were being moved at once. Bonnie himself had changed visually as well, his body now colored in an unnatural dark blue with his eyes glowing neon green and parts of his guitar glowing bright red. It didn't help in the slightest that loud, obnoxious music was now blaring through the room, making the whole thing look like it was some kind of demented party.

Despite the disorienting sensations being thrown at Jeremy's way, the actual instructions were exactly the same as the normal mode. Jeremy still remembered the instructions on how to fix Bonnie from before, and he was able to complete the Bonnie repair level without a single death. The only difficulty he had was with tuning Bonnie's guitar, as the cacophonous background noises muffled the sounds the strings made and required Jeremy to listen them multiple times to finally identify the correct one. Overall, though, the former Bonnie inhabitant was quite pleased with how easily he completed the level.

Chica's level, on the other hand, proved to be more complicated. At first, the changes to her level seemed to be largely cosmetic, similar to Bonnie's. The entire room was now all but pitch-black, with Chica herself being cast in the shadows with unnatural glowing green eyes and a dark red beak colored disturbingly like blood. The cockroaches had been replaced with giant spider-like monstrosities that gave Susie the shudders just from looking at them. The cupcake had also transformed into a nightmarish monstrosity, grotesquely morphed into a ghoulish beast with glowing orange eyes and a mouth filled with razor-sharp fangs. A subtle hint at the entity behind the creation of the level.

Unfortunately, unlike the Bonnie level, the changes didn't stop with the visuals. At first, the Blacklight Chica level played almost identically to the original, with Susie following the instructions up until she put Chica's arm, plate, and cupcake back into their proper positions. But when she tried to cleanse the insectoid monsters from Chica's body using the Chemi-spray the second time…

"Oh no. It looks like the chemi-spray is no longer effective," HandUnit's voice warned.

"WHAT?" Susie exclaimed frantically. "How am I supposed to get rid of these bugs then?" She had a sneaking suspicion she might know a possible solution, but she really hoped she was wrong…

So of course, HandUnit decided to confirm her worst suspicions. "To combat the infestation, pick them off by hand if necessary."

"Oh, no…" Susie groaned. "Oh no, no, no…" She hesitantly reached out and picked up a giant bug, tossing it onto the table next to her as soon as possible. "Ewwwwwwwwww…this is so disgusting!" she complained. "Why me? Jeremy didn't have to go through anything like this!"

She shuddered as she took off more bugs with her virtual hand, spending every second of it utterly grossed out. Fortunately, Susie only had to take a few bugs off before the game was apparently satisfied, progressing to the part where the cupcake jumped off the plate and she had to chase it to put it back on. The former Chica inhabitant was honestly happy for the distraction from the bugs, even if the chase was harder since the room was now pitch-black, and she honestly half-expected the cupcake to randomly jumpscare and kill her. Still, Susie was able to find the cupcake and put it back on the plate right as Chica started groaning in agitation, and like Jeremy, she was able to complete her animatronic's level on the first try.

Unlike Bonnie's and Chica's levels, Freddy's hard mode level was markedly different than the "pitch-black room with weird colors" theme the former two had been placed in. Instead, the entire room was filled with bright TV screens covered with static, and this time it was Freddy himself that was completely black, like a shadow. Gabe could barely see the makings of the lost-and-found bin and the table where the music boxes were located, and all around him were tiny Freddy-like beasts with razor sharp fangs that occasionally jumped in his face, emitting garbled yells of static. "Are those supposed to be little Nightmare Freddies?" Gabe wondered. "And if they are, do they really exist or is this something that Nightmare made up specifically for this level?" He wouldn't put it past Nightmare, given the demon lord's warped sense of humor.

Despite the unsettling visuals, the gameplay once again was largely similar to how the normal mode version of Freddy's level had played out. The interior of Freddy's body was largely the same as how Gabe remembered it from the normal mode, the only major nuisance being the occasional Freddle jumping into his face. Gabe waited until the Freddles were out of the way before removing first the child's belongings that were stuck in Freddy's body, and then the music box, making sure not to touch any of Freddy's mechanical parts. From there, it was a simple matter of replacing the music box that he "accidentally" dropped per the scripted event, and Gabe was able to replace the music box without triggering a jumpscare. Though the process of reaching into Freddy's body parts was somewhat challenging by its very nature, it wasn't any more difficult than the original level had been, and Gabe was able to finish his level without any deaths either.

