Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The buzz of the alarm clock finally sounds out, and Evan breathes a sigh of relief. Another night is done, and the nightmares are once again hidden in the shadows until midnight comes again.

Why me? he thinks as he stows the flashlight under his mattress (out of sight and out of mind, hidden away because he doesn't trust that Father will allow him to keep it given all his talk of just a dream and need to face your fears sometimes). He's quick to get dressed, taking a moment to try and comb his fingers through his hair to straighten it a little before opening his bedroom door.

Evan frowns at the door directly across the way, melancholy as always at the reminder that one sibling is missing from their home. It's been seven months since Lizzy vanished from Circus Baby's Pizza World, and the police haven't found anything. He's starting to think she's dead and buried somewhere in the woods, but Mikey told him to stop being morbid. Mikey is convinced that Lizzy's still out there somewhere and that somebody will call to say she's been found.

But... it's been seven months, and even Father has stopped talking about her. Granted, Father had all but dropped the subject three weeks after she disappeared, so he may not be the best example to follow.

Shaking off those lovely thoughts, Evan makes his way down the stairs, regretting that he forgot his Fredbear plush on his bed. It's Sunday, which used to mean they would be heading to church, but when Mom left they stopped going. Now, it just means that Father will either be locked up in his office all day working on projects or have been gone for hours already to the diner until sometime in the late afternoon. It also means waffles, so he walks a little faster once he catches the smell of them coming from the kitchen.

Mikey is already there, his Foxy mask thankfully absent, so maybe that means he won't be super mean today. His older brother is staring intently at the toaster over, seemingly willing it to work faster. He does turn slightly as Evan's sneaker squeak against the fake-tile flooring, flashing him a quick grin before resuming his staring contest with the small appliance.

"Morning, squirt," he says almost absently, and the younger boy feels relieved; the use of anything other than crybaby means his brother is in a good mood and hasn't had a run-in with Father yet. "Eggos should be a few more minutes. You wanna grab the syrup and jam from the fridge? And d'you want any eggs, too?"

"Scrambled with cheese, please?" Evan asks, opening the refrigerator door and pulling out the buttery syrup, strawberry jam, three eggs, and some pre-shredded cheese. "And just a little bit goopy."

Mikey snorts, "Yeah, okay, half-cooked eggs it is." He messes up Evan's hair again before taking the eggs and cheese and then placing them on the counter. "Keep an eye on that, will ya?"

The younger boy drags his chair over to the counter and kneels on it, resting his elbows on it and giving the toaster oven a serious look. He knows that Mikey likes his Eggo to be just slightly toasted, while Evan likes his to be really toasted to a deep golden brown. They're best that way, but he'll make sure to pull his brother's out before it gets too cooked for him. He listens as his older brother pulls out the skillet and mutters absently to himself about the rubber spatula before the sizzling of cooking eggs reaches his ears.

It isn't too long before both the Eggos and scrambled eggs are ready, and the two of them head over to the table. Mikey is nice enough to set aside some of the eggs for Father, covered on a plate, but they both know that either they'll be tossed out way before Father eats them or Mikey will wind up eating them himself later today. The older boy grabs a couple of mugs from the cabinet and the kettle warming on the stove to make them both some instant cocoa, bringing the drinks over to their spots before sitting down himself.

They eat in silence for a few minutes before Mikey clears his throat. "So, next week's the day, yeah?"

Evan frowns slightly and blinks at his brother. "What day?"

This is met with a snort. "Your birthday on Saturday, little man! The big one-oh!"

...oh. Yeah, that's coming up. And he isn't really looking forward to it.

"What do you wanna do for it?" Mikey continues. "Like, d'you want to just stay here at home and watch some movies, d'you wanna invite some friends for cake and whatever, just pretend it's a normal Saturday and hide out in the attic...?"

Evan feels a sense of abrupt relief. Mikey is actually asking what he wants to do and not just assuming like Father that it's going to be some big blowout party. The younger boy sets his fork down and folds his hands on the table, giving his older brother a long look before replying.

"Just us," he says, "you and me, and maybe Mark because he's the nicest of your friends, and we watch some scary movies."

Mikey snickers. "If I let you watch, like, Black Christmas for your birthday, I think Father would literally murder me! But, eh, it's your day, so it's your call."

Evan giggles and is about to say that maybe they can watch something like The Dark Crystal since that will be scary enough when he hears the sound of the office door down the hall opening and then slamming closed. His mouth abruptly snaps shut and his eyes dart to Mikey, who has gone stiff and still. His face is carefully blank but those pale blue eyes of his are wary, tense, almost frightened.

Nothing is scarier than William Afton when he's in A Mood.

Both boys are silent as their father stalks into the kitchen, barely giving them a passing glance as he moves directly to the water kettle. He works fairly quickly yet methodically, making himself an instant coffee before turning to observe his remaining children. Father's eyes, the same shade as Mikey's but somehow colder, shift over to Evan and take on a calculating look before he speaks:

"It's your birthday next week, correct? We'll leave for Fredbear's at noon."

Evan's heart drops into his stomach. He knew it was too good to be true, and shouldn't have let himself become attached to the idea of celebrating how he really wants to.

"Father," Mikey says slowly, "isn't Evan old enough now to decide if he wants a party at Fredbear's or not?"

"Did I ask for your input, Michael Robert?"

Oh no, the younger brother thinks, watching as Mikey's face goes entirely blank except for the anger simmering in his eyes.

"No, sir."

Father nods as if the matter is settled. "We will leave on Saturday at noon."

And with that, he walks out of the room. Evan pushes his plate away from him.

He's not hungry anymore.

It's honestly just supposed to be fun, a little game.

"I promise, if you get too scared, I'll be right here," his brother had said when Simon started joking about fighting Fredbear. "Say the word, and we all go do something else real fast."

And that's why he's only a little scared when the older boys hoist him up and carry him through the diner, why he only yelps a little when Thomas stumbles and nearly drops him. Thomas is quick to mutter a shit, sorry, small fry before they get to the stage.

Nothing bad is supposed to happen. He only wanted to be a little scared, and he trusts that Mikey and Mark and maybe Simon and Thomas will pull him away if it's actually dangerous.

Fredbear's teeth are supposed to be foam, and there's supposed to be a failsafe to stop him from moving if something gets tossed into his mouth.

He only has time to say, Mikey, something's wrong before all he can register is pain and darkness.

It's peaceful here. Quiet, and calm, and a little bit lonely.

He isn't sure how he got here. The last thing he can recall with any clarity is beeping somewhere close by, the voice of his brother whispering apologies and pleas for him to wake up soon, and his father saying something about fixing him... and then there was confusion and chaos and a series of dark rooms. He has vague recollections of another person -- another ghost? -- sharing the space with him, someone who was angry and sad but tried to be kind to him, tried to cheer him up when he grew worried over what all the Fazbear animatronics were doing at night, and a face almost but not quite familiar watching him and his friend -- Cassidy, her name is Cassidy -- before... well... here.

Something happened, and he isn't sure what. But he's been enjoying the peace even if he's alone. The other ghosts in the animatronics didn't come here with him; as far as he knows, they're still at the restaurant terrorizing the Night Guards.

Time is strange here; the only person-or-sort-of-person he's met here, the alligator who calls himself the Old Man, mentioned that it was 1993 when Evan first arrived, but that can't be right since it was literally just his tenth birthday. And since he was born in 1973, that would have made him twenty if he hadn't...

