Moon hung upside down from a dead security wire and counted the pizzeria's empty rooms. He needed the right one. Somewhere in this dark building slept the last child who still hummed his lullabies. She had stopped answering him. If he found where she once slept, he could reach her again. But the power had died months ago, and his memory had died with it. He swung across the ceiling on his silver arms. His golden bell rang once, then he pinched it silent. Below him stretched the giant playroom, a tower of colored slides and tunnels under a rainbow arch. Plush foxes and bears slumped in the dark. A ball pit sat below, its bright plastic balls faded gray. Moon dropped to the top level and crouched. He had painted himself into this place years ago, half his face a white crescent, half of it black. Children used to nap here after the pizza ran out. But which nook was hers? He had known once. He did not know now. He crawled through a yellow tunnel and found a nap mat. He pressed his red eyes close. Nothing. He tried a second nook near the sun mural. Nothing. Panic climbed his wires. Time was leaking. Each night she forgot more of his voice. Then he saw it. Tucked under the third slide, half-hidden behind a stuffed fox, lay a small blanket. Yellow stars covered it. The same stars stitched on his own cap. He had made that blanket for her. He remembered folding it here, tucking it around her shoulders while he sang. Moon lifted the blanket. Beneath it lay a child's drawing. A tall jester with a crescent face. A moon in a blue cap. Her hand had drawn him. This was her spot. He was certain now. He pressed his palm to the mat and began the lullaby, soft and slow, the one she used to sleep to. He aimed it at the room, hoping the walls still held her. A sound answered. Not a voice. A wheel, turning somewhere below. Then a red light blinked to life across the playroom, high on a security camera he thought was dead. Something else lived in this building. Something had heard him sing. The camera swiveled and fixed on Moon. Its lens whirred, focusing. A speaker crackled near the ball pit. A low voice spoke his old show name, the one only the pizzeria's system knew. Moon clutched the star blanket to his chest. He had found her room. He had found her spot, her drawing, her song. But finding it had woken something that guarded this place. Whatever now watched him stood between Moon and the child he meant to win back. He backed into the shadows above the rainbow arch and held still. The red light followed him. The chase for the child had a new rule now: he was no longer alone in the dark.

The red camera light held on Moon above the rainbow arch. He waited for the speaker to threaten him. Instead a small shape stepped out of the tunnel below. A fox in a starred wizard hat, purple hair falling over blue eyes, a golden bell at the collar. She looked up at Moon and did not run. Most things in this building ran. "You woke the old system," the fox said. "That was loud. It hears singing." She tapped the bell at her throat, and it matched the one on his cap. "I'm Starshine. I've watched you crawl these ceilings for three nights." Moon dropped one arm toward her. His memory of the child had thinned to scraps. He knew the blanket, the drawing, the lullaby. He no longer knew where she went. "The child who slept here," he said. "I need to find her. You know this place. Tell me where the children went." Starshine climbed the third slide easy as walking. She pulled a soft brown teddy bear from behind the stuffed fox. The bear had a stitched heart on its chest. "They came for the beds," she said. "Trucks, months ago. They took the nap furniture to a new playroom across the city. Whatever kids still came, they follow the beds." She held the bear out. "She left this. Kids don't leave a bear like this by accident." Moon took the bear in his silver hands. He remembered it now, tucked under her arm while he sang the sixth verse. The last real memory clicked into place. "Which playroom?" "The Neon Dream," Starshine said. "Bright signs, glass walls. Her bed's there if it's anywhere. A little one with rainbows and stars painted on the frame. She wouldn't sleep in any other." The speaker below crackled again. It spoke Moon's old show name, slow and wrong. The camera whirred and swung toward the fox. Starshine flinched. "It doesn't like company," she said. "Go now, while it watches me instead of you." Moon hooked a wire and pulled himself toward the far exit. He clutched the bear and the star blanket to his chest. At the mouth of the tunnel he stopped. "Come with me. You know the beds. You knew hers." Starshine glanced at the red light, then back at him. She climbed onto the wire beside him, quick and sure. "I know every bed they hauled out of here," she said. "You'd never find the right one alone." They slipped into the dark hall together. Behind them the speaker died. Moon no longer stared at an empty room with no next step. He had a place to go, the Neon Dream Playroom, and a guide who had watched him longer than he knew. The child had left the building. So had her bed. Moon would follow both.