Gregory sighed, putting Freddy’s head in a bag he had found lying around Vanny’s hideout. The animatronic bear looked up, giving a cheerful-looking expression, at least as best as he could.
“Sorry about your body, Freddy. I’ll do my best to fix you up.” Gregory muttered as he slung the bag over his uninjured shoulder.
“It is alright, Gregory. I am just glad that you are safe. What were you doing up there? What happened to Vanny?”
“Vanny? Uhm, I dunno. I was just playing the last Princess Quest cabinet. It was up in their hideout.” Gregory looked to the entrance of Fazer Blast, tilting his head. “Hey, that’s their hood.”
Gregory leaned down and picked up the rabbit hood, flipping it around and peering inside it. He took a moment to show it to Freddy, and shoved both it and the blue ribbon beside it into his bag.
“I… suppose it’s time to finally leave. The doors are still open, right?”
“Yes, Gregory. Please get out before you get hurt any further.”
Gregory gave a nod and leaned against the wall, before heading to the front of the Pizzaplex. Standing beside the door was Vanessa, who had a hand on her head and was looking a little dazed. The boy instinctively hid behind the lobby’s construction, wincing as several injuries were set off by doing so.
“Go on, Superstar. I believe in you!” Freddy encouraged, and Gregory let out another sigh. Peering over his cover, he noticed that Vanessa was looking in his direction, having clearly heard Freddy.
“Hey, kid. It’s alright, I’m not going to hurt you.” Vanessa called out, holding her hands up. “I promise.”
Gregory couldn’t tell if she was being genuine but regardless, he slunk out from hiding. If he didn’t, she was probably going to approach him, and he didn’t want that. Quietly shuffling up to the Security Guard, Gregory averted actually making eye contact and kept quiet as she crouched in front of him.
“I’ve seen smears of blood around the place, so I expected you to be injured… this is just more than I thought.”
Vanessa’s expression turned serious as she folded her arms.
“Do you want to tell me where your parents live so I can contact them? They’re probably really worried about you.”
“I’m rather doubtful of that.” Gregory responded after a long period of silence. He rubbed his bandaged arm, trying to change the subject. “I saw you rubbing your head. Did you hit it?”
“That’s not what I asked you. Where do your parents live? I can’t find any records on them or you.”
“They aren’t around anymore. They died… or something like that.”
“‘Or something?’” Vanessa dragged her hands down her face. “Come on, kid. You can’t keep lying to me.”
“I’m not lying! I don’t know what happened to them.” Gregory huffed, tightening his grip on the bag slung around his shoulder. “I just woke up one day, and they were gone.”
“Gone?”
“Yes, gone. Stop making me say it.”
Vanessa sighed. She supposed she would just have to take him to her own home to watch him until she could figure out what exactly was going on. She should also probably call some mechanics, because the Glamrocks looked rough now.
“I can help fix them.” Gregory spoke, noticing that Vanessa was staring at the bag Freddy’s head was in. “I’m pretty good with electronics and the like.”
Vanessa raised an eyebrow, as if to question why someone so young would be. Though, she still wasn’t sure if anything he said could be taken seriously.
“Okay, kid. If your parents are ‘gone,’ where have you been living?”
“With my sister, Cassie. Her dad adopted me.” Gregory looked down, shaking his head. “I don’t know if I’m ready to go home, though. I need some time to process last night.”
“Alright, that’s… fair. Let’s go.”
“Go where?”
“To my house. I’m not leaving you to wander the streets until you feel like going home.” To be honest, Vanessa didn’t really have the energy to get into a long, complicated conversation with Gregory’s adoptive father explaining where he was, especially not with a headache and having been up all night.
Speaking of… Gregory was rubbing his eyes, clearly exhausted. He was just a little kid, despite his ability to completely maim several robots.
“Tired, huh?” She’s found a lot of empty soda cans and popsicle packaging around the building, leading to her theory that the trash was left by Gregory, and that he was awake all night through sheer fear and sugar alone.
“Can we go now?” The boy felt like he was going to pass out right there. Vanessa sighed and gave a nod, leading Gregory out the door and over to her car. She carefully helped him inside, having noticed that he was limping slightly, like he was trying to act like his leg wasn’t hurt.
The medical bill was going to be rough.
Vanessa placed Gregory’s bag into the back of her car and sat down in the driver’s seat, adjusting the mirror. As she left the parking lot, Vanessa glanced over to the passenger seat to question the kid what he had been up to all night.
However, Gregory was asleep.
“Should’ve expected that.” Vanessa sighed.
Gregory woke up in a unfamiliar bed with his injuries wrapped up in gauze.
“Where am I?” He recalled speaking with Vanessa last night, but couldn’t really remember if her driving him to her house was real or not. Gregory attempted to get out of bed, but stumbled and fell back on it.
“Oh, you’re up. You passed out in my car on the way here, so I brought you to my bed.”
“Where’d you sleep? And where’s Freddy?”
“On the couch, where else? Freddy’s there too, we were talking.”
