A/N: I honestly can't tell if is still messed up. I understand that this fic isn't garnering as much attention as it did in its heyday, and I acknowledge that. But only 2 reviews on a chapter specifically meant to address a topic that multiple readers expressed concerns about on AOx3 seems rather unusual. Of course, those readers expressed their concerns on a different website, which might be the problem.
Anyways, it's time to advance the plot some more! Up until now, things have been pretty quiet and peaceful on the Mega Pizzaplex front. I think it's time we…shake things up, shall we say?
Chapter 226 – Losing Control
It started on a day like any other. Susie and Jeremy had been the ones assigned to patrol duty at the Mega Pizzaplex today, and in the beginning there hadn't been any red flags with any of the Glamrock animatronics or the other animatronics like the Daycare Attendant or DJ Music Man that any of them could identify.
"Geez, nothing's going on right now," Jeremy groaned. He glanced over at the stage and saw that the Glamrock animatronics had already vacated it and started mingling with the kids. "Oh hey, guess they've already started hanging out with the other kids."
"Hey, Jeremy?" Susie tugged at her brother's arm and pointed at Glamrock Chica. "What's Glamrock Chica doing over there?"
"Let's take a closer look," Jeremy replied, and the two ghosts flew closer, making sure to keep their presences hidden. Glamrock Chica was standing in front of a group of kids sitting around a table, upon which multiple pizzas were placed.
"I smell pizza!" Glamrock Chica exclaimed cheerfully, her eyes focused on the closest pizza right in front of her. "And there's no better way to celebrate a birthday than with our very special pizza!"
The kids cheered as the former Bonnie inhabitant shrugged. "I mean, so far, I don't see anything too strange…" he began.
"In fact, our pizza is so good, I'm going to eat some of it right now!" Glamrock Chica declared.
"Wait, WHAT?" Susie gasped, and she wasn't the only one. Completely taken by surprise, the group of kids (both living and dead) could only watch as Glamrock Chica took a chunk of pizza as large as three slices and ate them. "Mmmmmm!" the chicken animatronic gushed. "It's so delicious!"
"Chica! Why did you eat our pizzas?" a boy asked plaintively.
Glamrock Chica blinked. "Oh…I, uh…" she stammered.
"Chica!" a deeper voice interrupted. Everyone turned to see an older male employee walking up to them, giving a judgmental look towards the chicken animatronic. And given what she'd just done, neither Jeremy nor Susie could honestly blame him for it. "What are you doing?" he asked with a frown. "Why are you trying to eat a pizza? You aren't physically capable of eating it! All you're doing is making a giant mess!"
"I…I'm sorry," Glamrock Chica apologized. Even though her mouth was full of pizza, her voice could still be heard through her beak. Likely because she had a speaker instead of an actual human mouth. "I don't know what came over me." She turned to her audience, who were looking shocked and confused at seeing the animatronic try to eat a pizza. "I hope I didn't ruin things for you."
"It's okay, Glamrock Chica," a girl, who Jermey guessed was the birthday girl, reassured her. "You can have those slices. We've still got plenty more!"
"Aww, thank you, dear…" Chica gratefully replied. "You're so kind and generous."
"All right, Chica," the employee grumbled. "Let's go take you down to maintenance so we can clean you up. You can't be going around the Pizzaplex with pizza in your mouth."
"Sorry we have to cut this short," Glamrock Chica apologized to the kids. "You can talk to any one of my friends to continue the party, though!"
As the employee guided Chica away, Jeremy and Susie looked at each other confusion. "What…just happened?" Susie asked slowly as the kids, disappointed by the animatronic leaving, started taking pizza slices and eating them to distract themselves.
"Glamrock Chica tried to eat a pizza slice," Jeremy explained, before amending his statement slightly. "Actually, she tried to eat three slices at the same time."
"Did she…ever do that before?" Susie wondered, her voice filled with uncertainty.
Jeremy shook his head. "I never saw her do that," he answered. "And nobody else did either."