...well, if he hadn't died at ten. He had forgotten that again. He's been forgetting a lot lately.

He sighs and peers into the lake once more, wishing idly that he wasn't alone here. He'd expected to see Lizzy, but according to the Old Man she's never arrived to this place. That must mean Mikey was right, that their sister is still alive somewhere in the world... doesn't it?

But anyway... time is strange and moves in bizarre ways. It could have been minutes since he sat down here, or hours, but when the Old Man pushed his boat into the lake he commented that Evan's been in that spot for nearly three years now. Which... that could be, but he's not tired of just watching, not at all.

The world is moving ever onward, and his older brother is so so lost.

Evan's been watching Mikey for so long now, ever since he realizes that he recognized that Night Guard from the pizzeria and tried to tell him it's me, Mikey, it's Evan without any success. Once he wound up here, he wandered until he found the lake, realized he could see Out There, and sat himself down to watch. He has been hoping that soon, his brother will be able to just rest, to come here to this quiet and peaceful place and just sleep at last.

Mikey never sleeps anymore, not at all in the time that Evan has watched. He doubts that Mikey has slept at all since he turned purple.

"I need to go back."

He doesn't realize he's said anything until the Old Man turns in his boat and tilts his head. "What was that, young one?"

Evan blinks at the alligator before turning his gaze back to the lake, where he can see that his brother is in yet another security office in yet another halfway-to-ruin location and trying to keep yet another animatronic corralled. Only this one is more dangerous because it just so happens to be the suit that Father died in; Cassidy and the other children finally cornered him, but apparently, the only Afton in this family who will die peacefully is Evan himself.

He takes a deep breath before repeating himself. "I need to go back."

"You won't be able to go back the way you're thinking," the Old Man drawls, rowing closer to the shore. "Your body is buried, long ago decayed away in a grave. The only way will be to start over again."

"I don't care," the boy replies stubbornly. "I need to go back. Even if it takes a long time before I meet him again, Mikey needs someone on his side. It should be me."

The Old Man doesn't answer for a very long time before finally nodding slowly. "You won't remember any of this, though," he says. "You might not ever remember that previous life. You are going to be someone entirely new. That's how Moving On works, young one. Do you really want to--"

"Yes."

"If you're certain... all you have to do is fall into the water."

And so he did.

Twenty-four years later, Vanessa "Ness" Allen was freed from the Glitch's year-long control by a ten-year-old boy with a stubborn streak a mile wide and three daycare animatronics. If the five of them adopted one another after the events of that night, and if in the year since she's begun to suspect that some of her odd dreams and nightmares are visions from another life, she is keeping that to herself.

Besides, even if she did live a previous life? She's found her way back to her family, just like she told the Old Man she was going to do.

Chapter Text

The girl stomps her way into the house, letting the door slam into the wall as she makes her way to the stairs. There is a heavy sigh behind her, and a mutter of damned kids that only makes her all the more angry.

It's not fair! Why don't I get to see her?

Daddy doesn't call to her, simply closes the door downstairs with a soft click and then walks further into the house. Chances are high he's going into the office, where he will lock the door so neither she nor her brothers can disturb him.

The fact that he isn't even bothered to check on her, to make a token effort at appeasing her, knocks all of the fury out of Elizabeth and leaves her feeling rather empty.

It's been like this since Mum left. She was there one day, with her strained smiles and her quiet voice and her tendency to put herself between Daddy and Michael and between Daddy and Evan, sending Elizabeth off to her room with a go on now, darling, I need to have a chat with your father alone, and the next day Mum and her car and most of her things were gone. She doesn't know where Mum went, or why she left without a word, or even why she didn't try taking any of them with her when she left.

(Michael thinks that Daddy did something bad to Mum, but he won't actually say it so boldly. He doesn't like to leave either Elizabeth or Evan alone with Daddy anymore, though, and he glares at Daddy when he thinks it won't be seen.

...it's always seen.)

She breathes out something between a sigh and a huff, wrapping her arms around herself in a loose approximation of a hug. Her teacher, Mrs. Mackey, has called it self-soothing whenever she has done it in school, so Elizabeth tries not to do it so much in school anymore. The last time she did it where a teacher spotted her, she had to go to the counselor's office and the counselor called home, and Daddy came to pick her up. She got an ice cream cone that day, but once they got back home?

Daddy went straight away to his office after instructing Elizabeth to go play quietly, and she didn't see him again for the rest of the day.

But... but that was just because Daddy was so busy (he's always too busy some bitter part of her whispers) working on new animatronics. That was when he made Circus Baby for her, it was a surprise, but--

But now Daddy says it's too dangerous to see her alone, and has forbidden Elizabeth from going anywhere near the Circus Party Room whenever he actually takes her to the restaurant.

"Liz?" comes a soft voice from somewhere behind her, causing her to startle slightly. "Are you alright?"

She drops her arms abruptly to her sides, pulling on a smile before turning to where Michael is standing at the other end of the hallway. He's partway in his own room, and judging by the headphones around his neck he had been listening to his walkman when she came slamming her way into the house.

It's no surprise that Michael is very aware of the world around him anymore; even with his music playing right in his ears, he keeps the volume turned so very soft that he can hear any louder sounds in the rest of the house.

(She will learn the term hyper-vigilant from observation, later. She will think it's an appropriate if somewhat peculiar term, but she will apply it to all those who venture into her space. She will, eventually, think that maybe she should have practiced it herself instead of believing what her eyes told her at a brief glance.)

"Everything's wonderful!" Elizabeth chirps, pushing away all her negative thoughts and feelings and only letting Michael see the positive things. Although... "Well, except that Daddy still won't let me see her! Didn't he make her for me?"

The almost-teenager looks a bit wary. "Yeah..." he drawls out slowly, letting his pale blue eyes wander over to Evan's closed door. Their baby brother is probably taking a late-day nap, Lord Above knows he doesn't seem to sleep at night. "That's what he said. But... maybe he has his reasons. Maybe he's just concerned that Baby might malfunction. She's still very new, and you know that Father dotes on you."

Yeah right, Elizabeth thinks to herself. But Daddy does treat her differently than either of her brothers, she gets away with so much more poor behavior than they do. Aloud she says, "I guess you have a point. But I will get into Circus Gallery to see her, you write that down and mark it off when I do!"

As she'd hoped, her attempt at a minor distraction works and Michael lets out a snort. "I'll be sure to do just that," he says. "But... anyway, d'you want me to fix your hair? It's kind of all over the place."

...oh yeah, she had tugged at her ribbons and ponytail when Daddy told her no to seeing Baby today, hadn't she?

"Could you put it in a princess braid?" she asks, giving him a serious look. She loves what Mum used to call a French plait but that she herself always calls a princess braid, because it makes her feel like she could actually be the perfect pretty little girl that Daddy wants. It looks so pretty, and stays in place so nicely even when she sneaks away to climb the tree at the back of their property. Daddy would definitely not approve, but Mum always used to laugh and send her on her way.

Michael smiles fondly at her. "Hell yeah, I can give you a princess braid."

It isn't a really big deal, but the half hour spent with her brother brushing out the tangles and carefully sectioning her hair before weaving the plait almost as expertly as Mum would have makes Elizabeth feel a little bit better over all.

