Jeremy Fitzgerald
Jeremy exited his truck, then carefully removed the tarp and ropes covering the animatronic. He knew getting involved in this – whatever this even was – was probably a bad idea, but he couldn’t bring himself to care anymore. Years of nothing at Freddy Fazbear’s Pizzeria would do that to you. Sure, he helped keep watch over the restaurant, and fixed up the animatronics when a kid stuck a lollipop between its gears or something, but fuck him if that wasn’t the most uninteresting job on planet.
This was something at least. Something interesting. Something exciting. Carefully, he moved the animatronic onto the dolly, making sure to avoid damaging it further. Not like it could be damaged further.
He wheeled it into his garage, clearing a spot in the sea of tools and miscellaneous Faz-junk that littered the floor. He set the animatronic down, and got to work. No time to lose.
The first thing he did was inspect the face. Getting up close and personal with the thing still gave him the creeps – it felt like it could jump at him at any second – but years of this exact process helped him shrug his nervousness off.
The first thing he noticed was that there were parts that clearly shouldn’t be there. Like a suspicious data storage device wedged in between its wiring. “What the hell happened to you?” He muttered.
Using a pair of tweezers – well, he called them “tweezers”, but they were closer to tongs to in size – he carefully removed the device and inspected it. It was intact. “How did this get outside of you?” He shrugged. He’d put it back in later. Cautiously setting it down on his workbench, he continued the inspection.
The next step was to remove the outer casing. Strangely, this animatronic differed from the designs he was used to, being composed of an “endoskeleton” with removable plastic plates. Removing them was simple, each had a painted-over screw, which, when removed, would allow the plates to slide out. The extremities of the animatronic were undamaged, so he began by removing the torso. “Huh? What’s this?”
Inside was… something. Jeremy wasn’t entirely sure what he was looking at. The first thing he noticed was a sizable cavity inside of the machine. Perhaps for storage? He also noticed a very strange grid of metal connected to motors and the animatronic’s control board, as well as a strange disk-like object. What the metal was for, he couldn’t fathom. It clearly wasn’t support structure, nor could its purpose be power delivery – the metal had no insulation and, had power actually ran through it, it would likely fry the animatronic’s parts, or cause it to completely malfunction. Yet it was connected to areas clearly intended to receive electricity.
The strangest part of the grid, however, was the feeling it radiated. He couldn’t quite describe it, but moving his hand close to the metal, it felt hot and almost like he was in a thunder storm. He didn’t know what could cause it, but prayed it wasn’t a fatal dose of X-Rays barreling through his body. Shuddering, he took a closer look at the control board.
On the board, he noticed a spot very clearly intended for a data storage device. Like the one on his workbench. However it got out, he would put it back in. Gingerly, he picked up the device, carefully aligning it with the slot and pushing it was in. With that, the animatronic should at least function, even if it still wasn’t fully repaired.
Moving back, he took another glance at the animatronic’s strange features. It was completely unlike any he’d encountered. Like it had a different purpose all together. “Why were you built like this? What the hell can you do?” He whispered.
He moved his head upwards, taking in its face once more. This would be a project. But he could complete the repairs in a couple hours. If he neglected his sleep for that night. “Fritz, this better be worth it…”
Jeremy worked tirelessly, first cleaning out the animatronic of any loose bits. Next, he reconnected – and in some cases, replaced – the broken wires. Thankfully, the damage hadn’t affected any of the animatronic’s mechanisms, just the communication between them. After that, he used a spare – and mostly matching – eyeball to replace its missing one. Next, he removed its right face plate, examining and measuring it. He then constructed a mirror image of it, matching the paint before reattaching both face plates.
This was repeated for the other damaged parts. Having a reference – the undamaged side of the face – made the job much quicker. After 4 hours of labor, the repair was done. Well, at least in theory. Realistically, he’d have to test the animatronic, then repair all the broken parts that he missed. Oh well. The testing would be over soon enough.
The first thing he needed to do was put it into testing mode. The old animatronics used audio queues to handled this. With this one being much newer, he expected it to as well.
Slowly and deliberately, he said the activation phrase. “Enter. Testing. And. Quality. Assurance. Mode.”
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The animatronic’s eyes looked towards him, but it gave no response. Strange. Though it was likely they changed the protocol at some point. Hopefully the testing would still work out.
