My Little Devil Darling

Broken Hearts and Broken Promises

It turns out that Henry was right the whole time, the duo didn't cause as much chaos as he thought they would, but they did pull some pranks on the studio staff at times. Charlotte and Bendy have been the best of friends, a whole year since first meeting each other. Although the girl was older, she was still the outgoing, cute daughter that loves cartoons, drawing and playing the piano. Having those lessons with her Uncle paid off; Charlotte could now play simple classical songs with two hands. The cartoon devil was also having the time of his life, he would be excited to act for another cartoon for his creator's show, but he was glad when it was over so that he could play with his best friend. Right now he and Charlotte were in their secret room in the animation studio, the demon beside her; watching the girl draw. He was intrigued by her drawing skills, 'it must come from her father' he would think, but he enjoyed seeing Charlotte draw nonetheless. He sometimes thought of trying to draw as well, but never dared to point it out; he wasn't able to talk either because Joey never did anything for that. Soon the animator's daughter was done her picture and held it up for Bendy to see. It was her and the devil sitting and watching the sunset together. Bendy never knew what the outside world looked like, Joey always kept him inside to be safe, but maybe he and Charlotte could sneak out for a little while and be back before anyone noticed. As the child puts her new picture away, the cartoon grabs her hand and pulls her to a back door that led outside; then points to it.

"Do you want to go outside?" Charlotte asked and he nods, eyes seeming to sparkle.

Looking around them to see if anyone was near, which there wasn't, she opens the wooden door slowly so that it didn't make noise and alert someone. It was successful and she allowed her friend to wander out first. Bendy was terrified and excited at the same time, he couldn't completely understand what he was feeling, but didn't worry as much because the warm sun on his black, inky body made him calm. So many different colours were around the demon, it was overwhelming, but in a good way. He looked all around him, at the trees, the sky; he could even see some other buildings, despite the animation studio almost being in the middle of nowhere. Charlotte had walked up behind the cartoon and led him to a nearby tree to sit up against. They sat beside each other and took in the scenery, hearing the birds' chirp and cars going by at times, it was almost enough to make the girl sleepy and want to take a nap. Nothing was said, there was nothing to be said, it was just a nice visual experience for the two best friends, and Bendy was happy to have her.

"Charlotte," Joey called out, "Are you out here?"

Suddenly startled by his creator's voice, ink began to leak from Bendy's head, afraid that he would get in serious trouble if Joey found him breaking the rules. So without thinking, the cartoon melted into an ink puddle and scurried off to hide. Charlotte wanted to call out to her friend, but her Grandfather had already found her.

"Why are you outside?" he asked, putting a hand on the child's shoulder.

"I just wanted some air and to relax in the sun for a bit," Charlotte replied, "Am I not allowed?"

"Of course you are, just make sure you let someone know, your father and I were worried."

The girl nods and Joey leaves her be, going back into the building. When Charlotte heard the back door close, she started to search for Bendy. 'Why would he run off?' she thought to herself.

"Bendy! Come on out, Grandpa Joey left."

With no such luck of finding the devil darling, she gave up and went back into the studio.

Wally was wandering the studio, tidying up anything that was out of place. He was very skeptical about the Ink Machine ever since Joey announced that it was up and running. The tasks he had to perform on that thing were tedious, especially having to repair any pipes that broke, which happened almost twice a day. It's a hassle to have to fix the pipe, then clean up all the ink that flooded out of it. The janitor had never complained to his boss about the pipes to his face, but today was the last straw, sooner or later the studio will rot and fall apart from the amount of ink that had soaked into the walls and floor. After spending almost 45 minutes fixing the first broken pipe of the day, Wally stormed into Joey's office, hoping to knock some sense into him.

"This is ridiculous Joey," he said, wiping some leftover ink off his face with a cloth, "These ink pipes are bursting like fireworks; you need to make them stronger or something! I'm telling ya, if one more of these pipes burst, I'm outta here!"

The whole time the janitor was complaining, Joey was calm, knowing that Wally wouldn't leave. All the threats that the man was given never mattered to him. The workers' jobs were important to them; they needed the money. But Joey will never turn off the machine, he and this studio need it. After losing the little pipe war, Wally left, cursing under his breath. Down in the music department, Norman was up in his projection booth, with Sammy and the band down in the recording studio, practicing the new piece he had made. Having a movie reel with the new episode, the projectionist had it playing on the wall behind the band while they played the song and made sound effects when necessary. When the performance was over, fixing small parts now and then, the music director let the band go and they all put away their instruments and music sheets.

"That was a great practice, everyone," Sammy announced, "Hopefully it will be perfected and ready for the final recording tomorrow."

The band left the recording room and Norman walked down the stairs from his booth to meet up with Sammy.

"You guys did amazing," he complimented, "This song works with the cartoon; can't wait for the final outcome."

"Me too," the music director said, looking to the projectionist, "It amazes me every time an episode gets released, knowing it's my music that's playing. I love how the pieces turn out and how well my band performs; it's like a dream come true."

