I Don't Own Fnaf

"So... Christmas, we're going to do something for that right?" Mike had asked it during closing when everyone was close enough to be able to hear him, it was something he honestly should have asked a while ago, and they all had sort of talked about it, but it hadn't been something that they had talked about in much actual detail, and at this point it was getting a bit too close to to be comfortable with, with how much they probably should have done already. Thankfully, his voice seemed to gather everyone's attention, as Foxy was the first to pipe up, saying proudly and a bit excitedly as well.

"I want a Santa hat!" Mike just nodded, yeah, that was expected, as Evan just huffed in amusement at that, giving the fox a look who just stared right back before pointing at the bear, saying simply, "Goldie can get some antlers" Mike cracked a grin at the very displeased sound that his brother made at that in return, while Mari floated over, a delighted chime coming from him as he said quickly to the bear's rescue.

"That might be more fitting for me, I'm the one who flies around the pizzeria" Evan shot the puppet a small but thankful look, though it was clear Foxy wasn't done, as he just turned and gave the bear a long look over before asking casually.

"Eh, true... What then for you?"

"How about nothing?"

"Not happening"

"Of course not" Evan sounded more resigned than annoyed, so Mike just let that rest, though he did continue to smile just a small bit at the excited little woo sound the fox made, his hands shooting into the air, as he said excitedly.

"I'm sure we can find something!" Mike added his own two cents in at this point.

"So, Santa Foxy, and Reindeer Mari, how do you feel about being Miss Claus?" The look he got in response was answer enough, even if it did make the others crack a few laughs out as Jeremy moved over, joining the conversation as he said.

"What about Charlie Brown? That Christmas special is a classic, and all we'd really need to do is put a black line over your chest fur, a large enough red jacket, and get you that hat he wears" That seemed to get the bear to think about that before just shrugging.

"As long as no one tries to make me kick a football" Foxy gave the bear a pat on the back before turning to look at Mike and Jeremy both, saying as he leaned in with a squint to his one visible eye.

"What about you two?" Mike and Jeremy shared a look, before Mike just shrugged, saying casually.

"Elves I guess? We are the help technically, if Santa Foxy over here is suppose to be the ship captain if we're keeping the pirate metaphor going"

"I think you're a bit too tall to be an elf" Mike just shot right back to Jeremy.

"And yet you're just the right size" The two looked at each other for a moment before both letting out respective laughs over how ridiculous that was, as Mike just shrugged.

"I mean, we don't have to do anything crazy, suit Foxy up with a proper santa fox outfit and we can just have normal hats on for the holidays, no reason to go to crazy when we already have the Cove to spice up" It was around then that Fritz wandered over, saying as he jumped into the conversation.

"We can get a few of those small Christmas trees and pepper them around, and get some red and green streamers" Mike nodded, saying to the others as well.

"I can also do some little depictions I guess to put over the windows, you know, you three in the snow or whatever, cut out some big snowflakes out of paper as well and hang them from the hooks we got in place from Halloween" Mari quickly added in, seemingly just thinking of something himself as he said excitedly.

"Oh! We could do a little gingerbread house competition as well for the kids! Like, one every hour or so, and if we put a rush on it, we could probably get some Christmas Merch for the Prize Corner and the winners can get a free santa foxy!" That was a pretty good idea, as Mike nodded along, before saying.

"We'd probably have to hold it in the Prize Corner, not a lot of room out here unless we want to move some arcades out again like we did last time"

"No problem, I can keep a look over them all from my corner and it'd be nice to have a little thing just for my area with the prizes. I could probably make a few little Christmas treats as well!" Mike nodded along, making a note in the back of his mind to design said merch that night with Mari's help to be able to get that rush order in with Merch Girl, the woman that the Cove used as a point of contact when it came to their costume orders. Jeremy and Mari usually handled the orders and it had been a while since Mike really designed anything, they hadn't thought about it for Halloween, but the designs were kind of his thing so he could make the call.

