A/N: Hey guys! Just wanted to let you know that it might be a bit before we advance the plot to FNaF-related stuff like Special Delivery and Security Breach again. The last couple of chapters were pretty much centered entirely on it, and as much as this fic is about FNaF, I need a break from writing that kind of stuff every so often. I also want to briefly remind everyone that I won't be replying to every single comment from now on like I used to, as I simply just don't have the time to do so.

I do want to briefly address a request or a question that several reviewers have posted: namely, about the ghost kids watching FNaF fan games, videos, theories, and other things on Youtube. I'm going to be completely honest – the chances of this happening are very low. Writing high-quality stories even on just the actual canon FNaF stuff takes a lot of research and time, a resource that is becoming increasingly strained as the year progresses thanks to my job. I simply do not have time to accommodate other FNaF-related media into this fic on top of what I put into these chapters already. So unfortunately, I'm going to have to say a firm "no" to these requests, at least for the foreseeable future. Maybe if I have more time, but certainly not now.

With that being said, let's get right into the chapter!

Chapter 150 – Supernatural Playdate 3

The follow-up from Fazbear Entertainment's posted apology was initially promising. Even though there was little doubt to the Schmidt family that they were only apologizing to cover their own asses and not because of any actual remorse, it was a well-crafted and appropriately solemn statement that had clearly had genuine thought put into it. They could at least give the corporation credit for that, if nothing else.

And they could clearly see the effect that the apology had on the online community too. It was clear that most of the online world had expected Fazbear Entertainment to either completely ignore the backlash that they were receiving, or brush it off with a half-assed apology that anyone with half a brain could recognize as insincere. What the corporation had actually done instead was a pleasant surprise to most, and the atmosphere on the web towards Fazbear Entertainment had shifted from "overt hostility" to "general suspicion mixed with cautious optimism." Of course, there would be some diehard haters that would bash on the company no matter what they did, but at the very least it wasn't at risk for total collapse and abandonment by the rest of the world anymore.

"Wow, I'm actually impressed," Gabe typed on the same website he had previously condemned Fazbear Entertainment on, a follow-up statement to subtly influence public opinion once more. "I thought Fazbear Entertainment was going to bullshit their response or not post one at all. The fact that they wrote out a full, detailed apology makes me think that they might actually be serious about changing for the better. But you know what they say…actions speak louder than words. I'm not just going to blindly believe everything they say no matter how good it sounds, especially with all the horrifying shit that happened in the past and some of the scandals that are affecting even this latest version of Fazbear Entertainment. I want to actually see the improvement that they're promising, and prove that whatever they're doing will be safer for both the workers and regular people like me. Until I see that proof, I'm not going anywhere near anything that Fazbear Entertainment touches."

"Working on directing the narrative a bit there," Charlie commented approvingly as she read the words the former Freddy inhabitant had typed. "Nice going. Fazbear Entertainment's more likely to actually do what they're supposed to if the rest of the world is keeping a close eye on them and making sure they do it. Though it's gonna take a lot of pressure to get them to that point."

"We'll keep putting that pressure on them as much as we can," Jeremy promised.

Mike nodded, though a frown had appeared on his face. "We might not be able to get much more done for the time being, as much as I hate to say it," he admitted. "You guys haven't been exposed to the Internet very long, so you don't have as much experience and understanding of how online communities work like I do. But I can tell you that people have short attention spans and short memories. On the one hand, if we keep trying to drum this topic over and over again, people will eventually either get bored or get sick of it, stop caring, and move on. On the other hand, if we don't discuss it enough, then people will eventually forget about the shit Fazbear Entertainment's doing. Either one would let Fazbear Entertainment regress back into its old shitty business practices, which is something we absolutely DO NOT want to happen."

"So what do we do?" Cassidy wondered.

"My advice would be to make sure discussion on Fazbear Entertainment doesn't die completely, but don't go overboard with it," Mike suggested. "It would be best for you guys to amp up the scrutiny on Fazbear Entertainment like you did these past few days when they're closer to announcing or starting a major project. That way, those assholes will have to take shit seriously or face massive backlash if they fuck something up."

"And we can keep spying on Mr. Averus," Jeremy added. "Hopefully figure out whatever they're planning next."

"Yeah, we can definitely do this!" Fritz asserted.

