"It really isn't a good idea to get on his bad side."
I know. I couldn't help it, though! It was right there! I had to take it!
"Just because it was doesn't mean it was right."
Anyway, escape plans.
"That's futile. There are two entrances to the Daycare: that slide and those big doors. Sun can get from one to the other in less than seven seconds. I've seen him pick up a kid from the ball pit and then rush a kid trying to go behind the security desk."
What about if I make a mess and then run for it?
"Run for what? The slide he can climb up faster than you can or the locked door?"
Gregory growled to himself and leaned on one of the structures near the security desk. Fine. What's your idea?
"Wait."
Wait?
"For your stepdad to come pick us up."
Gregory jolted and threw Bonnie out at arm's length so he could look him square in the face. "Are you nuts?!" he squawked. He gritted his teeth to keep from wincing. Don't you know what happened the last time we saw him?
"Yes, I do. But if it saves you from this horrible time loop, I don't care, anymore. Just hand me over to Sun and I'll stay with the other toys here. I won't be as well taken care of here as I will be with you, but I won't be ever be alone and you'll be free."
Gregory shook his head and hugged Bonnie. No. Absolutely not. I'd rather stay here–and I mean stay here, I won't leave the doors at six am–then give you up. I mean it. You're my best friend, Bonnie. I promised I'd do anything to keep you safe and I meant it.
"You're the best friend anyone could ever ask for, you know that? Please, if the opportunity arises and you can get out of this time loop… even if you have to leave me behind to do it… do it."
"Not leaving you behind," Gregory mumbled. "I'll stay in this stupid pizzeria forever but I'm not leaving you behind." He sighed. "Okay, now that you're done distracting me, Bonnie, escape options."
Beep! Gregory winced. He tapped his glasses. [I heard that! :)]
Gregory growled, "Would you stop spying on me? …also, how the heck did you put a smiley face on that? Are you typing?" He looked around, but he couldn't immediately spot the Daycare Attendant.
Beep! [Magic~!]
He rolled his eyes. Whatever. "Hey, since you're at it, can you give me permission to use the cameras?"
Beep! [What do you say?]
"Please?" he asked, unconvinced.
Beep! [Only because I know how responsible you are. But if you give me any reason to think you're being naughty, I'll take it back! ]
Gregory blinked. No. No, way. He tapped his glasses. His CAMS tab, previously nothing but static, now had a few shapes with a couple of squares. There were only four cameras–in his experience, there were over a dozen throughout the Daycare area including the theater–and they all pointed into the play pen. "Uh… thanks."
Beep! [You're welcome! :) Remember, Gregory, I'm being nice. But if you break any rules, I'll take it back.]
"Okay, yeah." Gregory nodded, though he knew Sun wouldn't be able to see him. Gregory looked around and climbed into the structure behind himself so that he could watch the security desk without being watched back. This structure was halfway across the play place with an entire sectioned off area in front of the slide with toys on multicolored squishy tiles between the mouth of the curly slide and the desk. He also needed to get on his knees and look over the yellow plastic board attached to the blue slide to see the security desk.
Gregory sat down in his corner, set Bonnie on his lap, and watched a camera focused on the huge area in the front, mainly the yellow patch in front of the right structure with a bit of the security desk in view. He glanced at the security desk, where the person behind the desk was watching the cameras. He moved the camera himself to the left to see the security desk and then zoomed in. When the security guard didn't react–unfortunately he couldn't zoom all the way on the person as the camera didn't reach that far and would instead zoom in on the floor in front of the desk–Gregory put more of his attention on the cameras. He spotted Sun chasing a kid–no, running from a kid. A few children were running from a little boy. Said boy patted Sun's ankle and suddenly all the children were running from Sun.
"Pfft. You got caught easy."
Beep! Gregory had to switch tabs to read the chat log. [That's part of the fun! Do you want to come play? :D]
"Nah, you play your baby games." Gregory bit back a yawn. I could use the energy for when I'm playing tag with Vanny. He couldn't help the bitter thought. He went back to the cameras. At times, he meandered around to inspect the play structures and ground for any ways of escape, but Sun always grabbed his attention again with some new game.
