Mable: Enjoy!

Going Home in a Box

Chapter Seven

On the plus side, Marionette loved his little moon. He carried it around in a protective hold and coddled it like an old favorite. That was the only positive thing to come out of this.

Everyone was shocked at the news of the Pizzaplex. They realized right away that the four weren't exaggerating about what they saw either. There was too much they said with completely straight and totally shellshocked faces.

Once again, Foxy had taken it the worst. He didn't haywire again, but he did storm off into the back of the men's bathroom to start yelling every obscenity they he know. Like he thought the others wouldn't hear, which they all did. Eventually he came out and dragged himself to his stage to sit on the edge. Jeremy sat down with him while the others went through with cleaning the restaurant for closing.

"It's going to be okay. We'll figure something out," Jeremy assured, arm around Foxy's shoulders. "They charged me twelve dollars for a plush. Parents aren't going to be taking their kids there on a daily basis. Kids aren't going to be able to walk there from school and dump their allowance in the arcade. We'll be fine! We're just… Not going to be the hot spot we used to."

But for Foxy that was even worse. Logically he knew he should've been content with the idea of survival but being cast into the shadow of Freddy's made him want to tear through his own suit. Freddy's ended numerous childhoods, Freddy's tortured and ruined aware animatronics, Freddy's was a living nightmare and got away with all of it, and now here they were to play the role of the hero.

It made him so angry that he was twitching his leg, tapping his foot, and grinding his hook on the edge of the stage. Which Jeremy noticed and could feel the anger. He rubbed soothing circles in his back.

"They're not going to get away with this," he whispered to him. "They might be opening now, but people are going to remember and they're going to get angry."

"Only ones who get angry be us," Foxy muttered. "And there's nothing we can do."

Jeremy didn't say anything to that. He thought about it but didn't have anything else to contribute. Foxy huffed and slumped his head down into his hand with a look of defeat. He got a one-armed hug.

"Want to come home with me tonight?" Jeremy asked. Foxy shook his head. "…Are you sure? I don't think you should be alone…"

"I ain't gonna do nothin' stupid if that's what yer thinkin'," the pirate muttered. "I just want to wallow in me sadness without worryin' how I look."

"…When you say wallow in sadness-?"

"Take off me pirate coat, put on me depression hoodie, and gorge on whatever's left in the fridge… er in the garbage," he grumbled. "An' if I ain't feelin' dead enough, I'll put on some old Freddy movies an' wish I was."

Ah yes, the depression hoodie. The one article of real clothing Foxy owned other than his costume and was used exclusively for moping. Extra, extra-large so it was baggy and loose, and pitch black like his mood. A gift from Jeremy once when Foxy had joked about wearing a hoodie as an angsty teen. Neither realized he was promptly reverting back into said angsty teen anytime soon, but at least he had it.

Though Jeremy still frowned. "Please tell me you're at least pretending about that last part."

"…Yer right, I am. Because I sure ain't the person I be wanting dead," Foxy growled. That was a little livelier. At this point even anger sounded better than him being sad. Jeremy managed the slightest smile.

"I know, but… It could be worse. Don't forget that."

"Yar. It can always get worse."

"No, I didn't say that," Jeremy corrected flatly. He slid in closer to get a better hug while pushing up his glasses with his other hand. "It could always be worse. They're flashier and bigger than us, but they're a stage show. We're the local heroes. You're a local hero. We might not be raking in the dough, but we're right where we want to be. So, no matter what happens, it's going to be okay."

Foxy sat on that thought for a long moment before leaning in to press his head against Jeremy's. A motion that he welcomed and returned. Whatever was going to happen, they were going to get through it together.

…

Until someone decided to take it a step further.

…

The Pizzaplex was still some ways away from opening and there was still a plethora of features that had not been completed. Some attractions were going under last minute renovation, others were just getting tweaks to their system, many of the staff and security bots were not yet up and running, and the main band were still being fine-tuned as the big day steadily grew closer.

The key point though was those security bots. Having learned from the past, the common night guard had been replaced by a fleet of friendly faced robots that would roll around and alert if they spotted something out of the ordinary. Not that they would with the state-of-the-art security system that consisted of numerous security cameras, doors locked with both traditional keys and keycards, and hefty covers for the front entrance to keep everything out after hours.

This wasn't the only security measure though. The front doors, the back doors, the doors to the loading dock, the emergency exits and fire escapes, they were all locked up and sealed. Once the protocols were full in place, numerous doors separating the various attractions would be sealed shut as well. Only to be opened by their own combination of clearance, code, or ticket.