That left only Foxy's Blacklight level, and by extension Fritz's turn. Unlike the other Blacklight Parts and Services levels, Nightmare hadn't relied on shadows and bizarre colors to develop the atmosphere of Foxy's Blacklight level. Instead, the demon lord had apparently abandoned subtlety entirely and drawn inspiration from his infernal nature…

…by straight-up setting both the animatronic and the workspace around it on fire.

"What the HELL?" Fritz exclaimed, before promptly palming his face with his hand. "Oh. Right. Demon." He sighed as he took in the fiery surroundings. "Well, time to get to work, I guess. I don't know how someone's supposed to get any work done when the place they're working in is literally on fucking fire, but okay…"

Fritz picked up Foxy's head and placed it upon the animatronic's neck. The moment he did so, the flaming and burnt Foxy immediately began to move just as it had done so in its normal mode, though Fritz could have sworn that the burnt Foxy was moving slightly faster than the original had. He looked down at the drawers…and scowled.

"You've got to be fucking kidding me!" Fritz exclaimed. "They're ALL marked #1?" Luckily, he still remembered what each of the drawers contained from his normal mode run, but it was getting irritating to learn that out of all the levels in Parts and Services, Nightmare had apparently decided that Foxy's level was the one that he was going to give the biggest boost in difficulty.

Keeping one eye on Foxy to make sure the animatronic didn't try to slip away and attack him, Fritz opened the true Drawer #1 and looked at the fuses. He grimaced as he realized that all of the color patterns on the fuses were now changing color sporadically, occasionally flickering away from one "main" color to further confuse and annoy him. Paying attention to both the fuse holder in Foxy's leg and the actual fuse itself, Fritz slipped the correct leg fuse in while the colors were properly aligned and the animatronic stopped moving his leg.

"Well, at least the basics are still the same," Fritz muttered as he carefully put the proper fuses into their respective receptacles. He'd already failed this game 3 times in the normal mode, and he had no intention of taking that long to beat this level again, increased difficulty be damned.

Once the fuses were done, all that was left was Foxy's eye…which now presented a new problem all by itself. Before, Foxy's eye had been a normal one with a yellow iris, mixed in with a bunch of eyes that each had different colored irises. It had been a fairly straightforward matter for Fritz to simply choose the eye that matched the one in Foxy's left socket. But now, this new, burnt version of Foxy had a glowing yellow eye that made the animatronic look almost demonic…and it didn't have an iris. With a sinking feeling, Fritz opened the drawer that had once been #3, and his worst fears were confirmed when he realized that all of the eyes were now the same glowing yellow as the one that Foxy already had.

"Wait…SHIT!" Fritz exclaimed. "What the hell am I supposed to do now?" He looked frantically between the seemingly indistinguishable eyes. "Uh…uh…" he randomly picked one of them and put it in the eye socket. Almost immediately, the room darkened and the burnt Foxy disappeared. "Oh, fuck…" Fritz groaned as Foxy leapt at him from the shadows, roaring and snapping at his face with his jaws as he was forced to the Game Over screen.

"Dammit!" the former Foxy inhabitant shouted. "What the hell was I supposed to do there? All of the eyes looked exactly the same!" Grumbling to himself, he restarted the mission and repeated all of the steps that he had taken to rebuilt Foxy. Fortunately, he was able to get through all of them again without making any mistakes, and without wasting too much time he was back at the final stage of the level with the eyes again.

"Okay, let me think about this," Fritz muttered. "There's no way that this is completely luck-based. There's no way. Nightmare might be an asshole, but that would be just plain bullshit." He took a closer look at all of the glowing yellow eyes in the drawer, being careful to occasionally shift his head towards Foxy so that the animatronic wouldn't ambush him, and noticed something rather strange. All of the eyes in the drawer had smudges on them…except for one.

"Aha!" he exclaimed triumphantly as he picked up the eye. "Got it!" Once Foxy had stopped moving his head and the eyepatch opened up, he quickly plopped the eye in the socket and was rewarded with the sound of HandUnit congratulating him for his success. "Yes!" he cheered. "Only took me one try to get this done!"