"That's a terrible hiding place," Gregory pointed out as Sun hid behind a giant plush cube, his spokes sticking out the top.
Beep! [Says the one with the camera! I'd say I have a pretty good hiding place thank you very much.]
A little girl peeked around the cube and tagged his shoulder. Sun popped up and threw his arms up in celebration.
Yeah, they were baby games, and the kids were on the younger side, but maybe being stuck up here alone was…
Gregory asked, "If I promise to come back, can I leave? Just to go to Roxy Raceway for a little bit?"
Beep! [No can-do, Friend. I can't let anyone leave without a parent, guardian, or staff member accompanying them. Did you want to meet Roxanne?]
"No. I just… met someone else. I thought she might still be there, or something is all. She's more fun than a bunch of three-year-olds."
Beep! [You made a friend? Well… I'm sorry, I wish I could, but not even for a friend.]
Gregory let a breath out through his teeth. "Oh, whatever." He went back to his camera watching. Bonnie, he said my glasses were connected to the network, right?
"Yeah."
Why hasn't anyone else tried talking to us?
"Before we put them in Safe Mode, they mostly just tried killing you. I don't think it occurred to them to try. I don't know if they were even thinking."
Gregory switched to the camera above the security station. If my glasses are connected to the network, do you think I can contact someone?
"I don't think that's a good idea. Just keep your head low."
Gregory turned his head and peeked out over the clouds. I'm just curious… but fine. His eyes fell over a mop bot, and a couple of wet floor bots some distance away. He could barely see them around the edge of the cloud. You know, they never attacked me.
"Mop bots may alert for intruders, but their main priority is cleaning so at night, if you leave them alone, they'll leave you alone. Wet Floor bots are perfectly harmless. I think. Their coding is very rudimentary."
Gregory grinned. You mean like… a "fifth grader whose really good at coding could hack it" rudimentary?
"Gregory don't! You'll make Sun mad at you!"
I won't get caught. Don't worry.
"Okay, genius coder, how are you going to get it to come over here so you can hack it? You neither have the tools nor ability to get over there. If you did, we wouldn't even be considering this right now."
Gregory scoffed. "You're such a wet blanket sometimes, you know that? Er, Bonnie. Not you, Sun. Because you're still spying on me. I know it."
"Tch. Being realistic."
Gregory perked up. Hold on, a wet blanket! Those things love going to spills, right? So, we just gotta make a spill over here.
"Through the glass?"
Shush! Gregory tipped his head back. How would he get something spillable over the ten-foot-tall glass wall without Sun catching on? He hummed and looked out into the hall again. Finally, he asked, "Hey, Sun? Do those Wet Floor bots ever come in here?"
Beep! [Nope! Wet Floor bots go to the nearest mess and let out an alert for a mop bot. As I have the Daycare very well taken care of, they have no need to come here.]
"Okay. There's one outside. They never attacked me or anything at night."
Beep! [I expect not! They're completely harmless. :)]
"Can I talk to one?"
Beep! [Well, no. They have speakers but weren't coded to talk.]
Gregory rolled his eyes. "Okay, yeah. But I still want to talk to one. Can't I talk to it through the glass or something? People talk to dogs all the time and they don't talk back."
Beep! [Oh! Well, maybe there's one to spare somewhere. Come over to the window here!]
Gregory slid down out of the structure and ran out into the play place behind it. Sun skipped over to the play stove up against the window-wall and then bent down with his hands on his knees and his face close to the glass. One of the Wet Floor bots that had been watching the Mop bot rolled up to the window and stared up at Sun. Sun looked at Gregory. "Here you go! I put his priority to very low so other bots will be called before it, but they are busy bees, so keep that in mind."
Gregory grinned. "Thanks, Sun!" He ran up to the window, where the Wet Floor bot immediately stared at him. He tipped his head and moved one hand up and out to the side. The bot didn't follow his hand. However, when he stepped to the side, it twisted around to follow him. He shuffled to the side, and it rolled with him. Gregory grinned. See, Bonnie? No spill required and we practically got Sun's permission.
