2 CHAPTER 1: Trapped
(Earlier That Day…)
Ashley couldn't let it go. She had to keep going, no matter what. Last night was more than crucial for her, it was eye opening. It showed her that there was hope, there was a chance, that if she went into this enormous building one last time, she may never have to think about it again. The raw size and the outside of the building would seem wondrous to someone unaware of its history, but Ashley was very aware. Every detail. This building had so much, and still felt the need to steal her brother. The fact that this place was so much more than a simple pizzeria wasn't enough. The fact it was basically a mall for one brand wasn't enough. The fact it was going to actually open its doors as a hotel and get the money of so many wasn't enough.
There was even a zoo, huge and wide spread with its many animals and still, it wasn't enough. It had to take him. Well now Ashley would have to take him back. But her ways of getting in were limited, it wasn't like the girl would be welcomed by staff members just because it was daytime. The doors were locked, the walls were solid, she couldn't dig a hole, she had already tried that. This building seemed to have an infinitely long basement, and it seemed to have just as many ways to keep people out… And then it hit her. Almost literally.
A small piece of glass fell from a long since broken window ledge is what caught Ashley's eye, again, ALMOST literally. She moved just in time to avoid injury, allowing her to see her new way in at a distance. A broken window, now lacking any glass to stop Ashley's intent.
(In The Present)
Lora's breathing was scarce. The closet she had been forced into was damp with a strange heat, but it was far from comforting. It felt like a nightmare. The walls seemed to grow closer every second and she couldn't see anything. What was that? It was blue and had such long teeth. As far as she could tell she was only up to its torso when the teeth started dragging on her head. She felt her hair for blood, but she seemed fine. Lora calmed herself, letting her lungs breathe again. Something slammed on the door. Pointed feet with claws were through the little space under. The feet had a withered blue weird plush before what seemed to be a tear, leading into the nails. The nails were claw like, silver with a black swirl. Once again it slammed on the door. It shook, nearly opening.
Out of sheer fear, she threw herself towards what she thought was a wall behind her. In truth, this was a very deep closet. Behind a few coats was a dark part of the closet. Lora ran behind a chest and against the wall she jumped past as the door went flying by her. It crashed against the back wall she was parallel to and broke into pieces. A powerful stomp came from the direction of where the door previously rested. It was getting closer. She could hear frantic breathing coming from the opening she had jumped from. A deep breathing. It continued as a huge hand gripped the side of the darkness on what she would think was a wall. It seemed to be exactly like the feet she saw with a blue plush and a tear leading into silver claws with a dark black spiral. A foot stepped from the opening for her to see, and it was just like the one outside of the door two seconds ago, it's counterpart followed.
The silence predominated in that moment. Everything seemed to stop except her and this… thing. It was looking around. It knew she was here. It was searching for her. It took another step forward, or maybe even towards her. It's breathing became more and more intense with every second. Suddenly, it ran into the room. It was huge with blue, black, and purple. It stormed around like an animal before stopping at the chest. It thrusted it's hands into the chest breaking the front, but the back still mostly covered Lora, and so did the wall's shadow. It didn't seem to see her and yet, for a moment, she thought it glanced straight at her. It walked off towards the opening and this time did not pause. It seemed to leave, Lora didn't hear it return for another glance. She let out a sigh of relief, finally letting her body ease.
But she wasn't away from danger yet.
(Earlier That Day)
Just a little bit more and Ashley would be in. A few self made rock steps later, and she was making her way through the newly opened passage. How had she not thought of this? This potentially could've gotten rid of years of stress, and doubt. She shook her head, not letting the thought linger. She probably would've thought of it eventually, and she was her now, ready to help. Ready to save.
Ashley wasn't, however, ready to save herself. She hadn't counted on her falling when she had finally crawled through the window. For some reason she thought she would end up on the ground, or right above it. In fact, however, she was quite high, and fell an amazing bit. She didn't scream, but she acted fast, grabbing the edge of the window ledge. Ashley gave a sigh of relief. She had let herself become distracted, and nearly… She felt her fingers begin to slip, quickly she began falling again and…
Ashley found she had landed on bean bags. Huge bean bags, one in the shape of a bright blue bunny, the other in the shape of a bright brown bear, both with big red cheeks. They were old for sure, but they didn't have any tears. Instead they simply had a permanent smell of pepperoni on one, and sausage on the other, though they were without any food.
