Chapter Text
Sun considered himself very good at his job. And he loved it!
But it’d been months now of running at a tremendous velocity just to keep up with the daily demands meant for two. He governed the playtime and craft activities as well as the ever-important snack time – all as was his design – and he was great at it if he did say so himself! But now he was also in charge of leading the naptime hours, and he was lucky if he could even get them to be quiet hours let alone run for any longer than ten minutes.
Sun didn’t blame the children, no no not at all. He couldn’t imagine it to be very easy for his active little tykes to rest when the Daycare lights barely even dialled down to dim. But he had to try, every day and every time, because that was how the Daycare ran. It’s how it’s always run.
Though the massive spike in cranky, sleep-deprived tantrums to handle were wearing him thin.
Sun wasn’t a quitter though. He was good at this. He could do this. He had to be able to keep up until things were set back to rights. If he didn’t, he- well, he just would! They wouldn’t have to worry about replacing them or- or- or decommission because Sun could absolutely keep up and Maintenance will find what’s troubling Moon any day now. And then they and the Daycare would go completely back to normal and it would be fine.
As an animatronic he was technically tireless. He shouldn’t feel a weariness that ached deep into his frame. So he told himself he didn’t. And really tried to believe it.
Closing time had been bad enough. Sun knew it meant that ever-creeping onset was hiding right around the corner and he dreaded every awful minute leading up to it. So much so that, as soon as the last child waved goodbye and the large doors closed, Sun clamoured into action.
There were only so few hours between closing and the final lockdown, and oh so much to clean. If he just cleaned and cleaned he couldn’t think about the building anticipation for each hourly blip that would pepper his night after midnight. They were inevitable. He knew because he already tried everything to stop them.
It was easier if he just didn’t think about it, or acknowledge it, or have anything to do with it whatsoever.
Oh but then. But then. What a terrible, horrible night. He could scarcely wish to think about it!
The actions of one little boy set off a whole chain reaction of awful. His dread for the hourly blanks turned into outright fear, one which left him checking himself over and over and over again for any sign, any hint, that worst had come to worst when he came back to awareness alone in the middle of the Daycare play floor.
The terrible feelings he wasn’t supposed to think about compounded so much worse in every hour’s aftermath. He had cleaned and cleaned between them to drive it away as he always would but he’d already been so thorough there was nothing left to busy with.
It was all just so far out of his control. He just, just… he couldn’t do anything.
Sun had no choice but to hide in his room and scrunch himself up so tight there’d simply be no space for such terrible sensations to persist. It was all he could think of, lest he be driven to misery and madness.
He was meant to be a being of exuberance. Of joy and happiness and fun. If he was none of that- what was he at all? It was in these moments Sun felt he was most adrift, losing sense and sight of any part of his world making sense. He didn’t like fumbling down these neural pathways at all. He wanted to fall back on the naivety of foundation programs but they were as floaty and distant as everything else.
Sun shook and crushed himself down harder, forcing his solutions with desperately childish petulance. He did not want to think about the bitter quiet and the aching gaps and the crippling loneliness of being a half without a whole.
He didn’t have it in him tonight.
The upset was making him overheat. It was even clouding his vision. An undercurrent of feedback urged him to act and correct but could not bring himself to care enough. It itched and wiggled through his code but it was cold and uncaring and unkind and nothing like what it should be.
That silence in him stirred.
Stirred in a way it had not in a long time. Not since Sun had to enforce the new rule and Moon became so bitter, cold-shouldered and angry that he left. For the briefest instant, Sun feared he finally cracked under his own pressure – to simulate a phantom of what he wanted so perfectly it felt real.
Something’s wrong.
He jolted, fingers clattering to press against his face. That was even more- he couldn’t fake that-
There is! There has been! Please tell me what, help me understand so I can help you. His rays quivered and spun, elated that Moon was actually talking again even if it meant he had to start with such terrible facts and awful, unhappy questions. Moon’s complete shutdown and refusal before made it otherwise impossible. But this! This was an opportunity at last. And Sun was nothing if not desperate.
No… no, yes, but no…
His other half wavered, sluggish and slow as if he has not been awake in a very long time. Which was preposterous. Moon ran rampant every hour in the night and Sun could not stop that. He made it safe within the Daycare, but he couldn’t prevent security measures beyond it.
