Chapter Text
Alone.
For the first time in your life, you were truly, utterly alone.
Though it was not the first time in your life you’ve felt like this – of course not, considering your history: Growing up in a slightly unstable environment with your parents being unable to show you the love and affection you needed, which inevitable let to you being depressed by the time you were 13, though not able to tell the therapists your mother dragged you to, or even yourself for what reason.
You’ve felt like you were all alone in this world, sitting in the dark in your bedroom, while living at home.
But you still had your parents, at least in some way, and a part of you knew that, so it was not as bad as it felt, right?
When you finally moved out, not even two days after you turned 18, you were finally free from your parents lingering gaze, always expecting you to do something wrong and mess up. But you still cried yourself to sleep every night for a whole week, sometimes laying on the floor in your empty, small apartment, crammed with boxes full of plushies and books and clothes that didn’t fit anymore. You didn’t even have your own dishes yet, but somehow you managed to survive for the next few years.
After school, you decided to become a librarian. You always liked books, so it made sense, and you were really fast on a computer, plus, the pay wasn’t bad. You enjoyed college, even though you didn’t have any friends. You were always bad at meeting new people, and the fact that you still struggled with depression after all these years, didn’t exactly help.
And that’s when you met your now ex-partner, in a time when you were vulnerable and alone and didn’t expect the affection and love they offered you, and to be quite frank: you were head over heels in love with them not even a week into dating. You rationally knew it wasn’t a good idea to trust them blindly and make them responsible for your wellbeing, but you couldn’t help it. You loved them so much, loved someone like this for the first time in your life, and two months into the relationship, they moved in with you.
But bad luck seemed to follow you wherever you went, and it turned out, they were not the knight on a white horse they pretended to be. In contrary, they were actually an abusive, manipulative asshole, with a twisted sense of humour, always lurking in the dark to scare you, even though you told them a thousand times how much you hated being scared.
It wasn’t until three years later when you finished college and got a job at a library in the city an hour away from your hometown, that you pulled through and broke up. It was hard, but your new colleagues were really helpful and understanding, they even helped you finding a new apartment right next to the library. You were a bit hesitant about moving in next to your workplace, but soon enjoyed the benefits from doing so.
You could sleep until half an hour before your shift started and were fine. You could always go home for lunch. It was neat.
You always loved cats, so you adopted one, and then another one, and that became three. You loved your three ladies, even though they were menaces. You got used to it and soon you couldn’t imagine it being any other way. You even had a spare room in your apartment.
But it wasn’t empty for a long time.
On a Saturday night, when you had gone out with Marlene, one of few friends but a great one nonetheless, you met them. It was not love at first sight, but you immediately were curious about this person, standing out from everyone else in a crowd, with their prominent features and extravagant style. You spent the whole evening talking over a couple of drinks, and at the end of the night, you were exchanging phone numbers.
Marlene had a great feeling about it – “You are gonna get married someday, I just know it.”, she kept muttering as you drove home at two o’clock in the morning, which was way past your usual bedtime, but tonight, everything had been different. You didn’t want to wait for them to text you first, so you took the lead and did it first. It didn’t take long, before you two were dating.
They were so sweet, but also down to earth, not like your ex-partner, who love-bombed you immeasurable in the first months of your relationship, only to treat you like literal shit after. But your new partner, they were different.
They were eccentric, had their opinions, literally only ate raw vegetable and chicken and were very hesitantly towards anything new and change in general. But you liked them. A lot.
Soon, you were a couple.
You were still scarred from your last relationship, falling into old habits at times, but they were so patient, and forgave you when you fucked up and lashed out, getting triggered by a simple touch and wrong words. They loved your cats, and they loved him back, expect for your oldest lady, Momo, who hid under the bed for weeks when they came over. But she eventually got used to them as well, and soon they were inseparable, cuddling together on your couch when you were watching a movie.
Weeks became months and it was not until two years into the relationship, that they moved in together with you. It was a whole new experience to see each other every day and night, but you were coping. It was all worth it, every problem that appeared on the horizon, you always had each other’s back. You loved them, and they loved you.
