Background

If you just want to get into the story, and don’t really care about the philosophy, you can skip this part. Otherwise, read onward!

The goal of this story is to explore Phone Guy after Night 4, as well as absurdism. You don’t need to know anything about absurdism – or philosophy, for that matter – to understand and enjoy this story, but I’d still recommend reading the Wikipedia article on it if you have some time to kill. It’s a good read.

The idea behind absurdism is basically that we, as humans, want to find order in everything around us, but the universe we live in is absurd. There are important questions – “Why is there something rather than nothing?”, “What creates consciousness?” – that can’t really be answered without running into some pretty major roadblocks. Try coming up with an answer – if you dig deep enough, every conclusion leads to there being something very wrong – absurd – with not just our universe, but any universe we could conceivably live in.

And our universe is absurd, mind you. GPS (the thing your phone uses to figure out where you are) wouldn’t work if the people who made it didn’t account for TIME TRAVEL! This one’s worth reading about as well, but the gist of it is that time moves slightly differently for people on Earth than for satellites in orbit. Wild! And that’s one of the things we actually understand about the universe.

What most people do is look away from the absurdity. They don’t dig deep enough to reach it. But as soon as you do, it will haunt you. You will try, over and over again, to reconcile with the universe, and it will not work. You will never find an answer that doesn’t just lead to more questions.

There are ways to cope with this. One is to keep trying – after all, if no one sought answers, we wouldn’t be where we are today. But unless you’re willing to dedicate your life to these questions, seeking them out will simply serve as a reminder that the universe doesn’t work the way you think it should.

Another way is absurdism, the idea that instead of trying to force an absurd universe to have order, we should allow ourselves to forgo order and embrace absurdity. Normally it’s used for what I described, but it also works nicely with someone facing the impossibility (absurdity :P) of living as an animatronic.

Okay, textbook mode is over, and will stay off for the rest of the story. I know I just did a big info dump, but I promise that the story will be a story and won’t just force-feed you philosophy.

Also, please keep in mind that I’ve done almost no writing in the last few years, so this is bound to be rough. Especially for the first chapters.

Oh, and if you notice any mistakes, please let me know! Don’t be afraid to leave comments or critiques – the worse that can happen is me thinking “Holy shit! A comment!”

……

Fritz Smith

Fritz did not want to be a night guard. Sure, the pay was decent (well, half-decent, seeing as it was Freddy’s), and he was well aware of the danger, but the gravity of it only really dawns on you after you actually work the job, y’know? Especially after the 4th night.

He supposed there was nothing inherently wrong with the role. It was a job, just like any other, and he’d seen his fair share of horrors during his years at the company. It was the stress. It would be the death of him. Hah, if he didn’t get stuff in a suit first, that was. It wasn’t the robots that scared him. Freddy’s had made damn sure of that, seeing as his first day on the job had him calling an ambulance after that poor kid had his head chomped in half. No, it was the anticipation. The waiting. Haha, the power being limited didn’t help one bit either!

The power. His power was at 32%. It was 3:37 AM. He wouldn’t make it, couldn’t make it. He knew that. It didn’t matter. As if that shitshow of a company would do anything for him. He’d spent his whole life here, and for what? Even if somehow made it through, he’d just end up right back here again. He wouldn’t even be acknowledged if he stared the CEO right in their eyes. With his eyes. Hanging out of the suit. Hah.

The minutes drudged by, his power seemingly moving faster. He wouldn’t make it. He knew that. Haha, no one would be there to fill tomorrow’s shift. They had someone for next week though. His power was at 15%. He picked up the phone.

“Hello, hello! Hey! Hey wow, day four... I knew you could do it”.

Gulping, he said his goodbye. “Uh, hey, listen... I may not be around to send you a message tomorrow”.

Something banged at his door. It was on the right side. Chica. 13%.

“It’s, it’s been a bad night here. For me. Umm... I-I’m kinda glad that I recorded my messages for you”. He felt tears streaming down his face. He had to stay strong. “uh, when I did”.

10%. He wouldn’t make it. He knew that. “Uh hey, do me a favor: Uh, maybe sometime, uh, you could check inside those suits? Uh, in the back room? Uh, I'm gonna try to hold out... until someone... checks”.

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5%. He was frantic now. They would be here soon. Bonnie was at his blind spot. He checked the cameras, only keeping them powered for a split second. Hallucinations were dancing across his vision, the faces of the animatronics that had tormented him for the past 3 nights. He saw them in his room. Haha, that wouldn’t be a hallucination soon.

“Maybe it won’t be so bad. I-I-I-I always wondered what was in all those empty heads... back there-”

He checked on Bonnie. He was gone, but there was a strange poster left behind in his wake. It was a Freddy head, golden instead of brown.

He looked down from his camera. The face was still there. It was in his office. “Oh no”.

It jumped at him, screeching and tearing at his face. Despite its rough handling of him, Fritz was mostly unharmed. That would change shortly.

The power went out. Fritz let out a whimper, tears barreling down his face. He was being moved. He shut his eyes tight. He knew where he was going anyway. The trip over was paralyzing. He knew what would happen. He fought, but the animatronic’s grip was too strong. He was trapped. Haha, he’d be free soon enough though.

