Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

In a spanless void, a yellow spark glowed bright. The spark shined brighter and brighter, materializing into a female creature with yellow skin, blue hair with a streak of lavender, a green dress, and a pair of arms and legs. A blue eye blinked open, followed by a purple eye. She tilted her head up towards a fuzzy white screen above her as a console opened up from beneath, presenting itself with a single colorless button. The creature, drawn to the console, laid her hand across the button and pressed it, causing the button to take on a yellow glow. She heard a sound that she would come to cherish: a baby giggling delightfully.

The screen shifted to display a man and a woman smiling from above with fondness. A ding sounded off as a yellow sphere rolled down from the fuzzy white screen, and the creature picked it up, fascinated by how it replayed the moment of the man and the woman smiling at her. She rolled the sphere back on the rail, and it continued on its journey, illuminating her surroundings in a multi-color pattern of red, orange, and purple. A bright smile grew on her face as she pressed the button again, hearing those lovely giggles from the baby once more.

At that moment, the creature realized who she was.

Joy. Or more specifically, Riley’s joy.

It was amazing. Just Riley and her smiling together…for 33 seconds, that is.

When she briefly let go of the button, a shrill scream pierced through the multicolored background. Riley’s face contorted, her eyes went wide open, and she would not stop screaming her head off. Joy’s eyes darted to her right, seeing a purple creature with a thin curl of hair and dressed in a business outfit with a bow tie clinging onto the now-purple colored button.

“Uh…sorry for barging in like that. I’m Fear,” the purple creature hesitated before introducing himself hastily.

Joy put on a smile as a friendly greeting. “Oh, hello there, I’m Joy. Can I just…” she paused as she tried to gently nudge the creature away to put her hand on the button. 

“AAAAAH!” Fear yelped upon contact and dashed around in circles. “P-please don’t hurt me!”

“Hurt you?” Joy bit back a sigh, trying to keep her voice calm. “I wouldn’t do that. I just wanted you to move so I could fix something. Like so!”

She pushed the button, and Riley went back to happily giggling as Fear started to slow down. Having to share space with him was a prospect that she wasn’t exactly looking forward to, but for now, she was ready to keep her kid happy!

—

The console had greatly expanded in size and complexity over the next few years as Joy and Fear settled into their Headquarters. Numerous yellow spheres filled the shelves above and below, with a few purple spheres among them.

Riley ran around the house without a care in the world, dragging a wagon behind her as Joy held her palm down on the console’s button. The toddler turned a corner and up ahead was a cord trailing across the ground. 

“LOOK OUT!” Fear cried out in fright as he tried to rush towards the console.

Joy held her arm out, stopping Fear in his tracks. “Don’t worry about it! She’s just having fun, you know!”

“But–” Fear tried to warn her, but before he could finish his train of thought, Riley tripped over the cord, landing right on her knee.

A short blue creature with glasses arrived onto the scene, holding her hand down on the console. Tears formed in Riley’s eyes as she cried, hurt from the sudden impact.

“I’m Sadness,” the blue creature spoke up as the toddler kept crying. “Crying helps me slow down and obsess over the weight of life’s problems, like this one.”

Soon, her parents showed up, concerned and asking her what happened. Riley pointed to her knee with a sniffle, and her mother told her father to go to the freezer while she sat down and hugged her child, who continued to cry into her mother’s shirt. Her father returned with a pack of ice and instructed Riley to show him her knee. He gently placed the ice pack on the reddened area, and the toddler inhaled sharply from the numbing sensation. Slowly, she felt herself calm down as the pain began to subside.

As a blue sphere rolled down onto the shelves, Joy nodded approvingly at Sadness. While she was a little put off that the blue emotion also made Riley cry, she acknowledged that Sadness was crucial for Riley’s well-being as the one who lets others around her know when she’s hurt and needs help. Shedding tears every once in a while was something she could accept as a necessity for that.

“Maybe if we had stopped before crossing the cord…” Fear trailed off, having calmed his nerves enough to speak.

Joy shrugged. “Eh, what’s done is done. What matters is that she got the help she needed and can now be happy again!”

—

When Riley’s dad prepared broccoli for dinner, two new emotions took the stage.

The first was Disgust, who forced Riley to spit out the broccoli due to how gross it tasted. What if it was rotten or poisonous?

The second was Anger, who made Riley shout in frustration when her dad refused to serve her dessert if she didn’t eat her veggies. It wasn’t fair to be denied a sweet treat just like that, after all.

Then an airplane flew in and she gulped down the broccoli without further incident.

With a green sphere and a red sphere rolling into the shelves, Joy recognized the roles that the two new emotions served. This left Fear, who…

She wasn’t exactly sure what he was supposed to do. Beyond making Riley shriek on her 6th birthday when her parents took her to see Jangles the Clown, getting her to sprint away at the sight of a bug, and causing her to spend many a night waking up and screaming in terror, he seemed more like a liability than anything. But there wasn’t anywhere else he could go, and she wasn’t about to kick him out of HQ or anything like that, so here he was.

Joy spun around, checking on the many yellow spheres on the shelves. They served as Riley's memories, and she adored how happy each of them made her feel. She glided her way to a compartment and opened it up, displaying five golden spheres inside. Those memories were distinct in that they were core memories, having formed during Riley's most important moments in her life and serving as the power source for her five Islands of Personality.

Hockey Island formed when she scored a goal when she was two and a half years old.

Goofball Island took shape when she ran around her home with her underwear on her head.

Friendship Island came about when she made her first friend, Meg.

Family Island first materialized after Riley assisted her parents in baking cookies, and over the course of her childhood, it continued to grow, eclipsing the other islands in its size.

Rounding out the islands was Honesty Island. If she was being 100% honest, as per the island's theme, this one was probably her least favorite of the five. Why? Well…

—

*CRASH*

“Oh no oh no oh no, what are we going to do?” Fear whimpered upon seeing the plate that had shattered into several pieces.

“How should I know, beanpole?!” Anger shouted in frustration. “If they find out, we’re gonna get punished!”

“Ugh, those pieces look real sharp now,” Disgust winced. “Why did we think playing around with the hammer was a good idea?”

Sadness sat on the floor and sniffled tears of regret.

“Oh dear…” Joy trailed off, touching her finger to her head as she thought of what to do next.

“Should we tell Mom and Dad the truth?” Fear asked, the strand of hair on his head quivering. “What if they scold us? What if they take away our toys? What if they give us that ‘I’m disappointed in you’ look?”

Before Fear could continue listing off what ifs, Sadness pointed up towards the screen. “Look…they’re already here.”

Riley heard the footsteps of her parents getting closer and closer, and Disgust quickly pressed on the console, prompting Riley to hide the hammer behind her back.

“Step away from those shards!” Dad warned. “They’ll cut your feet.”

Fear tried to place his hand on the console, but Anger and Disgust were hogging the buttons, preventing him from getting his input in.

“Riley? Why is the plate broken?” Mom asked.

“Did you break it?” Dad followed up.

Riley rapidly shook her head, ashamed of herself and not wanting them to find out. Her eyes were looking off to the side.

“We heard something break from the other room,” Mom pointed out.

“If you have something to say for yourself, you should say it,” Dad gave a stern expression.

Sadness pushed herself up and pressed the button, causing Riley to cry.

“I…I didn’t…” she sniffled.

Fear suddenly slapped his hand down on the console, Anger and Disgust freezing in their tracks at how quick he was.

“Fear, what are you doing?!” Joy exclaimed.

Riley looked up to her parents and held out the hammer that she was playing around with, apprehensive of how they’d react.

“I’m sorry, Mom and Dad,” she admitted, wiping her tears away with her other hand. “I was having too much fun with the hammer and broke the plate with it.”

“Riley, you shouldn’t have been using that hammer without our permission,” Mom scolded. “You could’ve hurt yourself with it.”

“We appreciate that you told us the truth, so we’re not going to punish you this time,” Dad nodded. “But you’re going to need to learn not to get so carried away next time, ok?”

“Yes, Dad,” Riley set the hammer down on the countertop.

“Oh, that’s good news!” Joy smiled as she pressed her hand against the console.

As Riley let out a sigh of relief while Dad headed towards the kitchen closet to get a sweeper and a tray, a memory rolled down the rails, shining bright like gold and settling in the center with the other core memories.

“Phew! This core memory’s just like the rest of them!” Joy breathed out.

She turned to face Fear, not too pleased with his actions. “Why did you jump in like that? You could’ve changed the color of this core memory, and then I wouldn’t have been able to change it back!”

“Yeah! What gives, beanpole? You’re so jumpy all the time, but not ‘jumping on the console’ jumpy,” Anger ranted.

“You could’ve made Riley afraid of telling the truth,” Disgust remarked.

Sadness dropped down on the ground, giving Fear a sad glance.

Fear backed up, overwhelmed by the other emotions’ reactions. He himself wasn’t exactly sure why he did it. There were so many ways that incident could’ve gone wrong, so he should’ve stayed back for their safety, right?

“I…don’t know,” Fear uttered out. “S-sorry for almost causing a disaster there.”

A smile returned to Joy’s face. “It’s fine. Mistakes happen from time to time.”

—

Back in the present, Joy shook her head, trying not to let the unpleasant feeling of what could’ve happened bring her down.

After all, Riley's eleven years old now. What could possibly happen?

Chapter Text

“Oookay, not what I had in mind.”

Joy stared at the “Sold!” sign that had just been planted on the front lawn of their home in Minnesota while the other four emotions cried out in surprise. Before they knew it, the Andersen family had packed all of their stuff in their car's trunk and were about to leave their old home behind.

While Riley gazed outside the car window, her emotions conjured up some fun ideas on what her new home would be like. From a gingerbread house to a dark castle with a dragon to a fancy white mansion to a slightly bigger and more polished version of their old house, they remained in high spirits all throughout the trip.

However, once the car stopped in front of their new home, Riley got out to see it for herself, and to say that it went against their expectations was an understatement. The interior of the house left much to be desired as well with how small, dark, filthy, and frankly creepy it was. 

“A dead mouse!” Disgust shrieked, feeling her stomach heave at the sight and stench of it.

“It’s the house of the dead!” Sadness cried.

“We’re gonna get rabies!” Fear freaked out and climbed onto Anger’s head.

“GET OFF OF ME!” Anger yelled, his head flaring up, causing Fear’s rear to catch on fire. He screamed from the agonizing pain and ran around HQ, but the flames only continued to sear into his skin. While he was still running amok, Sadness, Disgust, and Anger tapped several buttons on the console, causing three memories of blue, green and red to roll into the shelves.

Just as Joy was about to pull out the fire extinguisher, Fear froze up, as though he just had an epiphany, and he fell onto the ground and proceeded to roll around. This proved to be successful in smothering the flames, and he continued rolling until he no longer felt the heat eating away at him. He let out a huge sigh of relief now that he was safe again.

“Huh. Guess I didn’t need the fire extinguisher this time,” Joy blinked.

Back in the real world, Riley’s new room proved to be significantly smaller than her previous one, especially with how the ceiling was sloped. Joy managed to lift everyone’s spirits up by getting them to think of how they could decorate the room. However, those spirits plunged down just as fast when Riley walked downstairs and overheard from her dad that the moving van wouldn’t arrive until Thursday at the earliest. Her mom argued that the van was supposed to be there yesterday, while her dad claimed that he had no idea this delay would occur. Fear tried to tap on the console, but couldn’t quite get his hand in amidst Sadness, Disgust, and Anger all mashing on the buttons, with several spheres of blue, green, and red rolling in.

Hoping to dissolve the tension brewing in the atmosphere, Joy plucked an idea bulb and screwed it in the console, prompting Riley to play hockey with a crumpled ball of paper, whacking it with her hockey stick into the fireplace. Her mom and dad joined in on the action, the former guarding the fireplace with a pillow, and the latter bending the rules by lifting his wife off the ground, letting his daughter score another goal before carrying her up as well. A yellow sphere rolled onto the shelves, and Joy smiled, having finally created the first happy memory in some time. These happy moments lasted until her dad’s phone rang, and he ended up having to leave the house. 

“Oh, Dad’s gone?” Fear was starting to feel bumps on his skin. “It’s going to be scary without him around. Maybe I should–”

He approached the console, only for Joy to nudge him aside while still staring at the screen. 

“Eep!” he squeaked, not moving an inch as Joy found a yellow memory and played it on the screen. Riley asked her mom if they could get some pizza, and they arrived at a pizza shop where the worker handed them a box containing her favorite food.

Or at least, it was supposed to be her favorite food.

“WHAT THE HECK IS THAT?!” Fear exclaimed, causing the other four emotions to either jump or wince at his outburst. Upon seeing this, he slapped a hand over his mouth, suddenly ashamed of himself.

“...what?” Sadness gasped, barely audible amidst the commotion.

“Aaaaand I’m out,” Disgust cringed, slapping her hand down on the console’s main button. Riley scrunched her face up and walked out of the shop.

“Okay, anchovies are one thing, but broccoli? I don’t even…” Joy held a palm against her forehead.

“Congratulations, San Francisco! You’ve ruined pizza!” Anger seethed. “First the Hawaiians, and now YOU!”

—

“Do you want something else for lunch?” Mom asked as she and her daughter left the pizza shop. She had managed to get a refund from the worker due to there being no other types of pizza, making a mental note to not go back to that shop in the future.

Joy recalled a happy memory involving her drinking a slushie with Meg, her best friend back in Minnesota. Aside from the slushie causing HQ to briefly freeze over (even Anger couldn’t thaw himself out until the surge of pain passed), it was a delicious treat that was just behind pizza as her favorite type of food.

“How about a slushie?” Riley suggested, reminiscing on how sweet they tasted. Then she placed a hand to her forehead. “It hurt my head the first time I drank it, though…”

Inside her mind, the borders of the screen displaying the memory of the slushie suddenly shifted from yellow to purple.

“Huh?” Joy paused. “Why’d the color change?”

She spun on her heel, catching Fear standing next to the memory with his hand dropping down to his side. “Fear, what were you doing back there?”

“S-sorry!” Fear stuttered, shaking on the spot. “It was the memory! I swear I heard it whispering to me, s-so I felt compelled to touch it!”

“So now you’re trying to blame the memory itself for your actions?” Anger scowled. “Memories can’t talk to us, dummy.”

“Can you change it back, Joy?” Sadness asked out of concern.

Joy grabbed the memory and rubbed on it, but the memory retained its new purple color, not turning yellow like she thought it would.

Disgust rolled her eyes. “Great job, Fear. Riley’s going to be scared whenever she thinks of slushies now.”

“Was it really whispering to you?” Sadness wondered, her tone more curious than doubtful.

“I-I know it sounds weird, but yeah!” Fear responded hastily before glancing off to the side. “At least I think so…”

“Well, I’m going to have to ask you not to touch any more of these memories until we find out what’s going on, okay?” Joy instructed Fear, who fervently nodded his head.

—

Joy returned to the console, facing the overhead screen with the other three emotions. They watched Riley skip her way to a set of stairs with a railing dividing the middle. Goofball Island radiated as brightly as Riley’s smile when she lifted her leg onto the railing. 

“Check it out!” Joy spread her arms out ecstatically. “We’re gonna ride that railing all the way down like it’s a water slide!”

However, her face suddenly shifted into one of worry, clinging onto the railing as she brought her leg down on solid ground. She walked down the stairs one step at a time, keeping her left hand on the railing with each step.

“Uh…what?” Joy asked, once again left puzzled. She heard the sound of something rolling on the floor and saw that it was a core memory that had fallen out of its holder.

Sadness’s eyes went wide. “Oh no! That’s a core memory!”

“How’d it fall out?” Disgust questioned.

“Guys! Look at Goofball Island!” Anger pointed towards the now-grayed out island. Every mechanism on it appeared to have frozen in time.

Joy spotted Fear right next to the core memory holder. “Fear, did you do this?”

“I-I, um, uh…” Fear trailed off, unable to muster up a proper response.

“Answer the question, beanpole!” Anger shouted from across the room.

Fear’s breathing grew shakier. “I-I thought the thing looked off, so I…”

He paused, seeing that the core memory was rolling further away from him, and before he knew it, he lunged towards the core memory, just barely missing it with his hands. A light-purple wave began to wash over it as Fear tried reaching out, Sadness, Disgust, and Anger gasping at the sight. Joy instinctively leapt forward and snatched up the core memory before Fear’s fingers could graze it, the color returning back to its golden hue, and she repositioned it back into its holder.

With Goofball Island’s power restored, Riley jumped back up the stairs with renewed glee. She let out a joyful “Whoo-hoo!” as she slid all the way down on the railing. Upon landing, her feet started to skid on the floor, and she flailed wildly, trying to regain her balance. Her heart continued to race as she managed to steady herself, gasping in short breaths.

“Ooh…the floor must have been slippery,” Sadness remarked. “At least Riley didn’t get hurt.”

“Fear! Do you realize what you were about to do?” Joy scolded. “Touching the normal memories is already bad, but if you do that to the cores, I can’t change them back! We’ve been through this with Honesty Island, you should know better!”

Fear yelped and leapt far, far away from the core memory holder as far as he could.

…and immediately smacked his face in the window, his body sticking to it briefly before slowly peeling off. Disgust let out an exasperated groan, dragging her hand over her eyes as Fear folded himself back up.

“Sorrysorrysorry,” Fear muttered out several apologies. “I know I’m not supposed to do that but I still did it! What’s wrong with me? I-is this what a breakdown feels like?!”

“No, it’s just you not following instructions,” Anger grumbled under his breath.

Fear heard that and shrunk in his spot in further shame.

“Anger, don’t make him feel worse about it,” Joy shook her head. “And Fear, that’s not what this is. You’re just under a lot of stress, that’s all.”

“But I keep repeating the same mistakes,” Fear whimpered. “I’m useless.”

“Hey now, you’re far from useless,” Joy smiled, trying to lift his spirits up. “You might have a lot to learn, but you just need to find the fun. It’s like learning to fly!”

“Or falling in love,” Disgust interjected before swooning. “Ah, Imaginary Boyfriend…”

“Learning to fly?!” Fear exclaimed, his teeth chattering. “I can’t do that!”

“Well…you could always think of something funny!” Joy proposed. “Like that time with Meg when Riley laughed so hard she squirted milk out of her nose!”

Fear shuddered. “W-we could’ve choked on the milk! A-and then we would’ve–”

“But that didn’t happen!” Joy refuted. “Let’s think of something else. Hmm…how about that time on the beach? Riley buried Dad all the way up to his head! Oh my gosh, he was such a hilarious sight!”

“The beach? Wasn’t it really hot there?” Fear questioned. “What if we didn’t have enough water? Or what if we got our skin burned by the sun? Or what if the heat–”

“Come on, Fear! Don’t worry about any of that!” Joy denied before thinking of a different topic. “What do you think is the funniest movie we’ve watched with Riley?”

“I don’t remember,” Fear admitted. “Except for the ones that kept me up all night…”

Sadness stepped in with a smile. “Remember the funny movie where the dog dies?”

That last word sent Fear into a nervous wreck, collapsing onto his knees. “D-d-d-dies?! Nonononono, we can’t die here! I DON’T WANNA DIE!”

Joy let out another sigh, but kept her cheerfulness intact. “Calm down, Fear. Nothing like that is ever going to happen, not on my watch.”

Fear took several breaths, managing to steady his nerves. He let out one last breath, willing himself to keep calm, and stood up straight, squeezing his hands together. “Ok…I’m good now.”

Sadness slumped over in guilt. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you like that.”

“No, don’t blame yourself, Sadness,” Fear shook his head. “It’s my fault for having yet another one of my freakouts over nothing.”

Joy jumped up to Fear, having thought of something he could do. “Hey, why don’t you come with me? I know something you can do that won’t set you off!”

She waltzed her way towards a corner of HQ where there were many manuals on the shelves, beckoning for him. Fear followed her there, and she opened up one of the manuals, holding it out with her hands.

“This corner contains all of the Mind Manuals we have in store,” she informed him. “Why not take the time to educate yourself with all the information you could ask for? The more you know, the less you have to fear!”

Fear looked at Joy, still feeling apprehensive. 

“Trust me, it’ll be fun as well!” she added.

He looked around the room until his eyes landed on Sadness, an idea having formed in his mind. “Sadness? Would you like to read with me?”

Sadness blinked at Fear, initially surprised at his offer before her eyes darted off to the side. “Oh, uh, I’ve already read most of these in my spare time. Sorry.”

“Right…” Fear turned towards Joy. “How about you, Joy?”

“Oh, I’d totally join you, but I’m pretty busy with my duties in HQ, especially now,” Joy politely declined.

He looked towards the green emotion. “Disgust?”

“Pass,” she immediately refused, shaking her head. “I’m not really into that genre, if you know what I mean.”

He shot a glance towards Anger, hoping for the best. “A-anger?”

Anger crossed his arms. “I do more than enough reading with these newspapers, beanpole.”

Fear let out a defeated sigh, resigned to his fate. He took the manual from Joy and sat down on one of the chairs. 

“Guess I’ll get started then,” he addressed Joy before muttering to himself, “That idea sure was a bust…”

“Great!” Joy beamed, not catching that last part before bouncing her way back to the console, glad that he wouldn’t be jeopardizing the memories this way. Perhaps he’ll adopt a more positive outlook on life by gaining newfound knowledge as well!

The memory shelves glowing blue, green and red were not exactly helping her own positivity, though.

Chapter Text

Fear sat down on a chair in the corner, flipping open the Mind Manual titled “Long Term Memory Retrieval: Volume 5”. It contained information regarding how to send memories from HQ to Long Term Memory by using the vacuum tube. The one thing that caught his eye, however, was a section at the bottom of page 6 highlighted in bright red:

“Caution: Make sure that there is absolutely nothing underneath the vacuum tube when it lowers. Failure to comply will result in the suction preemptively activating, interrupting the process.”

