I Don't Own Fnaf
"So, he's moved on" Mike just nodded as he and Marionette stood around in the motel room that Mike had managed to find, he had explained most of it in the car here, but it seemed to only just be hitting the puppet now, as he seemed to think for a long moment before saying. "I- I'm glad he found peace, but..." The puppet trailed off, unsure of what to say, Mike filled in the gap, asking softly.
"But you wanted him to have still been there?" The animatronic simply nodded, before letting out a faint static sigh as he floated over to one of the beds, sitting down on it and just staring at the floor. Mike moved over quickly enough, sitting down next to the animatronic, before saying.
"We can still get that number from Gasper, find out where exactly and who exactly got BB. Maybe we can buy him back, get the gang back together fully at the warehouse"
"Why? There isn't much of a point to that" Mike just shrugged, unsure about the sudden almost callousness to the puppet's tone, a far cry from the naturally more optimistic way he spoke, but deciding to just ignore it for right now.
"Couldn't hurt either, you said seeing the others safe and together made you feel better right? Or at least gave you some closure, maybe this could help with that" Marionette just let out an uncomfortable chime, shaking his head.
"I- Maybe... I just... I don't know. I doubt that man would give the information to you anyways, not without trying to haggle for it" Mike could concede that.
"True, that's why I wasn't planning on asking him" That got the puppet to lift his head up to look at him, tilting his head in confusion as Mike went on to explain, maybe with a bit too much energy to his voice, "The place doesn't have any guards, I could be in and out in a few minutes, just have to find where his contact book is and find the number. Easy enough"
"That's illegal" The puppet unsurprisingly sounded unimpressed with Mike's plan.
"Yeah, well, I am a reformed criminal, might as well put my skills to good use. Plus I need to see just how he found out where we lived to drop that card off" Marionette lifted himself up a bit more, looking a bit more stern now.
"You could just ask him that tomorrow, no reason to make a big risk out of it, there's no point Mike" Mike frowned now, but quickly hid it, instead saying with an easy casualness.
"I doubt it's that much of a risk, the only one I have to look out for is Browboy, and the thing's stuck on the catwalk, I'll be fine, especially if it can't see my face" Marionette still looked less than impressed, but Mike honestly wanted, or at least felt the need, to do this. He knew Gasper was holding something back from him, he could just tell from the way the man spoke, and he needed to know what it was, and more importantly if this was going to have some kind of future impact on Foxy's.
Not to mention the fact that it was clear this was affecting Marionette a lot more than the puppet was willing to let him in on, and the idea of being able to do something for his friend was a pretty big motivator. He didn't like seeing just how affected and down the puppet was about all of this.
"I don't think it's a good idea Mike, you shouldn't do it" Mike... Paused for a moment, stopping before defending himself, instead sighing and said.
"Yeah... Yeah you're right... In that case we should probably just go to sleep, I'm tired from the drive and it's getting late. I'd like to get home early tomorrow. Where's your music box?" Marionette moved, just for a second, before pausing, turning to give an incredibly annoyed look at Mike.
"You could have waited a bit longer before trying to sneak out. No Mike" The man gave an apologetic look, realizing he really should have waited, but something about all this was making something move in his gut to do something and it was hard to ignore, though, then the puppet mentioned half awkwardly, "... Besides I think I left my music box at home" Now Mike was the one looking unimpressed.
"You sure you didn't just want to recreate our first night together, you know, me sleeping off my bad choices and you creepily watching me?" That finally got a proper laughing chime out of the animatronic.
"No! And I didn't watch you all night, I had other things on my mind you know. Like if I was really going to go home with some weirdo" Mike placed a hand over his heart, looking on with a blank face that got the puppet to break into another set of giggle-like chimes. "But it worked out, so I suppose he wasn't that weird"
"Thanks, really appreciate it, fine, then let's at least watch some tv, maybe my show's still on" Mike had a new thought, but he really did wonder about it, he's been trying his best to catch up and there was suppose to be a rerun tonight that he hadn't thought he'd catch.
