The Miss and The Music: A Marionette X story

Night one

•Janus's P.O.V.•

The brisk air nipped at my heels as I walked eagerly to my new job. It was only ten, but Mr. Fazbear wanted to show us how to properly run things if we were going to be working there. I was staring to think wearing a skirt to my first day was a bad idea.

"Janus!" Katie yelled, opening the door for me as I arrived. She was grinning, bouncing around on her feet as she let me in. "You're finally here oh my god, I'm so excited."

"I can tell." I laughed. "Where's Mr. Fazbear?"

"Right here." He walked out from an open door I should've seen, holding two hangers with a shirt and a windbreaker on each. "Uniforms. Just a little touch to add to the Freddy family experience."

"Cool." Katie grinned, taking them and handing me one. We even got little badges to put on the pockets of each one.

"I'm assuming you ladies know your way around already?"

"Yes, we do," I said awkwardly. "We're sorry for what happened Saturday night, it was a stupid dare from our friends."

"Don't worry about it!" He bellowed, laughing. "You girls were an amazing team on the job. Night six is just about the hardest one you know, and you handled it like pros."

"Thank you." Katie smiled.

"Well, I'm going to leave you to get changed and get on with the night, feel free to wander until midnight, but once that time hits be in the office. I have a friend who's going to be calling to give you a few hints and tips, he's head of security at all the locations."

"Okay, sir." I said. "Have a good night."

"You too!" He smiled, turning and walking out the door. He mumbled something that I barely caught on the way out though. "May god have mercy on your souls..."

"Wow he's a weird one." I shook my head, dragging Katie to the bathroom. "Come on, I want to look around a little bit more before our shift."

We changed, the shirts and jackets both fitting nicely. She began to wander towards the main stage while I found my way to the prize corner, staring at all of the stuffed plushes on the wall. They looked different than the animatronics here, I wondered if they were maybe older models they hadn't bothered to change yet. I hopped the desk to take a closer look, accidentally knocking a pot over in the progress of it. It was empty thank god, but there were about twenty pieces on the floor now.

"Crap." I glared, jumping back over after finding a dustpan. I started humming as I collected the pieces, the singing coming soon after.

"A little sleep, a little slumber, a little fold of the hands. Left you weak, left you hungry, when there's supply you still demand," I chimed, picking up the pieces. "You're beginning to drag the ones you love down, will this phase ever end, a thousand arms to hold you but you won't reach for any hands."

I was singing the entire song as I cleaned, dumping the pieces in the trash before dancing around the room. I had a habit of this, it kept me from keeping my own room clean. All of a sudden I thought I heard someone singing along with me, or humming at least. Katie didn't know the lyrics, and she wasn't even in the room. I just shrugged it off as my echo when I checked the time; my shift was just about to start. I bolted towards the room, making it just in time.

•??? P.O.V.•

I woke up to the sound of music playing. No, it wasn't music, it was someone singing. Beautifully at that. I peeked around, spotting a girl picking up pieces of a shattered pot and placing them in a dust pan. She had long hair, which I found to be oddly colored, a pale purple. Her eyes were a clear grey, like a cloudy sky. I've only seen them through the windows here, but I liked the color. A lot of kids didn't seem to want to come in on those days, which gave us a break.

She continued to clean before dumping the shattered pieces in a trash bin, putting the dustpan back and starting to spin around. Her skirt flared, which looked just as pretty as she did. The girl was dancing to her own music and enjoying it. I'd heard enough of it to begin to hum the tune, I caught onto those pretty quickly. I caught onto most music quickly.

She stopped dancing, so I stopped humming. The girl looked around the room before looking at a phone she had in her pocket. She ran off somewhere, just before the twelve a.m. bell rang. The animatronics on stage began to move, and I hadn't realized that it was already this late. The music box started going off, so I'd be on a timer. Now that I heard it after hearing her, I started to realize how much I tired of the song. I wanted to hear her sing more.

There was a smashing noise, and I looked to see The Mangle walking around. The static noise that it made always scared me slightly, but I knew that it was probably the most misunderstood of all these animatronics. The poor thing was dismembered by children for gods sake.

I heard the timer on the music box hit zero. Today was Monday, so it was the night guards first day on the job. I wondered who it was this week. The strings began to lift me out of my box, so I let them, glancing around the now empty room. Everyone was scared of me for absolutely no reason.

I mean, I'm just a Marionette, after all.