Chapter Text
Danny gripped the edge of the sink tightly, staring at the rusted drain, wondering how her life had gone to shit so fast. Her skin rippled as she let out an exhausted sigh, easing the scowl off her face. Her claws retreated into hiding, leaving tiny scratch marks on the acrylic sink. She took a deep breath, trying to remember that focusing on the bad would only bring more negativity. Like someone thinking about how many red cars are on the road, and suddenly you see them everywhere.
'Today is going to be a good day,' she thought to herself, 'Today has to be a good day.'
It was the start of her second month working at Freddy's. A place so damn big children were constantly getting lost, it was a kidnapper's wet dream. She had lost count of how many times she had found a small kid sobbing after they separated from their family. Most of the time, she asked one of the security guards to walk them to the daycare. The daycare attendants could scan their wrist band and find their file. Usually, it was Sans that escorted them.
Being a janitor wasn't hard. Really, it wasn't. It was easy, mindless work that Danny enjoyed most of the time. However, cleaning up pee puddles from the kids too young to play in the new escape rooms was a different thing entirely. She couldn't understand how they kept sneaking in, but somehow they did. If she had to guess, it was the same glitch that let a few kids into the maintenance tunnels just last week. They were lucky that one of the moms had been anal about her kid checking in with her every half hour.
So yeah. Danny could say that being a janitor wasn't hard. It would be easier if management didn't go on a downsizing spree, putting pressure on those left to take on more hours. Even then, more of her coworkers had quit on their own, all of them stating "for personal reasons,". And while she found that suspicious, she didn't have much time to think about it with all the extra work piled on top of her.
Including babysitting some of the new hires that thought being a janitor was beneath them.
Wrangling new entitled hires was not on her to-do list, so with little effort, she bullied them out of the job. It may have caused even more work on her end, but she wasn't going to put up with the verbal abuse they tended to sling at her. She ignored the way this affected her reputation with her other coworkers, most of whom began to avoid her.
And that all led back to the stress that had triggered Danny's negativity.
She felt trapped in a job with no respect, underpaid, and lost.
Danny shook her head. She reminded herself that her situation could be worse. She could get fired too, and her position wasn't guaranteed. They were always improving the staff bots to replace organic staff. Or management could decide that the rumors had enough meat in them to do something about her. Vincent could stop talking to her, dropping her from his life. She could get run over, or kidnapped and-
Her fingernails dug into the palm of her hand. She was catastrophizing again. Danny had a secure job, and friends. Vincent stated many times that he was here to stay, even helping her when Danny first showed up. He wasn't going anywhere. Not after he had already seen all the ugly she kept hidden in her.
But while things were good, there was a little voice in the back of her head. More, it whispered to her, we want more.
We want better.
We want normal.
College, and a driver's license. A nice little town-home in a quiet neighborhood. A better job, hell her own business. A loving partner, a pet, a-
While it was good to keep that little voice in mind, she couldn't hurt herself to dream of impossibilities.
Danny was content with what she had for now. She wasn't in danger of being homeless. She was taken in by a good community, for people just like her. She wasn't in danger of starving. Not only did her paycheck cover that, but Vincent invited her over for dinner often enough. That didn't even count the free pizza vouchers suspiciously stuffed into her locker. Uncle Bon swore he didn't have anything to do with that, but no one else was that shade of blue. She knew it was him from the streaks of paint scuffed onto her locker, right where it was slightly dented.
Danny knew she was very lucky.
But she didn't feel very lucky.
Danny's hands shook as she finished getting dressed in all her layers. She swore at the northern cold, at how it made her joints ache and tied her stomach into knots. It was one of the very few things that she genuinely hated about where she currently was.
'Hopefully they'll fix the heater soon,' Danny thought to herself, double checking her door locked behind her.
Danny grimaced as she got in the elevator. Her headache pounded in tempo with the terrible 8-bit song someone thought would be a great idea. Whoever picked the elevator deserved to get fired. It made a nauseating combo with the flickering fluorescent lights they never fix.
The doors shut with a squeak, trapping her in the death machine. She slid down the back wall, pressing the heel of her palm into her eyes, trying to relieve the pressure building up.
The relief was short-lived, two floors later, the door slid open once again. While Vincent was her closest friend, he was a gossipy morning person, and it was terminal. Even though she liked to complain about him, and was one of the most annoying assholes she knew, Danny couldn’t have asked for a better brother.
Seconds later, the door opened and Vincent walked in with his neighbor.
"Mornin' Danny!" Vincent said, grinning as he leaned against the back wall, tilting his purple Security baseball cap at her.
"Morning." Danny greeted back, watching his neighbor's pudgy fingers press the button for the ground floor.
"Heard Bonnie's getting a new handler today. How's he handling the news?" Vincent asked, budging closer to her so he could elbow her side.
