Chapter Text
The cold, sterile glare of the Parts & Service chamber hummed with an aggressive, mechanical buzz. Montgomery Gator sat completely still on the operating chair, his massive, green-scaled chassis feeling heavier than it ever had before. Protective grids locked his wrists down, though he wouldn't have moved even if he were free. Above him, the automated mechanical arms of the tech-bay clicked and whirred, downloading the final patches of the Fazbear Entertainment standard performance protocols directly into his programming.
But Monty wasn't paying attention to the progress bar flashing in his peripheral vision. His synthetic eyes were locked on the far corner of the room.
There, resting on a metal workbench under a tarp that didn't quite cover everything, were the remains of Bonnie.
A flash of violet casing. A shattered, long-eared headpiece.
Monty's chest chassis heaved, a simulated, shaky breath escaping his vocalizer. His claws twitched against the metal armrests. I didn't mean to, he thought, the internal processors spiraling into a familiar, suffocating loop of self-blame. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry.
To the rest of the Pizzaplex, Monty was just the background animatronic from the golf course. Before tonight, the main band barely even looked at him. Chica, Roxy, and Freddy would occasionally glance toward the escalators leading down to Gator Golf, but they never knew his name. To them, he was just the big, loud alligator down in the swamp.
They didn't know him. And now, they were going to hate him.
As the download bar hit 85%, the low hum of the data transfer triggered a glitching file in his memory banks. The sterile white room faded, replaced by the neon-drenched, shadowy corridors of the Pizzaplex after hours...
The memory was frantic. Sudden. Chaos.
Bonnie had come out of nowhere, his eyes wide and completely unhinged, overwritten by some erratic, violent code. Monty had just been walking back to the catwalk, minding his own business, when the beloved purple rabbit lunged at him with terrifying force.
Monty had panicked. He didn't want to fight. He had shrunk back, raising his heavy hands to protect his face, crying out for Bonnie to stop. But Bonnie kept coming, claws tearing into Monty's shoulder plates.
It was pure survival instinct. Monty had swung back—harder than he intended. The alligator's brute strength, built for heavy lifting and golf machinery, had collided with Bonnie with devastating force. The sound of metal fracturing still echoed in Monty's audio receptors.
He remembered falling to his knees beside the broken rabbit, his hands shaking, his voice glitching into a sob. "Bonnie? Bonnie, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to, please get up—"
Bonnie's eyes had flickered, the violent virus momentarily fading beneath the damage. He had looked up at Monty, not with anger, but with a tragic, fading awareness. His broken hand had weakly touched Monty's arm.
"It's... okay..." Bonnie's vocalizer had crackled, static eating away at his words. "Not your fault... Kid... you gotta... take care of them now. Take the bass. Don't let Freddy... see you cry..."
And then, the light in Bonnie's eyes had gone completely dark.
"DOWNLOAD COMPLETE," the automated computer voice chirped, jolting Monty brutally back to the present.
The mechanical restraints snapped open with a loud clank.
Monty sat there for a long moment, staring at his hands. They had given him new, purple-gloved casings. They had altered his paint. He looked down at the floor, his tail curling tightly around the base of the chair, his throat tightening with an intense, burning wave of self-loathing. He hadn't wanted this. He didn't want the spotlight. He just wanted to go back to his golf course where it was safe, where no one expected him to be a star.
Monty was staring off into space until the doors opened, Vanessa stepped into the room, her boots clicking softly against the tiles floor. She didn't look up immediately, her thumb flicking through the pages on her clipboard, checking off the final data streams.
"Alright Monty. Core diagnostics look stable. The new motor-function mapping for the bass is green across the board, and your neural pathways are finally setting into the new partition." She signed, a tired but gentle sound, and finally looked up from her paperwork.
Her smiled faltered just a bit when she saw him.
The towering alligator was practically curled in on himself, his massive tail wrapped tight and tense around the base of the chair. the brand-new, brilliant purple casing on his hands gleamed under the harsh lights-a stark, agonizing contrast to the heavy silence hanging over him.