One year later, they proposed. They didn’t do anything big, it was not their style. Instead, they fell on their knees in the hallway while you were brushing your teeth. You almost had a heart attack, quickly spitting out foam from the toothpaste and tumbling into a crushing hug, you got tangled up on the floor with him, repeating: “Yes, yes, yes, I want to marry you!”, again and again.
And then, the accident happened.
Your fiancée always had a thing for fast cars. You were worried sick every time they said goodbye to drive around town when they were in a bad mood, but they promised you to take care, and everything was fine.
And it wasn’t their fault what happened, in the end. It was the other driver who messed up. He was drunk, and it was late, and dark, and cold, a chilly winter evening in December. He missed the give way sign and crashed into your fiancée’s car with 80 mph. The other driver survived. Of course they did. Your fiancée died on impact, immediately. They did not suffer for long, at least. And now they were gone. Forever.
You will never forget the police knocking on your door, giving you the news.
Suddenly, you were on your floor, gasping for air, wrapped in a blanket. Everything was blurry for a few weeks. The next thing you clearly remember was the funeral. It was beautiful, so many people came, even though your fiancée did not have many friends. You will never forget the look on their mother’s face, when they lowered their coffin into the ground. The driver of the other vehicle got ten years in prison. But you didn’t even care. It didn’t matter. The love of your life was gone.
Normally, you never missed a day’s work, rarely calling in sick, but it’s been four months staying at home now. Your boss was understanding, at least she pretended to be. But the truth was, you could not go to work. You could not eat, or sleep. The horrifying image of your fiancée, squished by the impact of the other car, haunted you. The apartment was a mess. You were a mess. You managed to take care of your three cat ladies, though. But yourself? If it weren’t for Marlene and Susanne, your favourite coworker, you were not sure you would have survived the last months. Even your parents helped you, came over, cleaned the apartment, from time to time at least.
But it’s been some time now. You could not stay home forever. You knew that. You had to go back to work, back to life, eventually.
Which day of the week was it? You are laying in your bed, head heavy from all the crying, after waking up from a nightmare once again. Sleeping would likely never be the same for you. You always slept like a rock before the accident. Now, you had such a hard time falling asleep, and when you did, all your dreams were about cars crashing and coffins being lowered down into the earth.
You reach for your phone, with shaky hands. It is Friday night, the screen says. On Monday, you had to get back to work. You promised your boss. They were short on staff, and you were the team manager after all.
You breath in shakily. No idea how you would cope next week. But you had to, somehow. Normally, you liked where you lived, it was a small town, everyone knew almost everyone else. It did make things easier at times, there were so many people who came by and brought you soup or homemade cookies or just offered to be a shoulder to cry on for you.
If you were rational, you’d know you weren’t really alone, even in those nights like this one you have right now. But it just feels so lonely. Like there is a black hole in your heart, swallowing you whole.
You curl into a ball once again. You feel so dizzy. When was the last time you ate or drank something? Nothing matters anymore. The love of your life is gone.
You can’t do anything but cry. Cry, cry, cry, till your eyelashes are wet and your head throbs. You close your eyes, sobbing. You feel so alone.
After some time, you have trouble breathing. Are you having a panic attack? You laugh through your tears, but there’s no joy behind it. That’s just the thing that’s missing in this miserable excuse of an evening. A panic attack. Your breathing becomes shorter and shakier by the minute, and with your last strength you get up from the messy bed, stumbling towards the living room, to the balcony.
Your cats are sitting on the couch, all three of them, eyeing you. They are probably hungry, you have to feed them. And clean their toilet, that was something your fiancée used to do for you.
Oh shit, the flat looks like a mess, you notice through the curtain of tears and snot, even though you still panic and barely manage to breath – no, stop. You’re overwhelmed as you are, there is no need to think about your chores right now.
You pull open the balcony door, and finally – fresh air. You shakily breath in and out, and finally your panic becomes to subside. One breath at a time. Easy. Just how your fiancée taught you all these years ago, when you were having panic attacks weekly, finally processing the trauma from your last relationship before them. But now, it felt different. More sharp, and real, somehow.
