Alone With Them

Chapter 41

Chica ran, and Cathryn didn't blame her as the sound of shouting increased behind them.

She'd had the perfect view peeking over the robot's shoulder to admire the truck in all its glory. The basic shipping logo on the outside had revealed no explanations about the strangeness within.

With some prompting, Chica explained as she speed-walked down the abandoned roadside. The animatronic had followed the supplies truck out of town. It'd slipped out of sight for a while, but she'd found it again when it'd pulled over on the side of the road. There'd been static and a voice coming over the radio, something about a meeting point having to be changed.

The driver turned frustrated and was starting to roll the truck back onto the road when Chica finally caught up. She'd popped a back tire with her metal feet and clambered onto the back of the truck.

"Then they shot at me," Chica finished. Her eyes darted away to a new hole along the top of her left shoulder.

"And you fought them?"

"Only as it was necessary."

Cathryn shook her head. "What about the secret entrance? Why didn't you tell me about it before?"

Chica stared at her before looking forward, picking up speed. "What secret entrance?"

"In the Repair Room. Didn't you know about it?"

". . . Yes."

Cathryn glared, but the chicken couldn't see her expression. Though perhaps she sensed it.

"Freddy told me about it once, at least what he could of it. He can't remember where it is exactly and how to open it during the day. But I didn't use that exit."

"Then how'd you follow the truck?"

"They dropped Freddy off at the front door," Chica said in a quieter tone. "It occasionally happens when a security guard disappears. Other times, they vanish from the Repair Room and we find him afterwards, wandering the hallways."

So Cathryn wasn't the first to get kidnapped thanks to Freddy. She wasn't sure how to feel about that. In fact, she wasn't sure of her feelings at all anymore. Everything had been fuzzy since slamming her head at Fazbear's, and only as she was jostled about by Chica's robotic arms, was it beginning to click that she'd really been taken away. Snatched in the middle of the night with no way of calling for help.

Cathryn shivered and wrapped herself tighter in her uniform. A single snag in the collar tickled her neck.

"I have some memories of opening the front door for him, so when things went quiet and we realized he'd disappeared, that's where I went. I saw them drive out of the parking lot." Chica's blank gaze never strayed from the road after that, even when she was answering questions. Maybe she was pretending to be deep in thought.

"What time is it?"

"Unsure. We started fighting near 3:30. I believe it was an hour's journey to find you."

Cathryn's jaw dropped. "3:30?" She'd been trapped in Pirate's Cove for nearly four hours? No wonder she'd been losing her mind! "And you were an hour away from the restaurant? It's almost the end of my shift! Whittle and Sam are going to kill me!"

"Odd thing to worry about, given your night," Chica commented.

"My brain is having a hard time processing things. Doesn't help that I still have a headache." And every time the bird spoke, the pain only tripled. But Cathryn needed to understand everything before they reached Fazbear's. Things could only get worse at the restaurant.