Mike's New Ghostly Family is a Web Serial Novel based on Five Nights at Freddy's written by Archcommander-Tenebros
. The fanfic was posted on Fanfiction.net. Its first chapter was posted on the December 14, 2017.
After the events of the Fazbear Tragedy, the spirits of the dead children are finally able to move on to the afterlife. However due to the deaths of many a night guard they caused in the time they possessed the animatronics they are denied entrance to Heaven until they are able to atone for their sins by improving the quality of life for one of the night guards who survived their attacks. Sensing the presence of the Marionette at his house, the ghosts choose Mike Schmidt (the protagonist from the first game).
Currently the fic is 199 chapters longnote , with chapters typically releasing between once a week to once a fortnight on average.
Please note that plot ideas and theories regarding the original FNaF continuity will be unmarked spoilers. It is HIGHLY recommended that you familiarize yourself with the plot of FNaF 1-FNaF 6 (and the theories surrounding the game continuity) before proceeding. Eventually the story incorporates Ultimate Custom Night, Help Wanted and Special Delivery as well.
Read the first chapter here.
Mike's New Ghostly Family contains the following tropes:
- 20 Minutes into the Future: The fanfic was first written in late 2017, but its events start out one year after the events of Freddy Fazbear's Pizzeria Simulator, which was stated to happen somewhere during or after 2023 (Chapter 43 lists 2024 as the year when events of the game took place). For the most part, the technology level didn't advance too much and is closer to present day technology, with majority of unrealistically advanced technology being made in The '80s. The only explicitly futuristic technology featured in this fic are Helpy being a self-aware self-learning A.I. (though self-aware A.I.s in the fanfic's universe were a thing ever since The '80s, CBEAR animatronics being the prime example) and Eisensteel's in-development secret project of advanced robots that would be able to smell, taste and maybe even outright eat and digest food.
- Adaptational Badass: In the games Mike was unable to fight back against the animatronics. Here he battles William Afton inside his own mind and wins while maintaining the upper hand for the entire fight. And then there's what happens after that...
- The Nightmare animatronics in the original FNAF series were either nightmares, hallucinations or animatronics created by William Afton, depending on the theory you believe in. Here, they're demons from Hell, who are merely taking on the forms of ghoulish, monstrous animatronics for their own amusement. Nightmare in particular borders on being a full-blown Eldritch Abomination.
- Adaptational Deviation: The arc for the fic's take on Five Nights at Freddy's AR: Special Delivery events is drastically altered from canon. In the original game, Fazbear Entertainment were selling and delivering animatronics to perform for people, only for them to become the same old Hostile Animatronics and attack everyone. In the fanfic, however, the Schmidt family works hard to avert such a fate and ensure that Fazbear Entertainment's "Fazbear Funtime Service" program won't hurt anyone.
- Adaptational Heroism: Elizabeth Afton in the original continuity was a Daddy's Little Villain who wanted to follow in William Afton's footsteps as a serial killer. Here, she (as Liz) is a much more noble and heroic character who has shifted her devotion over to Mike. Justified in that Circus Baby's malevolent programming corrupted Liz's soul, and she was freed from that corruption with the destruction of Scrap Baby in FNaF 6.
- A Downplayed case with Charlie. While she was never a truly villainous character even in the original continuity, here she realized that they were killing innocents soon after FNaF 2, and actually tried to stop the other ghost kids from murdering night guards in the 1993 restaurant (hence why the Marionette never attacks the player during FNaF 1 despite being present during the events of that game). She unfortunately didn't succeed, but at least she tried.
- Adaptational Intelligence: The Nightmare animatronics in the original canon were purely physical threats, and only developed speaking lines in the Ultimate Custom Night. Here, they're much more intelligent, especially Nightmare, and are masters of psychological torture just as much as they are at physical torture.
- Adaptational Species Change: The Nightmares. See the Adaptational Badass entry for more details.
- Adaptational Villainy: William Afton somehow manages to be even worse here than he does in canon. Going as far as cutting his child off life support because he didn't want to deal with a broken shell of a son. It's also made abundantly clear that he never genuinely loved Liz, and merely saw her as a tool to carry out his murderous legacy.
- Affably Evil: Nightmarionne is a genuinely friendly, cheerful, and humorous guy who enjoys games. He's also the second most powerful Nightmare, tied with Nightmare Fredbear, and enjoys torturing and brutally mutilating damned souls just like the rest of them.
