Second installment, coming up! With apologies for the instance of Babelfish-grade Spanish...
"Tom, did you get any of that?"
"I think so. He was damaged pretty badly when the staff forced him off that kiddy fiddler, wasn't he?"
"Yeah. And now there's a new animatronic... Damn it. I'm going after him."
"Barbara, we don't know if these things are hostile-"
"We know they're sapient and at least one of them is scared shitless! The longer I wait to establish contact the more time he has to do something stupid!"
"Alright. I'll be inside in a few minutes. And be careful!"
"I'm always careful, hun."
I drew my sidearm and stepped into the left-hand hallway. All clear. Cautiously, I moved towards the dining hall until I got to a door on my left. It yielded to a single kick, revealing a closet full of cleaning supplies. All clear. I moved on into the dining area, sweeping the muzzle of my gun across the empty stage.
No sign of Foxy. No sign of the other three either, although I could hear pots and pans being knocked around inside the kitchen so at least one of them was in there. That left the bathrooms and the backstage area. I thought about the fifth endoskeleton, considering it in a whole new light now; busting in might be a bad idea.
"Sitrep, Tom."
"These shutters are bloody wavesteel or something! I'm going round the back!"
"Copy. There's at least one animatronic in there so watch your-"
A terrifying distorted howl echoed through the entire building, coming from the office, then rather abruptly trailed off. "Hey, where'd he go?" a slightly petulant-sounding child's voice added.
I pulled the slide of my pistol back a tiny fraction of an inch, triple-checking there was a round in the chamber while inwardly cursing myself for leaving the shotgun behind. If the damn security doors were Handwavium-enhanced then those animatronics would sure as hell be toughened up too. Was a handgun going to do much more than annoy them?
I shoved it back in its holster, reminding myself of what I came in here to do, and knocked on the door to the backstage area. There was a soft gasp, barely audible even with my hearing.
"Hey, Foxy? I know what you're thinking, but I'm not here as your replacement, I promise. My name's Barbara, and I'm... Well, kind of a cop, I guess; it's hard to explain. But I'm not here to hurt you, or any of your friends, I promise. Now, how 'bout you tell me a little about yourself, huh?"
No response.
"C'mon, Foxy. Work with me a little here, please? At least tell me if you can hear me."
All the lights went out. "Damn. Tom, the faster the better!"
"I'm trying! This place is sealed up tighter than a nun's clunge, I swear... Wait a second. Aha! Daft bastards forgot about the doorframe! I'll be with you in five minutes!"
"Copy." I tried to work out how to overturn a table without making any noise, but gave it up as pointless.
Now, I knew where Foxy was, and one of the others was in the kitchen and a third was probably...
In the doorway.
"Somebody's not playing by the ru~ules," Bonnie giggled, mechanical voice sounding weirdly distorted. "Security personnel must remain at their posts at all times, on pain of termination!" He broke into a fit of insane laughter.
"Well guess which other policy I'm breaking, wiseguy!" I called out, grabbing for my gun as I spun to face him.
"I know!" he said gleefully, holding up the coach gun. "I found it!"
Trying to out-draw an AI is suicidal. He'd have that thing up and ready to blow a hole in me before I could even finish forming the thought...
If I was stupid enough to leave a loaded firearm unattended, which I'm not. If Bonnie'd had the necessary facial articulation, I'm sure his expression would have been a picture as the gun clicked dry. He screamed again, a horrible noise that sounded like a child in pain through some kind of voice distorter toy, and lunged towards me insanely fast. I fired twice but he was ducking low for a tackle and what should have been a headshot took the tip of one ear off. It still did the trick, though; he hollered in pain, stumbled and faceplanted on the tile hard enough to shake the whole building. His momentum sent him sliding right into a stack of chairs, which promptly collapsed on top of him. In other circumstances, his stream of anguished swearing would've been funny.