"That'd be cool... When are we going to do this though? I mean, Christmas is in two weeks, but I don't think we're going to be open on the day itself" ...Oh, right, Mike hadn't talked to the others about that. Right.

"Oh, I already had a thought about that. We're going to be closed the day before till New Years" Everyone seemed a bit surprised at that, but honestly, they had been doing surprisingly well income wise recently with fall break and the Halloween events, they were setting almost comfortably in the green for the first time in months, and frankly they hadn't actually had a break from work since they started on the Cove in the first place, well, Mike had, but he didn't really consider that as a break because he was getting over being viciously murdered in a secret basement at the time.

"And we were going to have that talk when?" Mike just shrugged at the questioning tone from Fritz, as he said back unapologetically.

"Probably around the same time it came up... So now it would seem"

"Is that a good idea? I mean, that's a few days closed"

"I think we'll be fine, plus I think we all need a break, I know I'm already planning on fleeing the town for a few days with Mari, and I'm the boss so I get to decide when I get my vacations, figured it was only fair everyone else got one as well" Everyone was just staring at Mike, and he wondered for a moment if they really had forgotten he was technically in charge of this whole operation. It didn't come up much, but... well, it was still technically true even if he felt like he really didn't do enough for that title. The one who spoke up first was his brother, saying dryly.

"Oh, how magnanimous of you" That seemed to break the mood, getting a few laughs, as they moved on quickly, as Fritz said.

"Then I guess we should do something for the week up to the twenty-third? Open the place up on that Monday and Tuesday as well so we get the most out of it if we're going to have a week-long break right after" Everyone agreed to that, but it also meant they really were pushing it way closer than they should have. He couldn't blame everyone else, the last few weeks, honestly most of November had been the most uneventful month he was sure any of them had in ages, he could hardly blame anymore that they all just took it in stride to relax for once with their normal routine for the most part.

That was exactly why it took so long for Mike himself to bring it up, still, they had managed before with Halloween, and it was already clear that this one wouldn't be as intensive as they had gone for that holiday, still it should be more than enough for a nice boost in revenue which would be a very nice thing to have before he and Mari left the town for a few days.

The talks continued for a while, not much really happened from it, just a few more plans being set up, shopping to do, things like that, before long they were all splitting up for the night with plans on what to do when they had the time in the next few days, it would be a bit rushed, but Mike was pretty confident that they could handle it.

Mike was unsure just what exactly caused this situation to come about, but in the end, here he was, sitting in his living room in the evening, with Charlie and Evan present as guests, both sitting in the two chairs that the living room had besides the couch that was occupied naturally by himself and Mari. The two somehow managed to pick the two chairs that were the least compatible with their bodies, Evan was sitting in the short arm chair, which was very nearly to small for his bulk, and Charlie was sitting in the old recliner that was built for someone much bigger, meaning she looked like she was taking negative space up. It was almost amusing as the two were clearly just a bit too awkward to acknowledge taking the wrong seats and switching them out after spending the first few minutes not noticing in time to point it out and correct the situation.

Mari didn't seem to overly notice or care about that, instead he was adamantly talking to the two about... something, Mike wasn't really paying attention to whatever it was to be honest, but he was pretty sure it was Mari catching Charlie up with the trip they were going to take in the next few weeks, but he wasn't certain. Don't get him wrong, he loved hearing the puppet talk, Mike could be wrapped up in the most boring of baking tips as long as it was Mari's voice they were being told in, it was just he was focused on other things at the moment.

That something being sketching out some designs, a lot of work went into making merch, he had been incredibly surprised the first time around with how much work went into making them, from dimensions to materials, there was a ton more to it than just making a cute little foxy plush and then sending it to the factory to be mass produced. Admittedly at first the company they ordered merch to be produced from had picked up that slack at first, but Mike had always been hands on and had learned the best he could to be as involved in the process as possible, even if it meant a bit more work.