"Bad idea."
"You're way different than the other bots. Why do you follow me and not my hand?" He tipped his head but was not followed. Unfortunately, he tipped himself over enough to throw himself off balance and he threw both arms out to catch himself. The Wet Floor bot followed his left hand–more precisely, it followed Bonnie.
Gregory regained his balance again. "You like Bonnie, huh?" He held out Bonnie and moved him. Wet Floor bot's square, bear-eared head followed Bonnie. "Heh. I do, too. He's my best friend. I hear a lot of funny things about the bots around here. Do you have a friend?" Gregory tapped his glasses. This would be a lot harder without a keyboard or tablet. But maybe he could pull it off.
The Wet Floor bot beeped.
"Oh, you do? Is your friend at work?"
The Wet Floor bot beeped.
"Maybe your friend will be able to visit later," Gregory suggested, wrinkling his nose, and glaring at the screen in his glasses. How did he get out of these tabs…? There! He let out a short, silent breath and carefully tapped through more screens that started popping up on his glasses, which by now completely engulfed the left side of his vision.
The Wet Floor bot beeped again in the same monotone pitch.
"Yeah, after it's done with work. How do you like work, anyway? The glamrocks and Sun say that they like their jobs. Do you like your job?" Gregory bit his lip, his finger hovering over his glasses. Okay, so, this was way more complex than he previously assumed. This was… high school coding level at least, if not more advanced. No! No room for doubting! Just, the bot is right there!
The Wet Floor bot beeped.
"I'm guessing that's a 'yes'?" Uh… oh! Profiles?
The Wet Floor bot beeped.
Well, he wasn't looking for profiles, he was looking for bots. Unless that's how he was going to find the bot. Did a Wet Floor bot have a profile? "Do you have a name?"
The Wet Floor bot beeped.
"No?" Gregory prompted, struggling to make his own narrative at the same time as navigate this new Hell he'd made for himself. "Can I give you a name?" He went into profiles. Whoa, shit. There were children's folders, as in children for the Daycare. Children in the Pizzaplex. There were staff, S.T.A.F.F., and the bots. When Sun meant… what was Monty thinking? Well, it wasn't like Gregory was going to be doing anything bad. Monty probably didn't even think Gregory could have gotten to it or thought about trying.
The Wet Floor bot beeped.
Gregory, by now his entire glasses screen filled with icons, folders, and a few prompts he struggled to get through with just the ability to tap on his glasses–he wasn't risking attempting a voice command–said, "Well, you really seem to like Bonnie. Bonnie, what do you think?"
"Are you seriously asking me to name this wet floor sign?"
Wet Floor bot, excuse you. It's a bot, it has feelings.
"Gregory, this is a mistake, a huge error. This is a bad–"
I'll call it Bob.
"Oh my–fine. Springy."
Springy?
"Yeah, like dandelions. In the spring. They're yellow."
Gregory barely stopped himself from rolling his eyes. "Bonnie thinks Springy is a good name. What do you think?" He got to the folder of Wet Floor bots and the ID list exploded. It was endless! Which one was this?!
The Wet Floor bot beeped.
Something on his glasses flickered. He squinted. The ID between "ID-WFB_199856" and "ID-WFB_199854" changed positions. On a hunch, he scrolled up and burst into laughter. "ID-WFB-Springy_199855" stared back at him. "Oh, you like that name, Springy?"
The Wet Floor bot, Springy, beeped the same monotone beep.
"Well, then, you'll be known henceforth as Springy." Gregory tapped the ID. A window with a screen of blinking green numbers flashed down it. He decidedly closed it. I… can't mess with him.
"Why? Does it need a password?"
No. You named it! What if I break it accidentally? I can't break something with a name!
"Oh my God, Gregory, this was a problem of your own creation!"
