Disclaimer: I don't own anything in this story!

A/N: Finally, another chapter! As always, flames will be thrown in the chocolate river, but all other reviews are more than welcome! :) Oh, and thank you to the one person who reviewed the last chapter! :)

Ronnie sighed. Things had not been going well for her at work. Ever since she'd made an idiot out of herself by running out of the factory, she had been feeling rather depressed. That and the fact that she couldn't seem to stop thinking about Willy hadn't exactly made it easy to concentrate on work! Today, unfortunately, was no exception. Her day had begun with her oversleeping after failing to set her alarm the night before. As a result, she almost went over the speed limit trying to get to work on time! Luckily, she DID arrive at work on time, but that was pretty much the only good part of the day.

The minute she arrived at work, Ronnie ducked into the bathroom to make sure she hadn't put her uniform on backwards or something in her hurry to get to work on time. Luckily, she hadn't. She almost wished she had, though, as the front of the shirt said "Slugworth Chocolates Incorporated", accompanied by the company logo. It was bad enough that she basically had to advertise for that despicable excuse for a candy-maker. Even worse than that, however, was the fact that Slugworth's name and company logo were printed right across her "assets", if you will.

She couldn't decide if Slugworth was a pervert, had a twisted sense of humor, or both. In any case, Ronnie never had been able to stand that shirt, and today she hated it more than ever. "I would love to burn this awful thing!" she thought (luckily not out loud!). Reluctantly, she headed to her work station.

Because there were so many different jobs that needed to be done in the factory and not all the candies were worked on every day, Ronnie and her co-workers had different tasks each day, based on what needed to be done on that particular day. Today, Ronnie's task was to work the machines that mixed the batter for Slugworth's Chocolate Bars. As the mixers hummed away, Ronnie noticed her reflection in the shiny metal of one of them. As she looked at her reflection's earrings, she suddenly had an idea: Candy earrings! She was actually a bit surprised that Willy hadn't thought of that before.

"I've got to write that idea down!" Ronnie thought. She reached into her purse and pulled out the notepad she always carried with her. "Candy earrings," she wrote. Then she pulled another pad out of her purse, her sketch pad. Smiling, she began drawing designs for candy earrings. She sketched for awhile until she was suddenly startled by a loud, mechanical nose. It sounded like gears sticking together or something. With a sinking feeling, Ronnie realized what was happening. "The mixers!" she cried. She had gotten so into sketching that she had completely forgotten to watch them!

She quickly ran over to the controls and checked the temperature and pressure gauges. To her horror, both were increasing at an alarming rate. Then, before she could even think about what to do about the malfunctioning machine, chocolate began spraying everywhere. Ronnie ran to the machine's emergency shut-off button and pushed it. Despite her quick reaction, the room looked as though a chocolate tornado had hit it. Practically everything in the room, including Ronnie, was covered in chocolate. Then Ronnie did something that she almost never did: She shouted a word that would make Mr. and Mrs. Bucket cover Charlie's ears.

Just when Ronnie was thinking that things couldn't possibly get any worse, the door open and Slugworth walked into the room. Obviously he had been walking by and heard Ronnie's outburst. "He WOULD pick right now to walk by!" Ronnie thought. "What is the meaning of this?" Slugworth demanded. "The machine broke down," Ronnie said meekly. "I can see that! Now go clean yourself up and then report to my office!" Slugworth said. "Yes, sir," Ronnie replied. With that, Slugworth turned and left the room.

When Ronnie reached the shower room (considering the often messy nature of working with candy, showers were a necessity at Slugworth's!), she realized that she had quite a dilemma on her hands. Her clothes were covered in chocolate and obviously needed to be removed to be cleaned properly (not to mention the fact that the wetness and stickiness of the chocolate on her clothes was making Ronnie very uncomfortable!). However, she didn't have any spare clothes with her (ordinarily she did bring a spare uniform with her, just in case, but in her hurry to get to work on time that morning, she'd forgotten.). Obviously she couldn't just waltz into Slugworth's office naked!

Finally, Ronnie decided to take off her clothes, scrub them off as best she could, and put them back on once she was finished showering. She didn't exactly relish the thought of putting dirty clothes back on after showering, but she didn't have any other options. So Ronnie stripped, showered, and did her best to scrub off her clothes. Unfortunately, all she succeeded in doing was making them look horribly stained instead of like she had just taken a bath in chocolate.

After showering and dressing, Ronnie took a deep breath and headed for Slugworth's office. Slugworth didn't even bother to say hello. He just pointed to a chair and said, "sit." Ronnie did as she was told. "Veronica Wells, you ought to be ashamed of yourself! How could you have let this happen?!" Slugworth roared. "I was just writing down and drawing an idea for a new candy to pass the time while the mixers mixed the chocolate, and..." Ronnie began. Slugworth cut her off. "You know that you are not to focus on anything other than the task at hand when you are working in this factory!" he shouted at her. This was followed by him hurling several expletives at her.

"I'm sorry," Ronnie said softly as she fought back tears. Those awful names that Slugworth had just called her really hurt. "Like that's going to fix anything! Your pay for today has been reduced by half, and if you mess up just one more time, you will not get ANY pay for today!" Slugworth shouted. Then he gave Ronnie her assignment for the remainder of her shift.

Luckily, Ronnie managed to finish her shift without any more mishaps. Even so, she had never been so glad to leave work in her entire life! Gratefully, she headed for home, stopping to pick up her mail on the way. "What a rotten day!" Ronnie said aloud as she collapsed onto the couch. Feeling rather depressed, she began to look through her mail. Most of it was junk...but there was one very peculiar envelope. It was pink and had pictures of strawberries on it. When she looked at the return address, she nearly fell off the couch. It was from Willy Wonka!

A/N: Sorry about the cliffhanger! I just couldn't resist!

Chapter 9 Preview: We find out just what it is that Willy sent Ronnie, and Ronnie experiences a bad case of nerves!