Chapter Text
Sun could not remember a time before the Daycare. Those initial moments after he was booted up went by in a blur, all action happening without his own input. Thought was not required, just passive submission to his programming. In those first moments, he barely registered all the colors around him, the feeling of solid ground beneath his feet, or the intermingling sounds from a currently unknown number of sources.
“All right, kiddos, I’d like you all to greet our newest animatronic, Sun! Say hello, kids!”
The cacophony of disorganized noise synchronized into greetings that Sun had no trouble deciphering. This was his cue.
Everything else came without any thought of his own. After all, this was what he had been created for.
“Hello, boys and girls, and welcome to the Superstar Daycare!” Sun threw his arms high over his head as a pre-scripted greeting of his own left his voicebox, his words more than loud enough to be heard over the children’s excited murmuring. “I can’t wait to meet all my new friends! I just know we’re going to have so much fun together!”
Sun knelt down to better match the children’s far smaller size as a portion of them broke off from the main group to meet him, crowding around him and poking at the bells on his wrists and all his many ruffles. While his database was already populated with the names of every child here, along with any other pertinent information, it was difficult to pair any of them with their guest profiles without a good look at their faces.
“What are you?” one child asked.
“Why, I am Sun, of course.”
“But what are you? Freddy’s a bear. What are you?”
“I am the Daycare Attendant.”
“He looks like a clown.”
“No, clowns have white makeup and big red noses.”
Another child was tapping one of the bells fastened around his wrists, creating a metallic jingle. “Why do you have bells?”
“Why do you have spikes sticking out of your head?”
“Those are sunbeams, dummy!”
Sun pulled his head back when a child tugged on one of his rays. “We do not call our friends dummies! You should apologize!”
“Sorry… It was just a dumb question, is all.”
“Can you pick me up, Sun-man?” The smallest child in the group attempted to squeeze through the crowd, but was only able to force one arm between the pair of boys in front of her.
“Of course!” Sun stood up just before one of the smaller boys could get a foothold on his leg and reached over the children closest to him. Picking her up, he held her at arm’s length just long enough for his facial recognition software to scan her face.
Name: Hana Tanaka
Gender: Female
Age: 4
Favorite Color: Pink
Legal Guardian: Jun Tanaka
Relation: Mother
Additional Notes: Allergic to peanuts
“Why, hello, Hana, how very nice to meet you!” He pulled her in close as she attempted to wrap a short arm around his neck. In the crook of her other arm was tucked a Chica the Chicken plush. “I think we are going to become very good friends!”
Hana giggled, nodding her head in agreement with enough force that some of her hair flipped into her face. Sun brushed her hair back behind her ear just as someone else was tugging on one of the ribbons around his wrist.
“Can you hold me, too?”
This appeared to be the same boy who had just been trying to climb all over him. With a hand to the boy’s chin, Sun carefully tilted the child’s face up to get a better look at him.
Name: Timothy Duluth
Gender: Male
Age: 4
Favorite Color: Orange
Legal Guardian: Barbara Duluth
Relation: Mother
Medical Condition: Asthma
Additional Notes: No known allergies
Now that the child had been successfully identified, he said, “Of course, Timothy! I would be happy to!”
Sun hoisted Timothy up with his free arm. Without any arms left to spare, any more requests of a similar nature would have to be denied.
Timothy mumbled something under his breath.
“I am sorry, I did not hear you. Could you repeat that?”
Timothy leaned closer and whispered, “Mommy and daddy call me Timmy.”
“Do you want me to call you Timmy, as well?” Sun whispered back.
The boy nodded.
One from a list of questions popped into his queue. “Hey, Timmy, who is your favorite animatronic at the Pizzaplex?”
The answer required a little bit of thinking on Timmy’s part. “Um, Freddy, I guess.” This time, the child’s voice had regained some of its earlier strength.
Sun bounced on his feet, the need for whispering clearly over. “Mine, too!” He turned to Hana. “What about you?”
