Just a Happy Ending

The Path Ahead

 "Did anyone- know this- was down- here?" Norman asked.

Bendy warily glanced at the high walls, the rancid pools of ink, and the precarious wood path they were walking single-file on. "I'd sometimes throw things down the Machine's pit, but I figured it was bottomless. Outta sight, outta mind."

"Not bottomless enough," grumbled Sammy from the front of the line. His blank face turned to the devil perched atop Norman's head, "Do we even know what we're looking for?"

There was an uncomfortable silence before Norman offered, "The... Demon King?"

Sammy wheeled on him, "Aside from the obvious, you dolt! How are we going to find it? Where do we even start looking?"

Bendy muttered something.

"What was that, imp?"

Bendy shrank beneath Sammy's sharp tongue. "It... will probably bring us to it," he repeated. The silence prompted his explanation, "I-it's smart. In a way, it's more animal than.... So we keep going and... and it'll probably show up to... hunt us."

Norman's shoulders drooped, "Cat- and mouse, huh?"

"So we're going into unknown territory, being hunted by the thing we're looking for," Sammy concluded. "Oh, and none of us have a solid plan."

Bendy wrung his hands and murmured. "W-well... if Henry was followin' Joey's story up there, m-maybe we're following a different story down here?"

"Sure, but whose?" asked Norman.

The answer was apparent, though none of them said it. They were all still puppets on Joey Drew's strings. Prey in the Demon King's hunt.

Characters in someone else's script.

Norman brightened his light, illuminating the path farther ahead. "Well, if it- is some kinda story-, only way to get- to the- end is to keep goin'."

"Or," Sammy said with a finger in the air, "We don't. We sit here and do nothing, whatever we can to hijack the story and make it work for us."

"Nothin' good happens to actors who won't follow the script ," said Bendy, "Besides, the story literally froze when Henry tried what you're suggesting. He found a few hidden rooms, but the story never progressed. He could never move farther without following the script."

"So we're stuck."

Bendy nodded. His tail curled around him and he tried to make himself smaller, feeling silently scorned.

Norman must have felt it, which led him to lift the little devil off his head and hold him gently. "Hey, hey none o' that, little buddy," he said soothingly, "We'll find a way outta this, script or no."

Something bloomed in Bendy's chest. "I k-know, I just-..." The tears kept rising despite Bendy's efforts. He felt... he felt! But it wasn't the cold despair he'd known for so long, it was something else. Something about the hands supporting him, the soft, comforting words that weren't accusing him of being weak and useless, the... the-... "You're... bein' kind ta me..." the devil whimpered.

An uncomfortable realization struck Norman and Sammy. The way Bendy said that... like no one had ever been kind to him, not even a single word of comfort...

Tears finally spilled down Bendy's cheeks, his words coming in breathy sobs, "H-Henry was k-kind to me, but I-I never-... I turned him a-way! I h-hurt him s-so bad! But he st-still came back for me. An' now he's go-ne, and you two are stuck with a devil you don't trust, but-... but you're still bein' kind! Ya haven't left me... or hurt me... I...!"