I know! Gregory bit back a sigh and looked at Springy. An idea popped into his head. Actually, I have an idea. "So, what's it like being a Wet Floor bot, Springy?" He clicked on the ID again and the black window with code popped up again. Upon closer inspection, and after getting over the initial shock, this coding did seem familiar. It looked a lot like the more advanced stuff in their class. Simple compared to a lot of the other stuff he'd been seeing to this point. He couldn't imagine what the Glamrocks' must look like–or Sun and Moon's for that matter.
Springy beeped again.
"So, I'm guessing it's good, but it has it's down times?" Gregory made the generic guess. He kept scrolling, skimming as quickly as he could while still actually searching. Again, he wished for a tablet or at the very least a keyboard.
Springy beeped.
Gregory hesitated. He said that he put Springy at a low priority, right?
"Yeah, I think so."
Well, it looks like if I change this little bit here, I can get it to prioritize following us over a mop bot.
"Why, though?"
Because it's funny. I dunno.
"'Because it's funny.' You're getting us arrested because it's funny?! Are you kidding me?!"
Come on, free Springy! He's been bound here for too long! Free Springy! Free Springy! Gregory snickered to himself and asked, "How do you like the mop bops, Springy?" Let's ask him. See what he thinks.
"We're getting arrested."
Springy beeped.
"So-so, huh?" Gregory prompted and tapped the line of code.
"I swear to God. Gregory, Springy doesn't have feelings!"
Oh, but he shouldn't be so stupid as to put his own name. …Bonnie. Springy shall follow Bonnie. It took a while to alter it as he had to essentially go through each letter individually, and each letter needed to be chosen individually as it started out automatically as "A" and each tap turned it into an "a" then "B", "b", "C" and further down until he stopped for a few seconds, at which point it would stop flashing and a new letter would appear. Still, he was patient and he triple-checked the new line and then continued.
"You're the worst."
"How about the Security bots?" For a "simple" bot, there were a lot of lines here.
Springy beeped.
"Ouch, not a fan, huh? Yeah, me neither. What do they do? Run into you?" He decided to skim faster. Most of this crap was just about messes and pathing, anyway.
Springy beeped.
"Yeah, they're the worst." He stopped at one point and read over a few lines over reactions to being struck but kept moving. The thing had virtually no responses other than letting out a distress signal. Like a plant! Heh.
…he just stole the electronic equivalent of a potato, didn't he?
Well, he didn't steal it. Technically, all he did was make it prefer following Bonnie instead of a mop bot, and that was already a given, honestly. He already liked Bonnie. If Springy tried to leave the Mega Pizzaplex, well, Gregory wouldn't help or hinder it. Finally, Gregory saved his changes and left the program.
Springy beeped.
Hey, Bonnie? Springy is officially your number two fan.
"If I had hands, I would strangle you."
Gregory hurriedly tapped his glasses to go back. "How about the Glamrocks? Do you talk to them often?"
Springy beeped.
"Oh, never talk, I see. That's a shame. They're really nice." Gregory went back to his chat log and then minimized it so he could see through his glasses again.
Springy beeped. Then, Springy let out another beep without being prompted. Gregory tipped his head.
Bells.
He bristled and spun around. Gregory looked up as Sun stopped behind him, hands on his hips and head cocked. "Gregory, I thought we talked about this!"
"Talked about what?" Gregory asked, scrambling to feign confusion. "You said I could talk to Springy!"
Sun's face was stuck in a permanent smile, but Gregory had the distinct feeling that Gregory's charade was not nearly convincing enough. Sun's voice dipped into a warning, "Gregory, that's not what we talked about."
"Busted."
Shut up!
Gregory glanced back at Springy and then at Sun. He let out a short sigh. "Okay, fine. But I wasn't stealing Springy or doing anything wrong! I did just want to play a little."
"P-play a little?!" Sun sputtered. "Gregory, Fazbear security just alerted the front desk to a possible security breach! You can't play with bots like that. It's against the rules to tamper with bots!"
"I didn't know!" Gregory scoffed.