Hana had no trouble finding an answer. With a bit of maneuvering, she managed to transfer her toy from the crook of her arm to her hand and waved it around. “Chica!”
“Mine, too!” As he updated their entries with this new information, Timmy started pushing one of Sun’s rays back into his head with one fingertip.
“Can I touch your spikes, too?”
Looking down, Sun took notice of a slightly older boy stretching one arm overhead as far as it would reach. Which was just about to the buttons painted on Sun’s chest. As for his request, Sun would have obliged, but it did not seem particularly easy to bend lower with two children tucked snugly in his arms.
“Not right now…” scanning… “David.”
“But they get to!”
By now, both Hana and Timmy were trying to push as many of Sun’s rays into his head as possible. Timmy had only succeeded in getting two, but Hana had managed three by using her plush.
Now that the majority of children had started to lose interest, it seemed some form of entertainment was in order. Sun already had a list of activities, and his system chose one for him. All that was required on his part was to verbalize it.
“Who wants to see a puppet show?”
“Me!” Hana screamed the word, startling Timmy, while a few other children who had already wandered off turned back around at the suggestion.
A chorus of “Me!” and “I do!” confirmed that the idea was most certainly a good one. In fact, one of the only children who had not voiced their approval was David, but he was too busy jumping up and down and trying his hardest to swipe at Sun’s rays. He only succeeded in smacking Timmy in the process.
Timmy’s response was a quiet, “Ow…”
“David, please do not do that! You must apologize for hitting Timmy!”
“I didn't do it on purpose!”
Sun turned his whole body to watch David when the boy attempted to go behind him, still watching Sun’s rays with undivided attention.
“I told you to apologize.”
“It’s okay, I’m fine,” Timmy mumbled, his head now resting on Sun’s shoulder.
David was spared when the other children started chanting a refrain of “puppet show” over and over again. He better not keep them waiting any longer!
“Can you hold me during the puppet show?” Timmy asked, his voice dropping low again.
“That will be a bit difficult,” Sun whispered back. “But I will let you sit in front. How does that sound?”
Timmy did not respond, but he did not say no, either. As far as Sun could tell, the boy looked ready to fall asleep. But naptime was not for many hours. Fortunately, he had just the right solution for this sort of problem.
After giving Timmy a Sunnydrop candy to help with the child’s lethargy, the puppet show could finally commence. As the children gathered around the portable puppet theater he had wheeled out from the closet, Sun grabbed some hand puppets from the storage cabinet, a yellow chicken, a purple bunny, and…a red fox and a brown bear?
For the first time since he had been brought online, Sun became distinctly aware of the gears grinding inside his head as his system searched for an explanation. The rabbit’s appearance was close, but the colors of the bear and the fox were all wrong, not at all like he…
It was not what he remembered.
At the children’s increased goading to start the show, Sun hurried to take his place behind the miniature theater, the bear and the bunny firmly planted on either hand.
The bunny popped out from the curtains first to open the show, waving its little arms around to greet the children. “Hello, boys and girls, it’s sooooo nice to see all your bright and smiling faces today! I’d like you to meet my best buddy, Freddy!”
The brown Freddy popped up, tilting its head as if to tip the tophat firmly sewn upon its head. “Heya, kiddos! How are you all doing today? Bonbon and I are going to tell you a super exciting-”
Giggles erupted from the audience, even before the story had even had a chance to get started.
“That’s not what Freddy sounds like!” one of the children yelled.
“It’s Bonnie, not Bonbon!”
“My mom eats bonbons.”
“Your mom ate Bonnie?”
“And Bonnie doesn’t…wait, what?”
For the second time in just the last few minutes, Sun’s system ground to a halt. Forced to pause his current process, he replayed the opening of puppetshow_01 internally in order to identify the error.
How are you all doing today? Bonnie and I are-
The program was supposed to run automatically. He ran the quickest diagnostic he could to identify the source of the error, only to come back with “No error found”.
