Archive of Our Own ^beta

“Wow, your brother is kind of a baby isn’t he?” The boy with the Bonnie mask snorted, looking towards Michael for approval.

The fuzzy image of Evan’s face turned to look desperately at him as the boy sobbed and blubbered. Yet he couldn’t feel anything but annoyance. “It’s hilarious!” He cackled.

There were streamers everywhere, with confetti littering the floor thanks to Charlie. There was a poster of Fredbear on the wall next to them, the air smelled of crappy pizza and the lights were blinding. Where was he? What was going on again?

He paused, turning to see that Evan had clutched onto Michael’s shorts and sobbed louder, his face turning red as fat tears spilled down his cheeks, making Michael’s head pound as he felt a slight déjà vu, but the ugly contempt he felt was stronger.

Suddenly, a plan that didn’t feel quite like his own formed in his mind and a grin stretched across his face. “Why don’t we help him get a closer look? He will love it!” He knew how frightened his little brother was of the animatronics, even though they were just dumb hunks of scrap. Maybe this stunt would finally make his brother quit being a snitch. That was why he disliked his brother so much, right? He couldn’t remember exactly, but surely there was a good reason like that for why he did.

As Michael glanced down, he noticed the smaller boy shrinking back in shock, before realising what was about to happen and shrieking “No! Please!”

His friends looked thrilled at the implications, their smiles somehow stretching wider, almost to an unnatural degree as they looked at one another and nodded.

Evan’s cries went ignored as Michael continued, even though he felt unsettled. “Come on guys, let’s give the little man a lift. He wants to get up close and personal!” He and his friends all lifted him up in their arms. Even though they were only preteens it wasn’t too difficult, as Evan was small for his age, and had turned seven that day.

Everything felt surreal, and he could lift Evan way easier than ever before. Why did he feel so strange? Michael couldn’t help but feel a growing feeling of panic, as if he’d forgotten something. As if something bad was going to happen.

The boy thrashed and squirmed, screaming as they slowly moved towards the stage, when suddenly Michael felt like his chest was going to burst.

Slowly, everything came to a halt. His friends weren’t around him anymore. He wasn’t even in the middle of the party room anymore, it was like time had fast forward and he was standing in front of the giant, muddy yellow mess that was Fredbear. This would usually be a normal sight, if his little brother wasn’t hanging from its jaws, not moving.

There was blood. Blood everywhere. All over Fredbear, all over Evan, all over himself. Michael swore it was even in his lungs with how he couldn’t fill them up quite right.

There was a sudden loud crying coming from an unknown location, it felt like it was reverberating everywhere, making his head pound. His little brother’s head was still spurting blood and brain matter everywhere. When had he gotten into Fredbear’s mouth? Where had his friends gone? The party room was empty suddenly, the noise of the crowd now dead silent.

The room seemed to melt away until there was only him and Evan, who wasn’t in the animatronics mouth anymore, and was limp in his arms. He wasn’t even crying anymore, so where was that loud sobbing coming from?

His baby brother’s head was a gory mess, somehow still spurting copious amounts of blood that got into his mouth, making him gag, and yet Evan opened his eyes, they were dull as they bored into him.

“It’s all your fault.” Evan’s tone was grave, and angry, unfit for a child as young as himself.

Michael’s stomach dropped, and his breath quickened. Of course, how could he forget? He killed his brother. It was his fault.

The crying grew louder as Evan suddenly vanished from his arms. Michael himself choked on fresh tears as he dropped onto his knees and held his head in his hands, and where was that fucking sobbing coming from?!

Michael’s eyes snapped open as he sprang up into a sitting position. His whole body was violently trembling, and it was so hard to breathe. He could barely fill up his lungs, and there was a heavy pit that swirled around in his stomach.

He banged on his chest as he choked seemingly on air, broken sobs spilling out from his mouth as he wheezed.

