A Fresh Take

    As Flight HEX4175 soared through the air, its passengers kept busy. Whether by sleeping, talking amongst themselves, or by watching the in-flight movie, they all had something pleasant to do. Save for one woman. A plainly dressed individual in a button down blouse and khakis, she would be wholly innocuous if not for how she filled out said clothes. Enough for curves in the right places that a toned body like hers could have. Shoulder-length blonde hair parted neatly from her head, with her bangs nicely framing her face, in addition to the contrast it struck with her tanned skin. Of course, what actually drew her looks was her height, something that gave her an almost amazonian quality. You would think a woman like that would have no trouble keeping herself busy with any number of willing parties to converse with. But instead of doing anything like that though, she had instead chosen to remain apprehensive about her upcoming prospects. This one had recently been relocated, by her own choice even. Despite getting what she wanted however, she had been second guessing herself the whole trip, wondering if it was the right thing to do. Seems she has a bit of a soft spot for the particular location she would be leaving behind. A quaint place by the name of Freddy Fazbear's Pizzeria.

    Memories of her time spent there began flooding in, revealing a look in her eyes that betrayed her youthful exterior. A beguiling gaze that showed years of experience. Of hardship. Something you wouldn't think for a simple employee at a children's restaurant. No, there must had been something more going on behind those doors. One could see that the woman had her fair share of scars, both mental, and surprisingly, physical. The latter were more numerous but very shallow, especially comparative to the former. But they would be inclined to draw your attention given her clearly athletic frame. You wouldn't think pizzeria work could cause someone to look like that.

    Breathing evenly, the restaurant worker snapped to attention as she noticed that the aircraft had begun its descent. She had reached her destination. A humble burg in a country known to some as The Motherland. She retrieved her coat from the overhead compartment, before disembarking from the plane. Her pace through the airport was steady, purposed. Worries still lingered in her mind, but she did not let them slow her down. Upon leaving the building she immediately began scanning the lot for her name. Prior to her trip she had been instructed that someone would be waiting for her. While looking for that someone, she hadn't yet noticed that a man had walked up to her from amongst the crowded entrance.

    "Excuse me-" the man began politely, before being cut off.
"I'm busy." dismissed the taller woman, who hadn't even bothered to look at the man. She was still looking out for her name.
"You don't appear to be doing anything." he stated, matching her tone immediately.
"I'm looking for my driver." she responded curtly, not noticing as the man's eyes lit up mischievously.
"I can help with that, da?" he said, which finally got the worker's attention.

    "Really, that's not-" she started to say, only to pause as she sized him up. He had a stocky frame, housing a solid core. There was a look of a bear about him, with his strong features and full beard that told her he wasn't one to put up with any shit. The man was wearing a worn security uniform with a thick overcoat, which gave her the impression that he must have just gotten off the job before being sent over to fetch her. It was then that she noticed the sign he was holding. A sign that made her face turn red with embarrassment.

    "I'm sorry." the woman eventually said as she closed her door of the truck. The driver shrugged, and keyed the ignition.
"Is fine, Miss Ratel." said the man with a yawn as he began driving the two of them. "I am Viktor, by the way." he added, casting a side glance at his charge. Her obvious embarrassment was still present, as she didn't return the gesture with her own first name. This amused him more than he'd willingly admit. At first he wasn't sure Ms. Ratel would work out as a new hire, but he was starting to feel like she'd be alright now. Minutes went by in silence as he drove her to where he (and soon to be her) worked. The Russian branch of Freddy Fazbear's Pizzeria, though it had a much simpler name; Fredorovich's.

    "So this is where we part, Miss Ratel." said Viktor as he parked the truck, causing the woman to look at him in surprise.
"You're not coming inside?" she asked.
"Nyet. I picked you up after mine shift." he replied wearily. The woman sidled out of the vehicle, understanding that he was tired.
"Alright." she said, while retrieving her luggage from the back. "I guess I'll see you."
"Da." Viktor replied, as he started up his truck. "Udachi, Miss Ratel. You will have need of it." he said, before driving away.
"Definitely going to have to remember to learn Russian later." thought the bemused Ms. Ratel, before she made for the front door.

    Nearing the door, it suddenly opened before her. She stood still for a moment as her eyes registered what was standing in the way. It was an animatronic fox in full pirate's garb. The woman immediately concluded that it must be this place's Foxy unit. The robot moved aside so she could enter the building. As she did so, she eyed the machine curiously. This Foxy was in near perfect condition, even still having both hands. In fact, to her surprise the foxbot even had a fluffy looking tailpiece. The only thing that seemed off about it was that the light in one of its oculars was out of commission. On this closer inspection, Ms. Ratel noted that the paint job seemed rather fresh. The unit must have been just out of Maintenance. Foxy then suddenly glared up at her.