“Mr. Sun, are you okay?”
The mention of his name, and the children’s increasing rowdiness, was enough to return Sun’s focus to his external surroundings. Peering through the curtains, he could just make out Timmy jumping up and down, repeating the words “puppet show” through his giggles.
Freddy waved his little arms around as he attempted to regain order, while Bon…Bonnie covered his face in distress. “Please calm down, children! We will continue our story just as soon as Timmy sits back down!”
At the sound of Freddy’s voice, the children started laughing again, repeating their same complaints from earlier. “That doesn’t sound like Freddy at all!”
“You’re doing it all wrong, Mr. Sun!”
As the children’s corrections continued to ring out, David reached forward and pulled Timmy down by the hem of his shirt. Seeing as this had the desired outcome, and Timmy did not protest, this display of roughness would have to be overlooked.
No amount of coaxing on Freddy or Bonnie’s part could convince Timmy to put his socks back on, but the show had been delayed for long enough, and the children had grown ever more restless. The complaints all but ceased, however, as soon as Sun set his system to auto-run and allowed the program to commence without any further interference.
“-story. This one’s all about the time the gang and I went to the park to have a nice pizza picnic when disaster struck! You remember that, Bonnie?”
“Oh, I sure do! Chica put so much work into that pizza, too, but that dastardly pirate Foxy just can’t leave us alone!”
Sun deemed the rest of the puppet show an unequivocal success, as was the heroes’ adventure. Captain Foxy stole all of the pizzas, but Freddy, Bonnie, and Chica used their clever ingenuity, along with the unstoppable power of friendship, to not only get all the pizzas back intact, but to make Foxy see the error of his ways. Until the next show, anyway.
According to Foxy, the moral of the story was about as cheesy as Chica’s extra cheesy, garlic-stuffed-crust pizza, now available in the food court for $19.99.
The children clapped and cheered as Foxy slinked out of view to be hastily replaced by Bonnie, who rejoined Freddy for some final bows and cheers of their own.
And now the children were free to run and scream about the Daycare to their heart’s content, while Sun ensured that all the puppets were safely tucked away back in their cabinet. He turned around when someone tugged on his pant leg.
“Mr. Sun?”
“Yes…” a quick scan paired the newest child’s identity with the correct entry in his database, “Amanda?”
“What happened to Foxy?”
“Well, Amanda, Foxy learned that stealing was wrong, and-”
“Not the one in the puppet show,” Amanda stomped one foot in aggravation. “The real one. Where is he?”
Fortunately, Sun already had an answer to that one. It took him only a moment to retrieve the appropriate message. “Captain Foxy has sailed to distant shores looking for new adventures!” Sun clapped his hands together to let Amanda know how exciting this truly was when she failed to respond appropriately, but she merely continued to stare up at him.
“But…but I miss him.”
Sun leaned in closer as he delivered the rest of the news, which he hoped would suffice to cheer her up. “You can see him in Captain Foxy: The Legend of Skeleton Cay. Now playing in a theater near you. Does that answer your question, Amanda?”
Clearly missing the point of his message, Amanda dropped her head, her bottom lip quivering. He was not quite certain what that expression was meant to convey until she started sniffling, a few tears running down her cheeks.
With his comforting protocol moving to the top of the queue, Sun held his arms out. “Would you like a hug, Amanda? Maybe that would make you feel better.”
Amanda shook her head, wiping her face with her forearm before walking away. With his offer rejected, there was little else he could do but return to his duties.
Sun spent the rest of the morning and beyond keeping a close eye on the children as they crawled through the play structures, scribbled with crayons, and just generally ran and screamed and played games of make-believe. Snacks were distributed precisely at 10:00 AM and lunch at noon, with Sun encouraging cleanup 15 minutes later.
All the while, several staff members kept a close watch over him from behind the security desk situated next to the Daycare’s entrance. One of them was even taking notes on a clipboard, though he did not remember seeing her earlier.