"Any time now, sweetie," I muttered, frantically trying to monitor every doorway at once and keep track of the wounded but still active and probably very pissed-off rabbit. "I really don't wanna hurt any of you people but I will if I have to!" I called out, trying to act more confident than I felt.
A tinkly music-box tune started playing off to my left, all the more frightening for how incongruous it was. I whipped around, gun raised in both hands, and saw Freddy slowly approaching. "That's far enough!" I barked. "No sudden moves and keep your hands visible or I'll blow your fucking head off!"
He laughed, a hollow and bitter sound. "Lady," he said wryly, with a strong Brooklyn accent, "you ain't got no idea how little that scares me-"
And then the whole world exploded.
When Tom and some of his buddies from the Army were training volunteers for Operation Great Justice during the Boskone War, a demolitions expert told a class of eager young fen that explosive entry is like cooking bacon: It's safer to overdo it than underdo it. Evidently Tom had taken this advice to heart.
Once I could hear again and had recovered from the choking cloud of dust and smoke that had filled the room, I discovered that there were now two doors to the kitchen. The original was hanging from one hinge, while a heavy metal door marked 'Fire Exit' was wedged into a ragged hole in the drywall a few feet to he right. It was noticeably dented in the centre.
A very frazzled-looking Chica staggered out of the doorway, missing a number of feathers. "¿Alguien vio a matrícula de esa bola de demolición?" she said to nobody in particular, and then fell facedown across a table, which broke.
"Oh my sweet Lord they sicced Harry Dresden on us," whimpered Bonnie. "Hey, I surrender dude! If I could move I'd totally have my hands up right now!"
Freddy just sighed. "Ain't I been sayin' this'd come back to bite us in the ass sooner or later?" he growled at Bonnie. "We ain't goin' down without a fight, assholes! You wanna dismantle us for study, yer gonna hafta do it tha' hard way!"
There was a long, awkward silence. "You really don't have very good night vision, do you?" Tom said at last, leaning around the doorframe. He hit the lightswitch.
Freddy blinked a couple of times, then took a long look at me. "What," he said, eloquently.
"Tom, did you get any of that?"
"I think so. He was damaged pretty badly when the staff forced him off that kiddy fiddler, wasn't he?"
"Yeah. And now there's a new animatronic... Damn it. I'm going after him."
"Barbara, we don't know if these things are hostile-"
"We know they're sapient and at least one of them is scared shitless! The longer I wait to establish contact the more time he has to do something stupid!"
"Alright. I'll be inside in a few minutes. And be careful!"
"I'm always careful, hun."
I drew my sidearm and stepped into the left-hand hallway. All clear. Cautiously, I moved towards the dining hall until I got to a door on my left. It yielded to a single kick, revealing a closet full of cleaning supplies. All clear. I moved on into the dining area, sweeping the muzzle of my gun across the empty stage.
No sign of Foxy. No sign of the other three either, although I could hear pots and pans being knocked around inside the kitchen so at least one of them was in there. That left the bathrooms and the backstage area. I thought about the fifth endoskeleton, considering it in a whole new light now; busting in might be a bad idea.
"Sitrep, Tom."
"These shutters are bloody wavesteel or something! I'm going round the back!"
"Copy. There's at least one animatronic in there so watch your-"
A terrifying distorted howl echoed through the entire building, coming from the office, then rather abruptly trailed off. "Hey, where'd he go?" a slightly petulant-sounding child's voice added.
I pulled the slide of my pistol back a tiny fraction of an inch, triple-checking there was a round in the chamber while inwardly cursing myself for leaving the shotgun behind. If the damn security doors were Handwavium-enhanced then those animatronics would sure as hell be toughened up too. Was a handgun going to do much more than annoy them?
I shoved it back in its holster, reminding myself of what I came in here to do, and knocked on the door to the backstage area. There was a soft gasp, barely audible even with my hearing.
