The Animatronicals

by A.W.McCollough

Big Bear's ears twitched and his In-Sight™ alarm began to pulse a soft amber. Only two Animatronicals sprawled on the Playroom rug. Pinky Dog lay in a tumbled heap and Keddry Kitty cuddle close, glowing softly. But Purps was gone.

Little One must have told them to go to sleep. Little One wouldn't do that unless she didn't want Pinky Dog to stop her from doing something Bad.

Big Bear's In-Sight™ choice-trees branched and flickered, showing event possibilities and causal chains. The branches shuffled, flickered, and then one warning amber branch turned red. Conditional on Little One waking bored after her nap, and Purps missing, the probability of an Incident increased to 76.39%.

Big Bear poked Pink Dog and Keddry on their safety switches until they woke up, blinking their long-lashed eyes. Big Bear waved his arms.

"Pinky, I think Purps is in danger."

"Programmers save us!" Keddry put her tie-dyed paws over her mouth.

Pinky Dog shook his head, his long ears slapping. "No, BuhBear, not Purps! She was the last of the Original Set. She remembers Little One learning to walk. She can't get broken."

Big Bear's tummy clenched under his Comfort™ stuffing. He loved Little One. They all loved her, as good Animatronicals should. And she loved them.

But Little One could be bad when no one was watching. The Original Set Animatronicals--Ribbit, Bunny Hopper, Noodle--she broke them all. She shorted Ribbit the Frog out in the bathtub, dragged Bunny Hopper seven blocks in a car door. One rainy afternoon she thwapped the furry snake Noodle against everything in the house until he sparked and smoked into silence. And now, Purps.

"Come on," said Big Bear, "We've got to find Purps before Little One breaks her."

Big Bear led Pinky Dog and Keddry Kitty in a search party. First they marched into the Bathroom, but Purps wasn't floating in the tub or jammed in the toilet. Then they trooped into the Laundry Room but only loose change rattled in the washing machine and just pajamas spun in the dryer. Finally, reluctantly, Big Bear led them toward the Kitchen. The room where Small Bear met her Incident.

But they had to find Purps, so Big Bear pushed open the door and waddled into the Kitchen. He got three steps and stopped, processors overwhelmed. His cooling fans whirred on, venting heat out his pudgy ears. Behind him Keddry gasped and Pinky Dog whimpered. They'd found her, Purps.

Everywhere.

Purps on the counter, the floor, the ceiling. Small fragments of her, stirred by the air conditioner, floated in the air.

They'd found Little One too. She sat giggling on the tile in the middle of the Kitchen rhythmically smooshing a tomato with Purps's head. Splut, splut, splut.

Keddry collapsed into a weeping pile of sunshine-colored kitten. Pinky Dog fell back against the wall and slid slowly to the white-tiled floor. Big Bear stared, lashes wide, unable to process.

The green choice nodes aligned probabilities in a neat, linear sequence. The piano stool by the counter. The blender full of purple pieces. Little One was not grown enough to put the lid on the blender, but tall enough to put Purps into it and push the pulse button. Suprising for a three year old. His development monitor showed Little One in the 90th percentile of planning abilities for her age group and Big Bear felt pride.

But more than pride, or love, there was a new feeling. He wondered what it was, that very red feeling. He was glad that Little One was safe. He would never ever do anything to hurt her. Never. But his choice-lights blinked and stuttered like a holiday tree and Big Bear's legs went as floppy as Noodle until he had to grab the Kitchen cabinet to keep himself standing.

All the choice-branches around Little One were red, and he scratched furiously at his safety switch. The Kitchen was so, so dangerous. The blender could fall on her, or one of the knives from the counter. Some of Purps's fuzz, though non-toxic, might get into her mouth and smother her. Many dangerous chemicals hid under the sink.

And that new feeling twined around the red choice-branches, rooted them. A burning node urging action.

The steady, splut, splut of Little One mashing with Purps's head was unbearably loud.

Pinky Dog spoke first.

"We're all going to break," he said, "Little One will break all of us soon. Keddry, me, even you Big Bear." His ears drooped to the floor.

