I inched away from the phone on the desk that crackled with static even long after the strange and unnerving recording we had heard was finished. Grimacing, I told Frida, "I think I want to keep my frontal lobe, so therefore I should never have signed up for this job, huh? At least I brought one of my friends since middle school with me- safety in numbers they say."
Frida was frantically chewing on the tip of her ponytail, streaks of coppery red glinting in the darkness. "Might as well check the cameras," she said, but her smile was a bit wobbly and not very reassuring. Cautiously, she clicked on the flashlight and moved to a camera. There were three animatronics- a bear with a top hat, a purple rabbit with a red bowtie, and finally a darker yellow chicken with a bib. The bib was sprinkled with confetti and read, "Let's Eat!" in bright, colorful letters. The fact that animatronics could look so comical was almost soothing, but if it weren't for the bear's sharp teeth I would have relaxed completely.
"Let's check the next camera," I said. We moved on to the next camera, where there was a fox animatronic standing behind a rather taped up and dilapidated stage, with purple curtains that had silver stars painted on them. The animatronic itself had pieces of metal tearing through the softer, furry coating and I felt a small spark of sadness well up inside of me.
"Aw, poor guy," Frida said. She clicked back to another camera and opened her mouth in shock, half-whispering, "The chicken moved!"
Perhaps I didn't feel so sorry for these animatronics anymore, no matter how dilapidated they were.
"Where?" I asked, clicking off the flashlight.
"She's in the dining area! The bear hasn't moved yet though." Then I looked next to one of the mechanical doors and stifled a scream, closing it by pressing the button.
"It's the fox! I-" I was interrupted by a loud banging on the door and rolled my eyes. "Well, at least if we die he's going to be a little more polite by actually knocking, right?"
Frida was too busy staring out at the other door, where the chicken awaited us. She tried to close the door, but it was too late- all we heard was a creak of metal as it entered the room. We were staring death in the face now as we opened our squeezed shut eyes, and death was rather… cute looking.
In place of the chicken stood a tiny little chick chibi- fluffy yellow feathers and all- with big, quivering violet eyes. It wore a bib around its neck that read, "Let's Eat!"
"Aww…" I said, scooping up the tiny chibi into my arms. "What's your name?" I cooed, stroking the soft feathers atop its head. It was so squishy… and small… and fluffy… and cute…
"Chica!" the chicken animatronic spoke in a high-pitched, childish voice of a little girl despite the fact that it was an animal chili of al things. The chicken flapped its tiny little side wings up at me, eyes sparkling. D'awwwwwww-
"OW!" Frida yelped, clutching one leg and hopping around. I stood up, still holding and stroking Chica, and asked, "What's happening?"
"This little devil chomped on my leg!" She hollered. I stared down at her leg, where a tiny bear chibi with a black top hat and bowtie gazed up at her with innocent china blue eyes. It eld a tiny microphone in his paw, and I tried to tug it off of Frida's leg while Chica perched on top of my head.
Wait… these two looked an awful lot like the animatronics we had just seen on the security cameras only a few minutes ago.
"Are you," I started, asking both the bear and Chica, "The animatronics we saw on the cameras?"
"Yep!" The bear animatronic bobbed his head up and down happily. "I'm Freddy Fazbear, the best singer here!" It was definitely hard to believe that these little chibis were really the terrifying animatronics outside.
"There's more of us!" China added, flapping her wings.
"By 'more of us' do you mean the bunny and the fox!"
"Yep!" Freddy bobbed his furry little head happily. "Bonnie and Foxy!"
"You forgot Goldie!" Chica complained.
"But he's always so quiet…" Freddy paused and decided that it was then a good moment to stare up at Frida's head. She wasn't glaring at them, just looking shocked.
"What is it?" she asked, eying Freddy.
"You said that Goldie's very quiet, but now he's here."
"It's me!" A tiny, squeaky boy's voice declared. I looked on Frida's head and lying there was a tiny bear chibi like Freddy, except instead of black his top hat and tie were either a dark purplish color or navy, it was hard to tell in the dark. The little chili's fur was a dark yellow, and his sclerla were pitch black with white irises and no pupils. "I'M Goldie!" it declared, hopping off Frida's head and staring smugly at Freddy.
"Hey! Just 'cause you have magic powers doesn't mean you're the boss," Freddy pouted, crossing his arms over his chubby body.
"I USED to be the boss," the yellower bear retorted. "That means I'm your big brother, Freddy! And the little brother always has to do what the big brother tells him to!" While Freddy and Goldie began to bicker and their argument gradually turned louder and louder, I turned to the doorway to find another chibi peeking its head through. It was a purple rabbit chibi, much like the animatronic we had seen, with big hot pink eyes and a red bow perched on one ear.
"What's your name?" I asked.
"B-Bonnie…" it whispered.
"Are you the bunny I saw on camera?" It nodded, and I could have sworn that I saw tears pricking at the edges of its big pink eyes. One of the large ears flopped over, and even though the rabbit animatronic outside had a red bowtie, I was still unsure as to whether to ask if Bonnie was a boy or a girl but I decided not to assume anything until further notice.
That, or I could just ask one of the other chibi animatronics.
I knelt down next to Goldie, who was trying to chase his "little brother" that was hopping around on the floor.
"Goldie?" I asked.
"Can't talk now! I'm chasing Freddy!" Frida had also decided to try running after them, since it looked as if things in the office were going to soon become rather chaotic if this didn't stop. Chica was merely sitting on the desk by herself and holding the cupcake that came as a decoration on the desk.
"Hey Chica?" I asked. She looked up from the cupcake.
"Hmm?"
"I just wanted to ask-" I cleared my throat- "Is Bonnie a boy or girl?" I gestured to the purple rabbit chibi who was currently curled up in the chair near the desk.
"Well, they wanted Bonnie to be a boy, but even though she has a bowtie she's a girl," Chica said. Just then, Bonnie hopped off of the chair and over to the doorway, hugging a darkly lit silhouette. After it stepped into the light, I realized it was the fox animatronic half-hidden behind the stage. It had dark red fur, an eyepatch and a hook, and a large bushy red tail.
"Foxy!" Bonnie said.
"Bonnie!" The so-called Foxy said. Then Foxy parted from the hug and sent a glare up at me.
"Yaargh! Fear the terror of Freddy's, the undefeated pirate foxy!" It had attracted Frida's attention as well and the animatronic repeated, "YARGH!" Noticing that we were indifferent, it asked, "Yaargh? Why are you not scared of me? You're supposed to be scared!"
I just started laughing at his antics. "Aw, that's adorable!" Foxy stomped his foot (paw?) and protested, "BUT I'M NOT CUTE! Why does everyone say I am?"
"Because you are," Frida said, scooping him up into her arms. He stopped protesting and leaned against her chest, saying, "Well, maybe having people call you cute isn't so bad…"
So, here we were. Security guards at a failing pizzeria with five little animal chibis that we needed to take care of. Looks like the boss wouldn't mind that and be so happy that his well-loved animatronics managed to turn themselves into the living equivalent of plushies (Note the sarcasm). But for now, we decided to enjoy how cute they all were while we could.
So Frida and I stayed there our first night, playing with them and telling them stories and hugging them. Perhaps the boss wouldn't like this, but at least the little guys had someone to take care of them for a while. They must get lonely during the day as robots with no one to actually talk to since they have programmed voices, right? And now they did have someone to play with.
Now, what were we going to say to our boss...