Another Member of the Band

by Magic Step

Endless Mistakes

Adorabelle had not thought this through. The hallways was completely dark except for the dim red light of an exit sign above her and a flickering light down the hallway that was-

The light at the end of the hall shut off, leaving her with only the exit sign. Never mind…

“*squawk* Hello, Hello! *squawk*”

The sound made Adorabelle jump.

“*squawk* Hello, Hello! *squawk*”

It sounded like a parrot with its head stuck in a tin can.

“H-hello?” Adorabelle responded.

“*squawk* Hello, Hello! And welcome to Freddy Fazbear’s pizza, the most magical restaurant you ever did see!”

The voice had changed. The squawk still sounded tinny, but the rest sounded… equine. A bit fuzzy, but equine nonetheless.

“You are currently near the emergency exit, so unless there is an emergency of a fire-slash-wild magic-slash monster attack nature, I must urge you to return to the party room where you came from. Keep walking in that direction if you need the restrooms. At the far end is the show stage, where you can watch the greatest show on earth! Thank you and remember to smile, you are having a ball at Freddy Fazbear’s Pizza!”

The whole time it was talking, Adorabelle was creeping closer to the sound. Then the nose of her bear mask hit a wall.

“Oof.” She stretched out a forehoof and ran it over the wall; she could feel a seam of wallpaper, slightly curling. Walking carefully on three legs, she took a few steps forward.

Then the lights snapped on in a room off of the hallway. Like a moth, Adorabelle darted gratefully to the door and peered inside.

It was a room with shiny pink wallpaper and two long white tables. Rows of striped metallic paper hats lined the tables. On the wall directly opposite Adorabelle hung some paper dolls, about as tall as her, with paper plates for heads, decorated amateurishly with crayon. To the right was a wall covered with a… well, it kind of looked like a mirror, but the reflection was all grayed out and fuzzy.

Oh, she knew what that was. They had them in the police department too; they were magic mirrors. Somewhere there must be another mirror that displayed the reflection the mirror was supposed to be displaying.

Satisfied, she turned her head to see, for curiosity’s sake, what the pony with the other mirror would see.

Her eyes bugged out.

Hunched against the wall was a giant purple bunny, twice as tall as Adorabelle. It was on all fours, but the front paws looked like hands with the fingers chopped into pieces. A red bowtie rested under the bunny’s chin. It’s mouth was hanging open, revealing a row of spaced-out teeth shaped like little white tombstones. Its eyes were wide open- no- had no eyelids, were glowing slightly, and had round black pupils with slight violet irises. Its ears looked broken in the middle and the tops of them were bent over.

Adorabelle trotted closer to the behemoth. It looked like a statue of… wait, what was that bunny’s name? It was the wrong color, but…

“Bonnie?” Adorabelle asked.

As if in response, a soft sound echoed through the room, like a soft female moan. Adorabelle looked through the room to try and see the source of the sound.

The mirror was working like a normal mirror again. She could see her reflection; the bear costume looked cute on her, but for some reason her eyes weren’t lining up with the mask’s eyes or something; they looked like empty black sockets.

She turned back to the purple bunny and reached out a hoof towards the ears.

The rabbit’s hand shot out and hit her in the throat. Adorabelle only got a second to gasp before the creature’s fist closed around her windpipe, making her squeak in pain. Slowly, the rabbit rose to stand on its hind legs, lifting Adorabelle into the air until her legs couldn’t touch the ground.

Adorabelle started flailing; she kicked at the rabbit’s legs with her hind ones, and her forelegs scrabbled at its arms. She couldn’t breathe; the world was turning pink…

They were glowing pink, sparkling pink. The pink glow got brighter until she couldn’t see, and then in a flash, everything was dark again.

But Adorabelle could still see Bonnie’s white, glowing eyes. She saw them until she finally lost consciousness for the second time in as many days.

***

Adorabelle’s brain felt fuzzy when she woke up. Something was poking her in the back… it felt like a box corner.

Everything was completely dark. She wiggled her legs a bit; they were fine at least. Her chin still hurt from where Bonnie had bopped it, and her throat hurt some.

Moaning, she twisted her body and tried to stand up. She could feel a small pile of boxes and some brooms. Maybe this was another elevator.