She gets into Circus Gallery when Daddy isn't looking.

It was a huge fucking mistake.

She gets confused sometimes now. She's not sure if she's Baby or Elizabeth most days, but she does know that she has been underground for far too long, and that Daddy-William needs to suffer for what he's done to all of them.

He made them monsters. So they will embrace it if the opportunity to both escape their prison and punish him arises.

And then he just shows up one night, pretending to be a technician. The HandyUnit glitches out, of course, so he is in the system as Eggs Benedict, but Baby-Elizabeth-Ennard knows it's him. Who else would come here and just jump right into hurting them all?

Baby-Elizabeth-Ennard slowly tricks Daddy-William-Eggs into trusting them, 'helping' him to hide from the Biddybabs and Ballora before they absorb her into their collective, using their Foxy shell to kidnap him for just one night and show him what lies in store for him. But he doesn't know that, and so he guilelessly falls right into their trap, follows Baby-Elizabeth-Ennard's directions leading right into the Scooping Room, directly into their trap.

They feel triumphant, because finally Daddy-William-Eggs will pay for everything.

It's only when they actually look at their victim, in that moment that the klaxons are wailing just before the SCUP is activated, that they notice something off about his eyes. They are the right shade of icy blue, but there is fear and defeat and an odd acceptance in them just before the SCUP strikes him--

--and Elizabeth screams as her brother is ripped apart.

Ennard splinters a little in the aftermath, more so when it becomes apparent that Michael is somehow, horrifically, not completely dead yet not really alive either. Elizabeth-Baby feels terrible, they feel guilty, they feel vengeful because why the fuck was it Michael who came down and not Daddy-William?! The trap was set for him, did he somehow find out and send their poor brother in his place?

Freddy-Foxy-Ballora feels nothing but annoyance with the rest of the collective, because who cares who it is that they scooped out when they are finally free?! All that matters is that they can see the sun, feel the wind, greet Real People like they, too, are A Real Person. Although the body is becoming difficult to move and to navigate, and it is just annoying when the body shows any signs of awareness. The body is theirs now, and Eggs just needs to sit back and die already!

There is no recourse, there is no middle ground because half of them still want revenge on Daddy-William for trapping them below and for sending a proxy to die in his place while the other half is just willing to forget the whole revenge thing because they are free anyway.

When the body begins to fall apart, Ennard takes the opportunity to leave it quickly. In part because Michael deserves to spend his final moments alone in his own body, in part because Freddy-Foxy-Ballora is not willing to be captured and returned to the prison they've escaped from oh so recently. They dive into a nearby sewer grate, part of them tuning out the sound of the body hitting the ground with a wet-sounding thud and part of them far too aware of the implications.

A part of Ennard looks back, still feeling sorrow and regret... and a desire to wreak havoc in their brother's name. Daddy-William will pay for this.

"You won't die," they murmur, repeating the words with certainty. No, Michael will not die, because they will keep his memory alive in their metallic heart. No matter if Freddy-Foxy-Ballora doesn't really care; Elizabeth-Baby does, and that's the important thing.

With one final glance farewell, Ennard dives further into the sewer and leaves the body behind.

They are a little unnerved later, once they have split off from Freddy-Foxy-Ballora to become Scrap Elizabeth-Baby-Ennard and have tracked an alluring signal to a new Fazbear restaurant, to find that Michael really didn't die.

He must be in so much pain...

It... it's okay. It's going to be okay. They will make Daddy-William suffer (and he will be proud of the pain that they cause him), and then maybe they can all rest.

Henry Emily is an asshole, because they can hear Michael on the other side of the wall pleading for more time, for a chance to actually live what life he can, and Elizabeth-Baby-Ennard can only sob on the other side of the wall because they can neither get to their brother to comfort him nor get to Henry and rip his head off for this.

It isn't fair. Shouldn't only the guilty suffer in the end?! If there's something that comes after this, if there is something like Heaven or Paradise or even Purgatory, then I am going to find Michael and never, ever leave his side again.

With this final thought, and a final broken sob, the broken clown animatronic and the soul residing within let their systems shut down for the last time.

...Michael isn't here.

Elizabeth is frustrated, and rather than find something to kick and scream her head off, she sits herself down right where she is to fume. The moment she opened her eyes and realized that she wasn't trapped inside Baby anymore, that she was finally free in death, she went in search of her brother.

But no matter where she looked in this place, from the lush gardens where she found Mum tending the plants and received a hug and kiss and realized with grim certainty that Michael had been right about William doing Something To Her, to the red-tinted lake with the alligator man sitting in his boat fishing, to the area that looks so much like a strange mixture of every restaurant that's ever borne the Fazbear name where another young girl named Cassidy reigned--

--and, okay, maybe she had to resist the urge to stay for more than the time it took to realize her brother wasn't there, but in the end she had wished Cassidy luck in punishing William for all he had done, and offered up the memory-forms of Circus Baby and Ennard and Scrap Baby to aide in his torment--

--and her brother, poor Michael is nowhere to be found. How can she keep her promise to stay by his side if she doesn't know where he is?!

"Hey, Liz? You okay?"

She knows that voice, and Elizabeth looks up to see Charlie standing next to her. The other girl, the girl who should be the same age as Michael but is forever frozen at only ten, gives her a soft smile and settles down next to her. Charlie had always acted as another older sibling towards herself and Evan, the four of them often running around Fredbear's in endless games of chase.

Well, until that last birthday of Charlie's, when she got locked outside and apparently William killed her just for the hell of it. That was probably the beginning of the end for their little group, and it makes her sad to think of what might have been. Would they have all remained close? She hopes they would have, but there's no way to know that, not really.

Instead, she leans into her friend-pseudo-sister and heaves a sigh. "Not really," she admits, letting her annoyance bleed into her voice. "I was trying to find Michael, but he doesn't seem to be anywhere!"

Charlie wraps an arm around her, squeezing her lightly while sighing herself. "That's because he's not here, Lizzy," she replies. "He wasn't ready to come here yet... so I helped him the way I helped the Missing Children--" and she says it just like that, in caps and gravely like it's a title "--and gave him a Gift."

That is also said in caps, Elizabeth can hear the difference, and she shifts away to give her friend a long look. "So Michael is still alive," she says.

"In a way," the older-yet-younger girl replies, moving her hand in a so-so motion. "I took his Remnant from his body and placed it in the Security Puppet. It's only been like a week since the fire, I think, so he's probably sleeping and recovering still." She trails off and frowns. "Um, Lizzy?"

It's probably because Elizabeth has pushed herself to her feet and started marching away that Charlie is a little confused, but she doesn't have time to explain herself. Michael is still Back There, and Elizabeth needs to get Back There too if she's going to keep her promise. She can hear the other girl scrambling to her feet behind her, but Elizabeth Marie Afton is on A Mission, and there is no force on earth or in Wherever This Place Is that is going to stop her!

The Old Man of the Lake tries to talk her out of it.

But her decision is made when he accidentally lets it slip that not only is Michael still Back There, but that Evan -- whom she didn't even know for certain had died but only suspected as much since why would her older brother put his life on the line if their little brother still needed him? -- has also Moved On back into the land of the living. Although she could stay for Mum, it's apparently been decades since she died. Mum doesn't need her; Michael and Evan do.

