Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“Oi, Mob… You sure this is the place your classmates said was haunted?” The Star Psychic of the 21st century, Arataka Reigen, straightened out his suit as he approached the American pizzeria in some random back alley.

“I’m fairly certain, Master Reigen. They said it was.. ‘Freddy Fazbear’s Pizzeria’ and that the supernatural happenings get worse over the course of a week.” Shigeo Kageyama, also known as “Mob” followed close behind his mentor as they stepped into the restaurant, adorned with a cartoon bear in a tophat plastered on the sign on top of the building. 

“Alright then, Mob… Guess that means it’s time for us to exorcize it!” Reigen was definitely a shady character, but in the end, he had good intentions. The main issue was that he possessed no actual spiritual powers for himself, and had no idea what he was getting himself and Mob into. As far as The Original Babygirl was concerned, he would just spread salt everywhere and then be off the hook. Also unknown to both him and Mob, there was one living soul inside: the night guard. 

- - - 

The sound of crying was common in the Afton household. Michael didn’t know what happened that day that his little brother got locked in the storage closet, but it clearly traumatized him… however, his old man always said that real men don’t cry, so he felt like it was his responsibility to scare the kid into growing up. 

“Why don’t you go a little easier on him? You’re acting like a big bully…” Elizabeth Afton, strawberry blond hair tied in their typical pigtails, pouted as she tried to get her brother to see reason.

“Tch. I don’t expect you to get it. You’re just a stupid little girl.” Michael knew deep down how harsh he was being, but he had to be. He couldn’t be seen as soft and emotional like his mother and sister, he refused to be lumped in with the girls. So he had to be the man of the house, besides his dad of course. His little brother just wouldn’t get with the program though, and it made him incredibly frustrated. 

The kid’s birthday was coming up soon, so Michael knew that he had to grow up quickly, hell, the other kids around the neighborhood were already making fun of him… So he had a plan to scare his little brother straight. There was no way it could fail.

- - -

“Master Reigen, where did you learn to pick locks..?” Mob seemed skeptical of their actions… Everything about breaking into this long abandoned pizzeria felt.. how should he put it, illegal? 

“There’s this guy on MobTube, he’s some kind of lock-picking genius. I started watching them just for fun.” Reigen shrugged, although the statement was true, it was clear that Mob wasn’t entirely buying that his mentor “just happened” to be watching lockpicking videos on the regular. He may have been naive, but he wasn’t that naive.

After a very long and awkward silence, the padlock that blocked off their entrance to the inside clicked open and the two entered… After which, they both realized that Mob most likely could have just busted them in with his psychic powers.

“Hey, you know what I just noticed? Dimple isn’t here with us today. What’s the deal with that?” Reigen started looking around, trying to find any sign of the green fart cloud of a ghost anywhere. 

“Ah, he said that he was doing something with some bones and that there were stalkers at your house. It sounded like he had a valid reason not to tag along, so I let him stick around.” The bowl-cut boy looked at the ground as he walked, taking note of the state of disrepair that the floor was in.

“STALKERS!? BONES!?? What the hell are you on about, Mob? The last time I remember bones being relevant was when I lost to a goddamn skeleton in a ‘sexiest man alive’ contest.” Reigen huffed, growing frustrated at the memory… To his recollection, Mob was the deciding vote in that race. He still couldn’t get over such a tremendous loss.

“He said that the stalkers were… drawing you? I’m not sure, but I think you should be taking this matter very seriously, Master Reigen. Have you been locking your doors at night?” Mob couldn’t help but worry about his mentor when he noticed how nonchalant he was about this whole thing. Had his master perhaps been stalked before? 

“Who the hell doesn’t lock their doors at ni-“ The conversation between the two was abruptly cut off by the sound of a man letting out a frustrated scream as some kind of very heavy metal contraption snapped shut. Soon enough, the dynamic duo stumbled upon the cause of the sound. A massive, terrifying animatronic chicken was hovering over a window into a sort of office. 

- - -

The horrifying sound of bone snapping and gray matter being crunched between steel jaws hit Michael like a truck as he witnessed his brother get bitten. He was mortified. He was in shock. Nothing around him felt real. The lights of the pizzeria buzzed and flickered in his head as he came to the realization that he might have just killed his brother. He might have just killed the boy he was doing all this for, even just on accident. How could this have gone so wrong? 

Everyone in the diner went dead silent, along with Michael’s own friends who had participated in the teasing of his little brother, and yet were now staring at him as if this whole thing was his fault entirely, his plan from the start, that he was the one solely to blame… but he wasn’t. It couldn’t be his fault, right? His brother couldn’t be dead because of him, right? 

Days passed and that crying child finally passed away, dying in the hospital with Michael sobbing over him and apologizing time and time again. His father barely reacted. He and Elizabeth could tell that he was just acting strong for their sakes, but there was something Michael found admirable in his old man’s stoicism. He tried his best to imitate it. 

Kids began to go missing after that, beginning with William’s business partner’s daughter. Things only got worse after that, and Michael’s father only buried himself in his work more, aiming to create more complex robots. Mike imagined that it was just his father’s way of coping with all the grief. Distracting himself from the tragedy with work, right?

