Hello, everyone! Nice to see you again for another chapter - and it was a very enjoyable chapter to write. I had fun composing something more intimate than the previous few, which had a big scope involving all the major players. We're only dealing with the perspectives of the two main characters this time, so the focus can be tighter. This is also the chapter which finally starts pulling together these separated characters, which is something I've built up to for a while.

It's fall here. The first leaves are dropping from the trees, and I need to wear a jacket when I go outside. Fewer bugs, too, thank goodness. Sorry if I'm kind of obsessed with the seasons, but I've never actually been here during autumn before. Just a nice change of pace from what I'm used to. My job is fine, as are my family and pets. Otherwise, there's not much to say about my personal situation.

Thanks to ThatOneGuy for reviewing since last time. Don't usually respond to reviews in A/Ns, but I will say you might be on the right track with some of your ideas. I always love reading your guys' thoughts about my stories. See you all next time. To be honest, I'm not sure where the next couple updates will take me; we'll find out together!

Saturday, July 29, 2017, 8:45 AM

"You doing OK down there?" Mike glanced over his shoulder as he asked, only comfortable taking his eyes off the winding road for a second. He did this every time Foxy or one of the other animatronics did this rigmarole. It wasn't something they had a choice about. Comfortable as the people of Whitewater were with the robots inside their own restaurant, too many questions would be raised if one was seen riding shotgun in his car. Perhaps he should have looked into getting tinted windows.

"I'm fine," Foxy replied from the floor of the back seat. Probably getting covered in lint and dust; he didn't remember when the last time he cleaned this thing. Of course, he did it himself rather than going to a car wash. He didn't want whoever scrubbed the interior with a vacuum to notice the copious accumulation of different strange fur and feathers. Again, it'd make them wonder. Couldn't have that.

Mike rounded a few more turns. A rainy night gave way to a cloudy but dry morning, yet plenty of water lingered on the road. He nudged the car to the right side of the lane, which allowed him to plow through a big puddle. A stream of water blasted to the side with a whooshing sound as his car rattled, and he chuckled lightly. He still knew how to entertain himself. His job helped; seeing how much kids enjoyed small things made him appreciate them, too.

"You're having a good time," Foxy commented. He heard the mirth in her voice over the purring engine. She loved that they both saw the beauty in every little thing… and each other. Too bad his sex drive had been seriously stunted by the danger they found themselves in. Impending doom didn't put him in "the mood". Still, that didn't matter. He always loved being around her and the sound of her voice. It was never difficult to be next to her. That's how he knew he was madly in love.

"Yeah, I am," he answered, feeling a hint of warmth creep into his cheeks.

Shortly after, Mike turned onto a gravel driveway, slid past the cleaned-out husks of stripped cars, and inched into June's auto garage. The door promptly shut behind him thanks to the efforts of a belt-driven contraption on the ceiling. June was already there, looking her usual casual self (jeans and a bun that day), and she wanted them out of the open ASAP. Just in case.

"Happy to have you two over," she said as Mike opened the car door. He was immediately hit with the familiar miasma of engine oil and old gasoline fumes. Doubted it was healthy to inhale too much, but June seemed fine living in it for years. Like bleach, some smells never really went away. Today, though, she didn't work on any cars. She took a while off - not just because of helping the rest of them, but also for personal reasons. That explained why she was busy filing a stack of paperwork instead of hitting an engine block with a wrench until it was fixed. He joked: it really was incredible what she could do with a can of WD-40 and pliers.

"Uh, how goes the sale?" Hoped she'd be able to secure a good price. She shrugged, and the movement itself told him most of what he needed to know.

"It's going. There's an interested buyer, but I'm not exactly striking gold, if you know what I mean, assuming it goes through at all. Still, it'll be nice to have some cash to fall back on, even if Berkshire Hathaway ends up taking more of a cut than I'd like." Mike wished he had enough of a safety net to fall back on those days. Good for June, though; he was happy his friend found herself on better financial footing than before.

With Jeremy gone, June was in the process of selling his house… well, their house, considering she never really moved out, except when she stayed with other family members in Oregon. Adding it to the market should have been a big deal. Not a lot of new abodes being created: a housing crisis, they called it, not too far behind the Great Recession's heels. Unfortunately, most of the demand came from cities and suburbs - places people wanted to live, not the boonies. If this were closer to Seattle, it would have been snapped up within days or even hours. Much as he loved Whitewater, nobody wanted to live there, as evidenced by the town's population shrinking each year. A lot of real estate opened up, even if most quickly fell into disrepair, inhabited by rats. The fact anyone expressed interest made her situation better than most.