The main thing was he was pretty decent at drawing, he was pretty creative if he liked to be generous to himself, but admittedly, the Cove's branding thing wasn't really the strongest of Mike's talents. Honestly, Foxy was the main one who kept up with the fact that the Cove was very loosely supposed to be pirate themed. Mike himself... kind of forgot occasionally, and right now he was wondering just how he was supposed to combine pirates with Christmas... or if he was supposed to do that at all really. The main thing was the hook hand, did Santa Foxy, as he had mentally dubbed this plush variant, need a hook because he wasn't 'Pirate Foxy'... Right?

Branding was hard, this was much more Jeremy's thing, and he could probably just ask Foxy himself, but neither were here right now and he didn't feel like getting up to get his phone, nor did he have time to really wait on the next day to get answers from the others. Hence his lack of focus on the conversation, thankfully though he still had an option, as he tuned back in enough to see that Evan and Charlie were talking now, kind of awkwardly, but both seemed to be trying and it was nice, made his slow beating heart warm a bit and all that, but it also meant Mari was free from his own ranting and as such could give him his opinion.

He didn't really think much of it, he didn't want to interrupt the other two's talk, so he didn't say anything, just leaning back a bit from where he was leaning against the arm rest to have a stable thing to sketch against to outstretch a hand that casually wrapped around Mari's body to the other side to his shoulder, as Mike just lightly pulled the puppet closer, who just let out a short surprised chime before simply following the movement until the two were much closer, as Mike pointed down at the few different designs of the same plush, before lightly marking out a question mark to ask what the puppet thought.

Mari quickly leaned in even more, crossing what for most would have been personal space, half leaning over Mike practically to get a better look at the page before all but taking it from Mike's hands as the man just smiled a bit as the puppet let out a happy little sound, as he pointed at a few of the designs in question with excitement to his movements that told all Mike needed to know, as he just circled the ones in question to make something out of them... before turning the page over and smirked a bit to himself at the slightly to loud chime from the puppet at the sight of the designs on this one.

It was Mari, or well, marionette plushies, also in the Christmas theme, a few rough sketches of the plushies they already had for the puppet but with cute little antlers that looked a bit like wires to keep to the puppet theme, while the other, instead of being black and white like most of Mike's design concepts, this one had to have color involved to really tell the point of it. In this case, it was like the normal ones, just... with a bit of a color scheme change.

The black remained, but the white stripes had been swapped out with swapping green and red, and while the foxy concept arts had Santa hats and even small little Santa outfits, the marionette ones had scarfs wrapped around their necks in a whole array of Christmas patterns that Mike had been trying out, most in green, red, or a mix of both. Mari looked properly ecstatic, giving Mike a massive smile as the man just returned it with a more subdued grin, as he felt one of the puppet's long arms wrap around his shoulders as he was pulled into a side hug that he easily returned, glad the puppet liked it, as he raised an eyebrow and nodded to it, as Mari quickly snatched Mike's pencil from him with his free hand before quickly circling a number of the designs, quickly erasing a few and circling others, seemingly wanting to have them all but knowing that he couldn't reasonably order all of them.

While that was happening in the same room Charlie was having an interesting time, talking to Evan usually was, the bear was just... So different, she was mostly adjusted to the bear being the same tiny kid from her childhood, but admittedly it had taken some time.

It had been a few weeks since they first met up again for the first time in years, technically they had talked a good bit during Thanksgiving, but that was when she was so wrapped up in so many other conversations and talks with everyone else that it was hard to really point back and say just what happened that day, it was more a blur of words and a positive feeling than actually remembering all the details of it.

So the first time she had come over and the bear had just been there, she had been surprised, and then even more so to adjust to Evan with how he was now. Sher could remember the kid that was always crying out about things, always nervous and shy, never willing to really put himself out there for much of anything, sort of like Sam but in different ways. And now the two couldn't be more different, and that was hard to figure out at first.