Fear trembled as his eyes darted over the warning text several more times before he set the manual back onto the shelf. The knowledge he had gained so far was doing the exact opposite of lessening his fear.

—

Riley laid down in her sleeping bag on the floor, waiting for her mom to come kiss her goodnight while looking glumly at her surroundings.

“Dad seemed pretty upset back there,” Sadness remarked.

“Some kind of move this has been,” Anger grumbled.

“Ugh, you can say that again,” Disgust groaned.

Joy, who had been reviewing the shelves that were still dominated by blue, green, and red memories, turned to face the unhappy emotions.

“Hey, don't say that!” she objected. “We've been through worse. If we just list off the things Riley should be happy about, it'll all be fine!”

“Happy, huh?” Disgust quipped, raising an eyebrow in doubt. “There's a rat in our home, the pizza makes us want to puke…”

“Our friends are back home…” Sadness sighed.

“We don't even have a mattress to sleep on…” Anger scowled.

“And the rest of our stuff is still in the van!” Fear exclaimed, sticking his head out from behind one of the memory shelves.

“Okay, I get it, we've had a rough start,” Joy conceded. “But things can only pick up from here, right?”

Anger stood steadfast, unsatisfied with her attitude. “No, Joy. I can't think of a single reason for Riley to be happy right now, and I'm sure the rest of us feel the same, like it or not.”

“There is no way we’re letting anyone see us without any clean clothes,” Disgust grimaced.

Sadness fell down on her face, overwhelmed. “I think we should stay here,” she sniffled before continuing, “And just let it all out into our pillow.”

“This is all way too much,” Fear shivered, running towards them. “We could panic until we can't breathe…”

He clung onto Joy in fright, and she pushed him off of her as she stood in front of the console.

“Or scream that curse word we know!” Anger sported a wide grin. “Like–”

“Now hold on,” Joy cut him off. “Just because today wasn’t that good doesn’t mean that–”

She too was cut off, this time by the sound of the door creaking open. 

“The Mom bad news train is pulling in! Toot toot!” Anger pumped his fist.

“So, the moving van’s fallen even further behind schedule and won’t be here until Tuesday,” Mom sighed, shaking her head in disbelief.

“Toot toot toot!”

“Where's Dad?” Riley asked.

“On the phone. He's been extremely stressed over this new business venture,” Mom answered, pulling her glasses up and rubbing her eyes.

“I rest my case!” Anger affirmed.

Joy walked off, letting Anger march up to the console to make Riley scowl in frustration. Maybe now wasn’t the time to be happy after all.

“Hey, I know all of this must be hard to hear, but before I go…” Mom paused before smiling. “I just wanted to say, thank you for hanging in there.”

The four emotions still standing near the console blinked, their eyes wide and their mouths hanging open. Anger let go of the console, and Joy froze in her tracks, just as surprised as the others.

“It warms my heart that you’ve stayed optimistic all throughout today, and I’m sure your dad feels the same way. He’s been under a lot of pressure, but as long as he knows we’re happy, he’s happy, too,” Mom continued. “Tomorrow’s going to be a big day for you as well, but as long as you stay positive, there’s nothing for you to fear. Hold onto your happiness, okay?”

With renewed vigor, Joy walked towards the console and pressed on the buttons, a smile forming on Riley's face. 

“Yeah, I will!” Riley nodded.

“What did we do to deserve you?” Mom smiled again, giving Riley a kiss on her forehead before turning the lamp beside her off and walking towards the door. 

“Good night, Mom,” Riley waved.

“Sweet dreams,” she waved back, closing the door behind her.

Anger, Disgust, and even Sadness smiled at Joy upon hearing Mom’s words of encouragement.

“Well, you can’t argue with Mom,” the former emotion shrugged. “Happy it is.”

“It’s Team H-A-P-P-Y!” Disgust cheered. 

Sadness tilted her head towards her. “But Riley’s not a cheerleader.”

Disgust flipped her hair. “Just let me have this one. I haven’t felt this happy in ages .”

Fear kept his doubts to himself, wearing a smile on his face.

The overhead screen blacked out, signifying that Riley had fallen asleep. “And that’s all, folks! Now that we’re in REM, I’ll take over Dream Duty from here,” Joy announced. “Great job, everyone! Sleep well, Team Happy!”

—

The other four emotions walked off to bed as Joy stepped on the Memory Dump button, watching today’s memories pour off the shelves, roll under the ground, and gather underneath the tube that had lowered in place. She watched the memories getting whisked up through the tube, and soon after, bright lines of blue, green, and red filled the night sky outside the window, with a few streaks of yellow here and there. It wasn’t quite the same sight she enjoyed at night, but it would have to do.

Once the colors in the sky began to fade, she pulled up a chair and settled herself in front of the console, awaiting what Dream Productions had in store for her and Riley. The screen flickered on, showing Riley and her family in their car, floating in the sky. It landed on the street, driving forward until it arrived at her new home. Things seemed pleasant enough up to this point, as the bright, blue sky turned into a stormy night without warning. A rat popped up towards the center, beckoning for Riley to come live with it before choking itself and falling over. This was followed by a bear with a chef’s hat arriving with a pizza box, opening it up to reveal that the slices were topped with broccoli that jumped up and down, begging to be eaten. 

“Get outta here, you stupid broccoli!” a familiar voice shouted.

Meg suddenly appeared, pushing the bear aside, and held out a slushie towards the screen. Joy stood straight up, taken aback by this development.

“Let’s drink this slushie as quickly as we can, bestie!” Meg challenged.

The slushie tilted itself towards the screen, and frost began to coat the borders, rapidly spreading across the screen. This was enough to make Joy shiver on the spot.

“Oh no,” she gasped, watching Meg's face distort into an unrecognizable mess through the fog. “This is not how today ends.”

She unplugged the wires underneath the console, causing the screen to black out again. Tapping several buttons, she recalled a yellow memory of Riley skating around on Spring Lake. Enthralled by the sight of this and the sound of Riley happily giggling, Joy followed her movements, gliding around HQ while never taking her eyes off of the screen.

“No need to worry, Riley. I'll make sure that tomorrow is another great day,” she promised.

—

Riley excitedly shoveled cereal and milk into her mouth, eager for her first day of school. Inside HQ, Joy pranced around, playing the accordion haphazardly.

“Yoo-hoo!” she called out. “Rise and shine, y'all!”

“Do you have to play that thing so loudly?” Anger complained.

Joy chuckled in response, tossing the accordion aside. “I was up all night and had some brilliant ideas on how to make today the best first day EVER!”

Once the other four emotions walked down the stairs, she got down to business, all while not letting up with her enthusiasm. After assigning her tasks to Disgust, Anger and herself (the latter of which involved her complimenting her own sundress) and checking up on the Train of Thought, she tapped on Sadness's shoulder.

“Sadness! Don't count yourself out, you'll be on the lookout for Riley's soon to be new friends!”

“Oh…how do I do that?” Sadness wondered.

“Just make sure you're watching the screen at all times to see which classmates are trustworthy and friendly enough for her,” Joy stated.

Sadness adjusted her glasses. “I'll do my best.”

“And last but not least, Fear!” Joy called out to the purple emotion. “You've got a very special assignment, my dear! It's right over here! Hehe, that rhymed.” 

Joy gestured towards the same corner with the manuals, causing Fear to tap his head with his index finger. “Isn't this the same place I was at last night?”

“Sure is!” She nabbed a piece of chalk and drew a semicircle, starting from the bookshelf and ending at the other wall. “You can call this corner Fear No More! Because today, there is nothing to fear!”

“What?!” Fear objected. “There are at least 37 reasons for Riley to be afraid right now!”

“Which is why you'll be keeping all the fear right there!” Joy beamed. “You still have the manuals to keep you company, right?”

“Yeah, but–”

“See? Atta boy! You've got this!” She had already begun to dash back to the console before finishing that sentence. “All right! We are gonna have a good day, into a good week, into a good month, into a good year, into a good life!”

“So, today's the day!” Mom smiled while putting Riley's backpack on her back. “New school, new friends, huh?”

“I know! I'm a bit nervous, but mostly excited!” Riley grinned.

“Are you gonna be okay? You want us to walk with you?” Mom asked.

“Mom and Dad with us in public?” Disgust denied, preparing to touch the console.

“I got it!” Joy stopped the green emotion, pressing the main button herself.

“No thanks! I'll be fine!” Riley declined, opening the door. “Bye, Mom! Bye, Dad!”

“Have a great day at school, monkey!” Dad smiled.

The family made monkey noises and silly faces and gestures towards each other before Riley headed out, closing the door behind her.

—

It didn't take long for Riley to settle into her seat for her first class of the day. Her eyes darted towards a student with half-blue, half brown hair and green eyeshadow. It reminded Joy of her own lavender streak in her blue hair.

Once the teacher arrived, she announced that there would be a new student joining their class today. She followed up by asking Riley to introduce herself.

“Are you kidding me? We're center stage already? This is not happening!” Fear wailed, peeking his head out from the memory shelves. “Guys! Pretend she can't speak English!”

Joy frowned upon seeing him out of his designated spot. “Don't be nervous! Just stay in your corner, and everything will be fine.”

The purple emotion flinched before reluctantly returning to his seat. He was too on edge to read the other Mind Manuals, leaving him with nothing else to do while Joy returned to the console.

“Ok, um…hi, everyone!” Riley began to speak as she stood up with a smile on her face. “My name is Riley Andersen, I'm from Minnesota, and now I live here.”

“And how about Minnesota?” The teacher prompted. “You certainly get a lot more snow than we do.”

Joy let out a snort, doubling over at the teacher's remark. Shortly after, she steadied herself, turning a lever with her hand.

“Heh, it does get pretty cold there,” Riley lightly chuckled before continuing her story. “When the lake freezes over, we play hockey on it. I'm on this great team called the Prairie Dogs, too. My friend Meg plays forward, my dad's the coach, and…” 

She paused briefly, trying to think of what she was going to say next. Joy recalled the memory of her family skating together, letting it serve as a guide for her kid.

“…everyone in my family knows how to skate! It's a family tradition of ours, going out on the lake whenever we can.”

Then the screen abruptly turned purple, and Riley went quiet, suddenly finding it hard to breathe. She huddled her arms together and tilted her head towards her desk.

“But now…” she trailed off, her voice having gone quiet.

Joy blinked in confusion before putting two and two together. “Fear! What did I say about not touching the memories?”

“...sorry,” he squeaked out, his hair standing up straight.

“Get back in your corner!” She ordered before unsuccessfully attempting to return the memory back to Long Term.

“Why isn't it ejecting?” Anger demanded.

“Cool kids whispering at three o'clock,” Disgust informed.

They could hear the other kids whispering among themselves upon seeing Riley now standing there in complete silence, and it made Sadness tear up. “They're judging us…”

Joy grabbed onto the memory, with Anger and Disgust backing her up, but it proved to be much stronger than she had anticipated.

Fear silently walked away from the memory holder, arriving at the console with Sadness currently in control. He began to tap some of the buttons, causing her to give him a puzzled look.

“Fear…what are you doing?” the blue emotion whispered.

“Everything's…different,” Riley choked out. “Now that we've moved…it's too much. I can't–”

“This is madness! Why are we freaking out on our very first day?!” Anger yelled.

That's when Joy spotted Fear operating the console, right beside Sadness. 

“What? No!” she exclaimed, finally yanking the skating memory free. “Get off the console!”

She shoved Fear off, causing him to yelp and retreat behind the memory shelves. 

*ding*

The sound alerted everyone to a bright memory that had rolled into sight.

“What the–” Anger gasped.

“A core memory?” Disgust pointed out.

“It's blue!” Sadness realized. Then her eyes nearly popped open upon closer inspection. “And…lavender as well?!”

“No, wait! That's not supposed to happen!” Joy shouted, dashing towards the dual-colored memory. It rolled towards the core memory holder, and Joy forced it open to take the memory out before it could settle in place. Fear watched from the shelves, his entire body shaking in his shoes.

Upon seeing Joy about to step on the Memory Dump button, he rushed out towards her. “Joy! Don't push that! The manual said–”

*click*

His terror intensified tenfold when he heard the vacuum tube lower from the ceiling. He was in full panic mode now, running straight into Joy. The impact knocked them away from the tube and into the still-open core memory holder, and all five core memories tumbled out, along with the blue-lavender core memory from her hands. The Islands of Personality all ceased functioning, turning black.

“No! The core memories!” Sadness cried out, leaving the console behind to run as fast as she could towards them. She grabbed the dual-colored core memory, but when Joy saw this, she panicked and slapped it out of the blue emotion's hands, causing it to roll towards the tube and for her to fall to the ground. Fear could only watch the rolling sphere in horror, knowing exactly what was about to happen next.

Upon detecting the memory, the vacuum fired up, sucking it out of HQ. Anger and Disgust backed off, while Sadness tried to scramble away from the suction. Through all the rapidly ensuing chaos, Fear noticed one of the core memories behind the holder and snatched it up, putting it right back in its place in a flash.

The rest of the core memories started to roll towards the vacuum. Joy managed to save two of them, but when she ran forward to try to rescue the third one, the suction caught her, and she stuck her foot out, trying with all her might to fight the vacuum. The purple emotion saw Sadness helplessly flailing on the ground, getting pulled closer to the tube by the moment.

He didn't spare a moment to think. He leapt forward, shoving Sadness away from the suction with all the force he could muster in his arms, sending her rolling away just far enough. The inertia from this act caused him to collapse, now too weak to hold on the ground. The vacuum yanked him off the ground, and he smacked right into Joy, sending them far, far up with one last shriek from them.

Back in the classroom, Riley sat down in her seat, a sense of numbness overtaking her.

“Thank you, Riley. I know it can be tough moving to a new place, but we're happy to have you here,” the teacher nodded at her.

The class remained quiet as the teacher started the history lesson, all while a heavy silence followed in HQ, almost as oppressive as the vacuum had been just moments prior.

“...Fear? Joy?”

“What just…”

“Can I say that curse word now?”

Chapter Text

If there was any time when Fear felt that his life was flashing before his eyes, it was now, in more ways than one. He had screamed plenty of times throughout his life, whether it be from a nightmare, from Anger bossing him around, or from being touched, but never had it been so deafening . He couldn’t even hear Joy’s own screaming over his own, and when the view of the Memory Dump loomed directly above him while he was forcefully dragged by the vacuum, he was surprised that he hadn’t passed out by now.

He could see the core memories falling away from him and Joy, each of them getting smaller by the moment. In between flashes of gray, he noticed that four of the five Islands of Personality were inactive and dark, while the remaining island continued to radiate a golden glow. Judging by the golden balance scale, the purple gavel, and the white building, it was Honesty Island. Somehow, he had managed to salvage things, if only by a little.

(…wait…he touched its core memory, didn’t he?)

The nervous emotion didn’t have time to ponder over that, as he landed face first into a big pile of memories in a bin. When he pulled himself up, a yellow memory and a blue memory fell from his eyes, and he spat out a green memory. Right beside him was Joy scrambling through the memories, gathering the core memories together. After reclaiming the fourth golden core memory, she spotted the blue and lavender core memory. Gripping it in her hand, she winded her arm up and prepared to lob it far, far away, towards the dark chasm.

“Joy!” he shouted, springing to his feet. “Stop it!”

The yellow emotion dropped the dual-colored core memory, her concentration broken. “Why? It’s all this thing’s fault that we’re stuck out here!”

“Are you listening to yourself?!” Fear shouted back at her. “If that core memory falls into the dump, who knows what will happen to Riley!”

Joy’s grip tightened on the blue-lavender core memory, pondering over his words. After a brief period of silence, she conceded, stacking it on top of the other core memories. The two emotions hopped out of the bin, taking in the new environment they had found themselves yanked off to.

“Where in the world are we?” Joy had to ask.

Fear let out a gasp, clutching his tie upon seeing the grayed out islands. Now that he wasn't shrieking like a banshee, the direness of their predicament dawned on him. “Riley’s Islands of Personality! They're broken!” 

“Wait…check out that island,” Joy pointed towards the one that was still lit up. “Honestly Island’s still functioning!”

“Yeah…” he trailed off.

“One of the core memories didn’t get sucked out with us,” she deduced. “But how?”

“Well, it’s good that didn’t happen, heheh…” the purple emotion chuckled nervously before tensing up again. “But what about you? Riley can't be happy without you around!”

“And that's why we gotta get back up there,” the yellow emotion declared. “All we have to do is return the rest of these core memories, and bingo! Riley will be back to normal.”

She started running towards Goofball Island while Fear stood where he was, uncertain about her plan. “Wait, you want us to walk over that island?”

Joy paused, turning back to Fear and pointing towards the tower beyond the island. “It's our fastest way back to Headquarters.”

“I-I don't know if this is a good idea,” he stammered. “What if that island falls apart while we're on it?”

“Don't be ridiculous! It's not gonna fall down, Fear!” Joy denied.

“...alright,” he agreed, albeit hesitantly. 

“I’m coming, Riley,” Joy nodded, running forward with determination. 

Still on edge, he followed her onto the bridge leading to Goofball Island, trying to avert his gaze from the eternal darkness beneath him.

—

Back at the Andersen home, Riley wore a tired expression on her face as she picked at her food in the container.

“So, it seems like Friday’s going to be an extremely hot day here. The forecast expects a high of 95 degrees Fahrenheit and a low of 88,” Mom reported.

“What is up with Riley? She’s acting super weird,” Disgust pointed out.

Anger glanced out the window and groaned. “What did you expect? All but one of the islands are down!”

“If only Joy were here, she’d know what to do,” Sadness hunched over with a sigh.

The red emotion brightened up at her words. “Then it’s up to us to be Joy for now!”

“Well, aren’t you a rocket scientist,” Disgust quipped. “Anger, Disgust, Sadness…how are we supposed to be happy?!”

“That’s the bad news,” Mom continued before smiling. “The good news is that I found a Junior Hockey League here. And get this: tryouts are tomorrow after school!”

The three emotions shared a look of uncertainty with each other.

“Uh-oh, what do we do?” Disgust questioned.

“I’ll be Joy,” Anger stepped up, ready to press one of the console’s buttons.

“Won’t that be exciting, Riley?” Mom asked.

The kid let out an annoyed grunt in response as the console glowed red. “Yeah, whatever.”

“Bravo. Perfect imitation of Joy right there,” Disgust snorted.

“Ya think?” Anger huffed. “I’m a lot of things, but I guess Joy ain’t one of them!”

Mom stared at her daughter, taken aback. Inside her head, her emotions were discussing how they should approach the situation.

“Did you guys pick up on that?” Mom’s Sadness asked her team.

“Yeah, something’s wrong,” Mom’s Joy agreed.

“Should we ask her?” Mom’s Anger suggested.

Mom’s Sadness nodded. “Let’s keep it subtle so she doesn’t suspect us.”

“So, how was the first day of school?” Mom inquired.

“Oh…I think she knows,” Sadness stated, her eyebrows rising up.

Anger threw his arms up and stormed off. “Screw this. If you guys wanna be Joy, be my guest.”

Disgust was the next to take command. “Guess I’ll have to try, then.”

The green emotion tapped a button with her finger, causing the console to light up in green.

“It was such a fun day, alright,” Riley rolled her eyes.

“Wow, you couldn’t get any less Joy than that,” Anger scowled.

Disgust shrugged, walking off without a word.

“Something is very much wrong,” Mom’s Disgust observed.

“She hasn’t been like this in a while. What do we do?” Mom’s Fear asked.

“Let’s find out what’s going on,” Mom’s Sadness replied. “But first, we need to signal the husband.”

Mom cleared her throat, looking towards her husband in the eye. Inside his mind, his emotions were fixated on a hockey game, cheering on the winning team. His lack of a response caused her to clear her throat again while narrowing her eyes.

“Oh boy,” Dad’s Anger sighed, realizing that the wife needed his attention. “She’s looking at us. What was she saying again?”

“Uh…seems like nobody was listening, sir,” Dad’s Fear reported. “Sorry.”

“And after all the nonsense I’ve had to put up with today…okay, fine. What does she want?” Dad’s Anger grumbled.

“There’s that stupid face again,” Mom’s Disgust groaned.

“I could strangle him right now!” Mom’s Anger seethed.

After another signal from Mom, Dad snapped out of his zone and glanced at his daughter, who had gone back to picking at her food. “Ah, so…Riley. How was school today?”

Mom fought the urge to facepalm right then and there while her emotions didn’t bother holding back their exasperated reactions.

“Sadness. It’s your turn now,” Disgust told her.

Sadness backed up, uncomfortable. “Wait, how am I supposed to be Joy? I’m her complete opposite!”

“Well, it can’t hurt to try, you know?” Anger encouraged. “Besides, you saw how well that went with me and Broccolady there.”

Disgust shot the red emotion a glare. “You did not just call me that.”

“Well, I did. Loud and clear,” Anger retorted.

The fashionable emotion looked ready to castrate the hotheaded one while Sadness slowly approached the console and pushed a button, making the console shift into a blue hue.

“School sucked, okay?!” Riley cried out.

Mom stiffened, taken aback by her daughter’s outburst. “Riley! What happened?”

Disgust and Anger stared at the screen and went silent, their argument dying out on the spot.

“Whoa…that was more than I expected,” Disgust commented.

“Sir, she just yelled at us!” Dad’s Fear informed his team.

“Shall we take it to Defcon 3?” Dad’s Disgust asked. “Or Defcon 2, perhaps?”

Dad’s Anger stroked his chin. “Hold up. This might be a false alarm. I don’t want to have to resort to the foot.”