She planned to move into the loft above her shop. Spent most of her time there, anyway, so it would save on fuel costs and time. Didn't need much space, being a bachelorette who never planned on getting into a relationship. Just a matter of moving a bed and some essentials up there, and she'd be set.

Enrapturing as that subject would have been to discuss, though, they had business, which June reminded them of as she finished signing another document.

"What brings you? It was a little vague," she said as she pushed the papers away.

"This does." Foxy, who had also come out of the car, gently pulled the ream of film from her pocket. It fluttered before drooping from her pinched claws like a strand of wet spaghetti. His wife quickly explained that she found this in the basement while snooping on Mary. Mike cringed, yet he was glad she didn't sugarcoat it. Still wasn't sure how to react after she admitted it last night, but he was at least willing to give the theory she proposed a chance to be tested. And God, he hoped it wasn't correct.

He hated that she spied on people - they needed to trust one another more than ever. If even one of them slipped, their plans would be for nothing, and they might all die. On the other hand, he had to admit Mary acted strange lately. Emotional outbursts, not associating with anyone else, spending all her free time alone, and so on. Mike couldn't summarize his concerns, since she'd always been somewhat separate from the rest. It was still enough to scare him.

"So, in short, would it be possible for you to splice this piece of tape into a longer reel so we can listen to what it says?"

His friend blankly stared at them for a moment, slowly blinking as she processed this very strange request. "Strange" meant little to them anymore, though, so she quickly agreed to humor them. "Give me 15 minutes and any spare tape you have in your glovebox, and I think I'll have something for you."

He wasn't sure being a mechanic technically encompassed fixing small objects like this, yet June possessed enough skill to give it a try. Therefore, she grabbed some scissors and a knife. Mike supplied the tape recorder and a roll of tape he salvaged from an old 8-track cartridge. Had to help somehow. From there, it was up to her to work her magic.

Mike and Foxy naturally split as the minutes passed. Foxy found herself browsing the tools attached to the corkboard. They might end up being used on her one day - though he hoped not with some of the larger ones! Mike, on the other hand, settled onto a wooden stool and pulled out his phone. There was no cellular data, yet June gave him the Wi-Fi password long ago. Flipped to the Internet after spending two mindless minutes on Angry Birds, deciding to look at the news. National and world news was more depressing than ever those days, so Mike only skimmed the happenings often enough to be a responsible, informed citizen. That was what he told himself, anyway. Felt himself grimace the whole time, even as he objectively knew not everything sucked.

After eating his vegetables, he got to something a little more fun. Local news was not only generally more positive, it mattered more for his everyday life. Objectively, something happening in the same state had more of an effect on his life than goings-on in China or wherever. Even if the news wasn't great, he didn't think he'd ever seen anything existential happening in his neck of the woods.

Until that day. Because when he typed in "washington state news", the first page of results made his stomach churn. He clicked on the first link his vision locked onto.

TEEN DEAD IN FORKS, WASHINGTON

Tragedy struck the town of Forks, Washington yesterday when a teenager was found dead and maimed in the forest outside of town.

15-year-old Alejandra Cartwright was staying with relatives in Forks while visiting from her Yakima home when she disappeared Thursday night. Her grandfather, upon realizing she had gone missing, contacted authorities. Footage obtained from the CCTV of a local gas station shows her walking into the forest at 11:44 PM. A local hiker stumbled upon the corpse late Friday afternoon.

Local and state investigators are examining whether the death is connected with other unresolved disappearances that have occurred in Forks over the last several years. Anyone with information is urged to contact authorities.

This is a developing story. More details will be added as they emerge.

Despite only being a few sentences long and sparse on details, the article was almost enough to make him gag. Not because of what happened, awful and unspeakable as that was. It was a feeling he got from reading this that the worst thing that ever happened to him came roaring back into the world with a vengeance.

He gobbled up the next several articles from different sites, local, national and even international, while barely blinking. This already made headlines within 12 hours of the story breaking. There were a couple things which stood out to him once he got past the horrible premise. For one thing, some of the more lurid rags implied, if not outright stated, that this was tied to Satanic ritual abuse because of carvings and mutilations of the girl. Normally, that'd be a ridiculous thing to suggest. In this situation, however, he was inclined to believe it was possible. Or, if not, something very similar. Something evil and cosmic.