He tried to focus on breathing for a few moments, his ears ringing as he did so. He felt like he was underwater, and he was drowning. Breathe in, breathe out. His previous hyperventilating was slowing down gradually as he tried to take deep, careful breaths, even as his heart pounded almost painfully hard in his chest and his breath stuttered a few times.

He looked down at his hands, there was no blood, of course, maybe there was 28 years ago, but not now. Even if he felt like Evan’s blood would never leave his hands, it did. Everything is okay. Michael tried to reassure himself. It didn’t work all that well.

His hands were still shaking, but thankfully not as severely as before, he felt paranoid, and twitchy. As if something or someone was going to hurt him, this was how Michael normally felt after a nightmare however, so he wasn’t too concerned. Though, as he put his hands down he noticed simply how drenched he was in sweat, with his shirt clinging to him as if he’d just been doused with water. Gross.

He swallowed and shook his head, the ringing in his ears starting to dissipate, and Michael gasped as he heard most likely what had woken him up from his nightmare.

There was loud wailing.

Michael heaved himself up onto shaky legs and cursed when he almost tripped over something in the dark. Why was Gregory crying? His son didn’t cry often at all, that was just who he was. Hell, when the kid heard stories of monsters he would stomp into his room and threaten the dark corner in his closet with an empty paper towel roll!

His breath hitched as he swung open his door and quickened his pace, did he fall out of his crib? Was he hurt? Michael turned and speed walked across the hallway, his previous panic from his nightmare replaced with worry, until he finally reached his son’s room.

The crying was now loud enough to make him wince before opening the door and peeking in.

Luckily Gregory was in his crib, seemingly not hurt. However the infant was bawling his eyes out, his small hands gripping the bars of his crib. Clad in his pyjamas with his hair sticking up at awkward angles, he looked like he’d just woken up too. Gregory didn’t seem to notice he was there yet, as his eyes were squeezed shut.

Michael’s heart twisted at the sight, he stepped in the room and softly closed the door behind him. Gregory—as brave as he was—didn’t like loud noises, whether it was a firm knock on the door or a toilet flushing, which was why it was unfortunately so difficult to potty train at the moment.

His son’s room was quite big, much to Gregory’s dismay (strangely the boy did not like big, open spaces either). The walls were painted a baby blue with toys, drawings, and crayons strewn across the carpet floor, which Michael had forgotten to pick up before bed last night. There was a bookshelf filled with children’s books as Michael would read to him just about every night, along with a beanbag and a wooden rocking chair in the corner. The room was dark aside from the night light near the crib, which illuminated a good part of the room in a soft orange light.

He bit his lip and approached the crib slowly, he didn’t want to startle him. “Hey, bud..” Michael whispered.

Gregory’s head snapped up to look at him, his loud cries quieting for a moment as he blinked, realising Michael was there, before it returned tenfold. Gregory reached out for him frantically as he stuttered to speak.

“Daddy!” He yelled.

Michael picked his son up, and frowned as the toddler clutched onto him tightly and shoved his face into Michael’s shoulder. He bounced him in his arms a few times, shushing him and running a soothing hand through his bed head.

Did he have a nightmare as well? Gregory didn’t get nightmares all too often, but then again, he only just turned three. Maybe when they went to the library the other day he saw the cover of a horror book?

Gregory seemed to calm a little after a few moments, loud sobs turning into small whimpers and sniffles. His grip on Michael wasn’t going anywhere anytime soon, which was worrying. Michael himself hadn’t done anything to cause this, right? Whenever he felt like he would have a breakdown, he would either shove it down until it was nighttime, or he’d go to the bathroom after making sure his son was okay to be alone for a few minutes. He tried his best to shield him from the sight of the almost hysterical state his father would be in.

He didn’t traumatise his kid, right? Shit, he was hopefully just overthinking this, besides, running himself into another panic attack wouldn’t help Gregory. Michael chewed on his lip, before he managed to ask in a low voice. “Did you have a bad dream? What’s happened?” He winced at how hoarse his voice was.

