Chapter Text
“The staff bot will give you a tour. Here’s your uniform shirt and your temporary key card. Someone will leave your official key card in parts and service tomorrow.”
“O-oh! Alright.” And with that, I was left alone in the neon-lit lobby of Faz Bear Entertainment’s pizza plex, the person from upper management vanishing into a side door.
I looked at the round-headed staff bot I’d been left with and it looked blankly back.
Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea.
Ever since my last job had fired me, I’d been having a hard time finding somewhere willing to hire me.
With the circumstances around why I’d been fired… and how I’d reacted, there was a good chance that my last job had been warning other industries NOT to hire me.
And I hadn’t been looking into robotics again until just recently. I’d wanted to stay away from the industry but I didn’t have experience in anything else so nowhere else had even glanced at my resume.
I wasn’t what they were looking for. And anything willing to hire me didn’t pay enough for me to make rent.
Faz co was either desperate or just didn’t care about my reputation. Seeing as I had been hired on the spot, I doubted that’d bothered to run a background check.
But that seemed to be standard for Faz Co. I’d only applied because I was getting desperate. Nowhere else that needed a robotics tech wanted anything to do with me, I’d blown through the last of my savings and I needed something if I was going to pay rent this month.
Faz Co tends to pay well due to… well safety concerns among other things.
“Follow me.” The staff bot chirped in its electronic monotone voice, bringing me back to the here and now.
“Ah! Yes! Sorry.” I trotted to keep up as the staff bot rolled away, through the crowds of people waiting for tickets or wondering towards the stairs.
Staff bots had oval-shaped heads with oval eyes, two long arms connected to a rather oval body, and then a lower body that looked a lot like a Segway. Two wheels on a rectangle. Very gray, and very round and they all looked like one another, not given much personality.
Kinda sad really when you look at the bright colors and lights of the rest of this place. Even the wet floor bots have personality.
Little rectangle heads with their yellow bear ears. Super cute. I waved to one was I was led through the turns styles and to the elevator of the main lobby.
The broken elevator of the main lobby.
The staff bot I was following stalled before turning towards me.
“The tour will continue upstairs. Another staff bot will meet you.”
Staff bots can’t do stairs. Poor guy was stuck down here.
“Well, hold on. I did just get hired on to do repairs, maybe I can fix this real quick.” I said, stepping over the caution tape and around the things that had been set up to keep guests away.
Technically I hadn’t been hired to do general repairs but this needed to be fixed.
The Staff bot turned to watch me, repeating what it had just said again, as though I had not heard them.
“I hear you,” I said simply so they wouldn’t feel ignored but continued to the big glass cylinder that was the elevator. Great for people with disabilities if it works but not much use while out of order. Even the staff bots were limited to where they could go if the elevators broke down.
If this wasn’t going to be a quick fix, I’d leave it for now.
The service panel was already opened and it looked like someone had half-heartily poked around in there but there were so many unnecessary wires in there that even I was having a hard time figuring out what I was looking at.
“Good lord…” I muttered, carefully shifting some wires, wincing as sparks spat out at me, like an angry cat.
“If everything is wired like this…” Well, I wasn’t ever not going to have things to do.
Carefully, not wanting to get electrocuted, I shifted the wires around a little more before I found the cause of the problem. One of the only important wires had come loose.
Shifting it back into place, the elevator powered up.
I eyed it for a moment before closing the panel.
“That should hold until I can come back to make more permanent repairs,” I said, walking back to the staff bot.
“So. Should I go upstairs and find a new staff bot or do you want to come with me and continue the tour?”
The staff bot stared at me for a long moment and I waited, letting him think, half expecting him to hit me with ‘the tour will be continued upstairs,’ Again.
Then without saying anything, the staff bot rolled past me and made its way to the elevator.
I followed with a smile that lasted until I entered the elevator with the staff bot.
I was getting attached. I couldn’t get attached…
Not again.
Exciting onto the upper floor, we got directly onto another elevator that took us to the main atrium.
Stepping out onto the carpeted floor the first thing that caught my attention was the large directory board. If this was supposed to be a map it was a bad one. Nothing showed how any of these colored pieces were supposed to connect to one another and the quality was subpar.
I raised an eyebrow at the ‘map’ and walked around it to look out over the atrium.
From this floor I could look down onto the main stage, empty for the moment, and the tables set up for the food court. Above us on the next floor up I could make our Bonnie Bowl and Mazersize.
“Follow me.” Came the robotic voice of the staff bot and I pulled away from the glass railing.
“Right. Sorry.”
Telling me little facts that Faz bear had clearly made up, did you know that bears are extinct and love pizza above all things?, the staff bot gave me a tour of the attractions in the atrium, starting on the top floor.
Even though staff bots can’t go upstairs, escalators are easily traversed.
As we went from attraction to attraction, my mental list of things that needed to be fixed, or at least some TLC got longer and longer.
Several of the walls in the Chica-themed maze didn’t turn, now forever stuck in place, one of the chief bots in El Chips was missing an arm and no one seemed to know where it had gone, the main door to the west arcade only opened halfway and several of the game cabinets were out of order, some of the lights at the prize counter just didn’t work (probably the wiring), and the list went on.
These things weren’t even what I’d been hired to fix but seeing how bad everything was how could I leave it?
No… no. If I had time I’d come back to these but my first priority needed to be the robot I’d been hired to attend to.