Once the Pizzaplex was open and these measures were put into place, it did it would be the safest, most secure amusement complex in the country. At least, that was the theory. After everything it took to reach this point, the only way Freddy's could survive was if it could avoid any bad publicity. Once those systems were in full effect, it would be foolproof.

Except for one thing. Those systems too were not yet in effect. Whether it was because so many workers had to stay late and come in early or just because of them still trying to implement said features, the security measures on the megaplex had yet to be activated. The doors were locked, and the entrance sealed, the shipping doors closed, the fire escape locked, but everything on the inside was left terribly under-protected.

This was the best possible time for someone to spontaneously decide to break in. Though in his defense, he probably would've found a way in regardless. He was just that determined.

That wasn't to say it was easy. It had been time consuming but not difficult to find a loose vent around back that could be pried open that was big enough to crawl through. In a few short minutes- after finding the vent- that first line of security had been breached and he was crawling into the compound, dragging a small backpack behind him.

Unfortunately for him, this would turn out to be the easy part. After a good fifteen minutes of vents, he found his way out into a storage room and snuck out through an unlocked door into an additional storage room, then found another door that led to a hallway that connected to two sturdy, locked doors and a third unlocked door that turned out to lead back to the first storage room.

He wasted an hour of precious, limited time just trying to find his way out of these crevices of tight space jammed up in the back corner of the Pizzaplex. It got to the point where he had to buck up and climb over some kind of barricade into a section of unfinished hallway, lined with drop clothes and leftover tools. By now he was completely lost and had no sense of bearings, so even if he did give up, he wasn't sure he was getting back out.

Eventually he made it into a small kitchen that looked like it belonged to a snack area, out into a cleaner hallway- one with carpeted floors and posters on the walls and walked himself up to a pair of double doors. He pushed them open and the true image of the Pizzaplex revealed itself to him as he was welcomed into the atrium.

It was nearly pitch dark save some running lights and a few neon signs. He still saw more than he wanted to. He remained dead silent as he trudged out across the carpet and towards the center of the enormous room.

One of the few things that was decently lit up was the main stage. Its running lights were some of the ones that were on, standing out as a partially illuminated pedestal in the darkness. Though again, not complete darkness. The place was too gaudy to ever truly be dark. Even now he could see clashing colors with frantic themes and when paired with the signs that would no doubt be fluorescent neon, it gave the image of something harsh on the eyes.

It also made him stand out as the thing that didn't belong. A figure in dark clothing, save for a dull, red mask that he wore to disguise his identity. In an act of intentional irony, the mask was a figment leftover from Freddy's distant past. The face of a character they no longer owned or could use. He doubted they would think that hard if they saw the footage, but to him it meant everything that he was here for.

He stepped up onto the stage and did a slow spin to look at the large atrium. Just seeing all of this hurt, but it wasn't going to much longer. He spun back around and reached into the child-sized backpack hung on one shoulder to pull out a can of yellow spray paint. He had black too, but this looked like it would show better on the stage. Shame that he hadn't found any red.

He painted bold, large letters across the bottom half of the massive stage with a clear message slowly being written out: "REMEMBER THE MISSING CHILDREN."

Once he was done and had admired his handiwork, he looked around at the massive building for another target. Just the act of committing the vandalization left him jittery and excited, reigniting a long-lost desire to break the rules and show up to authority. It was enthralling. The problem was that the atrium was simply too big for his work. The stage was an easy to see target, but just putting it anywhere wouldn't achieve the desired effect.

That was when he spotted the sign for Rockstar Row. He was looking at all of them- Golf, Arcade, El Chip's- for another sizeable target, but this one caught his attention. Because he was moderately sure he had heard Rockstar Row casually mentioned as being the hallway with the, for lack of a better term, animatronic enclosures. Feeling that defiance swell, he dropped off the stage and headed over.

After a few minutes of, again, walking through nearly pitch-dark hallways, one unfinished and another loaded with ads, he found himself in the Rockstar Row and the covered windows stretched out before him. Like earlier that day, the curtains were drawn, and maintenance posters were slapped on them. He walked to the end, looking at their entryways as he did and getting a good look at the competition.

Freddy himself was a gangly, freakish thing in comparison to the bear he remembered. It hurt just to look at him.

Roxanne Wolf looked suspiciously like a female Silver Fox, though not buffed up like he was and definitely not in captain attire. Probably both a Foxy and Silver Fox clone in one.