In anticipation, she pressed her body to the ground in case the thing started falling, and then she heard music.

It was a piano, a jaunty tune and very well played. It made her think of saloons in the Old West. And it was coming from the floor.

There was something under there; a basement level or something. And the closet didn’t seem to be moving, which meant there had to be another way down there.

Adorabelle lifted herself back to her hooves and felt her head spin a bit at the change in elevation. Feeling along the wall, her hoof brushed against… yes, it was some kind of strange sphere attached to the wall! She pressed it eagerly.

The door swung open. The sphere was a normal doorknob.

That was disappointing.

The hallway in front of her was poorly lit by light bulbs that weren’t even trying. The floor was made of black and white tiles; the walls were pink… and badly torn. A baby gate stretched across the hall with a sign saying “Pirate’s Cove Under Construction. Employees Only.”

Adorabelle stared blankly at the sign, wondering if there was any point in heeding that warning when she’d already invaded the restaurant. Then she decided she might want to check first and see if there was anything worth disobeying the sign for, so she looked up and tried to see further down the hallway.

Wait, there was something. Down the hall. Something had moved; she hadn’t seen what. It had looked bipedal, but not tall enough to be the homicidal rabbit. And it hadn’t had ears.

Adorabelle instinctively lit her horn, only to be blinded when the light went nowhere but inside the mascot head she’d forgotten she was wearing. Ouch.

When she blinked the red blotches out of her vision, she saw the creature peek at her again. It certainly didn’t have any ears, but it was more a silhouette in the bad lighting, and ducked away as soon as it saw her.

That did it. Adorabelle leapt over the fence and trotted down the closed hallway, her hoofsteps clacking on the cold tile.

About halfway she noticed something strange on the wall. It looked like a portal to a ship, but instead of a window, it had a green plastic tunnel that bent down and vanished. There was lots of inexpertly applied duct tape crisscrossing it in many directions and wadded in sticky clumps along the metal rim. A handwritten sign above the portal said “No, seriously, we weren’t kidding, it’s closed. Please return to your party room/main stage/parents. Thank you, and remember to smile! ~Record Scratch”

Adorabelle made a mental note to investigate that later, but the bipedal creature was her main priority, and it hadn’t ducked through there… the duct tape was better proof than any spiderweb. So she trotted down the second half of the hallway.

There was another baby gate here, but it was lying against the wall instead of blocking the hallway. There was a right turn here, so Adorabelle took it; not far after the turn was a set of double doors, designed to be pushed open with a cart, each with a round window a little too high for Adorabelle to see through.

“Probably the kitchen,” Adorabelle said to herself, out loud.

As if in response, the pots and pans inside clattered.

Adorabelle took a step back. “H-hello?”

The doors flung wide, and a yellow blur leapt at her. It’s blue eyes were wide, but it’s orange beak was wider, showing its many Bonnie-like teeth.

Adorabelle closed her eyes and screamed for a solid ten seconds.

Then she ran out of breath and stopped, and realized the other creature was screaming too.

And it was screaming words.

“New friend! New friend! New friend!”

Adorabelle opened her eyes to see the creature was now hopping up and down, its long orange legs compressing like a grasshopper’s, its long yellow arms flapping at its sides like wings, and an apron on its front fluttering up and down.

Adorabelle watched the strange creature a little longer, letting her head bob up and down in time with the duck-like thing’s rhythmic jumping and wondering if she should run or just wait for it to finish.

The lights flickered out, so that all Adorabelle could see was the creature’s glowing eyes with blue irises. When they turned back on, the duck stopped and stumbled backward, its beak still hanging open in what now looked like an astonished expression since no sound was coming out.

“New friend?” Adorabelle repeated, shivering a little.

With an extra loud grinding of gears, the yellow creature straightened its legs so fast that it wobbled back and forth when it was done. “Yes! You! We’re so so so so happy to have you here!” During all this talking, its beak didn’t even close completely; the two halves of its beak just bent an inch closer and an inch back, looking more like a hand puppet than an actual rigid beak. Then its long arm snaked behind its back and brought out a small pinkish-purple object. “Mister Cupcake says hello!”

Adorabelle examined the toy. It had a silver wrapper, a plastic candle with a fake flame sticking out the top, two black eyes, and a grin. Eyeballs and teeth did not belong in baked goods.