Ashley made her transition up and began to look around, spotting a sign, reading the text aloud as if a secret password. "Backroom Office, employees only."
(In The Present)
BANG! An even bigger hand slammed against the opening. It was a reddish orange and had tears on each of it's fingers. A tongue snapped in the opening. There was not silence. Instead, it felt loud. Lora's ears rang, but she could not hear anything. She began to breathe fast, very fast. So fast, it was audible. The head of the monster leaned in, smelling the air. It was like that of a wolf, or a dog, with a snout and a huge grin. This was indeed the tongue's origin and Lora realized the tongue was quite long and had two counterparts. The head also had not two, but three eyes, and they were blood thirsty, and they were all wrong. What should've been white was instead an unsettling pure black, making it seem like the wild blood shaded pupils floated in this creature's head. It licked it's teeth and twisted it's head as it looked in. A few moments later, it crept away. The breathing ceased, but Lora dare not move. She was too scared. She couldn't move. She wouldn't move.
It was only thirty minutes later that she realized nothing was coming. That she was alone. That she no longer had to stare at the checkered black and purple tiled floor, nor sit on it's cold surface. She was safe for now. She got up and realized she was missing Bonnie. She searched the room but found nothing before seeing a plush hand on the edge of the door. With great speed, she grabbed Bonnie and quickly coiled back to her hiding spot. She checked Bonnie to make sure he wasn't hurt and then gave him a big hug. "Oh Bonnie, I don't know what I'd do without you. I'm so glad you're okay." Lora didn't realize it, but Bonnie's eyes were closed. Suddenly, they opened with life. They blinked a bit before looking directly at Lora. They looked around and then once again they closed. Thundering footsteps marched towards the room and the blue monster once again was in Lora's view. It grabbed the broken chest in front of her and threw it aside before grabbing her with its claws. "AAAAH!" Lora screamed, louder than she ever had. The monster tried to shush her and even attempted to put it's hand over her mouth, but she managed to push it away. She yelled and yelled louder and louder, for so long, she began to feel tired. Eventually, she fell out, barely breathing. She was still barely breathing when she came to. When she did, she awoke to a noise.
It was a loud clanking, and came from above her. Lora couldn't move. She was wedged under something. The floor above her was a bit wet, while the dirt under her was drenched in a weird liquid and smell. It was sticky, and Lora struggled to move her arms at all at first. Lora couldn't see, it was much too dark. But then she saw it. A hole, a way up that was a small crawl away, but she didn't move just yet. The noise was still in the room above, and it sounded as if it was moving around. It sounded more like footsteps, something was up there. Still, she got on her stomach and got a bit closer to make sure she wasn't seeing things.
To her delight, Lora was right, and the hole was very real, and she could fit through it easily. She waited for the noise to leave and, after five minutes, she couldn't hear the monster's feet anymore, so she crawled to the light, but once she could see the room above, she nearly had a heart attack. The blue monster was in the room, on the opposite side of the hole, looming overhead, looking straight down at Lora. Lora went pale as all else went silent, her heart began to pound faster and faster. It grew even faster when the monster confirmed it saw her by kneeling right next to the hole, not breaking any eye contact. It grabbed something and set it in front of her. It was Bonnie! Lora looked so relieved, but her fear won the rest of her. She braced for it to jump for her, but it didn't. Instead, once she had taken Bonnie, it simply left.
Lora waited for a moment, and then summoned all of her courage to get up into the room. It was a small room, and had a poster for Freddy Fazbear's Pizza, and Fredbear's Family Diner. Even one for Circus Baby's Pizza, even though all of them had yet to reopen. The words "Fred World 1st Floor Security" was pasted on the wall in brown and gold large colors. The lights in the room were weird, some were silver, but most were a strong orange, other than the broken light, which seemed to be somewhat blue. There was a fan and a small monitor on the table in front of her, and the walls were striped with red and each had a doorway, and three buttons by the doors. A green one on top, a white one in the middle, and a gold one on the bottom. Lora didn't know what they did, but she didn't need to find out. She needed to get out of this place. She set Bonnie down and got on the little monitor. It had a keyboard and a mouse, ready for use, although they were quite dusty. She pressed the button on the computer, and hoped for the best.