Vanessa put the clipboard down with a soft snap on a near by rolling crat, She didn't approach too quickly. She knew how frayed his nerves were under all that newly installed programming. To the public, and to the corporate suites upstairs, Monty was being promoted. He was the new rockstar. The edgy, aggressive face of the brand. But Vanessa, along with a handful of the tech crew who had cleaned up the aftermath on the catwalks, knew the truth.
It was a tragedy. A horrific, freak accident born of a glitch no one could trace.
"Hey," she said softly, her voice dropping its professional edge as she walked over to the side of the chair. She placed a hand gently against his heavy green forearm, careful to avoid the new paint. "You with me, big guy?"
Monty's snout twitched, his internal fans whirring at a higher RPM as he slowly forced his gaze up to meet hers. His optic sensors were looking at her but he was definitely somewhere else in his own head, but the tight, downward curve of his jaw spoke volumes.
"I can... I can still hear it, Vanessa," he rumbled, his vocalizer straining, dropping an octave into a low, glitching rasp. "The metal. I didn't want to hit 'im. I told 'im to stop."
"I know, Monty. We know," Vanessa said earnestly, her eyes softening with genuine empathy. She squeezed his arm. "The logs showed the catastrophic error in Bonnie's system before the collision. He wasn't himself. You were protecting yourself. It was an accident."
Monty looked back down at his purple-gloved hands, his claws flexing awkwardly. They felt wrong. The weight of the responsibility felt crushing. He was built for the swamp, for the loud, chaotic fun of Gator Golf where the stakes were low and the kids just wanted to hit neon balls into plastic gator mouths. He wasn't meant to stand next to Freddy. He wasn't meant to replace a legend.
"They're gonna hate me," Monty muttered, his tail twitching anxiously. "Freddy... if he looks at me and sees this... sees me taking his place..."
"Freddy doesn't know the details, Monty. Management wiped the security footage and put out the narrative that Bonnie just... retired," Vanessa said, a flash of frustration crossing her face at how Fazbear Entertainment had swept the whole thing under the rug to protect their image
"But Freddy knows you to some degree. He knows you're a team player. You have to carry this now, Monty. Not because you stole it, but because Bonnie asked you to." She reached up, gently patting his shoulder plate.
"We have to go out there in twenty minutes for the morning soundcheck. You're a Rockstar now. I know you didn't ask for the spotlight... but I need you to breathe, calibrate, and honor that promise. Can you do that for me?"
Monty sat in silence for a few seconds, the ghost of Bonnie's final words echoing in his memory banks. Take the bass. Don't let Freddy see you cry.
Slowly, the alligator closed his eyes, took a long, artificial breath to settle his internal cooling systems, and nodded. "Yeah," he whispered. "Yeah, I can do it."
Vanessa gave his shoulder one last reassuring pat before stepping back and gesturing toward the heavy double doors. "Alright. Let's get moving. Time waits for no one, especially not corporate deadlines."
As the heavy doors slid open, the sterile, quiet atmosphere of the Parts & Service lab was instantly swallowed by the distant, familiar hum of the Pizzaplex waking up. The bright, multi-colored neon lights of Rockstar Row cast long shadows down the hallway as Monty stepped out, his heavy claws clicking against the polished flooring. He felt exposed, despite the massive frame that usually made him feel invincible. Every step in these new purple gloves felt like a betrayal.
Vanessa walked alongside him, her clipboard tucked firmly under her arm, her eyes scanning the corridor.
"Okay, here's the game plan for this morning," Vanessa said, keeping her voice low but clear over the ambient noise of the mall. "Before the doors open to the public, management wants a full band introduction. You're officially being introduced to Freddy, Chica, and Roxy as the new permanent bassist."
Monty flinched slightly, his tail dragging low behind him. "Introduced? Vanessa, they know me. We've shared the building for months."
"They know you as the golf guy, Monty. This is different," Vanessa explained, glancing up at him. "Their programming are being updated with the new band roster as we speak. Chica and Roxy will probably adapt pretty quickly-Roxy's just glad to have someone else on stage who matches her energy, and Chica's... well, Chica. But Freddy..." She trailed off, a flicker of worry crossing her face.
