Plushtrap Takes Manhattan

Stuffed animals were kind of creepy, David thought to himself. His father had brought home a stuffed animal for him; a rather beat-up looking rabbit. He’d gotten it from a yard sale, he said. One from that lush down the block. One of his kids had died recently, and the man would rather sell the painful memories to the highest bidder than keep them around the house.

Regardless of the reason, David was the not-so-proud owner of a plush rabbit. He had forced out a smile at his Dad, who’d smiled back down at him and ruffled his hair in response. His Dad was never home until late and his Mom wasn’t around anymore, so David assumed this gift was meant to keep him company.

If only the thing didn’t look so sinister. What sort of stuffed animal had sharp teeth?

So David made a compromise. Rather than just toss something his Dad bought him into the trash, which certainly wouldn’t be nice, he would just keep it stuffed in the back of his closet and out of sight. One box emptied of baseball cards later and it was done. If his Dad asked, the plush was just there for safekeeping.

That stuffed animal stayed at the back of David’s mind like it stayed at the back of his closet for the next few days. The young boy didn’t bother worrying about it. After all, it was just a stuffed animal.

Then, one day after school, when David had resigned himself to dry cereal and raw vegetables for dinner yet again – David blanched. He hated vegetables. – something interesting happened. A commercial played on television.

It was a commercial for Fredbear’s Family Diner, Hurricane’s only real local attraction. David had never gone, what with not having a parent around to take him, so it was his first time seeing the characters on the screen. It was mesmerizing in a way, somehow different from the normal Saturday morning cartoons.

It wasn’t until the commercial ended that David realized with a start that one of the characters had looked strikingly like his stuffed animal. Spring Bonnie, it had been called. One of the names in the trademark at the end – Afton – matched the name of the alcoholic down the street who’d managed to get banned from every bar in the county, so David guessed they were connected.

Would that make the stuffed toy Plush Bonnie?

Of course, now that Plush Bonnie had wormed its way back into his consciousness, David decided to go take him out of storage. Maybe he could time it so that he’d be playing with it when his Dad got home.

There was just one problem: Plush Bonnie wasn’t there. The box David swore he’d put the stuffed animal into was in its usual place, shoved into the back-left corner of the closet, but it was empty. He searched high and low for it, trying to figure where he’d misplaced it, only to give it up as a lost cause.

And then David found it draped on top of the sofa where he’d been watching television.

David had done a lot of growing up in the sort amount of time he’d been alive. All his teachers praised him for being mature for his age at parent-teacher conferences. Sometimes he had trouble making friends on the playground because of it, but David always consoled himself with the knowledge that that just meant that he was a big boy, already practically an adult.

None of that mattered at that moment, though, because David screamed and bolted for his room, hiding under his blankets just like any other kid his age would when faced with something scary.



Canyon Terrace, a small subdivision just within the town limits of Hurricane, was completely and utterly normal. It was the last place anyone would ever expect to be the home of something unusual or untoward. So much so that many of the people who lived there took pride in it. The lawns were well-maintained, but not extraordinarily so. The houses were all painted one of the wide varieties of HOA-approved colors ranging from eggshell white to beige. Every so often bored children and teenagers would wander around looking for a pick-up game of basketball or street hockey. Really, Canyon Terrace was indistinguishable from any other subdivision across America.

David biked around the neighborhood, destination unknown but firmly set to “anywhere that isn’t home”. Plush Bonnie scared him, and he definitely didn’t want to hang around with that thing in the house. He was firmly convinced it was alive, but no amount of shaking and sniffling would convince his Dad. The man had just smiled tiredly, ruffled his hair with a large hand, and promised that the toy wouldn’t hurt him.

“See?” his father had said, holding Plush Bonnie’s limp form in his hands. “Completely harmless.” He even shook it for good measure, and then grimaced at the sharp teeth. “Well, maybe not completely.”

Then he’d tucked David into bed, because it was well past his bedtime, dug the old nightlight David hadn’t used in ages – at least six months – out of the closet, and tossed Plush Bonnie in there while he was at it.

David couldn’t sleep that night. He’d tossed and turned in his bed, constantly feeling like something was watching him.

So, here he was, doing laps around his block to kill time. His Dad had managed to slip away from work around lunchtime just long enough to bring some fast food home, so David didn’t have to worry about cooking anything himself.

There was a commotion of the street when David rounded the corner on his bike. A whole bunch of the neighborhood kids, laughing and screaming. David biked up to them and watched.

It looked like a subdivision-wide game of Red Light Green Light. Every time one of them – the kid designated as the stoplight – screamed “Stop!”, half the group would try to pause mid-sprint and end up in goofy poses or stumbling. Hence the noise they were all making. As David watched, one of the kids far in the lead ran up to attempt to tackle the stoplight, only to eat dirt when he tried to stop too late.

One of the kids who was out spotted David and waved at him. It was hard to make out the yells of “C’mon!” over everyone else, but David got the gist right away. Besides, half the group was in his front yard, anyways.

Afternoon had petered out into twilight, and twilight into dusk, and eventually it was time for everyone to go home. Coincidentally, David’s Dad got home right as the mob of children were scattering. The two walked in, grabbed some food, and sat down in front of the television for the rare occasion of watching something together. Then David screamed.