“Move. Three. Steps.”
The animatronic complied.
“Turn. Five. Zero. Degrees.”
It turned, facing him head on, eyes still boring into him. He shuttered, then proceeded.
“Raise. Arms.”
Jeremy stifled a laugh at its new pose, it’s eyes seeming to glare at him.
“Lower. Arms.”
He proceeded like this, testing different components of the animatronic, before one stumped him. He knew that the chest and face plates could move, but he didn’t know the activation phrase for them. He couldn’t very well ask the machine to do it; it was programmed to respond to a specific, and limited number of phrases.
“Damn, I wish you’d open your chest cavity. I wonder what that’s for, anyway.”
The animatronic complied. That was not supposed to happen. Jeremy took a step back, eyes wide in fear. “What the fuck!”
Reigning in his fear, he tried once again. “Can you move towards me?”
The animatronic didn’t respond.
“Move. One. Step.”
It complied.
“Close. Chest. Cavity.”
It did as he asked. He made that phrase up, but maybe it was just what was programmed in? Shaking his head, he tried the first sentence again, thinking the animatronic was just picking up on some of the words he said.
“Damn, I wish you’d open your chest cavity. I wonder what that’s for, anyway.”
Despite uttering the exact same thing, the animatronic just started at him blankly. What the hell was going on? Jeremy left the garage, locking the door behind him. He had to call Fritz.
……
Fritz Smith
Yet again, he’d messed up. That was fine. Haha, he’d messed up that night too, but he was still alive – sort of. He’d live through this mistake as well.
He knew the door was locked, so he decided to explore the room he found himself in. If he came to it, he could probably force the door open. The garage was a mess of tools and animatronic parts. As his eyes danced before the sight in front of him, he caught sight of something. A Freddy head. Memories of the suit flashed before him, the pain fresh as though it happened only a few hours ago. He approached the head.
As he drew closer, he picked it up and examined it. Inside was a mess of electronics and jagged metal. It was amazing that his head had fit into that. Shuttering, he began to place the head down, when the door suddenly burst open.
“God damn it Fritz! What the hell kind of- THE SHIT?”
Fritz locked eyes with Jeremy. The man looked panicked. Frenzied. Suddenly, Jeremy leapt towards his workbench, grabbing hold of a cordless chainsaw and brandishing it menacingly. “Alright, GAMES ARE OVER! YOU better TALK RIGHT NOW, or I’M turning YOU into DUST!”
No. That couldn’t happen. If he got damaged, he’d just end up dead. Or worse, end up like how he was in that warehouse again. He bit back a shutter. He couldn’t do that again. Wouldn’t.
“Uh, Jerem- I mean- Calm down a litt-”
“FRITZ?”
God damn it.
Jeremy approached the animatronic in front of him, locking eyes with it. “Where the hell are you, Fritz? Two-way radio can’t travel THAT far, Fritz! I know you’re hiding here somewhere, and I’ve had enough of your bullshit for today.”
Good. That was good. He’d let Jeremy believe what he wanted to believe. Slowly moving upwards, he carefully placed the Freddy head on the ground. He then turned to face Jeremy, his eyes frantically searching the garage all the while.
Jeremy took a step back at that. “No, that isn’t possible. Unless you blew a couple million – which I know damn well you don’t have, Fritz – getting this thing as realistic as it is. How the hell are you even transmitting the video, much less aligning aligning both eyes correctly? I know your ass didn’t make the technological breakthrough of the decade, Fritz! What the fuck is going on?”
……
Notes
In case it isn’t clear, this is set somewhere in the mid ‘90s. It’ll be relevant later on, but just keep in mind that while VR / eye tracking / full-body tracking / mobile networks can probably let us create “realistic” remote-controlled robots today, none of those things really existed at the time.
You could pour a ton of money into getting a crew of people who each controlled part of the animatronic, but that would require, well… a ton of money. Which Fritz doesn’t have.
Alternatively, you could use VR and related technologies to do it, but those didn’t exist then.
So the fact that the animatronic that Fritz is “controlling” has accurate movement is baffling to Jeremy, since it shouldn’t be possible. He’d probably accept crazy tech (which the Funtimes pretty much are) or Fritz being a billionaire over what’s really happening though, but he knows that something’s up and can’t explain it.