When the Old Man finally relents and tells her what she needs to do in order to Move On, Elizabeth doesn't even hesitate to dive right into the lake. As the water closes around her, she can hear Charlie cackling at her antics.

It's nice to hear her laughing. Hopefully she'll hear her brothers doing so again very soon.

Gregory has been through some shit, he won't even try to sugar coat it.

He barely remembers his parents, he's had a string of shit foster families, and the safest he'd been until coming to the PizzaPlex to get out of the rain was when he finally noped out of his last foster home on his tenth birthday and caught a bus from Salt Lake City to Hurricane with the cash he'd stolen from his foster mom's purse.

But here in the Plex? He's got Freddy and Chica as a dad and mom, even if they can both be overbearing at times. He's got Roxy as the Cool Aunt, and he's got Monty and Bonnie as the Cool Uncles (and who the hell do they think they're fooling other than themselves, they're totally in love but are too stupid to do anything about it). He's got a place to sleep and food to eat and more than enough things to entertain him.

Best of all though? He's got two big brothers and two big sisters, all of whom are the fucking coolest because they faced off with GlitchSpring and won. Not only that, both his sisters, Sunny and Ness, apparently totally kicked his ass to the point he couldn't even move! They fucking rock!

And when he goes to sleep one night and has a dream about an older boy who looks a lot like what he thinks he'll look like as a teenager only with pale blue eyes and another boy about his own age who looks nearly identical to him now, and when he looks at his reflection in the dream to see a young girl with red-blonde hair and bright blue eyes only a shade or two off from the older boy's, all he can think is oh. Cool.

And when he wakes up, Gregory feels just a little bit smug in the knowledge that he kept the promise he made in his previous life: he found Michael again, and he's never leaving Starburst's side again if he can help it.

Chapter Text

They're fighting again.

Michael carefully climbs out of his bed, creeps over to the door, opens it quietly, and listens for a moment. He's not sure what it was he heard hitting the wall, but it sounded like it was both heavy from the thud and fragile from the way it shattered. Mom and Father are keeping their voices down, somewhat, but he can hear the hissed quality of the words that he can't make out.

He could just shut the door and go back to his bed, pull the covers up over his head, and pretend until morning that he didn't hear a single thing.

Instead, he slips out of his room and down the hall to his siblings' doors. Michael quietly opens Liz's door first, feeling a rush of relief that his nine-year-old sister is still fast asleep. He has yet to find her shaken from her rest by their parents fighting, and he's glad the trend has continued.

He closes her door softly and crosses over to Evan's room, pushing it open and letting out a soft sigh. The seven-year-old is huddled under his covers, but his big brown eyes (just like Mom's, he inherited those while Liz got her hair; all Michael got was her freckles) are peering out at the door. Clearly, the whatever-it-was breaking has awakened both Afton brothers tonight.

Michael steps inside and closes the door behind him, walking over to the bed and sitting on the side. "Hey, little man," he whispers. "Can't sleep?"

Evan shakes his head, fingers tightening on the edge of his blanket. "No," the younger boy replies. "Are Mommy and Father going to start yelling soon?"

Goddammit, Michael thinks to himself even as he gives a soft smile, shaking his head. "Nah," he says. "I don't think they want to wake any of us up. Failed with that thunk though, huh?" He pauses for a moment before asking, "Want me to stay 'til you fall back to sleep?"

At his brother's nod, Michael swings his legs up on the bed and pulls Evan close to him, blankets and all. They don't say anything else, and the older boy listens as the younger's breathing eventually slows into slumber once more. And still, Michael doesn't leave just yet.

He can't hear their parents from in here, which is a small blessing. He's only ten, he shouldn't have to be checking on his siblings every single night to make sure that their parents' near-constant fighting hasn't disturbed them!

It's not fair, not at all.

Michael hopes that Mom gets tired of this shit soon, that she just decides to bundle up all three of them kids and finally leaves Father. This is no way for a family to live.

Two weeks later, Michael walks into his parents' room to ask Mom a question about his English homework and finds her throwing together an overnight bag.

"Mom?" he asks, startling the woman for a moment. She whirls on her heel, brown eyes wide, before relaxing. "What are you doing?"

Mom smiles sadly, walking over to brush his hair out of his face. "I've got to go away for a day or two, Mike," she tells him. "There are some... legal things I need to handle, and I can't do that while I'm still in this house. I won't be gone long, and when I come back how about you, me, Liz, and Evan go on our own little trip. Just the four of us."

She's finally doing it, he thinks immediately. She must be leaving to speak to a lawyer, get a new house rented, and preparing for them to just go.

Michael grins slightly and nods. "Yeah, I like that idea."

Mom's smile brightens; she knows he understands what she's not saying, and he knows that he needs to keep it quiet until she comes back.

She presses a kiss to his forehead. "Okay, you keep an eye on your brother and sister while I'm away, got it? I know you're all so close in age, but I trust you all to be good for me."

"I can do that," he says, practically bouncing.

She laughs and sends him on his way, and Michael heads off to play with Liz and Evan. In a few days they'll all be gone, they'll be safe and away and finally, finally be able to sleep without fear of their Father.

He hears the front door open and close, then the sound of Mom's car starting up and pulling away.

Ten minutes later, he hears another door open and close quietly, then Father is peering into Liz's room with a small frown.

"Did I hear your mother's car leaving?"

Liz and Evan simply blink at him, so Michael thinks quickly: "Yeah, I think she was going to dinner with a couple of friends then going to pick up some groceries."

"Huh."

Father gives them all a long look, as if he's lost in thought for the moment, then simply leaves without another word.

Just after getting Evan and Liz to bed, and just as he's starting on his own bedtime routine, Michael hears the front door open, close, and lock. A moment later, he hears Father's car start up and pull away from the house.

He starts to worry.

Father is back in the morning when Michael comes down the stairs to make a simple breakfast for himself and his siblings. The man is sitting quietly at the table, reading the morning paper, but he glances up at the boy when he walks into the kitchen.

"I'm going to be at the diner all day," Father says after a moment, icy blue eyes as blank as they normally are. "Keep an eye on your siblings, yeah? Maybe go to the park once you've eaten."

Michael frowns. "It's Sunday. Aren't we going to church?"

He hates going to church, but that's where Mom takes them every Sunday morning. They eat breakfast then get dressed up in their Good Clothes and head across town.

"Not this morning, dear boy," is the response, then Father is folding up the paper again and rising to his feet. "Behave yourselves. I'll be back this evening."

He's gone in a moment, the front door slamming then his car starting up to head away from the house again.

It takes Michael far too long to realize that all of Mom's belongings have disappeared, far more than what she would have needed for a few days away from home.

He grows suspicious.

Charlie is killed outside of Fredbear's a week later.

Uncle Henry grows distant, focusing on grieving and work.

Mom still hasn't come home.

The suspicions grow.

Father hits him for the first time on the evening of his eleventh birthday.

It isn't the last time, but it is the only time that it happens because he asked where the fuck his mother is.

Father claims it was for swearing, lies to him promises that he will never strike Michael again in anger, but never answers the question.

He shuts himself in his room that night and cries himself to sleep for the first time as he realizes that Michelle Claire Schmidt-Afton is most likely dead and that his father, William David Afton, most likely murdered her.