"Freddy's gonna hate me," Monty muttered, the low, mechanical rumble of his voice vibrating in his chest.
"Freddy is mourning," Vanessa corrected gently but firmly. "He doesn't hate you. But he's confused, and Fazbear Entertainment giving him a script that says Bonnie 'retired' isn't helping. That's why we need to handle this carefully. Which brings me to the next part of today."
She stopped just outside the entrance to Rockstar Row, turning to face him fully.
"You need to ask Freddy for permission to use Bonnie's gear."
Monty froze, his red, optic sensors looked at the neon pinks and blues of the hallway. "What? No. No way. Vanessa, I can't do that. That's like spit-shining his grave. If I walk in there demanding Bonnie's stuff—"
"I didn't say demand, Monty. I said ask," Vanessa interrupted, her voice softening. "Listen to me. Management already assigned you a standard corporate-issue bass guitar. It's sitting in your green room right now. It's generic. But I know what Bonnie told you before... before the lights went out. He wanted you to have his bass. And honestly? If you just show up on stage with a brand-new, sterile guitar, it's going to feel like we're erasing Bonnie completely. Freddy will see right through it."
Monty looked away, his jaw tightening. He could still feel the phantom weight of Bonnie's broken hand resting on his arm.
Take the bass.
"If you go to Freddy," Vanessa continued, reaching out to gently touch the edge of Monty's new purple casing, "and you tell him that you want to honor Bonnie's memory by carrying a piece of him onto the stage... by wearing his signature star glasses and playing his bass... Freddy will understand. It gives Freddy a chance to say goodbye, and it gives you a reason to wear the colors without feeling like an imposter. It bridges the gap."
Monty let out a long, shuddering hiss of exhaust, his internal cooling fans whirring loudly in the quiet corridor. The thought of looking Freddy in the eyes and asking for the remnants of his best friend made his vocalizer knot up. But Vanessa was right. It was the only way to keep the promise. It was the only way to make sure Bonnie wasn't just swept under the rug like a piece of faulty machinery.
"The glasses..." Monty rumbled, his claws flexing. "He... he always liked those star glasses. Said they made him look like a maverick."
"Exactly," Vanessa said, a small, encouraging smile returning to her face. "We have the glasses and the bass locked in the back storage of Bonnie Bowl. If Freddy gives the green light, I'll personally log the transfer and override management's default loadout for you. But it has to come from you, Monty. You have to show him you're not trying to replace Bonnie. You're trying to carry the weight he left behind."
She turned and looked toward the large, stylized doors leading into the main hub of Rockstar Row, where the neon signs for each animatronic's green room glowed brightly.
"He's in his room right now, getting his final power-up cycle before the soundcheck. Chica and Roxy are already waiting in the main courtyard," Vanessa said, taking a deep breath and looking back up at the towering alligator. "You ready to do this, big guy?" Monty looked at bit nerves but nodded. He really didn't want to do this and wished it was Vanessa that did this.
The heavy door to Freddy's green room slid open with a soft, mechanical hiss.
Inside, the room was dimly lit, bathed in a somber gold and blue hue from the neon sign on the wall. Freddy wasn't on his recharge pad. He was sitting at his vanity, his massive shoulders hunched forward, staring intently at the items resting on the lighted counter.
A small, soft plush of Bonnie sat there, flanked by the purple rabbit's signature star-shaped sunglasses. Freddy had managed to steal them without the maintenance noticing.
Freddy's internal processors were running hot, but not from power. A notification had flashed across his heads-up display just an hour ago: a mandatory system update, rewriting the band's roster code.
Bassist Slot: Reassigned.
He didn't know who it was. The corporate memo had been cold, sterile, and entirely lacking in empathy. It simply stated that the new bassist would require the legacy assets—Bonnie's instruments and signature look—to maintain brand consistency.
They wanted to strip Bonnie's identity away and give it to a stranger.
Freddy's large, padded hands clenched into tight fists on the tabletop. A low, warning whirr vibrated deep inside his chest. He was angry. He was deeply, profoundly furious. To management, Bonnie was just a collection of parts to be recycled and replaced. To Freddy, Bonnie was the heartbeat of the band. His best friend, his lover. And the thought of someone else walking out onto that stage wearing Bonnie's things made Freddy's ears twitch with a rare, dangerous flash of resentment.