Fritz had to hand it to Nightmare, the demon lord absolutely knew what he was doing when he had been designing the new levels. And contrary to his initial beliefs, the challenge had been entirely fair. He just hadn't seen the solution the first time. "Well played, Nightmare," Fritz thought as he returned to the main level screen. "Well played."

When he took off the VR headset, he looked around at his siblings. "Okay, who's going to play next?" He looked over at Mike. "Dad?"

Mike was about to say something, but Charlie in the Security Puppet beat him to it. "Actually, Fritz, I'd like to play now," she requested. "Apparently Nightmare added another level to the FNaF 2 section, and based on the name it might actually have the Withered animatronics now. I'd really like to play that level again, especially cause all the other levels didn't have any of them except Foxy."

Fritz shrugged. "Sure," he replied as he handed the VR headset over to her. The Security Puppet put the headset on, and as soon as she was fully connected Charlie made her way over to the FNaF 2 levels and pressed the new Withered level. When she arrived at the black void that preceded every level, she was surprise to discover that, unlike every other level they had played so far, there was a difficulty level presented to the right in the form of a mechanical level. A bit of experimenting with the lever revealed that there were three possible difficulties: Easy, Medium, and Danger, the former two marked by Helpy's face and the latter marked by a snarling Foxy.

Charlie raised an eyebrow. "Okay, now I'm definitely interested." She thought for a moment about what level to pick, and then decided to start with Medium. "Don't want to start off things too easy cause that would be boring, but I don't want to jump into the hardest difficulty either unless I actually know what I'm going to be facing against."

She started the level, and once it loaded she discovered that, once again, the atmosphere of the 1987 office had changed. But this time, unlike the dark blue hues of Night 5, the office was covered entirely in a grim red light that made it look even more disturbing and dangerous, as though she were trapped in a locked-down facility. The lights that were cast into the hallways and vents were of a similar color, giving the whole place an unearthly atmosphere.

"Yeesh," Charlie shook her head in bemusement. "Nightmare really wanted to up the creepy factor here, didn't he?"

Without any further information to rely on, Charlie decided to fall back on the tried-and-tested strategy of alternating between checking the hall light and the vents. Around 1 AM, Withered Foxy appeared under the distant left doorway, attempting to attack her. Charlie was easily able to drive him off with the lights, but this time Withered Foxy wasn't her only visitor. A new animatronic that definitely hadn't been there appeared from the darkness, and Charlie stared in shock as Withered Bonnie walked down the hallway, in all of his faceless glory, stopping just short of the Office entry as he stared at her with his mechanical red eyes.

"Oh my God," Charlie thought as she stared back. "Nightmare actually did it. He brought the Withered animatronics into the game." She couldn't help but be thrilled at the prospect. As much as she thought the version of FNaF 2 in the VR game was superior to the original (in no small part thanks to the removal of a lot of luck-based elements, the addition of attack animations for the animatronics that had been missing them, and Withered Foxy being much less of a pain in the ass), she had felt that the game as a whole had been missing a vital component of its character without the Withereds. Now that they were back, she felt like she was truly playing a new and improved version of FNaF 2 for the first time.

She was so caught up in her thoughts that she was completely flatfooted when the already dim red light suddenly began to flicker. Charlie barely had time to register what was happening before Withered Bonnie suddenly appeared in front of her, screaming in her face and sending her straight to the Game Over screen. "Wait, WHAT?" Charlie exclaimed. "But…Withered Bonnie was in the hallway! He shouldn't have been able to attack me straight from the hallway!"

The realization hit her, and she groaned. "Oh, no…he can attack from the Hallway too, can't he?" What made it even worse was the fact that the game had barely given her one second of the lights flickering on and off before Withered Bonnie had made his attack. Even if she had been paying attention, she doubted that she would've had time to pick up the Freddy mask and put it on before he attacked. "I'm gonna have to hold the Freddy mask in my left hand the entire time, won't I?" she asked herself grimly, knowing that doing so would mean that she wouldn't be able to hit both the lights and the music box at the same time.