    "Ordinarily, I would reprimand you for staring like that." crackled the robot's voicebox.
"Oh! Sorry Foxy,-" she started to explain before one of the machine's hands shot out and clamped down on her mouth.
"I am your Kapitan, and you will refer to me as such." it stated while looking frantically, as though checking if anybody heard.
"Aye captain." she replied sullenly as the fox removed its hand.
"I apologize. But that designation is no longer in use, so please be sure to not accidentally call me that again." it explained.
Ms. Ratel found that very curious, but remained quiet, choosing instead to simply nod.

    The machine began leading her through the building, pointing out what was different about the place in contrast with the pizzeria. There seemed to have been some recent renovations, that the worker thought to look more like repair work being done. It appears that Fredorovich's was not a pizzeria at all, and was in fact a tavern or lounge of some kind. As more information was fed to her Ms. Ratel realized that she had this place's origin all wrong. Rather than an offshoot of the Fazbear brand, this locale had actually evolved from Frederick Bear's Family Diner. Much in the same way as Fazbear's originally had, just leaning more towards adults than children. There were still similarities of course. A Management that had to have been a cross between the devil and a winner of the Darwin Award. A group of animatronics providing services. The new worker wondered what this place's Bonnie and Chica were like. Then she wondered if it would have two Freddies. She reasoned to herself that if there's a Fredbear, there should still be a Freddy to tie the brands together. That's how it worked at the pizzeria, where Fredbear had become Golden Freddy. "So perhaps the Freddy here would be changed with the Fredbear remaining the same." she thought. Soon she had been brought to some stairs, upon which the fox informed her that her room could be found up above. While it spoke, she noticed that the voice of the animatronic was more feminine sounding than the Foxy she knew. She pondered on whether this Foxy might actually be a girl as she headed into her room to drop off her things.

    Moments later Ms. Ratel returned from upstairs, prompting Kapitan to resume the lead. The vulpine unit showed her to the Maintenance room whereupon one of the other animatronics could be found. What stood out to her first was the robot's size, being the first thing in a long time to dwarf even her. It must have been approaching (if not actually) seven feet tall at least. Not only was it tall, it was lanky, with disproportionately longer arms. As the woman looked it over she could see that this machine had to have been a Freddy, especially with that top hat adorned on its head. She was about to greet it when she stopped herself. A desire to not commit a second accidental faux pas filled her, so she waited for it to speak first.

    "YOU MUST BE THE NEW!" exclaimed the bearbot in an unexpectedly jovial voice. Not nearly as deep as the Freddy she was used to.
"That is correct, this is Miss Ratel." said Kapitan, introducing woman to machine.
"HELLO MISS!" he greeted the new hire excitedly.
"Well actually my name is-" the worker began to correct the robot on her name not being Miss, when it vigorously shook her hand.
"I AM F.R.E.D-- A FOOD-REFRESHMENT-ENTERTAINMENT-DISPENSER. YOU MAY CALL ME FREDDY! ALL ELSE DOES." it shouted over her.
"Um, hello then Freddy." admittedly she felt a tad sheepish around the bear, though she tried to hide it.
"CAN I GET YOU ANYTHING? FOOD? REFRESHMENT? ENTERTAINMENT? I DISPENSE THOSE THINGS YOU KNOW."
"Yes I got that. What do you mean by 'entertainment'?"
"Freddy is connected with the sound system, and so can control what music is played on a given night." explained the fox.
"I see. I'm good, thanks." the worker said, a bit eager to leave.
"ALRIGHT! AND YOU, KAP?"
"No thank you Freddy." Kapitan answered. In response, the dispenser switched itself to standby mode and went quiet.
"I guess that's that?" Ms. Ratel asked tentatively.
"Yes. If there's one thing that can bring Freddy down, it's the idea of not being needed."
"I can relate." said the woman quietly.

    "Now then, it's about time you met Fredorovich. He should be available now." the fox stated.
"I assumed he would be last." mused the worker as she followed the animatronic.
"Normally I would have you meet the others first, but he's been so busy lately..." Kapitan trailed off.
"I get it. Being the business bear is a tough job." Ms. Ratel said in understanding. They soon stopped at Fredorovich's door.
"This is where I leave you, I've other duties to attend to."
"Aye Captain." she said playfully. "Thanks for showing me around." then she watched as the maybe-vixen foxbot walked off.