Warning: Gore

They were in the room. He never liked that room, the walls decorated with empty heads and animatronic bits. Not empty for long. It started with the legs. The legs weren’t so bad. He felt the metal bits tearing deep gashes into them, letting out a scream in the process. It felt like jagged claws were running down the entirety of his legs, digging through skin and muscle, barely stopping at bone. Suddenly, he felt a mounting pressure. He didn’t fit. Oh no.

The darkness around him became red as his ankles simultaneously shattered. His tibia was next, the bone fragments embedding themselves into the already torn muscle, some finding their escape from his body. If only he was as lucky as them. He wouldn’t escape. He knew that.

Content with the results, the animatronics put on his new arms. Haha, just like a sweater. The arms were worse. Unlike his legs, the wrist posed no issue. The fingers were another story. They broke. All of them, compressed backwards by the walls of the suit and turning his hand into a bloody mess. His hands cracked as well, the appendages feeling more like round clubs than the tools he so dexterously used to keep the animatronics out. Haha, fuck all that helped.

The torso was simple, coming apart into two pieces. If only the other parts were the same. Oh well – the torso was simple. He felt the metal prongs digging in to his own torso, shattering ribs and embedding inside his skin as his plastic coffin was forced onto him. Click. The torso was attached.

Fritz thought he knew pain. Half of his bones were shattered, his hands a bloody mess and his feet facing vertically. He was wrong. The head (Freddy, he realized) was forced onto him. The opening was too small. Either the Freddy head had to change, or his own skull did. Crack. The mascot head was intact. His own was not. Bits of metal raked down his face as the head was pushed downwards. His sight was swiftly taken, as was his nose, the latter flattening. The skin along his skull and face was slowly peeled off, muscle and all. Click. He felt a fiery pain in his now-useless eyes. Suddenly, he heard a sickening pop, and felt jagged metal where his eyes once lay.

The job was done. The animatronics left, their heavy stomps the only indication without any eyes to tell. He had survived. He wished he hadn’t. Haha, maybe the new night guard would find him. The pain slowly faded, his own thoughts disappearing as well, and his wish was granted.

Gore Over

Fritz was awake. The pain had vanished. He could see again. He could hear again. The nightmare was over; he had reached the afterlife. Or… no, this was wrong. As his eyes slowly adjusted to the light, what he saw was definitely not his body. It was an animatronic’s. Heh, maybe that night guard found him after all.

Fritz could see. He could hear. What he could not do, was move. His muscles were definitely way too torn up for that, or maybe the doctors paralyzed him to prevent further damage. Hell, maybe his spine snapped while the torso was being put on. The suit. He shuddered at that thought, the agony of last night burning bright into his mind.

He took in his surroundings. This was not a hospital, nor was it an ambulance. He was in a car, a van of some sorts. He could hear the sounds of traffic around him and see the roof of the car above him. He could feel the movement under him. Shit. He shouldn’t be here. He should be in a hospital. Then, it hit him. He’d said it himself: “Upon discovery of damage or if death has occurred, a missing person’s report will be filed within ninety days or as soon as property and premises have been thoroughly cleaned and bleached and the carpets have been replaced”. He tried to yell. He tried to scream. Nothing came out. He was trapped, and everyone surely thought he was dead.

The minutes should have been agonizing, but all he felt was relief at being taken away from those animatronics. He was glad the pain was over. It made no sense though, why had it vanished completely? Shock? Or maybe something else? Regardless, he prayed that it wouldn’t return.

Eventually, the van stopped, and he heard two people exit. When the door opened, it dawned on him that it was nighttime. Had he really been unconscious for that long? How the hell was he still alive? Unable to voice his concerns, he watched as he was moved from the van to a dolly, then slowly moved into a warehouse. What the hell?

The warehouse was small and, for the most part, empty. He saw a few animatronic parts laying around, but that was it. He was moved onto the floor, then the two people left. Fritz was alone.

……

No one returned. It was night again. The warehouse had windows. It had been almost a full day since he was left here, maybe even more. How the hell was he still alive?

……

Fritz was sure weeks had passed. He couldn’t tell anymore. There was nothing. Nothing to do. Nothing to eat. Nothing to drink. He realized he wasn’t hungry anymore days back. Wasn’t thirsty anymore. Didn’t need to breathe anymore. Something was wrong.

……

It had been months, maybe? Fritz didn’t know. He didn’t think anymore, just stared at the ceiling tiles. He couldn’t even look around, his body still paralyzed. Why was he still alive? Why couldn’t he just die?

……

Notes

Whew! Looks like Phone Guy finally figured out what was inside those suits. On a serious – “serious” – note, I’ve always been a tad disappointed that Phone Guy’s story was over even before the first game ended. I’m glad he made an appearance in the later games, but it’s still a little sad that he’s basically a disembodied voice.

The plot will kick off in a few chapters, just know that, while I’ve tried to keep things as lore accurate as possible, it’s difficult. There isn’t a super good name for Phone Guy, so Fritz is gonna have to suffice. Canonically, Fritz is meant to have enough knowledge to tamper with the animatronics (I think), but Phone Guy definitely isn’t a technician, and knows next to nothing about how animatronics work.

Anyways, I hope you enjoy! Please leave a comment if you can – I love knowing there’s real people reading what I write :P