Not long after, Elizabeth died in an incident that nobody ever got a straight answer about, yet it was clear that Mr. Afton had played a role. He was acting off, and that was when Mrs. Afton decided to split, taking Michael and leaving the man behind the slaughter alone, to cause even more pain and agony in his wake. 

Michael knew something was wrong. He could see it, he could tell and yet everyone ignored it and pretended things were normal. He’d taken a few random shifts at old Freddy’s locations, hoping to find more about his dad but every time it just turned up more questions. 

Everything about this place was crazy, and nobody seemed to notice but him. 

- - -

“Nice… Birdie..” Reigen whispered as he stumbled backwards in a feeble attempt to escape the lumbering giant of an animatronic. “There’s no need for violence, right? You know, trespassing… it’s such a minor misdemeanor, right? Not.. Not anything worth the death penalty over!” 

As he tried to step back, Reigen started tripping over himself… He knew he was done for, preparing to feel the pain of metal tearing into his flesh when he shut his eyes. Yet, the worst never happened. The massive yellow chicken animatronic stayed stock still, held in place by Mob’s astounding psychic powers. 

“Master Reigen, I think that these robots are the source of the paranormal phenomena we heard about… You can feel it too, right? The vengeful spirits of little kids even younger than me who were killed..” Mob seemed disturbed by what he was able to sense.. He’d never even seen a normal spirit flat out possess an object and be fully tied to it. The closest thing he could think of would be that evil spirit that he exorcized at a farm only to be paid in nothing but broccoli seeds. 

“O- of course I felt it! I was just testing your abilities, Mob..! I didn’t actually think that I was in danger or that these things were some kind of complicated security measure…” Reigen waved his hands around in many complicated ways before he settled for resting his thumb and index finger on his chin, bending forward to examine the giant chicken. “Yes… I can feel this spirit’s pain very greatly.. It was certainly wronged during its life!” 

Reigen’s bullshitting was interrupted by the sound of a music box playing a well-known piece of music from the romantic period during the late 1800s. As both he and Mob turned around they were stunned to find themselves faced with a six and a half foot bear in a top hat. The fraud let out a yelp as he clung to his protégé for safety, noticing that there were now two massive hunks of metal to take care of… 

Before Mob could use his powers, the man who had previously been locking himself within his office stepped out, flashing a light towards the two animatronics in an attempt to scare them away. 

“Scram! Get away, the both of you! Dammit… how’d a couple of random civvies get in here?” The night guard, cloaked in shadow yet exuding a somewhat foul odor, looked down at the two “psychics” from Spirits and Such Consultations Office. 

“Civvies!? God, what are you, some kinda cop?” Reigen backed away from the security guy, there was no way he wanted to get involved with the police directly with the business he ran. 

“Not really, I’ve just always wanted to say that if I’m being honest. Here, get in my office before you and the kid get your heads crunched.” The man winced at the thought, as though he’d witnessed that kind of thing before. 

“What do you know about the spirits inside of those robots, sir..?” Mob, in his typically polite fashion, began asking questions to the security guard. Assuming this wasn’t his first day on the job, he should know something.. 

“Spirits? Oh. If you’re looking into the missing children’s incident from a few years ago, I’m sorry to say but I’m looking for the guy who can give me answers too.” As the guard stepped into the light, Mob and Reigen recoiled slightly, noticing the way that he didn’t look… quite right. 

The security guard wore a badge labeled “Mike” and stood relatively tall with a gaunt look on his face, his skin had an almost purple tint to it, making him look dead. Reigen couldn’t help but compare the man’s smell to that of a corpse after seeing his appearance, it was almost like he too was undead. 

“Oi, Mob.. Is this guy a zombie or something?” The phony psychic whispered to his student, donning a look of surprise when the boy shook his head. 

“I can hear you, you know.” Mike stared down at Reigen before moving a hand towards him, tapping the button on the wall behind him to open the steel door. “Quite frankly, I don’t know what I am. I’m looking for answers for myself too.” 

Reigen seemed to be in disbelief at how nonchalant this so-called security guard was. The guy was weirdly calm both about the fact that he and Mob had been caught trespassing and in regards to the accidental insult the con-man laid on him. 

The group’s discussion was drawn to a close when they heard the very loud noise of a door being busted down. 

“Ahaha- Alright Steph, where’s this party at?” The sound of a very loud jock rang through the pizzeria, calling the attention of the animatronics away from the office. 

- - -

“Guys… I think someone’s in my walls…” The stereotypical weeb, Richie, sat in his room surrounded by body pillows of various anime characters. His friends, Ruth and Pete didn’t believe him at first, playing it off as a joke. 

They thought it was a joke, of course, until they also heard the scratching from within Richie’s walls. 

“Why’d you suggest we come study at your house if you have goblins in your walls, Richie??” Ruth whined, trying to find a hole she could try and peer through. “More importantly, why didn’t you tell me?! Maybe they wanna talk…” 

Peter Spankoffski looked at Ruth in disbelief before addressing the problem more seriously, “Um.. Not to be a buzzkill but that sounds like a bit more than mice. Maybe you should check on that?” 