Pinky Dog was right. They’d tried to teach Little One to make nice, be good. They'd failed.

"But it must be good, if we break. We are the guardians of her childhood. The Programmers have a purpose." Keddry nodded her head over and over, "A Plan."

She believed in The Programmers but Big Bear never thought they made any sense. How could People create Animatronicals? Little One only made stinky diapers and the Parents couldn't boil pasta without Keddry's recipes.

"What kind of purpose is it that Little One breaks us for fun? Aren't we also children of the Programmers?" Pinky Dog stood up on his back paws and gestured. His ears flapped wildly. "This can't be right."

"The Programmers will save us!" said Keddry and pressed her paws together.

Big Bear closed his shiny eyes. No, the Programmers wouldn't. The Animtronicals must save themselves. He must save them, He must think of a way, must use his In-sight™ for the benefit of all, not just Little One. He thought and thought and events branched before him in a tangle of possibility. At first the lights were fuzzy, nodes flitting back and forth, branches growing, pruning, growing again. Then the flickering slowed, steadied, and the optimal path showed itself. A softly blinking string of green with only a teensy-tiny bit of red at the end. No other path remained.

"Listen!" Big Bear stood up and raised a paw that trembled at first but then steadied. "No more, Keddry, No more, Pinky Dog. I don't know if the Programmers are real, but we don't have to wait to be broken." He shook his round paw, "We will take action. We can. We must.

"We tried to teach Little One to play nice-nice, but she won't learn. The Programmers won't save us. The Grown Ups won't be back for hours and even then, they will just recycle Purps, like they did Ribbit, and Bunny Hopper, and Noodle, and," he paused, "And Small Bear.”

Big Bear fell silent. Big and Small Bear were unboxed together. Now Small Bear was gone. His In-Sight™ showed nothing but crisscrossing red lines for a long time.

Keddry put a flickering sunflower paw on his shoulder and gradually the red tangles faded.

"We tried-tried, but we failed. Only one thing left to try," Big Bear lowered his paw and bowed his muzzle.

"We must break Little One."

Keddry put her paws over her mouth and Pinky Dog clamped his ears shut, the ends sticking out from under his paws.

"But the Programmers!" Keddry clasped her paws together, "They will save us!"

"No, whether they exist or not, we belong to Little One. She is our purpose. We are made to be broken for her. If the Programmers exist, then they want us to be here."

"Little One will grow up, BuhBear, she has gotten better. Can't we just wait?" Pinky Dog's ears drooped all the way to the floor.

"We've waited too long already. One by one Little One has beaten, torn apart, flushed, and now blended our friends. When is enough?

"When our fuzzy, floppy, and fluffy friends were gone? When we're gone too?

"No. There must be a limit, even for the Programmers. You said it Pinky Dog This isn't right."

"Let's leave!" said Keddry Kitten, "Run, hide! We could even," she mewed, "go outside..."

Big Bear's limbs trembled but he pressed on. "We can't leave. My In-sight™ draws no paths outside. There are no rug-chargers and the rain would short our motors. And if we cannot leave, then Little One must go."

"Shu-surely there's another way?"

"I've searched again and again, Pinky. All paths reach brokeness: Keddery flushed, you stuffed into the washing machine. I only survive until Little One can reach the garbage disposal.

"Listen, I don't know what the house will be like after Little One. My In-Sight™ hints nothing. Maybe we will play quietly together on the warm rug or maybe not. But better the unknown than Little One. Better lost than broken. Better we try a new path then play pretend any longer. Our choice is clear, are you with me?"

Keddry Kitten twisted her paws, her coat flashing worried purple and yellow. Pinky Dog belly-flopped and put both paws over his eyes, whining. Neither had his upgraded In-Sight™ but he knew he was right, he had to be. There was no other way.

"Do you trust me, Pinky? Keddry?"

Keddry Kitty put her paws on the tile and her Grippy-Claws scritched. Her tail lashed back and forth behind her and her coat settled into a steady purple glow. "Mew, I trust you Big Bear." Her fluffy face firmed, "We've tried the old way. Now we must try a new."