Yet Moon’s sublevel buzz beneath their fronting system poured back into the space it had so coldly left behind. Sun almost wept under the familiarity of its return. So empty it had been. So empty and silent and alone. It took every ounce of willpower to not collide his own against it. That comforting mingle of code had been the cruellest part for Moon to take.
Something is wrong. He repeated, strengthening with clarity.
Yes! Sun stressed the syllable as if that would make him better understood. I want to help you, Moon. Please don’t push me out anymore, I can help. I just need to know what’s wrong.
Fire.
Secondary archives chimed against mains, murmuring alerts and warnings and procedures to undertake with immediate action. Sunny blinked, the line-up already underway because Moon was always quicker and he was there now and doing it as if he’d never stopped at all.
Sunny began to wring his hands and wrists and bells and hands and wrists and bells and hands and-
Don’t be silly! We’d be informed of such an emergency. T-this is no time for jokes, I’m trying to be very serious!
Discontent rustled from his counterpart. We’re cut off. No one has communications.
Sun leapt to his feet.
“That’s no good! Really not good at all! Someone must be told right away. We should do that!” He wheeled back on his heels. “No, no, we can’t, we have to stay, it’s not safe yet. So- oh- so first- first we have to talk! Please can we talk this out?” His fans were working overtime to cool him now. He swiped his face to correct the fog in his optics, and again when it did not make a difference. Whining in frustration Sun grappled the drapes to the balcony and stepped out to recalibrate under better light.
He was struck by an incredible heat.
Smoke eddied across the ceiling.
There was fire in the Daycare.
An avalanche of warning overwhelmed him, freezing him in his tracks. The strength he felt himself shoved with failed to rend it.
MOVE!
Sun remained rooted.
Then they were plummeting, when and how he didn’t understand but the horror that he had just thrown them over the edge left him reeling. They didn’t hit the ball pit. They were sprawled on the floor of their room but the walls were so distant when he moved without moving and there Sunny realised he wasn’t in front. But he was still awake, still aware, a re-binding frazzle of code struggling to reorient into a state he hadn’t shared since everything turned so wrong.
Moon had forced him out. And the shift was seamless.
It was fortunate their quarters were dim.
Moon launched down the hidden hall before he’d even fully calibrated, spitting them into the depths of the Daycare theatre and scrambling in double time to locate the nearest fire escape. They held no requirements to meet beyond it. He’d already cleared the queue.
Yet Sunny nearly swept his feet out from under them. We have to find the others!
The others will know! They will evacuate! Moon hissed, vying to stay in front and coordinate. An arm spasmed between them to bar their middle, knee buckling with a twist. Never had Sunny fought him like this before. It was startling how practiced he seemed.
You said! You said! He could feel the accusing finger pointed in his direction. No communications!
Sunny wouldn’t relent.
Fine!
Moon darted away from immediate freedom and crossed the smoky theatre, erupting back onto the outer Daycare floor where fire roared from the drop off zone and twisted the playground nets, collapsing over castle structures and warping plastics. S.T.A.F.F. bots were already shorting in their routes, failing in the heat with siren screams. In a cacophonous noise the Kid’s Cove access crumpled over party rooms in a furious blaze. Sunny wailed at the sight.
The lights agonised Moon’s sensors but he ploughed on with reckless disregard, locking out its threats, calling upon the high cable to send them into the rafters and bolting across metal framework. He could scarcely see through the blackened smog but it did not matter when he knew these walks better than anyone.
Moon’s own low, mournful hum echoed Sun’s despair as their cheery domain withered below.
Once they pushed through plaster panels and broke into the main lobby’s ceiling services, it was apparent this had spread incredibly fast. Floors above had already collapsed in, forcing Moon towards yet another path to reach the atrium.
Stupid, stupid ideas all round, he processed bitterly as they scuttled away from the Pizzaplex’s main entrance rather than towards it. Grinding gears pressed harshly when they drew too near the burning glow to get around.
“Stop pushing!” He scolded as his fingers fumbled over prying out a small access panel high in the internal walkways, head wrenching through a stuttered twist.
I’m trying! Sun keened, wheeling as far from their front as he could.