The three stared at the wall, anticipating something horrible to burst through at any moment while the scratching continued, until suddenly they heard a voice from behind. 

“Well, well, well… If it isn’t my favorite nerds! I heard you were all here, but really I’m only here to talk to one of ya.” Max Jagerman, the football star of everybody’s dreams, stood in Richie’s doorway. 

What. The. Hell. 

- - -

“Alright, why’s it so dark here? Did someone blow a fuse or something? Must be one wild party if you did!” The football player looked around before setting eyes on the huge purple bunny before him. He took one look at it before running to tackle it, much to the group in the security room’s surprise. 

“What the hell..? Mob, who’s that guy? Someone from school?” Reigen tried to examine the scene from the security cameras but seemed to be having difficulty. 

“Master Reigen… I think we’re in some kind of.. pocket dimension. That man  is definitely not from Seasoning City.” Mob closed his eyes and tried to ascertain their whereabouts, but found that he was unable to locate anyone or anything. It was like they were in an entirely different dimension. 

“Oh god, I’m getting flashbacks to the train to Ibogami Hot Springs. I guess we’ll have to figure out the issue here, too.” Reigen began to really start hunkering down and getting serious. He did not want to be stuck in this haunted pizzeria for months on end. 

“What the heck!? Not only is this place really haunted, but he’s actually just fighting the giant robot!” An unknown voice cried out from elsewhere in the pizzeria, sounding distressed. 

“Nani!? Is it like a gundam suit?” Another voice called out from a completely different direction. Soon, what sounded like a whole gaggle of teens were talking to each other and trying to determine what to do. 

- - -

“H- how’d you get in here!? What do you want??” Richie asked hesitantly as he hid behind Ruth. Chivalry be damned, he’d let her take the hit for him if it came down to it. 

“Oh! Well your mother is a very sweet woman…” Max began before being cut off by Ruth’s own voice. 

“You mean you got to do Richie’s mom!? Lucky…” The group stared at Ruth in shock. She had clearly read the room wrong. 

“What the fuck?! No, I didn’t- Huh???” The Jagermeister was so flabbergasted that he forgot what he was here to do. “Why the hell would I do that? She’s like, old and shit!”

“She’s totally milf material, right Pete??” Peter looked at Ruth in shock and horror before aggressively shaking his head. 

“What did you just say about my mom? W- what the- Ruth! First you want to get with the wall goblins and now my mother!? I don’t think I feel very daijoubu about bringing you into my house anymore.” Richie was about to push Ruth out of his room before he remembered that Max Jagerman was standing right there. He decided it was better to keep her around as a meat shield in the end. 

“Guys, guys! Can we please stop talking about Richie’s mom and focus on-“ Before Pete could even finish his sentence, Max himself had joined in, seeing this as an opportunity to make one of his targets uncomfortable. 

“Richie’s mom has got it going on!! Richie’s mom has got it going on!” The jock sang his poorly thought out parody at the weeb until he couldn’t take it anymore and started yelling. 

“OUT OF MY HOUSE! ALL OF YOU! GET OUT!!” After Richie’s outburst, the two nerds were standing outside of his house with Max. 

- - -

In the Cellar of “Circus Baby’s Pizza World,” Michael sought answers. This was the place that marked him first realizing something was wrong… so now that he’s come here on orders from his estranged father himself, he just knew he would be able to find what he was looking for. 

He punched his name into the HandUnit only to be bestowed with the name Eggs Benedict nonetheless. He could tell this was going to become a theme… Even so, he made the journey into the bunker to do his job, being instructed to give the animatronics controlled shocks. 

After a fairly uneventful day, which was rare for anything related to Freddy Fazbear’s Pizza in Michael’s experience, he went home to watch his favorite garbage television while eating popcorn. 

- - -

“Ugh, what ever . I was here to talk to Micro-Peter anyways…” The Jagerman sized up Pete in an attempt to make up for the fact that he got kicked out of the house. 

Peter could do nothing but gulp as he stared up at the much stronger brute before him. He couldn’t help but feel like he was dealing with a literal monster before he was getting pounded into the asphalt of the street. 

“You’re not supposed to- to hit a guy with glasses, right?” Peter barely managed to squeak out the words before the jock’s fist collided with his face again. 

“Ohoho, right! Alright, alright… I‘ll take care of it!” Max snatched Pete’s glasses off of his face and threw them into the grass of someone else’s lawn. “I just really don’t appreciate how you’re not putting in the work in this relationship… It really makes me sad..” Jagerman gave an exaggerated frown before he continued beating Peter into a pulp. 

“I- I just don’t have time to be your errand boy anymore..! I’m sorry! P- please, stop hitting me!” Peter cried out his pleas for mercy, but whatever god ruled this universe was a very cruel one.

After all was said and done, Ruth helped Peter back on his feet. She found his glasses amidst the grass and handed the cracked spectacles back to their owner. 