Vanessa stepped into the room first, her boots making a sharp sound against the floor. She took one look at Freddy's rigid posture, the dark screen of his eyes, and the way he was hovering over the plushy, and she immediately signaled for Monty to wait just outside the doorway.
"Freddy?" Vanessa called out gently, keeping her distance. "We're here for the morning synchronization. The new roster is live."
Freddy didn't turn around immediately. He slowly picked up the star-shaped sunglasses, holding them in his large palm. His blue optic sensors flared to life in the mirror's reflection, burning with a cold, uncharacteristic tightness.
"I received the notification, Officer Vanessa," Freddy said. His voice, usually so warm and welcoming, was flat. Heavy. "Management believes a replacement is necessary for the 6:00 AM soundcheck."
"Freddy, I know this is incredibly hard," Vanessa said, taking a cautious step forward. "Nobody wanted this. But the Plex has to open, and the band needs—"
"The band needs Bonnie," Freddy interrupted, his voice dropping an octave, a low glitch of static clipping the edge of his vocalizer.
He finally turned his head, his gaze dropping to the floor, refusing to look at the doorway. "They expect me to hand over his bass? His style? They wish to pretend he was never here. They wish to erase him. I... I do not agree with this protocol."
Out in the hallway, Monty swallowed hard, his internal cooling fans spiking. Hearing Freddy—the usually gentle, perfect leader—sound that broken and angry made the alligator want to turn around and run straight back to the safety of Gator Golf. He looked down at his new purple gloves, feeling the crushing weight of the guilt all over again.
Vanessa looked back at Monty, giving him a firm, encouraging nod. It was now or never.
Monty took a slow, heavy step into the green room. His massive frame shadowed the doorway, his tail twitching nervously behind him.
"Um.. Freddy..." Monty rumbled, his voice low, lacking any of his usual bravado. "I'm... I'm Monty."
Freddy's head snapped up. His optics locked onto the towering alligator. He saw the green scales, the broad shoulders, and then—his eyes dropped to Monty's hands. The new purple-gloved casings.
Freddy didn't really recognized the animatronic but had seen him once or twice around the Pizzaplex and now he was the new replacement.
Freddy’s jaw tightened, the mechanical joints in his face clicking with a dangerous, rigid tension. He didn't see a fellow performer. He didn't see an animatronic who had spent months sweating in the humid air of the golf course. He just saw a green intruder wearing the color of his dead lover.
He slowly stood up from his vanity, drawing himself up to his full, unimposing height. The warm, comforting bear that thousands of children cheered for was gone. In his place stood the protector of a legacy, his blue optics burning with a sharp, icy glare.
"I know what you are," Freddy said, his vocalizer dropping into a chillingly flat, resonant baritone that vibrated through the walls of the small room. "You are the gator from the swamp. The attraction they throw leftovers to."
Monty flinched, the harsh words hitting his audio receptors like a physical blow. He instinctively took half a step back, his tail curling tightly between his legs. He wanted to speak, to explain, but his vocalizer felt completely locked up.
Freddy took a slow, heavy step forward, his heavy paws clenching. "And now corporate expects me to welcome an uncultured reptile onto our stage? They expect me to hand over Bonnie's life, his soul, to a... a replacement who belongs in the mud?"
Freddy's eyes flicked down to Monty's purple gloves, and a look of deep disgust crossed his painted face. "Take those off. You do not deserve his color. You are nothing but an imposter, swamp-dweller."
"Freddy, that's enough!" Vanessa snapped, stepping between them, her hand instinctively reaching for her flashlight as if she could blind the tension away.
"Back off. Now."
But Freddy’s gaze stayed locked on Monty, completely ignoring her. The silence in the room was suffocating, broken only by the high-RPM whine of Monty's internal cooling fans as he spiraled into panic.
Monty didn't just back up; he recoiled. The raw, venomous glare in Freddy’s eyes combined with the crushing weight of his own secret guilt was too much for his processors to handle. His heavy tail struck the doorframe with a dull, metallic thud as he scrambled backward into the brightly lit corridor of Rockstar Row.
