A/N: Hello, everyone! I do have at least one filler chapter I want to write (possibly two) that dive into more philosophical things and talk about the afterlife a bit (even if it's way too late for me to change how Hell works in this fic consider how deep we're into the fic already), but I couldn't really come up with the proper way to express my thoughts in a fanfic chapter yet.
So instead, I'm just going to talk about how the ghost kids are gonna keep an eye on the Mega Pizzaplex to make sure things stay stable. After all, just because the Grand Opening went off without a hitch, doesn't mean that things will stay in an ideal state indefinitely.
Chapter 222 – An Eye on the Pizzaplex
As the Schmidt family returned home, they couldn't help but feel a sense of satisfaction. They had spent most of the day at the Grand Opening, and it appeared to have been as successful as they could have realistically hoped for. Fazbear Entertainment appeared to have honored and stuck with the changes they had made before the Grand Opening, and none of the Glamrock animatronics had set off any red flags.
"Hell yeah!" Fritz exclaimed triumphantly as they gathered in the living room. "That was such a big win! Can you imagine just how much of a shitshow this would've been if we hadn't made all those changes?"
"I know, right?" Susie agreed emphatically. "I mean seriously, if we hadn't stepped in, the company in charge would've done really stupid crap like keeping all the fire exits blocked and locking everyone inside the building at night." She scowled. "I mean seriously, who the heck thought that was a good idea?"
Liz shuddered. "Don't remind me," she mumbled. "And that's not even getting into the Daycare Attendant and that stupid bouncer mode on DJ Music Man!"
"Yeah, we've all done some great work fixing the Mega Pizzaplex over the past couple of months," Mike complimented. "But just because we've been incredibly successful so far, doesn't mean that we can afford to be complacent. Glitchtrap is the obvious problem that we have to worry about, and even if he wasn't, Fazbear Entertainment might let the success of the Grand Opening get to their head and stop caring about safety in the Mega Pizzaplex."
"Dad is right," Gabe agreed. "We need to keep monitoring the Pizzaplex to make sure things stay okay, at least until we deal with Glitchtrap."
"That shouldn't be too hard, though!" Cassidy answered. "We can just fly over to the Mega Pizzaplex every day, right?"
Charlie shook her head. "It's not that easy, Cass," the former Marionette inhabitant warned. "Flying over long distances takes energy. That's one of the reasons why we have to anchor ourselves to Dad's car whenever he's driving."
"But we were able to fly around all sorts of crazy places!" Jeremy exclaimed with a confused look on his face. "We flew around Las Vegas, New York City, and even the freaking Grand Canyon! Those places are huge!"
"Yeah, because you did all of those only in a single day, and only for a couple of minutes at a time," Charlie pointed out. "But flying to a place that's 30 minutes away and back, every single day? That's gonna tire you guys out really quickly, you know. Just because you're ghosts, doesn't mean you have infinite energy to do whatever the heck you want all the time. Otherwise, I'd be able to cast magic all the time with no problems…" her expression darkened slightly, "and Glitchtrap wouldn't have any limits on what HE could do either."
Everyone shuddered at the implications of a Glitchtrap with infinite energy reserves. "Yeeeeeeeeeaaaah, probably for the best, then," Fritz muttered. "But how the heck are we gonna keep an eye on the Mega Pizzaplex? We can't all go there and keep an eye on the place every single day, right?"
"No," Mike agreed, "you can't. While having every single one of you guarding all the rooms of the Pizzaplex together sounds good in theory, it could end up being complete overkill. And what worries me more is the possibility that you'll all get tired at around the same time if I force you to fly over to the Pizzaplex every single day."
"Couldn't you drive us there?" Jeremy wondered. "We wouldn't have the energy problem if we could anchor ourselves to the car and you drove over there."
Mike shook his head. "No," he denied, "because that would draw unwanted attention to me. As far as Fazbear Entertainment is concerned, I don't have any kids. I'm just a single adult man who, as far as anyone knows, lives by myself. And I can tell you right now, solitary adults do NOT belong in a children's play place by themselves." He frowned as his expression darkened ever so slightly. "If there is a solitary adult staying at a children's entertainment place like the Pizzaplex for long periods of time, they're either working there as an employee…or a predator with evil intentions."
"Like William Afton?" Cassidy asked quietly.