She restarted the level, and decided to spend the 12 AM to 1 AM hour trying to figure out the best way to handle the lights and the music box. After a few seconds of fiddling around, Charlie set up a routine in which she would check each of the lights and then wind up the music box afterwards, putting on the mask whenever she saw an animatronic about to attack. This new routine might have sacrificed some of her ability to keep the music box wound up, but it proved worth it when Withered Chica suddenly attacked halfway into 1 AM. The ruined form of Susie's former animatronic appeared randomly in the Office seemingly almost out of thin air, giving only a second of flickering lights for Charlie to put on the mask and escape death. The former Marionette gulped as she saw Withered Chica investigate the Freddy mask, her head twitching erratically as though she were trying to decide whether or not Charlie was an enemy, before finally leaving the office.

"Whew…" Charlie breathed a sigh of relief as she flashed the Hall lights repeatedly to fend off Withered Foxy. Withered Chica had given even less warning of her attack than Withered Bonnie had, as the latter had at least appeared outside in the Hallway before deciding to attack. Charlie had little doubt that if she had still been trying her old routine, she would have been too slow to prevent her attack for sure. As for Withered Bonnie, the animatronic had appeared in the Hallway just like last time, though this time he disappeared instead of attacking directly. Charlie had little doubt that the faceless animatronic would be attacking soon enough, likely from the vents while avoiding the blind spot like Withered Chica had.

Sure enough, around 2 AM, Withered Bonnie appeared in the Office without warning just as Withered Chica had. Charlie barely had enough time to put on the mask before Withered Bonnie attacked, shifting his head around in a manner very similar to Withered Chica before finally leaving. "I know that the Withereds didn't show up in the vents before attacking in the original game," Charlie complained, "but that's still so annoying!"

On the plus side, Toy Bonnie and Toy Chica were much easier to deal with. The fact that they showed up in the vent openings unlike their Withered counterparts allowed Charlie to see their attacks coming from a mile away, making them look like jokes in comparison. Both of them showed up during the 2 PM hour, but Charlie was able to easily fend them off, and right as she blocked Toy Chica she saw Withered Freddy marching down the hallway.

The decrepit version of Freddy Fazbear advanced towards the office, looking at her with wide, soulless eyes. He stopped once he arrived at the doorway just outside the office, watching her carefully, as though he were judging the perfect moment to strike. Functionally, he was behaving almost identically to Toy Freddy, but the latter had been a pristine and undamaged animatronic that was almost goofy in how he behaved sometimes. There was nothing goofy about Withered Freddy, even if he was easily the least damaged of the four Withered animatronics.

Charlie scowled as Withered Foxy appeared again, this time in the far right doorway. A few quick flashes of the light were easily enough to dissuade him from going any further, but it opened up the opportunity for Withered Chica to slip into the office and almost end her run. Charlie was able to put the mask on in time, but when she was gone the former Puppet inhabitant noticed that the wind-up bar was getting dangerously low on the music box.

"God, I had no idea how annoying I was back when I was in the Marionette and people had to keep winding that box to keep me asleep," Charlie muttered irritably as she pressed her finger on the appropriate button, noting with a certain irony how that statement could apply to both her past self back in 1987 and other players of Five Nights of Freddy's 2. Once she had brought the music box back up to an amount that satisfied her for the time being, she checked the lights again, and was just barely able to catch Withered Freddy marching straight into the office.

Charlie put on the Freddy mask right as Withered Freddy began his attack sequence. Unlike the other Withereds, however, he didn't twitch his head from side to side, pondering whether or not there was an enemy under the mask. Instead, Withered Freddy tilted his head forward and leaned directly over her, peering straight into her eyes as though he were trying to see Charlie underneath the Freddy mask and expose her for the night guard that she was. Eventually, Withered Freddy relented in his attack, seemingly satisfied that Charlie was a fellow animatronic after all, leaving Charlie alone in the Office.

"Wow, that was close…" Charlie muttered as she went back to her routine. Now that she had an understanding of how the Withered animatronics worked, she found that the night was surprisingly not much more difficult than the regular FNaF 2 levels. The difficulty was largely the same as Night 4 in the normal mode, with the main exception being the surprise attacks from Withered Bonnie and Withered Chica (which, granted, were also the most dangerous threats that she needed to deal with). Still, Charlie was able to successfully deflect another attack each from them, and with the time already being 5 AM it was extremely unlikely that either animatronic would have time to attack for a third time. True to her expectations, Charlie was able to complete the night successfully, with the only threats being attacks from Toy Chica, Toy Freddy, and Withered Foxy in that final hour before the night came to a close.