    "Alright, time to meet my new boss." thought Ms. Ratel confidently as she knocked on the door.
"Enter." said a commanding voice from the other side of the door. The new hire opened the door and strode in.
"Hel-" barely had she opened her mouth before the animatronic bear had raised a hand, causing her to pause.
"Sit." he gestured to the chair in front of his desk. Wordlessly she did as instructed, sitting across from him.
"You are-" he began before it was now his turn to be interrupted.
"Why are you naked?" the woman asked. Though she didn't let it show on her features, she was surprised to find him out of his suit.
"What?" the beardroid stared at her puzzled. He was clearly just his endoskeleton and headpiece, plus a purple top hat.
"You're naked. Why?" she reiterated. A moment passed in silence until Fredorovich understood what she had meant by 'naked'.
"This is optimal. The suit slows me down." he explained.
"Isn't wearing a suit one of the rules?"
"It is. But I am Fredorovich. I make the rules, they do not apply to me."
"Not a single rule applies to you?" asked the worker in surprise.
"Of course not. Would you like to touch me?" he suddenly asked, blatantly disregarding the number one rule of the establishment.
"Rule #1: Don't touch Freddy." the woman immediately recited. "The rules might not apply to you, but they do to me." she added.
"Good answer." he responded with a hint of a smile. But it soon vanished. "That said, I was initially expecting Valdez."
"He's no longer with us." she explained. "Iron poisoning."
"I see. A shame. I expect you'll be of use then, as I'm in need of increased security here." he said, not wasting a moment.
"Yes Mr. B-" the woman again found herself cut off by the beardroid's raised hand.
"There's no need for that. I am Fredorovich. That suffices." he said with another hint of a smile.

    Minutes went by before Ms. Ratel eventually emerged from the office with a small smile on her face. Things seemed to be going well for her so far she thought. All that was left was to meet this place's versions of the bird and the bunny. She would soon get her wish as she could hear voices she didn't recognize echoing from down the hall. Following the sound of the voices she rounded a corner and immediately stopped in her tracks. Further down the hall she could see the two animatronics. A toga wearing bird that was nearly her height was leaning over a much shorter dark green lizard of some sort that had its back against the near wall. The newly christened security guard assumed that despite its flat chest, the bird was the Chica. But there being a reptilian robot surprised her. Its chassis had no attached adornments like Chica's feathers, save for a pair of what looked to be frills on its head, and what looked to be the remnant of a tailpiece. What's more, the frame itself had a very obviously feminine design, covered by a zip up hoodie, and a skirt with spats on underneath. A nagging part of Ms. Ratel was bothered by such physical aspects on a dinobot, but she didn't have time to dwell on it once the Chica spoke.

    "Error? What do you mean 'error', Bon?" it said with a clearly masculine voice. This bird was a Chico it seems.
"It- well, it means I can't say it." replied the lizard shyly. This robot somehow was the Bonnie of the place.
"Say it. You know you want to." the birdroid said as it leaned in closer, sneakily placing one of his legs between the reptile's.
"I- I'm-" her voicebox crackled, matching her discomfort. 'Chico' shuffled slightly, causing the smaller animatronic to cry out.
"Go on." cooed the bird as he raised the dinobot's chin to force her to look at him. "You can say it."
"I'm your- your Bonitor Lizard." the poor thing shamefully said. Before he could relish in it, Ms. Ratel burst out into laughter.
"Hahahaha- that's just cruel!" chuckled the security guard, startling both animatronics as they jumped to face her.
"Who- oh it's you." the bird said as he composed himself. Now that she had a better look, the guard could see that the male Chica's garment still had the Let's Eat logo, it was simply lower where it could be an innuendo. Meanwhile the lizard's two headfrills had shot up. Now that they were face to face, the guard saw dark eye markings around its oculars. It gave off the appearance that she was wearing triangle shades.

    "!-You shouldn't scare people!" whined the dinobot, as she straightened her wide and floppy frills back down her head.
"Those kinda look like bunny ears." the guard said, finishing her thought out loud and pointing.
"They're not!" said a flustered lizardbot, as 'Chico' laughed in response.
"They do a little." he agreed before protruding a measuring tape from an internal compartment. "So the Captain told us everything."
"Us? Kappy didn't tell me anything." the dinobot pouted.
"Okay, me. Told me everything." he relented. Then he circled around the guard and wrapped his tape around her.
"You have three seconds." she stated plainly.
"Don't be like that, I'm just taking your measure-" cooed the bird, before the guard calmly pitched the machine over her shoulder.
"Put me down!" the feathered animatronic spoke frantically before being let loose. "You really are a badger!" he yelled as he fled.
"Next time I think I'll just suplex him." Ms. Ratel said with a crack of her knuckles.
"Please don't mind Chicanery, he wasn't always like that." the lizardbot said with a small laugh. "He wasn't always chicanery."
"What do you mean?" asked the guard, who then saw a look of having said too much on the dino's face. "Nevermind, forget I asked."
"Thank you." she replied before extending a hand out towards the guard. "Welcome to Fredorovich's, I'm Bonika." she said smiling.
"Amber Ratel. Nice to meet you!" the newest member responded happily as she grasped her newest friend's hand.