“Riley, calm down,” Dad instructed. “Take a deep breath and–”

Suddenly, the console’s blue color faded as a black tint began to overtake the edges of the console.

“Huh?” Sadness almost fell backwards from the shock. “What’s going on?!”

The bespectacled emotion scrambled her fingers across the console, trying desperately to drive the black color away. The console lit up in blue again, but the black tint didn’t quite subside. “Make it stop!”

“Stop telling me to calm down!” Riley exclaimed, clenching the table with her fists curled and tears forming in her eyes.

“What the heck is this?!” Anger shouted, rushing forward. “We gotta fix this!”

He tried to pound his fist on the console, but got knocked back by Sadness’s frantic movements.

“Sir! Incoming bad attitude!” Dad’s Fear exclaimed.

Dad’s Anger gave a firm nod. “Take it to Defcon 3.”

“You heard him, gentlemen. Defcon 3!” Dad’s Fear announced, sounding off the alarm.

Dad hardened his expression towards his daughter. “Riley…”

The blue emotion slapped her palms against several buttons all at once, creating a flash of blue. The black color began to dissipate, but outside…

“This home sucks, my school sucks, everything sucks!” Riley shouted, clenching her fists.

“Preparing to put down the foot!” Dad’s Disgust declared.

“Give the command to launch, sir!” Dad’s Fear saluted.

“Listen, Riley, you need to stop. Stop yelling at us or else…” Dad warned.

“Sadness, it’s gone now!” Disgust called out. “You should let her go.”

“Nonono, our dad’s mad at us now! We gotta get out of here!” the still panicking emotion cried out as she grabbed the outburst levers that Anger normally used.

“Wait!” the green emotion warned. “Don’t do it!”

It was far too late for warnings now. Sadness pulled on the levers as hard as she could while letting out an ear-piercing shriek.

“JUST LEAVE ME ALONE!” Riley shrieked, jumping from her seat with such force that she knocked over her container of food before rushing her way upstairs, leaving her parents utterly speechless.

“ABORT!” Dad’s Anger shouted.

“Abort?” Dad’s Sadness questioned.

“You heard me the first time, gentlemen,” Dad’s Anger affirmed. “It was a false alarm.”

“Disengage the foot, everyone!” Dad’s Fear ordered.

“Phew! That could’ve been a disaster if we had put the foot down!” Dad’s Joy sighed in relief.

“Well, that was a disaster,” Mom’s Sadness shook her head.

—

Right as Joy and Fear ran up to the edge of Goofball Island, they spotted a wire connecting the island to HQ. The latter’s ears picked up on a low rumbling in the distance, causing him to halt.

“Did you hear that, Joy?” Fear asked.

Joy turned back to him, confused. “Hear what?”

“That rumble! It could’ve been an incoming earthquake! I think we should get outta here before it’s too late,” he hastily suggested, glancing over his shoulder.

The bright emotion shook her head while flashing a bright smile at him. “Come on, Fear! We can’t back down now. We just need to cross this wire and then we’re home!”

“You want us to walk across that thing?!” Fear yelped, peering over the edge. “No way. Not happening for me.”

Her face contorted into mild irritation. “How else are we going to get back, then?”

The nervous emotion went quiet, still remaining on the island, but letting Joy walk across the wire. His anxiety briefly flared up when he saw her almost lose her grip on the core memories when she tried to rebalance herself.

Back in the real world, Riley collapsed into her sleeping bag, trying to wipe her tears away. After several minutes, she heard knocking on her door, and her dad entered the room.

“Hey, so…things got a little out of hand downstairs. Do you want to talk about it?” Dad asked.

His daughter didn’t respond, so he tried a different tactic. 

“Come on, where’s my happy girl?” he smiled, imitating a monkey with his hand and the sounds from his mouth.

“He’s trying to start up Goofball!” Anger realized.

The red and green emotions looked out the window as they heard Dad’s monkey noises echo in HQ. They had to strain their ears to hear it over the sound of the blue emotion sobbing in the corner with the Mind Manuals.

Riley only responded with a sullen glance before turning away from him.

Upon seeing the wire start to fall apart, hearing the sound of crumbling, and feeling the island shake violently, Fear completely lost what little cool he had remaining with him.

“AAAAAIIIIIEEEEE!!!!!” the unnerved emotion screamed his head off, breaking into a mad sprint back towards Long Term Memory.

Joy, startled by the wire breaking down and Fear’s shrill scream, felt the core memories slipping from her hands. She managed to hold onto the four golden ones, but the blue-lavender core memory fell off from her stack, and in her haste to retreat back to the island, she was unable to prevent the memory from falling into the Memory Dump. It was an unfortunate loss, but to her, it was the least important of the core memories, so it could’ve been worse.

By the time she made it back to the island, Fear was already halfway across it, dodging debris left and right.

“I THOUGHT YOU SAID EARTHQUAKES WERE A MYTH, JOY!!!” he hollered, pushing himself to his absolute limit because his life absolutely depended on it.

He dashed madly across the bridge, maintaining his speed up until he finally made it back to Long Term Memory, at which he collapsed onto the ground. The sounds of the island breaking apart continued to fill his ears as he laid there, not willing to spare a glance behind him.

Soon, the energetic emotion managed to escape from the island by the skin of her teeth. Joy watched helplessly as the rest of it fell into the black void. She didn’t even get to see or hear it land, as it seemed to vanish from existence without any fanfare.

“Goofball Island…it can’t be…”

She held up its core memory, watching Riley spin around gleefully as a baby on a hill with her parents, then as a kid jumping on a trampoline with them, and then riding her dad’s shoulders with chocolate ice cream smeared across her face. It was all a massive shock to her, witnessing the collapse of one of Riley’s Personality Islands firsthand.

Outside her mind, her dad ceased the monkey act, taking a step back.

“I understand. You need some alone time,” he acknowledged before heading towards the door. “Let’s talk tomorrow, okay?”

Inside HQ, Disgust and Anger stared outside the window in disbelief.

“We have a major problem.”

“Ugh, where’s Joy when you need her the most…”

Another sob echoed throughout the building.

—

“The island’s just…gone? And you lost one of the core memories, too?” Fear wasn’t taking the news well. “H-how’s Riley going to function without it? A-and also, what about Friendship? Or Hockey? Or Family? O-or even–”

The purple emotion tried to pick himself back up from the ground, but swayed back and forth on his feet, hyperventilating.

“Nonononono, don’t be scared, Fear! You survived an earthquake just now, you should be proud of yourself! That takes a lot of courage!” Joy begged.

Fear devolved into an emotional wreck as his legs gave out, muttering unintelligible sounds as he rolled around on the ground.

Joy let out an exasperated groan at the state of her coworker. “We don’t have time for this, Fear.”

She walked on ahead, assessing the distance they needed to travel to get to Friendship Island. It was going to be a lot more than she had anticipated, as the memory shelves extended up to the edges of the cliff. As she headed back to Fear, the sky above them transitioned into dusk. 

“And now Riley’s asleep…which is great, actually!” Joy’s face morphed into a grin. “That’ll give us the time to go through the scenic route. Nothing bad can happen to her while she’s in her slumber, after all!”

Right as the yellow emotion was about to walk into the depths of Long Term Memory, she heard him speak up. “W-wait! You’re just gonna walk into Long Term Memory?”

“Yep!” Joy winked. “You just gotta think positive, and we’ll make it through!”

“Well, I’m positive you’ll get lost in there,” the purple emotion muttered under his breath before raising his voice. “That place is an endless maze of memories. I’m telling you, the manuals don’t lie when it comes to this!”

“The manuals…that’s it! You’ve read the manuals, so you should know the way to Friendship Island from here!” Joy beamed. 

She excitedly stomped her feet and flashed a wide smile. “Oooooh, hehehe! Let’s go! Lead on, my map!”

Fear laid still on the ground. “Sorry I can’t move…I almost died a few minutes ago.”

Joy swallowed her frustration, opting to drag Fear by his leg with her left hand while carrying the four core memories in her right hand. 

“This doesn’t hurt as much as I thought it would,” Fear commented.

“Isn’t this great? We’ll be back to Headquarters before morning!” Joy walked into the maze as Fear gave out directions left and right. “This is totally working! Haha, I rhymed again!”

Chapter Text

“This is not working,” Joy grumbled as she continued to drag Fear through Long Term. Her hair was a frazzled mess, her previously energetic movements were sluggish, and she was at her wit's end with how much time they had spent wandering through the maze with no end in sight.

The dusk brightened into dawn, prompting a frustrated groan from the yellow emotion. “And Riley's awake now…great…”

Her grip on the core memories slipped, and they spilled across the floor. One of them rolled near the purple emotion, who reached his hand out towards it. Just as the lavender wave began to take form, she scooped it up with the rest of them, putting an end to the color change.

“Stop! You don’t want those memories to stay afraid, right?” she reminded him.

“Oh, sorry,” he apologized, letting his hand drop onto the floor.

Their journey continued until they arrived at two jelly bean shaped creatures analyzing some of the grayed out memories. 

“Mind Workers!” she brightened up, dropping Fear and running up to them.

The male Mind Worker held up a vacuum hose while the female Mind Worker directed him to a shelf filled with a large quantity of grayed out memories.

“That’s weird. I could’ve sworn most of these memories were just fine yesterday morning,” the male Mind Worker brought up.

“Is that so?” the female Mind Worker questioned. “Alright, let’s leave this shelf behind for now.”

As they moved onto the next shelf, one with far less gray memories, they got to vacuuming up several of them, from phone numbers, to piano lessons, to the names of the Presidents, to the names of the Cutie Pie Princess dolls. After Joy tried to get their attention several times to no avail, she leaned in and tilted her pupils in opposite directions while sticking her tongue out, startling them.

“Wah!” the male worker cried, releasing the hose out of surprise.

“What do you want, lady?” the female worker asked, annoyed at the interruption.

“Why are you throwing them away?” Joy responded with her own question. “They're good memories!”

“See how faded these memories are?” the female worker explained. “Riley doesn’t care about them, so they’re going into the dump. Gotta make room for the new ones.”

“Yeah. We’re Forgetters, so this is our job, okay?” the male worker added with irritation.

The yellow emotion raised an eyebrow. “Really?”

“Really. But you know what never fades? This one right here!” the male Forgetter replied, holding up a bright yellow memory from a nearby cart. He played the memory out, causing Joy to tilt her head back in annoyance.

“The song from the gum commercial?” she bemoaned.

“We send it up to headquarters every now and then just because,” the male Forgetter smirked while dancing along to the tune.

“And it loops in Riley’s head over and over!” the female Forgetter beamed, dragging her finger across it. “Like now!”

The Triple Dent Gum jingle replayed itself, prompting another frustrated groan from the joyful emotion. “Yeah, yeah, we all know the song. Real catchy stuff.”

“What do you say we whisk it up again?” the male Forgetter asked his coworker. “If there’s one thing Riley won’t forget, it’s this one!”

“Let’s do it!” she gave her approval.

“Here it comes!” he declared, singing along with the song before flicking the memory against the shelf. It rocketed all the way up to HQ, interrupting the quiet morning Disgust, Anger, and Sadness were currently having, the latter hanging far back from the console.

“This again?!” Anger slammed his newspaper down. He stormed up to the console and slammed his fist against it, ejecting the memory back where it came from.

The two Forgetters shared a hearty laugh and were about to depart before Fear rushed up to them, having watched them from a distance. Putting his own irritation at the gum commercial aside, seeing them send it back to HQ had sparked an epiphany in his mind.

“WAIT!” He shouted at the group. “There’s something I just realized!”

Everyone froze, turning towards the purple emotion.

“Joy, what if we sent these core memories back to Headquarters with those Recall Tubes?” He suggested, feeling proud for coming up with a surprisingly easy solution to their problems.

The yellow emotion wore a surprised look before it morphed into pure excitement. “Wait…we can just do that? Oh my gosh, you’re a genius, Fear! We send them back through the tubes, then the rest of the islands won’t collapse!”

Joy jumped towards the empty space in the memory shelf and set the Friendship Island core memory down in place. She gave it a hard push, sending the core memory into the tube. After everything that had transpired, luck was finally on their side!

—

“Triple Dent Gum will make you smile…”

Riley hummed to herself as she listened to her friend Meg on video chat from her laptop. Her eyes were only halfway open as she stared at the screen in front of her.

“Do you like it there? Were there any earthquakes? Is the bridge cool?” Meg asked her questions one after another.

“It’s fine, no, and we didn’t actually go on the bridge,” the blonde girl responded flatly. “What happened with the playoffs?”

“Oh, it was so much fun!” the redhead beamed. “Coach said we might go to finals this year, and we got this really cool new girl on the team, too!”

Inside Riley’s mind, Disgust scrunched her face upon seeing the photo Meg took with her new friend. “Uh, she did not just say that.”

“She has a new friend already?” Sadness despaired. “We’re going to be forgotten…”

Anger clenched the newspaper in his hands, growling with rage.

“Hey hey, stay happy, you two. We don’t want to lose any more islands,” the green emotion reminded them.

“We were passing the puck to each other without even looking,” Meg continued to ramble on. “It’s like mind reading!”

The furious emotion stomped up to the console, having heard more than enough. “You like to read minds, Meg? Read this, you backstabbing–”

“Stop right there,” the fashionable emotion warned, walking up to him. “Remember what happened with Sadness yesterday? You need to calm down, dude.”

“DON’T TELL ME TO ‘CALM DOWN’!” Anger hollered, shoving Disgust aside and yanking on the outburst levers, his head erupting.

Riley narrowed her eyes towards the screen. “I gotta go.”

“What?” Meg blinked.

“I gotta go!” the upset girl repeated, slamming her laptop shut.

—

The yellow emotion’s celebration was cut short when the core memory rolled all the way back down, hitting her dress and knocking her down.

“Ow!” she cried out, pushing herself up to her feet. “Wait…it didn’t work?”

Just as the words left her mouth, they heard rumbling in the distance, causing Fear to let out a squeak and huddle up against the shelf with his hands over his eyes. Joy saw that Friendship Island was falling apart, and within the span of several seconds, it had plunged into the Memory Dump.

“No! We were this close to saving Riley’s favorite island!” she exclaimed.

“It’s just like Goofball…never to be seen again,” the unnerved emotion mumbled, still trembling against the shelf.

Joy took a breath, finding her resolve. “I’ll try again with the other core memories.”

One by one, they all came tumbling back down from the tube, leaving the bright emotion aghast. “But…why? Why won’t they go up?”

A female voice called out from behind her. “Oh boy…that’s not good.”

Joy turned around, not liking where this was going. “What?”

“Riley’s been having trouble recalling a lot of her memories lately,” the male Forgetter mentioned. “So if she can’t even recall those core memories…”

Fear jumped up from his spot against the shelf. “Well, she’s gotta remember both of us! Right, Joy?”

To Joy’s surprise, he scrambled into the tube, pushing his way in. However, before he even had the chance to press his hands against the glass interior, a suction blew him out, sending him rolling across the floor and into the opposite shelf.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Joy frowned, shaking her head. “Is this some kind of worst possible timing security update?”

“I get the feeling it’s much more serious than that,” the female Forgetter worriedly tapped her chin.

“Maybe if you find a way to get into contact with Headquarters, they can do something about these Recall Tubes to make them work properly again,” the male Forgetter suggested.

“Would you two know a way to do that?” Joy asked, now desperate for a proper solution.

“Sorry, but we’re just Forgetters. We don’t know the intricacies on how those tubes work,” the female Forgetter broke the bad news.

“Plus, we gotta get back to work right about now. Hopefully both of you manage to find a way to solve this mess,” the male Forgetter waved the emotions off, departing with his coworker.

“I thought my plan would’ve worked, but once again, it was a bust…” Fear despaired, still lying on the ground.

“Now now, Fear,” Joy gave him a reassuring smile. “That was a really smart idea you had there! Honestly, I’m surprised I didn’t think of it earlier considering how obvious it was.”

She walked right up to the purple emotion and offered her hand. “You know, I’m impressed. Going right into the tube like that takes guts, even if it didn’t work out.”

The nervous emotion’s jaw dropped, surprised at her words. “You mean it, Joy?”

She gave one meaningful nod. “I mean it.”

He was briefly left speechless before taking her hand and standing straight up, at the ready. “Let’s keep going! I’ll try not to collapse this time.”

“Yes! Onward we go!” the bright emotion grinned at his newfound enthusiasm as they embarked on their journey through Long Term once more.

Thankfully, it didn’t take them nearly as long before they encountered someone else along the way. This one was a male, pink elephant-like creature with a brown coat and a hat who appeared to be eyeing certain memories, putting some of them into a bag he had with him.

“Hey!” Joy greeted the creature, who jolted up and bolted off.

“Wait!” the yellow emotion dashed on towards the pink figure with the purple emotion following her from a distance. “We just want to talk!”

She heard the sound of panting to her right, and there, she found the creature panting frantically with his hands over his face. “Excuse me?”

“Ahhh!” the elephant-esque being sprung up, shaking his head wildly. “I, er, uh, I was looking for–DIVERSION!”

“What?”

He snatched a blue memory and chucked it towards his right, leaping to his left. “So long, suckers!”

His face met a cart filled with memories, knocking them over, and he fell to the floor in a daze. “Ow…everywhere hurts…”

Joy let out a gasp upon recognizing who the creature was. “Wait, you’re Bing Bong!”

“Who?” The pink creature quickly denied, putting his hat back on. “I don’t know what a Bing Bong is.”

“Sure you do!” the yellow emotion insisted. “You’re Riley’s imaginary friend!”

Bing Bong’s eyes widened. “You really do know me?”

“Of course! Riley loved playing with you, both of you were best friends! We could use your help in trying to get back to Headquarters.”

“Headquarters?”

“Well, yeah. I’m Joy, that's Fear over there,” she pointed towards the purple emotion, who was hanging behind the corner.

“You’re Joy? The Joy?”

She gave the imaginary friend a firm nod in response.

“What the heck are you doing out here then?” Bing Bong wondered.

“About that…you wanna answer for us, Fear?” Joy asked him.

The nervous emotion shrunk behind the corner, remaining silent.

“Hey, don't be shy, Fear! He's not gonna hurt you,” she tried to reassure him.

Fear swallowed, trying to put aside his apprehensiveness at the newcomer. Slowly, he stepped out from the corner and approached them.

“Without you, Riley can’t be happy,” Bing Bong remarked. “I’ll make sure you get back. Follow me!”

Joy’s smile widened. “Oh, thank you so much!”

The two companions traveled through the Long Term shelves while reminiscing on the days when Bing Bong and Riley were in a band, played tag, and rode on his rocket while singing the “Bing Bong” theme song.

“Who’s your friend who likes to play?” Joy recited the lyrics excitedly.

“Bing Bong! Bing Bong!” he cheered.

“His rocket makes you yell ‘hooray’!” she sang out, twirling around on her foot.

“Bing Bong! Bing Bong!” they chanted simultaneously.

Fear raised his hand, having thought of something to ask of the imaginary friend. “What are you, exactly?”

“I’m not 100% sure, really. I’m made out of cotton candy, but I’m part cat, elephant, and dolphin all at once,” Bing Bong answered.

“That’s a lot of animals,” Joy remarked.

“Oh yeah, they were all the rage back then. The bird goes tweet, the pig goes oink, the fox goes yip, and so on.”

“What have you been doing out here?” Joy followed up with her own question.

The pink creature slowed down, a sense of melancholy and uncertainty washing over him. “Well...there’s not much for an imaginary friend like me to do these days, so I’ve, you know, been…”

He tensed up, going quiet on the spot and drooping himself over.

“Hey, don’t be like that! When we get back to Headquarters, I’ll make sure that Riley remembers you,” Joy promised.

“You will?” Bing Bong perked up at her offer. “Awesome! This is the greatest day of my life!”

He spun around and bounced up and down excitedly, celebrating the future ahead of him. Then he felt a crack in his left heel and he gasped in agony, clutching it with his hands. He was forced to sit down in an effort to reduce the acute pain while crying out candy from his eyes.

“Are you okay?” Joy asked, concerned.

“Is that…candy?” Fear stared at the sweets, confused.

“It is,” Bing Bong confirmed in between his tears. “Try the caramel, it's delicious.”

She reached towards one of the pieces, but almost lost her hold on the four core memories in her arm. Upon seeing this, the imaginary friend offered his backpack to her. Though he had to empty out the other memories he had stored there first, as well as a boot, an anchor, a trumpet, a sink, and a cat.

“Here,” he held the empty backpack out for her.

“You're a lifesaver,” Joy complimented, stuffing the core memories in the backpack. “It'll be a lot easier to walk back to Headquarters now.”

“Walk? That's way too long!” Bing Bong refuted. “We’re gonna get on the Train of Thought!”

He led the two emotions out of Long Term, indicating the train chugging on the tracks.

“The train, of course!” Joy realized.

“But how do we get there?” Fear asked.

“It goes all over the place, but the nearest station from here is in Imagination Land,” the pink figure pointed towards a huge metal wall with a door. “This way's a shortcut!”

As they walked towards the wall, Fear's eyes went wide at the sign above.

“THAT'S our shortcut?!” the purple emotion exclaimed out of fright and disbelief.

“D-A-N-G-E-R. Shortcut. Don't you see?” The simple-minded elephant gestured with his trunk before opening the door up.

Joy didn't see any problems with the path forward. “Well, he says it's the fastest way to Headquarters, so…”

“Yeah, there is no way in heck I am going in there,” Fear vehemently shook his head. “And you two shouldn't, either!”

“Come on, Fear! You were brave enough back there with the Recall Tube, you can handle this!” Joy encouraged before adding, “Besides, what's our other choice? Look at how long this wall extends.”

“That sign clearly says ‘Danger’!” the unnerved emotion exclaimed. “I don't know what that place is, but we're likely gonna die if we get stuck in there!”