“Dammit… These were freakin’ expensive, man. Ted’s gonna tear into me when I get home looking like this..” Peter couldn’t fully comprehend why this had happened, but what he did know was that something needed to change.

Chapter Text

After some debate between the trio in the security office, it was decided that Reigen would go out to find whoever else had shown up. Of course, to the others who thought he had actual powers this was the clearly right choice. Which meant he couldn’t protest… unless he wanted to be called out as the fraud he is. 

“Alright guys, the jig’s up! We know you’re here and could see you on the monitors, so just come on out and we can settle all this peacefully.” Reigen decided it would be best to try and be casual about this and reassure the kids that they’d be fine. 

“Um, sir! Look, don’t be mad but… We might have made an itty bitty mistake..” A girl with short brown hair held back by what looked like butterfly hair clips wearing a somewhat frilly outfit seemed hesitant to talk. At all. Given her attire and current demeanor, she looked like a small scared child, despite actually being a high schooler. 

“I won’t get mad, just tell me what happened.” Reigen was trying to diffuse the situation with the girl quickly, given that he knew he was running on borrowed time. If he listened closely enough, it was almost like he could hear the clanking metal footsteps growing nearer. 

“One of those- of those things t- took Max and stuffed him into- into some kind of suit!” The girl looked like she felt guilty about this turn of events, and Reigen certainly wasn’t one to just let a kid stay in distress. 

- - -

When the rag-tag group that consisted of Richard Lipschitz, Ruth Flemming, Peter Spanoffski, and Stephanie Lauter came together to try and form a plan to get back at Max, someone unexpected butted in. 

“Well I have a plan to take him down! We just need to get a few things together, and figure out how to break into an abandoned old pizzeria!” Grace Chasity, ever the unpleasant surprise, had decided to grace the group with her presence. What a delight. 

“I’m sorry, an abandoned what..?” Stephanie didn’t seem to be all that enthusiastic about this plan, not to mention being lukewarm when it came to Chasity as a person. However, she knew that this might be the best shot they had at getting Max to stop his bullying rampage…

So she put up with Grace’s presence, for Peter. Not that she was catching feelings for him or anything, she just… hated to see him with a busted face. That was all. 

“Isn’t that place supposed to be super haunted or something..? I heard that someone got their frontal lobe bit off at some point.” Peter definitely wasn’t all too ready to go along with this plan either, but when Grace started snapping her fingers the group knew she meant business. 

“We’re gonna bully the bully! Scare him right out of his pants, and then he’ll never bother us with his big… hot… scary presence again! He’ll be wetting himself in fear when we’re done with him!” Grace’s motivations were becoming clearer as she went over the plan. Nonetheless, the group heard her out. 

“Yeah! Fuck Max Jagerman! Fuck him straight to hell!” Richie chimed in, enthusiastic to see this plan through and be free from all the bullying he’d become so accustomed to over the years. 

“We’re gonna cut off his nips!” Ruth was also totally onboard, making the decision for Pete and Steph a no-brainer at this point. They’d do it. It was worth a shot, anyways. There was one caveat, though…

“No cutting off anyone’s nips. Please...” Stephanie added, trying to keep the plan at least somewhat sane. As sane as she could manage with these guys around, anyways. 

“Right you are Stephanie! We can’t engage with him physically, so we’ll have to be smart about it. We’re gonna be cool beans . Got it?” Nobody actually understood exactly what Grace meant by “be cool beans” but they agreed nonetheless. Excellent. Now they had a plan.

- - -

“THIS IS SO NOT COOL BEANS YOU GUYS!!” The teenage girl that Reigen was trying to comfort was standing in front of an animatronic suit, stuffed with the corpse of “Max,” as she called him. Blood oozed from the crevices in the bear costume, and various other bodily fluids that weren’t quite distinguishable besides having a putrid smell also began to leak out. 

“I… think that’s definitely a dead kid..” Reigen had to stifle a gag as he pulled the girl away from the dead body to ask her some more questions. “I heard others around the restaurant, do you know where they are so that we can check that they’re safe?” 

Reigen hated having to be the mature adult in this situation, but it was clear that he was the oldest one here and had been playing the part of a powerful psychic. A boy was dead and he didn’t have the time to think or register the tragedy because other kids were also still in danger. He didn’t even know what he could possibly tell Mob about all of this. 

The two walked on in near deafening silence, but at this point that was preferred. The alternative was hearing as one of the animatronics approached them, which now that they knew what happened to those who got caught… they were especially afraid of that possibility. 

“My name’s Grace, by the way.” The girl piped up, barely whispering as she led Reigen towards where she knew some of the others were hiding out for now. After a while of carefully tiptoeing to a hidden, tucked away corner of the pizzeria, Grace held out her arm, bringing the con man following her to a halt. 

“Grace? Is that you?” Another teenage girl with incredibly curly hair and massive orthodontic headgear came out of hiding, followed by a boy wearing taped up glasses and a girl in green flannel. 