"Do you think that…this is a sign that Glitchtrap's starting to mess with the Glitchtrap animatronics?" Susie asked worriedly.
"I…can't ignore the possibility," Jeremy acknowledged, before continuing, "but we just don't know for sure yet. Glamrock Chica eating pizza is really weird and might be Glitchtrap screwing with her programming…or it could just be a quirk or a glitch in her AI." He raised an eyebrow at his sister. "The old Chica ate pizza too while you were in her, remember?"
"Yeah, but I was controlling her to do that!" Susie pointed out with a pout. "She never did that on her own!"
Jeremy snickered. "I know, I' m just messing with you," he replied, before his expression turned more serious. "We need to keep an eye out, though. If Glamrock Chica acting weird about the pizzas IS because of Glitchtrap, he might've messed with the other animatronics too."
"Oh yeah, for sure," Susie agreed.
They continued to fly around the Main Atrium, keeping a careful eye on the Glamrock animatronics that were going around meeting with the kids. Glamrock Freddy soon came around to visit the same birthday party that Glamrock Chica had tried and failed to entertain. To both Jeremy's and Susie's relief, the bear animatronic and the leader of the Glamrocks didn't demonstrate any irregular behaviors. He cheered up the children who had been disappointed by Glamrock Chica's early departure and wished the birthday girl a Happy Birthday.
"Oh, thank God," Jeremy breathed a sigh of relief as Glamrock Freddy moved on. "Glamrock Freddy still seems normal, at least. He seems like the nicest guy out of all the Glamrocks. If HE started acting weird, I'd start having a really bad feeling about all this."
"Yeah," Susie agreed. "I'll always like Chica the most, but this version of Freddy might be my favorite of all time."
They watched the Glamrocks interact with the audience, until several minutes later, they were called back to the stage for a break. "Oh, actually, one of us should go check on DJ Music Man and the Daycare Attendant again. I know they were fine earlier, but after seeing Glamrock Chica try to eat pizza like that, I think it's worth giving them another look."
"I'll go," Susie volunteered. Jeremy nodded his head, and the girl went off to their respective locations to make sure that they weren't demonstrating any irregular behavior. DJ Music Man was still chilling and vibing at his station, looking as unthreatening as he could be given his unnatural appearance, and Eclipse was watching over a group of sleeping kids protectively in the middle of naptime. Neither of them demonstrated any odd behaviors after a few minutes of observation, and Susie left the Daycare Attendant to take care of the kids in the Daycare as the lights back on and she came back to the Main Atrium and Jeremy. "Nothing going on with those two," she reported.
"Yeah, not much has been going on here either," Jeremy answered back as Susie rejoined him. "I'm starting to think that maybe Glamrock Chica's little pizza incident was just a one-time thing."
Susie groaned. "Oh, don't say that out loud!" she scolded. "That's just tempting fate, right there!"
"Oh shoot, you're right…" Jeremy mumbled. And as if the universe was mocking him, a commotion suddenly broke out a few tables down from where they were floating. "Wait, what?" he turned his head towards the commotion. "What's going on over there?"
The two ghosts flew towards another birthday table, where Roxanne Wolf and a kid were…seemingly arguing. "I AM the best!" the wolf animatronic was boasting in front of a boy. "Who doesn't love a keytar-playing rock star wolf?"
"Nuh-uh!" the boy was firing back. "You're not the coolest! Glamrock Freddy is!"
"Freddy?" Roxanne Wolf snorted. "What does that dumb bear have compared to me? Everything about me is beautiful! My hair is beautiful, my tail is beautiful, my makeup is beautiful! I'm the number one animatronic in this building and all of my fans know it!"
"I still think Freddy is the coolest!" the boy argued back. "He's the best singer ever! And he doesn't have a place that's closed down! If you're the greatest, then why is your Raceway closed down?"