The other was that this girl was a big fan of the Twilight book and movie series, and visited Forks because that was the franchise's primary setting. Most of the aforementioned disappearances that happened over the last few years (that was apparently a thing he hadn't heard about, because those didn't have stomach churning descriptions to go with them) involved the same demographic: kids from out of town, many visiting because of the series. That was what confirmed for Mike what he already suspected.

Auric always preyed on the vulnerable, be they children or people desperate for money, like Mike was when he took the night guard job. Strangers, regardless of age, filled that niche.

Anyway, he avoided comment sections like the plague. He'd been online long enough to know there'd be many people blaming immigrants or minorities, or just being jackasses about the worst thing that could happen to someone, let alone a 15-year-old kid. Even barring that, what was there to say?

"What's wrong, Mike?" He almost jumped off the stool when Foxy spoke. She looked at him with concern; probably thought he got a text saying his parents had been injured or killed. There was nothing he could say, so he merely flipped the phone around so she saw the headlines, too. Her eye widened.

"It's, um, Auric. It must be," he said, voice quivering. This was the first time in forever that a crime screamed it at him. There may have been other things, but he knew. The monster finally returned, and he barely seemed interested in hiding it.

"That's… good, actually," Foxy said after she stopped wincing. She continued before he even had a chance to misconstrue her words. "Not like that. It's horrible that this happened, obviously. But we were worried about looking for Auric, and now we know exactly where he is." Mike hadn't thought about that. She was right, though.

They had been concerned about needing to chase dubious leads at best and make random guesses at worst. Mike was even willing to consult so-called psychics if he needed to - anything to find this demon in what little time was left. And now they knew where he was. Even better, it wasn't far. In the same state, not much longer than a drive to Seattle.

He searched the eclipse map again. Forks wasn't in the path of totality, so he'd still need to be lured south. The fear that bounced around his body for the past several minutes compressed into a stone in his abdomen. What had previously been a daunting abstraction suddenly became wholly real.

Before he could think too much about that, June walked back down from upstairs, a small, smug smile on her face. She raised a newly spliced tape, which was hopefully long enough to listen to in the recorder. "I didn't listen to this, so I don't know if it works. But it should."

Mike decided he'd tell June about Auric's bloody return later. For now, he tried to shake off his terror and be happy for this small victory… even if it led to distrusting someone he thought was on their side. She hit the play button on the side of the box, which set the tape to unspool.

"That's almost everything," Henrietta's voice spoke in the same tired tone she narrated most of the other cassettes in. "But in this last message, I want to tell you the dangers you'll be facing if you do this. There's a cost, and it's up to you all to decide if you want to - "

The message was overtaken by the sound of German singing and holiday bells, because the filler tape had been supplied by an old album he couldn't even remember getting called "Christmas in the Alps". He asked her to rewind it and play the message again, which she did. The same words repeated, and Mike knew he had not heard them before.

This came from a different tape from any he'd listened to: one that apparently wrapped everything up and warned of pitfalls. He hadn't thought it particularly odd that there was no conclusion - the monologue stopped after it finished explaining the occult ritual. No goodbye or well-wishes, which was fine. There was limited space, and all that stuff had been explained at the beginning. Lacking a denouement was one of the most normal things about this.

Except it turned out that there was, and Mary hid it from them. The notion roiled his gut almost as much as finding out Auric returned minutes before. Must have been intentional.

The timeline matched up; Mike listened to the first couple of tapes the night he got them before showing them to everyone the following day. Mary volunteered to listen to the entire set first because she possessed perfect recall and wouldn't get bored. The rest only got the opportunity after her. She could have destroyed or hidden one if she wanted to. It wasn't like he counted the number of tapes before and after, though he had a good general sense for how many there were. Would have noticed if she removed more than a few, so it was likely only the one.

From their troubled expressions, he could tell June and Foxy reached similar conclusions.

"Why would she do this?" his wife wondered to herself. She wasn't in the mood for answers, only putting those questions into the air. Mike had no answers, but at least he made the same inquiries.

His phone vibrated in his pocket from someone calling him. Fished it out to see who it was. Turned out to be Freddy, who contacted him at an inopportune time, to say the least. Do I tell him? No, he wanted to keep this private for the time being - though he'd see if Foxy and June agreed. On one hand, he stabbed everyone in the back by doing the same thing he accused Mary of: keeping secrets. On the other, they wouldn't be able to solve the mystery if others knew. Well, Freddy could keep a secret, but Bonnie or Chica would spill the beans to Mary immediately. Was it a mystery worth solving? Precious little time remained to spend some on a secondary problem.

"It's, um, Freddy," he told the others. Then he sighed and picked up. "Hello?