Curiosity caused him to pause for only a moment before one of the adults jumped up from her seat, pointing at something behind him. “Oh, gross! That kid’s sticking stuff up her nose!”
Sun turned around to seek out the child in question. Scanning the children individually, it was not long before he spotted a girl sitting at one of the low plastic tables, sticking a googly eye up her nose with one finger. Sun’s rays retracted of their own accord, and he rushed over to her as quickly as his long legs would allow. Which was, fortunately, fast enough to prevent her from shoving a second one up her other nostril.
“Oh dear, oh dear! What were you thinking? That is not food! And even if it was, you do not eat through your nose!”
His very first crisis, and this one appeared to have no pre-loaded solutions for him to follow. How she had gotten her hands on them, he had no idea, just as he was at a loss for how to get the wayward googly eye out of the child’s nose. He tilted the girl’s head up, studying where the googly eye had vanished into the darkness when the woman with the clipboard knelt down beside him.
“It’s okay, my toddler does this all the time.”
Plugging the child’s other nostril with one finger, she merely instructed the girl to “blow”. Just like that, the googly eye came flying out and landed on the table between them.
Before Sun could grab it, she halted him once more with a raised hand and the words, “Hold on, I got it. I should have a handkerchief in here somewhere.”
Sun scanned the woman’s face as she fished around in her pockets.
Name: Linda Hutton
Gender: Female
Age: 32
Position: Inspector
More information about her experience and previous employment was beyond his security level and inaccessible to him.
Linda picked up the googly eye with a frilly green handkerchief as the child reached for the container of googly eyes once more, but Sun’s far longer arms allowed him to grab it first.
“You’ve been doing very well today, honey.”
“Thank you, Linda. But my name is not honey, it is Sun.”
Linda laughed. “It’s a term of endearment, like sweetheart or sunshine.” She stood, Sun following suit. “And I think it would be best if you referred to the staff on a last-name basis. Keeps things professional that way.”
Sunshine? He liked that one.
“I am sorry…Hutto-”
“Mrs. Hutton. And there’s nothing to apologize for. I understand you’re still learning.” She gave the rescued googly eye another glance, wrinkling her nose in an expression he believed was disgust, before gesturing for him to follow. “Come with me. I’ll introduce you to some of the staff real quick.”
“Yes, Mrs. Hutton.”
Making their way back across the Daycare, she began to introduce the other two people behind the security desk just as Sun was scanning the staff member closest to him.
Name: Stacey Sullivan
Gender: Female
Age: 24
Position: Security Staff
Location: Superstar Daycare
Shift: Evening
Previous Position: Pirate’s Cove Security Staff
Next came the man, who had hastily put his phone away the moment he and Mrs. Hutton had approached.
Name: Steven Johnson
Gender: Male
Age: 21
Position: Security Staff
Location: Superstar Daycare
Shift: Evening
Notes: New hire
Without waiting for Mrs. Hutton to finish, Sun waved at them. “Hello, Mrs. Sullivan and...”
Before he could finish his greetings, Mrs. Hutton was already correcting him. “No, no, sweetie, Miss Sullivan here is unmarried. And this here is Mr. Johnson.”
Sun failed to see why this Sullivan lady’s married status had anything to do with her name. “Miss Sullivan and Mr. Johnson?”
Mrs. Hutton nodded. “That is correct.” Before he could ask for elaboration on the rules, she continued, “Say hi to Sun, you two.”
Miss Sullivan gave a very unenthusiastic and mumbled “hi”, while Mr. Johnson just waved. Sun waved back with both hands. Two people required two hands.
“These two are only some of the people who will be working with you,” Mrs. Hutton went on. “As you may have already noticed, we had different people for the morning shift. Did they happen to introduce themselves to you?”
Sun shook his head and gave a verbal, “No.”
One of them had introduced him to the kids this morning, but he had been too busy with his puppet show to pay them much notice.
