The Fall of the Aftons

003: William Afton

William stared at the few items in his trolley. A half-gallon of milk, three single bananas, a small box of crisped rice cereal, a bag of ground coffee beans, and some pre-packaged chicken breasts. William had been eating a lot of chicken lately. It was cheap meat, cheap protein.

"Oh, shoot!" William exclaimed quietly, facepalming himself.

Henry in front of him turned around to look at him. "What'd you forget?" Henry asked, chuckling at his friend's forgetful ways. With all of the stress from Fredbear's--their restaurant--there were so many things that he had forgotten recently. Most commonly, he came to work without having eaten breakfast or gotten dressed. Hungry and still in his pajamas.

William sighed, embarrassed about how many times he's forgotten things this week. "I forgot my bread for toast in the morning," he muttered. He turned and walked out of line, leaving Henry with his shopping trolley in the check-out line. He walked through the store and turned into the Breads & Grains aisle. He walked down to the area of shelving with the cheapest bread, but as he reached to grab a loaf in a bag, his foot shifted underneath him and he felt the side of his shoe hit something. He stopped reaching for the bread to look down to see what he hit, stunned at what his eyes landed on.

There was a little boy, asleep on the floor, his tiny leg clutched in his hands.

William dropped to the ground right next to the boy and lifted him off of the tile flooring, cradling him gently. The boy stirred a tiny bit, but he didn't quite wake up. William breathed a sigh of relief, carefully grabbed the loaf of bread, and walked back to his cart. No one questioned him on the way back. The boy's dark beige hair kind of went along with William's near-black hair, and they both had pale skin. Though the boy's skin was noticeably paler than his.

"Henry," William whisper-shouted once he returned to the line, dropping the loaf of bread into his near-empty shopping trolley.

"Yeah?" Henry turned around. "What's u--" But his words were instantly cut off, his eyes on the little boy in William's arms. "What on earth? William! Did you just steal some lady's kid?" Henry whispered loudly, bewildered and defensive.

William winced at the accusatory words. "W-What? No, of course not!" He laughed quietly, kind of amazed at where Henry was going with this. "I was going to take him to the doctor's office. I think something is wrong with his leg." William looked down at the little boy, who was still gripping his leg tightly. "No one was near him. No one was even in the aisle." He shifted the boy, the tiny one again stirring but not yet waking up.

"He's so cute," Henry mused. He tucked a strand of sweaty hair behind the boy's ear. That small motion stirred the boy yet again, but this time he woke up. William noticed the boy's eyes were red and swollen as they opened, most likely from crying or lack of sleep, but you could still see the beautiful night sky shade of blue his irises were colored. William gasped at the utter beauty of the boy's eyes.

"Hi there, little guy," William breathed curiously. "What's your name?"

The boy whimpered and brought the same leg from before to his chest, forcing William to move his arms so the boy wouldn't fall to the floor. The boy started to cry softly, his breaths shaky with sobs. William didn't know if his crying was because the boy was scared of him or if the boy's leg just really hurt. Or both, even. Probably both.

Having babysat his younger sister's kids numerous times, Henry took the boy from William's arms. Well, he tried to. The minute he laid a finger on the young child, the boy started to scream. Henry jumped back, startled, and as soon as his hand was off the boy's arm, the boy almost immediately settled down.

Miss Allie, the worker at the cash register, called William and Henry forward. William walked in front of the cash register as Henry pushed the trolley forward and started to unload the items onto the conveyor belt.

"How're you doing, Afton?" Allie asked William jokingly, chuckling as she checked out a couple of his items.

"I've been all right, what about--" he started, but she cut him off mid-sentence.

"What are you doing with him?" she asked, her voice worried, as she motioned to the boy still crying quietly in his arms. "Where's his twin?"

"Twin?" William asked, confused. She nodded her head. "I don't know. I found him alone, laying on the ground in the bread aisle. I think something might be wrong with his leg, so I thought that I'd take him to the doctor."

"That's Michael Song. He and his twin came in a few hours ago, looking for my help. Their older brother, Aster, was killed in a bad accident a few hours ago." She came around from the counter, attempting to pick the boy up. But just like with Henry minutes earlier, the second she touched him, he screamed. And when she took her hand off of him, Michael settled. "Odd," she mumbled, watching Michael with curiosity dancing in her light green eyes. "Mike, do you know where Khael went?"

Michael looked at Allie, then quickly glanced at his leg before burying his face into William's shirt. William felt the sweat on Michael's face start to soak through his shirt, the little one shivering as if he was cold. He adjusted him so the boy would only take up one of his arms instead of both. Then he put a hand on Michael's forehead, feeling to see if the boy had a fever, but then he realized that he didn't really know how to check for a fever.

"Henry," William said, looking for his friend's attention. Once he had it, he asked, "Can you feel his forehead to see if has a fever?"

Henry nodded his head, then walked over and rested his hand gently on the boy's forehead. He nodded his head, frowning slightly. "Yeah, he's definitely sick. He's burning up."

Allie went back behind the counter, grabbing something from the storage underneath. She stood back up and held out two small sweatshirts--a pale green one and a bright blue one. "The blue one is Mike's," she explained as she reached over the counter and placed it over the boy's shoulders. "The green one is his twin's, Maxwell."

"Then who was Khael?" Henry asked Allie, who was now back to scanning William's few groceries.

"Khael was Maxwell's nickname," she explained. "It was his middle name."

"Oh," he said understandingly. "Willy, you take him to the clinic. I'll pay for your groceries."

"Oh, that's not necessary. And don't call me Willy!" William exclaimed, annoyed. He rubbed Michael's back in a caring way, but when Michael winced, he automatically stopped. "What the..."

Allie looked up from her work to William. "What? Is something wrong?"

"Watch." William got Henry's attention, then brushed his hand gently against Michael's back. The boy cried aloud, wincing so hard he hit his head against William's shoulder.