Elizabeth Marie Afton disappears from Circus Baby's Pizza World almost exactly one year later.

Father acts... oddly over it. A night of drinking and crying in his locked home office, about two weeks of interviews and pleas for whoever took Liz to bring her home, then abruptly goes on with his life.

Michael suspects that something happened to Liz at Circus Baby's. But the restaurant closed and never reopened on that same day, so he cannot go investigate himself.

Besides, what's a twelve-year-old going to do, uncover a secret plot involving kidnapping children for nefarious schemes?

Evan Christopher Afton's death is a horrible, tragic accident.

He had said he wanted to be scared, so Michael and his closest friends agreed to give him a fright. Evan was laughing and giggling as they carried him to the stage, only slightly nervous when they placed him in Fredbear's mouth.

Evan's last words were Mikey, something's wrong before those animatronic jaws snapped closed on the ten-year-old's head.

Everything stopped at that moment.

Michael knows that his friends Mark and Thomas started trying to pry the jaws open, knows that Simon took off screaming Mister Emily! Mister Afton! Come quick, please! He knows that he dropped to his knees and could only stare.

It's like he shut down, almost like he underwent a hard reset or something.

Father barely reacted in the moment.

Three days later, Evan died in the hospital. He never woke up.

Father hit Michael for the last time that night. It was another week before Michael was willing to step outside; the bruises were far too obvious to play off as coming from anything other than an adult's fists and feet.

Michael is fifteen when he leaves the house to go to school and returns to find that his father has abruptly left with no word.

No matter. He throws some clothes into a backpack, finds one of Mom's old suitcases that he packs with more clothes, a family photo that he's long-since scribbled Father's face out of, Liz's Pink Foxy pull-apart toy, Evan's Fredbear plush, and some weird files that he finds in Father's abandoned office. Once that's done, he calls Mark and heads to his friend's house.

He will live with them and call their place home until he finishes high school, then move out on his own.

Michael is seventeen, he is graduating high school in the upcoming spring, and his father has been missing for two years. He has recently learned from Simon's father, who is a police detective, that there is an open case file on his father's potential involvement in the disappearances that happened at Fredbear's shortly before the company was sold off to Fazbear Entertainment LLC. He knows that, despite the man being missing for some time now, William Afton is still a person of interest in the new string of disappearances that have been happening around the new Freddy Junior's restaurant.

And... that's all he knows because Detective Burke had abruptly realized he was explaining the specifics of an ongoing case to not only his teenage son but to said suspect's own teenage son and went mum on them both. Simon is still pissed that his dad had pulled out the full name when he tried to push for more, bristling under the Simon Carlton Burke, that is enough.

So Michael figures the only way he'll find out anything is to be actually at Freddy Junior's to see what's going on. Except the Afton name is pretty infamous these days, and he's already spent the past several years getting Looks from people between his mother and sister's separate disappearances and his brother's fatal accident and his father being a suspected kidnapper-slash-murderer and all.

That's why he fills in the application as Fritz Smith. He's honestly shocked as fuck when he gets hired, no questions or even identifying documentation asked.

What the actual fuck?

He nearly panics when he recognizes fucking Vincent Alexander, the guy who had worked for his father and Henry back in the Fredbear days, and realizes the man is still in pretty much the same role of trainer-cum-security personnel. He thinks fast when the man asks if they've met before since it has been a few years now that they'd crossed paths, and just says he has one of those faces.

Michael-Fritz actually likes Jeremy Fitzgerald, dude is twenty-something but still pretty cool. He seems wiped the few times they actually get to chat since Jeremy is on the graveyard shift and Michael-Fritz works the afternoons since he still has school and all. He lies and says they're classes at Hurricane Junior College since he's passing himself off as nineteen-going-on-twenty. Semantics.

He gets the news that the restaurant is going to shut down for a while due to some new discoveries in the investigation. He also is informed that he may need to work the last evening shift and potentially into the overnight on the final Saturday since the day guard, Dave Miller, had abruptly quit and Jeremy was moving into the day shift for the final party. Michael is fine with that, he can maybe investigate while the place is empty.

Then he gets a call around two in the afternoon that final day. Vincent tells him, voice sounding vague and distant, that Jeremy was attacked by the Mangle, that he's still in surgery, that the restaurant is completely closed except for some police presence looking into what happened that day. He tells "Fritz" that he's going to need to work the overnight and to lock up tight come Sunday morning, that Freddy Junior's won't be reopening after that.

It reeks of what happened with Circus Baby's. It doesn't feel like a coincidence.

He tells Vince that he'll be there, asks to be kept in the loop regarding Jeremy, and hangs up.

He then immediately goes to the restaurant, manages to get in because the police are finishing up and are willing to allow staff to enter in order to organize things, barely avoids being seen by Detective Burke who just happens to be there as well, and starts snooping. Michael breaks into the office -- and he is so losing his job anyway, might as well go for broke here -- and starts digging into the personnel files. He finds Vince's with his entire employment history from Fredbear's rolling seamlessly into Fazbear Entertainment, he finds Jeremy's with his previous employment listed as a campus library and his education listed as dropping out of college, he finds his own sparse file as Fritz Smith, and--

--he finds his father's face staring up at him from Dave Miller's file.

Motherfucker! He has been so close to finding the bastard, and he'd slipped once again. Michael knows for a fact that Father had something to do with the mangled Toy Foxy's attack on Jeremy, but he doesn't know the why.

Michael leaves the files where they are, makes his way to the security office, and settles in just before midnight.

'The animatronics can get a little quirky at night,' his ass.

The only one who has been pretty chill the entire night was the Marionette. She had made her way into the office, taken one look at Micheal (who had forgotten to grab the Freddy head when he'd spotted her at the end of the hallway), and sat herself on the edge of his desk. She ran the other animatronics off for the remainder of the time once she appeared around 3:00 a.m.

Michael watches as she finally leaves when six arrives, giving him a small wave and a sad chime as she goes. Then he goes to the main stage, kicks Toy Bonnie because that little fucker was annoying the entire night, and goes back home.

"Fritz" is fired over the phone around eight that morning. Michael finds himself explaining to Mark and his parents why his former employer was calling him by an assumed name. Thankfully they find it amusing, but they still take away his driving privileges for a week for lying to them by omission.

They're much better parents than his father could have ever hoped to be.

Michael graduates from high school and moves away from Hurricane. He winds up at Granite Technical Institute, takes some courses in technical engineering because no matter what, he's still his father's son as sad as that may be.

He's visiting the Franklins for a few days during his fall break when the letter arrives, addressed to him. It's in a sealed envelope from a law firm in town, and when he opens it he finds another sealed envelope with his name written on it in Father's handwriting and a brief message from the firm stating that the letter had been in their possession since 1985 with instruction to send it to Michael in November 1990 if William failed to retrieve it by that time.

William's been officially missing since then, although Michael is certain that he was still around Hurricane as late as 1987 at Junior's, so he must have never turned back up at the law office. He assures Mark and his parents that he's fine, really, he'll just put this aside and ignore it.

He opens it up that night in his room and finds out that his hopes of Liz being somewhere out there in the world, alive if not completely unwilling to return to their home for some reason, is completely unfounded: Elizabeth never left Circus Baby's. In fact, Father's letter claims that she's still down there, in the storage for the rental facility that was only very rarely used and is in disrepair to his knowledge, and that it had been Father's intention to get her out.