Sam was different of course, in a lot of ways, but at the same time he was the exact same as well in others, in just how much he cared, about how he could go off on rants about things he loved to talk about and the next not say anything for an age without noticing. While Evan... Evan had been such a timid kid, but now that wasn't there, Goldie was rough and to the point to an almost rude level.

She honestly wasn't sure whether the bear even liked her or was just tolerating her presence for a while, but in the end she had figured out with a small bit of help from Michael, that Evan just was like that, he might come off as a bit strong and harsh, but he really had no intentions of being rude even if he came off as such, there was never often any actual mean spirited intentions behind it... For the most part. It was a hard change to really get her head around from what she had expected when she had first heard that Evan was still around as well in his own animatronic suit.

It was even weirder for a bit watching the springlock suit move around while knowing that no one was inside of it, in the traditional sense, with how much of her childhood had involved watching people perform in that thing. And very worrying if she was being honest, the thing was old, like, really old, potentially even older than Michael was, definitely older than Evan and even herself, and the sounds the parts of the suit made when Evan moved around... It worried her a bit to be honest, but no one mentioned it and she had a talk with that Fritz guy and he apparently was very keen on consistent maintenance for the bear so... it probably was fine right?

She still wasn't sure just how well she was adjusting to the strangeness of this all, but she liked to think she was doing a good job, as she continued the talk with the bear, it was an interesting conversation and she found herself stuck in listening to, but slowly her mind reminded her it had been a while since she had heard her brother speak up. It was an old habit, one she hadn't even realized she still had, but whenever her brother went suddenly quiet she would look over and make sure she was alright. She hadn't done that in years, well, that was a lie, she did it but there was never anyone to turn to before now, btu there was now.

So she went herself look over to the small couch of the two who lived in the house they were in and paused instantly, the words that she had been planning on saying freezing in her throat with heat shock of staring at Michael and Sam, or rather the position they were in, as she just blinked once, slowly, before so again as she turned back to the bear, the expression on her face apparently being enough to get a huff of laughter from him as he said.

"Ignore them" She just blinked again, turning back before saying carefully and a bit quietly as if to not disturb them.

"So they... Do that a lot?" The bear just shrugged, as he turned as well, so the two could watch their respective sibling practically cuddle the other, they were incredibly close, Sam was half laying across Michael's chest as he pointed at whatever was on the page that the two were sharing a look on, and Michael's free arm was wrapped around the puppet in a half hugging hold. Evan seemed less than caring, as he kept speaking at the same volume as before.

"I have no idea. They're clingy though so probably" Clingy... Charlie could understand that for Sam, but Michael? Not to insult the man or anything, but he looked very much like the type to throw someone out the window before giving a hug willingly... Then again, maybe that was just because he was a mountain of a man with a literal dead appearance, he had squeezed the life out of her the first time they had seen each other this decade after all, so maybe that was unfair of her. Still, she found herself still staring, unsure just... what that meant. They were close, she guessed. Well, obviously, but just... in a more literal way than she would have considered.

Before she could figure out just what to do now because it felt too quiet, once more Evan seemed to not be able to give less than a damn, as he said blandly and a bit louder.

"What do you think about that Marionette?" Charlie could admit it was a bit mean, but she felt a sharp half cut of snort escape her before she could quell her laughter as the puppet practically jumped, bumping against Michael in a way that couldn't have been comfortable for the man, as he spun around his attention to the other two, as a sharp flustered sound of some kind came from the puppet as he said.

"Oh- Uh, Yes of course, that... Good?" Charlie was failing to keep her laughter in check, and she was sure Evan was more than a bit proud of himself at the faint sounds coming from his suit as well, while Michael just gave the two a very dry look that told her he probably knew exactly what they had did and wasn't all that appreciative of it. She didn't manage to hide her smile in time to not receive a roll of the eyes, but Michael didn't seem to really care about being interrupted, as he shifted a bit to be more comfortable as the puppet moved away and went back to working on whatever it was he was doing.