(Earlier That Day)
A key. Ashley needed a key. It's never as easy as going up to a door and opening it up with these places. Though as she searched, she realized how naive that was of her to simply want the place to give her all its secrets. Did she honestly think it would be that easy? She was on a rescue mission, uncovering a kidnapper's tracks. But no matter how hard that would end up being, she would not give up. She had to find him. He was alive, somewhere in here.
After some searching, Ashley found herself in front of another bean bag. It was similar to the Bonnie one, but it was golden. Turning it over revealed what she was looking for, a key. "Here it is." She said triumphantly. "That wasn't too hard." Thinking of Bonnie, what was he talking about? This place didn't seem that dangerous... He made it sound like Ashley would die instantly, as if monsters of unworldly origins roamed, but so far she was just fine. Then again, he was a talking plushie, what could she expect it to know? That too deserved some explaining, but not right now. The point was, Ashley had begun to doubt the advice she had just received. Again though, she noticed her own naivety. Perhaps she was just lucky. Ashley had to keep her guard up. What if the person that took Tyler was here? They could jump out at any moment. She made her way back in front of the door, and unlocked the room behind.
(In The Present)
The monitor's power whirred to life to Lora's delight, it could have easily been broken. On the monitor was a little camera system, and a blueprint. Lora was across the entire building, far from the exit. There were about four whole rooms in her way on each side, many more rooms that simply existed, and three that had hazard signs flashing on them. Lora realized all the other rooms had the cameras turned off, only the exit and the office had cameras on, and something huge and brown trotted by the exit. It seemed even bigger than the blue one and, from what Lora could see, it had twisted enchanted green eyes and a huge lizard like tail, two sets of spikes going down along it's back to the tail, the top two spikes were huge and shined. Suddenly, it stopped in front of the door. It was completely idol before turning to the camera's direction. Lora then saw that the monster was looking straight at the camera, dead set on it, as if looking into Lora's eyes.
The screen went to static, but Lora could see what was happening just by the skin of her teeth. It was making a mad dash towards her. Lora pressed every button, eventually pressing the green one and watched a door slam down, sealing itself shut. She rushed to the other side and pressed the other green button. With that, she was sealed in. Bam! The right door shook. Bam! Bam! Bam! It continued for minutes on end. Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam! BAM!!! And then, it stopped, and was replaced with something else. A scratching on the window next to the door.
Lora suddenly noticed each button had words on them. The shaking had caused some dirt to fall and uncover the labels. Green was "Doors," White was "Lights," and Gold was "Shock." "What does 'Shock' mean?" Lora said to herself. Then she had an idea. She pressed the white button, which she assumed was the lights to the room. Instead, it was the lights outside. Once they were on, she could see the face of her tracker, who wanted to get in so badly. It was a huge, bulky, brown creature, with a sealed mouth, which was actually quite quant. Then, this mouth opened, showing a completely horrifically bloody inside with sharp, silver teeth and a bear-like nose. The eyes were a strange shade of green, and all of these would set off warnings without the black top hat on it's head. It placed it's hand on the window and then showed it's claws, causing Lora to fall back. It didn't react with a laugh, nor did it try to break the window. It just stayed there, keeping an eye on her, looking at her with most likely a horrible intent. It made Lora so… Uneasy.
"Beat it!" Lora yelled with frustration. It remained still, not flinching at all, as if she had said nothing. Lora was quite irritated. That door may not hold forever, and this thing was being stubborn. Then another idea presented itself. She slowly got up and walked to the door. Once more it lashed out, but stopped as soon as she was in front of the window. It now was giving her a squint. It was looking at her as if it had become suddenly confused. Lora thought nothing of it and went through with her plan. She pressed the yellow button and held it down.
(Earlier That Day)
The room riddled Ashley's mind simply from opening the doors. Flashing lights, buttons, levers, and a smell that was unsettling. Something… bloody… Something horrible happened in this room, someone… "Oh god…" Ashley thought. "Someone died in here. Maybe more than one person! The smell of it is still here." Carefully, she entered the room. Inside, she saw some sort of control panel. In front of it was some sort of one way window that Ashley hadn't noticed on her way in. There was some sort of camera system hanging from above with video of the entire establishment. Each floor, each section, everything. Buttons and a mouse to change cameras and which system the mouse was on. It was a complicated system, but Ashley could work with this.