"You mean that soap opera that you swear is incredible but is actually just dumb?" He just let out an offended gasp but didn't defend the point, he knew exactly how bad his shows were, they were corny and the writing was all over the place but all the same entertaining and they were an easy way to escape from what was happening around him. He needed that during some of the days he had in the last few years. As sad as it was to say, The Immortal and the Restless was something that helped him get through the days back then, because it was something daily he could look forward to.
He hadn't had a lot of that feeling until pretty recently.
The two quickly found themselves sitting on the edges of the beds, one on each, before Mike himself migrated up it to the headboard, some time passed, both just watched, but even if it wasn't a part of Mike's cooked up plan, he probably would have said what he was about to anyways.
"Want to move over here?" The puppet let out a confused chime, moving his head back to look at Mike, tilting his head as Mike explained with a shrug, "I'm not really used to watching stuff without you next to me anymore, it's kind of distracting actually" It honestly was, the fact this wasn't their normal couch as well didn't help, but the puppet didn't seem to think twice about it, easily moving up and towards the bed, clearly he was thinking something similar then.
Though, Mike had to admit, even if it this wasn't their couch, it was still much better like this.
Mike didn't really know if it would work, and he kind of felt bad about it, but not enough to stop, and sure enough, just like before, when Marionette had been tired and the two were close together, relaxed and calm, the puppet slowly began to lower himself down more and more, eventually his head half resting on Mike's shoulder as he just moved the puppet to be more comfortable.
And then... Mari stilled, unmoving, Mike stayed there for just a few more moments, wondering if the puppet would let him off the hook later with this discovery, as he watched the now sleeping puppet. He had been right it seemed, it was all about Mari being calm and relaxed enough to naturally slip into sleep instead of being a ball of nerves about it like he no doubt would have been every time he tried, alone in his room, in the past.
As it stood, he spent those minutes simply studying his friend, before slowly and carefully lowering him down into the bed, moving quickly to toss his jacket back on, lowering the volume on the tv, just a bit, and grabbing his keys before heading back out, back to the Bounce Palace.
He turned up soon enough, parking about half a mile down the road and walking the rest of the way. It gave him time to think, something he didn't really want to do, but reflected on anyway. Today had... It had been bad, the thing Marionette told him about the purple... That... That fucked him up, bad.
Looking down at his hands now, even in the darkness, he could easily imagine the pattern of splattered purple, the same color that leaked from his puppet's eyes, stained across his flesh. He had been able to remember and see such a sight on his hands for a long time now, just before now, the color hadn't been purple, it had been red. Perhaps that's the real reason that Mike was doing this, he didn't want to sleep, he didn't want to face his nightmares again, not tonight.
He wanted... He wanted to do something, something useful, something that would be able to do some good, he needed to, needed something to help continue balance his book, even if he now knew for fact that his sins would never truly be erased, something he had suspected already, but the confirmation of only hurt more than anything else. He truly wasn't redeemable, even his own damn soul stated that loud and clear for anyone capable to see, no matter what Mari or the others said. Mike was never one to willingly lie to himself.
Arriving at the Bounce Palace was simple, he took a moment to look around, but there weren't any cameras around, so he just moved straight to the front door, he already knew the thing wasn't alarmed, he knew what those looked like, as he pulled something out of his pocket. Lockpicks, he learned from his mistakes, and wasn't kidding back then when he said he wouldn't go anywhere without them.
It took less than a minute to get through the front doors, the warehouse that the business was located in had a skylight, letting more than enough light pour through that he didn't need a flashlight. Instead Mike just looked around for a moment, feeling the faint buzz of adrenaline begin to try and push through him. He was out of practice if this was what was getting him jittery.
Ignoring the feeling with a practiced ease, he moved to the left, ready to walk down the hall and quickly and quietly sneak in through to the back to root around in the office... And he did, nothing happened, he kept his head low and using the bouncy houses as cover from whatever animatronic monstrosity was up on the catwalk.
Once in the office, Mike quickly moved around to the desk, sitting down and quickly reaching forwards and looking over what was on the front... Nothing, right, ok then, drawers next. Mike easily went through the first few without a problem, looking through the files that were in them with a sharp eye as he skimmed over them, hoping to find something, but there was nothing.
