Ethan looked over at his clock on his TV, where he had been playing music through his surround sound. It was already seven o'clock at night. Ethan swore. He had completely forgotten about school and sleeping before his shift.

'Damn it all.' Ethan rubbed his face and eyes, feeling drowsy already. 'A, what, two, three hour nap?' Two hours would get him functional, at least, but a three hour one would get him… the exact same result.

Ethan walked over to his bedroom, Sylvia walking behind him and hopping up on his bed, snuggling down and promptly falling asleep again. Ethan laughed. 'Really, girl? Just like that?' Sylvia huffed, rolling onto her side. Ethan sighed, grinning ear to ear. He crawled into his bed, draping an arm over his dog. He pulled out his phone.

Alarm set two hours and fifteen minutes from now.

'That oughta be enough, yeah girl?' Ethan jokingly asked his canine companion. Sylvia, gave no response as she was, of course, a dog. Ethan set his phone on his bedside table, snuggling his dog closer before drifting off to sleep.

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Beep beep. Beep beep.

Ethan groaned as he rolled over, grabbing his phone and looking at the time. Nine fifteen, or twenty one fifteen for the twenty four hour clock. Ethan sighed. 'I don't want to get up, but I need money!' Ethan put on his best Mr. Krabs' voice, making himself laugh.

Groaning, Ethan got out of his bed, brushing his teeth and putting on his uniform. He sighed. The T-shirt of his uniform was black with purple seams, the Freddy's logo emblazoned on his left side. A black ball cap, also holding the Freddy's logo, sat on his counter.

Ethan stood there for a second, looking at himself. 'I definitely wasn't this last night. Or the night before.' Ethan chuckled. That's why he hadn't noticed the designs before. He hadn't been wearing the proper uniform at all. 'Christ, I must have the IQ of a potato to do that kinda BS.' Ethan laughed again, finishing getting dressed.

After giving Sylvia a quick pat on the head and dropping her off at his uncle's apartment, Ethan made the drive to Freddy's, blasting some heavy metal on the drive to drown out his thoughts for a few minutes. This shift would be hell, he knew.

Ethan pulled into the parking lot of Freddy's at nine forty five, a few hours early for his shift, but Ethan didn't care. He needed a few hours with them. Why, he had no rational reason, but somehow, he just knew he did.

The front door was still unlocked, the cleaning crew still servicing the restaurant. Ethan could care less. Walking in, he immediately beelined for the kitchen, grabbing some of the cold leftover pizza that was still on the counter and filling a soda cup full of Coke. He made his way back out into the main restaurant, haphazardly throwing his pizza tray on one of the center tables and flopping down into one of the steel seats.

Ethan put his feet up on the table, shoving a piece of pizza in his mouth and started to devour it. He looked at the main stage, which still had its lights on, perfectly illuminating the three animatronics on it, all currently in their deactivated state. Ethan scoffed and smiled. They all looked like they were ready to perform, stuck in limbo.

'Stuck before no audience, the suffocating silent ambience.' Ethan spoke out loud to no-one.'

'Such a fine poet, Ethan. I think you're wasting your talents here.' A voice called out. Ethan smiled slightly as he recognized the voice. Mr. Sinclair.

'I try, sir, I try.' Ethan responded half sarcastically. 'Unfortunately, being a poet doesn't pay much in high school. Or much at all, for that matter.'

Sinclair chuckled. 'Suppose that's true. Then again, neither does night security guard.'

Ethan chuckled as he swallowed another slice of pizza. 'Night guard has all the fun points, though.'

'Fun points, huh?' Sinclair shook his head. 'You're an oddball, sonny.'

Ethan laughed. 'That's an understatement. Mentally unstable sociopathic psycho is a bit more adequate.'

Sinclair sighed. 'You're definitely not a sociopath, let's get that straight right now. Now, mentally unstable?' Sinclair sucked his teeth and smiled slightly. 'Now that's just the damn truth.'

Ethan laughed loudly. 'Especially to take this job.'

Sinclair nodded. 'Exactly. Speaking of which, how's the night shift been going?'

Ethan stopped eating. Sinclair continued. 'You know, with the whole "Night wander mode" the mascots have.'