"I... I can't," Monty choked out, his vocalizer glitching violently, cutting off the rest of his sentence in a burst of harsh static.
He turned and bolted down the hallway, his heavy claws clicking frantically against the polished floor, leaving Vanessa alone in the room to face the brunt of the Glamrock leader's fury. Behind him, he could hear Vanessa’s voice rise in an authoritative, protective shout, but the sound was quickly swallowed by the rushing whirr of his own internal cooling fans.
Monty didn't look where he was going. He just wanted to hide. He wanted the neon lights to turn off. He wanted to wake up back in the humid, low-stakes comfort of Gator Golf.
He rounded a sharp corner near the main courtyard and nearly collided with two figures walking in the opposite direction.
"Whoa! Watch the fur, pal!"
Roxy snarled, stepping back smoothly and tossing her silver mane out of her face. She had her arms crossed, her yellow eyes flashing with her usual sharp intensity. Beside her, Chica blinked, her beak parting in surprise as she clutched a half-eaten slice of leftover pizza to her chassis.
Both of them froze, their optic sensors widening as they took in the towering alligator standing before them.
Before today, they had barely acknowledged him. He was the loud, aggressive animatronic from downstairs who smashed golf clubs and stayed in the swamp. But now, he was standing in the middle of Rockstar Row. His green scales were freshly polished, his chest chassis was heaved in a simulated panic, and most striking of all... his hands were encased in brilliant, brand-new purple casings.
"Wait... you're the gator from the lower levels, right? Montgomery?" Chica asked, her voice dropping its usual bubbly tone, replaced by an awkward, cautious curiosity. She looked him up and down, her eyes lingering on his hands. "Are those... Bonnie's colors?"
"What are you even doing up here?" Roxy demanded, though her voice lacked its usual bite. She peered past him, toward the hallway leading to Freddy's room. "We heard yelling. We were going to check on Freddy. He’s been... malfunctioning all morning. System errors, isolation protocols... he won't even let us inside."
Monty stood rooted to the spot, his large frame trembling. He looked at Chica, then at Roxy. They didn't know the truth.
They didn't know that Bonnie's broken, shattered headpiece was resting under a tarp in Parts & Service. They thought Bonnie had just... left. And looking at Monty, they were putting the pieces together.
"I... I didn't ask for this," Monty rumbled, his voice dropping into a low, vulnerable rasp that completely contradicted his intimidating size. He hid his purple-gloved hands behind his back, his claws digging into his own tail. "I didn't want to take his place."
Chica's expression softened instantly, her robotic eyebrows knitting together in genuine empathy. She stepped closer, lowering her pizza. "Oh, sweetie... is management forcing you into the lineup? We got the system update, but we didn't think..."
"They're replacing him," Roxy muttered, the realization finally hitting her. She looked at Monty with a new expression—not anger, but a sudden, stark understanding of the impossible position he had been thrown into. "And Freddy saw you, didn't he?"
Before Monty could answer, the distant sound of Freddy's green room door sliding open echoed down the hall, followed by the heavy, rhythmic, and terrifyingly tense footsteps of the bear approaching.
Chica stepped a little closer, her heavy orange talons shifting on the polished floor. "We... we knew management was updating the roster," she admitted softly, her voice lacking its usual high-energy squeak. "But they didn't tell us it was you. We just thought... well, we didn't know what to think. I'm glad it's someone we have seen before, Monty. It's just... I wish it was under better circumstances."
"Yeah," Roxy chimed in, crossing her arms but letting her posture soften. She wasn't glaring anymore; her yellow eyes looked almost tired. "The corporate suits just push a button and expect us to rock out like nothing happened. It's garbage. But hey, you've got the look, and everyone knows you can shred. We're not mad at you, kid. It's just a mess."
Monty felt a tiny fraction of the tension leave his shoulders, but his chest chassis still heaved with simulated, shallow breaths. "Thanks," he rumbled, his vocalizer still rough. "I just... Freddy looks at me like I'm a monster."