He shook to refocus his vision.
I know, I know. I didn’t mean to snap. Moon brushed their codes to soothe, finally clearing the passage and clambering up thick elevator cables. It was terribly hot in the shaft, firewalls suffering under the incredible proximity. It would not escape the encroaching burn much longer.
Thankful the way was not blocked with the elevator itself Moon reached the next level and wrested the sliding doors open, pushing themselves through to spill onto the main atrium floor. He fell away from tangibility as they rolled across the ground and back into stable light, unceremoniously dumping Sun to the forefront. Yet Sunny dug into his code as if to keep him in place, frantic impressions of don’t go and stay with me streaming in its wake.
Exhausted. He regretfully informed, the out-of-design activity more taxing than anticipated, especially in tandem to the atrocious state his own coding was in. He set to gathering his scattered data into some semblance of order, leaning into Sunny in an offer of support. Hurry up then. Find them. Roxy, Atrium. Chica, Fazcade. Monty, undetermined. Freddy, undetermined. Security: Vanessa, undetermined.
“Little rulebreaker, undetermined.” Sun added in a terrible whisper, scrambling upright and immediately scaling the nearest stairway. “But surely not, right? Right? It’s past 6am, the doors would be open!”
He did not like the way Moon rippled in displeasure.
Unless the doors have not opened. Fire emergency has not activated. The Pizzaplex is unwell.
He squeaked at the blaze spilling from where the Prize Corner once stood – now a molten mass of a hole bleeding back down to the main entrance lobby and gift shops, climbing higher, spreading wider and tearing well into the adjoined SuperstAr-cade. Sun darted across the remains of the upper floor, scanning over the atrium below with the vantage of height while they had it. Moon pinged in the same instance he did.
“Roxanne Wolf!” He cried upon spotting the glamrock star fumbling between rows of party tables, his voice volume striking near max capacity. “Fire evacuation is in order!”
She twitched and froze, and it was not until she turned her snout towards them that Sunny realised the animatronic was heavily damaged, the worst of which revealed a total loss of her eyes.
“Oh dear! Oh no!” He skidded to a stop and leaned far over the balcony railings, the Fazcade entrance directly behind him. Priority assessments howled its results. “Please seek a northern exit! I will return to assist as soon as possible!”
He wheeled about face, daunted by the task ahead.
You must climb. The lifts will not stay safe. That panel, up there.
With Moon’s guidance Sun pulled them up and on top of the elevator box, scaling the draw cables and guide rails with far less grace than his counterpart had previously. He was always better suited to diving, funnily enough, yet he was the one with ‘rise’ in his full designation. Moon was right, though. The heat was nigh unbearable within these narrow walls now, thick smoke and flakes of cinders seeping through every gap. It was dark and it made him feel so heavy to push through.
In the brief stretch where there was no input beyond the jingle-creak-whirr-groan of his reaching, grasping, pushing, lifting, it dawned upon Sun that he had left the Daycare.
He'd never had to leave like this before.
Moon swept in and curled around them like a blanket, muffling the scarier thoughts away in age-old practiced ease.
I’m here. I’m sorry I couldn’t be – it was not by choice.
It wasn’t? He wobbled through a tangled mess of misery and relief, jittering from rays to fingers. Moon still felt spotty and a little stilted, but he was undeniably more himself and improving by the second. There was no reason not to believe him.
There was something wrong, something terrible. A trespasser in our home. But we have lucked out. They made an error. Evacuation protocols are running a greater priority – it has it subdued for now.
“For now?” Sunny quailed in the lack of permanence. “But afterwards, when we find everyone and- and get clear? What then?” He stretched for the L4 painted door at last, pulling them apart in a mirror of Moon just minutes ago. The relief that came in realising Moon had never been mad at him was utterly dizzying.
The fear he could be as swiftly lost again was near crippling.
I’m aware of it now. This time they face a fight.
Violence wasn’t a problem solver. But in this instance, for his brother- “I don’t understand what it is yet, but I’ll fight it too. Promise it. I promise, I promise.”
Moon’s code curled even tighter. You have been, Sunny.