Liz shook her head. "I feel like we're saying this like we have a more solid plan than we actually do," she couldn't help but comment.

"Maybe," Susie admitted, "but it's not like we've got any better ideas."

Nobody could contest that, and the ghost children spent the next few days trying to pry any secrets they could get from Fazbear Entertainment with their spying attempts. But it seemed that their luck had run out for the time being, as Mr. Averus wasn't revealing anything either on his computer or his phone conversations. Either the company as a whole was keeping an incredibly tight lid on its plans for advancing the Fazbear Entertainment brand going forward, or they hadn't actually planned that far ahead yet to actually formulate any plans. Either way, multiple attempts came back empty-handed, to the frustration of the ghosts.

"There's nothing!" Cassidy pouted, after 2 weeks of no success. "We're getting nothing out of this!"

"What are they even doing right now?" Fritz grumbled. "They have to be doing SOMETHING!"

"I think it's pointless to keep going ahead with this for now," Mike decided. "We could try again in about a month or so, or if we get some hints anywhere about what Fazbear Entertainment are planning. But there's no use worrying about it when we have nothing to go off of. All that will do is make you guys more stressed out about it." He smiled at them. "You guys deserve a break anyhow."

Jeremy smiled at him. "Thanks, Dad."

"We'll be ready if anything comes up," Liz promised.

"In the meantime, I want to get in touch with Alex and Meghan," Susie declared as she opened up her laptop. "It feels like forever since the last time we've talked to them." Even as she was speaking, she had opened up the Facebook chat that all of them were on, some of her siblings doing the same. "Hey guys!" she eagerly typed in the chat.

"Oh hey, it's Susie!" Alex replied back a few seconds later. "How's it going?"

"Man, it feels like it's been forever since the last time we've talked to you guys!" Meghan added. "Have you guys been busy or something?"

The ghosts looked at each other uncertainly. "Yeah…we've been pretty busy the past couple of days," Gabe typed. It was vague and elusive, but now wasn't the time to go into detail about exactly what they'd been doing over for those past few days. "But it's still great to hear from you guys!"

"Yeah, what've you been up to?" Jeremy asked.

"We've actually been playing a new game that came out a couple of days ago," Alex answered. "That VR game about Freddy Fazbear's pizzeria that Fazbear Entertainment came out with? Have you guys heard about that?"

Everyone's eyes widened as they read Alex's message.

"Ummm…" Liz ventured with the question that hung in the air. "Did we ever…mention…this game to Alex and Meghan? And all the problems that's been going on with it?"

"Oh, fuck…" Fritz gasped. "I don't think we ever did."

Charlie quickly typed in a message. "Did your game ever come with a DLC?" she questioned. "A Halloween-themed one?"

"Yeah, that Curse of Dreadbear thing," Meghan replied. "Honestly, some of the things that came with that game scare the crap out of me. Those burning demon animatronics are really, really creepy."

Everyone breathed an immense sigh of relief as they realized that this was the version of the game that had been worked on extensively by Nightmare, and thus was safe from the corruptive influence of Glitchtrap. Gabe let out a dry chuckle. "I can't believe we're happy about the fact that there are fiery demon animatronics in this video game," he muttered.

Still, it couldn't hurt to be sure. "What version of the game are you playing?" Jeremy asked.

"…what version?" Alex asked, clearly confused. "This is the only version of the game that's come out. I know it was supposed to be released earlier but that got delayed due to some kind of fire or explosion or something."

That was even more encouraging to the ghosts, further evidence that the only version of the VR game that had ever made it to the public was the one that had been thoroughly modified and cleansed by Nightmare. Still, there was only one way to make absolutely certain that Alex or Meghan wouldn't ever fall victim to the corruption of Glitchtrap.

"Do you guys want to hang out and play that game together?" Gabe asked.

A Few Hours Later…

"So what did you want to talk to us about?" Alex asked as the Marshalls and the Schmidts gathered in his bedroom. Mike had, understandably, not been too pleased when his children had gone ahead and scheduled a playdate with the Marshalls without consulting him first. He was also, understandably, much more accepting of the arrangement when he learned that the Marshall children had gotten their hands on Fazbear Entertainment's VR game, and he was just as invested in making sure that nothing terrible happened to his close friend's children as much as the ghost kids were. "And why did you tell us to wait until you were here before we finished the game?"