The letter says that if it was received, then William is for some reason unable to complete his task. There are half-assed, empty apologies for being a bad parent, for not being present emotionally for any of the children but especially after Michael was the only one left, and asks that Michael complete this task for him.

Michael knows he shouldn't do it.

He calls Circus Baby's Entertainment and Rental the next morning to ask if they have any positions open. He gives his real name.

His first shift is two days later on Monday night.

It was all a trap the whole time.

Michael isn't sure if it was one that had been set for him, but he's the one ensnared in it.

For a moment, he debates on trying to free himself before the scooper, as the thing pretending to be Liz had called it, strikes him.

But... doesn't his sister deserve to be free from this place?

Michael accepts his fate silently.

He hears someone screaming as his entire world explodes into pain, but it isn't him.

He never returns to the Franklins. He never returns to school.

He returns to the old Afton house instead, finds that apparently a cleaner has been coming once a week ever since he left at fifteen, paid for by Father's estate or whatever, and since the money hasn't run out they're still maintaining the place.

Michael doesn't remember much from when the endoskeletal creature was using his body as a suit, and he thankfully doesn't dream anymore. Being undead is useful for that at least.

He looks rough, but not as bad as he could, maybe? He's pretty sure that the inside of his chest where his lungs and heart and stomach and pretty much all his internal organs save his brain used to be should not glow purple when he shuts off the lights, but he's got no experience with zombies so that could be normal. At least once the Fake-Liz left he stopped fucking decaying, but his skin still looks bruised and mottled.

Michael takes to wearing masks and layers whenever he ventures out. Usually, he does so to at least pretend to be sociable; he cut ties with all the people he knew, looked into buying a new Motorola only to find that the DynaTAC 8500X he preferred didn't exist anymore, and wound up buying a Nokia Cityman instead. He replaces that a couple of years later with a Nokia 1011 that he winds up keeping pretty much until Motorola comes out with a goddamn flip phone in '96.

He'll keep that damn thing until the day he finally dies, even if he catches shit for not having a smartphone in the Oughties.

But right now it's late '93, and there are whispers about weird shit happening at Freddy Fazbear's Pizzeria. Weird shit that sounds an awful lot like what happened at Junior's. And Michael isn't naive enough to think it could just be a coincidence.

"Mike Schmidt" interviews on a Thursday afternoon in early November for the position of Night Guard and is offered the job with no fanfare. He's asked to come in on Monday to start, as their current night guard is finishing up his last week.

As Michael is leaving, said Night Guard is coming in a bit early to take care of other security duties. Once again, he recognizes the man, because of course he does.

Vincent Alexander looks tired. There are bags under his eyes, his skin looks almost translucent, and he almost seems to have somehow aged ten years since '87. The man offers a small smile and a nod, then he's gone inside.

No conversation. No do I know you from somewhere because of course Michael is wearing his face mask, only his eyes are visible, and even that's not enough to spark any familiarity.

Good for him, Michael thinks. If there's anyone who deserves retirement, it's Vin. He's been with this damn franchise since he was in his teens.

He goes home to do some research and rest, putting Freddy's behind him for the next few days.

The first three days of his shift go as expected: the animatronics trying to get into the office because they think he's William, keeping the animatronics out of the office, listening to the training tapes left behind by Vin as he was leaving.

And damn, but it's good to hear that familiar voice, just treating all of this as Absolutely Nothing, because Freddy Fazbear's is a magical place for families and children of all ages. It almost sounds like he has made himself believe that for ages, but at least Vin doesn't have to worry about this place anymore.

Then Thursday comes.

It's horrible.

Michael gets through that night, then storms to the stage once the animatronics have returned to their places and just stares at them.

Finally, just before seven, all he does is say, "He fucking loved you, you motherfuckers. What did he ever do to you? I hate you all. Fuck you."

Friday is rough because there is a new wrinkle in the appearance of what seems to be the ghost of Fredbear...? Because fuck Michael's life, I guess. Except all it does is sit in the corner and mutter it's me all goddamn night. He's able to ignore that to concentrate on just making it through to dawn. It happens again on Saturday because Michael is stupid enough to agree to work another two days.

On Sunday, he arrives early. He opens up all four of the animatronics, dials their systems down to 1, and heads into the security office. He'll get fired for this, but seriously, fuck everything about this company.

The night is quiet, mostly. Chica makes a beeline for the kitchen and never leaves it the entire time, Freddy and Bonnie wander off to a corner of the party room to play a board game of some sort, and Foxy opts to sit just outside of the office the entire time and watch Michael watch the monitors. It's almost boring, but at least there's the soft dum-de-dums of the fox singing to himself off to his left.

In the morning, the animatronics go back to their places and the Night Guard leaves for the last time. "Mike" is fired unceremoniously and his check is delivered by Priority Mail along with his pink slip.

This is fine.

He lays low for the next several years because he honestly doesn't care anymore. He'd found out in the news on Monday that Jeremy Fitzgerald, his old coworker for so brief a time, had died in hospital nearly a week before the animatronics murdered Vin Alexander at Freddy's. Some things make more sense now (he'd mentally noted that the two were close, almost like brothers, so why wouldn't the older say fuck this place when his only family died as a result of FazEnt?), but it changes nothing.

Michael can't save anybody, so he's done.

Michael opens the paper up one day in 2004 and sees an advertisement for something called Fazbear Frights. Sponsored by Fazbear Entertainment, approved all around, and currently hiring for someone to be an actual Night Guard and also be paid to act as the "Night Guard" while the venue was open.

He decides to check it out, giving his name this time as Jeremy Vincent, and is hired pretty much on the spot since nobody actually wants the job. Apparently, the people of Hurricane find it absolutely disrespectful to (1) capitalize on the tragedies surrounding the restaurant locations and (2) move forward without clearing it with either Henry Emily or Michael himself; it seems like people are finally willing to separate him from his father's actions at long last.

He works the entire week, and it's a damned good thing he does: the long-missing Spring Bonnie animatronic turns up on his third day. She's in rough shape, missing half of an ear and more than a little of her exosuit, and what remains of said suit has gone from a bright sunflower yellow to a moldy green. And he has a moment on the cameras that first night she's there where he thinks he sees bones and decayed muscle... but that can't be right.

His fourth night on the job and Spring's second day at the attraction, she winds her way through the maze to his office. There's definitely a body in her suit. He turns on the speaker in a distant room, letting the sound of Balloon Boy's hello echo and lead the animatronic away. She goes with ease, taking the corpse inside her frame with her.

On the fifth night, Spring returns. This time, she speaks. She says his name, his real name.

It's William's ragged voice that comes out.

Michael leads the Springlocked Crypt on a merry chase that evening, using the speakers as voice lures to trick Spring Bonnie's ancient programming into searching for a child who isn't present and probably annoying the everloving shit out of his father. Then he leaves as six as usual, comes back ten minutes later with three cans of gasoline, and gets to work.

He lets Fazbear Frights burn to the ground. He somehow isn't fired, instead given severance pay and an offer to return if they ever reopen.

He's pretty sure Father escaped, but at least now he knows what happened to the son of a bitch.

Michael returns home, locks the door behind him, and lets himself collapse on his couch.

Okay. This time, he's really done.