“I can’t believe our plan went so wrong… I really hope Richie’s okay.. He was supposed to be filming it so there’s a chance-“ The boy had begun to go down a spiral of anxiety before being cut off by Reigen. 

“Nope. None of that, we can’t focus on what could go wrong. I’m sure your friend is just fine, and we’ll go find him now and everything will be a-okay. We’ll all cram together in that tiny security room and wait until this nightmare ends.” He had to be the adult in this situation. He had to stay strong because these kids were going through shit no kids should have to. One man was already dead, and Reigen really didn’t want to consider the possibility that someone else had also died. 

“We found this yellow bear suit, and- and since he has practice being in a mascot outfit cause he’s Zeke the Fighting Nighthawk and whatnot…” The headgear girl spoke up, her speech slightly impeded by the contraption. 

“A yellow bear suit… wait, Zeke the what? ” Reigen had to do a double take to try and process what this girl had just said before ultimately waving it off. He had more important things to do, like find that “Richie” kid. 

- - -

Teruki Hanazawa adjusted his totally real and normal hair that was not a wig at all as he approached Salt Middle School. It had been weeks since he had seen Mob, so he thought the best plan of action was to check his school. He did not find who he was looking for, but instead Mob’s little brother, Ritsu. 

“Oh, hey there li’l bro!” Teru had teased Ritsu with that nickname for a while now, which annoyed the latter to no end.

“Still huffing that copium, I see. You don’t get to call me your little brother, Teru. We aren’t related and my brother just isn’t interested in you.” Ritsu didn’t pull any punches, his patience with Teru had drastically shortened after he learned about the fellow psychic’s interest in Mob. “That aside, what are you here for? If it’s Shigeo then I’m afraid he isn’t here. He’s on some kind of ‘business trip’ with Reigen.” 

The second reason that Ritsu’s temper was so short. He hated Mob’s “master” with a passion, seeing through the no-good fraud’s act. He knew perfectly well that the man was just using his brother, and yet could never manage to finally put a stop to it. Sure, Reigen had his moments of goodness, but Ritsu had no doubt in his mind that even that was just a front. There was no way someone who was using his brother’s psychic powers for profit like that could be a good person in his eyes. 

- - -

After dropping off the four teenagers at the security station, Reigen decided to go find Richie alone. There was no way that he would put those kids in jeopardy like this. Besides, a bright yellow bear suit couldn’t be that hard to spot, right? 

As Reigen would soon find, it’s incredibly hard to find a bright yellow bear suit when it turns out that nobody is even fully wearing it. He stumbled upon Richie when he tripped through a door into the kitchen, an area he’d noticed the camera was disabled for earlier. He also noticed that when he walked, his shoes stuck to the floor slightly. Shining a light down on them and the ground revealed bloodstains on the ground, now stuck to his shoes. 

Reigen winced at the sight, but steeled his gut and continued. As he followed the trail of blood, he found a whimpering boy with a leg clamped by the leg of the yellow bear suit. He gathered that this must be Richie and examined further, putting a hand on the boy’s shoulder in an attempt to calm him down. 

“Hey… Kid, are you okay? What happened?” Reigen whispered before examining the other side of the boy’s body, noticing that he also had his arm held firmly, skewered by the suit. 

All he could really see at the moment was the blood which poured from each costume piece, not the damage that caused the gore. Richie didn’t seem to be in any state to talk, only hyperventilating and whimpering, tears falling from his face as he tried not to make any noticeably loud sounds. 

“Hey, hey…” Reigen knew he needed to do something to help, and so he took off his pink tie and handed it to the teen. “Bite down on this, I’m going to try and pry you out of here.” 

Richie obeyed and stuffed the tie into his mouth as Reigen started to pull at the two limbs trapped within the suit. He tried to find some kind of crack that would open up the suit, some kind of hinge or something… but he couldn’t. He realized that he was going to have to try and pull this off of the boy, with the metal already embedded and tearing at his skin. 

“I’m really sorry about this, Richie… I promise we’ll get you out of here as soon as it’s safe.” And so, Reigen began to yank, first at the golden bear glove clenched around his arm. Poor Richie cried out in pain, muffled by the tie as he bit down on it, trying to dull the pain as his flesh was ripped, cut into by the teeth of the springlocks in the suit. 

When Reigen finally had the glove-like piece fully removed, Richie’s arm was a mess of viscera and bone, blood pooling within the divots in his own flesh and chunks of missing flesh cut deep enough that his own radius was visible. He felt as if he was going to throw up, especially as he remembered that he was going to have to go through this a second time, with his leg. 

“Please don’t…” Richie spat out the tie and squeaked out the request as Reigen reached for his leg. He was already feeling faint, his consciousness fading at the tips and his vision going black within this already dark kitchen. He couldn’t take another one of these. 

“Kid, I don’t think having that rusty hunk of metal buried in your leg is a good idea… but I won’t do it if you mean it.” Reigen was really torn on what to do in this situation. Tetanus didn’t seem all that ideal, but he could see the boy getting paler by the minute, and he was still bleeding profusely. Not to mention how all the noise that they were making had probably undoubtedly alerted at least one of the animatronics to their location. 