Having nothing more to do for work, the two men leave the room to chat elsewhere. On the opposite side of the studio, Grant was stressing over the billing costs and tons of calls for complaints during the whole week. Parents have been calling a lot recently, saying that the Bendy cartoons were bad for kids. With fewer people watching the shows, that meant the company wasn't making enough money to pay for things. If this continued, the studio would go into debt and have to be shut down. The accountant had to do something, the first one being to go to his boss's office to share the news. He made it to Joey's door and knocked; hearing the 'ok' to come in.

"Mr. Drew, we have an issue," Joey gestures for him to continue, "We've been losing a lot of money and I keep getting complaints from parents about the cartoons. Not a lot of people are watching and if this goes on for much longer, we'll go out of business."

To Grant, it looked as if his boss didn't care about anything he was saying; that made him frustrated.

"Maybe if you got rid of that darn machine, all our money wouldn't be wasted on that," he finished off, storming out of the room.

Charlotte was in the toy factory with her Uncle Shawn, she never came down here often so it was always fascinating to see all the shelves filled with Boris, Alice and Bendy plushies. She was sitting in a chair beside Shawn while he painted faces on Bendy dolls.

"I wish I could make toys," the girl said aloud.

The toymaker smirked, "It's not as easy as it looks, especially since they have to be perfect to meet Joey's approval. Anything less than perfect gets thrown away."

Charlotte continued to watch him paint faces but jumped when she heard something fall. She turned around to see what it was and found a plushy that seemed to have fallen off the shelf it was on. Charlotte said 'goodbye' to her Uncle and left to go pick up the doll and put it back. But she found that it was not there and wondered where it went. A squeak was soon heard and it came from outside the toy room. The girl followed the noise and got startled by Bendy. She gasped and put her hand to her chest; taking a step back. Worried for his friend, the devil walked closer to the girl, only to get scared back for revenge. Charlotte expected the cartoon to laugh with her, but the exact opposite ends up happening, ink dripped from his head and eyes like he was crying. Feeling super bad for the toon, she walked over to Bendy and hugged him, and her prediction of Bendy liking hugs was true because he felt a lot better and even hugs back. Now the pair were walking around the studio, not knowing where to go, when Bendy stopped at the door that led to the Ink Machine room. Without even checking if Charlotte was behind him, he opened the door and went in. The first thing he visited was the machine, the thing that made him, and examined it. Bendy hasn't been in here for so long, so he never really got a good look at it. Charlotte had discovered that the demon was not with her and retraced her steps to find the Ink Machine room door open. She walked inside but couldn't see her friend anywhere, it seemed like a game of Hide-and-Seek to her so she searched. Since the girl saw that Bendy could melt into an ink puddle, she thought the best place to hide would be the Ink Machine, so Charlotte went to the nozzle first and looked inside. At the back of the machine, the cartoon found a strange lever near the huge container of ink. Being the curious, mischievous character that he was, Bendy used all his strength possible and pulled the lever down; making a loud, grumbling sound, come from the machine. Charlotte got startled by the noise but couldn't move fast enough before a whole bunch of ink flew out of the nozzle and hit her, most of it getting in her mouth and pushing the girl to the ground. Charlotte started coughing a lot; trying to get the ink out of her mouth. Bendy heard the coughing and was devastated to see his best friend almost passing out. All of a sudden, he heard footsteps running towards the room the two were in. Our of pure terror, ink dripped from the ink demon's head and he ran to hide in the room somewhere. Henry and Joey both ran into the Ink Machine room, Henry seeing his daughter limp on the floor, covered in ink and he ran over to her; picking her up. Joey had already turned off the machine flow and walked over to his friend.

"Don't get any closer to me!" Henry shouted, pushing the man back, "You said this was safe, how could this happen?"

"I never have this door open, I don't know why she would..."

"I don't want to hear it! You lied to me; I can't trust you! I need to save my daughter and once she's in the hospital and hopefully lives, I'm collecting all my things and leaving! Good luck with your show, Joey."

Henry then quickly ran out of the studio and lays Charlotte's pale body in the back seat of the car. He got in himself and drove off; calling the hospital for the major emergency. Joey was completely shocked as to what just happened; he just lost his best friend.

"This can't be happening," he said to himself, "I need to get him back, I..."

He looked back to his machine.

"I need to destroy the Ink Machine."

Hearing those words, Bendy was furious, it turns out his creator had lied to him as well. He was promised that he would live, no matter what, and the cartoon plans to keep it that way. Out of total rage, Bendy started to flood the studio with ink; making sure that the traitor couldn't stop the flow. The man saw what was happening and rushed around the building, getting everyone out of the place safely. The only person he didn't find was Norman and he prayed that he was out. Sammy ended up getting close to the door, but with the ink and weak floorboards, the wood broke and he fell, unable to get out. Joey was the last person that needed to leave but the angered ink demon stopped him and with no hesitation, he drowned his lying creator in the ink; killing him.