"Or worse," Mike answered ominously, refusing to go into detail. The ghost kids shuddered, not wanting to think about what their father could possibly consider worse than mass murder. "I can visit the Mega Pizzaplex every so often just to make sure things are okay, but any more than that, and Fazbear Entertainment might get suspicious of me and start thinking that I'm a threat to the kids in the Pizzaplex." He chuckled humorlessly. "And the worst part is, I couldn't even blame them for having that kind of mentality, even if they'd be wrong."
"So it looks like most of the work on keeping an eye on the Pizzaplex would have to be done by us," Susie declared.
"Yeah, which is why we need to come up with a plan to keep a consistent eye on the Pizzaplex," Charlie insisted. "We might not be able to cover everything and everywhere at once, but that's better than having entire days where none of us are there because we're all resting." She scowled. "With our luck, that's the one day things go horribly wrong or Glitchtrap decides to act."
"We definitely want at least one person at the Pizzaplex at all times," Gabe agreed, "but I'm kinda worried that one of us won't be enough. The Pizzaplex is really huge, and even with our powers as ghosts it'll take one of us a while to fly around the entire thing to make sure that everything's okay."
"Yeah, there's no way one person can hope to keep track of everything at once," Liz agreed, before suggesting, "Maybe three of us should go at a time?"
"Ehhhh…" Mike scrunched his face as he thought about the idea. "But that would mean that most of you would be going to the Pizzaplex every other day. Granted, I don't really know all that much about ghost powers and energy reserves even after living with you guys for years, but I still feel like making you fly over to the Pizzaplex every other day also runs the risk of you guys all getting tired pretty quickly. And again, we really don't want to run into the situation where all of you are too exhausted to properly keep guard over the Pizzaplex. If you're exhausted, you can't think or react properly to sudden dangerous situations, and that's arguably just as bad as you guys not being there at all. Hell, in some situations, it can be actively worse."
"Then it sounds like the sweet spot is two people," Susie replied thoughtfully. "Two of us would go to the Pizzaplex every day to keep an eye on things, while the rest of us would be able to stay at home, rest up, and relax. We'd swap around who goes to the Pizzaplex, and if I'm counting things right, we'd each go about every 3 days."
"That sounds about right," Charlie agreed. "Technically there's 7 of us so it doesn't quite divide evenly, but close enough."
"I was going to have Charlie stay at home anyway so I could have someone to strategize with," Mike interrupted. "See if we can't find some way to expose Glitchtrap's possession victim early, or talk about how we should react to any major developments in the Pizzaplex."
"I can be an extra third pair of eyes every few days," Charlie volunteered. "If the house isn't too busy or nothing's really going on in the outside world, I don't mind helping you guys out."
"Works for me," Mike agreed. "I think this as good of a plan as we're gonna be able to come up with."
Jeremy still didn't look quite as certain. "Ummm…Dad…do you really think 2 people will be enough?" the former Bonnie inhabitant asked a bit nervously. "The Pizzaplex is still really big. It'll be hard to keep track of everything that's going on for just 2 people."
To his surprise, his father smiled in response. "Ah, but that's if you're operating under the assumption that every single room in the Pizzaplex deserves the same amount of attention. But that's not true, is there? Some parts of the Pizzaplex will be more crowded than others, or have more staff members watching over the kids than others. In open places like this with plenty of supervising adults around, it would be extremely difficult and downright stupid for Glitchtrap's possession victim to try anything openly. You don't need to spend as much time for some rooms and attractions as you do for others. Use your best judgment, all of you. If there's a room where you think that Glitchtrap's possession victim could try something funny with a lone kid who's caught out and exposed, focus more of your attention in those kinds of places."
Jeremy nodded, happy with Mike's response. "Yeah, that makes sense. I didn't really think of it like that before, Dad. Thanks."
"That isn't to say that you shouldn't ignore rooms entirely," Charlie clarified. "You never know when something bad might happen. You just need to prioritize and spend more time in some rooms more than others."
"And keep in mind that you're functionally serving as security guards," Mike advised. "You're not all-seeing, omnipotent entities who can see everything going on in the Pizzaplex at all times. You shouldn't beat yourselves up if something bad starts happening and you didn't happen to be there. What you SHOULD do is get your asses over to the crisis as quickly as possible, which you can do more quickly and easily because you're ghosts, think quickly but rationally about the crisis, and then deal with it appropriately.