Joy let out a drawn out sigh, her patience running thin. “You're freaking out over nothing again, Fear. If you want to go the very looooong way around, that's up to you, but Riley needs to be happy!”

The imaginary friend entered the ominous structure first, dancing in place. “Look at me! I'm closer to the station, cause I'm riding the shortcut!”

“Bing Bong knows what he's doing, and I can't afford to miss that train,” the yellow emotion stepped in with the bag of core memories. “He's part dolphin, those creatures are smart.”

The tense emotion watched them stroll further into the building, unwilling to take the risk himself. Was he a coward for hanging back? He wouldn't refute that. But he just knew that it was better than the prospect of getting stuck in a place that was very clearly marked “DANGER”.

—

On the second day of school, Riley, dressed in a gray long-sleeve shirt and blue jeans, walked outside with her lunch tray. She spotted the rest of the students all conversing with each other, making her feel disconnected from them. There was an unoccupied bench a fair distance away from the tables, and she walked off to sit down on it, setting the tray on her lap.

…all while remaining oblivious to the sounds of buzzing above her.

—

“Uh…Anger? Disgust? This isn’t good!” Sadness called out to them, getting their attention.

“Riley, what are you doing ?” Anger dropped his newspaper. “Are you listening to what’s right above you?!”

As Riley picked up the hot dog bun, the screen shifted to show the rest of the classmates at the tables, with several of them whispering among themselves and a black girl sending a concerned glance her way.

Disgust urgently scurried towards the console. “We need to get Riley out of there. Now.”

Chapter Text

Fear was now saddled with the seemingly impossible prospect of running all the way around the wide chamber. He knew that he was the fastest of the five emotions, but even at top speed, he calculated that his chances of arriving at the Train of Thought before it departed would be slim to none. The long way guaranteed his survival, though, and that’s what mattered. So he broke into a sprint, keeping his eyes peeled wide open for a way past the metal wall.

After a minute of non-stop running, he saw it. A gap in the wall wide enough for him to pass through. The purple emotion cheered, but it was short-lived when it dawned on him that Joy and Bing Bong may have likely reached the train by then. Unwilling to let himself be left behind, he sped through the gap and dashed onward, spotting the train slowing to a stop up ahead.

—

High above Riley was a beehive, with one of the bees hovering next to her food tray. Disgust pressed her hand against the console, her nerves completely on edge. Riley pulled a face upon seeing the bee land on her hot dog. To the green emotion’s horror, the girl attempted to swat the insect with her hand.

“Riley, you’re supposed to run from those things, not fight back!” Disgust gasped.

“Geez, we should’ve been faster!” Anger grunted in frustration.

Sadness’s legs were quivering from dread. “Oh no…we just provoked it!”

In the bee’s head, alarms were blaring in her Headquarters as three bee-like emotions freaked out.

“Waaah!” the bee’s Fear hollered. “We’re under attack!”

“There is an intruder right beneath our hive!” the bee’s Anger shouted. “Drive them back!”

The bee’s Disgust, who served as the leader of the bunch, nodded. “Initiating the counterattack.”

“Call for backup! Call for backup!” the bee’s Fear yelled.

The bee’s Disgust yanked the levers, and the yellow insect flew towards the human’s left hand, readying her stinger.

What followed for Riley was pain. A sharp burst of pain stabbing through the back of her left hand. The bee tried to yank her stinger out of the skin, but the barbs got stuck, and the entire stinger ripped away from the rest of the bee’s body.

“Oh sh—” the bee’s emotions all gasped in unison just as they all felt faint and collapsed as the console and the rest of HQ shut down.

—

He made it.

Against all odds, he had beaten Joy and Bing Bong to the train station. And that was…very much not a good thing, actually. What happened in that dangerous chamber to set them back?

A yellow, triangle shaped leg sticking out of the door from the other side answered that question for him. Wait, no it didn’t.

“HUH?” Fear shouted, startled from the sight. “Who are you?”

“Fear! We need your help!” a familiar voice cried out to him, shaking her leg.

The purple emotion’s eyes went wide. “Joy?! What happened to you?!”

“We got turned into these…things!” Joy struggled to find the right words to describe her blocky appearance. “Grab my leg! We can’t fit through this door!”

The unnerved emotion stiffened, pressing his arms against his chest. He wanted to save both of his companions, but if he wasn’t strong enough, there was a chance he’d get yanked in there, too. And that would mean certain doom for him as well.

“This isn’t the time to stand there!” Bing Bong shouted desperately. “If you don’t pull us out, we’ll be stuck here forever! And the train will depart without us, too!”

Right after the imaginary friend said that, his body morphed into a pink trunk, while Joy transformed into a yellow star. The purple emotion began to sweat profusely, staring at them in sheer terror as his legs grew weak. Before he knew it, he had collapsed onto his knees, a sickening feeling of harrowing hollowness overtaking him. Somehow, it scared him more than Jangles ever did.

“We’re not gonna make it!” Bing Bong exclaimed as he attempted to squeeze his trunk through the door, only to get stuck.

“Save us!” Joy screamed, shining erratic bursts of light. “PLEASE!”

—

The buzzing grew louder as Riley looked up, seeing that several more yellow and black insects were flying towards her way.

“Gah!” Anger leapt towards the console, his pulse elevated. “I’m gonna give those bees a piece of my mind!”

“Anger, stop!” Sadness called out to him. “You’re gonna provoke the entire hive into stinging Riley!”

The fiery emotion immediately stepped back, frustrated, but recognizing that Riley’s entire well-being was at stake. If neither he nor Disgust could get Riley to safety, then it all had to come down to Sadness.

Riley felt her vision blur up. The stinging pain had gotten to her, and now there were more bees that were about to hurt her. She remained glued to her seat on the bench, resigned to her fate. All because she felt like she didn’t belong with the rest of her classmates.

“No, no, no!” Sadness sobbed, face-planting on the console. “I can’t keep Riley safe! We’re doomed!”

In an instant, the teacher ran up to Riley and pulled her away from the bees with one swift motion, leaving the three emotions stunned in silence as the tearful emotion pulled her face off of the console.

Thankfully, the bees didn’t continue their attack, instead opting to remain nearby the food left behind.

“Are you okay?” the black student asked, concerned.

Riley wiped her tears away with her arm and tried to give the other student an annoyed glance, but winced instead. “I’m fine.”

“We need to treat that sting right away,” the teacher informed the blond girl, pulling out her credit card from her wallet. “Give me your arm.”

Once Riley did so, the teacher flicked the card across, removing the stinger from her skin. “Let’s get you to the nurse’s office.”

—

Fear continued to watch the yellow star and the pink trunk, trying desperately to think of something, anything to save them without getting himself killed in the process. Judging by how they were running, no, moving about, they had been turned into two-dimensional objects, unable to fit through the doorway.

…two-dimensional…wait a moment.

This idea was a long shot. But if it saved them, then that’s all that mattered.

“JOY! BING BONG! Fall on your face!” Fear hollered at the top of his lungs.

The star and the trunk froze up and fell forward, turning into thin lines of yellow and pink. Joy let out a surprised gasp before crawling forward like a worm. “Come on! Let’s get outta here!”

Once they managed to exit the chamber, they reverted into blockier versions of themselves. However, the Train of Thought sounded its whistle, starting its engines up.

“Wait! WAIT!” the yellow emotion cried as she and Bing Bong ran forward to the vehicle. All Fear could do was stare at the train taking off without them, unable to lift his feet from the sheer amount of stress.

She facepalmed herself with her still blocky hand. “This was supposed to be a shortcut!”

“It was!” the pink elephant affirmed, shifting back into his normal fluffy self. “But dang, talk about a dangerous place we went through! There really should’ve been some kind of warning sign.”

Fear shot the imaginary friend a withering glare, now frustrated at his idiocy. “There literally was a sign that said ‘DANGER’ up there.”

Bing Bong gave the purple emotion a confused look in response.

“How do we get to the next station then?” Joy got the group back on track, turning back into her usual appearance.

“Oh that part’s simple!” the fluffy creature declared, pointing to his left. “We head on to the next station in line! It’s right through those gates!”

“So…another ‘shortcut’, then?” Joy deadpanned.

Bing Bong flashed a triumphant grin, strolling forward to the gate up ahead.

“I’m definitely glad I took the long way around…” Fear managed to get out, swaying back and forth on his feet. All the stress that came from running nonstop combined with seeing his companions almost perish had caught up to him, and he fell onto his stomach.

The bright emotion was about to make a frustrated expression, but something crossed her mind, and she gave him a curious look instead. “How did you know that what we did would save us from that place?”

“I…I'm not sure. I just realized that you two were two-dimensional and I spoke the first thing that came to my mind,” Fear gave his best explanation.

“Well, in any case, you just saved our lives,” Joy gently smiled. “Thank you, Fear.”

The exhausted emotion dragged his face up to meet her smile with his own. Then his neck gave out, and he collapsed on the floor again. 

“Sorry to make you do this again, Joy,” he mumbled, slowly raising his hand.

Joy didn't feel nearly as annoyed dragging Fear behind herself this time. Perhaps it was because she owed him her life. Perhaps it was because she knew that he was right to not go into that dangerous shape-shifting chamber. Perhaps it was because they were about to head into Imagination Land, a place she had always wanted to visit, with Bing Bong leading the way.

Or perhaps it was all of those reasons combined.

—

The teacher brought Riley to the nurse’s office, with the black girl following them. She brought her to the sink and had her rinse her left hand with water and soap while she retrieved an ice pack from the freezer. The swollen spot still hurt to the touch, causing the blond student to quietly hiss from the pain.

As Riley held the ice pack against the back of her left hand, the black student took the moment to speak up. “Why were you sitting underneath that thing? You could’ve been stung many more times by those bees!”

Riley felt herself going numb again, and not because of the ice. “Why do you ask?”

The black girl paused, taken aback by the other’s borderline apathetic delivery. “I saw you just sitting there, and I got scared. I asked the teacher to do something since I wasn’t sure how else I could save you from getting hurt.”

“Okay,” was Riley’s only response.

“Try not to put too much pressure on your left hand,” the teacher advised. “I’ll make sure that both of you aren’t marked tardy once we get back to class.”

“Please be more careful next time, okay?” the black student asked urgently.

“Alright…” Riley trailed off, returning back to class with the teacher and the other student. This day was already off to a far worse start than before, that’s for sure.

—

“Welcome to Imagination Land!” Bing Bong introduced the two emotions to the vast landscape that laid ahead of them. “I come here all the time. I’m practically the mayor.”

“Hey, you guys hungry?” He directed them to a forest made out of French fries in boxes and gobbled down on one of them. “Geh a low o dish!”

“No way!” Joy enthusiastically took a bite from the fry, savoring the saltiness.

“Are you sure we should be eating food that technically isn’t real?” Fear doubted.

“It’s Imagination Land! Everything that Riley thinks of is real here!” the imaginary friend proclaimed.

They proceeded towards a town full of trophies, where he kicked a ball towards the net. A bunch of Mind Workers cheered, showering him with several medals and ribbons.

“Haha! I won first place! Here, everyone’s a winner!” Bing Bong cheered.

“Let me try!” the yellow emotion let Fear’s hand go to set down a ball, kicking it right into the net.

“Yippie! Me too!” she beamed upon receiving a 1st place medal.

Fear continued to lay there on the ground, so he got something different instead.

“Participation award? I didn’t even participate,” the purple emotion gave a puzzled look at the ribbon.

“Is that–” Joy pointed towards a town made of clouds and let out a squee. “Cloud Town! That’s my favorite!”

She dashed over to one of its buildings and ripped out a piece of fluff, laying herself across the solidified surface. “Oh, so soft!”

“Wait for me!” Bing Bong called out, tearing a hole open in the wall in his quest to create a cloud bed for himself.

“Hey! What’s the big idea?” a cloud man floated up to the pink elephant. “You better fix that up, or you’ll be sor–”

Bing Bong let out a sneeze, blowing the cloud man away. This made the nervous emotion let out an appalled gasp, having caught up to them.

“W-what the heck? You just killed him!” he exclaimed, only for Bing Bong to awkwardly walk off from the scene.

“If anyone can hear me, we’re sorry!” Fear apologized hastily before dashing off to catch up to the others, who had arrived at a pit full of lava. Several couches, cushions, and tables floated in the molten rock.

“Oh no! Lava!” Joy grinned, bouncing across the furniture without a care in the world.

“Whoop-dee-doo! Imagination Land is the best!” Bing Bong cheered, springing from his feet with every step.

Fear felt himself sweat, not just from the sweltering heat, and he gathered his courage before taking his first leap across. He started to lose his balance on the cushion, rapidly flapping his arms to align himself.

“You can do this Fear, you can do this…” he mumbled to himself, preparing for his next crossing.

When he landed on the last table before the other side, it sank from the force from his jump, and before he could even register the panic, he shot up in the air from the lava, crashing to the other side.

“AAAH! NOT AGAIN!” Fear screamed, about to rush to his feet. He quickly remembered what he did the last time this happened, and fell onto his stomach and rolled around, extinguishing the flames.

“You okay, Fear?” Joy asked him, concerned.

“Uh-huh,” he replied, dusting himself off and fixing his tie as the three companions arrived at a house made of cards. 

“And this is where I’ve been keeping…” Bing Bong announced, opening up the garage of cards. 

He did a double take upon seeing that there was nothing inside. 

“WHAT?” he exclaimed, throwing his arm out and accidentally knocking the house of cards over.

“Great,” one of the Mind Workers grunted.

“Oh, sorry,” the fluffy creature hastily apologized.

“Bing Bong! What’s wrong?” the shining emotion ran up to the suddenly distraught elephant.

“My rocket! It’s gone!” he answered in between short breaths. “I know I stashed it there for safekeeping last time!”

“Your rocket?” Fear questioned.

“Yeah! How am I gonna take Riley to the moon now?” Bing Bong put his hands against his forehead, growing more worried by the moment.

Fear started to approach the pink elephant, but Joy pulled him back. “Wait, I’ve got this.”

She walked up and gave Bing Bong a reassuring smile, trying to cheer the imaginary friend up. “Hey, it’s going to be okay! Just because your rocket’s missing doesn’t mean that it’s gone forever! I’ll help keep an eye out for it, okay?”

Bing Bong returned her smile, feeling a bit more at ease. “Thanks. We won’t find my rocket if we don’t try, after all.”

Walking onwards, they saw a giant machine creating what appeared to be a teenage boy. 

“Who the heck is that?” Bing Bong inquired.

“Imaginary boyfriend,” the Mind Worker attending the machine answered.

“I would die for Riley,” the boy boasted in a deep voice.

Joy pulled a face at the imaginary boyfriend while Fear cringed.

“I really hope this is just a phase for Riley…” the nervous emotion muttered.

“Let’s go to Preschool World!” Bing Bong indicated the area in question. “My rocket’s gotta be there, and we’re nearly to the train, too!”

“Two birds, one stone!” Joy beamed. “Riley, here we come!”

Chapter Text

“On a scale of 1 to 10, this day gets a 2,” Disgust complained, fixated on her nails.

“At least that other student saved us from a horrible fate,” Sadness mused. “The black girl with glasses, I mean.”

The blue emotion looked down with regret. “Perhaps we should’ve tried to befriend her.”

Anger glanced over his newspaper with the headline “NOT THE BEES!” and the sub-header “Stung by a bee! Ouch!”

“And how would we do that?” he questioned. “We all saw Friendship Island take the plunge this morning!”

Nobody had a clear answer to the red emotion, so the green one changed the subject. “In any case, Riley still has tryouts to get through. And Hockey Island’s gonna fall apart if she tries to use it.”

The melancholic emotion pressed her fingers together. “Her left hand got injured…it's her dominant one, too.”

“Well, I’m gonna do something about this and recall whatever hockey memories I can find,” the fierce emotion went up to the console, tapping several buttons. After several unsuccessful attempts that left him increasingly frustrated, he managed to bring up a red memory of Riley aggressively whacking the puck into the goal.

“That one’s not happy,” Disgust observed. “You really think this will work in place of the core memory?”

Anger narrowed his eyes at the fashionable emotion. “Don’t you think I would’ve used one of the happy memories instead if I could actually find one of them?”

As he was asking her this, he approached the core memory holder and opened it up. Upon viewing the remaining core memory, he recoiled from surprise.

“What in the blazes happened here?!” he shouted.

Sadness and Disgust gathered around Anger to see what had him so worked up, and they gasped upon seeing what he saw.

The once purely golden core memory that powered Honesty Island was now radiating a half-gold, half-lavender glow.

—

Riley and her mom arrived at the ice hockey rink for tryouts, the former getting dressed in her hockey gear with her jersey, pants, helmet, and ice skates.

“This should be fun,” Mom encouraged. “New team, new friends…they’re from San Francisco, so they must be pretty good!”

“Andersen, you’re up!” the coach announced over the operating system.

“Let’s get this over with,” Riley muttered as she grabbed her hockey stick and stepped onto the ice rink.

“Good luck, sweetie!” Mom called out.

“We can discuss the state of Honesty’s core memory later,” Disgust urged. “Get the hockey memory in there. She’s about to play.”

Anger loaded the red memory into the core memory holder, and Hockey Island began to light up in a red hue.

“See? It’s working!” the hotheaded emotion gestured towards the aforementioned island.

As the hockey coach called out for the players to do line changes, Riley forcefully dribbled the puck back and forth, having to extend herself further with each step. She felt the back of her left hand ache, but pushed herself through the pain. Sadness watched uneasily, wondering if they were pushing Riley too hard by continuing with the tryouts.

Her thoughts were proven true when the core memory holder opened itself up and ejected the red memory, hitting Anger right in the face. Riley began to struggle to keep her balance on the ice while the coach demanded for everyone to pick it up, and she ended up losing control over the puck. Irritated, he shoved the red memory right back into the holder, pressing his fist against it.

An Asian girl took control of the puck, dribbling it carefully as she made her way to the goal. A surge of annoyance coursed through Riley, and she skated rapidly towards the Asian girl. Determined to be the one who scored, the blond girl took one, hard swing at the puck.

The red memory smacked Anger’s fist back hard as it was rejected again, knocking him flat on his back. Right afterwards, Riley missed the puck, tripping and falling onto the ice. The Asian girl, shocked and unable to stop herself, ended up tripping over the blond girl, collapsing right onto her.

“Are you okay?” one of the teammates asked, skating up to them.

“I…I’m fine,” the Asian girl replied, not feeling particularly injured due to her fall being broken by the other player.

“Andersen! Penalty box, two minutes!” the coach declared.

“Penalty already?!” Anger fumed, righting himself back up. “That’s it!”

He was about to storm up to the console when Sadness tugged on his arm. “Anger…don’t.”

“Geez, now everyone’s gonna look down at us,” Disgust facepalmed herself. “I’m so done with this.”

The green emotion, frustrated and upset at their failure, strolled towards the console while the blue one was stuck holding the enraged creature back.

“Disgust, wait! If we just wait out the penalty and apologize to the other girl…” Sadness hastily called out.

“And make a complete fool out of ourselves? Nope,” the fashionable emotion shut the bespectacled one down as she tugged on the levers.

Riley grabbed her stick, dragged herself up, and skated towards the exit, leaving the rest of the players behind.

“Riley, what’s wrong?” Mom asked with concern.

“We need to leave,” Riley grunted, yanking her ice skates off.

“It’s just a minor penalty,” Mom tried to reassure her. “You can still finish tryouts afterwards, right?”

“No. Not like this,” the kid bitterly seethed, forcing her shoes on her feet.

“Hey, it’ll be alright. Let’s just go back–” her mom tried to suggest.

“I said no, Mom!” Riley snapped, gripping her hockey bag and stomping away from the ice rink.

Sadness, feeling tears welling up in her eyes, let go of Anger and waddled up to the console.

“This is so sad,” she hitched, her voice shaky. “Can I even salvage this miserable day?”

She pressed the main button, creating a faint blue hue, and Riley felt her vision turn blurry as she looked back over her shoulder, her eyes landing on the Asian girl back on the rink. The Asian girl skated towards the outer ring, looking back at her with a hint of…sympathy?

The blond girl rapidly blinked her eyes, trying to swallow her guilt over the incident and turning to walk out of the building.

Inside HQ, the blue glow on the console abruptly cut out. Sadness froze, shocked from what had just happened. She continued to tap on the buttons and even pulled the levers, but there was no reaction, no color, just nothing. The shock gave way to dread as the blue emotion realized what this could mean for her, and more importantly, for Riley.

“Riley…doesn’t want me around?”

—

While the trio strolled through Preschool Land, a creaking sound pierced the relaxed atmosphere. Their heads turned to see Hockey Island taking the plunge into the abyss of the Memory Dump.

“Hockey?!” Joy exclaimed, bringing its core memory out. “No…that’s her favorite sport! She can't just give up hockey!”

Fear was about to scurry off to hide behind the castle, but stiffened upon seeing the state of the island right behind it. “Do you guys see Honesty Island? Something’s wrong with it!”

Everyone noticed that the island in question had changed colors, resulting in a half-gold, half-purple glow. The general structure of the purple half of the island looked crooked, while the golden half remained in pristine condition.

“What?” Joy gasped. “How could…”

She shook her head, putting the core memory back in the bag. 

“Gah, we're running out of time!” the yellow emotion urged. “Bing Bong, where is the train station?”

“It should be right over–” Bing Bong stopped when he noticed several structures in Preschool Land either missing, being demolished, or torn apart. Beyond the giant teddy bear's decapitated head was the rocket wagon he had been searching for, but it was being carried away by two Mind Workers.