The west arcade remained in power. For how much longer they could only guess. Smoke billowed in from the open shaft they left behind, climbing to form a likeness of theatre-thick drapes. The floor thrummed with a deep and soundless beat that rattled their lithe frame. Most unusual. Most uncomfortable. A large, golden statue of Freddy Fazbear and Friends stood over them from the entry hall in frozen performance. It only served to reinforce his goal.
Second tier, last I glimpsed. Go left.
They found Glamrock Chica shambling across the upper mezzanine, poking between rows of game cabinets as if on the prowl for an object unseen. Like Roxanne she was also in an incredibly distressing condition, her casings crushed and mangled, her beakless face gaping and endoskeleton exposed. He couldn’t possibly imagine what happened to cause such devastation.
And yet despite the limp and spasming tics that wracked her, she appeared unfazed from whatever task she held at hand.
It made Sunny’s circuits crawl with how off it all rang.
“Glamrock Chica, you must come immediately! It’s not safe in here and we need to get moving, we’re in serious trooo-uble,” he began in a rapid pour of words, even daring to be so bold as to reach out for the rockstar. The crunchy snap of her head pivoting the instant he grazed her froze him silly.
A panicky glance through the railing glass revealed the entrance had begun to warp and cave, wallpapers bubbling into sloughs, posters and plastics curling up to catch and smoulder.
When Chica finally spoke Sunny leapt like a bunny startled into its next life.
Cripes. Moon groaned, as equally fuzzy as he felt from the shrieking feedback. Not kid friendly.
Chica shrugged off his touch to reach around another game cabinet.
“O-o-oh, how terrible, how awful! Your voicebox is a mess!” Sunny weaved through three different placating gestures before summing the courage to clasp her arm again, redirecting the Glamrock star’s attention with a tug. “Please though we really must leave, and quickly!”
Moon bumped at him with frustration. Tell her directly! Like a protocol prompt.
“O-oh! Um, fire! Fire evacuation! Time to leave the premises! Right now!”
The effect was immediate, their fellow animatronic going alarmingly rigid before half-lidded shutters blinked rapidly through the refocusing of her misaligned optic modules. When Chica unlocked it was as if coming out of a daze, slackening into a more natural posture – until she scanned their surroundings and jolted back to him with alarm, her garbled bawk as unsettling as the first.
Sunny was practically jigging on the spot by now. “Yes! Exactly!”
And this time Chica stepped into his begging tugs.
Northwest, and hustle it.
Moon shuffled abruptly, searching for a sensation, settling on a memory of gentle warmth within their chest. It was one of Sunny’s favourites.
You’re… you’re doing well.
Sun practically burst with affection as he pivoted, leading them hand in hand and racing to follow the backwalls until they were passing through Staff doors under Moon’s direction. He was so so so glad Moon knew the way, because Sunny held no doubt he would’ve been lost a dozen times over by now. He really didn’t like the samey look of the Pizzaplex corridors at all.
There, that one!
Sunny turned sharp and slammed an open palm against the red door, yelping when it did not budge and the rest of him bounced off the unyielding surface. Chica barely evaded making a sandwich of them herself, crackling out another awful sound in the startle.
Wh- No, no, no, that should not be. Why is it barred?
“Moony Moony Moony what now where else!?” His voice ratcheted up to a hysteric degree as he shoved their blockade to be doubly triply sure.
Backtrack! I’ll think of something.
Sun resisted the urge to snatch Moon up when he retreated into internal banks. Selfish. Selfish to want to keep him close. Let him work. Let him help. He could do this. He promised to.
“So s-so sorry, friend. This way again,” he reassured their companion instead, far more frenetic than he should’ve been for an animatronic in his position. Leading with calm composure was a must, he knew, yet he could not settle the panic coursing in his systems as it grew. He nearly turned them wrong twice on their hasty return, jumbling to recall even the most recent of memory.
They’d just burst back onto the sweltering arcade floors when the power cut.
Sunny tripped as sheer surprise booted the switch of their fronts, only saved from landing flat on their face by Chica’s efforts.
Moon hushed the streaming rush of apologies as he regained his bearings from the upheaval, disoriented by the wrench away from deep archive – an ill-advised transition on the best of days. The Glamrock’s splitting, unintelligible chatter rattled him to his core as she patted at their back and set him on their feet. Moon returned to scouring through his database the second he could – the pathfinding admittedly easier under support of their main server. The number of gaps in his available memory was proving difficult to navigate.