Your mind wanders as you look into the brilliant, clear night sky. It’s April, so it’s not that warm outside, but the cold from outside doesn’t affect you anymore. Since the accident, everything feels dull – hunger, thirst, physical pain. It’s all dull, except the sorrow.
Now you truly know what it’s like to lose someone. Though it happened before, of course, your grandparents died years ago – but that’s different. You never were close with your family anyhow.
The first person you let see your true self, was your former best friend, Rachel. She was a mess, but she was your mess, and you loved her like there was no tomorrow. You were so close, glued together at the hip, but then your ex-partner came, and they destroyed your relationship with your best friend, like they destroyed you. You were a bit ashamed when you thought how you let this horrible person destroy your friendship. But at the time, you just weren’t strong enough to stop it.
And now, you haven’t talked in years.
Another tear rolls down your cheek, this time, because of your former best friend. If only you still had her in your life. You snivel silently as you think about what she would do, if she was here. If you were still besties, like you had been. She would wrap you up in a blanket, order some food, and then you would play your favourite video game, Five Nights at Freddys: Security Breach. And as always, when you had played the game, you would stay in the Daycare far too long, just because you liked the attendant so much.
It was true, you and your best friend had a full-blown obsession with Sun and Moon when you were younger and still had contact. You used to make roleplays, read fanfictions, draw them and even cosplay them on a convention you went together. While you always liked Sun more, for his bubbly though anxious personality, Rachel loved Moon, for his mysterious and mischievous self. Of course, you were by this point so deep into the fanlore, you were more in love with how the fans portrayed these two characters than how they actually were in the game.
You look up into the sky, and stare at the crescent moon above you. Even today, they were some sort of a comfort character for you. They seemed to represent some part of innocence and childhood within you, you weren’t gonna let go yet. If only Scott Cawthon would finally make another game featuring your two favourite characters. If only…
“If only Sun and Moon were real and would be here to comfort me.”, you whisper between two sobs, and in this moment exactly, you see a white flash, there is a shooting star in the sky. It startles you, and you finally stop sobbing. You stare at it, as it falls towards the horizon.
Wait a minute.
Did you just wish upon a shooting star for Sun and Moon to become real? You wipe your cheeks, wet from your tears. Suddenly, you get goosebumps. Magic isn’t real, you know that.
There’s no way, this actually worked. Right? And if it did, you would hate yourself for wishing upon something like that – and not for your dead fiancée to come back –
“Thank God magic isn’t real, right?”, you mutter bitterly to yourself, sighing deeply, turning around to re-enter the living room, as something loud crashes and you scream from the top of your lungs. Your cats hiss and flee into the bedroom and that’s when you see it in the faint glint of your fairy lights, the only source of light that’s currently turned on:
There is something laying on your carpet. No, not something, someone. He’s big and dark and wears familiar star-styled puffy trousers and a night cap. He’s made of metal and silicone and when he gets up, and his head turns and two red eyes stare at you, you know you’re fucked.
No. Nonononono. Your hand finds the light switch and you slam that thing just as the animatronic in your living room begins lunging at you –
Then, blue turns to yellow. Moon’s faceplate spins, once, twice, and he groans, and you stare, eyes bulging out of your head. Rays start to emit from his faceplate, his pants become striped and then he falls back. His faceplate stops spinning, and then it’s Sun, sitting on your carpet and staring at you with big, white eyes. He looks like he does in the game, unmoving face, lanky arms and legs, bells and genie shoes. You can’t believe it. You whished upon a shooting star and it worked. Your legs feel wobbly, your heart beats out of your chest, but you don’t panic anymore, at least.
Sun looks around the room, then lets go of his faceplate, which Moon grabbed at some point during their transformation. Then, he looks at you. He clears his throat, or pretends to, because he does not have a throat – he is an animatronic, goddamnit! – and stands up and woah, he is tall, at least two feet taller than you, and asks politely: “Hello new friend! Um, can you please tell me, what… what happened to us? Where are we?”