Chapter Text
Billy Loomis slouched into the chair like it was an accusation.
The office smelled faintly of burnt coffee and something older--dust, maybe, or machinery left running too long. Minnesota sunlight streamed through the blinds in clean, unforgiving lines. Billy looked out of place in it, all sharp angles and ill-fitting pressed clothes, jaw tight like he was bracing for impact.
Across the desk, Steve Raglan adjusted a thin stack of papers.
Calling it a résumé was generous.
William Afton--Steve, here--didn’t comment on that aloud. He didn’t need to. The silence did the work for him as his eyes scanned the page.
No achievements.
No volunteer hours.
No work history.
High school: incomplete.
He hummed thoughtfully, just soft enough to be irritating.
Billy’s jaw flexed. His hands were clenched in his lap, fingers digging into his palms like he was holding something down. William noticed that immediately. The tension. The coiled restraint. He’d seen it before--in mirrors, mostly.
“Hm,” William said mildly. “Short.”
Billy exhaled through his nose. “Yeah. That’s what happens when your life kind of… derails.”
William looked up at him then. Really looked.
Pale, sleepless skin. Eyes that were too alert for someone claiming grief. The irritation flickering just under the surface, quick and hot. A boy who didn’t like being evaluated--who hated being found lacking.
Interesting.
William’s gaze dropped back to the paper. “Schools in Woodsboro, California,” he noted. “That’s a long way from Minnesota. What brings you here, Billy?”
Billy stiffened.
There it was. The pivot point.
Billy inhaled slowly, deliberately, like he was stepping into a role he knew by heart.
“There was… an incident,” he said. His voice softened, roughened at the edges. “Back home. A massacre.”
William leaned forward slightly, elbows on the desk, fingers steepled. He didn’t interrupt.
Billy continued, eyes unfocused now, aimed somewhere safely distant. “A lot of people died. Friends. Principal. Police.” He swallowed. “My girlfriend. My best friend and I--we barely survived.”
He let just enough shake creep into his hands. Just enough pain into his eyes. It was a good performance. Convincing. Practiced.
William felt a spark of something like appreciation.
“A terrible thing,” William murmured. "To live through."
Billy nodded. “Yeah. My dad thought… a fresh start. Somewhere quieter.”
William smiled at that. A small, knowing curve of the mouth.
Survival stories always had such clean edges when the truth was buried properly.
He stood abruptly. “Coffee?”
Billy blinked. “What?”
“Coffee,” William repeated brightly, already turning toward the small counter behind Billy. “I made some earlier. Would you like a cup?”
Billy watched, thrown off-balance, as William poured himself a mug. He added sugar. One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Six.
Billy’s mouth twitched. “No, no--I’m good.”
William took a sip, considered it like a man tasting wine, then turned back and sat down again.
“I think,” he said, voice smooth, expansive, “that what a young man like you needs is purpose. Direction.” He gestured vaguely, as if sketching a future in the air between them. “Something structured. Something that gives you time to think.”
Billy rolled his eyes before he could stop himself. William did not miss it.
He leaned back in his chair. “I may have something for you. The pay isn’t great.”
Billy waited.
“The hours,” William continued pleasantly, “are worse.”
Billy ran a hand through his hair, gaze dropping to the résumé still sitting on the desk--his thin, empty life reduced to a single page. Beggars, choosers, all that.
“How soon can I start?” he asked.
William’s eyes gleamed.
“Tonight,” he said.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Working nights at Freddy’s couldn’t have fit Billy better if it had been designed with him in mind.
He settled easily into the rhythm of it. A horror movie playing low on one of the dusty surveillance-room TVs, his feet kicked up on the desk, Stu on the other end of the line. They talked like there wasn’t a state of wide, dusty, nothing between them.
The job itself was laughably simple. Watch the cameras. Make sure no one broke in.
And if someone did? Well. Billy almost pitied them.
They talked about the place, about how strange Steve Raglan was--his voice too cheerful, his smiles a little off. Then, softer, quieter, the things that hurt to say out loud. How empty everything felt. How much they missed each other. Billy didn’t say it directly, but Stu heard it anyway.
The first night passed without incident. So did the next. And the next.
Billy started to think he could live like this. Make a routine of it. Nights, movies, Stu’s voice filling the empty space.
Then, one night, something moved on the cameras.
"--oooooHHH and there we go, show your tits and die, of course! Billy, you seeing this?" Stu's voice was a far off nuisance as Billy leaned forward, eyes narrowing. A shape near the food counter. Someone rifling through trash.
"Stu, shut up," Billy hushed him. "There's something on the monitor."
A vagrant, he figured.