"Well listen here, kid!" Roxanne Wolf snapped, and both Jeremy and Susie could clearly see the genuine irritation in her eyes for the first time. "It's not my fault there's that stupid sinkhole that's messing with my raceway! It's not my fault that the best part of this Pizzaplex is blocked to the public because someone didn't build it properly! It's not my fault that I have to watch all the kids here go off and enjoy themselves in places built for everyone else, while I have to sit here with my arms crossed knowing that nobody's gonna get to ride around in the raceway because of something I don't have any control over!" she was practically shouting by the end of her rant.
The boy backed away slightly from Roxanne, his eyes widening as he looked both overwhelmed and at least a little fearful by the wolf animatronic's tirade. To her credit, Roxy seemed to realize that she had been too harsh and sighed, her expression softening. "Look, kid…I'm sorry," she apologized. "I've just been really frustrated over the whole mess with the Raceway. I shouldn't be taking this out on you." She shook her head. "I don't know why I started ranting like that. Usually, I'm better at keeping a lid on things than this."
"It's…it's okay," the boy comforted her. "I wish the Raceway was open too. You're still cool, I just like Freddy more."
"Yeah…I get it," Roxy admitted. "Maybe I need to take a breather for a bit. I'll see you around, okay, kid?"
"Okay!" the boy replied cheerfully as the wolf animatronic walked off to go back to her green room.
Jeremy and Susie were both silent for several moments as they processed what they had just witnessed. "Was that…normal?" Susie was the first to break the silence, but it was clear from her tone that she had already guessed what the answer was.
"Not at all," Jeremy confirmed her suspicions. "I know Roxy has a bit of a proud streak based on what we've seen of her and what everyone else told us, but I don't think she ever lashed out at a kid like this." He frowned. "This is the second animatronic we've seen today who's been acting weird."
"I don't like this," Susie mumbled. "The Glamrock animatronics were acting fine until today, and suddenly they're acting weird? I'm really starting to think Glitchtrap messed with them in some way, even if he didn't straight-up turn them into murder machines."
"It could just be a coincidence…" Jeremy suggested hesitantly…but from the skeptical look Susie was giving him, it was clear that she didn't believe that explanation any more than he did. "Oh, who am I kidding, something's definitely wrong. Even if it's not Glitchtrap, there's still something going on. What's the word Dad used…oh, right, malfunction."
"I think we definitely need to tell the others about this after we're done today," Susie declared. "That Old Man Consequences guy told Dad that we'd know soon if our big moment is coming."
"Well, before we do that, we need to make sure Monty Gator doesn't do anything weird," Jeremy pointed out. "He's the only Glamrock animatronic we haven't really paid any attention to yet."
"Oh, right. We were so busy with the others we kinda forgot about him," Susie acknowledged.
Unfortunately, the Glamrocks were all leaving the Atrium for a break, so they wouldn't get a chance to see Monty Gator interact with any of the kids in the main performance room for a while. This time, Jeremy was the one to check on DJ Music Man and the Daycare Attendant, while Susie decided to visit Monty's Gator Golf to see if Monty Gator had gone there by any chance. Once again, however, their investigations didn't yield anything unusual…and by now, Jeremy and Susie didn't know whether to feel relieved or concerned by this development.
"Hey, look!" Susie pointed towards the exit of the Main Atrium that led towards the green rooms. "Monty's coming back! Let's keep an eye on him while he's going around with the kids!"
"You got it," Jeremy affirmed. "But keep an eye on Roxanne Wolf and Glamrock Chica too, now that she's back from getting her beak cleaned."
"Yeah, to see if they go haywire again," Susie agreed.
The two ghost kids continued to watch the Glamrocks interact with more children. To their relief, neither Glamrock Chica nor Roxanne Wolf demonstrated the same irregular behaviors that they had noticed earlier in the day, although they both noted that the Glamrocks seemed to be demonstrating more awareness and a visible effort to control their own behaviors compared to before.
And then, right as Jeremy and Susie were about to give Monty Gator a pass like they had for Glamrock Freddy…
"Hey, mister!" A boy shouted out to Monty Gator.
