I pressed the start button on the game and was brought to a character selection menu. 'Dave's message said that the purple static only appears if the player is Roxy.' I thought, I selected Roxy and the screen changed to a kart selection menu. There were multiple customized options for the kart's body, steering, and tires. I was unsure which options I should choose, I wanted to be fast, but not too fast, otherwise, I might miss some static patches. I decided to go with the basic kart loadout for the race, hopefully, it will be enough to win the game and get rid of the static patches.
The screen transitioned to a racetrack that appeared to be in a large canyon. There were 12 racers on the track, I was able to recognize Freddy, Chica, Bonnie, and Monty, but I was unfamiliar with the rest of the racers. Roxy was at the very back of the starting line while all the other racers were ahead of her, as the sounds of engines humming played through the game's speakers, a countdown appeared on the screen.
I placed my foot on one petal, but I wasn't moving when the countdown reached zero and the other racers drove ahead of me. "Oh no! this isn't good!" I said as I tried to figure out what I was doing wrong, I imagined driving inside a broken-down car before, but I have never driven a car in real life or played a game like this. However, I did read about car functions from books with Claire in the past. From what I could remember, there were two petals inside a vehicle, the gas pedal makes it go and the breaks stop it. I took my foot off the petal I was pressing on and tried the other on.
The kart started moving forward with great force. Now that I'm moving, hopefully, I can recover from this rocky start, 'Remember the gas pedal is on the right!' I thought. I ran over a purple static patch in front of me and saw 3 racers ahead of me. "I hope I can get past them." I said and I drove faster, I managed to pull ahead of them and saw another racer not too far ahead of me. As I was approaching, the track was leading towards a large trench up ahead. Luckily, there was a ramp I could use to get across.
The car drove up the ramp and was gliding through the air, I was able to get a nice view of the track up above the trench. I glided past the racer ahead of me and kept driving as the kart touched back on the ground. I made a right turn and followed a winding path that took me into a dark cave. I caught glimpses of stalagmites on the ground and saw a racer crash into one, I took this chance to get ahead of them and reach 7th place. I drove out of the cave and saw multiple boulders on the race track.
I managed to avoid them by making a few sharp turns, but I almost crashed into the last one. I saw two more racers in front of me trying to get ahead of one another, one of them made a left turn and zoomed ahead while I was getting closer to the racer left behind. While I was struggling to get into 6th place, I saw another static patch coming up on my right. I pushed the racer next to me aside and got rid of the static, I even managed to get in 6th place too.
I zoomed across the finish line and started my 2nd lap around the track, "The other racers ahead of me can't be too far, right?" I said to myself. I saw two more static patches next to each other and drove right over them. As I kept driving through the canyon, I saw another static patch in front of me, but suddenly, a sandstorm was blowing through the canyon. "What the?!" I said as the sand obscured my vision, I nearly missed the static patch because of the storm, this was going to make finding them and the other racers harder.
I entered the cave again and was free from the raging sandstorm, but I still had to worry about the stalagmites hiding in the dark. Unfortunately, I crashed into one and felt the game's chair vibrate, this also caused a racer behind me to take 6th place. "Oh, crud!" I said quickly driving around the stalagmite. Luckily, the other racer crashed into a stalagmite too and lost 6th place. "I need to be more careful." I left the cave and was thrown back into the sandstorm. "Oh, come on! It's still going on?!"
Once again, I drove past the boulders littered on the track and got rid of a few more static patches in the process. I managed to get into 5th place as the racer ahead of me crashed into the last boulder, I could see the other Glamrock Animatronics ahead of me. Bonnie was behind the others and Chica was in the lead, Monty was bumping into Freddy as he tried to get ahead of him. Wow, even in this game, Monty is trying to steal Freddy's spot, at least that was no longer the case in real life.
They zoomed past the finish line with me not too far behind Bonnie. I managed to get past him and was gaining on Monty and Freddy who were still fighting each other for 2nd place. The sandstorm subsided and I was able to get a much better view of my surroundings, I drove up the ramp again and saw Freddy was falling behind, I managed to land in 3rd place and was catching up to Monty.
I drove into the cave once again, but this time the ground was shaking. "Huh?! What's going on? Is there an earthquake happening?" I said, stalactites were falling from the ceiling and the ground was cracking apart. Freddy pulled ahead of me and was trying to get in front of Monty again. We left the cave, but the earthquake was still happening, it also caused multiple large boulders to fall from the cliffside. Both Freddy and Monty crashed into a large boulder and I quickly got into second place, I got rid of another static path as I closed in on Chica.