Most of it was just records and other such things that he had no interest in, though it was clear that the place was struggling just as much as Mike thought it was judging by what he was seeing. He knew a thing or two about looking at business records at this point, as while Jeremy more or less handled all of it, Mike still liked to make sure he knew what he was doing and if he had to, Mike could do it himself, so he asked Jeremy to show him the basics.
As it stood, the place was barely handling themselves enough to keep their doors open, it wasn't really... a great sight, it made something in Mike's gut twist up a bit, not out of sympathy, he wasn't that good of a person, but out of seeing a business that could technically be competition struggling this much. It made him think about what would happen once the hype and newness of Foxy's wore off, what would happen to them? Would it be like this? A sad decline until bankrupting?
Because, realistically, what was the difference between the two? Between Mike and Gasper? Both had big ideas and managed to talk people into believing in them, using old Freddy's property to make something while not actually having the skills to keep the business they created afloat. Mike wasn't an idiot, but he knew he was missing a lot of skills needed to run a business, his education was literally as lacking as a high school drop out, so, really, what were the chances he'd be good enough to keep it going when others couldn't?
It was a spiral, Mike could recognize that, and he managed to at the very least focus his attention to the other side of the desk to start looking through those files, hoping that it would be enough of a distraction to keep his mind off of things.
Of course, that's when Mike's luck finally broke, as just as he moved to reach to pull open the drawer the sound of childlike laughter echoed from right underneath him.
It was out of instinct that had Mike kicking his feet out, slamming into the side of the desk to push him back on the wheels actually to the office chair he was sitting in. Getting to his feet just as quickly, Mike leaned down to peer under the desk, worried that some kid had been locked inside, it wouldn't surprise him that much, but instead of seeing a little girl, he saw a nightmare.
Ok, maybe Mike was being a bit harsh with the animatronics in this place, but they were just plain creepy to look at, and this one, that was peering up at him from underneath the desk was no different. Honestly, it was the one that looked the most like Balloon Boy, in fact, it looked the exact same as to what he had been told, just, in another color scheme. Blue and purple, staring up at him with massive eyes, before letting out another unsettling giggle... Right, well, that was worrying.
"I don't suppose you're alive? Now would be a good time to let me know" The thing just continued to stare at him, letting out another laughter, Mike just frowned, it sounded... off. Leaning down, Mike looked the thing over, staring straight into it's eyes before slowly moving back and forth, not much, but enough that a person would have to move their eyes to keep focus on him, but not enough for a motion detector to make it a big enough deal to follow his small movements.
The eyes didn't follow him... Ok, so not alive, just... weirdly programmed and set in a weird place. Mike probably accidentally activated the thing by bumping into it or something when he sat down.
"You're not going to lunge at me if I stay around here right?" It was hypothetical, now that he knew the thing wasn't alive he wasn't that worried, though he was mostly just berating himself for somehow not noticing the thing before now, instead he just left the... Balloon Girl? Alone, and instead just moved back to the drawer, looking it over, before finally finding a contacts book, flipping through it, the thing was thankfully organized by date, so he moved to the end of January, and looked it over before finding it.
The name next to it was labeled 'Collector?', so it was probably what he was looking for, the book wasn't all that filled up, there were a few calls that had been put in for party reservations, but that was it. Flipping back to the current month, after getting out his phone to add the number and name into his contact list for later use, and looked around for a moment, before finding where Mike had called earlier today, or yesterday given it was probably approaching or past midnight at this point...
That thought made Mike pause, the trained response from his time at Freddy's making his head turn to a nearby clock on the wall to stare at it.
12:04 AM
Mike felt something in his gut tense and clenched in faint horror as his eyes turned back to look down at Balloon Girl, who was still just staring in his general direction. She only activated after he had already been in the office for a while, hadn't she? She first laughed... about four minutes ago.
Oh... Well, shit. Mike glanced back at Balloon Girl and said casually.