“Oh.”
“Don’t get up, stay in bed, please. I’m going to take you to the doctor in a little bit, so don’t go getting yourself injured any further. This is gonna put me in enough debt.” Vanessa sighed. “Anyway, I tried asking you this last night, but you were asleep. What were you doing in the Pizzaplex after hours anyway?”
“Y’know… dumb kid stuff.” In all actuality, he had gotten into a fight with a kid in his class that day, and snuck into the Pizzaplex to calm down. The longer he stayed there, the more he wanted to explore… then he got locked in.
“Mm.” Vanessa gave a quick response, not entirely believing the explanation given. “You said you’re good with electronics, right? Why, exactly?”
“Oh, that? I really have no clue.” Gregory responded with a shrug, wincing and rubbing his bitten shoulder, which required moving his broken arm. “When was that hospital visit again?”
Broken arm, broken leg, bruised ribs, mutilated shoulder, cuts and scrapes, claw marks and a large gash right above his eye that led to Vanessa having to clean up the dried blood that had dripped down while he was asleep.
“Jeez, kid. I knew the Glamrocks were in bad shape, but what the hell happened to you ?” It’s not like she was saying Gregory was worse than they were, but she still just was caught-off guard by how bad his injures were.
“Uh… kart accident on the raceway?”
“This did not all come from a kart incident. In fact, the doctors showed me images of your injuries and x-rays - that bite mark on your shoulder came from Freddy. He’s the only animatronic in the Pizzaplex with a short muzzle and four fangs like that. I thought Freddy never tried to kill you.”
“Well, if you got that information from Freddy, I can see why you’d think that. This weird rabbit guy hacked him and he turned on me. I managed to fix him, but not before he tired to take out a chunk of my shoulder.” Gregory muttered. “And for your information, there was a accident on the raceway, it’s how I broke my arm.”
Vanessa sighed, shaking her head.
“Think your ready to talk to your dad and sister now?”
“No, I’m the hospital! Why would I want them here? To see how much money I’d drain from them?”
“They’d find out eventually. Besides, the Glamrocks malfunctioned and turned on you, correct? I’m sure your dad can try to work something out if you explain it.”
“My dad’s a employee of Fazbear Entertainment. How’s that work?”
“Gregory, employees can call out their bosses.”
“They can? I kinda just assumed that if you get hurt on the job, you just have to suffer.”
“It feels like that, but no. Haven’t you learned that in school?”
“I don’t know. I can’t remember anything from the past year.”
“Nothing?”
“Nope. I’m going to therapy for that, but it’s not going anywhere. Which sucks, because therapists keep dropping me for no reason after a few sessions.”
“Just out of the blue?”
“Well, they don’t ever give me a reason. And if dad knows, he certainly isn’t telling me.”
“That’s odd.”
“No kidding.”
“Okay. I think I’m ready to see them.” Gregory sighed out after a few hours. “Did you bring Freddy here?”
“‘Course not, that’s stolen property. I did bring you this, though. I saw it in your bag last night.” Vanessa stood up, holding out a Freddy plushie. Technically, it was also stolen property, but it was a hell of a lot easier to act like it wasn't.
“Oh, right, I don’t own this one.” He didn’t own a lot of the plushies, especially compared to Cassie’s Roxy collection. His sister loved that wolf… he needed to fix her as soon as possible. “When’s a estimated release time for me?”
“Not anytime soon, that’s for sure. Do you know their number? I can’t really call them otherwise.”
“Uh, no, don’t think I do.” Gregory muttered to himself. “Actually, wait, hand me your phone.”
“No, both of your arms are injured. Just give me the number.” Gregory sighed, but did as he was asked.
In the hallway, Vanessa called up Gregory’s father.
“Hello, Vanessa here. I have your son, he’s in the hospital, this isn't a ransom message. You’re out of town right now? Even with your kid gone? No choice, huh? What about Cassie, is she home? Right, it’s Wednesday. Well, if you could ask her to stop by after school, Gregory would appreciate it.” Vanessa hung up.
“What’d he say? Are they coming?”
“Later. Your dad got dragged on a business trip and Cassie’s at school.” Vanessa pocketed her phone. “Wait, don't you have school today?”
“Uh huh. But anytime I would be absent or come in late, Cassie would get the work from my teachers. It’s not exactly pleasant, but I don’t want to disappoint them.”
“I see.”
After school, Cassie poked her head in.
“They told me you were pretty banged up, how bad is- oh, woah! That’s pretty bad!” Cassie flinched at the state of her brother. He wanted to make a comment on how the Glamrocks were even worse, but felt like telling Cassie that Roxy was hurt in any way wouldn’t be the best idea.
“Yeah, yeah. I’m a dummy.” Gregory sighed. “This is what happens when you sneak into Pizzaplexes. Hey, did you tell Boots?”
“Uh-uh. Boots is… having some problems today. Something about Tony, you know how it is.”
“Tony? That missing Becker kid?” Vanessa spoke from the chairs lining the walls, causing Cassie to flinch - she wasn’t aware there was another person in the room. “Were you friends with him?”
