It had made a mistake.

A bad one. A really bad one.

This was what repeated in its mind, kept at the prize corner of Freddy Fazbear's pizza. Curled up in its box, holding its porcelain face in its spindly fingers. It- no, she had no idea what to do. She may not know her name, but she is not an it.

She was angry when she got stuck in this machine. This… this coffin, that had become her new body. Before, she had helped others like her get used to their own new bodies. They had gotten even more violent and unreasonable with time, wanting more than anything to get rid of Him.

They had lost a sense of self, she supposed. Unable to tell anyone apart, any adult looked like Him.

They had hurt people, she had hurt people. They had killed people, she had killed people.

Unaware of what she was doing, she had no idea how many had been killed, it took too long for her to gain a sense of self again. At least she knew exactly when she regained it.

It happened today, just a couple hours ago.

A guard had been working at the pizzeria, his surname had been… Fitzgerald, if she remembered correctly. He had survived nearly a week, with all of them after him. At the time it was infuriating, now she just found it mildly impressive. After his 6th night, he had been assigned to work the day shift.

That was when it happened. One of them got restless. She could have stopped them, but she didn't, in fact, she practically egged them on. Fitzgerald had been bitten, his head caved in and opened up by a pair of mechanical jaws. Blood poured out the brand new entrance in the man's skull, pooling on the floor in a puddle of dark red and bits of pink. The children cried, the adults screamed and gagged, blood was everywhere and other employees and a couple adults were crowding around Fitzgerald as she realized what she had just done. She had killed an innocent man. Well, technically she didn't do anything to Fitzgerald, but she was very supportive of the idea of getting rid of him, and anyone that looked like Him. Which was practically everyone.

Now everyone looked different, everyone seemed unique, even… innocent? (with the exception of the criminals her facial recognition had identified.)

Apparently, Fitzgerald might survive his injury. She had overheard some employees talking about it earlier, in the eerie silence of the building with no guests around. It was easy to listen in. He had lost part of his brain, but it was an unnecessary part of the brain for survival.

It's still going to permanently alter the direction of his life, but at least he may not be dead. That makes her feel less horrible. Still pretty bad, but less so.

…

…God, she was an idiot. How had she not seen that she was hurting people? Innocent people? She was horrible. She was evil. She was a monster, no better than-

'Click.'

She was about to start spiraling into a loop of these thoughts when suddenly she felt peculiar. Something had shifted.

The music had stopped.

That song that strangely made her feel too tired to move, 'My Grandfather's Clock', had stopped. Soon, 'Pop Goes The Weasel' started to chime from her internal music box, she was restless.

She opened the lid and peeked out, forgetting that the pizzeria was closed indefinitely because of the bite. There was no guard.

Or so she thought. She could hear two things, the sounds of all of the other animatronics moving around incessantly, which was technically several things. And a panicked string of swears from the office. A voice she had not heard before, younger. Had they hired a new guard? Already?

She floated down the hall towards the office, passing several of the others, who promptly backed off once they realized the guard had let her out. They always did this, always letting her get the guard when the music stopped. It seems they hadn't come to the same realization that she had. She felt a new wave of misery at that.

She looked down the hallway at the man in the office. He had dark hair, it was messy from the frequent taking on and off of the mask… He was much smaller than Fitzgerald, who was a tall man. Seeming to be slightly below average height. He had light skin. She was right about him being young, it looked like he wasn't even an adult yet. He had brown eyes, which were wide. Actually, all of his features were screaming fear.

But to the others, he probably still looked like Him.

She watched him hurry under the desk as she moved down the hall and into the office. He was hiding from her.

She felt worse for a moment before being distracted by a peculiar thing on the desk. A second monitor, one separate from the one used to view cameras and wind up the music box. Curious, she moved around the desk to investigate. It had 10 pictures on it. One of each of the others heads (or at least the ones that attacked the guard) with an 'AI value' beneath each one. She knew what those were, they changed with each night, lower meant that the others were slower, higher meant faster. She wasn't there, as when the music box ran out, her AI didn't really matter.