- Nightmare himself veers more into this category after Mike manages to win his respect, though he is still much more serious and less genial than his brother.
- Affectionate Parody: "One Night at Mike's," a game that the Schmidt family play where the ghosts possess the Rockstar animatronics and try to "attack" their father in the living room, just like they did back when Mike was the night guard. The game itself combines elements of FNaF 1, FNaF 2, and even Ultimate Custom Night. Needless to say, nobody's in any danger from playing this game, although it can still certainly get creepy at times.
- The Atoner: The ghost kids are still in the mortal plane to atone for killing the night guards they thought murdered them. Liz stands out as she feels incredibly guilty and horrible about serving William Afton as Scrap Baby back when she was still evil.
- Berserk Button: Anything involving William Afton is bound to piss off the family, for obvious reasons. Recently, with Help Wanted incorporated into the storyline, Fazbear Entertainment has become a more prominent one as well.
- Beware the Nice Ones: Mike is typically a friendly and amicable person, who will do anything for his ghost kids. However you don't want to piss him off. William learns this the hard way in chapters 77 through 82, especially the last two.
- Beyond Redemption: Played with, depending on the character in question:
- Big Good: Mike, natch.
- Bittersweet Ending: The Madman's Legacy arc ends with Circus Baby's Entertainment and Rentals (Except Bonnet) destroyed and any remnant gone with it but with The Marionette irreparably damaged due to damage sustained earlier in the chapter.
- Black Comedy: The Nightmares are a goldmine of this...when they're not being played seriously, that is.
- Butt-Monkey:
- If something comedically horrible is happening to anyone out of the cast, it's likely to be Fritz.
- The torture that William Afton goes through at the hands of the Nightmares is played for laughs from time to time, an example being when he was forced to listen to "Friday" on loop.
- Cerebus Rollercoaster: The story loops back-and-forth between being a lighthearted fluff story about the ghost children reliving their lost childhoods and a dark and serious story involving the horrors of Fazbear's franchise and ghost children's tragic pasts.
- Cerebus Retcon: For his entire life, Michael Afton believed that after he got his little brother Evan's head crushed in Fredbear's mouth, the poor boy died due to the aftermath of the prank gone wrong, passing away in his hospital bed due to blood loss and the sheer damage inflicted on his brain. Michael's entire life afterwards was spent moving forward in a sense of shame and regret, and a desire to atone for what he did to make up for accidentally killing Evan. As it turns out, what actually happened was that Evan, despite his trauma, could've survived and lived a somewhat-fulfilling life even with his wounds if he was sufficiently treated, as confirmed by one of his doctors. The reason Evan didn't survive? Well, William Afton had known that Evan was the only witness of Elizabeth's death via Circus Baby's entrapment, meaning Evan could've told people about William's plans...and William also simply did not to waste time raising a disabled child, so he found it easier to convince Evan's doctor to allow him to unplug Evan's life support. Michael, nor Elizabeth, never found out about this from the moment it first happened when he was around 13 years old, to the day he died for the final time within Henry's trap pizzeria, which was decades later. He was only ever told the truth from Evan himself, when the two of them returned from their eternal rest in Heaven to fight against William's assault on the Schmidt family.
- Cold-Blooded Torture: William suffers this at the hands of the Nightmare Animatronics. He intended to get revenge on Mike the same way in chapters 74 through 80. Someone got brutally tortured all right, and it wasn't Mike.
- Dark and Troubled Past: Aside from the obvious regarding the ghost kids, Mike did not have a happy childhood or teenage years. It's telling that he considers his night shift at the 1993 Freddy's location to be the least shitty part of his childhood.
- Dark Is Evil: The Nightmares, especially Nightmare himself. William Afton, during his escape from Hell and transformation into Nightmare Springtrap, also qualifies.
- Dark Is Not Evil: While all the ghost kids could arguably qualify for this trope, the biggest examples outside of the Schmidts are Shadow Bonnie and Shadow Freddy. The latter of whom is also The Bite Victim Child from FNaF 4.
- Deadpan Snarker: Mike in spades, though everyone joins in at some point or another.
- Deal with the Devil: Nightmare made one with William Afton early in the fic, as every damned soul is allowed to make a wager with their demonic tormentor. If the damned soul wins, they can enjoy a thousand years free of torture. If they lose, the limitations placed on their torments by Heaven are removed, and the demons can torture their victim in any way they want without restriction for a thousand years instead. William bet that if Nightmare revealed the dark truths of the past regarding Mike and the ghost kids, they would turn on each other and break their family apart. Nightmare, on the other hand, believed that they would stand strong and loyal to each other even after those truths were revealed, and he ultimately wins the wager. An unusual example in that the devil winning the deal actually turns out to be a good thing, at least for the family.