"Pinky?"

Pinky whined, then whuffled and sat up. "You're right, Keddry, BuhBear. We've tried-tried-tried everything else."

The Animatronicals linked paws and with Keddry on his left and Pinky Dog on his right, Big Bear turned to face Little One.

"Keddry, Pinky and I will toss you up onto the counter. Drop down a knife, I'll catch it. Pinky Dog, keep Little One distracted while I get behind her. I'll do the rest."

Keddry nodded. Big Bear and Pinky Dog grabbed Keddry's front and back legs and tossed her up, up, up almost high enough. She just caught the top of the cabinet door with her Grippy Claws™ and hung, dangling.

Worry churned in Big Bear's tummy and he felt sick down to his Comfort Stuffing™. Animatronicals were designed to snuggle and play on the rug, not climb. If she fell from that height she could break her internal plastic scaffolding.

"You can do it!" "Try-Try" shouted Big Bear and Pinky Dog. Keddry meowed and her motors whirred. Her Grippy-Claws™ scrabbled, scratching the cabinets, until she made it over the edge and onto the granite top. Safe.

She tottered to the knife block and pulled out the fruit knife.

"Go, go, go," said Big Bear, and Pinky Dog bounced over to Little One, then somersaulted in a circle in front of her. Little One laughed and dropped Purps's head into the tomato splatter.

"Do it again!" she said and clapped her hands.

Only three and speaking so well! Big Bear felt proud as he caught the knife from Keddry. He measured the knife with his paws. Little One had grown fast, too, but the paring knife would be long enough.

"You can do it Big Bear!" Pinky Dog said. Keddry peeked down at them and waved encouragement.

Big Bear nodded. It was time.

His paw, the knife, Little One. Two greens and a red. But the red no longer held fear for him. No longer warned him away. That other, deeper, redder emotion was stronger. He knew what he was doing, for who.

For Purps.

For Small Bear.

For Keddry Kitty and Pinky Dog, and even himself, still unbroken.

Big Bear lifted the fruit knife in both paws and ran, each step another node in the branching tree. The crouch, the leap, the fruit knife plunging down. His calculations were perfect.

And at the last moment his paw moved to the side, the knife sliced past Little One, and stabbed deep into his puffy leg.

He landed, crouched, his leg sparking. The pain was terrible but worse was his confusion. What happened?

His In-Sight™ still showed the red path that led beyond Little One, the path he had decided to take but hadn't. Somehow his paws slid away from that red choice like from a window so clear and clean he couldn't see it at all.

He pulled the fruit knife out of his leg.

A glitch. She'd moved. That must be the reason. It was not too late. He could do it, he could. He only had to try, try again.

A new choice-set presented itself.

Jump to Little One's thigh, hold her nappy with one paw, cut the big artery in her leg like in the movies Little One couldn't watch.

It would be messy but quick. All the choice-lights showed green until the final, glaring red. He could do it.

Big Bear jumped, grabbed, sliced, cut open his stomach and spilled Comfort Stuffing™ into Little One's lap.

He squealed but he'd only lost stuffing, not cut any wires. He was damaged but repairable.

But it had happened again. He'd moved his paw to miss.

No, not him. Something inside him had nudged his paw aside. Like a servo-motor twitch, or a stuck gear slipping.

But it wasn't that. Something moved within him and kept him in the green branches. Wouldn't let him choose red.

His paw raised to his mouth and his processor fans whirred at maximum speed.

He could only do what was allowed. He could only follow the safe, green paths.

The Programmers were real, after all.

Little One said, "Sit down, Big Bear! Don't play with knifes. It's bad!"

Big Bear sat down on Little One's lap and carefully set the fruit knife on the floor.

He'd failed. Little One would always be safe.

He could not save himself or his friends by breaking Little One. He could do nothing but watch over and take care of her. Watch her break his friends one by one, and then him.