Monty looked like that frog thing from Magictime Theater. Thinking that was amusing enough that it was hard to feel intimidated by his cool factor.

Chica was looking pretty cute though. She kind of had a blend of Toy Chica and that Funtime Chica Charlie once talked about and drew a little drawing of. But even then, she still wasn't the real Chica. None of these were the real band.

So, he got out the spray paint and got to work. Writing in big bold letters across the glass as far as he could reach: "FAKE."

Then he moved on to Monty. He had just drawn the 'L' for 'Lame' when he realized that in and of itself was lame. He was trying to spread a real message; he didn't want to ruin his credibility with terminology they could just write him off with. So, he changed it at the last second, and spelled out: "LIES." Because the Pizzaplex was full of them.

He got to Roxanne Wolf and stared at the glass for a long second. Then decided just to write: "SELFISH."

The last one was the special one. He had been preparing for this moment and already knew what he wanted to write. Unfortunately, the yellow was getting low. He noticed it requiring a lot more shaking during the end of that last word and still coming out a little thin. He would have to switch to the black, which in hindsight felt pretty appropriate.

Then he spraypainted smaller letters until he spelled out a name. Then another one nearby. Then another, and another, and as many as he could remember and fit without overlapping in his area of reach. At least a dozen names, some with last names but many without. Names like Chris and Susie, names like Gabriel and Marion, names that people could look up and see connected with Freddy's, and then could remember them all.

Unlike with the others, when he stepped back and looked up at his work, he felt no thrill. It was as though he committed a sin writing those names without their consent. But they would've wanted it, he was sure. They wanted to be heard.

He turned and started back down Rockstar Row with his head aimed down.

There was a loud clank directly behind him.

He spun around instantly and saw that the door to Freddy's room had opened up, but nobody was standing inside the doorway. From this angle, it didn't look like there was anyone inside at all- though he was only seeing a partial corner of the room. Weirdly enough, the lights were on in there, and the room was decorated in a sharp red color scheme. Instead of looking like Freddy's old storage rooms, it was a proper dressing room.

Part of him wanted to slip in and do a little more damage, but he was wary of approach. That door hadn't opened for no reason and instead he found himself walking backwards towards the way he came in. He slipped through under the security door and only then removed his gaze from that general direction.

After an egregiously long amount of walking and an uncomfortable hike up a set of dead escalators, he arrived at the elevator to the lobby and rode down into it. It was slightly brighter in the lobby, but that wasn't doing any favors when he had to look at the massive gold-tone Freddy statue standing in the center. He purposefully looked away with it, groaning inwardly at how much paint he wasted in the other room when he could've used it to blot out Freddy.

But that wasn't important now. What was important was getting his message out there, and he chose the stretch of clean floor in front of the fountain to do it. Shaking the black spray paint can, he thought up exactly what he wanted to say, and then he slowly began to spell it out onto the floor one letter at a time.

"AFTON KILLED US ALL."

Blunt, jarring, self-explanatory to an extent, it was perfect. It wasn't everything he wanted to say, but it was something that would catch eyes and jolt readers into a sense of horror. It was about time someone pointed the blame, and he wasn't afraid to use his name. If anything, there was something empowering about spilling the truth. To drag Freddy's down to his level by revealing their dirty secrets.

That was, until he heard a noise. It was a squeaking, then a metallic swivel, something rolling closer, and he spun around towards the darkness beside the gift shop. He watched as a grey figure slowly wheeled itself out of the darkness.

It was a robot. In fact, it was the most basic and stereotypical robot he had ever seen. Something that looked like it shouldn't even really exist, like a cartoon bot brought out as a stage show character. Except it wasn't on a stage, it was wheeling itself over with some kind of square mop in its hand and began to wipe at the freshly sprayed paint. He was so stunned that it took him a second before he darted forward.

"Cut that out," he hissed, trying his hardest to keep his voice down. The bot didn't even acknowledge him and just continued smearing the letters into a black mess. He strode forward to block his work. "Stop it!"

The bot finally acknowledged him. It stared directly at him and then waved its hand as though trying to get him to move before rolling in again. Starting to edge on frustration and panic, he shoved it back. This turned out to by a mistake as it made some sort of weird alarm noise and began waving its arm like it was flagging something. That edge quickly devolved into actual panic as he ran forward and kneejerk shoved the cleaner bot.

It proceeded to fall backwards and land flat on its back, then began to release an even more obnoxious alarm noise as it tried to push itself up and, once failing, began waving its arms like it was flagging for someone. He knew this was about to get a lot worse and looked around for a way out, not knowing if this alarm was about to call the police or just drag a security guard down here.