"Not bad, not bad," Charlie evaluated her own performance as she was taken to the Game Won! Room. Apart from that one death where she had been taken by surprise by Withered Bonnie, she had been able to complete Withered Medium without any problems. Charlie cranked the gift box lever, and when it opened she was rewarded with an action figure of Withered Freddy. "Fitting, I guess, given the level I just played," she commented.

With the level complete, Charlie went back to the main level hub. Given how even the Medium difficulty hadn't been that hard to handle once she had figured out how the Withered animatronics worked, Charlie opted to skip the Easy difficulty entirely, figuring that it would be a waste of time. "Besides," she thought wryly, "Dad would roast the crap out of me if I went down to an easy difficulty after beating the medium one."

There was only one option left for her to pick, and that was the Danger mode. "Let's hope this is more challenging than the last one," Charlie thought as she flipped the lever up and pressed forward. The moment she entered the level, she immediately started noticing differences. The first was that Balloon Boy laughed immediately upon starting the level, signaling that the little animatronic had already started gunning her Office.

The second was that, unlike in the medium difficulty, the phone didn't abruptly hang up after a few ringtones. Instead, a familiar voice echoed from it, one that Charlie hadn't heard in a long time. "Hello?" Phone Guy's voice greeted her, breaking the silence of the office and the soft tune of the music box. "Hello...uh...what on earth are you doing there? Uh, didn't you get the memo? Uh, the place is closed down, uh, at least for a while. Someone used one of the suits. We had a spare in the back, a yellow one, someone used it...now none of them are acting right. Listen…j-just finish your shift. It's safer than trying to leave in the middle of the night. Uh, we have one more event scheduled for tomorrow, a birthday. You'll be on day shift, wear your uniform, stay close to the animatronics, make sure they don't hurt anyone, okay? Uh, for now just make it through the night. Uh, when the place eventually opens again I'll probably take the night shift myself. Okay, good night and good luck."

"Okay…" Charlie steeled herself. "This is definitely meant to be the same thing as Night 6 in the original game." She dwelled on the words of the phone call as she began her routine, trying to reconcile them with what she remembered back in 1987. Granted, she had been stuck in the music box for most of the day and night, but she honestly couldn't remember who had worn that "yellow suit" that Phone Guy had mentioned, or the circumstances surrounding it. Heck, she wasn't even sure which suit had been the "yellow suit", as it could have potentially been either Golden Freddy or Spring Bonnie. Then again, since it had been Mike's friend Scott doing the voice-acting, he could have potentially "embellished" the story to make the game creepier, offering a warning of William Afton's murders even if they hadn't technically happened at that specific time or place. "Oh, God, I hope there weren't any more murders that I'm just not remembering," Charlie thought in horror. She consoled herself with the knowledge that, if William had murdered children in the 1987 location, they hadn't had their souls enslaved in suits like her family had.

Her thoughts were interrupted by the "danger" cadence, and Charlie gasped when she saw Withered Foxy. Unlike every single other level in the game, where Withered Foxy had hung back in the farther doorways, Fritz's former animatronic had started at the near left doorway immediately, bypassing his first stage entirely. Up close and personal, Withered Foxy looked much more menacing, his snarling face presented in greater detail now that he was so near.

"Ack!" Charlie exclaimed, frantically spamming the Hallway light button with her finger. "Go away, go away!" She watched Withered Foxy nervously, wondering if she had already been too slow and the animatronic would leap at her from the hallway. Fortunately, she had apparently been just in time, because the animatronic soon disappeared. She looked down at the clock and promptly groaned. "Not even the end of 12 AM yet," she deadpanned. "Great, this is already going wonderfully."

Her mood was not improved any more by the arrival of Withered Bonnie in the hallway, who apparently had also decided to get moving and start advancing before the run even hit 1 AM. Charlie carefully kept an eye on Withered Bonnie, wondering whether he was going to try for another direct attack like he had the first time or whether he would go for the vent instead. The faceless animatronic ultimately opted to leave the hallway for a vent attack, but that mattered little as Withered Freddy soon marched down to take his place, and the only thing Withered Bonnie's disappearance meant was that Charlie would have to deal with him later on.