"Like if an animatronic starts attacking people randomly?" Susie asked.
"Yeah," Mike nodded. "That's a good example. If an animatronic starts attacking people randomly, fly over to where it's happening as quickly as possible. Once you're there, you could either disable the animatronic outright or slow it down by hitting its weak spots on its endoskeleton or blasting it with your ghost powers that let you mess with electronics." He blinked. "Those powers don't hurt humans, right?"
Gabe blinked. "I don't…think so," he replied with a bit of uncertainty. "We used them to mess with the doors in the old pizza restaurant and screw around with your tablet as a prank, and I don't think we ever hurt you or anyone else with them. It's always been our actual, physical attacks that killed our victims."
"We might want to test that out a bit just to make absolutely sure our electricity powers don't hurt other people by accident," Charlie suggested, earning nods of agreement from everyone else.
"And remind me again, the animatronics have these buttons at the bottoms of both sides of their necks that lets you deactivate them immediately, right?" Fritz asked.
"Well, the isolated endoskeletons do," Mike corrected. "I'm not sure that the actual Glamrocks do…or if they use the same endoskeletons that the rest of the animatronics like the S.T.A.F.F. bots do."
"It would've been nice to get another look at the blueprints for the animatronics before the Grand Opening," Liz sighed. "Oh well. Guess we gotta make do with what we have."
"Do you have any other advice for us, Dad?" Cassidy asked.
"Yeah, just one other thing for now," Mike answered, giving them a serious look. "I don't expect us to find Glitchtrap's possession victim right away, but there's a chance that one of you gets lucky and finds out who she is. Now, if she's in the middle of doing something evil, like trying to kidnap or lure a victim away to kill, by all means stop her. Do whatever you can to save the kid."
"And try to keep her alive too, right?" Susie clarified. "Because she could still be an innocent victim in all this."
"Yes, try to keep her alive if possible," Mike affirmed. "Because unlike William Afton, she didn't start out as a depraved monster. For all we know, she was just a normal, innocent person who cluelessly stumbled into being brainwashed by Glitchtrap. If we can expose her or get her captured by the authorities, it would remove Glitchtrap as a threat from the Pizzaplex AND give us the opportunity to remove the brainwashing later on."
Mike grimaced. "I have a feeling that removing the brainwashing is gonna take some supernatural intervention," he acknowledged. "From Heaven or from the Nightmares. Either way, not something worth talking about until after we've removed Glitchtrap's possession victim as a threat."
"And while we do want to save Glitchtrap's possession victim if at all possible, keep in mind that your first and most important priority is keeping the children at the Pizzaplex safe," Charlie insisted. "If, God forbid, you end up in a truly messed up situation where your ONLY option is killing whoever Glitchtrap's possession victim is to save an innocent child from being killed, then go ahead and take that option."
"But make sure that this really IS your only option," Mike insisted. "Don't kill Glitchtrap's possession victim just because it'll make your job easier. We want to try and save as many people as possible, including her."
"Yeah, I get that," Gabe agreed. "She's an innocent person too, at the end of the day. And the whole point of our redemption quest is to make up for killing innocent people."
"We'll do what we can to stop her while keeping her alive," Susie promised. "That's how we can really prove that we're not gonna just go back to killing night guards anymore."
"Good," Mike praised with a smile that quickly faded into a more businesslike expression. "But going back to what I was saying originally. If you find out who Glitchtrap's possession victim is and she ISN'T doing something that requires you to intervene immediately, DON'T confront her," he warned. "Fall back and let the rest of us know who she is and what her job is in the Pizzaplex if she has one, so that we can plan out how we're going to deal with her."
"Wait…so you DON'T want us to go after her right away?" Fritz asked with a hint of disappointment in his voice.
"No," Mike shook his head. "If there's only one or two of you, Glitchtrap's possession victim can more easily escape from whatever trap or attack you have planned. And then both she and Glitchtrap will be alerted to your presence, or at the very least a lot warier of anything else we might try in the future. Glitchtrap has a major advantage right now that we don't know who his possession victim is, but the opposite is also true. Glitchtrap has no clue that you guys are still around and working to undo his mess. Hell, our secrecy advantage is arguably even greater than his, since we at least know there IS a female possession victim, while Glitchtrap so far has no idea that you guys even exist."
"The moment you choose to go after Glitchtrap's possession victim, you are effectively giving up that advantage," Charlie warned. "Even if he only finds out that one or two of you exist, he's going to be a lot more paranoid that there might be others like you around."