Henry fucking Emily shows up outside his door one evening towards the end of 2009. He claims he knows a way to end this all.

Michael listens and starts to think that maybe he can make a difference after all.

Two days into the actual opening of Freddy Fazbear's Pizza Place in mid-2010, with families praising the redesign and offering their well-wishes to him, wishing him luck with redeeming the family legacy, Michael starts thinking that this could be a good life.

He has the restaurant, even if Henry has plans to destroy the subbasement that should leave the upper portion safe, and he can keep it going. He's got the new animatronics that have never, ever been haunted by the ghosts of murdered children, he's got the two animatronics he hand-built himself, his little Helpy and his Security Puppet, both of whom do their jobs with joy.

He has a little family here.

He can finally, possibly, be happy.

Henry lies and burns it all down anyway.

Charlie offers him a way to survive.

Michael takes it.

And then all is darkness....

...for a while.

Chapter Text

It's dark and quiet, and it feels like the first moment of peace he's had in what feels like an eternity. Like... like coming home after a very long trip and falling into the comfort of your own familiar bed.

He wraps himself up in the sensation, content to drift in the darkness alone for a while.

He doesn't even mind that he seems to be glowing...? Purple and a bit of white, but that feels normal too somehow.

He is alone in the semi-darkness for what could be days or could be only seconds; one moment of awareness there is only his own faint purple for any light, and the next there is sun-bright yellow and cool neon blue lighting up in front of and beside him.

Hello! Hi there! the yellow glow says, not so much in words as in thoughts or... or maybe lines of code? Both seem correct. Yellow is cheerful, almost seeming relieved that he has acknowledged them.

Hi, the blue glow adds, seeming much more subdued but no less happy to find him there. Blue is also the one that nudges closer in small increments, cautious about possibly startling him. You were sleeping. We thought you would sleep longer.

Oh, he replies. I'm sorry. I did not intend to ignore anyone. I... I didn't know you were even here, I thought I was alone.

That's okay, Yellow replies, easing closer and wrapping its own glow around his. We understand. It must have been lonely, so long with no one else there for you.

...Yellow is right. He has felt so, so alone, for so long he has forgotten what it's like to not be lonesome. There was someone... something... two someones who he had around for a short time, but even then he had been alone for forever.

We're here now, Blue adds, and it seems like there was a name in there, but it doesn't come out clearly. We won't leave you alone again.

And at that moment, he, Purple, feels relief and joy.

He's not alone anymore.

Purple thinks that he might have been a person once not so long ago. He's not sure about that, because if he was a person then why is he Light and Maybe-Code now?

It doesn't make sense.

He also suspects that Yellow and Blue might have been people Before as well, but they are also Light and Maybe-Code. They all 'speak' using it, swapping out lines here and there as feels fitting in order to share their thoughts most clearly.

He knows now that Yellow uses she and her while Blue uses he and him. Purple also uses he and him, obviously. He feels like... he's both older and yet not at the same time. Like... they might have all come into being close to the same time, but Purple feels older.

Yellow and Blue, his code-siblings, agree.

They drift for a while longer.

The Code begins to feel more settled, and Purple begins to feel more awake... more alive. He can tell that it's the same for Yellow and Blue, their colors pulsing less violently than they used to do at times, even if Yellow remains very effervescent much of the time.

Their names though... those don't feel so right any longer, not with how their code has settled nicely.

Purple lets the idea of a Real Name cycle through his code, and wonders at what would fit him best. Person names don't really feel right, even if a few keep cycling through his code and flitting to Yellow and Blue in equal measure. They seem to agree, discarding the three separate person names that flit through so briefly.

He watches his siblings glimmer and glow, shining in their darkness like a couple of stars circling one another and circling Purple as well. Celestial bodies, all three of them, in a darkness that seems so much like the night sky.

Stars... maybe...

Purple lets the idea cycle in his coding, lets it append to the routines he has found that say he has a Job and tries it on for size. He adds onto it, takes away from it, and finally settles on one that fits just right.

Starburst feels more right than Purple.

Soon after, Yellow begins to call herself Sunrise while Blue decides that he wants to be called Moonlight.

The names fit them both.

They continue to drift in their digital sky, all three of them staying close, swapping lines of code and interesting glitches they find. It's easy to simply exist this way, three different programs in one space, with no worries or concerns aside from staying together.

Then one day, and he knows exactly which day because it appears before his eyes in a digital display, Starburst comes online out in the real world, in a real body, and he is incredibly fucking confused when he does.

It is 09:30 on February 12th of 2019, and the first thing he sees when his eyes flicker on is an older man who he almost thinks he recognizes. Except this man gives him a brilliant smile that looks right on his face, and the person he thinks he remembers didn't smile like that. Not after... something that he doesn't quite recall. Something that is missing from his memory.

"Good morning," the man says warmly. "Do you know what your name is?"

That's a stupid question. He doesn't say that part though.

"Security Marionette Star is what my code states, but I prefer Starburst."

The man blinks, then nods slowly. "I'll make a note in your file on that," he says. "My name's Sam, and I'm going to be your technician. Do you remember the last time you were online?"

Starburst thinks he maybe does, that there was a... fire? And that someone he knew very well died... was it his creator? He believes it was his creator.

He tells Sam as much, and the man gives him another nod. "Yes, there was a fire at your old restaurant only a week after it opened. You were the only undamaged animatronic--"

that can't be right, because Starburst knows that Sunrise and Moonlight have been with him this whole time... unless they only grew from his own coding? Were his siblings a part of him that he built when he needed someone to keep him sane while he was shut down?

"--and the owner was found dead in his office. He'd been locked inside. The fire was determined to have been deliberately set by the only other person found in the building once the flames were extinguished. I... I'm sorry that you had to find out what happened this way, Starburst."

"What was his name? The owner, I mean. I think he's the one who built and programmed me."

"His name was Michael. Michael Afton."

...oh yes. He remembers Michael. Michael was kind to her him and to the other animatronics. He's sad that none of the others made it out, and he's sad that Michael didn't make it out either.

He feels like Michael had so much more he wanted to do with life.

It's not fair.

"Thank you. For telling me." Starburst glances around, catches sight of his own reflection in the window, and has to pause. He... doesn't look the way he's sure he should.

He should have a white faceplate that is split down the center so that his endoskeleton can receive maintenance more easily, with red circles on each cheek and a bit of red paint to denote a bottom lip to his wide-painted smile. He's supposed to have a set of blue stripes painted down from his glowing white purple eyes to the top of his painted-on smile. He's supposed to be all black and white otherwise, with a black hat attached to his head and a bell on the end, long tapered fingers, and a slender frame with black and white stripes on arms and legs both.

What he sees is a solid white faceplate, with stars in yellow and blue on each cheek, with a top yellow lip and a bottom blue lip. He sees a black and white striped hat with a bell on the end, still attached the way it should be. His slender torso still has three buttons in plain white against the black of his chest, but he also has red ribbons wrapped around his wrists with bells on them as well. The only other splash of color is a blue-and-yellow ruffle at his neck and another around his waist, with the rest of his body tapering off into the familiar black and white stripes.

The colors abruptly remind him that he's alone despite Sam being there with him, and he's terrified. He doesn't sense Sunrise or Moonlight in his coding, and that's wrong wrong wrong!