"So, I should probably get the hell out of here huh?" She didn't answer, Mike took that as a good enough sign, as he quickly moved to leave the office only to freeze, as from outside of the doorway he heard the familiar sound of creaking heavy footsteps, not nearly as big as the animatronics that Mike was used to or not, metal feet had a distinct sound.
Deciding that the basic wooden door had nothing on the metal blast barriers he was used to, Mike quickly pushed the door open, and immediately cursed at the sight in front of him. Ballboy, of all things, was there, staring at him before a horribly creepy laugh that didn't fit his size echoed from his body, as suddenly Mike let out a yelp as the thing reared back an arm and with a pitch that would put a baseball pro to shame, threw a freaking skee-ball straight at Mike's head.
Mike just let out a shout of panic and dived out of the way just in time for the ball to impact with such force it put a hole straight from the office door as he turned and rushed down the back of the trampoline section, the sound of the ball hitting the door had reminded his mind way to much of a gunshot and it was forcing memories to pull up in the back of his mind that he could not afford to think about right now. The faint itch in his hand to reach for something not on his waist didn't help him here.
The animatronics' heavy footfalls moved up until Ballboy could see him down the thin tunnel Mike had just realized he had cornered himself as he turned back around just in time to see the animatronic rearing back ready for another fast ball special. Mike just let out a curse before turning to look at the wall next to him, it was just that material that the trampolines were made out of, if he had a moment he could probably unhook the springs attached to it and crawl through onto the bounce floor, as it was, he just didn't have the time, so instead he dropped down onto his knees before rolling onto his back, underneath the trampoline floor just as a skee-ball slammed into the ground right where he had just been laying.
There was a surprising amount of clearance underneath the trampolines, but that didn't change the fact that Mike was not a small man, his arms and legs were too big to be able to crawl on his hands and knees, so instead he had to reach out, grabbing onto the stilts that supported the individual sections of the trampolines, and used them to pull himself further into the crawl space underneath the trampoline flooring. The sounds of heavy feet could be heard from behind him, pacing back and forth from where Mike had vanished, but it wasn't following him...
Mike took a moment to take a deep breath, needing the second to get his head on straight to be able to think this through, the animatronics were a whole hell of a lot more hostile than he had been lead to believe that they would be, and that was... not great, it really wasn't great, and clearly he need to sit down with his brother and Foxy in the future to be able to actually accurately do the whole, eye reading thing, because his inability to do so nearly just got him killed because he didn't think anything of Balloon Girl. God, if he hadn't realized what the time was then he would be dead, Ballboy would have burst in and put a skee-ball through Mike's head.
As it stood, Mike should still be in trouble... but he wasn't... neither Ballboy nor the one from the office, Balloon Girl, had followed him, they saw where he had been, but weren't getting down to follow him, if anything it seemed almost as if Ballboy was trapped where he was, moving back and forth from where he last saw Mike but couldn't figure out what he was suppose to be doing next beyond waiting until he saw him again... Something was off here, but Mike didn't care to question it right now, instead moving forwards a bit more until he was at the very edge of the opening where one was normally supposed to get onto the trampoline floor, just, you know, underneath it.
Reaching up, Mike quickly began to slowly and carefully pull on the spring hooks that were latching the section of trampoline above him to the supports, not wanting to make too much noise to not attract anymore attention him even as his heart pounded in his ears, muting out the faint but honestly not really there fear that he knew a more normal person would be feeling right now.
Of course, those thoughts went right out the window and his heart practically joined it as the silence was broken at once with the sound of a crash, a crash that was scarily close to him. Mike nearly jumped out of his skin as his body flailed around to look in the direction of the sound only to pale at the sight of a set of massive plastic plated legs that had been slammed into one of the nearby trampoline sections, ripping the bouncy fabric to shreds under the shear weight of the thing, as Mike, from where he was watching, could only note that whatever animatronic that was, it was nowhere near as small as the other ones.
Then it stepped, moving and with it the next section, one that was even closer to Mike, ripping into pieces as well with just its bulk alone. Mike felt frozen in place, hoping that maybe it was just moving around, and would soon leave as his eyes stayed almost transfixed on the sight of the massive brown shoed feet in front of him. That hope died a swift death as in another massive step it ripped straight through one of the sections that was only a few feet away from Mike, and with it, the sound of a familiar laugh echoed from somewhere past him.
