Chapter Text
To be honest, Gregory had never given much thought to what would happen after his night of 'adventures' at the Pizzaplex.
Sure, he knew that even if it hurt, he wasn't going to step foot inside the establishment again, and after setting it on fire, there wasn't much to go back to.
But he has to admit that the result was pretty nice.
When both Freddy and he managed to escape from the burning restaurant, leaving behind that strange rabbit that was quickly tackled down by those endoskeletons that seemed to repeat that song that the Mimic had been singing, they found themselves in sight of the police along with the firefighters arriving at the scene.
Neither the child nor the bear could escape the attention of the firefighters or the police officers, after all, a two-meter robot with a child cradled in its arms wasn’t something they could easily ignore.
The firefighters tried to take him out of the arms of the animatronic, possibly to check him or something like that, but Gregory, who from the beginning had escaped from uniformed people who wanted to grab him, hugged the bear's neck more tightly, who squeezed him back further away from the firefighters.
Fortunately ( or unluckily ), Vanny comes out of the smoking flames with her rabbit costume singed in some parts while brandishing a knife, so immediately most people focused their attention on the furry killer.
Clearly, a woman dressed in a patchwork suit in a restaurant where there had been multiple disappearances of children, indicated that something wasn’t right.
So Vanny ( or rather Vanessa, I told you Freddy ) was taken to the mental hospital ( he forgot the word for the place ) while Gregory stayed with a policewoman to explain the situation.
And… This one was nice, actually, of course the brown-haired boy didn’t want to talk at first because he felt like she wouldn’t believe him, but the bear encouraged him to tell (although the woman looked at Freddy with a raised eyebrow).
Even though he was sure that everything would be taken with a grain of salt ( especially the part about the zombie rabbit possessing security guards ), the police not only believed him at face value, but snorted, and said under her breath: “Of course rabbits are still weird.” You know, as if that was something to be expected .
The officer, who was quite old to the point of having some gray hair (but he wasn’t going to call her an old lady, at least not to her face ) told him that she had to take him to get checked out to see if he was hurt and then go to the police station. And although the brunette didn't want to separate from Freddy, the woman assured him that, since he didn't seem to be infected, he was going to be okay, and that they had already notified the owner of the Pizzaplex, whom she knew and that he would make sure that the animatronic would be okay.
As they rode to the station in the woman’s patrol car with the Pizzaplex on fire behind them, the officer asked if he was the one who set the place on fire, and Gregory, crossing his arms defensively, replied that he did it, but instead of the reprimand he had expected, the adult just laughed and sneered: “Kids burning down Freddy’s, seems some things don’t change.”
The brunette thought about those words during their trip until they reached the police station where the woman along with another agent who looked younger recorded his account of the events of the night and then gave him some cookies, a hot chocolate, and a blanket, so considering his other contacts with authority figures, it was a nice change.
It was during his moment of well-deserved relaxation drinking his chocolate in the waiting chair at the police station, that the man arrived.
“Hey, is there a kid here named Gregory?” The moment he heard his name, the boy quickly hid in the blanket they had given him, as ridiculous as it was, but this movement instead of hiding him, only caught the attention of the man who was talking to the receptionist. “Oh! It must be you.”
The child wanted to respond with a: ‘No shit, Sherlock’ but the words died in his throat when the adult came close enough to stand in front of him (but still leaving a space) and kneeled to speak to him at his level.
“Hey.” He said softly as he looked into his eyes, and although he didn’t come any closer, the boy backed away as best he could in his seat. “Are you the ‘Superstar’ Freddy was talking about?” The boy stops at the mention of the bear.
“Is Freddy okay?” Gregory quickly asks, even leaning in the man’s direction, but he scolds himself for his emotional outburst when the man in front of him lets out an amused smile.
“Yeah, he’s okay.” The kid lets go of a tension he didn’t know was in his body. “He’s in my workshop right now while they put out the fire at the Pizzaplex and he asked me to come check on you.”
The boy gave the adult in front of him a sidelong glance, he didn't look suspicious, but he still didn't trust him. "Who are you?"
"My name is Mike Schmidt ." The adult introduced himself, holding out his hand. "I'm the owner of the Pizzaplex."
The guy, Mike , turned out to be a pretty nice guy, weird , but not the ‘I chase kids in the middle of the night in a bunny suit’ kind of weird, more like the guy who obviously used to had one thing on his mind at a time.
The man used to spend a lot of time in his office or workshop, but that doesn't mean he ignored Gregory, used to spend an hour or two with him, checking on the kid every so often to make sure he was okay, and when he was working (whether in his workshop or office), he would leave his door open so the boy could come in.
