Fazbear Frights #6: Blackbird

Hide And Seek

Forever desperate to prove his worth to his arrogant brother and distant father, Toby chases victory at an arcade game with horrifying consequences

Toby! Toby! Toby!"

Kids chanted as Toby Billings hunched over the Ultimate Battle Warrior arcade game at Freddy Fazbear's Pizza and Games. His left hand clenched the joystick tightly, shifting left and right. Up and down. His right hand punched the action buttons for his warrior character to bust the graveyard ghoul opponent in the face and kick him in the gut. Repeatedly.

Black blood and green sweat splattered from the ghoul.

It was freaking awesome.

Sweat dampened Toby's upper lip. He shifted the peppermint-flavored toothpick inside his mouth from one cheek to the other. His arm muscles clenched tightly. He was about to achieve his highest game score for Ultimate Battle Warrior. All he wanted was to be the new high scorer. He'd been focused on this game all week, and he was almost there ... almost.

He pounded, pounded, pounded on his opponent.

Bam! Took that sucker down!

Winner flashed across the screen.

Toby pushed off the game, raised his arms in victory. "Heck yeah!"

Someone patted his back. "All right, Toby!"

"Take that, sucker!" Toby punched the air, grinning.

"You had to take first place this time, Toby."

Toby expelled a breath, cracked his knuckles, then took a moment to enter his TAB initials, tapping his foot as he waited for the top scores to flash on the screen.

His smile fell away as he blinked in disbelief.

No. Freaking. Way. He still held second place.

Defeat sunk like a rock in his gut.

"Aw, nah, your bro is still the highest score. What a drag!"

Toby's hands clenched on the controls. Sure enough, his older brother Connor's initials, COB, were still listed as number one.

Always number one.

Jaw tight, he slammed his palms hard on the game. Dang it!

Kids started to walk away except for this annoying guy named Reggie.

"Don't worry about it," Reggie said, slurping a milkshake. His hair was a mass of red curls, flaring out like a halo around his head. "You'll get a game over him, eventually. You're just one thousand points behind. That's practically nothin'."

Toby curled his lip. Every game in Freddy Fazbear's Pizza and Games had his brother listed as the top player. He thought he had this one for sure.

He cracked his knuckles and turned away from the stupid game. Then he grabbed his soda cup from a small table next to him and sipped flat root beer through the straw.

"There's still Hide-and-Seek," Reggie went on. "It just opened up a week ago, and your brother hasn't even played that one yet. I mean, I haven't seen him, anyway. And you still have to play it. When you do, you'll have the advantage. No problem."

No, he hadn't told his brother a new game attraction had opened at Freddy's just for that exact reason. Toby wanted to play it first and snag the top spot. His brother used to have a part-time job at Freddy's when he was in high school. He'd spent his breaks and after-work hours playing all the arcade games in the place until he'd become the top scorer on every single game. Now that he'd graduated last year and moved on to—in his words— a real job, Toby had taken over his old job helping out with cleaning around the family restaurant.