Mike craned his head painfully to look down at the sight of... Balloon Girl, laying on her stomach, staring up at him from where Ballboy had been, those creepy massive eyes staring right at him.
She was telling the animatronic above him where he was, that must have been how Ballboy knew to go to the office as well!
Quickly twisting and rolling his body to an angle, Mike started to fervently grab at the hand holds he could get to, pulling himself deeper and deeper into another direction of the trampoline flooring, uncaring of just where he was going as long as it was far away from whatever Freddy's reject it was that was above him trying to kill him. The sounds of harsh stomps filled his ears as the clearly clumsy robotic nightmare was having a bit of a struggle chasing after him, if not nearly as much of a struggle as Mike would appreciate at the moment.
Finally he was quickly reaching one of the ends, finding himself at the end of the flooring where it looked like it was boarded up to keep kids from doing the exact same things Mike was now, gritting his teeth, he looked back long enough to see how closely the robot was getting, before spinning around as much as he could, before rearing a foot back as much as possible, before slamming it forwards into the boards.
He didn't have much room to get a good momentum going, but it was enough to knock some of the nails out of place and loose, yet it wasn't enough, as he reared back again, kicking twice more before it finally knocked the boards off as Mike wiggled without much grace, legs first, out from underneath the secondary flooring. Rolling up onto his feet with a bit of a stumble, he looked around for a moment before hearing that laugh again before turning just in time to realize he needed to jumped, leaping to the side, onto the trampoline floor he was just under as a skee-ball shot past him in a near miss. Damn it, right, that confirmed it, Balloon Girl was definitely the one telling these things were he was as he watched as Ballboy finally move back around to the side of the bounce room as Mike glanced at him just for a second before turning to see the other animatronic, the one he hadn't had a good look at yet.
In all honesty, it looked more scary when it was above him, with its feet crashing down around his head, now that he was looking at it, it was easy to tell this was Browboy, given the thing had a massive black unibrow going over the top of it's massive oblong shaped head. Just like the others, it had striped clothes, though this time around it was black and dark purple, with it's staple spinning hat which was actually and slowly rotating as Mike stared at it, and it stared back, with dull glassy red eyes.
The main thing was, while the rest were kind of creepy with how small they were, this one, it was scary because of just the sheer size of it. Built like two of his brother standing side by side, the thing was as wide as it was tall, towering at around Mike's height, compared to the much shorter sized other animatronics around, and the fact that instead of small round hands like the hands on the others were, it looked more like massive painted tan metal sized beach balls were attached to the ends of the things long arms, clearly where most of the thing's weight came from, and no doubt a single good hit from that thing would be lethal.
So the question became did Mike want to die by firing squad of one, or be crushed by a robot with a unibrow. it really wasn't a choice, and Mike wasn't looking to find his answer, as instead he took a single breath, before doing something that just made him feel ridiculous. He ran along the trampoline floor, soon practically bouncing down the floor given he's weight and speed, it was a miracle he wasn't stumbling over himself over the horrible footing, as Mike moved, trying to go around, but being a bit too close to Browboy than he was comfortable with as he only barely managed to duck around and about from the practical canon fire being shot at him.
And then having to stop running, dropping to his knees to let a massive whooshing metal round hand swung right over his head as he yet his heart nearly pop in his chest, only to feel it then jump into his throat as his drop did nothing to stop his forward momentum, sending him spiraling out, bouncing roughly along the floor, his back nailing some of the padded supports that also covered the trampoline section hooks, which hurt like hell, but he quickly rolled onto his feet and then leaped half stumbling over himself off the bouncing hell floor as the sound of destruction from Browboy continued as Mike simply charged ahead, immediately going through the hall that was now on his right, heading into the break room, slamming the door close before rushing through to the other one, looking to get out as soon as possible through the small arcade room.
Of course just as he got into the room, closing the door behind him before rushing to the exit that would lead to the front room and his freedom, the sound of another voice spoke up.