Still... Her eyes glanced between the two for a moment, a faint thought in the back of her mind almost forming into a wandering thought, but before it could quite get that far, Sam was talking away, trying to act like he knew what was happening, as Evan just let the puppet make a bit of a fool of himself, and Charlie's focus was put on quickly reentering the conversation to reassure Sam it wasn't anything important, the strange moment passing by without much of a note afterwards.

Fritz and Scott had the makings of... something close to a plan.

As it stood, Fritz had a lot on his plate, the Cove decoration stuff was mostly being handled by the others and was going much faster than it had last time, which he was very thankful for, but as it currently was, he had a new project on his hands, two really, but both had something to do with AR, so Fritz was mostly just taking it as one big project with two goals in mind.

The first of course being helping Scott get Ennard into something of a working shape that wasn't as... concerning as 'wire spaghetti' as some would say. As it stood, after a long and tedious fight with the handunit, he had managed to find the part, the cog thing, that Mike had talked about, and after being able to double check with the files he already had from the computer files on the animatronics, he was pretty sure the thing was something called a 'Spool Crank', it was from apparently a tool used to force the wires properly in alignment into the funtime suits, but it was more a tool than a fixture of the Funtimes, so it had taken a while to figure that out through looking over the files and tool information about the animatronics in question, they were incredibly advanced for the year that they had been created in.

Anyways, the two of them were planning on going down to AR soon to see if they could find one laying around, but the fact that Ennard hadn't already done that themselves to put themselves back into something close to together made Fritz pretty sure that there wasn't going to be one to be found. He hadn't seen one the last time he had made a visit to the bunkers parts and service room at least. He had also already looked through the warehouse, and they didn't have one there either, but after a bit of looking over, Fritz had come up with something of a plan.

Obviously the tubed wires that made up Ennard were way thicker than the metal strings that Mari used, but Mari still had something to wind up and lock his wires in place. And they did have spare puppet parts around the warehouse, not a lot, barely any really, just a spare few parts for a music box and a replacement spool, something he really hoped Mari wouldn't be needing any time soon, but the puppet never really required maintenance, like wear and tear just didn't affect him like the others, so it should be fine.

Sure, the spool was nowhere near strong enough as it was, Mari was an incredibly light animatronic all things considered when compared to a more standard one like Foxy, and his strings were nowhere near as thick, and that spool wasn't made to regulate and hold just to lock in place, but with some light modifying, and using the plans for the spool crank he had on file, he could make something that worked well enough to keep the animatronic into something resembling a person, it might take a while, but it was a good back up option if their trip to AR turned out to be fruitless in that regard.

But there were other reasons that Fritz wanted to go down there, something Mike had mentioned a while ago that had stuck in the back of his mind. Funtime Foxy was still down there, current and more than likely permanently unoccupied. Sure the thing was in more than one piece from what he had been told, but it would be a project that he could fully sink into, and that had been something he hadn't had in a while.

Honestly, he had been wanting an animatronic to work on and fix up for a while now, not for much of a reason, just... it was a habit, had been one for a long time now, working on and fixing up animatronics. Before it had been a job he couldn't really find any enjoyment in unless he snapped and actively enjoyed his life being in danger. But after Freddy's, it had been something he had always been doing really.

First it was Goldie, then Foxy, then Bonnie, he almost always had an animatronic in need of working on, it wasn't necessary anymore, Funtime Foxy didn't have anyone at home that needed their suit repaired, so he would be able to actually take his time and not feel guilty about it, as well as he just had really enjoyed during his time fixing up Bonnie the ability to just go and sink days of work into a long term project that he could use to take his mind of things.

So, that was a part of his plan, to go down there and get a proper look at the animatronic before seeing if he could load it up to take back to the warehouse to start working on it... Maybe his place? His apartment was on the first floor so it wouldn't be hard to get in, and it would be nice to not have to go anywhere to have to work on it, and it was hardly like he didn't have the tools here... Something to think about.