The game got even more hectic once 1 AM rolled around, as Withered Bonnie and Withered Chica both attacked, as did Balloon Boy. Toy Bonnie had also walked down the hallway as well, although he wandered off into the same room that he always did instead of going after her directly. And Charlie was not pleased to see Withered Foxy appear in the hallway again, so soon after his first appearance, this time lurking in the right doorway that was closest to her office. "He's going to attack every single hour, isn't he?" Charlie realized with an annoyed groan. Granted, it was still much more preferable to the original FNaF 2, where he seemingly appeared in the hallway all the goddamn time, but it was still giving her unpleasant flashbacks of constantly losing Night 6 in the OG game to Withered Foxy leaping out of the hallway at her face.

Withered Freddy finally decided to attack her towards the end of the 1 AM hour, as did Toy Chica. As 2 AM rolled around, Charlie flashed the light down the hallway and was greeted with the sight of Toy Freddy standing at the entryway, Withered Bonnie walking down the hallway again, Withered Foxy in the near left doorway, AND Mangle hanging from the ceiling all at the same time. "Holy crap, everyone's here," Charlie muttered, shaking her head in exasperation. "If there was ever a scene that showed FNaF 2 Night 6 in a nutshell, I'm sure this picture would pretty much sum it all up right here." She quickly got rid of Withered Foxy with the hall light, and then put on the Freddy mask to ward off an attack from Toy Bonnie. The only other notable thing that happened was an attack from Toy Freddy towards the end of the 2 AM hour, but as 3 AM rolled around Charlie noticed that her music box circle had gone down to about half left.

"God, I need to be careful," Charlie thought grimly as she wound up the music box. "Otherwise, I could end up getting killed by me!" She managed to catch Withered Foxy trying to sneak another attack on her for the fourth time in a row, and once he was gone she quickly drove away B.B. with the mask and then spent a few seconds winding the music box back up. She was only able to get a few seconds of reprieve, however, as Withered Chica interrupted her routine for the second time, followed by Withered Bonnie again a few seconds after. "You guys really want to kill me, don't you?" she asked rhetorically. Then again, Jeremy and Susie had always been the most frequent attackers of the office back when they had still been consumed by their murderous rage, as the original FNaF 1 game had demonstrated.

4 AM rolled around, and the toys began marching down the hallway again towards their respective rooms. This time, Charlie was able to see both Toy Chica and Toy Bonnie walk down, whereas last time it had just been Toy Bonnie. "I guess Toy Bonnie appears in the hallway every time, while Toy Chica only walks down the hallway sometimes," she mused. There had been times when the "new and improved" version of Chica had attacked in the left vent without walking down the hallway first, but Toy Bonnie had always showed up in the hallway without fail. Unfortunately, they weren't her only visitors, as Withered Foxy appeared close to her office for what felt like the hundredth time in a row, accompanied by both Withered Bonnie AND Withered Freddy. "Oh God, they're really going after me now, aren't they?" Charlie thought grimly as she spammed the hallway light to get rid of Withered Foxy. She checked the right vent to see Mangle lurking there, quickly putting on the Freddy mask to get rid of them. She watched as Mangle went through their attack sequence, admiring just how lifelike the broken animatronic was in the way they extended their head and hand towards her like a curious dog. "That definitely has to be one of my favorite things that they added to this game," Charlie thought as Mangle finally left the office.

The former Marionette inhabitant anxiously went through the routine of checking the lights and winding the box, feeling that her victory was so close. Unfortunately, it seemed as though the Withereds and Toys sensed this as well, for the assault that they launched upon Charlie was even more aggressive and more relentless than it had been even in the earlier hours of the night. Withered Bonnie attacked directly from the hallway this time, followed by Toy Chica a few seconds later. Charlie barely had any time to wind up the music box a few seconds before Withered Freddy marched into the office, glaring at her through the mask as he leaned his head down to glare at her as he had done before. The relentless assault continued well into 5 AM, with Toy Bonnie following where his withered counterpart had left off just as the hour changed numbers. "Seriously, can you guys just STOP?" Charlie almost yelled in exasperation. "Geez," she sighed, "this must be how Dad feels every time we go after him in our recreation of the game in Night 5 and Night 6."

