Good Morning

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 "I had to take the foxy animatronic into maintenance last night, Boss."

William's shoulder still hurt. He'd bandaged himself up well enough - nobody seemed to notice, which William didn't know how to feel about. It was good, he supposed, but a little sympathy might be nice.

"There's some sort of...eh, issue with the internal machinery. Not quite sure how long it'll take to repair."

"First Chica, now Foxy?" Boseman grumbled, setting his keys down on the counter. "What the hell is going on? We can't run this place if the damn mascots keep dropping like flies."

"Hold onto your trousers, Boss," William argued, furrowing his brows. He was going to need to start being more careful, he supposed. "I just gotta replace the parts. It may take a week or two, if I had to guess, but it will be fine."

"Ugh," Boseman groaned, pinching the bridge of his nose. "Why can't you just -"

The doors slammed open.

Standing in the doorway, looking totally disheveled, was Gino. He looked exhausted, deep, purple bags under his eyes. His eyes darted helplessly around the pizzeria before landing on Boseman.

"Boseman," he said hoarsely. "Oh, thank god you're finally here. I've been trying to get ahold of ya -"

"Gino? What the hell are you doing here? What do you -"

"It's Fritz - my son. I can't find him. I've been searching all night."

Boseman's expression softened as Gino approached.

"What? What do you mean, you can't find him?"

"I can't find him." Gino repeated insistently. "While I was out last night, I left him in charge of the restaurant with my employee, Mr. Afton. He said he went in here, but he hadn't returned..."

William said nothing.

"Fritz is missing?"

Gabriel seemed genuinely concerned, and frankly, Cassidy felt her own nerves getting to her, too - that kid was younger than her, maybe ten. Where could he have gone? She didn't want to worry about it. She groaned, shrugging her shoulders.

"Probably not a big deal," she insisted. "He's always off doing weird shit."

"I guess," Gabe muttered, making a face.

"Okay, okay, just calm down, Gino," Cassidy's father said firmly, waving his hands. "You said you and the other Afton searched for him?"

"Yes!" Gino cried. "We searched the entire restaurant. I checked every little place he likes to hide out and play. I even went home to see if he'd gone back. He's gone."

Cassidy watched as Jerry began to sneak off toward the counter.

"Jerry, where the hell are you going?" Gabe asked, annoyed. Jerry didn't answer, grabbing da's keys off the counter and beckoning his siblings to follow him. Cassidy glanced briefly at Gabe, and then got up to follow. Jerry led them through the back doors, into the back hallway, marching with a bizarre sense of confidence.

"What do you want, Jerry?" Cassidy demanded. "Dad's not gonna be happy if he sees you with those."

"I saw a secret room the other day," Jerry said brightly. "The purple guy went in there."

Gabriel looked at her. "The purple - ?"

"I think he means the British freak."

Cassidy let Jerry lead them to the back, until they were standing in front of a door; 'Restricted Access'. Fuck, she didn't even know this was back here. She snatched the keys from her little brother, scowling. "Gimme that." Cassidy moved toward the door, trying the keys until she found one that fit.

"What's inside?" Gabe asked.

"Dunno!" Jerry shrugged. "I think it's his secret lair!"

"Oh, bullshit," Cassidy rolled her eyes as she opened the door. "It's probably just a storage room.. But it seemed to be mostly off-limits..." she grinned. "Which means?"

Gabe and Jerry grinned at each other.

"Our secret lair!"

Cassidy led her siblings into the room, only to stop dead in her tracks when the scent hit her. She covered her nose, a wave of nausea knocking her chest. It was bad - like, rotting flesh levels of bad.

"Jesus Christ!" Gabe cried. "It's fucking rancid in here!"

"Yeeeeah," Jerry scrunched his nose, and then grinned. "It smells like Gabe's farts after eating dad's potato casserole -"

Gabriel spit on him.

Cassidy glanced around, her gaze falling on Foxy and Chica. Man, those things looked terrible. "Looks like this is where the limey bastard is repairing the broken robots."

"No wonder they're broken," Gabe muttered. "I didn't realize they smelled that bad..."

"Yeah," Cassidy responded. "Probably why he's repairing them in here and not in the regular parts and service room..." Cassidy turned away from the robots. Looking at them was making her feel...queasy. "But once he's fixed them, he shouldn't have much more of a reason to come in here. Look. This room is almost completely empty. It's barely even used."

"Yeah!" Jerry rocked back and forth on his heels. "We can make this our clubhouse!"

"Don't call it a fucking clubhouse," Gabe barked. "That's stupid."

"Who fucking cares?" Cassidy rolled her eyes. We can use this spot as a hangout and nobody will ever know. We can hide all our stuff in here. It's perfect. We just need to wait until it's cleared out..." Cassidy could picture it now. Her very own, super-cool, ultra-goth hangout. With candles. And a pipe organ. And a bearskin rug!

"Alright, that's fine," Gabe shrugged. "We need a more secluded place to practice anyway. Bonby's mom was getting mad because of how loud we were -"

Was he fucking nuts?

"You are not bringing your stupid fucking boy band in here!" Cassidy shouted, shoving a finger in Gabriel's chest. "Do you want us to get caught?"

"It's not a fucking boy band, asshole!" Gabe yelled back. "You don't understand real music because you listen to Bananarama!"

"Whatever," Cassidy scoffed, shoving past him toward the door. "Let's get out of here. I'm not gonna get this smell out of my nose for the next three days..." Cassidy left, her brothers following behind her - she heard the faint click of the door shutting, and Jerry was running up to walk beside her.

"I wanna draw my ideas for our clubhouse!" Jerry said excitedly.

"It's not a fucking-"

"Okay Jerry," Cassidy interrupted. "But I'm the design director. Got it?"

"Wha - but I'm tha one who found it!"

"And making it our secret base was my idea. So shut up. Or you're banned."

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