“My rocket! Riley and I were gonna fly to the moon with it!” the imaginary friend cried out, chasing after the workers while singing out his theme song. The rocket briefly started up, only to shut down just as quickly as the workers threw the rocket onto a pile of old memories. A bulldozer rolled in, pushing the memories and the rocket towards the edge of the Memory Dump.

“NOOOOO! Not the dump! Anywhere but the dump!” he yelled, running right in front of the bulldozer. His leg proceeded to seize up, resulting in the imaginary friend collapsing on the floor. He was paralyzed from the sheer pain of his leg cramp, unable to move himself out of the bulldozer’s path.

“Get out of the way, Bing Bong!” Fear cried out. A part of him wanted him to go after the imaginary friend, but his nerves shackled him to where he was, unable to suppress his self-preservation instinct.

“I CAN’T!” Bing Bong exclaimed, squinting in agony as the vehicle continued to proceed, undeterred. “My leg’s acting up!”

“Don’t just stand there, Fear!” Joy shouted, desperately dashing towards the pink elephant.

With just a few seconds to spare, she launched himself towards Bing Bong, tackling him and sending them rolling away from the bulldozer. The purple emotion gasped in short breaths, as all he could do was watch the vehicle forcing the rocket wagon and the rest of the memories off the edge and into the Memory Dump. The other two companions fell to the ground, the yellow emotion dazed from the impact, while the imaginary friend jumped to his feet, his leg cramp having passed. He peered into the black abyss, but couldn’t catch sight of his beloved rocket, no matter where he looked.

“My rocket…Riley can’t be done with me! She can’t!” he exclaimed, shaking his head wildly.

Joy shook off the dazed feeling and scrambled towards the fluffy elephant, determined to continue on with their journey.

“That’s not true!” she objected. “We can fix this. Just calm down and tell us where the train station is.”

“How am I supposed to calm down?!” Bing Bong snapped. “I had a whole trip planned for both of us, and it’s over, just like that? It’s not fair.”

The yellow emotion watched him continue to sulk, trying to think of a way to get through to him. “Hey, who’s ticklish? Here comes the tickle monster!” she held her hands up and wiggled her fingers on his fur.

The pink elephant didn’t spare her a glance, so she got in his face and stretched her mouth with her hands while tilting her pupils. When that proved to be ineffective as well, Fear approached them, tapping on Joy’s shoulder.

“Not now, Fear,” she whispered urgently. “We gotta get to the train station before it’s too late!”

The nervous emotion stiffened, but found it in himself to not back down, wanting to make up for his cowardice moments ago. “Just let me try. Please .”

Joy gave him a disapproving look, but she conceded, walking off to leave the two male creatures with each other. A moment of silence followed as Fear tried to think of the best thing he could say to make the imaginary friend feel better. Being who he was, he knew he wasn’t exactly the most socially skilled one around, but he had to at least give it a shot.

“Hey…I just want to say, I’m sorry that your rocket’s gone,” the nervous emotion spoke up.

“It was all I had left of Riley. I would do anything to take her to the moon,” Bing Bong confessed.

Fear nodded along. “What were your adventures like with Riley?”

“Simply wonderful. There was this one day where we flew back in time and had breakfast twice,” Bing Bong reminisced.

“That sounds pretty crazy,” the purple emotion commented. “I don’t know if I could ever go on an adventure like that.”

“The things Riley and I used to do…anything could happen. But now…there’s nothing left for me anymore,” the imaginary friend hunched over, upset.

“It’s scary, isn’t it?”

“Huh?”

“Losing something or someone that you loved,” the nervous emotion answered. “One moment, they’re right by your side, and the next thing you know, they’re just…gone.” 

They sat together quietly while Joy looked down with an unreadable expression, facing away from them.

“I’m scared, too. Scared of losing you or Joy to the Memory Dump, or whatever else is out here. Most of all, I’m scared of being forgotten,” Fear admitted. “That’s why I couldn’t bring myself to jump in the bulldozer’s path. Or entering that dangerous chamber for that matter. I wish I was able to save your rocket, but…”

The purple emotion stopped himself, taking a breath. Now probably wasn’t the time for self-deprivation. He looked down at the Memory Dump, bringing his arms to his chest, then turned back to his companion.

“I guess…if there’s one thing that I’ve always told myself, it’s that I want all of us to live to see the next day. And Joy wants you to live, too. I think that’s why she jumped in to save you,” the purple emotion spoke up.

Bing Bong felt candy welling up in his vision. “You guys…”

Fear slowly reached his arm around the imaginary friend’s back, thinking it would be the best thing he could do to comfort him. He felt the pink elephant’s head rest on his shoulder as pieces of candy fell from the latter’s eyes. The purple emotion jolted up reflexively from the contact, but willed himself to keep his nerves steady.

Once the stream of candy stopped, Joy began to make her way back to her companions. “Feeling better, now?”

“Yeah, I’m good,” Bing Bong nodded, giving Joy a light smile. “Thanks for saving me from getting dumped.”

Joy returned his smile with her own as he stood straight up and proceeded to head northwest. 

“The train station is over there,” the imaginary friend indicated.

While Bing Bong was ahead of the others, Joy looked at Fear meaningfully.

“I know you must be disappointed in me, and I’m sorry, but…I just couldn’t risk falling into the dump!” the stressed out emotion insisted.

“That’s not…” Joy started before giving him a smile. “I don’t know how you did it, but you managed to get Bing Bong back on track, no pun intended. Good job, Fear.”

“Oh, well…” Fear briefly averted his eyes. “I tried to listen to him, even though I’m not as good as–”

“There it is!” Bing Bong announced. “The train!”

The three companions all climbed aboard, and soon, the train began to take off.

“And here we are!” Joy cheered, twirling on the cart. “We’ll be home at last!”

Fear smiled at seeing the yellow emotion spinning around gleefully. Then she crashed into two boxes, one labeled “Facts” and the other “Opinions”, and he shrank back against the inner wall as several tiles flew out onto the floor.

“Oh no…we can’t tell these Facts apart from the Opinions!” Joy lamented.

The purple emotion crouched down, trying to investigate the fine print on the tiles, only for Bing Bong to gather them all up and drop them into the “Facts” box.

“Eh, no need to worry. It happens all the time.”

—

Riley stormed into her room, dropped her hockey bag onto the ground, and collapsed into her sleeping bag.

“It’s official: this day gets an F now,” Disgust grumbled.

“Then why don’t we stop sitting around and do something?” Anger demanded, kicking his seat over.

“Like what, dude?” the green emotion rolled her eyes.

The impatient emotion went quiet, conjuring up an idea on what he could do to resolve the issue of the missing core memories. Then a light bulb lit up in his head.

“Like the best idea ever!” he snapped his fingers, fishing out a cone-shaped Idea Bulb from the storage. “Riley’s core memories were all made in Minnesota, so we go back there to remake the rest of them!”

Sadness stared at him wide-eyed, appalled at his suggestion. “So…you want us to run away?”

“We’re not running away, we’re undertaking the ‘Happy Core Memory Development Program’,” Anger insisted.

“That’s not–”

“Hey, our life was perfect until Mom and Dad made us move to San Franstinktown!”

“It won’t–”

“We gave up our room, backyard, and friends for this garbage life! And I say we take it all back!”

“You can’t–”

He tried to bring up those memories of Minnesota, but was met with the Tripledent Gum commercial instead.

“Oh for crying out loud, GO AWAY, YOU STUPID COMMERCIAL!” he hollered, slamming his fist against the console to shut the jingle off. “The point is, our life was better back there.”

Disgust tapped her foot, considering his plan. “Riley was happier back in Minnesota…”

“It’s not gonna work, Anger!” Sadness blurted out. “Don’t you remember that our parents sold off our old house?”

The hotheaded emotion stared at the sad one, trying to think of a rebuttal to her point. “Well…”

“And they won’t be there with us if we go back all on our own!”

“It’s their fault that–”

“Just stop and think! We can’t be happy if we’re forever alone like that!” the blue emotion protested.

Anger clenched his fists, frustrated at her counterarguments, yet even more frustrated at himself. A tense silence followed between the group before the aggravated emotion chucked the idea bulb as hard as he could on the ground, smashing it into a myriad number of pieces.

“Okay, FINE! You’re right, this idea was stupid!” he bellowed.

“Which puts us back at square one,” Disgust bemoaned before letting out a yawn. “I just wanna go to sleep and forget this day ever happened…”

The bespectacled emotion let out a sigh of relief before asking, “Who’s going to handle Dream Duty then?”

“Why are you asking us that?” Disgust wondered. “You and Joy are the ones who have always done this, and since she’s not around…”

“Besides, you’re better at this than beanpole ever was,” Anger added. “All he’d ever do was give us a rude awakening.”

Sadness saw the expectant look on their faces and tilted her head down.

“Ohhh…normally, I’d be fine doing Dream Duty. But the console wasn’t responding to me earlier, and that’s never happened before. What if I can’t wake her up if I need to?” she stressed.

“That’s a good point,” the green emotion acknowledged.

“Well, I don’t wanna be the one on duty,” the grumpy one crossed his arms. “All they do is send in the most cliche plot beats.”

“I need my beauty sleep, so I really don’t want to do it,” the tired one rubbed her face.

“Then we have no other choice,” Anger huffed. “Broccolady! You and me, rock, paper, scissors!”

“I told you to stop calling me that,” Disgust gritted her teeth as she held out her palm while the melancholic emotion fetched a sweeper and a tray.

“Rock, paper, scissors, shoot!”

Anger held his palm out, while Disgust formed a sideways peace sign. Sadness gathered the broken base and shards and dumped them into a trash can.

“Looks like you’re taking the night shift,” the victorious creature smirked.

“Hmph…the one time I don’t go for the fist and I still lose,” the grouchy emotion grumbled, pulling up the seat he knocked over as Sadness and Disgust headed off to bed.

“There’s gotta be a better idea I can think of…” he muttered to himself as the sky outside darkened.

Chapter Text

As the Train of Thought chugged along the tracks that took form along the way, Joy thought it would be a good time to address the elephant in the room.

“So, about Honesty Island…” she had her eyes on Fear as she spoke. “Why is half of it suddenly purple and jagged?”

The nervous emotion stiffened up, scrambling to think of how he should respond to that.

“I’ve never seen one of those islands do that,” Bing Bong commented. “Then again, I never thought they’d shut down and collapse one by one.”

“Riley’s losing parts of herself every time that happens…” Joy trailed off. “But I still can’t help but worry about why Honesty is changing even though its core memory is still there.”

She froze, realizing what she had just said. “Wait…the core memory…”

“I TOUCHED IT!” Fear blurted out, swinging his arms out in front of him. Joy and Bing Bong instantly had their eyes upon him.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry! I was the one who put the core memory back in place before we got sucked out! I didn’t think that I’d end up causing the island to become all messed up!” the frantic emotion confessed, hanging his head low.

Despite the sounds of the train moving forward, the atmosphere remained in silence otherwise.

The first to speak was Joy. “If I’m being honest, I had a feeling that this was the reason why. The purple color kind of gives it away.”

“How are we going to fix it, then?” Fear had to ask, still keeping his eyes on the floor.

“I…I don’t know,” the yellow emotion admitted with an unsure frown. “Changing the core back is out of the question with how much the island has changed by now.”

“That said,” she turned her frown upside down. “You prevented Honesty’s core memory from getting sucked out with us, which means it’s still up and running unlike the other islands. So maybe it’s not entirely a bad thing that you ended up touching it.”

Fear was left speechless at Joy’s response. He had fully expected her to chastise him for doing exactly what he wasn’t supposed to do, and instead, she not only let him off the hook, but even acknowledged that things might have turned out for the better because of it.

He wondered if she had more to say to him beyond that, but before he could think things over, the sky blacked out, and the train came to a screeching halt as the tracks ceased to materialize.

“Hey! Why aren’t we moving forward?” Joy asked.

“Riley’s asleep, so we’re on break,” the engineer Mind Worker explained.

“The train doesn’t operate while she’s napping,” Bing Bong reiterated as they hopped off the train.

“We’re stuck here until morning?” Fear stressed. “We can’t wait that long! Perhaps we should–”

“Don’t stress out over it,” Joy advised before pointing out, “Remember that nothing bad can happen to Riley while she’s asleep?”

“Oh yeah…that’s right,” Fear nodded along in realization.

“And look where we’re at,” the yellow emotion faced the building ahead of them.

“Dream Productions!” the imaginary friend beamed.

“How’s that place going to help us?” Fear wondered.

Joy grinned as she felt herself growing more excited by the moment. “You know how one of us does Dream Duty every night?”

“Yeah. Though I’ve only done it a few times,” Fear glanced downwards shamefully. “I kept making everyone wake up when I wasn’t supposed to.”

“Well…” the optimistic one gave a dazzling smile, snapping her fingers. “This is our perfect chance to make Riley happy!”

“How do we do that?” Bing Bong asked.

“It’s simple! We go in while the Mind Workers are filming tonight’s dream, and we turn it into a birthday party,” Joy explained her plan.

The purple emotion shuddered. “That means directly interfering with Riley’s dream! We could risk waking her up and making her feel more stressed when it’s the last thing she needs!”

“Okay, maybe that could happen,” the cheerful creature acknowledged. “But Riley needs to be happy more than ever! So, you guys with me?”

The pink elephant gave an enthusiastic thumbs up. “I’m totally on board with that plan! This’ll also let me see Riley again. She’s gotta remember me once I show up!”

Fear, still feeling a bit of guilt over tainting Honesty Island, gave a slight nod. “Alright…I guess we can try.”

Joy spun around on her foot ecstatically with everyone on board. “Whoo-hoo! Let’s go!”

She ran ahead, pushing the doors open, and her companions soon followed her in.

—

“This place is so huge!” Joy smiled.

“Hmm, it looks smaller than I thought it would,” Fear observed.

Bing Bong marched up to several movie posters, eyeing one of them in particular. “‘I Can Fly’? I wish I could do that!”

The nervous one turned his head away from the posters and took several breaths, keeping his eyes on the lookout for the room where the dream was being filmed.

The energetic creature let out a gasp upon seeing who was in the director’s chair. “No freaking way! Rainbow Unicorn!”

The happy emotion glided towards the mythical creature to chat her up while Fear walked past them as he continued searching, with Bing Bong trailing him. Not long after, he found a door leading to Stage B. Above it was a red light flashing over a sign displaying “DO NOT ENTER WHEN LIGHT IS FLASHING”.

“Huh. Wonder what that’s supposed to mean,” Bing Bong shrugged.

“Oh no…it says ‘do not enter’,” Fear slowly backed away. “That place could be dangerous for us!”

Joy caught up to them, having noticed Fear acting scared upon seeing the sign. 

“Fear, I know you can do this,” she encouraged. “We’re not gonna turn into a bunch of weird things just by going in there! At least, I’m pretty sure we won’t.”

That didn’t exactly help the unnerved emotion settle down as he watched the imaginary friend open the door, letting Joy walk in before entering along with her. He rapidly turned his head to his left and right, paranoid that someone was out there watching. When he was sure that no one was in sight, he tiptoed his way to the door, inched it open, and quickly stepped in.

They were all now backstage, with the director Mind Worker giving out orders to her cast and crew.

“Set up the classroom set. Today’s memories are in, and all this work is cut out for us. Riley dumped her best friend, got stung by a bee, had a miserable day at school, fouled someone at tryouts, and quit hockey. That’s the script for tonight,” the director stated.

Meanwhile, in HQ, Anger was combing through all of the Idea Bulbs they still had in the storage.

“It’s taking forever for the dream to start up, so I may as well follow my own advice and not waste time waiting around,” the crimson emotion grunted to himself. “Now, which one of these ideas will make us happy again…”

Back in Dream Productions, Joy, Fear, and Bing Bong made their way into the backstage room once all of the Mind Workers had departed to set the stage for the dream.

“So…how exactly are we going to do this?” Fear wondered, scratching his chin with his index finger. “We can’t just show up on the set as ourselves. The reality distortion filter could make us look like a bunch of monsters to Riley, which would scare her for life!”

“Just leave it to me!” Joy gave a wide grin, doing a quick survey of the room. Her eyes darted towards a closet and she yanked the door wide open, revealing a purple dog costume and a yellow costume shaped like a fanny pack.

“You guys remember Bloofy’s House ?” she asked her companions.

“Oh, that show brings back memories,” Bing Bong smiled. “Riley would wake up early just to catch every episode aired on TV. The dog and his pouch would always ask us what item to use to solve the problems that they’d come across.”

“I know, right? I loved how interactive the show was!” the cheerful emotion praised.

“Interactive?” Fear questioned. “I had no idea who they were supposed to be talking to.”

“But I’m getting off track here,” Joy addressed. “What we’re going to do is dress up as the characters from that show, and as I said before, throw a birthday party.”

She tossed the fanny pack costume to the nervous one. “Fear, this one’s for you!”

“You want me to go onstage?” the timid emotion flinched. “My stage fright is gonna ruin the whole thing!”

“Hey, as long as you remain positive about this, you won’t ruin anything. If nothing else, just do it for Riley. Okay?” the bright emotion persuaded.

“...okay. For Riley,” Fear agreed.

He took the time to analyze his costume, taking note of the many, many different items that came bundled with it. It didn’t help that the head was way too oversized for him.

“When I call out for Pouchy, that’s your cue to go up,” she instructed.

“It’s kind of weird that you two are going to be in opposite colored costumes,” the imaginary friend remarked.

“That’s just because Bloofy has more lines than Pouchy does,” she explained.

The optimistic emotion handed the pink elephant her bag of core memories before proceeding to get dressed in her costume. “Before I forget, Bing Bong, make sure you take good care of these memories.”

“You got it!” he nodded with a smile.

—

Anger took another sip out of his coffee mug, absolutely bored out of his mind.

The Mind Worker acting as the “teacher” could not be acting more stilted if she tried. Then the “scary” parts rolled in with Riley’s teeth falling out and having no pants on. It was all so predictable and monotonous and are we at the end of this snoozefest yet?!

“Is that a bee?!” one of the “students” shouted, pointing towards a “bee” that was less flying and more waving up and down as it got closer and closer to the screen. In the span of just a few seconds, the entire screen was full of yellow and black, with buzzing sounds playing all over.

In other words, just another cheap jumpscare to put up with. What’s next, they say that one line that he heard a million–

“OH NO! NOT THE BEES!” the “students” all cried out.

And there it was. The frustrated emotion let out a sharp grunt, pounding the console with his fists.

Backstage, while the three companions were waiting for the right opportunity to enact their plan, the purple emotion had a thought cross his mind and decided to voice it.

“So who’s going to be on Dream Duty tonight?” Fear asked, keeping his voice low.

“Sadness and I usually handle it, so she should be the one watching us,” Joy answered quietly.

“That makes me feel a bit better about this,” the nervous one took a breath. “And also, maybe we should let her know that we’re on our way back so that the others don’t do anything reckless while they’re waiting.”

“Oh yeah, that’s a good idea, Fear,” Joy smiled. 

She peeked into the door and dragged her costume’s mask over her face. “Okay guys, it’s time to party!”

On stage, a two-dimensional purple dog suddenly jumped onto the scene from the doorway.

“Stomp like an elephant, scurry like a mouse, make your way down to Bloofy’s House !” the purple dog recited the jingle.

“What in the world?” the dream director was left speechless, rapidly flipping through her script. 

“Don’t tell me…” Anger leaned onto the console and held a finger up to his chin.

“Hi, friends! I’m Bloofy, and it’s so good to have you here today,” Joy as Bloofy introduced herself.

The “students” all stared blankly at the newcomer, none of them making a sound.

“Today is a very, very, very special day. We’re gonna need your help to make our girl happy again. Who’s that girl, you ask?” the cartoon character asked the audience.

Another period of awkward silence followed.

“Let’s ask our special guest over there,” Bloofy pointed right, and on cue, Bing Bong arrived on the scene.

“Hi Riley, it’s me!” the imaginary friend cheerfully greeted the camera before proceeding to dance around the set and sing his theme song.

“There’s two of them now? Please kill me,” the red emotion groaned.

“Bing Bong is correct! Our girl is none other than Riley!” the purple dog announced.

Bloofy followed up by asking Bing Bong, “What do you think we need to make Riley happy?”

“A party!” the pink elephant triumphantly answered.

“That’s right! And my pouch has just the thing for that. Say it with me everyone! Oh, Pouchy!” Bloofy called out towards the audience.

“Oh, Pouchy!” Bing Bong joined in.

If they were in the real world, crickets would’ve been chirping at this moment. 

The dream director brought out her walkie talkie. “They’re interrupting this dream. Call security!”

Soon after, a yellow pouch creature floated in.

“H-hi everyone, I’m Pouchy!” the pouch hastily introduced himself.

“Pouchy, we need some decorations for this party. Do you have anything for that?” Bloofy asked.

“Ah…yes! I have lots of items, heheh. Which one will work the best?” Pouchy opened his mouth and roughly dragged out a bunch of items. “A tomato? A frog? Or, uh…exploding dynamite?”

“The exploding dynamite, obviously,” Anger sarcastically quipped.

Bing Bong turned towards the yellow pouch. “Hold on, none of those items are going to work. Let me try!”

The imaginary friend stuck his hand in Pouchy’s mouth, pulling out a confetti popper. Anger couldn’t help but smirk at seeing Pouchy squirm from this.

“Hey!” Fear as Pouchy struggled against the pink elephant’s hand. “You can’t just shove your hand in my–”

The pouch was cut off as the sound of something cracking rang out.

“Oh boy,” Bing Bong paused in his tracks. “That doesn’t sound good.”

Anger nearly choked on his coffee upon seeing Pouchy’s jaw dislocate. The living pouch’s mouth was now twisted into an unrecognizable mess.

“The mouth! It’s broken!” Fear hastily whispered to the others. “What do we do?”