“Well, perhaps tomorrow, you can-”
Everyone’s attention was drawn to the Daycare’s double doors when one side opened, allowing two girls to slip through. One wore a baggy hoodie, her hair pulled back in a ponytail, while the other was dressed in a pink sweater decorated with hearts.
Sun was just able to scan the first girl’s face as she marched by, doing her best not to look back over after the initial glance. Rebecca, age 8. As for the other one…
“Girls, make sure you put your shoes in the cubbies!” Mrs. Hutton pointed to the left side of the Daycare.
Sun stepped in front of the other girl, splitting her up from the other. “Welcome, new friend!” He attempted once more to scan her face, but came back with nothing. “I am sorry, but I do not recognize you. You need a guest profile.”
The unnamed child grew stiff under Sun’s scrutiny, glancing over at the adults. “Yeah, about that…my dad said he’d sign me in later.”
“That’s all right, Cassie,” Mrs. Hutton said, walking over to join them, the clipboard tucked beneath one arm.
“But she needs a guest profile. It is a rule.”
Cassie stammered over her next words. “I-I know, but he had to rush off, and…”
Mrs. Hutton patted the girl on the shoulder. “It’s okay. We know Cassie. Her dad’s one of the technicians that work on the robots. Maybe you’ve met him?”
Unless Cassie’s father was Mr. Johnson, that was impossible. He had never been out of the Daycare before. He was not even a day old, after all.
“But it-”
“Cassie, this is Sun. He’s our newest robot.”
“I know.”
“I’m sure the two of you will have lots of fun together. Sun, why don’t you show Cassie where she can leave her backpack.”
This was against protocol, but the rule stating he must follow staff instructions turned out to be stronger in this particular case.
Placing the need for a profile on a temporary hold, Sun clapped his hands together. “Oh, yes…we have cubbies, as was previously mentioned. I will show you. Follow me.”
Cassie shuffled along behind him as Sun led her to the cubbies where the kids kept their belongings. This mainly included shoes and jackets, but they could also be used for storing toys and other things they were not currently playing with, which could otherwise be mistaken for the Daycare’s property.
“Here are the cubbies. They are very useful. You can fit all kinds of things in here. As long as they are small. And you do not have too many of them.”
Pulling her backpack off, Cassie studied the cubbies with a tired look on her face. That was not ideal. All the kids under his care were supposed to be happy, and Cassie did not look happy at all. Perhaps once she tried the cubbies for herself and saw how very practical they were, she would start to feel a little better.
She looked up at him, her mouth tilted in a frown. “My backpack’s not gonna fit.”
“Sure it will. Let me try.” But the cubbies were meant to fit anything the children brought with them. Aside from their sleeping bags and blankets for naptime, but those were stored elsewhere.
Cassie clutched her backpack more tightly when Sun attempted to grab it. “No, that’s fine! I’ll just leave it…over here.” She propped her backpack up next to the cubbies.
On second thought, the backpack did indeed look too big. Perhaps the cubbies were insufficient as she said. “Oh yes, in case you have forgotten, you must also take off your shoes! That is also a rule."
Cassie sighed, but sat down and began tugging her shoes off, revealing white socks adorned with even more pink hearts to match the red ones on her sweater. Perhaps this was a good time to populate a new entry for her in his database until he got an official one from the network.
“Cassie, how old are you?”
“8.”
“What is your favorite color?”
By now, both shoes were off. “Does it matter where I put these?”
That was not an answer, but perhaps he could fathom a guess based on her choice of clothing. “In the cubbies.”
“But does it matter which one?”
“An empty one. Cassie-”
“What?”
“Answer me honestly, please. Do you have any known allergies?”
Cassie shoved her shoes into an empty cubby. “No, um…I’m gonna go see Becky now, if…that’s okay.”
Becky? Sun did a quick search through his database, but the results came back empty. “I am afraid I do not know a Becky.”