"Gregory. You can't tell me you didn't know tampering with bots was against the rules."
"Well, yeah, but I didn't know everyone would make such a big deal about it. It's just Springy. He can't even do much."
Springy beeped.
Sun twitched. "That was still very wrong!" He turned to Springy. "Thank you very much, Wet Floor bot. You may go back to your station."
Gregory looked back. "What? No! Why?"
Springy started to move back, but stopped and looked at Gregory–more specifically, Bonnie.
Sun's rays twitched. "Please go back to your station, Friend."
Springy rolled forward to the glass.
Sun turned back to Gregory. Gregory shrank back into himself and hugged Bonnie tighter. Sun asked, his voice thin but calm, "Gregory, what kind of playing did you do to this bot?"
"Nothing much," Gregory muttered. "I saw how much he liked Bonnie. So, I just changed his priorities a little. Now he prioritizes Bonnie over the mop bots. Or, everyone else, I guess. I swear he already liked Bonnie before. He even followed Bonnie with his head! Springy, you did that before, right?"
Springy beeped.
Sun buried his face in his hands. "Oh, Gregory, that is against the rules! You can't tamper with the bots! How did you even do that, anyway?"
Gregory tried a shaky smile. "Magic…?"
Just then, the second Wet Floor bot rolled over to them, its job apparently finished. Gregory looked at it and then Sun. "Look! Watch this!" He held up Bonnie. Springy and the new Wet Floor bot tipped their heads back to look at Bonnie and then followed the rabbit from there. "See? So, it wasn't a huge change. All I did was make him want to follow Bonnie, not just look at him."
Sun said, "Gregory, the Wet Floor bots are there to warn guests of spills. They don't have feelings." Then, he held out his hand. "You can have those glasses back at the end of the day. But if I can't trust you to behave with them, then I can't let you wear them."
"My gator glasses? But Monty gave them to me!" Gregory held onto them as if just the thought of losing them would cause them to fly away.
"Do you want to be put in Time-Out, too?" Sun prompted, now in a sterner voice. Yeesh, this guy.
Gregory narrowed his eyes. After a long moment passed between them, Gregory finally took off his glasses. He blinked and rubbed his eyes at the harsh returning light as it lost its muted, purplish hue. "Oh, ow. Was the light always that bright?"
Sun chuckled and gently folded the glasses. "It's always bright during the day, Gregory!"
"I'm becoming nocturnal," Gregory grunted, still squinting. He opted to bury his face in Bonnie's head. "That it?"
Sun, no longer holding the glasses, clapped his hands together, ringing the bells on his wrists. "That's it! Go play, Gregory! Have some fun!"
Gregory, a hand over his eyes and squinting hard, slunk back into the structure around the ball pit and hid in the dark corner where he'd taken his nap. He could lay down in peace here, but there was no way he was sleeping even as exhausted as he was. Too many thoughts buzzed in his mind. Everything was way too bright. He didn't have his gator glasses. He pulled out his cupcake charm and held the loop through his finger and let it dangle in front of him for a few moments. He stashed it away and went back to hugging Bonnie and glaring at the wall. Eventually, his eyes readjusted to the light.
"You did realize that nothing good was going to come from that, right?"
I told you to shut up.
Sun did come back a few minutes later, but only to ask, "Gregory, would you like to join us for a puppet show?"
"No," Gregory muttered, glaring at the wall.
"Okay! Well, I'll be out in the play place if you change your mind!"
The amount of children in the play place dwindled further and further until finally, the giant double doors closed behind the very last children.
Bells jingled nearby but stopped short of his little corner. "Well! We still have a few more minutes to play! What do you want to do?"
Gregory looked up at the corner where his voice emanated. They're going to call the cops on me.
"Probably."
How do I stop them?
"You can't. Talk to Sun. He's worried."
"I dunno. I…" He sighed and rolled onto his back. "I don't want to play games. I don't want to be here. I don't want to be at the Mega Pizzaplex, anymore."
"I'm sorry, Gregory. I'm sure someone is going to pick you up any time now!"