“We keep going. The show must go on,” Joy whispered back.

Joy as Bloofy took the popper and twisted the bottom of it, releasing the confetti inside.

“Yay! We did it, everyone!” the purple dog cheered, dancing in place and pulling on a nearby rope to send a bunch of balloons floating upwards. “Let’s all sing the we did it song!”

“Here comes more confetti!” the pink elephant beamed.

“Wait wait wait!” the yellow pouch protested. “My mouth’s not safe to–”

The imaginary friend continued to yank out more poppers, aiming to set all of them off at once. Suddenly, Pouchy’s mouth snapped shut, causing Bing Bong to cry out in agony. 

“Hahaha! This is all kinds of messed up, but it’s the most entertaining thing I’ve seen from these dreams in a long time,” the hotheaded emotion laughed his head off.

The pink elephant instinctively yanked his hand out, the instantaneous motion making the yellow pouch fall backwards, tipping over the set wall.

“They’re guilty of trespassing and interrupting this dream! Stop them!” the dream director ordered.

Bing Bong, thinking fast, pulled Joy behind a set piece while Fear struggled to stand up as he frantically spun his head around, his view obstructed by his costume’s head getting tilted. 

“I-is the dream over?” he asked, remembering that he still had an important message to deliver.

Before the purple emotion could do so, however, the dream director ordered the camera operator to pan away from the scene, capturing the sight of Rainbow Unicorn sneaking off with a tray full of cupcakes. Right after, the guards forcibly restrained him and yanked his costume off. Joy noticed that the sleep indicator had tipped two-thirds of the way to the end marked “Awake” and was slowly creeping onward.

“Uh-oh…” she muttered softly. “Riley’s gonna wake up at this rate if things continue like this.”

“You! We have a warrant out for your arrest!” one of the guards snapped, recognizing who he was.

“Me?!” Fear yelped. “What did I do?!”

“You’re the one responsible for all those troublemakers running around Riley’s mind,” another guard accused. “Take him away at once!”

“Wait!” the unnerved emotion protested. “Let me speak to–”

Two of the guards hauled Fear off as Joy ditched the Bloofy costume and took the bag of core memories back from Bing Bong. The sleep indicator flicked back to “Asleep”, making the positive emotion ease up, but not by much.

“It’s over already? Just when it was getting good, too!” Anger growled in disappointment.

—

The yellow emotion and pink elephant snuck out of Dream Productions and stealthily trailed the guards who were dragging Fear off down a flight of stairs, towards a giant wooden door.

“NO! Please stop! I didn’t realize that I was the one who created him! You have to believe me!” he begged, flailing his legs.

“You’re just digging your own grave, pal,” one of the guards dismissed the panicking emotion’s pleas.

“I’ll do anything you guys want! Just don’t throw me in there!” the unnerved emotion cried out.

“Meeting the monster you made seems like a fitting punishment for you,” the other guard replied.

The guards opened the door up, tossed Fear in, and slammed the door shut. 

“Oh, this is bad!” Joy brought her arms against herself, worried. “We need to save Fear before Riley wakes up!”

“This is my fault. I screwed up the dream, and now they locked him away in that dark place. He didn’t even get to finish delivering his important message,” the imaginary friend looked down in guilt. “I’m scared of the dark, but it’s gotta be even scarier for him down there.”

The shining emotion glanced around, finding the stairs to get down to the tall door. “We haven’t a moment to lose, Bing Bong. Let’s go.”

—

With Dream Productions experiencing technical difficulties, Anger went back to inspecting the Idea Bulbs. Upon catching a glimpse of a blue filament light bulb with a pointy tip, a triumphant grin spread across his face.

“Aha! This idea is exactly what we need!”

Chapter Text

In the depths of a dark red chamber, Fear remained curled up in a ball, unable to open his eyes as the deafening sound of snoring cut through the air. At first, he had been overtaken by sheer terror upon viewing everything that was locked up in this place. Then, a sense of emptiness began to overtake him, slowly but surely numbing his sense.

If he was to be imprisoned here, then perhaps he deserved it for creating all of those monsters who haunted Riley’s dreams. After all, he was the one who hurt Riley by proxy, without even knowing it until now.

—

The glowing emotion and the imaginary friend wasted no time walking down the stairs to the big door.

“What’s behind that door?” Joy asked with a low voice, trying not to shiver.

“I dunno what it is, but I heard that the troublemakers get locked up here,” Bing Bong whispered. “It gives me the creeps.”

They tiptoed in front of the door, the guards distracted by the topic of whose hat belonged to which guard. The pink elephant grabbed onto the handle and gave it a tug, but it didn’t quite budge. He tried exerting more strength, and the door made a loud creaking noise.

“Hey! What are you doing out here?!” the guards spun around, directing their flashlights towards the two creatures, who froze in place.

“Uh…” Joy held her hands up, scrambling to think of what to say. “We were most definitely not trying to break out of that place!”

The guards apprehended Joy and Bing Bong, opened the door, and shoved them in.

“Tch. A likely story,” one of the guards scowled.

“You better not try to escape from the Subconscious again, or else!” the other guard threatened before shutting the door with a loud bang.

“So that’s what this place is called,” the imaginary friend realized.

“That’s certainly one way to get in here,” the bright emotion whispered to her companion. Her glow illuminated the darkness around her as they uneasily descended down the stairs.

“Are these Riley’s worst fears?” the pink elephant was quivering in his shoes as he eyed a forest of broccoli to their right.

“I think they are,” Joy replied with a shaky voice, spotting another flight of stairs that led further downwards.

What followed was a swarm of menacing insects buzzing overhead, resulting in both of them instinctively ducking.

“What was that?!” Bing Bong shouted.

“I don’t know, and I really don’t want to know,” Joy grimaced.

A whirring noise broke through the buzzing as a giant machine drove towards them.

“That’s Grandma’s vacuum cleaner! Hide!” the yellow emotion urged, dragging the imaginary friend with her behind a rock.

When the vacuum cleaner faded away in the distance, the two companions resumed their search for Fear. They could feel the air grow colder with every step they took along the way. Up ahead, Bing Bong spotted the source of the chilling breeze.

“An iceberg?” he questioned.

“Look down there,” she pointed towards the bottom of the frigid structure. “It’s coming from that slushie.”

“And it just keeps growing and growing,” Bing Bong shivered, watching the iceberg gradually grow in size.

They located a gap in the iceberg and squeezed through it. From there, they heard the unsettling sounds of a snoring beast mumbling about a “birthday girl”. The imaginary friend gasped and jumped before trying to hide himself behind the shining creature.

“I don’t believe it. It's Jangles,” Joy stood wide-eyed, hugging her bag of core memories and feeling her confidence slip away by the moment.

“Joy? Bing Bong? Is that you?” a terrified voice weakly called out, barely audible over the gargantuan clown’s snoring.

“Fear!” Joy whisper-shouted, her determination renewed. “We’re here to save you!”

“You came all this way for me?” the purple emotion peeked his head over the clown’s legs, his nerves completely on edge.

“Of course! How could we ever leave you behind? You’re our friend!” Bing Bong found his voice and smiled.

“Oh thank you! I thought this place would be my graveyard,” the unnerved emotion dropped to his knees, having lost the feeling in his legs.

Joy and Bing Bong helped Fear up over the clown, and once the latter was ready to stand, the three of them started to make haste towards the exit.

“Wait, if you two managed to get in here,” Fear stopped running to speak up. “How exactly are we going to get out?”

The other two halted, realizing they hadn’t thought about that.

“Right…those guards won’t be letting us out of here anytime soon,” the imaginary friend drooped his trunk.

The optimist glanced back towards the clown, seeing the only way out of the prison they were stuck in. Fear caught on to her idea and frantically covered his eyes with his hands.

“Ohnonononono, that is just asking for us to get smashed into smithereens!” the purple emotion wailed.

“Are you absolutely sure there’s no other way past that door?” Bing Bong urged.

“I can’t think of anything else,” Joy admitted, approaching the huge clown. “Stay back, you two. I’ll go and wake him up myself.”

*squeak*

The yellow emotion honking Jangles’s nose got him to awake from his slumber, rising to his feet and towering over the three creatures, all of them backing up in terror.

“H-hey Fear, Bing Bong!” Joy stuttered, raising her voice for the clown to hear her. “D-did you h-hear about the p-party that’s going on o-out there?”

“P-party? W-what party?” Fear stammered, confused at her words.

“You know! It’s s-supposed to be a b-birthday party!” the bright emotion emphasized.

“Did you say ‘birthday’?” the enormous clown questioned, a smile stretching across his face.

Jangles took a step forward, rattling the cave they were in, and the three companions broke into a sprint, running away from the abomination following them.

“And there’s going to be cake, and presents,” Joy continued.

“And games, and b-balloons,” Bing Bong added with haste.

“A BIRTHDAY??!!” the colossal clown whipped out a large mallet, cackling maniacally.

“MERCY!” Fear yelled at the top of his lungs. “HAVE MERCY ON US!”

“Just follow us out of here!” Joy shouted out as everyone made haste towards the door.

—

The guards outside the door to the Subconscious were still trying to figure out who the hat belonged to.

*SMASH!*

They screamed at the sound of the door being blown apart by Jangles’s mallet and fainted on the spot. Soon, the trio sprinted up the stairs, with the impulsive clown climbing his way out.

“AHAHAHAHAHA!! WHO’S THE BIRTHDAY GIRL??!!” Jangles screeched.

He proceeded to lumber towards Dream Productions, sending a surge of panic through Fear.

“NO! STOP!” the purple emotion shouted at the top of his lungs, pointing back towards Imagination Land. “THE PARTY IS THIS WAY!”

He sprinted towards the area in question, and Jangles changed course, following the unnerved creature with his mallet raised in the air. Forced to think on the spot, Fear sprinted in between the clown’s legs just as the mallet slammed down on the ground with such force that it made him jump. Once he had dashed far, far away, he watched the clown go to town on Imagination Land, but didn’t have the time to catch his breath, as the sky above and around them spontaneously brightened up.

“Riley’s awake…” Joy quickly realized what was about to happen because of that. “THE TRAIN! We gotta get back on it!”

Everyone managed to climb aboard just as the Train of Thought started its engines, proceeding to move along the tracks.

“Ha ha!” Joy let out a proud laugh. “We made it! We made it!”

Fear collapsed onto one of the seats in the train, completely spent. 

“That was,” he gasped out, having to pause to take a breath. “ Way too close.”

“Who’s on our way back to Riley?” Bing Bong hopped around ecstatically.

“We are!” the joyous emotion joined the imaginary friend in a victorious dance together.

The exhausted emotion wondered how the others still had the energy to celebrate, but he didn’t want to ruin the mood after everything they had been through, so he silently watched them with a tired smile, grateful to finally have the time to cool down.

—

Sadness and Disgust awakened from their slumber, stepping down the stairs and heading into the main room. There, Anger was pacing around with an impatient glint in his eyes.

“Finally! That unicorn dream was making my teeth rot!” the red emotion grunted. “Now I can tell you guys about the next best idea I managed to find.”

“Wait, before that,” Sadness interjected. “We should check up on Honesty Island first, just in case.”

They gathered around the window and saw that the island still remained yellow and purple, with uneven structuring on the latter side.

“Things aren’t getting better at this rate,” Disgust sighed. “How are we gonna fix that?”

“Well, we can’t touch the core memory,” Sadness urged. “None of us are Joy, so we wouldn’t be able to restore its color. And if it falls out, we could lose Honesty, just like with the other islands.”

“But if we just give up, then that island’s gonna stay that way. And this is where my idea comes into play!” Anger grinned, before adding, “That sounds like something Joy would say.”

He dragged his hand across his forehead with a groan. “Okay, I need to stop doing that.”

“Anyways, what’s your idea this time?” the green emotion questioned, letting out a yawn.

“It’s just a simple idea,” he stated before turning to face the blue emotion. “Actually, it’s not so much my idea as it is yours, Sadness.”

Sadness’s eyes widened upon viewing the blue Idea Bulb Anger held up, recognizing what it entailed. “That idea…I made it when Mom and Dad refused to let us visit the amusement park in Minnesota. Meg wanted to go, too, but her parents also said no.”

“They never told us why they wouldn’t let us go,” Disgust sighed. “It wasn’t like we were grounded or anything like that.”

“It was supposed to be the time of our lives! What are they, the anti-fun police?” Anger growled.

The well-dressed one rolled her eyes. “I wouldn’t know.”

“Anyways, this idea doesn’t involve running away, and I do mean it this time,” the hotheaded creature explained. “We simply take the day off to go visit Dizzy Land. That amusement park shouldn’t be too far from here.”

“Doesn’t that mean skipping school?” the bespectacled one pointed out.

“School’s not going to make us happy anytime soon,” Anger reiterated. “Besides, it’s just one day of us having a good time.”

Disgust slowly nodded her head. “As long as it’s nothing too drastic…yeah, let’s go with it.”

The melancholic emotion tilted her head downwards, not liking the choice she was about to make, but feeling that they didn’t have any other options at this point.  “I just hope this idea doesn’t come back to bite us.”

“It’s decided then,” he held the blue light bulb out. “You do the honors, Sadness.”

She tightly gripped the base of the bulb in her hands and gently set it down on the console’s Idea Bulb holder. The bulb lighted up in a bright, blue glow before screwing itself in and lowering in place. 

In the real world, Riley felt compelled to open up her laptop and search for a bus route to Dizzy Land.

“She took it,” Disgust noted. “If this doesn’t make us happy again, I don’t know what will.”

“We’ll need a bus ticket to get to the park,” Sadness realized. “How are we going to get the money for that?”

“Mom’s purse,” Anger responded without hesitation.

The fashionable one let out a shocked gasp. “You wouldn’t.”

“That’s stealing from Mom!” Sadness objected. “We could permanently ruin Honesty Island if we do that!”

“Hasn’t it been ruined enough already?” the fired up creature seethed. “Besides, they’re the ones who got us in this mess to begin with, so they deserve to pay for it. Now where was that memory…”

His attempt to bring up the memory of the purse resulted in a certain jingle replaying itself.

“SHUT UP!!!” he bellowed, pounding his fists against the console to silence the gum commercial and making the other two emotions flinch. Once that was out of the way, he tried several more times, but kept coming up short.

“Are you freaking kidding me?!” the enraged emotion growled. “Why isn’t the purse memory coming up?!”

“Can’t we just ask Mom for some money and say that we need it for a gift or something?” Disgust proposed.

“Hmm…I guess we can do that,” Anger agreed, calming down. “There’s souvenirs at Dizzy Land, so we’re technically not lying this way.”

—

Joy stood close to the open doorway on the Train of Thought while Fear laid down across one of the seats. Right beside her was Bing Bong pointing out several other locations, notably mentioning Deja Vu several times.

She turned back to face the purple emotion with a gentle smile. “Hey, nice job getting Jangles away from Dream Productions. That was surprisingly brave of you.”

“Brave, huh?” Fear wondered. “That’s the last thing I’d ever call myself, but thanks.”

He let out an exhausted sigh. “It still worries me that we weren’t able to send our message to Headquarters.”

“I know, but look on the bright side: it won’t be long before we’re home!” the shining emotion proclaimed. “Once we get there, I can set things right and bring the old Riley back.”

One of the memories in a crate caught Bing Bong’s eye, and he held it up to get a closer look at it.

“Huh. Was Riley always this small? She’s not going to fit in my rocket as she is now,” the imaginary friend remarked.

Joy took the memory in her hands, feeling nostalgic upon replaying it. “Oh, this one takes me back. This was Riley’s first big playoff game with the Prairie Dogs, and everyone was just so excited. Seeing her teammates lift her in the air and cheering while she laughs along with them is just…I love it.”

“Yeah, that day was a lot of fun,” Fear agreed before an uncertain glint appeared in his eyes. “Although…”

“What is it?” Joy wondered.

“There was so much at stake with that game! It all came down to one last shot with just a few seconds left, and Riley, no, we blew it! If something like that ever happened again…” Fear paused, realizing what he was doing. “Ugh, I didn’t mean to freak out over this. Sorry.”

The cheerful emotion’s smile remained intact. “Don’t worry about it. We’ll keep working on it once I get things sorted with Riley, okay?”

“...sure.”

—

Riley got dressed in a black long-sleeve shirt and gray pants and headed downstairs to find her parents seemingly waiting for her.

“Morning, Riley!” Dad greeted.

“Hey,” Riley half-heartedly greeted them back before following up with, “I need some money for today. It’s for a gift.”

“A gift? Who’s it for?” Mom wondered.

The blonde kid hesitated, briefly pondering over how to answer without arousing suspicion.

“Someone special, I guess,” she stated.

“Oh, has our Riley made some new friends already?” Dad asked. “Or is there a lucky guy out there?”

“I think so, yeah,” Riley replied.

Mom took out her wallet, handing her daughter a twenty dollar bill. “Here you go. Don’t spend it all in one place, okay?”

“Uh-huh,” Riley acknowledged, pocketing the bill and heading out. 

“Stay safe out there!” Dad called out after her.

“We love you!” Mom followed up.

The blond girl paused when she heard the sound of her parents making monkey noises. With one last glance behind herself, she caught sight of their joyful faces, stopping in the middle of the doorway momentarily.

She shook her head with a sigh and walked away from the house, determined to arrive at the Dizzy Land park.

—

The unsettling sound of rumbling filled the air as the Train of Thought approached Honesty Island.

“What?!” Fear’s eyes snapped wide open. “What’s going on?!”

Joy scrambled to the door, quickly catching sight of what was happening. “The island! It’s splitting apart!”

A crack formed in the middle of Honesty Island, cutting between the yellow and purple half. Both sides proceeded to drift apart, and the purple side was coming dangerously close to the supporting beams holding the train up.

“AGH! That island’s gonna derail the train at this rate!” Fear exclaimed.

“What do we do?!” Bing Bong spun his head around frantically.

“I don’t know, I don’t know!” Joy shouted, her mind going blank.

Seeing both of his companions panicking got the purple emotion to scream out the first word that came to him.

“JUMP!!!”

Just as the purple half of the island crashed into the supporting beams, everyone took a leap of faith, escaping the Train of Thought right before it was thrown off the rails. The locomotive collapsed into the Memory Dump as the three companions were now in free-fall.

“Hug me!” Fear yelled, his voice starting to grow hoarse.

Once the glowing emotion and the pink elephant clung onto the unnerved creature, he snapped open his bowtie, and out came a parachute, slowing their descent.

“No way! You brought a parachute with you?” Bing Bong gasped.

“I had it just in case!” the unnerved emotion hollered, steering everyone towards the yellow half of the island.

They all landed, the parachute dropping down over them. Once they had pulled the parachute off their heads, everyone looked back at HQ, now desperate for an alternate way back.

“No! That train was our only way back home!” Joy shut her eyes, frustrated and upset. 

Bing Bong scratched his head, confused. “What in the world is happening up there?”

Fear glanced down at himself, and what he saw reignited the panic in him.

The ground underneath him had turned purple, and was beginning to spread across the rest of the yellow half of the island.

Chapter Text

Several minutes of walking later, Riley passed through an isolated alley, using it as a shortcut to the bus station.

“I don’t know about this,” Sadness trembled worriedly, her eyes darting between the overhead screen and the Idea Bulb.

“We can’t turn back now,” Anger huffed. “Not when we’re almost at the bus station.”

“How much more walking before we get there?” Disgust asked, fiddling with her nails.

“Oh, I’d say another five minutes or so, based on the map we have,” the red emotion answered.

The blue emotion felt something wet on her forehead. Confused, she brushed her finger against it, and up close, she saw that it was sweat.

“Why am I sweating so much?” Sadness wondered.

—

Joy and Bing Bong took notice of the purple color spreading out from where Fear stood.

“This entire island's gonna become scared!” she gasped.

“And the rest of the shelves over there! They're all falling apart!” Bing Bong pointed towards Long Term Memory, where several memory shelves were tipping over, dislodging the memories and breaking the tubes.

“How do I stop this?!” Fear frantically flailed his arms.

“No time for that! We need to get off this island now!” the yellow emotion urged.

Everyone sprinted towards the bridge connecting the island to Long Term Memory, but before they could proceed any further, one of the pillars on the island toppled over, crushing the bridge upon impact.

“The bridge!” Bing Bong shouted. “It’s gone!”

“This just keeps getting worse,” the radiant emotion gritted her teeth. “How else are we going to–”

She caught sight of a clear tube that had been forced open and extended from the island to HQ. A flare of hope lit up within herself as she scurried towards the tube. “A Recall Tube!”

“Huzzah! We’re saved!” the imaginary friend cheered.

Joy and Bing Bong bunched themselves together in the tube, but the purple emotion remained where he was.

“Fear, hurry up!” the bright emotion insisted. “We can’t stick around here!”

“I can’t do this,” the purple creature whimpered. “If I go in with you two, I’ll taint the core memories again.”

Joy went silent, knowing that the unnerved emotion had a point, but feeling immensely pressured from all the destruction going on around them. Her eyes were rapidly darting between Headquarters and Fear.

“Come on, Fear!” Bing Bong urged. “We said we wouldn’t leave you behind!”

Right afterwards, another pillar tipped over, sending a shockwave throughout the island and knocking the nervous emotion off his feet. It pained Joy to look Fear in his eyes, knowing what she was about to do.

“I'm sorry!” she apologized. “We need to save Riley!”

“But Joy, we can't just–!” Bing Bong objected.

Fear shook his head. “Just go! I only make things worse for Riley anyway.”

The optimistic creature felt something heavy press down on her heart as she closed the Recall Tube off. While rocketing up the tube, Joy and Bing Bong looked down at the unnerved emotion with guilt stretched across their faces. The former pushed herself to focus on their destination while Fear grimly watched them grow smaller and smaller from his sight.