All of the others were set to 20. Which was the maximum.

…This man purposefully set all of the animatronics to max when he could have turned them off.

…

…What an idiot.

Fritz Smith had several things going through his head at the moment, some of which were swears. Some were mentally berating him for attempting something so stupid, others were mentally berating him for forgetting to wind the music box. But most of it was fear.

Hunched under the old metal desk, the dust from the black and white tiled floor pooled around him, with that almost frantic tune playing, echoing throughout the room, loud enough to freak him out but not loud enough to mask any sound, should he make one.

And worst of all, it was right next to him. The prize puppet had wandered in, and was standing at the desk, presumably examining something at his desk, or just standing there for no reason. He didn't know what went through a murder robot's mind, maybe it liked it there.

He hoped that was the case, and that it wasn't standing there cause it knew he was under the desk. It wasn't like he was incredibly hidden, but there was nowhere else to hide.

He noticed now that the thing lacked feet, its legs just rounding out to little nubs. Its legs were black, with white stripes near the bottom. And it was felty, soft, it looked like it'd feel like a stuffed animal. And he was almost crazy enough to poke it to check.

Almost. He wasn't that stupid.

Suddenly, the music started to slow, and eventually ground out to a halt with a couple confused sounding notes, clinking lowly. From the angle of its legs, it appeared it was examining the second monitor he had rigged to control the bots AI.

…Was it shocked at the stupidity of his decision to crank all the murder robots to their maximum efficiency?

…

…Well, they had that in common actually.

It was like that for a while, the prize puppet standing at the desk staring at something on the desk, while Fritz stared at its legs, waiting for it to do something.

Seconds felt like minutes, minutes felt like hours. He felt like his body was getting sore from holding one position so long. It had been after 5 before he was caught… What time is it?

Eventually he risked a glance at his watch, unfortunately having to look away from the puppet to see his wrist, in the angle he was in.

He felt like groaning, but didn't, obviously, he still had nearly twenty minutes left. He actually was a little impressed he made it 5 and a half hours without any life-ending mistakes. When he looked back, he couldn't stifle his yelp of surprise.

But it's not like it would alert the thing, as now it was hunched over and staring under the desk, directly at him. He got a better look at it now. Its entire body was black and thin, with white stripes on its forearms to match its shins, and three white buttons on its chest. Then there was its face. It was frozen in a joyful open-mouthed smile, its eyes squinted slightly, with rosy red cheeks, and red lipstick. And strangely, purple tear marks. It was more of a mask than a face, heavily resembling a comedy mask. Despite smiling, it did not look happy. It didn't appear to have as many bones as it probably should, possibly none, its body bending unnaturally and its limbs pooling on the floor slightly as it looked under the desk. It was really tall, he couldn't really see its full height with both of them sitting down. But the sheer length of its limbs gives away a basic estimate. The way it was positioned, the desk blocked most of the light, casting half of it in shadows.

It was almost sitting down to look under the desk, which didn't really make it seem all that threatening if Fritz was being honest. It looked almost relaxed, not poised to attack. He was still sufficiently threatened, however.

He backed away, his hands slipping on the floor as he did so. He bumped his head on the back of the underside of the desk, pressing as far away from the thing as he could with the wall blocking the way. Muttering swears as he soon realized, he was on the brink of death.

He hadn't thought of that till now, but he was going to die. He was never going to see his family or the few friends he had, the last face he sees being the thing right in front of him.. And with less than 20 minutes left.

He felt tears spring up in his eyes, from sadness and fear, and also anger at both the fact that he was so close and the fact that this was basically all his fault for screwing with the animatronics AI. He didn't want to die, he wasn't even 17 yet!

His breathing quickened as it cocked its head at him. It looked awfully like something analyzing its next victim. He noticed that it was shaking. He thought it was just his shaking, but it was shaking more than the cold underside of the desk. It must be preparing a pounce, he thought. He braced himself for the eventual attack, screwing his eyes shut.