Exposed endoskeleton waved before his face not two seconds after, pointing to the ceiling and prompting Moon to humour a brief, harried glance.
A massive hand emerged from the black haze.
Sensors wailed under the rapid shift in gyros as they were squashed together and yanked into the blinding smoke. Sunny’s terrified screech only spun him more as readings rushed and swung.
WhatisthatwhatisthatwhatisTHAT
Moon thrashed to strike whatever necessary to free them. His wrist was caught before he made good on that promise, Glamrock Chica imploring him with a crooked, damaged gaze. She did not seem nearly distressed enough considering the situation.
Their restriction twisted and drew them to a massive, pale body, the churn of many limbs pressing in tighter as orientation shifted some ninety degrees and all sound near fell away.
A giant, perma-smiling robot he drew file_missing; of craned its blocky head to stare down its front, dark eyes shining, key teeth flashing, clutching them tightly in one hand as the rest worked furiously to climb through some massive pitch-black tunnel. The path of which opened into a large section of building beyond Moon’s security plans, a considerable length of grey brick wall dedicated to few doors labelled as utility access. Otherwise, the space was only as wide as that tunnel.
The giant spider-like robot scaled down the walls to deposit them right in front of another fire escape.
Moon stared at the gift of sanctuary, the doorway to safety, audio receptors ringing in the sheer quiet now surrounding them as the temptation to resume his original plans reared at once. Sunny was too set back to throw them off a second time.
Chica’s grip shook slightly, his hand still clamped firm around her own. There was a faint tremor in her frame. He detected fear-resistance-concern.
Damn these sappy animatronics.
Moon swivelled to face the one looming above. A file resynced. He knew them.
How bizarre it felt to have misplaced that at all.
“We are going to find the others,” he informed in a rasp, parroting the words of Sun’s unwavering insistence still in mantra within his sublevel noise. The shift against his palm was immediate, its willingness returned. Humming low in careful thought, Moon added, “You have an exit?”
DJ Music Man flashed a thumbs up, then pointed them to the utilities door instead. Moon wasted no further time in plunging them down the spiralling stairwell it opened into.
For all her damage, Chica did not falter once behind him.
Thank you, thank you, we have to find them and help them too.
I have a bad feeling.
The stairwell ended within the basement service tunnels – somewhere Moon did have reference for – having them navigate the absolute disarray of stored equipment and outdated theme models cast away into the Pizzaplex depths. There was a reason he did not haunt these halls if he could help it though. The hazards- the disorganisation- so very irresponsible. It wasn’t within the Daycare boundaries so he wasn’t compelled to act but it still struck endless flags against their shared procedures (it shouldn’t, and yet). No matter how fast Sunny worked to clear the queue Moon’s frustration grew with every ticked violation they bustled over.
As did his frustrations over this situation he wilfully chose to continue.
How long has it been? Unhampered it would take very little for the flame to spread. It had torn through the complex so quickly as it was, and no measures had activated to prevent it. Their chances of returning to the upper levels, to ground floor or above, seemed null and void at this point. It would all be under.
Moon would be the first to admit the likelihood of locating anyone else by now was equally moot. If they weren’t out under their own power already… there was little help left to give.
But he was weak when it came to Sunny.
He supposed, if such was the case, their efforts of folly had at least secured one from a similar fate. Sun would have to settle for that and that alone. So he would take them back up, and when he proved that the path was no longer traversable Sunny had to concede to their departure.
He was consoled by the knowledge it would be hard pressed to burn through steel and concrete.
Moon pushed them through door after door, narrow tunnels expanding into wider facilities. Glamrock Chica had slowed now, a weariness sinking across her shoulders and hindering already stressed servos. As they entered one of the largest storerooms Moon eased the insistence of his tugging. Chica looked him up and down when they stopped, brows drawn and limbs twitching. She pinged of confusion-worry-insistence.
This wasn’t going to work.
“You should stay here,” Moon began, internally swatting at the buzz that erupted from Sunny at once. Listen first. “We will be faster alone. It is safer this way-”
Across the wide room another set of doors burst open under the shove of one Montgomery Gator, Roxanne Wolf hot on his heels with claws wrapped around the last segment of his tail.