Ethan let out an uneasy chuckle. 'It's been… interesting, to say the least. They do like to come and visit me in the middle of my shift to say hi.'

'Hmm. Any idea why?' Sinclair asked.

Ethan scoffed in disbelief. 'Come on, Mr. Sinclair. They're your mascots, right? How do you not know their night mode settings?'

Sinclair shrugged. 'I'm just the owner, Ethan, not one of those damn techies. I couldn't fix or program those things to save my life.'

Ethan shrugged. 'Fair enough.' Ethan checked his watch. Ten o'clock. Ethan stretched out a bit and turned his head back toward Sinclair. 'Shouldn't you be getting home by now, sir? Sure your old lady won't be too happy with you coming home so late.' Ethan said the last part with a slight smirk, saying "old lady" with a small Southern accent that Sinclair had present in his voice.

Sinclair smiled. 'You sure do like to use my vocabulary a whole bunch, don't you?' Ethan shot Sinclair his signature smirk, and the old restaurant owner laughed. 'Suppose you're right, son. I best be getting home. Gotta make sure Elizabeth is in bed and not up late watching that kids show she loves so much.'

Ethan chuckled in return. 'Yeah, she does love that cartoon. Can't say I blame her though.'

'You're still a kid at heart, Ethan. That's what I like about you.'

'Well thank you sir, it comes naturally.' Ethan returned, smiling widely.

Sinclair laughed loudly as he made his way toward the door. 'Well, see you tomorrow, Ethan.'

Ethan did a two finger salute of sorts toward Sinclair. As the old man walked out though, Ethan heard his final comment. 'If they let you, God willing.'

What an odd thing to say, Ethan thought jokingly.

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12:00am, Start of Shift

100% power

Ethan settled back into his office chair, having spent the last few hours working on homework and a rather important project he needed to get done by next week. However, once the clock struck the midnight hour, Ethan's attention quickly shifted from his school work to his much more deadly and attention grabbing job.

On the final chime of the hour, the phone rang. Ethan picked up the dated receiver and put the conversation on speaker so he could multitask as he listened to his comrade's message for him.

'Hello, hello?'

Ethan smiled. 'Hello there, General Phone Guy.' Ethan laughed at his own joke as he flipped up his laptop monitor.

'Hey, wow, Day 4. I knew you could do it.'

'Easy as pie, my friend.' Ethan's eyes narrowed as he checked the CCTV feed. Bonnie, Chica, and Freddy were already gone, though Foxy was being rather passive as of now.

'Uh, hey, listen, I may not be around to send you a message tomorrow.'

Ethan turned his head toward the old phone, eyebrows raising. He heard some sort of banging in the background of the call.

Phone Guy continued. 'It's-it's been a bad night here for me. Um, I-I'm kinda glad I recorded these messages when I did, you know, for you.'

Ethan's concern was growing still. What was he hearing?

'Hey, uh, could you do me a favor, if you, uh, get the chance? Um, in the backroom, there's the, um, endoskeleton and all the spare costumes, right?' There was more banging in the background. 'Could you go check those? I-I'll try to hold out until the end, but the way it's going right now, um, heh, I don't think that'll happen. Who knows? Maybe it won't be that bad. You know all those empty costumes always intrigued me. N-never quite knew how they worked.'

Ethan then heard some kind of tune playing faintly. He heard the breath of the Phone Guy catch.

'Oh no. Oh no no NOO-'

Ethan winced as he heard a loud screeching emanate from the receiver, static soon replacing the noise until the call cut. Ethan exhaled heavily. 'Who the hell was that?'

What didn't occur to Ethan at that moment was that he already knew it was one of the four mascots.

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12:30am

95% power

Hell had officially broken loose in Freddy's. This wasn't the usual "attack for half an hour then wait half an hour" back and forth the other nights were. This was a total blitzkrieg.

Foxy peeked out from his curtain at twelve thirty, marking the start of the next five and a half hours of hell. Ethan wasn't worried at that point, figuring that it would take Foxy another thirty or so minutes to rush him.

Thirty seconds later, Ethan realized how wrong he was.