- Decomposite Character: The game canon heavily implies that Mike Schmidt and Michael Afton are the same person in a Two Aliases, One Character manner. Here, Mike Schmidt and Michael Afton are two separate characters (though the latter did accidentally adopt the former's name as an alias).
- Dirty Coward: When Nightmare rips into William as part of his "The Reason You Suck" Speech this is one of the many things he calls him out on, deriding the fact that he only went after children too young or weak to defend themselves, and continued to engage in such behaviour even after he Came Back Stronger than a human as Springtrap.
- Enemy Mine: Nightmare and Mike form this when William escapes from hell. Over time, this relationship upgrades into Friendly Enemy territory, as despite their fundamentally opposite moralities they get along with each other surprisingly well and have no problems cooperating with each other when greater threats arise.
- Even Evil Has Standards:
- Nightmare utterly despises William Afton for how he abused and manipulated his own family for his own selfish and murderous desires. Tellingly, the demon lord isn't being a Hypocrite in this regard, as he treats his fellow Nightmares remarkably well for a demon lord and his "The Reason You Suck" Speech even implies he holds some level of familial feeling toward them.
- This is taken to an unbelievably serious level when it's very strongly implied by both Mike and Nightmare that Lucifer considers William to be absolute filth, and is essentially confirmed when he has William's Heaven—granted protective mandates eternally removed following his failed escape from Hell.
- Extremely Protective Child: Despite the fact that Mike himself is a Badass Normal, the ghost children will go through any lengths to keep him safe and will react very poorly to any real or perceived threats towards him and his safety. Whenever they end up in a dangerous situation, they will form the primary lines of defense between that danger and Mike.
- Faux Affably Evil: Nightmare speaks in a polite and almost friendly, if somewhat sarcastic tone that does nothing to hide his sheer malice and contempt for those around him. However, he shifts more towards Affably Evil towards Mike (and to a lesser degree, his family) after the man manages to win his respect.
- William Afton also acts like this when confronting Mike's family, and his malicious intentions are even more obvious than Nightmare's.
- Fish out of Temporal Water: Having been trapped in animatronic bodies and left to suffer in the dark for decades, they have missed out on more than forty years of technological and societal advancements, to the point that things like video games, laptops, and cell phones that we take care for granted are completely alien to them. Mike spends a good deal of time and money bringing them up to speed.
- Forced Euthanasia: It is eventually revealed during the "William Afton Returns" arc that the true reason why Evan Afton, a.k.a. the Bite of '83 victim died was not due to passing away from his cranial injuries sustained from Michael shoving him into Fredbear's jaws, but because his father, William Afton, had his life support unplugged. He presents his case as a Mercy Kill, despite the doctors stating that he could've survived were his injury treated sufficiently, claiming that he doesn't want to leave him broken for the rest of his life. In truth, however, William simply didn't want to waste his time raising a disabled child, and wants to keep Evan silent about Elizabeth's death at Circus Baby's hands. This act cements the ire he got from Shadow Freddy, a.k.a. Evan Afton's ghost, who is furious that his father would kill him for such petty reasons.
- God Is Good:
- While He is never directly seen, He is portrayed as an ultimately benevolent force who is willing to show mercy when possible and reward individuals like Mike for their virtuous actions, even if He works In Mysterious Ways. There's also the "Loophole Abuse" example described below, in which God found Himself in a situation that had never occurred before and opted to choose the more merciful option.
- His benevolent nature gets discussed in Part 6 of "Curse of Dreadbear" arc, where Nightmare Foxy (as Grimm Foxy) asks Mike Schmidt about why he believes in benevolent God who would allow horrible evil, including his own suffering, to happen on Earth. Though Mike was caught off-guard by the question, he actually managed to reach the conclusion that God can't contradict the rules He established on the world He made; ergo, He can't make the world without evil and suffering if He allowed free will to exist. He also explained that evil has to exist so that good may have a meaning and make great difference in the world, which would show that good people have proven that they earned the right to enter Heaven. This, as well as the fact that God gave the ghost children a second chance on Earth, was listed as a proof that God exists and that He is good.