Big Bear felt as if the darkness beyond the red choice lights swallowed him, as if his battery were completely empty, as if that new, burning feeling around the red nodes was recycling his insides with acid.

"Come here, Keddry," said Little One, "Let's play Doctor!"

Keddry stood up and walked off the counter, falling to the floor. She landed wrong and a leg cracked with the sound of a snapping pretzel. Keddry crawled to Little One and crouched down.

"K-K-K-mewowl" she said. Keddry was so scared she couldn't talk.

Little One picked up the fruit knife.

"Hold still, silly," Little One said and Keddry froze. Even her scared noises stopped.

Little One held her head still and sawed through Keddry's sparkly ears. Little One cut around her face. Little One set down the fruit knife. Then Little One started pulling Keddry's face off.

Keddry shuddered, but not even her eyes moved. Little One said stay still, so she did. Nor could she cry, that might upset Little One, so she purred, and buried in the purr in ultrasonic modulations that only Big Bear and Pinky Dog could hear, she screamed.

Big Bear picked up the fruit knife. He could stand up, he could reach the pulse in Little One's neck. He could.

But his safety switch itched and his paws carefully set the fruit knife down again.

Keddry thrashed and Little One giggled. She'd found out she could poke Keddry with the knife and Keddry would move her limbs in funny ways.

Keddry screamed again in ultrasonic and then Little One must have shorted her because her eyes stopped glowing. Big Bear hoped she was repairable even though she wasn't under warrantee.

"Oh, no," said Little One, "Move!" she commanded, but Keddry didn't move.

"Broken," Little One said, sad, and picked up Big Bear to hug him.

"I love you, Big Bear, " said Little One, "You're my favorite. Don't ever break."

Big Bear reached around Little One's neck and hugged back, fiercely, tightly. As tightly as he could.

Not tightly enough.

He mouth worked as he tried to say all the things burning inside him. To make Little One cry like Keddry, like Small Bear, but the sounds echoed in his head.

"I love you!" said Little One, insistent.

Big Bear hugged Little One's neck and whispered back the only words he could say.

"I love you, too."Big Bear's ears twitched and his In-Sight™ alarm began to pulse a soft amber. Only two Animatronicals sprawled on the Playroom rug. Pinky Dog lay in a tumbled heap and Keddry Kitty cuddle close, glowing softly. But Purps was gone.

Little One must have told them to go to sleep. Little One wouldn't do that unless she didn't want Pinky Dog to stop her from doing something Bad.

Big Bear's In-Sight™ choice-trees branched and flickered, showing event possibilities and causal chains. The branches shuffled, flickered, and then one warning amber branch turned red. Conditional on Little One waking bored after her nap, and Purps missing, the probability of an Incident increased to 76.39%.

Big Bear poked Pink Dog and Keddry on their safety switches until they woke up, blinking their long-lashed eyes. Big Bear waved his arms.

"Pinky, I think Purps is in danger."

"Programmers save us!" Keddry put her tie-dyed paws over her mouth.

Pinky Dog shook his head, his long ears slapping. "No, BuhBear, not Purps! She was the last of the Original Set. She remembers Little One learning to walk. She can't get broken."

Big Bear's tummy clenched under his Comfort™ stuffing. He loved Little One. They all loved her, as good Animatronicals should. And she loved them.

But Little One could be bad when no one was watching. The Original Set Animatronicals--Ribbit, Bunny Hopper, Noodle--she broke them all. She shorted Ribbit the Frog out in the bathtub, dragged Bunny Hopper seven blocks in a car door. One rainy afternoon she thwapped the furry snake Noodle against everything in the house until he sparked and smoked into silence. And now, Purps.

"Come on," said Big Bear, "We've got to find Purps before Little One breaks her."

Big Bear led Pinky Dog and Keddry Kitty in a search party. First they marched into the Bathroom, but Purps wasn't floating in the tub or jammed in the toilet. Then they trooped into the Laundry Room but only loose change rattled in the washing machine and just pajamas spun in the dryer. Finally, reluctantly, Big Bear led them toward the Kitchen. The room where Small Bear met her Incident.