He had to shut it up, and that's when he saw the fountain. Get it in the water, short circuit it, problem solved. The thing wasn't acting alive, so it wasn't hurting it, just shutting down a piece of very loud equipment. He grabbed it around the middle, trying to avoid the flailing arms, and started to drag it back towards the water.

When all of a sudden, he heard a bang followed by a stretch of rhythmic thumps. Like a door slamming open followed by rapid footsteps, except there was something very wrong with how heavy and fast they were. It was a dead giveaway immediately that it was not a human running through the outer lobby past the turnstiles. He dropped the cleaner bot and turned his head to look back.

It was Freddy Fazbear himself. Not the one that he remembered, but the one displayed in the golden colored statue behind him. Tall and bulky, with broad shoulders and long legs, and currently running directly at him.

He had never seen a Freddy run that fast and it was so jarring that it startled him. So, his first instinct was to run first and ask questions later. He caught sight of Freddy vaulting clean over the turnstiles before he turned around and made a mad dash back towards the stairs. He could hear those quick footsteps pounding right behind him. It was one of the fastest animatronics he had seen in a long time, but he was about to outrun it.

Or that was the plan before he had to sprint up two flights of stairs. Mercifully, the animatronic was also slowed by the ascent and it gave him enough breathing room to sprint over to and slide into the elevator. He slammed his fist on the button and pulled into the corner, keeping his head down and waiting for the doors to close. The Freddy came to a stop outside the door and made no attempt to reach for him or try to catch the doors.

The doors closed and the elevator began to lower. Now having a moment to think, he was hit by the full weight of what just happened and what he had seen. Freddy had been up and moving on its own volition. It was likely summoned there by the alarm the bot had let off, though that didn't explain why the Freddy was here and not in its room. Though it probably hadn't been in its room earlier or it would've come out when the door opened.

Just the sight of it sent a chill down his back. The tall, gangly, broad-shouldered Freddy was downright spooky in motion, and so fast that one trip-up would've been the end. He had to get out of here fast, and he adjusted his sleeves as the elevator came to a stop and opened its doors a few seconds later.

As soon as they did, he started to run and didn't stop. He ran down the escalators to the lower floor and across the stretch towards the double doors he had first come through. The room was deathly silent save his rapid footsteps and all at once there was a looming dread that he hadn't felt when he first came in. He could be heard very easily in this cavernous room. It had been so long since he actually felt hunted.

He burst through the doors and after only a second to get his bearings started to dash down the hall in what he thought was the direction of the storage room. He had barely made it a few feet before he began to hear something.

THUMP, THUMP, THUMP, THUMP, THUMP!

Heavy footsteps closed in quickly from a different direction and he was being chased again. He broke into an even more mad dash and was soon going at full speed, a speed where he could've lost the animatronic- if he knew where he was going. The moment he was back in that maze of hallways and storage rooms things started to blur together, and the instinctual flight reflex wasn't helping matters.

All it took was a single mistake. He realized the moment he made it too. He took a right, took a few steps, recognized it as a dead end from earlier, and immediately turned back and tried to run past. He knew the moment he did that that there was no chance, yet he still tried to slide under the clawed hand that reached out from the hallway. It missed his head only to grab ahold his hood and yank upright in an attempt to stop him.

It hoisted him into the air for only a second before he lost his grip and fell straight through the baggy fabric and onto the floor in a heap. He was exposed and he rolled over onto his back prepared to fight for his freedom

But upon seeing him, Freddy had come to an abrupt halt. He hadn't had a chance to really look it in the eyes until now with the glowing irises shining down like a spotlight. Its eyes were flicking over him and while the face didn't show much expression, the jerky motion of them scanning him showed something like confusion, or maybe shock. He looked down at the hand hold his hoodie and watched it slowly tighten, and he couldn't tell if it was reflexive or reaction.

The silence was almost deafening in that hallway. Even the squeaks Freddy once made were absent now that it was standing completely still. Something was keeping it from attacking him, he decided. Maybe because it could see what he really was and didn't understand how to process it.

That was when it took a turn that he wasn't expecting and in one moment everything changed in a way he could've never anticipated.

"Are you… Foxy?"

It spoke. Freddy had spoken, was capable of intelligent speech, and recognized what he was even without his proper head on display. Freddy Fazbear was alive…

…and he had caught Foxy red-handed.