"There's a lot about this game that you don't know about," Gabe explained. "And you should definitely learn about it first before you decide to go and finish it. Have you seen a glitchy yellow bunny pop up in your game? One that looks different from the other animatronics and is a lot creepier?"

"Yeah, now that you mention it…" Meghan muttered. "We HAVE seen something like that. It hasn't really done anything other than be creepy though. I thought it was just something spooky that the game developers put into the game as part of the whole horror game shtick."

"It used to be a LOT more than just that," Susie said forebodingly, in a tone that instantly put both Alex and Meghan on edge. "Do you guys remember that serial killer who murdered us? The one who got turned into a decaying bunny animatronic and was eventually set on fire and sent to Hell?"

"How we can forget?" Alex muttered. "That was one of the craziest things I've ever heard in my life."

"It's about to get a lot crazier," Jeremy replied grimly. Together the ghost kids explained the true nature of Glitchtrap, and the horrifying evil that the VR game had once possessed and the danger it had nearly posed to the rest of the world. As they proceeded through their explanation, the Marshall kids looked more and more horrified.

"What the FUCK?" Alex exclaimed in disbelief. "Fazbear Entertainment somehow managed to download a soul copy of a deranged serial killer in their game?"

"Yeah," Liz confirmed with a shake of her head. "We knew that the game was fishy, since Fazbear Entertainment is one of the most corrupt and greedy corporations to ever exist. But even we didn't think it'd be this bad."

"But…but…" Meghan spluttered, looking at the game with newfound fear and horror. "Did we…did we almost…?"

"Nope!" Fritz interrupted, looking much more cheerful than should have been appropriate…although his next few words soon explained why. "We took care of it. We figured out what was going on, and then Dad and a…friend of his took care of it."

"Took care of it?" Meghan repeated incredulously. "How did they take care of a problem this big? I'm pretty sure I read somewhere that there were other copies of the game before…they got…blown…up…" his voice trailed off as he started to put the pieces together.

"You guys blew up a bunch of storage buildings?" Alex gaped, not sure whether to be impressed or disturbed.

"No no, not US!" Cassidy denied immediately. "But the story behind that's even crazier than what's already been going on."

"At this point, I'll believe just about anything," Meghan deadpanned.

"The friend that helped Dad fix the VR game and destroy the real Glitchtrap is actually a demon lord from Hell itself," Susie dropped the bombshell.

Several seconds of silence followed the revelation. "…You're fucking with us," Alex finally managed.

"I wish we were," Gabe mumbled. "But that's what happened. The situation had gotten so bad, what with entire storages of games filled with Glitchtraps that could possess thousands of people, that a literal demon lord from Hell had to be called on to fix the mess. Nightmare destroyed all of the copies of the game that had Glitchtrap in them, exploding the storage buildings in the process, and then recreated the game to purge Glitchtrap's influence from it."

Meghan shook her head to try and gather her thoughts. "So…if Heaven and Hell are real, and demon lords are real…why would a demon lord do a GOOD deed when they're supposed to be super evil and stuff?" she wondered.

"It's pretty complicated, but we do have an answer for that," Charlie replied, before elaborating further. "From what I understand, God actually ORDERED our demon lord ally to help take care of this problem, and he isn't stupid enough to refuse a direct order from Heaven. And not only that, Nightmare not only likes our Dad, but he HATES William Afton. He hates him so much, both out of principle and for personal reasons, that he's willing to do good on Earth just to ruin our murderer and his plans as much as possible. He not only destroyed the real Glitchtrap from the VR games completely, but also included an extensive failsafe system and an entire DLC to warn people about Glitchtrap and make sure he can never come back."

"An extensive failsafe system…" Alex's eyes widened. "You mean those Nightmare animatronics? Are they also…?"

"They're representations of the demons that are part of Nightmare's family," Liz explained. "They're not ACTUALLY the demons themselves, at least not anymore. They basically act as programs now, both to act as the main enemies in certain levels and to destroy any trace of Glitchtrap that they find. But they're completely harmless. Nightmare isn't stupid enough to make them dangerous to regular humans and anger Heaven."

