#verse one- mangled

White-furred ears lowered, and she sighed. “I shouldn’t have jumped to conclusions… I’m sorry. I know you trust me, and I’m-…” She chuckled, closing her eye and quickly rubbing beneath it to rid her cheek of the tear that had tried to slip.

“…I’m really thankful for that.”

Mangle turned her head enough to see him approaching and made no effort to move away. Mike was the only person (human) she fully trusted here; the staff didn’t care about her, anyway. For all she knew, they could’ve been talking about completely scrapping her.

“I don’t know,” she started. “I wish I knew why I malfunctioned. But the memories are… hazy.”

Mangle thought for a few moments, but found it difficult to remember much at all.

“…I guess… the things I remember most are the sounds. Screams, and… a crunch, another scream…” Her eye closed, posture hunching slightly. “I-I remember the feeling of someone’s skull in my jaws, but I wasn’t… you know, there. It was like something else was controlling me. Maybe it was my criminal protection system…?”

She glanced at Mike, then turned her head to meet his eyes. “Do you know anything about, ah… what’s the word… our programming? The toy animatronics. Maybe mine’s damaged because… well, look at me.” She shrugged. “I don’t wear this blanket because it’s stylish. I just can’t stand to look at what’s… underneath. I’m hardly the picture of fun anymore. To most of the kids here, I’m just Mangle.”

For a long while, Mangle couldn’t look at Mike. She assumed she knew what he meant, and shocked angry brewed inside of where her chest was supposed to be.

Now it was just endoskeleton.

She furrowed her brows and took a shaky breath in, not wanting to lash out at him- he hadn’t done this- but why would he… ask her that?

“No,” she said, her voice laced with pain. “No, I didn’t want to bite that man. I-… Mike, hurting staff or guests is not part of my programming. Something went wrong.” Her blanket was still tightly wrapped around herself, but the white-furred vixen gestured to herself with the hand that was still white. The other was not, stripped of fur and outer metal.

Mangle turned her head and fixed the man with a strange look that was, probably, hard to decipher. But her single yellow eye was full of emotion, and her brows were still partially knit. “I thought you knew me… better than that. I thought you knew that I don’t truly have it in me to hurt anyone.” She turned away, ears flat, and her fluffy tail curled around herself.

“…it wasn’t in my control. Even if it weren’t against my programming, hurting people, I couldn’t. I’d-…”

She cut herself off, her voice beginning to waver. “Please, Mike… leave me alone. J-just for a little while. But it’s more than a surprise to me, though, that you’d think that of me.”

“…YOU TOLD ME BACKSTAGE THAT YOU COULD SEE SOUND, DUDE!!” Mangle looked rather panicked.

She probably had a right to be.

“T-Fred and TC had to take you back there because you shorted out during the show! FIVE HOURS AGO!! And you JUST woke up! When was the last time you had a maintenance check?!”

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“Oh- w-well, um… I-I… thank you?”

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@stringed-daughter

A little startled, Mangle’s single eye widened, and she looked down, then smiled and relaxed.

“Oh… hi, Charlotte. How are you?”

The blanket around Mangle remained tightly wrapped, her hands staying on it so it didn’t reveal the body she was so ashamed of.