#5nac

I’m a firm believer of cause-and-effect and this is how I feel the timeline of Five Nights at Freddy’s occurred, at least in the games:

Despite experiencing major problems with their springlock suits (wearable animatronic mascot costumes) resulting in the deaths of several people and sustaining injuries to themselves William Afton pushes forward with his sworn friend Henry Emily.

In the late 1900s William and Henry successfully establish Fredbear’s Family Diner and Freddy Fazbear’s Pizza, later founding Fazbear Entertainment as well as its subsidiaries.

In 1983 the suits are semi-retired due to increasing safety issues and malfunctions. It’s not until William’s oldest child Michael gets his younger brother Evan severely injured by one of them during a performance that they’re fully decommissioned and the diner is eventually shut down.

William vents his frustrations towards a remorseful Michael, distances himself from Henry and becomes an alcoholic. However, he’s still lucid enough to notice Fredbear (now known as Golden Freddy), the animatronic that killed Evan making strange movements.

Wondering if he could somehow bring Evan back from the dead William redesigns the Funtimes (his personal animatronic projects) to have hidden mechanisms for kidnapping and kickstarts Circus Baby’s Pizza World. Unfortunately, his daughter and middle child Elizabeth ignores his warnings since he made one called Circus Baby for her. She gets killed and possesses Baby which causes William to cancel his plans and spiral further.

At some point William discovers from the technology he and Henry used for entertainment how to alter someone’s perceptions of reality using sound. He tests these ‘illusion discs’ on Michael, giving him everlasting nightmares that eventually drive him to attempt suicide. William then has Michael institutionalized to further cover his tracks.

Henry notices William’s increasingly dangerous behavior and creates Marionette the Puppet as a precaution for kids, specifically his twin daughter and son Charlie and Sammy.

Jealous of Henry for seemingly having it all William exploits a hole in the security by approaching Charlie when she gets locked outside the diner and murders her; she then possesses the Puppet. Henry is grief-stricken and suspects William but is unable to prove it.

William founds Circus Baby’s Entertainment and Rental by repurposing his last project, locking the Funtimes away.

Deciding to kill by hand instead William lures children to the pizzeria’s ‘safe room’ using former mascot Spring Bonnie. Collecting the Remnant (souls) and Agony (emotions) of his victims William infuses the Funtimes with them. His experiments end in the Funtimes acting violently as a result of constant torture and prolonged isolation combined with the mixed essences used to power them.

Still possessed by Charlie the Puppet brings life to the pizzeria’s animatronics using the dead children. People notice that the animatronics suddenly look and smell like corpses after a while which forces the pizzeria to close. William successfully hides the dead bodies before they can be found.

A second pizzeria is built using the Toys (more advanced animatronics with facial recognition). However, they happen to use parts from the originals which infects them. William sneaks into the new pizzeria and kills more children causing them to possess the newer models. Security guard Jeremy Fitzgerald is bitten on the head by Toy Foxy (also known as Mangle), losing his frontal lobe.

William manages to deflect suspicion by eventually pinning the blame for any negligence on Henry causing him to be convicted; Henry’s wife leaves him and takes Sammy with her.

When William’s wife also suspects what he’s done and chooses to leave he kills her and puts her soul in the animatronic Ballora which he’d ironically made for her. Just as Fazbear Entertainment nearly goes broke he disappears from the public eye. Michael is released and just wants to forget about his past.

However, William tricks his only surviving child into freeing what remains of Elizabeth, though with the cost of being used as a vessel for the Funtimes to escape. When Michael outlives his purpose Ennard (the amalgamation of the Funtimes) forcibly ejects Circus Baby, causing the separated components to develop into Molten Freddy and Scrap Baby.

When he returns to the first pizzeria to disassemble the animatronics still there William releases his victims from captivity. Hiding in Spring Bonnie to scare them away, he ends up being crushed and slowly dying inside the costume before the room is sealed up.

Fazbear’s Fright: The Horror Attraction is built to capitalize on the infamy of the Fazbear franchise but burns down after a fire caused during a scuffle between William and the on-site staff. William escapes and switches to a different animatronic costume.

Henry, now cynical to the point of contemplating suicide chooses to keep going and builds Lefty (an animatronic meant to bring in the Puppet). Recruiting Michael, he restarts his old company with the intent of stopping the madness for good. Salvaging and recalling every product he can find he builds another pizzeria and constructs a subterranean furnace disconnected from the actual establishment.

Once all the pieces of his puzzle are in place he sets the pizzeria on fire with himself inside; Michael chooses to remain as well. William is then condemned to an unending nightmare by Cassidy (one of his victims).

This leads into the events of Help Wanted, Help Wanted 2, Special Delivery and Security Breach. Meanwhile, the events of every FNAF book except the novel trilogy occur at various points in time.

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Now I’d like to account for the timeline of Five Nights at Candy’s:

Rowboatics Corporation is founded as a side project and predecessor of the budding Fazbear Entertainment.

After recovering from the events surrounding the Rat and Cat Theater, Mary grows up and meets Mike Schmidt (Michael using his mother’s maiden name), eventually marrying him and having a daughter they name Marilyn. Michael, having found a kindred spirit in Mary after learning of her past chooses to stay and raise Marilyn with her.

Marilyn’s friends ultimately join her in visiting the abandoned Rowboatics factory but run into the still-possessed animatronics who end up killing all of them except Marilyn herself. When Marilyn’s parents discover what happened they deny her involvement for her safety and ground her.

The factory incident rattles Michael enough that he actually looks into the message his father sent him a long time ago. He leaves behind an explanation of his history upon suspecting he likely won’t return. Mary discovers it but is unable to contact Michael who has already gone into hiding.