Foxy had quickly moved to the hallway, quickly rushing down and catching Ethan so off guard that he barely had the time to think before he slammed the door shut, purely from instinct. Ethan exhaled heavily, rubbing his face and sighing.

Chica came stomping down the hall as Ethan continued to reconsider his life choices. Ethan quickly shut the right door in her face, opening the left one to try and conserve what precious power he could.

'Christ, can't a man get a few seconds of self pity?' Ethan commented as he listened to Chica stomp off again.

A deep, slow, and long laugh echoed throughout the restaurant. Ethan nodded in acceptance. 'Guess that's a hard 'Go screw yourself.' Figures.' He scoffed. 'Typical.'

2:30

60% power

'Christ, you guys are not letting up.' Ethan's voice, laced with panic, surprised him. '60% power, multiple close calls, and now this BS.' Ethan stared at the monitor looking out into the main eating area, eyeballing a pair of glowing eyeballs.

Freddy. The main attraction himself.

The past two hours had mainly consisted of Ethan fending off Bonnie and Foxy, with Chica making the occasional pass at his right door. However, the onslaught of Bonnie and Foxy both had significantly drained his power, along with his routing and frequent camera cycles. This wasn't going to end well, Ethan knew.

However, Bonnie and the pirate fox had seemingly stopped for a few minutes, and Freddy made his debut. 'An interesting development.' Ethan commented to no-one, smirking and scoffing. 'Performers are some of the biggest drama kings ever.' Ethan knew for a fact that Freddy had been waiting until this very moment. He didn't know why he knew, but he did.

Freddy was an interesting opponent, Ethan quickly realized. Unlike the others, he stayed mostly hidden, shrouded in the shadows and hidden in corners. Quite similar to the way a wolf or a lion will stay concealed until it's right on top of its prey.

'Slippery bastard, aren't you?' Ethan commented as he tried to both track Freddy and conserve his power at the same time, plus fend off the still frequent but lessening attacks by Bonnie and Foxy.

This was shaping up to be a troublesome penultimate night for Ethan.

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Freddy was thoroughly impressed with the night guard's performance so far. Evading Bonnie and Foxy was a challenge enough, let alone back to back runs at the office. He was clearly made of different mettle than the others they had hunted once.

However, something was still nagging the bear's mind. There was something about this guard that felt…off, in a way. He wasn't scared of them, at least he didn't show it; rather, he seemed to prefer to make sarcastic comments toward them and make poetry.

Somewhere in Freddy's mind, despite his hatred for the guard and all the others he had killed, Freddy felt a feeling he hadn't felt in a long time.

Unsure. Freddy felt unsure about killing this one.

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3:00

45% power

There he was. Finally, Freddy had made his way into the right hall, barely visible at the very end of it. Ethan watched him through CCTV carefully. The teen swore. 'Damn, gotta save power.' He shut the laptop and grabbed the flashlight from the desk, poking his head out the right door and shining the light down the hallway.

Ethan was well aware this is what nearly got him killed the night before, but he was fairly confident that the events wouldn't replay like they had last night.

The light shot through the darkness like a bullet, but Freddy was only illuminated dimly. Still, his silhouette was mostly coherent and his eyes glowed faintly, like a far off lighthouse blanketed in a thick layer of fog.

Ethan smirked. 'Just gonna stand there and admire the goods, Freddy? I know I'm a looker, but I'm not that good looking.' Freddy didn't respond, glaring at the guard.

Ethan nodded. 'Fair enough, then. Take your time.' Shutting off the flashlight, Ethan ducked back into the office, landing in his chair and rolling over to the left door. Hitting the light, Ethan jumped up in fright and yelled.

Bonnie had snuck up on him. Reacting as quickly as he could, Ethan's hand shot for the door button at the same time Bonnie began to walk in. The door came slamming down.

Bonnie, however, had caught it. He had quite literally caught the bottom of the door and was keeping it from closing.

'Oh shit.'

Instinct caused Ethan to act faster than his brain could. The teen bolted for the other door as Bonnie struggled to pick up the heavy blast door. Even if Freddy was closer now than he was, he stood a better chance of surviving.

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Part 2 of Night 4 whenever I get it done. Leave a comment with your thoughts if you want to.