- Go-Karting with Bowser: There's all the times that Nightmarionne joins the Schmidt family for gaming sessions in Mike's mind. And besides that, one gaming-centric chapter has Mike and the kids play a round of Team Fortress 2, playing alongside a mysterious player who was using a deliberately bad setup for the memes and yet somehow achieving the highest kill count in the entire game. Unknown to them, Nightmare was having a bit of fun demolishing the server with that very setup.
- Good Parents: Mike is obviously this.
- Greater-Scope Paragon: Henry Emily is consistently regarded by Mike, Charlie, and the murdered children as the man who ended the nightmare of Freddy Fazbear's Pizza, because he solely orchestrated the final trap that captured and killed William for the final time and finally brought him all the way down to Hell when everything else failed. He stood as William's greatest enemy to the very end, chasing him down for thirty years to make him pay for the crimes he committed against both him and his victims, refusing to falter to his grief for the sake of setting the spirits free. Following the success of his plan, finally having taken Afton down—at the cost of his life—the Missing Children were free to start a new life with Charlotte and Mike, and they all are eternally grateful for Henry's efforts and always address him with a very high amount of respect.
- Greater-Scope Villain: For obvious reasons, William Afton. The former best-friend of Henry turned serial killer amongst the Fazbear pizzeria chain, he is directly responsible the adopted children being in the state they are in, and Mike spends the entire fic working himself to the bone to give back to the ghosts everything William stole from them. He may be long dead, his vile soul trapped forever in Hell, but the shadow his deeds cast remains impossible to ignore. Through the remnants of the Fazbear Inc.'s work, to all his twisted creations, and to even the ghosts of his victims themselves, nearly every single problem/conflict that the Schmidt family must overcome can be traced right back to William.
- Happily Adopted: Goes without saying. Also applies to Mike himself, thanks to Oskar.
- Heel–Face Turn: The murdered ghost children are all examples of this, with Liz being the most prominent example. Charlie actually had hers earlier than the rest of the ghosts.
- Bonnet does this near the end of the Madman's Legacy.
- His Own Worst Enemy: As more and more characters get introduced, this trope becomes a startlingly common theme for the cast, both within the main group and beyond:
- Humans Are the Real Monsters: William Afton(of course) and Fazbear Inc. commit themselves to unambiguously criminal activities at best and mass sociopathic apathy towards the common public at worst in order to stay afloat, with countless innocent men, women, and especially children being treated as highly expendable liabilities to be used by both parties for personal, material gain, until their practices end up killing or irreparably maiming their own audience, to which both William and Fazbear, Inc. will always respond by carelessly sweeping the incident and whatever tragedy their victims felt under the rug. Afton does still hold a significant edge over the company though, as he caused the murders that kickstarted Fazbear's fall to it's unbelievable corruption, but the corporation still made the decision to deny whatever horrors were going on behind closed doors to the people of Hurricane, so they are not blameless. The ghosts of the Purple Guy's mass murders and Fazbear Entertainment's greed holding seething grudges against both parties is obvious, but then when you have the Nightmares, who consist of some Hell's most evil demons who enact no-holds-barred MIND RAPE on their damned souls without ever giving those souls a chance to even breathe, making sure to voice their own disdain(Nightmare, their leader, shows a noticeably deep—seated level of fouled rage towards the two parties, special mention going to William), it should really flash some red flags on just how fucked up William Afton and these people are.
- I Am a Monster: Liz feels this way about herself at first, given that she was the only animatronic who was actively evil as Scrap Baby. It takes multiple efforts from Mike, Charlie, and Gabe to help her overcome this.
- Intergenerational Friendship: The ghost kids have this both with the Marshall kids (who were born several decades after them even though they are about the same physical age as the older ghost kids) and Melody Park (an older woman who is a close longtime friend of Mike's.)
- Kicked Out of Heaven: Due to the fact that they killed many night guards during their stunts as haunted animatronics, the ghost children were cast out of Heaven, and sent back down to Earth as ghosts and are stuck in the mortal plan, until they atone for their murders by improving the life quality of one of the night guards that survived their attacks (i.e. Mike Schmidt).
- Knight of Cerebus: Zigzagged with the Nightmare animatronics. They aren't always played seriously, but when they are they herald the darkest parts and plotlines of the entire fic, even if they aren't the direct cause.
- Loophole Abuse: The primary reason why the ghost children weren't condemned to eternal suffering in Hell is because God acknowledged that the ghost children never committed any of the sins when they were alive; their killings of innocent nightguards happened due to them being trapped in animatronic bodies with Remnant keeping them imprisoned and preventing them from moving on, something that never happened before. Because of this, God chose to be more lenient with His rules and decided to show the ghost children mercy by returning them back to Earth to have them atone for their sins before they'll be able to properly pass on to Heaven.