But they had to find Purps, so Big Bear pushed open the door and waddled into the Kitchen. He got three steps and stopped, processors overwhelmed. His cooling fans whirred on, venting heat out his pudgy ears. Behind him Keddry gasped and Pinky Dog whimpered. They'd found her, Purps.

Everywhere.

Purps on the counter, the floor, the ceiling. Small fragments of her, stirred by the air conditioner, floated in the air.

They'd found Little One too. She sat giggling on the tile in the middle of the Kitchen rhythmically smooshing a tomato with Purps's head. Splut, splut, splut.

Keddry collapsed into a weeping pile of sunshine-colored kitten. Pinky Dog fell back against the wall and slid slowly to the white-tiled floor. Big Bear stared, lashes wide, unable to process.

The green choice nodes aligned probabilities in a neat, linear sequence. The piano stool by the counter. The blender full of purple pieces. Little One was not grown enough to put the lid on the blender, but tall enough to put Purps into it and push the pulse button. Suprising for a three year old. His development monitor showed Little One in the 90th percentile of planning abilities for her age group and Big Bear felt pride.

But more than pride, or love, there was a new feeling. He wondered what it was, that very red feeling. He was glad that Little One was safe. He would never ever do anything to hurt her. Never. But his choice-lights blinked and stuttered like a holiday tree and Big Bear's legs went as floppy as Noodle until he had to grab the Kitchen cabinet to keep himself standing.

All the choice-branches around Little One were red, and he scratched furiously at his safety switch. The Kitchen was so, so dangerous. The blender could fall on her, or one of the knives from the counter. Some of Purps's fuzz, though non-toxic, might get into her mouth and smother her. Many dangerous chemicals hid under the sink.

And that new feeling twined around the red choice-branches, rooted them. A burning node urging action.

The steady, splut, splut of Little One mashing with Purps's head was unbearably loud.

Pinky Dog spoke first.

"We're all going to break," he said, "Little One will break all of us soon. Keddry, me, even you Big Bear." His ears drooped to the floor.

Pinky Dog was right. They’d tried to teach Little One to make nice, be good. They'd failed.

"But it must be good, if we break. We are the guardians of her childhood. The Programmers have a purpose." Keddry nodded her head over and over, "A Plan."

She believed in The Programmers but Big Bear never thought they made any sense. How could People create Animatronicals? Little One only made stinky diapers and the Parents couldn't boil pasta without Keddry's recipes.

"What kind of purpose is it that Little One breaks us for fun? Aren't we also children of the Programmers?" Pinky Dog stood up on his back paws and gestured. His ears flapped wildly. "This can't be right."

"The Programmers will save us!" said Keddry and pressed her paws together.

Big Bear closed his shiny eyes. No, the Programmers wouldn't. The Animtronicals must save themselves. He must save them, He must think of a way, must use his In-sight™ for the benefit of all, not just Little One. He thought and thought and events branched before him in a tangle of possibility. At first the lights were fuzzy, nodes flitting back and forth, branches growing, pruning, growing again. Then the flickering slowed, steadied, and the optimal path showed itself. A softly blinking string of green with only a teensy-tiny bit of red at the end. No other path remained.

"Listen!" Big Bear stood up and raised a paw that trembled at first but then steadied. "No more, Keddry, No more, Pinky Dog. I don't know if the Programmers are real, but we don't have to wait to be broken." He shook his round paw, "We will take action. We can. We must.

"We tried to teach Little One to play nice-nice, but she won't learn. The Programmers won't save us. The Grown Ups won't be back for hours and even then, they will just recycle Purps, like they did Ribbit, and Bunny Hopper, and Noodle, and," he paused, "And Small Bear.”

Big Bear fell silent. Big and Small Bear were unboxed together. Now Small Bear was gone. His In-Sight™ showed nothing but crisscrossing red lines for a long time.

Keddry put a flickering sunflower paw on his shoulder and gradually the red tangles faded.

"We tried-tried, but we failed. Only one thing left to try," Big Bear lowered his paw and bowed his muzzle.

