Before I left for work that night, I made sure to personally say bye to everyone in the house. I didn't want to tell them it was because there was a chance I might not make it home tonight.

You might call me stupid for going back to that job; it's not like I signed some sort of contract forcing me to stay employed there! The truth is, though, I needed the money for the car. If that meant I had to go through hell to get it, I'd do it.

Something interesting happened before I left, though. Mom showed me some more pictures from Tommy's party that were taken before we got there. In the background of one, there was the Prize Counter. It seemed normal, except the purple present box was open! And in the box was what looked like some sort of skinny, smiley clown. It seemed to be giving a child something.

"What's that?" I asked Mom as I pointed at it.

"I think Aunt May said it was called the 'Prize Puppet' or something like that," she replied. "If a child gets enough tickets, they can give it to the cashier and they'll activate the Puppet, who will give them a random 'Super Prize', which is basically a bigger plush toy than the normal ones."

Now that she mentioned it, the Puppet did look like he was holding a giant Bonnie toy. But the Puppet was just so creepy-looking that I'm surprised a kid would want to receive a toy from that thing!

Anyway, I arrived to work at the same time as yesterday. The manager was in the main room, staring at the animatronics. It's like he was expecting them to start moving right in front of him. When I went through the door, he looked at me and gave a small nod.

"I assume you can guide yourself back to the office?" He asked. I nodded in response.

"Then, have a nice night, Mr. Fitzgerald."

He got up from his seat and left the building. What was that about?

Without thinking too much about it, I went to my office. The only light in the building was coming from the office lights. I sped-walked the whole way down the hall in fear. I then sat in the chair and exhaled.

'It's going to be fine, Jeremy,' I told myself. 'Everything is under control.'

Soon, the overhead clock chimed, signaling the start of my shift. I took a deep breath. Here goes nothing!

The phone then rang again. I was expecting it, but it still startled me. I answered it and spoke.

"Hello?"

" Ah...hello, hello!" It was the Phone Guy, as expected. "See, I told you your first night wouldn't be a problem. You're a natural!"

I was so tempted to scream at him about how it WAS a problem, but I saw no point in arguing with him.

"Thanks."

"Uh, by now I'm sure you've noticed the older models sitting in the back room."

"Yeah, I have, actually."

I pulled up the feed of the Parts/Services closet and shone the light, revealing all 3 busted robots.

"Those are from the previous location, but we just use them for parts now."

"I suppose that makes sense."

"The idea at first was to repair them. They even started retrofitting them with some of the newer technology, but they were just so ugly, you know? And the smell..."

I guess they DID look a little weird compared to the newer ones.

"So the company decided to go in a whole new direction and make them super kid-friendly."

"I guess that was for the best, right?"

I think I heard him chuckle on the other end.

"Uh, those older ones shouldn't be able to walk around," he continued, "but if they do, the whole Freddy head trick should work on them too, so whatever."

Well, the good news was the mask should work. The bad news was 3 MORE OF THOSE THINGS COULD MOVE AROUND!

"Uh...heh...I love those old characters. Did you ever see Foxy the Pirate?"

I paused. That name did ring a bell. Before I could reply, he started talking again.

"Oh wait, hold on...oh yeah, Foxy! Uh, hey listen, that one was always a bit...twitchy. Uh, I'm not sure the Freddy head trick will work on Foxy."

Well that was exactly what I wanted to hear right now.

"Well, what do I do about him?" I asked.

"Well, if for some reason he activates during the night and you see him standing at the far end of the hall, just flash your light at him from time to time."

"Will that really work?"

"Of course; those older models would always get disoriented with bright lights. It would cause a system restart or something."

Huh. That was interesting.

"Come to think of it, you might want to try that on any room where something undesirable might be. It might hold them in place for a few seconds...that glitch might be in some of the newer models, too."

What do you know; this guy can actually give useful information after all.

"One more thing - don't forget the music box."

"I wasn't planning to."

But it was actually a good thing he mentioned it; I pulled up the Prize Counter feed and wound up the music box.

"I'll be honest: I never liked that puppet thing. It was always...thinking. And it can go anywhere...I don't think a Freddy mask will fool it, so just don't forget the music box."

Wait, that puppet thing? Does he mean the Prize Puppet? What did he mean when he said it was always thinking?? I hope I'll never know.

"Anyway, I'm sure it won't be a problem," he concluded. "Uh, have a good night, and I'll talk to you tomorrow."

"Ok...Goodnight."

We both then hung up. I then began silently counting to myself. There was the 3 new animatronics, 4 older models, and possibly the puppet. That was EIGHT animatronics! Am I going to survive tonight??

I then looked at the main stage.