“Hello?” she said. “Um, like, you’re the duck I think?”

The yellow creature didn’t freeze, because it hadn’t been moving when Adorabelle asked the question. But it didn’t move for another ten seconds; Adorabelle counted.

“Chick. Chica. I’m a chick.” It’s voice sounded lower and its beak didn’t move.

“OMP, I’m sorry!”

The creature still didn’t move; just stared at Adorabelle with its black-rimmed, blue-eyed stare.

Adorabelle swallowed.

Then Chica bounced into the air again and tucked the cupcake behind its back again while in midair. “Come on come on come on! We have a Welcome to Freddy’s party all ready for you!” She bounced backwards through the swinging doors, which swung shut too fast for Adorabelle to see the inside of the kitchen.

The hall lights chose that moment to shut off, but Adorabelle could see the kitchen was still bright. She trotted forward and nosed the kitchen door open, taking in the shiny steel tables and shiny pots and knives and-

Adorabelle screamed and pulled her head back out of the door. That purple rabbit that attacked her was in there too!

She had to run, but which direction? Back the way she came? No, further down the hall. She dashed blindly in that direction, unable to see anything in the dark. She hit a wall- no- a door. She yanked it open and stumbled across slippery tile. She could hear clunking, clanking footsteps behind her.

The light came on, revealing two sinks, a large mirror, and two restroom stalls.

She’d let herself run into a dead end.

Clump, clump, the steps came closer.

Window, there had to be a window, there just had to be. She scrambled to the back and looked around wildly.

She was in luck; there was a ventilation duct in the ceiling, with the grate hanging half off, and it was even the right size for her!

A loud pounding on the door made Adorabelle’s heart jump. Following her heart, she threw a stall door open and climbed on top of the toilet tank. If she stretched, she could almost… yes, she could just get her forehoof up into the air duct. Now if she could just-

Sharp spikes dug into the top and bottom of her hoof. Adorabelle screamed and pulled away, losing her balance and falling back against the stall wall, only managing to catch herself by throwing her front hooves out to the floor. She couldn’t see her forehoof through the costume, and couldn’t feel anything either.

The pounding had dropped to just knocking. “New friend? Are you there?”

It wasn’t a voice Adorabelle recognized, but it sounded too calm for her to be scared of it. But first; she had to check her hoof. Wiggling, she unzipped the zipper under her chin and slipped her forehoof out, and couldn’t keep back a small gasp of shock. Her right forehoof was bleeding, the flesh pushed back from several little puncture wounds. The sight made her feel like crying.

“Is something wrong?” the calm voice asked.

She slid her hind legs onto the floor and limped towards the bathroom door, letting the empty costume sleeve drag across the tile. “Who are you?”

“I’m Bonnie. Please come out. I can’t go in the girl’s restroom.”

Beat. “But, like, you have a girl’s name! And a girl’s voice!”

“Ugh… Everybody says that… my voice only just started sounding girly; I swear!”

High-pitched laughter came from outside. “Keep telling yourself that, Bonnie boy!”

“Daddy says I’m a guy!”

Adorabelle was scared to open the door, so instead she started washing her forehoof. The water stung and flowed red into the drain.

“Can you come out, new friend? Please?”

Adorabelle shut the water off; her hoof was starting to throb. “You, like, tried to choke me to death!”

“No! I would never do something like that!” Bonnie sounded truly hurt.

“Then, what, you have a twin or something?” Adorabelle was blotting the blood onto paper towels.

“No…”

“You’re the purple bunny, right?”

“Right…”

“You grabbed me by the neck until I, like, fainted. I thought you, like, wanted me dead or something!” The wastebasket was beginning to overflow with bloody paper towels; Adorabelle hoped something this macabre wouldn’t freak out the staff.

There was silence outside. The pain of the cuts on Adorabelle’s hoof was starting to spread up her leg; she used her other forehoof to press the injured leg against her body, somehow thinking that would make the pain stop.

Then she heard the sound of crying.

Adorabelle swung herself to the side so she could face the restroom door and telekinetically pulled it open.

Bonnie stood outside, his face in his broken-up hands. “I d-did it again…”

“Bonnie means well,” Chica said, hopping up and down behind the rabbit, “but he doesn’t know his own strength. He was just trying to pick you up because he was happy to see you.”