I saw the finish line up ahead and one final static patch was in the way as well. I zoomed past Chica, eliminated the static patch, and won the race. The screen transitioned to Roxy standing on a podium and holding a golden trophy smiling at a large crowd. "Congratulations on winning the race, speedster!" The screen said, now the transmitter's signal should be weakened. I got off the game's seat and left the room with Bonnie, we found Freddy and Foxy holding different items.
"Gregory, I have found a Dance Pass for you to use." Freddy said handing the pass to me, "Thank you, Freddy." I replied taking the pass and putting it in my pocket, I also noticed a small chip in Freddy's other hand. "Freddy, what is that?" "This is a chip that will extend my battery power. Would you mind installing it into me, Gregory?" Freddy said. I nodded and Freddy bent down to my level, I open his chip compartment, placed the chip inside, and closed the compartment again.
"Thank you, Superstar." Freddy said standing back up, "You're welcome." I said. "Arrgh! I found something that ye should look at, lad." Foxy said as he handed me a message. "Dave gave me a message written in weird symbols he found from a Princess Quest game and needed help figuring out what it means. I was able to translate it and the message said, "I always come back." Not only that, but I also discovered something very disturbing on Vanessa's computer. Someone was sending another person messages written in the same encrypted symbols and camera footage showed that same person talking to someone. I don't know who they're talking to, but whoever it is, they're responding to them with the same symbols. When I asked her if everything is ok, she told me she was just having family problems, but she didn't go into any more detail than that. This is making me worry about her even more and I don't like where this is going. - Ness"
This information made me feel a chill down my spine. Knowing what the message from Princess Quest said was bad enough, but learning that someone was talking to someone else with the same symbols made me feel even more uneasy. The part about this person being caught on camera made me remember something else, Vanessa became more agitated than usual around that time and she would storm off whenever someone asked her about the people she heard talking.
It also surprised me that Vanessa opened up to Ness about it, but she could have been lying. 'Who are these people Vanessa heard talking?' I thought. Foxy could tell that I was getting bothered and pulled an ice cream bar out of his chest cavity for me. "Here ya go, lad. This should help ya calm down." I unwrapped the ice cream bar and saw that it looked like Roxy, and it has a strong grape flavor too.
"Were you able to weaken the transmitter in the game, Gregory?" Freddy asked, I nodded in response, and Freddy felt relieved to know that I was successful. "Well now that we got a Dance Pass for Greg ere', we betta get goin' to the West Arcade." Bonnie said. I left the Raceway with the Animatronics and walked back to the Atrium.
Bonnie and Foxy felt their battery power running low and stopped. "Arrgh! Looks like ye have to go without us, lad." Foxy said, "I hate to say it, but Foxy's right, champ. I'm running low on power." Bonnie said. They both entered two nearby recharge stations and Freddy walked up to the 3rd floor balcony with me. On the way up, we ran into Monty and Chica.
"Hey, little guy! How are ya doin'?" Monty asked, "I'm doing well. Freddy and I are about to enter the West Arcade." I said as I finished my ice cream and threw out the stick, but when we got to the elevator, Freddy stopped. "Freddy? What wrong?" I asked, "I wish I could join you, Gregory. But I must stay here." Freddy said, I wasn't sure why Freddy couldn't enter the West Arcade with him, his battery power was full, so what was the problem? "Huh? Why not?" "After my Stage incident, I am not allowed to perform. When I step onto the West Arcade Dance Floor, I cannot stop myself. It is a programming bug." Freddy replied.
Monty couldn't help but chuckle at that, he remembers what happened the last time Freddy went to the West Arcade. Freddy danced like crazy and didn't stop until his system crashed and had to be hulled down to Parts and Service for repairs. "Don't worry, Freddy. Monty and I will look after Gregory." Chica said, "Thank you, Chica." Freddy responded, he pulled the robot head out of his chest cavity and gave it to Monty. "A robot head? Why do ya have this with ya?" He asked.
"Well, long story short. I have a plan to deal with Roxy, but I need a working Driver-Assist Bot to put the plan into action. So I need to get this head to the repair station in the West Aracade." I said. "Ok then. You'll like the West Aracde, little guy!" Monty roared, "Before you go. If you see the DJ, say hello. He is such a nice fellow." Freddy said. "Sure thing, Freddy," I said. I showed my Dance Pass to the scanner and the elevator opened for me and the Animatronics. Chica pushed the button and sent the elevator up to the West Arcade.