"Why can't I go by myself?" Gregory asked, shoving energy he didn't have into his voice.
"It won't work if you leave. You need someone to take you." The bells on Sun's wrists clinked as his hand appeared around the corner, Gregory's Gator Glasses held on his open palm. Gregory immediately sat up and put his glasses back on. Weirdly, the other cameras in the Daycare were open so all fifteen were accessible to him. He clicked out of the CAMs tab, picked up Bonnie, and crawled around to the mouth of the corner to look at Sun. The Daycare Attendant crouched on his knees, his pupilless, milky white eyes on Gregory.
Gregory's eyebrows furrowed. "What does that mean? I bet I could make it to the front doors from here."
Sun chuckled, though the noise didn't seem particularly happy. "Oh, I bet you could! But… well, you've met Moon. Moon and I disagree on some things, but one thing we agree very strongly about is time travel."
Gregory groaned and rolled his eyes. "Not this again."
"Yes, this again," Sun stated. "You didn't know what you were doing, so you had no way of knowing, but because you've messed with time so much you've become… tangled."
Gregory narrowed his eyes. "Tangled?"
Sun hummed and twitched his spokes. He went on, "Imagine time as a cord. It's a whole bunch of strings all neatly woven together. Well, in the Mega Pizzaplex, time is more like an unraveled cord–just a mess of strings. The more and more you pull at the strings, the more they wrap around you and the harder it is to unravel them." Sun mimed pulling a cord taunt and then pulling at its invisible threads. "The strings are messy, messy but they are where they are supposed to be. We bots are all knots in these strings. We're tangled up for good. The customers and staff don't touch the strings at all. Those who do risk getting tangled up in them like us. It's Moon's job–my job, too, but mainly Moon since I'm restricted to the Daycare during the day–to stop people from messing with the strings."
Gregory tipped his head. "So… what does that have to do with me not leaving?"
"Well, when you're tangled up in something, it's not easy getting out of it," Sun explained. "Have you ever tried untangling knotted up strings or cords?"
Gregory wrinkled his nose at the memory of his knotted mouse cord. "Yeah."
"It's not easy, is it?"
"So, it's impossible?"
Sun's spokes twitched again, and he opened his hands as if dropping the cord. "Nope! That's the good part! You still have hope! But the only way to escape the Pizzaplex is if someone on the outside came in and brought you out. Now, maybe if the Mega Pizzaplex wasn't a big ol' time mess, you could leave on your own, but I don't think that's happening."
Gregory perked up. "Hold on, you said you guys were like knots instead of tangles. Does that mean you can't leave?"
"Mhm!" Sun answered, somehow cheerfully. "But the others don't know that. They think they can't leave because they'll run out of charge, or they'll break. They don't understand time like we do. Moony and I can't leave because it's our job to keep the order." He chuckled to himself. "And, of course, to watch little kids during the day. But that's the fun part of the job. That's the easy part."
Gregory looked down at Bonnie. "So, all those times Moon was after me… was because I was messing with time?" It wasn't because he was just being a jerk or evil or something?
"Eh… mostly. Moon used to be much more patient. But there's something that's making him… not-so-patient," Sun admitted. "I can keep time-order, too. Kind of. So, the lights stay on."
"Well, what about yesterday? Er–last time? When we put Moon into Parts and Service? He acted much better after that," Gregory pointed out. "Either he really liked Chica, or whatever I did in Parts and Service helped him."
"I believe it was both. He… was happy to have Chica as his friend."
Gregory scoffed. "Moon doesn't seem like the friendly sort."
"Moon has friends!" Sun squawked.
"Oh?"
After half a second's pause, Sun said, "He befriended the Mini Music Men in the vents."
"Of course he'd like the spiders."
"Well, we don't get very many visitors here," Sun pointed out. "And we can't leave."
Gregory snorted. "Well, what about the Spider King, the DJ? Has he met him before?"
Sun chuckled. "He has! The DJ is very nice."