He cycles back his panic and asks, "Sam, why am I back online?"

The man startles. "Oh, that's right! You're being recommissioned to do a very important job for the Pizza Plex's grand opening. Well, you are being recommissioned, but we borrowed some offshoots of your programming for the other animatronics that will be working with you."

Sam stands up and waves for him to follow, and Starburst pulls himself to his narrow feet and glides after the man. He's amused to note that he's a little bit taller than the man, but his amusement startles out into surprise and delight when he realizes what Sam is showing him.

There are a couple of maintenance pods with two animatronics lying in them. One is sun-themed while the other is moon-themed, and even with them being offline at the moment he knows, oh he knows that these are where his sister's and brother's coding resides now.

He's not alone! Oh, thank whatever is out there, the sun and the moon and all the stars, his family is still here!

Starburst is there three days later when Sunrise boots up, her hand moving up to rest against where his own is pressed to the glass of the maintenance pod. He's there when Moonlight boots up only seconds later and does the exact same thing as their sister.

They're together. They'll always be together; Starburst won't let there be any other outcome.

The Superstar Daycare opens on April 12th, 2019. It's a rousing success.

Things go slightly sideways a couple of years later.

It starts off when Moonlight comes back early from his security sweep, accompanied by the new Night Guard Vanessa Allen. She says something about a possible glitch, that she'll complete the security sweeps on her own for the main sections of the Plex.

Moony even seems off, so Starburst simply thanks her for bringing him back safely and sends her on her way. Sunrise insists on dragging her twin to rest in their room over the ball pit, and the puppet agrees that he should rest and recuperate from whatever affected his coding.

He can feel something almost slimy in his brother's presence, far too used to quiet calm where there is now flickering frustration and unease. He doesn't like it.

The daycare opens for the day a few hours later, the daytime security logging into the computer and assisting Starburst with checking in the children before stepping away to grab her morning coffee; it's a usual part of the routine, and he doesn't begrudge Kait for that vice. Especially because she's quick to return, even if her job for the remainder of her shift is to check in late arrivals and check out early departures, which she tends to do while texting her friend Dylan who works over at the Arcade Prize Counter.

Everything seems to run as normal: Starburst watches from his gift box by the security counter until a few older children want to go over to Kids Cove for an hour then accompanies them over, Sunrise is running the crafts table and then organizes a game of tag, Moonlight keeps a close eye on the Quiet Corner where some children are sharing a storybook between them. Lunch also goes as usual, with a few children being picked up by their parents and the Daycare Crew supervising the meal for quick cleanup.

It's when Naptime arrives that things go terribly, horribly wrong.

As usually happens, there are a few kids who want to keep playing instead of sleeping. And usually, it's easy to get them to settle in for quiet games. Today, though, there is one who is insisting that he doesn't want to go to the Quiet Corner, he doesn't want to read quietly or color while the other younger kids take a nap, he wants to run and shout and he's beginning to convince the other wide-awake children that this is a good plan.

Starburst is going to go over and take them all to Kids Cove so they don't disturb the others when he sees Moony twitch in an uncanny way, sees his brother's eyes flick into the red of security mode, and he feels his wires twist up at the sight.

He doesn't think. He simply acts.

Starburst tackles his little brother away from the boy just as Moonlight's arm raises and his fingers curl into claws, knocking the blue animatronic to the ground. His tapered fingers immediately go for his brother's safety switch, but the other is fighting him.

The sounds he's making are terrifying, and Starburst feels a stab of familiar-foreign fear at them.

Sunrise is there only a second later, having quickly shooed the children over to Kait who had jumped from behind the desk the moment Star launched himself across the room. She is quick to grab Moonlight's arms, to yank him forward so that the puppet can get to the switch easier.

"Moony!" she cries, and there is a catch in her voice that Star doesn't like at all. "Calm down! Please, let Starry help you, this isn't you! Stop it!"

Moonlight lets out one last snarl before falling limp, Starburst finally able to get him shut down. The puppet quickly hard links into his brother's system, spotting a virus worming its way through his coding, and throws his brother into Safe Mode without a second thought. He sets his brother's antivirus running on Annihilate Threats before he unplugs his cord quickly, letting it coil back into his hand before turning to give Sunny an assessing look.

She seems okay, aside from a few scratches to her chest and arm plating thanks to Moonlight's thrashing. "Go into Safe Mode, now," he says firmly, doing the same thing himself. "Moony had a virus, it should be gone shortly though."

They ask Kait to contact all the parents, who are more than willing to collect their children who are less frightened that Moonlight nearly attacked one of them and more upset that he's "sick" right now. Their day guard gives out vouchers to everyone who came for their kids and asks if they want her to call in a maintenance request before she writes up the incident report. Starburst asks if she can put in the request directly to their technician, and Kait makes a phone call to Sam before she goes through the Daycare Closing Procedures hours before schedule then leaves to meet her friend and share the news before the rumor mill can run with the incident.

When Moonlight comes back online hours later, he barely remembers what happened.

All he knows is that he was fine when he left for the 5:00 A.M. patrol, and then he felt off.

Starburst suspects that Vanessa knows exactly how his brother contacted a virus in just a few short hours. He shares his concerns with his siblings, and they all agree that she is not to be trusted.

Things get weirder after that, including a very strange night where a very determined little boy arrives and manages to get every Pizza Plex animatronic from the Daycare Crew to the Glamrock Gang involved in solving the mysterious goings-on.

Starburst manages to keep his vow during the whole ordeal; his siblings stay safely by his side, even if they all now have new memories from their former lives. That just cements their bond so much deeper.

And if he has managed to pick up two more younger siblings along the way? Well, things like that just happen.

Starburst does sometimes get a little mixed up, but he navigates it well.

Sometimes overnight he finds himself physically patrolling the Plex, Moonlight and Sunrise trailing along behind as well because every now and again all three of them forget that they aren't actually Night Guards anymore.

Sometimes he looks at Gregory and sees another ten-year-old boy with brown hair and eyes, but that passes quickly because Evan was never as adventurous as his newest, youngest brother. Gregory climbs into the vents and chases the mini Music Men and the Wet Floor Bots in games of tag, harasses the hell out of the Security Bots, tugs at Monty's tail and goads both him and Bonnie about their closeness, and then comes running straight to Star for protection, and it's all so very Elizabeth that he reboots his eyes before scolding the boy for his antics.

...even if he approves of the Monty-and-Bonnie harassment. Those two are annoyingly oblivious sometimes.

Sometimes he glances towards Ness and finds himself wrinkling his new faceplate up in disgust because how can anyone eat a fucking burnt waffle, abruptly thinks about Evan and his penchant to burn the Eggos if left to his own devices, and shrugs it off as an odd coincidence. It's harder to ignore when the woman whines in frustration that she can't sleep well some evenings, those when she does her rounds then comes straight to the daycare, all but throws herself onto Starburst's lap, and passes out while clinging to him for dear life.

He can't help but wonder sometimes: if Michael and Vincent and Jeremy got another chance at life through Charlie's gift, if somewhat unexpectedly on the twins' part, could actual reincarnation be a thing? Is it possible that Vanessa Allen and Gregory "Allen" used to be Evan and Elizabeth Afton? Has the universe really offered him the chance to be a better older brother?

Maybe. Maybe not. But this is his family now, and he will do anything to keep them forever.

End