- Lovecraft Lite: The misplaced spectres of the six murdered kids are only barely scratching the surface of the paranormal world that the tragedy of Freddy Fazbear's Pizzeria spawned. Old Man Consequences is a seemingly all-powerful, nigh-omniscient eldritch entity who watches over the world from the astral plane bordering between Heaven and Hell, spending his time taking a particularly close eye on those related to the dark history of Freddy's both by himself, and his two sentinels, Shadow Bonnie and Shadow Freddy, each of whom are far beyond humanity or anything the ghost children are capable of in their own right. Shadow Bonnie is a living, walking mass of pure shadow who uses mind manipulation powers to watch over the secrets of the dead, and Shadow Freddy is the ascended heroic spirit of Evan Afton, the Bite Victim of 1983, who periodically leaves his eternal rest in Heaven to watch over his loved ones remaining on Earth. In fact, it is stated multiple times that Heaven's angels, and even God Himself is keeping tabs on the lost kids and how Mike is raising them, ready to test their bonds and trust in each other whenever the moment arrives. And all the way on the opposite end of the spectrum, there's the Nightmares, a family of dream demons who wield great enough unholy power to rule undisputed over Hell's darkest pits, and are unknowable by mortals in nature, only taking the forms of the Nightmare Animatronics from FNAF 4 as a reflection of William Afton's corruption of the Fazbear franchise, and as a mockery to their enemies. Fortunately or unfortunately, depending on the situation, they are also very interested in the Schmidt family and even play games with them from time to time.
- Mass "Oh, Crap!": Pretty much EVERYTIME Nightmare arrives or makes his presence known in a scene, with every single character, be them members of the Schmidt family or otherwise, reacting to Nightmare's appearances with extreme wariness at best, or collective and unambiguous fear, despair and horror at worst.This is justified due to him being an arch-demonic spiritual tormentor who hails from the lowest circles of Hell, who is known for spending his immortal existence tearing into and destroying the hope of all damned souls who fall into his grasp using his god-like powers. The only exceptions to this rule are the Nightmares, who are his family and beloved subordinates.
- Another noteworthy case of this is when Mike, after being warned about the event in question and it's consequences in a dream by Nightmare, is forced to sit down his children down in a meeting, and tell them, as calmly as he can, that William Afton has returned from Hell, taken the form of a faux demon, and Mike himself is now at the top of the Purple Guy's hitlist. The Missing Children's reaction? Well, to say that they were all absolutely mortified would honestly be redundant. Hell, even Mike was spooked to his core, and for damn good reason.
- Mundane Utility: The ghosts can semi-possess their father so that they can taste food he eats, something that is normally unavailable to them since they're ghosts. This ability is put to full use whenever the family goes out on vacations and/or eats at fancy restaurants.
- My Greatest Second Chance: The ghost kids were sent to Mike's house not only for a second chance at the lives they never had as children before they were brutally murdered by William Afton, but also to redeem themselves for their own bloody crimes that they committed in their misguided, blind quest for revenge against both Mike and the rest of the night guards who worked at the Fazbear pizzerias they haunted, all of whom they mistook for the Purple Man. As a result, the ghost kids themselves are imbued with a sense of loyalty inspired by remorse powered by the debt they all owe to Mike throughout their time together as a found family, and they all willingly and fearlessly jump at the chance to atone for their past sins whenever the opportunity presents itself.
- Oh, Crap!: Their reaction to the discovery that yet another incarnation of Fazbear Entertainment has opened and is attempting to rise again, starting with the "Help Wanted" VR game. Mike in particular does not take this well.
- Only Sane Man: Mike, usually. Being the foster father of a group of wily, rambunctious, and easily excitable lost souls of dead children, and being the only member of the family who is an ordinary human, this is a given. The older siblings tend to fall into this category as well in comparison to their younger ones, especially Charlie.
- Our Demons Are Different: The Nightmares. They are a clan self-professed dream demons who delight in torturing their victims by attacking them with horrifying nightmares and magical recreations of their victims' greatest sins and regrets, making them experts at extremely sadistic mind-screwing. They are also special amongst the rest of the Inferno's monsters because they do genuinely care for and look out for each other, somewhat similarly to the bonds Mike and the Missing Children share.