"Hey, Foxy? I know what you're thinking, but I'm not here as your replacement, I promise. My name's Barbara, and I'm... Well, kind of a cop, I guess; it's hard to explain. But I'm not here to hurt you, or any of your friends, I promise. Now, how 'bout you tell me a little about yourself, huh?"
No response.
"C'mon, Foxy. Work with me a little here, please? At least tell me if you can hear me."
All the lights went out. "Damn. Tom, the faster the better!"
"I'm trying! This place is sealed up tighter than a nun's clunge, I swear... Wait a second. Aha! Daft bastards forgot about the doorframe! I'll be with you in five minutes!"
"Copy." I tried to work out how to overturn a table without making any noise, but gave it up as pointless.
Now, I knew where Foxy was, and one of the others was in the kitchen and a third was probably...
In the doorway.
"Somebody's not playing by the ru~ules," Bonnie giggled, mechanical voice sounding weirdly distorted. "Security personnel must remain at their posts at all times, on pain of termination!" He broke into a fit of insane laughter.
"Well guess which other policy I'm breaking, wiseguy!" I called out, grabbing for my gun as I spun to face him.
"I know!" he said gleefully, holding up the coach gun. "I found it!"
Trying to out-draw an AI is suicidal. He'd have that thing up and ready to blow a hole in me before I could even finish forming the thought...
If I was stupid enough to leave a loaded firearm unattended, which I'm not. If Bonnie'd had the necessary facial articulation, I'm sure his expression would have been a picture as the gun clicked dry. He screamed again, a horrible noise that sounded like a child in pain through some kind of voice distorter toy, and lunged towards me insanely fast. I fired twice but he was ducking low for a tackle and what should have been a headshot took the tip of one ear off. It still did the trick, though; he hollered in pain, stumbled and faceplanted on the tile hard enough to shake the whole building. His momentum sent him sliding right into a stack of chairs, which promptly collapsed on top of him. In other circumstances, his stream of anguished swearing would've been funny.
"Any time now, sweetie," I muttered, frantically trying to monitor every doorway at once and keep track of the wounded but still active and probably very pissed-off rabbit. "I really don't wanna hurt any of you people but I will if I have to!" I called out, trying to act more confident than I felt.
A tinkly music-box tune started playing off to my left, all the more frightening for how incongruous it was. I whipped around, gun raised in both hands, and saw Freddy slowly approaching. "That's far enough!" I barked. "No sudden moves and keep your hands visible or I'll blow your fucking head off!"
He laughed, a hollow and bitter sound. "Lady," he said wryly, with a strong Brooklyn accent, "you ain't got no idea how little that scares me-"
And then the whole world exploded.
When Tom and some of his buddies from the Army were training volunteers for Operation Great Justice during the Boskone War, a demolitions expert told a class of eager young fen that explosive entry is like cooking bacon: It's safer to overdo it than underdo it. Evidently Tom had taken this advice to heart.
Once I could hear again and had recovered from the choking cloud of dust and smoke that had filled the room, I discovered that there were now two doors to the kitchen. The original was hanging from one hinge, while a heavy metal door marked 'Fire Exit' was wedged into a ragged hole in the drywall a few feet to he right. It was noticeably dented in the centre.
A very frazzled-looking Chica staggered out of the doorway, missing a number of feathers. "¿Alguien vio a matrícula de esa bola de demolición?" she said to nobody in particular, and then fell facedown across a table, which broke.
"Oh my sweet Lord they sicced Harry Dresden on us," whimpered Bonnie. "Hey, I surrender dude! If I could move I'd totally have my hands up right now!"
Freddy just sighed. "Ain't I been sayin' this'd come back to bite us in the ass sooner or later?" he growled at Bonnie. "We ain't goin' down without a fight, assholes! You wanna dismantle us for study, yer gonna hafta do it tha' hard way!"
There was a long, awkward silence. "You really don't have very good night vision, do you?" Tom said at last, leaning around the doorframe. He hit the lightswitch.
Freddy blinked a couple of times, then took a long look at me. "What," he said, eloquently.