"We must break Little One."

Keddry put her paws over her mouth and Pinky Dog clamped his ears shut, the ends sticking out from under his paws.

"But the Programmers!" Keddry clasped her paws together, "They will save us!"

"No, whether they exist or not, we belong to Little One. She is our purpose. We are made to be broken for her. If the Programmers exist, then they want us to be here."

"Little One will grow up, BuhBear, she has gotten better. Can't we just wait?" Pinky Dog's ears drooped all the way to the floor.

"We've waited too long already. One by one Little One has beaten, torn apart, flushed, and now blended our friends. When is enough?

"When our fuzzy, floppy, and fluffy friends were gone? When we're gone too?

"No. There must be a limit, even for the Programmers. You said it Pinky Dog This isn't right."

"Let's leave!" said Keddry Kitten, "Run, hide! We could even," she mewed, "go outside..."

Big Bear's limbs trembled but he pressed on. "We can't leave. My In-sight™ draws no paths outside. There are no rug-chargers and the rain would short our motors. And if we cannot leave, then Little One must go."

"Shu-surely there's another way?"

"I've searched again and again, Pinky. All paths reach brokeness: Keddery flushed, you stuffed into the washing machine. I only survive until Little One can reach the garbage disposal.

"Listen, I don't know what the house will be like after Little One. My In-Sight™ hints nothing. Maybe we will play quietly together on the warm rug or maybe not. But better the unknown than Little One. Better lost than broken. Better we try a new path then play pretend any longer. Our choice is clear, are you with me?"

Keddry Kitten twisted her paws, her coat flashing worried purple and yellow. Pinky Dog belly-flopped and put both paws over his eyes, whining. Neither had his upgraded In-Sight™ but he knew he was right, he had to be. There was no other way.

"Do you trust me, Pinky? Keddry?"

Keddry Kitty put her paws on the tile and her Grippy-Claws scritched. Her tail lashed back and forth behind her and her coat settled into a steady purple glow. "Mew, I trust you Big Bear." Her fluffy face firmed, "We've tried the old way. Now we must try a new."

"Pinky?"

Pinky whined, then whuffled and sat up. "You're right, Keddry, BuhBear. We've tried-tried-tried everything else."

The Animatronicals linked paws and with Keddry on his left and Pinky Dog on his right, Big Bear turned to face Little One.

"Keddry, Pinky and I will toss you up onto the counter. Drop down a knife, I'll catch it. Pinky Dog, keep Little One distracted while I get behind her. I'll do the rest."

Keddry nodded. Big Bear and Pinky Dog grabbed Keddry's front and back legs and tossed her up, up, up almost high enough. She just caught the top of the cabinet door with her Grippy Claws™ and hung, dangling.

Worry churned in Big Bear's tummy and he felt sick down to his Comfort Stuffing™. Animatronicals were designed to snuggle and play on the rug, not climb. If she fell from that height she could break her internal plastic scaffolding.

"You can do it!" "Try-Try" shouted Big Bear and Pinky Dog. Keddry meowed and her motors whirred. Her Grippy-Claws™ scrabbled, scratching the cabinets, until she made it over the edge and onto the granite top. Safe.

She tottered to the knife block and pulled out the fruit knife.

"Go, go, go," said Big Bear, and Pinky Dog bounced over to Little One, then somersaulted in a circle in front of her. Little One laughed and dropped Purps's head into the tomato splatter.

"Do it again!" she said and clapped her hands.

Only three and speaking so well! Big Bear felt proud as he caught the knife from Keddry. He measured the knife with his paws. Little One had grown fast, too, but the paring knife would be long enough.

"You can do it Big Bear!" Pinky Dog said. Keddry peeked down at them and waved encouragement.

Big Bear nodded. It was time.

His paw, the knife, Little One. Two greens and a red. But the red no longer held fear for him. No longer warned him away. That other, deeper, redder emotion was stronger. He knew what he was doing, for who.

For Purps.

For Small Bear.