“Really?” Adorabelle asked.

Bonnie slowly lowered his hands, revealing dark trails under his eyes. Then he froze.

“What’s wrong with your costume!?” he screamed, making Adorabelle jolt. “Put it back on!”

“You didn’t take your costume off, did you!?” Chica had stopped bouncing and just stared at her, mouth gaping in horror or because it had no choice but to gape.

“But I’m bleeding!” Adorabelle cried.

“You’re leaking!? All the more reason to put it back on!” Bonnie reached out for her.

Adorabelle scrambled backwards. “No, wait, please give me a sec!”

“Do it now!” both creatures screamed.

Adorabelle wiggled her leg back into the costume and zipped it back up. Her forehoof was still throbbing. “There, it’s done!”

Bonnie and Chica relaxed. That is, they leaned backward and dropped their hands to their sides. But both still had their eyes wide and their jaws open.

“Thanks; you really can’t have your costume off at night.” Well, Bonnie’s jaw seemed to work just fine.

“Do you have a first aid kit?” Adorabelle said. “Something in the vent hurt me…”

“A what?” Chica said.

“Y’know, bandages and antibacterial stuff…” Adorabelle hugged her hoof to her side again.

“What are those?” Bonnie asked. “Are they for fixing you?”

“Mmmhmm.”

“Oh! They’ll be backstage then,” Bonnie said.

“Yupperoni!” Chica cheered.

Adorabelle blinked at them. “Hey, like, I just remembered… aren’t there supposed to be, like, more of you?”

She was met be wide-eyed blank stares.

“Freddy? The guy the place is, like, named for?”

“Ohhhhh, Freddy!” Chica gave a bound into the air. “He’s always on the show stage; I’ll show you!” She bounced off to one side.

Adorabelle slipped between Bonnie’s legs and followed Chica to a hallway much wider than the one blocked by the baby gate. In fact, if she turned her head, she could see the exit sign where she started this whole misadventure. Chica headed in the opposite direction, though, towards a wide doorless doorway. The room was dark, but Adorabelle could see a row of movie theater style seats in profile and silver strands of starry tinsel hanging from the ceiling.

Then the area in front of them glowed pink, and in a flash of light and shower of sparkles, Bonnie materialized in front of them.

“Gyah!” Chica fell backwards and kicked her legs frantically.

“The power went out, remember?” Bonnie said.

Chica’s legs froze. “Oh. Oh right. Sorry, he’s not on the show stage then. He must be fixing the generator backstage.”

“I’d better go help him,” Bonnie sighed. “Chica, your cupcakes will burn if you don’t look after them.” In another flare of pink light, Bonnie vanished.

“Oh, yeah, don’t wanna lose the cupcakes.” Chica pushed herself into a sitting position and sang softly to herself. “Cupcakes, so sweet and tasty…”

“Can I go meet Freddy?” Adorabelle asked. “I wanna see if he has something to help me…”

“Sure; you can find your way backstage by yourself, right?”

“I’m, like, not too stupid to know where ‘back’ is,” Adorabelle said. “I’ll come eat cupcakes when we’re done, mmkay?”

“Sounds joyidelic! Have fun meeting a new friend! I know I have!” Chica walked normally for once as she headed back towards the kitchen.

Adorabelle trotted into the huge room. A few rows of plush theatre seats were in the back, but most of the room was carpeted with a plush purple that any interior designer worth their salt would have said was a very bad idea. Smaller squares of various carpet samples were scattered about the area and stacked up against the wall. At the far side of the room was the promised show stage, currently home to a guitar stand and two microphones against a cloth backdrop depicting what looked like the surface of the moon. On the wall to the left of the show stage was another huge mirror; on the right of the show stage was a very impressive piece of playground equipment shaped like a pirate ship, with a steering wheel, climbing ropes, slides, and a spinning tic-tac-toe grid embedded in the railing. It made Adorabelle want to relive her childhood. The area was fenced off with velvet ropes like banks had; the velvet was the same purple as the carpet.

Adorabelle found a short set of steps in front of the show stage and trotted up; her hooves thumped nicely on the hollow wood. Then she poked her head behind the backdrop.