He hung up without much of a goodbye, figuring he'd be back later. Grabbed his flashlight and left the security room, boots echoing softly through the darkened building. He found the man hunched over, digging through discarded wrappers and boxes, probably hoping for something still edible.
Billy considered just scaring him off.
Then he thought about how long it had been since Woodsboro. Since he’d felt anything at all.
Who would miss this guy?
The pocket knife snapped open in his hand with a familiar, comforting sound. Billy approached quietly, pulse steady, every step deliberate. When he struck, it was with purpose--over and over, the blade sinking in again and again as the man fought weakly beneath him.
Thirty. Forty.
Billy lost count.
By the time the body went still, Billy was straddling it, chest heaving, breath tearing out of him like he’d been holding it in for weeks. Blood smeared his hands, his clothes, the floor. He barely noticed. He felt awake for the first time since Minnesota swallowed him whole.
He didn’t hear the footsteps behind him.
The soft chuckle was what finally cut through the haze.
“My, what anger you have.”
Billy froze. Slowly, he looked up.
Steve Raglan stood a few feet away, hands loosely clasped, eyes bright with something like fascination. Billy registered the blood only distantly--how much of it there was, how soaked he was in it.
For a split second, one clean, cold thought crossed his mind.
I’m going to have to kill him.
Then Steve gestured casually toward the body. “You look like you need help with clean-up.”
Billy’s grip tightened on the knife. “Why are you here?”
It didn’t make sense. Career counselors didn’t show up at their clients’ jobs in the middle of the night.
Steve laughed, light and easy. “Nostalgia.” He stepped closer and held out a hand--half an offer to help Billy up, half a handshake. “William Afton. Owner of this fine establishment.”
Billy blinked. He stood on his own, deliberately ignoring the offered hand.
William didn’t seem bothered. His smile lingered, stretched just a little too tight.
“Are you going to call the cops?” Billy asked, turning the knife slowly in his hand.
William giggled, genuinely delighted, as if Billy had said something charming. “Calm down, Cujo. I’m not going to tattle on you.” He raised his hands briefly, then pointed toward the corpse. “But we are going to have to deal with that.”
Billy hesitated. He’d never disposed of a body before. In Woodsboro, the bodies had been part of the point.
William’s gaze softened with understanding. “First time,” he said knowingly. “Don’t worry, kid. I’ll walk you through it.”
He turned and headed toward a maintenance closet, then glanced back and crooked one finger in a silent come here.
Billy followed.
He hated how natural it felt.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The next hour passes in a blur.
Billy moves through it like he’s underwater, still riding the high of the kill, every nerve humming. William doesn’t get his hands dirty--not really. He instructs, corrects, oversees. Gloves are pressed into Billy’s hands. Heavy garbage bags. An old hand saw retrieved from a maintenance cabinet that looks like it hasn’t been opened in years.
William talks him through it calmly, almost gently. Where to cut. How to separate the limbs and the head, bag them apart from the torso. Practical advice, delivered like career counseling all over again.
Billy listens. Billy does as he’s told.
They mop the floor together. The smell of bleach burns his nose. When it’s done, William leads him into the kitchen, to an old industrial sink. He turns on the tap and, without asking, helps Billy scrub the blood from his hands and forearms. Billy lets him. He doesn’t know why. Maybe because his body is still buzzing, or maybe because William’s presence feels… steady. Grounding.
William hums thoughtfully. “Your clothes are soaked.”
Billy glances down, like it’s only just occurred to him. Red-brown stains everywhere.
“Peroxide,” William says. “If that doesn’t work--burn them.”
“I’ve gotten blood out before,” Billy replies automatically.
It’s a slip. He realizes it the second the words leave his mouth.
William’s eyes flicker with interest, but he only smiles. “Of course you have.”
They stand there for a beat too long. The adrenaline has nowhere to go. Usually, Billy would burn it off with Stu--hands, mouths, bodies pressed together until the world quieted down. Instead, he’s left vibrating in his own skin.
Before he can think better of it, his hands are on William.
William is solid. Taller. Not as easy to shove around as Stu. Billy fists his hands in William’s shirt and shoves him back against the counter, breath hot, reckless. William’s eyes light up instantly.
Billy kisses him hard. He tastes like coffee and something smug, feels the scratch of William’s kempt beard. William doesn’t resist. He holds Billy there, lets him think he’s in control--though his hands slide into Billy’s hair, grip his hips, grounding him in place.
They rut against each other. It’s fast. Messy. All heat and friction and leftover violence bleeding into something else.
When it’s over, the clarity hits like cold water.
Billy jerks back as if burned, yanks his jacket into place, and turns for the door without a word.
William watches him go, straightening his own clothes, a quiet laugh spilling from him as the door shuts behind Billy.
He already knows.
This won’t be the last time.