- Quirky Household: The Schmidt family are an adoptive family of eccentric, playful ghost children, each with their own quirky personality, under the care of dry-witted and sarcastic ex-nightguard of Freddy's who is not without his own childlike interests. Hijinks are bound to ensue, and they most certainly do.
- Recursive Canon: Though the fic takes place in the Five Nights at Freddy's universe, the actual Five Nights at Freddy's games still exist in-universe as indie video games developed by Scott Cawthon, though only the original three games were made. Justified, because Charlie (as the Marionette) and Mike Schmidt directly told Scott about the events of FNaF series and requested him to tell the tale of Fazbear's tragedy and the ghost children's fate through the fictional medium.
- Secret-Keeper: The Marshalls, Melody, and Nelson are all aware of the ghost kids' presence in Mike's house and are all willing to keep their existence a secret.
- Secretly Wealthy: Mike, as an explanation for casually owning a mansion filled with materialist items and activities, despite having been retired for years by the beginning of the fic. Towards the end of his stint as the Night Guard at Freddy's, he received a lottery ticket that would win him $1000 every day for the rest of his life from a close friend and admirer of his adopted father's, which catapulted him out of poverty and turned his life around. He has gathered enough money throughout his life to become a millionaire, but apart from having a small mansion for a house, he has mostly lived a normal, down-to-earth lifestyle that includes going to college and working as a robotics engineer for years, with only a few of his closest friends aware of his affluent status. In the present day, he mostly uses his wealth to get the ghost kids gifts and take them on vacations, which are not restricted at all by money thanks to his wealth.
- Sir Swears-a-Lot: Mike practically lives this trope, and has passed that influence down to his kids. Old Man Consequences amusingly notes that the birth parents of the ghost children (who have long since passed away) are all grateful and honored that Mike is the adoptive father of their children...except for his cursing.
- Slice of Life: An overarching theme of the fic. Most of the chapters that don't have a specific plot arc (and quite a few that do) feature the family going about their daily lives and enjoying what life has to offer them.
- Stuff Blowing Up: The Schmidt family decides to infiltrate CBEAR in the dead of night and set the place on fire to destroy any evil animatronics or dangerous secrets that William Afton discovered, which ultimately leads to the entire place exploding and being destroyed forever.
- Those Two Guys: The Marshall siblings, Alex and Meghan, are rarely seen apart in this fanfiction.
- That Man Is Dead: Liz takes on her new name to distance herself both from her monster of a father and her own evil past as Scrap Baby. Needless to say, she is much happier as Liz than she ever was following her birth father.
- "The Reason You Suck" Speech: After the wager between Nightmare and William Afton of breaking Mike's family ended with nightmare coming out victorious and the children's bonds strenghtening instead, Nightmare rips a speech towards William after the latter says both of them are evil monsters.Nightmare: YOU NEVER SPECIFIED HOW I WOULD CARRY OUT MY ASSAULT, ONLY THAT I DO IT AT ALL. YOU LEFT THE DETAILS IN THE HANDS OF A DEMON, AND YOU ACT SURPRISED WHEN THINGS DON'T GO YOUR WAY? YOU ARE A FOOL.
William Afton: Why? Why wouldn't you try your hardest to break them apart? We're both evil monsters! We should be working together!