"It might've worked out for us, but there's a LOT of special circumstances behind why Nightmare and our families can work together without any issues or backstabbing," Gabe warned. "Normally, dealing with demons is a VERY bad idea. Heck, Nightmare even straight-up admitted that most demons aren't nearly as cooperative."

"So what the heck is the Glitchtrap that we've seen?" Meghan demanded. "If this demon lord destroyed Glitchtrap like you said, why have we still seen him in the game?"

"It's just a copy," Susie assured her. "A harmless copy created by Nightmare that looks and even acts a bit like the original Glitchtrap, but doesn't actually do anything."

"Can you…check…to make sure that's actually the case?" Alex requested, sounding more than a little worried. Considering how dangerous Glitchtrap had been, he had every right to be. "I'd really rather not get possessed by the soul copy of a deranged child murderer, if that's all right with you guys."

"Oh, sure!" Jeremy agreed. "Do you mind if I possess one of you for a little bit, though? I can't exactly play the game as a ghost." With some reluctance, Alex nodded his consent, and Jeremy floated into his body. Alex felt a shiver and a chill as he felt the former Bonnie inhabitant's presence enter his body, but he let Jeremy control his body's movements and place the VR game on his face. When the main menu loaded, he felt Jeremy turn his head to the right, where Glitchtrap was waiting for them, waving his hand as he already did. The glitchy bunny was much more disturbing than he had been minutes before now that he knew the truth about what it had once been, and the fact that it was so close to him now decidedly did not help.

What did help was the immense feeling of relief from Jeremy. "Yeah, he's safe," the ghost boy confirmed. "I don't feel any of William Afton's presence from Glitchtrap at all. There was this huge sense of wrongness and horrible familiarity when I saw Glitchtrap back when he was the real deal, and none of that's there. You should be good to finish the game's endings now."

"Thank God for that," Alex muttered as he took off the VR headset and Jeremy left his body. Now that the former Bonnie inhabitant had confirmed that the game was indeed safe and devoid of any trace of William Afton, the Marshall child quickly made his way through the Pizza Plex, surprisingly going through it much faster than the ghost kids had.

"Wait, what the heck?" Fritz exclaimed once Alex had taken off the VR headset. "How the heck did you get through the Pizza Party level so quickly? I know Jeremy died at least twice!"

"I, uh…I kinda…looked up a guide and watched somebody on Youtube play this game before played it," Alex admitted sheepishly.

"Aww, so that's not fair!" Cassidy complained. "We didn't have any of that to help us, we had to figure everything out ourselves!"

"Kinda cheapens the whole win, doesn't it?" Gabe pointed out. "I mean, you only got through the level then because you had help. Doesn't it ruin the sense of accomplishment?"

Alex shrugged. "I don't really care about that, to be honest," he nonchalantly replied. "I just wanted to get through the end of the level by any means necessary. Maybe I could have figured this out if I spent more time on it, but I don't really care to. And besides," his face darkened, "I was NOT gonna spend three hours trying to find out how the fucking Plushbaby level worked."

Liz shuddered. "Not gonna blame you there," she muttered. "That was one of the worst things I've seen in my entire afterlife."

Meghan smirked. "Thanks for doing that level for me," she spoke to Alex with faux-innocence. Alex's only response was to flip the bird at his sister, earning some snickers from the ghost kids and a sympathetic glance from Liz.

"Now we need to figure out how to find the ending with the 16 Tapes," Meghan commented. "I think between the two of us we already have 15 of them. That leaves only one more. I can go pick it up since you've already seen the Pizza Party ending."

"Sure," Alex agreed, handing the VR headset over to his sister. As he did so, he gave a side glance over to the ghost kids. "By the way, what HandUnit was saying made it so blatantly obvious that shifty shit is going on. Please tell me Fazbear Entertainment aren't actually that stupid."

Susie shrugged. "I dunno," she replied. "It's possible Nightmare programmed his dialogue like that to make Fazbear Entertainment look bad…but it's also possible that yes, they really ARE that stupid."

"Sheesh…" Alex muttered as Meghan looked through the Gallery to find the 16th Tape and listened to it in the black void that was the Tape Room. "So how do I do this?" Meghan asked as she listened to Tape Girl's instructions.

"I think when Glitchtrap starts to merge with you, you press the Showtime button, flip the Blacklight switch, and press the reset button to the left of the TVs," Charlie advised. "Or at least that's how it worked back when we played the game."