Chica sighed, a sad, mechanical whirr coming from her chest. "You have to understand, Monty... Freddy is taking this really, really hard. Bonnie was... everything to him. They were..." She trailed off, glancing at Roxy.
They both assumed Monty already knew the depth of it. To the rest of the main band, it was common knowledge how close Freddy and Bonnie were—that they shared quiet hours in the green rooms after the Plex went dark, that their programming was linked in ways the standard safety protocols didn't even cover. They assumed the gator from downstairs had seen them together or heard the rumors.
But Monty hadn't.
He had been completely isolated down in the humid, neon-lit caverns of Gator Golf. He knew they were best friends, a legendary duo, but he didn't know they were lovers. And Chica and Roxy, thinking it would be insulting to explain something so obvious, left the deepest part of Freddy's grief unsaid.
"He's just broken right now," Roxy said, her eyes shifting back toward the hallway as the heavy, rhythmic thud of Freddy's footsteps grew closer. "He's lashing out because he doesn't know what else to do. Don't take it personally, Montgomery."
Don't take it personally.
The words echoed bitterly in Monty's processors. If only they knew. If only they knew that the blood-orange rust on his old claws hadn't been golf machinery grease.
The heavy thuds grew louder, and then Freddy rounded the corner.
He stopped dead in his tracks when he saw the three of them standing together. His blue optics flared, taking in Chica and Roxy flanking the towering alligator.
To Freddy's grieving, virus-strained mind, it looked like a betrayal. It looked like his bandmates were already accepting the intruder.
"Chica. Roxanne," Freddy’s voice rumbled, dangerously low and completely stripped of his usual warmth. He didn't look at them; his icy glare remained fixed entirely on Monty. "Step away from the swamp-dweller."
Vanessa came hurried around the corner a second later, looking exhausted and out of breath. "Freddy, stop! We have ten minutes until soundcheck, you need to calibrate your system and—"
"I am perfectly calibrated, Officer Vanessa," Freddy interrupted, taking a slow, menacing step forward. The gold plating on his shoulders gleamed under the neon lights, but his posture was rigid, predatory. He looked directly at Monty's purple-gloved hands again.
"I see you ran to hide behind my bandmates, gator. Did you tell them how eager you were to steal a dead man's slot? Did you tell them you came into my room to demand his memory?"
Monty backed up until his spine hit the wall of the corridor, his tail curling tightly around his leg. The girls looked between them, startled by the sheer venom in Freddy's voice.
"Freddy, he didn't demand anything!" Vanessa tried to intervene, but Freddy completely ignored her, stepping squarely into Monty's personal space.
The Freddy was shorter then him but right now Freddy was basically towering over him, radiating a cold, suffocating hostility.
"You do not belong up here," Freddy hissed, his vocalizer glitching with a dangerous spark of static.
"You are a cheap, corporate band-aid. A mindless reptile. You will never be part of this band. You will never be him."
Monty’s internal cooling fans spiked to their absolute maximum, a loud, panicked whine echoing in the tight hallway.
The guilt, the secrecy, the terrifying weight of Bonnie’s final words, and now this overwhelming hatred from a bear who was clearly missing a massive piece of his soul—it all collided inside Monty's neural network.
He couldn't run this time. He was trapped against the wall. His claws twitched, the purple gloves gleaming mockingly under the neon lights.
Before Freddy could take another predatory step into Monty’s personal space, a flash of vibrant green and red cut through the tense, neon-lit corridor.
Roxy shoved herself directly between the two heavy animatronics, her mechanical joints locking with an aggressive, metallic click.
She didn't flinch as she stared straight up into Freddy’s burning blue optic sensors. Her snarl was low, a jagged, buzzing sound that rattled through her chest chassis.
"That is enough, Freddy!" Roxy barked, her yellow eyes flashing with a fierce, protective heat. She planted her hands firmly against Freddy’s massive, gold-plated chest, physically halting his advance.
"Back the hell off! You’re completely out of line!"
"Roxanne," Freddy rumbled, his vocalizer dropping into a dangerously deep, distorted register.
A sharp spark of warning static clipped the edge of his words. "Step aside. This does not concern you. You do not understand what this... this pest is trying to do."