Nightmare: DID YOU HONESTLY THINK THAT JUST BECAUSE I HAD MADE A DEAL WITH YOU, OUR AGREEMENT SUDDENLY MADE US INTO ALLIES? OR PERHAPS, EVEN FRIENDS? YOU HAVE NO IDEA JUST HOW MUCH I DESPISE YOU, WILLIAM AFTON. YOU ARE TRULY A MAN IN LOVE WITH VIOLENCE. PERHAPS, IF YOU HAD EARNED YOUR KILLS IN BATTLE, THAT WOULD EARN MY RESPECT. BUT, NO. YOU ONLY EVER TRIED TO SHED BLOOD WHEN YOU WERE UP AGAINST WEAK LITTLE CHILDREN WITH NO WAY TO FIGHT BACK, OR IN THE BODY OF ANIMATRONIC WITH METAL AND STEEL TO EMPOWER YOU. AND EVEN THEN, YOU ACCOMPLISHED NOTHING. YOUR ENTIRE LEGACY BURNED TO ASH AND OBLIVION WITH THE TRAP THAT YOU WANDERED INTO LIKE AN IMBECILE. THE ONLY THING YOUR MURDERS ARE A TESTAMENT TO IS YOUR OWN COWARDICE. AND I HAVE NO RESPECT FOR COWARDS. BUT THAT ISN'T THE ONLY REASON WHY I DESPISE YOUR EXISTENCE, WILLIAM AFTON. IT IS NOT EVEN THE MAIN REASON. I DO NOT PERSONALLY CARE HOW MANY PEOPLE YOU TRY TO KILL. BUT YOUR CRIMES RUN DEEPER THAN SIMPLE VIOLENCE, DON'T THEY? I KNOW WHAT YOU DID TO YOUR OWN CHILDREN, HOW YOU TRIED TO MANIPULATE THEM INTO DOING YOUR WILL. I KNOW HOW YOU SENT YOUR SON MICHAEL TO DIE IN YOUR PLACE AT THE DEATH TRAP YOU DISGUISED AS A PIZZERIA. AND I KNOW HOW YOU TRIED TO CORRUPT YOUR DAUGHTER ELIZABETH AND TURN HER INTO A MONSTER AND A MURDERER JUST LIKE YOU. MAYBE YOU MIGHT HAVE CARED FOR YOUR CHILDREN AT ONE POINT. I DO NOT KNOW, AND I DO NOT CARE. BECAUSE IN THE LAST MOMENTS OF YOUR EXISTENCE, YOU NEVER SAW EITHER OF THEM AS ANYTHING MORE THAN TOOLS TO CARRY OUT YOUR PERVERTED WILL, DIDN'T YOU? I HAVE PLEDGED MYSELF TO EVIL FOR OVER A THOUSAND YEARS, AND WILL CONTINUE TO DO SO UNTIL THE END OF TIME. THE MORALS AND PRINCIPLES I POSSESS ARE FEW AND FAR BETWEEN. BUT NO MATTER HOW DEPRAVED I MAY BECOME, AT LEAST I UNDERSTAND WHAT IT MEANS TO BE PART OF A FAMILY! - Vacation Episode: The Schmidt family sometimes goes off on vacations to famous places, something they can do easily thanks to their abundance of free time and Mike's wealth. In a twist, since the whole point of these vacations is to allow the ghostly children to explore unique, beautiful, or exciting places of the world that they never had a chance to visit thanks to their enslavement in the animatronics, these vacation episodes tend to encompass some of the longer arcs, often spanning multiple (3-6) chapters.
- Unobtainium: Remnant, the substance that kept the ghost children trapped inside the animatronics in the first place and allowed Michael Afton to live on as a zombie, is interpreted in the fanfic as a liquid metal composition that was manufactured by Emily Robotics and Afton Robotics before its discontinuation. Its official purpose was to stabilize the animatronics' structure and prevent them from falling apart, but it turned out to possess an unusual property of being capable of trapping a soul inside itself when accumulated in large quantities, but its effects can be nullified by very high temperatures. By the time events of the fanfic take place, most of the Remnant was destroyed in the fire of Henry's trap pizzeria, with the last remains of it being present in Circus Baby's Entertainment and Rental, until Mike Schmidt and his ghost children burned down the place to ensure that no one would be able to use Remnant for their sick purposes, and nowadays no one knows to recreate the substance. William Afton found out about the metal's properties when Elizabeth was killed by Circus Baby, a Remnant-coated killer animatronic, and ended up getting her soul trapped in the machine, which led to him trying to figure out how to achieve immortality through Remnant after he tested his hypothesis by murdering the children that would become ghosts in the present day.
- Wham Line: Quite a few, with the most prominent examples being:
- In Chapter 4, Mike is warned by Mary(AKA The Puppet, AKA Charlotte Emily) that they have a visitor, another spirit arriving at their home, but when Mike asks if she can meet the rest of the family, Mary immediately makes it painfully clear that this is not just any spirit:
Mike: Should we bring her in to meet with the rest of the family?
Mary: Not yet! (Mike flinches out of shock at her words, which Mary notices) I'm sorry. But the others must not know about her yet. They have not detected her yet, for their senses are less keen than mine.
Mike: Why? What's wrong with this particular ghost child?
Mary: ...Do you remember what I told you about the end of the Fazbear franchise?
Mike: As if I could ever forget something like that.
Mary: Then you must remember what I told you about the child who was corrupted into evil, through several tragic circumstances beyond her control.