There was a small sniffle before Gregory looked up at him with bleary eyes and responded in a quivering voice. “Yeah! It was really scary..” he paused, curling into himself a little. “You got hurt, and i was all alone!”

Talking about it seemed to upset him again, as he clumsily wiped the fresh tears that were flowing down his face with his fist.

Michael shifted him a bit, and approached the chair in the corner before sitting down, resting the boy in his lap so he could wrap his arms around him fully as he nuzzled in closer. “That does sound really scary, but look! I’m okay, and I promise you won’t be alone.” He murmured, he pulled back from the cuddle to cup his son’s cheek and smile softly at him.

Gregory blinked up at him, his face slightly flushed from his previous sobbing, he was seemingly scanning his face for anything out of the ordinary before he was satisfied. He slumped into his father’s embrace, shoving his face into his chest as he sniffled a little, still holding onto Michael tightly, but he seemed to have calmed down a bit.

Michael bit his lip, there was really no telling what could have brought this on, and he didn’t want to question his son about it at the moment, seeing as he’d just started to stop crying. He would have to ask more about it in the morning, Gregory’s had a few nightmares before, of course, but not a single one had left him so distressed.

He shook his head lightly to clear his head, before he noticed Gregory staring up at him, a small sheepish smile on the young boy’s face. Michael knew there this was going, his son loved to sleep in his bed with him, no matter the circumstance. Even though Michael wanted to encourage Gregory to be independent—especially at his age—he couldn’t deny that knowing his son was safe in his arms helped ease his own nightmares too.

Michael let out a sigh, leaning his head back as he stared back at Gregory, a smile slowly forming on his own face involuntarily. “Alright, alright. You can sleep with me tonight, I suppose.” He said the last part with playful reluctance. The feedback was immediate as Gregory’s eyes lit up, and he giggled before clutching onto his father again, he seemed to be getting tired again. Thank god.

Michael absolutely adored his son, but jesus, some nights the child would absolutely refuse to go to sleep, making Michael chase him around the house to try and get him into bed. He had to wrangle him into his pyjamas and tuck him in forcefully countless times, of course while Gregory laughed at him the whole time, then he would climb out of bed two minutes later. Even though it was extremely frustrating most of the time, Michael couldn’t help but crack a small smile sometimes because of Gregory’s stubbornness.

Michael chuckled quietly to himself before rising from the chair, still carrying his son who was now dozing off and jolting awake again every few seconds. He turned to the door—not before grabbing Gregory’s pacifier and Freddy plushie, of course—and opened it, slowly stepping down the hall to his room.

He softly hummed a song his mother used to sing to him and his siblings at bedtime as he messed with Gregory’s hair a bit more. Finally reaching his room, Gregory seemed to have fully drifted off, soft snores coming from the boy. Michael entered and quickly turned on the dim lamp on his bedside table, to act as a makeshift night light for Gregory.

Michael slowly rested Gregory onto his bed, pulling the dark grey duvet over him as he made sure the boy was comfortable. He gazed down at his son, before bringing his hand up to his cheek, slowly tracing his freckles they both shared before he finally pulled away. Michael walked around to the other side of the bed and got situated in the covers himself, before he wrapped his arms around Gregory again.

Michael sighed, and shut his eyes, before opening them slightly when he felt a shift, he jolted when he saw Gregory barely awake, yet grinning up at his father slightly deliriously. Michael couldn’t hold back a small snort as he looked at the toddler and raised an eyebrow.

Gregory giggled back, still barely awake, before he shut his eyes again, but not before muttering a contented “Love you, daddy.” He was fast asleep right after that, leaving Michael to blink at him for a moment, before he smiled.

“I love you too, sweetheart.” Michael whispered, before kissing the top of Gregory’s head and shutting his eyes. Normally it would be extremely difficult for Michael to fall back asleep after a nightmare, yet he’d almost completely forgotten he even had one. He felt content, and the usual paranoia and foggy feeling that would stick around after such a vivid nightmare was completely absent.

He slept peacefully for the rest of the night.