I was already nursing a frustration headache by the time we got to the Fazcade and we were still only on the top floor.
“I can see why they hired me on the spot,” I muttered to myself.
“Are there any other parts and services workers?” I asked my new staff bot friend-
No. Not a friend. I can’t get attached.
They turned their head toward me, continuing to roll forward as we walked toward the giant statue of Freddy in the Fazcade lobby.
“No. There were three humans working in parts and service but their employment was terminated. We are currently still hiring for 4 more parts and service employees.”
I sighed, rubbing my temples.
“Checks out.”
The staff bot said their employment was terminated and I did wonder if that was because they were fired or if they had quit…
Though, knowing Fazbear they may have died. Of course that was only an option if the rumors were true and seeing the state of only one floor of this place, they might be.
We wandered from the big entrance section to the right towards a large dance floor with an enormous stage. I didn’t think much of it, assuming the staff bot was planning on starting here before winding deeper into this area.
“This is the Fazcade, the mega pizza plex’s biggest arcade and the home of DJ Music Man.”
“Who?” My question was quickly answered as a loud thump shook the ground we were standing on, followed by another and the metallic groaning sound of metal holding up something heavy.
He was enormous. Large white rounded body with 6 arms extending from it, each with a gloved hand. His head was a large rounded rectangular shape with a small black top hat on top. Mostly piano key-looking teeth, DJ MM had a large forever grin and two round screens for eyes that rested above a pink nose. Blue cheeks, blue eyebrows, and an enormous set of green headphones that were clearly just for show because they weren’t resting on anything due to this big guy not having ears.
I had to fight with myself not to take several steps back as he crawled out from the large black tunnel behind the stage and loomed down to get a look at me.
As he neared, his large teeth getting uncomfortably close, all my unease suddenly went out the window as I got a good look at how much grime was on this guy. It was obvious that no one had bothered to clean him and judging by the sound his joints had made when he stood, he probably needed some oil and maybe some bolts tightened.
If this guy broke something he’d be a bitch to repair and I had no idea how I’d get parts up to him considering that there was no way he’d be able to leave this area.
“Oh dear,” I murmured and the DJ tilted his head a bit like a confused dog, making a sound akin to a guitar riff as two question marks popped up on his screen eyes.
“Sorry! Got a little lost in my head there! It’s good to meet you, DJ! I’m the new repair tech, just started today!”
Exclamation points popped up in DJ’s eyes and he reached a hand down to me. Grinning, I placed a hand on one of his fingers and gave him a handshake as best I could with how large he was.
“I’m excited to start work! Once my new friend here has shown me around the place and I get my hands on some supplies I’ll come back up here and give you a bit of a check-up. Would that be alright? Those joints sound like they hurt and I’d like to see if I can help.”
The exclamation points were back and bouncing this time as DJ played a loud fan fair, teeth clicking together rhythmically and I grinned up at him.
I was assigned to the daycare attendant but if there weren’t any other techs then I would of course check the other robots out when I had time.
If the others were in similar conditions as DJ then they would all need some TLC.
Hopefully, the daycare attendant wouldn’t mind.
The tour went from there, all the way down to the stage floor then behind it to Rockstar Row. This was a long hallway full of displays showing things from previous Fazbear locations and 4 well-lit green rooms each housing one of the main four animatronics.
It felt uncomfortably zoo-like in how this area was set up. At least there were currants in each of the rooms to give the 4 some privacy when needed.
The staff bot stopped in front of each room and announced which animatronic stayed in that room before moving on to the next.
Freddy Fazbear, Chica Chicken, Roxanne Wolf, and Montgomery Gator.
None of them were here right now, they were probably in the rehearsal room or out talking to guests. This place was so large I wasn’t surprised we’d missed them.
From there I was shown the stage entrance to parts and service then the tunnel system.
Turned out you could get to every part of the plex via the tunnel system. It was dark, sprawling and full of boxes and broken staff bots.
I already knew I would get lost down here at some point. Making friends with the staff bots was going to be my best chance of having help get around down here.
Finally, we came up back in the lobby and the staff bot made like it was going back towards the main atrium but at the top of the stairs, they turned and went to the right towards a set of doors I hadn’t noticed before.
There was a small sign pinned to the metal that proclaimed this the way for daycare drop off.
Through that door, I found that we were in a dim little anti-chamber with a water feature. On the brick wall, someone had painted “Superstar Daycare” in large fun letters.
I could see myself spending time in here on bad days to cool off. Hopefully, I won’t need to.
Through an opening on the other side of the room was a waiting room with an enormous statue of, what I assumed was, the Daycare attendant.
“Oh wow…” they looked nothing like the staff bots or the main four. I couldn’t wait to see how they were put together! And they were Sun and Moon themed to boot! That was perfect for playtime vs nap time.
Looking around I realized that the staff bot had rolled off without me and I had to run to catch up.
It seemed like once the kids were checked in they slid down a slide directly into a ball pit down in the daycare.
Maybe I’ll get a chance to try it out too. Could be fun.
Could also be funny when I get stuck in the slide.
From up on the upper walkway I could see down into the playroom and it was full of kids laughing and screaming and standing in the midst of them was a sunny yellow bot.
And he was looking straight at me, his blank white eyes tracking my movement across the walkway.
It was slightly unnerving.
Grinning, I gave him a wave and he quickly turned away, returning his attention to the children around him.
That’s fair. He doesn’t know me yet.