"If you're going to give that advantage up, it better for a very good reason," Mike concluded with an intense tone. "Like she's about to murder a kid, and you have to act immediately to stop them. Once you act openly against Glitchtrap's possession victim directly, the cat's out of the bag, so we want to make sure that we're stopping a major crisis immediately or have a solid plan to make sure we neutralize her as a threat once and for all."
"You're right, Dad," Jeremy agreed. "We can't go after Glitchtrap's possession victim slip through our fingers."
"We'll make sure we talk with everyone here first before acting," Cassidy promised.
"And we'll only act immediately if we absolutely need to," Liz added fervently.
Mike grinned. "Excellent," he declared. "I'm glad to see that we're all on the same page. And like I said before, I don't think things are immediately going to go to shit, after what we saw at the Mega Pizzaplex's Grand Opening. But we all know that Glitchtrap's going to act sooner or later, and having two of you keep an eye on things every day will help us get ready for when he eventually does."
"I guess the only question left to answer is, who's going to be the first pair to go to the Pizzaplex tomorrow?" Susie asked.
"I'll help out whoever goes tomorrow," Charlie offered. "If anybody wants to volunteer."
Fritz blinked for a few seconds, and then shrugged. "Eh, fuck it. I'll go." He turned to Liz. "Wanna come with?"
"Yeah, let's do this, Fritz," Liz agreed without any hesitation.
"All right, we have our first two volunteers!" Mike declared. "Here's what you'll want to look out for…"
Meanwhile, At an Unknown Location…
"It seems that the Grand Opening was a success," Glitchtrap mused. "Just as we expected."
As much as he hated to admit it, the Mega Pizzaplex's Grand Opening was certainly a demonstration of competence that Fazbear Entertainment had almost never displayed in the past. Even if he was certain that it had only come to pass because of Mike Schmidt's interference, he still had to give credit where credit was due.
"Now that the Mega Pizzaplex has officially opened, we're going to strike soon, right?" Vanny asked.
"Patience, my dear," Glitchtrap chided. "The successful opening of the Mega Pizzaplex will eventually lure those foolish executives into a false sense of security, but we do not yet have a window of opportunity to attack. I had expected Fazbear Entertainment to rely on those flawed and easily exploitable S.T.A.F.F. bots, yet they have hired many more human staff members than I expected. And we cannot rely on them to look the other way when we begin our work on the Glamrock animatronics, especially with how closely they are looked after and cared for within the Pizzaplex. Unsurprising given their immense importance to the very existence of the Pizzaplex, but certainly irritating."
"At least we have plenty of spare endoskeletons to work with," Vanny helpfully pointed out. "They aren't watched over nearly as carefully as the Glamrocks. It should be easy for me to reprogram them to do what you want them to do, master."
"True," Glitchtrap acknowledged, "but even then, it will take a while for us to change their programming to suit our purposes. And given their complete lack of subtlety, their use as attackers is rather poor unless we have many of them active at once."
"And we also have the prototype DJ Music Man bots too!" Vanny added. "They'll be able to attack anyone that crawls in the vents!"
"Yes, for all the good that will do us," Glitchtrap retorted. "Fazbear Entertainment actually bothered to place grates over their vents. A practice that I am very surprised by, given their utterly pathetic track record with their previous establishments. While an animatronic such as the Glamrocks would be able to easily lift open the grates, it is very unlikely that a foolish child will crawl into those vents on their own."
"Then what are we going to do?" Vanny asked petulantly. "We don't have anything to work with!"
Glitchtrap chuckled inside her head. "Oh, on the contrary, my dear. I was reviewing the job listings for the Mega Pizzaplex," he explained. "It appears that, within just a few weeks, the Mega Pizzaplex will be hiring someone to monitor the Pizzaplex at night, very much like those foolish night guards in the distant past. This is a perfect opportunity for us, my sweet, as it will give you the opportunity to work on reprogramming the machines of the Pizzaplex uninterrupted."
"So you want me to sign up for the night guard position?" Vanny clarified.
"Indeed, and as soon as hirings begin," Glitchtrap affirmed. "Being the sole night guard in the Pizzaplex will at the very least give us plenty of time to hack more endoskeletons completely uninterrupted, and perhaps we will find a way to twist more important animatronics like the DJ Music Man or the Daycare Attendant in time."