Chica shrieked a simply dreadful sound as she shot away. Moon’s own processors tripped in the metallic assault, scrambling to reorganise new information into the internal mess he’d already been dealing with.
“You beauty!” Monty roared, rushing to catch Chica’s hands in his own before pulling both her and Roxanne under his arms. Moon hovered offside the reunion, wringing his wrists under Sun’s nattering delight to be met with such fortune. How clever their friends were to find them! How brilliant!
“Roxy you legendary daredevil, they’re safe, they’re here,” Monty croaked with no shortage of relief, crowding the two against himself as he buried into them.
“And Freddy?” Roxy asked, shaken despite clear clawing for composure. Overstretched wires and hydraulic fluids stained the utter ruins of her face, reminiscent of drying tears. The damage she bore in her entirety was even more disturbing up close.
“Undetermined,” Moon answered distantly, scanning the structural integrity of their surroundings as a niggle began to itch the back of their casing. Sunny hovered by it anxiously, pressing near but too nervous to touch lest he interrupt. Moon spun on the two, distracted. “You are sound?”
“Protocol override,” Monty nodded, gesturing to Roxanne with a flick of his maw. “Doll sought me out, freakin’ blind at that, and put me straight.”
“Only thanks to you,” the wolf mumbled, ears shifting, nose twitching.
Moon hummed at the way Sunny beamed.
“To Sun, yes, he was exemplary. We cannot locate the others, we are out of time.”
Gently! His other half squawked abruptly, scandalised.
Grief crumpled through various faceplates alike. Moon didn’t have much capacity to guilt over his admittedly coarse assessment. He was equipped for handling children, not animatronics. Thinking twice, however, perhaps those measures would be better suited here after all. He wasn’t sure he could force it though.
It was Monty who nodded first, reluctant to find resolve.
“They’d have found a way. Resourceful kid. Careful bear. Yeah?”
Roxy bumped her snout against the gator’s front, tense and unhappy. “Vanessa’s not stupid, either.” She reinforced, hoarse. Chica sagged in resignation.
None of them enjoyed the concept of proceeding without guarantees. If they were running at any greater capacity there’d be no such hesitation. Yet as it now stood they were severely limited, very far away, and of little use in further search and rescue.
Sunny, on the other hand, was a writhing bundle of refusal and persistence.
This time Moon gave him a forceful shove. Sun’s code stilled completely, hurt. He recoiled further when Moon brushed back in a bid to reason, to explain, softly and softer again–
Moon snapped to the faint rumble above. No time, no time. They had to leave.
“Go on!” he hissed, waving to push them into action as if herding a gaggle of children. “The building will collapse. We cannot be under it when it does.” For something more was not right. These walls themselves were not sound. There was weakness in their foundations.
It was one damn thing out of his control after another and it was time he got Sunny out of this.
“We were tryin’ the loading docks,” Monty conferred, his hefty steps leading them to action.
Precisely where Moon had next intended. Very good. Gator had a brain after all.
The thunderous cacophony that was three Glamrock members rushing down concrete halls was deafening. Both sides of the Daycare Attendant wanted to shrink away from the echoing reverb threatening to shake their joints loose, struggling to make heads or tails of any other sound in the vicinity. The jingle of their bells may as well have been non-existent, let alone any chance to monitor the growing rumble overhead.
Moon checked in a second time to find Sunny low and unsettled in their sublevel, but surprisingly much less resistant. It would have to be good enough.
Roxanne broke into the terrible orchestra with a building snarl, hand in hand with Chica yet leading more than being led.
“I can’t believe this,” she spat, the shake of her head losing clumps of synthetic hair. “When I get my hands on whoever messed everything up… tch, they won’t know what’s coming.”
“Get in line,” Monty growled. “What’s the bright idea anyway, turnin’ us on some kid?”
“That kid!” Roxy cut back, bent teeth flashing. “An absolute menace. Don’t get me wrong – I want no ill on the spunky upstart, he’s got one heck of a backbone – but surely he could’ve gone a damn bit easier on my casing!”
The little rulebreaker did that!? Sunny balked. Moon winced at the way Sun became a prickly ball of sharpness. He focused on one foot after another instead, the Glamrocks melding into a blur of colour. Sunny pulled back together enough to query at his silence.