"Uh-oh! How unfortunate. Uh-oh! How unfortunate. I know how much you like to fight, so I'll add a new problem to your night!" Spinning around while feeling like he was about to have a heart attack from the sudden voice, Mike just stared in mild horror as he watched as the blank and glassy green eyes of DD stared down at him, as her weird body twitched about like an almost dance as she continued to chant out her jingle of death.
Because just like that, any cover Mike had gotten from being out of the sight of Balloon Girl was removed from sound alone as in an instant the dark room was lit up as over a dozen arcade cabinets all turned on and blasted out their own cacophony of sounds and chimes, and jingles, the speakers on the things letting out a blaring loud static showing the things were being strained to made so much sound as Mike let out a short yell of pain as his hands cupped over his ears, the amount and sheer volume of it was deafening and disorientating, even without his eyes being suddenly assaulted with dozens of flashing bright and colorful lights after having been adjusted to the dark.
Stumbling back, he shook his head before turning to rush out of the door, his eyes dancing with spots of lights that he wasn't facing anymore, as he grabbed onto the handle before swinging the door open only to gasp out in panic as two massive hands shot out and slammed painfully into his sides as Browboy grabbed onto him. It felt like his sides were being crushed, but the fact his guts hadn't already been turned to mulch meant something else was happening as Mike, all two hundred pounds of him was easily lifted off the ground by the pressure to his sides as he let out a gasp of pain, his hands flailing to grab onto the hands, trying to find purchase on something, anything, but there wasn't anything, as soon the two were walking out of the room as Mike came to a horrifying realization.
Gasper had said there were five animatronics in the Bounce Palace... Mike had only seen four so far, and from the looks of things, he was being frog marched straight to the right hallway, where no doubt that the last animatronic was waiting for him. It made Mike struggle even harder, but for the first time in a long time, brute strength did nothing to help Mike, it was a terrifying feeling, one that genuinely gripped at his chest, unlike the fear response he had up until now mostly just being out of adrenaline than anything that was truly scary to Mike.
In a cruel way, it was that genuine fear that made him get air back in his lungs and made him feel like he could think clearly, even if it did nothing to help, it sure as hell made Mike fight even harder, but the second he had been trapped, he was stuck, Browboy was simply too strong, the only hope against him would have been using the fact the thing was bulky and slow to not get in this situation in the first place. It did nothing to help now.
But, just as Mike was beginning to work on a new plan, while in the back of his mind, lightly lamenting the fact that this was going to be the thing that killed him, his thoughts and frankly distracting amount of pain he was in, was broken by the sound of a familiar song.
Marionette was getting pretty good at realizing when his dreams moved from dreams to... whatever these were. It was tiresome, and he never woke up peacefully, at this point he was more sure it was something he was doing to himself more than anything at this point, it was just a pain that cropped up occasionally. Some kind of version of nightmares that came from a mix of his past and abilities if he had to make a guess.
No one ever showed up, occasionally he said a set of eyes in the darkness, but nothing much else, no one spoke, and as such he was mostly just moving around doing what he had been doing before he realized he was in a void. This time the dream was nice. He was sitting around in his home, Mike was off somewhere, he thought the man was with Goldie from what he remembered from what his mind had made up before he had become aware.
He was baking, it was relaxing, making little Halloween based foxy cupcakes for the pizzeria, he wasn't sure why, but it was nice, the mood was wrong though, he felt uncomfortable, like someone was watching him. It was something that tugged uncomfortably in the back of his mind, that something was wrong, that nothing here was right, that this wasn't the place he called home, and it wasn't safe, but he refused to indulge in those thoughts.
Instead he thought of other things, focusing solely on the baking, wondering about the people he worked with, his friends, if they liked pumpkin flavored things. He'd have to ask, honestly he didn't really remember what they tasted like, but he had the feeling he would have loved the seasonal treats. Making them with his dad and mom had always been his favorite part anyways...
Marionette froze, just for a second, his hands stalling from the mix he had been lightly stirring together.