“We came in together. It’s short for Rebecca.”
“Oh, yes, I understand. Thank you for the clarification.” Sun made a note in his database to reflect Rebecca’s naming preference.
“Right…” Cassie started to walk by, only to turn right back around before she had gone more than a few feet. “I saw you when you were an endoskeleton. I was there when my dad was putting your shell on.”
Seeing as Sun’s memories could not have possibly extended before today, he had no recollection of what she was talking about. He tried to formulate a response, but his system sent back an error of “insufficient data”.
Unexpected social response…
Initiate distracting protocol
His system cycled through his current list of interactions.
“Cassie?”
“Yeah?”
“Do you like glitter glue?”
She laughed. “Yeah, I love glitter glue!”
After providing Cassie with a freshly opened bottle of pink glitter glue, Sun got back to work patrolling the Daycare, doing his best to keep all the children safe and entertained. Chelsea, the same child who had stuck a googly eye up her nose, was now attempting to gnaw on a crayon, forcing Sun to find her new ways to amuse herself in the form of blocks that were far too large for her mouth or nostrils to accommodate.
He had made sure to check in on Cassie, who now seemed a lot happier than she had upon her arrival. At his approach, she held up a sheet of paper adorned with a picture of…something, which was surrounded by a whole bunch of hearts. Her masterpiece sparkled in the light.
Kneeling down to get a better look, Sun clapped his hands together, causing the bells on his wrists to jingle. “That is very nice, Cassie! You did an amazing job!”
“It’s Roxy. Can you tell?”
He studied the figure in the middle of the page. It was vaguely humanoid in shape, with a scribble for a tail, long hair, and both hands placed on its waist. “Of course, I can tell! It looks just like her!” There was only one animatronic in the Pizzaplex with these features, after all.
“Roxy’s not even pink. Chica’s pink.” Across the table, Rebecca, or Becky, was busy reading some sort of picture book.
“Pink’s all I had, Becky.”
“Do you like picture books, Becky? If you would like, I can read to you.”
Becky lowered the book just enough so that she could peer over the top. Without her full face visible, Sun could not make out her expression. “It’s not a picture book, it’s a graphic novel.”
“That’s just a snobby way of saying ‘comic book’,” Cassie said.
Becky slammed the book down on the table. “Comic books are about muscular men in tights saving the world! I’m reading a graphic! Novel! It’s all about a gryphon prince and his efforts to take back his kingdom from the evil Sorcerer Malastron!”
Cassie did not even look up at her friend’s outburst, but was instead focused on idly screwing and unscrewing the lid back on the bottle of glitter glue. “Come on, Beck, it’s not as serious as all that. It’s got unicorns!”
“No, they’re dark unicorns that impale their foes with their horns!”
Sun gasped as soon as his internal dictionary enlightened him to the meaning of the unfamiliar word. “I am not sure you should be reading anything about impaling! We have plenty of fun fairy tales you can read instead. They even have good morals and happy endings.”
He had read Timmy one earlier that day about a dormouse who ran away from home. The boy had nearly fallen asleep in his lap once his hyperactivity had worn off, but that was nothing another Sunnydrop candy could not fix.
Timmy had been trembling the last time Sun had seen him. To his understanding, that was a sign that a human was cold. Wrapping the child in a blanket did not seem to have helped, though. Fortunately, his mother had picked him up hours ago. Surely, she would know how to handle the situation better than Sun did.
Becky still did not seem too pleased with any of these suggestions. “I don’t want to hear any fairy tales. Those are for babies!”
“Well, fortunately, we only have stories that are appropriate for ages 3-9.”
Becky only stared at him, her mouth drawn up in a snarl, before flipping the book back in front of her face.
Cassie set the bottle of glitter glue aside. “Can I have some colored pencils?”
“We do not have colored pencils. They have sharp points and could poke someone’s EYES out!” Sun found himself yelling the last few words to better illustrate the frightening implications of arming a bunch of uncoordinated children with sharpened pencils. Yes, they were very dangerous. Very dangerous indeed.