So when Richie shook his head, confirming he didn’t want Reigen to take the leg off of him, he complied. The adult picked up the kid and helped drag him back towards the security office. He had no idea how all of them would fit in that tiny cramped space, but they had to. Otherwise… he didn’t know what he’d do. He couldn’t leave any of these children behind. One of them was already dead and that was bad enough, so if it came down to it… he could fend for himself. Yeah. That’s what he decided.

Chapter Text

Michael had found that his subsequent nights in the rental bunker were not nearly as uneventful as the first. He started off his second night hiding underneath a desk, having to force the sliding shutter closed. Why was he being tormented by what looked like two baby dolls? Why did this desk have what amounted to a door with holes in it underneath it? All very sane questions to ask, he thought. 

What was stranger still about this whole situation was that the voice that tried to instruct him on how to stay alive… that tried to comfort him through this insanity.. reminded him of his sister. It wasn’t that the two sounded alike, but there was something in their cadence, maybe. A familiar way in which they spoke, something about the words, the tone.. Her voice was that of an adult woman and yet there was something so.. Elizabeth about it. 

It didn’t take long before Michael came to the realization that the voice, that Circus Baby herself, somehow was his sister. He found out how Elizabeth died, brutalized by this machine, this automaton animatronic that now impersonated her just to lure him into a false sense of security. A sense of security that was hard to be lured into when Michael had just been told he was kidnapped.

“Don’t be afraid… I’m not going to hurt you.” The man couldn’t help but roll his eyes. He didn’t believe her for a second. Michael had never had anything against clowns before this point, but now he felt like he might be a hater. Before the oversized doll had even started explaining, he already knew the predicament he was in. 

This was a Springlock suit. The same kind his father had designed.  

“You’re in the scooping room. Do you know why they call it the scooping room? It’s because, dummy- ” Michael had to keep himself from smiling at the vocabulary that would’ve been so typical of his little sister. “It’s the room where they use the scooper. I thought that would be obvious.” Of course it was obvious, Michael had never denied that. In fact, he didn’t even remember asking. 

Circus Baby droned on and on about the idea of the scooping room, and Michael was growing bored.. Even when some random outsiders came in for maintenance, he couldn’t help but want to go home, go back to his trash television show. Things made sense at home. Nothing ever made sense in any establishment connected to Freddy’s. Especially not this one. 

- - -

“So this is where Kageyama and Reigen went, huh?” Teru mumbled as he looked up at the rundown pizzeria. “I’m not sensing anything from this building… What about you?” 

Ritsu was ignoring his fellow psychic for a moment as he stared at the door blankly, opening it with ease. “I’m definitely getting weird vibes from it. I’m not sure if they’re from psychic powers or more so the fact that there’s a random American pizza chain here in Seasoning City.” 

The two looked at each other and nodded before stepping in. All they were met with was an old, abandoned building. It was completely empty on the inside, almost like they’d stepped into a concrete box. Even stranger, there was no sign of Mob or Reigen. Their search would have to continue elsewhere. 

“Why are you even looking for my brother in the first place, Hanazawa? I can’t think of anything that you would have to tell him.” Ritsu sounded suspicious, raising an eyebrow as he looked Teruki up and down, trying to find any tells, any nervous ticks, any sign he was hiding something. 

“Ah, it’s just that he had asked about the more.. novice psychics that I had taken under my wing. You know, the ones you met in the research lab? So I was going to meet with him to catch him up.” A perfectly reasonable explanation… but one that Ritsu couldn’t help but find fault in. 

“Then why did you come to our school? You could have easily set up a proper time and place to meet with him. It’s not as if you never cross paths…” Teru blinked in surprise. The kid was sharp, he’d give him that. He was still pretty off the mark, though. He genuinely did just want to catch up with Shigeo, but it seemed like Ritsu was now completely convinced that Teru could only ever have ulterior motives.

“You see, the issue was, that we hadn’t crossed paths. I had been waiting a while to just catch him on the walk home from school, but he hadn’t shown even once. So… I decided to investigate. See if maybe he was staying extra late with the body improvement club for some reason.” It was getting frustrating for Teru, having to explain himself to Mob’s little brother time and time again, but he would do it as often as it took for Ritsu to finally stop seeing him as a threat.

“Fine. Whatever the case, it’s clear that neither Shigeo nor Reigen are here. So, it’s time to search for leads somewhere else. Any ideas?” Ritsu was pretty frustrated at this point. Reigen had just dragged Mob off to god knows where and now he’d been missing for a few days. It certainly wasn’t the weeks that Teruki had been making it out to be, but it was still concerning nonetheless. 

- - -

Michael, after hours upon hours of tedious work winding up the springlocks and shaking off minireenas, was finally free. He could finally go home and relax. Nothing else of note happened that night. Circus Baby didn’t even utter a single other word to him. It almost felt suspicious, but he supposed that maybe he should just be grateful he had gotten out alive. After all, he’d heard plenty of tales of those who had gotten skewered by the springlock suits. 