Which was for the best, since it meant he could interact with Freddy, who he sometimes fixed his programming to remove the virus or was recharging.
‘Superstar!’
“Freddy!” The brunette said, throwing himself into a hug to the animatronic that was connected to some cables and sit down, happy to see him again even though he did it every day.
Mike, who was on the side of the scene concentrating on his computer, said in a careless tone: “Hey, little sport.” Ruffling the toddler’s hair absentmindedly, bringing out a lot of complaints from the boy, who didn’t give any response (although he saw an amused microexpression). “Okay, Fredo, could you run a system check?”
One notable thing was that the man was working quite a bit the days after taking him in, mostly because… you know … Gregory burned down his restaurant, there was a dangerous virus and now there was an open case about his animatronics.
In fact, in the case updates, they had so far suspected that Vanny had been the one to put the virus in the first place, something possible considering that she had knowledge in programming ( something he didn't know ), but similar events had happened before she was even working on the Pizzaplex, meaning that she couldn't be the mastermind (or there wasn't enough evidence of it).
All of this information came from the same officer who had picked him up at the Pizzaplex, Cassidy Jones, a woman who seemed to know Mike, and above all, seemed the most convinced that something else was going on at the pizzeria, something that people would normally not see.
“I’m telling you, Jason.” The officer would say when she came to the house, not seeming to mind having to talk in the home’s workshop or not ignoring Freddy’s presence. “I can feel it in my bones, he’s back , it has to be.”
“I don’t know, Aunt Cass. I don’t think that’s the issue.”
That was another thing, while most adults called Mr. Schmidt ‘Mike’, the people who were closest to the man tended to call him by what he knew was his middle name: ‘Jason’.
Gregory supposed it was a thing that happened when you had two names, although the adult seemed to prefer the first one (he told the boy’s new teacher to call him ‘Mike’), all of his relatives seemed to avoid saying the name.
“I don’t know Jay-jay , maybe you should wait a little longer before opening the restaurant.” Mike was told by his Uncle Evan (technically, now Gregory’s great-uncle), who was a writer of children’s horror stories, and sometimes agreed to create stories for the younger boy.
“ Jay , that would probably be a very bad idea in terms of business and publicity.” Supported by Aunt Elizabeth, Evan’s twin, she also had gray hair and was a child psychologist, she helped him get an appointment with a good doctor when he was taken in by his guardian.
“Hey, Jaybird , have you heard anything about the case? You know Cassidy isn’t allowed to tell me.” ‘Aunt Charlie’ would ask when they visited, she was a semi-retired nurse at this point who used to sneak candy to the kid.
“Pffft.” The older man snorted. “You know I don’t like talking about that Fazbear Entertainment nonsense, Jase .” It was Mike’s father, whom the boy lovingly called ‘Old Man Sam’, and although he seemed to hate everything related to Freddy’s image, from what he understood, his father was the creator of the characters.
(Although he must admit that he liked him, the old man knew quite a bit about animatronics even when he didn’t like the subject, so although he seemed annoyed, he usually answered Gregory’s questions well when he took care of him.)
It was strange how they avoided it, but the brown-haired boy didn’t pay much attention to it.
“Hey, Superstar.”
“Hey Freddy!” The kid greeted back as he entered the workshop. Mike wasn’t there since he was checking some ‘financial’ things in his office, but the man usually let the boy go in whenever he wanted to talk to the animatronic.
‘What do you have there?’ The bear said pointing at what was under the kid’s arm, the singer couldn’t move from his spot as he was connected to some cables so that Mr. Schmidt could thoroughly check the virus in his system.
Gregory quickly raised the book so that the animatronic had a good view of the cover. “It’s a family photo album.” After those words, he quickly walked over to drag one of the many chairs in the office and sit next to the bear.
‘A family album?’ Freddy parroted, but the boy could hear a hint of curiosity in his voice.
The kid nodded as he looked at the named book on his lap. “Yep, specifically Schmidt’s.” He said as he tentatively lifted the cover of the book a bit.
Now the animatronic seemed a bit uneasy. ‘Superstar, you know better than to take things that aren’t ours.’
“Oh, come on, Freddy!” The child said, looking at the robot bear with his brown eyes pleading. “Aren’t you curious to know what Mr. Schmidt was like when he was little?” Even though the singer didn’t answer him, he could see that he was curious, so the brown-haired boy smiled, knowing that the animatronic would agree, and opened the book.
And the first thing he saw… It wasn’t exactly what he expected, the kid found the image of two babies on a page, one with an olive green jumpsuit and white flowers; and the other with an orange one with rays.