Predictably, the assault did not let up as Charlie finally reached 5 AM and the last hour of the night. Withered Chica attacked for the third time, though fortunately B.B. had coincidentally attempted his third attack at the same time and had fled the office during the damaged animatronic's attack sequence. Toy Freddy and Mangle both appeared in the hallway again, even though Charlie definitely hadn't seen the former walk down like he usually did. "I must have missed it while I was distracted with the other animatronics," she thought, noting grimly that this meant she had no idea when Toy Freddy had arrived, nor any idea of when he would attack. Withered Foxy appeared in the near left doorway for his sixth and likely final attack, and as Charlie started pressing the hallway light she felt her spirit run cold when she saw Toy Freddy marching in at the same time.

"Are you kidding me?" Charlie shouted in disbelief. Panicking, she frantically jabbed her finger repeatedly onto the hallway light button before throwing the Freddy mask on her just before Toy Freddy initiated his attack. "He attacked RIGHT at the same time that Withered Foxy showed up? Am I dead here?" She waited with bated breath as Toy Freddy finished his attack, and when she took the mask off and lit the hallway up…Withered Foxy was gone. Charlie let out a massive sigh of relief as she realized that would probably be the last Withered Foxy attack of the night, although her relief was short-lived when she saw that the music box had only less than a quarter remaining. "I really need 6 AM to come…like…right now…" Charlie mumbled under her breath as she held the button charging the music box, watching the circle meter slowly tick back up.

And that was when Mangle decided to attack, crawling on the ceiling through the doorway towards her. "Oh, no no no!" Charlie fought the urge to scream. "Not now, not when I'm so close!" She threw the Freddy mask on her head and watched as Mangle went through their attack animation for a second time, this time appreciating it far less. Once they were gone, she threw off the mask and immediately looked at the monitor. To her dismay, the meter had lowered back down to less than eighth of its maximum capacity remaining, the red triangle warning sign flashing ominously on the screen. "Come on, come on, 6 AM!" Charlie pleaded as she jabbed her finger onto the button to stop it from depleting completely. "Get me out of here, please!"

DING! DONG!

The screen turned black, save for the glorious sight of 5 AM transforming into 6 AM in the center. "YES!" Charlie whooped, pumping a fist into the air in delight. "I did it! I beat Withered Danger mode on my first try! WOOOOOOOOOOO!" She was taken to the "Game Win!" room, a sight that had never been so welcome. "I'll take that prize, thank you very much!" she declared as she cranked the handle. The gift box opened up, revealing a plushie.

By itself, a plushie wouldn't have disturbed her, but it was who the plushie represented that gave Charlie pause. Although some of the details had been smoothed out, there was no mistaking the fact that the plushie was one of Nightmarionne. And if there was a plushie of the demonic Marionette here, then that could only mean that Nightmarionne himself was here as well.

And Charlie highly doubted that Nightmarionne was going to be the only demonic animatronic that Nightmare had introduced into the game.

"I wonder how many Nightmare animatronics we're going to see in this game," she muttered as she stared down at the Nightmarionne plushie in her hands. Even if Nightmare was their ally in dealing with Glitchtrap and relatively trustworthy (certainly more so than Fazbear Entertainment), that didn't mean Charlie was exactly looking forward to seeing ghoulish and monstrous forms of the animatronics that her original father had created.

Though there was one thing that she wouldn't deny. If the arrival of the Withered animatronics was any indication, Nightmare certainly knew how to make a damn good game.

/

A/N: Congrats to Charlie for beating Withered Danger mode on her first attempt! I actually managed to accomplish this as well when I played that level, and while it certainly wasn't easy by any stretch of the imagination, it still isn't nearly as frustrating as Night 6 in the OG FNaF 2 game…as long as you don't get screwed over by the occasional bug that I didn't include in this fic.

As funny as it may sound, me deciding to write about the Blacklight Parts and Services levels and the Withered levels was me deciding to take the easy road more than anything else. Writing about the Nightmare levels that were introduced into the game outside of Curse of Dreadbear (Plushtrap, Nightmare B.B., Nightmarionne, Nightmare Fredbear) was something that would require a bit more thought, and I had such an exhausting last week that I just couldn't work it out in my head. Writing about the Parts and Services and Withered mode was much less of a hassle, since it was something I already addressed in earlier chapters and I could just expand on what I had written while trying not to make it sound too repetitive. Somehow it still ended up as 13 chapters anyway XD.

Next chapter we'll finally get to the Nightmares, and Curse of Dreadbear from there. I hope you guys are looking forward to it as much as I am!