"Like he usually does, hiding in the janitor's lounge room with Uncle Bon," Danny said, blinking slowly as exhaustion crept back up in the back of her mind. She let out a jaw-cracking yawn as Vincent hummed.
"Well..." he paused for a moment, trying to find the bright side of things, "I heard she's cute. Tall, punk, pink hair, goes by Nikki."
Vincent's neighbor snorted.
"You were the one to do her background check?" Danny asked, turning to look at him with a raised eyebrow.
"Shi- shoot I even did her interview."
The elevator dinged, doors opening to let in more people heading out for work or school.
"You don't usually do interviews," Danny frowned harder, "Not for mechanics anyways."
Vincent shrugged, "Marcus was out that day, they got pretty sick and no one else could make it in time for her appointment."
Danny’s mind wandered back to just last week. Vincent had broken into her apartment, half-dressed yelling at her to "pack your work clothes and get into the truck!". He had broke a few laws and ran a couple of lights. Danny had never been so stressed out and sick before during one of their carpools he insisted on. Bonnie had laughed at her when she told him what happened when he walked in on her changing. After she had gotten over her embarrassment of showing up to work in her pajamas, she chewed him out.
He quickly quit laughing when she started crying.
Danny shook her head, "That's why you dragged me out so early last week, asshole."
"Language. 'Sides, I wasn't gonna let Vanessa interview her. You know how she is."
"So I was thinking you could meet her when she comes in to meet Bonnie." Vincent casually said, grinning down at her as they entered the cafeteria, "See what you think of her, be there for Bonnie, maybe make a friend, maybe more...?"
Danny glared at him, "Please stop trying to set me up with strangers. I'm not interested in dating right now."
"It'd be good for you! Y'know, do something different, socialize like your therapist is always telling you."
"It's uncomfortable. I don't like people."
Vincent finally dropped the subject as Danny ordered her food, then shoved her away before she could pay to order his food and pay for the both of them.
She rolled her eyes, and took a number, too used to his antics, and too tired to even think about arguing past minor grumbling.
"I'm going to pay for yours, someday," Danny said, taking a Tylenol with her coffee as the waitress set their food down in front of them. Crepes for Danny, and an ungodly amount of sugar that pretended to be a stack of pancakes with toppings for Vincent.
"Shut up and eat your fucking fancy breakfast." Vincent playfully snarked at her, "Seriously, don't worry about it. I want to."
Danny took another drink of her coffee. Once the nauseating hunger pangs were gone, she started on her crepes. She expertly ignored the way Vincent watched her as she stabbed the last of the eggs that fell out.
The two sat in silence, letting the quiet conversation from the other residents wash over them. Soon enough, Danny was stacking her plate on top of Vincent's, and he was sliding another large steaming hot coffee toward her.
Danny stood and groaned as she stretched. Vincent was nearly vibrating with energy as he waited for her to catch up. As the two headed towards the door, Danny noticed that Vincent started humming again. She smiled. It had been a while since she heard him hum the jaunty pirates tune from that old 80's cartoon she knew he loved. She couldn't stand the song, but she was happy he was feeling better.
Finally, they came up to his little two-door Chevy, as black and grungy as Danny felt her heart was. She patiently waited for Vince to find his key and unlock the doors. With a cheer of victory, he climbed in and unlocked the passenger door for her.
"Are you sure you don't want to at least meet her?" Vincent asked, batting his eyelashes at her, "Management would appreciate it,"
Danny scoffed, "I'm sure management would."
"And Bonnie seems to listen to you. They're starting to get fed up with him," Vincent frowned as he continued, "And he listens to you. I don't know why they don't make you his handler, you're qualified for it."
Danny grimaced, ignoring that last sentence, "I don't think it would be a good idea to just... show up like that."
And, ignoring the part about Bonnie, it was less of a bad idea and just more of a weird one. After all, wouldn't it be strange for a janitor like her to just show up for that? Her job didn't have anything to do with Nikki's job, or Bonnie's. There was no real reason for her to intrude on that.
"What? No way!" Vince exclaimed, laughing a little, "It'll be fine, everyone got a little welcome wagon when they got hired, so it's not like you won't be the only other one there."
Danny hadn't.
All she got was her manager, an older man with a thick mustache, and her uniform.
Purple. Just like Vincent's. Just like most of the night staff.
Just like all the other employees that Fazbear's doesn't want their customers to see.
A frown grew along with her headache, and she buried herself further into the passenger seat, saying nothing. The rest of the car ride was silent.
Danny winced at the neon lights blinding her as they pulled into the Fazbears parking lot. Vincent didn't look like he was mad, but Danny couldn't tell when his face went blank like that. She couldn't think of anything that could break the ice that formed between them before they got to the employee entrance.
They both scanned their badges and went their separate ways. Danny couldn't help but feel like she screwed something up again.