‘ Who are these? ’ The brown-haired boy asked himself as he looked at the photos (he could feel the bear leaning over to look at them too) and his gaze went down to the bottom of the page where it read: ‘Charlie and Sammy <3’. “Oh! It’s Grandpa and Aunt Charlie!”
The more he turned the pages, the more he realized that the album was more of old man Sam’s family with his sister and their family, it was strange to see the photos of Grandpa next to the one he supposed to be his father, both looked so alike with their hair turning from brown to red and thick-framed glasses.
Freddy and Gregory were commenting on some pictures that seemed funny (like the twins on their first time eating pasta) or curious, like one of the two kids proudly showing off their drawings, which, while Charlie was showing something that looked like noodles with black and white stripes, her brother was showing what looked like a band similar to the Glamrocks, but with the word ‘Rockstar’ at the bottom.
It was strange considering how much old Sam hated anything related to Fazbear Entertainment.
“Hey, Aunt Elizabeth and Uncle Evan finally showed up.” The boy said with a relief that he didn’t know where it came from; the twins seemed to be about to start elementary school and their other great-uncles hadn’t shown up yet. The pictures were of a picnic in nature, with several random photos, and in one of them in particular was the pair of children he was looking for.
He saw in a photo, the framed image of two babies: one with reddish-blond curls, big green eyes, and a pouty grin; on the other side, there was a younger one with a characteristic brown curl, big dark eyes (they almost looked like holes), and who looked like he was about to cry. Both infants were in the arms of a smiling young boy who looked quite similar to-
“Mike?” The kid asked out loud, looking once more at the image in front of him.
‘Is something wrong, Superstar?’ The bear beside him asked worriedly.
There was no doubt, the same unruly brown hair that his guardian had, similar blue eyes (although Mr. Schmidt had darker ones), freckles dotting his face, and although the boy’s skin in the photos was more tanned, the tone was quite similar.
“Who is this dude who looks so much like Schmidt?” The child asked out loud with some confusion, looking down he saw the description of the photo: ‘The Afton siblings on their first picnic together, Elizabeth, Evan and Michael.’ “Afton?”
‘Afton is the last name of one of the founders of the first Fazbear Pizza restaurants and the main founder of Afton Robotics, LLC, creators of the Funtime line of animatronics.’ Freddy said automatically, surprising Gregory a little as he was very focused on the mystery in front of him. ‘William Afton in the late 1990s was formally charged as the perpetrator of several crimes during the 80s.’
The child's eyes widened almost comically at the information, one of the founders? Afton Robotics? 'Fun-time' Animatronics? Crimes? The kid's mind quickly began to try to understand the new mystery, who was this William Afton? What crimes did he commit? Why did Uncle Evan and Lizzie appear as Afton instead of Schmidt? Who was the boy in the picture and why did he appear to Mike so much when (the more he turned the pages) he saw him interact with his grandfather?
'Superstar?' The brown-haired boy blinked as he broke out of his tumultuous train of thought. 'You look conflicted, are you okay?'
“Yes, Freddy, it's just…” The kid who was normally very tenacious when speaking, found himself without a way to express what was on his mind, just staring at the images in his lap.
Luckily for him, the bear seemed to understand what was happening to him. ‘Superstar.’ The animatronic began softly as he pressed his hand on the boy’s back. ‘There’s no point in tormenting yourself with various speculations without much foundation, the best thing is to ask who can have the most conclusive answers.’
The kid bit his lip before nodding. “You’re right, Freddy.” And with that he said goodbye to the named one before going to where the brown-haired man was, who had just finished what looked like a phone call.
“Hey, little sport.” The adult greeted when he saw him enter the office. “Oh, I see you found my grandmother’s album.”
“Yep.” The boy said, sitting down next to the adult on a wheeled chair, slightly kicking his feet nervously. “I wanted to ask you something about some of these photos.”
“Sure, Greg.” Mr. Schmidt immediately replied. “You can ask me anything.”
“... Who is Michael Afton?”
A silence settled in the office for a few seconds but was interrupted by a clearing of the throat from the adult in the room.
“I guess the time has come.” The man said, rubbing his hands on his thighs nervously. “Gregory.” The adult began, using his full name, which made the named one pay special attention to him. “You know how people usually honor those who are no longer here? It’s a way of showing that they are not forgotten, but sometimes they are still a painful thing to remember, and well, my middle name is one of those cases.”
The younger brown-haired boy remembered the whole Schmidt family oddity of avoiding using the adult's preferred name.
“But I think I'm getting sidetracked.” Mike said, drawing the kid's attention back. “Let's start from the beginning: Quite a while ago, my grandfather Henry became partners with a man who he believed was his friend…”