Gregory played with Bonnie's ears. "Those spider things and the DJ didn't really talk to me. Even the others talked to me when they tried killing me. What gives?"
"Oh! They can't talk! They don't have voice boxes like we do," Sun answered, shifting a little in his place. "They talk through music! They don't like Chica very much." Sun sighed and his spokes twitched again, curling counterclockwise before bouncing back again. "What a shame. She's so nice. But! Moon knows far more instrumental songs than I do."
"Like Springy?" Gregory prompted. "Springy doesn't have a voice box."
Sun shook his head. "No. Springy is a Wet Floor bot. They're very simply coded, barely bots at all. Even the S.T.A.F.F. are smarter, made to vocalize and not made to think."
Gregory eyed him. "So, what makes him different than you? Those dumb spider things in the vents only tried to kill me. There's nothing smart about that."
Ever patient, Sun explained, "They weren't built to think. The Wet Floor bots… they are what you would think of as like a drone. The S.T.A.F.F. can't think for themselves. They can move, talk, and respond, but they can't think. The band, Moony and I, the Mini Music Men, the DJ–we can think for ourselves and have personality chips! That's what sets us apart from them."
"It's true, Gregory. He's not being mean; that's just how things are."
"And that's what everyone thinks?" Gregory asked.
"Well, yes."
"Even the engineers?"
"Especially them! They made us!"
So, when Vanny said I couldn't use the bots against her, she wouldn't expect me to use a S.T.A.F.F. bot against her, would she?
"That's a… you know… not a terrible idea."
Of course it's not! Then, an idea popped into his head. "Do you know any humans that got stuck here? Like, how do you know I can't just leave?"
Sun's spokes twitched again. "We've seen a few of them. All of them were little children just like you who were taken here after hours. Most of the time, they couldn't time travel; they didn't know how to deviate from the set path. Some of them found ways, accidentally. That's when Moony had to come get them. You're the first to ever make it to six am. Twice!"
"And I'll do it a third time," Gregory stressed. "Myself. Myself and Bonnie, we'll make it out." His voice lowered. "Besides, no one's coming to get me."
"Oh. Don't your parents know where you are? Maybe they just need help getting here!"
Gregory shook his head. Shamefully, his eyes stung. "I don't want him to."
"Him? Why not?" Sun cocked his head. "I'm sure he loves you very much. He might just not know you're here."
"He loved my mom very much," Gregory grumbled. "He loves his son and his daughter. If they were here, he'd already be here. If mom was here, he'd pick me up. But he won't because she's not." He hugged Bonnie tight to his chest.
"It's okay. I'm still here. I won't leave you."
I know. Love you, Bonnie.
"I love you, too, Gregory."
Sun made a thoughtful hum and said, "I know that sometimes things might not be great. But if he loved your mom, then maybe he loves you, too! Sometimes it's hard for people to show their emotions, especially if they're really sad."
"He loves Owen and Gabriela. He got Gabriela her own dollhouse and made a Halloween costume for Owen for his Halloween Party." Gregory sighed. "Bonnie won't leave me, though."
Then, a thought occurred to him. He looked up. "Are you gonna tell them who my stepbrother and stepsister are?"
"Well…"
"You are," Gregory stated. He looked back down at Bonnie. "You're gonna call the cops on me and get them to call my stepdad. Well, I don't want to go back. You better know that."
Footsteps approached. Sun looked back. Gregory scooted back further into his corner.
"Sun, do you know the kid's name?"
"Um, Gregory."
"Sun."
"H-his name's Gregory!"
"…okay. Look, it's past time for him to leave. He's going to the front."
Sun thought for a long moment. "Gregory is still stressed and scared. I need to make sure he's okay. So, you can let him wait here for a while! I'll make sure he's a-okay!"
"Children aren't supposed to stay in the Daycare past closing. You know this. He's not a puppy. He goes home to his parents."
Sun made a noise like a sigh and leaned forward so he could look into Gregory's corner. "It's okay, Gregory. I-I'm sure everything will be okay!" He held out his hand for Gregory.
Yeah, right.