In a split second, the purple emotion heard the glass crack, and the entire Recall Tube abruptly shattered. The yellow emotion and pink elephant cried out as they fell straight down. Fear scrambled to his feet and lunged forward, right to the edge of the island, and he had to dig his feet into the ground to ensure that he didn't fall over. His left hand shot out in a desperate attempt to grab onto Joy.

“JOY! BING BONG!” Fear screamed, as if that would somehow help him reach out further than what he was capable of.

It was futile. Joy and Bing Bong dropped past the panicking emotion and into the depths of the Memory Dump.

Despondent over his failure, Fear's knees gave out, and his face met the ground.

—

Riley arrived at the bus station and used the twenty dollar bill to pay for a ticket, receiving half the amount in change. As she stood in line, her phone started ringing in her pocket.

“Uh-oh, I think that’s our parents,” Sadness trembled.

“They’ve caught on to us already?!” Anger grumbled.

Disgust frantically looked between the blue and red emotions. “What do we do?”

“Ignore it,” the latter demanded. “We need those happy core memories.”

“No, we should answer them back,” the former disagreed. “They must be worried sick about us.”

The green emotion nodded at Sadness’s suggestion and took control of the console, getting Riley to bring out her phone.

The phone went completely silent, shocking all three of the emotions.

“Anger! Why did you make her hang up?” the well dressed emotion scolded.

“Hey, it wasn’t me this time!” the grumpy creature threw his hands up defensively.

The bespectacled emotion felt lightheaded as she looked up at the screen, and her eyes widened. “Look at her phone.”

Disgust and Anger froze upon seeing the symbol that popped up on Riley’s phone. It was a nearly empty battery with a tinge of red at the left with a charger at the bottom.

—

The glowing creature collided against a hill of faded memories, rolling uncontrollably down the slope until she came to a stop. Everything around her that wasn't illuminated by her presence was pitch black. Dragging herself upright, she looked up, spotting the edge high above her, and she immediately dashed up the slope of memories.

Bing Bong, who had landed into the Memory Dump before her, felt as though he was losing a part of himself. Looking at his left arm told him everything he needed to know, as it now appeared transparent. He found Joy trying to run back up the slope, only for her to keep slipping due to how steep it was.

“Joy! Please stop!” the pink elephant called out to her.

“Bing Bong?” she answered back before preparing to sprint forward again. “We have to get out of here!”

“It's no use,” the imaginary friend faltered. “We’re stuck down here. Forgotten .”

“But…” Joy's denial quickly dissipated, the harsh truth of his words getting to her. She could hear the crackling sounds of memories crumbling away around her until nothing remained of them. With her nerves on edge, she trudged around the pit until she found a memory displaying Riley doodling a shape that resembled a rabbit.

“Do you remember how she used to stick her tongue out while drawing?” the yellow emotion asked, to no one in particular.

“I could listen to her stories all day,” her voice grew more shaky as she held up another memory, this one showcasing the child playing with her dolls.

The bright creature hugged the memories tightly against herself, the footage becoming more and more blurry to her. One of those memories was a mixture of blue and purple, replaying the time when Riley freaked out on her first day at her new school. “I just wanted Riley to be happy, but now…”

Joy couldn't take it anymore. She dropped all of the memories at once, tears falling from her eyes. She cried, knowing that they had failed to make it back to HQ and were stuck here, possibly for good. She wailed, terrified at the prospect of being erased into dust, just like the forgotten memories around her. She sobbed, distraught over Riley’s joyless state of mind without her presence and the core memories around.

All that was left for them was a world of nothing.

—

Fear lifted his face off the ground, starting to feel his neck ache. The pain normally would've made the purple emotion flinch, but it barely registered with him as he trudged his way to the edge of Honesty Island, with only a small wedge remaining yellow amidst all of the purple.

He was trapped here, with no simple way to get off. But did it even matter anymore? If he hadn’t been such a coward and just went in the tube before it broke apart…

Then again, all he ever did was hurt Riley to begin with.

Before he could think of what he was going to do next, he heard the all too familiar sound of rumbling from around him, and he spotted Family Island breaking down, only this time, it was piece by piece rather than instantaneously.

A sense of lightheadedness began to creep up on the nervous emotion, and he fell on his back, waiting to pass out. At least he wouldn’t have to feel anything this way.

—

“You gotta be kidding me! How could we forget to charge our phone last night?!” Anger bellowed, slamming his palm against his forehead.

“I don’t know!” Disgust shouted, ashamed of herself. “Of all the times for us to forget, this is the worst time! Now what are we gonna do?”

Sadness wobbled over to the Idea Bulb, trying to twist it out. “We need to stop before it’s too late!”

However, the Idea Bulb refused to budge despite the melancholic emotion’s efforts. “I can’t get it out!”

“Lemme at it then!” the fiery emotion declared, clenching the bulb in his fist and pulling on it with all his might. Even then, the light bulb still wouldn’t unscrew itself.

“Don’t tell me…it’s stuck?!” the green emotion exclaimed.

A black wave poured out from the holder, and it began to spread itself over the buttons on the console, forcibly shutting them down.

“Oh no, it’s happening again!” Sadness wailed, swaying on her feet.

“Make her feel sad!” Disgust urged. “It worked the last time this happened.”

The blue creature stumbled forward, losing her balance and collapsing on her face.

“Sadness! Now is not the time for this!” the furious emotion reprimanded, trying to shake her awake. She was unmoving, having fallen unconscious.

A look of utter horror dawned on the fashionable emotion’s face. “She’s not waking up.”

Anger stopped shaking the blue emotion, a similar look of terror materializing on his face as well.

—

Once Joy had composed herself, she wiped her tears off of the Prairie Dogs playoff memory with her hand. The memory rewinded itself, and it shifted into a purple hue while displaying Riley double checking all of her protective gear. Her helmet, her gloves, her joint pads, and her mouthguard were all in place. Right before stepping onto the ice, she paused, shifting her eyes from side to side. When she was done surveying her surroundings, she skated onward, ready for the big playoff game as a member of the Prairie Dogs.

There was still a stray tear on the memory, so the radiant emotion brushed it off, causing the memory to turn yellow and fast forward to the last ten seconds of the playoff game. Riley was skating around, keeping a watchful eye on her teammate with the puck. With seven seconds remaining, her teammate took a hard swing and passed the puck over to her, and she picked up speed to reach it.

She felt her skates losing their grip on the ice, throwing off her momentum. The memory turned purple as she gasped at the immediate danger of slipping and falling. She bent her knees and straightened her back, trying to rebalance herself.

The blonde kid saw the puck approaching her much more rapidly than she had anticipated, and that was the moment she missed the puck. By the time she was about to reach out with her stick, the puck sailed right past her, with no way for her to catch up with it. The buzzer went off, signifying the end of playoffs.

A blue color overtook the memory as Riley sat on a tree branch by herself, upset over costing her team the game. Soon, her parents arrived, and they expressed relief that Riley didn’t slip and fall on the ice. Her teammate approached them as well, admitting that she was feeling pressured by the countdown and shouldn’t have used as much force when passing the puck.

After they encouraged her not to give up on hockey, Riley rejoined the rest of her team to celebrate their big playoff game, in spite of their loss.

“Riley protected herself from getting injured because of Fear,” Joy gasped. “All this time, he was just trying to keep her safe.”

She lifted her head up, eyeing Bing Bong with newfound determination. “We need to get back up there.”

“You still don't get it, Joy?” the imaginary friend grimaced. “There's no escaping this place. We're practically stuck on another planet.”

“Another planet?” Joy repeated, her eyes widening as she remembered there was something  else that just might be their way out of the dump. 

“Bing Bong, you're a genius!” the happy emotion praised, while the pink elephant gave her a dumbfounded look in response.

“Who's your friend who likes to play?” she called out into the darkness.

The fluffy elephant stared at the bright emotion, not quite getting what she was trying to do.

“Who’s your friend who likes to play?” she repeated her verse.

“His rocket makes you yell ‘Hooray!’” the imaginary friend finished, catching on to her plan.

Their ears picked up on the tune of the song playing faintly in the distance, and they ran forward, their voices fueled by hope. Once they found Bing Bong's rocket wagon, they dug through the memories covering it up and carried the small vehicle to a hill that sloped down into a book sticking out.

The yellow emotion cleared her throat and the pink elephant took a breath. Together, they jumped into the wagon, letting their momentum push the wagon down the slope. They sang their hearts out, trying to power up the rocket to get it to carry them out of the pitch black pit.

Their first attempt only worked for a few seconds before the rocket stopped in its tracks. Joy and Bing Bong fell out and tumbled back down along with the wagon.

Without wasting a moment, the two companions dragged the wagon back up the hill and rode it down again. They pushed their vocal chords until they hurt, managing to lift off higher this time. Unfortunately, it still wasn’t quite high enough, resulting in another crash landing. The imaginary friend glanced at his faded hand before turning to face the glowing emotion.

“Come on, Joy. I got a good feeling about this one. Third time's the charm, right?” he encouraged.

They rocketed down the hill and up the book once more, never letting up with their singing. Midway, the rocket began to peter out despite their best efforts, and Joy felt her chest tighten up.

“Louder, Joy! SING LOUDER!” the pink elephant exclaimed.

“WHO'S YOUR FRIEND WHO LIKES TO PLAY? BING BONG BING BONG! HIS ROCKET MAKES YOU YELL HOORAY!” she belted out at the top of her lungs, feeling the wagon rise higher and higher with every word that left her mouth. Despite her breath starting to run short, the joyous emotion saw the edge grow nearer by the moment, so she pushed her voice to its absolute limit, never looking back.

The rocket wagon managed to propel high enough, collapsing on the edge and breaking apart once it landed. Joy took in a huge breath as she registered the fact that she had made it to solid ground.

“Whoo-hoo! We did it, Bing Bong!” the glowing emotion celebrated, spinning around, only to find that the imaginary friend wasn't beside her.

“Bing Bong?” she called out, suddenly feeling a sense of dread as she looked over the edge of the dump.

“YEE-HAW! You made it!” Bing Bong laughed heartily, dancing around in the Memory Dump. “GO! Go and save Riley!”

“But what about–” the yellow emotion tried to get out, faltering when she noticed that the pink elephant was beginning to fade away from existence.

“I'll be fine,” he reassured her, accepting his fate without regrets as his body proceeded to vanish. “Take her to the moon for me…okay?”

With his last request delivered, the imaginary friend reached out with his left hand. His head and hands were the last parts to cease to exist.

Joy swallowed, fighting back tears at his sacrifice. “I'll try. Bing Bong, I– we promise.”

Composing herself, she turned away from the edge and ran off. More than ever, she absolutely could not afford to lose her other companion if she wanted to save Riley.

Chapter Text

“Riley? Riley, please answer me!” Jill Andersen spoke frantically, having tried to call her daughter's phone several times. Her calls continuing to go unanswered spiked her fear immensely. She had just received a call from her daughter’s school informing her that Riley didn’t show up for her class today. One thing Jill knew about her daughter was that she consistently achieved As and Bs in all of her classes, so it was completely unlike her to skip school, even if she didn’t always enjoy having to go there. What could have prompted her to do this?

It took her many slow breaths for her to calm down, but once she had reasonably composed herself, she dialed her husband's number.

–

Riley lumbered her way to a seat in the bus, her face devoid of emotion. The vehicle was almost completely empty of passengers, and the ones who were there were fanning themselves with their hands. She slouched over, staring blankly out of the window as the bus drove off.

Inside her head, the heat that had been gradually building up in HQ had risen to scorching levels. Without the blue emotion, Disgust and Anger had no easy way to stop the console from getting shut down.

Then it hit her. There was another highly important thing that they had forgotten about aside from having their phone charged.

“Water!” the green emotion exclaimed. “We didn’t bring any water with us! No wonder Sadness passed out.”

“If this keeps up, we’re all gonna dehydrate!” the red creature spoke gravely.

The well dressed emotion leapt towards the console, desperate to make Riley feel something, anything to save her from the encroaching heat. Anger joined in, slamming his fists against the buttons with all his might. A sense of lightheadedness began to creep up on Disgust, but with everyone's lives at stake, she fought against it as hard as she could. There was absolutely no way they could afford to pass out now.

–

Joy made a beeline towards Honesty Island, remembering that Fear was still stranded there. Along the way, the air felt hotter and more humid than before, causing her to sweat. It was discomforting and made her feel very worried about Riley's state, but she pressed on until she arrived at the almost completely purple island.

“Fear! There you are!” she called out upon seeing the nervous wreck lying face down on the island.

He refused to budge, thinking that his mind was playing tricks on him.

“Fear? Can you hear me? It's me, Joy!” the glowing emotion shouted across the gap.

There was still no response from the purple emotion, which unsettled Joy.

“He's not responding to me,” she spoke to herself. “I'll have to get on that island myself, but how?”

The sparkling emotion thought of what she could use to cross the gap left behind by the collapsed bridge before a loud crash disrupted her contemplation. She whipped her head around to see Jangles continuing his mass destruction of Imagination Land. Then her eyes landed on the generator used for the Imaginary Boyfriend.

“That's it!”

–

“Jill? I'm kind of busy with work at the–”

“Riley didn't show up at school today.”

“What?”

“We saw her leave our house this morning. Where could she possibly be?”

An excruciatingly long pause soon followed.

“Bill? Are you still there?”

“I called off work early. We have to find her, no matter what. I’ll be back home as soon as possible.”

Jill hung up the phone, trying desperately to recall what her daughter was wearing right before she left their home.

–

The first place Joy had to get through in Imagination Land was French Fry Forest. A quake rumbled across the ground, startling her, and several packets containing the salty food fell down, blocking her way forward. Thinking fast, she nabbed one of the fries and vaulted herself over the packets. The optimistic emotion took a few moments to lick her fingers before pushing herself up and dashing onward.

Next up was Cloud Town, though it was practically unrecognizable from her prior visit. All of the buildings had evaporated, with not a single fluffy resident in sight. Sweat dripped from her forehead as she forced herself to not think too much about the state of her surroundings.

Before she knew it, she had arrived at the generator. Along the way, she noted that there weren’t any Mind Workers around, and judging by how frequent the quakes were getting, she knew exactly why this was the case. She set her bag below the conveyor belt and hammered the “9” button on the keypad, creating many duplicates of the Imaginary Boyfriend.

“I would die for Riley!” their voices echoed over and over as they fell into her bag. The process was taking longer than Joy would've liked, as she spotted the gargantuan clown lumbering his way towards her direction. The positive emotion felt an acute sense of dread from how close the huge clown was, so she scooped her bag up and sped off, abandoning the rest of the copies. Just moments later, Jangles's hammer came down on the generator, sending chunks of shrapnel flying in every direction.

Joy winced as she picked up the pace, knowing that she was gonna have to make do with what she got.

–

The bus arrived at the gates surrounding Dizzy Land, though it was hard for Riley to tell from how blurry the letters on the sign looked. She struggled to rise to her feet, feeling a dull ache in her head. The blonde kid had to force her eyes open while trudging through the aisle with uneven steps. The sound of the fan seemed distant to her as she headed towards the bus door.

She stepped out of the bus, vaguely hearing its engine fade away in the distance. As she tried to walk towards Dizzy Land, she suddenly lost her balance, tumbling forward and falling flat on her face on the pavement below.

–

Suddenly, the sky above Joy abruptly darkened.

“What?” she gasped. “Did Riley just fall asleep in the middle of the day?”

The sparkling emotion was hoping that she was right, but given how it was still hot and humid, she had a feeling that something far worse had happened. Nevertheless, she pressed on.

Once she caught up to Honesty Island and reached the edge, she flipped her bag upside down, and out came a stack of Imaginary Boyfriends. All of them were still proclaiming that they would die for Riley, even as they swayed back and forth from the intense heat. Without hesitation, she gave the Boyfriend holding up the tower a push.

“For Riley!!!” they all proclaimed as they fell forward, the frontmost Boyfriend latching onto the edge of Honesty Island. 

Having created a bridge of Imaginary Boyfriends to cross the gap, the bright emotion scurried across their backs without looking back. Halfway there, however, she found herself on the verge of losing her balance as the bridge wobbled back and forth. Taking a deep breath, she spread her arms across to steady herself. Just as she stepped onto the almost entirely purple island, a tremor broke apart the Imaginary Boyfriend bridge, scattering the copies into the Memory Dump.

She didn’t pay them any mind, as up ahead was the purple emotion, still lying face down on the ground.

“Fear? It’s me, Joy!” the nervous emotion heard a familiar voice call out to him. He didn’t budge, still thinking that he was hearing things.

Joy got up close and tried to shake him awake. “Come on, Fear! Please get up! We gotta get back to Headquarters now!”

He rolled over and opened his eyes to see Joy above him. 

“Am I seeing things? Is this some kind of mirage?” the paranoid creature mumbled out of confusion.

“No, it really is me!” the bright emotion clarified.

Fear’s jaw dropped, bewildered at the appearance of her. “Joy?! How did you make it out there?!”

“...I’ll explain that later,” the optimist hesitated, trying to figure out what she was going to say next.

“Fear, I just want to say, I’m so sorry for everything. I kept pushing you away from the console because I thought you were hurting Riley, but I couldn’t have been more wrong about that. Now I realize that you’re the one who’s been trying to protect Riley from harm all this time. Without you, the entire team would fall apart. I should never have tried to eject the core memory you and Sadness made, and we got in this mess all because of me,” the words tumbled out of her mouth one after another.

“Really? But–” Fear was about to doubt himself when Joy pulled out the playoff memory from her bag and held it up for him to see.

“Take a look at this memory,” Joy explained, dragging her hand across to replay the scene in its entirety.

“So, everyone came to support Riley because of me? Even though I’m the reason why she missed the last shot to begin with?” Fear asked after watching it.

“Yes,” she confirmed. “You kept Riley from getting injured, so she was able to celebrate with her teammates even though they lost. You're the only one who can keep her safe in times like this.”

He nodded in agreement before staring up at Headquarters in the distance. “The real problem is, how on earth do we get back?”

Joy let out a frustrated sigh. “I was planning to stack the Imaginary Boyfriends high to bounce on the trampoline on Family Island, but I wasn't able to get enough copies for that.”

The yellow emotion eyed her surroundings, trying to think of an alternative way back. On this island was a large balance scale, which had one side at its peak while the other end was low enough to touch the ground. Nearby the scale was a large gavel, which seemed to be teetering ever so slightly on its handle. 

Unexpectedly, the dark sky lit up, and several bright, orange air currents began flowing towards Headquarters. Then she spotted something that left her truly baffled.

A Mind Worker was being carried by one of the air currents.

A light bulb lit up in her head.

“Wait, do you see that gavel and scale over there?” Joy pointed out.

“I do, but how are they gonna help us get back?” Fear questioned.

“I was thinking that we could tip the gavel over and jump on the lower end of the scale. This would let the gavel catapult us high enough to reach those wavy things and ride them to Headquarters,” she explained.

Fear’s eyes practically popped open at her plan. “That sounds crazy. Absolutely crazy.”

“It is,” the shining emotion acknowledged. “But Riley managed to wake up, and we might not get another chance to return to Headquarters if we wait for too long. Are you in?”

The nervous creature gave another nod. “I’m in.”

–

To say that things just went from terrible to harrowing for Disgust and Anger was an understatement and then some. They had just witnessed Riley fainting soon after she exited the bus, causing static to fill the overhead screen and the sky to darken while the lights flickered continuously.

“Is there really nothing we can do?” the green emotion asked, her voice wavering as she already knew the answer to her own question.

“What have we done?” the red creature followed up, staring blankly with the most terrified expression she had ever seen him with.

The static began to clear up as the sky turned bright again, though what they saw next somehow managed to drive even more terror in them.

The blonde girl drifted back into consciousness and limped away from the bus, seemingly unaware of the gravel on her face and the pain in her head. The screen proceeded to defocus as Riley kept on walking aimlessly, not even aware of her dehydrated state.

Disgust and Anger were well aware, though. It was impossible for them not to notice how shriveled up their bodies had become by this point.

–

“Are you really sure this will work?” Fear inquired as he and Joy stood behind the gavel.

“We just need to stay positive that it will,” the optimistic emotion responded, a slight hint of hesitation in her tone. “Because I’m positive…that this is CRAZY!”

They gave the gavel one hard push and immediately booked it towards the lower end of the balancing scale without looking back. For just a moment, Fear wondered if they had used enough force on the gavel.

A loud boom went off, and both emotions were sent rocketing straight up. While Joy was focused on the bright orange currents that were getting closer by the moment, Fear was watching the island underneath get smaller and smaller.

“WHOOOA!” he yelled, overwhelmed by how high he was off the ground.

Despite how unnerved he was, he willed himself to look up, and he saw one of the air currents close by. He reached out and actually felt himself grabbing onto a fully tangible wave of air. It was incredibly hot to the touch, but he grit his teeth, refusing to let go.

“Hang on!” Joy called out as she clenched her knuckles around the air current and gave Fear the most reassuring smile she could.

–

The green emotion was on the verge of giving up hope that they would make it out alive. Any thoughts of body odor from the heat were drowned out by the excruciating pain from her migraine. The resigned look on Anger’s face told her that even he was struggling to stay conscious in the heat that had completely overtaken HQ.

Then, as if some divine intervention had just transpired, she heard a thump against the window, and she turned to see a purple creature flattened against the glass and a yellow creature sliding down the pane.

“JOY!” Disgust gasped, utterly surprised to see their leader back.

Joy clung onto the strap of her bag to stop herself from falling while Fear latched onto the other strap with all his might, praying that he was strong enough to hold her up.

“I’ll save you!” Anger grabbed onto a chair and chucked with all his might, only for it to bounce off the glass.