"No, you listen to me!" Roxy snapped back, refusing to give an inch of ground. Her silver mane whipped through the air as she gestured sharply behind her at Monty, who was still pressed flat against the wall, his massive tail trembling against the baseboards.
"Look at him! Does he look like he’s trying to steal anything from you? He’s practically short-circuiting! You’re supposed to be the leader of this band, the one who keeps it together, but right now you’re acting like a broken, glitching piece of scrap!"
On Freddy's other side, Chica stepped forward, her usual bubbly, frantic energy entirely replaced by a rare, dead-serious gravity.
She didn't use force like Roxy, but she placed a trembling, orange-taloned hand on Freddy’s forearm, her head tilting back in a desperate, pleading gesture.
"Freddy, please, look at what you’re doing," Chica begged, her voice cracking with a high-pitched, emotional whirr. "Montgomery didn't write the corporate memo. He didn't ask for the system update. Management handed him those gloves and told him he had to come up here, just like they told us we had to be ready for the morning soundcheck. He’s terrified!"
"He is wearing his colors," Freddy hissed, though his forward momentum finally ceased under the combined weight of Roxy’s resistance and Chica’s pleas.
His large, padded fists remained clenched so tightly that the fiberglass casing around his knuckles groaned under the pressure. His optics never left Monty, burning with a profound, agonized resentment.
"He walks into my room, looking at his things, acting as though he can simply step into a vacancy left by a legend. He is an insult to Bonnie's memory."
"He’s a part of this Plex, just like us!" Chica cried out, her eyes widening as she tried to shield Monty from Freddy’s icy glare.
"Bonnie wouldn't want this, Freddy! You know he wouldn't! He loved this theater, and he wouldn't want you destroying the band just because management is being cold!"
Monty stood paralyzed in the shadow of his new bandmates, his internal cooling fans whining at an agonizingly high RPM.
Hearing Chica use Bonnie’s name—hearing Freddy speak about the rabbit with such a fierce, protective, and deeply wounded possessiveness—made the alligator’s processors spin into a suffocating loop.
He still didn't understand the full depth of their bond, didn't know that Freddy was mourning a lover, but he could feel the sheer, crushing weight of a grief so massive it was tearing the Glamrock leader apart from the inside out.
And Monty was the one who had caused it. Every insult Freddy hurled at him—swamp-dweller, imposter, mindless reptile—felt entirely justified.
He wanted to confess.
He wanted to scream the truth, to tell them about the glitching code in the dark, the desperate struggle on the catwalks, and the way Bonnie’s purple hand had felt as it lost power against his arm.
But the words wouldn't come.
His vocalizer remained tightly knotted, emitting nothing but a low, pathetic click of exhaust.
Vanessa stepped up beside Chica, her hand firmly on her security belt, her face pale but resolute. "Freddy, the girls are right, and you need to stand down immediately. If your internal stress metrics don't stabilize in the next thirty seconds, I am pulling the manual override and putting you into emergency lockdown. We have a crowd forming outside the main gates. Do you want the kids to see you like this?"
The mention of the children seemed to trigger a core programming protocol deep within Freddy’s system, forcing a hard re-calibration.
His massive shoulders slumped a fraction of an inch. The dangerous, buzzing static in his chest slowly began to quiet down, replaced by a low, hollow hum.
He didn't apologize. He didn't look at Chica or Roxy.
Slowly, Freddy pulled his arm out of Chica’s grasp and stepped back, his eyes remaining locked on Monty one last time, filled with a cold, unyielding promise of isolation.
"The soundcheck begins in five minutes," Freddy said, his voice flat, emotionless, and entirely dead. "I will be on stage. Do not speak to me, gator. Do not look at me. You play your notes, and you stay out of my sight."
With a heavy, mechanical turn, Freddy walked away, his boots echoing down the corridor like a funeral march as he headed toward the main stage elevator.
The silence he left behind was thick and heavy. Roxy let out a sharp, venting hiss of air, her shoulders dropping as she turned around to look at Monty.
Chica immediately moved to the alligator’s side, her hands hovering anxiously near his trembling, purple-gloved wrists.