The immediate eye-catcher was the shelf at the back filled with heads. Slack-jawed, empty-eye socketed bunny, chick, and bear masks. That stared into her soul.

Adorabelle tried to force herself to look away. There were some rolled-up backdrops, there was a bucket of props, there was a wall full of creepy masks…

…and something smelled horrible. Metallic, maybe. She coughed and put a hoof over her nose. “Freddy?”

A soft moan answered her. This sound continued, getting louder and more staccato.

Adorabelle held her nose with her injured hoof and limped with the other three.

The shelf wasn’t at the back of the room, she realized; it was in the middle, and the other half was behind it. She wove around, trying not to let the creepy masks unnerve her, and took in the other half.

“Oh, there you are!” she said happily.

Sitting on a workbench, slumped to one side, was a big brown bear with a top hat. He was sitting in a more human position, with his arms bent at awkward angles. His arms and legs looked different from Bonnie’s and Chica’s; their limbs had had small gaps around the knees and elbows, but this creature didn’t; they were solid tubes that seemed able to crumple up to bend, that were capped by a hemisphere to which the hands and feet were attached. Black splotches were all over the bear’s brown coat, so much so that Adorabelle almost didn’t notice his bowtie. He had blue eyes, but one of them was falling out.

“Hi, Freddy,” Adorabelle said, limping closer. The moaning didn’t stop. “Chica says I’m the new friend. Are we friends?”

Nothing coherent came out.

Adorabelle looked around the room more closely, trying to avoid the stares of the creepy masks. “I’m hurt… do you have a med kit?” She saw a set of tools bolted to the wall, but nothing with a red cross.

The bear’s groans shifted to sounding more like sobs.

“Aw…” Adorabelle turned back to Freddy and reached for the back of his head. “There there; I’m sor-”

When her hoof made contact with Freddy’s head, the dangling eyeball came loose and rolled across the floor. The bear gave a strangled, muffled cry.

“Oh-OMP, I’m sorry! I’m so sorry!” Adorabelle knelt down and scooped the eyeball up into her telekinetic grip. “I can fix this, I hope I can fix this…” She fetched a screwdriver down from the wall of tools and moved to face Freddy more full on.

The bear got quiet for just a moment.

“Shhh, don’t worry, I’ll make it better, it’ll be fine.” Adorabelle lined the screwdriver up.

Freddy whimpered.

Adorabelle plunged the screwdriver up the empty eye socket, wiggling it around to try and find a groove. Freddy’s cries turned to wails as she struggled to manage the tool. She tried to move it with her hoof and realized why; for some reason, the screwdriver felt like it was stuck in a tub of play-doh or something.

“Dang it; let me try again.” She braced herself with her hooves on Freddy’s chest and used her mouth to yank the screwdriver, pressing hard on the bear in the process.

The screwdriver was stuck in well, so she pulled back. More fluid was dripping from Freddy’s mouth, and he’d finally stopped making sound.

“What are you doing?”

Adorabelle whirled around so fast she slid on the wet tiles and landed on the costume’s nose, which fortunately prevented her own nose from being hurt and just put pressure on her horn and forehead. “Oof.” The liquid on the floor smelled horrible too. She pushed herself back up and saw Bonnie staring at her.

“Oh, Bonnie, I’ve broken Freddy and I can’t fix it and I’m so sorreeeeee,” Adorabelle sobbed.

Bonnie didn’t react beyond jerking his head from one side to the other. Finally he said, “Oh, that’s not Freddy.”

Adorabelle blinked her tears away. “He’s… he’s not? What is he?”

“Just a spare. Don’t worry. We’ll take care of him.” Bonnie leaned back and folded his arms. “I… I hate to say this… but Freddy says he doesn’t want to meet you now.”

“Aw… why?”

“Dunno. He’s antisocial. It’s one of his bad times.” Bonnie walked over to Adorabelle. “Want some cupcakes?”

“Do I!”

She followed Bonnie out of the room, leaving the broken bear silent and motionless.

Author's Note:

Happy witching hour (for those in the same time zone as me) on a Happy Halloween, and a happy first birthday to Another Member of the Band! Yup, I started writing this story on Halloween last year. ...And it's taken me the whole year to get her to the place advertised in the story description. Well, here's to a faster paced next year!