In the meantime, he just continued to study the plans of Funtime Foxy, ignoring the faint occasional static crackling from the handunit that was laying nearby, if he was lucky he wouldn't need to bother with the thing... Well that was a lie, he'd need to use it as soon as he had the foxy to work on, another reason he wanted to work on the thing was to look over any code that was left over in the remaining wires and work on seeing if he could figure out a way to purge the more... concerning programs that were in the machine, something he needed to do no matter what if they wanted to be able to use it in the Cove.

As well as to help out Scott as well, given he was sure the man would prefer it if the kids he was taking in didn't have an uncontrollable habit of trying to kill people. Fritz wasn't really big on code and programing stuff, he was much more suited for the mechanical side of things, but there wasn't really anyone else here that would be able to do something like that, so as the only technician for haunted animatronics he had to make due with what he had on hand.

Goldie was unsure just how the fox was going to take what he had to say, but he just trusted that Foxy wasn't going to make too big of a deal out of this... by too much... Even if the bear still felt very awkward about this, it did feel like something to talk about, especially if he was going to get the animatronic's help with this.

It was easy enough to convince Foxy to come over to the warehouse for the night, he was incredibly grateful to the fox for a lot of reasons, one of the biggest ones being the animatronic always made time for him, sure, Foxy didn't often have much going on himself if the bear was being honest. But there were some times that he wanted to be at the Cove but still didn't say as much of a complaint when Goldie asked for the fox to come over.

This was one of those, times, he felt a bit bad about it, he knew how excited Foxy was about the next holiday season, just like for Halloween, the fox had been planning on spending just about every day leading up to the events starting looking over the Cove and coming up with more ideas and moving decorations about until everything was to his exact liking.

But Foxy didn't seem to mind much at all, instead just happily waving to Goldie as he disembarked from the van, giving Jeremy a wave as well as the man just pulled out, Goldie watched as he did so... Jeremy seemed tired recently, he didn't even seem to notice the fox's wave goodbye, and he seemed almost half asleep at work... It was probably nothing, but it was a bit weird, as he turned his attention back to the fox who was walking over to him, a hook being raised in greeting as he spoke.

"Yar" Goldie withheld the small huff at the typical if strange greeting from the fox, as he said.

"Hey, thanks for coming over, I had a few things I wanted to talk to you about"

"Course, it's no problem lad, was curious as to why you wanted me over to be honest. Yer not usually the one to ask" That was true as well, usually Foxy just kind of showed up whenever he wanted to, Goldie hardly minded, his 'home' was more an open invite place for just about everyone that knew about the place, something he knew about before even moving into here, it was also just nice when the fox made the decision to visit on his own without any prompting.

"Right... Well, I told you about the calls that I've been getting right?" Foxy seemed to think about that for a moment, before saying suddenly.

"Yeah, something about another Sam? Samantha right?" Goldie nodded, glad the animatronic remembered, as he explained.

"Yeah, I-... Originally at least for a while I thought maybe she was Charlie, in that short time between learning about Marionette's past and meeting her properly again, but that's obviously not the case anymore. So I'm just... Worried I guess about what might have happened to her"

"Right... You think something happened?"

"I think so. I got a call and it- Well it sounded like she wasn't sure if she'd get the chance to call again" The fox stilled at that, frowning to himself, as he looked away for a long moment before saying, his voice shifting, dropping the accent as he spoke. Goldie found himself noting the animatronic had been doing that more and more recently.

"This sounds a lot more serious than whatever I can help with, we should talk to Mike if you think someone is in trouble" Goldie just shook his head, maybe a bit too quickly, as he answered back.

"No, I don't want him to have to get wrapped up in this"

"Any reason why" Did he have a reason?

"Not really, it's just... She's my friend" There was more to it than that, she... It was just something about it, the way she spoke, the things she had talked about. It felt like he should be the one to do something about it right? "And, uh, I'm probably just overthinking this to be honest, there's little chance that this is actually some big thing or something I can actually effect, I just... Don't want to not do anything, and it's not something that I need to drag Michael or the others into without reason" It felt dumb explaining it like that, but it was true.