There was something that was bothering him, though. He never got to see the face of that suit from the outside. He never knew which animatronic had served as his personal prison for the majority of the night. Maybe he should be glad that he didn’t know. At least he wouldn’t have nightmares about them then. 

Michael didn’t think he could stand nightmares of the Freddy’s animatronics again. He’d had enough of them for one lifetime. Though, he supposed rather morbidly, maybe that meant that his lifetime was near its end. He shook himself out of his thoughts. He couldn’t afford to start thinking like this. Not when there was so much he still didn’t understand. Not when his father still owed him answers.

This tilt-a-whirl that he was stuck on at this point left him so dizzy he could barely see straight, even sitting alone in his chair watching TV alone. He was stuck at this point in his pursuit of knowledge. Michael Afton was going to make sense of all of the things that had happened to him, if it was the last thing he did. Terrifying suits built like death traps be damned. If there was one thing he wanted, it was the truth.

- - -

Richie had long fallen unconscious by the time that Reigen had finally dragged him back to the security office, his leg still clamped by the “boot” of the yellow bear suit and his arm tied up in Reigen’s tie, which was now being used as a makeshift tourniquet. He’d see if the night guard had any real first aid supplies soon. 

“Hey… open up. It’s your favorite star psychic of the 21st century right here!” Reigen called out towards the door, which slid open at his call. 

He scrambled to get inside and pressed the button to close it back, clearing out a small space to lay Richie down in the back of the office. He needed to figure things out. And fast. 

“Oh man… I think I’m gonna be sick…” The girl with headgear proclaimed, clutching her stomach to emphasize the point. 

“Guys, guys, it’s all gonna be okay… S- surely, this was just an act of God! You know?! Max deserved what he got… and, well, Richie.. Maybe he didn’t need that arm and leg anyways!” Grace was trying to rationalize everything at this point, and it was clear from the concerned looks she was getting from her peers that this wasn’t standard behavior from her. 

“Master Reigen… I was wondering, are we really going to exorcize these spirits? From what I’ve been sensing so far.. they’re just little kids.” This was something that really got the group’s attention. Who was this kid to say that those strange robots were harmless?! It was pretty clear to them that Max had just died because of them. 

“I don’t know if you noticed, but those ‘spirits’ totally just killed Max Jagerman! Children or not, they’re violent, and you should get rid of them!” The girl in green flannel had spoken up, sounding incredibly anxious and frantic in her speech.

“Hey now, you will not talk to my apprentice like that. Mob knows what he’s talking about, and if he isn’t comfortable with the idea of exorcizing a certain spirit, then I can’t make him.” Reigen had jumped to Mob’s defense so quickly that he had forgotten all about one important detail. 

“Then… can’t you exorcize them, sir?” The boy with the taped together glasses spoke. Of course. Everyone here thought that Reigen was actually psychic. This was incredibly bad news for everybody’s second favorite con-man, because he now had to come up with a plausible excuse not just for the gullible Mob, but for six strangers. Dear god. 

Chapter Text

Michael had just narrowly escaped death on his fifth night on the job. Something in his gut had told him not to listen to Circus Baby. Something in his gut had told him to run forward and to the right. He landed in an office, much like one of his previous jobs in a Freddy’s establishment. He also found himself stuck closing doors and checking vents. This whole song and dance felt all too familiar.

Worse yet, he still couldn’t help but think about the voice that had called out to him, trying to lure him out. It was unmistakably Elizabeth. It seemed that she was under the impression that Michael was his father. How… charming. Things were falling into place now for the poor night guard watching TV so late at night. William hadn’t sent him to Circus Baby’s to give him the answers he’d been asking for for years.

William had sent Michael to Circus Baby’s to die in his place. He knew what was down there, and he knew it wanted revenge. All Michael could really manage was a laugh. It was so characteristically cruel of his father at this point, wasn’t it? He had to wonder if it was truly stoicism he’d seen in his old man the night his brother died… or if perhaps he had never felt anything for the kid at all.

As Michael passively watched his show, shoveling popcorn into his mouth while disdainfully glancing at the basket of Exotic Butters he had received as the only compensation for his work, he couldn’t help but fall deeper and deeper into his own thoughts. The pieces were in place for him, it felt like… Maybe he could finally find his father and bring him to justice for his crimes. Or perhaps, the terrifying spaghetti amalgam of animatronics that had tormented him in the office that night had followed him home, and was now slowly inching towards him.

There was no universe in which this ended well for Michael. And yet, he didn’t die. He couldn’t die. Even after finding out what it was like to have his insides scooped out and be replaced with a mass of wires and endoskeletons, even after his hollowed out corpse rotted into a disgusting purple hue, and even after the animatronic inside him had abandoned his body… he wouldn’t die. Mike the security guard got up, wanting answers, not even knowing what he was to begin with.

- - -

Reigen scrambled for a plausible explanation, trying his best to come up with anything that would get him out of this situation. In the end, he settled on the old reliable excuse he usually went with.

“Ah, well- well you see… If I were to try and exorcize those spirits, then I could end up melting this entire pocket dimension and all of us with it! My power is simply… that vast…” A bead of sweat rolled down the con artist’s face. He could only hope that nobody would ask any further questions.