"Mike, you should get back to the restaurant soon." Freddy's voice came from the other end, sounding tight and a little raw. Something was up. Bonnie and Chica hurriedly talked to each other in the background, just a little too faint to make out the words.

"What's wrong?"

"Nobody died, but there's something here. Not that you need to come back right this second, but let's say sooner would be better." Mike turned and rested his forehead on the wall. The drama and deception felt like the worst parts of high school, at least according to high school dramas. Mike never had enough friends - or enemies - to know.

Then he hung up, finding the women looking at him expectantly. Foxy, at least, had heard it all.

"I wanted to stay a while, but I guess we need to go now," she said to Mike before turning to June. "Want to come see what's up?"

"Thanks, but I need to do more paperwork. How about you call me and tell me what happened?" Fair enough. Just because June was part of this didn't mean she needed to put her life on hiatus like the rest. He and Foxy needed to see what rattled everyone so much.

He really wasn't looking forward to it.

10:00 AM

Foxy spent the ride to the restaurant in a state of mounting anxiety while stuck between the rear seats of the Honda. She was no stranger to the roiling in her stomach these last few days, though she had a different philosophy about it than her husband. He saw it as something unnatural to be fixed. As a pirate, she knew it was natural to be nervous before battle. Not being worried was a bigger sign of foolishness than bravery.

That didn't mean it was pleasant. On that point, they were in complete agreement.

The dappled pattern of light through the leaves distracted her for a moment as she stared up and out into the world. It was beautiful. She wished she could see more of it instead of the tiny corner she'd been confined to. There wasn't enough time, even if she had a long existence ahead of her. Still, it was a good life. If she needed to choose between freedom and family, she'd pick the latter without hesitation.

Almost wanted to say that to Mike, yet she restrained herself. They had a little while to go, even if a climax came at them too quickly. It sounded too final. In any case, she didn't need to hold her tongue for long. A slight bump and a quick right turn let her know they were back on their home turf. Popped up to take a look, since they had already arrived. The building hadn't burned down in their absence, so things could have gone worse!

"Well, uh, everything looks OK." Her version was funnier, but she let him have it without rubbing her superior sense of humor in. Also, jinx!

Her hook grabbed the inner door handle and pushed it open, leading to her stepping out. It was like an inverse version of that urban legend. Pretty sure she'd gone out as "the Hook" instead of her normal self for Halloween one time, though she couldn't remember what year. Speaking of which, it was starting to get into that season again, so she needed to decide what she wanted to dress up as this year, if anything. Though, she admitted, that question would matter more after they dealt with the matter at hand… no pun intended.

The others (save Mary) stood around the central table, wound up like clocks; Bonnie jumped at least two feet in the air when he heard the door open!

"It's just us," she assured him. Who else would it have been? He turned, and the look in his purple eyes was one of trepidation. Then she drank in what exactly was wrong.

An open letter sat on the floor, along with a stack of promotional fliers that had been dropped. Maybe the electric bill, too. It must have been the cause of all this, since they, even Freddy, avoided it like the paper carried a pathogen.

"Read it," Chica said, sounding parched. "We did already. I kind of wish I hadn't." She retched, and Foxy worried her sister was going to vomit on their mail, but she held back. They were great actors, yet this was no act. None of them would ever joke about something like this. That made whatever she and Mike were about to get into even more disturbing. Then again, it came to them, not the other way around. Her husband didn't say a word, instead pursing his lips as she picked up the paper.

Her heart skipped a beat when she saw the handwriting. Though atrophied by years of disuse, she'd never forget the broad outlines of this cursive. Hardly anyone wrote in this style anymore, and it was a piece of evidence in determining who this person really was. Unfortunately, it was a person who she wished never entered their lives again. Her eye was magnetically drawn along the top line and through the rest of the prose.

To Those I Have Wronged,

Hello, everyone. It's Phil. I wanted to write to you all.

Assuming you haven't torn this letter up and thrown it away after reading that, I wanted to say I'm sorry. There will never be enough words to express exactly how I feel (and this shouldn't be about me beating myself up, anyway), so I'll leave it at that.

How are you doing? Well, I hope. I check Fazbear's website pretty often, and it lists Freddy, Bonnie, Chica, Foxy and Mary as the performers, so I'm happy none of you have died. Except Jeremy - I saw the little announcement you had on the site that the main mechanic died. Tell June I send my condolences. Unless you're reading this, June, in which case, hello. I never really got to know you, even as "Springtrap", but I hope you're handling this well. Your father seemed like a good guy.