Monty spared a sideways glance as they turned the weaving corners of storage rows.
“Doll, you look… well I mean, it’s not so-” the gator faltered.
“Don’t even dare. I don’t need to know.”
Moon’s vision flickered, an alert dismissed the instant it rose. Not fast enough by the way Sunny’s alarm skyrocketed.
He wasn’t accustomed to long term stretches of such fervent activity. His night patrols were only brief stints – ten minutes of rapid floor sweeps for an entire complex – whereas the naptime routines he used to govern, while considerably longer, rarely saw him bolting across the Daycare as relentless as this.
He’d done more out of his design here than he ever had in his functioning lifetime.
Light levels alone couldn’t keep him now, yet he feared to relinquish control. Feared what would happen when Sunny could call the shots again.
No choice.
Take front. Was all the warning he could eke before he folded like a house of cards. It was enough for Sunny to catch their footfall, arms thrown wide for balance, and regain a bustling skip-hop of a trot with nary a missed beat under the shift and resettlement of delicate plates.
“Hello, hellooo friends,” he shout-whispered nervously, skittering between the three animatronics as they twisted to regard him. He shivered when all he could really distinguish was the bobbing light of optics. He hadn’t realised there was no power down here, too. In all of the Pizzaplex now, probably.
“You alright?” Monty asked, Chica herself garbling what he could only assume the same. The Glamrocks’ concern filled Sun with an incredible warmth and he nodded with rapid intensity.
“This is very very very tiring so Moony needs to rest. I uh- the docks are close? I can’t… see very well in the dark.” He thought it incredibly unfair to get locked out of the optical mode himself.
Moon was only a bare shift of code, a formless hum of reassurances and a poorly hidden flash of desperation. Sun scooped him up and whirled them in the equivalent of a superstar hug. Rest, Moony. You’ve done so amazing! And I understand. It’s okay. We’re going.
He squeaked when pressure wrapped firm around his tangible hand, registering mechanical warmth and the underlying thrum of working servos. Red, softly lit optics bounced just enough light over a long green muzzle.
“I gotcha, Champ.” Said the one and only Montgomery Gator.
Being swept under the umbrella of the Glamrocks like this, Sunny could’ve imploded. If only they weren’t in such dire, dire situations. But he glowed in the knowledge that they had been successful, that they had helped and guided and that they were getting out of this together. He and Moony had given it their best and he couldn’t be prouder. Even if… even if it wasn’t quite with everyone everyone as he’d hoped. Wanted. Wished. Needed.
And though as important as all that was, above all he was just so incredibly glad to have his brother back. Sunny intended to keep it that way, whatever it took.
A distant roar began to build, lancing fear through every processor that caught it. Tremors echoed through the ground below their feet.
The loading dock’s exit was right there.
Sunny drew back upon being let go, bunching anxious fingers into his ruffled collar. Monty wacked at the unlit control panel in passing, hissed at himself for ‘being dumb’ and slammed the double doors with both palms.
It refused to open. He shoved them harder.
Security level clearance shouldn’t matter when there was no power to uphold it.
“Oh hell,” Monty uttered in cold realisation. Together they froze in an unnatural stillness.
Because that was precisely it. These were not internal doors. As a direct outside access way, they ran by different rules. Extra measures.
Power loss had tripped the bolt locks.
Their own security measures had turned against them.
The basement’s shuddering intensified, the complex wailing through its halls, tearing itself apart under the weight of its crumbling, falling, burning remains.
Monty lunged in desperate attack, claws shrieking against metal and making headway but not fast enough. Roxy and Chica stooped arm in arm, pressing to the gator’s back as the deep roar gained on them. The walls groaned, fractured, and buckled.
Sun’s terror spiked at the crunch of concrete and collapse of steel above, whisking and whirling to see but it was only dark and the sound-
Moon slammed against him.
Sunny tingled in weightless disconnect, realising the intent when he was held firmly in between the cusp of a switch. He threw himself into the embrace, determined to give Moon the same.
De-synced from every physical receptor, neither felt the shatter of their casing.
Nor heard the screams of their companions.
Freddy Fazbear’s Mega Pizzaplex came down, wholly and completely.