“I thought you were just a Pizzaplex security guard. Why are you so interested in this?” At Cassie’s confused expression, Gregory introduced Vanessa. “This is Vanessa, she brought me here.”
“I don’t know, I heard that name around my co-workers, I was just curious.”
“Yeah, we were friends with him until he completely disappeared.”
“Sorry about that.”
When it got late, Cassie left to go home. Vanessa also had to leave, since there were a lot of conversations she was supposed to have in the morning. Maybe she could take Gregory up on that claim he made about being able to fix the Glamrocks.
Being robots, the destroyed casing was the simplest thing to replace - Fazbear Entertainment could make new ones, it would be easier to do than create four whole new characters or designs for the Pizzaplex, especially when one was Freddy himself. There weren’t any animatronics already in the building to replace anyone with either like with Bonnie. The endoskeletons, however… they had tons of spares too, Gregory knew that for sure.
Vanessa had taken note of how insistent he was that Freddy and Roxy shouldn’t get new endoskeletons. He commented something about Chica as well, but didn’t seem to care about Monty. It’s not like Fazbear Entertainment could avoid giving Monty a new endoskeleton anyway - he was ripped in half at the waist. It was kind of frightening knowing a 12 year old caused that.
During her work shift, Vanessa chose a new endoskeleton for Monty, rough and aggressive, like his old self, though not quite capable of maiming or murder. This new Monty endoskeleton was brought to Parts & Service, in order to program Monty into it. When that was done, he would be given a new Monty casing when it was available, and sent to Monty Golf under supervision for a few weeks.
Vanessa recalled asking Gregory why Freddy had yellow eyes like Roxy. When Gregory explained they were Roxy’s eyes, he elaborated by saying that wherever Freddy’s body was, it had Chica’s voice box and Monty’s claws. Freddy’s original parts should still be in the Parts & Service room, which Vanessa did find hidden under a box.
The new Monty would be fitted with the old Monty’s claws, so that Fazbear Entertainment can be at least some what cheap in their manufacturing - it was like a necessity at this point.
When Vanessa was able to return to the hospital after this New Monty was put into Gator Golf, she was able to inform Gregory about this, and also ask how exactly Monty ended up in two pieces like that.
“Catwalks.” Gregory answered. “We had a scuffle.”
“You had a ‘scuffle’ with every animatronic in the place.” Vanessa sighed out.
“Well, it also had to do with the Hurricane Bucket. And it falling on Monty. His attempt to push it back up broke the catwalks beneath him, and since I was right beside him… that’s how I bruised my ribs.”
“Jeez, Gregory. Did you have any ideas or plans in this place, or did you just want to fist-fight everyone you came across?”
“I had plans! They just involved the animatronics. I wanted to get out, but that wasn’t a thing I could do until 6. So instead, I had to get them to stop trying to murder me until then, so decommissioning them was my only option. It also allowed me to install their unique upgrades into Freddy so that I could use them.” Gregory tightened his grip on his blanket with a wince. “Anyway… so Monty’s back?”
“He was the easiest, since Fazbear Entertainment didn’t even bother trying to repair him, and just scrapped him. But yeah, the new one’s already in Monty Golf. He seems to be doing well so far.”
Gregory looked down with a sigh. Boots hated Monty, so decommissioning him felt like doing Boots a favor as well as avenging Bonnie. However, not being able to at least try to repair him was bothering Gregory.
“I know what you’re thinking, kid. There wasn’t anything you could do. You know what happened to him, don’t you? You are the one who ripped him in two, after all.”
“I know that, it’s just… I feel bad, I wasn’t even given the option.” Maybe it was for the better that Monty had been scrapped. The notes Gregory found made it sound like he was responsible for Bonnie not being around anymore…
Unexpectedly, Vanessa had found Freddy’s body in Fazerblast, looking rather worse for wear. His casing was removed in places, and his endoskeleton was missing pieces, both of which were strewn around.
“S.T.A.F.F. Bots, could you pick up all of Freddy’s pieces and carefully bring them to Parts & Service?” Vanessa called to a group of S.T.A.F.F. Bots sweeping up the floor nearby. They rolled over, picking up parts of Freddy, before rolling out. They’d probably be there for some time, Vanessa noted. She should try looking for Roxy and Chica.
Roxy was in her green room, while Chica was in the kitchen. It was easier to find them both than Vanessa would’ve thought, but she disregarded it and brought them both to the Parts & Service room.
“Where… where are we going?” Roxy asked. “Is Gregory here?”
“Gregory? Uh, no. He’s not here. But he feels terrible about what he did.” Vanessa sighed.
“Vanessa, he broke us. Why would he feel bad about this?”
“He didn't have much of a choice.” Vanessa responded, shaking her head like Roxy could see that. Chica emitted some static, as if she was joining in the conversation.
Roxy didn’t reply, but she didn’t seem pleased. She’d feel better once she was fixed… won’t she?