Epilogue? More like epic-louge am I right? I am going this in the morning but I ams ne;ed .sleep It's like midnight nad I'm watching markiiplier rn and I am very tired lmaoaioaoaoao so onto the reviews

Penguimom: Haha funni Simpsons reference. Also turtles are very turtle tbh, good choice.

Qxr: Yeah I'm doing Fnaf 4! It'll definitely be different from canon lol, but that's what's going to be fun, it'll be unpredictable. I'm very excited to write it!

Enjoy!

Chapter 83

Act 2 Epilogue

Ruby awoke with a very urgent need to cough.

Which was rather unfortunate, since four-year-olds did not take lightly to being woken up by their noisy older sister in the room beside them who now had a chronic cough, apparently. So instead, she reached for the mug beside her and took a long swig of it, hoping it would push the urge down so far it would practically cease to exist. Honestly, she could relate to Rylie. It wasn't a very nice feeling to be woken up from a lovely dream with loud, hacking coughs.

Not like she'd been having lovely dreams, anyways. Ever since the fire four days ago, she hadn't been sleeping well, plagued with nightmares of Springtrap's screams, the licking flames, and the barbeque-like burning-flesh smell of her second degree burns all up her right arm.

When the fire department had been called, they rushed up to the burning building and while spraying it down with a hose, discovered Ruby's crumpled body lying on the lawn in front of it. They'd gone through her backpack and found her bus pass, calling her parents and then, after seeing her wounds, the hospital. She had woken up at 6:34 with a cool gel soothing her gauze-wrapped burns and a plastic face mask over her nose and mouth pushing oxygen into her body.

A blonde nurse drained blood from the middle of her arm shortly after, and gave her a sticker with a chick on it, which made her think of Chica, and then she cried in front of her mom and Jared and Rylie and the nurse, which was awfully embarrassing - but hopefully they didn't remember it.

Then, a stone-faced doctor in indigo scrubs had pulled out a clipboard and explained to Ruby and her tearful mother that Ruby had inhaled quite a lot of smoke, and while it was possible that in time, her lungs would heal, she'd probably have a cough the rest of her life. She'd have light scarring across her arm and, after an X-ray, very faint on her lungs. He prescribed a saline nasal spray, lots of water to flush her system, and vitamin C pills.

He'd called her lucky that she had gotten out of there. According to the police after investigating the ruined building (faulty wiring and gas leaks, apparently) a few more minutes in there and the whole roof would have crushed her flat. Not to mention the more severe damages to her lungs.

Ruby stayed at the hospital the rest of the day to make sure there weren't any problems or allergic reactions to the medicine. She didn't mind much, she got to drink lots of 'detoxifying' ginger tea and play Subway Surfers. Ruby just wished it had been a school day instead of the first day of summer break.

And while at first her mother had been adamant on not letting her go on the summer trip with Ducky and her friends, the doctors actually said that the ocean breeze and cool water would be good for Ruby's lungs, and the healing process, and blah blah blah. All she and her mother heard was 'Ruby beach good', and apparently that was enough for her mother to start helping pack her suitcases for the long haul.

Once she'd gotten back, she had checked her phone to hundreds of worried texts and missed calls from her friends, to which she called and explained the whole story, beginning to end.

But even after the days that followed, after thousands of empty tea mugs on her dresser and thyme steam baths with uncomfortable nasal spray twice a day, and even a five hour Zoom call with her old therapist who her mother had insisted on her seeing, Ruby still felt like something was missing. But this time, she knew what it was.

It was Springtrap.

It felt like she should feel relieved, like a weight was lifted off her shoulders, but she wasn't, and it didn't. Something about it just didn't feel right, didn't feel over. Maybe it was because of last year, after a big fight she'd thought her friends had passed on and Springtrap was dead, but that wasn't the case then, so why now?

There was only one solution to her problem, and so what if it was an illegal solution? At least it was a solution.

rubyred: hey, is anyone on?

heyyyjoshuaaa: yeah, I am.

heyyyjoshuaaa: it's 4:20, why are you still up?

rubyred: ditto

heyyyjoshuaaa: doing a project that I didn't finish, I've got to email it to my teacher because it's worth 20% of my grade

heyyyjoshuaaa: plus packing for tomorrow

rubyred: omg yeah I'm so excited

heyyyjoshuaaa: same

heyyyjoshuaaa: not to sound rude but what do you want?

rubyred: …how good are you at sneaking out with a car to my place for some partially illegal activity

heyyyjoshuaaa: be there in twenty

~lll~

"So basically you made me steal my parents' car, pick you up at your place, and drive across town to go dumpster diving?!"