“Some savior you are,” the fashionable emotion quipped, her sarcasm returning to her.

“Well what would you do to save the day, genius?” the grumpy emotion fired back with his head sparking.

“Hmm…” Disgust tapped her foot with a rather smug grin. “I dunno if I should. Your vegetable brain’s so tiny, you couldn’t possibly understand my plan.”

“WHAT?! That’s a load of bull–” Anger yelled.

“Now, now, you big stupid,” the proud emotion interrupted. “I’m sure you’re still in denial at how moronic you are, so I’ll just have to dumb it down to your level.”

She stuck her tongue out at him and blew a raspberry. “Pfffthwp!”

A fierce yell broke out from the livid creature as his head fully ignited. Disgust donned a welder’s mask and picked Anger up, aiming his head towards the window. The glass shattered, leaving a hole large enough for the others to fit through. She dropped the outraged emotion to pull Joy through the hole before following suit for Fear.

“Joy! Get to the console now!” Disgust exclaimed. 

“We screwed up and now Riley’s life is on the line!” Anger confessed.

However, the yellow creature shook her head. “Fear, it’s up to you now.”

“Huh?” Fear stared at her, wide-eyed.

“Fear?!” the green and red emotions cried out simultaneously.

“But how?” the purple emotion questioned.

“You know what to do,” Joy reiterated with a smile. “Riley needs you.”

A jolt of realization struck him upon hearing those words, and he ran up to the almost completely blackened console without hesitation. The other three emotions watched, trying to anticipate what would happen next now that Fear was in control.

With a trembling hand, he reached towards the Idea Bulb and gave it a twist.

Chapter Text

Everything seemed foggy to the 11 year old girl as she continued to stumble around haphazardly.

Then, all at once, she realized just how parched she was. She had forgotten to bring water for this hot day. It made her feel terrified to the point where she wanted to scream, but all that came out was a hoarse groan. Where could she find water?

She spotted a drinking fountain on the sidewalk across the street. Just what she needed.

–

Fear set the Idea Bulb aside and mashed several buttons on the console at once, prompting Riley to stop in her tracks apprehensively and look both ways. A car drove by just seconds afterwards, and when the purple emotion was absolutely sure that it was safe to cross, he let go of the console.

The girl ran across the street to the fountain and pushed the button beneath it. The moment a stream of water erupted from the spout, she pursed her lips and slurped down the liquid. The oppressive atmosphere inside Headquarters gradually receded as the emotions felt their heads clear up.

Fear turned his head around and saw Disgust and Anger had reverted back into their non-shriveled up states. A familiar voice yawned, and he spotted the blue emotion pushing herself up.

“Uh, what's happening?” Sadness questioned. “I was trying to get the Idea Bulb out and then everything went black.”

“Sadness! Oh, I'm so relieved to have you back!” Joy exclaimed.

“Me? It's all my fault, Joy,” the saddened emotion confessed. “I'm the one who gave Riley the idea to skip school today to go to Dizzy Land and look how that turned out.”

“No, Sadness,” Anger spoke up, guilt etched across his face. “I'm the one to blame for finding the idea and pushing you to use it. I didn't mean to endanger all of us, and for that…I'm sorry.”

“I can't believe I forgot about bringing water and charging our phone,” Disgust facepalmed herself. “That one’s on me.”

Joy took a deep breath, trying to process all of what had transpired while she and Fear were gone.

“Everyone! I just realized something,” the purple emotion addressed his fellow emotions. “We’ve been lying to ourselves about the move to California all this time.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Anger asked, confused.

“We’re scared of having to leave the past behind,” Fear explained. “But lying to ourselves isn’t gonna keep us safe from the truth forever. The only way we can move forward and truly be happy is if we accept that fact.”

“Is that true, Joy?” Disgust asked.

The bright emotion simply nodded in agreement with him.

“So what do we do, then?” Sadness wondered.

Joy stepped up to the console with a determined look in her eyes.

“Let's get back to our parents. They deserve to know the truth.”

–

“What should we do?” Jill asked her husband while clutching her chest. “Do we file a missing child report?”

“That might be our only option at this point,” Bill answered with bated breath.

Just as they were about to leave their home, they heard the doorbell go off.

“Is that–” Jill gasped.

“Let's see who it is,” Bill turned the doorknob, desperately hoping that it was at least someone who had a lead on where their daughter was.

Waiting in front of the door was none other than Riley Andersen herself.

“Riley!!” both parents shouted simultaneously as their child hesitantly took several steps forward into the house.

“Thank goodness you’re back! I tried calling your phone, but you weren’t answering, and we were about to–” Mom continued before having to pause to take a breath.

“We were so worried about you! Where have you been all this time?” Dad asked worriedly.

Inside Headquarters, Joy scooped up the golden core memories from her bag and held them out for Fear. The purple emotion went wide eyed at her offer before reaching out and taking the memories in his arms, causing a purple wave to sweep over each of them. With a meaningful nod from the optimistic emotion, he walked over to the recall unit and replayed the fully lavender core memories one by one.

Riley’s pupils dilated and her breathing hastened as she looked up to her parents.

“I know I should be happy for you guys, but,” she trembled before continuing. “My old home, my teammates, even Meg…they’re all gone.”

Riley glanced away briefly, taking a few breaths in an attempt to compose herself. Fear looked back towards Sadness and beckoned her to the console alongside him. He stepped aside, letting the blue emotion take control, and tears began to form in Riley’s eyes.

“Mom…Dad…I’m scared. I can’t live the life I used to back in Minnesota. I tried to be happy here, but I just…” she poured her heart out, her nose running.

Mom relaxed her posture, her eyes filled with sympathy. Dad sensed the fear that his daughter was experiencing and he felt a strong urge to protect her.

“Please don’t be mad,” Riley begged, tears running down her face.

“Oh, sweetie,” Mom gave a melancholic smile.

“We’re not mad,” Dad reassured, feeling his own vision start to blur up.

“You know what? I miss Minnesota, too,” he admitted. “I miss going hiking in the woods together.”

“Playing in the backyard was so much fun,” Mom followed up.

“And helping you learn how to skate on Spring Lake,” Dad reminisced.

He brought his arms out, inviting his family in for a hug, and everyone embraced each other as Riley shut her eyes, continuing to let it all out. Joy approached Fear and Sadness with the lavender-blue core memory detailing Riley’s self-introduction on her first day at school. The purple emotion took the remaining core memory in his hands as the yellow emotion walked off. Before she could do so, Fear took her hand, leading her to the console. Realizing what Fear wanted to do, Sadness let go of the console to make room for the other two, and he brought his and Joy’s hands to one of the buttons.

Together, they pushed their hands down, creating a mixture of gold and lavender on the console.

“I’m sorry,” Riley apologized, working up the courage for what she was about to say next. “I lied about needing money for a gift so I could skip school to go to Dizzy Land today. I forgot to charge my phone, so that’s why I wasn’t able to answer your call, Mom.”

Mom and Dad shared a look between each other, processing their daughter’s words. Eventually, she gently stroked her daughter’s hair with her hand.

“It’s okay, sweetie. We’re just glad you’re safe,” Mom whispered.

“Thank you for being honest with us,” Dad nodded. “And once things settle down, let’s all visit Dizzy Land together.”

A ding alerted the emotions to a new core memory rolling in. With a golden hue on one side and lavender coloring the other half, it set itself in the core memory holder, and a brand new Honesty Island materialized, bigger and brighter than before.

All the emotions stared outside, surprised at the outcome. Then Joy and Fear shared a smile, not letting go of each other’s hand.

–

One by one, the personality islands that had previously fallen were revived over the weekend by the emotions.

Shortly after the revival of Honesty Island, Joy and Sadness worked together to bring back Family Island, which grew even bigger than Honesty Island did.

Hockey Island returned via the teamwork of Joy and Anger, remaining around the same size as before.

Goofball Island made a comeback under the optimistic emotion’s influence, albeit smaller than the rest of the islands.

Last but not least was Friendship Island, one that came about after Riley returned to school on the following Monday.

That day got off to a rough start, as upon walking in the classroom, she could feel the entire classroom staring right at her, causing her to flinch. Then she heard several students whispering among themselves:

“Hey, she’s back. Wonder why she didn't show up last Friday.”

“Did she get in trouble?”

“No, she doesn’t look like someone who would be like that.”

“Still, I wonder what happened.”

“Welcome back, Riley Andersen,” the teacher addressed. “Last Friday’s assignment was to read chapter 9 over the weekend and answer the questions at the end. I’ll extend the deadline by tomorrow for you, but please make sure that your parents call in advance if you’re going to be absent from class next time.”

“Yes, I understand,” Riley replied, a mixture of fear and disgust rising up within her as she took her seat.

Inside HQ, Joy watched the purple and green emotions handle the console, knowing that she was gonna have to sit out for now. It wasn’t exactly the time to be joyful in having to deal with the aftermath of skipping school.

Once it was time for lunch, Riley walked out and saw the familiar scene of the other students hanging out with each other, which in turn stirred up an awkward feeling within her. That is, until she saw a black girl with glasses waving her over to the bench she was sitting at.

“Hey Riley! Want to sit with me?” the black girl asked.

Sadness gasped. “That’s the girl who saved us from those bees!”

“Bees?” Fear asked.

“Long story short: Riley got too close to a beehive and swatted at a bee,” Disgust informed.

The purple emotion shuddered, as he could only imagine how painful and scary that must have been.

“Wasn’t that sweet of her?” Joy offered her thoughts, tapping several buttons on the console.

Riley’s face brightened up at the black girl’s invitation. “Yeah, sure!”

“Hold up, we don’t even know her name yet,” the green emotion interjected, tugging on one of the levers.

“Uh, what’s your name again?” Riley asked as she took her seat beside the other girl.

“I’m Bree. Bree Young.”

The two girls brought out their lunches and started to eat.

“How have you been?” Bree asked.

Riley continued to chew her food before swallowing it down and letting out a sigh. “I’m not entirely sure. It’s been rough these past few days, but things have been getting better.”

Bree nodded before asking “Can I tell you something?”

“Sure.”

“Just a few weeks ago, I was the new kid here, actually.”

“You were?”

“Had to move here from Nevada,” Bree explained. “It sucked having to leave my old hockey team behind, but there wasn’t much I could do about that.”

“Wow…that’s almost like what I went through,” Riley realized. “Only I had to move from Minnesota.”

After taking another bite out of her lunch, Riley opted to change the subject. “Do you like playing hockey?”

“Yeah! I always get pumped up every time I head out onto the ice,” Bree grinned. “I take it you’re a hockey player as well?”

The blond girl averted her gaze. “I quit recently.”

Bree looked at the other girl with concern. “How come?”

“I slipped and fell on the ice,” Riley answered. “And I fouled someone else, too.”

“Hey, everyone makes mistakes from time to time,” Bree reassured. “I once had the perfect opportunity to break the tie by scoring and I didn’t skate fast enough to reach the puck.”

Riley took the moment to savor another bite from her lunch, surprised at how easily she could relate to the other girl. She was about to say something when the teacher called out that lunch break was over.

“I’d like to keep in touch with you,” Bree smiled. “Let’s exchange numbers.”

Riley gave her an excited smile in return as they exchanged numbers.

Inside her mind, a golden-lime colored memory sphere rolled into place, constructing an island full of friendship.

–

The next few days were busy for Riley and her emotions, as their teacher had announced a science project that they needed to work on and present to the rest of the class.

“Ohhh, I don't like that we’re the first ones up,” Fear stressed. “That gave us less time to prepare the experiment and rehearse our speech!”

“That's what happens when our last name starts with an A,” Disgust grumbled.

“I feel bad for Bree,” Sadness remarked. “She’s going to be the last one presenting, so she’ll have to wait for everyone else.”

“Well, we absolutely cannot screw up in front of the whole class,” Fear reiterated. “Otherwise…”

“What are you guys complaining about?” Anger rebuffed. “Let’s get this over with! No need to wait for everyone else to ramble on before our turn!”

“Riley’s gotten better at public speaking, so this shouldn’t be too hard!” Joy affirmed.

All the emotions watched expectantly as Riley brought out a lemon, a piece of paper, a paintbrush, and a small dish from her backpack. Feeling well prepared, she introduced her invisible ink experiment to the class, then demonstrated by squeezing lemon juice into the dish, dabbing the paintbrush in the juice, and drawing the paintbrush across the paper in a circular motion with a few dabs here and there.

With those steps completed, she showed the seemingly blank sheet of paper to the class, then slid the paper underneath the desk lamp. The paper now displayed a yellow smiley face.

“Aww…that’s cute,” Joy smiled warmly, resting her arm on the console and leaning her head on it.

The class applauded Riley for her project, and she returned to her seat with a deep breath.

“Phew!” Fear wiped his forehead. “It’s finally over!”

“Now to sit back and wait for the others,” Anger sighed.

Sure enough, the next presentations went by uneventfully. That is, until a familiar looking girl got up with a jar of coins and introduced herself as Grace Hsieh. 

“Wait a moment…isn’t that the girl we fouled at tryouts?” Sadness pointed out.

“Well, this is awkward,” Disgust crossed her arms. “Didn’t think she’d be in the same class as us.”

She spoke about how the change in a couch could change the world, only for her to lose her grip on the jar, causing a bunch of coins to spill out onto the floor.

“Oh no! We should do something!” Joy gasped.

“No way!” Disgust argued. “Not after what we did to her at tryouts. Let’s lay low and move on from that social Titanic.”

A bunch of students laughed at Grace’s mishap, which set Anger off.

“What the heck is wrong with you guys?!” the fired up emotion scolded. “You’re just going to laugh at that poor girl?”

He stormed up to the console and mashed several buttons at once with his fist.

“Hey!” Riley stood up from her seat to address the class. “Stop laughing at her!”

Those same students stared at the blond girl, some surprised, some annoyed, while the teacher called for everyone to settle down.

“Scratch that, this is officially even more awkward now,” the green emotion reported.

“What should we do?” Fear asked, darting his eyes between the console and the overhead screen.

“Look at all those coins,” Sadness spoke up with a hitch in her breath. “She shouldn’t have to clean those up alone.”

“I totally agree, Sadness,” Joy smiled, about to tug on a lever on the console.

Right as she was about to touch it, the core memory holder retracted, startling all of the emotions. In its place was a bunch of light blue strings smoothly intertwining with each other, forming a completely new object in Headquarters.

Riley left her seat and approached Grace, kneeling to pick up several coins on the ground. The latter looked surprised to see the blond girl willingly helping her out, while Bree got up and assisted in cleaning up the mess as well.

Once all the coins were secured, Riley and Bree went back to their seats to let Grace wrap up her presentation. Afterwards, class was dismissed, and right as Riley and Bree were about to leave, Grace took the moment to approach them.

“Hey…Riley and Bree, right?” Grace asked just to be sure.

“Yeah, that’s me,” Riley nodded. Bree followed suit as well.

“Why did you two help me back there?” the Asian girl asked with a nervous look on her face.

“I…” Riley wasn’t exactly sure how to respond to that at first.

“It’s the right thing to do,” Bree answered. “And you looked like you needed some help.”

“Yeah, what she said,” Riley added on somewhat hastily.

“Oh, thanks,” Grace replied before turning to face Riley. “It’s just…I think I know you from somewhere.”

“Me?” Riley asked. Then the realization hit her, and she bowed her head apologetically. “I’m so sorry! I didn’t mean to foul you at tryouts!”

Grace looked surprised at the blond girl’s reaction. “No, you don’t have to apologize! I know it was just an accident, and I wasn’t hurt too badly by it.”

Riley let out a breath she had been holding up until that point. “So…are we good?”

“Yeah, we’re good,” Grace nodded.

“What do you all say we get some ice cream together?” Bree suggested.

Grace perked up at the mention of her favorite dessert. “I’m so gonna get the rainbow sherbet!”

“I haven’t had ice cream in a while, but sure!” Riley agreed with excitement. “Gotta think of which flavor I want…”

“I know what I’m ordering,” Bree grinned. “A nice scoop of mint chocolate for me.”

As the newfound trio of friends headed off, the light blue strings in Riley’s head echoed a sentence in her mind.

“I’m a good person.”

–

Something had been nagging at Riley’s mind ever since she got a brain freeze while eating her strawberry ice cream with Bree and Grace.

Meg. Her old friend from Minnesota. She had coldly shut Meg out over something petty, and now she felt horrible for that. With this thought in mind, she booted up her laptop and got to writing up an email.

“ Hey Meg, it’s me, Riley, and I’m sorry for getting mad at you when you mentioned your new teammate. I’m also sorry it took me this long to respond. If you feel the same way, I’d still like to keep in touch with you. ”

Riley hit the “Send” button and closed her laptop before drifting off to sleep.

Inside HQ, Joy had been watching silently with a smile that didn't quite reach her eyes.

“Is something wrong, Joy?” Sadness asked, noting that something seemed off about Joy.

“If this is about Meg, then I get it,” Disgust acknowledged.

“Oh, it's not that,” Joy denied. “Don't mind me, I'm just lost in my thoughts right now.”

Fear had a hunch on what was troubling the normally positive emotion.

“It's about Bing Bong, isn't it?” He spoke up.

“I–Yes, it is,” Joy faltered. “When I saw Riley reach out to Meg, it warmed my heart. But then it reminded me that she won't ever remember who Bing Bong was to her.”

Fear sat down in a chair, letting out a sigh. “I wish I got to say goodbye to him. He really wanted to see Riley again, but I don't think she would remember seeing him in her dream.”

“Yeah, we were trying to make Riley happy by using Dream Productions to make her dream a happy one,” Joy explained to the others. “Sorry if it confused you, Sadness.”

Sadness tilted her head, confused. “Huh? I don't remember seeing a dream like that.”

“Oh, were you not on Dream Duty?” Joy questioned.

“Wait a minute,” Anger interjected. “That thing with that dog and the pouch and Bing Bong…it was you guys?”

Fear suddenly started shaking, his nerves on edge. “Uh…”

“And you were that pouch who got his jaw dislocated?” Anger pointed at Fear, trying to hold back a chuckle.

“Hey, stop smiling!” Fear exclaimed.

That was enough for the red emotion to double over in laughter, causing the purple emotion to drag his hands over his eyes. Disgust managed to keep herself composed, but couldn't hide the smirk on her face. Even Sadness looked notably happier than usual.

“It was the costume's fault! The zipper got stuck when Bing Bong was trying to pull the items out!” Fear insisted. “So stop laughing at me!”

After several more wheezes, Anger managed to calm down enough to speak. “I'm not laughing at you. I'm just laughing at the sheer absurdity of that moment. So good job on making the dream not boring, buddy.”

“Oh…” Fear trailed off. “I guess I can see that. Thanks, Anger.”

The purple emotion then realized something. “And is it just me, or did you actually call me ‘buddy’?”

Anger turned away. “Don't get used to it, Fear.”

“Aw, Anger…” Joy grinned.

“Not you too, Joy!” the irritated emotion threw his hands up in the air.

A snicker escaped Disgust's lips, and Sadness wore a small smile on her face as Joy started giggling.

And Fear smiled too, glad to be part of the whole team.

–

Over the course of the next year, Friendship Island continued to balloon in size to the point where it towered over Family Island. A new elevator opened up, leading to an area dubbed the Belief System deep underground that contained the origin of the strings that made up Riley’s Sense of Self. Several new islands also made their debut, notably Fashion Island, Social Media Island, and Boy Band Island.

(Disgust was instantly hooked upon first hearing one of Get Up and Glow’s songs, while Fear really hoped that last island would just be another phase for Riley).

Mind Workers had arrived at Headquarters to upgrade the console. Now it adorned many new buttons, one of which Fear decided to try out by pushing his finger against it. A beep sound went off, startling him into letting go almost immediately.

Anger rubbed his hands together excitedly as he approached the console. “I finally have access to all the curse words I could ask for! This console is the absolute s–”

Another beep sounded, cutting the fiery emotion off.

“Sorry, my bad,” the purple emotion apologized.

“Hey, what's with the ‘puberty’ thing?” Disgust inquired, pointing at the big red object labeled “PUBERTY”.

Joy shrugged. “Eh, it shouldn't matter too much for now. We gotta focus on the hockey game!”

All eyes were on the overhead screen displaying Riley about to head towards the ice rink alongside Bree and Grace. Her parents were also present, standing in the bleachers and cheering Riley and her team on enthusiastically.

Riley’s face scrunched up in embarrassment as she heard Grace giggling at her parents’ antics. With an exasperated sigh, she left them behind, only to bump into a boy with a cap and curly hair, causing him to drop the water bottle he was carrying.

“Oh, sorry!” Riley apologized, picking the water bottle up for him. “Here.”

The boy stared back at her, remaining speechless. Somewhere in his mind, his emotions were running amok as a “girl alarm” blared away.

“Hey, cat got your tongue?” Bree asked in an attempt to dispel the awkward silence.

Grace didn’t respond, unsure of what to say to the stranger.

“I’m Riley,” the blond girl introduced herself with a friendly smile. “What’s your name?”

“Jordan,” he managed to get out with a quiet voice.

“I like your hat,” Riley complimented. “It’s pretty stylish.”

Her words brought a blush to the nervous boy’s cheeks, with Bree and Grace giving her a knowing look. Knowing she didn’t have much time left before the hockey match and suddenly feeling a tad bit embarrassed, Riley stuck the water bottle in Jordan’s arm.

“Uh, I gotta go, bye!” she spoke hastily.

Once the three girls skated onto the rink, Grace had something to say to Riley with a grin on her face. 

“So that boy back there…do you think he’s cute?”

“I…uh…”

“We can talk about that later,” Bree got them back on track. “Let’s play some hockey!”

“1, 2, 3, Foghorns!”