Though that was the least of his problems right now, because as bad as it was to know that he was fully on display- with his disguise quite literally wrenched away from him- it was nothing compared to the dread that came with this revelation.

Someone had already died.

But he was quickly snapped out of that thought and back into intense focus the moment Freddy slightly moved forward. Foxy began to edge back across the floor, his hook raised threateningly in an attempt to ward him off. That didn't detour Freddy who was slowly lowering into a crouch, still watching him closely, as though carefully approaching a feral animal. Which Foxy definitely felt like cornered like this.

Freddy started to lift his opposite hand and that was when Foxy realized he was about to reach for him. That was what triggered those fight or flight reflexes to kick in again. Foxy swiped at the hand, missing it completely but getting Freddy to yank it back before rolling over onto his hands and knees and was up in a mad dash in only a matter of seconds, sprinting down the hallway at full speed.

"Wait! Please do not run away!" Freddy called after him.

His baritone voice only barely resembled the original's which Foxy was familiar with. Rumbly and echoing down the hall around him, and it wasn't too long before that thumping joined in. Freddy was running after him again, though now there was a different kind of fear driving him to run.

Foxy ducked into the first open doorway he saw and into a tight space between two shelves, crouching down and hoping to lose Freddy long enough to figure out where he was going. He had a new problem too. While he was still wearing the sweatpants and garbage bag wrappings around his lower legs, without his hoodie his torso and endoskeleton head were exposed, and the flimsy mask did little to hide it.

It didn't help that he could hear Freddy still stomping around outside the door. It was only made significantly worse when the bear began to call for him.

"I am not going to hurt you! I can help you. Please do not hide from me," Freddy called for him. His speech pattern was stiff, but his tone was emoting significantly more than his features had. There was no denying that he was awake and alert. He sounded concerned, but Foxy couldn't trust it. He wasn't putting himself at the mercy of his own competitor.

That thought left a much more bitter taste in his mouth than he expected. Probably because he wasn't supposed to be alive. That was the whole reason he was trying to sabotage Freddy's, because it was a vile corporate entity that was going to destroy his business. Now there was at least one living animatronic complicating that. He didn't even want to think about what he was going to do if there were more.

Freddy walked into the storage room and looked around before continuing down past the shelves in the opposite direction of Foxy. He was still clutching the hoodie as he searched the room for the other animatronic. Foxy considered making a run for the door at that point, but it was left home and he was behind it, meaning he would be stopped midway through his escape. Eventually he decided the best option was to keep his head down.

It turned out to be the right plan as after only a minute or less Freddy returned. Now he was emoting. His ears were tilted forward and down, and his eyes were lidded with sadness, accompanied by a mock sigh as he came back towards the door. His eyes slid across the shelves in Foxy's direction, and he dropped down to try and hide from it.

The beam fell right over him, with only a few boxes and the shelves saving him from being spotted. Though he did notice that light stay on him a little longer than needed. He stayed completely still.

Then Freddy finally stepped out of the room. Foxy could hear him do something with the doorknob before his heavy footsteps headed down the hall the way they came. He waited for about thirty seconds and listened, noticing that it didn't seem like the bear had gone far but it did sound like he was further down the hall. He began to carefully slide out of his hiding spot, taking careful little steps.

He gently edged the door closed, listening to the dullest squeak and wincing, waiting, and after not hearing the familiar thump, thump, thump slid past the door to leave.

Only to regret it the second he spotted his hoodie hanging on the doorknob. A dead giveaway that Freddy knew he was in here and was baiting him. He almost rushed back to his hiding spot, but he was tight on time and couldn't afford to get himself cornered by the bear again. He carefully pulled it off with his hook and then began to pull it on. His elbow lightly bumped the shelf, he froze instantly, and when there was no reaction, he continued putting it on.

Then he finally stepped out of the door and looked down the hall after where the bear had gone. There was a corner not too far down, about exactly where he heard the footsteps stop. Paranoia seized him as he realized Freddy could be standing right around the corner waiting for any signal to sprint out of his hiding spot and after him. He wasn't about to go hide again, and he didn't want to keep running like a coward. So, he did the best thing he could think of.

He began to slowly creep down the hallway. Keeping his head back to look at that corner, Foxy took gentle steps forward and started to inch away from the door. He was sort of impressed with how quiet he was.

Until Freddy's head suddenly poked out around the corner. Both froze on the spot as their eyes locked in another staring contest. From this reaction and how Freddy was peeking out, it was obvious that he hadn't planned on getting caught.