"Thanks, I'll be sure to…oh my God!" Meghan exclaimed. Judging by their own experiences, the ghost kids guessed that Glitchtrap had chosen that random moment to try and "possess" the player. "Uh…uh…" she fumbled as she tried to follow Charlie's instructions. "Press Showtime...flip the switch…hit the reset button…did I do it?"

"What do you see?" Jeremy asked.

"I see…I'm in front of some kind of metal door with a keyhole in it," Meghan verbalized what she was seeing after a few seconds. "Glitchtrap's opening the door…making some kind of weird shushing noise…and closing the door. And that's pretty much it. I'm back at the main menu, and there's this weird plushie version of Glitchtrap in front of me. Was that supposed to happen?"

"Yeah," Gabe replied, visibly relieved that neither Marshall kid had gotten their soul trapped in the game now that Nightmare had eradicated Glitchtrap's influence from it. "That's exactly what's supposed to happen."

"I'm glad I already saw a video of that ending on Youtube," Alex remarked. "Otherwise I would've been pretty salty about missing out on what's supposed to be the Good ending of the game."

"Not much of a good ending though," Meghan commented as she took off the VR headset. "I know this Glitchtrap is a complete fake, but when it comes to the plot it just feels like we only solved the problem temporarily, and that Glitchtrap could wait any time for another chance to get out and possess someone."

"It's worse than you think," Fritz replied ominously. Both Marshall siblings turned to look at her with surprised expressions.

"Nightmare was able to destroy almost all of the copies of the original version of the game that had Glitchtrap in it," Charlie explained. "All of them…except one. There was one copy of the game where Glitchtrap was able to escape before Nightmare used his magic to destroy it."

Alex's and Meghan's eyes widened in horror. "Wait…" he spluttered. "So there was one Glitchtrap that was able to SUCCESSFULLY possess someone?"

"Oh my God…" Meghan gasped. "That means that there's someone out there possessed by the virus ghost of a freaking child murderer!"

"Do you know who it is?" Alex asked urgently.

The ghosts shook their heads in dismay. "If we did, then things would be a lot easier," Gabe replied. "We'd be able to keep a lot closer tabs on him, especially as ghosts, or if we REALLY needed to, we could ask Nightmare to deal with the problem." The grimace on his face made it abundantly clear that they wouldn't be happy with calling on the demon lord's aid unless there was no other option. "But we don't. The only thing we know is that the person Glitchtrap possessed is a female, and that they're likely affiliated with Fazbear Entertainment in some way. That's all we have."

"How do you know that the person is female?" Meghan wondered.

A humorless smile appeared on Susie's face. "Play through the new DLC and get through all the levels," she replied. "Nightmare hid a clue about the possession victim in the final level, where you can hear her voice. He had to hide it so thoroughly cause otherwise Fazbear Entertainment would've found it and tried to get rid of it before the game got released to the public."

Alex scowled. "The more I'm hearing about Fazbear Entertainment, the less I like them."

"Good," Cassidy retorted. "We've spent the last few days online telling everyone about how much they suck."

A light bulb flashed in Meghan's head as she realized why her ghostly friends had been mostly silent the past couple of weeks. "Ohhhhhh…all those posts online bashing Fazbear Entertainment were done by you guys?"

"Some of them," Gabe clarified. "We got the ball rolling, and let the Internet take things from there."

"Nice," Alex snickered. "I don't think Dad likes them either, from what I've heard."

Meghan, however, looked more contemplative than anything. "You guys didn't arrange a hangout just to catch up and have fun, did you?" she questioned. "You actually had a serious reason for this."

"Yeah," Fritz confirmed, looking uncharacteristically serious. "There's some serious shit we've got to warn you about. And it's all about Fazbear Entertainment."

"The first thing we were worried about was the VR game," Liz picked up where her brother had left off. "When we heard that you guys were playing Fazbear Entertainment's VR game, we got really nervous. Sure, Nightmare assured us that all the copies released to the public were safe and Glitchtrap-free, but we still wanted to make absolutely sure."

"We didn't want you guys to play through the endings without us there to make sure nothing went wrong," Gabe added. "Cause that's where the danger was. Luckily, everything seems to be perfectly fine, and if this is the same version of the game that was released to the public, that means that everything else is fine too, at least on that front."