Nothing happened.

It was silent, completely, utterly silent. He heard the shuffling of its felt 'skin' dragging across the tile floor and winced, waiting for the hands that wrap around his legs, dragging him out from under the desk and over to the parts and service room.

Or maybe it didn't even care about the suit, maybe it'd just grab his throat and strangle him, it's long fingers wrapping around his throat and squeezing, the things face and the dull metal of the desk being the very last things he ever-

He jumped as bells erupted through the office, ringing in his ears, giving him a headache. His eyes shot open to look at the opening to the desk. It was empty.

The thing was gone.

After several moments, he nervously stuck his head out from under the desk to glance around. Nothing. It was actually gone.

He stood up, pointedly ignoring the fact that his legs felt like they would collapse, and looked at his watch. His hand was vibrating so much that it was unreadable, so he had to use his other hand to steady it. He breathed a sigh of relief as he practically collapsed into the chair, staring at the ceiling

6 AM. He had made it.

She had no idea what she was doing, but she wasn't thinking clearly.

She was outside. It wasn't like it was hard to get through the door once 6 hit. They had no failsafe for the animatronics leaving, they just knew they wouldn't.

But she had to get away, she had to. She was 'running' as fast as she could through the woods, rushing through the greenery. That man had looked so frightened, so defenseless, so completely and utterly innocent. Even calling him a man was generous, he looked like he was barely a teenager. Practically a child.

Had other guards been that young?

Coming to a sudden stop, she felt strange. She felt… something. It was indescribable..

But she was drawn to it. She changed directions, slowing down but not by much. Now she had a sense of purpose.

She arrived at the place quickly, tilting her head to look at it. It was a house.

Tall and old, parts of the paint peeling from lack of care. Thorny vines beginning to poke through the porch. The top step to the door cracked, all of the lights inside off, and soft green in color. It was familiar.

It was hers.

Getting inside was not a difficult task. She could have done it if she was still hu-.

If she had a human body. She is still human. She must be.

…

…The back door had been unlocked.

She explored the house with a strange feeling in her chest, an almost panicked tune playing quietly. Nostalgia filled her senses, but she couldn't remember anything.

She wasn't too surprised, she couldn't even remember her own name.

She remembered her father however. His scraggly beard, his tired yet kind eyes, his deep yet kind voice. She also remembered how he left her alone too often to work, always leaving her to a babysitter, which was consistently someone she couldn't quite remember. She supposed it could be possible to blame him for leaving her alone. Alone in the rain. Alone to die.

But she didn't. It wasn't his fault. It wasn't the people who threw her outside. They didn't know what He would do.

She found the object quickly, in a room that must have been her father's workshop. Sitting on the work table was a green bracelet. It looked like it glowed but was off. She wrapped one long finger around the band to lift it gingerly, inspecting the object with a curious gaze. Something clicked in her AI as she stared at it.

BRACELET CODE: CHARLIE

She thought about that. This bracelet had been made specifically for one person, this 'Charlie', by her father. It also strangely felt high priority. Like it was the single most important-

She collapsed. Her body pooling at the floor in a heap of black and white, suddenly feeling a wave of agony. Her name was Charlie. Her father had engineered the puppet specifically to keep her safe.

And it hadn't worked out. It had failed.

Why?

It wasn't fair. It wasn't fair. It wasn't fair that HE-

…

She had repaid his protection by using this machine to murder people. She stared at her hands, but they weren't hers. Her body wasn't hers. Her hands weren't hers. Her face wasn't hers.

She had to get out. She couldn't handle this, it had to stop. It had to be quiet. It was so loud. It was so LOUD. It HAD to STOP.

WHY WON'T IT-

The prize puppet, which had been trembling on the floor while a frantic tune played, clawing at its mask, suddenly froze, seizing up.

Its body relaxed as it splayed out on the floor, a violent whirring from its head slowing to a stop with a 'click!'

That peculiar bracelet resting next to it.