Chapter 1: Different, Yet the Same
It had been 3 days since Mike Schmidt had been fired from his night guard position at Freddy Fazbear's Pizzeria, and he had been spending his time trying to find another job. The reputation of his previous place of employment had made it difficult, since many of the employers assumed that Mike would be suffering from partial insanity. Or total. Mike understood, a lot of the other employees had been pretty messed up from having to deal with the robots in some way or another, as well as rumors that the restaurant was haunted. That wasn't the case, as Mike knew, but urban legends still affected the community. The rumors got so out of hand, that even the local high school students didn't dare try and get inside and figure out the truth. Plus, there was a guard anyway.
After spending an entire day on the phone, Mike finally landed a job at another pizza joint, ironically, although this one didn't feature a band of singing metal animals. It was called Vito's Signature Italian, and was pretty much a higher-class type of pizza, saturated in Italy. He was brought on as a janitor, since the place's old one quit, meaning Mike was once again working nights alone in a pizzeria. He figured it would be fine. After Freddy's, how bad could it have been? So, Mike arrived just as the sun fully set to get the low down on his assignment for the night. The manager met him at the door, and handed him a mop.
"Just clean stuff up," he said.
"No... Important info?" Mike asked.
"The water's wet, that suffice? Hop to it," the manager said gruffly, before leaving.
"Is the power conserved at night?" Mike called after the manager.
"What? No! Turn them all on for all I care," the manager barked back, before getting into his car and driving away. Mike walked through the door, put at ease by the fact all of the lights were on.
A welcome change, he thought, and set to work. The entire restaurant could have fit in the Dining Hall of Freddy's, including the kitchens, and was done up to resemble an Italian villa, with fake grapevines covering some of the walls. After seeing the destruction kids could cause, Mike was also pleasantly surprised to find that this place was much cleaner, even if his job was more menial. After 20 minutes spent mopping the floors, Mike unknowingly nudged a metal pot almost entirely off a counter in the kitchen with the handle of his mop, and as he began wiping tables, it finally fell onto the floor. The loud clanging caused Mike to immediately snap his head up.
"Chica?" he called out reflexively, before checking himself. "Right... She's not here..." Mike shook himself out of the memory, mind again drifting back to the two bodies that had lain backstage. Despite Mike's renewed fear of the robots, he couldn't help but wonder how they were getting along without him.
Freddy sat on the edge of the stage, deep in thought. After the new guard's first night, it began to feel much like before Foxy's escape: they didn't want to hurt the guard, but said guard didn't know. Mike hadn't returned the next night, or the night after that, but the new girl did, which surprised the animatronics, since the plan was to scare her into quitting. Hopefully, after enough guards quit, the restaurant would be forced to rehire Mike, and Freddy and the others could hopefully win his trust back.
Besides trying and keeping the position open for Mike, the other goal was to find some way to contact him, so he would take the job in the first place. But the robots weren't exactly sure how to do so. They didn't know anything about what Mike did when he wasn't in the restaurant.
So here Freddy sat, trying to figure out a way to learn more about their favorite night guard. He strained his memory, hoping to recall something, anything that could give them an idea of where to go. Coming up with nothing, the bear looked up, spying Foxy poking his head through his curtain, ready to charge once again. He seemed to be the most effective, since the fox could essentially come out of nowhere. Foxy had actually managed to get into the office, forcing the guard into a corner and screeching until she broke down. Freddy felt a little guilty they had to go that far, but considered it worth it to get Mike back.