Alex shuddered. "I don't even want to THINK about what would happen if thousands of Glitchtrap-infected games got released to the public," he mumbled. "All those people who could get possessed…"

"Thanks for stopping us from playing that game until you got here," Meghan murmured. "I know now that nothing bad was going to happen, but it would've been REALLY bad if we were wrong about that."

"Of course," Charlie nodded. "There's no way we'd let you risk your safety with anything Fazbear Entertainment-related until we were sure it was safe."

"Speaking of Fazbear Entertainment…" Jeremy pitched in, "…that's the second big thing that we wanted to talk to you about today."

"The TL;DR version is that Fazbear Entertainment sucks," Susie bluntly commented. "They REALLY suck. Everything you might've seen on the news and online about how crappy their business practices are…it's all true. Every single bit of it."

"We were the ones who killed those innocent night guards," Gabe added solemnly. "We're not denying our own guilt and the crimes we committed. But Fazbear Entertainment was so goddamn incompetent in how it ran its business that it let the killings go on for YEARS when they could've stopped the tragedy after the first night guard death if they just took some goddamn responsibility."

"That one former exec I saw on TV really went into detail about that," Meghan commented. "Like, seriously, how you can run a business when you're THAT dumb?"

"And all that talk about them turning over a new leaf and being better than ever before? It's probably bullshit," Cassidy remarked. "Even this new version of Fazbear Entertainment has some scandals surrounding it, and it's likely that they might've actually scanned Glitchtrap into their VR game to begin with."

"The point is…don't trust ANYTHING from Fazbear Entertainment," Charlie warned. "Don't visit any of their restaurants or new establishments, don't buy any of their products, just stay the hell away from them as much as possible. If possible, tell all of your friends to stay away from any and all things Fazbear Entertainment, at least until after we can confirm that they aren't the same God-awful quality that the old Fazbear Entertainment was all about."

"And I know you've probably heard this before…but stay away from strangers," Gabe added. "Especially women. Except for the very few clues we have, we have NO idea who Glitchtrap's possession victim is. For all we know, the person who lives in the house a few blocks away could be possessed by the soul fragment of a deranged child-killing psychopath."

"Got it," Alex acknowledged, with no trace of his usual playful personality. "With how seriously you're taking this, it would be really goddamn stupid for us to not do the same."

"We'll try to warn our friends away from anything Fazbear Entertainment might do in the future," Meghan promised, before adding skeptically, "although we can't really control what they do."

"That's all we're asking," Jeremy replied approvingly, and the rest of the ghost kids looked similarly relieved at how they had gotten the warning off to the Marshalls and how their living friends were taking the problems of Glitchtrap and Fazbear Entertainment seriously.

"Well, we still don't know what Glitchtrap's possession victim sounds like, so we need to figure that crap out ASAP," Alex declared as he put the VR headset back on. "Let's start playing the Curse of Dreadbear DLC so we can hear her voice and know what to look out for. Hopefully there isn't another fucking Plushbaby level that we have to deal with."

Liz gave him an apologetic look as she opened her mouth. "Umm…actually…"

"…God fucking dammit!"

/

A/N: Okay, so I might've semi-lied. This chapter still does technically cover FNaF-related content, but it's a FNaF fic, what did you expect?

Seriously though, the ghost kids never actually had a serious discussion about the dangers of Glitchtrap and Fazbear Entertainment with Alex and Meghan before. And since those two are not only their closest friends but could also potentially die if they were left uninformed about those dangers, it only makes sense for the ghost kids to not only warn them as soon as they have the opportunity but also to supervise their completion of the new, Glitchtrap-free VR game to make absolutely sure nothing goes wrong. The Marshall family (at least the kids, who will be quick to warn their parents) is now more or less aware of the situation, and they at least will be safe from any of Fazbear Entertainment's or Glitchtrap's bullshit.

To be honest, this conversation could and probably should have been done a few chapters prior, but it slipped my mind. But better late than never, and now is as good a time as any while we're wrapping up FNaF-related content for the time being and before we move on to less serious matters for a time.

Also, making jokes about the Plushbaby level and its insane difficulty never gets old XD

That's all I have for now. Hope you guys enjoyed!