His... dad and mom... He had no idea where the thought had come from, but it made the fake dream coils and cogs in his chest tighten, before quickly pushing the barest hints of memories away. He didn't need them, didn't want them, he moved on, there was nothing there for him, so there was no reason to look back to see what was there. As he went back to baking.
Marionette chose to ignore the way the orange batter was slowly changing color into a thick disgusting brown, he knew he was doing everything right, he knew it, he had done this dozens of times before, hundreds possibly, he knew how to bake... even if he didn't know when he learned to do so, didn't want to know, but that didn't matter.
Just like it didn't matter that the walls of his home, or more accurately the safe place that the kitchen had become for his thoughts, were slowly beginning to peel away, revealing a rotten foundation. He refused to look, he didn't need to look, he knew what eyes would be there when he did, even as he continued to work on a batch of sweets that were already past the point of ruin. he kept trying to ignore it, but the feeling of being watched grew more and more, until, finally with a faint distorted crack from his internal music box he said, pushing the now cracked and dirty bowl full of something more resembling mud away from the shattered counter top, the bowl crashing to the ground.
"W-What! What do you want from me!" His long thin things gripped tightly onto the sides of the counter, his entire body feeling like it was shaking, the internals of his machinery feeling hot and burning, even though he knew those thoughts were only in his head.
And that's when things changed, as from the darkness he knew was behind him, where those damn haunting eyes laid rest on his form, came a horrible, crackling and distorted voice, broken in such a way that making out any kind of voice from the words was nearly impossible.
"I wa-nt- yo-u to- s-e-e t-he tru-th"
The sound of the voice was horrible, and so surprising that Marionette felt his entire body jolt before-
With a gasp Marionette shot up, sitting straight up, as he felt his chest thrumming loudly as a distorted static filled the room for a moment before he was able to get control of himself, realizing just where he was, he looked around quickly to make sure he didn't accidently wake Mike up, not quite realizing just yet he had been asleep once more without his music box. And he wouldn't for a fair bit longer as he noticed the bed was empty, and in a quick second realizing the entire motel room was empty outside of himself... Mike was gone.
The last conversation they had before he had gone to sleep slowly played out through his mind.
He knew exactly where Mike was, and with all the chaotic feelings still rushing through his servos, it was too much, and he didn't think twice about flickering over straight to the parking lot of the place he knew Mike had gone, ready and willing to scold the hell out of the man, absolutely annoyed more than anything about the situation as he floated to the doors and then through them... Only to feel his figurative heart stop at the sight of Mike, being crushed and dragged off to who knows where by a massive abomination with the same visage of his old friend.
The annoyance and mild aggravation shifted quickly to a level of anger and protectiveness that had been long since dormant in the puppet. Before he knew what he was doing the tune of Pop Goes the Weasel was pouring out of his chest as he pounced.
This is a fairly short chapter all things considered compared to the general length of these act 2 chapters, which are ranging around seven thousand words, while act one was around five thousand. But, as thing are, if I kept going with this chapter until the conclusion at the very least of the fight, then... Well, it would probably be closer to nine thousand words give or take and then it would leave off at kind of an awkward place for next chapter that I'll have to fill in more stuff into and make it feel awkward with what I have planned, so I'mma end it here with the end of Mari coming in to try and save the day.
Doesn't mean this chapter isn't good on it's own, I like this one a far bit, it's a piece back into the action, Mike doing his thing but being wildly underprepared for literally everything that was happening to him. He had nothing on him, neither a taser or even his mask, so I think he did pretty well given how unprepared he was. Beyond that, as for just why he went back there when he honestly knew it was a bad idea, and Marionette asking him not to... Well, it's Mike, making impulsive decisions is just in his nature, I explained it a bit in the chapter, but really that's all it was. Mike's guilt complex and issues aren't gone, and they got reignited last chapter, it wasn't suppose to turn out the way it did, but that doesn't mean it wasn't a stupid decision. I think we can all agree what Mike did was a dumb ass move, but people make mistakes sometimes and in this business those mistakes can be costly. While for the animatronics... Eh, something's weird going on with them, wonder that could be?
And the return of our favorite puppet's nightmares! I bet there's nothing going on there either, it's all fine... until then, See ya!