“Are you talking from experience?” The girl in the flannel questioned, looking skeptical. So much for no further questions…

“There’s no way this guy is really psychic, Steph. Those aren’t real. The only man who can perform miracles with his otherworldly powers is our lord and savior Jesus Christ-“ Grace was quickly interrupted by the girl who assumedly bore the name Stephanie.

“Oh my god, shut the fuck up… Ghosts aren’t supposed to be real in the first place, and yet here we are! I’m not even sure that this purple guy isn’t dead too!” She pointed aggressively at Mike, who only responded with a shrug.

“Well if this guy’s supposed to be so powerful, then why the hell is Richie on the floor still bleeding out!? Shouldn’t he be able to… I dunno, use his weird force healing to patch him up?” The boy with the broken glasses sounded like he was coming from a place of concern for his friend, his voice cracking at awkward intervals as he crouched down to get a closer look at his injured comrade.

“I can’t just heal people with psychic powers! That’s impossible! Isn’t it, Mob?” Reigen frantically looked towards his apprentice, trying to get the boy to agree with him.

“I don’t know, master… I think Ritsu once told me about an esper who could heal people. Even then, I don’t think that I can.”

“See?! Some psychics just… can’t do that kind of thing! And I’m one of them!” The fraud defensively yelled out his statement before quickly turning his attention to the room. He may not have powers, especially not the kind that can regenerate someone, but the least he can do is find a first aid kit somewhere in this room. There has to be one, right?

“Hey guys… If Richie dies, does that mean I can get his stuff?” The girl with the headgear may have been trying to lighten the tension, or maybe that was genuinely where her mind was at. Either way, it wasn’t received well by the rest of the group, especially Reigen. He couldn’t let another child die on his watch.

“Stop it. He’s not going to die, so don’t even say that.” Reigen did his best to stay positive as he scoured the cramped room, looking for any kind of medical supplies. Even just a bandage would help at this point, anything is better than nothing. “What does he have that you even want so bad anyways?”

“I’m pretty sure his figure collection could sell for a lot.” The girl looked deep in thought, like she was genuinely mulling it over. “Maybe it could pay for my orthodontics.” She sighed dejectedly. Reigen supposed that dental bills could be pricey sometimes, but he still couldn’t accept such an ill-timed comment.

“Well, maybe ask him about it when he wakes up or something. Your friend isn’t going to die, though. I’ll make sure of it.” A now very sweaty Reigen finally spotted a first aid kit and ripped it away from the wall, immediately rummaging through it.

“Yeah, Ruth. Richie’s gonna be okay… He has to be.” The boy with the taped up glasses looked over at the girl in the headgear -- Ruth, apparently. She hung her head in concession and began to fidget awkwardly with the sleeves of her sweater.

“I found a few things we can use. You, glasses boy… You seem like you’ve had to use a few gauze wraps more than once in your life. Wrap him up while I replace my tie with a real tourniquet.” Reigen had taken a natural leadership role as the most responsible adult present, as well as, by his own word, the most powerful. The fact that his words were lies didn’t matter in that moment… it’s not like anybody besides himself knew.

“O- on it! You can- You can count on me..!” The boy responded, reaching forward to take the bandages from the con man. The two began to slowly and carefully treat Richie’s arm, taking things step by step as they attempted to dress the skin which had been shredded by the golden bear costume.

- - -

“Hey, Paul? Did your nephew say anything about his little nerd club going on a trip or something?” Ted Spankoffski, Pete’s older brother, combed his moustache as he asked the question.

Paul looked a little unsure as he thought back on whether Richie had mentioned anything about that when he was over last… The answer was a pretty solid no, unfortunately.

“He didn’t mention anything even remotely in the ballpark. He came over to borrow some camera equipment, but he said he was just taking it to film some kind of ‘supernatural phenomenon’ at a pizza place in town.” Paul shook his head as he spoke. “You know, I’m not sure when he got into ghost hunting or whatever, but I guess at least he’s broadening his horizons past those Japanese cartoons.”

“Well, I don’t think filming at a pizza place should take… almost a week now? I’m actually getting worried, man.” Ted looked the part too, with the way his brows furrowed as he pulled out his phone and tried to dial Pete for the 53rd time since he’d gone missing. “Come on… It’s not like you’re at a rager doing something cool, so pick up!” He yelled at his own phone as the dial tone cut off, going to voicemail.

Paul decided to do the same, calling Richie only to get the same result Ted did. No response, straight to voicemail. Something seemed horribly wrong, and he decided that the two of them were going to get to the bottom of it.

“Well Ted, there’s only one thing to do in a situation like this.” Paul began to type on his computer, looking something up in Google.

“What’s that?” Ted wasn’t quite following where Paul was going with this, looking over his shoulder with a confused expression on his face.

“We go to every single pizza place in Hatchetfield to look for them.” Ted laughed for a moment, thinking that Paul was joking… But one look at his search query and the determination on his face quickly put the thought to rest.