Looking through the cameras for a little bit, Ashley barely saw anything, her eyes twitchy, she was ready for something, but she wasn't ready for the emptiness of the building, nor how broken it was. Some cameras were broken, and others were facing the wrong way. There was nothing until she got on the first floor camera. The floor she was on. There was something near the entrance, but she couldn't make it out. It was hunched over in the dark, facing away from the camera. It seemed large, and looked extremely dangerous. As strange it may sound, it looked like it could kill someone. The doors were wide open, and yet it had decided to stay inside. Ashley wondered why. Then, something happened. It began to stand. It was as big as she thought, and turned towards the door's direction. Seconds later a window burst, a small blue plushie coming through. In the moment, Ashley hadn't realized the plushie had two very distinct bunny ears. She was more focused on the creature. Did it know that was going to happen?
More and more started happening. There was shuffling and metal running playing through the camera system, but Ashley couldn't see anything. The monster backed off into the darkness, someone was shouting, Lora ran inside the building, the footsteps were still going… Ashley's thoughts came to a horrified halt. Lora was there, right next to the monster. The blue plushie must have been Bonnie. "Oh no, oh no, please don't tell me you followed me here. Please don't tell me you're here because of me!" She shouted to herself as she looked for something she could do. The monster began to move, and the person shouted again, catching Lora's attention. Was that her dad's voice? No, that didn't matter, Ashley had to do something, now! Anything she could! Frantically she looked, and a few seconds later, she pulled a lever. She hadn't bothered to read the label. She hadn't bothered to realize her mistake.
"Lock-down."
Ashley's heart sank as she returned her view back to the cameras. Lora turned around, probably to leave, only to be met with a heart jabbing slam of the doors behind her. The doors had seemingly closed on their own, but Ashley knew better. She had done this. In trying to save her new friend, she ensured her death. BOOM! The sound echoed not only through the many cameras, all of the many screens, but also in the room Ashley was in. Lora looked to her left to watch all of the windows be sealed off by metal, and Ashley saw the same through the one way window in the backroom office. On the cameras, Lora began furiously pushing the doors as the sealing windows continued to create a loud echo, with the doors no longer being able to be opened. As Lora seemed to realize they were locked, the camera went out. Its feed broken. Ashley pressed every button she could, but it was no use. The camera wouldn't come back on. She had no idea what was going on with Lora, she had no idea how to undo the lock-down. She tried pushing the lever back, but it wouldn't budge, it wasn't that simple. There were no other buttons for such things, no other levers or switches, nothing. They were stuck there. They were stuck with the monster. They were enclosed in the walls of this place because of Ashley. Thanks to her, they were trapped.
(In The Present)
Screams suddenly came from the hall. More like a roar. Bright blue sparks were flying within the hall and The monster had left the window as if it had fallen. Then it returned to Lora's gaze, crawling on the floor. It was roaring, roaring in pain, and from this angle, Lora could see it's back and it's tail. Unlike its front, it's back was scaly, and was like that of a brown alligator, it's tail also resembling a swamp goer. The two spikes at the top were in fact silver metal, but had blood surrounding them on the body, and actually seemed to come out of holes, the top of the spikes attached with ripped scaly brown leather, the monster's own skin.
Lora was caught by the sight, but quickly realized the brown mash between a bear and an alligator was making its way to the other wall of the hallway. As it reached the wall, it got to one knee and pounded on it. It didn't try to run, it just pounded on the wall. Suddenly, the shock stopped, and the lights in the halls and the room went out. The monster seemed to get up before the lights went out. It seemed to shake with rage, it's claws extended, the spikes o it's back seemed to enlarge, becoming sharper as a green liquid seemed to pour out of its mouth. Its hands and arms seemed to get larger as it continued to change, making the strangest sounds. It began to turn it's head back to Lora, the look in it's eyes all telling. Blood thirsty, wild in nature, and furious, all with a demented smile on its face. Its mood of confusion was gone, and in its place was now an insane need to kill.
Lora backed away into the parallel corner of the room, in front of the other buttons, now filled with regret and fear. She was shaking, and now almost fully engulfed by the room's darkness, with only some lights barely on. Their tint of silver wavering with each passing second, the sounds of the monster changing continuing until they stopped. BANG! The door flew into the other one, landing in front of Lora's feet. She realized what it had done. What it was doing. It had broken the rooms power source, or at least turned it off. Putting up a fight, the room lights went out completely, but Lora could still see two emerald eyes, staring straight at her.