The fox was silent for a long moment, before simply saying.

"Alright" Goldie... blinked, before asking carefully-

"Alright?" Foxy just gave a short nod.

"Yeah" Goldie... admittedly didn't think it would be that fast, as he asked all the same.

"Oh, uh... No questions?" The fox seemed to take a moment to think about that before nodding, which was somehow a relief for the bear that Foxy wasn't just blindl-

"Right! What do you need me to do? Or is it like you need help coming up with a plan or something?" He felt his mouth open and close a few times before finally Goldie just let out a faint huff before saying.

"Yeah, yeah, that'd be nice. Thank you Foxy"

"Haven't done anything yet" Goldie just felt the warmth in his springs and just acknowledged the words even if on the inside he had a feeling the fox really didn't know just how much Foxy did already, as he just said instead.

"Right, let's get to thinking then" The fox just nodded as they headed into the office to get something of a plan going... Though the two quickly found out that spending a portion of their childhoods and entire teenage life removed from daily life, it made figuring out just what they needed to do to figure out what to do a bit harder when it came to stuff that involved life outside of the Cove. But they managed to think of something before the night was up at the very least, and Foxy himself had a mission to try and get done, so, all in all, not a bad night.

"You doing alright?" Jeremy blinked, his vision a bit too blurry at first from how unfocused his eyes were, but they managed to lock onto Mike soon enough, as he blinked once before managing to speak up, as his brain finally registered the question.

"Oh! Yeah, sorry just... tired" The man gave him a doubtful look, as Jeremy glanced over to where everyone else was, spread out around the Cove as they moved to put up decorations and little things up for the events that would be happening over the next few days. Jeremy had been mostly going on autopilot up until this point if he was being honest with himself, which had apparently led him to standing and staring blankly at a depiction of a cartoon Foxy standing on the front with a leg propped up on the traditional Santa style sleigh, hand pointing out like he was on the bow of a ship. It was cute, but clearly not something worth staring blankly at for the last five minutes or so. Coughing to himself, Jeremy said awkwardly, "Pretty tired"

"The rabbit giving you that much trouble?" Jeremy glanced back to the others, it didn't look like Mari was nearby, probably in the Prize Corner setting up all his own little events and trading out the normal merch with the more holiday themed stuff that they had managed to get from the rush order. They hadn't really done that last time, but Jeremy was hoping that this would give them another little boost in income if they just straight up sold some of the plushies as they were. Mari had gotten a little cash register in there now which he had been surprisingly enamored by at the time.

Either way, the puppet wasn't in ear shot, which gave him the confidence to say-

"I- I mean, I think it's just growing pains, you know, adjusting to everything, but it's not going... well"

"Anything that you could think of that would help?" The almost overwhelming need to ask if Mike would mind if Jeremy went into the back office and just took a nap while the others handled the rest of the decoration honestly almost won out, but that felt to much like admitting he had no idea what he was doing, and after asking for so much advice and help from the man already, when it was clear he was already supporting his own animatronic, it didn't feel right for Jeremy to toss that on the man, so instead he managed to put on something close to a genuine smile and said gratefully.

"N-No, I'm fine, it's just been a lot of adjusting for me as well you know?" Mike seemed to study for him for a minute, and Jeremy just did his best to not fidget under the man's gaze. Mike always had very impressively imposing glares and looks when he was trying to figure something out. But in the end he finally just nodded, and Jeremy pretended there wasn't a mix of relief at not being called out for being unable to handle this, and a faint sense of dread that came from realizing that meant he wouldn't be getting any help either, as Mike said.

"I mean, I guess, I never really went through that with Mari, but then again Bonnie's way younger so it's not like our situations are at all comparable" That Jeremy could easily agree with, he had no idea what the two went through at first during their time living together, but he couldn't imagine it being anything like what he had been dealing with when it came to Bonnie.

"Yeah, I doubt you ever had to deal with Mari throwing a temper tantrum" Mike snorted at that, before saying good naturedly.