"Huh?" Monty Gator turned to look at the child who had called to him. "Oh, hey, kid!" He walked up to the kid. "What's up?"
"You've got some really cool teeth!" the boy complimented. "They're so sharp and they look badass!"
Monty chuckled. "Yeah, they really make me look like a true badass, huh? Thanks, kid."
"I wanna touch your teeth!" the boy declared. "I wanna see if they're really as sharp as they look!"
"Wait, what?" Monty Gator exclaimed. "Whoa, hey kid, you can't do that! No touching my fangs allowed!"
"But I wanna!" the boy complained. Then, before Monty or anyone else could stop him, the boy reached out and touched Monty's fangs.
"Hey, what the heck, kid?" Monty shouted angrily. "I told you you couldn't do that, it's against the rules!"
"Nuh-uh! I'm gonna keep touching them because I wanna!" the boy protested. "And I wanna touch your glasses too!" Without warning, the kid reached out and grabbed Monty's glasses, trying to swipe them off the gator's eyes.
"All right, that's it, kid!" he growled. "I'd had enough!" Monty reached out and grabbed the boy's arm…harder than he had clearly intended, because the boy suddenly shouted in pain.
"Owwwww!" the boy cried out in pain. "Why did you do that, Monty? That hurt!"
"Oh, shoot!" Monty muttered, realizing what had just happened and letting the arm go immediately. "Shoot, kid, I didn't mean to grab your arm that hard!"
"You didn't have to grab my arm that hard!" the boy sobbed as he held his arm. "It hurts!"
Monty (and unbeknownst to him, both Jeremy and Susie) checked on the kid's arm to make sure there weren't any major injuries. Thankfully, it didn't look like Monty had accidentally broken or disfigured the kid's arm in any obvious way, although they could still see the red mark on his arm where Monty had grabbed him. "Well kid, sorry for hurting you, but you really shouldn't have broken the rules like that!" he scolded. "You could've gotten into an even worse accident if I clamped my mouth down on your hand. And don't you know that stealing from other people is wrong? How'd you like it if I stole your birthday hat?"
The boy sulked as Monty sighed. "All right, kid, I'll take you over to the nurse's station. Make sure I didn't hurt you worse than it looks. It's the least I can do."
He proceeded to escort the boy over to the nurse's station, with both Jeremy and Susie following to make sure he didn't malfunction and attack the boy in some way. Monty took the boy to the nurse's station, and left to go back to the Atrium. "What the heck is wrong with me?" the gator growled underneath his breath, unaware that he had an audience of two ghosts listening to him. "I know how to deal with kids grabbing at me with their grubby mitts when they shouldn't be. I know how strong I need to be when handling them. How the hell did I make a mistake like that? I'm lucky I didn't crush that kid's bones by accident!"
Jeremy and Susie looked at each other in alarm as Monty walked back to the Atrium, looking noticeably more dejected than before. "Okay…" Susie said what they were both thinking out loud, "NOW we have a problem."
"Monty pretty much said it all," Jeremy agreed with growing concern. "Not only did he accidentally hurt a kid, he straight-up said that he normally knows how to handle kids properly so that kind of thing shouldn't even be happening in the first place. So how the hell did something like that even happen?"
"And did Monty seem kind of…angrier to you?" Susie asked worriedly. "I mean, the way he shouted just before he grabbed that kid's arm and started yelling at him…that isn't normal, is it?"
Jeremy shook his head. "No, it isn't," he replied grimly. "I know Monty's always had a bit of a rougher edge compared to some of the animatronics…but I don't remember him ever shouting at a kid like that…and he definitely never hurt a kid like that before. Heck, NONE of the Glamrock animatronics ever hurt anybody like that before, even by accident."
"And with all the other Glamrock animatronics besides Freddy acting weird in some way…" Susie grimaced. "Jeremy, I've got a bad feeling like this."