"Oh, uhm… Excuse me," Freddy said. Then he slowly pulled back behind the corner and was gone. Well, not GONE. Just standing around the corner again.

This bear was going to be the death of him. After he got him caught and ran him out of business.

Though less on edge, Foxy managed to reign himself in enough to regain some self-control. Freddy was, at least, not aggressive, and Foxy didn't want to continue slinking around like he was afraid of him. So, he straightened up his posture, puffy out his chest- in a sense, and held his head high as he walked backwards down the hall without removing his eyes from that corner.

Eventually he backed himself into the right storage room and right into the corner of a shelf, which he grumbled about and finally turned around. There was the vent left wide open for his escape. He ran over and scrambled into it, clawing at the bottom, and dragging himself inside, about to make a clean get away when-

He suddenly realized that he was missing his backpack. His backpack with the spray cans in it and his own face on it, taken straight out of his own merchandise, and now probably sitting between his graffiti and the robot he knocked over.

"Bloody 'ell. Don't even remember takin' off the blasted thing," Foxy muttered. No point in not sliding back into character as he squirmed back and out of the vent. He was about to climb out when he noticed a peculiar amount of light on him, and he knew exactly where it was coming from. That bear was standing somewhere behind him, staring right as his backend. He instantly crawled back in. "Forget it. Ain't goin' back. Nobody's gonna figure it out."

Children disappeared hand over fist at Freddy Fazbear's Pizza and nobody ever connected it back to them. What was the likelihood that a Foxy's logo backpack was going to be linked back to the cove?... Honestly, probably rather high, but his disguise was passable enough that it wouldn't be linked to anyone in particular, and there weren't any cameras in the hall where his hood was wrenched out.

This was a bad, bad idea and yet Foxy continued crawling ahead. He felt like he was in quicksand and getting closer to being suffocated. Like he was buried in sand with only his head sticking out, staring up at a sky about to spill forth a torrential downpour. Though to be fair, he had been feeling that one since news of Freddy's opening was spread.

He was just turning the first corner when he heard a clatter from behind and looked back suddenly. Freddy was standing there, as expected, with his hands resting on the edge of the open vent as he stared inside. He opened his mouth like he was preparing to say something, looking down like he was searching for words, but he didn't get enough time. Foxy was getting twitchy and paranoid, and he continued to crawl onwards.

Freddy didn't follow him, much to his surprise, and didn't try to stop him. Maybe he wasn't aware of how far he was going, instead thinking he was hiding somewhere in the building when, in actuality, Foxy was going much further. After crawling back the way he came, he got as far from the pizzeria as fast as he could.

It wasn't until he was walking beside the highway that he started to think about it. He was worn from the trip here and everything that went on inside, so he was forced to keep a steady, slower pace as to not burn himself out before he got back to the pizzeria. This left him with more time to think than he wanted.

And most of that time was spent wondering if he had made a horrible mistake.

The other was about that strange living Freddy Fazbear whose lines he kept running through his mind. It was all so bizarre. It was one thing to lash out at the conglomerate whole of Fazbear Entertainment, but to try and derail the livelihood of another living animatronic? It felt weird. He liked to think that he had the backs of those like him- except the ones that tried to kill him.

Did he actually feel bad about what he did? Not for the business' sake, no bloody way, but for that strange, wide-eyed bear? Maybe, he reluctantly decided. Maybe he did.

But at the end of the day, survival came first.

…

It was a while before he got back to the pizzeria.

By then he was starting to feel the effects of so much prolonged walking. Though not human, his body could not go on forever, and the soreness in his joints was a sign of that. Maybe he was just starting to get a little rusty too. Or maybe he could've paced himself a little better. At least he got off the road long before sunrise, which meant nobody saw the suspicious man in the dark clothes and weird mask hiking down the hallway.

And if they did, they would probably just blame it on the Hurricane Clown. God bless Ennard for being such a menace.

He discarded the trash bags in the kitchen trash and hid the hoodie and sweats in the nook underneath his stage, then slipped his head back on and was back to being Foxy. Though he still felt amped up, twitchy, exhausted, and yet having to pace to work off the nerves leftover from his close encounter. He eventually made a silent, solemn swear that this was it, that he was never doing something like that again, crossing his hook over his heart like it meant something.

Which it didn't. He had the creeping realization right then that he wasn't really in control of himself. He went over there and did something stupid on a whim and saw something he couldn't take back.

It was only a matter of time before he took it too far again. He wondered if Freddy would be waiting for him when did.