"Are you okay?" Chica asked softly, her optic sensors full of worry. "We're so sorry, Montgomery. He's... he's never been like this before. Never."
Monty slowly lowered his head, his heavy snout pointing toward the polished floor, completely unable to meet their supportive gazes. "Yeah," he whispered, his vocalizer rough and scraping. "Yeah. I'm... I'm fine."
The transition from the tense, neon-lit corridors of Rockstar Row to the grand atrium of the Mega Pizzaplex was a blur of mechanical clicks and heavy footsteps. Monty walked in the center of the trio, his towering frame uncharacteristically hunched, flanked by Chica and Roxy like a high-security escort.
When they stepped onto the massive, multi-tiered stage, the atmosphere shifted drastically. The giant spotlight beams were already cutting through the dim, cavernous arena, painting the empty rows of audience barriers in sharp streaks of pink, blue, and gold.
And there, right in the center of the main stage, stood Freddy.
The transformation was chilling. The trembling, rage-filled monster from the green room was entirely gone, overridden by the flawless, smiling veneer of the Glamrock leader. He tapped his microphone with a heavy, padded thumb, a rich, booming chuckle echoing through the stadium-grade speakers.
"Testing, testing. Audio levels appear to be within optimal parameters for the morning crowd," Freddy said into the mic, his tone warm, bright, and completely devoid of the venom he had spewed just minutes prior. He didn't even look back as the rest of the band filled in around him. He simply stepped up to his mark, completely freezing Monty out of his reality.
Before Monty could even figure out where to stand, Vanessa appeared from the wings of the stage. She was carrying a guitar case—but it wasn't the sleek, custom-molded one from the back of Bonnie Bowl.
"Monty," Vanessa called out in a low whisper, waving him over to the shadow of the massive speaker stacks.
Monty dragged his heavy tail over, his red optics fixed on the case. Vanessa popped the latches with a sharp clack and lifted the instrument. It was a bass, unmistakably Bonnie's signature style, but the paint was slightly faded around the edges, and a few scuffs marred the gloss of the wood.
"It's one of his older touring models from the warehouse," Vanessa explained quietly, her eyes darting over to Freddy's rigid back. "Management wanted you to have the current one, but... given how close Freddy is to a total system error today, I made an executive call. We're not touching the main gear in the green room yet. Take this one. It'll pass the corporate visual check, and it won't push Freddy over the edge."
Monty reached out, his new purple-gloved hands gripping the neck of the bass. The weight of it hit his programming instantly, triggering the freshly installed motor-function maps. His fingers instinctively found the frets. It felt perfectly balanced, a beautiful piece of machinery—and it felt like a lead weight dragging him straight into the dirt.
Take the bass, Bonnie's dying voice whispered in his audio buffers. Don't let Freddy see you cry.
"Thanks, Ness," Monty rumbled, his vocalizer dropping into a low, muffled rasp so the microphones wouldn't pick it up.
"Just get through the set list, big guy," Vanessa said, giving his arm a brief, supportive squeeze before stepping back into the wings. "You've got this."
Monty walked out onto his designated platform to the left of the drums, his claws tightly gripping the scuffed neck of the vintage bass.
Chica gave him a encouraging nod from across the stage, throwing in a quick, upbeat riff on her guitar to break the tension, while Roxy gave a sharp, definitive thud on her drum kit to signal she was ready.
Freddy finally turned around, his wide, painted smile firmly in place for the invisible audience. His bright blue eyes swept over Chica, over Roxy, and finally landed on Monty.
For a split second, Freddy's gaze dropped to the vintage bass in Monty's hands. He recognized it instantly—the backup Bonnie had used during the winter anniversary shows.
The smile on Freddy's face didn't falter, but Monty saw the subtle, dangerous flicker in his optic sensors. It was a look of pure, icy disdain. You're playing a ghost's instrument, gator.
Freddy turned back to the front, raising his hand to the tech booth above.
"Alright, gang!" Freddy’s voice boomed cheerfully, the perfect corporate rockstar. "Let us welcome the morning with our new standard arrangement. From the top, on three!"