Reconciliation

Chapter 1 Neon Lights and Past Frights

When you got the offer you turned it down immediately.

You were not going to work at any Fazbear entertainment owned establishments. Ever.

"What? So quickly? I didn't even tell you the position or your pay!" The anxious guy on the phone questioned. You could hear him fumbling with the phone and his hands shook with nerves.

Said anxious guy was actually your old classmate from college, Tim Elliott.
As soon as the word 'Fazbear' left his mouth you said no.

"Look, there is no way I'm working at that place." You replied, continuing to stir your dinner, clutching the phone with your shoulder to your ear.

"I just, I just, I really need someone! I don't know how I got this job and I only need to hire one employee to help run this place. You're the only one I trust to behave yourself with total free reign." Tim stuttered.

"I'm sure you've got other friends besides me. And besides maybe it'll be better for you to hire a stranger and actually act like a grown adult in charge of a giant pizza establishment." You grumbled, hanging up and putting your phone down as you served up your dinner into a bowl, storing the rest in Tupperware for tomorrow's lunch.

Sitting down with your meal, you felt slightly guilty for being so brash with Tim, he wasn't even doing anything wrong.

You'll call him back later and apologize, but you still won't take the job.

As you ate, you checked your phone and saw an email notification. It was your paycheck for this week at your current job.
When you opened the attached document however, you immediately noticed something wrong.

The end date of your contract seemed different than normal. You're sure your contract was meant to be renewed in a few months, not next week.

Doing some digging, you pulled up all your previous paychecks and sure enough, at a certain point last month, the contract end date was shortened by one day. And then the next one was shortened again, and again and again.

The mother fuckers were trying to let you go before they were legally allowed to.

Rage pulsed through you, giving you a headache.

You envisioned yourself taking them to court and getting your sweet sweet revenge, however, being such a big business you doubt that you'd ever win in court.

Glancing at your contacts, you groaned.

You taped the green phone icon and put the phone you your ear again.

"So about that job offer."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Pulling up to the large building you immediately got a headache from the inaudible buzzing of the neon lights and other heavy machinery.

There was several painted depictions of the animatronics decorating the concrete walls of the exterior of the building.

Seeing the painted likeness of a particular familiar face, you felt your stomach churn.

The car felt hot and the buzzing of the lights pierced your eardrums with a sudden high pitch ringing. You could feel the deep throbbing of your heart as it pulled at your chest from the inside, feeling like a strange hiccup each time.

Your thoughts almost began drifting in a dangerous direction before a knock on the car window made you harshly flinch in your seat, holding your hand to your chest as your rapid breath whistled and wheezed.

"Hey, you okay?" Tim asked from outside the car, hand still raised after knocking on the window.

You opened the door and Tim stepped out of the way, allowing you to get out.

"Yeah I'm fine, you just scared me is all." You forced a chuckle, following Tim inside the daunting building.

"So basically the situation is that this entire place is automated, trust me, there are robots everywhere, doing everything."

You gulped at the thought.

"There is the only ever three people hired on full time at this location, me, the manager, a night guard, and someone for 'human resources', that's you." Tim continued to explain.

"What about animatronic maintenance?" You asked. "Surely there's a technician on site?"

"No, since the animatronics are so high tech, there are very few people who know how to work with them, which means their services are in high demand around all the establishments. If there's something majorly wrong we'll call one in, but everything else like polishing, performance checks and shell repair all go to you."

Your stomach dropped and you stopped in the middle of the lobby, turning to Tim.

"Tim. Why the hell didn't you just hire someone that knew atleast a little about robotics? I don't know jack-shit!" You exclaimed in frustration.

"Don't worry! Don't worry! I'm calling in one of the technicians tomorrow to teach you the basics." Tim flailed his hands around almost as if he was trying to fan away your anger.

You sighed, this job better pay really well.

"You'll basically be in charge of everything that a robot can't do, or that it may struggle with. Like angry customers and any malfunctions in the robots or games."

"Sounds fun." You sighed sarcastically.

"But! Since there are very few staff hired across the entire franchise, you know, three at each building and a handful of technicians, the company can afford to spend a little bit more on our paychecks." Tim grinned, handing you his payslip from last week.

You stared at the numbers in complete shock.

Yeah okay maybe this job wouldn't be so bad.