"But what about the Glamrocks?" Vanny replied uncertainly. "They're the most important animatronics out of all of them!"
"You are correct, but with how much scrutiny the company has placed on them given their importance, hacking them while they are in the Pizzaplex is risky," Glitchtrap answered. "The other engineers and programmers who work at the Pizzaplex may detect and reverse any…irregularities…and with you being the only night shift employee, they would more than likely place their suspicions on you. No, it would not be wise for you to attempt to hack the Glamrock animatronics within the Pizzaplex itself."
"Then how are we going to get to them?" Vanny questioned, clearly confused. "There's no way we can truly continue our work without the Glamrocks."
Vanny could feel a sinister grin form on Glitchtrap's face inside her mind. "Not at the Pizzaplex, no. But as it so happens, according to the schedules that I have read, the Glamrock animatronics are periodically removed from the Pizzaplex and taken to a warehouse for more extensive maintenance beyond what Fazbear Entertainment is capable of performing here. A warehouse a few miles away where the protections will almost certainly be more relaxed and we will have a much greater opportunity to add our own…special adjustments to the Glamrocks," Glitchtrap explained, before quickly adding. "Assuming, of course, that Schmidt isn't working there as well. And so far, I have seen and heard nothing to suggest that this is the case."
Vanny giggled. "Ohhhh…I see, master. If we can't hack the Glamrocks at the Pizzaplex, then we do it elsewhere."
"Now you are seeing my true plan," Glitchtrap answered approvingly. "Even in the worst-case scenario, where the Pizzaplex's engineers are intelligent and discerning enough to discover and correct our adjustments, if we do them over at an outside facility, then they at least will not be able to track them to us." He chuckled. "That is, of course, assuming that they are indeed capable of detecting or correcting our programming changes. Which I highly doubt is the case, given Fazbear Entertainment's sordid history. And wouldn't you know it, but the first of these extended maintenance sessions will be occurring shortly before the night guard position opens. A prime opportunity, to be sure."
"Then I'll get into contact with my bosses about getting that night position as soon as I get the chance," Vanny affirmed.
"See that you do once the chance arrives," Glitchtrap interrupted. "Until then, be careful and do nothing to draw unwanted attention." Now, Vanny could picture a frown appear on her master's face. "I do not have any concrete evidence to confirm this, but for some reason, I have a sneaking suspicion that we are being watched." For the first time, a hint of uncertainty appeared in his voice. "I do not know why I feel this way. Schmidt has no reason to suspect your existence, and there are no other competent enemies that I am aware of. Yet for some reason, I feel as though there is someone or something else trying to find us that we are not aware of. Until we are ready to strike, do nothing openly that could expose you as a threat to the Pizzaplex."
"Understood, master," Vanny nodded her head in acknowledgement of his orders.
"Good," Glitchtrap's grin returned. "We may have faced more setbacks in the past than I would have cared to admit, but this time, nothing will stop us!"
/
A/N: This chapter is more or less meant to highlight how the Schmidt family and Glitchtrap/Vanny are gonna be spending the weeks leading up to the events of Security Breach. I probably won't write any chapters actually showing the ghost kids taking up the role of invisible ghost guards at the Mega Pizzaplex, because that would more or less be a dumbed down version of the Grand Opening and that wouldn't be fun or interesting for either the readers or myself.
It's rather interesting to note that both the Schmidt family AND Glitchtrap/Vanny have the advantage of secrecy over each other. The Schmidts don't know who Glitchtrap's possession victim actually is, and Glitchtrap/Vanny don't know about the ghost kids. Granted, Glitchtrap does have a vague suspicion that he has other potential enemies he may have to worry about besides Mike Schmidt, but this is nothing more than a hunch currently; he certainly doesn't know that there's seven ghost kids trying to expose him, let alone that they're his previous victims. I would say the Schmidt family has a more robust secrecy advantage overall since they at least know about Glitchtrap and that he's possessing a female worker. But so far, both parties maintain that crucial advantage over each other in their own ways, and neither of them is willing to give up that advantage unless they absolutely have to.
Like I mentioned at the beginning of the chapter, there'll be at least one, maybe two filler chapters that are more serious and philosophical in nature than the typical filler chapter in this fic, and then it's straight to Security Breach we go!
That's all I have for now, and I hope you guys enjoyed!