"I think you're right," her brother answered with a serious tone. "I know the Mega Pizzaplex closes at 9 PM, but I think we should leave earlier and let everyone else know what's going on. I think it might be a good idea for us to check back in at the Pizzaplex after the public is gone and see if there's anything suspicious that happens without anybody around."
"Yeah," Susie agreed. "And we might need the backup if Glitchtrap and whoever he's possessing try to pull off something major."
The two ghost children would continue their surveillance until around 7 PM, which was when the Glamrock animatronics would finish their last performance, after which they left the Pizzaplex and flew home. Since they lacked the teleportation capability that Cassidy did, they would have to rely on their natural flight. And although they had long mastered that basic ghost power, it still took them several minutes to fly back home.
"Guys!" Jeremy and Susie flew into the house through the front door, surprising the other members of their family with their shouts. "We've got a problem!"
"What?" Charlie asked in surprise as she and the rest of the family gathered in the living room. "What's going on?"
"We were looking over the Glamrock animatronics today," Jeremy answered grimly, "and they're acting in weird ways that just aren't normal." Together, he and Susie described all the abnormal behaviors and malfunctions that they had witnessed throughout the day from all the Glamrock animatronics. Their siblings and father looked concerned, but their expressions turned into outright shock when they described how Monty had accidentally hurt a kid, and how he had been lucky to not have caused a major injury. "I really think we should go back and take a look at the Pizzaplex once the public is gone," Jeremy concluded once and Susie had finished their report.
"I really don't like this," Mike commented grimly. "To quote that one James Bond movie…once is happenstance, twice is coincidence, three times is enemy action. We can't ignore this, especially after a kid got hurt. I agree, I think this warrants a late-night investigation to see if anything suspicious happens after the public is gone."
"Well, I'm ready to go!" Fritz volunteered. "I've been doing basically nothing all day!"
"And I'll go with you," Liz added. "I think it was gonna be my turn to check up on the Pizzaplex tomorrow anyway."
"Well, hold up," Mike interrupted. "Part of me is hoping that this is nothing, but if this is really what I'm worried it is, Glitchtrap starting to take action, we may need more than just two of you. I'd like to have all of us on standby just in case this turns out to be much bigger than we expected."
"You mean the plan we talked about to make sure you don't look suspicious, Dad?" Charlie asked knowingly.
"Yep, found a diner I can eat at and a hotel I can stay at, and I'll make sure to make my presence well-known in the lobby and with the staff so that I'll have an alibi in case Fazbear Entertainment learns I was around the Pizzaplex and tries to accuse me of anything," Mike affirmed. "Not that I intend to personally approach the Pizzaplex at all unless shit has well and truly hit the fan, and I have no choice."
"Then we should get going as soon as possible," Gabe declared. "We've only got about an hour or two until the Pizzaplex closes to the public." An idea suddenly occurred to him. "If Glitchtrap IS making movements, we might FINALLY be able to learn who his possession victim is."
"And knowing is half the battle," Mike agreed. He left for a few seconds, and when he came back he was carrying a travel suitcase behind him as he put on his jacket. "Let's go."
/
A/N: Well, things had to start going wrong eventually, and the events of Security Breach are rapidly approaching. At least in this timeline, Vanny and Glitchtrap haven't already gone on a killing spree since they had to take things slow to avoid Mike's notice. And Fazbear Entertainment isn't as incompetent so that'll help too, even if they're only less competent because they didn't have a choice otherwise.
As you can see, the glitchy corruption that Glitchtrap introduced to the Glamrock animatronics is starting to kick in. Thankfully, no one has gotten grievously injured or killed yet because of it. Monty Gator arguably had the most dangerous malfunction, but I didn't want to portray him as a child killer either. Even if you go with the least sympathetic and most villainous interpretation where he deliberately engineered Glamrock Bonnie's destruction and tried to replace Glamrock Freddy, that doesn't necessarily mean he wanted to kill children pre-Glitchtrap corruption.
That's all I have for now. Hope you guys enjoyed!