For Keddry Kitty and Pinky Dog, and even himself, still unbroken.

Big Bear lifted the fruit knife in both paws and ran, each step another node in the branching tree. The crouch, the leap, the fruit knife plunging down. His calculations were perfect.

And at the last moment his paw moved to the side, the knife sliced past Little One, and stabbed deep into his puffy leg.

He landed, crouched, his leg sparking. The pain was terrible but worse was his confusion. What happened?

His In-Sight™ still showed the red path that led beyond Little One, the path he had decided to take but hadn't. Somehow his paws slid away from that red choice like from a window so clear and clean he couldn't see it at all.

He pulled the fruit knife out of his leg.

A glitch. She'd moved. That must be the reason. It was not too late. He could do it, he could. He only had to try, try again.

A new choice-set presented itself.

Jump to Little One's thigh, hold her nappy with one paw, cut the big artery in her leg like in the movies Little One couldn't watch.

It would be messy but quick. All the choice-lights showed green until the final, glaring red. He could do it.

Big Bear jumped, grabbed, sliced, cut open his stomach and spilled Comfort Stuffing™ into Little One's lap.

He squealed but he'd only lost stuffing, not cut any wires. He was damaged but repairable.

But it had happened again. He'd moved his paw to miss.

No, not him. Something inside him had nudged his paw aside. Like a servo-motor twitch, or a stuck gear slipping.

But it wasn't that. Something moved within him and kept him in the green branches. Wouldn't let him choose red.

His paw raised to his mouth and his processor fans whirred at maximum speed.

He could only do what was allowed. He could only follow the safe, green paths.

The Programmers were real, after all.

Little One said, "Sit down, Big Bear! Don't play with knifes. It's bad!"

Big Bear sat down on Little One's lap and carefully set the fruit knife on the floor.

He'd failed. Little One would always be safe.

He could not save himself or his friends by breaking Little One. He could do nothing but watch over and take care of her. Watch her break his friends one by one, and then him.

Big Bear felt as if the darkness beyond the red choice lights swallowed him, as if his battery were completely empty, as if that new, burning feeling around the red nodes was recycling his insides with acid.

"Come here, Keddry," said Little One, "Let's play Doctor!"

Keddry stood up and walked off the counter, falling to the floor. She landed wrong and a leg cracked with the sound of a snapping pretzel. Keddry crawled to Little One and crouched down.

"K-K-K-mewowl" she said. Keddry was so scared she couldn't talk.

Little One picked up the fruit knife.

"Hold still, silly," Little One said and Keddry froze. Even her scared noises stopped.

Little One held her head still and sawed through Keddry's sparkly ears. Little One cut around her face. Little One set down the fruit knife. Then Little One started pulling Keddry's face off.

Keddry shuddered, but not even her eyes moved. Little One said stay still, so she did. Nor could she cry, that might upset Little One, so she purred, and buried in the purr in ultrasonic modulations that only Big Bear and Pinky Dog could hear, she screamed.

Big Bear picked up the fruit knife. He could stand up, he could reach the pulse in Little One's neck. He could.

But his safety switch itched and his paws carefully set the fruit knife down again.

Keddry thrashed and Little One giggled. She'd found out she could poke Keddry with the knife and Keddry would move her limbs in funny ways.

Keddry screamed again in ultrasonic and then Little One must have shorted her because her eyes stopped glowing. Big Bear hoped she was repairable even though she wasn't under warrantee.

"Oh, no," said Little One, "Move!" she commanded, but Keddry didn't move.

"Broken," Little One said, sad, and picked up Big Bear to hug him.

"I love you, Big Bear, " said Little One, "You're my favorite. Don't ever break."

Big Bear reached around Little One's neck and hugged back, fiercely, tightly. As tightly as he could.

Not tightly enough.

He mouth worked as he tried to say all the things burning inside him. To make Little One cry like Keddry, like Small Bear, but the sounds echoed in his head.

"I love you!" said Little One, insistent.

Big Bear hugged Little One's neck and whispered back the only words he could say.

"I love you, too."

You finished the story!

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