It must be hard to deal with being the subject of legends and lore from people who spend too much time on the Internet - which I can relate to. I know there are a lot of weirdos who are obsessed with you guys (some in really fucked up ways), and I can only hope you've kept those people far away from you. Seems like you've mostly managed to stay under the radar, which I'm glad about.

Speaking of which, I guess I'm part of that, myself. I've been squatting for the last two years in Fazbear's Fright: The Horror Attraction. You know, the huge haunted house outside Salem, Oregon - pretty sure there are a few others, but this is the big, famous one that sometimes gets shown on TV. It's not a bad deal. I lay low most of the year, but I can actually interact with people during the operating season, which is going to start soon. I'm excited to have people to talk to. Don't worry, I don't make it weird. Exchanging a few words with people who see me as an actual person is enough.

That's all I have to say. I've had a few adventures and squatted in a few different places in Washington and Oregon - and Nevada one time - but it doesn't matter. What does is that I'm still around, and I wanted you all to know it. Not sure how often you wonder about that, but I am.

It was good to write this. I don't sound like a child; I haven't written or had a real conversation in so long; it feels odd to put my thoughts anywhere. If you want to talk more, though, I have a phone, and it'd be easier to communicate that way. The number is (971)-555-0128. I'm never busy, so you can call whenever.

Sincerely,

Phil

Her gaze lingered on his name for a few seconds before the paper slipped from her grasp, fluttering to the floor again. Even with the words fresh in her mind, she could scarcely believe she read them. It wasn't that she never expected Phil to try and worm his way back into their lives. No, she thought that'd happen someday (unless he died in the woods somewhere). But when it did, she thought it'd be in a stranger way - like, him physically returning as if nothing had happened.

Her second thought was wondering whether they should bother calling Helen. It took a moment, but she decided against it - though she'd need to talk to Mike and the others to hear their opinions. Foxy didn't want to drag the woman out of retirement for this. Besides, Phil wasn't really a threat to anyone except himself. The man had been broken beyond repair. This was proof enough; 17 years, and this was the first time he tried to say a word to them. Again, she had expected something like this to come much sooner than it did.

Good, she thought, sticking up her nose. Even as she thought that, though, she wondered how genuine the sentiment was. She rarely thought of Phil those days, and when she did, it was rarely to reflect on how much she despised him. Oh, she still hadn't forgiven him, and she probably never would. However, enough time had passed for antipathy to cool into more casual disgust. He wasn't some bugbear now that he had no power over them.

She looked at Mike, who finished picking his jaw off the floor. "T-thanks f-for calling," he muttered, clumsily picking up the papers and shoving them onto a table. Still needed to look through them and figure out what to toss.

"You're welcome," Freddy answered, more disturbed than she expected. Though stoic, Phil was one of the few topics to still him. "There's a lot to digest - I'm still doing that - but do you think this is related to… what Auric did?" Ah, Freddy must have seen the news on his phone, too. Less to explain.

"Uh, what'd Auric do?" Chica innocently asked, and Foxy felt herself cringe. Yeah, this would be a tough day. To answer Freddy's question, though - the one that she wanted to answer to avoid Chica's query - she answered plainly.

These things didn't seem connected. In fact, they couldn't have been. Phil must have sent the letter at least yesterday morning for it to have gotten to them that day, whereas Auric's kill hadn't been discovered until yesterday night. Auric hadn't bothered any of them in ages, so she doubted he'd let Phil in on his plans to start murdering again, more deranged than ever. It was a case of pure coincidence.

"Hey," Mike said, flipping his phone. The same map of the upcoming eclipse he'd shown her twice in the last few weeks dominated the screen. His finger pointed to a little dot. "Salem is, like, right in the total eclipse's p-path." Indeed it was. That meant the haunted house was, too. Foxy wasn't sure what that'd mean, if anything. But it was something they'd need to consider. It was a small enough band that anything within it raised her interest.

"We can deal with this later," she asserted, though her mind was torn in a dozen different directions. Between subtly investigating what Mary hid, mastering the ritual, arranging the ingredients in correct measures and getting Auric where they needed him, they had a challenging few weeks ahead. Couldn't afford to take their feet off the gas for a moment. For the time being, though, their main job was to master the chant.

After that… well, she didn't know what came next, but they'd cross that bridge soon enough. For the time being, it seemed like everyone was on the same page; nobody said anything if there was a different opinion. Mary, looking sullen, came in from outside. Foxy had no business speculating why (though the rogue in her kind of wanted to).

With luck, she and Mike would find out soon and on their own terms.