Now that he had, hopefully, cleared up any confusion over the Daycare's lack of colored pencils, he continued, “But we do have crayons. Would you like some crayons, Cassie? We have fresh new boxes!” He clapped his hands at the idea and giggled.
“O-okay, crayons are fine.”
“Great, I will be right back!”
Jumping to his feet, he marched over to the nearby supply cabinet, humming along with the music emanating from overhead. It was a very catchy tune indeed. From behind him, he could hear Becky talking.
“Is it just me, or is he kind of creepy?”
Sun tilted his head, a box of crayons in one hand.
“It’s not his fault. Dad said he’d learn the more he’s around people. It’s some AI thing called…deep learning, I think.”
“So they’re using us like guinea pigs, huh? We gotta train the robot to not creep people out?”
“Come on, Becky, he’s not that bad. And besides, he’s trying his best.”
Sun forced himself to turn around just as Becky was muttering, “That thing’s not safe to be around people.” He looked away just as she caught him staring at her.
Both girls grew quiet when Sun returned. "Here are the crayons." Setting them down, he snatched up the bottle of glitter glue. "I will put this away. Let us do our best to keep the Daycare clean, please."
The following hours went by in much the same manner as those that came before. As was the case with the first group, the evening group of children slowly lost interest in the new robot in their midst, with requests for piggyback rides and braided hair eventually dying down entirely. Their energy waned further as the hour grew late, but Sun's protocols were instructing him that no more Sunnydrop candies were to be distributed.
It was at precisely the moment his internal clock hit 6:55 PM that Sun found himself compelled to make a new announcement. “Naptime, children! Get your blankets and sleeping bags!”
Nearby, someone groaned. “Naptime? We’re not babies!”
When Sun located the source of the voice, he took note that it was Becky speaking. “Babies are not allowed in the Daycare, only ages 3-9,” he corrected.
“I know, you’ve already said that before!”
“Then I should not need to repeat myself.”
“But I-I didn't bring a sleeping bag!” This time, it was Cassie speaking.
"Me neither," Becky grumbled.
“It is okay, Cassie. And Becky. I am sure I have some-”
The lights went out, and the next thing Sun knew, he was waking up in a brightly lit Daycare with no recollection of what had taken place during the past…three hours. Nor did he remember climbing onto the play structures where he had since found himself perched.
Below him, the children were rubbing their eyes and picking themselves off the floor from where they had been lying amongst crumpled blankets and sleeping bags. From the front of the Daycare, he could hear the voices of adults he did not recognize calling the children’s names.
As the children retrieved their belongings, with help from the human staff, Sun searched through his memory banks for some record of the past few hours and, upon finding nothing, ran another query to check if some error had taken place. But just as was the case with the puppet show, no such error was found. Everything was functioning exactly as it should.
Before he could think too much further about what had just happened, he recalled a conversation he had been having just prior to the lights going out. Sun dropped lightly down to the padded floor. Normally, this would have gone against his safety protocols, but most of the children had already filtered out of the Daycare, and no one was in danger from his sudden descent.
“Cassie! Cassie?”
“Yeah?”
Sun turned to the sound of her voice. "Did you ever get your…sleeping bag?”
Cassie was already heading towards him, two large bundles in her arms. “Yeah, uh…thanks. Moon got me and Becky something.”
“Moon?” Sun repeated. He did not know that there was someone else in the Daycare. He looked around, but saw no one out of the ordinary.
Becky wandered over, two backpacks slung over either shoulder and Cassie's shoes in one hand. “He’s even creepier than you are.” She dropped her friend's shoes on the floor, Cassie's backpack landing with a muffled thud beside them thanks to a careless shrug.
Cassie shoved the sleeping bags into Sun's arms and picked up her bag. "Becky, shut up!”
"You shut up!”