"Well, he's certainly been pissed off at me, but nothing I'd call a tantrum"

"Really? I- I honestly can't imagine the two of you ever not being on the same page" Mike just hummed, glancing back out to the floor of the Cove for a long moment before just shrugging.

"We had our moments where we didn't get along perfectly or fought or something dumb afterwards, they never lasted long though, those fights. I think... I think the two of us were too tired to actually fight about stuff for long, which kind of sounds bad thinking about it" It kind of did, but Jeremy still managed to smile and give a small laugh, before saying.

"It makes sense, the two of you went through a lot. I'm glad it didn't cause any big issues though"

"We're lucky like that, or, well, I'm lucky Mari puts up with me, I'm not exactly the most... emotionally open at times" He just gave Mike an amused look at the way he said the words emotionally open, like it was a concept that was held in not particularly high regard, still...

"I'm sure he'd say the same about you" Mike just shrugged, saying back quickly, a hint of curiosity in his voice.

"Yeah, what about Bonnie? How, or, well, what is he like?"

"You haven't asked Mari about it?" Mike just shook his head.

"Sore topic, and with everything else going on, I try to not bring it up if I can help it"

"Well, I guess that makes sense... I don't know really... Is that bad to say? We don't really talk much, he keeps himself busy and isn't really interested in conversations you know? And I'm not really in my apartment for most of the day" Mike just nodded.

"Think that's a good sign?" Jeremy really didn't, given when they did talk it was more or less just Jeremy trying to get the rabbit to talk to him, or Jeremy having to try and figure out a way to calm the animatronic down from whatever thing he did that day that made him angry enough to start shouting. But that was not what Jeremy wanted to bring up in the conversation, so instead he just said carefully.

"Ah, maybe, we'll see. We're both still adjusting like I said" Mike only nodded, and Jeremy was grateful the man didn't mention how they had been adjusting for apparently weeks now. It was not getting easier, but Jeremy could do it, he had to, he said he would, and Bonnie needed to know that someone was there for him after all. It would work out, Jeremy was sure of it... At least he really hoped so, because he wasn't sure just how much longer he could go without sleep before passing out while standing.

The two talked for a bit longer, about less meaningful things before Mike had wandered off to talk to his brother about something, who himself was in some kind of talk with Foxy about what Jeremy could only imagine to be snowflake placement with how much Foxy was gesturing to the paper cut outs hanging from the ceiling and just how painfully unimpressed the bear seemed to be with the fox.

Nothing to crazy here, just some set up and all that jazz. Dealing with the fact that it's kind of awkward to have three decently big holidays back to back while not just skimming over them has been a bit of a challenge if I'm being honest, cause, like, we're going to have a Christmas chapter soon, but it's not been long since the Thanksgiving one which wasn't far from Halloween, managing that is kind of weird, but it let's me get a lot of fluff in before everything goes to shit which I can definitely appreciate.

Mike and Mari being the adorable clingy mess that they are with their respective siblings being forced to see it in action was funny, especially cause Charlie is just really awkward and unsure just what that means, while Evan is just rolling his eyes with those two being so obvious at this point. That whole seen was just to show everyone bonding a bit more and showing the puppet's doing his best and all that stuff.

While on the other hand... I have thought out the funtimes and how they work so much, there's going to be a lot of more technical stuff in the future about them from Fritz's POV, and I just want it to be said I have no idea how that happened. But it's also probably important to have all that set up going on in the background in some way, and maybe, just maybe, we'll have a new foxy at some point in the Cove... Which I'm sure no one can guess who'd that be!

Jeremy on the other hand is going through it, Bonnie isn't being the nicest roommate, that's for a reason of course, but Jeremy really was not ready for this responsibility, his heart being bigger than his head in this case, not that that's to surprising given this is Jeremy we're talking about. Not to mention that the rabbit in question really isn't making it easy on the man.

And of course Evan's got something going on in the background... Sure that's nothing important! Anyways, See ya!