Mike: I remember...it was that bastard William Afton's daughter... (The realization hits, and his eyes appropriately widen in shock) Wait, you can't be saying...!- The next chapter, going into the final part of her backstory speech, Elizabeth goes into detail about what happened to her following her ejection from Ennard, and ends up giving away the precise event that cemented her fall to the dark side, and subsequent rebirth as Scrap Baby:
Elizabeth: I fled back to the place that, despite being a barren prison, had been the closest thing to a home I had since my death. I thought that I could repair myself slowly, and maybe regain my strength. But when I arrived there, there was someone waiting for me.
Mike and Mary, after simultaneously realizing exactly who she's talking about and what is about to happen: Springtrap.- And after that, Fritz, after seeing how skeptical Gabe and Jeremy are about trusting Elizabeth when she introduces herself for the first time, decides to side with Elizabeth when he is asked for his opinion on the matter. When his confused adopted brothers and sisters ask why, Fritz's argument comes out in a form that catches EVERYONE, including Mike and Mary, off guard:
Fritz: I trust her. Completely.
(The ghost children, Elizabeth, Mike and Mary fall silent with surprise, until Jeremy curiously speaks up.)
Jeremy: Why?
Fritz: .....For starters, you guys are forgetting something. If she really WAS evil and lying to us, she wouldn't be here. She'd be downstairs, enjoying the eternal barbecue with her dear old dad as part of a 2-course meal for whatever the literal Hell is down there.- In Chapter 17, Cassidy, after seeing her brothers have trouble playing Spyro, goes to Mike for help with the game, only to see him eating chocolate cake...that he got from a birthday party. Perfect time to remind the reader that this is, in fact, a Five Nights At Freddy's fanfic, eh?
Chocolate cake...just like back when...when...
June 26, 1982
Jeremy, before the party: Come on Fritz, we're going to miss the party!- And in the same chapter, Mary searches through the now-emotionally-distraught Cassidy's mind to find the source of this newfound trauma, which leads to a one-two whammy exchange that warns the Schmidt family and the readers that the child-like spirits of William Afton's victims are not the only supernatural creatures who inhabit this world and beyond, and they are FAR from the most dangerous:
Mary: You were cursed...
...
Liz: But there's still someone out there... Someone who wanted to hurt Cassidy, someone who very likely wants to hurt all of us. And something tells me that whoever cursed Cassidy isn't human.
Mike: That's what I was thinking too, Liz, and while I'm very glad that Cassidy's curse was minor and temporary, there's still some worrying implications. Mainly the fact that someone planned this, and that they weren't going all out. - Wham Shot: Right after the above-discussed Wham Line in Chapter 4, Mike, after Mary implicitly confirms that William Afton's daughter is right outside their home, is immediately greeted to what Mary saw when she she opens the front door for him. And sure enough, the ghost of Elizabeth Afton herself is right there for Mike to see. However, what makes this scene hit so hard, isn't the fact that she's here...it's the expression on her face when they open the door that instantly tells Mike and Mary that this poor girl went through some serious shit before she got here.(That, and the narrative implies that Mike is far more familiar with said shit than he's initially willing to let on.)
- In Chapter 12, after the ghost children go through the bulk of Mike's life documentary book, Liz comes across a photo hidden on the back of the book's binder. Upon looking at said photo, it's quickly revealed that the reason said photo was hidden away was because it is a picture of Mike's bloodied, scarred, and discolored back exposed to the camera, the picture being taken shortly after one of many whipping sessions that Mike's extremely abusive father regularly unleashed on his son throughout Mike's childhood. The depiction is so horrifying that seeing it causes Liz to scream out in fear upon seeing it for the first time, and the other children, including Mary are chilled to their cores when they see it. This single image is what kickstarts Mike going into extensive details explaining his life story to his new family, telling how he went from the tortured child within the picture to the wealthy, laid-back, slappy-go-lucky man of fun he is today.
- The World Is Just Awesome: The ghost kids react with awe and wonder whenever they see a new part of the world during their vacations, finally being able to see what the world is really like after being enslaved in animatronics and trapped in the same place for decades.
- Xanatos Gambit: The entire reason for Nightmare's initial attack on Mike's family, tied with the Deal with the Devil mentioned above. If he succeeds, he breaks apart the family only moments after they came together, advancing the cause of evil on Earth. If he "fails", he actually wins his wager with William Afton, meaning that he gets to torture the bastard for a thousand years without any limitations. As he tells the family, he was playing a different game from the start, one that he was guaranteed to win. It's implied that the outcome that actually happened, the family standing strong, was the one that he wanted to happen.