The girls ran off giggling, Sun's opening to correct the girls' rambunctious behavior now passed. “D-do not forget your shoes!”
"Aw, shoot!" Cassie ran back, already out of breath, and picked up her forgotten footwear. “I’ll see you tomorrow!” Without bothering to put them on, she was off after her friend once more. "Hey, Beck, slow down!"
“Good night, Cassie! I will see you tomorrow, too!” Sun would have waved back, but his arms were full.
Eventually, everyone filtered out of the Daycare, kids and staff alike, and Sun was left to himself to clean up what messes the kids had left behind and organize for the next day. Everyone, that is, except for Mrs. Hutton, who shuffled over just as Sun was putting away the last of the spare sleeping bags, rubbing her eyes with her free hand, the clipboard still clutched in the other.
"Well, looks like you finished your first day," she said, straightening her glasses. "You and Moon did great. But I'll still be watching you both for the next few weeks. Keep in mind this is just the soft opening. That means we won't be opening to the public quite yet."
"Okay, thank you, Mrs. Hutton!"
"Of course, sweetie. I need to head out." She yawned. "I'll see you tomorrow."
"Yes, but…I have a quick question."
"Mm-hmm?"
"Who is…Moon, exactly?"
Mrs. Hutton laughed. "Oh, that's just your night mode. Nothing to think too much about, really." She almost walked away, only to turn back one final time, a finger raised high. "Oh, and one more thing. The lights go out automatically in an hour, so…just a heads up. Bye-bye!"
"Bye-bye!"
Sun stood frozen in place for a moment longer, the same silly music that had been looping all day even more prominent without the many voices of children and staff to drown it out. So Moon was his night mode. Why did he need a separate night mode anyway? He was certain he could handle whatever naptime entailed. And the associated memory loss seemed like a terrible design flaw. But he was not human, so perhaps the one who had programmed him this way knew better.
A far more pressing matter updated into his queue, forcing these concerns aside. He had some organizing to do. He tried his best to keep the Daycare clean and tidy throughout the day, but there was only so much he could do with a bunch of screaming, hyper kids running around.
Sun worked next on gathering up any remaining art supplies that had yet to be properly put away. He paused to study a box of crayons that was missing the yellow one. Oh, this was not good at all! Without yellow, how could anyone draw him? From what he could see of himself, he was very yellow indeed. The only other colors that he was aware of was the red of his ruffles and pants and the orange of his slippers. Thankfully, both of those colors were present and accounted for, but that did not make the situation any less dire.
Sun looked for the missing crayon, resorting to checking under the small plastic tables and chairs on his hands and knees when it did not readily present itself.
But why had Cassie and Becky talked about Moon as if he was someone else? On second thought, even Mrs. Hutton had implied as much.
“I'll still be watching you both-”
Sun snatched the missing yellow crayon from where it had rolled amongst a pile of foam shapes with a triumphant, “Ho ho, I got you!” Upon closer inspection, this was only the bottom half. His rays retracted partially into his head.
How could any kid use it like this? This was truly the worst disaster he had faced thus far! And on his very first day, too!
“No no no, where is the top? Oh, where could it possibly be!” he asked out loud, looking this way and that with renewed desperation. Who had done this anyway? Cassie had not broken any of her crayons! They had all been returned completely intact.
What little rule-breaker had to ruin playtime for everyone else! Was it Becky?
Sun sat very still, focusing on the whirring of the gears inside his head, clicking in precise rhythm like the hands of tiny, unseen clocks.
Two halves of a whole were not much use apart, he thought. He did not know why the idea had popped into his mind. Or why it made him feel…no, he did not know what this feeling was.
Machines like him did not have feelings, so he must have been mistaken. He was merely experiencing a logic error.
Sun ran his third diagnostic that day. As before, it returned "No error found". Nevertheless, he could not shake the feeling that…there was that word again.
He could not shake the belief that something inside him was deeply, irrevocably broken.