"Not dumpster diving." Ruby rolled her eyes at her friend, sticking her foot on top of the fence and hoisting herself up, jumping off the top and landing squarely on all fours. "I wanted to check what was left. Of you-know-who."

"Gotcha." Josh shoved his feet into the diamond-shaped twisted metal of the fence, gripping them with his fingerless-gloved hands and pulling himself up. "I just don't get why it had to be me."

"One, I can't drive, and two, you were online. Simple as that." Ruby adjusted her black beanie, which she'd worn for the sole purpose of getting into that criminal activity mindset.

Josh landed with a slight stumble beside her, pulling his phone out of his pocket and shaking the flashlight feature on. The two walked down the yellowed and dried-up grass, which had managed to die in the span of four scorching heat-wave days. It wasn't long before they reached the pile of black metal and charred wood, nothing more than ash and a bunch of yellow Caution! tape that Ruby planned to ignore.

"Alright, where are we looking first?" Josh asked, turning to Ruby.

She squinted, scanning the white-lit wreckage. "Give me a sec." One of her many talents was excellent spatial recognition. She'd always been good at things like 3d models and movement, and had a keen eye for memorizing the room layout in a building. She stuck her thumb and forefinger out, tracing the structure till she found the spot. "There. That was his room."

The two bent under the construction tape, making their way gingerly across fallen planks and beams of metal over to the invisible lines of Springtrap's room.

"Start pulling off planks. We're looking for his body, it might be charred, but you'll know when you see it." Ruby instructed, heaving a particularly large plank over to the side.

Josh wrinkled his nose, adjusting the beam of light so Ruby could see what she was doing. "Has anyone told you that you'd make a good mortician?"

"Ha-ha-ha." Ruby lifted what looked like a spinny chair from the mix, huffing as she threw it over her shoulder. Luckily, the doctors said that her cough wouldn't be brought on by physical activity, so she was free to play sports and lift chairs all she wanted.

There! A gray chunk of concrete, same material as the roof! This must be it.

"Help me lift this," Ruby instructed Josh, digging her short fingernails under the concrete and spreading her legs wide, straining to lift it up. Josh set his phone down in-between two rocks so it shone the beam on the two.

"In case you couldn't tell, I'm not exactly *urg* made for lifting weights." Josh muttered, biceps burning with strain.

Ruby let go suddenly, dusting her stinging hands off and rubbing them together. "Okay, new plan. How about we just try and shift it to the side, instead of lifting it up?"

"Yeah, I like that idea better." Josh puffed, taking a few deep breaths before assisting Ruby in pushing the rock to the side.

And just as Ruby was about to give up, underneath the gigantic chunk of roof she spotted none other than a black-tinged green finger, the fingertip worn off and revealing one tarnished metal claw. She frowned, prodding it a few times with her own finger, then nodded. "Yeah, that's him. He's gone." Relief washed over her like a waterfall, and she stepped back from the hands.

"Okay, now can we go? Unless you want to perform an autopsy or something?" Josh asked, wrinkling his nose as he bent over to grab his phone.

Ruby rolled her eyes, giving him a shove. "No, no, it's fine. Come on, we're leaving tomorrow at six, so we should try and go to bed."

"Says the girl who got me to drive her out here at four."

"Oh, shut up."

And as the two walked away, shining the flashlight down the sidewalk and planning what they'd do at the cabin, the chunk of concrete covering the arm shifted and slid down a log. And instead of revealing the twisted corpse underneath, it simply exposed a single charred arm to the cold summer night air.

A/N

Woo woo epic slay epilepsy I mean epilogue I am very tired I need to sleepp cool Springtrap is still alive who could have guessed not me I would never predict that hahahaha

Morning me here! And with epic news! Me and the slay mixsii are making an official wiki page for this fic, with trivia, timelines, and fun facts, so stay tuned!

Anyways! Q and A! Rules!

You may ask up to 4 questions to either the characters or me

For the past and present aftons, if you wanted to ask something to William or Springtrap, Springtrap=Present, William=Past. Same with Mari/Charlie, and the three kids plus Clara and Henry are all past.

Deadline is August 8th, so get them in fast! If you miss it by a day or two, don't worry I can edit you in.

That's it! Have fun! I'm going to sleep till noon!

~Ghost