“Whoa, buddy,” his Dad said. “What’s the matter?”

David, scared out of his mind and unable to get words past his sudden hiccups, pointed at the windowsill. Plush Bonnie was there, sitting calmly and facing the yard, as though it’d been watching the children play.

An awkward smile broke out on David’s father’s face. “Don’t be so scared, buddy. I took him outta the closet when I stopped by to drop off dinner. I thought if I put him out somewhere you could get used to him.”

David just dove at his father and buried his face in his side, not wanting to see the stuffed animal any longer. The smell of his father, like wisps of smoke and cologne, washed over him, and David fell asleep to his father’s rough hand clumsily rubbing his back.

That night, David nearly died.



David woke up to a dark bedroom and a creaking house, momentarily confused about where he was. Then he remembered falling asleep in his Dad’s arms and burrowed deeper into his covers. If he smelled really hard, he thought he could still smell his Dad’s cologne. David tried to fall asleep to the comforting smell, but instead he just ended up flailing beneath his covers trying to find a comfortable position.

David frowned. Something was wrong, but he couldn’t put his finger on what. Something was different, out of place, and it tickled at the back of his mind and didn’t want to go away no matter how hard he shooed it.

Then the pitter-patter of little feet ran past his bedroom door, and David realized that his nightlight was off.

David slid out of bed, tiptoed to his bedroom door, and cracked it open. Then he peeked out into the dark hallway. Nothing. It was even darker out there than it was in his bedroom, though, so dark that he could barely even see the floor. David crept back to the nightstand next to his bed and rummaged through one of the drawers until he found a flashlight. He flicked it on to check that it worked, and drew confidence from the light. Then he stepped out into the hall.

David shone the light down one end, aiming it at the stairs. There wasn’t anything there. Then he aimed down the other end of the hall, towards the bathroom and his Dad’s bedroom and a closet. He stifled a scream.

Plush Bonnie was sitting down, looking at him.

David kept his flashlight trained on the toy. His breathing started coming faster, and tears pricked at the corners of his eyes. The stuffed animal didn’t move, though. It’s empty, soulless eyes just kept staring straight at him. Somehow, the spotlight made Plush Bonnie’s shadow look huge, until its black silhouette was the size of a man and its teeth gleamed wickedly and its beady eyes shifted and suddenly David didn’t feel so grown up any more.

David turned around, ready to dive back into his room. The scurrying of feet brought his attention back to Plush Bonnie, and David swung back and aimed the flashlight at where the stuffed animal had been sitting. All he saw was a dark shadow dart into one of the hallway’s doors.

The darkness of the hallway felt much more oppressive now. It felt like a living thing, creeping around David, trying to trap him, to wrap around him and squeeze and squeeze and squeeze until he went pop. Plush Bonnie was doing something, he could hear it, but he had no idea what.  Then David heard a creak on the stairs behind him, and spun around to face it.

The stairs were empty, but David was very aware that the hallway behind him very suddenly wasn’t.

The young boy turned back around just in time for Plush Bonnie to tackle him to the floor. David fell with a thud and the flashlight went spinning. He yelled. The stuffed rabbit was strong, way too strong for its size. The two flailed on the floor, rolling around together. David could feel hard metal beneath its plush exterior, could feel teeth scraping against his face and neck, could feel it slipping out his grasp every time he though he had grabbed it.

Then the lights came on, and Plush Bonnie went sailing down the stairs.

David’s father still had his leg outstretched from the kick he’d delivered, and his face looked like it was carved from stone. He hurriedly grabbed David, picking him bodily from the floor with a single hand even as he took the stairs 3 steps at a time.

Plush Bonnie was scrambling towards the kitchen when they got to the bottom of the stairs. David’s father set him down and got on one knee to hastily check over him for injuries. A steely glint entered his eyes when he saw the bruises and scratches.

“Go back to bed.” His tone brooked no argument.

David nodded, rushing back up the stairs. His Dad rushed into the kitchen, where the clattering of cutlery was very audible. David ran into his bedroom, and hid under the covers, and screwed his eyes shut, and covered his ears, and he waited.



Canyon Terrace was a subdivision indistinguishable from any other subdivision across America. Indistinguishable, that is, except for one house in particular. Perhaps one man in particular would be more appropriate. William Afton was downright strange. Nobody could ever tell what he was thinking, or why he did the things he did. Whatever it was that made him tick, nobody bothered giving it much thought. The man was just a weirdo, and that was that.

Jesse Miller walked down the sidewalk with one very specific goal in mind, eyes locked on the aforementioned Afton residence. He looked rather rough. His pajamas were in complete disarray, his hair had a very stubborn cowlick in it, and his socks were mismatched.

He was also covered in blood from a couple of bad cuts on his arms.

It was early in the morning, so early in fact that dew still clung to the grass, but William Afton was out in his yard reclining in a fold-out chair. The Australian ex-pat had a cooler sitting next to him and was chugging down beers far too fast for the time of day.

Afton waved at Mr. Miller when he saw him. “’Ow’s it goin’, mate? Ya look like shit.” He drained the last of his beer, unheeding of Mr. Miller’s stormy expression. “Oh, yeah, how’d your tyke like ol’ Plushtrap?”

Jesse Miller walked up to William Afton, balled his hand up into the tightest fist he could make, and punched him sober.